Get It Together: Recent Episodes
Lauren Denitzio
A queer-feminist perspective on punk/indie/pop music, visual art, etc. along with interviews on building a creative life.
It’s a little ranty, pretty queer, and my outlet to earnestly tell you about the things I love.
getittogether.substack.com
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You might know Chris Gethard from a lot of things. From standup comedy to his off-broadway show turned HBO special Career Suicide, to the podcast Beautiful/Anonymous, to the undefinable Chris Gethard Show, to appearances on shows like The Office and Parks and Recreation, he’s pretty much everywhere. I even saw him front a Smiths cover band that was, no matter your current opinion of Morrissey, f*g GREAT. So when I thought about who I wanted to talk to about their creative process and sustaining a creative career these days, I knew we had to talk.
Chris and I have known each other for a long time, and this conversation eventually dissolved into friends reminiscing about the before times. We come from very similar roots in New Brunswick Basement Shows and Chris brings up accurate points about coming from the great state of New Jersey. Jokes aside, the insight and perspective he shared are really valuable. I think Chris is not only incredibly talented but also a great example of what sticking to your own values and goals will get you. If you enjoy this conversation you should absolutely read his book, Lose Well.
This conversation sort of sounds like his podcast, if only because his audio is near perfect whereas I often sound like I’m calling from a landline. I’m still getting my Zoom recording sea legs, so bear with me. Thanks, folks!
ICYMI, Worriers has a new shirt available! And for those of you who have asked, yes I’m going to review Happiest Season. Stay tuned!
A list of interviews previously published in Get It Together:
Laura Jane Grace of Against Me!Jeff Rosenstock of BTMI, Craig of the Creek, etc.Marisa Dabice from Mannequin PussyAuthor and pizza lover Colin HagendorfDavid Combs, aka Spoonboy, from Bad MovesSarah Tudzin from Illuminati Hotties
You can follow Worriers on Instagram | Twitter | FacebookYou can see my artwork on my website and on Instagram.
I also have a PO Box if you’d like to send or share things:PO Box 4684, Valley Village, CA 91617
Subscribe at getittogether.substack.com
This week I have another interview on the creative process, making things, etc. with Laura Jane Grace of Against Me! As I started doing these interviews again, I was glad to have the excuse to ask her about her brand new solo record Stay Alive.
I’ve admired Laura’s songwriting for a very long time, and somehow she also produced the first Worriers record, so we’ve talked a lot about songwriting at this point. This was a fun way to catch up on that and talk about her new record, the lengths she went to record at home without bothering her neighbors, and how much work actually goes into live streaming (spoiler: entirely too much work imho).
This was recorded on Zoom and I’m happy to share it here as a podcast-ish thing!
If you enjoy this conversation, you can also listen to the interview we did for All Songs Considered a few years ago too where you can hear me get called out on national radio for coincidentally having a song with the same chord progression as Baby, I’m An Anarchist.
If you’d like to receive this newsletter in your inbox, you can subscribe for free below. Paid subscriptions with extra content and snail mail are also available and help keep this thing going. Feel free to forward and share this post. Thanks for reading/listening!
A list of interviews previously published in Get It Together:
Jeff Rosenstock of BTMI, Craig of the Creek, etc.Marisa Dabice from Mannequin PussyAuthor and pizza lover Colin HagendorfDavid Combs, aka Spoonboy, from Bad MovesSarah Tudzin from Illuminati Hotties
You can follow Worriers on Instagram | Twitter | Facebook
I also have a PO Box if you’d like to send or share things: PO Box 4684, Valley Village, CA 91617
Subscribe at getittogether.substack.com
If you’d like to receive this newsletter in your inbox, you can subscribe for free below. Paid subscriptions with extra content and snail mail are also available and help keep this thing going. Feel free to forward and share this post. Thanks for reading/listening!
