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Talkhouse

Christina Puerto is a musician currently living in Jersey City. She plays guitar in the band Bethlehem Steel.
(Photo Credit: Edwina Hay)

Christina Puerto

Music

Christina Puerto Quit Her Day Job to Join Bethlehem Steel

Morgan Enos is a musician, essayist and music journalist specializing in classic rock. He records and performs as <a href="https://finalhouse.bandcamp.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://finalhouse.bandcamp.com/&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1567703426703000&amp;usg=AFQjCNE969PQS5H6jwcQaH3Zb_8LZ4WVew">Other Houses</a> and has bylines in Billboard, HuffPost, the Recording Academy, Vinyl Me, Please, TIDAL and more. He is also the co-founder and editor of <a href="https://northoftheinternet.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://northoftheinternet.com/&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1567703426703000&amp;usg=AFQjCNGi0xmSRKyGPRseoPZ41v4L7WkbQw">North of the Internet</a>, a series of conversations with creative people. He can be found at <a href="https://www.morganenos.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.morganenos.com/&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1567703426703000&amp;usg=AFQjCNG79-8vfghEO9sl4msNRI9Ts-3rdQ">his website</a>.
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Morgan Enos

I Made a Daniel Johnston-Themed Cartoon Video and Daniel Watched It

Shamir is Shamir and remains Shamir through and through, no matter what the universe puts him through. You may know the singularly named artist (think—Madonna or Cher) from his 2015 debut hit record Rachet, beloved by NPR listeners and club kids alike. After quickly rising to underground fame with his Northtown EP in 2014, the DIY pop star made a sonic splash with Rachet’s lead single “On The Regular,” a poppy banger that had extensive commercial usage. But how to follow all that up? Shamir, who came from the dusty dunes of Las Vegas, to Brooklyn’s Silent Barn, to the Philly indie scene (and all over the world in between), wanted to go back to what had inspired him from the beginning. Outsider music, country &amp; punk. Raw and vulnerable tunes, stripped down to their emotional core. 2017’s Revelations explored a new avenue of guitar driven hooky indie rock and was widely critically praised in the US and overseas.
Shamir’s most recent releases, the brilliant Room 7” on Father/Daughter, and his self-released limited edition album, Resolution, are pinnacles in the catalog of the increasingly fascinating artist’s career. Room and its b-side Caballero celebrate Shamir’s love of country music, while Resolution is a deeply introspective look into the fabric of society and the artists’ own mind.  With these two releases he has refined his craft exponentially and done so in less than six months from the release of Revelations.

Shamir Bailey

Remembering Daniel Johnston

LA-based indie pop rocker Maddie Ross was once described by The 405 as an &#8220;Alt-Pop Dream Queen.&#8221; Ross writes guitar-driven anthems about her producer, co-writer, and longtime girlfriend Wolfy. In September of 2018, songwriting legend KT Tunstall came across Ross&rsquo;s music during a Twitter exchange, and immediately reached out via direct message to invite Ross to open on a 22-city North American tour. Ross agreed, and quickly released her sophomore EP, Touch Hands, Touch Bodies in anticipation of the tour. Tunstall fans fell in love with Ross&rsquo;s high energy performances, &ldquo;abundant cussing,&rdquo; and candid love songs about being lesbian and proud. In May of 2019, Ross released her debut album Never Have I Ever, produced and co-written by Wolfy. The album was named Billboard Staff&#8217;s &#8220;Top 50 Albums of 2019 So Far,&#8221; and has gained praise from Teen Vogue, MTV, Billboard and NPR Music. Ross toured in support of Never Have I Ever by again opening for Tunstall.
(Photo Credit: Aubrey Devin)

Maddie Ross

How I Found Myself Opening For KT Tunstall on a 22-City Tour

Tim Bluhm is frontman of acclaimed San Francisco rock outfit The Mother Hips, a solo artist, an accomplished rock climber, and an avid paraglider. In late 2015, Tim was speed-flying near California’s 10,000 ft. Mt. San Jacinto when he lost control and crashed – an accident that he and doctors considered near fatal. He shattered his pelvis and his foot was nearly separated from his leg, connected by an artery. Though doctors said he would never walk again, Tim has made almost a complete recovery. Over the course of a dozen surgeries and heavy rehabilitation, Tim wrote the songs on his appropriately-named new album, Sorta Surviving.

