True Crimelines Garage Bullshit | Forensic Files

Hey everybody, this is Josh Hallmark from True Crime [ __ ] and I thought as we were getting into the holiday
season, it would be a great time for a bunch of true crime podcasters to come together and do what I'm calling I was
originally calling it crime on crime but that has some very different implications.
So I I I guess just like actors on actors we're going to get together in small groups and talk about true crime,
the experience of creating true crime podcasts and I guess just our feelings and thoughts on different cases, each
other's work and the medium at large. And for this group I'm here with the captain from True Crime Garage and
Charlie Worrall Worrall from Crime Lines. Hi guys. Hello. How are you? I'm I'm fantastic.
It's a Wednesday morning. It's great. Love Charlie's voice. And me too. It's like very
uh soothing in an unexpected way. It's like I feel like It's my maternal nature coming through
on the mic. I think it is. I feel very unjudged when I'm with you which is an oxymoron but
I was going to say usually we're sitting there judging other people together. Maybe that's why maybe I feel safe
because the judgment is usually external. Exactly. Yeah no I it's funny I as we are
recording this I'm done with an episode and I'm waiting for music clearance and my editor to finish
and I thought that would be a good jumping off point. When I finish an episode I like to post it immediately
because for all the interim time I sit there second guessing everything I've just created.
And so right now I keep being like, should I go change this thing? Should I rewrite this? And so I don't like having
episodes in in limbo. What what is your process? I guess both like literal like from concept to research to creating and
then also emotional. Like what's it like for you to like create and birth episodes week
after week? I do pretty much my whole show by myself. So I find that the research and the writing
process are so linked. If I get research from someone else, it almost takes me just as much time getting up to speed on
the information, synthesizing it, deciding how I want to say things, how I want to structure it as if I just did
the research myself because they're just so linked. I write, I rewrite, I record, I rewrite
as I'm recording. I don't know if you do that. We're you're like, oh, that sounded really good when I wrote it, but
it's not really sounding good as I'm saying it. So it's this constant rewrite, but like you
Josh, if I have something sitting there too long, I'll be like, well, let me go back over it just one more time. And
then I'm like, okay, well, let me just re-record this one section because I don't think I emphasized the right
words. So I also have to I don't necessarily Well, sometimes have to release it right away because I hit
my deadline. And that's like just a just a, you know, procrastination issue, but
sometimes I never happened to me. Oh, yeah, I know. And it like that actually came up.
This is my second one of these bonus episodes and we actually discussed how we can't talk to you on Wednesdays
before because your episode comes up Thursday, so you ignore all of us the day before your episode comes out cuz
you're busy. But I Yeah, I mean, sometimes I have to get it out just because I hit the
deadline, but a lot of times I have to do a like a mental block and say, okay, that episode is done and move on just so
that I don't go back to it. Ours is a little different because we uh record live together and then I edit
afterwards. So, if Nick misspeaks or something, he tries to correct it in the moment and
then I kind of take mental notes, you know, fix that error, you know. I used to think that every episode that we're
going to put out could change the world. I think we took it to made it too precious.
And I think sometimes you just kind of have to let it go because some of the episodes that you record and you're like
I don't after we record it, I have the opportunity, you know, I have the opportunity to make it better
as I edit it. But you know, you can only polish a turd so much, but some some episodes that I that
I just don't think are that interesting you know, the the audience loves those ones. And and then some of the cases
that I can't get enough of, they're so tired of us talking about. So, but I think, you know, it just comes down to
just try to be as honest uh with yourself as possible and I think that that comes across in in everybody's
work. That any show that's been doing this for longer than a a couple years, I think it's the honesty, but like what
Charlie said and I'm not going to name any names, but you know, there's there's a lot of shows
that people have come to me and said, "I don't listen to their show anymore. I can tell they
don't write their own material." Yeah, I agree. I I think like the research thing is interesting because
I've had people do like research projects. So, my research team is mostly just like we do our own, you know, small
research or we look into different things and then we have big long group discussions about it and it's never
necessarily for a specific episode. It's just more of a holistic research workshop.
Right. But I've had a few times where people have like researched for a specific
episode and I have a really hard time with it because it's like well, A, I don't know like
what you've looked at and what you haven't. Like I don't know how you got here. Of course, they're like citing
their sources, but I'm like like what got left out? Or like did you pursue this avenue? Or like did you pursue this
and it led to a dead end? And I just to me, I think it creates more questions than it does help me in my process. And
then I also agree like the authenticity thing, especially for shows like us who in the true crime world are I like
ancient at this point. Yeah. I think at a certain point people are like, okay, no, like we've heard this.
Like they want you to be yourself, which I have a hard time with. Tina Fey just There's this quote from her that
I both love and scares the [ __ ] out of me where she's like, "Authenticity is dangerous and expensive." And that's my
big fear is like the more people get to know me, the more they can project [ __ ]
onto me, and the more they can scrutinize me, and the more they can decide they don't like me. But in the
same time, like the longer they spend with me, the greater the desire is to get to know me and hear my feelings
about stuff. So it's this very delicate balance. Yeah, but you have to remember what Adam
Sandler said in Big Daddy. You're not mad at me. You're just mad at your dad. And I
Look, I was told to hang myself multiple times when we first started the podcast.
And especially for somebody that's I struggled with depression and I was actually just went through a period of
my life where for like 2 years I I I actually was thinking about hanging myself.
So to actually have somebody that I don't even know say, "I love this podcast, but you ruin
it." It's like, well, one, there wouldn't wouldn't be a podcast if I didn't help
Nick create the podcast. Right. That something clicked in me where I was just like I just started apologizing. I
am sorry that you have to put up with my nonsense to enjoy his show and I appreciate you listening and most of the
time people would write back and be like, I'm so sorry I should have never said that and cuz I think people forget
that we do have feelings even though mine aren't I don't have big feelings. Uh sure.
I'm almost I'm almost dead inside. Hey, if you watch Dawson's Creek like the whole series like more than 15 times
that might kill you. I will say your Dawson's Creek viewing is legend within the podcast community.
It's amazing. and it's partly my fault because I was just the first time I ever met you cuz
here like a great example I had very preconceived notions about you and then I met you and most of them were like
wildly inaccurate and I think the Dawson's Creek of it all was like such a great metaphor for that like it doesn't
sum up who you are as a person but I think it is so in opposition to how I think many people perceive you who have
never met you and so to me it's like a a beautiful allegory and also like a funny
allegory Well it's tough though too because I mean in simple in simplest form when I
