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Speaker 1: Too Much Information is a production of iHeartRadio.

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Speaker 2: Hello everyone, and welcome to Too Much Information, the show

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Speaker 2: that brings you the secret histories and little loone fascinating

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Speaker 2: facts and figures behind your favorite TV shows, movies, music,

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Speaker 2: and more. We're your two Midwestern micro scenes of Minutia.

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Speaker 2: I'm Alex Heigel, I'm Jordan. Run Talk Jordan. Today we're

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Speaker 2: talking about one of the load stars of the nineties

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Speaker 2: indie rock boom, a defining record for both Chicago and

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Speaker 2: the increasing ranks of women with guitars throughout the era.

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Speaker 2: That's right, we're talking about Liz Fair's Exile and Guyville,

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Speaker 2: which turns thirty years old in June. I wanted to

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Speaker 2: introduce a bit where I started pronouncing it in French

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Speaker 2: exile and giv you know I didn't. I never really

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Speaker 2: had too much experience with this record growing up, because

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Speaker 2: I kind of came of like investigating music age. When

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Speaker 2: her allegedly misbegotten and now reclaimed as all things must

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Speaker 2: be as brave and innovative, her pop attempt came and

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Speaker 2: so I just saw her on MTV and VH one

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Speaker 2: with that pop song. What is it called? Was he

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Speaker 2: even called? Why Can't I but I kept seeing that

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Speaker 2: cover and that name in like the Rolling Stone lists

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Speaker 2: and the spin lists and everything, and I was just like,

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Speaker 2: what is going on with this? But you know, I

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Speaker 2: never really got around to it until I did like

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Speaker 2: a big deep dive in kind of that Chicago, like

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Speaker 2: the roots of like Chicago because I'm a huge Tortoise

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Speaker 2: fan and I like Jesus Lizard and I like Steve Albini.

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Speaker 2: So I was like doing a bunch of lists. There's

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Speaker 2: like ten years ago. I was like reading about Chicago

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Speaker 2: a bunch and I finally put this record on. I

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Speaker 2: was like, well, Okay, I get it. I kind of

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Speaker 2: like PJ. Harvey's Rid of Me, though better that record

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Speaker 2: makes this one. It's like Black Sabbath versus The Beach Boys.

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Speaker 2: Not that I'm pitting women against each other. I'm just

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Speaker 2: saying that one's a little bit more on my I'm

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Speaker 2: not so much into the kind of tweet mumbly jangly

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Speaker 2: pop stuff, even though it's sexually explicit though it may be.

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Speaker 2: I'm more like, give me the heinous guitar tones. Ah,

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Speaker 2: what about you, Bud.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, I kind of came at this album from a

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Speaker 3: similar place. I think I mentioned this numerous times on

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Speaker 3: this show. But I was born in nineteen eighty seven,

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Speaker 3: and I spent most of my childhood pretending that I

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Speaker 3: was living somewhere between the late fifties and the mid sixties,

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Speaker 3: So my engagement with any sort of pop culture from

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Speaker 3: this era that I actually grew up in was pretty spotty.

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Speaker 3: I started to get with the program in like the

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Speaker 3: late two thousands as I was graduating college, and I'm

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Speaker 3: fascinated by stuff that happened before I was born, But

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Speaker 3: the stuff that actually happened, like in my childhood in

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Speaker 3: the nineties is still kind of a blind spot for me.

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Speaker 3: But the music that I know best from the nineties

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Speaker 3: is courtesy of my father, which, despite my own boomer tendencies,

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Speaker 3: my actual boomer dad never stopped listening to new music,

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Speaker 3: which is something that I've always here. Now, Yeah, he's

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Speaker 3: got really great taste of music, so big Dick Runtah,

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Speaker 3: Big Dick runtag, Yes, incredible taste of music. While I

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Speaker 3: was listening to Dion and the Belmonts and Ricky Nelson

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Speaker 3: around the house, like no joke, he was playing like

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Speaker 3: never Mind or something, so which was a fun little

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Speaker 3: like Alex p Keaton role.

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Speaker 2: Reversal that my friends always got a big kick out of.

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Speaker 3: But my dad's favorite albums were almost without fail, usually

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Speaker 3: by female singer songwriters, especially in like the really passionate, tempestuous,

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Speaker 3: pissed off vein. Jack a Little Pill was a huge

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Speaker 3: one around the house, so was Fiona Apple's title Torry

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Speaker 3: Amas's Little Earthquakes. Amy Mann and Exile in Guyville definitely

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Speaker 3: fit this vill and I remember hearing it around the house,

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Speaker 3: sometimes not quite as much as Jackie Little Pill. But

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Speaker 3: it really wasn't until the twentieth anniversary in twenty thirteen

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Speaker 3: and the resulting title wave of retrospective pieces that I

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Speaker 3: realized just how revered this album is, which led me

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Speaker 3: to giving it a well deserved re examination and appreciating

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Speaker 3: it for the groundbreaking work that it is.

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Speaker 2: It really is, And I mean there's there's so much

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Speaker 2: of like there's so much contextualizing that always helps stuff

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Speaker 2: and and helps me check when I'm not like impressed

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Speaker 2: by something. And so I definitely hear how like in

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Speaker 2: the music scene at the time, like hearing this record

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Speaker 2: and like Blowjob Queen and been Rod and all that.

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Speaker 2: It's just it is. It was like quietly revolutionary, and

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Speaker 2: I'll try not to let my scene politics poison that well.

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Speaker 2: But so from the actual geological location of Guyville in

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Speaker 2: to the weed fueled lengths, Fhare went to mimic and

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Speaker 2: or tweak the Rolling Stones Exile on Main Street as

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Speaker 2: an influence to the seething backlash she faced when the

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Speaker 2: record took off. Here's everything you didn't know about Exile

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Speaker 2: in Guyville. Question go on geological location? Does that mean rocks?

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Speaker 2: That is that a rock joke? Nope? That was yes,

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Speaker 2: well I mean it is now I'm gonna only read

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Speaker 2: one of my head air's here that I was marginally

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Speaker 2: proud of. This is a subsection called exile in Chaivill

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Speaker 2: because they call it Chai Town. Actually, I've heard Chicagan's

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Speaker 2: hate that, so I'll maybe cut that. Jordan, Can we

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Speaker 2: get Lori Lightfoot on the phones hated Chicago mayor Lori

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Speaker 2: Lightfoot to contextualize fairs record and the scene came from

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Speaker 2: we need to set our site seven years prior to

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Speaker 2: its nineteen ninety three release. In the magical year of

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Speaker 2: nineteen eighty six, Welcome to the Heigel Scene Corner. ALF

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Speaker 2: was on the airwaves Metallica's Kill Them All had just

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Speaker 2: come out. Other things were surely happening. I'm sure we've

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Speaker 2: been friends that were born year. I just I'll know them. Yeah. Uh.

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Speaker 2: That was the year when the Near Northwest Arts Council

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Speaker 2: or NNWAC, a Chicago nonprofit to support local artists, was

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Speaker 2: formed in the not particularly bustling neighborhood of wicker Park, which,

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Speaker 2: in the urban renewal trends immemorial, was characterized by a

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Speaker 2: lot of unused industrial space, which like you know, soho

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Speaker 2: when when the free jazzers and the minimalists took over

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Speaker 2: all of their lofts in the nineteen sixties and you

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Speaker 2: know Bushwick in the in the early ten to twenty tens.

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Speaker 2: Two years later, that organization set up an office at

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Speaker 2: the Flat Iron Arts Building at the intersection of Milwaukee

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Speaker 2: North and Damon Avenues, and they started holding a series

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Speaker 2: of exhibition and performances that began the classic life cycle

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Speaker 2: of how should we say, underperforming, underutilized, under what's not raised?

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Speaker 2: Help me out here more buildings than other resources? Oh

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Speaker 2: how about that? Yeah, and started transforming the neighborhood of

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Speaker 2: wicker Park into an artistic hotbed in her thirty three

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Speaker 2: and third book on exile in Guyville, author Gina Arnold writes,

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Speaker 2: when I knew it in the early nineteen nineties, wicker

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Speaker 2: Park was one of those slightly dangerous edgy neighborhoods where

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Speaker 2: lofts and practice spaces were cheap to rent, where young

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Speaker 2: women didn't wander around alone at night without an escort,

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Speaker 2: and sometimes even the escort was nervous. The storefronts were

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Speaker 2: run down and the bars were all dives. There were

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Speaker 2: coffee shops rather than cafes, and one bought one's clothing secondhand.

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Speaker 2: This all begins to change as Nirvana's never Mind makes

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Speaker 2: its merry way into the monoculture, and at this point

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Speaker 2: there was a huge influx of money into Chicago as

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Speaker 2: a recording legend, Chicago icon, and crank about town, Steve

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Speaker 2: Albini told Pitchfork in twenty sixteen. He went on to

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Speaker 2: say you can't overstate how much that changed everything. Independent

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Speaker 2: labels and bands stopped being sidelines and became growing concerns.

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Speaker 2: Speculators wrote absurd checks to bands on very little evidence,

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Speaker 2: sometimes without a note of music. In the shops, labels

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Speaker 2: sank fortunes into promotion, buying out venues and offering tickets

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Speaker 2: for free paying headline bands for support slots and festival positions.

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Speaker 2: Radio Payola guys made a mint buying airplay to break

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Speaker 2: bands in different markets. Lawyers got involved, some specializing in

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Speaker 2: the independent major interface, crafting complex documents that were more

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Speaker 2: likely to expire unfulfilled than run to term. Bookers became

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Speaker 2: booking agents and managers. Local booking agencies became international players.

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Speaker 2: Money changed everything, and one of the things it changed

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Speaker 2: was the expectation bands had. Some bands saw this insane

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Speaker 2: inflation as their birthright. Local journalists, bought off with access

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Speaker 2: and promotional spending, began to write about this freeding frenzy

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Speaker 2: as though it were the renaissance of a music scene

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Speaker 2: that had been percolating along nicely. Riglass.

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Speaker 3: The man's got away with words, He sure does. I'm

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Speaker 3: going to get a business card printed up for you.

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Speaker 3: This is crank about crank at large.

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Speaker 2: Chicago, like a lot of major metro hubs that weren't

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Speaker 2: New York or LA, nurtured a thriving underground scene. In

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Speaker 2: the nineteen eighties and nineties. There were number an enormous

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Speaker 2: number of DIY labels in Chicago, and then a bunch

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Speaker 2: of aggressively weird bands like Albini's projects, Big Black Shellac,

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Speaker 2: Jesus Lizard, and then through the nineties this turns into

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Speaker 2: there's also like a big jazz subject subculture where guys

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Speaker 2: are getting into making what's called has been termed in

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Speaker 2: retrospect like post rock, which is essentially when you get

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Speaker 2: a bunch of guys who like jazz into a studio

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Speaker 2: and they don't want to make a jazz record. The

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Speaker 2: Tortoise is like the biggest band from like that kind

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Speaker 2: of scene. There's another band called The Sea in the Cake.

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Speaker 2: Jim O'Rourke, big Chicago guy, and he's just one of

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Speaker 2: those musical polymaths. Of course, will go how can we

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Speaker 2: forget Wilco, who would later adopt Chicago. You ever been

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Speaker 2: to Chicago?

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Speaker 4: Yeah?

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Speaker 2: Yeah, I like Chicago. My uncle lived there. Yeah, my

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Speaker 2: aunt's that. My uncle's a longtime University Chicago professor. I

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Speaker 2: did not know that long Yeah. I like Chicago. I

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Speaker 2: just can't deal with it. It's too fucking cold man

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Speaker 2: during the winter. That did off the lake breeze effect

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Speaker 2: or whatever they call that. No, thank you. Even the

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Speaker 2: legendary British Diy folk punkers the me Cons adopted Chicago

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Speaker 2: as their base of operation in the early nineties. Guyville, actually,

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Speaker 2: though is a nickname for wicker Park, which itself was

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Speaker 2: also called Bucktown, came from the band Urge Overkill, who

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Speaker 2: you will most likely remember from their Neil Diamond cover

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Speaker 2: on the pulp fiction soundtrack Girl Naral Naral Naryl. That's

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Speaker 2: Urge ever Kill. I've told, I'm told, they did other things.

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Speaker 2: They have a song called Goodbye to Guyville that was

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Speaker 2: released in nineteen ninety two. I feel like if they

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Speaker 2: had just kept calling it Bucktown, that's got more snap.

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Speaker 2: Maybe not wicker.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, Guyble's more evocative, though, I feel like it's true

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Speaker 3: in a bad way.

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Speaker 2: Well, please tell us about that, Jordan. Yes. Yes.

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Speaker 3: During an appearance on the show All Things Considered, Liz

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Speaker 3: Fair elaborated on the concept of Guyville.

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Speaker 2: She said, quote, it was a state.

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Speaker 3: Of mind and or neighborhood that I was living in Guyville,

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Speaker 3: because it was definitely their sensibilities that had that aesthetic,

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Speaker 3: you know what I mean. It was sort of guy things,

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Speaker 3: comic books with really disfigured, screwed up people in them,

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Speaker 3: the sort of like constant love of social aberration. You

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Speaker 3: know what I mean, there's kind of guy mentality, you know,

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Speaker 3: where men are men and women are learning.

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Speaker 2: Her soundbites are so funny to me because no one

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Speaker 2: ever crops out all of her like asides, like you

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Speaker 2: know what I mean, it's what right kind of It's

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Speaker 2: like a no interviewer ever truncates Liz Fair's quotes.

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Speaker 3: And then ask about what she sees in Guyville. She

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Speaker 3: said that all the guys have short cropped hair, John lennnglasses,

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Speaker 3: flannel shirts unpretentiously worn, not as a grunge statement, and

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Speaker 3: work boots. Guyville to me sounds like the thing that

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Speaker 3: the scientists from the Simpsons says, what's that?

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Speaker 2: Yeah, Guyvil? Yeah, that been exiled? Who am I thinking of?

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Speaker 2: Let's professor Frank? Which is just which is just Jerry Lewis.

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Speaker 3: Ha I never realized that, Yeah, I've.

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Speaker 2: Been exiled in Guyville. Right when I think about it,

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Speaker 2: it seems dark, it seems cold, It seems exciting and

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Speaker 2: lawless in a way. Fair were called of the scene

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Speaker 2: to Chicago Magazine in twenty nineteen, like we were in

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Speaker 2: a transitional neighborhood and a lot of us didn't have

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Speaker 2: a lot of money, but we all got together anywhere

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Speaker 2: we could and shared music interest, listened to each other

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Speaker 2: recording in the studio. There was a lot of cross

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Speaker 2: pollination with creative people in Chicago back then, and you

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Speaker 2: actually had to go be with them to get that.

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Speaker 2: There was no internet, so you couldn't check them out online.

