The Church of What’s Happening Now (#606) and podcasts in general
What a world we live in now where we can listen to Joey Diaz talk to Henry Rollins talk about music, work ethic, travel, and Al Pacino. If previously celebrity talk time was limited to late night or early morning talk shows, glossy magazines, and ghost-written biographies, now we live in a world of instantaneous (albeit one-sided) LA to fans everywhere correspondence. While most social media is a bit too concocted and perhaps held back for me, podcasts are looser. Fully in control of their output, everything is game. As weird as it must have been for Cuban-born Joey Diaz to imagine talking to Black Flag vocalist Henry Rollins for 90 minutes, it’s weirder to realise that the conversation is as mature and inspiring as any other duo.
Highlight: Joey Diaz recounting how his five-year-old daughter has to hold up hardcore rock legend Rollins on the phone because she’s got a loose tooth.
The Travelling Wilburys Vol. 1 & 2
As Bob Dylan is touring the country, I thought of a couple of things. I replayed myself seeing him in 2010 and promptly crossing over the line to the second part of the love-him-or-hate-him divide. I thought of his run of ridiculously good 2000s albums and how I have yet to listen to anything of his post-Tempest. Scrolling Reddit, I came across a heavily-filtered picture of Sean Lennon and James McCarthy, which lead me to think of George, and then to the supergroup, The Travelling Wilburys.
So I found myself looking back on albums which were released 30 years ago that I hadn’t listened to in about eight years. Here’s the thing: if I played this record without mentioning that this was made by Harrison, Petty, Orbison, Dylan, and Lynne, I’m not sure it would get a lot of traction. Entertaining, yes, but I’m not sure it was the listener that had the most fun.
Still, who hasn’t fantasised about making an album with their best mates?
Death Cab For Cutie’s Thank You For Today
How long before the ones who:
held up lighters to ‘I Will Follow You Into The Dark’ back when it was allowed; these days want to go home before the clock strikes midnight, as fatigued as the narrator of ‘The New Year’; cry at least twice during a wine-indulged listen of Narrow Stairs; once read and worshipped Kerouac like Ben Gibbard; wonder what happened to the guitar-squeal-at-the-end-of-‘Scientist Studies’ Death Cab; once bought big time into emo and held fist to heart at lines like “You were the one, but I can’t spit it out when the date’s been set / The white routine to be ingested inaccurately”
finally concede that DCFC don’t talk to them (me) as much as they used to?
Joel Mak 