Podcasts about whip smart

My guest today is the author and essayist, Melissa Febos. Melissa has written four award winning books - Whip Smart, Abandon Me, Girlhood (which won the National Book Critics Circle Award in the states) and Body Work. She's won too many prizes to mention here and her writing has appeared all over the place! In her mid thirties, after, let's just say a pretty horrific two year relationship, Melissa decided to step away not just from sex, but love, relationships, intimacy in general. At first for three months, then six, then ultimately for a year.  Three months? Hardly a big deal, You might think. But for someone who'd been in one relationship or another since she was 15, it was the start of a long road to breaking a 20 year serial monogamy habit.  Soon she realised she was not just taking a break, but making a change. One that would affect not just her relationships with friends family and lovers, but with herself, her work and the way she lived her life. The result is her new memoir, The Dry Season. Melissa joined me from Iowa to talk about that year of celibacy and what it taught her about independence, creativity, sexuality and above all herself. We also discussed shaking off the soup of sexual prescription, the happy ever after narrative, women's celibacy in history, sexual fluidity in midlife and why she's obsessed with the TV detective Vera! * You can buy all the books mentioned in this podcast at ⁠⁠⁠⁠The Shift bookshop on Bookshop.org⁠⁠⁠⁠, including The Dry Season by Melissa Febos as well as the book that inspired this podcast, The Shift: how I lost and found myself after 40 - and you can too, by me. * If you enjoyed this episode and you fancy buying me a coffee, pop over to my page on ⁠⁠⁠⁠buymeacoffee.com⁠⁠⁠⁠. • And if you'd like to support the work that goes into making this podcast and get a weekly newsletter plus loads more content including exclusive transcripts of the podcast, why not join The Shift community, come and have a look around at ⁠⁠⁠⁠www.theshiftwithsambaker.substack.com⁠⁠⁠⁠ • The Shift (on life after 40) with Sam Baker is created and hosted by Sam Baker and edited by Juliette Nicholls at Pineapple Production. If you enjoyed this podcast, please rate/review/follow as it really does help other people find us. And let me know what you think on twitter @sambaker or instagram @theothersambaker Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Continued talk about Liz Phair's sophomore LP Whip Smart 30 year anniversary with writer, poet, musician J.Johnson. We talk about everything from Monster theory, San francisco 90's-early aughts era, and of course LIZ PHAIR.

It's the second Booklab: First Pages episode! At some point, these episodes will go out only to our fellow Stickers—supporters of the podcast. Want to join that crew, where you'll be able to send in your own first page for the pod, join write-alongs and get AMAs from our hosts and guest book coaches?I'm a sticker! Or I want to be. Also I get that y'all need support to get this out here and I love that it's here so yeah.On today's episode, we discuss the first pages of Title Redacted, a novel and Welcome to Heaven, an upper middle grade novel. Would we turn the page? Opinions are mixed, but good advice for improving—these first pages and yours—abounds. THANK YOU to the writers willing to submit their work for our discussion.Did you like First pages? Have ideas for how we can make it better? We'd love to hear it and we'll talk back, so comment away.We offered some comps to our first submitter:Whip Smart, Melissa FebosI Love a Man in Uniform, Lily BuranaA Certain Appeal, Vanessa KingWant to submit a first page to Booklab? Fill out the form HERE.Theme music credit: “Circle,” by Phoebe LaheyIt's hard to believe the summer is almost over, and in the next few weeks, we will be wrapping up our special Blueprint Challenge that we did here at the #AmWriting podcast. As a part of that challenge, anyone who signed up for and completed it will be getting a list of exclusive offers from Author Accelerator book coaches to help them with their blueprints.But if, as the summer closes, you're at a point where you feel like you could use some help from a book coach, we suggest you check out Author Accelerator's book coach directory. They've certified more than 260 book coaches in fiction, nonfiction and memoir, and one of them may be the perfect person to help you get your book back on track. Head to https://www.authoraccelerator.com/matchme to find the book coach that's right for you. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit amwriting.substack.com/subscribe

pt. 2 of my conversation with writer Liz Barker about Liz Phair's sophomore record but perhaps underappreciated "Whip Smart".

30th anniversary of the phenomenal sophmore album by Liz Phair. After Exile in Guyville's success and indie welter weight winner in the early 90's circle Liz Phair brought Whip Smart to the shooting range. It performed well but maybe didn't get it's due. I speak with writer Liz Barker and sort out each other's early experiences with this amazing record.

