The Michigan Daily’s Arts section has impacted us all greatly. From the words we have written, to the friendships we have made, to the ways we have grown, our time here has helped make us who we are. Even for a group of writers, it can be incredibly difficult to put into words just how much this community has shaped us. However, we decided to take this opportunity to do just that. The Arts B-Sides always inspire the most vulnerable, intimate writings, and because this is the final B-Side that we will be participating in before we graduate, this felt like the perfect opportunity to write about how much Daily Arts means to us. And because this B-Side’s theme is “Firsts,” it felt even more appropriate: What better way for seniors to honor their time here than by writing about their favorite “Firsts” related to the Arts section, as we all contemplate the endings — the “Lasts” — that await us?
First interview: Meeting a hero is fine, just don’t call them a hero
There was a point in my junior year — right around the start of the second term — when I suddenly awoke from my album-review-every-week grindset and realized that I hadn’t done a single interview in my four semesters at The Daily. I’d be lying if I said that nose-to-the-ground mentality wasn’t an escape from the monolithic task I had always envisioned interviewing to be. The irony was, in my hasty attempt to snag an interview at a concert, I stumbled into speaking with an all-time hero. The immense pressure didn’t wash over me until Phil Elverum (of The Microphones and Mount Eerie fame) replied to my email saying that he was starting his tour next week, so the interview had to take place within the next few days. I only had a day to come up with all of my questions. For the next 24 hours, nothing else existed in the world. My life became a maelstrom of logistics: what sources could I find, what questions should I avoid, how to even record a phone call — it was very much a learn-as-you-go process. And then the actual interview came, announced by my phone screen lighting up with a Washington area code. A gentle voice that was as recognizable to me as members of my own family gave a meek “Hello,” as if to gauge whether he had the right number. It was time. The conversation went about as well as I ever could have expected. We talked about infinity and the music industry and (because I couldn’t help myself) iconography. Ultimately, he found the sort of indie folk mythos fans build around him rather baffling and occasionally unnerving. Even in hearing all this, something in me felt like I would live to regret not mentioning how impactful his work has been to me when the interview was over. His response was a sort of muted graciousness, one that couldn’t quite disguise a slight discomfort. It was then I knew I perhaps made a mistake.
Cut to several weeks later, I’m at the concert before Elverum’s set begins, and as I approach the front of the merch table, who is there but Phil selling his own stuff. The question of whether I should mention the interview was looming large in my mind. As I grabbed a poster and paid for it, my last opportunity was staring at me. But I realized I was just staring at a man. I walked back to my seat, waited for that man to come on stage and tell me his story in the one way he knows how.
Daily Arts Writer Drew Gadbois can be reached at gadband@umich.edu.
First Race Day
The Arts marathon team was the first time I was convinced to leave my book behind to sweat it out across the finish line. Bizarrely, I credit the Arts section for pushing me toward physical fitness. While not the fastest runner, I found my way back to running through Daily Arts. The Arts section runs the Probility Ann Arbor Marathon as a relay team of four. We have written extensively and scrupulously about our experience training (and sometimes not training). An unlikely combination to be sure — media reviewing and sprinting — but it works. Besides the other memories made, I will treasure running in the Arb, making race T-shirts and navigating the labyrinthine Michigan Medicine complex with Arts friends. I’m thankful to have seen the people whose brains, writing and personalities I adore in a new context. The Arts marathon team was the first time I was convinced to leave my book behind to sweat it out across the finish line.
Daily Arts Writer Elizabeth Yoon can be reached at elizyoon@umich.edu.
First time I was personally vulnerable in an Arts article: The Queer B-Side
I knew I’d wanted to write about Queerness, quarantine and my One Direction phase again; Katrina Stebbins’s announcement of the Queer B-Side a year ago gave me the perfect opportunity. But to do it, I would have to come out — not only as a Queer woman, but as a Directioner. Luckily for me, Arts is an incredibly wonderful, welcoming, supportive space where I have never felt uncomfortable with my identity or with my opinions about media (everyone is surprisingly nice about my “Twilight” obsession). I was nervous about coming out in such a public way — sometimes, when I get an email from a random person who read my article, I’ll realize I’ve forgotten how big of a readership The Daily really has. After all, someone could Google my name (no one is Googling my name) and have this article come up! Still, having this platform, and being able to use it to talk about things that are important to me, has been invaluable.
