The Colin McEnroe Show

Here are some songs from your life, "Backstreet Girl" by the Rolling Stones, "Joey" by Bob Dylan, "Road to Nowhere" by the Talking Heads, "Boy In The Bubble" by Paul Simon, "July Fourth, Asbury Park", better known as "Sandy" by Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band, "Wouldn't It Be Nice" by the Beach Boys. They all rely heavily on the accordion. "Wouldn't It Be Nice" is the biggest shock. Even if you know that song, it might never have occurred to you that Brian Wilson uses I'm pretty sure two accordions to make the primary propulsive musical fabric of that song. The last two decades of indie music ought to have normalized the accordion - Tom Waits, REM, Arcade Fire, The Decemberists... I could go on. It has also endured years of ridicule here in the United States, even while it remained beloved and esteemed in Argentina, Paris, and almost everywhere else in the world. Now, it's enjoying a renaissance here in the States. This hour, we celebrate that with accordion rock stars of all styles. You'll meet a man who is reclaiming the accordion, outfitting his latest version with MIDI controls, so it can mimic voice and other instruments, a woman who specializes in klezmer, and a man who plays his accordion in a trio alongside a guitar and tuba. You also meet other accordion rock stars, including James Fearnley from The Pogues. Just try to tell him that the squeezebox isn’t cool. GUESTS: Cory Pesaturo: Multiple award-winning accordion player from Rhode Island Christina Crowder: Accordion player who specializes in klezmer and other Eastern European styles, and is a member of the Accordion/Violin/Viola trio, Bivolita Will Holshouser: Accordion player and founder of the accordion/guitar/tuba trio, Musette Explosion James Fearnley: Accordion player for The Pogues and the author of the memoir, Here Comes Everybody, The Story of The Pogues. He’s also a composer, and a founding member of The Low And Sweet Orchestra Join the conversation on Facebook and Twitter. Subscribe to The Noseletter, an email compendium of merriment, secrets, and ancient wisdom brought to you by The Colin McEnroe Show. The Colin McEnroe Show is available as a podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, TuneIn, Listen Notes, or wherever you get your podcasts. Subscribe and never miss an episode. Colin McEnroe and Chion Wolf contributed to this show, which originally aired on August 7, 2014.Support the show: http://www.wnpr.org/donateSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Wikipedia has lately been under attack, accused of bias and spreading propaganda. And for years students have been told not to trust the source. But are any of those claims fair? This hour, we take a look at the free online encyclopedia, how it functions, and its role in the modern world. We'll ask: can we trust the information we find there? And we'll celebrate the joys of falling down a Wikipedia rabbit hole. GUESTS: Stephen Harrison: Writer and tech lawyer. His new novel, The Editors, is inspired by Wikipedia Amy Bruckman: Regents' Professor in the School of Interactive Computing at the Georgia Institute of Technology, and author of Should You Believe Wikipedia?: Online Communities and the Construction of Knowledge Annie Rauwerda: Writer, comedian, and Wikipedia influencer, who created “Depths of Wikipedia.” She was named “Wikimedian of the year” in the media category for 2022, and is currently working on a book about Wikipedia Support the show: http://www.wnpr.org/donateSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

We’ve been doing these shows where we don’t book any guests, where we fill the hour with your calls. And your calls have been interesting and surprising and amusing. This hour, the conversation winds around to Colin’s constant laughter (or not) and his nearly life-threatening reaction to Weekend Update on last week’s SNL, The Kennedy Center Honors, Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s proposed autism database, Elissa Slotkin on The New Yorker Radio Hour, the 60 Minutes piece on fraud, Cicero’s Catalinarian orations … Anything. (Seemingly) everything. These shows are fun for us, and they seem to be fun for you, too. So we did another one. You can now watch our calls shows on Connecticut Public’s YouTube. Subscribe and get notified when we go live. Or join the conversation on Facebook and Twitter. The Colin McEnroe Show is available as a podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, TuneIn, Listen Notes, or wherever you get your podcasts. Subscribe and never miss an episode! Subscribe to The Noseletter, an email compendium of merriment, secrets, and ancient wisdom brought to you by The Colin McEnroe Show. Colin McEnroe, Megan Fitzgerald, and Dylan Reyes contributed to this show.Support the show: http://www.wnpr.org/donateSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Our friend, the singer, songwriter, and performer Jill Sobule, died May 1 in a house fire in Woodbury, Minnesota, near Minneapolis. She was 66. Jill appeared on our show at least seven times between 2012 and 2022, including the Season Two premiere of Pardon Me and the time she wrote an original song for our dumb towels episode. But it was her four full-show, in-studio appearances that really made her such an important force in the history of our show. This hour, cobbled together from bits of those appearances, a best-of compilation of Jill Sobule on The Colin McEnroe Show. It’s our tribute to Jill and our insufficient thank you for the many hours that we got to spend with her on the radio. GUEST: Jill Sobule: Singer/songwriter The Colin McEnroe Show is available as a podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, TuneIn, Listen Notes, or wherever you get your podcasts. Subscribe and never miss an episode! Subscribe to The Noseletter, an email compendium of merriment, secrets, and ancient wisdom brought to you by The Colin McEnroe Show. Join the conversation on Facebook and Twitter. Colin McEnroe, Eugene Amatruda, Betsy Kaplan, Cat Pastor, Dylan Reyes, Patrick Skahill, Lily Tyson, and Chion Wolf contributed to this show, parts of which originally aired June 14, 2012; May 16, 2018; December 6, 2018; December 12, 2018; and September 15, 2022, in a different form.Support the show: http://www.wnpr.org/donateSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The New York Times’ Chief Fashion Critic, Vanessa Friedman, joins us for the hour to discuss fashion in President Donald Trump's second administration, what we can learn from how politicians dress, the impacts of tariffs on the clothes we wear, and more. GUEST: Vanessa Friedman: Fashion