Join co-hosts Annie Liontas and Lito Velázquez in conversation with LitFriends Melissa Febos & Donika Kelly about their grand statements, big revelations, sentential seduction, queering forms, the power of vulnerability, and love poems. We're taking a break and will be back for our next episode with guests Yiyun Li & Edmund White on January 16,  2024. Happy Holidays, LitFam!   LINKS Libsyn Blog www.annieliontas.com www.litovelazquez.com www.melissafebos.com www.donikakelly.com LitFriends LinkTree LitFriends Insta LitFriends Facebook TRANSCRIPT Annie: (00:00) This episode is dedicated to Chuck, a dog we have loved, and Donika and Melissa's sweet pup.   Annie & Lito: Welcome to LitFriends! Hey Lit Friends!   Annie: Welcome to the show.    Lito: Today, we're speaking with memoirist Melissa Febos and poet Donika Kelly, lit friends in marriage,   Annie: About seduction, big boss feelings, and sliding into DMs.   Lito: So grab your bestie,   Annie & Lito: And get ready to fall in love!   Annie: What I love about Melissa Febos, and you can feel this across all four of her books, is how she declares herself free. There's no ambiguity to this. This is her story, not your telling of it, not your telling of her. I meet her on the page as someone who's in an act of rebellion or an act of defiance. And I was not really surprised but delighted to find that, when I read Donika Kelly, I had sort of the same reaction, same impression. And I'm wondering if that's true for you, and, Lito, what your understanding of vulnerability and its relationship to power is.   Lito: The power for me in these conversations, and the power that the authors that we speak with possess, seems to me, in the ways that they have found how they are completely unique from each other. And more so than in our other conversations, Donika and Melissa, their work is so different. And yet, as you've pointed out, the overlap, and the fire, the energy, the defiance, the fierceness is so present. And it was present in our conversation. And so inspiring.   Annie: Yeah. I'm thinking even about Melissa Febos has this Ted Talk. (01:54) Where she says "telling your secrets will set you free." And it feels that not only is that true, but it's also very much an act of self reclamation and strength, right? Where we might read it as an act of weakness. It's actually in fact, a harnessing of the self.   Lito: Right, it's not that Melissa has a need to confess. It's that she really uses writing to find the truth about herself and how she feels about something, which that could not differ more from my writing practice.   Annie: How so?   Lito: I find that I sort of, I write out of an emotion or a need to discover something, but I already sort of am aware of where I am and who I am before I start. I find the plot and the characters as I go, but I know sort of how I feel.   Annie: Yeah, I think for me, I do feel like writing is an act of discovery where maybe I put something on the page, it's the initial conception, or yeah, like you coming out of a feeling. But as I start to ask questions, right, for me, it's this process of inquiry. I excavate to something maybe a little more surprising or partially hidden or unknown to myself.   Lito: That's true. There is a discovery of, and I think you're, I think you've pointed to exactly what it is. It's the process of inquiry, and I think both of them, and obviously us, we're doing that similar thing. This is about writing, about this, this is about asking questions and writing through them.   Annie: Yeah, and Donika Kelly, we feel that in her work, her poetry over and over, even when they have the same recurring, I would say haunting images or artifacts. Each time she's turning it over and asking almost unbearable questions.   Lito: Right.   Annie: And we're joining her on the page because she is brave enough and has an iron will and says, no, I will not not look this in the eye.    Lito: That's the feeling exactly that I get from both of them is the courage, the bravura of the unflinching.   Annie: I think something that seemed to resonate with you was (03:58) how they talk about writing outside of publishing right? Yeah.   Lito: Yeah, I love I love that they talk about writing as a practice regardless, they're separated from The need to produce a work that's gonna sell in a commercial world in a capitalist society. It's more about the daily practice, and how that is a lifestyle and even what you said about the TED talk, that's just her. She's just talking about herself. Like that she's just telling an absolute truth that people don't typically talk about.   Annie: Right. And it's a conscious, active way to live inside one's life. It's a form of reflection, meditation, and rather than just moving through life, a way to make meaning of the experience.   Lito: I love that you use the word meditation because when you talk about meditation, you think of someone in a lotus position quietly being, but the meditations that both of them do, these are not quiet.   Annie: No. And of course we have to talk about how cute they are as married literary besties.   Lito: Oh my god, cute and like, they're hot for each other.   Annie: Oh my god.   Lito: It's palpable.   Annie: So palpable, sliding into DMs, chatting each other up over email.   Lito: They romanced each other, and I hope—no—I know they're gonna romance you, listener.   Annie: We'll be right back.   Lito: (05:40) Back to the show.   Annie: Melissa Febos is the author of four books, including the best-selling essay collection Girlhood, which won the National Book Critics Circle Award, was a Lambda finalist, and was named a notable book by NPR, Time Magazine, the Washington Post, and others. Her craft book Body Work is a national bestseller and an Indie's Next Pick. Her forthcoming novel The Dry Season is a work of mixed form nonfiction that explores celibacy as liberatory practice. Melissa lives in Iowa City with her wife, the poet Donika Kelly, and is a professor in the English department at the University of Iowa, where she teaches creative writing.   Lito: Donika Kelly is the author of The Renunciations, winner of the Anisfield-Wolf Book Award in poetry and Bestiary, the winner of the 2015 Cave Canem Poetry Prize, a Hurston Wright Legacy Award for poetry, and the Kate Tufts Discovery Award. Donika has been a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award, the Publishing Triangle Awards, the Lambda Literary Awards, and was long listed for the National Book Award. (06:00) Donika lives in Iowa City with her wife, the writer Melissa Febos, and is an assistant professor in the English department at the University of Iowa, where she teaches creative writing.   Annie: Well, thank you for joining us for LitFriends to talk about the ultimate lit friendship. It does seem like you've won at the game of lit friends a little bit, having married your lit friend. I think of you both as writers who are in the constant act of subversion and resisting erasure. And that's the kind of work that Lito and I are drawn to, and that we're trying to do ourselves. And your work really shows us how to inhabit our bravest and most complex selves on the page. So we're really grateful for that.   Melissa: Thanks.   Annie: Yeah, of course. I mean, Donika, I think about poems of yours that my friends and I revisit constantly because we're haunted by them in the best way. They've taken residence inside of us. And you talk about what it means to have to do that work. And you've said, "to admit need and pain, desire and trauma and claim my humanity was often daunting. But the book demanded I claim my personhood."   And Melissa, I think you know how much your work means to me. I mean, as someone who is raised as a girl in this country and writing creative nonfiction, Body Work should not be as revelatory as it is. Yet what I see is that you're shaping an entire generation of nonfiction writers, many of them women. So, you know, also very grateful for that. And you've talked about that in Body Work. You've said "the risk of honest self-appraisal requires bravery to place our flawed selves in the context of this magnificent broken world is the opposite of narcissism, which is building a self-image that pleases you." So we'll talk more in a bit about courage and vulnerability and how you all do the impossible things you do, but let's dive into your lit friendship.   Melissa: Thank you, Annie, for that beautiful introduction.   Donika: Yeah, thank you so much. I'm excited to talk about our friendship.   Lito: We're so excited to have you here.   Melissa: Talk about our special friendship.   Annie: Very special friendship. Friendship with benefits.   Lito: So tell us about your lit friend, Melissa, tell us about Donika.   Melissa: (09:07) Tell us about her. Okay, she's fucking hilarious, like very, very funny and covers a broad spectrum of humor from like, there's a lot of like punning that goes on in our house, a lot of like silly wordplay, bathroom humor, and then like high level, like, literary academic sort of witticism that's also making fun of itself a lot. And we've sort of operated in all of those registers since like the day we met.   She is my favorite poet. There's like those artists that whose work you really appreciate, right? Sometimes because it's so different from your own. And then there are those artists whose work registers in like a very deep sort of recognition where they feel like creative kin, right? And that has always been my experience of Donika's work. That there is a kind of creative intelligence and emotionality that just feels like so profoundly familiar to me and was before I knew anything about her as a human being.   Okay, we also like almost all the same candy and have extremely opposite work habits. She's very hot. She only likes to watch like TVs and movies that she's seen many times before, which is both like very comforting and very annoying.   Lito: Well, I'm gonna have to follow that up now. What are some of the top hits?   Melissa: Oh, for sure, Golden Girls is at the very top. I mean…   Annie: No one's mad at that.   Lito: We can do the interview right now. Perfect. All we need to know. A++!   Melissa: She's probably like 50% of the time that she's sleeping, she falls asleep to the soundtrack of the Golden Girls or Xena, maybe. But we've also watched the more recent James Bond franchise, The Matrices, (11:00) and Mission Impossible, never franchises I ever thought I would watch once, let alone multiple times at some point.   Annie: I mean, Donika, your queerness is showing with that list.   Lito: Yeah.   Donika: I feel seen. I feel represented accurately by that list. She's not wrong. She's not wrong at all. But I've also introduced to her the pleasure of revisiting work.   Melissa: That's right.   Donika: And that was not a thing that Melissa was doing before we met, which feels confusing to me. Because I am a person who really likes to revisit. She was buying more books when we met, and now she uses the library more, and that feels like really exciting. That feels like a triumph on my part. I'm like…   Annie: That is a victory. Yeah.   Donika: …with the public services.   Melissa; Both of these examples really allude to like this deep, fundamental sort of capitalistic set of habits that I have, where I… like there's like this weird implicit desire to try to read as many books as possible before I perish, and also to hoard them, I guess. And I'm very happy to have been influenced out of that.   Annie: Well it's hard not to think—I think about that tweet like once a week that's like you have an imaginary bookshelf, and there are a limited amount of books on that you can read before you die, and that like troubles me every day.   Melissa: Yeah it's so fucked up. (12:22) I don't want that. It's already in my head. I feel like I was born with that in my head, and I'm trying to get free.   Lito: Same. Serious book FOMO, like…   Donika: There are so many books y'all.   Lito: I know. It's not possible.   Donika: And, it's like, there are more and more every year.   Annie: Well, uh Donika tell us about Melissa.   Donika: Oh Melissa As she has already explained we have a lot of fun It's a funny household. She's hilarious. Um, and also she's a writer of great integrity, which you know I'm sitting on the couch reading Nora Roberts, and she's like in her office hammering away at essays, and I don't know what's going on in there. I'm very nosy. I'm a deeply nosy person. Like, I just I want to know like what's going on. I want to know the whole history, and it's really amazing to be with someone who is like here it is.   Annie: How did you all meet?   Donika: (13:20) mere moments after Trump was elected in 2016. I was in great despair. I was living in Western New York. I was teaching at a small Catholic university. Western New York is very conservative. It's very red. And I was in this place and I was like, this place is not my place. This place is not for me. And I was feeling very alone. And Melissa had written an essay that came out shortly after about teaching creative writing at a private institution in a red county. And I was like, oh, she gets it, she understands.   I started, I just like looked for everything. I looked for like everything that she had written. I read it, I watched the TED talk. I don't know if y'all know about the TED talk. There was a TED talk. I watched the TED talk. I was like, she's cute. I read Whip Smart. I followed her on Twitter. I developed a crush, and I did nothing else. So this is where I pass the baton. So I did all of that.   Melissa: I loved Bestiaries, and I love the cover. The cover of her book is from this medieval bestiary. And so I just bought it, and I read it. And I just had that experience that I described before where I was just like, "Oh, fuck. Like this writer and I have something very deep in common." And I wrote her. I DMed her on Twitter.   Sometimes I obscure this part of the story because I want it to appear like I sent her a letter by raven or something. But actually, I slid into her DMs, and I just was like, "hey, I loved your book. If you ever come to New York and want help setting up a reading, like I curate lots of events, da da da." And I put my email in. And not five minutes later, refreshed my Gmail inbox, and there was an email from Donika, and…   Donika: I was like, "Hi. Hello. It's me."   Annie: So you agree with this timeline, Donika, right? Like, it was within five minutes.   Donika: Yeah, it was very fast. And I think if I hadn't read everything that I could get my hands on that Melissa had written, I may have been a little bit slower off the mark. It wasn't romantic. Like the connection, I wasn't like, oh, this is someone who like I want to (15:41) strike up a romantic relationship with, it really was the work. Like I just respected the work so much.   I mean, I did have a crush, like that was real, but I have crushes on lots of people, like that sort of flows in and out, but that often is a signifier of like, oh, this person will be my friend. And I was still married at the time and trying to figure out, like that relationship was ending. It was coming to a quick close that felt slow. Like it was dragging a little bit for lots of reasons.   But then once it was clear to me that I was getting divorced, Melissa and I continued writing to each other like for the next few months. Yeah. And then I was like, oh, I'm getting divorced. I was like, I'm getting divorced. And then suddenly the emails were very different. From both of us. It wasn't different.   Melissa: There had been no romantic strategy or intent, you know, and I think which, which was a really great way to, we really started from a friendship.   Annie: And sounds like a courtship really. I mean, it kind of is an old fashion.   Melissa: Yeah, in some way, it became that. I think it became that. But I think it was, I mean, the best kind of courtship begins as a, as a friendly courtship, you know what I mean? Where it was about sort of mutual artistic respect and curiosity and just interest. And it wasn't defined yet, like, what sort of mood that interest would take for a while, you know?   Lito: So how do you seduce each other on and off the page?   Donika: That's a great question.   Melissa: That is a great question.   Donika: I am not good at seduction. So that is not a skill set that is available to me. It has never been available.   Lito: I do not believe that.   Annie: I know. I'm also in disbelief out here, really.   Melissa: No one believes it, but she insists.   Annie: I feel like that's part of the game, is my feeling, but it is not.   Melissa: It's not. Here's the thing I will say is that like Donika, I've thought a lot about this and we've talked a lot about this because I balked at that statement as well. It's like Donika is seductive. Like there are qualities about her that are very seductive, but she does not seduce people. You know what I mean? Like she doesn't like turn on the charisma and shine it at you like a hypnotist. Like that's not… (18:08) that's not her form of seduction, but I will say…   I can answer that question in terms of like, I think in terms of the work, since we've been talking about that, like in a literary way, both in her own work, like the quality, like just someone who's really good at what they do is fucking sexy, you know? Like when I was looking for like a little passage before this interview, I was just like, "ah, this is so good." Like it's so attractive when someone is really, really good at their craft. right? Especially when it's a crop that you share.   Donika: So Melissa does have the ability to turn on what she has written about, which I think is really funny. Like she like she has like, she has a very strong gaze. It's very potent. And one of my gifts is to disrupt that and be like, what are you doing with your eyes? And so like, when I think about that in the work, when I'm reading her work, and I'm in like its deepest thrall, it is that intensity of focus that really like pulls me in and keeps me in. She's so good at making a grand statement.   Melissa: I was just gonna bring that up.   Donika: Oh, I think she and I like often get to, we arrive at sort of similar places, but she gets there from the grand statement, and I get there from the granular statement, like it's a very narrow sort of path. And then Melissa's like, "every love is a destroyer." I was like, whoa, every one? And there's something really compelling about that mode of— because it's earnest, and it's backed up by the work that she's written. I would never think to say that.   Melissa: I have a question for you, lit friend. Do you think you would be less into me if I weren't? Because I think for a nonfiction writer, I'm pretty obsessed with sentences. It's writing sentences that makes, that's the thing I love most about writing. It's like where the pleasure is for me. So I'm a pretty poetically inclined nonfiction writer. If I were less so, do you think that would be less seductive to you as a reader or a lit friend?   Donika: I mean, that's like asking me to imagine like, "so, what if… (20:30) water wasn't wet?" I just like, I can't like, I can't imagine. I do think the pleasure of the sentence is so intrinsic to like, I think there's something in the, in your impulse at the sentence level. That means that you're just careful. You're not rushing. You're not rushing us through an experience or keeping us in there and focused. And it's just it's tricky to imagine, or almost impossible to imagine what your work would look like if that weren't the impulse.   Lito: Yeah, I think that's an essential part of your style in some ways, that you're taking that time.   Melissa: Mm-hmm.    Annie: And how you see the world. Like I don't even think you would get to those big revelations Donika's talking about without it.   Melissa: Yeah. Right. I don't, yeah, I don't think I would either. We'll be right back.   Lito (21:19) Hey Lit Fam, Lit Friends is taking a break for the holiday. We hope you'll join us for our next episode with our guests, Ian Lee and Edmund White on January 16th. Till then, may your holiday be lit, your presents be numerous, and your 2024 be filled with joy and peace. If you'd like to show us some love, please take a moment now to follow, subscribe, rate, and review the LitFriends Podcast on Apple podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts. Just a few moments of your time will help us so much. Big hugs to you and yours. Thank you for listening. And thank you for making season one a big success!   Annie: (22:05) Welcome back.   Lito: I've noticed that both of you, you know, you have your genres that you work in, but within that you're experimenting a lot with form and structure. Does anything of that come from being queer? I guess it's a question about queering forms of literature, and what that has to do also with the kinds of friendships that queer people have, and if that's different, maybe. So I guess I'm asking to connect form with queerness and friendship.   Melissa: That's a beautiful question. I think, and I'm starting with thinking about my relationship to form, which has been one of inheriting some scripts for forms. This is what an essay should look like. This is what plot structure looks like. This is how you construct a narrative. And sort of taking those for granted a little bit, and then pretty early on, understanding the limitations of those structures and the ways that they require that I contort myself and my content such that it feels like a perversion or betrayal of sort of what I'm dealing with, right? And so the way I characterize my trajectory, the trajectory of my relationship to form has been sort of becoming conscious of those inherited forms, and then pushing the boundaries of them and modifying them and distorting them and adding things to them and figuring out, letting my work sort of teach me what form it rests most easily in and is most transparent in. And I suspect that my relationship to friendship and particularly queer friendship mimics that.   Donika: Yeah, that sounds right to me. And I'm reminded of Denise Levertov has this essay titled "On the Function of the Line." And in it, she presents an argument that closed forms, received forms, are based on a kind of assumption of resolution, and that free verse or open design, like in a poem, it shows evidence of the speaker's thinking.   (24:24) Right? So that where the line breaks, the speaker is pausing, right? To gather their thoughts or like a turn might happen that's unexpected that mimics the turns in thinking. And I really love that essay. Like that essay is one of my favorites. So when I think about my approach to form, I'm like, what is the shape that this poem is asking for? What is the shape that will do, that will help the poem do its best work? And not even like to be good, but just like to be true.   I really love the sonnet shape. Like it's one of my favorite shapes. And it's so interesting and exciting to use a shape that is based on like argumentative structure or a sense of resolution, to explore. Like to use that as an exploratory space, it feels like queering our, like my expectations of what the sonnet does. Like there's something about the box. If I bounce around inside that box, there's gonna be something that comes out of that, that I wouldn't necessarily have gotten otherwise, but it's not resolution. Like the point is not resolution.   And when I think about my relationships and my chosen family, in particular, and to some degree actually my given family, part of what I'm thinking about is how can I show up and care and what does care look like in this relationship and how can I make room to be cared for? And that's so hard, like being cared for is so much more alien to me than, like, as a concept, like I feel like very anxious about it. I'm like, "am I asking for too much?" And like over and over again, my chosen family is like, "no, it's not too much. Like we, we got each other."   Melissa: I think particularly for queer people, we understand that it doesn't preclude romance or healthy kinds of dependency or unhealthy kinds of dependency, you know, that all of the things that happen in a very deep love relationship happen inside of friendship, where I think sort of like straight people and dominant culture have been like, "oh, no, like friendship isn't the site of like great romance or painful divorce or abuse." And queer people understand that all of those things happen within relationships that we call friendships.   Annie: (26:46) Yeah, I mean, I'm hearing you both talk about kind of queer survival and joy and even, Donika, what you were saying about having to adjust to being cared for as a kind of, you know, that's a sort of, to me, it's a sort of like a survivor's stance in the world. One of the things that I love about my kinship with Lito as, you know, my queer lit friend and, you know, brother from another mother is that he holds that space for me and I, you know, vice versa.   Even thinking about vulnerability, I think you both wield vulnerability as a tool of subversion too, right? And again, Lito and I are both creating projects right now that require a kind of rawness on the page. I'm about to publish a memoir called Sex with a Brain Injury, so I'm very consciously thinking about how we define vulnerability, what kind of work it does to reshape consciousness in the collective. And the ways that you each write about trauma helps us understand it as an act of reclamation, you know, power rather than powerlessness. So maybe you could talk a little bit about what is or what can be transformative about the confessional and maybe even more to the point, what does your lit friend teach you about vulnerability?   