Podcast ponderings
Monster mash, how horror happens, abandoned explorations, haunted houses, Halloween trivia, climate housing crisis, protesting protests.
October 28, 2022 is the day I thought of the name Podstack and created a Substack for it. It was a Friday afternoon and I have no idea what made it pop into my head around 5pm. I liked the name, but didn’t know what I wanted to do with it, so I just sat with it for a few months. I think part of that motivation was witnessing the demise of Twitter, the primary place I had been sharing podcast ponderings and recommendations. When it started going up in flames, I knew I needed somewhere else to talk about podcasts. Even though I waited until January 2023 to officially launch Podstack, this still feels like an important ‘anniversary’ to recognize! Thank you so much for being here!
This week’s podstack
Speed of Sound - How Monster Mash Became the Ultimate Halloween Smash
I did not expect the history of the monster mash to involve songs called mashed potato and gravy, but it’s pretty great! In order to understand how a song about a bunch of monsters hanging out together would spring into someone’s head, you have to recognize the huge popularity that monster movies and characters received in the 60s. That’s half the story, then there’s the mashed potato and gravy, which were very popular songs and dances. If you take those two things and blend them together, you see how it came to be! This is a fun listen for the Halloween season we’re in and the beginning of a bit of a theme for this list.
Let’s Make A Horror - Episode 1: Horror 101 (feat. Eduardo Sánchez)
The fact that this episode opens with Eduardo talking about how he didn’t really like scary movies and mentioning The Exorcist as a notable one was a little too relatable for me! I do not like horror movies, but I have seen a lot of them and I also happened to watch The Exorcist recently. But that is where the overlap ends, because Eduardo went on to co-write and direct one of the scariest horror movies of all time – The Blair Witch Project. Maddy, Mark, and Ryan are back with a new genre to tackle! They’ve written a sci-fi, they’ve written a rom-com, now they’re writing a horror. Maybe listening to this will make me less scared by hearing the behind the scenes? Only one way to find out! These series are so great at combining the crew’s process of creating a movie with interviews featuring experts from across the industry. It’s fun, it’s fascinating, and they just keep getting better. The difference with this season - they’re not only writing the thing, they’re also making the thing! And this is a genre where they have the least amount of experience as a group. I fear the day they run out of genres for this show.
“This podcast is an immersive audio experience - part fact, part fantasy. So it’s important that you listen with headphones on, imagination on, and everything else turned off,” - Blake Pfeil knows how to set the mood at the top of an episode! Admittedly, I kept the lights on while listening, but had my noise cancelling headphones on to learn about Blake and Isabel’s experiences at the Lehigh Valley Dairy building. Isabel gets a dark feeling and thinks she knows where the mafia brings people to die. Blake seems to converse with some ghosts as he walks through this place. They’re there to experience and explore these ruins, trying imagine what they were like during the recession of the 1930s. The music and soundscape of their exploring gives me those butterflies when I’m listening to something that I really like. What story does this building have to tell us? Isabel is picking up on a feeling about it and Blake is along to see what his imagination dreams up. The fictionalized re-creation of what might’ve occurred in this place really transports you into the building, whatever building you’re thinking about as you listen.
Imaginary Worlds - Haunted Housing Market
I had never realized the connection between haunted house movies and the terrors of the housing market before, but thanks to this episode I’ll never not be thinking about it! Like this episode points out at the beginning, the reason haunted house movies work so well is because the people in them have put everything they have into buying that house. When the house turns out to be not such a safe place, they’re kinda stuck with it because there’s no financial way out. By analyzing this broken American dream of home ownership, the terrible ‘Indian burial ground’ trope, and how the genre is becoming self aware of the real estate scares, it becomes a scary story so rooted in reality. I’m so glad Lauren recommended this episode, it might be one of my favourite Halloween themed episodes this year!
Past Perfect - Episode #6: "Don’t Ghost Me."
Speaking of Halloween themed episodes - my favourite time traveling trivia show is back with some special Halloween trivia! This time the contestants are Bobby and Lindsey from the podcast Who? Weekly. If you’re planning any kind of Halloween get together or road trip this weekend, I highly recommend putting this episode on and playing along. You’ll get a little spooky history, some movie memories, catchy song lyrics, and a really great lightning round! The song lyrics are always surprisingly hard but I was kinda proud of myself for knowing the movie ones. It’s so fun to see who struggles and who shines when it’s lightning round time- the questions are just as hard, but you don’t have time to second guess yourself!
SOLD OUT: Rethinking Housing in America - Searching For Home On Higher Ground
I was almost in disbelief when I realized this episode was 30 minutes long, because it felt so much shorter. I think that’s a testament to how well the story is paced, making it feel like you’re effortlessly going through the journey. This season of Sold Out is showing the devastating impact that climate change is already having on people’s homes and the housing crisis. In this first episode, we learn about a family whose house is impacted by flooding from the Pajaro River, forcing them to relocate. There are certain practices and policies being considered by the area to deal with helping these families find new homes, but none of it is totally sorted out yet. What it does show us is that the key to making things work and adjusting to the challenges of more extreme weather is generosity with each other and openness to new norms. Like the family that offers to let Denia Escutia and her family stay with them until they find a new home.
Drilled - The Tomato Soup "Controversy"
What role does the use of civil disobedience play in the climate change movement? These acts, where people are intentionally breaking the law as part of a protest, are not new and have been present in other social movements before. That means that we can actually study how effective or harmful they are. So when protestors threw tomato soup at a Van Gogh painting, did it set the climate movement back? It’s so interesting to analyze both ways this could go. On the one hand, people who want to see climate policies change to help improve our planet, might not agree with “extreme” methods. But is that true to what we’ve seen happen in the past? Amy Westervelt walks you through previous studies about the different forms of protest and demonstrations that the climate movement and other social movements have seen happen, in order to help us understand why, what’s changing, and what the impact is.
More sweet treats
Even more Halloween podcasts to listen to.
This is making me the closest I’ve been to leaving Twitter. I listened twice.
Listen to me play some AI-generated podcast trivia!
Work Appropriate is ending, but their final episode gave some helpful reminders on how to change our relationship to our work.
How did we get so obsessed with 12 ft. skeletons?
Thank you for reading! If you listened to something this week that made your heart sing, your imagination wander, or your brain ponder, I’d love to hear about it!
Hmmm, I heard a pretty different Monster Mash origin story here https://youtu.be/s1qdnOMLWS8?si=GXEfse04c3cEKW9L
I want it to be a chef from The Bear but it’s Ted Lasso isn’t it?!