The Kray Twins

This episode will be available to listen to for free on 22nd June 2026. You can listen to it right away by subscribing to Noiser+. Head to www.noiser.com/subscriptions for more information.

Ronnie and Reggie Kray were a vicious pair of gangsters who somehow cultivated an air of charm and 60s cool. They were criminals who attracted celebrities like Jackie Collins and Judy Garland to the clubs they ran; murderers who became folk heroes in London's East End.

But how did two boys from poverty-stricken post-war London come to rule the capital's underworld? Who were Reggie and Ronnie to the people who knew them, and to each other? And what caused their carefully constructed criminal empire to come crashing down around them?

This is a Short History Of the Kray Twins.

A Noiser podcast production. Hosted by John Hopkins. With thanks to Kate Beal Blyth, a documentary filmmaker and co-author of The Krays: The Prison Years.