Mark Ronson: Funk Politics
The distinct sounds of 70s funk are clearing out the radio of overplayed and increasingly stale electronic dance music. Why did funk ever go away? Did the industry force it out? Or maybe it never never left us, and it has been buried deep within Pop music all along.
The Imperative Jingle Bells
You’ve heard it a million times, you know how to sing it, its ubiquitous during the holiday season, but you’ve never heard a definitive recording. Where does it come from, why is it so catchy, and why of all holiday songs is Jingle Bells the most widely played song?
To Be Young
Pop music and youth go together like peanut butter and pickles. The music we hear when we’re young shapes our identities forevermore. In this episode we take three songs that promise an eternal adolescence and put them under microscope to see what makes them tick.
Boom Bang Pow
We look at the Rhythms that make us dance, those primal beats, the “Boom Bang Pow” that make us want to move. We’ll ask what makes them work and why is that we’re hearing that untz untz everywhere we go from the dance floor, to the coffee shop, to the insides of our minds?
The Oeuvre of Taylor Swift
We uncover the common songwriting techniques and chart the musical evolution of Taylor Swift. Featuring songs from her early country period, transitional indie period and her latest pop album, 1989.
Heartbreak
Why do we love listening to heartbreak songs? What do songwriters do to emote such strong feelings?
Mini Series
The French duo’s anti-utopian disco-rock record makes us question, are they robot, or are they human?
On their second album Discovery, Daft Punk fully lean into the artificial – singing through robotic vocoders that correspond with their now-iconic robot helmets.
On their first album, Homework, Daft Punk stretched the boundaries of electronic music and began wiring the circuits that would become their robot alter-egos, asking a fundamental question: where does the human end and the machine begin?
How Bollywood strings, surf guitar, and Britney’s ethereal vocals add up to pop perfection
“I realized that Classic Soul can exist with everything and somehow not lose its potency.”
“They're all these little secrets and surprises that pop up...it's like bespoke, maximalist, power pop.”
When we listen closely to the Fifth, we hear that's it more than a museum piece, it’s a living testament to self-expression and determination.
Before Beethoven’s time, classical music culture looked and sounded quite different. In episode III we explore how Beethoven’s symphony was used to generate the strict culture of classical music — and the politics that undergird those norms of behavior.
In movements II , III and IV, Beethoven keeps trying to overcome his dark fate with bright major melodies, and keeps getting defeated.
The first four notes of the piece are more than a modern meme, they’re the main character in a drama life and death.
Cultural critic Ivie Ani breaks down how Missy Elliott broke into the pantheon of anthems, and how she changed the scope of who could belong.
How “All Star” became an anthem played in sports arenas, soundtracked by Hollywood, and embedded into seemingly every internet meme.
n 1995, ESPN launched Jock Jams Volume 1, a compilation record that would define the sound of sports for the next quarter century.
Cory Henry & The Funk Apostles’ album “Something To Say” makes you want to get up and dance as much as it makes you want to take action.