The Cracked Podcast

If recent interviews with music legend Quincy Jones are any indication, every famous musician hangs out with every other famous musician (and yes, we know Quincy Jones also said......other stuff). Which kind of makes sense, right? Once you’re in that upper echelon of winning Grammys and living in the Hollywood Hills, you’d probably at least run into each other at whatever the rich people equivalent of 7-Eleven is (8-Twelve?). But here’s the amazing thing: a lot of those hangouts almost led to bands and team-ups that would’ve changed the course of music history.

On this week’s episode of The Cracked Podcast, Alex Schmidt is joined by Jack O’Brien and Miles Gray (The Daily Zeitgeist) for a reunion of sorts, as they mentally reunite music legends who almost built mind-blowing awesomeness together. And we’re not just talking “the Beatles do more stuff” awesomeness. We’re talking “Paul McCartney and Jimi Hendrix and Miles Davis BECOME A BAND” AWESOMENESS.

Footnotes: https://goo.gl/yUq29X

If your politics lean left, your trusted pundits are telling you THIS. IS. THE. YEAR. when our disastrous political situation will turn itself around. “Robert Mueller’s closing in on Trump! The American people are starting to wise up! A midterm election Blue Wave(TM) will #Resist the #NotMyPresident into #DrumpfDefeat!” Well what if we told you none of that will happen without a herculean effort on the part of America’s decent people? What if we told you none of this will get fixed soon? And what if we reminded you those same pundits who think everything’s about to be fine LITERALLY LAUGHED at the prospect of a Trump presidency not that long ago?

On this week’s episode of The Cracked Podcast, Alex Schmidt is joined by comedian/soothsayer Adam Tod Brown (Unpopular Opinion Podcast Network) for a deep dive into the history, technology, and basic math that proves we are nowhere near getting out of the woods yet. They’ll look ahead to what might actually happen by the end of this midterm-riffic year of politics. And they’ll help us all preserve our mental health by setting reasonable expectations, instead of assuming we’ll be saved by the total nonsense hopes of pundits on TV.

Footnotes: https://goo.gl/CCNKvT

If your politics lean left, your trusted pundits are telling you THIS. IS. THE. YEAR. when our disastrous political situation will turn itself around. “Robert Mueller’s closing in on Trump! The American people are starting to wise up! A midterm election Blue Wave(TM) will #Resist the #NotMyPresident into #DrumpfDefeat!” Well what if we told you none of that will happen without a herculean effort on the part of America’s decent people? What if we told you none of this will get fixed soon? And what if we reminded you those same pundits who think everything’s about to be fine LITERALLY LAUGHED at the prospect of a Trump presidency not that long ago?

On this week’s episode of The Cracked Podcast, Alex Schmidt is joined by comedian/soothsayer Adam Tod Brown (Unpopular Opinion Podcast Network) for a deep dive into the history, technology, and basic math that proves we are nowhere near getting out of the woods yet. They’ll look ahead to what might actually happen by the end of this midterm-riffic year of politics. And they’ll help us all preserve our mental health by setting reasonable expectations, instead of assuming we’ll be saved by the total nonsense hopes of pundits on TV.

Footnotes: https://goo.gl/CCNKvT

If you tuned into The Super Bowl, The Tonight Show, or mainstream radio this month, you experienced America’s most bizarrely fascinating celebrity. That celebrity is Justin Timberlake. He’s spent the past year or so carefully turning himself into “Justin Timberlake, Montana Cowboy”, and that seemingly random choice WOULD be fine, if not for these three things: 

1) The transformation’s only Instagram-deep. 

2) White men across America are doing the same thing. 

3) The reasons behind these white fellas running west aren’t as simple as musical taste/cheap land.

On this week’s episode of The Cracked Podcast, Alex Schmidt interviews Montanan slash culture writer Anne Helen Petersen about her pioneering examination of The West, our celebrities, and why they’re hiding there. They also break down the myths of the Old West, the realities of why modern white people are flooding it, and why being a “Man Of The Woods” is no substitute for engaging with reality.

Footnotes: https://goo.gl/EhdvWi

If you tuned into The Super Bowl, The Tonight Show, or mainstream radio this month, you experienced America’s most bizarrely fascinating celebrity. That celebrity is Justin Timberlake. He’s spent the past year or so carefully turning himself into “Justin Timberlake, Montana Cowboy”, and that seemingly random choice WOULD be fine, if not for these three things: 

1) The transformation’s only Instagram-deep. 

2) White men across America are doing the same thing. 

3) The reasons behind these white fellas running west aren’t as simple as musical taste/cheap land.

