Rock Docs & DIG! XX (2024)! Plus, Craig Calcaterra!

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
All right, Millier, are you recording?

Speaker 2 (00:03):
Yeah, I am.

Speaker 1 (00:04):
Okay, okay, just start it up. Whenever you're ready, you start,
start the intro. Whenever you're ready, Okay, I will.

Speaker 2 (00:12):
Hey, everybody you're listening to Ugh, did I say, Millily?

Speaker 1 (00:16):
You fucked it up? You fucked it up again? What
fucked up the intro? You fucked up my intro?

Speaker 3 (00:22):
The intro?

Speaker 1 (00:22):
I wrote, dude, I it.

Speaker 4 (00:24):
Was a complete mistake. Like what am I supposed to be? Like? Perfect?

Speaker 2 (00:27):
Every time?

Speaker 4 (00:29):
Here?

Speaker 1 (00:29):
You need to be perfect because I'm fucking perfect every time.
I come to every one of these recordings with perfect instrumentation,
perfect vocalization. I know the script backwards and forwards. It's
just about doing.

Speaker 4 (00:41):
A little bit of fucking homework, and you don't do it.

Speaker 2 (00:43):
You know, no one is going to talk to me
like that on this podcast, bro, Like you're not gonna
talk to me like that on my side, to you.

Speaker 4 (00:52):
However I want.

Speaker 1 (00:53):
I can talk to you however I want, because I
am the Messiah of podcasting. Okay, I am a mystic
and people don't respect me enough and they don't understand
the vision that I'm that I have for this show.

Speaker 2 (01:04):
Yo, let me tell you something though, in every spiritual
tradition you burn in health, pretending to be God and
not being able to back that shit up.

Speaker 1 (01:11):
Bro, Well, you know, if I'm going to Hell, I'm
bringing you with me.

Speaker 4 (01:14):
Come out, Hey, Hey, get back here? Oh you walk
my fucking sitar. Don't don't touch my hair.

Speaker 1 (01:21):
Don't touch my hair.

Speaker 2 (01:22):
God, what a fucking freak like here, I'm quitting.

Speaker 4 (01:25):
Good riddance, man, there's the door. There's the door. Listen.

Speaker 2 (01:29):
You're gonna be so fucking sorry without me. I'm just
gonna go and walk and I'll just walk back to California.

Speaker 4 (01:35):
I don't give a shit about you. Hoo hoo. Boo
hoo hoo.

Speaker 2 (01:48):
There goes Casey with his God complex again. Pretty much
a typical recording of the podcast Dear Movies, I Love
You and it's too bad that we had to break
up again because we have an amazing show. This week,
we're going to be digging into the reworking or the
reducts of a documentary that was made in two thousand

(02:10):
and four called dig We're actually talking about the twenty
twenty four update dig XX, which is all about the
feud between the Brian Jonestown Massacre and the Dandy Warhols.
We're also going to be talking to our friend, baseball
writer Craig Calcaterra. He is bringing his area of expertise

(02:30):
this week, which is all about actors who play athletes,
and maybe even the reverse, which is athletes that turn
into actors. But it's a great conversation. It's going to
be a great show if we can try to get
this maniac under control. And we hope you'll stay tuned.
You're listening to the greatest fucking podcast in the entire world,

(02:55):
Dear Movies, I Love You.

Speaker 5 (02:57):
Dear I love you, and I've got to know you
love me to check the box.

Speaker 2 (03:26):
Hey, everybody, you are listening to Dear Movies, I Love You.
It is the podcast for people who are in a
relationship with movies. Problematic, sometimes violence, sometimes sometimes fueled completely
by drugs and alcohol, but a relationship nonetheless. My name
is Millie.

Speaker 1 (03:46):
To Jericho, I'm Casey O'Brien. I'm really sorry about that, Millia.
I don't know what came over.

Speaker 4 (03:51):
Me, dude.

Speaker 2 (03:52):
I was halfway to La on foot just now. I
slept on a lawn share that was behind a dumpster. Yeah,
and a strip mall somewhere in Arkansas. I don't even remember.
But we got to work on this, dude. I mean,

(04:14):
you're listen, you're a genius. You're a musical genius. Even
if you treat me like shit, I'm gonna buy all
your albums. Still. You just need to learn how to
be a person, dude.

Speaker 1 (04:24):
Yeah, yeah, well yeah, I'm working on it. I'm working
on it, working on the drugs, I'm working on working
on it all, working on my sitar ob session. We'll see,
we'll see about it. But Millie, huge week this week,
Huge episode this week. Yeah, very excited to talk about Dig,

(04:44):
a movie I'd never seen before. But I wanted to
do something which I mentioned a few episodes back, about
checking in with the Criterion Channel twenty four to seven
feed and seeing if we can guess the movie. Okay,
are you ready to dive into the Criterion Channel?

Speaker 2 (04:59):
Oh yeah. So basically, for people that don't know, this is,
you know the Criterion Channel, which is you know, the
Criterion Collections streaming service. They actually have a section of
their app where you can watch like a live feed
twenty four hours and they just throw movies on there.
There's no intros or commercials or anything. It's just a

(05:22):
live feed of movies back to back to back, and
then in order to find out what they're actually playing,
you have to go to this separate section. It's called
what's on now dot Criterion, about it dot com?

Speaker 1 (05:32):
You got it? Okay, yeah, no, I got I was saying,
don't look at what.

Speaker 2 (05:35):
Yeah, I'm not looking at it, bro I'm playing the
game fit Okay, okay. But basically we're gonna go to
the channel, see what's on there, and try to guess
what it could be.

Speaker 1 (05:45):
Okay, you ready, I'll do three to one click.

Speaker 2 (05:47):
Okay, hold on, hold on, hold on, let me get there,
let me get there.

Speaker 1 (05:50):
Okay, here we go, three two one click. Okay.

Speaker 2 (05:55):
It's French. It's French.

Speaker 1 (05:57):
It looks so it looks seventies like a It looks
like it could have been a TV movie.

Speaker 2 (06:06):
Uh oh, okay, this well, I'm trying to figure out
who the man is that's talking about.

Speaker 1 (06:11):
We've literally been on a shot of a woman sitting down.
She has a white collar and a black vest. It
seems of contemporary of the time. Okay, Now they're in
a cafe, A turtlenecked frenchman has his arm around this woman.

Speaker 2 (06:23):
Oh shit, this is looking kind of more eighties.

Speaker 1 (06:25):
Now, Yeah, this isn't a Robert Brisson movie, isn't.

Speaker 2 (06:29):
No, Maybe it's like a.

Speaker 1 (06:32):
Is it like a god fashion good dard?

Speaker 2 (06:34):
I mean they're kind of like, well only because they
feel like they're kind of uh, they're kind of short
with each other and I don't know, maybe talking.

Speaker 1 (06:45):
Is this an Eric Romer movie? No, I don't think.

Speaker 2 (06:50):
I don't know. I mean they're talking about their relationship.
It's like a man and a woman talking about the relationship,
which is very roman Esque. But for some reason, the
stiffness of them in the shot makes me think it's.

Speaker 1 (07:04):
A good dar thing. Okay, well you what you Let's
go with a guest. Do you have a guess?

Speaker 2 (07:10):
Fuck? I don't know. I really don't know.

Speaker 1 (07:13):
I can't even come up with one godar movie from
the eighties. I know.

Speaker 2 (07:16):
I'm just gonna say, I'm gonna say nothing and just
see what it is.

Speaker 1 (07:21):
Okay, let's see what it is.

Speaker 4 (07:23):
What is it?

Speaker 2 (07:24):
Oh, Love in the Afternoon? That was a Romere movie.
Good for you?

Speaker 4 (07:29):
Oh whoa?

Speaker 1 (07:30):
Yeah, some people in this band should start paying attention
to do the things I say.

Speaker 2 (07:34):
Ah ha, ha nineteen seventy two's Love in the Afternoon.
So we got the decade, you got the director. I
should have just definitely.

Speaker 1 (07:44):
Listened to Afternoon. I would have never been able to
pull that one out of my butt though.

Speaker 2 (07:48):
So well, I'm proud of you. You got like two
out of three. Well you shouldn't get the title.

Speaker 1 (07:54):
All right, one point for casey.

Speaker 2 (07:56):
Uh?

Speaker 1 (07:58):
Okay, Millie, moving on one, It's time for our film diary.
Open up the film diary.

Speaker 2 (08:06):
Oh do you want to get heavy? This is heavy.
This is a heavy diary because you don't know the
song you just say. I don't even know it either.
I think it might be a John Spencer blues explosion song.
I don't know.

Speaker 1 (08:20):
Ah, I'll be appropriate for this episode. Sure, uh, Millie.
What have you watched this past week?

Speaker 2 (08:27):
Okay? So I watched one, two, three, I watched four things.
It's pretty good.

Speaker 3 (08:34):
It is good.

Speaker 2 (08:35):
I watched two documentaries. One was a big flashpoint documentary
or the other is just sort of something I've been
wanting to see for a while because I like the subject.

Speaker 1 (08:46):
So uh.

Speaker 2 (08:47):
The first documentary I saw is called Rude Boy, The
Story of Trojan Records. It was made in twenty eighteen,
and it's essentially a documentary about the ska reggae label
Trojan Records, And if you are a Jamaican music aficionado
like I am, then you will know what I'm talking about.

(09:08):
I thought it was okay. I thought there was kind
of too many reenactments, which interesting is unfortunate because a
lot of the people who were involved in ska music
in the sixties are dead because of old age. There
was a couple of people still live and that was
pretty interesting. But then the most most of the documentary
was kind of done in this like weird almost kind

(09:31):
of like Netflix movie esque reenactment thing, which.

Speaker 1 (09:35):
That's so interesting. I'm not used to a reenactment in
that type of documentary. I think of that more in
like true crime documentaries.

Speaker 2 (09:42):
Yeah, it made me wonder because a lot of times
you see, you know, in place of something like that
would be ephemera like from the era, like newspaper clippings
and you know, like video and not video would be
film because it was the sixties seventies. But it made
me think that I just didn't have enough of the

(10:03):
you know, archives to really fill that part out. So
it was weird. I like the subject, but thought it
was kind of okay. Then I saw, speaking of Netflix,
a huge documentary that's right now in the zeitgeist. It's
called Unknown Number The High School Catfish.

Speaker 1 (10:23):
Oh yeah, this is all over This is all over
the place.

Speaker 2 (10:26):
Oh yeah, who have you seen it?

Speaker 1 (10:29):
I haven't. I knew about this because we discussed it
on that's messed up. Oh, I see, so I knew
the twist and I've seen obviously, I've seen the tiktoks
that have been popping up of people being surprised by
the twist.

Speaker 2 (10:42):
Ending.

Speaker 1 (10:43):
Yeah, but so I'm well aware of it, but I
haven't seen it.

Speaker 2 (10:46):
But it's like I kept thinking when I was watching this,
I was like, how they could do this all day,
all night, Like there are so many like weird little
stories like this. They could be making true crime documentaries
until the end of time.

Speaker 1 (10:57):
I think they're trying to.

Speaker 2 (10:58):
They are trying to. And then I saw two movies.
I finally saw Weapons from twenty twenty five.

Speaker 1 (11:06):
Would you think fun?

Speaker 2 (11:10):
Fun? Weird? It was kind of weird.

Speaker 1 (11:13):
It's weirder than I think people talk about. It is
sort of a strange. It has a strange feel to it.

Speaker 2 (11:20):
Yeah, there was some funny parts there was. I had
a couple questions. There were a couple questions that I
had about it. Daniel I watched it with Danielle actually
because she was in town, and we went to the
movie theater that my infamous movie theater which gets shut
down all the time because of bad teens. We managed
to make it through the entire movie, but basically we

(11:42):
were like, huh, what was There was a part where
there was a spoilers, Yes, spoilers, Sorry, I mean maybe not.
I don't know if this is a spoiler, but there
was a part where there's like a like a giant
AR fifteen rifle that's like cascade on this night sky.

