Getting Better Acquainted

In GBA 286 we get better acquainted with Nick Harris. He talks about how he accidentally got the job he'd always wanted (although he didn't know he'd always wanted it at the time), making podcasts and youtube videos for The British Museum, travelling around the world a lot during his childhood, ancient board-games, building sound studios, super cats, living in an uncertain world, getting sent to t...

GBA 285 is a special episode of Getting Better Acquainted. It's two parts monologue and one part interview as my dad tells the story of two road trips he made across America in 1969 to film in American coal mines on behalf of the British Coal Board. We get better acquainted with him and the places and people he met. This is an edited version of some recordings I made with him before GBA had even s...

In GBA 284 we get better acquainted with The Family Tree Podcast. I'm joined by Jen Adamthwaite the co-producer/creator of GBA's weird sister podcast to talk about the whys, the hows, the highs and the lows of making the first season of this magical realist podcast drama. THIS EPISODE CONTAINS SPOILERS FOR THE FAMILY TREE. To listen to The Family Tree from Episode 1 and for more info about the ser...

In GBA 283 we get better acquainted with Dr Cathy Elliott. We talk about changing your mind, being aware of your emotions, The Radical Ordinary, Temporal Othering, storytelling, her book Democracy Promotion as Foreign Policy, whiteness, creativity and so much more. We also spend quite a bit of time deconstructing our experiences of me performing my show about masculinity to her students and how we...

In this Getting Better Acquainted Extra, which I recorded just before Christmas, I round up how 2016 went down both personally and politically, in what has become an annual post New Year retrospective. The episode finishes off with a true story I told at Spark True Stories at the first ever London Podcast Festival. Contact me on twitter where I'm @goosefat101 on by email on goosefat101@gmail.com o...

In GBA 282 we get better acquainted with Christmas (again). It's the 2016 Christmas Special! This year contains some tributes to the late great Leonard Cohen and a conversation with my 92 year old dad about the ghosts of Christmas past. Content note: mental health issues, Christmas For other flavours of Christmas check out the Christmas specials from past years: https://soundcloud.com/gettingbette...

In GBA 281 we get even better acquainted with Radcliffe. He talks about being in a coma, continuing battles with addiction, the double edged swords of being attractive and charming, storytelling, class, belief and so much more. We recontextualize his journey through addiction, prison, homelessness and public school and we talk about the pressures, ironies and positives that can come in telling aud...

In GBA 280 we get better acquainted with Joe Marshall. He talks about his journey from being a child who thought words weren't for him due to dyslexia and bad education to eventually becoming an award winning travel writer. Along the way we talk words, true stories, depression, hair beading in Cornwall and what crap rooms can tell us about the housing crisis. Joe plugs: Crap Rooms London: https://...

In GBA 279 we get even better acquainted with Liz. We explore what has happened to her since the last time she was on the show and how the ways in which we know each other have changed since then, including working on Stand Up Tragedy together and her journey into academia and teaching. We also talk about Star Trek, myths, social policy and bereavement. An extra plug from Liz (which I have failed...

In GBA 278 we get even better acquainted with my dad. We sit down to talk about his working life making documentary films about the coal mining industry and the communities who provided it their labour, and we do touch on that frequently, but we also end up talking about lots and lots of other things. Threading through the conversation are the changes, both physical and mental, that have happened...

In GBA 277 we get better acquainted with Zack. He talks acting, therapy, art, activism, politics, that time he wen't a bit viral for heckling Jeremy Corbyn, how he views the political landscape of party politics as someone who has tried to create social change from within the system, being a hypnotherapist who doesn't believe in hypnotism and so much more. This conversation was recorded in a busy...

In GBA 276 we get better acquainted with Rob Auton. He talks about finding words, what driving lessons taught him about art, what exactly it is that he does, trying to find the right balance of confidence and worry, and so much more. As I try to fit him into boxes like introvert, depression and wizard, he nimbly avoids all the labels and reaches instead for the specifics and universals of this str...

