Sounds Like A Cult Amanda Montell & Isa Medina

Catch Amanda back on tour this summer in Chicago, Minneapolis, and Seattle!!

Friday, July 12: The Big Magical Cult Show at Park West in Chicago, IL (buy tickets here!)

Saturday, July 13: The Big Magical Cult Show at Cedar Cultural Center in Minneapolis, MN (buy tickets here!)

July 29: The Age of Magical Overthinking book talk at Elliott Bay Book Company in Seattle, WA (free!)

Imagine you’re a little kid and your parents are actually your bosses. Now imagine that, as your professional superiors, your parents' job is to engineer and exploit every single precious moment of your childhood for millions of people on the internet to behold, all in exchange for clicks, comments, and ad dollars. Sometimes they prank you, embarrass you, and/or produce a whole ‘nother sibling purely as a career move. Now imagine if your parents manage to figure out at some point that this dynamic is power abusive and manipulative, and they decide to stop sharing your face with the world, scads of strangers who’ve gotten parasocially attached to you since before you were born start flipping the f*** out. Such is the uncanny experience of a kid born into the cult of family vloggers, this week’s culty a$$ subject, featuring journalist Fortesa Latifi, who is currently writing a book about parenthood and content creation. 

Follow us on IG @soundslikeacultpod @amanda_montell

To order Amanda's new book, The Age of Magical Overthinking: Notes on Modern Irrationality, click here :) To subscribe to her new Magical Overthinkers podcast click here!

Thank you to our sponsors, who make this show possible:


Visit BetterHelp.com/CULT today to get 10% off your first month.
Dipsea is offering an extended 30-day free trial when you go to DipseaStories.com/cult. 
Go to the App Store or Google Play store and download the FREE Ibotta app to start earning cash back and use code CULT.
Go to stopscooping.com/SLAC and enter promocode SLAC to save an EXTRA $50 on any Litter-Robot bundle.  

Listen to Isa Medina NEW PODCAST – I'm Right You're Wrong on Spotify or Apple Podcasts, or wherever! Isa Medina is the Former Host and Co-Creator of Sounds Like A Cult Podcast. Follow Isa on IG @isaamedinaa for info about her live stand up comedy and her new podcast @ethicalgirlies.

The episode preview ended at 23 min 40 seconds if you want to start where we left off and finish the episode 3 

Right or Wrong? Nepo Babies: This week on I'M RIGHT YOU'RE WRONG, your gorgeous hosts, Lydia Keating and Isa Medina, debate nepo babies. Is it ethically right or wrong for nepo babies to have easy access to coveted careers just because their parent(s) work in the industry? Lydia argues that nepo babies are WRONG. Isa argues that they are RIGHT. They discuss the different types of nepo babies out there (it’s not all Hollywood, honey!) and if there is even an ideal way to be one… After they debate the extremes, in classic fashion, they open their dialogue up to a broader and more honest convo. Are THEY nepo babies?? (no, lol but they do get real about their own privileges). Lydia ponders creativity—is it something innate to the fibers of your being? Was Reese Witherspoon’s son born to be a DJ in the West Village? Isa talks about her boy drama and how men should never complain about being tired. Lydia acknowledges her annual spring/summer glow up. Both hosts agree that ebbing and flowing in one’s hotness is wayyyyy better than being consistently hot all year round, which would actually be so boring. And finally, they talk about WHO is to BLAME for nepotism? (and it’s not the nepo babies or their parents! It’s something far more insidious…) Enjoy the episode! Love you so much. 

Catch Amanda back on tour this summer in Chicago, Minneapolis, and Seattle!!

Friday, July 12: The Big Magical Cult Show at Park West in Chicago, IL (buy tickets here!)

Saturday, July 13: The Big Magical Cult Show at Cedar Cultural Center in Minneapolis, MN (buy tickets here!)

July 29: The Age of Magical Overthinking book talk at Elliott Bay Book Company in Seattle, WA (free!)

WE TRIED OUR BEST not to get too roasty in this long overdue episode, where host Amanda and her special guest, music journalist and host of the Songs My Ex Ruined podcast Melissa Locker, examine the cult of jam bands from Phish to the Grateful Dead. Where freewheeling guitar solos, acid trips, tape-trading, endless noodling, and oodles of exclusive lingo reign supreme, this world of die-hard fans who dedicate their whole life and personality to following their faves around the country is nothing short of a musical religion. Jam bands are definitely, ahem, a culty vibe to say the least... the real question is how destructive are they?? Tune in to this lol-worthy chat as Amanda and Melissa try and figure that out. 

Follow us on IG @soundslikeacultpod @amanda_montell

To order Amanda's new book, The Age of Magical Overthinking: Notes on Modern Irrationality, click here :) To subscribe to her new Magical Overthinkers podcast click here!

