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Dork Academia with Stace Santiago Pisani
102 Plays1 year ago
This week, we have the privilege and honor of hosting the brilliant Stace Santiago Pisani: an emergent novelist, a maestro of musicality, a compassionate veterinary nurse, and an old hand at looking extremely cool. Get ready as we dive deep into their fraught journey of gender expression through clothing, explore the vivid soundscape of Brit Pop, look behind the scenes of writing a book, unravel the degrees of separation from the legendary Ralph Lauren, and so much more!
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Transcript
Introduction and Studio Setup
00:01:18
Speaker
Hi, I'm Connor Fowler. And I'm Matt Split. Welcome to Apocalypse Duds. Again. You, dear listener, may not know this, but we record these out of order! So this is actually after the interview that we just did. A little behind-the-scenes podcasting magic.
00:01:39
Speaker
brought to you from the Apocalypse Duds Studios here in sunny Baltimore, Maryland. Yes, by studio Connor means that we are recording on a podcast platform remotely because I am recording. And our guest is wherever in the world we find someone. So yeah, thank you. The Apocalypse Duds Global Studio.
00:02:09
Speaker
The Global Studio, yes. We are sadly not in a bunker somewhere that's like, you know, cast with six feet aluminum walls or whatever the fuck, or maybe steel walls. I wish we were in a bunker. I would like to be in a bunker now. They would probably avoid aluminum. Probably, yeah. I don't know what the fuck I'm talking about with this. I don't know much about bunker design.
00:02:36
Speaker
Right, right. And yeah, same here. I don't have a bomb shelter. I guess we want to ready ourselves. I mean, that's the, I'm reading the room and it seems that way.
Bartering Clothes in Apocalypse
00:02:51
Speaker
Yeah, yeah. I don't know. I always tell myself and like, if you're a friend of mine, like in real life, I probably said something like this to you, but
00:03:03
Speaker
I like to tell myself because of what I do for a living, I will always have clothing to barter with someone that has like peanut butter when the apocalypse comes. I will have a plethora of shit to trade for food and sustenance and things of that nature. So I like to think that's my way. Why did you need to trade when you got peanut butter?
00:03:27
Speaker
Well, I mean, but what I'm saying is like, yo, you've got food. Cause every trade would be down. Every trade would be down. Peanut butter is the greatest food of all. Uh, you know what I mean? Somebody would be like, here's some beef, Turkey. And you would be like, well, I'm a vegan even after the apocalypse. Yeah. I mean, I can also like, I got to learn to forage. Like this is something I've thought about a lot lately is, uh,
00:03:55
Speaker
I have friends that forage like mushrooms and shit. I'm halfway scared that I would eat something that's like either gonna send me to Venus or actually I wouldn't mind that or on the worst side of that spectrum, something that would give me. You should be all the way scared. You should be all the way scared. You definitely just go foraging for the news. Cause I wouldn't be able to do the show without you. I mean, I have,
00:04:22
Speaker
I need to learn, I just have not yet, and I don't really know if that's in my skill set, which is very, very low. But yeah, I just like, I feel like foraging is a good preparation for the oncoming, whatever the fuck we're gonna face, and maybe in our lifetime, maybe not. Well, this went really dark, really fast.
Frustration with Government and Politics
00:04:51
Speaker
Yeah, Connor and I were talking before we started this recording about just how fucking ridiculously stupid our government is at this point. Juvenile. Juvenile. Juvenile. Literally no one knows what the fuck's going on. Nothing's happening. This is not a way to live.
00:05:20
Speaker
You know, I told Connor, you got a lot to keep from crying. And that's kind of my mind. I say I'm praying. OK, I just like I got to pull the quote on this one. Here we have it. Quote.
00:05:41
Speaker
When I make a statement that I'm praying about it, I'm praying about it. And when I get a call from the speaker and he belittles that to me, that shows another reason why we need a change in leadership, a merchant told reporters on the way to the house floor Tuesday. So that's Tim Burchat of Tennessee.
00:06:01
Speaker
Yeah, they're not sending their best, folks. They're not sending their best. No, they're not sending their best. And that's like... I also would wager that the opposite side is also mostly not sending their best. No, no, no, I mean... It's so fucking dumb.
00:06:22
Speaker
Yeah. I mean, we, we just got rid of fine scenes. So, you know, that's, that's one step in the right direction, I guess. The powers that be. If you're, if you're fucking pulling a week into Bernie's situation, you do not need to be legislating. Sorry. I'm not trying to be agents. I think, I think we said this exact same thing on the fucking last intro, but yeah, it just, it's, it, like it's comical. It's beyond, like the onion could not write the situations that we've endured the past.
00:06:52
Speaker
I mean, I guess for a long time, but like with social media, it just like, it's been like, it's been like this forever. Well, what I'm saying is, so here's my point with that. Um, Bill Hicks, who
00:07:15
Speaker
I feel like I have to mention him regularly, has a bit about the Iraq War, the first Saudi Arabia, like the desert storm, where he talks about this was the first time on live television you can see a missile going down a hole.
00:07:36
Speaker
And it's like, couldn't we use that fucking technology for something good? Like, Hey, that there's a hunger guy and shoot a sandwich at him. And like, that's kind of my point is that like, since I guess the Bush administration, the first Bush.
00:07:51
Speaker
We've just gradually become more connected with what is happening so that it used to be turning on the eight o'clock news or the nine o'clock news or whatever. Now it's all the time. I'm a Twitteraholic. I read far too much news, but it's in front of my face all the fucking time. All of this shit has always happened. It's only the last,
00:08:19
Speaker
maybe 20 years or so that it's really been in your face at all times.
