Welcome back to the summer term, High Lowers! We recap some news and bring you a boat load of televisual, podcast and - mainly - book recommendations. Plus, Dolly falls for the ultimate whale hoax/ocean con. Enjoy. E-mail [email protected] Tweet @thehighlowshow American Marriage, by Tarayi Jones This is The Story of a Happy Marriage, by Ann Patchett My Sister, the Serial Killer, by Oyinkan Braithwaite Three Women, by Lisa Taddeo Bad Behaviour, by Mary Gaitskill Trick Mirror, by Jill Tolen...
Apr 30, 2019•1 hr 20 min
We discuss Lorraine Kelly’s “performative construct”, Dolly’s piece about I’m In Trouble syndrome and what we don’t know - and need to know - about women in prison, rehabilitation and reform. And we deep-dive into perfectionism, failure and why society needs to re-frame the idea of “childless” women, with novelist and High Low returning guest, Elizabeth Day, whose memoir How To Fail comes out on April 4th. Tweet @thehighlowshow E-mail [email protected] The High Low is now on Easter holida...
Mar 27, 2019•1 hr 17 min
We ring up director Dan Reed to discuss his sensational documentary, Leaving Neverland, which is all anyone else is talking about. We deep-dive into the allegations against Michael Jackson - so long, brushed over - and what Reed's documentary teaches us about child sex abuse, trauma, grooming, the aura of celebrity and how the internet has changed popular culture - and accountability - for the better. E-mail [email protected] Tweet @thehighlowshow SARC information: https://twitter.com/Ess...
Mar 20, 2019•1 hr 27 min
*** PLEASE NOTE: This episode was recorded several days before it was announced that Shamima Begum's baby had died, which is why it is not discussed in this episode *** This is one of the most important - and certainly prescient - author specials we’ve ever had. The journalist and author Fatima Bhutto (the niece and granddaughter of two Pakistani Prime Ministers and the daughter of a political exile) joins us to discuss her new novel, The Runaways, about the radicalisation of 3 teenagers. As the...
Mar 11, 2019•1 hr 17 min
We’re live from Pandora jewellery’s flagship store in London on Friday 1st March, in partnership with Ovacome for Ovarian Cancer Awareness month. Aaaand this week we bring you Emma Thompson’s open letter to The LA Times after she quit an animated movie in protest against the studio’s new hire (a man accused of multiple counts of sexual harassment) and we do a deep-dive into self-discipline. Pandora’s discovered the Pomodoro technique; but is Dolly a fan of self-imposed rules? Take a listen and f...
Mar 04, 2019•58 min
The High Low turns TWO this week! Excuse us while we wallow in (the admittedly shallow) nostalgia of it all. This week we discuss the Oscars; the ongoing case of Shamima Begum’s citizenship; the Insta-tributes to Karl Lagerfeld; and the Martin Scorsese fan who wants to erase a film ending he doesn’t like. Where does our ability to meme popular culture end; and how will it affect problematic art? Is Animal Hospital without Rolf, just a koala hanging in mid-air? Today we have an author special wit...
Feb 26, 2019•1 hr 29 min
*** PLEASE NOTE: This episode was recorded about 8 hours before it was announced that Shamima Begum had been denied entry back to the UK and was stripped of her British citizenship.*** This week, we discuss the most flammable news story of the week: the return of Shamima Begum, the 19 year old Londoner who fled to the Islamic State 4 years ago and returned to have her 3rd baby in the UK. Home Secretary Sajid Javid wants to deny her entry - but should a humane society seek to rehabilitate? We als...
Feb 19, 2019•1 hr 9 min
We couldn't not discuss Liam Neeson's race row and The New Yorker long-read setting the publishing world alight: about best-selling novelist Dan Mallory, aka AJ Finn, who built his career on an extensive web of lies. How did it take a decade for anyone to see through his deception? And what does it tell us about the publishing world - and ourselves? Also today, we discuss Valentine's Day (and reveal our best and worst and our plans for this year), the diversity of vaginas and the M&S love sa...
