Tierney Talks

Send us a textLive from L.A. Stories, a reading and fire relief fundraiser I presented at Murmurs Gallery on April 27th, 2025. Ticket sales benefited Altadena Girls. Featured readers included Wendy C. Ortiz, Anna Dorn, Jasmine Johnson, Alicia Novella Vasquez, Heather Jewett, Tasbeeh Herwees, Taleen Kali, Clement Goldberg, and Marcel Alcalá (you won't hear Alicia included here though–you'll have to wait for her publication for that!). I read something too! Thank you to Gabby Datau and Morgan Elder at Murmurs for hosting us!  Wendy's three books just got reissued! Buy them! Listen to Taleen's music–she's touring the west coast this summer. Read Heather's writing & listen to her podcast on Planet Heather.Make Anna's "Perfume and Pain" your first summer read.Tasbeeh has a fab new LA-centric Substack called NO BAD DAYS. See Marcel's painting "Anima" at Various Small Fires in Orange County through May 31st. Watch what Jasmine makes, always. Make Clemen

Send us a textWelcome back Andrea Ámez! Andrea reflects on her ten years in the beauty industry and talks about relaunching her Anti Pollutant Masque with Aliangé. She walks us through what you can expect from a facial at her West Hollywood studio and identifies what she considers the most special part of her treatments. We discuss tons of products, product formulators, tips, and techniques. We also answer a couple of listener questions. Finally, Andrea shares four non-negotiables everyone should keep in mind when it comes to caring for our skin in 2025.Subscribe to ÁMEZING NEWS here. Leave a question in the comment box on any of the posts and Andrea will answer it next month! Browse Andrea's ShopMyShelf here. Follow Andrea on IG here. This episode was recorded in December 2024. Our hearts go out to everyone in Los Angeles, particularly those of you directly impacted by the fires. Please continue sharing healing and repair resources with us.  For those of you able to offer financial support, please consi

Send us a textMakeup artist & photographer LOFTJET joins me to discuss GLAM. He tells me about storytelling through makeup, honing your unique perspective, & having faith that your time will come! We talk about the pleasure of getting lost in routines and rituals (and why no makeup makeup is still a million steps...'cuz it's meditative, duh!). He also discusses disrupting the politics of “good taste” and embracing Salvadoran glamour. Listen to hear what it was like to do makeup on PAT McGRATH herself! Follow Loftjet on IG here. Oh, the beauty store he recommends for niche and Black and Brown-owned niche brands is Thirteen Lune on Larchmont!  Follow me on IG here. Access exclusive content on my Substack here. Please rate and review the show wherever you listen! Write me here tierneytierneytierneytalks@gmail.com Thanks to Margot Padilla for engineering and editing this episode!Support the show

Send us a textEmma Specter just published their book More Please: Food, Fat, Bingeing, Longing, and the Lust for "Enough"! "More Please" is a beautifully reported journalistic memoir that interrogates and reframes Emma's own relationship with their body. They're also the culture writer at Vogue, where they write about film, TV, books, podcasts, news, body politics, and queer artists and issues.  From abortion access in California, Dakota Johnson's performance in "Am I OK?", and being fat during a global pandemic to ranking the best Mary Kate and Ashley movies of all time, Emma covers culture with smarts and style.  Listen to us discuss the book, our bodies, clothes, relationships, allyship and more. Buy More Please: Food, Fat, Bingeing, Longing, and the Lust for "Enough" by Emma Specter today. Follow Emma on Instagram here. And on X here. Follow me on IG here. Access exclusive content on my Substack here. Please rate and review the show wherever you liste

Send us a textMy favorite heavily-perfumed party girls are in the studio discussing niche fragrances! Welcome Chloe Coover and Maddie Phinney! The noses behind the one and only Nose Candy podcast! This episode is like smoking weed, getting an iced coffee, and going perfume shopping at the mall. Only with two passionate experts at hand!Chloe and Maddie share their approaches to collecting scents. They discuss their fan-favorite friendship. And they recommend tons of fragrances!Nose Candy honors the art of perfumery with knowledge, intuition, and eroticism. They're smart and hot and listening to them will make you an insatiable frag-hag™. You will learn words like "gourmand" and "flanker." Your vocabulary and olfactory system will grow, deepen, ripen, and bloom. Curate your own collection! Cultivate your own personal taste! Open your nose!Join Nose Candy at their Scent Swamp on Saturday, July 6th! At Murmurs Gallery in LA. Tickets available here. Curate your own collection! Cultivate yo

