Hi,
I’m a big fan of podcasts and I’ve been enjoying “Against the Rules” and “Darknet Diaries” lately.
Now, I want to hear your recommendations! What podcasts do you love and why? Let’s build an epic list of must-listen podcasts together.
Thanks in advance for your suggestions.
I like listening to historical podcasts, and my favorites are “The History of Rome” (which has finished) and its followup “The History of Byzantium” and “Hardcore History” . I’ve heard good things about “Revolutions” by the creator of “The History of Rome” but I haven’t checked it out yet.
Also I’ve been enjoying “Fall of Civilizations” a lot, but so far have only listened to a few of the episodes.
The Fall of Civilizations is one of my favorite podcasts right now! I highly recommend it if you like to think about history from a sort of different point of view. The host is really invested in trying to contextualize what things may have looked and felt like from the common person’s point of view.
Revolutions is stellar, big fan of Mike Duncan and Dan Carlin
Blowback and throughline are both pretty solid looks at much smaller segments if you want context for your history.
I’ll chip in the Trojan horse affair was great too.
Fall of Civilizations is the best podcast I’ve listened to. Every episode is amazing.
Thanks for the recommendation. I’m a big fan of Hardcore History so will check out the others.
I also really enjoy You’re Dead To Me - different topics from history with an expert and a comedian.
I have listened to a few of the “Fall of Civilizations”. The quality of the production is very impressive.
If you are a fan of history podcasts, the BBC have a series “You’re Dead to Me” which is a history podcast with a lot of British humour added in.
“Gone Medieval” is another history podcast by History Hits, but the quality off each show is very hit or miss. Quality of the topic can be lackluster sometimes and even the sound quality of guests can be poor. The topics are all medieval and can be more UK centric. Still good and worth a listen.
I’ve listened to all of these podcasts besides Hardcore history, and I can highly recommend all of them. It’s hard to pick a favourite but it might be Revolutions, which I found the most eye-opening, especially season 3 on the french revolution. I’m currently working my way through Wittenberg to Westphalia, the Wars of the Reformation, which is meant to be on the 30 years way, but takes a very deep dive into the life, economy, history and culture of the middle ages and early modern period.
Behind the Bastards, a deep dive into the various shit people of history. Episode one is Saddam Hussein: Erotic Novelist.
There’s nearly 700 episodes, and I’ve yet to run tio a dud. Loads of great guests. My only gripe is that it’s a touch Amerocentric, but other than that I’d recommend it to basically anyone. Not kid friendly, in case that wasn’t obvious.
I think it’s only fair to add that this podcast has a very left leaning bias. I’m not saying that that is bad, just being objective.
That’s fine I do enjoy seeing what a bias various forms of media have.
This is a fair assessment, but I would add that the host mentions that he’s a gun owner with a carry permit, and does from time to time point out the failures of the US political left. There is a bias, but I wouldn’t put him in the realm of Democracy Now!
That said, some of the episodes are great. I recently listened to the Jack Welch ones and loved them.
-Last Podcast on The Left - crime and comedy is a perfect mix for me.
-Bow and Blade and The Medieval Podcast - I love medieval history
-Dan Carlin’s Hardcore History -general history (waiting for another episode is like waiting for Christmas)
-Unsolved Misteries Podcast- I love the TV show and that podcast is great too :)
deleted by creator
Behind the bastards, Self explanatory.
Ear hustle, A podcast about prison made by prisoners in prison.
Knowledge Fight, a couple of dudes who like to sit around and talk about Alex Jones. Essentially deconstructing his bullshit.
There’s a great Discord community for Knowledge Fight too. Note that there are two of them, and one of them is a LOT more fun than the other.
Got a link?
Hardcore History. The come out a few times a year and are incredibly long (some episodes are five hours), but listening to Dan Carlin talk is really engaging. Plus he has one of those voices you can fall asleep to.
It Could Happen Here. Keeps my righteous anger at ‘the man’ topped up.
Criminal Records. Fun crime podcast focussed on the weird and less heard of crimes in history.Massively depends on what you’re into.