Impact of Media and Social Media on Society
00:08:25
Speaker
The in-your-fatedness of it, I guess, I just... The things that happened during the Bush administration were broadcast loud and clear. I mean, it was... Oh, totally. Totally. Social media as it is. I'm not saying that it wasn't. I'm just saying that like now it's...
00:08:48
Speaker
Like, I feel like we've gotten dumber as a country, and also now there's a million and one things in your face at all times, not just like in the morning and the evening when you're reading the newspaper or watching the, you know, private time updates. Including this program. Including this program. Including this program. Yeah, Connor has been a little sick this week. I don't think that that's really effective. It's not covered.
00:09:21
Speaker
I am starting a new band for the first time in a very very fucking long time called Extinction Age which is kind of relevant to fitting a lot of things. Had the first band practice this Saturday and I'm really really fucking pumped. Of course I will spam the shit out of
00:09:48
Speaker
account my account whatever the fuck whenever we get something recorded but yeah we had a great interview with uh with states uh at sartorial underscore misfits um talked a lot like it was a more free form thing but it uh yeah it just allowed us to get into a lot of like good little snippets of conversation and tangents about um
00:10:14
Speaker
kind of going from goth to rep and all the things in between, being influenced by whatever music you're listening to, which holds a special place in my heart. It was really fun. It was one of our best conversations, I think. And there will be a little add-on at the end that I think you're probably going to want to stick
00:10:47
Speaker
Yeah, counter. I think we're good. Yeah, I think so. Enjoy the show. I think you will really appreciate it. Thanks, and it's a fun thing.
00:11:09
Speaker
Please rate the show and review on the platform of your choice. If you'd like to contact us with anything, we're at apocalypseduds on Instagram and then apocalypseduds at gmail.com. I am Matt Smith at Rebels Works. And I'm Connor Fowler at Connor Fowler.
00:11:40
Speaker
And thank you very much, Dean. See you next week. You are now listening to Apocalypse Duds. I'm sorry, I'm a little under the weather. I don't have COVID, but I am congested, so bear with us. Our guest today is an extremely fashionable, dynamic dresser.
Building Communities on Instagram
00:12:06
Speaker
We have
00:12:07
Speaker
used to see Santiago Pisani here in the studio with us at the Sartorial Nisfit on Instagram who I guess I have been we have been following each other for like about a year now um and I was going no it's so come on states we're old friends right
00:12:30
Speaker
When you get to a certain age time has no meaning like like a year a year to me Like I'll I'll think of something that happened like, you know free COVID I'm like, oh, yeah, that was a year or two ago. I'm like, no, no, that's five years back Yeah, I feel like I just I can't even page it a year in Instagram time
00:12:51
Speaker
Yeah, yeah. Yeah, exactly. It's a different, it's a different type of world. Yeah. It truly is. Well, like Matt and I met on Instagram, right? I mean, we talked about on the show, it's how the show happened, but it really, it really has sustained the whole show. Like almost everyone we have met through Instagram. So it's kind of an amazing community. Yeah, it definitely is.
00:13:16
Speaker
can be. What's your relationship with Instagram? I feel like there's some people that still really, really enjoy it. I don't know how many of those people there are, but I feel like a lot of us, it's kind of like a love-hate thing. So I just wanted to quickly, before we start going through shit, to get your take on that.
00:13:36
Speaker
Well, I used to only use Instagram on a private account that's just for like friends and family, or like my band account for like, you know, disseminating information about what my band was doing. So my sartorial account is the first time I'm interacting with like strangers. And that's kind of fun. That's it? Do you? So what is your band?
00:14:00
Speaker
I'm afraid to say it because if you go looking for it and you listen to it out of context, it's going to be very strange and very weird. Okay. That kind of sounds awesome.
00:14:15
Speaker
Yeah. Okay. So just keep in mind when you go looking for this and you listen to this for the first time, you are listening to a completely out of context and just roll with it. Um, my, my last project, it's no longer, we're no longer doing, but it's defunct, but it's still out there and we're still making royalties. Okay. Nice.
00:14:39
Speaker
It's a group called Swoosh and Flick. If you search it, the first thing that will come is actually a podcast. That's not me. Okay. So you have to search Wizard Rock, Swoosh and Flick. Oh, Wizard Rock. Yeah. And I don't think we have enough time on the podcast for me to explain it. So I'll just put it out there for, you know, to marinate for the future. Okay.
00:15:02
Speaker
I guess the other thing that I have done, also defunct but still out there making royalties, is Cookie Glore. That's my old electro band from the 90s.
00:15:16
Speaker
So I guess yeah, so listen to it in the context of this stuff was made in the 90s
00:15:46
Speaker
So for Swish and Flick, it's hip-hop. So I would write the lyrics, I would produce the music. Or Koki Gullor also produced the music, played guitar. I can also play drums. I play drums for my friends' bands. I play bass for people. Wow. Yeah. So that's like the whole, you're like the whole band. Basically.
00:16:11
Speaker
Nice. Which is tight. That's like, that's like, I don't know. People, people try to do that and they suck at it. You know what I mean? So I mean, on you. Yeah. That's, that's amazing. That's a very like Jay Maska's way to, uh, to make music. So I respect that. Hold it. Fuck it. Thank you for sharing. Um, so where are you from? Where do you live now?
00:16:36
Speaker
So I was born in Queens, New York. I only lived there for a couple of years and I was raised in the suburbs north of New York City. And I went away to college upstate New York and I came back to live an hour north of New York City. So I never went very far. I'm a New Yorker for life. Yeah. I feel like that's a very common New York experience.
00:17:00
Speaker
Yeah, I mean I did spend like two years living in East Village the night promptly to the suburbs. Like in the 90s? Like in the 90s? I lived in the East Village, I want to say it was 2000.