Tim Bluhm

Tim Bluhm Confronts His Fears

Free Cell begins in isolation. Lina Tullgren’s guitar picks a delicate, slow-moving melody out of silence. Sweeping strings and brass echo out to some far-away horizon. In this moment, on the title track of Tullgren’s second album, they sound like the only person left in the universe.
Many of Free Cell&#8216;s songs were initially written between tours while Tullgren (who uses gender neutral pronouns) was living in their parents’ house in New England — sans car, alone most of the day, and sleeping in their little sister’s trundle bed. As the album materialized, Tullgren’s world took focus as they made their way from New England to Queens to be closer to their musical community.
Tullgren’s sophomore effort provides listeners with a portrait of Lina alone, discovering a new method of writing and a new way of thinking about composition. This stands in stark contrast to their debut album Won, a portrait of close companionship and collaboration between Tullgren and their best friend Ty Ueda.
The biggest development in the path to Free Cell was something unthinkable: shortly before recording, Ueda was injured in a car crash and Tullgren was unexpectedly put in the position of self-producing their own album.
Mainly recorded and produced at Brooklyn’s Figure 8 Studios, with Ueda later assisting on final tracking at his Mount Misery studio upon recovery, Free Cell is masterfully confident. Throughout Free Cell, Tullgren looks back on their memories from the position of an analyst, often cool and cynical but always with an undercurrent of humor and deep feeling. In their poetry Lina Tullgren writes anthems for the alienated, for those alone on busses, at parties, at their parents’ house, for those who cannot help but feel lonely even if they are surrounded by others. Free Cell invites us to sit and listen, to reflect, but with no guarantee of any of those things being easy.

Lina Tullgren

Lina Tullgren on Playing Solitaire as a Form of Meditation on Tour

Adam Schatz has recently released the improvised album Civil Engineering Vol. 1 and the Landlady album Make Up / Lost Time. See him on tour this summer, tickets and info at <a href="http://linktr.ee/landladyland" target="_blank" rel="noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=http://linktr.ee/landladyland&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1780425624327000&amp;usg=AOvVaw3vXy-qQUGj-lKK5bDfgzP-">linktr.ee/landladyland</a>.
(Photo Credit: Sasha Arutyunova.)

Adam Schatz

When I Played a Sofar Sounds Show

Talkhouse Contributing Writer Norman Brannon is a musician, writer, and educator in Brooklyn, New York. Best known for his work in bands like Texas Is the Reason, New End Original, 108, Shelter, and Ressurection, Brannon has also maintained a steady, albeit whimsical career in music criticism, worked as a TV presenter on a gay cable network, and has been recognized by his music-loving students while working as a university lecturer. You can follow him on Twitter <a href="https://twitter.com/normanbrannon"> here.</a>

Norman Brannon

Emo: A Personal History in Three Parts — Part 3, 2004–2019

When asked, who is Kate Tempest? She gives a brief, albeit telling answer. “Kate Tempest is the words,” she responds. You haven’t ever seen, heard, or experienced anyone quite like her. Tempest uncovers the missing link between the Golden Ages of literature and hip-hop. The London-born BRIT Award-nominated spoken word artist, rapper, poet, novelist, and playwright rhymes with a century-turning fury. Since her emergence in 2011, she has redefined what it means to be a wordsmith in the Modern Age. To date, she has published three poetry collections, staged three plays, and released two studio albums — Everybody Down (shortlisted for the 2014 Mercury Prize) and Let Them Eat Chaos (shortlisted for the 2017 Mercury Prize). Along the way, she entranced audiences on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon, NPR’s Tiny Desk, and more. Not to mention, she garnered widespread critical acclaim from the New York Times, The New Yorker, Forbes, and more, to name a few. In the midst of this whirlwind journey, she performed a passage of her popular 75-minute narrative poem, &#8220;Brand New Ancients,&#8221; on Charlie Rose. Legendary producer and American Recordings Founder Rick Rubin caught the show, tracked down her phone number, and made a call. This set a series of events in motion that led to her debut album for American Recordings, The Book of Traps and Lessons, was released on June 14, 2019.
(Photo Credit: Julian Broad)

personal essay

Christina Puerto Quit Her Day Job to Join Bethlehem Steel

I Made a Daniel Johnston-Themed Cartoon Video and Daniel Watched It

Remembering Daniel Johnston

How I Found Myself Opening For KT Tunstall on a 22-City Tour

Tim Bluhm Confronts His Fears

Lina Tullgren on Playing Solitaire as a Form of Meditation on Tour

When I Played a Sofar Sounds Show

Emo: A Personal History in Three Parts — Part 3, 2004–2019

Kate Tempest Talks Live Performance as an Antidote to Numbness

Remembering My Dad Through Classic Rock’s Greatest Misses

Emo: A Personal History in Three Parts — Part 2, 1991-2003

Emo: A Personal History in Three Parts — Part 1, 1987-1990

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