Acast & Mushroom Group partner for inaugural Melbourne Podcast Festival

Mushroom Group, Frontier Touring, Acast and Schwartz Media have united to announce the launch of the inaugural Melbourne Podcast Festival this July.

Taking place over the weekend of Friday July 30 – Sunday August 1, the Melbourne Podcast Festival will seek to celebrate the country’s finest podcasts and the creators, content and audiences involved in the medium.

The festival will see people from over 25 podcasts gather at South Yarra’s Village Cinema Jam Factory to record episodes in front of live audiences, with the lineup consisting of a range of genres from news and sports to comedy, current affairs, food, science, beauty, lifestyle and beyond.

Andrew Denton’s Better Off Dead, 7AM, AFL Exchange, The Culture with Osman Faruqi, Australian True Crime with Meshel Laurie and Emily Webb and The Grattan Podcast are already on board with the event.

Mushroom Group CEO Matt Gudisnki said that the Melbourne Podcast Festival would aim to become an ongoing annual event on Melbourne’s festival calendar.

“We’re thrilled to be launching a new annual event from the Mushroom family showcasing some amazing podcasters,” Gudinski said.

“We believe this festival will become a mainstay in the Melbourne events calendar moving forward.”

Acast Australia and New Zealand’s content director Guy Scott-Wilson said that the company was thrilled to be a part of the inaugural festival.

“As the home of independent podcasting in Australia, Acast has the privilege of working with many of the country’s biggest and best podcasts. We are passionate about helping our creators to find new ways to engage with their audiences, and passionate about supporting this dynamic, emerging industry,” Scott-Wilson said.

“We’re thrilled to be the principal sponsor for the inaugural Melbourne Podcast Festival – after the year we’ve all had, it’s great to be able to look forward to the return of live entertainment and to see the breadth of Australian podcasting celebrated in this way.”

Tickets for all events go on sale from 1pm AEST Monday June 21, with further details being available via Frontier Touring.

Melbourne Podcast Festival

7AM with Ruby Jones
AFL Exchange
Australian Birth Stories with Sophie Walker
Australian True Crime with Meshel Laurie and Emily Webb
Beauty IQ Uncensored
Better Off Dead with Andrew Denton
How I Work with Amantha Imber
It’s A Lot with Abbie Chatfield
Loose Units: The Podcast with Paul Verhoeven and John Verhoeven
Plumbing the Death Star with Jackson B Baly, Joel L Zammit and Joel Duscher
SIZZLETOWN’s Tony Martin and Matt Dower in conversation with Astrid Edwards
Somehow Related with Glenn Robbins and Dave O’Neil
The Chaser Report with Dom Knight and Charles Firth
The Culture with Osman Faruqi
The Gargle with Alice Fraser
The Grattan Podcast
The Junkees with Dave O’Neil and Kitty Flanagan
The Pop Test with Andy Matthews and Alasdair Tremblay-Birchall
This Working Life with Lisa Leong
Too Much Tully with Tully Smyth
Triple Bi-Pass with Ruby Mountford, Amelia Arnold and Alex Morris
Too Peas In A Podcast with Mandy Hose and Kate Jones
We Want To Be Better with Annie Nolan and Bianka Ismailovski
Welcome to Patchwork with Dion Factor, Josh Porter and Christian Pisasale