joined the jazz band in high school I remember my director after a couple weeks said to me, you're not good at
this. I heard you're good at sports and that really bothered me because I I come off
as a I come off as a Bob Ruff I come off as a Bob Ruff but inside I'm more a Josh Hallmark. So it's
it's a weird world that I've navigated. Well on the Dawson's Creek thing is super weird too cuz it wasn't like I
watched it in high school and you know it's like when people watch Friends cuz it's just nostalgic. It's like no I I
started watching Dawson's Creek in my 30s. But but that was, you know, heavily medicated, heavily depressed, and
and it was um I literally thought like by watching this show it's going to give me some answer to life
um that I missed out on. So, you know, as funny of a thing that that it is it when people like make fun of it
I'm always like to me I'm like it's it's very depressing to me that I I I've watched this show as many times as as I
have and anytime I'm in like a bad place in life I start it over again and I I tell
myself, "What are you doing? This is self-sabotage. You know that she picks Pacey. You know she picks Pacey."
It's funny cuz I did the same thing with Grey's Anatomy in my 20s where I like I
saw Meredith Grey and was like, "Wow, I've never felt more seen." And now 20 years later I go back and I'm like,
"Wow, that is a tough existence." But can you imagine if you tried to rewatch I mean, what is it? 20-some
seasons? Captain, this is where like the joke's on me. I have. Well, I have to say that I think this
kind of goes to that authenticity thing and what people will see and hear of us.
They're only getting part of it when we're doing our podcast. Even if we have a personality-driven show, they're only
getting part of us and they're kind of building a person around that perception that might not be who we actually are.
And then we do episodes like this where we're just talking open and honestly and
people are surprised to kind of see the other sides of us. So, I think that when
you're listening to somebody on a podcast that is about one thing like Israel Keyes or just true crime in
general, just remember you're seeing a small amount of that person and not don't build a whole thing around that
because it might not be an accurate perception of who they are. And on the other hand, like we have to get used to
that. We have to know that happens and try to not take it personally. Well, it's tough that too because like
when Nick came up with this idea, I mean, we were in his garage and he said, "What if it was just like this, you
know, we're just sitting around drinking beer talking about crime." And I'm like, "But
I don't really drink that often." And he was like, "Well, but I do." And but if you listen
to the show, he sounds sober the whole time. And I could be drinking orange juice and
I sound drunk out of my mind. So, that's a difficult thing too, especially if you
have a I'm going to use a a Rocky quote, a relaxed brain that, you know, sometimes I come off as, you know, like
this bumbling drunk and so when you get people that Like it's Nobody likes to listen to
themselves talk. And and we have to not only talk, but then we have to edit it down and then to have somebody say, "Oh
man, the captain was super drunk on this episode." And you're like, "I I I haven't had a drink in the last
2 months maybe, you know? So, if I sounded drunk, I was just sounding stupid, you know?"
That's my like post event feeling is like I have such severe social anxiety. Which I don't think people would know
when they hear these conversations cuz I'm super comfortable with you guys. And then also like we go to these events
and they're like summer camp because we'll get to see each other maybe twice a year. And so we're like having fun and
celebrating. And so like the way people at these events see us is not a holistic view of who we are as people.
And I always think like, you know, I'll be hungover on the last day and I'm like, "Oh god, everyone saw me like
wasted three nights this weekend." And now now they think that's who I am, but it's really just in response to being in
like a high-pressure socially awkward situation with people I see twice a year where I'm like partying and having fun.
And so it is this weird thing where people get such small windows into who you are, and then those windows become
the reality of who you are, which is tough. And I see like that's the [ __ ] that like really bothers me. I don't
mind unfair criticisms. I mean, I do, but they don't I don't like spend my nights like
crying over them. What bothers me is like the ethos of the unfair criticisms of like
people who go on to Reddit and say crazy things about you who have never met you
and don't interrogate that at all. Where it's like, "Oh, that's the world we live
in now where we can like build a model of someone based on very very very little information whom we've never met
and present that to the world and most of the world buys into it. And And so like I don't care that people say shitty
things about me. I care that like no one second-guesses that in a broader sense.
I hate being misunderstood, and that's what I feel like this is. When someone posts something on Reddit and says, "Oh
well, you know, Charlie I can't listen to her show. She's such a know-it-all." I'm like, "But I'm not. I'm pedantic,
and that is not the same thing as being a know-it-all." But maybe I'm being a know-it-all by pointing that out. But
anyway, so now I've just made it a joke on my show that I'm pedantic all the time because I am.
But I was like, "No, you don't get it. That's not what I'm It's not what I feel like I'm putting out in the world, but
it is what they're receiving, and I have to just accept it and move on because I'm I'm not going to change and act not,
you know, intelligent or whatever they're getting from what I'm doing. I'm not going to stop doing that because
they're misunderstanding it. But I do hate being misunderstood. Yeah, but there but there's also just
And I can only speak for men, but I know that there's men out there men out there
that are afraid of strong intelligent women. I've always liked that, and I think the true crime space has really
kind of been a platform for intelligent strong women, and I think that's a cool cool thing. And even though we used to
be called misogynists every episode. Like these guys just sound like two drunken frat boys. I'm like me and Nick
are the farthest from frat boys. But I you you guys probably get this though, too. I hate when people
assume opinion I had about a case that I never gave. Yes, I get that all the time.
I know Josh gets it all the time because I'll see it on Reddit or wherever where
they're like, "Well, Josh thinks this." And I'm like, he absolutely does not. Why are you saying that? And it just
they picked up something in the episode that hit them they that they misunderstood the context of maybe. I
don't know, but I definitely see that happen to Josh. I one time had someone email me and they're like, "I can't
believe you just this is clearly a wrongful conviction and you just presented the state's case and you
didn't even present the defense case at all." And then I was like, "What in the world are they talking about?" Because I
said this is a wrongful conviction case. Like clearly I gave my opinion. And then
like 6 weeks later she emailed me and said, "Hey, I re-listened and I misunderstood what you were saying. I
was just so upset about it." And I was like, "Oh, okay. She did ask if she could She did ask if
she could call me to apologize and I was like, "No, ma'am. We I do not need to give you my phone number."
And I think if you created enough content, like here's my opinion. If you want to give no information about
yourself awesome. If that's how you choose to do it. And if you want to have a show where
you talk about what you ate for lunch and and what's your favorite coffee and you want to
give every detail of your life, that's cool, too, you know, I or some somewhere in between. I like that I have a partner
in the show that he is very strict about he will not talk politics, period. Yeah, it's funny. I think like as a gay
man, politics is so intrinsic to how I exist in the world and how I perceive and synthesize everything I'm doing or
researching or experiencing. And so, I have such a hard time with it because like yes, I don't want to
