PODCAST · society
The Lydian Spin
by Lydia Lunch
A series of lively, deep and often hilarious interviews conducted by Lydia Lunch, one of the most vocal spoken word artists of this or any century and Tim Dahl, musician and general know it all.
Episodes
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Episode 360: Tim Stegall Returns to Discuss His New Book Anarchy in the Studio: Punk Music 1970-1979
The veteran punk journalist and resident Austin chronicler Tim Stegall returns with a new book in tow. Anarchy in the Studio: Punk Music 1970-1979 (Ruffian Books) is a, five-hundred-page love letter to the genre's formative decade, told twelve inches at a time. Tim, who has been documenting punk...
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Episode 359 Karen Fiorito
Karen Fiorito returns to The Lydian Spin. On this episode, Lydia and Tim talk with her about The Urgency of Now: ¡No Pasarán!, a new multi-disciplinary political art exhibition and "Get Out The Vote" activation. Curated by Karen, Dale Youngman, and Isa Gordon, the project is a direct response to...
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Episode 358 Filmmaker Todd Stephens & Actor Birkett "Kett" Turton
Filmmaker Todd Stephens is best known for his semi-autobiographical "Ohio Trilogy" — Edge of Seventeen (1998), Gypsy 83 (2001) and Swan Song (2021) — all set in his home town of Sandusky. Gypsy 83, his directorial debut, follows two small-town goth outsiders who leave Ohio for New York, chasing...
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Episode 357 Jeffrey Henson Scales
Photo: Sabrina Santiago Early in his career, photographer and current New York Times photo editor Jeffrey Henson Scales documented the Black Panther Party in the late 1960s. These photographs were compiled in his 2022 monograph In a Time of Panthers: Early Photographs. During the 1970s, he worked...
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Episode 356:In the Red Records Head Larry Hardy
In 1991, Larry Hardy founded the enduring Los Angeles-based label In the Red Records. Guided by Larry's personal taste for raw, "atonal garage music" and sonic extremes, the small operation has cultivated a catalog of over 300 titles, championing underground acts like Ty Segall, the Black Lips…
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Episode 355: Lydia & Tim Summer Break / Tour Update
It's been a busy summer for Lydia and Tim. Stay tuned for more guests joining in the coming weeks, but for now, we're catching you up on everything in this brand-new "minisode"—recorded all the way from Lydia's bed in Brooklyn and from Tim's tour in Japan.
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Episode 354 Black Cab's Andrew Coates
During their June 2026 tour across New Zealand and Australia, Lydia turns the mic on her touring partner, Andrew Coates of Melbourne's Black Cab. Together, the duo brought a , live reimagining of Suicide and Alan Vega to stops in Wellington, Melbourne, Brisbane, Sydney, Adelaide, and Perth. The…
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Episode 353 Guitarist Reg Bloor
Reg Bloor is a guitarist, instrument builder, and founder of the Systems Neutralizers record label. For 18-years she collaborated with composer Glenn Branca, serving as a guitarist, concertmaster, and manager on international tours and multiple albums. On June 12, 2026, she will conduct Branca's...
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Episode 352 Beirut Slump's Bobby Swope AKA Bobby Berkowitz
Robert "Bobby" Swope belonged to a talented cadre of avant-garde visionaries—among them Arto Lindsay, Connie Burg, Mark Cunningham, and Gordon Stevenson—who first crossed paths as students at Florida's Eckerd College in the mid-1970s. This collective moved to New York City in 1977, where they...
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Episode 351 Short Tour Special
Lydia and Tim are on a whirlwind tour right now, hitting stages in Brazil, Australia, Japan, and Europe! The heavy travel and intense performance schedule have made pinning them down for an interview tough, but this week we've got the scoop on exactly where you can see them live. If they are…
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Episode 350 Writer Zoe Hansen
In this episode returning to The Lydian Spin is writer and artist Zoe Hansen. Zoe is a writer, video artist, and longtime friend of the podcast. On this episode she is here to celebrate a big milestone. Her brand new memoir, Going Down in Gotham, is officially out from Far West Press. It is an...
