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List of free GOOD audio

#1
We have a list of free Audiobooks which I have downloaded and listened to most of, but many of them are boring or have bad sound. Since there is a lot of audio out there on the internet I think we can afford to be pickier. So how about we post here stuff that:

1. is interesting/funny
2. has good sound
3. is free

I also think listening to the same podcast or story again is very beneficial. Kind of like using an SRS hearing the same thing over and over again drills it into your head. Here is my stuff.

セクシー心理学(Sexy Psychology)

Contains information about various psychological tests and also allows you to participate. Very well produced and very interesting.

Tokyo Local

It's a guy and two girls chatting about random stuff. They often have the results of interesting questionaires as the topic. The great thing is, most of the radio shows have people trying to hard to be funny and everyone pretending to laugh, but these guys are chill. Note that the first 4 or so minutes are an interview with someone who has used ProActiv to get rid of their acne. It's a little bit boring but great Japanese practice, since it follows the same format every time you can learn a lot I think.

今すぐ使える新潟弁 (learn about the niigata dialect)

Personally I have little interest in learning this dialect but the 3 people who teach this are delightful. It is also interesting to hear the dialect which sounds almost nothing like Japanese. The great thing is this is easy to understand since the sentences they teach are not hugely complex. 90% of this is in standard Japanese.

道産子女子高生のしゃべり場!まりもえお!(3 high schoolers chatting)

The great thing about this is the 3 of them are very uninhibited. I think it's rare to find Japanese people let alone people posting something to a public forum who just chill out and have a good time. Lots of jokes and laughing.

Of the audio books posted in the other thread, I think the Sherlock Holmes (Sir Arthur Conan Doyle) stuff is the best. Also good for learning since it follows a common format.

Anyway, I would love to hear what you guys love.
Edited: 2009-05-27, 7:51 pm
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#2
tentative bump
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#3
Thanks! Normal speak good.
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JapanesePod101
#4
音泉 インターネットラジオステーション

Updated every day from Monday to Friday with several hours of new podcasts. The quality is very good. However, there are lots of girls speaking in cute high-pitched anime voices, so if you don't like that you're out of luck.

As for how interesting the podcasts are, I really can't say since I understand like maybe 1% but they seem to be talking about anime and otaku-culture related things a lot of the time...
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#5
I'm not quite sure what you're looking for, Thermal. Based on your examples, you might like TBS Life radio which I described here. The member bios make me think the conversation could be more interesting than typical pop stuff, but who knows. There are more recommendations in that thread too. It's hard to search the forum, but I recall there was an earlier thread with audio recommendations.

Sounds like you like literature as well as talk show format. There's a site called Japanese Classical Literature at Bedtime with audio and text - 20th c stuff too.

I thought Japanese documentaries might be a great source of unscripted conversation, but I discovered that Japanese docs use interviews less than other countries. If you like film, a good source is the extra interviews and background stuff on some DVDs.

If anyone finds some interesting conversational/interview audio, pls let us know. For example, I would love to listen to archived interviews with great writers, filmmakers, musicians, politicians, gangsters... There must be Japanese sites with such archives.
Edited: 2009-06-09, 1:59 am
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#6
The Hokaido girls are funny...not that I am at a level where I can understand it....but fun! I was chatting online with a girl fro Hokaido one night, and told her about it. She started listening to it, and at some point types "Oh they're talking about POOP!"....

And that really livened up the conversation for quite some time. I was laughing my ass off discussing the finer points/idioms of the duece.

Sooooo.....yeah...
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#7
Obviously there are many good, free audio recordings available online, but the point of the audiobooks list I compiled was to find audio which also had both transcripts and translations available so that beginners could employ the "Listening Reading" method of language learning. Audio like the ones listed in this thread are good for more advanced students, but are not particularly useful for relative beginners.
Edited: 2009-06-09, 4:58 am
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#8
I wouldn't say that. It helps for making a more Japanese environment and even though I can't really follow the conversations yet I'm planning on borrowing my dad's iPod Radio... thing which will let me make a 'custom radio channel' on my iPod then hooking it up to my home audio player so I can always have it in the background.
In short, this is very good passive listening material regardless of your level. That said, the list you compiled is very good and I agree thermal probably misinterpreted your goal with that list.
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#9
Thanks for the list. Turns out I'd already subscirbed to the last one, though it looks like they haven't added a new podcast for nearly 2 years.

