Episode 539
with Nora McInerny, Nabil Ayers, and Madison Cunningham
Host Luke Burbank and announcer Elena Passarello discuss the ways in which we are too hard on ourselves; writer and podcaster Nora McInerny (Terrible, Thanks for Asking) explains why she is the saddest happy person she knows; music industry entrepreneur Nabil Ayers chats about his memoir My Life in the Sunshine and his estranged relationship with his biological father, funk/soul musician Roy Ayers; and Grammy-nominated singer-songwriter Madison Cunningham gives a show-stopping performance of her song, "All I've Ever Known” from her Grammy-nominated album Revealer.
Nora McInerny
Writer and Podcaster
Nora McInerny is the best-selling author of the memoirs It's Okay To Laugh (Crying Is Cool Too), No Happy Endings, and The Hot Young Widows Club. Her newest collection of essays Bad Vibes Only is a response to a society that requires our best vibes even on our worst days. It's a reminder that sometimes it is just not possible to live, laugh and love in these conditions (and that’s okay). In essays that revisit her cringey past and anticipate her rapidly approaching future, Nora lays bare her own chaos, inviting us to drop the facade of perfection and embrace the truth: that we are all -- at best -- slightly unhinged.
Nabil Ayers
Author
Nabil Ayers has written about race and music for The New York Times, NPR, Pitchfork, Rolling Stone and GQ. His new memoir My Life in the Sunshine documents the complex task of building an identity around an absent father. Alongside his literary pursuits, Ayers has run musical campaigns for The National, Big Thief, Grimes, and at the age of twenty-five, opened Seattle's Sonic Boom Records store. Unable to stay off the stage, Ayers has performed as a drummer in several bands, and began his own record label, The Control Group/Valley of Search, which has released music by Cate Le Bon, The Killers, PJ Harvey, his uncle-the jazz musician Alan Braufman-and others. In his free time, Ayers lives with his wife in Brooklyn, NY. Website • Twitter
Madison Cunningham
Singer-Songwriter
Madison Cunningham is an American singer-songwriter and guitarist. Rolling Stone described her music as "a new spin on West Coast folk-rock," and her latest album Revealer, released in September 2022, is full of confessions, intimations, and hard truths the Los Angeles based singer-songwriter has learned over her tenure in the music industry. Her past albums titled Who You Are Now and Wednesday (Extended Version) were nominated for a Grammy Award for Best Americana Album and Best Folk Album respectively. She has also toured with Andrew Bird, and feels her songwriting soars when she allows herself to confident in her idiosyncrasies. Website • Listen
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Luke Burbank Hey, Elena.
Elena Passarello Hey, Luke. How's it going?
Luke Burbank It's going well. Although we're in that time of year where I'm starting to feel stress about the lack of holiday shopping I've done.
Elena Passarello Yup. Same right there.
Luke Burbank Okay. Okay. Good. I'm glad we can share our anxiety on this.
Elena Passarello I'll do your shopping and you do mine.
Luke Burbank Perfect. Are you ready for a little "station location identification examination"?
Elena Passarello Absolutely.
Luke Burbank All right. This is where I am going to talk about a place in the country where Live Wire is on the radio. Elena has to guess where I am talking about. This place is the home to Kenneth Huggins, who in 2012 was awarded the Guinness World Record for largest collection of toasters, which at that time was over 1200 toasters for Ken.
Elena Passarello Yeah, I'm trying to figure out what, like, where was True West set. That's a play that has a lot of toasters in it.
Luke Burbank Wow.
Elena Passarello California?
Luke Burbank Getting dramatic here on the show early. How about this? Synchronous fireflies, which are fireflies that light up at the same time are only found in about half a dozen places. And one of them happens to be right outside this city in Congaree National Park.
Elena Passarello Is that somewhere in Tennessee?
Luke Burbank It is somewhere in South Carolina.
Elena Passarello Oh!
Luke Burbank Your old stomps.
Elena Passarello I should know all of these things. All right, one more.
Luke Burbank Let's see. The first textile mill run completely by electricity in the world opened to this place in 1894.
Elena Passarello Spartanburg.
Luke Burbank So close. Columbia
Elena Passarello Columbia!
Luke Burbank South Carolina, where we are on the radio on WLTR Radio, shout out to everybody in Columbia. All right. Should we get to the show?
Elena Passarello Yes.
Luke Burbank All right. Take it away.
Elena Passarello from PRX, it's...
Audience LIVE WIRE
Elena Passarello This week, writer and podcast host Nora McInerny.
Nora McInerny All of my books like fall under the category of like, Is this woman okay? But I'm also like a fairly good time. If I leave my house.
Elena Passarello And music industry entrepreneur Nabil Ayers.
Nabil Ayers I have lots of fun stories. I was in a band that went to jail and I owned a record store and I, you know, met the dude from Sugar Ray. Like, I had all these fun things.
Elena Passarello With music from Madison Cunningham and our fabulous house band. I'm your announcer, Elena Passarello. And now the host of Live Wire, Luke Burbank.
Luke Burbank Hey, thank you so much, Elena. Thanks to everyone tuning in from all over the country, including out there in Columbia, South Carolina. We got a great show in store for you this week. One of my favorite people out there, Nora McInerny is going to be stopping by. Of course, we also asked the Live Wire listeners a question. We asked, what is a small thing that you are too hard on yourself about? And we're going to hear the listener responses coming up in a minute. First, though, of course, we got to start things with the best news we heard all week. This is our little reminder at the top of the show that there is some good news happening out there. Elena, what's the best news you heard this week?
