Answer Me This – what the hell is it?

Answer Me This! is the weekly British comedy podcast from misappropriated geniuses Helen Zaltzman and Olly Mann.

Since its debut in January 2007, it’s been a certifiable hit, getting the chattering classes chatting, and the working classes working to afford an iPod so they can discover what all the fuss is about. It was an iTunes Podcast of the Year in 2008, and in 2009 was nominated for a Sony Radio Academy Award. Fancy!

With listeners all over the world, and more than a million downloads per year, the show is now one the most popular independent podcasts in Britain, and has been named ‘Critic’s Choice’ in The Times, Time Out, The Guardian, Q Magazine, Radio Times, and The Independent (you can read some clippings here)… And all for something recorded in someone’s front room in Crystal Palace and then distributed over the Internet! The British press have gone mental, eh? They’ll be making stars out of ex-reality TV contestants, escort girls and cuckolds next.

Anyway, the show has a question and answer format, with occasional skits and sketches peppered throughout. Which might not be the most original bit of lateral thinking since John De Mol said “Hey, let’s put some nutty people in a house, barrage them with mild torture techniques and see what happens,” but, by heck, it works. And it’s flipping well interactive - you, the audience, get to ask the questions! It’s a bit like Any Answers with Jonathan Dimbleby, but not as respectable.

Since the show began, Helen and Olly have lent their trademark irreverence to over 1000 questions, as diverse and fantastical as “Is Bremen in Germany a weird place to want to go on holiday?”, “Why do you never see the Three Musketeers with a musket?” and “Who’s your favourite serial killer of all time and why?” Here’s an archive of all the questions they’ve ever answered. They’ve also been ably assisted by their sidekick, physics correspondent and jingle maestro, Martin the Sound Man, and the beautiful interstitial soundscapes of the Answer Me This! Players.

Thanks to the success of the podcast, Helen and Olly have been invited on to numerous TV and radio shows, released four ’selection box’ albums on iTunes, and have been scarily recontextualized into some superb Photoshop fan-pics. Ah, the joy of weblebrity.

We’re guessing that now we’ve whetted your appetite, you’re anxious to start listening. The archive of all previous episodes is right here, or you can SUBSCRIBE FOR FREE ON ITUNES, where you can stream or download all our latest episodes.

And if YOU’VE got a question, you should email it to us right now, at this address – answermethispodcast@googlemail.com – and we’ll try to incorporate it into a future episode. Or, if you’d like to hear your voice asking the question in the podcast, dial up our Question Line instead on 0208 123 5877 or Skype AnswerMeThis.

Want to know more about AMT!? Try reading our FAQ.

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