Michael Overa‘s project for the 2021 Jack Straw Writers Program is a novel he calls an elegy for his youth, about the origins and career of a punk band in Seattle. His conversation with curator E.J. Koh touches on Michael’s favorite ‘90s punk bands, authenticity in art, and his own Seattle youth. “It’s not necessarily a time that at my age I want to go back and live, but it’s fun to think about.”

Music by Andrew Weathers, produced in part through the Jack Straw Artist Support Program.