Let’s have a look at well known podcasts that have returned with new series, or have new episodes just around the corner!
Get Birding, a podcast that tries to get us all into ornithology (that’s birds!) is returning with a new series later this month. Previous hosts have included Strictly winner and nature filmmaker Hamza Yassin and the environmental campaigner Dr Mya-Rose Craig. This new series will be hosted by City Girl in Nature (aka. Kwesia), who will be interviewing the American novelist Jonathan Franzen and Jim and Nancy Moir.
British Scandal, the popular series looking into well-known scandals in British history, has just started a series exploring the life of Oscar Wilde. The Chipping Forecast will be exploring the world of golf with commentator Andrew Cotter, broadcaster Iain Carter and golfer Eddie Pepperell.
How Do You Cope? …with Elis and John, featuring conversations about mental health, has started up again after a break for more than a year.
NOTABLE NAMES ON PODCASTS THIS WEEK
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- Jacqueline Wilson is on Stompcast with Dr Alex George this week, where they both walk around East Sussex. She talks about her writing process and how she couldn’t accept the success that she received from Tracy Beaker.
- Tony Britten, who composed the Champions League anthem, is on the Unsung podcast, which amplifies unsung heroes within the sporting world.
- The journalist Laura Barton is on The Failing Writers Podcast, a podcast that is all about the process of getting published.
- Ruby Wax, comedian and mental health campaigner, is on Dish with Nick Grimshaw and Angela Harnett this week.
Here are our podcast picks for the week ahead
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Unfiltered with Oli Dugmore – A great little interview podcast has just started a new series. Oli Dugmore from the website Joe.co.uk asks guests about the major events that shaped their life, with their most recent guest Niall Horan talking about how being part of One Direction was a whirlwind, but had its pitfalls: “I literally packed a suitcase fourteen and never went home.” The band’s fame also caused him to become what he says was something of a recluse.
Other episodes include conversations with the broadcaster James O’Brien, the film director Spike Lee and the editor Alan Rusbridger.
White Smoke: America’s Chemsex Killer – A powerful investigative series by iNews journalist and Special Correspondent Patrick Strudwick, looking at why a rich donor to the Democratic Party in the United States was not initially arrested after a body had been recovered from his apartment, then 18 months later when it happened a second time.
The series explores this lack of justice and the wider issue of chemsex, where people engage in sexual activity whilst under the influence of drugs. “We’ll be uncovering an entire hidden world that people escape into, revealing the layers of stigma and shame that drive people there and then keep them silent,” says Strudwick. This podcast is available on Audible, which means that it is only available for subscribers, but will not use any of your existing credits.
The Global Jigsaw – The BBC has a monitoring department, which analyses mass media from around the world in more than 100 languages. Why? Because the media of a country says a lot about the country itself. And in autocratic or non-democratic countries, the media may be the mouthpiece of the government, so monitoring its media can help make sense of what it is thinking.
This new podcast by BBC Monitoring, presented by Krassi Twigg, looks at international affairs reflected through their media, throwing up interesting stories along the way. There’s an episode looking at the spread of Russian military influence on the Central African Republic, to the Communist Party in China weighing in on masculinity, asking its citizens to push back against K-Pop. Expect stories that you won’t hear anywhere else.
The Louis Theroux Podcast – The latest podcast star to have made a hit podcast with the BBC, only to then take the podcast elsewhere, is Louis Theroux. He’s taken his hit format Grounded, where he digs deep into a celebrity’s life and what makes them tick, to Spotify. In his first episode he interviews the Canadian singer-songwriter Shania Twain about not loving being in the spotlight, losing her music partner of 14 years due to her divorce and her upbringing performing in bars underage.