Speaker 1 (12:02):
Uh huh? Why?

Speaker 4 (12:05):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (12:05):
I kind of was like, it's either like something I
don't understand or it's so completely on the nose that
I it's bizarre that it's in here. Yes, because it's
a weapon. Yes, Like I don't know.

Speaker 2 (12:19):
Yeah, I was gonna say, are we just making sure
we know why the title of the movie is the
way it is? Anyway, there was a lot a lot
of moving parts in that movie, But otherwise I thought
it was fun, Like that was the thing about Barbarian
which was the movie that the director had, the first
one he did. I was there was a lot of
big fucking concepts in that movie too, and I was like,

(12:40):
you know what, I'm just in for this ride. It's funny. Yeah,
it's weird. I'm in. So anyway, I.

Speaker 1 (12:46):
Would say about weapons, this isn't a spoiler either. I
don't know if the chapter structure of that movie totally
worked for me, yeah, because I sometimes really felt deflated
when we were on different story lines.

Speaker 2 (13:01):
So yeah, agreed. Well, anyway, I'm gonna have to sit
with it a little bit more and probably watch it.
I'm definitely gonna rewatch it. Then I rewatched this because
you know, there's a little bit of bite in the
air fall. It's sort of in the air here in Atlanta.
It probably the same here. Yeah, it's probably gonna get

(13:21):
hot again. But in the past week or so, it's
been kind of like seventy five seventy eight degrees, which
I'm loving.

Speaker 1 (13:28):
So leaves are starting to turn here, oh wow, o geez,
beginning to enter that spooky season.

Speaker 2 (13:34):
Yes, well, and I think because I was maybe be
jumping the gun a little bit to be starting to
watch horror movies but I was like, Okay, I was
with some friends and we were like, let's watch or
rewatch John Carpenter's Prince of Darkness from nineteen eighty seven.
I got a soft spot.

Speaker 1 (13:54):
I got a soft spot in my heart for this one.

Speaker 2 (13:56):
Good for you. Somebody has to because I gotta tell you,
this might be one of the my least favorite John
Carpenter movies.

Speaker 1 (14:04):
Talk about moving parts.

Speaker 2 (14:06):
Dude, I was like, do I need to sit down
with that professor and get him to kind of explain
to me what the fuck is going on? Like there's
a lot of a lot of uh, it's real heady,
Like I'm just like, what, Like why are we what
are we doing? What is this thing? Why are these
people here? What's this portal? What's this?

Speaker 4 (14:28):
You know?

Speaker 2 (14:28):
I don't know.

Speaker 1 (14:30):
Just at there are like nine hundred characters introduced, yes,
and they're I would say most of them are killed.
But it's like ridiculous how many people they introduce just
to kill them very quickly. It's almost like mcgruber es, yes,
so there's a lot. There's too many people. It's too
like esoteric of a concept. I do like the fact

(14:53):
that there's three Asian characters I was like, Wow, that's
an all time high.

Speaker 2 (14:58):
I like the goal once it starts happening, But honestly,
there's like multiple scenes where Donald Pleasance is like just
sitting at a desk talking to the professor, and I'm like,
what is this boring shit? What the hell are they doing?
They're just having the most boring conversation of all time

(15:19):
and we happen to be dropping in on it multiple times.

Speaker 3 (15:23):
M hm.

Speaker 2 (15:24):
So I'm just I don't know, not enough action for me,
I suppose. And I'm not saying I'm not saying I
need it to be wall to wall disgusting shit, but
I just it's a little one of my least favorite
Carpenter movies.

Speaker 1 (15:39):
So anyway, Okay, So I saw that movie for the
first time. They had a screening of it at a theater,
which is the theater is a converted church and it's
where they shot the movie. So I saw Prince of
Darkness where it was shot. That's great, in the church
where it was shot. Yeah, it was like a very end.

(16:01):
It was a very bizarre feeling exiting the theater from
the like in the same place where I just was
in the movie.

Speaker 2 (16:10):
Is it in Pasadena. Where is that?

Speaker 1 (16:12):
No, it's in downtown la Oh wow. So I believe
it's an Asian American theater group theater now so interesting.
But anyways, it was a very memorable screening experience for
that film. Yeah, maybe that's way that'd be fun.

Speaker 2 (16:27):
I'd probably like it a little bit more if that
were the case. Probably that concludes my film diary. What
about yours?

Speaker 4 (16:34):
Ooh key?

Speaker 1 (16:37):
I watched three movies this week?

Speaker 2 (16:39):
Okay.

Speaker 1 (16:40):
One is from twenty twenty two. It's called Hannah Haha.
It's a little indie movie. Have you ever heard of this?

Speaker 2 (16:46):
Never?

Speaker 1 (16:47):
It was very cute. It was written and directed by
Joshua Pigowski and Jordan Toutouski. It's sort of a gentle,
killy Reichart esque movie, sort of a slacker movie about
this twenty six year old Hannah who takes care of
her sick father and she needs to get a job basically,
and that sucks. But it was fun and it was funny,

(17:08):
and it's a good like New England summer movie. That's
what I felt.

Speaker 2 (17:11):
It was kind of mumblecore esque. How did you find
out about this movie?

Speaker 1 (17:15):
I don't know. Trisha brought it to me and I said,
let's watch it. Okay, Okay, I don't know where she
gets her things.

Speaker 2 (17:21):
Excellent.

Speaker 1 (17:22):
It won like the slam Dance Best Feature or something.
I won some slam Dance awards, so it was of
some renown. But it was good. Then I watched nineteen
ninety Eight's a Simple Plan with Billy Bob Thornton, Bill Paxton,
Bridget Fonda. Have you ever seen this movie? No, it's

(17:43):
directed by Sam Raimie yes, and it's set in rural
Minnesota and it's like smalltown crime Minnesota movie two years
after Fargo came out. Yeah, and it's directed by Sam Raimi,
who's like best friends with the Coen Brothers. So I
was kind of like, yeah, per plexed by why does
this movie exist? It's very Fargo esque.

Speaker 2 (18:04):
I remember when it came out because I remember the
trailers playing and they were like in the woods with
like a shovel and some shit.

Speaker 1 (18:11):
Yeah, and it's it's snowy. It's set in the winter
like Fargo. So I was just kind of like, why
do you make this movie? It was fun and it's
like violent, and it's like a crime movie with you know,
these like kind of lunkheads. But I don't know, it
was okay. Yeah, then I watched shock Waves, which is

(18:32):
a zombie not a Nazi zombie movie from the seventies,
h starring the beautiful Brook Adams. I love. Yes, it's
set in the Tropics though for some reason, and I
know they explain how the Nazi zombies got there, but
I can't remember why they got there, and it was

(18:54):
set in an abandoned castle. But yeah, so it was fine.
It was a pretty unsubstantial zombie horror movie. That's substantial interesting,
So it was fun. Yeah, that's all I got.

Speaker 2 (19:08):
Okay, that's a pretty good swath of films, all very different.

Speaker 1 (19:13):
Yes, we try to keep it varied in the Obrien household.
But let's close up the diary.

Speaker 2 (19:19):
Oh god, this diary is so, oh god too much.

Speaker 1 (19:40):
All right, moving on to our main topic. Dig exclamation
point x X twenty twenty four.

Speaker 2 (19:50):
Thank you for saying it properly.

Speaker 1 (19:52):
Directed by Andy Timminer who I've met. Uh, Dig, what
a great movie. This is kind of one of the
major rock docs of all time, I would say, and
it was a big deal when it came out. Did
you see this when it came out?

Speaker 2 (20:07):
And what was your.

Speaker 1 (20:08):
Opinion of it came out.

Speaker 2 (20:12):
Oh God, dude, I don't even know what to tell you,
because of course I saw when it came out, because
I was I lived it, I was there. I mean,
I wasn't friends with these bands. I knew people from

(20:34):
a band that one of this is gonna be very
blind eyedem me, but I'm gonna say it. I knew
somebody I was friends with somebody who was in a
band with one of the Brian Jonestown Massacre guys after
they left the Brian Jonestown Masacre.

Speaker 1 (20:56):
Hmm, what could that be.

Speaker 2 (20:58):
You gotta I don't know.

Speaker 1 (21:01):
So you knew you had sort of a personal relationship,
you were kind of tangentially, you were kind, you could
almost had a connection to.

Speaker 2 (21:08):
These well, but I think even beyond that, not as
if I sat around with this person being like, so
tell me what it was like for your bandmate to
be in this legendary, fucking fucked up band. Right beyond that,
I was working in college radio from the years of
like late nineteen ninety seven till the summer of two

(21:30):
thousand and two, Okay, which.

Speaker 1 (21:32):
Is perfectly This movie was filmed from nineteen ninety six
to two thousand and three, so you were right inside
of this era.

Speaker 2 (21:40):
Absolutely. I was in college radio. I was going to
places like CMJ and south By Southwest. I was seeing
bands like this. I was seeing the people who were
around bands like this. I was a DJ. I was
a club DJ at the same time, so I was
also playing and I was a club I was a
club D or bar DJ from I would say I

(22:03):
really started dj out in like maybe two thousand to like,
I mean I DJed for a very long time, like
even after I started my job at TCM, but my
years that I was a real like I was, you know,
I had a weekly night at this bar called Lenny's

(22:27):
in Atlanta that's no longer. But I also DJ at
places like MJQ and at Mary's and some other places.
I was there for probably two thousand and maybe like
two thousand and five, two thousand and six. So yeah,
and I mean I'm talking about you know, I was
in my late teens early twenties, going out multiple nights

(22:51):
a week, going to britpop nights. More on that in
a second, but just being in the in the sauce
of this kind of scene in this world, definitely knowing
people who were going to see Brian Joe Saunascer and
Dandy Warhols and all associated acts.

Speaker 1 (23:09):
So where to begin with this converseit, I mean, it's
maybe maybe I'll just do a synopsis really quilt see,
so we can just sort of jump off. So this
was originally released in two thousand and four, like we said,
and we kind of watched the updated version that came
out this year, and I mean, I really enjoyed the updates.
In the movie, it's about the struggle and the love

(23:31):
hate relationship between two bands. This is a documentary, by
the way, the Dandy war Halls and the Brian Jonestown massacre.
They were at one point like really best friends, and
then they started to despise each other, but they also
still loved each other. It's a very love hate sort
of thing. The film actually particularly focuses on the volatile

(23:52):
lead singer of bjm Anton Neukom, and there are multiple
all out brawls on stage, Tantrum's death threats the Dandy Warhols.
It's also kind of about the Dandy Warhol's ascent, and
I'm putting that into quotes. They signed to a major
label and they play like major festivals, while BJM is

(24:12):
sort of I don't know, they're having trouble like getting
signed or even making it through one of their shows.
So they sort of start from the same place and
one sort of ascends to a higher level during the
course of the documentary. But that's essentially the whole movie.

Speaker 2 (24:29):
Yeah, okay, So I want to ask you, maybe because
you're a little younger than me, Yes, okay, did you
see this when it came out or what was your
experience with this whole fan bango.

Speaker 1 (24:44):
I think by the time that I kind of discovered
this documentary and even the Dandy Warhols and the Brian
Jonestown massacre, I was so allergic to, like both of
their names are pun portmanteaus, which is like so embarrassing

(25:04):
and stupid. And I think by the time I sort
of discovered this, I feel like brit pop as we
knew it in the nineties was out the door. The
nineties obsession with nineteen sixties Britain was kind of over,
and so they just felt like relics pretty quickly to me,

(25:27):
and so I just didn't really have any desire to
listen to their music or to watch this movie when
it came out, so I only saw it a few
days ago for the first time, and I'd never listened
to either of these bands. I mean, I knew some
of their songs, but I've never listened to these bands.

Speaker 2 (25:44):
Well, okay, this is so you bring up this really
interesting point that I feel like I have to I
must in fact iron out because some people are gonna
look at this and go, this is Indy Sleeves, right,
And I see why you would think that, But I

(26:06):
feel like this, like I would say, Brian Jonestown, Massacre
and Dandy Warhol specifically, and a couple of other bands
were kind of actually more of this, like Bridge in
the Brig Pop to Indy Sleeve's pipeline.

