- Q: What do you call three average white people having a mid-life crisis?
- A: A podcast!
Now I’ve started with this fabulous, brilliant, splendid, marvellous, (insert your favourite synonym for awesome) joke, let’s be serious. I'm just kidding. Who wants to be serious?
But no, seriously, I'm not being mildly hilarious or immensely sarcastic for no reason. The joke above is true. We are living in the era of podcast overpopulation, and it’s causing a problem for a lot of people who don’t have time to find great podcasts for themselves because they are too busy wasting time efficiently.
Human beings have always had the attention span of a goldfish, and living in this time of information overload has made it so that no one gives more than a minute to anything in their life that isn’t the thing that keeps an aesthetic roof over their heads and a Starbucks Pink Drink in their hands (this is me throwing shade to people who care too much about the colour of their drink, and if you are one, I'm sorry for being mean. I'm actually not mean, it is just a long-standing habit of withering ridicule, which I cannot control, no matter how hard I try).
But that’s what I am here for, oh amazing, aesthetic, pink drink-loving people. Consider me your friendly neighbourhood podcast list curator. So, before I got into podcasting myself, I was a huge podcast listener.
I don’t have a favourite show though. That is a lie. It is CRIMINAL, which is my guilty pleasure, but nobody knows that. I usually cover the trail by listening to a few Science V/S episodes, and nobody will ever know.
I still am a big podcast listener, and I have spent hours finding out the best podcasts to listen too, so you don’t have to. Here are my top five picks for the best podcasts to listen to in 2022.
1. Real Dictators
This is one of my most recent finds, and I have found it to be the maraschino cherry on top of a classic chocolate milkshake. Real Dictators by Noiser is a gem of a podcast discovery for a history freak like me. It is one of THE BEST history podcasts I have ever listened to, and it is everything you want in the form of incredibly narrated anecdotes about historical figures who brainwashed and killed wayyy too many people for one person, all supported by suspenseful music and smatterings of sound effects here and there.
I mean, who wouldn’t like to listen to a British dude talk about the bloodthirsty monsters disguised as avenging angels, who ruined peoples’ lives and made them live in a dystopia they think is a utopia? No? So, just me?
Oh well, if you are anything like me, I am sure you will love RD. My recommendations for this podcast are the episodes about Kim Jong-il and Colonel Gaddafi.
Photo by Colin Lloyd on Unsplash
2. The Freakonomics Radio Book Club
The Freakonomics Radio is kind of a cult classic, and most podcast listeners must have heard of this podcast narrated by our favourite dudes who tell us economics in a freaky way. But have you ever heard of their spin-off podcast of this spin-off, The Freakonomics Radio Book Club? It is a podcast of selected episodes from The Freakonomics Radio, but for the book lovers, and listeners of the podcast.
The episodes are all related to literature in which the host talks to authors of mind-bending books, and it is just a great podcast for people who want to listen to the book-related episodes of The Freakonomics Radio. I would suggest The Mom Who Stole the Blueprints for the Atomic Bomb, and How to Get Anyone to Do Anything if you want to start listening to The Freakonomics Radio Book Club.
Photo by Thought Catalog on Unsplash
3. How I Built This with Guy Raz
I was introduced to this podcast by my dad. How I Built This with Guy Raz is a podcast that dives into the stories behind some of the world’s best-known companies. Guy Raz interviews people who have reached the top- innovators, entrepreneurs, and idealists.
It is a podcast about success and brilliance- blood, sweat and tears included. The host has also written a book based on the wisdom he has gathered from his interviews.
It is called “How I Built This: The Unexpected Paths to Success from the World's Most Inspiring Entrepreneurs” and you can buy it on Amazon. If you want to start listening to How I Built This, I will recommend the following episodes: Wisdom From The Top: Bonus Episode (Indra Nooyi), Khan Academy: Sal Khan, Wikipedia: Jimmy Wales and Steve Madden: Steve Madden.
Photo by Josh Olalde on Unsplash
4. Little Woman: A Modern Audio Drama
This podcast is a literal dream for me. How did the world know I needed a modern adaptation of Little Woman!? I cannot justify my love for the book in a paragraph, so I’ll just let you know that it’s my life. Little Woman: A Modern Audio Drama is the perfect podcast for lovers of the best feminist literature ever written, and everyone else.
Also, the theme music is the best podcast theme music in the history of podcast theme music. I don’t have any recommendations for this podcast as it is an eighteen-part audio drama based on the lives of the Marches, so just listen to all of it. Trust me, you won’t regret it.
Photo by Jez Timms on Unsplash
5. The Donut Shop Murders
For the fans of true crime, The Donut Shop Murders is a podcast exploring the murders carried out by the McCrarys, a psychopathic co-dependent family led by an unhinged patriarch and his depraved son-in-law, killers Sherman Ramon McCrary and Carl Taylor. When the two east Texan natives used to come together, their brains formed this weird chemical bond in which they tried to outdo each other in criminal acts, which ranged from simple robbery to full-blown murder!
The podcast also includes one of the two murderers' taped confessions. Spine-chilling, hair-raising and blood-curdling, this podcast is sure to activate these uneasy feelings in all of the mentioned body parts.
Photo by Diogo Palhais on Unsplash
