Friday Special Blend
Friday April 11th, 2025 with Susan Johnston
Cinephonic's Refuge. Michael Blouin talks Hard Electric. The Phoenix Players preview 1979.

In Hour One, Susan shares tracks from Cinephonic's forthcoming album, Refuge. Then a chat with Michael Blouin about Hard Electric. Some context: Hard Electric is Michael Blouin’s third book of poetry, a road-tripping, bridge-burning collection of the author’s hard-won and soft-edged reflections that seem to stutter-step towards resolution while tumbling down a decided slant towards disaster. “Where Does My Heart Beat Now” was Celine Dion’s first North American hit and in it she asks: ‘Where do all the lonely hearts go?’ In Hard Electric Blouin presents a bleakly unsettling but ultimately life-affirming treatise that hints at his fascination with the same question and perhaps shuffles into the neighbourhood of an answer. That neighbourhood is peopled with late-night bars of Key West’s Duval Street, the sharp spice of BBQ joints, sunburned beach motels, and Christmas lights frozen to February trees. And Susan Sarandon’s cousin. It’s a book not for the faint of heart, but for the lonely-hearted, and for those who know them well. In Hour Two, the Phoenix Players arrive in-studio to talk about 1979.