Paul T. Bradley
As an L.A.-based musician of complex talents and singular taste with his own band, The One AM Radio, Hrishikesh Hirway understands the amount of finesse and perfectionism that goes into crafting fantastic songs. With his Radiotopia-powered podcast, Song Exploder, he takes that understanding to interviews with other music makers — some of whom are of the household-name variety — and draws out the best parts and thoughts. By doing all of the hard work of chasing down his favorite songmakers, conversing with them at length and — most importantly — filing his conversations down to their essential pieces, he ends up with a tight but well-tuned 13 to 15 minutes about a single song. All of his own effort cuts out the prosaic (though often necessary to the process) prattle that lesser music podcasts force their listeners to endure. Given that he's been featured in Wired and the AV Club and has featured acts like U2, Death Cab for Cutie and Best Coast, it's doubtful he'll have to do much more chasing.
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