Rob McGinley Myers

I’ve sometimes fallen into the trap of thinking that complementing a creative person for their work is less sophisticated or desired than discussion or debate about it but very often the best thing you can say to them is hell yeah and that doesn’t make you dumb it just makes you nice

So great to see @signalhillfm.bsky.social in @asarahlarson.bsky.social's list of the year's best podcasts. This episode of Phonograph about their show, including my interview with @jacksonroach.bsky.social and @lizayeager.bsky.social, is one of my favorite things Britta and I made this year.

So great to see @signalhillfm.bsky.social in @asarahlarson.bsky.social's list of the year's best podcasts. This episode of Phonograph about their show, including my interview with @jacksonroach.bsky.social and @lizayeager.bsky.social, is one of my favorite things Britta and I made this year.

This Is It For the first entry of this newsletter about audio narrative, a story about how an episode of The New Yorker Fiction podcast basically saved my life back in 2008

The most harrowing essay you will ever read about driving 500 miles to visit family for Thanksgiving just after being diagnosed with depression in the midst of the 2008 financial crisis and then listening to an episode of the @newyorker.com Fiction Podcast.

phonograph.beehiiv.com/p/this-is-it...

Rewatching The Shining for the first time in a while and I suddenly imagine it cold-starting with Shelly Duvall’s chilling speech about her son’s dislocated shoulder. Cut the foreboding helcopter shit.

This Is It For the first entry of this newsletter about audio narrative, a story about how an episode of The New Yorker Fiction podcast basically saved my life back in 2008

For my first entry of my new newsletter about audio narrative, a story about how an episode of the New Yorker Fiction podcast sort of saved my life back in 2008.

phonograph.beehiiv.com/p/this-is-it...

Special thanks to @mnkatehopper.bsky.social and @katefreeborn.bsky.social for editing help.

A selection of radio books, zines and cassettes laid out on a table

A year of radio sneaking into physical forms… 📚

A joy to see audio makers push back against the last few years many losses with these beautiful, gently defiant objects 🔮

@resonance-archive.bsky.social @soundfieldsjournal.bsky.social @writteninair.bsky.social @swavecollective.bsky.social

If Books Could Kill | Patreon Those shoes look really comfortable

The last podcast bonus feed Britta and I discuss is the Mile High Club from @ifbookspod.bsky.social. I can’t think of any other show where the bonus feed is simply a second (arguably even better) podcast made by the same people. More like this please!

www.patreon.com/cw/IfBooksPod

Selects | Selects

A lot of podcasters downplay the value of their membership feeds, but Britta and I talk about one exception: the Selects podcast from @benjaminriskin.bsky.social and Mitra Kaboli, which offers an amazing library of audio documentaries rather than a mere bonus feed.

selects.supportingcast.fm

This American Life Partners We launched our Life Partners program to help fund the show in a world with less ad revenue. One year in: it's working! But we need it to grow to sustain our work long-term. Your support allows us to ...

We also do a deep dive into @thisamericanlife.org's bonus feed, which we were skeptical of at first, and find surprising richness in the episodes where producers look back at stories that meant something to them.

thisamericanlife.supercast.com

We then delve into the bonus feeds of various shows we've been listening to, starting with @slate.com's Slate Plus version of a podcast I've been listening to since 2008: the Slate Culture Gabfest (and an especially relevant bonus segment about the end of narrative podcasts).

Alex and the Impossible Ask Podcast Episode · Proxy with Yowei Shaw · 09/09/2025 · 56m

We start by discussing a great episode of @yoweishaw.bsky.social's podcast Proxy where she talks to @agoldman.bsky.social about the necessary struggle for indie podcasters to ask their listeners for financial support.

podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/p...

Weirdly Fun - What Podcast Bonus Feeds Are Offering — Phonograph

Britta and I decided, on a bit of a lark, to do an episode of Phonograph about the phenomenon of podcast bonus feeds. And we were surprised and delighted by what we heard. So here's our pitch for the true value of narrative audio.

www.anxiousmachine.com/phonograph/2...

I keep thinking about Ira Glass listening to all his podcasts at 2x speed. It's like learning one of your favorite chefs consumes all his gourmet meals by grinding them up in a Vitamix. He just prefers the efficiency of smoothies.