Elena Passarello Okay. This is adorable news. Are you ready?
Luke Burbank The most adorable news you've heard all week.
Elena Passarello It's so adorable. There's a six year old named Madeline living in the L.A. area who really wanted to get a pet unicorn. So her mother didn't want her to feel discouraged and be told that, you know, it's impossible to get a pet unicorn. Everybody puts your hands over your six year old's ears because they don't exist. So to sort of, like, push the, kick the can a little bit on that question of Madeline's question, her mom said she probably need a lot of permission from local authorities in order to keep one.
Luke Burbank So this was her mom trying to kind of like stall the conversation.
Elena Passarello Like so it's not really the softest "no" she could think of.
Luke Burbank It's a permitting issue.
Elena Passarello Yes, that's exactly right. She's like, yeah, it's they're exotic animals, young girl. And that. But Madeline was like "brb". As she went into her room, and she came back with this handwritten letter that says, I would like your approval if I could have a unicorn in my backyard, if I could find one. And she made her mother mail it to the L.A. County Animal Control Department, and they got her letter. And two weeks later, they wrote her back and they said, here is a little heart-shaped license that you can, right now, it was attached to a stuffed unicorn because it would probably take over a while to find, you know, the real deal.
Luke Burbank Yeah, you got to practice with kind of, you know, the pretend one first.
Elena Passarello Yeah, exactly. And then there were five rules. Feed it watermelon, which is unicorns favorite food. Polish its horn at least once a week with a soft cloth. Make sure it has regular access to sunlight, moonbeams and rainbows, insert L.A. smog joke here, four, only decorate it with nontoxic, biodegradable glitter and perhaps the most adorable one, number five be in full compliance with Title Ten of the L.A. County Code for Animal Welfare.
Luke Burbank You know, those are also the tips for taking care of me.
Elena Passarello Oh, yeah. Do you need only to be decorated in nontoxic, biodegradable glitter?
Luke Burbank I only eat watermelon. That is adorable. But of course, you know, the county sort of doing this little girl that solid has now really brought to a head this conversation with the mom.
Elena Passarello Yeah, they did say in their letter that it would probably take a while to find one. So I guess it's now on Madeleine to sort of like realize, to to manifest her dreams.
Luke Burbank Speaking of having a dream about something, Elena, there is a guy out in Maryland named Brian Ruberry. And for like over the last 40 years, he has been writing various kinds of screenplays. He was a football player in college. He wanted to go pro. It didn't work out. So he was taking an English class and one of his professors, like, submitted one of his short stories for some award and he won. So he really got into the idea of writing was never really making a living doing it, but he was just writing these screenplays. He says he was rejected over a hundred times, sending in his screenplays. Well, at age 66, he finally managed to get one of his screenplays produced. It was a Lifetime movie, one of these, you know, holiday movies that they do on the Hallmark Channel and Lifetime. It's called Single and Ready to Jingle.
Elena Passarello I love it already.
Luke Burbank And it it just aired last week and he had a whole party. Everybody came over. And he's now has the ear of the people who make these like, you know, kind of schmaltzy but sort of relaxing this-time-of-year movies. And so he's working on another project and like his screenwriting career is finally coming together at age 66.
Elena Passarello That is so wonderful to hear and also wonderful that there's more Lifetime holiday movies in the hopper, because I could watch those forever.
Luke Burbank You know that I am working on a TV story on that very topic.
Elena Passarello Are you starring in an upcoming Hallmark film?
Luke Burbank I did a scene with the Queen of the Hallmark holiday movies, Lacey Chabert, but it was not filmed as part of the movie, was filmed as part of our TV piece. So you will not be able to see me on a Hallmark Channel near you. But just know that Lacey said I did pretty well.
Elena Passarello Good job.
Luke Burbank That's the best news I heard all week is that high school drama class I took is really paying off. And it comes to my my audition with Lacey Chabert. All right. Let's get our first guest on over. She is the host of the award winning podcast Terrible, Thanks for Asking. Is also the bestselling author of a bunch of books, including No Happy Endings and the Hot Young Widows Club. Her new collection of essays, Bad Vibes Only and Other Things I Bring to the Table covers everything from body image to the benefits of lax parenting. Take a listen to this. Our conversation with Nora McInerny recorded in front of a live crowd at Town Hall in Seattle. Nora, welcome to the show.
Nora McInerny Thank you. My self-esteem balloon just like flew up.
Luke Burbank We're talking about this great book, Bad Vibes Only that that you have out, because I just was I thought it was so funny and also so kind of insightful and also very relatable. One of the things that you write about is that you really don't like traveling like it's a miracle you're here in Seattle. I follow you on Tik Tok. And I was watching you on your book tour with an increasing series of Tik Toks about how mad you were about travel and airports. And I was thinking, she's not coming to Seattle like I'm watching a person meltdown in real time. So thank you for coming. But you have actually shown up at the airport like multiple times without a ticket.
Nora McInerny Without a ticket. Or then I get to the city because I did have a ticket and I walk up to the rental car counter and they say, We would love to give you a car. However, you did have to reserve one. We don't have any for you. I say check again and they're like, Ma'am, we checked or I will get to the airport and I will have a ticket, but my children and my husband won't. And I swear I bought more than just one ticket.
