Episode 75’s conversation provides guest Sara Watkins with innumerable ideas for songs yet-to-be-composed, including tiny horses and boogie boards.
Listen to the Watkins Family Hour Podcast on the Nerdist Podcast Network!
Episode 75:
The JV Club
Sara Watkins
Sara Watkins
Hey, sorry to impede on your blog. My name is Steve Ekstrom I work in the comic book inrdutsy as a writer and I write for Newsarama. I noticed you mentioned Russ VIck if it’s the same guy I’m thinking of he and I went to college together at Valdosta State University.Could please you pass my e-mail address along to him? I’ve been trying to get a hold of him for MONTHS now.My e-mail is Congrats on your cartoon I love Adult Swim. Hell, I have a pitch ready to throw at them myself!Take care,Steve Ekstrom
Dear Janet,
I must ashamedly admit that I have been out of the J.V. Club loop for about a month. As I resumed my sewing career today, and pressed play on the podcast, I am so glad that I did!
My first love was a rusty haired fiddle player. And his Mom could speak fluent gaelic. So, I was instantly involved in this interview.
I must explain that I am a retired d.j. and that my oratory senses are most heightened by the genres of funk, disco, hip-hop and disco and jazz. So, it was much to my surprise that when the song started playing, it was very joyous and my heart and stomach proceeded to feel strange and wonky, and my eyes became teary. That song totally was quite special. What a talent and thanks for sharing, and taking me out of my music comfort zone!
Warmly,
Jenny S
This was wonderful!
How has no one picked Rainbow Brite’s horse, Starlite, as a mode of transportation yet??? He’s an awesome hyper-intelligent talking horse with AMAZING hair. Also, he can literally travel through the void of outer space on that rainbow he manifests everywhere!
I first got into bluegrass in high school thanks to This Side, which was released right before I was a freshman. Nickel Creek has always held a very special place in my heart, so I was super excited to listen to this episode! So excited that I actually am commenting! This was a lovely interview, and a joy to listen to, especially hearing about her school experiences.
I love Sara, and this was a really great episode. Although it has done nothing to ease my desperation to learn the dulcimer! 🙂
So much goodness!! FYI, Kris Kristofferson and Keith Carridine co-star in Alan Rudolph’s “Trouble in Mind”!! Worth watching!! As for the new dog talking, I had a German Shepherd named Tramp who talked too! He completely understood if you talked to him like a person, and the only reason he couldn’t talk back are because dogs (and cats) don’t have vocal cords to talk like humans do. I’m sure in 70 years we’ll have genetc experimentation changing this, and another 30 years after that we’ll all serve our Cat Overlords.
@ Joseph: Oh Joseph believe me when I say that there is nothing in the world that I ever wanted more than to go to the States.I have always (since I was 10!!) been fascinated with ‘American culture’ and mesmerized by the beautiful and diverse landscapes of the USA…soo..If I were to go, I would definitely love to see all the things you’ve seen!Maybe someday…
In reference to the “grand-parents & great-aunts’ topic”…I would like to say that I really like the use of those ‘prefixes’ in English because they denote some kind of grandeur and respect…HOWEVER, in Spanish we just say ‘bis'( as in ‘twice’) for great-grand-x and ‘tatara-x’ ( which sounds like a herald trumpet!) to say great-great-grand-x. There’s no comparison!
@maria
Thanks darlin’. You should visit the ol’ Smoky mountains. Once you see a cool mountainside forest with baby deer, fireflies and crystal clear mountain springs or general stores filled with local organic honeycomb candy, and folks who just want to play music and dance it’s really hard to leave. Makes for a wonderful and peaceful vacation.
@janet
Thinking about “great” aunts, and “grand” parents… I guess when the singularity happens and grandma can download her consciousness into a server we’ll have to call her UltraMa or something. Then when your grandma says her “memory is going” you can just pop over to Best Buy and hook her up with some DDR3. ….
(insert cricket noise)….
3, 2, 1, …thanks everyone I’ll be here all week.
Looking up the spelling of Ullrika, I just found Sara Watkins shares her birthday (down to the year) with my younger brother… Speaking of Sweden, Janet, if you think the Pacific is cold (I’ve been to the beach in Vancouver, it’s not that bad), wait until you take a dip in the Baltic Sea.
