45 Top Podcasters Reveal Pre-Show Rituals, Role Models and Dream Guests

Lacey Rose
·20 min read
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Rub a little Vaseline on your teeth, fire up a hot latte, do a few mouth stretches and whisper, “It’s showtime!” That’s how the most powerful people in the podcasting business — a mix of hosts, executives and reps featured on THR‘s annual power list — ready themselves before recording their widely-heard shows. As part of this year’s survey, the group, which also includes Call Her Daddy‘s Alex Cooper, Bill Simmons, Ben Shapiro and My Favorite Murder co-hosts Karen Kilgariff and Georgia Hardstark, reveals its dream guests and guilty pleasure listens as well.

My pre-recording podcasting routine entails…

Bill Simmons, The Bill Simmons Podcast Big bottle of water, put my phone on silent, remind myself not to say anything dumb.

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Karen Kilgariff, My Favorite Murder I feed the dogs, gather up all of my beverages (usually 4, 1 hot and 3 colds), rub some Vaseline on my teeth and as I log onto Zoom, I whisper, “It’s showtime!”

Emma Chamberlain, Anything Goes Step one is writing out an outline for the episode. Sometimes this takes an hour, sometimes this takes a week. I like to go into recording with a fully fleshed out concept because it ensures that I am able to include all of my thoughts on a topic, rather than talking spontaneously and forgetting key points. Step two is making the perfect recording beverage. Sometimes it’s a hot latte, sometimes it’s a chamomile tea, sometimes it’s a latte in a can, but I always have some sort of beverage from Chamberlain Coffee by my side while recording. Step three is getting dressed in the perfect pair of sweatpants with a slightly more elevated top, like a sweater. Then it’s go time!

Josh Clark, Stuff You Should Know If I’m not cramming right up until we start recording, I try to go outside for a little bit and take in some sunshine and fresh air, kind of get my fill before I go cram myself into a windowless studio for a couple hours.

Chuck Bryant, Stuff You Should Know Get all my notes in order, give them one last quick glance, pour a glass of cold water and do some mouth stretches.

DJ EFN, Drink Champs A good meal and listening to a playlist of the guest we are about to sit down with.

John “MrBallen” Allen, MrBallen Podcast Try to speak, fumble my words instantly, scream obscenities, pace around the room, try again, fumble words again etc. I do this for the first 20 minutes or so, then somehow get into a groove, then I’ll record for several hours pretty much straight through without too many hiccups after that. I’ve tried to incorporate breathing exercises and vocal techniques to warm up, but nothing works! I guess I have to just screw up constantly and make a lot of noise for about 20 minutes to get in the zone.”

Jon Favreau, Jon Lovett, and Tommy Vietor, Crooked Media Slap each other in the face as hard as we can — then look at our signed picture of Ira Glass and shout “DREAM IT, MAKE IT, BE IT.”

My podcasting heroes are…

Dan Fierman, Higher Ground Click and Clack.

Ashley Flowers, Crime Junkie Sarah Koenig, duh!

DJ EFN, Drink Champs Combat Jack, Juan Ep, Ice-T and Joe Budden.

Donald Albright, Tenderfoot TV Reggie Osse’ (aka Combat Jack), Alex Blumberg and Sara Koenig and Julie Snyder. They all opened doors and paved the way for so many of us.

Ross Adams, Acast Sarah Koenig and what she did with Serial, not only because it got me personally fully immersed in the world of podcasting, but also for its role in kick-starting the industry. Serial launched just six months after Acast, and played a significant part in the mainstream growth and popularity of podcasts, turning it into the multi-billion dollar industry it is today.

Emily Rasekh, Sony Music Entertainment: Alex Cooper. I think she’s now one of the best interviewers out there, across all mediums.

Josh Lindgren, CAA As the industry reinvents itself over and over this answer changes, but right now I have to say James Kim. He is helping push the medium forward and it has been fun to watch.

Gillie Da King and Wallo, Million Dollaz Worth of Game A top one is Joe Rogan because Joe is always setting the bar for what can be achieved in the podcast world.

Ben Shapiro, The Ben Shapiro Podcast The original greats include Joe Rogan and Adam Carolla and Bill Simmons — original entrepreneurs who were willing to launch their own pirate ships.

