Ekko Astral's Jael Holzman on Climate Reporting, the D.C. Community, and Arctic Monkeys

This is a free post from Larry Fitzmaurice's Last Donut of the Night newsletter. Paid subscribers get one or two email-only Baker's Dozens every week featuring music I've been listening to and some critical observations around it.

Ekko Astral's Pink Balloons was one of the most acclaimed rock debuts of last year, and it's one of a few things that bandleader Jael Holzman has going on: In addition to her frontwoman duties as part of the D.C. post-punks, she's also a climate reporter for Heatmap and has put in time as a Congressional journalist as well. (In December of last year, she also reported out the Democrats' utter fecklessness when it comes to the current administration's desire to inflict pain and suffering on trans people; you can read that right here.) In short, she's at the intersection of a few things that make her the type of person I'm always interested in talking to, and we got on the horn near the end of 2024 (the week after Trump was elected if I recall correctly) to chat through a whole bunch of things. Check it out:

How's everything going for you today?
People are asking that question a lot right now, and I would just say it's fucking awful.

Word, that's real. Anything specific contributing to that?
I spent a good part of this year warning a lot of people that I worked with as journalists that all of this was gonna happen, and no one did anything about it and now I'm watching the chaos that I said would happen just kind of happen. That's what I do in my own personal capacity. If it wasn't for the the fact I fully expect all my civil rights and healthcare that I need to survive to go away, I'd be pretty good. I've got a got a nice life.

Yeah, something that was on my list of things to talk to you about is the discrepancy between you and your presumptive colleagues when it comes to level of awareness. Let's start out by talking about how you're currently doing climate reporting.
I'm a beltway baby. I grew up in Rockville, Maryland, and I did a lot of stuff in the local scene—played a lot of singer-songwriter stuff. I got the bug for writing when I went to college and fell in love with working at the school paper. My dream was to either do music or do journalism, and my dad, like a fucking fool, was like, "Well, the money's in journalism." [Laughs] There's no money in either of those things! I wound up having the good fortune, after three years in college, to get an offer that started part-time the week that Trump was inaugurated as a reporter, and I eventually became a full-time reporter in Congress.

Shortly after that, I wound up being obsessed with climate issues in the heat of the first Trump administration, when former lobbyists and government affairs people who represented fossil fuel companies were running agencies. There was a lot of science being meddled with in ways that were quite salacious—and, as a journalist, what's a bigger story than the fate of our planet, the fate of humanity?

I wound up where I am today by getting really obsessed with that nerdy topic, and that's still how I make my daily bread. I write for a fossil-free news outlet called Heatmap that launched last year. I write a newsletter that launched a few months ago about conflicts over building solar and wind farms, battery storage projects, and the things that we need to wean off of fossil fuels and rely on renewable energy sources. I'm the only journalist in the country that has a dedicated focus on that issue, as far as I know—and as far as the academics I've spoken to have told me.

Us not accepting fossil fuel advertisements definitely has made it easier to sleep at night, and after all the time I was in Congress covering politics, I find it much easier to rest and take stock. For the first time in my life, between my journalism and music, I feel like I'm dedicating my life to bettering the world. So much of the media is so concentrated, and it focuses on clicks, influence, and access. I feel very lucky and fortunate to have the chance to help people through that work.

Obviously, a lot has changed in the world—and in the profession of journalism—since you first started working in the field. Walk me through some of the changes you've witnessed on your side of things.
I'm deeply troubled by how few of the lessons we learned from that era were internalized by the industry. I'll give you a really clear example: Even just today,
there's a bunch of bullshit being strewn about about who Donald Trump is gonna put in charge of an agency. Our whole business spent years writing about how these people are just figureheads—we did copious journalism on that topic. How did this business change? Well, the website that most journalists who are based in D.C. used to get their daily information was acquired by a man who fully backed the now-elected President Trump and has particular ideologies that are that are hateful and painful, and at times [he] spouts rampant disinformation about climate, vaccines, and other diseases.

