Spectra is out now. And I feel fine.
Announcing some tour dates with Circles Around The Sun, in the midwest USA starting in like 2 weeks.
top of page
AQUARIUM DRUNKARD INTERVIEW::: https://aquariumdrunkard.com/2023/02/21/jenny-o-the-aquarium-drunkard-interview/
First of all, I am honored to have been interviewed by Aquarium Drunkard. I really enjoyed talking to Jennifer Kelly, who sounded like an old friend. We didn’t speak more than our transcribed phone conversation (this process is always wild to me.) I did not ask her any questions [as is my understanding of interviewing.] I am generally overwhelmed in communicating my answers, in survival mode. While I think I said many good things, there are also instances of me rambling and I already disagree (sometimes we just say shit.) Post-event processing. I will let most of them go but:
These are two significant clarifications I’d like to make about my words in this very long interview and I've decided to use my blog to proclaim them, in italics, in order of appearance.
(I suggest you read the full interview first. These are just my amendments.)
1.
Aquarium Drunkard: Where you were mentally and creatively as you started working on these songs? What was going on in the background?
Jenny O.: Well, at the time, I was writing a lot about…I went inward a lot and was really exploring my relationship to other people and my ability to communicate and connect with others. And exploring my neurotype, that’s the word I’ll use. That was a lot of what I was processing at the time I wrote Spectra.
I wish I said “Exploring neurodiversity.” I am still of course being impersonally vague here but I remain unsure how personal and where and when I wish to be open about my life. I agree that truth and vulnerability is liberating for others. But I am in process. These are new-ish words, our language is developing in real time.
2.
AD: I read the Gates book recently. Have you read that? [Bill Gates, How To Avoid Climate Disaster]
Jenny O.: I haven’t because initially I was like why read the Gates book, because if he could do it, he should just do it himself. But lately I’ve been thinking I’ll read the Gates book. But before I read it, I need to read the Indigenous books and the Black books. But yes, I will read it.
OMG... A. I will likely never read the Gates book. What I meant is, sure, I'll read anything, I even want to know what we are up against. But it is my clear understanding that endless growth and profit is quite specifically what got us into this conundrum and it will not be Gates who will lead the oil industry to abandon "stranded assets" or wind down destructive agriculture, etc......
And B. as soon as I said it it I regretted my phrasing, I wish I said “books by Indigenous authors and books by Black authors” rather than "Back books and Indigenous books." I was talking quickly, looking at and referring an actual pile of specialized books I already selected to read over the following months. Books about soil, interconnectedness, the energy commons, mushrooms, etc. MUCH/EVERYTHING to say about all this of course but I am here specifically to edit those words. I am just getting my footing as a climate communicator, we all are, this is an emerging field. Please read the full interview. & thanks.
bottom of page