Mark Blankenship and Sarah D. Bunting are journalists, friends, and music fans who love talking about pop music of all stripes.
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Sep 28, 2026 · 1:26:12
We're joined by the C-side by MASTAS's William Joel third chair Dan Rogge to rank "Storm Front," Joel's melodramatic 1989 paean to fish, weather, marriage to a model, and Boomer…
Aug 31, 2026 · 1:24:51
The days are getting short, but we're wrapping up the Summer Of Soundtrack at MASTAS with the longest ep of the three -- on the 17 non-score soundtrack cuts of Almost Famous .…
Aug 10, 2026 · 1:05:12
The MASTAS Summer Of Soundtrack swelters on with a look at the soundtrack for City Of Angels , a reimagining of Wings Of Desire that did fairly well at the box office, and even…
Jul 13, 2026 · 1:09:35
We're declaring 2026 the Summer Of Soundtrack, contemplating film soundtracks across the decades -- and we're starting with 10 selections from the 1980s John Hughes teen oeuvre,…
Jun 8, 2026 · 1:15:21
Dan Rogge returns -- with our new friends L.V. Beethoven and Phyllis Domain -- to discuss his least favorite William Joel album, 1983's "An Innocent Man." The recurring Diane…
Apr 27, 2026 · 27:28
The moment has arrived: the selection of the Dolliest Dolly Parton song of them all. As we investigate whether all Parton-narration roads pass through "Jolene," we're also…
Apr 20, 2026 · 27:17
And you think about it, don't you? ...As much as we'd like every one of these Dolly Parton songs to get a participation tiara, we will forge ahead with choosing the championship…
Apr 13, 2026 · 34:33
Today we select our Final 4 in the Dolly 64, after struggling with self-imposed rules that don't serve us, identifying the Dolly songs that won't end up in a commercial for floor…
Apr 6, 2026 · 57:04
It's the hardest round in every bracket season in some ways, and the Dolly 64's Sweet 16 ep is no different. How many different lists did Sarah have? Is Mark's "Dolly didn't…
Mar 30, 2026 · 48:52
The second half of our Dolly 64 Round Of 32 is still confronting the question of which Dolly Parton narrative voice is the most typical and/or dominant. It's also confronting…
Mar 23, 2026 · 58:21
"What a way to make a living," indeed -- the Dolly 64 Round Of 32 raises a lot of tough questions. Which Dolly are we talking about when we ask which song is the Dolliest? Which…
Mar 16, 2026 · 1:02:27
We're wrapping up the Dolly 64 opening round this week with songs that work better in theory than in practice, the difference between "not for me" and "not good," countrymaxxing…
Mar 9, 2026 · 1:18:23
The Dolly 64 season has reached perhaps the strongest bracket section in our third ep, with the joyful chaos of mis-alphabetizing, growers and showers in the holler, songs about…
Mar 2, 2026 · 58:53
The Dolly 64 season continues with our second set of first-round contenders, including overplayed classics, underrated '80s gems, toothless platitudes, tempo no-man's lands,…
Feb 23, 2026 · 1:00:18
Welcome to our Dolly 64 season -- in which we use a highly scientific*, legally binding* March Madness-style bracket to determine the most quintessential Dolly Parton track of…
Dec 22, 2025 · 1:13:00
It's Part 2 of our ranking of Madonna's studio albums! When did Madonna stop dictating the culture and start chasing it? When should listeners write to their Congressional reps…
Dec 15, 2025 · 1:25:52
Welcome to Part 1 of our ranking of all 15 of Madonna's studio albums! The Material Girl's woeful underrepresentation on our podcast continues, as we start with the eponymous…
Sep 29, 2025 · 1:22:05
Dan Rogge is back (-ack-ack-ack-ack-ack) to help us discuss and rank William's 1979 breakthrough release, "The Stranger" -- complete with derogatory Lost In Translation…
May 26, 2025 · 1:22:33
Don't ask us why* we decided to hurl a rock at William Joel's 1980 release, "Glass Houses" -- but we're ranking that album with the help of Ambassador To Long Island Pop Culture…
Feb 3, 2025 · 1:30:30
