An intervu at NPR pointed to this post by a guy who’s given and received waterboardings, all in the employ of the US.gov, “Waterboarding is Torture… Period.”
The blogger (at Small Wars Journal) is “counterterrorism consultant Malcolm Nance, who has trained hundreds of American service members to be ready for interrogation techniques.” From NPR’s story “Expert Sheds Light on Waterboarding“—
The Third Coast Festival conf is having a live broadcast party at :Vocalo, ChiPubradio’s new station. You can contribute pieces to this on-air extravaganza (how-to: start a user acct, then upload audio w/ tag “Third Coast Festival”).
The Public Radio Talent Quest has posted vid of the winners, presented at the PRPD. The tape proves once again proves how much Glynn (Snap Judgement) rox:
Just in time for Dias de los Meurtos, the 365 Days project has posted mp3s of Drop Dead: An Exercise in Horror, an LP by ol’ time radio innovator Arch Oboler (Lights Out). Track 1 is an “Introduction To Horror” (2:34 mp3):
Saw Joe Frank a couple weeks ago perform “The Blue Room” at Largo’s in LA, along with a live groovin’ Frank-en-jazz band. Quite the show. Don’t have audio from that night, but here’s another taste of JF live— his acceptance speech for the Third Coast International Audio FestivalAudio Luminary Award:
Painful & amusing video of NPR host (from new Bryant Park Project) trying unsuccessfully to melt the frozen Icelandic band Sigur Rós, repeatedly pursuing unpromising lines of questioning, which NPR titles “When Good Interviews Go Bad.”
This has inspired Stereogum to collect bad musician intervus. And while you’re wincing, here’s some Sigur Rós;, “Untitled 4” (mp3):
On October 3 1957, San Francisco Municipal Court Judge Clayton Horn ruled Allen Ginsberg’s “Howl” was NOT obscene, despite lines like “who let themselves be fucked in the ass by saintly motorcyclists, and screamed with joy.” A full fifty years later WBAI still feels it legally risky to broadcast the poem, so instead offers it in an online-only special at Pacifica.org. “Howl Against Censorship” includes intervus w/ poets Lawrence Ferlingetti and Bob Holman (1:32:08 mp3):
Talk about oldies radio, this signal left the station three billion years ago, and it’s just arriving: from SPACE.com “Astronomers Find Mysterious Radio Burst.” Tune in if you’re roadtripping thru the small Magellanic Cloud (a couple small galaxies, about 200K LY away, in orbit around our Milky Way Galaxy) — that’s the direction in the Southern sky the signal was detected.
More at National Radio Astronomy Observatory, “Powerful Radio Burst Indicates New Astronomical Phenomenon.” The burst lasted less than five milliseconds. Journalists say the scientists say, “it may signal a cosmic car crash of two neutron stars, the death throes of a black hole—or something else.” Aka, dunno what ’tis. Maybe they can use it to fill the “Enormous Hole in the Universe” astronomers also recently found (“nearly a billion light-years across, empty of both normal matter such as stars, galaxies, and gas, and the mysterious, unseen ‘dark matter'”).
PRX Announces Winners of Public Radio Talent Quest. Rebecca, Al, and (my fave) Glynn got selected as the hosts with the mosts (20K+ voters, 1.4K+ entrants). I attended the announcement this Wed. nite, and all three proved pretty damn Hosty in front of tough crowd of top pubradio execs.
Now, they each make a series pilot. We’ll see.
CPB conceived & funded this talent search. I was skeptical of this top-down institutional instigation of aesthetics engineering, but you can’t argue w/ the results: 3 (actually 6) people w/ plenty of pubradio potential.
Sidenote: CPB head Pat Harrison was there. This is second time I’ve heard her talk about the role of public broadcasting as a community builder, and the second time I’ve been impressed with her visions and comm skills.
Two apps that record radio for later listening, progammable by station and time: Rogue Amoeba – Radioshift (Mac $32) and RadioTime.com (Win $29). Both capture the station’s online audio stream then save it as an mp3 soundfile. Haven’t used either but I frequently resort to Rogue Amoeba’s Audio Hijack Pro, and can vouch for that co. heartily.
If you’re near Twin Cities this weekend, crash the party at the Public Radio Programming Conference. Sue SchardtMEDIA has invited me on her Thurs morn panel “Setting the Program Makers’ Table: The Sound of a New Generation,” along with Torey Malatia, (GM Chicago Public Radio), Sean Cole (American Public Media producer), and Chana Joffeâ€Walt (Seattle indie).
Truth in advertising? Check this (anyone know who did this?) mock radio spot for Baltimore’s “Big Bill Hell’s Cars” (1:00 mp3; and definitely NSFW– Sensitive Ears Shouldn’t Hear This):