Talkhouse Podcast

On this week’s Talkhouse Podcast we’ve got two old friends whose bands started around the same time, and who’ve had very different albums hit the 20-year-mark recently: Jim Adkins of Jimmy Eat World and Davey von Bohlen of the Promise Ring. I had the idea to pair these guys after seeing a bunch of “best of emo” lists floating around the internet ether lately, and it reminded me of the heady days of the late ‘90s and early 2000s, and how many fond memories I have of those times. I saw the Promise Ring and Jimmy Eat World plenty of times back then; full disclosure: I was then and am now friends with the guys in the Promise Ring. It occurred to me that while the two bands had been on similar trajectories back then, that they diverged right around 20 years ago in a really interesting way. I figured it’d be fun to reconnect them and see what they had to say about it. The Promise Ring were at the top of the emo heap in the late 1990s, though everybody hated that word with a passion back then. They were early fans o

On this week’s Talkhouse Podcast we’ve got a comedian and a musician who recently joined forces to make a music video: Joe Pera and Dan Wriggins. Joe Pera is a stand-up comedian who’s best known as the star and creator of Joe Pera Talks With You, the Adult Swim TV show about the beautifully modest existence of a middle-school choir instructor in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula. It’s a show unlike anything else on TV, past or present, and it’s a direct reflection of Pera’s unassuming comedic persona: In other words, it’s hard to tell where Joe Pera the character ends and Joe Pera the guy begins. It’s also insightful, weird, and decidedly sweet. And while the show just finished its three-season run recently, it won’t be the last the world sees of Pera. In fact, he’s in the midst of a stand-up tour right now, and you can find dates at joepera.com. Oh, and he also just landed the role of James Bond, which you can hear all about on his recent Seth Meyers appearance. Seems like kind of a big deal. Yet Pera still has tim

On this week’s Talkhouse Podcast, we’ve got what might seem at first to be an unusual pairing, but that has its genesis in some serious fandom: Taylor Bennett and Matt Johnson. Taylor Bennett is a musician, entrepreneur, and community activist who has helped guide the career of his older brother Chance the Rapper while also busting genres on his own records. Bennett is a restless musician, rarely content to make the same moves twice. He raps and sings, and has proudly been sample-free on his last few records. A few years back, he released Be Yourself, a manifesto of sorts that championed inclusivity and positivity—he also told the world around the same time that he’s proudly bisexual. For this year’s Coming of Age, Bennett once again found inspiration in all different kinds of music, even bringing in some guests from various areas on the musical spectrum. One guest he was particularly excited to work with was Matt Johnson of Matt and Kim, the New York indie duo behind some of the past two decades’ most invigo

On this week's Talkhouse Podcast we’ve paired up a couple of old friends and onetime tourmates, Sharon Van Etten and Jonathan Meiburg. This pairing was especially fun for me, since I had the pleasure of putting these two together in a different context many years ago, when I was editor of The A.V. Club: Sharon and Jonathan performed an amazing version of the Tom Petty/Stevie Nicks duet “Stop Draggin’ My Heart Around” for the site’s A.V. Undercover series. Seeing their faces together brought back that fun memory, and it was great seeing them reconnect. Van Etten is a singer and songwriter who’s been making records for the past decade plus, growing and changing and taking chances in exactly the way you hope truly talented people will. Her amazing early records were quietly intense, very confessional affairs, but she burst from the seams with subsequent releases. In 2019, she released Remind Me Tomorrow, which brought in bigger sounds and colors and an entirely different kind of confidence to her songwriting and

This week we’re revisiting a Talkhouse episode that was originally released in October of 2020, when perhaps you missed it because you had other things on your mind. It happens. This one features a great chat between two women at different phases in their careers: Carly Rae Jepsen and mxmtoon. You might recognize mxmtoon’s name from her podcast 365 Days, which is part of the Talkhouse Podcast Network. Speaking of, did you know we have a network full of other great shows, including Aquarium Drunkard Transmissions, Sing for Science, Craig Finn’s brand new podcast That’s How I Remember It, and What Had Happened Was with Open Mike Eagle? We do! Anyway, just before this episode, Carly Rae and mxmtoon had just collaborated on a track called “Ok on your own,” and they dove right into a great conversation about songwriting and much, much more. Check it out, and we’ll be back with a brand new episode next week!   To celebrate Carly Rae Jepsen and mxmtoon's rad collab track "ok on your own," we paired the pop stars for

