Hello Darling Ones,

While I was doing my taxes last night one of my twitter pals expressed an interest in my Top 10 Music Memoirs List. Because the only two things I need to do are make potato salad and work on The Beast, making this list is what they like to call productive procrastination.

Before we get to the list, I broadened the category. I’ve read a lot of memoirs by musicians. A lot. Maybe forty? Fifty? I’ve read twenty-six memoirs just by female musicians. Tonight I’ll be starting Crying in H Mart by Michelle Zauner. I’m on the library’s hold list for Brandi Carlile’s Broken Horses.

I’ve also read memoirs by men too. From Keith Richards and Pete Townshend to Bob Mould and Ben Folds.

Here’s the thing, a lot of musician memoirs are shockingly similar. The only thing that really changes are the dates. So yeah, I broadened the category to include nonfiction books about music or musicians.

One more caveat: I did not include Trouble Boys Bob Mehr’s biography of The Replacements because it is fucking boring. Scandalous! But if you really want to know where everyone who ever met the ‘Mats was born and where they went to high school, this book is for you. Did you know Tommy Stinson’s grandma was from Shakopee? You would if you read Trouble Boys.

Also missing is Michael Azerad’s Our Band Could Be Your Life, which I need to revisit. It’s been nearly twenty-years since I read it, so my memory may be fuzzy, but I’m pretty sure there are absolutely zero women in the book. None. I know none of the bands featured include women, so it doesn’t make the list.

I only mention these two books because they’re the ones I expect to get the most flack for not including. Also, one more preemptive shut-up. Yes, I know about Lester Bangs. And Robert Christgau. And Greil Marcus.

Wanna know what else I know? Men have been writing about and controlling the story of rock & roll since its inception. They’re the ones who choose what is good, what is bad, what is lauded, and what is forgotten. That is some bullshit. As I always say when someone gets all horny about The Beatles or The Stones being the greatest of all time, “It’s not hard to be the best when you only compete against other white men.”

So, now, on with the show!

1. Out of the Vinyl Deeps: Ellen Willis on Rock Music by Ellen Willis

This book changed the way I think about and consume rock & roll. I read in the spring of 2012 and it caused a paradigm shift in my soul. I often joke that I’m unsure about God, but I believe in Ellen Willis and thus she is my deity of choice. What I love about her writing is the social and political context she gives the music she writes about. And it’s so refreshing to get that context through a feminist point of view (rather than the male sexual gaze)

2. Kicking & Dreaming: A Story of Heart, Soul, and Rock and Roll by Ann & Nancy Wilson

This one is so damn fun. I love that Ann and Nancy tell the story of Heart. I love that we learn there is another Wilson sister who is not in the band. I love the stories of pre-grunge Seattle and touring with ALLLL those dudes. I love that they talk about sexism and fatphobia and being in Seattle right before grunge broke. But my favorite is they are the first of all the women I’ve read who talked about wanting to be a Beatle and not marry a Beatle (this is a recurring theme in a lot of memoirs by women).

3. Rat Girl by Kristen Hersh

Quoting myself here: “If you’ve ever felt music was your religion or your life or had a deep, confusing, inexplicable relationship with Rock & Roll you should read this book. While I believe Hersh’s relationship with music is wholly unique to her, she writes about it in such a way that it gives those of us who have yet to find the words hope that those words are still out there.” She has a new memoir out too. My cup overflows.

4. Just Kids by Patti Smith

Come on! This probably the most lauded, awarded music memoir of all time. Justifiably so.

5. It’s a Long Story: My Life by Willie Nelson

Wanna know what’s so good about Willie Nelson’s memoir? He leaves out all the boring shit. This doesn’t happen a lot when men write their stories (see: Townshend, Richards, Mould). It’s folksy as fuck and has so many fun facts! Charlie Pride sent him his first email! Tons of ’em about “Pancho & Lefty” I won’t spoil for you. It’s a super fun read.

6. Let’s Go (So We Can Get Back): A Memoir of Recording and Discording with Wilco, Etc. by Jeff Tweedy

Hi. I feel like I have not shut up about this book since I read it in March. I talk about it a lot, almost as much as the Sylvia Plath biography. This one is such a great read because Tweedy is funny, self-deprecating, a little catty, totally vulnerable, and smart.

7. My Own Devices: True Stories from the Road on Music, Science, and Senseless Love by Dessa

You know that sentence that I wrote about the Jeff Tweedy memoir? Same goes for the Dessa minus the catty but make the smart, super smart. I’ve read this one three times. There’s a passage where she writes about singing with Aby Wolf that when I read it I get goosebumps and when I talk about it to people my throat clogs with tears. It’s that beautiful.