We end the Best New Artist season where it all began for the podcast: the Grammys. We're talking today about the 67th Grammy Awards' "big 4" categories, plus a couple of…
Dec 23, 2024 · 1:07:01
It's the Best New Artist Breakdown season finale, featuring a MASTAS greatest-hits line-up, the return of sprung rhythm, grand unifying complaints about breakthrough categories,…
Dec 16, 2024 · 1:20:02
Our penultimate Best New Artist Breakdown moves into the teens; we're talking about Amy Clonehouses, lost anthems of lady rage, gold-watch nominations, the Overton window of…
Dec 9, 2024 · 42:37
As the Best New Artist Breakdown season rounds the millennium turn, we're talking about which band is playing when Jennifer Love Hewitt flees a serial killer, artists we should…
Dec 2, 2024 · 1:02:39
We're closing out the twentieth century in our fifth episode, and there are fewer howling embarrassments among our Best New Artist winners this time...but just as much…
Nov 25, 2024 · 1:05:00
Confusing band names, the MTV aura, and what happens if the comedy/tragedy masks and a keyboard mate: it's the 4th episode of our Best New Artist season, which brings us great…
Nov 18, 2024 · 1:05:58
Disco, NuRo, and not knowing where to look during "Afternoon Delight" -- it's all part of our third episode, when we're also talking about Starman's dinner party, the mayonnaise…
Nov 11, 2024 · 51:05
We're wading into the '70s in our second ep, which includes ruminations on inessential classic rock; how Karen Carpenter and Judy Garland can take you whenever they are; holding…
Nov 4, 2024 · 51:21
The Best New Artist Breakdown season has begun! Instead of pitting the 64 winners of the Grammys' Best New Artist category against each other, we're talking about each year's…
Oct 7, 2024 · 45:27
Our finale finds us talking about actor/musicians with lasting pop careers: Oscar-winners (Jamie Foxx), Grammy-winners (Childish Gambino), former child stars (Hailee Steinfeld),…
Sep 30, 2024 · 41:51
This week's crop of actor-musician hyphenates got their thespian starts in films of the 1980s: Corey Feldman, Keanu Reeves (Dogstar), Kevin Bacon (the Bacon Brothers), and Kiefer…
Sep 23, 2024 · 47:38
Do you love to laugh? Then fall down the ha-ha hole that is Pop Goes The Actor's third episode! This week, we're looking at comedians who tested the pop waters, including a Blues…
Sep 16, 2024 · 40:23
Oh yes it's ladies' night on the second episode of Pop Goes The Actor...but IS the feeling right? Sometimes! We wend our way through copyright-compliant bugle boys of Company…
Sep 9, 2024 · 51:04
Pop Goes The Actor: a mini-season about thespians who tried (and sometimes succeeded at!) being pop musicians. In our premiere episode, we're talking about Jeff Conaway (Taxi),…
Jul 22, 2024 · 55:55
1996's Romeo + Juliet seemed like a slam-dunk ending to our soundtrack mini-season...but we have regrets! Epcot industrial music, lazy versions of Shakespeare, the psychotic…
Jul 15, 2024 · 1:22:58
This episode is, we suppose, like a box of chocolates, because technically you don't know what you're going to get, but we can tell you we're talking about the ubiquitous Forrest…
Jul 8, 2024 · 1:10:32
The '90s Soundtrack Flashback season is bustin' surfboards with Pulp Fiction , 1994's omnipresent Quentin Tarantino joint. After talking about how the movie itself holds up…
Jul 1, 2024 · 1:07:48
Welcome to our '90s Soundtrack Flashback mini-season! We're ranking the soundtrack albums from four legendary 1990s movies, starting with grunge-adjacent rom-com Singles . We…
Apr 22, 2024 · 23:16
"Blurred Lines," the sound of the summer of 2013, is compared (unfavorably) with a cold sore in today's episode, which pits Robin Thicke, TI, and Pharrell against Weird Al's…
Apr 15, 2024 · 28:53
Thirty years after the death of frontman Kurt Cobain, Nirvana and their music still feel very close. Does that have anything to do with Weird Al's equally "defining" parody, a…
Apr 8, 2024 · 27:40
It's an all-time training-montage banger vs. Weird Al's vision for Rocky XIII in today's episode, as we drop Wiki factoids, contemplate an all-depressing-follow-up-hits season,…
