Talkhouse Podcast

On this week’s Talkhouse Podcast, we’ve got a fantastic chat featuring three boundary-pushing musicians that turns into a lovefest: It’s Daniel Lopatin, better known as Oneohtrix Point Never, along with David Grubbs and Jim O’Rourke, who were known together as Gastr del Sol.

Lopatin has created an incredible body of experimental records over the past 20 or so years. His woozy, sample-heavy early material had him pegged as the inventor of vaporwave, but he never stays in the same musical place very long. He broke through to a different audience with soundtracks for the Safdie brothers’ movies Good Time and Uncut Gems, and Lopatin is also heavily responsible for the sound of The Weeknd’s records, where he’s credited as an executive producer. The tenth Oneohtrix Point Never album, called Again, came out late last year, and once again it found Lopatin utilizing a new set of inspirations, one of which was the post-rock movement of the 1990s, which figures heavily into today’s conversation. More on that in a minute, but first check out “Again,” the title track from the latest Oneohtrix Point Never album.

Featured on that track was none other than Jim O’Rourke, an experimental musician and producer perhaps best known to the pop-music world for working on Wilco’s Yankee Hotel Foxtrot and  A Ghost Is Born. But O’Rourke’s cv is far too vast to dive into here, and the focus of this conversation is his 1990s collaboration with fellow musician David Grubbs in a band called Gastr del Sol. That duo burned bright for a few years, amassing a catalog that’s difficult to pin down, ranging as it does from arch orchestral pop to more rangy, experimental songs. They disbanded in 1998, leaving the world on a high note with their poppiest yet perhaps weirdest set of songs, Camofleur. Gastr del Sol’s legend has only grown in the meantime, and they finally got around to releasing some new-old material just this year, in the form of a combination live album/rarities set called We Have Dozens of Titles. True to their ethos, it’s neither a standard odds and ends package or a greatest hits, but rather combines an excellent live recording—of what turned out to be their final concert—and songs that had been previously orphaned on various compilations. Check out “The Seasons Reverse” here, which is referenced in this chat.

Speaking of this chat… Talkhouse conversations are usually more two-way streets than this one, but it turns out that Daniel Lopatin is a huge Gastr del Sol geek, so he ends up asking most of the questions. He’s got deep-seated opinions and interesting theories on their music: They chat about getting into music, about specific passages in Gastr songs, about the idea of indie-rock as a genre, and about the time Gastr del Sol was asked to license a song for a tentacle porn movie. Oh, and Daniel calls Gastr del Sol’s music trashy. Enjoy.

Thanks for listening to the Talkhouse Podcast, and thanks to Daniel Lopatin, Jim O’Rourke, and David Grubbs for chatting. If you liked what you heard, please follow Talkhouse on your favorite podcasting platform, and check out all the great stuff at Talkhouse.com. This episode was produced by Myron Kaplan, and the Talkhouse theme is composed and performed by the Range. See you next time.

This episode is brought to you by DistroKid. DistroKid makes music distribution fun and easy with unlimited uploads and artists keep 100% of their royalties and earnings. To learn more and get 30% off your first year's membership, visit: distrokid.com/vip/talkhouse

On this week's Talkhouse Podcast we’ve got what might seem like an unlikely pairing, but one that makes sense when you dive into it: Rick Mitarotonda from Goose and M.C. Taylor of Hiss Golden Messenger.

If you’re not into the jam-band world, Goose might not be super familiar to you yet, but in that world, the Connecticut band is absolutely massive, moving from clubs to amphitheaters over the past few years. And while jam bands themselves are pretty common—the barrier to entry isn’t super high—very few have reached these heights, and after a decade Goose already find themselves in the vaunted company of bands like Phish and Dead and Company. It’s kind of obvious why: They are fantastic players, and their songs offer more than just extended noodling. It makes sense that they’re not influenced just by their jam forebears, but by jam-adjacent indie kingpins like Radiohead. And they’ve even got the stamp of approval of Vampire Weekend’s Ezra Koenig, who asked them to cover his band’s song “2021”—and to stretch it out to 20 minutes and 21 seconds. The latest Goose album is Dripfield from 2022, but as you’ll hear in this chat, they’ve got a couple more in the works. Check out their song “Give It Time” right here.

