Speaker 1: Welcome, Welcome, Welcome back to the Bob Leftstets Podcast. My
Speaker 1: guest today is a Lindas Cigara of Hooray for the
Speaker 1: riff Raff. Alinda is Hooray for the riff Raff. Basically
Speaker 1: you and a roving cast of characters or is it
Speaker 1: a band?
Speaker 2: It's both. It's definitely my project, it's my songwriting, but
Speaker 2: I really, you know, I'm in it for the band feeling.
Speaker 2: I'm in it for the family of the band. So
Speaker 2: even though it is a rotating cast of characters throughout
Speaker 2: the years, I definitely get attached to the bands of
Speaker 2: certain records.
Speaker 1: Okay, So presently, how many members in the band.
Speaker 2: Altogether? There's four of us, sometimes five when I'm lucky.
Speaker 1: Okay, let's start with the four. How long have the
Speaker 1: same four been together? Uh?
Speaker 2: They joined for this record, So we've been all playing
Speaker 2: together since February.
Speaker 1: Okay, so every record might be a new band.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think. You know, for a while I was
Speaker 2: rolling with the same crew of people. But then with
Speaker 2: moving around, you know, and also just like life changes
Speaker 2: that the transition of late twenties into early thirties into
Speaker 2: pandemic times was very interesting with having band members. So
Speaker 2: everyone goes through like huge life changes. So I would
Speaker 2: love to hold onto this band as long as possible.
Speaker 2: I'd love to continue playing with them for next record too.
Speaker 1: Okay, let's break this down. Tell me about the transition
Speaker 1: from twenties to thirties.
Speaker 2: Well, people start having kids. I'm not, but you know,
Speaker 2: sometimes your drummer does, or a bassist or you know,
Speaker 2: people start just having different lifestyles. So I thought that
Speaker 2: was a really interesting time to be a semi hustling
Speaker 2: touring musician in a van.
Speaker 1: Okay, since not everybody is familiar with you, how old.
Speaker 2: Are you today, I'm thirty seven.
Speaker 1: Oh, you look so much younger. So you say, you know,
Speaker 1: I'm older than you are, And I find every decade,
Speaker 1: especially as you get older, it's really quite a transition.
Speaker 1: Have you find a straight evolution or can you sympathize
Speaker 1: and identify with them going from their twenties to their thirties.
Speaker 2: Oh, I can definitely sympathize. I feel like, you know,
Speaker 2: my transitions have been artistic for sure. I feel like
Speaker 2: I don't really have this urge to start a family
Speaker 2: per se in the typical sense of the word. But
Speaker 2: I definitely feel like I'm looking for more stability. I'm
Speaker 2: looking for more Also when it comes to creating art,
Speaker 2: I'm looking for something that feels more fresh to me,
Speaker 2: or I guess realer. I'm trying to get to this
Speaker 2: root feeling of making something that feels very true to me.
Speaker 2: So I guess that's my That's the track that I'm
Speaker 2: on as I get older.
Speaker 1: When you say about having a family that is something,
Speaker 1: just go a little deeper on that.
Speaker 2: Well, I've always wanted a family in a certain sense
Speaker 2: since I was a kid. I grew up feeling very
Speaker 2: out of place, very a bit like an alien, like
Speaker 2: I was drop. I grew up in the Bronx. I'm
Speaker 2: from a Puerto Rican family, and I was interested in
Speaker 2: things that weren't necessarily what is typical like at the
Speaker 2: time for a kid like me, and I felt very
Speaker 2: out of place. So I went to music, to going
Speaker 2: to live shows, and then eventually to making a band
Speaker 2: because I wanted to feel like I was a part
Speaker 2: of something and I had people to depend on and
Speaker 2: people that I was getting vulnerable with.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 2: I just didn't want to go through this life alone.
Speaker 2: And I never felt that urge to become a mother
Speaker 2: or to you know, to get married or something. So
Speaker 2: songwriting and creating a band is a way that I
Speaker 2: put those It's a place for those feelings.
Speaker 1: I think, let's go back to growing up in the Bronx.
Speaker 1: You know, the Box has been through a lot of
Speaker 1: transitions in the seventies and eighties, or a lot of
Speaker 1: movies about the South Bronx. Tell us about growing up
Speaker 1: in the Bronx. It was.
Speaker 2: It was a very friendly neighborhood for me to grow
Speaker 2: up in. I feel really lucky. It was pretty old school.
Speaker 2: Everybody talked to each other, a lot of older people
Speaker 2: and families, a lot of working class people, a lot
Speaker 2: of like union talk. It felt Now that I look back,
Speaker 2: it feels very special. It feels like something I don't
Speaker 2: really see that much anymore, you know, as in terms
Speaker 2: of neighborhood and neighbors communicating with each other. But at
Speaker 2: the same time, I felt like it was horribly boring
Speaker 2: and all I wanted to do was be in the
Speaker 2: Lower east Side because I heard that that's where the
Speaker 2: weirdos were. I started listening to punk music and I
Speaker 2: heard that everybody who was a punk was in the
Speaker 2: Lower east Side. So I would take the train and
Speaker 2: it would take me about two hours, and I loved
Speaker 2: every second of it because I just wanted to be
Speaker 2: like where that action was.
Speaker 1: Okay? You know, on one hand, you have the Rolling
Speaker 1: Stone song Miss You, which they now sing live. I
Speaker 1: just saw and they left this line out. You know,
Speaker 1: there's some Puerto Rican girls just dying to meet you, okay,
Speaker 1: and then in New York, you know, uh, there's just
Speaker 1: there's been racism. You know. What was it like growing
Speaker 1: up being a Puerto Rican kid in the Bronx.
Speaker 2: Well, I feel like for me, I was really confused
Speaker 2: because I was constantly told that I didn't act like
Speaker 2: what a Puerto Rican kid or girl was supposed to act.
Speaker 2: Like the idea of what that was was Jlo, you know,
Speaker 2: like or before her it was West Side Story. There
Speaker 2: just like wasn't a lot of representation or a lot
Speaker 2: of that in the media that I understood, you know,
Speaker 2: that I could see. So I just was constantly told
Speaker 2: that I wasn't doing you know, whatever I am correctly,
Speaker 2: and that was from kids that weren't Puerto Rican that
Speaker 2: you know, or kids that were So I guess my
Speaker 2: experience of it was just constantly feeling like Okay, I
Speaker 2: guess I'm doing everything wrong, and this is just naturally
Speaker 2: the way I am and the things that I'm interested in.
Speaker 2: You know, as I got older and when I made
Speaker 2: my record in twenty seventeen, The Navigator, I started doing
Speaker 2: more research into just Puerto Rican activism and I found
Speaker 2: out about the Young Lords, and that's when everything starting
Speaker 2: started to make sense to me. You know, here's like
Speaker 2: these really inspired and serious intellectual Puerto Rican women and men,
Speaker 2: like all in their twenties, who were all into revolution
Speaker 2: and they were into revolutionary art and community activism. And
Speaker 2: suddenly all these things that people told me, I'm like,
Speaker 2: that's not true. I come from these from these people
Speaker 2: very obviously, you know, like these are my ancestors in
Speaker 2: a way, or like my elders.
Speaker 1: You know, what do your parents do for a living?
Speaker 2: My mother was, she actually worked for Giuliani. She was, Yeah,
Speaker 2: she was the deputy mayor for Rudolph Giuliani for both
Speaker 2: of his terms. And my dad, well, whoa whoa, whoa,
Speaker 2: whoa woah.
Speaker 1: Not everybody's familiar, including myself. Is the deputy mayor an
Speaker 1: appointed position.
Speaker 2: Elected position? No, well actually appointed, yeah, it's not elected.
Speaker 2: And I think there are four.
Speaker 1: That was my next question.
Speaker 2: Okay, yeah, yeah, wait wait wait, wait, wait.
Speaker 1: Wait, your mother isn't walking down the street and all
Speaker 1: of a sudden, Juliani says, oh you I want you.
Speaker 1: You have to climb the ladder to get to that job.
Speaker 1: So what did she do to ultimately get that gig?
Speaker 2: To be honest, I don't know. I didn't grow up
Speaker 2: with her. I grew up with my with my aunt,
Speaker 2: that's actually my dad's sister, and she's who raised me.
Speaker 2: So my relationship with my mother is very strained. You know.
Speaker 2: I grew up seeing her a couple of times a year,
Speaker 2: or I would live with her for a stint in
Speaker 2: elementary school, and then I would get sent back to
Speaker 2: my aunt. You know. It was a lot of where
Speaker 2: am I gonna end up? And my aunt always being
Speaker 2: the person who was like, I will take a Linda,
Speaker 2: you know. So yeah, so the relationship is it remains
Speaker 2: mysterious for me. It's like one of the big mysteries
Speaker 2: in my life.
Speaker 1: Okay, were your parents ever married? Yes? And you have
Speaker 1: brothers and sisters? Yeah?
Speaker 2: I have a brother. I have an older brother.
Speaker 1: And did they share the same parents?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 1: And when you were growing up with your aunt? Who
Speaker 1: was he living with?
Speaker 2: He was with my dad.
Speaker 1: Okay, so do you ever remember living under the same
Speaker 1: roof with both your parents and your brother.
Speaker 2: In elementary school, like in kindergarten and first grade, which
Speaker 2: is when she was first she first got her appointment.
Speaker 2: You know, I don't know how you'd say it, right,
Speaker 2: So I think that there was a bit of like, let's,
Speaker 2: you know, look like a normal family. She had already
Speaker 2: split up with my dad though, so there was this
Speaker 2: brief period of living under the same roof, but my
Speaker 2: aunt still being our caretaker, and that ended pretty quickly.
Speaker 1: Okay. And what did your father do for a living.
Speaker 2: He was a music teacher at a public school and
Speaker 2: then he became vice principal.
Speaker 1: Okay, now you say your Puerto Rican heritage? How many
Speaker 1: generations was your family in New York?
Speaker 2: My aunt and dad were both born in Puerto Rico,
Speaker 2: but they grew up here, so I'm second.
Speaker 1: Okay, So what's your relationship with your mother today?
Speaker 2: Uh, there isn't one, really, I'm just kinda yeah, there
Speaker 2: there isn't one. It's it's become more. I don't know,
Speaker 2: it's one that I'm working through but the older I get,
Speaker 2: the more it becomes you know, I'm not waiting for
Speaker 2: some kind of change. It's more of accepting this is
Speaker 2: the story of us, and I'm happy with the life
Speaker 2: that I have.
Speaker 1: You know, what do you speculate happened such that you
Speaker 1: lived with your aunt as opposed to your biological mother.
Speaker 2: I'm not sure. I mean, honestly, that was a question
Speaker 2: that was asked a lot of me when I was
Speaker 2: a kid, and I would always be a little bit
Speaker 2: confused about how to answer. When I was younger, I
Speaker 2: would give a very you know, generous answer of well,
Speaker 2: and I do think that this is still true. You know,
Speaker 2: my mother is of a generation where you really had
Speaker 2: to choose between being a mother or being a professional,
Speaker 2: and it seemed like those two things were very in
Speaker 2: conflict with each other. So I think that being a
Speaker 2: professional person was really where her heart was and where
Speaker 2: her passion was, and I don't think that motherhood was
Speaker 2: where she was called, you know which, you know, as
Speaker 2: I get older, it definitely makes sense for me. This
Speaker 2: idea of becoming a mother is a very big deal
Speaker 2: to me. Like I would not want to do it
Speaker 2: unless I was completely ready and ready to put my
Speaker 2: obsession with songwriting a little bit to the side, you know,
Speaker 2: because I don't I'm so afraid that I wouldn't be
Speaker 2: able to do it well. I see other people juggle
Speaker 2: it just perfectly or you know, beautifully. But for me,
Speaker 2: I've learned from being a kid that was like, well,
Speaker 2: I you know what's going on here?
Speaker 1: So, yeah, okay, what is your mother doing now?
Speaker 2: I don't know, not sure.
Speaker 1: You were living with your aunt. Yeah, brother was living
Speaker 1: with his father, also your father. Why were the two
Speaker 1: of you living in different locations.
Speaker 2: I think it was just easier for my dad to handle,
Speaker 2: you know. He Yeah, I don't know. I mean I
Speaker 2: grew up with my aunt and uncle and it was
Speaker 2: like a really stable household. So I felt really lucky.
Speaker 2: And my brother grew up with my dad and it
Speaker 2: seemed like that worked out really well. So I never
Speaker 2: really asked a lot of questions about it because I
Speaker 2: was really happy with staying with them.
Speaker 1: Okay, and then when your brother was living with your
Speaker 1: father and you're living with his sister and her husband,
Speaker 1: how much contact are you having with the father and
Speaker 1: the brother.
Speaker 2: Oh, I would see them a lot. We would do
Speaker 2: we would do these big trips every summer when we
Speaker 2: were out of school, where we would all drive from
Speaker 2: New York to Florida together because we had family down there.
Speaker 2: So we would do big trips like that and like
Speaker 2: be together all summer. Or I would see my dad
Speaker 2: I don't know, like every other week or something and
Speaker 2: talk to him on the phone a lot. So that
Speaker 2: was a pretty you know, in contact relationship.
Speaker 1: Okay, your aunt and your uncle, did they have any
Speaker 1: of their own kids?
Speaker 2: Yeah? They had two, two daughters that are my older cousins,
Speaker 2: but kind of like my older sisters. They were all
Speaker 2: they're like in their fifties now.
