Pondercast: Recent Episodes
Laurie Brown
Pondercast explores the thoughts and feelings we often feel but rarely put into words or sound. Host Laurie Brown writes thought-provoking scripts set to ambient scores by Joshua Van Tassel. We dive beneath discomfort, into the mundane, and examine the sky. We explore the unknown within the solace of the present moment.
New episodes every three weeks.
Pondercast is supported by listeners through Patreon. Www.patreon.com/Pondercast Www.pondercast.ca
When life changes from order to chaos and then to….nothing. We are lost in space. I’m here to report back.
Hi. There is nothing new we can say about the month of January... or is there? There are two phrases that came to me in the grey gloom and they are: 1) soft and alive 2) rich and steady Work with me. Yours in January solidarity, Laurie and Joshua
Our quarterly collboration with Killbeat Publicity featuring some of the fall's most exicitng new releases, curated by the discerning and eclectic ear of Laurie Brown.
Chances are, if you live in Canada, you have already seen some snow this season….but..have you had a perfect snowfall yet?
Chances are you have a list kicking around your place right now. Maybe a
shopping list – or a ‘to do’ list? Do you make a list of pros and cons when
faced with a big decision? We humans love our lists because they offer a
placebo effect to the complex chaos of our world.
Chances are you have a list kicking around your place right now. Maybe a
shopping list – or a ‘to do’ list? Do you make a list of pros and cons when
faced with a big decision? We humans love our lists because they offer a
placebo effect to the complex chaos of our world.
Pondercast is taking a high dive this fall for our 6th season.
Our new motto: Expect the unexpected...unexpectedly.
This episode is our first step to a new, more immersive, embodied experience for you.
Climb the Yarmouth, Nova Scotia lighthouse with me..and dive down into the cold waters of
The Bay of Fundy.
An antidote to that all too familiar ‘back to school’ feeling.
Pondercast is on a small summer break, but here's 10 minutes of a beautiful summer rain to help wash away some stress.
Pondercast is on a small summer break, but here's 10 minutes of a beautiful summer rain to help wash away some stress.
Our quarterly collaboration with Killbeat Music featuring some of the summer's best new music, curated by the discerning and eclectic ear of Laurie Brown
We have a guest contributor this time around - coming to you from deep inside Laurie with the inside scoop on the Roe vs Wade decision.
What was the combination for your first high school locker? I bet you remember it.
That combination was the ONLY thing I was sure of when I stepped into school that year.
Character Count is about the life long process of getting to know yourself.
It starts with recognizing yourself in the mirror. Where it ends depends on how closely you
are willing to scrutinize what you see.
Here’s looking at you kid!
We start this Pondercast with a field trip to my pond to hear the spring peepers and then head off into an exploration of how our seasons are not sticking to their lane anymore.
Spring is here. Huzzah! Tax time. Whatever. I started thinking about this episode while I was on hold with Canadian Revenue Agency. Let’s think about time and how it comes to us in a 100 different flavours.
Warning: When you ponder time deeply – it turns into space. This will be a journey: forwards and backwards.
Tempus fugit.
Oh boy…spring is almost here!
Let’s celebrate with a Ponderbeat episode – our quarterly collaboration with Killbeat Music! An entire episode of new and about to be released music. Settle in and feast yourself on some fresh music. Thanks to Killbeat!
As always, if you hear an artist you love here – BUY THEIR MUSIC!!
- Kyla Charter - Qwyn
- Jordan Klassen - Ash Wednesday
- Scott Hardware - Summer
- Helena Deland - Swimmer
- Yves Jarvis - Prism Through Which I Perceive
- Katie Tupper - How Can I Get Your Love
- Donovan Woods - Leave When You Go
- Cassidy Mann - Election Night
- The Weather Station - Marsh
- Sam Weber - Money
Ears up!
Laurie, Ty and Joshua
Oh boy…spring is almost here!
Let’s celebrate with a Ponderbeat episode – our quarterly collaboration with Killbeat Music! An entire episode of new and about to be released music. Settle in and feast yourself on some fresh music. Thanks to Killbeat!
As always, if you hear an artist you love here – BUY THEIR MUSIC!!
