Finn and the Bell (Rumble Strip via Radiolab)| radiolab.org
Animal (BBC Radio 4) | bbc.co.uk
The Rest Is Money (Goalhanger Podcasts) | podcasts.apple.com
Mooching around my podcast feed the other day, I came across Radiolab and thought: “Ooh, I haven’t listened in ages, I’ll bang a quick episode!” Radiolab, like This American Life and 99% Invisible, is an American offering that specialises in interesting one-off documentaries and idea exploration; a many-episoded pod that I binged like mad 10 or so years ago, when I first came across such shows. Like TAL and 99% Invisible, most of Radiolab’s podcasts are also a radio programme – broadcast weekly on WNYC, a New York-based public radio station. It’s broadcast weekly on WNYC, a New York-based public radio station. Regularly scheduled, excellently soundscaped and hosted, its shows make perfect podcasts, each one standalone so you can scroll through the long episode list and just pick one you fancy.
Anyway, I thought I’d try the most recent ep, Finn and the Bell (not originally a Radiolab show, but made by Vermont-based independent producer Erica Heilman for her podcast Rumble Strip). Finn and the Bell has won loads of awards, including a Peabody, and if you listen, you’ll understand why. It’s an exceptional listen: a glittering jewel of a story, absolutely heartbreaking and completely uplifting all at once. It’s based around Finn, a young man who dies, and what happens because of this, both within Hardwick, the small-town community he grew up in, and to his mother, Tara Reese, when she discovers his death. Her devastating speech – entirely unplanned, unbelievably profound, full of love and, yes, the meaning of existence – about the moments just after that terrible discovery has stayed with me ever since. It’s one of the most moving things I’ve ever heard. How Heilman was able to coax Reese to speak in such an intimate manner I have no idea. Anyway, I don’t want to tell you anything more about it because you should listen. Ignore the annoying adverts at the beginning and in the middle, but give half an hour of your time to this beautiful, humane work. You won’t regret it.
After that, of course, everything else is going to seem a little second rate. But even if I hadn’t heard Finn and the Bell, I’d have had a few problems with Animal on Radio 4. Not with the presenter, Blair Braverman, who is charismatic and clever; nor with the idea behind the series, that humans can be unusual in how they relate to animals. It took me a while to put my finger on it, but it’s to do with the approach.
To explain: in each short episode of Animal we meet someone who has a “thing” about a certain species of animal. So someone who’s scared of spiders; someone who loves sharks; an Australian woman who became so besotted with the local magpies that visited her garden that she wrote a PhD about their methods of communication. In episode two we meet Sabrina Imbler, who’s queer and has found deep oceanic life an inspiration as to how those outside the mainstream might live. All of the stories are interesting and sweet. But after a while I thought: not everything in the world is about humans! Animals exist for and of themselves; we don’t have to designate them as interesting/inspiring/frightening/in need of some better PR in order to have a deep relationship with them. The idea that animals are only worthy if they inspire an emotion within us is arrogant in the extreme. Still, there are many lovely moments in this show, especially in the one about the magpies.
Gary Lineker, scourge of the right wing-cum-excellent football host, is, if you didn’t already know, a podcast supremo. His company, Goalhanger Podcasts, has given us The Rest Is History, The Rest Is Politics, The Rest Is Football and now, The Rest Is Money. While a good idea, this latest show is actually a spoiler for another, non-Goalhanger podcast announced at the beginning of summer: an economics show hosted by ex-chancellors Ed Balls and George Osborne. There are two odd things about the Balls and Osborne podcast. One, that it was announced so long before any actual shows had been made (it’s due to launch this autumn). And two: that Osborne will be a host. Podcasts only succeed if their hosts are popular and likable, and Osborne is very much neither.
Anyhow, when the Balls/Osborne show was announced, Goalhanger clearly thought: Cheeky! and swiftly cracked on with its own economics show. The Rest Is Money, which launched last Wednesday, is hosted by Robert Peston and Steph McGovern. They seem, at first, to be an odd pairing – Peston posh, pompous and drawly, McGovern swift and sunny, a conversation-driver – but actually, they know each other well, as McGovern was Peston’s producer when he was at the BBC. (Now, he has his own political discussion show on ITV and she hosts Channel 4’s Steph’s Packed Lunch, which makes her seem far more Loose Women than she is: she’s an award-winning engineer and business presenter.)
After some slightly unconvincing opening blurb and a by-the-numbers section about the collapse of Wilko and Pizza Hut, the show got into its stride when Peston tackled two topics: how the UK is ill-prepared for a catastrophic system failure such as our National Grid being hacked; and – hold on to your bowler hats – the current state of the London stock market. This last proved very interesting, even for a listener (me) who zones out whenever bankers are mentioned. The Rest Is Money gives Peston enough time to flesh out his ideas, to let his drawl speed up into excitement about imparting his fascinating insider knowledge. And that, combined with McGovern’s excellent show-pacing skills, turns out to be a good thing.
