Year: 2008/Archives

Transom- After The Forgetting

Marjorie SharrowHV and Transom just finished collaborating on getting an edited version of Eric Winick’s “How Are You Who You Are?” on NPR ATC. Our next co-project was just posted: “Transom Show: After The Forgetting” by Erica Heilman (who has a resume item you don’t see often: “an independent radio producer and private investigator”).

Th story documents a Vermont family’s changes as their mother’s dementia progresses. What happens to love when there is no memory? An evolution of relationships reveal themselves in these conversations between Gregory Sharrow, his mother Marjorie, and Greg’s husband Bob Hooker. (Produced for The Vermont Folklife Center with music by Karinne Keithley.)

Deer Hunting with Jesus

Book coverJoe Bageant is a Well Read Neck. Just finished his illuminating look at the typical towns of Billy Bob & Bobby Sue Sixpack, and why they don’t vote lib’rul, Deer Hunting with Jesus: Dispatches from America’s Class War:

With Micheal Savage and Ann Coulter openly calling for liberals to be put in concentration camps, with the CIA now licensed to secretly detain American citizens indefinitely, and with the current administration effectively legalizing torture, the proper question to ask an NRA member may be, “What kind of assault rifle do you think I can get for three hundred bucks, and how many rounds of ammo does it take to stop a two-hundred-pound born-again Homeland Security zombie from putting me in a camp?” Which would you prefer, 40 million gun-owning Americans on your side or theirs?

Bageant blogs at JoeBageant.com.

HV041- Christmas Mashup

Beatles Christmas record cover, 1963Hearing Voices from NPR®
041 Christmas Mashup: Holy Days & Silent Nights
Host: Barrett Golding of Hearing Voices
Airs week of: 2010-12-22 (Originally: 2008-12-10)

“Christmas Mashup” (52:00 mp3):

Holiday cheer and holiday weird, a mix of lotsa holiday stories, found-sound, and sprinkling of sampled songs:

A home-recording of a “Christmas Gathering 1947” (4:08 excerpt), on an unlabeled 7″ Wilcox Gay Recordio Disc, was found by Bob Purse. The complete recording is posted at the 365 Days Project, “Christmas Gathering 1947” (6:32 mp3):

John Beltran remixes Bing Crosby “The First Noel” (5:02), on the compilation Holiday Chill – The Christmas Remixes.

“Dad and Sam” (4:43) is Jay Allison‘s story of father and brotherhood, from his series Life Stories. More…

Bad Bad Whiskey

Classic early R&B, Amos Milburn “Bad Bad Whiskey:”

Story of Stuff- HV

Story of Stuff logo Airing this Weekend America: Annie Leonard spent a decade researching where our consumer stuff comes from, how its made, who the manufacturing effects, and where it ends up.

Among the results is a 20min. video, The Story of Stuff (also in chapters on YouTube), made by Free Range Studios, the same folk who exposed The Meatrix.

“From its extraction through sale, use and disposal, all the stuff in our lives affects communities at home and abroad, yet most of this is hidden from view.”

“Story of Stuff” (7:38 mp3):

The video came out on the web a year ago and has since been viewed four-and-a-half million times. Time Magazine named Annie Leonard a 2008 Hero of the Environment. Our HV radio report is by Chase Sbicca.

Prop 8 – The Musical

“Prop 8 – The Musical” starring Jack Black, John C. Reilly, and many more…

See more Jack Black videos at Funny or Die

End of Wall Street

Where did Wall Street go wrong? Everywhere. In the Dec08 Portfolio.comThe End of Wall Street’s Boom,” by Michael Lewis (author of Liar’s Poker):

“To this day, the willingness of a Wall Street investment bank to pay me hundreds of thousands of dollars to dispense investment advice to grownups remains a mystery to me. I was 24 years old, with no experience of, or particular interest in, guessing which stocks and bonds would rise and which would fall.… I’d never taken an accounting course, never run a business, never even had savings of my own to manage. I stumbled into a job at Salomon Brothers in 1985 and stumbled out much richer three years later.”

