Music In My Shoes

Fireworks are loud, but the real Fourth of July time machine is a song you haven’t heard in years. We kick off our holiday special by talking Atlanta traditions like the Peachtree Road Race, then dive straight into the United States Bicentennial vibe that made 1976 feel bigger than life. Along the way, we share the tiny details that still stick: Bicentennial quarters, the two-dollar bill comeback and Operation Sail in New Yor...

We bounce from a killer Cracker and Drivin N Cryin concert to a surreal moment where Heart’s “Barracuda” follows us through LaGuardia. The mailbag sparks stories about meeting listeners, debating concerts, and how the songs we love can turn into life lessons we don’t forget. 
• Cracker plays loose and confident 
• Drivin N Cryin opening run and why “Scarred But Smarter” still hits...

“Losing My Religion” has one of the most recognizable feels in modern rock, and a big part of that atmosphere lives in the strings. We’re joined by former Atlanta Symphony Orchestra violinist David Arenz, who played on R.E.M.’s Out of Time, to unpack what it’s like to walk into a studio, open the sheet music, listen to the track, and deliver takes that end up etched into music history.

We get pr...

Ferris Bueller’s Day Off hits 40 years, and somehow it still feels like the kind of perfect stolen day you can step into whenever you need it. We rewatch it with fresh ears, from Cameron’s quiet sadness to Jeanie’s rage at always being overlooked, plus the running joke of Rooney trying way too hard to catch a kid skipping school. And yes, we keep coming back to the line that never stopped being true: life moves pr...

Paul McCartney got dragged for writing “silly love songs” and then turned the criticism into a No. 1 anthem. We start with that 1976 chart run, the irony baked into the lyrics, and the way one summertime hit can glue itself to your memory, right down to the bicentennial vibe and what was playing everywhere you went. 

From there we jump 50 years forward to McCartney closing out Saturday Night Live with Will F...

A band that lives in a hearse sounds like a gimmick until you hear the reasons it happened and the work it takes to keep it going. We’re joined in the studio by Shaun and Rachel from The Stifftones, a DIY touring duo that turned a full reset into a full-time musical life, complete with two dogs, a rolling home, and a schedule built around small venues, open mics, and the people they meet along the way.

We talk through ...

The fastest way to time-travel is to press play on a song you haven’t heard in years, then realize you still know every word. We pull up the Billboard Hot 100 from May 23, 1981 and take it for a spin, bouncing between classic rock, radio pop, and the kind of tracks that were simply unavoidable if you lived anywhere near a car stereo or a skating rink.

Along the way, we dig into what’s actually happening inside th...

Top Gun turns 40, and we can’t talk about it without talking about the soundtrack that still punches through your speakers. From the first seconds of Kenny Loggins’ “Danger Zone” on the aircraft carrier, we trace how 80s movie music uses needle drops to build character, tension, romance, and pure momentum.

We get into the details that make the Top Gun soundtrack legendary: the way the Righteous Brothe...

What happens when musicians stop trying to look cool and start trying to tell the truth? We continue our sit down with Slightly Famous Somebodies for a freewheeling ride through creativity, aging, and the weird influences that make a band sound like itself. The deeper we get, the clearer it becomes: authenticity is not a brand, it is a practice, and sometimes it shows up only after you have failed enough times to stop performing fo...

We’re joined in the studio by Jonathan Spencer, Laura Slade Wiggins, and Vaylor Trucks from Slightly Famous Somebodies, and the story starts with a simple ask: record one Kevn Kinney song as part of a living tribute. That one track turns into more covers, then a hard pivot into original music, and suddenly the “project” becomes a real band with momentum, a core lineup, and a sound that can stretch from heartfelt r...

A record can be simple and still change the world, and the Ramones proved it in 1976. We’re celebrating the 50th anniversary of the Ramones’ self-titled debut album and pulling apart why those tight, fast songs still matter: the way “Blitzkrieg Bop” became a universal chant and why the band’s look and sound clicked as one complete idea. Even if you’ve never called yourself a punk fan, it’s ...

A two-season black-and-white sitcom leaves a 60-year shadow, a band logo becomes more famous than the band name, and a random music reference boomerangs back into your week at the perfect moment. That’s the lane we love: pop culture history that feels like real life, where classic rock stories sit right next to TV theme songs and the little memories that make certain tracks impossible to forget.

We start with The Addam...

Athens, GA didn’t just produce great bands; it produced a whole value system. When Trent Allen from Dreams So Real joins us, we get into why Athens carried “artsy credibility,” why Atlanta bands sometimes got brushed off, and how those scene politics affected real careers, real audiences, and real opportunities.

We also zoom in on the moment when underground experimentation started turning into something mo...

One TV host with a stiff posture and a sharp instinct helped rewrite the map of American pop culture. We’re talking about The Ed Sullivan Show, the variety powerhouse that ran from 1948 to March 28, 1971 and acted like a weekly national stage for music, comedy, Broadway, and everything in between. When Ed thought you had talent, he put you in front of the country, and millions of people trusted his taste because there weren&r...

We’re coming to you from Cracker’s Campout, where the music is loud, the stories are better than any liner notes, and the distance between the crowd and the artists basically disappears. From the song-swap to the final-night blowout, the whole weekend feels like stepping inside the world that shaped Cracker and Camper Van Beethoven. 

The heart of the show is audio with David Lowery and producer Dennis Herrin...

We hang with Kevn Kinney of Drivin N Cryin and Johnny Hickman of Cracker in Athens, GA and trace how songs and scenes shape a life, from new releases to punk rock beginnings. Kevn opens up about writing “Mirror Mirror,” a power pop song about Alzheimer’s, with a chorus built around one hard line: “I know you’re in there somewhere.” We talk about what memory loss looks like up close, and the quiet...

The room lifted before the first chord. Athens came alive with a storyteller’s spark, a stripped-down trio threading classics and new cuts, and two supercharged nights honoring R.E.M.’s Life’s Rich Pageant that turned a tribute into living history. We walked in as fans and left feeling like part of a scene that refuses to fade.

We start with Jason Narducy weaving road stories from Mostly The Van between raw...

We sit down with May Pang to unpack John Lennon’s misnamed “Lost Weekend” and reveal a season of creative fire, repaired friendships, and family reconnection. May shares what really happened across those 18 months: the studio grind behind Mind Games, Walls and Bridges, and Rock ’n’ Roll; and the bet that led to a thunderous Thanksgiving return with Elton John.

We walk through May’s unexpec...

We revisit Pretty in Pink at 40 and admit the movie’s plot is fine while the soundtrack is legendary. We trade takes on Ducky, Blaine, Spader’s chill menace, WLIR Screamers, and how a film’s music can outlast its script.

Then we fast-forward to a blistering live night with Drink the Sea at the 40 Watt in Athens, where Peter Buck, Barrett Martin, and Alain Johannes stitched songs to cinematic visuals and welcomed Mi...