It’s fitting, and somewhat bittersweet (and a little bit meta), that this is the last B-Side I’ll write for. I’m being vulnerable about my vulnerability. A Last about my First. I loved you then, Daily Arts, and I love you now.
Daily Arts Writer Emilia Ferrante can be reached at emiliajf@umich.edu.
First time my article got published: 250 words for Frank Ocean
I wrote for my high school newspaper for three years, writing articles mostly about music and pop culture. When I was writing my “Why Michigan?” essay back in 2018, I highlighted The Daily, saying, “Beyond the classroom, I would join The Michigan Daily to continue my love for working on a school paper.” I held true to that promise. In October of my freshman year, I applied for a writer’s spot on the Daily Arts Music Beat. The rest, as they say, is history, but one of my fondest and most vivid memories from my time at The Daily was the excitement and anxiety surrounding my first published article: “Frank Ocean returns with a second: ‘In My Room.’ ” Coming in at a measly 250 words, this single review took me hours. I recall sitting in the Shapiro Undergraduate Library day after day, trying to figure out how I could write a perfect, show-stopping piece in such tight constraints. Every word, every sentence, was painstakingly edited, removed and then re-added, until I finally decided that there was nothing more I could do. Submitting that article had me on pins and needles waiting for feedback, waiting to hear that my article was not up to par with what The Daily published. I checked The Daily website every day, waiting to see when it would go up. When it finally did, I felt euphoric. Seeing my name and my words on a website, getting to send it to all my friends and family, was the best feeling. I quickly stopped feeling nervous about writing, realizing that The Daily was forgiving of error and would help me become the best writer that I could be without ever putting me down. Looking back, my Frank Ocean review is one of my least favorite articles I’ve written from a quality perspective. But in terms of nostalgia? It’s probably my favorite.
Daily Arts Writer Gigi Ciulla can be reached at gigishea@umich.edu.
First friend I made at The Daily: Or, the one time that stalking was okay
The reason that, Daily Arts writer, Sabriya Imami and I are such good friends is because she stalked me. Okay, yes, we have a lot of things in common, but we only ever found all that out because she stalked me. For one of my sample pieces in the Daily Arts application, I wrote about my experience on #BookTok, and in a stroke of bravery, I decided to link to my account in the piece. Little did I know that while I sat anxiously for the next few days, waiting to hear whether I’d be hired, Sabriya was scrolling through my videos during the hiring meeting … then moving on to my Instagram, where she deduced from my bio that I must have been a “Gilmore Girls” fan (in omnia paratus!). After I introduced myself at my first-ever Daily Arts Sunday meeting, Sabriya asked me if I was “the BookTok girl,” then whether my local Barnes & Noble was the one in Northville, because she recognized the building in one of my videos. By the end of that first meeting, we had exchanged phone numbers and made plans to get coffee later in the week, and because of her “detective skills” we had no shortage of things to talk about. I haven’t connected with somebody that easily since I was in the first grade, and even though stalking is normally frowned upon, I’m so grateful that Sabriya did. She was not only my first friend from The Daily, but my first friend anywhere on campus since I had just transferred to the University of Michigan. I can say with certainty that we are going to stay friends for a very, very long time.
Daily Arts Writer Hannah Carapellotti can be reached at hmcarp@umich.edu.
First viral article: When Harry Styles’ mom tweeted my article
For one of my first B-Side pieces for The Daily, I, of course, wrote about Harry Styles — his start as a member of One Direction, his move to a successful solo career and his start in acting. I thought nothing of it. It was nothing more than another love letter. Only this time it was backed with solid evidence as to why Harry Styles is one of the best human beings to walk this planet.
