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29 June 2015updated 04 Oct 2023 10:39am

SRSLY #1: Grey Beginnings

In the first episode of the NS's new pop culture podcast, we discuss Grey by E L James, the new Amy Winehouse documentary, and why One Direction is actually the saddest music you will ever hear.

By Caroline Crampton

This is SRSLY, the pop culture podcast from the New Statesman. Here, you can find links to all the things we talk about in the show as well as a bit more detail about who we are and where else you can find us online. Listen to our first episode now:

First things first: who we are. SRSLY is hosted by Caroline Crampton and Anna Leszkiewicz, the NS’s web editor and editorial assistant. We’re on Twitter as @c_crampton and @annaleszkie, where between us we post a heady mixture of Serious Journalism, excellent gifs and regularly questions J K Rowling needs to answer. The podcast is also on Twitter @srslypod if you’d like to @ us with your appreciation. Our guest this week, NS arts editor Kate Mossman, does not have Twitter, but you can currently watch her excellent BBC documentary When Pop Music Ruled My Life on iPlayer.

If you’d like to talk to us about the podcast or make a suggestion for something we should read or cover, you can email srslypod[at]gmail.com.

Make sure you never miss an episode by subscribing in iTunes, adding our RSS feed to your reader, or visiting our Audioboom channel. Other places to listen, like Stitcher and SoundCloud, will be coming soon – bear with us!

The Links

The quote that Anna read is from I Love Dick by Chris Kraus.

This is the John Scalzi quote Caroline read.

Give a gift subscription to the New Statesman this Christmas from just £49

You can see some clips from the Amy Winehouse documentary here, and watch the trailer below.

More info about the Kurt Cobain film, Montage of Heck, can be found here.

The Pitchfork piece about the gendering of martyred rock stars is here.

If you really feel you have to, you can buy Grey by E L James here.

Laurie Penny’s piece on Fifty Shades of Grey is here. Helen Lewis and Zoe Margolis are also both very good on this subject.

Listen to the One Direction playlist that Anna made for Caroline here.

Samantha Hunt's piece about the "darkness in this light music that stirs thoughts of life, death, gender, literature, and the multiple problems of aging" is here.

And if you’d like to discover The Lizzie Bennet Diaries with Anna before next week’s episode, you can watch the entire series here.

Our theme music is “Guatemala - Panama March” (by Heftone Banjo Orchestra), licensed under Creative Commons.

See you next week!

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