Speaker 1: Okay, so they were good fifteen odd years older than you.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah, So you know, this decision to take on
Speaker 2: a new kid, you know, when you're done raising your own.
Speaker 2: I mean, as I get older, it's something I also
Speaker 2: think about that it was such a big decision to
Speaker 2: make and they did, and I never felt any type
Speaker 2: of I don't know, it was like they made that
Speaker 2: decision and they never looked back, and it was like,
Speaker 2: I'm their kid.
Speaker 1: And what did they do for a living?
Speaker 2: My uncle worked in the housing project that we lived in.
Speaker 2: He would do maintenance and stuff like that. And then
Speaker 2: before that he was a construction worker, but he got
Speaker 2: hurt on the job at one point. So just jobs
Speaker 2: like that.
Speaker 1: And your aunt worked in the home. Yeah, you know,
Speaker 1: I have to ask, is it ignorant suburbanite? One thinks
Speaker 1: of bronx and one thinks of projects, and one thinks
Speaker 1: of crime and danger. Is that an accurate or a
Speaker 1: fantasy thought about it?
Speaker 2: I mean, I think it's both. It's definitely accurate, and
Speaker 2: also at the same time, there's a lot there is normalcy,
Speaker 2: you know. I think people get used to the environment
Speaker 2: that they're in and you learn to watch out for
Speaker 2: certain things, and you also learn to acknowledge Yeah, there
Speaker 2: are people who are addicted to drugs and they're standing
Speaker 2: outside the building, but also they're just people, you know.
Speaker 2: And I think, especially growing up in New York, everybody
Speaker 2: that I was growing up around was just very matter
Speaker 2: of fact of here are the dangers, and here is
Speaker 2: you can maneuver them. But at the same time, I
Speaker 2: also feel like it was a really like great neighborhood.
Speaker 2: You know, I could walk at night by myself and
Speaker 2: never feel nervous, and I could go there were like
Speaker 2: a lot of really great parks and stuff like that.
Speaker 2: So in that way, I mean, especially when I moved
Speaker 2: to New Orleans, I felt like I was naive about,
Speaker 2: you know, certain dangers and stuff. I felt really independent
Speaker 2: when I was growing up in New York and.
Speaker 1: The neighborhood you grew up in. Was that a mixed
Speaker 1: neighborhood race wise mostly Puerto Rican? What was it like?
Speaker 2: It was really mixed. It was Irish for sure, definitely
Speaker 2: Jewish population. Yeah, also like Middle Eastern. I felt like
Speaker 2: there were people from every part of the world.
Speaker 1: Okay, you're going to school. You good student, bad student,
Speaker 1: have friends, don't have friends.
Speaker 2: I was a good student in certain ways. I was
Speaker 2: really obsessed with poetry early on. In English class in
Speaker 2: like you know classes that have a lot of conversation,
Speaker 2: discussion stuff about the arts, I was all in. And
Speaker 2: when it came to subjects like math and science, I
Speaker 2: was just I couldn't do it. I just felt like
Speaker 2: I couldn't. I don't know, I couldn't handle the pressure
Speaker 2: of it or something. And I was a good student
Speaker 2: really until I got into high school. Pretty quickly. Into
Speaker 2: high school is when I started making friends and hanging
Speaker 2: out more like in the Lower East side scene, and
Speaker 2: that was when most of my friends were outside of
Speaker 2: my school, and I just started really questioning this kind
Speaker 2: of track I was on. I started questioning, like, would
Speaker 2: I really ever be able to go to college? What
Speaker 2: kind of college could I really afford? Anyway, it was
Speaker 2: a lot of these existential questionings of this track that
Speaker 2: everybody was telling me I should be on.
Speaker 1: You know, Okay, you're obviously there's a few years of
Speaker 1: gone by, but you're wise and you have insight into
Speaker 1: the landscape. Did you have friends that felt the same
Speaker 1: way or did you feel kind of you were out
Speaker 1: of place and you had these thoughts and there were
Speaker 1: people really you could relate to you or you couldn't
Speaker 1: relate to them.
Speaker 2: I feel really lucky to have found the punk scene
Speaker 2: when I did, because I definitely felt like I wasn't alone.
Speaker 2: And also, you know, in my freshman year, I pretty
Speaker 2: much in the first week of school, if I remember correctly,
Speaker 2: was nine to eleven, and that experience really changed all
Speaker 2: of my generation at the time, you know, and I
Speaker 2: felt really lucky to well, I'd feel really lucky now
Speaker 2: to have gone through such an intense historic moment with
Speaker 2: other kids that were like minded that were. I don't know.
Speaker 2: I just I didn't feel alone, you know, during it,
Speaker 2: and I think if I had, it would have been
Speaker 2: really bad for me.
Speaker 1: So how did you find out about THEE And where
Speaker 1: were you when the planes hit the towers.
Speaker 2: I was in art class and my somebody came in
Speaker 2: and westbood in my teacher's ear and she yelled holy
Speaker 2: shit or like oh shit or something like that. It
Speaker 2: was like this moment of you see your teacher break
Speaker 2: the facade for a second. And what I remember after
Speaker 2: that was just pretty much chaos, like kids immediately needing
Speaker 2: to find out if their parents are okay, just total
Speaker 2: madness in the school, them trying to basically get all
Speaker 2: of us out and finding out how we can get home.
Speaker 2: You know. I don't remember a lot of it, but
Speaker 2: I remember the chaotic feeling, and none of us have
Speaker 2: cell phones obviously at the time. And I remember going
Speaker 2: into one office and there being a little TV and
Speaker 2: it playing on the TV. It I didn't recognize at
Speaker 2: that age how big of a shift it was for
Speaker 2: me to see this bubble of normalcy get popped like that,
Speaker 2: you know, at the time, because I was, you know,
Speaker 2: fourteen going on fifteen, I was just like, Wow, something's
Speaker 2: happen happening. Life has been so boring, and now something
Speaker 2: is happening. But it did create just a really different
Speaker 2: view of, you know, what is possible, and it was
Speaker 2: really interesting to be so young and to watch people
Speaker 2: deal with grief in different ways, and to watch certain
Speaker 2: people want revenge, and you know, to just really get
Speaker 2: this look outside of just me and my personal life
Speaker 2: and my home. Suddenly I was looking out at the
Speaker 2: world and at our country, and that was the first
Speaker 2: time I really started to do that.
Speaker 1: Okay, so you say you were a freshman in high
Speaker 1: school and you started getting into the punk scene. How
Speaker 1: did you get into the punk scene.
Speaker 2: It started off with pretty like mainstream bands, you know,
Speaker 2: like I went to go see Wheezer or I I
Speaker 2: I'm trying to think of some other bands, like the
Speaker 2: band Rancid. You know, there are definitely bands that you
Speaker 2: hear of, and then it leads you to smaller and
Speaker 2: smaller bands and more local bands. You go to a
Speaker 2: show because you bought a CD that looked cool in
Speaker 2: Tower Records, and then you go to the show and
Speaker 2: somebody hands you a flyer and it's like handwritten photocopied
Speaker 2: and you're like, what is this? I got to go
Speaker 2: to this, you know, it was like this treasure map
Speaker 2: of finding out the deeper and deeper road where you
Speaker 2: could make more friends and go see a band that
Speaker 2: nobody had ever heard of because like they're playing out
Speaker 2: of a basement or something like that. It became like
Speaker 2: a reason for me to live. Really, all of a sudden,
Speaker 2: I was like, this is what I'm supposed to do.
Speaker 1: You know, Okay, I live through this myself, and I
Speaker 1: certainly go on to see a lot of bands in
Speaker 1: nowhere spots. Yeah, were you so young that it was
Speaker 1: just so exciting that you said, well, you know, these
Speaker 1: people really aren't that good, but I'm here and this
Speaker 1: is something.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah. I didn't care if anybody was good. I
Speaker 2: just loved I mean, probably if they were, you know,
Speaker 2: quote unquote bad, I probably liked it more because I
Speaker 2: was just really excited. I think at that age, I
Speaker 2: didn't even want to be entertained, and I didn't even
Speaker 2: want to really be blown away by artistry. I mostly
Speaker 2: wanted to feel like there was no separation between me
Speaker 2: and the band. I wanted to feel like we could
Speaker 2: become friends, right after this, and that anyone in the
Speaker 2: room was actually capable of doing what the band was doing.
Speaker 2: We were all just like shifting our positions for temporarily
Speaker 2: between like audience and performer or something. So it was
Speaker 2: all about being connected.
Speaker 1: Okay, let's just go a little bit lower. You're a girl,
Speaker 1: you're going on a freshman year in high school. Yeah,
Speaker 1: how do you literally hear punk? Do you have a
Speaker 1: friend say, oh, you have to listen to this record,
Speaker 1: or you hear something on the radio, or were you
Speaker 1: a someone who bought a lot of records to begin with?
Speaker 1: How did you literally discover punk?
Speaker 2: I bought a lot of CDs, especially on those drives
Speaker 2: to Florida. You know, as I got older, I was
Speaker 2: feeling more rebellious and more just confused and feeling less
Speaker 2: like a happy, go lucky kid, and I wanted to
Speaker 2: buy as many CDs as I could and listen on
Speaker 2: my headphones in the car for that really long drive
Speaker 2: to Florida. And I remember buying a Dead Kennedy CD
Speaker 2: simply because it looked cool, you know, And that was
Speaker 2: my first experience. And then after that, I get a
Speaker 2: Bikini Kill CD because it looks cool and they're girls,
Speaker 2: you know, instead, it's like this, like, yeah, that's how
Speaker 2: it started. Was I see something that catches my eye,
Speaker 2: and then I go to the next band, and then
Speaker 2: this band mentions a band in their thank yous or
Speaker 2: something like that. It felt like piecing together little like
Speaker 2: tips that were left behind.
Speaker 1: Okay, at the time, did you literally have to go
Speaker 1: Manhattan to see these acts or was there a scene
Speaker 1: in the Bronx where you grew up.
Speaker 2: If there was, I didn't know about it. I definitely
Speaker 2: think it's different now. You know, genres are so different
Speaker 2: now in a way that I'm really excited about. At
Speaker 2: the time, it felt very clear that if you listened
Speaker 2: to hip hop, you could not listen to punk. And
Speaker 2: if you dressed a certain way, you were over here,
Speaker 2: and if you dressed this way, then you're over here.
Speaker 2: So it felt like in my neighborhood, everybody loved hip
Speaker 2: hop and that's what people were listening to. So I
Speaker 2: didn't know of a scene in the Bronx, if there
Speaker 2: was one. So it really felt like the Lower East
Speaker 2: Side was the place to be.
Speaker 1: And were you out there alone or did you have
Speaker 1: a compatriot or what?
Speaker 2: I started going alone, you know, to those earlier shows,
Speaker 2: and then in high school, I did make a couple
Speaker 2: of friends that there was a place that we would
Speaker 2: all gather, you know, we just kids just like to
Speaker 2: sit outside and like smoke cigarettes and talk shit with
Speaker 2: each other. So I started making friends that way, not
Speaker 2: through classes or anything. And I started gathering a couple
Speaker 2: of friends who would want to go to shows. And
Speaker 2: then at the shows you meet other people, and so
Speaker 2: that's how it started.
Speaker 1: Let's be point blank. Yeah, a woman goes alone to
Speaker 1: a show is different from a man going alone to
Speaker 1: a sho show, Amica, or a boy can go be
Speaker 1: one hundred percent alone. If you are a woman going
Speaker 1: to show, a guy's going to come up and talk
Speaker 1: to you. If not, twenty guys, what was it your experience?
Speaker 2: Like, it really wasn't that It was not that I
Speaker 2: uh yeah, I felt pretty good, honestly. I mean it
Speaker 2: was all like other teenage kids, you know, so I
Speaker 2: never really felt any creepiness. I was going to mostly
Speaker 2: to shows at this place called ABC No Rio, and
Speaker 2: that was really good because it was pretty much designed
Speaker 2: for younger kids. It was it was a matinee show,
Speaker 2: so it started at like three o'clock and ended at
Speaker 2: like six, you know, and it was like five dollars,
Speaker 2: so I felt, really, I don't know, it was a
Speaker 2: lot more.
Speaker 1: Not like.
Speaker 2: I mean, everybody was drinking and stuff, but there was
Speaker 2: not a lot of like creepy be feelings or feelings
Speaker 2: of predatory stuff going on. So I feel lucky in
Speaker 2: that way.
Speaker 1: Did your and uncle have any idea what you were doing?
Speaker 1: Did they ever set limits or did they just trust you?
Speaker 2: They definitely tried to set limits, you know. At first
Speaker 2: it was I think also my aunt really was happy
Speaker 2: that I was finding something that I was excited about,
Speaker 2: and she wasn't really intimidated by music, and she didn't
Speaker 2: seem to like distrust it. You know. She was happy
Speaker 2: that I was excited about going to shows and I
Speaker 2: wasn't coming home drunk or anything. You know. It was
Speaker 2: like I was pretty good at coming home. And then
Speaker 2: as I got older, I would say into sixteen and
Speaker 2: seventeen was when it started to be really noticeable that,
Speaker 2: you know, I was like dropping out of school and
Speaker 2: things were just kind of like spiraling into a chaos
Speaker 2: that my aunt couldn't really handle. She would really try
Speaker 2: to keep track of me and try to track me
Speaker 2: down when I would be coming home late and stuff
Speaker 2: like that, that there was only really so much that
Speaker 2: they could do.
Speaker 1: Tell me about dropping out of school.
