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Ep. #241: Rangda

Rangda is a powerful, American instrumental trio featuring guitarists Sir Richard Bishop and Ben Chasny and drummer Chris Corsano. Their new album is called The Heretic’s Bargain, it’s out now via Drag City, and they’re on the road right now with forthcoming shows in Bloomington, IN, Columbus, OH, Pittsburgh, PA, Baltimore, MD, and Philadelphia, PA. In fact, they were just in Toronto for a tremendously powerful show at Double Double Land in Kensington Market where I had the opportunity to speak with the band about high chairs in Kensington Market, getting a sense of the tour from Rick and the story about a pastel artwork piece of Donald Drumpf he discovered in Brooklyn, Canada’s new president, ravishing Justin Trudeau, madness now versus Reagan and multiple Bush madness, how Rick is convinced Hillary Clinton was preordained to be president, conspiratorial political theory, waking Ben up to dodge three or four questions, weird things people say about Rangda, Ben subscribes to Just Say No, no rage, the first time Johnny Mathis is mentioned by Rick, emotional miscue, song titles in an instrumental band, “Without Us” and Family Ties, when Chris met Ben, how Rangda came together, Rick’s hat, why Ben’s band Six Organs of Admittance keeps oscillating, over sensitive rock, I can’t get no fulfillment, richardbishopbookseller.com, occult books, people who cast spells on their employers, Canada and its border, Montreal and Harris Newman, weird jazz festivals, Chris is busy and Rick’s busy but Ben’s somehow got a lot of free time, Rangda sort of have a band meeting in the middle of our interview, not-so-busy Ben, the song “Mondays Are Free at the Hermetic Museum,” and then I finally get to leave Chris Corsano eating my dust.   

Related links: dragcity.com/artists/rangda vishkhanna.com

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News Podcast

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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