Send us a textWelcome Lara Marie Schoenhals! Lara is a legendary podcaster, best-selling writer, and gorgeous funny girl. She created the world’s first Vanderpump Rules podcast and offers an unrivaled anthropological analysis of the cast. But first we delve into our friendship! From its sweetly erotic origins on a West Hollywood rooftop to our era working together at a media startup in Venice, we giggle our way through memories of pranks, parties, puking, and piercings. If you love listening to Lara, you’ll adore this cute and candid conversation! Tune into Sexy Unique Podcast and get tickets for the Midsummer Night’s SUP tour today! You should also check out Once Upon A Time in Nashville, the new true crime podcast Lara executive produced. Support SUP on Patreon for exclusive access to Lara’s archival interviews with VPR cast members, like the one with Kristen Doute she describes in this ep. Support Tierney Talks by becoming a paid Substack subscriber today! On Substack, you’ll also find my new series OUTRAG

Send us a textWelcome back Katrina Kemp! Katrina is an actor, producer, activist, DJ, and intuitive from LA. Katrina not only shares her own coming-of-age story as a person with pseudoachondroplasia but also speaks to the relatively new project of people with Dwarfism collecting their own history, free from the gaze of average-height people. She explains how people with dwarfism were enslaved for centuries and how being forced to labor as circus performers still inform how they’re treated in the modern movie industry (and the world at large) today. Katrina traces the relationship between erasure and exploitation in media and reflects on how vital it was for her to find representation and community online growing up. “We find each other deep, deep in the internet. But other people are finding us too,” Katrina says. This sets the stage for our discussion of “Dear Average Height People,” a film Katrina is producing by director Aubrey Smalls. As far as Aubrey and Katrina know, this is the very first documentary c

Send us a textHaewon Asfaw and Ale Lemus are friends, abolitionists, and pop culture enthusiasts. In this episode, they explain how practicing abolition together informs the way they watch their favorite Bravo shows together, especially The Real Housewives. Whether you’ve watched every episode of every franchise or have never seen the show, our conversation is for you. Listen to hear Haewon and Ale use real relationships from The Real Housewives to articulate ideas about conflict, punishment, and revenge. Using memorable moments from the Bravo canon, they also dissect capitalism, individualism and white dominant culture.  Haewon offers a working definition of abolition and advocates for the need to study whiteness as a mental health issue. Ale discusses intergenerational healing in the Bravoverse and makes me cackle with comments like, “Big Kathy is a figure that looms large in Beverly Hills.”Plus, they tell me about valuing your relationships as your currency and finding your resources within them. Listen fo

Send us a textRachael Finley is the author of the new book “Nobody Ever Told Me Anything,” a memoir and survival guide detailing her highly isolated childhood in South Florida and unique coming-of-age experience online. She tells me about exploring the duality of women through writing about her mother, surviving her 11-year-old year squatting alone in a vacation rental while her mom sought out mental health treatment, and broadening her horizons by hanging out at the mall. At the mall, she met strangers for the first time and began experimenting with the parts of herself she thought the world should know and the parts they shouldn’t… tailor-fitting parts of herself for an audience… a lifelong experiment that led her to write this unfiltered book.Follow Rachael on IG @instasteak and buy her book on Shop Hot Lava here. Thanks to Margot Padilla for engineering and editing this episode.  Recorded 10/3 at Pirate Studios Silverlake. Pirate is open 24/7 in Silverlake and West Adams, as well as all over the US, UK, G

Send us a textHi! Michelle Badillo is back. Watch her as Winnie, the sardonic astrologist in the latest season of "Search Party," streaming now on HBO Max. Michelle has also written for beloved shows including "One Day at a Time," "The Bold Time,"  "The Great North" and more. Watch her new project, "A League of Their Own," this August. We talk about our relationship and individual writing practices. Lots of chit-chat and tabloid musings. I drink a Coca-Cola and say Lacan when I mean Kristeva. I sound square despite my desire for narcotic freedom for all...fentanyl crisis much? Recorded on 5/27/22 at Pirate Studios Silverlake.Thanks to Margot Padilla for engineering and editing.  Our show music is "Let Me Love You" by Dis Fantasy.Follow me on IG: @TSTAR7 Write me: tierneytierneytierneytalks@gmail.comSupport the show (https://cash.app/$TierneyFinster)Support the show

