🤳 10 podcasts I texted my friends (cassette tapes, TWO beloved show returns, the scariest thing)
🍭 👂 "I guess we pinballers have always been risk takers" 🌈 🤸♀️
Bonjour.
Today is Monday October 13, 2025. I don’t have space for links again, but here’s a note: If you have ever picked up a recommendation from me or Podcast the Newsletter, I want to hear about it! I’m compiling a special issue of my recommendations that have worked and want to include you. (That means I’ll shout out your show or whatever you’re working on.) Respond to this email if you have one.
xoxo
lauren
🚨the one thing🚨
I love RESONATE, Chioke I’Anson’s audio festival for creators. I went to the first time last year and I swear to god hearing about the way great audio people make audio broke my brain. I didn’t KNOW that sound had shape!!! This year, Tink is working with RESONATE to co-produce a podcast called Pitch Party, which features a bunch of incredible podcast pilots from the best independent producers in the biz. We are doing this in hopes to get them in front of the right people who can offer these creators funding. If that’s you, give it a listen. But even if it’s not, listen anyway. You might hear one of the best things you’ll hear all year. I felt that way about every single one. They are all completely unique and made with such care, and all are accompanied by a standalone interview with the creator about what they made, why they did it, and what they need. The first piece, “Heart Trouble” by Katelyn Hale Wood, has arrived. It’s about Katelyn connecting with her dad, Sid Wood, who died of a sudden heart attack when she was a baby, via old cassette recordings of him on air as a country radio DJ. It seems almost like a miracle that she has all of these these tapes that they have survived. But it’s a scary miracle, right? Meeting and grieving a person you don’t know but is part of you? (We generally don’t know how to grieve normal things.) This is a packed emotional experience. But Katelyn is also learning about country music and how her dad…the loss of her dad… fits into her life now. How much convincing do I have to do to get you to listen? It’s about why we are all here, connecting with others via sound. In this case the other is very, very far away. She’s looking for funding and distribution, is open to co-production, and has secured a grant from University of Virginia. If you can help email us at pitchparty@tinkmedia.co.
~sponsored~
What’s Next? With Lacey is the career podcast for anyone who’s ever Googled “What does a marketing coordinator actually do?” or “How do people even get jobs in health tech?” Hosted by Lacey, it’s your backstage pass into the careers you’ve heard of — but don’t fully understand.
Every other week, Lacey chats with young professionals across industries like entertainment, finance, education, and everything in between. Think of it as an unfiltered informational interview, minus the awkward LinkedIn cold message. Guests share what their day-to-day really looks like, how they got their start, what they wish they’d known earlier, and what it’s actually like behind the job title.
No corporate-speak, just honest conversations that make the working world feel more accessible and less mysterious, whether you’re in college, mid-job hunt, reconsidering your path, or just nosy about what other people do all day.
Get to know Lacey in this solo episode about the real power of networking.
⭐️Reply to this email for classified ads and sponsorship opportunities. ⭐️
notes
✨The Audio Storyteller featured an interview with award-winning documentary maker Sayre Quevedo, who tells stories about identity and human relationships. He was formerly a producer for NYT’s The Daily and Vice News. We talk about narrative structure, trusting our listeners, and interviewing for non-narrated stories.
“The thing I most want for my work is for the audience to feel that things are unfolding naturally. Because that, to me, is what life feels like. At its best, our work is reflecting life back to the audience – reflecting the form and feeling of life.”
✨Yesterday, Arielle featured 5 funny true crime podcasts (curated by Barry Rothbart of Searching for Allan Rothbart) in EarBuds.