As the primary creative force behind Hiss Golden Messenger, M.C. Taylor has amassed an incredible catalog over the past 15 or so years. He was initially lumped in with the alt-country scene and later with the likes of Will Oldham and Bill Callahan, Hiss records kind of defy categorization, though I should mention that 2019’s Terms Of Surrender was nominated for the Best Americana Album Grammy. Taylor’s latest album as Hiss Golden Messenger is called Jump For Joy, and the title is reflective of what’s inside: It’s looser and more playful and even groove-oriented at moments, a new move but not an unwelcome one for sure. Check out “Sanctuary” right here.

In this chat, Rick and M.C. chat about making studio records versus playing live, and they get into the fundamental question of how songs are written. Answer: It’s different for everybody. They both reflect, oddly, on the Hare Krishna world, and Rick decides that Goose is more like a sitcom or a sports team than a band. Enjoy.

0:00 – Intro

2:48 – Start of the chat

4:04 – What are you listening to right now?

12:05 – Rick’s musical awakening

19:01 – Long songs versus short ones. “It’d be sick to have some short bangers.”

24:36 – Goose’s recent lineup change and how that might affect things.

36:16 – The difficulty of writing new songs while on tour.

Thanks for listening, and thanks to Rick and M.C. for chatting. If you liked what you heard, please follow Talkhouse on your favorite podcasting platform. This episode was produced by Myron Kaplan, and the Talkhouse theme is composed and performed by The Range. See you next time!

This episode is brought to you by DistroKid. DistroKid makes music distribution fun and easy with unlimited uploads and artists keep 100% of their royalties and earnings. To learn more and get 30% off your first year's membership, visit: distrokid.com/vip/talkhouse

On this week’s Talkhouse Podcast we’ve got a pair of songwriters who’ve both been through some tough times and emerged all the better for them: Ruston Kelly and Sasha Alex Sloan.

There was no disguising the fact that Ruston Kelly’s third album, last year’s The Weakness, was deeply informed by his divorce from singer-songwriter Kacey Musgraves, with lines like “My marriage ended and I moved up north to mend.” But the album isn’t weepy or wallowing; in fact, it’s musically the most lively piece of Kelly’s catalog so far, sonically bigger and wider than anything he’s done before. It’s one of those close-one-door-and-other-opens kind of records, at times contemplative—he once cheekily described his music as “self-help rock”—but also not afraid to be playful and catchy.

The other half of today’s conversation is Kelly’s pal Sasha Alex Sloan, whose early career was kind of pop-focused. She had a co-write on a Juice WRLD song and did a huge duet with Sam Hunt that’s alluded to in today’s chat. But in spite of her pop leanings, Sloan’s music always has an undercurrent of self-examination. She left the major label that had released her first two albums recently and fully embraced a more inward-looking style for the new Me Again, which leans toward simplicity more than her past records. It’s still catchy as hell, of course, just with a more mature edge. The album also features a duet with Ruston Kelly on the fading-relationship song “Falling Out Of Like.” Check it out.

In this candid conversation, Kelly and Sloan talk about the vulnerability of making music—and how Sloan is handling the anxiety of putting out a less pop-oriented set of songs. Kelly talks about the pros and cons of a recent stripped-down tour he did, and they both reflect on the challenges of opening for bigger artists. We also get thoughts on nicotine, Shark Tank, and more. Enjoy.

0:00 – Intro

2:22 – Start of the chat

6:40 – On parental TMI

13:37 – Sloan’s concerns about whether her new record is as commercial as her past work

24:05 – Kelly’s recent bare-bones tour, and what he learned

31:50 – "I feel icky talking out financial sh-t as an artist"

41:03 – “There were some 14 year olds there. There are braces happening. I’m up here singing about hardcore drug addiction.”

