💡 Strange lamps 📈 nerdy curves 💃 hey baby🕺🏻too many podcasts 🎙️
🍭 👂I wet myself but it was scary 🌈 🤸♀️
Bonjour.
Today is Monday, March 24, 2025. I wrote this kind of drunk and in the sun on a cruise ship so buckle up / bear with me. I can hardly see the screen lol. In case this newsletter is too long, I found a niche intersection of two of my favorite topics here, this is as much nerdy as it is fun, and after listening to the first episode of this I panicked until I secured the remaining episodes.
xoxo
lauren
P.S - If you’re interested in placing an ad in Podcast The Newsletter or Podcast Marketing Magic, fill out this form
👋q & a & q & a & q & a👋
Ryan Broderick
Ryan Broderick is a journalist and host of Panic World. He writes the Garbage Day newsletter.
Do you consider yourself a podcaster? Or just a creator or writer or what?
Identifying as any kind of creator is embarrassing, but the only thing, in my opinion, more embarrassing than identifying as a podcaster is identifying as a YouTuber.
Describe Panic World in 10 words or less.
Witch hunts, moral panics, viral freakouts, fun times, oh yeah.
You started with your newsletter, Garbage Day, which I love. What made you decide making a podcast was the right decision.
My producer Grant and I had been kicking around ideas for about a year before we started working on it. I was hesitant to start a podcast just because they're very tough to grow and Garbage Day felt like a big enough job. But the idea we settled on felt too perfect to pass up.
Was it the right decision?
So far so good! We're growing a good sized audience and it's opening up new opportunities that the newsletter couldn't. Plus it's a lot of fun.
What was your goal for the podcast when you started it?
What is the goal for your podcast now?
Pretty much the same as when we started. We were really inspired by shows like Maintenance Phase, Behind The Bastards, and also film podcasts like Blank Check or How Did This Get Made. We want it to be fun, but also informative. Obviously, we want it to keep growing and pay the bills, so to speak, but ultimately we're trying to build a unique news-focused show and it's been a lot of fun figuring out how to do that.
How do you think about having a podcast and newsletter together…do they work together? Do you speak to the audiences separately?
We thought they would but the truth is they really don't. Based on what we can see, the majority of people only get podcast recommendations from other podcasts. There's a barrier between text and audio and no one wants to cross it. Which I sort of blame on podcast apps and social platforms more than actual users. But the two projects do fit together nicely I think and we're brainstorming ways of making them fit better together in the future.
How would you describe your audience? Can you give me like 5 words?
We actually don't know yet! I've done a bunch of live Garbage Day events and I feel like I understand who they are, but I really don't know what the average Panic World listener is like yet. Which is kind of exciting.
How do you book guests and plan episodes?
My producer Grant and I have a big spreadsheet of topics. We try to record them a month or two out and so we have a backlog to choose from. We pick guests not because they are experts in a subject, but closer to how film podcasts do it: Is this person excited about the topic? Then our researcher Adam does a deep dive into the topic, Grant throws it together into an outline, and then I handle things once we get on mic. We don't want it to feel scripted, but we do want it to be paced well and flow nicely.
If you were going to make aNOTHER podcast…don’t worry about any of the logistics, if it’s possible at all (there is no time and space) or whether or not ANYONE would like it…this podcast is for you and your budget is $1M…what would it be?
I know my producer Grant has some projects he's dying to do, but I, honestly, would love to do a super self-indulgent documentary, complete with sound design and music I do all myself. I really love that stuff — I did the Panic World theme — and I used to do little musical motifs and stuff for my previous show The Content Mines back when I had more time. I would basically use a podcast as an excuse to get super in the weeds on sound design and scoring lol.