Speaker 1 (26:26):
They're kind of they're sort of proto Indy Sleives, like
they're not I wouldn't include them in there.

Speaker 2 (26:33):
Yeah, I I I definitely agree with you. They're the
kind of pathway to what would be called Indy Sleives.

Speaker 1 (26:42):
And I think it's and Indy Sleeves, as we've discussed before,
is only a term that's come out in the last
couple of years. It was not referred to as such.
Well it was happening. I I feel like we use
the term hipster a lot. That's that was like how
we defined that genre.

Speaker 2 (26:59):
Yeah, I would say it was like hipster white built music.
I've heard it. There's also a lot of throwing around
of the term electric class, even though electro class is
a completely separate thing then like the Strokes and the
Yaayas and things of that nature. But the way that
I envisioned it when I was in the mix is

(27:22):
that mid to late nineties there were bridpop nights happening
probably in most major cities. There was like at least
one or two. There was the Wednesday Night at MJQ
in Atlanta, but then there was also places like club
Bang and stuff in LA and places in New York.
Every city had a breadpop night for the most part,

(27:43):
and this was primarily a place for young people to
congregate to listen to like whatever the new bridpop bands
were at the time, which was you know, Blur, Pulp,
swayed a lot of like eighties British music like The
Smith and the Cure and New Order. Because I want

(28:03):
to say britpop knight, the term britpop knight got kind
of a wonky. It got kind of wonky after a while, Okay,
And this is why I think that there is a
pipeline between britpop to indiesleys because Britpop Knight was like
again modern British bands of like Oasis of the you know,
like I said, Freakin' Supergrass, Travis, you know, like all

(28:27):
these bands being played alongside eighties you know, alternative music
for the most part, but then also sixties kind of
mod rock stuff, so like early Who, the Small Faces,
garage rock ish stuff. You know. It was this kind

(28:51):
of melding of like the Nuggets box set, basically the
Nuggets box set, anything that was kind of like coming
from Britain in the sixties, like the Rolling Stones was
absolutely just like the number one band for all these kids.
But then also again like kind of moving into this
like britpop of the nineties thing. Then towards the end

(29:15):
of the nineties, I would say, you're right, Brit pop
was kind of moving out of the conversation and there
was weirdly enough a lot of like dance and club
music that was kind of coming into the world, but
it wasn't really a britpop night thing. Like they would
play like daft punk once in a while, but like
that would probably or Air was a huge band that

(29:36):
they would played Britpop Knight, lez rhythms, digital, you know,
kind of French house stuff that was was sort of
like topical for Britpop Night. And then when you started
going into the two thousands, that's when the Strokes and
the Yaya Yeahs came along with the Rapture was a
huge band, you know, that kind of stuff like the

(30:00):
DFA Records things moving into that kind of James Murphy vibe.
So that's really where I think the pipeline is this
Britpop Knight, because britt Pop Knight began encompassing so many
different little micro genres and it was really just about

(30:21):
getting white hipster kids to get wasted, do drugs and dance.
That was all it was about.

Speaker 1 (30:31):
Well, it's interesting because watching this obviously like the Britpop Knights,
it sounds like it's a lot of like referencing to
like kind of a it's kind of a nostalgia trip, yes,
you know, and that is the entire band especially I
feel like the Brian Jonestown Massacre. Yes, they are like

(30:51):
trying to relive the nineteen sixties, like their music is
that way, the way they dress, I mean like Joel
gian who I'm sure we'll get into more later. He's
always like the feds are out to get his man,
Like they're like talking like, oh, they're from the sixties.

Speaker 2 (31:10):
Although the feds are out to get his casey, I mean,
do you know that?

Speaker 1 (31:13):
Well, sure, yes, of course he was one hundred percent
correct about that. But there and then like even being
like I co wrote this song with Charlie Manson and
it's like it's so annoying and unoriginal. Yeah, like they
thought they were so original, but like the fact that
their name is the Brian Jonestown Massacre, I mean, like

(31:36):
what a joke.

Speaker 2 (31:38):
Yeah, but see at the time, I would argue, I'm
not defending it. By the way, it is so irolly,
Like when I watched this doc like, I was like,
because you know, here's my take quickly when I first
saw it, when it was actually it was felt like
it was happening so in this weird way, I was like,

(32:00):
it felt like the documentary was happening in real time,
and it was sort of like, so the documentary came
out in two thousand and four, the original dig okay,
so it was still kind of happening, and it felt like,
in a weird way, was sort of lionizing these two
bands that were sort of like, okay, does that make sense.

(32:23):
It was almost kind of like trying to create a
legend before any time had passed to where a band
could become a legend. Like I understand that they were
badly behaved and they were doing tons of drugs and
the lifestyle was crazy even back then, like I wrote,
like they were hitting it real hard, like if you're

(32:44):
doing heroin, like it's you're.

Speaker 1 (32:47):
Hitting where they The way they lived was it was
like it's one thing to be like I'm a bad boy,
you know, But I was like, the way you live
is so disgusting.

Speaker 2 (32:56):
Yeah, oh uh uh huh. I but I knew people
who lived that way here in Atlanta too, and it
was just like back then, even when I was roughly
their age, I was like, oh, I just started my
adult job and I'm no longer doing speed and selling

(33:16):
painkillers to people, you know, Like I just kind of
cleaned up the act a little bit. But I again,
I was one of the I have friends that told
have told me like I was one of the first
people that they knew in their friend group that got
a real job, So people were still partying like that.
But it was like, even back then, I was like,

(33:38):
they're going real hard like to be that to be
sleeping like behind dumpsters on patio cushions and to like, yeah,
to just like have no money and having and having
to like steal things and stuff. That was kind of
a little bit of a bridge too far for me.

(33:59):
But it was like, but I also thought, why are
we doing a documentary on these bands? Is it because
they're just like loud and drunk and they fight?

Speaker 1 (34:07):
Like what I mean it is? It was I thought
it was a great documentary just because these these personalities
are so outrageous.

Speaker 2 (34:16):
Yeah, but it's it's just interesting to be in the
time period that there is, when it's happening in real time,
and you're like, oh, like I don't know, like are
we exacerbating this behavior by just putting a camera on
these people who are complete maniacs and love attention and
just making this like spectacle Like I don't know, I'm

(34:38):
sitting here going like are we just pumping this entire
scene full of air when we just need them to
clean up enough to live like normal human beings.

Speaker 1 (34:52):
I don't know.

Speaker 2 (34:52):
It was crazy, I do you know. I think the
message of the documentary is pretty simple at the end
of the day, which is that like there's always going
to be like two types of people in this scene,
one that wants to stay underground and not sell out,
and the other is the person that wants to be
in an actual band and make money and be able

(35:15):
to buy their mama house type of thing. That's always
like the confluence between these two essences in rock and
roll is that like do you sell out or do
you become a millionaire?

Speaker 1 (35:28):
Right?

Speaker 2 (35:28):
Yeah, And we've talked about this during the k Pop
episode where it feels like that the goals of that
are so different now than they were back in two
thousand and four. Like I feel like now you couldn't
even have a band like the Brian Jones Samasker because

(35:50):
they just wouldn't do anything. Like it's almost kind of
like the point is not The point is now to
just make money because there's so many points of entry
for musicians at this point, it's like, well, if you're
in the game at all, what are you doing.

Speaker 1 (36:06):
It's interesting watching the movie at the time because a
band like the Dandy Warhols could become huge and make
a ton of money, like a rock band could become
huge and you know, like the Strokes or the White
Stripes or the Rapture or the aa Yas, but we

(36:26):
don't really have popular music, like like what's the most
popular band now, you know. And so it was interesting
watching this because I was like this, this just doesn't
exist anymore, Like a band that has like indie roots
could not make a ton of money.

Speaker 6 (36:43):
Now it feels like yeah, I mean I like I said,
I don't think that a band like the Brian Jonestown
Masker could exist on a commercial level at.

Speaker 2 (36:55):
All, or the Dandy War because a there's no record
labels to sign bands anymore. I mean, let's get serious.
The music industry is fucking destroyed. There isn't a record
label like TVT Records that's going to court a band
like Brian Jonestown masacer A because they don't even work

(37:16):
in the same ways that they do as they did
in two thousand and four. The music industry was still
pretty much intact in two thousand and four, except Napster
had taken over. But it was also like now they're
not They would never take a chance on a band
that was completely fucked up on drugs and anti social
do you know what I'm saying. Like they're like, it's
almost kind of like a ticket to hell, like a

(37:39):
one way ticket to hell, and they wouldn't even entertain
that anymore because they only want to produce like Sabrina Carpenters,
if that makes anyse totally, But it.

Speaker 1 (37:46):
Was kind of funny because I feel like the Brian
Jonestown Massacre are like, well, we're kind of costs playing
as like the Rolling Stones what a bad Boy is Like,
we're like, this is what it takes to become a
successful rock group, where they're like emulating that type of personality.
But even at the time of the documentary, they're kind
of like, well, no, the world has moved that you

(38:08):
can't actually act like that anymore. That's like unacceptable behavior now,
you know. It was like, so it's sort of funny
seeing them kind of like run headfirst into that reality, right.

Speaker 2 (38:18):
Well, And what I think becomes part of the documentary
is the ways in which the Danny Warhols are able
to like rein in their hedonism to be able to
like actually play gigs and be reasonable. I mean, they
still have their little TIFFs yeah, they do that with

(38:39):
the David la Chappelle section where David la Chappelle does
a music video and they're like, I mean, it was
almost kind of like the lead singer of the Danny
Warhol Is his name.

Speaker 1 (38:49):
Courtney Courtney Taylor Taylor.

Speaker 2 (38:52):
Basically he was like, I know, I'm I know, I
look like a poudy beautiful model with my lower jeans,
but I don't want you to film me like that.
I want I want to be like a real rocker.
It was kind of like him in a weird way,
kind of telling this fashion photographer like don't make me hot?

(39:15):
Did you get that?

Speaker 1 (39:16):
Was so funny because he was like, yeah, can we
can we just come back and like reshoot this once
my hair is grown out? And I was like, you
guys are on set right now, Like that's not good,
That's not possible, buddy. But I felt like he was
kind of like trying to be like Anton, like he
really admired Anton, and so every time he Courtney through

(39:37):
kind of a fit, it felt like he was just
doing it to be like, well, this is what real
artists do, this is how real artists behave right, And.

Speaker 2 (39:45):
I feel like this this documentary made me kind of
question my deep seated belief in my older age, which
is that there are very there are actually really few
actually creative people in this world. Like for all of

(40:06):
the like social media, neess of people saying that they've
got bands and movies and record labels and art projects
and stuff. It just seems that like everybody is an artist,
and everybody can create art in any kind of way
they want to. Yeah, most of it is actually not

(40:27):
very creative, and there's a very like like there's even
a smaller amount of actual creative people than we ever
thought in the world, and that most people have just
been able to create their art because they were adjacent
to someone who was more creative than them. Does that

(40:48):
make sense? It does.

Speaker 1 (40:50):
Do you feel like there is any creative people in
this movie or they were all adjacent to something.

Speaker 2 (40:57):
I actually think that there is a creative Like, say
what you want about Anton Newcome in this in this
documentary right and again, I would like to maybe create
a line of demarcation between who he is in real
life right now versus what was shown in the documentary.

(41:22):
Does that make sense? Because I don't know him at all,
I'm not friends with him. I don't know who he
is in real life. I can only speak about what
I saw in a documentary that was made about him. Now,
whether or not that's him him, or that's him pretending
to be like a much more exaggerated version of himself,
I don't know. That's the power of a documentary is

(41:44):
that you don't know those things.

