Category: Audio Drama

BBC Radio 4: On The Beach by Nevil Shute dramatized

Jesse Willis

SFFaudio Online Audio

BBC Radio 4Roy of the U.K. writes in to say there’s a “Classic Serial” on BBC Radio 4 that is worthy of our attention. It’s a BBC dramatisation of this recently mentioned Nevil Shute novel: On The Beach…

A 1957 novel set in the then future 1963. A nuclear conflict has devastated the northern hemisphere, polluting the atmosphere with radioactive fallout and killing all animal life. While the nuclear bombs were confined to the northern hemisphere, global air currents are slowly carrying the fallout to the southern hemisphere. The only part of the planet still habitable is the far south of the globe, specifically Australia and New Zealand, South Africa, and the southern parts of South America, although all of these areas are slowly succumbing to radiation poisoning as the fallout continues to circulate southwards!

BBC Radio 4 Radio Drama - On The Beach based on the novel by Nevil ShuteOn The Beach
Based on the novel by Nevil Shute; performed by a full cast
2 Parts – Approx. 2 Hours [RADIO DRAMA]
Broadcaster: BBC Radio 4 / Classic Serial
Broadcast: Sunday Nov. 2nd 2008 & Sunday Nov. 9th 2008 @ 15:00-16:00

These will each be repeated once at 21:00-22:00 on the following Saturdays.

And, Roy tells us to stick around for the “Bookclub programme” that immediately follows the first broadcast of Part 1 as it features Fay Weldon discussing her 1989 novel The Cloning Of Joanna May. That’s later repeated the following Thursday at 16:00 (30 minutes).

Thanks Roy!

Posted by Jesse Willis

Review of Slasher by F. Paul Wilson

Scott D.

Aural Noir: Review

Grist Mill - SlasherThe Grist Mill: “Slasher”
By F. Paul Wilson; Performed by a Full Cast
Audio Download – 1/2 hour – [AUDIO DRAMA]
Publisher: STH Productions
Published: 2008

A man loses his daughter to a killer. At the funeral, he is approached by an FBI agent who keeps him up to date on the investigation. When the investigation doesn’t go the way the man wants it to… well, I can say no more. This audio drama is definitely worth 30 minutes of your time, if only to experience the ending.

Sound effects are used in a professional manner and the acting is pretty good. The only thing that turned me off about this drama is a bit of jarring piano music that is used at a couple of points in the story – it wasn’t appropriate for the mood.

This is my first experience listening to an F. Paul Wilson story, and my first experience hearing an audio drama from The Grist Mill – I look forward to hearing stuff from both again.

Posted by Scott D. Danielson

Meatball Fulton’s 90 Second Cellphone Chillin’ Theatre

Jesse Willis

SFFaudio Online Audio

90 Second Cellphone Chillin’ TheatreMeatball Fulton’s podcast, Meatball’s Meatballs, will feature six stories from his series, 90 Second Cellphone Chillin’ Theatre starting on Friday October 10th 2008. In #17 |MP3| Fulton reveals how he came up with ideas for the 50 stories in this series, stories like Drooling Doreen, Ghouls Galore and Zombie Al’s Big Night Out. They are described as “humorous Hollywood influenced horror stories.”

And, be sure to check out podcast #11 which is a “making of” for the classic The Mist In 3-D Sound by Stephen King |MP3| headphones are required for the full effect.

Subscribe to the podcast feed:

http://www.zbs.org/dircast/dircaster.php

[Thanks Julie!]

Posted by Jesse Willis

The SFFaudio Podcast #006

Podcast

The SFFaudio PodcastThe SFFaudio Podcast #006 is here. Six is the loneliest number (after 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5) dontchanknow. In this our 6th, and sixth loneliest, show we’re asking lonely questions like: ‘If you had to choose a universe without either Ray Bradbury or Neil Gaiman, which would you pick?’ And ‘Which is the worst audiobook recording ever made?’ Pod-in to find out the answers to these and many more exciting questions that nobody asked us.