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Speaker 2: You had to go see them play. It forges personal relationships,

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Speaker 2: for better or for worse. In November of nineteen ninety three,

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Speaker 2: just a few months after Exile was released, Billboard published

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Speaker 2: a cover story on wicker Park titled Chicago Cutting Edges

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Speaker 2: New Capital, which predictably hastened the churn from arts Haven

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Speaker 2: to Turist Destination a matter of weeks.

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Speaker 3: Yay.

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Speaker 2: Long time Chicago Tribune music critic Greg Kott, who will

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Speaker 2: make many appearances in this episode, told The av Club

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Speaker 2: in twenty seventeen, I don't think we've ever had an

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Speaker 2: era where you can say, oh, what happened to Chicago music.

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Speaker 2: There's an infrastructure here to support independent music that's artistically minded.

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Speaker 2: It's not focused on that sort of commercial Let's get

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Speaker 2: a song on the radio. Wave of major label signings

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Speaker 2: that occurred in the early nineties. In some ways that

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Speaker 2: was an aberration. It came and went almost as quickly

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Speaker 2: as it arrived. We may never see that again, and

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Speaker 2: in some ways I hope we don't, because I thought

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Speaker 2: it did put this artificial layer on Chicago that in

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Speaker 2: some ways was antithetical to what Chicago's artistic scene has

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Speaker 2: been all about for so many years.

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Speaker 3: So that is the scene that gave rise to Liz

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Speaker 3: Fair's groundbreaking album Exil and Guyville. Let's talk about Liz

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Speaker 3: Fair the person at a glance. But Clark Fair was

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Speaker 3: born in New Haven, Connecticut, in April nineteen sixty seven.

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Speaker 2: Adopted a birth.

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Speaker 3: By intellectual and affluent artsy parents who worked at high

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Speaker 3: falutin places like Northwestern Memorial Hospital and the Arts Institute

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Speaker 3: of Chicago. Liz Fair lived in Cincinnati until she was nine,

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Speaker 3: when her family located to the Chicago suburb of Winnetka.

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Speaker 3: Big Noise from Winnetka swing band song that my jazz

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Speaker 3: band played in high school?

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Speaker 2: Anyway? Really anything?

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Speaker 3: Oh yeah, that's hilarious. It's my only point of reference. Now,

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Speaker 3: my second point of reference of Winneka is Liz Fair.

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Speaker 3: She attended Oberlin College, graduating in nineteen ninety with a

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Speaker 3: BA in art history. She told The New York Times

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Speaker 3: in nineteen ninety four, I decided to make a name

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Speaker 3: for myself and become a fine artist. I had a

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Speaker 3: modern art book assigned to me by a female professor.

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Speaker 3: I started counting, and there were I think fifteen female

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Speaker 3: artists before nineteen sixty. That was pretty frightening. But I

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Speaker 3: figured that after nineteen sixty they were sure to be more.

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Speaker 3: And there were just fifteen female artists after nineteen sixty,

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Speaker 3: So in a book of twelve hundred pages, there were

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Speaker 3: thirty female artists.

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Speaker 2: I just freaked out.

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Speaker 3: I walked around for days telling everyone I could, and

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Speaker 3: they'd say, that's nice, Liz.

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Speaker 2: It was really pretty frightening for me.

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Speaker 3: And Liz indeed supported herself off her charcoal sketches for

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Speaker 3: a time, and she said I hadn't even wanted to

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Speaker 3: be a recording artist. This is her talking to Spinding

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Speaker 3: the lead up to the release of Exile in Guyville.

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Speaker 3: It was completely a side thing for me music. I

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Speaker 3: was concentrating on being a fine artist and working on

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Speaker 3: my drawing. But before settling at Chicago, Liz Fair made

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Speaker 3: an aborted attempt at a music career in San Francisco,

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Speaker 3: where she went broke after about a year in return

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Speaker 3: home to live with her parents. Similar trajectory if I

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Speaker 3: recall that Janis Joplin took She went to San Francisco

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Speaker 3: in the early sixties to try to be a sort

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Speaker 3: of a beat musician, and then got hooked on speed

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Speaker 3: and moved back home with her parents and took a

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Speaker 3: correspondence course to be a secretary, I believe, and then

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Speaker 3: she got drawn back into San Francisco.

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Speaker 2: I think I have that right. I believe you list fair.

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Speaker 3: She began writing and recording songs into a four track

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Speaker 3: tape machine in her bedroom, massing enough for three tapes.

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Speaker 3: This title I don't know why this title is as

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Speaker 3: bad as this is. I don't even know if I

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Speaker 3: can say this right on the first attempt, Yo yo, buddy,

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Speaker 3: yup yup, word to your mother.

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Speaker 2: Girls Girls, that's the first one, which is written in

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Speaker 2: a disturbing transliteration of ebonics that I hate. Yeah.

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Speaker 3: The second tape is girls, Girls Girls. I can live

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Speaker 3: at that, and the third is Sooty, Sooty. She passed

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Speaker 3: these tapes around. There were friends in Chicago under the

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Speaker 3: band name Girly Sound.

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Speaker 2: Which I like. I like that name. Yeah, yeah, little

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Speaker 2: Touch of the Tina Fey thirty Rock for You. Oh sure.

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Speaker 4: Yeah.

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Speaker 3: The other players in the Exile and Main Street story, Nope.

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Speaker 3: The other players in the Exile and Guy story is

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Speaker 3: a guy named Brad Wood, who opened his studio Idful

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Speaker 3: Music Corporation in wicker Park in nineteen eighty nine, and

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Speaker 3: John Henderson, who operated an indie label called Feels Good.

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Speaker 2: All Over another really good name.

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Speaker 3: Lilliz Fair told Jessica Hopper for Spin Magazine's oral history

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Speaker 3: on Guyville in twenty thirteen. I was living this completely

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Speaker 3: post college flat broke, only cared about going out at

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Speaker 3: night existence shirking my adult responsibilities. I was hanging out

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Speaker 3: at Northwestern with frat guys. I just wanted to get out. John,

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Speaker 3: the afore mentioned John Henderson, the indie label owner. John's

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Speaker 3: apartment became one of my destinations. He introduced me to

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Speaker 3: bands and spent a lot of time to teach me

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Speaker 3: about good songwriting, which I definitely learned, but it was

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Speaker 3: only half paying attention to and not taking super seriously.

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Speaker 3: He had a room and said just move in here.

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Speaker 3: It's super cheap, and we started working on this record

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Speaker 3: and the songs on Guyville Liz told Pitchfork in two

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Speaker 3: thousand and eight, quote a vocal period when I was

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Speaker 3: on the edge. I was not living up to the

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Speaker 3: expectation of my family. What I had been raised to do.

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Speaker 3: I was certainly not doing. I was scamming my way

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Speaker 3: through life, not really working, and I think I had.

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Speaker 2: Some self destructive tendencies. But it was also wild and fun.

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Speaker 3: Brad Wood, who you remember operated his studio Idful Music

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Speaker 3: Corporation in wicker Park, told Spin. In the fall of

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Speaker 3: nineteen ninety one, John Henderson, who ran the indie label

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Speaker 3: Feels Good All Over, told me about this amazing songwriter

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Speaker 3: named Liz that he was working with. He thought my

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Speaker 3: recording studio might be the place to make her record.

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Speaker 2: But Farren Henderson had a falling out and she moved

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Speaker 2: out of his place by December of nineteen ninety one

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Speaker 2: and back in with her parents. Bradwood told Spin. After

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Speaker 2: Liz moved back to her parents place in Evanston, I

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Speaker 2: figured that was the end, but the potential of those

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Speaker 2: songs kept nagging at me, and I called Liz. In

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Speaker 2: January of nineteen ninety two. I drove up to Evanston,

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Speaker 2: drove her back to wicker Park, and she and I

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Speaker 2: recorded Can Run that night. It was a big success,

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Speaker 2: and we even had time for a drink before I

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Speaker 2: drove her back home. Hours of driving, things progressed at

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00:18:59,440 --> 00:19:02,720
Speaker 2: that snail's pace. Me driving forty five minutes to her parents,

348
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Speaker 2: she and I driving back to the studio for forty

349
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Speaker 2: five minutes, record for a few hours, maybe watch some PBS.

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Speaker 2: Drive back to Evanston to drop Liz off, then finally

351
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Speaker 2: drive back home to wicker Park. I saw a lot

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Speaker 2: of Lake Shore Drive in nineteen ninety two. I love

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Speaker 2: that they made time for PBS. You think they were

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Speaker 2: watching Bob Ross.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, I just realized Evanston was a tom Alone Chicago.

356
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Speaker 2: John Hughes, No, that's Wineka. That's where the houses.

357
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Speaker 3: I thought, Oh yeah, I was just thinking, yeah, Waneka

358
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Speaker 3: has the home alone house. Who knows Liz Fair could

359
00:19:32,000 --> 00:19:36,160
Speaker 3: have been the callister's neighbor. Think about that. You didn't

360
00:19:36,200 --> 00:19:37,000
Speaker 3: do Jay, You should have?

361
00:19:37,119 --> 00:19:38,960
Speaker 2: I didn't I should. Yeah, you're right, I'm sorry. It'll

362
00:19:39,000 --> 00:19:42,800
Speaker 2: never happen again. See that it doesn't. A few people

363
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Speaker 2: from this scene have mentioned that Fair didn't have a

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Speaker 2: ton of live experience performing solo or even playing with

365
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Speaker 2: a band at this point. Patrick Monaghan, who founded Carrot

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00:19:50,240 --> 00:19:53,720
Speaker 2: Top Records in nineteen ninety three, recalled Pitchfork about seeing

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Speaker 2: Fair for the first time at a small Polish bar

368
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Speaker 2: not long before Exile in Guyville, describing her as a

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Speaker 2: nervous performer, shy girl with an acoustic guitar. Greg Cott,

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Speaker 2: the tribute critic, told The av Club, there was one

371
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Speaker 2: of two disastrous Liz Fair gigs that I saw early on.

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00:20:10,359 --> 00:20:12,920
Speaker 2: She was clearly unprepared for the stage, so those kind

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00:20:12,920 --> 00:20:14,960
Speaker 2: of stick out, But the songs were really good.

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Speaker 3: This is kind of a through line in the Liz

375
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Speaker 3: Fairs story. Live performance for her is not really her thing.

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Speaker 2: By the end of it, I mean, but by her

377
00:20:22,800 --> 00:20:26,439
Speaker 2: own admission, Yeah, oh yeah, exactly so. Yeah, but no,

378
00:20:26,560 --> 00:20:28,280
Speaker 2: I think a lot of it, a lot of it

379
00:20:28,359 --> 00:20:30,320
Speaker 2: is gendered, and a lot of it is really gross.

380
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Speaker 2: But like there, you know, I couldn't I found a

381
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Speaker 2: really truly devastating summary of the evening that Greg Cott wrote,

382
00:20:39,920 --> 00:20:41,639
Speaker 2: and then I wasn't able to find it again. But

383
00:20:41,680 --> 00:20:43,359
Speaker 2: it was like she broke a string on her guitar

384
00:20:44,840 --> 00:20:47,600
Speaker 2: and like the sound guy had to come and fix,

385
00:20:47,680 --> 00:20:51,960
Speaker 2: like replace it for her, and then it was something

386
00:20:52,080 --> 00:20:54,480
Speaker 2: like twenty three minutes later, to the relief of the

387
00:20:54,520 --> 00:20:59,240
Speaker 2: audience and the performer, the like embarrassing display ended something

388
00:20:59,280 --> 00:21:03,480
Speaker 2: like that. It was yeah, so, but you know who

389
00:21:03,560 --> 00:21:07,760
Speaker 2: among us? Who among us? Exactly who among this guy? Particularly?

390
00:21:08,680 --> 00:21:08,800
Speaker 3: Uh?

391
00:21:09,320 --> 00:21:10,200
Speaker 2: You got you?

392
00:21:10,200 --> 00:21:12,919
Speaker 3: You're a machine with that with that right hand, You're right,

393
00:21:12,920 --> 00:21:13,880
Speaker 3: you're quite a strummer.

394
00:21:15,400 --> 00:21:19,440
Speaker 2: That's how he got his nickname. Is that true, Joe? Yeah?

395
00:21:19,480 --> 00:21:23,800
Speaker 2: From his from his right hand attack so obvious. I

396
00:21:23,840 --> 00:21:30,000
Speaker 2: thought it couldn't possibly be that. But Fair's unpolished approach

397
00:21:30,160 --> 00:21:33,880
Speaker 2: found its match in brad Wood. He will get into

398
00:21:33,880 --> 00:21:36,440
Speaker 2: some of his recording techniques later, which are really endearing

399
00:21:36,520 --> 00:21:39,159
Speaker 2: and really wild. But he told the av Club, I

400
00:21:39,160 --> 00:21:40,679
Speaker 2: think that was the first time where I worked with

401
00:21:40,720 --> 00:21:43,720
Speaker 2: somebody who was writing really great lyrics and great songs,

402
00:21:43,880 --> 00:21:47,239
Speaker 2: but also was not encumbered with a band. Working with

403
00:21:47,280 --> 00:21:48,920
Speaker 2: Liz was the first time where I was doing things

404
00:21:48,960 --> 00:21:51,080
Speaker 2: musically that I had been thinking about for a long time,

405
00:21:51,400 --> 00:21:53,240
Speaker 2: or that I hadn't done since I was in college.

406
00:21:53,280 --> 00:21:55,439
Speaker 2: With my cassette four track and a delay line and

407
00:21:55,480 --> 00:22:01,680
Speaker 2: a couple of microphones, just goofing around as you meditate

408
00:22:01,760 --> 00:22:02,000
Speaker 2: on that.

409
00:22:02,359 --> 00:22:05,080
Speaker 5: We'll be right back with more too much information after

410
00:22:05,119 --> 00:22:16,280
Speaker 5: these messages.

411
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Speaker 3: Now, A big part of the narrative around Exile in

412
00:22:20,280 --> 00:22:22,800
Speaker 3: Guyville is that Liz Fair crafted it as a track

413
00:22:22,880 --> 00:22:27,199
Speaker 3: by track response repulst to the Rolling Stones debauched epic

414
00:22:27,280 --> 00:22:30,600
Speaker 3: Exile on Main Street. She told Spin I was dating

415
00:22:30,640 --> 00:22:32,600
Speaker 3: this guy, and I was living in this apartment where

416
00:22:32,600 --> 00:22:35,080
Speaker 3: I was writing the songs for Guyville. It belonged to

417
00:22:35,119 --> 00:22:37,320
Speaker 3: some friends who had vacated and they left behind these

418
00:22:37,320 --> 00:22:40,439
Speaker 3: cassette tapes, and one was Exile on Main Street. I

419
00:22:40,520 --> 00:22:42,320
Speaker 3: was listening to it and thinking about how to make

420
00:22:42,359 --> 00:22:45,399
Speaker 3: a record, and I was fighting with this guy. He said, well,

421
00:22:45,440 --> 00:22:47,640
Speaker 3: why don't you do that one? That's a double record,

422
00:22:47,920 --> 00:22:49,959
Speaker 3: But he was kind of sarcastic about it, so I

423
00:22:50,000 --> 00:22:53,119
Speaker 3: was like, Okay, I will. I listened to it over

424
00:22:53,160 --> 00:22:55,640
Speaker 3: and over again, and it became my source of strength.