Feb 12, 2019•1 hr 14 min
We’re back! Have you missed us? Dolly’s tits-deep in her Everything I Know About Love tour (buy tickets here: faneproductions.com/dolly and the paperback is out now) and Pandora’s essay, The Authentic Lie, for independent crowd-funding publisher, The Pound Project, is now open for pledging. Buy in online or mini book form, here! (Plus, there’s a foreword by Elizabeth Day.) https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/poundproject/the-pound-project-part-four-pandora-sykes This week we discuss everything ...
Feb 05, 2019•1 hr 31 min
It’s our favourite time of year: Betwixtmas. We hope you’re face-planted on the sofa, whilst we waltz down your ears with this end of year episode. Dolly devises a very silly quiz which *sort* of refers to things that happened in 2018 and sort of includes rogue personal questions about her internet provider. The High Low is taking a winter holiday, so here’s what’s on our bookshelf to devour — whilst the pod is sunning itself with a cocky by the pool, restoring and renewing its energy for a new ...
Dec 29, 2018•44 min
It’s Chriiiiiiiistmas! From cracker jokes to festive songs; Yuletide readings and actual Christmas cards from the ACTUAL ye olde mail bag; a host of Christmas surveys unpicked and the ultimate question: should a parent ever tell their kid Father Christmas doesn’t exist? Also today, a ton of recs and a quick-fire festive round of Ask The High Low. The Pact We Made, by Layla AlAmmar https://www.harpercollins.co.uk/9780008284442/the-pact-we-made/ Hannah Gadsby meets Roxane Gay for The Guardian http...
Dec 21, 2018•1 hr 14 min
It was the week of Knickers (the cow too big for the abattoir), a Guardian long-read about poo (much to Dolly’s dismay) and Ada Hegerberg, the Norwegian Ballon d’Or winner who coolly refused to twerk. This episode, we discuss the proposed ban of the Christmas song, ‘Baby It’s Cold Out Here’, on account of its supposed coercion (“I really must go”) and connotations of date-rape (“what’s in this drink?”) But, when you dig into the lyrics and read what music historians have to say - it turns out th...
Dec 12, 2018•1 hr
We're back at Google's Curiosity Rooms to celebrate the launch of their Google Pixel 3 phone and we're still not over Baby Shark. On the agenda today: the zeitgeisty new buzz-phrase 'emotional labour'. What does it mean and are we using it correctly? We also discuss Sarah Michelle Gellar's thanksgiving gaffe, after she shared a pic of her in her underwear, as a 'warning' not to over-eat at Thanksgiving. Do women in the public eye hold responsibility for how we feel about their bodies? Plus, how ...
Dec 03, 2018•1 hr
The Baby Shark ear-worm; Joanna Lumley saying the word 'waz'; and the Chinese man who got so drunk on Black Friday (aka Single's Day in China) he bought a salamander and a tiny Thai pig. Oh, it's a good week at The High Low. Today we discuss M&S's Christmas display - a woman in red lace underwear next to a man in a suit - which one Twitter user gone viral called "vomit-inducing." Is it? We also discuss John Allen Chau, the American missionary killed by the isolated Sentinelese tribe and Lena...
Nov 28, 2018•1 hr 6 min
It was the week of the BBC's 100 Women of the Year list, Hockney's record-breaking art sale and the story of Deke Duncan, a radio jockey playing to an audience of one (Dolly's spirit animal.) On today's agenda, the 'cleanfluencer' phenomenon, Mrs Hinch - who has over 1.3 million IG followers and shares videos of herself cleaning. Why DO people go so potty for her? Does she offer an ordered escape from a terrifyingly messy world? And we discuss Lolly Adefope's wry joke about a whitewashed comedy ...
