Captain Radio Visits Dead Line Anthology

July 27, 2011 By 1 Comment
Captain Radio Audio Reviews


Graphic - FunGraphix.com
Theme music - Shane Lamb

Title: Dead Line Anthology / Shorts (series)
Producer: Jack Ward
Production Company: Electric Vicuña
Type: Dram
Genre: Horror, Mystery, Thriller
Length: Anthology episodes – about 25 minutes; Shorts – 5-15 minutes
Rating: AD-PG* (psychological horror, mortal danger/fear)
Availability: Free – Electric Vicuña

Greetings, Audionauts! Captain Radio here with a visit to Electric Vicuña’s Dead Line Anthology, from Electric Vicuña, made possible by RØDE Microphones.

Dead Line Anthology Logo

[SOUND BYTE]

And so the mysterious disembodied Dead Line telephonic voice ushers listeners into another dark journey through mystery, horror, and, usually … murder.

As might an old Alfred Hitchcock Presents episode, each macabre tale begins mundanely enough, perhaps like a pair of generationally-alienated businessmen getting away on a hunting weekend, as in Clay Pidgeon Shooting …

[SOUND BYTE]

Soon, though, things begin to seem out of place as dialog exchanges or character actions build up viscerally uncomfortable apprehension:

[SOUND BYTE]

Then, suddenly, the dark journey twists violently off into stark and irrepressible horror as, here, a stunned husband listens to his doomed mistress plead desperately for help over voice mail:

[SOUND BYTE]

From 2003-2005, pioneer audio drama podcaster Jack Ward aired The Shadowlands old-time radio series from a public radio station in Halifax, Nova Scotia. Having authored and produced over a dozen originals among these shows, Ward joined forces in 2005 with Shannon Hilchie to host the Sonic Society, which focused on original audio drama from independent producers. Initially, associated Sonic Society producers included Jerry Robbins of Colonial Radio Theatre, Jonithan Russell of DreamRealm Enterprises, and Gregg Taylor of Decoder Ring Theatre.

In 2009, Ward formed Electric Vicuña to branch into audio cinema, voice acting, audio books, and audio anthologies. Regarding the latter, his colleagues encouraged Ward to develop a horror/mystery anthology that would more immediately fulfill evolving audio drama listener taste than would science fiction or fantasy equivalents.

He responded with the Dead Line Anthology that opens and closes on the slightly menacing telephone narrator signaling a warning or challenging the listener to explore the subtle edgy inner significance, or occasionally the message, revealed by the chilling story.

Dead Line Shorts Logo

Later, Ward added the Dead Line Shorts as vignettes of evil that cut to the chase of their story, tossing listeners immediately into “the dark moment”, often requiring them quickly to suss out from the contracted plot and dialog what precisely is happening.

 

[Dead Line theme music]

Despite having already turned in over a half decade of continuous original creative production, Ward’s Dead Line tales, long or abbreviated, come across as refreshingly original with plenty of spine tingle, more plot twists than a Celtic pretzel, and plenty of unexpected moments when you may suddenly and instinctively wish to cover your ears, as horror movie viewers might shield their eyes, from the fearful scenes unfolding within your imagination.

Listen to the Dead Line Anthology and Dead Line Shorts at Electric Vicuña.Com.

 

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Remember – passionate, unique audio transforms our world …You start with RØDE™

Visit RodeMic.com

 

CaptainRadio.com Reviews originate on the Radio Drama Revival podcast. Subscribe to free weekly downloads of more top-notch, independently-produced modern audio drama from around the world at RadioDramaRevival.com.

 

Until next time, Audionauts, this is Captain Radio™, signing off!

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Captain Radio™ Visits Electric Vicuña’s Dead Line Anthology and Dead Line Shorts

 

* Rating based on the Audio Drama Directory Ratings System.

Filed Under: Captain Radio Reviews, Drama, Electric Vicuna, Horror, Jack Ward, Mystery, Radio Drama

Captain Radio Reviews: Every Now and Then

June 15, 2011 By 1 Comment

Captain Radio Audio Reviews

Graphic - FunGraphix.com | Theme music - Shane Lamb

Title: Every Now and Then
Producer: Voices in the Wind
Type: Drama
Genre: Mystery/Suspense, Romance
Rating: AD-G*
Availability: Free – Voices in the Wind Audio Theatre

L. Ron Hubbard's The Headhunters Audio Book Cover
Greetings, Audionauts – Captain Radio here, sponsored by RØDE Microphones, with a review of Every Now and Then from David Farquhar and Voices in the Wind Audio Theatre.