I feel like people who create audio, print, and video stories of all kinds need to start labeling work that's organic. Not unlike food that's made without pesticides.

Britta and I are planning an episode of Phonograph that touches on podcast bonus feeds like @slate.com's Plus (CultFest edition) @thisamericanlife.org's Partners, and @ifbookspod.bsky.social's Mile High Club. If you know of any other especially good or interesting podcast bonus feeds, let me know.

Phonograph A sound-rich audio zine about podcasts, hosted by former public radio producers Rob McGinley Myers (The Writer's Almanac, Anxious Machine) and Britta Greene (Minnesota Public Radio, The New Yorker Rad...

@connorratliff.bsky.social I host a podcast called Phonograph where we do deep dives on the best examples of audio storytelling. (Jonathan Goldstein, 99% Invisible, numerous stories from TAL). Gearing up to discuss Dead Eyes and I wondered if you'd be up for an interview.

phonograph.libsyn.com

Hey Jackie - The Evolution of Jonathan Goldstein — Phonograph Listen in any podcast app

@asarahlarson.bsky.social I know you don’t really write about podcasts anymore; I just think you might enjoy this episode of my show Phonograph about Jonathan Goldstein. I had your profile of him in the back of my mind as I worked on it:

www.anxiousmachine.com/phonograph/2...

🤳 10 podcasts I texted my friends (fits, Etsy witchcraft, a cemetery, Satanic Panic) 🍭 👂 Ghosts don’t vomit, you’re alive. Even though you shouldn’t be. 🌈 🤸‍♀️

So nice to see Phonograph’s episode about Jonathan Goldstein featured among so many great podcasts in this week’s Podcast The Newsletter from @laurenpassell.bsky.social

podcastthenewsletter.substack.com/p/10-podcast...

A stat we don't talk about enough: Newspapers have lost 77% of their jobs over the last 20 year, more than any of the 532 other industries tracked by the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Hearing Ira Glass talk about Heavyweight on the latest episode of @thisamericanlife.org made me think he might enjoy this episode of Phonograph about Jonathan Goldstein.

Feel free to tell him. Or anyone.

Hey Jackie - Jonathan Goldstein — Phonograph Listen in any podcast app

Britta and I are back with a new episode of Phonograph, which takes a deep dive into the career of Jonathan Goldstein, from his earliest stories from TAL and up through Wiretap, Heavyweight, and all those phone calls to Jackie Cohen:

www.anxiousmachine.com/phonograph/2...

Questions we wrestle with in this episode (and this clip):

How is Jonathan Goldstein the narrator different from Jonathan Goldstein the person? And how has he evolved over the years?

Hey Jackie - Jonathan Goldstein — Phonograph Listen in any podcast app

Britta and I are back with a new episode of Phonograph, which takes a deep dive into the career of Jonathan Goldstein, from his earliest stories from TAL and up through Wiretap, Heavyweight, and all those phone calls to Jackie Cohen:

www.anxiousmachine.com/phonograph/2...

Oh hey guess what. The Audio Flux Podcast launches 10/22! ✨

- Hosted by the singular AMY PEARL
- Launching as a proud new member of @hubspokeaudio
- Season 01 features Circuit 01 fluxworks, one three minute burst of sound + story at a time

COME. FLUX(CAST). WITH. US!

In a week, that is. 😘

Give Issac Chotiner subpoena power

My co-host Britta and I did a two part re-evaluation of the podcast Startup a year ago (the 10th anniversary of the release of that podcast), and we found—especially in the second episode in our series “Suitcase Full of Cash”—that the show now comes across like a Greek tragedy.

tinyurl.com/5xbf589x

I know it’s not a solution, but this is part of why my co-host Britta Greene and I launched our podcast Phonograph exactly a year ago. Someone needs to argue for the value of narrative podcasts. Why not us? Our episode about Signal Hill is a good example:

pod.link/1438655330/e...

If the rock musicians of the 1960s had been hired to make music for the record companies of the era, and then after a decade they were all laid off, that might approximate what’s happened to narrative podcasters. Super depressing, but my hope is that folks might start making their own music again.

@thehighsign.bsky.social Your question about Napoleon reminded me of how much I enjoyed Tolstoy's portrayal of him in War and Peace, where right from the first page he looms Trump-like over dinner party conversation. And later Russian aristocrats have to try to stop speaking French in protest.