Episode 227: Matt Pryor of The Get Up Kids
Vinyl Emergency
Having spent the last thirty years fronting The Get Up Kids, Matt Pryor has earned an honorary doctorate in sharing intimate, vulnerable moments on record and making them sound catchy as hell. Through albums like Four Minute Mile, Something to Write Home About, On A Wire and Guilt Show, he's galvanized thousands of songwriters to similarly lean into the raucous joys of independent touring while pining for the stability and comforts of home. But on his latest solo effort released last week, The Salton Sea, we get inarguably the deepest and most honest look into Pryor's life yet, from the...
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Episode 226: Tom Petty Producer/Engineer Ryan Ulyate
Vinyl Emergency
Hot on the heels of his involvement with a new, one-step vinyl pressing of Wildflowers -- celebrating its 30th anniversary -- Ryan Ulyate talks today about working with Tom on late-career albums like Highway Companion, Mojo and Hypnotic Eye, as well as selecting tracks for The Live Anthology from literally thousands of performances over a three-decade span. Purchase the limited edition one-step pressing of Wildflowers from or .
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Episode 225: 'Springsteen: Deliver Me From Nowhere' Preview w/ Warren Zanes (Executive Producer)
Vinyl Emergency
If you were tasked with making a feature film about Bruce Springsteen, you could throw a dart and hit any number of career peaks worth covering. Instead, director/writer Scott Cooper chose to zoom in on the Boss' personal low, chronicled by author Warren Zanes in his acclaimed 2023 book Deliver Me From Nowhere: The Making of Bruce Springsteen's Nebraska. With unbounded access to his subject, Warren's meticulous and potetic account of what he calls "the ultimate underdog of all recordings" is now the basis for 'Springsteen: Deliver Me From Nowhere,' coming to theaters everywhere this...
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Episode 224: Joshua Hedley
Vinyl Emergency
He may have only turned 40 this year, but Joshua Hedley figures he's already been gigging for 75% of his life. Infatuated with the fiddle and western swing from an early age, he began performing steadily at 12 and had released his first album by 15, before moving from Florida to Nashville, playing almost 60 hours a week up and down Lower Broadway. Ahead of the late-October release of All Hat -- his third LP, courtesy of New West Records -- Joshua chats today about failing in public, the similarities between pro wrestling and Music City's cutthroat country-western food chain, and why he's...
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Episode 223: Noah Reid (Schitt's Creek)
Vinyl Emergency
Before his profile as a musician exploded, actor Noah Reid thought of his songs as "a little closet that I could put my thoughts and feelings into." But in early 2018, that door came off its hinges. As his character Patrick Brewer, on the eventual Emmy-winning Canadian TV comedy Schitt's Creek, Noah performed a remarkably grounded and unfeigned acoustic cover of "The Best," usually known as a reach-for-the-rafters power ballad, made popular in the late 80's by the incomparable Tina Turner. TV Guide went as far as to say that Noah's contribution created "the most romantic scene on television,"...
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Episode 222: Evan Weiss (Pet Symmetry / Into It. Over It.)
Vinyl Emergency
A lot has changed since Evan Weiss last came on this podcast over nine years ago -- marriage, a plethora of new music, and a deliberate "one in, one out" strategy to balancing his record collection. But one thing that's stayed the same (perhaps even increasing) is his steadfast drive to spotlight forgotten records of his heroes, friends or total strangers, which he now accomplishes through a ; giving subscribers exclusive access to limited runs or releases that never came to turntables until now. On the heels of his latest album with Pet Symmetry, Evan walks us through how love songs and LSD...
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SECOND SPIN: Brian Stack (Colbert/Conan; March 2016)
Vinyl Emergency
This is an encore presentation of a previous episode, originally airing in 2016. --- Currently a writer on CBS' Late Show with Stephen Colbert, Brian Stack started on NBC's Late Night with Conan O'Brien in 1997, winning an Emmy for writing on the show ten years later and appearing as the caped and mustachioed Interrupter, hapless door-to-door salesman Hannigan and the ghost of old-time radio crooner Artie Kendall, among a slew of other characters. He followed Conan to both his truncated tenure at The Tonight Show and his current TBS program, but moved with his family back to New...
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Episode 221: Glen Hansard and Markéta Irglová (The Swell Season)
Vinyl Emergency
It's been nearly two decades since the tender indie film Once -- an intimate depiction of two struggling musicians at multiple crossroads -- became a global phenomenon, earning stars and songwriters Glen Hansard and Markéta Irglová an Oscar for their tremendous ballad "Falling Slowly." Based in Dublin, the picture won over audiences with its modesty, as director/writer John Carney chose a rather fly-on-the-wall look to the ebbs and flows of artistic collaboration. Together known as The Swell Season, their first LP together in over 15 years arrived last week (titled Forward), bringing in a...
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Vinyl Emergency Trailer: Spinning Since '16
Vinyl Emergency
Vinyl Emergency is where your favorite songwriters, producers, record label owners or other personalities who just love music come to discuss how vinyl's mere existence has shaped their lives and careers.
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Episode 220: Ben Nichols of Lucero
Vinyl Emergency
With a new solo album dropping later this month — In the Heart of the Mountain, his first in over 15 years — Lucero frontman Ben Nichols addresses why some of his recent songs feel like graphic novels, how he’s reconnected with the mythological Arkansas of his youth, and the parts of him that still wrestle with his southern heritage. Vinyl pre-orders, tour dates and more can be found at .
info_outlineIt’s not out of bounds to say that the Smoking Popes began as a bit of a joke. Vocalist, guitarist and songwriter Josh Caterer deems the earliest incarnation of the band as “a Spinal Tap version of hardcore punk,” choosing song titles first and how those songs would actually go later. But after finding a propulsive drummer in a teenage Mike Felumlee, the quartet began showing true heart around 1993: no longer just goofing off in the garage, Caterer was penning some of the punchiest, most direct odes to lost love on the college radio dial, emphasizing all the best parts of the Smiths, Cheap Trick, Roy Orbison and the Ramones, while feeling wholly original. It’s now been three decades since Born To Quit, the band’s heroic half-hour featuring “Need You Around” and “Rubella,” put them on the map. And although an LP reissue dropped earlier this year (without the band’s consent or knowledge), Josh and Mike decided that the Popes needed their own “Taylor’s Version” of sorts, in order to take these songs back into their possession — even in the most modest of terms. So before a minimal audience in a small, central Illinois studio, the band chose to cut Born To Quit live, front to back, and a vinyl version comes out this week to put a stamp on the occasion. During this episode, Josh and Mike speak to their longevity as a unit, what we can expect from their brand new album this spring, and what it meant to control Born To Quit’s legacy a bit, with this new approach. We also dive into Mike’s tenure in Alkaline Trio, and Josh’s solo performances pressed to wax during the 2020 lockdown. Visit anxiousandangry.com to pre-order the Born To Quit Live Session, and hit up smokingpopesmusic.com for tour dates, social media and more.