JJ Grey is a musician from North Florida.  Other writers have described his music as front porch soul, swamp funk, all kinds of adjectives slapped together to label something for the advertising departments that doesn't need a label.  It's just damn good music.  And to make it JJ has proven himself to be one of our finest songwriters.  His songs are taught and full of the characters, sawgrass and water that make up his home.  But to leave it at that is to do him a disservice.  There's a depth to his songs that moves beyond place toward something greater, something…

You started out wanting to be a writer, ended up formfitting for a while before becoming a musician. Let's start with the writing. How does your initial desire to write affect how you approach writing a song? The Kerouac influence is obvious in your songs, but there's much more at work there than him. What other literary influences do you find creeping into your work? Who should aspiring songwriters be reading?

most recently my friend LENNY KAYE gave me an assignment to read the ALEXANDRIA QUARTET by LAWERNCE DURRELL which lead me to NAQUIB MAHFUZ and the CAIRO…

1: How do you develop style? That is, you play a particular kind of music, you have blues and country and other genres running through your musical veins, but how do you assimilate those and come out your own without seeming like you're just imitating?

I don't have a clue how style comes about. Some things just feel right though. The same way that you know other things aren't for you. You either get it or you don't. I don't follow trends and keep up with what the cool kids are into, and I haven't the foggiest idea what is hip, hot, or about to be the next big thing.…

Tell us about your background. You grew up in the South, went into the Army, became a writer. How did you go from one to the other? Why?

I was born in Millport, Alabama, in my grandparents' house, and we lived in and around Millport until I was seven, when we moved to Mississippi. In those days my father worked on a channelization project for the WPA and sharecropped (cotton). A year or so before we moved to Mississippi, he got a job on the assembly line at Beneke Corporation in Columbus. Beneke made toilet seats in those days and, so far…

The Industrial Worker Book Review has recently interviewed Patrick Michael Finn, author of the novella, A martyr for Suzy Kosasovich (Cleveland State University Poetry Center, 2008), and the short story collection, From the Darkness Right Under Our Feet (Black Lawrence Press, 2011). A native of the industrial town, Joliet, Illinois, Finn currently teaches at Chandler-Gilbert Community College in Arizona.

Eric Miles Williamson: I came across your most recent book, From the Darkness Right Under Our Feet, a few months…

Anis Shivani is a poet, short story writer, critic and novelist. His debut collection of short fiction, Anatolia and Other Stories, was longlisted for the 2010 Frank O'Connor Award. A second collection, The Fifth Lash and Other Stories, is forthcoming in 2012. His debut collection of poetry, My Tranquil War and Other Poems, will also be released in 2012. Long known for his forceful, passionate criticism, especially for the Huffington Post, Shivani released his first collection of criticism (reviewed on this site) back in November. Against the Workshop: Provocations,…

1: What is most striking about your books is the style, your compression of line and event. Whereas many realists go for the long line, the expansive book, you have moved in the opposite direction. And yet, realism is never lost. How did your style come about? There are echoes of Algren, Farrell, Borges, Dos Passos, but its always you.

Stream-of-consciousness went for the flow of the mind, of thought; I am trying for the flow of action, of events. I don't think most of us – especially in this "Information Age" – live our lives in a smooth and…

1: You have labored as a gunite worker, cement mason, carpet layer, mover, professional trumpet player, demolitionist, and longshoreman amongst other things. At what point did you say "writer" and begin pushing yourself toward it? Why, when so many choose not to, did you claw your way out of destitution and struggle? How can others do it?

EMW: I get asked variations on a theme of this question often—I suppose because it's a good question.

I never wanted to be a writer, never set out to become a writer, and, even today, with…