Over/underrated: a music podcast with Fran and Babs

Joined by writer & broadcaster Bill Cummings , we're returning down under to discuss two bands who experienced wildly varying levels of success... INXS have sold a whopping 95 million albums worldwide - they're one of Australia's most successful musical acts ever. With their crisp new wave sound and iconic frontman, will Fran & Babs feel the hype is nevertheless deserved? Bill...

We often discuss covers, so it was about time for a special episode dedicated to the ones we admire, as well as those we don't love so much... We've picked ten overrated cover versions - those that are better known than the originals or ones we don't enjoy - as well as ten underrated covers, songs we feel add to, or even improve on, the original. Tune in also for a slightly controversi...

Joined by musician, comedian and podcaster Robin Allender , we are back feeling nostalgic about the late 90's... Stereophonics are clearly one of the more successful acts to emerge from Wales - to date, their most famous song Dakota has had over 200 million streams on Spotify - but are Fran, Babs or Robin fans of the band? Robin picked Ash as an underrated favourite in part due to the influenc...

Billie Eilish is undoubtedly one of the world's most famous pop stars and Babs enjoys quite a few of her songs. She pitches some of her faves - and a couple of not-so-faves - to Fran, as we both ponder whether the hype is justified... Babs also FINALLY gets to chat Fran's ear off about how much she loves Charli xcx. Charli is undeniably also a famous pop star, but Babs is frustrated that she doesn...

Joined by our first ever returning guest - Ryan Schaff, host of ⁠The Broken Record Player podcast⁠ - we're breaking out the eyeliner, black nail varnish and discussing what makes a band truly goth... Ryan is a huge fan of The Cure - they're in his top five favourite bands of all time - while Fran & Babs don't exactly muster the same level of enthusiasm...can he get them more on boa...

Joined by friend of the podcast Lieselotte Smets, we're learning more about the musical landscape of the Netherlands 🇳🇱 Lieselotte is Belgian, but has lived in the Netherlands for many years. Despite being Flemish - and therefore a native Dutch speaker - she realised there was a massive gap in her Netherlands music knowledge, so she has been keenly exploring the country's lesser-known gems...

U2 are obviously one of the biggest bands in the world, with 15 studio albums to date - Fran believes there's a lot of gold in their extensive back catalogue and that some of their albums are more underrated than others...will Babs agree? We also discuss The Psychedelic Furs' back catalogue in some depth - Babs had previously dipped into the band's music but not gone much beyond their...

We're kicking off our new season with a very special episode! We're interviewing Bob Stanley, a very talented writer, musician, DJ, and film producer. Since founding the band Saint Etienne, Bob has enjoyed a parallel career as a music journalist. He came on the podcast to talk about two of his books, which - together - span the entire history of pop, from the invention of the 78 rpm record...

Joined by comedian, writer & performer Joz Norris , we're finally delving into prog rock for our last episode of the season - and we hope, like us, that you don't take it TOO seriously... Joz picked Emerson, Lake & Palmer as overrated because he feels that they represent the wildest excesses of prog and contribute to its pretentious reputation. With one of the songs on Joz's pl...

Joined by content creator, musician, amateur historian, YouTuber, journalist & author Christian Patrick , we're discussing two glam bands on, arguably, the opposite of the fame spectrum this week... First up, another sacred cow under the microscope - we're talking about behemoths Queen, specifically their output from the 70's...like most people, Christian, Fran & Babs like some...

Joined by Chris & Mark from the Unsung Podcast , it's Part II of our Record Label special, where we're talking about Wilmington, Delaware's Jade Tree Records (check out Part I where we discussed Washington DC's Dischord Records). Fran & Babs hadn't previously heard of Jade Tree Records - and didn't know many of the bands on their roster. Founded in 1990 and initiall...

Joined by Chris & Mark from the Unsung Podcast , it's a different approach for today's episode - our guests have picked two different record labels and five bands who released records from them to make up each playlist, and we're all discussing whether a label can be classified as overrated or underrated. In Part I we're talking about Washington DC's Dischord Records, an ⁠i...

Following on from our Eurovision 2023 episode , we popped online for a quick chat to talk about an entertaining short film - Worst Kept Secret: The Subwoolfer Documentary which is available on the Eurovision Song Contest YouTube channel . Fans of Eurovision 2022 will definitely remember Subwoolfer, the yellow Norwegian space wolves who managed to keep their identities under wrap throughout the com...

