Dirty Diana
Lux
This is podcast studio QCODE’s steamiest, most sex-positive series yet. Demi Moore is perfect as Diana, a woman so bored of her carefully curated life and sexless marriage that she secretly starts a website to host recordings of other women’s erotic fantasies. Every episode features a different fantasy, titled with the dreamer’s name, interweaving the narrative with sexy daydreams. This audio collaging creates a dissonance between Diana’s muggle life (and its seemingly pedestrian approach to desire) and her unfettered recording work. This second episode turns up the heat as Diana loses all her Xanax to the bathroom sink, instigates a visit to the strip club, and encounters a woman at work who recognizes her voice and likes it. “Lux” perfectly encapsulates the relationship between horror, desire, and grief as a young client describes what would happen if she could fuck her dead boyfriend and Diana deals with the consequences of numbing out. Dirty Diana is a summer beach read for your ears, and a great entry point for anyone who might want to test the waters of audio eroticia. [Morgan McNaught]
Everytown
Chapter 1: A Knock at the Door
Everytown from NPR exposes the reality of the immigrant experience in America by focusing on one small motel in the well-to-do town of Southampton, New York. Host Charles Lane investigates the controversy that surrounds the Bel-Aire Cove motel, which provides inexpensive housing for its predominantly Central American tenants. These are the people who work as maids, cooks, and cleaners for the mostly white, affluent residents of the town. They now find themselves the target of a harassment campaign to force them out of Southampton. Lane learns that the Bel-Aire, which is set to be shut down for code violations, is just one of many centers of immigrant housing in the area that have suffered a similar fate. In this premiere episode, Lane captures the fear and anxiety of the families who live at the Bel-Aire, but also their confusion: Why won’t the town of Southampton just let them exist in peace? The episode also scratches the surface of a dark conspiracy involving local townspeople who want the police to take the Bel-Aire by force and keep lists of the children who live there. [Anthony D Herrera]
There Are No Girls On The Internet
#DisabledandCute
As a queer Black woman with cerebral palsy, author/journalist/screenwriter Keah Brown (The Pretty One) found power in deciding to love herself. On February 12, while looking at selfies, Brown was feeling like a “ bad bleep” so she posted the photos on Twitter with the hashtag #DisabledandCute. The post resonated with users around the world, inspiring countless others with disabilities to share their selfies and stories. On this week’s episode of There Are No Girls On The Internet, Brown is interviewed by host Bridget Todd about her experiences online and the way the world interacts with disabled populations. They discuss the dismal media representation of disabled communities, disability porn, the erasure of minority contributions to the movement, and more. The conversation is a great representation of this new podcast’s strengths, centering the overlooked voices that helped shape the internet landscape. Todd is an excellent host and, as a woman of color, brings her own unique perspective to the series. Any listener interested in broadening their understanding of intersectionality and internet culture will find themselves drawn to TANGOTI. [Nichole Williams]