Each month, Podcast Review’s staff offers recommendations on the best new shows to listen to. Here are our favorite podcasts for June.
So We’ve Been Told with Sahaj Kaur Kohli
There are a thousand approaches to understanding mental health. In So We’ve Been Told with Sahaj Kaur Kohli, the award-winning therapist explores feelings through the lens of bi-cultural identity. Those familiar with Sahaj’s online community, Brown Girl Therapy, will recognize the themes in her new eight-part series: intercultural relationships, family secrets, and the pressures of duty. While no bi-cultural experience is the same, much can be gleaned from Sahaj’s thoughtful and probing episodes.
While this mental health podcast delves into issues like narcissism and childhood trauma (subjects that are both real and, lately, unusually fashionable), it does so with care and nuance. Sahaj recommends the show to anyone who lives between cultures, whether immigrants (and their children), mixed families, or those living in a foreign country. The show functions as an educational resource for loved ones, too. Five episodes have been released so far, and we suspect this podcast will grow beyond its intended scope.
June is Pride Month. What better way to celebrate than with a new podcast from drag icon Courtney Act? After rising to fame on Australian Idol and being a runner up on RuPaul’s Drag Race, Courtney has become something of a celebrity in certain circles, and like many of her fellow drag stars, has branched into podcasting as a way of speaking to (and expanding) her audience.
RnR is an interview podcast at its heart. With early guests including Katya and Nicole Byer, it’s clear that comedy is on the agenda, too. Forgoing the small talk, Courtney is going deep into the topics that unite us, and we see this appealing to fans of Drag Race, pop culture, becoming who you are, dealing with toxic parents — and, frankly, anyone who wants to give a middle finger to the suppression of LGBTQ+ rights.
Vine: Six Seconds That Changed The World
Vine: Six Seconds That Changed the World has already become one of the buzziest podcasts of the summer. It’s hard to overstate the impact of this video-sharing app. Vine was a pioneering platform for sharing silly six second videos that turned regular people into internet celebrities, just for posting micro skits and pranks to their feed. Vine was as big as Tumblr. It was the precursor for apps like TikTok that now dominate the space. But just as quickly as Vine became ubiquitous in the culture, it was gone. What the heck happened?
Benedict Townsend needed answers. In his eight-part series, he tracks down Vine’s founders to find out what really happened to the popular app. The story he uncovers reads like modern myth making. All episodes are available now.
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Alice Florence Orr is a staff writer and managing editor for Podcast Review. She is a writer and freelance media strategist.