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Episode 7: Best of 2024
25 Plays3 months ago
Restricting the content of best-of lists to things produced or released during a single year is, in many ways, fairly arbitrary. Books, movies, or TV shows don't cease to be relevant as soon as the calendar changes. So we got together to talk about some of the things we particularly enjoyed in 2024. Here's hoping they bring you joy, make you think, and entertain you in 2025.
Hosted by Nancy Boissonnet, Tiffany Carlson, Connor Ferguson, Madison Hunt, Neal Kane, Adrian Pio, and Ian Sutherland.
Music by Coma-Media, via Pixabay.
© 2025 Libretto. All Rights Reserved.
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Transcript
Introduction to the Wellput Podcast
00:00:13
Speaker
Welcome to Wellput, a podcast about communications for mission-driven organizations from libretto. I'm Connor Ferguson. And I'm Madison Hunt. I'm Adrian Pio. I am Tiffany Carlson. I am Neil Kane. I'm Nancy Bossanet.
00:00:28
Speaker
And I'm Ian Sutherland.
Annual 'Best of' List Sharing
00:00:30
Speaker
Today on the podcast, we have the entire team together and we're going to share our annual best of list, which we've done for a number of years. And it's about discussing some of the books.
00:00:47
Speaker
and music and shows and other cultural productions that we enjoyed and that struck us and that we'd like to share with others. And we're excited to have this conversation with you and thanks for joining us.
Jackson Crawford's YouTube Channel
00:01:16
Speaker
One of the things that I discovered this year that I have been Enjoying quite a lot is the YouTube channel of a guy named Jackson Crawford. He is he actually has his PhD in Old Norse from ah the University of Wisconsin-Madison right here. um But he's an honest to God cowboy. like He's from originally from Texas, I think, and lives in Colorado and like genuinely wears like big old cowboy hats and like ends every one of his videos with sort of like
00:01:49
Speaker
all the best and and tips his hat literally. um But he does he makes videos all about sort of Old Norse and Indo-European linguistics and you know Old Norse sagas and and things like that. um So the kind of nerdy things that I'm into. um How I initially got onto his YouTube channel though was that he has started and is still in the process of doing a um read through and react to Lord of the Rings. He's self-confessed, he's not like a huge fantasy nerd, he's read lord of the ring he read Lord of the Rings many years ago and has seen the movies like once or twice. um But he's basically reading Lord of the Rings not from the perspective of a
00:02:36
Speaker
fantasy nerd, but the from the perspective of somebody who has sort of the same academic and intellectual pedigree as Tolkien himself. So he's reading it and then does a video every three chapters where he reacts to the three chapters and talks about the things that kind of stuck out to him, particularly instances where it's clear that Tolkien is, you know, borrowing from either Anglo-Saxon or Old Norse mythology and um and legend or he's, you know, using very archaic, usually very archaic terminology and words in incredibly specific and um in correct ways.
00:03:24
Speaker
Um, but it's just really refreshing because he's just this kind of soft spoken literal cowboy. He does some of his videos like out, out in the Colorado wilderness.
00:03:35
Speaker
um and he's reacting like he doesn't have some of the sort of meme baggage of Lord of the Rings like he's not he's not talking about the things that everybody always talks about the example that I can remember is early on in the Fellowship of the Ring he picks up on the fact that when when Aragorn slash Strider is first introduced, he is described extensively many times as being like not not particularly fair, not particularly good to look at. And he just kept commenting, like is is the point that that he's trying to say that Aragorn is ugly or is he trying to say that it's like he is just haggard from the road or things like that? I don't know.
00:04:26
Speaker
But it's just a really interesting video series and so I would recommend anybody check it out Particularly the Lord of the Rings stuff. I think that the the like old Norse language and Indo-European linguistics things are maybe kind of just my thing but Well, has he done, Connor, has he done other ah series in addition to the Lord of the Rings or is this the first? I don't think so. No, I mean, he's he he primarily sort of talks about um you know descriptions of like topics in kind of like Old Norse mythology or linguistics and things like that. um He, I don't think has done any other sort of reaction videos to fiction.
00:05:15
Speaker
I would love to check them out. Yeah, that's super intriguing. Yeah. Jackson Crawford, the old Norse cowboy. That description was a bit of a roller coaster for me. You had me with the cowboy and then you went on the old Norse linguistics and I was like, oh no, I think this is maybe too deep for me, but you brought it back before the- Oh no, this is too much of a Connor thing.
00:05:36
Speaker
Yeah, exactly.
'The Will of the Many' Discussion
00:05:38
Speaker
um The other thing that I am recommending um is, and this is, you know, also maybe very much a Connor thing, but this is a new fantasy novel that I read um this year that's called The Will of the Many by James Islington.
00:05:56
Speaker
um And the one caveat that I would say in terms of recommending this book um is it is the beginning of a new series. The book itself has a ah a decent you know storyline and arc, but it ends very clearly like, oh, this is part of something much bigger. And if you just wanted to read this one book, you are not going to be satisfied.
00:06:18
Speaker
um And the rest of the series hasn't come out yet, so I can't actually vouch for the rest of it. But this first book, The Will of the Many, um It's basically, you know, how a lot of fantasy literature oftentimes in in a sort of otherworldly context is based on medieval Europe, essentially. This is basically taking that and basing and creating a world that is somewhat based on the Roman Republic. um So it is this ancient Rome inspired
00:06:55
Speaker
a fantasy world in which um people basically cede their will, which is their strength, their life force, etc. to sort of other people up the up the social and political hierarchy. um So not at all a ah metaphor for anything like like our society or any society that's ever existed.
00:07:19
Speaker
um But it is a ah really interesting sort of like i not overly magical world. um It's there's most of it just feels like you're sort of in a kind of historical Roman context. But I also really like it because of all of this sort of like little clearly the guy who wrote it is like a classicist and knows Latin and is putting all of these little details in terms of the names and stuff. um And just to make sure that I don't get like too broad of an appeal with the way that I talk about my um recommendations, the one thing that drove me crazy is looking at the end and seeing that there was he actually provided a pronunciation guide.
00:08:07
Speaker
And I was just incredibly frustrated by his inconsistency with whether or not he was using something like ecclesiastical pronunciation or classical pronunciation for his Latin. Like some, literally some of the names, it's like, oh, that's clearly like, like Roman classical pronunciation and some of them it's like, oh, that's ecclesiastical pronunciation and some of them it's like, oh, that's like,
00:08:30
Speaker
Anglicized pronunciation. Anyway, I, I digress. I know. And here I was going to say ecclesiastical pronunciation was one of my favorites of the year. but yeah
00:08:46
Speaker
Anyway, that's my stuff.
