This is episode #12 of Artful Thought, recorded live at the University of San Francisco's KUSF studio, which aired on Saturday, August 17th, 2019.

I’m stoked to be joined by Roadkill who I met 7 months ago at my first weekly meeting as a volunteer at the Coalition on Homelessness. Roadkill is an SF Native who grew up in the  Mission and shares her experience as a formerly unhoused citizen. She’s an adamant community leader for housing and human rights justice, working alongside the Coalition on Homelessness, the production team at Stolen Belonging Project, and among other capacities to urge social change.

We talk about almost everything in this episode, including the Queer community, The Lumineers, mental health, colonialism, how Mayor Breed’s snoozin’ on the job, the fact that Jesus was homeless, her kiddos, as well as the central urgent message of how Roadkill and I met, as she says “we need more solutions for homlessness.”

Nonprofit organizations Roadkill urges folks to learn about and get involved....

*Due to copyright laws, I had to cut the music from the recording, but have embedded my Spotify playlist to accompany the edited cut.

This is episode #11 of Artful Thought, recorded live at the University of San Francisco's KUSF studio, which aired on Saturday, July 27th, 2019. I'm beyond stoked to talk with Paul S. Flores. His roles as a prolific poet, playwright, performance artist, youth arts educator, and USF theater professor continue to inspire and illuminate.

Due to copyright laws, I had to cut the music from the recording, but have embedded my Spotify playlist on KUSF to accompany the edited cut. The music includes legendary and current Latinx artists PALO!, Cimafunk, Celia Cruz, Johnny Pacheco, La Lupe, Obsesión, and the Colorado-based Mocochetes accompanied with their tribute music video to the 1969 Walk-Out Movement, Que Viva la Revolución. 

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Paul’s Future & Ongoing Projects: 

On top of teaching his popular Hip Hop Theater course here at USF, this fall he will also be teaching in SF State’s Theater Department, and two creative writing classes in the Prison Arts Project at Solano, Vacaville State Prison. His portfolio of outreach includes co-founding Youth Speaks, Brave New Voices: National Teen Poetry Slam (now on HBO), founder of Latino Men & Boys Program, former programming director at La Peña Cultural Center  and currently the Paseo Artístico Coordinator at Acción Latina. As a performing artist, he has gone on tour with his creative works and collaborations all over the U.S. as well as internationally, including Cuba, Mexico, El Salvador— and most recently presented at 2019 Latinx Theatre Commons in Miami, Florida. His play, We Have Iré begins touring in December.

Creative Works

Future & Ongoing Acción Latina Events

This is episode number 10 of Artful Thought, recorded live at the University of San Francisco’s KUSF studio, which aired on Saturday, June 29th, 2019. 

This is Part 2, but not the finale, of a music-talk feature about the ongoing celebration and an address to current social issues of the LGBTQIA community. The mix consists of phenomenal new (and newish) artists as well as seminal figures, including Lou Reed, Le Tigre, Ezra Furman, Blood Orange, Girlpool feat Dev Hynes (aka Blood Orange), Dizzy Fae, Courtney Barnett, Ssion, Troye Sivan, RuPaul feat. Kummerspeck, Janelle Monáe, Planningtorock and KUSF currents: Lucille Furs, Amyl + the Sniffers, Soak, and Razteria. 

Between Pride Parts 1 and 2, I do a scattering of commentary on music from decades starting from the  1920s to current, as well as historical/cultural  landmarks, including the “Lavender Scare,” and personal ponderings about the other “Q.”  Both episodes come back to engaging with an ongoing question about gender-sexuality exploration while respecting boundaries that refrain from Queer appropriation.

Also, as chatted about, but not deeply dove into, I referenced some enlightening sources on Queer culture and how the history of LGBTQIA came into the movement as we understand it today. Those references and others are...

or abuse (mental and/or physical) related to your (non)gender and/or sexual identity, please know that you have a community that loves you, supports you, and will enthusiastically help you feel more welcome for whoever you are, and protect you from abusers. 

This is episode number 9 of Artful Thought, recorded live at the University of San Francisco’s KUSF studio, which aired on Saturday, June 22nd, 2019. 

