My Favourite Podcasts 2020 Update

I used to do this series of favourite podcasts last year, and then I started uni and got friends (hahahha, more like didn’t have an hour commute anymore tbh) and stopped listening to as many. But now there’s covid-19 and well – I’m back to loving podcasts.

Podcasts previously mentioned that I still listen to a lot:

(Let me know if you want to discuss any of these, honestly! I’ve linked to where I wrote more about them. I can’t believe there’s this few now compared to before, and yet there’s so many.) Reply All by Gimlet Media, Anthropocene Reviewed by John Green, Ologies by Alie Ward, Nancy by WNYC studios (it just posted its last episode though … find me crying in the corner), the Legendarium, Cortex by CGP Grey and Myke Hurley, No Dumb Questions by Destin Sandlin and Matt Whittman, Hello Internet by CGP Grey and Brady Haran, Dear Hank & John by John & Hank Green, Delete This by Hank & Katherine Green and the Wikicast by Simon Clark and Dan Maw.

‘New’ Podcasts I Love

• 

• 

• 

SciShow Tangents

• The SciShow team: Hank Green, Ceri Riley, Stefan Chin and Sam Schulz
• Weird and funny science facts centered around a topic, with the group (mostly Hank) going on a few weird & funny tangents as well. The group just has a great dynamic and different levels of background knowledge, making it very accessible. I still sometimes miss the video couch format of the ‘beta-version’ (in my mind) Holy Fucking Science though.

The Catch and Kill Podcast

• by Ronan Farrow, Pineapple Street Studios
• Made as a continuation of the book Farrow made by the same name where he goes through reporting on the revelation of Harvey Weinstein’s sexual assaults, but also how NBC tried to manipulate and hold him back. The book goes very much in depth on the pattern of different powerful people’s assault & manipulation, and then the cover-ups. I would recommend listening to that audiobook as well if you’re even more interested after finishing the podcast.
• The podcast is a good ten-episode summary focusing more on just Weinstein and how the women he assaulted took brave stances to take him down, in addition to the last episode with Rose McGowan made after the verdict of Weinstein.

Two Headed Girl

• I would probably listen to anything Alex Cox puts out tbh, but their partner Mattie Cox is so amazing in sharing his story transitioning from female to male in this podcast, taking the listener with them on every step of the way and being so vulnerable. It seems to be both a podcast to process and document this time of their life as well as explain and teach anyone who wants to listen.
• Their own pitch is “Welcome to Two Headed Girl, a new show about gender, mental illness, and all sorts of transitions made by a couple of married queers trying to figure themselves out.” which sums it up pretty pretty good.

• 

• 

Lovett or Leave It

• by Jon Lovett, Crooked Media
• I found this podcast, while actually already knowing about Jon Lovett before, because I was trying to find more interviews with Ronan Farrow and he happened to have made a rare recent podcast with his partner Jon Lovett because of being in quarantine together. But it’s news-related, trying to bring it with some humor where possible. These corona/Black Lives Matter days it’s more interviews and segments, with jokes in between, which is a great mix if sometimes news-related things are too much.

Wind of Change

• by Patrick Radden Keefe, Crooked Media
• Eight episodes in total of 1990’s rock music or more specifically how and if the CIA was involved in writing the famous “Wind of Change” by the Scorpions, the soundtrack of the revolution aka Berlin Wall falling and the Soviet Union collapsing. Really, it’s a podcast about how the CIA operates, how propaganda works and how far a journalist is willing to go to figure out if a rumor from a credible enough source is true.

• 

• 

The Scaredy Cats Horror Show

• by the Reply All team Alex Goldman (horror fan) trying to convert PJ Vogt (scaredy cat) for Gimlet Media. I don’t know how I found podcasts pre-university because apparently I found a lot, but since then I’ve basically just become aware as existing podcasters I listen to have started new ones.
• It’s basically an experiment of ‘can you gradually get used to horror movies so you’re not as afraid of the really scary ones anymore’. I’ve listened to the five episodes so far without watching any of the horror movies, and the only one I truly wanted to watch out of them was Midsommar, but I have definitely brought horror podcasts and stories into my life in a bigger way, so maybe it actually worked anyway?? I’m confused about that, but it’s great. Also fun to listen to PJ Vogt actually being really scared, sorry for laughing about that, I would be too.

