HARKpodcast

While we bide our time between the first and second phases of Eggnog Watch 2021, we're covering a request that's been languishing for years! And it offers plenty more blasts from the past - "Donde Esta Santa Claus" by Augie Rios is a 1958 novelty hit, and uh, you know how those are. Thankfully, "Player's Ball" by Outkast is a refreshing (so fresh) palate cleanser (so clean). Thank you to Dave for...

This week: listener requests! First, we unpack the time capsule of the mid-sixties that is "7 O'Clock News/Silent Night" by Simon & Garfunkel, and then interrupt that program to do some PSAs about the dangers of ornament consumption as we discuss "Tinsel in the Tea Leaves" by Kathy Lowe. The ranking music this week is "You Can Call Me Al" by Paul Simon. Thank you to Eben for these requests! The re...

Do you remember? That's right, it's almost September the 21st , and to celebrate, we've got two Christmas songs by Earth, Wind, and Fire! The first is "December" by Earth, Wind, and Fire, and if you're wondering - yes, that's it, what you're imagining, it's that exactly! Then we discuss "Holidays" by Meghan Trainor featuring Earth, Wind, and Fire - and manage to say a lot about a song that wasn't...

With Rosh Hashanah approaching, we endeavor to add more Hanukkah music to our long list of winter holiday songs! Join us as we travel back in time, revisiting early childhood memories and discussing two nostalgia-inducing tunes, "Dreidel Rap '89" by Abraham and "The Rockin' Dreidel Song" by Sha Na Na. Also: Ian debuts his new catchphrase! Here's the Chicago Reader article about Dreidel Rap '89 ! T...

The Gold Cup Parade (???) is approaching, which means (???), but anyway, we're doing a jingle horse episode. Maybe Dan Brown ghost-wrote this one because we go deep down some meaningless rabbit holes - beginning with "New Jingle Horse", a revisit to the oeuvre of the Geeta Brothers Duet Group, and ending with cracking the case of "Jingle Horse" by Jerry Riggins (et al).

It's a real Choose Your Own Theme-venture this week. Summer? Sure, it's hot out, so we cooled off with two versions of wintery classic "Winter Wonderland". Olympics? Yeah, let's get back into the Very Special Christmas catalogue that benefits the Special Olympics, regardless of the fact that those games aren't happening until next year. Jason Mraz's last name means "frost" in Czech and Annie Lenox...

It's Ian's birthday this week, so you know what that means - he's selflessly gifting half of his Birthday Boy's Choice to RJ!! What a sweetie. Ian and RJ exchange the gift of music - or in the case of "All I Want For Christmas" by Lil Jon featuring The Kool-Aid Man, the gift of post-ironic brand partnerships. Then we cleanse our palates with the new wave taste of "It Doesn't Often Snow at Christma...

We're back, and we're talking about death! To get back into the swing of things after our brief summer break, we listen to two requested songs - "Yes December" by Nerina Pallot and "Lost in the Snow" by Bruce Hornsby - about cooler weather. And also, it turns out, mortality!  Thank you to Jenny and Daniel the Macy's Elf for these requests! Our ranking music in this episode is "Farmhouse" by Phish.

The summer solstice approaches (in this hemisphere), and we're celebrating the new season with two New Year's Eve/Day songs! By listener request, we add another song to our list from the genre we are hereby dubbing "TMBGcore ": "New Lang Syne (Thank God It's Over)" by Jim's Big Ego. Then by our own free will we add another song by Taylor Swift, "New Year's Day". When the genie that only lets you l...

Hang on to your beep-boops, in this episode we returning to the world of neural-net-generated carols! OpenAI's Jukebox performs an original song created by fellow neural net GPT-2, under the title "Classic Pop, in the Style of Frank Sinatra". The Forever Now, a band composed of regular ol' humans, puts their spin on the same lyrics under the title "Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer, King of All the E...

With Victoria Day approaching, we're once again covering holiday songs from across the pond! By listener request, we discuss "I'm Gonna Spend My Christmas with a Dalek" by The Go-Go's, a British novelty song documenting the mid-1960s Daleks obsession, and "Arthur McBride and the Sergeant" as performed by Paul Brady, an Irish folk song documenting some British recruiters getting their asses handed...

You ever hear a brass instrument doing its thing and you think: that's jazz, baby! And then in another song you hear a brass instrument doing something , maybe not its thing , and you think: is this approaching the concept of jazz? For this International Jazz Day episode, we explore two songs' proximity to the category of jazz. First up is "Mary Had a Baby" as performed by Wynton Marsalis, featuri...

