The High Low

Latest Episodes:

A Bumper Back To School Special Apr 07, 2020

Show notes

What a time to be alive. It feels like we've all aged a decade since our last episode under 4 months ago.

Today we discuss lockdown life - what we're wearing; eating; meme-ing - and recommend a plethora of articles, books and podcasts. There will be another episode on Sat.

*Please do note that because we are recording remotely via a trilogy of new tech, there may be some occasional audio issues.*

This year 100% of profits for The High Low's merchandise (thehighlowshop.com) will be going to charity - 10% to Women's Aid and 90% to the NHS Charities COVID-19 Urgent Appeal. You can donate directly here: https://bit.ly/2xc17Hx

E-mail thehighlowshow@gmail.com or tweet @thehighlowshow

Reading

David Nicholls #twitterbooklaunch on Twitter @DavidNWriter

Fatima Bhutto and Sanam Maher's Stay Home, Stay Reading initiative, via @fbhutto and @topbastard on Instagram

Florence Welch's book club @betweentwobooks on Instagram

The Love Letters of Dylan Thomas https://amzn.to/3e6Io0v

Join Me In My Obsession With Desert Island Discs, by Hua Hzu for The New Yorker https://bit.ly/3aTdjeX

The Discomfort You're Feeling is Grief, by Scott Berinato https://bit.ly/2y2h9DK

Languages of Loss, A Psychotherapist's Journey, by Sasha Bates https://amzn.to/2URT3ET

The Luxury of Awkwardness, by Hugo Rifkind for The Times LUXX https://bit.ly/2wt2hOE

What Brits need to learn about being Danish, by Sofie Hagen for The Guardian https://bit.ly/2wkyTd8

The Panic Years, by Nell Frizzell https://bit.ly/2JLyaF2

The Hungover Games, by Sophie Heawood https://bit.ly/2JLybc4

Listening & Watching

Dawn O'Porter on The Adam Buxton podcast https://adam-buxton.co.uk/podcasts/ep109-dawn-oporter

Ian Wright's Desert Island Discs https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000fdxw

Feel Good, by Mae Martin https://www.channel4.com/programmes/feel-good

Sorry You're Sick, by Ted Hawkins https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YeuLTL8pQRQ

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A Christmas Special with Joan and Jericha Dec 17, 2019

Show notes

Oodles of cracker jokes, festive Dolls polls, jolly songs and weird Christmas facts; and Dolly pays a snowy visit to everyone’s favourite filthy agony aunts, Joan and Jericha for their first EVER audio interview. Their top tip for Christmas? A handjob under the dining room table.

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We’ll be back from maternity leave in April 2020!

Donate to Solace Women’s Aid:

https://www.solacewomensaid.org/news/solace-womens-aid-christmas-campaign-invites-support-women-who-arrive-refuges-nothing

Buy a homeless young person a Christmas dinner:

https://centrepoint.org.uk/more-than-a-christmas-dinner/

Painfully British Haikus, by Dale Shaw

*Please note that the inbox will be unmanned during this time.*

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Does A Slogan Tee Have The Power To Offend? Dec 10, 2019

Show notes

The High Low has launched merch! Roll up, roll up: berets, sweaters, t-shirts, tote bags and notepads are on sale at www.thehighlowshop.com and 10% of all profits go to Women's Aid. Order by December 18th to get your goodies in time for Christmas.

Today we discuss Boris's prediction for a post-Brexit "bonking bonanza", the brilliant scheme that is Press Pad and (more) global idioms.

Also today, the woman who was chucked off an American Airlines flight for her "offensive" slogan tee, which read 'Hail Satan.' Are words the same as actions? Dolly says no; Pandora thinks that in our scripturient time, they just might be.

Links

Donate to PressPad https://natwestbackherbusiness.co.uk/diversifythemedia

Elizabeth Is Missing, on BBC iPlayer https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000c6pv

Wild Game: My Mother, Her Lover and Me, by Adrienne Brodeur https://www.penguin.co.uk/books/111/1116165/wild-game/9781784742577.html

How To Throw A Great Christmas party, by Raven Smith https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/raven-smith-on-how-to-throw-a-great-christmas-party-shpjjgnjm

Ode to the Dinkus, by Daisy Alioto for The Paris Review https://www.theparisreview.org/blog/2018/06/08/ode-to-the-dinkus/

The Manifesto Read https://www.manifestoread.com

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*Please note that although there will be a Christmas special released on 18th December, The High Low is now on maternity leave until April 2020 and the inbox will not be monitored during this time*

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Why Mental Health Is Nothing To Do With Wellness, with Author Bella Mackie Dec 03, 2019

Show notes

We talk perineum sunning, Christmas tree erection, global idioms and polygraphs. And we host the journalist and author of Jog On: How Running Saved My Life and The Jog On Journal, Bella Mackie, to discuss mental health, running and why it's nothing to do with wellness or personal bests, divorce before the age of 30 and what the media gets wrong about mental health.