Luke Burbank So this was that you were going to do the New York City half marathon and you had your husband and your kid and but you were the only one with a ticket. So you just left them at the TSA.
Nora McInerny It sounds worse than it is. I also had a carry on baby.
Elena Passarello It's a lot better than an overhead bin baby.
Nora McInerny This is not a baby you could check.
Luke Burbank I hate it. Every time I bring my baby, they make me put it in that metal frame and, like, it won't fit.
Elena Passarello Yeah, big baby.
Nora McInerny Nope. He's going to steerage. So that did happen. That did happen. That happened. I was running the half marathon for the American Cancer Society, so you can't be too mad at me for abandoning only one child and one husband at the airport. Their flight was a different day.
Luke Burbank Uh huh. So that you had got them tickets, but just for the next different day?
Nora McInerny Yeah.
Luke Burbank You write something in this book that I want to try to unpack with you a little bit. You say that you're the saddest happy person that you know. What does that look like on a like a day to day basis for you?
Nora McInerny Oh, oh. Oh. I listen to a lot of Taylor Swift, right? All of my books like fall under the category of like, is this woman okay? You know, but I'm also like a fairly good time if I leave my house. But I am also a person who, you know, I listen to a lot of Bright Eyes early in my twenties and I never stopped. Yeah. You know, so it's it's a it's definitely a good experience for the people around me and who love me to never know, like will Nora cry because she thinks that the man across the aisle from her on the airplane might be lonely. I can cry right now. He was he was watching YouTube videos of Rod Stewart and tapping that toe. And I was like, Oh, I hope someone loves you. I don't know why I'm like this. I don't know why I'm like this. Okay. Or, you know, will Nora take you to the airport and not buy you a plane ticket. I don't know. It could be anything.
Luke Burbank You feel things really deeply in whatever direction you're feeling them.
Nora McInerny True. Yes.
Luke Burbank You also write a lot about body image in this book. You want to look a certain way in your mind, but you also feel bad that you want to look that way. But you also feel bad that you feel bad. And then also you got your jaw accidentally paralyzed with some filler.
Nora McInerny I'm telling you one, I'm an easy sell. You have anything to sell me? I'll buy $2,000 worth of filler for my face. And they did hit a nerve. And I was I experienced an unintentional facial paralysis, but my jaw was it was very sharp. And I as you can tell, you don't have a natural. So, you know, highs and lows, highs and lows, you win some, you lose some. But yeah, am I am I a bad feminist for wanting to preserve myself in the amber of like who I am in my mind, which is, you know, a 29 year old woman, you know, or am I a bad feminist for judging myself, for responding to a patriarchal, capitalistic system that made me like, it's not my fault, and then who am I to judge myself for judging myself? And around and around we go. And do you want the syringe? Yeah. So my husband was like, well, I mean, at least it only cost you. Like, at least it only cost me. You have no idea. He was like, How much would you say you've spent on your face this year? And I was like, What a question, what a question. Oh, my God, you look so good today with your three gray hairs and the and all men age like boys. It's like, oh, no, you're a handsome boy, man. Cool. Cool.
Luke Burbank What did you-
Nora McInerny I'm looking at you. I'm looking at you.
Luke Burbank You know what? Well, listen, as they say on TikTok, a win is a win. A win is a win. I will take that from you Nora. We have to take a quick break here on Live Wire from PRX. We're at Town Hall Seattle this week. Yeah! I'm Luke Burbank, here with Elena Passarello and Nora McInerny. Quick break and then we're back with much more Live Wire in a moment. Hey. Welcome back to Live Wire from PRX. I'm Luke Burbank here with Elena Passarello, we're coming to you from Town Hall in Seattle this week. We're talking to Nora McInerny, host of the podcast Terrible, Thanks for Asking and also the new collection of essays, Bad Vibes Only, by the way, this whole thing brought to you by the Hotel Five here in Seattle. I'm wondering, Nora, would you say that you hate writing, which is basically your job?
Nora McInerny Only when I have to do it. Oh, okay. You know, otherwise, I love the idea of it. I'll wake up in the morning, be like, Wow, I thought of a sentence. I can't wait to get in there, crack open that laptop, and then fall down a rabbit hole for 6 hours. The kids will come home from school. I'll be extremely irritated because they're interrupting my work time that I had all those hours to do. But nothing inspires me like a crushing deadline. And in that moment, like, I can write and I love it. I love it.
Luke Burbank Is it like once you get into the flow with it, it just it feels like the ideas are coming easily in the words and things like that?
Nora McInerny Yeah. You know how some writers are like, here's what you got to do. You got to wake up early, eat the same thing every day.
Luke Burbank Real John Grisham style.
Nora McInerny Yes, very like John Grisham style or like, you know, whatever sort of airport man book is. Like, here's ways to crush it. And they're like, the only way to do it, you got to wake up, you got to do the same thing like, no, no. I think if if I can't write that day, I'm not going to write. Unless I told someone I would turn something in in 30 minutes. In which case, yeah, I'm doing it. And I was always doing it, and it's actually my fourth draft and I thought about this very deeply. But I think like even reading is writing, watching TV is writing, interacting with the world is writing. And if you want to treat it like a commodity and a product, which yes, of course it is, but also if you want to just turn yourself into a lifeless production bot sure, force yourself to get up every day and like meet a word count. But otherwise, like, know that most writing is about living and like being a part of the world.
