QLS Classic: Jon Batiste

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Of Course Love Supreme is a production of I Heart Radio.
This classic episode was produced by the team at Pandora.
Musician John Batiste joins Team Supreme to rehash his journey
from smalltown Louisiana to musical director of The Late Show
with Stephen Colbert. Originally released March fourteen, Just follow on,

(00:30):
You'll get it sum roll Call Suprema, sum roll Call
Sua sum roll Call sum sumroll Us all day, Yeah,
wal Winter, Spring and Summer. Yeah. To band leaders of

(00:51):
Late Night, both started out is drummers, sull up. You're
both real talented. Yeah, yeah, and the best band leader
is yeah, Doc Severan su primo role. I'm fell in

(01:14):
my second line after the show, Hey Bill, Yeah, and
Tom's a whack Yeah, but have no fear. Yeah. Suremo,
roll call Suprima roll call. My name is Boss Bill. Yeah,

(01:36):
right as a Halogen. Yeah, Steve and some Hollywood Africans
rom roll call Suprima Primo roll Call. It's yeah, and
it's going down yeah, Tomson Betts Yeah all right, Suremo,

(02:01):
roll call Premo roll Call. It's John bad Teacher and
I'm in the house. Yeah, We're about to get down. Yeah,
that's what we bout oh Sam, roll call, So prima
sum roll call, so frema, so fremo, roll call, prima primo,

(02:29):
roll call. Ladies and gentlemen, Welcome to another episode of
Course Love Supreme, Late Night at the Late Night at
Bright Wait, he's starting already, he started already, Now, mother,

(02:58):
it is Jamaica. I knew I was gonna have to
play an eventually thank you that I was gonna say. Um,
I mean I was going to introduce our guests, but no,

(03:21):
let's introduce me and all right, well let's let's just
let's just keep it tradition, so we don't, you know,
scare for our viewers. Um, our guest today actually needs
no introduction, ladies and gentlemen, And there's not late night
war is happening in this building. Yeah. No, our our
guest today is uh. I will say he's band leader Supreme.

(03:42):
Uh he is uh multi instrumentalist. Uh. You are a
Juilliard graduate. Um, and I'll say that most of America
currently now knows you as the band leader for the
number one show in late night. No, okay, no, no,

(04:06):
no fake news over no, no, no, no nothing. Of course,
it's uh wait, technically, what is the show called it's
Late Night with Stephen Corbert Late Show, the Late Show.
There's like late night Late show later tonight. Yes, the
Show with Stephen Colbert. Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome to

(04:29):
quest Love Supreme. The one and only John Patiste. Yes,
all man, So Bill going on, Bill, I'm having to
see Ja. I have not seen Johns since uh club
the food is a lot of your house. That was like, minute,

(04:50):
have you ever had him on Sesame Street? I just
asked him. Got very upset because I grilled him about
what hasn't he been on Sesame stre Yeah, he's like
Taylor aid for I know this. I have talked to
him about this and I'm working on it. Everybody simmer down.
I haven't been here in a long time. Everybody a

(05:11):
question ship. I've been here for a ten minutes, just checking. Wait,
Can can I ask you something? John? This is this
is the one. This is the question I always wanted
to know, are you silently? Because I know you have
history way before I knew of you, like Lenny Kravis
put me on to you long ago, and you you

(05:34):
You've actually inspired some ideas I've had about how to
put show presentations on and everything so I've I've known
about you way before Colbert. Yeah, I mean you got
hired by Colbert because of the reputation that you were building.
Are you do you get slightly annoyed when people come
up to you and just like, hey, Stephen Colbert's guy,

(05:56):
like without knowing the history, like you just came out
of nowhere to yeah that happened to you, It does?
You know, Like I'll be going somewhere and I'll run
into somebody and they'll be like, hey, you're the guy
from Colbert. What what's your name? And then after a
while they were like, oh, yeah, that's John Battis, but
it's still from from the Lake Show. I mean you
could be from Colbert technically, yeah, you're from there, but

(06:19):
it's almost like, you know, I'm Jimmy Fallon's drummer, yes,
and you're too. Sometimes yeah, because that's why it's it's
it's cool to um and as as you do when

(06:39):
you have other things that you do that kind of
paints a full of picture. I actually, all right, now
that we're saying this, I believe that's probably the real
reason I stick the nineteen jobs, because it's almost like, hey,
what am I my chef, my cook guy to day
and my you know, music teacher today and my like it.

(07:00):
I always wanted to know, is that slightly irksome when
people don't do the research and know yeah, your history. Yeah,
it's it's It's something that I think over time, people
and people still have been digging back into the catalog
and saying things that we're done. But I think over time,
the more you do and the more you just keep

(07:21):
doing your thing um and not letting any one thing
define you, the more that you can continue to kind
of bring people into what you do with your art
or your creativity. You know what about the flip side
where I was gonna on the other side give you
the megaphones that neither of you had ever had. Pride, right,
I'm gonna go out. When I saw the last episode
of Colbert Report, when you guys did the line, yeah,

(07:42):
that was the first time I ever saw you, and
I was like, oh ship, And then I did the
research and I was like, okay, yeah it was It's
the way to bring new people in. Absolutely, it's amazing.
I mean just being on a show that's kind of
like this, it's fraternity, and it's hard to have any
sort of malice or disrespect to it, even if people

(08:03):
just know you for that right now. But I feel
like I've always just been somebody who likes to create
and explore different things and evolve and grow, and I'm
always pushing myself to try to find something else that's
going to challenge me. So the consistency of the show
is one thing, but I have to balance it out
even just for me, not even for the sake of
people knowing that there's more that I have the offer,

(08:25):
but just for my own well being as an artist.
I gotta keep pushing and creating. So, um, it gives
me a chance to share it with a lot more people.
How easy is it to do? Because I know that, Uh,
there's many sides to John Fatis, as far as like
you're You're like you'll do traditional draft records and stuff

(08:47):
will stay human, You'll do different projects. Um what I
primarily knew you for worthy sort of uh kind of
musicals speak easy so to speak, where uh, I'll say,
you know, years before he was on the show, he would, um,
word would get around that there's gonna be a secret

(09:09):
John Petite show at some nondescript random warehouse in Harlem
or in Brooklyn or in the Bronx somewhere, and it's
almost like it's the musical version of well only New
Yorkers will get this reference of like Sleep No More.
Sleep No More is kind of like a play where

(09:29):
the fourth wall is sort of exposed and you're part
of the play. You as the spectator. So you go
to this like big wide open space and then John
and State Human basically perform. There's there's no traditional stage,
so there's almost like four setups. They you know, they'll

(09:50):
they'll pick one side of the corner where their music
set up, and then they'll march to the other side
of the room where there's other music instruments set up.
Like everyone gets a chance to be the front row seat.
And it's and it's immersive. They have like stuff hanging
around you could you could play instruments and all that
other stuff and joining It's like I've never seen a

(10:11):
show in which the the the artists that the audience
is actually immersed in with the show. Are you able
to still do those secret Smurf shows at all? Is
it like it's it's it's hard. I mean, I'm sure
as you know, to keep the energy level up after

(10:32):
doing the show. I had to take the first six
months when I started doing Cold Bad just to figure
out how to do it and and figuring out how
to balance everything else that I have been doing with
now this um my job on the show. But then
after I figured that out, I started to focus more
on recording things and and being in the studio because

(10:55):
I was mostly playing live during that time, and exploring
how to really present a real immersive experience that brought
people together. So, yeah, it was an amazing show that
was fun for free. I was like, you're giving them

(11:16):
all of this and then you literally jumped in the crowd.
I went around. Yeah, I was wondering, like, how do
you get paid because okay, okay, well sometimes like when
we're going to road, we do them after the show,
so it would be with would take the guarantee from
the show and use that, so you do a regular show, right,

(11:36):
and then that's like your Prince after party. I never
knew that. I thought that was your bread and butter. Well,
at one point it was when we were in New York,
and then we started to get known for that, and
then we got an age in and then we went
on the road. And then we went on the road.
We didn't want to stop doing that because every venue
doesn't accommodate that that kind of performance. So it was

(11:59):
kind of like, Okay, well we can just do two shows, right.
It's cool. It's cool to see how people react to
the music when you put when you put it in
a different context, because um, like if we play jazz,
for instance, and it's in a jazz club, it's much
different than if like somebody's sitting next to you on

(12:21):
the piano or somebody's sitting behind the drums and they
can really see the interaction with the rhythm section and
stuff like that. Does that does the plan sometimes backfire?
Because you do present this whole speak easy thing like
it's it's like you know, like sometimes it's almost like
you're you're walking into a set of an old like

(12:41):
fifties burlesque or whoever like designs the stuff. And you know,
sometimes I'll see like people trying to sit on your
piano bench with you, Like so how you know some
drunk guy suddenly wants to sit in on drums or
you know, like how do you guys control that situation?