On this Talkhouse Podcast, we’ve got one of those chats that feels like it’s going to lead to something bigger down the road: Jonathan Davis and Danny Brown. Neither of these guys probably needs an introduction, but here goes anyway: Jonathan Davis is the frontman of the band Korn, which basically invented a sound and subsequent genre about 30 years ago. I’m not sure if people still say “nu metal,” but whatever you want to call it, it never really seemed to leave the cultural zeitgeist once it took hold. Korn always seemed to have a wider variety of influences than some of their peers, taking bits and pieces from goth, metal, and hip-hop to make a strange new brew. They’ve released an impressive 14 albums, taking stylistic turns like 2011’s The Path of Totality, which incorporated dubstep and drum-and-bass elements. The band’s latest is Requiem, which was written and recorded during Covid’s enforced ban on touring. It’s a bit of a return to their classic sound, and it’s gotten incredibly positive reviews from

On this week’s Talkhouse Podcast we’ve got a pair of musicians who both suffer from the effects of LSD—that’s lead singer disease—Stuart Murdoch and Ramesh Srivastava. Ramesh was and is now again the lead singer and chief creative force behind the Austin, Texas band Voxtrot, which burned bright but maybe too quick in the early 2000s. They released a series of rapturously received EPs and one LP that were beloved by fans of deeply British institutions like Sarah Records and The Smiths. But the band had split by 2010, and Ramesh went on to release a pair of solo albums that didn’t quite have the impact his band did. For a while, he was content to leave Voxtrot in the past, but gathering material for two reissues gave him the spark to get thing going again. The next few months will see the release of both Early Music—which gathers the band’s beloved EPs—and Cut from the Stone, which features rarities and B-sides. And then, like some unstoppable force of nature, Voxtrot will tour the U.S. again. Dates can be foun

On this week’s Talkhouse Podcast we’ve got a pair of songwriters who are meeting for the first time, which we haven’t had in an episode in quite a while. Martin Courtney and Tim Darcy. Until recently, Darcy was the frontman of the band Ought, which released three fantastic, brainy art-punk albums from their home base of Montreal—despite the fact that Darcy is, in fact, “secretly American.” Ought split up pre-pandemic but that wasn’t really public news until the announcement of the existence of Darcy’s new band, Cola, which he started just a couple of years ago along with Ought bassist Ben Stidworthy and Weather Station/US Girls drummer Evan Cartwright. Just last month, Cola released their debut album, Deep In View, and it feels like a sort of back-to-basics take on their old band—but still fresh and exciting. Darcy is a guy who takes his lyrics seriously, and though he clearly had a great time making the record, there’s a darkness to it that recalls the best post-punk and trebly art-rock of the past 40 years,

Hello Talkhouse listeners and readers. We’ve got a special treat for you this week: Instead of the usual Talkhouse Podcast, we’re featuring the debut episode of a podcast called That’s How I Remember It. Craig Finn, as you hopefully already know, is the singer of The Hold Steady as well as a solo artist. He’s got an excellent new solo record called A Legacy of Rentals, and it inspired him to start a new podcast that explores the intersection of memory and creativity. The Talkhouse gang helped him put it together, and we’re happy to present the first episode here. If you like it, which you undoubtedly will, please subscribe! Here it is, the first episode of That’s How I Remember It, featuring Craig in conversation with Patterson Hood of Drive-By Truckers. Enjoy, and we’ll be back to regular Talkhouse episodes next week! Subscribe to That’s How I Remember It to catch future episodes with Brian Koppelman, Fred Armisen, and many more.

Hello Talkhouse listeners; this week we’re resurfacing a talk featuring a frequent Talkhouse contributor who seems to be having yet another career moment: Michelle Zauner, aka. Japanese Breakfast. You may have caught Zauner and her band on the season finale of SNL, or playing your local theater, or on every playlist worth a dang. This talk, which originally ran on June 3, 2021—around the time the latest Japanese Breakfast album, Jubilee, came out—features Zauner in conversation with Rostam, the musician and producer best known as part of Vampire Weekend. If you like what you hear, there are two more Zauner-led Talkhouse Podcasts in the archives, one with Alex Cameron, and the other with Rachel Goswell of Slowdive. --------  Today’s Talkhouse Podcast started with a little bit of serendipity in the form of album release dates: Both of our guests, Michelle Zauner of Japanese Breakfast and producer/musician/former Vampire Weekend guy Rostam, have excellent records coming out on June 4. They’re also fans of each o

