In early June, I loaded up my recording equipment, and drove to Hillsdale, NY to meet up with Joanna. The last time we saw each other was sixteen years ago when we both lived in NYC and she would crash the East Village Radio recording studio while Ruth and I were live on the air with the Hella Fabulous Show. But, from the way we launched right into our raucous conversation and finished each other’s sentences, you would think we hang out every day. Anyways, Joanna has lived at least 4, or maybe 5, different lives—and while we get into some of that, we mostly focus on the Upper Shire, a magical campsite she built with her partner Barbara. Joanna aka Backroad Jo may live in the rolling hills of the Hudson Valley, but she is definitely still punk rock on the inside. (more links to more about the Upper Shire below).

As hilarious as she is gracious, Joanna made it easy for me to laugh at the technical glitches that came up during this true on-the-road recording session. (FYI—I selected the wrong input settings so I had to get help from Reddit and ultimately YouTube to work out how to fix that in post-production…thank you to the internet for saving this episode from total ruin).

Anyway, this one is a lot of fun, and I invite you to get comfortable, sit back, and listen in.

Links for all things Upper Shire:

Upper Shire booking page on HipCamp

Video about the Upper Shire, featuring Joanna and Barbara

Upper Shire on Instagram

And CLICK HERE to link to all my things.

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