I woke up to several emails a few days after publication:
“I don’t even know if this will reach you and you’ll be able to ever read this, but I felt the urge to thank you for the beautiful article you’ve written about Harry Styles’s career for The Michigan Daily.”
“I recently read your article ‘Harry Styles, boy-bandhood and beyond’ published in The Michigan Daily. I came to know about it via Ms. Anne Twist’s tweet today. I am so glad to come across it. If Ms. Anne likes it, it surely is special.”
That second line hit me: Did I just read that Harry’s mom tweeted my article? Absolutely dripping sweat, I rushed to Twitter. She had quoted The Daily’s tweet of my article, writing, “A lovely piece to read with my morning coffee.” I screamed and alerted everyone I knew. What if Anne shared the article with her son? Has Harry himself read my words? Sometimes, I still tell myself yes.
Daily Arts Writer Laura Millar can be reached at lamillar@umich.edu.
First hate mail: Insulting readers with my “embarrassing, pompous drivel”
I’d like to dedicate my blurb to all the haters. As a book reviewer, one might be shocked at the amount of hate mail I’ve received over the past four years. Some of it has been funny, some unpredictable, some very problematic and always, of course, mean. This goes out to all of our readers who take the time to draft (grammatically incorrect) messages while they rage. Here’s the first hate mail I received for an article I wrote about John Green for a themed magazine on cancel culture:
“Let me just start with … why did you feel the need to write that silly article? Just because he made up a fake drug? And has a particular way of writing? Girl, I know you have cancer and I’m sorry but … this is a low blow. This is why cancel culture is as toxic as it is. People are ‘canceling’ celebrities and public figures left and right just because they don’t agree with something. If (you’re) that upset that you feel the need to write that silly article, just (don’t) read his books. Or watch his movies. Find a different author (perhaps a biography, cause it sure as hell looks like you don’t enjoy fiction). But, I’ll also let you know that while his books may be corny, he’s also done quite a lot of good. In his movie adaptation of ‘The Fault in our Stars,’ he gave real cancer kids the chance to be on the big screen, and he donated money from both the book and movie to cancer research. He has an advice podcast. He, with his brother Hank, have a YouTube channel, dedicated to learning. I’m not saying you must like him. You don’t have to. What I am saying is that there are plenty of public figures who are way more toxic and dangerous than John Green. Write about them. Bring attention to them and the way they act. This article was not necessary and kind of feels like a scream into the void for attention. Are you satisfied?
An annoyed reader.”
Daily Arts Writer Lillian Pearce can be reached at pearcel@umich.edu.
First email: The time a little nostalgia went a long way
Okay, I have a confession: This was not actually the first email I received in response to an article. The first email I ever got was a subtly transphobic response to this article. Funnily enough, the email I am writing about, the first kind response I ever received, was referencing the same article, but it took less of a focus on women in gaming and more on a shared experience:
“I read your gamer girl story in the Daily earlier today, and I just wanted to let you know that I really appreciated it, because it reminded me of how my little sister and I used to play video games together when we were kids. I remember those moments really fondly, and it was nice to see that other people have had similar experiences, even if it did take you a bit longer to get to actually playing the games. Glad to see that you finally did get there, though. I hope you’re having fun with Zelda :)”
The piece in question, “Gaslight, Gatekeep, Gamer Girl,” was a deep dive into the experiences of female gamers and my own upbringing around video games. That article was deeply personal and focused on someone integral to my interest in video games and, subsequently, digital culture: my big brother. I shared a beloved part of my childhood and defended it fiercely. To hear that my experience was intimately shared with a stranger was an intense moment for me. When I joined The Daily, I never imagined I would get random, unsolicited responses to my work, and I especially didn’t think I’d forge emotional connections over email. But, here I am, holding onto this stranger’s email because it reminds me why I love to write and why we expose our hearts to the world in our writing.
Daily Arts Writer Maddie Agne can be reached at maagne@umich.edu.
