Media/Diet (April '25)

Phonetics On and On by Horsegirl + a week of bad eating

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MEDIA/DIET APRIL 2025

Thanks for reading my newsletter! This is a monthly edition of Ultracold where I share informal thoughts on media and food that I have consumed recently. A slightly more polished piece, on attending a giant physics conference during the International Year of Quantum, will run on the 28th.

MEDIA

Though I had been warned that Brooklyn’s Warsaw has the feel of a high school gym, when I look up at the ceiling I am still struck by how much the curlicues painted there remind me of being a teenager. When they said high school, I didn’t think that faded yellow building where I had spent two years being a student in Croatia was included. But this isn’t fully inappropriate; I am here to see musicians that only recently made it out of high school themselves.

This is a value neutral fact. The crowd is heterogenous enough to underscore that if you thought something teenage was about to go down then you just don’t have it quite right. My partner and I, in our thirties and looking somewhat vintage but not exactly as brutal and crunchy as we might have looked upon our own exit from high school, are not the oldest nor the most normie people there. Next to me, a man says to his date “I’ve seen every Horsegirl tour in New York,” but this is only the band’s second album so I don’t know whether I find his fandom endearing or the performativity of it annoying. When Nora Cheng, Penelope Lowenstein, and Gigi Reece take the stage he cheers loudly, as does most of the room. The balcony is packed and the folks up there are extra enthusiastic. The three young women on stage, however, are mostly unperturbed. They plan to play all of their new record, Phonetics On and On, one of them says - and little else.

The record has been well received, with the Guardian’s Stevie Chick calling it “a minimalist indiepop masterpiece.” The general consensus among critics seems to be that the band, now in their 20s rather than their late teens, have dropped some of the noisiness of their debut for a more stripped down sound that packs both more tenderness and more vulnerability. On stage, however, Horsegirl make me think of seeing Boris in Chicago, which happens to be their hometown and where I went to college, many years ago. Boris marry drone with melodies and echoes of classic rock in a way that is as enchanting as it can be overwhelming. Their guitarist Wata had stared not quite at the floor, but definitely past the audience in a similar way as I saw Horsegirl show disinterest in eye contact at Warsaw. There’s not a lot of banter at the Horsegirl show, and despite the reviews they are also still noisy, their gallop pleasantly drone-adjacent.

As I am experiencing it live, the album’s minimalism, both in the number of notes played and words sung, feels more opaque than it feels like an unraveling towards some more pure and soft core of the band. It reminds of how Harry Sword described Sonic Youth’s early records as featuring “structural dynamics that favoured abstraction.” Of course, there are echoes of Kim Gordon in Horsegirl and her bandmates guitarist Lee Ranaldo and drummer Steve Shelley did play on Horsegirl’s first record. Inspired in part by the musician’s move to college where two of them are majoring in English, Phonetics On and On invites abstraction almost by default. The lyrics function more as another way to add rhythm than a means of telling a story and Lowenstein and Cheng trade off singing them in a well-rehearsed deadpan tone, making all the “ah-hoo,” “la la la,” and “do do do,” become part of the songs’ texture.

“We were trying to embrace something rudimentary, and phonetics are like the building blocks of learning language,” Cheng told The Line of Best Fit. This has another, completely contradictory function - because the record is fairly upbeat, and because it is sung by three young women, this linguistic choice also lightens it up, inviting images of friends just hanging out after school, maybe playing hopscotch, maybe in the 1960s. It’s the kind of retro vibe that sounds frantic and jaded when Sleater-Kinney do it on Dig Me Out in 1997, but Horsegirl are Gen Z, there’s less drama here. What they’re doing is not nostalgia and it’s not reactive, it may even be genuine.

Writing for NPR, Hazel Cills says as much: “Listening to Phonetics On and On, I kept feeling like I had stumbled across a group of girls playing jump rope on some street corner, the playful but coordinated physicality of the music so accessible and seductive it's like a game I could jump into, be a part of, contribute my own "la-la-la"s.”

