The Bunker – News without the nonsense
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News without the nonsense, every weekday morning. In episodes that fit your commute*, The Bunker cuts through the noise to make sense of what’s really going on in news, current affairs, politics, economics and culture. We bring you smart explainers, interviews, fresh perspectives and under-reported stories to as a refreshing alternative to repetitive Punch and Judy news coverage. It’s the only way to start the day. From the producers of Oh God, What Now?
Our regulars include: Gavin Esler • Ros Taylor • Alex von Tunzelmann • Andrew Harrison • Zing Tsjeng • Jacob Jarvis • Emma Kennedy • Rafael Behr • Seth Thévoz.
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(* Even if it’s just from the kitchen to the front room. )
The Bunker is a Podmasters production.
1726 Episodes
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It’s the last of our Best of 2025 and the final Bunker of the year! And how better to see off/kick out the year than with the thing that’s blighted the last twelve months, crappy artificial intelligence imagery? The far-right stuffs your feeds with blond white children at play, London as an open sewer patrolled by threatening migrants, and Trump as Superman – but why? Is A.I. slop the official art style of the new authoritarianism?
New York Times columnist Jamelle Bouie talks to Andrew Harrison about why the radical right loves shiny, sentimental images; how they connect to Hitler’s fascist kitsch; and what it means when reality doesn’t live up to your fantasies.
patreon.com/bunkercast
Written and presented by Andrew Harrison. Audio production by Chris Jones and Robin Warren. Produced by Liam Tait. Music by Kenny Dickinson. Art by Jim Parrett. Managing Editor Jacob Jarvis. Group Editor Andrew Harrison. THE BUNKER is a Podmasters Production
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We’re bringing you some of the best Bunkers of the year to tide you over the holidays. Today: Where’s your flag???!? The Cross of St George sprouted across the lamp-posts and roundabouts of Britain this summer. Fans, boosters and grifters claimed it was simple patriotism. Imagine our surprise when it turned out that many behind “Operation Raise The Colours” had far-right associations – who’d have thought it?? Alex von Tunzelmann sat down with Jonn Elledge to find out what flags really mean today.
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Written and presented by Alex von Tunzelmann. Producer: Liam Tait. Audio editors: Robin Leeburn. Managing editor: Jacob Jarvis. Art by James Parrett. Music by Kenny Dickinson. Group Editor: Andrew Harrison. THE BUNKER is a Podmasters Production
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In case you missed them, over Christmas we’re bringing you some of the best Bunkers of the year. “Organise before they rise,” is Max Brooks’ advice in his zombie survival guide. But are world leaders prepared enough? Jacob Jarvis speaks to Daniel Drezner, author of Theories of International Politics and Zombies and professor of international politics at Tufts University, to find out how the world might react and how governments would interact during such a catastrophe.
Buy Theories of International Politics and Zombies through our affiliate bookshop and you’ll help fund The Bunker by earning us a small commission for every sale. Bookshop.org’s fees help support independent bookshops too.
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Written and presented by Jacob Jarvis. Audio editor: Robin Leeburn. Art direction: Jim Parrett. Managing editor: Jacob Jarvis. Music by Kenny Dickinson. Group Editor: Andrew Harrison. THE BUNKER is a Podmasters Production.
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1In case you missed them, over Christmas we’re bringing you some of the best Bunkers of the year. Today: How mobbed up is the American political establishment? From FDR to Trump, every modern president has had brushes with organised crime. So how have secret pacts, betrayals, and under-the-table deals influenced the commander-in-chief? Eric Dezenhall, author of Wiseguys and the White House, explores the not-so-hidden ties between the leader of the free world and the mob with Seth “The Consigliere” Thévoz.
