D Magazine's EarBurner

James is the artistic director for the Dallas International Film Festival. That means he watches about 600 movies every year. It also means that he has a great story about a wild night with Harry Dean Stanton (R.I.P.). We also talked about what happened to him when, as a kid, he saw E.T. fives times in row and the odd interaction he had one time in a hotel room with Joan Jett when they were both w...

In 1994, The Ticket launched in Dallas with a lineup largely assembled by Mike Rhyner, thereby creating a radio format—guy sports talk—that would be copied around the country. Mike ended his 40-year radio career with a retirement in January 2020. Except not quite. The Old Grey Wolf is returning to the airwaves on 97.1, which has been rebranded The Freak. We talk about who convinced him to come out...

Tim and Zac interview a legend, the man who helped write some of N.W.A and Eazy-E's biggest songs, the man whose solo debut album, 1989's platinum-certified No One Can Do It Better , pretty much says it all. If you're not aware, Doc's voice was permanently changed by the aftermath of a car crash the same year that album came out. The lads discuss the wreck, Doc's quest to end gun violence in Dalla...

Will is the hyperkinetic, mustachioed founder of the publishing house Deep Vellum and its allied bookstore in Deep Ellum. He's responsible for the reissue of Jim Schutze's book "The Accommodation," about the bombing of Black-owned homes in South Dallas in the 1950s and how White leaders in this city did what they could to duck the civil rights movement. When it was first published, in 1986, it was...

After 33 years on FOX 4 in Dallas, 27 of them doing the morning show, Tim is throwing away all his makeup and retiring. He tells us how the job has nearly killed him, why he doesn't have much use for social media, and the secret to surviving 100-mile bicycle rides. Also, he ranks the local Tims.

David "Schoop" Schechter worked at the Dallas ABC affiliate, WFAA Channel 8, for 16 years. This week he quit his gig to go work as a national environmental reporter for CBS. In this episode, we talk about "cheerful nihilism" and David's amazing calf muscles. At least five stars.

Brian has been a freelance dining critic for the Dallas Observer and Dallas Morning News ; now he's the fulltime food dude for D Magazine . Did you know there might be only 20 people in the country who have such a job? He tells us what goes into a formal dining review, what goes into his mouth when he's not on the clock, and where you can find a secret sushi place that's perfect for a date. 

Barak is one of the folks behind the legendary Texas Theatre and a co-founder of the Oak Cliff Film Festival. He breaks down eight of his favorite flicks in this year's shindig, which runs June 23–26. Along the way, he talks about why he won't buy Central Track and what he did to anger the Catholic Church. Also, he and Tim nearly come to blows over "Ready Player One."

JZ is the newly chosen, first ever poet laureate of Dallas. We talk about why he loves the word "donkey," how he won the biggest poetry slam competition in the world, where Dallas sits in the literary firmament, why we should print poems on DART buses, and what the Mavericks need to do to beat Golden State. Oh, and he reads a new poem for us titled "Signs" that is partly about bird sh**. 

Emily is the director of corporate sales for the 25-year-old improv comedy group called Four Day Weekend. It's a boring job title for a funny woman. Emily went through Second City, in Chicago, she worked at The Onion, and she also performs. We talk about people in the SNL cast that she knows and how Four Day has survived the pandemic by doing something quite clever. Oh, and she tells a horrible jo...

Carpenter Park, at just under 6 acres, is now downtown Dallas' largest park. It also has downtown's first outdoor public basketball court. Tim and Matt hit the court on the morning of May 3, the park's debut, to play the first official game there. Zac recorded the play by play. WARNING: the sound is terrible, and Tim uses the word "avoirdupois" in the midst of an actual basketball game. You should...

Nicole founded the Dallas fashion house KOCH under whose umbrella she and her son, Henry, have launched a new line of sneakers. So we talk about that. But we also talk about her wild upbringing traveling the country with her father, Bill, who was an NBA coach, and how she performed at halftime shows and was babysat by a guy named Boot who was a "Gong Show" contestant with an act that involved a po...

