Slate Culture Feed

Latest Episodes:

Grasping at Straws Edition Jul 18, 2018

Show notes

Stephen Metcalf, Julia Turner, and Dana Stevens discuss the film "Leave No Trace", Sacha Baron Coen's new show "Who is America?" and plastic straw bans as an agent of change and/or useless virtue signaling.

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Spoiler Specials: The Handmaid's Tale Season 2 Jul 13, 2018

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Christina Cauterucci, Veralyn Williams and Lena Wilson spoil the second season of The Handmaid's Tale.

Podcast production by Daniel Schroeder and Shasha Léonard.

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Hit Parade: The Deadbeat Club Edition, Part Two Jul 13, 2018

Show notes

In the second part of our two-part episode about the B-52’s and R.E.M.—the bands that put Athens, Georgia on the map, and helped define new-wave rock in the early ’80s—we trace how they transformed themselves from hipsters to hitmakers. One band waited years to graduate from an indie label to the majors. The other almost quit after an AIDS-related tragedy, before their pop breakthrough. By the end of the ’80s, their hits—from “Orange Crush” to “Stand,” “Channel Z” to “Love Shack”—brought them squarely into the mainstream, just as “alternative rock” was coming to define a new sound for the ’90s.

Email: hitparade@slate.com

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This Is the Chewiest Thing I've Ever Had in my Mouth Edition Jul 11, 2018

Show notes

Julia Turner, Dana Stevens, and Stephen Metcalf discuss the summer blockbuster Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom, the appeal of the Netflix cooking-failure show Nailed It, and Scarlett Johansson's casting as a trans man, with Slate's Evan Urquhart.

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Unproblematic Trolley Edition Jul 04, 2018

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Dana Stevens, Stephen Metcalf, and Julia Turner discuss the new documentary about Mr. Rogers: Won't You Be My Neighbor?, the Netflix comedy special Nanette, and the World Cup, with Mike Pesca.

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Hit Parade: The Deadbeat Club Edition, Part One Jun 29, 2018

Show notes

The B-52’s and R.E.M. don’t sound all that much like each other. One group were avatars of kitsch, fusing punk, girl-group and garage rock—even Yoko Ono—into a retro-nuevo style all their own. The other group were mysterious, elliptical, often indecipherable, but they reinvented jangly guitar and classic-rock influences to make a new kind of New Wave. Together, this pair of distinctive bands helped make Athens, Georgia the epicenter of alternative cool in the ’80s and ’90s. In part one of this two-part episode of Hit Parade, we present the story of how the B-52’s and R.E.M. created a scene out of a college town—and became the most prominent queer-friendly, gender-fluid bands of their era.

Email: hitparade@slate.com

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Spoiler Specials: Westworld Season 2 Jun 29, 2018

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Willa Paskin, Sam Adams, Jonathan Fischer and Rachelle Hampton spoil the second season of Westworld.

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Anthony Rising Edition Jun 27, 2018

Show notes

Dana Stevens, Stephen Metcalf, and Julia Turner Discuss Brad Bird's The Incredibles 2, the 30 For 30 podcast series about Bikram yoga, and the re-emergence of astrology with production assistant Daniel Schroeder.

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Decoder Ring: Clown Panic Jun 25, 2018

Show notes

Decoder Ring is a podcast about cracking cultural mysteries. Every month host Willa Paskin,Slate’s TV critic, takes on a cultural question, object, idea, or habit and speak with experts,historians and obsessives to try and figure out where it comes from, what it means and why it Matters.

Today: The clown has existed in various forms for thousands of years, what changed and made us suspect and fear them? The modern birthday clown is a very recent invention, by going back into the history of clowns and clowning we see that clowns are far more complex and capable of far more expression than the kids entertainment of Bozo and Ronald McDonald. How those complex figures transformed into obligatorily sunny commercial mascots may also explain why they are increasingly seen as sinister today.

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Unkindest Cut of All Edition Jun 20, 2018

Show notes

Stephen Metcalf, Isaac Butler, and Laura Miller discuss the horror film Hereditary, the return of The Staircase with Rebecca Lavoie, and Isaac's Shakespeare podcast Lend Me Your Ears.

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