The Rise and Fall Of… Indie Sleaze (BBC Radio 6 Music) - “we must deal, as the show attempts to, with what ‘indie sleaze’ actually is. The term, which describes both alternative and dance bands that arrived in the early 00s, wasn’t used at the time… Which is fine; except The Rise and Fall ... performs all sorts of contortions to tell us that, honestly, indie sleaze actually was a scene, but also, OK, no, it wasn’t, really.”
Sport’s Strangest Crimes (BBC Radio 5 Live) - “Let’s see which odd presenter it has landed this time, shall we? Past series have boasted a Formula One scandal hosted by Pete Tong; a US bank heist by an amateur basketball coach presented by, um, Johnny Marr; and the story of Shergar the racehorse, told by – checks notes – Vanilla Ice.”

Fiona Sturges in the FT

Mistresses (Mags/Audible) - “Women get the benefit of the doubt, and their male oppressors are called all the names under the sun. Lister and Jamil are an excellent duo, full of charisma and bouncing off one another in amused outrage. There is also a third voice, that of Katie Kennedy, who made her name making raucous videos on TikTok answering questions such as ‘Did Queen Victoria invent sending nudes?’ Here she provides irreverent contextual information, Philomena Cunk-style.”

Patricia Nicol in the Sunday Times

From the Oasthouse: The Alan Partridge Podcast (Audible) - “Partridge, of course, started off in audio — on radio in 1991 as the golf-sweatered sports reporter of Armando Iannucci’s news-spoofing On the Hour. On screen he has to be a more exaggerated grotesque. But here it is the subtleties of the satire in a script co-written by Coogan and Rob and Neil Gibbons, coupled with their deep (even affectionate) understanding of this vain, self-serving prat, that make these such a ticklish listen. Partridge is just so pleasurably ghastly, yet also fondly familiar.”

Lucy White in the Irish Independent

Wanging On (Listen) - “During Norton’s summer hiatus from his eponymous TV chat show, it’s a reminder how much his whip-smart mischief is missed.”
Dig It (Persephonica) - “Whiley met Zoe Ball (54) – a treasure in her own right – while both were researchers on the 1990s Channel 4 show The Word. They’ve been firm friends ever since, which is on palpable but never nauseating display.”
Comfort Eating (The Guardian) - “It’s not the first time Grace Dent’s Comfort Eating has appeared in this column. And it won’t be the last, due to its reassuringly simple format, great guests and Dent’s wit.”