Speaker 1 (41:46):
And I mean that was one of the criticisms of
the documentary by the people who are in it, where
they're like, well, it was filmed over the course of
eight years, and they were like, basically they took all
the Jerry Springer moments, that's what they said, and put
them together and which, of course you would to make
the documentary interesting. But I will say after watching the movie,
I was kind of like, in the Brian Jonestown massacre storyline,

(42:07):
there are no there are only low points, so it
would you don't quite get the full Yeah, I feel
But anyways, contem I just.

Speaker 2 (42:16):
Don't want to, like, you know, talk about somebody who
is still living that I don't know. I'd rather speak
about them via the documentary I watched as a viewer. Okay, yes,
I will say in the documentary Anton seems very creative.
He seems kind of well. First of all, he definitely

(42:36):
has like the need to be creative. He had such
a rough life according to what was going on with
his dad at least, and he's definitely probably, you know,
in via the documentary, at least has probably some mental

(42:56):
illness in his family and maybe in his own life. Right.
But I also think that, you know, so he could
definitely write songs. He's got amazing influences. You can't deny that.
Like the stuff that he likes and the the stuff
that he channels is awesome. Like all of these things
are great things to like, like sixties psychedelic bands and

(43:21):
you know, counter cultural people, countercultural figures. I mean, Harry
Dean Stanton is in the movie. At one point.

Speaker 1 (43:29):
I thought that, yeah, and the music was good, and
he obviously is, like I thought, he was a very
creative person. And some of the more interesting parts of
the movie are when he's collaborating on like recording the music,
because you can actually tell he's like pretty focused and
like using other people and collaborating in a positive way.
It seems like things sort of fell apart during the
live performances, but during the actual like creation of music.

(43:52):
It seems like he really thrives and is like very creative.

Speaker 2 (43:54):
So yeah, I mean, you know, it seems like there's
another person in the Brian Jonestown ascer Matt Hollywood, who
seems to have written a lot of the songs. He look,
he looks exactly like John Lennon.

Speaker 1 (44:04):
I mean, I was like he was his very look
like John Lennon.

Speaker 2 (44:07):
Yes, but you know, there are always like gonna be
in a situation like that, there's gonna be at least
one or two creative people who are actually crative. I
think my argument is really that like legit creative people
a lot of times can actually function in society. It
is exactly like you see it in a documentary, which
is that like somebody that's absolutely a pure creative visionary

(44:33):
a lot of times is destroyed by that notion.

Speaker 1 (44:37):
Yeah, and like they they might not be able to
navigate the intricacies in the politics of working with a
record label. Yes, you know, they can't do both of
those things at the same time.

Speaker 2 (44:50):
Yes, Like a lot of people that have inspired me
over the years that are just super interesting, super creative
and just like extremely like gifted at what they do,
have personal problems. They have mental problems, they have socialization problems.
It's not like these people are able to like navigate

(45:14):
big corporate meetings where they're able to just be really
slick and polished. Like most most people I know who
are creative and cool and interesting have problems in some way,
shape or form, and especially have problems with dealing with
the Feds, the man the thing that's trying to give

(45:37):
them a platform, right, Like it's it's hard because it's like,
as an artist, you're sitting there going like, of course
I want my music or my art to be out there,
but I also have a problem with, like I have
a problem with with with sharing that with others in
a monetary way. Like it seemed to me like in

(45:57):
the documentary that was like the big argument because like
the Dandy Warhols were easily able to like take their
talent and make it bigger, and Brian Jones Enn Masker
just kept like self destructing all the time and falling
on their own sword, and it was kind of like
and that was the thing to going back to what
you said, whereas the Dandies were sort of like maybe

(46:19):
we're too commercial and we need a little bit more
of that fire that create a fire, but then they
would look at it and be like, well, this is
a fucking disaster. We can't be that, you know.

Speaker 1 (46:30):
Yeah, No, I mean, and I don't like which band
would I rather be in? Probably the Dandy Warhols, because
they're not living in a dumpster, you know. They kept
saying they're like the most well adjusted rock band in America,
and they were, and it seemed like fun to be
a member of that band. But is their music as
good as the Brian Jones ten massacre?

Speaker 2 (46:50):
I don't know. I'd probably say no. Well, I mean
I feel like it's I think the argument is that
it's less complex, right like I would say, I mean
that I actually love at least two or three Dandy
warhol songs, Like I used to DJ Boheman like You

(47:10):
at DJ nights when I was at DJ, and the
shit would fucking kill, Like people would go crazy for
that song. Everybody on the dance floor. Everybody loves that,
like who Who Who Part? I mean, you can't deny that.
And there's at least like again, like maybe two or
three other songs there's that I really like. I think
that's really catchy. But they're more pop songs, right, Yeah,

(47:36):
they're more digestible songs than some of the Brian Jonestown
stuff that I've heard. So it's like, and I'm not
saying that they're not as good because they're not making
poppier music, but I just think that obviously there's a
reason why one band went more commercial route than the
other one didn't. And it's funny because the label that
ended up trying to sign them, there was like this

(47:57):
moment I was having. First of all, I was completely
having flashbacks every fucking five seconds, Like it was like
going back to music industry days, club nights, knowing people
like this, I mean, Joel's hair, I don't even want it.

Speaker 1 (48:15):
We got to talk about Joel Gian who is sort
of representative of a whole identity.

Speaker 2 (48:22):
If you don't know what he looks like, imagine just
imagine a hipster from this era dressed it all black,
rail thin, little black motorcycle jacket with like a low
rise pair of slacks, and then this hair that most

(48:44):
people at this point have called the shotgun blast, which
is basically like hair that is blowed out in the
back spiky shorts, and then the front part is all
slicked down. I mean, it was kind of made famous
by john and Kate plus eight. That's what a lot
of people used to say. It was like the Kate Goslin.

Speaker 1 (49:06):
Hair, the can I speak to your manager hair?

Speaker 2 (49:09):
Yeah, well, bitch, I had that fucking hair back in
this era. Okay, if you looked at my Makeut Club profile,
I definitely had it, and it was not influenced by
Johnny Kate plus eight that came out later. For me,
my influence was coming from the Jesus and Mary chain.
That's who I wanted to look like. I wanted to
look like Robert Smith or the Jesus and Mary chair

(49:31):
with my wild, crazy black hair, and I just would
not wash it, then run a bunch of like sticky
tacky stuff through it, and then just mess it up
BedHead style. But then the front part had to have
this shape because I just had short bangs, so I
was like I had his hair. So I'm telling you,

(49:53):
when I saw Joel from the Brian jo Samascar, I
was immediately rocketed rocketed back to that hairstyle.

Speaker 1 (50:02):
And I did write in my notes, I feel like
Milly knew a lot of jewels because he is like
a caricature of a person in this movie. And he
is very much playing the nineteen sixties San Francisco guy
in this movie. Just the way he talks, the way
he acts, the way he dresses. It's like he's always
in character. And it's so funny because he is probably

(50:25):
the most loyal member of the band to Anton. He
plays the damn tambourine.

Speaker 2 (50:31):
He's the tambourine even, and.

Speaker 1 (50:33):
He's the tambourine player. I don't think he sings. He
might sing, but he doesn't write any of the music.
He's just the tambourine player. And I don't know. I
feel like you could take or leave a tambourine player.
I don't know if that's a vital member of your band.

Speaker 2 (50:49):
Well, he's the visual, he's the he's the visual, the bostone,
you know.

Speaker 1 (50:56):
But I just feel like I as a person, and
he seems like a very creative person.

Speaker 2 (51:03):
He's a writer and stuff.

Speaker 1 (51:05):
I wouldn't put up with all the bullshit of the
movie if I was just like, I'm just on stage
playing the dan tambourine. I don't know how he is
so committed to this lifestyle. It takes something that I
don't understand.

Speaker 2 (51:18):
Yeah, I guess it's just like a commitment to the mission.
Plus it's like, I don't know, I definitely see why
people were drawn to Anton, Like I think that was
kind of another running theme in the movie is just
I mean, he always had girlfriends, he was married, obviously at.

Speaker 1 (51:35):
One point, the hottest women wanting him, and.

Speaker 2 (51:39):
Just and going back slightly to what I was saying
about the music industry, there was this whole section where
you know, obviously like all like TVT Records, which I
don't even know if they exist anymore, but they were
trying to court. There was all this conversation about how
the Brian Jonestownasker was like a favorite of every A
and R person in the industry, and that was that's

(52:01):
probably true. I mean I remember them being very talked
about like the next big thing. They were. I mean,
everybody had them on the tip of their tongues in
this era, whether or not you wanted to admit it.
But it was that feeling of like who was gonna
be able to tame this monster? Like who's gonna be

(52:21):
able to make the Brian Jones Tamask are a viable
commercial band? And that's kind of what I saw in
the documentary was TVT being like, we're gonna do it.
We're gonna be the ones that could make them show up,
and they're gonna make a hundred albums with us, and
they're gonna stop doing drugs and stop fighting and we're
gonna make a million, tillion fucking dollars. And obviously that
did not happen. But it's the same instinct that all

(52:42):
these other people had towards Anton in the documentary, which
is that I'm gonna be the person that grounds this person.
I'm gonna be next to this person who's extremely interesting
and charismatic and fucked up and all the things, and
I'm gonna like be the avatar, the person that can

(53:04):
get it and be by their side. And I feel
like that's kind of like Joel at the end of
the day. He was like, yeah, you know, I'm gonna
be the one in the band that, like, I mean,
I'm part of it, but I'm also like I'm aware
of things to a certain day.

Speaker 1 (53:22):
Yeah, I mean they had to fly Joel to the
record label meetings in place of Anton to like make
sure they got this contract sign basically.

Speaker 2 (53:33):
And listen, not for nothing, not to sound like some
fucking Tenacious D character in the Tenacious D Show. But
I remember being in San Francisco in nineteen ninety nine
and going to a mod party. I went to a
mod party in somebody's house, and every dude looked like Joel.

(53:55):
Every dude looked like him, and they drove away on
their little Vespas and the Lambrettas, and they were all
like coked out assholes. So there was a lot of
Joels back in that era. Okay, I love.

Speaker 1 (54:14):
That you brought up the Tenacious DTV show. We need
to go in a deep dive. Maybe we can dedicate
a whole episode to the Tenacious DTV show.

Speaker 2 (54:21):
Not to be like Captain Ed's being like Mama Cass
or no, what does he say? He goes Janis Joplin
was washing dishes and throwing up. Then the cops busted
a total set up, Like that was me just now
talking about indie sleeves and brit pop. There's the part
he was like.

Speaker 1 (54:42):
Mama Cass was doing cheese balls in the backs that
speed mixed with cheese.

Speaker 2 (54:50):
I mean, this is the thing about being old, is
that your every day is like Yo, every story I
tell is gonna be that it's gonna be you come
closer and closer to Captain Ed, who owns a fucking
stupid little store and just regales young people with like
their fucked up stories of their childhood. And I'm like,
I'm doing it right now. This is a podcast that's

(55:12):
making me into captain Ed. Oh my god.

Speaker 1 (55:16):
It was interesting in the documentary because there are people
who are like self aware of what's going on, and
one of them I felt like was Miranda Richards. Yes,
I always enjoyed when they interviewed her because she was
like kind of in the band, but she was like
not enough to where she's like living with them or
like she was able to remove herself, so it wasn't
like totally she didn't get totally like dirtied by them,

(55:38):
but she had these quotes about Anton and like their
bad behavior, and she's like, they're emulating these bad boys
from the sixties with their drug habits and their fighting
and stuff. But all those bands did the drugs after
they became famous, and Brian Jonestown Massacre aren't even famous yet,

(55:58):
you know, And it's like it.

Speaker 2 (56:00):
Is kind of a reverse engineer scenario going on, because yeah,
that's their biggest like, I think the big question coming
out of something like dig xx is saying, like, what
could they have like if they just completely cleaned up,
could they have made it? Could they have now been

(56:23):
on the like reunion tours that the Dandy Warhols are on,
you know, making a lot of money at festivals, you know.
I mean, I think the biggest thing that came out
of this redux of dig XX, which wasn't in the
first documentary from two thousand and four, was obviously when

(56:44):
they got back together and what was it twenty twenty
three in Australia and then they just fucking kicked each
other's ass again. Yeah right, and.

