The Organist

Take a weird, thoughtful and pleasurable journey into literature, music, art, philosophy, the internet, language, and history with McSweeney's and KCRW.

Give Everybody Everything: The Financial Life of Bernadette Mayer 04/18/2019

Give Everybody Everything: The Financial Life of Bernadette Mayer The life of a poet is rich with meaning and beauty. But the financial life of a poet is decidedly less rich. The poet Bernadette Mayer is a case study in how literary influence does not translate into income. She dedicated herself to art knowing it... /episode/index/show/theorganist/id/13001819

The Narrative Line 04/04/2019

The Narrative Line We’re constantly telling ourselves stories — who we are, where we’re going, what comes next. But what happens when the story you’re telling yourself turns out not to be true? Or, more fundamentally, what if the narrative form you’re... /episode/index/show/theorganist/id/13001822

Consider the Grackles 03/21/2019

Consider the Grackles Touring a punk act pushes the limits of physical endurance — driving all day, sweating on stage, eating badly, sleeping worse. What keeps a band going for 14 years without a major commercial success? And what would possess someone old enough... /episode/index/show/theorganist/id/13001825

Death in Twin Peaks 02/21/2019

Death in Twin Peaks Twin Peaks was never just a TV show: it was an obsession and an apparition. In its 2017 incarnation, the real-life deaths of several cast members hang spectrally over the proceedings. Legendary critic Howard Hampton meditates on how the show’s... /episode/index/show/theorganist/id/13001828

A Call in the Night 02/07/2019

A Call in the Night Your phone rings at 3:30 in the morning. You answer the call, and a person who's just been woken up with a call from you is on the end of the line. The call is being recorded. Both of your lives are changed forever. In this episode we explore the... /episode/index/show/theorganist/id/13001831

Angelyne 01/24/2019

Angelyne For decades, Angelyne pouted down from Hollywood billboards, looking like a New-Wave Jayne Mansfield: a dense cloud of bleached blonde hair and abundant cleavage barely contained by furry pink bikini tops. No one was sure what to make of the... /episode/index/show/theorganist/id/13001834

The Dogfather 01/10/2019

The Dogfather Today’s episode is about dogs. /episode/index/show/theorganist/id/13001840

The New World 11/15/2018

The New World Where do speech balloons come from? How does time move from panel to panel? This week we explore the techniques of comic-book storytelling through Chris Reynolds’s graphic series, newly anthologized as The New World. Join us as we travel deep into... /episode/index/show/theorganist/id/13001846

Low Fidelity 11/01/2018

Low Fidelity What sounds don’t we hear when we listen? What sounds are discarded in digital processing, whether it’s through hearing aids or mp3s? This week we travel to Scottish lighthouses, professional sound-testing facilities, and animal slaughterhouses... /episode/index/show/theorganist/id/13001852

Between Speaking and Singing 10/18/2018

Between Speaking and Singing Will spoken language become obsolete? What if, in the future, a simple conversation between two adults becomes a rarity, like an obscure musical piece that involves months of rehearsing and vocal training to be able to perform? /episode/index/show/theorganist/id/13001855

The Blindfold Challenge 10/04/2018

The Blindfold Challenge In his audio diaries recorded while driving cross-country, artist David Wojnarowicz tries to describe how he feels after being diagnosed with AIDS. Writer Sandy Allen translates the autobiography of their schizophrenic uncle, presenting his... /episode/index/show/theorganist/id/13001858

The Secret Life of Plants 09/20/2018

The Secret Life of Plants Stevie Wonder’s entire life, according to conspiracy theorists, is a lie. He’s been able to see all along. But what does that have to do with the idea that plants are conscious beings capable of communication? /episode/index/show/theorganist/id/13001861

Bingeing Texas 08/23/2018

Bingeing Texas The national news media is mesmerized by a president who runs the White House like a reality show. Jen Rice takes a look at the weird relationship between political actors and public audience. In her recap of the 85th Texas legislative session, she... /episode/index/show/theorganist/id/13001864

Borderlands 08/09/2018

Borderlands This week, two stories from the U.S. borders. The first, from Javier Zamora, who crossed into the U.S. without his parents when he was nine years old. The other comes from our border with Canada, which Porter Fox navigated from end to end, by canoe,... /episode/index/show/theorganist/id/13001867

Two Years With Franz 07/26/2018

Two Years With Franz The poet and Pulitzer Prize–winner Franz Wright recorded 546 audio tapes in the two years of his life after a terminal cancer diagnosis. The tapes show incredible vitality in the face of death. Over two years, Bianca Giaever listened to all 546... /episode/index/show/theorganist/id/13001870

The Voice of God 07/12/2018

The Voice of God Actor and writer Ellie Kemper (Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt), director Penelope Spheeris (Wayne’s World), and voice-over master Peter Coyote (Ken Burns’ documentaries, including The Vietnam War) describe voices from heaven, hell, and everywhere in... /episode/index/show/theorganist/id/13001876

