Podcast review — Intersections: Detroit is a portrait of a resilient city

Intersections: Detroit is a new 10-part podcast which tells the story of Detroit via interviews with people who live and work there. Its 100 or so contributors were handpicked by their peers as “agents of change” — people attempting in different ways to improve a city that is often viewed negatively by outsiders.

Each episode of the series, which is an offshoot of a broader multimedia project I, Detroit, by the artist and photographer Marcus Lyon, opens with the resident poet Jessica Care Moore sharing her memories of city life: “[As children] we played baseball in the street, we played relay races, we rode our bikes . . . You only stayed in your house to sleep. You went outside because you wanted to see what everyone else was doing.” She then hands over to the interviewees, whose contributions form an artful audio tapestry about a bruised but resilient town focused on renewal.

And so we hear from Satori Shakoor, founder of the arts organisation The Secret Society of Twisted Storytellers, who recalls how the block where she lived in East Detroit “looked like a mouth with a lot of teeth missing” owing to the state of the houses, yet “was full of people and life and diversity”.

Local historian Jamon Jordan talks of the destruction of the Black Bottom neighbourhood that began in the late 1950s to make way for a freeway, and the Detroit rebellion of 1967, as pivotal moments in black history. He also recalls his curiosity as a child when he saw his grandmother cleaning wealthy people’s houses — why, he wondered, didn’t he live in a house like that? Studying history gave him necessary context. “I was able to understand my place in the world,” he says.

Elsewhere we hear from a man helping young boxers who have skipped high school to improve their literacy and an eco-entrepreneur getting young people in touch with agricultural practices. Wrapped around their testimony are elegant, immersive soundscapes that weave in the hubbub of the city — car horns honk, pedestrians talk on their phones, life bubbles away.

There is original music, too, courtesy of Detroit musicians Efe Bes and Marcus Elliot and, unexpectedly, Brian Eno. Their soundtrack is ambient and unobtrusive in parts, but in other instances takes centre stage. Those who, like me, come to this series knowing little about Detroit beyond the big historical markers — cars, Motown, economic decline — get a different picture, one that is full of creativity and community, and one in which a bright future beckons.

This City, hosted by Clara Amfo, is a podcast about London as seen through the eyes of its famous residents and visitors. Each of the guests, who include writer Candice Brathwaite, rapper and TV presenter Big Zuu and singer Olly Alexander, discusses the places that mean something to them, from music venues and museums to the city’s green spaces.