The WriteLion podcasts are recorded roughly once a month at Stone Soup studios. It’s a beautiful studio and as is the LeftLion way, cobbled together by various volunteers. Beatmaster Bill is my usual fait accompli but for my second podcast, Milk – a talented local musician who is named as such because he randomly appears on everyone’s doorstep – kindly helped over at Rubberneck Studios.

As is often the case with journalism, it is the nuts and bolts which irk the most. Editing together a podcast is about as enjoyable as transcribing an interview. You have to listen out for pauses, check for anything that could potentially lead to slander or unfair offence, put in all of your inserts and then edit together so that it flows naturally. Then you have to keep playing back the podcast to make sure the order of guests is linear.

When I first started recording them, I’d get a guest in every Tuesday night and then piece together a month’s worth of material. It was time consuming and created endless wasted hours in the studio waiting for a recording opportunity with the other podcasters. Now I have an allocated evening which enables me to book guests in advance into specified time slots. Although this has made matters a lot easier and freed up more time, the podcasts never get edited together in one evening and so I find myself downloading them to my memory stick and then pestering various friends with the latest IT equipment to help me out. Fortunately I have patient, IT-savvy friends!

I’m hoping my second podcast sounds a little better than the first and that I don’t come across as too arrogant, smug or overtly polite. And if I do, well there’s not really much I can do about it. I’m really delighted with the line up for this one. Please see below. If you are related to writing in any shape or form, please get in contact and let’s get smug together.

Listen to WriteLion 2#

• Marion Bell discusses how the Liverpool poets influenced her work and her dislike of pomp in poetry.
  David Belbin reads from his latest novel The Pretender and gives an insight into running the NTU MA in Creative Writing
  Aly Stoneman and Milk perform Mermaids
  Aly Stoneman and Killing Jar author Nicola Monaghan discuss life at the Nottingham Writers’ Studio and November’s Word of Mouth event
  Liv Torc performs Mr Bumblebee which was one of the highlights from the Phased and Confused tent at Summer Sundae.
  Al Needham discusses Todger Talk, his 2008 sex blog of the year and why it is impossible to pull in Nottingham
  Rebecca Dakin discusses her transition from escort to author with details of her book The Girlfriend Experience

No room for music this time around as the podcast weighs in at a mammoth 1hr 23 mins and breaks all our rules about uploading files. But it flows beautifully and the guests are carefully selected around two themes. The NWS and the NTU MA in Creative Writing. Now time to email those edited out that they will definitely be in the next one. Promise…