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Written and presented by Seth “The Consigliere” Thévoz. Produced by Liam “Big Guy” Tait. Audio editor: Ice-Pick Simon Williams. Art direction: Crazy Jimmy Parrett. Managing editor: Jacob “Mr Clean” Jarvis. Music by Mr Fingers Kenny Dickinson. Group Editor: Andrew “Uncle Junior” Harrison. THE BUNKER is a Podmasters Production. You should drop by some time. Play some cards.
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In case you missed them, over Christmas we’re bringing you some of the best editions of the year. Our first selection: It’s February and Labour legend and former leader Neil Kinnock joins us for the FIFTEEN HUNDREDTH edition of The Bunker.
On the agenda: the story Labour should be telling… what his battles against Thatcherism can teach Starmer about fighting the rising right wing… the dangers of a radicalised Conservative Party… and how to hit Reform UK where it hurts. With Andrew Harrison and Alex von Tunzelmann.
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Written and presented by Andrew Harrison. Audio production by Tom Taylor. Art by James Parrett. Music by Kenny Dickinson. Managing Editor Jacob Jarvis. Group Editor Andrew Harrison. THE BUNKER is a Podmasters Production
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Talk ’90s To Me is the new podcast from the makers of The Bunker which dives into all the key characters and topics that made the 1990s great. The first episode covers Oasis and how they brought chaos, electricity and working-class swagger to a music scene dominated by po-faced grunge and indie bands in the early 1990s. How did the Gallaghers go from humble beginnings in Manchester to taking over the world? Find out in our first episode – here’s a teaser and go subscribe here: linktr.ee/talk90stome
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Written and presented by Miranda Sawyer. Produced by Liam Tait. Video and audio production by Simon Williams. Managing editor: Jacob Jarvis. Group editor: Andrew Harrison. Music by Soniq Branding from Artlist. Talk ’90s To Me and The Bunker are Podmasters productions.
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Try the latest edition of our new podcast where ex-Met Commissioner Bernard Hogan-Howe and former Mirror editor Alison Phillips bring you the truth about true crime.
On this episode: When police shoot dead a suspect the consequences are huge. But how is the decision to shoot to kill made? Is firearms policy fit for purpose? And is it right that the officer cleared of murdering Londoner Chris Kaba in a police roadblock now faces gross misconduct charges? Bernard and Alison share unprecedented insider knowledge on real cases including Kaba, Mark Duggan and Jean Charles de Menezes.
• Get Crime Scene every Thursday.
Presented by Bernard Hogan-Howe and Alison Phillips. Audio production by Tom Taylor. Music by Simon Williams. Produced by Managing Editor Jacob Jarvis and Group Editor Andrew Harrison. Executive Producer: Martin Bojtos. Thanks to Helen Purvis at Knight Ayton Management. CRIME SCENE is a Podmasters Production
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Bunker listeners, try a bite-sized sample of our brand new podcast CRIME SCENE. Every week ex-Met Police Commissioner Bernard Hogan-Howe and former Mirror editor Alison Phillips lift the lid on how criminal investigations really work. In our debut episode: The horrific shooting of an innocent nine-year-old girl in Dalston in 2024 laid bare bitter rivalries between London’s armed gangs. Are police they fighting a losing battle against guns in the Capital?
Want to know more? Search CRIME SCENE for the full episode and subscribe for new episodes every Thursday.
Presented by Bernard Hogan-Howe and Alison Phillips. Audio production by Tom Taylor. Music by Simon Williams. Produced by Managing Editor Jacob Jarvis and Group Editor Andrew Harrison. Executive Producer: Martin Bojtos. Thanks to Helen Purvis at Knight Ayton Management. CRIME SCENE is a Podmasters Production
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The brand new podcast from the makers of The Bunker. Bewildered by the US Presidential Election? Don’t worry, American Friction has got you. Every Friday Chris Jones, Jacob Jarvis and Nikki McCann Ramírez of Rolling Stone join expert special guests to count down to America’s most rancorous election in generations.
Get the full episode and subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify and all major platforms.
