Like our previous albums – AMT Jubilee, Sports Day, Holiday, Love and Christmas – AMT Home Entertainment is an hourish of all-new AMT material that has never been on the podcast.
All the questions are about how you might homelily entertain yourself, with telly, music, films, food and some YouTube deep cuts. We discover:
🌴 What IS a wonderwall?
🎥 What was the first movie to have a director’s cut?
🐘 What’s with the big wooden elephants in Les Miserables and Moulin Rouge?
🅾️ What’s with blood groups in The Simpsons?
📺 Are TED speakers allowed teleprompters?
🍔 When did Justin Timberlake stop singing ‘I’m Lovin’ It’ at the end of the McDonald’s ads?
🍳 Why doesn’t Cathy eat breakfast in this, er, thought-provoking educational film/Dairy Council propaganda from the 1970s??
AND MORE!
AMT Home Entertainment is out now at the Answer Me This! Store or (but we make less money this way – just saying) from iTunes (UK / USA )
The album art is by the excellent Joe List, whom you can find at joelist.co.uk and on Instagram and Twitter @joelist. (You may recall that, way back when, Joe illustrated the AMT book after his magnificent entry to our 2009 Photoshop Challenge!)
Greetings, listeners! If you’ve ever wondered how jellyfish eat, shit and fuck, we’ve taken the hit to our search histories to illuminate you in Answer Me This! Episode 374. We also discuss:
microwave cookery
confirmation of the Buckingham Palace in-house (in-palace?) cinema
post-chemo hairdos
Eddie Izzard vs Gerard Butler
many Michaels
green screens vs blue screens vs yellow screens
death by Babybel
sea monkey soup mug cakes
brownie points
Helen’s gash
Disney’s Spaceship Earth
and
the contents of Ryvita.
In this month’s Bonus Bit of Crap on the App – available for iPadPhones, Android and Windows devices – Olly expresses his wish for an in-house jellyquarium. As long as the jellyfish don’t watch him sleep.
Olly’s other podcast The Modern Mann is back with a new series, and an episode containing New York japes and aerial gymnastics. Find it at modernmann.co.uk – and catch up on the news that you haven’t heard much about on his other other podcast The Week Unwrapped.
Helen and Martin are on tour of Australia with an all new Allusionist live extravaganza! Visit theallusionist.org/events for listings – extra dates have just been added in Adelaide and Melbourne. And wherever you are in the world, 100 – one hundred!! – episodes of The Allusionist await at theallusionist.org for your listening pleasure.
Sing along to Martin the Sound Man’s gap year diary of songs: his new 40-track mega album The Year of the Bird, complete with illustrations and diaries about each song, is being released at palebirdmusic.com.
This episode is sponsored by Squarespace, with which you can easily and quickly set up a good-looking website for your projects, eg your terrifying experiments in fusion food. Visit squarespace.com/answer and get 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain with the discount code ‘answer‘.
And go behind the money curtain to get AMT episodes 1-200 and our special albums, Sports Day, Holiday, Jubilee, Love and Christmas. OK, maybe wait a few months for Christmas. But this month, Sports Day goes well with the Wimblesport.
For the rest of this month, AMT listeners in the UK can get a free trial of Audible at answermethispodcast.com/audible – or, if you’ve had such a thing before, you can get a spell of half price membership! And remember: 1. for each of you that takes up the trial, Audible gives us a little bit of money, even when you cancel without paying a thing; 2. you can keep your free audiobooks forever.
As ever, we want your QUESTIONS: send them, in writing or as voice recordings, to answermethispodcast@googlemail.com. (Also the email address to which you can send your requests for us to do the voiceovers on the theme park rides you’re building.)
