October 24, 2024 • 33 mins
They did it. Kevin and Casey take on Dave Matthews and his cohorts for their 2001 ear worm. Do the dudes decide dat Dave did it? …Or has he gone too far?
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:02):
Give it a chance, give it a chance, Give it
a chance. Good morning, give it a chance, Give it
a chance, give it a chance, give it a chance,
good morning, Give it a chi You want to give
it a chance, give it a chance, give it a chance.
Speaker 2 (00:14):
Just give it a hello.
Speaker 1 (00:17):
Monsieurs answers, Mansas, Charles Mansers, sorry, shout out.
Speaker 3 (00:27):
She want to give a shout out to.
Speaker 2 (00:29):
You can't even say it.
Speaker 3 (00:31):
Just shout out to Charles Manz. Shout out to Charles Mancey.
Speaker 1 (00:35):
All right, it's Dave Matthews.
Speaker 2 (00:41):
I did it.
Speaker 1 (00:44):
I didn't have a clever way of like do you
think I've gone to hard?
Speaker 3 (00:50):
That's right, girl, guilty. I actually don't remember.
Speaker 2 (00:56):
When was the last time you heard this song? Like
everyone knows this chorus?
Speaker 1 (00:58):
Not maybe not everyone, but like the people I know
know this chorus and don't know anything else about it.
I haven't listened to it since it came out.
Speaker 3 (01:05):
That's for sure. I fit that demographic. I have not
heard this song probably since it was like on MTVVH one,
the radio, which what it was, what late nineties?
Speaker 1 (01:17):
I bet you this came out like I bet you
this came out two thousand and two.
Speaker 2 (01:21):
No, maybe later. I think it's I think this this
song is later.
Speaker 3 (01:25):
Let me see. Let's let's let's ask the listening platform
of my choice. Let's see which is I Did It
by James Matthews. Okay, oh, I started the song. I
don't want to do that. I just want the cribs.
Speaker 2 (01:41):
I see two thousand and one.
Speaker 3 (01:43):
Three, nine to eleven, two thousand and one, it's almost
two thousand January third. Imagine it came out after nine.
Speaker 1 (01:50):
To eleven because everyone was thinking meant that.
Speaker 2 (01:56):
Because it's also the same name as the OJ book.
Speaker 3 (02:01):
Book. That is why. That is truly truly like reality
rending levels of batshit crazy. Yeah, yeah, yeah, if I
did it, this is what I would have done. That
is like, you can't, I can't.
Speaker 2 (02:19):
I mean, I don't know.
Speaker 1 (02:20):
Some chancers know my good friend. You definitely know my
friend Joe em Bergio. Oh yeah, he wants to write.
Speaker 2 (02:25):
A book called If.
Speaker 3 (02:27):
I Did It.
Speaker 1 (02:29):
And however, yeah, he would have been a child, so
it's like, how would he even get to California like
all these things.
Speaker 3 (02:37):
So it's a really genius joke. I really love it.
I hope now, I hope he gets to do that
someday if there are any publishers out there listening, and
if we have any publisher chancers Joe and Bergio, we
will give out his home address, social everything on the air.
On the air.
Speaker 2 (02:56):
With that being said, let's listen to Dave Matthew's confession.
Speaker 3 (03:00):
This is his confession. Gone down, Yo, unturned that cheek case?
What do you got? I am?
Speaker 2 (03:13):
I have a lot of thoughts.
Speaker 3 (03:15):
I was loving watching your face watch that vid.
Speaker 2 (03:20):
Can I give the preamble of why even this song
was picked for me? Aside from you want? Okay?
Speaker 1 (03:25):
So I grew up, you know in Staten Island where
I had friends, and this one friend who is a
lifeguard at like a swim club that I used to
go to, said to me, if you know I had
He had a CD case and he said, I was
building my CD case, building on this my case logic,
my case logic case, and I am case.
Speaker 3 (03:47):
My name is Casey.
Speaker 1 (03:48):
And he said to me, every your CD if you're
from Staten Island, your CD collection. I don't know why,
I said that your CD collection needs to have wu
Tang checks out and Dave Matthews man, he said.
Speaker 3 (03:58):
That was the time. Yeah, but and it was true.
Speaker 1 (04:01):
There was a lot of people I knew that like
loved Dave Matthews band, and they loved going to the
concerts and like the drinking and smoking weed that came
along with that, and like dancing to the.
Speaker 2 (04:12):
Music right Like that whole culture also fit.
Speaker 1 (04:15):
In in some ways with the the liking hip hop culture
for those similar reasons. I don't know, there's something about
especially like kind of freestyle rap, like the craft of
that and the craft of like a jam band. Yeah,
I can see that I liked a lot of that,
you know, by proxy, Like I listened to the play
(04:36):
played in their cars, we'd played on dribes, they'd played
at the sim Club like in a like a little
boom box, and I really liked a lot of the
Dave Matthews songs.
Speaker 2 (04:43):
I bought the albums.
Speaker 1 (04:44):
I really liked Dave Dave Matthews band at that era
of that Crash Into You Ants, Marching under your Table,
unironically loved that stuff. And then when this came out,
because I was excited for the next album in the
same way that I think we've probably talked about, like
with Weezer going into Green Elm. I was excited for
it and I felt really let down by the song
because it didn't feel like they're old stuff at all.
(05:06):
But now that I'm so far away from that error
hearing this song, there's a lot to like. In my opinion,
it's it's chaotic, and there's there's there's in some ways,
I'm like, I don't even understand how this chorus and
these verses go together. So but I give them a
lot of credit. And now I'm picking up on so
much more like Primus influences and Ween and Tori Amos
(05:27):
even at like times, like there's like a lot of
other stuff that I never picked up because I didn't
know it. I don't think at the time the only
Primus song I knew was the South Park intro, and
you know, and it's like, it's really crazy to hear
it now years later. It's it's it's it's akin to
like if you watched the David Lynch movie or something
(05:50):
and you didn't get it and you get older and.
Speaker 3 (05:51):
You're like, oh, I see what that is now, Yeah, yeah, yeah,
some parts of you have caught up to some parts
of it. Yeah, dude, I I fully identify I think
that you know, I'm slightly older than you, but that
that same thing. Like I was a college student in
nineteen ninety seven, that's when I started college and I
(06:11):
played guitar, and the thing that you were asked most
was do you know any Dave?
Speaker 2 (06:19):
Yeah?
Speaker 3 (06:20):
Yeah, like and you know it was the other thing
that was funny was there was this little clutch of
like there was these kids that were like. The other
thing was the Wonder Wall joke, that's real. The other
thing was like everyone everyone I knew that played guitar
at that school either was Dave Matthews, definitely maybe Slash
what's the story Morning Glory, go Oasis or both? And
(06:44):
that was around and I can come back to that
maybe later for a funny story. Also, I definitely think
I had I owned I think I bought the Dave Matthews,
Tim Reynolds, Cbeah. That's two of them, like an acoustic thing.
Speaker 1 (06:58):
And I don't know the story about it, but it
sounds like it's just Dave Matthews playing his songs and
this other guy shredding all over yeah, and that kind
of works.
Speaker 3 (07:07):
I don't understand it. I think they were buddies and
they're both really I mean, that's the thing like this
so so yes, I definitely identify, and I definitely had
friends in college who I've My first memory of Dave
Matthews hearing Dave Matthews was what's the song? The song
with the title from that first record, not under the
(07:29):
Table in Dreaming, What was the first single the one
that was like, oh, what did you say? What?
Speaker 2 (07:36):
What did you say?
Speaker 1 (07:37):
Mom?
Speaker 3 (07:37):
It's my birthday? Right you say?
Speaker 2 (07:40):
Don't?