On the live show, I named the first episode of a 2-part special, “All the Pride and No Prejudice”, reverting back to my DJ Mr. Darcy persona as I jammed-and-gabbed out to a playlist made up of Queer Artists, seminal through current to celebrate the month of Pride. The playlist is chalked full of fantastical artists, starting with Ma Rainey, Lesley Gore, Liberace, Queen, Tracy Chapman, Sylvester, RuPaul featuring Martha Wash, Jobriath, Elton John vs. Pnau, George Michael, David Bowie, The Internet, and Vampire Weekend. In mic breaks, I talk about each artist and related LGBTQIA issues from past to present. Between Pride Parts 1 and 2, I do a scattering of commentary on music from decades starting from the 1920s to current, as well as historical/cultural  landmarks, including the “Lavender Scare,” and personal ponderings about the other “Q.”  Both episodes come back to engaging with an ongoing question about gender-sexuality exploration while respecting boundaries that refrain from Queer appropriation.

Due to copyright laws, I had to cut the music from the recording, but have included my archived Pride Part 1 playlist to accompany the edited cut. 

What is poetry? Poetry can be anything. Fellow Poet-Writer, Abhay Shetty and I break down this cryptic question and answer a bit further. One of the things that inspires me most about Abhay, as a writer (and as a human in general) is how he strives to peacefully cruise with the flow of circumstances that unfold outside of his control. Which as you'll hear in this episode, is something I struggle with on the daily, if not hourly, basis. 

We dig into the rituals of a writer, in discipline and in enjoyment, the importance of balancing writing and reading, how to turn anger into calmness in the process of creative works, and how to stick with or leave a certain rhythm. Abhay shares his fascination, saying “I get to serve as a medium for something to travel from the unknown to the known world onto the page”, and always looks forward to the mystical act of writing. We also talk on the restraint from comparing ourselves to writers who have reached success by a certain age, initial perceptions of poetry between his childhood education in Mumbai, India and mine in Fair Grove, Missouri, and the dangers of overthinking. He urges listeners to head towards a book of poetry if you’re still unsure about the genre, as it can lead to surprising tools of self-knowledge.

The poems recited or mentioned in this broadcast were from books...

*And, if you haven’t already, Abhay recommends folks to check out works by Sufi poets, Hafiz (or Hafez) and Rumi.

Thanks times infinity to Abhay for sharing so much of his process and relationship to the art and practice of writing. And a special thanks and music credit to Mark Allred.

This is episode #8 of Artful Thought, recorded live at the University of San Francisco's KUSF studio, which aired on Saturday, June 15th, 2019.

This is episode #7 of Artful Thought, recorded live at the University of San Francisco's KUSF studio, which aired on Saturday, May 25th, 2019. My guest is California native, Rachelle Rosegold, who is a savant and lover of various audio-sound realms, where her mission is “Combining communication with innovative audio to create social change.” We chat about Rachelle’s upbringing in a family of musicians, starting out in L.A. with her 3 sisters in a Pop Quartet, leading up to her journey as a vocalist, songwriter, podcast producer, sound engineer, Foley Artist, and DJ among other roles that she plays.

Rachelle has tread a great deal in experimental sound projects, where she says she has “seen the power of sound and audio in people’s eyes and how transformative it can be.” She takes us through the many areas of the sound and audio, including live, audio production, new audio/digital workspaces (including at-home production), and mixing and mastering as the final step of audio production.

As women whose paths crossed in the audio world, we shift to delving heavily into the questions and answers as to why on earth women only make up 5% of the professional audio world, and how the community as a whole needs to dismantle biased perceptions about gender through education, dialogue, and a shared goal of equal opportunity. We approach the issues of female identity and the gender gap in workspaces from a personal and global perspective. The root of the problem begins with ingrained undertones of a societal gendering of values— which in stark contrast to men, values women for how they look rather than what they do. Rachelle points out “We’re not even aware of the stigmas that are projected onto us” when reviewing statistics and commentary from an academic journal. Through a combination of our researched sources and personal frustrations with gender inequality, the message iterated is a need to dismantle certain perceptions about gender before gendered power structures can truly shift.  

Also, make sure to tune into Rachelle's KUSF show, Levels and Luster on Fridays 1:30-3pm PST, and check out her 2018 Self-Titled EP.

For more info on how to help dismantle the audio world's gender disparity, please reference...

Mega thanks to Rachelle for waking up this early on a holiday weekend and dishing out her wisdoms and kindred artsy juju to myself and the sea of radio wave dwellers! 