00:17:20
Speaker
Wow. After 9-11, I left the city directly after 9-11. I can only imagine how living through an event like that in New York City was. I don't know how I held it. Yeah, totally surreal. Yeah, for sure.
00:17:41
Speaker
So I was going to lead with this, with your Instagram bio, if you don't mind, Stace.
Santiago's Sartorial Journey
00:17:47
Speaker
Uh, pending the rules of fashion since 1975 from punk to preppy and everything in between. That is like what we like to hear around here. That's pretty much our show.
00:18:00
Speaker
Yeah, basically, you're like the perfect you're the perfect interview. So like, how do you do it is a bad question. But like, I guess to begin, what are your some of your influences, inspirations?
00:18:15
Speaker
Um, I think in, in, in order to explain like who I am now, like sartorially, I'd have to like go back to like way back and I'm really old. So the story is long. So I don't know if you have time.
00:18:32
Speaker
Man, we're only eight and a half minutes in. We got a whole lot of time to kill. Yeah, yeah. And we want to know because it's a lot of cool time periods, right? So I guess I'll start from sort of the beginning. Yeah, sure. I'm going to take notes.
00:18:50
Speaker
As a kid in the, the eighties and the nineties, I, I dressed my, the way that I dress was heavily, heavily influenced by what music I was listening to. Like I was always super into music. And, um, you know, back when magazines were an actual thing, you know, I scour magazines and try to emulate what these artists were wearing. So we're talking like the cure, the Smith's suede blur. Um.
00:19:18
Speaker
Some white girl stuff. And they all dress very differently from each other, especially the Britpop stuff. They're all lumped into this one category of Britpop, but they're so different in style. And I would pull from all those bands. So I'd wear thrifted 70s stuff, or I'd emulate Courtney Levin, wear a baby doll dress with combat boots. So that was my...
00:19:47
Speaker
my teens and my 20s. And then when I entered the workforce, I was kind of like, I don't know, forced to conform, like trying to be an adult, but I really didn't know what the heck I was doing. So I was kind of like forcing this notion of femininity upon myself, like trying to be society's vision of what a woman is supposed to look like. Wow.
00:20:16
Speaker
failing miserably because at the time, I was feeling very dysphoric. Like this was before I understand who I was, you know, as you know, I before I understood my gender and my sexuality. So I spent many years wearing what I thought I should be wearing and feeling miserable and not feeling like nothing felt good on me. And I couldn't understand why. Um,
00:20:41
Speaker
And then in my thirties, you know, this is like when social media was starting to become a thing, when, um, like all my communities started to become a thing. I was getting exposed to all different kinds of people with different gender expressions. And I began to understand that, um,
00:21:00
Speaker
maybe I'm not supposed to be this ultra femmy femme. So I started to kind of experiment, but on the down low. So I would steal my partner's clothes. My, my partner is a cis man. And I would wear them when I was home alone and take pictures of myself. Like this was before you would take pictures of yourself and put it on the internet. I would just do it for personal edification. Um, then
00:21:30
Speaker
Tumblr was a thing and I did a little bit on Tumblr, but putting things on Tumblr back then was like putting things out into the ether because it didn't go anywhere. Right. So then, you know, um, as they got older in my forties, um, I started to understand that, um, my gender expression is fluid. Um, I understood that I identify as non binary and that freed me to, um,
00:21:55
Speaker
to be a lot more purely expressive of what i really wanted to be wearing like giving myself that freedom so um i guess that's how i got here um i guess i have to explain the preppy part right because we we went from like the 90s stuff and then now we're i've arrived at a place where i'm wearing a lot of preppy clothes because that is the like the gear that you're in right now basically yeah totally totally
00:22:20
Speaker
So this, okay, this weird thing happened. So there was the pandemic that happened. We all know, um, I was wearing, um, I wasn't going to wear, so I was wearing a lot of what I call goth leisure. So I harkened back to my goth self and I'd wear like, you know, all black, really loose stuff. Um, leggings. Um, I think like Ali Sheedy in, um, breakfast club.
00:22:48
Speaker
That was like my pandemic wear. It's a good outfit. Yeah. And then 2021, something weird happened. I was listening to Duran Duran, as you do. You're a Duran-y. I wasn't always a Duran-y. I was not into Duran Duran when they were hot in the 80s. I was listening to metal as a young child. Nice, nice. But anyway.
00:23:15
Speaker
Yeah, like from the 90s on, yes. Okay, sorry. Side note, what metal just out of curiosity? Yeah, I'm curious about this as well. Okay. Both are not black metal. My first, my first ever ever concert was Suicidal Penancies. Holy shit! My second of the Ramones. Fucking hell! I've seen Metallica twice, Anthrax, Testament, like that kind of metal. Fucking hell.
00:23:47
Speaker
And so I'm a huge Metallica fan, like basically Justice and Before. I don't get to talk about anything else. Some of the garage, like the covers on that record are good. Anyway, I digress. I'm a huge Metallica, huge. The first band that I ever played in was basically a Metallica cover band, which we've talked about probably
00:24:09
Speaker
It's so awesome. It's not my favorite record, but Kill'em All is easily, easily the best thrash record that's ever been made and recorded. So good. I end up talking about this a lot to people because I have a lot of musical conversation, but I want to go on record to say that Kill'em All is the fucking perfect thrash record.
00:24:33
Speaker
They took all the cool aesthetic. They took all the cool stuff. They took all the cool stuff. It's unfair what they did.
00:25:02
Speaker
That's what I have to say.
00:25:04
Speaker
early childhood, early teenage years, I was only allowed to listen to Christian officials. That's all I could buy. And I loved SCA at like 14, 15. And so one of the Christian SCA bands, I didn't put it together until years later, but they fucking ripped off Metallica's intros and creeping death was one of them.