While shopping for a friend’s wedding gift, young marrieds Frank and Diane (respectively voiced by Hollywood television and audio veteran Gregg Rainwater and by Noelle Dupuis) seem close to drawing serious lines in the sand when unruffled antique store owner, Mr. Sagan (voiced by Norm McLeod) sensibly intervenes to smooth things over:

[SOUND BYTE]

Deciding to give the shop a chance, Frank becomes intrigued with an old gramophone. Mr Sagan demonstrates its use before escorting Diane elsewhere to browse. Frank sits in an old nearby chair to remove a pebble from his shoe and suddenly experiences the first of several shocking and disorienting reciprocal transitions.

Listen to producer David Farquhar begin to show off a bit of sound engineering skill as he transports us instantly from a creeky, squeaky antique shop to the middle of a bustling street totally somewhere else:

[SOUND BYTE]

Perhaps the persistent shocks keep Frank a little slow on the uptake, not realizing as we do that the chair and the gramophone together control his continuous time sliding between now and 1903. There he exists as Johnny, a young family man leaving on a fateful sea voyage with Diane’s oblivious Edwardian era lookalike, Mabel, and their hauntingly lovely and enchanting young daughter, Virginia (voiced by Alexandra Poole).

Gradually, and understandably, Frank’s hold on reality loosens. Which reality is reality? Yet, his heart finds manifold reasons to cherish his loved ones regardless when they exist, especially spell-binding, innocent Virginia.

The tranquil trip is suddenly marred by a raging storm. Frightened, Virginia asks her father to tell one of the strange tales that he shares with her alone about how things will be when she is an “old lady”:

[SOUND BYTE]

On deck moments later, tragically separated from Mabel and facing the storm’s full fury, the pair desperately clings to each other as Farquhar’s thunderous audio background and award-winning script writer George Zarr’s emotional story simultaneously peak:

[SOUND BYTE]

Even if Every Now and Then might seem a bit nostalgic for jaded modern tastes, listeners will enjoy the mystery, growing suspense, and redemption of heartbreak in the end.

The play itself has a somber footnote. When Farquhar originally conceived an artifact-centered story, he at first collaborated on a script with Erin Connelly, a public radio audio drama rising star and gifted artist in many other ways. Following the shock of Erin’s sudden tragic death in a car accident before completing the script, the project drifted.

[SOUND BYTE]

Eventually, Radio Works’ Sue Zizza recommended that Farquhar bring George Zarr’s experience and craft aboard both to finish the script and to direct the final production. Zarr completed the script at his New York home before flying to Chatham, Ontario. There the play was performed and recorded in about three days utilizing Rainwater and a clearly talented and empathetic cast of local actors.

Zarr went on to script nearly a half dozen more audio dramas for Design Sound Productions as it gradually morphed into today’s Voices in the Wind Audio Theatre.

Listen to David Farquhar’s Every Now and Then at the Captain Radio™ Audio Drama Showcase, or hear it and other Voices in the Wind Audio Theatre productions at VoicesInTheWind.ca


R0de Microphones Logo

Remember – passionate, unique audio transforms our world … You start with RØDE™

Visit RodeMic.com

Until next time, Audionauts, this is Captain Radio™, signing off!

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

Captain Radio™ Reviews David Farquhar’s Every Now and Then from Voices in the Wind Audio Theatre

 

* Rating based on the Audio Drama Directory Ratings System.

 

 

Filed Under: Captain Radio Reviews, David Farquhar, Mystery, Romance, Voices in the Wind Audio Theatre Tagged With: , , , , ,

Captain Radio Reviews: The Swamp

June 1, 2011 By Leave a Comment

Captain Radio Audio Reviews

Graphic - FunGraphix.com | Theme music - Shane Lamb

Title: The Swamp
Producer: Tanja Milojevic and LightningBolt Theater of the Mind
Type: Drama
Genre: Horror Mystery

Rating: AD-PG*
Availability: Free – LightningBolt Theater of the Mind

 

Greetings, Audionauts – Captain Radio here with a review of Tanja Milojevic’s The Swamp from LightningBolt Theater of the Mind.