Melissa: (28:06) Oh, God, what doesn't she teach me about vulnerability? It's interesting because like you're correct that vulnerability is like very central to my work and to the like lifelong project of my work, and also like there's literally nothing on earth I would like to avoid more. And I don't think that is visible in my work, right? Because my work is the product of counteracting that set of instincts, which I must do to survive because the part of me that wants to avoid vulnerability, its end point is like literally death for me.   It is writing for me often starts from like kind of a pragmatic practice. I don't start like feeling my feelings. I write to get to my feelings and sometimes that doesn't happen until like after a book is published sometimes. You know like it's really interesting lately I've been confronting some feelings in like a really deep way that I think I have gotten access to from writing Girlhood, which came out in 2021. And it's like I had to sort of lay it all out, understand what happened, redefine my role in it and everyone else's. And I definitely had feelings while I was writing it. But like the feelings that Donika refers to as the big boss, like the deepest feelings about it. Like I, I feel like I'm only really getting. to it now.   My relationship to vulnerability, it's just like, it's a longitudinal process, you know? And there's no one who's taught me about that and how to be sort of like gentle and patient within that and to show up for it than Donika.   And I'm just thinking of like, you know, starting from pretty early in our relationship, she was working on the poems in The Renunciations, and over the years of our early, the early years of our relationship, she was confronting some childhood, some really profound childhood trauma. And she was doing that in therapy. And then there were like pieces of that work that she had to do in the poems. And I just watched her not force it. And when it was time, she like created the space to do the work. And like, I wasn't (30:35) there for that. I don't think anyone else really could have been there for that. And just like showing up for that work.   And then like the long tail of like publishing a book and having conversations with people and the way that it changes one's relationship and like the act of the vulnerability—achieved feels like the wrong word—but the vulnerability like expressed or found in the writing process, how that is just like a series of doorways and a hallway that maybe it never terminates. Maybe it doesn't even turn into death. I don't know. You know, but I've just seen her show up for that process with like a patience and a tenderness for herself at every age that I find incredibly challenging. And it's been super instructive for me.   Donika: Ooh. I, I'm, it makes me really happy to know that's your experience of like being like in like shared artistic space together. I think I go to poetry to understand, to help myself understand what it is that I'm holding and what it is that I wanna put down. Like that's what the poems are for. You know, like the act of writing helps me sort out what I need and what I wanna put down because narrative is so powerful. It feels like the one place where I can say things that are really hard, often because I've already said them in therapy.   Right? So then it's like, I can then explore what having said those hard things means in my life or how it sits in my life. And what Melissa shows me is that one can revise. I know I've said this like a few times, but that one can have a narrative. Like I think about reading Whipsmart and the story that she has about herself as a child in Whipsmart, and then how that begins to change a bit in Abandon Me. And then in Girlhood, it's really disrupted. And there is so much more tenderness there, I think. It looks really hard. Like, honestly, that joint looks hard because I might be in a poem, but I'm in it for like, like we're in it, like if I were to read it out loud for like a minute and a half.   Melissa: (33:50) It's interesting hearing you talk. I wonder if this is true. I think I'm hearing that it is true. And I think that's where it's with my experience that you often get to the feelings like in therapy or wherever, and then write the poems as more of a sort of emotional, but like also cognitive and kind of systemic and like a way of like making sense of it or putting it in context. And I think very much I, there'll be like deeply submerged feelings that emerge only as like impulses or something, you know, but I experience writing— I don't that often feel intense emotion while I'm writing. I think it's why that is writing is almost always the first place that I encounter my own vulnerability or that I say the like unspeakable thing or the thing that I have been unable to say. I often write it and then I can talk to my therapist about it or then I can talk to Donika about it.   And I think I can't. I'm too afraid or it feels like too much to feel the feelings while I'm writing. So I sort of experience it as a cognitive or like intellectual and creative exercise. And then once I understand it, sometime in the next five years, I feel the feelings.   Annie: Do you feel like it's a kind of talking to yourself or like talking outside of the world? Like what is it in that space that does that for you?   Melissa: Yeah, I do. I mean, it's like. Talking outside the world makes more sense to me than talking to myself. I mean, it is talking to myself, right? It's a conversation with myself, but it's removed from the context of me in my daily life. That's why it's possible. Within my daily life, I'm too connected to other people and my own internal pressures and just like the busy, superficial part of me that's like driving a lot of my days. I have to get away from her in order to do that work.   And so the writing really happens in a kind of separate space and feels like it is not, it has a kind of privacy that I don't experience in any other way in my life, where I really have built or found a space where I am never thinking about what other people think of me, and I'm not imagining a skeptical reader. (35:18) It is really like this weird spiritual, emotional, creative, intellectual space that is just separate from all of that, where I can sort of think and be curious freely.   And I think I created that space or found it really early on because I was, even as a kid, I was a person who was like so concerned with the people around me, with the adults around me, with what performances were expected of me. And being a person who was like very deeply thinking and feeling, I was like, well, there's no room for that here. So I need to like find somewhere else to do it. And so I think writing became that for me way before I thought about being a writer.   Lito: That's so fascinating to me. I think that's so different than how I work or Donika works or a lot of people I know. We'll be right back.   Lito: (36:26) Back to the show.   So this question is for both of you really, but it just makes me wonder then like, what is the role for emotion, but in particular anger? How does that like, when things get us angry, sometimes that motivates us to do something, right? So if you're not being inspired by an emotion to write, you're writing and then finding it, how does anger work as not only a tool for survival, but maybe a path towards personhood and freedom?   Donika: Oh, I was just thinking, I can't write out of that space, the space of anger. It took me a long time to get in touch with anger as a feeling. That took a really long time because in my family, in my given family, the way that people expressed anger was so dangerous that I felt that I didn't want to occupy those spaces. I didn't want to move emotionally into that, into that space if that was what it looked like. And it took me a long time to figure out how to be angry. And I'm still not sure that I'm great at it. Because I think often I'm moving quickly to like what's under that feeling. And often what's under my feelings of being angry, often, not always, is being hurt, feeling hurt. And I can… write into exploring what that hurt is, because I know how to do that with some tenderness and some care.   Melissa: I feel similarly, which is interesting, because we've never talked about this, I don't think. But anger is also a feeling that I think, for very different reasons, when I was growing up… I mean, I think just like baseline being socialized as a girl dissuaded me from expressing anger or even from feeling it, because where would that go?   But I also think in the particular environment that I was in, I understood pretty early that my expressions of anger would be like highly injurious to the people around me and that it would be better if I found another way to express those things. I think my compulsive inclinations have been really useful in that way. And it's taken me a lot of my adult life to sort of… (38:44) take my anger or as Donika said, you know, like anger for me almost always factors down to something that is largely powerlessness, you know, to sort of not take the terror and fury of powerlessness and express it through like ultimately self harming means.   Writing can be a way for me to arrive at like justifiable anger and to sort of feel that and let that move through me or to be like, oh, that was unjust. I was powerless in that situation. You know? Yeah, it has helped me in that way. But like, if I'm really being honest, I think I exhaust myself with exercise. And that's how I mostly deal with my feelings of anger.   Annie: Girl.   Melissa: Yeah, there's also a way I will say that like, I do think it actually comes out in my work in some ways. Like there is like a very direct, not people-pleasing vibe and tone in my work that is genuine, but that I almost never have in my life. Like maybe a little bit as a professor, but like    When Donika met me, she was like, "Oh… like you're just like this little gremlin puppy person. You're not like this intense convicted former dominatrix." You know, which is, I express it in my writing because it is a space where I'm not worried about placating or pleasing really. It's a space where I'm, I am almost solely interested in what I actually think.   Donika: I was just thinking about like the beginning of, I think it's "Wild America," when you talk about like not cleaning your room, Melissa. Because you didn't, like when you were a kid, right? It was like you cleaned your room when you wanted to appear good, but that didn't matter to you when you were alone in your room. Like you could get lost in a book or you could, you know, like just be inside yourself alone when you were alone in your room. And that's one of my favorite passages that you read. Like I'm always sort of like mouthing along, like it's a song.   Melissa: (40:57) I'm just interested and I really love the sort of conception of like a girl's room as a potential space that sort of maps on to the way I described the writing space where it's just like a space where other, where the gaze of others, or the gaze that we're taught to please like can be kept out to some extent. And just like, you know, that isn't true, obviously for like lots and lots and lots of girls, but just that there is an impetus for us to create or invent or designate a space where that is true.   Lito: Yeah, I think that's what she's up to in "A Room of One's Own."   Annie: It makes me think of like girls' rooms as like kind of also these reductive spaces, like they all have to have pink or whatever, but then you like carve out a secret space for yourself in that room, which I think is what you're talking about with your writing.   Donika: Oh, I was just thinking about what happens when you don't have a room like that, cause I didn't, like I absolutely did not have a room that was… inviolable in some way or that like really felt like I could close the door. But writing became a place where that work could happen and where those explorations could happen and where I could do whatever I want and I had control over so many aspects of the work. And I hesitated because I was saying I didn't have that much control over the content.   Like I might think, oh, I'm gonna write a poem about this or a poem about that. And as is true with most writing, the poems are so much smarter and reveal so much more than I might have intended, but I could like shape the box. There are just like so many places to have control in a poem, like there's so many mechanisms to consider where like when Melissa was first sharing like early work with me, I would get so nervous because I would wanna move a comma.   Because in a poem, like that's a big deal, moving somebody's commas around, changing the punctuation. And she was like, "it doesn't matter."   Melissa: I would get nervous because she would be like, "well, I just have one note, but it's like, kind of big." And I would be like, "oh, fuck, I failed." And she would be like,    Donika: "What's going on with these semicolons?"   Melissa: She'd be like, "I just, these semicolons."   Annie: You know, hearing you both talk about (43:20) how you show up for one another as readers, right? In addition to like romantic partners. I mean, we do have the sense, and this can be true of all marriages, queer or otherwise, where like we as readers have a pretty superficial understanding of what you kind of each bring to the table or how you create this protective space or really see one another. I imagine that you've saved yourselves, but I'm curious about to what extent this relationship may have also been a way to save you or subvert relationships that have come before. And yet at the same time, we've asked this question of other lit friends too, which is, you know, what about competition between lit friends? And what does that look like in a marriage? What is a good day versus a bad day?   Donika: I mean, we could be here for years talking about that first question. And so I'm gonna turn to the second part to talk about competition, which is much easier to handle.   I feel genuinely and earnestly so excited at the recognition that Melissa has received. Part of what was really exciting for me about the beginning of our relationship that continues to be exciting is that, is getting to watch someone be truly mid-career and navigate that with integrity. It feels like such a good model, for how to be a writer.   I mean, she's much more forward-facing than I would ever want to be. But I think in terms of just thinking about like, what is the work? How, like, where is the integrity? Like, it's just, it's always so, so forward and it feels really grounding for me and us in the house, so it's always big cheers in here. It helps that we write in different genres. I think that's super helpful.   Melissa: I think it's absolutely key. Yeah.   Donika: It's not, I mean, I think, and that we have very different measures of ambition. I think those two things together are really, really helpful.   But I've read everything that Melissa has written, I think. (45:38) There might be like a few little, I mean, I've read short story, like that short, there was like a short story from like shortly, I think after you, like before you were in your MFA program, maybe.   Melissa: Oh my God. What short story?   Donika: I can't, I'll find it. And show it to you later.   Melissa: Is it about that little plant?   Donika: No, no, it might've been an essay. I'm not sure.   Annie: I love this. This is sort of hot breaking news on LitFriends.   Donika: It's like, I've just like, I did a deep Google dive. I was like, I want to read everything and it's, it feels really exciting.   Melissa: You know, I've dated writers before, and it was a different situation. And I think even if I hadn't, even before I ever did, I thought, that seems unlikely to work. Because even though there are lots of like obvious ways that it could be great, the competition just seemed like such a poison dart that it would be really hard to avoid because writers are competitive, and I'm competitive. And maybe it would have been harder if we were younger or something.   And certainly if we were in the same genre, I think actually, who knows? Maybe it would be possible if we were in the same genre, but it would require a little more care. Even if for some reason we would never publish again, we would keep writing. It just like it functions in our lives in similar ways. And it's like a practice that we came to, you know, I have a more hungry ambition or have historically. And I think our relationship is something that helps me keep the practice at the center because we're constantly talking about it. And I'm constantly observing Donika's relationship to her work. So it really hasn't felt very relevant. Like it's kind of shocking to me how, how little impact competition or comparing has in our relationship. It's really like not even close to one of the top notes of things that might create conflict for us, you know, and I'm so grateful for that. And so happy to have like underestimated what's possible when you have a certain level of intimacy and respect and sort of compatibility with someone.   Lito: We'll be right back.   Annie: (47:57) Welcome back. Well, then I'm wondering, you know, you both have had some like incredible successes in the last few years. And I'm wondering if conversely, you've been able to show up for one another in moments of high pressure or exposure, or, you know, having to confront the world, having been vulnerable on the page in the ways you have been.   Melissa: Donika was not planning on having a book launch for The Renunciations.   Donika: What's a book launch? Like, why do people do that?   Annie: Listen, mine's going to be a dance party, Donika. So…   Melissa: And I made, meanwhile, like when I published Abandon Me, I had a giant dance party that I had like several costume changes for during. But I remember feeling pretty confident about making a strong case multiple times for her to have a book launch for The Renunciations. And also like having a lot of respect and like tenderness watching her navigate what it meant to take work that vulnerable and figure out how to like speak for it and talk about it and like present it to the world. Parts of her would have preferred to just let the book completely speak for itself out there.    Donika: But you were right it was a good time.   Melissa: I was right.   Donika: Because like when Melissa's so when Girlhood came out it was like, that was still the time of like so many virtual events. And it was just like, I think that first week there was like something every day that week, like there was an event every day that week. And now, now like, again, I had to be talked into having a book launch. So I own this. Um, but I was like, Ooh, why, why would you do that? Oh, yeah. Four?   Melissa: This is definitely one of the ways that she and I are like diametrically opposed, and therefore I think, helpful to each other in sort of like creating a kind of tension that can be uncomfortable but is mostly good for both of us to be sort of pulled closer to the middle.   Donika: But my favorite part of that is then hearing you give advice to your friends who are very similar and be like, "whoa, you did too much. You put too many things on the calendar."     Melissa: (50:15) You know, some people would say that that's hypocrisy, but I actually think, I have a real dubious like position and thinking about hypocrisy because I am an expert in overdoing things. And so I think I speak from, I am like the voice of Christmas future. You know what I mean? I'm like, let me speak to you from the potential future that you are currently planning with your publicist. And like, it's not pretty and it doesn't feel good. And it's not, it has not delivered the feeling that you're imagining when you're scheduling all those events.   Annie: I can appreciate this. And I appreciate Donika's kind of role, this particular role in a relationship, because sometimes I just have to go see Leto and literally just lay on Lito and be like, stop me from doing anymore.   Melissa: I know, I know.   Lito: You and Sara are like super overachievers. I have to be like, "can you calm down?"   Annie: We do too much.   Lito: Way too much. What would you like to see your lit friend make or create next?   Donika: I got two answers to this. The first one is the Cape Cod lesbian mystery. I'm ready. You know, we got, I've offered so much assistance as a person who will never write prose. Um, but I got notes and ideas. The second one is, uh, a micro essay collection titled Dogs I Have Loved. Cause I think it would be a New York Times bestseller.   Lito: Oh, I love that.   Donika: I know.   Lito: Speaking of, who's the little gremlin puppy there?   Donika: Oh, yeah, that's Chuck. Chuck is a 15-year-old chihuahua. I've had him since he was a puppy.   Annie: Is Chuck like a nickname, or is that just, it's just Chuck?   Donika: It's just Chuck.   Lito: I love that.   Melissa: His nickname is Charles sometimes. One of his nicknames is Charles, but his full name is Chuck.   Melissa: OK, so I would say, I mean, my first thought at this question was like, I want Donika to keep doing exactly what she's been doing? As far as I can tell, she doesn't have a lot of other voices getting in the way of that process. My second thought is that I'm really interested. I've never heard her talk. She has no interest in writing prose of any kind. She is like deeply wedded to poetry. But I have heard her talk more recently about potential collaborations with (52:40) other artists, visual artists and other writers. And I would, I'm really excited to see what comes out of that space.   Lito: Would you all ever collaborate beyond your marriage?   Annie: I could see you all doing a craft book together.   Melissa: I feel like we could make like a chapbook that had prose and poems in it that were responding to a shared theme. I could definitely see that.   Donika: I really thought you were gonna say Love Poems for Melissa Febos, that's what you wanted to see next.   Melissa: I mean, I already know that that's on deck, so I don't... I mean, it's in, it's on the docket. It's on deck. Yeah. So…   Lito: Those sonnets, get to work on the sonnets.   Donika: Such a mess.   Melissa: This is real, you think, this is not, like, a conversation of the moment. This is…   Annie: Oh no, we can, this is history.   Donika: "Where's my century of sonnets?" she says.   Lito (53:33) What is your first memory?   Donika: Dancing?   Melissa: Donika telling me I'm pretty.   Annie (54:15.594) Who or what broke your heart first?   Melissa: Maddie, our dog.   Donika: Kerri Strug, 1996 Olympics. Vault.   Lito: Atlanta.   Donika: The Vault final. Yeah. Heartbreaking.   Lito: Who would you want to be lit friends with from any time in history, living or dead?   Donika: I just thought Gwendolyn Brooks. I'm gonna go with that.   Lito: I love Gwendolyn Brooks.   Donika: Oh yeah.   Melissa: My first thought is Baldwin.   Donika: It's a great party. We're at a great party.   Melissa: I just feel like I would be like, "No, James!" all the time.   Melissa: (54:30) Or like Truman Capote.   Lito: It'd be wild.   Donika: Messy. So messy.   Annie: What's your favorite piece of music?   Melissa: Oh my god, these questions are crazy! "Hallelujah"?   Donika: Oh god, there's an aria from Diana Damraus' first CD. She's a Soprano. And it's a Mozart aria, and I don't know where it's from, and I can't tell you the name because it's in Italian and I don't speak Italian, but that joint is exceptional. So that's what I'm gonna go with. Oh God, just crying in the car.   Lito: If you could give any gift to your lit friend without limitations, what would you give them?   Donika: Just like gold chains. So many gold chains. Yeah! If I could have a gold chain budget, it'd be a lot.   Annie: (55:23) Donika, we can do this.   Lito: Achievable.   Donika: I mean, yeah. Yeah.   Lito: Bling budget.   Donika: That's the first thing I thought.   Annie: Love it.   Donika: Just like gold, just thin gold chains, thick gold chains.   Melissa: I'm going to go with that, then, and say an infinite sneaker budget.   Lito: Yes. Oh, I want a shoe room. (55:50) That'd be awesome.   Melissa: We need two shoe rooms in this house, or like one. Or we just need to have a whole living room that's just for shoes.   Donika: I just like there's just like one closet that's just like for shoes. Like that's what we need.   Lito: That's great.   Donika: Yeah, but it's actually a room. Yes. With like a sorting system, it's like computer coded.   Annie: Soft lighting. That's our show.   Annie & Lito: Thanks for listening.   Lito: We'll be back next week with our guests Yiyun Li and Edmund White.   Annie: Find us on all your socials @LitFriendsPodcast.   Lito: Don't forget to reach out and tell us about the love affair of you and your LitFriend.   Annie: I'm Annie Liontas.   Lito: And I'm Lito Velázquez. Thank you to our production squad. Our show is edited by Justin Hamilton.   Annie: Our logo was designed by Sam Schlenker.   Lito: Lizette Saldana is our marketing director.   Annie: Our theme song was written and produced by Robert Maresca.   Lito: And special thanks to our show producer, Toula Nuñez.   Annie: This was LitFriends, Episode Three.    