Nicholas Caprio, Lionsgate Sound I have always admired Adam Carolla. He recognized the difficulties facing terrestrial radio quicker than most and created his “pirate ship,” Carolla Digital, so he wouldn’t have to depend on a studio or network to give him a voice. I am also a huge fan of Karen Kilgariff and Georgia Hardstark, the creators of My Favorite Murder — two friends who met at a party and decided to start a podcast talking about murder, which in turn grew into the Exactly Right network.

Tiffany Ashitey, Acast 1. Tracy Clayton and Heben Nigatu. It was through their former podcast Another Round that I discovered how podcasting could be a common ground for meaningful, unfiltered conversation. Before celebrity interviews, rapid-fire questions, and drinking with celebrities in interviews became mainstream, these phenomenal Black women were some of the originators. It was one of the few podcasts of the time that spoke to Black culture. 2. Phoebe Robinson from 2 Dope Queens to Black Frasier (and in between), she’s had so many podcasting lives, throughout the evolution of this industry, and it’s been very cool to follow along. 3. Twila Dang and Juleyka Lantigua-Williams are two driving forces in increasing diversity and representation in podcasting. And they’re both doing it independently.

Audie Cornish, The Assignment Jenna Weiss Berman of Audacy, who cofounded Pineapple St Media [and] who developed Another Round at BuzzFeed (RIP to all three brands). She was the first podcast development person who helped me understand what collaboration could look like and who seemed to have some real idea of how a person’s “voice” could carry over into the podcast space.

Jenna Weiss-Berman, Audacy The Kitchen Sisters, who were working on non-narrated documentary audio before basically anyone. And Dan Taberski, who has hosted five of the best audio series ever made.

Karen Kilgariff, My Favorite Murder I’m in awe that Paul Scheer, June Diane Raphael and Jason Mantzoukas from How Did This Get Made? have been putting out such consistently hilarious and brilliant episodes since 2010. It’s impressive.

Scott Greenstein, SiriusXM 1. Conan O’Brien, for being a fantastic interviewer and taking to the medium immediately. 2. The Office Ladies Jenna Fischer and Angela Kinsey, for setting the bar on what a great rewatch podcast should be. 3. Ashley Flowers, for her ability to connect with audiences from all walks of life.

Ashleigh Kelley, Morbid: A True Crime Podcast Dax Shephard from Armchair Expert and Alex Cooper from Call Her Daddy are two of my podcasting heroes simply because of the way they interview and really connect with their guests. I think there’s something to be said about how comfortable their guests always feel and it really translates into the listening experience. I also have so much respect for Alex as a host. I really look up to the way she took the reins of her show when it was time to find the next home for it, stayed true to her goals and values and then single-handedly transitioned the content in such a big way.

Rachel Maddow, Déjà News Alex Blumberg is the person who made podcasting make sense to me for the first time. I’d had a bunch of conversations with him about his ideas for podcasting as a business, but it never really sunk in for me until he launched StartUp in 2014. I finally understood, and I was hooked! I was bereft when season one of StartUp ended. I also fell head-over-heels for Leon Neyfakh’s Slow Burn and Nate DiMeo’s Memory Palace — those were my gateway drugs to now being a full-blown podcast addict.

Jacob Weisberg, Pushkin Industries When Christopher Lydon began distributing Open Source over an RSS feed 20 years ago, it was arguably the first podcast. At 83, Chris continues to hold deep, illuminating conversations about ideas, history, music, and life. You might call the show This American Intellectual Life.

Julie McNamara, Spotify Jonathan Goldstein. Heavyweight is magical.

One of my most formative memories of radio entails…

Georgia Hardstark, My Favorite Murder Staying up late for Dr. Demento and late night drives to listen to Coast to Coast.

Josh Clark, Stuff You Should Know I remember riding around in the back of my parents’ car on weekends with Casey Kasem and American Top 40 playing the radio. I still happily listen to vintage ones that I come across from time to time.

Karen Kilgariff, My Favorite Murder I’m from the Bay area and we used to listen to KFRC Dr. Donald D. Rose on the way to school. Our whole carpool would be laughing together. I call it “San Panty Jose” because of him. He was the best.

