This New England

-- Barnet Fain Old Growth (2008) Solar Plate/Monotype

Part of the "Printable Views'' show at the Providence Art Club, March 29-April 17

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I get a kick out of the PBS and NPR station fund drives in which they say they are ''commercial-free'' but in fact run incessant commercials -- for themselves! They can make WBZ sound like the Brookings Institution.

The PBS stations are far the worse.They run interminable performances of really bad music, usually by elderly pop musicians, or infomercials for inspiration marketers like Suze Ormond, interrupted by increasingly embarrassed and exhausted looking paid pitchmen for the stations.

The tedious pop music, informercials, including from the occasional conman or woman, and reruns of dusty British sit-coms have reached such critical mass that many people have decided to turn off PBS stations for good, despite the occasional good shows, such as, around here, the 11 p.m. BBC world news.

It's sad to see that even the once very impressive WGBH-TV, perhaps the PBS flagship, has joined in this decline. Where is founder Ralph Lowell now that we need him? (Well, actually, dead!)

NPR stations are, however, so packed with information (when they aren't on their sellf-advertising orgies) that they are well worth it. It's okay to send them money.

 Tags  Barnet Fain NPR PBS Printable Views Providence Art Club Suze Ormond WGBH

Comments

Charles Pinning said:

Absolutely! Make a big trunk. Toss in Suze Ormond, those "angelic" singers from Ireland with mikes curving in front of their mouths and the blonde guy with the trumpet. And the bald guy with advice and the Hawaiian guy, too. Depak Chopra, too. Send them to Baffin Island.

Open up another trunk, and take out the BBC's Martine Croxall reading the news, and anything else she wants, 24 hours a day!

Link | March 27, 2009 4:16 PM
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