At the Warsaw show, however, I am feeling the abstraction, and the drone, a lot more. As Horsegirl play through the record, I am struck by how coherent it is, its repetitive rhythms and occasionally repeated phrases bind it together really well. A few times, the volume goes up significantly, and scratches the part of my brain that just loves to be physically overwhelmed, held by sound as if it were trapping me within a body, within a heartbeat of something bigger than me. When the noise abates, the kinetic quality of the songs persists.

Though bits and pieces of tenderness come through, I feel a lot more propelled and pulsing than when I’d played the record in my headphones at the office. Then, I could see myself finding some narrative about three young girls recording songs that are more true to them, and less about trying to be the cool next thing, a less labored effort than their peers like, for instance, Wet Leg. Horsegirl were not at Warsaw to be edgy or clever, just to play this record that made them get really geeky about linguistics when speaking to a number of journalists. So, hearing them live dissuaded me from thinking about their age or girlhood, and made me pay more attention to their interest in form, a sort of polished minimalism that truly can be both cerebral and warm.

The minimalism of Phonetics On and On also makes it versatile. When I put it on to read on the train a few days after the show, it pours into me in a way that is a lot more mellow than I am ready for, still galloping but brighter now that I’m not in that fan-packed faux gymnasium, but still changed from when I had first heard it. Every time I hear it, the record morphs slightly, from youthful play to noisy showcase of competence to a soothing exercise in cheerful repetition. In Opacities, Sofia Samatar writes that “the spaces between the streetlamps make the world.” Later, she asserts: “Only with fragments can you make a universe; this is what we call worldbuilding.” Horsegirl seem to simply know this, as they’ve said repeatedly, the record provides some great building blocks.

DIET

The week when March turned into April was a week of bad eating. For one, me and my partner kept missing each other for dinner thanks to meetings, work functions, and one short trip that he took at the end of the week. I grew up in a family that always ate together and have put lots of effort into making that the norm for the family I have built for myself, even when we are just two, so eating alone is always an emotional disruption. Because my schedule for the week became both packed and chaotic, I also simply cooked less, relying instead on a few staples that I had stocked the fridge with once I realized what sort of week we would be up against. This was very practical and very helpful, but I am happier when my evenings allow for some chopping, sweating, sauteing, roasting or frying and not just a liberal use of the microwave and the phrase “small side salad.” Below is my food diary from most of this week, a record of everything that stressed me out through the imprint it left on the procession of my meals

Sunday, March 30th

We have woken up irresponsibly late so I am rushing to make us brunch before running out the door for a workshop that my friend is teaching in a co-working space in Chinatown. I scrounge some leftover rice that I had previoulsy cooked with chervil, fried raisins, red onions and spices as well as half a block of tofu that I had forgotten to find a purpose for. I heat some oil in a cast iron pan, crumble the tofu with my hand over it and let that fry while I chop up some romaine. The romaine gets dressed with olive oil, red wine vinegar, nutritional yeast and salt, and I season the tofu rather heavily with turmeric, cumin and smoked paprika, then stir until its color is a vibrant yellow. At this point, I add the rice and stir for another minute or two. Right before serving, I squeeze half a lime over this golden rice and tofu fry and add salt. The result is rich in flavor and the texture is just on the right side of mushy. We eat it all, accompanied with coffee made in the style that I would call Croatian though I know an American would label it as Turkish instead. I rush out while the sludge is still settling into the bottom of my cup.

The workshop is on soup and culminates with a collective riffing on a Superiority Burger recipe. Within the first half hour I am identified as someone who can “man the hearth” and spend most of the dedicated soup making time stirring a giant pot over an induction plate and catching up with friends who are also attending. The workshop is a success, the soup is well received, and because it reminds me of soups that my mom used to make when I was in middle school, eating it with friends feels just right.

On my way home, I duck into a Chinese grocery store and buy four different kinds of tofu (dry spiced, fried, silken, extra firm), several oranges, some chestnuts, frozen bao and a packet of seaweed. At home, my partner has company, they are about to be deeply enthralled in college basketball but they are also hungry and do I want anything from the Ridgewood Taco Factory? Two perfectly crisp empanadas round out my night before I confine myself to the home office to work on edits for my book.

