The Ongoing History of New Music, encore presentation: Musicians battling disease, part 1

The human body is a wonderful thing, a marvel of evolution, biology, and chemistry along with a few bits, like consciousness, that we still don’t understand. And for the most part, this meatbag full of water and chemicals works pretty well. But it’s not perfect. We will continue to age as long as we can’t figure out how to improve the reproduction of telomeres, those little strands of special proteins at the end of chromosomes. After many, many reproductions, they become ratty and degrade. That has a bad effect on our NA and leads to symptoms of aging. We’re susceptible to infections by bacteria, invasions of viruses, and assaults by various fungi. And sometimes there are things within our own bodies that turn on us, resulting in cancer and other diseases. This, however, is all part of life and the things we must deal with. And because musicians are made of the same stuff as us, we often hear of the health issues that befall them. In that sense, they are just like you and me. What we’re going over the next couple of shows is to look at about two dozen musicians who have health issues, how these challenges have affected their music, and how they manage to keep on keeping on, despite the difficulties. These are stories of bravery and inspiration here–and maybe, just maybe, these stories will help someone in the same situation. This is part one of musicians battling disease. Songs heard on this show:

• • Everclear, Hot Water Test
  • Billy Talent, This Is How It Goes
  • Halsey, I Am Not a Woman, I’m a God
  • Pearl Jam, Sirens
  • U2, City of Blinding Lights
  • Wilco, Either Way
  • Joy Division, She’s Lost Control

• And now, a playlist from Eric Wilhite.

The Ongoing History of New Music can be heard on the following stations:

• 102.1 The Edge/Toronto – Sunday night at 7pm
• Q107/Toronto – Sunday night at 9pm
• Live 88-5/Ottawa – Saturdays at 9am and Sundays at 6pm.
• 107.5 Dave-FM/Kitchener – Sunday nights at 11pm
• FM96/London – Sunday nights at 8pm
• Power 97/Winnipeg – Sunday nights at 11pm
• Sonic 102.9/Edmonton – Sunday at 8am and 8pm
• The Zone/Victoria – Sunday at 8am and 9pm
• The Fox/Vancouver – Sunday at 11pm
• Surge 105/Halifax – Sunday at 7pm
• WAPS/WKTL The Summit/Arkon, Canton, Cleveland, Youngstown – Mon-Fri at 9pm

We’re still looking for more affiliates in Calgary, Kamloops, Kelowna, Regina, Saskatoon, Brandon, Windsor,  Montreal, Charlottetown, Moncton, Fredericton, and St John’s, and anywhere else with a transmitter.