Madness Belongs to the People is a book of poetry by Jody Chan to be officially released on September 22, 2026 by Brick Books. Music accompanying the book by Yang Chen will be released by people | places | records.
Our book-album launch event and live performance will take place on October 10th, 3pm at the Tranzac Club in Toronto.
About the book
With gentle fervour and precise language that speaks to the nonverbal, the gestural, the sonic, Jody Chan's third collection of poetry mobilizes the intimate, the historical, the revolutionary, and the mundane to confront the instrumentalization of disability as a surplus class. Chan's multidisciplinary poems are a lyrical account of anti-colonial, anti-capitalist psychiatric survivor- and patient-led movements, from Germany to Japan. This is an investigation of madness as resistance, in which we experience "listening as a form of touch," and the future as a change of form.
About the album
listen to this album alongside the book of the same name, by Jody Chan, or on its own. each track corresponds to a movement in the text.
we tried to locate the sound of madness. we found indigo, organ, clock time, queer time, barley, silence, wildness, repetition, a dictionary of air and light.
for those who know there is something to be done, despite not knowing what it is.
Album credits
Released September 22, 2026 by people | places | records.
Performed, recorded, and produced by Yang Chen.
Mixed by Yang Chen and Andrew Noseworthy.
Mastered by Andrew Noseworthy.
Cover art by Michael DeForge.
Liner notes by Jody Chan.