First time I had no idea what to write: The “Annette” fever dream
There is no better feeling than when a work of art leaves you speechless. When you are so completely blown away that you can’t possibly comment on it further. When a work is so bizarre, so ambitious, so effective at doing what it sets out to do that you couldn’t add to it. It simply speaks for itself. It’s a wonderful rush … unless you actually do have to say something about it.
I love when I can go into a film with as little knowledge as possible. It feels like the only way I can be surprised at movies anymore, but it also allows me to bring as fresh of a perspective on it as possible. I heard of “Annette” shortly before its premiere at Cannes in 2021. As a big fan of both Adam Driver and musicals, I was already sold. I didn’t need to know anything else going in. And going in with no other information about the film was both the best possible way to experience it for the first time and left me fully unprepared for what I was about to see.
The only theater near me playing “Annette” was a multiplex 20 minutes away. I was shocked that a big theater was showing a film like “Annette,” but I was less surprised when I walked into an empty theater for the showing. I probably should have expected that, given it was 1:00 on a Wednesday afternoon. The next two and half hours of my life were one of the most mystifying, confusing and invigorating theatrical experiences I have ever had.
How do you write about something you aren’t even sure you experienced? I couldn’t talk to anyone else walking out of the theater, as there wasn’t anyone else. I couldn’t chat with friends, as they hadn’t seen it yet (if they had even heard about it). My piece on “Annette” is not good, maybe one of the worst I wrote for The Daily. It doesn’t really have a clear thesis apart from “it’s bold, it’s weird and I like when films are like that,” and much of it is just me stating things that happen in the film because I really didn’t know what to say about it. And yet, “Annette” is one of my favorite pieces of art that I have written about for The Daily. The piece reads like someone who has no idea what to say about “Annette,” and I think it perfectly captures the feeling of seeing that film better than any other piece I’ve written.
Daily Arts Writer Mitchel Green can be reached at mitchgr@umich.edu.
First Daily gossip sesh: Or, the First night of production
You can’t expect a 550-person organization full of university students whose job is to be nosy and then write about it not to come with just a liiiiiittle bit of gossip on the side. You put four editors who share a love for art and The Daily together for a two-hour patch where there’s a lot of waiting for edits to come in — I mean, what do you expect to happen? As with all gossip, you obviously have to be as kind as you’d want others to be when discussing you, and take care not to extend or stretch the details too hard or maliciously. If you’re like me, someone with their head constantly in the sand about all manner of the relationships of others, there’s a lot of revelations to be had. And, as an added bonus, you get to refine your storytelling skills: the build, the smattering of tiny details to set the scene, the teasing out of the drama before you pounce with the climax. If you’ve done it well, you’ll have the gift of watching your “readers” (co-editors) react in real time, a luxury most published pieces don’t have (though as you can tell from the rest of this article, there are different ways, first and foremost email, that readers can communicate their … interpretations of your article to you).
Gossip, on weeknight evenings when you’re supposed to be finishing homework in the gaps between editing, feels like a delicious, unexpected form of community building. You stay later in the newsroom when the conversation is silly and good, pushing an hour later, then an hour and a half. There’s something so wonderful about realizing all the ways your environment, filled with people you love, is similar to those of your co-editors, especially as you’re just getting to know them. Your weekly edit night becomes a funny little detective group of its own, one willing to share and banter with each other and never take anything more seriously than you’re supposed to. Through gossiping, you build a strange connection, a shared affinity for, exasperation with or endearment toward a set of people. It turns The Daily, seemingly so scary and large, into a community.
Daily Arts Writer Rosa Sofia Kaminski can be reached at fiakamin@umich.edu.
