We admit: The audio on this thing is truly awful. And we introduced the podcast with a song. It’s supposed to be funny, but we have a weird sense of humor. We had fun with the podcasts in those days, because we were pretty sure that none of you listened.

Read Rev. Mason’s thoughts about the Advent Conspiracy, which seeks to bring back the spiritual simplicity of Christmas without any Scrooge-like sneering, and listen to our podcast with him about why his church has joined the movement.

If the demands of the holiday season already are causing heart palpitations, take a few minutes this week to read the Rev. George Mason’s worship column in the December Advocate (which should be delivered to your doorstep starting this weekend). It focuses on the Advent Conspiracy movement, in which Mason’s congregation, Wilshire Baptist Church, is participating.

Coincidentally, the Rev. Blair Monie, who pastors Preston Hollow Presbyterian Church and writes a worship column for the Advocate in other neighborhoods, also chose Advent Conspiracy as his December column topic. For this week’s podcast, we brought the two pastors together to discuss why they decided to join the conspiracy, and what that looks like for their churches.

“If we could simply accomplish one thing, that is that loving each other at Christmas is not synonymous with spending,” Monie says during the podcast.

The Christian season of Advent begins this coming Sunday, Nov. 27. Wilshire Baptist will be posting corresponding devotionals daily on its website and Facebook page, and neighbors also can request to receive them via email.

Listen to the 10-minute interview below.

If you flipped through the print version of November’s magazine, you probably noticed that it looks, well, different. The section designs and fonts are updated, with the goal of giving readers more information while simultaneously giving the stories more room to breathe. Also, we’re hoping you saw quite a few invitations to visit our website. (Perhaps that’s how you ended up here.)

The last time we changed the look of the magazine was four and a half years ago, and much has changed since then — namely that we now have this robust, dynamic website with new stories, photos and videos added daily. If you’re reading only the print version of Advocate, you’re getting only a small portion of our neighborhood’s news. So we hope the more obvious, more colorful and more frequent mentions of website content will remind you to add us to your blog feeder, like us on Facebook, follow us on Twitter, subscribe to our weekly newsletter, download our apps or even make us your home page.

With our new apps, can also peruse our redesigned magazine on your mobile device, whether iPhone, iPad or Android. (For the best user experience, make sure to download the entire magazine before viewing.)

Is there still room for improvement? Definitely, and we hope you’ll give us feedback on what you see in the magazine and what else you’d like to see. Email us or comment below.

For those of you interested in things like font choices and specific section approaches, listen to this special podcast with art director Julianne Rice and editor Emily Toman, who were the driving forces behind the Advocate print magazine redesign. After the jump, we’ve excerpted a few of the highlights and provided the full audio version, which lasts roughly six minutes: (more…)

Sol Villasana is a lawyer who lives in Lakewood, and he grew up in the Little Mexico neighborhood. He recently published a book, Images of America Dallas’s Little Mexico from Arcadia Publishing.

Krys Boyd of KERA’s “Think” interviewed Villasana about the book this week. It’s interesting stuff about the history of downtown and what is now Uptown and Victory Park from the perspective of Mexican Americans. KERA’s studios are in the former Little Mexico neighborhood, and it’s a neighborhood whose history has been somewhat neglected.

Listen to the interview here. The book is widely available, including on Amazon.

Bill Bragg gives Big Tex his voice

Our guest for this week’s Advocate Radio interview podcast is Bill Bragg. Never heard of him? Possibly. But if you live in Texas, you’ve undoubtedly heard his voice. His most famous character? The State Fair’s Big Tex!

Advocate editors are obviously in awe of Bragg's gigantic hat

Bragg shares inside info about his State Fair gig and his radio project Yesterday USA Radio. He talks about various ways one can put booming vocals to work, and shows off what is possibly the world’s largest belt buckle.

LISTEN HERE: Bill Bragg aka Big Tex Interview.

Bragg sports Texas' biggest belt buckle

This week’s Music Monday features Trey Johnson, the subject of an Advocate Q&A last year. Johnson’s new album “Where the East Ends” contains an eclectic musical mix featuring band members James Driscoll, Rich Martin and Don Cento, plus appearances from a number of their contemporaries. Two faves,  “Salt of the Earth and “Rain”, are on the podcast; you can hear the rest if the album here.

Celebrated chef Dean Fearing is known for his culinary art, but he’s got a little side project — it’s The Barbwires, known for their country-rock stylings. The Barbwires’ latest album is Bliss and Blisters, which has been called sophisticated … with echoes of Buffalo Springfield, Poco, Creedence Clearwater Revival, The Beatles, and the Grateful Dead.

LISTEN HERE:  9.7 Music Monday

It’s Monday and that means local music on Advocate Radio. Today we have some good stuff:

I have a song off the new record from Jackopierce, whose Cary Pierce is the subject of the Advocate’s “Conversation Piece” in the East Dallas and Lake Highlands September editions. Pierce will be teaching choir this semester at St. John’s Episcopal.

During our interview, Pierce introduced us to a couple of students he met while teaching a songwriting class at Booker T. Washington High School. He’s producing an album for one of them, Tiger Darrow. You can listen to her single, “Only a Year”, on today’s podcast, and another former student Joshua Golberg’s first release, “Fly”.

Finally, I’ve got an cool country ditty from Chris Knight, not a local, but he’s playing at the Granada Aug. 28, so have a listen, and if you like, getcha tickets here.

If you have a song for Music Monday at the Advocate, send the track to chughes@advocatemag.com.

LISTEN HERE: 8.22 Music Monday

Wayne Maynard just returned from his solo flight to the North Pole.

Neighborhood resident Wayne Maynard recently returned from a trip to the North Pole. The 61-year old took the solo journey in an effort to raise money and awareness for Grace Flight, a national organization that pairs volunteer pilots with people in need of transportation for medical or humanitarian needs. In this week’s podcast interview, Maynard tells us about the trip and his personal reasons for embarking on such an adventure.

Interview—Wayne Maynard from Grace Flight

Vicki Hitzges at the Advocate office

Vicki Hitzges, motivational speaker, former television news reporter and author of the new book, “Attitude is Everything, 10 Rules for Staying Positive” joins us for a podcast interview this week. She shares some secrets to staying happy including tips on ridding your life of unnecessary worry, and talks a little bit about what she learned from the famous Zig Ziglar while working for him. To purchase an autographed copy of Vicki’s book, visit her website.

Listen to the podcast here:Interview-Vicki Hitzges