B-Side Stories

We talked to local legend Tim Jones on his life, his tireless decades in climate and transport advocacy, and his new novel Emergency Weather!

If you go down to the wild Wellington South Coast during a storm, there's a high chance that you could spot Mary Livingston there, braced against the wind and happily taking photos.

Mary has a lifelong love of the sea, which lead to a 40 year career as a marine biologist, and, more recently, to her fascination with capturing astounding images of the surf and coastline. Mary also uses abstraction to create landscapes with her camera from all sorts of surfaces, from cars to fenceposts.

We talked to her about her two current photography exhibitions, her love of performing folk music, especially songs of the sea, and her time spent on boats chasing flatfish...and we found out which other creative art she practises.

Made with support from Wellington Access Radio and NZ on Air.

Nigel Beckford collects, curates, augments, and transforms snippets of the culture of Aotearoa, taking moments of daily life from the news (man tasered after doing kung fu moves on a fried chicken joint's roof) or from his own experiences and conversations (playing football in goose poo leads to amputation of limb) and turning them into songs and stories.

In this episode of B-Side Stories Nigel talks to Sadie and Trish about performing with the collective of musicians Sven Olsen's Brutal Canadian Love Saga, about his previous "bonkers rock" band The Inhalers, about writing, and art, and imagination, and lots more.

Nigel is a natural born storyteller in all media: listen in for how he instinctively seized on the special nature of radio to prank Trish at the start of the show.

This programme was made with the support of NZ on Air and Wellington Access Radio.

You might know that Geordie Rogers was elected to represent the Pukehīnau/Lambton ward during the February 2024 Wellington City Council by-election. But you might not know much about Geordie and his background.

In this episode, Laura and Victoria ask Geordie about the close election campaign, and explore his background, interests, and first impressions of the job at Wellington City Council. You'll learn a bit about Geordie's advocacy with Renters United, and much more.

Multi-disciplinary artists Biddy and James open their home and garden each year as part of Newtown Open Studios. They talk to Sadie and Trish about the art they create both separately and together in what they describe as a cross-pollination, and about the home they've created, which is a landmark in Newtown, Te Whanganui a Tara.

Have you ever written a song? Our guest Ali Whitton completed a 52 week song writing challenge - writing a new song every week for a whole year! Hear him speak about the challenges, the learnings, the rap song... and hear some of Ali's music performed live.

Recorded at Wellington Access Radio 20 Feb 2024.

Hosted by Laura Keown and Sadie Coe.

Follow @lostbirdsings on Instagram to hear more from Ali Whitton.

Morgan Bach talks writing, rage and Verb 2023 by B-Side Stories

Esther King shares her love for foraging with B Sides, offering some great tips and motivation for the forage-curious!

Terese McLeod talks about islands, a stream, and views that can't be bought by billionaires by B-Side Stories

Part 1