First in-person Arts meeting, post-quarantine: We never really needed a building anyways
I remember that I brought brownies to that first in-person Arts meeting after months and months of quarantine. The funny thing is that I don’t really remember much else. You’d think that it would have stuck with me, that this momentous meeting with my fellow Daily Arts staffers after over a year of no in-person interactions would have struck me as something really special. But it felt like an Arts meeting like any other, and I think that’s actually what made it special. Even though, during quarantine, we were all in different places — some of us on separate corners of the globe — the Daily Arts community never really faltered. Sure, we swapped out half-hour-long icebreakers with Zoom reacts and late nights in the newsroom with late nights squinting at our computers during yet another video call, but the heart of everything felt the same. We were still meeting, still reading and watching and listening, still engaging with art as we always did. The fact that our first in-person meeting after that felt mundane was like proof that our community withstands difficulties. It felt like validation that Daily Arts really could survive through everything — that not only would we continue to make stellar, important content, but we would also be able to keep each other in our lives even when we weren’t seeing each other every day. And for someone about to say goodbye to everyday interactions with these individuals, that’s meaningful. I don’t need to be in the newsroom to keep the spirit of Daily Arts in my life. I just need to open Goodreads and see the newest book that Lillian Pearce has put on her TBR list or listen to a Taylor Swift song and think about baking cookies with Hannah Carapellotti or watch “Minions” and “Marriage Story” back to back to remember the multitudes that the Film Beat contains. I only need to surround myself with art and remain in touch with the people that have impacted me to feel like a part of the Arts section. Yes, I’ll miss 420 Maynard St., but what quarantine and that first in-person meeting afterward taught me was that we didn’t really need the newsroom to be together after all.
Daily Arts Writer Sabriya Imami can be reached at simami@umich.edu.
First night as a Managing Arts Editor: Leaning into the chaos
Full of ideas, treats from the Arts desk candy jar and chutzpah, Laine Brotherton and I started our tenure as Managing Arts Editors at the end of 2022. This was a big first for me, one I couldn’t begin to imagine when I first entered the newsroom as one of many bodies during The Daily’s mass meetings. The vibes were merry and bright during the semester’s final production, with winter break’s soothing embrace within reach. The Arts desk was so packed, people resorted to huddling around, last year’s editors sitting next to the new and all of us settling into our new reality.
Production edits ended pretty quickly for the new editors, and what was a low hum of conversation became a raucous roar. More laughter. More movement. Meanwhile, I began to settle into a gentle panic. Laine and I made eye contact through the chaos: It was time. We were going to publish for the first time, no supervision, no takebacks. We double-checked the caption and triple-checked for Oxford commas, and the first piece we ever published was out in the world. Nothing exploded.
Only half a dozen to go. (And hundreds more after that, though I certainly wasn’t thinking about them at the time.)
It doesn’t really ever stop being scary. But what also doesn’t get old are the high-fives Laine and I give each other amid the chaos of editing and the satisfaction of doing something important — something that makes the work of the writers and editors come to fruition. I learned to love the process of publishing during PowerPoint nights and loud evenings in the newsroom, surrounded by the very people that make the work worth it. The fun doesn’t start after the work is done, the fun is the work itself and what it means. Cheers, Laine. I’ll drink to that.
Managing Arts Editor Sarah Rahman can be reached at srah@umich.edu.
First message of support: An email from Sarma Melngailis
Almost exactly one year ago, I wrote an article covering a Netflix documentary titled, “Bad Vegan.” The documentary was about Sarma Melngailis, a former famous raw-food chef who was disgraced in a scandal that she had allegedly been roped into with her then-husband Anthony Strangis. When writing my piece, I made it a point to highlight the haphazard method of storytelling and how by the end, I didn’t feel satisfied with Sarma’s story. I woke up the morning after the article was published with an email in my inbox from none other than Sarma Melngailis herself. In the email, she expressed that she felt the same frustrations that I did with regards to her documentary. Not only did she tell me that she admires the honest work that journalists do, but she added that my article was better than some of the work that appears in mainstream news. We conversed about the nature of the documentary, as well as next steps in the art of TV.
For the first time, I considered myself a journalist. For the first time, I saw the impact that our words can have on others and on the world. And every time I have published a piece since then, I feel proud to be able to connect with someone with the words I put on a page.
Daily Arts Writer Swara Ramaswamy can be reached at swararam@umich.edu.