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Ear Hustle

Ear Hustle
Author: Ear Hustle & Radiotopia
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Ear Hustle brings you the daily realities of life inside prison shared by those living it, and stories from the outside, post-incarceration. The podcast is a partnership between Nigel Poor, a Bay Area visual artist, and Earlonne Woods, formerly incarcerated at San Quentin State Prison, and was co-founded with former San Quentin resident Antwan Williams. The Ear Hustle team works in the San Francisco Bay Area, both in San Quentin State Prison’s media lab and from offices on the outside, to produce stories that are sometimes difficult, often funny and always honest. Episodes offer a nuanced view of people involved with the American prison system and those reintegrating into society after serving time.
107 Episodes
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San Quentin’s population is changing, and a lot of the old ways are dying out. But some prison OGs don’t want to let go of the past.
Big thanks to Lieutenant Guim'Mara Berry and Acting Warden Oak Smith for their support of the show.
Ear Hustle is a proud member of Radiotopia, from PRX. Find a full list of episode credits at earhustlesq.com.
When you’re incarcerated, are your dreams set outside prison walls? Or out on the prison yard? Are they a comforting space to escape to? Or a painful reminder of what you no longer have? From lucid dreams to wet dreams to dreams of freedom, we ask how incarceration changes what you see when you sleep.
Big thanks to Guim'Mara Berry and Warden Ron Broomfield for their support of the show.
Ear Hustle is a proud member of Radiotopia, from PRX. Find a full list of episode credits at earhustlesq.com.
After 22 years in prison, our inside colleague Rahsaan “New York” Thomas is now a free man. We meet him at the gates of San Quentin, and tag along for his first meal outside and a trip to Target.
Big thanks to Lieutenant Guim'Mara Berry and Acting Warden Oak Smith for their support of the show.
Ear Hustle is a proud member of Radiotopia, from PRX. Find a full list of episode credits at earhustlesq.com.
Lieutenant Sam Robinson has been with Ear Hustle since day one. As he retires from his post as Public Information Officer at San Quentin, we pay tribute to the man behind the mic.
Big thanks to Lt. Guim'Mara Berry and Warden Ron Broomfield for their support of the show.
Ear Hustle is a proud member of Radiotopia, from PRX. Find a full list of episode credits at earhustlesq.com.
While she was in jail awaiting her sentence, Karen was housed with a pregnant cellie on the verge of giving birth. At the time, the experience barely registered. It took us a while to understand why.
This episode contains references to suicide. Listener discretion is advised. You can reach out to the Suicide and Crisis Lifeline at 988.
As always, big thanks to Lt. Sam Robinson and Warden Ron Broomfield for their support of the show.
Ear Hustle is a proud member of Radiotopia, from PRX. Find a full list of episode credits at earhustlesq.com.
Radiotopia’s fall fundraiser is under way! Donate today to support Ear Hustle and help us reach our goal of 1,000 supporters. Thank you. on.prx.org/3NQBrDp
If you have to serve prison time, Norway is the place to do it … at least that’s what we’d heard. Incarcerated people in Norway wear their own clothes, cook delicious meals from scratch, and even take short leaves to re-acclimate to society. Are Norway’s prisons all they’re cracked up to be? Ear Hustle takes you inside to find out.
Radiotopia’s fall fundraiser is here! Donate today to support Ear Hustle and help us reach our goal of 1,000 supporters. Thank you. on.prx.org/3NQBrDp
As always, big thanks to Lt. Sam Robinson and Warden Ron Broomfield for their support of the show. Thanks also to Knut Eric, Joacim, Mina, Martine, and everyone else at Norwegian prison radio Røverradion who helped us out while we were in Norway.
Ear Hustle is a proud member of Radiotopia, from PRX. Find a full list of episode credits at earhustlesq.com.
The Ear Hustle music episode returns! We catch up with some guys at San Quentin who are longing for love, and then, for the first time ever, we toss the mic to the ladies at the California Institution for Women.
You can find out more about Musicambia here.
Radiotopia’s fall fundraiser is here! Donate today to support Ear Hustle and help us reach our goal of 1,000 supporters. Thank you! https://on.prx.org/3NQBrDp
Thanks to Lt. Sam Robinson, Lt. Berry, and Warden Ron Broomfield at San Quentin, and to Lt. Newborg, Mr. Mumm, Acting Chief Deputy Lewis, and Acting Warden Core at CIW.
Ear Hustle is a proud member of Radiotopia, from PRX. Find a full list of episode credits at earhustlesq.com.
From 180s and 270s to “just one long-ass hallway,” different kinds of prison architecture leave different marks on the people who live there. In this episode, like the last one, we explore how architecture shapes the experience of incarceration, and how people push back to reclaim space for themselves.
Learn more about the San Francisco Public Library’s 2022 One City One Book, This Is Ear Hustle, at sfpl.org/onecityonebook. And find out how you can watch the main event — Nigel and Earlonne live in conversation with Piper Kerman on November 3 — here.
As always, big thanks to Lt. Sam Robinson and Warden Ron Broomfield for their support of the show.
