Crash and Ride

Tierney Tough was the second guest ever on Crash and Ride and she has released a new solo EP. Normally the phenomenally talented bassist, vocalist, and keyboardist for the band The Pauses, Tierney was inspired by the isolation and uncertainty of the Pandemic to create a new EP of haunting and powerful tunes, A Farce to Reckon With. In our most recent conversation, we talk about the Pandemic, her new music, and an absolutely infuriating encounter with an obstreperous soundman. You can hear A Farce to Reckon With here: https://tierneytough.bandcamp.com/ You can hear The Pauses here: https://thepauses.bandcamp.com/ You can find out more about Nuci's Space here: https://www.nuci.org/ You can donate to Access Point GA here: https://www.accesspointga.org/donate

Episode 87 is my interview with Jes Skolnik! Jes writes for Bandcamp Daily, the music journalism arm of the Greatest Music Distribution Platform of all time. Besides being an incredibly gifted music journalist, they are also a musician, a trauma survivor, former addict, and a sexual assault survivor. Together, Jes and I talk about the pandemic, surviving in isolation, overcoming trauma, and how it all relates to playing, loving, and writing about music. CONTENT WARNING: this episode contains frank and difficult discussions about sexual assault, drug use, and suicidal ideation. You can read Jes' work by going to their Bandcamp contributor profile here: https://daily.bandcamp.com/contributors/jes-skolnik

Jolie Holland is an extraordinarily gifted singer/songwriter and multi-instrumentalist living in Los Angeles, California. She's possessed of an incredible insight and lyricism and she writes gorgeous and vivid songs that have been praised by luminaries such as Tom Waits. She escaped an abusive and toxic upbringing in a devout family of Jehovah's Witnesses and spent many years on the road, only to eventually settle down and create an enormous and stunning body of work. Jolie is currently collaborating with a group of activists and families to produce a benefit called "Abolition 2021," which will create a living space and activist space near the Louisiana State Penitentiary in Angola. In her words, "I've been helping produce this benefit to create a free hospitality house for family and lawyers of incarcerated people near Angola aka Louisiana State Penitentiary. It's out in the middle of nowhere like an ugly secret, difficult to get to, even for people with money. Reallocating city budgets from violence to community support, ending slave labor and abolishing the death penalty are the big goals. Creating this hospitality house is one important step we can take to improve people's lives. The house will serve as a hub for activists." The show will be online April 9th, 16th, 23rd, and 30th, and you can buy your tickets here: https://noonchorus.com/abolition-2021/ You can hear more of Jolie's music here: https://joliehollandmusic.com/ Also, as I mentioned in the intro, I've been working for a Harm Reduction organization here in Athens, and you can help us out here: https://www.accesspointga.org/donate

Pete Krebs has played guitar in so many influential Portland bands that it's hard to list them all: Hazel, Golden Delicious, The Stolen Sweets, The Portland Playboys, and Thee Catnip Brothers. He started his journey playing in punk bands and now he plays Western Swing at the rodeo every year in Pendleton, Oregon. He's a two-time inductee into the Oregon Music Hall of Fame, and he's survived cancer twice. I met Pete for the first time in 1992 when our bands played together in Virginia at a club called The Insect Club. It was his band, Hazel, my band, Five Eight, and the Spinanes. Someone got naked onstage and we almost got beat up and very nearly didn't get paid. The next time we played together was in Portland and that night I heard Pete play a song that has haunted me for 30 years. In this interview, I finally find out the name of it and the original artist. Wild. You can find the infamous photo that brought all of this together on the Crash and Ride Facebook page. You can read more about Pete and hear a bunch of his music here: https://www.heypetekrebs.com/ As promised, here's the Corona Virus Relief Fund set up by MusiCares: https://www.grammy.com/musicares/get-help/musicares-coronavirus-relief And also here's a link to the Athens area musician's Covid 19 relief fund set up by Nuci's space here: https://www.nuci.org/get-help/

Tad Doyle! TAD DOYLE of the band TAD! Before the explosion of bands out of the Pacific Northwest changed the entire face of rock music in the early '90s, TAD was crushing live shows and releasing huge sounding slabs of wax on Subpop records. Years later, Tad would struggle with drugs and depression as the "grunge" thing got mutated and commodified into an MTV-ready PRODUCT. Tad, though, is a survivor, and he is still making music "heavier than God's Balls." I was super-stoked to talk to him and this is his story. His current band is just as heavy as TAD and you can hear Brothers of the Sonic Cloth here: https://brothersofthesoniccloth.bandcamp.com/album/brothers-of-the-sonic-cloth If you want to book time and record with Tad, you can find Witch Ape Studios here: https://www.taddoyle.com/witch-ape-studio-celebrating-four-years-from-our-basement-days-to-your-ears/ As promised, here's the Corona Virus Relief Fund set up by MusiCares: https://www.grammy.com/musicares/get-help/musicares-coronavirus-relief And also here's a link to the Athens area musician's Covid 19 relief fund set up by Nuci's space here: https://www.nuci.org/get-help/

Lindsay Powell is a Brooklyn-based singer and multi-instrumentalist who performs under the name Fielded. Her music defies genre classification and nimbly draws influences from trance, hip-hop, Neo-Soul, and new psychedelia. I have been a fan for many years, and after overcoming some shyness about reaching out to someone so accomplished, I made contact and we did one of my favorite interviews ever. Lindsay was very forthcoming about her struggles with mood issues and her restlessness with a "normal" life. Also, she just got a puppy. You can hear all of Fielded's music on Bandcamp here: https://fielded.bandcamp.com/ You can see the captivating and gorgeous video for "I Choose You" here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9gBVyTo91bQ This is Backwoodz Studioz, the label with whom she collaborates: https://backwoodzstudioz.com/artists/fielded/ As promised, here's the Corona Virus Relief Fund set up by MusiCares: https://www.grammy.com/musicares/get-help/musicares-coronavirus-relief And also here's a link to the Athens area musician's Covid 19 relief fund set up by Nuci's space here: https://www.nuci.org/get-help/

