i should tell you: she's so rad

Well hello there, and welcome to chapter eight of I Should Tell You, where I interview cool musicians who will answer my emails. The same three questions about food every time, just to see what kicks we can kick up. This week it's Jeremy Toy from the band whose name is also a lovely compliment: She's So Rad.



I'm not even going near the hornet nest that is trying to write a bio, since I've seen them described as a four-piece and a duo but She's So Rad definitely does contain Jeremy Toy and Anji Sami, and I definitely adore their music. You can listen to their album In Circles in its entirety on bandcamp, and you can even buy a copy of it on vinyl, which I totally intend to do soon. The whole thing is effing dreamy, although I do favour the track called Ice Block. Posssibly because I just really like ice blocks. Their single Confetti is all gorgeous too, all swishy and light-reflecting like taffeta. Just listen to everything, okay? But perhaps most of all I recommend losing yourself several million times over in their cover of that pinnacle of utter dreaminess, Rockin' Back Inside My Heart. (From Twin Peaks, so important.)

They also have a new video coming soon and a fresh EP out on Japanese label Wonderful Noise ere long. What! Heard it here first. If you heard it here first. But till then...the interview starts now. Thanks, Jeremy!

Where's somewhere you've eaten that you kinda like to brag about or drop into conversation? 

I took a trip to LA with a couple of mates and one lunch they were on a mission to find this place I knew nothing about. What  we ended up trawling backstreets for (pre-iphone) was Roscoe's Chicken & Waffles. This place is an institution and has fed many a celebrity (Kanye, Alicia, Biggie, Snoop). I foolishly ordered the chicken salad thinking it would be the healthy option however when it came out from the kitchen my initiation to Roscoe's began as before me lay 2 deep fried chicken breasts sitting on a humongous bowl of lettuce and topped off with so much processed cheese that you could barely see the lettuce. My mate did a much better job of ordering and got the classic Chicken and Waffles, 2 pieces of fried chicken, whipped butter, maple syrup and 2 waffles. Amazing. I usually don't like to entertain myself with the trash aspect of Los Angeles as there is so much more to the place than Hollywood and Disneyland but Roscoe's is the one place I recommend to everyone going to LA as it is totally extreme food.

What do you fix for yourself, or where do you go to eat, when it's just you on your own?

Bian at 183 Symonds St in Auckland is my go to place. They do a real good half serve of salmon and rice that gets the job done every time.

What's one of your favourite food memories from your childhood? 

My old man used to do these amazing charcoal barbies. More often than not everything would come out looking like charcoal itself. After one night of brutal inedible sausage charring he took us on a mission with one of his charcoaled sausages and we posted it in his mate's letterbox.