Interviews Around The House
A little memoir of my recent trip up to Michigan to visit Josh Malerman
I’m about to drop a series of three episodes, collectively titled Interviews Around The House. This series is drawn from recordings I made, and other stuff shared with me, during a recent trip to Michigan to visit Josh Malerman.
A little about the trip:
Friday
I made the five hour drive up to Michigan on Friday afternoon. The first night, we kicked off the visit by recording a bit of conversation in Josh’s kitchen while listening to live records of The Doors. We talked about his documentary and some other things. Friday night, we played pool with some of Josh’s friends. It’s the first time I’ve played pool in well over a decade, but I am pretty proud of my performance.
Saturday
It was action-packed! Josh’s band The High Strung had a rehearsal for an upcoming gig, so I got to hang out while they went through their set. It was the first time I really had a chance to see a legit band rehearse, so it was cool. Then, back to the Malerman house for some podcast recording. We got comfy out on Josh’s deck, and spent a couple hours talking about INCIDENTS AROUND THE HOUSE, Josh’s nonfiction book he wrote, Daniel Kraus, and more. Then, it was time for some pizza. Josh was generous enough to play for me the latest edit of the documentary that he made about the process of writing a book (You’re going to love it!) Later in the day, with the help of our friends Jack Daniels and Blanton’s, we did some more recording, and got very passionate about the importance of archiving the creative process, and pitched a terrible idea for Josh’s 41st novel to Ryan, Josh’s agent. We rounded off the evening with a screening of Josh’s movie Jizzly Bear, which is quite the adventure, I must say.
Sunday
The morning saw me and Josh slowly convincing ourselves that we were well enough to get out of the house. I packed up my stuff, and followed Josh to a freakin race track! Josh and his performance troupe Wow Town had scheduled a rehearsal of their performance of Incidents Around the House, and one of the folks in the group has a little spot in this racing concourse that they were using for rehearsal space. I recorded the entire rehearsal, and will be posting bits of it in the Interviews episodes.
Note: The race track was in use during rehearsal, so there will be moments in the recording where you hear loud engines. It’s cool, but would be quite confusing if you didn’t know about the setting.
After the rehearsal, I made the five hour drive home. When I got home, I fell on the bed and didn’t move for a long time.
The Aww
I’ve always considered Josh a friend, and this recent weekend has solidified that. He was fun, intelligent, brilliant, and welcoming. Finally meeting Allison was exciting! I got to see her nearly-completed painting that she recently debuted at an art show. It’s incredible, and she’s a very talented artist.
Eternal thanks to Josh and Allison for their generosity, letting me stay at their house for the weekend. Eat their food, drink their booze. Love to Jim, Chad, Mark, Derek, the folks of Wow Town, and all the other folks from the Shark Club. You all made me feel welcome and gave me a wonderful weekend.
Let’s do it again soon.