I Love Rock and Roll (so put another app on my smart phone, baby!)

by Chiron O'Keefe

While I love my iPod, and continue to cherish my endless stacks of CDs, the appeal of radio still remains. We finally traded in one beloved car for a new model sporting satellite radio with Sirius XM. Suddenly, my frantic punching of buttons searching for snippets of music between blaring commercials seemed archaic. I discovered a wide range of stations catering to every possible yearning that might erupt.

Want acoustic? Check out The Coffee House. Like oldies? There's 60's on 6, Classic Rewind, Deep Tracks and Classic Vinyl. I love Soul Town, featuring favorite Motown and soul cuts through the years. My favorite station is B.B. Kings' Bluesville, but if a yearning for Bruce Springsteen, Frank Sinatra or the Grateful Dead should arise, there's a station dedicated to the songs I want to hear. Crazy, man!

Unfortunately, sooner or later, I have to exit my vehicle. Argh. Thrust back into the cold, cruel world with nothing but an iPod loaded with thousands of songs. How barbaric! *shudder* Who will guide me? Are you telling me I actually have to load a playlist By My Self???

Luckily, as the old/new joke goes: "There's an app for that." Yup, I'm now rocking to tunes blaring from computer, home theater system, and yes, even on my smart phone. My latest love affair with radio has expanded thanks to Pandora.

Pandora Radio is an automated user generated radio station that customizes playlists based on your preferences. You create new stations by picking a song or an artist. If you type in Beatles, the station will begin selecting songs based on that preference. There will be some Beatles songs, and others that have similar qualities. You can Like or Dislike any song choice, which helps to further customize that station.

Even though it's designed for a band name or song title, I plugged in a genre, Motown, and enjoyed a wonderful selection of tunes. This internet radio is free, though you can upgrade to a paid version with more options (you can skip more songs and there's no commercials ever). Some Blu-Ray players with Wi-Fi can hook up to Pandora, letting you groove to tunes over your home theater system. Recently, I discovered there's also an App for the Android smart phones. Snap!

There's such an endless stream of musical options available over the internet, the mind boggles trying to keep up. (By the way, Mind Boggles is a great name for a rock band. Just saying).


Last Saturday, while sipping wine late at night, my hubby introduced me to yet another unique source of tunes floating on the internet. If you're a fan of either the Rolling Stones, The Jeff Beck Group or The Faces, you might recognize one of my favorite musicians, Ronnie Wood.










Seems between touring with the Stones, whipping up masterful paintings, and getting shit-faced drunk, this bad boy of rock also began producing an internet radio show!
Here's how Ronnie describes it: This website is home to my brand new radio show! Every week I get to dig through the archives and play some of the music I love and the stuff that’s influenced me over the years. It’s music from the soul and I’m really excited about the fact that I get to listen and play along to my favourite songs every week so sit back, relax and enjoy the ride.
Love Ronnie xx

Ronnie's Radio Station--Ronnie Wood Radio

The song choices jump all over the place with one common factor—each song is kick ass music. Ronnie, baby, you can DJ at my place anytime!

So there you have it. A brief glimpse of just a couple of the overflowing number of choices for internet music these days. A computerized juke box just bursting with lovely tunes. What can I say? Once again, it's only Rock-n-Roll but I like it.

--Chiron O'Keefe

When not snoozing it up in dreamland, Chiron loves to write, to sing, to dance and play music.