Kirk McElhearn
Co-Host of The Next Track
Kirk McElhearn is a freelance journalist. He writes on his website Kirkville, and is Senior Contributor to Macworld, where he is The iTunes Guy. He is also a regular contributor to TidBITS, as well as several other web sites and magazines. He is co-host of The Committed podcast. Kirk has written more than twenty books, including Take Control of iTunes. On Twitter, he's @mcelhearn, and he has a Facebook page.
Kirk McElhearn has hosted 316 Episodes.
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Episode #156 - 10 Ideas About the Future of the Music Business
August 14th, 2019 | 35 mins 30 secs
We discuss the future of the music business, and come up with at last 10 ideas about how things will change in the next 10 years. Because 10 is a good number.
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Episode #155 - Running a Small Record Label: Another Timbre
July 31st, 2019 | 36 mins 46 secs
We welcome Simon Reynell, who runs Another Timbre, a one-man record label that releases experimental and contemporary music. Simon tells us how he started the label, and what it's like to run a record label in a niche of this kind.
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Episode #154 - Remembering the Walkman and Cassettes
July 18th, 2019 | 25 mins 43 secs
The Sony Walkman was introduced 40 years ago. When it first came out, it was the biggest change in musical listening since the record player. It ushered in an era of personal listening, and, with the popularity of cassette tapes, changed the music industry.
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Episode #153 - John Lysaker on Brian Eno's Music for Airports
July 3rd, 2019 | 33 mins 21 secs
Philosopher John Lysaker joins us to discuss his recent book about Brian Eno's Music for Airports. We talk about the idea of ambient music, and how Music for Airports defined a genre.
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Episode #152 - Flogging a Dead App: Is it Really the Death of iTunes?
June 19th, 2019 | 23 mins 54 secs
"iTunes is dead!!!" claim a number of websites and publications. Even on the TV news they were saying that "Apple has discontinued iTunes," that "it's the end of an era." Apple made big announcements at the company's Worldwide Developer Conference in early June. Did they really kill off iTunes? We look at this subject, yet again, for what will be the last episode about the future of iTunes, at least until the next one.
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Episode #151 - The Latest Trends in Hi-Fi
June 5th, 2019 | 39 mins 9 secs
We welcome back Chris Connaker, who tells us about the latest trends in hi-fi at the Munich High End audio show.
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Episode #150 - Ambient Music
May 22nd, 2019 | 28 mins 11 secs
The problem with the genre of ambient music is that most of it is not ambient music. No one really agrees on what exactly ambient music is. We discuss the genre, and the music, and how we feel about this type of music.
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Episode #149 - In Which We Discuss the Potential Breakup of iTunes Yet Again Because We Really Didn't Have Anything Else to Talk About This Week
May 17th, 2019 | 22 mins 29 secs
We discuss the potential breakup of iTunes yet again, because there is some new information about what the future of iTunes will be.
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Episode #148 - Spoilers
May 10th, 2019 | 23 mins 36 secs
We don't often talk about TV, but this week we discuss some TV series, how people watch TV, and in particular the disappearing experience of appointment TV. And we link this all with iTunes, at least a bit.
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Episode #147 - Kirk's New Sonos Amp
May 3rd, 2019 | 27 mins 40 secs
Kirk bought some new audio equipment: a Sonos Amp. We talk about how this amp works, and how it has allowed Kirk to minimalize the equipment in his home office.
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Episode #146 - Woodstock
April 26th, 2019 | 20 mins 43 secs
The 50th anniversary concert of Woodstock has been planned, and tickets were supposed to go on sale this week, yet have been delayed. We look back at the original Woodstock festival and how much the music influenced us.
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Episode #145 - The Future of iTunes Redux
April 19th, 2019 | 15 mins 23 secs
It’s time to have a brief discussion of the future of iTunes again. Some news has been circulating suggesting that Apple will be including separate apps for music, TV, podcasts, and books later this year. We discuss this, and how we predicted this a few months ago.
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Episode #144 - Cornelius Boots and His Bad-Ass Shakuhachi
April 12th, 2019 | 32 mins 47 secs
Cornelius Boots is a bad-ass shakuhachi player, and Kirk's second shakuhachi teacher. Cornelius is a composer, performer, and teachers, and has just released his third album of original compositions.
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Episode #143 - Too Old to Rock 'n Roll
April 5th, 2019 | 29 mins 48 secs
Lots of big rock stars are getting old. How much longer will these musicians be able to perform and tour?
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Episode #142 - Why Wi-Fi Is Important for Your Home Media Use
March 29th, 2019 | 26 mins 37 secs
Most people depend on wi-fi to get data from one device to another in their home. This is the case for music and video, and having good wi-fi ensures that you can enjoy your home media without any glitches.
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Episode #141 - Algorithms
March 22nd, 2019 | 29 mins 54 secs
Continuing our reunion tour, we welcome back our friend Andy Doe to talk about algorithms; how they work, and how they affect music listening.