Popular Reviews of The Turnaround

Interviews on podcasts can take on a complacent blase - so much so that this type of show can turn me off before I even set about listening. The world is so saturated with celebrity talk-abouts that it can be easy to write off the timeworn tradition of the interview. There is, however, a lot to enjoy amidst the expansive sea of mediocrity. Jesse Thorn provides just such an opportunity here in a new series of interviews with professionals that are usually on the delivering end of the questions. Guests range from podcast godfather Ira Glass to trashy TV godfather Jerry Springer to (somewhere between those two?) legend Larry King. Thorn, podcast host and cofounder of the Maximum Fun network, lets his own craft shine in these interviews. He lays bare his own interviewing insecurities, all the while getting these venerable guests to give a little bit more than you may be used to hearing from the format. This is a great mix of candid insidery-ness complemented with some true insight for those of us interested in journalistic mechanisms embraced and spurned by giants in the world of media.

If you strive to be a better interviewer, this podcast is a virtual master class. Every episode features a stellar interviewer and Jesse Thorn does well to bring out their unique approaches and craft. Indeed, nobody is born a world class interviewer so it requires putting in many hours to develop one's own style. Ira Glass, Marc Maron, Audie Cornish, Larry King, Anna Sale, Terry Gross, Katie Couric... this is really good stuff. They say that you should always leave your audience wanting more. Bravo! This is one podcasts that I wish was still publishing.