Podcast of the Week: This American Life

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I agree. It's kind of shocking that This American Life hasn't been our podcast of the week yet. Well, now it is.

TAL is the show that's changed everything, public radio and podcasting-wise. It brought a new sensibility to public radio, which you can hear in almost every show out there. It inspired numerous podcasts, including the game-changer Serial, its first spinoff. It introduced us to David Sedaris, Sarah Vowell, David Rakoff, Dishwasher Pete and so many more. It lives up to its name, bringing you stories of life in America from the funny to the unexpected to the unbelievably important.

There are too many highlights to imagine in 541 episodes but I'll list a few, mostly recent but a couple from back in the day.

  • Listen to the current episode, Regrets, I've Had a Few. It's got a lot of good pieces but the best, in my admittedly biased opinion, is "Tattoos and memories and dead skin on trial" by Emily Hsiao. She made this story at the Transom story workshop. Which you can apply to right now. Trust me, if you're interested in podcasting or any form of audio storytelling, this is the place to go. If you can't take eight weeks to immerse yourself, stay tuned for other opportunities closer to home.
  • I mentioned this last week but I'll say it again: the TAL episode about Drugs — I Was So High — is really good.
  • Ever think about death? You should. Nancy Updike, one of the founders and most amazing writers/producers from TAL, spent time at a hospice and came out with this piece last spring: Death and Taxes.
  • Speaking of Nancy Updike, check out her reporting from the Green Zone in Iraq (remember that)? I'm From the Private Sector and I'm Here to Help.
  • A couple from the vault: This episode, Fiasco!, is one of my favorites from back in the day. But the one I think about most often might be First Day with its immortal segment, "Squirrel Cop."

Podcast press. As usual, much about Serial.

  • Sarah Koenig was on the Colbert Report! And it turns out Serial's last day and the Colbert Report's last day are the same day, next Thursday. The media universe is re-aligning.
  • Vox, which is one of my favorite news sources these days, asked a legal expert for an analysis of Adnan Syed's case. After this week's episode I am more sure than ever that Serial is going to end without a definitive conclusion. I will be really interested to see the reaction to that.
  • How does Syed's family feel about Serial? This piece in the Guardian lets you know. Generally, they say it's brought them closer together.
  • This is an older piece from the Guardian that I missed at the time but if you're interested in the whole Serial-listeners-on-Reddit phenomenon, it's good. I am torn between sympathy for the Serial producers who are taken aback at the Reddit attention and impatience, as in "what media era did you think we were in?"
  • Best Buy made a Serial joke on Twitter. Um, Best Buy?

A couple non-Serial links, just for form's sake:

Past recommendations:

 

Podcast of the Week: WTF with Marc Maron

As soon as I became aware that podcasts were really, truly a thing -- which was last spring at the Transom workshop -- I heard about WTF with Marc Maron. It's a true podcast -- not a radio show and definitely not a public radio show. But when people were talking about their favorite podcasts, this one came up a lot.

I've hesitated to listen to it, not because I didn't think I would like it. I liked the bits I've heard of Maron (like his great segment on this This American Life episode about drugs -- by the way that whole episode is worth listening to). But I resisted listening to this podcast. Because it is really long. Really, really long. Like an hour and a half long. That's a commitment.

Recently, though, I gave it a try and what do you know -- everyone is right. Maron is great. He's like a funny, profane therapist or life coach. He's like that guy you knew in college or your friend's older brother, who could be kind of an asshole (see, the profanity is already influencing me!) but was also a guy you know you could call if you were in trouble. I liked listening to him talk for 90 minutes, though it wasn't all him -- a lot of his podcast is his guests talking.

Those guests are generally people from the entertainment world: comedians, actors, musicians. But they're talking about their lives. The first one I listened to was the episode with Allie Brosh, because I love her blog and book, Hyperbole and a Half. But the one I probably enjoyed the most was the recent one with Julia Sweeney. I always liked her but never knew a lot of detail about her life, other than that she'd dealt with some extremely bad stuff after her short stint on Saturday Night Live. She was fantastic -- funny, smart, kind, candid. She and Maron do different things and have had very different career arcs but connected just enough to have a great conversation -- it was like eavesdropping on the most interesting party conversation ever. I can't say I'll be listening to every WTF episode. There are just too many of them and they are too long. I have a lot of comic book-based TV shows to keep up with! But I'll be listening regularly. You should, too, or at least give it a try.

Podcast Press

Serial continues to occupy a lot of this space. For example,

In non-Serial podcast press:

Past recommendations:

Podcast of the Week: Wait Wait ... Don't Tell Me!

This week's podcast recommendation is Wait Wait ... Don't Tell Me!, a radio show from NPR (and WBEZ) -- so, not that new or edgy in the grand scheme of things. But exceedingly well done -- thanks, largely, to host Peter Sagal whose wit is both quick and sharp -- perfect at going exactly as far as he can or should on a public radio program without pulling punches.

Wait Wait seems especially good, to me, in its choice of panelists who offer a varied but funny wiseacre take on the news. And it seems especially good in comparison to other quiz shows on public radio.