My favourite is 小島秀夫「ヒデオチャンネルラジオ」, by Hideo Kojima (of Metal Gear fame). It's funny and lively, and updated once a week.
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#10
I didn't mean to dis your work sheetz. It's a good list and like you say for those that want the script of what they are listening to, it's great.

However, I think there is room for another list of just stuff that is good and has good sound. It's great to find stuff that is interesting to you and you really want to understand. Makes the brain take notice and try all the harder and gives you really positive feedback. Good sound also allows you to hear really clearly and get the most from it.

Certainly there are difficult topics and such, but more or less you have audio aimed at native speakers and audio aimed at people learning Japanese. Whatever the form, the native stuff is going to be hard. Yet, I believe you have to get used to this so the sooner started the better. i + 1 sentences will come along. Anyway, just saying boths lists have their value.

Thora, I'm not really looking for stuff that I like, just stuff that you like. I'd like to get a bit of a list going for everyone, not just one based on my tastes. I'm sure if you like it it is worth checking out! (will check out your suggestions)

nicksan, yeah no more セクシー心理学. It's a real pity. It's so well put together and interesting.
Edited: 2009-06-09, 9:16 am
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#11
A new one.

今日の猫ちゃん

This guy keeps a diary about his cat called イケメン. It's really cute. Quite simple and good for beginners. Script is also included on the podcast website.
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#12
[kana]今日の猫ちゃん[/kana]

Love it! I'll enjoy mining this for sure. Thanks!
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#13
Life is Comedy

There are 8 at about 10 minutes each. Doesn't look like there will be any more. Its just a nice and interesting guy talking quite reflectively on various topics. The whole thing is just so relaxing and nice. It's fairly complex Japanese, but he speaks quite slowly. 1st is a little boring though.
Edited: 2009-06-11, 2:57 am
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#14
Well in case anyone missed it, there's a link leading to
http://coffee-and-milk.radilog.net/
at the high schoolers' site. It's pretty much the same but with a girl and a guy instead. Well, I'd say it's easier in a way because they're not interrupting each other as much and it feels even more relaxed. Very nice. (can't say much more because as I mentioned in the first post I don't understand everything. they talk about food a lot, dunno if that's a theme or just them liking food)

And about the niigata site: man that's hilarious. I'm definitely gonna learn a wacky dialect once I know standard Japanese well enough, hehe. Oh and thanks for working on this thread!
Edited: 2009-06-11, 11:20 am
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#15
I've tried a few times to get into coffee and milk. For me it doesn't have the same magic.

Yeah the niigata stuf is good Smile

ビールの話 -talking drunk-

It's fairly self explanitory Smile It's a nice guy drinking various alcohols, getting quite drunk and talking mostly about the various alcohols he is trying. I think strongly themed audio is good. He uses complex Japanese, but because of the strong theme you hear the same words and phrases many times, so it's a good for learning. He gets more and more drunk as he goes, gets sillier and has to slow down to be able to articulate properly. Good stuff.
Edited: 2009-06-11, 10:36 pm
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#16
sheetz Wrote:...the point of the audiobooks list I compiled was to find audio which also had both transcripts and translations available so that beginners could employ the "Listening Reading" method of language learning.
Just to hijack the thread for a moment... Has anyone actually tried the listening reading method? I've been reading about it a bit over the past few days and it's kind of intriguing. I'm going to give it a go after my exams are over (what the heck am I doing on here now anyway!), but was just wondering if anyone has actually tried it properly?
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#17
SammyB Wrote:
sheetz Wrote:...the point of the audiobooks list I compiled was to find audio which also had both transcripts and translations available so that beginners could employ the "Listening Reading" method of language learning.
Just to hijack the thread for a moment... Has anyone actually tried the listening reading method? I've been reading about it a bit over the past few days and it's kind of intriguing. I'm going to give it a go after my exams are over (what the heck am I doing on here now anyway!), but was just wondering if anyone has actually tried it properly?
i tried it, though not precisely as siomotteikiru described it, but with a shorter text (to avoid wasting too much time if it didn't work). i must say it did help my listening a bit, but after the three times she suggested (doing step 3, reading english+listening japanese), i really couldn't understand all that much, and was much too annoyed to keep on listening to it again and again.
but, as i said, i didn't follow the system completely, the whole audiobook was only 1:30 (it was 宮沢賢治's 銀河鉄道の夜), maybe with longer texts it could work, but i won't waste my time on it unless i hear from someone that it does, indeed, work.
so, has anyone alse had any experience, success or failure, with the system?