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Episode 349 Genre Is Death
Genre Is Death, a limitation-destroying noise band formed by Ty Varesi (guitar, vox) and Tayler Lee (bass, vox), release their debut album, Attractive People out May 1 2026 on In The Red Records. Their sound is abrasive yet melodic, using heavy distortion, dissonant riffs, and reverberating…
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Episode 348 Lorin Benedict
Lorin Benedict is a California-based improvising vocalist (scat singer, essentially), who operates in the fields of jazz and jazz-adjacent music. In addition, he works as a theoretical and computational applied physicist where his focus is on understanding the properties of materials in extreme...
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Episode 347 Al Johnson
As the frontman for U.S. Maple, Al Johnson utilized his voice as a textural and percussive instrument rather than a melodic vehicle. His delivery consisted of rasps, sharply drawn breaths, and fragmented phrasing. Al operated with rigid adherence to a self-devised notation system, scripting every...
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Episode 346 Larry Mullins Pt2
Part 2 of Larry Mullin's sit down with Lydia and Tim.
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Episode 345 Musician Larry Mullins Part 1
Larry Mullins, also known as Toby Dammit, is a musician, record producer, and composer who plays drums, percussion, and keyboards. He performs as a member of the bands Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds and Swans, and previously played with Iggy Pop and The Stooges. He has also worked on scores for film...
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Episode 344: Musician and Author Ian Svenonius
Ian Svenonius is a musician and author who began his career in the 1980s Washington D.C. punk scene. He has been the lead vocalist for several bands, including The Nation of Ulysses, The Make-Up, and Chain and The Gang, and later released music under the electronic solo project Escape-ism. In...
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Episode 343 Swans Guitarist Norman Westberg
Norman Westberg is a guitarist known for anchoring the monolithic avant-rock of Swans. Away from the band's trademark volume, however, his solo work—like the Lawrence English-produced After Vacation—abandons traditional riffs for meditative, ambient drone. By manipulating sustained tones through...
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Episode 342 UK Artist Nuha Ruby Ra
Nuha Ruby Ra is a London-based artist working across music, performance, and visual art. Blending industrial sound, art-pop, and spoken word, her work explores power, instinct, and transformation through raw, physical live performance. Following two critically acclaimed EPs, she is currently...
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Episode 341 Gary Wilson
In 1977, Gary Wilson finished recording You Think You Really Know Me in his parents' basement and released it himself. Through the 1980s, his work in experimental music that draws across styles including new wave, rock, funk, jazz, lounge, and avant-garde. developed a following. After a 1981…
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Episode 340 Percussionist Blake Fleming
Blake Fleming is a percussionist, author, and educator known for his work with experimental bands and for writing The Book of Rhythm, an encyclopedia of over 5,000 organized rhythms for all instruments. The book has been sold in more than 20 countries and was a top 5 instruction title in the 2020...
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Episode 339 Musician Stephen Mattos
Rhode Islander, Stephen Mattos is a musician and librarian. He's been performing since the late 2000s under the name Chrome Jackson, and his latest band is , THERE. Outside of music, he spends his time cycling, working on photography, and cooking and gardening with his wife, artist Alicia...
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Episode 338 Sonny Vincent
Sonny Vincent fronted Testors in the mid-1970s New York punk scene, playing CBGB and Max's Kansas City before the band split in 1981. He later formed Sonny Vincent and the Extreme and Model Prisoners, and went on to record and tour with Maureen "Mo" Tucker and Sterling Morrison from the Velvet...
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Episode 337 Scott Bomar
Scott Bomar is a Memphis lifer who moves easily between the grit of garage-surf (Impala) and the deep-pocket groove of classic soul (the Bo-Keys), with credits alongside Stax/Hi orbit players and on Al Green's comeback-era sessions. As a producer/engineer and film soundtrack composer, he…
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Episode 336 Kavus Torabi
Kavus Torabi is a British musician, composer, broadcaster, and DJ known for a "bent path" songwriting style. He's worked with Knifeworld, Gong, Guapo, and Cardiacs, and now focuses on structure-driven songs, home recording, and steering clear of cliché while bringing the music in his head to life.
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Episode 335 Writer Mishka Shubaly
Mishka Shubaly is a nonfiction writer and storyteller known for essays on addiction, recovery, endurance, and reinvention. After earning an MFA in fiction from Columbia University, he toured as a musician before returning to writing. His seven Amazon Kindle Singles all became bestselling titles,...