Apr 1, 2024 · 16:11
You can't always control what people do with your art once it's out in the world -- something Mark Knopfler of Dire Straits may have learned the hard way with both the original…
Mar 25, 2024 · 30:28
It's that Airbnb pasta-taxonomy poster in pop-song form: "Lasagna," Weird Al's take on Los Lobos's take on Ritchie Valens's take on the Mexican folk song Sarah and her classmates…
Mar 18, 2024 · 20:31
Late-sixties melodrama meets early-nineties blockbuster in today's episode, as we contemplate who left the Barney cake out in the rain while comparing Richard Harris's "MacArthur…
Mar 4, 2024 · 22:34
The unique legacy of Tommy James and the Shondells adds another chapter today, as Weird Al contends with Tiffany's smash cover of "I Think We're Alone Now." We're discussing…
Feb 26, 2024 · 17:49
Can Weird Al inch ahead in the season standings with "I Lost On Jeopardy," his parody of the Greg Kihn Band's "Jeopardy"? We're talking early adopters, terrible album-title puns…
Feb 19, 2024 · 23:59
This week's match-up pits The Presidents of the United States of America's "Lump" against Weird Al's "Gump"...but is it really a face-off if the original is two thirds of the way…
Feb 12, 2024 · 21:20
"What if we just........didn't." That's one of the questions confronting us as WE confront an out-of-character entry in the Weird Al songbook: "Fat." The problems don't start…
Feb 5, 2024 · 22:30
Grab a tube sock for your privates: it's time to pit the Red Hot Chili Peppers against Weird Al! Before Mark makes the pun that drives our listenership numbers off a cliff, we're…
Jan 29, 2024 · 23:11
Welcome to the Weird Al vs. Everybody season of MASTAS! We're looking at a couple dozen Weird Al Yankovic songs and the originals that inspired him, and choosing a winner in each…
Dec 4, 2023 · 50:14
The competition is over, but the discussion of comeback songs isn't -- and today's is about comebacks in the answer/clapback sense. Seven "answer" songs come under the…
Nov 27, 2023 · 25:04
It's time to declare a winner -- the definitive pop-music comeback song -- but the road to the final result is a twisty one. "Believe" and "Walk This Way" each crystallize the…
Nov 20, 2023 · 34:17
The semifinal round is, while somewhat predictable, still full of ups and downs, including Spelling Bee's interest in our works and days, the way Adam Lambert takes and gives…
Nov 13, 2023 · 47:22
We're down to eight great comeback songs; which ones will join the Do Call It A Comeback season's Final Four? We're quoting Wayne's World , we're putting things in plaid place…
Nov 6, 2023 · 1:16:30
The Sweet 16 is here, along with the return to numbered rankings...and the unkindest cuts of all, plus another Auto-Tune justice conversation, myriad matrices, Tracy Chapman's…
Oct 30, 2023 · 54:00
We're taking a quick break before the emotional press of the Sweet 16 to talk about a handful of "off-label" comebacks: award-winners, kids' songs, comebacks only we noticed, and…
Oct 23, 2023 · 1:00:30
Mark's spreadsheet of history has spoken: we're choosing the rest of the Do Call It A Comeback season's Sweet 16 this week! From the top of the pallet of improbable late-'80s…
Oct 16, 2023 · 1:00:30
The Round Of 32 is underway! After a brief chat about our head-vs.-heart processes in this round, we descend into the valley of the shadow of twos: struggling to come up with the…
Oct 9, 2023 · 1:12:20
The last 15 songs have entered the comeback fray, along with Nickelodeon dominance, stinky vocals in classic songs, what Clive Davis is drinking while he waits for artists at a…
Oct 2, 2023 · 1:24:00
It's the second half of the first round, and some of our toughest choices yet, as we struggle with how comebacks used to look in a monoculture; human Razzie Awards; the…
Sep 25, 2023 · 1:16:25
The next 15 songs in our definitive-comeback-song season storm the booth! Sometimes the song is coming back to the podcast from a previous season; sometimes our lunch is coming…
