Podcasts about Josh Kun

“Legend” is a word that is often too lightly doled out, but today we proudly present an interview with a bonafide LEGEND. Art Laboe is a broadcasting icon who was inducted into the Radio Hall of Fame in 2012. This honor was rightly bestowed as he was the first DJ to play Rock and Roll on the west coast airwaves, smashed color lines by presenting mixed race concerts and playlists, coined the term “Oldies but Goodies,” invented the concept of the compilation album and continues to bring joy to generations of radio listeners. At 87 years young, Art is a sprightly figure, holding one of the top rated slots in Southern California radio, one of the world's most important markets. He graces the airwaves six nights a week with his Art Laboe Connection program. The show's format is an exception amongst commercial radio, emphasizing a direct connection with the community. Throughout each show he takes dedications from listeners and sends their songs and kisses over the airwaves to loved ones, many of whom are incarcerated. His radio show is a pipeline through which the emotions and wishes of listeners are transmitted. The songs heard on the Art Laboe Connection are a refreshing and heartfelt break from the glossy buzz flooding much of the dial. While Art plays tried and trued favorites every show his playlist varies widely night to night based on to listener requests and his mood. On any given episode you're likely to hear rare doo-wop, R&B or sweet soul cuts played nowhere else. We were honored that Art Laboe opened up his studio and schedule to graciously allow us this interview. Scholar and dublab board member Josh Kun sat down with Art at his Original Sound Studio on Sunset Boulevard to revisit the history of his illustrious career and explore the dynamic of his nightly connection with listeners cruising the California streets or listening close for the voice of a loved one. On Saturday, August 5th, 2023, we pay tribute to Art Laboe at Grand Performances. More details here: https://www.dublab.com/events/111367/a-tribute-to-art-laboe --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/dublab-inconversation/support

For the last five years, curator Natasha Ginwala has been investigating riots, uprisings, and pogroms. As a part of this research, she's curated an exhibition and edited the book ​​Nights of the Dispossessed: Riots Unbound, edited with Gal Kirn and Niloufar Tajeri. For this podcast, Ginwala considers the sonic expression of riots through a collection of mixtapes and sound collages on social unrest. The episode features contributions by Arshia Haq (writer, filmmaker, DJ), Louis Henderson (artist, filmmaker), Josh Kun (author, music critic), and Atiyyah Khan (arts journalist, music writer, artist). Host Ross Simonini Credits Produced by ArtReview and Ross Simonini Featured image Jitish Kallat, Anger at the Speed of Fright, 2010, Riots: Slow Cancellation of the Future, 2018, ifa Gallery Berlin, courtesy: Victoria Tomaschko

We're breaking format to create something completely new: a collaborative performance of music, poetry and ideas between Hanif, artist Thao Nguyen (Thao & The Get Down Stay Down) and scholar Josh Kun. Named after the tool that mixes tracks on a DJ controller, Josh has been organizing an event series called ‘Crossfade Lab' where he brings artists together to ‘mix without erasing, combine without destroying' and find new places of connection between their work. In this episode, Hanif and Thao share poems and songs as they commune over how they use their respective practices as a way to expel and transform grief. Let's crossfade!Show NotesJosh Kun's ongoing project is Art of The Crossfade. If you're in Phoenix, join Josh and artists Teresita Fernández and San Cha for a live Crossfade Lab. Information here. Hanif read his poem It Is Maybe Time To Admit that Jordan Definitely Pushed Off, published in A Fortune For Your Disaster; and an excerpt from ‘On Going Home As Performance,' featured in his most recent book is A Little Devil In America: Notes in Praise of Black Performance.Thao performed the songs “Marrow” and “Temple” off her most recent album, Temple, and “Age of Ice,” off her album We the Common.CreditsThis show is produced by work by work: Scott Newman, Jemma Rose Brown, Mayari Sherina Ong, Kathleen Ottinger and by Hanif Abdurraqib. The show is mixed by Sam Bair. 

In this episode, The Believer’s deputy editor and essayist Niela Orr finds a home in Toni Morrison’s words. Then, Vegas-born poet Fred Moten and cultural historian Josh Kun discuss James Baldwin, music, loss, extraordinary listening, and–for Moten–what it was like growing up in Las Vegas.  

