Music podcasts for your summer road trips: ‘Cocaine & Rhinestones,’ ‘Questlove Supreme,’ and more
Dan DeLuca, The Philadelphia Inquirer
Streaming services put all the world’s music at your fingertips, but serious fans crave more than that.
They need artist interviews, granular looks back at classics, and grand narratives laced with surprise. Great music podcasts cover all those bases.
Road trip season is podcast season, and the music podcasts we’re recommending here offer satisfying aural companionship, taking varied approaches to storytelling and spanning multiple genres.
All these podcasts are easily searchable and widely available, unless otherwise noted.
Cocaine & Rhinestones. The greatness of this country music podcast from Tyler Mahan Coe, now in the middle of its second season, can be measured by its introductions and digressions. The opening episode takes its time getting around to George Jones, the hero of the season, starting with a fascinating interlude about the secret history of pinball and its role in music. The second show, about producer Owen Bradley, begins with Little Richard’s “Tutti Frutti,” and teaches you more than you thought you needed to know about the history of refrigeration.