T minus 20

In what is one of many unexpected moves, Russian President Vladimir Putin interrupted the afternoon programmes on the telly to inform his countrymen that he had just sacked the entire Russian Parliament mere weeks after he was elected for a second term as President!  In Australia Qantas launched it's budget airline, Jetstar with fares from Sydney to Melbourne as low as 60 bucks! Who cares abo...

This week in the news residents the Sydney suburb of Redfern clashed with police over the death of Aboriginal teenager TJ Hickey. TJ was allegedly clipped by a police car while being pursued on his bicycle. He hit the gutter and fell. His injuries were fatal and the local Indigenous community erupted with grief and outrage. We look at the incident and the media coverage from the time, and wonder i...

In response to a very conservative State of The Union address, San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsome gives the directive to issue same sex marriage licenses. This would be seen by many as the spark that lit a fire under conservatives right across the nation. Poor old Gavin just wanted to do the right thing by his constituents. Out in space the largest diamond ever discovered was spotted by the Harvard...

It's the biggest story of 2004 so far, the moment when the world was seemingly more shocked by Justin Timberlake exposing Janet Jackson's nipple at the Superbowl Halftime Show than anything a little old war in the middle east could deliver. We take a look at it from all sides 20 years later.  Meanwhile over at Harvard University as student by the name of Mark Zuckerberg took his first st...

It really is a mixed bag this week, Spirit's twin probe Opportunity touches down on Mars and instantly goes to work proving that there was once water on the red planet.  In Taiwan a massive explosion rips through the city centre of Tainan, but it's not what you think. A dead whale being transported through the city becomes so bloated with rotten gas in the heat that it bursts, leaving ev...

It's a sad and shocking start to the week this week with the death of cricket legend David Hookes as the result of an altercation with a bouncer at a nightclub.  In scientific news NASA lost contact with the Spirit rover as it's flash memory subsystem overloaded. Thanksfully they were able to try turning it off an on again to get things working.  In tech Nintendo announce the release of...

It's the wedding of the year already, Britney Spears goes on a bender in Vegas, get's married and divorced all in the same weekend! It really is the perfect start to 2004!  Over in the Middle East construction begins on the world's tallest building, The Burj Khalifa. While it still remains a spectacular feat of engineering it has one terrible flaw that has to do with poop.  While we...

It's our final week of best bits before we kick off a new season. We're going through the archives and pulling out the best bits from the past year including: 50 Cent and Lil' Kim's collaboration on 'Magic Stick' - the song that changed the game in strip clubs around the world.  US Forces kill Saddam Hussein's sons - former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein’s sons, Q...

We're going through the archives and pulling out the best bits from the past year including: The No War protest on the Sydney Opera House - while the perpetrators were maligned by the media and community at the time, these days they display all sorts of stuff on the sails of one of Australia's most recognisable landmarks.  The conspiracy against JC Chasez from NSYNC -  and why Justin Tim...

We're going through the archives and pulling out the best bits from the past year including: The Antwerp Diamond heist - dubbed the "heist of the century", it was the largest ever diamond heist and one of the largest robberies in history.  50 Cent releases "In Da Club" - the single produced by Dr Dre that put everyone else in the hip-hop community on notice, especially Irv...

It's a 2003 extravaganza for our last episode before summer programming kicks in.  The best and worst in Google search, the Time person of the year, billboard, iTunes and the ARIA charts, movies, television and even books!  Brace yourself!  Send us Fan Mail Hang with us on socials to chat more noughties nostalgia - Facebook (@tminus20) or Instagram (tminus20podcast) . You can also contact us...

It almost took until the end of the year for what was possibly one of the biggest news stories of 2003 to break but Saddam Hussein is found hiding in a spider hole in Tikrit and captured by US forces. At the same time there's terrosim in Moscow when Red Square is bombed in a Chechan suicide attack. In popular culture, and almost as horrific, Nick Lachey and Jessica Simpson provide colour comm...

This week its Guy Sebastian vs Shannon Noll in a showdown for the title of Australian Idol. And knowing what we know about both contestants now, we have to say Nollsy was robbed! We’ve got a legend who climbed the Sydney Harbour Bridge during a night out on the beers and stole the flag. We discuss why Abercrombie and Fitch were cancelled in the early 2000s and why Irv Gotti decided to drop the ‘Mu...