On this week’s Talkhouse Podcast we’ve got a pair of electronic-music duos whose histories, as you’ll hear, are intimately intertwined: The Knocks and Sofi Tukker. The Knocks—consisting of James Patterson and Ben Ruttner—just released their third album, and it’s once again dancefloor-ready and heavy on the collaborations with indie icons. It’s called History, and it’s their first since 2018’s New York Narcotic, which featured the massive Foster the People collaboration “Ride or Die.” The guys used the extra time granted them by the pandemic to refocus and make History exactly what they wanted it, and it shows. The album includes guest spots from Cold War Kids, Cannons, and another jam with Foster the People. Check out “Slow Song,” which features Dragonette. Speaking of features and collaborations, The Knocks have worked with Sofi Tukker—the duo consisting of Sophie Hawley-Weld and Tucker Halpern—a bunch over the years, and as you’ll hear in this conversation, Sofi Tukker might not even be a chart-topping outf

On this week’s Talkhouse Podcast we’ve got a pair of musicians from the UK who recently collaborated for the first time, Dana Margolin and Joseph Mount. Mount has been the driving force behind Metronomy since 1999, and he’s found success not only with a series of winning electro-pop records, but also by remixing tracks for big names like Franz Ferdinand, Gorillaz, and Lady Gaga. If you’re unfamiliar with Metronomy, a good place to start is 2008’s Nights Out, which is a sort of concept album about, as you might guess, a night out. But Metronomy’s catalog is intriguingly all over the map; the band’s latest is called Small World, and it features a much gentler side of Mount’s songwriting personality overall. It also features a stunning duet with the other side of today’s conversation, Dana Margolin of Porridge Radio. Like Metronomy, Porridge Radio really started out as a solo project but grew into more of a band situation—though each is still the brainchild of one person. Margolin started recorded under the Porr

On this week’s Talkhouse Podcast, we’ve got a pair of guests who I can call legends without hesitation: Shirley Manson and John Doe. Doe is a founding member of the insanely influential punk band X, which started life way back in 1977 Los Angeles. They were part of a scene that leaned into hardcore punk, but X set itself apart by sneaking elements of country and Americana into their blistering records and live sets. And the chemistry between Doe and his co-lead singer Exene Cervenka was legendary: In fact, it still is. Though the band has split a few times over the years, they’re still actively rocking all these years later, and in fact released a really great record in 2020, called Alphabetland—it was their first in about 20 years. Doe has also been an active solo artist as well, and he’s got a great new album coming out May 20, 2022: It’s called Fables in a Foreign Land, and it’s a concept record whose tales take place in the 1890s. It’s dark and folky, and includes some songwriting help from a bunch of ama

On this week’s Talkhouse Podcast we’ve got a legendary guitarist and songwriter in conversation with one of our favorite repeat guests: Mike Campbell and Margo Price. Campbell is best known as Tom Petty’s right-hand man, a position he proudly held for five decades until Petty’s untimely death in 2017. Together they wrote some of the Heartbreakers’ best known songs, including “Refugee,” “Here Comes My Girl,” and “You Got Lucky.” Campbell also produced a bunch of Petty solo and Heartbreakers songs, and has contributed his playing and writing skills to lots of other artists, too. I was surprised to learn just recently that Campbell co-wrote Don Henley’s massive “Boys of Summer,” too. Who knew? But even before the end of the Heartbreakers’ run, Campbell would spend time with his side band, the Dirty Knobs, where he not only plays guitar but also sings and writes the lyrics. The band recently released their second studio album, External Combustion, which is where today’s other guest comes in. Margo Price is a fire

On this week's Talkhouse Podcast we’ve got two leading lights of modern psychedelic indie-rock, Melody Prochet and Lila Ramani. Prochet is the creative force behind Melody’s Echo Chamber, whose evocative name is taken from a dream she once had. Her debut album under the name, which Prochet recorded with help from Tame Impala’s Kevin Parker, was released in 2012. She has since released two more full-lengths while bouncing around the planet and raising children. The new one, Emotional Eternal, was partly inspired by Prochet’s move from Paris to the idyllic quiet of the Swiss Alps. It features assists from members of the Swedish band Dungen, though it’s more spare and stripped down than that might suggest—and more spare than her past work, too. There are bits of psych in there, along with echoes of bands like Stereolab. Lila Ramani of the New York band Crumb shares some of those influences, and Melody Prochet’s music influenced what Ramani wanted to do in her band, too. Crumb got going while its members were sti

