What Now with Simo

Good spot for a picnic — Green grass — Forgot the pillow — Shade — Sandwich — S.Pellegrino sparkling natural mineral water — Shoes — Rainbow-coloured blanket — Helmet — Why haven’t I done this before? — I don’t believe in beating yourself up — Easygoing — A long time ago — Academia — Dry place — Parties and picnics — May Day — That part of the day — In warmth with a breeze — Basic things most impo...

“Season 4 Theme — 2nd Anniversary Opening Version” (@ 0:00) — Two years from recording the first episode at Hótel Vellir in Iceland — My mother’s passing — My parents — “2nd Anniversary Lyre” (@ 1:52) — New leather couch from Denmark — “Passages Dark and Light — Part 1” (@ 2:40) — Note regarding earlier symphony discussion — At Dawn: Early Short Stories for a later episode — The three first Psycho...

Northern Lights , Op. 2 No. 1 for Lap Steel Guitar: “A Beginning Is a Difficult Place to End” (@ 0:00) © 2022 Simo Sakari Aaltonen. All rights reserved.

“Notes to Self” (@ 0:25) — Backlog — Some individual points — Line by Rod Serling — “What are you, some kind of sadist?” — Nicholas Meyer on specificity and universality — The very picture of a violinist — Sir Yehudi Menuhin — Poster in a café — Tastes in music — Plastic people — A really bad idea — Symphonies were originally not expected to be heard by any single person more than once — What type...

Year 2022 — On a train — Warmth — Finland has two great festivals of light and warmth — Midsummer and Christmas — Human warmth is a miracle — The most difficult thing to get across in art — Harder than comedy — Everything needs to be just right — Sense of balance and lightness — The Finnish Christmas song “Varpunen jouluaamuna” (“Sparrow on Christmas Morning”) — Prose translation in the season 4 b...

Finnish Christmas song: “Varpunen jouluaamuna” (“Sparrow on Christmas Morning”)

“Winter Is Here” (@ 0:27) — My tribute joke to Norm Macdonald — A reason why many old poems no longer play — First world problems — Hundreds of poetry readings from 1923 to the 1950s — Listening to some during morning exercise (5 to 6 a.m.) — Wordsworth, John Donne — Donne’s “The Sun Rising” (1633) — Raging at the sun — Determines the comings and goings of lovers — Casts an imperious eye — How pri...

So many of our problems come from misuse of language — “What is the meaning of life?” — Not possible without language — Like the memory of a wind that came and went — Questions of self-worth — At some point in the past — Need to be responsible with language — Any idea can potentially live forever — Self-defeating and other-defeating ideas — Ruthless — Mosquitoes — Getting rid of deeply seated thou...

An illustration — Something I and Pierre talked about — Silence, negative space, and room — Tight vs. looser editing — Exact same background music (“Fresh Start”) — Postponing some topics — Great losses recently — An uncle, a friend, Dean Stockwell — The passing of Norm Macdonald — He was the first outside my personal circle to have an impact on this podcast — Early in season 1 — Norm’s encouragin...

“Season 4 Theme” (@ 0:00) — Welcome — “Fresh Start” (@ 0:33) — New cover art and theme tune — Looking back on season 3 — Discussions with David Lee Homb and Pierre Estève — Great feedback — All music in my own episodes is by me — No ready-made elements — Hardcover books — An Iceland Symphony — Short episodes — Introductory episode — Original idea and secret hope — Chris Stevens in Northern Exposur...

Atlantis II : “Rainbow Bridge” (@ 0:00) — Cahors — Avignon — Nature and wild places — Dragon Lore II : “Sanctuary” (@ 2:02) — Listening — Sound is a miracle — Field recordings — Studies — Learning — Your own voice — Confidence — The best way to learn — Pleasure in the doing — Teachers — David Lynch — Rules vs. principles — John Cage: Silence (1961) — Freedom — Atlantis: The Lost Tales : “Spitzberg...

Atlantis: The Lost Tales : “Sunriders” special remix (@ 0:00) — Introduction — Welcome — Composer and artist — Sound experimentation — Recording company Shooting Star — Non-profit organisation Art Science 21 — Crossroads of art, science, and sustainability — Bandcamp page — Website — Something special coming — Vangelis — Music and friendship — Closer relationship — YouTube — Huge instrument collec...

Good morning — Back at the lake — Some basic truths about healing and human life — Speaking from experience — Bad advice and good advice — Getting out of the house — Active outdoors — Nutrition — Health and happiness — Depressed, down in spirits, in despair — What will never help — When summer got here — Daily activity — You can’t get to a better place by only thinking — Choosing activities you en...

