In case you missed it, yesterday’s show on XM satellite radio’s POTUS ’08 channel is available for downloading here. Pretty nifty line-up, too:

Join host Bill Bradley for thoughts on yesterday’s GOP YouTube/CNN debate, plus:

Pajamas CEO Roger L. Simon and Bob Owens of Confederate Yankee interview Sen. Fred Thompson regarding the future of America’s War On Terror.

Should Thompson not get the nomination, Ed Morrissey and Duane Patterson (producer of The Hugh Hewitt Show) discuss his chances as a GOP vice presidential nominee.

Glenn Reynolds and Dr. Helen Smith discuss the upcoming Supreme Court case involving the Second Amendment with Robert Levy of the CATO Institute.

Liz Stephans and Scott Baker of Breitbart.TV on the role of YouTube and viral online video in the 2008 presidential election.

Produced by Ed Driscoll.

For extended versions of each of today’s segments, and the video of the Thompson interview don’t miss this week’s PJM Political “Director’s Cut Interviews.”

For podcasting techies wondering what I used to record the segments with Liz and Scott, and the previous segments from the last two weeks’ shows all recorded earlier this month from Blog World in Las Vegas, I simply used my trusty Samson Zoom H4 Handy Recorder (which has a pair of pro-style XLR jacks, visible in the photo that accompanies the Videomaker review), a pair of Shure SM58 mics, and a pair of tabletop mic stands. The Zoom recorder uses an SD card, and an 2-gig sized card provides about two hours of audio, which can quickly be ported over to a PC’s hard drive and then into your DAW program of choice for editing and mixdown.

I threw them all into a suitcase before heading to Vegas just as a lark, but I was astounded at how clean the audio was, even with the roar of Vegas Convention Center crowd all around, which is why I ended up doing so many interviews there. The trick, I think, is the Shure SM58s. There’s a reason why so many rock groups use them on-stage and on live recordings–their cardioid input pattern makes them great at focusing the loudest sounds (which normally should be the person talking/singing/playing into them) and de-emphasizing the background noise.

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Bill Bradley, the host of Pajamas’ PJM Political on XM’s POTUS ’08 channel, has some thoughts on the GOP debate on CNN, in a podcast we recorded immediately after the debate aired on Wednesday night.

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You watched their show, seen their clips from the candidates–now hear how they do it, their thoughts on the YouTube phenomenon and the role DIY video will play in the 2008 presidential channel, as Scott Baker and Liz Stephans of Breitbart.TV sit down with me for a 15-minute audio interview recorded live at Blog World Expo in Las Vegas.

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Well, it’s not that new a podcast–I actually recorded this last December, just as Tech Central Station was transitioning away from podcasting back towards emphasizing traditional print articles. But I didn’t want this interview with author Paul Kengor and his book The Crusader: Ronald Reagan and the Fall of Communism to be abandoned entirely, so I’m sharing it here, as a sort of late summer rerun. While there are a few questions near the end of my interview with the author tied to the then-recent mid-term elections, most of the material discussed is pretty timeless stuff: how Ronald Reagan won the Cold War–and spent much of his adult life preparing for the job.

27 minutes, 33 seconds in length, 25.2 MB file size, and no iPod required–virtually any PC with a broadband connection can download and play a podcast. So click here to listen!

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As I’ve written before, the past 25 years have seen a quiet revolution in home music recording, that’s right in line with the growth of other “Army of Davids” technologies that dramatically empower individuals. In 1982, the breakthrough product that made home recording possible was the cassette four-track recorder. These weren’t one half of the eight-track deck that you had in your ’77 Chevy Vega; they used an ordinary stereo audio cassette, but played that cassette in only one direction, so that there were now four individual, synchronized tracks to record on. You could put a drum machine (another newly designed product) on one track, a bass guitar on another, an electric guitar on the third and a vocal on the fourth, and voila! Instant DIY song. (Bruce Springsteen’s Nebraska album was home-brewed using a cassette four-track machine.)

But most musicians wanted to do more than that–and these days, companies such as Boston-based Cakewalk offer products that give the average home musician as many tracks as his PC’s memory and hard drive will hold. Not to mention PC-based software synthesizers that are also infinitely more flexible than their 1980s counterparts. George Martin and Quincy Jones cost a lot more to hire, but the same basic technology they use in their recording studios is increasingly accessible to those recording home.

Having launched in 1987, Cakewalk are currently celebrating their 20th year of business, and my interview with Greg Hendershott, Cakewalk’s CEO, is an attempt to bridge the gap between those early days and now. Ideally, it will make a good overview to those new to PC-based recording, but dying to dip their toes into the water. It’s 20 minutes long, 18.7 MB in size, and can be downloaded here, or via our Apple i-Tunes page. (No iPod required; virtually any PC can download and play an MP3.)

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It’s not quite Tarkenton meets Staubach, Dylan meets Lennon, Prince meets Morris Day, or an even better Minneapolis-themed metaphor that’s eluding me, but James Lileks is interviewed by Pajamas’ own Austin Bay on this week’s Blog Week In Review podcast to discuss the current state of the New, New Journalism.