The Magnus Archives

• by Jonathan Sims and Alexander J. Newall from Rusty Quill
• There’s a 173 episode back catalogue as of right now, but after a few days I’m 35 episodes in and hooked. It’s a horror podcast with a huge fanbase (and soo much good fanart). As far as I’ve figured, it starts out really episodic with different people coming into the magnus archive to tell about their supernatural experiences and get them investigated, and then the archive itself is attacked and it gradually becomes more of meta storytelling. Would recommend it even if you’re not such a big horror fan, like me. The stories themselves (at least at the start) are not that horrifying, but the storytelling is just amazing.

My Favourite Podcasts: New Finds

Here’s all my previous podcast posts, where I gathered up my favourites. With themes like space, robots, queerness, illness, science, productivity, books and mythology.

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

Supercomputer

• By Matthew Cassinelli (tech expert, especially Siri shortcuts) and Alex Cox (who also has the Do by Friday, The robot and the unicorn and Roboism podcasts)
• “Making sense out of a mess of technology”, which is true as I’m interested in tech, but haven’t taken the deep dive needed to understand a lot of the automation, Siri shortcuts and things they discuss before this.

History on Fire

• By university history professor Daniele Bolelli
• Human stories from history, told in a fascinating way, even for those of us who can’t bring ourselves to appreciate history classes
• Fav episodes: #24 Pirate queen #39-42 Joan d’Arc ( currently listening to this, it’s so fascinating)

Off the pill podcast

• By Ryan Higa (youtube) and friends, sometimes guests
• General type of talking podcast, discussing the Internet and social media, current events, controversies, stories from their career and life together, etc.

Space Cave

• By David Huntsberger, a comedian
• This is not a podcast I listen to every episode on because it spans such a broad type of guests, but the episodes I have heard is so interesting and that means there will probably be a topic catching your eye if you go through the titles quickly
• Fav episodes: #51-52 Material science #71-72 Electrical engineering #127-128 Electrical engineering #135-136 Quantum physics

Delete this

• By Hank Green (author, nerdfighteria, vlogbrothers) and Katherine Green
• Where they go through Hank’s (and sometime Katherine’s) twitter feed, talking about how to not use social media, interact with others and how the social media affects us. Also sharing cute twitter moments, and CATS, to brighten the mood.
• Fav episode: #38 The perineum of kindness (with guests)

What podcasts do you listen to?

My Favourite Podcasts: Stories

I made this post quite some time ago, and then it disappeared into my drafts. So I just updated it with some more recent episodes recommendations as well!

It was difficult finding a category for these kinds of podcasts, the journalistic ones where there’s a host or two, but mainly they’re based on telling people’s stories. They’re not talking about a random subject from their lives, but something specific they’ve investigated. Where often a single occurence leads to a much bigger story, one that’s worth listening to.

I’ve done other lists of my favourite podcasts. Here’s a list of general, two-dudes talking type. Here’s science and productivity. Here’s book and mythology podcasts. And finally here’s even weirder interests like space, robots and chronic illness.

– stories – 

 

Reply All

• It’s about the internet
• I’m just going to give a list of my fav episodes, because there’s a lot of places to start this one
• Zardulu (#56) talking about a weird internet fenomena that is rat videos and the possible mind behind it
• Long distance (#102 og #103) where Alex Goldman goes on a hunt to find out who the telephone scammers are, leading him to travel to another country and making some strange new relationships. 
• Shipped to Timbuktu (#28) about a girl guide troop ending up in the Weihsien concentration camp in China
• Hello? (#82) where they take call-in’s for 48 hours straight
• Pain funnel (#121) about the US rehabs and how they’re run
• Boy in the photo (#79) about the long road trying to track down a guy at a college party (here’s the photo)
• The founder (#136) about Paul Le Roux, who went from a programmer to build himself up as the leader of a drug cartel from behind his computer.
• The reply all hotline (#139) with call-in stories, ending with a story from a Syrian refugee living in Turkey about the difficulties trying to create any future and wanting help navigating the Canadian college system. I cried so much. Everyone deserves hope. 