💎podcasts i texted to friends💎
👂I listened to the first two episodes of A Whole Other Country and was like hmmmmm this reminds me of something, what is it? It was not occurring to me, so originally this write up said “I can’t figure out what this reminds me of so I’ll get back to you.” But I was on one of my Wawa Walks when it struck me—Cement City, one of my favorite shows of last year. Zoe Kurland is going deep into Western Texas The Davis Mountains Resort (the DMR for short) to tell the story of Rick McLaren, a guy who grew up in Ohio and moved to Texas to start a winery but ended up building a republic that declared war on the US government and pulled his neighbors into a real life wild west standoff that killed people. It’a juicy story, something happens. But it doesn’t have to. The reasons I loved this story was the writing and storytelling and sound. Zoe is bringing her microphone around this closed-off place that is really something. It’s an “empty spot on the map,” a place that attracts drifters from far away who might be running from something. It doesn’t have mail delivery or municipal water system or cell service. An ornery, braying donkey butts in on one of Zoe’s interviews with Rick’s old neighbors, who are still there. She describes the DMR like a painting or illustration, but I see the people like paintings or illustrations, too. The details she gives them (“her hair a gold platinum cloud, wearing so many rings we couldn’t shake hands,” “a woman in a purple sweatshirt driving the biggest truck I’ve ever seen.”) I cannot remember the last time I heard such rich and textured audio. It feels far-out quiet, she captures those twangy accents, the music sounds like a hazy dusk. We hear educational videos and her mother singing the Davy Crockett song. (This is to illustrate that this is personal for Zoe, who has always felt drawn to the west.) The names are fantastic. One guy they talked about is called “Skinny Friend” but nobody knows his real name. This is a story about a guy building a wild west town but it’s also a story that unlocks answers to the question: “What are the consequences when cowboy cosplay gets weaved into real life?” Where else does myth get lived out this way? Press releases are usually stupid and it’s almost always stupider when someone from the team gets quoted in it (IMHO) but here we get a great quote from the show’s editor Liza Yeager (yes that one, from Planet Money, Invisiblia, Radiolab…) that says it so, so well. “Poetic meditations on land and mythology are knitted together with jokester adventures and small town small talk—plus, of course, a lot of classic cinema-style Wild West drama. In a podcasting landscape where too much sounds the same, this show is a breath of fresh air. Listen to A Whole Other Country here.
How I discovered it: Press release
👂If you knew that aliens were going to take over the world in fifty years, would you be worried? Just in time for spooky season, The Last Invention argues that this is our new reality, not with aliens so much, but AI. Rough Translation’s Gregory Warner is sharing the history of AI, examining what human intelligence really is and what our future looks like, and is considering the different approaches and schools of thought about how to best prepare ourselves. The Last Invention isn’t saying the world will look different, it’s saying the world is already over, the way we think of jobs, schools, the nation state. All over. And it’s not presented like it’s a conspiracy theory or a secret. This was the show I listened to this week, maybe even this year, that had me taking the most notes, sending to the most people. I talked about the first two episodes for an hour with my husband. It’s thoughts on AI I’ve never heard before, told with eye-opening interviews and chilling storytelling. It’s not just the facts it’s the way things are framed. You’re worried about ChatGPT? That’s adorable. This podcast took my brain to scary places it’s never been before, like a future where the AI has built better AI, and that AI has built even better AI…to the point that we are just ants to them. They don’t want to fucking annihilate us, but they will kill us if we get in the way and they will take away all of our rights. This podcast isn’t trying to scare us, it’s informative. But it’s the scariest thing I’ve listened to in a long time. Listen to The Last Invention here.
How I discovered it: Gregory Warner told me about it but it’s everywhere
👂Listen, there has been some bad news in podcasting lately,and it has been so long since we were blessed with a new episode of Love Me that I had made peace with the fact that it would never come back. Don’t be sorry it ended, be glad it existed, Lauren. I have relistened to old episodes like a comforting soundtrack. I was shocked to see that it was back, not shocked to hear how good it still is. Two episodes dropped last week. The first, “Undeniable,” produced by trans creator Xander Adams, is a day-by-day audio journal of Xander’s experience getting facial feminization surgery. It’s honest and funny and while I was listening I wrote down the words “graphic messy raw real pain messy owwww.” That graphic nature is necessary. Beauty is gross and horrifying underneath. (Did you see The Substance?) The writing is amazing, (“I looked like a bloated mummy pulled fresh from the water,” “my face was a skin flab stapled to my head.”) But don’t forget funny. (“Oh my god I’m J Edgar Hoover!”) It’s transactional to have a doctor say to you, “you don’t need to change your chin because it is already feminine” and at the same time it’s the most personal, emotional thing ever. The stakes are high. Would Xander pass for pretty or would all this be for nothing? The next piece was reminiscent of a Heavyweight episode in the best, best way. In “My Dead Mother’s Italian Lover” Peter confronts the man who loved his mom before he was born, after his mom died, to explore how close he came to not existing. In conversations with his brothers and yeah, his dead mom’s Italian lover, he connects dots to reveal things he never knew about his mom, like the fact that she was probably thinking about leaving the family. But she didn’t leave. So now Peter is thinking about her, who she is now to him with this new information, and about the life she decided to stay in. The whole life path that Peter existed on “almost got pruned.” (The writing is good here, too.) Love Me is about human connection and this story, with audio of phone calls (the brother, at one point, is doing his laundry) connects people from all over the world on both sides of the grave, and the past, present, and future. Listen to Love Me here.
