The 18 Best Podcast Episodes about Music

While I was working on my book Uncharted Territory: What Numbers Tell Us about the Biggest Hit Songs and Ourselves, I knew that I would be consulting tons of books, news articles, and documentaries. What I wasn’t expecting was how vital podcasts would be as a source. In fact, the surfeit of podcasts can be overwhelming during the research process. Still, I had to wade through them. Lots of them.

Given the amount of time I’ve spent listening to music podcasts over the last few years, I wanted to highlight some of my favorite episodes. Nearly all of these were jaw-dropping and some pushed the podcast medium to its limits. Interestingly, you’ll notice that many of these don’t come from dedicated music podcasts. While music podcasts are great when you get to know the hosts and who they are interviewing, I found some of the most exceptional standalone episodes came from unexpected places.

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When Tyler Mahan Coe, the son of country music hitmaker David Allen Coe, set out to tell the history of country music, it seemed like a fool’s errand. You could spend a lifetime dissecting the genre. And while Coe doesn’t cover everything, his specialty is showing you how small details illustrate larger trends in the genre.

This skill is best displayed in his episode on Bobbie Gentry’s “Ode to Billie Joe,” a song that really isn’t even a country song. Not only will you learn about Gentry’s massive hit, but you will think deeply about the nature of fame and authorship.

Bonus Episodes: “The Louvin Brothers: Running Wild” and “Wynonna”

In 2012, a letter began circulating online that claimed that in the early 1990s prison companies goaded music executives to push gangsta rap more heavily in hopes of landing more people in jail. Was there any truth to this conspiracy? If so, who was involved? Also, can popular music even influence how we behave? The debut episode of Louder Than a Riot explores all of these questions and more.

Here are the first few stanzas of “Rednecks,” the lead track on Randy Newman’s 1974 album Good Old Boys:

How did Randy Newman — a White man now known for writing soundtracks for Disney movies — end up writing those words? Malcolm Gladwell tracks down Newman to understand what shaped this record and how its message remains as vital as ever.

Bonus Episodes: While Malcolm Gladwell has some questionable music takes, he once did a fascinating episode on Sammy Davis, Jr. (2018 — 45 min.) Coincidentally, days after I heard this, I stumbled upon Mo Rocca doing a similar episode on Sammy Davis, Jr. (2019 — 56 min.) for his podcast Mobituaries. The catch? Gladwell and Rocca had very different takes on the entertainer. The episodes are a great example of how journalists can interpret the same events in very different ways.

There’s a strong case that Switched on Pop is the greatest music podcast in existence. The premise is relatively straightforward: Nate Sloan and Charlie Harding sit down to talk about the latest trends in pop music. But this isn’t two buddies ragging on current trends or prattling aimlessly about whatever’s on their mind. Sloan is a musicologist. Harding is a songwriter. And these two have done their homework.

What I most appreciate about Switched On Pop is how they hold your attention even when the topic doesn’t interest you on the surface. Their episode on Beyoncé’s album Cowboy Carter is a great example of that. I wasn’t in love with this album when I first heard it, but the Switched On Pop duo are able to contextualize it in a way that makes it interesting even if the songs don’t move you.

Bonus Episodes: “The L.A. guitar shop that reinvented indie folk” (2023 — 37 min.) “Invasion of the Vibe Snatchers” (2022 — 28 min.) “The biggest theme song fail” (2025 — 42 min.) and “Listening 2 Britney: …Baby One More Time” (2022 — 30 min.)

Though 99% Invisible is broadly a podcast about how architecture and design impact the world, they have delivered fascinating episodes on music over the years. This episode focuses on a John Cage composition that was supposed to be played “as slow as possible.” A German church took these instructions very seriously. The current performance is supposed to last from 2001 to 2640.

Bonus Episodes: “Whomst Among Us Has Let The Dogs Out” (2020 — 46 min.) “One-Nil to Arsenal” (2025 — 40 min.), and “All Rings Considered” (2019 — 44 min.)