- Kyla Charter - Qwyn
- Jordan Klassen - Ash Wednesday
- Scott Hardware - Summer
- Helena Deland - Swimmer
- Yves Jarvis - Prism Through Which I Perceive
- Katie Tupper - How Can I Get Your Love
- Donovan Woods - Leave When You Go
- Cassidy Mann - Election Night
- The Weather Station - Marsh
- Sam Weber - Money
Ears up!
Laurie, Ty and Joshua
Oh boy…spring is almost here!
Let’s celebrate with a Ponderbeat episode – our quarterly collaboration with Killbeat Music! An entire episode of new and about to be released music. Settle in and feast yourself on some fresh music. Thanks to Killbeat!
As always, if you hear an artist you love here – BUY THEIR MUSIC!!
- Kyla Charter - Qwyn
- Jordan Klassen - Ash Wednesday
- Scott Hardware - Summer
- Helena Deland - Swimmer
- Yves Jarvis - Prism Through Which I Perceive
- Katie Tupper - How Can I Get Your Love
- Donovan Woods - Leave When You Go
- Cassidy Mann - Election Night
- The Weather Station - Marsh
- Sam Weber - Money
Ears up!
Laurie, Ty and Joshua
Oh boy…spring is almost here!
Let’s celebrate with a Ponderbeat episode – our quarterly collaboration with Killbeat Music! An entire episode of new and about to be released music. Settle in and feast yourself on some fresh music. Thanks to Killbeat!
As always, if you hear an artist you love here – BUY THEIR MUSIC!!
- Kyla Charter - Qwyn
- Jordan Klassen - Ash Wednesday
- Scott Hardware - Summer
- Helena Deland - Swimmer
- Yves Jarvis - Prism Through Which I Perceive
- Katie Tupper - How Can I Get Your Love
- Donovan Woods - Leave When You Go
- Cassidy Mann - Election Night
- The Weather Station - Marsh
- Sam Weber - Money
Ears up!
Laurie, Ty and Joshua
Oh boy…spring is almost here!
Let’s celebrate with a Ponderbeat episode – our quarterly collaboration with Killbeat Music! An entire episode of new and about to be released music. Settle in and feast yourself on some fresh music. Thanks to Killbeat!
As always, if you hear an artist you love here – BUY THEIR MUSIC!!
- Kyla Charter - Qwyn
- Jordan Klassen - Ash Wednesday
- Scott Hardware - Summer
- Helena Deland - Swimmer
- Yves Jarvis - Prism Through Which I Perceive
- Katie Tupper - How Can I Get Your Love
- Donovan Woods - Leave When You Go
- Cassidy Mann - Election Night
- The Weather Station - Marsh
- Sam Weber - Money
Ears up!
Laurie, Ty and Joshua
“It's taken us 5 years, but we finally managed to have a robot reading a whole list of curses, followed by a Sun Ra free jazz drum freak out. Great work team, this episode will be DIVISIVE”
– Joshua Van Tassel
“It's taken us 5 years, but we finally managed to have a robot reading a whole list of curses, followed by a Sun Ra free jazz drum freak out. Great work team, this episode will be DIVISIVE”
– Joshua Van Tassel
“It's taken us 5 years, but we finally managed to have a robot reading a whole list of curses, followed by a Sun Ra free jazz drum freak out. Great work team, this episode will be DIVISIVE”
– Joshua Van Tassel
“It's taken us 5 years, but we finally managed to have a robot reading a whole list of curses, followed by a Sun Ra free jazz drum freak out. Great work team, this episode will be DIVISIVE”
– Joshua Van Tassel
“It's taken us 5 years, but we finally managed to have a robot reading a whole list of curses, followed by a Sun Ra free jazz drum freak out. Great work team, this episode will be DIVISIVE”
– Joshua Van Tassel
“It's taken us 5 years, but we finally managed to have a robot reading a whole list of curses, followed by a Sun Ra free jazz drum freak out. Great work team, this episode will be DIVISIVE”
– Joshua Van Tassel
Beyond being places where we put stuff to get it out of our way, attics and basements are the perfect metaphor for the stuff in our heads. Both the things we run away from and what we want to return to.
Personally, I prefer attics to basements…but I know there’s something here for everyone.
