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Listening to the WW1 series from Dan Carlin made me really appreciate the power of imaginative descriptions people gave of all the absolutely terrible things they're seen or experienced. Churchill was such a beast of language proficiency when it comes to describing events and Ernst Junger is such a crazy person but holy cow his 'Hammering a man tied to a post' is the best description I have ever heard for detailing what being bombarded with artillery feels like. So far the series has been really awesome. the last episode was super harrowing but not my favorite, I love it when Dan uses hooks that immediately make me go 'All right, I'm strapped in for this ride', like when he simply states in the beginning "When did human civilization gain the ability to end itself?" Holy Moly, I just found out that Ernst Junger lived to be 102. Al-Saqr fucked around with this message at 22:22 on Aug 24, 2014 |
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Aug 24, 2014 22:18
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And he used to take LSD with Albert Hoffmann. He is such a fascinating character. Just look at all the crazy poo poo on his Wikipedia page: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ernst_J%C3%BCnger He joined the Foreign Legion BEFORE the war started and then he lived until 1998  .
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Aug 25, 2014 15:52
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Just finished the lates Hardcore History. I really liked, I have such a bad chronological understanding of WWI that I keep expecting the USA to enter the war or the Russian Revolution to start in every episode. Anyway, I hope he reduces the description of the horrors of trench warfare, at this point I have a pretty good idea that war is hell, no need for further descriptions.
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Aug 25, 2014 23:32
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Honestly, I think he has to keep reiterating how different the trench warfare was during WWI because it was so completely different from every war before and since. It's hard to imagine that many artillery shells being fired and going off continuously. He tells of soldiers describing it in the trench as the roar of the ocean but louder. I still can't really imagine those calibers being fired continuously for days on end.
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Aug 26, 2014 14:32
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Yeah, I think that's part of what makes it so fascinating and disturbing as a narrative. Things got so terrible, so quickly, and then they just... continued being terrible. Interminably. Agin, and agin, and agin.
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Aug 26, 2014 15:25
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WrathOfBlade posted:Yeah, I think that's part of what makes it so fascinating and disturbing as a narrative. Things got so terrible, so quickly, and then they just... continued being terrible. Interminably. Agin, and agin, and agin. Like the first round of a boxing match. You think you've been hit hard now but you have no idea how bad it's going to get.
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Aug 26, 2014 15:40
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head58 posted:Like the first round of a boxing match. You think you've been hit hard now but you have no idea how bad it's going to get. And the thing is, you know that this is the championship match, it's not like it's going to be done quickly, where one of you takes a bad hit and BAM he's out, that's it... now both of you can take a punch.
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Aug 26, 2014 16:13
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mortons stork posted:And the thing is, you know that this is the championship match, it's not like it's going to be done quickly, where one of you takes a bad hit and BAM he's out, that's it... now both of you can take a punch. It always reminds me of an episode of the old Star Trek TV show, where they meet these aliens... you know, Ben, I've been called a bit of a Martian myself... Ben, if there is a Ben...
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Aug 26, 2014 16:31
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Who is Ben?! One of podcast's greatest mysteries.
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Aug 29, 2014 17:27
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WrathOfBlade posted:Yeah, I think that's part of what makes it so fascinating and disturbing as a narrative. Things got so terrible, so quickly, and then they just... continued being terrible. Interminably. Agin, and agin, and agin. Grey Area fucked around with this message at 18:15 on Sep 1, 2014 |
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Sep 1, 2014 18:12
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Grey Area posted:Like Dan says, there are no decisive battles in this war. It's a matter of nations grinding away at each other until they crumble. 1916 is the bleakest year because they all just grind and grind. 1917 (next episode, presumably) is when the hardest hit begin to collapse. I can't wait. The last episode was crazy good.