Sep 18, 2023 · 1:34:08
What is the most representative comeback song in pop history? Our Do Call It A Comeback season will find out...and we have been here for years, thinking about the philosophical…
Jul 24, 2023 · 39:45
It was a winding road from our #FirstNameBasis finale to our favorite jock jams, but we hope y'all ARE ready for this contemplation of sporty hype tracks -- as well as county…
Jul 17, 2023 · 52:01
Whoooo's number ooooone? (BA BA BAAAAAA!) That's not a spoiler, by the way, so you'll have to listen to our First-Name Basis finale to find out which name song is the most iconic…
Jul 10, 2023 · 1:10:41
The rankings only get more challenging as the First-Name Basis season confronts its Top 20 -- as well as iconic pop numbers, Jersey "law," unholy mash-ups of finalist songs, the…
Jul 3, 2023 · 1:00:00
Welcome to the intermission of our First-Name Basis season -- in which we're contemplating important songs with more than one name in them, and ranking them, too! And while this…
Jun 26, 2023 · 47:23
We're finishing out the Top 40 in our First-Name Basis season with an all-timer set of 10 songs: all three of the songs your co-hosts and their husbands picked to win the whole…
Jun 19, 2023 · 55:22
"Mark and Sarah: why ya buggin'?" Why aren't we buggin' in the third ep of our First-Name Basis season: the weird fade-out during Barry Manilow's "Mandy"-ending glory note,…
Jun 12, 2023 · 44:01
The second batch of 10 songs is raising tough questions for our First-Name Basis season, like: Does difficult subject matter preclude a song from moving on? How can you tell if a…
Jun 5, 2023 · 55:10
Our First-Name Basis season is underway! Our mission: to identify the most iconic song associated with a first name. But how? It starts right here, as we look at the first 10 in…
Mar 20, 2023 · 30:35
The Record Of The Year Showdown comes down to this...and there's not a ton of surprises here, probably, but there IS the wall of history, the wisdom of (drunk, stoned New York…
Mar 13, 2023 · 46:27
Mark's shenanigans aside, we had an easier time ranking our semifinal group than we'd expected -- but we didn't necessarily expect to go on a sentimental journey with TLC, Sarah…
Mar 6, 2023 · 49:33
"This'll be cinchy! [ cut to: sobbing ]" We thought we'd have a more straightforward time of our quarterfinal rankings, but alas, no. We did have a Whitney-koan reader mail, a…
Feb 27, 2023 · 58:30
More like the BITTER-sweet 16, the episode that forces hosts and listeners alike to make terrible choices, as well as rank things politically, salute album-cover pets of yore,…
Feb 20, 2023 · 38:46
The Round Of 32 is a plot-heavy affair: Coldplay premonitions, beautiful German cheese, learning to love advisedly off-putting pop, and songs that grab you by the nip. As the…
Feb 13, 2023 · 57:58
The Round Of 32: where the choices get tougher and the cheeses get lonelier. We're writing Back To The Future /Babybel fan-fic, analyzing palimpsest layers, appreciating Bobby…
Feb 6, 2023 · 1:21:42
It's the final section of our Record Of The Year Showdown Round Of 64! The Grammys get more of a clue, albeit seemingly by accident, here in the 21st century, and we're talking…
Jan 30, 2023 · 1:27:51
We're heading -- somewhat angrily! -- into the 21st century in our third Record Of The Year Showdown episode. Spanning 1991-2006 at the Grammys, our discussion also looks at…
Jan 23, 2023 · 1:36:19
The Record Of The Year Showdown enters the second "bracket" section with winners from 1975-1990, which means a lot of flashbacks to our America's Damp 40 season; theories about…
Jan 16, 2023 · 1:07:51
Welcome to our Record Of The Year Showdown season! With listeners' help, we're going to find out which Grammy-winner for ROTY is the best of the 64 winners to date...or maybe…
Dec 5, 2022 · 49:30
We're wrapping up our second "embarrassing radio hip-hop" ep with Marky Mark, Vanilla Ice, MC Hammer, and two by Young MC. Different Wahlbergs for different times in one's bunk,…
