It’s been on and off my mind for a couple of weeks now, so while I’ve got a moment, I’ll vent my spleen: Popular music these days is relentlessly boring. Worse than that, it’s almost a monotone. I seriously have a hard time telling one artist from another, whether it’s contemporary pop or country.

I’m reminded of this most every time I turn on the radio, but what drove the point home was listening to Tom Petty’s Greatest Hits a while back. I thought, “Who sounds like that these days?”, which was immediately followed by, “Who sounded like that then?” No one. Which is the point. I couldn’t help but be reminded then of the huge variety of music that we took for granted back then.

Think about who was on the radio back in the late 70’s, early 80’s. A quick list off the top of my head: The Cars, Supertramp, Tom Petty, Journey, Blondie, Fleetwood Mac, Doobie Brothers, Van Halen, Billy Joel, Go-Gos, Bruce Springsteen, The Police, John Mellencamp, Boston, Kiss, Pat Benatar, Foreigner, The Eagles. . . .

And the list goes on. And who among those could possibly be mistaken for another? Blondie for Benatar? The Cars for The Police? Petty for Mellencamp? Not a chance. (Not to mention the fact that back then you could routinely hear Kenny Rogers and Linda Ronstadt in that mix as well.)

Today’s music, on the other hand, seems almost to strive for homogeneity. There are a few who manage to separate from the pack—Julie Roberts in country, for instance, and Norah Jones in pop—but in general, even the exceptions sound the same as the other exceptions. They all just blend. At the very least, and the heart of my complaint, is that there is nothing like the variety of music on the radio that I got to enjoy as a youngster and teenager. I don’t know if video killed the radio star, but Top 40 sure seemed to kill variety.