Monday, March 31st

I am up early and trying to make my standard smoothie but we’re completely out of peanut butter and running very low on protein powder. I deal a final blow to the mostly empty jar of almond butter that I had bought for a cake months ago and add some chia seeds and hemp hearts to the smoothie. This works rather well, but it brings me anxiety because I am suddenly remembering a pink slip from the post office that has since disappeared - it’s probably about my protein powder being held hostage by USPS. I make us coffee.

I have brought my own lunch to the office, as I do most days, and it is another fridge clearing effort. I turned the silken tofu, roasted red pepper, garlic, lemon and za’atar dip that a friend and I had with bread in the previous week into a pasta dish and my side salad features radishes from our farmshare, more romaine, a wedge of lemon and a few olives as a briney element that can disguise my being too lazy to bring a proper dressing.

I work late then rush off to yoga. I’m eating alone tonight and both romaine and radishes are back on my plate, except now with dry spiced tofu in a tahini soy dressing and a few potatoes that I microwave until soft then cut in half and sear in a blazing hot cast iron pan.

While I am having my umpteenth cup of coffee for the day, it becomes clear to me that I will likely feel frantic and frenzied all week. So, I quickly take stock of our pantry and give myself an hour to get some stuff on the stove and in the oven before I glue myself to a computer screen again. I stew black eyed peas with negi scallions, bay leaves and red onions, roast turnips tossed in paprika and salt, dredge a generous amount of tiny golden potatoes in oil and salt then chuck those into the oven as well, and fill the last remaining bit of space on its bottom rack with a large cookie sheet covered in sliced sunchokes.

It’s well past midnight when I start getting ready for bed, which includes boxing up and putting all this food away, and I am for the billionth time grateful that I’ve signed up for the farmshare that provided us with this abundance of hearty root vegetables that always have my back.

Tuesday, April 1st

For breakfast, I break with routine and pair my coffee with have overnight oats with chia seeds, hemp hearts, shredded coconut and raisins, topped with half a diced apple, runny tahini and a sprinkle of salt. My lunch is a consequence of the previous day’s dinner: thinly sliced radish and dry spiced tofu tossed with some of the roasted sunchoke chips, tamari, rice vinegar and sesame oil. I grab a cup of coffee from the mediocre French bakery across the street from the office. The coffee is better than what the company coffee maker can do, and the staff make me feel like a regular. That’s worth crossing the street for.

I have a doctor’s appointment after work so by the time I make it home it’s both late and I am feeling unwell. The moment I enter our building, however, I can tell that my partner is hard at work at a mushroom stir fry. In the kitchen, I am greeted with his mise-en-place of carrots, negi scallions, yellow onions, thinly sliced fried tofu, lion’s mane and shiitake mushrooms, and plenty of minced garlic. I pull bao filled with spinach and bao studded with scallions from the freezer and set up the steamer while he sautés, sauces, then sautés some more. We share some very crunchy but otherwise mostly flavorless grapes for dessert, and chase them with more Croatian coffee.

Wednesday, April 2nd

I’ve still not gone to the post office but we’re back on smoothies and I am really enjoying the combination of purple carrots and blueberries. I have coffee with breakfast, then a cup of hojicha tea with a splash of almond milk while I work from home. The day is busy again, one Zoom call after another and several deadlines to meet in-between, so my lunch break is only half an hour long. This is just enough to doctor some leftover soup from my friend’s workshop with tiny potatoes and fried tofu and eat it in the one perpetually sunny spot in our living room. Usually I make a loaf of sourdough on Wednesday afternoons, but today is just too busy.

For dinner, hungry after boxing class, I pile roasted turnips and sunchokes at the bottom of my bowl then pour the black eyed peas over them. While those are microwaving, I slice another radish, this time a purple daikon, and toss it with salt and rice vinegar, my side salad for the night. I make another cup of Croatian coffee. I am feeling down and consider baking something to make myself feel better, but instead just eat slices of a very large and crispy apple dipped in peanut butter, take a long shower, and work on edits for my book until it's time for bed.

