Get out (leave!) right now
Celebrity memoirs, Bratoween, vintage Hollister, 83 versions of "A Thousand Miles" 🎹
Today’s issue:
📚 Celebrity Memoir Audiobook Section: 📚
🍀 Over The Influence by Joanna “JoJo” Levesque
🎸 Walking Disaster: My Life Through Heaven and Hell by Deryck Whibley
Links 4u:
🍏 I’m ready for Bratoween
🎤 “Long live physical media” is what I’ve been saying, and everyone agrees
🧸 Need Green Day HitClip so bad
💍 Store bought is fine
🖥 My dream thrifting find
👗 Passing down Hollister is essentially Millennials’ version of generational wealth
🕶 DIY Spongebob cat eye sunglasses are like…very chic…
🩸 Jennifer’s Body paper dolls
🎹 Michael Myers goes crazy on “A Thousand Miles”
AND MORE!
🎶 83 versions of Vanessa Carlton’s 2002 classic, “A Thousand Miles”
🇨🇦 Come see me give a scholarly presentation about Drake and Degrassi
🏃🏻♀️ This week’s themed fitness class schedule
ICYMI, last week’s issue was about autumnal baking and Italian American heritage month! I was blessed to have this JWoww Christmas ornament pop up on my IG feed – now I need to go search eBay for the whole set. Catch up on these editions before they enter the archive (access via paid subs only!) 🔐
Huge thank you to Nicstalgia supporters who I will love forever: Janine, Marie, Liv, Mitra, CY, and Chet! 💐💐💐
📚 Celebrity Memoir Audiobook Section 📚
I have a new, refreshing routine of listening to a celebrity memoir audiobooks. Hearing someone’s voice I recognize during my commute is so comforting. I was particularly excited to read memoirs of two musicians that I was obsessed with in the early 2000s – and still love and respect now – JoJo and Deryck Whibley of Sum 41.
Recently Read
🍀 Over The Influence by Joanna “JoJo” Levesque
Honestly, my favorite part of the book was finding out the real lyrics to “Leave (Get Out)”. Google is wrong. Spotify is wrong. JoJo herself – printed in black and white in her book – is my only source of truth. In the chorus, she doesn’t say “WHO?” She says, “LOSER!” I’m absolutely screaming at how funny this is, and I can’t believe I’m just finding this out 20 years later.
Get out (leave) right now
It’s the end of you and me
It’s too late (now), and I can’t wait for you to be gone
’Cause I know about her (who? LOSER!) and I wonder (why?)
How I bought all the lies
You said that you would treat me right
But you was just a waste of time
JoJo and I are both from New England and were 13 when her debut single was released. I was excited to meet JoJo at her book signing last month in New Jersey. The owners and employees at Books & Greetings were so incredibly kind!! I told them it was my first time at their lovely bookstore and was incredibly appreciative that they sent me to the front of the queue (since I crossed two state lines to get there). Although I wish there was a sit-down conversation like some of the other tour stops, I will simply have to become a literary booking agent so I can bring authors to Connecticut and moderate these discussions myself :)
The book dove into nuanced interpersonal relationships with her mother, father, manager, record label(s), collaborators, lovers, and friends, as well as the intersectional implications of her look, sound, and brand positioning on an R&B label. The through-line of the book was JoJo’s journey in coming back to herself and not abandoning herself, her beliefs, opinions, thoughts, or convictions for the love, approval, acceptance, or financial motivations of someone else.
After reading this passage toward the end of the book, my heart swelled. I deeply relate to this, and I couldn’t have read it at a more appropriate time. I don’t know JoJo personally, but when I told her in person that I was always rooting for her, I meant it.
“I wanted to put out the bodies of work [people] had told me were too left of center or not digestible enough. My heart wanted to take more chances, collaborate with different different kinds of artists…break away from mainstream convention, yet I never had the courage to step out and do it because I didn’t want to do it alone…”
🎸 Walking Disaster: My Life Through Heaven and Hell by Deryck Whibley
I missed Deryck Whibley’s book tour because I didn’t know it was happening, and I’m trying not to be mad about it. (Again, I will just have to become a booking agent and bring him to town.) I was in love with Deryck after seeing him on MTV’s TRL in middle school. He was a part of my Holy Trinity of pop punk crushes, along with Mark Hoppus of blink-182 and Joel Madden of Good Charlotte (who I later made eye contact with in the smoothie line at Erewhon). I can’t remember where I was recently with a random group of people, but I played “Fat Lip” and it was the one song that we could all agree on. The power of music never ceases to amaze me.
