UPDATE (March 12): Popcast, which is hosted by Jon Caramanica, pop music critic for The New York Times, won best music podcast at the 2024 iHeartPodcast Awards, which were held on Monday, March 11, at the Fairmont Hotel in Austin, Texas. Popcast, which covers the latest in popular music criticism, trends and news, is produced and distributed by The New York Times.
The event, held in conjunction with SXSW, was streamed on iHeartRadio’s YouTube channel and broadcast across iHeartMedia radio stations nationwide and on the iHeartRadio app.
New Heights, hosted by Jason and Travis Kelce, took podcast of the year and overall ensemble. In accepting the award via video, the brothers thanked Taylor Swift fans for boosting their podcast.
Laci Mosley (Scam Goddess) won best overall host. Other top winners included Watch What Crappens (best pop culture), How Did This Get Made? (best TV & film), How I Built This (best business & finance), Pivot (best news), Hard Fork (best technology) and The Really Good Podcast with Bobbi Althoff (best emerging).
Charlamagne Tha God opened the show.
PREVIOUSLY (Feb. 7): Disgraceland, Million Dollaz Worth of Game, Popcast, Questlove Supreme (hosted by Questlove) and Song Exploder are vying for best music podcast at the 2024 iHeartPodcast Awards. The awards honor the best in podcasting from 2023.
This year, iHeartMedia is teaming with South by Southwest (SXSW) Conference and Festivals to host the live and in-person ceremony at the Fairmont Hotel in Austin, Texas, on Monday, March 11, at 8 p.m. CT.
Joe Budden, a rapper-turned-media personality, broadcaster and cultural critic, is nominated for best overall host for The Joe Budden Podcast. Budden’s eponymous debut album made the top 10 on the Billboard 200 in 2003 and included “Pump It Up,” a top 40 hit on the Billboard Hot 100. He also performed as a member of the hip-hop supergroup Slaughterhouse, which was signed to Eminem‘s Shady Records in 2012. In 2015, he began hosting The Joe Budden Podcast.
Competing with Budden for best overall host are Jonathan Goldstein (Heavyweight), Julia Louis-Dreyfus (Wiser Than Me), Laci Mosley (Scam Goddess) and Nicole Byer (Why Won’t You Date Me?).
The 2024 iHeartPodcast Awards will present three industry Icon Awards. Jason Flom, former chairman and CEO of Atlantic Records, Virgin Records and Capitol Music Group, activist and CEO of Lava for Good, who works with The Innocence Project, and Maggie Freleng, a Pulitzer-Prize winning reporter and producer, will both be honored with the 2024 Social Impact Award for their work on the podcast Wrongful Conviction. Jonathan Goldstein, audio industry veteran, author and podcast host of Heavyweight, will be honored with the 2024 Pioneer Award.
The awards will also honor the podcast Rotten Mango with the Innovator Award, which celebrates the voices that are breaking new creative ground in podcasting.
Juries will determine the winners in categories including comedy, crime, news, TV and film, sports, food, business and more. Each year, podcast fans help decide the winner of the Podcast of the Year award by voting online at iHeartPodcastAwards.com. This year’s nominees are Crime Junkie, The Daily, My Favorite Murder, New Heights, Normal Gossip, On Purpose with Jay Shetty, The Retrievals, Scamanda, SmartLess and Wiser Than Me with Julia Louis-Dreyfus. Voting opened on Feb. 5 and continues through Feb. 18.
The ceremony will broadcast on select iHeartMedia radio stations nationwide, digitally through the iHeartRadio app and video stream in partnership with YouTube on the iHeartRadio Channel. The event will additionally be available on demand following the initial live stream on YouTube.
Here’s a link to the nominees in all 29 categories: https://www.iheart.com/podcast-awards/
Here’s a closer look at the nominees for best music podcast at the 2024 iHeartPodcast Awards.
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Disgraceland
Host: Jake Brennan
Produced by: Double Elvis
Disgraceland explores the alleged criminal connections of such musicians as Jerry Lee Lewis, The Rolling Stones, Taylor Swift, David Bowie, Cardi B, The Grateful Dead, Amy Winehouse and Bob Marley. Disgraceland is a scripted, single-voice narrative storytelling podcast that melds true crime, music history, mystery, and misadventure. Disgraceland bills itself as an entertainment podcast inspired by true events and not a journalistic podcast. Certain dialogue and scenes are sometimes fictionalized for dramatic purposes.
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Million Dollaz Worth of Game
Hosts: Gillie Da King and Wallo
Produced/distributed by: Barstool Sports
Million Dollaz Worth of Game is a weekly podcast hosted by Philadelphia rapper/actor Gillie Da King and social media influencer and disruptor Wallo. This show is a conversation about what it’s like growing up in the streets of Philadelphia, and how the values Gillie and Wallo learned apply to everyone. The focus of the show is to teach you how to have game, while injecting humor into every aspect of conversation.
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Popcast
Host: Jon Caramanica
Produced/distributed by: The New York Times
The Popcast is hosted by Jon Caramanica, pop music critic for The New York Times. It covers the latest in popular music criticism, trends and news. Caramanica joined The New York Times in 2010, after having served as music editor of Vibe. Prior to that, he wrote for XXL, Rolling Stone and Spin. In 2020, he announced that he is writing a book about Kanye West.
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Questlove Supreme
Host: Questlove
Produced/distributed by: iHeartPodcasts
Questlove Supreme is a weekly podcast that digs deep into the stories of musical legends and cultural icons. Each episode is driven by conversation ranging from the guest’s origins to their life passions and current projects. Previous guests have included Usher, Michelle Obama, Chris Rock, Steve Miller, Maya Rudolph, “Weird Al” Yankovic, Chaka Khan and Babyface. Questlove has won six Grammys. In 2022, he won an Oscar for documentary (feature) for Summer of Soul (…Or, When the Revolution Could Not Be Televised).
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Song Exploder
Host: Hrishikesh Hirway
Independent, distributed by: Radiotopia
Song Exploder is a podcast where musicians take apart their songs and tell the stories of how they were made. Each episode is produced and edited by host and creator Hrishikesh Hirway in Los Angeles. Using the isolated, individual tracks from a recording, Hrishikesh asks artists to delve into the specific decisions that went into creating their works. Hrishikesh edits the interviews, removing his side of the conversation and condensing the story to focus on how the artists brought their songs to life. Guests have included Fleetwood Mac, Billie Eilish, U2, Metallica, Solange, Lorde, Yo-Yo Ma, The Roots and Bon Iver.