425
00:22:56,000 --> 00:22:59,399
Speaker 3: My involvement with Exile was like an imaginary friend. Whatever

426
00:22:59,440 --> 00:23:01,960
Speaker 3: Mick was saying, it was a conversation with him, or

427
00:23:02,000 --> 00:23:03,800
Speaker 3: I was arguing with him, and it was kind of

428
00:23:03,840 --> 00:23:06,200
Speaker 3: an amalgam of the men in my life. That's why

429
00:23:06,200 --> 00:23:09,959
Speaker 3: I call the Guyville friends romantic interests, These teacher types

430
00:23:10,200 --> 00:23:12,200
Speaker 3: telling me what I needed to know, what was cool

431
00:23:12,280 --> 00:23:15,320
Speaker 3: or wasn't cool. I developed a very private relationship with

432
00:23:15,359 --> 00:23:18,199
Speaker 3: this record, listening to it again and again and again.

433
00:23:18,640 --> 00:23:20,399
Speaker 3: What are your thoughts on Excellent main Street?

434
00:23:20,880 --> 00:23:23,480
Speaker 2: Excellent main Street? One of the greatest records of all time.

435
00:23:25,359 --> 00:23:30,119
Speaker 2: There's a couple skippers on there, not many for as

436
00:23:30,320 --> 00:23:30,960
Speaker 2: as it is.

437
00:23:31,800 --> 00:23:35,119
Speaker 3: It's too dark for me. It's too the dark. I

438
00:23:35,200 --> 00:23:37,520
Speaker 3: usually I don't look away from the darkness, but in

439
00:23:37,520 --> 00:23:40,600
Speaker 3: this case I do it. X Nazi Basement I can't

440
00:23:40,600 --> 00:23:41,160
Speaker 3: be yeah.

441
00:23:41,200 --> 00:23:42,960
Speaker 2: I mean, obviously there's that, but no, it's just that

442
00:23:43,119 --> 00:23:46,679
Speaker 2: it's it's also like, you know, inasmuch as the richest

443
00:23:46,720 --> 00:23:49,359
Speaker 2: rock band in the world could be accused of being DIY,

444
00:23:49,480 --> 00:23:52,560
Speaker 2: it's pretty DIY. They recorded in a bit of basement

445
00:23:52,640 --> 00:23:56,320
Speaker 2: in between drug binges. It's just and like the production

446
00:23:56,600 --> 00:23:59,040
Speaker 2: is so good, the layering. I think it's the closest

447
00:23:59,040 --> 00:24:01,040
Speaker 2: they ever really got to in the like kind of

448
00:24:01,880 --> 00:24:05,760
Speaker 2: country soul stuff that the band did. I think it's

449
00:24:05,800 --> 00:24:08,000
Speaker 2: a great companion. It's like the British version of the

450
00:24:08,040 --> 00:24:10,679
Speaker 2: second band album. It's got so many of my favorite

451
00:24:10,720 --> 00:24:13,280
Speaker 2: songs on there. It's torn and Freid is such a banger.

452
00:24:13,560 --> 00:24:21,000
Speaker 2: It's got Nicky Hopkins come on, come on, Exile bing Bong,

453
00:24:22,800 --> 00:24:25,840
Speaker 2: greatest album in the world, Greatest album in the world.

454
00:24:25,960 --> 00:24:31,159
Speaker 3: Baby, I'm more of a sticky fingers guy. You more

455
00:24:31,200 --> 00:24:33,000
Speaker 3: of a satanic Majesty's request guy.

456
00:24:33,359 --> 00:24:37,119
Speaker 2: You day you have to say yeah? Is he kidding?

457
00:24:38,200 --> 00:24:42,400
Speaker 2: After Math I'll go with after Math. Yeah, Black and Blue, Black,

458
00:24:44,880 --> 00:24:48,840
Speaker 2: ghasts Heads, goats Head Soup actually has some bangers. Winter

459
00:24:49,040 --> 00:24:55,720
Speaker 2: is incredible. One hundred years ago. They call me Lady Bones.

460
00:24:56,160 --> 00:24:58,159
Speaker 2: I just love the production on those things. It's so

461
00:24:58,440 --> 00:25:01,280
Speaker 2: like it just sounds like I mean, goats Head Soup

462
00:25:01,320 --> 00:25:04,600
Speaker 2: literally sounds like soup. It's I think you're swirling in

463
00:25:04,640 --> 00:25:10,000
Speaker 2: this seedy miasthma of like much like Exile and Gayville.

464
00:25:10,000 --> 00:25:11,720
Speaker 2: And that's what they talked about with the production here.

465
00:25:11,720 --> 00:25:14,240
Speaker 2: They were deliberately trying to be like, how do we

466
00:25:14,280 --> 00:25:17,520
Speaker 2: make this like murky and weird? And they built all

467
00:25:17,560 --> 00:25:19,320
Speaker 2: of it around just her guitar and voice and then

468
00:25:19,359 --> 00:25:22,399
Speaker 2: added all the extraneous crap to it. Not extraneous, but

469
00:25:22,440 --> 00:25:25,800
Speaker 2: like added all the weird percussion layers and sound loops

470
00:25:25,840 --> 00:25:28,840
Speaker 2: and anyway, sorry, where we where were we?

471
00:25:29,720 --> 00:25:29,840
Speaker 3: Oh?

472
00:25:29,880 --> 00:25:32,399
Speaker 2: You were talking about Exile Main Street. Don't get me

473
00:25:32,400 --> 00:25:33,879
Speaker 2: started on Exile main Street.

474
00:25:34,720 --> 00:25:38,280
Speaker 3: Well, making an album that was a response to Exile

475
00:25:38,359 --> 00:25:38,840
Speaker 3: main Street.

476
00:25:38,880 --> 00:25:41,040
Speaker 2: This is fair to old writer Rob Joyner, who now

477
00:25:41,119 --> 00:25:47,080
Speaker 2: writes about mma stuff. Really, I tried to. I wasn't

478
00:25:47,480 --> 00:25:50,119
Speaker 2: a hundo verified on all the on this interview that

479
00:25:50,160 --> 00:25:52,879
Speaker 2: I found everywhere, because he doesn't seem to have much

480
00:25:52,880 --> 00:25:54,960
Speaker 2: of a digital footprint, but from because this was like

481
00:25:55,040 --> 00:25:58,200
Speaker 2: archived on a blogger page. Do you remember Blogger?

482
00:25:58,400 --> 00:25:58,640
Speaker 1: God?

483
00:25:59,280 --> 00:26:03,320
Speaker 2: But huh yeah yeah. But from what I could tell,

484
00:26:03,320 --> 00:26:06,600
Speaker 2: he now focuses extensively on covering mixed martial arts, which

485
00:26:07,280 --> 00:26:12,000
Speaker 2: is the natural progression. Yeah, well it was fair, told

486
00:26:12,080 --> 00:26:12,719
Speaker 2: Rob Joyner.

487
00:26:12,960 --> 00:26:15,040
Speaker 3: I thought it was a cool structural device, and I

488
00:26:15,080 --> 00:26:17,639
Speaker 3: wanted to give myself something extra to think about. I

489
00:26:17,760 --> 00:26:20,320
Speaker 3: come from an academic background, and I got off on

490
00:26:20,440 --> 00:26:23,320
Speaker 3: going through my little warehouse of songs to find the

491
00:26:23,359 --> 00:26:25,480
Speaker 3: ones I thought had the same feel or were of

492
00:26:25,520 --> 00:26:27,879
Speaker 3: the same type. The more I listened to Exile on

493
00:26:27,920 --> 00:26:30,920
Speaker 3: Main Street, the more I was perfectly appropriate. I began

494
00:26:30,960 --> 00:26:34,040
Speaker 3: to organize my songs into correspondence with themes I've seen

495
00:26:34,080 --> 00:26:36,920
Speaker 3: in Exile on Main Street. I made lists and lists

496
00:26:36,920 --> 00:26:39,760
Speaker 3: of what Exile songs were three words or less, what

497
00:26:39,840 --> 00:26:42,720
Speaker 3: kind of song was this, and made tons of sequence

498
00:26:42,800 --> 00:26:45,120
Speaker 3: lists different orders of the songs I wanted to do.

499
00:26:45,600 --> 00:26:47,800
Speaker 3: It was like writing a thesis, taking a song of

500
00:26:47,840 --> 00:26:49,919
Speaker 3: mine and somehow putting it in a dialogue with a

501
00:26:49,920 --> 00:26:53,280
Speaker 3: song on Exile on Main Street, both sonically and lyrically.

502
00:26:53,760 --> 00:26:57,640
Speaker 3: I absolutely took it dead, seriously. I sat around with stacks,

503
00:26:57,680 --> 00:26:59,159
Speaker 3: like hundreds of pieces of paper.

504
00:26:59,440 --> 00:27:02,840
Speaker 2: Yeah, after I was stoned a lot. I love that

505
00:27:02,960 --> 00:27:03,840
Speaker 2: quote so much.

506
00:27:04,520 --> 00:27:07,160
Speaker 3: I was a twenty something, no job, I hung out

507
00:27:07,200 --> 00:27:10,159
Speaker 3: playing guitar all day. I had all this education, I

508
00:27:10,200 --> 00:27:13,159
Speaker 3: thought analytically, and someone had made a dare and she

509
00:27:13,240 --> 00:27:16,040
Speaker 3: describes charting the sequencing of the records with symbols like

510
00:27:16,119 --> 00:27:19,879
Speaker 3: asterisks or crosses that indicated like a poppier song or

511
00:27:19,920 --> 00:27:23,399
Speaker 3: a slower one. She continued, I went nuts. I can't

512
00:27:23,440 --> 00:27:25,560
Speaker 3: tell you. We would go into the studio and I'd

513
00:27:25,560 --> 00:27:27,800
Speaker 3: be like, you have to have this big guitar solo

514
00:27:27,880 --> 00:27:30,280
Speaker 3: three quarters of the way through, because that's what Excel

515
00:27:30,359 --> 00:27:32,800
Speaker 3: on Main Street has, and the lyrics had to be

516
00:27:32,840 --> 00:27:35,600
Speaker 3: an answer or my equivalent. I put so much into

517
00:27:35,640 --> 00:27:39,000
Speaker 3: it and uninterrupted attention. It was like a doctoral thesis,

518
00:27:39,400 --> 00:27:42,080
Speaker 3: and decades after the release of Exile in Guyville. Sometime

519
00:27:42,119 --> 00:27:44,880
Speaker 3: around two thousand and five, she actually met Mick Jagger.

520
00:27:45,359 --> 00:27:47,000
Speaker 3: This was around the time she was finishing up her

521
00:27:47,040 --> 00:27:50,520
Speaker 3: album Somebody's Miracle in an La studio and nearby the

522
00:27:50,560 --> 00:27:53,360
Speaker 3: Stones were having a listening party for their latest album,

523
00:27:53,680 --> 00:27:56,120
Speaker 3: I think it was their last album of original material,

524
00:27:56,160 --> 00:27:59,040
Speaker 3: A Bigger Bang in two thousand and five, and a producer,

525
00:27:59,160 --> 00:28:02,360
Speaker 3: John Shanks Inner, deuced Liz to Mick Jagger, and she recalled,

526
00:28:02,840 --> 00:28:05,159
Speaker 3: I can barely speak and Nick is just kind of

527
00:28:05,200 --> 00:28:08,320
Speaker 3: standing there, not interested in me at all, like, yes,

528
00:28:08,560 --> 00:28:10,399
Speaker 3: I've heard of you. This is her talking then the

529
00:28:10,480 --> 00:28:13,919
Speaker 3: Chicago Tribune in twenty eighteen, and he basically forgave me

530
00:28:14,040 --> 00:28:16,040
Speaker 3: for my using of their name to sort of make

531
00:28:16,080 --> 00:28:19,320
Speaker 3: myself famous. It was not like, Wow, thanks for that

532
00:28:19,400 --> 00:28:21,960
Speaker 3: awesome thing, that great album. It was kind of like,

533
00:28:22,560 --> 00:28:23,200
Speaker 3: you're welcome.

534
00:28:24,760 --> 00:28:28,280
Speaker 2: That sounds like what Mick Jagger would have done. There

535
00:28:28,280 --> 00:28:31,280
Speaker 2: are a few more obvious links between the records. There's Flowers,

536
00:28:31,359 --> 00:28:34,320
Speaker 2: with an allusion to the Stones track Dead Flowers, which

537
00:28:34,800 --> 00:28:38,560
Speaker 2: does not appear on Ella Main Street. Mesmerizing is the

538
00:28:38,600 --> 00:28:41,160
Speaker 2: name of the Liz Fair song as Marized is a

539
00:28:41,240 --> 00:28:45,600
Speaker 2: lyric and rocks off from exile, and even Shatter. The

540
00:28:45,680 --> 00:28:48,240
Speaker 2: song Shatter that could even be a reference to Shattered,

541
00:28:48,280 --> 00:28:51,400
Speaker 2: which is on Some Girls. That's one where Mick Jagger

542
00:28:51,480 --> 00:28:56,560
Speaker 2: raps it's my favorite. It's so bad. He's like, uh,

543
00:28:56,840 --> 00:28:59,480
Speaker 2: what's the one part where he goes, uh, I'm shattered.

544
00:28:59,600 --> 00:29:03,560
Speaker 2: My brain's in tatters. It's been splattered all over Manhattan

545
00:29:04,160 --> 00:29:07,400
Speaker 2: like it's it's He's said so for being one of

546
00:29:07,400 --> 00:29:12,280
Speaker 2: the most dynamic frontmen ever, he is so astoundingly bad

547
00:29:12,320 --> 00:29:15,280
Speaker 2: at trying to do this this new fangled thing they

548
00:29:15,320 --> 00:29:19,320
Speaker 2: call rappin'. Oh my god, it's so funny. It's worse

549
00:29:19,360 --> 00:29:20,040
Speaker 2: than Blondie.

550
00:29:20,280 --> 00:29:21,800
Speaker 3: I don't want to puss that in. If it wasn't

551
00:29:21,840 --> 00:29:24,440
Speaker 3: for the fact that that seems like sue bait, Oh yeah,

552
00:29:24,440 --> 00:29:25,440
Speaker 3: they get our ass.

553
00:29:25,920 --> 00:29:28,440
Speaker 2: Fair told Details magazine in nineteen ninety four that while

554
00:29:28,480 --> 00:29:31,560
Speaker 2: she was still attending Oberlin College, where she graduated from

555
00:29:31,560 --> 00:29:34,120
Speaker 2: in nineteen ninety she tried to seduce a guy on

556
00:29:34,120 --> 00:29:37,480
Speaker 2: one drunken night. I had this big crush on a

557
00:29:37,520 --> 00:29:39,880
Speaker 2: younger man, and I was so frustrated. I felt like

558
00:29:39,920 --> 00:29:42,200
Speaker 2: a man dealing with a young fawn of a girl.