Thank you to our sponsors, who make this show possible:


Head to Squarespace.com for a free trial, and when you’re ready to launch, go to https://www.squarespace.com/CULT to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain.
Go to the App Store or Google Play store and download the FREE Ibotta app to start earning cash back and use code CULT.

Catch Amanda back on tour this summer in Chicago, Minneapolis, and Seattle!!

Friday, July 12: The Big Magical Cult Show at Park West in Chicago, IL (buy tickets here!)

Saturday, July 13: The Big Magical Cult Show at Cedar Cultural Center in Minneapolis, MN (buy tickets here!)

July 29: The Age of Magical Overthinking book talk at Elliott Bay Book Company in Seattle, WA (free!)

Time to Milky Jelly™ cleanse your souls, culties. If you were alive in 2017, and anywhere near our same millennial pink corner of the internet, then you KNEW what a Glossier girl was. The emblem of relatable-but-aspirational coolness helmed by cult leader… ahem, CEO… Emily Weiss (of The Hills fame) was so much more than a cosmetics line. Glossier was a lifestyle, a uniform, an identity template, a cultural phenomenon, a religion? Come on, those pink bubble wrap pouches??? If you had one, it meant you’d reached a certain kind of ~enlightenment~. Alongside the likes of other rare brands like Starbucks and SoulCycle, Glossier was a ”cult-followed” company through in through… but was something more sinister lurking underneath? Why did the brand take off as astronomically as it did? And what is the status of the “cult” now? At long last, host Amanda is (over)analyzing the spiritual movement that is Glossier with none other than beauty journalist Marisa Meltzer, author of the New York Times bestselling book Glossy: Ambition, Beauty, and the Inside Story of Emily Weiss's Glossier (out now in paperback!).

Follow us on IG @soundslikeacultpod @amanda_montell

To order Amanda's new book, The Age of Magical Overthinking: Notes on Modern Irrationality, click here :) To subscribe to her new Magical Overthinkers podcast click here!

Thank you to our sponsors, who make this show possible:


Earn points by paying rent right now when you go to joinbilt.com/cult.
Visit BetterHelp.com/CULT today to get 10% off your first month.
Dipsea is offering an extended 30-day free trial when you go to DipseaStories.com/cult. 

First of all, we are downright GIDDY to share two iconic voices on this week’s episode—not only our expert guest, culture reporter (and personal hero of Amanda’s) Anne Helen Petersen, but also Sounds Like A Cult’s very own intern (actually recently promoted to coordinator 😎), Reese Oliver!!! Speaking of new voices, team SLAC has been cooking up additional cult leaders to add to the hosting rotation later this year, and Amanda is v excited not to have to converse all by herself 😂 In all seriousness, everyone at team SLAC has been feeling a lot of gratitude lately, and we want to thank you listeners for sticking around for this wacky roller coaster ride. NOW, onto introducing the “cult” of tradwives. Short for “traditional wife,” this disturbing cultural craze marries idealizations of biblical womanhood with romantic social media aesthetics to create a freaky wave of politically regressive influencers, who’ve rejected feminism in favor of oppression… but make it "cute?" In between churning their own butter and brushing their naturally birthed kids’ hair, tradwives evangelize a host of ideologies so racist and sexist, at first it seems like a bit… and then it’s not. SCARY!!!! Join Reese, Anne, and Amanda down the rabbit hole, as they attempt to puzzle out this confounding modern-day “cult.”

Follow us on IG @soundslikeacultpod @amanda_montell

To order Amanda's new book, The Age of Magical Overthinking: Notes on Modern Irrationality, click here :) To subscribe to her new Magical Overthinkers podcast click here!

Thank you to our sponsors, who make this show possible:


Get 20% off your first order of Liquid I.V. when you go to LiquidIV.com and use code CULT at checkout
Go to stopscooping.com/SLAC and enter promocode SLAC to save an EXTRA $50 on any Litter-Robot bundle.  
Dipsea is offering an extended 30 day free trial when you go to DipseaStories.com/cult. 
Head to Squarespace.com for a free trial, and when you’re ready to launch, go to https://www.squarespace.com/CULT to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain.

Hi Culties 3 Isa Medina here, former host and co-creator of Sounds Like A Cult! With a special announcement.... My New Podcast is Coming! I'M RIGHT YOU'RE WRONG hosted by Isa Medina & Lydia Keating. Click to subscribe on Spotify, Apple or wherever you get your pods. If you want to stay up to date with me, my comedy, live shows & my new podcast, follow me on my instagram @isaamedinaa 33  Follow the podcast on IG @ethicalgirlies