The Good News Podcast

• Tired of the bad news each day? Here’s some adorable, heartwarming or funny news to balance it out. From the Cards Against Humanity team.

The Anthropocene Reviewed

• Author and youtuber John Green’s new podcast where he reviews a couple very unrelated things that are “facets of the human-centered planet on a five-star scale”. With his calming voice and poetic phrasing. 
• Fav episodes: #10 about Tetris and the seed potatoes of Leningrad and #11 about teddy bears

S-Town

• One day an email arrives with the subject line “John B McLemore lives in Shittown Alabama.” John is a man who takes contact with the journalist Brian Reed, asking him to look into a possible murder in his town, which no one else is talking about. He lives in this small town, which he doesn’t have lack of problems with. As the journalist travels down to John he realizes his life and person comes of as interesting and slightly eccentric. But all his actions doesn’t make sense, he comes off as a loner, but then there’s all these people who knew him and slowly the story of John unfold.
• LABYRINTH, he made a freaking awesome labyrinth. It has nothing (and everything) to do with the story btw

 

Heavyweight

• In most peoples life there’s something that changes, some occurence or relationship that you don’t deal with or got to say everything you wanted to. This podcast host doesn’t let it be with that, as he drags everyone along trying to make things right. From trying to reunite grumpy men in their eighties to a woman finallly getting the answer from her step-mom to why she made her quit basketball. It all went in direction I didn’t expect.

My Favourite Podcasts: Space, robots, chronic illness

Here’s the general, two-dudes-talking type of podcasts I like. Here’s a list of book podcasts. And finally, here’s a list of science and productivity podcasts. Yes, there’s a lot of podcasts.

 

Hackable?

• Find out just how easy it is to be hacked and how it’s done. Usually faturing a hacker scene from a popular movie or tv series to debunk how close or far from reality they are.

 

Sickboy

• Hosts are Brian Stever, Jeremie Saunders and Taylor Macgillivary. Jeremie has cystic fibrosis.
• Chronic illness and humor combined, the three guys interviews people with all kinds of illnesses and injuries. The people, both hosts and interviewees, are really what makes this podcast hearthwarming, educational and often very funny. They’ve shown that even the episodes with deadly illnesses can have humour, without taking away from communicating the gravity of the people’s struggles and trouble. I’m chronically ill, mainly with crohn’s and a lung problem, and this is what I’ve been looking for without completely knowing so. Illness is tough, and talking about it means it gets heavy at times, but I think all people should know a bit more about diseases and in which ways it affects people’s lives.
• All episodes features fascinating people and I’m nowhere near having listened to them all. I would definitely recommend checking out the 1st episode about Jeremie’s cystic fibrosis, nr. 9 with ptsd, nr. 112 with multiple sclerosis (ms), nr 107 with zika virus and nr 75 with juvenile rheumatoroid arthritis. But they’re all pretty great.

Liftoff

• Space news and history (that part I skip) that you don’t have to be a rocket-scientist to understand. Very calming voices, so at the very least it’s good to fall asleep to, but I’m pretty into space and find it exciting.

My Favourite Murder

• I’ve listened to a few murder podcasts out there, this is the definite winner and the only one I still follow. Every once in a while something different, like a cult story, is thrown into the mix.
• Hosted by two lovely ladies, who needs all the credit for the amazing woman-empowering perspectives they give, Karen Kilgariff and Georgia Hardstark.

Nancy

• Stories and conversations about queer experiences today. Contains episodes that made me both laugh and cry. Talks about lgbt issues with interviews and history.

Roboism

• Savannah Million and Alex Cox from Do By Friday/Cards Against Humanity team
• Talks about robots! All the new, weird robots!

