

AirGo
Damon Williams and Daniel Kisslinger
Subscribe on Apple Podcasts! https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/airgo/id1016530091
A podcast and radical media hub reshaping Chicago and beyond for the more liberatory and creative. Listen to longform humanizing conversations with artists, organizers, performers, comedians, scholars, and more who are reimagining Chicago and beyond toward liberation. Hosted by Damon Williams and Daniel Kisslinger.
A podcast and radical media hub reshaping Chicago and beyond for the more liberatory and creative. Listen to longform humanizing conversations with artists, organizers, performers, comedians, scholars, and more who are reimagining Chicago and beyond toward liberation. Hosted by Damon Williams and Daniel Kisslinger.
Episodes
Mentioned books

Jan 16, 2021 • 54min
BONUS - Angela Davis Debrief
On this bonus episode, listen to audio from an IG Live on 1/15, in which the guys break down the Behind the Scenes of their interview with the legendary Angela Davis.
SHOW NOTES
Become an AirGo Amplifier - airgoradio.com/donate
Rate and review AirGo - podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/airgo/id1016530091
Check out another wonderful podcast, The Lit Review, hosted by Chicago organizers Page May and Monica Trinidad - www.thelitreview.org/
Intro contains audio from "Crooklyn," produced by Q-Tip of A Tribe Called Quest and was featured in the 1994 film.

Jan 14, 2021 • 59min
Ep 270 - Angela Davis
Yup, it's real–we can't believe it either. The guys have the extraordinary privilege and honor of talking with legendary Black revolutionary Angela Davis. She discusses her experience this summer during uprising, the remarkable popularization of abolition, the significance of addressing gender violence and inequality in the fight for liberation, and much much more. Wow!
SHOW NOTES
Grace Lee Boggs and Jimmy Boggs - http://boggscenter.org/
Audre Lorde - https://alp.org/about/audre
Fumbling Towards Repair - https://www.akpress.org/fumbling-towards-repair.html
Creative Interventions toolkit - https://www.creative-interventions.org/tools/toolkit/
George Jackson - http://www.historyisaweapon.com/defcon1/rodneyjackson.html
Attica Brothers - https://www.prisonlegalnews.org/news/2011/sep/15/remembering-attica-forty-years-later/
Without Guarantees by Stuart Hall - https://www.google.com/books/edition/Without_Guarantees/MYcFKbUl0zkC?hl=en&gbpv=0
Frank "Big Black" Smith - https://www.nytimes.com/2004/08/03/us/frank-smith-71-is-dead-sought-justice-after-attica.html
Critical Resistance - http://criticalresistance.org/
Mike Davis essay on PIC - http://archive.li/RF45D
INCITE! - https://incite-national.org/
Southern Negro Youth Congress - https://www.blackpast.org/african-american-history/southern-negro-youth-congress-1937-1949/
Mariame Kaba - http://mariamekaba.com/
Barbara Ransby - https://barbararansby.com/about-2/
Robin Kelley - https://history.ucla.edu/faculty/robin-kelley
Become an AirGo Amplifier - airgoradio.com/donate
Rate and review AirGo - podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/airgo/id1016530091
Check out another wonderful podcast, The Lit Review, hosted by Chicago organizers Page May and Monica Trinidad - http://www.thelitreview.org/
Intro contains audio from "Crooklyn," produced by Q-Tip of A Tribe Called Quest and was featured in the 1994 film.
📸 by kk ottesen

Dec 29, 2020 • 38min
#GoBack - PrepAirGo in 2015
Each month this year, we're going to revisit an episode from the 260+ episodes in the AirGo Archives and bring that conversation back to the forefront. For the final #GoBack of the year, we're excited to share the first conversation we ever had on the air in Chicago, a week before the first official episode of AirGo. We tried to find our rhythm and played some songs we were bumping at the time. Check out this never-before-heard (except for live on the air) gem from the AirGo archives!
SHOW NOTES
Become an AirGo Amplifier - airgoradio.com/donate
Rate and review AirGo - podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/airgo/id1016530091

