5 Comedy Podcasts for October, From Amy Poehler to Conan, for People Who Drive a Lot
The comedy club has moved into your earbuds. Here are five shows worth the commute, picked by a man who has listened to all of them in traffic.
By the Heckle Desk · · 2 min read
There was a time when, if you wanted to hear a comedian talk for an hour, you had to put on a collared shirt, drive downtown, pay a cover and order two drinks you didn't want. Now they come right into your car, for free, and they talk for two hours, and you still don't get to leave early. That's progress, more or less.
Podcasts have become the place where a great many comics do their real work, the loose talking that used to happen at the bar after the show. Here are five that hold up, in no particular order, except the order I thought of them, which is the only honest order there is.
- 01
Good Hang with Amy Poehler (The Ringer / Spotify, weekly since March 2025)
Poehler talks with friends and guests about their work and their lives, and it started with Tina Fey and Martin Short on the first day, which is like opening a restaurant by inviting the two best cooks in town. It went on to win the first Golden Globe ever given to a podcast. Most of us can't get a Golden Globe for talking. We can barely get a word in.
- 02
Conan O'Brien Needs a Friend (Team Coco / SiriusXM)
Conan left network television and found that the thing he was best at was the part between the jokes. It's long, it's silly, and the best moments are when he bullies his own staff, gently, like an uncle at a barbecue who means well.
- 03
Las Culturistas (Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang, since 2016)
Two friends from NYU started it in an apartment with a mattress in the window to keep out the noise, and early on they had about 65 listeners. It now hands out its own annual awards. That's the American dream: start with a mattress, end with a trophy.
- 04
Comedy Bang! Bang! (Scott Aukerman, since 2009)
The grandfather of the improvised comedy podcast. Aukerman plays it straight while his guests show up as invented characters and lie to him for an hour. It's the closest thing radio has to a good pickup game.
- 05
SmartLess (Jason Bateman, Sean Hayes and Will Arnett, since 2020)
One of the three brings a surprise guest, and the other two have to find out who it is live. Three very famous men being impressed by one another sounds like it would be unbearable. It's somehow charming, the way it's charming to watch rich men argue about where to eat.