The Ongoing History of New Music encore presentation: The Completely Useless Information Show

Let’s face it. My entire career is based on finding obscure information. The more weird stuff I can find out about an artist, a band, a song, an album, a scene or a music-related technology–really anything to do with music–the better.

However, obscure information doesn’t always equal useful information. And yes, I will admit that some of the stuff I’ve learned over the years is pretty, well, useless.

But there’s also nothing wrong with useless information. This is the fun stuff, the bits of trivia that can give colour to a story, streams of data that can be mined for bar bets, one-upping your friends, and the sheer joy of being a music nerd.

It’s the kind of enlightenment that makes anyone go “WOW! That’s COOL! Yes, it means almost nothing to any practical aspect of my life. It’s not going to make me richer, thinner, healthier, happier or more attractive. But I’m glad to know about it because–well, because it’s just fun.”

With that in mind, I’ve gather together much of this material and presented it to you in one big glop of illumination. I call it “The Completely Useless Information Show.”

These are the songs included on the program.

Trash Can Sinatras, Obscurity Knocks

Coldplay, Clocks (Live)

Skatenigs, Loudspeaker

Terje Insungset, The Other Side

Ramones, Teenage Lobotomy

Joy Division, Love Will Tear Us Apart (Live at the BBC)

Kurt Cobain, Divine and Bright

Radiohead, Everything in Its Right Place

White Stripes, Icky Thump

Eric Wilhite, our playlistist, has created this.

Don’t forget that you can get the podcast version of this podcast through iTunes or wherever you get your on-demand audio.

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

• • 102.1 The Edge/Toronto – Sunday night at 7
  • Live 88-5/Ottawa
  • 107.5 Dave-FM/Kitchener
  • FM96/London – Sunday night at 7, Monday night at 11
  • Power 97/Winnipeg (Sunday nights at 11)
  • Rock 97.7/Grand Prairie – Sunday nights at 6.
  • Sonic 102.9/Edmonton
  • The Zone/Victoria
  • The Fox/Vancouver
  • Live 105/Halifax
  • WAPS/WKTL The Summit/Arkon, Canton, Cleveland, Youngstown The show runs at 11 am Sunday. This, by the way, is a great option for American listeners who are prevented from listening to the show live because of geo-blocking,

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. If you’re in any of those markets and you want the show, lemme know and I’ll see what I can do.