The Brewing Network - The Session. Seriously??!

I got a link to the yeast show on the session and figure I will listen.

I am ten minutes in and they have mentioned the guest. But they are just talking about golf and freaking santa claus.

Seriously?

I expect some mindless banter with the self promotional world of podcasts, but wow! Maybe it is all becoming more real since we turned off our TV because we realized it was not worth $50 a month to us... and now I have lost my tolerance for the dribble that I was likely accustomed to .

I guess I am on an anti pod cast kick right now... I was given the how-it-works podcast on moonshine (I believe it is off the website of that name). My friend was so excited and enlightened by it. It ended and I had a list of ten things that were factual wrong and I was still waiting for them to START with some real content.

I think maybe HBT has runied me for being able to focus on the content that I am interested in.

All right. Time to go grill some steaks and drink some brew.

Sirloin on the grill dome (think big green egg), roasted beets, cauliflower whipped liked mashed potatos (SWMBO is on some diet, fine by me!)

More beer. And we are both off tonight. Finally.

Try Basic Brewing Radio. James Spencer's podcast is basically the NPR of brewcasts, for better and for worse. He's kinda dorky, but he knows his stuff, often has some really interesting guests, and there isn't very much horsing around. Even the Jamil Show, which I love and which has been tremendously valuable to me, has times when they're just bull****ting on and on and on.

Good word... and yes, I have been drinking, because it is the Brewing Network, not Northern Brewer... I think I must have beer induced dyslexia.

I will check out the James Spencer show... NPR is more my style.

I am now about 20 minutes in and they have said NOTHING of substance.

NADA.

And yes, it took me an hour and twenty minutes to get another 10 minutes listened to. But I drank alot of beer and the steak turned out GREAT!

I love my hobbies.

I can rarely get through a whole Brewing Network podcast- I think it's about 90 minutes long, with about 30 minutes of brewing info. They are great people (we met Justin at the National Homebrewers Conference) but unless I'm walking the dog or something, the inane banter drives me crazy. (And even then, we rarely walk an entire podcast). Like the_Bird said, Basic Brewing radio (and the video version) are much more beer-centered. James Spencer is a pretty laid back host. One thing that makes me a little crazy- they have tastings. Well, they taste and give you their impressions. I can't taste the beer they're sampling, but they describe it well. It's kinda weird listening to a beer tasting, ya know?

Yeah I have never been a fan of TBN's stuff, I think it's a generational thing...between the wasted Drivel and the music breaks like it was a real radio station...and the sheer mind numbing length I find most of their programming useless...

I agree with The_bird about basic brewing...I'm a NPR guy (literally, I used to work for a Station in Detroit) so I like the professional style, and the one topic one hour shows.

I also like Craftbrewer Radio from Australia CraftBrewer Radio They started as a radio show on australian radio over a decade ago, and were the first to do the homebrewing podcast thing...they've got combined 60 years of brewing experience between them...They are chatty, and cover a bunch of things in each show, but it's mostly beer related...And they do interesting things on their show, brew with nearly 5o% white flour, brew with hot stones, stuff like that...

I listened to everything they have archived (which if you dig enough, goes back to their radio days) and when they first went online, some guy named John Palmer from america, used to email or write to them asking questions...it was quite funny that a couple years down the road, when How to brew comes out that the guy that used to email them asking questions...was THE John Palmer...

I enjoy it but never listen to it at home. Let's just say I like it better than talking to the people I work with...HA HA.

YooperBrew said:

I can rarely get through a whole Brewing Network podcast- I think it's about 90 minutes long, with about 30 minutes of brewing info. They are great people (we met Justin at the National Homebrewers Conference) but unless I'm walking the dog or something, the inane banter drives me crazy.

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Ninety minutes? The Session is usually like 4 hours long!

I sometimes listen to it while I'm brewing, because the sheer length of the thing gets me almost through an entire AG batch, and it's not really necessary to pay close attention to what they're saying usually. If you want the meat (such as it is) of The Session the key is to skip ahead an hour or so until they get to the guest, because that part of it is often pretty good. And then after the guest is done you can turn it off, unless you're really dying the hear who wins drunk of the week or something.

I don't think one can really compare The Session with the James Spencer podcasts. James' stuff is intended strictly as an informational podcast, where The Session is really more of a live internet radio show that is later re-released in podcast form. Hence the amount of futzing around.

But regardless of what one thinks of The Session, I found the Jamil Show to be a great resource when looking to brew a particular style.

I enjoyed Justin's banter on how he almost burned down his front porch during a brewday.

The Jamil SHow and Brew Strong are much better shows on the BN. Give them a try.
THough, if you turned off your TV and are antipodcast, maybe the whole podcast thing is just not for you.

James' stuff is good but not entertainment. THe session is supposed to be entertaining.

The Session used to actually be a pretty great show, but I don't want some monotone voice talking about the best hydrometer to buy. I want a couple laughs in there. The show isn't that great now because a couple of things happened...
1 The main host learned how to brew. When he started he didn't know much beyond basic extract brewing. So he asked a lot of questions. When he learned more, he could skip over a lot and stopped getting into the details.
2 They developed a tight core group of people around the show. So they entertain themselves more and more. Also this caused a lot of inside jokes and material. So you need background to know what they are talking about half the time.
3 One of the orignal hosts was the girlfriend of the head guy. She got a new job and could no longer participate. When she left the show suffered. She seemed to have held the whole thing together by keeping the audience involved via the chat room. She also seemed to have a calming effect on the guys to keep it from devolving into a frat party (nothing wrong with a frat party, I was involved with many. But I doubt they make for god radio). There's another woman that fills in now, but she seems to eat up the flirting, etc.

Anyway, try some of the older shows, too. They are a lot better.

I can't do the Session. Too much alcohol-driven drivel. In spite of their warts, The Jamil Show and Brew Strong has some real gems once you desensitize your ears to the dick n' fart jokes.

I was pretty surprised at how unprofessional brewstrong is. Sometimes I get pretty frustrated. I guess I was just used to reading how to brew and brewing classic styles and not used to hearing the adolescent giggling. Not that I don't make immature jokes, I guess it's just the kind of thing where you have to be there.

Coastarine said:

I was pretty surprised at how unprofessional brewstrong is. Sometimes I get pretty frustrated. I guess I was just used to reading how to brew and brewing classic styles and not used to hearing the adolescent giggling.

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MEH...you are just an old fogey like me and chefmike.

You admit once that you like NPR and you get old fogeied... just like the college kids I work with!

I will check out these other shows... I have listened to Jamil and I think Brewstrong. I like the style info in Jamil. Perhaps I was ruined in childhood on morning shows on the radio. No one should talk that much before 9am.

Revvy, what are the chances of you knowing an engineer from minnesota public Radio that dropped it all a year or two ago... someone I met and have kept up with. Shot in the dark.

I guess I am more sober now. They finally got to the guest. I paused it before they got to washing yeast, which is what I started it for in the first place.