Part Two: Alan Lomax: How to Record Everything and Mostly Make the World Better in the Process

Margaret continues her talk with Bridget Todd about the origins of folk music and the man who dedicated his life to preserving traditional art.

Sources:

https://acousticguitar.com/alan-lomaxs-steel-string-discoveries/
https://pinemountainsettlement.net/biography-a-z/alan-and-elizabeth-lomax-visitors/
Alan Loman: The Man who Recorded the World, John Szwed
Bring Judgment Day: Reclaiming Lead Belly's Truths from Jim Crow's Lies, Sheila Curran Bernard
Andy Cohen, personal correspondence
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=loYoTc7Aw0A

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
Cool Zone Media.

Speaker 2 (00:05):
Hello, and welcome to Cool People Who Did Cool Stuff,
your new weekly podcast that talks about recording things sometimes. Actually,
this is the only episode that I'm aware of that
is about recording things, but it is one. This is
an episode. I never know whether to say one episode
or two episodes when I have two episodes a week.
But I know what I do have on this podcast,
which is a guest named Bridgett. Hi.

Speaker 3 (00:26):
Hi, Margaret, thank you so much for having me. I
am thrilled to be back.

Speaker 2 (00:30):
Yay, welcome back five minutes later, I mean two days later.
Sophie is our producer. Hello, Sophie.

Speaker 4 (00:36):
This is our second time starting this podcast because the
first time failed. We got so distracted that we went
on a like personal stories chat for like fifteen minutes,
and now we're back to restarting the podcast.

Speaker 2 (00:50):
Yeah, we had to complain about beauty standards.

Speaker 3 (00:52):
Yeah, girl talk, just some off the record girl talk.

Speaker 4 (00:54):
Yeah, nothing for you sickos.

Speaker 2 (00:57):
But right, anyway, this episode or two episodes, or however
we define things, I changed the way to find it
all the time is part two of a two parter
about Alan Lomax, and part one was mostly complaining about
his dad. But where we last left our hero, he

(01:19):
was traveling with his dad and had led belly in
toe I think, guess where we're at, and he was
up to no good. It was up to no good. Eventually,
Honey led better breaks free of the Lomaxes, and eventually
Alan breaks free of his father and builds his own
career doing the same work, but hopefully in a less

(01:41):
exploitive way. Almost certainly in a less exploitive way. It
would be hard to do it as exploitavely. And also
it's kind of cool that these two people are very similar,
have these two ways of going about this. And the
person who changed the world and is remembered and is
like everyone's like, what a guy is the one who
did it without fucking people over?

Speaker 3 (02:03):
The cool one.

Speaker 2 (02:04):
Yeah, And so soon enough, at about twenty, he's like,
instead of teaming up with Dad, what if I team
up with two women in their forties. So one of
them is the still famous black writer Zola Neil Hurston,
who is most famous for the book Their Eyes Were
Watching God, And the other is a folklorist, a white

(02:26):
professor named Mary Elizabeth Barnacle. Barnacle's not spelled the same,
but it's still I think it's kind of a cool name.
I'm like, oh, you're probably like Scottish sailors name, like
Mary Elizabeth Barnacle. The only one of them with a
real job is the professor Mary Elizabeth Barnacle. So they're
working off of Barnacle's salary and they travel around the

(02:47):
South and they're recording folk music. And this time they're
less detached from their subjects, even when the Lomaxes had
led better with them, Like the Lomaxes were like sleeping
in white hotels and like not really mingling, you know.

(03:08):
So with Hirston, they're staying in black communities, and in
the process, the three of them produced the first I
kind of can't believe this, but it was presented to
me as fact. They produced the first audio recorded account
of someone talking about their time being enslaved. Wow, it
was a ninety two year old man.

Speaker 3 (03:27):
It seems wild to me that that would. I mean,
I believe you, but I share your that that seems
unbelievable to me.

Speaker 2 (03:34):
I know. But one of the things that's interesting Alan
Lomax is going to kind of invent oral history while
trying to record folk music. So I think it didn't
occur to anyone when they started recording out of wax
cylinders that instead of just playing songs, they could be like,
what was your life like? And famously say famously no

(03:55):
and gave a shit about inside people. But actually there's
an incredible amount of literature and stuff produced and especially
by formally enslaved people to try and record their experiences.
And they're hanging out in the South and they're specifically
studying a lot of like Creole and Haitian music, and
that's what Herston's history background of like academic study and

(04:15):
stuff is, And they started to do the work to
show which dance and musical styles had no European origins.
So like the idea of being like, oh, what is
African dance from a diasporic point of view was worked
that the three of them did, including a musical dance
style called Jurrey, which I hadn't heard of before. But

(04:37):
you can watch modern folks still accessing those songs because
of that work, and this goes on to influence Zydeco
music is the one that I had heard of. So
while these two white people are driving around the black
person and hanging out in black communities. Do you know
what they did stay safe? That doesn't sound good in retrospect.

Speaker 3 (04:53):
Oh my god, I cannot even imagine.

Speaker 2 (04:55):
Tell me they did blackface. Ah, of course, but not
in the way you'd think.

Speaker 3 (05:04):
I'm so scared.

Speaker 2 (05:05):
I know. So at Zora's insistence, they put walnut oil
on their skin to appear darker. Alan was like, black
people will know we're not black. This is not gonna
fool anybody. Yeah, and Zora's like, no, shit, it's not
to fool black people into thinking that you're black. It's
to fool white people so that they don't get mad

(05:26):
at you for hanging out with black people.

Speaker 3 (05:29):
Uh, so I have to step in.

Speaker 2 (05:31):
Please do I love this?

Speaker 3 (05:33):
I love Zora Nolhurston the way when you read her writing,
she really had such a savvy way of bridging the
gap between black and white. This is so like I
had never heard this anecdote, but this is so spot
on for her.

Speaker 2 (05:47):
Oh yeah, I only know a little bit about her.

Speaker 3 (05:49):
She seems fucking cool, such a fascinating Like I said.

Speaker 2 (05:52):
She's going to be her own subject at some point.
Please tell me, Oh my god, please.

Speaker 3 (05:55):
Yeah. So all of her work was like funded by
wealthy white pace, which is pretty common at the time,
and she subsequently she was so good at navigating sort
of black white relations and how you like keep white
people feeling good while being authentic to the black voice.
This so like what you're saying totally tracks for something

(06:16):
that herson would have done. And she was also funny
about it. So her being like, no, shit is not
gonna full black people. It's supposed to make white people
feel good. That is classic person. I love this.

Speaker 2 (06:27):
No, I love it because like as soon as they
read like oh fuck, because I was reading a line
it was like, and then they put Waldo oil on
their skin. I was like, oh God. And then I'm like, ah,
I'm not mad, Like I'm not mad.

Speaker 3 (06:38):
That's the thing is like it actually.

Speaker 2 (06:40):
Is kind of like it's not minstrelism or whatever the fuck.

Speaker 3 (06:43):
Yeah, like kind of just makes sense.

Speaker 2 (06:45):
Like I get it, I get it.

Speaker 3 (06:46):
It's what I'm saying.

Speaker 2 (06:47):
Also, Alan got arrested multiple times on this trip for
being a white person hanging out with black people. We did,
so it's like it was it was necessary.

Speaker 3 (07:00):
She knew what she was talking about.

Speaker 2 (07:03):
Basically, every time the police saw this guy, they're like, oh,
he's an instigator. He's gonna give them ideas, and so
this is true even when he travels in poor white areas,
he's seen as an instigator because the only out of
towners that are usually coming into these areas are labor
organizers and police don't like white unions or black unions,

(07:25):
or especially integrated unions. So it's worse when he's like
the white person hana with black people. But even when
he's the like out of towner, like we like to
imagine we have like free travel in this country. Obviously
we certainly didn't then, but like it's just interesting to
think of all of the ways people are like you're
not from around here can go really badly. So he

(07:47):
gets arrested like twice, and this time the three of
them tried to help people build their careers and not
just exploit them, like they would help people find contacts
and get shows. And later Alan is going to spend
a lot of time helping people copyright their own music.
And that's where it's like crucial from my point of view,

(08:07):
it's like who owns this? Like something that we've had
to cover on the show a lot, is that the
most resilient to Jim Crow. Black people in the South
during the Jim Crow periods with people who owned land.
So the work that happened during reconstruction to get land
into black farmers hands was some of the most essential work.