E-mail thehighlowshow@gmail.com

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Links

Jog On: How Running Saved My Life, by Bella Mackie

The Jog on Journal, by Bella Mackie

Being Single at 30, by Bella Mackie for British Vogue https://www.vogue.co.uk/article/being-single-at-30-a-vogue-memoir

How I Found My Wedding Dress (For The Second Time), by Bella Mackie for British Vogue https://www.vogue.co.uk/article/how-i-chose-the-dress-for-my-second-wedding

In the Dream House, by Carmen Maria Machado

When I Hit You, by Meena Kandasamy

Bikram: Yogi, Guru, Predator, on Netflix https://www.netflix.com/title/80221584

David Merritt on the death of his son, Jack Merritt, for The Guardian https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2019/dec/02/jack-merritt-london-bridge-attack-dave-merrit

For Desire, by Kim Addonizio http://pureapplesauce.blogspot.com/2009/01/for-desire-kim-addonizio.html

Derren Brown on The Adam Buxton podcast https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/ep-110-derren-brown/id1040481893?i=1000457582733

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What Women Want: The Rise and Fall of Victoria's Secret Nov 25, 2019

Show notes

This week we discuss the party leaders Question Time, the tragic murder of Grace Millane (and what we have learned and still need to learn about BDSM), the incredible documentary that is For Sama and the upcoming shortage of middle-class foods. Hold on to your halloumi...

And we cover the news that Victoria's Secret have axed their catwalk show - a pop-culture institution that cost £12 million to produce - after sales continue to dive at the lingerie brand. We talk choice feminism, body diversity, the underwear market and models in the age of social media.

E-mail thehighlowshow@gmail.com

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Links

@sendb00ks on Instagram https://www.instagram.com/sendb00ks/?hl=en

MUBI.com for international cinema

Onloan clothing rental: https://onloan.co/

73 Questions with Cardi B, for US Vogue https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0qTROr7cgCY

My Wild and Sleepless Nights: A Mother's Story, by Clover Stroud https://www.penguin.co.uk/books/111/1116784/my-wild-and-sleepless-nights/9780857525901.html

For Sama, on Channel 4od https://www.channel4.com/programmes/for-sama

Broken: Jeffrey Epstein podcast https://www.stitcher.com/podcast/sony-music-podcasts/broken-jeffrey-epstein

Dolly Parton's America: https://www.wnycstudios.org/podcasts/dolly-partons-america/episodes/only-one-me-jolene

Jane Garvey on How To Fail: https://play.acast.com/s/how-to-fail1/howtofail.podbean.com%2Fhow-to-fail-jane-garvey-256a07c04edf0b34828bd1ad62d2a867

Sophie Wilkinson on the murder of Grace Millane, for The Huffington Post https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/grace-millane-bdsm_uk_5dd57b30e4b0fc53f20cde5e

Halloumi Hell, by Séamus O'Reilly for The Observer https://www.theguardian.com/global/2019/nov/24/the-halloumi-crisis-supplies-of-one-of-britains-best-loved-imports-are-running-low

This Be The Worst, by Adrian Mitchell: http://aotearoasunrise.blogspot.com/2013/09/tuesday-poem-this-be-worst-by-adrian.html

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What Was He Thinking? Prince Andrew's Car Crash Interview Nov 20, 2019

Show notes

Dolly goes wild for Rod's railway, whilst Pandora decides to spend her upcoming maternity leave at the world's first vagina museum. Plus: Gregg's diet donut, the cassette tape revival and Nan Goldin's protest against the Sackler family.

And of course, we discuss Prince Andrew's disastrous, obfuscating interview with Emily Maitlis, as she quizzes him about the allegations of sexual assault against him and his continued friendship with the late sex offender, Jeffrey Epstein.