00:25:26
Speaker
Christian Ska? Christian Ska? Christian Ska Band? Christian Ska Band, called the Supertones. They're probably still together. It did not age well. But yeah, I didn't put together until years later that like this intro that I loved was Christian Ska Band was actually the creeping death and that's that's easily my favorite without the song.
00:25:47
Speaker
Dude, Christian Ska is like, that belongs in a novel. Someone is the Christian Ska front man. I would wager that it's probably still going on. Let's see. I'm gonna do some research. That's my Christian Ska to Metallica pipeline. Anyway, please continue. He's a formal Christian alternative rock. How did we get here?
00:26:15
Speaker
Duran Duran. Duran Duran. Duran Duran in a different direction. This is what no other podcast on the planet is going to have a conversation about. This exact Duran Duran, two metal Christian ska. You heard it here folks. That's an apocalypse. Anyway, I think you were going from Duran Duran to Preppy.
Book Inspired by Music and Fashion
00:26:42
Speaker
Right. Okay. So listening to Duran Duran, and I thought to myself, I wanted to write a book that felt like, um, I should also note that I'm also a aspiring writer. I haven't published a note, but anyway, so listening to Duran Duran thought I wanted to write a book about it. And to me, Duran Duran sounded like privilege, sounded like decadent. It sounded like
00:27:07
Speaker
an Ivy League boy in a Porsche doing Coke. I want to write the book about this. Oh, that's going to be a direct quote. Wow.
00:27:18
Speaker
Yeah. This is our first video. The full quote is, I did post something on my Insta and it's a little dirtier. Okay. You're a dirty shit. We are a dirty shit. Okay. All right. So the whole thing was Duran Duran felt like, it felt like decadence, like an Ivy League boy in a Porsche doing coke, getting a blowjob. That's Duran Duran. Yeah.
00:27:46
Speaker
And basically that's my book except super duper uber queer because that's what I wanted. I started doing research and around the same time I'm starting to take my daughter
00:28:03
Speaker
to look at colleges and it's still kind of COVID time, so we're not really allowed to do tours. So I'm not seeing what the kids look like. So I have to do research other ways. So I want to get the clothes right. I want to get the location right. So I Googled and I found Avery Truffleman's podcast, Articles of Interest. And if you haven't listened, it's really good.
00:28:27
Speaker
Yeah, absolutely. She devoted an entire season to American Ivy. And so I use this as the basis of how to dress my characters. And in listening to the podcast, I listened to the season twice over, I discovered that Ivy style, preppy style is actually really accessible.
00:28:47
Speaker
and actually looks good on a variety of people and is perfect for somebody who is gender non-binary because it's, you know, it's androgynous clothes. Right, right. It's like male coded, but it's like, uh, there's nothing super duper gendered about like an Oxford. Well, yeah, I kind of think about it as like, like,
00:29:15
Speaker
quote unquote women's femme whatever the fuck I usually say femme clothing it's it's like inherently it inherently has like a thought that when people see you know attached to like oh you're wearing a dress like that's a that's a good thing but like
00:29:32
Speaker
women have women and femme people have worn suits since the dawn of the fucking suit it might have been paired with a skirt it might have been paired you know it's cuddled a little differently but like you know tailored clothing in my opinion like you said is completely gender neutral because it's kind of like it is kind of mostly just based around being like quote unquote offensive and so like you can't really fuck that up if you were flattering the human body yeah
00:29:59
Speaker
Yeah, totally, totally. Like, that's what tailor clothing, like, a mask or a fit is all about, is flattering the body and flattering the fit. Yeah, that's it.
00:30:08
Speaker
I wanted to ask you about outfitting people in the book. Can you talk about that generally? I don't know if you're, spoiler alert, I don't know if you, how do you choose what, let's say, the main character wears? Are you describing that once? Are you describing that often?
00:30:34
Speaker
The outfit changes. There's a lot of there's a lot of clothes talk in the book. So a lot of times the outfit is very important to the scene. So, for example, the main character is a similar background to me. He's Filipino, Filipino-American, first generation.
00:30:54
Speaker
He's going to an Ivy League school and he's trying desperately to fit in. And there's kind of class difference because he's from working class back. So he goes to this event and he's told, okay, the dress code is smart sports way. He doesn't know what that means. When he comes to the supper club dressed in a polo shirt with a zip up fleece hoodie and everyone else is wearing like sport jackets and like.
00:31:24
Speaker
You know, Oxford shirts, loafers, any kind of shit. Yeah. Yeah. They laugh at him? No, but he feels self-conscious. Like he's wearing the wrong thing because he's trying really hard to be accepted as one of them. Yeah. That's a pretty fraught, I guess. That's like very anxiety ridden, I would think.
00:31:48
Speaker
But then he quickly learns what he's supposed to wear to these different things. He's good at figuring that out and being resourceful. Another example.
00:32:02
Speaker
His roommate is, um, his roommate is very, is a very flamboyant, um, gay man who likes to wear verse. This is the nineties. So he's wearing Versace. He's wearing like those, you know, loud print Versace. Yeah. Yeah. And then they, they have to go.
00:32:19
Speaker
Yeah. Um, they have to go to a fraternity event and he's like afraid of getting picked on by the frat boys. So the two of them are wearing matching outfits and it happens to be a light blue, um, Oxford cloth, button down, khakis loafers. And yeah.
00:32:40
Speaker
We've talked about that particular uniform on this show before. Yeah, yeah. This sounds like a really cool book. And also the fact that it's based in the 90s instead of like more of a modern kind of thing is super cool. Because like, you know, like polo was huge, and that polo look was huge. And so you're kind of like, you know, it sounds like in your research, you're getting to your ear diving into like more historical kind of like context of the night.