(08:27):
And so to me like ownership, like, oh, the copyright
is with the musician, fucking matters. But the two white
academics in the nineteen thirties were still not exactly good
at this, still not perfect. The two women began to
argue in the cars they drove. We also, I only

(08:49):
have this one biographer. I don't trust on this. But
the two women began to argue in the cars they drove.
I don't know exactly. Oh, that's funny. I put in
my own script that I should mention I don't trust source,
but I already said that you must.

Speaker 3 (09:02):
Have really not trusted the source that you were, Like
I said it and I wrote it.

Speaker 2 (09:06):
Yeah, it's been ten minutes in the first episode talking
about I'm gonna hear from that author and they're gonna
be like, here's all my sources, and I'd be like,
I guess I was wrong. I don't know whatever. Anyway,
Barnacle took a photo of a black kid eating watermelon,
and Zora was like, what the fuck? And I don't
know exact this is as much information as I have
on that. And also I'm paraphrasing when I say what
the fuck? And Alan defended Barnacle and was like, oh,

(09:29):
what's the big deal? And Zora was you know it said, Zora,
you're being unreasonable, which never happened again in the history.

Speaker 3 (09:37):
Yeah, no, well, meeting white person has ever told a
black woman that we were being unreasonable. Ever again, this
was beginning and end.

Speaker 2 (09:43):
Yeah, you can't say that because I'm anti racist, so
I can't. You have to be the unreasonable one. So
Zora left and the two white ethnographers they continued on.
And you won't be shocked to know the two white
folklorsts were met with way less success now that they've

(10:03):
driven off the black author.

Speaker 3 (10:07):
Surprise, surprise.

Speaker 2 (10:08):
Yeah, they went onto the Bahamas, the two white folklorists.
They went onto the Bahamas, and folks trusted them more.
I just assume different race relations, you know, the South
being a particularly hard time place. Whatever. Anyway, they go
onto the Bahamas and the people the recording tend to
trust them, for better or worse. The officials, however, decide

(10:30):
they're probably labor agitators and drove them out of the country.
So they didn't last there. They drifted back up to
New York and they started going through the endless hours
of recordings, and I think at this point Hurston is
back to participating in this. I don't think it was,
because certainly Alan is going to continue to work with Herston.
Later they go back to New York and they're going

(10:51):
through endless hours of recordings and they're hanging out with
all the bohemians and folks in New York were working
really hard to try and figure out what American less
music should be because if you ever heard like European
leftist music, it's classical international, everyone's gonna be mad at me,

(11:11):
you know.

Speaker 3 (11:12):
I know the vibe you're going for.

Speaker 2 (11:13):
Yeah, and this is before Belachow, so people hadn't realized
there's folk music in Italy too, and you could just
use that. But I love the song I'll ave Beticotas
and it's fucking classical music.

Speaker 3 (11:24):
Yeah, that was good. Was good.

Speaker 2 (11:27):
I liked that, And so American workers were like, yay,
let's sing me international. No, They're like, we want songs
that sound like American music, and so all these folk musicians,
labor organizers, not just New York City residents sat down
to be like, there's a conscious thing. They were like,
what does our folk music look like? And this is
how you start getting like Pete Seeger and Woody Guthrie
are part of these scenes, and you end up with
songs like dump the Bosses off Your Back. I have

(11:50):
to admit I like Alice beticottas more than dump the
Bosses off your Back, but I like led Belly more
than I like either of them. So and this ended
up tying into this caught me by surprise. It ties
into the larger project of trying to build American cultural identity.
So it wasn't just like what does the leftist American
cultural identity look like? Leftists were some of the first

(12:12):
people saying, what does American cultural identity look like? If
we're not England, you know, And we're like, what does
it look like to try and have? And I have
When I say I have mixed feelings about the American project,
that's a lie. I have negative feelings about the American project.

Speaker 3 (12:32):
They're not mixed, they're just purely negative.

Speaker 2 (12:35):
I see why some of the things that they said
that they believed in are interesting. I see why people
coming were interested in democracy as a concept. We just whatever,
and people heard me talk about this a million times.
I'm just very aware of it right now because we're
recording on the second of July, right before America the

(12:56):
stage falls apart, and everyone realized the metaphor of it.
I'm sorry we have to do this tangent today. Right
before we recorded in Washington, DC, where Bridgetot I believe
you sometimes keep track of the news. Yeah, the stage
that people were practicing for America's fucking anniversary party. You
w know this story. You can tell me this stort.

Speaker 3 (13:17):
Better bell apart before our very eyes in the one
hundred and four degree DC heat. Truly, I cannot imagine
a more apt metaphor for our democracy and the way
that it feels right now than watching this like hastily
erected shabby stage fall apart before our eyes, a stage

(13:39):
that was meant was erected to celebrate America to fifty
watching it crumble.

Speaker 2 (13:44):
I know, I like to imagine that those all those
shirts that say America seventeen seventy six of twenty twenty
six is just birth and death dates.

Speaker 3 (13:53):
Anyway, it does look like that, doesn't it. Yeah, totally rip,
Like somebody needs to make the like bootleg funeral shirt
for America.

Speaker 2 (14:04):
It's like rip, like yeah, America seventy seventy six, twenty
twenty six. It was good while it lasted fast for
some people some places.

Speaker 3 (14:15):
I would buy that. I would buy that. Make that
so I can buy it. If you're a bootlegger or
an airbrusher, make that t like I will buy you.
Got one customer, I'll buy it.

Speaker 2 (14:24):
Hell yeah, don't sell them on the street in DC.
I worry for your safety. No bootlegger, airbrusher. So anything homegrown,
anything bootleg in America, even white stuff wasn't taken seriously
as art. This is starting to change in the early
twentieth century. This surprised me, so I kind of want

(14:45):
to like see more sources talking about this, but I
believe it that it was certainly at least ongoing, if
not really starting at this point. And there's this whole
big fight all the record companies. Everyone's fighting for authenticity,
and this is going to tie into shit today just
so completely race music, black music was authentic, hillbilly music
was authentic. White people music. How dare anyone do both?

(15:09):
Of course, Led Belly kept getting told he couldn't play
cowboy songs despite being literally a cowboy. Charles Seeger, one
of the musicians and theorist who's doing this work, father
of the more famous Pete Seeger, wrote about how it
was all about constructing yourself as folk to sell yourself
to the non folk. I remember when I was like younger,
being like, what the fuck does folk mean? And the

(15:30):
answer is, what the fuck does folk mean? Like that's
the answer to the question, is like folk is a
morphoist concept, you know. And so Charles Seger wrote that
since the folk and nonfolk quote has now exploited the
other for a couple of decades, in the large frame
of the United States, there must exist few, if any

(15:51):
person's left ratable as one hundred percent either folk or
non folk. The vast population lies between these limits, each
individual made up of varying proportions or inhabited or released
folkness or nonfolkness. And so kind of just like making
fun of how everyone's obsessed with like fucking authenticity.

Speaker 3 (16:11):
I don't want to take us on a tangent, but
what's your thought on this era? Of folk music is
this Are you down with this?

Speaker 1 (16:17):
Oh?

Speaker 2 (16:17):
Yeah, no, I like this era folk music, And actually
I like it more now after doing these episodes, because
when I was like, okay, so if I'm going to
be an asshole about folk music, when people are like
I'm a folk musician and they put on Pete Seeger
and I'm like, this is a guy with a guitar,
a singer songwriter. I want accordions, I want like fiddles,

(16:38):
I want people who are really good at instruments. I
want you know, this other shit, right. But I think
I was actually, in a weird way a bias against
kind of American music because I like blues and shit,
but I didn't consider it folk, although in this context
it sort of is considered folk, right because it's like
authentic American music from the working clas I'm making lots

(16:59):
of air quotes gestures that nobody can see, whereas like
European folk or like Irish folker, you know, Balkan folk music,
or you know, even like traditional music from not Europe.
Like I was like, this shit's amazing and complicated. I
just don't want to hear a man who doesn't know
how to sing named Bob Dylan sing things. You know,
not to pick on anyone in particular named Bob Dylan,
but if like the general Bob Dylan's yeah, and like

(17:21):
I actually never really liked that. Okay, that's a lie.
I like Bob Dylan in high school because I was
desperately trying to find an identity, not because I actually
enjoyed his music. See also when I like Smashing Pumpkins
in middle school, you know, yeah, yeah, what's your opinion
of folk music?

