When I woke up this morning and checked my email inbox, there it was… email subject “Martin Streek – R.I.P. Soundtrack To This Email: ‘Gone Still’ N.I.N.” At first I thought this was coming from Martin Streek in regards to the recent death of Michael Jackson, but no… I googled his name, I went to the home page of the radio station and sure enough, Martin Streek has recently been let go of his position as an on-air radio personality for corus entertainment’s 102.1 the edge.
It’s truly quite sad, you’d never suspect that. I’ve been an edge listener for years, to be honest now that I think of it, there was one episode where Martin got quite emotional on air with some of the not so nice fans who challenged his Canadian roots. I’ve also seen photos where he looked pretty upset but I always saw it as one of his “tough guy” poses. Martin was top 3 in my books next to Darrin Pfeiffer and Barry Taylor (other members of the edge radio personalities). Nonetheless, Martin always seemed pretty content… but perhaps that all came down to working for the edge.
Who knows what his reasons were for committing suicide, perhaps the loss of his job, a girl, drugs or all of the above. Why does this feel like another “Kurt Kobain” story? Wasn’t he the one who said “It’s better to burn out than to fade away”. Something tells me Martin Streek felt the same way and chose to “burn himself” out after being fired, rather than live on and “fade away”.
I’m sure things will come to surface sooner or later, provided Michael Jackson doesn’t continue to steal the spot light. I’d just like to note how influential he was to me as a listener; if it hadn’t been for him, I would not have discovered N.I.N. or the Clash. He hosted the most important show on the edge; the Thursday 30 countdown with pizza pizza! Now I really feel bad for never dropping it to enjoy a free slice with him which I always said I’d do.
As usual, it’s too little too late. If you were a fan of Martin Streek, check out this Facebook group setup in his memory.