Good News and Bad News
a.k.a. The book tour marches on.
Just to get it out of the way, let’s start with the bad news.
Although I fully intended to return to First Floor’s regular publishing schedule this week, I haven’t yet completed a new long-form piece for today’s edition of the newsletter. In truth, I actually did conduct an interview with an A-level electronic music figure a couple of weeks ago, my plan to transcribe said interview while running around the UK and Europe on my book tour proved to be short-sighted.
I’m sorry about that.
I do, however, hope to make it up to you. The good news is that being in the middle of promotional cycle for my book—which officially comes out this Friday, July 7 but is already available at select stores and via Velocity Press—means that I’ve been giving interviews about my work, so those of you with an interest in hearing some of my usual opinions, analysis and pontifications about electronic music still have some options today:
I appeared on the most recent episode of Holly Herndon and Mat Dryhurst’s vaunted Interdependence podcast. As a longtime fan of the show, it was a real honor to be invited on, and our lengthy conversation touched upon a veritable “Greatest Hits” collection of First Floor topics, including the ongoing generational shift in dance music, the impact of streaming on the DJ-producer relationship and the current state of music journalism. The episode is currently available exclusively for Mat and Holly’s Patreon subscribers (and I would definitely encourage readers to support their work), but I will share it again once the paywall comes down.
While in Manchester last week, Cong Burn label head John Howes invited me to join him in the studio for his monthly NTS radio show. The episode debuted on Friday night, and it’s now been archived for anyone who missed the initial broadcast. It was my first time on the station, and Howes and I spent much of the program discussing my work on First Floor—including several specific essays that had caught his interest over the years—but we did manage to play some excellent tunes as well.
There’s more to come in the weeks ahead, but hopefully those two things will tide you over while I’m wrapping up the book tour.
And speaking of that tour, there are only two dates left:
June 25 -London, Cafe OTO (moderated by patten)June 27 -Bristol, Dareshack (moderated by Bruce)June 28 -Glasgow, University Chapel (moderated by Andrew Thomson)June 29 -Manchester, O! Peste Destroyed (moderated by John Howes)July 4 - Barcelona, Llibreria Finestres (moderated by John Talabot)
That final event is a last-minute addition to the tour that was announced only YESTERDAY, so if you’re anywhere near Milan (or know someone who is), please come down and / or spread the word. Lorenzo Senni will be moderating! That alone is very exciting.
I promise things will be “back to normal” around here soon, but in the meantime, I’ve made it home to Barcelona—for all of 24 hours—and tonight I’ll be speaking with none other than John Talabot. It’s also going to be the first book event conducted entirely in Spanish, which admittedly is somewhat terrifying, but I’m looking forward to it.
Shawn Reynaldo is a freelance writer, editor, presenter and project manager. Find him on LinkedIn and Twitter, or you can just drop him an email to get in touch about projects, collaborations or potential work opportunities.