While every podcast episode in this list is well-researched, I don’t think anybody’s depth of research approaches Andrew Hickey of A History of Rock Music in 500 Songs. In fact, sometimes his depth can be overwhelming, like when he spends seven hours discussing “Never Learn Not to Love” by The Beach Boys. But at his best Hickey can demonstrate how songs usually represent much more than they seem to on the surface. For example, he turns a discussion about Buddy Holly’s “It Doesn’t Matter Any More” into a deep meditation on celebrity, shady practices in the music business, and death.

Bonus episodes: “‘Ida Red’ by Bob Wills and his Texas Playboys” (2018 — 30 min.) and “‘Tomorrow Never Knows’ by the Beatles” (2022 — 1 hr. 19 min.)

Though Hrishikesh Hirway is the host of Song Exploder, you rarely hear his voice. He tucks himself into the background while an artist provides the most intimate details about their creations. In fact, by the time you get to the end of every episode, you’re almost guaranteed to like the song they’ve been discussing even if you’ve previously detested the artist.

This episode featuring New Zealand pop star Lorde talking about her song “Sober” is no different. Not only does it provide great insight into how songs are made these days, but by the time Hirway plays the song at the end of the episode, you feel like you’re in on a secret.

Bonus episodes: “The Postal Service – The District Sleeps Alone Tonight” (2014 — 16 min.), “Sharon Van Etten – Seventeen” (2019 — 31 min.), and “Weezer - Summer Elaine and Drunk Dory” (2016 — 22 min.)

Each season of One Year focuses on, well, one year. Thus far, they’ve covered 1995, 1990, 1986, 1977, 1955, and 1942. Given that the 1942 season takes place at the height of World War II, there’s a lot to cover. Still, they devote an entire episode to one of the most important but under-discussed events in music history: when musicians went on strike and stopped recording new songs for two years. The effects of this strike were far-reaching — forcing us to reconsider how we view musicians as laborers and how performers are paid — but it also led to the early history of bebop jazz going almost completely unrecorded. In less than an hour, One Year pieces it all together.

A mini-series produced by Galaxie 500’s

, Ways of Hearing explores how the shift from analog to digital recording changed how we experience sound in the world. This episode on sound and time permanently rearranged my brain not just because Krukowski is a wonderful storyteller but because he knows how to use the podcast medium to demonstrate what he’s saying as he talks about it.

Bonus episodes: “Love” (2017 — 25 min.)

The premise of This American Life is that host Ira Glass and his team pick a topic and then bring you three to four stories about that topic. Though they have done some episodes completely dedicated to music, I don’t think any of them are worthy of inclusion on this list. That said, they have many short music-related stories that are worthy of your time. Because of that, I’ve decided to build a fake episode for you from their best musical work. I would have ranked this higher if it were real.

• “Music of the Night after Night after Night” (2023 — 26 min.): What is it like to do the same thing each night for decades on end without a break? Reporter Jay Caspian Kang heads to the pit of the long-running musical Phantom of the Opera to find out.

• “Dr. Phil” (2007 — 29 min.): In the wake of a break-up, Starlee Kine decides she wants to write a break-up song. Not a musician, she reaches out to Phil Collins for some tips.

• “I Am Curious, Jello” (2005 — 19 min.): In the 1980s, Michael Guarino was lead prosecutor on a case accusing the Dead Kennedys of obscenity. Decades later, Guarino sits down with Dead Kennedy’s frontman Jello Biafra to tell him how he regrets the case.

• “That's Funny, You Don't Look Jewish” (2004 — 39 min.): Brooklynite Billy Campion, better known by his stage name Vic Thrill, comes to befriend a Hasidic Jew named Chaim who is interested in making music. Campion puts Chaim on stage, but isn’t sure how to feel when Chaim considers leaving his faith for his art.

• “Record Deal with the Devil” (2019 — 20 min.): During the 1980s, a fiery pastor named Bob Larson was concerned that rock music was turning people toward Satan. Bob Guccione Jr., the publisher of Spin, convinces Larson to go on tour with Slayer to found out how sinful rock music really is.

Bonus episodes: “I Thought I Knew U2” (2016 — 6 min.), “Do You Hear What I Hear?” (2014 — 16 min.), “Reverb” (1997 — 17 min.), and “Crunk In The Trunk” (2004 — 14 min.)