Lightningbolt Theater of the Mind LogoIf you ever experienced ghastly fear trying to escape a nightmare presence but unable to awaken, then you know Rachel’s terror.

[SOUND BYTE]

This hungry, menacing demon dream swamp metaphorically overflows into her conscious existence. First, Rachel (voiced by Milojevic) abruptly loses her best friend, Alice (voiced by Amanda Fur) when their college expels Alice for surreptitiously cheating off Rachel’s exam. Then, after Rachel pleads vainly with her mother (voiced by Deborah Adams) to forego a simple driving errand in an icy blizzard, Rachel receives the worst of all calls:

[SOUND BYTE]

Finally, adding to Rachel’s growing horror, the relentless swamp dream demon returns, this time with unholy help as Rachel’s mother, apparently casting blame for the accident, joins him in terrorizing her.

[SOUND BYTE]

The only seeming positive in Rachel’s waking life is the sudden appearance of dark, handsome, and very mysterious fellow student, Blake, who quickly, and quite literally, entrances her:

[SOUND BYTE]

Eventually, we gain the eerie sense of having missed a key scene along the way. By the time both we, and Rachel, learn what’s missing, it’s hideously late in the game … maybe too late.

Milojevic’s unhurried but increasingly suspenseful pace of revelation here renders The Swamp’s sudden finale all the more shocking, while the denouement “chaser” is served up suitably well chilled.

Milojevic emigrated with her family from Serbia to America at age 6. Since 2008, by day, she pursues an undergraduate degree in English Writing with a minor in Communications from Boston’s Simmons College. After-hours, she pursues her calling as an independent audio drama producer at which she steadily has improved.

For example, The Swamp, actually enlarged and scripted from a high school English Lit writing exercise, comes smartly decorated with background and bridging music so discriminately selected that I wished to hear the scoring again apart from the play.

Appearing instinctively to leverage her visual-impairment, Milojevic also aptly employs her keenly attuned hearing to evoke college environs and voices as binaural backdrop to her drama. You’ll need headphones or good stereo speaker separation to catch this particular nuance, but listen closely to this clip from The Swamp in which a professor’s voice seems at first to wander about randomly until we realize that he’s passing out student exam sheets:

[SOUND BYTE]

Having already completed over ten independent audio productions, Milojevic has also begun to create Spirit Blade Underground Alliance series episodes of Out of the Night in collaboration with Spirit Blade producer, Paeter Frandsen.

Ms. Milojevic, who aspires to graduate work at UMass and, thereafter, to teach Braille, seems also to be well underway with a moonlight career as a talented independent audio producer and voice actor.

Hear Tanja Milojevic’s The Swamp on the Audio Drama Showcase at CaptainRadio.com, and listen to all her productions at LightningBoltTheaterOfTheMind.Mypodcast.com.

 

Until next time, Audionauts, this is Captain Radio™, signing off!

 

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Captain Radio Reviews Tanja Milojevic’s The Swamp from Lightningbolt Theater of the Mind

 

* Rating based on the Audio Drama Directory Ratings System.


 

Filed Under: American, Captain Radio Reviews, Drama, Horror, Lightningbolt Theater of the Mind, Mystery, Paeter Frandsen, Radio Drama, Spirit Blade, Tanja Milojevic

Captain Radio Review: Too Much of a Good Thing

May 19, 2011 By 2 Comments

Captain Radio Audio Reviews

Graphic - FunGraphix.com | Theme music - Shane Lamb

Title: Too Much of a Good Thing
Producer: Elsa Lankford and Black Crow Productions
Type: Comedy/Drama
Genre: Social Satire

Rating: AD-G* (mild swearing)
Availability: Free to Listen on PRX (Free Listener Registration Required)

Greetings, Audionauts – Captain Radio here with a review of Elsa Lankford’s Too Much of a Good Thing from Black Crow Productions.

Some global cultures have well-known, presumably independent news gathering outfits working alongside reasonably respectable commercial enterprises.