alienate people and I also want to have productive conversations. So, you it's very hard in a podcast to
like, you know, veer into politics whether it's like apt or, you know, relevant or not and then not have like a
full productive conversation about why you have that view or like why that view is important or why that view should
even be considered. I think it's such a tricky fine line because, you know, crime in many ways is political. And so,
it's hard to have this conversation without bringing in at least like subtext of politics. I I've been able to
do it with Unsafe Spaces, but that's because it's a show about marginalized people. Um but I always envy like Wine &
Crime who just say it and then move move on and make They do not care. Yeah. I have found that sometimes politics
does come up in my show because I do cover a lot of the legal side of things and the people who make our laws are
politicians. So, it comes up and it came up in a recent episode because the sheriff that is overseeing the case that
the family is not happy with got a political appointment recently that was then revoked. And so, my audience will
clearly recognize his name if they read the news because it just happened. So, I
do address that, but I mean, I I also have a different view of what is political and what is not political.
Like saying that indigenous women go missing at rates higher than any other ethnicity or race within our country is
a fact. It's not a political stance. However, some people interpret that as a political stance.
Yeah. Oh, man. I mean, we could be getting into some uncomfortable ground and want to shift
here. I understand that, but it is How many emails do we want to get? That's the thing, too, is like we have
the choice to read those comments or not. Our episodes get posted to our feed and then they go to our YouTube. And I
never check YouTube comments after the first day. This person loves to say like skip to
the marker six, you know, six minutes into the show because everything before that is garbage.
I see people do that on YouTube all the time. And and my reply to them was, in fairness, it's probably all garbage, you
know. But my father was a detective, so it's like some of what we're doing is playing
make-believe that I'm going to be able to look into a case from a bird's-eye view
and bring something to the table that gets that case solved and I have like a 6-day turnaround to do so every week.
That's just not likely and Yeah, that's interesting. I think for me like it's such a fine line between
interrogating someone's actions and then like critiquing or criticizing someone's
actions. And I just did a two-parter, which the first was one of my favorite I've ever done and the second episode
was the least favorite episode I've ever done. I you know, I had a fundamental issue
with the way that the family was handling the disappearance. And I think like I had to and it was also biased
because there was like familial alienation involved, which is something I've dealt with and so I was trying not
to see it through the lens of my own experience, but also like it was so important to me to like make sure people
knew like the family can't speak holistically about this missing person if they haven't talked to him in 3 years.
Mhm. Uh they can't say like he didn't have a job or he didn't have money cuz they
don't know. Um and then there was another case that we still haven't covered yet that we have like thousands
of pages on where the gentleman was like out and proud but his family was not. I wouldn't even say condoning of it.
They refused to acknowledge that he was gay and I think that that has created a massive barrier in media coverage of his
case which there's hardly any. And it's like how do you do that? Like cuz part of me is like well you can't
out someone whether they're dead or missing or whatever but this guy was already out and he like had boyfriends
and was out in the community. Um and so like by reporting on that am I harming his family? Am I alienating his family?
It's it's tough. It's a very hard thing to do and I think we need to hold people
not so much accountable but to the truth without necessarily criticizing them because there's so much we don't know.
When I was looking into the Brian Shaffer case, a missing man from Columbus, Ohio,
there's all these rumors about his sexuality and and experimentation and and then it's
like do you put that out to the world? But at the end of the day, all we can do is put out every
piece of information that we have learned that we know is factual. We're not speculating that
he had a homosexual relationship at some point. It's not speculation, it's fact and and
all you're trying to do in each case is to put as many puzzle pieces on the table.
Now again, if somebody said well I don't put every puzzle piece on the table for
the public because that's not what kind of content I want to put out there. Um that that's up to
them. But for me I thought it was important. And And like you said, I I had disagreed with the way the has He He
really hasn't looked for Brian or It doesn't seem like he's been involved in in his brother's missing case much at
all. And I was very critical of that when we first started. And now I think in the true crime space, we put
too much emphasis or too much speculation on on what we think we would do in a certain situation.
Mhm. If it would If it was my brother that went missing, then I would do this. And
so by the And And that's very James Renner. And not to call him out, but he You can. We can disagree with something
while still understanding why it happened in that situation, even if we don't think it was the right thing to
do. Because we all do things in our lives that aren't the right thing to do. And looking back, even we know that. But
kind of to the point of what to include and what not to include about someone's personal life or the family's life, when
it comes to unsolved cases, I feel like it's really hard to say what's not relevant because we don't know the
answer, therefore it may be relevant. If you got arrested for, you know, a pot possession 20 years ago, probably not
relevant. I'm not going to bring it up. But if, you know, the person was doing serious hard drugs 6 months before they
disappeared, it may be relevant. When it comes to solved cases, we we get that that broader view of what is and is not
relevant to the case, so it's easier to just know what to leave in and leave out. But like in unsolved cases like
you're talking about, we don't know what's relevant and what's not until it's solved, so we need to put that
information out there so that the person can be found or the killer could be found because that's how they generate
tips. Something gets to the right person and they remember something. Well, in in Charlie, in your case, it's
probably harder because there's sometimes that I say something on the show or Nick says something on the show
and and 5 minutes later the person saying, "Hey, we should probably edit that out.
I'm not comfortable with sharing that." And then then you have a you have a soundboard, somebody going, "Well, no,
no, I think that's good information." Or "No, I agree with you, we should cut that out."
This is where having a network of other podcasters is helpful cuz Josh can tell you how many times in a kind of our
group chat, it's the it's going to be something like, "Hey, I used this word for, you know, a marginalized community,
but I'm not sure that's the current language. How would you say this? Okay, I'm thinking about putting this in the
episode. Here, can you read this paragraph over for me?" And we do that a lot because we don't have a sounding
board, particularly in the moment when we're sitting like by ourselves recording. So, you have a sounding board
automatically, you know, I've had to kind of seek them out. Yeah, it's funny. I um
like I think about that in the process of like forgetting stuff or like not being maybe as PC
driven or forward as you'd like to be. Like, I have a room, literally a room full of binders just on the Keys case.
And like most of that information is in my brain at all given times. And so like
you sit down and you write a script and you rewrite it and it becomes like word salad at a certain point. And then
