Getting Down & Wordy

Today we see what was the most popular song from exactly 100 years ago in 1923. And wow, it's weird. But it's nicely rooted in the history and culture of the time and tells us a lot about ethnicity, comedy, and the precarious fate of the banana at the time. So we dive into all that. Additionally we give you the history and etymology of banana of course. And we talk about its relation to co...

Today we discuss Hannah's favorite song so she'll stop suggesting we do an episode about it every week. We talk about the pop culture of movie monsters that it arose from, and the pop culture of songs about dance crazes. We explain the origin of the word monster and what words it's related to. And we explore the history of the idea of a monster. Where did it begin, and how has it evolv...

Today we discuss charisma and its little Scrappy Doo-esque sidekick rizz! What does it mean, where'd it come from? What's the story of charisma? Why do we say charisma in Dungeons & Dragons and not like "persuasiveness" or something? And while we're talking about Dungeons & Dragons, what slang terms could we come up with for the other D&D stats? We also discuss wh...

We talk about how men talk! And we talk about how Matchbox Twenty talk with "Push" the surprisingly controversial song about pushing women around. Will I have some research about it? Well, I will. Well, I will. As we did with the feminine genderlect episode, we have a couple interesting lists of words that men are more likely to know than women. Additionally, we talk about various resear...

This week we talk about barbie - the movie and the doll and the song "Barbie Girl" by Aqua. And as you'd expect we're pairing that with a girly language topic. We're talking about how women talk. Is it different from how men talk? Or is that a myth? How do you perform femininity in language? What are the conceptions and misconceptions, and what is the reality? In Eurovision w...

Today we welcome special guest, Youtube star Rob Watts of the Robwords English language show. He joins us to talk about the definitely real UK rappers Pete & Bas. And we reveal the true story behind their whole deal (hoax? how dare you!). Then we talk about some of the differences between UK and US English that you definitely don't already know about. I'm telling you. There are some re...

Today we talk about Ice Spice, whose appearance on the scene has been so meteoric she hasn't even had time to make enough songs to fill an album yet. Is she an industry plant? Is that really a thing? Do Hannah and Russell know enough famous zoomers to stuntcast a new Spice Girls? And we discuss the word mood itself, its etymology and how it's used now in contemporary culture. Additionally,...

Today we're joined by Lowell Hobbs the lead singer of post-punk band Tongues of Fire to discuss the language of spiciness. We talk about the history of spicy food, the different kinds of spiciness, and how different languages have adapted words to describe the relatively recent introduction of capsaicin to their cultures. For Eurovision, we talk about Australia's 2023 song "Promise&qu...

Michael Colby, from the podcast Jack Billings Presents: Haunted Apartment Complex, stops by to fanboy out with Russell over Yeah Yeah Yeahs . . while Hannah sits there awkwardly and probably thinks about Dungeons & Dragons or something. And we discuss the dialect-y origins of their band name. Then we talk about all the things that we say that hark back to a simpler, flatter earth (like 'ed...

We discuss the culture's complex and changing perceptions of Vanilla Ice, a rapper who there are lots of reasons to dislike, but maybe everyone's being a little too mean? His real story will suprise you. Will it make you like him more? Well.... No.... Then we talk about "gangway", a word which somehow we all intuitively know is kind of nautical and piratey, but where are we even...

Today we excitedly interview Puppy Songs creator and musical genius Matt Hobbs, and together we all talk about how humans talk to pets, whether pets understand or not, and how pets communicate with us. We discuss pet voices. Child-parent relationships as models for interspecies relations - do they go in both directions? I mean like, does my cat think of me as her son? Should I give her a mother&#3...

In light of the release of the live action The Little Mermaid and in support of Pride Month, in this episode we're talking about Doctor Octopus's drag persona, Ursula. Just kidding, but she IS purported to be based on a drag queen. Is it a fun cool drag queen that we should all celebrate? Well... At least Divine had lots of pride about being a drag queen. Oh? He didn't at all? Well . ....