It's our yearly Eurovision special - we've listened to all 37 songs from this year's competition and picked our five favourite and least favourite tunes. This time, we're also joined by contributors across Europe giving their opinions on the competition and some of the entries we talk about! If you enjoy this episode, you should check out our 2022 and 2021 episodes as well as our t...

Joined by Shane McMenemy from the Mixtaping Identity podcast , we're talking about one of his all-time favourite bands - as well as a DJ he's not super-keen on. It's not that Shane massively dislikes Calvin Harris (Dumfries), but he feels his music is "cynically-produced and commercially-driven" - Shane feels Calvin is good at capitalising on trends, but there's little su...

Friend of the podcast Tom Haigh joins us again - he previously talked about David Bowie in Part I of this British Singer-Songwriters theme - and this time he's talking about musician Nick Drake. An influence on many big artists like R.E.M., Kate Bush and The Cure, Nick Drake's profile was low during his short lifetime - and, argues Tom, still not high enough these days for such a talented...

Joined by friend of the podcast Tom Haigh, we had such fun chatting to him that it's gonna be another two-parter... Fran & Babs have wanted to talk about David Bowie for ages and Tom is a mega-fan, primed and ready to defend him - he has picked some deeper cuts to introduce lesser-known Bowie tunes to two people who feel that he is, at the very least, overhyped... Tom's brother Jack is...

While Fran acknowledges Kraftwerk have been a huge influence on many bands he likes, he's never been interested enough to dip into into their back catalogue too heavily...Babs is a fan and hopes to convince Fran that Kraftwerk's source material is worth listening to in more depth... Fran introduces Babs to Henric de la Cour, a solo act who also used to be the main singer-songwriter in the...

Joined by Wisconsinite podcaster and YouTuber Brad LeBaron , we're heading back down under... Melbournites Jet are obviously best known for their smash hit 'Are You Gonna Be My Girl' - but they produced three albums and supported huge acts like the Rolling Stones, Oasis, Green Day and Bruce Springsteen...however, do Fran & Babs agree that a lot of their music sounds derivative? Bra...

We're joined by Teesside-based singer songwriter Jen Dixon this week, who brings two nostalgic rock bands for discussion.. .Jen is a huge Foo Fighters fan - drumming from a young age, she was especially in awe of Taylor Hawkins...Fran is a Foo Fighters fan and says they're excellent live - but Babs has always felt they're overplayed (and that Dave Grohl shouts a bit too much in songs)....

'Ow do! We're back in Yorkshire to discuss two more Leodensian rock bands, having talked about Alt-J and Duels back in our first season... Kaiser Chiefs might be best known for their songs and albums of the noughties, but the band has continued to release music as recently as 2022...Fran has put together a playlist spanning most of their albums so he and Babs can talk about whether their t...

We will be back next week with the first episode of Season Six! Bands we'll be discussing in this series include David Bowie, Queen, Nick Drake, The Ark, King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard, Jet, The Music, Kaiser Chiefs, Kraftwerk, Calvin Harris, Henric de la Cour and Frightened Rabbit. In the meantime, find out what some of our BIGGEST FANS have to say about the podcast....

Rounding off this season is a special bumper episode with Chris Olley, musician and lead singer/guitarist from Six by Seven . If these names sound familiar, it's because Fran picked Six by Seven as an underrated band in our previous Nottingham episode - so this conversation is an Over/underrated first!  Chris listened to our episode, got in touch and we invited him to come on to talk about wh...

Santa Fran & Babs welcome you to our first ever Christmas special! We're joined by festive music appreciator and friend of the podcast Richard Delahay, who has picked his top five overrated & underrated Christmas songs... How much has working in retail and catering traumatised Fran & Richard's reactions to Christmas songs? How much of our conversation will be dominated by discussing th...

We've wrapped up the year once again, each picking our ten favourite tracks from 2022 and discussing our musical highlights and lowlights. However, this year we've mixed it up a little 🍸 and assigned each of our picks to ten categories... In Part II, we have five more categories to discuss: best sync song, favourite song you'd like to hear live, best new artist, best rock song and favourite non-E...