Why is NPR so effing bad sometimes?

i don't mind this american life most of the time. i do mind shows that are like this american life where they do that thing with the quick cuts between two speakers and the too much music. i think snap judgment and radiolab do that.

One of the Sirius NPR stations does 8 hours of Car Talk a day, I just don't get it. Are there Deadhead-esque Car Talkers who really savor a 2002 CT show?

The dinner party podcast was enraging for the four minutes I could last.

I liked Radiolab for a while but now I can hardly stand to listen to it, the sound effects alone ugggh

there's plenty on npr i tolerate but radiolab is the one show i cannot bear.

oh, and philosophy talk.

One of the things I really hate on Radiolab and that the TAL guy also often does is this exaggerated, pretend incredulity thing

Radiolab: So what happened to the particle?
Scientist: Well, in essence, it became undetectable to our instruments.
Radiolab: You mean it just went off the radar?
Scientist: Well, for our purposes.
Radiolab: It just disappeared, like vanished off the grid?
Scientist: Basically, yes.
(SWELLING SYNTHS)

(btw is the TAL guy not the same guy as the nerdy sounding guy on Radiolab? They have different names but I'm not convinced they're actually different guys)

are you talking about Ira Glass? NPR has about 7 guys who sound like him.

yeah I genuinely blanked on his name, was not doing the art of pretend forgetfulness in the course of describing pretend incredulity

7 guys but they are all named neil or peter

the Radiolab guy is a different guy. His name is Jad and he's Lebanese-American.

x-post all the men on Planet Money sound exactly like Glass

haha they do. whenever planet money shows up on this american life it freaks me out, like, why is ira glass talking to himself?

i am addicted to this american life, tbh

i used to think morning edition was pretty good but i hardly ever listen to it anymore.

all things considered is borderline terrible imo.

i like steve inskeep. does he still do morning edition?

I think I dislike the other Radiolab guy more though actually, he's the one who more often does the incredulous schtick, and also has this yuk-yukky laugh

also it is a baltimore program, but i like midday with dan rodricks, the times i've heard it.

i used to haaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaate kai ryssdal, especially the way he says THIS.........is Marketplace" but now i don't mind him.

that's a pretty good show, i have to say. it always has ken doll-sounding hosts, for some reason. i was totally in love with the guy who hosted two hosts before ryssdal. i can't remember his name now! his voice was identical to ryssdal's. dreamy-man-voice.

there's definitely something lacking in weight about him, like if he were delivering really grave news he'd still have that bouncy, smug tone

i hate the way everyone on radiolab trips over each other when they are talking

can't remember if it's Guy Raz or Robert Siegel, but he's always making these horrible puns/dad jokes, I think he thinks he's being lowbrow or ironic in a humorous way, but no so much

i hate guy raz

horseshoe, was it david brancaccio? he was 2 season ago, and then david brown was 1 season ago.

i had a bit of a crush on david brown, but i heart kai now

x-post --Why do you hate Guy Raz ? I recall him in DC where he used to ocassionally write some ok articles for our local alt-weekly. What's he up to now?

here's definitely something lacking in weight about him, like if he were delivering really grave news he'd still have that bouncy, smug tone

― james franco tur(oll)ing test (Hurting 2), Tuesday, March 25, 2014 12:41 PM (42 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

haha, something like "two AIRPLANES, t'day, crashed 'nto the world trade center, and the markets on wall street - ain't - too - happy - 'bout that, coming up next .... on marketplace....

mean

actually i think david brown might have been the one i had a crush on. i am creepily trying to track down an old marketplace clip to confirm.

guy raz hosts the ted radio hour which doesn't need to exist. he also hosts weekend all things considered. it might not be him, it might just be that the shows are bad.

david was a total voice doppelganger for kai, but he was funnier iirc

Yeah exactly xp "Possibly thousands dead -- we'll give you more specifics when we do the numbers coming up"

okay i have confirmed that it was david brown i had a voice-crush on! i feel better now.

hooray

he was lovely

I have probably mentioned in some thread or other that I had a huge voice crush on Terry Gross before seeing what she looked like.

the Radiolab guy is a different guy. His name is Jad and he's Lebanese-American.

Surmounter's cousin, right?

(Ha, I just found a photo of them together from 2006.)

posts v much in character, obv

btw, a guy in my office is first cousins with Brian Lehrer, I thought that was cool as shit when I found out, he's my favorite WNYC guy

there are some local people whose voices are starting to drive me crazy for phonological reasons as well as the overuse of the word "conversation"

There's also this talking-through-a-smile-and-almost-stifling-a-chuckle thing I hear a lot with younger-sounding NPR voices, e.g. on Planet Money. It gets really annoying when the topic is serious. The kind of presenters that come off a segue from an anchor with "Right, so..."

there's also the 'trying to prove something' slow-talker who moves the tongue down and back while saying (and frequently emphasizing) words like THAT and BACK

it's innocuous but it gets on my nerves because it's so obviously a strategic choice

my wife and i have a game where we try to describe what the various npr voices look like in person. does everybody have that super stiff nerdy guy who says "funding provided by the john d. & catherine t. macarthur foundation. this is npr."? we think he wears a bowtie and has super thick glasses

http://www.ihiphop.com/content/wp-content/uploads/2011/05/common-glasses.jpg

haha

one of my roommates is an asst. producer for WNYC. he's an alright guy, but he's the living embodiment of the NRP "thing": remarkably stiff, uptight, prudish, obsessed with conventional upper middle class conspicuous consumption (one of those turds who rambles on about designer coffee beans). i'm not sure if he's human or if i had a bad trip listening to 93.9 and he's a manifestation of a part of my psyche that detached from itself.

"The dinner party download" is such a terrible name for a show, it kind of enrages me whenever I hear the promos.

damn spectrum

i feel bad talking smack about the guy, his thing's his, i'm just amused i get to experience a human being who so perfectly captures the NPR experience for me.

a few months ago they started ending morning edition with a 30 second "lighter side" story, so now the prelude to every day's drudgery is Renee Montagne's forced laughter.

buh.

I think NPR could be vastly improved if they engaged in that business practice of just cutting the bottom 10% of features/programming/presenters every few months or so, like if they just surveyed listeners what there least favorite shit was and culled that every so often

Then we'd end up with the 24 hr Lake Woebegone comedy hour and I'd never hear the news again.

Only news, no funnies.