Tune in here–no iPod required; virtually any computer with broadband can stream an MP3 file.

Related: Maybe Brian Williams should take a listen!

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In this week’s Blog Week In Review podcast, Austin Bay gets Jeff Goldstein and Neo-Neocon’s thoughts on Live Earth: “Rockstars For Whatever“.

And speaking of Live Earth, Tim Blair writes that the party to fight global cooling continues!

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After getting some background on Breitbart.tv for an upcoming article, I realized that its proprietor (who

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Happy Fourth of July!

And for some music to further set the mood, here’s the Ed Driscoll Orchestra (aka Sonar and Reason) perfoming the “Washington Post March“.

(On Monday, a friend sent me this link and asked me to make a loop of the WaPo March for the NRA’s float in the Morgan Hill Fourth of July Parade; after routing all of the MIDI tracks through the synthesizers in Reason, and some reverb, I’d like to think it at least sounds a bit better than the version on the site.)

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Austin Bay interviews Thom Shanker, Pentagon correspondent for the New York Times in this week’s Blog Week In Review podcast, over at the Pajamas Media mothership.

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Austin Bay interviews Senator John Cornyn (R-TX) in the latest Blog Week In Review, online now at Pajamas HQ.

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If you haven’t heard it yet, Austin Bay’s lengthy and informative interview of Dr. David Kilcullen, the senior counterinsurgency adviser to Gen. Petraeus, calling into Pajamas HQ from Baghdad, is a must-listen. And don’t miss Austin’s latest syndicated column, which expands on Dr. Kilcullen’s thoughts.

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Austin Bay was particularly keen to interview Daniel Drezner on his new book All Politics is Global for the latest Blog Week In Review podcast. You can hear the results here–as Pajamas HQ notes, “Get out your notebooks and pay close attention to this one. There

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Blog Week In Review is celebrating its first anniversary with three quarters of its original line-up: Austin Bay, Glenn Reynolds, and Tammy Bruce. (Sadly, Eric Umansky had a scheduling conflict, but promises to return sometime this summer.)

From my point of view in the producer’s chair, I think the sound quality on this one is the best yet; I’ve been very fortunate to have the time to experiment and fine-tune things. So please have a listen, here.

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On Hugh Hewitt’s radio show recently, James Lileks mentioned that when he wants commentary regarding the Middle East, he doesn’t bother with the wire services, he checks out The Three Michaels: Michael Yon, Michael “Faster, Please” Ledeen…and Michael Totten, who’s this week’s guest on Pajamas’ Blog Week In Review podcast, featuring Austin Bay, and produced by yours truly.

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Michael Yon was the special guest of the Blog Week In Review podcast yesterday, as he and Austin Bay discussed the Surge and the–hopefully stillborn–ban by the Pentagon on milblogging.

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Over at the Pajamas mothership, of course:

This week

Filed under: Podcasts, War And Anti-War

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Austin Bay asked me to guest host the Pajamas Media “Blog Week In Review” podcast this week, so I interviewed Robin Aitken, the former BBC journalist and on-air personality who left the network and has written a new book, very much in the vein of Bernard Goldberg’s books on American media bias, titled Can We Trust The BBC. I tried to aim the questions towards an American perspective on the topic, but then, how could I not? Aitken also discussed in depth the BBC’s biases regarding Iraq, Israel, and the Palestinians. Regular readers of this blog won’t exactly be shocked where the BBC comes down on these issues, but for those who still hold out a belief that the BBC is entirely objective, its an eye-opener.

I also asked Robin if this was still flying on the walls of his former workplace.

It’s a 20 minute long podcast (no iPod required–any computer with broadband and a soundcard can play an MP3 file), so please tune in and listen.

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Pajamas reports:

Bill Roggio talks about the surge, security in Iraq, and holding our ground in Afghanistan with host Austin Bay in this week

Filed under: Podcasts, War And Anti-War

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When the Beatles broke up in 1970, they left behind a treasure-trove of archives in the vaults of EMI records, many of which have yet to see the light of day. There are also countless hours of live recordings and movie footage from Let It Be, which is still locked away, despite a few false rumors to the contrary from time to time.

Late last year, rock journalist Richie Unterberger returned from an Indiana Jones-like exploration of those archives, and described their contents in book titled, The Unreleased Beatles. It was originally published by Backbeat Books, and is currently distributed by Hal Leonard, and available from Amazon.com.

Richie spoke with us recently in a 21-minute long, 19.3 MB podcast, which you can download here, or via our Apple iTunes page. Note that in both cases, no iPod is required; virtually any computer with a broadband connection and a soundcard can play an MP3 file.

And speaking of playing, since I somehow lost Paul and Ringo’s phone numbers, that’s me playing the guitars, bass and keys, along with some Acid Loops for the drums and synths, on the intro and outro music. I think I knocked out some fairly bitchin’ (for me at least) lead licks on my Telecaster on the fade out, if I do say so myself.

Update: Also at Blogcritics, and Pajamas Media.

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