American news-gathering falls largely upon the shoulders of both commercial and intensely-sponsored “public” organizations.

Both, of late, have received their fair share of cynical criticism for dubious content, methods, objectivity, and, importantly, independence.

The separation between news and sponsorship can become precariously blurred, as our Too Much of a Good Thing protagonists learn while watching “news” that seems more broken than “breaking”:

[SOUND BYTE]

Gumshoe Image

Laura, a wannabe mystery writer (voiced by Danielle Lenhard), and her Helen Reddy-obsessed intimate roommate, Trina (voiced by Lankford) step outside to try to fathom the news frenzy engulfing the house next door.

When Trina defends neighborhood trash collector Joey (voiced by Patrick Zemeral) from media pillorying, “ace” live reporter Dank Stevens (voiced by James Armstrong) soundly repudiates her:

[SOUND BYTE]

The reporter then presses on to fast-breaking coverage of … unicorn abuse.

Soon, a furtive figure recruits the amenable ladies to investigate the mysterious comings-and-goings in the neighborhood, just as the old News Director at “Channel 7.5” (voiced by Grace Enriquez), explains the (sad) facts of news evolution to Dank:

[SOUND BYTE]

When neighborhood uber-gossip Mrs. Lewis (Enriquez again) abruptly is hired and upgraded to become the new Channel 7.5 News Director, Lankford unleashes through her a droll and thinly veiled volley at network newsgathering credibility:

[SOUND BYTE]

Satire eventually shifts more toward a genuine mystery, and imperiled Laura and Trina uncover a plot so large and so sinister that even Monty Python writer/director Terry Gilliam’s dark fancy would be tickled.

While the play hints at autobiographical asides and harbors some fun, if not essential, dialog, its virtually unrelenting satire seems all too suited to modern network news-mongering.

Listen to Elsa Lankford’s Too Much of a Good Thing from Black Crow Productions at PRX.org.

During your visit, you may also wish to hear Lankford’s half-hour documentary about a neighborhood bypassed by road construction entitled, Rooted and Unrooted: West Baltimore’s Highway to Nowhere.

Until next time, Audionauts, this is Captain Radio, signing off!

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

Captain Radio Reviews Elsa Lankford’s Too Much of a Good Thing from Black Crow Productions

 

* Rating based on the Audio Drama Directory Ratings System.


 

Filed Under: American, Captain Radio Reviews, comedy, Drama, Mystery Tagged With: , , , ,

Episode 206 – On a Twilight Zone “Walkabout,” and Talk with Carl Amari

December 31, 2010 By 1 Comment

Twilight Zone Radio Dramas

We conclude our three-week run of episodes from the magnificent and long-running Twilight Zone radio dramas.

This week we shy away from the holiday-oriented programming and join a hack writer on the hunt for alien abductees in the story “The Walkabout.” But this researcher may soon find himself the subject of his book, not the writer…

Followed by an interview with producer Carl Amari, founder of Radio Spirits and now producer with plenty of stripes. We talk about getting the rights to produce this series, his word-for-word dramatization of the Bible and thoughts on the changing landscape of radio drama.

COMMITTED TO THE RADIO DRAMA REVIVAL ARCHIVES. TO HEAR THE SHOW, VISIT TWILIGHT ZONE RADIO WEBSITE.

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Standalone Interview with Carl Amari

Filed Under: Carl Amari, Fantasy, Interviews, Mystery, Podcast, Science Fiction, Twilight Zone Tagged With: , , , , ,

Episode 205 – Twilight Zone’s “Gift” for Christmas… Or Humanity?

December 24, 2010 By 1 Comment

Twilight Zone Radio Dramas

This week we have a second-round of seasonal programming from The Twilight Zone.

Today’s tale has a child, a gift for humanity, a small rural village. Wait, is it the Christmas tale? Not quite. Aliens and the Mexican army collide in this adaptation of “The Gift.”

COMMITTED TO THE RADIO DRAMA REVIVAL ARCHIVES. TO HEAR THE SHOW, VISIT TWILIGHT ZONE RADIO WEBSITE.

Filed Under: Drama, Fantasy, Holiday, Mystery, Podcast, Twilight Zone Tagged With: , ,
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