How I discovered it: Email from CBC
👂Whenever people tell me they don’t like fiction podcasts I say, listen to an episode of The Truth and come back to me. It always changes people’s minds. Partially because it is top tippy top notch in everything from production to writing to voice acting to how goddam funny and smart it is, partially because it is a comfortable gateway for people. The episodes usually start out in something pretty relatable, two friends at dinner, a guy at the gym, a mom with her baby. It’s approachable. The stories are so, so human. It’s like, you like TV shows, right? How could you not like this, it’s better. So I felt a real kick in the gut when it went away. I get it—it’s good = expensive, hard to make. But I really do think it’s done a lot of good for turning people into more experimental listeners. So huge news, it’s back, thanks to a passionate community of listeners who supported a fundraising campaign earlier this year. (They made vinyl pressings of two classic episodes—Moon Graffiti and Silvia’s Blood.) The episode it returns with is really an audio delight, it takes place in Perry’s Submarine, a NYC pin ball hall run by Perry, a sweet nerd seriously obsessed with pin ball. His obsession ends up getting him a bit tangled up with a pinball-loving mafioso who he thinks he saw in his arcade. He convinces the NYPD to buy him a rare pinball machine in order to lure the mob boss inside to trap him. I don’t want to give too much away but there is a hilarious news segment that is so funny I listened twice in a row. I saw behind-the-scene photos of this recording, producers holding mics up to real pinball machines. It is so much fun to hear, and the story got me thinking about my own obsessions in a way I never have. Listen to Operation Skill Shot here.
How I discovered it: Longtime listener but Jonathan Mitchell sent me an email
👂Endless Thread and 99% Invisible have teamed up for a ridiculously fun, Endless Thread-y, 99 Percent Invisible-y mini-series called “Hidden Levels,” all about the invisible ways video games have shaped the physical world we live in. I’m in love with the way they collaborated—they joined their teams so seamlessly that they basically created a new show you could call Endless Invisible or 99% Endless or Invisible Thread. They worked completely together, shared vision, voice, producers, from the very start. The show will be appearing on both feeds with some bonus episodes in the Endless Thread feed. (This is suchhhhh a hallmark of Roman Mars, who is the gold standard of collaboration, sharing the mic, unearthing voices and stories that need to be heard.) Episode one, about NBA Jam, isn’t just a fun, nostalgic story but the perfect story for audio. Producer James Parkinson talks to the voice of the video game’s basketball game’s announcer, Tim Kitzrow, aka Boom Shakalacka man, about how he got a job saying pithy bangers like “REJECTED!” And we see what made this game different, how it changed not just video gaming but basketball, and the things we learned about gaming from watching it become a hit. (It made a reported $1 billion in quarters in its first year.) This episode actually reminded me of one of the best, most beloved episodes of 99% Invisible ever, “Whomst Among Us Let The Dogs Out.” Listen to Hidden Levels Ep. 1: Mr. Boomshakalaka here.
How I discovered it: Email from Ben Brock Johnson
👂It’s been 10 years since the launch of My Dad Wrote a Porno, where Jamie Morton reads, chapter by chapter, from Belinda Blinked, a porn novel his dad wrote under the pseudonum Rocky Flintstone, with James’ friends James and Alice in attendance. To celebrate the milestone, the team is releasing remastered versions of season 1. I listened to the show ten years ago, wasn’t that into it, and moved on. You know how 16 year olds shouldn’t be able to make decisions? I don’t think I should have been able to make a forever judgment on a show so beloved for a decade after listening to part of an episode once. So I’m listening to the remasters, which are dropping each day. ICYMI: In this very first episode, Jamie Morton introduces us to the heroine of the book, Belinda Blumenthal, reading a scene that has Belinda interviewing for the job of her dreams—worldwide sales director of a pots and pans company. I know you probably know this already, but it’s hysterical. The writing is unsexy and not hot but also NSFW at the same time. It’s bad for everyone. There is so much awkward description of sex it’s like aliens have written it. Before Belinda even gets naked (something that happens pretty quickly) I started to wonder why I ever dismissed this show. I love things that are so bad they go past bad and return to good. One thing that makes this podcast so funny, among other things, is Rockey’s dedication and attention to detail in the book. Another is the commentary. And forcing your brain to imagine the logistics of some of this stuff and the motivation of these characters is really quite the mental exercise. Listen to S1E1 - ‘The Job Interview’ REMASTERED here.
