The Story Of My Friends Podcast: Real People Telling Real Stories

With celebrity interview podcasts appearing almost weekly as if they were assembled in a Ford plant, it is so refreshing to listen to an interview podcast where a non-celebrity interviews people who are not only not celebrities, but also are his friends. 

The Story of My Friends is a weekly interview podcast - real people telling real stories, no scripts, no gimmicks. It's fully independent, recorded mostly around L.A., with episodes ranging from a hospital-escape survivor to a world-record juggler to a Corvette road trip that turned into its own adventure.

Before I tell you the name of the creator/host of The Story of My Friends, let me remind you of a somewhat famous quote by the character, Christopher Moltisanti, in the HBO show The Sopranos, who said, "You ever think what a coincidence it is that Lou Gehrig died of Lou Gehrig's disease?"

 Here's my version of that quote: "How is it that the creator/host of The Story of My Friends (TSOMF) is named Joe Friend?"

Joe Friend doesn't focus on celebrities or influencers. Instead, the podcast features a rotating cast of everyday guests and friends, sharing wild and unique real-life stories. The show dives into a wildly eclectic mix of topics, including fire dancing, juggling for a Guinness World Record, hypnotherapy, mining for gold, and surviving prison. Driven by the motto Life Is Better When We Talk, the conversations are designed to be entertaining, unpredictable, and relatable.

TSOMF covers topics including fire dancing, astrophotography, juggling for a Guinness World Record, hypnotherapy, escaping a hospital, mining for gold, producing a musical, dancing naked with witches, yoga faux pas, artificially inseminating prized dogs, creating a board game, surviving in prison, driving a Corvette across the country, giving a woman a stroke, shooting a good friend, and much more.

In Season one, episode nine, we learned that Pitta Dosha is one of the three fundamental mind-body types (doshas) in Ayurveda, an ancient system of traditional medicine from India. Representing the elements of fire and water, Pitta is known as the energy of transformation, digestion, and metabolism. 

It governs everything from how your body processes food to how your mind digests ideas. Apparently Joe is a Pitta Dosha. And it doesn’t mean ‘sweaty bastard’ like he thought it did. Thankfully we have yoga gurus Angela Kukhahn and Shayna Hiller here to set him straight, teach him that “Shiva’s Couch” is not meant to be his impression of the Burt Reynolds centerfold, and inform him that the warrior drishti is not intended to psychically explode the person in front of you. 

Joe exclaims: "So pranayama your chakras free from your bandha and tell your mama about this one!" His guest in that episodes were Angela Kukhahn, Shayna Hiller.

Regarding his background, Joe Friend admits:"I fell 'bass-ackwards' into the media and entertainment field, beginning with The Philadelphia Inquirer and Daily News, then on to Discovery Communications, Fox Networks Group, and Disney. In advertising and streaming technology, the industry is in upheaval and seismic shifts, so I decided to take a beat and generate some of my own intellectual property."

Joe says he started the podcast because, "I noticed people increasingly ‘locked-in’ to their cellphones in public spaces and many news articles on an epidemic of loneliness; having  'regular ole conversations' is my attempt to encourage others to pick their heads up, realize the cure for their loneliness won’t come from their little glowing rectangles, and start talking IRL again."

When Ear Worthy asked Joe the hardest part of podcasting, he was quick to respond: "The show requires spending a lot of time alone, planning, editing, mixing, mastering, pre- / post-launch activities, so in order to get the show produced and ideally help other people, it gets a little lonely making it."

 

Joe's dilemma is the same as most independent podcasters: monetization. Joe asks: "Are these Season One or freshman show issues? I do not know. I do know that having people around me while making the show would require paying them with money that the show is not currently making… the Catch-22."

 

What I find most frustrating about the hill that indie podcasters like Joe Friend have to climb is that quite often there are more creative, talented, and organized that celebrities or podcasters working for these large podcast networks. Yet, they do not get the recognition they deserve.

 

Listen The Story of My Friends. Creator/host Joe Friend is a far better interviewer than most of those quasi-celebrities talking about their fashion collection. His guests are ordinary, non-famous people who are fascinating in their right, partially due to our connection to them and also due to Joe Friend's skills as an interviewer. 

 

I think that Joe Friend has discovered that no life is "common." We are all celebrities in our right. Joe Friend realizes that we are all celebrities in our life narratives.