This episode is a report from deep inside the limbic system of the brain. Also known as the paleomammalian cortex (if you want to get fancy), or the emotional brain. Perhaps you’ve been there before?
I’m calling it ‘I’ve Come Back from Worse’, because shit has been going down in my world. Yours too? If so, how about something you can hang on your wall to acknowledge that? The phrase “I’ve come back from worse” has earned a reputation in my family, and my niece has created this tea saucer and sends them out into the hurting world from her shop in Peterborough, Ontario.
Pondercastronauts get a 10% discount! Type in the code
IVECOMEBACKFROMWORSE and you can join this illustrious club of survivors.
https://www.watsonandlou.com/collections/altered-vintage-plates
You will also hear about a program I took called The Grief Recovery Method. Here’s a link to find out more about that.
https://www.griefrecoverymethod.com/ If you are looking for grief support, contact me (laurie@pondercast.ca) and I’ll put you in touch with someone who can guide you through the course.
Phew! Lots of big stuff happening. And...life goes on. May you be well.
Look out for the ice.
Happier New Year! We are all adjusting constantly these days, so taking a look at what it takes to feel secure is a good way to start 2022 here on Pondercast. Is that even possible? We discuss.
You made it through another November. You are to be congratulated. Why is November so hard? (I can hear you listing reasons). I think it deserves a word all its own: viscerable.
Join me on this ‘romp’ through November and right out the back end of it!
You made it through another November. You are to be congratulated. Why is November so hard? (I can hear you listing reasons). I think it deserves a word all its own: viscerable.
Join me on this ‘romp’ through November and right out the back end of it!
What happens when you start a conversation with ‘I don’t know’... where do you go from there?
We've moved all our guided meditations and grounding thoughts to our new podcast "Ground Level". Search for it wherever you get your podcasts and subscribe to keep getting guided meditations.
More about Ground Level here.
For our first episode of the 5th season - expect some turbulence in the weather! Laurie looks at our emotional response to big weather: wind and rain, thunder and lightning and fog - and Joshua outdoes himself creating a musical electrical storm.
If you’ve been missing The Signal with Laurie Brown on CBC radio – she’s back with Pondercast Radio.
Imagine the experience of radio only on your favourite music streaming provider. If you subscribe to Spotify or Apple Music then Pondercast Radio is within your grasp. Laurie will be publishing a new ‘radio’ show every month filled with new stories and new music – for you to enjoy anytime day or night. Become a supporter of Pondercast on Patreon for as little as $3 a month and we will bring the special late night vibe you remember.
Another quarterly instalment of fresh new music delivered to your inbox courtesy of Pondercast and Killbeat Music!
- Absolutely Free - How to Paint Clouds
- Astral Swans – Spiral
- Andy Shauf - Jaywalker
- Charlotte Cornfield: Drunk on You
- Homeshake - Passenger Seat
- Jasper Sloan Yip - Strange Calm
- KDAP - Wilner’s Parade
- Charles Spearin - My City of Starlings
- Ouri - Ossature
- Cots - Last Sip
This episode is about what happens when the music dies. Don’t worry, there’s a happy ending here.It’s coming back! Only this time around – we have changed.
You are heading to the clouds in this episode. Let’s ponder a world where we could be living a second life up in the data flow of the cloud.
Ready to leap to a complete mind upload? What could go wrong?
I’ve changed, you’ve changed, the climate has changed. If we aren’t all experiencing a sea change moment right now - I’m not sure when that moment might be.
The world is coming out of hibernation…and so are we. This episode is about all kinds of new beginnings - first hellos - and the art of making an entrance.
Let’s get together again. (That feels so good to say.)
What’s in a name?
This episode started with seeing ‘June’ painted on a side of a car door. And things kind of took off from there...
We humans can make such joyful sounds. Yet we have been pretty quiet lately. Time to turn the volume up again.
This is an episode to kickstart us back into the world of people. And we will do it through sound - one of Pondercast’s best things.
[Listening Party]
Bring on the new music! It’s time for our quarterly Ponderbeat, our collaboration with Killbeat Music to bring you 10 fresh new tracks that we love.
This episode declares an end to overthinking! An end to the way our minds circle back - again and again - to the same old things!
This episode is an ode to a spring night I recorded outside sitting beside a pond filled with spring peepers. Lots of sound in this edition of Pondercast. A very welcome sound.