🚨If u only have time for 1 thing🚨
Statisticians and science writers Regina Nuzzo and Kristin Sainani have formed an audio Journal club called Normal Curves, where they look at scientific studies and try to help us make sense of them. The math and science are interesting, the vibes are good. (Regina and Kristin are friends which is so clear. One of the best fun facts you’ll learn early on is that they were friends in school via their boyfriends who were friends with one another. The boyfriends are long gone.) Regina and Kristin are looking at scientific studies the way Biblical scholars look at the Bible. What is the context that this study was written? In the first episode they go over that study about pheromones attracting sexual partners. (Or not.) This episode is a bit of a mea culpa, they both have referenced this study (weakly?) in their own work. This episode is also about a widely cited study that’s not as good as we thought it was, the inappropriate use of bar charts (not so good for numerical data!,) and science writers wandering away from data like horses galloping into the wilderness because in the end…I wrote this in my notes in all caps…BECAUSE WE ALL WANT A GOOD STORY. Regina and Kristi start off with an episode called “Who are we and what are we about” which is such a comfy intro to the two of them. By the time episode one hit I was like “here are my FRIENNNDS!!!” More podcasts should do this sort of thing. Listen to that if nothing else.
notes
✨WEDNESDAY is my next Marketing 101 Radio Bootcamp, sign up here.
✨I’m following up with a Podcast PR 101 class, sign up here! It’s the first time I’m doing it, I have so much stuff I want to share.
✨Sign up for Jennifer Johnson Avril’s Radio Bootcamp “Storytelling for activists” (3/30) here. Very timely.
✨I’m speaking at Podcast Movement Evolutions with Arielle Nissenblatt next month and am so excited. Come find us!
✨Thanks to Deanna Chapman for having me on The Podcast Life to talk about marketing. Listen here.
✨Arielle spotlighted Teaching Through Emotions in EarBuds.
💎podcasts i texted to friends💎
👂On Belief in the Future, host David Zvi Kalman intersects two huge subjects that I rarely see intersected—religion and technology. When I discovered it and saw all of the episodes I felt like a giddy school girl subscribing to each one faster than the next. In fact, when I started listening to the DeathGPT episode, I thought “oh this is boring, skipping for now.” Imagine that subject being BORING. That is how cool I found the rest of the episodes, how cool all of these conversations are. An episode about the Bible talked about how Christians use apps to spread the good word, but think about how social media and technology change how we experience the world. Are we getting fed some parts, are others being hidden? That’s a big question. What does reading the Bible through an app do to our faith? Also interesting to hear that Christians will listen to the Bible on apps like background music, all throughout the day. I think this conversation was so eye-opening because to many people, faith is the most important thing they have. So examining how they fit technology into that very close relationship is worth it. We all struggle with our relationship with technology, let’s look at the people who have to think about it when the stakes are so, so high. On another episode, David talked to an expert in the sociological impacts of technology on religious communities about how the Amish view technology and compared that to how he does as someone who grew up Orthodox Jewish. Both communities have rules about how they are to interact with technology that I’ve always assumed I understood, but I was wrong. You don’t want a play by play of these episodes, do you? Don’t you want the same excitement I had when I looked at the feed for the first time? Listen here!
How I discovered it: It was a potential Tink client call. Not sure if I’ll get hired but I found a new favorite show!
👂Listen, I’m watching White Lotus, I just started watching Gossip Girl for the first time (it is way better than Severance)...I love rich people doing bad things and getting into trouble. I also went to a boarding school which means I grew up around a lot of rich kids without tons of supervision which means I was exposed to some really bleak, screwed up things and learned a lot about privilege and power at a young age. That is why I was drawn to (In) Justice: Killer Privilege. It’s about the murder of Alex Morgan, who was killed by his friend Bennet, the son of an ultra-rich art dealer. But it was brutal. Alex had 50 injuries to his head alone. Bennet had rammed a candlestick down his throat. There are more details but they’re honestly too gross. It’s a level of brutality that’s hard to fathom. Bennet’s defense was that this was done in self-defense. He believed Alex was an alien with green ears and red eyes trying to kill him. (They were on a ton of drugs.) I listened to the first episode, the only episode available publicly, then panicked because I wanted more so badly that I was kind of annoying to the Wondery team, who let me binge the whole thing, which I did in a single morning. It isn’t quite like I thought it’d be, it’s not only about how fucked up rich people are. Although there is a good bit dedicated to the psychology of the wealthy, “golden cage syndrome,” and the way very rich young people feel invincible, are self-destructing and reckless, sometimes have violent streaks, and oddly, sometimes are living in the shadows of their absent fathers??? But this show is really about Alex’s mom, Katja Faber, who fought and fought and fought. She went from mother to fighter to get justice for her son, which is very hard to get if the person who murdered him is very, very rich. She was fighting that, as well as Article 263, a funny little loophole that says when people are drugs they are not responsible for what they are doing.I wish she didn’t have to take on this role but she’s very good at it. So often it's the moms who become freakish warriors in these situations. Listen here.