559
00:29:42,640 --> 00:29:44,920
Speaker 2: I'd been dancing around him in ways he wasn't even

560
00:29:44,960 --> 00:29:47,720
Speaker 2: aware of and all I wanted to do, and all

561
00:29:47,760 --> 00:29:49,960
Speaker 2: I wanted to do was get down and bone was

562
00:29:50,040 --> 00:29:55,080
Speaker 2: this you fair did end up getting the guy in

563
00:29:55,120 --> 00:29:58,080
Speaker 2: bed where he did nothing but fall asleep. Yeah, she

564
00:29:58,160 --> 00:30:02,480
Speaker 2: said he just she said, he just snoozed there. It

565
00:30:02,600 --> 00:30:10,440
Speaker 2: was ridiculous. Yeah, that's great, that's great. Uh So one

566
00:30:10,440 --> 00:30:12,680
Speaker 2: of my favorite things about Exile is all the like

567
00:30:12,800 --> 00:30:15,480
Speaker 2: extraneous noise in it. And they also really loved that

568
00:30:15,480 --> 00:30:18,760
Speaker 2: when they were making Exile in Guyville, because brad Wood

569
00:30:18,800 --> 00:30:23,760
Speaker 2: talked about deliberately going like yeah and whoa while he

570
00:30:23,840 --> 00:30:26,719
Speaker 2: was doing drum tracks to sound like Mick Jagger, like

571
00:30:26,920 --> 00:30:29,440
Speaker 2: whooping it up in the background of the of Exile

572
00:30:30,040 --> 00:30:32,560
Speaker 2: where he was not present. That's always my favorite thing

573
00:30:32,600 --> 00:30:35,800
Speaker 2: about that. There's that they just handed off this behemoth

574
00:30:35,840 --> 00:30:37,840
Speaker 2: of a record to Mick and he finished it all

575
00:30:37,880 --> 00:30:42,280
Speaker 2: out an ocean away. Was there for.

576
00:30:42,320 --> 00:30:44,680
Speaker 3: Some of it, but he was mostly living I think

577
00:30:44,680 --> 00:30:48,600
Speaker 3: in Paris when Keith was living in Nelcote in southern France.

578
00:30:48,760 --> 00:30:51,080
Speaker 2: So yeah, but he was. He was there for some

579
00:30:51,160 --> 00:30:55,760
Speaker 2: of it, for those basement sessions. But no, wa, he wasn't.

580
00:30:57,120 --> 00:31:01,720
Speaker 2: He wasn't cool enough. Uh what was I gonna say,

581
00:31:01,880 --> 00:31:08,440
Speaker 2: oh yeah, they added moroccas, shakers looped percussion because that

582
00:31:08,560 --> 00:31:11,000
Speaker 2: was their way of trying to get at like all

583
00:31:11,080 --> 00:31:14,520
Speaker 2: of the percussion on the Stone's rhythm tracks. Wood also

584
00:31:14,680 --> 00:31:19,120
Speaker 2: used cardboard boxes and pillows that he would put contact

585
00:31:19,200 --> 00:31:23,160
Speaker 2: mics on and play them through guitar effects pedals for

586
00:31:23,200 --> 00:31:25,600
Speaker 2: percussion sounds. He got the percussion sounds on one of

587
00:31:25,600 --> 00:31:29,440
Speaker 2: these tracks by just banging on a countertop with like

588
00:31:29,640 --> 00:31:33,320
Speaker 2: marimba mallets. He told the av Club, Dance of the

589
00:31:33,320 --> 00:31:35,480
Speaker 2: Seven Veils has a lot of that. I used an

590
00:31:35,520 --> 00:31:37,920
Speaker 2: old sampler that I found in college and used samples

591
00:31:37,920 --> 00:31:39,840
Speaker 2: I recorded of a mission of the music department, and

592
00:31:39,880 --> 00:31:42,400
Speaker 2: I was recycling that stuff, pitching it and changing it

593
00:31:42,440 --> 00:31:44,880
Speaker 2: and putting it on the record. In addition to all

594
00:31:44,920 --> 00:31:48,160
Speaker 2: of that, you know, he played bass, He wrote and

595
00:31:48,200 --> 00:31:50,400
Speaker 2: sang most of the harmonies on the record. As I

596
00:31:50,400 --> 00:31:53,480
Speaker 2: mentioned earlier, he drummed. And there's another guy at the

597
00:31:53,520 --> 00:31:58,000
Speaker 2: studio in Folt, Casey Rice, who played lead guitar, and

598
00:31:58,520 --> 00:32:01,320
Speaker 2: Wood told Spin that came he devised a great way

599
00:32:01,360 --> 00:32:03,920
Speaker 2: to set up two guitar amps facing each other with

600
00:32:03,960 --> 00:32:06,400
Speaker 2: me in the middle with a telecaster turned way up

601
00:32:06,640 --> 00:32:09,000
Speaker 2: and depending on which way I leaned would generate a

602
00:32:09,000 --> 00:32:13,080
Speaker 2: different pitch. He was great at setting up controlled feedback situations.

603
00:32:13,400 --> 00:32:16,040
Speaker 2: That's what Santana used to do. He would mark off

604
00:32:16,080 --> 00:32:18,760
Speaker 2: where he would get all the different feedback parts. And

605
00:32:19,400 --> 00:32:21,480
Speaker 2: that's how they did Heroes too. That all the ever

606
00:32:21,720 --> 00:32:23,640
Speaker 2: that stuff that everyone thinks is like an ebo or

607
00:32:23,680 --> 00:32:26,440
Speaker 2: like a tape delay, that's just like frip. They marked

608
00:32:26,480 --> 00:32:28,520
Speaker 2: off where he would stand in the studio to get

609
00:32:28,520 --> 00:32:31,760
Speaker 2: that feed that kind of self sustaining feedback drone. I

610
00:32:31,800 --> 00:32:35,480
Speaker 2: didn't know that. Wow, Yeah, cool stuff. The record was

611
00:32:35,520 --> 00:32:40,520
Speaker 2: tracked piece Mail would work backwards, structuring the drum patterns

612
00:32:40,560 --> 00:32:43,840
Speaker 2: and bass lines around Fair's vocal phrases and guitar riffs,

613
00:32:43,960 --> 00:32:46,080
Speaker 2: and then Casey Rice would add his lead guitar tracks.

614
00:32:46,560 --> 00:32:49,680
Speaker 2: Would told Spin almost every song on Guyville started with

615
00:32:49,720 --> 00:32:51,880
Speaker 2: Liz playing her guitar to a click track or drum

616
00:32:51,920 --> 00:32:55,440
Speaker 2: machine or looped hand percussion. Drums were often added last,

617
00:32:55,440 --> 00:32:57,040
Speaker 2: which is the opposite to how a lot of rock

618
00:32:57,160 --> 00:32:59,200
Speaker 2: music is recorded ass backwards.

619
00:33:01,600 --> 00:33:04,440
Speaker 3: But Liz Fair was not especially interested in all the

620
00:33:05,320 --> 00:33:11,480
Speaker 3: technicalities of the studio trickery and gizmo stuff. She told Spin,

621
00:33:11,920 --> 00:33:14,320
Speaker 3: the worst part would be when Bradwood would talk for

622
00:33:14,360 --> 00:33:17,160
Speaker 3: a really long time about an amplifier and how it

623
00:33:17,240 --> 00:33:19,240
Speaker 3: grew out of this and that, and I would just

624
00:33:19,240 --> 00:33:23,960
Speaker 3: be like, oh God, I brought in my own little

625
00:33:24,040 --> 00:33:26,560
Speaker 3: cheap PV amp and had my own way of setting it.

626
00:33:26,560 --> 00:33:28,040
Speaker 3: It was kind of like the amp you would buy

627
00:33:28,040 --> 00:33:29,800
Speaker 3: for a child who you didn't think was going to

628
00:33:29,840 --> 00:33:30,320
Speaker 3: be good at.

629
00:33:30,280 --> 00:33:32,360
Speaker 2: Music, and so you didn't want to invest in it.

630
00:33:32,680 --> 00:33:35,880
Speaker 3: Like the worst possible amp. But it was my security blanket.

631
00:33:36,120 --> 00:33:38,080
Speaker 3: I would not be taking off this amp with my

632
00:33:38,160 --> 00:33:40,680
Speaker 3: settings and my guitar. So that is the music of

633
00:33:40,720 --> 00:33:45,160
Speaker 3: exile in Guyville. Tell us about the words no, because

634
00:33:45,680 --> 00:33:48,960
Speaker 3: I would like to instead also mention that the secret

635
00:33:49,040 --> 00:33:54,520
Speaker 3: sauce on another iconic album is ATYPV guitar amp, and

636
00:33:54,560 --> 00:33:58,440
Speaker 3: that is Strokes. Strokes debut record, a vocal sounds that

637
00:33:58,480 --> 00:34:02,720
Speaker 3: has been attempted and copy be endlessly, And Gordon Raphael

638
00:34:02,840 --> 00:34:05,680
Speaker 3: said that is in fact, Julian Casablancas is like eight

639
00:34:05,760 --> 00:34:08,560
Speaker 3: watt PV practice amp that they would run his vocals

640
00:34:08,560 --> 00:34:10,160
Speaker 3: through and then blend that with the clean sound.

641
00:34:10,239 --> 00:34:14,880
Speaker 2: So shouts to PV man. You know PV gets a

642
00:34:14,920 --> 00:34:18,239
Speaker 2: lot of hate, but here they are quietly popping up

643
00:34:18,280 --> 00:34:25,560
Speaker 2: as iconic studio tools. Words of exile in Guieville. Uh

644
00:34:26,440 --> 00:34:31,560
Speaker 2: Fairs explicit lyrics on and and and subtler lyrics on

645
00:34:31,719 --> 00:34:34,440
Speaker 2: songs like I very well blowjob Queen, She says, I

646
00:34:34,480 --> 00:34:36,279
Speaker 2: want to be your blow job queen. There's not a song.

647
00:34:36,360 --> 00:34:39,120
Speaker 2: Let me take that again. It's not a song called

648
00:34:39,120 --> 00:34:43,040
Speaker 2: blow job queen. Idiot she wants to She says, I

649
00:34:43,040 --> 00:34:45,640
Speaker 2: want to be your blowjob queen in divorce song or

650
00:34:45,680 --> 00:34:48,800
Speaker 2: in Oh it just made the mistake of just googling

651
00:34:48,840 --> 00:34:53,520
Speaker 2: blowjob queen. That was that was not flower Yeah. Uh

652
00:34:53,640 --> 00:34:57,480
Speaker 2: Fairs explicit lyrics and songs like can Run and Flower,

653
00:34:57,680 --> 00:35:00,520
Speaker 2: which she states memorably I want to be your blowj queen,

654
00:35:00,640 --> 00:35:03,799
Speaker 2: and Canary, which has its lines I jump when you

655
00:35:03,800 --> 00:35:06,600
Speaker 2: circle the cherry, I sing like a good canary. I

656
00:35:06,719 --> 00:35:09,840
Speaker 2: come when called. And there's my new notification when you

657
00:35:09,920 --> 00:35:13,799
Speaker 2: text me. Well, then there's the even less subtle every

658
00:35:13,800 --> 00:35:16,120
Speaker 2: time I see your face, I get all wet between

659
00:35:16,120 --> 00:35:17,080
Speaker 2: my legs.

660
00:35:17,640 --> 00:35:17,799
Speaker 5: Oh.

661
00:35:17,880 --> 00:35:22,680
Speaker 2: Actually, yeah, there's my new text notification from you. Yeah.

662
00:35:22,800 --> 00:35:26,440
Speaker 2: And it's really quietly revolutionary stuff, man, I mean, think

663
00:35:26,480 --> 00:35:30,560
Speaker 2: about the climate of ninety two ninety three. You've got hair,

664
00:35:30,600 --> 00:35:34,719
Speaker 2: Metal is on its last legs, you know, and then

665
00:35:34,760 --> 00:35:39,520
Speaker 2: you've got dour. You know. Hear suit men from the

666
00:35:39,520 --> 00:35:42,640
Speaker 2: Pacific Northwest, and then the hair comes this tiny five

667
00:35:42,719 --> 00:35:49,200
Speaker 2: tube woman singing aggressively abo about sex. Yeah, I understand

668
00:35:49,239 --> 00:35:50,919
Speaker 2: why it made such a bomb. I understand why it's

669
00:35:50,920 --> 00:35:55,719
Speaker 2: why it's gone on to be so so groundbreaking. As

670
00:35:55,760 --> 00:35:57,880
Speaker 2: a female, I don't think you're supposed to say the

671
00:35:57,960 --> 00:35:59,960
Speaker 2: kind of things I wanted to say, or at least

672
00:36:00,120 --> 00:36:01,959
Speaker 2: I had gotten myself into a position where I didn't

673
00:36:01,960 --> 00:36:04,840
Speaker 2: feel comfortable saying to people's faces a lot of stuff

674
00:36:04,880 --> 00:36:07,600
Speaker 2: I said on that record. Phair told NPR in two

675
00:36:07,600 --> 00:36:10,160
Speaker 2: thousand and eight, I had been listening for ten years

676
00:36:10,160 --> 00:36:13,200
Speaker 2: to records where guys talked explicitly about sex, and then

677
00:36:13,239 --> 00:36:15,080
Speaker 2: all the women that came out with music, barring a

678
00:36:15,080 --> 00:36:17,560
Speaker 2: few like Patti Smith and Chrissy Hind and other people,

679
00:36:17,880 --> 00:36:20,000
Speaker 2: women were sort of shunted to the area of emotion.

680
00:36:20,480 --> 00:36:22,839
Speaker 2: But I've always been pissed off, frankly that the whole

681
00:36:22,880 --> 00:36:26,160
Speaker 2: myth that women aren't interested in sex. If you had

682
00:36:26,200 --> 00:36:29,080
Speaker 2: thirty thousand years of really bad consequences for being interested

683
00:36:29,120 --> 00:36:31,720
Speaker 2: in sex, you might hide it too, and I wanted

684
00:36:31,760 --> 00:36:33,919
Speaker 2: to be like I want to QW hard, I want

685
00:36:33,920 --> 00:36:37,600
Speaker 2: a bad like now, I'm.

686
00:36:37,480 --> 00:36:41,560
Speaker 3: Really trying to think of any other women who saying

687
00:36:41,560 --> 00:36:44,719
Speaker 3: I mean, obviously not this explicit, but like saying that

688
00:36:45,080 --> 00:36:47,000
Speaker 3: sort of bluntly about sex.

689
00:36:47,320 --> 00:36:50,520
Speaker 2: In the it would have been the early not this time.

