August 7, 2018
THE LIST
1. This American Life - "ICE Capades"
This episodes casts a broad and surprising picture of the infamous agency that continues to dominate headlines. There is definitely an emotional hook, natural for a story ostensibly about separating families, but the amount of nuance sets “ICE Capades” apart from the well-meaning cries to abolish the agency. Politics, human interest, and a longform journey into a multi-year scam preying on people backed into a corner..
2. The Anthropocene Reviewed - "Googling Strangers and Kentucky Bluegrass"
Perhaps the most impactful chapter of the John Green-hosted podcast, this matchup of disparate forces in the human driven world lays bare an incredibly personal story from the author’s past. Each episode seamlessly imparts tidbits of universal human connection, but these two subjects are especially rife with commentary on what it means to be alive in our modern world.
3. Planet Money - "The Poop Cartel"
Decentralizing services has been the mark of “disruption” pocking industries from taxi rides to grocery shopping. So it should come as no surprise that Senegal is experimenting with the “Uber of poop.” The gimmicky title of this episode prefaces a deeply serious waste management issue that Planet Money encapsulates in yet another tight sub-twenty-minute mini-study in economic experimentation.
HONORABLE MENTION
Still Processing - "We Blaxplain Blaxplaining"
Part-Time Genius - "How does Rick Steves Think You Should Travel?"
SOMETHING NEW
In reviewing seemingly arbitrary objects in the natural and built world, John Green deftly integrates autobiography into meditations on the meaning of culture. There’s a comedic element from the start, as the author applies a 5-star rating system one might use to find the best local pizza place in a 2 mile radius to rating seemingly anything on this planet or the next. Along the way we are treated to tiny flashes of memoir, ranging from the somewhat trivial (that he plays Mario Kart with his son) to the immensely poignant (that his path to being a priest was interrupted by a scarring experience interacting with a family in the trauma ward of a hospital). This exemplifies the gold standard of celebrity podcasting, synthesizing an established personality to the series of innovative meditations on human existence with the quintessential thing that has propelled copies of books like The Fault In Our Stars and Wonder into homes across the world - entrancing prose. Best of all, there is nary a whiff of self-importance and many a whiff of self-deprecating humility.
Now you may be thinking, “This is all well and good, but isn’t this kind of just an audiobook on an extremely slow piecemail release schedule?” There is little in the way of deeply layered audio mixing wrapped up in this product, nor are there other podcast staples like interviews or a discussion of current events. Green’s tone mirrors the wryness of Jonathan Goldstein, enlivening what sometimes comes off as academically precise writing. Contrast this with Revisionist History, where Gladwell’s joyfully ebullient rage is at odds with his comparatively straightforward reading of his audiobooks, and The Anthropocene Review does land much closer to sounding like a collection of audio essays. (Sidenote: Both shows have clever advertising, but TAR blew me away - easily the best native ad copy I’ve come across) But the show’s minimalist production aesthetic renders the end product all the more captivating for the lack of any extraneous bells and whistles. The one exception to this is the brief coda that plays out the episode with a quirkily prescient bit a soundscape, a mood-appropriate flourish that staves off the potential for kitschy inanity with a bit of resonate aural snapshot listeners can carry out into the world they continue to create.
It’s fun. It’s deep. It’s short. With its once-a-month schedule it is sufficiently infrequent to stir up a rabid following of listeners on edge for every new release. It’s very well written which, you know, makes sense. It’s, fine, a combination of a podcast and an audiobook. It’s a history podcast via the lens of an unexpected object, telling human stories in the micro of Green’s life and the macro of lived experience in the past, present, and, occasionally, the future. The very exercise of giving these quirky or grandiose things a rating calls into question what things we want to create for future generations to promote and relegate in whatever medium is captivating us centuries from now. I give it five stars.
Now you may be thinking, “This is all well and good, but isn’t this kind of just an audiobook on an extremely slow piecemail release schedule?” There is little in the way of deeply layered audio mixing wrapped up in this product, nor are there other podcast staples like interviews or a discussion of current events. Green’s tone mirrors the wryness of Jonathan Goldstein, enlivening what sometimes comes off as academically precise writing. Contrast this with Revisionist History, where Gladwell’s joyfully ebullient rage is at odds with his comparatively straightforward reading of his audiobooks, and The Anthropocene Review does land much closer to sounding like a collection of audio essays. (Sidenote: Both shows have clever advertising, but TAR blew me away - easily the best native ad copy I’ve come across) But the show’s minimalist production aesthetic renders the end product all the more captivating for the lack of any extraneous bells and whistles. The one exception to this is the brief coda that plays out the episode with a quirkily prescient bit a soundscape, a mood-appropriate flourish that staves off the potential for kitschy inanity with a bit of resonate aural snapshot listeners can carry out into the world they continue to create.
It’s fun. It’s deep. It’s short. With its once-a-month schedule it is sufficiently infrequent to stir up a rabid following of listeners on edge for every new release. It’s very well written which, you know, makes sense. It’s, fine, a combination of a podcast and an audiobook. It’s a history podcast via the lens of an unexpected object, telling human stories in the micro of Green’s life and the macro of lived experience in the past, present, and, occasionally, the future. The very exercise of giving these quirky or grandiose things a rating calls into question what things we want to create for future generations to promote and relegate in whatever medium is captivating us centuries from now. I give it five stars.
From: Standalone
Recommended for: Humans who like contextualizing their existence with a handy rubric and elegant opining.
Drop Schedule: Thursday, Monthly
Average episode length: 20 minutes
Rating: Gotta Have It
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