Monocle on Culture
Robert Bound and guests explore what’s new in art, film, books, and media. Expect lively discussions, in-depth interviews, and expert insights.
Latest Episodes
How do you make a playlist?
Playlists are everywhere: in the clothes shop where you bought that new shirt, in the bar where you went for drinks last night, hell – even on the radio. We find out what makes a good playlist with music supervisor Rebecca Grierson, Lebanese DJ Ernesto Chahoud and the Argentinian duo…
Who do you think you are?
This week we’re tackling ideas of self. Where did you come from? What class do you think you are? What signifiers of success do you flaunt? We meet Dan Fox, author of ‘Pretentiousness: Why It Matters’, head to a Brooklyn bar to find out what our choice of drink says…
Aussie rules
This week we’re spinning the globe 180 degrees and zooming in on Australia to explore the people making waves in the music, radio, television and newspaper industries. We get music tips from Sydney’s coolest record label Future Classic, speak to seasoned broadcaster Myf Warhurst to find out why Australia loves…
How do you know what to read?
Thousands of titles are published each month and we all have a list longer than our lifespan of books we want to read – and say we’ve read. So how can we decide which ones to tackle? To help us answer this week’s question we speak to Lisette Verhagen, founder…
How do you draw the news?
A picture’s worth a thousand words, they say, so how do political and topical cartoonists drill down into the core of a news story, a scandal or a cover-up to reveal its essence? How do they transform the news into something worthy of a laugh? We sit down with cartoonist…
Sundance & Trieste Film Festivals
We round up two of last week’s film festivals that really set the pace for the rest of the year: Sundance and Trieste. While the mainstream is focused on the run up to the red carpet of the Oscars, the rest of the film industry is still busy making movies,…
How do you look after a legacy?
Will Hodgkinson, rock and pop critic for ‘The Times’, tells us how David Bowie led the world in musical legacies. We also meet sculptor Frances Segelman to find out how you immortalise someone in statue form. Plus: David Foster Wallace’s ‘Infinite Jest’ and its reputation as a modern classic that…
How do you give a warm welcome?
In order to answer the question of how you give a warm welcome we meet Fred Sirieix, general manager of restaurant Galvin at Windows and all-round hospitality mastermind. We also talk to Monocle’s tech correspondent David Phelan about how technology such as smartphones and even rice cookers attempts to make…
Whatever happened to hype?
Who hypes the arts? Publicists? Artists? Fans? Robert Bound sits down with music magazine maestro David Hepworth, arts and entertainment writer for ‘The Daily Telegraph’ Alice Vincent and publicist Emily Bryce-Perkins to find out how hype has developed over the decades.
New year’s resolutions
We ring in the new year with comedian James Mullinger, who tells us why his resolutions for 2016 could leave him with a red face on Canadian television. Plus: we hear about New Year’s Eve celebrations from folk in Morocco, London and Amazonian Brazil.
