Photo by Mary Grosswendt

COPY turns five years old this year! We’re kicking off our birthday celebrations with a concert on October 8th at Trans-Pecos in Brooklyn, and we invited some of our favorite NYC bands to be a part of it. I first saw partygirl last summer, and they truly live up to their name. Dramatic, theatrical, and so, so fun. I got to chat with them ahead of the show about the art they’ve loved lately.

Tickets here :)

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Pagona (vox):

The Gothic
It all started when I read Moby Dick and, as a self-identifying Ahab type, it changed my life. I became obsessed with how the Gothic, in the US tradition, portrayed the rotten, the grotesque, the violent in American life. My recent Gothic works of interest are decidedly Southern: I quickly read Flannery O’Connor’s Wise Blood, which fascinated and moved me, the points at which faith and crisis can drive terror (Hazel Motes is an Ahab if I ever saw one). I just, literally moments before writing this, finished the complete collection of Flannery O’Connor’s short stories, where some (such as my favorite, “The River”) made me scream out loud. Similarly, on a drive across rural Pennsylvania (west to east, from Ohio), I realized another one of my favorite writers, Patterson Hood of Drive-By Truckers, specifically just Patterson Hood’s songs on 2003’s Decoration Day, is more Southern Gothic literature. Hood combines unrelentingly honest and rich storytelling in this tradition with some of the best guitar tones I’ve ever heard. Hood’s “My Sweet Annette” is a genuinely perfect composition, but his song “Sinkhole” is plainly perfect for me.

Jenna (saxophone):

Charles Mingus
As I’ve been going through the shift of closing out my college years and starting the rest of my life, I have found myself turning to an old hero of mine. The first job I had in New York was working for The Charles Mingus Estate for almost three years. While I was searching for a new job, I was reflecting on my time as a measly intern who spent all day memorizing his records. Beyond Mingus being one of the greatest bassists, composers, and artists of all time, I have been resonating with a different part of him lately. He was known for his passion, intensity, anger, and odd personality, and I am starting to understand how being misunderstood led him to be at the apex of creativity!

My robe
Everyday after a scorching hot shower paired with a crisp Miller High Life, I put on my robe. It’s gorgeous. It is huge, plush, and has pockets; it’s from Brooklinen. I got it for Christmas last year from my mother. It reminds me of a big hug from her!

Andrew (bass):

1066bergen
My wife has a microgallery outside our apartment building (@1066bergen) to display work by local artists. Most recently, she collaborated with @sendoneletter to hang a bunch of postcards from a tree by the gallery. The postcards are prestamped and free for anyone to take and mail to a friend or loved one.

Fran (guitar):

9 to 5
In honor of Dolly’s passing, I rewatched 9 to 5 with a dear friend of mine. Rewatching it felt like a fever dream, as I completely forgot about some bonkers animated sequences, but it also provided me with some endearing whimsy and evidence of the sometimes crazy and indescribable loyalty of female friendship.