This week I’ve been listening to way more podcasts. I go through these phases where I only want to listen to music on my commute and other times I only want to listen to podcasts. This week’s been a podcast week. I’ve also gotten a promotion at work and now have to do a bit of traveling. It’s not a lot, maybe 20-30 minutes a day, but enough to get through another story of No Sleep or halfway through another show.

My tastes for the past few years have been skewed towards horror. I’ve loved watching B-horror movies since college and I’ve recently gotten into reading horror novels and playing horror games. This time of the year is one of my favorites for entertainment. Horror movies are coming out, haunted houses start to open, and Halloween decorations are out in force. In fact, yesterday, my wife and I saw a horror triple feature at our local Drive-In Theater.

The No Sleep Podcast

I listened to one and a half episodes this week. I finished up Season 4 Episode 14 and started into the Season 4 Halloween episode.

My favorite stories this week:

• A Campfire Story S4E15
• Dinosaur Bones S4E15
• The Stump S4E15

The following are links to the original Reddit posts as some stories are part of the paid season pass for the audio version. This season’s Halloween episode is one of my least favorites. There are still some good stories but, halfway through, I’m not enjoying it as much as past Halloween Episodes. Who knows? It might change my mind with the last few stories. I’ve listened to less No Sleep than usual because…

The Black Tapes

The Black Tapes is a serialized docudrama about one journalist’s search for truth, her enigmatic subject’s mysterious past, and the literal and figurative ghosts that haunt them both.

The Black Tapes was recommended to me on Tuesday and it’s all I’ve listened to since. This show is in the style of documentary podcasts and it does a really, really good job sticking to that format convincingly. If I didn’t know any better, I’d be convinced it was a non-fiction podcast. The cast does an excellent job selling that this is all real.

So what’s it about? Alex Regan is starting a new podcast where she tries to filter peoples experiences and stories through their occupation. The first episode is about ghost hunters and she goes on a ghost hunt with them. Afterward, she gets in contact with Dr. Richard Strand, a paranormal debunker. They meet and he explains how some of the most convincing evidence of ghosts and the paranormal are all fake. The title of the podcast comes from a collection of tapes Strand has in his office. They’re in black cases and these are the ones that Strand claims he doesn’t have the technology right now to prove that they aren’t real. The show becomes Alex and Strand digging deeper into the Blak Tapes and following up with the people in them about their experiences.

This week I got to episode 5. I have a feeling next week I’ll be done with season 1. I don’t think I’ll be writing about any other podcast next week. I’m beyond hooked on this one!