Hit Me

Favorite emails ever to HV:

From: dhjob
Subject: I love your stories
Date: December 16, 2006 6:15:15 AM
To: hearingvoices.com

all the programme of today's radio are talk ,talk and talk, I'm tired.
listen your story such as Hitchhiker Along a Lonely Utah Highway .
I have a specially feeling.I think it hit me.
Thanks Scott Carrier.
christopher
beijing
china

Chorus Of Refuge

Two African women holding babiesChorus Of Refuge” is new sound installation by (HV producers) Ann Heppermann, Kara Oehler, and composer Jason Cady. It’s free at Union Docs in Brooklyn (322 Union Ave), December 13th 7-9p.m; part of their Documentary Bodega series.

“Chorus of Refuge is a sound installation that transmits the stories of six refugees,living in different cities across the U.S. to six radios. The voices of the refugees are superimposed and coordinated in both rhythm and tonality to unite their narratives of struggle, survival and triumph.”

LIFE pix

Google posted the LIFE photo archive, “millions of photographs from the LIFE photo archive, stretching from the 1750s to today. Most were never published and are now available for the first time.”

To search only the LIFE photo archive, add source:life to any Google image search. Here’s some gems from radio source:life search:

Farm family gathered around table on which radio receiver is set & listening to radio for entertainment. Location: Hood River County, OR, US / Date taken: July 20, 1925 © Time Inc. More…

Elk Season

A classic Montana scenario: Just got this email & photo from my hike-ski buddy Jim, about why he hasn’t been able to hike-ski w/ me of late. Lottie, mentioned below, is Jim’s daughter…

Got one, now we can leave this particular project behind and move on to XC skiing. Getting an elk this year was mighty hard. Finally was able to line Lottie up on a shot with the help of nephew Jake. She is pretty proud of herself. I’m off to work till the 20th, then will commence to moving around thru the woods without heavy weaponry.

who loves ya baby?

Wilco the Song, if you’re feeling a little low, oh, oh, oh, oh Wilco…

Natural Sound

Site logo (detail)Ben Adair has unearthed a treasure trove of online audio at his new Natural Sound site. It’s an audio archive, blog, and podcast featuring works by dozens of producers on the several series Ben has helmed, the dearly departed Pacific Drift & Savvy Traveler, and the still-going-strong Weekend America.

Ben posted every piece from PacDrift’s two seasons and 26 episodes. This one’s by Ben himself, from Pacific Drift 03: The Markings of Culture, correctional officer “D.J. Vodicka Takes on the Most Dangerous Prison Gang of All” (7:56 mp3):

And do check Ben and wife Shoshanna’s new baby pix.

Exodus/Éxodo

Exodus/Éxodo is a new book (Amazon) with words by Charles Bowden and photographs by Julián Cardona . Excerpt:

Consider this: you get up at 5 a.m. You live in a one-room shack and pay $59 a month in rent. Your address is on the outskirts of the world’s second largest megalopolis, México City. You share this shack with your woman, a niece and your child. At 5:30 a.m. you’re on the bus, a ninety-minute ride for $2.45 a day roundtrip. You work in a tortilla shop for $1.64 an hour, eleven hours a day, six days a week. A gallon of milk at the store, the electricity that lights your shack, the fuel running the bus, all these things cost more than in the United States. Basically, everything costs more than in the United States — except labor.

Mexican civilization existed before the American people were even a thought. Americans have come to the game very recently, and like so many new arrivals believe they possess all the answers. At the moment, human beings are moving all over the planet to save their hides. Things have been upended, the moon rises at a strange hour, it is blood red, and dripping with hunger.

HV040- Spirit World

Crossroads sign: Spiritualist St and Mediumship WayHearing Voices from NPR®
040 Spirit World: Angels on the Line
Host: Larry Massett of Hearing Voices
Airs week of: 2010-09-15 (Originally: 2008-12-03)

“Spirit World” (52:00 mp3):

Paranormal sonic-expeditions:

“Alice of the Spirits” (6:07 & 8:07) David Franks

A preacher/prank-caller/audio-artist conjures up a con.

“Ritual Magic” (4:09) Carmen Delzell

Carmen samples some voodoo Santera, soaks in a spirit bath; she prays for sex, adventure, and central heat.

“Cassadega” (2:16) Ceil Muller

Ceil visits the small Florida town known as “The Psychic Center of the World.”

“A Night on Mt. Shasta” (25:04) Larry Massett

Our host hangs out in the new age atmosphere of the California city that sits below the spiritual Mecca of Mount Shasta (4,317 m. / 14,162 ft.).

Photo of the Cassedega intersection signs © Rachael Anne Ryals.