When does speech become music? How does our brain process sound? And what determines which musical ideas disgust us and which keep us coming back? On this episode of the science podcast Radiolab, hosts Jad Abumrad and Robert Krulwich go to the edge of knowledge and back to answer these questions.

Bonus episodes: The excellent podcast Unexplainable explored many of the same ideas in “Making Sense: How sound becomes hearing” (2022 — 43 min.) Other great Radiolab episodes include “Pop Music” (2008 — 59 min.), “Unraveling Bolero” (2015 — 26 min.), and “A 4-Track Mind” (2011 — 20 min.)

Rob Harvilla is a double liar. First, his podcast 60 Songs That Explain the '90s covered 120 songs from the 1990s. Second, after he did that, he continued onto the 2000s. But I’ll forgive Harvilla. His podcast rocks.

Harvilla’s secret weapon is that he is very funny. For example, his episode on Santana’s “Smooth” opens up with a long phallic joke. But humor is not enough to get you onto this list. Harvilla manages to weave deep insights through that humor to the point where you can find yourself belly-laughing and mouthing “Wow” within moments.

Bonus episodes: “‘My Name Is’ by Eminem” (2023 — 1 hr. 25 min.), “‘Ice Ice Baby’ by Vanilla Ice” (2022 — 1 hr. 27 min.), and “‘Macarena’ by Los Del Rio” (2023 — 1 hr. 11 min.)

Can a song be dangerous? If so, is it the artist or the audience that faces that danger? In the case of Billie Holiday’s “Strange Fruit,” the answer is both. As she sang her radical song about the lynching of African-American people, the United States government pressured her to stop. Throughline explores how that pressure drove Holiday deeper into the drug addiction that would take her life.

Bonus episodes: Albeit a different podcast, in “The Lost Genius of Judee Sill,” UnFictional tells the story of another musical life cut short by drugs and alcohol.

Berghain is one of the most famous dance clubs in the world. It’s also one of the hardest clubs to get into. Prospective patrons will wait for hours and get turned away at the door without any idea why. Over the course of two episodes, Search Engine’s P.J. Vogt heads to Germany to try to understand what it takes to get into the club and what that says about music and community.

If you look at the description of almost any episode of The Memory Palace, you won’t see many details about what you are about to hear. Host Nate DiMeo does this on purpose. He doesn’t want you to come in with any preconceived notions. So, all I’ll tell you about this episode is it’s about silence, music, and how we choose which music to remember.

Bonus episodes: “A Brief Eulogy for a Commercial Radio Station” (2022 — 12 min.), “Awake” (2024 — 18 min.), “Newsboy” (2024 —15 min.), “(Heard, Once)” (2012 — 9 min.)

Twenty Thousand Hertz is what podcasts were made for. It’s a show about sound and sound design from Dallas Taylor. While this show is special for how well Taylor tells stories, it’s on this list for how Taylor manipulates sound in live time to make those stories come to life. This makes a topic that might seem bland — like music mastering — come to life.

Bonus episodes: “The NBC Chimes: How three notes made history” (2016 — 12 min.) and “The THX Deep Note: From chaos to cinematic legend” (2018 — 29 min.)

In the 1990s, Gregor leant his friend Richard Melville Hall a big box set called Sounds of the South: A Musical Journey from the Georgia Sea Islands to the Mississippi Delta. Under his stage name Moby, Hall would sample music from that box set on his 1999 multi-platinum album Play. Two decades later, Gregor decides he wants his CDs back.

“The Case of the Missing Hit” may not just be the greatest music podcast episode of all-time, but it might be the greatest podcast episode of all-time. The premise is simple. A man claims that he remembers a hit song from the 1990s that nobody else does. Podcast hosts P. J. Vogt and Alex Goldman say that they will track it down. The rest must be heard to be believed.

If you enjoyed this piece, consider ordering my book Uncharted Territory: What Numbers Tell Us about the Biggest Hit Songs and Ourselves. The book chronicles how I listened to every number one hit in history and used what I learned during the journey to write a data-driven history of popular music from 1958 through today.

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