On this week’s episode of The Cracked Podcast, Alex Schmidt interviews Montanan slash culture writer Anne Helen Petersen about her pioneering examination of The West, our celebrities, and why they’re hiding there. They also break down the myths of the Old West, the realities of why modern white people are flooding it, and why being a “Man Of The Woods” is no substitute for engaging with reality.

Footnotes: https://goo.gl/EhdvWi

They say the past is a foreign country. (Trust us, it’s a saying!) What they leave off in that aphorism is the fact that the foreign land of Past-zakhstan is a foreign country of constant pranks and goofs. From 1950s America to Renaissance Italy to the Norman conquest of England, our ancestors were all about changing the world AND yoink-ing each other every step of the way.

On this week’s episode of The Cracked Podcast, Alex Schmidt is LIVE at UCB Sunset with comedians Caitlin Gill, Christine Medrano, and Blake Wexler. They’ll run down the all-time silliest nonsense of actual human history. And the audience joins in at the end with some historical pranks and goofs of their own, because our live shows are interactive and fun like that.

Footnotes: https://goo.gl/SKp2qk

They say the past is a foreign country. (Trust us, it’s a saying!) What they leave off in that aphorism is the fact that the foreign land of Past-zakhstan is a foreign country of constant pranks and goofs. From 1950s America to Renaissance Italy to the Norman conquest of England, our ancestors were all about changing the world AND yoink-ing each other every step of the way.

On this week’s episode of The Cracked Podcast, Alex Schmidt is LIVE at UCB Sunset with comedians Caitlin Gill, Christine Medrano, and Blake Wexler. They’ll run down the all-time silliest nonsense of actual human history. And the audience joins in at the end with some historical pranks and goofs of their own, because our live shows are interactive and fun like that.

Footnotes: https://goo.gl/SKp2qk

Monty Python once taught us the following neuroscience: “The human brain is like an enormous fish. It is flat, and slimy, and has gills through which it can see.” That obvious bullshit is obvious bullshit. It’s also not much sillier than our own daily treatment of our brains. We know the human brain needs calm, care, and interaction with other humans. So why don’t we give that to our gilled head-fish?

On this week’s episode of The Cracked Podcast, Alex Schmidt sits down with Jason Pargin (aka David Wong) to rediscover brains and the humans carrying them around. They’ll get into why this is the era of bombarding our minds with Snapchats, sleeplessness, and incomplete friendships. They’ll explore the fundamental feedback loops that make us seek out bad habits. And they’ll pick out how you can be aware of your own mental health needs, even if our wider culture wants to trick you into forgetting all about them.

Footnotes: https://goo.gl/nmGrMf

Monty Python once taught us the following neuroscience: “The human brain is like an enormous fish. It is flat, and slimy, and has gills through which it can see.” That obvious bullshit is obvious bullshit. It’s also not much sillier than our own daily treatment of our brains. We know the human brain needs calm, care, and interaction with other humans. So why don’t we give that to our gilled head-fish?

On this week’s episode of The Cracked Podcast, Alex Schmidt sits down with Jason Pargin (aka David Wong) to rediscover brains and the humans carrying them around. They’ll get into why this is the era of bombarding our minds with Snapchats, sleeplessness, and incomplete friendships. They’ll explore the fundamental feedback loops that make us seek out bad habits. And they’ll pick out how you can be aware of your own mental health needs, even if our wider culture wants to trick you into forgetting all about them.

Footnotes: https://goo.gl/nmGrMf

In the year 2050, there will be 10 billion people on Earth. Or at least that’s the scientific estimate. Sounds like a giant human milestone, right? Well IT TOTALLY IS…assuming we harvest 50% more food than we are now, to feed those people. Oh and 4.5 billion people will be short on fresh drinking water by 2025, 1.2 billion people are short on electricity right now, and global temperatures are about to rise a degree Fahrenheit or two (or 8.1, turning most of the world into a desert). So…where do we go from here, Earth?

Well on this week’s episode of The Cracked Podcast, Alex Schmidt sits down with science/history/everything about life on Earth writer Charles C. Mann. They’ll explore the lives of Norman Borlaug & William Vogt, the title “characters” of Mr. Mann’s new book The Wizard and the Prophet: Two Remarkable Scientists and Their Dueling Visions to Shape Tomorrow's World. We’ll also uncover photosynthesis’s stupidity, nail down climate change’s branding, and look back on hundreds of years of human self-improvement that suggest we might just make it to 10 billion if we pull it together.

Footnotes: https://goo.gl/p4sxHy