you're like, "How do I pronounce this?" Or like, "What's the word I'm supposed to be using for this?" And it just gets
lost amongst everything else. And then that's the thing people will glom on to and it's like, "Dude, like I just spent
4 weeks researching where all the trash in Portland goes." Like, [ __ ] off if I
like didn't pronounce this right or like didn't say the most up-to-date like correct word for something. Like, it
just it like again, it goes back to perception versus reality. Yeah, or sometimes Nick is reading the
actual report from the police and he's using the terminology they use. And people will say that, well, that's
not correct. And it's like it's not that's not Nick's words. That's a report he's reading. Again, and then I
think sometimes with the podcast it's tough because there's a big difference if I sit down
at my desk and turn everything off except for a audio book, how I'm going to receive that information as opposed
to if I'm listening to This American Life while I'm while I'm doing the dishes, how I'm
going to receive that information. So, I think sometimes as as content creators,
we have to also give the audience a pass that they they might have been running a a
marathon while while they listened to the the show and they didn't receive the information in the correct way.
I think we also though have a the privilege too of like understanding what happens behind the scenes and like
understanding where mistakes get made or where stuff gets overlooked. And so it's
it can be challenging when like you have the privilege of this information that the audience doesn't necessarily have,
but then the audience is using it against you. I like I wish I could show you what happens behind the scenes so you
understand, but I also can't hold you accountable for like not knowing what you don't know.
And I think that goes with the criticism as well. It's that you know, it sounds like we're closed to
criticism. We're not really receptive to it, but it's as some of it is in the delivery. I
don't need anyone to coddle me. You could say, "Hey, you got this wrong." You don't even have to be nice about it,
but just don't be mean about it. And so, I think sometimes the the mean criticism
kind of like the captain was saying earlier, you know, just the actual violent, you know, feedback that we will
sometimes get. It drowns out the people who actually a point that maybe we should say something a little
differently. Maybe we need to keep something else in mind because it's just at some point you start getting
defensive. I feel like I've moved past that point, but early on because of the like mean criticism, I started getting a
bit defensive to all criticism and that's never a good place to be. Yeah, I only now respond to like
direct not even critique like a direct discourse. Like and granted I very very rarely read any comments
emails from listeners just cuz like you said like we've had to create or what has been
created for us like a pretty tough shell. So like I don't invite anything in that
I don't have the bandwidth to take on. But the the ones I do see that I respond to are like why did you make this choice
rather than like [ __ ] you for thinking this or like I can't believe you did this. It's like
why did you make this choice? Because for me that shows like not a judgment, a curiosity and a willingness to have a
conversation about whatever it is that they don't like, but also an understanding that like there may have
been decisions made that they don't know that impacted why I made that choice. And so I think if you actually like care
about something and want to see it resolved or express your opinion in a meaningful way, it's about creating
discourse and not criticism. But I think it's also difficult. I don't know if you guys have found this
difficult. So in my early 20s one of the things I did for cuz I was a musician is I'd get hired by independent
labels or artists to help them with social media. And so when we started the podcast at first we're
like we're going to have no social media and we just kept on having listeners go
that'll be a great way to help build an audience and it and it was, but then I got sucked back into that world
and I like living in a world that's less me, less in the social media world. So,
do you do you guys find that hard to balance in your life? When I started podcasting, every podcast
had a podcast group. So, that was one of the first things you did on Facebook was
start a podcast group and it turned out to really be a massive headache. Like, a
lot of the people were really nice, but it's hard to moderate people when they start disagreeing. Okay, well, now I
have to decide, are you being too mean or are you not? One time my old podcast got a bad review because they didn't
like how we handled something in the Facebook group. So, with with Crimelines to do with the podcast
Absolutely nothing to do with the podcast. And so, what I ended up doing with Crimelines is like I have a social
media presence, but anyone will tell you I'm not there very often. Um, I rather keep social media to my
personal life where I'm enjoying sharing pictures of going to the park and things
like that. That's how I want to spend my time on social media. Balancing personal
social media and then this podcast social media, it's just too much for me. I do not have the bandwidth for it.
Yeah, when I started, I loved it, but I think it's because the show was smaller and I think the social media landscape
was totally different 8 years ago from what it is today. You know, back then people joined a
group because they were passionate about a topic and wanted to have meaningful conversations about it and I think now,
like, you know, the internet exists for research and trolling and then as the show got bigger, obviously, like there
were disparate points of view and the passion turned into anger and it just got really ugly. Um,
and then it's just now a new medium for people to like say mean things to me where they are confident I'll see it.
And so, I am less and less involved. Um I also think there's been a stronger need to
protect what I call my 99% like the 99% of me that people don't have access to or don't see or don't know.
And so yeah, I think like think that there's a great value to it and I was telling the boys from Somewhere in the
Pines like you just you need to have a Facebook group especially this early on in your career. Um but as I've had the I
guess luxury of getting bigger, I feel less and less the need to be involved in it and I think also like I need a
separation and unfortunately, there's no way to control that. Like people will message me about keys or message me
about my bad thoughts on my personal Facebook or on my personal Instagram or like tracking on your Gmail address and
I'm like like I like I'm not, you know, messaging the AT&T rep on his, you know, home
email address complaining about my phone service. So please don't do the same with me cuz I
know that like my true crime [ __ ] or uh Studio Both And social media is the easiest to find. Like it's harder to
find my personal stuff online. So I'm like you're putting in a lot of effort to like reach me where no one's home.
Well, I turned off um instant messaging on all my podcast social media. So like if you want to talk to me, you are going
to have to email me. I just need everything funneled. If I could have all my DMs forwarded to my email and
funneled into a folder, I would do that. It just I I can't have 700 places to look. So people have to email me and as
soon as I turned it off, I started noticing I was getting a lot more message requests on Facebook on my
personal one from people I'm not friends with and I checked and they were like all podcast
related. But like I turned them off on my podcast stuff not because I don't want people to reach out to me. It's
just I cannot manage, you know, four different mailboxes. I need everyone to send everything to one place.
Yeah, I remember when my grandmother died, I was on Facebook like messaging with my cousins.
And it was my personal Facebook, had nothing to do with the show, and like throughout all these messages were like
messages from listeners being like, "Does this mean we're not getting a new episode?" And like,
"What do you think about this and keys?" And I'm like, "Dude, like Let me grieve for a minute.