Speaker 3 (07:42):
And it was a buzz bin MTV at that point
post Nirvana, it was like they had that buzz bin
thing where they would have like a thing that they
were that was coming up and it was like coming
on and it was like usually something that was a
little left of center. And what I will say is
listening to that and I remember like kids coming into
my biology class at high school like singing that song
because it was also kind of funny. It was like
(08:04):
memified before that was a word we used. Like there
were lyrics in it that like Loser or something by
Beck where they were like things that you would just
be like you would repeat them because they were almost
like memes, you know, like mimetic I guess is the
word for that. But this, like this song, what I
will immediately say is like listening to it in the
(08:24):
context of a bunch of you're like you said, chaotic.
Chaotic is what I think is one of the things
I think it has going for it. Yeah, it is
an insane thing to think that this music was and is,
but certainly in that moment was like immensely popular on
my TRL.
Speaker 2 (08:40):
Yeah, this was big because it's as you said, Yeah, I.
Speaker 3 (08:43):
Thought of Annie DeFranco, DeFranco whatever during it, and there
is like it does he has always I mean, and
I think this is a feature of what he his
his whole project was about. It's a it's a melting pot,
a blend of all of these different sensibilities that represent
different corners of his musical interests, some of which are
like profoundly not pop music. But he did manage to
(09:07):
sort of like boil them into a thing that for
several albums was like immensely successful on a pop scale
and had like legit top forty singles it probably four
or five of them over a couple of records.
Speaker 1 (09:20):
I actually don't believe it. The nineties were really great
at like letting artists like this shine. But he it's
amazing the amount of people that liked this because this
is he's the next generation, right of like fish or something.
Speaker 2 (09:33):
Yep, and this is so mainstream and why.
Speaker 3 (09:36):
It's like you've got your ball, You've got.
Speaker 1 (09:39):
You like yeah, yeah, yeah, like on the radio so
much and it's such he makes so many weird choices
and his band is so odd.
Speaker 3 (09:46):
There's a violin player.
Speaker 1 (09:47):
And yes it's world music ofteah, it's world music. But
it was on the radio constantly, and that was the testament,
I guess, to college radio.
Speaker 3 (09:54):
And I think he was. Yeah, he was one of
those stories. We talked about this with Metallica and it
even came up with the Good Charlotte thing, a little
bit about like Green Day and Good Charlotte's punk roots
things that are kind of sprung from like a corner
of DIY. Like my cousins grew up in Earliesville, Virginia,
which is like outside Charlottesville. And I remember my cousin
(10:16):
telling me about like this, Like my cousin who was
a college student. You know, he's a little older than me,
so it was a college student in like the early
nineties at Roanoke, you know, in Virginia, and I remember
him being like he would go to house parties in
Charlottesville where they were the band Dave Matthews band was
like playing. It's those stories of like people being like
(10:37):
I was at CBGB's when the Ramones he literally that's
what that was. Just was like red solo cup house
parties with like you know, fucking beer pong or whatever,
and they were playing the songs. So they really did
and you can hear it. It's like the fucking Beatles
in Hamburg thing, like you can hear the ten thousand
Hours in this band. This band really knows how to play.
Speaker 2 (10:58):
With really a great way to you know, like they.
Speaker 3 (11:02):
Really you really can you can hear. Now there's a
whole other thing that you could talk about about, like
but that's more about subjectivity and taste and what one's
interests are. Like I've I was never into Dave Matthews
because of my own issues around self governance. There were
certain things he did that were like bordering on like
scatting and like for instance, in this song, like why
(11:23):
does he have to say was me right or wrong?
Like I recognize that he's like referencing. He's referencing a
linguistic trope in certain like Caribbean and African modes of
music with that, and I know he is a person
of I don't know his biography super closely, but I
believe you like grew up or spent time in South
Africa or something like that. Yeah, but there's a degree
(11:44):
to which you're like stuff like that for better or
for worse. I feel like I say that now every
episode too. There was like something broken in me by
the things towards which I gravitated and the things to
which I devoted myself and got really into where something
like that, I was just like, oh, I can't cross
that bridge. I'm so sorry. I can't get into like
was me right or wrong with you? It's like jar
(12:07):
Jar Binks is singing the chorus of the song all
of a sudden, so like there's stuff like that with him.
That was just like a no fly zone for someone
with my character defects.
Speaker 2 (12:18):
So I will make.
Speaker 3 (12:19):
That about me and not about Dave.
Speaker 1 (12:35):
I think there's a lot of people who, if they
listen to this song for the first time today, would
either say that this was the worst song we've ever
picked in terms of it's all over the place, but
also some people and I actually feel like this might
be the best song we've picked in certain ways that
I think there's it's like, well, it's like listening to
a jazz where you're like, there's so much going on,
I'm gonna need to listen to this a bunch.
Speaker 3 (12:56):
Musically speaking, I think there is a school of excellent
musicianship that is about what isn't there taste and restraint,
and I do understand why people from that sort of
category and lineage have always found something like this to
be a little fussy, busy, overstuffed and see that as
(13:18):
a detriment. The other side of that, though, is like
everyone who's playing on this song, Yeah, they might all
be playing like all the notes all the time, but
they're all like really good every single instrument, and like
there's these little polyrhythmic things that are happening, and for
what it is worth, Like I actually stopped and was like,
is the structure of this song verse, chorus, post chorus,
(13:41):
this whole thing about like I never did a single
thing that did a single thing to change.
Speaker 1 (13:45):
That's also a really nice lyric, by the way, and
it's what we talked about on the last episode. He's
saying I've never did a single thing that did a
single thing to change the ugly ways of the world.
We talk about that with like raging against the machine,
with Zach leaving the day to try to actually do something.
Speaker 3 (14:00):
He's outright saying I've never seen textualizing it. Yeah, it's
like and I think, but what's interesting is like that
comes It's not the verse because we just heard the verse.
It's not the chorus where the title of the song
comes in because we just heard that. It's not a
bridge because it happens three times. It's a post chorus.
We've never fucked with a post chorus on chancey before.
Speaker 2 (14:22):
This is first I think Nickelback nic.
Speaker 3 (14:28):
What I think we determined was that Nickelback effectively had
five chorus.
Speaker 2 (14:32):
Yes, yes, yes, you're right.
Speaker 3 (14:34):
So maybe you could say that this is so distinct
and that it's like that's a whole, separate, energetic thing.
And when it ended and the verse came back, I
was like, wait, what did I just hear? And then
they repeat that, and then they go in for what
is actually a truly musically and lyrically psychotic bridge, which
which for me passes the bridge test on sheer audacity,
(14:57):
Like I'm like, what is this? This insane and I
think that one thing I was thinking about this was like,
I think there's a lot of garbage in the lyrics here,
there's also other things that I don't think are garbage,
and so I give him credit because that's the province
of someone who's at least trying to speak poetically is
sometimes you're gonna miss and sometimes you're gonna hit. But
unless you're like excellent at it, and there's people who
(15:19):
are better and people who are less good. What I
was thinking was like, is there someone who knows this is?
What's chaotic to me is the lyrics, the actual density,
volume structure, the amount the words themselves. I'm like, is
there somebody who knows all the words to all the
David Matthew songs? Because he's kind of just like going
(15:40):
off in all these wild assid directions And it's not
like storytelling like people like Dylan or Leonard Cohen or
there's a lot of language, but the language follows a
sort of logic, even if it's like a hallucinogenic sort
of dream like like in some of that Dylan stuff,
you can sort of like follow it. This is sort
of like all you people are the skewers of our dreams,
(16:03):
like the Cat that Collared Me? Oh, and what I
got to say to you, Like, it's just like it's
almost like he's making it's almost improvisational.
Speaker 2 (16:11):
Which I think is Yeah, I believe that that is
what it is.
Speaker 3 (16:15):
And then but part of what's improvisational about it is
outside of the chorus, outside of those three distinct parts,
the thing in the bridge, it's alot. It doesn't have
a melody, it's not melodic. He's just kind of like
and you're like, does someone memory, like, did someone ever
sing this at karaoke and nail the bridge? If so,
(16:36):
that person should get like a fucking Nobel prize or
something that's insane so fun.
