Do you know what stinks? Radio really stinks.

Back when I had true choice over the music playing

I want to take my time today to talk about the state of pop music currently playing on the radio.

It's terrible and way too repetitive. I swear, they're playing the same songs from a year ago. I guess there's very little in the way of new pop music. On the rare occasion they do play a new song, it's from a band from last year and their new song sounds exactly like every other song they play. I know not a lot of people still listen to the radio since we have ipods, iphones, androids, windows phones, so on and so forth, but, some people still do listen to the radio in their cars.

My wife and son are two of these people. I can't really listen to a lot of the stuff on my devices because I'm a stay at home dad and I have my son with me 99 percent of the time. I listen to a lot of hip hop, so the curse words make it impossible for me to listen while he's in the car. He does like some of the rock music I listen to, but it's usually the same couple of songs over and over again. A lot like the radio. My wife only likes about half of my music, so when we are all in the car together, I'm not going to make the two of them listen to my music, it's not fair to them. This leaves us listening to the radio.

I've had it up to here with song selection and the DJ's that host their respective shows. Most of these DJ's are just terrible. The song selection is just as bad, if not worse. I'm sick and tired of hearing the same Taylor Swift songs over and over and over again. I don't like her as a musician AT ALL and as far as her personal life goes, she's a terrible girlfriend to her many different, famous musician boyfriends. I swear, she only dates these poor guys so she can get new writing material for her next album. She's a bad person and really annoying. If I have to listen to a "pop" star on the radio, I'd much rather hear Meghan Trainor. At least Meghan Trainor's music is fun and danceable. I'm sure she's a better person too. Taylor Swift is UNBEARABLE!

Which brings me to one of her ex boyfriends, whose songs have been playing on the radio for over a year now, and I'm done with them, they're awful. I'm of course talking about Ed Sheerhan. I swear, if I have to hear "Thinking Out Loud" or "Don't" one more time, I'm going to rip my stereo out of my car. Those songs are very, very bad and have been played WAY too much. I feel like George Ezra, the new "pop" star, song "Budapest" is heading towards Ed Sheerhan level. This makes me upset for him. George Ezra has a unique voice and he writes his own stuff, but "Budapest" is getting into the repetitive play on the radio, and I'm getting sick of this song already. The single came out about 3 to 4 months ago, but just recently it's getting over played. The other day, while in the car for less than an hour, I'm pretty sure I heard "Budapest" three times. THREE TIMES IN LESS THAN AN HOUR! THAT'S TOO MUCH!

Lastly, I'm so done with the band Maroon 5. Every single one of their songs sound exactly alike. I can't tell the difference between, "Sugar", "Animals", or any other song they may have on the radio right now. Adam Levine is no Freddie Mercury, no matter how much he might think he is. His band looks like a bunch of rejects from the Foo Fighters. The Foo Fighters also happen to be a much better band than Maroon 5. Dave Grohl is ten thousand times cooler than Adam Levine. He's a much, much better musician too. Oh, by the way, I'm not even a fan of the Foo Fighters. It upsets me that a band like the Black Keys, equally as famous as Maroon 5 or the Foo Fighters, has grammy awards, plays arenas, just like those two bands do, get little to no air play. Their songs are way better and different. Their songs actually make an album because, each song is unique in it's own way. Each song doesn't sound the same. Revelatory, right? But, if you're just a bit different, play your own instruments and write your own songs and have your own style, no radio play for you because you don't fall in line with the rest of the pack. You're unique and radio stations are afraid of that. Another band, TV on the Radio, falls into this unique territory. They write and play songs that are radio friendly, but do they get air play? Of course not, they're too different and that scares these dumb ass radio execs. That's a crying shame. I just hope in the future, for my son's case, radio changes it's way and starts to get some original people with original ideas working there.

Diversify and you will get new listeners. The very same listeners who are fed up with your playlist right now.

Ty

Ty is the Pop Culture editor for SeedSing. He is this close to paying for a streaming music service, but is afraid they will pull the same crap as traditional radio. Follow him on twitter @tykulik.

Cloves and Fedoras: Ty gives praise to Leon Bridges, the new voice of soul.

Cloves and Fedoras is Seed Sings reviews for little known pieces of pop culture (or older pieces).  Feel free to contact us with your own submissions of undiscovered gems that must be known. 

This is a follow up an earlier blog post about Leon Bridges.  You can find it here.

The sound of Sixties soul music is back today.

The sound comes in the form of a young man that was born thirty years after Stax Records and guys like Otis Redding and Rufus Thomas were making their strides in the soul music world. He's a twenty five year old music genius named Leon Bridges. His first album "Coming Home" was released today and it is so perfectly a throwback to the golden age of soul/R&B. This record is phenomenal. I didn't think I'd hear an album the rest of 2015 that I liked as much as Alabama Shakes "Sound and Color", but I've already listened to "Coming Home" two and a half times and I've got to say, it's now my album to beat for the year. Leon Bridges vocals are so damn smooth. I like to call this type of music "baby making music". He sounds like a much better version of Raphael Saadiq, and I love me some Raphael Saadiq. His guitar playing and his band are really tight. I seems like they've been perfecting this sound for sometime now, and they hit a grand slam. This may sound like it's from the Sixties because Leon Bridges asked to record on vintage equipment. He was taking a huge chance doing this because, in my opinion, you have to be one hundred percent committed to the equipment being used and you can't succumb to the technology today. That's got to be pretty difficult. But they did a wonderfully masterful job. It sounds like a recording from Stax in it's heyday. I've mentioned Leon Bridges on this site before, stating that I thought he would be the next great soul star, and today has not changed my mind at all. In fact, I feel even stronger about this prediction after listening to his record. He is going to be HUGE. There's ten songs on the album, with the longest being about four and a half minutes. This is great because that's how songs were back in the day. Singers back then only needed two to three minutes per track and they packed each song with as much soul as possible. Leon Bridges is no exception. He effortlessly flows from upbeat, drums and guitar heavy songs to slower songs with horns being his main background music. For example, for the more up beat songs, check out "Smooth Sailin" or "Twistin and Groovin". Both these songs are powered by Bridges vocals and his excellent guitar work. His drummer is superb with the groove of these songs too. With songs like "Shine" he lets the keyboardist take front stage and, accompanied by his vocals, they sing a sweet, slow soul song. My favorite song on the record is a slow song, which is very unlike me. But, "River" is a beautiful closer to this excellent album. It starts out with strumming from an acoustic guitar and soft vocals. It builds until the last minute of the song and it's just Leon Bridges and an all female chorus singing "take me to your river, I want to go". It's beautiful. I literally got goose bumps while listening. I hope his tour brings him to Saint Louis. I'd love to see him perform live. "Coming Home" by Leon Bridges is fantastic.