Nov 28, 2022 · 58:01
We had so much to say about embarrassing radio hip-hop of the H.W. Bush era, we had to split our convo into two episodes! Here in the first one, we're confronting C+C Music…
Nov 21, 2022 · 41:04
Tone Loc was everywhere; then, he wasn't -- or so it seemed. Did Anthony Terrell Smith really disappear, or did the nineties just make him less visible? What exactly is in a…
Nov 14, 2022 · 34:07
Sarah is obsessed with late-'80s Bronx/Central Islip outfit JVC Force! Mark...is also on this podcast! ...But seriously, folks: we're unpacking a handful of tracks from "Doin'…
Nov 7, 2022 · 44:00
Salt-N-Pepa's here and they came to out-rap you -- but not in a mean way! Today we're talking about six Salt-N-Pepa hits across a handful of albums, the difference between '80s…
Oct 31, 2022 · 27:37
In our second Beats Around The Bush-isode, we're (re-?)introducing the world to the joyous, winking, horny turn-of-the-nineties sound of Jeffrey Fortson, aka Def Jef. We're also…
Oct 24, 2022 · 57:00
Welcome to our Beats Around The Bush season, in which we investigate the rap and hip-hop that brought us joy during/near the first Bush presidency, 1988-1993ish. After we try to…
Sep 12, 2022 · 1:08:36
Who is the Lilith Fairest of them all? At last, our answer -- but first, we look at last-comers Heather Nova, Jewel, Paula Cole, Des'ree, and Natalie Merchant. And we ask a few…
Sep 5, 2022 · 54:11
The second-to-last set of 5 songs joins the Lilith fray by zig-zagging all over the map: Ani DiFranco, India.Arie, Natalie Imbruglia, Aimee Mann, and Chantal Kreviazuk take us…
Aug 29, 2022 · 56:10
The murderers' row of artists joining us for our Top 30 episode -- Joan Osborne, Tracy Chapman, Fiona Apple, Shawn Colvin, and Lisa Loeb & 9 Stories -- might actually literally…
Aug 22, 2022 · 1:02:08
We're in the #LilithFair40 homestretch now with our top 25, joined by Bif Naked, The Juliana Hatfield 3, Jill Scott, Patty Griffin, and the Cardigans. Discovering Toni Morrison,…
Aug 15, 2022 · 46:01
The Lilith Fair 40 reaches the halfway mark -- what better time to confront the contribution of festival founder Sarah McLachlan, along with Macy Gray, Dionne Farris, Mary Chapin…
Aug 8, 2022 · 51:35
Mark gets emotional, Sarah gets confused, and the Lilith/WB Venn gets unpacked: it's the third #LilithFair40 episode, with the Indigo Girls, Letters to Cleo, Alanis, Liz Phair,…
Aug 1, 2022 · 44:15
The rankings get exponentially tougher in our second episode, with k.d. lang, Tori Amos, Sheryl Crow, The Cranberries, and Melissa Etheridge joining the countdown. Raisin girls,…
Jul 25, 2022 · 37:46
It's the first "real" episode of the Lilith Fair 40: Dar Williams, Meredith Brooks, Frente!, Suzanne Vega, and The Corrs inaugurate our chart, with help from the MCSL "listies"…
Jul 18, 2022 · 28:36
Welcome to The Lilith Fair 40, in which we put on broomstick-pleated skirts and Pride jewelry, light some Nag Champa, and set off on a journey of discovery: what is the Lilith…
Jun 20, 2022 · 1:34:44
We decided NOT to write a book about all the pop songs that "only" (or..."somehow") hit #11 on the Billboard charts...but you wouldn't know it from our voluminous notes on the 11…
May 23, 2022 · 1:16:54
It's the America's Damp 40 season finale! Dave Mason, Silver, Leo Sayer, Barbra Streisand, and Chicago file onto the big stage, and Shaddo and Peej discuss moist chord…
May 16, 2022 · 45:09
There was a "35 moisture-units per hour" joke here but Sarah just couldn't get it to go. YOU should go listen to the second-to-last episode of our America's Damp 40 countdown, as…
May 9, 2022 · 43:19
Three quarters of the way through the America's Damp 40 countdown! Wading into the swamp this week are Nicolette Larson, Bread, Barry Manilow, Jim Croce, and the Garden State's…
May 2, 2022 · 49:01
It's getting real -- real soggy, that is -- as we wrestle with the next five songs in the America's Damp 40 countdown. William Joel, Kenny Rogers, Randy Vanwarmer, Bertie…
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