In the second half of this free-flowing conversation with producer Brad Wood, he digs into the recording of Whip-Smart, Liz Phair's follow-up to her groundbreaking debut album Exile in Guyville, and the subsequent tour that never happened—and he tells of his more limited involvement on her third album, whitechocolatespaceegg. He reflects on what went right with Veruca's Salt's debut album, American Thighs, and its hit single “Seether,” and what went wrong when Billy Corgan hired him to produce Smashing Pumpkins' Adore. He also discusses his efforts to let the Bangles be the Bangles on Doll Revolution, his poignant reunion with Veruca Salt, the reason he moved from Chicago to Los Angeles and what a producer should and should not do.

This episode contains a freshly recorded conversation with Ania Bas, a hard-working Polish Artist-turned-Author (based in the UK). Her debut novel Odd Hours revolves around a prickly female protagonist who works in a well-lit, unethical supermarket and lives in a badly-lit zone 3 flatshare. The book contains unidealised migrants, a self-help book-within-a-book, short and sharp poetry and some saucy scenes. The elevator pitch reads: "Odd Hours is a whip-smart social comedy for those of us who feel that life is a game where someone else has stolen the rules." Ania Bas is certainly someone who is living life by her own rules, transitioning mid-career from a socially engaged artist to a novelist. Oriana asks about that transition, the book itself and the important links between Bas's visual arts practice and her writing. Oriana Fox is a London-based, New York-born artist with a PhD in self-disclosure. She puts her expertise to work as the host of the talk show performance piece The O Show.Ania Bas is an artist and writer whose work explores how narratives shape understanding, mythology and knowledge of places and people. Her work takes diverse forms to create situations that support dialogue and question existing frameworks of participation. Bas has been commissioned by the Tate, Whitechapel Gallery and Yorkshire Artspace, and her debut novel Odd Hours was published by Wellbeck in June 2022. It is available to purchase  in all good bookshops or from bookshop.org Other works mentioned in the podcast:Susie Orbach Fat is a Feminist Issue (1978)The office-sabotaging works of artist Pilvi TakalaMarie Kondo The Life-changing Magic of Tidying (2014) Credits:Produced, edited and hosted by Oriana FoxIntroductory Voiceover by John Kilduff, aka Mr. Let's PaintOriginal theme song written and performed by Paulette HumanbeingSpecial Thanks to Tom Estes, Sven Van Damme, Katie Beeson, Janak Patel and Mimosa House Gallery, Londonwww.theoshow.livePlease rate and review this podcast to help others to find it!How to Rate and Review a Podcast on iTunes:First, Search for the Podcast in the Podcasts App. Note: You'll need to look the show up in the app.From Here, Select the 'Reviews' Tab, Then 'Write a Review'You'll Then Be Asked to Log in to iTunes.Then Tap the Stars to Rate the Podcast and Write Your Headline and Review.How to Rate and Review a Podcast on SpotifyFirst of all, you have to log in to your Spotify account, then follow these steps:Search Podcast pre-installed App on your phone.Hit the “Search” button. Here you will see “Write a Review” in the top right corner.You can also give ratings in the form of stars 1-5 (One star for lowest rating and five stars for highest ratings.)Submit your review.

originally aired 07.14.2022Dr. Bryan Mark Rigghttps://bryanmarkrigg.com/BOOKS: FLAMETHROWER: Iwo Jima Medal of Honor Recipient and U.S. Marine Woody Williams and His Controversial Award, Japan's Holocaust and the Pacific War andCONQUERING LEARNING DISABILITIES AT ANY AGE: How an ADHD/LD kid graduated from Yale and Cambridge, became a Marine officer, Military Historian, financial advisor and caring father.Dr. Bryan Mark Rigg, the Biographer of Woody Williams, the Last WWII Medal of Honor Recipient and author of Flamethrower. Dr. Rigg is a recipient of the 2002 William E. Colby award for his work Hitler's Jewish Soldiers. https://bryanmarkrigg.com/originally aired 03.07.2022Serge Prengel is a therapist and a co-founder of the Integrative Focusing Therapy training program. This program puts person-centered therapy within the context of neuroscience, trauma-informed therapy, and depth psychology. Serge is the editor of the Relational Implicit series and of the Active Pause podcast. His most recent book, The Proactive Twelve Steps: A Mindful Program For Lasting Change, has received high praise as “a user-friendly guide to the application of mindfulness in everyday life.” https://activepause.com/https://proactive12steps.com/originally aired 05.26.2022Melissa Febos is the author of the memoir Whip Smart, the essay collection, Abandon Me, and a craft book, Body Work. She is the inaugural winner of the Jeanne Córdova Nonfiction Award from LAMBDA Literary and the recipient of fellowships from The National Endowment for the Arts, MacDowell, Bread Loaf, Lower Manhattan Cultural Council, and others. Her critically acclaimed, Girlhood, examined the narratives women are told about what it means to be female and what it takes to free oneself from them. https://www.melissafebos.com/girlhood

