seekingferret (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
seekingferret) wrote2019-07-11 09:38 am
seekingferret) wrote2019-07-11 09:38 am
Entry tags:
Podcasts
I had a lot of hours in the car this past weekend as I drove to Gloucester, MA for my cousin's wedding. I could've gone with my parents, but decided to go alone so I'd have my car, which was a good choice. It gave me the ability to jaunt back to Somerville to see ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
speckled_llama and thefieldsbeyond, and just generally gave me a little more space from my parents, which I valued.
On the drive up I listened to the full season of "Running from Cops", a journalistic podcast about the way the TV show Cops is made and what its impact is on the way policing works in America. It was fascinating and I highly recommend it.
Needless to say, Cops presents a highly manipulated vision of police work. In the final episode, the reporter is given a copy of the unedited original footage from one ten minute scene from the show, a closely guarded piece of media that emerged in the discovery for a lawsuit against the police department involved. It's stunning to see what gets left out, how it gets reshaped, how it is forced to conform to a narrative that the producers know will sell.
On the drive home, I listened to most of the first season of "I Only Listen to the Mountain Goats", afterbrainwane has been pushing me to listen to it for ages. It's so good, I'm sorry I waited. I've already subsequently finished listening to season 1 and am a few episodes into Season 2.
It's a podcast where Joseph Fink, one of the writers of Night Vale, interviews John Darnielle from the Mountain Goats. Each episode focuses on just one song, and they discuss how the song works, what the process of creating it was like, and then tangent off in all directions talking about art and life. In the first season, which covered the classic Mountain Goats album "All Hail West Texas", each episode ended with a newly commissioned cover of the song. Many of these covers are stunning.
But beyond that, it's just a really enlightening series of conversations about what it is to make art. The co-hosts have great chemistry that deepens as the show progresses. Darnielle in particular is fascinating, the way he makes himself so vulnerable and seemingly transparent and yet continues to hide and obfuscate himself. The combination of interiority and exteriority that art requires is so fascinating to think about.
I also listened to one episode of "Everyone's a Critic", a podcast about, ahem, Reading the Comments on The Internet. It did not go on my list as a must-listen, but it entertained me well enough. People are amazing.
speckled_llama and thefieldsbeyond, and just generally gave me a little more space from my parents, which I valued.On the drive up I listened to the full season of "Running from Cops", a journalistic podcast about the way the TV show Cops is made and what its impact is on the way policing works in America. It was fascinating and I highly recommend it.
Needless to say, Cops presents a highly manipulated vision of police work. In the final episode, the reporter is given a copy of the unedited original footage from one ten minute scene from the show, a closely guarded piece of media that emerged in the discovery for a lawsuit against the police department involved. It's stunning to see what gets left out, how it gets reshaped, how it is forced to conform to a narrative that the producers know will sell.
On the drive home, I listened to most of the first season of "I Only Listen to the Mountain Goats", after
brainwane has been pushing me to listen to it for ages. It's so good, I'm sorry I waited. I've already subsequently finished listening to season 1 and am a few episodes into Season 2. It's a podcast where Joseph Fink, one of the writers of Night Vale, interviews John Darnielle from the Mountain Goats. Each episode focuses on just one song, and they discuss how the song works, what the process of creating it was like, and then tangent off in all directions talking about art and life. In the first season, which covered the classic Mountain Goats album "All Hail West Texas", each episode ended with a newly commissioned cover of the song. Many of these covers are stunning.
But beyond that, it's just a really enlightening series of conversations about what it is to make art. The co-hosts have great chemistry that deepens as the show progresses. Darnielle in particular is fascinating, the way he makes himself so vulnerable and seemingly transparent and yet continues to hide and obfuscate himself. The combination of interiority and exteriority that art requires is so fascinating to think about.
I also listened to one episode of "Everyone's a Critic", a podcast about, ahem, Reading the Comments on The Internet. It did not go on my list as a must-listen, but it entertained me well enough. People are amazing.