(13:03):
It's it's it's a casualty of the situation, like you
gotta go into it expecting some people to get super free.
That's what we're like, Oh, this cat is about to
get super free. And then when that happens, you almost
plan the show, like the set more from UM whatever
it was gonna be, to accommodate whatever happens. So if

(13:26):
that guy comes and grabs the drumsticks or something, then okay,
well let's go into the drum circle that we had
planned for the next three songs down and put that right.
Now here's a question because I haven't I haven't seen
one of these, but they sound amazing and I'm wondering,
have you ever done these at schools? Oh? Yeah, yeah,
not in New York actually, but we've done them in schools.
We went to um UM in Amsterdam. We actually we did.

(13:52):
We did a show at the concert Gibaut, which is
like a concert hall there and that was just like
a traditional show. And then we went into a school
and did UM basically kind of like this kind of
curated thing but in their auditorium. But um that was
one thing we didn't. We also went into one of
the um that the equivalent of like the hood, and

(14:13):
I got I got them to put a piano in
the middle of the street, which I always loved that visual,
just having like instruments on the block, which I mean,
I know you you played. And that's kind of how
we started this whole kind of concept of immersion, which
is when we started playing on the streets and we're
playing the subways in New York. Um, and we'll see

(14:36):
how people react. When you see see the band come
into a car and just set up for like thirty
minutes and play. It's like, Wow, these you're not asking
for money, You're not bust us because at the end
you get to the next cars. Didn't ask Gonna be honest,
it's always it's always with the weary look when somebody
sets up on the trains. It's like exactly like the

(14:59):
first five minutes of The Hardest Have you do? Have
you done New York Trains yet? Oh? Yeah? Really? When
you walk in there, but it's like I always wanted
to do that, Everyone's like, oh yeah, we should do
that one day. Yeah train and just I guess nothing
shocking in New York City. No, that would be who

(15:21):
was it? Who are those two guys? Station or something
like that, and like nobody knew like nobody noticed that
they were there. Vis Yeah, yeah, I saw just like
shredding the violin and like Bleaker Street and people like actually,
come to think of it. So I tried to want

(15:42):
to get jay Z to come to one of your events.
Has he seen it yet? Not that not the he
saw traditional one, Damn, because the thing was I gotten
the halfway agreed to it. I had seen the first
time I saw you, was I guessed, or the time
in which uh Jay was doing something at Carnegie Hall, right,

(16:06):
So I said, okay, this is what I want to do.
I said, what I want to do when this is
actually after a reasonable doubt slightly, this is like when
American Gangster was out, and I told him, I said,
this is what we're gonna do. You're gonna do someone
stage right, and then we're grand marked to the the
four year and then when you're done, you and Just

(16:30):
Blazes are going to do the encore and the Nose Bleeds.
And he looked at me like, I'm not doing this ship,
but he I convinced him at least to do. He
did his encore and the Nose Bleed, and unfortunately, what
I didn't realize with with Carnegie Hall. Was that the
way that the balconies are built. If you're like under,

(16:53):
if you're sitting on the floor row, you can't see
what's happening right there. So and of course they're like no,
you gotta you can't stand and you know, like it
stands at Carnegie Hall stas. It was rather frustrating for
the people on the who weren't in the news right right, yeah,
I been they have a close up you for once

(17:13):
exactly exactly. I was like, no, just give them to there.
It's good. So we're amazing. I want to know your story,
like where were you born and how was music brought
to your life? Oh? Wow? So I was born in
um actually Medite, Louisiana, and I was raised in Kenna, Louisiana,

(17:37):
between Canada and New Orleans. I was like, there are
other places besides. These are like literally ten minutes outside
of New Orleans. They're like suburbs of New Orleans. But
basically even though the airport is in Canada, it's called
New Orleans in the national so it's like the New
Orleans area. And my dad, he's um a great bassist.

(18:01):
My mother is not a musician, but she has a
really good ear and UM, my dad had six brothers
and they all played in the band together. And from
the six brothers, they're like thirty cousins. And at the
time when I was growing up, I was the youngest. Um.
Of the cousins that yeah, all of them. When I

(18:22):
was growing up, I was the youngest, and there were
two that were closer to my age, and we started
the junior band together. And the three of us were
drummers when we started the band. But you can't have
three drummers in the band. And I'm the youngest, so
obviously I'm gonna be the one that switches instrument and
the second youngest. He had to switch the instrument because
everybody wanted to play the drums, so I switched to

(18:45):
UM piano. Then it's around the time it was like
um tener eleven um it was I was already kind
of like UM. We would pick out songs from video
games and flay them, all of us, would Mario. When

(19:10):
Sega came out, Sonic Oh, Sonic soundtrack is amazing maybe
or maybe not created by Michael Jackson, by the way,
I know, maybe or maybe not, we don't know. The
soundtrack is incredible. UM and UM Street Fire to soundtracks
from Street Fight to to All of the Street Fire
to Alpha Final Fantasy seven like we we would played.

(19:33):
We would legit transcribe the soundtrack and played on piano,
so I kind of had a little bit of piano chops.
And then I was also kind of, uh, you know,
taking classical piano lessons but not really taking them seriously.
So I had a little bit of a foundation, but
when I switched to a piano, I didn't really get
serious about it until I was like, did y'all play

(19:55):
for other kids? Because it seems like that would have
been dope for other kids to like enter the world
of as instrumentation and stuff. It was cool when we
did a gig every year UM at the Children's Museum.
That was our first regular gig. The band is called
the Baptiste Kids, and we printed these shirts, uh he said,

(20:16):
purple and white shirts Batiste Kids, and it had us
on the shirt, um cartoon versions I remember. And we
played only gig for a while was the Children's Museum
in New Orleans every year, and we played for kids
at the museum, played the video game songs and we
played Mardi Grass songs. Same go watching then you know

(20:38):
how uh, I won't even say how important, but how
And I know that you're from Louisiana, so you gotta
trade like how burdensome is the idea of the tradition
of New Orleans music. Like I almost feel like if

(21:01):
you come out the womb, it's like you have to
know every solo from Sachemo. You have to know and
is it right? Well, I mean the thing is that
you're I mean, I I've I've grew up in I
mean I've I've seen jazz Nazis all my life. And

(21:24):
that's a technical term, jazz Nazis. All those listen, No,
I mean, but I just Steve is looking at me
right now. Even I asked the question, I will play
you j J. But I mean there's I mean, the

(21:46):
reputation of New Orleans. Um. I had to deal with
Ellis Marcella's when I was a kid. He told me
give up, like you know, he just straight up told
me give up, like and I think that's what really
pushed me to not following because I went to school

(22:06):
with Christian McBride, Joey Di Francesco, all these guys. So
I was striving to be a young lion and I
did this masterclass with Ellis and he just like it
was past embarrassment and humiliation, like and you know, I
was good. Yeah, you know what I mean. But it
was just like, you know, he like the tone of it.

