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Ep. #132: Christine Fellows

Christine Fellows lives in Winnipeg, MB and is one of the world’s best songwriters. She is an adventurous and compelling storyteller and a gifted musician who brings her work into other disciplines for really cool collaborations. Her sixth album also includes her first book of poetry; both are called Burning Daylight and were released by ARP Books on September 23. Here, Christine and I discuss things like how good looking Kyle at Milagro Mercer Mexican Cantina in Toronto is, secret menu items and difficult customers, good Toronto food areas and bikeability, the sparseness of Burning Daylight, the drums, the influence of writer/Klondike chronicler/renaissance man Jack London, the short story “To Build a Fire,” the Dawson City Music Festival songwriter’s residency, curling clinics and natural ice, rickety planes in the Yukon Territory, the gold rush and men, Women of the Klondike, the song “To Build a Fire,” we are full, our budgies Pickles and Buddy, things to know about budgies, Marianne Moore and her bathtub alligator, cats and computers, Gary the cat, I miss Buddy, sled dogs, celebration and adaptation, growing up in Kelowna, a drum kit and a punching bag, reading and remembering, the Humber College jazz program and the University of Guelph philosophy and english departments, that fucking Stephen Harper, meeting John K. Samson, couples who consult each other about their art, working in Nunavut and the Northwest Passage, how the Inuit people are oppressed, getting into the world of poetry, a new show with Shary Boyle, ARP Books, Jason Tait lives in Winnipeg again, the spoken word song “The Gold-Seekers,” and then it’s adios.

Related links: christinefellows.com arpbooks.org vishkhanna.com

Christine Fellows and Pickles

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Ep. #131: Ronnie Spector

Ronnie Spector is one of the most influential vocalists and performers in all of pop music. Her work with the Ronettes in the 1960s was legendary, altering the course of rock ‘n’ roll with its style, attitude, and gigantic international hits like “Be My Baby,’ “Walking in the Rain,” and “Baby, I Love You.” Spector simply casts a long shadow on contemporary culture, influencing filmmakers, fashion designers, hair stylists, and a list of musicians that includes the Beatles, Beach Boys, Bruce Springsteen, Ramones and Amy Winehouse among many others. On September 19, Spector heads to the Riatlo Theatre and Pop Montreal with her acclaimed show, Beyond the Beehive, an evening of music and stories about her life. Here, Ronnie and I discuss the rock ‘n’ roll state of Connecticut, the origins of her current stage show and its unfiltered examination of her entire life, talking about yourself in an age of oversharing, how artists don’t have lasting power in the current music industry, doing her Keith Richards impression, making the live Ronnie Spector experience a special one, how her marriage to Phil Spector impacted her ability to tour and release records, losing years in court battles, deflecting her icon status, raising kids and living a perfect life, Bed Bath & Beyond, cooking, falling in love with the voice of Frankie Lymon, music homework, going to the Apollo Theatre for amateur night at 11 years old, what Phil Spector was like to work with in the studio, the wall of sound was people, her relationship with “Be My Baby,” how there is still a lot of unreleased material by the Ronettes and Ronnie that has yet to see the light of day, we get cut off, the song “Be My Baby” and that was it.

Related links: ronniespector.com popmontreal.com vishkhanna.com

Ronnie_Spector_Feb_2842375b

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Ep. #130: Elisabeth de Mariaffi

Elisabeth de Mariaffi is a gifted writer and poet who lives in St. John’s, Newfoundland. Her 2012 short story collection How to Get Along with Women is extraordinarily moving, emotionally jarring, texturally precise, and it was longlisted for the 2013 Giller Prize with good reason. Of her work, author Michael Winter once astutely said, “She’s alive to what disturbs, and she’s dead to cliche.” Elisabeth’s work has been featured in prominent periodicals and her story “Kiss Me Like I’m The Last Man On Earth” was nominated for a 2013 National Magazine Award. She is also one of the founders of Toronto Poetry Vendors, a small press that sells single poems by established Canadian poets through toonie vending machines. De Mariaffi has a new novel coming out this January via HarperCollins Canada called The Devil You Know and she’s appearing at the Eden Mills Writers’ Festival on Sunday Sept. 14. Here, she and I talk about the weather in St. John’s, living between Toronto and Guelph and Newfoundland, meeting St. John’s current poet laureate George Murray, Book Ninja, working for an airline during a long distance relationship, just married, working at Ed Video Media Arts Centre and learning about video editing, writing poetry under the tutelage of Dionne Brand and short stories with Michael Winter, flying together, finding the time and resources to write the stories in How To Get Along With Women, short stories versus long stories, travelling to Hungary a lot as a kid, learning several languages, politics and perception and the tangible impact of the Cold War, how I thought How To Get Along With Women would be funny but it was actually very heavy, the politics of our day-to-day existence, relationships and power dynamics, fear, the whole literary prize nomination deal, writing a novel while the iron was hot, Invisible Publishing, working at Breakwater Books, having four kids and jobs as writers, NO, her new novel The Devil You Know and its relation to fear, February 1993 in the weeks that Paul Bernardo was being pursued by police, darkness, writing more short stories or another novel, sending wedding thank yous, the future, and then the end.

Related links: invisiblepublishing.com twitter.com/ElisabethdeM edenmillswritersfestival.ca

mariaffi2

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