Speaker 3 (17:35):
Oh, I'm kind of similar to you. I'm only coming
to appreciate it now because I feel like, for most
of my life as a black person, it's like I
imagine it sort of being this like in opposition to
my own identity. But then learning more about the roots
and how it came to be only and honestly used
to be a out of your work, Like learning about

(17:55):
the roots has made me realize how much more in
common we had. I hate the fact that when you
think about folk music, people have been so successful at
being like, oh, this is about you know, like it's
supposed to be about like white identity. When I actually
learned about the roots, it really I've only now come
to really appreciate it more. Does that make sense?

Speaker 2 (18:16):
No, it makes complete sense to me. That is like
it's so complicated because then you're like, ah, yes, all
of this stuff was basically stolen from black people. And
then it's awkward because some of it you go back
far enough and John is just stealing it from black people. Yeah, right,
but Alan is like trying to do an anti racist
cultural exchange exactly, which leads to it being stolen by

(18:37):
like and it it just makes me sad, you know,
because like I would love to live in a culture
of cultural appreciation instead of appropriation, but we live under
capitalism and white supremacy, so we don't get to have
that because we have to destroy those things.

Speaker 3 (18:52):
You know.

Speaker 2 (18:53):
I think listening to led Belly makes me like Woody
Guthrie Moore. And also the fact that led Belly literally
mentored what he got three like it wasn't a like
in opposition to each other thing, you know. And their
whole thing was that they they tried, they made this
fantastic gamble to try and create a culture that was
actually diverse, you know.

Speaker 3 (19:15):
And I have to say the first guy I was
ever deeply, deeply like infatuated with had a, uh, this
machine kills fascist tattoo. And I know it's a cliche,
but it's still like when I hell I see that tattoo,
I'm like, oh.

Speaker 1 (19:31):
Yeah it.

Speaker 2 (19:33):
No totally and like and even like anti warship, like
anti fascism. It wasn't just white folk musicians, you know,
like fucking yes, Led Belly sings a song called mister
Hitler and that's like We're gonna bring you down, you know,
like yeah, ah, I like that tattoo too. But then
there's the people who write this machine mixed folk music

(19:54):
on guns.

Speaker 3 (19:55):
Oh I have not seen that.

Speaker 2 (19:57):
But yeah, I live in a horrible niche So all right,
back to our heroes, our anti hear our people. After
he had another wild summer, Alan is back to Texas
for his junior year of college because he is still
twenty years old. That's the other thing to remember about
all of this. He is a legally distinct from child.

(20:18):
He is a child, you know, he's doing all this
crazy shit. And then the next summer he bums around
Mexico with no money, busking with a guitar, and he
starts dating a Jewish communist, a card carrying communist named
Elizabeth and he's pretty happy about it. But do you
know what I'm happy about?

Speaker 3 (20:35):
Is it the good folks who sponsor of this podcast.

Speaker 2 (20:38):
I am very happy about the ability that I have
to feed my dog and myself. I actually have some
appreciation for the people who help me do that. Who
you if you want to appreciate even though they don't
feed your dog, you can choose to listen to Andrew back.
But instead of going back to college, Alan gets the

(21:02):
Library of Congress to send him to Haiti to record
music with Zorahurston.

Speaker 3 (21:05):
Awesome.

Speaker 2 (21:06):
It almost made you do a spittake.

Speaker 3 (21:08):
I know, I was drinking water when she was saying that,
and I was not expecting it. Getting sent by the
Library of Congress to Haiti.

Speaker 2 (21:16):
Yeah no, Yeah. And Haiti in the nineteen thirties was
we're going to go with not exactly a tourist destination,
but the locals were glad to have the pair because
they considered documenting in preserving their traditions to be part
of how they would resist colonization in europeanization. And soon
he's there on his own, and he's just buried by possibility.

(21:37):
He's like everything is folk in America. You don't know
what's authentic When you're in Haiti in nineteen thirty and
you're a white guy from Texas, You're like, oh.

Speaker 3 (21:47):
Fuck, it's all authentic to me.

Speaker 2 (21:50):
Yeah, And everything around him is folk because there is
a very strict class thing where that schools don't teach
creole and the constitution for bids vodu. But that's what
everyone speaks, and that's what everyone lives. That's Everyone's not everyone,
but it's most people's language and religion and so everything
it's not just folk, cause is different. It's folk because
it's like not allowed, you know, so there's like an

(22:12):
inherent rebelness to it. Yeah, and he is, i believe,
along with Hurston, the first to record these things, which
makes his recordings essential for modern folks who are trying
to understand their own culture. Right, So it's not this
is actually watching a bunch of YouTube videos of like
modern people using Lomax recordings to be able to continue

(22:34):
their own culture. That was like an interesting moment where
it's like not always just about a pipeline for your
shit to be exposed to the white world and sold
off Elizabeth the card caring communist. He's excited about joins
him in Haiti with the intention of getting married in
this exotic locale, but actually specifically one they liked it there,

(22:55):
and two they had to get away from his family
because John Loma, not a big fan of the card
carrying Communist that his son wants to marry.

Speaker 3 (23:07):
Didn't love it, didn't Was it what he was expecting
for his son.

Speaker 2 (23:10):
Yeah, now he's not into it. But they're not old enough.
I actually it's funny. I ended up covering the age
of consent and how America is really backwards about this
in recent episodes. God, what a fucking weird job I have.
But they weren't old enough to get married in Haiti
because they weren't twenty three.

Speaker 3 (23:30):
Oh, in Haiti, the age of consent to marry is
twenty three.

Speaker 2 (23:33):
Without parental permission in nineteen thirties. I cannot tell you
about what's happening currently, okay, And so he wrote his
dad to get permission, and it's like the whole letter
I read it, it's like he's very like, I don't
want to write this, You're not gonna like it. Can
you please fill out the following form and send it
with the following identification. So that I can get married,

(23:55):
and I don't think his dad responds. So instead, it's
easier they get the president of Haiti to waive the
age laws. She's like twenties, like twenty two, so that
they can get married in Haiti. It was easier to
get the fucking president of Haiti than John fucking Lomax
to approve of their.

Speaker 3 (24:13):
You know how much your dad has to so super
fucking not approve to be like, we just got to
go to them. My dad's a non starter. We gotta
go to the President of Haiti.

Speaker 2 (24:21):
Yeah, absolutely, anyone could just do that. And so they
stay there. They live there for a little while, and
they live in a dirt floorhouse with leaves for a roof,
and it's all very exotic for them. And the two
of them get back to their work and soon they
are initiated into vodu, which at the time included being
buried alive briefly. And they're both soon sick with malaria,

(24:43):
and they're broke and they're having a hard time. And
Alan wrote, quote in Haiti, it is not a good
policy to grow weak and helpless and be broke. I
love that line. My formerly effective arguments could bring no singers.
Before the microphone, I had just enough money to buy
a little for the crowds that gathered each night at
the house to listen to the records being made, but

(25:04):
not enough to make them all respectful or consider it
invited into my house. They took possession of it. They
camped on all the chairs and refused to be moved.
They laughed and talked while the records were being made,
and no threats or wheedling reasons could stop their mouths.
Occasionally the gendarmes would descend from the bouquet and pretend
to clear the house, but it was only to occupy

(25:25):
the chairs themselves and add more undisciplined to the already
boisterous audience. I love this because it's so visceral, and
people are treating them like people and giving them some respect,
and their work was accepted. They're like, yeah, you can
do this. But people did not kiss their asses. People
are like, oh, you got nice shit. Fuck. Yeah, I'm

(25:45):
gonna hang out.

Speaker 3 (25:46):
Yeah, I'm gonna lay on That'll put my feet on
this couch. I don't give a fuck.

Speaker 2 (25:49):
Yeah, Oh what are you gonna do? Sick white boy?

Speaker 3 (25:53):
Yeah, I will not be moved.

Speaker 1 (25:55):
Altho.

