February 3, 2019
New year, new layout, new release schedule! Welcome back to the Pod Piper. After taking a month off, I'm back to bring you all some quality podcast recs in a slightly different way. My goal is to transition from a weekly post to one that drops every two weeks, with an extended episode list and perhaps a greater devotion to publishing the Something New section every single time. We'll see how it all works out...let's go.
SOMETHING NEW
SOMETHING NEW
When listening to The Sound and the Story, one can’t help but feel the sincerity in what might otherwise be described as angsty music. Yeah, I’m talking about emo, but this podcast also features indie rock, rap, alt rock, and punk. And really, isn’t music of any kind a sort of inexorable plea of the soul, when mere written word or speech simply won’t do? That may be, and as the saying goes, “there’s no accounting for taste,” but don’t expect to find David Kallison tackling Rod Stewart or Lady Gaga. The host selects a record and deftly pairs down an artist’s thoughts and emotions to a point where listeners start to internalize the beauty in the artistic journey.
The episodes strike a nice balance of speculative dissection and bibliographic objectivity, and there is always a healthy dose of musical clips. Each installment is a mini biography of the artist, specializing in contextualizing the circumstances that birthed the featured album. Not only does this draw in listeners without a history with a given artist, it synthesizes the lyrical content of a work with an understanding of the artistic process. It isn’t as technical as Song Exploder or Switched on Pop, and it shouldn’t try to be. There are many nods to specific musical stylings, though, and it is not simply a lyrical analysis. Fans of mid-90s to mid-2000s darlings (Death Cab For Cutie, Say Anything, Brand New to name a few) will feel some nostalgia as familiar sounds spirit away to a different time. While I’ve known almost all the bands to grace The Sound and the Story thus far, the most resonant one to date is the lovely parsing of Bon Iver’s “For Emma, Forever Ago.” Kallison brings a perfect revelation of details to this seminal album of my youth that already has a somewhat mythic origin story, transporting me to a time when I would sit in dark contemplation with the album as my companion.
Wait a second, I hear you groan. Is this some sort of show for 20-30-something hipsters who listen to counter cultural noise they pretend to pass off for genius? No, friends, Kallison has good - not elitist - taste, and in fact a decent amount of household names have cropped up thus far - Counting Crows, Weezer, and even Kanye West among them. West might look like an outlier in the TSATS discography, but his extremely public boughts with some form of mental illness make him an intriguing subject for the album deep dive. (Note: The Kanye episode was released in the good old days of August 2016, and consequently there is no mention of the recent cozying up to a certain president) After years of sort of bewildered awe, I think I finally understand the ego at the center of this artist of our time.
Deadset against acknowledging Kanye’s brilliance? Fine. Simply select the episodes based on your preconceived notion of an artist. But just know that you are denying yourself the pleasure of Kallison’s beautiful writing. His understated hazy drawl might lead you to believe this is all improvised, but the insight is so elegantly couched that the work invested into every word is evident. Kallison has a knack for laying bare his emotions in tidy morsels dropped in as related asides to the album journeys. These come with just the right frequency to give the work a personal touch without devolving into distracted banter. Then, in the most recent (and possibly final?) installment of the series, we get a striking recounting of depression and loneliness and how music pervades it all in such a meaningful way. This episode, entitled “The Depression Issue,” is unlike anything I’ve encountered in the podcasting world. It is quite sincere but also structured in a way that conveys the emotion and the reality behind depression. This one isn't representative of the show as a whole, but it is one of the most unique things I've heard in a while that also might appeal broadly (check out The List below for further proof of my championing).
Episodes are released infrequently, which is actually really nice. Sometimes there is a month gap, sometimes it’s two, but after you get through the back-catalog (which is completely doable with a total of 16) episodes don’t pile up in your podcatcher and begin to collect dust. It’s fun to hear the subject of the next installment teased with a cover song, and it seems rare for a pod to broadcast what’s next (besides serialized shows that dangle new narrative crumbs that promise to flesh out details on the way to a conclusion). Knowing there is a chance Kallison might just tackle an album that’s meaningful to me, that little moment of reveal is such a thrill. Oh, and there are no ads! Forcing listeners to reconcile the show's independent nature and the general stick-it-to-the-man ethos of rock with a plug for mattresses or food prep services would be brutal.
In the words on the back of a certain high school show choir t-shirt, and also maybe Hans Christian Andersen, “Where words fail, music speaks.” How, then, can we account for music criticism and scholarship? Is it a futile exercise in attempting to enlighten those who don’t vibe with the devastation of a wicked guitar solo or the haunting whistle of a theremin? I submit that this pursuit is ancillary, both for avid listeners to further shape their fandom and for the uninitiated that just haven’t experienced art with the proper amount of guidance. David Kallison is a passionate fan, an excellent analyst, and a person willing to be vulnerable on mic. In an audio landscape with a burgeoning pool of talent, I think that last trait is the hardest bit to convey in a podcast. Intimacy, sure. But letting an audience in on one's own personal tumult? That’s another thing altogether. Take a ride with this dude and you’ll likely come out with a better understanding of a specific band. If you’re lucky and open to it, maybe you’ll even have a better feel for the creative process as a whole - what is means to forge something out of nothing in a chaotic world.