690
00:36:50,600 --> 00:36:52,840
Speaker 2: It would have been like the early blues musicians like

691
00:36:56,400 --> 00:37:02,000
Speaker 2: Bessie Smith. They were singing really foul dude, uh Nina.

692
00:37:02,440 --> 00:37:04,080
Speaker 2: One of my favorite Nina some Own songs is I

693
00:37:04,080 --> 00:37:08,400
Speaker 2: Want a Little Sugar in my bowl, which is not subtle,

694
00:37:10,120 --> 00:37:12,560
Speaker 2: but yeah, around this time, No.

695
00:37:13,040 --> 00:37:16,640
Speaker 3: I can't really think of anybody on the same topic.

696
00:37:16,719 --> 00:37:19,240
Speaker 3: Liz Fair later said, I felt like everywhere I turned

697
00:37:19,320 --> 00:37:22,640
Speaker 3: people were denying my experience of my own sexuality. I

698
00:37:22,719 --> 00:37:25,680
Speaker 3: was very interested in sex. I wasn't promiscuous, but I

699
00:37:25,719 --> 00:37:28,480
Speaker 3: was as interested as any boy that I knew. Also,

700
00:37:28,520 --> 00:37:30,360
Speaker 3: it was the era of AIDS, so I was highly

701
00:37:30,400 --> 00:37:34,160
Speaker 3: conscious of health. I got tired of reading articles justifying

702
00:37:34,200 --> 00:37:37,880
Speaker 3: social norms with these really limped studies about how animals behave.

703
00:37:38,400 --> 00:37:40,880
Speaker 3: They hadn't studied the female brain enough at that point,

704
00:37:40,920 --> 00:37:42,360
Speaker 3: and they were still trying to tell you that you

705
00:37:42,400 --> 00:37:44,680
Speaker 3: didn't have a G spot and that women were less

706
00:37:44,680 --> 00:37:47,600
Speaker 3: interested in sex, and I'm like, maybe because they married

707
00:37:47,640 --> 00:37:49,839
Speaker 3: a guy for security and they're just not into him.

708
00:37:50,160 --> 00:37:51,720
Speaker 3: Like there are other explanations.

709
00:37:52,200 --> 00:37:53,080
Speaker 2: I felt like it was.

710
00:37:53,040 --> 00:37:56,200
Speaker 3: Really important to want overtly and to lust, and to

711
00:37:56,239 --> 00:37:59,360
Speaker 3: be able to own my own sexuality. I was scared

712
00:37:59,360 --> 00:38:01,160
Speaker 3: to do it, but I felt like it was important

713
00:38:01,160 --> 00:38:03,680
Speaker 3: to take the territory back for myself.

714
00:38:04,400 --> 00:38:07,120
Speaker 2: Good for her. What do you think about all this?

715
00:38:07,200 --> 00:38:13,200
Speaker 2: You're kind of a prude. Well, someone's gotta have these discussions.

716
00:38:13,239 --> 00:38:20,640
Speaker 2: I'm just glad it's not name. Popular music has always

717
00:38:20,640 --> 00:38:23,720
Speaker 2: been a vehicle for talking openly about sex, but often

718
00:38:23,760 --> 00:38:27,399
Speaker 2: that's happened in very exaggerated terms. That's NPR Music's pop

719
00:38:27,400 --> 00:38:30,720
Speaker 2: critic And Powers, who wrote an essay about exiling Guyville

720
00:38:30,719 --> 00:38:33,360
Speaker 2: for the two thousand and eight box set The Brilliant Thing.

721
00:38:33,440 --> 00:38:36,120
Speaker 2: Liz Fairdad was talk about sex in a normal tone,

722
00:38:36,160 --> 00:38:38,320
Speaker 2: as if it were part of her normal life. I

723
00:38:38,560 --> 00:38:40,680
Speaker 2: guess sort of. The tonal. The tonal, what makes it,

724
00:38:40,719 --> 00:38:44,560
Speaker 2: what makes it so tonally interesting and so gripping, is

725
00:38:44,600 --> 00:38:51,520
Speaker 2: that you know she is marrying that kind of slacker affect,

726
00:38:51,640 --> 00:38:54,840
Speaker 2: and that kind of slacker like can't be arsed to

727
00:38:56,040 --> 00:39:00,320
Speaker 2: enunciate or really get too bothered about things in uh

728
00:39:00,400 --> 00:39:03,600
Speaker 2: in this really frank and explicit stuff. That's I just

729
00:39:03,800 --> 00:39:07,239
Speaker 2: you know. I didn't put that together until now because

730
00:39:07,280 --> 00:39:07,880
Speaker 2: I'm a dummy.

731
00:39:10,960 --> 00:39:13,560
Speaker 3: All that said, Liz Fair told writer Rob Joyner that

732
00:39:13,640 --> 00:39:17,680
Speaker 3: quote a lot of Guyvilla's bullsh total made up fantasy crap.

733
00:39:18,080 --> 00:39:20,560
Speaker 3: That stuff didn't happen to me, and that's what made

734
00:39:20,600 --> 00:39:24,080
Speaker 3: writing it interesting. I wasn't connecting with my friends. I

735
00:39:24,120 --> 00:39:26,919
Speaker 3: wasn't connecting with relationships. I was in love with people

736
00:39:26,920 --> 00:39:29,440
Speaker 3: who couldn't care less about me. I was yearning to

737
00:39:29,480 --> 00:39:32,680
Speaker 3: be part of a scene. I wasn't opposing kind of mode,

738
00:39:32,840 --> 00:39:35,440
Speaker 3: yearning to have things happened for me that weren't happening.

739
00:39:35,760 --> 00:39:37,960
Speaker 3: So I wanted to make it seem real and convincing.

740
00:39:38,400 --> 00:39:40,360
Speaker 3: I wrote the whole album for a couple people to

741
00:39:40,400 --> 00:39:43,680
Speaker 3: see and know me. There wasn't one synopsis that will

742
00:39:43,719 --> 00:39:46,120
Speaker 3: cover the record in terms of was it made in

743
00:39:46,160 --> 00:39:47,320
Speaker 3: reaction to this scene?

744
00:39:47,520 --> 00:39:49,759
Speaker 2: Was it made as a feminist statement? Was it made

745
00:39:49,800 --> 00:39:50,480
Speaker 2: as a love.

746
00:39:50,360 --> 00:39:52,840
Speaker 3: Record to try to talk someone into paying attention to me?

747
00:39:53,200 --> 00:39:54,879
Speaker 3: This is her talking to the Village Voice in two

748
00:39:54,880 --> 00:39:57,480
Speaker 3: thousand and eight. It was all of those things like

749
00:39:57,680 --> 00:39:59,919
Speaker 3: is it true, Yes? Did I make it up?

750
00:40:00,120 --> 00:40:00,400
Speaker 2: Yes?

751
00:40:00,719 --> 00:40:03,120
Speaker 3: The problem is in the years and years of talking

752
00:40:03,160 --> 00:40:05,719
Speaker 3: about this that what's true is a multiple thing.

753
00:40:06,520 --> 00:40:11,719
Speaker 2: Sure, they needed more money to finish the record, and

754
00:40:11,960 --> 00:40:15,680
Speaker 2: fair on Wood's advice called up Mattador Records, whose head

755
00:40:15,719 --> 00:40:18,000
Speaker 2: Gerard Coslay, had happened to read a review of the

756
00:40:18,000 --> 00:40:20,759
Speaker 2: Girly Sound Tapes in fanzine. And this is where I

757
00:40:20,840 --> 00:40:24,400
Speaker 2: start to get really really bitter calling up calling it

758
00:40:24,480 --> 00:40:27,120
Speaker 2: with just just calling up Matador and being like, hey,

759
00:40:27,160 --> 00:40:29,520
Speaker 2: can you put on my record? And the guy just

760
00:40:29,600 --> 00:40:32,560
Speaker 2: happens to read he happened to read a single review

761
00:40:32,600 --> 00:40:37,800
Speaker 2: of your work in a self printed not even Rolling Stone,

762
00:40:37,840 --> 00:40:40,839
Speaker 2: just like a zine, a regional zine. Yeah, And they

763
00:40:40,880 --> 00:40:44,000
Speaker 2: sent her between three and five grand. It was enough

764
00:40:44,000 --> 00:40:45,719
Speaker 2: to let her move into wicker Park and finish the

765
00:40:45,800 --> 00:40:48,359
Speaker 2: record closer to the studio. I liked it a lot,

766
00:40:48,520 --> 00:40:50,600
Speaker 2: Coslay told The New York Times in nineteen ninety four,

767
00:40:50,800 --> 00:40:53,399
Speaker 2: and played it for everybody else. We don't usually sign

768
00:40:53,440 --> 00:40:56,400
Speaker 2: people we haven't met or heard other records by or

769
00:40:56,440 --> 00:40:58,960
Speaker 2: seene as performers. But I had a hunch and I

770
00:40:59,000 --> 00:41:03,239
Speaker 2: called her back and said, Okay, the famous cover art

771
00:41:03,280 --> 00:41:09,640
Speaker 2: for Exile and Guyville with its conspicuous nip slip? Can

772
00:41:09,680 --> 00:41:13,680
Speaker 2: I say that it's kind of d listed? But sure?

773
00:41:14,560 --> 00:41:19,680
Speaker 2: How about how about it's auspicious with its auspicious areola?

774
00:41:21,120 --> 00:41:28,160
Speaker 2: Is that better anything? There no bad ideas in brainstorming.

775
00:41:28,320 --> 00:41:31,960
Speaker 2: There's no bad ideas in brainstorming. That wasn't even the

776
00:41:31,960 --> 00:41:36,120
Speaker 2: original concept for that cover. Apparently the concept art as

777
00:41:36,160 --> 00:41:39,120
Speaker 2: we got it, it was something to Urge Overkill, which

778
00:41:39,200 --> 00:41:42,120
Speaker 2: is the second way in which this record is indebted

779
00:41:42,120 --> 00:41:45,399
Speaker 2: to a band. I have heard one song about from End.

780
00:41:46,600 --> 00:41:49,239
Speaker 2: Are they good? Do you know anything else about them?

781
00:41:49,000 --> 00:41:52,560
Speaker 2: I'm not super familiar, Fair told Vulture in two thousand

782
00:41:52,600 --> 00:41:54,439
Speaker 2: and eight, I turned in a still from a friend

783
00:41:54,440 --> 00:41:56,479
Speaker 2: of mine's student film for the cover of the CD.

784
00:41:56,960 --> 00:41:59,560
Speaker 2: It was an orgy of barbies floating in a pool.

785
00:42:00,040 --> 00:42:02,959
Speaker 2: Mattador was like, what the fuck is this? They called

786
00:42:03,040 --> 00:42:05,879
Speaker 2: up Nash Cato o Verge Overkill and asked him to help.

787
00:42:06,280 --> 00:42:08,200
Speaker 2: So he comes to me. He goes, Lizzy, listen, the

788
00:42:08,280 --> 00:42:10,600
Speaker 2: record's great, but they're not digging this. Why don't you

789
00:42:10,600 --> 00:42:12,799
Speaker 2: go into the photo booth, take off your shirt and

790
00:42:12,880 --> 00:42:18,080
Speaker 2: leave on your necklaces? Gross? My words, not his, and

791
00:42:18,120 --> 00:42:21,480
Speaker 2: then or hers, and then Fair continues, And before I

792
00:42:21,480 --> 00:42:23,720
Speaker 2: went into the bathroom, he was like, oh, and remember

793
00:42:23,760 --> 00:42:27,040
Speaker 2: to put lipstick on your nipples because I have very

794
00:42:27,120 --> 00:42:30,120
Speaker 2: light pink nipples. And I figured it was some weird

795
00:42:30,160 --> 00:42:32,880
Speaker 2: porno thing he knew about. Like, wow, that's why the

796
00:42:32,960 --> 00:42:37,800
Speaker 2: nipples always look so good. Yeah, thoughts on that lighting's important.

797
00:42:37,880 --> 00:42:40,200
Speaker 2: That's uh.

798
00:42:40,360 --> 00:42:42,799
Speaker 3: I got on to say, I never noticed that there

799
00:42:42,880 --> 00:42:45,399
Speaker 3: was the nip n yeah in the album cover.

800
00:42:45,560 --> 00:42:48,960
Speaker 2: Yeah, well, I mean I was always seeing it about

801
00:42:49,000 --> 00:42:51,320
Speaker 2: like a one inch by two inches in like rolling

802
00:42:51,320 --> 00:42:53,759
Speaker 2: Stone or spin. I don't think I saw it in

803
00:42:53,760 --> 00:43:00,640
Speaker 2: a record store physically until years later. Anyway, I was,

804
00:43:00,760 --> 00:43:02,600
Speaker 2: she said. I was always game to try fun and

805
00:43:02,640 --> 00:43:05,439
Speaker 2: somewhat reckless things. And the last shot was just sort

806
00:43:05,440 --> 00:43:08,359
Speaker 2: of wow, and that became the cover and that one

807
00:43:08,360 --> 00:43:10,719
Speaker 2: little nipple showed, which was a big deal. Later on,

808
00:43:11,040 --> 00:43:14,319
Speaker 2: over the years, various labels have cropped it out. I

809
00:43:14,400 --> 00:43:16,320
Speaker 2: believe it has since been placed back in for the

810
00:43:16,360 --> 00:43:22,359
Speaker 2: various reissues. So good for the nipple. We're gonna take

811
00:43:22,360 --> 00:43:24,640
Speaker 2: a quick break, but we'll be right back with more.

812
00:43:24,719 --> 00:43:45,719
Speaker 2: Too much information. In just a moment, buzz around Fair's

813
00:43:46,040 --> 00:43:49,960
Speaker 2: release started building from basically the second that advanced tapes

814
00:43:50,040 --> 00:43:54,480
Speaker 2: of Guyville hit the streets, and she was already looking

815
00:43:54,520 --> 00:43:57,080
Speaker 2: a little askance at it. She told the Chicago Reader

816
00:43:57,200 --> 00:44:01,600
Speaker 2: in January of nineteen ninety three, I'm completely serious about success,

817
00:44:01,800 --> 00:44:04,000
Speaker 2: but I also realized the pitfalls of that. You know,

818
00:44:04,680 --> 00:44:06,680
Speaker 2: But what's going to happen to me? If everyone thinks

819
00:44:06,719 --> 00:44:09,200
Speaker 2: it's hot shit? Am I ready for that? Am I

820
00:44:09,239 --> 00:44:11,759
Speaker 2: prepared to achieve at the level I might have to?

821
00:44:12,560 --> 00:44:13,760
Speaker 2: That's a very appreciate quote.