8. Queens of Noise: The Real Story of the Runaways by Evelyn McDonnell

I fell in love with Joan Jett when I was eight or ten or whatever age it was I discovered her cover of “Crimson & Clover.” I fell hard. So hard that at my 40th birthday party, childhood BFF Jodi Hanson glared at my cousin Laurie and asked, “Were you the one with the “Crimson & Clover” forty-five?” I played the song a lot. This biography of The Runaways blew my mind. There was so much I didn’t know and, again, McDonnell gave me so much context for the band I didn’t have before.

9. Nobody Ever Asked Me about the Girls: Women, Music and Fameby Lisa Robinson

This book is a lot. There’s an entire chapter about rape and sexual assault and how that played out in some women’s music. There’s also chapters about marriage and sex and babies and Lisa Robinson never fails to point out the hypocrisy in how men never get asked these kinds of questions. Go for the Madonna-snark and stay for the keen insight on how female musicians are portrayed in the media.

10. Janis: Her Life and Music by Holly George-Warren

I think this book was so revelatory because it was the first time I experienced Janis outside of the male gaze. George-Warren presents her as a flawed, complicated woman with all the care her story needed and never seemed to get.

I could probably make a list of Top 10 Fiction Music Books, and I might.

For now, it’s time to make the potato salad,
Jodi

The post The COVID Diaries: Top 10 Nonfiction Music Books appeared first on I Will Dare.

So, Darling Ones,

Still no flower, which is okay. I’m putting my money on that baby bursting forth on March 3rd.

I got a lot on my mind today, as I mentioned in yesterday’s letter, so all I have is a small list of things that delighted me today.

• There are SO MANY donuts in my house right now.
• When I folded and put away the laundry every sock had a mate. All of them. There’s no random sock on top of my dresser waiting for me to find where it’s mate is. They are all happily coupled, so at least something in this joint is.
• I’m obsessed with Lyle Lovett’s song If I had a Boat. I just learned of this song’s existence the other day and now I have to listen to it three or four times a day. Something about the And if I had a boat I’d go out on the ocean, and if I had a pony I’d ride him on my boat makes me grin.
• I spent a lot of time with the warm sun on my face while sitting next to a window that was opened about an inch even though it was only 36º.
• During last night’s Mad Men binge a bearded Stan started to recite Edgar Allan Poe’s “Annabel Lee” and it made me tingly in my sex parts. Beards do it for me. So do men who recite poetry from memory. And somewhere in the space-time continuum 15-year-old me is all, “I KNEW HOT GUYS WOULD LIKE POE” because Poe is her favorite at the moment.
• I made Greek meatballs today which is gonna solve my dinner problem for the next few days.
• Oh! I won a test pressing of Dessa’s record Chime (which I bought the other day because I wasn’t as sad as usual & she was selling signed copies to commemorate the record’s third birthday and also I love Dessa).
• I finished reading Dear Edward, which one of the Tea Ladies recommended. It was very sad and sweet and made me cry a few times.
• Benjamina, the weeping fig, is pushing out new leaves which isn’t as exciting or dramatic as Phyllis blooming, but still makes me happy because I almost lost Benjamina when I replanted her.
• Did I mention the donuts?

That’s all, folks!
Jodi

The post The COVID Diaries: Donuts & Other Delights appeared first on I Will Dare.

Hello Darling Ones,

Do you remember the TTHM? He was a tall, tall handsome man who was much older than I was. Maybe 14 years older? We went out on two dates. I think he might have been the first man I ever kissed who was taller than I was.

I was pathetically smitten and he was not at all attracted to me. He liked me, but he didn’t like me like me. We went on to have a strange, many-yeared not exactly platonic but not romantic friendship that faded away a dozen years ago.

He’s on my mind today because he once criticized this here blog and the writer of it because I reported on my life like a journalist and never took the time to process and analyze it. Or something like that. Rude. True? Kinda. But still rude.

This is on my mind because I didn’t report anything yesterday and now my brain is a hot mess of zooming thoughts that I cannot process because I can’t hold onto one for very long and make sense of it. Also, processing shit takes a long time and a lot of energy. I haven’t even processed my entire relationship with him and that happened in my thirties.

Even though I haven’t left the house more than once a week for all of 2020 and rarely spend time in the presence of other human beings a lot happened yesterday. I was too busy being sad and tired to write about anything, and thus the zooming thoughts and emotion hangover.

