Pop Conference

The Popular Music Books in Process Series accepts submissions for 2024/2025! Since 2020, the Popular Music Books in Process series has held online events for music writers and scholars to showcase recent books or works in progress for an engaged audience. The series is a collaboration between the Journal of Popular Music Studies, the Pop Conference, and IASPM-US. There have been more than 120 Zoom events so far, almost all preserved on YouTube. We generally run biweekly through the fall and winter-spring seasons. We’re looking forward to another year of presentations by single, paired, or grouped writers. Send us new proposals, for fall of 2024 into spring 2024. If you are publishing a book in that span, or have a work in progress that could benefit from feedback, please let us know. All kinds of formats are welcome, from readings and dialogues to roundtables to pre-recorded “digital lectures” (of roughly 15 minutes), always including a generous Q&A. Some authors have even incorporated live music. We do encourage you to make your event conversational on some level; if you don’t have ideas for interlocutors or co-presenters, we may suggest some. Our YouTube page shows the variety of strategies presenters have used. We may group authors with kindred approaches, too. Whatever the format, our focus remains books, whether early in gestation or after publication. We want to showcase popular music writing of many kinds, keeping our communities connected, and welcoming in new participants. Please feel free to share this call with others you think might be appropriate. For Fall 2024 and beyond, please email to all six organizers (listed below) by August 1: — a proposal of about 300 words describing the book or books that you would like to present, along with your preferred presentation format; — a bio of about 100 words for each participant; — an indication of when would be best for you. Specific months or even a few specific dates are encouraged. Sessions in the fall will take place on Tuesdays at 5:30 pm ET. A time for spring is still to be determined, always Mondays or Tuesdays. View past editions of the series on YouTube: https://lnkd.in/gFrzXxm2... Thank you! Francesca Royster, froyster@depaul.edu, DePaul University Gus Stadler, gstadler@haverford.edu, Haverford College Eric Weisbard, eric.weisbard@gmail.com, University of Alabama Carl Wilson, carlzoilus@gmail.com, Slate, Bookforum, and other venues And a welcome to some new co-organizers: Elena Razlogova, elena.razlogova@gmail.com, Concordia University Alyxandra Vesey, amvesey@ua.edu, University of Alabama

Popular Music Books in Process Series Monday, May 20, 5pm ET Robert Dayton in conversation with Carl Wilson Cold Glitter: The Untold Story of Canadian Glam For more information and to grab the Zoom link visit: https://lnkd.in/gGDu8J95 This conversation will focus on a forgotten yet fascinating chapter on glam rock music and culture from Canada, a universal story of determined creators striving to make their voices heard. Carl Wilson and Robert Dayton will discuss Dayton’s upcoming book Cold Glitter: The Untold Story of Canadian Glam (Feral House, 2024). Dayton has spent years researching and interviewing these ground-breaking musicians trapped by geography, colonial mindsets, and the difficulties of penetrating the cultural behemoth that is the United States. There's no denying that glam rock was marginalized in Canada. Cold Glitter gets at the reasons why: nature vs. artifice, old world values vs. new freedoms, and transgressive actions, including gender play, as well as intense stories from these top acts on how they were run out of town for appearing outrageous. Within the struggle to be fabulous are anecdotes of fun and mayhem. Readers will be taken back to the seventies as they meet the unknown and infamous musicians and artists who dared to be glamorous: magician Doug Henning, Vancouver band Sweeney Todd and their lead singer Nick Gilder, and his replacement, Bryan Adams, to underground heroes like The Dishes, to hundreds of musicians who put away their mascara and left their glamorous wild days behind.

