Heather Jewett Is Your New Obsession
There’s no place like home. And for me? That’s on Planet Heather.
There’s no place like home. And for me? That’s on Planet Heather.
Heather’s voice is meant to be heard. Before the podcast, she fronted the band Gravy Train!!!! from 2001–2009, cementing herself as an electroclash legend. She’s now releasing music on her own under the name Heathers.
Heather’s voice comes through her words, her lyrics, and perhaps most clearly… her soundboard. A fabulous archive of hundreds of soundbites — most added by Heather herself (the real winners), and some pre-loaded. She’ll earnestly respond to a heavy relationship advice question sent in by a listener, then close the segment with the crescendo of Lady Marmalade. Or perhaps a gunshot. After years of listening to the pod, I find myself (pretty!) accurately predicting which sound she’ll use before she uses it. Getting it right is an amazing feeling.
And today, dear reader, you’re in luck… I’ve asked Heather to introduce you to a bit of the soundboard herself. Enjoy:
This fall, Heather flew in from LA to housesit for a woman she’s barely knows, but has a years-long personal connection to her dogs. The house is completely stunning and the weather that day was gorgeous. We had a blast shooting and chatting. Here are a few highlights from our conversation:
Tell me about the soundboard, how did it come to be?
It started to help me make transitions. I just love the rhythm and structure that it gives the podcast. Language is wonderful, but it’s finite and I need more. The soundboard is a way to get the bigger moment, or regroup with a LOL after something serious.
You have a unique way of talking that I’m addicted to… tell me about it?
I like the way words feel. When I abbreviate and make up words, it’s because I just want to have more fun when I’m talking. I’ve always done it. Even when I’m writing, I struggle because punctuation isn’t enough for me, I need more.
Do you dream?
Yeah, especially on nicotine gum. Those are the craziest dreams ever. Your ex, your crush, your dead brother–the gang’s all there!
When did you realize you were funny?
Me and my friends would put on little variety shows in school at lunch, called Funny Stuff. We would like, pick up cigarette butts off the ground and pretend to smoke them. I’m talking like seven or eight years old, just being hams. The crowd (other small children) went wild!
Thoughts on being cringe?
You really can’t do anything creative if you’re not okay with cringe. If you try to write a poem without being cringe, good fucking luck with that. Or singing without being cringe? That’s insane. It’s hard. You are moving mountains to put pen to paēps by writing a poem. Anything worth doing takes audacity, which I think is just the other side of the same coin.
How do you start a project?
I’ve learned that just starting is everything—whether it’s perfect or not, and just being open to the mystery of not knowing where it’s gonna go. Until 2020-ish, I’d been going about my process in a way that was totally unnatural to me, which was by sitting down to a blank page to try to make something “good.”
Now my process is getting things out as they come, like jotting down ideas, and working with the scraps later. It’s kind of a hack where you never actually have to do the hard part, because if I’m looking at a blank page, count me out.
Show up imperfectly. That is the best advice I ever got about making art.
Do you make yourself laugh?
One of the most reliable things you can laugh at is your own self-seriousness. Being in the airport makes me so anxious and over-serious. Weirdly I feel like I’m at Buckingham Palace and I’m gonna get in trouble if I make one false move. So many rules that I’m probably accidentally breaking. Oh my god, they’re gonna weigh my bag and they’re gonna find out that my bag is too fat to fly. And then they’re gonna find out I brought my fucking coffee maker from home and that’s gonna be this whole thing. But it’s because I’m staying at multiple places and I need a reliable coffee situation! Don’t tase me, it’s just a Moka pot!
What made you start giving a fuck?
It hit me later in my 20s post-touring band life, sitting still and thinking like, oh… I’m on this earth to be more than a shock rocker and get attention from that. And later, a lot of self-discovery due to experiencing personal loss and finally realizing, brutally, that we really do only live once.
Thoughts on gay people?
There are no straight people in my phone. I mean there’s straight women but I think if I scroll down to find my last text with a straight guy, you would be here when autumn turned to winter. You would see the lake freeze over.
What is your best day?
Oh, my God, my best day is simple and full of errands or hiking on a gorgeous LA day with a Cavalier King Charles spaniel by my side. And then at night I go to a chic dinner with three fab friends… I’m not on my phone at all. Forget it exists.
What do you want people to know about you?
I want people to know about my music. I have two singles out under the name Heathers on streaming, and I also fronted the band Gravy Train!!!! I’m working on the first Heathers album right now.
Planet Heather has hundreds of episodes and a lot of them are free to listen to. I’ve never done anything that has felt so intimate with an audience, and it’s so wonderful. It’s my favorite thing that I’ve ever done, and I feel so close to the listeners. I’m so happy with this podcast. I count it as my biggest success.
Have you always been deep?
I’ve always been somewhat contemplative and a seeker of the deeper truths and the dark humor in everything. I just want to live a curious life and be in touch with the miracle that I’m alive.
Should we be doing The Artist’s Way?
Huge fan of The Artist’s Way, but miss me with morning pages. I tried for years. I have tomes of my morning pages, and they’re mostly just me writing, in hundreds of different ways, that I feel fat.
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One Hour Photo Podcast vibes! Heather and I discuss climbing cringe mountain.