That said, I follow these podcasts:
News related comedy:
- Wait Wait Don’t Tell Me from NPR
- Friday Night Comedy from BBC Radio 4
- The Bugle
- Breaking The News from BBC Scotland
DnD:
- Dicefunk (I recommend seasons 3 & 4 in particular)
Puns:
- Punwatch
- (also The Bugle sometimes)
Science communication:
- The Infinite Monkey Cage
- Daniel And Jorge Explain The Universe
- The Curious Cases Of Rutherford & Fry
- Supermassive
- A Problem Squared
- Creature Feature
- My Favourite Theorem
About Media:
- Failure To Launch, about TV pilots that failed to become full series
- Get Played, originally called “How Did This Get Played?” and focused on the worst games ever made, now about games in general
- Dream Factory, about plots of non-existing movies
Security/Hacking:
- Malicious Life
- Darknet Diaries
- Human Factor Security
History:
- You’re Dead To Me
I like; 99% Invisible & Radio Lab, those are my main 2, i also listen to Malicious Life & some others I can’t think of right now.
I am surprised some of the big ones haven’t been mentioned yet -
-
Radiolab - Not really sure how to describe this podcast. It’s superb journalism at its core. They do both short and multi-episode long form about a variety of topics from science to history to current events. For example, how dinosaurs died when the asteroid hit earth, the story of a Guantanamo convict with the same name as the host, and how poorly computer databases are designed for names that are outside the norm.
-
Planet Money - An excellent economics podcast where complex topics are distilled in fairly short episodes. They recently released a completely AI generated episode which was incredibly scary with how good it was.
-
More Perfect - Everything the US Supreme Court
-
Serial - One multi-episode series at a time about complicated criminal cases.
-
What Roman Mars can Learn about Con Law - Started off during the Trump Presidency when tough questions about the US constitution are being asked given his penchant for pushing the legal boundaries and norms.
-
History:
- History of Rome
- History of Byzantium (spiritual successor to HoR) - ongoing but with an end planned
- British History Podcast (in depth) - ongoing but with an end planned
- Revolutions (various revolutions from HoR
- Blowback
- Hardcore History
- Fall of Civilizations
Horror:
- Magnus Archives
- The Lovecraft Investigations - unsure if finished
True Crime:
- Bear Brook
- Dirty John
Others:
- *Shut up and Sit Down (Boardgames)"
- Beef and Dairy Network (Comedy)
- Outer Reach (Sci-Fi)
Bold = Ongoing with no end planned
It’s an old one, but Stuff You Should Know. I’m listening chronologically, a couple a day (I do a lot of driving for work) and I’m still only up to about mid-2018. The hosts are so easy to listen too, and I really enjoy their humour.
Came here to say this
If you like Against the Rules I think you’d enjoy Revisionist History by Malcolm Gladwell.
Few of my favorites:
- Planet Money by NPR
- Revisionist History
- Against The Rules
- Hardcore History
- 99% Invisible
- True Crime Garage
- Morbid
- Slow Burn
- Hey Babe
The Nosleep Podcast (Horror).
Welcome To Nightvale (Comedy/Horror)
Alice Isn’t Dead (Horror/Mystery/Road trip?)
Conan O’Brian Needs A Friend (Comedy)
The Three Questions With Andy Richter (Interview/Comedy. Can occasionally get kinda heavy)
WTF With Marc Maron (Interviews)
Watch Out For Fireballs (Deep Dive Discussions On Video Games)
Abject Suffering (Comedy. The Same Two Guys From W. O. F. F., but they’re looking at bad/WEIRD Games)
GM Word Of The Week (history)
Ologies by Ally Ward.
She basically interviews random professors and authors. Anyone who studies something. And then asks all the dumb questions that I’d be too embarrassed to ask, in order to understand what it is that they study, why they study it, what we know about the topic.
She’s got several hundred episodes from black holes and dark matter, to fire ecology, to (one of my favorites) Ferroequinology (the study of iron horses, trains).
Really great energy, great questions. Highly recommend.
- Hidden brain for psychology
- 99 percent invisible for interesting stories of stuff.