Ear Hustle is a proud member of Radiotopia, from PRX. Find a full list of episode credits at earhustlesq.com.
Prisons are built with one thing in mind: surveillance. The architecture is designed to assert control and diminish privacy. But even in these spaces, people find ways to claim just a bit of privacy. In this episode and the next, we explore how individuals adapt to prison architecture. First: carving out pockets of privacy, real and imagined.
Listen to Earlonne guest hosting the podcast Wrongful Conviction here.
As always, big thanks to Lt. Sam Robinson and Warden Ron Broomfield for their support of the show.
Ear Hustle is a proud member of Radiotopia, from PRX. Find a full list of episode credits at earhustlesq.com.
Stories from our first-ever international reporting trip! From the nightclubs of Oslo, to Norway’s first in-prison Pride parade, to an incarcerated Danish guy who wouldn’t take no for an answer: Ear Hustle goes abroad, mics on, baby.
Each episode this season will feature new artwork by an incarcerated artist. You can see their illustrations on our website.
Hear the full episode of the “San Quentin Prison Report” that we mention in this episode, here.
Is this your first time listening to Ear Hustle? Are you trying to convince a friend to start listening? For our tenth season, we’ve chosen 10 essential Ear Hustle episodes. Find those here.
As always, big thanks to Lt. Sam Robinson and Warden Ron Broomfield for their support of the show.
Ear Hustle is a proud member of Radiotopia, from PRX. Find a full list of episode credits at earhustlesq.com.
Sam Brown spent 24 years in prison not just denying his crime, but lying about it, over and over again. Finally, he decided to come clean. Would the parole board believe him?
Each episode this season will feature new artwork by an incarcerated artist. You can see their illustrations on our website.
Is this your first time listening to Ear Hustle? Are you trying to convince a friend to start listening? For our tenth season, we’ve chosen 10 essential Ear Hustle episodes. Find those here.
As always, big thanks to Lt. Sam Robinson and Warden Ron Broomfield for their support of the show.
Ear Hustle is a proud member of Radiotopia, from PRX. Find a full list of episode credits at earhustlesq.com.
Life in prison can mess with your senses. There are smells you can’t unsmell, and sounds you long to hear. Some tastes you forget about entirely, and some forms of touch are almost too evocative to bear. Five San Quentin residents reflect on the sights, tastes, touch, smells, and sounds of prison life.
Each episode this season will feature new artwork by an incarcerated artist. You can see their illustrations on our website.
Is this your first time listening to Ear Hustle? Are you trying to convince a friend to start listening? For our tenth season, we’ve chosen 10 essential Ear Hustle episodes. Find those here.
As always, big thanks to Lt. Sam Robinson and Warden Ron Broomfield for their support of the show.
Ear Hustle is a proud member of Radiotopia, from PRX. Find a full list of episode credits at earhustlesq.com.
A special episode from Uncuffed: During the COVID lockdown at San Quentin, Steve and Darren both got unexpected letters that changed their lives.
This is the second episode of the new season of KALW’s Uncuffed, a podcast training program at San Quentin and California State Prison, Solano. They’re in the middle of an emergency fundraiser right now, trying to keep their training and broadcast programs going after their main funder rescinded a grant because of a bureaucratic error.
You can learn more and support Uncuffed’s work here. Uncuffed is a production of KALW public radio in San Francisco.
Ear Hustle is a proud member of Radiotopia, from PRX.
The Ear Hustle team is hard at work on our next season, which launches September 7! In the meantime, we’d like to tell you about a new podcast, hosted by Jason Reynolds. Reynolds is a New York Times bestselling author, and the Library of Congress' national ambassador for young people's literature. He’s ambitious, he says yes to everything, and he’s feeling overwhelmed. On the first episode of My Mother Made Me, his new podcast with Radiotopia Presents, Jason turns to his mother for advice, and discovers that overwhelmed is a feeling she knows very well.
Find out more about My Mother Made Me here.
Also mentioned in this episode:
The latest season of Motive, from WBEZ Chicago, explores the culture and secrets of prisons in small-town Illinois.
And the podcast series Deliberate Indifference examines how the Alabama prison system became one of the most dangerous in the country.
As always, big thanks to Lt. Sam Robinson and Warden Ron Broomfield for their support of the show.
Ear Hustle is a proud member of Radiotopia, from PRX. Find a full list of episode credits at earhustlesq.com.
The jig was up for Ryan, so he told police he’d turn himself in. His mom had one request: a final family meal at Applebee’s. Plus, Earlonne and Nigel head to the intersection of Firmona and Marine Avenues in Lawndale, California, the scene of E's last memory before being locked up.
As always, big thanks to Lt. Sam Robinson and Warden Ron Broomfield for their support of the show.
Ear Hustle is a proud member of Radiotopia, from PRX. Find a full list of episode credits at earhustlesq.com.
We did it! Thanks to your generosity, we reached our goal of 1,000 donors and unlocked the $25,000 matching gift. Thank you! If you wanted to donate but haven’t yet, you can still chip in and help us explore more beyond San Quentin.
