Welcome to The Big Smoke Variety Show!

This week, we throw open the doors to Variety Week and descend into the wonderfully strange — from apprentice magicians wrestling with the laws of reality to historic London loos wrestling with the laws of plumbing.

First, fan-favourite trainee magicians The Strange Brothers return from the Xander Eldrick Institute of Illusion, Divination and, of course, Dance. This time, Salazar Strange and Craig attempt one of magic’s most iconic feats: sawing a man in half. What could possibly go wrong? Quite a lot, as it turns out.

Then, once the blood has been mopped up and the Wi-Fi re-connected, we head back out into London with Rachel Cole-Wilkin of London Loo Tours.

This week, Rachel takes us beneath Covent Garden to explore one of the capital’s most atmospheric public conveniences. Tucked beneath the west side of St Paul’s Church, these underground loos come complete with iron gates, turnstiles, fading grandeur, old-fashioned scales, 1960s byelaws, and a rich aroma that leaves little doubt about what lies below.

We’re also trying something new, with episodes now coming to you every single week. So stay tuned next Thursday for more adventurous audio from across The Big Smoke.

So whether you’re attempting impossible magic or simply looking for somewhere to spend a penny, remember: there’s always something unexpected waiting beneath the surface — and we’ll keep finding it together here in The Big Smoke.

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Links

🚻 London Loo Tours

🍸 Cellar Door

🍷 WC Bars

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Chapters

(00:00) Intro & Show Menu

(01:55) Strange Brothers

(13:13) London Loo Tours

(22:43) Outro

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Credits

Hosted & Executive Produced by Kevin Bennett

Produced & Edited by Alex Graham

Original Music by Giles Terera

Music arranged and played by Joseph Atkins

The Strange Brothers written and performed by Jamie Sandersfield and Matthew Nicholson

Welcome to The Big Smoke Variety Show!

This week, we log on and step into the complex world of China’s internet, a digital landscape shaped by innovation, censorship, and the ever-shifting boundaries of freedom and control.

Kevin is joined by journalist and author Yi-Ling Liu to discuss her new book, The Wall Dancers: Searching for Freedom and Connection on the Chinese Internet. Yi-Ling’s work has appeared in The New York Times Magazine, The New Yorker, Harper’s Magazine, WIRED, and The New York Review of Books and her book has been named a finalist for the 2026 Orwell Prize for Political Writing.

Together, Kevin and Yi-Ling explore the human stories behind one of the most influential digital worlds on the planet. From the Great Firewall and the rise of Chinese social media to hip hop, online censorship, queer communities, tech entrepreneurs, and the strange ‘dance in shackles’ between expression and control. Along the way, Kevin reflects on his own experiences working in China as a theatre director, from touring an English-language production of The Merchant of Venice to directing a Mandarin version of Romeo and Juliet in Beijing. Yi-Ling also shares the personal journey that led her to the book: growing up between Hong Kong and mainland China, encountering censorship for the first time as a teenage intern at China Daily, studying at Yale, reporting on Chinese hip hop in Chengdu.

We’re also trying something new, with episodes now coming to you every week. Join us next Thursday for more adventurous audio from across The Big Smoke, including more magical mayhem from fan-favourite apprentice magicians The Strange Brothers, and another wonderfully unexpected trip to the loo with the London Loo Lady.

So whether you’re scrolling through your feed, peering behind the firewall, or wondering how much of the internet you truly understand, remember: behind every screen are human stories, invisible boundaries, and people trying to make sense of an increasingly connected world — just as we do here in The Big Smoke.

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Links

💻 Yi-Ling Liu

📕 The Wall Dancers

📝 Recommended Journalists: Viola Zhou, Sarah Wu and Vivian Wang

📚 Recommended Book "I Deliver Parcels in Beijing," by Hu Anyan.

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Chapters

(00:00) Intro & Show Menu

(01:34) Yi-Ling Liu Interview

(1:00:09) Outro

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Credits

Hosted & Executive Produced by Kevin Bennett

Produced & Edited by Alex Graham

Original Music by Giles Terera

Music arranged and played by Joseph Atkins

Welcome to The Big Smoke Variety Show!

This week we wander away from the ordinary and into a world of folklore, hidden histories, and strange things waiting to be found — from shapeshifting spirits in the north of England to forgotten objects emerging from the River Thames.

First, in a brand new segment, Stories You Haven’t Heard, Kevin takes us to Northumberland for the tale of the Hedley Kow — a mischievous boggart-like trickster said to haunt the village of Hedley. Sometimes appearing as a goblin, a horse or a voice at the window, the Hedley Kow was less a terrifying monster than a deeply annoying force of chaos, delighting in confusion, embarrassment, and a good mocking laugh.

Through tales of milkmaids, servant girls, unlucky young lovers, startled midwives, and one wonderfully optimistic old woman who finds a mysterious pot on the road, we explore the curious place these stories hold in our imagination. Are they warnings? Explanations? Entertainment? Or simply a reminder that the world has always felt a little stranger than it first appears?

Then we return to the banks of the Thames, where resident Mudlark Sean Clark shares his Latest Find from the foreshore. This time, it’s a beautifully preserved 17th-century trade token, found during a rare low spring tide and untouched for more than 350 years. Marked with the name Paul Badcock, Tower Ditch, 1669, and bearing the image of a ship, the token opens a small but fascinating window into everyday London life near the Tower of London in the late 1600s. With further research planned at the London Archives and Guildhall Library, this tiny halfpenny may still have more of its story to tell.

We’re also trying something new, with episodes now coming to you every single week. So stay tuned next Thursday for more adventurous audio from across The Big Smoke.

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Chapters

(00:00) Intro & Show Menu

(01:38) Stories You Haven’t Heard: The Hedley Kow

(14:03) Sean Clark the Mudlark’s Latest Find

(18:28) Outro

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Credits

Hosted & Executive Produced by Kevin Bennett

Produced & Edited by Alex Graham

Original Music by Giles Terera

Music arranged and played by Joseph Atkins

Stories You Haven’t Heard written and performed by Scott Brooksbank