This episode has been a long time coming. I started to dabble with the idea of Late in 2020, when - like many of us - my sleep problems were out of control and I wanted something to fill the hours. I realized that the kind of radio that I listened to as a sleepless kid no longer existed, and I wanted to recreate it. I filled my overnight hours with teaching myself to edit sound and cobble together my meandering thoughts. I started with Audible and a $40 mic, and sent it to a couple of friends.
Now, roughly 5 years later, I am still filling the wee hours with creating the show, and I’m so grateful that the folks at KOPN have given it a place to live. It’s a venerable old quirky, radical station located in Columbia, Missouri, somewhere I have never been. I live around 400 miles away. But through the miracles of modern technology and neighborly, Midwestern solidarity, the folks there have embraced it.
I’ve honed my storytelling skills, worked on vocal training, and upgraded to professional equipment. I want to grow my audience to expand beyond my friends and a few nightowls who happen upon it on the radio dial, so if you enjoy Late, please share this link with others so they can join in and listen anytime, anywhere - always free/ad free: Late with Taffeta V
Playlist
Last Night a DJ Saved My Life - Indeep
You Can’t Walk In Your Sleep (If You Can’t Sleep) - The GoGos
Lights (single version) - Ellie Goulding
Deep Sleep - DEVO
Up All Night - The Boomtown Rats
Up From a Dream - HAIM
I Guess I Should Go to Sleep - Jack White
Behind the Wall of Sleep - The Smithereens
When You Sleep - Cake
When You Sleep - my bloody valentine
Both Ends Burning - Roxy Music
Sleep Comes Down - The Psychedelic Furs
Sleep to Dream - Fiona Apple
Come Into My Sleep - Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds
Fireflies - Owl City
Sleep - She Wants Revenge
Sleep - Hope Sandoval & the Warm Inventions
In the Wee Small Hours of the Morning - Ella Fitzgerald
One For My Baby (And One More For The Road) - Billie Holiday
Mr. Sandman - SYML
References
In the intro, I mentioned a bunch of my favorite DJs in popular culture - if you’re not familiar, I highly recommend you check ‘em out
Venus Flytrap (portrayed by Tim Reid) on WKRP In Cincinnati
Dave Garver (portrayed by Clint Eastwood) from Play Misty For Me
The DJ (portrayed by Lynne Thigpen) from The Warriors
Stevie Wayne (portrayed by Adrienne Barbeau) from The Fog
Mark Hunter/Hard Harry (portrayed by Christian Slater) from Pump Up the Volume
Chris Stevens/Chris In the Morning (portrayed by John Corbett) in Northern Exposure
Johnny LaGuardia (portrayed by Tim Curry) from Times Square
Poems
Insomniac, by Sylvia Plath
She wrote this one sometime around 1960/61 (not too long before her death, in 1963), and it was first published posthumously in a 1971 collection of her work called Crossing the Water
Insomnia, by Alicia Ostriker
This poem comes from her 2009 collection, The Book of Seventy
Quotes/Readings
I quoted several people and read passages aloud - here are the titles and authors in case you want to visit and support your local library!
Roxane Gay - I read a quote that appeared in her blog in 2010, which is no longer active. But you should for sure go and read any/all of her books, post-haste!
Stephen King, Insomnia (novel, 1994)
Barbara Kingsolver, Animal Dreams (novel, 1990)
Iain Reid, I’m Thinking of Ending Things (novel, 2016)
Jonathan Lethem, Motherless Brooklyn (novel, 1999)
Charles Dickens, Bleak House (novel, 1852)
Ray Bradbury, Something Wicked This Way Comes (novel, 1962)
Poppy Z Brite - I’m not sure where they first said this, but it’s an oft repeated quote from Poppy Z. Brite. Check out their work if you are unfamiliar - good stuff
Colette, The Other One (novel, 1931)
Leonard Cohen - his quote was just…Leonard Cohen being Leonard Cohen, man
My Stories
I tell true stories in every episode - sometimes they are personal, and sometimes they are about topics I’m passionate about, weird rabbit holes I have gone down, or personal obsessions. I research these myself (NEVER using any sort of AI - I read actual books, periodicals, and credible sources online, getting into as much original source material as I can)
Queen of the Night