When Manu Chao announced he would be releasing his first solo album, fans around the world were both elated and hesitant. Manu's previous albums with his band Mano Negra were both critically and commercially successful, but the band's breakup was ugly and Manu was running around Central/South America, playing bar shows for three years before he started work on the album.  Clandestino was initially released to little mainstream success, but eventually found its audience around the world. It tackled issues like social injustice and immigration and spoke to the displaced. It spoke truth to power. Writer and academic Josh Kun sits down with Oliver and guest host Ernest Hardy to talk about the power of politically charged music, the nomadic production of this album, and the term "world music." More on Clandestino Clandestino: the story of Manu Chao's classic album (The Guardian) At 20, Manu Chao's 'Clandestino' Remains a Radical and Compassionate Work of Art (Remezcla)  More on Josh Kun The Autograph Book of LA Josh on KCRW's Press Play Website | Twitter Show tracklisting (all songs from Clandestino unless otherwise indicated): Clandestino Desaparecido Dia luna...dia pena Rosalia: Catalina Desaparecido Bongo Bong Roy Eldridge: King of the Bongo Bong Mano Negra: King of the Bongo Black Uhuru: Bull in the Pen Mario Winans: Never Really Was (Remix) Bongo Bong Je ne t'aime plus Bongo Bong El viento Afrosound: Tira al Blanco Malegria Welcome to Tijuana Por el suelo Manu Chao: Welcome to Tijuana (Live) Ana Tijoux: 1977 Stromae: tous le memes Ana Tijoux: Somos Sur Coldplay: Arabesque MIA: Hussel Negu Gorriak: Radio Rahim Here is the Spotify playlist of as many songs as we can find on there If you're not already subscribed to Heat Rocks in Apple Podcasts, do it here!

The episode features an interview with Josh Kun about his latest book, The Autograph Book of L.A.

In the second of a series of conversations, we focus on the "how" of composition by bringing together a group of master practitioners working across a wide range of forms and media: acclaimed jazz flutist and composer Nicole Mitchell, who directs Jazz Studies at the University of Pittsburgh; cultural historian Josh Kun, who holds a PhD in Ethnic Studies from UC Berkeley and is director of USC’s Annenberg School of Communication; and poet and scholar Chiyuma Elliott, a faculty member in UC Berkeley’s African American Studies Department and a former Wallace Stegner Fellow at Stanford University. In a conversation moderated by UC Berkeley professor and jazz pianist Myra Melford, panelists share their ideas about what it means to compose.

The autograph is the premise for a dream: maybe, just maybe, the autograph hunter will become the autograph hunted, maybe the autograph will double as a magical transfer of renown, and by receiving the signature, one day you will be signing your name when someone asks. So surmises Josh Kun in the pages of The Autograph Book of L.A.: Improvements on the Page of the City, the third in his trilogy of books sponsored by the Library Foundation of Los Angeles and based on the Special Collections of the Los Angeles Public Library. But leave it to MacArthur Fellow and culture communicator par excellence Kun to take the concept of “autographs” beyond the mere signing of names in little forget-me-not books. He looks at Los Angeles, his hometown, and sees the stamp of other people who also call it home. Suddenly imagery, graffiti, and yes—hand-written names—become the signature of a new Los Angeles, far beyond the one envisioned by Charles Lummis, the city librarian who created the LAPL autograph collection by soliciting a cache of famous people’s signatures on thelibrary’s own embossed stationery.

