Category: Online Audio

Tantor Media: FREE AUDIOBOOK: Vanishing Act by Thomas Perry

Jesse Willis

Aural Noir: Online Audio

Tantor MediaTantor Media is currently offering a FREE MP3 audiobook download of Thomas Perry’s Vanishing Act!

All you’ll need to get it is a Tantor account, which itself is completely free. If you already have one you’re three or four clicks away from getting the zipped folder full of MP3s.

There’s no information on how long this promotion will last, based on similar past freebies I’m betting it’ll be gone by month’s end, so grab it while you can.

TANTOR MEDIA - Vanishing Act by Thomas Perry

Vanishing Act (Book 1 in the Jane Whitefield series)
By Thomas Perry; Read by Joyce Bean
MP3 Download – Approx. 10 Hours 7 Minutes[UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Tantor Media
Published: October 28, 2009
Vanishing Act introduces Thomas Perry’s popular heroine Jane Whitefield, a Native American guide who secretly provides sanctuary to fugitives seeking new identities. In assisting the mysterious former cop John Felker, Jane is drawn into a trap that will take all of her cunning and the knowledge of her ancestors to escape.

Posted by Jesse Willis

The Horror At Red Hook by H.P. Lovecraft

Jesse Willis

SFFaudio Online Audio

The Horror At Red Hook by H.P. Lovecraft

Here is H.P. Lovecraft’s novelette The Horror At Red Hook. The story was first published in the January 1927 issue of Weird Tales and later in the March 1952 issue (which is where I found the terrific Jon Arfstrom at the bottom of the post).

Red Hook is a mysterious slum in New York City, full of gangs, crime, and just perhaps a terrible cult. Detective Malone had a case that had tendrils extending into Red Hook. It seems that one Robert Suydam, a corpulent and scruffy recluse, has been looking younger, more radiant and prosperous. What does that have to do with the recent spate of kidnappings?

Lovecraft described his inspiration for the story in a letter written to Clark Ashton Smith:

“The idea that black magic exists in secret today, or that hellish antique rites still exist in obscurity, is one that I have used and shall use again. When you see my new tale “The Horror at Red Hook”, you will see what use I make of the idea in connexion with the gangs of young loafers & herds of evil-looking foreigners that one sees everywhere in New York.”

The When Elvis Died PodcastFirst up, as recorded in three parts for Quentin Lewis’ When Elvis Died podcast back in 2010.

Part 1 |MP3| Part 2 |MP3| Part 3 |MP3|

Podcast feed: http://www.quentinlewis.com/podcast/rss.xml


Cthulhu PodcastNext, a two part recording, for the Cthulhu Podcast, read by FNH. The first part begins at 14 minutes in and the second part begins at 34 minutes in.

Part 1 |MP3| Part 2 |MP3|

Podcast feed: http://feeds2.feedburner.com/cthulhupodcast


Finally, here are the text sources |WIKISOURCE ETEXT| and a |PDF|.

"Age old horror is a hydra with a thousand heads."
Weird Tales illustration by Jon Arfstrom for The Horror At Red Hook
Weird Tales illustration by Jon Arfstrom for The Horror At Red Hook

Posted by Jesse Willis

Decoder Ring Theatre: Marvellous Boxes: Frozen Words Thawed? by Tim Prasil

Jesse Willis

SFFaudio Online Audio

Decoder Ring TheatreMarvellous BoxesThere’s a new anthology series running on Decoder Ring Theatre – it’s entitled Marvellous Boxes. I’ve somehow missed the first episode because I’ve just heard the second episode, Frozen Words Thawed?. The plot impressed me, the unconventional storytelling impressed me, the research and scholarship impressed me, and I liked a whole lot too! Once you’ve heard it, check out THIS terrific post on the writing of it. And there’s a nice discussion thread starting on AudioDramaTalk HERE. Very, very impressive Mr. Prasil!