Thanks for listening to the Talkhouse Podcast, and thanks to Ruston Kelly and Sasha Alex Sloan for chatting. If you liked what you heard, please follow Talkhouse on your favorite podcasting platform, and check out all the other great podcasts in our network. This episode was produced by Myron Kaplan, and the Talkhouse theme is composed and performed by the Range. See you next time!

This episode is brought to you by DistroKid. DistroKid makes music distribution fun and easy with unlimited uploads and artists keep 100% of their royalties and earnings. To learn more and get 30% off your first year's membership, visit: distrokid.com/vip/talkhouse

The inspiration for the pairing on this week's Talkhouse Podcast goes back 40 years, to one of the greatest concert films—maybe the greatest concert film—ever made, Stop Making Sense. We’ve got Jerry Harrison and Carlos Arévalo.

Harrison was of course the keyboard player and sometimes guitarist behind one of the most influential and groundbreaking bands of the 1970s and 80s, Talking Heads. The band’s legacy can’t be overstated; they made eight incredible studio albums before splitting up in 1991, they’re in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, and their impact on both other musicians and the culture at large has been enormous. And in addition to all of those studio records, Talking Heads—along with director Jonathan Demme—made Stop Making Sense, the audacious live document of the band from 1983. The film was lovingly restored for its 40th anniversary last year, with both the visuals and audio painstakingly refreshed—the latter in no small part due to Harrison’s efforts. Celebrating this reissue has been the closest thing to a Talking Heads reunion that the world has ever seen—or likely will see. They’ve gotten onstage together to talk about it, but the likelihood of them playing together again seems very slim. But during the band’s tenure and even more so afterward, Harrison made a career for himself as a producer for other bands, manning the boards for some incredibly successful records, some of which you’ll hear about in today’s chat. From Live to No Doubt and beyond, he’s had a hand in some really big ones.

Along with the Stop Making Sense re-release came a star-studded tribute album called Everyone’s Getting Involved: A Tribute to Talking Heads’ Stop Making Sense, and that’s where today’s other guest comes in. The album features contributions from heavy hitters like Paramore, Lorde, and The National, but one of the best tracks is by Arévalo’s band, Chicano Batman. The Los Angeles group has been around since 2008, mixing up a genre-defiant stew of psychedelia and R&B with bits of indie-rock and Latin flair. On the trio’s latest album, Notebook Fantasy, they stretch out a bit more than usual, allowing some extra breathing room for the songs. That’s not necessarily the case for their contribution to the Talking Heads tribute album, though: They do a pretty faithful rendition of the frenetic “Crosseyed and Painless,” re-creating its indelible groove and then adding their own flavor. Check out that cover right here.

In this conversation, Harrison and Arévalo talk about how Chicano Batman approached their Talking Heads cover—including the special guests they brought in to help. Then Arévalo, a budding producer himself, picks Harrison’s brain about some of the records he’s produced over the years, from Live to Les Butcherettes to No Doubt. Great stories abound, enjoy.

0:00 – Intro

2:34 – Start of the chat

4:06 – Jerry's thoughts on Chicano Batman's cover

8:28 – Talking about Jerry's production work, starting with the first Live album

19:20 – Carlos on Notebook Fantasy and studio techniques

24:05 – Producing No Doubt's "New"

34:40 – Jerry loses his car while mixing "Girlfriend is Better"

38:45 – On how Chicano Batman's cover of "Crosseyed and Painless" came to be

Thanks for listening to the Talkhouse Podcast, and thanks to Jerry Harrison and Carlos Arévalo for chatting. If you liked what you heard, please follow Talkhouse on your favorite podcasting platform, and check out all the great stuff at Talkhouse.com. This episode was produced by Myron Kaplan, and the Talkhouse theme is composed and performed by the Range. See you next time!

This episode is brought to you by DistroKid. DistroKid makes music distribution fun and easy with unlimited uploads and artists keep 100% of their royalties and earnings. To learn more and get 30% off your first year's membership, visit: distrokid.com/vip/talkhouse

On this week’s Talkhouse Podcast we’re diving deep into a chat inspired by two tribute albums to an incredibly influential musician, Sun Ra. Joining us are Meshell Ndegeocello and David Harrington.