“Your Honor, I see you’re wearing your surfing robe…”
So charming, even by the usual high standard of JV CLUB interviews…it helps that I’ve been a bluegrass fan (and amateur singer), body and body-board surfer in both the Atlantic and Pacific (mostly in Hawaii, where the Pacific is reasonably warm), and am of similarly (or even a little more) exogamous/”mongrel” ancestry…consider the Asian/Polar influence/look on A Whole Lot of folks from Russia, Scandinavia and points nearby, and just to cite some reasonably famous other examples, Mary Woronov on over to Bjork (as the Icelandic settlers were certainly out of that northerly stew).
And Watkins’s unflagging good spirits and your enthusiasm (not Quite dorkish, I’d suggest…the true dork would’ve been all over the fiddler choice, for example) were only capped by the DUDE!-ing during the game results. Nothing like a little back of the magazine Jungianism as with that other game, as well!
Thanks, as always, for sharing…and your Husky wants a chance to go gambol in Alaska, too. (<as an Alaska-born, but not resident since age five, can I now have a slice of that oil-money allotment, bureaucrats in Juneau? No? Ah, well, worth a shot.)
Congrats on another spectacular podcast!I loved every second of it…plus the song at the end of the interview…wow!! I got goose bumps!!The lyrics are just so emotional and they have moved me profoundly!Sara’s got a beautiful voice!I am a new fan!
Thanks Janet for the shout-out!! I very much appreciate it!I thought I was getting better at it (Im trying v.hard to control my emotions!I get butterflies in my stomach, what can I say?!) however when you said goodbye to your friend Maria ..I got all jumpy (probably because it came out of nowhere!unexpected!) and I came to the realization that I will never get used to your shout-outs!
Great guest & converation today. I loved her attitude/lifestyle and the way she talked about her childhood and teenage years. She was very passionate and intense.I very much admire her love for animal and music.I think I can relate a bit to Sara in terms of independence and loneliness.
Today’s podcast has been very very educational in terms of: US education system and music instruments!so…thanks for that.I must go further and say that I strongly believe that Janet is (and sounds ‘like’) a very well-spoken person, I am always fascinated by her elocution.
Oh!now I know what a swatch is!so triple thanks!
loads of love from Spain everybody and I cant wait for comments!
marÃa
PS: I’ve never watched ‘the Legend of Korra’ but ..I ‘ve found a website were I can watch it …so I am gonna start asap!Speaking of ‘new’ series..while I was listening to Erins Gibson’s interview, Janet mentioned something about the TV series called ‘Girls’.I got curious about it so I started watching it…and I have very mixed feelings about it …cuz even though I like the plot and the topics on it ,,,I cannot stand the male characters…they make me nervous and uncomfortable!I feel like im gonna have nightmares with that Adam character!ugh!Is it just me?
@ Joseph: Oh!I really loved your comment(amazingly written, I must add) …I feel very envious (the good kind of envy) of your experience!
Loveeeee Sara and so happy to have her on the podcast! I spent a good chunk of my time in high school in the basement of my local music store listening to Nickel Creek songs over and over again trying to learn to play along. I also really loved her stories about her experience with school- my experience was very similar, and I don’t think it’s a very common way to do middle and high school, so it’s great to hear other people talk about it.
Awesome as always. I love bluegrass, so I was very excited about this one. I remember playing Nickelcreek and Flatt/Scruggs as I traveled through the beautiful mountains of Tennessee and Virginia. The music is everywhere in that region, almost as if they are born with fiddles and guitars in their hands. You can visit a local general store, or sip on a fresh glass of mead from small family business on a mountainside and no matter where you go there are bluegrass musicians just on the porch playing their hearts out. Plus they are always willing to have people sit in. So I grabbed my guitar and played a bit with some, if I didn’t have my guitar I’d sing some harmony. So amazing…
I know some people might find bluegrass a bit old fashioned, but I’ll always have a wonderful association with that music and the friendliness of those musicians, the amazing mountain top views, the rolling wind swept hills filled with birds and fireflies that are just so plentiful in that region.