Here’s the official description:

The second installment of author Tim Prasil’s all-new anthology series continues our tour of new worlds of the imagination. This week, a reminder that history is written by the victor, and that the strangest gladitorial arenas are often the ones that appear the most civilized. What will happen when we hear… Frozen Words Thawed?

|MP3|

Podcast feed: http://decoderring.libsyn.com/rss

Posted by Jesse Willis

The House On The Borderland by William Hope Hodgson – Read by Wayne June

Jesse Willis

SFFaudio Online Audio

The incomparably awesome-voiced narrator, Wayne June, has completed a terrific sounding narration of William Hope Hodgson‘s The House On The Borderland. This is the famous supernatural horror novel, from 1908, that H.P. Lovecraft described as “A classic of the first water” – I looked that phrase up – “of the first water” means means “of the highest quality.”

When you combine the wonder of Wayne June’s narrative powers with a classic of this magnitude you’re bound to get something special.

And he’s selling it for just $10 HERE.

The House On The Borderland by William Hope Hodgson

The book comes in five MP3s. But, and this is a pretty interesting experiment, Wayne June is also giving away the entire novel there, on the site, in a streaming format!

Yup, if you want to listen to the novel streaming you can hear the whole thing FREE!

Posted by Jesse Willis

The Audacity To Podcast: TAP065: Audacity Compressor Showdown

Jesse Willis

SFFaudio Online Audio

The Audacity To PodcastThe Audacity To Podcast is a podcast about the freeware program Audacity. We use Audacity to edit The SFFaudio Podcast. It’s wonderful and it’s free. Back in January, in episode TAP065: Audacity Compressor Showdown the host, Daniel J. Lewis took several podcaster’s recordings and ran them through various compression software programs – it’s pretty technical – but the results seem to be pretty conclusive – if you’re not getting paid by the hour to edit audio and you want to make your podcast sound nice and loud Levelator is what you want to use. Here’s the conclusion Lewis makes:

Surprisingly, Levelator did a consistently fantastic job on the audio and handled background noise well. It gives no controls and may add an extra step if you don’t record into WAV or AIFF. But it’s easy (albeit slow) and very effective.

Here’s the |MP3|, and HERE‘s the informative post (with all the samples you can play with).

Podcast feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/TheAudacitytoPodcast

Posted by Jesse Willis

Volume problems on podcasts, a comparison of two podcasts I listened to today

Jesse Willis

SFFaudio News

Geeks Guide To The GalaxySearch Engine with Jesse BrownDavid Barr Kirtley, who puts together and hosts Geeks Guide To Galaxy is responding to my complaint about his podcast being too low in volume.

But his show isn’t the only one I’ve had this issue with. Our most recent podcast, #155, also featured two out of three of us complaining about the volume of the Clarkesworld podcast.

I’ve also complained, by email, to Tevi Troy of New Books In Public Policy about the same issue.

Most podcasts are ok for volume. But there are some that are consistently low.

But to get a sense of what I mean I’ll use the two latest shows as my example.

So, picking on David Barr Kirtley again, I listened to Geeks Guide To Galaxy on my walk home from work today (the episode with Morgan Spurlock) – I could barely hear it at maximum volume. It was raining and there were cars on the roadway and because I wasn’t in front of my amplified speaker system at home I just couldn’t hear everything that was being said, and to make it worse to hear anything I had to jam my earbuds down my ear canals. A podcast should physically hurt me.

Here’s the Geeks Guide To Galaxy file: http://downloads.wired.com/podcasts/assets/underwire/geeksguide57.mp3

Now, compare that experience to the one on my way in to work today. I listened to TVO’s Search Engine. And right away I had my iPhone set to half volume of full, and at that it was plenty loud, loud enough, in fact, so that even set at half volume and with my earbuds hanging loosely over my ears, I could hear everything.

Here’s the Search Engine file: http://feeds.tvo.org/~r/tvo/searchengine/~3/mZBN588091g/801144_48k.mp3

And, incidentally, at home now in another comparison I’ve just made again, I can hear Search Engine from across the room at 3/4 volume through my iPhone speaker. The Geek’s Guide is at full volume and is not loud enough.

Posted by Jesse Willis