Director and Chief Fashion Critic of The New York Times Support the show: http://www.wnpr.org/donateSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Are you the same person, today, that you were when you were a little kid? Are you the same person, right now, that you will be in the last years of your life? When Scotty beams folks up, are the people arriving back on the Enterprise really the same people who were down on the surface of whatever alien planet? In a movie like Mickey 17, is the 16th cloned Mickey really the same person as the original, first Mickey? This hour, a look at the age-old philosophical concept of continuity of self. GUESTS: Edward Ashton: The author of six novels, including Mickey7, which has been adapted as the movie Mickey 17 David Finkelstein: Associate professor of philosophy at the University of Chicago Hal Hershfield: Professor of marketing and behavioral decision making at UCLA and one of the authors of MIT’s Future You project The Colin McEnroe Show is available as a podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, TuneIn, Listen Notes, or wherever you get your podcasts. Subscribe and never miss an episode! Subscribe to The Noseletter, an email compendium of merriment, secrets, and ancient wisdom brought to you by The Colin McEnroe Show. Join the conversation on Facebook and Twitter. Colin McEnroe and Dylan Reyes contributed to this show.Support the show: http://www.wnpr.org/donateSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Shakespeare’s tragedy about two star-crossed lovers, Romeo and Juliet, has appealed to audiences for centuries. It’s been adapted countless times for stage and screen. And it’s in Hartford for the next few weeks. From the set of Romeo and Juliet at Hartford Stage, and in front of a live audience, we talk with experts exploring the play and its legacy. GUESTS:  David Sterling Brown: Associate professor of English at Trinity College; he is the author of Shakespeare’s White Others and a development associate and scholar in residence for the American Globe Center, and he is on the curatorial team for Claudia Rankine’s The Racial Imaginary Institute Melia Bensussen: Hartford Stage’s artistic director Carman Lacivita: Actor who is currently playing Friar Laurence in Hartford Stage’s production of Romeo and Juliet; he is a recipient of the Bayfield Award — given to the best performance of Shakespeare in the New York Metropolitan Area If you or someone you know is in crisis, call or text the 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline. Hartford Stage is a current sponsor of Connecticut Public. The Colin McEnroe Show is available as a podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, TuneIn, Listen Notes, or wherever you get your podcasts. Subscribe and never miss an episode. Subscribe to The Noseletter, an email compendium of merriment, secrets, and ancient wisdom brought to you by The Colin McEnroe Show. Join the conversation on Facebook and Twitter. Colin McEnroe, Robyn Doyon-Aitken, Megan Fitzgerald, Jonathan McNicol, and Dylan Reyes contributed to this show. Thank you to the staff and volunteers at the Hartford Stage, including Lucas Clopton, Wesley McCabe-Schroeder, Lindsay Abrams, Zoe Golub-Sass, Jennifer Levine, Todd Brandt, and the volunteer ushers.Support the show: http://www.wnpr.org/donateSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This hour we take your calls about anything you want to talk about. You can now watch our calls shows on Connecticut Public’s YouTube. Subscribe and get notified when we go live. Or join the conversation on Facebook and Twitter. Colin McEnroe, Jonathan McNicol, and Dylan Reyes contributed to this show.Support the show: http://www.wnpr.org/donateSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Sinners is the fifth feature film written and directed by Ryan Coogler and starring Michael B. Jordan. (Coogler has never made a feature without Jordan.) After years of sequels and Marvel movies, it’s Coogler’s first wholly original movie based on no other source material whatsoever. Sinners is a sexy Southern musical horror gangster thriller set in 1932 in the Mississippi Delta. With vampires. And it’s the No. 1 movie in the country. Plus: We read Jill Lepore’s New Yorker piece about reading a Penguin Classic on each of the first 100 days of President Trump’s second term. And then a Vox piece about giving up Spotify. And we started thinking about the ways that we’re all consuming culture — avoiding or giving up some things, immersing ourselves in other things, etc. — in these, let’s say, anxious times. GUESTS: Raquel Benedict: The most dangerous woman in speculative fiction; she’s the host of the Rite Gud podcast Shawn Murray: A stand-up comedian, writer, and the host of the Nobody Asked Shawn podcast Brian Slattery: A journalist and musician The Colin McEnroe Show is available as a podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, TuneIn, Listen Notes, or wherever you get your podcasts. Subscribe and never miss an episode! Subscribe to The Noseletter, an email compendium of merriment, secrets, and ancient wisdom brought to you by The Colin McEnroe Show. Join the conversation on Facebook and Twitter. Colin McEnroe and Dylan Reyes contributed to this show.Support the show: http://www.wnpr.org/donateSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This hour we talk with Christine Rosen about her book, The Extinction of Experience: Being Human in a Disembodied World. We talk about how technology has impacted face-to-face interactions, boredom, loneliness, handwriting, and more. GUEST:  Christine Rosen: Author of The Extinction of Experience: Being Human in a Disembodied World. She is a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, a columnist for Commentary magazine, senior editor at The New Atlantis and fellow at the University of Virginia’s Institute for Advanced Studies in Culture. Join the conversation on Facebook and Twitter. Subscribe to The Noseletter, an email compendium of merriment, secrets, and ancient wisdom brought to you by The Colin McEnroe Show. The Colin McEnroe Show is available as a podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, TuneIn, Listen Notes, or wherever you get your podcasts. Subscribe and never miss an episode! Colin McEnroe and Dylan Reyes contributed to this show, which originally aired on October 3, 2024. Our programming is made possible thanks to listeners like you. Please consider supporting this show and Connecticut Public with a donation today by visiting ctpublic.org/donate.Support the show: http://www.wnpr.org/donateSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.