Once upon a time, there was a problem with Classic Rock Radio. This was back in the eighties, when the entire concept of "Classic Rock" came into existence in the first place; when the finest minds of the boomer generation discovered scientifically that the music they thought was cool back when they were all teenagers was — somehow, through some miracle – still cool. In the year 1982, these same scientists built a time machine, went back to 1978, and quick-fossilized a great many, very corporate AOR stations, freezing them in time-loops from which they could not escape. Special techniques were used to prevent these stations from changing with the times, but for two exceptions: One, the ads would be periodically updated. Secondly, the DJ’s would be allowed to become a little more bald, year by year.

Thus was the world’s greatest music preserved. If not for these great men of science, Classic Rock would not exist; there would only be (shudder) Golden Oldies.

Not much has changed in the world of Classic Rock Radio. Why should it? New music is weird and scary, and it gives young people filthy ideas that they never would have come up with themselves, because hormones aren’t real, or, if they are, have no more effect on a person’s behavior than a day-old Glade Plug-in air-freshener. Because, I think we can all agree that a man howling, "Waaaaay down inside, I’m gonna give you my love," is just good, appropriate, family-dentistry waiting-room music.

It seems that some Classic Rock stations are experiencing a few worrying problems with their stasis circuitry. And, let me just say that I saw this coming way back. As soon as I heard the local Classic station play Duran Duran, I realized that the slow incorporation of music from more recent eras would be the synthesized ringing of an alarm bell. As each progressive generation turned to the airwaves to cocoon themselves in the arthritic certainty that comes from knowing that they represent the apex of taste, something would have to give.

At first it seemed manageable. Classic was redefined to include any music that is more than ten years old. But in 2006, a critical year, when that criteria would have mandated the inclusion of Hootie and the Blowfish into the Classic canon, the machine that is Classic Rock Radio balked. This new software was incompatible.

Unfortunately, the Classic stations had slowly become accustomed to change. Since they could no longer go forward, they leapt back into their own pasts, widely advertising their intention to explore longer, more obscure album cuts from "back in the vault."

Of course, this was a standard feature of AOR stations, way back when. This return to a previous mode of existence only goes to show how deep the problem lies: in selling their history as some brave new thing, they only proved that they didn’t even know that what they were marketing was history.

And, it was already too late. The evolution of the Classic Rock milieu into a multi-generational layer-cake could only serve to alienate the various self-righteous purists that had become their core audience. The new could not simply be laid on to the old: they weren’t compatible.

What happened was that radio exploded. Thanks to vast repositories of MP3s, the rise of HD and satellite radio, broadband and streaming technologies, listeners now have fine-grain control over which musical eras they would like to trap themselves in. Even now, someone, somewhere, is listening to an all 80′s channel, preferring to ensconce himself in the music of a dark-age where Republicans and his Parents held power, where nuclear annihilation lurked around the corner, and where videogame programmers would not discover the concept of "breast physics" for many years yet.

This, of course, is good. Very good. Let the oldsters have their Classic Rock Radio back. Let them keep their mysterious electromagnetic waves that deliver music for free over the open air. (Witchcraft, I say!) The youngsters will stick with their wires, and pay-to-decode microwaves from space, thank� you very much!