Fire up Answer Me This! Episode 373 and travel round the world on the wings of George Ezra lyrics and/or an evil sled, via the following:
Montjuïc in Barcelona
Olly’s Happy Fork
Helen’s sentient bed
the Queen’s en suite cinema (and post office, and operating theatre)
Slendertone
the new Narnia novel? The Magician’s Nephew vs Better Call Saul
Dr Klaus Maertens
the Relax-A-Cizor
and
a Tale of Two Seans/Shawns.
If you’re curious to hear Helen and Martin on the Potterless episode they mention, it’s HERE – but be aware, this episode is NOT FOR KIDS, also (unsurprisingly) contains spoilers for the Harry Potter series up to chapter 23 of the Deathly Hallows.
This month’s Bonus Bit of Crap on the App – available for iPadPhones, Android and Windows devices – is a question from violist Clem about whether concert musicians are more prone to haemorrhoids.
Olly’s other podcast The Modern Mann is back for a new series, which kicks off with an episode ‘Pupil A‘ that Olly says you do not want to miss. Do check the shownotes for content warnings before listening.
Helen and Martin are on tour of New Zealand and Australia with an all new Allusionist live extravaganza! Visit theallusionist.org/events for listings and ticket links to see the show that has been declared ‘good’ by New Zealand’s finest.
Sing along to Martin the Sound Man’s gap year diary of songs: his new 40-track mega album The Year of the Bird, complete with illustrations and diaries about each song, is being released at palebirdmusic.com.
This episode is sponsored by Squarespace, with which you can easily and quickly set up a good-looking website for your projects eg your Oscar-nominated documentary. Visit squarespace.com/answer and get 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain with the discount code ‘answer‘.
This is the last month you AMT listeners in the UK can get a free trial of Audible at answermethispodcast.com/audible – or, if you’ve had such a thing before, you can get a spell of half price membership! And remember: 1. for each of you that takes up the trial, Audible gives us a little bit of money, even when you cancel without paying a thing; 2. you can keep your free audiobooks forever.
With a spring in your step and a scent in your nostrils and a freshly cleaned undercarriage and Answer Me This! Episode 361 in your ears, join us to consider:
Smell-O-Vision
reclaiming skipping for the adult man
museum buddies the Dalí museum
bidet chat
baby equipment the perfect baby bottle warmer
getting aboard Michael Palin
crystal prawn cocktail glasses
and
Trainy McTrainface.
In today’s Bonus Bit of Crap on the App – available for iPadPhones, Android and Windows devices – we have a bonus question from prolific questioneer Lindon from Huddersfield about how to cut off the ex-housemate who’s still a parasite upon Lindon’s Spotify account.
Want to see Helen and Martin live on stage? (NB that’s ‘live’ in an adverbial sense, not a verbal sense. Although they will be alive on stage. They just don’t live on one. Why do you have to make everything so complicated?) They’ll be touring with Radiotopia in the eastern USA in May and the Allusionist in Australia in June, and you can check where and when and how at theallusionist.org/events. And hear all about Olly’s grandmother’s amazing piss-based beauty routine on The Modern Mann at modernmann.co.uk.
Thanks to Squarespace for sponsoring the show, and for making it so easy to set up a good-looking website for your projects. Visit squarespace.com/answer; play around during the two-week free trial; then when you’re ready to buy your website or domain, you can have get 10% off your first purchase with the discount code ‘answer‘.
You can also get two free Audible audiobooks if you go to answermethispodcast.com/audible. Why don’t you listen along with Olly to Andrew Lloyd Webber’s memoir? He turned TS Eliot’s poetry into a hit musical and Thomas the Tank Engine into what looks like a load of off-brand Power Rangers on roller skates – what ISN’T he capable of?
You are capable of sending us your QUESTIONS: deliver a voice memo or a written question by emailing answermethispodcast@googlemail.com. You can still use the old ways of calling the Question Line on 0208 123 5877 or Skype ID answermethis, but a lot of those messages haven’t been reaching us lately or are coming out sounding like you’ve just been eaten by a robot. So emailing a voice memo is the safer bet.
