Listening to
99% Invisible: Bijlmer (City of the Future, Part 1). Already looking forward to Part 2. In particular this is about the post-war development of a suburb outside Amsterdam (the Bijlmermeer) but beyond that, it’s about all modernist egalitarian utopias that people like Le Corbusier imagined – but never actually attained.
Turns out that actually dealing with people and politics and the real world results in these grand ideas largely falling flat. I’d never actually heard of the Bijlmermeer, but growing up in Plymouth with its massive concrete post-war monstrosities (check out A Plan for Plymouth), I am sort of familiar with the legacy of trying to build a city around these grand gestures. I’m totally on board with the idea of getting stuff like this to work, and always interesting to look at why it never seems to take off.
This American Life: Rom-Com. Bit late for valentines day but still good. Ignore the bit with Daniel Radcliffe at the start, and you’ve got a solid episode about some relationship things. I don’t want to give away any spoilers, but suffice to say there’s romance and comedy.
The Cipher: Evidence. Though I’m not checking for Ev as much as I used to, I’ll always have a soft spot for him. Big fan of Dilated Peoples back in the day. In fact, they were the first 'big’ American rap group I ever saw – 2002, I think… at The Thekla in Bristol, after a ludicrous drive up crammed into a Nissan Micra. That was fun. Anyway, as often happens with these Cipher interviews, I’ve got a newfound appreciation for him and I need to give the new album a listen.