1001 Album Club: Podcast

 

A friend mentioned this to me and I gave it a listen - the idea was that a few casual friends meet every week and discuss the quintessential albums listed as 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die. 

What was immediately obvious was that these are not educated (or even well read) music critics, these are completely regular guys meeting and discussing what they just heard. My initial reaction was very negative because they come across as children of their own times and completely unaware of anything that has ever been done before - obviously they are stuck in their own time frames and can't wrap their heads around something that was a product of previous era. Lots of giggling, guessing, absolute no knowledge or previous research about the artists and some quasi-serious, authoritative insights that most of the time just made me angry.

However, I found that later I actually go back to this Podcast when I'm in a tram on my way home from work or even as I walk in the street. It took me a few episodes to warm up to them and something strange happened: I realised they are good guys. Yes, they are totally naive and uninformed, they still giggle and say stupid things but what matters is they actually go and listen these old music albums and try to figure them out. Obviously, they are children of their times so its very difficult for them to understand the atmosphere of 1950s and 1960s, but at least they are trying: there is 0 insight or anything fresh they have to say about music itself, since all they do is read Wikipedia. On the positive side, because they are not professionals, the guys react to the music with a clean heart and open ears, so when they really enjoy something, they embrace it with open arms.

For example, they hated debut album by Joan Baez but were absolutely enamoured with Dave Brubeck (so much that one of the guys later went out and bought a record), they very passionately discuss why this particular album is listed as must hear, etc. There is a warm atmosphere around the table and each episode (annoying as they might be, when they talk about my favourite artists and have absolutely no clue) and a feeling that I am a fly on the wall where friends just chat about the music.