Dear Darling Ones,

The best thing about being a work from home freelancer is that it affords me very much time to daydream. Instead of commuting to work, I daydream. Instead of getting a case of the Mondays, I let my mind wander through my favorite subjects: books, music, and making out with men. Rather than attend meetings, I daypanic about imminent climate disaster. This last one is zero percent fun.

Today while arguing with my Twitter pals about the unevenness of Paul Westerberg’s 2003 record “Come Feel Me Tremble,” I wished for the 82,198,591st time that I had more women to talk about The Replacements with. This is not a slight on my much-beloved dude Westernerds. I adore them, but I still wish ‘Mats fandom was more female-friendly and that once in awhile a woman got to be an expert on the band.

At the same time I thought, wouldn’t an all-female tribute to The Replacements be the greatest thing to ever happen to rock & roll? This kind of tribute with zero dudes involved would be so excellent. It would introduce girls to the band. It would let women talk about The ‘Mats in a way that had zero to do with wanking off about the shitty production of “Tim” or about who the cute one was/is. And for sure a woman would get to write the liner notes because we’re done with letting one dude be the ‘Mats expert.

I was a little surprised how quickly my imaginary track list came together. Here it is

Angel Olsen, Can’t Hardly Wait

My brain started with Olsen because she recently covered Safety Dance and she has a covers EP coming out in a few weeks.

Phoebe Bridgers, If Only You Were Lonely

She already covered Here Comes a Regular at First Ave a few years ago, so just imagine how much she would slay this one.

Neko Case, Bastards of Young

Something about Case’s song “Man” made me think she’d do an interesting take on this one.

Lucinda Williams, Achin’ to Be

The first time I saw Westerberg at the Guthrie in 2000 he sang the last line she’s achin to be, just like Lucinda and me. So this one is obvious.

Amanda Shires, Within Your Reach

The synthy intro on the original made me think of Shires’ “Parking Lot Pirouette.”

Lydia Loveless, Sixteen Blue

Loveless does that aching, conflicted, longing thing so well.

Joan Jett, I Bought a Headache

She already did “Androgynous.” Just imagine her growling giving me a eight dollar and fifty cent, I bought a headache.

Liz Phair, Answering Machine

I think Liz could interpret this sad song into something kind of sexy and I’m mad that I can’t hear it right now.

Laura Marling, Unsatisfied

The woman who sings “False Hope” will bring the same plaintive desperation to “Unsatisfied” that Westerberg does.

Japanese Breakfast, Little Mascara

In my head I want her to treat this one just like her “Savage Good Boy.”

Julien Baker, Here Comes a Regular

This cover doesn’t exist as far as I know, but I can hear Baker singing it in my head and it gives me gooebumps. Just imagine the woman who sings I’ll wrap Orion’s belt around my neck and kick the chair out singing You’re like a picture on the fridge that’s never stocked with food
I used to live at home, now I stay at the house. Ugh, I could already cry.

The Linda Lindas, Kids Don’t Follow

These are the young women who sing “Racist, Sexist Boy.”

Morgan Wade, Alex Chilton

I’m pretty new to Wade’s music, and I really like how she sounds on “Wilder Days.” I think she could give Alex a good go.

Kathleen Edwards, Skyway

“Hockey Skates” is lovely and feels Minnesotan (though Edwards is Canadian), kinda like “Skyway.”

Jenny Lewis, Left of the Dial

This one felt really obvious to me.

Waxahatchee, I Will Dare

This is, obviously, the most coveted honor of all. My life needs to hear her sing “I Will Dare” the same way she sings west memphis is on fire in the light of day.

boygenius, Valentine

This was Wolfdogg’s suggestion that was so good I had to include it. Their cover of “Cowboy Take Me Away” is so wonderful you know they’d bring that to “Valentine.”

The Go-Go’s, Kiss Me on the Bus

This was Westernerd Chris’ suggestion that was so good and obvious I’m a little angry I didn’t think of it on my own before he did.

Is this manifesting, Darling Ones? I have put this wish out in the world so now the universe can make it happen.

Dibs on writing the liner notes,
Jodi

The post Playing Makeup, Wearing Guitar: My Dream All-Woman Tribute to The Replacements appeared first on I Will Dare.

Oh Darling Ones,

The very excellent singer and songwriter Phoebe Bridgers broke the Dude Rock Establishment’s collective boners last night and I am annoyed by their fucking bellyaching. Dudes, why you gotta ruin everything all the fucking time?

For those of you who don’t know not only has Phoebe Bridgers released two very excellent records (Stranger in the Alp and Punisher) and one excellent EP with boygenius (Featuring Lucy Dacus and Julien Baker)*, she’s one of the women who came forward about Ryan Adams being a dirtbag. She also has a song about how Eric Clapton sucks (and he does). So, already she’s on the DRE’s list, because how dare she?

Last night Phoebe Bridgers played on Saturday Night Live and as a testament of my admiration for her I stayed downstairs to watch it. I have not watched SNL in a long time because it is not funny. At all. Not even a little bit. It’s cringey in the worst way possible and it embarrasses me that so many talented people can come together to create utter shit.

As Phoebe Bridgers howled through the closing seconds of her last song dressed like an ethereal witchy skeleton with a ribcage made of pearls she took off her guitar and smashed it against the amp. It was glorious. So wonderful and my spinster heart went to bed warm and happy and aglow with the power of rock & roll.