822
00:44:14,840 --> 00:44:17,360
Speaker 3: And now we go back to Liz Fair's uneasy relationship

823
00:44:17,360 --> 00:44:21,479
Speaker 3: with live performance. Some kind of shaky early gigs didn't

824
00:44:21,520 --> 00:44:24,200
Speaker 3: really help the perception that Liz Fhair was a rich,

825
00:44:24,280 --> 00:44:27,320
Speaker 3: ambitious girl from the suburbs who hadn't paid her dues.

826
00:44:27,719 --> 00:44:30,680
Speaker 3: Greg Cott quoted the Chicago based Thrill Jockey Records head

827
00:44:30,680 --> 00:44:33,520
Speaker 3: but Tina Richards in a nineteen ninety four Tribune article,

828
00:44:33,640 --> 00:44:36,399
Speaker 3: is saying the only thing that's aggravating is that there

829
00:44:36,400 --> 00:44:39,759
Speaker 3: are other female songwriters I love that couldn't understand why

830
00:44:39,760 --> 00:44:43,000
Speaker 3: they're not getting the attention. Liz Fair is Barbara Manning,

831
00:44:43,040 --> 00:44:46,319
Speaker 3: for one. To me, her lyrics are so sophisticated, but

832
00:44:46,400 --> 00:44:49,120
Speaker 3: she's also not as aggressive about wanting to be successful.

833
00:44:49,520 --> 00:44:51,400
Speaker 3: I don't see her ever putting her chest on a

834
00:44:51,480 --> 00:44:55,719
Speaker 3: record cover, and even Liz Fair's former supporter feels good

835
00:44:55,719 --> 00:44:59,200
Speaker 3: all over. Recordhead John Henderson bashed Fair to cot for

836
00:44:59,320 --> 00:45:02,719
Speaker 3: quote talk about how male dominated the record businesses in

837
00:45:02,719 --> 00:45:06,240
Speaker 3: her interviews, and then hiring established figures such as Will

838
00:45:06,320 --> 00:45:09,960
Speaker 3: Botwin beer manager and Bob Blatton, the beer booking agent.

839
00:45:10,280 --> 00:45:12,040
Speaker 3: I don't know who those names are, but I assume

840
00:45:12,040 --> 00:45:13,160
Speaker 3: they're very powerful men.

841
00:45:14,239 --> 00:45:18,320
Speaker 2: I mean, or at least they are men. Yeah. Yeah,

842
00:45:18,360 --> 00:45:20,560
Speaker 2: And this is where the backlash is. This is this

843
00:45:20,640 --> 00:45:22,719
Speaker 2: is honestly, I don't co sign this, but I do

844
00:45:22,760 --> 00:45:24,960
Speaker 2: find this to be the really interesting stuff because the

845
00:45:24,960 --> 00:45:28,400
Speaker 2: politics around like what would have been considered sellout and

846
00:45:28,560 --> 00:45:32,120
Speaker 2: ambition were so they are so foreign to us these days.

847
00:45:32,560 --> 00:45:35,040
Speaker 2: There's no way you would talk about any female artists

848
00:45:35,040 --> 00:45:37,080
Speaker 2: like this today, or any artists who just wanted to

849
00:45:37,080 --> 00:45:40,400
Speaker 2: get famous or wanted to sell records or like you know,

850
00:45:40,719 --> 00:45:44,520
Speaker 2: had a like the nipple a nipple shot on their record,

851
00:45:44,560 --> 00:45:46,640
Speaker 2: you know, like we talked about it, like I know,

852
00:45:46,719 --> 00:45:49,759
Speaker 2: like Cardi b and Meghan the Stallion got like like

853
00:45:50,040 --> 00:45:52,520
Speaker 2: got in trouble for wat but it certainly wasn't coming

854
00:45:52,560 --> 00:45:56,480
Speaker 2: from their own like home team. You know, it was

855
00:45:56,560 --> 00:45:59,080
Speaker 2: coming from it's always nowadays would be coming from like

856
00:45:59,120 --> 00:46:03,480
Speaker 2: conservative media. This is like the Area Record labels like

857
00:46:03,719 --> 00:46:07,680
Speaker 2: slamming her in the paper. That's crazy, just such an

858
00:46:07,760 --> 00:46:10,799
Speaker 2: utterly different climate. And in the same Greg cut piece

859
00:46:10,840 --> 00:46:14,160
Speaker 2: in the Tribune and Lis Fair defended herself essentially by saying,

860
00:46:14,200 --> 00:46:16,360
Speaker 2: my critics saw me as the lucky daughter that the

861
00:46:16,440 --> 00:46:19,839
Speaker 2: new daddies are gonna take and make and they ask,

862
00:46:20,080 --> 00:46:23,080
Speaker 2: why do I deserve it? But it's not about deserving it.

863
00:46:23,080 --> 00:46:26,279
Speaker 2: It's about the path of least resistance. I'm accessible enough

864
00:46:26,360 --> 00:46:29,000
Speaker 2: in so many channels and you can sell me really well,

865
00:46:29,320 --> 00:46:34,960
Speaker 2: which is very self aware. Yeah, it's funny her self

866
00:46:34,960 --> 00:46:39,680
Speaker 2: awareness and like candor and everything either comes across. I

867
00:46:39,680 --> 00:46:42,120
Speaker 2: can see why people were like turned off by her

868
00:46:42,239 --> 00:46:45,040
Speaker 2: and like annoyed by it and thought that she was

869
00:46:45,120 --> 00:46:47,480
Speaker 2: just kind of this Johnny come lately and very brash

870
00:46:47,520 --> 00:46:53,000
Speaker 2: and getting a lot of unearned resources and hits and everything.

871
00:46:53,120 --> 00:46:55,480
Speaker 2: But it is so funny the way that she is

872
00:46:55,600 --> 00:46:59,080
Speaker 2: just very astute about the business and kind of her

873
00:46:59,080 --> 00:47:02,640
Speaker 2: place in it. You know, Casey Rice, who played guitar

874
00:47:03,200 --> 00:47:07,359
Speaker 2: on Excellent Guyville told Spin for their oral history, he said,

875
00:47:07,400 --> 00:47:09,880
Speaker 2: I agreed in some respects it with the criticism of

876
00:47:09,880 --> 00:47:13,440
Speaker 2: the backlash backlash, it did seem unfair in that regard.

877
00:47:13,719 --> 00:47:16,120
Speaker 2: And then here's the real note of that quote. But

878
00:47:16,200 --> 00:47:21,200
Speaker 2: when was the music business about being fair? So always

879
00:47:21,400 --> 00:47:25,279
Speaker 2: you know, grain assault there. The record was a critical hit.

880
00:47:25,400 --> 00:47:27,240
Speaker 2: It was number one album in the Year End Critics

881
00:47:27,239 --> 00:47:30,480
Speaker 2: Poll and Spin and the influential Village Voice PAS and

882
00:47:30,560 --> 00:47:35,280
Speaker 2: JOP Critics Poll and by Chicago Indie Standards a financial

883
00:47:35,360 --> 00:47:37,360
Speaker 2: hit as well. By the spring of ninety four, it

884
00:47:37,400 --> 00:47:40,799
Speaker 2: had sold over two hundred thousand units, peaking at one

885
00:47:40,840 --> 00:47:43,680
Speaker 2: to ninety six on the Billboard. Two hundred was Mattador's

886
00:47:43,719 --> 00:47:46,879
Speaker 2: most successful release at the time. In nineteen ninety eight,

887
00:47:46,920 --> 00:47:49,719
Speaker 2: it was certified gold by the RIAA, which is five

888
00:47:49,800 --> 00:47:50,680
Speaker 2: hundred thousand copies.

889
00:47:50,800 --> 00:47:50,960
Speaker 5: Right.

890
00:47:52,080 --> 00:47:54,640
Speaker 2: It was like a bomb went off. Bradwood told the

891
00:47:54,680 --> 00:47:58,000
Speaker 2: av Club. There was everything before Exile and Guy Phil,

892
00:47:58,120 --> 00:48:00,359
Speaker 2: and then there was life after that. Nothing has been

893
00:48:00,400 --> 00:48:03,840
Speaker 2: the same since. Gerard Cousley, who's a head of Matador,

894
00:48:03,880 --> 00:48:05,560
Speaker 2: told New York Times, if you had told me we

895
00:48:05,560 --> 00:48:07,880
Speaker 2: were going to sell five thousand copies, I would have

896
00:48:07,920 --> 00:48:11,480
Speaker 2: been satisfied. If it had been twenty or thirty thousand copies,

897
00:48:11,520 --> 00:48:14,280
Speaker 2: I would have been pretty shocked. There was no precedent

898
00:48:14,320 --> 00:48:16,960
Speaker 2: for it in my experience. The sales were generated by

899
00:48:16,960 --> 00:48:19,280
Speaker 2: a lot of word of mouth and by Liz's hard.

900
00:48:19,080 --> 00:48:22,680
Speaker 3: Work, and this herself reacted to the warm reception of

901
00:48:22,719 --> 00:48:25,600
Speaker 3: Guyville by saying, quote, I don't really get what happened

902
00:48:25,600 --> 00:48:26,320
Speaker 3: with Guyville.

903
00:48:26,360 --> 00:48:28,520
Speaker 2: It was so normal. From my side of things.

904
00:48:28,800 --> 00:48:31,160
Speaker 3: It was nothing remarkable other than the fact that I'd

905
00:48:31,160 --> 00:48:34,399
Speaker 3: completed a big project. But I'd done that before. Being

906
00:48:34,440 --> 00:48:37,759
Speaker 3: emotionally forthright was the most radical thing I did, and

907
00:48:37,760 --> 00:48:39,960
Speaker 3: that was taken to mean something bigger in terms of

908
00:48:39,960 --> 00:48:43,160
Speaker 3: women's roles in society and women's roles in music. I

909
00:48:43,239 --> 00:48:45,240
Speaker 3: just wanted people who thought it was not worth talking

910
00:48:45,239 --> 00:48:49,040
Speaker 3: to to listen to me. But Fair also recalled the

911
00:48:49,120 --> 00:48:52,279
Speaker 3: Rob Joyner. Nobody in my neighborhood liked me. After the

912
00:48:52,320 --> 00:48:54,799
Speaker 3: record came out. I'd walked in the bars and my

913
00:48:54,840 --> 00:48:57,759
Speaker 3: friends would be debating, she dyes her hair blonde, she

914
00:48:57,800 --> 00:49:00,560
Speaker 3: can't sing, she came from a suburbs. They were so

915
00:49:00,760 --> 00:49:03,160
Speaker 3: furious with me because I didn't deserve the attention I

916
00:49:03,200 --> 00:49:06,000
Speaker 3: was getting. They'd been slogging away in the city being

917
00:49:06,080 --> 00:49:08,480
Speaker 3: indie for ten years, and I get out of school,

918
00:49:08,719 --> 00:49:11,360
Speaker 3: throw this thing together in Boom. I'm the poster child

919
00:49:11,360 --> 00:49:14,719
Speaker 3: for indie and she sang about this phenomenon and the

920
00:49:14,760 --> 00:49:17,280
Speaker 3: song never said, but she wrote to be the album's

921
00:49:17,320 --> 00:49:20,240
Speaker 3: big radio single. She put it as the fifth track

922
00:49:20,280 --> 00:49:22,440
Speaker 3: on Exile in Guyville because that's where she felt the

923
00:49:22,440 --> 00:49:25,960
Speaker 3: most crucial songs should go on every album. Case in point,

924
00:49:25,960 --> 00:49:28,399
Speaker 3: on Exile on Main Street, that's where Tumbling Dice went,

925
00:49:28,440 --> 00:49:32,040
Speaker 3: which was kind of a pseudo radio hit. Fair later

926
00:49:32,080 --> 00:49:34,319
Speaker 3: said up never said. It was just kind of like

927
00:49:34,360 --> 00:49:36,960
Speaker 3: about the music scene and how caddy it was. People

928
00:49:36,960 --> 00:49:39,799
Speaker 3: were always getting upset about something that someone had said

929
00:49:39,800 --> 00:49:42,920
Speaker 3: about their band or whatever the latest gossip was. It

930
00:49:43,040 --> 00:49:48,000
Speaker 3: was a very very caddy, little incestuous scene. She added

931
00:49:48,000 --> 00:49:50,719
Speaker 3: to The Book Club Chicago in twenty eighteen. There was

932
00:49:50,760 --> 00:49:52,840
Speaker 3: also a lot of blowback when my record blew up,

933
00:49:52,880 --> 00:49:55,239
Speaker 3: because I hadn't been the scene as long, I hadn't

934
00:49:55,280 --> 00:49:57,960
Speaker 3: really paid my dues. In their minds, maybe it was

935
00:49:58,000 --> 00:50:00,680
Speaker 3: the suburban thing where some were like, oh, rich girls

936
00:50:00,680 --> 00:50:03,200
Speaker 3: getting all the attention. I think there was a sense

937
00:50:03,200 --> 00:50:06,160
Speaker 3: that people felt they were waiting their turn longer. That

938
00:50:06,239 --> 00:50:08,080
Speaker 3: was a little upsetting, as well as how they took

939
00:50:08,120 --> 00:50:10,919
Speaker 3: the sexual songs on my record and amplified it, which

940
00:50:10,920 --> 00:50:13,480
Speaker 3: I didn't have anything to do with. Lots of bands

941
00:50:13,480 --> 00:50:15,640
Speaker 3: were talking about sex, but they picked mine up and

942
00:50:15,719 --> 00:50:19,000
Speaker 3: turned it into like a Playboy centerfold thing. That was

943
00:50:19,040 --> 00:50:22,200
Speaker 3: actually traumatic for me. I got a little anorexic during

944
00:50:22,200 --> 00:50:24,960
Speaker 3: that period because I felt really exposed and didn't know

945
00:50:25,000 --> 00:50:28,080
Speaker 3: what was going on. I wanted to impress the neighborhood,

946
00:50:28,200 --> 00:50:30,360
Speaker 3: and then I got picked up by this national media

947
00:50:30,440 --> 00:50:33,040
Speaker 3: thing and I got a little lost in there. How

948
00:50:33,040 --> 00:50:36,120
Speaker 3: do you feel about all this about her kind of

949
00:50:36,160 --> 00:50:37,560
Speaker 3: not knowing what.

950
00:50:37,560 --> 00:50:40,880
Speaker 2: Was about the backlash? Just about this backlash. You've been

951
00:50:40,960 --> 00:50:43,880
Speaker 2: part of it. You were part of our little micro

952
00:50:44,000 --> 00:50:47,399
Speaker 2: scene in Brooklyn where people get mostly me, people get

953
00:50:47,400 --> 00:50:52,240
Speaker 2: red asked about other people's success and paying your dues

954
00:50:52,440 --> 00:50:56,279
Speaker 2: and so on and so forth. I mean, I understand

955
00:50:56,320 --> 00:50:59,440
Speaker 2: that from an emotional standpoint, how galling that can be.

