Back in the day, preparing for a road trip involved selecting a couple hundred music CDs, removing each disc from its plastic jewel case, and placing them one-by-one into a giant vinyl CD binder. That ritual was replaced about five years ago by a laptop full of mp3s that I used to tote around on the road. Two years ago, the laptop was replaced by an iPod Touch.
Despite having a large music library, I tend to listen to the same albums over and over again on the road, and those albums are starting to get old. Recently, I began hunting down interesting Podcasts to listen to while driving. One podcast I always download and tkae with me is the Retroist’s.
Most episodes of The Retroist use the following format: a topic (usually something from the 1970s or 80s) is announced, and the opens the show with a short anecdote from his childhood relating to the topic. A song related to the topic (sometimes peripherally) is then played (I sometimes skip this part), and then the Retroist discusses the topic at length for about 30 minutes. Most of the show’s topics include movies (The Lost Boys, Ghostbusters, The Neverending Story), television shows (Star Wars: Droids, ALF, Smurfs), video games (Missile Command, Tetris, Pole Position) or other bits of retro memorabilia (New Coke, VCRs,and Rubik’s Cubes). If you are interested in any (or all) of those topics, you should check out the Retroist’s podcast. There are currently 75 episodes available to download. The shows are packed full of facts, and are short enough to enjoy in a single sitting.
Link: Retroist.com
PS: Speaking of podcasts, I should have a new episode of You Don’t Know Flack all about Arcade Auctions posted Monday morning.
I listened for a while until I realized that most of the facts sounded like they were read straight off Wikipedia. Then it got kinda boring. I wish Earl Evans would do more Retrobits podcasts. Those were cool!
Yeah, I like the Retrobits podcast too. I think Earl does a great job, but they’re not always subjects that interest me, so I tend to pick and choose episodes for road trips.