RiYL

Sound Field Volume One turned out quite differently than its creator planned. Randy Randall had grand plans for field recordings. Inspired by his early years growing up the Inland Empire, the No Age guitarist took a microphone to the freeways of Southern California. Turns out all freeways more or less sound the same. Lesson learned. The experience did, however, shape his first instrumental for the...

NYLONANDJUNO finds Jason Lytle trying something new. It’s a set of songs constructed around limitations — in this case, all of the music is played on a synthesizer and guitar, with a broken bottom nylon string. It’s also an entirely instrumental album, a far cry from the singer-songwriter’s days fronting indie-rock mainstay, Grandaddy. The record finds Lytle joyfully exploring new territory more t...

The group’s URL evocatively posits the question, Who Is Arthur King? It’s not a particularly easy question to answer. It never is with a collective. For the sake of brevity, we’ll cowardly default its own description. Arthur King is an experimental music and visual art collective seeking to engage the tension between the known and unknown inherent in creative expression. For the sake of this inter...

When Drive appeared in theaters, Electric Youth was still finding its sound. The track, created in collaboration with producer College, was a defining aesthetic touchstone for the film, appearing throughout. For the Toronto-based duo, it was as good a sign as any that they were on the right track. It was a sort of overnight success for Austin Garrick and Bronwyn Griffin, a pair that had been toget...

There’s been an argument. Actually, that’s probably too strong a word. Some minor disagreement. The entire band is laughing about it by the time I arrive at the Brooklyn apartment. Like everything else they do, the conversation over some synth patch is downright familial. The quartet has been making music together for so long, they’re practically siblings, with all of the love and squabbles that b...

Having just secured a plate of pasta, Lonnie Jordan’s beaming. Even with a nightly club rider, life on the road as a vegan can be a tough one. But he swears by it, even when it means getting creative with a couple of slices of bread and some condiments. At 71, he swears he’s in best shape of his life, having sworn off the many vices of a touring rock musician. Toward the end of our conversation, I...

I had to double check, but its seems that, in all of my time writing about comics for various outlets, I’ve never actually interviewed Sammy Harkham. It’s shocking, really, given what a important player he’s been in the indie comics scene for some time. Thankfully, the release of Kramer’s Egot 10 presented the perfect opportunity. For fans of round numbers, next spring also marks the 20th (!?) ann...

At times, Nice Try is a book about failure. Josh Gondelman chronicles his struggles as as up and coming comedian, love woes and awkward teenage attempts to be cool — all topics that might be a touch too painful had things not worked out so well. When he meets up with me, he’s just come from his gig writing on the Showtime series for the beloved Bronx duo, Desus and Mero. It’s a gig he left John Ol...

In Revenge of the She-Punks, Vivien Goldman charts feminist ideology in punk across nations, languages and decades. Beginning with 70s pioneers like Poly Styrene, Patti Smith and The Slits, the book draws together threads that are often ignored in wider conversations about the genre. The book follows the rebirth of Goldman’s own musical career, with 2016’s terrific anthology, Resolutionary (Songs...

The guest are running late. So far as I’m aware, my conversation with Aaron “SonReal” Hoffman is the first RiYL to get pushed back due to an appearance on Sway’s morning show. It’s a pretty good excuse, so far as those go. Hoffman is in good spirits when he arrives. The appearance went well. It was his second time free styling on the show, and things went far better this time It’s amazing what a f...

In  Faking It , Lux Alptraum explores a wide range of lies about sex, from faked orgasms to sexual assault. It’s a powerful statement that spans the wide range of her many years of writing about sex — the good, the bad, the unspoken. As an author, her work has appeared in a wide range of outlets, including The New York Times and the Guardian. She also served as the editor of Fleshbot, a pop cultur...

Life was fairly different the last time Whitney Matheson was on the show. In fact, USA Today pulled the plug on her 15 year culture column Pop Candy sometime between the recording of the interview and its publication.  In the intervening half decade, Matheson took up a teaching gig, moved to Tennessee and had a kid “It's funny how life can change on a dime” is how she put it as we were discussing...

