In this oral history, Mish Barber-Way discusses her upbringing in Vancouver, her relationship with her parents, siblings and friends, her experiences as a high school and college student and her involvement in the local music scene. She details the formation of White Lung, her relationship with her bandmates, the band's trajectory to success and her eventual move to the United States. Barber-Way also discusses her musical influences, feminism, sexism, and her experience as a working musician, journalist and writer.
Mish Barber-Way is a singer, musician, writer and fronts the Candian punk band, White Lung. She is the sex and relationship columnist in the Vancouver newspaper, Westender, and is a writer and reporter for Broadly and Vice. She currently lives in the suburbs of Los Angeles with her husband.
Interviewed by Tanya Pearson. Filmed by Sophia Cacciola and Michael J. Epstein. Edited by Michael J. Epstein
The Women of Rock Oral History Project is a collection of digital interviews and written transcripts housed at the Sophia Smith Collection at Smith College, documenting the lives and careers of women in rock music, focusing primarily on artists who have been left out of the popular rock narrative. The Women of Rock Oral History Project has been made possible, in part, by the Helen Gurley Brown Magic Grant (2016) and the Rebecca Samay Rosenthal Memorial Fellowship (2015). The project is otherwise self-funded and sustained entirely by volunteer labor. This labor includes travel, video recording and editing, transcribing, grant writing, event organization and promotion, and publicity. You can view the list of volunteers here.