Luke Burbank Yeah, I think that's something to applaud. You put words to something in this book that I had kind of thought about in my brain for a long time, which is that basically sleeping is weird. It's not like we need it. But the idea that at the same time, all over the world, when it gets dark, we agree to go inside and get on like a soft rectangle and put a thing over and close our eyes. It is a strange phenomenon.
Elena Passarello And special clothes.
Nora McInerny In special sleep outfis that you can only wear when you sleep. Like I had to put on my sleep costume and like after you like clean your little teeth like humans are the cutest mammal. Like also, like, not just that we sleep, but like imagine. Do you think any other mammal gathers in a room to look at another mammal doing something? Isn't that so cute? Like people are the cutest of the animals. Like, look at all these little animals, like. And I wore my favorite little thing and it carried all my favorite little things with me. And I'm going to sit here. We're going to look at these ones. It's just so cute. It's so cute. Then they all have to sleep at night.
Luke Burbank All of them. Except you.
Nora McInerny Yeah, not me. And. But I get to watch my husband sleep because he falls asleep if he wants to. If he's tired, he'll just be like, well.
Luke Burbank You also write about your parents complete lack of awareness of where you were at any time in your childhood.
Nora McInerny Yeah.
Luke Burbank Which I, my parents are here actually for the show, so I'll tread lightly. In fact, I believe my mom once texted me, why do you say that you were gone 12 hours a day in the summertime on the radio? It makes me seem like a bad mom. Did you send me that text, Mom? Yeah. But it is true that our parents were much less aware of our whereabouts.
Nora McInerny Yeah.
Luke Burbank Yeah, I was like, you took a canoe trip that really could have killed you.
Nora McInerny Yeah. I don't think any like nine and ten year olds should be in a water vessel unattended, like, ever. I think that might be considered maybe even illegal now, but it was the nineties and our moms were doing something else and we were up at our grandparents cabin, which was like rustic. Like, whatever you're imagining, dial it down. Okay? Oh, you want to watch TV? You can listen to the Twins game on the radio. Won't that be a gas? My cousin and I really wanted to go to town because we had maybe $5 between us, like burning a hole in our pockets and we took a canoe to just paddle our little bodies. And other people were on this lake like other people saw us. Adults, by the way, adults floated by two children, like with no water. Like also kids drink so much water. I never I never had a glass of water, I think, until I was like twenty. I was like, what is this? Like, you could go to a water fountain and, like, take, like, a little. Like. Like one little. And that was it. Yeah, that's all I need.
Luke Burbank There was 30 kids in line behind you.
Nora McInerny 30 kids. And they were like.
Luke Burbank And if it was a bully, you were getting your head smashed into it anyway. And it was like the saddest stream of water here to basically, like create as much suction as possible.
Nora McInerny Put his lips right on it. It was shhhuup. You're like, Jeffrey, we saw that. You don't just suck it out of the pipe.
Luke Burbank Are you able to then like you have kids, are are you able to be sort of hands off with them?
Nora McInerny I want to, I want to. These kids are so soft. My kids, like we had a high schooler like this is like even before the pandemic. Who would be like, what are we doing? I was like, Well, it's Saturday. What are you, oh, we? All of us? Okay, like, all right. And I would love to just have my kids walk to school, which is totally doable. But my husband is, I mean, he's a real like 21st century parent. And I'm still in the nineties. I'm still like, they take a left. How hard can it be? He's like, Well, they have to cross a busy street. There's a crossing guard, like an adult one with a light up stop sign. I'm like, I think they'll be okay. So I would love to.
Luke Burbank You have the really incredible podcast Terrible, Thanks for Asking. And you have this TED Talk that's been, I like watched maybe as much as any other TED Talk out there. Like you really have been known for a while as somebody who is really wise when it comes to grief because you you lost your husband, you lost your father, and you've written about it. And a lot of people I know who are here, they look to you for advice and comfort and things like that. I also know that's a big emotional burden for you because I know you. Is this book to some degree kind of moving past the grief space?
Nora McInerny I don't know if I'll ever be past it, because I do think it is a part of that little sad inner core of me. And I do think that we are meant to be changed, right, by all these experiences. And losing Aaron when he was 35 years old, losing my dad when he was, you know, 64, 62. I should know that. 62. Of course, I will always, like that permanently affected who I am. It formed me into who I am today. And also, when you make your life everyone's business and then you sort of inadvertently with no strategic plan whatsoever, make it like your literal business, it does start to feel like you are a commodity that you are, I am revolted by the idea of a personal brand, and yet I sort of find myself in one. Like in this one that I made, I didn't know that I was doing it. Maybe I did. Who knows? I am always going to be a person who is shaped by that experience. But wait, there's more right? There, but wait there's more.
Luke Burbank There's also bad parenting.
Nora McInerny There's also bad parenting. Okay. There's also so much bad parenting on both ends. Okay. It starts from the top. Right. And then it just keeps going. And I did want to write about the other experiences and the other thoughts, the other feelings I have that also make me me, that also connect me to this world around me and make me happy to be here, you know?