Wallo, Million Dollaz Worth of Game I used to listen to Golden Girl in Philly. She was raw and uncut and didn’t care what anyone thought – she would say all types of crazy stuff. I loved it.

Gillie Da King, Million Dollaz Worth of Game DJ Cosmic Kev and the Come Up Show. Loved the rapping and freestyling atmosphere back then. It wasn’t about tell me about what you could do, it was show me. He put the freestyle, he put the instrumental on it. You got freestyle right there for five, ten, 15 straight minutes.

Steve Ackerman, Sony Music Entertainment Late night listens in bed as a kid to Capital Radio in London.

Josh Lindgren, CAA Burning an episode of This American Life onto a CD and mailing it to a girl I liked.

Shantae Howell, Acast Growing up in Chicago, I loved listening to WGCI and hearing the morning jockeys make god awful remixes of my favorite songs. My favorite has to be their take on Juneville’s No Motion for Me, No Lotion for Me. Truly classique.

Gretchen Stockdale, Lionsgate Sound Getting my very first clock-radio! So much better to be awakened by music than a jolting caustic beep, beep, beep.

Nicholas Caprio, Lionsgate Sound I’m dating myself here, but there was nothing quite like the thrill of spontaneously catching a song I loved on the radio, coupled with the frustrating and wonderful challenge of quickly trying to record that song to cassette off of a portable radio.

Kara Swisher, Pivot Listening to the most excellent Diane Rehm of WAMU in DC while in college.

Ross Adams, Acast Listening to the Top 40 charts (Pepsi Chartshow) in the UK and then hitting play and record on my cassette player to record the songs I liked…showing my age now.

Will Pearson, iHeart Most definitely the top 40. It always felt significant to know which songs moved in and out of the top 10 and which was at number one. This started when I was 9 or 10. So we’re talking serious chart domination by Paula Abdul and Janet Jackson, with a little Poison and Fine Young Cannibals in the mix, if I remember correctly.

Jen Sargent, Wondery Riding in the car with my mom as a young kid, listening to Dr. Laura Schlessinger (“Dr Laura”) on talk radio giving advice that seemed really important even though I was too young to know what she was talking about.

Jacob Weisberg, Pushkin Industries I grew up in Chicago in the 1970s listening to some of the great talkers and critics on WFMT — not just Studs Terkel, but Herman Kogan, Claudia Cassidy and Harry Bouras. Saturday nights, my family actually gathered around the radio to listen to The Midnight Special, where I got my education in what we’d now call American Roots music.

Ashleigh Kelley, Morbid: A True Crime Podcast I would say the earliest, and one of the most comforting memories I have from childhood is sitting in the back seat listening to Delilah’s radio show on Magic 106.7 I always loved the wholesome stories she would tell and the conversations she would share with callers who wanted her to play a song for someone special in their life. It was the first example I had of someone on the radio forming a really positive connection with her listeners, and something I now aspire to do myself.

Conal Byrne, iHeart Radio was a hugely important part of my childhood, growing up in the Bay Area, where it truly defined culture and trends. I remember the moments when DJs would first spin big, new singles (like Desire, by U2 … still remember hearing it for the first time over the airwaves … exactly where I was, who I was with, and the energy in the room when it blasted out). I remember calling into stations to ask them to spin songs (like We Built This City, by Starship … still remember hearing my name on-air as the “caller who requested it” – just awesome). Simply put, there’s not one memory … I remember DJs being an anchor, mentor and companion to my entire youth.

Bill Simmons, The Bill Simmons Podcast Listening to Bob Ryan come on a local Boston morning radio show in the early 80s and break down the Celtics. I was like, “I want to do that.”

Rachel Maddow, Déjà News I have a distinct memory of my dad sitting on the couch in our family room watching baseball on TV, with a little silver transistor radio in his lap with the antenna up. He would turn down the sound on the TV and turn up the sound on the radio because he thought the radio guys were better announcers. He was right.

Ben Shapiro, The Ben Shapiro Podcast I used to listen to Rush Limbaugh in the car with my father. My first radio interview was when I was 17. I remember how excited I was when Larry Elder interviewed me at KABC studios.