Because there isn't enough public evidence about the throttling and siloing, there's nothing I can really do to prove it all to you—but the vibes, as someone who has watched it all up close pre-and-post-Elon Musk...the city changed, in terms of Elon Musk's acquisition of Twitter. We've talked about this publicly, but Ekko Astral are now working on our next record, and a lot of it is focused on Washington, D.C.—how it's changed in the last 10 years, how we've reached the point that we're at today. On some level lyrically, in some of the new stuff it's literally me furiously writing stuff into my notes apps as I'm hearing people ask racist, transphobic, or wrongheaded questions of people who are vulnerable, or lawmakers of marginalized communities, or myself. I'm struck by the lack of self-reflection, but it's damning. It's damning.

I think there are people in the business today that are still trying to do good work. I have friends that, in my own personal capacity, I urge to ask more questions. I spent months urging my colleagues and peers to ask themselves what would happen if Delaware elected its first trans member of Congress, because I knew that they could ban that person from going to the bathroom—and ban me and everyone else who was trans from using the restroom with the the flick of a switch, because you don't need a law. They control the buildings. But now that they're actually banning trans people from the restroom, I'm getting texts from my friends who are like, "I miss you"—and I'm like, "Well, a little too little too late, but I miss you too and I'm glad you're required to think about this to think about me."

I'm curious—what do you think is the way that industry has changed over the last 10 years from the arts perspective? I've only seen it from the politics perspective.

I feel like the gravest misassumption I've made in my career is that people I'd come in contact with who are interested in music and art also have some sort of progressive ideology that they care about, which is why like I try to operate as independently as possible with music writing at this point. I'm able to operate without being worried about somebody being like, "Maybe you shouldn't express this viewpoint."
I mean, maybe I'm old school, but I do think there is still some value in journalists who cover things really trying to not have the way they see the world [influence them]. You can't control how people use the information in public. I spent a long time afraid that even expressing that I was trans was going to mean that I wasn't going to be able to get the jobs that I wanted to get at the media outlets that I ultimately wound up working at. But I think that it was only because of the experience that I'd had by working in their midst, closeted for some time...you know, I'm struck by what you're saying, in part because I hesitate to use the word "disappointed" because I don't think it accurately describes the feeling. There's frustration, anguish, and anxiety in there, because we know how important the work that we do is.

I remember the moment that the switch flipped for me and I realized that so much of the work we do is vaporware. A PR pitch to an editor gets an album review, that gets a Spotify playlist, which produces a loop that then makes an artist interesting. By that same token, so much of this is a PR pitch that gets an article written about a politician that kills legislation or impacts the way that we see an election. I can give you one one example. We have a lot that we're discussing right now about whether or not an advertisement that said "Kamala is for they/them, Trump is for you" turned this election. I'm sure that somewhere, someone has a cool data product that says that. But that is the media catching on to that narrative in a way that's showing their own biases against populations—not actually revealing the substance of whether or not that issue turned people.

The only advertisement that seems to have actually registered any change in people's opinions related to trans undocumented immigrants in prison—is it the trans part? Is it the immigrant part? Is it the prisoner part? Do we even know that? Are we going to just eliminate rights and health care for a sizable percentage of not only a population, but a population that that that predominantly votes for the party that's going to throw the population under the bus? It's a situation where the media bubble in Washington, D.C. is choking on itself—and I've written about this before, this literally happened last year—you could choke Washington, D.C. in wildfire smoke and they wouldn't do anything about climate change. Everyone's just high on their own supply these days. It's dispiriting, but it can also be encouraging, because if everything is vaporware, it means that you and I might actually be able to make the difference. Because if all this is bullshit, it means it's actually easier than you think to disrupt it.

Tell me more about your relationship with D.C.
I'm from Rockville, Maryland, right outside of D.C. on one end of the red line of the metro. I went to college at the University of Vermont and interned for NPR affiliates in Boston, but other than that I've lived in D.C. and the DMV Beltway area for almost my entire life. I've lived in D.C. proper almost consistently, except for during lockdown. I've moved into the periphery of Maryland occasionally, but I've been in the area my whole life, and I've watched this place change in so many ways. It also influences my art and everything I do, and at this point—even though I have my own complaints, as any resident of a metropolitan area will tell you—I don't foresee myself leaving. My family's here. My friends are here. My love is here. My band is here. My community is here. And honestly, if anything, at this moment, people need people who aren't going to be scared to speak up and provide space.