I was sad because a bunch of trolls landed in my inbox who were mad, I think, that I had the audacity to get my girl germs all over their music. Someone on facebook linked to my Westerberg site and I got a bunch of emails where men repeatedly told me I was fat, ugly, dumb, and, my favorite, an unfuckable whore. Listen dudes, I can’t be both. Yes, I am large and contain multitudes but when it comes to that last slight you have to pick one. That’s the way logic works.

It was like the Jimmy Kimmel incident all over again, only I was already sad and weak so I cried about it all day. It’s hard when strangers affirm all of your very worst thoughts about yourself. Logically, I know they are cranky ol’ misogynists taking their bullshit out on me, but emotionally I’m all How do they know? How did they figure it out? Why is it so obvious?

Aside: This is why I get so fucking mad when all you see are rock dudes talking to or writing about other rock dudes. They make music a stew of toxic masculinity where women are not just unwelcome but actively abused for trying to participate. Fuck all the way off and rot in hell for eternity you fucking dickbags, especially the men who THINK they’re feminist allies but still only discuss music with other men.

So yeah, yesterday was a bad scene. I did not help matters at all by engaging in all manners of self harm from googling “Is there a book to teach me how to fall in love*” to eating instant mashed potatoes and pizza rolls for dinner. I was a fat, ugly, dumb, unfuckable whore mess. I was so bad that I even cried on the phone to a friend who decided to take one for the team and cheer me up. I had never cried in front of this friend before and, ugh.

However, the call did cheer me up and today I’ve done nothing but self care. I stayed in bed until close to noon because I have the emotion hangover. Once I dragged my weary bones outta bed I made myself some delicious French toast and ate it while reading Dessa’s My Own Devices for the third or fourth time all the while chanting this is self-care, this is self-care to myself. Then I spent the rest of the day thinking and writing and thinking and listening to Phoebe Bridgers’ “Stranger in Alps” on repeat.

I also wrapped the last of the Christmas gifts I’m gonna wrap and it was, coincidentally, Dessa’s “Sound the Bells record. I’ve already made big plans to get drunk on New Year’s Eve and listen to this record.

Bruised but not beaten,
Jodi

P.S. I bought candles with my initials on them because I’m a giant nerd and they were $5 at Target.

*I’m developing a theory that I don’t know how to fall in love or be in love. It was inspired by re-reading Dessa’s book. However, since I’m not a total fucking idiot I’ve decided to wait until I’m not so vulnerable to do more research.

The post The COVID Diaries: Emotional Hangover appeared first on I Will Dare.

Sometimes I have zero regrets about missing a day. Yesterday was one such day. Mostly, because I realized I’m the only one who really cares. Also, it’s okay to give myself a break and recover from the emotional upheaval of Christmas.

Last night was the Dirty Santa edition of Rock & Roll Bookclub, which really is our finest gathering of the year. We eat breakfast for dinner, drink Bloody Marys (at least BFK and I do), and play games — most notably Dirty Santa. We keep the limit low ($20) to force more creativity and it usually works. This year there was a lot of booze.

I designed the yearly coffee mug and made a Red Owl basket to put it in, and threw in some tea towels (more on that later). It was a highly sought-after gift, stolen a few times. Everyone always wants to be the giver of the most stolen gift.

So, I won on that account, but the real win was stealing the signed copy of Dessa’s My Own Devices from Heather. It might even be my favorite book of 2018. I read a lot though, so I still have to go through the list before making the final determination.

The post Day 158 of 200: All I Do is Win at Dirty Santa appeared first on I Will Dare.

My original goal was to read 60 books in 2018. I upped the number to 70 this summer. I’m currently in the midst of book 74 (The Witch Elm by Tana French). Amazing what you do when you long to escape, well, 2018.

Other 2018 goals: replace an old chair (check), revise Rock & Roll Loudmouth (ha!), paying off credit card (check), and write a short story (haha!).

In honor of reaching this reading goal, here’s some books to read when you’re in the mood for. . .

Smarts, music, and heartache — My Own Devices by Dessa. Memoir/essays by the Minnesota rapper/smarty pants. This book was so charming it even got me to come around on her coyness about naming her ex.

Cute, slightly naughty fun — Erotic Stories for Punjabi Widows by Balli Kaur Jaswal. These old ladies are dirty. It’s hot, funny, and sweet.

Messed up families & a riveting POV — Baby Teeth by Zoje Stage. I wish more people would read this so I had more people to say, “Wasn’t that so messed up?” with.

Super-original tale of late-stage capitalism and zombies – Severance by Ling Ma. It’s impossible to overstate how much I loathe zombies. And yet. . . this one is brilliant. I don’t throw that word around lightly.

The post Day 87 of 200: I Met My Yearly Reading Goal Already appeared first on I Will Dare.