There was so much about Deryck’s story that I didn’t know. First of all, I wasn’t aware of the extent of his talent in writing and production, in addition to his role as the frontman of Sum 41. He’s also faced so much ridicule, blame, betrayal, addiction, and pain, even when – especially when – he was successful on all accounts. While the story is harrowing at times, partiularly as Deryck describes his experience realizing – and coming to terms with – being groomed as an underage teenager by his 34-year-old musical idol. Ultimately, the story does have a happy ending, with Deryck finally closing the Sum 41 chapter of his life (on his and the band’s terms), maintaining sobriety, and cherishing his loving family.
📖 A common takeaway
What did these two seemingly disparate memoirs have in common? They were both written by people who have clearly been to therapy LOL. I’m weary of celebrities giving out advice for pretty much any reason, and self-help books just don’t do it for me anymore. Both authors are talented and extraordinarily accomplished writers (of songs, and now books) who spoke about their personal and professional development in a genuine, honest, unfiltered, and not self-help-y kind of way. Love to hear it! These memoirs were thorough testaments to their incredible growth, self-awareness, forgiveness, and acceptance, and I was blown away by their stories.
More celebrity memoirs I read in 2024
• Talking as Fast as I Can and also Have I Told You This Already? by Lauren Graham
• Love, Pamela: A Memoir of Prose, Poetry, and Truth by Pamela Anderson
• The House of Hidden Meanings: A Memoir by RuPaul
• I Probably Shouldn't Be Telling You This (But I'm Going to Anyway) by Chelsea Devantez
• XOXO, Cody by Cody Rigsby
• Paris by Paris Hilton
Memoirs in my queue
• Friends, Lovers, and the Big Terrible Thing by Matthew Perry
• The Third Gilmore Girl: A Memoir by Kelly Bishop
• When I Was Your Age by Kenan Thompson
• From Here to the Great Unknown by Lisa Marie Presley and Riley Keough
Upcoming releases I’m looking forward to
• Cher, The Memoir: Part One by Cher (November 2024)
• Fahrenheit-181 by Mark Hoppus (April 2025)
• Semi-Well-Adjusted Despite Literally Everything by Alyson Stoner (August 2025)
📲 I’m just a simple girl in a high-tech digital world
🍏 I think the apple’s rotten right to the core
🎤 “Long live physical media” is what I’ve been saying, because yes we should all get to watch our favorite 2000s rom-coms whenever we want
🧸 Obsessed with Green Day’s Dookie Demastered release, in partnership with BRAIN. For Dookie’s 30th anniversary, the 15 tracks are on 15 obscure, obsolete, and otherwise inconvenient formats, including a HitClip, Teddy Ruxpin, and Big Mouth Billy Bass
💍 ‘Charm Bracelets Are The Early '00s Trend You Probably Forgot About – Until Now’ *Samantha Jones Voice* Oh honey, I don’t forget anything. I’ve been making my own charm bracelets for almost 2 years, but store bought is fine
🖥 My dream thrifting scenario is to find a vintage iMac G3 all-in for <$100
👗 Mom passing down Hollister clothes to daughter…I’m not crying, you’re crying
🕶 DIY Spongebob cat eye sunglasses
🩸 Jennifer’s Body paper dolls
🎹 Michael Myers goes crazy on “A Thousand Miles”
Speaking of “A Thousand Miles”, a song I’ve mentioned many times in this letter, I recently came across this playlist. I’m so glad at least 83 versions of this song exist.
🇨🇦 Laugh Now, Cry Later
I’m very excited to be presenting at the Sixposium, the first and only academic symposium on the topic of Drake! The End of Drake is hosted by my friend Ruby Justice Thélot in Brooklyn on Saturday, 10/26.
My presentation, Laugh Now, Cry Later, will be an exploration of how Drake – much like his fictional counterpart, Jimmy Brooks from Degrassi – has a knack for reinvention. If you can’t make it in person, I’ll be publishing the essay here soon. You can also watch my presentation from last year, SOCIAL MEDIA RUINS EVERYTHING in the meantime <3
🏃🏻♀️ This week’s class schedule
🦋 Social butterfly
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OMG I didn't realize the Deryck Whibley memoir was out. Debating now do I buy anotherrr book when I have so many already?! But I need this.