As I’m more home-bound just now and want to rest in order to get back to productivity speed, I’ve been in my bed and listening to podcasts, especially the 70+ Rundgren radio episodes — some might have figured out I’m a big Todd Rundgren fan. I heard Initiation on the Finnish radio and the next week figured out a way to do a field trip at my middle school to the nearest city to look at various other educational institutions. When we arrived at the city I sneaked out from the bus and found my way to a record store to purchase the Initiation album. As there were no ipods and walkmans at that time, I tried to memorize the tracks while I was working on the field driving a tractor, so that was one way to internalize tracks. I’m sure all this has influenced my music making, especially the big interest to make 30+ long songs.

Anyway, there’s always been all kinds of interesting stories what really happened during XTC’s Skylarking sessions, and Andy tells a lot of fun stories. Not only that, he talks about the music business today, about his Ape record label and much more. Not only that, he’s a funny chap.

So if you have a chance and interest, listen to this somewhat long (two hour) question and answer session. I have one link to Odeo, but based on the state of web links coming and going you might need to hunt down the Rundgren radio podcast sessions in future. I will actually try to listen to them all, as they have interviewed musicians that are working or have worked with Rundgren, and they all have fascinating and interesting stories and insights.

I think I mentioned it before, but podcasts is the future of radio, not FM or even digital/satellite FM. The reason is that the cost to set up a podcast is minimal, even the technologies needed are here, such as GarageBand. As anyone could start any themed podcast, no license needed, all that is required is someone who wants to do it. There’s always an  audience out there if the content is interesting.