Speaker 2: I mean, I was just doing bad and I was
Speaker 2: So it's really hard sometimes to tap into the stubborn
Speaker 2: brain of like a sixteen or seventeen year old at
Speaker 2: this point in my life because there's so much that
Speaker 2: like I don't relate to now, and that being this
Speaker 2: very very confident belief that there was just something out
Speaker 2: there for me that I was going to find that
Speaker 2: nobody else could see. And it was just like truth
Speaker 2: to me, Like nobody could convince me that my life
Speaker 2: was going to be shit because of Now, if I
Speaker 2: had a kid at that age, it'd be like, what
Speaker 2: is your plan, you know? And my big plan was like, well,
Speaker 2: I'm going to become a squatter and I'm gonna, you know,
Speaker 2: go ride freight trains and I'm going to learn how
Speaker 2: to live outside of society and it's going to be great.
Speaker 2: Like that was just the life track that I was
Speaker 2: learning about from different people I was meeting in the
Speaker 2: Lower East Side, and it seemed so yeah, factual to me.
Speaker 2: So that was where my head was at.
Speaker 1: Okay, is it one day you say I can't take
Speaker 1: this anymore, or you drop out, or you can't wait
Speaker 1: till you turn sixteen, or you're thinking it about six months?
Speaker 1: Are your aunt and uncle involved? How does it actually
Speaker 1: come to be that you drop out?
Speaker 2: It was, you know, a lot of trouble at school,
Speaker 2: the school talking to us, and then it's like, okay,
Speaker 2: let's try this different public school. And then I try
Speaker 2: a different public school, and then that school it's like
Speaker 2: guidance counselor gets involved. We think you have so much
Speaker 2: promise what's going on? And then it's like, okay, let's
Speaker 2: go to this third school where like kids go to
Speaker 2: when they're on the verge of dropping out. And then
Speaker 2: eventually when I got to that school, it was like,
Speaker 2: let's okay, let's talk seriously about me just getting my ged,
Speaker 2: you know. And it was a countdown for me of Okay,
Speaker 2: I'm gonna turn seventeen and I'm going to find a
Speaker 2: way to get out of here. And my mind was
Speaker 2: very focused on I'm I'm not doing anybody any favors
Speaker 2: by sticking around, you know. I felt very much like
Speaker 2: I'm stressing out my family and they don't see this
Speaker 2: thing that I see for myself, this future that I
Speaker 2: see for myself. So I'm just gonna have to go
Speaker 2: do it. And then once I do it, I'll prove
Speaker 2: to them that, you know, they can relax. They'll see
Speaker 2: that I'm okay. It's like it's a theme that I
Speaker 2: hear in a lot of folk songs. At once. I
Speaker 2: left this idea of like I have to go, I
Speaker 2: can't go home this way, like I'll I'll show you
Speaker 2: by doing it, and you'll see that what I saw
Speaker 2: for myself was real. You know, did you get your
Speaker 2: ged I didn't.
Speaker 1: Now, okay, you drop out. You have this dream of
Speaker 1: being a squatter going on the rails, what do you
Speaker 1: actually do?
Speaker 2: I actually do that. I've become a squatter. I start
Speaker 2: writing for trains with some friends. I start playing on
Speaker 2: the street eventually, because at first it was just spare
Speaker 2: changing and asking for money on the street, which can
Speaker 2: be just so like, you know, mind numbing and so
Speaker 2: just can drive you crazy. So I felt lucky when
Speaker 2: I started meeting kids that were playing on the street,
Speaker 2: specifically when I went to New Orleans.
Speaker 1: Wait wait, let's let's before we get to New Orleans.
Speaker 1: Tell meybe is riding freight tree in something you did
Speaker 1: once or something you did a few times, and what
Speaker 1: was that.
Speaker 2: Like, I did it for about two years. It was
Speaker 2: and there were very different experiences throughout doing it, because
Speaker 2: I feel like it can get shaped so much by
Speaker 2: who you're with or if you're alone. You know, that's
Speaker 2: something I never did alone. I was way too scared.
Speaker 2: So there are a lot of diferent experiences. Sometimes me
Speaker 2: and another young woman I was traveling with, or me
Speaker 2: and a band. When I finally started my first band
Speaker 2: that was based in New Orleans, there were all other
Speaker 2: hobo kids, uh or before I started playing music, and
Speaker 2: it was just like me and a bunch of guys
Speaker 2: that I knew. That was kind of like a shitty vibe,
Speaker 2: you know, it was. It was so many different things.
Speaker 2: Sometimes it was extremely hard, and sometimes it was like
Speaker 2: the biggest high I've ever had of feeling like wow,
Speaker 2: I've done it. I've like escaped the matrix to use like,
Speaker 2: you know, a tired metaphor like here I am looking
Speaker 2: at these tiny towns as we like whiz by them
Speaker 2: at night, and just this feeling of like I escaped America,
Speaker 2: like I am on the outside and I don't have
Speaker 2: to like function in this system anymore.
Speaker 1: Okay. You know the old myth and movie thing is
Speaker 1: the train is moving slowly and you run onto the
Speaker 1: train and you ride it far away and then it
Speaker 1: stops you get off. What was it actually like.
Speaker 2: Well, some people can do that, they have very good
Speaker 2: upper body strength. For someone like me, it was a
Speaker 2: lot more of you know, you wait until the train
Speaker 2: is stopped. You like start to learn about, like you know,
Speaker 2: how long people, how long engineers and conductors are on call,
Speaker 2: and you learn that it's like an eight hour shift,
Speaker 2: so you start to you know, just figure out when
Speaker 2: a train has stopped. It's a lot of this is
Speaker 2: like really before the Internet, so a lot of like
Speaker 2: word of mouth, a lot of people telling you if
Speaker 2: you want to go he if you want to go
Speaker 2: west to this town, like be in this specific spot.
Speaker 2: A lot of like writing down directions and going through
Speaker 2: holes in the fence and stuff. It was like extremely
Speaker 2: detailed and really like it has to be your whole life,
Speaker 2: you know, because you get to a spot sometimes you're
Speaker 2: waiting for like two days for a train to arrive,
Speaker 2: and you have all these different ideas of knowing Okay,
Speaker 2: this has like a Freddy on the back. It's like
Speaker 2: a blinking light. It means it's going somewhere. You watch
Speaker 2: the conductor and the engineer get off, You're like, okay,
Speaker 2: we have this amount of time probably before somebody else
Speaker 2: comes on. So a lot of that, a lot of
Speaker 2: like nerd stuff that I really loved. But I only
Speaker 2: tried to get on when it was moving. I'd say
Speaker 2: maybe twice, and it was terrifying. At one point I
Speaker 2: got thrown off. So I definitely knew, like when not
Speaker 2: to temp fate.
Speaker 1: Okay, if you're starting in New York, yeah, how far
Speaker 1: would you take the train?
Speaker 2: Well, in New York it was very difficult. We like
Speaker 2: went to New Jersey and that was a terrible experience
Speaker 2: to try to get out of there. We ended up
Speaker 2: going to Buffalo. That was a really scary experience. So
Speaker 2: that was hard. What I did, you know, It wasn't
Speaker 2: like I solely rode trains, Like I took the Chinatown
Speaker 2: bus to Philly, and from Philly is a very much
Speaker 2: easier place to get a train or than at some
Speaker 2: point I would hitchhike, which I hated doing. That was
Speaker 2: like the that I felt like was the most dangerous
Speaker 2: of course. So so yeah, getting out of New York
Speaker 2: is a shit show. All it all transits.
Speaker 1: So how far are you know Philadelphia? You know, less
Speaker 1: than two hours away or so? How far west or
Speaker 1: south did you actually get?
Speaker 2: Well, I've written trains like basically on the east coast.
Speaker 2: It was mostly the southeast, and I also did the
Speaker 2: whole top half of the country, so across Montana, which
Speaker 2: is so beautiful and like North Dakota and stuff, and
Speaker 2: then also a lot down up and down the West
Speaker 2: coast all over the place, because that is just like
Speaker 2: it was so beautiful and it was really a lot
Speaker 2: easier to do, and a lot of the southeast. So
Speaker 2: I never did really the I never did the lower
Speaker 2: half of the country, which I regret. And I did
Speaker 2: a little bit of going through the Midwest until I
Speaker 2: reached Nebraska, which I talk about in a song. And
Speaker 2: then we had to like take a greyhound, which was
Speaker 2: always like when you took a greyhound, it was like
Speaker 2: the biggest humiliation. It was like such defeat that you
Speaker 2: you couldn't figure it out or something, you know, So
Speaker 2: it was like the walk of a certain type of
Speaker 2: walk of shame, and.
Speaker 1: You were doing what for money to you know, eat.
Speaker 2: A lot of spare changing at first, a lot of
Speaker 2: like what we would call drug studies, where people would
Speaker 2: like ask you about your life on the street. They
Speaker 2: would ask you if you did certain drugs or you know,
Speaker 2: people trying to like get I guess, like focus group
Speaker 2: type information. And also we would eat at like a
Speaker 2: lot of Christian feedings. We would do a lot of
Speaker 2: dumpster diving. But this was all before I started playing
Speaker 2: music on the street, which was when life got a
Speaker 2: lot better.
Speaker 1: Okay, So in this long history, you know, punk is
Speaker 1: a DIY movement. At what point do you say, hey,
Speaker 1: I can do this.
Speaker 2: I don't know. I think probably when I there was
Speaker 2: something when I turned sixteen, you know, I won a
Speaker 2: poetry contest, and I think that really did something for
Speaker 2: my confidence as a writer. And even though I wasn't sure,
Speaker 2: I had no idea that I could like play music
Speaker 2: because I tried to and I felt like I failed horribly.
Speaker 2: That was my perception at the time. But writing poetry
Speaker 2: felt really like something I was good at, and I
Speaker 2: got really obsessed with beat poetry. I was so into
Speaker 2: Alan Ginsburg. I just like thought about him all the
Speaker 2: time and read him all the time, and street poetry
Speaker 2: really spoke to me, So that was that was really
Speaker 2: the beginning. Is like that type of poetry mixed with
Speaker 2: going to shows. It felt like, Okay, I think there's
Speaker 2: a place for me here somewhere, but I'm not sure
Speaker 2: where it is.
Speaker 1: So how did you find it?
Speaker 2: I think through desperation, honestly, you know, the desperation at
Speaker 2: first of really needing like camaraderie, really needing people to
Speaker 2: be my friend and to feel confused with me and
Speaker 2: to feel angry with me. I was really if I
Speaker 2: could have hung out, Like hanging out was just like
Speaker 2: the best drug to me. I wanted to hang out
Speaker 2: all day long. So this feeling of like I need friends,
Speaker 2: this isn't like a light thing for me, you know,
Speaker 2: It's like if I don't have friends who who see
Speaker 2: me as I see myself and who share a worldview,
Speaker 2: then I'm I'm gonna not survive because I felt even
Speaker 2: though my aunt and uncle gave me so much stability
Speaker 2: and love, I was just really struggling mentally and emotionally.
Speaker 2: So then the desperation of really leaving home, you know,
Speaker 2: like running away and needing a place to stay and
Speaker 2: needing to you know, the people I meet, doing a
Speaker 2: gut check of like can I trust these people are not?
Speaker 2: I don't know. I think something about that desperation led
Speaker 2: me to just like really strong connections and also a
Speaker 2: feeling of like I don't have a choice, like this
Speaker 2: life is for me because this is the only one
Speaker 2: I can see.
Speaker 1: Okay, you win the poetry contest. How does it become music?
Speaker 2: Well, really that really started in New Orleans.
Speaker 1: So I oh wait, wait, wait, wait, So you drop
Speaker 1: out of school, you're squatting, you go on trains. Do
Speaker 1: you not play music on the street until you're in
Speaker 1: New Orleans? Yeah? Okay, So how do you end up
Speaker 1: in New Orleans?
Speaker 2: Through word of mouth? I ended up back in New
Speaker 2: York City, and I'm it was for I think the
Speaker 2: RNC was happening there and there were like huge protests,
Speaker 2: so all these people were heading back to New York
Speaker 2: or heading to New York. I go and I end
Speaker 2: up staying at this squatter building and meeting a bunch
Speaker 2: of people, and people are telling me that New Orleans
Speaker 2: is unlike any other place in America. I came back
Speaker 2: from probably eight or nine months on the road just
Speaker 2: feeling completely destroyed and like I had one friend with
Speaker 2: me and just feeling really lost, and hearing about this city,
Speaker 2: I was like, that's where I want to go. So
Speaker 2: I actually caught a ride in a van from New
Speaker 2: York to New Orleans with some other people that were
Speaker 2: living there that are still my friends to today. And
Speaker 2: the minute I got there, it was like, yeah, I
Speaker 2: felt like this is where I'm supposed to be.
Speaker 1: Well. New Orleans has a unique culture, even a unique
Speaker 1: legal system, the French legal system. But it's moist and
Speaker 1: it's hot. It's not really good to be poor in
Speaker 1: New Orleans. See.
Speaker 2: I was just trying to get away from the cold.
Speaker 2: So I was like, bring it on, you know, but
Speaker 2: to be fair, when the summer came, we did like
Speaker 2: all scatter because the summer is so intense there. But
Speaker 2: when I when I got there, you know, it was
Speaker 2: definitely a place of the way street kids make money
Speaker 2: is playing music. So I met some people who some
Speaker 2: two other musicians, this guy Barnabas is kid Kiowa, and
Speaker 2: I had this little washboard that someone had given me
Speaker 2: and that was how I started to play. They were
Speaker 2: you know, we were all hanging out. It was like
Speaker 2: a campfire. Kiowa was playing Johnny Cash songs and that
Speaker 2: was also a huge like folk awakening for me. Early
Speaker 2: on was listening to Johnny Cash, so I knew all
Speaker 2: these songs that he was playing, and I started singing
Speaker 2: with him. And I was playing my washboard with just
Speaker 2: like some fucking rocks or something that I found on
Speaker 2: the street, and Barnabas was learning how to play the violin.
