Quiet Riot

To her friends and colleagues, she was Renee Nicole Good, a 37-year-old mother of three, prize-winning poet and guitarist. To the Trump administration, she was a 'domestic terrorist'. Naomi Smith and Alex Andreou look at the aftermath of the killing and ask what we are to make of the age of ICE. There is a lot to digest. And they discuss the latest X outrage, with Grok creating abusive images of w...

NOW what's he done, and why? Trump, the self-appointed King of Chaos, is ramping up that chaos, kidnapping foreign leaders, hijacking oil tankers, reiterating his threats to move in on Greenland and more besides. Naomi Smith and Alex Andreou are joined by the redoubtable Arthur Snell – Quiet Riot regular, former diplomat, author and, of course, host of the excellent Behind The Lines podcast – to t...

Buckle up as we break out our crystal ball to make a few tentative predictions for the year ahead. Joining Naomi and Alex is Danny Sriskandarajah, chief executive of the New Economics Foundation (also former boss of Oxfam GB, the youngest boss of the Royal Commonwealth Society and author of civic action bible Power to the People ... phew!). As it's Quiet Riot, expect a healthy dose of optimism ami...

HAPPY NEW YEAR! And we kick off 2026 with an uplifting 40minutes that is short on politics and big ... very big ... on Wokey Dokey and Grin And Share It. These are the most popular features on Quiet Riot so we thought we'd pull together a bumper episode featuring only Wokeys and GASIs. Marvel at the very Welsh response to last year's flag-flying epidemic; cheer for the beavers that couldn't be rel...

What's this? More holiday helpings of our James O'Brien special? You'd better believe it. And, as well as looking over our shoulders as 2025 disappears beneath the horizon, we're also asking what one thing we'd each change that would have made the world a (hopefeully) better place. Plus the usual Quiet Riot mixture of chat and chortles to help you through the twilight of the holiday season. Also ....

Ding-dong! It's time for our festive specials and this year we've got broadcaster extraordinaire James O'Brien with us to help prod the soggy sprout that's been 2025 ... and to peek in the oven to see how 2026 is cooking up. Who's had a bad year, a mad year, a (dare we ask) fab year? Buckle up for bants, insight and the usual helping of Quiet Riot laughter. And this is only part 1 of the show! Lis...

Turns out Epstein was a keen black rectangle collector. Either than or the DoJ is trying to rewrite history. Or at least redact history. ALSO - The Westminster Lobby is in a tizzy over losing their special access to No.10, but is this about less transparency or more? PLUS - Some hilarious panto-related political polling from our friends at More in Common. Naomi Smith and Alex Andreou pick over the...

We need to talk about war. MI6 has warned that we are, in this country, now in the space between peace and war. The Government has announced an independent review into foreign interference with our domestic affairs. Europe is talking tougher and even Germany is now reframing its own dark past as a warning about what happens when dictators are appeased. Alex Andreou, Naomi Smith and Kenny Campbell...

So it turns out Belgium of all places has Russia by the financial short and curlies ... and that's awks for various reasons. The EU is immobilising indefinitely £185bn of Russian assets – held mostly by Belgian bank Euroclear – to help Ukraine and Russia is somewhat miffed. Belgium doesn't want to be saddled with a huge bill if this all goes pear-shaped. Alex Andreou and Kenny Campbell pick over t...

The Lib Dems have elected a new president and his journey to that lofty position is pretty non-standard. Naomi Smith sits down with Josh Babarinde to find out how a beermat set him on his political journey, and what he learned through his work with young offenders and broken phones. There's politics too, of course – from the latest developments in the UK-EU debate, to the future of the Lib Dems. S...

It is time for Europe to get past squabbling and realise that the US is no longer even ambivalent, but an active hostile antagonist, intent on picking off liberal democracies one-by-one. Unless we can unite. PLUS: A very interesting experiment with social media is taking place in Australia. Can it work? Alex Andreou and Naomi Smith are joined by brilliant satirist and former "Secret Tory", Henry M...

You know the right-wing content that crops up relentlessly in your socials? Well, it's not your fault and you can't escape it, even if you start a new account. Naomi Smith and Kenny Campbell look at new research showing that TikTok serves up right-wing propaganda even *before* you've had a chance to build your browsing history. And, in the week that both France and Germany revealed plans for natio...

History defines our present, our present defines our future. And so this week we look at the lessons finally being accepted from Brexit, plus some lessons for Labour from the 2024 General Election. Alex Andreou and Naomi Smith are joined by Sam Freedman – Substacker extraordinaire, political commentator, author and senior fellow at the Institute for Government. He knows his political onions! And t...