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Written and presented by Chris Jones, Jacob Jarvis and Nikki McCann Ramírez. Audio editor: Simon Williams. Group Editor: Andrew Harrison. Executive producer: Martin Bojtos. Artwork by James Parrett. Music: Orange Factory Music. THE BUNKER is a Podmasters Production
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If you haven’t tried our new press review show PAPER CUTS yet, here’s a taster of today’s episode. This time it’s the Mail and Telegraph’s Johnson-related meltdown, the majesty of Glenda Jackson and much more as comedian Fin Taylor and writer-historian Alex von Tunzelmann join Andrew Harrison under a huge pile of newsprint. Hear the full episode here.
We’re out mid-morning every Monday, Wednesday and Friday to look at the the day’s best headlines, wildest stories and weirdest opinions. Subscribe on your favourite app. It’s the perfect chaser to your daily Bunker…
Illustrations by Modern Toss https://moderntoss.com/
Written and presented by Andrew Harrison. Produced by Sophie Black. Design: James Parrett. Music: Simon Williams. Managing Editor: Jacob Jarvis. Exec Producer: Martin Bojtos. Group Editor: Andrew Harrison. PAPER CUTS is a Podmasters Production.
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The Ukraine War is reshaping the world. Arthur Snell writes the first draft of its history. In this excerpt from Ep.1 of our new series: How Russia’s febrile history, Putin’s paranoid resentment and Western complacency led to an historic crime against a peaceful nation, the largest European land action since the Second World War… and a conflict of unprecedented brutality.
Doomsday Watch: The Ukraine War is out now. Hear it wherever you listen to podcasts.
Get every edition a week early and ad-free when you support the show on Patreon.
Photo by Paul Conroy.
Written and presented by Arthur Snell. Produced by Robin Leeburn. Original theme music by Paul Hartnoll – https://www.orbitalofficial.com. Group Editor Andrew Harrison. Doomsday Watch is a Podmasters production.
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From Trump remodelling the White House along the fake gold New Jersey steakhouse aesthetic to the shambolic launch of Your Party (splitting the party before there’s a party to split?) 2025 has set new standards in bafflement. But which are the supreme moments of weirdness? Regulars Gavin Esler, Alex von Tunzelmann and Jason Hazeley set out the most bizarre, unnerving and occasionally enchanting moments from a year we can scarcely believe.
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Written and presented by Gavin Esler with Alex von Tunzelmann and Jason Hazeley. Producer: Liam Tait. Audio production: Tom Taylor. Music by Kenny Dickinson. Artwork by James Parrett. Managing Editor: Jacob Jarvis. Group Editor: Andrew Harrison. THE BUNKER is a Podmasters Production.
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Wrapping up the stories of the week… Alex von Tunzelmann is joined by Jonn Elledge to examine the global response to the antisemitic Bondi Beach shooting and ask whether it signals a wider rise in the threat of terror attacks. Plus, how will resident doctor strikes affect the NHS as the flu wave intensifies? Jonn tries to work out if the unexpected drop in inflation is good or bad news for Rachel Reeves and crowns his winner and loser of the week.
🎄LAST DAY! Get 20% off a year’s support for The Bunker until midnight on Fri 19 Dec – whether you’re a new backer, renewing or upgrading.
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Written and presented by Alex von Tunzelmann. Producer: Liam Tait. Audio production: Simon Williams. Music by Kenny Dickinson. Artwork by James Parrett. Managing Editor: Jacob Jarvis. Group Editor: Andrew Harrison. THE BUNKER is a Podmasters Production.
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For more than a decade, Tommy Robinson has been written off again and again. Yet he keeps re-emerging, reshaped for the moment. From street agitator to convicted criminal to most recently, self-styled Christian crusader. Robinson has followed a familiar far-right playbook: collapse, reinvention, repeat.
On The Bunker, Alex von Tunzelmann is joined by journalist Daniel Trilling to examine the staying power of Tommy Robinson and the strategy that keeps bringing him back. We look at the warning signs we missed and what Robinson’s latest reinvention reveals about the durability, adaptability and danger of Britain’s far-right ecosystem.
