Talkhouse Podcast cover art

Talkhouse Podcast

Talkhouse Podcast

Written by: Talkhouse
Listen for free

About this listen

 Your favorite musicians, filmmakers, and other creative minds one-on-one. No moderator, no script, no typical questions. The Talkhouse Podcast offers unique insights into creative work from all genres and generations. Explore more illuminating shows on the Talkhouse Podcast Network.2025 Talkhouse Art Entertainment & Performing Arts Music
Episodes
  • Florence Shaw (Dry Cleaning) with Sue Tompkins

    Florence Shaw (Dry Cleaning) with Sue Tompkins
    Feb 19 2026
    On this week’s Talkhouse Podcast, we’ve got two women whose singing styles are similar in that they’re both absolutely singular, unmistakable, and wonderfully out of step—just don’t call it spoken-word. It’s Florence Shaw of Dry Cleaning and Sue Tompkins of Life Without Buildings. As you’ll hear in this chat, Dry Cleaning sort of fell together in London around 2017, when the three instrumentalists approached their friend Florence Shaw to add some vocals to the music they had been writing. It turned out that Shaw’s approach—speaking dense, clearly crafted but never obvious words—slotted in perfectly with the sort of nervous-yet-precise songs they had been working on. By 2020, Dry Cleaning had signed with the venerated 4AD label and the next year released a debut album, New Long Leg, that earned comparisons to post-punk greats like Siouxsie and Sonic Youth. For their third studio album, Secret Love, Dry Cleaning worked with producer-slash-musician Cate Le Bon, and they stretched out a bit, mellowing the sharp corners a bit while Shaw experiments more with vocal melody than before. Check out “Cruise Ship Designer” from Secret Love right here. Another person that eagle-eared listeners have compared Florence Shaw to is Sue Tompkins of the legendary, kinda-lost Scottish band Life Without Buildings. Life Without Buildings only released one album, Any Other City, in their brief three-year run, but it had a focused impact. Shaw remembers hearing the record as a teen. “It blew my mind that you could free yourself from the pressure of making traditional sense in lyrics,” she told the website Hearing Things, before mentioning that she’d love to meet Tompkins one day and thank her. Well, with some recent activity on the Life Without Buildings front—Tompkins contributed vocals to a new Sleaford Mods song, and the band just announced a couple of reunion shows—it seemed like the perfect time to get them together. In this delightful chat, Tompkins and Shaw talk about the similar origins of their respective bands, how genuinely kind the dudes of Sleaford Mods are, and their understandable reticence about the term “spoken word.” They also chatted a bunch about the TV shows Dragons’ Den and Eastenders, but we had to trim that in the interest of time. Trust me, it was great. Enjoy. Thanks for listening to the Talkhouse Podcast, and thanks to Sue Tompkins and Florence Shaw for chatting. If you liked what you heard, please follow Talkhouse on your favorite podcasting platform and check out all the great stuff at Talkhouse.com. This episode was produced by Myron Kaplan, and the Talkhouse theme is composed and performed by the Range. See you next time! Find more illuminating podcasts on the ⁠⁠⁠Talkhouse Podcast Network⁠⁠⁠. Visit ⁠⁠⁠talkhouse.com⁠⁠⁠ to read essays, reviews, and more. Follow @talkhouse on ⁠⁠⁠Instagram⁠⁠⁠, ⁠⁠⁠Bluesky⁠⁠⁠, ⁠⁠⁠Twitter (X)⁠⁠⁠, ⁠⁠⁠Threads⁠⁠⁠, and ⁠⁠⁠Facebook⁠⁠⁠.
    Show More Show Less
    56 mins
  • A Very Special Episode: Apologizing to the Fiery Furnaces