Speaker 2 (25:55):
Yeah, like, I like appreciate that way that they were
handled by people. It feels I.

Speaker 3 (26:02):
Don't know, yeah, And I bet they were thinking, oh,
these people are going to be so thrilled that we
even want anything to do with us, or there's going
to be automatic, like they're going to be differential, and
it's like, actually, no, yeah, they're gonna make themselves right
at home.

Speaker 2 (26:15):
Yeah, totally sorry. They're folk, not non folk. You know.
After about four months, they just ran out of money
and they had to return to America, and they had
about fifty hours of audio recordings three hundred and fifty
feet of eight millimeter film, which I do not know
how much time that is, but that film shows day
to day life. It shows like people like how they
made their drums and how they did a bunch of stuff.

(26:37):
And it was like some of the first recordings of
this stuff. And he took a job at the Library
of Congress as assistant in charge of the Archive of
American Folk Song, and he and Elizabeth kept wandering recording songs,
and they were watching folk music disappear in front of
their eyes with the advent of radio right and recording.

(26:58):
And they went to a full folk festival in Ohio,
only to find it commercial hillbilly music. He complained about it,
as I love this never changes. Shit. This is also
like when people are like, oh, what styles of music
do you like? And I'm like, I like all styles
of music, So I don't really listen to radio country.
I say radio country on purpose because I like some
country music, you know. And so he complained about the

(27:19):
Ohio Hillbilly Music Festival as quote a huge drove of yodling, crooning,
Alabama mooning Kentuckians and quote the most horrible exhibition of
Anglo American blonde, blue eyed sentimentalism and musical gashery. I
have ever endured what a fucking burn totally, And I'm like, oh,

(27:41):
that's just that's radio country.

Speaker 3 (27:44):
Yeah, you know.

Speaker 2 (27:45):
I mean, now some radio country got interesting again because
once again it's stole some shit from black people.

Speaker 3 (27:50):
But the few times I've listened to radio country, it does.
I mean, like, and I really don't know. I would
love somebody to explain the difference. To me. It's sounds
like rap music. It just sounds like, oh, it's the
same thing, but like we're talking about country girl shaking
that butt on the hood. Of a Truck, which is
a real song by the way I heard. Yeah, I mean,

(28:11):
I'm curious, like what's the difference.

Speaker 2 (28:13):
Really, I guess I should clarify when I say radio country,
I mean in the nineties and oughts, when I was
like younger, when it wasn't as much influenced by rap
and hip hop. And that's what I was saying, is
like some of it's actually are right now because they
stole more shit from black people. Yeah yeah, but like
I would also need someone to explain to me what
I mean. It kind of gets into like the audience

(28:34):
is often what creates the difference. Like everything is a
social construct, Like one of my favorite ways to be
like everything is a social construct. People like, nah, things
are really physical and specific, and I'm like, how many
fucking continents are there, Like, oh yeah, Europe, Asia, Uh huh,
it's different culture. It is a social construct, so right,

(28:55):
it would make sense to me that like country music
is a social construct. Oh God, I'm gonna get it wrong.
So one of the first originators of modern country music
was a white racist in the South who had like
started off friends with black people and then they were
like mean to him at work and so then he
went off and started his racist career and now I

(29:15):
can't remember. So now I'm just talking shit in an
entire genre that so many of my friends, like so
many of my friends are into country music.

Speaker 3 (29:23):
Well, I know this is not who you meant, but
that's essentially the origin story of one mister kid Rock
who started as a rap artist. Literally, that is his
origin story.

Speaker 2 (29:33):
That doesn't surprise me at all. Fuck that guy. So
one of the next things that he does is he
helps and emphasism helps invent oral history as a concept
I promised you. And he does this with a singer
named jelly Roll Morton Jazz is first a ranger, like
the first person who actually wrote the notes down, and

(29:56):
he also possibly takes credit well he certainly he was
willing to take and possibly deserves to take credit for
inventing jazz swing and stomp and is one of the
first people to call a song blues and so Alan
Lomax and Jelly Roll is like no longer like important
at this time, and he's very bitter about it. As
a club that he runs by himself, and they do

(30:17):
eight hour sessions of music and talking and it's like
kind of like explaining jazz, and so it becomes oral history.
It starts off as a music recording, but it naturally
becomes a talking about what's happening. And some of these
sessions were so explicit that the Library of Congress didn't
make them public until two thousand and five, which is

(30:39):
funny because I didn't know this jelly roll was slang
at the time. For you know, pussy.

Speaker 3 (30:49):
I didn't know.

Speaker 4 (30:49):
Yeah, famous country singer now that same jelly roll?

Speaker 2 (30:54):
Yeah? Really is he copying jelly roll Morton? Or is he?

Speaker 4 (30:58):
I don't care enough about him to know.

Speaker 2 (31:01):
Yeah, but I can look it up. Probably he's not.
I don't know anything about this person. I'm not going
to pine one way or the other about the modern
jelly roll. But no, it was.

Speaker 4 (31:13):
He was given the name because he was a chubby
kid with a fondness for donuts. His mother gave it
to a boring Yeah, God, I like your version better.

Speaker 2 (31:26):
Alan also recorded the ethnic whites who were not being
included in a lot of the cultural recordings at the time.
He went to Irish communities and Polish communities. He recorded
French balladiers, and his whole thing is he was like,
I have to rush and record these people before all
of their music is assimilated into playing American pop music,
which at the time was jazz and square dance. And

(31:49):
so like all of these musicians if you want to
make a living or playing jazz and square dance music.
And he's doing this for the Library of Congress, and
he has to account for every penny he spends in
the like when he's doing all of this stuff, it's
shoestring budget, you know, it's like not technically DIY, but
it's like shoe string in New York. The scene he's

(32:13):
in throws festivals to support the Spanish anti fascists and
Friend of the Pod the Spanish Civil War nineteen thirty
six to nineteen thirty nine. Maybe people have heard of it.
If not, they should check out more or less the
entire first two years that they did this show.

Speaker 3 (32:26):
I was gonna ask, like, the whole war is Friend
of the Pod.

Speaker 2 (32:30):
Yeah, No, it's just well one it comes up all
the time because it's kind of interesting. Partly, I'm just
really interested in it because it's the you know, high
water mark. Unfortunately, to say, of the ideology that I'm
most interested in, which is like anarchist communism where huge
chunk of Catalonia was able to People have heard me
give this rant a million times, but for about three years,

(32:50):
workers organize themselves in a non hierarchical socialist fashion, and
I'm very interested in it. But it specifically, it comes
up all the time because even though it's like largely
forgotten because it's over, World War two had a tendency
to make people forget everything, you know, because it was
kind of a big deal. But this was the anti
fascist fight that had everyone, like everyone who's paying attention to, like, oh,

(33:11):
fascism is on the rise. So the Spanish Civil War
was like the cause celebrit I know how to spell it,
but I don't want to pronounce it cause celebrity at
the time. So he's raising money for it. He also
plays union rallies and local bars, but he refuses he
like is playing shows two but he's like, I am
not a musician. That's not my thing. I refuse to

(33:32):
get paid more than food or drink. He started going
to grad school at Columbia, but he dropped out of
college to help raise money for Howe, he led better
after the guy got arrested again for knife fighting again,
probably in self defense. But you know, I don't know.
He started working in radio, and he basically has like
a which way do you want to go? Moment, like
a little little meme with the two castles, you know.

(33:55):
And he starts working in radio, teaching school children about
folk music, and he's skeptical about the program, but he
is glad for a chance to get to pay artists.
And there's this whole thing. I had no idea that
musician who was like, why would I let you record me?
You'll just play that instead. The musicians' unions in the
thirties and I think forties fought and successfully had for

(34:17):
a while radio couldn't play recorded music. Radio played people
playing music. Bands would come into the station and play
I had no fucking idea.

Speaker 3 (34:29):
I didn't either. And if we're thinking about you know,
I really resonated with this idea of someone saying, oh,
why would I let you record me? You're just going
to play that recording instead of paying me to play. Ye.
This is very interesting. It's like we're still having the
same conversations today as to pertain tech technology like AI.

