Stay ConnectedThe Sounds in My Head is a biweekly music show featuring songs and bands you might have missed. Hosted by Daniel since 2004.
Musically The Sounds in My Head attempts to be fairly eclectic, but probably tends to lean towards “indie pop” music. Also, I try to squeeze in as much left-wing propaganda as possible between tracks.
Season 21 Episode 19
SPECIAL "2024 ELECTION" EPISODE!
This episode features several clips: Pete Buttigieg on the NYT Ezra Klein Show talking about people’s trust in government. Kamala Harris’ campaign debut ad: Freedom. Bill Maher talking about the young people who founded America and contrasting the US to her enemies who young people today seem to think are preferable. The AI-generated song “Fucking My Couch” by AI Larry Bob.
Season 21 Episode 18
EXTREMELY SPECIAL "PARENTHOOD" EPISODE!
This episode features a clip from The Local's podcast Sweden in Focus where Richard Orange talks about the country's generous paternity leave and the effect it has on families. There's also a clip from Bill Maher's not-so-great podcast Club Random where Penn Jillette talks about evolutionary love for one's children. Nick Cave also reads a response he wrote to a fan who was concerned about bringing a child into the world in its current state on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert. There are also birthday greetings to September babies from Tiktoker Soupy Garbage Juice (he’s released the full song but I didn’t realize it until too late to include the whole song on the show). And while not mentioned in the episode, I highly recommend Ric Burns' documentary about Ansel Adams.
Season 21 Episode 17
SPECIAL “ALL COVERS” EPISODE!
This episode features a couple of clips from recent VP candidate Tim Walz contrasting his modest lifestyle to other political figures and talking about the Trump agenda vs. his and Kamala Harris’.
SPECIAL “ALL WOMEN” EPISODE!
This episode features a clip of Julia Steinberg's testimony in front of Congress on November 9, where she talks about the rise of antisemitism on college campuses and its modern roots in the conflict theory of the oppressor vs. oppressed.
Season 20 Episode 10
This episode features an edited-down “41 Lessons from My 41 Years” list presented by Nate B. Jones on TikTok. It was too long to include the whole thing, but I really don’t disagree with any of his list. This kinda thing easily veers too far into trite, but there can be a lot of truth in well-composed bumper stickers, and I think Nate hits them all well.
Season 20 Episode 9
This episode features a clip of a CNN Town Hall where former NJ governor and Trump lackey Chris Christie recounts how Trump gave him COVID, which very nearly killed him, then lied about it, naturally.
Season 20 Episode 8
This episode features a clip from a recent episode of Sam Harris’ podcast Making Sense, where he talks about the incomprehensible waste of collective attention the human race has wasted on about the least important human to ever be born. I didn’t include much of it, when he gets into a media analysis and so on, but I’m 100% with him on all of it.
Season 20 Episode 7: Special “Music from Soundtracks” Episode!
Asteroid City
1. Last Train to San Fernando - Johnny Duncan
2. Freight Train - Chas McDevitt Skiffle Group
Poker Face
3. Charlie's Theme - Pellea
4. Six Foot Down - Gene Ski
5. Blues Run the Game - Jackson C. Frank
John Denver: Country Boy
6. Take Me Home, Country Roads - John Denver
The Worst Person in the World
7. Waters of March - Art Garfunkel
One More Time
8. Yours to Keep (acoustic version) - Myie
Rogue Agent
9. Just Like Heaven - Hannah Peel
Cold Feet
10. Just Like Honey - Hannah Peel
Fleishman is in Trouble
11. Wise Up - Aimee Mann
Little America
12. Come On Home - The Lijadu Sisters
Lord of War
13. Mama Africa - Young Bakuba Band
Masters of Sex
14. You Don’t Know Me - Lizzy Caplan
This episode features a clip from NPR’s Fresh Air where film critic Justin Chang reviews Asteroid City, and also a brief clip where Taffy Nivert talks about the origin of Take Me Home, Country Roads from John Denver: Country Boy.
Season 20 Episode 4 - SPECIAL “MUSIC IN FRENCH!” EPISODE!
This episode features a clip from Jim Gaffigan’s album Quality Time about eating French Cheese, as well as a very old Louis CK bit about being approached in NYC by a French guy who needs directions. Light, but relatively topical fare for this episode. heh.
Season 20 Episode 3
This episode features a brief clip from FOX’s The Family Guy which made me LOL, and a TikTok by @philjamesson about his incredibly successful social media empire.
Season 20 Episode 2
This episode features a clip from the new podcast The Urbanist Agenda from Jason of the great Not Just Bikes. His co-host for the inaugural episode was Adam Something who shows off his pitch-perfect Slavoj Žižek impression as they talk about living in human-friendly cities.
Season 20 Episode 1
This episode features a clip from Marc Maron’s latest HBO comedy special, From Bleak to Dark, where he outlines a strategy to win over Christians by rebranding abortion clinics as “angel factories”. It may be a joke, but I think the plan could be just crazy enough to work. Mental note: From now on, always refer to Planned Parenthood and their ilk as angel factories.
