British podcasts are great — but there's a north-south problem
Crossed Wires, the podcast festival that last weekend took over some of Sheffield's best-known venues, including the Crucible Theatre, seeks to redress that. It was founded by the podcaster Alice Levine (My Dad Wrote a Porno, British Scandal), the producer Dino Sofos (the creator of Americast and The News Agents) and the local impresario James O'Hara (the music festival Tramlines), and the ambition is to create a podcasting equivalent to the Edinburgh Fringe, albeit for just one weekend annually.
Sofos, however, wants to challenge London's cultural capital year round. He spent 14 years down south, pioneering BBC formats like Brexitcast. But to build his audio company Persephonica, he came home to Sheffield. Increasingly he perceives a north-south divide in career opportunities for young creatives, with the high cost of housing giving an unfair advantage to those already from the southeast. But podcasts can be produced from anywhere (as exemplified by two of Persephonica's highest-profile yet hardest-holidaying presenters, Dua Lipa and Lily Allen). Sofos dreams that others — perhaps even the BBC — will follow him to Sheffield and help to make England's sixth biggest city a centre for podcasting.
This year's festival had the BBC Radio 1 breakfast host, Greg James, as its creative director. First, he lured back one of the city's most beloved sons, Michael Palin. The natty 82-year-old reminisced about once alighting from the London train 'wearing one of those communist-style collarless shirts'. A gruff South Yorkshireman barked, 'Hulloo!' before declaiming sotto voce: 'Bourgeois are back.' Palin has never worn that shirt since.
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James hosted the Friday headliner Nobody Expects the Michael Palin Podcast. Then, a delightful Sheffield/Palin-themed edition of Rewinder. It was recorded at Cole Brothers, which for generations was Sheffield's destination department store, but since the closure of John Lewis in 2021 is a semi-derelict high street eyesore.
Last weekend it was reclaimed as a BBC hub. So, in a sense, the bourgeoisie were back (Radio 4's controller even popped along to settle a potentially unpaid Palin guinea fee from the 1960s). But the venue's bare bulbs and wires hanging from concrete girders made this a buzzy, down-to-earth space. 'A better audience than at the Hay Festival,' said Rob Lawrie, the bluff Yorkshireman presenter of the investigative hit To Catch a Scorpion.
North and south, privilege and poverty, the politics of a post-industrial landscape, all were recurring themes across a northern-accented weekend attended by more than 20,000. As Nick Grimshaw and Angela Hartnett's guest on Dish, the Hull-raised comedian Lucy Beaumont was bleakly funny about the hunger-staving, cheap stodgy staples of Yorkshire cuisine.
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Audiences flocked to hear a recording of Jarvis Cocker reading the Shipping Forecast. His Pulp bandmate the drummer Nick Banks joined Drunk Women Solving Crime. At the gateway to the Peak District, the novelist David Nicholls discussed his hiking romance You Are Here with Sara Cox ('delighted to be on my second favourite side of the Pennines').
At the festival's stimulating finale Pod Save the UK, Oliver Coppard, the mayor of South Yorkshire, dealt impressively with shouts of 'shame on you' for saying his office would not turn away arms manufacturing jobs, given local levels of long-term unemployment.
Crucially, Crossed Wires events were great fun. The Saturday evening headliner was the class-riffing comedy Help I Sexted My Boss, presented by the Capital Radio breakfast host Jordan North and the etiquette expert William Hanson. Even before curtain up at the sold-out 2,200-capacity City Hall, its bars had run dry of 'G&D', the show's signature tipple of gin and Dubonnet.
• Read more radio and podcast reviews
Its innuendo-laden humour harks back to a pre-Palin(lithic) age. 'I'm more City Hall — you're sod all,' was Hanson's opening salvo to North, as if he were a snooty southern pantomime villain talking to Buttons. To cheers, North (born in York, brought up in Lancashire) explained Sheffield to Hanson (Bristol) as the city of Pulp, Arctic Monkeys, Self-Esteem and Sean Bean. For the second half's opener, he and the producer did a 'full Monty', stripping to gold lamé briefs. Hanson, more demurely, unveiled a half Sheffield United, half Wednesday strip, then came good officiating the marriage proposal of Tristan to Shona. You'd have to have been a right misery-guts to have not been borne along.
Edinburgh's festivals have been pivotal to the careers of some mentioned here, including Palin. Although this was much smaller in scale, it felt like there were parallels — another walkable festival in a university town girded by hills. I hope Sheffield's Crossed Wires succeeds and helps to devolve more podcasting power to the regions.