(22:27):
He liked the shirt I was wearing, like you're not
a real jazz cat, and like, I just I gave up.
I didn't give up. I just like, well, you're right,
you go. Let me go to what I really love,
which is hip hop. Did you have a circle back?
I just I didn't need to know. Branford and I
laugh at her all the time. I don't mind, so,

(22:48):
but I'm asking you, Uh, was your being the youngest
of it where your was your family the same way
where it was just like you don't get any respect
from us until you learn like everything from Maple Levrad
to all these old scrolls of it was. It was like, um,

(23:12):
it was. It was an interesting mix of different um
flavors of that. So like my family was coming from
the meters and it's like the funk tradition. So um,
my uncle was was one of the first keyboardists in
the meters Um and then U my cousin Russell, he

(23:37):
took over in the meters after Ziggaboo, who was original
drummer so zig that that was like my immediate family.
And that's kind of like what that's what I got
from from being around them, was kind of that tradition
and just almost vicariously because it was never like John
play this, this is how this beat goes, uh, the

(24:00):
how these calls. I would just be on stage as
a kid, and I would be watching and kind of
absorbing that, and that was that was fun because that
kind of influenced a lot of how UM. I look
at UM performing for people in stage presence, and also
just the communal aspect of music because they will be
playing and sometimes you know, you'd have UM musicians just

(24:24):
coming up on stage unannounced, and you know, it was
turned into this massive tribal groove and and that was
one side of it. And then as I got older
and started getting into jazz, around thirteen and fourteen, there
was a camp that we all went to called the
Louis Sachemore Armstrong Summer Jazz Camp. And that's when I
started getting exposed to what you're talking about. And I

(24:46):
was lucky because there were a few of them I
called call them like the village elders that were just
like so open minded, but they also came from the
generation where it was like, you know, people were hard
on them, but they were so open minded with us,
Like Alvin Battiss, he would just he would teach us

(25:07):
how to play stuff that was way beyond our level,
but he would do it in these little baby increments,
like we'll be playing the Giant Steps, and he would
teach us like two notes at a time, and then
after we got the melody, he would just show us
the harmony, and then after it would take like a month,
but then after a month would be like twelve thir
team playing Giant Steps, but we wouldn't know that we
were playing Giant Steps, and and that if I didn't

(25:31):
have him and and a few others who were kind
of more just like okay, I'm not gonna come at
it from a critical place. I'm gonna come at it
from a place of okay, everybody has a voice. Learned
this and then once we got older, I played in
his band, the Jastronauts, and that was a band where
it was like if it's not different and weird, then

(25:54):
it's not right. You would always say it's you can
be correct, but don't make it right. And and I
actually believe that he would say, because I like unorthodox.
Oh yeah, it's the best. I mean, he had a
sittar player on one of the gigs when we're playing
a jazz club and I was fifteen at the time.
I was like, wow, you can do that. It just open.

(26:19):
So because of people like him, I kind of lucked out.
I didn't get caught in the dogma that can kind
of grapple you. Who who were your your age peers
at the time that are notable now, like who who
was in your circle? So at the camp we were
both we started a band together and that became the

(26:40):
band that still his band now, same members the band
Trammon Shorty. So Troy and I were like, he's a
little older, but we were basically camp at the same time.
Christian Scott, he was also at the camp. And also
we went to high school together. Um, they're just it's
a real interesting thing because we had the same teachers,

(27:04):
but we all came out in different routes. It's a
whole another you know, each person doing their own thing. Um,
how important is as far as uh New Orleans as
a city. Well not how important is it? But how
uh explain to us or our viewers are listeners, Sorry

(27:28):
you're not on TV right now, I know, explain to
our listeners. Um, the frequency of of Well it's odd
now to have music in nightclubs, and when you're in
New Orleans, every block still has bands in it. We
were moving to North We cop two houses in all

(27:54):
get July two July two thousand five, and then Katrina
happened and then that was out the window. Like we
were going to go down and record game theory because
the thing is New Orleans has they still They're the
last city left with like three very distinctive jazz traditional jazz,

(28:16):
uh you know the zieg You have to explain Ziego
music to me and and Cliff how that separates and
then bounce music, you know. So they we were like, okay,
this is this is a city with three very distinctive
styles to it, and we're gonna move down there and
figure our way into this mess. And then boom, like

(28:39):
man it got ruined. But do do you guys even
mixed with each other? Like, first of all, we're even
allowed to listen to pop music as a kid. Oh yeah,
it wasn't frowned upon. No, No, I was always listening
to cash Money, that's right. I mean there was a point,

(29:03):
um where when you're walking down the street, out of
every car you were hearing the cash money or no
Limit like bumping. That's the fourth that's the fourth element
of New Orleans that people forget about musically, right, bounced music.
Yeah you count? Do you count? Is that really? Is
that bounced? It's in the same stream, the the the

(29:26):
the Drake and my feelings beat New Orleans. Yeah, so
first of all, it is cash money and no Limit.
Is that sort of like are you either one side
or the other? Is that like the Beatles and Rolling
Stones at the time At the time, not anymore, but
at the time it was like, oh yeah, to choose

(29:49):
what side, you know, and cash Money was a little younger, right,
So yeah, yeah, I mean I always because I'm looking
at it from a musical perspective, I was want of
them to make something together. I thought it would be
crazy if they came together. It never did. I thought
it was it just would be so powerful because it

(30:10):
was just such an embodiment of music in the city
up until that point. There's so much in the sound
that that came from all of the different elements, even
like the the the zoetical and the second line tradition.
You could hear it in the rhythm of what they
were doing. So, can you break down for us the
difference between the various music styles in New Orleans as

(30:33):
far as yeah? Yeah. So so there's there's what we
call the second line, which comes basically from marching traditions.
So you have like the marching band tradition, which was
a big thing in early American culture, and then in
New Orleans that tradition was changed because you had the
influence of the African rhythmic culture and Congo Square which

(30:55):
doing slavery, which on Sunday. All of the different front
rhythms and traditions that they did in Africa they would
carry on in New Orleans and that was the only
place in America where that was continued. So then that
rhythmic culture seeped its way into the marching tradition and
that became second line. So the base rhythm of second

(31:18):
line is the it's like a bamboola rhythm, and that
rhythm you can hear it in um zydeco music. You
can hear it and uh, you can hear in cash
Money's music even if you think of of of mmm

(31:38):
mmmmm mmmm mmmm mm hmmm mmm boom m hm. You's
a fine I mean that rhythm. I feel like it's
the thing that ties all of the styles together. Wait
now I'm thinking about it. What we what rockets were
traditionally called the bow did Ley rhythm punched, So that's basically, yes,

(32:05):
that's where the basis of that rhythm comes from Louisiana. No,
but bo Didley that the the uh, that's the same.
And and to me, when you start hearing that, that's
how you can tell. Oh, that's kind of like New
Orleans influenced music. But the things that change it all

(32:27):
the instrumentation and the different different ways that people saying,
like the instrumentation of out of Code with the accordion
versus like second line is with tuba and marching instrumentation.
And then you have bounced music, which is made actually
you could do it on MPC. So it's it's a
range of different songs that you can get but the

(32:48):
same d n A. But what's the first line. The
first line is the church, so second line is basically
in the funeral. Some people call jazz funeral the lines
of the family that goes into the church, and that's
a slow, mournful song. And then the second line is
when you're coming out leave and you leave and it's
a celebration. Thank you John, like the whole world straight up.

