Walter Martin Radio Hour: Selected Episodes - Walter Martin

Selected public episodes from Walter Martin Radio Hour. The full show — weekly episodes, handmade playlists, interviews, and the complete back catalog — lives at waltermartin.substack.com.

So who is Walter Martin?

I’m a songwriter and musician and I’ve been in the bands The Walkmen and Jonathan Fire*Eater in one form or another since I was 12. Literally. I also make a lot of music under my own name and write songs for film, TV and advertising. You can learn all about my work here.

What’s the deal with your radio show?

In May 2024, I started a weekly radio show (Walter Martin Radio Hour) on Sunday nights on my favorite radio station, WEXT in upstate New York and I post new episodes on my Substack every Friday. I play vinyl records from my record collection and talk about why I like them and why other people might like them.

What’s the show like?

It’s an informal hour-long show recorded live with my favorite scratchy records. I provide some deep and shallow commentary and some mostly accurate background for the songs (no Googling allowed). Basically I just play great records and joke around.


Why do you think you are qualified to do a radio show?

I don’t know… I mean, I’ve been collecting records since I was 15 or so and over a few decades as a touring musician I think I went to basically every record store on planet Earth and I’ve got a ton of great records. I’ve always been the guy in my friend-group who finds the music and makes the mix tapes and all that, so now I’m doing that for anyone who wants to listen. Does that qualify me?

What kind of music do you like?

I like every kind of music but I guess my musical world revolves mostly around early rock ‘n’ roll—but I really listen to everything. After I fell in love with early rock ‘n’ roll, I starting researching who made it and what else did they make and what were they listening to when they made it and who played what on what record and what were they inspired by and who wrote what and what else did they write…etc. So in answering all those questions, I guess I figured out how to find more and more great music. And now I have a lot. And that process spread my tastes across most of the world.

Do you think you have better taste in music than most people?

That’s a weird question…I’ve never thought about it that way before..

Well, do you?

Ummm. I don’t know…no…? I mean…I think I might listen to a lot more music than most people.

So does that mean you like better music than most people?

Not necessarily. But I mean, I listen to music all the time basically so I guess, when you do that, you end up getting sick of the mediocre stuff pretty quick and, by necessity, you have to find more great stuff and then you wind up knowing about a lot of great stuff. I dunno…does that make sense?

I guess… but I think that’s just a clumsy way of saying yes you do think you have better taste in music than most people…

Ok I don’t know what to say I guess…

Do you like new music?

Yes.

Like who?

I like SZA. And Adrianne Lenker. And I like Sam Gendel’s records a lot. And I dunno, I like a lot of new stuff. Oh and I love that song called Million Dollar Baby. I forget who sings it but it’s so good.

Yeah I agree. Million Dollar Baby rules.

Yeah totally.

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