Today, the woman being El Perro del Mar, Sarah Assbring, goes from subject of this podcast to a guest, as she joins me in celebration of the 20th anniversary of Spiritualized’s 2001 album ‘Let It Come Down’. We talk about how the album shook up Sarah’s life during a period where she had walked away from performing as a singer-songwriter, how the ambition of the record continues to inspire her, the incredible scope of the album’s orchestrations and emotions, the relationship between the album and religiosity, how Sarah has found her own version of the wall of sound used on this album and how she still harbours ambitions to create a record with a similar scope.

Today spellbinding singer-songwriter-doctor Sophie Payten aka Gordi joins me to dive into the world of Bon Iver’s 2016 game changer ‘22, A Million’. We dig into how Sophie feels about frequent comparisons between her and Bon Iver, how this album upended what people thought of as Bon Iver’s sound, different interpretations of the album’s opening line ‘It might be over soon’, what it was like for Sophie to work with this album’s co-producer and mixer on her latest record, the unpronounceable track names and how she ended up singing with Bon Iver on The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon. Plus, we chat about Sophie’s new single, a duet with friend of the show Alex Lahey about my favorite dive bar, Dinos in East Nashville.

Australian comedy legend Colin Lane (Lano and Woodley) is a self-proclaimed sceptic when it comes to people’s deep emotional connection to pop stars, but he proves a game guest on this week’s podcast, as he and I mark Elton John’s first appearance on the show by talking about ‘Goodbye Yellow Brick Road’. We get into the ins and outs of Elton’s partnership with Bernie Taupin, how much the songs reflect Bernie’s point of view over Elton’s, Colin’s own insights on how to keep a creative partnership together over multiple decades, the beautiful ‘naffness’ of Elton’s music, whether it’s becoming more acceptable to sing explicitly about same sex relationships in pop music and a great rollicking chat about the Elton biopic Rocket Man and why we feel like it was far superior than Queen biopic Bohemian Rhapsody.

Today one Australia’s most compelling artists, Mo’Ju, joins me for a celebration of the love child of Raymond Chandler and the Cookie Monster, Tom Waits, and his classic 1978 album ‘Blue Valentine’. We talk about the Tom Waits musical universe, how Waits uses a clearly defined persona to keep his private life private, the film noir sensibility that pervades Waits’ lyrics, how Mo’Ju chased the sound of Waits’ records in her early music, how Waits made the grotesque and the mundane beautiful, the different definitions of authenticity in art, double standards around lyrical content for different types of artists and much more.

Today music journalist (People, Rolling Stone) and co-host of the Rivals podcast Jordan Runtagh joins me from New York City to finally tackle one of our white whales - The Beach Boys immortal classic ‘Pet Sounds’. Yes, somehow we are in year eight of the show without anyone doing the record. Never fear, we get into it in some detail today, from the background of the record and Brian Wilson’s shift to non-touring creative genius, the intra-family fights between Brian and Mike Love, the contrasts between Pet Sounds and the Beatles' Sgt Pepper, the starkness of the lyrics, the contributions of the Wrecking Crew and Jordan’s experiences interviewing Brian Wilson and how this album helped him connect with his father.

Today we’re bringing you a fascinating conversation with Batwoman’s Nicole Kang on country icon Patsy Cline’s ‘Sentimentally Yours’, the last album the legendary singer recorded before her tragically premature death at age 30. Nicole tells the story of how Cline’s music formed part of the tapestry of her childhood and became an essential shibboleth of her relationship with her taciturn immigrant father and spoke to his relationship with his adopted home country. Nicole tells the story of discovering the album anew as an adult in the midst of heartbreak and how it led her to open a new dialogue with her father about her childhood. We talk about identity, assimilation, direct emotion, the idea of Nicole playing Patsy on Broadway, the mystique around artists who died young and Nicole performs a poem from her one-woman show that speaks to the impact of Patsy Cline’s music on her.

Today New York bred Nashville based singer-songwriter Jillette Johnson joins me on the eve of her new album release, to discuss Patty Griffin’s game-changing genre-defying second album Flaming Red. Like Bob Dylan, Patty shocked a lot of people when she ‘went electric’ on this record, and we get into why this album was different to her folky debut, the reactions upon its release, why it’s impossible to put Patty in a genre box, how Jillette has been inspired to expand and evolve her sound on her new record and more. We dig into seminal songs like ‘One Big Love’, ‘Tony’ and more, the different lyrical modes Patty deploys across the record, and the contributions from producer Jay Joyce and the other stellar musicians who played on the record.

Today, legendary songwriter and Semisonic frontman Dan Wilson joins me to talk about the Joni Mitchell masterpiece that isn’t ‘Blue’ - 1976's ‘Hejira’. We talk about where the title came from, how a teenage infatuation led Dan to Joni, why Jaco Pastorius is like Hannibal Lector, the album’s lyrical themes of groundedness vs freedom, key songs like Amelia and Furry Sings the Blues and how Dan’s relationship with the album changed when he started writing his own songs.

We’re kicking off 2021 with the legendary producer, guitarist and singer/songwriter Daniel Lanois, talking about one of the greatest debut albums of all time, The Jimi Hendrix Experience’s 1967 barnstormer ‘Are You Experienced?’ We delve into Daniel’s discovery of the record while he was a teenage record producer in Canada, how the album opened up his imagination, the idiosyncrasies and nuances of Hendrix’s guitar playing technique and how it’s influenced Lanois’ own approach to the instrument, Mitch Mitchell’s jazz influenced drumming and some of the studio innovations that made the album special. Daniel also talks about reimagining ‘May This Be Love’ with Emmylou Harris when they recorded it for her classic album ‘Wrecking Ball’. Plus I pick Daniel’s brain about the making of my favorite Willie Nelson album ‘Teatro’, which he produced and was the subject of a previous episode of this show.