Our guests include activists & environmentalists & political analysts; musicians, a storyteller, a slam poet, an architectural sculptor & a Jerry Rubin biographer; plus we discuss Outsider Art & welcome AMLO to Mexico.
Guitar virtuoso Bill Kirchen performs on Rag Radio in the KOOP studios in Austin on June 1, 2018. Photo by Roger Baker / Rag Radio.
The following podcasts are from recent Rag Radio shows with host and producer Thorne Dreyer. The syndicated Rag Radio program, produced in the studios of Austin’s cooperatively-run KOOP-FM, has an international audience and has become an influential platform for interviews with leading figures in politics, current events, literature, and cutting-edge culture.
The show first airs Fridays, 2-3 p.m. (CT) on KOOP, 91.7-FM in Austin, and streams live at KOOP.org and Radio Free America.
♦ Historian Philip Russsell on AMLO and the Mexican Elections
Our guest is historian and author Philip Russell, who discusses the recent Mexican elections and the remarkable ascent of Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO). Austin resident Russell, who writes about Mexico for The Rag Blog, and is a regular guest on Rag Radio, has written six books on Latin America, including The Essential History of Mexico, and is the editor of the Mexico Energy News.
Read the full show description and download the podcast of our July 13, 2018 Rag Radio show with historian Philip Russell, here — or listen to it here:
♦ Rag Radio Environmental Reporter Bruce Melton from Yosemite Park
Climate change researcher and Rag Radio environmental reporter Bruce Melton is Thorne Dreyer’s guest on Rag Radio, joining us live from Yosemite National Park (actually from Fresno, where he could get cell phone service). Melton is on a marathon environmental research expedition that is taking him all the way to the Arctic Ocean.
Read the full show description and download the podcast of our July 6, 2018 Rag Radio show with environmental reporter Bruce Melton, here — or listen to it here:
♦ Jay Wehnert, author of ‘Outsider Art in Texas: Lone Stars’
In Outsider Art in Texas: Lone Stars, author Jay Wehnert — Thorne Dreyer’s guest on Rag Radio — takes readers on a visually stunning excursion through the lives and work of 11 outsider artists from Texas, a state particularly rich in outsider artists of national and international renown. Outsider artists live and create on the fringes of culture and society.
Read the full show description and download the podcast of our June 29, 2018 Rag Radio show with author Jay Wehnert, here — or listen to it here:
♦ ‘Digging In!’ with Thorne Dreyer & Glenn Smith: A View of the News
Host Thorne Dreyer and Rag Radio political analyst Glenn Smith give us their unique views of the news. “Digging In” is a regular feature on Rag Radio. On today’s show we discuss the moral crisis brought about by Trump’s “zero tolerance” immigration policy and the separation of children from their parents.
Read the full show description and download the podcast of our June 22, 2018 Rag Radio show with Thorne Dreyer and Glenn Smith, here — or listen to it here:
♦ Jerry Rubin Biographer Pat Thomas; ‘DO iT!’ Ghostwriter James Retherford
Pat Thomas and James Retherford are Thorne Dreyer’s guests on Rag Radio. Thomas is the author of DiD iT! From Yippie to Yuppie: Jerry Rubin, An American Revolutionary, the first major work about Yippie co-founder Rubin. And Austin resident Retherford, who was in the Yippie inner circle in New York, was the ghostwriter for Jerry Rubin’s Iconic 1970 New York Times bestseller, DO iT!
Read the full show description and download the podcast of our June 8, 2017 Rag Radio show with Pat Thomas and Jim Retherford, here — or listen to it here:
♦ Legendary Commander Cody Guitarist Bill Kirchen
Thorne Dreyer’s guest on Rag Radio is rock ‘n roll legend, Bill Kirchen. The show includes discussion and live performance. Bill Kirchen co-founded the original “Americana” band, Commander Cody and his Lost Planet Airmen. His Telecaster licks drove their hit “Hot Rod Lincoln” into the Top 10 in 1972. In 2001, Kirchen received a Grammy nomination for his instrumental “Poultry in Motion.”
Read the full show description and download the podcast of our June 1, 2018 Rag Radio show with musician Bill Kirchen, here — or listen to it here:
♦ Middle East Scholar Roy Casagranda: Can the Palestinian Suffering be Justified?
Thorne Dreyer’s guest is Middle East expert Roy Casagranda, who addresses the question, “How can we justify what the Palestinians have been made to endure?” Topics of discussion include whether Zionism is justifiable in the face of Palestinian suffering. Roy Casagranda is Professor of Government at Austin Community College where he teaches U.S. and Texas politics. His areas of research include Middle Eastern history and politics.