Dec 24, 2020 • 1h 9min
Ep 269 - The Notebook Suite Vol. 3: Elizabeth Mendez Berry
AirGo is excited to present The Notebook Suite, a series of conversations with writers about liberation, craft, and radical imagination co-curated by poet Nate Marshall. On this last episode of 2020, we get to learn from Elizabeth Mendez Berry. Elizabeth is an editor, writer, and funder who is currently the Vice President and Executive Editor of One World, an imprint of Random House in New York. She's also the cofounder of Critical Minded, an initiative supporting cultural critics of color, and the Unicorn Fund, which offers resources to artists and others who have been targeted for speaking out. We talk about the transformative potential of criticism, her experience as a music writer for VIBE, and much more.
SHOW NOTES
Jeff Chang - https://jeffchang.net/
Black Star Film Festival - https://www.blackstarfest.org/
Greg Tate - https://www.newyorker.com/culture/cultural-comment/the-critic-who-convinced-me-that-criticism-could-be-art
Karen Good Marable - https://twitter.com/kgoodmarable
Toni Morrison - https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/authors/21332/toni-morrison/
One World Lit - https://www.oneworldlit.com/
Haki Madhubuti - https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/haki-madhubuti
Richie Perez - https://www.nytimes.com/2004/03/29/nyregion/richard-perez-is-dead-at-59-advocate-for-minority-rights.html
Love Hurts by Elizabeth Mendez Berry - https://elizabethmendezberry.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/02/LOVE-HURTS-for-site-2.pdf
Become an AirGo Amplifier - airgoradio.com/donate
Rate and review AirGo - podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/airgo/id1016530091
Photo by Rog and Bee Walker (instagram.com/papermonday)

Dec 18, 2020 • 1h 50min
BONUS - More Abolitionists Than Ever
Our movement has been fighting hard to #DefundPolice all year long! As we come to the end of 2020, the #DefundCPD Campaign hosted a celebration and discussion on December 16 at 6pm CT about the campaign so far, featuring #DefundCPD campaign organizers in conversation with abolitionist organizer Mariame Kaba, and special guests from other defund police campaigns from the Midwest to the South.
Follow the campaign: https://www.facebook.com/defundcpd
Sign the demand to #DefundCPD if you haven’t already: https://actionnetwork.org/forms/sign-on-to-demand-defunding-of-the-chicago-police-department
Watch the whole event here: https://www.facebook.com/defundcpd/videos/200794354995963

Dec 17, 2020 • 1h 4min
Ep 268 - The Notebook Suite Vol. 2: Natalie Y. Moore
AirGo is excited to present The Notebook Suite, a series of conversations with writers about liberation, craft, and radical imagination co-curated by poet Nate Marshall. On this episode, we have the pleasure of talking with Chicago legend, WBEZ journalist, and writer Natalie Y. Moore. The author of popular and necessary books The South Side, Almighty Black P Stone Nation, and Deconstructing Tyrone, Natalie talks about how she maneuvers complex responses to her work, how telling the story of segregation helped her report on the pandemic, and much more.
Shoutout to our friends over at Scene On Radio, aPeabody-nominated podcast from the Center for Documentary Studies at Duke University. Subscribe now: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/scene-on-radio/id1036276968
SHOW NOTES
The South Side: A Portrait of Chicago and American Segregation - https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250118332
The Almighty Black P Stone Nation: The Rise, Fall, and Resurgence of an American Gang - https://www.chicagoreviewpress.com/almighty-black-p-stone-nation--the-products-9781569768464.php
Natalie Hopkinson - https://www.nataliehopkinson.com/
Chana Garcia - https://chicago.suntimes.com/2019/3/21/18483831/remembering-my-friend-chana-and-why-black-women-must-stand-up-for-their-health
Metropolitan Planning Council - https://www.metroplanning.org/index.html
Our Equitable Future: A Roadmap for the Chicago Region - https://www.metroplanning.org/uploads/cms/documents/cost-of-segregation-roadmap.pdf
Become an AirGo Amplifier - airgoradio.com/donate
Rate and review AirGo - podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/airgo/id1016530091

