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​Local news themes, universal appeal.

As I once learned while editing a web series, finding the kind of goofy music that goes under “fun” TV news stories is a lot harder than you think. Describing that music is such a pain in the ass to begin with (is “Yakety-Sax-like” descriptive enough? How about .. “stupid-core”?) that Google is no help at all. Fortunately, in learning said hard, obscure lesson, I also stumbled upon the Southern Media News Music Archive, which is exactly what you think it is, and even more wonderful. The site has a full collection of news theme music from all over the world, going back to the sixties. If you delight in how odd the mundane can be, then kiss a chunk of otherwise well-used time goodbye.

There are little Anchorman-like nuggets, like this ‘80s gem from Sacramento, this ‘70s theme that practically gives the news soul, and this 1995 theme from KATC news in in Lafayette, LA, that is so oddly new-age-Cajun that it makes me wonder if the whole state really is as one dimensional as Treme would have us believe.

The themes also sometimes have amazing names, like  “Making A Difference” (OK, great, but also, how?) and “On Top Of It All” (if “it” happens to be groovy, at least). If I ever wondered why my parents preferred to watch the evening news on WBZ-TV during my childhood, now I know why (and I also know why, in more recent years, they stopped). This just in: I love this site.