Lindsey Charles is the dynamic and powerful singer of the Chicago band The Cell Phones and also one of the creators of Dagger Cast, a podcast "a horror based podcast dedicated to the LGBTQ, Black, LatinX, female experience." She is also a talented illustrator, actress, and a new mother. We talked about all of that and more while sitting on the porch of her new home in Indianapolis, masked and bundled up against the grey autumn chill. The Cell Phones have a new record out that you can check out on their bandcamp page and you can check out her podcast at the link below. What a great talk! Check it out! The Cell Phones! https://cellphonesband.bandcamp.com/ Daggercast! https://www.facebook.com/daggercast/ Here's the Corona Virus Relief Fund set up by MusiCares: https://www.grammy.com/musicares/get-help/musicares-coronavirus-relief And also here's a link to the Athens area musician's Covid 19 relief fund set up by Nuci's space here: https://www.nuci.org/get-help/

photo: Morten Fog There is one globally influential magazine that focuses on Americana and I was fortunate enough to speak with its editor. Hilary Saunders is the human tornado who wrestles No Depression to the presses every quarter, and she is a phenomenal human being. For Episode 75, we had an wide-ranging conversation about her journey to the editorship of No Depression, about life in New York City during these strange times we're living in, and about using guava jelly in hamantaschen. I enjoyed every minute of it. During the course of our conversation, she recommended the email newsletters of a couple of music journalists. You can find Gary Suarez on Substack here: https://cabbages.substack.com/people/1989736-gary-suarez You can find out more about Marissa Moss and Natalie Weiner's newsletter here: https://marissarmoss.substack.com/p/coming-soon?r=5wdr&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&utm_source=copy You can sign up for Zachary Lipez's newsletter here: https://zacharylipez.substack.com/ And you can find Sara Benincasa's essay about the aftermath of the suicide of Anthony Bourdain here: https://humanparts.medium.com/when-they-leave-8eb15cc2ee1f I mentioned in the intro that I was going to include a link to the Corona Virus Relief Fund set up by MusiCares: https://www.grammy.com/musicares/get-help/musicares-coronavirus-relief And also here's a link to the Athens area musician's Covid 19 relief fund set up by Nuci's space here: https://www.nuci.org/get-help/

Jodi Shapiro is a drone composer, competition poker player, world class photographer, and the best rock and roll tour guide of the Lower East Side of Manhattan that you could ever ask for. She's one of the most accomplished people I've ever met, and yet, surprisingly, she struggles with a sense that her work isn't worthy. We talk about that and so much more in this week's episode of Crash and Ride. This is part 1 and part 2 will be out in just a few days! Here is her photography site: http://samuraiphotog.com/

Episode 71 is the second half of my interview with Conan Neutron! Conan is a guitar player and singer from Modesto, CA, now living in Milwaukee! He was in the great band Replicator and went on to be in Mt Vicious and the band Victory and Associates. Now he works with a rotating cast of brilliant musicians as Conan Neutron and the Secret Friends! In the second half of our talk we get into the lessons he learned from the breakup of Mt Vicious, the formation of Conan Neutron and the Secret Friends and the deaths of Lauren K Newman and Vern Rumsey, Conan's bandmates in Household Gods. You can hear more of Conan's music here: https://www.neutronfriends.com/

J Christopher Arrison is a guitar player, songwriter, singer, writer for Adult Swim, and a friend I have known for 30 years (!!). His band Trinket had one of the most star-crossed record deals of all time, and the story is all here. Even with that bit of bleakness, this is one of the funniest episodes of Crash and Ride ever, and I'm super proud of it. You can see and hear his work for Fish Center on his Bandcamp: https://murderwizard.bandcamp.com/album/fish-cuts-vol-4 If we ever get to go see live music again, you can see Saved By The Band at Venkman's: https://venkmans.com/event/saved-by-the-band/ You can read his essay about his former wife's journey through cancer surgery here: https://www.salon.com/2012/07/20/my_wifes_brain_surgery/

Brad Wood is an engineer, producer, and multi-instrumentalist from Rockford, Illinois. He was the producer of the groundbreaking Liz Phair 'Exile in Guyville' and went on produce records by Red Red Meat, Veruca Salt, Ben Lee, and dozens of others. We talk about the year on the road where he played drums behind a deeply ambivalent Liz Phair, we talk about the role that anxiety, depression, and mania can play in the life of a musician, we talk about what he perceives his role to be in the studio, and lord god do we go off on a tangent about bikes. We both love bikes a lot. We talked so much I decided to split this episode in two! You can hear the rest later this week! You can hear samples of his work at his website here: http://www.bradwoodmusic.com/

For Episode 65 I finally got to talk to David Pajo. David was, of course, the incredibly influential guitar player in the band Slint,. David later went on to play with Will Oldham, The For Carnation, Tortoise, Stereolab, Royal Trux, King Kong, Bush League, Zwan, Peggy Honeywell, Yeah Yeah Yeahs and, most recently, Interpol. Despite his incredibly prolific musical career, he still struggled with depression. In the winter of 2015, he attempted to take his own life. As a survivor he has made it his mission to talk frankly and openly about his depression and how grateful he is that he survived. I am so happy that we had this conversation. We talked about how Slint's record 'Spiderland' absolutely spun out a generation of indie rock nerds like me, about our mutual friend Lance Bangs, about his life since his suicide attempt, and about espresso for maybe longer than anyone could possible care about.