Nov 21, 2018•1 hr 7 min
It's World Kindness Day & Dolly has a beautiful poem to kick us off, whilst Pandora has a new Spotify suggestion for everyone who went nutty for French Chill. 46% of men remove their body hair, up from 36% in 2017. Is it the fusion of porn culture and pop culture? Plus we discuss Collins dictionary's word of the year - 'single-use.' What were the other contenders? Are you a plogger? Lastly, Iceland's Christmas ad, banned for being political, after the supermarket re-branded a Greenpeace adve...
Nov 13, 2018•56 min
From Prince George memes (@garyjanetti) to vegan abuse (last week journalist William Sitwell was sacked from the Waitrose Food magazine, for his jokes about killing vegans) via the healthiest/ unhealthiest high streets in the UK, as voted by The Royal Society of Public Health. Edinburgh won, Grimsby lost, and you’ll have to listen to the podcast to find out why. Today we have author Olivia Sudjic on the show to discuss her new essay, Exposure, about the anxiety that threatened to engulf her afte...
Nov 07, 2018•1 hr 25 min
Since we’ve been gone, Apple has added cream cheese to its emoji bagel after furious complaints (we discuss what we have on OUR bagels and spoiler alert: it’s not cream cheese, Apple); Urban Outfitters has produced an “influencer’ Halloween costume of crop top and leggings; and, of course, a new scandal which features a megalomaniac at its centre, has broken: Arcadia chairman, Philip Green, has been accused of sexual and racial harassment after peer Lord Hain exercised his parliamentary immunity...
Oct 30, 2018•1 hr 8 min
By the time she died in Syria, in 2012, Marie Colvin was one of the world’s most renowned and courageous war correspondents. Recognised for her trademark eye patch - the consequence of a grenade in Sri Lanka, in 2001 - and revered as a journalist, with a 25 year tenure at The Sunday Times, Marie Colvin had a personal life as tumultuous as the war zones she covered. With the help of 300 of Marie’s journals, her friend and colleague, Channel 4’s International Editor, Lindsey Hilsum, has written a ...
Oct 24, 2018•1 hr 13 min•Ep. 75
Everyone’s talking about Kanye’s nutty meeting with Trump in The Oval Office last week; whilst Melania, in her most frank televised interview yet, described herself as the most bullied person in the world. Meanwhile, Fendi has made a £750 scarf which looks like a vulva (transcendental experience of being ‘born again’ presumably baked in to the price), the Duchess of Sussex is having a baby and we discuss the juiciest tidbits of the 850-guest royal wedding that we both, accidentally, got really q...
Oct 16, 2018•1 hr 23 min
It’s our favourite time of year: The OED have released their new admissions. Are you feeling bongga ? Or are you - whisper it - just a nothingburger ? We also discuss the Banksy that shredded itself; Brett Kavanaugh’s ascendancy into The Supreme Court; Taylor Swift’s Instagram politics; and that time Trump walked around with a wad of bog roll stuck to his shoe. It’s the little things. This episode concerns two men accused of domestic abuse - comedian Seann Walsh, and Johnny Depp who currently co...
Oct 10, 2018•1 hr 14 min
Hello October! It’s Dolly’s favourite month of the year. If she were reincarnated, says Pandora, it would be as a knee-high boot. This week we discuss MeToo’s infighting - as Asia Argento unveils a new bloody dagger tattoo aimed at Rose McGowan; Pret’s tragic error and the 14 allergens that all foodstuffs should be labelled with; and why the Nobel peace prize should be taken away from Myanmar leader Aung San Suu Kyi despite the organisation’s novel explanation as to why it hasn’t. Masses of reco...
Oct 03, 2018•1 hr 16 min
New Zealand PM Jacinda Arden made history when she took baby Neve to the UN Assembly in NYC this week; meanwhile, Trump made world leaders laugh out loud with his address (“that’s not what I was expecting” he replied, surprised at the lols.) In the domestic landscape, Dolly discovers a great new podcast and Pandora reads a unnerving but thought-provoking book. Also this week, we host comedian and podcast supremo, Deborah Frances-White, creator and host of The Guilty Feminist. The podcast has had...