Speaker 2: So we just like started to gather every day and
Speaker 2: think of different songs that we could sing together, like
Speaker 2: Tom Waite songs or that's where I started learning Why
Speaker 2: Guthrie songs. And through that we formed my first band,
Speaker 2: a hobo band called the dead Man Street Orchestra.
Speaker 1: But you're playing the washboard, yeah, And in the first band,
Speaker 1: to what degree is it your lyrics in your voice?
Speaker 2: That was hurry for the riff raff. That was the first.
Speaker 2: It was after this hobo band that I was in
Speaker 2: for about a year. It was when everybody started to
Speaker 2: scatter from that, from that project that I felt devastated.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 2: I put so much of my time and so much
Speaker 2: of my identity became being in a band with these people,
Speaker 2: and I just really remember this feeling of I can't
Speaker 2: risk that again. I have to have something that's mine.
Speaker 2: So I started putting poetry that I had to song
Speaker 2: with my first like instrument after the washboard, which was
Speaker 2: the banjo, and it was I was in this apartment
Speaker 2: in Brooklyn that all these other feminists were living in
Speaker 2: and they let me stay there. You know, they are
Speaker 2: probably seven of us in the apartment, and I recorded
Speaker 2: my first record or EP on my friend Emily's just
Speaker 2: like her laptop with like a built in microphone. I
Speaker 2: like locked myself in a room and recorded like eight
Speaker 2: or nine songs.
Speaker 1: Okay, the Hobo band is that something you're just playing
Speaker 1: around the campfire? Are you playing on the streets? Is
Speaker 1: this a working band?
Speaker 2: We would yeah, we would play on the street. So
Speaker 2: we would we would ride mostly you know what they
Speaker 2: called junk. It's like cargo that is not deemed like
Speaker 2: very important. So we had this idea of like, well,
Speaker 2: it'll be less secure because you know there's high traffic
Speaker 2: stuff that like the security risk is that you're gonna
Speaker 2: steal it. So we're like, okay, we'll ride junk all
Speaker 2: around the Southeast and end up in tiny little towns
Speaker 2: like Waycross, Georgia or like random towns in Florida or
Speaker 2: North Carolina. And what we would do is we would
Speaker 2: get off the train in this tiny town, go walk,
Speaker 2: find like the main street, and basically busk until we
Speaker 2: could like meet someone and you know, hopefully meet another punk.
Speaker 2: There was a lot of that, looking for anyone who
Speaker 2: like looked kind of weird, and sometimes people would let
Speaker 2: us play in their backyard. We would end up playing
Speaker 2: in a in a you know, a living room or something,
Speaker 2: or at a coffee shop. Sometimes we were really a
Speaker 2: spectacle because there were like six of us and a dog,
Speaker 2: so it was it was easy to attract attention. It
Speaker 2: was kind of like we were a magnet that the
Speaker 2: weirdos of the town would like be drawn to us,
Speaker 2: and suddenly on the third day it would be like,
Speaker 2: I've heard about you guys wandering through town, you know.
Speaker 1: And how did that fall apart?
Speaker 2: I think the same way all bands do, you know, Like,
Speaker 2: especially at that age, people have these different goals. Someone's
Speaker 2: like I'm trying to get on a barge to Alaska.
Speaker 2: Someone's like I'm trying to like go on a bike
Speaker 2: trip through Europe, like everyone is just everyone had these
Speaker 2: like really lofty ideas of like what their next adventure
Speaker 2: would be, and it felt like this adventure had run
Speaker 2: its course. But a lot of us did end up
Speaker 2: in New Orleans, and everyone's still playing music to this day,
Speaker 2: just in different projects.
Speaker 1: Okay, you start playing the bando before you get to
Speaker 1: New York or when you get to New York.
Speaker 2: I started playing the banjo in New Orleans after I
Speaker 2: would say, like, uh, like four or five months into
Speaker 2: playing with Dead Man, just because I wanted to sing more.
Speaker 2: And everybody in the group had their own folk music inclinations.
Speaker 2: You know. Some people who were playing stringed instruments or
Speaker 2: the accordion player. They wanted to learn a lot of
Speaker 2: like Eastern European music, and I was really drawn to
Speaker 2: the old time ballads or like more early country songs
Speaker 2: just because what I wanted to do to do was sing.
Speaker 2: And that was what I learned with that band, was
Speaker 2: that I loved to sing. And I knew that when
Speaker 2: I was a kid. When I was a kid, I
Speaker 2: would play songs with my dad. But once I hit puberty,
Speaker 2: I really lost touch with that, you know. So this
Speaker 2: was the beginning of me knowing what kind of lyrics
Speaker 2: I liked, what kind of song structures I liked, and
Speaker 2: also I started learning some early blues songs like by
Speaker 2: Bessie Smith.
Speaker 1: Okay, you're playing the biancho. Then you end up in
Speaker 1: New York with these women. How do you end up
Speaker 1: in New York?
Speaker 2: Just from the same type of wanderings, you know, it
Speaker 2: was like a really long northern journey on the Last
Speaker 2: Dead Man Street Orchestra tour where we ended up. The
Speaker 2: fiddle players had family and like rural New York I think,
Speaker 2: like near Fishkill or something like that. And then it's
Speaker 2: like I find I make my way back to the city.
Speaker 2: And it was my friends Amelia and Emily, who were
Speaker 2: still my best friends today. They were in school and
Speaker 2: you know, these like really tough feminists I met who
Speaker 2: were a part of that like squatter movement during this
Speaker 2: protest period, and they started just like being in regular
Speaker 2: contact with me. We would email each other. They started
Speaker 2: teaching me about feminism and teaching me like different you know,
Speaker 2: they'd like lend me a book that I should read,
Speaker 2: like here's Bill Hooks, here's Angela Davis. All these types
Speaker 2: of people.
Speaker 1: Okay, you're in the apartment, you record these songs on
Speaker 1: a laptop. They become your first EP. As I say,
Speaker 1: we're now more than ever you can do it yourself.
Speaker 1: When you were singing those songs into the laptop, are
Speaker 1: you thinking this is a record or are you thinking
Speaker 1: I'm just making a permanent record of the music.
Speaker 2: In my mind, I think at that point I was
Speaker 2: thinking I'm making a tape because that was still like
Speaker 2: we still had. It was a bit nostalgic, not as
Speaker 2: nostalgic as it is now, but there was this like
Speaker 2: romanticism about getting a mixtape or something that we were
Speaker 2: really excited about, and that was my preferred way of
Speaker 2: listening to music. So I think I was thinking, Okay,
Speaker 2: I'm gonna record this and then put it on CD.
Speaker 2: We all knew CDs were terrible, So I was excited
Speaker 2: to make tapes. And I definitely had the intention of
Speaker 2: like distributing it, like you know, in a DIY way,
Speaker 2: but I was excited to There was something about thinking
Speaker 2: I can make this tape and I can give it
Speaker 2: to these people and they'll be able to really see me.
Speaker 2: There was this really this excitement of being seen in
Speaker 2: a way that I felt like I couldn't quite communicate
Speaker 2: Throughout just like being myself every day.
Speaker 1: Okay, you record it, you then put it on CD.
Speaker 1: Then what do you do?
Speaker 2: Uh? I started just making copies, making tapes, asked a
Speaker 2: friend to make some album art for me. We would
Speaker 2: have shows at that you know, acoustic shows at that apartment,
Speaker 2: and that was something that I was doing. It started
Speaker 2: to become more of like, oh, this is something I
Speaker 2: could do. I started to take on more of an
Speaker 2: identity of I think it's possibly could be a singer songwriter.
Speaker 1: Okay, you put out this EP in two thousand and seven,
Speaker 1: you put out two more albums two thousand and eight,
Speaker 1: twenty ten. You're doing it. But is it there any reaction?
Speaker 1: Is it growing? Are you trying to get on the radio?
Speaker 1: What is going on with your career at that point?
Speaker 2: Definitely not trying to get on the radio that I
Speaker 2: wish I thought of that time. At first, it was
Speaker 2: purely Okay, I'm trying to give something to my friends.
Speaker 2: And then you know, I had to make the realization
Speaker 2: that was time for me to really buckle down in
Speaker 2: New Orleans after the Hobo band fell apart, and I
Speaker 2: started to really think like, Okay, I want to live somewhere.
Speaker 2: I want to have a home and I want to
Speaker 2: focus on songwriting. So I get jobs at coffee shops
Speaker 2: and start living in a house with three other four
Speaker 2: other artists. And that when I made the record it
Speaker 2: don't mean I don't love you. I had started playing
Speaker 2: around New Orleans a lot. I made friends with a
Speaker 2: local musician there, Walt McClements, who is still making really
Speaker 2: beautiful music today. He starts playing with me, he starts
Speaker 2: supporting me and just helping me get respect in the local,
Speaker 2: you know, underground scene, the scene that's separate from from
Speaker 2: the jazz world there, and I was getting a lot
Speaker 2: of really great a lot of great support and excitement.
Speaker 2: At one point, there was a brief period where I
Speaker 2: was able to get a manager and then that fell apart.
Speaker 2: And that was during the second record, what I called
Speaker 2: the second record, Young Blood Blues. I briefly got a
Speaker 2: manager and then she very quickly, you know, dumped me.
Speaker 2: And then it was there was a local lawyer who
Speaker 2: was hanging out and who was my close friend named
Speaker 2: Andy Buiser, and he was like, I'm just going to
Speaker 2: become your manager. And from there it felt like, okay,
Speaker 2: this is go time. Let's really let's go on tour.
Speaker 2: Let's try to do something, you know, And that was
Speaker 2: all leading up to making Lookout Mama, and look Out
Speaker 2: Mama felt like a real change in my life, like
Speaker 2: this is what I do. I'm on the road. I
Speaker 2: finally met, you know, a real producer in a even
Speaker 2: though it's I call it a real studio, but it
Speaker 2: was his house, Andrea Tokic in Nashville.
Speaker 1: Okay, let's go back a little bit. If I heard
Speaker 1: you correctly, at this point, when you first moved back
Speaker 1: to New Orleans, you have a straight gig working in
Speaker 1: the coffee shop. Yeah, okay, that's paying the bills. While
Speaker 1: that is going on, you're working on your music. Are
Speaker 1: you playing live at all?
Speaker 2: Yeah? A lot of playing live, Yeah.
Speaker 1: For money or just in the background for money.
Speaker 2: Probably not a lot of money. But it was definitely
Speaker 2: shows where you know, it's multiple acts, and so I was.
Speaker 2: I was definitely playing a lot. And then also I
Speaker 2: was still playing on the street. That was when I
Speaker 2: started to play on the street purely for money. Was
Speaker 2: playing traditional jazz on the banjo or singing, doing both
Speaker 2: with some bands that were like pretty established on the
Speaker 2: street scene there. And I mean honestly that paid better
Speaker 2: than the coffee shop gig. Like that was. I felt
Speaker 2: very conflicted with playing in those bands because they paid
Speaker 2: so well, but I found them to be so boring,
Speaker 2: and all I wanted to do was write my own music.
Speaker 2: But I felt like, man, I could play a wedding,
Speaker 2: I could play two shifts on the street on a
Speaker 2: beautiful day and come out with like four hundred dollars,
Speaker 2: because it was like we were just making an insane
Speaker 2: amount of money.
Speaker 1: At what point do you start playing the guitar?
Speaker 2: That was closer to look Out Mama. I think the
Speaker 2: first time I'm recorded playing the guitar was on Young
Speaker 2: Blood Blues, and that was the record right before I
Speaker 2: look Out Mama. In like twenty ten, I started playing
Speaker 2: the guitar because I would go see family in New
Speaker 2: York and I would end up at the well. It
Speaker 2: wasn't at the Jalapie. It's something called Ruts and Rucis.
Speaker 2: That is a night of folk music with like many
Speaker 2: different revolving performers, and it was it used to be
Speaker 2: at Cafe is it? Oh? No, the village, Ma, Yeah,
Speaker 2: it used to be at the Village, Ma. A friend
Speaker 2: of mine started the night, so I would go play
Speaker 2: that for some money and also to see other great
Speaker 2: folk musicians and be inspired. And it was hanging out
Speaker 2: with those people that I started to really fall in
Speaker 2: love with the guitar.
Speaker 1: Okay, in this you're making a couple of records, you're driven.
Speaker 1: Are there any signs that things are opening up you
Speaker 1: certain reactions, certain breaks, or you just doing it on
Speaker 1: a real underground level.
Speaker 2: It was a lot of local reaction, which felt like
Speaker 2: the whole world to me. You know, this is really
Speaker 2: before we were still like really clued into the internet.
Speaker 2: I definitely wasn't. I wasn't really that focused on anything
Speaker 2: outside of New Orleans. Anything outside of New Orleans felt
Speaker 2: like it was it didn't involve me. So when I
Speaker 2: would get local reaction, or when I would be on
Speaker 2: a show and one hundred people show up at the show,
Speaker 2: it felt like, man, I made it, you know. So
Speaker 2: that really did a lot for me. But I, like
Speaker 2: I said, a major change was when I got in
Speaker 2: contact with this look, with this manager and she was
Speaker 2: talking to you know, she like flew down to meet me.
