Building a cosy soundscape

Because without podcasts I’d have gone stir-crazy a lot sooner

Pull Up A Chair is a weekly newsletter containing all the things I’d like to be chatting about if we could hang out together in real life.

• 📕 Husband Material by Alexis Hall. I adored the preceding book about these characters, Boyfriend Material, when I read it during one of the lockdowns. It’s a fake-dating novel about the son of a rock-star and a straight-laced barrister. (I know, right!!). Husband Material is a rare thing in the romance novel universe - a follow-up book about a couple who we saw get together and who are still together at the end of this book. Alexis Hall writes funny, honest fiction that makes me want to be a better person and gives me confidence that I will find my person. Bonus points for the best fictional use of the concept of a ‘dick pic’. (Affiliate links to Bookshop.org and Amazon - ad). 

• 🍝 Jarred Pasta Sauce. I’ve seen multiple newsletters this week linking to Jason Diamond’s fantastic piece on Taste, so I decided it must be okay to admit to having a few favourite jarred pasta sauces. Just to remind you all, I’m one of those people who sometimes makes her own houmous and will cook huge batches of Smitten Kitchen recipes to eat over the next week (i.e. a single woman in possession of a nice kitchen and in want of someone to cook for). Growing up, the only jarred sauces we ever had in the kitchen were the Patak’s curry sauces; my mum would make pasta sauces from scratch with canned tomatoes or passata, and half the time we’d just have pasta with butter and peas. Today, I’m the opposite: I always make my curry sauces myself, but I have a shelf with multiple jarred pasta sauces on it, in readiness for a night like last night when I want something just a little bit more interesting than plain pasta with broccoli. My main rule for a pasta sauce is that all its ingredients have to be ones I would use when making it at home, if I could be bothered. My go-to’s are the M&S (especially the arrabbiata) and Heinz sauces. My favourite pasta shape: Mafalda Corta. 

• 👟Converse All-Stars. I have finally given up on trying to find a ‘cool’ pair of trainers that don’t leave me limping and wounded, and gone back to my inner 16-year-old’s happy place: Converse. In particular, these gorgeous mainly-black high tops with stars and moons all over. Just look at the embroidery around the top eyelet!

A couple of weeks ago, I told you all about how I’ve curated a set of social media feeds that make the world feel like a cosier and friendlier place. What I didn’t have space to talk about then was using audio to do the same. I live alone, and work mostly from home, so using sound is really important, whether it’s to set the scene for a particular activity or to make me feel like I have some company while washing the dishes. 

On any given day, my soundtrack starts off with the radio. This is something I used to do as a student, but got out of the habit when my little FM clock radio didn’t make it into my suitcases for my initial move to Scotland. Last Christmas though I found myself in possession of some rewards vouchers from work, and used them towards the cost of a cute little clock radio which now sits on my bedside table and which clicks on at 6.15 every morning to Scala Radio’s In The Park, their weekday morning show of birdsong and gentle classical music. Just before 7.00, Charles Nove pops onto the airwaves to start the breakfast show, and then we’re off with more music, the headlines, and trivia questions. The playlist at Scala is like a much more accessible version of Classic FM or BBC Radio 3; all the classical big hitters and new music, but also pieces from film and video games or classical recordings of pop songs. My Shazam history is full of songs played on Scala that I’ve wanted to identify, from a brass cover of Bohemian Rhapsody to 2CELLOS’s take on Shallow. 

During the work day, I have music playing in the background; through my noise-cancelling headphones if I’m in the office, or just through my phone speaker if I’m at home. A friend recommended the ‘Road Trip To Tokyo’ playlist a while back and that alone was responsible for getting lo-fi beats onto the list of most-listened genres on my 2022 Spotify Wrapped. Lately, I’ve been bouncing between ‘lofi covers of popular songs 🌙 2023’ (catchy) and Pop Goes Classical. Other favourites for working, writing, and reading include Cosy Girl Winter, Writing fanfiction at 3am (no judgement), and iced vanilla latte. 

The last part of my holy trinity of audio is podcasts. Years ago, I appeared on the BBC’s Edinburgh Fringe coverage in a vox-pop from the queue for a Reasons To Be Cheerful live recording, explaining that I like podcasts because I live alone and it’s like they’re keeping me company while I’m washing up. It’s still true! I think podcasts cab seem a bit difficult to get into if you’re not currently a listener - the way I describe it is that it’s like my own personal Radio 4 station, without The Archers or Gardeners’ Question Time. Both fine shows, just not my thing. If you have an iPhone, Apple’s built in podcasts app is pretty good, and a lot of people listen to podcasts through Spotify too. I use an app called Pocket Casts, which I really like. For the first time last year, it gave me a round-up similar to Spotify Wrapped, including the horrifying statistic that in 2022 I listened to over 40 days’ worth of podcasts.

As the ‘Radio 4’ (roughly equivalent to NPR, I think?) comparison implies, I tend to have podcasts just on in the background while I cook, wash up, or do my errands. Sometimes I’ll go back a bit if I miss something particularly interesting, or even remind myself to come back another time and take notes if there are insights I don’t want to forget (as with this week’s #AmWriting podcast full of Sarina Bowen’s insights about writing at speed).

It’s hard to recommend a podcast without any starting point, like recommending ‘a book’ from the entirety of a bookstore. But here’s a few ideas:

• If you like big ideas and interesting policy proposals (if you watched The West Wing this is probably you!) I’d recommend Reasons To Be Cheerful. Ed Miliband (yes, that one) talks to Geoff Lloyd and a range of experts about policy ideas ranging from sortition to restorative justice and, this week, international train travel. Genuinely fantastic. 

• If you’re into books, I’d recommend ‘What Should I Read Next’, in which Anne Bogel plays matchmaker for a new guest each week, to line up their next books, based on what they love, hate, and what they’re reading lately. Also check out Strong Sense of Place to join David and Melissa as they travel the world within the pages of their books.  

• If you like listening to intelligent women chatting about any of the above, or shooting the breeze about nothing in particular, look up Bad On Paper, Hysteria, or Forever 35. 

Honestly though, I could continue for hours, so if you’re looking for a podcast about a particular subject, do comment below, and I’ll see what I can do. 

Speak soon,

Lily

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