"Talking At The Diner" Podcast

I went out to Bob’s Diner in the Roxborough section of Philadelphia for a repeat visit after having first been introduced to this charming spot by Emily Drinker in 2023. I was very excited to meet up with two uber-talented musicians’ who happen to be a married couple. Ross Bellenoit and Andrea Weber are both hugely respected members of the Philly music community. Both highly educated in their...

Very often on TatD, I seek out guests I don’t know all that well because it’s fun to get to chat with and learn about new people, but sometimes it’s fun to sit down with friends you’re known a long, long time. And such is the case on this episode with my two guests, both of whom play in a Philly band I have been close with for twenty years. We’ve played countless shows together, in front of...

This is a very special episode of TatD. I mean verrrrry special. During a "social media day" we shared back in February, I was thrilled to hang out with my fellow bandleaders of Asian American Pie II coming up on May 17th at MilkBoy in Philadelphia.Carissa Matsushima is the powerhouse band leader of Kikashima.Judah Kim is AAPie co-founder and my first two-time guest on the show.Listening back to...

I recently got a chance to hang out at one of my favorite haunts - the Broad St. Diner in south Philly - with my friend Taylor Kelly. Taylor caught the music bug as a young school kid in upstate New York and moved to Philadelphia from Boston after college in 2016. By the time she was in her early 20's, she was already a seasoned touring musician, playing trumpet in a big band (an actual 18-pc big...

I met Philly musician / singer / songwriter Deirdre French in 2019, less than a year before Covid, when she walked into the open mic I was hosting at the Khyber in Philadelphia, and basically silenced a loud, chatty room with a pin-drop performance showcasing her impressive vocal and songwriting chops. In the intervening years, she’s done a lot of personal and artistic exploration and now she’s...

Happy 2025, diner buddies! I am so excited to begin the new year of "Talking At The Diner" with this conversation. Tyler Asay is the lead singer and band leader of The Tisburys, a Philly-based indie band who are close to my musical heart because they are at the forefront of what I like to think of as a Philly power pop renaissance, which has been bubbling under with fellow torch bearers like Log...

I met up with Brendan Johnson - guitarist and primary songwriter of Stella Ruze, a band that he started in 2014 with vocalist / mandolin player Katie O' Donnell, keyboardist Mason Hunter, and trumpet player Alex Styer. In the ten years the band has been together, their sound has evolved past early comparisons to The Lumineers and Mumford and Sons to a more complex marriage of modern folk...

I first met Camille Peruto when she was just 14. We were the designated opening acts for 80’s rocker John Eddie at Coffee Works - a long gone music venue located in a shopping center in Voorhees, NJ. Even then, you could tell she had something special.In the decade-and-a-half I’ve known her, she’s gone from Coffee Works, to American Idol, to her current life as a can’t stop / won’t stop gig...

I recently met up with Philly podcast host and longtime musician Dan Drago at the Penrose Diner in south Philly and before we even walked in he kindly hooked me up with a bag of homemade goodies made with stuff from his own garden. I scored jars of homemade tomato sauce, salsa roja, pickled green tomatoes, and even figs. FIGS! I got all that, and all he got was a John Faye Power Trip CD from...

I’m super excited about Ep. 38 of the show because I recently had the opportunity to sit down with Olivia Rubini.. now, those of you familiar with my story know that the last name Rubini is a very important one in the long arc of my musical life. Ritchie Rubini has been my partner in crime with the Caulfields for three decades. His late brother Rudy played a huge role in getting the band signed...