Podcast offers nostalgia of a time before COVID-19

For years Medina neighbors Will Padilla and Ray Sexton would get into deep dive conversations about a shared love of '80s-related pop culture. The discussions would cover everything from catchphrases, cars and TV characters to movies, video games and MTV. It was roughly a year ago when the Gen Xers decided to take their conversations to the next level and create a weekly podcast. Finally, last summer the hosts released "The 80its." Currently, the podcast enjoys 1,000 monthly downloads. "What I love most about the podcast is that we've been able to prove week after week that 1980s pop culture is better than any other decade's pop culture," said Sexton, who works for a sign company. "We've done it beyond a shadow of a doubt — over and over." While Sexton is from Northeast Ohio, Padilla is a Jersey City, New Jersey native, who moved to Ohio shortly after Sept. 11, 2001. He's called Medina home for six years. "I always looked for a way to express myself," said insurance company fraud investigator Padilla, who worked in the New York theater scene decades ago as a writer, actor and composer. "The podcast is about the era I grew up in. Oftentimes decades will have a reemergence as time goes on, and the '80s is reemerging now." Regarding current television shows set in the '80s, Padilla said both "The Goldbergs" and "Stranger Things" are decent representations of the era with the latter being more in his creative wheelhouse. (Feel free to binge watch both this weekend.) "With the podcasts, I want to be able to have a discussion of it not only as a person who lived in it, but from the perspective of being able to prove to people who didn't live through it that it was still the greatest decade in terms of pop culture," Padilla said. Previous episodes of "The 80its" include interviews with comic book writer/illustrator Ho Che Anderson, N.Y. theater critic/historian Peter Filichia and former U.S. congressman Zack Space, with future shows featuring actress Catherine Mary Stewart ("The Last Starfighter," Weekend at Bernie's," "Night of the Comet"), Toni Hudson ("Just One of the Guys") and Cindy Morgan ("Tron," "Caddyshack"). The duo also recently interviewed original MTV VJ Nina Blackwood. Currently in the mix are discussions with Michael Sweet, the singer in Christian heavy metal band Stryper, and actor Lou Ferrigno ("The Hulk"). Topics of recent podcasts ranged from "Cars of the 1980s TV & Film" to "Reboots and Remakes." "Ultimately I want the podcast to be a definitive, unquestionable resource for objective proof that the 1980s was our contemporary renaissance as far as pop culture, art and media, but I didn't want it to be I guess overly scholarly or intellectual," Padilla said. "It must be accessible to folks who loved the 1980s. I didn't want them to think I was just creating various white papers on moments or media from the 1980s. That would turn a lot of folks off, and it would probably be very boring." The one thing Padilla isn't promising is that "The 80its" listeners will want to be gagged with a spoon. "Hopefully not," Padilla laughed, "but maybe you'll at least appreciate the importance of that catchphrase." For more information, visit the80itspod.com. Contact John Benson at ndiffrence@att.net.