Netflix Rom-Com 'Nobody Wants This'
00:08:49
Speaker
Let's hear from you, Madison. Alright well um I guess the one thing that I've been raving about I guess in the last like few months is the Netflix show Nobody Wants This. I feel like I've told you guys over and over again that you should watch it. um It's a Netflix rom-com that kind of totally took me by surprise. um It's about Kristen Bell, who is who plays Joanne. She's like this chaotic, unfiltered podcaster who meets this witty, ah cool rabbi at a dinner party. And it kind of follows their love story. It's
00:09:28
Speaker
It kind of took me by surprise just because I've loved Kristen Bell since a Gossip Girl and having these two having these two characters kind of come together. kind just I thought it was going to be a typical Netflix show where you know it's the typical fairy tale love story but it actually dove into the real realities of relationships in this day and age.
00:09:51
Speaker
um And how it's uncomfortable and it's awkward and also just the religious aspects and also the cultural aspects. And I think, you know, being ah two people who are very different, you know, Joanne, she's very loud, she's unfiltered where um ah Sorry, the rabbi, he's very like reserved and he comes from a very structured lifestyle. um Seeing their two lives collide is
00:10:23
Speaker
very charming and warm and it brings a fresh perspective to relationships. I think it also adds to, um you know, I guess for like the single girls out there who are trying to date, it gives them, you know, like the realities of what it's like. And also for the men who are trying to date in this day and age, it gives like a very real image of what we are going to have to deal with, especially trying to make relationships work and having families and friends involved. um So yeah and it's also very funny. It's sarcastic, it's sometimes uncomfortable because you have to look at yourself when you watch it but I think that's also what is the magic behind the show. So I recommend it 10 out of 10. They actually got renewed for like a season two so if you haven't watched it yet I definitely recommend it before the next season comes out.
00:11:17
Speaker
And, you know, like the surprising characters that I ended up loving wasn't the main characters. It was actually the brothers and the sisters of the main characters. um So Sasha, he is the brother of Timothy who, oh, who's played by Timothy Simmons, who is um the brother of the rabbi. So he is a married man, but he has this sort of eclectic view on life in terms of just making sure that his brother takes all of the opportunities with this new relationship. So it's actually kind of fun to see that he actually goes outside of his family to encourage the relationship that he's currently in. And um Joanne's sister, she's kind of like the polar opposite of Sasha. um She is completely against the relationship, but, you know, as a sister is, she has to support it. um But she continues to point out all of the wrong things about their relationship throughout the show, but I think that's also funny. And how the two of like the brother and the sister come together is also very interesting.
00:12:27
Speaker
And I think playing on their relationship going into the new season is going to be really fun. So again, I say 10 out of 10 recommend. Madison, I watched the show on your recommendation and loved it. And I completely agree. I feel like the siblings steal the show. And I i think every review has talked about Kristen Scott Thomas, but the actress who placed her sister is so fantastic and is able to convey so much just with like the raise of an eyebrow. um It made me really happy. Thank you for that recommendation.
00:12:59
Speaker
Yeah, Madison, i need to I need to add that to my watch list. i um I didn't know that there was an element, like the fact that you say it's kind of, you've found reflections of dating culture through watching the show in, you know, sort of in your own life. I guess I was, the the premise, it seemed a bit more focused on the, you know, specificities of dating and the Jewish faith, but the fact that you you find that it's more, somewhat more universal story is really interesting.
00:13:28
Speaker
Yeah, so I had a watch party with a couple of my girlfriends because I told them to watch it and we ended up finishing the season together. And at the end, it was kind of these conversations that we had all had to have in terms of dating because a lot of my girlfriends and I were all single.
00:13:44
Speaker
so um getting like going outside of our bounds and pushing our boundaries within the dating culture is also something that we're not necessarily comfortable with. So then seeing it firsthand and also on this show of someone who is kind of like us, we kind of relate a lot to Joanne. um It was just it's fun to see how someone who can be completely opposite of you but also relate to you at the same time gives you that sort of reflection that you need and i wasn't expecting that none of my girlfriends were so that's why it was kind of like we're waiting for season two to drop so we can have those watch parties
00:14:22
Speaker
yeah You're sort of dancing around topics that could get rather real here, Madison. yeah
00:14:31
Speaker
um so I guess the second thing is Wicked.
Love for 'Wicked'
00:14:34
Speaker
um I am a sucker for a musical. I always have been, but actually three years ago for my birthday, um I had the unforgettable experience of seeing Wicked on Broadway with my parents. They actually took me for my birthday.
00:14:47
Speaker
And everything about it, the story, the studying performances, the music was just pure magic to me. um Again, I am a sucker for a musical. But when I heard Ariana Grande was cast as Glinda and Cynthia Erivo was alphabet for the movie, it kind of just, it was a dream come true for me specifically just because of the nostalgia. I've grown up with Ariana Grande and Cynthia Erivo is someone who I've watched since the beginning.
00:15:17
Speaker
um I think the two performances from the both of them, they just blend very well together. um They lived up to the hype of the characters and I really didn't have any doubt about whether the adaptation would live up to the Broadway production.
00:15:34
Speaker
um But I was a little weary and this is like my own personal review just because I've seen the Broadway play and it's unmatched in my experience. um But I ended up seeing the movie with my best friend Sydney on Thanksgiving and my expectations were completely exceeded. I actually ended up crying.
00:15:57
Speaker
a couple times. um And my friend Sydney actually was crying throughout the whole movie. I will give her that. I didn't cry until the end, until like the last number of Cynthia Erivo's performance. um But her performance of Defying Gravity was something that actually brought me to tears. I didn't expect it just because, again, I don't usually cry in movies. um But, you know, watching Cynthia finally getting her due was something, I guess,
00:16:27
Speaker
Such a massive and truly special experience for me, um because I actually saw her in 2017 when she played Celie in the color purple on Broadway. So seeing that and then also seeing her on the big screen was kind of like ah full circle moment for me. um The movie, I will say it didn't, I wish it would have captured more of the story in the first half, but I am excited to see the second one. um I will say their performances honored these characters to a T. So if you haven't seen it, I feel like I'm
00:17:03
Speaker
like a reviewer telling people to go watch this movie. um But I actually seen it three times over Crisp's break. Don't judge me. um But i saw I saw it with my friend Sydney, I saw it with my friend Andrea, and then I had to see it with my friend Shannon again. And then I actually plan on seeing it when it comes out on DVD, the sing-along version with my sister-in-law.
00:17:26
Speaker
so um I will say it is something magical, it's an experience. I do still have my Wicked sweatshirt from the first time I saw it on Broadway so I will be wearing it the next time I see it in the movie theater. We went to see Wicked this weekend.
00:17:43
Speaker
And did you love it? I loved it so much, but I was actually um really late to the party. I had never seen the Broadway show. I didn't know the music that well. I was really kind of, I went into it a little blind. um So I was discovering it in a really different way than you are as a super fan.
00:18:02
Speaker
has a t-shirt and her switching and which somebody had like didn't videotaping or recording your reaction like i feel like that's like when when when people do those videos of like you know like people who've never seen star wars react to the end of empire strikes back and it's like how o how have you miss I don't know how I missed this whole phenomenon over the years, but I did. And so I discovered it at the movie theater this weekend. And I feel like the people like me who see it as a movie first are going to have a hard time ever thinking of those characters beyond those actresses because they were both so amazing.
