After telling Julie Bindel I would use her piece about her love of some Snoop Dog music, for my class assignment I asked if she would also like a theme song for her podcast. She seemed surprised and delighted. I wrote something quickly about the great journalism she does then reached out to X, a student from years ago with a magical voice. I know a lot of singers but I wanted to ask X first because long ago when I recorded her outside of school, it came up that there was some horrible chapters in her relationship with her father. The man beat her up and if I recall correctly he did this to her mother as well, but not the younger sisters. Anyway, when she got back to me she declined. She did not know who was Julie Bindel but did not like what came up after a quick Google search.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I think she said something like feminism repels her. I don’t know how this happens. I grew up with an understanding of feminism as simply respecting women’s rights, full stop. But I have noticed people younger than me, women and men, sometimes have negative connotations about what feminism is. I wrote her back pointing out Bindel’s work championing women’s rights and squashing abusive men. X replied she would take a second look. A couple days later she said she would do it. I was so pleased about that. The lyrics I wrote summarized my sense of her stories<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Julie, tells it truly,<\/p>\n\n\n\n
doesn’t take a fist,<\/p>\n\n\n\n
doesn’t take a kiss,<\/p>\n\n\n\n
to make a little fix – takes a journalist.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
X liked it and we coordinated a recording one week ago. First the piano was recorded, an old upright downstairs at the Tranzac club here in Toronto. Then a drum pattern that might be hip hop-esque considering Julie\u2019s Snoop love and then X\u2019s vocals which we added background counterpoint with too. All that was left was sending it to Julie Bindel and wait for the rejection. I wrote a theme song for Alan Park when he had a podcast called Conspiracy Theories. I thought it was hilarious plus Alan was a brilliant comedian. For sure he will get my joke. I had another comedian, who imitates Bjork, sing the song as if she was Bjork. A great play on conspiracy I thought. Alan hated it. Instead he used dumb metal music. The only thing better than handling rejection gracefully is getting accepted and praised. So much easier. So when Julie wrote me back and said she loved it, I was over the moon. Very satisfying.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"