Have We Entered the Era of the ‘Roadcast’?

Mark Vanhoenacker argues that we have. What’s a roadcast? It’s “a podcast that has particular qualities of randomness and reflection; they’re fascinating and thought-provoking but not news-focused or educational,” he writes in the Christian Science Monitor. “Like the tape deck itself, or the cup holder, roadcasts manage to revolutionize the road trip while also being right in tune with its sensibilities.”

Do these types of podcasts “revolutionize the road trip”? Not quite. Are they intriguing? Sure.

Some of Vanhoenacker’s examples of good roadcasts: Philosophy Bites, In Our Time and the New Yorker’s fiction podcast.

Vanhoenacker goes on to say he believes that roadcasts fill in “some gaps in the road trip experience.” He writes:

Unlike roadcasts, mixes never offered much in the way of conversational fodder. Nor did stories ever have much of a road-trip presence, unless you count the dusty books-on-tape for sale at the gas station counter.

He lost me there. In my experience, music mixes on road trips are almost guaranteed to stimulate conversation. And storytelling? Another road trip staple, whether it’s a book on tape or listening to your traveling companions talk about that time on the overnight train to Amsterdam or the heartbreak of their first love.

But I do think Vanhoenacker has made an excellent larger point in his essay:

America’s leitmotif of pedal-to-the-metal escapism—whether in film, novel, or song—has always reserved reflection, philosophical ponderings, and a kind of absent-minded wonder for a quiet stretch of open road.

So if there’s a rise in “roadcasts” to keep us company on the road, I’m all for it.

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