On the radio" "End of the Line" by the Travelling Willburys

I caught this track, the second single off the debut Willburys album, on a local station while driving home the other night. It's nice to get that quick radio thrill every now and then--the excitement of, "Hey, haven't heard THIS in a while!" It's also nice to know I still get it. I write about this every now and then, and this moment triggered another post.

If I have access to YouTube, I can listen to just about any song I can think of in a matter of moments (depending on the length of the ad I have to sit through), which has changed the way I interact with and feel about music. For example, right now if I want to TOTALLY ROCK OUT, I can crank up some vintage Christopher Cross while I write this, Who knows what it's like for these millennials (that's still the term, right?) who grew up in an on-demand world and never had to listen to the radio hoping to hear a certain tune. Do they yearn for Christopher Cross? Or have they heard his stuff so many times they just feel jaded?

Maybe the on-demand scene hasn't totally eradicated the feeling of--not even discovery, but of REdiscovery, of catching up with a song you forgot you loved. After all, the station I was listening to when "End of the Line" played was in the middle of a syndicated all-request show. So presumably someone picked up the phone and asked for the show to play the song on the radio, then waited to hear it, as opposed to just Googling it and hearing it on a phone.

The end result: I got to hear a cool one I hadn't enjoyed in quite some time. If I want to hear it again, I don't even have to dig into my CD collection. I can just type and click. But is that as satisfying or as fun as stumbling upon it while driving home? I think not.

Eh, maybe I'm just old.