Best of the Best Podcasts
/In case you missed part 1 on why to listen to Podcasts click here. For everyone else, here are some of my favorites (I broke them down into four categories: Educational, Interviews, Comedic and Niche). I am not claiming to know every podcast, but have read many, many best-of lists and sampled an episode or two of most of them and here is what stuck with me:
Educational
If you love astronomy or just want to learn about astronomy, Astronomy Cast hosted by Fraser Cain & Pamela Gay. It is a “weekly facts-based journey through the cosmos, where we help you understand not only what we know, but how we know what we know.” The show can vary vastly from very interesting, cutting-edge and/or insightful to dull and obvious. But this is good because someone new to Astronomy can easily jump onboard and learn quite bit while someone with a deep knowledge of Astrophysics can get an update on the newest happenings in the world, I mean literally the universe. Also the ability to choose topics of your personal interest and avoid more boring ones makes this an easy podcast to catch up on even with missing many episodes.
If you love analytics and politics, FiveThirtyEight Elections podcast does a great job of not only breaking done all the news of the day but more importantly how these stories and developments effect the odds in the upcoming elections. They will break down different demographics to a state level, past political trends and how they are changing and even how their statistical model they use to make election predictions really works. At the end of the day, they are unbiased since they don’t care who wins, they projections and predictions hold true on election day.
Interviews
For great insightful and sometimes meaningful interviews, the Bill Simmons podcast and the Nerdist are the places to go. Both give great interviews that will dive into subjects not normally addressed in a short media tour. In Bill Simmons podcast you will learn about David Duchovny’s White Men Can’t Jump audition and his deep love of the Knicks. On the Nerdist, you will learn David Duchovny was a thesis away from his PhD in English Literature and his thoughts on the fan theory that his characters from the X-Files and Red Shoe Diaries were in fact the same person. Did I care about Duchovny before these? No, not at all. But afterwards I knew he was a very funny (in both interviews) and educated huge sports fan. While there are rarely guest crossovers, I thought it was amazing I could listen to both and learn about the many sides of person other than just a quick funny antidote and their latest project they are promoting. Unlike a quick 4-minute Late Night show appearance, these interviews actually humanize the subject.
For a person to choose one it is easy. If sports are your thing choose Simmons, if nerd culture is your thing choose Nerdist. If you love both like me, listen to both (picking guests you love always helps). And if you end up loving either, both have a long library of other Podcasts in their respective networks.
Marc Maron’s WTF I could also a recommend (his Obama interview was amazing). His unique and somewhat negative outlook on life leads to some amazing interviews but it also leads to some depressing ones. I will choose to listen to the Nerdist and Simmon’s podcasts first and therefore will probably never listen to the WTF library, but it is a solid option. Do listen to the Obama one, it was great.
Comedy
Doug Loves Movies and How Did This Get Made? are both fantastic. A great thing about both is you can listen anytime, months even years later. Current events may be mentioned but are never the main or even important topic. While Doug Loves Movies may take a few episodes to completely understand the games and some other returning elements and just having comedians and actors riff with each other and talk about movies may not sound amazing. The actual end result is always entertaining and sometimes downright hilarious. Walking through a grocery store alone and spontaneously laughing uproariously will always garner a number of strange looks. I swear I am not a deranged mental patient, I just happened to hear an amazing riff between seasoned comedians.
While Doug Loves Movies only requires a small knowledge of movies (basically if you enjoy movies that is enough), How Did This Get Made has each episode focus on one movie. For episodes on movies I have not seen I have only listened to a few episodes, got a few laughs, but for movies I have seen (even if in the case of Face Off or ConAir not seen for well over 10 years) they are amazing. I would say absolutely hilarious! One great episode my wife and I listened to made the drive from Boston to New York fly by. We were laughing and making comments and all of a sudden nearly 2 hours had passed.
Niche
If you love Gilmore Girls (as my wife and many others do), Gilmore Guys is for you. It goes episode by episode with guests (sometimes actors from the show) to breakdown everything that happened. While I have listened to only an episode or two, my wife (an infrequent Podcast listener) has sat through a dentist appointment or two and come out the other side much happier than if she was without their commentary. While I have seen most of the show and enjoyed it, only a true fan that will remember season by season interactions will get much more from this.
If you love fantasy sports but would rather have light hearted entertainment instead of just boring facts, Fantasy Focus Football is the perfect choice. Host Matthew Berry has been in the industry for years and knows his stuff, but I listen for the comedy and interaction between the hosts, producers and anyone else who shows up. It is a great combination of comedy and up-to-date information with every development in the NFL. Stephania Bell’s medical training really adds a knowledge base to keep the injury and recovery process as transparent as possible. Rather than friends that spend countless hours reading article after article and sorting through every stat possible, I just listen to this during a quick lunch break and know as much or in actuality more than anyone else on the subject. Knowledge and humor wrapped in one.
In the end, there are probably hundreds of other amazing podcasts out there (please send recommendations). But this list is a good starting point to begin your listening quest. Or for seasoned podcast listeners a quick place to find additions to your listening queue. It will definitely give you many different flavors of education and entertainment.