This was supposed to be our annual 4/20 episode, but it also turned out to be a sleeper Halloween episode - though I suppose an anxious, paranoid vibe is not wholly inappropriate. Our first song, "Pudsy's Christmas" by Jonathan Coulton, manages to give RJ a serious case of heebie-jeebies due to its origin story. "California Christmas Trees" by Mila J doesn't provide quite the come-down we're looki...

This week we're forgoing our tradition of covering more religious songs for the Easter and Pesach seasons in favor of lighter fare. We dig into two 2020 Hanukkah songs brought to you by that one company that owns most of the things! You know the one. "Hanukkah Medley" performed by Julia Lester of High School Musical: The Musical: The Series packs three traditional Hanukkah songs (including one tha...

It's St. Patrick's Day, so for this episode we've got... well, one mildly relevant song. By request, we listen to "The Season's Upon Us" by Dropkick Murphys, a Celtic-punk entry in the "I hate my family" subgenre of holiday tunes. Then we hear No Doubt's rendition of "Oi to the World", evoking both nostalgia and regret. Our ranking music in this episode is "I'm Shipping Up to Boston" by Dropkick M...

In honor of International Women's Day on March 8th, we're listening to two songs that bring women to the forefront of the Christmas character canon! Uh, sort of. "Good Queen Wenceslas" by Goldstein is an odd take on the classic carol that leaves us feeling conflicted, while "Red Nose, Red Dress" by Christmas Aguilera has us completely hooked. So much so that it's also the ranking music for this ep...

In honor of International Mother Language Day on February 21st, we're increasing the linguistic diversity of our list by covering two songs in languages that haven't been featured on the show before! First up we enjoy "Elu Agogo", a cheerful Christmas song in Yoruba performed by Ife Ogunwumiju. Then we experience "Marie Te Po", a Te Reo Maori translation of "Silent Night", performed by Lucky Boy^...

As Lunar New Year approaches, we're looking back at one very specific year - the only year between 1943 and 2020 that has never had a song featured on the podcast! We discuss two of 1972's strange and sometimes haunting holiday songs: "The Gift of Giving" by Bill Withers and "Slipping into Christmas" by Leon Russell. This episode's ranking music is "Lean On Me" by Bill Withers.

In anticipation of Groundhog Day, a holiday that is as much about repetition and time travel than it is about anything else, we're doing our most repetitive episode yet - two requests by a repeat requester, featuring two versions of songs we've discussed before, performed by two artists we've discussed before! We discuss "Baby, It's Cold Outside" AGAIN, this time as performed by Louie Armstrong an...

It's Epiphany, aka Three Kings Day - but instead of three kings, we've got two princes! That's right, we're abandoning our format to talk about the Spin Doctors' 90s hit! No, just kidding, we're talking about Prince. Join us as we reflect on the apocalyptic New Year's anthem "1999" and the strange, gloomy "Another Lonely Christmas". This week's ranking music is, in fact, "Two Princes" by the Spin...

Our final episode of 2020 marks another 25 episodes of HARK and another 50 songs on our list, so as per tradition, we're aiming to unseat the songs at the top and the bottom. For Ian's best-of-the-best pick, he selects a song that leans into the philosophical questions Christmastime poses and also our early-00s-indie-bullshit wheelhouse. For RJ's bottom-of-the-list pick, they select a scalding hot...

Ian and RJ are forgoing the usual episode structure this week to instead deal with an appeal! Er, of sorts - using a testing method devised by Ian, our co-hosts finally decide whether or not they will act on their long-standing threat to switch the places of two songs on the list: "Ipod Xmas" by Hello Saferide and "Christmas Wrapping" by The Waitresses.

It's beginning to look a lot like Dragon Tuesday . And to celebrate, we listen to two draconic Christmas songs! First is "Darcy the Dragon" by Roger Whittaker, which leaves some questions unanswered regarding both Darcy himself and the events of his Christmas errands. Then "Fly On Christmas Dragon" by Robby Grant splits open our brains - not because its lyrics pose any deep or complex quandaries,...

As Diwali approaches, we listen two winter holiday songs by Desi artists. Our first song, "All of the Lights" by Vivek Shraya, is a blend of elements lovingly arranged into a beautiful whole. Then we say as much as we can say about "Desi Jingle Bells" by Lilly Singh. Shraya's essay about her Diwali/Christmas EP All of the Lights can be found here ! The ranking music in this episode is "New Jingle...

It's time for our annual Halloween-Christmas crossover episode, in which we listen to two spooooky winter holiday songs! This year, in recognition of the 5 anniversary of our first Halloween episode, we're revisiting the H.P. Lovecraft Historical Society's musical offerings with "It's Beginning to Look a Lot Like Fishmen," and then dipping into the Nightmare Before Christmas well again with "Kidna...