How I discovered it: I have been a subscriber for 10 years though have never really listened but my interest was piqued when I saw the remasters in my feed
👂The Curtis Flowers season of In the Dark is one of the best investigative series I’ve heard and it also helped free Curtis Flowers from jail for a crime he did not do, after almost twenty-three years of being inside. We got a surprise bonus episode from Madeleine and producer Samara Fremark, who went back to Winona, Mississippi, where Curtis’ troubles began, to catch up with him. The first thing they see is his car, his bumper sticker says “locally hated.” He’s caring for his aging dad, now a widow. Curtis’ mom died while he was in prison. This catch-up is full of a lot of things, sweet moments between Curtis and his dad who sing together, some sadness at the end. One of the things is how racism can shape the outcome of a criminal trial in the US. That is why we are all here. This is the episode that is hanging in my mind like a fog this week. Listen to Season 2 Update: Five Years Later here.
How I discovered it: Longtime listener but someone called it out on Reddit and honestly I might have missed it if hadn’t read that
👂In the early days,I was a casual watcher of America’s Next Top Model, Tyra Bank’s reality TV show that tested aspiring models to see if they had what it took to be on top in the modeling world. Even if you’ve never seen it, you’ve heard clips of Tyra shrieking at a contestant, “I was rooting for you! We were all rooting for you!” When Wil Williams recommended Curse: America’s Next Top Model to me I listened to the first episode and said, “feels like a book report.” I take it back, things are getting interesting. First of all, this show is for superfans of the show or Tyra or fashion or reality TV or celebrity culture. Or, true crime? Can this be considered a true crime series? I do believe Tyra had good intentions but the way these women were used and abused for entertainment feels especially heinous. This was pretty early days of reality TV, and Tyra wasn’t super rich yet. She was making this show on the cheap. (If you look closely, or even not that closely, it shows.) Add that to the fact that modeling can be pretty fucked up and you have yourself a big old mess. Something that kept popping into my head as I listened was, “at the end of the day this is a show about contracts from hell.” (These women thought that signing these contracts would make their dreams come true, for many people it ruined their lives.) Host Bridget Armstrong goes through the contracts, reading us some of the craziest sentences I’ve ever heard. (One line is literally about Tyra owning your life story in “every universe” or something.) But then I got to the part about the psyche evaluations and I was like, “Oh noooo, this show is about psyche evaluation.” The show did these mental evaluations, which are necessary for reality TV, but also can be used as a way to exploit contestants. Producers want to find out if this person is stable enough to do this, technically. Or do they? Do they want to find out if the contestants have been through some abusive relationships they want to spill about? (Domestic abuse history seemed to be something they were almost looking for—dark enough to drop a viewer’s job but it’s not murder, right?) Bridget is interviewing past contestants and other experts to find the truth about what happened behind the scenes, what the show was hiding or just blatantly lying about, and what being on ANTM does to your career. (Hint: it ruins it. It ruins your career.) Listen to Curse: America’s Next Top Model here.
👂Ear Hustle has spent seasons and seasons in men’s prisons, has started dabbling in women’s prisons, and now for a 6-part series called “The Loop,” is catching up with kids (in NYC specifically) caught up in the criminal justice system. They’re spying into this thing in one of the prisons called Drama Club, that lets kids practice improv together. Earlonne is in a way, in a loop with these kids. He sees himself, nothing much has changed, this is a cycle that keeps repeating. As for Nigel, “these fucking teenagers, man.” She has never been so scared or intimidated. Imagine what it must take to intimidate Nigel Poor at this point. Now imagine trying to get these kids to be vulnerable and silly. It seems to me that it could go really well or really poorly. Silliness is likely not a survival skill they’ve honed. But we know kids want routine structure and safety and these kids need it more than ever. Hearing audio of them and how childlike they are forces you to come to terms with the fact that these kids are so far away from everything kids should be near. You want to hug them. My favorite girl, Tiny, says that she just loved the Oreos they put out and the fact that “this nice ass lady came up to me and asked about me. I can be my kid-self in a nasty ass jail. I can be a cowboy.” Anyway Earlonne and Nigel are not sugarcoating this. The first day was hard. Nigel calls it “crushing and demoralizing, hell.” This series looks like it’s going to be a look into the extremes of light and dark. Listen to the first episode of The Loop here.
How I discovered it: Longtime listener
I love you!
The only danger of reading this newsletter is that my 'to-listen' list gets dangerously long. Always love the way you write about podcasts Lauren!
You’re getting a shout out in my review tomorrow!