Related Recs

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Sending articles and short stories to friends all the time

Whenever I read a great article I love sending it around to the pals and making it “go viral” within my circle of friends. It’s basically like book club but short form so everybody actually reads …. And then you have something to talk about when you all hang out in real life! A few years ago we became obsessed with a New Yorker article by Gary shteyngart about his botched circumcision and we still talk about it to this day.. powerful stuff . Today my friend sent me the NYT story of the guy who lived rent-free in the New Yorker hotel for 5 years. We will have much to discuss when I see her next!!

@mysocalledwife

Mar 25, 2024

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Alissa Bennett’s Zines

I don’t personally know Alissa Bennett, but I think she is a brilliant and funny person who has clearly lived a vibrant life. A friend of mine once said about himself, “I’m not a journalist; I just live this shit.” I think this mantra (with the tweak, “I’m just really interested in this shit”) applies to Bennett’s writing and various projects — from her burner IG @regret_counter and podcast, to the next-level zines she publishes. Those zines though, wow! The writing is so intimate, confident, and, well, perfectly imperfect (sorry, sorry…).I like that every other paragraph has a typo, that she will frequently and flagrantly use cap-locks, and that she essentially unpacks the indiscretions of fringe tabloid figures in order to exhume her own demons and make sense of her past and present. It’s got a very “warts and all” vibe, and I respect that she’s willing to air her own dirty laundry in service of establishing a spiritual connection to the subjects of her texts. That’s not to say she goes easy on them, but it all feels empathetic instead of exploitative or solipsistic. Rarely do I audibly laugh while reading, but Bennett’s work consistently makes me LOL. Generally, I prefer when people write the way they talk. Her essays feel like the coolest girl at the bar is whispering (and occasionally shouting) a very good story directly in your ear, but she also doesn’t really care whether you like the story or not. She already knows it’s good.Start with “Bad Behavior,” which is a series of essays/love letters to various semi-public figures who engaged in specific, scandalous acts. Then hit “Pretend You’re Actually Alive.” Most of the zines are sold out, but I’m sure she’d send you a PDF if you ask nicely. There’s also a new one on the way.

@zach-sokol

Sep 8, 2022

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Alissa Bennett

Alissa is my favorite writer. Whether it’s her cult favorite Dead is Better zines (on every bookshelf with integrity) or her seminal piece I’m a Clubber, Alissa has long been heightening the lows of pop culture history so that we don’t have to. She’s also my best friend and together we host The C Word, a podcast about women who have been called crazy for which she does a, well, crazy amount of research. It’s also crazy that I regularly get to sit in bed with my favorite writer while she does her lengthy skin care routine and we watch the best moments of Dateline and scream at the ceiling. I hope we die together in a piece of real estate worthy of us.

@lena-dunham

Jan 3, 2023

Top Recs from @jayson

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Not caring about tik tok ending

I'm often accused of being an "old soul", a categorization I vehemently dislike because it pretends as if my taste is because of nostalgia, as opposed to what is actually cool and compelling. (If something cool comes out now, I enjoy it, but we're in a down period when it comes to culture). But, something old about me, is that I do not care at all about TikTok ending, if does happen. If Elon takes it over from the Chinese, you might as well leave anyway, but I'm just worried at why this is a huge deal for people. It's just an app. Another one will be made. TikTok is not culture, it directly flattens culture into these ten second clips that take music, movies --- things that you need to process --- into something that is now consumed by everyone at a rapid pace, not allowing for the nuances, the style, the aesthetics to sit with us. I have never watched something on TikTok and thought that this is something in that pushing American culture to deeper heights. I am sorry. Now I am sure they're good stuff on the app, but it's not really a necessity. Whenever I hear the words "it's blowing up on TikTok", my mind immediately growls. I understood why X becoming overrun with Elon bots and right wingers is a big deal; X actually created things, made careers, made American life, and American events available to be seen by everyone. However, TikTok is a corrupt fantasy, chopping at the wires that make physical connection important. Read a book! Go to the movies! Go to the restaurant of a cuisine that is unheralded, go to a baseball game. Who cares about TikTok?

@jayson

STAFF

Jan 14, 2025

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The King of comedy (1983) directed by martin scorsese

There's something quite startling about Martin Scorsese's 1980's period compared to the rest of his decades as one of America's greatest filmmakers. In the 80's, he was weird, strange, and making weirdly manic films that feel more New York than even some of his movies about the mob. They're movies about characters who aren't glamarous people that they want to be, but rather, are losers who can't seem to correctly fucntion in normal society. They're non-violent sociopaths. I saw The King of Comedy at Metrograph recently, and it's exhilarating, hilarious, manic, and scary. With Jerry Lewis, Bobby De Niro and Sandra Bernhard, Scorsese was able to create a world where incels who are bad at comedy are wishing for fame. Sound familiar? This is a great movie. In 1983, it was a box office flop. But in 2025, it is magical in how it's telling the future. A future of scam artists who don't want to work to get there, and don't want to sit in their mediocrity: they want to steal to get their fifteen seconds. Go watch this masterpiece.

@jayson

STAFF

Jan 28, 2025

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carol (2015, directed by todd haynes)

It's a perfect movie. It's almost too perfect. The fashion, the look on Cate's face when Theresa (Rooney Mara) is walking to her at the end, the line reading of "ask me things, please"; the fact that men are the joke throughout the movie. It makes me wonder about representation and the limits of it because of how womanly and queer this movie is, despite the fact that it never feels like a movie made for women. It's just a great movie.

@jayson

STAFF

Feb 13, 2025