In Conversation with Radha Botofasina, Varun Soni, Sita Michelle Coltrane, Purusha Hickson, Ashley Kahn, Brandee Younger, Flying Lotus, Shankari Adams, Ed Michel, Surya Botofasina, Marilyn McLeod Ellison, Reggie Workman, Baker Bigsby and Oranyan Coltrane Created later in life, The Ashram Albums of Alice “Swamini Turiyasangitananda” Coltrane featured synth and vocal laden compositions inextricably linked to in her spiritual practice. Coltrane had always claimed music as an “expression” from within, but with these albums she left the commercial world in her wake, developing a new synthesis between her musical roots and Vedic sonic traditions. Through the voices of those who were closest to her, we are treated to an intimate view into this utterly transfixing and original body of work and the powerful heart and mind behind it. This episode was produced by Mark "Frosty" McNeill. Special thanks to all those who so graciously gave their time to be interviewed for this project. I would especially like to express my gratitude to the students of The Vedantic Center for opening their arms and memories to me. I am indebted to Josh Kun, Varun Soni, and Diane Winston for their guidance. Many thanks to Sasha Anawalt for her enthusiastic support. Eternal gratitude to my wife Nara Hernandez for her patience, love, and wisdom. This program is dedicated to the memory of Swamini Turiyasangitananda. –Frosty In Conversation is produced by dublab. Sound editing and music are by Matteah Baim. Due to rights reasons music from the original broadcast has been shortened. To hear more, please visit dublab.com.

Written in taut, mesmerizing, often hilarious scenes drawn from 2004 through 2009, Night Moves captures the fierce friendships and small moments that form us all. Drawing on her personal journals from the aughts, Jessica Hopper chronicles her time as a DJ, living in decrepit punk houses, biking to bad loft parties with her friends, exploring Chicago deep into the night. And, along the way, she creates an homage to vibrant corners of the city that have been muted by sleek development. A book birthed in the amber glow of Chicago streetlamps, Night Moves is about a transformative moment of cultural history—and how a raw, rebellious writer found her voice. Hopper is joined in conversation by Josh Kun, author and winner of a 2018 Berlin Prize.

Culled from a sprawling personal and professional archive of thousands, Double Vision marks the first time that George Rodriguez’s two lives, his career of double exposures, have been gathered into a single volume. Until now, only his images of Chicana/o protest and politics have ever appeared in published volumes, gallery, or museum exhibitions. A student of Sid Avery and a contemporary of Dennis Hopper, but born in South Los Angeles and often working as the first Latino photographer in the room at a time when his own rights were on the line, Rodriguez is one of the great visual documentarians of Los Angeles and of the cultural complexities of Mexican-American life. Rodriguez is joined in conversation with Josh Kun, a 2016 MacArthur Fellow and the winner of a 2018 Berlin Prize and a 2006 American Book Award.

Culture historian and 2016 MacArthur “Genius” grant recipient Josh Kun says although there’s no “magic science” to figuring out a city, there are at least three types of places he visits from the outset: bookstores, record stores, and stationery stores. Plus, he eats out – preferably street food.

USC professor Josh Kun creates some of the most impactful cultural presentations in Los Angeles. We discuss his upcoming music events, as part of Pacific Standard Time: LA/LA - a 5 month series of exhibitions and events that explores Latin American music in LA. Plus much more culture talk! This episode was recorded at the LINE Hotel.

USC professor Josh Kun creates some of the most impactful cultural presentations in Los Angeles. We discuss his upcoming music events, as part of Pacific Standard Time: LA/LA - a 5 month series of exhibitions and events that explores Latin American music in LA. Plus much more culture talk! This episode was recorded at the LINE Hotel.

Los Angeles has spurred countless culinary concoctions, including the chili burger, Korean tacos and the Cobb salad. Listen as our host Kara Miller takes a trip to California and learns how immigrants shaped LA’s food scene.

LA Times columnist Patt Morrison discusses Los Angeles culture beyond Hollywood with MacArthur Fellow Josh Kun.