Speaker 1 (56:53):
They're like in their fifties and sixties and they're fighting
on stage again, and it's like I couldn't believe it,
and it wasn't really an act necessarily.

Speaker 2 (57:05):
Well, and like, this is the thing that I think
is really interesting because I remember when that happened, all
the comments, like everybody that I knew that was posting
about this story were people of my age, Like they
were like, oh, look at these fucking tools back at
it again. Glad that you know I didn't see them
back in two thousand and one because you know, I

(57:26):
have friends that have tried to see them in the
past and they can't get their shit together. They were
always fighting. It was kind of just like a mixed
bag on whether or not you were actually gonna see
them perform music, I guess, but it was like, you know,
people by age that were kind of like, I can't
believe these assholes are fifty and they're still doing this right.
But I think it's what's really interesting about the nostalgia

(57:49):
trip of this is I look at a band like Oasis,
who right now is probably the most popular band on
planet Earth. Yeah, it's a mix between people by Asian
people who loved them back in the day, and then
like new fans like gen Z or even like late

(58:11):
millennial fans who probably came to Oasis based on stuff
like TikTok and that kind of stuff, who have definitely
internalized their bad boy behavior as something to be funny
or to be want.

Speaker 3 (58:31):
Like.

Speaker 2 (58:32):
So I'm kind of like, well, Oasis is now fucking
selling out the Rose Bowl and I know people who
are paying thousands of dollars to see them in Australia
weirdly enough, and it's they're kind of costing on a
sort of similar line, which is this just like bad
British guy behavior and fighting. I don't know what their

(58:55):
secret sauce is. I don't know if they wrote better
songs or they were able to get their shit together
in a better way. But you know, it's like.

Speaker 1 (59:04):
I don't know. Yeah, I mean, I feel like they
were just they were just they were probably able to
write better songs, slightly better maybe, and then they were
able to keep it together slightly better, like just like
you know, but yeah, what's the difference. They're like printing
billions of dollars and you know, Anton Nucomb is hanging

(59:26):
out in Berlin now.

Speaker 4 (59:28):
I know.

Speaker 2 (59:28):
It just makes you wonder if Anton Newcomb had just
worn more Stone Island parkas and not done heroin and
only had really done the drugs and the drinking that
Liam Gallagher had still fought just as much as as

(59:50):
he'd always had, but he could just if he just
made those slight adjustments, would they now be Oasis? Could
they now be selling out the Rose Bowl?

Speaker 1 (01:00:00):
Yeah? I think it's a timing issue too, because I
think Oasis came out like.

Speaker 2 (01:00:04):
Just a few years before.

Speaker 1 (01:00:06):
Yeah, you know, so, I don't know, it's interesting and
I mean I think the watching dig XX made it
because I didn't see this in two thousand and four.
But if you watch that movie in two thousand and four,
you'd probably be like, oh, he's going to be dead
in a year. Yeah, And there was a darker undercurrent

(01:00:27):
to it. And so watching dig XX, it's like, Hey,
no one in the band died, and they comment on that,
and that's sort of surprising, to be honest.

Speaker 2 (01:00:38):
Yeah, I actually know shit. Actually did Google to see
if he had died, because I was like, maybe I'm
remembering wrong. Did he die? I don't think so, but
I'll check. I'm happy that he's still alive. I'm happy
that anybody that you know, anybody that partied as hard
as him and is still alive. I'm like tip of the.

Speaker 1 (01:00:59):
Hat right truly. I mean it seemed like an impossible
task by the end of that movie.

Speaker 2 (01:01:07):
Well, I don't know, I feel like I'm sorry if
I had all these disjointed thoughts this episode.

Speaker 1 (01:01:13):
It just was it touched a part deep within you.

Speaker 2 (01:01:16):
Millie Well, and I kept thinking to myself, like, is
this why like gen Z are so neutered and careful
about everything, is because their parents were this their parents
were around in the Brian Jonestown massacre Dandy Warhol's era.

Speaker 1 (01:01:37):
Yeah, that is an interesting question of did this have
an impact on why gen Z is so chaste and boring?

Speaker 2 (01:01:49):
Hell, I feel like two of the Dandy Warhols became
real estate agents or something.

Speaker 4 (01:01:54):
Right?

Speaker 2 (01:01:54):
Am I wrong about that?

Speaker 1 (01:01:55):
Yeah? Well one of them did, no, and one of
the former members of Brian Jonestown also did to real
estate agents.

Speaker 2 (01:02:05):
Crazy got to love the coked out rocker to real
estate agent pipeline.

Speaker 1 (01:02:14):
Jesus.

Speaker 2 (01:02:16):
Well, I don't know what else to say.

Speaker 1 (01:02:17):
I feel like, again, there's nothing else too sick.

Speaker 2 (01:02:21):
I have, Like I was having so many feelings when
I was watching this again. I started questioning my own
participation in the scene, being like should I have had
my hair this way? Should I have maybe instead gone
a different route, maybe like gone to seminary school or something.

(01:02:43):
I don't know. This it felt very like almost kind
of like wow, I can't believe anybody that partied like
this in this era is alive. And I knew people
who partied way harder than I did. I mean, I
was a fucking prude compared to some these other people
I knew so I don't know, I I have nostalgia

(01:03:06):
for it. I had a great time, Like they were like, unfortunately,
it is true, like Indye Sleeves was really fun and
it was really fun to be a DJ, and like
it was really fun to have sweaty bangs and to
be messy and like smoke a bunch of cigarettes and

(01:03:28):
do shots. It was fun.

Speaker 1 (01:03:30):
Well, I think Indie Sleeves also, you know it's in
the title indie, it still felt like this is our music.
It didn't feel even though it was you know, major
labels putting it out a lot of the times, it
did feel like there was some ownership and it wasn't
the mainstream where I don't know, if you go dancing

(01:03:51):
out at a club now, all the music would feels
like it would most like you brought up Sabrina Carpenter.
It's like she's incredibly famous. It's like, I don't know,
it feels like there's some sort of musical genre or
like the indie music level isn't there anymore? You know?

Speaker 2 (01:04:14):
Yeah, I mean that is a huge topic of conversation,
and I you know, I know, we tried to crack
it a little bit with the K Pop episode but
it was like, yeah, I just think the entire music
industry has changed. I think culture has completely changed. I think,
you know, what we valued back then or not what
people value anymore. Like nobody cares about selling out, nobody

(01:04:35):
cares about like, you know, trying to be you know,
respectful and classy and and have a you know, like
everybody thinks in terms of brands. Everybody thinks in terms
of making money, you know, I mean even older people.
I mean Oasis is making a fucking cash grab as
we speak. We talked about them, Yeah, I mean they're
printing fucking money and probably making their limited edition merch

(01:04:59):
that you know, you can only get for like three
hundred dollars a day of show. So it's like we're
also coming to it. It's just this new era of capitalism,
I suppose. But I do like it when it was
a little raw, a little rough around the edges, you know.
I mean, again, the music industry was still involved. It
couldn't have been that. We're not talking about true underground

(01:05:21):
you know, Anton Newcomb type of shit. We're talking about
just a different form of the same machine. But it
was at least on the bar and club level and
just like the hanging out level. Yeah, it was pretty
fucked up and fun. And I'm happy if you're alive.

(01:05:44):
I'm happy for you, I'm happy for us.

Speaker 1 (01:05:48):
Well, that's a great way to end this conversation. Okay,
I'm happy. I'm happy you're alive.

Speaker 4 (01:06:02):
Okay.

Speaker 2 (01:06:03):
So we have a really great guest for this round
of what we call my area of expertise, which is basically,
we bring on somebody that we like to talk about
their specific passion for film, and very niche passion sometimes,

(01:06:26):
and this is no exception, our guest is a dear
old friend of mine. He is the writer and editor
of the daily baseball news and culture newsletter Cup of Coffee,
which you should all be subscribing to if you haven't already.
And he's written the books Rethinking Fandom, how to Beat
the Sports Industrial Complex at its own game, Stars of

(01:06:47):
Major League Baseball, and Legends of Major League Baseball. And
he was the former lead National Baseball writer for NBC Sports,
where he launched and edited the baseball blog Hardball Talk,
which is how I even know is to be honest,
But he's a good friend. I can't wait to talk
to him. He's going to provide an amazing little nugget

(01:07:08):
of expertise, and here he is. Please welcome Craig Calcaterra.

Speaker 3 (01:07:13):
Welcome, Craig, Hey, thanks for having me.

Speaker 2 (01:07:15):
Guys, we are stoked about this. This is I've been
wanting you to come on the pod for a while.

Speaker 3 (01:07:22):
Not gonna lie, well, I was jealous because, like, you've
had like a couple of really good podcasts in the
past that I'm like, boy, that's a podcast I would
totally go on. And now there's one I'm on. So
this is fantastic.

Speaker 2 (01:07:34):
Yeah, well, let's talk. You are obviously deeply steeped into
the world of baseball, and uh, I mean you put
out a daily baseball newsletter and that shit is in
my inbox at like seven am or something. It's like
the news. It's like it comes in with like the news,

(01:07:56):
which is so fantastic.

Speaker 3 (01:07:59):
So my past life before I was a sports writers,
I was a lawyer. And when you're a lawyer, you
live and die by the clock. And so when I
started to be a blogger, I thought, oh, I'm gonna
sit in my pajamas and do whatever the hell I want.
And then I realized, no, I can't do that. I
have to have a schedule and a regiment, and so yeah,
I put that thing out every day. It's never out

(01:08:19):
after seven o'clock.

Speaker 2 (01:08:20):
Oh my gosh, it's fantastic. It has like all the
scores from the games of the previous night. It's just
it's like essential. Like I said, it's like getting the newspaper.
It's fabulous, and you work really hard on it. So
I just wanted to say it is appreciated by us.

Speaker 1 (01:08:34):
But are you optimistic about the Minnesota Twins feature?

Speaker 3 (01:08:39):
Oh yeah, no, see I'm not really optimistic about the Twins,
and I'm really sorry for my Minnesota friends out there.
But no, man, that's just bad news.

Speaker 1 (01:08:49):
It's a dark time. This has been a very dark season.

Speaker 3 (01:08:52):
And it's that good for the Braves either. So neither
of you guys are in good shape at all as
far as baseball fandom going forward.

Speaker 2 (01:08:59):
Dog right now, she's jumped shipped. I mean, I don't
know we've actually spoken in depth about this, Craig, but
like you know, I don't know. A couple a while ago, actually,
even prior to moving to LA, I was like those Braves,
I don't know, they're pissing me off with the whole
stadium issue.

Speaker 3 (01:09:20):
So yeah, White Flight Stadium in Cobb County is not
exactly the best place to watch baseball anymore. I don't think.

Speaker 2 (01:09:27):
Oh yes, I totally agree, and being as I grew
up in Cobb County, it's extra.

Speaker 3 (01:09:31):
Personal for me.

Speaker 2 (01:09:34):
But but I will say that, like, you know, when
it comes down to baseball, I mean, like there was
a period for a while where you know, I kind
of was, like I was, I've been a super fan
my entire life, but that there were days where I
wasn't kind of every day, you know, And now I'm back.
I'm back to every day. Like I bought the MLB

(01:09:58):
All Access thing and I am checking in with your
newsletter every single day.

Speaker 3 (01:10:02):
Well, on the one hand, that's great. On the other hand,
I hate to break it to you, but like there's
this well known like sociologists have written patterns, like papers
about how baseball fandom works. And the classic model is
you're really into it when you're a little kid. You
sort of get out of it when you're cool and
you have, you know, a life in your twenties and stuff,

(01:10:24):
and then middle age is when it grabs everybody and
drags you back into it. And I started to become
a full time baseball writer when I was about thirty eight,
and you know, I'm in my fifties now, so it's
right in the wheelhouse. And I know you're younger than me, Millie,
but welcome.

Speaker 2 (01:10:40):
Is that the beginning of the end.