Speaker 2 (16:41):
That's such a great point because you know it's in
those books.
Speaker 3 (16:46):
It was.
Speaker 2 (16:46):
It's big enough to be like under the Day of
Matthews section.
Speaker 1 (16:49):
I don't know. Yeah, going back to what you're saying,
what is this song about? Right, because at first it's
like I'm mixing up a bunch of magic stuff, a
magic potion, cloud of care, a push that will rock,
the boat will rock, make a bomb of love and
blow it up. Maybe it's talking about songwriting. Maybe it's
talking about making music, making art.
Speaker 2 (17:05):
I did it. Do you think I've gone too far
with my art? I did it? Guilty is charged?
Speaker 3 (17:08):
This is great, This is who my fuck is cooking
right now.
Speaker 1 (17:11):
Then, when it's like a nickel or a dime for
what I've done, which is okay getting paid free music,
the truth is that I don't really care to get
paid for such a lovely crime, I'll do the time.
Speaker 3 (17:21):
So wow, you really open in my mind up about this?
I had no this is great to keep going.
Speaker 1 (17:26):
You better lock me up. I'll do it again. I
did it. Do you think I've gone too far? I'm
speculating if it is this about the making our.
Speaker 3 (17:35):
Acts of creation?
Speaker 1 (17:36):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, and saying I never did a single
thing that did a single thing to change ways of
the world, which I think.
Speaker 2 (17:42):
He's being modest about that. He's being modest.
Speaker 1 (17:45):
I think I think art can change the world, like
especially the ugly ways of the world. It could brighten horizon.
So I do think I didn't know it felt so
right inside. I didn't know at all. Open up the curtains.
I heard sirens, there was lights, flash and crawl. I
did it justice, I did it for the buzz.
Speaker 3 (18:03):
Yeah, I mean I feel like you're you're actually leading
me to a deeper consideration, and that I actually think
is quite lucid. By the way, I think what you're
saying makes a lot of sense. It does seem like
there this is a as you kind of lay it out,
I'm like, oh, yeah, that is what that sounds like
to me. It's like a thinly veiled metaphor for the
act of creation and somebody who's kind of like reflecting
(18:27):
about their the limits of that, the utility of it.
Even because I think what you point out with the modesty,
it's like there's a difference between I do but agree
with you. Art can and music can I change the
world as particularly in the sense that it's art and
music speak to your your heart and your soul. Not
(18:50):
to sound cheesy, but I really do. They also can
be intellectually stimulating and funny and a lot of other things,
but they can open something in you. And I think
that what is interesting is he gets to a place
in that bridge where what he's kind of talking about
is like, you've got love, don't turn it down, turn
it loud, let it build. You've got a long way
(19:11):
to go, but you've got to start somewhere, go door
to door, he's basically saying, which is not a novel thought,
but it might be maybe at the end of everything,
the only one is that it's like what we have
that is the most the most powerful thing we can
offer one another is our love and empathy. So even
when you feel whatever, like he maybe in this song
(19:35):
he's wrestling with like, well, how much have I actually done?
I have this platform and I write this is what
I do. And but you know, I, for one, don't
turn my cheek for anyone. Unturn your cheek to give
your love love to grow. I mean, I don't know.
He's a little confused there. I have no idea exactly
what I think. But he might I don't know what
that is. He might have gotten to that point and
(19:56):
been like, I'm out of esteem. But I mean the
unturn your cheek is something that I was like, it's
going to live in my brain forever as like a
hall of fame ludicrous. But there's other things in here,
and I do think you know, he's kind of talking
maybe in that part you identify as modesty about like
what is the difference between the limitations of what art
(20:17):
and music can do versus like, yeah, it can open
hearts and minds and it can like influence, but also
like ultimately, yeah, it's like I think about the difference
between like solidarity work and activism, Like I've definitely talked
to There's a lot of people I've been friends some
of my life I'm thinking of right now as specific
who are the people who've been Like, I like went
(20:38):
to Occupy Wall Street a few times. I like played
at Occupy Wall Street at the Boston version. I wasn't
fucking living at Occupy Wall Street. I wasn't there when
they swept the park. I wasn't, you know what I mean.
And I've known people who were, And that's part of
for me why it's like as a person who writes songs, Yes,
art and music can change the world, but I don't
(20:59):
can fuse oh yeah, my solidarity one. Yeah, with a
fucking activist who's actually there when like the cops show
up at two am and they sweep Zukatti Park, Like,
that's a really different level of commitment and skin in
the game. So I kind of like that he says
that there because I feel like he's it's modesty, but
it's also something that I actually some fucking relating with Dave.
(21:23):
He's an older man at this point too. He was
sixty five when he wrote this song. How old is
Dave Matthews?
Speaker 1 (21:28):
Actually, I know, I feel like he's been forty two
for like two decades.
Speaker 3 (21:33):
Yeah, he looks great. He might be fifty five years old.
He looks the same as he looked since like this time.
Speaker 2 (21:39):
I bet you he's older.
Speaker 3 (21:40):
We're gonna look it up on ours fifty seven.
Speaker 2 (21:44):
You were fifty seven years old.
Speaker 1 (21:46):
But I think he you know, he had like an
like I don't know, like he had the same look
for like, yeah, like twenty years.
Speaker 3 (21:52):
He's not exactly somebody who's you know, another Chancey side
Chancy little erratic Chancey my chance hit me, not a
person who was concerned at all with this music fitting
in with whatever the tropes of popular music around it were.
There's not a moment where you're like, and that's where
he's kind of doing like a new metal thing or like, oh,
and that's where he's kind of referencing like the sort
(22:13):
of like a Max Martin school of songwriting.
Speaker 1 (22:16):
You know, it's funny, this isn't in this song. He's
not even trying to be himself, but not in not
that he's trying to be what's on the radio. He's
just trying something new. And I give him credit for
that because in the same album, I think he had
the space between oh, that was a radio banger as
well forward yeah, and that fits with the radio but
(22:36):
not trying to but just.
Speaker 3 (22:37):
That almost could be like a collective soul song or
something like that.
Speaker 2 (22:41):
Like the verses of.
Speaker 3 (22:42):
Yeah, the verses of that song, there's a very particular
like yeah. I feel like, what's funny with him is
there's a couple of moments where I feel like I
wonder if he was like, yeah, he's got to like
give him one of these, so I can kind of like,
I mean, that might not be true.
Speaker 1 (23:01):
He might. That's so funny if if if they're like
if they're like, you know, the our A and R
wants us to write a hit song, and then it's like, so, guys,
I did it.
Speaker 3 (23:10):
Listen to this.
Speaker 2 (23:12):
I did it because.
Speaker 1 (23:13):
I don't know how you would sit down with a
guitar and write the chorus.
Speaker 2 (23:17):
I did it. I think I've.
Speaker 1 (23:20):
Gone too far Like that does feel actually, I hope
that's true. I feel like an A and r was like,
I need you to actually try to write it radio song,
and then he's like and maybe he said like, don't
go too far right, don't go too crazy with it.
And Dave wrote the craziest version he could, which is this,
And I think that if if he pointed to the
outfield like Babe Ruth and and wrote this song and
(23:42):
it got on the radio, that's amazing, amazing.
Speaker 3 (23:57):
There's that great story from this same timeframe. That's the
Way I Am story. Do you know that that they
basically yeah, they get. So he gave them that record,
and I guess Jimmy Ivean was like, you know, well
this is crazy and very bracing and interesting, and I
think it's going to really make an impression, you know,
(24:19):
but it's your follow up and we need like an
undeniable single, And he went back and wrote The Way
I Am, which is not that single. It was him
basically being like, oh, you want me to give you
like a pop song, here's me in the same cadence
for four minutes, rapping about how I can't write a
(24:40):
more popular song than the one year and then of
course what comes out is in the eleventh hour is
the real Slim shady and it's like the poppyst song
he'll ever write, which wow, that was almost like an afterthought.
