What’s it called?
Ear Hustle
What’s it about?
Life behind bars. Specifically, the bars holding prisoners at the legendary San Quentin State Prison near San Francisco, once home (if that’s the right word) to Charles Manson, Black Panther Eldridge Cleaver and Sirhan Sirhan, Robert F Kennedy’s assassin. What’s particularly unusual about this podcast – and what makes it so gripping – is that it’s made by prisoners, and recorded and edited within the prison. The podcast launched in 2017 with Cellies, an episode devoted to the etiquette of sharing a cell that measures just four feet by ten and into which are crammed two men, two bunks, a sink and a toilet. Two of the inmates interviewed are Amiel and Eddie, who as well as being cellmates are also brothers – not that that stops them arguing.
Who’s in it?
The three co-presenters are Earlonne Woods, serving 31 years to life for attempted (!) robbery; Antwan Williams, serving 15 years for armed robbery; and Nigel Poor, a female artist and photographer, and a professor at California State University. Williams does the sound design – the prison has what’s known as a “media lab” – while Woods acts as interviewer-in-chief and also functions as a guide of sorts for Poor, who narrates much of the show.
Best bits so far?
The episode devoted to music inside San Quentin is fascinating. Meet Redbone, beat-boxer extraordinaire and the prison’s “mouth music maestro”, and listen to him perform his prison rap Two Wheels, a hymn to his bike.
Fun fact …
In November 2018, Earlonne Woods had his sentence commuted, in large part because of his work on Ear Hustle.
For fans of ...
Orange Is The New Black, Porridge, Johnny Cash At San Quentin.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here