956
00:50:59,520 --> 00:51:02,120
Speaker 2: But also if you have somebody coming along that makes

957
00:51:02,120 --> 00:51:05,560
Speaker 2: a piece of art that resonates with people right away

958
00:51:05,600 --> 00:51:07,480
Speaker 2: in that moment, I don't think it's something that should

959
00:51:07,520 --> 00:51:09,719
Speaker 2: necessarily have to be earned. I think it's something that

960
00:51:10,239 --> 00:51:13,160
Speaker 2: you made the right piece of art for the right moment. Yeah,

961
00:51:13,200 --> 00:51:15,640
Speaker 2: I have aged into thinking that, but a small and

962
00:51:15,719 --> 00:51:21,280
Speaker 2: secret part of me is still full of rage, such

963
00:51:22,920 --> 00:51:27,080
Speaker 2: such rage because it I mean, yeah, yeah, I don't know, man,

964
00:51:27,160 --> 00:51:31,560
Speaker 2: It's it's tough. It's it's really the whole major label

965
00:51:31,600 --> 00:51:34,839
Speaker 2: feeding frenzy of like independent music in the nineties, did

966
00:51:34,840 --> 00:51:38,920
Speaker 2: this of the nineties, did this to like everything scene?

967
00:51:39,120 --> 00:51:42,200
Speaker 2: You know, they did it to in Berkeley, in San Francisco,

968
00:51:42,320 --> 00:51:45,640
Speaker 2: they did it in Seattle, they did it in you know, Portland.

969
00:51:45,840 --> 00:51:48,200
Speaker 2: They did it like they just parachuted in and a

970
00:51:48,239 --> 00:51:51,640
Speaker 2: couple people, and it was never a rising tide lifts

971
00:51:51,680 --> 00:51:54,920
Speaker 2: all boats, you know, the rising tide in the music industry.

972
00:51:54,960 --> 00:51:57,920
Speaker 2: The rising tidle doesn't do for the other boats. So

973
00:51:57,960 --> 00:52:01,279
Speaker 2: it's like, yeah, I I I understand the bitterness, and

974
00:52:01,600 --> 00:52:05,280
Speaker 2: I understand. I just I think, if anything, she probably

975
00:52:05,800 --> 00:52:10,000
Speaker 2: didn't help her case by like immediately abandoning like Chicago

976
00:52:10,160 --> 00:52:13,600
Speaker 2: and going to become because she she moved into like

977
00:52:13,640 --> 00:52:17,360
Speaker 2: film and television, composing and stuff and then going extremely pop.

978
00:52:17,520 --> 00:52:19,839
Speaker 2: Like it's not that it's not just that she made

979
00:52:19,880 --> 00:52:23,359
Speaker 2: a she parachuted into a scene and profited off from it.

980
00:52:23,440 --> 00:52:28,600
Speaker 2: She abandoned it and never looked back, So I understand that.

981
00:52:28,880 --> 00:52:31,880
Speaker 2: But you know, also, whatever, dude musicians getting paid? She

982
00:52:32,320 --> 00:52:34,319
Speaker 2: she wrote songs people like that's it.

983
00:52:34,880 --> 00:52:37,600
Speaker 3: You know, you either die an indie hero or you

984
00:52:37,640 --> 00:52:39,440
Speaker 3: live long enough to become a producer.

985
00:52:42,320 --> 00:52:46,799
Speaker 2: Oh okay, uh bar none. The most famous bit of

986
00:52:46,920 --> 00:52:52,319
Speaker 2: hatred from this era comes from Steve Albini. Albini is

987
00:52:52,320 --> 00:52:57,600
Speaker 2: probably more famous most famous for his work as a producer, engineer,

988
00:52:58,719 --> 00:53:01,800
Speaker 2: stuff like Nirvana's In You to Row, Pixie Surfer Rosa,

989
00:53:01,840 --> 00:53:04,840
Speaker 2: a million other things, but he was also sort of

990
00:53:04,880 --> 00:53:09,120
Speaker 2: an Enphone Terrible of the Chicago underground for quite some time.

991
00:53:10,080 --> 00:53:12,319
Speaker 2: It's funny that everyone is like, Steve is actually a

992
00:53:12,360 --> 00:53:15,640
Speaker 2: really nice guy, and he's also actually really mellowed out

993
00:53:15,680 --> 00:53:17,520
Speaker 2: since he did it. He actually wrote like a very

994
00:53:17,560 --> 00:53:21,480
Speaker 2: long and heartfelt thing in mel magazine of all outlets,

995
00:53:21,680 --> 00:53:26,360
Speaker 2: being like like gracefully and maturely and like apologizing for

996
00:53:26,400 --> 00:53:30,000
Speaker 2: all of his like provocateurs that he did and really

997
00:53:30,000 --> 00:53:32,560
Speaker 2: and owning it and being like, I'm sorry, I was

998
00:53:32,600 --> 00:53:35,239
Speaker 2: really shuting me at the time. I'm like doing a

999
00:53:35,239 --> 00:53:38,279
Speaker 2: bunch of work to to you know, correct that and

1000
00:53:38,320 --> 00:53:42,279
Speaker 2: I hope I can be forgiven for that stuff, so

1001
00:53:42,560 --> 00:53:44,640
Speaker 2: I find that really sweet. But he was also in

1002
00:53:44,680 --> 00:53:50,000
Speaker 2: a band called rape Man, and his band Big Black

1003
00:53:50,120 --> 00:53:54,759
Speaker 2: had songs about child abuse being slaughtered, and he was

1004
00:53:55,080 --> 00:53:59,160
Speaker 2: very famous for what what what a different generation would

1005
00:53:59,280 --> 00:54:05,279
Speaker 2: call his poisoned Ben. He would just constantly write these

1006
00:54:05,320 --> 00:54:10,400
Speaker 2: screeds to mostly the Chicago Reader because he really had

1007
00:54:10,440 --> 00:54:14,480
Speaker 2: a bone to pick with Bill Wyman the critic, not

1008
00:54:14,560 --> 00:54:18,960
Speaker 2: the Stones basis, but probably him too, and like maximum

1009
00:54:19,040 --> 00:54:24,479
Speaker 2: rock and roll, and he he wrote probably his most

1010
00:54:24,520 --> 00:54:29,520
Speaker 2: famous to in January of nineteen ninety four. The previous December,

1011
00:54:29,719 --> 00:54:34,800
Speaker 2: Bill Wyman had named Exile in Guyville to his Best

1012
00:54:34,800 --> 00:54:37,840
Speaker 2: of Year end lists along with Urge, Overkill and the

1013
00:54:37,880 --> 00:54:41,640
Speaker 2: Smashing Pumpkins and had written this defense of them, saying

1014
00:54:41,680 --> 00:54:45,040
Speaker 2: that the backlash to them from the underground scenes was

1015
00:54:45,560 --> 00:54:50,440
Speaker 2: not deserved. And Albini wrote him an open letter called

1016
00:54:50,800 --> 00:54:56,279
Speaker 2: three Pandering Sluts and their music press Stooge, and in

1017
00:54:56,320 --> 00:54:58,719
Speaker 2: it he takes aim at fair, Urge, Overkilled and the

1018
00:54:58,719 --> 00:55:03,200
Speaker 2: Smashing Pumpkins and they're quote calculated and overbearing hype barrage,

1019
00:55:04,280 --> 00:55:08,200
Speaker 2: and then some truly devastating lines he says these three

1020
00:55:08,239 --> 00:55:11,719
Speaker 2: are not alternative artists any more than their historical precursors.

1021
00:55:12,040 --> 00:55:15,400
Speaker 2: They are by of and for the mainstream. Liz Fair

1022
00:55:15,560 --> 00:55:18,640
Speaker 2: is Ricky Lee Jones more talked about than heard, a

1023
00:55:18,640 --> 00:55:22,560
Speaker 2: persona completely unrooted in substance, and a chore to listen to.

1024
00:55:23,160 --> 00:55:27,760
Speaker 2: Smashing Pumpkins are Ario Speedwagon, stylistically appropriate for the current

1025
00:55:27,800 --> 00:55:32,000
Speaker 2: college party scene, but ultimately insignificant and urge overkill. Are

1026
00:55:32,080 --> 00:55:36,600
Speaker 2: oingo boingo wieners in suits playing frat party rock, trying

1027
00:55:36,600 --> 00:55:41,440
Speaker 2: to tap a goofy trend that doesn't even exist. Obviously,

1028
00:55:41,520 --> 00:55:44,320
Speaker 2: history is pulling have proven him wrong about the Smashing Pumpkins,

1029
00:55:44,320 --> 00:55:49,680
Speaker 2: but damn that is a withering put down in his column,

1030
00:55:49,719 --> 00:55:52,120
Speaker 2: though he did concede that Fair and her album are

1031
00:55:52,160 --> 00:55:54,480
Speaker 2: probably the least defensive of the three you focused on

1032
00:55:54,520 --> 00:55:56,680
Speaker 2: in your column, which may explain why you think she

1033
00:55:56,840 --> 00:56:00,400
Speaker 2: is any good. Wyman later wrote of this back and

1034
00:56:00,719 --> 00:56:03,920
Speaker 2: particularly his relationship, his patronage or whatever, of her. In

1035
00:56:03,960 --> 00:56:07,000
Speaker 2: twenty sixteen, he wrote, I like gossip. The free flow

1036
00:56:07,040 --> 00:56:10,279
Speaker 2: of information is great for journalists, particularly back then when

1037
00:56:10,280 --> 00:56:11,640
Speaker 2: I was one of the few people who had a

1038
00:56:11,640 --> 00:56:13,799
Speaker 2: public outlet for it. But I gotta say a lot

1039
00:56:13,800 --> 00:56:17,240
Speaker 2: of it was heavily sexualized and felt hostile. One letter

1040
00:56:17,280 --> 00:56:20,400
Speaker 2: to the editor slamming Fair said, I was quote trying

1041
00:56:20,440 --> 00:56:24,280
Speaker 2: to get a whiff of Winnetka pussy. That was typical

1042
00:56:24,320 --> 00:56:27,760
Speaker 2: of the tone. The Chicago Headline Club, at its annual

1043
00:56:27,800 --> 00:56:30,040
Speaker 2: comedy show at the Park West, did a weird skit

1044
00:56:30,080 --> 00:56:33,319
Speaker 2: that implied we were sleeping together. A local journalist named

1045
00:56:33,320 --> 00:56:37,080
Speaker 2: Ben Kim was really vicious in trashing Affairs live shows,

1046
00:56:37,440 --> 00:56:40,479
Speaker 2: and then in response, she canceled an interview with another

1047
00:56:40,560 --> 00:56:43,319
Speaker 2: journalist who worked for the same outlet Kim did, even

1048
00:56:43,360 --> 00:56:45,759
Speaker 2: at a local level, it was just ugly.

1049
00:56:46,000 --> 00:56:48,560
Speaker 3: And this is maybe goes some way and explaining why.

1050
00:56:48,640 --> 00:56:52,360
Speaker 3: Liz Fairs started to sort of sour on her feelings

1051
00:56:52,400 --> 00:56:55,560
Speaker 3: for Exile and Guyville. By October nineteen ninety four, a

1052
00:56:55,560 --> 00:56:57,880
Speaker 3: little over a year after the album was released, she

1053
00:56:57,960 --> 00:57:01,080
Speaker 3: told The New York Times, I can't feel these songs anymore.

1054
00:57:01,360 --> 00:57:03,360
Speaker 3: I have to act like I feel them. It feels

1055
00:57:03,480 --> 00:57:06,080
Speaker 3: very scanny to me. It feels very much not a

1056
00:57:06,160 --> 00:57:09,200
Speaker 3: sincere element for my music. I can get really upset

1057
00:57:09,239 --> 00:57:13,040
Speaker 3: about this, she continued. If performing live is a livelihood,

1058
00:57:13,080 --> 00:57:15,040
Speaker 3: I'm never going to make any money in this business.

1059
00:57:15,400 --> 00:57:17,440
Speaker 3: They can try really hard to make a performer out

1060
00:57:17,480 --> 00:57:19,760
Speaker 3: of me, and I'll rise to the occasion. But I'm

1061
00:57:19,840 --> 00:57:22,280
Speaker 3: much happier making the art. And if this messes up

1062
00:57:22,320 --> 00:57:25,000
Speaker 3: my career, I can accept it. I can be poor again.

1063
00:57:25,600 --> 00:57:27,960
Speaker 3: Some people just take to performing and it feeds them,

1064
00:57:28,160 --> 00:57:30,640
Speaker 3: but it drains me. What feeds me is to have

1065
00:57:30,680 --> 00:57:33,440
Speaker 3: an actual project for my efforts. Where is it written

1066
00:57:33,440 --> 00:57:35,240
Speaker 3: in the good book that if you make records you

1067
00:57:35,320 --> 00:57:37,919
Speaker 3: have to play live. There's plenty of bands out there

1068
00:57:37,960 --> 00:57:38,600
Speaker 3: playing live.

1069
00:57:38,680 --> 00:57:39,760
Speaker 2: What are they me for.

1070
00:57:40,440 --> 00:57:41,880
Speaker 3: I don't think I can give it up for a

1071
00:57:41,920 --> 00:57:43,760
Speaker 3: couple of years, but there's no way I'm going to

1072
00:57:43,800 --> 00:57:46,200
Speaker 3: play this out. I may make albums for a really

1073
00:57:46,280 --> 00:57:50,280
Speaker 3: long time, but in terms of promoting them, that's totally finite. Again,

1074
00:57:50,440 --> 00:57:53,440
Speaker 3: very self aware, yeah, self assured and self aware.

1075
00:57:54,680 --> 00:57:57,280
Speaker 2: Her follow up records nineteen ninety four is Whip Smart

1076
00:57:57,480 --> 00:58:01,479
Speaker 2: Whip Smart and nineteen ninety eight's White Chocolate Space Egg

1077
00:58:01,800 --> 00:58:09,080
Speaker 2: All one word No. I reject that they didn't flop exactly,

1078
00:58:09,560 --> 00:58:12,800
Speaker 2: but nor did they quote unquote capitalize on the momentum

1079
00:58:12,800 --> 00:58:15,720
Speaker 2: from Guyville. Then, of course, in two thousand and three

1080
00:58:16,000 --> 00:58:20,640
Speaker 2: came Fair's self titled record She was open about the fact,

1081
00:58:20,680 --> 00:58:23,160
Speaker 2: and had been since nineteen ninety eight that she wanted

1082
00:58:23,160 --> 00:58:25,800
Speaker 2: to make money from her songs, and so she hired

1083
00:58:25,840 --> 00:58:28,920
Speaker 2: the songwriting and production team The Matrix, who had produced

1084
00:58:28,920 --> 00:58:32,760
Speaker 2: songs by Britney Spears, The Backstreet Boys, Ricky Martin, and

1085
00:58:32,840 --> 00:58:37,800
Speaker 2: of course, Avril Levine's deathless hit Complicated. Fairh told The

1086
00:58:37,840 --> 00:58:40,320
Speaker 2: Washington Post at this age, I wanted to feel more

1087
00:58:40,360 --> 00:58:43,720
Speaker 2: like an entrepreneur, not just a dumb artist. I wanted

1088
00:58:43,800 --> 00:58:48,480
Speaker 2: the work to reward ratio to be more recognizable. First

1089
00:58:48,480 --> 00:58:50,800
Speaker 2: half of that is a little clunky, the second half

1090
00:58:50,840 --> 00:58:55,240
Speaker 2: of that. I understand. She had been open about this

1091
00:58:56,200 --> 00:58:59,160
Speaker 2: the financial side of her career before. She sang it's

1092
00:58:59,240 --> 00:59:01,400
Speaker 2: nice to be light, but it's better by far to

1093
00:59:01,440 --> 00:59:04,520
Speaker 2: get paid on a song from nineteen ninety eight called

1094
00:59:04,960 --> 00:59:11,880
Speaker 2: loads of Money, The first single from the self titled record,

1095
00:59:11,920 --> 00:59:15,040
Speaker 2: Why Can't I, charted on the adult Top forty and

1096
00:59:15,160 --> 00:59:18,160
Speaker 2: Hot Adult Contemporary charts, and its music video landed fair

1097
00:59:18,240 --> 00:59:20,439
Speaker 2: in heavy rotation on vh one for the first time.

