T minus 20

Rewind to 8 May 2005 to 14 May 2005 — when HuffPost launched the comment section wars, John Cena dropped a platinum rap album and Malcolm Glazer bought Manchester United like it was a timeshare. Also: the Gorillaz went full apocalypse, Bush nearly got grenaded and 50 Cent whispered sweet nothings on the beach. 🎤 You can’t see this album. John Cena drops You Can’t See Me and somehow it slaps — fro...

Rewind to 1 May 2005 to 7 May 2005: Fall Out Boy drops From Under the Cork Tree straight into our black emo hearts, Lionel Messi scores his first ever goal and The Bold and the Beautiful pulls the ultimate soap opera move — bringing back Taylor from the dead. 🎤 Fall out boys & mySpace feels. Fall Out Boy dropped From Under the Cork Tree and instantly soundtracked your emo awakening. Whether y...

Rewind to 24 to 30 April 2005 — where a massive plane took flight, Gwen taught us how to spell bananas and Japan's rail system suffered a shattering blow. 🚄 Speed kills in Amagasaki. Japan’s famously punctual trains derailed — literally — when a young driver trying to make up time crashed into an apartment block, killing 107. JR West’s obsession with being on time sparked a national reckonin...

Rewind to 17 to 23 April 2005 – when the Bali 9 are busted with 8.3kg of heroin, a teenager drove a tram like a boss and YouTube dropped its very first “like and subscribe.” 🚨 Bali 9 busted. An Aussie drug smuggling op was blown wide open as nine young citizens were caught in Bali with 8.3kg of heroin strapped to their bodies. The kicker? Aussie police tipped off Indonesian authorities, sparking...

Rewind to 10 to 16 April 2005 , when science cloned your dog, Mariah staged a mega comeback, and Pamela Anderson worked in a bookstore (yes, really). 💣 Olympic bomber finally busted. Eric Rudolph pleads guilty to the 1996 Atlanta Olympic bombing, ending a 9-year manhunt. Four life sentences, no parole. 🐶 Who’s a cloned boy? Snuppy the Afghan hound becomes the world’s first cloned dog, born after...

🕊 Farewell JP2. The world farewelled Pope John Paul II after 26 years in the top job. Cue one of the largest funerals in history and all eyes on a chimney as the conclave kicked off. White smoke = new pope. Enter Benedict XVI. ✊ Iraqis Say No. ThanksFirdos Square, once the backdrop for Saddam’s statue toppling, became the stage for a massive anti-American protest. Led by supporters of Muqtada al-...

🌊 Another quake, more heartbreak. Just months after the Boxing Day disaster, a massive 8.6 earthquake rocked Sumatra . Panic spread across the region but mercifully, no tsunami. Tragically, nine Australian military personnel lost their lives in a Sea King crash during the relief mission. ⚖️ Terri Schiavo’s heartbreaking goodbye. After years of legal battles, political interventions and national d...

🌍 The Fukuoka earthquake shakes Japan —an unexpected 6.6 magnitude tremor devastates Genkai Island, leaving one dead and over 1,000 injured. Aftershocks continued for months, proving nature doesn’t always follow the schedule. 🔥 The BP Texas City Refinery explosion —one of the worst industrial disasters in U.S. history. A hydrocarbon vapor explosion kills 15, injures over 180 and sparks billions...

⚛️ Did scientists almost create a black hole? Scientists at the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider were smashing particles together at nearly the speed of light, reaching temperatures hotter than the sun. One physicist suggested we may have created our own version of a black hole. Big bang anyone? 🥊 Manny Pacquiao vs. Erik Morales – The first of an epic trilogy that saw two legends trade punches, sw...

⚖️ The U.S. Supreme Court makes a landmark ruling, banning the death penalty for crimes committed by minors.  ♟️ The world’s greatest chess player retires, leaving us all to wonder: who will defend us when AI takes over? 🎤 50 Cent and The Game go from rap battle to actual battle, beefing over The Documentary, a radio station shootout and general gangster posturing.  🍼 Vin Diesel trades muscle ca...

🛫 Steve Fossett is at it again, this time flying solo around the world without stopping and making history. 🏒 Canada loses its collective mind over curling as Jennifer Jones pulls off “the shot” to claim victory. 🥋 Mortal Kombat: Deception drops for GameCube , delivering spine-ripping fatalities and, for some reason, a Mortal Kombat chess mode. 🎵 50 Cent drops The Massacre —because apparently,...

Pop-punk fans everywhere are in emotional free fall—with Blink-182 confirming their split , leaving us all whisper-screaming Where are you? 😭 Meanwhile, Spain votes sí on the EU Constitution , but the whole thing crashes and burns when France and the Netherlands say non. Over in Sydney, Macquarie Fields erupts into riots after a deadly police chase. NASCAR legend Jeff Gordon wins the Daytona 500...