To Live and Dine in L.A. (Angel City Press)  Note: This event was previously scheduled for Wed, July 8th, at 7:30 pm, and has now been moved to Friday, July 17th, at 7:30 pm. We apologize for any inconvenience.  Tonight's event features the book To Live and Dine in L.A. by USC Professor Josh Kun with a Foreword by Chef Roy Choi.To Live and Dine in LA is a huge project of The Library Foundation of Los Angeles based on the Menu Collection of the Los Angeles Public Library. Central to the project are a major exhibition at the Central Library downtown and the book published by Angel City Press. Together, the exhibition and the book ask and address an important question: How did Los Angeles become the modern city the world watches? We know some of the answers all too well. Sunshine. Railroads. Hollywood. Freeways. But there's another often overlooked but especially delicious and revealing factor: food. Think veggie tacos and designer pizzas, hot dogs on sticks and burgers from golden arches, Cobb Salads and chocolate topped ice cream sundaes, not to mention the healthiest dishes on the planet. Ask anyone who has eaten in L.A.—the city shapes the tastes that predict how America eats. And it always has.  ​With more than 200 menus—some dating back to the nineteenth century—culled from thousands in the Menu Collection of the Los Angeles Public Library, To Live and Dine in L.A. ​is a visual feast of a book. In his detailed history, author Josh Kun riffs on what the food of a foodie city says about place and time; how some people eat big while others go hungry, and what that says about the past and today. Kun turns to chefs and cultural observers for their take on modern: Chef Roy Choi sits down long enough to say why he writes “some weirdass menus.” Pulitzer Prize-winning critic Jonathan Gold looks at food as theater, and museum curator Staci Steinberger considers the design of classic menus like Lawry's. Restaurateur Bricia Lopez follows a Oaxacan menu into the heart of Koreatown. The city's leading chefs remix vintage menus with a 21st century spin: Joachim Splichal, Nancy Silverton, Susan Feniger, Ricardo Diaz, Jazz Singsanong, Cynthia Hawkins, Micah Wexler, Ramiro Arvizu and Jaime Martin del Campo cook up the past with new flavors. And, of course, the menus delight: Tick Tock Tea Room, Brown Derby, Trumps, Slapsy Maxie's, Don the Beachcomber, and scores more.  Kun tackles the timely and critically important topic of food justice, and shows how vintage menus teach us about more than just what's tasty, and serve as guides to the politics, economics, and sociology of eating. To Live and Dine in L.A. ​is the first book of its kind—the definitive way to read a menu for more than just what to order. It's about how to live. And how to dine. In L.A. Spread the word and join the conversation about Los Angeles' food history online by tagging your tweets and posts with #ToLiveandDineLA. Josh Kun ​is an Associate Professor in the Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism at the University of Southern California. His previous collaboration with L.A. Public Library was the award­-winning book and exhibition Songs in the Key of Los Angeles. He has written for the New York Times, Los Angeles Times, and many other publications. He is author and an editor of several books, including Audiotopia: Music, Race, and America, Tijuana Dreaming: Life and Art at the Global Border, and Black and Brown Los Angeles: Beyond Conflict and Coalition. As a curator he has worked with the Grammy Museum in Los Angeles, Contemporary Jewish Museum in San Francisco, Santa Monica Museum of Art, and the National Museum of Jewish History in Philadelphia. Kun curated Songs in the Key of L.A. in 2013 and To Live and Dine in L.A. in 2015, both exhibitions that originated at Los Angeles Central Library galleries. Roy Choi was born in Seoul, Korea and raised in Los Angeles, California. He graduated from the Culinary Institute of America and went on to cook at the internationally acclaimed Le Bernardin. He was named Best New Chef by Food and Wine in 2010. Choi is the co-owner, co-founder, and chef of Kogi BBQ, as well as the restaurants Chego!, A-Frame, Sunny Spot and POT. He lives in Los Angeles, California.

Panel discussion with Ron Finley, Elizabeth Medrano and Neelam SharmaIn conversation with author Josh Kun, author and professor, USC Annenberg School for CommunicationThe L.A. food scene is as trendy, tweeted, pop-upped, and profit-busting as it’s ever been, and yet more people are going hungry at a greater rate than perhaps any other moment in the city’s history. As the USDA has declared, Los Angeles is the nation’s “epicenter of hunger,” where the phrase “food insecurity”—lacking reliable access to nutritious and safe food—has become as much a part of the local vernacular for activists and organizers as sunshine and traffic. In a special collaboration with the Library Foundation to rediscover the Los Angeles Public Library’s vast archive, USC professor Josh Kun uses the Library’s menu collection to explore the shaping of Los Angeles. With vintage menus as our guides, join Kun for a conversation about the struggles and triumphs of contemporary food activism with urban gardener Ron Finley, the Healthy School Food Coalition’s Elizabeth Medrano and Community Services Unlimited Inc.’s Neelam Sharma.*Click here to see photos from the program! 

