Kreative Kontrol

Casey Gomez Walker from Case Oats is here to discuss their new album, Last Missouri Exit , why no federal government should ever underestimate the grit and resolve of the people of Chicago, growing up in St. Louis and being assigned school band instruments, music lessons and having the right learning tools, falling in love with storytelling, a song about an ex’s girlfriend and that same girlfriend...

Will Anderson from Hotline TNT is here to discuss their new album, Raspberry Moon , his love of Canada and why he almost lived here forever, moving to New York City only a few months before the COVID-19 pandemic started and how the isolation of that time bolstered his DIY ethic, a line-up shake-up, his Association Update fanzine and our love and criticism of the NBA, streaming strangeness and why...

Amy Millan is here to discuss her latest and deeply personal solo album, I Went to Find You , remembering Dallas Good of the Sadies, finally, as an adult and as an artist, processing the sudden death of her father when she was only five years old, how a person’s actual age might be different than their spiritual age, the key role that producer Jay McCarrol and her longtime partner and musical coll...

Dan Wriggins from Friendship is here to discuss their latest album, Caveman Wakes Up , being and having a roommate, his interest in creative writing and poetry, and being from the same state as noted author Stephen King, seeing Bob Dylan live with his father, his own musical influences and academic pursuits, temporality, fashion, and subcultural explosions, gassing up his bandmates and how Friends...

Owen Ashworth from Advance Base is here to discuss his latest album, Horrible Occurrences , life in Illinois, his parents’ San Francisco high school rivalry with Creedence Clearwater Revival’s Fogerty brothers, his friendship with Dan Wriggins from Friendship and starting Orindal Records, why he ended Casiotone for the Painfully Alone, what draws him to narrative songwriting about transience and d...

Josh Cole, Craig Dunsmuir, and Colin Fisher from Dun-Dun Band are here to discuss the September 27 Toronto release party for their new LP, Pita Parka, Pt. II : Nim Egduf , where they live and how they met, the best pizza slice in Toronto, the Holy Oak Family Singers, Not the Wind, Not the Flag, Sandro Perri, and other musical pursuits, a growing interest in physical media, Colin and I unknowingly...

Abby Govindan is here to discuss her Pushing 30 stand-up show at Just For Laughs Toronto on September 22, visiting her family in her beloved Houston, Texas hometown, her excitement as a New Yorker with high hopes for mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani, being outspoken, translating one’s affluence into empathy and fighting for those who are less fortunate than you are, the end of centrism, Malcolm X...

Alan Licht is here to discuss his recent releases, including Havens , New York City politics, plugging in and then improvising on an acoustic guitar, fond memories of the Hoboken, New Jersey venue Maxwell’s and seeing memorable shows by Ween and Eric’s Trip, meeting and playing with his old friend Tim Barnes, interpreting a Stooges song, revisiting Love Child, upcoming tour dates, other future pla...

Michael Gira from Swans is here to discuss their exhilarating new album Birthing , an erotic dream he had about Roy Cohn, Richard Nixon, and the current president of the United States, which inspired a new song, dishonesty and the relative truth, what he reveals about himself in his music and how his aesthetic might relate to those of Bob Dylan and Jim Morrison, including contributions by his wife...

Carson McHone is here to discuss her brilliant new album, Pentimento , news about Daniel Romano’s Outfit recording and touring activity, artistic foundations, layers, and repentance, the journal full of messages to her from her mother, which were entered since Carson was born, pondering history and the personal passage of time, celebrating creativity, motherhood, and children, assembling a band of...

Jens Lekman is here to discuss his new album and novel, Songs for Other People’s Weddings , life in Sweden, insights about being a musician and also part of an arts community that works on weddings, distinctions between authentic and cheesy music, Frank Sinatra’s album Watertown , working with author David Levithan and conversations they had about love and relationships, staging this album for a t...

Saul Williams is here to discuss Saul Williams meets Carlos Niño & Friends at TreePeople , performing and improvising while suffering from jet lag, geopolitics and the crumbling American Empire, technology’s impact on socio-political awareness, capitulation, civil unrest, and anti-capitalism, working with Deerhoof and outspokenness in censorious times, his working relationship with Carlos Niño...