00:18:39
Speaker
it It was kind of incredible to see Ariana Grande in that role because I feel like it kind of brought her back to life in my experience um just because I know that she's gone through so much and then to just see her light and fluffy and happy and pink and just bubbly was just so fun to see. And also with, you know, the interviews that they have to do beforehand, it's like they're actually the characters in their interviews talking about it as if this is the first person. um And there's like a bunch of kids who come to the premieres and it's just like, they're fulfilling that role for them because a lot of the kids are seeing it for the first time too.
00:19:19
Speaker
So it's kind of like in my experience as you know someone who's seen it on Broadway, seen it in the movie for the first time, I kind of had to take that Broadway experience out, and it which also made it better, but it's also like I'm also experiencing this for the first time with these two characters and these two people who are failing these roles.
00:19:38
Speaker
um But also, I don't want to spoil it, but there are also previous characters of Glinda and Elphaba in the movie. so That I did pick up on, and I was whispering to the kids during the show um who they were. That was really fun.
00:19:54
Speaker
i've never I have never seen Wicked. I only know a very sort of Cliff Notes version of what it's about, and i'm and I'm embarrassed by that. I really need to see the movie, especially given that I live in New York. I've i've never seen a show. I really don't think I know the music. Would I know one of the songs? like is it You would know this, actually. Probably no popular. You would know this song. You've heard Define Gravity, I'm sure. And popular, right? Yeah, and popular, definitely. Okay. Well, Madison, our friend was the sound designer for the Broadway production, so we will probably... We will not go down that road, but you and I will go down that... That yellow brick road at some point. Yes, please. Who has house seats on Broadway, by the way, if anybody ever... If anybody wants to go... Hint, hint, hint.
00:20:44
Speaker
i couldn't hope
00:20:48
Speaker
Well, I guess the next step is Adrian.
Curated Road Trip Music
00:20:51
Speaker
Excellent. So I have two sort of general concepts. I was thinking about specific recommendations and they were falling into big buckets. And I'm going to take a little bit of a cheater's route and recommend some more sort of existential ideas instead. um So the first idea, first recommendation and or favorite from the year is writing in cars, listening to music with other people.
00:21:13
Speaker
um I had a lot of driving in my gear for some reason. There was a lot of back and forth from Baltimore to Boston when we were moving and when we were looking for places to move into. My wife and I did a road trip where we drove from Maryland through West Virginia, through the length of Tennessee into North Carolina and then back. and We put about 2,000 miles on the rental car and we had a curated playlist throughout the drive as we went from our sort of Eastern Tennessee mountain country home music into our Nashville country into our Memphis blues and then back through North Carolina. And I was also thinking of the ride we took when we were visiting Stevenson in California, we were driving ah to Pebble Beach.
00:22:00
Speaker
We had a good couple hours in the car ride together. It was a actually a beautiful, sunny day. and And I think I introduced you to a few folks and you actually introduced me to a few folks. And it's just ah such a lovely experience to share music in that way when you feel like, you know, otherwise you're sort of bored or you feel like there's not that much to look at or to do when you're stuck in a car ride. um Being very intentional about the music that you're bringing, I think is wonderful.
00:22:25
Speaker
um Within that umbrella, I do have some musical recommendations. Obviously, as anybody who's been paying attention to popular music knows, this was the year of Brat, so of course, I have to strongly recommend Brat by Charlie XCX. That album is phenomenal, but I'm sure everybody's familiar with it. Similar. s Sabrina Carpenter is short and sweet. I'm sure everybody is sick of espresso at this point, ah but that album is lovely and wonderful.
00:22:51
Speaker
ah The person that I was most excited to see breakout this year was Chapel Rhone, who I think I had mentioned to several folks earlier in the year, her Tiny Desk concert, and then subsequent performers at Coachella, I think was sort of her breakout moment. But I loved that Tiny Desk. It's phenomenal. It's such a great encapsulation of who she is as a performer, what her aesthetic is, the style that she brings to her music. She's also just a phenomenal singer.
00:23:16
Speaker
um And having that toned down venue I think is really excellent for showcasing her instrument. So highly recommend that. um I also want to put out a word for one other probably lesser known pop girlie who I think is on the rise, whose name is Remy Wolf. um Her album Big Ideas came out this year and is also probably one of my top five of the year. So definitely great stuff to go check out. This was a great year for music overall, but especially a great year for the young women in pop music. So those are my four album recommendations to sit in a car and listen to with someone else.
00:23:53
Speaker
Those are all fantastic recommendations, Adrian. i I would add one more, somebody that you showed me on that a trip to California that you previously mentioned, and that was Waksahachi. I'm forgetting the name of the album you played, most of those that most of those tunes were off of. What what was the name of that album again? so We were probably listening to St. Cloud, but her album Tiger's Blood came out earlier this year and is also exceptional. Highly recommend it.
00:24:21
Speaker
Yeah, that was, um I mean, the lead singer of that group has a haunting, hauntingly beautiful voice and lyrically is outstanding. I have a great memory obviously of that trip to Stevenson and driving along the California coast and listening to that music. And then we had a ah few months later, a workshop ah with a client at Dartmouth Health up in New Hampshire. And I listened to it again on the train ride back to New York and a totally different environment out the window, but still a very
00:24:56
Speaker
um I don't know, it's just,
'Comfort TV' Recommendations
00:24:59
Speaker
it's beautiful music. So yeah, big thank you, Adrian, for, for getting me on that train. Walk as a hot sheet is excellent. I'll put out one more word for, uh, an artist that Ian introduced me to when we were on that trip, which is Thames. Um, she released an album this year, which is also wonderful. Um, T E M S check her out.
00:25:18
Speaker
Thanks, Adrienne. That was my my ah my sister's first dance at her wedding this summer, was to You and Me by Tams, or Me and You, sorry, Me and You. And yeah, her, all her music is... Yeah, been listening to her a lot. She's incredible. My other...
00:25:38
Speaker
category, I would say, of recommendation. I've really this year been enjoying what I'm going to call comfort TV or less cynical television. um I think that prestige TV is phenomenal and has really had its moment in the last decade or so. Think about things like Game of Thrones or even go back to the Sopranos and the Wire.
00:25:58
Speaker
People love these very serious, heady, dramatic television shows. Stressful television. Stressful television. Stressful television. I'm thinking also, yeah, in that vein, like The Bear, which is wonderful and I love The Bear, but you know it's known for being sort of high stress serious. It takes itself seriously. Even though they classify that show as a comedy for some reason, you know it's not a laugh out loud and then chill out and go to bed type of show. It's a type of show where you really need to pay attention and it feels like you're invested in every moment and it's intense. um I've been enjoying shows that do sort of of a reversal of that lately. um So I recommended last year at the show, Shrinking, which just had a second season come out and remains exceptional. um I know a lot of folks are familiar with Ted Lasso. I think that was maybe a recommendation a few years ago from somebody in the libretto group.
