Ben Lee performs Catch My Disease live at an awards show

Ben Lee performs his great tune Catch My Disease live. This tune is also the theme song of the great radio show and podcast [imaginary radio show] TBTL by Luke Burbank...


---o0o---

TBTL Lives!

click to enlarge


TBTL roared back to life as a Podcast after being cancelled as a terrestrial radio show in Seattle. The show was always one of the lowest rated in Seattle, but it has fans around the world and its podcast was always extremely popular. The parent company decide to fund Too Beautiful To Live as a podcast for an unspecified period of time. This is my favorite radio show of all time.


Subscribe! Go to the iTunes Podcast page to subscribe or download shows, or go to http://www.tbtl.net/



Tom Tangney, a Seattle movie critic, wrote the following moving tribute last week, when TBTL's cancellation was announced:


TBTL - Why it mattered
By Tom Tangney


The KIRO radio show TOO BEAUTIFUL TO LIVE has attained its own apotheosis. The show whose very title dared to foretell its demise has now completed its mission. TOO BEAUTIFUL TO LIVE has indeed died.

I am not here to bury TBTL however, but to praise it. Its 396 shows now constitute the complete "TBTL Collector's Series" of programs and, in retrospect, the most compelling question may not be "Why is it suddenly gone?" but rather "How did it last as long as it did?" I'd like to believe we live in a world in which something like TBTL could survive but the evidence points to the contrary. So instead, I'll just appreciate the fact it existed at all.

TBTL was the most original, innovative, and intelligently off-the-wall show I've ever heard on radio. Where else are you going to hear butchered impromptu readings of famous movie scenes, regular visits from a grammarian, an in-house a capella re-enactment of a modern opera, an Oscar show in which food from a nominated film is cooked and consumed live on air, a week's worth of Spanish and Latin lessons, a spontaneous dance-off to music designated as impossible to dance to, in-studio imitations of Bob Dylan singing Christmas songs, and hundreds of other wacky ideas. And who else but TBTL would organize a listeners' prom, a roller skating party, and nights out at the Opera AND a Mariners game?

Often described as the radio equivalent of the TV series SEINFELD, TBTL really was a show about nothing. And in its seemingly haphazard investigation of "nothing," it proved to be, more often than not, about "everything." The genius of TBTL was that it recognized the profundity of the mundane. We all have to live in the mundane world, of course, but articulate dissections of our mundane lives can actually produce clever and entertaining insights. The personal stories shared each night by host Luke Burbank, producer Jen Andrews, and board-op Sean De Tore were more humorous than earth-shattering but the point was they were always very human - the kind of daily victories and embarrassments that make up our everyday lives.

TBTL often hurtled headlong into the inane preoccupations of pop culture as well. Their WHY IT MATTERS segments would debate everything from the silly to the sublime (e.g. an early show took on the significance of those Karate Kid movies, a late show examined the brilliance of Quentin Tarantino.) But no matter how deep it dove into the superficial, it would always, or almost always, emerge with a smile and a wink. After all, this was a show run by smart and culturally savvy people. Burbank is an especially quick and literate host who can drop off-the-cuff references to Tenzing Norgay, Soren Kierkegaard, and Jeff Koons as readily as he can to Zooey Deschanel and Jemaine Clement and he often does so in a single conversation. And Andrews was always more apt to cull material for the show from, say, THE NEW YORKER than she was from TMZ. For me and much of the TBTListan nation, I suspect, it's that high art/low art tension that best defines the show's appeal.

TBTL always reminded me of a slice of lemon meringue pie. At its best, it was the perfect combination of sugar-spun fluff and tart flavor. When taking a bite out of TBTL, you had to make sure you tasted both the meringue and the lemon, or you'd miss the point. Too many people, I'm afraid, couldn't get past the meringue in the show to taste the lemon. But if you stuck with the show long enough, the lemon would always out.

Rawr.
---o0o---

Dave Wakeling and Nat Love perform Save It For Later on Luke Burbank's TBTL

It's kind of cool when your heroes meet.

While Dave Wakeling and the English Beat were in town for an awesome show at The Showbox, they dropped by Seattle's (and now, the world's) Luke Burbank's TBTL (Too Beautiful To Live - KIRO 97.3 FM and 710 AM). They play two songs, including one of their greatest, Save It For Later. I have seen The English Beat twice now, but have never seen Dave without his pink Danelectro. They're playing unplugged.

