michelel72

Posted by Athena Scalzi

https://whatever.scalzi.com/2025/06/24/the-big-idea-travis-kennedy/

https://whatever.scalzi.com/?p=56175

We’re gettin’ the band back together! And this time, they’re gonna rock the political climate in foreign countries. Author Travis Kennedy is bringing you the best of hair metal bands with espionage on the side in his debut novel, The Whyte Python World Tour. Follow along to see how his Big Idea will shred… your expectations of 80s bands!

TRAVIS KENNEDY:

In my debut novel, The Whyte Python World Tour, the CIA recruits a hair band to foment regime change in the Eastern Bloc at the end of the Cold War.

That’s not the big idea I want to write about here, though, and I’ll be the first to admit that I didn’t dream it up on my own. There’s nearly a century of evidence that the CIA has meddled with popular music to influence public sentiment all over the world. More specifically for my purposes, there’s a longstanding rumor – made popular by the fantastic podcast “Wind of Change” by Patrick Radden Keefe (2020) – that the CIA wrote the hit Scorpions song “Wind of Change” after the Berlin Wall fell, to rally Eastern Europeans into harmony with the Western world through the power of soft metal.

By the time I heard the podcast, I had been thinking about writing a book in the world of glam metal for almost twenty years – and even earlier on some level, since I was a little kid in the 80s watching MTV even though I wasn’t supposed to. Eight-year-old Travis saw metal guys as zany party animals without a care in the world. The cool kids in the back of the bus. In more recent years, I read autobiographies and biographies and watched documentaries from the era, believing all along that there was a story to be told there that could be bigger than the standard “Behind the Music” drama about how everything was great until it all came crashing down.

I didn’t entirely know why the genre captivated me so much. The entertainment factor never let me down, of course; a lot of their adventures are objectively funny. These borderline-feral Muppets were suddenly swimming in fame and fortune, and they didn’t have any of the tools to handle either. That was a good place to start. But I did learn quickly that my childhood impression of the glam metal bands was all wrong. 

Because more often than not, these guys were not the cool kids in the back of the bus. They were misfits. Outcasts. They had abusive and tragic childhoods. 

They usually weren’t popular. They did badly in school. People had no expectations for them. And they didn’t have much expectations for themselves. But they had this one thing they loved and were good at. 

Music. 

And while they were misfits on their own, when they found each other and played together, they unlocked these superpowers. The castaways and dropouts – with their massive hair, and makeup, and spandex – dominated the zeitgeist of the back half of the 1980s. It was one underdog story after another, like the Mighty Ducks or the Bad News Bears.

There it was: that simple but true BIG IDEA, proven over and over: that when misfits and outcasts find their communities, they can accomplish really big things together.

By the time I listened to “Wind of Change,” I knew already that metal dudes shared a lot of hidden traits. They were resourceful. They were adaptable. They were willing to live in circumstances that most other people weren’t. And they were constantly underestimated.

Those are actually really good qualities for spies! 

So, while the concept was still hilarious to me, it was also weirdly kind of plausible. Now I was off and running, and a fascinating thing happened – the big idea kept finding different ways of telling itself in the story. Without spoiling too much, the band Whyte Python is not the only group of underdogs in this book; and whether it’s their Agency handlers or the people living under dictatorships a world away, the spark of music becomes a pretty powerful connector for disparate outcasts who go on to accomplish big things together.

Make no mistake, The Whyte Python World Tour is a satire. But always present is the belief that art – even if that art is party metal, played by feral Muppets – has immeasurable power when it’s shared. When it means something to people, and helps them find other people who have the same feelings about it. You’re doing that now as fans of this website, and every time you give a recommendation for a book or an album or a movie you loved. Participating in culture means that you’re a part of a thousand little movements, inspiring others to seek new ideas and talk about them with each other and maybe build something amazing out of it. 

So on behalf of the band, let me be the first to say: welcome to the revolution. 

Tell your friends.

The Whyte Python World Tour: Amazon|Barnes & Noble|Bookshop

Author Socials: Website|Band Website|Facebook|Twitter|Rikki Thunder’s Facebook|Davy Bones Facebook|Spencer Dooley Facebook|Buck Sweet Facebook

https://whatever.scalzi.com/2025/06/24/the-big-idea-travis-kennedy/

https://whatever.scalzi.com/?p=56175

Posted by John Scalzi

https://whatever.scalzi.com/2025/06/23/back-in-the-day-and-here-and-now/

https://whatever.scalzi.com/?p=56163

My friend George sent me this picture of me and Krissy — which I had been literally trying to find for years! — where she and I were at the wedding of my friend Clete. I was a groomsman, which is why I’m dressed up; Krissy is dressed up because, you know, wedding, you’re supposed to look nice. I seem to remember the wedding taking place in 1995, although I might be off by a year; either way, this is us, roughly 30 years ago.

And here we are now!

30 years is a lot of time and also, not nearly enough time with someone if you love them a lot. Fortunately for us we get to keep going. Not gonna lie, though, I miss my hair. Krissy’s still looks spectacular, of course. That’ll have to be enough for the both of us.

Also, hello, we’re back in the United States now. Venice was lovely. I’ll post some more pictures of it soon.

— JS

https://whatever.scalzi.com/2025/06/23/back-in-the-day-and-here-and-now/

https://whatever.scalzi.com/?p=56163