Across the Margin: The Podcast

This episode of Across The Margin: The Podcast features an interview with award-winning journalist and photographer currently focused on migration, conflict, and humanitarian crises, Sally Hayden. Hayden has worked with VICE News, CNN International, TIME, BBC, the Washington Post, the Guardian, the New York Times, Al Jazeera, NBC News, Newsweek, the Independent, the Telegraph, the National, the Huffington Post and ITV News, and had stories and photojournalism republished on six continents by outlets including National Geographic, NPR, the Observer, ABC News, among many others. She was named as one of Forbes' "30 Under 30” in Media in Europe, in part because of her work on refugee issues. Her book My Fourth Time We Drowned: Seeking Refuge on the World’s Deadliest Migration Route — the focus of this episode — exposes a human rights disaster of epic proportions. One day, Sally Hayden was at home in London when she received a message on Facebook that read: “Hi sister Sally, we need your help.” The sender identified himself as an Eritrean refugee who had been held in a Libyan detention center for months, locked in one big hall with hundreds of others. The city around them was crumbling in a conflict between warring factions, and they remained stuck, defenseless, with only one remaining hope — contacting her. From this single message begins a staggering account of the migrant crisis across North Africa. With unprecedented access to people currently inside Libyan detention centers, Hayden’s book is based on interviews with hundreds of refugees and migrants who tried to reach Europe and found themselves stuck in Libya once the EU started funding interceptions in 2017. My Fourth Time, We Drowned is an intimate portrait of life for these detainees, as well as a condemnation of NGOs and the United Nations, whose abdication of international standards will echo throughout history. But most importantly, Hayden’s groundbreaking work of investigative journalism shines a light on the resilience of humans — how refugees and migrants locked up for years fall in love, support each other through the hardest times, and carry out small acts of resistance in order to survive in a system that wants them to be silent and disappear. In this episode host Michael Shields and Sally Hayden discuss the compelling story of how a cryptic Facebook message led to the revelation of atrocities taking place in detention camps in Northern Africa. They discuss the true scope of the migrant crisis taking place while expounding upon how the European Union (EU) and the United Nations (UN) are largely responsible for the ongoing emergency. They discuss the importance of documenting and paying attention to the suffering in the world, and much more.Grab a copy of Sally Hayden’s My Fourth Time, We Drowned here!  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This episode of Across The Margin: The Podcast presents an interview with independent underground rapper Sage Francis, widely considered one of our generation’s greatest lyricists. His career derives mainly from gifted wordplay which creates vivid narratives to instigate as well as inspire. Dubbed as the “forefather of indie-hop,” Francis originally earned acclaim in the early 2000s by winning the most highly coveted titles of the emcee battle circuit. With little to no funding, Francis sustained himself by selling his innovative “Sick of” mixtapes, all made by hand on the floor of his Providence, Rhode Island apartment. These were essentially bootleg compilations full of select recordings from his 12” vinyl singles, demo sessions, live performances, and radio freestyles. The popularity of these tapes birthed Strange Famous Records (SFR); a meager, one-man operation in 1999. Despite having no official distribution, Francis’ unique brand of music spread like wildfire via the advent of file sharing networks. This resulted in him attaining a massive cult-like following around the world, creating a demand for his albums and live performances at which point the bigger labels took notice. With his first studio album, Personal Journals (2002), — the focus of this episode — Francis daringly set aside the more boastful side of rap by catering to his poetic leanings and scathing socio-political commentary. In 2005 Sage Francis was the first hip-hop artist signed to the punk rock label Epitaph Records and soon became one of the highest selling independent artists of his genre. Rather than abandon his day-to-day grind at SFR, he channeled all of his newfound resources into it, allowing the label to expand in staff as well as roster. Having fulfilled his contract obligations with Epitaph Records, Sage Francis has returned to releasing music independently as he gears up to defeat the odds. But, as alluded to, this episode focuses on where it all began for Francis, his aforementioned first studio album put into the world by the underground hip-hop collective