Wednesday, December 5, 2007

Worst Radio Commercials

I've been driving to work a fair amount lately, as a result of my wonderful girlfriend living in Baltimore and me working in Silver Spring. The drive, surprisingly, isn't that bad - it typically takes about 45-50 minutes on the way in and a half-hour on the way out. Since my metro ride is about a half hour door to door, the added time on a given day is only about 20 minutes. But that's not what I'm here to write about.

Since a car commute that lasts longer than 15 minutes is a bit of a novelty to me, I've started listing to talk radio in the morning. I used to listen to NPR when I had a short drive to work, because I liked getting a little bit of news in the morning. But NPR news radio, with it's smooth monotones, non-confrontational musical choices and cute-accented reporters with funny names, just doesn't cut it for 25 minutes of 85 miles per hour followed by 25 minutes of stop-and-start traffic. For the first part, I need something a little more agro for getting around all the dolts on the road, and for the second part, I simply need to stay awake.

Therefore, it is with some shame that I must admit to listening to the Elliott in the Morning show on DC 101. Now, this guy is not as obnoxious as Howard Stern or Don Imus or the like - which is obvious by the fact that he still has a job. But still, he's basically cut from the same cloth. The show is pretty much bathroom and redneck humor, lots of sexism, some slightly right-wing politics, and a dash racial and religious stereotyping thrown in for good measure. And on top of that, his voice is grating. But listening to all the idiots who call in is pretty entertaining, and generally it serves it's purpose well: keeps me awake, and pisses me off.

Anyway, one of the consequences of actually listening to the radio is having to listen to radio commercials. And there are a lot of them. And I have to say I have grown to hate some of the advertisements so immensely that I will actually change the station simply to avoid listening to it. Others are more subversive and just annoy me subconsciously. But on to the list.

Worst Radio Ads during Morning Rush Hour

#1. Charleston Alexander Diamonds. Annoying primarily because of the unbelievable saturation - at least once every 20 minutes. Second, every sentence uttered by the silky-voiced narrator ends on a downward inflection. You know, he lowers his the last syllable. I am sure that they must have done some study that determined that this speech pattern was most likely to induce people to buy diamonds, but to me, it just makes me feel like I'm being mocked. Can't take that one.

#2. Empire Today. 1970's jingle-ized version of their phone number that is repeated at least 12 times. It's permanently stuck in my head. Though I may find myself dialing it when I'm 86 years old in some kind of amnesiatic haze, I swear I will never buy anything from them as long as I am a functioning member of society.

#3. Stub Hub. I am not sure if these guys are some kind of scalping agency or bricks-and-mortar ebay operation, but the sing-songy way they say "Stuuuub Hub" drives me nuts.

#4. Anyone who uses traffic sounds in a radio ad. Are you fucking nuts? Who the hell thinks it's funny to put honking car noises in an ad that airs during rush hour? Or screeching tires? Or the sound of an 18 wheeler whizzing by you? Even though I've heard all these ads a thousand times I still can't avoid being startled when I hear those sounds. People have enough to worry about with the real traffic, and I could easily see someone reacting and getting in an accident.

I honestly can't remember who the conspirators are for #4, probably because I'm so shocked about the impending accident I believe to be underway, that I completely lose focus on the radio. I think Stub Hub has honking cars on top of their primary offense, but ALL of these sounds come up during the advertisement rotation that airs every morning.

I urge everyone to boycott the companies mentioned above. Anyone have anything to add?

1 comment:

Julia said...

I'm with you on the Charleston Alexander commercial. The current one out there bugs me to no end because it says "You'll know you're in a jewelry store [pause] that'll be around for years to come." It makes me wonder how stupid one would have to be to be IN a jewelry store and not know it. I think I'd heard the commercial nearly 100 times before realized the pause was unintentional.