Category: Podcast

Ep. #76: Jessy Bell Smith

Post author By vish
Post date March 4, 2014

Jessy Bell Smith is a Guelph-based musician with one of the most remarkable singing voices I’ve ever heard. She’s been playing her own songs live for a long time, was a member of a band called Beautiful Senseless, and is currently in the Skydiggers. She recently released her highly-anticipated debut album, The Town and will be playing Kazoo! Fest in Guelph between April 9 and 13. Here, beyond some friendly bickering and badgering, Jessy and I discuss my reputation as a totalitarian bandmate (sometimes we play together), artists in Guelph who need an encouraging push, the long-gestating history of Jessy’s first album, happenstance and J.J. Ipsen and Andy Magoffin, fate, confidence and productivity, a Gary the cat interruption, musical eras and nostalgia, Watergate comes up somehow, Kate Bush and Tom Waits and singing in a musical family, burnt rice, deliberation and re-recording The Town, her role in the Skydiggers, how you are not going to die, turning anxiety into antagonistic anger to conquer an annoying audience, the song “Douglas St.” and more.

Related links: choosemymusic.org/jessy-bell-smith/ kazookazoo.ca vishkhanna.com

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Tags Andy Magoffin, Gary the cat, Guelph, J.J. Ipsen, Jessy Bell Smith, Kate Bush, Kazoo! Fest, The Skydiggers, The Town, Tom Waits

News Podcast

Ep. #75: Michael Feuerstack

Post author By vish
Post date February 25, 2014

Michael Feuerstack is a well-respected, sophisticated and possibly underrated singer, songwriter, and musician who is based in Montreal. For many years he played in a Ottawa band called Wooden Stars and also nurtured his own project, Snailhouse. Last year he released an LP called Tambourine Death Bed, his first record under his own name, and he’s due to release a new, collaborative effort as Michael Feuerstack & Associates on April 19 called Singer Songer (Forward/Headless Owl). He’s scheduled to play Kazoo! Fest in Guelph (April 9-13) with more tour dates to follow. Here, Mike and I discuss doing this episode in my living room, weird weather, true facts, purple seagulls, tasty coffee, celebratory enthusiasm, the musical shift between Snailhouse and Michael Feuerstack, home recording, my lack of preparation for this interview, Mike’s relationship with the press and his interest in how he’s perceived, antagonism vs. cynicism, Mike’s hardcore punk past in Moncton in the band the Underdogs with Rick White of Eric’s Trip, my son’s blue puck, Mike’s musical origins and early collaborations with White and Julie Doiron, how Wooden Stars began, what punk rock means, and why the gruelling lifestyle of lowly rock bands makes it tricky to keep them together, the intermingling of earnestness and irreverence, how Bob Dylan and Leonard Cohen are really funny, and the connection between music and comedy, how working as ‘Michael Feuerstack’ might be a confluence of every kind of music he’s ever made, my desire to get everyone to say they’ll “Yahoo! it” instead of “Google it,” some details about his forthcoming album Singer Songer, which includes vocals by the likes of Mathias Kom, Devon Sproule, Bry Webb, Leif Vollebekk, John K. Samson, Jessie Stein, Jim Bryson, Angela Desveaux, and Little Scream, the song “Leave Me Alone,” and more.

Related links: michaelfeuerstack.com vishkhanna.com

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News Podcast

Ep. #74: Stephen Malkmus

Stephen Malkmus is the lead singer and songwriter in a great band from Portland, Oregon called the Jicks. Since he dissolved his highly influential and respected band Pavement, Malkmus has led a prolific artistic life, releasing six albums with the Jicks and touring the world extensively over the past 14 years. The latest album by the Jicks is Wig Out at Jagbags, it’s out now via Matador Records, and the band makes Canadian stops in Toronto, Montreal, Calgary, Edmonton, Vancouver, and Victoria in the coming months. Here, Stephen and I discuss the end of snail mail and end times, living in Berlin and pretending to be Canadian, why I might not know anything about geography or culture because I’m a music journalist, our interaction at Sled Island where Stephen suggested I get my toddler a trampoline, my son’s obsession with Pavement and Silver Jews songs, the video for the Jicks song “Gardenia,” and how my son might eventually be into hair metal, how the new Jicks album is translating live, his perception of electric guitar solos and his approach as a player, feeling appreciated for his work, making music that has its own voice, the tension between nostalgia and appreciating history and certain eras, playing and creating things against memories, deflecting people’s perceptions of cynicism, the Pavement reunion and its ‘pure nostalgia,’ what it sounds like when my son and I sing “Stereo” and “Shady Lane” right before bed, and more.

Related links: stephenmalkmus.com matadorrecords.com vishkhanna.com

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Tags Berlin Germany, hair metal, Matador Records, nostalgia, Pavement, Portland Oregon, Silver Jews, Sled Island, Stephen Malkmus, the Jicks, Wig Out at Jagbags