E-mail thehighlowshow@gmail.com

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Links

Refinery 29'scampaign to decriminalise abortion https://www.change.org/p/boris-johnson-make-abortion-a-medical-issue-not-a-criminal-offence-imacriminal

To buy Christmas cards from the Mouth and Foot Painting Artists visit www.mfpa.uk

The Crane Wife, by CJ Hauser for the Paris Review https://www.theparisreview.org/blog/2019/07/16/the-crane-wife/

Naomi Campbell interview, by Nosheen Iqbal for The Guardian https://www.theguardian.com/fashion/2019/nov/16/naomi-campbell-friends-enemies-tabloids-fashions-new-world-order

Tom Hanks interview, by Taffy Brodesser-Akner for The New York Times https://www.nytimes.com/2019/11/13/movies/tom-hanks-mister-rogers.html

Hood Feminism, by Mikki Kendall https://www.bloomsbury.com/uk/hood-feminism-9781526622402/

I write in pockets of stolen time, by Roxane Gay for WePresents https://wepresent.wetransfer.com/story/roxane-gay-essay/

Elizabeth Day on Prince Andrew https://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-7693403/ELIZABETH-DAY-not-victim-Andrew-real-victims-invisible-you.html

Suzanne Moore on Prince Andrew https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/nov/17/prince-andrew-abuse-emily-maitlis-queen

Camilla Long on Prince Andrew https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/poor-st-andrew-far-too-honourable-to-leave-sex-offender-pal-to-stew-7vtjxwbx5

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Megan Phelps-Roper On Leaving The Westboro Baptist Church, AKA 'America's Most Hated Family' Nov 12, 2019

Show notes

We talk about rapper T.I.'s incredibly creepy confession that he gets his teenager daughter's hymen checked every year, what 'shitposting' really means and Emma Watson's re-naming of singledom as 'self-parternering'. And of course: there are some updates in the now legendary segment, Dolls Polls.

This week we have one of the most important and moving author specials we have ever had. Megan Phelps-Roper's memoir, Unfollow, charts her upbringing in the radical Westboro Baptist Church, a church in Kansas made famous by their shocking picketing of funerals, where they held up signs that read: God Hates Fags, and Pray For More Dead Soldiers. They were also the subject of two Louis Theroux documentaries, including the 2007, 'The Most Hated Family In America' - as WBC then became known. Megan left the church in 2012, aged 26, after her conversations with 'outsiders' on Twitter opened up an internal chasm in her faith.

We talk about radicalism, indoctrination, religion and how the ideology of a binary, black and white world, is not something specific to Westboro. It defines the time that we live in, too. And Megan describes the agony of leaving her family behind with her faith. "I left the church - but never you. And never will" she writes in her epigraph to her parents.

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Links

Unfollow, by Megan Phelps-Roper

Do Humankind's Best Days Lie Ahead? By Pinker, Ridley, De Botton and Gladwell

By Grand Central Station I Sat Down and Wept, by Elizabeth Smart

Emma Watson interviewed by Paris Lees for British Vogue www.vogue.co.uk/news/article/emma-watson-on-fame-activism-little-women

What is shitposting? By Sarah Manavis for The New Statesman https://www.newstatesman.com/politics/media/2019/11/what-is-shitposting-and-why-does-it-matter-bbc-brexitcast-laura-kuenssberg-got-it-wrong

Cruel Intentions, on Netflix

The Souvenir, on Amazon Prime

Black Woman, by Twayna Mayne on BBC Sounds www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p07r9qy3

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Obama on Wokeness & Our Love for Modern Love <3 Nov 05, 2019

Show notes

This week we discuss Snapchat dysmorphia, the data-collection of period-tracking apps and why Dolly wants to shag Autumn. Also today we discuss Obama's speech-gone-viral on wokeness - which wasn't really about wokeness but on seeking not to shame, or humiliate others, in the name of progress. Is there space for Obama's brand of gradualism - or do we actually need radical change?

And we talk about Amazon Prime's Modern Love, based on the New York Times column, which we have both fallen hook, line and sinker for - because we are but sentimental fools.

E-mail thehighlowshow@gmail.com

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Links

Modern Love on Amazon Prime https://www.amazon.com/Modern-Love-Season-1/dp/B07VNF5351

Modern Love, Edited by Daniel Jones https://www.waterstones.com/book/modern-love/daniel-jones/9780307351043

One Dimensional Woman, by Nina Power https://www.amazon.co.uk/One-Dimensional-Woman-Zero-Books/dp/1846942411

Sabotage, by Emma Gannon for The Pound Project https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/poundproject/the-pound-project-part-six-emma-gannon

Exposure, by Olivia Sudjic https://peninsulapress.co.uk/product/exposure

A Woman's Beauty: Put Down or Power Source? By Susan Sontag, 1975 http://www.wheelersburg.net/Downloads/Sontag.pdf