But when you need a break from public radio's earnest sincerity, or just want to hear Paula Poundstone or Roy Blount, Jr., getting off some good lines, this will give a solid hour's entertainment. And the show's MC's have been perfect choices, from NPR veteran Karl Kassel to Chicago/A&E newsman Bill Curtis, who may as well have been the model for Troy McClure, the anchor on the Simpsons voiced by the late, great (sob!) Phil Hartman.

Podcast Press:

Even when Serial takes a week off, it still dominates the podcast press. Some examples from this week:

  • Serial's appeal for funds raised enough to pay for a second season. Yay, for radio storytelling and good luck meeting all those raised expectations!
  • The New York Times' David Carr writes a very smart piece about Serial that not only looks at that individual podcast but at how podcasting in general could affect the public radio environment generally and stations in particular.
  • Suddenly the Times can't get enough: Sarah Koenig is the subject of this week's Magazine interview.
  • Smart piece from Vulture (New York Magazine's culture department) about "the strange intimacy of Serial." Written from a place of both admiration and hesitation about why we are all enjoying this so much.
  • Entertainment Weekly gets on the bandwagon.
  • Gawker has a really interesting piece by a racial and economic justice attorney called "What Serial Gets Wrong." Her basic premise is that you can't "solve" the crime by just re-reporting the facts of the case, and that the answer to whether Adnan Syed is really guilty or not more likely lies in the actions of the Baltimore police and prosecutors -- who were unbelievably shorthanded and overwhelmed at the time of this crime. Which I have no doubt believing to be true. However ... the journalist in me feels defensive of Koenig & co. because while they are setting out to try to figure out what happened, they are also setting out to tell a story and that, they are obviously doing very well. And while I accept Duffy's premise I don't know how you would tell that story. Even as fine and determined a journalist as David Simon had to turn to fictional drama to show how messed up those institutions are.

Had enough? Some of these other posts use Serial as their jumping off point but are not focused on that podcast:

Past recommendations:

 

Podcast of the Week: Gravy

We were on the Serial thing early -- but Podcast of the Week is even earlier to this party. Check out Gravy, the new podcast from the Southern Foodways Alliance and you'll be in on the first course. Or the appetizer. You'll be one of the first at the table.

OK, you get it. Gravy's first episode debuted yesterday and it's a good listen. Perfectly timed for Thanksgiving, Gravy tells the story of the Lumbee Indians of North Carolina. I'd never heard of the Lumbee Indians, more shame on me, and I learned about food and culture and history, without feeling like I was being force-fed educational matter. And I'm really glad it was audio, because hearing the actual voices made it so much stronger. I'm looking forward to hearing what these guys come up with next.

Podcast press

Serial gets its own category in this section, since so much of the podcast press is driven by coverage of that show. For example:

OK! There were a few other pieces of podcast press that were *not* about Serial, though it sneaks a mention in some of them, if only as the starting base for alternative suggested listens.

Past recommendations:

Starring Alicia Zuckerman, Judy Blume & Miami Beach as itself

I’m not going to the Miami Book Fair this year, which makes me sad — especially since I’m going to miss my friend and editor/producer Alicia Zuckerman’s event with Judy Blume Saturday afternoon, about the Sally J. Freedman Reality Tour, a project Alicia worked really hard on. While Judy is best known for books like Are You There God, It’s Me Margaret, Forever and the Fudge series, Sally J. Freedman is her most autobiographical book. It’s set in Miami Beach in the late ’40s, the same time Judy lived there as a kid. It’s been close to 40 years since I read it and I can still remember details like the fear/dread/excitement of Sally’s conviction that one of their neighbors was actually Adolf Hitler in disguise — and the pain of being stung by a man ‘o war jellyfish.

Even if you can’t make it to the event, check out the story online at WLRN’s website — along with the slide show and the accompanying tour of Judy’s Miami Beach. It’s good stuff, and more than just nostalgia especially if you know and love Miami Beach.

I also wanted to post a couple of recent book reviews I wrote for The Miami Herald. The first was the final book in Philippa Gregory’s Cousins War series, The King’s Curse.* More recently, I wrote about The Forgers by Bradford Morrow, a fine crime novel especially for those who like books about books and fans of 19th century gothic dread. And may I once again sing the praises of my alma mater, The Miami Herald, and editor Connie Ogle for continuing to publish book reviews and news about books and even pay local freelancers to write them? Many a larger newspaper has given up the effort entirely and just runs wire. Like the Book Fair and the great bookstore Books & Books, Connie and her team are irrefutable evidence that South Florida is a far more literary place than you’d guess.

* I liked this book a lot and the series as a whole has helped lead me to more of an interest in the Wars of the Roses, the run-up to the Tudor era. My favorites were probably The White Queen, about Elizabeth Woodville who married Edward IV, and The Lady of the Rivers, about Woodville’s mother Jocasta. Others, especially The Red Queen, about Margaret Beaufort, and The Kingmaker’s Daughter, about Anne Neville, I found more of a slog — probably because the women who were telling the story seemed so unhappy and powerless. Well, Beaufort wasn’t exactly powerless — she did successfully maneuver to get her son, Henry Tudor, on the throne. But she was just a drag to live inside of for a couple hundred pages. I wound up watching the Starz mini-series based on the books, The White Queen, and got into it eventually. I’d recommend it for anyone who’s jonesing for the next season of Game of Thrones, especially since George R.R. Martin has repeatedly said that his Song of Ice & Fire books are rooted in the Wars of the Roses.