Anticon in 2002. It’s a deeply personal album where Francis wears all of life’s suffering on his sleeve while inviting listeners to join in on a tour of the tortured, introspective mind of a gifted storyteller. While decisively weighty, Personal Journals is also witty, and full of hard-hitting old school boom bap hip-hop brimming with a slam poetry ethos. Personal Journals, like few hip-hop albums ever birthed, is an amazing display of fearless honesty and it’s easy to look at the lyrical offerings of Personal Journals as akin to Francis pulling wide his scar tissue and narrating a detailed, candid tour of their frayed innards. In this episode host Michael Shields and Francis discuss what Francis feels and about Personal Journals with twenty years of hindsight to consider. They explore the meaning behind a bevy of the tracks on the album while Francis shares stories about the Personal Journals recording sessions, how his intimate lyrics were received by those closest to him, and much, much more.Bonus Feature: At the conclusion of the episode you will hear a snippet of a demo referenced in the interview of "Runaways" lyrics over the Alias beat which would eventually become the "Keep Moving" song on Human the Death Dance!  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This episode of Across The Margin: The Podcast presents an interview with organ, keyboard, and synth extraordinaire Robert Walter, a founder member of the Greyboy Allstars. Walter is a dynamic and prolific musician who splits his time between his own 20th Congress, The Greyboy Allstars, and a robust film soundtrack career in Los Angeles. Initially formed as the backing band for rare groove luminary DJ Greyboy, The Greyboy Allstars became a long term project for Walter with a string of critically acclaimed albums and world tours. The band quickly became home to some of the most revered players in the modern music scene and their success served as a platform for the band's individual members to launch highly successful and substantially diverse solo careers. The Greyboy All Stars recently released an album entitled Get a Job: Music from the Original Broadcast Series Soul Dream, which lies at the heart of this episode. Originally aired as Soul Dream — a four-part, episodic series on Nugs.net in the summer of 2021 — Get a Job is a ten song set of unique never-before-released covers that have become an integral part of the band’s famed live sets for nearly three decades. Songs by artists such as Gene Ammons, Gil Scott-Heron, Sonny Stitt, George Harrison, Gary Bartz and Langston Hughes, Dr. Lonnie Smith, and Burt Bacharach and Hal David. In this episode host Michael Shields and Robert Walter discuss how Get a Job emanated from the four part episodic series Soul Dream while conversing over how Walter and the Greyboy Allstars decide upon the songs they choose to cover. They go back in time to talk about the genesis of the Greyboy Allstars, celebrating the famed Wednesday night shows at The Green Circle Bar in San Diego where it all began. They discuss Walter's excellent solo album Better Feathers, how he came to be a part of Mike Gordon from Phish’s band, what it is going to mean to him to return to Jazz Fest this year, and a whole lot more. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This episode of Across The Margin: The Podcast presents an interview with the author of Fight Like Hell : The Untold History of American Labor, Kim Kelly. Kelly is an independent journalist, author, and organizer. She has been a regular labor columnist for Teen Vogue since 2018, and her writing on labor, class, politics, and culture has appeared in The New Republic, The Washington Post, The New York Times, The Baffler, The Nation, The Columbia Journalism Review, and Esquire, among many others. Kelly has also worked as a video correspondent for More Perfect Union, The Real News Network, and Means TV. Previously, she was the heavy metal editor at “Noisey,” VICE’s music vertical, and was an original member of the VICE Union. A third-generation union member, she is a member of the Industrial Workers of the World’s Freelance Journalists Union as well as a member and elected councilperson for the Writers Guild of America, East (WGAE).  