DAVID
BARNETT
Broken strings, broken bones, broken hearts.
Burnt pages, burnt bridges—
burning ember...
FOXTAIL
— MEMOIR —
Foxtail is a raw exploration of survival, instinct, and the wild untamed nature lurking beneath the surface. Through visceral storytelling and unflinching honesty, Barnett navigates trauma, transformation, indulgence, and the price of chasing extremes . . . and the price of chasing your dreams. This is no sanitized narrative—it's a chronicle of duality: the beautiful and the brutal, the sacred and the profane, the comic and the tragic. It's a story about blind ambitions, and the belief that the world owes us a destiny.
FOXTAIL
— MEMOIR —
Foxtail is a raw exploration of survival, instinct, and the wild untamed nature lurking beneath the surface. Through visceral storytelling and unflinching honesty, Barnett navigates trauma, transformation, indulgence, and the price of chasing extremes . . . and the price of chasing your dreams. This is no sanitized narrative—it's a chronicle of duality: the beautiful and the brutal, the sacred and the profane, the comic and the tragic. It's a story about blind ambitions, and the belief that the world owes us a destiny.
FOXTAIL
— MEMOIR —
Foxtail is a raw exploration of survival, instinct, and the wild untamed nature lurking beneath the surface. Through visceral storytelling and unflinching honesty, Barnett navigates trauma, transformation, indulgence, and the price of chasing extremes . . . and the price of chasing your dreams. This is no sanitized narrative—it's a chronicle of duality: the beautiful and the brutal, the sacred and the profane, the comic and the tragic. It's a story about blind ambitions, and the belief that the world owes us a destiny.
★ MEDIA ★
APPEARANCES
How Did I Get Here?with Johnny Goudie
A great conversation about Foxtail—the self-examination that comes with writing a memoir, growing up in 90's and early 2000's Austin, Kurt Cobain, The Back Room, drugs, getting into trouble as a kid, and much more.
Booked on Rock— Podcast
Books & Stories Behind Classic Rock's Greatest Hits
Writing on the Airwith Mindy Reed
KOOP Radio · Austin
A live in-studio conversation on KOOP's long-running writers' program, digging into the work, the wreckage, and the road that produced it.
LISTEN TO THE SHOW
Aligned Author— Podcast
with Valerie Ihsan
An analytical breakdown exploring the eight-year structural development architecture and narrative boundaries of Foxtail.
August 12th
Segment begins at 1:35:00
April 22nd
Segment begins at 1:29:00
UPCOMING APPEARANCES
Citywide Blackout— Podcast
with Max Bowen and Curtis Hughes
Pulling back the curtain on the creative process of Foxtail
That Record Got me High— Podcast
with Rob Elba
A track dissection exploring the personal significance of (hed) p.e.'s seminal album, Broke.
The Teaching Journeys— Podcast
with Dave Roberts
A high-substance clinical-literary crossover tracking severe somatic anxiety, coping mechanisms, and the uncorrected autopsies of identity.
★ CONTACT ★
GET IN TOUCH
FOR PUBLICITY REQUESTS
★ AUTHOR SPOTLIGHTS ★
“At its inception, Foxtail was never meant to be a commercial product; it was a private psychological and emotional exercise designed to excavate and exorcise my demons.”
BORN TO
MAKE NOISE
David Barnett is an author, a lightning rod, and a man who has lived multiple lives within multiple worlds of chaos. After years defined by the jagged friction of the underground music scene and a scorched-earth lifestyle of indulgence and excess, Barnett eventually learned to transmute his demons and harness the power of his ghosts—channeling a legacy of reckless abandon and outlandish antics into the art that saved his life. The winner of the 2025 WriterCon First Place award for Memoir, he resides in Austin, Texas, where he remains a dedicated seeker of the next distorted, exquisite frequency.