Panel discussion with chefs Cynthia Hawkins, and Ricardo DiazIn conversation with Josh Kun, author and professor, USC Annenberg School for CommunicationCan a city’s history be told through restaurant menus? In a second installment of a special collaboration with the Library Foundation to rediscover the Los Angeles Public Library’s vast archive, USC professor Josh Kun uses the Library’s menu collection to explore the shaping of Los Angeles, from the city’s first restaurants in the 1850s up through the most recent food revolutions. Join him for a multimedia tour of the L.A. menu paired with a conversation on L.A. food past and present with chefs Cynthia Hawkins (Hawkins House of Burgers), and Ricardo Diaz (Colonia Publica)*Click here to see photos from the program! 

This book is a ton of fun. To Live and Dine in L.A.: Menus and the Making of the Modern City (Angel City Press) taps the deep and colorful collection of Southern California restaurant menus archived by the Los Angeles Public Library. Author Josh Kun, a professor in the Annenberg School for Communications and Journalism at the University of Southern California, presides over beautiful pages showing a century of menus, ranging from the Art Deco high points of the Brown Derby (purportedly where the Cobb Salad was invented) to the low points of “Southern” style joints whose menus used stereotype Aunt Jemima-type depictions of African American women to draw in customers. My favorites include a menu for the Hangman’s Tree Cafe, a joint in the San Fernando Valley that seemed to be working the theme of serving last meals. Fun? Kun uses the images to spin a narrative about class, race and, of course, food in the history of Los Angeles. Enjoy. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This book is a ton of fun. To Live and Dine in L.A.: Menus and the Making of the Modern City (Angel City Press) taps the deep and colorful collection of Southern California restaurant menus archived by the Los Angeles Public Library. Author Josh Kun, a professor in the Annenberg School for Communications and Journalism at the University of Southern California, presides over beautiful pages showing a century of menus, ranging from the Art Deco high points of the Brown Derby (purportedly where the Cobb Salad was invented) to the low points of “Southern” style joints whose menus used stereotype Aunt Jemima-type depictions of African American women to draw in customers. My favorites include a menu for the Hangman’s Tree Cafe, a joint in the San Fernando Valley that seemed to be working the theme of serving last meals. Fun? Kun uses the images to spin a narrative about class, race and, of course, food in the history of Los Angeles. Enjoy. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This book is a ton of fun. To Live and Dine in L.A.: Menus and the Making of the Modern City (Angel City Press) taps the deep and colorful collection of Southern California restaurant menus archived by the Los Angeles Public Library. Author Josh Kun, a professor in the Annenberg School for Communications and Journalism at the University of Southern California, presides over beautiful pages showing a century of menus, ranging from the Art Deco high points of the Brown Derby (purportedly where the Cobb Salad was invented) to the low points of “Southern” style joints whose menus used stereotype Aunt Jemima-type depictions of African American women to draw in customers. My favorites include a menu for the Hangman’s Tree Cafe, a joint in the San Fernando Valley that seemed to be working the theme of serving last meals. Fun? Kun uses the images to spin a narrative about class, race and, of course, food in the history of Los Angeles. Enjoy. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Colin Marshall talks with Patricia Wakida, editor of Heyday Books' new LAtitudes: An Angeleno's Atlas, a collection of cartographically organized essays on the real Los Angeles from such contributors as David L. Ulin, Glen Creason, Laura Pulido, Lynell George, and Josh Kun.

Josh Kun’s talk, “California Border Blues: Guthrie, L.A., and Tijuana,” was featured on a panel titled “Beyond Woody” at the conference “This Great and Crowded City: Woody Guthrie’s Los Angeles,” held at the University of Southern California on April 14, 2012, in celebration of the centennial of Woody Guthrie’s birth. Kun is professor in the Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism at USC.

Josh Kun, “The Kidnapped Country: Violence, Drugs, and the Crisis of Mexican Culture”