There's a Will Go story like that too with Summer Teeth,
when they were still like trying to like make it
on the major and that record in a certain sense
(25:02):
is like, you know, it's a funny Will Goes, like
a very different execution of a kind of roots adjacent music.
But then Dave is but like, I'm sure there's been
some worlds where there's people who probably are very big
fans of both, and they've probably played some festivals together
here and there. But there's a story with Summer Teeth
where they gave the record in and that's like a
(25:22):
perfectly executed you know, Beach Boys beatles hybrid. It's him
doing like a genre record, almost like a pop thing
in the Will Go way, And I guess they were like, yeah,
this is really nice, but there's no single, and I
forget which song they wrote that was they wrote They
went back and wrote like three and you can kind
of tell when you're listening to the record. There's a
(25:43):
few where you're like, oh, this is like a gin
Blossom song, like they were trying to like what's the
closest we could get to that? All right, Well it's
this Maybe it's like the Nothing's Ever Going to Stand
in My Way again. I think that's one of the
songs or something. But there are these moments. I don't
know if that's the deal with Dave by this record.
I would imagine Dave Matthews band had already done enough
for the label that they were sort of like they
(26:05):
want a hit, but they also were like, yeah, he's
just going to do his thing, and even if it
doesn't go like multi platinum, the tour is going to
sell fifty thousand tickets a night and we'll get involved
with you know, we'll make a cut of the merch
or whatever. However it worked for them. Look, I definitely
think when you say, there are people who are going
to hear this and say it's the worst song we did,
(26:26):
and there's people who would say it's the best.
Speaker 1 (26:27):
Song we did.
Speaker 3 (26:28):
I think and that you know, to his credit, he
did his thing and people he did it. He did
it and people for a length of career he's either
been like a punchline to some people or to other
people like the best songwriter and band leader of his generation.
And I think that's actually like, you know, fucking you
(26:50):
want to be polarizing on some level, right, And he's
been polarizing and managed to sell out Giants Stadium along
the way.
Speaker 1 (26:57):
So I saw him there. I saw him five times.
One was a Giant stadium. It was one of the
craziest concerts I've ever been to. It was supposed to
end the night, it didn't rain, and then during space
between he ended with like you a few his like
after his when they go away on Core. During the space.
Speaker 3 (27:13):
Between, it starts raining and then he plays that song
two Step.
Speaker 2 (27:15):
I don't remember. It's like a real building.
Speaker 3 (27:16):
Oh I do remember that song, and it starts puring,
rain pouring.
Speaker 1 (27:21):
Everyone's going crazy dancing, and then he finishes the song
and it's topped rain stop it. It was really amazing,
and he's talked about that in interviews like that was
like one of his favorite concerts because it was just
so crazy.
Speaker 3 (27:32):
That's amazing. When was that was that? Like?
Speaker 1 (27:35):
I think I was in like a later era of
high school, so probably I graduated in two thousand and three,
So yeah, probably two thousand and.
Speaker 3 (27:40):
Three or four. I wonder because I know I have
the concert ticket at my parents' house. I'll go find it.
I would. Yeah. One of my very close friends went
to see like from Fordham went to see one of
those shows two thousand. It would have been like been
the early aughts, late nineties, early aughts, and it was
like a graduation press. It was probably ninety nine or
(28:03):
something though. It was but Giants Stadium and it was
exactly like you described, like it was like fish or
the dead people going and like, what's it called pregaming?
But there's a word for that tailgating. Yes, yes, yes,
we did a lot of that. We took a party bus.
Speaker 2 (28:17):
I was like it was it was a bunch of
I knew and didn't know and everyone took a party bus.
Speaker 1 (28:23):
Wow. I remember, yeah, because I was like it was
still kind of early in experimenting, even with drinking. And
I remember like somebody spiran off ices. I remember being
like this is lovely.
Speaker 3 (28:35):
Yeah, yeah, this is what drinking is. I'm all about it.
It is candy, this is yeah right, that was I
definitely had that moment.
Speaker 2 (28:44):
Oh yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3 (28:45):
I think my dad, who was like really funny. Our
dad was like a you know, grew up in Park
Slope and lived in Bay ridge and was like, you know,
not a Zeema guy, and that at some point when
we were on Staten Island were like going to in
the basement in the in the fridge, and it was
like there was zemas. I was like a teenager, and
I think I remember drinking them, being like I didn't
(29:07):
drink much in high school. And then I remember drinking
those and being like same thing, like this is like sprite,
and then like refilling his zemas with water and like
closing them again. I don't even know if you ever
drank them again, because no one ever said to me
like there's fucking water in those, you know, but also
like they're crudely resealed. I love it starts like a
class action lossuit against and they're like, I did it?
(29:34):
Do you think that Zema's nods? All right? So listen, listen.
End of the day. Oh, very quick story quick Dave Matthews.
So I laid the groundwork. College people love Dave, people
love Oasis. My college girlfriend breaks up with me. There's
a hurricane adjacent storm that closes for them, and there's
(29:56):
going to be a big party in the dorms. She
comes to my room. We're hanging out for a little while,
tells me that she's dating another guy. I'm devastated. Okay,
so I start drinking. It's going to be a party
that night, big dorm room party. I decide I'm going
to go up to the party drunk. Now, Chris O'Brien,
the homie, shout out to Sephis. He was like, yo,
(30:20):
I'll come up. He was like saying he's gonna come
for me. But also he was just like, I want
to come up and get fucked up at this party.
So he comes up anyway, so he's telling me he's
going to get in. I'm like, how are you going
to get in? There's a faery involved, it's a hurricane morning.
He's like, I'll get there, Moses, I'll get there all right.
So anyway, I'm at I go to this party. I'm drunk.
There's this girl I always thought was super cute for
my classes, and now I'm like trying to like get
(30:41):
over this heartbreak that I'm feeling. And so there's like
I'm sitting there having a drink. Someone hands me a
guitar and this girl goes, do you know any Dave?
And I was like, I'd never usually that was like,
I do not cross that line in my head. But
I had learned crashing.
Speaker 2 (31:00):
Oh, I was guessing. I was really guessing satellite And
I was like.
Speaker 3 (31:04):
You mean. And it was the one time I ever
used like music for the forces of evil. Like I
started to play crash into me and from behind me,
this is real down like the hallway of this party,
I hear, Yo, what the fuck are you doing? And
it was Cephas he arrived at the party at the
moment that I was like going against my my moral code.
Speaker 2 (31:29):
And I remember like I was like, nothing, like I
put it down, start playing paranoid Android.
Speaker 3 (31:33):
Exactly I mean, and I lack all sun. That was
also the first night I tried cocaine. And I remember
like the next morning, Kevin Cole and Kowski in my
roommates sitting at the end of the bed. I looked
up and he was like, don't ever do that again.
Guess what I did, Mad, I did it. I had
(31:54):
to stop to do it.
Speaker 2 (31:55):
Eventually, I stopped doing it a Vand if he had
a lyric that was I had to stop doing it.
Speaker 1 (32:03):
Avengch No one would even question it. No, he would
say the power of Dave Matthew, the only question I
would have is why didn't he say me stop doing it. Events,
me stop doing it, event she starts becoming Yoda, Avenge me.
Speaker 3 (32:16):
Stop doing it.
Speaker 1 (32:17):
Avenge it is you said, it's charge of Biggs, but
it's also very Yoda.
Speaker 3 (32:21):
Yeah, it's Star Wars for Sure, Star Wars for sure. Done.
We are, I've done, we are.
Speaker 2 (32:29):
Chance, we gave chance, we gave Yeah.
Speaker 1 (32:33):
Yeah, I actually there's times that I finished the podcast,
I'm like, I hope that we.
Speaker 3 (32:37):
Give that enough of a chance.
Speaker 2 (32:38):
But I think we do.
Speaker 3 (32:41):
And if you don't think so, please feel free to email.
I don't give a rats ass at dot fart dot.
Now that's not a really address everybody. I do, we
do give it an about you do, but ow dot
do not give all right, it's been good peace, real
(33:11):
peace until next piece.
