Afleveringen
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Songwriters in most every genre dabble in themes of alcohol and drug use - some of them just looking for a good time, some of them looking for a serious escape from their lives and some of them looking to feed an addiction.
On this episode of "How We Heard It," the guys take it all in, from the playful and silly party songs to the sobering cries for help from artists who are no longer with us.
If you or someone you care about is struggling with substance abuse, please seek the advice of a trusted friend, family member or professional.
And if you just want to unwind with a cold one or have a toke, we've got you covered.
No judgment.
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Forget about sappy love songs and happy party songs. Sometimes you've just got to rip somebody a new one, and you don't want to be nice about it.
The cathartic power of a mean song can't be underestimated, whether you just need to get something off your chest or you need to dig deep and drive someone completely out of your life.
So this week the hosts of "How We Heard It" are mad as hell and they're not going to take it anymore. They've come up with their favorite mean songs for any situation - whether you need to obliterate an ex, tell off a co-worker or shake your fist at the whole world.
Let us help you help yourself.
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The whole world is full of great music, so this week the "How We Heard It" guys travel the globe to unveil some of the artists who have caught their attention - from Latin America to Asia to Europe to Africa.
Some sing in English, some don't. Some play contemporary popular music you might hear throughout the United States and Great Britain, others don't. And some of these acts you might already know - including performers you may not realize aren't from an English-speaking country.
Find out how and why some of these artists have found their way into the Western conscience and how the show's hosts discovered some of the others.
It's a big world out there.
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Music is in a constant state of change, keeping it in line with shifts in popular culture overall as genres rise and fall in popularity and technology trends change how music is made and how we listen to it.
They say change is good, and often that's the case, but veteran music critics Wayne Bledsoe and Chuck Campbell and their musician friend John Baker have been irritated and incensed by some of these changes - some of them were just temporary bumps in the road and some of them have been permanently irritating.
On this week's "How We Heard It," the guys debate music trends that got under their skin and stayed there, including shifts in rock, pop, R&B, rap and country music as well as how music is produced on stage and in the studio.
And a special note to today's performers: Please stop singing with dead people. It's just creepy.
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We're constantly passing judgment on others, even if subconsciously - including when we're deciding what movie to watch or what music to hear. The words and actions of celebrities are met with our approval and our disdain, coloring our interest in their work.
It's no different for critics, who have to teach themselves to be fair and neutral when evaluating the work of performers. Or do they?
In this week's episode of "How We Heard It," veteran entertainment critics Wayne Bledsoe and Chuck Campbell talk about the process of separating the artist from the art ... and what they've done when they just couldn't.
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While searching and scrolling through music videos on YouTube, most of us have found ourselves watching videos of people watching the videos we came to see.
And they're commenting and reviewing these videos, pausing them and replaying parts, sometimes talking over them and sometimes talking more about each other than about the videos.
They typically claim to have never seen the music video before, and often to have never heard the song before. And some of them are obviously lying. Sometimes they don't know much of anything about their subject - and worse, sometimes they spread misinformation. These "reaction videos" can be irritating, insulting and infuriating.
But when done correctly, the reaction video can be a beautiful experience, a chance to see and hear someone fall in love with a song or an artist you already love as younger folks feel the vibe of beloved older songs and as older folks find beauty in new artists ... and as people of different cultures broaden their horizons as they embrace the power of music.
Not to get too meta, but this episode of "How We Heard It" finds veteran music writers Wayne Bledsoe and Chuck Campbell reacting to the videos of people reacting to music videos. They talk about how these videos get it right, how they get it wrong, and how they go completely off the rails.
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All the time they tried their best, is this the kind of thanks they get?
Veteran journalists Chuck Campbell and Wayne Bledsoe have made careers of keeping up with and analyzing music, and in this episode of "How We Heard It," they unload on the pitfalls - like slogging through terrible albums, dealing with pushback from disgruntled fans and shaking their heads at undeserving bands and singers who became improbably famous.
Joined by their engineer/musician friend John Baker, the guys talk about the value, or lack of value, of negative reviews, the impact of technology like Auto-Tune on music, the celebrity deaths that hit the hardest and that godawful Kars4Kids jingle.
But at the end of the day, they still love music, and they explain how nothing hits like hearing a great song for the first time.
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Veteran entertainment writers (and friends) Chuck Campbell and Wayne Bledsoe and their engineer/musician friend John Baker love a good laugh. So on this episode of "How We Heard It," they check off a list of the best comedians in the business these days.
From the cleanest of the clean to the ones who constantly teeter on the line of getting cancelled, these comedians have all found their niches.
In addition to sharing some of their favorite jokes by these celebrities, Chuck and Wayne talk about behind the scenes dirt, share the struggles they've had interviewing comedians and zero in on a couple of comics they just don't like.
And of course Wayne dusts off the memories of comedians who are no longer with us. Wayne is gonna Wayne, after all.
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Most bands and singers do at least an occasional love song now and then, and love is the most common subject in popular music.
But good love songs can be hard to find - some of the best singers aren't quite convincing as they try to manipulate us with formulaic schlock, and hardly anything is worse than a bad love song.
So in this episode of "How We Heard It," veteran music critics Chuck Campbell and Wayne Bledsoe put their heads together to come up with a list of songs that actually capture the magic of love, from classic rock to modern pop plus a healthy group of diversions and surprises.
Love is out there. You just have to look for it.
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No offense to long songs, but sometimes you don't need to hear long intros, repetitive choruses, bridges, someone noodling around on a guitar and protracted outros.