Adrian Hyland is an award-winning Australian author of twisty crime stories that are perfect for the fans of Jane Harper, The Dry and Chris Hammer's Scrublands. Hi there. I'm your host, Jenny Wheeler. And on Binge Reading today, we've got author who was a delightful discovery for me. Adrian Hyland's latest book, Canticle Creek combines complex and engaging characters, heart racing plot lines, and whip smart writing that captures the spirit and natural landscape of the Australian Heartland. Our free book offer is a great selection of historical romances - a big contrast to Adrian's work. You'll find the links for that in the show notes for this episode on our website for joys of binge reading.com, or you can take the easy route, join in our newsletter and have the links sent to you every week so that you can get in and enter for these books straight away. This week's book Giveaways BOOKSWEEPS SWEET ROMANCE BOOKSWEEPS sweet ROMANCE - $500 VALUE HISTORICAL ROMANCE GIVEAWAY A range of romances from a group of popular fiction authors.... DOWNLOAD FREE HISTORIC ROMANCE You'll also find out what's coming up next. Don't forget to check out. Binge reading on Patreon for exclusive bonus content for less than a cup of coffee a month. Links to this episode Tanami Desert, Northern Territory: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tanami_Desert Walpiri people: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warlpiri_people Kinglake-350: https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/12146952-kinglake-350 Walter Savage Landor:  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walter_Savage_Landor The Black Summer: https://theconversation.com/australias-black-summer-of-fire-was-not-normal-and-we-can-prove-it-172506 Mick Herron: https://www.mickherron.com/ Herron's Slow Horses TV series, starring Gary Oldman: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt5875444/ Ali Smith, Scottish novelist: https://www.penguin.co.uk/authors/21919/ali-smith David Mitchell: https://www.davidmitchellbooks.com/ John Kinsella, poet: https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/john-kinsella Where to find Adrian online Text Publishing: https://www.textpublishing.com.au/ LaTrobe University, Melbourne: A.Hyland@latrobe.edu.au · Introducing crime novelist Adrian Hyland But now here's Adrian. Hello there, Adrian. And welcome to the show. It's great to have you with us Adrian Hyland, writing crime that is popular fiction with a literary edge. Adrian Hyland: Good morning, Jenny. Thanks for asking me. Jenny Wheeler: We're going to be focusing first on Canticle Creek, which is your most recent page turning mystery. I loved it. I must say it was quite a discovery for me. It's a page turner, as I emphasize, a really strongly, motivated narrative mystery, but it's got the sense also of an awareness of landscape and the creative process, which is sometimes more credited to literary fiction. In short, it does an excellent job of being a great page turner with a literary edge. And I wondered, is that a tension that you consciously feel as you're writing or is it just more something that comes to you naturally? Adrian Hyland: Hmm. I'd say it's one of the demands of the craft. I mean, for me, it what I like most about language, the thing that I appreciate is it's beauty. And if something isn't well written, so it comes across as a cliche or flat? Well, the book loses me, so yes, I try and balance both of those things, I think. Whether I succeed in either, as I was saying, I'm somewhere between the popular and the literary, I think, and maybe I fall between those two stools. But try to honor both of them, I think. I mean, I love both. I like reading, I love reading poetry and all sorts of things, but I also love reading. You know, all sorts of crime novelists, that they're all important to me. One of Australia's best writers is a crime novelist Jenny Wheeler: Australia's been particularly strong in crime novelists over the last couple of ...

Feminist writer Melissa Febos is the author of four memoirs, including the essay collection "Girlhood". Dubbed "a book every woman should read", it investigates how adolescent girls are conditioned to accept patriarchal structures. Her first novel "Whip Smart" recounts her four years working as a Manhattan dominatrix to pay for college and drugs. By sharing her "unspeakable bodily truths", Febos aims to liberate herself and her readers. She spoke to FRANCE 24 about power, addiction, breast reduction surgery and expanding the definition of what's possible for women and feminists.

Jordan Matthews is a business trial lawyer and litigation partner at Weinberg Gonser LLP. Jordan is lead counsel in the RICO case against Steve Wynn. Jordan currently handles matters throughout the country and has litigated or otherwise been involved with matters pending in California, Nevada, and Massachusetts before the Ninth Circuit of the United States Courts of Appeals and is involved in litigation covered by the Wall Street Journal, Fox News, CNN and others. https://www.wgfcounsel.com/Tim Dura served as a command fighter pilot in the United States Air Force and, after 22 years of service, retired due to medical issues. He then began a 20-year teaching career and became involved with teaching entrepreneurship. Tim's program was extremely successful, sending five businesses to the NFTE National Business Plan Competition in New York City in the six years his NFTE kids were eligible. Currently Tim is semi-retired doing consulting work, coaching girls' softball and acting as the COO of the Polk Institute Foundation. https://polkinstitute.org/Melissa Febos is the author of the memoir Whip Smart, the essay collection, Abandon Me, and a craft book, Body Work. She is the inaugural winner of the Jeanne Córdova Nonfiction Award from LAMBDA Literary and the recipient of fellowships from The National Endowment for the Arts, MacDowell, Bread Loaf, Lower Manhattan Cultural Council, and others. Her critically acclaimed, Girlhood, examined the narratives women are told about what it means to be female and what it takes to free oneself from them. https://www.melissafebos.com/girlhood

Melissa Febos is the author of the critically acclaimed memoir, Whip Smart, and the essay collections, Abandon Me and Girlhood. Her craft book, Body Work: The Radical Power of Personal Narrative, will be published on March 15th.In this episode, Melissa and I chat about her wonderful book Body Work. We talk about writing as a spiritual practice (and mode of discovery), learning to quiet that pesky voice saying “who cares?” while making art, and some of the other common fears and worries creatives face.This episode was audio produced by Aaron Moring. Music is by Madisen Ward.

A lot of us folks in recovery have big collections of self-help and memoir books, and with good reason. Books give us solace, they help us see how other people deal with similar challenges, they are a source of community through contact with other minds, and, as articulated by Eva Hagberg, this week's guest on the Flourishing After Addiction podcast, books, and particularly memoirs, are a way of trying on different “moral selves.” Eva is an author who has written beautifully about her own addiction and recovery in her  memoir, How to be Loved. It's an honest and raw account that includes her experiences with chronic medical conditions, grief, loss, romances, and friendship. In this episode, we talk about being seen and wanting to be known, the creative process, what she has learned from memoirs—addiction and otherwise—and her own experience with different varieties of 12-step recovery. And, with my own book coming out soon, she gives me some great advice about focusing on what matters most. Eva Hagberg is an author, cultural and architectural historian, architecture critic, speaker, and more. Her critically-acclaimed memoir, How to Be Loved, is out now from Mariner Books. In a fun twist, we also talk about an unexpected set of connections between recovery and architecture, related to her next project: a biography of Aline Louchheim Saarinen, forthcoming from Princeton University Press.  She teaches at Columbia University in the Graduate School of Architecture, Planning, and Preservation, and at Bard College in the Language & Thinking Program. She lives in Brooklyn. Find her at her website, or on Twitter.In this episode: - Ira Glass on the “taste gap:” “Nobody tells people who are beginners — and I really wish somebody had told this to me — is that all of us who do creative work … we get into it because we have good taste. But it's like there's a gap, that for the first couple years that you're making stuff, what you're making isn't so good, OK? It's not that great. It's really not that great. It's trying to be good, it has ambition to be good, but it's not quite that good. But your taste — the thing that got you into the game — your taste is still killer, and your taste is good enough that you can tell that what you're making is kind of a disappointment to you”- Melissa Febos, author of Whip Smart, Girlhood, Abandon Me, and Body Work. - A Round-Heeled Woman: My Late-Life Adventures in Sex and Romance, by Jane Juska- Dani Shapiro, author of Slow Motion, Devotion, Inheritance, and other books. - The sociologist Robin Room analyzing codependency and Adult Children of Alcoholics, in the context of other 12-step thinking: Alcoholics Anonymous as a Social Movement - Erving Goffman, The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life - Someday This Pain Will Be Useful to You, by Peter CameronSign up for my newsletter for regular updates on new interviews, material, and other writings.

Paul Boross is joined by writer, producer, presenter and creative extraordinaire Danny Wallace. Wallace has built a career on a quality collection of creative endeavours that captivate crowds and inspire comedy. His book, Yes Man inspired the film of the same name starring Jim Carrey. In addition to his writing credits, Wallace has performed in a variety of roles on the stage, screen, and radio airwaves. No matter what his role is in the creative process, Wallace always places funny at the forefront. “So much of humour is about surprise, and delight, and taking people down one path, and then revealing that it's another.”Join us this week as Danny dishes out side-splitting stories and recalls countless adages of advice from his successful creative career. Come say ‘yes!' to a creative life filled with funny only on The Humourology Podcast. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

We continue Giraffetober with Jason Vs. Leatherface, The Silver Coin, and Batman: The Brave and the Bold. Join us next week to finish off Giraffetober with Shadowman Vol. 1, Bitter Rott Vol. 1, and Young Justice: Secrets! Thank you DJ VON MIER for "FROM DA GO". Facebook Twitter Ralf Dave Donny Patreon

This is a segment of episode 301 of Last Born In The Wilderness “Girlhood: Empty Consent & Defining Granular Harm w/ Melissa Febos.” Listen to the full episode: https://bit.ly/LBWfebos Purchase ‘Girlhood' through Bookshop: https://bookshop.org/a/24168/9781635572520 Critically acclaimed author Melissa Febos joins me to discuss her most recent collection of essays, ‘Girlhood' — "a gripping set of stories about the forces that shape girls and the adults they become." I first became aware of Melissa and her book ‘Girlhood' from an essay she published in The New York Times Magazine titled ‘I Spent My Life Consenting to Touch I Didn't Want,' adapted from an essay published in the then-to-be-released ‘Girlhood'. Her personal reflections on the concept of "empty consent" from her experiences attending a cuddle party (pre-pandemic), compelled me to contact her to discuss the complex issues she deftly navigates through that essay. After reading Girlhood, I recognized the significance of her masterful writing and exploration of her own childhood and development into womanhood. Melissa Febos is the author of the critically acclaimed memoir, ‘Whip Smart' (St. Martin's Press 2010), and the essay collection, ‘Abandon Me' (Bloomsbury 2017), which was a LAMBDA Literary Award finalist, a Publishing Triangle Award finalist, an Indie Next Pick, and was widely named a Best Book of 2017. Her second essay collection, ‘Girlhood,' a National Bestseller, was published by Bloomsbury on March 30. A craft book, ‘Body Work,' will be published by Catapult in March 2022. WEBSITE: https://www.lastborninthewilderness.com PATREON: https://www.patreon.com/lastborninthewilderness DONATE: https://www.paypal.me/lastbornpodcast / https://venmo.com/LastBornPodcast BOOK LIST: https://bookshop.org/shop/lastbornpodcast EPISODE 300: https://lastborninthewilderness.bandcamp.com BOOK: http://bit.ly/ORBITgr ATTACK & DETHRONE: https://anchor.fm/adgodcast DROP ME A LINE: Call (208) 918-2837 or http://bit.ly/LBWfiledrop EVERYTHING ELSE: https://linktr.ee/patterns.of.behavior