Speaker 2 (33:13):
Just give it
Give it a chance, give it a chance, Give it
a chance. Good morning, give it a chance, Give it
a chance, give it a chance, give it a chance,
good morning, Give it a chi You want to give
it a chance, give it a chance, give it a chance.
Speaker 2 (00:14):
Just give it a hello.
Speaker 1 (00:17):
Monsieurs answers, Mansas, Charles Mansers, sorry, shout out.
Speaker 3 (00:27):
She want to give a shout out to.
Speaker 2 (00:29):
You can't even say it.
Speaker 3 (00:31):
Just shout out to Charles Manz. Shout out to Charles Mancey.
Speaker 1 (00:35):
All right, it's Dave Matthews.
Speaker 2 (00:41):
I did it.
Speaker 1 (00:44):
I didn't have a clever way of like do you
think I've gone to hard?
Speaker 3 (00:50):
That's right, girl, guilty. I actually don't remember.
Speaker 2 (00:56):
When was the last time you heard this song? Like
everyone knows this chorus?
Speaker 1 (00:58):
Not maybe not everyone, but like the people I know
know this chorus and don't know anything else about it.
I haven't listened to it since it came out.
Speaker 3 (01:05):
That's for sure. I fit that demographic. I have not
heard this song probably since it was like on MTVVH one,
the radio, which what it was, what late nineties?
Speaker 1 (01:17):
I bet you this came out like I bet you
this came out two thousand and two.
Speaker 2 (01:21):
No, maybe later. I think it's I think this this
song is later.
Speaker 3 (01:25):
Let me see. Let's let's let's ask the listening platform
of my choice. Let's see which is I Did It
by James Matthews. Okay, oh, I started the song. I
don't want to do that. I just want the cribs.
Speaker 2 (01:41):
I see two thousand and one.
Speaker 3 (01:43):
Three, nine to eleven, two thousand and one, it's almost
two thousand January third. Imagine it came out after nine.
Speaker 1 (01:50):
To eleven because everyone was thinking meant that.
Speaker 2 (01:56):
Because it's also the same name as the OJ book.
Speaker 3 (02:01):
Book. That is why. That is truly truly like reality
rending levels of batshit crazy. Yeah, yeah, yeah, if I
did it, this is what I would have done. That
is like, you can't, I can't.
Speaker 2 (02:19):
I mean, I don't know.
Speaker 1 (02:20):
Some chancers know my good friend. You definitely know my
friend Joe em Bergio. Oh yeah, he wants to write.
Speaker 2 (02:25):
A book called If.
Speaker 3 (02:27):
I Did It.
Speaker 1 (02:29):
And however, yeah, he would have been a child, so
it's like, how would he even get to California like
all these things.
Speaker 3 (02:37):
So it's a really genius joke. I really love it.
I hope now, I hope he gets to do that
someday if there are any publishers out there listening, and
if we have any publisher chancers Joe and Bergio, we
will give out his home address, social everything on the air.
On the air.
Speaker 2 (02:56):
With that being said, let's listen to Dave Matthew's confession.
Speaker 3 (03:00):
This is his confession. Gone down, Yo, unturned that cheek case?
What do you got? I am?
Speaker 2 (03:13):
I have a lot of thoughts.
Speaker 3 (03:15):
I was loving watching your face watch that vid.
Speaker 2 (03:20):
Can I give the preamble of why even this song
was picked for me? Aside from you want? Okay?
Speaker 1 (03:25):
So I grew up, you know in Staten Island where
I had friends, and this one friend who is a
lifeguard at like a swim club that I used to
go to, said to me, if you know I had
He had a CD case and he said, I was
building my CD case, building on this my case logic,
my case logic case, and I am case.
Speaker 3 (03:47):
My name is Casey.
Speaker 1 (03:48):
And he said to me, every your CD if you're
from Staten Island, your CD collection. I don't know why,
I said that your CD collection needs to have wu
Tang checks out and Dave Matthews man, he said.
Speaker 3 (03:58):
That was the time. Yeah, but and it was true.
Speaker 1 (04:01):
There was a lot of people I knew that like
loved Dave Matthews band, and they loved going to the
concerts and like the drinking and smoking weed that came
along with that, and like dancing to the.
Speaker 2 (04:12):
Music right Like that whole culture also fit.
Speaker 1 (04:15):
In in some ways with the the liking hip hop culture
for those similar reasons. I don't know, there's something about
especially like kind of freestyle rap, like the craft of
that and the craft of like a jam band. Yeah,
I can see that I liked a lot of that,
you know, by proxy, Like I listened to the play
(04:36):
played in their cars, we'd played on dribes, they'd played
at the sim Club like in a like a little
boom box, and I really liked a lot of the
Dave Matthews songs.
Speaker 2 (04:43):
I bought the albums.
Speaker 1 (04:44):
I really liked Dave Dave Matthews band at that era
of that Crash Into You Ants, Marching under your Table,
unironically loved that stuff. And then when this came out,
because I was excited for the next album in the
same way that I think we've probably talked about, like
with Weezer going into Green Elm. I was excited for
it and I felt really let down by the song
because it didn't feel like they're old stuff at all.
(05:06):
But now that I'm so far away from that error
hearing this song, there's a lot to like. In my opinion,
it's it's chaotic, and there's there's there's in some ways,
I'm like, I don't even understand how this chorus and
these verses go together. So but I give them a
lot of credit. And now I'm picking up on so
much more like Primus influences and Ween and Tori Amos
(05:27):
even at like times, like there's like a lot of
other stuff that I never picked up because I didn't
know it. I don't think at the time the only
Primus song I knew was the South Park intro, and
you know, and it's like, it's really crazy to hear
it now years later. It's it's it's it's akin to
like if you watched the David Lynch movie or something
(05:50):
and you didn't get it and you get older and.
Speaker 3 (05:51):
You're like, oh, I see what that is now, Yeah, yeah, yeah,
some parts of you have caught up to some parts
of it. Yeah, dude, I I fully identify I think
that you know, I'm slightly older than you, but that
that same thing. Like I was a college student in
nineteen ninety seven, that's when I started college and I
(06:11):
played guitar, and the thing that you were asked most
was do you know any Dave?
Speaker 2 (06:19):
Yeah?
Speaker 3 (06:20):
Yeah, like and you know it was the other thing
that was funny was there was this little clutch of
like there was these kids that were like. The other
thing was the Wonder Wall joke, that's real. The other
thing was like everyone everyone I knew that played guitar
at that school either was Dave Matthews, definitely maybe Slash
what's the story Morning Glory, go Oasis or both? And
(06:44):
that was around and I can come back to that
maybe later for a funny story. Also, I definitely think
I had I owned I think I bought the Dave Matthews,
Tim Reynolds, Cbeah. That's two of them, like an acoustic thing.
Speaker 1 (06:58):
And I don't know the story about it, but it
sounds like it's just Dave Matthews playing his songs and
this other guy shredding all over yeah, and that kind
of works.
Speaker 3 (07:07):
I don't understand it. I think they were buddies and
they're both really I mean, that's the thing like this
so so yes, I definitely identify, and I definitely had
friends in college who I've My first memory of Dave
Matthews hearing Dave Matthews was what's the song? The song
with the title from that first record, not under the
(07:29):
Table in Dreaming, What was the first single the one
that was like, oh, what did you say? What?
Speaker 2 (07:36):
What did you say?
Speaker 1 (07:37):
Mom?
Speaker 3 (07:37):
It's my birthday? Right you say?
Speaker 2 (07:40):
Don't?
Speaker 3 (07:42):
And it was a buzz bin MTV at that point
post Nirvana, it was like they had that buzz bin
thing where they would have like a thing that they
were that was coming up and it was like coming
on and it was like usually something that was a
little left of center. And what I will say is
listening to that and I remember like kids coming into
my biology class at high school like singing that song
because it was also kind of funny. It was like
(08:04):
memified before that was a word we used. Like there
were lyrics in it that like Loser or something by
Beck where they were like things that you would just
be like you would repeat them because they were almost
like memes, you know, like mimetic I guess is the
word for that. But this, like this song, what I
will immediately say is like listening to it in the
(08:24):
context of a bunch of you're like you said, chaotic.