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Sep 1, 2014 19:39
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The History of Rome progress report: I just finished up on Constantine's famous victory at Milvian Bridge. Though the real "unsung badass" I never heard of until the podcast was Aurelian. Dude reclaimed huge chunks of the empire lost by previous emperors, fought off lots of invasions, and had the foresight to build walls around cities that already proved useful in the Tetrarch wars. All in five years. Typically, like many recent history hobbyists, I try to downplay the role of Great Men and Great Battles, but I'm not regretting listening to the podcast about the most History-esque subject in History. At least I now know a bit more now on what's traditionally supposed to be household names in Roman History. (Like Trajan, Hadrian, Marcus Aurelius, and Diocletian)
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Sep 2, 2014 14:27
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Hell, I'm up to What, me Claudius? myself and while I've read a ton about the Julio-Claudian dynasty, the whole actual reign of Augustus as Augustus was always kind of hazy in my mind. Now that I've listened to 25 minutes on the subject I have a fair handle of what actually happened. The problem of his succession and having to settle for Tiberius, for instance, was something I hadn't really committed to memory before.
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Sep 2, 2014 20:50
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I'm glad there were so may adoptions and insurrections in the Roman Empire's history. Those are easy to follow. The most convoluted part was the dynastic politics of the Julio-Claudian era, since the same 5 names keep popping up in Augustus' family tree. I kept on having to pause the podcast and study the family tree to make sense of it. Even the chaos of the Crisis of the Third Century was way less confusing. Also, Constantine abolished the Praetorian Guard. I kept asking, after all the imperial assassinations, why the emperors kept having the Praetorians around. I like him already. Echo Chamber fucked around with this message at 08:00 on Sep 6, 2014 |
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Sep 5, 2014 01:00
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Of course these posts pop up when I'm trying to stave off the urge to listen through the History of Rome for a 3rd time
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Sep 5, 2014 02:29
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WDIIA posted:Of course these posts pop up when I'm trying to stave off the urge to listen through the History of Rome for a 3rd time It's a great fallback when you've run through all your normal podcasts/you're out of audible credits.
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Sep 5, 2014 02:31
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Echo Chamber posted:I'm glad their were so may adoptions and insurrections in the Roman Empire's history. Those are easy to follow. The most convoluted part was the dynastic politics of the Julio-Claudian era, since the same 5 names keep popping up in Augustus' family tree. I kept on having to pause the podcast and study the family tree to make sense of it. Even the chaos of the Crisis of the Third Century of way less confusing. Yeah, I had to do the same, I'm now watching I, Claudius as well and even after listening to HoR I'm sometimes having trouble keeping up with all the Nero Drususes, Agrippinas and Tiberius Germanicuses. The actual Emperor Nero wasn't even born with the name Nero! And think about how ultimately arbitrary it is how we name popular figures of the past. If you called Augustus just plain "Augustus" to his face he might think you're taking the piss. Ditto Caligula.
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Sep 5, 2014 10:01
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Well with Caligula you actually are of course.
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Sep 5, 2014 11:31
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Attila the Hun is dead now. And I got up to the episode when Mike Duncan announced that he'll end the show at 476 CE. I'm in the final stretch of the Western Empire.  Most likely, I'll listen to the Revolutions cast next. I did listen to a few of the China history podcast; maybe I'll go back to that too. There's also that Byzantium podcast too. I haven't seen too much opinions here about that one. It's understandable why some podcasts aren't chronological (considering the gaps in Chinese history, for example), but I really like having historical context. I didn't always know what happens next beyond the broad strokes, and neither did the figures themselves. I'll repeat I began listening to the Rome podcast with the Roman Empire not being among my favorite historical subjects. It's still probably not, but there were plenty of interesting figures I felt like I should have been familiar with, but never really learned about. I remembered from middle and high school learning only about Julius Caesar, Augustus, and maybe Constantine. We didn't cover the Punic Wars, the so-called Good Emperors, the Crisis, Diocletian, or even the fall of the Empire. (I picked up on some of these from documentaries and such, but nonetheless, not from school.) Despite being told they're supposed to be somewhat household names, I actually didn't know about Cicero, Trajan, or Marcus Aurelius. Other characters I found interesting but knew nothing about earlier: Sulla, Pompey, Aurelian, Elagabalus (for just being really weird), Galla Placidia, Ambrose
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Sep 19, 2014 04:40
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Personally I found the English Revolution too confusing to follow and I may just come back to it later, but the American and French Revolutions were great.