I'm gigantically honored to talk with Ayasha Tripp on this week's episode. Ayasha is a Writer, Educator, Producer, Creative Activist, and I came across her in the stellar podcast, The Seeds You Sow which she hosts and produces here at the KUSF studio. In the myriad hats she wears, she always dons the urgency and importance of social justice that relies on a willingness to keep talking, listening, learning and in turn, changing our lives for the better.  She's an extra special guest, because I'm not sure if my show would exist without her guidance back in the spring of 2018 where she led a 2 hour podcast workshop which influenced me  to start my own show. And what draws me to Ayasha most is how she wears so many hats, as a podcaster, producer, activist, film, media and theatre savant, and all of which come around to highlight the value of writing, sharing, and being supportive of causes that create positive social change.

In our talk, she reflects on the impact of the storytellers in her family, the importance of reading writers like Langston Hughes, Zora Neale Hurston, and learning about the history of Oakland’s Black Panther Party, acknowledging these historical figures and movements as paving the way for her own artistic and academic endeavors. She also takes us through the ups, downs, middles, and any other directions taken in the ever-capricious relationship that artists have with the work that pushes toward their vision. Most importantly, she comes back around to her conviction for sharing stories in the first place, saying that she wanted to create “stories that empower...that encourage and start social discourse” as well as giving advice to “be brave and bold enough in order to really pursue what makes you happy.”

Roles, works, and ways to follow and support Ayasha in her various projects...

This is episode #5 and the second live recording of Artful Thought at the University of San Francisco's KUSF studio, which aired on Saturday, May 11th, 2019. A USF Alumnus and Development Assistant at San Francisco’s nonprofit organization, No Bully, Génesis Barraza delves into the Kindness Revolution which they describe as a call for social change that has to be created through collaboration, compassion and equity. They share their own experience of childhood bullying in Miami, Florida, and reflect on the impact of afterschool programs which introduced them to nonprofit organizations and the power of community outreach. They elaborate on how both hard work and treating people with compassion— values first instilled by their mother, then later reinforced by educators and other community leaders— have informed their collegiate accomplishments and have led up to the current role they now fill at No Bully. Gen details the nonprofit organization’s mission, which is to help eradicate bullying and in a non punitive approach that involves problem-solving with students (who are either the target or the source of bullying) alongside their teachers, parents, guardians, and other adult leaders in order to dismantle the school-to-prison pipeline. No Bully has a 90% success rate in elimination of bullying, while also addressing cyber bullying, in the 326 schools and over 200,000 students they’ve served. Gen emphasizes that bullying is an epidemic, about one in three students are targets of bullying, and that there is an urgent need for nonprofits like No Bully and community members alike to step in and be a part of the Kindness Revolution now. 

Connect with Gen on how to get involved with No Bully, and to learn more about cyber bully prevention, visit Power Of Zero. Make sure to follow No Bully on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.

*Profuse Gratitude to Gen! The light they carry and their work are truly inspirational and urgently needed to help shift the world into more compassionate and inclusive communities.

Photo by Jaime Borschuk

Lily Sloane, host of Radical Advice at BFF.fm, chats about her beginning through present views on therapy and her role as a Psychotherapist. She delves into the problem of transparency in the field of therapy, and offers insights into how the negative connotation of the term/meaning of ‘judgment’ can get in the way of having honest, healthy relationships with ourselves and others. She posits that therapists as well as their clients (and folks in general) need to work toward unpacking judgements to find out how and why they shape certain social perceptions, and what that might reveal about ourselves. 

Learn more about and/or connect with Lily...  Listen to her show live on Tuesdays from 10am to noon, and Tweet her questions in search of radical advice, or submit questions on RA's homepage. Also, check out her past podcast A Therapist Walks Into a Bar.

*PS....I made a rookie mistake and forgot to press the ole play button for the first hour of our live conversation... Hope you caught it when it aired, and if you didn't, my apologies. In a nutshell re-enactment that won't do it justice but is better than nothin'-- we delved pretty deeply into the process of podcasting in terms of craft, content, creative audio composition, editing, genre, and several things in between. We especially addressed the subject of gender inequality in the audio world, where only 5% of production in audio/media is produced by women. Lily dropped an invaluable toolkit of storytelling in radio/podcast resources if you’re looking to create your own podcast but need some more direction in how to get started...

Chari and Darcy originally recorded this interview with British DJ and podcaster, Jon Carroll, in October of 2018. They discuss music, the Arts, and personal stories about creative minds struggling with inner Dementors- namely with mental health and addiction. Check out Jon's radio show, @Jon_Digital and his podcast, The Hangout.