Peak Time – Extraterrestial Sounds: Douglas Vakoch of METI and Sónar Calling

Peak Time goes to outer space! On this episode, Vivian talks to Douglas Vakoch, former Director of Interstellar Message Composition at the SETI Institute and current president of METI (Messaging Extraterrestrial Intelligence); they discuss sending messages into space in an attempt to make contact with extraterrestrials, the Fibonacci sequence and the music of the galaxy. We also talk to Enric Palau, co-director of Barcelona's Sónar Festival, about their new Sónar Calling project, which celebrates 25 years of the festival by beaming 33 commissioned pieces of music (from Autechre, Holly Herndon, Richie Hawtin and more) to Lutyen Star B, the closest potentially habitable exoplanet. This episode also explores the forgotten music of Disneyland's Tomorrowland, the time-capsule-style _Golden Voyager Record_ that Carl Sagan curated with NASA, not to mention galactic cuts from Celestial Trax, DUST, Model 500 and more.