Jenna Weiss-Berman, Audacy My brother fell asleep every night listening to The Bill O’Reilly Show, and unfortunately, I could hear every word of it through the wall. It inspired me to make better radio, and to be a political progressive.

My favorite episode that I made or was involved with was…

Bill Simmons, The Bill Simmons Podcast I have a favorite one every year. So far this year, it’s the one with Damon and Affleck together.

Kara Swisher, Pivot Monica Lewinsky

Lisa Ammerman, Treefort Media It is from our series Paul Giamatti’s Chinwag entitled, “So You Think You’re A Starseed” — I laughed and learned so much!

Ashley Flowers, Crime Junkie Most recently, the Mary and Suzanne Reker case was a two-parter I wrote and hosted for The Deck. I felt especially proud of that one.

Jacob Weisberg, Pushkin Industries My favorite Pushkin episode this year was the inspiring conclusion to “Never Seen Again,” the third season of Jake Halpern’s Deep Cover. This story had so many crazy twists and turns. The final, moving one is meeting someone who so completely rebuilt her life.

Gillie Da King, Million Dollaz Worth of Game I would probably say one of the basketball episodes like Kevin Durant or Damian Lillard.

Wallo, Million Dollaz Worth of Game Mike Tyson would def be one.

My podcasting guilty pleasures include ….

Georgia Hardstark, My Favorite Murder Unbelievable, sometimes-salacious true stories, ie Family Secrets hosted by Dani Shapiro and This Is Actually Happening hosted by Whit Missildine.

Jon Favreau, Jon Lovett, and Tommy Vietor, Crooked Media 2x speed power listens. You get the gist. Ezra Klein is worried about AI, for example.

Bill Simmons, The Bill Simmons Podcast Podding right after something huge just happened, when there’s no time to prep and you basically have to trust that you’re good at what you do.

Adam Sachs, SiriusXM There’s nothing guilty about it but the Home Cooking podcast from Samin Nosrat and Hrishikesh Hirway was like joyful “comfort food” throughout the pandemic. I wish I could guilt them into releasing episodes more frequently. Another guilty pleasure is Mallwalkin’ from Matt Gourley and Mark McConville. It’s exactly what it sounds like – those two guys and an occasional guest walking around a different mall each week, providing commentary with their uniquely weird and funny sensibility. It has an ASMR quality that makes it a great show to fall asleep to and I say that 100 percent as a compliment.

Ashleigh Kelley, Morbid: A True Crime Podcast I love a good reality TV recap kind of show, or even just a Pop-culture gossip show. They’re the perfect listen when I’ve wrapped a day covering some pretty dark subject matter.

Nishat Kurwa, Vox Media Podcast Network Putting off work-related “research listening” to luxuriate in the full three hours of a Drink Champs episode.

Kelly Garner, Treefort Media This may sound like an odd guilty pleasure, but during the thick of the pandemic I binged a show called, The Hilarious World of Depression with John Moe.

Marshall Lewy, Wondery How Did This Get Made and our daily hot gossip show Rich and Daily are two.

Rachel Ghiazza, Audible If I have half an hour to myself, I’m probably deep in the Dateline archives, listening to some terrifying story that’s going to keep me up at night.

Shantae Howell, Acast Dateline, don’t judge me.

John “MrBallen” Allen, McBallen Podcast I love fantasy football podcasts, even though I don’t really do fantasy football anymore. I used to do it all the time when I was in the Navy, and at the time I got really into the Fantasy Footballers podcasts. I even emailed the hosts and asked them advice on how to structure my lineup one week. I was so pumped/starstruck when they wrote me back, and the advice was really good (told me to play Alshon Jeffery on the Eagles and he crushed that week, 2 touch downs)!

Jenna Weiss-Berman, Audacy I don’t believe in guilty pleasures because no one should feel ashamed of something that thrills and excites them, but I sure do love celeb gossip podcasts, specifically Who? Weekly.

What I haven’t yet done with the podcast that I’d like to is…

Gillie Da King and Wallo, Million Dollaz Worth of Game Sign on another podcast, and we are going to do it soon.

Kelly Garner, Treefort Media A weekly, always on scripted fiction series like a soap opera or a horror anthology.

Ashley Flowers, Crime Junkie I’d love to explore more video.