The episodes strike a nice balance of speculative dissection and bibliographic objectivity, and there is always a healthy dose of musical clips. Each installment is a mini biography of the artist, specializing in contextualizing the circumstances that birthed the featured album. Not only does this draw in listeners without a history with a given artist, it synthesizes the lyrical content of a work with an understanding of the artistic process. It isn’t as technical as Song Exploder or Switched on Pop, and it shouldn’t try to be. There are many nods to specific musical stylings, though, and it is not simply a lyrical analysis. Fans of mid-90s to mid-2000s darlings (Death Cab For Cutie, Say Anything, Brand New to name a few) will feel some nostalgia as familiar sounds spirit away to a different time. While I’ve known almost all the bands to grace The Sound and the Story thus far, the most resonant one to date is the lovely parsing of Bon Iver’s “For Emma, Forever Ago.” Kallison brings a perfect revelation of details to this seminal album of my youth that already has a somewhat mythic origin story, transporting me to a time when I would sit in dark contemplation with the album as my companion.
Wait a second, I hear you groan. Is this some sort of show for 20-30-something hipsters who listen to counter cultural noise they pretend to pass off for genius? No, friends, Kallison has good - not elitist - taste, and in fact a decent amount of household names have cropped up thus far - Counting Crows, Weezer, and even Kanye West among them. West might look like an outlier in the TSATS discography, but his extremely public boughts with some form of mental illness make him an intriguing subject for the album deep dive. (Note: The Kanye episode was released in the good old days of August 2016, and consequently there is no mention of the recent cozying up to a certain president) After years of sort of bewildered awe, I think I finally understand the ego at the center of this artist of our time.
Deadset against acknowledging Kanye’s brilliance? Fine. Simply select the episodes based on your preconceived notion of an artist. But just know that you are denying yourself the pleasure of Kallison’s beautiful writing. His understated hazy drawl might lead you to believe this is all improvised, but the insight is so elegantly couched that the work invested into every word is evident. Kallison has a knack for laying bare his emotions in tidy morsels dropped in as related asides to the album journeys. These come with just the right frequency to give the work a personal touch without devolving into distracted banter. Then, in the most recent (and possibly final?) installment of the series, we get a striking recounting of depression and loneliness and how music pervades it all in such a meaningful way. This episode, entitled “The Depression Issue,” is unlike anything I’ve encountered in the podcasting world. It is quite sincere but also structured in a way that conveys the emotion and the reality behind depression. This one isn't representative of the show as a whole, but it is one of the most unique things I've heard in a while that also might appeal broadly (check out The List below for further proof of my championing).
Episodes are released infrequently, which is actually really nice. Sometimes there is a month gap, sometimes it’s two, but after you get through the back-catalog (which is completely doable with a total of 16) episodes don’t pile up in your podcatcher and begin to collect dust. It’s fun to hear the subject of the next installment teased with a cover song, and it seems rare for a pod to broadcast what’s next (besides serialized shows that dangle new narrative crumbs that promise to flesh out details on the way to a conclusion). Knowing there is a chance Kallison might just tackle an album that’s meaningful to me, that little moment of reveal is such a thrill. Oh, and there are no ads! Forcing listeners to reconcile the show's independent nature and the general stick-it-to-the-man ethos of rock with a plug for mattresses or food prep services would be brutal.
In the words on the back of a certain high school show choir t-shirt, and also maybe Hans Christian Andersen, “Where words fail, music speaks.” How, then, can we account for music criticism and scholarship? Is it a futile exercise in attempting to enlighten those who don’t vibe with the devastation of a wicked guitar solo or the haunting whistle of a theremin? I submit that this pursuit is ancillary, both for avid listeners to further shape their fandom and for the uninitiated that just haven’t experienced art with the proper amount of guidance. David Kallison is a passionate fan, an excellent analyst, and a person willing to be vulnerable on mic. In an audio landscape with a burgeoning pool of talent, I think that last trait is the hardest bit to convey in a podcast. Intimacy, sure. But letting an audience in on one's own personal tumult? That’s another thing altogether. Take a ride with this dude and you’ll likely come out with a better understanding of a specific band. If you’re lucky and open to it, maybe you’ll even have a better feel for the creative process as a whole - what is means to forge something out of nothing in a chaotic world.
From: Podcast Advocate Network
Recommended for: The musically obsessed and the musical curious.
Drop Schedule: Monday, Infrequent
Average episode length: 45 minutes
Rating: Gotta Have It
THE LIST
I've never heard a more distinctive podcast episode about dealing with mental health. This is not the best sample of all that The Sound and the Story is, but I implore you to experience it and let yourself into a unique headspace on the issue of depression.
There are sports stories filled with the inspiring awe of a Hallmark card, and there are stories about bureaucratic injustice perpetrated/covered up by some kind of governing body. This one has both, and it's incredible. By far the most interested I've ever been in hockey.
Listening to this episode marks an important moment in my life: one in which I so deeply understand just how out of touch I am with pop culture. If you, like me, have never heard of Milly Rock OR played Fortnite, you've definitely got to check this out! And if you are familiar with that artist and/or that game, I imagine this would be appealing in a totally different way.
For a show built around themed episodes, This American Life has kind of missed the boat in coordinating with it's episode numbers. 69? Zilch. 420? Nothing. 100 kind of got there. 500 marked an impressive milestone with a more or less trivial tribute. 666 goes all in on Satan and it is devilishly good. (FWIW, this is also one of the most interesting episode landing pages I've ever encountered for a podcast)
Maybe in counterpoint to the episode of Function, listening to this episode might be the most refined I've ever felt while listening to a podcast. I have always wanted to love opera, and I think with the help of host Rhiannon Giddens (a well-known contemporary vocalist who just so happens to have had operatic training) I just may get there.
HONORABLE MENTION
Comments
Post a Comment