[Fultonius]

The Fault Line
A very slickly made and presented podcast (as you'd expect from a Dimbleby) about the Iraq War. Not surprisingly,  a considerably more nuanced situation than many people realise.  Interviews with people like Christopher Meyer and Blair are particularly interesting.

On episode 3 of this. Really well done and very easy to listen to. Some really interesting perspectives and not just focusing on did Blair lie etc...

Yeah, I'm 3 down one to go. Interested to hear how the last one ties it all together.

[Davo]

Is there only 4? For some reason I thought it was 8??

[TobyD]

Is there only 4? For some reason I thought it was 8??

Yeah its 8, I believe.  Glad others like it too.

[slab_happy]

Thanks for the heads up about Towton. Shall definitely check it out. Have just covered that part of the War of the Roses in the podcast!

Once you're through the real history, you've also got the option of stepping sideways and getting into Shakespeare's Wars of the Roses plays, which have a very iffy relationship to the actual events (Tudor propaganda version combined with dramatic license) but are a good gory soap opera.

[Davo]

Funnily enough when Covid is over I had been inspired to go to his plays on this topic!

[slab_happy]

Intermittently theatre companies will do Henry VI (1, 2 and 3) and Richard III as a cycle, or the full Richard II-through-to-Richard III cycle (though Henry VI usually gets squished into two plays), and it's loads of fun, especially if they schedule "marathons" where you get to see all of them in a row during a long weekend.

In the meantime, though, you've got options -- Globeplayer lets you rent stuff to stream online (and helps prop up Shakespeare's Globe, who've been hit brutally hard by the pandemic), and they've got productions of all the Histories:

https://globeplayer.tv/

I've heard good things about the BBC Hollow Crown, but not seen it yet. On iTunes and Amazon video, I think.

Digitaltheatre.com has two different productions of Henry IV, and David Tennant's Richard II.

For free stuff -- YouTube has the 1965 "Wars of the Roses" (Henry VI and Richard III) -- old school and a bit clunky to modern eyes but it's got Peggy Ashcroft as Queen Margaret, David Warner as Henry VI, and Ian Holm as Richard III, so you can't complain too much:

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL71808247F47E2A6E

And there's the English Shakespeare Company's version from 1990 (powered by chutzpah, great verse-speaking and a violent loathing of Margaret Thatcher). Cruddy video quality and sadly lacking Henry IV part 2, but the productions are great and the comments are full of people being upset by the modern dress.

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLWV0UMXyDX7HyCDvO75vJsuRvJCmBl9_P

(Yes, I am a Shakespeare nerd too.)

[Davo]

Amazing stuff! Thanks for the info. I shall have a look at the Hollow Crown series and also may well rent the Shakespeare’s Globe stuff.

[slab_happy]

So, like a lot of people, I lost the concentration needed to read anything during the first few months of lockdown. Then it came roaring back and I read "Moby Dick" because a giant unhinged 19th-century novel seemed like it would hit the spot, and it did not disappoint.

I'm still not sure if it's a good book or not, but it is an Experience.

Anyway, I'm now back to not being able to read anything again, but I'm binge-listening to the podcast "Moby Dick Energy", which lives up to the excellence of its name.

Talia Lavin is going through the book chapter-by-chapter, with different guests each episode -- variously journalists, literature scholars, marine biologists, food critics (for the chapter on chowder), and so far at least one rabbi. Funny and fascinating and goes deep into this glorious mess of a book.

[TobyD]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m000nkv7

Brilliant spooky techno, if you like that sort of thing!

[TobyD]

... and very different, the locked in podcast with Jeremy Paxman.

I enjoyed his conversation with Richard Dawkins.

[crzylgs]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m000nkv7

Brilliant spooky techno, if you like that sort of thing!

Listening now - nice find!

[TobyD]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m000nkv7

Brilliant spooky techno, if you like that sort of thing!