Sep 27, 2018•54 min
The High Low inbox was full of people asking us to cover the media coverage of Carrie Symonds, the former Tory comms director accused of having an affair with Boris Johnson. We discuss the ‘scarlet woman’ trope, historically embodied by Monica Lewinsky, the then intern who was globally shamed for her affair with Bill Clinton (if you haven’t watched her 2015 TED talk yet - DO IT.) Let’s stop with the ‘tabloidese’ whereby women accused of having affairs with famous, married men are party-loving sl...
Sep 19, 2018•1 hr 9 min
Roxanne Pallett has been cast (and since left) Celebrity Island since our last record (exploitative, much?) and Hurricane Florence is heading towards the USA. Meanwhile, 2 more people have attempted to make bookings at The High Low hotel. Our towels must be reeeeeally soft, or something. Today, we discuss Serena Williams’s epic tantrum at the US Open final - and how it overshadowed Naomi Osaka’s first Grand Slam win. The most interesting part of the narrative isn’t the tantrum, itself: but how i...
Sep 12, 2018•1 hr 3 min
We’re back! We wish we were still on the sun lounger, but here we are, at your disposal - with a giant book chat of what we have enjoyed in the last month. Also today, we discuss the social media trolling of the late Sinéad McNamara and Instagram influencer Scarlett Dixon; and Celebrity Big Brother’s biggest controversy yet - after soap actor Roxanne Pallet accused fellow contestant and actor Ryan Thomas of assault, which footage revealed to have never happened. The fall-out has been swift; Roxa...
Sep 05, 2018•1 hr 14 min
Jeremy Hunt forgot his wife's nationality; someone tried to book 6 hotel rooms at The High Low (us neither); & Dolly smashed a glass of wine all over CJ's recording equipment. Hola August: the summer madness has officially begun! We discuss Jane Garvey's comment on Radio 4's Woman's Hour this week: that "hey guys" should not be used when a gathering includes women. Is "guys" an anti-feminist collective term; or has it evolved into unisex slang? And are there any non-gross alternatives? Also ...
Aug 01, 2018•59 min
We might be a little delayed - much like a Ryanair flight - but we got there in the end. Yup, that’s a pun; we’re talking about Plane Bae. Unfolding like a modern meet-cute, the tweet story of a ‘romance’ observed by another passenger over the course of over 50 tweets-gone viral, Plane Bae soon morphed into a cautionary tale of consent, privacy and doxxing. What does this incident reveal to us, except, yet again, that the internet is misogynistic? Also today, we discuss two news stories surround...
Jul 25, 2018•1 hr 2 min
The POTUS hit the UK for his week of ridicule: the balloon; the march; the press conference and *that* video gone viral of Trump barging in front of the Queen. Meanwhile, Dolly discovers a new music hero (David Keenan) and Pandora reads her first ‘work-help’ book (The Discomfort Zone by Farrah Storr.) Oh, and Love Island fans: Undercover Lover is your new favourite podcast. You’re welcome. Today we are honoured to host Yomi Adegoke & Elizabeth Uviebinené, the writers of Slay In Your Lane: Th...
Jul 18, 2018•1 hr 5 min
There’s a ton of cabinet reshuffles this week and baby Trump - all 6-foot helium-filled malevolence - is flying over London. Is the balloon a meaningful protest; or is it a childish blimp that could ruin a trade agreement with the US? And aren’t there leaders (Erdogan, for example) whose visit to the UK we should protest more? Also this week, Justin Bieber’s engaged! Kylie Jenner’s almost a billionaire! Cardi(gan) B has had a baby called Kulture! In (more important) news, we discuss Amanda Knox’...
Jul 12, 2018•1 hr 2 min