Speaker 2 (34:46):
Yeah, no, totally. And so even when he's playing folk
music on the radio, he's literally playing it because he's
gone around and collected all these songs and he learns
these songs or whenever possible, and he does seem to
do this as much as he can. He brings me
psitions on and gives them the money, right, and so
it's like folk music is meant to be played. Even
his recordings, a lot of it is about transcription. And

(35:08):
so there's like all of this stuff about that didn't
end up in my script, but there's all these arguments
about all of these different folklorists going through the Lomax recordings.
Because he kind of gets all the credit, but there's
all these women who helped do all the transcriptions, and
I didn't include them in the script. Fuck me, But
that's because I wasn't as interested in as transcriptions. But
maybe that's the problem because it's behind the scenes where
and they're arguing about how they transcribe music that does

(35:31):
not meet Western ideas, right, Like you're like, oh, is
this twelve bars or twelve and a half bars? And
the person's like, man, I don't know, I play guitar.
What do you want you know? And then he gets
to play a show that I don't know anyone else
who's ever played. He played for the Roosevelts and the
King and Queen of England at one show at the

(35:51):
White House at twenty four years old. Wah, but remember
how he's kind of a communist. He's actually not a
card carrying communist. He no longer capitalizes the sea and
draws flames spitting out of the letters.

Speaker 3 (36:04):
You know he's not doing this, does the s anymore? Yeah,
the communist.

Speaker 2 (36:09):
That's the real way to know someone's in the Communist
Party is they use the cool less in the Communism,
whatever the ideology. If the Essenism is a cool less,
you know they're fucking down for the cause they're down. Yeah. Unfortunately,
the FBI is like they get a tip and one

(36:31):
version is that like it was a friend of the
family who over heard him talking to his dad. Another
version is it was his dad. They get a tip
that he's a communist, So the FBI detains him and
searches him in a stairwell. Like they it's not even
like searched on the way in. He's like going through
a stairwell and two plane clothes officers come up behind
and in front of him and like search him and

(36:52):
inquisite and inquisitate him, ask him questions, Oh no, that
is a bad vibe I do right before or he
has to go play for the fucking King and Queen
of England. So he's he's shaken and he's so nervous
while he's playing that. Eleanor Roosevelt mentioned it in her autobiography,

(37:16):
and for the next thirty years the FBI is going
to be investigating him. And no one who the FBI
interviews about him ever admits he's a communist, is what
one thing said. Another thing said that his dad did,
or his uncle, but whatever. People keep being like this
guy communists. People are like, nah, not really, it's fine,
and so no insnitcheing on him. And he's also like

(37:38):
not in the Communist Party because it is a huge
and complicated difference because at the time the Communist Party
was literally takes direction from the Soviet Union, right, and
so saying I am a Communist at the Capital C
means like, I am part of a hierarchical structure that
takes orders from the Soviet Union, whereas he being like,
I believe in communism from each accordion to ability to

(37:59):
each accordion, a need and maybe have mixed feelings about
the Communist Party. It's a very common sentiment, and I
feel like, got to play for the King and Queen,
but it was also detained by the FBI for being
a Communist while doing it. Pretty much encapsulates so much
about this man's life. Yes, he was something of a
sensation at this point as a radio personality. He was

(38:20):
offered the chance to retreat into academia. This is his
two Castle's moment. But he's He's like, I actually don't
just want to be a folklorist. I'm not just interested
in the academic study of folk music. Basically, someone's like, hey,
come to Brazil and study indigenous people with me, and
he's like, what if instead I want to be involved
with communicating with people about folk music. And he's like,

(38:41):
much more interested in radio and TV in popular education.
I like him, But do you know what else I like?
Tell me, I like all of the products and services
that support this show, even the ones that I don't like.

Speaker 3 (38:57):
Great, let's hear more about them.

Speaker 2 (38:59):
All right. I'm glad you asked, And we're back during
World War Two. First, on his own time, he helps
design musical propaganda and songbooks for the troops all tied
into national folk heroes. So he like because he's always

(39:19):
been interested in anti fascism and now it's like a
government run project and he's like, yeah, okay, whatever, whatever
fucking takes. And so he's doing all of this work
to connect with different like ethnic enclaves in America and
finding folk heroes that they're going to like resonate with
and tie it into anti fascism propaganda is so weird.

(39:40):
So like the white people get Davy Crockett and the
black people get John Henry, and he's like going through
and like finding all the songs and being like, here's
the songs and how they tie into America hates fascists,
and he's writing patriotic songbooks about killing Nazis while also
organizing singing groups called like the Union Boys sick name

(40:00):
for a band, I'll fa yeah. And in the process
during all of this, he ends up in a screaming
match with his father. He's like talking to his dad
about the same shit he's always his dad's probably has
your life, and he's like, black people haven't really bad
in the South, dad, and this drives his father into
a screaming rage, who yells you have disgraced the South,

(40:22):
not the whole South, the whole South.

Speaker 3 (40:24):
I love how much father issues are a thread through
his story.

Speaker 2 (40:29):
I know, because his father is just like, how dare
you say that? Like white Southerners are racist?

Speaker 3 (40:34):
You all have disgraced the South.

Speaker 2 (40:37):
Even though his father once wrote a fake autobiography by
Lead Belly and that used I'm gonna get the numbers
exactly wrong because it's not script. I don't really care
what his dad thinks. His dad sucks, his dad raises
a shit, but his dad like like son says something
on the radio about like, oh, this one black man
was pulled over for being black. So dad goes in

(40:57):
and investigates. It's like, actually, this man was pulled up
for this other reason. It just happened to be black
in this one particular case. Your whole argument is invalid.
And he probably sounded exactly like that at the time.

Speaker 3 (41:08):
I'm sure people listening are like, oh, that sounds I
can relate to sitting with my dad at a dinner table,
and that's exactly how my dad sounds.

Speaker 2 (41:15):
Yeah, I really won the family lottery. I don't talking
about my family on air, but I really won that lottery.
I'm real happy. So he has like really mixed feelings
about his personal involvement in the war, which is reasonable,
Like he spends a while finding jobs that'll defer him
from going to the front because he's like, I like
being alive. That's like a thing. But every now and

(41:38):
then he's like, no, fuck it, I should just join
up and kill fascists. But in nineteen forty two, while
he's working his ass off for the war effort, the
FBI starts questioning him directly about whether he's a member
of the Communist Party, which he wasn't, So he said
he wasn't, and he wound up on a list of
alleged communists for the Committee investigating on American activities. But

(41:59):
the FBI, what they wrote about him is really interesting
because the FBI kind of actually had his number in
a weird way. But they think it's bad. Whatever, I'll
just read it. He was possessed of an artistic temperament,
a bohemian, single mindedly devoted to folk music, ornery. He
was not discreet in his choice of words and was
slovenly in his appearance. He was intensely interested in negro

(42:23):
and underprivileged classes. Was sometimes slow to pay his rent,
had several arguments with his father on the Negro question,
wherein he termed his father as a fascist and himself
as a communist on this question, his father being anti
Negro minded, and he was known to associate with a
Negro by the name of Leadbelly who was released from
a Southern penitentiary. He I'm no longer quoting. He had

(42:46):
a suspicious number of books. But they decided in the end,
this is why I think they had his number, that
he was too undisciplined and independent to be loyal to
a political party, So instead of arresting him, they just
tailed him for yeah, thirty years.

Speaker 3 (43:01):
It does kind of sound like they had his number. Also,
that's a pretty lit description of somebody lots of books. Yeah,
you know, very slovenly didn't always pay his rent on time,
you know how it is. I was like, oh shit,
all right, all right.

Speaker 2 (43:18):
Like we both know this man. You know I've dated this. Yeah,
I know the guy totally.

Speaker 3 (43:24):
You're right. It does sound like the FBI had his number.

Speaker 2 (43:26):
Yeah, And it's so interesting to me that like genuinely
they were like, well he probably is like kind of
a socialist or whatever. But he's like clearly not actually organized.
It's like fine and not fine all at once.

Speaker 3 (43:37):
You know, he's not gonna get it together to actually
do anything.

Speaker 2 (43:40):
We don't think, Yeah, which is funny because he's working
for the government. He's part of why he's being investigated
so much, probably, but like he writes patriotic songbooks for
a living. At this point about how like you know,
Davy Crockett wants you to join the war effort and
in nineteen forty four, and I actually really appreciate this
if you're going to write propaganda, but how you should
go to war? In nineteen forty four, he decided to

(44:03):
have his employer cancel his draft deferment and so he
was drafted into the army. He had a bit of
a rough time socially because he joins the army, it's
a segregated army, and he has the habit of punching
every white soldier who says the N word.