If this past year has taught us anything, hopefully it’s how to let go of expectations and deal with the reality in front of us.
There is a serious undertow to creativity. It always feels like there is some risk involved. Like a dream that might turn dark at any moment...
This weekend is the full moon and in February it’s called the snow moon... the last full moon of winter... my two favourite things: the moon and snow!
So, let’s talk about other people. It’s been a year since we’ve been pulled apart from some people and locked up with other ones.
I miss strangers, I miss the opportunity to be kind to them. And...I regret the moments when I pulled back from offering kindness and help to the people I know.
Let’s talk about how we feel about other people now...a year in.
I have been pondering plexiglass. All those rectangles separating us from the rest of the world. It’s got to have an effect. Like a window - those plexiglass sheets put a frame around our daily outings into the world. Is it changing us?
I’ve been looking for a measured, middle way to get through this pandemic...and I believe moderation will help me see it through.
Here's a second look at our live show recorded in 2019 on the winter solstice featuring some amazing tunes!
Nothing like having your life completely upended by a pandemic to give you a real look at the habits that rule your world.
Time for the quarterly music episode that Killbeat Music and Pondercast collaborate on.
- Gord Downie - Away Is Mine
- Luka Kuplowsky - Do I Have to Be
- Braids - Here 4 U
- Steven Wilson - KING GHOST
- LAL - End of This World Together
- Yves Jarvis - Emblem
- Edwin Raphael - Mild Sanity (feat Juletta)
- The Weather Station - Robber
- Charles Spearin, Josefin Runsteen - Breathing With You, With Me
- Matthew Cardinal - May 7th
To help recreate that special feeling boarding an overnight flight that delivers you to a new place in the world.
How many of us have wished for ‘one more room’ during the pandemic?
As we turn our homes into offices and classrooms and spend so much more time at home..the idea of ‘a room of one’s own’ has new importance.
This episode is about what it means to have a space we can call our own.
There are many kinds of heartbreaks that life throws at us. Today’s episode covers a few different flavours.
Having our hearts broken is not something we can avoid...life is like that. They must be there to teach us something. Can we get better at having our hearts broken? Is that possible?
If you are soaking in a broken heart at this moment, or if your last broken heart was years ago..this episode will perform some amateur exploratory surgery on your tender heart. Fun!
We have had plenty of time during covid to contemplate our relationship with our beds. So that’s where we head for this episode.
The weirdest back to school feeling ever.
Let’s mull it over together, while we cling to the end of summer in our second annual outdoor nighttime Pondercast, at a cottage by the edge of Lake Huron.
The start of our 4th season. Amazing!
This episode is a special one. Designed to be listened to with headphones, Pondercast is taking a trip inside your head. Be prepared for quiet sounds and binaural awesomeness.
For those of you with ASMR tendencies (Autonomous Sensory Meridian Response), this ought to produce goosebumps!
A lot of things in life are feeling mysterious at the moment. There are questions that can’t be answered: about your future, about yourself and perhaps about the person you live with.
Nothing like a pandemic to kick up a dirt storm of personal stuff.
So, I asked on Facebook for the big questions that are plaguing you these days. This episode tackles a few of them...
Stepping back into the world feels strange. Each of us has a different reading of the risk that still remains.
I’m not counting on the world to return to normal, but I wish I would return to myself.
This episode is about shifting gears:
From slow to fast
From anxious to ease
From thinking to action
From present to future.
Change is coming...not fast enough for many of us...too fast for others...it is dizzying.
Dealing with Covid-19 is like learning to sail while in a storm on the ocean. Everyone is making mistakes and changing direction to try and keep afloat.
What has been keeping me sane is walking.
Here we are...week whatever of lockdown. This episode should be buried in the backyard as a time capsule of what this time has been like.
As I wildly swing between optimism for a changed future and desperation at our situation at this moment, I am hearing (and feeling) the deep struggle that many of us are suffering through.
We are following our instincts here on Pondercast. We want to create episodes you can use during this surreal COVID-19 lock down.
Well. When I started thinking and writing about this episode...COVID-19 wasn’t a pandemic. This episode is called Thinking Time, Pondercast’s first episode to address what is coming up as we all struggle to adapt to massive change.