[Intro: 6:52] Critically acclaimed author Melissa Febos joins me to discuss her most recent collection of essays, ‘Girlhood' — "a gripping set of stories about the forces that shape girls and the adults they become." I first became aware of Melissa and her book Girlhood from an essay she published in The New York Times Magazine titled ‘I Spent My Life Consenting to Touch I Didn't Want,' adapted from an essay published in the then-to-be-released ‘Girlhood'. Her personal reflections on the concept of "empty consent" from her experiences attending a cuddle party (pre-pandemic), compelled me to contact her to discuss the complex issues she deftly navigates through that essay. After reading Girlhood, I recognized the significance of her masterful writing and exploration of her own childhood and development into womanhood. We discuss, within the 47-minute interview, a few of the significant insights I drew out of my reading, including the gradients of consent and trauma, and the role men can, and must, play in upending patriarchy in our time. Melissa Febos is the author of the critically acclaimed memoir, ‘Whip Smart' (St. Martin's Press 2010), and the essay collection, ‘Abandon Me' (Bloomsbury 2017), which was a LAMBDA Literary Award finalist, a Publishing Triangle Award finalist, an Indie Next Pick, and was widely named a Best Book of 2017. Her second essay collection, ‘Girlhood,' a National Bestseller, was published by Bloomsbury on March 30. A craft book, ‘Body Work,' will be published by Catapult in March 2022. Episode Notes: - Learn more about Melissa and her work: https://www.melissafebos.com - Purchase ‘Girlhood' through Bookshop: https://bookshop.org/a/24168/9781635572520 - Read ‘I Spent My Life Consenting to Touch I Didn't Want': https://nyti.ms/38gozlV - Music was produced by Epik The Dawn. WEBSITE: https://www.lastborninthewilderness.com PATREON: https://www.patreon.com/lastborninthewilderness DONATE: https://www.paypal.me/lastbornpodcast / https://venmo.com/LastBornPodcast BOOK LIST: https://bookshop.org/shop/lastbornpodcast EPISODE 300: https://lastborninthewilderness.bandcamp.com BOOK: http://bit.ly/ORBITgr ATTACK & DETHRONE: https://anchor.fm/adgodcast DROP ME A LINE: Call (208) 918-2837 or http://bit.ly/LBWfiledrop EVERYTHING ELSE: https://linktr.ee/patterns.of.behavior

Want to know how entrepreneurs get things started and why? Listen in to a fun, hilarious, and revealing conversation with Ayeshah Abuelhiga, CEO and Founder of Mason Dixie Foods! She talks about her beginnings, what it's like to jump out of the corporate boardroom and into the entrepreneurial trenches, and how kids (especially young ladies) can be trailblazers in their own right. Wicked Funny, Whip-Smart, and Real, Ayeshah breaks it all down for us to show how great biscuits and giving back can be the true measure of happiness.Go to www.masondixiefoods.com to learn where to purchase all of their delicious offerings!Follow, like, and comment on all of their social media sites: IG, FB, & TW - @masondixiefoodsSupport the show

Melissa Febos (@melissafebos) talks with Ink Slingers via Zoom Books by Melissa Febos: Girlhood (2021) Abandon Me (2017) Whip Smart (2010) Want to connect with Ink Slingers? Tweet us @inkslingers2 or catch us on Instagram @inkslingerspodcast. Music: Dub Feral by Kevin MacLeod Link: https://incompetech.filmmusic.io/song/3683-dub-feral License: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

Melissa Febos is the author of the memoir Whip Smart and two essay collections: Abandon Me and Girlhood. The inaugural winner of the Jeanne Córdova Nonfiction Award from LAMBDA Literary and the recipient of fellowships from The MacDowell Colony, Bread Loaf, Lower Manhattan Cultural Council, The BAU Institute, Vermont Studio Center, The Barbara Deming Foundation, and others; her essays have recently appeared in The Paris Review, The Believer, McSweeney's Quarterly, Granta, Sewanee Review, Tin House, The Sun, and The New York Times. She is an associate professor at the University of Iowa, where she teaches in the Nonfiction Writing Program. Find out more about Community Building Art Works at www.cbaw.org. --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/cbaw/support

Melissa Febos is the author of the memoir Whip Smart and two essay collections: Abandon Me and her latest is Girlhood. She is an associate professor at the University of Iowa, where she teaches in the Nonfiction Writing Program. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Liz Phair has announced that her first album in 11 years titled Soberish is set to be released on June 4 through Chrysalis Records. Phair made the announcement on Wednesday alongside the release of her latest single, “Spanish Doors.” Advertisement The track is available to stream on YouTube , Spotify, Apple Music, Amazon Music, Tidal, Deezer and Pandora. “Pushing past the table, spilling my drink/ Locked up in the bathroom, staring at the sink/ I don't want to see anybody I know/ I don't want to be anywhere that you and I used to go,” Phair sings. Phair last released the album Funstyle in 2010. The musician said during an interview with UPI that the COVID-19 pandemic delayed the release of Soberish and that staying indoors made music more difficult to pursue. From Publisher: UPI Liz Phair, her full name is Elizabeth Clark Phair is an American singer-songwriter. Born in New Haven, Connecticut, Phair was adopted at birth and raised primarily in the Chicago area. After graduating from Oberlin College in 1990, she attempted to start a musical career in San Francisco, California, but returned to her home in Chicago, where she began self-releasing tracks under the name Girly Sound. She soon landed a recording contract with record label Matador Records. Her 1993 debut studio album, Exile in Guyville, was released to critical acclaim; it has been ranked by Rolling Stone as one of the 500 Greatest Albums of All Time. Phair followed this with her second album, Whip-Smart (1994), which earned her a Grammy Award nomination for Best Female Rock Vocal Performance. Phair signed with Dave Matthews' label ATO Records in early 2008 and re-released Exile in Guyville on June 24, 2008, featuring three songs, “Ant in Alaska” and “Say You”. Phair is due to tour with Alanis Morissette for Morissette's rescheduled 2020 tour later in 2021.

SUPPORT ME ON PATREON WATCH MUSIC is not a GENRE VIDEOS and MORE We need to get sick. We need to be tired of the same stories again & again. History is NOW, and enough is enough. Too many artists – too many people – have been taken advantage of by those in power, pushed around & forced to either comply or risk major rejection. So many of us have been manipulated, exploited, stepped on, shunted aside – all for money & power. That includes us fans, who are force fed opinions WAY MORE than we realize. Take this week's shining example, Liz Phair. She came roaring out of Chicago with an album that's now one of the top 500 greatest of all time. Then she faded. NOPE NOPE NOPE. That's the narrative we've been fed by critics and the industry every step of the way. Thing is, IT'S TOTALLY FALSE. I just listened to her entire catalog, and I've come away with one overriding impression. She's always been herself, always done what she wanted, and always kicked ass at it. Whoever you think she is, she's not that. Or that's just a small part of her. Her output is kind of like Bowie's. Every album does something different. You have the deceptively raw & off the cuff sounding debut, Exile in Guyville. Whip-Smart proved she didn't just burn out all her creativity the first time around, and was here to stay. It added just enough tightness & difference to indicate she had more places to go. Whitechocolatespaceeggis an absolute songwriting & performing tour de force. She is the titan of making intimate, quirky lyrics & catchy pop melodies go together like they're meant to be. And don't overlook her guitar playing. This is my personal favorite. Her eponymous album was PANNED when it came out, because she dared to be power pop. Ridiculous. We're all so easily duped by production values, critics & fans alike. We think a loosey-goosey tossed off sound indicates more authenticity, and a polished put-together sound is shallower. They're both affects and it's all total bullshit. It shows how few critics ACTUALLY LISTEN beyond first impressions. It's why SO MANY ALBUMS that were first panned end up getting “reconsidered” years later. Somebody's Miracle – it's Taylor Swift before Taylor Swift even got started. She takes the stereotypical “singer-songwriter” production mode and spins lyrics, intricacies, & vulnerabilities that would come to define pop songwriting. Funstyle – experimental and going wherever she wanted to. Weird & not afraid to say fuck-you to both genre constrictions and the industry. I suggest listening to this first. If you end up liking or loving it, all the other albums will fall right into place. The point is, regardless of what story we've been told or impressions we get before digging deeper, she's always been herself. Which is exactly what we should want every artist – and every person – to be. Every single thing she's done stands the test of time, because it's always honest & real. Dig in and give her all the listening & credit she deserves. And get ready for her long awaited new album to pop very soon. My entire last project, REC's The Weird Objective, was dedicated to that same kind of genre fuck-you. It goes everywhere I wanted it to. And because it's 32 TRACKS, it's also kind of a fuck-you to the industry. Judge for yourself: REC – The Weird Objective - https://www.nickdematteo.com/rectheweirdobjective Do you remember Liz Phair? If you do, do you remember her as just a sexually explicit rabble rouser? Or do you know her hits more? Are there other artists you think deserve more credit for persevering despite misperceptions & mistreatment? Discuss dammit! --- This episode is sponsored by · Anchor: The easiest way to make a podcast. https://anchor.fm/app Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/nick-dematteo/support

Alternative rock (also called alternative music, alt-rock, or simply alternative) is a category of rock music that emerged from the independent music underground of the 1970s and became widely popular in the 1980s. "Alternative" refers to the genre's distinction from mainstream or commercial rock or pop music. The term's original meaning was broader, referring to a generation of musicians unified by their collective debt to either the musical style or simply the independent, DIY ethos of punk rock, which in the late 1970s laid the groundwork for alternative music. ---- The genre can be found as early as the 1960s, with bands such as the Velvet Underground and artists such as Syd Barrett, and continued to evolve through the 1980s. ---- Traditionally, alternative rock broadly consisted of music that differed greatly in terms of its sound, social context and regional roots. Throughout the 1980s, magazines and zines, college radio airplay, and word of mouth had increased the prominence and highlighted the diversity of alternative rock. ---- Before the term alternative rock came into common usage around 1990, the sorts of music to which it refers were known by a variety of terms. In 1979 Dallas radio station KZEW had a late night new wave show entitled "Rock and Roll Alternative". "College rock" was used in the United States to describe the music during the 1980s due to its links to the college radio circuit and the tastes of college students. ---- On September 10, 1988, an Alternative Songs chart was created by Billboard, listing the 40 most-played songs on alternative and modern rock radio stations in the US: the first number one was Siouxsie and the Banshees' "Peek-a-Boo". ---- An LP record is one, long, groove, filled with music. But, in reality, it is “Just A Groove”, an album oriented groove. Enjoy. - - - Join the conversation on Facebook at - - - https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100008232395712 or by email at - - - dannymemorylane@gmail.com - - - In this episode you’ll hear: 1) The Crying Game by Boy George (From the 1987 album, Hollywood Soundtracks) 2) No Woman, No Cry by Fugees (From the 1996 album, The Score) 3) A Pair Of Brown Eyes by The Pogues (From their 1985 album, Rum Sodomy & The Lash) 4) Hell's Gates by Jason & The Scorchers (From the 1995 album, A Blazing Grace) 5) Whip-Smart by Liz Phair (From the 1994 album, Whip-Smart) 6) Amnesia by Kevin Salem (From the 1994 album, Soma City) 7) No One To Run With by The Allman Brothers Band (From the 1994 album, The Cowboy Way: Music From The Motion Picture) 8) I Don't Think So by Dinosaur Jr (From the 1994 album, Without A Sound) 9) Should by Over The Rhine (From the 1994 album, Eve) 10) Believe What You're Saying by Sugar (From the 1994 album, File Under: Easy Listening (F.U.E.L.)) 11) Shimmer by Throwing Muses (From the 1995 album, University) 12) Moon by Fossil (From the 1995 album, Fossil) 13) Dreams In Motion by Felix Cavaliere (From his 1994 album, Dreams In Motion) 14) And If Venice Is Sinking by Spirit Of The West (From the 1993 album, Faithlift) 15) First Day Of The Sun by Darden Smith (From the 1997 album, Deep Fantastic Blue) 16) Skin Turns Blue by Primitive Radio Gods (From the 1996 album, Rocket) 17) Sweetheart by Penelope Houston (From the 1993 album, The Whole World) 18) How To Be Happy by Too Much Joy (From the 1996 album, ... finally) 19) Joe by Jude Cole (From the 1995 album, I Don't Know Why I Act This Way) 20) Maybe An Angel by Heather Nova (From the 1993 album, Blow) 21) Evolution by The Big Geraniums (From the 1995 album, Girls on Sheep) 22) Of Course You Can by Michael Franti & Spearhead (From the 1994 album, Home) 23) Steady On by Shawn Colvin (From the 1989 album, Steady On) 24) Return of the Grievous Angel by Gram Parsons with Emmylou Harris (From the 1974 album, Grievous Angel) 25) One Of Us by Joan Osborne (From the 1995 album, Relish) 26) Unoriginal Sin by John Hiatt & The Goners (From the 2003 album, Beneath This Gruff Exterior) 27) Angel Mine by Cowboy Junkies (From the 1996 album, Lay It Down) 28) Going Back To Georgia by Nanci Griffith and Adam Duritz (From the 1994 album, Flyer)

Matt Heart Spade & Jinners interview singer-songwriter and actress, Sharon Van Etten. They discuss the art of a great cover song, her childhood in New Jersey, her early days gigging in New York while also working at Ba Da Bing Records, and much more. For the Repeat/Skip segment, they discuss Portishead's Roseland NYC Live (1998) and Liz Phair's Whip-Smart (1994).Follow us on social media: @mixtapememoriespodcast @pantheonpodcasts on Facebook @mixtape.memories on Instagram @MemoriesMixtape @pantheonpods on Twitter Visit mixtapememories.com for links to our Spotify playlists, blog posts and episode extras as well as the wonderful podcast network pantheonpodcasts.com for the episodes!Special thanks to Ryan Mulkey, our technical director who also wrote our theme song and drew our cover art!

