Over the course of the last three podcasts, the Blerd Radio team has been exploring nostalgia. Well, we’ve been specifically exploring nostalgia. After all, this podcast spends a lot of time looking back.
This three part series concludes (after a bit of a break…sorry y’all, life happens) with a look at how our romanticism of the past plays a part in the media we consume today. We also welcome our friend The Packet Man back! He sat out the first two episodes, but that just gave him the opportunity to come up with a bunch of Rachel Dolezal jokes.
Elsewhere in this podcast, we discuss how the film industry has turned nostalgia into a major money maker thanks to reboots like Jurassic World. This also seems to be crossing over into television, with the success of Girl Meets World and the impending threat of Fuller House (featuring D.J. Tanner, the unluckiest woman on the planet when it comes to losing loved ones unexpectedly.)
(The Packet Man also reveals a retroactive crush on Kimmy Gibler).
A discussion of the ridiculously awful trailer for the (likely) ridiculously awful film Pixels leads into some serious superhero/comic nerdery on the part of the panel. We wonder when the reboots for the Batman, Superman and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles series will end.
Finally turning over to music, we discuss how some of our favorite current artists directly or indirectly call back to styles/musicians we enjoyed in our youth. Whether these artists creatively meld a variety of sounds from the past and turn it into their own sound (like D’Angelo or Jack White) or directly (and in some cases egregiously) copy (like Duffy or Chromeo), the fact of the matter is that almost all of what passes for popular music these days is based on sounds originated by others.
Of course, “Uptown Funk” has to be part of this conversation. Mark Ronson & Bruno Mars each have been lauded for/accused of putting a “now” sheen on older sounds/being unoriginal (where you stand on this issue depends on how you feel about the artists themselves.) This song seems to have brought the “ripoff” argument to the fore.
(Why is The Packet Man so quiet during this portion of the podcast? Turns out that he’s hesitant to join the conversation for fear of implicating himself!)
Ultimately: have we reached a stage in music where nothing at all can be called completely original? And if completely original music does exist, will we ever hear it in this increasingly fragmented landscape?
In addition to The Packet Man (can you tell we’re happy to have him back?) please follow me (Big Money), Dr. Z and Michael Parr on Twitter.
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