(33:11):
The second line. I didn't know. I didn't know that.
We justad it. Like I'm telling you, I've seen a few,
uh second line marches for funerals, and those are some
extravagant productions. Like I've seen them Dan like hip it parade,

(33:35):
throw casket in the air or whatever you like. They'll
take the casket and start our what I'm doing. They
will fish pump it up, you know, like when you
get married and you sit in the chair and like
they toss you up in the air like a pizza. Yeah,

(33:57):
you know what I'm talking about. Damn, Steve, you sleep
and you you let him Bill the first time back
in a minute, I'm letting them some juice space. I
appreciate you. No, I never knew how easy is it.
I found out that anybody can get a permit to

(34:21):
have a parade in New Orleans for her wedding. Yeah,
I didn't know it was that easy. Oh yeah, yeah,
I mean it the city hall and just you can
hire a band for three hundred bucks. You ever heard
hanbl Bursus thing when he went to New Orleans. He's
like he bought a band for three bucks. They followed
him around all that. Really, yeah, can I have a

(34:44):
real really I'm not even New Orleans question then, because
I'm just gonna ask him since we didn't know what
the line was, what is money gras really about? Oh
my goodness. So that that's a little more complex. Not
not getting drunk, I know what. More, it's a historical
component because people in some traditional dress and you know

(35:04):
and stuff. So I was always wondering, see, see the
thing is Marti Gral goes into the Trinidad tradition and
Brazilian tradition, like an Afro Caribbean tradition, and people think
it's just oh, we go to the Bourbon Street and
we just get drunk and yeah, I'm sorry, but no, no,

(35:29):
it's it's it's a very beautiful tradition that's about people
coming together and family and and keeping traditions that have
been centuries old alive. And that's just the party is
is something that has it's morphed into and you know,
it's find the party, but it's not only just a party.
It's nice to know where it comes from. That's yeah.

(35:51):
So how much Caribbean influences and all the types of
music that you just told us about. Oh, it's like
a like a line. You come from West Africa, go
through the Caribbean. New Orleans almost like the northern tip
of the Caribbean. To me, in my mind, I think
of it as the same. So that rhythm and even

(36:13):
even the the stories that you hear about reggae and
how they would be listening to New Orleans music and
it would be a bootleg signal and they couldn't hear
all of the full rhythm, and they took certain parts
of it thinking that that was the rhythm, and that
influenced the reggae and then it's kind of it's like
a feedback loop. Wow. I never Yeah, that's amazing. I mean,

(36:40):
so New Orleans music influenced reggae, not the other way around,
or no, it's it influences each other because because the
New Orleans music came from that line of the culture
moving across and basically sitting in New Orleans and Congo
square being the hub where it kind of was fermenting

(37:01):
and then you know, at the end of a flavor
when you kind of have this release. UM, it's okay
to have people making their music and sharing it with
the world. You get people like Louis Armstrong who come out,
Buddy Bold, all these geniuses. It's like you let the
lid off. Speaking of which UM I just recently discovered UM.

(37:24):
Our listeners owe it to themselves to discover the music
of Lord Kitchener who he's he's he's king of sort
of trinid daddy. He's part if any Lord Lord Kischner.
I would say that maybe the origins of disco isn't

(37:50):
the music because uh with the socks symbol like it's
it's traditional trinid daddy music, which is more like des
so it's part New Orleans rhythm and the socks symbol
thing with it, but lyrically. And now his music is

(38:10):
coming from the forties and fifties, so he's in the
tradition of uh kind of uh here's the humorous uh
forties jazz guy lou Louis he's in the tradition of
Louis Jordan's or almost like the beginning of what Luke
and Two Live Crew were about. Like his songs are

(38:33):
Quasi risk A and wait can I can I play
one song of it? Okay, it's this is Lord Kitchener's
um Kitchener Kichener. Maybe yeah, it's a mirror talking, so
possibly I could be saying, okay, wait, rural jury, Yes

(38:55):
there's another rural. Yes. I have a question, how old
are you? Because in my head you're like Yoda and
you're like years old because you have that vibe. But
I don't think it's that old. Oh no, no, it's
still see. I thought that was a worthy question. He's
an old soul. Man. It's different. You must have a

(39:16):
it must be a lot of ages m for you
because I know them jazz cats be like, man, you
don't know nothing, so I would think, I mean you
you speak wise so and you seem to know you.
But the number is the number though, right like sometimes
they just like, p's your thirty one? Now what could
you know nothing but a number? It ain't nothing number? Okay,

(39:43):
all right, you got two choices. My favorite is my
wife's ninety and which in which he kind of inadvertently
gets with her girlfriend who stills his wife's clothes or
Muriel in the Bug, which is story about a bed

(40:05):
bug that happens to make its home in the most
unsavory place of this woman. Yeah, I feel like the
choice has been made. Yes, I'm putting both of those
in the cost of Mixed Supreme. I love it when
you intro to and give like the lyrical which one
is us bed Bugs? Now, I'm gonna have to do

(40:31):
both because this is less New Orleans tradition than the
other song, but was amazing Ryan. Secondly, where'd you find this? Yeah?
How is this? Who's like? The person that tips you
to this says a lot about them? Um, I don't know, Like, Oh,

(40:52):
I was looking at Calypso because I knew there was
more than Harry Belafonte. Yeah, so that The beautiful thing
about streaming is that's one of the best. Lose fair
Count Rabbit. He has a traditional Well I didn't know
if he had albums out with lyrics or he just

(41:13):
he got one coming out with ny Gamble. Oh snap,
really been working on it. He going out. Yeah, anyway,
I got played What's my wife? This one is Miria
in the Bedbug? No, what's the next one? My wife's ninety,

(41:35):
because I might had to charge you with loss any
all right, he's known as the King of calypso this
is nice, but the lyrics are funny. She came for
with kitchen, she seems. But when I woke up in

(41:56):
the morning, my wife, pretty ninety, was missing come back
with night. Didn't you like? This feels like a late night?
I know, I know, so basically kitch kids. His wife

(42:16):
is away and he's letting her girlfriend spend the night
on the couch. And by the way, here's my wife's
nightclothes the house. Well, he also sexes her down in
the third and fourth and fifth verse. I was like,
seven verses, I am a mince fan of of of

(42:37):
of kitch. Well that's yeah, lord kitchen. I'm wondering what
the song negro by Injection is about. Dog. It's exactly
what you think. He goes there, I mean ejects a
lot of humor and politics. Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's sexy.
But yeah, lot of you know, coming from uh Trinidad.

(43:04):
A lot of his music, the clips of music I
can hear sort of origins of New Orleans music and
in there and disco and other things like this was
in the fifties, so um, yeah for our listening Auston,
Uh lord around there, right, no, right, or the nineties

(43:27):
because all the ladies know they don't need to fear.
They really don't go past your knees. The bad bugs,
So I don't want to record. I had bad bugs
once it was outful. They go to your elbow in
your knees. Wow, so you're bad bucks. Weren't that clever
to find that area? Wow? That was a great lyrical choice.

(43:52):
That was a great lyrical choice. And lost and ninety
are really rhyming today. No, it's he's the best. Mann't
got that. Louis Jordan's energy too, Yes, absolutely, humor and
all that stuff. You recorded your first album you were seventeen, correct, yes, yes?