Send us a textI'm back from a prolonged hiatus with my very first solo ep! What a risk! Tell me how it goes! I talk about losing a friend, traveling for the first time since the pandemic began, turning 30, getting engaged, and more. I also discuss my love of Lindsay Lohan and Anthony Kiedis, the shameless way I engage with Bravolebrities, and my year of only reading memoirs. Please subscribe to the show wherever you're listening. New interviews coming soon! Follow me on IG @TSTAR7 and write me with questions and comments at tierneytierneytierneytalks@gmail.com. Thanks to Margot Padilla for engineering and editing. Our show music is "Let Me Love You" by Dis Fantasy. Support the show

Send us a textWelcome back Beth Pickens! My favorite art consultant, art counselor & lesbian-feminist  money coach (she's a Capricorn too!) We celebrate her new book “Make Your Art No Matter What: Moving Beyond Creative Hurdles” and discuss some of its core topics — money, time, fear, grief, isolation, education, and asking for what you want. Listen for a chance to win your own copy! Beth shares tons of tips to enhance your experience of both your art and your life. Investing time and money into yourself, distinguishing isolation from solitude, and warming up for your own creative practice are all talked about. We also explore staying connected to stillness while an abundance of ways to spend time become available to us. Beth gives advice to artists with common fears like experiencing disappointment while pitching and avoiding promoting your completed projects. Beth says, “For artists, the hard thing is not attaining goals, getting the grant or getting the opportunity or the show or whatever, the har

Send us a textHolistic esthetician ANDREA ÁMEZ returns to the show for the first time since launching the ÁMEZ Marketplace and developing her ANTI-POLLUTANT MASQUE w/ ALIANGÉ. We discuss building an independent skincare brand during the peak of the celebrity skincare boom, hand-picking products for her own retail platform and formulating her first masque with protective and reparative properties. We pour ourselves into the topic of perfume and luxuriate in memories of the defining scents of our pasts. We touch on hair brushing and hair serums, meditating and resourcing inner power.  Andrea talks about treating kilaris pilaris, identifying melasma, using microcurrent facial devices at home, double cleansing sensitive skin and more. She explains choosing mineral vs chemical sunscreen, protecting your skin from the sun while driving and incorporating smaller lines into your wellness rituals. There are tons of ÁMEZING tips! All rooted in Andrea’s interdisciplinary knowledge of holistic wellness, health, beauty an

Send us a textAlissa Nutting talks about adapting her novel "Made For Love" into a TV series and reflects on writing her singular first novel "Tampa" almost nine years after its release. She tells me about creating a character that engages with being loathsome and going over the top to make your point. We discuss eating breakfast at McDonald's and eulogize the Mexican Pizza at Taco Bell. Toward the end, I endorse a new drugstore lip product, share the perfect spring coffee order, gush about the documentary "Naughty Books" and more. Watch Alissa's new TV series "Made For Love" on HBO Max. Buy her books "Made For Love," "Tampa" & "Unclean Jobs For Women and Girls: Stories" on Bookshop. Subscribe to Tierney Talks wherever you're listening now. If you liked this episode, revisit my conversation with Michelle Badillo here. Follow Alissa on IG @nutting_alissa  & Twitter @alissanutting.Our show music is "Let Me Love Yo

Send us a textNiko Karamyan (@nikotheikon), Saturn (@saturnrisin9) and Katrina Kemp (@kueenkatrina) join us after watching "Framing Britney," the new New York Times documentary about Britney Spears. Saturn decodes Britney's ability to use performance as protest, Katrina recounts spending time with Britney and paparazzi in the Valley as a high-school stan and Niko raises questions about the role of the rose imagery in Britney's quest for autonomy. We discuss our emotional responses to the doc, explore what else we wish it would have touched on and tell precious Britney stories (including an epic dance battle). Also: the sick connection between Amanda Bynes and Jamie Lynn Spears (trigger warning!), the way Britney's torturous predicament led to the creation of a personal space bubble law in LA  and the Felicia Culotta of it all.  Katrina pulls an oracle card for the #FreeBritney movement. "Look at what white men do to their daughters," Saturn says, summarizing it all. Recorded