Check out this video on YouTube (or down below) and download the TBTL podcast with songs and interview at the TBTL website. or at the iTunes podast site.


---o0o---

TBTL - Too Beautiful To Live headlines iTunes podcast page

click to enlarge

My favorite radio show, Luke Burbank's TBTL is headlining the podcast page on iTunes. Download some shows there, stream it live from http://mynorthwest.com/ , or even listen to it live on KIRO 97.3 FM, if you live in the Seattle area, from 7-10 Pacific Time Monday-Friday, with a best of on Saturdays...

---o0o---

Music, video and lyrics: Ben Lee's Catch My Disease (a/k/a The TBTL Theme song)

This is my favorite song this week.







This is a fan video of a TV show called House (I think) set to Catch My Disease. The link may not have long to live. No other version on YouTube would allow you to embed, and virtually all fan versions were pulled, (in short, Ben has some vigilant people combing the internets for copyrightviolations).

Not only is this a wonderful song, it's the theme song for my favorite radio show, TBTL, which you really need to hear (live in Seattle, on iTunes, and KIRO always has one week of downloadable shows).

My head is a box full of nothing
and that's the way I like it
My garden's a secret compartment
and that's the way I like it
and that's the way I like it
Your body's a dream that turns violent
and that's the way I like it
and that's the way I like it
The winter is long in the city
and that's the way I like it

So please
baby please
Open your heart
Catch my disease

I was backstage in Pomona
and that's the way I like it
She drank beer with coca-cola
and that's the way I like it
and that's the way I like it
She told me about the winds from Santa Anna
and that's the way I like it
and that's the way I like it
She told me she loved me like fireworks
and that's the way I like it

So please
baby please
Open your eyes
Catch my disease

So please (PLEASE!)
baby please
Come on
Catch my disease
Catch it

Na na na na na na na na na

They play Good Charlotte on the radio
and that's the way I like it
They play Sleepy Jackson on the radio
and that's the way I like it
and that's the way I like it
I hear Beyonce on the radio
and that's the way I like it
cos that's the way I like it
and they play me on the radio (whoo!)
and that's the way I like it

So please
baby please
Open your heart
and catch my disease
So please
baby please
Come on
Catch my disease
(catch my disease)
nanananananananana
(catch my disease)
nanananananananana
(catch my disease)
nanananananananana
(catch my disease)
---o0o---

TBTL: Too Beautiful To Live: Give it a listen

I keep bringing this up, but you need to listen to Luke Burbank and Jen Andrews on TBTL (Too Beautiful To Live). I am not going to go into any details--if you live in Seattle, tune in Kiro 710 AM from 7-10 Weekdays (with a best of on Saturday), or go to iTunes, or to TBTL.net. These people are reinventing radio.
---o0o---

Is Bill Clinton, as Luke Burbank said on TBTL, on "a one-way ticket to Crunktown?"

Luke Burbank pegged it on Too Beautiful To Live (TBTL). He called the tale appearing in Vanity Fair, about which Bill Clinton is apparently livid, "A one-way ticket to Crunktown."

The fast-paced, depressing, and pretty danged interesting story with the subtitles "Bubba Trouble" and "The Comeback Id" appears here."

After reading this story, I just want to give a shout out to Scooter, a long time reader. It's almost a crime you didn't write this VF story! You've been ranting about this for years now, most of it, as it turns out, depressingly spot on. I don't know how much a smear piece the Vanity Fair piece is. . .or if it is 100% verifiable, but. . .whew! Party on Mister President!

At least Dick Nixon went on to write eight books, advise every single President who followed him, and for one thing, in office, helped pry open the doors to China and Russia. Dick Nixon helped our world get just a little bit closer even in "retirement", and you waded into your wife's ill-fated Presidential campaign with anger and racially coded messages, and angry outbursts all along the campaign trail, from cocktail parties, to rally to $5,000 a plate dinners, and apparently some extremely "fast company."
---o0o---

TBTL Lives! Too beautiful to live? Not yet.

Luke and Jen

Blatherwatch has just reported on Too Beautiful To Live's beating the odds. This is possibly my favorite radio show of all time; a show without T & A, or people ranting about gasoline and taxes, and it miraculously survives. This show is all over the map, from tedious to sublime, and it's the best "talk" radio I've ever heard, except for Jean Shepherd's sublime run of shows for 20 years on WOR in New York City.