Speaker 2: I'm thinking, like, oh, it's all happening, Like like what
Speaker 2: people say is going to happen. And then pretty quickly
Speaker 2: she's like, I don't see this going anywhere for you,
Speaker 2: you know, which I don't blame her, because at the time,
Speaker 2: I don't think I seemed very like like I made
Speaker 2: sense in any sort of there was like this. It
Speaker 2: was kind of still inde sleeves going on or something
Speaker 2: going on in music at that time. So that was
Speaker 2: I really had to reckon with that. Though I had to.
Speaker 2: I think it woke me up and it also made me.
Speaker 2: It made me less naive of Oh, things are just
Speaker 2: going to flow. It's going to be some like music
Speaker 2: documentary where someone discovers you and then you're a folk
Speaker 2: star or something like that that you see. It made
Speaker 2: me think, Okay, I don't want to play jazz gigs
Speaker 2: for my living anymore. That's not what I like to do.
Speaker 2: I need to find a way to get more serious
Speaker 2: about my songwriting. And that's when Andy Buiser became my manager,
Speaker 2: and when I made look Out Mama. That was when
Speaker 2: I started to feel like, Okay, let's try to make something.
Speaker 2: Let's try to get attention from outside of this city.
Speaker 1: Okay, at what point do you call it hooray for
Speaker 1: the riff raf.
Speaker 2: From the beginning from the very first one.
Speaker 1: Okay, I have to ask the obvious question, why hooray
Speaker 1: for the riff.
Speaker 2: Rath Okay, my memory is shoddy, but I remember that
Speaker 2: fiddle player I mentioned Barnabas. We were all, you know
Speaker 2: that the Jovo band ended up at this their family house.
Speaker 2: They let like the six seven hobo kids like all sleepover,
Speaker 2: and we're all hanging out and we were all saying goodbye.
Speaker 2: The next day we got like, I think she dropped
Speaker 2: me and Barnabas off at a train yard nearby. We
Speaker 2: were going somewhere and she said something about riff raff
Speaker 2: and she said it in this really like loving way,
Speaker 2: just and it. I remember in that moment thinking like
Speaker 2: I like that. And I'd already been toying around with like, well,
Speaker 2: what would I call a band if it was just
Speaker 2: my band? What would you know? I really didn't like
Speaker 2: the idea of just using my name. I was a
Speaker 2: big fan of cat Power, and I was like, I
Speaker 2: loved that she had a cool, weird name, you know.
Speaker 2: I just thought like it was more mysterious, So I
Speaker 2: got it. I remember it was inspired by my friend's mom.
Speaker 2: And then and then I used.
Speaker 1: To Okay, there are a million bands who say, hey,
Speaker 1: we just settled on a name, and if we knew
Speaker 1: it was going to be the ultimate name of a
Speaker 1: big wish, it wasn't this. Are you happy that it's
Speaker 1: hooray for the riff Raff?
Speaker 2: I wouldn't say I'm overjoyed, but I've learned to. I've
Speaker 2: learned to love it. I've learned to. I think it's
Speaker 2: good for me that I have to you know, I'm here.
Speaker 2: It's kind of like when you get a tattoo when
Speaker 2: you're seventeen. It's like, I'm still very much in touch
Speaker 2: with that young kid. And also I do think that
Speaker 2: the threads and the themes are still so much of
Speaker 2: what inspires me and what is like the colors that
Speaker 2: I paint with, you know, I think that a lot
Speaker 2: has changed, and also like the main themes are still there.
Speaker 1: Okay, you make the Lookout Mom a record? What changes
Speaker 1: after you make that?
Speaker 2: That was when we started to get more attention. That
Speaker 2: was when you know, we're still the tours. We were
Speaker 2: still rough, but at that age, I'm probably like twenty
Speaker 2: four twenty five, I was just so excited to like
Speaker 2: live on the road for two months in the van
Speaker 2: and we start meeting other like like minded musicians that
Speaker 2: are it felt like there was something really happening in
Speaker 2: the Southeast that was really exciting. And that was when,
Speaker 2: you know, as I was making the next record, small
Speaker 2: Town Heroes, or writing those songs, I started to get
Speaker 2: contacted by Ato Records, by this woman Kirby Lee, who
Speaker 2: actually saw me play at a Roots and Ruckus set
Speaker 2: in New York one time, like when I'm playing by
Speaker 2: myself and she, you know, approached me and we became
Speaker 2: fast friends. And that was my first time getting attention
Speaker 2: from a label. And also then the next record, small
Speaker 2: Town Heroes, was my first record with a label in
Speaker 2: the US.
Speaker 1: Okay, you're going on the road. It's a band? Is
Speaker 1: it the same people? How did the economics work?
Speaker 2: We split everything equally, which I think was very generous.
Speaker 2: I just didn't you know we would just split everything
Speaker 2: split like the CD sales. I mean back then CD
Speaker 2: sales were you could be like a working, just like
Speaker 2: hustling musician and you sold so many CDs. It's so
Speaker 2: crazy to think that, Like, we don't sell physical copies anymore.
Speaker 2: You know, I had made I made look Out Mama
Speaker 2: into physical pressings through a Kickstarter. That was how we
Speaker 2: paid for the vinyl and how we paid for like
Speaker 2: the album art and everything, but we would split everything equally.
Speaker 2: We would sleep on people's floors. Sometimes at the end
Speaker 2: of a set, we'd be like, and we're looking for
Speaker 2: blades to stay We like end up staying in random
Speaker 2: people's houses. So it was it was very like still Hoboesque,
Speaker 2: but it was the same people for that period of time.
Speaker 2: I'd say, like look Out Mama and Small Town were
Speaker 2: a similar group, a similar band. It was two people
Speaker 2: from a band called the Deslons that are still going
Speaker 2: and Yos Pearlstein who played on h Young Blood Blues
Speaker 2: and look at Mama and small Town Heroes.
Speaker 1: So yeah, okay, Kickstarter, how much money do you ask for?
Speaker 1: And in Kickstarter you have to reach that level on
Speaker 1: like cah go go how much money? And how do
Speaker 1: you get the word out?
Speaker 2: Uh? Well, I think think that was when Facebook was
Speaker 2: finally here, So we were putting it out to like
Speaker 2: a lot of our friends and family, and I think
Speaker 2: it's like I want to say, it was not a
Speaker 2: lot like seventy five hundred or something. I should find
Speaker 2: it because you know, we were recording with Andrea at
Speaker 2: his house still, so it wasn't like a crazy amount
Speaker 2: and we just wanted to make physical you know, CDs,
Speaker 2: So it wasn't a lot, but we made our goal
Speaker 2: and and yeah, I thought it was a big success.
Speaker 1: Now you made a covers album via Kickstarter after that, right, well, that.
Speaker 2: Was one of their rewards. I wanted to give people
Speaker 2: a reward, so I said, okay, you'll get uh, you'll
Speaker 2: get some of my covers record that I'll also record
Speaker 2: with Andrea as like an incentive. And you know, I
Speaker 2: think we had we had like a mailing li at
Speaker 2: the time. We definitely had some like cult fan base
Speaker 2: in the Southeast, particularly because that was where we would
Speaker 2: you know, tour so often in like Alabama and North
Speaker 2: Carolina and Georgia. So there were people that were really supportive.
Speaker 1: Okay, this comes out before the person from Ato makes contact.
Speaker 1: Other than getting the money on kickscharter and having enough
Speaker 1: money to make the record, did that grow the act?
Speaker 2: Yeah? I mean it really it felt like that record
Speaker 2: was reaching outside of our bubble. It felt like people
Speaker 2: were hearing about it. It felt like we could go
Speaker 2: on tour on the West Coast, and people would come.
Speaker 2: It felt like there was a word of mouth and
Speaker 2: it was also at a good time for that sound.
Speaker 2: I felt like that sound was you know, during that time,
Speaker 2: we met Brittany and members of Alabama Sheikhs, and there
Speaker 2: was a band Shovels and Rope. It felt like there
Speaker 2: was really something going on with that type of sound.
Speaker 2: So it felt like it was growing for sure.
Speaker 1: Okay, by time you get the deal with Ato, is
Speaker 1: the lawyer still your manager? Do you have an agent?
Speaker 1: What's the status of the band?
Speaker 2: By the time Ato came to us, Andy was still
Speaker 2: our manager and it was signing with Ato. I'd say
Speaker 2: after small Town when we started to realize that it
Speaker 2: was getting really big for him, you know, he started
Speaker 2: starting his own family that and then Kirby Lee, who
Speaker 2: signed me, actually became my manager.
Speaker 1: And who is your manager today, Chris chen So how
Speaker 1: did you get from Kirby to Chris.
Speaker 2: Gosh? I mean, well, me and Kirk we were together
Speaker 2: for a couple of records and that was amazing, and
Speaker 2: we were really we were best friends and we still
Speaker 2: are very very close. And I felt like after you know,
Speaker 2: me and Kirby were together from small Town till the Navigator,
Speaker 2: and after the Navigator, things in my life and in
Speaker 2: the life of the band felt really confusing. After I
Speaker 2: put out that record, I had no idea what to do.
Speaker 2: And then you know, after that, we're hit with the pandemic.
Speaker 2: So I was in a really tough spot and me
Speaker 2: and Kirby weren't working together anymore. And actually Chris Chris
Speaker 2: chen I met him because when none Such approached me,
Speaker 2: uh after the Navigator, he was working at None Such.
Speaker 2: So we became friends and stayed in touch, and it
Speaker 2: was through that meeting that he became my manager.
Speaker 1: Okay, let's back up. Yeah, you're an ATO. Do you
Speaker 1: have an agent?
Speaker 2: At first we didn't. Then we eventually signed with Josh
Speaker 2: Brinkman for a little bit. This is the part of
Speaker 2: the interview I'm going to be bad at because I
Speaker 2: feel like I don't remember a lot of people's names.
Speaker 2: But we're with Josh Brinkman for a little and he
Speaker 2: became our booking agent. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Well, how many booking agents since then?
Speaker 2: Uh? Just too including the one that we're with now.
Speaker 2: So now we're with Martial Debts.
Speaker 1: And what is the difference between booking agents.
Speaker 2: Well, I think there's been a big difference in me.
Speaker 2: You know, I learned a lot with small town Heroes
Speaker 2: because I was coming from this scene in New Orleans
Speaker 2: that it wasn't the genre didn't really matter as much,
Speaker 2: and I didn't really understand anything about like your presentation
Speaker 2: and your brand and all these types of just like
Speaker 2: aesthetic choices that you make about a band and how
Speaker 2: that affects where you play, the type of festivals you play, like,
Speaker 2: you know, the genre that you end up in, and
Speaker 2: small town heroes to me, I didn't really know that
Speaker 2: it would mean I would be on this Americana track,
Speaker 2: which is funny to say now, but I wanted to
Speaker 2: get off of it pretty fast once I was. Once
Speaker 2: I put out that record, I felt like I was
Speaker 2: presenting myself the wrong way, and it was really hard
Speaker 2: for the people that work with me to understand what
Speaker 2: I meant. You know, It's like I don't want to
Speaker 2: play these like Americana festivals. It's like, well, you play
Speaker 2: Americana music, so what do you want. So that's why
Speaker 2: with The Navigator, I wanted to really shift the focus
Speaker 2: and I wanted to take the reins and just change
Speaker 2: the track of where I was going.
Speaker 1: You know, that's not that easy. Was it easy for you.
Speaker 2: To seem so hard? So hard? And so many people
Speaker 2: were like, you're ruining your career, and I don't even
Speaker 2: doubt them. I was just like, well, I'm miserable though
Speaker 2: I'm in situations. I was in environments where I felt
Speaker 2: extremely un like respected and I felt very sometimes unsafe,
Speaker 2: just like I felt like an outsider at my own gigs,
Speaker 2: you know, not ones that were particularly for me, but
Speaker 2: I felt like I was being placed in the wrong settings.
Speaker 2: And I just had this idea of yeah, I play
Speaker 2: the singer songwriter music and sometimes there's a fiddle, but
Speaker 2: it's still a little bit indie rock. It's still a
Speaker 2: little bit off kilter. I don't want to go down
Speaker 2: this like I want to somehow show the off kilter
Speaker 2: of it and show that it's still a little bit
Speaker 2: weird in the best use of the word, you know.
Speaker 2: So it was really difficult, and a lot of people
Speaker 2: were just like, you're not gonna be able to do this.
Speaker 2: And luckily, I feel like now genre has been blown up,
Speaker 2: so I think it's working a lot better than it
Speaker 2: did at first.
Speaker 1: So at first it was a struggle career wise.
Speaker 2: Definitely The Navigator in general was a really hard time
Speaker 2: for me. I'm so proud of that record, and I'm
Speaker 2: so proud of of just like the campaign that we
Speaker 2: made and the people that I worked with. You know,
Speaker 2: I was working with shore Fire. I still do on publicity,
Speaker 2: and I learned so much in how that was a
Speaker 2: part of my art. You know, that was a major
Speaker 2: I think, just a tool that I was able to
Speaker 2: express these other parts of myself, Like I was able
Speaker 2: to talk to writers I really respect, and to thinkers
Speaker 2: and to show the side of me that I think
Speaker 2: is a huge part of the music. But as far
Speaker 2: as as educating an audience, taking you know, taking them
Speaker 2: a new direction from this like idea of me that
Speaker 2: they first met with small Town, it was really hard.