(44:14):
What did you know? How much information did you gather
in those five years that you learned traditional jazz to
make a record? Like did you know what you wanted?
And how did how did it come to be? I
had been playing at a club in New Orleans called
Snug Harbor, which is like our jazz clubs is like, Um,

(44:37):
you had the balcony where you can look down at
the band stand, and then you had the bottom level,
which it's like forty people down there, and I've been
leading bands there from the time I was fifteen, and
I kind of figured out what I wanted and the sound,
and I was composing music and things like that. So
by the time I was seventeen, I wanted to document

(44:57):
the stuff I had figured out about playing at snug
and UH and also just document the uh the different
musicians that I've been playing with at that time. UM.
So that was really for me, uh, a documentation of
something that I wanted UM to look back on because
I was about to move to New York. I moved

(45:18):
to New York when I was seventeen in two thousand four. UM,
and that's when the record was finished. You moved to
New York when you was seventeen, Yes, junior, Yeah, and
your parents someone never got to do. Man, what was
that like for you today? Was that the first time
you've been to New York When he was seventeen, Well,

(45:38):
I was listening to Yeah, Well I've been to New
York one time before then. Um. In two thousand and two,
we played Summer Stage with A. Troy and I Trammon
Short and we played the Apollo Um seventeen, he was fourteen,
and when we did that, that was something yep um

(46:01):
and we played Summer Stage and we played the Apollo.
Now the first time I've been New York. And then
a couple of years after that, I moved to New York.
But I have been listening to Actually, I've been listening
to a lot of records that you made, and that
was one of the reasons I wanted to go to
New York because I was I went, oh, for sure,

(46:23):
I went to paying this. I went to Berkeley the
summer after I've been to New York for it's like
a summer I went to that summer program. Yeah, it's
like a five week thing. I got rejected from that
because Ellis Marsalis was on the community. I didn't make

(46:46):
it to the summer program. Couldn't afford to go. What
year did you go to some program that was oh three, okay,
I'm older than ye a, wow, that's cool. You went
to you like years before then? Yeah, oh you went there. Yeah,
I didn't go to that. You actually had a childhood
and then a teenager. And I also played music to

(47:10):
you forever. Like my science teacher, like your science teacher.
Most of the time, I'm like your cp A. Now
I'm like, but I forgot wait the joke job. Every
time he sees me if I comb my hair, he
never recognizes me. Listen, So like this is true on
three or four occuasions. This is the time wrong, you're
doing it wrong, but this is this is wrong. Listen

(47:34):
sometime every time. Listen. He and I really meant when
we worked on Hamilton's. Okay, So during the Hamilton's mixing
process and the recording process, he had like longass hippie hair.
He was like, what's his name with the comedian, not
to me, the actor. He we were supposed he's supposed

(47:55):
to do this show. Why am I playing dollar Pyramid
right now? He had a seth vibeout him. And then
and then when Hamilton was finally finished, we all took
like the master photo together, like my accountant camel. He
had this nice hair cut in a suit and I

(48:17):
shook his hand, O, nice to meet you a mirror
and he was looking at me like, motherfuck, it's me.
So that's funny. But that was like two and a
half years ago. So months ago. I was at a
six months ago, six months ago. I've been doing this
for years, like we've been to Minneapolis, all these places together,

(48:39):
he's been on. Yeah. So six months ago at a wedding,
I was wearing glasses like that, like it makes me
a whole different person. I was wearing a suit and glass.
I walked up to him. I was like yo, and
he was like I Like it actually made sense in

(49:07):
the conversations. It's just that mom Jamaican. She wasn't here
for that show that you haven't been here for six
months a black woman or Indian American woman like a
butt in Jamaica. His mom's black, No, not by sack.

(49:33):
The stepmother was like slack black. Yeah she could. Yeah,
I gotta get something. I love cooking a few things
really red beans and rice, Yes, doing sauce without part?
Yeah something? Are you going to this house right now?

(49:55):
She can bite herself over? Can you pronounce that word
again because nobody does that right? I'm dewey, like you
knew how to say that first time. And sausage yeah wait,
I was gonna say uh. And what was my man
that always cooks outside of his gigs a Karmit ruffs

(50:16):
and the barbecue swingers where Kermit Karmit he plays. He
did a thing at a club called Vaughan's, and he'd
have every Monday night in the in the in the gig,
a big old pot a red beans and rice sitting
there and you just go self served. Dude. I love

(50:38):
Kermit Ruffins music, but I really love Kermit Ruffins cooking.
It's amazing. It's yeah when like I he and he
cooks out front, yeah, like not even in the back
where it's just like for the music. He cooks the food. Yeah,
in the front, in the front, this pot where I
gonna play the solo real quick, like good fellas, Like

(51:03):
I want to go Yes from New Orleans, Yes, yes,
Kit Rough Kermit Roughins Rebirth alone. So okay, why did
you choose Juilliard? So I was I wanted to come
to New York. I went to Berkeley before, and I
got in the scholarship to go there, and I thought
I was gonna go there. Okay, I got that out
the way. I got one more year high school. Then
I figured I would have want to do. I wasn't

(51:25):
even sure if I wanted to go to college, but
I was like, if I can get to New York.
Because actually I was listening to those records that you
made and I was reading the line of notes. What
I used to do. I used to go to Blockbuster Video,
and in Blockbuster they had a used C D Ben
and I used to get Sorry, I used to get

(51:54):
all of the you see d s and and um,
I listened to him down whatever it was, just to
get some different sounds happening. Damn him, tell him, wasn't that?
It's okay? The ones the ones that I bought. Some

(52:14):
of them I bought at Tyle Records. So actually no,
it was a uc D Music club. And I didn't
pay for that one. So anyone else want to confess, Yeah,
came from my roommates. Thank you. Theory came outside and
paid for that one either. No, thanks fall apart. I

(52:35):
bought uh, like water for Chocolate is the one that
I was So I bought Dangerous Michael Jackson and like
water for Chocolate at the same time. Wow, that's it
was a range of stuff that was it was happening
to the bend. Is just it's the gift that keeps

(52:55):
on giving. What most most people right know. I know
that Christian McBride chose Juilliard because Miles Davis went to Juilliard.
So usually like jazz cats that go to Juilliard, which
is it's not weird of itself because in education is
in education. But I do know that Miles Davis going

(53:16):
to Juilliard is a big reason why most jazz cats
mess with Juilliard, because otherwise they will all just go
to the new school. But got a vibe, right, It's
like it's one of the music schools and it's a classical.
It comes from that tradition, so it has that like
Lincoln sent Ah, you know, did you enjoy it? You

(53:40):
got your masters from that? That means you served six
years there. I was doing stuff that I wasn't supposed
to do um, which made me take time off in
the middle. But then I went back basically because my
mom was like, you have one year left at the time,
finished the degree, just go and finish it. But I

(54:03):
was doing all types of touring, and basically I kind
of developed my work ethic by going to Juilliard and
then playing all night, and then touring on the weekends,
and then coming back and then on the breaks doing
all kinds of stuff putting it together. So it was
a really great experience to kind of figure out how
to do a bunch of stuff at the same time,

(54:26):
and pretty much you When did you finally get your degree?
It was two thousand eleven, so I started in two
thousand and four. So did you slide in some acting
classes while you were there? Yeah, I was. I love
that school because there's so much that you can do
to kind of cross pollinate, um, acting and dancing. There's

(54:51):
an orchestra, there's the drama division, that you can kind
of put these all these all these different things together
that I was always interested in that. Um, that's one
of the reasons that why I went. I read Miles autobiography.
It's just something about Juilliard and also being in New
York and and checking out a lot of the people

(55:13):
who are online and knows that I liked um that
music lived in New York at the time, or played
in New York a lot. It just all seemed to
make sense. Just all Arduls pointed, well, go to Juilliard.
If you make it through school, UM, that's great. If not,
you'll be in New York where where everything that you
like is happening. So can I naturally assume that perhaps

(55:37):
Juilliards where you met the other band members of State Human. Yeah, yeah, yeah,
I figured as much. So, okay, how did you guys
for well? The drummer and bassist, um Joe sale him, Yeah,
the cowboy, Yeah Joe with the hat. We we met
in high school. He was visiting, uh uh, he's visiting

(56:01):
in New Orleans at the jazz Fest actually, and I
was cutting my theory class, I think it was, and
I was walking around town in the French Quarter because
our school was in um Noco, was near the French Quarter.
And he was walking around and he had a stick
bag and he recognized me and came up and said, Hey, man,