Speaker 3 (01:10:42):
But it's a long end. It's a long end.

Speaker 2 (01:10:45):
Well, that's actually really interesting because I think part of
I think part of what I like about baseball specifically
versus other sports. I mean, I really only really only
follow basketball besides baseball, is that there is this like
very pleasing tempo to baseball because it's like long seasons.
It feels like a almost like a show that you
watch every night or something. You know, It's like you're

(01:11:08):
checking in with your team, your boys, and you're just
like and I think maybe there is something to that
in my middle age where I'm like, yeah, I just
want to like come home and do my thing and
check in with my show, follow my show, and like, yeah,
I can totally understand why you'd pick it back up
later in life.

Speaker 3 (01:11:26):
So a lot of people have romanticized it as far
as that whole Oh, it's the background sound of summer,
and that's true. That's absolutely how I agree with it.
But the one thing that I think of it as
the most applicable is it's like watching Network TV back
in the day when there were twenty three episodes and yeah,
you know what, Look, if you miss one episode of
Hunter on Friday night, you're gonna be fine to watch

(01:11:49):
Hunter the next week. You didn't miss anything. It's the
stakes are so very, very low, And that's what I
love about baseball. Once you get to a certain age,
you don't need the drama. You don't just want to.

Speaker 1 (01:12:01):
I was gonna I was going to compare it to Cheers,
like just well, like watching the show Cheers actually, like
you're kind of like I want to check on, check
in on my buddies, you know.

Speaker 2 (01:12:12):
It's so comforting.

Speaker 3 (01:12:14):
Yeah, there's like this whole parasocial of oh man, that
Catcher girl mustache. That's fantastic. I have no idea what's
happened for the last month, but but he looks good.
You know. It's totally casual like that. That's what I
love about it.

Speaker 2 (01:12:24):
Yeah, for sure, I and my Dodger fandom right now
is at an all time high because I'm just like, oh, well,
they've got a lot of Asians on that team. I
am here for that, and I just love the whole
I don't know, I mean the idea that they are,
you know, even on social media, like I follow the Dodgers'
Instagram and stuff, and it's like they're behind the scenes,

(01:12:45):
like messing around and having fun. I'm like, they're my friends.
I love them.

Speaker 3 (01:12:50):
They they love me too. So they get it right.
They get it totally right the Dodgers do. As far
as that whole.

Speaker 2 (01:12:56):
Experience, yeah, one hundred percent.

Speaker 1 (01:13:00):
Okay, so let's get down to business.

Speaker 4 (01:13:03):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:13:03):
I was gonna say, we're not even really making that
heart of a shift because it's interesting. When you brought
up your area of expertise, I was like, of course,
but why don't you tell everybody what is your area
of expertise?

Speaker 3 (01:13:19):
My area of expertise is are actors who play athletes
in movies? And whether they do a good or a
bad job convincing you that they're an athlete irrespective of
how they act, irrespective of characterization or anything else. Do
they like allow you to suspend disbelief that they could
be a ballplayer or a football player, a basketball player

(01:13:41):
or something like that.

Speaker 2 (01:13:42):
That's a good one oh, man, I really thought about this.
I mean, I'm sure you have, like, Okay, so for you,
is there someone that's like miles ahead of the rest
or is I mean, is there just like one or
even two people that are performances that you're like this is?
I feel like they're actually an athlete.

Speaker 3 (01:14:02):
There are two actually that the two of them stand
head and shoulders above everybody else. One of them is
kind of a cheap, but I don't think it's a
big cheap And the actors are Kevin Costner and Burt Reynolds.

Speaker 2 (01:14:14):
Wow.

Speaker 3 (01:14:14):
Bert Burt Reynolds is a bit of a cheap because
he was a college football player at Florida State in
the fifties, and he would have gone pro. He could
have been in the NFL and could have been a
big star, but he blew out his knee and so
then he shifted gears and got into acting. And his
two biggest sports movies were The Longest Yard and Semi Tough, which,
in both of which he plays a football player. So

(01:14:36):
it's not that hard, but he does it so much
better than even ex athletes who play roles that are
in their same sport. He just does it great. Plus
he did a NASCAR driver once in a horrible, horrible
movie called Stoker Race that I watched when I was
a kid. Would look they look Turkle's chicken. I know
this that that's one of the underrated ned baby vehicles

(01:15:00):
as far as I'm concerned. But Burt Reynolds and then
and then Kevin Costner just I don't even like Kevin
Costner very much. I tend to not like him in
most of the roles he plays. I don't know what
about him that I don't like. But between Bull Durham
for the Love of the Game and Tim Cupp, he
was an extraordinarily convincing baseball player, an extraordinarily convincing golfer

(01:15:25):
just so much better. Maybe he went into the wrong field.

Speaker 1 (01:15:27):
Frankly, Yeah, he carries himself like an athlete, like he
has such body confidence even in non athlete movies, the
way he walks, it's just there's a casual comfort in
his body that I feel like a lot of athletes have.
And so I think that's part of the reason that
he is such a convincing athlete in all these movies.

Speaker 3 (01:15:50):
There's that, and there's also the fact that the sweet
spot for him and all three of those movies I mentioned,
he's playing sort of a once great athlete at the
end of the line. And I'm guessing a lot of actors,
whether they're in their thirties or forties, when they filmed
those kinds of roles, don't want to let themselves look
kind of half washed up, and for some reason, Costner

(01:16:12):
does a great job of that. He still has the
arrogance and the ego that every athlete has to have
to be great, and probably is just part of who
Kevin Costner is, frankly, but he manages to make himself
look vulnerable as an athlete too, and not many do
that well.

Speaker 2 (01:16:29):
So Okay, so now we've got Burt Reynolds and Kevin
Costner sort of the elite actor slash athletes. Right, what
are some other memorable because there's because I when I
was like looking things up, I was like, there have
been so many actors that have played athletes in one

(01:16:50):
form or another, and yeah, some of them, you're like,
they're just wearing a uniform and they're not doing anything
beyond that, right, Right, And then you know, you've got
certain other actors that are actually like on the field,
and like maybe you know, if they're playing baseball, they're batting,
or they're doing something like I think of stuff like

(01:17:11):
major league or whatever. So is what would be like
the next tier down? Like, what are there some like
you know, maybe not inherent to the you know, like
the Costner or Burt Reynolds model, but like good enough.

Speaker 3 (01:17:26):
The next tier down. I'm going to split the next
tier into two separate categories.

Speaker 2 (01:17:32):
Fair fair.

Speaker 3 (01:17:33):
The first one are sort of one offs peer actors
no athletic background to speak of, who just sort of
nailed it and maybe they didn't do a lot of it,
but they nailed it. And one is DeNiro in Raging Bowl.
Yes sure, which yeah, I mean, he's de Niro. He
that's what he did, right, That's what he does. He

(01:17:55):
was just so convincing as a boxer. And I know,
you know, Jake Klamata was full of crap, but you know,
he even said by the time that movie was done filming,
he looked like a credible middleweight, like he could have
bucked And that's you know, being a method actor becoming
a boxer. Maybe that works. But he looked great. And
he's never done anything that else that makes you think, oh,
he could be an athlete. And then the other one

(01:18:16):
is Charlie Sheen in Major League. Charlie Sheen, wild thing, Yes,
wild thing. You know. I'm sure he probably played you know,
high school baseball at you know, Malibu High School, wherever
the hell he went. But he looked like a pitcher
and not just a picture. He looked like a closer,
which is a very specific, you know, brand of pitcher
for non sports fans out there. He's the guy that

(01:18:38):
comes in in the ninth inning to lock it down
at the end. Those guys have a whole thing about them.
They're they're half insane. They're very intense because they're coming
in in very tight situations and stressful situations. They just
carry themselves into a certain way. They look like they're
about ready to die at all times. But they managed
to get the job done. And Charlie Sheen in Major League,

(01:19:00):
in addition to having a great wind up, great form,
if you believe the lore from the set, he was
hitting you know, in the eighties on his fastball, which
is very very good. But he also nailed the whole
composure and deportment part of it. He looked like he
was probably about ready to have a nervous breakdown, but
held it together. And that's exactly what a closer does.

Speaker 1 (01:19:20):
You know something I noticed in a lot of movie
sports movies, part like the movement that is the most
noticeable that they're doing it wrong is throwing a baseball.
For some reason that that stands out. I see that
in I just watched the movie Ephis. Have you seen His?

Speaker 3 (01:19:36):
I was gonna mention Ethis, okay that those guys.

Speaker 1 (01:19:41):
I just was like, you're not throwing the baseball right
a lot of these guys, but just so, it just
it sticks out more than any other. You can't fake
it as much.

Speaker 3 (01:19:49):
I feel like to go off on a bit of
an Ethis tangent. Carson Lund, the writer and director of Ethos,
came to my town, Columbus, Ohio a few months ago
for a screen and I got to go to the
screening and I did a Q and A with him
about the movie Ethis and a couple beers of them.
Great guy, And the big question I had was how

(01:20:10):
did you find these guys? And were they actually good
baseball players? How much of this was magic? And he
said they, you know, they put out the ad or
the notice or whatever for guys who have some baseball experience,
and a lot of them lied because that's what you do.
But they looked the part, so he made it work. Sure,
And the throwing was the hardest thing. Guys can kind

(01:20:31):
of pretend to hit running is not that hard. And
then some of the guys were supposed to be, you know,
fifty five year old, out of shape dudes who did
a very good job of doing that. But the throwing
was the hardest part. And you know, you got to
be a little you got to be a little careful
with that, yeah, and not to skip around too much.
But that that gives me the absolute worst athlete actor

(01:20:52):
in any movie I've ever seen. And I think he's
so far he's farther ahead of the bad ones than
Kevin Coster and but Reynolds are ahead of the good ones.
And I'm talking about Freddie Prince Junior in the movie
Summer Catch.

Speaker 4 (01:21:04):
Wow.

Speaker 6 (01:21:06):
We just talked about him.

Speaker 3 (01:21:10):
Summer Summer Catch. You know, it's supposed to take place
on the Cape Cod League, which is where sort of
elite college level players play in the summer as they're
trying to up their draft stock. So if you're playing
on the Cape Cod League, you're pretty good. And uh,
Freddie Prince Junior looks like he saw baseball for the
first time when he got to the set. He has

(01:21:30):
this weird hitch in his throw that looks like he's
kind of throwing a frisbee or kind of throwing a football,
but like at an amusement park to try to get
like a prize, not like he's an athlete. And you
could watch that movie and know nothing about the production
of it and know that the director wanted to kill
himself every single day, and the editor whoever edited that

(01:21:52):
movie needs just a special oscar for how many cuts
in one throwing motion you could do to make it
look credible. Is the absolute worst throwing a baseball, which
a lot of us do when we're a little kid.
I don't know what happened to Freddy Prince Junior, though.

Speaker 1 (01:22:07):
That's fascinating. And we you know, Milly and I are.
I would say we're fans of Freddy Prince Junior. So
it's it's it's hard for us to hear this, but you.

Speaker 2 (01:22:14):
Know, listen, he could be really good, you know, communicating
his sadness and she's all that, but also be bad
at throwing.

Speaker 1 (01:22:24):
A base he's actually okay.

Speaker 3 (01:22:27):
In the rest of that movie is you know, the
rom com elements and whatever the hell else is going
on in that movie. He you know, he's credible. He
just you know, they can't have any baseball. They should
have said it in like a ping pong setting or
something like that.

Speaker 2 (01:22:38):
I don't know, Oh, I have I completely Matthew Lillard
is in this movie too. This is oh yeah, this
is okay, s this is a two thousand and one classic.

Speaker 1 (01:22:48):
This is en my wheelhouse early two thousands. You want
to say, yeah, Jessica Beal's in it. I just want
to say it. Back to the ephis point. I loved
Ephis and that didn't like. I actually thought it worked
for that movie because they are a bunch of like
club slobs and the slubs and so that was fine.
But I did just notice the throwing motion was off

(01:23:09):
in that movie.