Speaker 2: And it was also a very you know, it was
Speaker 2: the beginning of a very tense political climate of course,
Speaker 2: so it was just rough. Being on the road was rough.
Speaker 2: Playing shows was rough. Sometimes we'd get heckled. I mean,
Speaker 2: I've been pretty lucky with stuff like that, but a
Speaker 2: lot of like why are you speaking out about things
Speaker 2: like go back to playing the fucking banjo or whatever.
Speaker 2: You know, it was really it was a really hard time.
Speaker 1: Okay, in this evolution, did the audience adjust or did
Speaker 1: people fall off and you get new people?
Speaker 2: People fell off and I got new people, and then
Speaker 2: you know there is a section that adjusts. I think
Speaker 2: there's a there's a core group that always saw me
Speaker 2: as just an artist, a songwriter. I think some people
Speaker 2: who've who've like, they have artists that they love, and
Speaker 2: they also are willing to go down a journey with
Speaker 2: them and expect changes and expect different influences. So people
Speaker 2: who listen in that way and our fans in that
Speaker 2: way were ready for the ride and if anything, excited
Speaker 2: about it. And then some people drop off and then
Speaker 2: you make new fans or I made new fans.
Speaker 1: Okay, you obviously decide I did to go down this path,
Speaker 1: and you were staying the path. But in the transition,
Speaker 1: which had was not one hundred percent smooth, to what
Speaker 1: degree were you personally angstying?
Speaker 2: Oh it's really hard. Yeah, I was experiencing a lot
Speaker 2: of stage fright. I was experiencing just like I still
Speaker 2: was in a place where I wasn't that worried about
Speaker 2: like my overall future. I still think I had some
Speaker 2: of that like gift of like of youth where I
Speaker 2: was like, no, I'm on my hero's journey and something
Speaker 2: is going to happen. But I hated the feeling of
Speaker 2: being misunderstood and I hated the feeling of being scared.
Speaker 2: And I felt like when I had to go play
Speaker 2: sometimes I had to come out with such a warrior energy,
Speaker 2: and it is exhausting to be a warrior all the time.
Speaker 2: I felt like I wasn't giving the subtlety that I wanted,
Speaker 2: and it was also just really hard on my nervous system,
Speaker 2: hard on my body, and also you know, we're like
Speaker 2: still in the van, so it's just a hard touring life. Yeah.
Speaker 1: So if you put out that album The Navigator, at
Speaker 1: what point do you say, I've turned it around. I'm comfortable,
Speaker 1: this is who I am. It's working. If you've even
Speaker 1: reached that point.
Speaker 2: I think it took a lot of time. It took,
Speaker 2: you know. Now is when I feel like that, because
Speaker 2: people mention that record to me, and it's so it
Speaker 2: blows my mind every time. I'm like, Wow, I'm so
Speaker 2: glad that you're here. You know. Now, people talk about
Speaker 2: Balante and at first, like I remember telling people about
Speaker 2: this song and it was just like I felt crazy.
Speaker 2: I felt, you know, they didn't know what this word meant.
Speaker 2: I hardly knew what the word meant. It means to
Speaker 2: keep going. It's like Puerto Rican slang about continuing on.
Speaker 2: So and I will say, even though during that time
Speaker 2: I didn't know, I felt very uncertain about the audience reception.
Speaker 2: I did feel like the people I worked with were
Speaker 2: real believers. The producer Paul Paul Butler was such a
Speaker 2: believer and we I felt like I went through like
Speaker 2: a spiritual transformation while making that record. That that was
Speaker 2: how I survived because I felt a very deep spiritual
Speaker 2: connection to the music.
Speaker 1: Okay, you produce the first ATO record, as you say,
Speaker 1: Paul Butler produced the second. What's that transition about.
Speaker 2: I think I just understood that I don't want to
Speaker 2: be good at everything, or I don't have to be
Speaker 2: the best at everything. I felt like I wanted some guidance.
Speaker 2: I wanted to say, hey, I don't know what to
Speaker 2: do with this, and also to say I'm at a
Speaker 2: stalemate here, help me get out, you know, like I'm
Speaker 2: trying to change my sound or I'm trying to expand it,
Speaker 2: I should say. And I was listening to a lot
Speaker 2: of Georgia Ben and listening to Rodriguez. So I had
Speaker 2: all these sounds in my head and also this idea
Speaker 2: of like this music should be put to a play
Speaker 2: that I was also working on the side that was writing.
Speaker 2: So I wanted a creative partner. And when I met Paul,
Speaker 2: I just knew that this was it and he would
Speaker 2: challenged me, but he was also really excited to make
Speaker 2: something ambitious.
Speaker 1: Okay, you know Ato, the majors mean less, the independence
Speaker 1: mean more. I remember when Ato was much smaller. Aho
Speaker 1: is kind of a major thing now. But you're making
Speaker 1: these two records. How much money are they giving you
Speaker 1: to make these records.
Speaker 2: For a small town. We really didn't get a lot, uh,
Speaker 2: because you know, Andrea was extremely affordable at the time.
Speaker 2: I'm sure its rates have gone up, but also we
Speaker 2: didn't really need We had a band, so that was
Speaker 2: the touring band for Navigator. We had to get more,
Speaker 2: and I don't know, like it wasn't a lot. I
Speaker 2: would say it was like when me or I don't know.
Speaker 2: I feel like I'm the worst person to ask, but
Speaker 2: I remember it not being an insane amount.
Speaker 1: Okay, let's be point blank for the ato records. They
Speaker 1: cost X Did you ever make a royalty? No? Okay,
Speaker 1: at this point in time, other than selling music at
Speaker 1: the gig, are you making any money from music being
Speaker 1: streamed or used in any way online?
Speaker 2: From my early record well? Actually no, that's like I
Speaker 2: didn't even have them. Well, I was selling them at
Speaker 2: the gigs, you know, I had these CDs that I
Speaker 2: could sell at the gig.
Speaker 1: But I'm talking about online.
Speaker 2: Oh online? No, no, no, no.
Speaker 1: To this day, you're not making any money from online?
Speaker 2: Not really no, I mean definitely not recouped.
Speaker 1: So okay, wait before you switch to none, such, what
Speaker 1: does the touring look like? Are you headlining? Are you opening? What?
Speaker 1: And how are you traveling? Et cetera.
Speaker 2: A lot of headlining the gigs were not as frequent.
Speaker 2: It would be like an occasional gig.
Speaker 1: You know, Well, do you're not opening by you know,
Speaker 1: I have a friend who's got a philosophy. My acts
Speaker 1: never open, so if somebody comes, they're coming to see them.
Speaker 1: It might be a smaller gig, but it's their audience. Yeah,
Speaker 1: Were you headlining by choice because of that or it
Speaker 1: just happened that way?
Speaker 2: We would do which we still do you know, like
Speaker 2: a year of headlining and then hoping to get it, like,
Speaker 2: I'll definitely go on a tour like I just went,
Speaker 2: you know, for Life on Earth. I went on tour
Speaker 2: with Bright Eyes for like on and off for like
Speaker 2: four or five months. And if it's the right act
Speaker 2: then and it pays the bills, then for sure, I'll
Speaker 2: do it. But it seemed like nobody was really knocking
Speaker 2: on our door to open. And yeah, I really agree
Speaker 2: that we had a small but dedicated fan base. It
Speaker 2: just was better for us to headline.
Speaker 1: Okay, bright Eyes got a good reputation, not exactly your sound.
Speaker 1: How was that experience opening for Bright Eyes?
Speaker 2: It was it really it made more sense than you'd think.
Speaker 2: You know, we're all like in that band, and for me,
Speaker 2: we're all obsessed with the song. You know, it's very
Speaker 2: song storyteller focused. And also these are guys that are
Speaker 2: interested in all genres just like me. It was a
Speaker 2: really amazing experience. Life on Earth was my last record,
Speaker 2: and that was also a tough time for me and
Speaker 2: a tough time on the road. Coming back through pandemic
Speaker 2: times and going on tour with them saved me. I also,
Speaker 2: I didn't grow up as big of a Bright Eyes fan.
Speaker 2: Of course I knew who they were, and of course
Speaker 2: I listened to some songs on mixtapes and stuff, But
Speaker 2: this was my first time really experiencing Connor's lyrical genius
Speaker 2: every night, and that was a lifesaver. Hearing those lyrics
Speaker 2: every night just expanded my mind. I felt like, okay,
Speaker 2: I'm learning each night, you.
Speaker 1: Know, Okay, tell me about switching to none such.
Speaker 2: It was again, well, this was right before the pandemic.
Speaker 2: My you know, my time with Ato ran its course,
Speaker 2: and I had these.
Speaker 1: Yeah, theoretically, if you'd wanted to make another record with Ato,
Speaker 1: could you have? And if not, was it with a
Speaker 1: choice to separate their's yours?
Speaker 2: It was their?
Speaker 1: Okay?
Speaker 2: Yeah, you know the Navigator. It wasn't a huge success commercially,
Speaker 2: and I think again, like for people who first worked
Speaker 2: with me with small town heroes, maybe they thought that
Speaker 2: they were getting a certain type of artists and then
Speaker 2: I do this complete change or it. You know, it
Speaker 2: was a pretty drastic change. And then coming into life
Speaker 2: on Earth, the demos I had were even weirder. And
Speaker 2: now I'm like playing with electronics stuff and I'm just
Speaker 2: starting to go in this just experimenting in this other way.
Speaker 2: So I think it just wasn't what they were interested in,
Speaker 2: and none such was really.
Speaker 1: Well, was a little bit slower, a little bit slower. Huh,
Speaker 1: Ato says we're going to part ways. Yeah, how do
Speaker 1: you handle that emotionally?
Speaker 2: I mean, even though I'm sensitive, I can be really
Speaker 2: tough and stubborn where I'm just like okay, like I'm
Speaker 2: gonna find a way where there is no way.
Speaker 1: Okay. Then, how does nuns you said, nuns such found you?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 1: I mean, did you have a manager of somebody putting
Speaker 1: out demos feelers? How did none such ultimately make contact
Speaker 1: with you?
Speaker 2: Yeah? I mean I think it was probably I had
Speaker 2: a brief manager after Kirby Lee, and I feel like
Speaker 2: that was the connection. I remember meeting, you know, David
Speaker 2: By there came to New Orleans, where I lived at
Speaker 2: the time. I just recently moved.
Speaker 1: And wait, wait we live where now?
Speaker 2: And now I live in Chicago.
Speaker 1: And why Chicago?
Speaker 2: I love it here. I mean also, my whole band
Speaker 2: is based out of here, and I've I've slowly started
Speaker 2: to become obsessed with the music scene in Chicago that
Speaker 2: this like independent music scene specifically my Bassis Namdi, who
Speaker 2: puts out really he's been putting out really amazing weird
Speaker 2: music forever. Also send Marie Mooto. There's just like a
Speaker 2: really cool scene of kind of genre lists, really inspired
Speaker 2: artists here. So I started making friends and I'm excited
Speaker 2: about the change.
Speaker 1: Okay, so by There comes to New Orleans and.
Speaker 2: And we have a dinner and it was really great
Speaker 2: and I felt really respected, and it was just everything
Speaker 2: I was looking for, you know. It was It's like
Speaker 2: a prestigious label with uh, just a roster of artists
Speaker 2: that I'm I'm just like, I want to have a
Speaker 2: career like that. I want to have a career that's long.
Speaker 2: I want to have a career that is inspired and
Speaker 2: takes chances where the art is is first. And so
Speaker 2: I felt like that was the home for me.
Speaker 1: Well, No Such is great on a million levels, and
Speaker 1: by There was great, but point blank, you've made two
Speaker 1: records for None Such, which really is a major label.
Speaker 1: You know, it lives in its own world, but it's
Speaker 1: part of the Warner Group, et cetera. What is different
Speaker 1: about being un Done Such as opposed to your prior records.
Speaker 2: I mean, I think I've I think the experiences are
Speaker 2: pretty similar, honestly, like I've never had the experience of
Speaker 2: people telling me what to do with the art. I've
Speaker 2: gotten lucky for both rounds with Ato and None Such
Speaker 2: that they're very the artist knows what you want, so
Speaker 2: so yeah, I would say, I mean also, of course,
Speaker 2: like this time for life on Earth and for for
Speaker 2: the past is still alive. The money was better, and
Speaker 2: especially I needed that because I'm working with a producer,
Speaker 2: Brad Cook, and just like everything's leveled up and it's
Speaker 2: kind of like, okay, we're in the big leagues. Now
Speaker 2: we got to do some big leak stuff, you know, Okay, you.
Speaker 1: Know, irrelevant of view, irrelevant of none such. The landscape
Speaker 1: continues to evolve. The old paradigm has dead. You know,
Speaker 1: let's get print to TV, getting on the radio now,
Speaker 1: you know, it's more. Yeah, you have your fan base,
Speaker 1: but growing your fan base is on the road. And
Speaker 1: then there's like some luck you know, Spotify, TikTok. You know,
Speaker 1: is there anything that None such has done in particular
Speaker 1: that a previous outfit did not do that you can
Speaker 1: see to your benefit.
Speaker 2: I think they were just very supportive to what to
Speaker 2: the process I was going through. I think Life on Earth.