00:26:52
Speaker
This year, recently, we watched the show, A Man on the Inside, which is by Michael Schor, who's the guy who did Parks and Rec and Brooklyn Nine-Nine and The Good Place. um So a lot of other excellent comedies. And this one also stars Ted Danson, who's excellent in pretty much everything. um But what characterizes or or what how I would group these shows, I think, is around the idea that people act in empathetic and compassionate ways at the end of the day.
00:27:19
Speaker
Like there are certainly moments of conflict. There's certainly moments of crassness. They're funny. They're not intended to be, you know, Hallmark movies. But when people sit down to talk through problems, they are pretty honest and they say how they feel and they apologize. And I feel like that's not something that you get in a lot of these high stress type shows. And it's something that feels more true to life to me. And it feels like maybe if it's not the way conflict always goes, it feels like the way I wish conflict would go and the way that I hope conflict goes in my life.
00:27:50
Speaker
And there's something comforting about watching two people who have wronged one another, who have upset one another, just sit down and be like, Hey, I'm sorry that I did that and have the other person be like, no, I understand why you made that choice. And, you know, I forgive you and like, we can move on from that. And it's like, why doesn't that happen more in TV? Everybody's so grumpy in TV and I wish they would just chill out and just like be humans, you know? So that's something that I've, I've really been liking watching. Um, and I, I will add that.
00:28:19
Speaker
the next season of Severance comes out in like two weeks and I'm sure I will be back on the prestige. Everybody's mad yeah genre soon. Yeah, talking about stressful television. hit On the subject of Michael Shore, I think, and and sort of the idea of like television where people are people are good, I guess, like I think it's very interesting to look at his shows over time and it's almost like you kind of see him as a creator transforming from like a more cynical early 2000s person to like somebody who seems to kind of fundamentally see the good in humanity. like If you trace the arc from the office to Parks and Rec to the good place, it's like, oh, this guy is... ah like like I think he went to therapy at some point in there and and he's and he's doing better.
00:29:16
Speaker
I think you can even see it within the run of the office, you know going from the way that it was inspired based on the UK office, which is much more cynical even than the American office. And just mean too. like Yeah, definitely. Mean. Anyway, this most recent one, A Man on the Inside, definitely worth checking out. It's about it's apparently based on a true story about ah Ted Danson playing an older gentleman who's hired by a private investigator to investigate a potential theft within a ah like a nursing home, within a retirement community. um So he poses as a person who's in the retirement community, even though he doesn't want to be there, doesn't need to be there, and starts interviewing all the other residents to figure out who may or may not have committed this crime and starts making friendships with all of these other older retired people. and
00:30:05
Speaker
You know, it's nice to see retirees treated as humans with their own lives and and political squabbles and romances that are blossoming within the retirement community, et cetera. I am completely sold. That sounds perfect. That does sound wonderful. Thank you, Adrian. Well, here's the point where I reveal that my music taste is very similar to Adrian's because several of the albums that he mentioned are on my list for this year. Um,
00:30:34
Speaker
Chapel Rhone, I got into a lot this year. Actually, I'd heard Adrienne talk about it, but actually my cousin who is like 18 is a huge, huge Chapel Rhone fan. And she's like, you absolutely have to listen to this. um And I just got really into it. I really love how some of the songs have like an 80s vibe, um having grown up with a mom who loved listening to 80s music really loud in the house in my childhood. So it's kind of,
00:31:05
Speaker
sentimental for me but also just really fun to listen to and Sabrina Carpenter's album has been really fun too. I like to sing along with Sabrina Carpenter because um her vocal range is very similar to mine and not every pop stars is so hers is one that I like to play in the car because I can sing to the steering wheel No one to judge. um But actually my favorite album you did not mention, my favorite album from this year. There's been some singles released over the course of 2024. The album came out in September. um It's called Flood and it's by this band called Hippo Campus.
00:31:42
Speaker
and they're actually out of St. Paul, ah but I really recommend them if you haven't listened to them. They have, I want to say like four or five albums now, um and it is that same sort of pop vibe. Some albums get a little, not techno-y, but there's like kind of that electric keyboard kind of sound. It's very fun.
00:32:07
Speaker
um and They're actually gonna be touring this year and we're thinking about going to see them in Minneapolis when they're ah Performing there ah because it's really fun and actually one of the guys in the band. I also like his wife's music his wife Raffaella does um Music on her own. I also recommend listening to her um Her song NASA's fake has been on repeat like all year on my playlist. So um lots of music and And yeah, so that's been kind of what- Hippocampus is already on the playlist added. Okay. We'll be listening. Good. I love the name. Hippocampus is very funny. Yeah, I love that name. That's great. ah They're fun. um They actually did a song with Raffaella too. map um They covered maps, the song by the yayayayas. Yeah. And I do enjoy their cover of it.
00:33:02
Speaker
um But highly recommend Sippo Campus. Is Sippo Campus in the in indie rock realm, Tiffany? Yeah, I would say that. um Indie rock, kind of pop rock crossover. Definitely similar vibes to a lot of the popular music out there right now. Do you have a favorite song by them?
00:33:27
Speaker
Yes. um I like, actually it's one of their much older ones. I think it's called Bad Dream Baby. I don't even remember titles. I just hear the like first few notes and I'm like, that's the song I like. so but um Their Wasteland EP and then LP3 are really, really good. We have those that we play um we have the records that we'll play downstairs all the time.
00:33:56
Speaker
a little louder than maybe we should, but you know. And then- It's your house, you can play whatever you want. Exactly, exactly. In a much more serious note, I went for a serious TV show this year, and um I tend to just rewatch shows that I really enjoy, so me watching a brand new show is very rare, so enjoy it.
00:34:19
Speaker
um Very serious show, though, called Deadwood um was an HBO show in like the mid 2000s. And it's about the Deadwood, South Dakota area. ah Before it was part of the Dakota territory, I think the show will cover that happening. I'm almost done with season two. And there's three seasons. um Very gritty, very HBO, you know, a lot of language, a lot of, you know,
00:34:51
Speaker
They'll show blood and shooting and stuff. But I mean, the plots themselves are fairly interesting. It took me a while to get into, to be completely honest. And it honestly took until the women had more of a role. I really appreciated how one of the characters, um, she actually, she and her husband had a claim to a huge plot of land that had a ton of gold on it. Her husband died and she has been, you know,
00:35:19
Speaker
standing up for herself, allying herself with men who can help her keep her claim um because George Hurst is coming in and wants to snatch up all the land. um There's a lot of historical accuracy, um but I haven't like enjoyed reading you know which parts of this are accurate and which parts are kind of fabricated or dramatized for television.
00:35:43
Speaker
um And I guess, you know, looking back at how it did when it was on the air, it won a ton of awards. It won eight Emmys, a Golden Globe. It was, you know, really highly regarded at the time. um And I guess it got a movie in 2018, so that's also on our list to watch. um And I think I'm actually going to, we're going to be planning a trip there to actually see it in person.