Yes, truly. Yeah, but you know, it's um I mean, not to talk [ __ ] to ourselves, but
I also kind of feel like we're lucky to I'm lucky that I get to work at home. I'm lucky that I get to
you know, have a a subject that other people are fascinated in that because of this job, you know, {quote}
{unquote} job, I get to dive into a different case every week and share my thoughts and opinions, and some people
are going to like it, and some people are going to won't. But, we all have met super talented
individuals that have put out content, and they just didn't get any traction. Mhm.
And and some of these individuals put out hundreds of episodes and just eventually one day just
decided to fold up shop, you know? And so, the fact that you know, if you can make a living doing it, it's um
you know, it it is a privilege, and it's also a weird thing, too. Like Josh was saying,
podcasting back in the day was so different than it is now, because everything now is networks,
and they've swallowed up and they own everybody now. And even though they might not own us,
cuz we're not a part of a network, we're of the old school model where the the listeners own you.
And they took ownership of you, and they would fund your beer fund or, you know,
go back to like Sword and Scale where hey, this costs money to put out. I need to raise money and he'd do a GoFundMe or
whatever. And so, you know, before ads became a big part of a lot of people's shows,
we were supported so much by the listeners. So, I think some of original true crime podcast, we we feel
maybe a sense of obligation to the listener. Mhm. Because how how much they supported us,
you know, in the in the beginning. Uh if that makes any sense. Yeah, I think of the listeners as
shareholders. Like they have a vested interest in the product because they have invested so much of their time and
often money into it. But then they also like are not a part of the decision-making and don't see the
machinations, you know, that go on behind the scenes. And I think you're right. Like that creates
a challenging dichotomy of being like I'm so invested in this, but I have very little control over it and I want my
opinions to be heard. Uh but my opinions don't necessarily have the value to the greater podcast
that they do to me. There's a social media influencer named Elise Myers. She does very wholesome
kind of story time content, sometimes some music. And due to like just like an onslaught of negativity, she took a
social media break and a lot of people are like, "Oh, you bullied bullied her off the internet." Whereas other people
are like, "Look, she like sits at her house and does a story time for an hour and makes all this money." So, John
Green, who's a YouTuber and an author, said that, you know, being in that position where you're a public figure
is a privileged position and so your problems are privileged problems, but that doesn't make them not problems. So,
yeah, it is absolutely a privileged problem that I have to sit at my house in my basement in my pajamas all day to
work and support my family and I get to do it all in comfort and yes, I get the emails of people telling me how amazing
I am and all of that really is a privilege. The downsides, it doesn't mean they they're not also problems.
They're just privileged problems. It's interesting because like, you know, I wrote down a bunch of topics for this
conversation and like we got to one. We got to Well, and it wasn't even on my list and I think
it speaks more to where the culture is because I think five or six years ago this conversation is a conversation you
might have for like 15 minutes once a year. Mhm. But I have found I'm having this
conversation with other creators more and more and more frequently and so I agree and I wish
cuz it's too late now, like that had been what this conversation was predicated on is like it is a privilege
and these are privileged problems and we are so [ __ ] lucky to get to do what we love, turn it into a career and have
people who support that even if that support often comes through critique. But also like it speaks volumes to the
culture that more and more often people are feeling the weight and burden of criticism um that you know, either is
unfair or fair criticism that is presented in unfair ways. Not to have the the straight white man cut you off, but
uh I'm used to it. You're fine. about uh privilege. This is something I know a lot about. We're also in a state too
where I think people are struggling with their worth and I saw this Rainn Wilson
had had a podcast but this is a clip of the podcast where his his guest was saying like we only value as a society
money. And we only and and I think I'm not saying that's for everybody, but but I think as somebody
that struggled with self-worth and self-care and self-love and all that stuff. Like to me, the more I've worked on that
and the more I've focused on if somebody doesn't have weight in my life that their opinion doesn't get
weight. I'm the one that gets to choose if it has weight or not. Does that make any sense?
Mhm. Totally. And and you probably seen this with other true crime podcasters when
you're at these events and they're talking about uh contracts and they're talking about maybe they're getting less
ads or maybe they're getting more or their network is forcing them to be a part of the bonus content or
everybody loves to [ __ ] about Ashley Flowers. You know. And I think that's anyone who makes more money than me.
Yeah, and Which includes you, too. But but but I think it's like that you know, like we have to not just as
content creators, but people in general value ourselves more and care about ourselves more. And just like you said
like people are going on and talking [ __ ] to people online and that is not of value or
or something that they would do in real life because it won't be acceptable. But they're allowing it to be acceptable
in a different space. But that's that's them valuing themselves less. And am I am I making any sense here?
Yes, absolutely. And I think like going back to this is such a great full circle thing
is like we don't show that on the shows because either there's no room for it or the
audience doesn't want to hear it or you know, authenticity is dangerous and expensive. But like that also I think
adds to the critique is because people don't see that they presume or assume that like we are not holding ourselves
accountable or we are not interrogating ourselves. I've never met a more self-deprecating,
unkind to themselves group of people than true crime podcasters. And I I wish the audience could see that
because I think they think we hold ourselves on a pedestal and actually we're just beating ourselves up around
the clock. Yeah, but then there's also the host that you meet that and I don't want to give
away names, but they they start creating this fake what is called vibrato or I can't speak.
Vibrato. Maybe maybe I should speak for a living. No, but it's like they they start
creating this sense of you know, me and Nick got into this big argument cuz I was at CrimeCon. It was I want to say it
was Nashville or No, no, it was What was the other one? New Orleans. We're in New Orleans and
I was walk walking around and I saw all these true crime podcasters like by the 6-hour of being there everybody was like
peacocking and and and and strutting their stuff and and sticking out their chest uh because all these people were
coming up to them and wanting pictures and autographs and I just thought I thought it was hilarious.
Because I've been on concert cruises where you're opening up for 311 or Kid Rock or you know, I I opened
Kanye one time. Nobody at that show wanted my autograph, you know? I could have pretended that I was like some big
star, but they were there to see Kanye. So, I think maybe some of my background allows me to view it as like I'm just a
regular person just like the listener. I've just spent a little more time maybe working on the cases and then presenting
the cases. And but I think even the the guys that that puff up their chest they're doing it because they're not
great at self-love and they're not great at self-confidence and they're not I feel like I'm not making any sense at
all but No, I know you're making perfect sense. You're making sense and it's actually
reminding me of something that Josh said at a podcast event we were on we were at
