VIA PRESS RELEASE | Featuring stories from: Weyes Blood, Fleet Foxes, Bob Mould, Dawn Richard, Sylvan Esso, Kevin Morby, Pavement, Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith, PUP, Portugal. The Man, The Beths, Talking Heads’ Chris Frantz, Kero Kero Bonito and more.
Most people know musicians as keen observers of the world around them, but many do not realize that they are true untapped resources for thoughtful, incisive food and travel writing. In Taste in Music: Eating on Tour with Indie Musicians (Chronicle Books | September 24, 2024| $27.95| Hardcover) musician Alex Bleeker (Real Estate) and food and travel journalist Luke Pyenson (formerly of Frankie Cosmos), explore the unique relationship between touring and food and the bonds formed by shared meals and culinary adventures.
With over twenty years of experience in the music industry, Alex and Luke are the perfect guides to take readers on tour with a diverse lineup of inspiring indie musicians from around the world, sharing meals and travel experiences, peeking behind the curtain at this singular and singularly misunderstood way of life. These stories, like the best songs or meals, evoke something central about the human experience.
Having toured with their own bands—Real Estate and Frankie Cosmos, respectively—they’re asking all the right questions, shedding light and understanding on the lives of touring musicians and the people feeding them. Taste in Music offers a unique glimpse into the off-stage experiences of a diverse lineup of fellow Indie musicians, each with their own ideas on food as it relates to hospitality, self-care, family, and identity.
In addition to meditations about eating on tour, Pyenson and Bleeker have gathered illuminating and thought-provoking stories that take place on five continents, in private homes and street-side stalls, in temples of fine dining and in actual temples, backstage and in the van, early morning and late at night. Stories that deal with the best parts of touring: meaningful cultural exchange, hospitality-induced euphoria, and the opportunity to build relationships around the world. And the worst: loneliness, exhaustion, estrangement from family and friends, struggles with disordered eating, and unsteady access to medical care.
In Taste in Music, Bleeker and Pyenson reveal how a basic human necessity can create a sense of community and interconnectedness in one of the most mobile industries in the world.
Alex Bleeker is the bassist and co-founder of beloved indie rock band Real Estate and ascendant jam band Taper’s Choice. During his decade-and-a-half career as a musician, he has released more than ten full-length albums and toured extensively on five continents. He holds a bachelor’s degree from Bennington College and lives in coastal California with his partner, Leanne. Real Estate just released their critically acclaimed new album Daniel, and are on tour in support of it now.
Luke Pyenson is a food and travel journalist whose work has appeared in The Washington Post, The New York Times, The Boston Globe, Saveur, and other publications. He was the longtime drummer of the critically acclaimed indie rock band Frankie Cosmos and founding drummer of cult DIY band Krill. He holds an MA in the Anthropology of Travel, Tourism, and Pilgrimage from SOAS, University of London, and lives in Brooklyn with his wife, Lauren.