Kelly’s profoundly researched book shares the stories of working-class heroes who propelled American labor’s relentless push for fairness and equal protection under the law. Those champions of American labor include freed Black women organizing for protection in the Reconstruction-era South, Jewish immigrant garment workers braving deadly conditions for a sliver of independence, Asian American fieldworkers rejecting government-sanctioned indentured servitude across the Pacific, Incarcerated workers advocating for basic human rights and fair wages, and the queer Black labor leader who helped orchestrate America’s civil rights movement. Throughout Fight Like Hell, Kelly excavates these untold histories and shows how the rights the American worker possess today — the forty-hour workweek, workplace-safety standards, restrictions on child labor, protection from harassment and discrimination on the job — were earned with literal blood, sweat, and tears. Fight Like Hell comes at a time of economic reckoning in America. From Amazon’s warehouses to Starbucks cafes, Appalachian coal mines to the sex workers of Portland’s Stripper Strike, interest in organized labor is at a fever pitch not seen since the early 1960s. Inspirational, intersectional, and full of crucial lessons from the past, Fight Like Hell shows what is possible when the working class demands the dignity it has always deserved. In this episode host Michael Shields and Kim Kelly talk about how a heavy metal writer and editor became a tireless advocate for the working class. They touch on a bevy of the stories told in Fight Like Hell, from early 1800’s washwoman and garment workers to the prison labor unions of today. They converse about how Covid-19 affected the worker’s right movement, the Amazon Union battles, and so much more. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This episode of Across The Margin: The Podcast presents an interview with multi-instrumentalist, composer, arranger, and music producer Stuart Bogie. Bogie has toured and recorded extensively with groups such as Antibalas, Arcade Fire, TV on the Radio, and Iron and Wine, to name a few, and he performed as the featured soloist in the original Broadway production of Fela!. As a composer/arranger, he scored the Oscar nominated documentary How To Survive a Plague, which featured performances by the Kronos Quartet alongside Bogie’s group Superhuman Happiness. He has appeared on recordings by renowned artists such as Craig Finn (of The Hold Steady), Cass McCombs, Sharon Van Etten, Angelique Kidjo (2 Grammy winning albums), Medeski Martin and Wood, Yeasayer, Spencer Day, Holly Miranda, Foals, Passion Pit, Mac Miller, and legendary improvised conductor Butch Morris. Bogie currently leads The Bogie Band featuring Joe Russo, a nine piece Winds and Drum group that just released their debut album entitled The Prophets In The City (Royal Potato Family) — the main focus of this episode. The Prophets in the City is a collaboration between old friends, as Bogie teams with drummer extraordinaire Joe Russo most known for helming Joe Russo’s Almost Dead. Heightening Bogie's fiery arrangements and Russo's dynamic drumming, The Prophets in the City features a supporting cast of musicians whose resumes run through some of New York City's most beloved bands including Antibalas, The Dap-Kings, Budos Band, St. Vincent, and David Byrne's American Utopia.The resulting efforts on the debut album are riotous and jubilant, pushing the boundaries of instrumental music. In this episode host Michael Shields and Stuart Bogie discuss how New York City’s energy and spirit directly inspired The Prophets in the City. They discuss the brilliant grouping of players on the album and what it's like for Bogie to work with the phenomenally talented Joe Russo. They discuss music that has influenced Bogie over the years, a variety of his other projects, and so much more. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode of Across The Margin : The Podcast host Michael Shields interviews Elijah Anderson, the Sterling Professor of Sociology and of African American Studies at Yale University. Anderson is one of the leading urban ethnographers in the United States and his publications include Code of the Street: Decency, Violence, and the Moral Life of the Inner City (1999); Streetwise: Race, Class, and Change in an Urban Community (1990); and the classic sociological work, A Place on the Corner (1978). He also wrote The Cosmopolitan Canopy: Race and Civility in Everyday Life (2011) and his latest book — the subject of this episode — is Black In White Space which sheds fresh light on the dire persistence of racial discrimination in our country. A birder strolling in Central Park. A college student lounging on a university quad. Two men sitting in a coffee shop. Perfectly ordinary actions in ordinary settings — and yet, they sparked jarring and inflammatory responses that involved the police and attracted national media coverage. Why? In essence, Elijah Anderson would argue, because these were Black people existing in white spaces. In Black In White Space, Anderson brings his immense knowledge and ethnography to bear in this timely study of the racial barriers that are still firmly entrenched in our society at every class level. He focuses on symbolic racism, a new form of racism in America caused by the stubbornly powerful stereotype of the ghetto embedded in the white imagination, which subconsciously connects all Black people with crime and poverty regardless of their social or economic position. From Philadelphia street-corner conversations to Anderson’s own morning jogs through a Cape Cod vacation town, he probes a wealth of experiences to shed new light on how symbolic racism makes all Black people uniquely vulnerable to implicit bias in police stops and racial discrimination in our country. Throughout this episode Michael Shields and Elijah Anderson discuss how Black In White Space is part of a larger, and critically important, body of work by Anderson. They define and explore the role of ethnographers in social science while breaking down the idea of symbolic racism, the ghetto as a symbol and a mental space, places that Anderson defines as “cosmopolitan canopies,” and so much more. