Niche things I love when podcasters do
Nature's sounds, racist psychiatry, jinxes, nachos, great innovations, how to listen.
I hope you’re not tired of me mentioning Vibe Check or Handsome, because I can’t help it! They’re ingrained in my brain. This time I’m using them as an example because they both do this very niche thing that for whatever reason just absolutely delights me. That thing they do? Speak directly to their producers when something extra silly happens. On Vibe Check, it’ll typically be Sam who says “leave it in, Shantel!”. That usually means they’ve either gone way off the rails or said something scandalous, and they love it. Do not edit it out of the episode! On Handsome, any time they have a ridiculous idea they say “add it to the list, Thomas!”. I need to know that Thomas is in fact adding all of their ideas to a list and I hope they review it someday.
What do you love that podcasters do?
This week’s podstack
Threshold - Hark | 4 | Do You Hear What I Hear?
If Future Ecologies and Twenty Thousand Hertz had a pod-baby, it would be this new season of Threshold. Do you ever stop to think about how loud our world has gotten? I learned that bioacoustics is a thing and it’s what helps us understand and interpret the sounds of life. This episode is the fourth in the series but I feel like it really captures the essence of the series in the way it makes you realize the diversity of sound. From the technical process of how hearing works, to the sounds of dolphins and treehoppers, to a beautiful perspective on what it really means to listen. I was in awe of all the places this episode took me and I love how almost meditative this sometimes very sciencey series feels. “Sound is ephemeral and ever changing. And so is our experience of it.” We might all hear the same thing making a sound, but we don’t hear the same thing. (transcript)
Antonia Hylton stumbled into a class about the history of psychiatry kinda by accident and found it interesting but disturbing. Through all the stories, Black people were not present. In the stories, in the texts, and in the medicine. She knew that Black people had been in these spaces throughout history so she looked for the stories. The more she learned, the more she realized why her parents and grandparents were so against mental health care. Like the fact that when Black people showed signs of mental illness or distress in the past, the dominate theory from white people was that it was because they just couldn’t handle the freedom. In this episode Antonia and Yolo Akili Robinson, one of the co-hosts of Black Healing Remixed, take us back to the days of the Crownsville State Hospital to reveal just how damaging the racism, ableism and misogyny was and has been to psychiatry in the United States. Yolo is so great at referencing specific stories from Antonia’s book throughout the episode and allows for so much reflection. I highly recommend following the show so you don’t miss their next episode because you’ll get to hear Yolo joined by his co-host Natalie Patterson and their guest Tabitha Brown.
Little Devils - #01 An Evil Little Man
Little Devils are what Jasmin Bauomy calls the sometimes strange habits we all have that others might judge us for. We might even judge ourselves for them. This first episode is the story of Endre and the strong hold that the fear of jinxes has on him. He is always worried about saying anything that might jinx things. He hasn’t always felt this way, but it’s definitely a habit that he inherited from his family. He takes us through the family history that made him this way and by the end it becomes a touching moment of realization of the ways grief continues to follow us. I found Endre so endearing to listen to and so appreciated Jasmin’s gentle and thoughtful work as she helps him unpack these feelings. If you’ve ever felt superstitious or been nervous to jinx something before, you’ll relate to Endre a lot and his nervous attempt to defy the belief that the universe shouldn’t be tested.
Warning: this episode will make you want nachos. At least, some version of nachos which may be quite different from the original recipe. This episode reveals the history that few realize. The reason few know the real history is because the family of the creator, Nacho, haven’t even been asked that much! There’s some facts out there but even when there was a special Google doodle to commemorate him, the family wondered why they hadn’t used a more accurate photo. Ignacio “Nacho” Anaya Garcia invented the recipe fairly casually but it became an instant hit at the restaurant he worked at. It may have been spontaneous, but it was backed by all the culinary knowledge he had from cooking Mexican cuisine. Even with its popularity there, he didn’t really think it was going to become that big and chose not to patent it or anything. That’s why it was someone else who made it become a concession stand staple. “The story of the nacho is really a story of the loss of an apostrophe.”
Part-Time Genius - 2024 PART-TIME GENIUS AWARDS!
In this absolute delight of an episode, Mango and Will honour great innovations of 2024 and the whole episode taught me about so many things I had no idea existed!! Like an invention that helps tell you the freshness of a carton of milk? Mango also mentioned some absolutely hilarious niche awards that exist. Like there’s already an award for the oddest book title of the year?! And the worst first sentence in a novel?! If you want to laugh along with them expect unexpected stories about hippos, the new placebo powers, invasive snails, and even some seagull insurance?!
Illuminated - One Hundred Ways of Listening
We started with an episode about sound and listening, and we’re ending with one too! What can you learn from an anthropologist who specializes in studying our relationship to sound? At least a hundred ways that we think about and interact with sound, specifically when it comes to listening. Our world is full of sounds but that doesn’t mean there’s only one way to listen. What sounds satisfy you? Which ones can you not stand? I find myself thinking a lot about listening habits (especially as they relate to podcasts) and attention spans, and this goes deeper into both of those things in ways I hadn’t thought about. When Lauren mentioned this episode to me, she mentioned hungry listening and that’s a type of listening that definitely applies to my podcast habits. It’s listening to acquire knowledge and accumulating facts to satisfy our consumption needs.
More sweet treats
Every time I see someone talking about the environmental impacts of banks, I have to listen and tell people about it.
Tupperware tells the story of the obsession with organizing everywhere in our homes in an aesthetic way.
Top Podcast Fun Facts of 2024 (from EarBuds)
Thank you for reading! If you listened to something this week that made your heart sing, your imagination wander, or your brain ponder, I’d love to hear about it!