Popular Music Books in Process Series Monday, May 13, 5pm ET John Shaw in conversation with Francesca Royster Trickster Virtuoso: Louis Armstrong, “St. Louis Blues,” and African American Modernism This conversation will focus on the modernist and trickster strategies of Armstrong in his resistance to the Eurocentric condescension of Leonard Bernstein during their one collaboration, a symphonic arrangement of “St. Louis Blues,” a song that had been recorded in arrangements both glorious and degrading, a vehicle for Black virtuosity and blackface backlash. A vision of African American modernism emerges that works to subvert white dominance, a modernism born of solidarity and the continuity of resistance. This Black modernism shines in contrast to the Eurocentric account of modernism, which posits discontinuity, fragmentation, isolation, and despair as central. For more information and to request the Zoom Link visit tinyurl.com/fe8p396s John Shaw Links Draft first chapter to Trickster Virtuoso: Louis Armstrong, “St. Louis Blues,” and African American Modernism https://lnkd.in/gksKMigM Notes on an embedded Spotify playlist, “St. Louis Blues – Moments of Splendor and Glory” https://lnkd.in/gWfD2Aiq Notes on an embedded Spotify playlist, “St. Louis Blues in the Blackface Backlash” https://lnkd.in/gqTMUq_M Bio John Shaw is an elementary classroom teacher for Seattle Public Schools and an active union member. He was a founding member of Chicago’s experimental and non-hierarchical Theater Oobleck, has self-released several albums of original songs and music, has scored several stage plays and an experimental film that has been exhibited internationally, and is the author of This Land That I Love: Irving Berlin, Woody Guthrie, and the Story of Two American Anthems (2013). Francesca T. Royster Book Link: https://lnkd.in/gTiKMqbV Bio Francesca T. Royster is Professor of English at DePaul University in Chicago, and received her PhD in English from University of California, Berkeley. She’s written scholarly work on Shakespeare, Black Lesbian Country music fans, Prince, and Fela Kuti on Broadway, among other topics. Her books include Black Country Music: Listening for Revolutions (2022), which won the 2023 Ralph Gleason Popular Music Book First Prize; Choosing Family: A Memoir of Queer Motherhood and Black Resistance (2023); Sounding Like a No-No: Queer Sounds and Eccentric Acts in the Post-Soul Era (2013), and Becoming Cleopatra: The Shifting Image of an Icon (2003).

The Journal of Popular Music Studies (JPMS) is accepting applications for two co-editors to begin three-year terms on July 1, 2024. JPMS, published on behalf of the United States branch of the International Association for the Study of Popular Music (IASPM-US), is a peer-reviewed journal dedicated to research on popular music throughout the world, approached from a variety of positions. Published four times a year, each issue features essays and reviews, as well as roundtables and creative works inspired by popular music. Editors enjoy substantial flexibility with format, structure, and special issues. We encourage applicants to identify in their applications creative curatorial ideas they might wish to pursue. We would also like to hear from editorial candidates regarding their thoughts about how to further diversify who edits and writes for the journal and what it includes. That means highlighting under-represented groups in particular, but also bringing more extra-academic work into the mix and taking advantage of our flexible and media-rich online platform. For a detailed description of responsibilities, see the images below. The outgoing co-editors, K. E. Goldschmitt and Elliott Powell, have generously agreed to work closely with the new editors to ensure a smooth transition. Candidates interested in the editorial positions are encouraged to submit, via email, a C.V. and a 1 to 2-page letter of interest detailing relevant skills and experience and outlining your vision for the future of the JPMS. Applications may be made individually, on the assumption that a co-editor will be identified by the selection committee; or potential co-editors may make a single, jointly prepared application. Please submit applications with the subject line “JPMS CO-EDITOR SUBMISSION” to IASPM-US president Anthony Kwame Harrison at anharri5@vt.edu by May 24, 2024. Any questions should be directed to him.

Please join us for our next Popular Music Books in Process series celebrating the new volume, Taylor Swift: The Star, The Songs, The Fans, TODAY! Monday, May 6th at 5 p.m. ET. Christa Anne Bentley, Kate Galloway, and Paula Clare Harper with Nate Sloan Taylor Swift: The Star, The Songs, The Fans This conversation previews the forthcoming edited volume Taylor Swift: The Star, The Songs, The Fans–the first book-length academic project on global superstar Taylor Swift. Bringing together an interdisciplinary and international array of scholars, writers, and practitioners, the edited collection positions Swift as a prism through which we can examine intersecting issues in contemporary music industries and media ecosystems–from copyright and pandemic creation to multimedia star texts and digital fan practices (and even professional sports!). The collection’s co-editors will be joined in conversation by Nate Sloan (USC and Switched on Pop), a fellow Swift scholar whose work on the star reaches both academic and popular audiences. For the Zoom link or more information visit https://lnkd.in/gGDu8J95 #TaylorSwift

Popular Music Books in Process Series Monday, April 22, 5pm ET Michael Gallope and Elliott H. Powell The Musician as Philosopher: New York's Vernacular Avant-Garde, 1958–1978 This conversation will be focused on the politics, aesthetics, spirituality, and philosophy of avant-garde musicians in New York during the long 1960s. We will discuss the ways musicians from a variety of traditions and perspectives (rock, jazz, and experimental classical music) thought about the metaphysical powers of music and the questions of social inequity through creative choices in their work. The occasion for the conversation will be the recent publication of Gallope's book, The Musician as Philosopher: New York's Vernacular Avant-Garde (University of Chicago Press, 2024), but the conversation will also extend to Elliott H. Powell's book, The Other Side of Things: Afro-South Asian Collaborations in Black Popular Music (University of Minnesota Press, 2020), a book that was important and influential for Gallope in the completion of his project. For more information and to request the Zoom link visit https://lnkd.in/gJPRsTkq Brought to you by IASPM US, Pop Conference & Journal of Popular Music Studies