where we each had like a tablecloth and like some stickers and that was our entire table set up and then we look
around and people who were brand new had these full-size like backdrops and all this stuff and we're like oh, I think
there's um a difference in what we think when we're coming into this space because we started when it really was
just a bunch of regular people with a microphone, you know, we all had our blue Yeti's fired up and we were making
podcasts to whoever listened and then people coming in now with now that celebrities are podcasting and
corporations are involved, they see it as as a little bit different than we do where we see ourselves as just regular
people. I mean anyone who's gone to an event that I've been at and I know you and Josh because I've seen you guys at
these events they know we're just hanging out. Like we're just hanging out with everybody.
It's very calm and chill and it's it's like there's not a lot of peacocking happening but so I I mean I think it's
just the the podcast landscape has changed a lot. We all sound like you know, pod grandfather Justin Evans when
we talk about it but you know, we it's just it's so different now. When people ask me for advice to get started on a
podcast and to grow like I have no idea. But not not to talk [ __ ] about Justin.
You can. No, I'm just But that's a great example. All of a sudden one day he's he makes this big point of like we're
the OGs. Well, congratulations Justin. You did a couple episodes before other people did
episodes and they also And they also talked a lot about MMA for, you know, and Bigfoot.
They did. And which is fine. And those were my favorite episodes. And I And I've told
Justin to his face, "Shame on you for not talking about aliens and Bigfoot because those were my favorite
episodes." But But there again, I think that's this thing where that's what the audience doesn't
see. If they see the peacocking, they don't see that sometimes the peacocking is not confidence. It's because of the
lack of confidence or like or why did we get passed over? Why did this other show
become bigger? And or why does this show make more money? And we just put this value we as
a society we put this big value like when people go, "Oh, I listen to true crime. I love Ashley
Flowers. You're going to tell me that she's uh as good at looking and dissecting cases as as Nick?
Not a chance in hell. She does a 45-minute episode that's basically a lot of the cases are Wikipedia
versions of the case. I'm not going to hate on her because she makes more money doing it. The The money doesn't make it
uh better quality. Well, there's a reason Two and a Half Men was the number one show in America
for a decade. Like, you know, it's I I think it's like for the masses. And what uh what I had to decide a long time
ago is like I'm never going to be a top 10 show and I have to be okay with that because I value the work that I'm
putting out and I value the audience who is engaged with that work. And like, as
long as I can make a living and pay my staff and like, you know, keep investing into this staff
that I would love to have here. You have Nick. He's enough. Uh he's enough of a staff. He He He
definitely is a staff. Um No, no, but I think it's it's though, too. And and but I that doesn't mean
that we should sit on this throne of righteousness and be like, "Well, Ashley Flowers doesn't deserve it." You know,
um I saw her uh she did an interview with John Ramsey. And I'm like, "They would never give me
that interview." Because they couldn't control what I'd ask him. They couldn't control if I would be
confrontational or not. And then also like she's her network's putting out what? Five, six shows a
week? Oh my god, I'd hate to put out five or six shows a week. Like and then like and and I look, I
went through a period of that, too, you know, you'd see these shows start taking
off and uh we got this really big bump uh from My Favorite Murder, but we were out for a while and then people were
like, "Oh man, I heard you guys' show on My Favorite Murder." And you're like, "Yeah." But but at least they called us
out. And my only cri- criticism to Ashley Flowers is if you borrowed information or or you listened to a
podcast and got some information from it, why not shout them out? Why not? And I and I've been less precious about
that, you know, I used to not want to talk about other true crime shows as if it was going to diminish my audience.
And it's like uh My Favorite Murder put out some funny it was this this funny social media clip
about their merchandise and they're having their merchandise lady do all the ads and she's just hilarious. And so
I've been putting them in our stories and then if I listened to uh Tim and Lance or or whoever and went, "That was
a great episode." I've been sharing it in our stories. Like and not asking for a
uh promo swap, you know, just going, "Hey, this was good content. And if you're into this kind of content, cool."
Um But and I don't again, I don't want to sit on this throne of well, I'm learning
to love myself. So everybody else should. But I think um it'd be good if we all could get to that
place. Not just as hosts, but the society and everybody and then maybe that would stop some of these
problems. Well, one of the things I've noticed is one of the things I do to center myself
when I'm having like oh my gosh, this show is did a 20-minute episode barely scratch the surface on this case. I
spent hours and hours putting out this huge episode and they got so many more downloads. What I remind myself is if I
wake up tomorrow and I have five times the number of downloads as I had the day before, what would I change about my
show? And the answer is absolutely nothing. I'd be doing the same thing I'm doing now. So I'm just going to keep
doing it. Yeah, it's that's why I said like I I think all all this stuff just comes down to be
you have to just be as honest as you can with yourself and what you're trying to
do and and um and I know everybody's going to be affected by it differently, but it um
you know, but but like you said, I think there is a big difference now because before when we started the podcast and I
always tell this to Nick, the reason why I should get paid more than Nick is when we started,
he's like, wouldn't that be awesome if we made a little money doing this? And I was like, yeah. Like $500 a month.
Because we both drove really shitty cars and I thought $500 a month, we both could drive nicer cars because maybe
because of the show. And Nick didn't hear me correctly and Nick said $500 a year, that would be
awesome. And we're like on the sixth episode. I'm like, this is a lot of work for $500 a
year. But I think when you guys started and when generation Y started and sword and scale
and and and even My Favorite Murder and those when when those shows started it wasn't
Like, I think the the the ladies in My Favorite Murder viewed it as hey, we could talk about this and have a podcast
and this might help our comedy career. Mhm. And then it turned into this other thing
and same, you know, I just thought oh, this would be fun to do this project and if I could make $500 a month, that'd be
amazing. But now I think you're getting a lot of people that get into it for the wrong reason. Oh, if I
if I start a show, maybe I can quit my job. It's like you're not going to you're going to quit your job to take on
another job. Yeah. It's going to be a job, you know. It's going to be an awesome job.
I didn't see a profit for 3 years and I was uh consistently in the top 50. And I
think and that and it was way easier back then to make money than it is now unless you're a celebrity. And I think
that's the thing people don't realize. So many people are like, oh, I'm um I want to become a podcaster and make
money. And I'm like, well, don't cuz you're not going to. Me and Nick differ on this. I think we
should do a state of the union every year to say, this is what's happening with the podcast. This is how our
contract is broken down. I mean, they don't need to know every detail, but like we're contractually we're contract
contractually obligated to release X amount of episodes per year. And so we we talked about the JonBenét
Ramsey case. We thought it was going to be a one-parter because we've talked about it a million times. Turned out to