Listening now - nice find!

Thanks, glad you liked it. R1 and 6Music both do some decent podcasts. The essential mix can be good, depending on whether you like what's on it.

[moose]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m000nkv7

Brilliant spooky techno, if you like that sort of thing!

Spooky techno, is that a similar genre to "haunted house"?

[cowboyhat]

I think it was mentioned on the film thread a while ago but I still really love

The Rewatchables podcast.

Funny, informative; reminds me why its ok to just love movies as well as proper films.

[cheque]

My mate Al hosts a podcast called Chart Music in which he co-ordinates two of a panel of five of his mates who used to write for the Melody Maker in meticulously dissecting an old episode of Top of the Pops.

It’s frequently hilarious and in my experience the more you listen the more you get into the pundits and their lifestories and it leads you to start thinking about all sorts of aspects of music and pop culture that had either passed you by, you’d forgotten or you’d never taken seriously as well as getting a new perspective on stuff you thought you fully understood.

As they’ve got into the groove of making the show and Al’s come up with ever more ways to set the historical context, each episode seems to get longer than the last (the new one is over 6 hours long) and gradually listening to them all in sequence has played a big part in staying sane over the last 12 months for me.

[crzylgs]

I think it was mentioned on the film thread a while ago but I still really love

The Rewatchables podcast.

Funny, informative; reminds me why its ok to just love movies as well as proper films.

Can second The Rewatchables - not sure if I was put on to it by people here or elsewhere but have been listening to it for a while and slowly made my way through most of their earlier offerings.

[Will Hunt]

Does anyone struggle with the BBC sounds app? I'm listening with it hooked up to my car speakers using a headphone jack. Every time the screen lock comes on the sound cuts out then will intermittently come back in before cutting out again. Releasing the screen lock gets it playing normally again. I've googled and it suggests the issue is Android's battery optimisation but I've turned off all of that in the settings and still no joy. Does the same sort of thing when using podcast addict and I'm playing it through a Bluetooth speaker.

[Pantontino]

My mate Al hosts a podcast called Chart Music in which he co-ordinates two of a panel of five of his mates who used to write for the Melody Maker in meticulously dissecting an old episode of Top of the Pops.

It’s frequently hilarious and in my experience the more you listen the more you get into the pundits and their lifestories and it leads you to start thinking about all sorts of aspects of music and pop culture that had either passed you by, you’d forgotten or you’d never taken seriously as well as getting a new perspective on stuff you thought you fully understood.

As they’ve got into the groove of making the show and Al’s come up with ever more ways to set the historical context, each episode seems to get longer than the last (the new one is over 6 hours long) and gradually listening to them all in sequence has played a big part in staying sane over the last 12 months for me.

I've listened to a few of these and they are ace. I was an avid Melody Maker reader back in the day so know of the journalists (Simon Price, Neil Kulkarni, David stubbs etc). Great stuff.

[Pantontino]

I would recommend the The Socially Distant Sports Bar podcast. Basically three Welsh blokes (a mix of sport journalists and comedians) chatting bollocks about various historical sport events, but spinning off into all sorts of hilarious nonsense. Dead funny and interesting. I've become a regular listener.

https://open.spotify.com/show/32TCAZClErWNRfDoI2YD2d

[Will Hunt]

The latest series of Intrigue on the BBC is called Mayday and explores The White Helmets and the misinformation surrounding them. Fairly essential listening considering that only a year ago there were links posted on this thread to conspiracy theorist websites helping to prop up the Russian/Assad narrative that they are a Jihadi group.

It made me seethe at times. What really struck home was the idea that, since the catastrophe of the Iraq war, public confidence in institutions has been eroded so much that lots of well-meaning people in the West are prepared to buy into the alternative narratives that serve the interests of those who drop bombs and chemical weapons on small children.