00:36:14
Speaker
Because I... Inspired by watching the show? Yes, inspired by watching the show, actually. And I mean, maybe it's because I'm born and raised in the Midwest, but we don't always have these historical locations that end up the topic of television shows. So when it does happen, I'm really interested to see, you know, what does this place actually look like and soak up the history because the bulk of the cities where history has been talked about is, you know, East Coast, you know, bigger cities like that. So I really appreciate to, you know, it may be a more gritty, less glamorous type of history, but I'm really interested to see, you know, the same main streets and parts of it have, you know, there's a hotel that was built around the time that the show takes place that's still there today. Like there
00:37:11
Speaker
parts of that area persist. And so I'm really interested to see what it looks like and you can camp out there too. So, you know, I was going to say you should bring my camping. No, no, we're going to camp. So once I heard, once I heard camping, yeah, I knew Tiffany, I figured you and Dave would be jumping on that. Yeah. Yeah. We'll be camping when we go out that way. Um, we have to time it right. Cause it's also really near Sturgis and we don't want to like be overrun with a motorcycle rally when we go.
00:37:39
Speaker
since those areas are pretty close, but I recommend the show. It's good. It's serious though. So if you want something funny, this is the show. I'll wait till I'm back in my serious, serious phase. Yeah. Wait till you're in your serious phase to, to watch this, but it's good. It's only three seasons. I think there's 12 episodes in each season. So it's not a huge undertaking.
00:38:04
Speaker
You recommend the show and everybody will have to stay tuned for next year's best of to figure out whether you recommend the town itself. Yes. Yes. That sounds about right. Okay, so i have ah I have two. One is very much of the moment and one
'On Tyranny' by Timothy Snyder
00:38:22
Speaker
isn't. So I think it's hopefully this kind of a counterpoint. So one of them is a book published in 2017 that you may actually have heard about, which is called On Tyranny by Timothy Snyder.
00:38:38
Speaker
and He is a professor of history at Yale, and he has an extensive background in sort of the Soviet era and 20th century free politics in Eastern Europe. so
00:38:55
Speaker
Looking at this book now, what's interesting is even in the last month or two, um it's basically made up of 20 lessons from history, and ah the first lesson ah is something that's actually been sort of alluded and quoted in the media, which is, it's, do not obey in advance. Most of the power of authoritarianism is freely given. In times like these, individuals think ahead about what a more more repressive government will want and then offer themselves without being asked. A citizen who adapts in this way is teaching power what it can do.
00:39:36
Speaker
And I just think that in a year when there was so much disappointed associated with sort of predictions and kind of opining and punditry to see something that is so squarely of the moment um In a way that isn't, ah you know obviously it's it's kind of disturbing, but it just rings so much truer than a lot of the rhetoric um that you've been been exposed to lately. And another one another one that really stuck with me was, ah you know, lesson 13 is practice corporeal politics.
00:40:17
Speaker
Power wants your body softening in your chair and your emotions dissipating on the screen. Get outside. Put your body in unfamiliar places with unfamiliar people. Make new friends and march with them. And I just love that notion of sort of in real life um solidarity and you know that's two of the 20 lessons right there so it's it's an incredibly compact book and it's incredibly powerful and and perhaps somewhat ironically ah one of his more recent books is called On Freedom which I'm going to be reading and I think that's about the idea of um you know how how freedom is earned and what it involves and why
00:41:03
Speaker
it's It's such a necessary part of kind of living in a um viable and healthy society. So I'm looking forward to seeing the contrast of that. And he also, he has a sub-stack that I've subscribed to that's really great. And there's something again about the fact that um he's a historian as opposed to a commentator.
00:41:26
Speaker
I find that nowadays I'm just drawn to people who have that kind of broader context rather than um reacting to things in the moment. And I think it's good to have a connection with people who are in that kind of work because my sixth sense tells me and all my other five senses tell me that there's going to be a lot of reacting um going on in the near future. And so um my second choice is a counter to that. And one of the things in recent months that I've been, it's funny, one of the things that I've kind of found solace in is sort of history podcasts. Like I've been listening, I mean, everyone knows I'm a Jeopardy freak.
00:42:10
Speaker
So I've been listening to a podcast about the history of science because that's one of, but of course, because that's one of my weaker categories. But, you know, it's just, it's kind of like just knowledge for the sake of knowledge at a time when there's so much kind of tumult, um really feels, ah it's it's kind of a refuge for me almost. so but um Everyone also knows that you know i am I have a, I know it's a weird, but I have a mild celebrity obsession. ah But one of the podcasts that I've really enjoyed over the last year is called ah You're Wrong About. And it's hosted by this woman named Sarah Marshall, who has the greatest yeah URL of all time, which is remember Sarah Marshall instead of forgetting Sarah Marshall.
00:42:59
Speaker
And she basically uses these episodes to explore the context of particular individuals who are kind of cultural tropes and to examine the reality of their lives. And you know, it's longer format, it's usually around an hour.
00:43:19
Speaker
And um the topic the best topics I find are just really fascinating. She did one on um Lawrence v. Texas, which is the case where they ended up the Supreme Court ended up overturning the anti-sodomy laws in Texas. And she talks about you know how these people were arrested and how their case kind of gained traction and how they responded to this all this sort of fuss and publicity as individuals and how they were regarded afterwards and how you know their their lives played out. and There's just so much depth and context. and and I think the word that I feel a lot is poignancy that you see when people whose
00:44:10
Speaker
lives become these these almost cultural fodder, what that actually is about in reality. And she really, she really honors them. And there's another one, she did a two-part one on, wait for it, George Michael.
00:44:26
Speaker
And, you know, it's about his, obviously his celebrity phenomenon, his fall from grace, but also what his lived experience actually looked like and was about while this was happening to him in a way that I just, is so fascinating and so much more interesting than the cultural, but I'm sorry, the superficial sort of takes, hot takes that you you see about people.
00:44:54
Speaker
and so the other episode that we've i've mentioned to you all before which is kind of the, I think it's probably the most famous episode of the podcast is a two hour episode, which is about the making of rumors. And she just goes into this whole thing about how the record was made over a period of like, I think it was nine months. And it's it's an incredible portrait of what the music industry was in the seventies vis-a-vis what it is today and just incredibly thought provoking. And there's actually a Broadway show
00:45:28
Speaker
that's I think it's going to be a closing scene called Stereophonic, which is a three-hour show. ah The music was done by the guy from Arcade Fire, and it's about these this group making an album on stage and really playing and really singing. And you know that in some respects it's sort of an homage.
00:45:47
Speaker
to Fleetwood Mac and Rumors. So I'm just really, like and she's an incredibly smart, funny, great Morden kind of sense
Film 'Amelia Perez'
00:45:57
Speaker
of humor. And it's just a great way to get some quality social and cultural commentary. So those, I think those are two things that have just really um provided me with a lot of rich context over the last year, including the last few months. And I'll just add super quickly, because because we are recording this in 2025, just in the past week, I did see Amelia Perez, ah which is an absolute, I thought it was an absolute knockout and um incredibly
00:46:38
Speaker
It's an incredibly unfamiliar terrain and I'll just give the one-line description which is it's about the leader of a drug cartel who transitions from male to female and it's a musical and a lot of it is in Spanish and um Carla Sofia Gascon who we think is going to be probably The first trans actor to be nominated for an Oscar um is absolutely phenomenal in the role. And Zoe Saldana, amazing. And Selena Gomez, amazing. It's just ah really, again, really mind blowing, provocative.