00:33:09
Speaker
Right. Yeah. Because that's, that's when I went to college. I feel more comfortable writing from that perspective than present day. Cause I mean, it's completely different landscape. Like no internet people are doing. Yeah. I mean, I think we all have a general idea. Yeah.
00:33:30
Speaker
Like no one, no one, um, under 30 listens to this show. Probably not. Probably not. Well, it's like we have the data. Yeah. Yeah. We may have had two guests. I think Nick and Laura are both under 30, but maybe those are the only ones where we're like.
00:33:49
Speaker
I don't know, like we're that weird demographic that's like close 30 to 55 or something, which I think is probably the demographic or like on London or on London clothing shed in general. You should interview my daughter.
00:34:05
Speaker
We're down. Yeah, we'd be very curious to get some, to get some young, truly young people. Does your daughter steal your old band shirts? My, my daughter steals all of my old goth clothes. That's fucking awesome. Yeah, I bet. Yeah. So I wore this like, kind of like lace applique strappy dress to the prom, like very, I don't know, like cute goth, whatever. Right.
00:34:31
Speaker
And my daughter stole it and she wore it in her senior portrait. Oh, that's fucking sick. Wow. See, and I'm glad that she's like going to the source and not just like, not depending on like, trends or whatever. And like, yeah, Sheen and like Hot Topic, which is somehow still a thing. Yeah, like she's getting the real shit.
00:34:55
Speaker
Right. Yeah, so she's getting it from me, but she also she's good at thrifting She's just had she has a very interesting sense of style for her age She only wears black and white and occasional pink, but she's not goth per se in the modern sense of goth It's just her aesthetic, right?
00:35:18
Speaker
And she was named after a fashion designer, so this is all like, Dustin. Who was she named after? When I was pregnant, I was watching Project Runway, and one of the finalists, maybe she won that year, I can't remember, was Chloe Dow. Oh, okay.
00:35:34
Speaker
i see wow that's you guys man like well we have a question here about um you made an instagram post you took your daughter to your alma mater and you were kind of like how do you feel about it oh gosh this was very fraught so i i lost a friend over oh wow wait what oh well to start what is your alma mater i don't want to drag it up
00:36:04
Speaker
See, I don't want to drag it up. I just thought it was awesome. The result of it was awesome that you did not feel totally satisfied with your college experience, but have worked so hard that your daughter could go where she wanted to.
00:36:22
Speaker
Right. So, so I, um, I went to a state school because it was affordable. Um, and my, one of my best friends from high school, same situation, first generation Filipino, um, parents are from the Philippines. He went to Columbia. Um, I went to visit him at Columbia and I was like,
00:36:45
Speaker
oh my god this is what college could be like why does he get to have it but i don't so i i lived with that simmering for a long time um you know kind of chasing that ideal of what the american middle class is and yeah trance um not transcending it but
00:37:09
Speaker
So in my family, it was not really about surviving. We were surviving. We were doing okay. There was a point where we were on food stamps, whatever. My parents were able to make their way out of that, and so we were doing more than surviving. We were thriving, but there was always the sense that they wanted to
00:37:30
Speaker
ascend the social hierarchy. They not only wanted to be seen as, you know, socially acceptable immigrants, they wanted to be part of the American middle-class fabric and not just seen as immigrants that are doing all okay. So that's what I grew up with. So I grew up not just wanting to, you know, make it, but to make more of myself. So when I, you know,
00:37:55
Speaker
got married, had kids, got to a place where we could, you know, afford to allow our kids to, to do better than. And in my mind, that's okay. In other people's minds, it's like, you know, why are you social climbing? Good luck trying to, my, my former friend said, good luck keeping up with the Joneses because, you know, this is the kind of, what I wanted for. Yeah. That's just like, what is even the point of that?
00:38:24
Speaker
That's so fucking grim to say to someone. Why can't I want it? Isn't the fucking point of being a human being leaving shit better than how you found it? Which is like you trying to provide shit to your daughter and your family as a whole.
00:38:51
Speaker
that that you either didn't have or that you saw and was like oh like i can i can get i can get past this like it's not social climbing it's just trying to be a decent
00:39:02
Speaker
It's about, I don't know, like exceptionalism to a degree. And I think that the status quo in America like kind of pushes back against non-white people who are trying to get their piece of the American dream. Right. So yeah, I mean, that was the question.
00:39:26
Speaker
What is it like to, yeah, I guess what is your view of the American dream? Like some people would say you have achieved it. You are a version of the American. Is there a terminus to the American dream? I don't know.
00:39:38
Speaker
So it's, it's really fraught because, I mean, you go out into the world as, you know, I go out into the world as somebody, a person of color, and, you know, as evolved as we think we are, there's still people that are going to judge me. They're gonna, they might think that, you know, I'm a new immigrant. I don't speak English. Maybe, you know, I'm struggling economically. And, you know, like a white person can go out into the world and there won't be those, um,
00:40:08
Speaker
So, and I guess that's where I hate saying this word, but like Asian exceptionalism comes from, I think is because we want to see, we want to be seen as more than just like, you know, people fresh off the boat trying to make, like we're actually trying to contribute to American society.
Critique of the Model Minority Myth
00:40:29
Speaker
Totally. Yeah, and then the the flip side of that for assholes is like, like, somehow, you know, like, there's a, there's a weird like fetishizing of a good majority of Asian people for whatever reason, like the quote unquote,
00:40:44
Speaker
model 100 and like, that's so fucking gross. And it's like, you know, I just, I'm just trying to be a person in society makes a difference and does some cool shit. Uh, like you said, people think we're winning more evolved than we are. That's a, that's a really good point about like the model minority myth. Right. And yeah.
