Young Bostonians think city overreacted, says MSNBC about the whole “Mooninites set up us the bomb” incident. The article is a far cry from yesterday’s shitastic press scrum with the arrested artists that degenerated into the press asking why the two men “weren’t taking this seriously.” The artists, who demanded questions about 70s hair styles, were taking the incident exactly as seriously as they should have, as in not at all.

Anyways, in the article there’s a quote from a law enforcement officer that *gasp* actually displays some common sense:

In the Seattle area, authorities thought the devices were “obviously not suspicious.”

“In this day and age, whenever anything remotely suspicious shows up, people get concerned — and that’s good,” King County sheriff’s Sgt. John Urquhart said. “However, people don’t need to be concerned about this. These are cartoon characters giving the finger.”

In an ideal world, this man would just be displaying common sense. In this world? Give this guy a promotion and a raise and send him to Boston, please.

(previously…)

It’s done. After being put on life support last year following the apparent disappearance of Patti Schmidt from the host position, Brave New Waves has been cancelled. CBC Radio 3 is also being moved off the FM radio waves in favour of podcasts and Sirius, but at least it will continue to exist—though arguably Radio 3 has never quite lived up to elder colleagues like BNW and Radio Escapades, nor its previous incarnation as a web magazine. Brave New Waves is irreplaceable, and arguably the last bastion of genuinely interesting, challenging music on Canadian radio. Even when the show would play excerpts from tapes of cosmic static, lovingly labelled with the time and radio frequency they were recorded at, Brave New Waves was cooler than anything on the dial. And now it’s gone.

I still remember the last BNW show I heard, two summers ago on the 401, standing on the blacktop waiting for an accident to clear. My friend and I would miss the midnight rendezvous with our other friends at the Denny’s in Mississauga, but that night I learned of the existence of the Danielson Famile and White Magic. Patti Schmidt explored the Danielson Famile’s career more thoroughly than anyone else on the radio could possibly dream of, unencumbered as she was by the need to schedule commercial breaks or pander to the rush-hour crowds. And where else on the radio is anyone going to give even a fraction of that attention to a band like the Danielson Famile anyways? The hosts of Brave New Waves were the antithesis to the Jack-FM anti-DJ advertising campaign. They showed people that being a DJ didn’t have to be about reading out song titles and promoting crappy contests; they had a genuine relationship to all the music they played, and were eager to share their knowledge and affection with their listeners. Brave New Waves is the sort of radio show you don’t hear about any more. And now it’s gone.

I spent so many hours falling asleep to Patti Schmidt when I was in high school, and for a moment I was kicking myself for not tuning in more often now, as if I could’ve saved the show by being more faithful in my college and post-college years. As if I was to blame for its withering and cancellation. Maybe Brave New Waves deserved to be cancelled if people like me didn’t listen, I thought. But then I realized that’s bullshit; that for every person like me who stopped listening in the late 90s, or the early 90s, or the late 80s, there are others who just started listening in a couple of years ago. There are kids out there now who used to be like me, staying up nights listening to French sample-noise-art and Matador compilations on Brave New Waves, taken by the hand by Patti Schmidt and led into a glorious universe of bizarre music you’d never heard before. Kids who are being barred from that glorious universe, who will have nowhere to turn in their insomnia, no place to call home after midnight. And now there will be kids who will never have the pleasure of tuning into CBC Radio 2 at midnight and hearing that quiet invitation after the news: “Hey. It’s Brave New Waves.”

A Megaupload link to the final new BNW show, aired May 27, 2006 and featuring Republic of Safety. Megaupload is a shit service but it’s worth the hassle to grab 174 MB of BNW goodness. To the CBC, a hearty middle finger; there was so much promise a scant few years ago that has now all but crumbled into dust.