1098
00:59:20,920 --> 00:59:23,880
Speaker 2: It sold respectably, but not enough to earn her the

1099
00:59:24,160 --> 00:59:27,120
Speaker 2: few money she probably wanted for making such a blatantly

1100
00:59:27,160 --> 00:59:30,040
Speaker 2: commercial pivot. It took until twenty eighteen to even be

1101
00:59:30,040 --> 00:59:33,919
Speaker 2: certified gold. Oh fifteen years Wow. That said, I did

1102
00:59:33,920 --> 00:59:36,760
Speaker 2: take a look at the Spotify numbers today. Why can't

1103
00:59:36,800 --> 00:59:40,960
Speaker 2: I this single has thirty five point two million plays,

1104
00:59:41,640 --> 00:59:44,840
Speaker 2: all the Exile and Exil and Guyville, the exile in

1105
00:59:44,880 --> 00:59:48,240
Speaker 2: Guyville stuff. The top stream is can run with six

1106
00:59:48,320 --> 00:59:51,200
Speaker 2: point nine million, So like a.

1107
00:59:51,200 --> 00:59:53,200
Speaker 3: Soundtrack or something. I'm trying to figure out why that

1108
00:59:53,280 --> 00:59:54,560
Speaker 3: song so much higher than the rest.

1109
00:59:55,440 --> 00:59:57,280
Speaker 2: The numbers don't lie. It's probably on a bunch of

1110
00:59:57,320 --> 01:00:01,280
Speaker 2: like two thousands throwback playlists would be my bet.

1111
01:00:01,760 --> 01:00:04,880
Speaker 3: Well, Liz faced yet another backlack from fans of her earlier,

1112
01:00:04,960 --> 01:00:08,520
Speaker 3: more idiosyncratic work, though at least some aspects of her

1113
01:00:08,520 --> 01:00:13,480
Speaker 3: songwriting remained unchanged after this very divisive self titled pop album.

1114
01:00:13,640 --> 01:00:17,160
Speaker 3: There's a song on that album called HWC, which stands

1115
01:00:17,240 --> 01:00:18,880
Speaker 3: for you say white.

1116
01:00:18,680 --> 01:00:26,280
Speaker 2: Hot Hot white White. What do you think Liz Fair

1117
01:00:26,280 --> 01:00:35,640
Speaker 2: would be singing about? Not chick? I imagine? No? Oh, I

1118
01:00:35,680 --> 01:00:40,560
Speaker 2: want to be your blow jumps chit queen hot white Okay,

1119
01:00:41,320 --> 01:00:43,680
Speaker 2: don't you don't make me say it? No, I won't

1120
01:00:44,240 --> 01:00:44,560
Speaker 2: thank you.

1121
01:00:46,600 --> 01:00:49,160
Speaker 3: Another song on the record chastise as a younger lover

1122
01:00:49,280 --> 01:00:52,680
Speaker 3: by saying your record collection doesn't exist. You don't even

1123
01:00:52,680 --> 01:00:55,600
Speaker 3: know who Liz Fair is, which that's a great line.

1124
01:00:56,240 --> 01:00:56,520
Speaker 5: It is.

1125
01:00:56,600 --> 01:00:58,760
Speaker 2: It's funny because it's sort of a meta tweaking of

1126
01:00:58,840 --> 01:01:02,240
Speaker 2: like what she wrote about out Excelling Guyville, that she

1127
01:01:02,280 --> 01:01:04,160
Speaker 2: was surrounded by all of these guys talking down to

1128
01:01:04,160 --> 01:01:06,439
Speaker 2: her about music. So now she's like flipped it. That's

1129
01:01:06,480 --> 01:01:09,680
Speaker 2: either very clever or very grating, depending on where you stand.

1130
01:01:09,840 --> 01:01:13,360
Speaker 2: I like that, yeah, But critics for the self titled

1131
01:01:13,400 --> 01:01:16,880
Speaker 2: pop album were savage. New York Times critic meganal Work

1132
01:01:16,920 --> 01:01:22,720
Speaker 2: titled her review Liz Fair's Exile and Avrilville and complain

1133
01:01:22,800 --> 01:01:26,080
Speaker 2: that Fair quote gush is like a teenager having quote

1134
01:01:26,080 --> 01:01:30,360
Speaker 2: committed an embarrassing form of career suicide. Matt Lamy at

1135
01:01:30,360 --> 01:01:35,120
Speaker 2: Pitchfork gave the album a zero point zero, sniping It's

1136
01:01:35,160 --> 01:01:38,720
Speaker 2: sad that an artist's groundbreaking is Fair would be reduced

1137
01:01:38,720 --> 01:01:43,880
Speaker 2: to cheap publicity stunts and hyper commercialized teen pop, and

1138
01:01:44,080 --> 01:01:46,920
Speaker 2: Liz Fair would later come at megan'roork by saying in

1139
01:01:46,960 --> 01:01:50,280
Speaker 2: twenty nineteen, Megan ought to try wearing some hot clothes

1140
01:01:50,320 --> 01:01:53,080
Speaker 2: and having a good time. She might be happier.

1141
01:01:55,680 --> 01:01:58,439
Speaker 3: She was kinder to Matt LeMay at Pitchfork, the guy

1142
01:01:58,440 --> 01:02:01,720
Speaker 3: who gave her a zero point zero h He apologized

1143
01:02:01,720 --> 01:02:06,919
Speaker 3: for his quote condescending in cringey review, and Liz forgave him.

1144
01:02:06,920 --> 01:02:09,560
Speaker 3: She tweeted that she enjoyed his pan much more than

1145
01:02:09,600 --> 01:02:13,120
Speaker 3: others because it quote had some humor in it. I,

1146
01:02:13,240 --> 01:02:16,240
Speaker 3: for one, remember none of this controversy in two thousand

1147
01:02:16,280 --> 01:02:18,640
Speaker 3: and three when she went pop. This seems a really

1148
01:02:18,840 --> 01:02:20,120
Speaker 3: gooing electric type thing.

1149
01:02:20,160 --> 01:02:22,400
Speaker 2: I have no memory. Oh I remember, and I remember

1150
01:02:22,400 --> 01:02:24,880
Speaker 2: it on people talking about it on MTV and VH one.

1151
01:02:25,000 --> 01:02:26,720
Speaker 2: I think it was even landed in some of those

1152
01:02:27,680 --> 01:02:28,960
Speaker 2: because remember Jewel.

1153
01:02:28,760 --> 01:02:32,400
Speaker 3: Did it too, Yeah, Jewel, I remember much more from Yeah,

1154
01:02:32,840 --> 01:02:33,560
Speaker 3: much more of.

1155
01:02:34,080 --> 01:02:37,520
Speaker 2: Let me listen to this damn song. We're gonna do

1156
01:02:37,560 --> 01:02:39,880
Speaker 2: one of those YouTube react videos.

1157
01:02:41,640 --> 01:02:49,480
Speaker 4: Yes, you at night, gotta go friend us? Right, and

1158
01:02:49,880 --> 01:03:03,280
Speaker 4: I got someone waiting to.

1159
01:03:05,080 --> 01:03:07,160
Speaker 3: I think I always thought that was like Michelle Branch

1160
01:03:07,200 --> 01:03:07,960
Speaker 3: or Hillary Duff.

1161
01:03:08,760 --> 01:03:12,000
Speaker 2: Yeah, I remember this song. Yeah, it's kind of a banger.

1162
01:03:12,480 --> 01:03:15,360
Speaker 2: I like it. I like it quite a bit, or

1163
01:03:15,400 --> 01:03:24,920
Speaker 2: like Ashley Simpson. Yeah, she sounds so young like. I

1164
01:03:24,960 --> 01:03:28,200
Speaker 2: don't know how they treated her vocals, Probably a lot

1165
01:03:28,200 --> 01:03:33,000
Speaker 2: of pitching. It's that it's the panned yeah radio effect

1166
01:03:33,200 --> 01:03:37,520
Speaker 2: delay that instantly marks it as a two thousands production. No,

1167
01:03:37,880 --> 01:03:40,040
Speaker 2: I can see why you would hate it if you

1168
01:03:40,400 --> 01:03:43,080
Speaker 2: like Excel and Guyville was part of your like like

1169
01:03:43,200 --> 01:03:45,760
Speaker 2: right on your shelf next to like Slater Kinney and PJ.

1170
01:03:45,920 --> 01:03:49,600
Speaker 2: Harvey and Tory Amos and Fion Apple, and then this

1171
01:03:49,680 --> 01:03:53,600
Speaker 2: comes out after five years, you'd be like, what the happened?

1172
01:03:54,840 --> 01:03:58,280
Speaker 2: But you know, conversations around selling out were very different

1173
01:03:58,600 --> 01:03:59,640
Speaker 2: even twenty years ago.

1174
01:04:00,640 --> 01:04:03,880
Speaker 3: Fair Way Wait, in interview a vice, fair explained of

1175
01:04:03,920 --> 01:04:06,240
Speaker 3: this song why can't I My hope was that someone

1176
01:04:06,280 --> 01:04:08,280
Speaker 3: would hear the song in the gym and buy the

1177
01:04:08,320 --> 01:04:11,000
Speaker 3: record and then start buying my albums and sort of

1178
01:04:11,040 --> 01:04:11,880
Speaker 3: half an awakening.

1179
01:04:13,560 --> 01:04:17,920
Speaker 2: That's a story sticking to it. Yeah, did she think

1180
01:04:17,960 --> 01:04:23,800
Speaker 2: that did? How did and how did that go for you? Liz? Yeah,

1181
01:04:23,840 --> 01:04:26,880
Speaker 2: I don't know. I mean, I hate to I hate

1182
01:04:26,880 --> 01:04:29,160
Speaker 2: feeling like that. I'm coming off as negative to her

1183
01:04:29,200 --> 01:04:32,800
Speaker 2: as I am, But I understand I understand every in

1184
01:04:32,960 --> 01:04:35,520
Speaker 2: like a much less tolerant part of my life. I

1185
01:04:35,680 --> 01:04:40,680
Speaker 2: was Steve Albini and I yeah it rich girl coming

1186
01:04:40,720 --> 01:04:43,640
Speaker 2: in from the suburbs and joining your scene, walking away

1187
01:04:43,680 --> 01:04:46,800
Speaker 2: with two hundred thousand copies of a record sold and

1188
01:04:46,800 --> 01:04:51,240
Speaker 2: never coming back or making music that sounded like that. Again, Yeah,

1189
01:04:51,320 --> 01:04:54,200
Speaker 2: I get it, but I still find her very charming

1190
01:04:54,360 --> 01:04:57,760
Speaker 2: and funny and self aware and obviously a great songwriter.

1191
01:04:58,040 --> 01:05:01,680
Speaker 2: And you know she doesn't it seemed particularly damaged over it,

1192
01:05:02,120 --> 01:05:04,960
Speaker 2: although she did say in a twenty ten interview with

1193
01:05:05,280 --> 01:05:09,080
Speaker 2: Consequence of Sound, the interviewer asked if she felt trapped

1194
01:05:09,080 --> 01:05:12,560
Speaker 2: in a can't win situation between her critics and her fans,

1195
01:05:13,680 --> 01:05:16,360
Speaker 2: and she responded, I've given up on the win thing.

1196
01:05:17,600 --> 01:05:22,760
Speaker 2: Oh so, yeah, you know, we've spent a lot of

1197
01:05:22,760 --> 01:05:25,200
Speaker 2: time dwelling on all the gossip and all the backlash,

1198
01:05:25,280 --> 01:05:28,480
Speaker 2: but it's better to dwell on that original, pure spirit

1199
01:05:28,680 --> 01:05:33,920
Speaker 2: of the album. As Fair told Spin, it's that girl

1200
01:05:34,120 --> 01:05:37,080
Speaker 2: I was growing up, that girl having people say you

1201
01:05:37,120 --> 01:05:39,400
Speaker 2: can't do this, you aren't good enough to do this,

1202
01:05:39,720 --> 01:05:42,120
Speaker 2: you don't know what you're doing, and me getting enough

1203
01:05:42,240 --> 01:05:44,080
Speaker 2: rage in me to say I have as much of

1204
01:05:44,120 --> 01:05:46,520
Speaker 2: a voice as anyone, and even if I didn't have

1205
01:05:46,560 --> 01:05:52,680
Speaker 2: the education or the musical knowledge, it didn't stop me. Folks,

1206
01:05:52,720 --> 01:05:54,840
Speaker 2: thank you for listening. This has been too much information.

1207
01:05:55,280 --> 01:05:58,520
Speaker 2: I'm Alex Hagel and I'm Jordan Runtug. We'll catch you

1208
01:05:58,600 --> 01:06:06,640
Speaker 2: next time. Too Much Information was a production of iHeartRadio.

1209
01:06:06,920 --> 01:06:10,160
Speaker 2: The show's executive producers are Noel Brown and Jordan Runtog.

1210
01:06:10,320 --> 01:06:13,200
Speaker 2: The show's supervising producer is Michael Alder June.

1211
01:06:13,440 --> 01:06:16,560
Speaker 5: The show was researched, written, and hosted by Jordan Runtog

1212
01:06:16,600 --> 01:06:17,720
Speaker 5: and Alex Heigel.

1213
01:06:17,560 --> 01:06:20,760
Speaker 1: With original music by step Applebaum and the Ghost Funk Orchestra.

1214
01:06:21,120 --> 01:06:23,120
Speaker 2: If you like what you heard, please subscribe and leave

1215
01:06:23,200 --> 01:06:23,720
Speaker 2: us a review.

1216
01:06:23,960 --> 01:06:28,320
Speaker 1: For more podcasts on iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,

1217
01:06:28,520 --> 01:06:34,560
Speaker 1: or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.