SEASON 19 FINALE!
This episode features a clip from the podcast The War On Cars where guest, prominent sex columnist Dan Savage, talks about how terrible cars are, and how livable streets activists can win people over to our side. It was a fun interview, and while I’ve always enjoyed his media appearances, but prior to this interview I never knew he was a kindred spirit with regard to this topic.
SPECIAL "CHRISTMAS MUSIC 2022" EPISODE!
This episode features a bulletin from Sveriges Radio’s daily English language news podcast about how shop workers in Sweden’s largest trade union think Christmas music poses a health and safety risk. MY APOLOGIES if this episode is triggering for any listeners.
This episode features a clip from a terrific interview with Yuval Noah Harari on by Sean Illing on his Vox podcast The Grey Area. After Ezra Klein went to the NYT Vox slowly auditioned other people to fill the gap, renaming The Ezra Klein Show first to The Conversation with different hosts, of which Sean was by far and away the best, and they eventually gave him the feed and renamed it The Grey Area. I just never unsubscribed. Ezra is awesome, but I like the NYT incarnation of his show less than the old version, and I think The Grey Area is usually more interesting than EKS these days.
This episode features an extended series of clips stitched together from a recent episode of Sam Harris’ Making Sense podcast where Sam talks to subject matter expert Timothy Snyder about Russia’s war on Ukraine and he systematically knocks down bad take after bad take from the "do your own research" wing of the Twitterverse.
This episode features a clip from Coleman Hughes’ podcast Conversations with Coleman where music critic and historian Ted Gioia talks about where musical innovation comes from and the pattern of things from the fringe becoming mainstream.
This episode features a clip from Channel 4 News' report on the truck bombing of Russia’s bridge connecting illegally annexed Crimea in Ukraine to the Russian mainland. The latest in a long series of colossal embarrassments for Putin.
This episode features a clip from The Michael Shermer Show where Michael talks to British satirist and commentator Andrew Doyle about the adoption by progressives of trans activist’s world-view, and how folly and unprogressive he predicts history will judge that to be. Call me a “TERF”, but I tend to agree, and I hope saying so doesn’t mean I lose a bunch of friends. Also, I’m personally more concerned with the elimination of sex-separated spaces for women and girls, as well as social contagion among teenage girls leading to irreversible medical interventions for them, than I am about gay boys, but ya know, yeah them too.
This episode features a clip from HBO's Real Time with Bill Maher where Bill predicts how the traditionally unifying event of an alien invasion would go down in present-day America.
This episode features a clip from Sam Harris’ Making Sense podcast where he explains why Donald Trump is a worse person than Osama bin Laden. His description here mirrors much of my own take and was a big part of why I felt so compelled to escape from post-Trump America.
This episode features a clip from a recent Al Franken Podcast wherein he interviews journalist and Russia expert Julia Ioffe who explains why negotiating with Putin about Ukraine is ill-advised.
SPECIAL "CLASSIC EXOTICA MUSIC" EPISODE!
This episode features a clip of Coleman Hughes from his podcast Conversations with Coleman where in his discussion with Jonathan Haidt he discusses the pros and cons of the social fragmentation allowed by the internet. Seems like most people I know focus only on the benefits or the downsides, but to me it seems worth observing both.
SPECIAL "NEW FRONTIERS IN EXOTICA MUSIC" EPISODE!
This episode features a clip from The Local’s Sweden In Focus podcast where they interviewed Carlos Velasco from Honduras about what led him to a life in Sweden. The thing I’ve been most surprised by living in Sweden is how few of my fellow ex-pats came here not for work or love, but for the same kinds of reasons I did: that by the numbers it’s among the best places in the world you can live. Carlos knows what’s up!
SPECIAL "LET'S HEAR FROM THE LADIES" EPISODE!
This episode features a clip from The Ezra Klein Show where Ezra is setting up the context for his interview with legal expert Dahlia Lithwick about just how extremist and anti-democratic the SCOTUS is at the moment. As well as a clip from NYT’s The Daily where Sabrina Tavernise interviews abortion-rights lawyer Nancy Stearns about whether or not her stronger, pre-Roe legal case could have changed the course of history for women’s rights.
This episode features a montage of clips assembled to sound like one thought by Ezra Klein from a recent episode of The Ezra Klein Show where he talks about “The End of ‘The Everything Bubble’” with Financial Times journalist Rana Foroohar. She was fine, but I thought the questions Ezra asked throughout the course of the interview told the story better than she did.
This episode features a clip from Dan Olson’s epic 2+ hour rant/takedown of the grifts known as crypto and NFTs and all their associated cruft, Line Goes Up. I have friends who’ve earned literally hundreds of thousands of dollars leveraging the NFT shell game to great effect. But they did so with no delusions of grandeur, just wanting to take part in the early stages of an obvious MLM scheme. So I guess good on them for getting in early and milking the cash cow. But I still find the whole thing distasteful. Ha.
Our TOPPODCAST Picks 