Read the full show description and download the podcast of our May 25, 2018 Rag Radio show with Middle East scholar Roy Casagranda, here — or listen to it here:
♦ Border Rocker & Actress Patricia Vonne
Our guest is critically-acclaimed Austin-based singer-songwriter, musician, recording artist, and actress Patricia Vonne. Vonne is a native of San Antonio and her unique “border rock” is a product of that city’s cultural “menudo.” She is the sister of filmmaker Robert Rodriguez and was a cult hit as “Zorro Girl” in his Sin City films. On the show, Patricia performs with guitarist Rick del Castillo and violinist David Perales.
Read the full show description and download the podcast of our May 18, 2018 Rag Radio show with musician Patricia Vonne, here — or listen to it here:
♦ ‘Rhapsody in Blue’: Slam Poet Genevieve Van Cleve and Latino USA Storyteller Luis Guerra
This broadcast preview of Rhapsody in Blue (“Revelry for the Resistance’s Sake!”) is hosted by Rag Radio’s Glenn Smith and Thorne Dreyer, and features storyteller Luis Guerra (of NPR’s Latino USA fame, and the slam poetry of poet and political activist Genevieve Van Cleve.
Read the full show description and download the podcast of our May 4, 2018 Rag Radio show with Glenn Smith, Genevieve Van Cleve, and Luis Guerra, here — or listen to it here:
♦ New Artist Showcase with Musicians Sydney Wright, Ty Richards & Andy Macintyre
Rag Radio presents a New Artists Showcase with young Austin-based musical talent Sydney Wright, Andy Macintyre, and Ty Richards. West Texas-born Wright is a songwriter and pop singer with an experimental edge. Macintyre is known for “straddling the line of alternative and guitar-heavy blues-rock.” Ty Richards is Austin’s new psychedelic rock star.
Read the full show description and download the podcast of our April 27, 2018 Rag Radio show with musicians Sydney Wright, Andy Macintyre, and Ty Richards., here — or listen to it here:
♦ Architectural Sculptor Margo Sawyer, Guggenheim Fellow at UT-Austin
Professor of Sculpture and Extended Media in the Department of Art & Art History at the University of Texas at Austin. Sawyer was awarded the 2018 John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Fellowship. Her art “intersects sculpture and architecture.” Sawyer creates installations “which translate the notion of an ancient sacred space into a contemporary vocabulary.”
Read the full show description and download the podcast of our April 20, 2018 Rag Radio show with artist Margo Sawyer, here — or listen to it here:
Rag Radio, a weekly hour-long syndicated radio program that has aired close to 400 original shows since September 2009, is produced and hosted by Rag Blog editor Thorne Dreyer. Tracey Schulz is engineer and co-producer.
Rag Radio is produced in the studios of KOOP 91.7-FM, a solar-powered cooperatively-run all-volunteer community radio station in Austin, Texas, and is first broadcast live on KOOP every Friday from 2-3 p.m. (CDT) and streamed live on the web. All Rag Radio shows are posted as podcasts at the Internet Archive.
Rag Radio can also be heard on WFTE, 90.3-FM in Mt. Cobb, PA, and 105.7-FM in Scranton, PA., on KPFT-HD3 90.1, Pacifica radio in Houston, on KKRN 88.5-FM in Round Mountain, CA, at WALHRadio.com in Wilmington, Oh, as a featured podcast at Veterans Today, and the feed is available to Pacifica stations and affiliates at AudioPort.org. Find details here.
After broadcast, all Rag Radio shows are posted as podcasts at the Internet Archive.
Rag Radio is produced in association with The Rag Blog, a progressive Internet newsmagazine, and the New Journalism Project, a Texas 501(c)(3) nonprofit corporation.
Please contact us at ragradio@koop.org.
[Thorne Dreyer is an Austin-based writer, editor, broadcaster, and activist. A pioneering alternative journalist, Dreyer was a founding editor of the original Rag in 1966 Austin and Space City! in Houston, and managed KPFT-FM, Houston’s Pacifica radio station. Dreyer now edits The Rag Blog, hosts Rag Radio, is a director of the New Journalism Project, and is an editor of the critically-acclaimed new book, Celebrating The Rag: Austin’s Iconic Underground Newspaper. Contact Dreyer at editor@theragblog.com.]