Matt Heart Spade & Jinners interview singer-songwriter and actress, Sharon Van Etten. They discuss the art of a great cover song, her childhood in New Jersey, her early days gigging in New York while also working at Ba Da Bing Records, and much more. For the Repeat/Skip segment, they discuss Portishead's Roseland NYC Live (1998) and Liz Phair's Whip-Smart (1994). Follow us on social media: @mixtapememoriespodcast @pantheonpodcasts on Facebook @mixtape.memories on Instagram @MemoriesMixtape @pantheonpods on Twitter Visit mixtapememories.com for links to our Spotify playlists, blog posts and episode extras as well as the wonderful podcast network pantheonpodcasts.com for the episodes! Special thanks to Ryan Mulkey, our technical director who also wrote our theme song and drew our cover art!

Episode 4 continues our NCAA Tournament styled brackets to determine the greatest rock music artist of all time. Having already discussed the '60s, '70s, and '80s matchups, here we continue with the '90s. Matchups for this episode: (1) Nirvana vs. (16) Foo Fighters (2) Radiohead vs. (15) Dave Matthews Band (3) Pearl Jam vs. (14) Green Day (4) Soundgarden vs. (13) Red Hot Chili Peppers (5) Oasis vs. (12) Blur (6) Wilco vs. (11) Beck (7) Alice In Chains vs. (10) Pavement (8) Nine Inch Nails vs. (9) The Smashing Pumpkins Notes for this episode: The key moment of the “seismic shift” mentioned was probably when Nevermind replaced Michael Jackson's Dangerousas the #1 album in the U.S. On second thought, Phil Collins is a guy who went from being “just the drummer” in Genesis (albeit a very good drummer) to become a major leading man (both with Genesis and as a solo artist), but even then it wasn't quite the same because people already knew he could sing and he didn't change instruments from drums to guitar. The Foo Fighters documentary Back and Forth is highly recommended. Dave Matthews has released several live albums with Tim Reynolds, but Reynolds was not at The Central Park Concert and none of their live albums took place there either. Scott mistakenly referred to the 2015 Blur album The Magic Whip as Whip-Smart(which was a 1994 album by Liz Phair). Below is a slightly edited version of a letter Scott's brother wrote to Howard Stern regarding their Woodstock '94 experience that Howard read over the air: Howard, you have been promoting Woodstock '99 like it's the greatest thing ever. I just wanted to share with you my Woodstock '94 experience. Here's the setup. Me and three friends (one flew in from Atlanta). With our tickets ($130) we were given parking passes. Our parking lot was like 30 miles from the concert. We get there at around 9pm Friday. The lot is full, we have to go to another lot around 20 miles away. We get there and that lot is full. We have to go to a parking lot in SUNY Albany. We get to SUNY Albany. We get to that lot around 11 and there are thousands of other people. There we wait for a bus to take us 1/2 mile away where we will get another bus to take us to the concert. After waiting fruitlessly for a couple hours to get on the bus, we walk the 1/2 mile with our backpacks and bags to the next lot where we will get a bus to get to the concert. We get there and find thousands of other people. It's about 2am. At about 4am the worst monsoon I was ever outside for struck. 4 buses were coming about every 45 minutes. They felt like the buses that were taking us out of concentration camps. Finally, after fighting to the death, get on the bus at 6am, at the concert by 7am. All my stuff for the weekend soaking wet. Defeated. Exhausted. We pitch our tent about 1 mile from the stages, on a hill. Try sleeping for about an hour when Joe Cocker starts singing. Nightmare continues. Port-o-potties are overflowing, food unbearable, so sick can't even drink. Try to watch the music. Go back to our tent by like 2pm (it takes like 3 hours to get across the park because of the mass of people). Tent is under piles of mud. Everything ruined. Raining again. Had enough. On bus back to Albany by 3pm. Woodstock '94.

This episode is a wide ranging talk about Liz Phair, her career and her impact, globally and personally. I run through all of her records including the Girly-sound tapes, Exile in Guyville, Whip-Smart, Whitechoclatespaceegg, Liz Phair, Somebody's Miracle and Funstyle. www.patreon.com/charlielikesmusic www.charlieshortmusic.com  

In which Melissa Febos, author of Whip Smart and Abandon Me, dubs writing "psychological alchemy" and recites a poem by Mary Oliver.

Day: 013 Date: Saturday, Jan. 13, 2020 Note from Aimee J.: You will do amazing today! Topic: Gratitude Action: In the mirror, tell yourself at least one affirmation. You are welcome to use the ones below. Say as many affirmations as you need. Affirmations: You are Cool. You are Amazing. You are Whip Smart. You are a Champion. And You are Awesome. You are Loved. You are Needed. And most importantly, YOU ARE ENOUGH. Resources & Links: Chasing Dreams Podcast with Aimee J. Your Personal Hype Man ; Alexa Skill: Your Personal Hype Man ; Your Personal Hype Man on iTunes Let’s Connect: Leave a Voicemail ; E-mail Aimee J. ; Aimee on Instagram ; Aimee on Facebook ; Aimee on Twitter ; Aimee on YouTube ; Aimee on LinkedIn ; Aimee on TikTok ; Aimee on Snapchat ; Aimee on Pinterest ; Transcript: Hey fam, it's your girl, Aimee J., Your personal hype man and friend here today on this Monday, January 13th, 2020. I am recovering from a devastating weekend for my Ravens. Um, that was rough. Still still recovering from that. Hope you're having, you had a better weekend than I. um, but I hope you had a great weekend. I hope you had a chance to get some work done. But I also hope you had a chance to get some rest. Cause like I said, it's important to do both. You gotta be persistent to get the work done, but you gotta find that balance so that you can rest and recharge cause that's just as important as getting the work done. A tired dream chaser is not a very productive dream chaser. So what are you guys trying to do today? The thing I want to talk about mostly is about trying. There was a famous quote, it's still famous today by Yoda and he said it to Luke Skywalker in Empire Strikes Back, which was in 1980 but it lasts for years. And we, he goes to Luke who's trying to raise his X-wing, I think from the swamp if I'm remembering correctly. And Luke's like, all right, I'll try and years like, "No. Do or do not. There is no try. Terrible accent. But the concept was either do it or you don't do it because trying isn't going to get it done. And for years I will all about that quote. It was like, bam, look at that quote. That is a powerful quote. Do or do not. Don't just try. And it's only in my recent years that I've realized that that is actually not a very good thing to tell people. It's, it's not guys, because what you gotta do is you gotta try, you gotta try and you gotta fail. Those are the two things you need to do in order to succeed, which seems counter intuitive and seems backwards, but in reality, that's how people get better. That's how people make progress. That's how we have so many amazing inventions in the world today. It's because people tried something, failed, learned, and did better. Right? It's, it's counterintuitive. It's weird. It's like, wait, what are you saying you don't do? I want you to do, but I want you to know that if you don't fail, if you don't make mistakes, that's where the learning truly is. That's where you're actually going to grow, is in the mistakes, is in the efforts you're making and the mistake that you made and kind of learning from it. So the key is if you make a mistake, if you try and you fail, but you don't learn from that failure, that's not progress. So let's make sure we keep that clear. I want you to try, I want you to fail. But the key point I'm trying to make is that you have to learn from the failures. You have to learn from the mistakes. Now, I don't want you to go to school or your job and be like, uh, my girl, Aimee, Aimee J., She, she's that host of the Chasing Dreams podcast and that Your Personal Hype Man podcast, she said it was okay for me to fail. Don't get me in trouble. The truth is I want you to succeed. But when you fail, if you fail, when you fail, when you fail, because you should be failing and making mistakes, you gotta learn from it. Okay? So, yes, I want you to do best. I was a straight a student, uh, as was expected of Indians and family members. And you know, we have high standards. That's okay, that's fine. I, I got all A's in elementary, middle school, high school, valedictorian. I didn't truly feel like I started to learn until college when I did not get all A's. When I did struggle, and it was in the struggle that I did better, it was in the struggle that I really actually understood the material. So it's okay, get your A's, but know that it's okay to make mistakes. It's okay to fail. I'm telling you that now. I'm giving you permission now to understand that, accept that. So you can still get straight A's and make mistakes. It's possible. But I want you to understand mostly, maybe, maybe that wasn't so clear in the beginning, um, that I want you to fail. I want you to fail. I want you to do your best, try your best and if you fail, that's okay. Learn from it and keep on going cause it's in that learning. It's in that growth that you will do and grow even better. That's why it's just as important when you work to rest because when you rest, your body recharges and you just do better. You keep going and cause you can bounce back stronger than ever. That's what happens when you make a mistake. You learn from it. You bounce back further than before. Trust me guys, that's, that's how it works. You are still amazing. You are still cool. You are still whip smart, but it's okay if you fail. It's okay if you fall down, it's okay if you make a mistake. It is not the end of the world despite what you may feel in that moment, despite the severity of your feelings, the world is ending. My grades are over. The semester is coming to an end. Woe is me feeling that you are feeling which you are. You are. You've earned that feeling, feel that feeling, but know that it will be okay. You will be okay. And then I want you to give yourself five minutes with that feeling. It may take some people a little bit longer, but try to minimize it and then dust yourself off. Pick yourself back up again and say, Hey, what can I learn from that? What can I do to do better? And that's how you will learn to be a better person, a better student, a better employee, a better family member, right? This is how we grow by trying and failing, making mistakes and learning from them. So keep that in mind as you go about this Monday cause you're going to feel like you're making a lot of mistakes, especially on a Monday. A lot of people feel like Monday is the worst day. That's okay. I you're going to kick it on Tuesday because you're going to learn for what happened on Monday. That's how it works. As don't let yourself sit down in that failure, in that mistake, in that problem that you're having. You will grow and you will rise from it because you are a champion. You are amazing. You are awesome, you are loved. And you were needed. And most importantly, guys, regardless of what you may hear from teachers, bullies, people you don't even know you are enough as you are, regardless of anything, I put no limitations on that. You are enough. That's brainpower, that's physical abilities, that's athleticism. All of that. You are enough. Remember that? Okay. All right. Until next time, when we check back in tomorrow on Tuesday, of course. Remember, Don't stop, Keep Chasing.

The 1993 debut Exile In Guyville by Liz Phair was declared a landmark album that helped define the 1990s almost as soon as it was released. To be a decade-defining artist can be a stifling burden, but Phair managed to release a worthy follow-up in 1994 with Whip-Smart, sticking with mostly the same group of players and studio folks for both. On her third album whitechocolatespaceegg from 1998, all the lo-fi was stripped away as 3/4's of R.E.M. and a bevy of other musicians and studio pros joined the team on Phair's quest to reinvigorate and reorient her sound. From touches of trippy psychedelia on the opening title track to the swinging sixties Baby Got Going, Phair isn't afraid to explore and expand. Layers of guitars and synths pair well with her songwriting, which switches between character-driven story songs and personal sketches of aging, motherhood, and marriage. But at sixteen tracks and over fifty minutes, the precise production can get fatiguing on the ears, and we wondered if some editing and rearranging would have been for the best.   Songs In This Episode: Intro - Polyester Bride 11:26 - What Makes You Happy 13:44 - Whitechocolatespaceegg 22:02 - Baby Got Going Outro - Johnny Feelgood   Support the podcast, join the DMO UNION at Patreon. Listen to the episode archive at DigMeOutPodcast.com.  

