'The Invention of Money'

I'm hit and miss with "This American Life" but the recent "The Invention of Money" episode is worth downloading.

Sounds boring but it's not. In "asking the same stoner-ish question: What is money?," host Ira Glass and his team explain the crazy "pre-industrial society on the island of Yap that used giant stones as currency (including one on the bottom of the ocean far from residents), to how Brazilian economists tricked people with a virtual currency to the most recent efforts by the U.S. Federal Reserve Bank to prop up the American economy.

Fascinating breakdown on a subject that drives our daily lives but which most of us have no real grasp of.

'Year in Rock: 1991' a fun reminder of an amazing year

The guys at "Sound Opinions" recently went back in time 20 years with a "Year in Rock: 1991" episode that examines the amazingly transformative year of 1991.

Think first of Guns 'N Roses' two "Use Your Illusion" albums, then Garth Brooks and Bryan Adams. But the real magic kicks in with the influential new sounds of Nirvana and the Grunge scene, NWA and Ice Cube, Pearl Jam, the Shoegazer bands, Nine Inch Nails and much more.

It's shocking to think how many major artists released landmark recordings that year, how much music the public was actually paying for, and how the new genres of alternative and rap exploded into the mainstream. Looking back, that revolution in music is comparable to rock 'n' roll's heydey in 1956 and the British Invasion in 1964.

The weekly "Sound Opinions" podcast is always great fun but this one of the best I can recall in years.

Mostly complete copy of first Super Bowl telecast finally surfaces

The first Super Bowl was held in 1967, pitting the NFL champs Green Bay Packers vs. the upstart AFL champs, Kansas City Chiefs.

Two networks telecast that first Super Bowl, but, amazingly, neither CBS nor NBC saved a copy. The only archival video from the game is courtesy of NFL Films, which shot from the sideline.

That was until a mostly complete video recording of the CBS broadcast finally surfaced after decades in a Pennsylvania attic. The tape has been restored, but because of rights issues remains out of the public view.

Speaking for other diehard Packer fans, let's hope the NFL and the tape owner reach agreement so the rest of us can see the game that started the Super Bowl frenzy that now consumes America like no other single event.