    A Very Special Episode: Apologizing to the Fiery Furnaces
    Feb 12 2026
    For this week's episode, we're going to skip the typical Talkhouse format and give you something that I think you're going to love just as much, about a band called The Fiery Furnaces. I bet a lot of you remember, but if you don't, The Fiery Furnaces are siblings, Matthew and Eleanor Friedberger from Oak Park, Illinois, not far from Chicago. Together they put out seven of the scrambliest, catchiest rock albums of the 2000s, and then they kind of disappeared. We got contacted by a longtime radio journalist and producer of the show Snap Judgment, John Fecile, who wanted to talk to Matt and Eleanor. It turns out he had spoken to them over a decade ago, and as he'll explain, there was a very specific reason he wanted to talk to them again. Upcoming live shows for The Fiery Furnaces Find more illuminating podcasts on the ⁠⁠⁠Talkhouse Podcast Network⁠⁠⁠. Visit ⁠⁠⁠talkhouse.com⁠⁠⁠ to read essays, reviews, and more. Follow @talkhouse on ⁠⁠⁠Instagram⁠⁠⁠, ⁠⁠⁠Bluesky⁠⁠⁠, ⁠⁠⁠Twitter (X)⁠⁠⁠, ⁠⁠⁠Threads⁠⁠⁠, and ⁠⁠⁠Facebook⁠⁠⁠.
    Show More Show Less
    45 mins
  • Maynard James Keenan (Tool) with Daniel Ash

    Maynard James Keenan (Tool) with Daniel Ash
    Feb 5 2026
    I might overuse this word a little bit, but on this week’s episode we do have a true pair of legends in conversation on the Talkhouse Podcast this week: Maynard James Keenan and Daniel Ash. Keenan is of course best known as the frontman for Tool, the dark, complex, heavy band he formed way back in 1990—but whose records come few and far between. Keenan is also the frontman for A Perfect Circle, but the reason for today’s chat is yet another band, Puscifer. This one started out almost as a solo outlet for Keenan’s weirdest ideas: There are comedic elements, and—fun fact—Puscifer actually sprung to life as part of a Mr. Show sketch. (Google it, it’s a good story.) But the band has evolved over the years into a steady trio that features Keenan alongside Carina Round and Mat Mitchell, and that more recently has explored Keenan’s most theatrical and straightforward impulses. It’s funny, weird, and heavy, and the brand new Puscifer album, Normal Isn’t, even nods sonically to UK post-punk bands like Killing Joke. Check out “Self Evident” right here. The other half of today’s conversation is Daniel Ash, whose resume also includes a remarkable number of incredible bands, starting with Bauhaus, moving directly into Tones on Tail, and then heading for a long stretch into Love and Rockets, which reunited a couple of years ago for some very welcome shows. Ash’s guitar playing over the years has been quietly influential on a ton of players; you can hear his tone in a remarkable swath of bands. Last year, he released the first album by his latest outfit, Ashes & Diamonds. Called Ashes & Diamonds Are Forever, it’s unmistakably Ash’s voice and tone, though in some flashier dressing on occasion. It’s a lot of fun. Check out “Teenage Robots” right here. In this wide-ranging conversation, Ash and Keenan talk about Keenan’s wine business—he was nice enough to send Ash some bottles in advance of this chat—as well as touring, making videos, and the seemingly inevitable future of AI. Ash thinks it’s going to be good, so even if he’s wrong, it’s nice to hear some optimism. Ash is also obsessed with motorcycles, leading Keenan to suggest an intervention. Enjoy. Thanks for listening to the Talkhouse Podcast, and thanks to Maynard James Keenan and Daniel Ash for chatting. If you liked what you heard, please follow Talkhouse on your favorite podcasting platform and check out all the other great shows in our network. This episode was produced by Myron Kaplan, and the Talkhouse theme is composed and performed by The Range. See you next time! Find more illuminating podcasts on the ⁠⁠⁠Talkhouse Podcast Network⁠⁠⁠. Visit ⁠⁠⁠talkhouse.com⁠⁠⁠ to read essays, reviews, and more. Follow @talkhouse on ⁠⁠⁠Instagram⁠⁠⁠, ⁠⁠⁠Bluesky⁠⁠⁠, ⁠⁠⁠Twitter (X)⁠⁠⁠, ⁠⁠⁠Threads⁠⁠⁠, and ⁠⁠⁠Facebook⁠⁠⁠.
    Show More Show Less
    51 mins
No reviews yet