Tell me more about what community means to you in that respect, as well as how you've seen D.C. change over the years.
D.C.'s gone through its fair share of shifts in the music and art scene over the last decade. I moved here around the time the first Priests album dropped. I wasn't active in the scene when they were active—I first became active in the D.C. arts community after lockdown, when a lot of people needed people. Before that, there was definitely a bit of a stasis. There were these great venues that were not doing that hot and ultimately closed, like Rock & Roll Hotel and the old Songbird.

There's been ups and downs. For me, after lockdown, the music scene—I don't know if we were part of creating this, if we did have a small role, I'm proud of that—but I would say it was a group effort from DIY show organizers and other bands in the scene to get a degree of organizing and familial relationship where all of our bands could hop on each other's bills and shout each other out in a way that said "We're all in this together." That happened to align very well with the post-COVID lockdown need for community in the D.C. queer community.

You know, if D.C. was the 51st state, it would be one of the queerest states, if not the queerest state per capita in the United States based on population. One of the things about the community here is that so much of the front-facing culture is a suit-and-tie, dress pants energy, but there's this underground subaltern of people—the people who fucking ride the bus every day, which is always packed, and most people who ride the bus are not the ones who work in Congress or in office buildings at agencies. Those are people who migrate in from Virginia and Maryland. The people who actually live here and go to shows and are part of the community work trades, or at restaurants and bars. We're the real D.C. that comes out. The people who go to go-go clubs, that's fucking D.C.

In the last few years, it's really blossomed. There are cases like ours where we've achieved some press attention—and, like, I'm glad people listen to our music, and I hope that Ekko goes well–but I can just open my phone, see what show is happening in a week, and know that show is going to be sick. I proudly say anywhere I go that D.C. is one of the strongest music scenes locally in the country—hands down, without a doubt. That's because of David Combs, Bad Moves, Rediscover Fire Booking. It's because of Miri, my band's drummer, who's in, like, four or five different bands at this point. It's because of the people in this community that really have dedicated themselves even beyond what I've done, who I'm immeasurably thankful for. Nowadays, there's whole friend groups that exist purely because of the shows that formed after lockdown.

I'm always interested in asking people who are actively involved in music scenes how things could be improved upon. What do you see as potential improvements to the D.C. scene?
I think the broader public in in the United States needs to understand that D.C. punk and D.C. music didn't die with Fugazi. It's probably as active, if not more active, than it was back then—and I think people would be surprised by how active and present we make ourselves in the face of local and institutional repression. It's one thing to make culture about what happens in your country—it's another to make culture from within the locus, the epicenter, of that country, and D.C. music is as alive and as vibrant as it ever was. People also need to understand in our scene that this is an inclusive one—one that is safe. We take great pains to monitor for abuse at our shows and make it abundantly clear that our shows are safe for people no matter their gender identity, race, or background.

With taking pride in your local scene, there are so many bands and artists that have come out of D.C. artists that have left—and I'm not naming names, but to leave D.C. after dedicating your career to it, that's okay, but don't forget where you came from. Right. Don't forget that we can be your ally and your crutch in the face of anything else, and if you stand by D.C., D.C. will stand by you. And the venues here rule—the small rooms even more than the big ones. If you haven't been to Pie Shop or to Comet Ping Pong, you're just fucking up.

Something Ekko is trying to do—something I think more artists should try to do —is to adequately and accurately represent what it's like to live here. Everyone thinks that being in D.C. is House of Cards or Veep or The West Wing. That couldn't be further from the truth. Living in D.C. is like Euphoria—like a fucking slacker stoner comedy. That's what living in D.C. is like, and it's a theme that we roll with a lot. We drive by the CIA to go to work every day—what does it mean to other people? What does it mean to us?

We make it clear that there's still fucking joy here. In fact, there's copious amounts of love here. You're required to find it. I got into an argument recently with people on social media because—and maybe this is a radical thing to say after this election —but I still have Republican friends, and I'm trans. People will go, "How could you?" And I go, "How could I not?" These are people who would come to my aid at the hospital if I was shot. Do I throw them away?

People don't understand that, in D.C., your political party or where you work is as normal as the factory that you work in. Imagine living in Detroit and being like, "Oh, you work at Ford. We don't fuck with you." I understand people's high emotions, and if you roll that way with your friends and how you make your life, I get it. But, I mean, I got people who have my back that are Republicans that are far better friends of mine than whoever is Resistance-posting their way through another election result that didn't go their way.

