Welcome to Tequila Nation
November 11, 2009
The segment from Plan B, titled “It’s another Tequila Sunrise”, is very intriguing. The podcast is geared toward a mature audience; however, the product, Jose Cuervo Tequila, is best served for a more rowdy bunch. Host Ira Glass narrates almost the entire piece, while he conducts a so-called interview with Ryan McDonough: the Cuervo Man. This podcast caught my ear because of its humor and use of transition between music, bar- noise and diction. It’s comical and entertaining to hear that a man who had graduated from Princeton is a known “party catalyst” and a human advertisement for Jose Cuervo. It is even more comical to learn that McDonough uses rubber chickens, plungers and spedos as props at the bars he visits. Evidently, these are tools to intrigue drunk minds and provoke playfulness. After all, drunk people think almost anything is amusing.
Transitions between different aspects of the podcast play a significant role in its outcome. Music breaks between separate ideas in podcasts, similar to “fade- ins” and “fade- outs” between images that pertain to separate concepts in films. For example, music is spliced in between Glass’s narration and McDonough’s response in the interview. Music is also spliced in between Glass’s narration and real bar- noises where the Cuervo Man is present. This upbeat music relates to the theme of the portrayed act of partying. Essentially, it grasps the listener in to this realm that consists of Cuervo shots and pleasure.
As Glass explains, Ryan McDonough’s antics will continue to name him as a “God of drunken rebelry”. He is the most interactive and amusing advertisement I have seen yet.
After watching Glass on storytelling on Youtube, I found that he upholds to his advice. Not only do I have a better understanding of how to tell a good story, but I am determined that Ira Glass is not a hypocritical prick who doesn’t uphold to his own teachings. What Glass conveys is exactly how he tells his stories in all four Acts of the “Plan B” podcast. Importantly, Glass expresses that a narrator should accentuate a sequence of actions, rather than follow the “high school” lesson of shoving in facts beneath topic sentences. The use of anecdote provokes momentum and grasps the listener. I agree that this method is more effective because listening to someone state facts can be incredibly boring. Glass’s stories are vibrant and enjoyable.
It is funny, we both did the same segment and touched upon pretty much the same points. So I agree with this post completely. Although, you brought up a great points about the rowdy background noises, which I didn’t even catch! I guess there are different kinds of listeners. I guess I was more of a passive listener, I can’t sit still for more than like 5 minutes, so my un-diagnosed ADD did take over and I tended to stray off into other things, yet still listening to the podcast. Do you feel that people could possibly miss some important “background” information because we live in a multi-tasking generation and people might be drifting in and out of podcasts?
I agree with what you say about Glass’ storytelling in that it is vibrant and enjoyable because he does not just stick boring facts under topic sentences. We talked about in class how if you have a bunch of random funny anecdotes that make up a story, that’s one thing, but unless you can connect them and say something important then the stories are meaningless. Anecdotes have to have some structure like an essay in that they have depth and elaborate both on the subject and something more general that the audience can relate to. But as you pointed out that Glass explains it has to be a story with momentum and flow that catches the reader as well.
I also thought the Youtube videos of Glass on storytelling were enjoyable. I do not have much experience with storytelling and Glass gave some good advice that will help me with my personal narrative. He related to the viewers when he talked about storytelling, saying how he has made mistakes before. I really liked how he did that. I hope that in the future I watch more videos of him.