00:41:07
Speaker
I really love the show Beef. Have you guys seen that? It's a Netflix series. Yeah. So it's, it's, it's been almost, you know, 99%, um, Asian American cast and it's just, um, all behaving very badly, doing terrible things. But I love it. Cause like it's showing that, you know, no, we are not like model minorities. We can be shitty people too.
00:41:33
Speaker
Yeah, exactly. Like, you don't get a pass. Like, like, white people overall are shitty. I'm shitty because, you know, blah, blah, blah. Like, I understand this and I try my best not to be a shitty. But no, no race or ethnicity or anything else gives you a pass to be a shitty fucking person.
00:41:56
Speaker
Yeah, I'm not a TV watcher. But I guess also the other side of that is also that, you know, not every Asian person needs to be perfect and exceptional. Oh, totally. Yeah, I mean, humans are flawed. That's kind of the point of being human. Like, we're all fucked up. We've all got some shit going on.
00:42:16
Speaker
Yeah, I'm not a TV person, but this sounds like a very interesting channel, just watching people do crazy shit. Well, I just like, I can't imagine if my mom, like as my friends, like some of them Korean parents, some of them Chinese parents, uh, serious intervention in their academics, like, which my mom would like help me do stuff, but I would have just like died. I don't know what I would have done if
00:42:45
Speaker
Uh, she was like on me all the time. Like what would have happened to me? I would have turned out worse than I am. I did not have like a stereotypical tiger mother because my mom was always so busy working. She didn't have a tiger mother, but I just had a lot of deep thighs as I should have. And the deep sigh is a knife. Yeah, it definitely can be. Well, so you say you DJ.
00:43:15
Speaker
Oh, COVID ruined DJing. Oh, did it really? Well, is it still ruined? Because I've seen people. For me. For me. I've seen people. Okay, okay. Gotcha. Gotcha.
00:43:25
Speaker
ruined it for me because I was a party DJ. So during COVID there are no parties. And then the last party that I DJed was in May and it was not that well attended and not many people were dancing because there were still COVID restrictions. Like you had to wear a mask on the dance floor.
00:43:48
Speaker
and you know and this there was a bar and you know what are you supposed to do you have a drink in hand you want to go to the dance floor but you have to wear your mask but you can't drink so yeah it was not fun yeah i'm not actively pursuing parties they don't pay well anyway i mean me i just get them for fun yeah yeah that's uh well maybe you can get back to it one of these days
00:44:13
Speaker
Maybe. I don't know. How long have you been doing DJ kits? I was a college radio DJ. Oh, hell yeah. In college. So that's how I got my start DJing. And then I would DJ like background, instrumental music with my partner when we were in the city. And then by accident,
00:44:37
Speaker
I DJ this humongous party. I swear there was probably a thousand people because the DJ who was my friend had broke their laptop and was like, you have good taste in music. Help me. And I DJ this party. And I was like, Oh, I think I could do this. And then I got invited to do other parties. It took off from there. That's cool. What kind of stuff do you like your most fun gigs? Like what kind of stuff were you playing?
00:45:06
Speaker
The ones that were most fun were probably like the themed night. So like goth industrial night is super fun because I really enjoy that music anyway. 80s night is fun. I did 90s and 90s rave like right before, I think it was 2019, right before COVID. So yeah. The last rave of all time.
00:45:34
Speaker
I wanted to ask about dark academia. I mean, that's a big part of the book. It's a part of your style. So I wanted to get from the horse's mouth, as it were, what your definition would be.
Defining Dark Academia
00:45:52
Speaker
um i don't want to put you on the spot but you know i don't know how to describe dark academia um so like exam it's example so yeah yeah because it's it's i guess it's it's a genre of fiction but it's also an aesthetic um i i don't know like for me it's it's smart people doing very bad things
00:46:16
Speaker
They dressed really nice while doing it. That's what target academia is to me.
00:46:25
Speaker
That's really funny because it's a little bit Ivy. I didn't want to bore our listeners with my definition. It's like looking like a professor, but you're like an evil one. You know what I mean? You're probably not wearing a lot of pink in a dark academia fit. Right. But then there's light academia that has a lot more. Which is how I dress.
00:46:52
Speaker
But dork academia is the hashtag that I use occasionally, which I think is pinning. It's not a dig at you, it's a dig at me. I like it though. Yeah, it's funny. I mean, I think that the whole, when I was at school in 2008, I was wearing a tie all the time as I do now, and people just thought I was a professor. There's the professor guy. He sure does smoke a lot of cigarettes.
00:47:22
Speaker
That also cracks. Yes, yes, yes. They did ban cigarette smoking eventually. Just talk about fraud. My relationship with UMBC's cigarette policy is very fraud indeed. I got a lot of tickets.
00:47:39
Speaker
Because they would walk around and give you a ticket if you were smoking a cigarette. Absurd. I don't even smoke cigarettes anymore, but I still feel like that is... I don't know. That's like, like, walk up to you and write you a ticket. Like, you're smoking cigarettes. Yeah, really wild. So anyway. In my book, which takes place in the 90s, everybody's smoking. And they're smoking on the Amazon. They're standing outside their dorms and smoking.
00:48:04
Speaker
Yeah, which is what we did. Oh, totally. What grunge music makes the book because that's my like, I was gonna say this earlier, it's sort of boring. But like, I was cosplaying Kurt Cobain, middle school and high school in the 2000s, you know, like anachronistic definite. Um, so I was wondering what the grunge appearances in the book
00:48:27
Speaker
Actually, none. None! Too passé? Too passé? No, no, just because the people in the book are anachronistically listening to 80s music. Oh, I see, I see, I see. Well, a follow-up question. They could discover bleach.