How I discovered it: I have a Google alert for “best podcasts” that I hardly ever read but one of them pointed me toward an article in The Times about it.
👂On The Novelizers gets comedy writers to rewrite movies, turning them into funny audiobooks, and then he gets comedians and actors to act out the script. The new season is tackling Dirty Dancing, and so far has featured the writing of Rich Talarico and Jordon Morris and narration of Rachel Dratch and Jesse Thorn. (The Jordan/Jesse one is so good I listened to it once to appreciate the writing and another time to hear Jesse’s read.) Scene one opens with Baby and her family driving to Kellerman’s (with a direct reference to the Torrence family driving up to The Outlook Hotel in The Shining) and introduces lots of meta jokes about Jerry Orbach’s career as a NYC detective and Lumiere, the singing candlestick in Beauty and the Beast. It’s cheeky, feels breezy, and is just one more way for me to inject a hint of Dirty Dancing into my veins. It’s an excellent combination of witty writing with hilarious reads. Episodes also include interviews with people who worked on the actual movie, and on episode one we get Liza Minella, acted by Matteo Lane. Matteo is so fucking talented, his Liza Meinellei impressions are my favorite. Start here.
How I discovered it: I believe Arielle recommended this to me ages ago, she discovered it through work and thought I’d like it because I love reading and she was right?
👂Jody Avirgan (This Day in Esoteric Political History, 30 for 30, GOOD SPORT, tons of other stuff…) launched Summer Album / Winter Album with Craig Finn of The Hold Steady (lol I’m sure most people would intro Craig first but my podcast-coated heart thinks of audio people first.) They are convinced that every album is one or the other, a summer album or a winter album, and this podcast is their debate about which is which. Each episode has a guest that helps explore the album and finally, at the end, the artist who made the album pops on for a final verdict. I love a show with a mission and a winner, and also one that has a philosophy that can be applied to awkward silences and at parties or places in need of a good ice breaker. And this one simple question, winter or summer, is a spring board into some really nuanced conversations about music. (I also don’t think we talk about albums enough.) Which side you choose depends on you as much as the artist. (Episode one is about Modest Mouse’s “The Lonesome Crowded West” and the second is Vampire Weekend’s “Modern Vampire Of The City, two picks that are on their way to Dad Rock.) Spoiler alert: when Jody and Craig ask Ezra to weigh in on the season for “Modern Vampire,” he says March 8, and who doesn’t respect odd specificity?) Listen here.
How I discovered it: I follow Jody, it did a live event at On Air Fest.
👂Lost Women of Science is a podcast that uncovers the stories of forgotten female scientists who didn't get the credit they deserved, and for Women’s History Month they are running The Extraordinary Life and Tragic Death of Evangelina Rodríguez Perozo, a five-part series about the first female doctor in the Dominican Republic. It truly is one of the most remarkable stories about a woman who had not just nothing (she was poor) but worse than that—she was a woman with dark skin growing up in the aftermath of The DR’s somewhat recent liberation, her father was out of the picture and she, to top it all off, kept on getting leprosy. But Evangelina wanted to go to PARIS this woman saw stars and she fucking got there. She ends up somehow graduating from med school and setting up sexual health clinics and milk banks for struggling new mothers in the DR. As if that story were not interesting enough, the title of the podcast hints at her tragic ending which I don’t want to spoil for you but it has something to do with a dictatorship and imprisonment. The season is available in both English and Spanish, and is narrated by Laura Gómez (Orange is the New Black.) Start here (for English…Spanish can be located in the same feed.)
How I discovered it: Nice email that didn’t feel like a pitch at all, but pretty much was.
