Overview of How Long Gone with Shaad D’Souza
In this London-recorded episode of How Long Gone, Chris Black and Jason Stewart are joined by journalist Shaad D’Souza for a fast, joke-heavy conversation that bounces between nightlife, fashion, music criticism, body aches, and the politics of taste. The episode has the show’s usual mix of gossip, sincere-ish opinions, and deliberately chaotic banter, with Shaad arriving prepared with a list of topics to steer the discussion.
Main Topics Discussed
London nightlife and a post-club injury
- Chris and Jason open with stories from a big London night out in Shoreditch.
- Jason describes a foot injury he jokingly attributes to clubbing in heavy shoes for hours.
- The group riffs on how nightlife, fashion, and comfort rarely align.
Fashion, shoes, and “one in, one out”
- A long stretch of the conversation centers on footwear and clothing:
- Our Legacy shoes and jeans
- Dansko clogs
- Arc’teryx slip-ons
- Salomon Mary Janes
- Uggs, Nike, and branded sneakers
- Shaad talks about his style choices and the pressure to edit his wardrobe.
- Jason and Chris debate comfort vs. aesthetic and joke about “one in, one out” rules for buying clothes and shoes.
The state of techno and club culture
- The hosts and Shaad dig into techno, EDM, and micro-genres.
- Jason repeatedly admits he’s not deeply into techno, though he understands the club context.
- They joke about AI-generated “summer techno” and the way dance music is marketed.
- Fortet, Fred Again.., and the broader “accessible dance music” conversation come up as examples.
Gay guys in indie rock
- One of the episode’s central discussion prompts is Shaad’s question about whether there are fewer openly gay men in indie rock than there used to be.
- The conversation becomes a loose “who’s who” of gay indie artists across generations:
- Perfume Genius
- Stephen Malkmus references
- Sufjan Stevens
- Orville Peck
- Car Seat Headrest
- Stephen Malkmus / Morrissey-era comparisons
- The takeaway is that the scene has become more inclusive overall, but gay male frontmen stand out less in the current landscape.
A racist pop star incident
- Shaad mentions a recent incident in which a pop star confused him with another South Asian music journalist and then doubled down when corrected.
- The joke lands as a frustrating but absurd example of celebrity carelessness and racial misidentification.
- The identity of the pop star is intentionally not named in the transcript.
Music criticism, taste, and “big-name” acts
- The trio debates artists and scenes including:
- Harry Styles
- Shania Twain
- Robyn
- Billy Joel
- Steely Dan
- Grateful Dead
- Weezer
- Carly Rae Jepsen
- They compare legacy pop acts, “cool” credibility, and whether certain artists are overrated or still culturally useful.
- Shaad also discusses writing about internet-native culture and niche music coverage.
Shaad’s writing and internet culture
- Shaad references his publication/work and a recent piece about a woman tracking MAC Cosmetics shade changes over time.
- The hosts joke about color palettes, aging aesthetics, and how internet weirdos often produce the best niche reporting.
- There’s also a brief discussion of magazine-style identity labels, “metrosexual,” and the collapse of old taste categories.
Notable Running Bits
Paddington and British culture
- Chris and Jason repeatedly lean into London-specific references.
- Paddington is brought up as a kind of emblem of polished British charm.
- They also joke about Costa, Pret, and the city’s “theatre” of daily life.
Dog care and domestic life
- The episode detours into dog grooming, paw wipes, booties, and the general grossness of city sidewalks.
- Jason and Chris contrast their own domestic habits, including trash duty, cooking, and household roles.
“Trade,” “metrosexual,” and old internet language
- The hosts and Shaad poke at dated terms like “metrosexual” and “trade.”
- The conversation frames them as relics of older internet and gay-adjacent slang, now used half-seriously and half-ironic.
Key Takeaways
- The episode is less about one subject than about Shaad fitting into the show’s ecosystem as a sharp, prepared, culture-savvy guest.
- Fashion and music remain the central lenses, but the episode keeps returning to broader questions of taste, identity, and social performance.
- Chris and Jason are at their best here when they’re riffing on the everyday absurdities of being in the world: clubs, shoes, photo ops, bad posture, and the politics of who gets to be an authority on what.
- Shaad’s value as a guest is that he brings real topics while still matching the show’s loose, funny energy.