The 1993 debut Exile In Guyville by Liz Phair was declared a landmark album that helped define the 1990s almost as soon as it was released. To be a decade-defining artist can be a stifling burden, but Phair managed to release a worthy follow-up in 1994 with Whip-Smart, sticking with mostly the same group of players and studio folks for both. On her third album whitechocolatespaceegg from 1998, all the lo-fi was stripped away as 3/4's of R.E.M. and a bevy of other musicians and studio pros joined the team on Phair's quest to reinvigorate and reorient her sound. From touches of trippy psychedelia on the opening title track to the swinging sixties Baby Got Going, Phair isn't afraid to explore and expand. Layers of guitars and synths pair well with her songwriting, which switches between character-driven story songs and personal sketches of aging, motherhood, and marriage. But at sixteen tracks and over fifty minutes, the precise production can get fatiguing on the ears, and we wondered if some editing and rearranging would have been for the best.   Songs In This Episode: Intro - Polyester Bride 11:26 - What Makes You Happy 13:44 - Whitechocolatespaceegg 22:02 - Baby Got Going Outro - Johnny Feelgood   Support the podcast, join the DMO UNION at Patreon. Listen to the episode archive at DigMeOutPodcast.com.  

Singer-songwriter Mike Hadreas, who releases his intensely captivating music under the name Perfume Genius, talks about early creative influences including the Edward Scissorhands soundtrack, Liz Phair’s Whip Smart, a babysitter with a small role in the Twin Peaks tv series, and more. Plus, an excerpt from a 2003 interview with the brilliant Chan Marshall of Cat Power, on the subject of motherhood.

Liz Phair rose to indie-rock queen status in the early 90s with the seminal album Exile In Guyville. In the first of two Liz episodes, we're talking about how she got there and what came next. We are diving into the legendary Girly Sound tapes and the early evolution of Liz's songwriting. Then we take a little time to enjoy the masterpiece that is Exile In Guyville. We're highlighting the best and the best from that album before moving on to its rush-released follow-up, Whip-Smart. What makes Guyville so special and how can Liz top that album? How many off-the-wall samples can one artist jam into their songs? And why is there always a Liz stan next to me when I'm siting in seat 27C?? Listen now to find out! Follow us on twitter @missthingpod and on instagram @missthingpodcast Listen to our Liz Phair playlist on Spotify: https://spoti.fi/2EnADUt

How much does the Life TK audience know about being a professional dominatrix? That was one of the first questions my interviewee—the remarkable Melissa Febos—had for me when we recorded today's episode. I don't have that data, unfortunately, but it's a fair question because Melissa is the author of the amazing memoir Whip Smart, about the time in her twenties she spent as a college student and professional dom, one of the best books I read last year. Whip Smart is about so much more than the world of domming; it's about power, desire, control, and Melissa's struggle with drug addiction. Get it. Read it. Love it. Also one of the best books I read last year: Melissa's powerhouse essay collection Abandon Me, which chronicles an emotional, intimate, fraught long-distance relationship she had with a lover, and her reconnection to her birth father. Abandon Me was named one of the best books of 2017 by Esquire, Refinery29, BookRiot, Electric Literature, The Cut, and more, and The New Yorker said that the "sheer fearlessness of the narrative is captivating." What I love about Abandon Me is not only does the subject matter invoke this incredible feeling of vulnerability, but also Melissa is a master of form. A lot of the essays are braided and the prose is amazing, dipping into religion, psychology, mythology, popular culture—this is a book that will turn you inside out emotionally and intellectually, and leave you wanting more. So here's some more: Today Melissa and I are talking about the process of writing, how Whip Smart poured out of her—and how Abandon Me was different. Whip Smart started as a five-page memoir assignment for a nonfiction survey class, and when Melissa handed in hers, about her first session as a dom, her professor recognized she was on to something. Melissa was told to drop everything and write this book. "Anyone who finds the work they are called to do will recognize this feeling," she told me. "When I started writing that story, it just—it was writing me. It just came out. It wasn't easy, but there was an engine in me for it, and the story wanted to be told." If you're wondering, like I did, whether Abandon Me felt just as urgent to write, it did—but it was different because Melissa was still living through some of the experiences she was writing about. She didn't know how the book was going to turn out because she wasn't sure, well, what she was writing to. "I just knew I had to examine it in order to move through it," she said. As I often do on Life TK, I asked the million-dollar question: Did Melissa ever feel like giving up? Here's what she told me: "Oh God, I felt like giving up yesterday. It's so lonely sometimes. I can't really speak for other kinds of writers, but because I'm writing memoir or work based on my personal experience, I spend a lot of time alone, re-living and examining the most painful, sort of incoherent parts of my experience. Which is a lot. It's not required. It's not even recommended for a lot of people. It's really painful. I have often wanted to give up. ... In my early twenties, when I had graduated college and I wasn't writing and I wasn't reading and I was an active drug addict working as a dominatrix, I was like, 'I feel so far from the life that I thought I'd be living, and from the person I am.'" But how did she get through it? By getting quiet, she told me, and listening to the inner wisdom that's underneath the fear we all experience. "For me, even in those times when I felt incredibly hopeless, far from where I needed to be, if I got really quiet, I could hear it. It's like those moments when I was like, 'You have to get clean.' 'You have to quit this job.'" Speaking of, one of my favorite parts of Whip Smart is when Melissa, wanting to use her degree, takes a break from domming and starts a new job working in editorial...and it blows, so she quits. You know I'm the A-number-one fan of hanging in there, but Melissa's confidence made me think twice about my "no quitting" policy. We talk about how she knew that job wasn't the right fit, and what she did after she left (dog walking, assistant to a really rich lady). And finally, I ask Melissa for her advice for Life TK listeners. Keep going, and call yourself a writer even if you don't write for a living (which most of us don't, btw). "Tell people about your work, even if your heart is broken out of rejection, send it back out again," she said. "It doesn't feel good, it feels like the wrong thing to do, but we have to do it anyway." This episode was produced by Erin McKinstry. Our music, from Blue Dot Sessions, is called The Zeppelin, Drifting Spade, and Vulcan Street. This interview was recorded with the help of Google Hangouts. Logo by Theresa Berens of Boss Dotty.

My guest is Melissa Febos. She's the author of two critically acclaimed memoirs, "Whip Smart" and "Abandon Me". Her work has been widely anthologized and appears in publications including Tin House, Granta, The Kenyon Review, Prairie Schooner, Glamour, Guernica, Post Road, Salon, The New York Times, Elle UK, The Guardian, Vogue.com, Hunger Mountain, Portland Review, Dissent, The Chronicle of Higher Education Review, Bitch Magazine, Poets & Writers, The Rumpus, Drunken Boat, and Goodbye to All That: Writers on Loving and Leaving New York. Special Guest: Melissa Febos.

Join us and meet the WHIP SMART showrunner Steve Sessions!  We were so lucky to get Steve to be a guest right after he finished filming his pilot, His Wives and Daughters.  Steve shares a sentiment we hear again and again - the people in charge WANT the actors to be good.  They are rooting for us when we walk in the door!  Incredibly humble and generous, Steve tells us what stood out to him as he was casting his pilot and why he chose the actors he did.  INVALUABLE information for an actor.  Enjoy!  

When the other guys on the podcast posse found out Jason's guest, Melissa Febos, had written a memoir about her time as a dominatrix in NYC, they all got gun shy. Their loss. I'm grateful to consider Melissa an (e) friend now. Not gonna lie- and you can give us your feedback- but I think this conversation with Melissa is the best we've had yet on the podcast, ranging from writing, bodies as objects and bodies as sacraments, Woody Allen, grace, shame, mercy, and the eucharist as an erotic act. Melissa Febos is the author of the acclaimed Whip Smart and the new memoir Abandon Me. Her work has been widely anthologized and appears in publications including Tin House, Granta, The Kenyon Review, Prairie Schooner, Glamour, Guernica, Post Road, Salon, The New York Times, Hunger Mountain, Portland Review, Dissent, The Chronicle of Higher Education Review, Bitch Magazine, Poets & Writers, The Rumpus, Drunken Boat, and Goodbye to All That: Writers on Loving and Leaving New York.She has been featured on NPR’s Fresh Air, CNN, Anderson Cooper Live, and elsewhere. Her essays have twice received special mention from the Best American Essays anthology and have won prizes from Prairie Schooner, Story Quarterly, and The Center for Women Writers. She is the recipient of fellowships from the Bread Loaf Writer’s Conference, Virginia Center for Creative Arts, Vermont Studio Center, The Barbara Deming Memorial Fund, Lower Manhattan Cultural Council, and The MacDowell Colony.The recipient of an MFA from Sarah Lawrence College, she is currently Assistant Professor of Creative Writing at Monmouth University.

When the other guys on the podcast posse found out Jason's guest, Melissa Febos, had written a memoir about her time as a dominatrix in NYC, they all got gun shy. Their loss. I'm grateful to consider Melissa an (e) friend now. Not gonna lie- and you can give us your feedback- but I think this conversation with Melissa is the best we've had yet on the podcast, ranging from writing, bodies as objects and bodies as sacraments, Woody Allen, grace, shame, mercy, and the eucharist as an erotic act. Melissa Febos is the author of the acclaimed Whip Smart and the new memoir Abandon Me. Her work has been widely anthologized and appears in publications including Tin House, Granta, The Kenyon Review, Prairie Schooner, Glamour, Guernica, Post Road, Salon, The New York Times, Hunger Mountain, Portland Review, Dissent, The Chronicle of Higher Education Review, Bitch Magazine, Poets & Writers, The Rumpus, Drunken Boat, and Goodbye to All That: Writers on Loving and Leaving New York.She has been featured on NPR’s Fresh Air, CNN, Anderson Cooper Live, and elsewhere. Her essays have twice received special mention from the Best American Essays anthology and have won prizes from Prairie Schooner, Story Quarterly, and The Center for Women Writers. She is the recipient of fellowships from the Bread Loaf Writer’s Conference, Virginia Center for Creative Arts, Vermont Studio Center, The Barbara Deming Memorial Fund, Lower Manhattan Cultural Council, and The MacDowell Colony.The recipient of an MFA from Sarah Lawrence College, she is currently Assistant Professor of Creative Writing at Monmouth University.

Melissa Febos is the author of the critically acclaimed memoir, Whip Smart and the essay collection, Abandon Me. Her work has been widely anthologized and appears in publications including Tin House, Granta, The Kenyon Review, Prairie Schooner, Glamour, Guernica, Post Road, Salon, The New York Times, Hunger Mountain, Portland Review, Dissent, The Chronicle of Higher Education Review, Bitch Magazine, Poets & Writers, The Rumpus, Drunken Boat, and Goodbye to All That: Writers on Loving and Leaving New York. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Melissa Febos is the author of the memoir, Whip Smart, about her life as a professional dominatrix, and the essay collection, Abandon Me, coming out February 28th. In this episode, she talks to the girls about the subjects she so eloquently covers (read: both Holly and Laura's minds were both totally blown on this book) in Abandon Me: obsessive love, addiction, mental illness and recovery from all of it. Melissa's award-winning work has been published in the New York Times, Salon, The Kenyon Review, among many others. She's the Assistant Professor of Creative Writing at Monmouth University and MFA faculty at the Institute of American Indian Arts (IAIA). She serves on the Board of Directors for VIDA: Women in Literary Arts, and co-curated the Manhattan reading and music series, Mixer, for nine years. More about Melissa and her work at www.melissafebos.com.

  And here we have the second episode. Melissa Febos, author of the memoir Whip Smart, which details the years she spent working as dominatrix in New York City.  There was some heroin addiction.  Some college.  Some wild experiences.  Some ... Continue reading → Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Mistress Alex and I sit down with Melissa Febos who’s book Whip Smart details her experiences as Pro Domme in NYC. We talk about her experiences writing the book, the reaction she has received from the mainstream press, how people […]