I tell my partner that I will figure out how to make a vegan version of a proper New York coffee cake once the book has been transmitted to the printer in the summer.

Thursday, April 3rd

I am up extra early because I am attending a “deep tech” event instead of going to the office so my everyday smoothie is extremely helpful - I make it sleepily and eat it quickly. After arriving at the event, I grab some fruit from the breakfast spread, not so much because I am hungry but because I have the instinct to never refuse free food, especially not something perishable like grapes and strawberries, that I developed while I was broke in graduate school. The event runs long so I go back to this spread for lunch, opting for more fruit and a disappointing raisin-studded bagel that I am pretty sure came from the Wegmans down the street from the event venue.

There is no official afternoon programming for this event, but I have been invited to a “VIP dinner” with some of the attendees. In a private room of a generically hip SoHo restaurant I eat about seven roasted shishito peppers and half a serving of a kale and sweet potato salad. There are no other vegan options, and we are meant to be eating family style. It’s almost 11 at night when I get home and, having passed on several plates of steak and fries, Bolognese with burrata and a big slice of cheesecake, I take the shortest possible path from the door to the fridge. More black eyed peas, more potatoes, ajvar to soothe me by adding a small taste of home to an otherwise exhausting day.

Friday, April 4th

I’m working from home again and I am craving ease and sameness so the day is predictable: a smoothie for breakfast, black eyed peas with potatoes ajvar and a side salad (radish, cucumber, salt, lemon juice) for lunch. I tell myself, and my manager, that I have worked too much overtime this week and will log off early, but it’s already quarter to five when I head out of the home office to wash my face and put on my running shoes.

I manage a little over six miles of solid running and chase that with half an hour of dumbbell work. In-between I wash some rice and let it soak while I sweat. Once I am done, I cook the rice and sauté a really generous amount of spinach with garlic then finish it with sesame oil and fermented tofu. I layer the spinach on top of cooked rice, then top this silken tofu, a splash of tamari, sesame seeds, and daring dollops of sambal oelek. I love this type of meal and rejoice in the fact that I remembered to finish the spinach with fermented tofu, which is delightfully salty and funky. For dessert, I eat half a bar of dark chocolate filled with hazelnut butter and put down another cup of thick coffee. I head back into the home office.

Saturday, April 5th

I really need some time away from screens so my best friend takes me hiking by the Hudson river about an hour outside of New York City. On our way there, we pick up bagels from the bagel spot that I try to frequent every weekend, usually with my partner. My friend opts for a toasted everything bagel with scallion tofu spread and I get my usual, a pumpernickel everything bagel with veggie tofu spread, untoasted. Eating it by the river makes it extra pleasurable.

The day is gray and rainy but our hike is relaxed and the raindrops that bashfully deflate the curl of my hair also wash out some of the week’s tiredness and resentment out of me. Afterwards, we drive into Nyack, NY and settle into a vegan café where everything looks extremely homemade and you can peruse various pieces of witchy jewelry and tiny “fairy houses” while you wait for your meal. I have a tempeh BLT and a cupcake that I am told is Oreo flavored, but is mostly just sugary and squidgy in a nondescript but satisfying way. The sandwich feels straight out of some 1990s vegan cookbook and the tempeh is not at all crispy, but that has its place too, and I am feeling as good as I’ve felt all week.

Later, back in the city, I fall back into whatever of the week’s rhythm is left in my body. I work on book edits some more then dinner is black eyed peas again, now topped with a bit of crumbled fermented tofu and shredded purple daikon that I massaged with salt and lemon juice. I serve this with a slice of homemade sourdough from the freezer, toasted and generously slathered with the vegan “butter” from Trader Joe’s. It’s not my favorite to bake with, but I quite like it on bread. I eat some grapes and take my time with another cup of Croatian coffee. I edit some more and eat some Sour Patch Kids, my favorite candy, before crawling into bed.