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Sep 19, 2014 05:46
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I know people here have mixed opinions on Radiolab, but I usually like it well enough. However, the last episode (In The Dust Of This Planet) is a huge mess. I'm having trouble figuring out what the point of the whole thing was: Something about Jay-Z's t-shirt indicating a larger generational shift towards nihilism. Radiolab has always been about style over substance, but this was just ridiculous. It seems unlikely to me that it would have been an episode at all hadn't one of the main characters in it been Jad's brother-in-law
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Sep 19, 2014 08:28
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I won't listen to it, but did they use a song by Liturgy? http://www.radiolab.org/story/dust-planet/#commentlist quote:We talk nihilism with Eugene Thacker & Simon Critchley, leather jackets with June Ambrose, climate change with David Victor, and hope with the father of Transcendental Black Metal - Hunter Hunt Hendrix of the band Liturgy. Special thanks to Thrill Jockey for use of the Liturgy song 'Generation'. It's from their album Aesthetica, out now, which is highly recommended listening for the end times. "Transcendental Black Metal" 
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Sep 19, 2014 12:21
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The whole time I was listening to that end part, I was hoping it was a joke. What a stupid loving "song".
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Sep 19, 2014 15:24
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Echo Chamber posted:Most likely, I'll listen to the Revolutions cast next. I did listen to a few of the China history podcast; maybe I'll go back to that too. There's also that Byzantium podcast too. I haven't seen too much opinions here about that one. Well, if you want a Chinese history podcast that is chronological, there's always The History of China, which is definitely a Duncan influenced take on it. He even starts every episode, "Hello, and welcome to The History of China." The most recent two episodes are even the Yellow Turban Rebellion and the start of the Three Kingdoms period. He's not as good about editing out his mistakes seamlessly as either of Duncan's podcasts though, which can take you out of it for a second.
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Sep 20, 2014 06:11
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AstroWhale posted:I won't listen to it, but did they use a song by Liturgy? Hunter Hunt Hendrix
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Sep 20, 2014 14:44
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For what its worth, the other side of the nihilism conversation from Radiolab, Brooke Gladstone's part, is better. The second half of this week's On The Media podcast is Brooke's rebuttal to Jad's assertion that there is something special about the current pop culture flirtation with nihilism. She does a good job summarizing recent history and the whole thing is way more organized and than Jad's take.
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Sep 21, 2014 00:18
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Oh yeah, I finished the Rome podcast. I can't get the word "exacerbate" out of my head now.
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Sep 21, 2014 06:36
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Is there a good podcast covering or dealing with timeframes roughly between 500 and 1000 that's not about byzantium? (Excepting dealing with italy)
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Sep 23, 2014 22:46
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The British History Podcast starts way before then but does cover that era (or I should say is covering that era.)
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Sep 23, 2014 23:11
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Any opinions on the Ask Historians Podcast from Reddit? I've been listening to some episodes and they have been rather interesting, but I don't know much about that subreddit.
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Sep 30, 2014 21:06
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The Erland posted:I know people here have mixed opinions on Radiolab, but I usually like it well enough. However, the last episode (In The Dust Of This Planet) is a huge mess. I'm having trouble figuring out what the point of the whole thing was: Something about Jay-Z's t-shirt indicating a larger generational shift towards nihilism. Radiolab has always been about style over substance, but this was just ridiculous. It seems unlikely to me that it would have been an episode at all hadn't one of the main characters in it been Jad's brother-in-law I read that as "In the Durst Of This Planet" and it really should have been about a Limp Bizkit T Shirt
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Oct 1, 2014 10:20
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radlum posted:Any opinions on the Ask Historians Podcast from Reddit? I've been listening to some episodes and they have been rather interesting, but I don't know much about that subreddit. I haven't actually listened to the podcast yet, but the subreddit is excellent. Most of the people who are flaired users (i.e., have been determined by the moderators to regularly contribute content of a fairly high level) have graduate education in their topics of expertise and it shows. The moderation is also very, very good.