And oh man, do I have my work cut out for me in trying to introduce these incredible people and their careers—I won’t even scratch the surface. Meshell Ndegeocello’s biggest foray into the public consciousness, strangely enough, came on a duet with John Mellencamp in the mid-’90s, but that’s not at all indicative of her wide-ranging career, which also includes everything from go-go music to neo-soul to jazz to rapping on a Madonna song. These days, the Grammys had to create an entirely new category for what she does: She just won the first-ever Grammy award for Alternative Jazz for last year’s The Omnichord Real Book. It’s no surprise given her musical serachings that Ndegeocello is also deeply inspired by Sun Ra, the legendary out-there jazz composer and performer who traveled through time and space until leaving our planet in 1993. His legacy lives on, though, and Ndegeocello recently released Red Hot & Ra: The Magic City, which features new compositions, old sounds, and a fresh look not just at Ra’s work but his musical spirit. It’s hard to explain, but check out “Bedlam Blues” from The Magic City right here.

Today’s other guest is David Harrington, founding member of Kronos Quartet, which has been expanding the music world for 50 years. I’d be a fool to try and sum up everything they’ve done and everyone with whom they’ve performed over the years, but do yourself a favor and Google them if you’re not familiar. I’ll just say that Kronos has pushed the envelope from just about every conceivable angle and expanded the scope and understanding of classical music, pop music, experimental music and much more. They’ve done film scores that you’ve definitely heard and deep dives into fringe classical compositions that you almost certainly haven’t. So it’s no wonder that they, too, like Ndegeocello, have found the wonder and mystery in Sun Ra’s music, and that they’ve put together their own tribute in the Red Hot and Ra series. Theirs is called Outer Spaceways Incorporated: Kronos Quartet and Friends Meet Sun Ra. The friends on their volume of the series include Laurie Anderson, Marshall Allen, Laraaji, Moor Mother, Terry Riley, and more. Check out “Outer Spaceways Incorporated,” which features Georgia Anne Muldrow, right here.

I should mention too that both of these albums are being released by the Red Hot organization, which has been raising money and awareness for good causes—initially AIDS research, and now that and more—since 1989. The Red Hot and Ra series is just the latest in a long line of albums that push musical boundaries while also serving humanity, so kudos to them—and to former Talkhouse host Elia Einhorn, who’s been working with the Red Hot folks on these Sun Ra tributes.

In this great conversation, Harrington and Ndegeocello talk, naturally, about Sun Ra, and they get granular with it, touching on MLK’s "I Have A Dream" speech and its relationship to this music. They also chat about bringing more women into composition—a Kronos mandate since the beginning—as well as how finding Sun Ra changed Ndegeocello’s musical path completely. Harrington also shares a great story about rehearsing with Ornette Coleman. Bonus! Enjoy.

Thanks for listening to the Talkhouse Podcast, and thanks to Meshell Ndegeocello and David Harrington for chatting. If you liked what you heard, please follow Talkhouse on your favorite podcasting platform, and check out all the great stuff at Talkhouse.com. This episode was produced by Myron Kaplan, and the Talkhouse theme is composed and performed by the Range. See you next time!

This episode is brought to you by DistroKid. DistroKid makes music distribution fun and easy. To learn more and get 30% off your first year's membership, visit: distrokid.com/vip/talkhouse

On this week’s Talkhouse Podcast, we’ve got a popular comedian, podcaster, and actor in conversation with a musician-slash-director who released their first song together earlier this year: Marc Maron and Paige Stark.