This week on "How We Heard It," veteran music journalists (and friends) Wayne Bledsoe and Chuck Campbell celebrate the beauty of short songs - they hit fast, they hit hard, and then they let you get on with your day.
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Veteran music critics Chuck Campbell and Wayne Bledsoe have spent decades arguing with each other, publicly and privately, about who should (and who would) win the Grammy Awards.
On paper, the 2025 Grammys look like a showdown between the two biggest powerhouses of the day: Will pop music maverick Taylor Swift steamroll over the competition again to take home an unprecedented fifth Best New Album, or will Beyonce finally succeed by winning her first Best Album award (after four previous nominations) with her polarizing country album?
Or are the Grammy voters sufficiently exhausted by the Taylor Swift vs. Beyonce hype to pivot to another winner? Billie Eilish is waiting in the wings, and both Chappell Roan and Sabrina Carpenter had amazing breakthough years. And somehow there's even a "new" Beatles song in the mix!
Chuck and Wayne break it all down on this week's episode of "How We Heard It," analyzing how and why each contender could win or lose ... and of course, they argue.
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With rare exceptions, humans love to laugh and they love music. We differ on what we find funny and what kind of music we like, but when comedy and music come together, it can be magical.
On this episode of "How We Heard It," the guys explore how humor has found its way into music, and vice versa, and how the two art forms are probably more united now than ever.
Also this episode, "How We Heard It" welcomes guest Sneaky Pete Rizzo, a scientist and professor emeritus from Texas A&M as well as an accomplished musician who has more than dabbled in humor in music over the years. Pete, who has had many songs featured on the "Dr. Demento" radio show, talks about the glory days of novelty songs and how humor and music intertwine.
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On this episode of "How We Heard It," the guys talk about some of the greatest ballads in classic and modern pop music.
Well, first they argue about what a ballad even is, but once they settle on a definition, they talk about how a performer's authenticity makes all the difference between a song that inspires you and a song that's just generic garbage.
If you've ever been moved by a song and you can't explain why, maybe this can help you figure it out!
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The movie industry has buckled under intense challenges in recent years - including a devastating pandemic that shut down theaters for months, labor strikes that disrupted the production process and release schedules, a glut of streaming services that fragmented distribution ... and not least of all, a lack of innovative thinking at the top, where the same basic movies are constantly being greenlighted to lukewarm (or even cold) reception.
In this episode of "How We Heard It," veteran entertainment journalists and longtime movie fans Wayne Bledsoe and Chuck Campbell dissect where the film industry keeps getting it wrong and what it's doing right to keep hope alive.
Spoiler alert: The world doesn't need all these comic-book-based movies. Also, some of best ideas these days are coming from, improbably enough, horror films ...
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Change is inevitable.
When you live in the day-to-day world of popular music, you might not notice, but the music industry is endlessly changing. It's a revolving door of artists and a rise and fall of genres. Also, the recording process and delivery system for music is constantly pivoting, and the audiences themselves are cycling in and out as their wants and needs shift.
This week on "How We Heard It" we ring in the second half of the 2020s by looking at just how much has changed in music from decade to decade in the past 50 years.
Then the team looks into the future with their hopes and fears: How will music change between now and 2035?
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Songs can make you blush and songs can make you mad, but should they ever be banned?
Veteran music journalists Wayne Bledsoe and Chuck Campbell take a look at how and why artists have been censored and how others have avoided it. And no, it doesn't always make sense.
They also look at the fickle world of cancellation and how some artists get whacked while others get a pass. (Plus, sometimes artists even ban their own songs.)
One thing's for sure: History shows that whatever you think is OK by today's standards will probably come under fire years from now.
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Sometimes performers and journalists hit it off beautifully, and the result is a fun and breezy piece that engages and informs fans.
This episode of "How We Heard It" isn't about those stories. Instead, veteran entertainment journalists Wayne Bledsoe and Chuck Campbell share their experiences in which musicians lied about who they were as well as interviews that were beyond awkward - including the time when a woman cornered Wayne to talk about her multiple personality disorder and the time when Chuck sat down with a 1970s icon and their conversation got so weird they had to get away from each other.
These are the stories journalists rarely tell.
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If singers talked the way they sing, you might think they were having a stroke.
From The Beatles and Nat "King" Cole to The Police and Beck to Taylor Swift and Sabrina Carpenter, singers have been making up words, started counting or spelling for no reason, and they've had weird bouts of repeating select words.
Sometimes they're avoiding censorship, sometimes it just inexplicably sounds right ... and sometimes, well, maybe they ARE having a stroke.
In this episode of "How We Heard It," Chuck and Wayne explore modern and classic songs featuring weird lyrics that have entertained, and irritated, them for years.
And the haters can just hate, hate, hate, hate, hate.
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You might enjoy a couple of those old Christmas movies and TV shows that you watch every year, but let's face it: Most of that stuff is looking awfully dusty these days.
It's time for a reset.
In this episode of "How We Heard It," veteran entertainment journalists Chuck Campbell and Wayne Bledsoe catch you up on a bunch of more recent holiday movies and TV shows you may have missed - and also throw in some older fare that might have eluded you.
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The debut album is a monumental accomplishment for a music artist. It's an announcement that you've arrived, an introduction to your heart and soul that just anyone can explore.
But debut albums aren't always such a wonder for the listener. The artist might still be rough around the edges, the production might be shoddy, the songwriting might be clunky, and the artistic vision might be blurry.
It's no wonder that many performers don't hit stride until their third or fourth albums.
Yet sometimes an artist gets it just right with their very first release, and in this episode of "How We Heard It," your fearless hosts make a case for some of the best debut albums in the history of popular music.
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