 

My Favourite Podcasts: Books and mythology

Could I have a book blog and not post my book podcast recommendations? I’ve already given my favourite general two-dudes-talking type here and science and productivity podcasts here.

– books and mythology –

The Legendarium

• They read and discuss fantasy series. The biggest book series they’ve covered is Brandon Sanderson’s books, Wheel of Time, Lord of the Rings and they’ve recently started Narnia. In between there’s discussions on movies and tv series, like Black Panther.

Unattended Consequences

• Patrick Rothfuss, author of The Name of the Wind (Kingkiller Chronicles) and Max Temkin from the podcast Do By Friday and the game Cards Against Humanity.
• Currently inactive, but it’s perfect for fans and book lovers

Reading Glasses

• Discusses books, book items and interview authors

Spirits

• Mythology, legends and lore from all cultures told by two hosts with a drink in hand. The themes varies widly, which I appreciate and along with the discussions it keeps it interesting. Personal favourites are nr. 55 Yuki-Onna, nr 43 Javanese Mermaid Queen, nr 40 Laumes and nr 32 The Butterfly Lovers.

Poetry Off the Shelf

• About poetry, obviously. Each episode seems to have a theme, The Wilderness is the first episode of series called A Change of World, and was amazing as it included women’s place in poetry from the 1800th century to now. They read poems out loud, and it’s wonderful, thought-provoking and calming.

My Favourite Podcasts: Science and Productivity

It’s time for my favourite kind of podcasts, science and productivity. I love listening to passionate people talking about science from a perspective you don’t get in class, with more humour. Here’s a post with the general, two-dudes-talking type podcasts I like.

 

– productivity –

Cortex

• Youtuber CGP Grey and relay-founder Myke Hurley dicuss their work as independent content creators

The College Info Geek Podcast

• A productivity podcast for students, discussing all kinds of decisions, troubles and tips students might need.

 

– science –

Ologies

• Alie Ward interviews one expert in a field about what they do, and proves no questions are stupid. It makes me want to work with a new thing each episode when I hear about what these awesome people do. Personal favourites are cosmology, horology, volcanology, gizmology and mythology. Lots of ologies.

Holy Fucking Science

• By the CrashCourse/vlogbrothers/Hank Green team
• Four people get together with the goal to amaze each other with facts about the universe and how they found out about them. Usually lots of laughs.

No Dumb Questions

• By youtubers Destin Sandlin and Matt Whittman
• Science and politics and all the dumb questions

Showmakers

• Youtubers Sam from Wendover Productions and Brian from Real Engineering interviews a third youtuber or science person about what happens behind the scenes.

 

Do you have any podcast recommendations?

My Favourite Podcasts: General

I listen to so many podcasts. It’s probably eaten into my reading time, but I’m more often available to listen to things while doing chores or getting ready, even eating.

Apparently the whole list of my favourite podcast was a lot for one post, which is probably a sign I should cut down on them. To start out, here’s the general/two people talking type of podcasts I listen to. Also narrowing down what these podcasts are about is difficult, because they’re mostly a mix of the hosts interests. Check them out for yourself! I would recommend listening to one of the latest episodes. Podcasts with more special interests like books or science will come later.

– two dudes* talking type – 

*not always two dudes, or even just two people

 

Hello Internet

• Youtubers CGP Grey and Brady Haran
• Nerdy. I have no idea how to sell this, but it’s probably my consistently favourite one.

Two Tims Talking

• A fan podcast of Hello Internet, it was started by
• listeners who talk about their lives and topics that interest them

Dear Hank and John

• Youtubers and authors Hank and John Green from vlogbrothers. It’s great.

Do By Friday

• Alex Cox, Max Temkin and Merlin Mann. First two are from the Cards Against Humanity team and Mann an experienced podcaster.
• Has a new challenge each week, along with weird internet news and humor

The Wikicast

• Youtuber and newly phd in physics Simon Clark and Dan Maw
• Talks about a random wikipedia page each week, mostly about everything else