Social Distancing With Laura Jane Grace: Acid, Weed, Poetry and Epic Baths
As the world fights a pandemic, we reached out to some of our favorite artists with a few questions about these unprecedented times. Here’s what of Against Me! had to say email about her current quarantine.
What are you doing with your unexpected time at home?
For the past 20 days — since we got home from the tour we had to cancel — I have been completely isolated and alone here in Chicago, dropping acid, smoking grass, and watching TV news. I’ve run a couple of miles every morning (don’t worry, not anywhere that I’m close by people) and then spent at least three hours a day in my bathtub with a humidifier with eucalyptus oil in it going.
Other than that, I’ve been working on songs and music, bullshitting on Twitter, writing in my journal, reading and cleaning the fuck out of my apartment and drinking copious amounts of water (this has been great for my skin) and eating lots of chewable vitamin C tablets.
What music do you turn to in times of crisis for solace and comfort, and why?
The Waxahatchee record Saint Cloud] that just came out is fantastic. We may as well just all agree right now that’s the best album of the year. We’re done.
Otherwise, I’ve only been listening to lots of Archers of Loaf/Crooked Fingers and Marc Almond… Lots of Marc Almond and Soft Cell. I had This Last Night In Sodom on repeat for at least four days straight. It’s nothing specific about the music that’s bringing me solace and comfort (other than it’s all really great songs and production and I like it, etc) it’s the obsessive behavior that is bringing me solace. The act of obsessing over music right now is bringing me comfort.
What about books or films?
I wish that I could send a copy of May Sarton’s Journal of a Solitude to everyone right now. I bought it secondhand in Maine a couple of weeks ago, down the street from the venue we were playing before we had to cancel the run.
It’s a year-long journal about solitude. Just a study on solitude and it is brilliant and stark and heartbreaking in ways but beautiful, too, and it’s completely relevant to everyone right now. I also started reading Last Days Of Pompeii but then I had a panic attack so I put that one down for a while…
Anything else you want to say to your fans right now?
“To keep on living I could recall the time/When, if only over the telephones/We became lights and went seeking/One another, and were answered by other lights/And invisible people speaking.” – Haniel Long
