Jason Baldinger – We're All Gonna Die! (And Other Fun Facts)

Ep 116 Man, I Don’t Know if Those Hummingbirds are Ever Gonna Get Here

For this episode, our most stalwart guest (Jason Baldinger) joins one of our favorite guests (James Benger) to talk about their new poetry collection Waiting on Hummingbirds, as well as James Benger’s new-ish book Floating Downstream. Through the course of our conversation we talk about poetic collaboration, old cars, and the perspective that comes when writing about youth in middle age.

You should attend the Zoom book launch for Waiting on Hummingbirds on Friday, December 6th at 8 PM Eastern Time, and buy the book from either James Benger’s Bandcamp Page or Jason Baldinger’s Bandcamp Page, and if you do, you get a bonus broadside.

You bet there’s swearin’.

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Ep 115 Hope Really Is a Prison

Rebecca Schumejda is an excellent narrative poet and editor of Trailer Park Quarterly. In this podcast we discuss her ekphrastic collaboration with old friend of the podcast Jason Baldinger. Hope is a Prison is a collection of photographs from a former prison and sanitarium while Rebecca’s poetry tells the story of the complicated life of Liberty, a child who has seen the worst of what this world has to offer. We also discuss her books Sentenced and Waiting at the Dead End Diner. If you like this podcast, be sure to tune into the Hope is a Prison Virtual Book Launch on November 15, 2024

I swear once, because I have to.

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Ep 111 American Aorta

Old friend Jason Baldinger is back with a new book and new conversation. Jason did a lot of reading from his new book American Aorta, and American Aorta comes with its own playlist! As always, Jason is super funny, engaging, and honest. Our conversation ranges from rust belt memories, travel, and the craft of poetry. Jason reads a poem about a famous Ben Shahn painting and many others. Catch Jason reading at the Poets Building Bridges Series on February 10, 2024.

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Ep. 106: This Still Life

We’re back from another unplanned, unannounced hiatus, and who knows, this could be the beginning of another one. Old friends Jason Baldinger and James Benger discuss their new split poetry collection This Still Life. In our discussion, we talk about what it means to work on a collection like this, James and Jason read, and during The Bottom 5, we accidentally discover while rock music is cool and so are lots of rock bands, a lot of folks who are in rock bands aren’t cool. You can buy This Still Life on James Benger’s Bandcamp Page. And you can get a bunch of other cool stuff on Jason Baldinger’s Bandcamp Page. You can hear James and Jason read at Swordfish Tom’s on Sunday, September 18, 2022.

As always, we swear.

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Ep. 102: Jason Baldinger’s KTel Record

Our most frequent guest has released his KTel record of the greatest hits and unreleased poems. A History of Backroads Misplaced is a retrospective of the last decade of his work. During this episode we look back at Jason Baldinger‘s evolution as a poet, what it means to revise old work, and there are some special surprises at the end.

And sooo much swearing

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Ep. 99: The Afterlife is a Hangover

Jason Baldinger is one of the folks who has made this podcast what it is, and who better to have on for our last show in the double digits but him. However, this was perhaps the most difficult podcast I have ever recorded, because it is about his split poetry and art book co-authored by Nell Hendricks called The Afterlife is a Hangover. The book is about the death of someone who meant a lot to a lot of people Pittsburgh musician, writer, professor, and record store owner Karl Hendricks.

We miss Karl, we love Karl, and unfortunately sometimes we have to meet the grief head on as we do for this extensive conversation about poetry, death, and record stores.

We swear a lot, and well . . . f*ck cancer anyway.

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Ep 89: A Threadbare Universe

Jason Baldinger is our most frequent guest, and for good reason. He writes lots of books of poetry, reads those poems very well, and always has something interesting to say in-between. For this episode we talk about his newest collection A Threadbare Universe. We also discuss the state of our post-Trump world, and we get in depth into his writing process.

He says if you send him a message on Facebook you can get a copy of A Threadbare Universe mailed to you for $15. You should also check out Jason Baldinger’s Bandcamp Page.

As always, there’s swearing.

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Episode 78: The Better Angels of Our Nature

Every time Jason Baldinger writes a new book, it’s his best book, and so for this new podcast we have a hard time, because Jason is here to talk about two new books: The Better Angels of our Nature and Everyone’s Alone Tonight, co-written with the great Kansas City poet James Benger.

In the course of our conversation Jason and I talk about our long state of national emergency, the importance of travel for poetics, why Jack Kerouac kinda sucks even though he’s important to us both, and American mythology. Jason’s new books The Better Angels of our Nature and Everyone’s Alone Tonight can be bought from a big (but not the biggest) internet book retailer, at independent books stores, or just find Jason on Facebook. He is also going to be going on a reading tour starting with the dual book launch party on October 2nd at The White Whale Bookstore in Pittsburgh at 7PM. Look him up on Facebook to find the other tour dates.

As always, I swear.

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Episode 69: Party Line

In an attempt to forge new frontiers of podcastdom We’re All Gonna Die tries our hand at podcasting over the phone, and I’m sorry about the constant hum. I ran noise reduction and the compression software multiple times, and well…it’s at least an amusing conversation between myself, Stephanie Brea, Jason Baldinger, and all the way from a U-Haul parking lot in Kansas City James Benger.

During our talk we discuss the holiday season, why labor and poetry go together, James and Jason’s great new book Little Fires Hiding, the 5th Annual Bah Humbug:Writers Wrestle with the Holiday Spirit reading, and James has to get out of his car and explain why he’s talking on the phone in a U-Haul parking lot

At this point, I try to earn the explicit tag on every single podcast.