Maron is of course the host of the long-running interview podcast WTF, but that’s really just the headline on a long and winding career. He was of course first known—and is still known!—as a top-tier stand-up comedian whose shows are often discursive explorations of his own psyche while also being wildly funny. He’s also an actor, having been a regular on the Netflix series GLOW and a lead in a couple of dramatic movies, including To Leslie, which comes up in this conversation, and Sword of Trust, which was directed by Maron’s girlfriend Lynn Shelton, who died unexpectedly in 2020. That fact worked its way into Maron’s latest stand-up special, last year’s brilliant From Bleak to Dark. Oh, and he also dabbles as a musician, having played guitar in bands in his school days, and keeping it up mostly as a hobby since.

That’s where singer and songwriter Paige Stark comes in. A friend of Maron’s, she recruited him recently to play some "searing" guitar and duet with her on a cover of Love’s 1966 song “Signed DC.” Stark has been kicking around the L.A. music scene for years, most notably as part of the band Tashaki Miyaki, whose name is the subject of discussion in this podcast. Stark only recently began releasing music under her own name, including a bunch of singles this year that feature friends like Cherry Glazerr, Jon Brion, and of course Maron. Stark is also an actor and director who’s working on a narrative short at the moment. Busy busy. Check out the duet she did with Maron on “Signed DC.”

This funny, wide-ranging conversation covers everything from the recording of this duet to Maron’s guitar setup to Stark’s substance-fueled nights out in Los Angeles. They also clearly love talking about music, dissecting everything from Nick Cave to Bob Dylan and beyond. Enjoy!

0:00 - Intro

2:27 - Start of the chat/Trying to figure out Talkhouse

8:14 - Periods of self-doubt and Maron's confidence in singing

20:16 - "I don't know that many comedians."

29:20 - Paige's party years

33:26 - "You're one of my favorite actors"—Stark

37:18 - Maron's junior high and high school bands

45:55 - New bands Maron has recently seen

Thanks for listening to the Talkhouse Podcast, and thanks to Marc Maron and Paige Stark for chatting. If you liked what you heard, please follow Talkhouse on your favorite podcasting platform, and check out all the good stuff at Talkhouse.com. This episode was produced by Myron Kaplan, and the Talkhouse theme is composed and performed by the Range. See you next time!

This episode is brought to you by DistroKid. DistroKid makes music distribution fun and easy with unlimited uploads and artists keep 100% of their royalties and earnings. To learn more and get 30% off your first year's membership, visit: distrokid.com/vip/talkhouse

On this week’s Talkhouse Podcast we’ve got two singer-songwriters who both come from the tradition of socially conscious folk-punk. One of them you could credit with inventing the genre, the other may be its most popular current proponent: Billy Bragg and Frank Turner.

Billy Bragg is a legendary British performer who came up just after the punk boom of the late 1970s and channeled that energy into the style of a solo troubadour. His early records were massively influential to all sorts of musicians, which is no surprise given their wit, their lyrical pointedness, and how beautifully they capture the spirit of youthful engagement. But that was 40 years ago, and Bragg has created an incredible body of work that’s always expanding but never losing that kernel of truth. It got really easy to catch up with the whole thing recently, as he released a massive 14-CD box set called The Roaring Forty, which you’ll hear a little bit about in this chat. Bragg also has some US dates lined up for this July. Check out a classic Bragg track right here, one that today’s other guest references in this chat. This is “Tank Park Salute.”

Frank Turner mentions that song as well as some other Bragg classics in this chat, because he’s clearly a big fan. Turner has been doing it for two decades now, and he’s an absolute road warrior: Next week will mark his 3000th gig, a big number recently aided by a world record he set in which he played 15 shows in different cities in the span of 24 hours. True to his ethic, this wasn’t a publicity stunt, but also a way to support one of the many causes he believes in—in this case the Music Venue Trust. Those shows came hot on the heels of Turner’s tenth album, Undefeated, in which he reckons a bit with getting older but remaining true to himself and the things he believes in. That feeling is perfectly encapsulated in the relatively chill “Ceasefire,” check it out.

In this great chat, Bragg and Turner talk about everything from Bragg’s first US tour to their moments of musical awakening. Turner hilariously talks about his inner 15 year old giving him shit for being successful, as well as an old punk mentor who came to see him at Wembley. They talk about how activism and understanding change over the years, and how one of Bragg’s biggest songs, “Sexuality,” has morphed in this age of trans visibility. And they talk about how music—especially live music—as a chance for communion, which is something I imagine most Talkhouse listeners can relate to. Enjoy.

