Скачать или смотреть (*both laugh*) - The Dying Scene Quarantine Chats: Episode 14 - Mike Henneberger

For Episode 14 of our quarantine chat series (*both laugh*), we were joined by Mike Henneberger. Trying to narrow down an appropriate descriptor for Mike is a difficult task: he's been the lead singer of a south Texas-based Christian ska band. He's done some time in the US Army. He started a veteran's services-related charity called Zero Platoon. He won an Emmy for his work on Comedy Central's "Night Of Too Many Stars."

Now, Mike has published his first book. It's called "Rock Bottom At The Renaissance: An Emo Kid's Journey Through Falling In And Out Of Love In And With New York City," and it's a harrowing memoir to say the least. Really, there are sort of two main narratives; one that tells the longview of Mike's history, and one that takes place over the course of a singular weekend several years back during which he, accompanied only by a handful of prescription pills and a bottle of Johnnie Walker, locked himself in a room at the Renaissance Hotel in Times Square in order to write.

What came out was a love story, I guess. It's not, like, a Nicholas Sparks-style love story, by any stretch. It's a raw, uncomfortable tale of looking for "the one" in New York City; of trying and failing and trying and failing and almost willing it to happen come hell or high water. Each chapter also centers around a song. Sometimes it's a song that was stuck in his head at the time, sometimes it's a song that reminded him of a situation. It's a written mixtape if you will, featuring the likes of Mayday Parade and Bright Eyes and Jimmy Eat World and Death Cab and Brand New and The Dangerous Summer and more.

This is a long one. We ran into a few technical difficulties, but then we just kept chatting, so stick with it, because it's pretty good. And HUGE props to Mike not only for being a gracious and honest guest, but for actually stitching the two parts of the video together. That's way above my paygrade, and I'm the host!