Hola, Sneakers. Welcome to Episode 440 – a show about something. (When we know what that something is, we’ll let you know.)
This week on our talking-packed show: inspired nonsense; the chocolate of the Sierra Madre; eternal project; cash isn’t king; banker’s hours; Phase 2; the great bangs disaster; dumb joke; not fun fudge; visitation dreams; loved ones; show, don’t tell, but also tell, don’t show; undemonstrative dads; gasfighting; thinking ahead; bees vs. murder hornets vs. praying mantis; blithe ignorance; red in tooth and claw; insect politics; better than it should be; the Price is creepy; stumbling on; the Best Scene channel; you need your valleys; no argument; car chased; the French continuation; the Seventies ending; awkwardly cool; behind the porn curve; eat local; breakfast for dinner; tomato talk; Question of the Week – Sneakers respond; plain ol’bread; ridiculous names; bagelling match; goofy gremlin; monomaniacal; the cost of loving; and, finally, the romaine lettuce exchange rate.
Thanks for listening.
Question of the Week: What food don’t you like very much, but are okay with mixed in with other food?
Sub-question: What horror movie remake is better than the original?
Sub-sub-question: Tell us about a monomaniacal project you’ve done or are in the midst of doing like listener Todd’s Twilight Zone re-watch or Dave’s Trollope-a-thon?
Big news!
Longtime listener to the show Sarah Walsh has released a new EP of music and it’s really good! Please check out her page on Bandcamp where you can listen to the songs and confirm that we are right. Feel free to go to her Facebook page and give her a like as well!
Don’t miss out on your chance to WIN WIN WIN!
That’s right! Our 450th episode is fast approaching and we will be hosting our traditional Listeners’ Questions Episode! Every question gives you a chance in our GRAND PRIZE DRAW. The more questions you ask, the better your chances to win! So get to asking!
Send your list of questions by email to sneakyd@sneakydragon.com. If you’d like, record your questions, send us an audio file, and we’ll play it during the show. Fun, right???
Curious about the Ursula K. Leguin essay Dave mentioned. The original essay seems to have disappeared back into the book of essays it was drawn from, but here is a nice overview.
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Hello Dave and Ian,
I finally decided after months of hearing you ask listeners questions that I’d chime in! Now that college is over I have no excuse.
First about the food, for me it’s the classic broccoli. I don’t understand how people eat it on it’s own, and really don’t know how people eat it plain, but in a stir fry or with pasta it’s pretty tasty.
For the second question, like you said in your example I went through a HUGE Beatle phase. During this time I went through all the Beatles records in order, with the help of Completely Beatles, watched old interviews, then watched all the of the films, and finally listen to the anthology revisited podcast. This happened over the course of a summer, I was 17 at the time so I had all the time in the world. It was a bit of a domino effect, once I had gone through the Beatle’s discography I listened to other 60s artists, then 70s artists and so on.
Right now, I also fine myself with extra time on my hands, and have begun trying to listen through most of the 70s prog scene. I have already been listening to Yes for a couple years, actually after Dave played Heart of the Sunrise on his ‘5 songs about sun’ playlist I was hooked. Anyway, If anyone has recommendations please let me know.
Lastly, for last week questions, I am SHOCKED that no one said baguette! I have never tasted a bread more delicious than a baguette from the streets of Paris. I could eat twelve a day. Also I eat pierogis with sour cream, I assumed this was normal.
I posted in the new episode as well, but I am definitely seconding David’s recommendation of PG-era Genesis. My favorite album is Foxtrot, but they’re all great!
Thanks, I’ll check it out!
Well first off, thank you! For the glowing review, for buying my whole discography, and for the plug and Ian’s pull quote (which I will definitely be putting on my page as soon as I make a graphic for it).
David, you were spot on: my bass Colin is indeed named after Colin Moulding. I also love that you picked up on the Carl Perkins reference! I looked up the Jesus Of Cool album cover, and it is eerily similar – maybe I subconsciously stole the idea. Nick Lowe keeps popping up in my periphery, but I never make the effort to dive any deeper than the handful of hits I’ve heard. I need to get on that!
Anyway, thanks again! I’m glad you liked it. And you definitely have permission to play my stuff on the show!