link to where the system was first presented (or so i've been told):
http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/for...PN=0&TPN=1
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#18
I don't know about the listening reading method but I recommend 銀河鉄道の夜 . The story is great and it's not so hard to understand. The narrator is also good.

http://jclab.wordpress.com/2007/12/24/gi.../#more-169
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#19
I've been listening to national geographic videos from the japanese national geographic site on repeat on my ipod. I watched all the videos at the site, and recorded the audiio, so I know what they're about and each time it repeats I'm able to pick up more and more words. These videos have high quality naration and background music so it's easy to listen to without tuning out and are on a wide range of interesting topics.
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#20
dbh2ppa, how much Japanese did you know when you tried L-Ring?
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#21
Thora Wrote:I'm not quite sure what you're looking for, Thermal. Based on your examples, you might like TBS Life radio which I described here. The member bios make me think the conversation could be more interesting than typical pop stuff, but who knows. There are more recommendations in that thread too. It's hard to search the forum, but I recall there was an earlier thread with audio recommendations.
http://www.tbsradio.jp/life/index.html

I am going to have to second Thora's suggestion especially to guys cause this is great for hearing natural conversation cause lets face it people dont "really" talk like news casters lol. This is the essence of pretending to have japanese friends. Be warned though some of these guys are 早口 (machine gun mouth). I personally use this for shadowing practice recently.
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#22
saizen Wrote:I personally use this for shadowing practice recently.
What exactly does that entail? I'm curious because all I've done for shadowing is repeating individual sentences. How does it work with something like this? Do you need a script?
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#23
yukamina Wrote:dbh2ppa, how much Japanese did you know when you tried L-Ring?
next no nothing. i had done pimsleur japanese 1, but we all know how useless those tapes are.
saizen Wrote:Be warned though some of these guys are 早口 (machine gun mouth).
qft. i'm a native spanish speaker and we speak pretty fast by western standards, but those guys are in a totally different level. it's actually somewhat impressive.
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#24
dbh2ppa Wrote:
yukamina Wrote:dbh2ppa, how much Japanese did you know when you tried L-Ring?
next no nothing. i had done pimsleur japanese 1, but we all know how useless those tapes are.
For learning a language so different from English, it's probably better to have at least a basic understanding of the language before L-Ring. I haven't really don't much with L-Ring myself though.
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#25
I guess this is like shouting stop midway through the thread funeral but I like this thread and my post fits here.

I've been thinking about varying my audio input as much as possible and right now what I have is:
News (http://www.nhk.or.jp/r-news/, absolute best news audio I know of)
Japanese music (thank you japanese music thread)
Podcasts (まりもえお and TBS radio mentioned here + random iTunes finds)
Anime audio rips from very different series
Audio books

And that's it. But I was thinking about more kinds of audio and something I really want now is more subject-centered audio, like business, history, culture... There should be podcasts like these but I don't find much other than music podcasts and "let's learn english lol".
A really cool thing would be recorded university,etc. classes - I know there's a lot available in english for students of different subjects so I don't see why it wouldn't be the same in Japan. Or just recordings of speeches, interviews in "60 minutes" style. I want to learn to learn in Japanese, I suppose. Besides, I figure this is very useful for anyone who'd have plans on working/studying in Japan to get familiar with their subject's lingo.

I realize youtube should be good for finding these kinds of things but I don't know very well what search terms to use and I wanted to share the idea.
Edit: Hm, this didn't sound enough like a request. If you have any material of this sort, please post them I will be grateful.
Edited: 2009-08-23, 8:39 am
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