Chit-Chat Check-In #76 Audio Transcript

Hello, this is your Captain speaking. It's 10PM, and I realized that I have probably never done a Chit-Chat Check-In on Starship Casual at this hour of the day. And that reminded me that some of the things I do at this hour of the day are some of the things I get asked about a lot. Like "What books are you reading? What records are you listening to?" And stuff like that. We just published a list of some of our favorite records of the year, a Wilco list, on our social media stuff. So I won't go into that.

But I was just looking for something to read. I have a nice pile of newer things. Some books from my friends at Community Books in Brooklyn that I got on the book tour—Community Bookstore, sorry, not Community Books. And oddly enough, I've never spent a lot of time reading biographies of musicians. And right now, there are three—one's not really a biography. One's just an amazing book about Bob Dylan called Mixing Up the Medicine that's kind of the ultimate Bob Dylan book, put together by the scholars at the Bob Dylan Center in Tulsa. Which I was lucky enough to grab a copy of, I think I got it even before it was out. Maybe it's still not out? I don't know. But it's awesome. 

And then I have Lou Reed's biography that Will Hermes just put out. I hope I'm pronouncing that right. And my favorite, so far, the Sly Stone Thank You (Falettinme Be Mice Elf Agin) memoir.

I'm always alternating between a lot of different books. I've always been that way. I've always been a person that reads five or six books at the same time. I don't know ... I just kind of like to read, and I read a lot, all day, so I kind of move to one or the other when I get a little tired of one thing.

You can analyze that all you want. It probably does have something to do with some deficiency in the attention department. But it doesn't feel that way, because it just feels fun to bounce around.

Anyway, I've known a lot of other people who are actually kind of like that, too, so it's not that unique. I don't know why I haven't shared books more often here. It's a big part of my life. But there you go. That's what's on the reading table at the moment. 

What are you reading? Or as Bill Hicks would say, "What are you reading for?" Carry on.