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Episode 334 Byron Coley
This week's episode features a conversation with critic, Byron Coley, whose work has covered experimental music and independent culture. Byron discusses Now Jazz Now, the newly published, fully illustrated 270-page softcover book edited by Eva Prinz, with a preface by Neneh Cherry and an…
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Episode 333 Ben Roy
Stand-up comedian Ben Roy is also an actor, writer, podcaster, and musician. He began his career in Denver, developing his stand-up at Comedy Works, and has since appeared at festivals including Just for Laughs, the New York Comedy Festival, and South by Southwest. His television credits include...
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Episode 332 Harley Flanagan
Photo Maurice Nunez Harley Flanagan began performing in the city's punk scene at age 11 as the drummer for the Stimulators. In the early 1980s he founded the Cro-Mags, a band widely cited for its influence on later hardcore, punk, and metal groups. His memoir, Hard Core: Life of My Own, frames…
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Episode 331 Martin Atkins
Martin Atkins's three decades in the music industry in nearly every aspect of record production, gives him a rare perspective on the music business past, present, and future. After early success as a drummer with Public Image Ltd. and later work with acts like Killing Joke, Ministry, and Nine…
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Episode 330 Filmmaker Jasmine Hirst
Longtime friend and collaborator of Lydia and friend of The Lydian Spin, Jasmine returns to the show. She is a filmmaker and artist who wrote letters to Aileen Wuornos and later conducted a filmed interview with her on death row in 1997. Jasmine's footage appears in the new Netflix documentary...
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Episode 329 Excepter members John Ryan and Lala Ryan
Excepter is an experimental music collective formed in Brooklyn in 2002. John Fell Ryan (sometimes called "Jeff") founded Excepter and has remained a central member, providing vocals, synths, and electronic instrumentation. Lala Harrison Ryan has been involved in the group since at least 2006,...
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Episode 328 Producer and Musician Paul Roessler
Paul Roessler is a musician and record producer based in Los Angeles. Active since 1978, he was part of the early L.A. punk scene and played keyboards with band including The Screamers, Twisted Roots, 45 Grave, Nervous Gender. His work includes solo albums such as Abominable, Curator, and The…
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Episode 327 Culture Critic Carlo McCormick
Carlo McCormick is a pop culture critic and curator living in New York. He is the author of numerous books on contemporary art and artists and has lectured and taught extensively at universities around the United States. His writing has appeared in Aperture, Art in America, Art News, Artforum…
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Episode 326 Musician & Author Chris Connelly
Chris Connelly is a Scottish-born musician and writer whose career spans from the industrial and post-punk scenes of the 1980s to a wide range of solo and collaborative projects. Beginning with Rigor Mortis (later Fini Tribe) and continuing through Revolting Cocks, Ministry, and Pigface, Chris's...
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Episode 325 Author Gary Lippman
Gary Lippman is a writer, artist, and attorney. He has worked with New York's Innocence Project and is the author of the acclaimed new book I Wish Therefore I Am. His play Paradox Lust ran off-off-Broadway in 2001, and his writing has appeared in The New York Times, The Paris Review, and VICE....
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Episode 324 Dave Naz
🎙️ Support The Lydian Spin 🎙️ Dave Naz played in various LA punk bands including Chemical People, Down by Law, and The Last touring the USA and Europe from 1985 til1997, until an exhibition featuring Larry Clark, Nan Goldin and Diane Arbus, inspired him to pick up a camera. As a photographer…
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Episode 323 Shane Embury
🎙️ Support The Lydian Spin 🎙️ (https://www.paypal.com/paypalme/tsd1975) Shane Embury is longtime bassist for the grindcore/death metal band Napalm Death, which he joined in 1987 and has remained with ever since. In addition to Napalm Death, he has been involved in numerous side projects and…
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Episode 322 Harlow Crandall
🎙️ Support The Lydian Spin 🎙️ (https://www.paypal.com/paypalme/tsd1975) Inspired by a lifelong obsession with poetry and prose, Harlow Crandall channels his obsession with literature and rock music into the release of his new album, Better a New Demon, recorded with the support of Peter...
