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RTake off your cream polo shirt, forget the Bruce Springsteen football chants whose lyrics bear no relation to reality: Euro 2024 is over. Actual football (arguably the best) aside, this has been a total first for the competition: interest levels in what actually happened on the pitch have been easily matched by debates over the punditry’s commentary provided by podcasts.
Okay, maybe “expert comment” isn’t exactly the best option, given the number of headlines generated by Gary Lineker saying that the England vs Denmark match was “shit”. The rest is football. But it is remarkable that a podcast has caused a controversy (even if it was based on taking a quote out of context) that ended with the England captain in an awkward situation at a press conference. There were articles that tried to create the Battle of the Garys – pitting Lineker’s podcast against Gary Neville’s. There were financial analyses of how much money had been made by being cruel to England in people’s headphones (imagine! Getting paid to be an honest pundit about bad football!).
This time, what was happening on Euro 2024 podcasts was almost more interesting than what was happening at Euro 2024, and as podcasting grows, the importance of football tournament shows will only become more pronounced. Maybe that should be the aim of the next England manager: to produce a team that is more entertaining than something you can listen to on Spotify. It might be harder than you think…
In other podcasting news, this week we featured some truly wild stories. There’s the time members of ZZ Top impersonated another band for money. Or the blackmail plot that somehow ended up involving Charlie Sheen’s former bodyguard. Add to that a look at the London life coach who convinced numerous women to betray their families, and a second season of an excellent show that profiles inspiring figures who tried to make a difference in the early days of the AIDS epidemic.
Alexi Duggins
Deputy TV Editor
Selections of the week
The true story of fake zombies
Widely available, weekly episodes.
In 1969, St Albans band The Zombies had a hit single in the US and began playing live shows around the country. Except they had broken up years earlier, had no idea of their success, and weren’t actually touring. This show is part fanboy tribute, part deep dive into how two separate outfits – including one featuring two ZZ Top members – ruthlessly pretended to be The Zombies for money. A lively piece of pop history with a wild story behind it. Alexi Duggins
The problem with Erik
Widely available, weekly episodes.
A defense attorney who represented Matthew McConaughey after the actor was caught playing the bongos naked at 2 a.m. FBI informants. Charlie Sheen’s former bodyguard. There are many colorful details in this story of a wealthy Texan who was the subject of a blackmail plot for having an affair with an escort, but ended up losing his mind and leaving two people dead. ADVERTISEMENT
Dangerous memories
Turtle, weekly episodes
Welcome to the dark side of healing in a podcast that delves into the world of the stylish young women in London who turned to the same “personal development coach.” But as Grace Hughes-Hallett discovers, a pattern soon emerged where these women turned against their families. Hollie Richardson
Resurrection: Heroes of the Early Years
Widely available, weekly episodes.
The second season of Dane Stewart’s podcast focuses on the pioneers who tried to make a difference in the early years of the AIDS epidemic, but were often hampered by prejudice. It’s fascinating to hear the story of Dr. Joseph Sonnabend, who treated a then-mysterious disease affecting gay men in New York. Hannah Verdier
Esther Perel: The arch of love
Widely available, weekly episodes.
Super psychotherapist Esther Perel has compiled some of her best observations on love with a beach listening concept. She joins couples in therapy, who unload their feelings on the big questions of love, including dilemmas around polyamory, reproduction and divorce. Perel’s thought-provoking questions take you straight into the therapy room, and her wise insights take you right out of it. High voltage
There’s a podcast for that.
This week, Raquel Aroesti choose five of the best podcasts about deathfrom planning a fantasy funeral with Kathy Burke to a guide to coping with all types of grief.
Punishment for pain
Before starting her podcast in 2016, Cariad Lloyd was best known as a comedic actress and member of the improv troupe Austentatious. Today, she’s synonymous with open, compassionate dialogues about grief, thanks to this humane and somehow funny series, in which she speaks to a different guest each week about a loved one they’ve lost. Sometimes the grief is recent, other times the person has been living with it for decades (an experience our host can relate to; she’s spent the last 30 years coming to terms with the death of her father). On each occasion, though, the podcast functions as a poignant act of remembrance, as well as a meditation on the deeply personal experience of grief.
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Where there is will there is vigilance
On WTAWTAW, comedian Kathy Burke asks celebrities what their ideal ending to their lives is, from their last meals and causes of death to the location and music of their fantasy funeral. Being a comedy genre, Burke has some great guests (Bob Mortimer, Jennifer Saunders, Gimme Gimme Gimme creator Jonathan Harvey) along with the usual suspects on her podcast rounds. For all its cheerful levity, though, this is a podcast that’s doing valuable work when it comes to confronting the taboo of death: If you’re joking about it, that means you’re actually thinking about it.
Terrible, thanks for asking.
In 2014, Nora McInerny had a miscarriage. Six weeks later, she had lost her father and her husband, Aaron, to cancer. After an irreverent obituary she and Aaron had written together went viral, McInerny’s grief came into the public eye, where it has remained thanks to this podcast and a trio of spin-off books. TTFA debuted in 2016, and saw our host deal with her cavalcade of losses with offbeat humor and candor. Soon, the show expanded to allow other people to tell their stories of losing a loved one, and subsequently became a home for stories of incredible and often heartbreaking challenges in general. However, death and grief remain the podcast’s main themes, with recent episodes reflecting on the connection between grief and magical thinking, and how to ensure your children feel loved after you’re gone.
The Death Studies Podcast
Death studies, also known as thanatology, is a real academic discipline that overlaps, in fascinating ways, with a whole host of other subjects. In this podcast, Dr Bethan Michael-Fox from the Open University and medical anthropologist Dr Renske Visser delve into the most interesting ideas in the field and related areas of study. The result is an eclectic range of conversations featuring expert guests including Prof Helen Wheatley, who discusses representations of death on screen, Dr Christopher Hood, who discusses his book about the fatal Japan Air Lines crash of 1985, and Dr Helen Frisby, who delves into Victorian funeral customs.
Grief works
This podcast from psychotherapist Julia Samuel is just five episodes long, but our host’s esteemed reputation in the world of grief therapy makes it a must-listen. Samuel, who founded the charity Child Bereavement UK and has written three books on grief, is an expert on grief and possesses a rare understanding of how to comfort and support those who have lost a loved one. For this short series, she moves from the therapist’s couch to the interviewer’s chair to speak to journalist Decca Aitkenhead, historian Sir Anthony Seldon, fitness trainer Victoria Milligan, author Cathy Rentzenbrink and the aforementioned Cariad Lloyd about their losses with great nuance and insight.