👂Hot and Bothered is doing a series on films based on classic literature set in high school, which might sound niche but there’s a lot. (Vanessa Zoltan and Hannah McGregor just did a good episode on 10 Things I Hate About You which pairs nicely with the 10 Things I Hate About You episode of Sentimental Garbage that also recently came out. The other day I told someone I just watched 10 Things I Hate About you and realized I had not, I have just been consuming a lot of TTIHAY content. Anyway the format of this series is: Vanessa and Hannah dedicate to one episode to a review of the whole film, picking apart themes and putting everything into context, and then there is a special episode about the final scene. I love the specificity of digging into those last few moments. Emma Stone’s Easy A is a favorite of mine but I’ve never been able to put my finger on why until now. Vanessa and Hannah take us back to the 1800s when Nathaniel Hawthorn was writing The Scarlet Letter and explain why the rom com of Easy A is more closely tied to Nathaniel Hawthorn’s definition of romance than the modern one. They point out a ton of positive things about this film (the portrayal of parents, the hypocrisy of Evangelical Christianity) and the bad (the myth that is “losing your virginity” which this film seems to believe in, the portrayal of friendship.) But my favorite thing they pointed out was about how to survive high school, something that seems so unlikely (and now that I have a daughter I am thinking about that more) but can be done with a sense of humor. I survived with a sense of humor, that’s the tool that allowed Olive Penderghast to survive, too. THAT’S THE KEY YOU GUYS. Listen here and here.
How I discovered it: Longtime subscriber.
👂When The Wolves Came is a new show from my friends The Mash-Up Americans about the rise of White Christian Nationalism and how the rise of MAGAChurches has shaped our country’s policies and politics. It starts with “the Great White Christian Freak Out” of 2015 that was supercharged by Trump, leading up to now, when we are seeing a divide open up in the Evangelical Church. Did you know how different White Christian Nationalism is than plain old regular Evangelicalism? I thought I did, but the WCN movement makes Evangelism look like Mister Rogers. (That is a Mrs Doubtfire quotation that I’ve been using way longer than anyone should. Also was Mister Rogers Evangelical? Probably! Never meet your heroes!) The story is tied to this Neo Nazi skinhead-turned pastor who is leading a resistance to the extremism of White Christian Nationalism, which believes that this country needs to be white, straight, and definitely not a woman. They have extremely different interpretations of the Bible and believe it is their responsibility to save America by controlling the government etc. They believe this stronger than I guarantee you believe in most things and they are willing to die for it. This is an important thing to know right now but also important to hear that there are pockets of resistance where you least expect. This show has great storytelling, fascinating interviews, and is beautifully made. Listen here.
How I discovered it: Email from Rebecca Lehrer
👂On Sound Heap, John-Luke Roberts, the CEO and “Fun Captain” of Sound Heap, Inc., (mission statement: “Make Too Many Podcasts,” “offering something for everyone, and quite a few things for no one at all”) lets us sample podcasts from Sound Heap. It’s a kaleidoscope of funny, beautifully made skits, each one totally different than the next, with totally unique sound design and a variety of talented voice actors. I like these episodes for the same reason I love short stories, they’re great to dip into. One podcast about different ways to say Timothy Chalomet actually sounded like poetry. I completely fell for the sweet idiot guest on the podcast “Things Described to an Idiot” who called sports “a little war with costumes.” One history show, “Then, Then, Then, Then, Then, Then, Then, and Now” reveals that when you pour over George Washington’s diaries you find an insecure, cagey young man who felt an erotic urge to chop down cherry trees before feeling a great deal of shame which led to why he insists he would never tell a lie about the cherry trees. Listen here.
How I discovered it: Sometimes I just go to Maxfun.org and click on things and I think that’s how I found this.
👂Curious Tourism is doing a series on White Lotus, watching the entire series episode by episode through the lens of (ir)responsible travel. They’re going to be giving awards to the cringiest travel moments and even crowning a “most conscientious traveler” award, which should be extremely hard. This is a fun way to watch the show and a smart way for a podcast to tie their content to it. Yes I am aware that I listening to a podcast about responsible travel while on a cruise ship. At least it’s making me feel bad. Start here.
How I discovered it: Email from Kattie Laur
👂I love you!
❤️ Podcast Tink Loves ❤️ Before the Chorus
So much happens even before musicians hit record on a song. They think, live, and feel a LOT. Before the Chorus is about that part of their stories. Hosted by award-winning journalist Sofia Loporcaro, the podcast goes beyond the sounds of our favorite songs to hear the stories of the artists who wrote them. Sofia, who has often spoken about how music helped her embrace her OCD, combines her expansive music knowledge and her own experiences with mental health to connect with artists on a meaningful level. She's interviewed musicians like Julien Baker, Feist, and Mon Rovîa.
Thank you, Lauren, I listened to Normal Curves and thoroughly enjoyed it. I'll review it in April.