be a three-parter and we put two of the two of the episodes behind a paywall and
we got people talking [ __ ] you know, oh, you guys are just always grabbing at the money. It's like, "No, we were only
contractually obligated to release one episode that week, and we weren't going to give
them extra episodes because they didn't deserve the extra Not not the audience, but the
the ad agency didn't deserve the extra episodes, and they don't see they don't see that
we weren't try we weren't trying to upcharge anybody. We didn't think, "Oh, we're going to release these and make a
bunch more money." We thought, "No, we're going to release this content cuz we have it to the audience,
but we're not going to give the the advertisers a cut of this, you know, because we we've met our obligation."
I wish they could see the big picture cuz when I tell people like, "I'm lucky if I make a penny for every download I
get," they're shocked. And you're like, "No, like we're not raking in the I mean,
even, you know, I have a friend who was on one of the most successful TV shows in the history of television.
And I we were talking, and I was like, "So, are you going to like buy a house?" And they were like, "I can't afford to
buy a house." And I'm like, "You are top five billing in one of the biggest shows, and you can't afford to buy a
house." I think people have such a distorted idea of like compensation and how money is moved around in the
entertainment industry writ large and by an extension the podcast industry. Yeah, or some And I think the other
tough thing about what we're creating is if you put out a 45-minute episode, you know, I think we did because of our
contract, we had a multiple weeks that we put out a one-parter, and we're normally putting out two-parts.
And we got somebody saying, "Oh, man, you guys are getting pretty lazy." It's like, "Well,
we're not we're not going to put out two episodes for no reason. Like, the case dictates how much content we
will put out. Right. If the case lends itself to have all these talking points, well, that might
be a two-parter. Might be a four-parter. But they also don't see that sometimes that 45-minute episode took us 40 hours
or more to create. Yeah. Yeah. I think that's the biggest thing and I've tried to like
delicately explain that to the audience over and over and over again is like for
every 40 minutes of content you hear, expect that there's been 80 hours of work.
You You think about doctors and and I would put, you know, Charlie and Nick and Josh in this category. You guys have
been specially Josh has been working on one case. So, it's not just even if you put out an episode of you just
regurgitating information or thoughts that you've had about keys, well, how many hours are you at now?
25,000 hours? 3,000 hours? There's no way to quantify at this point. Yeah, it's been so much. Yeah, I've
definitely found that my listeners do respond to me, like you said, doing a state of the union. I didn't do one last
year cuz I was like so swamped and overwhelmed with other things. But most years I do a end of the year wrap-up.
You know, not every the casual listener is not going to click play on it, but your core listeners will. And in those I
talk about any changes that were in the podcast, including this year I'm going to include why I have more ads
in my podcast now versus when I started. And I'm getting into how industry standards have changed, how
We're forced to. We're forced to and how Apple, you know, changed how they did things. Everyone
took a big hit on their downloads. So, now we're getting paid less per episode. Like if you put in two an extra ad
break, that's basically just to make what you used to make two years ago. So, I'm just I put it all out there because
I mean, I don't put like how much money's in my bank account, but I put it pretty much everything else out there
because I think people are interested in it. And I also think people will understand more if they know there's a
reason behind it and it's not just oh, I was slacking off and that's why this isn't a two-parter or I'm just grabbing
money, which is why I put in an extra, you know, ad break. There is actually a reason, I promise.
Yeah, I I try to remind people that I didn't want to do this. I was forced to do this.
You know, and it's so funny cuz we've done 800 and some episodes on the main show, over 200 episodes of bonus
content. So, over a thousand episodes and there's not a single person out there on the
internet calling the cops and saying, "Look, we know for a fact that this guy, Nick, kidnapped this
drunk sailor and he's forcing him to edit all of his thoughts on whatever he wants to talk
about. And he's been uh he's been in hiding. We don't even know if he's in the country anymore.
Um and nobody has once come to my defense and and called law enforcement to try to
have me found. It's it's kind of sad. I mean, I I also I wrote a book about it, but Nick uh
stole all that material. Releasing that uh later this year. Yeah, it's that's the biggest crime of
the true crime space. Really, think about it. I think like the perfect like metaphor I
have for what we do is every time we're at an event, like a you know, uh true crime podcast festival or any big event
where there's a lot of podcasters, on like the very first morning, you can kind of walk around and everybody has
this look on their face of like, "Okay, I'm here. I'm on the floor. What do I do? What do
I do? What do I say?" And I think like that exemplifies how we exist in this space
at large. It's like, "Okay, I'm here. Now what? do?" I also wonder if it's different for me
than because I don't feel like I and look, I have friends of mine that will be like,
"The show would be nothing without you." I'm like, "Nick would be just fine if I never talked once on the show." And
there's been episodes that I've just sat there and thought, "Let's see how long I
can go before he lets me talk." And he will just keep going. I mean, I think the
longest like time that I had was like 20-some minutes of me not talking and and he
just kept going. So, but I so I wonder if it's different because like Josh and Charlie, you're the you're
the face of it and somebody could go, "Well, you're the face of this, but I'm the captain, you know? I don't even
own a boat. Zero sense at all, you know? So, I think there maybe I view things a
little different because I I don't even view it as my show. I view it as it's Nick's show,
you know? And and we have some friends that have no clue about the podcast space. So, one of my buddies um
I don't know, about a year or so ago, he like pulled me aside and he was like, "Hey, man,
I know who the talented brother is. And the whole world one day is going to see that. Don't worry, man, your time is
going to come." I didn't have the heart to tell him like, "I'm not Nick's employee, you
know?" But uh yeah, but maybe I maybe I feel different about it that way or maybe I it's also
cuz my my dad was a detective and there's sometimes that I just think like my dad
got paid nothing to go into a room with a stab victim that was stabbed 40 times and have to try to figure out what
happened. And he was paid nothing, you know, like like we weren't we weren't broke, but
there was no extra money to put in savings, you know. Right. Yeah. So I think sometimes um
you know, when we had this uh we we vibe or something like that. It was like a like like adult sex toys joy toys uh
and like they wanted us to read that and I just thought there's no way it's going
to be graphic. So sure, we'll do it. Like why not? Like my dad got paid nothing. We should just be happy to do
They were like the most graphic ads ever and we had to contact them and say we can't read this anymore. This
probably probably embarrassing. But no, it's like maybe I I I think of it different that
way cuz I mean even just like you know and I you know, like you said a lot of things
are changing. You know, we used to get a little bit of a bonus you know, at the start of the contract
just to get things up and going and to get content going. And now those days are done. I just we don't get But you
know, I remember getting the first bonus and telling my dad what it was and he he
almost [ __ ] himself, you know, cuz he's like man, he's like I actually did this