George W Bush on board Air Force One touched down in Bagdad this time 20 years ago to surprise the troops with a message  from home and stayed for Thanksgiving dinner.  From one muppet to another Kami from South Africa's sesame street is appointed the UN mascot for juvenile AIDS victims. Kami made headlines in 2002 when she was introduced as the worlds first HIV positive muppet! In sporting n...

A new album, a number one single in the Aussie charts and the youngest singer ever to get a star on the Hollywood walk of fame… What did you get up to when you were 21? Because all of this happened in just one week in the life of our patron saint, Ms Britney Jean Spears!  It wasn’t a bad week for Outkast either as they crack into the charts with the single ‘Hey Ya’, which would go on to be a mains...

A sex tape starts spreading across the internet this tiem 20 years ago, featuring a young Paris Hilton and her ex-boyfriend Rick Salmon. The tape would later be packaged and marketed by porn distributor Red Light District as 'One Night In Paris'. At the time it was all anyone in the mainstream media would talk about, we examine the controversy around it and look at how an incident like t...

One of the most powerful solar flares ever was recorded thie week 20 years ago which saw ghostly auroras appear as far south from the North Pole as Florida. We think it's has a profound effect on the music business this week along with some other world events. Needless to say, doomsday preppers were in heaven.  Ja Rule rears his ugly head as the herpes of music gives everyone the clap back, L...

It's a real life horror story this week when 13 year old Bethany Hamilton goes for a morning surf and has her arm bitten off by a tiger shark. While it's a horrible story, Bethany is a pretty incredible human.  Also in the news… Fuelled by the Santa Ana winds, the Cedar Fire wreaks havoc across California, taking homes and lives with it. On the homefront ASIO conducts a series of terror...

It's a death match for the ages and you get to decide... Who performed the best miracle? Mother Theresa healing the sick in Calcutta or David Blaine who spent 44 days in a perspex box without having a poo.  We discuss the beatification of Mother Theresa from an ailing Pope John Paul II, and look at her career from her training in Dublin to caring for the destitute and dying in the streets of...

China launches it's first manned space mission this time 20 years ago and nobody finds out until after the fact.  The Staten Island Ferry collides with the pier at the St George Ferry Terminal in Staten Island NY killing 11 people and injuring dozens more.  MIcrosoft discusses a merger with Google and Google plays hard to get.  And it's a week of releases, MTV had Room Raiders. Yunbloodz...

Democrat Grey Davis was recalled and Arnold Schwarzenegger becomes the governor of the State of California on October 7 2003. That's right, just like the intro says, The Terminator became the Governator! Rising to the top of a field of candidates that included Gary Coleman from Diff'rent Strokes, Larry Flynt from Hustler Magazine and porn star Mary Carey. In tech news, still in Californi...

Roy from Las Vegas institution Sigfried and Roy is attacked by one of their tigers, Montecore, live on stage, thus ending their run as one of sin city's most popular show. Find out what happened and why Roy did not blame the tiger for biting off his hard and tearing out his throat!  In other news. Italy is plunged into darkness as a blackout leave around 56 million people without power. Thank...

The  2003 Tokachi-Oki earthquake rocks the eastern coast of Hokkaido, in the Tokachi region of Japan while David Hempleman-Adams embarks on a trans-Atlantic flight in a wicker basket balloon.  Meanwhile Dido goes to number one in the Aussie charts with 'White Flag' the lead single from her album 'Life for Rent. We think it may have had something to do with a fella called Slim Shady!...

On this day 20 years ago, President Bush said that he had seen "no evidence" that Saddam Hussein was involved in the September 11 terrorist attacks While The White House has never formally charged that Mr. Hussein was part of the Sept. 11 plot, President Bush had wondered immediately after the attack whether Saddam Hussein’s regime might have had a hand in it.  We discuss that and the te...

The title says it all, a week of political significance and a low point for art.  Libya accepts responsibility for the Lockerbie Bombing in 1988. This leads to sanctions against the country being lifted and the victims of the disaster are finally compensated.  Meanwhile Lil’ Jon unleashes Get Low on an unsuspecting society, thus committing one of the biggest crimes against music since The Black Ey...