13 April 2005

Podcast Review: Pop Goes the Culture!

Exercise: 30 min. (dance)
Water: 48 oz.

This week I gave Pop Goes the Culture! another listen. This weekly podcast would be a nice fit for NPR. The two presenters are obviously articulate and well-read. Barbara Luhring is a political cartoonist and her podcast partner Susie Watson is a trend analyst who has worked in advertising. The topics are varied but always viewed through the lens of pop culture.

I mentioned that last week's show suffered from sound problems, but that was an aberration. The duo has only been podcasting since January, so I was able to listen to all of the archives in one sitting. The sound quality on the other shows was very good, even when they have someone else sit in on the discussion with them. There were only two instances where I heard a phone ring in the background but they barely acknowledged it, unlike some podcasts where the presenter would veer off topic and center the rest of the show around the ringing phone.

Despite all the positive aspects I've mentioned, I don't think that this is a show that I would listen to every week. In two separate shows, Barb and Susie have commented on how society is divided into people who care about hard news/real issues and people who care about celebrity gossip. I think that I fall into a third group: people who are so busy juggling all the balls in their own lives that they don't have time to care about either one. My favorite PGtC! shows were ones about TV, libraries, and Americans' eating habits. These are topics to which I can relate, while the fantasy press conference with President Bush went completely over my head. I guess I will be keeping PGtC! on my Bloglines list and give them a listen when they are talking about something I can understand. Now I am off to their blog to comment on that library episode :-).

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