Luke Burbank Yeah. Words of wisdom from Nora McInerny, everyone, right here on Live Wire. That was Nora McInerny right here on Live Wire. Her new collection of essays, Bad Vibes Only and Other Things I Bring to the Table is out now. Live Wire is brought to you in part by Alaska Airlines. Alaska Airlines offers the most nonstops from the West Coast, including destinations like Hawaii, Palm Springs and San Francisco. And as a member of the OneWorld Alliance, Alaska Airlines can connect you to more than 1000 destinations worldwide with their global partners. Learn more at AlaskaAir.com. You're listening to Live Wire. Of course, each week we ask our listeners a question. This week we ask, What's a small thing you're too hard on yourself about. Elena has been collecting up those responses. What do you see?
Elena Passarello How about this one from Thea. The small thing Thea is too hard on herself about when I don't have my punch rewards card at a place where they give you punch rewards. I hate that feeling. Sometimes they give you another one. And you know, so and I get my coffee shop that I go to the most, I have like six punch cards that each have one punch on them.
Luke Burbank And you can kind of, like, add them all up and make, like, a full card or whatever.
Elena Passarello Yeah. You tie a string around them and wear around your neck. You just come in.
Luke Burbank I'm hopeless with those things. You know what I need? You know, at the casino, there's a lanyard they make that, like, clicks into your little rewards card, so you can't ever lose it. I need multiple lanyards to keep track of, that and reusable grocery bags. I just need to have those kinds of things all attached to somewhere on my shirt so I won't forget them.
Elena Passarello That's a rotten feeling too, isn't it, when you show up at the grocery store bagless. I always have usually like a purse and then I'll like dump it all out in my car, all my lunch, food and electronics, and then I'll have, like, my handbag and I'll fill it with cat food.
Luke Burbank I'm always the person carrying like an armful of the most oddly shaped items because I don't want to get bags like three oranges. A thing of ice cream. A Swiffer wet/dry mop for some reason, it's very comical. All right, what's something else small that one of our listeners might be a little hard on themselves about?
Elena Passarello Oh, how about this one from Ava? Ava says, When the waitstaff tells me to enjoy my meal and I say, You, too. The same thing at airports when people tell me to have a nice flight.
Luke Burbank I've had entire vacations ruined by just casually uttering you two when the person at the gate says, Enjoy your flight like that, we'll just live, as they say, rent free in my head for weeks on end. I hate that kind of stuff. All right. One more small thing that one of our listeners is kind of hard on themselves about.
Elena Passarello Speaking of airports, how about this one from Whitney? Whitney says not having matching socks on at the airport and then going through security and everyone could see how ridiculous you look. Aww, it's okay to have mismatched socks. It's fine.
Luke Burbank I feel incredibly seen from this segment this week, Elena, because that's the only time when I figure out if I'm wearing matching socks. I have a bunch of socks that are sort of like in the same family, but they have different like levels of insignia on them. And they're, I just put them on, you know, in the morning it's probably dark out. And then I'm standing in line at the airport and that's when the rubber really meets the road. Am I wearing matching socks or not?
Elena Passarello I don't I don't know. I feel like you should all be absolved of that. The only thing that I'm afraid of in that is if I forget and I have sandals on and I have to walk through barefoot like that's I don't want to walk through that security line barefoot is the only thing I don't want to do.
Luke Burbank Right? All right. Thank you to everyone who sent in a response to our listener question this week. Like I said, I like to know that I'm not alone in these various, all these various adventures in life. All right. Let's welcome our next guest on over to the program. He's seen the music industry from almost every possible angle. He was the drummer for the indie band The Long Winters. He co-founded one of the most iconic record stores in America, Sonic Boom Records in Seattle. And he's the biological son of the legendary musician Roy Ayers, who is the person behind the hit, Everybody Loves the Sunshine. In fact, that relationship, or lack thereof, is what Nabil Ayers explores in his fascinating new memoir, My Life in the Sunshine, which Kirkus calls a searchingly eloquent memoir of music and family. Take a listen to this, it's our conversation with Nabil Ayers here on Live Wire. Welcome to the show.
Nabil Ayers Thank you. Thanks for having me.
Luke Burbank I really enjoyed this book. I mean, it has a whole lot in it. It's a lot of it is about your musical career. A lot of it is about your relationship or again, sort of lack thereof, with Roy Ayers. I guess a way that this book could be boiled down, maybe reductively, would be guy is very successful in the music business but is astranged from his biological father and sets out to find him. But I feel like that misses some of the nuance of the book and specifically the actual agreement that your mom and Roy Ayers had regarding your conception. Can you kind of talk about that?
Nabil Ayers Yeah. I mean, my mother, who I'm still very close with, who lives close to me in Brooklyn, I see all the time. She was 21, living in New York, had kind of, I think, a relatively unhappy childhood and decided she wanted to be a young, single mother. She knew she wanted to do that. And she met my father and she said, I think they were "dating", these are air quotes for the radio, and and said, hey, I really want to have a child. I want you to be the father. You do not have to be part of our lives. What do you think? And he said, okay. And so I've always known that. And it's never been weird in that he didn't leave us. There wasn't a divorce. I had incredible male role models and a great father figure in my uncle. But it's a, you know, unique situation.
Luke Burbank Yeah. Did you start off with the writing project of this book thinking it was going to be about your life and career and experience and not get into the dad stuff?
Nabil Ayers No, it was kind of the opposite. I start I mean, I'm not a writer. I run a record label. I played in bands and owned a record store. And five or six years ago I started writing because I think I just thought I'm in my forties now. I have lots of fun stories. I was in a band that went to jail and I owned a record store and I, you know, met the dude from Sugar Ray. Like, I had all these fun things.