This is your spring edition of Ponderbeat! Be prepared for an earful of new music. Here’s your track list:
Things We Do - Andy Shauf
woman, here - Ada Lea
Nostalgia For The Present Moment - Jaunt
Eclipse (Ashley) - Braids
Risk It - Austra
Best Of Me - Mister Nobu
Good Instead of Bad - Dana Gavanski
The Agreement - Rose Cousins
Age - R. Grunwald
Well we are truly deep in it now: winter.
This is an episode for a cold, dark night. But you won’t be alone; this is a show we recorded live in Toronto on the winter solstice at the Burdock Music Hall with a roomful of musicians and Pondercast fans. It was a night of telling winter stories and singing songs.
You will hear from...
- Michael Feuerstack
- Evangeline Gentle
- Doug Tielli
- Abigail Lapell (with Christine Bougie)
- Mappe Of
- Gregory Hoskins and Don Rooke of The Henrys
- Christine Bougie
- Charlotte Cornfield
- Tony Dekker of Great Lake Swimmers
- Michelle Willis (with Christine Bougie, Charlotte Cornfield and Joshua Van Tassel)
- ...and of course, Joshua Van Tassel and myself.
This is part two of our emotional adventure through the musical intervals that make up western music. Make sure to checkout part one.
It’s been a long time since I’ve spoken with Jason/Chilly/Gonzo/Maestro Gonzales so we had a lot to talk about.
This is part 1 of a 2 part series all about intervals. The building blocks of western music. Every interval comes with a feeling that is bred in our bones. Prepare to feel emotionally manipulated as we wander through the octave, the minor 2nd, the major and minor 3rd...and the list goes on!
I’m a big fan of Leif Vollebekk and so it was a highlight to get to sit down and talk with him. You get it all! Talk and music!
This episode was inspired by an idea by Joshua. He was thinking about breath and breathing when he wrote these pieces of music. So I picked up on that theme and Breathing Lessons is the result.
So take a deep breath, and let’s time travel; from your first breath to your last.
Music – I’m taking you to Jenn Grant’s house in Nova Scotia. It’s in the woods on a lake.
Listening Party – A full episode of soon to be released and just released music from Killbeat’s great roster.
Thanksgiving happened. But my fridge is still feeling it.
Actually my fridge is the inspiration for this episode. You know that feeling when you open the door and see your fridge packed with good food? We start there.
Let’s feel full together.
Listening Party – We have Canadian music royalty for you this episode. After a 15 year hiatus, The Rheostatics have a new album: Here Come the Wolves.
This episode is a live recording of Moon Merge at The Bentway in Toronto on September 14th - the night of the full Harvest Moon.
The start of Season 3 of Pondercast!!
In this episode we join forces with another podcast: 'The Moth' to talk about storytelling.
The Moth has been encouraging real people to tell their real stories in front of an audience for 22 years. If you haven’t listened you should..right after you listen to this.
The urge to disappear...to shut down the phone and walk away from being ‘social’. Are you feeling it?
This episode is our second instalment of summer-isms. Because we all can’t get enough of summer. We also can’t get enough time off to enjoy it.
Listening Party – Rich Aucoin’s latest album is called Release - and that’s what it feels like. I sat down with Rich to find out how he writes such uplifting music about such serious stuff...like death and fear.
This episode is built for a summer’s night.
So instead of recording inside, I took the microphone to the backyard on a beautiful night and pressed record. Then Joshua took his recording gear outside and filled this with warm summer music.
So imagine we are all sitting outside in a backyard together, soaking up the summer night vibes.
If you are heading in to the fridge will you grab me something?
Interview and Listening Party – We talk about storytelling, songwriting, and about the joy of creating. And we also talk about how the sound of a voice attracts us.
Listening Party – It’s here! The latest Ponderbeat is going to fill your summer of 2019 with a buffet of brand new music.
Listening Party – Music! Talk! Pondering!
Tony Dekker of Great Lake Swimmers and I got together to talk about things that are mostly wordless. Ha!
Hear my conversation with Icelandic composer Ólafur Arnalds. We talk about creativity, flow and sweat. In that order.
How to talk about what silence does for us in a sound-based medium?We start with the opposite: noise!
