College radio in the 1990s played Beck and rightly so – he was alternative hip and had all the proper rock action. As opposed to random songs available on a preview disc, we actually had the full-length Odelay available at our disposal and therefore had added a number of tracks, including The New Pollution, to rotation far before official singles were released.
One thing about The New Pollution that I’ve always been convinced of – rightly or wrongly – is that it samples a song from some old Christmas special, like Rudolph the Red Nose Reindeer or the like. The thought hit me instantly when I first heard the song a decade ago. I still hear the trance-like introductory notes of the song and try to recall just where I’ve heard it before? Obviously I don’t fret about it now, but as the moronic college DJ I hit up a number of my colleagues with the question many times. Where have we heard that song before?
We also brought out the turntable for The New Pollution: not long before the end of my junior year, the station received (of all things) a copy of the single on vinyl. I think it was the usual album version along with two remixes. None of us were too sure what we should do with it since we had little use for the turntable to begin with. In the end we did air some of the remixes but usually just let the CD get the most use. Still I do know we had some fun with the turntable a few times during what we called "helium hour," really ten or twenty minutes of a dumb joke.
The idea behind "Helium Hour" started months earlier during our morning classical program. As some of the classical pieces ran longer than what we wanted, a few crafty people (such as the faculty advisor and program director) would increase the pitch control of the CD players, thereby speeding up the songs and getting them over with sooner. As classical pieces are fairly slow, the increased pitch is seldom noticed and no one is the wiser. This trick was not the best with loud, speedy rock music, usually rendering the track to an Alvin and the Chipmunks-sound-a-like.
I remember being an idiot late one night and thinking it would be cool to play The New Pollution on the turntable – but I didn’t bother to check the speed. So what should have been spinning at 33 1/3 went out over the air at 45 rpm. To compensate, I adjusted the pitch on the CD players slightly – noticeable but annoying – and went the next ten minutes with three or four songs all sped up.
At the next stop set, or break, I apologized on air for the fact that there was a helium leak in the studios and therefore things may have sounded a bit high-pitched.
Lame, I know, but such is the goofiness of kids on college radio.
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The New Pollution
(Beck, King, Simpson)
Beck
From the album Odelay
1996
She's got cigarette on each arm
She's got the lily-white cavity crazes
She's got a carburetor tied to the moon
Pink eyes looking to the food of the ages
She's alone in the new pollution
She's alone in the new pollution
She's got a hand on a wheel of pain
She can talk to the mangling strangers
She can sleep in a fiery bog
Throwing troubles to the dying embers
She's alone in the new pollution
She's alone in the new pollution
She's alone in the new pollution
She's alone in the new pollution
She's got a paradise camouflage
Like a whip-crack sending me shivers
She's a boat through a strip-mine ocean
Riding low on the drunken rivers
She's alone in the new pollution
She's alone in the new pollution