DJ EFN, Drink Champs An animated version of the show.

Donald Albright, Tenderfoot TV With our background in music, we really haven’t taken our narrative storytelling style in that direction. We know when we do it, it has to be special, so we’ve been very selective about those stories. I’m looking forward to landing on the perfect story to bridge that gap.

Payne Lindsey, Tenderfoot TV I haven’t ever pulled back the curtain in its entirety when it comes to how an investigative true crime podcast is truly made. The tremendous boom of true crime podcasts has tremendously lowered the bar in my opinion. In the 4th season of Up and Vanished coming out later this year, I’m looking forward to telling an important sub story about what it really takes to go investigate an unsolved murder. There’s a lot of bad that comes with true crime, but a successful true crime show can still be a very powerful tool in solving a case if given the proper care and right motivations. I plan to put all the cards on the table, no cheesy gimmicks or salacious tropes.

Alex Cooper, Call Her Daddy I would love to be able to do a live show and interact with my fans.

Tiffany Ashitey, Acast I would love to experiment with formats not traditionally experienced in audio. For example, producing a series of podcast game shows.

Shantae Howell, Acast Nonfiction!

Jenna Weiss-Berman, Audacy A non-narrated reality show.

Dan Fierman, Higher Ground A musical! It’ll work!

My dream guest is…

Kara Swisher, Pivot A joint interview with Dolly Parton and Taylor Swift about business — no quaint sweet Kentucky home or shitty ex-boyfriend stories allowed.

Bill Simmons, The Bill Simmons Podcast Eddie Murphy.

DJ EFN, Drink Champs Jay-z, Dr. Dre, Kool Herc and Queen Latifah.

Donald Albright, Tenderfoot TV Barack Obama. I don’t even know what Tenderfoot podcast it would be for, but I’d figure it out.

Audie Cornish, The Assignment Beyonce. But not for the reasons people think. She has navigated several life transitions from child star to business leader; recorded music to streaming era; motherhood in the public eye. I would love to hear about how she did that while maintaining an airtight protective shell against the celebrity industrial complex. When she understood the value of lawyers, keeping record labels at a safe creative distance, embracing her social political awareness in an age most pop stars running fleeing from hit. It’s a hell of a hat trick.

Ben Shapiro, The Ben Shapiro Podcast Bernie Sanders or Barack Obama…somebody with whom I disagree. There’s nothing more enjoyable than battling out real issues.

Glennon Doyle, We Can Do Hard Things Taylor Swift.

Gillie Da King, Million Dollaz Worth of Game Michael Jordan and LeBron James.

Wallo, Million Dollaz Worth of Game Denzel Washington, Tyler Perry, Will Smith, Future and I want to get Drake in here, we would have some fun.

The podcast only I would listen to is…

Josh Clark, Stuff You Should Know A podcast of me sharing my memories and recollections of the mid-80s American Top 40 episodes I grew up on. I feel like it would just be a lot of, “Ooo, Howard Jones. He was really good,” and “The Police, I liked them a lot.”

Chuck Bryant, Stuff You Should Know A tour diary of me following musician Bonnie Prince Billy on tour.

Will Pearson, iHeart A podcast intended to help me sleep where the host just lists even numbers with a focus on multiples of 4. So calming.

Josh Lindgren, CAA I want to make a Groundhog’s Day rewatch podcast where on each episode the hosts have the same conversation about Groundhog’s Day.

Tiffany Ashitey, Acast A history lesson on New York City, or a dating game show.

Shantae Howell, Acast Errrr…mine (Edges). JK people who are not my mom listen too.

Bill Simmons, The Bill Simmons Podcast My Mom doing a 15-minute pod about what she watched and drank the night before.

Ben Shapiro, The Ben Shapiro Podcast A podcast on the history of classical music. I’d imagine that wouldn’t draw a large crowd, but then again I once thought the same about philosophy podcasts, history podcasts, and Bible podcasts — and all of them have great audiences.

Nishat Kurwa, Vox Media Podcast Network Precocious toddlers who haven’t yet nailed “L” and “R” articulation, explaining metaphysical concepts (think “Recess Therapy”, but strictly ages 3-5, with an overreliance on their Ws).

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