Kathleen Edwards is here to discuss Billionaire , becoming a snowbird by getting married and moving to Florida from Canada, how relocation and travel and running a coffee shop can foster curiosity and appreciation for the human condition, accepting yourself and pondering other people’s behaviour and pain, embracing growth and confidence that stems from lived experience, reflecting upon relationshi...

Mac McCaughan and Laura King from Superchunk are here to discuss their new album, Songs in the Key of Yikes , North Carolina living and many Ludwig drums, writing dark-hued songs packaged in sunny, energetic arrangements, Jon Wurster retiring from Superchunk and how the band have met the challenge of filling his role, Laura’s musical background and why drummers have been in the news so much in 202...

Marc Ribot is here to discuss his new album Map of a Blue City , his late, dear friend and beloved music producer, Hal Willner, and demoitis, how producer Ben Greenberg helped him finish an album 30 years in the making, the best way to catch bluefish and also fish you really shouldn’t eat, his relationship with his own singing voice and recent lyrical themes centred around loss, god, German Romant...

Chris DeVille is here to discuss his excellent new book, Such Great Heights – The Complete Cultural History of the Indie Rock Explosion , his history as a music fan, musician, and music journalist at Stereogum, the impact that mass media once had on him as a source for music and music news, why his book has a particular focus on the outsized influence that Pitchfork has had on 21st century pop cul...

Howlin' Pelle Almqvist from the Hives is here to discuss The Hives Forever Forever The Hives , living in Sweden, whether or not the band’s substantive, outspoken lyrics get enough attention, the eerily cyclical nature of western civilization, reflecting upon being in a band for 30 odd years, another artistic outlet he has but has never really talked about before, recording fidelity and punk rock,...

Brian Fauteux is here to discuss his book, Music in Orbit: Satellite Radio in the Streaming Space Age , his lifelong interest in underground music, culture, and media, how the advent of satellite radio in the early part of this century modelled the way subscription culture functions now, the huge role Howard Stern, Bob Dylan, and Eminem played in all of this, and much more. Part of the South East...

Liz Pelly is here to discuss her book Mood Machine – The Rise of Spotify and the Costs of the Perfect Playlist , loving New York City and high hopes for mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani, rationality and current reality, becoming a music fan, musician, and investigative journalist, questioning authority, corporations, and oligarchs, why Spotify has become so prominent and why some of its practices...

Marissa Nadler is here to discuss New Radiations , leaving the Boston area to live in the American South, the small number of non-male music producers and why she produced her latest record herself, loving Bruce Springsteen’s Nebraska , dealing with the doubt, why she’s associated with metal, singing songs of solitude and independent departure, her novelist brother Stuart Nadler, characters in Bob...

Peter Ames Carlin returns to discuss his new book Tonight in Jungleland – The Making of Born to Run , the fireside chat he had at Bruce Springsteen’s home, how Springsteen was pegged to be dropped by Columbia Records if this record failed, the desperation of the artists creating this music and how that was reflected in the protagonists and narratives in these songs, the Boss’s impulsive and indeci...

Thanya Iyer is here to discuss TIDE/TIED , her recent Canadian tour and what exactly is a jazz festival these days, Montreal music inspirations, her South Indian heritage and studying music from a young age, how synthesizers and pedals impact improvisation, dealing with chronic pain and becoming a music therapist, thematic lyrics about water and breathing, writing new songs, playing Sappyfest , ot...

Ty Segall is here (at last!) to discuss Possession , the vibe lights in his recording studio, how the late Steve Albini gave him great advice about studio design and construction and the time they recorded themselves smashing a toilet, starting songs off on the drums and reflecting upon click tracks, demoitis, and studio trickery, connections between his three recent records, his singing voice and...

Between August 1 and 3, 2025 in Sackville, New Brunswick, Sappyfest celebrates its twentieth anniversary as one of the world’s best programmed and most fun music and arts festivals. Back in the summer of 2011 just ahead of the sixth annual Sappyfest, I met Julie Doiron and three of her children at Grapefruit Moon for an interview over breakfast. Aside from her inspirational work in the band Eric’s...

Cory Hanson returns to discuss “I Love People,” becoming a father and how that has altered his relationship with sleep, creativity, and time, his personal interactions with the late Lou Reed and the song he wrote about him, whether he truly loves people, his interest in folk heroes and villains like the Joker, soldiers, and one of the Eagles, a potential Western Cum trilogy, risk-taking in contemp...