00:47:24
Speaker
And it just takes you into ah new and unfamiliar terrain in ways that just kind of blew my mind. And it just won the Golden Globe as well.
Spy Series 'Slow Horses'
00:47:38
Speaker
It did. And Madison, it beat out Wicked. I know. I saw. Well, we'll see. This actually, I have to say this award season is really interesting because there's a lot of contenders coming at things from different directions.
00:47:54
Speaker
I also just say, I will say if we're talking about award seasons, again, hashtag celebrities, if anyone watched the Golden Globes, I thought Demi Moore's speech, her acceptance speech was amazing because she talked about someone referring to her as a quote, popcorn actress who would never receive any serious recognition. And, oh, she just, she just killed it. She was, you know, it was really,
00:48:21
Speaker
You don't get a lot of those moments in those shows, but I thought it was a really great moment. I have to see the substance. Has anybody seen the substance? I've heard such wonderful things about it. i'm Well, Sally doesn't like body horror, so she would never go for watch. You don't have to go with Sally. No, I know, but it's hard to explain.
00:48:43
Speaker
watch things on my own when there's only one TV in the house. I'm ah i'm with Sally on that one, Connor. I have difficulty with body horror as well. also I just had to mention, Neil, you had recommended On Tyranny, I think in October ah during one of your New York visits.
00:49:00
Speaker
And I put a hold in at ah Brooklyn Public Library ah shortly before the election. And then not surprisingly, after the election, there was about 100 holds on all available copies. So it is certainly relevant. I think I'm number 20 now. So I'll let you know when I finally get a chance to read it. But um I'm looking forward to reading that book for obvious reasons and for the reasons you just shared. I want to put in a word too quickly just for a podcast. My dad's favorite podcast was In the Dark, which had two seasons in like 2017 and 18. They just did a new season um this year, which was like a very close examination of Haditha in Iraq, some murders of civilians performed by US Marines.
00:49:47
Speaker
and It is horrifying and heart-wrenching and tarrowing, and I have a hard time recommending it unless you know you're getting into that, but it's incredibly well done and produced. When you think about sort of revisiting historical moments and and their impact and and sort of the way that it reverberates, I think that one's particularly interesting these days. Definitely worth a look.
00:50:09
Speaker
I could go on about this ad nauseam, but what you made me think of is there is a really excellent podcast that's about five episodes. That was five or six episodes that was done after the invasion of Ukraine, and it's called Next Year in Moscow, and it's about the experiences of Russians in relation to the war in Ukraine, and it is absolutely it's the it's done by the economist.
00:50:35
Speaker
And it is absolutely phenomenal. And again, it's just, it's really unfamiliar terrain because it's just what you're not getting when you're seeing kind of the mainstream media soundbite versions of the narrative. So another strong recommendation.
00:50:52
Speaker
I guess it's my turn. um The first thing that I wanted to talk about was a book that is called We Don't Know Ourselves. It's a personal history of Ireland since 1958. I learned about this book because a lot of people were talking about it when it came out and I thought, oh, you know, I don't know that much about Ireland. That would be an interesting book to read, but I didn't read it. And then we went to Ireland this summer and we we had a number of trips this year where we went to places and we got to the place and we realized like, wow, the history that we know about these places is very high level.
00:51:32
Speaker
We know about the history but only in the broadest sense. Like we know about the troubles and I know enough to tell my kids about what it was generally, but beyond that I sort of go off a plateau. ah We spent some time in northern Spain this year and I had this realization that I don't really know anything about the Franco years. I know what I learned in history class, but there's just all of these really big holes in my knowledge of sort of deeper historical context for a lot of places. um And I felt that very strongly while we were driving around Ireland this summer.
00:52:08
Speaker
So I decided that it was time to visit this book and I stopped in this little village in Seaside Town and this bookseller came out and it was a book that a bookstore that really catered to a lot of tourists and it had sort of a whole front section that was just romance novels. And um I went up to the guy and asked him for this book.
00:52:32
Speaker
And he was sort of a tweed jacket with leather patches kind of guy. And he got so excited and he he just started talking to me about this book. And he seemed really proud of my choice, which made me feel this great dedication to read the whole book and to really engage with it. But he um he was saying how this book has changed a lot of people's vision of Irish history because it is a personal history of Ireland since 1958. So Finton O'Toole wrote it, realizing that what he wanted to do originally was to write a memoir. And he said, you know, in one of the reviews I read, he said, my life wasn't exciting enough to write a memoir, but I realized that during my life, all of these incredible things had happened in Ireland. And so he wrote the book through the lens of his own life and his own experiences.
00:53:20
Speaker
So I am not someone who typically reads a lot of nonfiction. I'm a real reader of novels. But this book was the perfect blend for me because you get all of the history and you get the narrative of his life. But unlike a novel where the history is sort of the backdrop to the plot, in this book, it sort of flipped. And so the history is in the forefront. And in the background, you have him kind of filtering it through his own life experience, even from the day he was born. He starts really when he was born. and talks about the context of the country and what his parents were going through and how it kind of framed his family when he was very young. So that was really, really fun for me and interesting. And it got me um engaged with the nonfiction in a way that I don't always, um I don't always get as into it as quickly, but there's that narrative bent on this made it really, really fun and engaging. And I had just learned a ton of things that
00:54:19
Speaker
I mean, it really showed me that when I thought I didn't know anything about Ireland, I was entirely right. um There's just really an incredible history that is um covered in the, it's a 60 year history, so it's covered there.
00:54:32
Speaker
It sounds like, in some ways, like a picaresque, like when you're describing it. I'm thinking of, you know, uh, Candide. Candide, yeah. Voltaire Candide, where he, his life is lived out against the backdrop of these historical events. And just while we're talking about it, another kind of picaresque that if you've never, Midnight's Children by Salman Rushdie.
00:54:50
Speaker
Because the main character is the first child born in India, I think, after the partition. So his entire life is determined by these historical events. And this sounds like a really interesting kind of non-fiction kind of version of that.
00:55:09
Speaker
It is, it allows you a foothold into the history. So you have, you know, I've learned so much history from novels, from the reading of novels, but oftentimes I think like, oh, you know, maybe it's not exactly the history as it was told, or maybe I'm getting a different version of it because it's told through the lens of this character. It's told in support of this story. Whereas in this case, I felt like this, the the the personal history was simply the lens through which to see the history. And it allowed you to just get that unfiltered version, but also the narrative on top of it. Yeah, I mean, I think you're absolutely right that there's a ah tie into the the character development that happens in, I mean, there's lots of novels. You could even think about a Don Quixote or something like that, where how you take the the reality versus the e-reality of the character's life and how that stacks up to the historical moment.
