When I first started to take podcasts seriously – roughly around 2015 – two newish ones caught my ear. My Dad Wrote A Porno and No Such Thing A Fish. Both became rather massive. The former filled the Royal Albert Hall with fans and released a final episode last December, but No Such Thing As A Fish swims on, further adding to its 450 million downloads.
Last night it started a new run of recordings. The format could not be simpler. Dan Schreiber, Andrew Hunter Murray and James Harkin, who cut their teeth as fact-truffling ‘elves’ on the BBC TV show QI, sit and riff about trivia they have recently unearthed. The line-up is usually slightly more diverse, but Anna Ptaszynski is currently on maternity leave. Ptaszynski is replaced by a surprise guest at the shows.
And by a nice spot of synchronicity the first invitee was Jamie Morton from My Dad Wrote A Porno, lending the evening a podcast supergroup vibe. He was immediately relaxed, armed with a printout of dorky research and taking to being a temporary team member like, well, a fish to water.
The topics ranged from the comically odd to the utterly bizarre. One section on people who survived shipwrecks revealed that a man called Elvis lasted 24 days at sea by living on ketchup. The quartet did not reveal their source, or should that be sauce, but one imagines Google is well-thumbed.
It is the onstage chemistry that makes the performance so much fun. Comedians can often be over-competitive but the quick-witted core trio – Schreiber and Hunter Murray also do solo stand-up – never seemed to be trying to out-geek each other. As Schreiber says, they like their knowledge “so quirky it’s a bit sexy”.
Appropriately there was a section about people who died laughing in the theatre. The earliest documented case was Mrs Fitzherbert, who passed away after The Beggar’s Opera in 1782. Actually, she died at home three days later; the podcast does not always let facts stand in the way of an enjoyable anecdote.
Seeing them natter is a nice way to stock up on stories to tell at dinner parties. Although you might not want to share the one about the family who gave themselves enemas when they were castaways. But it was highly rewarding to learn that the Pentagon – the “concrete cobweb” – used to have a room where staff could enjoy Pokémon battles.
Each show will be different, so future nights will not include tonight’s highlight about the unlikely history of water beds. Morton has actually slept in one and recalled that it made him feel “lost at sea”. Maybe he should have taken a bottle of ketchup to bed with him.