🎄Get 20% off a year’s support for The Bunker until Christmas – whether you’re a new backer, renewing or upgrading.
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Written and presented by Alex von Tunzelmann. Producer: Liam Tait. Audio production: Tom Taylor. Music by Kenny Dickinson. Artwork by James Parrett. Managing Editor: Jacob Jarvis. Group Editor: Andrew Harrison. THE BUNKER is a Podmasters Production.
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From 9/11 and the wars that followed to the expenses scandal, the Financial Crash, austerity, Brexit and a carousel of leadership crises, Westminster has spent the last 25 years governing through upheaval. Since 2000, crisis has shifted from disruption to default setting, with governments reacting rather than governing and institutions stretched well beyond their limits. Prof. Andrew Hindmoor, author of Haywire, talks to Zoë Grünewald about how British politics got stuck in crisis mode and what we can do about it.
🎄Get 20% off a year’s support for The Bunker until Christmas – whether you’re a new backer, renewing or upgrading.
• Buy Andrew’s book Haywire: A Political History of Britain since 2000 through our affiliate bookshop and you’ll be helping the podcast by earning us a small commission for every sale. Bookshop.org’s fees help support independent bookshops too.
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Written and presented by Zoë Grünewald. Producer: Liam Tait. Audio production: Robin Warren. Music by Kenny Dickinson. Artwork by James Parrett. Managing Editor: Jacob Jarvis. Group Editor: Andrew Harrison. THE BUNKER is a Podmasters Production.
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The stories that will shape the week ahead: How will the atrocity at Bondi Beach reverberate in a world where antisemitic violence is rising? Plus: the shocking murder of Hollywood director Rob Reiner and his wife. Junior doctors decide whether to strike as Britain hits peak winter flu. Will Phase Two of the Gaza peace talks stay on the rails? And happy 250th birthday to Jane Austen. Alex von Tunzelmann and Andrew Harrison set out the week ahead.
🎄Get 20% off a year’s support for The Bunker until Christmas – whether you’re a new backer, renewing or upgrading.
Written and presented by Andrew Harrison with Alex von Tunzelmann Producer: Liam Tait. Audio production: Tom Taylor. Music by Kenny Dickinson. Artwork by James Parrett. Managing Editor: Jacob Jarvis. Group Editor: Andrew Harrison. THE BUNKER is a Podmasters Production.
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Wrapping up the stories of the week… Alex von Tunzelmann is joined by LBC host Natasha Devon to break down Keir Starmer’s latest approach to tackling the migration crisis. Across the pond, we take a look at Trump’s ongoing campaign against the EU and ask”why now”? Plus, Natasha shares her view on the proposed ban on social media for under-18s, we read your comments from the week, and finally we take a look at the stories that have gone under the radar.
🎄Get 20% off a year’s support for The Bunker until Christmas – whether you’re a new backer, renewing or upgrading.
www.patreon.com/bunkercast
Written and presented by Alex von Tunzelmann. Producer: Liam Tait. Audio production: Robin Leeburn Music by Kenny Dickinson. Artwork by James Parrett. Managing Editor: Jacob Jarvis. Group Editor: Andrew Harrison. THE BUNKER is a Podmasters Production.
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Personality politics isn’t just a modern problem – it started centuries earlier with an aristocrat called Charles James Fox. You can trace the roots of modern political celebrity back to this 18th-century provocateur, whose charm, scandals and theatrics helped redefine what leadership looked like. Fox built a movement around himself rather than his policies, offering an early blueprint for the dangerous style of politics reshaping democracies today. Alex von Tunzelmann speaks with Dr Callum Smith of Aberystwyth University about Fox’s rise and how history helps us understand the dominance of modern figures like Trump and Farage.
🎄Get 20% off a year’s support for The Bunker until Christmas – whether you’re a new backer, renewing or upgrading.