Luke Burbank I probably would kick the story off with the Sugar Ray guy.
Nabil Ayers It made the book The Sugar Ray story, in case anyone's wondering.
Elena Passarello He's wonderful. He's a lovely,
Nabil Ayers Really smart, too.
Luke Burbank Side note, by the way, if you've ever looked at Mark McGrath on Cameo, which I have, guy really over delivers.
Nabil Ayers My my wife hired him for a company.
Luke Burbank He is great on Cameo, would reccomend.
Nabil Ayers He's great. Where were we?
Luke Burbank The origin of the book, or how you started with this.
Nabil Ayers So I was writing about all the fun stories about music and record stores and things and and it was my wife who said, you know, you should really be writing about your father and your race. And I knew she was right, but I wasn't trying to write a book at the time. I was really just writing for myself for fun. My mother writes a lot. My grandmother, my mother's mother wrote a lot. And so to me, it just felt like I was telling stories, it was interesting, it was something I was doing in a really safe way because I didn't think anyone is going to read them. And at a certain point when I started writing about my father, I just started thinking about each of the times I'd met him, the time when I saw him open for the Grateful Dead when I was nine years old. And apparently we went backstage and talked to him for 3 minutes. I actually didn't remember that time, but I remember the story my mother told me about it the time when I was 35, and I finally decided it's time to try to meet him. And we had this great lunch in Seattle and there are lots of other sort of not lots like five or six moments. And so I wrote each of those and I think eventually I realized like, wow, if there is a way to sort of connect all these moments, this could be a book. So I'd done a lot of the kind of emotionally hard work before I decided anyone might see it. And I think that's the kind of the only way it could happen.
Luke Burbank I never met my biological father, so I read this book with great interest. And I just remember for me growing up because I had a really great stepdad and a good, really loving family, I didn't go around feeling like I was missing out on that. And you had this really great mom and this really great uncle. What was it like for you to not have your actual father in your life as a kid?
Nabil Ayers It depended where I was. For my first ten years, I was in Amherst, Massachusetts, in New York City and Cambridge, Massachusetts. And the specific places we were were really diverse. And it wasn't weird to be a biracial kid with a black father and a white mother. It wasn't weird that we had no money and we were on welfare those years while my mother was going to college. And it definitely wasn't weird to not have a father. There are lots of single parent households and so I was just a normal kid for ten years. And then we moved to Salt Lake City when I was ten.
Luke Burbank Not the bohemian enclave that Amherst had been, as you describe it.
Nabil Ayers My mother worked for American Express. They moved us there. And and that was just the first time that anyone, you know, people would say, can I touch your afro? I used to have one of those, you know, where's your father? Those kinds of questions that that would have actually sadly been normal for for people to ask me, but in the places that we lived, no one ever asked me those questions and suddenly they did. So it was weird to to have this very confident, normal childhood till I was ten and then suddenly at ten years old, hear these questions for the first time and I think realize, Oh wow, maybe it is weird that I don't have a father in my life or that, or that people think it's weird for the first time. So it was interesting to have that happen then. But I think I was confident enough that I just sort of made it work. And that's when, you know, I was playing drums and I was into MTV and records and that was really, I don't want to say the thing that saved me meaning like I would have gone into a life of crime if I didn't have those things. But I mean, it made it made my life better. It's how I connected with people. Kids came over and I always tried to start a band and I would play records. And that was kind of the thing that made me more of a normal kid.
Luke Burbank Right. I know that you you've sort of become friendly with a couple half siblings of yours who are more directly raised by Roy Ayers. And I know you sent your half brother a copy of the book, and it sounds like that's pretty much all you know about if Roy Ayers has read it or not.
Nabil Ayers Right. Well, I didn't even send it to him. I emailed him and said, this is my half brother who actually grew up with my father, who I've met once and emailed with a few times. And I just said, this is probably in January when the book was coming out in the summer. I thought like, okay, word's going to start to get out. I should at least do some due diligence. So I emailed him and I said, I've got this book coming. It's about our father. You're in it. He is in it a lot. I'm not in touch with him. If you want to tell him, you should. If you want me to send it to you, I will. And he replied like, lol congrats.
Elena Passarello What?
Luke Burbank That is going to be my new response when I don't want to engage.
Nabil Ayers I was like, this isn't like, this is the email I've been dreading sending. People, close friends, my wife, everyone's been asking like, Are you going to tell your father? Are you going to somehow get it to him? This is really like, you know, and it's getting to the point where, okay, I need to do something or I need to make a decision. And when I sent it, I felt like, you know, all that applied pretty quickly. It's like, Oh, great we're cool.
Luke Burbank Yeah, yeah. That must have been a big relief.
Nabil Ayers A big relief in that that's all I was going to do. So there's nothing else for me to do. I assume by now he knows about it. I don't know if he's read it, but that's, that's all I know.
Luke Burbank Yeah. Yeah. We are talking to Nabil Ayers about his new book, My Life in the Sunshine. You found a day you co-founded a record store in Seattle that I just grew up hanging out in a lot. Sonic Boom records. It was the place to go if you were like an indie kid in Seattle and I was there. I'm wondering what it's been like for you to be a Black man in the indie music space, the record store space. A lot of these places that can be traditionally pretty white.