Chaotic is what I think is one of the things
I think it has going for it. Yeah, it is
an insane thing to think that this music was and is,
but certainly in that moment was like immensely popular on
my TRL.
Speaker 2 (08:40):
Yeah, this was big because it's as you said, Yeah, I.
Speaker 3 (08:43):
Thought of Annie DeFranco, DeFranco whatever during it, and there
is like it does he has always I mean, and
I think this is a feature of what he his
his whole project was about. It's a it's a melting pot,
a blend of all of these different sensibilities that represent
different corners of his musical interests, some of which are
like profoundly not pop music. But he did manage to
(09:07):
sort of like boil them into a thing that for
several albums was like immensely successful on a pop scale
and had like legit top forty singles it probably four
or five of them over a couple of records.
Speaker 1 (09:20):
I actually don't believe it. The nineties were really great
at like letting artists like this shine. But he it's
amazing the amount of people that liked this because this
is he's the next generation, right of like fish or something.
Speaker 2 (09:33):
Yep, and this is so mainstream and why.
Speaker 3 (09:36):
It's like you've got your ball, You've got.
Speaker 1 (09:39):
You like yeah, yeah, yeah, like on the radio so
much and it's such he makes so many weird choices
and his band is so odd.
Speaker 3 (09:46):
There's a violin player.
Speaker 1 (09:47):
And yes it's world music ofteah, it's world music. But
it was on the radio constantly, and that was the testament,
I guess, to college radio.
Speaker 3 (09:54):
And I think he was. Yeah, he was one of
those stories. We talked about this with Metallica and it
even came up with the Good Charlotte thing, a little
bit about like Green Day and Good Charlotte's punk roots
things that are kind of sprung from like a corner
of DIY. Like my cousins grew up in Earliesville, Virginia,
which is like outside Charlottesville. And I remember my cousin
(10:16):
telling me about like this, Like my cousin who was
a college student. You know, he's a little older than me,
so it was a college student in like the early
nineties at Roanoke, you know, in Virginia, and I remember
him being like he would go to house parties in
Charlottesville where they were the band Dave Matthews band was
like playing. It's those stories of like people being like
(10:37):
I was at CBGB's when the Ramones he literally that's
what that was. Just was like red solo cup house
parties with like you know, fucking beer pong or whatever,
and they were playing the songs. So they really did
and you can hear it. It's like the fucking Beatles
in Hamburg thing, like you can hear the ten thousand
Hours in this band. This band really knows how to play.
Speaker 2 (10:58):
With really a great way to you know, like they.
Speaker 3 (11:02):
Really you really can you can hear. Now there's a
whole other thing that you could talk about about, like
but that's more about subjectivity and taste and what one's
interests are. Like I've I was never into Dave Matthews
because of my own issues around self governance. There were
certain things he did that were like bordering on like
scatting and like for instance, in this song, like why
(11:23):
does he have to say was me right or wrong?
Like I recognize that he's like referencing. He's referencing a
linguistic trope in certain like Caribbean and African modes of
music with that, and I know he is a person
of I don't know his biography super closely, but I
believe you like grew up or spent time in South
Africa or something like that. Yeah, but there's a degree
(11:44):
to which you're like stuff like that for better or
for worse. I feel like I say that now every
episode too. There was like something broken in me by
the things towards which I gravitated and the things to
which I devoted myself and got really into where something
like that, I was just like, oh, I can't cross
that bridge. I'm so sorry. I can't get into like
was me right or wrong with you? It's like jar
(12:07):
Jar Binks is singing the chorus of the song all
of a sudden, so like there's stuff like that with him.
That was just like a no fly zone for someone
with my character defects.
Speaker 2 (12:18):
So I will make.
Speaker 3 (12:19):
That about me and not about Dave.
Speaker 1 (12:35):
I think there's a lot of people who, if they
listen to this song for the first time today, would
either say that this was the worst song we've ever
picked in terms of it's all over the place, but
also some people and I actually feel like this might
be the best song we've picked in certain ways that
I think there's it's like, well, it's like listening to
a jazz where you're like, there's so much going on,
I'm gonna need to listen to this a bunch.
Speaker 3 (12:56):
Musically speaking, I think there is a school of excellent
musicianship that is about what isn't there taste and restraint,
and I do understand why people from that sort of
category and lineage have always found something like this to
be a little fussy, busy, overstuffed and see that as
(13:18):
a detriment. The other side of that, though, is like
everyone who's playing on this song, Yeah, they might all
be playing like all the notes all the time, but
they're all like really good every single instrument, and like
there's these little polyrhythmic things that are happening, and for
what it is worth, Like I actually stopped and was like,
is the structure of this song verse, chorus, post chorus,
(13:41):
this whole thing about like I never did a single
thing that did a single thing to change.
Speaker 1 (13:45):
That's also a really nice lyric, by the way, and
it's what we talked about on the last episode. He's
saying I've never did a single thing that did a
single thing to change the ugly ways of the world.
We talk about that with like raging against the machine,
with Zach leaving the day to try to actually do something.
Speaker 3 (14:00):
He's outright saying I've never seen textualizing it. Yeah, it's
like and I think, but what's interesting is like that
comes It's not the verse because we just heard the verse.
It's not the chorus where the title of the song
comes in because we just heard that. It's not a
bridge because it happens three times. It's a post chorus.
We've never fucked with a post chorus on chancey before.
Speaker 2 (14:22):
This is first I think Nickelback nic.
Speaker 3 (14:28):
What I think we determined was that Nickelback effectively had
five chorus.
Speaker 2 (14:32):
Yes, yes, yes, you're right.
Speaker 3 (14:34):
So maybe you could say that this is so distinct
and that it's like that's a whole, separate, energetic thing.
And when it ended and the verse came back, I
was like, wait, what did I just hear? And then
they repeat that, and then they go in for what
is actually a truly musically and lyrically psychotic bridge, which
which for me passes the bridge test on sheer audacity,
(14:57):
Like I'm like, what is this? This insane and I
think that one thing I was thinking about this was like,
I think there's a lot of garbage in the lyrics here,
there's also other things that I don't think are garbage,
and so I give him credit because that's the province
of someone who's at least trying to speak poetically is
sometimes you're gonna miss and sometimes you're gonna hit. But
unless you're like excellent at it, and there's people who
(15:19):
are better and people who are less good. What I
was thinking was like, is there someone who knows this is?
What's chaotic to me is the lyrics, the actual density,
volume structure, the amount the words themselves. I'm like, is
there somebody who knows all the words to all the
David Matthew songs? Because he's kind of just like going
(15:40):
off in all these wild assid directions And it's not
like storytelling like people like Dylan or Leonard Cohen or
there's a lot of language, but the language follows a
sort of logic, even if it's like a hallucinogenic sort
of dream like like in some of that Dylan stuff,
you can sort of like follow it. This is sort
of like all you people are the skewers of our dreams,
(16:03):
like the Cat that Collared Me? Oh, and what I
got to say to you, Like, it's just like it's
almost like he's making it's almost improvisational.
Speaker 2 (16:11):
Which I think is Yeah, I believe that that is
what it is.
Speaker 3 (16:15):
And then but part of what's improvisational about it is
outside of the chorus, outside of those three distinct parts,
the thing in the bridge, it's alot. It doesn't have
a melody, it's not melodic. He's just kind of like
and you're like, does someone memory, like, did someone ever
sing this at karaoke and nail the bridge? If so,
(16:36):
that person should get like a fucking Nobel prize or
something that's insane so fun.
Speaker 2 (16:41):
That's such a great point because you know it's in
those books.
Speaker 3 (16:46):
It was.
