It's an all-time-great This Is Your Afterlife with artist, musician, and independent folklorist Daniel Bachman. Daniel creates huge concept albums like Almanac Behind, which documented the climate crisis with field recordings of extreme weather that sometimes swallowed his guitar playing, and writes pieces on his Substack like “Well Seasoned”: A History of North American Immunocapitalism.

Content warning: I use this space to alert folks to traditional content warnings as well as cheekily share some of the topics covered in the episode. This time, we've got some fairly heavy genuine content warnings, almost all to do with the American culture of white supremacy: hate crime, suicide, drug overdose, Charlottesville Unite the Right rally, animal cruelty, COVID, and colonialism. AND there is so much genuine beauty, history, camaraderie, and fun in this episode! From Daniel teaching me about abolitionist minister and writer Moncure Daniel Conway to discussing his non-human collaborators, this is just a wall-to-wall banger of a conversation.

If you believe in This Is Your Afterlife and want fun bonus episodes, like the Crossing Guard Trilogy of This Is Your Aftershow episodes, become a patron for $5 or $15/month at patreon.com/davemaher.

Follow Daniel: @almanacbehind on Instagram and Twitter.

Listen to his most recent recording for Longform Editions, Quaker Run Wildfire (10​/​24​/​23​–​11​/​17​/​23) for Fiddle and Guitar.

Follow this show on IG: @thisisyourafterlife, and get more info at thisisyourafterlife.com. Have thoughts on the show? Email thisisyourafterlifepodcast@gmail.com.

Follow me @thisisdavemaher on Instagram and Twitter.

All music by This Is Your Afterlife house band Lake Mary.

Check out my other podcast, Genre Reveal Party!, where I analyze TV and movies with my friend, writer and cultural critic Madeline Lane-McKinley.