00:56:05
Speaker
Two years ago I read about that book in The Atlantic because The Atlantic magazine did a review and I was really intrigued by it. but It's been somewhere on my to-do list for a while to read that book because I was just so moved by the review, which is written by somebody from Ireland who's roughly the same age as Fentanyl Tool, and the reviewer is seeing their own parallels and in terms of their life experience. So I know that's this is this is going to move a little bit higher up on my to read list. Good call.
00:56:38
Speaker
Um, so my other recommendation is a TV show. And I was really, really worried that somebody else was going to talk about it because I feel like everybody should be watching the show and maybe everybody is, maybe everyone's not loving it as much as I am, but, um, it's slow horses. So this show, Oh, I love that show.
00:56:57
Speaker
I love it. I mean, it just for me, it hits every button of things that I love. It's like, it's got the spy stuff. it's got Why do I want to be Gary Oldman even though he's so reprehensible? Like there's there's something about his character in that show that is just like... Because he's like a sleeper genius, right? You you don't realize how incredibly spot on every one of his decisions is because he's got this veneer of the drinking, farting, miserable, acerbic guy. And then you you as you watch the show, you realize that everything he's doing is spot on and that the reason that he's... So I'll start, I'll back up a little bit, but Slow House is about an MI5 division that is made up of
00:57:47
Speaker
spies who have somehow screwed up their career. So they've had some massive blunder and they've been put into slow house to ride out their days, essentially. So they're supposed to be just sitting around kind of biding time until their retirement.
00:58:03
Speaker
But they all are still in the game and they're ambitious and they want to do the work and they want to prove themselves and get back into the main MI5. And they're led by Jackson Lamb, who's played by Gary Oldman.
00:58:19
Speaker
And Gary Oldman is just a hot mess in this show, but incredibly lovable at the same time. um So yeah it's like Connor said, why do you want to be him? Like, why do you want to be his friend too? He's awful. And yet he captures every single scene that he's in.
00:58:38
Speaker
um And he saves a lot of the key moments of the show. And one of the things I thought it was funny to hear Adria knew talking about the sort of diversion TV. One of the things that I love about this is that it has so much of the really smart geopolitical stuff going on. You really use your brain about it, but it's also hilarious. And in the middle of the darkest moments, they somehow make me laugh.
00:59:03
Speaker
out loud, which is very rare for me in a TV show, but um the show absolutely cracks me up. And it's also complex enough so that I never lose interest so that you have all of these different storylines and you have the spy storylines and the interpersonal storylines, but somehow they managed to connect them. So season four is an incredible season where the interpersonal stuff and the spy stuff has really come together and been knitted together. So for some of the characters, you start to understand how their background is really tied into MI5 history. um So for me, it hits all my buttons and it's incredibly well acted and it's got Kristen Scott Thomas wearing spectacular outfits. um So it it's it's just pleasing on many different levels and I highly recommend.
00:59:55
Speaker
It sounds a little bit like, because of course, for peak stress TV, there's nothing like Homeland. And you know, Claire Danes is just like a spectacularly messed up spy. So that's a good, it's a good sandbox to play in it sounds like. To play in, yeah. Unstable spies. I'm doing some side research here, Nancy, and I see that there's only six episodes per season, which is also very attractive.
01:00:24
Speaker
It is attractive and yet at the end of every season, I'm bereft and I want it to keep going. and And so they do a really good job keeping it super tight, but it it leaves you wanting more. um It definitely made me think, and Neil, I actually thought this was what you were gonna say. It definitely made me think of the Bureau in a lot of ways, um but the Bureau takes itself a lot more seriously than the show does. So this is closer maybe to the good place than to,
01:00:53
Speaker
um The Bureau, it's got a lot of that interpersonal stuff that just keeps it very light and funny, even though there's really crazy stuff going on. So it doesn't have all of that darkness that The Bureau has. Well, speaking of stress TV, I think you know this, is I was started watching The Bureau and I do not try this at home. I read the synapes synopsis of the next episode I was going to watch and I was like, I cannot watch this and I stop.
01:01:23
Speaker
There's also something about watching like like sort of espionage, thriller, like like political geopolitical shows that take place in another country because it's a little bit sort of like, okay, well, this isn't really my problem because they all have fancy accents. so you know This particular terrorist threat is not my problem. Exactly. Yeah, exactly.
01:01:47
Speaker
ah Yeah. And it's also, we watched the Bureau and the depth of the COVID lockdowns and it was all of those foreign locations and seeing bustling marketplaces in Turkey and um busy train stations in Paris and that kind of thing was just reminding us that the world was out there. And I think there's definitely these shows make you travel and Slow Horses does that, it gets you into the, I mean,
01:02:18
Speaker
people who've seen the show, there's this ongoing trope of them running through train stations and chasing the bad guy and knocking all these people over. And just the the banality of the daily commute that you see in the show is really amazing. And then it's broken up by these action sequences of them repeatedly running through the train stations. I find it hilarious and wonderful. That is hysterical. That's funny.
01:02:45
Speaker
Well, my two picks, the first was partially inspired by
'The Path Between Seas'
01:02:50
Speaker
Neil. Neil had told me about a podcast he was listening to called The Big Dig, which is obviously about Boston's Big Dig, an enormous infrastructure project. And I have always had a soft spot for histories about enormous like urban works. I i read The Power Broker a few years ago, which took me a few years to read because it's an enormous book. And then this year I read The Path Between Seas, which is about the creation of the Panama Canal. And though it may sound a little dry, it was actually a very fun, fast
01:03:30
Speaker
The first attempt at construction of the Panama Canal was by the French and it's a really fascinating history to see how they all convened with a bunch of engineers in Paris and they had consultants and experts from all over the world show up to this ah meeting where they tried to figure out the best way to construct the canal and um just the force of personality that the French had in um deciding upon the plan, much to the chagrin of some of the other experts in the room who were advocating for other cheaper ways to do it. um It was just really very fascinating history. and And David McCullough, who wrote the book, does a great job of bringing out the the personalities and the dispositions. Eventually, of course, the French run out of money, the Americans take over. That's sort of the second half of the book, Teddy Roosevelt. um
01:04:28
Speaker
moves pretty aggressively into the into the final phase of construction, which actually um is ah I think 60 to 70% of what was left. um the The French only got about 20 to 30% of the way there, but it was yeah i was it was a great book. I was expecting something that would be a bit of a challenge, but I think it was actually Pretty easy sledding, um so highly recommended, especially here in the depths of winter if you want to spend some time in late 1800s Panama. It's funny because I was thinking about i thinking about the power broker because when Conor was talking about the the sort of the read-along of Lord of the Rings,
01:05:07
Speaker
um Roman Morris who does 99% Invisible. oh yeah They did a Power Broker book club and ah every week they do a chapter with people like AOC and Conan O'Brien. So Ian, you could actually listen to that without having to read.