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Written and presented by Alex von Tunzelmann. Producer: Liam Tait. Audio production: Robin Leeburn Music by Kenny Dickinson. Artwork by James Parrett. Managing Editor: Jacob Jarvis. Group Editor: Andrew Harrison. THE BUNKER is a Podmasters Production.
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Nigel Farage continues to react furiously to growing allegations that he engaged in racist and antisemitic bullying when he was a pupil at Dulwich College in the late ’70s and early ’80s. But are his angry response and his attempts at diversion doing the real damage? And can you really judge an adult on what they may have done at school? Long-time Reform-watcher Michael Crick joins us to explore a crisis unlike anything Farage has faced before. His verdict? “Farage is as rattled as a baby’s pram.”
🎄Get 20% off a year’s support for The Bunker until Christmas – whether you’re a new backer, renewing or upgrading.
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Written and presented by Andrew Harrison. Producer: Liam Tait. Audio production: Tom Taylor. Music by Kenny Dickinson. Artwork by James Parrett. Managing Editor: Jacob Jarvis. Group Editor: Andrew Harrison. THE BUNKER is a Podmasters Production.
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Far fewer people are getting into relationships than they were in the past, with a major rise in the amount of single people across the world. Why are we seeing this so-called “relationship recession”? And how can it impact us all? Jonathan Rosenthal, international editor at The Economist, wrote about this for a magazine cover story recently and joins Zoë Grünewald to discuss.
• Head to https://www.nakedwines.co.uk/thebunker to get a £30 voucher and 6 top-rated wines from our sponsor Naked Wines for £39.99, delivery included.
www.patreon.com/bunkercast
Written and presented by Zoë Grünewald. Audio production: Tom Taylor. Producer: Liam Tait. Managing Editor: Jacob Jarvis. Group Editor: Andrew Harrison. Music by Kenny Dickinson. THE BUNKER is a Podmasters Production.
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I was with her all the way, right up until she lumped trans identified males in with women. How can you address misogyny when you believe men can be women? It pulled the rug out from everything she'd said up to that point.
Contrails happen because the fuel is hydrocarbons. when burnt the H and the C combine with oxygen to make mainly H20 and CO2. Nothing to do with the fuel containing "a little bit of water" as your expert believes.
Great episode…we’re off to see DH on the big screen on 23rd 👍🎉
eloquent guest
nonsense
I think you should see a doctor , you sound really wheezy. Please take care!
it's a shame you have been si dishonest in your account of the violence in Amsterdam. what did the Israeli fans do? People responded to their initial violence. a real shame you replicate the worst of what telly tells you. What's the point if you can't tell basic truths?
Sorry have to disagree that Bluesky is a poor experience on the phone. It's absolutely fine and improvements are being rolled out all the time. The main benefit of it is that it's a lively forum for civilised debate. Not a mad hellscape of paid for far right blue ticks. Twitter is in a tailspin while Bluesky is undergoing steady organic growth.
violence from the left is irritating, but genocide is OK. Yeah. Got it. if only they'd stop going on about those dead babies.
These people do not want to stop fascism. They are more comfortable with fascists than they are with the left. I do not support the right of Nazis to exist.
Excellent edition, thank you both 👍
Eugene… very clever!
Chasing shadows… Great title, we were going to call our book that, but eventually went for the War on Dirty Money instead. This sounds like a well researched piece of writing. Congratulations!
What an unnecessary spoiler at the beginning.
20 hours of Fox news !! FUCKING HELL
TV news is still the most trusted source of information. Now that BBC has been captured, we’re doomed.
Marie lost me on this one! Not sure what saving has to do with government
Is Alex a Spurs fan 🤣
Fantastic! Noone better than Danny to explain the sh*tshow Truss has descended on the country. and precisely the market reaction he predicted would happen if she ever enacted her policies.
Helter Skelter is grunge 👍🤘