Nabil Ayers Yeah. And Seattle, a place that can be pretty white. I mean, it's so weird because there's there's a section of the book where I talk about the store, and I remember that when I started writing about it. There's a lot of stuff about race in the book, and I wrote a sentence that said I didn't have many racial issues at Sonic Boom or something like that. And then I started thinking, But surely there are some let me think, Oh, there's this time, oh, there's this time. Oh, and there's that time. And then I race the first sentence. And then I wrote about 30 things, and then I kept in like the best sort of five, and none of them were terrible, but it was like, you know, some of them were real things, like when people came in and have to on the store. And I could just tell the way they looked at me that they were surprised. And that's, you know, whatever we call those microaggressions now, right. Not the hugest, most racist thing. And some of them were sort of protective measures that I kept in my head where like when the store, I got broken into one night and I got the call from the alarm company, and I showed up at two in the morning and I was in the store and the lights were out and the cash register is smashed, you know, on the ground. And I knew the police were coming. I immediately thought to go outside, wait for the police, make sure I had my ID and not be inside the store crouched over the cash register. But I, you know, so nobody did that to me, but I thought that. And so, yeah, there's a lot of that and there always has been. And that's the way the world was and is I think it's it's not terrible, but it's not great. And I wish it didn't exist.
Luke Burbank Now, this, of course, is not your first time in Portland. You toured with lots of bands in the Northwest and I was reading an interview you did with the Willamette Week where they asked you, I think some memories from Portland. And here's your most vivid memory involved, crouching under a drum kit for the guy from Black Flag.
Nabil Ayers I mean, this is this is a great memory, even though it comes across as a terrible story. But and the backstory is I mean, when I lived in Salt Lake City in high school, I became a huge fan of the band Descendents. I'm sure there are some fans here, it's a California punk band. Saw them in high school. That was one of the shows that for me really was like, I was going to lots of tons of shows, but like lots of arena shows and big things. And this was the first show that it was like, Wow, I can like hear the amp and I can make eye contact with the guitar player. This is like this real visceral thing. And and eight, nine years later, suddenly I'm in this band called The Lemons, this rock band in Seattle. And we're touring with All, which is essentially Descendents with a different singer. And it's Bill Stevenson, the same drummer who I just worshiped and idolized. And we're in Portland at La Luna. So anyone remember La Luna? Yeah. This is probably 1995 at La Luna. And Bill, the drummer, comes to me and says, I think it was the Lemons and Toadies and all.
Luke Burbank Oh, wow. Yeah.
Nabil Ayers Taking you back. And Bill says, hey, my drum tech is, you know, is sick or something, so I need you to drum tech for me tonight. I'll pay you $50. And at the time, I was like, Jesus, that is so much money. I am like, That's incredible. And then the other, you know, that was the angel on my shoulder in the Devil was like, that is the hardest $50 you're ever going to make, because I knew what that guy did every night. And so I had to say yes. And so they played like maybe an hour set. They didn't play a very long set. And I was crouched under him. And, you know, he just like they just play a straight set. They don't take breaks, they don't talk between songs and it's really fast music. So he's playing the whole time. And my job is to, like, tighten his snare drum because it loosens, because he hits it so hard throughout every song. But I can't ever do it because he never stops playing. And so I'm doing it. I'm seriously getting like, hit with sticks and there's like wood chips. He's sweating. Sweating all over me. He's spitting, that's like hitting me. And of course, at one point, his bass drum pedal breaks, which is the worst thing that can happen to a drummer. And I know that, you know, there's an extra one sitting right there, but I have to completely crawl under him and fix this thing. It was a really treacherous, crazy hour, but a great story to have, you know, I mean, it was fun.
Luke Burbank Like, could you have ever imagined in that moment at La Luna that one day I'll be the head of multiple record labels and have a hit memoir?
Nabil Ayers Right, right right. I thought I'd made it at that point when I was looking up him getting hit with drumsticks.
Luke Burbank In fairness, we are not paying you $50 to be here. So that was a more profitable evening. Sheer dollars. Well, it's been great having you and congrats on the book.
Nabil Ayers Thank you so much.
Luke Burbank That was Nabil Ayers right here on Live Wire. His memoir, My Life in the Sunshine, is available now. I'm Luke Burbank here with Elena Passarello. We've got to take a quick break, but don't go anywhere. We'll be right back with some incredible, and I cannot overstate this, incredible music from Madison Cunningham. You do not want to miss this coming up on Live Wire. This is Live Wire from PRX. I'm Luke Burbank, here with Elena Passarello. Okay. Before we get to our musical guest this week, a little preview of next week's program. It's a very special holiday episode of Live Wire for you featuring Paul F. Tompkins, the comedian and actor who will finally weigh in on one of the more pressing issues of this time of year: passive aggressive Christmas carolers at a Scottish themed steakhouse in Los Angeles. Okay. We're also going to talk to Sarah Marshall, host of the wildly popular podcast You're Wrong About, which takes a look at why so many of us, myself included, tend to forget what exactly happened when it came to big news stories and events. Also, we're going to hear some music from a Live Wire favorite, Jimmie Herrod. So that's all on next week's show. In the meantime, our musical guest this week is an American singer, songwriter, guitarist and Grammy nominee. Her previous albums, Who You Are Now and Wednesday, were nominated for Grammys. Rolling Stone describes her music as a new spin on West Coast folk rock. And her latest album, Revealer, which was released this year, has also been nominated for a Grammy for Best Folk Album. Here is Madison Cunningham on Live Wire, recorded at Town Hall in Seattle. Welcome to the show, Madison.