Speaker 3 (01:23:09):
Yeah, And Carson Lunz said that it was hard to
get around, but it ultimately worked, and I think he's right.
I think it totally worked because what that movie was
trying to communicate so totally. So if you went into
that movie, and I know a lot of people in
the sports internet space whenever a sports movie comes out,
everybody wants to talk about it, and there are some
people that are just sort of dogmatic about it. Wasn't

(01:23:30):
believable because that guy you can't do that with esis don't.
In fact, it defeats the purpose of ethis.

Speaker 2 (01:23:35):
You know what I was thinking, because you know, I
was like coming up with some choices. I was thinking, like,
who are like my favorite actors? Now this is probably
I don't know how faithful this is to your area
of expertise, but it's certainly like my favorite. I think
he's probably my favorite actor playing an athlete in any movie,

(01:23:55):
and that's Paul Newman and slap Shot.

Speaker 1 (01:23:58):
Oh he took mine, Melian, Did I really love? I
love Paul Newman and Slapshot. I love Slapshot.

Speaker 3 (01:24:05):
He is well partially he just nails even more so
than Costner the whole athlete at the end of the line, attitude,
and you know, he's Paul Newman, so of course he's
going to handle the acting piece of that better than
Costner is I think, even though Costner is okay, but
he's a credible skater. You know, he was pretty credible

(01:24:26):
with that. Now he does get out class because one
of the guys I mentioned I wrote down earlier that
I wanted to bring up is one of his co
stars in that movie, Michael an Keen. Yes, he he
You know, most people might know him as he was
the sheriff on Twin Peaks, but he was he was
in Slap Shot is like he played Ned Braydon, who
was like the young prospect or whatever. He's almost a

(01:24:49):
bit of a cheap too, because he's he's from Canada
and he grew up playing youth hockey and he got
a scholarship to play hockey at the University of New
Hampshire or somewhere like that, and he looks amazing. He
might be one of the best athletes I've seen who's
an actor in a movie. He's skates. There's this thing
in hockey about skating with your head up, and anybody
who learns how to play hockey when you're young, the

(01:25:11):
biggest thing is you're looking down at the puck, You're
looking down where your skates are going. You got to
learn to skate with your head up and just let
everything go otherwise. He just does that perfectly, and it's
it's notable because there are a couple pros there are
a couple of ringers in that movie who are also
doing it, but whenever the actor types and even Paul
Newman has his head down quite a bit. So i'n
king just totally nails it well.

Speaker 2 (01:25:28):
I mean, I would be remiss if I didn't mention
maybe my favorite hockey movie of all time, which is
The Cutting Edge starring dB Sweety.

Speaker 1 (01:25:37):
I can't remember how dB looked out on the rink.
How much of a good I think it's pretty good.

Speaker 3 (01:25:45):
I mean I see that one, so I don't know
I'm missing.

Speaker 2 (01:25:49):
Face. Oh it's yeah, it's definitely a fame. I now know.
Mori Kelly is, you know, the the romantic uh lead
in that movie with him. I'm not sure if she
was skating all the time. It was a little hard
to tell, but it felt like he was skating, like
when they were doing shots of him, like it seemed

(01:26:12):
like he was on skates moving around like he had,
you know, full autonomy. I'm not sure if that was her,
but I don't know. I could be wrong. It's been
a minute since I've seen it.

Speaker 3 (01:26:22):
But better than Talia Shiro and Rockies.

Speaker 2 (01:26:25):
Yes, yes, definitely definitely. Well, Okay, let me ask you this.
I'm gonna throw a curveball, no pun intended. What about
I think we can the punch? Okay, let's intend it
this time?

Speaker 1 (01:26:40):
Can we intend it?

Speaker 2 (01:26:41):
All?

Speaker 4 (01:26:41):
Right?

Speaker 2 (01:26:41):
You're the producer. Yes, you're gonna make a note of it.
What about the inverse? Is there an athlete who is
an incredible actor?

Speaker 3 (01:26:55):
The first answer I would give for a yes on
that I don't think counts, but I got him man
to him anyway is Kurt Russell. Because Kurt Russell was
an actor first. Obviously it was a Disney child actor
and whatever. But he also he was a baseball player
and he played fairly high level minor league baseball for
the team his dad owned. The Portland team back in

(01:27:15):
the latest seventies I think was Portland Mavericks. There's a
documentary about them a few years ago that was really
really good. But Kurt Russell was a very credible player
for them. I don't think he counts though, because he
was an actor first and he was obviously going to
go back to that. The category that dominates that are wrestlers,
and a lot of that is because you know, they're

(01:27:37):
showman anyway. You know, if you're a baseball player you're
not trying to play to the crowd necessarily, but wrestlers
have to and they do a great job. So, you know,
Dwayne the Rock Johnson's a great example. Dave Bautista has
done a really good job. Roddye Weimer might be my
favorite because They Live is one of my top five
movies of all time.

Speaker 1 (01:27:52):
Yes, so those scena is really funny.

Speaker 3 (01:27:55):
Yeahina, he's gotten really good, especially TV. But him playing
that peacemaker, Yeah, peacemaker, he's he's really good in that. Really,
his timing is great. A couple others are football players.
Terry Crews is good. Terry Crews played in the NFL
for a while. Carl Weathers. Carl Weathers is great because

(01:28:18):
he was an NFL player. He played for the Oakland
Raiders for about a year in the early seventies and
then obviously everybody knows him as Apollo Creed, but he
was an amazing boxer in that. So not only could
he act and he played the sort of Muhammad Ali
stand in that was Apollo Creed and did a very
convincing job of it, but he looked the part as
a boxer too, even though that wasn't his sport. So
he's very underrated as far as that goes.

Speaker 2 (01:28:40):
Well, that's it's it's interesting you mentioned this because you
know my day job, I'm a film programmer, and I
did I just recently did a stunt, as we call them,
which is basically like a night or several days worth
of you know, themed programming or whatever. And it was
basically to celebrate the beginning of the NFL. Elison and

(01:29:00):
I program a channel that is primarily blaxploitation. And there's
a lot of blaxploitation stars that were former NFL players,
and so you've got like Fred Williamson and Jim Brown
and Bubba Smith and Carl Weathers and Bernie Case. I mean,
you obviously have oj which we won't mention, but it's yeah,

(01:29:22):
but it's it's really interesting because and there's actually this
movie called The Black Six, which I feel like came
out in the early seventies, but it was the entire cast.
It's like a black biker gang movie, and all of
the actors are football players, and I feel like there's
like there was this weird pipeline from football player to

(01:29:42):
black's rotation actor happening in Hollywood.

Speaker 1 (01:29:44):
At some point the seventies certainly.

Speaker 3 (01:29:45):
Yeah, guys that played football in like the late sixties,
early seventies, it was just this huge pipeline. And the
part of it is they're big, so they looked intimidating
in a lot of their action movies or crime movies
or whatever. But there's something about the charisma of that
era of football players. And you know, you mentioned Bubba Smith,
but there are also you know, a couple of white
players Terry Bradshaw and Merlin Olsen and Alex Carriso.

Speaker 1 (01:30:09):
I'm written down.

Speaker 3 (01:30:10):
All about the same age, all coming into movies in
the seventies at some point, and it fed into that
whole you know, the whole North Dallas forty and all
that kind of like it was sort of the last
years of the NFL being the wild West with outlaws
and crazy people and whatever was drawing people to football

(01:30:30):
in the sixties and into the early seventies. I think
lent itself very well. The big personalities and acting, Yeah
it is.

Speaker 1 (01:30:36):
I wrote this down. I was why are there so
many NFL players that end up actors? It seems more
than any other sport, football players end up having somewhat
successful acting careers. And it is sort of odd because
their faces are hidden in the sport itself, unlike other sports,
but yet they find their way to the movies. I

(01:30:58):
don't know, it's sort.

Speaker 3 (01:30:58):
Of interesting not to go two armchair psychiatrists with it,
But I think that you need a certain level of
ego and confidence in football that you don't necessarily need
in the other sports because someone is going to hit
you hard all the time. Yeah, and if you don't
think I'm going to hit them harder or I'm going
to persevere, you're not going to last long in football,

(01:31:20):
whereas baseball has just kind of a bunch of boring dudes. Frankly,
it's a leap full enormies all the time. But in football,
you don't make it to the highest levels if you
don't have a certain confidence that probably translates pretty well
to acting.

Speaker 2 (01:31:33):
Yeah, yeah, you know what I was thinking, because obviously
I feel like we can make the correlation that you know,
wrestlers and football players turn actors primarily go into the
action movie genre, right, wouldn't you say so? I was
trying to think of, like maybe an athlete that would
appear in something like a rom com or something, and

(01:31:55):
the only one I could really think of and I
don't you know this is again is probably like Jason Lee,
who was a skateboarder.

Speaker 1 (01:32:02):
Right, I have an answer for this too, well, go
ahead tell me more. So there's an actor. His name
is Namdi Asamuga, and he was a really good football player.
He was like a shutdown corner in the league. And
he's forty four now, but he is like primarily he
was in a movie called Sylvie's Love that's like a
romantic movie. He's the lead in it with Tessa Thompson.

(01:32:22):
So he's not like super well known, but he's a
successful actor right now who's in like more thoughtful movies
as an actor. And he was like a really good
football player.

Speaker 2 (01:32:34):
Does he play a football player in the movie or
is he play?

Speaker 4 (01:32:36):
No?

Speaker 1 (01:32:37):
No, No, he doesn't.

Speaker 3 (01:32:38):
Wow.

Speaker 1 (01:32:38):
No, he's like he's he's like graduated to like actual movies.

Speaker 2 (01:32:42):
Wow. Fascinating.

Speaker 3 (01:32:44):
So that's pretty good, yeah, because you usually see the
tough guy, and if you do see somebody in a
non tough guy, non action thing, they're often playing themselves
or versions of himself. Like you know, Lebron James was
in train Wreck, but he was playing Lebron James and
the whole of his being there was Hey, it's Lebron James.

Speaker 2 (01:33:02):
Yeah. Yeah, I'm like I was like kind of pressed
to find somebody. I was like, well, Jason Lee, I mean,
you know, skateboarding is this sport. He's good, Yeah, he's good.

Speaker 1 (01:33:11):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:33:12):
But also, you know, then you've got the artolds of
the world, if you know, basically starting out in action
and then eventually making his way to kindergarten cop and
things of that nature. But I don't know, this isn't
this is such a fascinating subject because it does feel
like I don't know. I mean, do you think that

(01:33:33):
there are I think we were talking about this with
Josh Fatam a while back about the sort of the
new scene of movies like who, like who besides wrestlers?
Do you see any of this? You know, these athletes
who are still acting in that way that maybe they
were doing it in like the seventies and eighties perhaps,

(01:33:54):
or like even in the nineties with the martial arts
movies like the Jackie Chan movies and you know, oh
my god, I'm planking on his fucking name, Oh John
Claude van Dam or something. Oh yeah, who do you
do you see anybody now who is kind of in
both worlds, like an athlete that's acting and does a
pretty good job, or you know, I'm.

Speaker 3 (01:34:15):
Not seeing a lot. Part of it is just the
way the business of sports works. In the All the
athletes now are so very well media trained, and they're
they're told and taught to not say anything controversial. Ever,
the personality is kind of drained out of them by design,
so you don't get headlines, bad headlines about you or something,

(01:34:38):
and so that I think sort of mitigates against those
personalities coming through to the extent. There should be some
or could be some NBA players who are sort of
at the end of their career right now, because in
the NBA that will switch to let's be boring, only
really started about three or four years ago, and there's
this whole generation of NBA players. I'm thinking of guys

(01:34:58):
like Kevin Durant. Yeah, I have no idea if he
has any skills. I don't have any idea if he
wants to act, but just based on his you know,
his social media presence in the sort of interviews he
gives and stuff, there's a whole bunch of NBA players
who probably would be amazing, whether it's comedy roles or
you know, whether it's the guy in the chair, you know,
in an action movie or something that would just be
great because they're quick and they're funny as hell. And

(01:35:22):
there's also that arrogance about it that the old football
players probably had that someone needs to tap into that.
Maybe they just don't want to.