Send us a textErin Taj joins us to share astrological knowledge juicy enough for beginners and devotees alike. Taj breaks down fixed, mutable and cardinal signals, explains astrology as geometry and defines what houses mean in the context of your natal chart. She teaches what having planets “conjunct” and “square” one another means, expands on popular misconceptions of rising signs and discusses favorite parts of her own astrological makeup. Saturn Return, synastry and generational forecasting based on Pluto are also hot topics. “No one owns astrology,” Taj says, “It’s embedded in us to be curious.” Write to Tierney -- tierneytierneytierneytalks@gmail.com Our show music is "Let Me Love You" by Dis Fantasy. Recorded and edited by Margot Padilla. Hosted, written and produced by Tierney Finster. Support the show

Send us a textJane Ward is a feminist scholar and author of the books “Not Gay: Sex Between Straight White Men” and “Respectably Queer.” She teaches gender and sexuality studies at UC Riverside, specializing in feminist, queer and heterosexuality studies and creating “scholarship for the feminist revolution.” Jane joins Tierney to discuss her new book “The Tragedy of Heterosexuality,” a “lesbian feminist diagnosis” of heterosexuality that exposes the realities of heterosexual culture while encouraging its development into something deeper, more loving and less violent. Jane declares herself an ally to straight people as “they work to liberate heterosexuality from misogyny.” She’s an expert at revealing how weird most “normative” cultures and social identities tend to be. In this book, Jane contextualizes heterosexuality as the romantic arm of patriarchy and details how the heterosexual advice industry has been trying to help men and women in this country survive their marriages for the last 100+ years (not al

Send us a textToday’s guests are Erin Christovale, Asuka Hisa, Suzanne Isken, Sarah Williams, Morgan Elder, Allison Littrell, Vanessa Zenedjas, Rudeness, Tatiana Vahan, Abby Kavanaugh, Katrina Carl, Laura Mart, Katherine Ross, Angelique Soave & Klaus Biesenbach. Tierney Talks hosted the first TELETHON For Your Art at Frieze Los Angeles in February. We brought the talk show to the art fair and broadcasted live from the ForYourArt booth on the Paramount Pictures Studio backlot, all Frieze long. The result is this collection of 60+ interviews about art, entertainment and community in Los Angeles. We had so much fun! This episode celebrates a handful of places and community spaces for art in Southern California. Erin Christovale (Black Radical Imagination, The Hammer Museum)Asuka Hisa (Institute of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles)Suzanne Isken (Craft Contemporary)Sarah Williams (The Women’s Center For Creative Work) Morgan Elder and Allison Littrell (Murmurs gallery and cafe) Vanessa Zendejas (AZ West)Rudeness

Send us a textToday’s guests include: Tini Stormberg, Trevor McFedries, Janet Taylor Pickett, Samantha Taylor Pickett, Chloe Coover, Zoé Blue M., Jiro Maestu, Jasmine Nyende, Irina Karamyan, Han Donovan, Toryn Seabrooks, Emily Barker & Peggy Noland. Tierney Talks hosted the very first TELETHON ForYourart at Frieze Los Angeles in February. We brought the talk show to the art fair and broadcasted live from the ForYourArt booth on the Paramount Pictures Studio backlot, all Frieze long. The result is a collection of 60+ interviews about art, entertainment and community in Los Angeles. We had so much much! This is the fourth in a five-part series of Tierney Talks episodes documenting TELETHON ForYourart.  Support the show

Send us a textTierney Talks hosted the very first TELETHON ForYourart at Frieze Los Angeles in February. We brought the talk show to the art fair and broadcasted live from the ForYourArt booth on the Paramount Pictures Studio backlot, all Frieze long. The result is a collection of 60+ interviews about art, entertainment and community in Los Angeles. We had so much much!   This is the third in a five-part series of Tierney Talks episodes documenting TELETHON ForYourArt. Today’s guests include: Saturn (Listen to their new single "Ready" on Bandcamp) Cyrus Dunham (Read his book "A Year Without A Name")Martine Syms (Subscribe to Scene Report) Jonny Makeup & Christopher Schwartz (View The Gallery @'s exhibition "Chips") Casey Jane Ellison (Watch this tbt of her talkshow) Lili Lakich (Take the Van Nuys Flyaway to see one of her public sculptures) Jason Correa (Visit his project space and gallery for some the best contemporary art, music, and performance in Van Nuys) Willy Bost