"TBTL: it lives!
Everyone wants to know: Is KIRO's show Too Beautiful to Live?

Seems the KIRO suits were high-fiving each other Monday: "We're the highest rated show on the station in the 18-34 demo," says Luke Burbank, the host of the new low-concept show (m-f, 7-10p). "

Read the full article here.


---o0o---

TBTL --- Too Beautiful To Live? Luke Burbank's Talk Show On Seattle's Kiro 710 AM

Luke somehow doesn't seem like a baseball hat guy.

I should be, since I grew up in Kent, Wash.

I love these people! I have been a radio fan since sometime around 1960, when I got my first seven-transistor radio. When I was young, I used to listen to the talk shows on KGO (like KIRO another 50,000 watt powerhouse) in San Francisco at night, when their signal would skip all the way up the coast. When I lived in SF, I listened to KGO too, and when I lived in NYC, I used to listen to a couple of different talk stations. I have a collection of about 600 Jean Shepherd radio shows I listen to frequently--all from WOR in NYC from about 1960-1977. Alas, Jean Shepherd signed off the air on WOR just about the time I arrived. Next to Jean Shepherd, my favorite radio show of all time is a brand new one, that has only been on the air since January in Seattle (with podcasts available for the unfortunate who live out of broadcast distance). You hear that Luke? In some perverse way, you're up there with Shep!

Jen, who grew up in my neighborhood,, Ballard.

In January, in Seattle, talk radio began to live again. Or at least someone was performing artificial recussitation in hopes of breathing life back into what had become a loud and moribund format. Unfortunately, according to its creators, it may be Too Beautiful To Live. Luke Burbank, who was working on NPR returned to Seattle for his own talk show on KIRO 710 AM Radio.

Luke Burbank's TBTL is a bit [extreme understatement] of a departure from "typical" AM radio — "I'm going to hang out with my friend and talk about things," Burbank says — and that's the whole point of these three hours a night. The show spits in the face of talk radio conventions, and they are fatalistic about it. But, I have heard people on the street, at work, and at parties mention the show. That's never happened before with a local show. People write in from around the world and all over the U.S. "There's something happening here/What it is ain't exactly clear..."

Sean, cook, engineer, and mixmaster

"Too Beautiful To Live" runs from 7-10 p.m. weeknights on 710 KIRO-AM, with a Best Of... on Saturdays. You can download the MP3s a/k/a PodCasts from KIRO's Web site Mynorthwest.com, and also from iTunes.

Luke is vain, funny, often a smart-ass, and always sharp. His partner in crime, Jen, is also funny, and extremely bright. She has a wicked sense of humor along with a heart of gold. Their engineer Sean, is an amusing knucklehead who sometimes talks about making eight bucks stretch the last four days before payday. TBTL is like sitting around with some funny friends, friendos. And the strangest and best part: they almost never take calls. Unlike most talk shows, you're glad. Unlike most talk shows, you actually want to hear the host.

"You have to treat it [the show] like it's a firefly and you've put it in a jar and it's flickering," said Luke in an interview.

Burbank and producer Jen Andrews have daily weigh-ins along with their engineer Sean. As most diet experts tell you, you shouldn't weigh yourself every day. But it's a great icebreaker and they treat it like it matters (also a recurring segment on the show: "Why ____________ [insert the name of something cool like Office Space] Matters." And then, they often delve into just what, and how much, they drank the night before (even Luke, who is now training for a marathon).

Just tune in and you'll figure it out on your own. Or you won't. You'll either detest it, or become a fan for life. Like most people (I'm too ancient to say peeps), I can't describe the show. . .I just ask is that you give them a listen. The podcast, with its high fidelity and no commercials is excellent.

I guess I am one of the 10's...a group of people who've been listening since the show's listeners numbered in the 10's. I tuned in the very first night after reading an interview with Jen and Luke before the shows began. Sure, I'm old enough to be their Dad, but I love these people. Even when they rant about pushing the graybeards out of the way (as they did this week)! Tune in M-F 7-10. They live in that dead zone...one of radio's worst possible time slots. They may be too beautiful to live, but I hope they're just homely enough to survive.

---o0o---