Speaker 3 (44:20):
Ah the forties, probably like all of them, and.

Speaker 2 (44:24):
So like there's like a story where he's like I
was watching him at a cafe and he physically threw
a man out of the cafe into the street, and
the man came back and said sorry, sorry, sorry, but
I just don't like sitting next to black people. Didn't
say that, and so he gets punched for that, and
I'm like, the man he just threw out apologizes to
him that keeps being racist. So he attacks him a

(44:46):
second time.

Speaker 3 (44:47):
That is like, the could skit? I just I just
kept going at him. He wouldn't stab.

Speaker 2 (44:53):
You'd be like, I don't get it. You're a white soldier.
Why can't I say racist shit in front of you?

Speaker 3 (44:58):
Punch? Yeah.

Speaker 2 (45:01):
I and a friend who used to kick people in
the nuts when they call people packets.

Speaker 3 (45:08):
They probably learned though eventually.

Speaker 2 (45:10):
I know it was sort of like it wasn't even
I mean, it was homophobic, but it was like not like,
oh that gos you know, for the record, I only
say slurs that have been said at me by people
who want to kill me. If anyone's curious why I
use that word, yeah, no. Anyway, that particular person was like, oh, yeah,
I probably shouldn't say that.

Speaker 3 (45:27):
Sounds like it was an effective deterrent.

Speaker 2 (45:29):
Yeah, to be honest, totally. And he wanted to go
to Europe because he wanted to fight Nazis, but instead
they made him make radio content. He fucking podcasted his
way through the war and he didn't want to. And
he is the guy for Better or Worse who brought okay,
So like marching Cadence songs, they're like, I don't know

(45:49):
what I've been told, but I like cliches in my
movies that comes from black culture. This is probably not
gonna surprise you.

Speaker 3 (45:58):
What did surprise me was your little version of it,
which I appreciate it. Yeah, that was that was pretty.

Speaker 2 (46:03):
Thank you, real good at rhyming off the top of
my head. So black regiments were singing that way, and
eventually Alo Max was like, look, that's clearly better. They're
actually better at marching. You should stop making everyone be
dour all the time and let them sing and they
will do better at this. So for Better or Worse,

(46:23):
that's his fault. He did radio. They made him a corporal,
and they kept him around for a year after the
end of the war. I think they were like, I
don't know what if it pops off again, I'm not
actually sure. And then they let him go and he
goes back to New York and New York is on
fire with the radical possibility of song and folklore. Pete
Seeger was like, We're going to change the world, and

(46:45):
this is where have you heard of da Von Ronk? No,
he's another one of these white folk singers in the
New York scene, but he's mostly If people know him today,
it's largely because he was like one of Bob Dylan's
main influences. Again, for Better or Worse, this is the
thing that well, I feel like for Better or Worse
is like the main thing with like disseminated stuff to
the masses, and you're like, oh, how'd that go in
the end once the mass has had it? But like,

(47:07):
I also do believe it's fucking complicated. Anyway. The reason
I knew Davon Ronk and I got really excited when
he popped up in this story is that Davon Ronk
is famous in my world because he's a straight guy, right,
and he's sitting at a cafe and oh my god,
I remember its nineteen sixty or nineteen sixty nine, whenever
Stonewall was Everyone's gonna be mad at me now I'm
a fake gay. But Stonewall Riot pops off, Davon Ronk

(47:27):
is like shit, people are fighting cops, and so he
runs out of the restaurants are throwing bricks at cops.
He gets arrested.

Speaker 3 (47:32):
He's like, I don't need I'll find out later what
the cause is. If we're throwing rocks at cops, I'm
in I know which side I'm on exactly?

Speaker 2 (47:42):
Is the George Orwell quote that's like, I'm gonna do
terrible mis justice this quote. I don't have much of
a appreciation for the idealized worker that exists in the
bourgeois communist member's mind. But when I see a flesh
and blood worker in conflict with his natural enemy, the policeman,
I do not have to ask myself which side I
am on.

Speaker 3 (48:01):
There you go, actually a good like axiom to live.

Speaker 2 (48:05):
By, genuinely. Yeah. Every now and then you'll be like, oh, like, oh,
I don't mind that kind was like, that's a NASTI
fighting a cop. I don't know, man.

Speaker 3 (48:15):
Yeah, there are a few times where you're like, oh no,
But for the most part, I feel like it will
work out totally.

Speaker 2 (48:22):
The New York City scene tried to sell unions on
folk music in the late forties. They're like, we gotta
figure it out. This is our leftist music. But by
that point, folk music that they were doing was already
seen as hokey and out of touch, so some thing's
never change. And they formed People's Songs, which was an
advocacy group, and they backed the Progressives in the nineteen
forty eight election, which didn't work, and they kept going.

(48:44):
And the whole time, he's sleeping with other women, and
I only learned that almost all the way through the
why would anyone mention that? Eventually, nineteen forty nine, Elizabeth
is like, I'm kind of done. Need to just keep
cheating on me? So she leaves him. He deserves it.

(49:04):
The Feds are still after him. He used his name
to sponsor a fundraiser that, okay, so this is how
many steps of separation will get you in trouble. He
used his name to sponsor a fundraiser to defend lawyers
who defended someone that people accused of being communists, and
that was too close to being a communist, so the
FEDS were after him again.

Speaker 3 (49:23):
I feel like that Winona Ryder meme where she's trying
to it looks like she's trying to do a math
equation in her head on stage. I'm like, that's so
many degrees removed.

Speaker 2 (49:33):
You shouldn't arrest lawyers for defending people who are accused
of being communists, and because I'm going to raise the
money for the lawyers who are defending the people accused
of the communists. He literally has to leave the country
at this point. And a report came out on the
radio personalities who were secret reds and he was on

(49:53):
there alongside Orson Wells and Langston Hughes and Pete Seeger,
and that FBI started investigating everyone wh knew him, and
he was like, you know what Europe is folk music,
Maybe I should go there. And that means ditching his
kid with his ex wife, despite the fact that he'd
agreed to help raise his daughter. He did offer double

(50:14):
the child support she asked for. When he was like,
I'm not helping, she was like, I one hundred bucks
a month. He was like, I'm giving you two hundred.
This is a crumbs thing. Everyone involved on this zoom
call is making roughly the same face.

Speaker 3 (50:27):
Yeah, I had a nickel for every like very cool guy.
He was like, oh, I did kind of abandon my
kid and let somebody else raise them. That is a
common thing, unfortunately.

Speaker 2 (50:38):
Which is funny because his philandry, cheating whatever it's called
barely mentioned ever. Led Belly, famous for being a womanizer,
constantly like this is the number of kids he had
out of wedlock. Led Belly had a lot of kids
out of wedlock. What led Belly did not do is
a band in those kids. He was like, that is

(51:00):
my kid. I actually don't know whether you paid child support.
I just like literally don't know one way or the other.
But like a lot of his kids took the name
led Better because they're like, yeah, that's my dad. My
dad's cool. Anyway, I wonder what the difference between Alan
Lomax and Haughty Ledbetter is.

Speaker 3 (51:17):
I was gonna say, it's interesting, who's philandering and having
a lot of kids is like a big part of
their story, even though they were there for their kids.
It sounds like and who's It's just like it's not
part of it's like a footnote if mentioned at all.

Speaker 2 (51:31):
Right. One of the things that we talked about in
the Honey led Better episodes is that consciously John Lomax,
the Terrible Man, was building an idea of the black
man as the like dangerous man but who can sing,
you know, and like created this fucking racist stereotype and
like used led belly to do it.

Speaker 3 (51:52):
That persists. It's wild how this still lingers?

Speaker 4 (51:56):
You know?

