Tony O’Neill, a British-born writer now in the U.S., has built a career that moves between fiction, non-fiction, and screenwriting. A former musician who played with Marc Almond and The Brian Jonestown Massacre, he made his literary debut with Digging the Vein in 2005, followed by noir-tinged novels like Sick City—now edging toward a TV adaptation with Bret Easton Ellis. Tony's work has found an eager audience in France, where 13e Note Editions translated much of his output. He’s also co-authored bestselling memoirs and worked with screenwriters like Jim Uhls. When not writing for The Guardian or Vice, he resides in New Jersey with his family.

Ali Smith, a portrait and documentary photographer, moved to the UK from NYC, where she built a career shooting for The Guardian, The New York Times, and more. She’s shot campaigns for Rimmel, Disney, and Johnson & Johnson and published two acclaimed photography books—Momma Love earned praise from The NY Times and Gloria Steinem. Her work, rooted in gender equality and environmentalism, includes a grant-funded project on incarcerated mothers. She’s exhibited and taught internationally, mentoring young women in photography. Also a writer and former touring musician, her memoir The Ballad of Speedball Baby dropped back in January 2024 via Blackstone Publishing.

Bruce Moreland grew up in West Covina California, playing in glam rock bands with his brother Marc before diving into LA’s punk scene in the late ’70s. He hung around The Masque, played bass for The Weirdos, and co-founded Wall of Voodoo, recording on most of their albums between stints in and out of the band.

He later formed Black Cherry, played with Nervous Gender, and co-wrote a track for Concrete Blonde. After Marc’s death, he started Ravens Moreland, shifting to vocals and guitar. 

JD Pinkus, who set a Georgia Boy's State 100-meter freestyle relay record in 1980, left swimming behind in 1985 to tour with the Butthole Surfers, later playing bass for Melvins, Helios Creed, and others. He took up the 5-string banjo, releasing albums like Keep On The Grass (2018), Fungus Shui (2021), and Grow A Pear (2024). JD splits his time between the road, the studio, and the mountain he now calls home.

Mike IX Williams, the voice of New Orleans for lack of a better term "sludge" pioneers Eyehategod, embodies the unrelenting grit of the genre. Raised in High Point, North Carolina, he gravitated toward rebellion and punk before finding his footing in the music scene of late-70s New Orleans. Over the years, he’s faced addiction, incarceration, Hurricane Katrina, and a liver transplant, emerging as a testament to survival against the odds. Mike's music channels the chaos of a life shaped by struggle and defiance, capturing an unvarnished reflection of the world around him.

Randy Blythe, frontman of Lamb of God, will release his second book, Just Beyond the Light, on February 18, 2025. The book combines memoir and philosophy, detailing his approach to maintaining perspective through challenges. Randy writes about his childhood, touring, sobriety, and the lessons shaped by his life in music and art.

During New Year’s week, we noticed a significant dip in our numbers—likely because everyone is enjoying a well-deserved break. Good for you! We’ll be back next week, refreshed and ready, with exciting new guests joining us each week.

In the meantime, enjoy this extended intro. Cheers to a eh uh fantastic 2025??

Elliott Sharp is a composer and multi-instrumentalist active in New York City's avant-garde music scene since the late 1970s. With over 85 recordings across genres such as contemporary classical, jazz, noise, and electronic music, he incorporates elements like algorithms, Fibonacci sequences, and literary themes in his experimental compositions. In the 1980s, he developed the Virtual Stance project, utilizing personal computers in live performance. Elliott plays guitar, saxophone, and bass clarinet, and leads ensembles including Terraplane, Orchestra Carbon, and SysOrk.

Yva Las Vegass is a groundbreaking musician and queer icon whose journey from immigrant busker to trailblazing artist has shaped the soundscape of both Venezuelan folklore and American alternative music. Born in Venezuela, Yva began her musical career as a busker, performing on the streets of Seattle after immigrating in the early 1980s. Her unique fusion of traditional Venezuelan rhythms and melodies with the raw energy of punk and alternative rock became a hallmark of her sound, which she introduced to the American music scene in the 1990s.

Throughout her career, Yva has been involved in several influential bands, including Dos Mundos with Deanna Chapman, later renamed Tres Mundos with the addition of Christine Gunn in the Cello. In Seattle Yva sang in Bochinche the only salsa band in the city at the time. Together with her band mates from Tres Mundos she formed Delusions of Grandeour a fusion of pop, folk, punk and rock where they played original tunes. in the early 90's she joins the Florists,a funk rock band as the vocalist and guitar player and the band, Sweet 75, who together made a record and toured the U.S and parts of Europe. All the while she continued performing and writing venezuelan folkloric songs on her own.  She continues to explore themes of identity, cultural resistance, and the experiences of marginalized communities.

Today, she is a fixture in the NYC music scene, performing in clubs and theaters projects alike, and remains an independent force in the world of music and performance art, defying boundaries and challenging conventions as a queer female Venezuelan alternative artist. Her contributions to both folklore and alternative music have made her an influential figure for young artists living in NYC today.