On this week’s Talkhouse Podcast, we’ve got a lovefest between two musicians who came together to create one of the year’s most electrifying records: Eno Williams of Ibibio Sound Machine and Joe Goddard of Hot Chip. Ibibio Sound Machine has been mashing up sounds for just under a decade now, blending elements of Afrobeat and electronic music into a fierce combination that inspires dancing, chanting, and sweating—at least when they’re allowed to hit the road. Williams is a force of nature on their newest album, Electricity. She was born in London but grew up in Nigeria—specifically the Ibibio region—and was exposed to those incredible regional sounds before moving back to London for school and steeping herself in the electronic music happening there. Electricity captures her vision pretty perfectly, thanks at least in part to today’s other guest, Joe Goddard of Hot Chip. As you’ll hear in this chat, Goddard was a fan of Ibibio Sound Machine, having seen one of their incredible live performances at a festival,

On this week’s Talkhouse Podcast, we’ve got two veterans of ‘90s rock who went on to form bands that referenced air travel in their name and whose biggest bands both start with Jaw: Blake Schwarzenbach of Jawbreaker and J. Robbins of Jawbox. Sorry if that was confusing, I’ll clear it up for you. Blake Schwarzenbach was and is the singer and guitarist of the band Jawbreaker, which had its initial run from 1986 until 1996, at which time they acrimoniously splintered after longtime fans turned their backs on 1995’s Dear You, mostly because these dogmatic listeners were mad that the band had signed to a major label. These things were a big deal then, which seems kind of quaint now. History was incredibly kind to both Jawbreaker and Dear You, so much so that in 2017 they reformed to headline Chicago’s massive Riot Fest, and they’ve been playing together on and off ever since. In the intervening years, Schwarzenbach also played in other great bands, most notably Jets to Brazil, which is what I was referencing earli

On this week’s Talkhouse Podcast, we’ve got a pair of Norwegian friends who both have excellent new records out this year: Sondre Lerche and AURORA.  Lerche started writing gorgeous pop songs while he was still a teen in the suburbs of Bergen, Norway. It wasn’t too long before his music started finding its way out into the world, and he’s released a bunch of albums since the early 2000s. Though clearly starting from a pop background—his songs are incredibly catchy—Lerche has nimbly moved through various permutations over the years, flirting with jazzy sounds, more intimate acoustic numbers, touches of Brazilian sounds, and the occasional out-and-out new wavey rock. Not long before the pandemic, Lerche recorded Patience, which he intended to tour behind, but instead he ended up moving back to Norway from Los Angeles and recording another excellent album, called Avatars of Love. For this one, his tenth, Lerche recruited a bunch of friends to help out, including another Norwegian star from a younger generation,

I’m thrilled to share a special preview of the Broken Record podcast from Pushkin Industries. In honor of the Red Hot Chili Peppers new album, Unlimited Love, the band members sit with their legendary producer Rick Rubin to share exclusive insights about the band’s dynamic. In this preview, Rick, John, and Anthony discuss John rejoining the band after a 10 year hiatus and how right it felt to be playing together again. You can hear the full episode, and more from Broken Record at https://podcasts.pushkin.fm/brokenrecordrhcp?sid=talkhouse. 

On this week’s Talkhouse Podcast we’ve got a pair of songwriters who share a serious dedication to the craft, a slightly sardonic outlook on life, and deep, incredible catalogs: Neil Hannon and Ben Folds. Neil Hannon is from Northern Ireland, and it’s safe to say that he and the band that he’s fronted for the past 30 years, the Divine Comedy, are a bit better known in Europe than in the States. Under the Divine Comedy name, Hannon has released a dozen delightfully clever albums, the latest of which is 2019’s Office Politics. If you’re a newbie and that seems far too much to catch up on, you’re in luck: Just this year, the Divine Comedy released a fantastic greatest-hits set called Charmed Life. Hannon has also kept himself busy over the years writing an opera of sorts, as well as composing the theme songs to two beloved British sitcoms, The IT Crowd and Father Ted—the latter show comes up at the beginning of this conversation. Another thing you’ll hear Hannon reference in this chat is “Wonka money”—he’s refer