0:00 - Intro

3:00 - Start of the chat

4:58 - Where to look while you're on stage performing

8:04 - Who's the most famous person in Frank Turner's phone?

16:11 - How to sustain yourself in the music industry

18:50 - Turner's upcoming 3000th gig

24:24 - Frank's 15-year-old inner punk judges his current chart success

29:45 - Staying true to your 25 year old self

44:58 - People choose the wrong Frank and Billy songs for their weddings

Thanks for listening to the Talkhouse Podcast, and thanks to Frank Turner and Billy Bragg for chatting. If you liked what you heard, please follow Talkhouse on your favorite podcasting platform, and check out all the great stuff at Talkhouse.com. This episode was produced by Myron Kaplan, and the Talkhouse theme is composed and performed by the Range. See you next time!

This episode is brought to you by DistroKid. DistroKid makes music distribution fun and easy with unlimited uploads and artists keep 100% of their royalties and earnings. To learn more and get 30% off your first year's membership, visit: distrokid.com/vip/talkhouse

On this week’s Talkhouse Podcast we’ve got a favorite repeat guest alongside a newer name you perhaps haven’t heard yet: Amelia Meath and Fabi Reyna.

Meath is half of the duo Sylvan Esso, which has been crafting gorgeous electro-pop for the past decade. It’s been amazing to watch Meath and her partner Nick Sanborn grow over the years, building a catalog and fanbase with songs that are equally enjoyable on headphones and in front of massive crowds. Speaking of massive crowds, Sylvan Esso has been trying to figure out for years how to play to all the people that want to see them in their adopted hometown of Durham, North Carolina, and this weekend marks their inaugural Good Moon Festival at a minor-league stadium. They’ll be joined by other great bands including co-headliner Fleet Foxes, plus a lineup of hand-picked bands including today’s other guest, Fabi Reyna.

Reyna is the driving force behind Reyna Tropical, whose debut album Malegria was recently released on the Psychic Hotline label, which is run by none other than… Sylvan Esso. Reyna has long been an advocate for women in music; she’s not only a musician herself but also founder and editor of She Shreds Media. It’s a fantastic, bouncing album that plucks influences from all over the world: Reyna is Mexican-American, and she pulls sounds from all over the Southern Hemisphere as well as West Africa and sultry pop. Check out “Cartagena” from Malegria right here.

In this great chat, Meath and Reyna talk about the upcoming Good Moon festival, about how playing in front of unfriendly audiences can sometimes be helpful, about the loss of Reyna’s musical partner Nectali Diaz, aka Sumohair, the just-released tenth anniversary reissue of Sylvan Esso’s great debut album and much more. Enjoy.

0:00 - Intro

2:14 - Start of the chat

3:42 - Anxiety, a constant companion.

5:58 - What to do when the audience isn't there for you.

12:26 - On naming the Good Moon festival.

15:20 - On Amelia's favorite part of a festival.

25:48 - On overcoming imposter syndrome.

Thanks for listening to the Talkhouse Podcast, and thanks to Amelia Meath and Fabi Reyna for chatting. If you liked what you heard, please follow Talkhouse on your favorite podcasting platform and check out all the great stuff at Talkhouse.com. This episode was produced by Myron Kaplan, and the Talkhouse theme is composed and performed by the Range. See you next time!

This episode is brought to you by DistroKid. DistroKid makes music distribution fun and easy with unlimited uploads and artists keep 100% of their royalties and earnings. To learn more and get 30% off your first year's membership, visit: distrokid.com/vip/talkhouse

Greetings, Talkhouse friends. Instead of a Talkhouse episode this week, I wanted to share another episode of my pal Craig Finn’s show, That’s How I Remember It, which is just starting its third season. Craig has an incredible array of guests lined up, and he’s switching to a new schedule where he’ll have new episodes every other week without a break. That means more amazing chats for you, including this one with Phosphorescent’s Matthew Houck. Craig and Matt chat about the philosophy behind That’s How I Remember It—it’s a podcast about creativity and memory—as well as an early meeting between the two, Phosphorescent’s mighty “Song For Zula” and much more. I’ll be back next week with your regularly scheduled programming, but for now, give That’s How I Remember It your attention. See you next week!

