With a title like “My Dad Wrote A Porno”, I went into my first listen of the podcast series somewhat apprehensively. I mean, sure, it’s a funny and bizarre premise, but I’ve never really been totally on board with overly sexualised things. Fortunately, the former outweighed the latter in such exceptional measure that – despite the mentions of fucking, dildos and vulvae – I found myself wholly enjoying a narrative romp, apparently tied to a trellis in a hedge maze.
Not wanting to tarnish my largely clean and practically virginic worldview (I even went as far as going Incognito to Google the plural of “vulva” just now to keep my search history clean), I’m somewhat surprised at the reaction that listening to the aforementioned podcast has evoked in me. I’ve laughed at comedy things before, I’ve chuckled, I’ve raised a smile, but it’s been a long, long time since I’ve belly-laughed, guffawed and howled to the point that I struggle for breath.
Maybe it’s because the content is a little more taboo. Maybe it’s because I’m more amused at the constantly-interrupting reactions of the podcast participants. Maybe I just think turkey sandwiches are hilarious. Who knows? But I have a feeling that it has a certain appeal in me because of the literary appraising nature of the whole experiment.
For those who haven’t quite experienced the pleasure or the thrill just yet, “My Dad Wrote A Porno” is essentially an audiobook gone wrong. A piece of amateur erotic fiction as discovered and narrated by the author’s adult son, delivered to his two friends who mercilessly tear apart the story, the description, the dialogue and the smut in very much the same way my peers and I used to do to each other in Creative Writing sessions.
The result is a quite banal story about office workers, intercourse and for some reason a tombola, being raised to cult status by a group of twenty-something laughing at it; with which we, the listeners, laugh along. And that’s just the first book. There’s apparently a whole series of them, evidenced by the fact that this year they’re tackling the third instalment while I’ve binged the first tale from two years ago.
I’m putting the rest of listening on hold for a while. Despite the instalments traditionally coming weekly, I managed to tackle a whole story over a weekend, which – while satisfying in some respect – left me feeling more exhausted than the titular Belinda. I’ll catch up eventually, but for the time being, just knowing that something as hilarious as this exists is good enough for me.
Winding things down a bit, here’s a video about how goths in them there olden days did ballroom dancing. As with a lot of these musical features, the music takes centre stage, while the fact that I include a video below can often throw up some questionable imagery. Sorry about that.
Even though August is traditionally a summer month, the general mood weather-wise has been particularly dulled down. That’s not to say I find this song dull. If I did, what would be the point in featuring it? There’s a certain calmness and melancholy to this that tends to match the dreariness of the outside world these days. Plus, those occasional echoing bass strings keep reminding me I need to carry on watching Twin Peaks again sometime.
Phoebe Bridgers – Smoke Signals
Jamie Walsh 
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