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Episode 321 Banshee Drummer Budgie
Budgie (born Peter Edward Clarke) is an English drummer recognized for his work with Siouxsie and the Banshees (1979–1996) and the percussion-driven project The Creatures (1981–2004). He lost his mother at age 12, and that early loss becomes a central theme in The Absence: Memoirs of a Banshee...
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Episode 320 Composer and Musician Paul Cantelon
Paul Cantelon grew up with music in his blood—his mother played trumpet in the Philadelphia Symphony, his father was a preacher. A prodigy on violin, he debuted at UCLA's Royce Hall at 13, then studied piano across Geneva, Juilliard, and Paris. At 17, a bike accident left him in a coma and wiped...
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Episode 319 Yowie Drummer Shawn O'Connor
Shawn "The Defenestrator" O'Connor is a founding member and drummer of the St. Louis band Yowie. Outside of music, he works as a clinical psychologist. Shawn is also something of a luddite, aiming to be the last adult in America without a cell phone.
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Episode 318 Pamela Des Barres
Pamela Des Barres, born in California, emerged from the 1960s Los Angeles rock scene as both participant and witness. Introduced to Captain Beefheart in high school, she soon immersed herself in the vast Los Angeles demimonde, befriending and dating musicians from The Byrds to Led Zeppelin. With...
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Episode 317 Comedian Eddie Pepitone
Comedian Eddie Pepitone, dubbed "The Bitter Buddha," blends caustic humor with existential musings, delivering performances that ricochet between volcanic rants and self-effacing confessionals. A veteran of New York's improv scene and a familiar face on television—from It's Always Sunny in...
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Episode 316 Poet Shannon Sky
Shannon Sky is a poet, author, photographer, publisher, and activist born in Chicago. She received her MFA in Creative Writing from the Jack Kerouac School of Disembodied Poetics at Naropa University. Shannon is an off the radar, gender queer, underground poet. She previously worked in electoral...
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Episode 315 Star Route Farm's Tianna Kennedy
Tianna Kennedy is co-owner and operator of Star Route Farm. She has lived in Tucson, the Bay Area, Nottingham, and Brooklyn. For over a decade, she has been farming in the Catskills, which now serves as her home base. Tianna is also part of the crew of Apollonia, a 64-foot steel-hulled schooner...
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Episode 314 Producer, Composer & Musician Dougie Bowne
Dougie Bowne is a producer, drummer, guitarist, and composer who entered New York's avant-garde scene in his early twenties after a chance street encounter with a member of John Cale's circle, who invited him to jam simply because he was carrying a bag of drum sticks and "looked cool". Unfamiliar...
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Episode 313 Tuba Player, Composer & Improviser Dan Peck
Dan Peck is a tuba player, improviser, and composer. He performs with ensembles such as ICE (not that ICE) Wet Ink, and has appeared with the New York Philharmonic, Metropolitan Opera, and NYC Ballet. He has toured internationally with his doom jazz trio The Gate and collaborated with artists…
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Episode 312 Artist Philip Zimmerma
San Francisco-based artist Philip Zimmerman has exhibited in San Francisco, Portland, and New York City over the past thirty years. Known for his sculptural work, Philip's pieces explore themes of death, beauty, and symbolism through intricate assemblage. His craftsmanship has been compared to…
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Episode 311 Musician & Artist Kilynn Lunsford
Lydia and Tim are on tour, which means no intro this week. Here is a message from Lydia on the eve of Independence Day: "There has never been a better time for a People's Revolution than this July 4th, when the fireworks you'll be watching will mirror the explosion in our heads after Diaper…
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Frequently Asked Questions
How many episodes does The Lydian Spin have?
The Lydian Spin currently has 100 episodes available on PodParley. New episodes are automatically indexed when they're published to the podcast feed.
What is The Lydian Spin about?
A series of lively, deep and often hilarious interviews conducted by Lydia Lunch, one of the most vocal spoken word artists of this or any century and Tim Dahl, musician and general know it all.
How often does The Lydian Spin release new episodes?
The Lydian Spin has 100 episodes. Check the episode list to see recent publication dates and frequency.
Where can I listen to The Lydian Spin?
You can listen to The Lydian Spin on PodParley by clicking any episode. We provide an embedded audio player for direct listening, and you can also subscribe via your preferred podcast app using the RSS feed.
Who hosts The Lydian Spin?
The Lydian Spin is created and hosted by Lydia Lunch.
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