(56:22):
do you want to play? And I was like, yeah,
let's go. So, hey, how you doing? How you doing?
Let's play? Almost no words. We walked and didn't really
speak after that, and we walked to my class that
I was cutting and I was like, hey, I have
a guest, and we played a song for the class.
And then the next year he moved to New York

(56:43):
to go to Manhattan School of Music. I moved to
go to Juilliard and that's when the band came together.
That's one experience that I regret really never having. I've
never been like a jammie guy. You don't like the
jam what do you mean called the roots? Damn used

(57:05):
to I avoid them? It's no, it's like it's it's expected,
you know, because my legacy is on jam. But I
don't know like you created albums off of it, like
for Phrenology. It's just like, well for me, I don't
like jam sessions because someone has to be the bad
guy says time for you to go, all right, that's

(57:28):
enough of you or no you can't yeah, because there's
again I have two microphones, so I'm the guy that's like,
you know, trying to tell the saxophone player, don't solo
over tarik, like play a riff, play like it's it's
it's it becomes like you think I'm a pain in
the ass here, imagine me on a job that I'm

(57:51):
you know, like sometimes we see you back there right exactly.
So maybe it's like I have to be the bad guy.
But more than that, it's just like I like Kirk
does that easily. Like Kirk goes up to the whoever
the guest band is on the show and they talk
about their their guitars and is this a you know,

(58:12):
sixty three strat and da da da da, and then
they started doing you know riffs together and I don't know.
I never like and sometimes that happens, like I feel God,
I feel horrible because Chris Dave has been calling me
like all week, he's been doing this residents. No, well
technically I was out of town, so no, no disrespect Chris,

(58:33):
of course, But I just I don't know why. I
don't have musicians ever jammed without being the boss. Maybe
that's the problem. Let somebody else. It's not even like
I think if it comes to like music collectors, like
record collectors, like that's my zone. But I've never been

(58:57):
like the thing is one I don't I'm not one
of those like do you know like the oh this
the Steinway was like, I don't know what my drums are,
like yeah this is made of wood or my hockey
wood or yeah, yeah, I don't know how to you're

(59:17):
not a gear head. No, I don't think you know
what else. I'm really not a vinyl head, even though
I have all those records, I'm not you know, he
means like the material to vinyl and just like you know,
you're not like yeah like Stevens, everyone thinks like it
sounds better on Oh, you're not one of those good

(59:43):
for you, a mirror for coming out because you know,
people would be scared to say that I love Vinyl
because that's the thing that me and my dad bonded
on as when I was a kid, like going, I
like record shopping, but I was never like I don't
know which turn people around October November like can you
recommend Christmas? Yeah? Can you recommend what turntable I should get?

(01:00:05):
And I'm like, yeah, an iPhone? So you guys, just
basically within five minutes you were like, hey, you played
you didn't you do that earlier in the day, earlier
in your life? Like you like the roots were more
of no, dude, I start. My dad threw me into
his oldies act like Trek was the first person of

(01:00:29):
my age that I played with it even then, like
my parents looked, you know, he was you not you. Mom.
Mom listens to the show and gets mad that I
strow under the bus. Mom love dad not so much.
So Yeah, I love it. It's just you know, I

(01:00:51):
wish I could enjoy it. I don't know, Yeah, I
guess I don't press. But you say something like I'm
not having a road map right because we kind of
went over this with with Bobby mcpharron. Hey, I love
having road maps. Oh yeah, I just mcfahren with the
Juilliard John But would you say that when when the

(01:01:14):
music becomes a profession, the jamming aspect of it all
to like hang out and jam with friends thing kind
of comes down. I feel like that, like, yeah, I'm
in music all day long. I did of like going
and like playing for the sake of playing is a
little different now than it was when I was twenty two.
I feel like when you're younger and you're jamming is
almost like practice, whereas at this point I feel like

(01:01:38):
we have to have an objective exactly load map um
or just a concept like we're jamming in order to
figure out, yeah, this is the sound, because I feel like, yeah,
but tell that to Prince who yeah, like six hours
you know the show, You'll give you six hour jam session,

(01:02:00):
which is probably my only inspiration from he do it
all right, I'll come that was for a reason. They
were doing that for the show, like figuring out the
parts of the show and stuff like that. At least
that's what the princes like really enjoys. He doesn't like
talking to people, so you read the jam with wow.
I mean, I don't like jamming or talking to peoples

(01:02:21):
on the people because some people don't know how to jam.
So do you what if you're in a situation and
again you are you present a situation which people can
randomly walk up and play you do you have to
be the bad cops sometimes and like like no more cowbell,

(01:02:42):
thank you. Sometimes there's been times where it just crosses
the line and then you have to you have to
shut it down. But I feel like a thing that
I find joy and is taking something that's just like
would otherwise be disastrous and making music out of it.
Like oh snap, this person is playing the piano. They're

(01:03:07):
not trained, Well let's make this into something. That's what
Bob mcpheren said when I asked him about hecklers. He's like,
the way that I extinguish it is just incorporating whatever
they're doing. Yeah, uh see, I hate that. I'm a
control free It's like, oh wow, that's happening right now. Okay,

(01:03:32):
let's see what we can do with that. Are these
with random drink audience people were like musicians, you might
ask icians super free arrange it's arranged. It can be
anything because sometimes it can be uh, you can you
can have a great musician who is is um technically there,

(01:03:54):
but doesn't understand the spirit of the moment or what's happening,
and then that can change what's happening, and you have
to go with that. Otherwise the band sounds this disconnected.
So describe to me the day that you got the

(01:04:15):
phone call that you're being considered for the night show.
Oh yeah, late Night with Night. I'm sorry, Stephen, I
love you man, all right? So where were you? What
was the day when you got the phone call for

(01:04:36):
the Late Show with Stephen Kobe. So I was in
the studio and um, I got a phone call from
Stephen himself saying, I'm about to go on vacation for
ten days and when I come back, I want to
sit and have a conversation with you. And he didn't

(01:04:58):
tell me what it was about, but I kind figured
what it was about. Knew each other already at this point.
I've been on the Colbert Report a couple of times,
and after the second time we kind of had become
friends in a way where we could talk and I'd
call him sometimes. But he was not um. He wasn't
at any way at at the Colbert Reports offering me

(01:05:20):
the job. But I've been seeing in the news everything
was leading to him taking over for let Himan, and
I didn't hear there was a band yet. I figured, okay, well,
if there's a band, we may have heard about it,
or at least it's not solidified because they haven't announced it.
So when he called me, I figured, okay, he wants
to talk about that. So he goes off the grid

(01:05:41):
for about ten days, no phone or anything, and I
have ten thinking about it for ten days. Is this
something that I think he called me because he knew, okay,
think about this because when we come back, you're gonna
probably have to make a decision quickly, which is what happened.
We sat down and he talked to me about his
vision for the show, and that was, like, uh, a
pretty long conversation. Then I was introduced to the staff

(01:06:04):
which was going to move from the Kolbe Report to
the Late Show. UM, and I was you know, walked
around the office and met everybody, and then after about
two or three hours, he's like, okay, so let me
know there's something you want to do, and um, we'll
we'll call you in a few The next few days
to you know, see where you're at with it. Who

(01:06:26):
else was in the running? Do you know? Well? He
told me after this is like, after we had done
a few shows, a few test shows, came to the
dressing room and he says, um, I don't know if
you knew this, but Alvis Costello was, ste would have left.