00:48:49
Speaker
yeah in the 89s follow-up question are there are there any 80s artists that make like a that you like name drop just out of my own period oh um i don't know how that works also with like copyright and shit so if that's not possible i i don't know i i'm pretty sure i'm not like i've never been traditionally published so i don't know how this works but i'm pretty sure it'll i i'm pretty sure you can name drop but um
00:49:16
Speaker
Morrissey gets a name dropped. Of course. Also kind of dark academia in a weird way. Like very well dressed, but also doing terrible shit. The Smith and Morrissey are dark academia before there was dark academia.
00:49:36
Speaker
right yes yes sadly yeah sadly morrisy particularly the lyrics right yeah morrisy the dick yeah i have a more complete dick i have a morrisy tattoo that did not open it that way
00:49:50
Speaker
I was a I was a super fan. I was a super fan. Yeah I'm gonna admit this because it's just one of my favorite songs of all time but like as shitty as he is now and like I Have a hard time with to the smith's remorse II because that fucking but uh, I will still secretly put on speedway occasionally just because that song holds a ton of men so You know, maybe twice a year
00:50:20
Speaker
Yeah, I can't listen to Morrissey at all, but I can listen to the Smiths every day.
00:50:33
Speaker
um duran duran gets a lot of nice it gets a lot of well i think that makes sense yeah because duran duran inspired the book so right they're all over it kelly you mentioned the hip-hop which we glossed over a little bit right you say you listen to a lot of old-school hip-hop i was curious about that do you listen to any new hip-hop do you listen to are there trap artists who you respect
00:51:01
Speaker
I don't actively listen to hip-hop anymore, but I like what's happening in hip-hop right now. I like a lot of the female rappers coming out, but not actively listening. Yeah, of course, and there's so much garbage waded through. There was a really long period of hip-hop was just not interesting to me at all. What period are we talking about?
00:51:31
Speaker
We're talking like prior to like seven years ago, like before Megan Thee Stallion, before Cardi B. So the kind of like late aughts in early like 2010. Is that kind of the time period? Does that feel like a lot of music? Yeah. So like after, yes, after the golden age until like a few years ago.
00:51:54
Speaker
Right, yeah. And I'll be 40 next month, have a huge musical taste. And there is very little that I go back and listen to of most genres from that time period. There was good shits here and there, but I feel like pretty much everything just, I don't know, suffered. Maybe it was just a transitional period.
00:52:17
Speaker
Not a lot of staying power. Yeah, it's like shit that I liked back then that was new, didn't really age that much. Yeah, like a lot of the music that I was listening to in high school, like I can't, like I can't listen to it all, like grindcore, like that kind of more extreme metal. And like, lots of screaming I just can't listen to anymore. You just get, at least I have gotten old.
00:52:45
Speaker
Well, so what do you think, Matt? Man, this was this was awesome. And we covered a lot of very like, I don't know, we kind of did this more free form than usual, partly because Connor's been sick. But like, yeah, this was a great conversation. Thank you so much. Yeah, yeah. Thank you. You know, I feel like we could have an entire episode with you again, that we just talk about music and like music and its influence on style, because I feel like that's something
00:53:15
Speaker
me and Connor for sure. And seemingly you also like that played a big role. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I'll say this on, I'll say this on the record. Matt takes notes during the show as do I. Matt has taken like a full page of notes.
00:53:31
Speaker
So now is engaged. I was really engaged. Anytime I get to use music and clothing talk, I'm 100% down all the time. Yeah, this is really fun.
00:53:48
Speaker
Thank you, thank you, yeah. We just had our first, like, two-part, I guess, what, return guest with Shane. Yeah, down the line in the next, you know, nine months or so, we'll have you back on. Hey, maybe you can talk more about your book, too? Yeah, that would be super cool. Fuck it. Hell yeah. Well, the apocalypse starts exclusive book launch. Yeah, yeah. Just give us a press pass on the journey when you start that one.
00:54:15
Speaker
That's all that I want. We will get an advanced creator copy. We don't have to be the first. Yeah, no, that's please. We don't have to be the first interview, but this is straight the fuck up our wheelhouse. So we want to be in the first spot. It's not funny and I don't have an agent, but okay.
00:54:34
Speaker
Well, listen, when you, when you have your, when you have your billions of dollars from this franchise, you'll be looking back and you'll be like, Oh my word, I did a done that on you and here I am. So thank you. Yeah. It's been really a delight. Yeah. That's been great. Um, and they always for a while. So this is awesome. We always like to give our guests a chance to plug whatever they want to plug. So have that.
00:55:00
Speaker
Um, you can follow me on Instagram, um, at sartorial underscore misfit. Um, all my other accounts are private. Um, and I will not accept your request.
00:55:15
Speaker
I do want to plug something, but the website is down right now, but hopefully it'll be back up. I've been running a fundraiser for the Transgender Law Center over the past year. So far we have raised close to $4,000. It's still running.
00:55:34
Speaker
You can go to misty-con.com, M-I-S-T-I dash C-O-N dot com. And there's a button there that says, donate to transgender law center. So if anybody's listening and wants to kick in a few bucks to that, it's a really good cause, especially with all the, you know, anti-trans legislation going on in this country right now. Website should be up again. So yeah, I guess that's it.
00:56:02
Speaker
We're about to say the same thing.
00:56:13
Speaker
Yeah, if we always, we always plug like, Hey, if you like what we do, like make a donation for this episode. And literally any episode we, if we ever ask that and you want to donate to this fundraiser more so than us or not even more. So just donate to this other fundraiser. If you can kick us about some cool, but we want some shit to go to this organism. So thank you for blogging. That's, that's fucking great.