Go out and get this album as soon as possible.

Ty 

Ty is the Pop Culture editor for Seed Sing. He has made two babies, we do not know what kind of music was on. Follow him on twitter @tykulik.

Cloves and Fedoras: Is Leon Bridges poised to be the next great soul singer?

Cloves and Fedoras is Seed Sings reviews for little known pieces of pop culture.  Feel free to contact us with your own submissions of undiscovered gems that must be known.

I'm always on the hunt for new music that sounds like old music. By this I mean it sounds like a throwback to older music. For example, I started listening to the Black Keys because they sounded a little like Led Zeppelin to me. I started listening to Gary Clark Jr because he had that old blues feel to his music. Saint Paul and the Broken Bones sounded as if they'd just recorded with Rufus Thomas. Well, I think I may have heard the next Otis Redding, or dare I say Marvin Gaye. He's a 25 year old soul singer named Leon Bridges. His music sounds like he just got done recording at Stax Records in the 60s. This guy is legit. He writes and plays, on guitar, all of his own music and he uses vintage equipment to record. How cool is that. This guy is going to be a star. I know comparing him to an Otis Redding or Marvin Gaye is a bit much, but this guy has the chops. His album doesn't come out until June 23rd, but do yourself a favor and go check out his stuff on YouTube. That's where I found out about him. So, next month, go out and buy his album "Coming Home".

Remember the name Leon Bridges. He's the next big thing in soul music.

Ty

Ty is the Pop Culture Editor for Seed Sing.  He likes listening to the musical styling of his parents generation being sung by people of his generation.

Cloves and Fedoras: Alabama Shakes refuses to submit to a sophomore slump.

I just recently bought the new Alabama Shakes album "Sound and Color."

This is a work of art. People and critics talk about sophomore slumps when bands put out their second album after the first was a surprise success, but let me tell you, Alabama Shakes knocked it out of the park with "Sound and Color." You can really hear the growth and exploration of the band through all twelve songs. They are taking chances and stretching limits more than most rock bands making music right now. Their first single off the album "Don't Wanna Fight" is a great rock/pop song with Brittany Howard's beautifully gritty singing voice driving it home. Her guitar playing on the song, and throughout the whole album, is a distorted, crunchy pleasure to the listener. The opening track, "Sound and Color" is a very trippy, slowish tune with, what I believe to be a marimba, accompanying the whole song. It's a great tune. I love every song on the record. This is an album you can put on, press play and let the whole thing go with no skips. If they continue to grow and explore on forth coming albums like they do on "Sound and Color" the sky is the limit for them. Last year they were playing small rock clubs, now theaters. Keep this up and they'll be selling out arenas in two to three years.

Very, very good album. Check it out.

Ty

Ty is the Pop Culture Editor for Seed Sing.  He is eagerly anticipating the next great album from Alabama Shakes.

Cloves and Fedoras: Favorite artist Saul Williams does a not so favorite live show

I attend a lot of live shows. Most are good, some great and some not that good.(I don't like to say bad, because these people are performers and I'm sure they work very hard) Recently I unfortunately saw a not so good show.

Saul Williams was playing the Duck Room in Saint Louis last month. I was very excited when the show was announced and got my tickets immediately. I did this because I'm a huge fan of Saul Williams. I've seen him do his poetry live, I've read all his books, I own all his music and I've seen pretty much every movie he's been in.(The best being "Slam" in my opinion)

My problem with the recent concert was, it wasn't really a concert. In his own words, it was a "workshop". This had me off guard from the get go. I went there expecting to hear music, but all I got was a damn "workshop". He would move back and forth between doing half a song and then reading poetry and then just talking to the crowd. Another problem, this must have been the sound and video people's first live show. They did not know what in the hell they were doing. First, their video playing on the screen froze before Saul Williams even got on stage. And then, the sound mix was so bad, Saul Williams himself had to tell the guys to turn the bass down and turn his microphone up. He was impossible to hear at times. It was unbearable.

There was another thing that had me frustrated. The show started at 9pm with two openers and Saul Williams didn't even get on stage until 11:30pm.  Once on stage he only performed for about an hour. Two and a half hours of standing around and the payoff was a "workshop". Even after seeing this, I will still probably see him if he comes back to Saint Louis, but I will definitely think long and hard before purchasing tickets.

Still a big fan, but this "workshop" was a huge disappointment.

Ty

Ty is the Pop Culture Editor for Seed Sing.  Look for him around St. Louis at any number of live shows.  Do not expect him to attend anymore workshops.