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Today we talk about the number 1 most played karaoke song of all time (?) "Before He Cheats", and struggle to say something thoughtful about country music, a genre we know even less about than usual. We talk about the wild history of the expression "Souped Up", from safe crackers boiling dynamite to race horses taking the most cruel and disturbing drugs imaginable. Hannah tries...

We talk about Karol G, who made a song that Hannah actually liked (a rare phenomenon) even while saying repeatedly that she doesn't have an ear for spanish, whatever that means! We discuss "affirmative language", words like "yes", and in Spanish "si". Some alternatives like aye, roger, yeppers, uh-huh, nodding.... Is nodding an instinctive action? Darwin thought s...

We talk the origins and evolution of "slime" from unassuming mucus to cool guy best friend. DnD oozes. Young Thug's singing voice. RICO. And in Eurovision, we talk about the big 5's songs - Germany, Spain, France, Italy, and UK. This week's ad is Memento Mori. Find this podcast at https://mementomoripod.buzzsprout.com/ You can find tons of other great podcasts on our network...

Today we discuss Meghan Trainor's new song "Made You Look". That's right, Mrs. Spy Kid herself (she married a Spy Kid). Is the song kind of good or really bad? We also talk about "make" and other delexical verbs like take get do have go . . . Those verbs that get used to mean anything such that you can make a product, but you can also make a bed, make up with someone, m...

This is the first episode of our new format. We've decided to stop talking about music, and from now on we will talk about fruits and their etymology and history instead. Today we'll taste some varieties of apples, kumquats, goldberries, pineberries, horned melons, and starfruit. As for Eurovision, we're going to talk about the documentary released about the 2020 Eurovision competition...

** AUDIO QUALITY ADVISORY ** There's some trouble with Russell's recording in this episode. He may be a little tough to hear. Today we talk Taylor Swift's song Anti-Hero. We talk about anti-heros and the etymology of the word hero, and we discuss linguistic bleaching, the way that words fade in strength over time. In Eurovision, we talk about the Baltic countries' entries. This epi...

Today we talk about Waka Flocka Flame's hit song "Hard in da Paint". What does hard in the paint mean and where did it originate? For that matter where did the word paint come from? We discuss some other basketball idioms in every speech. Then we do a March Madness style tournment bracket of the last 16 Eurovision winners. We choose our winner. If you want to choose your winner, you can find our l...

We talk about Sam Smith (who Russell stupidly misgenders like a hundred times, sorry listeners!), Kim Petras, LGBT and transgender stuff of course, and the etymology of body shop and specificly the word body. We look at some songs about other kinds of shops and Hannah tries to guess if they're sexual or not. And for Eurovision we talk about some of the songs that have been chosen for 2023 thus far...

We talk "Age of Aquarius/Let the Sunshine In" by The Fifth Dimension, and of course we talk about Aquarius the astrological sign, astrological ages, and the endless list of different astrological bodies which a sign can be 'in', i.e. moon sign, saturn sign, etc., and what each means. TRIGGER WARNING: we are a little derisive toward the whole idea of astrology at times, even though Hannah is an ast...

We review our favorites and least favorites of the podcast episodes of 2022. We talk 5 favorite songs from the podcast. 1 worst song covered. 3 favorite language facts learned. Favorite and least favorite Eurovision song. And predictions for the future of the English language in 2023. Today's featured podcast is Anything Bones! Find them here or anywhere you get podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.co...

**POOR AUDIO QUALITY ADVISORY** There are some problems with the audio in this episode, namely some voice quality loss and a background puppy. Listener beware. Today we are joined by Andres from the Latin Jukebox podcast to talk about Bad Bunny and the history and impact of Spanish on American culture and the English language. We discuss Bad Bunny's activitism in LGBTQ rights and Puerto Rico advoc...

We talk about NSYNC, why pretzels are the ultimate Christmas snack, etymologically speaking, the merry marry mary merger, and of course why we say "Merry Christmas", spoiler - it's like saying have a drunken socialist christmas . . . We also talk about Lithuania's Eurovision offering Sentementai by Monika Liu.