OUR FAVORITE PODCAST OF 2018: “BAG MAN” BY RACHEL MADDOW

If you haven’t heard it, we recommend you check out Rachel Maddow’s seven-part limited series Bag Man. 

It is the true story of former Vice President Spiro Agnew’s acceptance of envelopes of cash for political favors while he was in public office in the early 1970’s.

The story a cautionary tale with relevance to today’s political climate. Plus, Bag Man showcases Maddow’s innate talent as an audio storyteller.  

Bag Man reminds us of Maddow's best radio work at Air America prior to her MSNBC cable television gig. (There is more  about Air America further down in this post.)

Bag Man is available via free downloads wherever you find podcasts. We listened to it on Podbay [link]. More information about the series is also available from MSNBC [link].

Screen shot from MSNBC

True Crime is perhaps the most successful podcast genre. In Bag Man, Maddow and her team go back almost half a century to uncover one of America’s most brazen bribery schemes. Few people, even historians, remember Agnew’s resignation because it was overshadowed by Watergate and Nixon’s resignation in August 1974.

The story deserves to be told now because of the uncanny similarities to “Person 1” in today’s news. Agnew did his best to blame “media bias” for his troubles. But ultimately he was guilty of betraying the public’s trust by the facts of his deeds.

Bag Man passes our Do I Care test by affirmatively answering the question Do I really want to spend time with this?

Apparently others agree with this assessment. 

Check out the screenshot on the right that shows the ratio of positive listener reviews from Podbay.

Not only is the story compelling, Bag Man provides excellent best practices for all podcasters. Executive Producer Mark Yarvitz and editors Jonathan Hirsch and Marissa Schneiderman from Neon Hum Media [link] excel in important ways:

• Maximize the presence of the voice

Maddow is a skillful announcer and her voice literally jumps from the earbuds in Bag Man because of the producer’s adept use of equalization, compression and the acoustics of the recording booth.

• Careful use of archive audio

Audio from newscasts and the Nixon White House is essential to telling this story.   

Note that the historical clips are short and clear. If the source audio isn’t clear, Maddow provides context before the clip is heard.

• Power of the pause

One of the reasons Maddow’s voice sounds so immediate is her use of pauses in her patter. The pauses are as important as the words – they are there to add impact. 

Maddow’s pauses make the delivery seem more personal, like hearing a trusted friend.

RACHEL MADDOW & AIR AMERICA

Rachel Maddow & Al Franken at Air America in 2007

Maddow’s first big break in the media biz was at the progressive talk commercial radio network Air America. 

Even though Air America was failure that cost her around $4,000 in unpaid wages, her work there caught the attention of execs at MSNBC. 

At MSNBC Maddow did fill-in shifts but soon she bagged her own prime-time program.

Air America was in business from March 2004 until January 2010. There was plenty of talent. In addition to Maddow, the network featured talk shows by Al Franken, Marc Maron, Lizz Winstead, San Sedar, Thom Hartmann and Randi Rhodes.

Air America failed because of the lack of attention radio basics:

Maddow on CNN in 2006

• Air America’s affiliate stations were mainly beat-up, old AM stations that provided poor coverage in big markets.

• Air America’s owners and managers thought that the only thing that mattered was the politics and they took little interest in the quality of programming.

• Air America’s business affairs were poorly managed. When the company declared bankruptcy its unsecured debts exceeded its net worth by more than $15 million.

TOP PODCAST CHARTS SHOW MAJOR DIFFERENCES IN LISTINGS

Last week, Podtrac published its list of the Top Twenty Podcasts for 2018. (Scroll down to see the Podtrac chart.)

We decided to see how other top podcast charts compare with the Podtrac chart.  The resulting chart is on the left.

There is one important difference between the charts:

Podtrac looks back on a month of data but the other charts are based current and very recent usage. This is why Bag Man shows up on some charts by not on Podtrac.

None of charts provide explanations of the methodology they use. So, the public doesn’t know how much more popular #1 is than #2 or #10. Some of the charts also seem to favor podcasts owned by the chart provider. Know one will ever know…

There are some consensus listings:

The Daily and The Joe Rogan Experience appear in four of the five charts.

Serial, This American Life and Bag Man appear in three of the five charts.