The November issue of D Magazine got tossed out of a Dallas grocery store because its cover bears the word "Negroes." Jean, a Black woman and a journalism professor, describes how the cover came across to her and how she might have done things differently. Also, we talk about how often she gets to party with Bob Schieffer. 

Alex is the guy behind D Magazine 's new daily newsletter, LeadingOff. We had him on the podcast to promote that, a conversation that led us to his deep-seated animosity toward Axios and all who work for it. But then we started talking about what scares Alex, and things got — REAL. Who knew that Tim and Zac both have their own (very valid) reasons for fearing rats? And garbage disposals!

D Magazine 's new sports editor explains what the heck a "sports vertical" is and why StrongSide is going to be the best version of such a thing that Dallas has ever seen. Also, he performs a Cowboys-related feat that will blow your mind. And collegiate meat judging. We get into some of that, too.

Rejoice, cinephiles! The Oak Cliff Film Festival makes its triumphant return June 24 – 27. Barak is one of the organizers. He stopped by to break down some of the 23 feature-length films on the program. We also discussed some exciting news about the Texas Theatre and why Barak's home theater setup is trash. If you would, hop into Apple's podcast app and write a short review of EarBurner. We'll be...

The new top cop in Dallas just announced how he'll get after the bad guys in this town. Matt and Zac fired fastball questions at him on that topic and others, including his taste in hip-hop and his allegiance to the Cowboys (he was a fan before he even learned to speak English). 

The mayor of Dallas is an interesting fellow. He hoisted himself out of poverty, went on to earn Ivy League degrees, and got elected, it seems, without really trying all that hard. Two years into his first term, he is involving himself in City Council elections, undermining incumbents who've butted heads with him. So what exactly is at work here? D Magazine 's Peter Simek went looking for answers,...

Our staff photographer, Elizabeth Lavin, talks about her work for the August issue of D Magazine . She donned PPE to go inside UTSW's Clements hospital to document what doctors and nurses are doing to save lives in Dallas. 

Jim worked at the Dallas Observer for 24 years. Now he works for us. How long will this arrangement last? God only knows. But for the time being, the most revered and reviled city columnist in Dallas will do his best for your favorite city magazine. Here's what he has to say about that transition, whether the police chief should be fired, how Backpage.com took over the Observer , and everything el...

The former mayor of Dallas invited us into his backyard to talk about sheltering in place; the people he'd pick to marry, eff, and kill; how he worked with County Judge Clay Jenkins through the Ebola crisis and the lessons from that experience that our current mayor might want to heed; and which sports arena in the land is the most hostile to visiting teams. Plus there was gin. So much gin that ev...

Mike is a beloved radio legend and not a young man, so to avoid killing him, we recorded this podcast in a park within eyesight of the friendly Mercantile Tower and not too far from his downtown Dallas apartment. We stood 6 feet apart and controlled our sneezes. The studies so far have been inconclusive about whether the virus can be spread via flatulence, so that was fair game.

The councilwoman from District 9 now co-chairs a task force to help the city recover from the economic fallout of the virus. To make sure we followed all city rules and kept each other safe, we recorded this podcast in the parking lot in front of Lakewood Growler, with our cars forming a protective circle around us. It got personal. And that's a good thing.

What is a CIA spy who hunts terrorists supposed to look like? Well, maybe she's supposed to look just like Tracy. Straight out of school at USC, she went to work for the agency. Then she worked for the FBI. THEN she became a teacher at Hockaday, an elite Dallas private school for girls. If you think that's enough to write a book about, you're right. Special note: this podcast ended in a way that n...

This episode ran a bit long. You know why? Because Dave is a dang funny dude who has a lot of good stories. You'll learn the following: why he hates the Astros, how he once got traded for a blind guy, what he thinks of the Rangers' new ballpark, what happened to Cookie Talk, where he likes to party in Flower Mound, and so much more! Like, for example, he answers a hypothetical that involves baseba...