Dec 10, 2020 • 53min
Ep 267 - The Notebook Suite Vol. 1: Nate Marshall
AirGo is excited to present The Notebook Suite, a series of conversations with writers about liberation, craft, and radical imagination. We kick the series off by chopping it up with brilliant poet and suite co-curator Nate Marshall. Author of poetry collections Finna and Wild Hundreds, Nate is a longtime friend of the show and professor at Colorado College. He shares what he's wrestling with in his writing right now, as well as some questions for us to ask the folks we're going to be talking with throughout the suite.
SHOW NOTES
Coffee and Books with Marc Lamont Hill - https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/coffee-and-books/id1522592619
The Difficult Miracle of Black Poetry in America by June Jordan - https://www.poetryfoundation.org/articles/68628/the-difficult-miracle-of-black-poetry-in-america
Phyllis Wheatley - https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/phillis-wheatley
The American Scholar by Ralph Waldo Emerson - http://digitalemerson.wsulibs.wsu.edu/exhibits/show/text/the-american-scholar
Jamila Woods - http://www.jamila-woods.com/
Sarah Kay - https://kaysarahsera.com/
Nina Simone on Freedom - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ySYRI4wXUpo
Imagine the Angels of Bread by Martin Espada - http://www.martinespada.net/uploads/6/9/9/8/69989673/imagine_the_angels_of_bread.pdf
Buy Finna today! https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/610570/finna-by-nate-marshall/
Become an AirGo Amplifier - https://airgoradio.com/donate
Rate and review AirGo - https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/airgo/id1016530091

Dec 3, 2020 • 1h 35min
Ep 266 - theMIND Listening Party
You're invited to an AirGo Listening Party with old friend, vocalist, and stellar human theMIND! A Philly native and longtime Chicagoan, he just dropped a gorgeous and soul-enriching new project entitled Don't Let It Go To Your Head. In the first edition of our new Listening Party series, we go through a few tracks on the album together and talk about his creative process, what he's wrestled with in his artistry and personal growth, and much more.
Listen to the album: https://cinqreleas.es/yourhead
SHOW NOTES
Busy/Sirens by Saba x theMIND - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zhE-fQU6P9U
Revolution and Evolution in the 20th Century by James and Grace Lee Boggs - https://www.google.com/books/edition/Revolution_and_Evolution/M6WSDwAAQBAJ
Rate and review AirGo on Apple Podcasts - https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/airgo/id1016530091
Support AirGo with a monthly or one-time donation - https://airgoradio.com/donate
📸 by ANF Chicago

Nov 25, 2020 • 1h 4min
Climate Changemakers Vol. 8 - Olga Bautista
Climate Changemakers is a podcast series showcasing and celebrating leaders in equity work and climate action across Illinois, presented in celebration of the 20th anniversary of nonprofit organization Elevate Energy.
On this eighth and final episode of Climate Changemakers, Dame and Daniel are joined by Olga Bautista of the Chicago Southeast Side Coalition to Ban Petcoke. In response to decades of pollution and environmental destruction by industry in her home neighborhood on the Southeast side of the city, Olga banded together with other community members to fight for environmental protections from and cleanup of Petcoke, a toxic byproduct of oil refinement that was poisoning the air she and her family were breathing. The coalition successfully fought the Koch brothers, who were forced to dispose of the petcoke in a less destructive manner. She talks about the devastation of industrial pollution, learning to collect the necessary data herself, the unique challenges of having a set at the redevelopment table during a pandemic, and much more.
SHOW NOTES
Exit Zero - www.goodreads.com/book/show/24898568-exit-zero
COPD - www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-condit…es/syc-20353679
NRDC - www.nrdc.org/
Nancy Loeb - www.law.northwestern.edu/faculty/prof…s/NancyLoeb/
Invest South/West - www.chicago.gov/city/en/sites/invest_sw/home.html
Great Cities Institute - greatcities.uic.edu
Poor People's Campaign - www.poorpeoplescampaign.org

Nov 22, 2020 • 1h 44min
BONUS - Spill the Tea: a #DefundCPD Discussion
In the midst of a pandemic, Mayor Lightfoot is threatening to punish aldermen and the communities they represent if they do not vote for her racist and regressive budget. There is a lot to unpack, from Lori increasing the share of funding for the police department to her telling the Black Caucus that voting against her budget means they shouldn’t expect investment from the city for their wards, and so much more… and that ain't right!
Listen to the audio from a Facebook Live conversation on Saturday, November 21st at 12pm between Kennedy from @uwfillinois, Damon from @letusbreathe773, Ald. Rossana Rodriguez, CTU's Stacy Davis Gates, Amika "Big Tree" Tendaji, and organizers from Good Kids Mad City spill the tea on Lori’s fake progressive, anti-Black budget. Stay tuned this week as we share more info on the folks who will be joining the conversation and ways to demand alderpeople vote no and #BootTheBudget!
Sign up to phonebank or textbank to help #DefundCPD at bit.ly/2020Chibudget.
#SpillTheTea #BootTheBudget #TakeBackTheBudget #DefundCPD