Speaker 2 (16:46):
It's big enough to be like under the Day of
Matthews section.
Speaker 1 (16:49):
I don't know. Yeah, going back to what you're saying,
what is this song about? Right, because at first it's
like I'm mixing up a bunch of magic stuff, a
magic potion, cloud of care, a push that will rock,
the boat will rock, make a bomb of love and
blow it up. Maybe it's talking about songwriting. Maybe it's
talking about making music, making art.
Speaker 2 (17:05):
I did it. Do you think I've gone too far
with my art? I did it? Guilty is charged?
Speaker 3 (17:08):
This is great, This is who my fuck is cooking
right now.
Speaker 1 (17:11):
Then, when it's like a nickel or a dime for
what I've done, which is okay getting paid free music,
the truth is that I don't really care to get
paid for such a lovely crime, I'll do the time.
Speaker 3 (17:21):
So wow, you really open in my mind up about this?
I had no this is great to keep going.
Speaker 1 (17:26):
You better lock me up. I'll do it again. I
did it. Do you think I've gone too far? I'm
speculating if it is this about the making our.
Speaker 3 (17:35):
Acts of creation?
Speaker 1 (17:36):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, and saying I never did a single
thing that did a single thing to change ways of
the world, which I think.
Speaker 2 (17:42):
He's being modest about that. He's being modest.
Speaker 1 (17:45):
I think I think art can change the world, like
especially the ugly ways of the world. It could brighten horizon.
So I do think I didn't know it felt so
right inside. I didn't know at all. Open up the curtains.
I heard sirens, there was lights, flash and crawl. I
did it justice, I did it for the buzz.
Speaker 3 (18:03):
Yeah, I mean I feel like you're you're actually leading
me to a deeper consideration, and that I actually think
is quite lucid. By the way, I think what you're
saying makes a lot of sense. It does seem like
there this is a as you kind of lay it out,
I'm like, oh, yeah, that is what that sounds like
to me. It's like a thinly veiled metaphor for the
act of creation and somebody who's kind of like reflecting
(18:27):
about their the limits of that, the utility of it.
Even because I think what you point out with the modesty,
it's like there's a difference between I do but agree
with you. Art can and music can I change the
world as particularly in the sense that it's art and
music speak to your your heart and your soul. Not
(18:50):
to sound cheesy, but I really do. They also can
be intellectually stimulating and funny and a lot of other things,
but they can open something in you. And I think
that what is interesting is he gets to a place
in that bridge where what he's kind of talking about
is like, you've got love, don't turn it down, turn
it loud, let it build. You've got a long way
(19:11):
to go, but you've got to start somewhere, go door
to door, he's basically saying, which is not a novel thought,
but it might be maybe at the end of everything,
the only one is that it's like what we have
that is the most the most powerful thing we can
offer one another is our love and empathy. So even
when you feel whatever, like he maybe in this song
(19:35):
he's wrestling with like, well, how much have I actually done?
I have this platform and I write this is what
I do. And but you know, I, for one, don't
turn my cheek for anyone. Unturn your cheek to give
your love love to grow. I mean, I don't know.
He's a little confused there. I have no idea exactly
what I think. But he might I don't know what
that is. He might have gotten to that point and
(19:56):
been like, I'm out of esteem. But I mean the
unturn your cheek is something that I was like, it's
going to live in my brain forever as like a
hall of fame ludicrous. But there's other things in here,
and I do think you know, he's kind of talking
maybe in that part you identify as modesty about like
what is the difference between the limitations of what art
(20:17):
and music can do versus like, yeah, it can open
hearts and minds and it can like influence, but also
like ultimately, yeah, it's like I think about the difference
between like solidarity work and activism, Like I've definitely talked
to There's a lot of people I've been friends some
of my life I'm thinking of right now as specific
who are the people who've been Like, I like went
(20:38):
to Occupy Wall Street a few times. I like played
at Occupy Wall Street at the Boston version. I wasn't
fucking living at Occupy Wall Street. I wasn't there when
they swept the park. I wasn't, you know what I mean.
And I've known people who were, And that's part of
for me why it's like as a person who writes songs, Yes,
art and music can change the world, but I don't
(20:59):
can fuse oh yeah, my solidarity one. Yeah, with a
fucking activist who's actually there when like the cops show
up at two am and they sweep Zukatti Park, Like,
that's a really different level of commitment and skin in
the game. So I kind of like that he says
that there because I feel like he's it's modesty, but
it's also something that I actually some fucking relating with Dave.
(21:23):
He's an older man at this point too. He was
sixty five when he wrote this song. How old is
Dave Matthews?
Speaker 1 (21:28):
Actually, I know, I feel like he's been forty two
for like two decades.
Speaker 3 (21:33):
Yeah, he looks great. He might be fifty five years old.
He looks the same as he looked since like this time.
Speaker 2 (21:39):
I bet you he's older.
Speaker 3 (21:40):
We're gonna look it up on ours fifty seven.
Speaker 2 (21:44):
You were fifty seven years old.
Speaker 1 (21:46):
But I think he you know, he had like an
like I don't know, like he had the same look
for like, yeah, like twenty years.
Speaker 3 (21:52):
He's not exactly somebody who's you know, another Chancey side
Chancy little erratic Chancey my chance hit me, not a
person who was concerned at all with this music fitting
in with whatever the tropes of popular music around it were.
There's not a moment where you're like, and that's where
he's kind of doing like a new metal thing or like, oh,
and that's where he's kind of referencing like the sort
(22:13):
of like a Max Martin school of songwriting.
Speaker 1 (22:16):
You know, it's funny, this isn't in this song. He's
not even trying to be himself, but not in not
that he's trying to be what's on the radio. He's
just trying something new. And I give him credit for
that because in the same album, I think he had
the space between oh, that was a radio banger as
well forward yeah, and that fits with the radio but
(22:36):
not trying to but just.
Speaker 3 (22:37):
That almost could be like a collective soul song or
something like that.
Speaker 2 (22:41):
Like the verses of.
Speaker 3 (22:42):
Yeah, the verses of that song, there's a very particular
like yeah. I feel like, what's funny with him is
there's a couple of moments where I feel like I
wonder if he was like, yeah, he's got to like
give him one of these, so I can kind of like,
I mean, that might not be true.
Speaker 1 (23:01):
He might. That's so funny if if if they're like
if they're like, you know, the our A and R
wants us to write a hit song, and then it's like, so, guys,
I did it.
Speaker 3 (23:10):
Listen to this.
Speaker 2 (23:12):
I did it because.
Speaker 1 (23:13):
I don't know how you would sit down with a
guitar and write the chorus.
Speaker 2 (23:17):
I did it. I think I've.
Speaker 1 (23:20):
Gone too far Like that does feel actually, I hope
that's true. I feel like an A and r was like,
I need you to actually try to write it radio song,
and then he's like and maybe he said like, don't
go too far right, don't go too crazy with it.
And Dave wrote the craziest version he could, which is this,
And I think that if if he pointed to the
outfield like Babe Ruth and and wrote this song and
(23:42):
it got on the radio, that's amazing, amazing.
Speaker 3 (23:57):
There's that great story from this same timeframe. That's the
Way I Am story. Do you know that that they
basically yeah, they get. So he gave them that record,
and I guess Jimmy Ivean was like, you know, well
this is crazy and very bracing and interesting, and I
think it's going to really make an impression, you know,
(24:19):
but it's your follow up and we need like an
undeniable single, And he went back and wrote The Way
I Am, which is not that single. It was him
basically being like, oh, you want me to give you
like a pop song, here's me in the same cadence
for four minutes, rapping about how I can't write a
(24:40):
more popular song than the one year and then of
course what comes out is in the eleventh hour is
the real Slim shady and it's like the poppyst song
he'll ever write, which wow, that was almost like an afterthought.
There's a Will Go story like that too with Summer Teeth,
when they were still like trying to like make it
on the major and that record in a certain sense
(25:02):
is like, you know, it's a funny Will Goes, like
a very different execution of a kind of roots adjacent music.
