building simple radio
Simplest possible AM receiver that outputs to an 8 ohm speaker:







simulate this circuit &ndash; Schematic created using CircuitLab

This radio has:


extremely poor selectivity
extremely poor sensitivity
extremely poor volume
extremely poor fidelity


It is however, without a doubt, the simplest radio that meets your requirements. It works because the voice coil can pick up RF currents just like an antenna, and these currents will move the diaphragm. It will help to use a very cheap speaker, since these have worse shielding.

You will need to be quite close to the transmitter for it to work however, due to the poor sensitivity. And also far from other transmitters, because it pretty much has no selectivity. Being entirely passive and also being very insensitive, the speaker won't be very loud, and since speakers aren't really intended to be operated in this manner, I'm sure the audio fidelity will be horrible. It is, however, obviously maximally simple.

While not an especially good receiver, it is an instructive example, and it does work. It demonstrates that radios aren't magic, and electromagnetic radiation can interact with just about anything. The only thing you need to receive AM is a detector: anything that responds to current differently in one direction or another.