Explosions, heists and YouTube’s awkward dating era? This week on T minus 20: 💣 Rafik Hariri was assassinated in Beirut, triggering mass protests and forcing Syria to withdraw from Lebanon after nearly 30 years of occupation. The explosion, which killed Hariri and 21 others, sent shockwaves through the region, leading to the Cedar Revolution and an international investigation that would take over...

Tony Blair breaks records as the longest-serving Labour PM—but let’s be real, his coolest moment was inviting Oasis to Downing Street . ( Noel Gallagher later called it awkward, which is ironic coming from him.) Meanwhile, his approval ratings nosedived over the Iraq War . Yikes. Over in the world of extreme determination, Ellen MacArthur sails solo around the world in 71 days, surviving on power...

We had such a great chat with Ryan Cabrera and he was so generous with his time that we pretty much had enough content for an entire show. So, as a special treat to our wonderful subscribers, we thought we'd give you the full interview, warts and all, in this bonus episode.  You'll hear all about his 20th anniversary re-release of his single "On The Way Down". We discuss father...

From Iraq’s first free elections 🇮🇶 to Canada paving the way for same-sex marriage rights 🌈, we’re unpacking the headlines that shaped history. The Royal Rumble serves up chaos (and a limping Vince McMahon) in the WWE ring 🤼‍♂️... But, the biggest story for us this week is that US pop rock sensation Ryan Cabrera drops by to talk about the 20th anniversary of his single “On the Way Down”, the gol...

👑 P rince Harry’s Fashion Fiasco – A royal costume party goes awry, and the future Duke of Sussex learns a lesson in history—and headlines. ✋ Fancy dress parties are overrated anyways, but you will be shocked at the theme for this one.  🚀 Eris, the Queen of Strife ! – A distant icy rebel in the Kuiper Belt shakes up astronomy and dethrones Pluto . Goddess of discord or frozen farts? You be the...

We've saved some of the biggest stories of 2004 for our last week of summer programming. Protesters, dressed as Batman, scaled Buckingham Palace. Protesters, dressed as construction workers, broke into British Parliament. And Saddam Hussein, dressed as Saddam Hussein faced his first day in court following his capture.  We dissect the conspiracy theories around Eron's Ken Lay and his myst...

We're halfway through our little sabbatical and getting ready to come back with our biggest season yet. In the meantime enjoy the tall tales of Malice at The Palace - the biggest brawl in NBA history, the time Britney married K-Fed and Mel's adventures with porno Tetris. Plus we've got shaved mouse mats, tornado chasers getting sucked out of ditches and we see whether or not reality...

We're still taking a short break but now is your chance to catch up on some of our bigger moments from 2004. The Killdozer rampage, Lance Armstrong's fall from grace and who could forget the time Dave Matthews tour bus dumped a full tank of human waste on the city of Chicago!?!?  Also we have the body horror that was the reality series The Swan, a book of 10 Big Ones from Janet Evanovich...

Its that time where we get to put our feet up, but not before we go over some of the better stories from 2004. So load up your Party Susans and get ready for Nipplegate, Ceasar Milan, some hot coffee from GTA 3 and loads more.  Send us Fan Mail Hang with us on socials to chat more noughties nostalgia - Facebook (@tminus20) or Instagram (tminus20podcast) . You can also contact us there if you want...

It's our best of the best for the year 2004 where the internet’s favorite new words take center stage 📖, we find out who Time ’s Person of the Year  was and look at all the hot topics that were trending on Google search 🌟. On the music charts, there were epic dance tracks 🕺, soulful ballads , and funky throwbacks dominating airwaves. Over on iTunes , fans downloaded pop hits and rock anthe...

🌏 On December 26, the Boxing Day Tsunami , triggered by a 9.3 magnitude earthquake, devastated 14 countries, including Indonesia, Sri Lanka, and Thailand . With waves up to 30 meters high traveling at 800 km/h, nearly 228,000 lives were lost, 167,000 in Indonesia alone. The disaster exposed the lack of warning systems and even shifted Earth’s rotation slightly. Sony’s PSP launched in Japan on Dec...

It's a week full of heartbreak. There's no way to sugar coat it, but we will press on and make the best of it. On December 8, tragedy struck the music world 💔 when an obsessed fan killed Dimebag Darrell Abbott and three others during a Damageplan performance at the Alrosa Villa nightclub. The shooting riased a LOT of questions about the safety of music venues but also fuelled the gun de...

This week, the heartbreaking Shaanxi coal mine explosion in China . A methane gas build-up caused one of the deadliest mining disasters ever, claiming 166 lives and shining a harsh light on the dangers of an industry where safety often took a backseat. 💔💨 But in Wales , it was all about the glow-up! ✨ After years of drama (and a scrapped Zaha Hadid opera house), the Wales Millennium Centre fina...