(01:06:48):
He's like, Alvis Costello was. Basically I'd given him the gig.
But this before I met you, Steve, did you know this?
I was gonna go work for them? I knew it.
Steve produced some Elvis records. Yeah, seriously, No, I didn't.
I didn't. I didn't. I don't think if you had

(01:07:08):
to make the decision, Steve, yes, that would be Yeah,
that would be a tough decision. I would let Steve
do it. I'm just kidding, Thank god, John, just you
would have had to split. I mean, I would understand,
I would understand. I was, yeah, you know, oh man,

(01:07:30):
I'm sorry here. Yeah, so he was he was up
to it, like yeah, yeah, but with his band or
I'm not sure, but apparently he flinched and Colbert had
it in the back of his mind after we had met.
In that Colbert Report, Love Rite performance. He was like,

(01:07:54):
I'd be cool to spend some time on stage with
this guy. He wasn't aware of it before then, but
then yeah, I was about to say did he go
to any of the No, no, he's actually one of
his producers went to one of those. And what's what
y'all doing we were talking about at the beginning, right,
But this also proves the point that there's Ronald McDonald's

(01:08:17):
and then there's Ray CrOx. And for every figurehead that
you think, like, did Steven Gobert go to these shows,
it doesn't matter because it only matters to the five
people the Ray CrOx, the five people there in Steven's
ear about this is cool. You should check it out
right right, it's never the person that the Kanye is
that have the ideas that people ear that he takes

(01:08:42):
it from anyway. So so that that that was um,
when we've done some test shows, he said, you know,
and and Elvis he flinched. He said, you know, I
don't know if I want to have a boss um.
And then Stephen says, okay, well, um, that's okay, hangs up.
The phone, calls me and it's like, hey, do you

(01:09:04):
do you want to have his conversation. Come back in
ten days. We have the conversation. He calls me the
next day after we have this this conversation, I meet
the staff and he says, you know, I want to um,
you officially have been named the band leader of the
Late Show. Um. Congratulations, we start on this date and

(01:09:26):
you should start rehearsing your band. So Stay Human was
basically for months, and not only Stay he was a
wild thing in the air of where people were coming
to me and telling me that I should call Stephen,
telling me you should be the band. The band was like, man,

(01:09:46):
we had just finished like a nine month tour and
they were like, we didn't have anything on the books.
The band was like, man, you should call Stephen. You're
cool with Stephen, right, you should call Stephen. You should
get that gig. Man, that would be great. We should
ay that get He's so cool. It would be so great.
And I was just like, I don't know, I just

(01:10:07):
don't know if that's something that I want to do.
We just finished my first real tour and like we
have some momentum. I feel like we could we had
signed a label deal yet with just like all this
stuff that and all this stuff was Yeah, I hadn't
signed a label deal. No, I'm just putting out independent,
just put it on the internet, no market and no anything.

(01:10:27):
Did you think Let me just ask one question to
the both of y'all, what's the difference you signed on
to the Jimmy when? How about how long happy been
with him? Um? We agreed and April of two thousand
eight and it took about Yeah, it took about seven
months to make it real. Steve, that's like three for

(01:10:50):
three years. It's the fourth year. Now did you ever
think to maybe make a call because you made a call?
In fact, I reached out, but we met before, Um,
we could even connect on the phone. The first night
of the show, Alex Sorros had a birthday party and

(01:11:11):
you basically laid the He laid the whole science of
the gig down at at this part at the Boom
Boom Room. I it was the second time that I
talked to a bandon The first person I talked to
was was Schaefer. Chevy Chase introduced me to Schaeffer and
we went to I wasn't cool with chevy Chase really,

(01:11:37):
but I had dinner with him a couple of times.
From a mutual friend, and he was like, you should
have and he plays piano, so we bonded over the
piano for a minute before they got the deal. Chevy Chase.
Chevy Chase plays piano. This is why you're here because
I never knew that Bill Evans is his idol wait

(01:12:03):
Chase Comedy. Okay, so did he introduced you to Pau Yeah,
because I didn't know Paul, but obviously I wanted to
talk to him when this was kind of in in
the running. Um and I went. We went to U P. J.
Clarks up in Lincoln Center and he and he told

(01:12:25):
me his experience and then a mir we uh we
met on the first night of the show at Sorrels
and he told us about how y'all do all the
stuff with talkback Mike and the left top and I mean,
I kind of just I saw it everybody out. I
called Brandfort and Um we linked up when he was

(01:12:46):
in town doing It's like a Bill Withers thing at Carnegie.
It was all like, right around the beginning of the season,
I'm having a brain fart. Who was post Bradford from Philly.
Kevin and I went to see Kevin played with Dave
Holland at the vanguard Um which we're playing the Vangard
next week shout out. But so the Van God with

(01:13:07):
Dave Holland human, Yeah, hell yeah, I'm coming. Yeah. It
might be sold out, no mercy risk way back. I
know she was with us first. Anyway, I'm going to

(01:13:30):
the winner circle. You're a winner. I was playing it, man.
Elvis just sent me an email. I gotta okay, So

(01:13:50):
you're basically saying that you went and sought out. Wow,
you did it in ways that I didn't even think of.
I think maybe I talked to Branford for like one
second upstap for so you know he's still around. Yeah,
well he played with us, but I didn't. The thing
was like, we literally we weren't going to take it,
and I just during those eight months from April to

(01:14:14):
to what September, I just figured, Okay, I know we're
not going to take this gig because the money was
getting Goode's just numbers. It's you said eight months April
to September. That's like five Oh you nerd any words.

(01:14:39):
I'm just saying that I said September. But I guess
we told him it's real. Maybe in November. So I'm
just saying that. In my mind, I thought, Okay, you're
gonna say no, but at least you're gonna have a
friend in late night so that when the Roots released records,
you could be the musical guests. And that's all we

(01:15:00):
wanted because we were making good money at that point.
And you know, I guess he kind of didn't take
no for an answer, but in my mind, I just
thought by that point, a lot of acts that we
were opening for back in uh like we're now they're

(01:15:22):
now opening for us, like and no disrespect, you know,
I love but it I would hate when our management
would let run DMC open for us, and I'm like,
they're fucking run DMC like they need the headline, And
even run DMC was like, no, dog, we just do
this hour, get our money be out, and you know,
like they didn't care about like whatever romantic things I

(01:15:45):
had in my head of us being legends. They just
like gives the money not for nothing at all, but like,
for real, have you y'all two soaked up this moment
where we just we just mentioned all these past band
leaders and this is great, but this is the first
time like the two brothers have really been how many
the band leader thing on the late night like the
same time, at the same time, at the same time,
at the same time on the two competing shows, not

(01:16:07):
on the late late late late in the late Well,
let me finish my point. My point was. My point
was basically, and I had building mind when I did this,
Let me finish my point. My point was pretty much that, uh,
I just I didn't want to be in that run

(01:16:32):
DMC position. I just thought, like, okay, two thousand and eight, man,
what if we're not a thing in in two thousand,
we'll be running We'll be run DMC opening for Drake
or like like we could ever do that anyway. I'm
just saying that that was part of my Okay, let's
let's just go here and get safe and we'll just

(01:16:54):
go somewhere quietly to die. And that's what I thought. Now.
I never, I never once thought that it would be beneficial.
So in your head, after you after you got all
this information, what were the pros and what were the cons? Honestly,
I was I was looking forward to touring more. But

(01:17:19):
I really Stephen actually kind of really convinced me because
not not by what he said, I just really liked
him because I wasn't familiar with the Kolbert Report before
I was on the show, so I didn't know anything
about him or his whole um ethos so the whole
kind of satire that he came from in that tradition.

