April 29, 2006 (#19)- The Women Show
Originally broadcast April 17, 2005

The International Language of Women
Gwen Macsai- Independent Producer, Re:sound Host

The essay that explains, at long last, why women always go to the bathroom in twos. (NPR’s All Things Considered, 1991)

Dreaming of Fat Men
Lorelei Harris- Features, Arts & Drama Editor at RTE Radio 1

One evening in 1994, four women came together for a feast. They had never met one another before. As far as anybody knew, they only had one thing in common. They were all obese: not a little bit overweight or pleasantly plump or well rounded or anything like that. These were four very fat women. (RTE Radio 1, 1994)

The Walls
Laura Vitale- Independent Producer

Every semester the bathroom walls in Brown University's main library are painted fresh, and by the end of the semester they are full of contemplative scribbles in overwhelming quantities. The heartfelt, highly repetitive graffiti often creates something like poetry.

Featured Music:

The Cars are the Stars, “Helikopter,” Fragments (Chez Moi, 2004)
E*Vax, “The Process of Leaving,” Parking Lot Music (Audio Dregs Music, 2001)
E*Vax, “What We Mean,” Parking Lot Music (Audio Dregs Music, 2001)
Broken Social Scene, “Anthems for a Seventeen Year Old Girl,” You Forgot It in People (Arts & Crafts, 2003)

Extras:

Lorelei Harris discusses the unusual production of Dreaming of Fat Men Behind the Scenes

April 22, 2006 (#18)- The ShortDocs Show
Originally broadcast April 10, 2005
Each year, the Third Coast International Audio Festival commissions stories based on a single topic. We call them “ShortDocs,” and in this edition of Re:sound, we feature several from 2004, when the topic was thirst, and 2003, when the topic was darkness.

Dinner at the Blind Cow
Adam Burke - Independent Producer

You're in complete darkness from the moment you enter. Blind waiters take your order, help you find your water glass, lead you to the bathroom. Some diners struggle, but others find the Blind Cow in Zurich, Switzerland, a sensory delight.

Memento Mori
Jude Fletcher - Independent Producer

Some members of producer Jude Fletcher's family have a fondness for taking pictures of the dead. And as eerie as this may seem, photographing the dead, or memento mori, was popular back in the nineteenth century.

Listening to Jamie
Hugh Levinson - Producer, BBC

Imagine a cold, London winter. Now listen as the bizarre and unpredictable sounds made by producer Hugh Levinson's sleeping newborn punctuate the dark in the most unimaginable ways.

Interview with Hugh Levinson

Gwen Macsai talks with Hugh Levinson about Listening to Jamie, and getting cheap laughs at the expense of his firstborn.

Hidden Messages

Presenting hidden messages found in the proposals for the 2004 ShortDocs call for stories about darkness.

The Color Is Black
Rick Moody – Writer
Jerome Schmidt – Sound Designer

Rick Moody and Jerome Schmidt present darkness construed as manifestations of the color black through history, space, time, and in the natural world.

“And I Walked...” Stories from the Border
Ann Heppermann and Kara Oehler – Independent Producers, Reporters, KNAU

In this story, the thirst for the American dream translates into a literal thirst for the scores of illegal immigrants who risk their lives to cross the desert from Mexico into the United States in search of better-paying jobs.

Featured Music:

Languis, “Half Way There,” Unithematic (Simballrec, 2000)
Rainstick Orchestra, “Powderly,” Floating Glass Key in the Sky (Ninja Tune, 2004)
E*Vax, “To Scale a Fish,” Parking Lot Music (Audio Dregs Music, 2001)
Featured Music: Beequeen, “Buzzbag Drive,” The Bodyshop (Important Records, 2005)
Credits Music: The Books, “Smells Like Content,” Lost and Safe (Tomlab, 2005)

Extras:

Learn more about the Third Coast Festival ShortDocs.

April 15 , 2006- The Coping Show

Soundtrack to War
Cath Dwyer- Producer, Australian Broadcasting Corporation
Mark Don- Technical Producer, Australian Broadcasting Corporation
George Gittoes- Filmmaker, Artist

So much has been written abou the war in Iraq but how much has been heard? The sound of war isn’t just guns and grenades. It’s Guns N Roses, Eminem and Tupac -- to say nothing of the  Baghdad Beegees. Australian war artist George Gittoes has traveled to Iraq four times since 2002 and he’s recorded the music that soldiers listen to to psyche up for battle and to unwind afterward. In a place of isolation, insecurity, fear and death, soldiers have turned to singing, rapping, and playing music as lifeline to survival. (Street Stories, 2005)

I Made Pizza for Kim Jong Il
Hugh Levinson- Producer, BBC

This story is really two stories. Both absolutely true. And they contrast not only in content but in form. One, is about power and authority, and it is told with a flourish that is right out of central casting. The other is about deprivation and disadvantage and is told in a much quieter way as though it wants to take up less space in the room.  The first deals with an Italian chef who was asked to travel to North Korea to display his pizza making skills with only the best ingredients and the most expensive tools.  The other is about a student with nothing, witnessing the North Korean famine of the late 1990s. (BBC Radio 3, 2005)