The backlash against birth control apps, by Olivia Sudjic for The Guardian https://www.theguardian.com/society/2018/jul/21/colossally-naive-backlash-birth-control-app

Malaika Jabali on Obama https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/nov/01/does-obamas-critique-of-radical-politics-help-bring-about-the-change-he-wanted

Sarah Ditum on Obama https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/nov/02/barack-obama-right-you-dont-change-minds-by-damning-your-opponents

I walked out on my husband and kids for true love, by anon for The Sunday Times Magazine https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/i-walked-out-on-my-husband-and-kids-for-true-love-and-im-not-going-to-live-with-aching-regret-8xnjkgqpd

Instagram might be removing plastic surgery filters, but what about the skin lightening ones? By Ellie Abraham for gal-dem

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Soft Ghosting, Driving Lessons & An Author Special with Louise Callaghan on The Zookeeper That Defied ISIS Oct 31, 2019

Show notes

We've got facts about sloths, sea turtles and rats that drive cars. We also discuss the new terms we've learned this week - 'soft ghosting' and 'gradualism' - and Harvey Weinstein's appearance at a showcase for emerging comics.

Our author special today is with award-wining journalist and The Sunday Times Middle East correspondent, Louise Callaghan, who has written a tender, funny and impactful book, Father of Lions, about the zookeeper of Mosul who kept his animals alive through the ISIS occupation of 2014-2017. We discuss the nuances of radicalism, what the west is getting wrong with the dialogue around ISIS brides and the reality of working in a warzone. What is daily life like when you're on the frontline? How do you decompress?

E-mail thehighlowshow@gmail.com

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Links

Postmark collaboration with The Miscarriage Association https://postmarkonline.co.uk/miscarriage-association-cards

Father of Lions, by Louise Callaghan https://www.waterstones.com/book/father-of-lions/louise-callaghan/9781789540765

The Examined Life, by Stephen Grosz https://www.waterstones.com/book/the-examined-life/stephen-grosz/9780099549031

Suzanne Moore on Deborah Orr:

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/oct/22/deborah-orr-true-editor-writer-friend-broke-conventions

Sophie Heawood on ageing:

https://www.standard.co.uk/lifestyle/esmagazine/sophie-heawood-confronts-the-reality-of-growing-older-a4268066.html

Alain de Botton on philosophical concepts of failure, on Elizabeth's Day How To Fail podcast https://howtofail.podbean.com/e/how-to-fail-alain-de-botton/

Fortunately with Fi and Jane:

https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/fortunately-with-fi-and-jane/id1220808096?i=1000454885674

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It's An Omnishambles! Our Fave New Words To Be Added To The OED Oct 22, 2019

Show notes

We discuss Extinction Rebellion, Meghan and Harry's African tour documentary for ITV and Deborah Orr, the brilliant journalist who sadly died this week.

And it's our favourite time of year: that time when The OED adds its new words into the dictionary. 2019's additions include 'omnishambles', 'nomophobia' and 'simples'. We unpick the good, the bag and the ugly new entries.

The High Low is currently on tour! The next High Low Experience tour date is Monday 28th October in Manchester. For more info: https://www.fane.co.uk/our-shows/the-high-low-experience

E-mail thehighlowshow@gmail.com

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Harry & Meghan: An African Journey, for ITV https://www.itv.com/hub/harry-meghan-an-african-journey/2a7842a0001

The creator of 90s anxiety unpicks the appeal of his 5 most popular posts, for Man Repeller https://www.manrepeller.com/2019/10/90s-anxiety-instagram-nostalgia.html

The sadness of miscarriage can build up like soot, by Lucy Pavia for The Evening Standard https://www.standard.co.uk/lifestyle/health/the-sadness-of-miscarriage-can-build-up-like-soot-baby-loss-awareness-week-a4259591.html

The essays of Rebecca Solnit http://rebeccasolnit.net/books/

Bernadine Evaristo on black female writers https://www.google.co.uk/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/books/2019/oct/19/bernadine-evaristo-what-a-time-to-be-a-black-british-womxn-writer

Deborah Orr https://amp.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/dec/28/second-thoughts-rational-decisions-brexit-trump?__twitter_impression=true

https://www.google.co.uk/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/jan/26/nhs-health-service-britain

https://www.google.co.uk/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2015/jul/06/in-praise-of-lunchtime-drinking

https://www.google.co.uk/amp/s/inews.co.uk/opinion/columnists/sally-challen-appeal-coercive-control-95229%3famp

https://www.google.co.uk/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/media/2019/oct/21/deborah-orr-obituary