In GBA 275 we get better acquainted with Joz Norris. He talks about making weird and silly comedy about ideas and disconnected feelings, why he currently doesn't think of what he does as comedy but why he probably will by the middle of next year, ending up naked apart from a gold thong on a rooftop in Edinburgh, sitcoms, comedy and drama about awkward people in awkward situations and lots more. Jo...

In GBA 274 we get better acquainted with Guilaine Kinouani. She talks about structural power, racism, mental health issues and self care in relation to the experiences of women of colour, clinical psychology, feminism, the #PredatoryPeacekeepers campaign, the differences (and similarities) between British and French attitudes to race/migration and so much more. It's also the first Getting Better A...

In GBA 273 we get better acquainted with Natasha Magigi. She talks about making interactive community theatre out of news headlines, playing nearly all of Shakespeare's virgins, why the favourite character she has played is a many headed monster and so much more. We recorded the conversation in the National Theatre and a lot of it is about theatre and performance but we did try not to be too wanky...

In GBA 272 we get even better acquainted with Paul. After his first appearance on the show Paul wanted to return when he felt more himself to do a second conversation. We met up and walked and talked along the South Bank in the rain, covering mental health issues, masculinity, art, copyright, podcasts, ASMR, cultural appropriation, why people are like sliced bread, how facebook memories remind you...

In GBA 271 we get better acquainted with Nathaniel Tapley. He talks writing, if our current political landscape is killing satire, being a women on the internet for a short period of time, making political comedy, pissing off Dapper Laughs, creating the comic character Sir Ian Bowler, MP, the landscape of print and online media and so much more. @Natt plugs: Following him @natt and/or Sir Ian Bowl...

In GBA 270 we get better acquainted with Karla. She talks about making the Arts Emergency Podcast, how radio and music have intertwined with her life, how she came to writing the long way round after her hopes to be a dancer were defeated by circumstance, how class, race and other types of privilege have an effect on the arts, the media and society and so much more. You can find her on twitter at...

In GBA 269 we get better acquainted with Terry. He talks stand-up, graphic design, novels, politics, how he definitely isn't a hipster and why he makes a podcast about Formula 1. We also talk class, writing, how the darkest times in life are also often hilarious and about the time we worked together making a radio show for Cbeebies where Terry was played Jenni Murray's underling. Terry plugs: His...

In GBA 268 we get better acquainted with Ben. We talk about gender, sexuality, privilege, music, podcasting and lots of other things. We met for the first time about an hour before I turned the mic on after being introduced by a mutual friend via email. Ben had heard my show about masculinity and was interested in talking about some areas in and around it and we were also meeting because he is gea...

In GBA 267 we get better acquainted with... me. In this shorter episode than usual I share some of the true stories I've told on the Spark London stage in 2016. As host of the Spark Hackney open mic I start every night with a story from my life that fits that months theme. I've been hosting for 4 years so finding stories to tell is a constant challenge. For more about Spark True Stories: http://st...

I'm taking a few days off after working flat out on a new podcast that's coming out in the autumn and so don't really have time to write episode notes for this one. It's a great conversation with Richard, who I studied creative writing with at University, recorded a while back in 2012 (I think!) on a trip with my partner Jen to Lancaster. She is also in the episode but not much. She's also co-prod...

In GBA 265 we get better acquainted with... well... it's hard to say really. This was recorded in 2012 for what I intended to make into a Lancaster special, but things didn't go entirely to plan. Mostly you get better acquainted with me and with my partner Jen and get an idea of why audio roadtrips are not something we are best suited to doing together. This is a shorter episode than most GBAs:. I...

In GBA 264 we get better acquainted with Jen. We talk about the things she wants to have done before turning 30, the process of working on yourself, the value of sharing true stories and attempting to live authentically and so much more. Despite working together as part of the Spark London team we had never really sat down and had a face to face conversation and we dive straight in with the big qu...

In GBA 263 we get better acquainted with Neil. We talk about the personal and political factors and influences that motivated him to co-created Arts Emergency, how Arts Emergency has impacted his life and the vital and important work the organisation does supporting and mentoring young people from less advantaged backgrounds to find their way into to arts and humanities. Arts Emergency is the gras...