Welcome back to the lake — Windy but warm — Bradbury land — Many of them — Years looking for it — Lakes — Carnivals — Some good futuristic things — Summer mornings, days, evenings, and nights — Green grass — Freshly mown lawn — Learned rowing from my father — Principles of responsible boating — Centre of gravity — Orientation and direction — Oars in water — Genius inventor of rowing — Saving a lit...

Early morning on the lake — An Iceland Symphony: A Theatrical Symphony for All Ages — First large-scale composition — Book of sheet music — 21 sections — Calls for performers of all ages — Started writing in early 2019 in Iceland — All of Iceland and all Icelanders — Children and teenagers and adults — A land where childhood is still possible — Grocery store anecdote — “Pabbi” (“Father”) — The voi...

An audio message recorded for a friend on my phone — An interview with Philip Glass — His early years — One of the most successful composers of our time — Film music, operas, and countless other types of pieces — His first opera — Back to driving a taxi — Opera doesn’t make a profit — Nothing to fall back on — Always working on many things rather than a single big thing — Not allowed into the usua...

Rod Serling — A gift to all writers — Worked hard all last year — Gift to myself — The 60th anniversary Blu-ray set of The Twilight Zone — The best presentation of this material ever made — Serling himself never got to see it in this astounding quality — Lighting, filming, sets, costumes — Super quality — A treasury for any creative person — Creative insight — Keys to creativity — Apologies to my...

The discussion with David Lee Homb very special for me — Never had a peer group of creatives for long in life — How different life would’ve been — Easy connection among likeminded souls — Something to do with creativity, caring, and wanting to have a positive impact — Selfishness closes a person off from any meaningful path in life — What we can do for others — A question with art also — What effe...

Heartfelt messages — Reaching out to likeminded people — Saying what feels right — David Lynch — Therapy and creativity — Tigger — ADD / ADHD — Doctor in Beverly Hills — Bouncing rather than medication — Effects on creativity — Insidious effects — Changed brain chemistry equals changed personality — Upcoming book of poetry — Started writing after Phantasmagoria — Pulling through the dark years — S...

First anniversary — Special guest David Lee Homb — Actor and writer — This podcast started in Iceland on 24 March 2020 — Sierra’s groundbreaking adventure game Phantasmagoria — Live actors in computer-generated sets — Nothing can replace a real actor — Lead male role — Kindred spirit — Same wavelength — Two-part episode — Skype recording — David’s introduction — Great things coming — Starting on h...

Unplanned break — Clearing the cobwebs — Spotify playlist from 1952 to 1955 now over 15 tracks old — The only agenda for it — Period pieces or timeless quality — Recent Icelandic earthquakes — Best wishes from Finland — Increasingly less interested in comics — An art form as good as any other — Films, TV series, theatre, music — Limitations — Following real passions — The possibilities of theatre...

Recap: TV, malls, driving — Lighter episode — Happy 75th birthday to David Lynch — Spotify playlist — “Scène” from Act II of Tchaikovsky’s Swan Lake — London Symphony Orchestra/Anatole Fistoulari — Dragnet premiere correction — Favourite film of 2020: The Vast of Night — Subtle depth — Nothing about it needed excusing — Favourite TV series: The Right Stuff (Disney+) — Science fiction and science f...

Season 2 transcript book now on Amazon — More than 41,000 words — Introduction, footnotes, and bonus chapter on The Ray Bradbury Theater — Book series — Happy with this volume — Closer to my ideal of being like a late night radio programme — Thanks to Alessandra for checking my facts regarding S.Pellegrino mineral water — Course correction re: sharing my journeys through different realms of art —...

Welcome to 2021 — Journey through art — Music, film, TV, books, comics, more — About dates — Spotify playlist: “What Now with Simo 1952–1955” — Tony Bennett’s “Blue Velvet” — January 1952 — Version by Bobby Vinton in the 60s — Used by David Lynch in his film — A threshold moment — Modern era — “Riders in the Sky” — Caccini’s “Amarilli” — Ages for reference — David Lynch turned 6 — Philip Glass tur...

Season 2 finale — Over 5,000 listens since 24 March 2020 — Dark events and crossroads in time — David Lynch writing and directing Wisteria for Netflix — Published Art & Love, Vol. 1 — A legacy creation — 100 years from now — Future-proof language — Encapsulations and essences — The substance of a person’s life — 124 chapters — Preserving or diminishing the value of a creation — Imagine a theat...