Against the Grain is the Farm Aid podcast, designed to bring the magic of Farm Aid’s annual festival to listeners year-round. Listeners will hear from artists and farmers, advocates and food experts, activists and policymakers – all of whom are working towards building a more just and equitable farm and food system.
Farm Aid’s Jessica Ilyse Kurn and MichaelStewart Foley will take you all over the country, from Farm Aid’s backstage and Homegrown Village to rural and urban farms and farmers’ markets. There, you’ll meet the extraordinary citizens who make up the Farm Aid universe, fighting the industrial agriculture giants, holding the government accountable, and shifting the culture towards a food and farm model that is better for farmers, the planet and for all of us.
In Season 1, we talked to a range of farmers, organizers and artists about the most pressing issues in our farm and food systems. In Season 2, we spoke with more than two dozen artists about using their platforms to speak to social and political issues. Our upcoming season will bring us back to Minnesota, host of Farm Aid’s 40th anniversary festival, to spotlight the work of farmers and others in fighting corporate dominance of meat processing in rural Minnesota.
Engineered by: Michael Smeltz, Directed by: Dawn Sorokin
Produced by: Christine Sykes Lowe
Live from Farm Aid 40: Policymakers talk about the current farm crisis
November 26, 2025
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In this episode, we take you back to Farm Aid 40 in Minneapolis, where we spoke to some of the state's leading policymakers about issues facing farmers in the current crisis and about how to get a Farm Bill passed. Our colleague, Hannah Tremblay, Farm Aid's Policy and Advocacy Manager, helps frame our conversation by discussing the state of ...
Sustaining Community in the Face of Climate Disasters
September 10, 2025
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In this final episode of Against the Grain’s Artists & Activism series, we take you back to Luck Reunion where we recorded a panel conversation in front of a live audience. This panel had four artists who lived through various climate disasters and have been working to sustain their communities in the aftermath. Listen in as we talk to ...
In this penultimate episode of Against the Grain’s series on Artists and Activism, we get personal — as in “the personal is political.” We talk to Waylon Payne, Allison Russell and Hunter Park (who performs as She Returns from War) about how their personal lives (and, really, all of our personal lives) are political and politicized, even if ...
In this fifth episode of Against the Grain’s series on artists and activism, we talk to Lukas Nelson, Micah Nelson and Allison Russell about their experiences with climate change at home and on the road, and what artists — and all of us — can do about it. Lukas discusses showing up for his community in the face of the Maui wildfires; Micah ...
In this episode of Against the Grain’s new series on artists and activism, we zero in on a subject that has come up in all of the previous episodes – artists catching flak for taking a public stand on an issue. We’ll hear from Allison Russell and Grace Bowers on issues that should not be controversial – school shootings and voting – as well ...
In this third episode of Against the Grain’s series on Artists and Activism, we talk to artists who come from farming backgrounds and have joined Farm Aid over the years to stand up for family farmers. We hear first from the legendary bluesman, Taj Mahal, who grew up picking tobacco and working on a dairy farm in Massachusetts before studying ...
In this second episode of Against the Grain’s series on Artists and Activism, we carry on from last episode’s focus on the folk singing tradition to explore the ways artists use their storytelling skills and platforms to engage with important social and political issues. We’ll hear from Steve Duncombe, co-founder of the Center for Artistic ...
In this first episode of Against the Grain’s new series on Artists and Activism, we focus on the American folk music tradition. Music journalist Dorian Lynskey provides valuable historical context. He reminds us that music and politics have mixed from the beginning – even before the dawn of recorded sound – but that its folk musicians who ...