The Organist returns Thursday 07/10/2018

The Organist returns Thursday From KCRW and McSweeney’s, the Organist returns with its fifth season on July 12! /episode/index/show/theorganist/id/13001879

Bonus: Neighborhood Secret 04/26/2018

Bonus: Neighborhood Secret New Edition was an unlikely boy-band from Boston that launched Bobby Brown’s career and incubated the smooth 90s R&B of Bell Biv DeVoe. /episode/index/show/theorganist/id/13001882

How to Be in Two Places at Once: The Firesign Theatre in the US and Vietnam 12/14/2017

How to Be in Two Places at Once: The Firesign Theatre in the US and Vietnam Four comedians trained in poetry and psy-ops, Firesign Theatre created dense, album-length art-objects that could take multiple spins to understand. Comedy in the form of abrasive soundscapes that reviewers were as likely to call “frightening”... /episode/index/show/theorganist/id/13001885

Antigonick 11/30/2017

Antigonick Antigone is one of the most widely performed plays in the world. Poet Anne Carson’s experimental translation of Sophocles’ tragedy incorporates 2,500 years of its performance and interpretation. The play’s emotional core persists even as we... /episode/index/show/theorganist/id/13001888

The Gospel of Ndegeocello 11/09/2017

The Gospel of Ndegeocello Meshell Ndegeocello’s debut album kicked off the era of neo-soul, inspiring Lauryn Hill, Erykah Badu, and D’Angelo. Twenty-three years later, Ndegeocello is still making art, but she’s expanded her medium with a new project that’s part... /episode/index/show/theorganist/id/13001894

A 700-Foot Mountain of Whipped Cream 10/18/2017

A 700-Foot Mountain of Whipped Cream From in utero to the studio, Clive Desmond gives us a history of the golden age of radio ads, featuring Frank Zappa, Ken Nordine, Linda Ronstadt, and Randy Newman. While the 1960s shift in print and TV advertising has been heavily documented and... /episode/index/show/theorganist/id/13001897

The Ideological Organ 10/05/2017

The Ideological Organ In Stockholm, an organist plays hymns in a cathedral; at night, he sleeps in a makeshift recording studio in the cathedral’s basement where he composes otherworldly electronic music based on a Hungarian translation of the Tibetan Book of the Dead. /episode/index/show/theorganist/id/13001900

Incense, Sweaters, and Altadena: An Interview with Martine Syms 09/21/2017

Incense, Sweaters, and Altadena: An Interview with Martine Syms Fresh off her first solo show at the MoMA, Martine Syms talks with the Organist about how growing up in Altadena, a red-lined suburb of Los Angeles led to her fascination with DIY culture and conceptual art. Syms draws inspiration from both famed... /episode/index/show/theorganist/id/13001906

Appendix: Still Not Dotcoms 09/14/2017

Appendix: Still Not Dotcoms At last! An unobstructed view of the internet’s lacunae: Brian McMullen reads his Still Not Dotcoms, an epic catalog of one thousand unclaimed URLs, in its totality. /episode/index/show/theorganist/id/13001909

magnificentwebsite.com 09/07/2017

magnificentwebsite.com In this four-part episode, MF Doom, in absentia, sends imposters to wear his steel gladiator mask and rap at his concerts. Joshua Cohen, author of Moving Kings, writes a novel live online while heckled by Reddit-grade hate speech. Novelist Fiona... /episode/index/show/theorganist/id/13001912

The Show About the Show About the Show 08/10/2017

The Show About the Show About the Show In the vein of Werner Herzog, Larry David, and Spalding Gray, the radical documentaries of Caveh Zahedi find comedy in pushing social norms. His oddly life-affirming efforts to merge lived experience with art trigger the dissolution of his marriage.... /episode/index/show/theorganist/id/13001915

The Mother Road 07/27/2017

The Mother Road If you drive along I-70 through Missouri, you’ll see site-specific contemporary art displayed on the billboards. What happens when that artwork says “Keep Abortion Legal”? /episode/index/show/theorganist/id/13001921

Private Ears 07/13/2017

Private Ears This week we’ll hear from two artists whose work investigates the growing prevalence of surveillance in societies around the world. Both Lawrence Abu Hamdan and Trevor Paglen approach their art as investigations: They see themselves as detectives,... /episode/index/show/theorganist/id/13001924

Ravening for Delight 06/29/2017

Ravening for Delight Stephen King, Neil Gaiman, and the Alien movies all trace their tone of cosmic dread back to the horror writer H.P. Lovecraft, whose stories were published in pulp magazines in the 1920s and 30s. Paul La Farge’s latest novel, The Night Ocean,... /episode/index/show/theorganist/id/13001927

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