This episode moves from noise to silence and from past to present.
Listening Party – Dan Mangan writes songs way above his pay grade. From the moment he started putting out music, his songs had the sophistication of a much more experienced writer.
So on this Pondercast - may I pull your attention towards this remarkable new album by Dan called More or Less.
I was channeling my inner teenager in this episode. Remembering back to that agonizing time of trying to decide what to do with the rest of my life. Trust me - it wasn’t my idea to try and answer that question, but every adult around me couldn’t stop asking it. Drove me nuts.
[Listening Party] It’s Ponderbeat time!
The third edition of our collaboration with Killbeat Music - a taster of great new music that’s just been released - or just about to be released. Be the first kid on your block to hear some of these tracks!
We North Americans are constantly asked to choose. Everywhere we go we are asked to register our preference, to make a choice out of an embarrassing number of options available to us.
Listen to 8 things I’ve learned about sex.
It was an article by Kate Julian in Atlantic Magazine that inspired this. Look for The Sex Recession issue.
If sex is losing its appeal - this Pondercast is an appeal for more and better sex.
Have a sexy 2019.
Optimum listening time for this Pondercast is Monday December 31, 2018 at 11:51 PM!
Here we are again - wrapping up another year and sending it on its way to the history books. See ya 2018!
This Pondercast comes from a live performance at The Music Gallery in Toronto, and from the bottom of my heart. Writing about my complicated relationship with my mother was hard - and if you struggle with your mother - you understand why.
New music! Interview! Sonic weirdness!
Really happy to lay this one on you. Richard Reed Parry of Arcade Fire fame has released a solo album called Quiet River of Dust. Fire up your ears.
Ah...the smell of a new book. There’s thrill and excitement and anticipation in that intoxicating ink and paper smell.
Built for an east coast audience, Laurie fathoms the unfathomable with musician Joshua Van Tassel creating live sea/soundscapes.
[Listening Party]
Here you go! Brand new music just in time for your Thanksgiving long weekend! The second edition of our collaboration with Killbeat Music - a taster of great new music that’s just been released - or just about to be released.
[Night Series]
The third episode in our Night Series is called Driving. Really don’t need to say anything more about that. Download this one and take with you for your next night time drive!
[Interview] This episode is called ‘You Make Me Feel’. And if you finished that line with ...’like a natural woman’, you are already in the zone! Daveed Goldman and Nobu Adilman started Choir!Choir!Choir! as a weekly drop-in singing event at a bar.
[Listening Party] In an emergency: break glass and listen to Altered States. The ultimate chill-out Pondercast.
Let’s just hang together for about 2 hours. I’ve found the perfect musical accompaniment; a new album of ambient music called States. Three musicians: Robbie Grunwald, James Bunton, and our very own Joshua Van Tassel have each contributed 3 pieces that are each 11:00 long.
Getting beyond the noise. A conversation with Les Stroud aka Survivorman about silence and sound in the wild.
Anger seems to be the emotion of the moment. It doesn’t take more than a sidelong glance at the news to get the mad motor humming. How are you handling it? I’m not doing so well. I do not anger easily, so feeling it so often is getting to me.
[Listening Party] Come on a walk with me to a dizzying, heart pounding cliff edge (without pulling your butt out of your seat.)
Learning how to be OK with being alone may be one of the toughest life skills we grapple with. Michelle Parise of the podcast “Alone - A Love Story” has a story to tell about this – so do I.
[Listening Party] We are pretty darn excited to announce a musical collaboration between Pondercast and Killbeat Music, Canada’s premier publicity/media company.
In this audio version of my Globe and Mail piece titled 'Living Like I'm Dying', I ponder my own death, yet again.
I imagine I'm not the only person who's written their own obituary, but maybe I'm the first one to see it in print. Writing my obit was the first task in an exercise that came to an end yesterday.
This episode is a follow up to Episode 07 – Death. Thanks to Sick Boy Podcast and Jeremie Saunders for giving me my 3 months to live exercise!
This episode was recorded from my bed at 3:00 AM.
How many times have you wished there was someone there beside you when you can’t get back to sleep because of ...well...a million reasons and all of them inducing worry and anxiety?
Night Series Pt. 2 – Night becomes an entirely different beast when you head outside in the dark.