#406: Katy Kirby

🥘 Babette’s Feast, 👖🪡 Getting Clothes Altered To Fit Better, 📍🗺️ Conspiracy Theory/Serial Killer Maps/aka Evidence Boards, and more.

Perfectly Imperfect is a newsletter offering “A Taste of Someone’s Taste” from guests like Charli XCX, John Cale, Julian Casablancas, Lena Dunham, Mac Demarco, Dasha Nekrasova, Tim Heidecker, Ayo Edebiri, Michael Imperioli, Rayne Fisher-Quann, Mel Ottenberg, Chloe Cherry, Matty Matheson, Anna Delvey, The Dare, Caroline Calloway, Snail Mail, and more. Check out our full archive here.

Cool people like cool things, which is why we asked Katy Kirby to share a taste of her taste on Perfectly Imperfect.

Katy Kirby is a Texas-born, New York City-based singer and songwriter. Katy released her 2018 EP Juniper followed by her 2021 debut album, Cool Dry Place, and since then has solidified herself as a force to be reckoned with in the indie pop-rock scene. Cool Dry Place earned notable acclaim through its feature as Stereogum's “Album of the Week” and was featured on numerous best-albums-of-2021 lists, including those by Paste, Our Culture Mag, and Consequence of Sound. Katy’s upcoming record, Blue Raspberry is scheduled to drop on January 26th, with ANTI- Records. Written in part during her 2021 tour opening for Waxahatchee, Blue Raspberry explores themes of human connection and delves into the sounds of queer country yearning. Katy’s upcoming headline tour is set for Feb-March. Lucky for us, Katy is here to tell us what she’s been into.

Without further ado

Katy Kirby (instagram)

👖🪡 Getting Clothes Altered To Fit Better

Knowing I can simply waltz into a dry cleaner’s with alteration services near me and get some pants taken in at the waist emboldens me to make all sorts of questionable thrift purchases. But yet, it pays off every time. I think most people under 40 find it oddly intimidating to just go do this because they’re not sure how much it might cost? Or because it’s weirdly intimate to talk to a stranger about how you want your clothes fit on your body? But verily I tell you–it is usually costs less than $20-30, and anyone doing that job professionally has seen all sorts of weird vanity in action and absolutely doesn’t care.

🥘 Babette’s Feast

I often find it hard to find something on the Criterion Channel that is….maybe just a little bit…uplifting? This film is maybe the only piece of media that my mother and I both agree upon as superlative. Also probably a great holiday watch? When you’re not exactly in the mood for It’s A Wonderful Life but something in the neighborhood sounds good? This is not a niche movie by any means, but if you haven’t seen it, quite nice! 

📍🗺️ Conspiracy Theory/Serial Killer Maps/aka Evidence Boards

I did this with a bunch of lyrics at some point when writing my last record and it was actually super productive and also very fun. I would especially recommend it as an aid in learning or creating something, as a therapy pre-game activity, or of course proving a point/crafting a theory. Anything you wanna wrap your head around can be effectively tackled with a very cheap set of color coded push pins.

🍧 Very Sour Cranberry Sauce on Pistachio Ice Cream

I had a particularly rough Thanksgiving Day this year and processed some of that stress by making a cranberry sauce with actual fresh cranberries, a thing that is incredibly easy to make and my fave holiday food by a significant margin. I was only making it for myself so I used slightly less than half of the sugar called for in whatever recipe I found online (I wanna say it was a variation on the NYT “red wine cranberry sauce” but I only used a tiny bit of wine and no cinnamon?) THEN at the end of the day I just put a bit of it on top of some pistachio ben and jerry’s I had leftover. It is so so good and I’ve made it twice again since then. I would also suggest fucking around with a bit of cardamom or maybe black sesame seeds?

Bonus 💫 recommendation for paid subscribers below!