Topics discussed include:

StarShipSofa’s Aural Delights, Paul Campbell, Michael Marshall Smith, The Seventeenth Kind, Estalvin’s Legacy, Rebels Of The Red Planet, Charles L. Fontenay, The 2nd SFFaudio Challenge, Parallel Worlds, The Graveyard Book, Neil Gaiman, The Jungle Book, American Gods, The Fix Online, Audiobook Fix, author read audiobooks, Harlan Ellison, Isaac Asimov, Arthur C. Clarke, Stephen King, Robert J. Sawyer, James Patrick Kelly, Good Omens, Terry Pratchett, Neverwhere, Gary Bakewell, if you had to pick…, Stardust, Douglas Adams, Roger Zelazny, The Long Dark Tea Time Of The Soul, radio drama, BBC Radio 4, BBC iplayer, Artemis Fowl, Eoin Colfer, The Supernaturalist, The Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy [the Ivory Coast edition], The Spanish Prisoner, Strange Horizons, Shaun Farrell, From iTunes to the Bookshelves: The First Wave of Podcast Novelists, Podiobooks.com, Nathan Lowell, Quarter Share, Evo Terra, Pavlovian experience, Ed McBain, Donald E. Westlake, NPR, Driveway Moments,

Posted by Jesse Willis

Sound Affects does a War Of The Worlds month

Jesse Willis

SFFaudio Online Audio

Sound Affects: A Radio PlaygroundThis October marks the 70th Anniversary of the Orson Welles and the Mercury Theatre’s War of the Worlds program, now known as “the panic broadcast” of 1938. It’s also the 110th Anniversary of the publication of the original novel by H. G. Wells. In celebration each Sunday this month Jerry Stearns, host of Sound Affects: A Radio Playground, will present excerpts from some of the many different radio versions of the War of the Worlds, plus parodies and take-offs, and background on the original Orson Welles production and at least a dozen other versions since then.

Sound Affects: A Radio Playground airs every Sunday in October at 9:30 PM on
KFAI, 90.3 FM and 106.7 FM, Minneapolis and St. Paul. Online streaming is available at KFAI.org. Here’s the October schedule:

October 5th 2998 – The story surrounding the 1938 Orson Welles “War of the Worlds”, the most famous radio broadcast of all time. And a parody, “They Came For The Candy” by Wisconsin’s Radio Pirates (featuring Scott Dikkers, of ‘The Onion’).

October 12th 2998 – Excerpts of War of the Worlds productions by the *Lux Radio Theater*, and the *L.A. TheatreWorks* (with an all Star Trek cast), plus three different parodies.

October 19th 2998 – Excerpts of *Jeff Wayne’s musical* version of War of the Worlds, from *WKBW* in Buffalo, NY, and from the *BBC*, plus more take-offs, including the *Simpsons* parody.

October 26th 2998 – The complete *50th Anniversary Production of War of the Worlds*, starring *Jason Robards*, Steve Allen, Hector Elizondo and recognizable voices from NPR, all recorded on location at George Lucas’ Skywalker Ranch by Oscar winning sound artist Randy Thom, and directed by David Ossman.

Posted by Jesse Willis

The SFFaudio Podcast #005

Podcast

The SFFaudio PodcastThe SFFaudio Podcast #005 is alive! Recorded at 5 am! By 5 (minus 3) people! We don’t claim to make sense.

Topics discussed include:

A Bite Of Stars, A Slug Of Time And Thou, Samuel R. Delany, Aye, and Gomorrah, arty Science Fiction, Resonance FM, Dangerous Visions, Orhan Pamuk, My Name Is Read, Fantasy, Muhammad, figurative art, movies about Jesus, movies about Buddha,
Paraworld Zero, Matthew Peterson, Audible.com, Audible Frontiers, John Varley, The Persistence Of Vision, Press Enter, Titan, Wizard, Demon, Wonder Audio, The Status Civilization, Robert Sheckley, Mark Douglas Nelson, The Accidental Time Machine, Joe Haldeman, Camouflage, Tobias S. Buckell, Sly Mongoose, Macmillan Audio, Old Man’s War, The Addams Family, Netflix, DVDs, new formats, VHS, Laserdiscs, Apple TV, iPod, Philippa Ballantine (she rented John Carpenter’s The Thing through iTunes), The Office, NBC, Zoe’s Tale, John Scalzi, Paul Williams, LibriVox.org, Edgar Rice Burroughs, The Caspak Series, Tantor Audio, John Carter Of Mars, Waiting For A Window, Frederick Greenhalgh, William Dufris, The Grist Mill, The Slasher, F. Paul Wilson, Aural Noir, Joe R. Lansdale, The God Of The Razor, LibriVox’s Ghost Story Collection #006, Robert E. Howard, Gods Of The North, Solomon Kane, Conan, H.G. Wells, The Red Room, Robert Barr, The Man Who Was Not On The Passenger List, Nightfall, CBC, Stephen King, Blood And Smoke, 1408, The Red Room, ghosts, Simon & Schuster Audio, BoingBoing.net, The Ellsberg Paradox, fear, the unknown, Jaws, H.P. Lovecraft, The Statement Of Randolph Carter, Audio Realms, Wayne June.

Posted by Jesse Willis