All hail the greatest Middleton sibling – not the one that begat the next generation of royals; not the one with 2011’s favourite bottom; the Marshmallow King!
He appears in Answer Me This! Episode 339, alongside such topics as:
Plus: Olly would happily forgo the best thing about Dalmatians, the wally; Helen ponders making an augmented reality patchwork quilt; and Martin the Sound Man needs praise ASAP – it’s an emergency!
Today’s Bonus Bit of Crap on the App – available on iThings, Android and Windows devices – sees Helen trying to get in on the Pippa Middleton party book business.
Today’s episode was sponsored by the whacking great text adventure game Fallen London, which you can play in browser or app; but you’ll get some in-game freebies if you sign up at failbettergames.com/answers.
Following Olly’s suggestion in AMT314 that Wings contains the first offical gay kiss in mainstream cinema, Anna says:
I have two other suggestions for the first gay kiss in cinema.
The first is Marlene Dietrich in Morocco (1930). Dietrich’s character, Amy Jolly, is a nightclub singer who does one of her songs in a very fetching tuxedo and kisses one of the women in the audience. Obviously, this isn’t a full-on snog in the context of a gay relationship, but it’s definitely sexual rather than friendly.
The second is from Madchen in Uniform (1931). Again, it’s not a full-on snog in the context of a gay relationship, but its lip-to-lip and there is lesbian feeling between the two characters that kiss (revealed in another scene in the film). Madchen in Uniform was the first film to show lesbians in a positive light – yay for the Weimar Republic! Obviously, with the unfortunate turn that German history took soon after 1931, it was banned in Germany a few years after its release. Nearly banned in America too, but Eleanor Roosevelt saved the day by giving the film her endorsement.
Answer Me This! Episode 308 is a surprisingly jobs-themed episode, with questions about whether your tertiary education should prepare you for one, to how your hair can affect your ability to get one, to what you do when you lose one.
On today’s roster are such topics as:
cat-cleaning
pink hair
green hair
vocations
FDR’s hot dog banquet Bill Clinton’s night out with the lads
redundancy
sleeping naked
fainting at Elvis
and
throwing knickers at Tom Jones.
Plus: a typo made Olly a lot more popular in 90s chatrooms; if you’ve been made redundant, join Helen at the Daytime Cinema Club; and Martin the Sound Man manages to make a big pile of underwear sound like the grossest, most unappealing, least sexy thing possible.
In today’s Bonus Bit of Crap on the App – which you can get for your iDevices, Android and Windows gadgets – we continue to contemplate the question about how our nightwear-averse questioneer could dress for slumber. There must be a compromise between a tutu and a full suit of armour.
Thanks very much to Squarespace.com for supporting this episode, and for giving you 10% off their website-building and -hosting services for a year if you use the code ‘ANSWER‘. Which you should, to demonstrate your devotion to this podcast.
Since we are devoted to providing you with this podcast, we’ll return on 5th March 2015 with AMT309.
Helen & Olly
••• AMT308 Child-Friendly Rating: 64%. A few swears, though the strongest are right at the end, so you could cut out before then. Very mild bawdiness in the question about naked sleeping, but nothing that would startle a nun. •••
In writing this post, we’ve learnt that the paintings of Helen Daniels are SO dreadful, even Google Images refuses to index many of them. There’s not even an ironic Tumblr collection! The image above was the only shot we could find of the Kennedy klan’s portrait, but it remains as powerfully repellant as ever.
Why have we waved this horrifying visual in front of your eyes? Listen to Answer Me This! Episode 275 to discover:
On today’s slate:
the British Museum
loans for kids
Colosseum 4 Kids
pet heirs
Sir Hans Sloane
covered bridges
melting marshmallows
and
crayon-eating.
Plus: Olly is waiting for the long overdue system update for wooden furniture; Helen’s swerving from pumpkin-spiced lattes; and Martin the Sound Man has identified the point at which he left childhood for adulthood: when he started fancy-talking about his excrement.