[Teaboy]

I would recommend the The Socially Distant Sports Bar podcast. Basically three Welsh blokes (a mix of sport journalists and comedians) chatting bollocks about various historical sport events, but spinning off into all sorts of hilarious nonsense. Dead funny and interesting. I've become a regular listener.

https://open.spotify.com/show/32TCAZClErWNRfDoI2YD2d

Second this, really makes me laugh, just to add each sporting event is based on a YouTube clip so you can extend the enjoyment by watching the clips. Also worth noting that a lot of clips are only partially related to sports (e.g. a promo video for a new America Football team in Glasgow) and the chat goes off in all directions so it's enjoyable if you're not massively into sport

[Fultonius]

The Fault Line
A very slickly made and presented podcast (as you'd expect from a Dimbleby) about the Iraq War. Not surprisingly,  a considerably more nuanced situation than many people realise.  Interviews with people like Christopher Meyer and Blair are particularly interesting.

I take it Blair is still lying through his teeth? Does he get pressed much on the dodgy dossier etc?

It's rather more interesting than that. Have a listen and find out.

It certainly was. I found that a very enlightening and interesting listen. Thanks. (and thanks for encouraging me to challenge my preconceptions...)

[Fultonius]

The latest series of Intrigue on the BBC is called Mayday and explores The White Helmets and the misinformation surrounding them. Fairly essential listening considering that only a year ago there were links posted on this thread to conspiracy theorist websites helping to prop up the Russian/Assad narrative that they are a Jihadi group.

It made me seethe at times. What really struck home was the idea that, since the catastrophe of the Iraq war, public confidence in institutions has been eroded so much that lots of well-meaning people in the West are prepared to buy into the alternative narratives that serve the interests of those who drop bombs and chemical weapons on small children.

Were you not in any way sceptical about any of that Will? I've listened to the lot, and here are my feelings on it...actually, no...it's a bit late and I'm going to bed. This will take more time.

All I'll say for now is - you bought it.  I don't buy it. The people interviewed, the constant character references and "witnesses said".... It stank, the whole lot.

So.

Do I think the White Helmets were an organ harvesting wing of ISIS? No. Never did, in fact, this podcast in one of its many strawman arguments was the first time I'd heard that claim.

Did it clearly and definitively (even with it's extra episode) make me any less doubtful of the "Chlorine attack in Douma" narrative, no. I still don't buy that one.  Please, someone, do Will a favour, and debunk this, without attacking the man, just the facts and sources:

https://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2019/05/the-world-what-is-really-happening/comment-page-2/

I will, most happily, write Murray off for ever if someone can put it to bed. It would make my life much simpler....

[Davo]

Christ. I just spent 5 mins getting lost in that miasma of utter garbage of a conspiracy theory blog by that guy Craig Murray. Had never heard of him before and hopefully never will again.

It all just strikes me as typical conspiracy theory garbage that sounds very convincing and has lots of threads all linking stuff together in a seemingly plausible manner. Next minute you start believing that there were no moon landings and that 911 was a conspiracy by the CIA and that the towers could never have fallen down just by being hit by planes.

[Fultonius]

Christ. I just spent 5 mins getting lost in that miasma of utter garbage of a conspiracy theory blog by that guy Craig Murray. Had never heard of him before and hopefully never will again.

It all just strikes me as typical conspiracy theory garbage that sounds very convincing and has lots of threads all linking stuff together in a seemingly plausible manner. Next minute you start believing that there were no moon landings and that 911 was a conspiracy by the CIA and that the towers could never have fallen down just by being hit by planes.

See, this is my issue. Everyone writes him off as a "conspiracy nut", but he's been proved right time and time again. I'm yet to see a definitive case where he's categorically proven wrong. People don't engage as their bullshit radars go off, and they give up.

I'd genuinely rather none of it were true, and I could start writing him off like everyone else does. Maybe he's a Russian disinformation shill? If so, show me. I'm willing to admit I'm being mislead. We all can be. I need facts though...