News, Reviews, and Commentary on all forms of science fiction, fantasy, and horror audio. Audiobooks, audio drama, podcasts; we discuss all of it here. Mystery, crime, and noir audio are also fair game.
Earbud Theater has a new show they want you to hear. Written by Casey Wolfe, it’s entitled CLANG! and it features a cast you may recognize from other podcasts and movies and elsewhere around the universe.
As any parent knows, balancing work and family can be difficult to say the least. For Gern and Betty Steadfast the two are about to slam together with a great… big… CLANG!
Cast:
Stephen Tobolowsky as Gern Steadfast
Meeghan Holoway as Betty Steadfast
Sean Keller as The General & Gabriel Edgar Wech
Alex Wagner as Jenni & Ellie
Lindsay Zana as Tyler & Jack
My friend, Bill Hollweg, has posted the first episode of his new original Science Fiction audio drama series 2109: Black Sun Rising. Produced for BrokenSea Audio Productions, the show makes extensive use of the stereo format (so be sure to use headphones or widely spaced speakers while listening). Also present are a many allusive character names, a plethora of familiar voice actors, and a teensy bit of harsh language.
Here’s the 2109: Black Sun Rising – Episode 1 |MP3|
Sometimes titled The Highwayman, sometimes The Highwaymen, Lord Dunsany’s elegant prose poem is an 1,800 word tale about a scabrous gang of bastard highwaymen. And it has something for almost everyone.
I think, despite the sacrilege and desecration in the story, that my Christian friends will like it – it’s got a lot of that redemption stuff they are big on.
I’m confident that fans of capital punishment will like it – because it certainly doesn’t repudiate legalized killing.
And my friend, Gregg Margarite, who didn’t believe in any of the underlying mythology, liked it enough to read it for LibriVox.
And me?
Yep, I like The Highwayman too.
I like the overarching premise, about friendship, I think it’s heartwarming.
Plus it’s got lot of ghoulish shit in it, and I like that stuff too.
The Highwayman
By Lord Dunsany; Read by Gregg Margarite
1 |MP3| – Approx. 12 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: LibriVox.org
Published: January 13, 2010
First published in 1908.
Here’s a |PDF| made from the publication in Famous Fantastic Mysteries, December, 1944.
The Mist, a legendary audio dramatization based on a 1980 Stephen King novella, is available from Simon & Schuster Audio. It’s actually been available since the mid 1980s. It started on LP, being released by it’s producers at ZBS Foundation, then was acquired by Simon & Schuster to be released on cassette and later CD. Today it’s still available on CD, as well as a Audible.com download. Every time it has been re-released I’ve been reminded of how astoundingly great an audio drama it really is.
Here’s the official description:
After a mysterious mist envelops a small New England town, a group of locals trapped in a supermarket must battle a siege of otherworldly creatures . . . and the fears that threaten to tear them apart.
And here’s the text from the back of the first CD edition:
Sound so visual you’re literally engulfed by its bonechilling terror! Stephen King’s sinister imagination and the miracle of 3-D sound transport you to a sleepy all-American town. It’s a hot, lazy day, perfect for a cookout, until you see those strange dark clouds. Suddenly a violent storm sweeps across the lake and ends as abruptly and unexpectedly as it had begun. Then comes the mist…creeping slowly, inexorably into town, where it settles and waits, trapping you in the supermarket with dozens of others, cut off from your families and the world. The mist is alive, seething with unearthly sounds and movements. What unleashed this terror? Was it the Arrowhead Project—the top secret government operation that everyone has noticed but no one quite understands? And what happens when the provisions have run out and you’re forced to make your escape, edging blindly through the dim light? The Mist has you in it grip, and this masterpiece of 3-D sound engineering surrounds you with horror so real that you’ll be grabbing your own arm for reassurance. To one side—and whipping around your chair, a slither of tentacles. Swooping down upon you, a rush grotesque, prehistoric wings. In the impenetrable mist, hearing is seeing—and believing. And what you’re about to hear, you’ll never forget.
The YouTube version, below, is NOT in stereo. Stereo is ESSENTIAL to the experience, but if you want to get a sense of the story and how it plays out, have a look:
Here are two illustrations from the Dark Forces: The 25th Anniversary Special Edition , which came out 25 years after the original publication of the original Dark Forces anthology that included The Mist:
And of course there was a film adaptation which was, surprisingly, great too:
Time and Time Again was H. Beam Piper’s first published story. It first appeared in the April 1947 issue of Astounding Science Fiction. Time and Time Again features many of the themes of Piper’s later writing, including time travel, evidence of his electric reading habits, and a love of firearms.
Set in part during both WWII and WWIII Time and Time Again features time travel of the type made famous in both Back To The Future and Quantum Leap.
Time And Time Again
By H. Beam Piper; Read by Bellona Times
1 |MP3| – Approx. 45 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: LibriVox.org
Published: August 09, 2010 To upset the stable, mighty stream of time would probably take an enormous concentration of energy. And it’s not to be expected that a man would get a second chance at life. But an atomic might accomplish both— First published in Astounding, April 1947.
For some reason the ending to the X-Minus One version has been changed – to it’s determent in my view.
X-Minus One – Time And Time Again
Adapted from the story by H. Beam Piper; Performed by a full cast
1 |MP3| – Approx. 30 Minutes [RADIO DRAMA]
Broadcaster: NBC
Broadcast: January 11, 1956 A soldier is wounded in a future war and is transported back to 1945 when he was thirteen years-old with his future memory and past memory intact.
Here’s a |PDF| made from its appearance in Astounding.
One other interesting bit from the original story is the mention of a B-25 bomber crash into the Empire State Building, here’s a contemporary newsreel about that:
Earbud Theater has a new show they want you to hear. Written by Casey Wolfe, it’s entitled CLANG! and it features a cast you may recognize from other podcasts and movies and elsewhere around the universe. 
The Highwayman
X-Minus One – Time And Time Again