for a living and they didn't pay me. They didn't give me that much. What are your highs and lows of this
whole experience? Like the worst part of it and it can be a specific thing or a general thing and then like the best
part of it, same specific or general. Why don't you start, Captain? I mean it's going to sound a little
sappy, but like my you know, Nick's my brother and it's something that he like dreamed up and I
have and like I said, he's gone above and beyond. I mean, the amount of times that
he goes, "Hey, we got a couple thousand dollars in the beer fund. Let's donate that to
um Project Porchlight or, you know, uh National um Center for Missing Children. And and just how he's gone above and
beyond trying to make a difference with the platform that we have. I mean, the amount of times that I go, "I've never
heard of this case." He goes, "Don't worry about it. I got you know, I'm talking to this detective. They reached
out. They're trying to get more people talking about the case." So, just to be able to say that like he
had this dream and I helped facilitate that and he's then instead of gone on and and and I mean,
yeah, he's got a big head about himself now and his [ __ ] don't stink, but um but he's also doing really good in
the world and and so I'm proud of that. And uh I don't know. It's hard to say that there is lows because I
like I said, I I've struggled with depression and um self-confidence and self-worth and
all that stuff and I and I actually think the negative comments help me confront that.
And then I've also just met so many great people like Charlie and Josh and and uh what
you know, dare I say Bob Ruff guys from Generation Y and and then the people that I haven't met personally,
but like My Favorite Murder, like Karen is hilarious and I just think it's such a talent and
and just so many smart people and so I I don't know. I don't know if I guess I I the worst part would be when you
talk to the victim's family and you don't know if you can help them. I guess that would be the worst part,
you know. But other than that, I mean, I I've had a great time doing it, you know, and I
hope you know, we can continue for another like 3 months and then I'd like to retire.
What about you, Charlie? Um I mean, as some people know, I had a podcast before Crimelines and it ended poorly.
Uh my Unlike Unlike the captain, my co-host wasn't diligently working on things and that was I mean, that is in
That would have to be absolutely the hardest because it's not you know, I ended a podcast which I hate
disappointing people and so every message a listener sent that they were disappointed, like I appreciated the
support, but also every one of those was like a stab and then also, I mean, literally walked away from thousands and
thousands of dollars in upcoming ads that I then had to start over and start Crimelines where I was
barely making anything again. So, starting over was really really hard. Best thing ever, but really really hard.
Um so, that's kind of my big downside of this entire journey. But honestly, it's I comes back to
people again with the best part is I've met so many listeners. I've networked with people I would never
think I would ever have a conversation with, people who are experts in their field, whether you know, it's forensics
or they're psychiatrists or they're investigators, which has just been incredible and then,
you know, the podcast through podcasting, some podcasters have become, you know, my go-to people in my personal
life, too. If I have something coming up, you know, with my kids, like I don't always just text everybody about
podcasting. And so, making, you know, really strong connections has been incredible.
My low is probably the bad ways that this has changed me. Like, I was thinking about there was
someone I was friends with like 15 years ago who like vaguely through the show and has vaguely come back into my life
and I was like thinking of the ways I've changed in that time and I think because
of the podcast I'm like a harder person. I think I used to be a lot less cynical, a lot more open, a
lot more willing to share myself with people than I am now. And that kind of bumps me out and I know
that all comes from just like self-preservation from doing the work that we do. Yeah.
And then I think the high is yeah, the people. Um of all the people, like being able to
engage with people who have experienced traumas or experienced, you know, significant responses to the crimes that
we discuss or crimes similar to the crimes we discuss. And then the podcasting friends I've made, like
the fact that there are probably 20 true crime podcasters who I didn't know 6 years ago who I now talk to every
single day and vacation with and travel with and like I'm excited to see when we go to
these overwhelming, you know, events is the coolest thing in the world and like Charlie said, most of the time we're not
even talking about podcasting and I think because we all experience this very like niche, often isolating career,
we're able to be a whole or version of ourselves with each other in a way that everyone else understands because we
know this strange experience. It's a it's an experience that nobody else gets and then like my
experience is different than yours because I have a a partner. So, you know, the guys in Generation Y like
we get along but we've shared similar experiences if that makes any sense. Totally. Totally. And even and like
victims' families, like who I you know, there are so many people who I've never met who I care about immensely. And I
know I started this by saying it's made me a harder person, and it has, but it's
also made me a much softer person. Yeah, but and I I don't know if you guys would agree
with this or not, but the true true crime fan. And Nick used to talk about this fictitious person when we started. He He
just wanted to have like a We want to put out the best show that we can that has the most factual
information about a case that we can. And he would always talk about the true true crime fan. And we've seen like a a
fad in the true crime world, but I think the true true crime fans, whether we agree on theories or suspects
or whatever, like they're good people because they want the case solved. They want justice or closure for the victims.
And and that's crazy to see when you're at a CrimeCon and you see thousands of of these individuals that they're not
just there to take a picture with you. They're also there to get information to try to help
solve cases. I couldn't agree more. And I think that's Oh, my alarm is going off. So, I
think that is the perfect way to end this conversation. The alarm with Josh is Yeah. Well, we
can end with Josh's alarm saying, "Let's go. Move it along." Shut the [ __ ] up, you three.
I just want to say it's a privilege knowing you. I hope uh a ton of success. Uh we'll all uh get our flowers, no pun
intended, 2025. Same. And I hope that Nick lets you out of the garage at some point, Captain.
Well, happy holidays, everyone. And uh this has been really lovely. I love doing
these conversations with people because you never know what's going to come.

True Crimelines Garage Bullshit

Josh from True Crime Bullshit and Charlie from Crimelines sit down with the Captain to discuss the world of True Crime. Happy Holidays!!! Cheers Mates

www.TrueCrimeGarage.com

Brief Summary

True crime podcasters discuss their creative processes, audience perceptions, and the emotional challenges of producing content.

Key points

The Emotional Toll of Podcasting. Podcasters discuss the emotional challenges of creating and releasing episodes.
Navigating Public Perception. The hosts reflect on how listeners perceive them based on limited interactions.
The Challenge of Reporting. Navigating the fine line between critique and truth in true crime reporting.
The Weight of Family Dynamics. Exploring how familial alienation complicates the narrative of missing persons cases.
The Burden of Public Scrutiny. Content creators face the challenge of balancing personal life and public perception.
Privileged Problems. Discussing the complexities of being a public figure in the podcasting world.

Episode highlights

Episode quotes

Authenticity is dangerous and expensive.

Tina Fey's quote on authenticity.

6:28WatchDec 23, 2024

Tension

40/ 100Low tension

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