Rubin Recommends

(Part of The Weekly Check In series)

I’ve never met Jessica Hopper in person (a lot of friend of a friend) but if you were into music in the scene I was, her name or her zine Hit It Or Quit It was often around.

Jessica Hopper is an author/journalist and just released her new book The Girls’ Guide to Rocking, which she’s now on tour doing readings from currently. She regularly writes for The Chicago Reader, Chicago Tribune and LA Weekly and also does music supervision for one of my favorite shows, This American Life. I’m so glad we’re in touch now.

You can find out more by reading her blog at http://tiny.abstractdynamics.org and keeping up with her on Twitter.

Rubin: What are you currently working on or just finished that you’re excited about?

Hopper: I just finished sleeping for nine hours straight and I am totally excited by that. I have been on tour for the last week and haven’t slept more than four hours a night due to six a.m. flights. I didn’t have to work at it though. Other than my book and subsequent tour, I am excited about this long piece I just wrote for Chicago Reader about David Bazan and following him around the Christian music festival, Cornerstone, which he just played, despite now being agnostic. He and his record, the new one about to come out, are just brilliance. We are lucky we have music is so smart.

Rubin: Where have you traveled so far this month?

Hopper: I have been to Portland, Seattle, LA and Minneapolis in the last four days. I got too much sun in CA and subsequently, as my friend Jenna put it, look like I went to Burning Man. I am a delicate shade of watermelon.

Rubin: What’s your favorite music right now?

Hopper: Main two things I have been sticking to this week are specific songs. Every time I put on my lil earbuds, the plane communicators say it’s time to stow for landing. I have had the title track from Joni Mitchells Hissing of Summer Lawns stuck–like LODGED–in my head for a few days. It’s my favorite record, so that’s not really a surprise. But there are two lines from that record: “He bought her a room full of Chippendale/ that nobody sits in” and “I was a hopeful in rooms like this/when I was working cheap” that I keep hearing the melody lines and it’s kind of like an itch. I also like the Maxwell single from the new album a lot. I feel like I could get pregnant just hearing it.

Rubin: Best food you’ve had in your neighborhood lately or while you were traveling?

Hopper: Poe Que No in Portland, though I didn’t get to enjoy it too much because I discovered I was allergic to the horchata I had with my fish tacos in pretty short order. I was depressed to be barfing the best meal I had had all summer. When I am at home in Chicago, I pretty much only eat at Lula if I am going to eat outside of my home.

Rubin: Anything else you want to mention?

Hopper: Sean Nelson’s 33 1/3rd book about Joni Mitchell is worth full retail price.