I woke up this morning to discover the broken boners of many men who were upset that Phoebe Bridgers did rock & roll wrong. Why did she smash that guitar? It was a cheap guitar anyway. It was just attention-seeking gimmickry. Boo! She got girl germs all over our dick-swingingest rock & roll move and now what? I mean you put a woman in the Vice Presidency and now they’re smashing guitars on national TV. Where will this end? Doesn’t anyone care about our boners?

And while those dudes are the absolute worst, there are dudes who try to be, um, helpful? They only retweet the more female-friendly tweets of other dudes. Because dudes are the only ones with valid thoughts about rock & roll. And of course there are also the dudes who are all “Phoebe Bridgers? I never heard of her!” Good. Thanks for that information. Nobody fucking cares.

In a small way, I understand. Fragile men are frightened by powerful women, and if those women are being passionate or angry or showing any emotion it scares living shit out of them and they don’t know what to do about it so they try to shut it all down by passing shitty judgements on it.

It’s okay to be afraid. Men scare the shit out of me on a daily basis. You learn to cope.

Here’s the thing dudes, and really all people, if it makes you uncomfortable you can go ahead and shut the fuck up. Think about why seeing a woman on stage smashing a guitar makes you uncomfortable. Maybe ponder your own bias for like 36 seconds before you spout off. Also consider this, maybe that wasn’t meant for you. This will be really hard for dudes to understand because you live in a society catered to your every whim, but not everything is meant for you.

As for me, I loved that shit. I want all the girls to grow and play guitar-smashing rock & roll. I want them all to do whatever the fuck they want to do without having to consider the male gaze.

Dudes, man, knock it off already,
Jodi

*Yes, I know about Better Oblivion Committee. This sentence was getting too long.

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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.

Hello Darling Ones,

I spend roughly six to eight hours a day listening to music. This isn’t an exaggeration. I usually put my headphones on as soon as I’m done with breakfast and don’t take them off until it’s time to make dinner. Sometimes I put them back on after dinner. It’s why 90% of my selfies include headphones, my hair has a permanent headphone divot in it.

My sisters laugh at me because I wear headphones all the time even though I’m the only one here and I won’t disturb anyone with my loud rock & roll music. I like them. I find it nearly impossible to work without headphones on. I blame all those years in corporate America.

After rediscovering The Kooks, I decided to take a stroll through the music I loved in 2006 via my Top 25.

For many, many years I would keep track of the Top 25 most-played songs in my iTunes. It is a wonderful time capsule and as I was perusing 2006, I wished I had kept up with that. I had kinda given up the ghost when I stopped using iTunes in 2012.

Since I only had 30 minutes of work to do today (for real, the lack of work is killing me) guess what I did? I logged into last.fm and then I created seven years worth of Top 25 lists. It was the most fun I’ve had, well, I had some fun when I woke up at 6 a.m. this morning and couldn’t get back to sleep, but other than that it’s the most fun I’ve had all week.

So far. I think I might watch “Twister” tonight while eating a frozen pizza, because this spinster knows how to party.

It was fun watching my musical taste evolve. The early aughts lists are very dude dominated and you can watch them virtually disappear once the Turnip was elected. You can also tell when I switched from just listening to songs to listening to entire albums. Here, I’ll show you, these albums show up nearly in their entirety on that year’s Top 25:
2010: “The Wild Hunt” by Tallest Man on Earth
2011: “Wild Flag” by Wild Flag
2012: “Gossamer” by Passion Pit
2013 “Southeastern” by Jason Isbell
2014: “Somewhere Else” by Lydia Loveless
2015: “Short Movie” by Laura Marling
2016: “My Piece of Land” by Amanda Shires
2017: “The Nashville Sound” by Jason Isbell & The 400 Unit
2018: “Historian” by Lucy Dacus (Though Phoebe Bridgers’ entire “Stranger in the Alps” is on the list too)
2019: “The Highwomen” by The Highwomen

2008’s list is probably my favorite because it makes no sense. It’s The Decemberists, Liz Phair, The Hold Steady and then randomly “Peg” by Steely Dan. Who was I?

The one thing I tripped over that broke my stupid heart was Ryan Adams’ “Dear Chicago” showing up six times over the years. I fucking love that song and I have failed thus far at carving it out of my heart. It’s so hard to do and something I struggle with when I have fallen in love with art made by men who turn out to be bad people. Like, I get that he is a dirtbag extraordinaire, but my heart doesn’t nor do all my memories and associations with this song. WHAT AM I SUPPOSED TO DO?

Barf,
Jodi

The post The COVID Diaries: 15 Years of Top 25s appeared first on I Will Dare.

Somehow I still feel the need to apologize to everyone about the Bright Eyes phase I went through back in aught-three. A cursory search of the I Will Dare archives show many posts that filch Conor Oberst’s lyrics for their titles.

I refuse to apologize for my Phoebe Bridgers phase, which is still in full effect. Join me in this phase.

So you know I was gonna be drawn to the Better Oblivion Community Center collaboration between the Oberst & Bridgers, right? Of course I was. Her ethereal haunting voice with his earthy scratchy vocals was not something I was going to stay away from. And boy I have been rewarded with the song “Chesapeake.”

I would been a fan of this song about going to a big concert when you’re the fan of the much smaller, less-known opening band and not so much of the headliner. I love the line “I was all covered in sound. When you asked me to turn it down.” I also love using sweet child of mine to address someone.

But what I love the most is the obvious reference to The Replacements. “I can’t hardly wait for someone to replace.” I am easily pleased.

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