In this week’s Bit of Crap on the App (available for iDevices, Android and Windows) Helen readies herself for the inevitable call asking her to join Gladiators if they ever rereboot it. She may not be match fit, but she’s got her name all picked out.
Until that happens, we will continue to do battle with your QUESTIONS: leave voicemails on the Question Line (call 0208 123 5877 or Skype ID answermethis) and send emails to answermethispodcast@googlemail.com.
This episode was brought to you by the largesse of squarespace.com, who are also offering you a 10% discount off their service if you use the code Answer10 after you’ve used up your two weeks’ free website-building experimental phase.
See you next Thursday,
Helen & Olly
AMT275 Child-Friendly Rating: 98%. Educational content; clean language apart from the word ‘shat’. Not bad going, eh?
Sound the sirens – today, in Answer Me This! Episode 258, we address a VERY IMPORTANT QUESTION. One of those questions that completely reshapes your neural pathways, redirects your chi, repapers the hallways of your spiritual palace. Get ready:
What is a dickbag?
A bag OF dicks, a bag FOR dicks, or a ballbag?
Yup. One of the greats.
We also discuss:
cinema intervals
sleeping in parks
the not-circular Circle Line
silly cows
presidential perishables
gifts for Sophie Raworth
Dumbo vs. DUMBO
exes vs. economics
potplant-murder vs. potplant-suicide
the White House postal address cartoon crows
and
coffee in the loo.
Plus: young Olly wanted value even more than he wanted Disney cartoons; Helen is a lady; and you don’t want to be hot-desking at Martin the Sound Man’s office, you really don’t.
In this week’s Bit of Crap on the App (available for iDevices and Android) we feel the threat of the new Greatest Show On Earth: Radio 4’s Tweet of the Day.
If birdsong isn’t your thing, how about a month of free film/TV/games instead? Deprive yourself no longer; sign up to our free LoveFilm offer right now. You’d not only be delighting yourself with all the free entertainment of LoveFilm, you’d also be helping maintain the free entertainment of AMT, because we get money if you take up the trial.
There’s another way you can help keep this show going: send us your QUESTIONS! Leave voicemails on the Question Line by calling 0208 123 5877 or Skype ID answermethis; or email answermethispodcast@googlemail.com.
Happy Valentine’s Day, listeners! We know how you love to celebrate the feast day of the patron saint of plague, epilepsy and bee-keeping, so we’ve got a wonderful gift for you: A FREE AUDIOBOOK FROM AUDIBLE! Gallivant to answermethispodcast.com/audible right now to get it, then as a warm-up to your many hours of free audio content, listen to half an hour of free audio content, ie Answer Me This! Episode 246:
This week we consider:
the Chinese zodiac
the longest queue ever
Lemar
premium cinema seats
stop-motion water
baby clothes
asexual koalas
Mike Leigh vs. Red Dragon Les Miserables vs. Undercover Boss Mary Poppins vs. The Sound of Music
Pete Doherty vs. Peter Brame
and
the point of kissing.
Plus: Olly’s going to build his business empire on XXX fortune teller fish, whilst Helen’s looking into a range of mouth condoms for slimmers; and Martin the Sound Man is a shrivelled little short tongue man. But at least he’s not the only one.
This week’s Bit of Crap on the App (available for iDevices and Android) is further contemplation upon the masterwork of David Sneddon, star of Fame Academy series 1 and AMT245. It’s a song which bears many hours, nay months, of interpretation. This week’s lesson: what’s up with your sleeves, Sneddon?
Instead of whatever Valentine’s love token you were planning to give us, please send your QUESTIONS: email them to answermethispodcast@googlemail.com or leave voicemails on the Question Line by calling 0208 123 5877 or Skype ID answermethis. (Although, when we say ‘instead’, we do mean ‘as well as’, if the token was heart-shaped boxes of Ferrero Rocher. Keep ’em coming.)