Speaker 2: You know, Life on Earth also wasn't a blockbus by
Speaker 2: any means, but they were very patient and very supportive
Speaker 2: of this weird record I made that I really believe in,
Speaker 2: and then I think staying with me and staying supportive
Speaker 2: during that time and giving me what I needed to
Speaker 2: make the past is still alive. This is by far
Speaker 2: like the most successful record I've made, and I think
Speaker 2: it'll continue to be. I think it'll be a life
Speaker 2: changing record for me, and I think when other labels
Speaker 2: would have started to really freak out, they were just
Speaker 2: extremely supportive and really listened to me and Chris and
Speaker 2: followed our lead.
Speaker 1: Okay, how can you feel or how you measuring that
Speaker 1: the new latest album is so successful?
Speaker 2: I can feel it in the audiences. I can feel
Speaker 2: it also just in like a cultural sense. It feels
Speaker 2: like it's I mean, the type of press that I've
Speaker 2: gotten and the responses that I've gotten, it feels like
Speaker 2: it really connected, like the vision I had in mind
Speaker 2: was being I brought it to people. And also I'm
Speaker 2: starting to feel like other avenues are opening up for me,
Speaker 2: like this record has somehow opened up avenues for me
Speaker 2: in writing and in meeting other thinkers that I really respect,
Speaker 2: and just getting into rooms that I felt like I
Speaker 2: was locked out of before because I'm just like a
Speaker 2: musician solely. Something about this record has really opened up
Speaker 2: a multi faceted future for me. I think.
Speaker 1: Now, if I remember correctly, they did a feature on
Speaker 1: you in the New York Times, Right, that feels good?
Speaker 1: You know, did you hear from the people you grew
Speaker 1: up with? Did it have any effect? Or you say
Speaker 1: that was nice?
Speaker 2: Now it's Wednesday, Definitely, that was nice. Now it's Wednesday, definitely,
Speaker 2: that was nice. Time to go on tour. We better
Speaker 2: fucking sell tickets on this tour, you know. And in
Speaker 2: that way, I think, I think things are still growing
Speaker 2: for sure in the touring world. That's where my focus is.
Speaker 2: Is like I want to get out of the fucking
Speaker 2: van and I'm just stubborn as hell, and I'm gonna
Speaker 2: work until I do. You know, there's a huge chasm
Speaker 2: between like van band to bus band. It feels like
Speaker 2: the fucking Grand Canyon, like you just you don't know
Speaker 2: how to get over there. And I think a lot
Speaker 2: of it is luck and the right timing and the
Speaker 2: right placement and the right like you know. So that's
Speaker 2: my like struggle right now. But I'm gonna just keep working.
Speaker 1: Okay, the economics. You know, you were literally, you know,
Speaker 1: a squatter. What's your economic status today?
Speaker 2: I mean I feel rich. It's like I can pay rent,
Speaker 2: and I mean my life is still compared to other people.
Speaker 2: It's like I don't have a car, you know, I
Speaker 2: don't own any land or anything. I don't I but
Speaker 2: I can go out to dinner, I can pay my rent.
Speaker 2: I'm just I'm also constantly working. I'm at a place
Speaker 2: where I'd really love to not tour as much as
Speaker 2: I do. I've been on tour on and off since February,
Speaker 2: you know. I've had like two weeks off recently, and
Speaker 2: it was so good for my body. So I'd love
Speaker 2: to get to a place where I'm not consistently touring.
Speaker 2: Because I tour and then I find a way to
Speaker 2: tour the second year of a record, and then when
Speaker 2: that starts to dry up, I'm like, well, I can
Speaker 2: do solo shows.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 2: There's always some kind of get back on the road
Speaker 2: to make some money hustle, and I want to start writing.
Speaker 2: I want to find a way to spend more time
Speaker 2: at home.
Speaker 1: So tell me about how you cope with the pandemic.
Speaker 2: By writing through it. For sure, I felt really lucky
Speaker 2: to be in New Orleans. It's just it was so
Speaker 2: beautiful and we didn't have to deal with like the winner,
Speaker 2: you know. I was always able to go outside. Luckily
Speaker 2: we had a democratic governor who believed in science, or
Speaker 2: else I think we would have been fucked, you know.
Speaker 2: So I felt like the state actually handled it really well.
Speaker 2: We were able to get testing pretty early on. It
Speaker 2: was also the time that I met Brad that I
Speaker 2: started to a friend, I'm a terrible driver. I'm like
Speaker 2: always a New Yorker who didn't grow up driving. So
Speaker 2: I didn't want to fly, of course, So I convinced
Speaker 2: two separate friends on two separate trips, to drive with
Speaker 2: me to Durham, and I'd like, get an Airbnb and
Speaker 2: we would get, you know, get tested, and then I'd
Speaker 2: go get into the studio with Brad. So that was
Speaker 2: how I coped, was making life on Earth and meeting
Speaker 2: Brad and getting inspired in that way.
Speaker 1: And how'd you cope financially?
Speaker 2: I was pretty okay, I mean, really not doing anything helped.
Speaker 2: Not doing anything, not going anywhere definitely had to like
Speaker 2: buckle down. But also I'd just gotten this. I felt
Speaker 2: really lucky to have gotten a record deal, you know,
Speaker 2: before the pandemic hit. It was like a week before
Speaker 2: so where I feel like maybe they would have been
Speaker 2: a little bit more timid about signing me. A couple
Speaker 2: of weeks later, when the world shuts down, I just
Speaker 2: had this record deal go through. I felt like, let's
Speaker 2: I don't know. I felt like there was actually a
Speaker 2: lot of opportunity for me, and I was so happy
Speaker 2: to not be on tour.
Speaker 1: Okay, I've seen you live Beyond before the pandemic. I'm aware.
Speaker 1: But in all the press for these none such work,
Speaker 1: they've referenced non binary and they them pronouns.
Speaker 2: Ye.
Speaker 1: Is it just because this is something I'm aware of
Speaker 1: now or is it something that was always the case
Speaker 1: in I'm late or is it a change what's going
Speaker 1: on there?
Speaker 2: It was a change during the pandemic. I think there
Speaker 2: was something about not being you know, this word perceived
Speaker 2: that I feel like people are using a lot. It
Speaker 2: was a but a major time of I was getting
Speaker 2: a lot of nostalgia and I was also doing a
Speaker 2: lot of recounting my life and the people that meant
Speaker 2: a lot to me, and a lot of those people
Speaker 2: are trans people. That's a huge part of this band
Speaker 2: still existing is just like trans community throughout my whole life.
Speaker 2: Somehow coming in seeing me the way I saw myself
Speaker 2: supporting me. And there was this moment in the Pandemic
Speaker 2: where I just kind of got this little inkling of like,
Speaker 2: why am I not allowing myself to just like, for
Speaker 2: lack of a better term, to like fuck around with gender,
Speaker 2: Like why don't I allow myself that freedom? I allow
Speaker 2: myself a lot of creative freedom, but I have I
Speaker 2: focus so much on performance and the art and the band.
Speaker 2: And it felt like giving myself this gift to allow
Speaker 2: my own personal life and the way that I see
Speaker 2: myself and the way I communicate with people and ask
Speaker 2: them to address me and stuff. It felt like a
Speaker 2: gift of allowing myself, Yeah, a new freedom and an exploration.
Speaker 2: It's also extremely vulnerable because you're just you're like, well,
Speaker 2: a lot of people aren't going to get it. Some
Speaker 2: people are going to make fun of it. Some people
Speaker 2: it's going to make them really mad, and you're not
Speaker 2: sure why. But it felt like suddenly I was getting
Speaker 2: closer to this, to the truth of like the kid
Speaker 2: in me who never felt like gender quite made sense
Speaker 2: to me in my experience of it, who felt like
Speaker 2: I was always this like kind of third other thing.
Speaker 2: And it felt like I feel very fine with that,
Speaker 2: you know. Just it felt like I was giving myself
Speaker 2: a gift to be a little bit more complicated to
Speaker 2: people and to not care.
Speaker 1: You know, theoretically you could have changed this but not
Speaker 1: announced it. You chose to announce it because.
Speaker 2: Because it's just the truth of where I'm at, you know,
Speaker 2: announcing it. Also, it mostly was just telling press like
Speaker 2: when they write when they wrote about me, And also
Speaker 2: I felt like, well, people are also gonna write whatever
Speaker 2: they want. But it felt important to me to say
Speaker 2: this is where I'm at. This would have been thinking about,
Speaker 2: you know, and this is how I see myself. So
Speaker 2: you can refer to me as this or you cannot.
Speaker 2: But I'm still going to be doing what I'm doing.
Speaker 1: Okay, So you have these thoughts. You gave yourself this freedom, Yeah,
Speaker 1: has your life changed or it's a terrible term to
Speaker 1: say you've acted on this freedom. But once you've come
Speaker 1: to this realization and announced it has your life changed.
Speaker 2: I feel a sense of relief and I feel, you know,
Speaker 2: who knows what of it is also from just aging
Speaker 2: in the great way of a new confidence and just
Speaker 2: more of a rooted feeling in knowing who I am.
Speaker 2: You know, I definitely feel like what's funny about freeing
Speaker 2: yourself from identity is like then you just get new categories.
Speaker 2: It's like then you get more boxed in in a way,
Speaker 2: but as far. But I also feel like that has
Speaker 2: so much to do with outside perception and the Internet
Speaker 2: and just like all this bullshit when it comes to me,
Speaker 2: It's like, I feel happier at this time in my
Speaker 2: life than I've ever felt. And I think a lot
Speaker 2: of that is by is a testament to just being
Speaker 2: honest about who I am and to be unapologetic about it.
Speaker 1: You mentioned that you had a lot of trans friends
Speaker 1: the trans community. I certainly have trans people, I know.
Speaker 1: I guess what I'm saying is the way you mentioned
Speaker 1: it sound like you had more trans friends than someone
Speaker 1: who might live in the city, and for some reason
Speaker 1: you fell into a world where you had more trans friends.
Speaker 1: Is it just the luck of the draw, or is
Speaker 1: there something about your drawn to this community and how
Speaker 1: does that affect you.
Speaker 2: I was definitely drawn to the community for sure. I
Speaker 2: think also there was something going on in the punk
Speaker 2: scene when I was, you know, in Turning, like eighteen nineteen,
Speaker 2: that there was this like queer punk like revolution happening.
Speaker 2: And I was also meeting a lot of trans train writers.
Speaker 2: You know, my old fiddle player Yo C. Pearlstein, who
Speaker 2: was on three records. We rode freight trains together before
Speaker 2: he joined the band, and he was a part of
Speaker 2: like a really cool crew of trans train writers called
Speaker 2: bent Rails. So it was definitely the world that I
Speaker 2: was drawn to. And I felt like when I would
Speaker 2: be in these very queer spaces, very trans spaces, I
Speaker 2: felt a sense of freedom.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 2: I used to play this one DIY festival out in
Speaker 2: rural Tennessee called Ida that was all mostly trans artists,
Speaker 2: and I couldn't I didn't have the language for why
Speaker 2: I felt well, extremely why I felt more comfortable there,
Speaker 2: but I just knew that I did. So it was
Speaker 2: just something that I kept with me this whole time.
Speaker 1: Are you in a relationship presently?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 1: And I'm going to ask, yeah, man, woman, trans person.
Speaker 2: It's as a man. Yeah, okay, And how long has
Speaker 2: this gone on for a year now?
Speaker 1: And you live together with him in this apartment?
Speaker 2: I do, yeah.
Speaker 1: And is he a musician?
Speaker 2: He is, yeah, but he doesn't he does, he's mostly
Speaker 2: does front of house.
Speaker 1: Now and in the past with this itinerant lifestyle. Yeah,
Speaker 1: have you been mostly solo or had relationships mostly solo?
Speaker 2: A lot of obsessive songwriting.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and prior to now, what is the law longest
Speaker 1: relationship you've had?
Speaker 2: It was for actually for seven years?
Speaker 1: Seven years a long time.
Speaker 2: It is a long time. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1: How old were you when this happened?
Speaker 2: This was after Navigator, which is how I see my
Speaker 2: life in the chapters of albums. But yeah, it was
Speaker 2: for seven years after Navigator until you know, until pretty recently.
Speaker 1: Okay, I mean until pretty recently. Yeah, was this person?
Speaker 1: What was their life about?
Speaker 2: They were not a musician. I don't normally I just
Speaker 2: don't really talk about my especially not for people who
Speaker 2: are not in the music world. So I try to
Speaker 2: give them their privacy.
Speaker 1: Okay, Then let me ask you a different question. Why
Speaker 1: did it end?
Speaker 2: Gosh, just like complete fork in the road, life, life stuff,
Speaker 2: definitely two different lifestyles me, especially going into these last
Speaker 2: two records, being like I need to pedal to the metal,
Speaker 2: do everything I can for my career, you know, and
Speaker 2: their life is very not like this. And also I
Speaker 2: think I think there is something to just like to
Speaker 2: not wanting a traditional relationship, not wanting a traditional not
Speaker 2: wanting marriage eventually you know that type of life.
Speaker 1: Okay, but relationships of that length. Breakups are really hard. Yeah,
Speaker 1: sometimes you get back together other people. I'm more of
Speaker 1: this school. It's like when it's done, I can't have
Speaker 1: contact with you, it's just too painful.
Speaker 2: Yeah, for sure.
Speaker 1: What is going on with you in this person?
