PM (BBC Radio 4) | iPlayer
Will Self’s Great British Bus Journey (BBC Radio 4) | iPlayer
The Boring Talks | BBC podcasts
Mansplaining. There’s a lot of it about. Clever fellas letting other people know that, actually, I think you’ll find, this is the best way to go about performing a task, or analysing a situation, or thinking about a subject in which you’re already well-versed. For some reason, last week’s audio offerings seemed to abound with such male blether. Maybe I’m being over-sensitive. January is a long, dark, skint month. Too much thinking time.
To be fair, sometimes it was a woman doing the ’splaining. On Tuesday’s PM, Fran Unsworth, the BBC’s director of news and current affairs, was given the unenviable task of justifying the PWC report into the BBC’s gender bias around on-air pay decisions. It’s OK, said Unsworth, the report says there isn’t any. “No one set out to pay any less,” she explained. “It wasn’t a systemic approach.” Bias isn’t written into the rules, so it can’t be happening. Phew! Thanks for ’splaining! Could you clarify that to the female employees who are taking the BBC to court? “It looks like a BBC management report, commissioned by BBC management, for BBC management,” said one commentator. “PWC don’t seem to have spoken to any of the people the report is actually about.” That’s because there was no need. All the BBC’s gender bias troubles have been ’splained away. Do you see?
One of my favourite on-air ’splainers is Will Self. This is because he is funny, both ha-ha and peculiar. He moans, he pontificates, he ruminates, he gets stroppy. I enjoy it all. And for any other Self-splaining fans, he’s on every weekday for the next fortnight, traipsing around A-roads on the bus, searching for the truth about Britain in 2018. God, men love looking for Britain, don’t they? At any given moment there are hordes of them travelling the length and breadth of the country, sniffing out some hidden British-osity like lugubrious bulldogs. “What does the word Britain actually mean?” they wonder, as they chow down on a British (English) breakfast at yet another authentically British (English) cafe. “Who cares?” wonders everyone else.
At least Self takes the mickey out of himself for doing so. “British! Are you British? Do you want a bit of British shortbread?” he hissed, like a sarky schoolgirl on the back seat of an interminable bus journey between Bristol and Swansea. “Would you like a British sock? Hello, British woman, where do you lay your head? In Britain?” He made himself – and me – laugh with the ridiculousness of it all.
If you can ignore what he claims to be looking for, Self is a fabulous travel companion. He meets everyone he encounters without prejudice or bias; he expects – and usually gets – honesty and cheer. He’s a great interviewer, he has excellent descriptive powers. Whether he’ll manage to get to the heart of contemporary Britishness doesn’t really matter. His crotchetiness will carry us all through.
If you’re in the mood for yet more explanation, why not try The Boring Talks podcast? It’s new to podcast world, though the actual talks have been going on for quite a while. I once met a chap who told me he’d done a full hour’s Boring Talk on the merits of the watch I happened to be wearing, a Casio something-or-other (I got it because I liked the colour). Anyhow, the first podcast is an in-depth analysis of Douglas Adams’s The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, in order to determine exactly when, according to the book, the world ends. To the day. This is dementedly detailed mansplaining. And it’s very enjoyable. Episode two features Tracy King womansplaining how book pricing algorithms work. This is the kind of explication I can cope with. It’s comforting in its silly meticulousness. Like sitting next to a 12-year-old talking you through the ins and outs of Pokémon Go. You will definitely learn something. Whether or not you want to learn it is another question.
Podcasts for insomniacs
Sleep With Me
A podcast designed specifically to send you to sleep. Drew Ackerman – dearest Scooter to his fans – suffers from sleeplessness, and understands the desire for a zzz-inducing podcast. He calls his shows “a conversation that goes on a little too long”, and makes his voice monotonous, chooses topics that meander into dullness, and rambles on for an hour. New shows come online three times a week, including Game of Drones (recaps of GoT episodes) and the Sleep to Strange strand, where Ackerman drones straight into a silly story without any previous explanation (my favourite type).
Mysteries Abound
The Mysteries Abound podcast is not, in itself, boring at all. It has episodes called 10 Crazy Facts About Urine, Earth Is an Alien Prison, and Poodle Clipping as an Olympic Sport: all of which, I’m sure you agree, sound far from dull. It’s just that each episode opens with woo-woo science fiction music, and Paulrex, our host, has a soothing Aussie voice that lulls you into a weird, everything-is-strange snooze. He reads from his script in old-fashioned Alfred Hitchcock Presents/Tales of the Unexpected style. Expect odd dreams about mysterious strangers and alien abduction.
Story Not Story
Married US couple Chyna and Craig tell each other bedtime stories that they make up on the spot, often from listeners’ suggestions. Their voices are too upbeat and croaky to be naturally slumber-inducing, plus there are the usual hesitations that you get with spontaneous tales (this can drive you a bit mad), but the idea is sweet enough. There are a few recurring characters, including Tumblin’ Toby, who overcomes brigands for Queen Susan. Chyna and Craig are taking time off at the moment, as they’ve just had a baby, but there are almost 30 episodes available.