0:00 - Intro

2:41 - "Do you think you have a good memory?"

3:58 - The origins of That's How I Remember It

8:43 - Craig vs. Matt's approach to songwriting

13:14 - "Do you have a first memory of music?

23:00 - "Do you connect music with seasons?"

35:53 - Craig and Matt first meeting at SXSW 2010

36:52 - "Did the Full Moon Project ... affect your own songwriting?"

43:30 - "Song For Zula" - "Did it surprise you?"

46:45 - "Has traveling/moving changed your music?"

This episode is brought to you by DistroKid. DistroKid makes music distribution fun and easy with unlimited uploads and artists keep 100% of their royalties and earnings. To learn more and get 30% off your first year's membership, visit: distrokid.com/vip/talkhouse

On this week’s Talkhouse Podcast we’ve got two incredible singer-songwriters who sprung from the same fertile late '80s/early '90s scene, and who are still doing it right all these years later: Joe Pernice and Bill Janovitz.

Joe Pernice first found notice in the country-ish pop band Scud Mountain Boys, whose home-recorded songs landed them a deal with Sub Pop in the mid-1990s. The Scuds weren’t around super long, but their end was the beginning of the Pernice Brothers, Joe’s long-running band that continues to put out excellent, often melancholy songs. The latest Pernice Brothers album—and by the way, he’s really the only constant member at this point—is called Who Will You Believe, and it stands up there with his incredibly durable catalog. In addition to writing and playing songs, Pernice wrote a great novel a while back called It Feels So Good When I Stop, and he even had a short stint writing for TV. But for now, he’s concentrating on music. Check out “December in Her Eyes” from Who Will You Believe.

The other half of today’s conversation, Bill Janovitz, has been the singer and guitar player for the band Buffalo Tom since their inception back in 1986, and while there have been quieter periods in there, they’ve consistently released records, including the new Jump Rope, which comes out on May 31. Buffalo Tom came out of the same incredible Boston/Amherst music scene that birthed Pernice Brothers, Pixies, Dinosaur Jr., Sebadoh, and many more, and these guys dive right into reminiscing about those fertile days. In addition to making music, Janovitz is also something of a rock historian, having written the comprehensive Leon Russell book in recent years, as well as a volume on The Rolling Stones. His next book is about The Cars, which these guys talk about during this chat as well. Check out “Helmet” from the upcoming album Jump Rope right here.

Like I said, these guys dive back into the Boston days, talking about mutual friends and collaborators like J Mascis and David Berman of Silver Jews. They also try to remember their first encounters, one of which involves Pernice being a little ornery, and they talk about selecting songs for records—and how they never know which ones people are going to react to. Enjoy.

0:00 - Intro

2:46 - Start of the chat

7:37 - Joe's legendary cousin

12:15 - Joe walks out of college and has "a mild nervous breakdown"

18:20 - "When did you meet [David] Berman?"

23:58 - "My first album was made for $60."

31:01 - Berman wants to hear Joe say the word "cocksucker."

42:12 - Craft versus hack, and writing for TV and film

Thanks for listening to the Talkhouse Podcast and thanks to Joe Pernice and Bill Janovitz for chatting. If you like what you heard, please follow Talkhouse on your favorite podcasting platform, and make sure to check out all the goodness at Talkhouse.com. This episode was produced by Myron Kaplan, and the Talkhouse theme is composed and performed by the Range. See you next time!

This episode is brought to you by DistroKid. DistroKid makes music distribution fun and easy with unlimited uploads and artists keep 100% of their royalties and earnings. To learn more and get 30% off your first year's membership, visit: distrokid.com/vip/talkhouse