01:05:26
Speaker
It's so funny. My brother is listening to that right now every day. He listens to that on his commute and he played it for me on a drive back from New Jersey to New York. It's amazing. Highly recommend that podcast. 99% Invisible is fantastic. I might need to listen to that. I will third that recommendation. Same.
01:05:46
Speaker
I might need to listen to that series because it's the that that would probably be the way that would actually get me through The Power Broker. I like i'm i think I'm pretty close to 50% of the way through, but um it's it's sort of like, okay, yeah, i'm i'm I'm making good progress. Oh, wait, I still have the entire second half of the book to read. Oh, boy.
01:06:07
Speaker
Well, this is a weird segue, but it's like if it wasn't for Robert Moses, I would probably have a four lane highway like running through my apartment because what he did to people in New York and to the urban landscape in New York is what inspired people to stop the Route 95 project. That's the sort of the starting point of the big dig.
01:06:32
Speaker
podcast. And that whole story is just, it's also, it's incredibly emotional. I mean, when you realize what these people did and they actually, they really sort of started a movement first, um first federal highway project ever stopped by citizens.
01:06:47
Speaker
center distance interaction and I just I'll stop but The big dig is also the completion of the US interstate project because it's written 90 I mean, it's just really so that stuff is that it's it's funny It's infrastructure which you think of is you know, the most boring stuff ever, but it's as is the canal, right? Right. but No, totally again context so um Just this morning. lives it's yeah not it's It's not boring. It's it's people's lives. it's how they It's how they interact with their surroundings. and it as I think as as something like the big dig or or the power broker or any of these
01:07:25
Speaker
these works reveal, it truly shapes how people live their lives and their economic fortunes and social fortunes and basically everything. like we We think of it as sort of like, oh, well, here's a street. like Well, no, this this the way that this street has been constructed is fundamentally shaping all of the people who interact with it in any way.
01:07:54
Speaker
And now we can talk about Jane Jacobs. But I actually wanted to talk about this morning in the New York Times, there was an article about um the Panama Canal and the the fish and how the expansion of the canal has created this ecological disaster of um all of the freshwater fish are being displaced by the saltwater fish. And you know I think it just it's another example of infrastructure affects everything, and it has this incredible environmental effect. And now they're realizing that when they did the expansion, they did not consider how the salinity levels of the freshwater pieces of Lake Atun were going to
01:08:37
Speaker
fundamentally changed the ecology of the location. And there you have it. Like this is going to be a long standing problem. One of the fishermen they interviewed said, you know, I'm not so worried about me, but I'm worried about the next generation. Like what is going to happen to our drinking water, to our traditional fishing methods, to our food sources, all of it's connected. I think Robert Moses may have displaced 200,000 people.
01:09:03
Speaker
in total via eminent domain. probably more yeah but And guess what kinds of zip codes they tend they guess what zip codes they tended to inhabit. you know it's and that it's like what conra was saying ah infrastructure it real It's funny, it really is so much about power and the levers of power. And and brokering power.
01:09:21
Speaker
Yeah, he did that without ever being elected without ever being elected to office. He was a very nice Adrienne. But yeah, that's I think that's the most haunting part of the Robert Moses story is he was never an elected official. He just appointed himself under all these various mayors and governors governors and committee members transformed. Yeah, a huge region without anybody having a chance to say What? No? Well, hold on. No, you know, yeah, it's a fascinating story. I'm gonna keep it moving along here.
Jack Johnson's New Album
01:09:51
Speaker
My second ah best of the year is in a totally different vein. It's the new-ish album from Jack Johnson, who was a huge powerhouse when I was in like middle school and high high school. It was just kind of the chilled,
01:10:11
Speaker
brought out soundtrack to a lot of bonfires and car rides. I didn't really take him too seriously when I was a kid, maybe because he was a bit he was kind of everywhere and and I might have just gotten a bit ah fatigued. But his um the album he came out with, I think it's about a year and a half ago, it's just really beautiful. he's um really embraced Hawaiian slack key guitar playing. So a lot of the songs are in these Hawaiian tunings and the collaborations are with a lot of native Hawaiian guitar players and musicians. It's a beautiful piece of music. I was listening to a lot of, um I think through a friend of mine, he got me into this like,
01:10:58
Speaker
album of just slack key players which is just very relaxing music um played in these alternative tunings and to hear it in sort of a more pop folk context.
01:11:10
Speaker
I was really, really impressed. I've been playing it a lot and playing it even more now that it's so cold in New York City. It's kind of a nice way to mentally escape the doldrums of early January, but highly recommend. I did not have high expectations going into it and I was very pleasantly surprised. He's a very adept guitar player. It's very pretty. I feel like Jack Johnson for years was sort of the equivalent of comfort TV. It's like you could listen to it. Tough music or you could listen to Jack Johnson. Totally. Curious George soundtrack, for example. Outstanding soundtrack for an outstanding show. That is always what I think of when I think of Jack Johnson as Curious George. I don't know why. Maybe that's not what he would prefer to be most known for in my mind. Probably not.
01:11:59
Speaker
My first introduction to Jack Johnson was I think of a like an eighth grade talent show. Some guys in my class played flake and it was the first time I'd heard him and I was like, this song is amazing. I went in a big Jack Johnson kick. There are parallels to be drawn between Jack Johnson and the Steve Miller band, I think. Yeah. I mean, it's that sort of lightness is that like people are slightly embarrassed about listening to it. Yep. It's kind of I think it's I think it's a lot harder to be pleasant background music than really self-serious music. I think it's like easier to write a sad song than a happy-go-lucky song. I've never thought about it. Steve Miller Band is in similar waters for sure. I was singing more like Jimmy jimmy jimmy Buffett, but I see Steve Miller Band as well.
01:12:43
Speaker
I have recently like discovered a number of bands that, and I think Ian, I think I i i turned you on to one of these, which was Lawrence. um But like Lawrence and Couch and Sammy Ray and the Friends and stuff like that. yeah And it's like, I couldn't quite figure out exactly like what is this genre? Like what did what what what unites these these these bands? And you know, it was sort of like,
01:13:10
Speaker
I couldn't like it was a little bit soul inflected like it's definitely happy go lucky. um Lake Street Dive. Yeah, oh, absolutely Lake Street Dive love Lake Street Dive. um And then like I was reading about at least one of these bands.
01:13:26
Speaker
And i think it was on wikipedia and it said like that like genre yacht rock and i'm like oh no oh no it's oh but but they're right oh it is it's neo yacht rock oh that's awful so talk about i feel so thats good about myself now.
01:13:44
Speaker
Exactly. Talk about music that you're like kind of embarrassed to to be listening to. It's like I never thought myself as ah as a yacht rock person. like so Embrace it, Connor. I know. i i i I reject the label and continue to listen to the music.
01:14:14
Speaker
Well, thank you everyone for sharing these recommendations. I know that I am certainly going to be checking some of these out. I hope all of our listeners found some interesting tidbits here as well and that everyone had as great a year as all of us have had. This has been Well Put, a libretto podcast. And if you want to learn more about libretto and what we do, check out ahretto hyphen ink dot com that libretto That's libretto-inc. Well put.