Speaker 2: That's definitely more of it. I'm you know, But I
Speaker 2: also have I feel lucky to be a part of
Speaker 2: a world that's like, even though it's big, it's small,
Speaker 2: and I definitely feel a lot of love. But I
Speaker 2: feel so like, especially mixing that with the loss of
Speaker 2: my dad, it's like, right now I have to be
Speaker 2: like I'm forward motion and I'm changing my life and
Speaker 2: I'm going to a new chapter because if I look back,
Speaker 2: it's just so difficult. It's just like the nostalgia will
Speaker 2: just like take over me. And also it's like this
Speaker 2: this grief about being a younger version of myself and
Speaker 2: just like a different part of life. It really feels
Speaker 2: like that was a magical time and now it's like
Speaker 2: I have to let that be and I need to
Speaker 2: find a way to, you know, keep moving and look
Speaker 2: forward to the future.
Speaker 1: When did your father pass us?
Speaker 2: He passed away a month before this record. We supported
Speaker 2: it before I recorded it. Yeah, so it was a
Speaker 2: year ago in February, and then I went into the
Speaker 2: studio in March. So it was really sudden, and it
Speaker 2: was pretty Yeah, it was pretty recent.
Speaker 1: Okay, you've had this parapatetic lifestyle, you drop out of
Speaker 1: high school, you go on the road. Now, as we
Speaker 1: said earlier in the New York Times, where were your father,
Speaker 1: your aunt, and your uncle about all this?
Speaker 2: They were really supportive. My dad particularly was really supportive
Speaker 2: of my music. You know. He he randomly sent me,
Speaker 2: like the week that he got sick, he randomly sent
Speaker 2: me a box with every CD I'd ever sent him.
Speaker 2: Because I just like thought he was the coolest. I mean,
Speaker 2: he drove me crazy, but he was like a jazz musician,
Speaker 2: so I just thought he was the shit. And he
Speaker 2: sent me. It was CDs from jazz bands on the
Speaker 2: Street that I'd sent him that I was recorded on.
Speaker 2: It was the dead Man Street Orchestra, was all my
Speaker 2: early records.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 2: He's on the cover of Lookout Mama. So that was
Speaker 2: a huge moment for him. So he was so supportive.
Speaker 2: And my aunt and uncle were really supportive too.
Speaker 1: Let's be very clear, when you're riding the trains and
Speaker 1: you're in the Dead Mid Orchestra, were they supportive then?
Speaker 2: I mean more so are you gonna die? Like? My
Speaker 2: aunt for sure went through many years of are you
Speaker 2: going to die?
Speaker 1: Like?
Speaker 2: That was just I mean, bless her heart, you know,
Speaker 2: Like to me, I was like, I'm having the time
Speaker 2: of my fucking life, even when it's horrible, I'm having
Speaker 2: the time of my life. And to her, she's just like,
Speaker 2: what are you doing? Are you gonna survive? You know?
Speaker 2: Once I started, I think her life got a lot
Speaker 2: easier when I like settled in New Orleans, got a job,
Speaker 2: and she was excited that I was, you know, starting
Speaker 2: to write songs, and she didn't understand the music at all.
Speaker 2: It's definitely not her style of music. But once that
Speaker 2: started happening, there was so much relief. There was never
Speaker 2: a lot of like shame about me not going to college.
Speaker 2: I mean now we joke about how I saved so
Speaker 2: much debt, Like I'm not in debt because I didn't
Speaker 2: go to fucking college, you know. So, but there was
Speaker 2: this relief and appreciation when when I started this band.
Speaker 1: And what is your brother up to?
Speaker 2: He was a police officer in New York for a
Speaker 2: long time. That was attention. That was like to completely
Speaker 2: separate it separate people. But he was super supportive too.
Speaker 2: We just like didn't talk about politics ever.
Speaker 1: Okay, do you have health insurance?
Speaker 2: I do? Now?
Speaker 1: Yeah, when did you get it?
Speaker 2: Uh? Well, actually when I signed to none such.
Speaker 1: Okay, So you've had this amazing career going on for
Speaker 1: basically two decades at this point or so. You're living
Speaker 1: the dream. But you're an incredibly driven, persistent person, constantly
Speaker 1: putting one foot in front of the other. Yeah, what
Speaker 1: is the dream? What is the target in front of you?
Speaker 2: I think about this all the time. For me, it's
Speaker 2: that I want to get to a place where I
Speaker 2: can have when I can where I have a solid
Speaker 2: and supportive crew that I can pay well, and that
Speaker 2: we can tour in a way that's easier on our bodies,
Speaker 2: and that also we're putting on the best show we
Speaker 2: can put on. Like, I want to feel more support
Speaker 2: in doing the art of performing, so that means I
Speaker 2: would My goal is to get to a place where
Speaker 2: I have a small crew, you know, like monitors, front
Speaker 2: of house, maybe lighting, and my band, and that we
Speaker 2: can be in a bus and that we can play
Speaker 2: for a dedicated fan base until I'm old. But also
Speaker 2: I want to start writing. I think that's like a
Speaker 2: really important part of my future. I don't want to
Speaker 2: I want to tour when I put out a record,
Speaker 2: but I don't want to be constantly hustling. I'd love
Speaker 2: to explore writing more and I would love to write
Speaker 2: a memoir one day and just open up those roads
Speaker 2: for myself. For me success. I don't have any illusions
Speaker 2: about becoming this huge commercial success. I don't really like
Speaker 2: I would. What I want is to feel like I'm
Speaker 2: I have the tools and the support to make my
Speaker 2: art and that I'm a working musician. That isn't Also
Speaker 2: like just sometimes I think tour is like constant punishment
Speaker 2: at this level, and I want it to be a
Speaker 2: little less punishing.
Speaker 1: You know, Okay, the goal is direct, but let's snap
Speaker 1: our fingers. You're in a bus, You're playing to two
Speaker 1: thousand people a night. You can tour pretty much as
Speaker 1: much as you want to. Let's say you we hit
Speaker 1: that hurdle and you can do that to the end
Speaker 1: of time. Yeah, you think that's going to be happy
Speaker 1: enough for you? Are you going to say, well, I'm
Speaker 1: here now, I'd like to get to the next level.
Speaker 2: No, no, if you I mean you talk to musicians
Speaker 2: all the time. Sometimes the most the people that are
Speaker 2: struggling the most are above that level. And like, I
Speaker 2: see that a lot, and I don't like. Fame doesn't
Speaker 2: look great to me. Fame looks terrible. What looks great
Speaker 2: to me is like se level fame. You know, like
Speaker 2: your situation.
Speaker 1: Your situation is not the average beer. Okay, you made
Speaker 1: records independently, you put them out on independent records. You're
Speaker 1: on the major label. Now. Most people never make it
Speaker 1: to the major label unless they're pop or hip hop. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and a lot of them. The major label came early
Speaker 1: yeah okay, and then it went behind. So there's a
Speaker 1: level of persistence and belief that the average person doesn't have,
Speaker 1: never mind that almost everybody would have given up along
Speaker 1: the way. Yeah, so it's hard. Two things. I've never
Speaker 1: met an artist who didn't want to have more people
Speaker 1: exposed to their art. And of course, being an artist,
Speaker 1: your stuff is out there. You don't really know who's listening,
Speaker 1: You don't really know how much acceptance is there. But yes,
Speaker 1: you're moving forward. You're moving forward, You're climbing the ladder.
Speaker 1: You know, are you going to sit here and say no,
Speaker 1: I don't want to play Madison Square Garden or say
Speaker 1: that'd be pretty good?
Speaker 2: Yeah, that'd be pretty good.
Speaker 1: Right, Okay? And in terms of musicians, you know, as
Speaker 1: one gains success both critically and commercially, opportunities arise. You're
Speaker 1: on the road with the bright eyes. But now have
Speaker 1: there been other opportunities of meeting heroes, whether it's just
Speaker 1: being in the environment or working with them.
Speaker 2: You know, it's been mostly literary heroes, which I've find
Speaker 2: really interesting. I haven't really connected with that many musicians
Speaker 2: who are my heroes, but like I've met recently some
Speaker 2: poets and some writers. Honey f Abduah KiB Me and
Speaker 2: him did a talk when I was in New York,
Speaker 2: and I met this poet Ocean w Wang and of
Speaker 2: course Eileen Miles, who I talk about on this record.
Speaker 2: That to me is where I really feel like I
Speaker 2: am living my dream. When I'm meeting like these types
Speaker 2: of artists of different mediums, it kind of frees me
Speaker 2: of like the bullshit of music. Sometimes with other musicians,
Speaker 2: I feel so like the hierarchies are so a part
Speaker 2: of the conversation, and there's a lot of sizing up,
Speaker 2: and there's a lot of like you're at this level.
Speaker 2: I'm at this level. So I really enjoy being around
Speaker 2: writers because I feel like all of that goes away.
Speaker 2: I don't have to worry about that stuff, which is
Speaker 2: another reason why I came to Chicago, because I felt
Speaker 2: like musicians here are not really playing that game, you know,
Speaker 2: a similar thing with New Orleans. So I haven't really
Speaker 2: met a lot of my musical heroes.
Speaker 1: In terms of these poets and other writers you've met,
Speaker 1: Has this just been by accident? Have you reached out
Speaker 1: to them? Have they reached out to you?
Speaker 2: Well, with Honi, if it was you know, a set,
Speaker 2: it was like an event. So my publicist Greg reached
Speaker 2: out to him and he was he wanted to do it.
Speaker 2: So I was excited, and then with these other poets,
Speaker 2: it was like, I, well, one person reached out to me.
Speaker 2: But then like by chance, I happened to actually meet
Speaker 2: Eileen Miles, who's a poet that I'm completely obsessed with.
Speaker 2: So it's been a mixture.
Speaker 1: Okay, a couple of times during our conversation you mentioned
Speaker 1: political things. Yeah, the nature of being a touring musician
Speaker 1: is you're in all of these communities that a lot
Speaker 1: of people were writing at infinite and really have no
Speaker 1: idea what's going on, what is going on in the country.
Speaker 2: Jesus, I've been trying to check out. Honestly, I like
Speaker 2: I've after life on Earth, I you know, especially living
Speaker 2: in New Orleans and with watching the Insurrection live on TV,
Speaker 2: I definitely felt like I don't want to be the
Speaker 2: warrior in this fucking crazy war. Like I felt a
Speaker 2: very real this is not it's not safe, and it's
Speaker 2: not good for me to be out trying to convince
Speaker 2: people of something or rally people in the same way
Speaker 2: that I was during Navigator. I felt much more like
Speaker 2: I have to take care of my my spiritual health,
Speaker 2: my physical health, you know. So and also more and
Speaker 2: more I don't understand what's going on with our country
Speaker 2: because I don't think I'm as online as a lot
Speaker 2: of the the like, which is the method of like
Speaker 2: what's drawing up the chaos and the insanity. The America
Speaker 2: that I see when I'm touring is the people that
Speaker 2: are not hiding behind their computer, you know. So I'm
Speaker 2: just seeing this different these different people, like I'm seeing
Speaker 2: the person side of them. And it's also felt personally
Speaker 2: in my travels. It's felt a lot less tense than
Speaker 2: it was when we were touring under Trump. That was
Speaker 2: it just felt like that was the first time I
Speaker 2: really experienced like, oh, you walk into a gas station,
Speaker 2: It's like we should get the fuck out at this
Speaker 2: gas station, you know. And that's after I had toured
Speaker 2: with like trans people looking crazy all over the Southeast
Speaker 2: before he before he was elected, you know, and I'd
Speaker 2: never felt the way I did like when he was president.
Speaker 2: So it's feeling it's definitely been feeling less tense, less
Speaker 2: like at war. But also there's just this feeling of like,
Speaker 2: whatever is brewing, I have no idea what's going to
Speaker 2: happen with this election, and I'm trying not to consistently
Speaker 2: check my phone every hour for like a new poll.
Speaker 2: I told myself I wouldn't.
Speaker 1: And you know, there's some musicians who only listen to
Speaker 1: their own music, others who are really students of the
Speaker 1: game check everything out. Where are you on that continuum?
Speaker 2: I love to check everything out. I'm definitely a music lover,
Speaker 2: and I'm really excited about new music. I I feel
Speaker 2: like there was a period where I really didn't relate,
Speaker 2: and that was when I was putting out like Lookout Mama.
Speaker 2: You know, I related to this scene in the Southeast,
Speaker 2: but that was really it. But now there's just like
Speaker 2: so many very popular artists in like indie world that
Speaker 2: I love and I'm really inspired by.
Speaker 1: Well, since you say that, give me two.
Speaker 2: Adrian Linker, of course, I think is just like one
Speaker 2: of the best songwriters that's ever lived. Sometimes listening to
Speaker 2: her music just like makes me sad because I'm like,
Speaker 2: how did you write that song? But I also love
Speaker 2: that feeling. I love feeling like damn, how the fuck
Speaker 2: did you write that? So that's a really great example.
Speaker 2: And also I've been a huge fan of Ezra Furman
Speaker 2: for a long time. She put out a record called
Speaker 2: Transandelic Exodus right when I put out Navigator, and that
Speaker 2: was someone that I thought, Wow, we are on the
Speaker 2: same page, We're the same type of artist. I'd really
Speaker 2: like to collaborate with her someday. And I just think
Speaker 2: that record, trans Angelic Exodus is like one of the
Speaker 2: best albums in like the past decade for sure. It
Speaker 2: feels like it feels very similar to like Hedwig, also
Speaker 2: to like Ziggy start Us. I don't know, it just
Speaker 2: feels like this epic tale, you know.
Speaker 1: Okay, Linda, I think we've come to the end of
Speaker 1: the feeling we've known. It's been great talking to you.
Speaker 1: Thank you so much for being open and honest. It's
Speaker 1: been a pleasure.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Thanks for having me.
Speaker 1: Next time, this is Bob left Sex
Speaker 2: Sh