But then Dave is but like, I'm sure there's been
some worlds where there's people who probably are very big
fans of both, and they've probably played some festivals together
here and there. But there's a story with Summer Teeth
where they gave the record in and that's like a
(25:22):
perfectly executed you know, Beach Boys beatles hybrid. It's him
doing like a genre record, almost like a pop thing
in the Will Go way, And I guess they were like, yeah,
this is really nice, but there's no single, and I
forget which song they wrote that was they wrote They
went back and wrote like three and you can kind
of tell when you're listening to the record. There's a
(25:43):
few where you're like, oh, this is like a gin
Blossom song, like they were trying to like what's the
closest we could get to that? All right, Well it's
this Maybe it's like the Nothing's Ever Going to Stand
in My Way again. I think that's one of the
songs or something. But there are these moments. I don't
know if that's the deal with Dave by this record.
I would imagine Dave Matthews band had already done enough
for the label that they were sort of like they
(26:05):
want a hit, but they also were like, yeah, he's
just going to do his thing, and even if it
doesn't go like multi platinum, the tour is going to
sell fifty thousand tickets a night and we'll get involved
with you know, we'll make a cut of the merch
or whatever. However it worked for them. Look, I definitely
think when you say, there are people who are going
to hear this and say it's the worst song we did,
(26:26):
and there's people who would say it's the best.
Speaker 1 (26:27):
Song we did.
Speaker 3 (26:28):
I think and that you know, to his credit, he
did his thing and people he did it. He did
it and people for a length of career he's either
been like a punchline to some people or to other
people like the best songwriter and band leader of his generation.
And I think that's actually like, you know, fucking you
(26:50):
want to be polarizing on some level, right, And he's
been polarizing and managed to sell out Giants Stadium along
the way.
Speaker 1 (26:57):
So I saw him there. I saw him five times.
One was a Giant stadium. It was one of the
craziest concerts I've ever been to. It was supposed to
end the night, it didn't rain, and then during space
between he ended with like you a few his like
after his when they go away on Core. During the space.
Speaker 3 (27:13):
Between, it starts raining and then he plays that song
two Step.
Speaker 2 (27:15):
I don't remember. It's like a real building.
Speaker 3 (27:16):
Oh I do remember that song, and it starts puring,
rain pouring.
Speaker 1 (27:21):
Everyone's going crazy dancing, and then he finishes the song
and it's topped rain stop it. It was really amazing,
and he's talked about that in interviews like that was
like one of his favorite concerts because it was just
so crazy.
Speaker 3 (27:32):
That's amazing. When was that was that? Like?
Speaker 1 (27:35):
I think I was in like a later era of
high school, so probably I graduated in two thousand and three,
So yeah, probably two thousand and.
Speaker 3 (27:40):
Three or four. I wonder because I know I have
the concert ticket at my parents' house. I'll go find it.
I would. Yeah. One of my very close friends went
to see like from Fordham went to see one of
those shows two thousand. It would have been like been
the early aughts, late nineties, early aughts, and it was
like a graduation press. It was probably ninety nine or
(28:03):
something though. It was but Giants Stadium and it was
exactly like you described, like it was like fish or
the dead people going and like, what's it called pregaming?
But there's a word for that tailgating. Yes, yes, yes,
we did a lot of that. We took a party bus.
Speaker 2 (28:17):
I was like it was it was a bunch of
I knew and didn't know and everyone took a party bus.
Speaker 1 (28:23):
Wow. I remember, yeah, because I was like it was
still kind of early in experimenting, even with drinking. And
I remember like somebody spiran off ices. I remember being
like this is lovely.
Speaker 3 (28:35):
Yeah, yeah, this is what drinking is. I'm all about it.
It is candy, this is yeah right, that was I
definitely had that moment.
Speaker 2 (28:44):
Oh yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3 (28:45):
I think my dad, who was like really funny. Our
dad was like a you know, grew up in Park
Slope and lived in Bay ridge and was like, you know,
not a Zeema guy, and that at some point when
we were on Staten Island were like going to in
the basement in the in the fridge, and it was
like there was zemas. I was like a teenager, and
I think I remember drinking them, being like I didn't
(29:07):
drink much in high school. And then I remember drinking
those and being like same thing, like this is like sprite,
and then like refilling his zemas with water and like
closing them again. I don't even know if you ever
drank them again, because no one ever said to me
like there's fucking water in those, you know, but also
like they're crudely resealed. I love it starts like a
class action lossuit against and they're like, I did it?
(29:34):
Do you think that Zema's nods? All right? So listen, listen.
End of the day. Oh, very quick story quick Dave Matthews.
So I laid the groundwork. College people love Dave, people
love Oasis. My college girlfriend breaks up with me. There's
a hurricane adjacent storm that closes for them, and there's
(29:56):
going to be a big party in the dorms. She
comes to my room. We're hanging out for a little while,
tells me that she's dating another guy. I'm devastated. Okay,
so I start drinking. It's going to be a party
that night, big dorm room party. I decide I'm going
to go up to the party drunk. Now, Chris O'Brien,
the homie, shout out to Sephis. He was like, yo,
(30:20):
I'll come up. He was like saying he's gonna come
for me. But also he was just like, I want
to come up and get fucked up at this party.
So he comes up anyway, so he's telling me he's
going to get in. I'm like, how are you going
to get in? There's a faery involved, it's a hurricane morning.
He's like, I'll get there, Moses, I'll get there all right.
So anyway, I'm at I go to this party. I'm drunk.
There's this girl I always thought was super cute for
my classes, and now I'm like trying to like get
(30:41):
over this heartbreak that I'm feeling. And so there's like
I'm sitting there having a drink. Someone hands me a
guitar and this girl goes, do you know any Dave?
And I was like, I'd never usually that was like,
I do not cross that line in my head. But
I had learned crashing.
Speaker 2 (31:00):
Oh, I was guessing. I was really guessing satellite And
I was like.
Speaker 3 (31:04):
You mean. And it was the one time I ever
used like music for the forces of evil. Like I
started to play crash into me and from behind me,
this is real down like the hallway of this party,
I hear, Yo, what the fuck are you doing? And
it was Cephas he arrived at the party at the
moment that I was like going against my my moral code.
Speaker 2 (31:29):
And I remember like I was like, nothing, like I
put it down, start playing paranoid Android.
Speaker 3 (31:33):
Exactly I mean, and I lack all sun. That was
also the first night I tried cocaine. And I remember
like the next morning, Kevin Cole and Kowski in my
roommates sitting at the end of the bed. I looked
up and he was like, don't ever do that again.
Guess what I did, Mad, I did it. I had
(31:54):
to stop to do it.
Speaker 2 (31:55):
Eventually, I stopped doing it a Vand if he had
a lyric that was I had to stop doing it.
Speaker 1 (32:03):
Avengch No one would even question it. No, he would
say the power of Dave Matthew, the only question I
would have is why didn't he say me stop doing it. Events,
me stop doing it, event she starts becoming Yoda, Avenge me.
Speaker 3 (32:16):
Stop doing it.
Speaker 1 (32:17):
Avenge it is you said, it's charge of Biggs, but
it's also very Yoda.
Speaker 3 (32:21):
Yeah, it's Star Wars for Sure, Star Wars for sure. Done.
We are, I've done, we are.
Speaker 2 (32:29):
Chance, we gave chance, we gave Yeah.
Speaker 1 (32:33):
Yeah, I actually there's times that I finished the podcast,
I'm like, I hope that we.
Speaker 3 (32:37):
Give that enough of a chance.
Speaker 2 (32:38):
But I think we do.
Speaker 3 (32:41):
And if you don't think so, please feel free to email.
I don't give a rats ass at dot fart dot.
Now that's not a really address everybody. I do, we
do give it an about you do, but ow dot
do not give all right, it's been good peace, real
(33:11):
peace until next piece.
Speaker 2 (33:13):
Just give it
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