My Criminal Life
Mark Cassette- Youth Producer, Blunt Youth Radio
Kerry Seed- Producer, Blunt Youth Radio

Eighteen year old named Mark is just two months shy of aging out of the Long Creek Youth Development Center in Maine (otherwise referred to and the juvenile detention system).  As he and his family stare at the future, Blunt Youth Radio at WMPG in Portland, recorded some their thoughts. (Blunt Youth Radio, 2005)

Featured Music

P:ano, "Heavens," Alphabet Series E (Tomlab, 2005)
Talib Kweli, "Get By ," Quality (Rawkus (Uni), 2002)
Tony, "Angers," Itinerance (Autres Directions in Music, 2005)
Melodium, " La fin de tout," La tete qui flotte (Autres Directions in Music, 2005)

April 8 , 2006- The Music Show

Number 1 for 37 Minutes
Trent Wolbe- Independent Producer

This has to be one of the most fascinating marriages of music and technology we’ve heard about. Luke Dubois is a musician and computer programmer who has developed a technique called time-lapse phonography, which works on the same basic principle of time-lapse photography, condensing sound over time instead of image.  He used the technique on all the #1 songs on the Billboard charts from 1958 to 2000, collapsing 42 years of charts into one 37 minute piece of music. (PRI's Studio 360, 2005)

The Intriguing Theremin
Michele Ernsting- Producer, Radio Netherlands

Here is an instrument that redefines the word. It’s not a woodwind, a string, a drum or anything else you play with a sick or a bow. You don’t shake it, hit it, blow into it or pluck it. In fact you don’t even touch it. And though it’s pretty obscure and very few people play it, you’ve all heard it, you just don’t know you have.  Named after its colorful and enigmatic inventor, Russian scientist Lev Sergeivitch Theremin, the theremin is a staple in the soundtrack of every old scary movie you can think of.  And despite the fact that it is a relatively new instrument, at least compared to say, the violin, its history is just as rich. (Radio Netherlands, 2004)

Can I Get an Amen?
Nate Harrison- Artist, Independent Producer

Ever since sampling came into existence, taking a previously recorded song and reproducing part of it to create a new song, a lot of new music can be dissected to reveal old musical elements. Sound artist Nate Harrison traced one of the most sampled drum beats in the history of recorded music back to its origin for a sound installation he created for the California institute of the Arts.

Featured Music

Coldcut, "Colours the Soul," Sound Mirrors (Ninja Tune , 2006)
Coldcut, "Man in a Garage," Sound Mirrors (Ninja Tune , 2006)
Birdy Nam Nam, "Transition," Birdy Nam Nam (Uncivilized World, 2006)
Birdy Nam Nam, "Kind of Laid Back," Birdy Nam Nam (Uncivilized World, 2006)
Birdy Nam Nam, "Too Much Skunk Tonight... ," Birdy Nam Nam (Uncivilized World, 2006)

Extras:

Listen and watch the video of the full 37 minute version of Luke DuBois' Billboard.

Listen and watch the video for the California Institute of the Arts installation of Nate Harrison's Can I Get an Amen?

April 1 , 2006- The Fake Doc Show

Ice Music
Gregory Whitehead - Performance Artist, Playwright, and Independent Producer

What if sounds could be frozen into ice cubes then released upon their melting? Everyday moments and actions might become rich musical performances. (NPR's All Things Considered, 1999)

The Dribble Down Effect
Eurydice Aroney- Producer ABC
John Jacobs- Engineer

Blending satire, drama and interviews, this Australian documentary portrays a not-so-distant future where robots care for children and parents agree to live apart from their families during the work week. (Radio Eye, 2002)

Incurable Romatics
Benjamen Walker- Producer/Host, Theory of Everything
Nick Van Der Kolk- Producer/Host, Love & Radio
Adrianne Mathiowetz- Producer/Host, Love & Radio

Two young STD sufferers find love through the majesty of Web 2.0. (Theory of Everything, 2005)

Suicide Bridge
Joe Frank- Independent Producer

Lines form around the block for the world's most popular suicide spot. (Joe Frank, 2000)

Featured Music

Chihei Hatakeyama, "Towards a Tranquil Marsh ," Minima Moralia (Kranky, 2006)
RJD2, "Ghostwriter," Dead Ringer (Definitive Jux, 2002)
Depth Affect, " Dani Guimauve," Arche-Lymb (Autres Directions, 2006)
The Album Leaf, "Micro Melodies," Moog (Soundtrack) (Hollywood Records, 2004)
Luc, "EtE" peaofthesea (Aagoo Records, 2005)

Extras:

Hear more from Gregory Whitehead's Laboratory for Innovation and Accoustic Research.

Hear Eurydice Aroney's addictive, real-life, documentary soap opera My Personal Board.

Subscribe to the Theory of Everything alt.npr podcast.

Hear more from the TCF's 2003 Lifetime Achievement Award Winner Joe Frank.