Ways of Hearing

A six-part podcast

Ways of Hearing is a six-part podcast exploring the nature of listening in our digital world, produced for Radiotopia Showcase in 2017. Written and hosted by Damon Krukowski. Sound design by Ian Coss. Executive producer Julie Shapiro. The complete transcript was published as an illustrated book by MIT Press in 2019 but is currently out of print. The series is also available as downloads from Bandcamp, together with a bonus “Making-of” episode featuring the creators of the Radiotopia podcast and the MIT Press book.

Ways of Hearing Episode 1: TIME

Digital audio – in music recording, and in radio and television broadcast – employs a different sense of time than we use in our offline life, time that is more regular and yet less communal. Guests include: Ali Shaheed Muhammad of A Tribe Called Quest; and Joe Castiglione, the radio voice of the Boston Red Sox.

Ways of Hearing Episode 2: SPACE

In Tokyo, people on crowded trains pretend they’re asleep, to avoid eye contact. But in modern-day New York, count the headphones: it’s like we’re avoiding ear contact. In this episode, Damon examines how digital technology is privatizing public space. Guests include writer/activist Jeremiah Moss, and historian Emily Thompson.

Ways of Hearing Episode 3: LOVE

You don’t have to be the son of a jazz singer to recognize the voice of a loved one as music, made up of sounds so basic to our understanding that they precede language. And yet our digital devices strip much of that away, trading intimacy for efficiency. But what is the essential part of our voices, and what isn’t? Guests include: jazz singer (and Damon’s mom) Nancy Harrow, Roman Mars of 99% Invisible, and musicologist Gary Tomlinson.

Ways of Hearing Episode 4: MONEY

In the 20th century, music seemed like an object — bought and sold like any other product. But digital technology has dematerialized music, separating it from money and revealing its real terms of exchange. Guests include: artist and writer Jace Clayton (aka DJ Rupture), Victoria Ruiz and Joey DeFrancesco of the Providence punk band Downtown Boys.

Ways of Hearing Episode 5: POWER

When you go into a bookstore, or record store, or library, you enter another world that you have to learn to navigate. You adapt to it. But today’s digital corporations have created a musical universe that adapts, predictably, to you. Guests include: Jimmy Johnson, owner/founder of music distributor Forced Exposure; Paul Lamere, director of developer platform for Spotify; and Elaine Katzenberger, executive director of City Lights Books.

Ways of Hearing Episode 6: NOISE

Ways Of Hearing has looked at how digital technology has changed our world: our sense of time, of space, of intimacy and exchange. In the final episode, Damon lays out an essential choice: between a world enriched by noise, and a world that strives toward signal only. Guests include: Dr. Alicia Quesnel of Harvard Medical School and Mass Eye and Ear Infirmary, and audio engineers/musicians Steve Albini and Bob Weston (Electrical Audio, Shellac).