The other day I awoke to an intense, sudden, and overwhelming awareness of the horror of the "morning zoo" style radio program. The circumstances under which this apprehension arose, as I lay in a guest room bed at ten minutes to seven, might make you think that it was inspired by some actual exposure to the thing.* But no, it was an unprompted revelation, beamed into my skull as a special gift from the goddess of banal pseudo insights.
Not that the fundamental notion that morning radio is horrible is incorrect or indeed news to anyone, but in my drowsy hypnagogic state I was convinced that it is truly the face of the abyss. The frenzied auditory capering, the pathetic sequence of zany set pieces and wacky songs about how unpleasant it is to get up in the morning, the jokey nicknames, the promotional photos displaying weary middle-aged radio personalities in labored 'funny' poses or costumes -- all too, too depressing to contemplate and surely the product of a species that has been beyond hope since at least 1981.
This, you will have noticed, is a profound and significant epiphany. I am almost deep enough to be fourteen again. (If I really were, though, I'd be far too busy practicing my newly crabbed handwriting by filling countless tiny green notebooks with an endless stream of cryptic phrases to tell you about it.)
They are really awful, though, aren't they? Or were. Actually I have no idea how widespread they are anymore. They used to be tremendously popular. There must still be something in that genre and time slot. I still see billboards advertising radio stations' Whatever Team and Loony Crew. How far-ranging was the zoo phenomenon, anyway? Are there radio presenters in New Zealand playing 'Fish Heads' at six in the morning and bumper music about how much the listener can be presumed to hate getting out of bed? Are there Spanish and Norwegian Zoo Crews? Ugandan?
It turns out that Glenn Beck, jackass 'political' 'commentator' extraordinaire, first made a name for himself on one of the earliest and most popular of those programs. And actually, once you know that, his whole spazzy, coked-out, goofy-voiced pile of tics suddenly snaps into focus as something with a provenance. Steve kindly suggests that thinking of Beck's career as one long run from the horrific maw of morning radio makes it slightly more sympathetic, but I'm afraid that's a vastly more generous interpretation than the facts can bear. Still, even the hint of sympathy for Glenn Beck suggests that my fourteen-year-old self is absolutely right about the abyssal qualities of the Zoo Crew.
* In fact, I awoke to the infinitely superior sound of 'Single Ladies.' Suck it, Nietzsche! No abyss for me.
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