Podcast Recommendations
by Dillan-James Carter
via pixabay.com
The sun is finally reappearing in Aberdeen and the exam pressure is building. These two things mean one thing: it will all be over soon… well uni anyway. So, as we begin the mad dash to the final deadlines, a podcast might just be the right thing to practise your crying as you hop on the Megabus or plane back home (especially if you’re saying tara to that dude who always laughs too much at the lecturer’s crap jokes).
Beautiful Stories from Anonymous People
For five months my parents’ landline was barraged not by the usual cold calls and ‘quick’ surveys but from an elderly woman named Susan who was ringing for her daughter Barbara. For these few months, Susan would ask for Barbara, be disappointed for not reaching her and hang up without saying goodbye; only to ring back the next week with no memory of this recurring scenario. From this experience I wonder what if, for one of these myriad of calls, I’d pulled up a chair and chatted with the addled OAP about her hopes, fears, regrets. Beautiful Stories from Anonymous People from the comedian Chris Gethard is the ‘what if’ podcast. Chris talks to a random caller for an hour and chats about whatever they want to and then hangs up, never to speak to them again. Ranging from the mundane chats of podcast creation and interviews, to calls from a man who can’t stop crying after going for a run and a woman who had been groomed by her teacher as a child, Beautiful Stories is a deeply compelling format which allows you to listen to the life of someone you’ll never meet nor hear again.
Griefcast Episode 23: Jen Offord
Cariad Lloyd hosts Griefcast, a podcast in which fellow comedians recount their experiences with death. Inspired by the death of her dad when she was a child and her observation that the topic of death is buried six feet under, Lloyd makes a light-hearted show on a topic which stunts British sensibilities. “Episode 23: Jen Offord” is a perfect example of why this podcast won Podcast of the Year 2018 as its blend of tragedy and comedy is so endearing you can’t tell whether the tears pooling from your eyes were from laughter or misery.
Offord lost her older brother to suicide while at university and recounts getting the news and having to organise to get back home with not a penny to her name. During this dreadful time, her uni mates piled into her closet-sized room with a pack of cigarettes each to console her while her lift travelled to collect her. The imagery of this scene is oddly satisfying for such a morbid occurrence, but I feel that if something horrid were to happen in my life, it’s all I’d ever want. If you’ve ever been through the five stages, this podcast will highly resonant with you and change the narrative of bereavement needing to be buried.
99% Invisible Game Over
A short but sweet episode from the acclaimed podcast 99% Invisible created by Roman Mars – the man whose voice makes you believe in a divine aural god. “Game Over” covers the end of an online server: ‘The Sims Online’, which after a lack of sales was turned off. Unlike other massively multiplayer games, you weren’t killing orcs or flossing on the corpse of your latest kill, but you were just socialising with people from around the globe; which makes the end-times so heartbreaking as the community comes together for the last hurrah. If you’re looking for a podcast which covers a sudden e
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