Around the Risky Fuel household we mostly consider anti-vaxxers to be crazytown bananapants wackadoodles.
That said, their backwards anti-science rhetoric can cause people genuine harm. Particularly to autistic individuals because of the (thoroughly scientifically debunked) notion that vaccines cause autism.
Sarah wrote about this issue in a column for Health.com.
To read it click here.
Filed under Culture, Health, Shameless Promotion
Polaris Podcast EP7 was live from Ottawa.
When the Polaris Music Prize released its ten album 2017 Short List it also enlisted CBC Music and a batch of jurors to talk about what made the list, and what didn’t.
The Polaris folks then turned the result of that conversation into episode eight of the Polaris Podcast.
The most helpful way people can listen to the podcast would be by subscribing to it in iTunes. But those craving convenience can listen to it below on Soundcloud.
Filed under Music, Shameless Promotion
Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy
The Risky Fuel household is particularly pro-John le Carré and pretty much support all the author does while writing about spies with father issues who constantly get betrayed by the institutions they served.
Sarah argues these broken men, full of feelings, represent a better vision for masculinity than the traditional dude hero type.
She explained why in an essay for Electric Lit.
To read it go here.
Filed under Books, Films, Recollections, Shameless Promotion
Games For Change
I recently interviewed Susanna Pollack, the president of the organization Games For Change, about how her organization hopes to use video games — both the creation and playing of — as a social tool to help young people with less opportunity.
There’s also a Lady Gaga connection in all of this.
To read the story head over to Samaritanmag by clicking here.
Filed under Culture, Shameless Promotion
Carly Rae Jepsen
Two months ago, Carly Rae Jepsen got a panicked call from her sister. “She was hysterically screaming into the phone ‘Justin Bieber just tweeted about your song!'” Jepsen tells AOL Music Blog. “I was like ‘What? Really? No way!’ And then I went to check it out and, in fact, he had.”
The pop idol had heard Jepsen’s insanely catchy new single “Call Me Maybe” on the radio and instantly fallen under its spell. Soon, both the Biebs and his lady friend Selena Gomez were both tweeting about their love for the song, gaining the Juno nominee and Canadian Idol alumus (she placed third in the show’s fifth season) instant international attention.
And that was only the start of Carly Rae’s whirlwind ride to almost overnight pop stardom.
“Not too long after that, we were informed by my label, 604, that [Justin] and his manager [Scooter Braun] had actually approached them and asked if we’d be interested in combining forces and spreading the music outside of Canada.”
Jepsen and her team were definitely interested, so she flew out to Los Angeles to meet with the pair and wound up signing with Braun and his Schoolboy Records label.
The ink was barely dry on the contracts before Jepsen discovered that her new label mate had another surprise in store for her. Back at home, she went on Facebook and watched a video she’d recently been tagged in. She thought the video, which featured a bunch of mustachioed fans dancing around and goofing off to “Call Me Maybe” was cute, but she didn’t really realize what was going on at first.
“It didn’t really register until halfway through. I was kind of looking at it and I was like ‘That looks a lot like Justin Bieber! That looks a lot like Selena Gomez!’ And then at the end of it, I was like ‘My goodness! This is insane!'” she laughs. “That was a total shock. A good shock, but definitely a shock.”
That video — which also features the likes of High School Musical/Hellcats star Ashley Tisdale and members of Big Time Rush — became a viral sensation, garnering over 20 million views on YouTube and rocketing “Call Me Maybe” to the top of the digital charts, the first song by a Canadian artist to do so since her new buddy Bieber accomplished it with “Baby” in 2010.
“It felt like a really welcoming gesture,” Jepsen says of the video. “We had just signed the documents not a day or two before and then they posted the video and I kind of realized how sincere they were about helping me.”
To thank him for the video tribute, Jepsen made a last-minute appearance at Justin’s 18th birthday party. “It was kind of something that was thrown my way at the last minute. Through the first verse, I’m not really aware that I’m there! And, like, halfway through the song I start to sing,” she admits. “It was a terrifying and exciting experience to be spontaneously thrown into!”
She’s also working on a duet with Bieber. “The first day I met him, he invited me to join in on a song that he had in mind for me, and we mapped it out that night. I was pleasantly surprised with just how passionate he is as a musician and how much I loved the song!” Jepsen enthuses. “I can’t even begin to explain how talented that guy is.”
She isn’t sure exactly when their track will be released, but the singer hopes it’s soon. “If I had my way, it would be out today! Yesterday!” she exclaims. “I can’t wait to share that one.”
In the meantime, she’s already back in the studio with her friend and “Call Me Maybe” co-writer Josh Ramsay of Mariana’s Trench fame, working on new pop-oriented material that she hopes will expand on the sound she discovered with her hit single. Even though her current album, Curiosity, just came out, she expects to have a new album ready for release by September. Then she’ll start planning a proper tour.
And somewhere, in all of this craziness, she might actually find a couple of minutes to catch her breath and enjoy the ride.
“There’s moments on plane rides where I’ll sit for a second and just take it all in. I’ll be looking at the clouds, thinking, ‘Life is nuts. This is so insane. I’m flying to Texas right now. I’m flying to L.A.!’ This is not something I thought would ever really be happening for me. So there’s definitely moments where I sit there and I can just feel overcome with gratitude.”
This story originally appeared May 12, 2012 on AOL Music Blog.
Filed under Music
I Overcame My Autism And All I Got Was This Lousy Anxiety Disorder: A Memoir
Risky Fuel 