What podcasts have you enjoyed recently? Let us know in the comments below
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McIntosh was further compromised by a published photo of the fitness fanatic appearing to snort an unspecified white powder during a boozy night out - an incident he played down as a 'bit of fun.' 'Sarah often asked me to pose for silly pictures when I was drunk and, in today's article in The Sun, there is a picture of me purportedly "posing" over what appears to be white powder on a table,' he explained. 'I did not take any drugs on the night that picture was taken and am very disappointed that Sarah has lied. 'I merely (and in hindsight, very stupidly) posed for a "fun" picture at Sarah's request. I was clearly intoxicated with alcohol in the picture and acted naively.' He added: 'As for Sarah's other claim that I slept with her whilst with Kelly, it is 100% untrue and I categorically deny it. 'I'm incredibly hurt and sickened by Sarah's false accusations and believe she has done this out of jealousy and spite because she knows that, 1) I'm not interested in her romantically and 2) I only love and want Kelly. 'I did not cheat on Kelly whatsoever! Kelly is my world and, other than my son, she's the only person I've ever truly cared about in my life. 'Whilst with Kelly, my text exchanges with Sarah were few and far between and there was never anything inappropriate, flirtatious or sexual in them, so it's perfectly clear I'm innocent and kept everything with Sarah purely on a platonic level.' There was also room for a thinly veiled criticism of Brook and her decision to break off their engagement. 'I'm absolutely devastated that Sarah's lies have caused Kelly to end our engagement but am even more deeply upset that the woman I thought loved me and was literally my life would not stand by me. 'In a strange way though, there is a silver lining to all of this because at least now I can breathe a sigh of relief.' Unfortunately for McIntosh it would prove to be a temporary reprieve, with adult movie veteran Gina Rodriguez weighing in by claiming he sent her explicit messages on Facebook – and rubbishing stories of an engagement to Brook. Speaking to The Sunday Mirror, Rodriguez - who at the time performed under the name Demi Delia - claimed he indulged her with saucy banter after asking if she wanted him to 'pose naked.' A source close to McIntosh later claimed that the Facebook account used to maintain contact with Gina is fake. 'David's already been accused of treating Kelly badly once before,' a source told the Sunday Mirror. 'This is the last thing the pair of them need.' A difficult year was rounded off by a court appearance in April 2014, during which he pleaded guilty to crashing a van load of dead badgers while on a controversial animal cull the previous September. Just three months before crossing paths with Brook, the TV personality had been employed to take the dead creatures for disposal as part of the badger cull in Gloucestershire. But as he drove his VW Transporter van to a furnace in the middle of the night, he swerved and smashed into a bus stop after falling asleep at the wheel. Appearing at Stroud Crown Court in April 2014, McIntosh claimed to have lost control when a radio - which police used to pass on intelligence about the location of anti-cull protesters - fell under the brakes. He admitted to driving without due care and attention and not having a valid licence. The court heard McIntosh, of Altrincham, Cheshire, had managed to get the job as a driver despite having his licence for that class of vehicle suspended for running a red light in 2005. He was fined £91, plus an additional £20 victim surcharge, £30 prosecution costs and given six penalty points. Away from court and newly single, McIntosh would soon embark on a series of fresh romances, notably a relationship with Australian jewelry designer Juliet Bakos. But the bitter fallout would cast a tall shadow over his subsequent relationships and eventually lead to him sharing a series of abusive messages, purportedly sent by Brook about Bakos. A source told The Sun: 'Kelly said even more offensive things to David but for Juliet's sake he didn't make them public. He doesn't understand why Kelly is even interested in his life any more. 'She is the one who dumped him, then begged him to come back, only so she could dump him again. For some reason she hates the thought of him with other women but doesn't actually want to be with him.' The posts included Brook allegedly ranting about Bakos, writing: 'the weave? the dress? as long as she is buying you s**t and you have a place to stay, all can be overlooked. lol.' Additional messages include pointed references to TV personalities Aisleyne Horgan-Wallace and Jess Impiazzi, with whom McIntosh had also been romantically connected. Despite protesting his innocence, the former Gladiator later admitted that he was incapable of remaining faithful. Appearing on American dating show Famously Single in 2017, he said: 'When I get into a relationship it is all about being faithful 100 percent, but what are you going to do when you're partying and you're drunk and you've got a plethora of delicious beautiful women coming on to you? 'You think you are not going to get caught. The girls gravitate to me. I can't help it. I was born like this. I get a lot of women throw themselves at me. They are a sucker for abs and a good jawline.' McIntosh also claimed he'd secretly exchanged vows with Bakos before taking part in Famously Single, only for the marriage to end because they refused to compromise on what they wanted out of life. 'Yeah, I was married to Juliet. [We were married for] a year. We were together for two. [We split up] about five for six months before I filmed the show,' he said. 'It was just differences. She didn't want me travelling for work. She didn't want me to go to America. She wanted me to do some nine-to-five job, and that isn't me. I wasn't ready to retire in Australia.' These days McIntosh enjoys a more domesticated life away from the spotlight with a new partner and frequently shares family updates on Instagram - where he refers to himself as 'King David.' A cursory glance at his Instagram profile reveals an assortment of obligatory gym selfies and fitness videos, the musclebound former Marine is pictured enjoying tropical family holidays and outdoor adventures. For the casual observer, there's little to suggest his life is anything more than that of a domesticated father, and nothing to remind us of the colourful journey he took before finally settling down. He also appears to have welcomed two more children with his partner, who features in family photos but hasn't been named, with recent updates capturing McIntosh alongside his young daughter. Despite everything, McIntosh claimed his toxic relationship with Brook helped him develop a thick skin and learn to accept the benefits if being single. 'I don't need anyone else to tell me what I can do,' he told MailOnline in 2018. 'This just helps me deliver my message. I don't care about what people say or think I've done. 'I care about how people develop. I care about giving a message to people who need a message. 'It's what people like to read but now it's time to sweep all that under the carpet. I don't hold grudges.'