The new record's gonna be a concept record about the Beltway, is that correct?
Yeah. There's one more song that we're still working the kinks out of, but it's 95% written. We played a lot of it at our recent performance at the National Gallery of Art, and we're recording it next month.

Last summer, we'd recorded Pink Balloons, which itself was a meditation on anticipating the precise direction of our country that wound up happening—which is depressing. Last summer, I became really convinced that this was going to happen—it went from being like a fear and a postulation to, "No, I'm so dead set that this is going to happen that we should just start making a concept record about the end of America as we know it. This feels predictable and statistically likely."

I hate to be this level of a bummer, but if you looked in a vacuum and you have an unpopular president running for re-election in an economy against a guy who lost narrowly last time because of stuff outside of his control, you'd be easily predicting that election. That's how I predicted Trump would win in 2016. I hate being right on this shit. But in this case, why don't we start making an album that really will align with how people will feel when the dust settles?

I'm sure there's a lot of people who are putting pen to paper right now because they were surprised by this result, but we spent a year and a half working on our record, and we go into the studio next month. We don't have a title for it, or a cover, or any plans on how we're gonna put it out—but it's definitely the best art we've ever worked on, and I think it's because we spent so much time on it and everything wound up coming to pass.

There's a song we've been playing live called "The Beltway Is Burning," and wrote it in April or May of [2024]. The lyrics are about a presidential assassination that brings about the end of America as we know it. We performed it for the first time at the Sultan Room right after [Trump] got shot and it was crazy. There's another track that's called "Elegy for a System," and the day we went in to demo it was the day that Trump picked [J.D. Vance].

I don't want to say too much about the record, but this is stuff we've been performing, so it's not like I'm talking about stuff that hasn't been, at least, put onto setlist.fm. But it has felt like that movie with Will Ferrell. Do you know what I'm talking about? I can't remember the name of the movie.

Stranger Than Fiction?
Yeah.

Word. I've seen you cite Arctic Monkeys as an influence. I love them, I honestly think they're one of the best rock bands of the last 25 years. Very underrated. Talk to me about your love of Arctic Monkeys.
Thank you for asking me about one of my favorite bands. When you say that you're an AM fan, people will either immediately bond with you or think your taste is trash—wrongfully. I would say I'm a passive fan of everything up to Tranquility Base, but Tranquility Base and The Car I am a rabid fan of. I'm like, "What the fuck? This is some of the best music anyone has ever made."

I wish [Ekko Astral guitarist] Liam Hughes was here, because he'd have a lot more to say than even I would. The older stuff, the riffs, definitely were a starting place for Liam mentally when we started out. I come from a huge amount of post-punk fandom—I'm the Savages fan in the band, per se—so I'd try and explain stuff to Liam and have to show him who Car Seat Headrest was. There wasn't a shared language. But with Arctic Monkeys, I was like, "Yeah, it's that little noodle-y thing," just naming songs.

On Pink Balloons, the two biggest lyrical influences for me were Alex Turner and Charli XCX. There was this game that we'd play in the studio where I'd say lines from the record like Alex Turner. [Does Alex Turner impression] "Poppin' wheelies on a flat screen TV." Once you hear it, you can't unhear it. There's also the way that Charli uses consonants and vowels, really emphasizing stuff like the "p" in pop.

Did you see Arctic Monkeys on their most recent tour?
I didn't. I did see them on the Tranquility Base tour when they headlined at Firefly Festival, and honestly, I'm happier I saw them there. I don't even remember what drugs I was on at the time, but I do remember that I was shouting very loudly the entire time and dancing by myself. No one I knew gave a shit, and I'm over there just watching people leave before the encore and running up to the stage like, "What do you mean, they haven't played 'Four out of Five' yet?"

Strings in rock music are still very underrated. Our producer Jeremy Snyder performs as Pure Adult with his friend Bianca, and he loves adding strings to our music. There's definitely gonna be more strings on the next record. We definitely take a lot of influence from that baroque mentality that Alex does. Who would've thought Arctic Monkeys would make lounge music? That's the best shit they've ever made. My approach to music is that if you're getting into this shit to make stuff that everyone's heard before...what a waste of time and money, personally speaking.