Ever since I upgraded my home studio to include a broadcast-quality mic, I’ve wanted to start producing a (slightly) more professional podcast. I’ll be straight up: I was totally inspired by the example of Jesse Thorn of The Sound of Young America after being interviewed by him a few years back and realizing: damn, he produces his entire show out of his living room. 1 I’m not trying to produce a public radio-level podcast but having good sound was at least a step in the right direction. 2
The idea behind the Sidebar is simple: interview a guest and find a way to work in a 3 song playlist. For my first guest, I speak to DJ Matthew Africa, a stalwart presence in the Bay Area and a heavyweight (and stealth) record dude. Matthew and I used to both be on 90.7FM, KALX in Berkeley together, back in the ’90s, and since then, he’s moved into internet radio with his show, 2 Busy Saying Yeah. Matthew knows more about records than most people I know (which is saying a lot) and very recently, he took the very big step to begin to purge his collection by selling 400 jazz/funk albums, most of them fairly top-choice. This is the first time he’s sold off records out of his collection and that formed one of the bases of our conversation.
Subscribe to this and future podcasts.
Relevant links (based on what’s in the podcast):