Speaker 2 (01:35:27):
Yeah, Aliston, I think if Jimmy Butler wants to be
an actor, he should. He's funny and well.

Speaker 1 (01:35:33):
I got to point out Minnesota Timberwolves. My guy Anthony Edwards.
He did act in a movie with Adam Sandler and
he was, i mean, played a basketball player, but he
was very good and charismatic.

Speaker 3 (01:35:44):
And it Kevin Garnett too. Kevin Garnett was Yes, Kevin Garnett, Yeah, Jebs, Yes,
which I'm sure he did a good job. But I'm
never watching that movie again because the anxiety level.

Speaker 2 (01:35:54):
Oh, I'm with you, I was amazing. Well, listen, I
mean this has been amazing. Craig. I'm so glad that
you were here to give your analysis on these athletes
or these actors turned athletes and then athletes turn actors.

(01:36:15):
I don't know, Casey, is there anything else you want
to bring up before we.

Speaker 1 (01:36:19):
No, this is great. I feel like I could keep
riffing on this forever. But this was so fantastic and
it was yeah, so great meeting you and getting to
talk to you about this stuff.

Speaker 3 (01:36:27):
Craig, Thank you so much for having me. This was
a lot of fun.

Speaker 1 (01:36:30):
Is there anything you want to plug that we haven't
plugged already?

Speaker 3 (01:36:33):
Nah, just a cup of coffee news every day. I'm
not going anywhere.

Speaker 2 (01:36:36):
Cool and so where. So basically if you just type
in cup of coffee you'll find the subscription options and everything.

Speaker 3 (01:36:44):
The website is cupocoffeeanews dot com or if you just
search cup of Coffee on there.

Speaker 1 (01:36:49):
Cool, fabulous. Craig.

Speaker 3 (01:36:52):
Thanks again.

Speaker 2 (01:36:53):
You're amazing and we'd love to have you back sometime.
So thanks again.

Speaker 3 (01:36:58):
Thank you.

Speaker 1 (01:37:08):
All Right, everybody, that was great talking to Craig. Love Craig.
Love Craig, love baseball, Love the conversation. I love that topic.
It was great. He's like great meeting him.

Speaker 2 (01:37:21):
He's like one of these people that I love that
loves loves loves sports but also loves loves loves movies
and music.

Speaker 1 (01:37:29):
Yeah, so it's great. I feel like you and I
are like that, MILLI. We like sports, but we like
movies and music too. I thought that's a special type
of person because I hate when people I don't know
if you ever encountered this. I encountered this in film school,
and I don't know, in improv groups where it'd be like, oh,
who's watching the sports ball tonight or that kind of bullshit.

Speaker 2 (01:37:51):
You know, of course, of course hate these people. I
know so many people like that. I know people like
I grew up in the nineties. Of course, if you
liked art, you didn't like sports. Neverthe two shall meet.
But you know what, that's changing, And actually I think
it's probably overcorrecting because there are certain people I'm just
gonna dangle this out there that are sports people that

(01:38:20):
try to go too hard in the paint to use
a sports metaphor when it comes to art, and they're
not shooting very well if you know what I'm saying.

Speaker 1 (01:38:33):
Interesting, do you mean people who are like into sports
but think they know a lot about art?

Speaker 2 (01:38:41):
Correct you can know both things, but you can also
don't forget what you know more.

Speaker 1 (01:38:46):
Okay, Millie, what do you have for us for employees' picks?

Speaker 4 (01:38:53):
Okay?

Speaker 2 (01:38:53):
Okay, So I was like, let's just go straight down
the line. Let's do another music documentary. My favorite music documentary.
It's actually more of a performance, like it's more of
a concert, but that it has like wrap rounds of
documentary stuff happening is a little documentary called depeche Mode

(01:39:16):
one oh one that was made in nineteen eighty nine
by Da Pettabaker. And this shit is so good, dude,
I rewatch it probably every year. Who I will tell
you with authority that if you go to the desert
and do mushrooms and watch it, it will be a fantastic experience.

(01:39:43):
But Depeche Mode is one of my favorite bands of
all time, and like this era of depeche Mode is
my favorite era. It's sort of like their late eighties
early nineties music for the masses violate, like when they're
wearing like leather pants but then cowboy hats and like

(01:40:08):
leather jackets. It's almost kind of like electronic music by
way of like they figured out what rockabilly is and
went to Sun Records for a day and did a tour.

Speaker 1 (01:40:21):
Is this like uh personal Jesus correct era correct?

Speaker 2 (01:40:27):
So it's basically like so the documentary focuses on the
tour that they did for Music for the Masses, which
is their album that came out in the late eighties,
and I I mean between Music for the Masses and

(01:40:47):
Violator Dog. I mean I just was like it was
like Music for the Masses one oh one, which is
basically the live album from the concert, and then Violator.
I'm just like peak depeche Mode for me, Peak depeche Mode,
and they're like my favorite boy band of all time. Honestly,

(01:41:11):
they're so good. But anyway, this documentary is really interesting
because they did the show at the Rose Bowl, but
then there's also this like section where basically they took
like a group of fans and put them on a
tour bus and they kind of like toured with the band.
Interest So it's all these like kind of cool like
people in their twenties that are like dancing at the
shows and they're kind of like on a tour bus

(01:41:33):
like hanging out together while they're on tour with Depeche Mode.
It was kind of fun and it looks amazing. And
also just to tie it back to I suppose Brian Jonestown,
Masacer Dave Gohan from Depeche Mode successfully kicked his own
heroin addiction and became even hotter, which is a fucking

(01:41:57):
incredible story, so very good.

Speaker 1 (01:42:00):
You know, we've been talking about selling out and in
the music and you know capitalism, and there's no band
that sold out less than Fugazi, which is a punk
band from Washington, DC that started in the late eighties

(01:42:23):
and went through the early two thousands. They're on like
an indefinite hiatus, but there is a documentary about them
by the great filmmaker Jem Cohen. It's called Instrument from
nineteen ninety nine. It's a lot of concert footage. It's
kind of an impressionistic style documentary where it's like it
just sort of weaves in between concert footage and then

(01:42:46):
the band, and it's it's a vibe and it would
be a great movie to put on at a party
just because it looks great and it's just sort of
flows between, you know, interview and footage. It's not very structured,
and but it's really interesting and there's like a lot
of great concert performances, a lot of great performances of Fugazi.

Speaker 2 (01:43:09):
On the road.

Speaker 1 (01:43:10):
You know, they were road dogs. They toured all the time.
The ticket prices were like never they were all ages shows,
never above five bucks, and they really did it, you know,
and they were like really well organized, and you know,
they're straightedge, so they never drank or did any drugs
and maybe that's why they were able to be so disciplined.

(01:43:32):
But it's a great documentary and I love Fugazi and
I put it on all the time just to like
watch a few minutes of it because it's Wonderful's great.
Check out Instrument. It's on the Criterion channel right now.

Speaker 2 (01:43:46):
Actually, Oh, is it because they have that? Isn't there
like a music documentary theme? No, there might be.

Speaker 1 (01:43:53):
They have like more movies of Jim Cohen too.

Speaker 2 (01:43:56):
Oh I see, I see so yeah, check it out.
Great recommendation, my fellow.

Speaker 1 (01:44:05):
Employee, have you seen Instrument? Hell?

Speaker 2 (01:44:08):
Yeah, dude, are you kidding me? Who are you kidding?
You know what's interesting that we're gonna you know. You
know what's interesting that we have not brought up is
there's actually a lot of music documentaries.

Speaker 1 (01:44:21):
We didn't touch upon that at all.

Speaker 2 (01:44:23):
I know, there's a lot a lot of my favorite
bands there's a documentary about them. I always find music
documentaries fascinating, even if they're terrible.

Speaker 1 (01:44:34):
I'm always like, they can be really bad, but they're
interesting and I find them sort of relaxing.

Speaker 2 (01:44:40):
Yeah, I mean, I was trying to go back to
think of what some of my favorite ones are. I
was like, dude, I have like too money to count. Like,
I love the documentary about Big Star. I love the
documentary about Morphine, you know. I love the documentary about
Benjamin Smoke, which we talked about, like, I think that's
a gem Cohen documentary. Actually, so many good docs about

(01:45:03):
about even like really really small bands that I never
thought i'd never find anything out about. So yeah, I
don't know, kind of spoiled for choice, and like you,
I think they're all entertaining if even if they're terrible.
So well, hopefully one day I'll get the Casey O'Brien
Gripes and Grits doc. Graps and Grits. People really loved that,

(01:45:30):
by the way.

Speaker 1 (01:45:31):
They did glad to hear it. They loved they loved
having my mom on too. That people seem to really
enjoy it.

Speaker 2 (01:45:39):
They're loving you, baby, They're loving you.

Speaker 1 (01:45:44):
Okay, you know, yeah, well that's nice. That's nice to hear.
Uh Meleie, that's our show in the future. If you'd
like to email us for film advice, a grap or
a grit, email us at movies at exactlyrightmedia dot com.
You can also send in a voicemail. Just record a

(01:46:05):
voicemail on your phone that's under a minute and email
it too Dear Movies at exactly rightmedia dot com.

Speaker 2 (01:46:13):
Absolutely follow us on our socials if you will. We
are at Deer Movies I Love You on Facebook and Instagram.
Our letterbox handles are at Casey le O'Brien and at
MD Jericho.

Speaker 1 (01:46:29):
And listen to Dear Movies I Love You on the
iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts.
Please yes and rate and review our show. Please oh
positively preferred.

Speaker 2 (01:46:42):
Oh oh oh next week. I just looked.

Speaker 1 (01:46:45):
Huh, we're watching The King of Comedy from nineteen eighty two.

Speaker 2 (01:46:49):
Yeah, we're gonna talk about We kind of dangled this
a little bit a few episodes ago. When we were
talking we stumbled into Yeah, we were talking about Bona
by Lino Broca. We're gonna do an episode about obsessed
fan movies.

Speaker 1 (01:47:04):
Can't wait to get into it. You remember in Tenacious
D TV show when they have an obsessed fan.

Speaker 3 (01:47:10):
Do I.

Speaker 2 (01:47:12):
Total love knife materials. Also, my favorite is John cy
Rally is Bigfoot. Yeah, and he just comes to the
show and he's like, tell him it was Bigfoot. No,
you just tell him it was a friend. And then
he comes he comes back.

Speaker 1 (01:47:28):
Actually because you're telling Bigfoot, they might not know.

Speaker 2 (01:47:31):
He's like, thanks, see you. That ship is fucking genius.

Speaker 1 (01:47:38):
Anyways, Millie, thank you for taking a trip back to
a different time in our lives, a different time in
your life.

Speaker 2 (01:47:47):
Thanks thanks for letting me be that like annoying captain
ed Yes, that like stupid boomer dude. That's like remember Woodstock.
It was fucking incredible.

Speaker 4 (01:47:59):
You know what.

Speaker 1 (01:48:00):
Sometimes the past was fun. Is that a crime? I
don't think so.

Speaker 2 (01:48:04):
No, it's not a crime.

Speaker 1 (01:48:07):
All right, see you later, Millie. All right, bye bye,
bye bye.

Speaker 2 (01:48:14):
This has been an exactly right production hosted by me
Millie to Cherico and produced by my co host Casey O'Brien.

Speaker 1 (01:48:21):
This episode was mixed by Tom Bryfogel. Our associate producer
is Christina Chamberlain, our guest booker is Patrick Cottner, and
our artwork is by Vanessa Lilac.

Speaker 2 (01:48:30):
Our incredible theme music is by the best band in
the entire world, The Softies.

Speaker 1 (01:48:35):
Thank you to our executive producers Karen Kilgareff, Georgia hart Stark,
Daniel Kramer and Milli. To Jericho, we love you.

Speaker 3 (01:48:42):
Goodbye Beker

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