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode of Across The Margin : The Podcast host Michael Shields interviews Danielle Allen, James Bryant Conant University Professor at Harvard University where she is also the principal investigator for the Democratic Knowledge Project. In 2020, she won the Kluge Prize for Achievement in the Study of Humanity, administered by the Library of Congress, that recognizes work in disciplines not covered by the Nobel Prizes. She is the author or co-editor of many books, including Our Declaration: A Reading of the Declaration of Independence in Defense of Equality, and Democracy in the time of Coronavirus, which is the focus of this episode. In Democracy in the Time of Coronavirus Allen untangles the U.S. government’s COVID-19 victories and failures to offer a plan for creating a more resilient democratic polity — one that can better respond to both the present pandemic and future crises. Looking to history, Allen also identifies the challenges faced by democracies in other times that required strong government action. In an analysis spanning from ancient Greece to the Reconstruction Amendments and the present day, Allen argues for the relative effectiveness of collaborative federalism over authoritarian compulsion and for the unifying power of a common cause. But for democracy to endure, we — as participatory citizens — must commit to that cause: a just and equal social contract and support for good governance. In this episode Michael Shields and Danielle Allen explore what exactly an ideal social contract that serves as the basis for a functioning constitutional democracy would look like while examining how currently that social contract is fundamentally broken. They discuss how important leadership is when dealing with massive crises, how the prospect of a "common purpose" could be the most powerful tool in the democratic tool kit, how federalism can be an asset in trying times, what the federal and state governments should have done to combat Covid 19, and much, much more. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This episode of Across The Margin: The Podcast presents an interview with Phil Freeman, a renowned music journalist specializing in jazz and metal. He is the former managing editor of the world music magazine Global Rhythm, the former editor-in-chief of the metal magazine Metal Edge, the founder of MSN Entertainment's Headbäng daily metal blog, and currently writes a monthly jazz column, Ugly Beauty, for Stereogum. Freeman is also the co-creator of Burning Ambulance, a quarterly journal of arts and culture that encompasses a website, a podcast, and a record label. His latest book, Ugly Beauty: Jazz in the 21st Century, the focus of this episode, highlights how vibrant and diverse today’s Jazz scene truly is. What does jazz “mean” 20 years into the 21st century? Has streaming culture rendered music literally meaningless, thanks to the removal of all context beyond the playlist? Are there any traditions left to explore? Has the destruction of the apprenticeship model (young musicians learning from their elders) changed the music irrevocably? Are any sounds off limits? How far out can you go and still call it “jazz”? Or should the term be retired? These questions, and many more, are answered in Ugly Beauty, as Phil Freeman digs through his own experiences and conversations with present-day players. In this episode host Michael Shields and Freeman discuss what to expect when exploring the pages of Ugly Beauty while expounding on the unique jazz sounds coming out of the four cities focused on in the book: Los Angeles, London, Chicago, and New York City. They talk about the current surge in jazz appreciation abounding and the reasons for it, what it meant when Kamasi Washington broke through garnering masses of fans from outside of the Jazz world, and how hip-hop has dramatically affected Jazz in the 21st century. They also praise a slew of artists who cannot be contained by traditional views of what is and isn’t jazz, and so much more. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This episode of Across The Margin: The Podcast presents an interview with guitarist Scott Metzger, a musician who has spent the past decade earning a reputation as one of the most adventurous improvisers in live music. When he wasn’t sharing the stage with the likes of Phil Lesh, John Scofield or Nels Cline, he was playing to massive crowds with Joe Russo’s Almost Dead. His musical interests, however, run broader than his bonafides might suggest. During downtime from JRAD Metzger pursued projects like WOLF!, a hard-charging, fully electrified guitar trio that balanced tight compositions with group improvisation, and the Showdown Kids, an acoustic gypsy jazz trio. When the global pandemic darkened stages everywhere, Metzger hunkered down in Brooklyn and did what came naturally — he picked up the guitar every day and wrote instrumental music. Shortly thereafter, he booked time at a Brooklyn recording studio to document the guitar pieces he’d created. The result of those efforts is Too Close to Reason — Metzger’s first solo album and the focus of this episode. The 12-track collection, released by Royal Potato Family, showcases a more contemplative side of his musical personality. From the first swelling notes of the atmospheric ”Appropriate Wattage,” the album is full of musical surprises, starting with the fact that Metzger plays nearly every note of this primarily acoustic guitar-based album. The sole exception is “Only Child,” a ballad with Katie Jacoby, violinist for The Who (and Metzger’s wife). Too Close To Reason exposes trace elements of Metzger’s musical DNA through influences like Chet Atkins, Django Reinhardt, Jim Hall, and Richard Thompson, but it ultimately presents his own fully-formed and distinct voice as a guitarist. In short, his debut reveals an artist in full bloom who has honed his craft and knows himself, contradictions and all. Within this episode host Michael Shields and Scott Metzger discuss the musicians, the guitar, and the pandemic that inspired his new album. They expound upon the fascinating ways in which the first two singles, “Don’t Be a Stranger” and “Waltz For Beverly,” came to life while conversing about how special it is that he has had the opportunity to create music with his wife, violinist Katie Jacoby. They even discuss how the artist's recent addiction to running bolstered his capabilities in regard to his performing with Joe Russo’s Almost Dead, and so much more. Scott Metzger will celebrate the release of Too Close To Reason with four East Coast performances beginning at the end of March (currently on-sale) in Cambridge, New York City, Washington, DC and Philadelphia. Too Close To Reason is available March 4th, pre-order a 180-gram vinyl here! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This episode of Across The Margin: The Podcast presents an interview with Ian Tyrrell, emeritus professor of history at the University of New South Wales. He is the author of numerous books, including True Gardens of the Gods: Californian-Australian Environmental Reform, 1860 –1930 and Historians in Public. His latest book, American Exceptionalism: A New History of an Old Idea, is the focus of this episode and persists as an important and remarkably comprehensive examination of an extremely contentious notion. The idea that the United States is unlike every other country in world history is a surprisingly resilient one. Throughout his distinguished career, Ian Tyrrell has been one of the most influential historians researching the idea of American Exceptionalism, but he has never written a book focused solely on it, until now. The notion that American identity might be exceptional emerged, Tyrrell shows in his book, from the belief that the nascent early republic was not simply a postcolonial state but a genuinely new experiment in an imperialist world dominated by Britain. Prior to the Civil War, American Exceptionalism fostered declarations of cultural, economic, and spatial independence. As the country grew in population and size, becoming a major player in the global order, its exceptionalist beliefs came more and more into focus — and into question. Over time, a political divide emerged: those who believed that America’s exceptionalism was the basis of its virtue and those who saw America as either a long way from perfect or actually fully unexceptional. Tyrrell masterfully articulates in his book the many forces that made American Exceptionalism such a divisive and definitional concept. Today, the demands that people acknowledge America’s Exceptionalism have grown ever more strident, even as the material and moral evidence for that exceptionalism — to the extent that there ever was any — has withered away. In this episode host Michael Shields and Ian Tyrrell discuss the origins of American Exceptionalism, how one would go about quantifying a nation’s exceptionalism, how American Exceptionalism persists as ideology representing reality rather than an account of American actuality, the rise of religious-based American Exceptionalism in the 1970s and 80s, how America can increasingly be perceived as exceptional in a negative light, and much, much more. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.