The day before committing the crime that sent him to prison, Michael stood in a parking lot in Bakersfield, California, and looked up at the sky. Twenty-two years later, Earlonne and Nigel visit that same parking lot, then return to San Quentin to tell Michael what they found.
If you need help for yourself or someone else, contact the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 800-273-8255 or suicidepreventionlifeline.org.
As always, big thanks to Lt. Sam Robinson and Warden Ron Broomfield for their support of the show.
Ear Hustle is a proud member of Radiotopia, from PRX. Find a full list of episode credits at earhustlesq.com.
We’re more than halfway to our goal of 1,000 donors! Donate to help us get there and unlock a matching gift of $25,000.
Life in prison, without regular sex and intimacy, can cause all sorts of emotional and physical issues. Yep, we're going there — to explore the impact of this constraint inside prison, and for men and women seeking close relationships after they get out.
As always, big thanks to Lt. Sam Robinson and Warden Ron Broomfield for their support of the show.
Ear Hustle is a proud member of Radiotopia, from PRX. Find a full list of episode credits at earhustlesq.com.
Support the show and become one of 1,000 listeners to donate before June 8. Learn more and donate at https://on.prx.org/3KMxzRw.
What happens to a prison town when its main prison closes? The residents of Susanville, in Northern California, are about to find out. Ear Hustle took a road trip to see how Susanvillers — both inside and outside the prison — are reacting to the news.
As always, big thanks to Lt. Sam Robinson and Warden Ron Broomfield for their support of the show.
Ear Hustle is a proud member of Radiotopia, from PRX. Find a full list of episode credits at earhustlesq.com.
We talk about love on Ear Hustle, plenty, but it’s hard to think of prison as a “romantic” place. What does dating look and feel like, on the inside? Against all odds, sometimes true love prevails.
As always, big thanks to Lt. Sam Robinson and Warden Ron Broomfield for their support of the show.
Thanks also to everyone who called in to tell us their one-minute love stories.
Ear Hustle is a proud member of Radiotopia, from PRX. Find a full list of episode credits at earhustlesq.com.
In California and many other states, calls from prison are limited to 15 minutes and are monitored, recorded, and often difficult to come by. But whether you’re trying to fix a marriage or a broken wall heater, these short conversations are a lifeline for family on the outside.
As always, big thanks to Lt. Sam Robinson and Warden Ron Broomfield for their support of the show.
Ear Hustle is a proud member of Radiotopia, from PRX. Find a full list of episode credits at earhustlesq.com.
love Sam Robinson! He is a model of what it means to respect folks no matter what.
安昂昂欸安艾未未問我奧 嗯嗯 奧 昂 歐啊 惡意韋恩我
The thank you's- AMAZING, just listen to the very end!
Why aren't you calling this what it is, 'rape'?
Wow!! He's getting out this year? this episode was powerful......
This podcast is just pure gold. Well done, once again.
it is the personal touch. I know my man in jail can have the same feelings reading my letters as I did writing them. no pc or printed out paper can ever take that away.
like this
I thought it was written and read by a 12 year old. Seventy percent of black kids have no dad so that black women stay dependent on the Democrat party of the KKK and Jim Crow. If I want to listen to an articulate, intelligent black woman, I listen to Candace Owens - not this racist, self-obsessed drivel. Low quality drivel at-that.
Hi, is there any plan to release the Ear Hustle book in paperback?? The book seems to have been requested by a number of incarcerated as a Christmas gift, unfortunately though I am getting the impression that hard cover books are not accepted by many facilities....
a bittersweet story about Curtis. very touching. very well done podcast. Thank you Team Ear Hustle.
really enjoying this show recommended by a friend. great idea and content is fascinating
After listening to the guard talk....Tell me your a fan of systematic oppression and racism with out tell me your fan of systematic oppression and racism. 🤨
Great music 🎶 thank you as always!
just started the podcast and I'm up to unwritten...ty for my new favorite thing!!!
Absolutely fuuuuck that guy with THIRTY kids who left his mom in the lurch like that. Scum of the earth.
I'm so happy ear hustle is back!! I binge listened when I found the podcast earlier this year and have been hanging for new episodes. Love the show!
It was my understanding to be placed on Death Row you had to commit at least one murder and an additional serious crime such as rape, armed hold-up etc. Pity you couldn't record Scott Peterson when he was on Death Row, now that would have been something! Great podcast.
WADUP WITH ANEW EPISODE? I MISS YALL!
She is only kept in prison for political reasons. She far more remorseful, contrite, and empathetic then many others sentenced to life who are now out and thriving in society. She’s taken full and complete responsibility, is far more accountable than the above average citizen, and the last three governor’s of California are cowards for not releasing her. She’s no different than any other lifer who has been released after committing murder or a litany of other life crimes. The notoriety of this case is all that keeps her there. She’s paid dearly and she outta be released where she could at least live the rest of her days in freedom. She’s a tremendous Christian woman who will live the rest of her life making living amends. Anyone who knows her story and doesn’t advocate for her freedom is complicit in her incarceration. All that is necessary for evil to triumph is for good men and women to do nothing.