Speaker 2 (51:57):
No, absolutely, So he goes, he leaves country, and he
spends eight years out of the country recording folk music
everywhere he could. He comes back to the States in
nineteen fifty eight, and there in New York City he
saw a folk scene musicians playing in Washington Square Park,
largely because of his recording work. And if you're like, well,
We've been talking about this the whole time, but I'm
just gonna read it because of my script. If you're like, oh,

(52:18):
great white city kids discover folk music from rural and
black people, well, Lomax would agree with you. He wrote
about it. Quote. Some of the young folknicks who dominated
the New York scene asserted that there was more folk
music in Washington Square on Sunday afternoon than there was
an all of rural America. Apparently it made them feel
like heroes to believe that they were keeping a dying

(52:40):
tradition alive. The idea that these nice young people who
were only just beginning to learn how to play and
sing in good style might replace the glories of the
real thing frankly horrified me. So he'd kind of hate
what folk music came to.

Speaker 3 (52:55):
Yeah, it sounds like that.

Speaker 2 (52:58):
And he went on to record a lot of music
that went on to have big white bands cover them,
The Rolling Stones, Led Zeppelin, all of those people. Even
with the best intentions, the colonization continued. He believed in
what he called cultural equity, he said in nineteen ninety one.
He lived for a pretty long time, he said, quote,
cultural equity should join all the other important principles of
human dignity, freedom of speech, freedom of movement, freedom to

(53:20):
work and live and enjoy yourself, and freedom for your
culture to express itself. So basically he's saying, like, you
can't have cultural superiority. That's his argument. He's like that
needs to be up there with everything else, is that
you can't suppress people's culture. His biographer, John Sweed wrote
about him. The biographer who only in like one sentence

(53:40):
mentioned the fact that he was cheating on his wife
and loved his kidding.

Speaker 3 (53:43):
This is the one that you don't trust.

Speaker 2 (53:45):
Yeah, yeah, is the one that I don't trust, said
about him. Quote. His enthusiasm was boundless and seemed to
grow with age. His drive to celebrate life in all
its diversity and to see, taste and hear everything was astonishing,
and he kept his Texas accent despite decades of living
in New York and steadfastedly refuse to let anyone give
him shit about it. Basically, his argument was like, this

(54:05):
doesn't make me a bad person. This is just where
I'm from. You know, the fact that this is a
bad person is unrelated. I'm just like bitter. I'm so
bitter about the number of times I have written entire
things about subjects and then gotten to the end and
been like, why can't respecting women be part of being radical?

Speaker 3 (54:23):
Misogyny is eternal.

Speaker 2 (54:24):
Yeah, God, I read essays not by a good person.
I read essays by Dwarkin, my second wave feminist that
I was influential on me. And then I have to
admit that where she was complaining about the free love movement,
where she was like, you know, so that all the
free love people are like all the men were feminists
until they got birth control and then they stopped because
all they cared about was access to sex. That was

(54:45):
what they were in the fight for.

Speaker 3 (54:47):
Oh, Margaret, this is like I would talk all day
how many leftist progressive men and then you're in the
movement with them, and it's like, we expect the women
to make food and clean up, and we're gonna be
the leaders of this whole thing. We're gonna be the face.

Speaker 2 (55:01):
Like totally, it is taialeless all this time. Totally. Oh god,
I remember which episode it was. It might have been
when I was talking about the Young Lords. I didn't
know that Chauven's pig like calling men pigs comes from
late sixties. I can't remember if it's panthers or young Lords,
but it's calling them cops.

Speaker 3 (55:21):
Yeah, because like it is cop shit totally, like policing
what women do and what women can't do, that's cop shit.
Kill the cop in your mind, especially the misogynistic one
if you are a leftist.

Speaker 2 (55:32):
No, absolutely, well okay. And then the final things I
have to say about Alan, I talked with my friend's father.
I did some original research for this episode. My friend's father,
Andy Cohen, was part of the folk scene that Alan
and let Belly helped create, and I asked him about Alan.

Speaker 4 (55:49):
Not that Andy Cohen Bridget, I feel.

Speaker 3 (55:52):
Like you saw my face be like, what are we
talking about? Bravo for a minute, Yes, this is.

Speaker 2 (55:59):
Are we talking about? This, say, Andy Cohen, Or is
the different.

Speaker 3 (56:01):
A different beloved Andy Cohen.

Speaker 4 (56:04):
It is a celebrity that Margaret has no idea.

Speaker 2 (56:06):
No, I don't know.

Speaker 3 (56:08):
You're not in this world at all.

Speaker 2 (56:09):
I was willing to accept that you are hot for
my friend's dad.

Speaker 3 (56:13):
Like, tell me more about this con.

Speaker 2 (56:17):
I asked him about Alan and Abouff folk He told
me quote folklore is a bottom up view of history
of working people, many of whom are known to be
as conservative as the people who control their fates from
the top. Well, my guess is is that lomaxa an
opportunity to change attitudes about things like race relations and
union movements, peace struggles, and even gender roles by bringing
people from different turfs together on the same stage to

(56:38):
show how much they have in common. In some detail,
the tune Flop Eared Mule has Russian cognate tunes that
play to the same melody and rhythm. How did this
Slavic tune end up in Tennessee? In any case, he
was using pragmatic cultural language to get different neighborhoods to
speak to one another across turf lines, a mechanism for
uniting the working class broadly across those same turns, you

(57:01):
name them. They were there each against all, dog eat dog,
especially in urban areas, tribalism rather than cooperation. Pulling the
musicians together had the effect, along with multi ethnic labor unions,
ongoing civil rights battles, and so forth, of erasing some
of those turf lines. He was teaching first principles using
commonly known songs instead of emotionally charged rhetoric. So that's

(57:23):
what folk music tried to do. Tried to bring everyone together,
tried to say we're all folk versus those non folk. Did,
try to unite the working class. Oh also created Bob Dylan.
So give it. Someone here really likes Bob Dylan. It's fine,
you can like Bob Dylan. I'm not mad at you.
This is a bit sort of.

Speaker 3 (57:43):
I like how much you are not down with Bob Dylan.

Speaker 4 (57:45):
You ambiguous, lady.

Speaker 2 (57:51):
There are some Bob Dylan songs I like. It's fine,
it's followed. I was always confused for a long time
why singer songwriter was called folk music when there was
things with accordions in the world, and you know, banjo's
and like people stomping and clapping and just way more
interesting things. But now I understand the lineage better.

Speaker 3 (58:10):
I'm dating myself a little bit here, but have y'all
ever heard that Moby album play? It's like full of
Alan Lomax's recordings. That was one of my first Oh shit,
that's him. Yeah, And I don't know if he ever
heard it, but Alan. My understanding is that Moby's Play
came out in ninety nine. I think what Max did
in like the two.

Speaker 2 (58:27):
Thousands, yeah, two thousand and two, Yeah, so he might have.

Speaker 3 (58:31):
Heard this album that was, like, you know, very popular.
I have my feelings about Moby, but I'm so curious,
like what he thought to hear this album that was
like recontextualizing these recordings that he was responsible for.

Speaker 1 (58:44):
No.

Speaker 2 (58:44):
I genuinely wonder too. And I bet someone even knows
even mentioning Lomax on last week's recording, I've had a
bunch of people reach out. That makes so much sense
to that album was that I loved Moby as a
teenager me too. Woo. I was like the idea of
being like you made all of the music, well, not
that album where he is sampling really heavily, but like

(59:06):
you could be the entire band was so interesting to me.

Speaker 3 (59:09):
Yeah, Yo, you're not gonna get me. I know Moby
is problematic, y'all are not gonna get me to talk
badly about Moby because it was such a big part
of my musical awakening as a youth. And you know,
when you first heard music like that, it did open
at least for me, it opened up the whole world
of what was possible. And so yeah, I am right
there with you. And it is interesting that like he

(59:30):
was hearing the same Lomax recordings and wondering like, oh,
could I recontextualize this?

Speaker 2 (59:34):
You know, no, and totally in a world without white supremacy,
i'd feel way. You know, It's like it makes me sad,
but like, okay, wait, why is Moby problematic? I know
that he I met people who went on days with
him from Tinder who didn't like it, but not I'm
not accusing anyone of any crime here.

Speaker 3 (59:49):
No, no, no, I mean I don't know, but I
know that, like my understanding is that he pursued a
relationship with a very young Natalie Portmanu and she's written
about how it like just wasn't a super chill vibe,
and it's like, oh, you're talking about someone who was
a lot older and someone was a lot younger. Yeah,
it kind of goes back to what we were saying

(01:00:10):
about how all people can be cool in a lot
of ways, and then it's like, oh, when it comes
to how you treat and see women, maybe.

