So, so SMOOTH...

Do not entirely disregard my earlier asseverations about some of these our “new generation” radio stations as it’s going to take quite some doing, in fact nothing short of a miracle, for me to have a change of heart in entirety… but if there ever was one radio station I could make a wee exception to, even though its one station that can be readily singled out as a very guilty party in the “Americanization” of naija radio.
I Cannot really say when I started getting hooked on Jazz music but these days, I am more inclined to lend my ear to some good ol’, smooth Jazz tunes from the days of my great, great grandfathers than listen to a lot of these noise generated by my peers (and believe me, I do know some of these guys on a first name basis too). It beats me to but whenever I listen to a good Jazz song (most of ‘em are anyways), there’s this wonderful feeling of peace and serenity that just seeps right through me. I am less tense; less restrained and almost certainly assume a friendlier manner. It’s become so much a part of me now that I have more Jazz songs on my PC and phone than ever before and I keep acquiring more whenever possible because the hunger is getting insatiable. Some people are even beginning to suspect that I am way older than my birth certificate suggests since popular consensus is that such music is for “matured minds”.
Sincerely, I think Nigerians, especially the youths, ought to take to listening to a bit more mellow, easy listening music such as Jazz and soul – God knows we need a lot of calm out there on the streets and all these loud, abrasive, chaotic and “scam-encouraging” music of today does little to help. Imagine the spending hours in the Lagos sun beating down on your head, baking up the little that’s left of your sane brain cells (and am sure most of us know that feeling) and as if that is not enough, “fokasibe” or “scatter your head” is thumping loudly in your ears through some old, scrawny speaker system that makes the pioneering batch off the Bang & Olfsen’s production line look like technology of a hundred thousand years ahead of today. If you picture it right, not very encouraging I presume!?
So what has my unfounded love for Jazz got to do with one of the radio stations that I, literally, verbally assaulted only a few weeks ago!? You’re probably one of those who do not tune the FM band on their radios beyond the 97.99 MHz frequency limit or one those that only skip through these three frequencies; 93.xx, 96.xx and 99.xx MHz… so what is the obsession with these SMOOTH guys? Very simple… they play the best Jazz!