FIRST, BLAME COVID.
Like many podcasts, HOTEL BAR SESSIONS was born of the pandemic lockdown, when most people were feeling a bit more philosophical than normal and when everyone missed going to bars. This was an especially tough time for professional philosophers, whose bread and butter is face-to-face interactions, arguments, and debates. Original HBS co-host Leigh M. Johnson had already dipped her toes in the podcasting waters with a limited podcast series called "Black Mirror Reflections," during which she invited experts from various fields to talk with her about the moral, philosophical, and technological significance of one episode of the television series "Black Mirror." Alas, there were only so many episodes of "Black Mirror" to discuss, but by the time that podcast reached its end, she had already caught the podcast "bug."
HOTEL BAR SESSIONS' INITIAL POUR:
Leigh reached out to a couple of her friends at the time, Ammon Allred and Shannon Mussett, to ask if they'd be interested in co-hosting another podcast. It only took a little while to determine the vibe of this new creative endeavor: we wanted to try to recreate the feel of the conversations that academics have at the end of a long conference day when they met up at the hotel bar. The current podcast's name quite literally served itself up as a shot.
Allred and Mussett kicked this venture off, but couldn't stick with it for more than one season, so Leigh decided to reach out to other potential co-hosts to see if it had legs.
PEOPLE LISTENED... AND JOINED IN OUR CONVERSATIONS!
After securing fantastic new co-hosts for Season 2 (Rick Lee and Charles Peterson), the HBS crew quickly learned that we weren't just shouting into a void. Real human people were listening! So, the three of us committed to the long, hard, and often exasperating work of trying to truncate our learning curve. We got better at editing and production. We honed our "brand" and identified our "voice." We established a social media presence and, perhaps most importantly, we began calling in favors from some of our most prominent intellectual friends.
In Seasons 2-5, HOTEL BAR SESSIONS podcast hosted conversations with some real heavyweights: Eddie Glaude, Jr., Charles Hughes, Kate Devlin, Joel Michael Reynolds, Linda Alcoff, A.O. Scott, Stewart Motha, Regina Rini, and Charles McKinney,
In Seasons 2-5, HOTEL BAR SESSIONS podcast hosted conversations with some real heavyweights: Eddie Glaude, Jr., Charles Hughes, Kate Devlin, Joel Michael Reynolds, Linda Alcoff, A.O. Scott, Stewart Motha, Regina Rini, and Charles McKinney,
CHANGE IS INEVITABLE, GODDAMMIT.
Nothing good lasts forever, and we unfortunately had to say goodbye to Charles Peterson as a co-host after Season 5, as he took on more administrative responsibilities at Oberlin College. (We still miss you, Charles!) Rick and Leigh went on the hunt for another co-host, though, and (thanks in part to Charles) HBS struck gold for a second time!
Jason Read took his seat at the hotel bar as our newest co-host starting in Season 6 and (although he wouldn't take credit for it) our listenership almost tripled every season he was with us.
These were the years when we all felt that HBS really hit its stride. We had found our voice and our niche in an increasingly crowded "philosophy podcast" space, and we were settling into our saddle quite nicely. The chemistry between Rick, Jason, and Leigh was as natural as it was genuine, and the product of that chemistry resulted in some of our best episodes ever. Thanks to Jason, we also generated two new "structural" elements for HBS: we started each season with a "Trip to the Movies" (in which we delve into the philosophical significance of a film) and we ended each season with a deep-dive into a "Philosophical Text or Idea" that we suspected the general public may be noddingly familiar with, but wanted to know more about. Those two staples of HBS seasons are and will remain Jason's legacy.
Jason announced that he was stepping down from his barstool at the end of Season 9, much to our chagrin, but he remains a core part of what made HOTEl BAR SESSIONS what it is today.
These were the years when we all felt that HBS really hit its stride. We had found our voice and our niche in an increasingly crowded "philosophy podcast" space, and we were settling into our saddle quite nicely. The chemistry between Rick, Jason, and Leigh was as natural as it was genuine, and the product of that chemistry resulted in some of our best episodes ever. Thanks to Jason, we also generated two new "structural" elements for HBS: we started each season with a "Trip to the Movies" (in which we delve into the philosophical significance of a film) and we ended each season with a deep-dive into a "Philosophical Text or Idea" that we suspected the general public may be noddingly familiar with, but wanted to know more about. Those two staples of HBS seasons are and will remain Jason's legacy.
Jason announced that he was stepping down from his barstool at the end of Season 9, much to our chagrin, but he remains a core part of what made HOTEl BAR SESSIONS what it is today.
NEW CO-HOST, NEW BEGINNING
For the THIRD time, now after Jason's departure, Rick and Leigh managed to win the barfly lottery again! Starting in Season 10, David Gunkel joined HOTEL BAR SESSIONS as the newest co-host. David was a previous guest on the podcast waaaay back in its infancy stage (for our Season 2 episode on "Robots") and was happy to help steer our conversations going forward.
David and Rick share a lot of Polish connections, Leigh and David share a lot of robot connections, and Rick and Leigh still share, well, the last 9 seasons of podcasting together! This pivot to a more intentionally interdisciplinary approach to our topics and questions was an exiciting development for HOTEL BAR SESSIONS, especially combined with David's almost inevitable push to force us to think more carefully about the future.
David and Rick share a lot of Polish connections, Leigh and David share a lot of robot connections, and Rick and Leigh still share, well, the last 9 seasons of podcasting together! This pivot to a more intentionally interdisciplinary approach to our topics and questions was an exiciting development for HOTEL BAR SESSIONS, especially combined with David's almost inevitable push to force us to think more carefully about the future.
As ever, HOTEL BAR SESSIONS remains committed to the ideals we started with:
Philosophy is best done in conversation (and the best philosophical conversations happen when up to a bar!). Questions of meaning and value matter to all of us. Philosophy is for everyone, and it is professional philosophers' responsibility to translate discipline-specific jargon into the vernacular. (Relatedly, if philosophers can't explain themselves in plain language, they probably don't know what they're talking about!) There are NOT "two sides" to everything... and, even when there are, one side is usually wrong. And, finally, what distinguishes us (humans) from toasters and trees is that we can make judgments about which one of those sides is wrong.