00:56:41
Speaker
Thanks for letting me. Of course, of course. Well, everyone, thank you for listening. It was a really fun conversation. And yeah, I'm Matt Smith at Rebels Roads. And I'm Connor Fowler at Connor Fowler. And come back next week for a new episode. Yeah, have a good day.
00:57:03
Speaker
Okay, we have an epilogue to the show that we just recorded, which was one of the best, sorry to all the other guests, we're not discounting you, but this was fucking awesome and you're gonna love it. And we are going to be graced with a Ralph Oran story, because I did not bring it up enough on this episode.
00:57:29
Speaker
Because I knew that you have that Ralph quota, I had to search for something Ralph to say. And this is my, this is, this is how we meet the Ralph quota. So in my line of work, I am a veterinary nurse.
00:57:47
Speaker
And I work for a concierge vet service. So we go into people's houses, apartments, and we provide veterinary care. So six degrees of separation from Ralph Lauren. I work in Westchester County, New York. Ralph Lauren lives in Westchester County, New York. One of his houses, his equestrian estate or whatever is in Bedford, New York, Westchester County. Sure.
00:58:17
Speaker
I take care of not Ralph's dogs, but Ralph's caretaker, like the person who's like the head caretaker of his estate. I take care of his dogs.
00:58:36
Speaker
But not Ralph's dogs. I would love to take care of Ralph's dogs, but we don't. I don't need to take care of Hillary Clinton's dogs, and my boss lives down the street from her.
00:58:49
Speaker
Okay, that is possibly the coolest Ralph story we will ever have on this show. Also, I did not know we were a vet tech, or I would have asked a thousand different questions about animals, because I'm a massive animal person. Connor is not, famously.
00:59:09
Speaker
you're gonna throw me under the bus like this parent but you're a plant parent I see and I'm a fucking future so I deal with
00:59:26
Speaker
children for my job. Yes, you are a nerd. No one ever gets any credit for no one ever says oh my god, what a nice thing you do to take care of the kids. They say, fuck you, we're giving you $2 an hour. And that's what happens. I will qualify as a teacher. I used to. God. Yes, I was assigned to teacher. Oh my god. But I really fucked up by being sick because I have like,
00:59:55
Speaker
notes, but maybe I wouldn't have been able to find out that you were a teacher anyway. No, probably not. I used to teach from first grade through eighth grade. Wow.
01:00:11
Speaker
Yeah, so I taught as an environmental educator in the Bronx for a few years, and then I taught for two years at a private school in these village. Wow, you really have done a lot of stuff.
01:00:32
Speaker
Did you go to school to be like a veterinary nurse or did you, I guess you had to go to school to do that. I went to school. The first degree that I got was in environmental science. So I wanted to be an environmental educator. Really, I wanted to be a park ranger.
01:00:52
Speaker
And I kept getting told that I do not have the temperament to enforce laws. So I interviewed many times for the
01:01:06
Speaker
I was interviewed a couple of times to be a park ranger and I never got the job. So I didn't know what to do. So I became an environmental educator and then I found myself in the classroom and it was soul crushing. No offense. Yeah. No, no, no, no, no, no, no. What I do is I work for two and a half hours every day with kindergarten class or first grade class. That's what I do. Oh, that's the best.
01:01:35
Speaker
pure joy. It's like, I'm sick again. But it's like, and I only have to teach the one subject. So it's just like, Mr. Khan is the reading guy. And that's the whole like, everyone wants to be in my little class. So it's like, perfect. Perfect. And I absolutely despise extremely hard.
01:02:00
Speaker
I was going to say, I absolutely despise children and I absolutely love animals. So that's where I am on the spectrum. See, this is why the show, the yin and yang of the show. Also, I don't know if ACAB contains bark ranchers, but I kind of say if you're enforcing laws in certain ways, then yeah. Like if you're writing a ticket, you're a cop.
01:02:31
Speaker
Hmm. Okay. So it wanted to become a park ranger. Like, I don't know anything about park rangers. So I, I, I'm not judging, but well, like, I know that they, I know that they bus people for cannabis. Like that's something that they are like very proud of doing, which I think is like, bro, you're in nature and people trying to, trying to enjoy nature. Maybe a little bit.
01:03:00
Speaker
I just wanted to do the enforcement part. I just wanted to do the, you know, yeah, education, environmental education part. Yeah. Which it sounds like you would have been awesome at. So when things are different and when everything's going our way, you'll be a park ranger someday.
01:03:22
Speaker
I don't think I want to be anymore. It just doesn't work like that. I think it would be a different job. Yeah, I'm too deeply entrenched in my job now. And I did have to go back to school to get a veterinary nursing degree. And I do have my job right now. That's awesome. What's the, just for my application?
01:03:43
Speaker
What is the cutest animal that you have? I'm definitely a cat person I had a French bulldog puppy yesterday that was so freaking cute
01:04:13
Speaker
How little is that? That's got to be like three inches big. Tiny piglet. Yeah, that's funny. They don't stay cute forever though. But French Bulldogs, yeah. What are you talking about? French Bulldogs, cute forever. I am firmly, although their reading makes it an issue. I love Bulldogs of bull stripes. English Bulldogs are ugly cute. French Bulldogs are cute cute.
01:04:43
Speaker
And I will not take any questions at this time. They're both incredible, just in certain ways. I'll have to look. I'll have to look.
01:04:53
Speaker
Because I don't even know what the difference is. Yeah, like Shih Tzu's in Boodles and those types of like, like, there's one happening is my friend Eleanor's, or my best friend Eleanor's parents' dog that I think is cute just because she's adorable. But like, there are some breeds that I will shit talk endlessly. Bulldogs are not one of them.
01:05:19
Speaker
Wow. And we really run the game on this show. Yeah. Thank you so much for tuning in and hopefully I'll be less sick sounding in our next interview.