Over the past year, I’ve interviewed several friends about their creative process. I haven’t interviewed anyone since COVID hit (what is making art anymore?) but if there’s one person I wanted to talk to this year, it’s Jeff Rosenstock. I’m going to go out on a limb and assume that most of you are at least slightly familiar with his punk and ska-adjacent music, or the soundtrack he composes for Craig of the Creek. If not, I think you’d like it!
We’ve been buds for a long time and a couple of years ago Jeff interviewed ME in Brooklyn (for his newsletter?) but that chat hasn’t made it anywhere because we talked for so long that no one in their right mind would transcribe that for fun. I thought it would only be fair for me to follow up that conversation in our new home of Los Angeles at one of my favorite places, Razorcake HQ. Big thanks to Todd Taylor and Razorcake for letting us use their podcasting studio. Of course, I forgot to take a photo that day, so the one above is from a show we played together at House of Independents in New Jersey.
I’m clearly not a podcast host, and this is really half interview, half two friends talking about stuff, but hopefully it comes through that I really appreciate Jeff’s approach to making music. We discuss such urgent questions as what are we doing with our lives? is it possible to write a positive song right now? and if you release a record during lockdown, does it truly exist?
Enjoy!
Here’s Jeff’s appearance on Late Night with Seth Meyers, as mentioned in the interview:
A list of interviews previously published in Get It Together:
Marisa Dabice from Mannequin PussyAuthor and pizza lover Colin HagendorfDavid Combs, aka Spoonboy, from Bad MovesSarah Tudzin from Illuminati Hotties
You can follow Worriers on Instagram | Twitter | Facebook
I also have a PO Box if you’d like to send or share things: PO Box 4684, Valley Village, CA 91617
Subscribe at getittogether.substack.com
I usually save covers and other recordings for the paid version but here’s a home recording anyway!
If you want to hear more things like this along with process videos, tutorials, and advance access to limited edition stuff, please consider subscribing for $5/month. All subscriptions support Worriers and my art practice - a huge help now that I can’t go on tour for quite a while. You can see the full breakdown of subscription levels here. Telling your friends is also great.
I’ve been spending a lot of time over the past few weeks recording songs that other people wrote with my bandmates, flexing my mediocre home recording skills, and singing in my closet surrounded by blankets. I’m looking forward to sharing those songs with y’all in the coming months and to spending more time writing and recording things that maybe no one will ever hear. No pressure. Completely for fun.
To transition back to that mindset, I recorded the above cover of Guided By Voices - Best of Jill Hives a few days ago. I’m familiar with maybe 5% of the massive GBV catalog, but this is one of my favorites. It’s also a favorite of my friend Fid, who I’m pretty sure has a mental list of everything Robert Pollard has ever released. Guided By Voices are one of those bands that are truly daunting to dive into, and the question “which album do I start with?” will receive 20 different emphatic suggestions. My vote goes to Alien Lanes but I know next to nothing here.
Fid has been the one to slowly but surely explain to me more and more of the Guided By Voices story and I’m only kinda sorta just now beginning to understand. We have a tentative plan to sit down and record a conversation where we really get into it - a conversation I will share here - but we just haven’t made it happen yet. In the meantime, I’m sharing this cover and giving folks some time to play Guided By Voices catchup.
If you’re looking for some new music by an incredibly prolific songwriter, Fid’s band Hatrabbits just released a new song Fables of the Reconstruction from their upcoming 2xLP album Cognitive Dissidents on Rad Girlfriend & Underground Communique Records. It comes out November 20, 2020, and you can pre-order a copy here.
Today I also came across this video for the Worriers song Yes All Cops made by Yoko Oso. I’ve always wanted to make a found-footage video for this song, so the fact that someone else just went ahead and did it with a drag performance really made my weekend. If you like where this song is coming from, please check out #8toabolition to find out what police abolition actually means, and ways that your community can invest in care, not cops.
Hang in there, everyone. Please wear a mask and figure out how you’re voting.
Subscribe at getittogether.substack.com