This week, listeners, we delve deep into one of the darkest mysteries of our age: the T&C of Pizza Hut’s ‘Don’t Open Me‘ wheeze. So tantalising! What could possibly be within the mystery envelope? Without even looking, we can guess a) heart attack b) disappointment c) spelling mistakes. Find out what else in Answer Me This! Episode 188:
This classic episode is available to BUY NOW for just 79p at the Answer Me This! Store, through a secure server, without DRM restriction. CLICK HERE to find out more and support our podcast. (This helps keep our most recent episodes free)
Today’s conversation features:
GCHQ
autotuned ocarina
diet and fitness messiahs
Winchester James Morrison vs. Radiohead
pseudo-hedonistic parties vs. Butlins Spy
the Milky Bar Kid
Ibiza
Pinkberry
loggers
Chuck Jackson
and
a frozen shark’s head.
Plus: Olly prefers M&Ms to be faceless, voiceless, nameless and unopinionated about film; Helen challenges you to match the member of The Wanted to her descriptions (ideally without having to expose yourself to their current single); and Martin the Sound Man doesn’t want to win a year’s supply of anything, thanks, although we suspect that if you offer him a new guitar every day, he wouldn’t kick you in the box.
This week’s Bonus Bit of Crap on the App includes some precautionary advice from Ashley from Atlanta regarding last week‘s questioneer who was intent on having sex atop a washing machine. Try to guess how this results in a story about Rome Police Station, Olly’s arse, and a leaking Nissan Micra. You can’t! So you’d better fire up your iPhone, iPad or Android to string this tale together.
So that we may string next week’s podcast together, you should send us your QUESTIONS: voicemails go on the Question Line (dial 0208 123 5877 or Skype answermethis), and aim your emails at answermethispodcast@googlemail.com. Or, if you bump into us at Green Man or Edinburgh over the next week, you could questions in person! That’s a less reliable method than the usual phoning and emailing, but hey, we’re feeling risky.
We, you, and everyone else in the world with functioning ears should be celebrating following the joyful news this week that the Black Eyed Peas are cancelling their subscription to What Sample? magazine, hanging up whatever contraption it is that makes their oeuvre so appealing to people who enjoy shit parties, and taking an indefinite leave of absence from generating that infernal racket.
Yes.
But if, for some reason, you start to miss the sound of puerile nonsense, simply fire up Answer Me This! Episode 183:
This classic episode is available to BUY NOW for just 79p at the Answer Me This! Store, through a secure server, without DRM restriction. CLICK HERE to find out more and support our podcast. (This helps keep our most recent episodes free)
No booms, pows or lumps, we promise; just conversation upon the following:
Christmas in July
BBC1’s Coast Shakespeare in Love
Queen Middleton’s off games excuse
sample groups
substitute swears
baseball
Caroline Quentin
Annabel Chong
Anna Paquin
Neal Street
Canadian cricket
verticals
and
Danny Baker’s Dozen.
Plus: had he not been thwarted by the onset of puberty, THIS could have been Olly; Helen gives Tesco some much-needed advice to raise their game or lose their festive glove market share; and Martin the Sound Man blackmails petrol stations with his bowel movements. Concede to his demands, or face the direst consequences on the forecourt.
This week’s Bonus Bit of Crap on the App (available on iPhone and iPad, or Android) is a question from Simon from Beddington, who has one problematic nipple. But which one? You have a 50% chance of guessing it correctly!
You have a 100% chance of sending us a QUESTION if you properly employ the usual means, which are leaving voicemails on the Question Line (dial 0208 123 5877 or find answermethis on Skype) or emailing to answermethispodcast@googlemail.com. Our new intern Apl.de.Ap looks forward to sifting through them all.
RT @HelenAndOlly: 🎵I gotta question
📧Email your question
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📧Email your question
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Answer Me This! Podcast 