Oh and while I’m here I’ll answer the sub-sub-question: I actually have a major thing about watching or listening to all of something in the correct chronological order, so I do this a lot. For bonus points, I even did this with Sneaky Dragon! I found you during the Compleatly Beatles run, listened to one or two regular episodes to see if it was worth following, then I went right back to the very beginning and listened to every episode.
Sarah, your songs are fabulous!
Why thank you! ❤️
My latest monomaniacal project has been watching all of the James Bond movies for the first time. My review is that Raiders of the Lost Ark is the best James Bond movie ever made. Runners up are Goldfinger, Goldeneye, and Casino Royale. Also, it’s been great to finally listen to the James Bonding podcast and hear what originally inspired Compleatly Beatles.
Maybe more sci-fi than horror, but for my money the 1978 Invasion of the Body Snatchers remake is much better than the 50s original. Or maybe I’m just partial to Donald Sutherland.
Dave has inspired me to give Trollope a try. I probably won’t read all his books, but I’m sure I could manage one. Any recommendations on his best overall and/or best standalone novel?
Yeah Todd, you kind of stole my thunder here but I’m with you. I love the ’78 Body Snatchers remake so much and I’ll give it a rewatch every once in awhile. Still creeps me out.
Passing on the food question since I’ll eat just about anything, except maybe cottage cheese. Which begs the question, what would you mix cottage cheese with?
From a classic filmgoer’s perspective I respect all the Universal Monsters films, but I particularly enjoyed Coppola’s “Bram Stoker’s Dracula” and Branagh’s “Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein” for their efforts as modern remakes. There’s a hanging scene in Branagh’s Frankenstein that still haunts me and the score by Patrick Doyle that still blows me away. Listen to it during the scene where Victor Frankenstein is preparing to bring the creature to life and he’s pulling and pumping all the machines to get started, it’s so damn good.
Your comment about Cronenberg’s “The Fly” having some good ideas throughout got me thinking about kind of a subtle McGuffin that drives the the film. Brundle’s main inspiration for inventing the transport pods in the first place is because he suffers from extreme motion sickness. Any type of travel is painful to him and causes such a chronic discomfort, that he invents the method of teleportation to solve for it. I though that was a really neat impetus to the story.
I was also onboard with “Time After Time”, which is one of my favorite time travel films and full of great ideas throughout. McDowell is always terrific, but I’m also a big fan of the great David Warner and he does so well Stevenson aka Jack the Ripper. Directed by Nicholas Meyer of “Star Trek II The Wrath of Khan” fame, I didn’t know this until recently, some Trekkie I am! I was also excited that the movie was adapted into a TV series three years ago. I guess I was alone because it was cancelled after the fifth episode. If anyone listening was watching this show like I was and you want to see the complete first season, I just found out it’s available through the CW Seed for free, all 12 episodes to complete Season One, finally after three years.
Monomaniacal? According to my folks I was the textbook definition of monomaniacal. So many times growing up I would obsessively pour every thought and action into something I was fanatical about, to the point where my parents would worry. Be it comics, Marx Brothers, Star Wars, The Beatles, The Lord of the Rings or whatever, I’d obsess over it until I was emotionally burned out. The best way to express myself while I was in the process of this state was to draw and illustrate whatever it was, so I did get some good work from it. The only part that concerned me from within was that I was completely self-aware of this behavior at all times and could feel myself burning out and about to go onto something new..with no way of stopping it. I had no variety of interests but instead a single focus on one interest at a time…and this kind of scared me when I had no control over it. Fortunately it faded away over time to now, where I can have a safe and segregated interest in a wide selection of interests. I honestly haven’t thought back on this at all until you guys asked this question for this week, so I’m glad you offered me the chance to elaborate.
I don’t like cauliflower but it’s okay chopped up in a stir fry or pureed in this cauliflower and cheese soup my sister makes. I don’t like cooked cabbage but it’s okay raw in cole slaw. Unlike Jada, I DO like broccoli which also has a strong flavor so go figure.
Ooo…you two were THIS close to getting Ms. Boyd’s first name right. The classical guitarist and former partner of Pierre Trudeau was neither Linda nor Fiona, but Liona. Thanks, guys. With Jeopardy in reruns and Jimmy Carr no longer doing his Little Tiny Quiz of the Lockdown, I’m missing the endorphin rush I get retrieving random data from my brain.