Song by Song

Happy New Year! 2019 brings Song by Song back to take another look through the listener mail we've received over the last year or so. Check out the show notes on the website for more links and details of the songs discussed.

Lucky for some, season 13 brings us to another structural shift in the format of the podcast, as we take the opportunity to bounce off of the Night On Earth soundtrack into Waits's film appearances. Season 13 will continue to expand over the coming...

It’s back to the megamix format for the second Original Soundtrack of the Waits discography, as Martin and Sam spend a minute (or so) on each of the 16 tracks from his 1991 score to Jim Jarmusch’s film Night On Earth. This time with 100% less...

To educate us all on the history of the Brat Pack, Sam & Martin welcome Kevin Smokler to take a look at Coppola's adaptation of S.E Hinton's coming of age novel, The Outsiders. While Kevin educates us as to the historical and social context of...

Kevin Smokler rejoins Martin & Sam for another dip into a teen-drama Hinton/Coppola/Dillon collaboration, as Song by Song takes a look at 1983's Rumble Fish. There's some discussion about the acting styles of the Dillon/Rourke/Hopper family, the...

Martin & Sam welcome back friends of the show Simon Renshaw and Sam Clements to have a little chat about Coppola's jazz-odyssey The Cotton Club. There's some real difficulties for all four hosts with this one, although there are some standout...

Sam and Martin welcome friend of the show Matthew Crosby to dig into one of Waits's most sizeable film roles, the 1986 Jim Jarmusch classic Down By Law. Immediately proving their analytic credentials by remembering at least two of the main characters'...

We're joined by Helen O'Hara (host of the Empire Film Podcast and author of 'Women vs Hollywood') to discuss the down-and-out misadventures of Streep, Nicholson, Waits & co in this 1987 box-office flop.

Back for a second week, Matthew Crosby joins Martin and Sam to take a look at Jim Jarmusch's 1989 multiple-narrative movie Mystery Train. While we're all full of love and excitement for the quirks and details of the film, there's some debate as to the...

Matthew Crosby returns for another film episode, this time with at least 80% more emeralds-hidden-in-a-horse. We discuss some of the big performance choices and tonal frustrations in this mostly-forgotten 80s comedy, and assess Waits's work as an...