Madison Cunningham Thank you very much.
Luke Burbank Congratulations on your most recent, because this is actually, these are the third and fourth Grammy that you've been nominated for?
Madison Cunningham Yes, and I will probably lose. I am a two-time Grammy loser.
Luke Burbank That's the spirit. I know that you grew up in the church and like your dad was a pastor. So I assume you played a lot of like worship music and stuff in the church. Is that where you basically learn how to play guitar and sing and stuff?
Madison Cunningham Yeah, that's also kind of where I learned how to sing and play at the same time, which was, it was it was important for me.
Luke Burbank Did you have a favorite worship song?
Elena Passarello I can't say that I did.
Luke Burbank You weren't like an "Awesome is Our God" kind of gal?
Madison Cunningham I don't know.
Elena Passarello "Our God is an awesome God.".
Madison Cunningham Does that exist? I don't know it.
Luke Burbank Oh, yeah. I can sing it right now, believe me. We can get my mom and dad up here. We have a whole situation.
Madison Cunningham Is that is that like a nineties worship song?
Luke Burbank I think it was probably like eighties. It was probably, you know, like on a tape that we would get we used to get a monthly worship like tape that had worship music on it. But. Do you think you would have been a musician if you hadn't grown up in a, in a particular environment where there was the freedom for you to, like, play an instrument and sing, like if your dad had owned a dry cleaners?
Madison Cunningham God, I don't know. I think having him as an example, he was the, you know, the first person I ever saw hold a guitar and play guitar. And I think without that, who's to say if I would have come to it or not? But I don't know if I would have been maybe I would have taken over the family dry cleaning business instead. I hope I would have found my way to music. Right. But yeah, that's an interesting rabbit hole to fall down. I don't know.
Luke Burbank Backstage, we were talking a little bit about being performers and because I consider us almost on the same level. And I was asking you if you had that phase as a musician where you were playing a lot of, you know, coffee shops and I don't know if you busked or not, but just like playing music in places where no one really asked you to show up and play music, how do you get through that as a as a performer?
Madison Cunningham That is the most important stage, I think, because that's where your your ego sort of grows for a minute, then it gets crushed. But yeah, oh, countless shows where it was just my mom and dad and sisters in the front and I would go home and, you know, we would celebrate. And they were so nice like that. And I would cry a little bit too. And, you know, you just didn't know if it was ever going to become anything or if anyone would really ever show up. And slowly as as the time went on, they did. But it's also great because like at the time when people do show up, you're a little bit more ready for it because you've been playing all of those, all of your best shows to nobody.
Luke Burbank Well, what song are we going to hear?
Madison Cunningham This one's called All I've Ever Known.
Luke Burbank All right. This is Madison Cunningham on Live Wire.
Madison Cunningham (singing) In a fiften passenger van to Ohio the Chrysler invention hums and blows. Oh, air through the vents sends it straight to the bone. Outside it's nine below. It's a pain I've never known. I lost my heart to the great Golden State and the lanterns in Little Tokyo. If the fumes don't kill you first, then the dreaming surely will. You tell me on the phone it's a pain you've never known. I look out the window and let my mind wander from order to the open sky. Sometimes. I swear I'll just never return but you're all I've ever known. You're all I've ever known. Will you take me as I am? In perfect obedience to all these demands. I'm a child to the wonder but a victim of the change. When I see you again will I know what to say? I'm not immune to a piece of bad news. I just do what I must to move on. Give me truth, but put me under so I don't feel a thing. It's the only way I know. It's the only way I know. I have nothing, no rescue coming. Just church bells drawing out the dogs. I'm afraid you were made by invention and odds are I may never know. I may never know. Oh, will you take me as I came? In this resistance to the sound of my name. I'm a daughter to the mystery, but a servant to strain. When I see you again, will I know what to say? Say, ooh. You're all I've ever known. You're all I've ever, all I've ever known, all I've ever-I'm afraid of what I don't know.
Luke Burbank Wow. Madison Cunningham, everybody. That was Madison Cunningham right here on Live Wire, recorded at Town Hall in Seattle. Her latest album, Revealer, is available now. All right. That's going to do it for this week's episode of Live Wire. A huge thanks to our guests, Nora McInerny, Nabil Ayers and Madison Cunningham. Live Wire is brought to you in part by Alaska Airlines. Special thanks this week to Town Hall Seattle, Hotel Five, Cupcake Royale and Reuben's Brews.
Elena Passarello Laura Hadden is our executive producer, Heather De Michele is our executive director. Our producer and editor is Melanie Sevcenko. Our assistant editor is Tré Hester. Our marketing manager is Paige Thomas and our production fellow is Tanvi Kumar. Our house band is Ethan Fox Tucker, Sam Tucker, Ayel Alvez, Mitch Shepherd and A. Walker Spring, who also composes our music. Molly Pettit is our technical director and mixer and our house sound is by D. Neil Blake.
Luke Burbank Additional funding provided by the James F and Marion L Miller Foundation, Live Wire was created by Robin Tenenbaum and Kate Sokoloff. This week we'd like to thank members Mitch and Trent Benley of Portland, Oregon. For more information about our show or how you can listen to our podcast. Head on over to LiveWireRadio.org. I'm Luke Burbank for Elena Passarello and the whole Live Wire crew. Thanks for listening and we will see you next week.
PRX.
