ESOPUS

Each issue of ESOPUS features an audio CD with brand-new music inspired by a particular theme. For the forthcoming ESOPUS 23 (on newsstands in May), the CD explores the subject of "Close Calls." For it, we invited 13 musical acts to pick a close-call moment from their lives — ranging from near-death experiences to romantic misfires — that they've never been able to shake. For this podcast, ESOPUS editor Tod Lippy talks with four contributors to the CD — Anthony LaMarca (The War on Drugs), Darren Solomon (Science for Girls), Jo Lawry, and The Kickstand Band — about the songs they created and the near-miss moments that inspired them.

The ESOPUS 23 "CLOSE CALLS" CD also includes new tracks by Kristin Andreassen, The Big Bright, Gabriel Birnbaum, Dollshot, Coling Gilmore, Lemolo, Trees Take Ease, Grant Widmer, and YC the Cynic.

More information about ESOPUS 23 and its CD is available on our website: http://www.esopus.org

Each fall, ESOPUS creates a limited-edition artwork for its Premium subscribers. This fall's edition, "Three Types of Reading Ambiguity," is a multidisciplinary collaboration between musician Charles Bissell and contemporary artist Beth Campbell.

A layered reflection on the differing meanings of “original” and “copy” in the visual arts and music — and a fascinating glimpse into the creative processes of Bissell and Campbell — it includes a custom-designed audio cassette containing a brand-new track from Bissell's band The Wrens on one side and a sonic interpretation of the song by Campbell on the other, as well as a 17 x 30" archival print of a new drawing by Campbell, a foldout poster of Bissell's lyrics for the song in their original format, and a download key to access music, videos, and other related material.

This podcast, featuring interviews with Bissell and Campbell as well as excerpts from both tracks, documents in depth the process behind the edition, from Bissell’s initial conception for the song, written nearly seven years ago, to the final mixing of Campbell’s version in Bissell’s basement studio in late September.

To get a copy of the edition by becoming a Premium subscriber to ESOPUS, visit https://secure.esopus.org/store/product/24

This podcast offers a preview of the forthcoming issue of ESOPUS, the nonprofit arts publication based in New York City. It includes three interviews with contributors to ESOPUS 22: MEDICINE: Thomas Juncher Jensen, an interior designer who has designed "the perfect waiting room" based on our subscribers' suggestions; acclaimed contemporary artist Melissa Meyer, who created one of the 6 artists' projects for the issue, and Anne Watts, the founder and lead singer of Baltimore-based band Boister, who contrbuted a track for the issue's included CD, which features songs inspired by bodily organs. The podcast closes with Watts's demo for Boister's song, "Mr. Spleen."

ESOPUS 22: MEDICINE will be on newsstands in early May.