Popular Music Books in Process Series   Monday, April 15, 5pm ET   Elijah Wald in conversation with Kimberly Mack  Jelly Roll Blues: Censored Songs and Hidden Histories   A conversation about Jelly Roll Blues, an exploration of the censored and hidden worlds of early blues and jazz inspired by Jelly Roll Morton's oral history at the Library of Congress. The book looks at the ways Black oral culture was preserved and the “silences of history”— all the things that were not preserved or were preserved in distorted forms. It explores the language and culture of the Black "sporting world," the extent to which early blues was directed at a female audience and dealt with issues of sexuality that were not being discussed in any other media. It attempts to recover language, stories, and individuals that earlier histories ignored and suppressed, and to open up new conversations about what is missing from familiar narratives—including the ways that missing material connects the Black oral culture of the early twentieth century with styles and approaches that only reached a mass market with rap and hip-hop.   The discussion will focus on lost narratives, (re)constructed histories, the process of engaging and harnessing such a rich archive, and the complications and messiness of race and authorship. Email Froyster@depaul.edu to be added to the series email list and get Zoom links. Co-organizers: Kimberly Mack, Antonia Randolph, Francesca Royster, Gustavus Stadler, Eric Weisbard and Carl Wilson for Journal of Popular Music Studies, IASPM-US, and the Pop Conference.

Please Share! Popular Music Books in Progress Series proudly presents: Monday, February 12, 5pm ET Ma’Chell Duma and Ben Apatoff Music and Moral Panic: Body Count, the PRMC, and the Road to WAP Ben Apatoff author of Body Count: Body Count for the 33 ⅓ series and Ma’Chell Duma author of the upcoming 33 ⅓ book, Cardi B: Invasion of Privacy, discuss the moral outrage both Ice T and Cardi B stir with their confrontational and provocative work, and the process they each went through writing their books for the acclaimed series. For the Zoom link and more info about the PMBiP series visit https://lnkd.in/gGDu8J95 The Popular Music Books in Progress Series is sponsored by the Journal of Popular Music, IASPM-US, and Pop Conference.

Join us this Monday! And feel free to share :) Popular Music Books in Process Series   Monday, February 5, 5pm ET   Corey J Miles and Kemi Adeyemi   Getting the Vibe to Feel Right      This conversation will bring black queer women from Chicago and black trap rappers from the U.S. South into contact to carve out a space to hear and feel the emotive possibilities created through sound and dance. We shift the conversation about rights away from simply the juridical and legislative status of blackness, to look and listen instead to the creative actions that take place in recording studios and on the dance floor to understand the practice of feeling as a terrain through which belonging to a city or region is negotiated. Kemi Adeyemi's Feels Right (Duke University Press) and Corey Miles's Vibe (University Press of Mississippi) do a similar dance but to different songs. Together they offer a story about how bodies and voices that have been positioned as nonnormative and/or out of place, have used sound and dance to forge intimate relationships with space and live beyond place altogether. For more information and the Zoom link, visit https://lnkd.in/gGDu8J95 Presented by Pop Conference, the Journal of Popular Music Studies, and IASPM-US

Popular Music Books in Process Series Monday, January 22nd, 5pm ET Nate Patrin and Michaelangelo Matos The Needle and the Lens: Pop Goes to the Movies from Rock ’n’ Roll to Synthwave Tracking the link between film and song through the past fifty years, Nate Patrin reveals the power of music used in movies to move the needle in popular culture. As he surveys the scene—musical and cinematic—across the decades, expanding into the deeper origins, wider connections, and echoed histories that come into play, The Needle and the Lens (University of Minnesota Press, mid-November 2023) offers a new way of seeing, and hearing, these iconic soundtrack moments. For information and the Zoom link visit https://lnkd.in/ge-dTi4J Participants and Links: Nate Patrin Various reviews for The Shfl: https://lnkd.in/g794-a4b... UMP website for the book: https://lnkd.in/gedkubyX Bio: Nate Patrin is a longtime music critic whose writing has appeared in dozens of publications, including Pitchfork, Stereogum, Spin, Bandcamp Daily, Red Bull Music Academy, and his hometown Twin Cities’ late alt-weekly City Pages. His first book, Bring That Beat Back: How Sampling Built Hip-Hop (Minnesota, 2020), was named a Best Music Book of 2020 by Kirkus and Rolling Stone. Michaelangelo Matos Beat Connection newsletter: https://lnkd.in/gBxdqUTm Bio: Michaelangelo Matos is the author of Sign ‘O’ the Times (Bloomsbury/33 1/3, 2004), The Underground Is Massive (Dey Street, 2015), and Can’t Slow Down (Hachette, 2020). He is at work on a history of Lou Adler’s, and L.A. rock’s, sixties and seventies for Hachette.