Speaker 2 (01:00:17):
That's so cool. No, that makes sense because movie was
an incredibly actively leftist in the nineties rave scene and stuff,
and like has albums called Everything Really Long and another
one called Animal Rights and like Moby Played.

Speaker 3 (01:00:30):
I mean I got my start in the reproductive justice movement.
Has for free DJed many reproductive rights or like like
events that I've been at.

Speaker 4 (01:00:39):
Like I remember the Natalie Portman thing, because he was
like we briefly dated, and she was like he was
an old weirdo and he.

Speaker 3 (01:00:48):
Creep on me and it was not good. So in
a memoir, his version of it is like, oh, we dated,
and then her version is like I was in college
and this old guy creeped on me actually teenager.

Speaker 2 (01:01:01):
Yeah, that's the more famous you are as a man,
the fewer people we should date.

Speaker 3 (01:01:06):
Agreed. Also, I read a excerpt of his memoir I'm
really just like.

Speaker 2 (01:01:11):
Pulling off on Teah is the secret movie. If you've
made it this far. You get the Secret movie, So.

Speaker 3 (01:01:15):
I know, yeah, he's hanging out with Lana del Rey
and he has he's taking her to his apartment and
it's one of those apartments where the elevator opens on
in his apartment and she's according to him, She's like, wow,
your apartment. You're a man. But then she's like, no,
I met you're the man. Like you're not in a

(01:01:36):
good way. Yeah, no, no, no, like the man like a cop,
like yeah, like like not like in his mind. He's
like complimentary and she's like, no, I meant it. Deron
Thorley like the man.

Speaker 2 (01:01:47):
Oh my god, I probably somewhere have Moby's drumstick from
when I was sixteen and went and saw him at
the Black Cat in DC. Oh my god, I'm wondering
whether you were at the show. Is the reason I'm mark.

Speaker 3 (01:02:01):
You have opened eight a little door in my brain
like I might have been at that time.

Speaker 2 (01:02:06):
Yeah, yeah, no, it this seems very possible. Well. Alan
Lomax died July nineteenth, two thousand and two, and eighty
seven years old, in Florida, and I wish I knew
more about his personal life. I can't even say he
was horrible to women. I don't know. All I know
is one sentence, because why would anyone write about that,
because that's not what matters anyway. Frustration noted. Yeah the music,

(01:02:32):
powerful shit.

Speaker 3 (01:02:33):
Powerful shit.

Speaker 2 (01:02:34):
Well okay, wait, I want you to plug your podcast
in your book, but I also want to find in
my notes where I wrote this, Oh, that people should
follow you on Instagram because I like your Instagram Bridget
Marie in DC, because you do a weekly roundup of
tech news and it's you're always like, I think it's
like it's been a busy week. You might have missed
it or something like that.

Speaker 3 (01:02:54):
That's right, Yeah, yeah, chaotic.

Speaker 2 (01:02:56):
Week and I always have missed it, and they're actually
always really interesting.

Speaker 3 (01:03:00):
So oh that means so much coming from you. Yeah,
I just feel like when it comes to tech in
AI news, it moves so quickly, it's so chaotic, and
then you see these stories that you don't necessarily click into,
and I click into them and I read them, and
I give you this the top lines, just fact based,
here's what's going on, because we deserve just accessible, accurate

(01:03:22):
news in a news climate that feels like it moves
so quickly that it's just hard to keep up. So
that means so much coming from you.

Speaker 2 (01:03:28):
Well, it's like, especially headline type news in a world
of AI, it's about trust in the people who put
it together, you know, So it's like, yes, it's easier
for me. It's because I know your work that I
see that and I'm like, oh fuck, that's interesting.

Speaker 3 (01:03:42):
So like yeah, and especially and I think in this
world of AI, it's like I'm a real person, so
you're gonna get these typos. You're gonna get. This is
me just hand or reading and like using my eyes
and brains and fingers to synthesize and process what I
read and give it to you.

Speaker 2 (01:04:00):
Do you think that? Okay? Do you know how letterpress
creates an indent when you print? But it's not supposed to.
Have you heard this story, I know exactly what you're
talking about. So if anyone's listening, letter pressing as a
way of printing where you have like actual type that's
like physical and has it's indented or whatever. It's opposite
of indented, it's extented and it pushes into the paper
with ink. And the way that people signal now that

(01:04:23):
they're using letterpress is they overpress it. And it leaves
an indentation in the paper. This was seen as like amateur, shoddy,
terrible work for years and years and years, when letter
press is the way to get ideas across and now
letterpress is a way of being like cute. I love
letterpress suit, but it's like a way of being like
cute and kitchy and like proving that something's handmade in
a world of automation. I'm thinking about how in my

(01:04:45):
most recent Instagram story, it's like ten slides long, there's
one typo and I'm like mad at myself, like I
already fixed it in my substack newsletter.

Speaker 4 (01:04:53):
I love it.

Speaker 2 (01:04:54):
Yes, that typo is probably the fucking print mark.

Speaker 3 (01:04:59):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, I'm so glad that you're so like
I am dyslexic. I cannot spell everything I write is
my handwriting is elegible. In a world of AI, I
almost feel like it's kind of an endearing I don't know,
I've always been very self conscious about my inability to
spell and my bad writing, and I'm a fucking writer.

(01:05:19):
But in a world of AI, I'm like, you know,
this was written by a human. Yeah, look at the punctuation.

Speaker 4 (01:05:26):
I had a very like this feels like the like
Sophie Hobby version of this story. I was buying art
from this woman who quit her job and decided that
she was gonna sell art, like she was gonna go
around and tell original art to other women on the
internet and like turned her like apartment into like a
cute little art gallery. And she was like, oh, like

(01:05:47):
I'm gonna sell this, but like I want to fix
up the frame and I was like, no.

Speaker 2 (01:05:51):
I'll buy it.

Speaker 3 (01:05:52):
I want the mistake.

Speaker 4 (01:05:54):
And then she was telling me about this piece, which
was actually folk art at full circle, and she was
showing it to me and she said, this looks like
a mistake, but I kind of like and she was
explaining that there was like a dot that was like
different than the other parts of the section, and she's like,
I like to think that she like was painting this
and then like it dripped and she was like, no,

(01:06:15):
I'm going to leave it, and I was like, yeah, yeah,
Wabbi Sabby and that's her fucking signature. That's how you
know it's not fucking screen printing and it's not like
a mass production. She left them and at the typos it.

Speaker 3 (01:06:30):
All comes back. It is the imperfections that make things
beautiful and unique and most importantly human, like this is
why we express ourselves exactly.

Speaker 4 (01:06:40):
Also, isn't it great that a woman was like, yeah,
masel art and then she did Yeah, I had a
great time.

Speaker 2 (01:06:48):
But bridget if people want to know more about AI
and how it's not a person and how well do
you even talk about how like even talk about I'm
not accusing you having not talked about I'm just like
suddenly thinking about do you talk about how one of
the reasons is poisonous to be in a relationship with
a robot is that the robot is perfect? Oh?

Speaker 3 (01:07:05):
Yes, I sure do.

Speaker 2 (01:07:06):
I chark you in a book maybe that's coming.

Speaker 3 (01:07:08):
Out if you want to know more about why as
some of the problems involved in being in a relationship
with a robot like AI. Check out my audiobook. It
comes out on July fourteenth. It's called Love at First Prompt.
You can check it out at Love at First Prompt
dot AI. Spoiler alert, it is not a pro AI book.
You might see it and think, oh, this is telling

(01:07:30):
me I should be in a relationship with AI.

Speaker 2 (01:07:33):
Ah, all right, well you've changed my mind.

Speaker 3 (01:07:38):
Although there is a section of the book where I
try to gaslight chat SHEETBT into having sex with me.
It does not go very well.

Speaker 2 (01:07:47):
On that note, I will see you all next week.

Speaker 1 (01:07:50):
Amazing Cool People Who Did Cool Stuff is a production
of Zone Media. For more podcasts, Goo goole Zone Media,
visit our website

Speaker 4 (01:08:04):
Goalzonemedia dot com, or check us out on the iHeartRadio app,
Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.