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Oct 5, 2014 21:34
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Finished the English portion of the Revolutions podcast. I'm hoping the worst of the dry, parliamentary politics is over. But it wasn't too bad. I wished he did more analysis. I'm really looking forward to when he starts covering the Haitian Revolution. It's probably the most complicated to cover since scholarship over the subject is still rewriting a good amount of it.
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Oct 12, 2014 05:58
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Has anyone listened to the History of WWII podcast by Ray Harris Jr.? Is it any good and worth investing my time in? I'm very interested in the subject however I want to make sure I'm listening to a quality interpretation of events and not some amateur hour stuff. Would appreciate any opinions. I've listened to a bit of the first episode and it seems ok, but I could use some good reviews as motivation to get through it because of how annoyingly loud the dudes breathing is. It only took a couple of minutes for it to drive me crazy. The guy takes a super loud quick and sharp intake of air like twice every sentence and it's super loving distracting. Who breathes like that, really? It's so terrible. He better stop doing that as the show goes on because no matter how good the content is it's practically a deal breaker in itself. Damo fucked around with this message at 18:26 on Oct 13, 2014 |
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Oct 13, 2014 18:18
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For anyone looking for more Chinese history, I've been listening to the Romance of the Three Kingdoms podcast. I've always had a bit of an interest in the era (I'll admit to this being because of Dynasty Warriors), but knew nothing about it until listening to this. The host does his own translations and is really good at making it accessible, and the website has really really good supplemental material. http://www.3kingdomspodcast.com/
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Oct 14, 2014 15:51
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I didn't realize in our time had an extensive back catalogue divided into separate podcasts! Bragg sounds positively spritely in the ones from the late 90s
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Oct 20, 2014 20:42
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gradenko_2000 posted:That Carlin sounds like a talk radio host isn't a coincidence because he used to be one, and on his political podcast he's straight up admitted that he does sound like a conspiracy theorist sometimes
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Oct 21, 2014 21:14
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snucks posted:His podcasts are pretty much well-researched talk radio. He's giving long, loosely-scripted monologues broken up with citations and quotes meant to provide an atmosphere more than a list of facts and dates. He definitely lapses into predictable patterns of speech and analogies, but you can hear everyone do this if you get them to talk for long enough. The result is typically dense subject matter decompressed into a pacing much more appropriate for what podcast listeners demand (while doing easy manual labor, driving, etc), wrapped up in a really pronounced style that turns a lot of people off but also serves as comfortable familiarity for long-time listeners. I love Revolutions, but the material doesn't stick with me nearly as well because it's too dry and dense for me to give an appropriately close listening of while I'm cooking dinner or cleaning dishes. This is well put and something I was thinking yesterday when I tried to listen to the latest Revolutions episode while at the supermarket. I kept missing things because it requires you to pay a lot more attention to it. It's fine for a walk or on the bus but if you need to concentrate on anything else you start losing the thread. HH meanwhile I can listen to while working and not feel like I'm not giving it the attention it deserves. This makes the enormous episodes much easier to tolerate too.
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Oct 22, 2014 11:51
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Each to their own, and nothing against HH, but if I can't pay attention to a dense podcast while doing menial tasks without it sounding like the morning zoo I'm probably not super interested in the subject matter in the first place
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Oct 22, 2014 13:52
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Dan Carlin doesn't sound like a morning zoo crew, but oh man I'd be first in line to listen to a show that covers the decline of the Roman Empire with heavy use of a soundboard and muted hard rock riffs on loop in the background.
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Oct 22, 2014 15:35
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