Student experts: Top 10 online radio stations

The internet is overflowing with exciting radio for your listening pleasure, but where to begin and what can you expect? As a help, I have compiled this list of ten radio stations and podcasts I find interesting right now.

10. The Nerdist Podcast

I found this podcast randomly when I first got into the great world of podcasting: The Nerdist invites new exciting guests for interviews every week. The hosts and their sheer excitement to meet their heroes is fantastic, and makes it a pleasant company on a rainy Sunday. And you can understand why they would get excited, with guests like Paul McCartney, Bill Gates and George RR Martin to name a few, there is excitement enough to go around. Do you like Doctor Who, Star Trek, Marvel Comics and stuff like that? This is the podcast for you!

9. NPR – First Listen

NPR does a lot of nice programmes, and they will frequent this list, since this is a go-to-place for music and culture radio online.

Their First Listen feature gives you access to new music before its release, and, no, not just a single or a B-side of a record. Entire albums are available days and weeks before they hit the stores. In April, they actually had the Danish band Mew’s new album ”+-”, and as I am writing this I am listening to SOAK’s debut ”Before We Forgot How To Dream”, a full week before the release on iTunes.

8. 99% invisible

Once you have found some nice new music, get ready to learn something entirely different. 99% Invisible is a podcast ”about design, architecture & the 99% invisible activity that shapes our world” to quote themselves. It has gained a lot of recognition for the high production value and the host Roman Mars’ ability to process design and art through audio, which is a mind-boggling conundrum if you ask me.

7. NPR – All Songs Considered

Another way to discover new music on NPR is All Songs Considered. I often have a hard time stumbling upon new music on my own, but once I started tuning in for this show occasionally, I sometimes find myself weeks and even months ahead of the music-trends here in Denmark. Hosts Bob Boilen and Robin Hilton deliver new music in a fashion that really makes you want to hear what they selected this time around, and there is usually something for everyone.

6. Love + Radio

This podcast repeatedly blows my mind. This intimate look into the life of people you maybe knew existed, but never hear about, takes you close to some strange but interesting characters. Nick van der Kolk, the man behind Love + Radio is a man I truly admire. The episode featuring Jay Thunderbolt, a man who runs a strip club in his apartment, and threatens Nick in every other sentence in the interview, is a thrilling look into the life of a man who truly lives the hard knock life.

Another recent episode features a woman who, for over a decade, has made a living from humiliating men on the phone for their pleasure and selling used panties to the highest bidder. I highly recommend giving this podcast at try.

5. The Bugle

”Audio newspaper, for a visual world,” John Oliver excitingly opens every program. You might know him from The Daily Show w/Jon Stewart, where he was a reporter and temp-host, and more recently on HBOs Last Week Tonight.

He and his British colleague Andy Zaltzman call each other up once a week for a satirical look at news and politics from around the world. The Bugle is half an hour of solid mockery of politicians and other people in the media in the manner you would expect from comedians.

4. The Bret Easton Ellis Podcast

Yes, that Bret Easton Ellis, author of American Psycho. Every week he invites a new prominent member of the American pop cultural elite to The Bret Easton Ellis Podcast. Just to pique your curiosity I might mention folks like Marilyn Manson, Kanye West and pornographer James Deen.

3. NPR – Pop Culture Happy Hour

This round-the-table podcast NPR – Pop Culture Happy Hour discusses American pop culture with a variety of different guests, primarily writers from NPRs different sections. These guys know everything about all sorts of topics, and you sometimes get amazed at how they throw references around with everyone just nodding their heads and agreeing, which at the same time can be a bit annoying. They mostly agree about everything. But the bottom line is, if you’re looking for some new rabbit hole to dig down into, this podcast will present a bunch of stuff to get lost in.

2. This American Life

The king of podcasts, Ira Glass hosts an excellent weekly hour-long podcast This American Life exploring the life of Americans. Each week has a new theme, and by means of field-reporting and journalistic exploration different staff and freelance contributors illuminate the theme in a so well produced manner that will make you drop everything and give it your undivided attention in fear of missing a single syllable. Highly recommendable!

1. KEXP

At the top of the list we find the best music-radio I my opinion. A bunch of talented DJs and people in the music industry are hosts on KEXP, and this is the go-to place to find your new favourite artist. There’s really not anything else to say except to give it a listen.

On the last note, I will recommend everyone to get the app TuneIn on your phones and tablets. This way you’ll always have every online radio in the world right at the tip of your fingers.

When you’ve tried out all of these radio stations and podcasts, tune in the University Radio of Copenhagen, Universitetsradioen, where the author Anton Hagedorn works as an editor.

Do you have any more suggestions for cool podcasts/radio stations? Write them in the comment field below!

universitypost@adm.ku.dk

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