Four guys with varying experiences in the world of music talk about performing, listening to and working with music. We explore a few questions like - What are the challenges facing the music industry today? How can music shape identity and meaning? Can any genres be considered pretentious or is pretention a myth? Is there a valid argument for "culturally appropriating" music? And can pop music be considered a bad thing?
Drawing from our gigging experiences and academic study we chat about the psychology of music, its appeal as a universal language and how it can be seen as a kind of therapy. - Our thoughts summarised
Edited by Connor.
Audio & music mastering / production by Nye James. Jingles recorded by Nye (guitars) & Connor (harmonica, mandolin)
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For our 50th episode we thought we'd try something a little different… Our off the cuff conversation takes us from experience machines to belief in god, free will, happiness and humanism. We ask whether it makes sense to think of a non-religious life as meaningless and whether "unearned" or "false" happiness is desirable (or indeed, even possible). What is the relationship between meaning and happiness and is there something valuable in the pursuit of both? We'd love to have more improvised chats like this and expand on a lot of these ideas in the future.
Articles by Connor & Nye on related stuff https://nyejames.com/blog/ https://twobeersuntilphronesis.weebly.com/herefordshire-humanists.html
Editing by Connor.
Audio & music mastering / production by Nye James. Jingles recorded by Nye (guitars) & Connor (harmonica, mandolin)
We've all heard of it but have you ever wanted to find out what Quantum Mechanics actually is? Well here's a Christmas treat! As promised, Nye explains QM from the ground up; starting with the history and context of why and how it was theorised.
Apologies for any minor audio issues or repetition of points made in other podcasts.
Editing, audio & music mastering / production by Nye James.
Jingles recorded by Nye (guitars) & Connor (harmonica, mandolin)
Named after Italian-American physicist Enrico Fermi, the Fermi Paradox characterises the contradiction between optimistic probabilistic arguments for the existence of life elsewhere in the universe and the lack of evidence for it. In this podcast Nye explains why most estimates (such as the Drake equation) are so high and covers the suggested explanations for this famous contradiction. In doing so Nye unpacks many of the statistics that highlight the extraordinary vastness of space and the miracle of life itself.
Edited by Connor.
Audio & music mastering / production by Nye James. Jingles recorded by Nye (guitars) & Connor (harmonica, mandolin)
Outraged by the death of his mentor Socrates, and the thoughtlessness of ancient Greek society, a young Plato set off travelling on his adventures. It was during this time that Plato turned to writing his first dialogues. Using the character of Socrates in some of the craziest ancient fan fiction ever written, Platonic dialogues explored questions of truth, reality, virtue and the soul; often all at once.
While Alfred North Whitehead's statement that "All of philosophy is a footnote to Plato" - may be the philosophical equivalent of saying "stairway to Heaven is the world's best song" - he wasn't far wrong! In exploring these questions, Plato set the ball rolling for topics like epistemology, the mind-body problem, indirect realism and political philosophy. Though his answers may leave something to be desired to the modern reader, Plato's burning questioning and inexorable influence is still nonetheless felt today; from classrooms, counselling and even Hollywood blockbusters like the Matrix. These early dialogues generally focus on more grounded issues like courage, justice and art and seem to reflect the qualities of the recently deceased Socrates more accurately. However, even at such an early stage, we can begin to see how Plato's method established Western thought itself...
Edited by Connor.
Audio & music mastering / production by Nye James. Jingles recorded by Nye (guitars) & Connor (harmonica, mandolin)
SPOILER WARNING. To cap off Series Two, we thought we would talk about one of our favourite films - Ex Machina; a science fiction thriller released in 2014. Ex Machina concerns artificial intelligence and handles themes about technology, purpose and consciousness with a bit of religious mythology thrown in.
Part review, part analysis: we give an overview of the film's themes and run through some of the general ideas relating to AI mentioned in the movie… The Turing Test, The Chinese Room, Mary's Room (or the Knowledge Argument), Machine ethics and AI Consciousness. We also talk a little about Devs, Frankenstein, Annihilation and Westworld. Our thoughts summarised Emergence Explained
Edited by Connor.
Audio & music mastering / production by Nye James. Jingles recorded by Nye (guitars) & Connor (harmonica, mandolin)
The Forest of Dean is an area in and around Gloucestershire brimming with local heritage and communal history. We talk about the Forest's mining culture, as well as some of its historical quirks, before hosting the world's first (and only) Forest dialect quiz!
We then explore the controversy of the decline of mining culture and its impact on communities, the dilemmas of wild boar and finally solve the age-old mystery of who killed the bears. Finally we finish up with some ghost stories, folklore and ponder whether the Beast of Dean is a load of old bollocks. We'd love to chat more about history, heritage and culture on these podcasts so let us know if you know any spooky stories or interesting places… - The story of who killed the bears can be found, as well as many other of the tales we mention can be found here. - Some dialect poetry about sheep "Varest Ship" by Keith Morgan - Here is some info on free mining and a website on freemining. - A documentary on Freemining. FOREST OF DEAN FREEMINERS. - Some stuff on Dennis Potter here. - The world's strangest place - Littledean Jail - Our thoughts on the topic Edited by Connor. Audio & music mastering / production by Nye James. Jingles recorded by Nye (guitars) & Connor (harmonica, mandolin)
Hope everyone is having a nice Easter despite the current circumstances. This will be the first episode we release during the lockdown and we've got loads more on the way…
In this episode Connor, Nye, Joe & Zach take a look at some of the weirdest Easter traditions on Earth; from anti-Satan butter to willow whipping. Finally Zach can rest easy knowing the true date and religious significance of Easter, Connor goes on a rant about neo-paganism and we learn the dastardly ingredients of chocolate eggs. - Butter lamb number 1 - Butter lamb number 2 - Our thoughts summarised
Edited by Connor.
Audio & music mastering / production by Nye James. Jingles recorded by Nye (guitars) & Connor (harmonica, mandolin)
This is kind of a sequel to our episode "alcohol & sobriety"
There was once a day when you could smoke in pubs, lager was considered a lady's drink and pints would cost 11p. In this episode Connor, Nye, Kieran and Zach talk about the history and conventions of the public houses - from the very first "pub quizzes" to the history of "lock ins". Since most of us have worked behind a bar and been involved in making beverages we also talk about campaigning for ale, cider mills and some of the moral issues surrounding the bar industry. (It was decided Zach's scream didn't need any special effects) - Henry Weston's Cider - CAMRA - An American Video made in WW2 to help soldiers understand the British pub - Wychwood Brewery (Hobgoblin) - Bespoke Brewery (Beware the Bear)
Edited by Connor.
Audio & music mastering / production by Nye James. Jingles recorded by Nye (guitars) & Connor (harmonica, mandolin)
Well our plan was to dig into some of the conventional questions surrounding the philosophy of sport… however in true philosophy fashion we ended up bickering for half an hour about how to define sport itself!
After we were finally done with the semantics we explored some aspects of self-realisation through control and harnessing skill. Drawing inspiration from experiences with boxing, e-sports, jujitsu, darts and more, we discussed how sport can challenge and encourage personal growth. Identity is distilled into the expressive form of sports - not dissimilar to art. As we discuss, its all about learning boundaries while incorporating the shadow of the self; both testing and tempering our physical and moral limits. We also talked a little about "accessing" sport and fan culture.
Editing by Connor.
Audio & music mastering / production by Nye James. Jingles recorded by Nye (guitars) & Connor (harmonica, mandolin) |
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