From Labour's Budget to Corbyn/Sultana's conference ending in acrimony, it's been a big week for the political left. You can buy Mismanaged Decline: What politicians won't tell you about the economy here and support both a local bookshop and Quiet Riot. But has it also been a good week for them? Alex Andreou and Kenny Campbell tread warily through the Budget fallout on their way to the Your Party...

Budget 2025: A world of taxes, benefits and leaks. Mostly leaks. Tune in to find out what Alex Andreou and Naomi Smith make of it all. And they are joined by economic heavyweight Vicky Pryce to ensure that the economics aren't overshadowed by the theatrics (of which there were many). ***SPONSOR US AT ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠KO-FI.COM/QUIETRIOTPOD⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠*** Head to ⁠⁠nakedwines...

Alex Andreou and Naomi Smith, mull the week's news. The second part of the Covid Inquiry issues its report on decision making and is scathing about the toxicity, chaos, and sheer incompetence at the centre of the Johnson administration. Should there be consequences? Trump tries to impose a surrender on Ukraine, in order to distract from the MAGA meltdown at home. How should Europe respond? And mor...

In this country, we can get through multiple Prime Ministers in the time it takes for a serious sexual assault allegation to make it to trial. As Keir Starmer battles leadership challenges (Real? Imagined?), Naomi Smith and Kenny Campbell look at the threats from Streeting, Mahmood and Burnham; there's the scent of blood in the air at Westminster. And, in a week during which a judge expressed desp...

Not AGAIN, Labour comms team... After a week that started with a leadership kerfuffle and ended with an income tax volte-face (or was it..?), Naomi Smith and Kenny Campbell try to work out how sticking to a manifesto pledge can transmogrify into a U-turn. And there's a look at the unbelievable 'canal' of fly-tipped waste that has appeared in Oxfordshire, as we ask why Brits put up with this behavi...

It takes a very special team to accidentally advertise and fuel a leadership challenge that was not even real yet, but the current team in No.10 is nothing if not special. AND... Is the BBC just another legacy giant that has outlived its purpose? Or is it worth defending against Trump? (SPOILERS: Hell, yes, it's worth defending!) PLUS... an unexpected "Wokey Dokey" and a superbly inspirational "Gr...

Why is a moral panic gripping the country about a handful of mistaken prisoner releases? How do we lift our gaze to a better horizon? Musk's remuneration package is designed to shock. Why is the Tesla board so keen to reward failure? And - with Comcast eyeing up ITV and the BBC scoring a massive Traitors hit, were news of the death of legacy media premature? Alex Andreou and Naomi Smith, mull the...

The future's bright, the future's not orange. Perhaps. Trump may think he's the ultimate New Yorker but the Big Apple turned rotten on him, as Zohran Mamdani became the first mayor to attract a million votes since the 1960s, on an uplifting night for Democrats across the US. We take a deep dive. And, talking of rotten, we look at Rachel Reeves' attempts to prepare us all for a bruising Budget. Uh-...

This week, a nod to Halloween, we have a real CREEPSHOW. Alex Andreou and Kenny Campbell look at how Buck House, the media and the Metropolitan Police have dealt – or failed to deal – with the fallout from Virginia Giuffre's long and ultimately tragic campaign for justice. Where does the PR end and the restructuring of the Royal Family begin? And, if the Met won't act on behalf of a woman who was...

Lies, lies and more lies. How many lies can our institutions survive? And why are we so bad at defending those institutions? Alex Andreou and Kenny Campbell are joined by a Quiet Riot favourite – Christina Pagel, a professor of operational research at UCL as well as the creator of the smash hit service to humanity that is the Trump Action Tracker. Is Britain vulnerable to the sort of institutional...

When the trust vanishes, you're finished, whether you're Labour in Caerphilly or a celebrity in BBC's The Traitors. Alex and Kenny pore over three examples of democracy in action from a hectic week – Plaid Cymru's historic victory in Wales, a new Deputy Leader for Labour in Westminster and ... a bizarre litany of bad voting decisions in The Traitors. All three have involved some measure of chaos b...

Special guest Zoe Williams (and young Ruby), discuss the week's big stories with Alex and Kenny. What is it about Zack Polanski that seems to be taking the British left by storm? Has Corbyn and Sultana's 'Your Party' missed the boat? Will the Caerphilly by-election become a test case? AND how is it possible for AI solutions to be both at the fingertips of every minister, to answer all the UK's pro...