There will never be another Swamp Dogg. At 77, Jerry Williams Jr. has had one of the most fascinating and diverse careers in popular music. It’s hard to believe the same man created the psychedelic funk of 1970’s Total Destruction to Your Mind, manage a young Dr. Dre, and penned the country standard, “She’s All I Got. While his career career and life have hit plenty of rough patches, he’ll be the...

Toward the end of the interview, Wayne White gestures to a word painting sit nearby on the floor of his home workshop. “Finally got there, wasn’t so great,” he says, reading the big, block letters out loud. “That’s the story of life. It’s been a heck of a journey, though. In the late-70s, the Chattanooga kid moved to New York, to attend classes at SVA, including a brief stint studying under Art Sp...

Some time in six or so years since I last sat down with Adam Lisagor, something strange happened. He became a nationally broadcast product spokesperson. It wasn’t the career trajectory any of us were expecting, but here we are.  Over the years, the video producer had begun to appear on camera during his signature well produced startup ads. But it was TrueCar that made him a in inescapable presence...

In November 2018, Ace of Cups released their self-titled debut. The album arrived more than 50 years after the band’s formation. With several tours and a second double album on the way, it’s clear the group has every intention of making up for lost time. The groups was an anomaly during its first go-round. The all-female rock quintet shared stages at legendary venues like the Fillmore with the lik...

When he was 16, Lou Barlow formed Deep Wound. Two years later, he and the hardcore band’s  drummer, J Mascis would create Dinosaur Jr. (then simply Dinosaur), one of alternative’s most beloved and influential groups. Barlow stuck around for three albums — regarded by many as the band’s best. That would have been enough to have cemented his status in the indie rock pantheon, but the music would go...

Five years ago, Gastor Almonte quit his job and went all in on standup. It was no small commitment from a married man with two kids and a six figure sales job. But a supportive wife, encouraging family members and his position as a landlord in East New York, Brooklyn allowed him to take the leap. With the recent release of his debut album, Immigrant Made, things appear to be paying off. Almonte’s...

Things are a lot quieter. The last time I say down with Guster, the full band passed around a mic, seated at a table in the front of the sadly now-defunct Grassroots on St. Marks Place. Percussionist/drummer Brian Rosenworcel came alone this time, and the ambience is little more than an office air conditioner. It’s a welcome change and one that allows us to get to the heart of the group’s nearly 3...

The first thing you learn upon meeting Joanna Sternberg is that they want to be your friend. It’s nothing about you, specifically, mind. They would love to be friends with everyone, but there simply aren’t enough hours in the day. The second thing you learn, quite probably, is Sternberg’s lifelong love of Motown bassist James Jamerson. It’s a fact pertinent enough to be list in the two sentence bi...

Shortly after appearing on the podcast way back in 2015, Joe Biel sent me an email. Since the interview, he’d been diagnosed with autism (or “Asperger’s” at the time), a revelation that had already begun to have a profound effect on his life. Biel returned 30-odd episodes later to discuss the insight and impact. On a recent visit to New York City, the Portland-based publisher returned my apartment...

In 2006, a 19-year-old Yuna auditioned for Malaysian reality singing show, One in a Million, ultimately making it into the top 40 prior to elimination. After finishing up law school, the she threw herself into her songwriting at a time when Myspace was still a musical gatekeeper. Discovering her music online, agents flew to Malaysia to meet the singer, eventually signing her to Fader. The label re...

In February, “Peter Frampton Finale—The Farewell Tour” was announced. Running through October, the tour would find the musician going on the road one final time. Of course, in the world of older rock musicians, the “farewell tour” has become a kind of running joke. For Frampton, however, an artist whose work has been inexorably linked to the live setting since Comes Alive made him a household name...

At 15, Michael Mwenso was on stage with James Brown. It took the Sierra Leonean teenager four years to convince the godfather of soul to let him up there, through a combination of raw talent and persistence. But once he did, he wowed the crowds and Brown alike. It was then that Mwenso got a taste for the stage and learned the dos and don’ts of management from one of the late-20th century’s great b...

Prior to The Deconstruction, Mark Oliver Everett took a break. Four years passed between albums. Honestly, it’s not too long for most musical acts pushing a quarter century, but The Eels have released records like clockwork, with a dozen studio albums currently under their belt. For Everett (that’s “E,” to you), the last few years have marked a new chapter. He got did some acting married, got divo...