(01:17:42):
But when I met him and talked to him, we
just had a lot of things that I felt like
we're in common and his objectives for the show, what
he wanted to do in the world in general, with
everything that he had been doing. I was really compelled
to do it because of that. And I also thought, well,
at the time, I was any six, So I was like,

(01:18:03):
why do you laugh every time? Because that's just amazing,
Like what do you do after? Just remember where I
was at six? And it definitely was not on late
night television lead like he's not just playing I'm just
just playing on I justyment line right. It was it was,
it was. It was such a a great vision that

(01:18:27):
he showed us, and I mean, you know this is
before Trump, but it was just the idea that was,
let's make a show about people. Um. So, did you
draw any parallels between his concept for a show and
what you've been doing in music? Absolutely? I mean, there's
something we talked about in the first initial conversation about

(01:18:49):
the show, um calling the show the joy machine. I
guess a machine that you get into and you basically
ate joy and you pump it out through the air waves.
That's my word. I tell people all the time. Joy
is the ultimate level, like happen, this is cool? Joyous? Man?

(01:19:11):
Wait one, how did you Black? How did you not
know this? And Steve, how did you know this? I
was just trying to insult her. I didn't know. It's
a real thing. Like me and my dad, we have
a whole thing about joy, and really that didn't just happen,
Like happiness is fleeting, but joyous forever. Even when you're mad,

(01:19:31):
still with this sense of this joyous, you're trying to
be a dick. You're backfired on you because that's actually
actually I was an inverted I would love to be
person yet world, that's so good. So okay, I'm curious
to know. I'm curious to know what your daily schedule

(01:19:54):
is now, yeah, and I want to know if it's
similar to mine. First of all, how often do you
guys have to do? You guys ever? Back up guests
that come on this show. Yeah. Yeah, we back up
guests sometimes, uh, fragmented parts of the band back up
and guests like, um, the last thing we did, um
I played not with the band with nas mac miller

(01:20:17):
when he um man, Yeah, last performance on TV damn
yeah yeah yeah um man. Yeah. We we we do
it a fair amount. Um in season one, we we
did it a lot, but um and we also did
a lot of sit ins. And then after about a

(01:20:40):
year and a half, we kind of scaled back on
that and now we're just Yeah, it's harder shit, ain't it. Yeah,
let's do it. I'll start first, Okay. The thing is,

(01:21:00):
it's because I always want my fantasy's like, yo, I
want my idols to sit in with me. And the
thing is, it's like my idols are I'm being generous
if I say sixty, they're more like sixty five, seventies,
seventy five and and set in their ways. And the

(01:21:21):
thing is to be the position that we're in right now.
To trust me, we're birds of I believe that to
be in the position that we're in right now is
a bunch of fast thinking thinking fast, thinking fast, and
that someone that gets so we want a who's who's
the cat that um uh the drama right? Uh no no, no, no,

(01:21:42):
no dead. So you know, wait the dead. I got
a great example. I got a great example. There's two examples.
Who is the guy. Who's the guy that sings the
theme to Mr Belvidere and the LLL the all de

(01:22:06):
churgent we can all utilize. I want to know Mr Belvedere,
come on, Mr a Double like he leon soon he's
about was he like seventy eight? Now how did he

(01:22:28):
get the gig? Because Jimmy, that's the thing like oftentimes,
um like, random ideas will come and then the unfortunate
thing is like the perception of the roots can do anything.
Is that hurts us so much because I'm a dog
and smoke a mirrors? Yeah, with with with with smoking mirrors.

(01:22:51):
I mean, anything can happen. But oftentimes we'll get thrown
Occasionally we'll get thrown a curveball where it's like I want,
you know, I want to hear the guy that's singing
all the commercials from the seventies and and the Mr.
Belvedere theme. It's like, in theory, it seems like a
good idea, but it's like I'm the one that has

(01:23:13):
and usually these people are like seventy nine, eight years old,
so it's like how old does he trust me? And
he's more like eighty nine, and it's like, okay, so
at the count of three, we're gonna start whatever the
lyrics are. And it's like they might not be that quick,

(01:23:36):
you know what I mean? And oftentimes they'll be like
why two and they'll just look at the camera like, oh,
who's the guitar player? And um uh Aretha Branglin was
singing respect to him and the Blues brothers. Uh oh

(01:23:58):
Mcatar Murphy, no macots our Murphy once I macutar Murphy.
You remember how aunt esther in Friday when she was
the Jovis witness, the way she said fuck you with
the funniest moment in in in our history of that

(01:24:21):
show sittings Macutar Murphy again up there in age or whatever.
I didn't want to wear any ears or anything, so
I'm like trying to tell him yeah, and he just
looked at me and he's just like fuck me, and
he took his guitar and walked off off. You're subside

(01:24:46):
here over to you. What's your favorite What stories are
you allowed? To tell you speaking in pictures, we had
jazz week. I was talking about some good old dies.
Wow that it's only like twelve seconds of Jimmy Heath

(01:25:11):
to the Heath Brothers. Uh. That week it was the
Heath Brothers, Wayne Shorter, Roy Haynes. Yeah, he can know.
He's good. Roy is good. Roy played over Stephen on
a bumper Yeah five at least, right, he's ninety two.

(01:25:39):
He fired music director job on Late Night. He played
over the bumpers at last, you know, like twelve fifteen
seconds coming in and then you stopped, and then the
show goes on, propels you into the next act of
the show. So Roy's playing and he's in the middle

(01:26:02):
of just this fiery solo and like all of us
on stage and like, man, this is amazing. But I'm like,
how do I get him to stop? And I'm like
waving my hands were coming in, how do I get

(01:26:22):
him to stop? So? What did you do? What did
you do? So at one point he realized it, but
it was about thirty seconds in and Stephen was like,
did I just hallucinate? Did y'all just hear that? You know?

(01:26:43):
He incorporated into the bit. But it's just the sittings
are very difficult. How how how distracting? Can I ask?
How distracting is noodling? Oh to the show? Noodling? Okay,
so I'm not I'm not throwing Jimmy under the bus

(01:27:06):
at all. Jimmy is very distracted by noodling. So just
cooking noodles on the side of the stage. It's just
like you're not playing a song even if the amp
is off. You know. Sometimes guitar players will sit there
and like practice a little bit, but Jimmy can still

(01:27:27):
hear the So oftentimes I have to remind people like
any tuning, any tuning, or you're basically supposed to be
a frozen statue while the show is going on, and
oftentimes one little like a or. But accidents happen, you

(01:27:51):
know what I mean. But it has a potential to
throw his concentration game off. It's like if you're shooting
uh uh three point shot with five seconds left in
the game and suddenly your mom's on the side, Hey, hey,
you know, and you could throw off the game. So

(01:28:12):
I'm saying, how when mistakes like that happened, is there
fear in your heart, like, oh God, this is the
end of mine. It's we've gotten good at at at
moving around because we still move around, um the theater,
and and and and basically we'll be playing in the
balcony one break, or we'll be playing, you know, we'll

(01:28:33):
go to the there's a two tier, so we'll go
to the balcony on the stage side, or we'll go
to the balcony on the audience side, or we'll go
in the aisles or and and we have a lot
of percussion instruments, and tambourines make a lot of noise
when you pick them up again, So we've gotten good
at it, so we don't have as many hiccups anymore.

(01:28:54):
But we got a note early on, like in the
first year, we got an email. I get the email
and it's like, so, um, during the show, I would
like it if the band area could be as quiet
as possible. And I was like, oh okay, but the

(01:29:16):
energy was like doing the show. I knew it was
coming because I think somebody dropped the tambourine and Stephen
looked over. He didn't say anything, but she just looked
over like He's like, m okay. And then next day, Oh,
what what time do you have to be there? Normally. Well, um,
it's changed production meetings. Where is Marissa the production meeting?

(01:29:38):
Present time? Do you have to be there? So I
technically don't work at the Late Show anymore. I worked
just for John, but I worked there for three years.
I actually worked the premiere of the Late Show and
the premiere of the Tonight Show. The information and made
me so this is like a colliding of two worlds
right now a little little bit. Yeah, but production meetings

(01:30:02):
starts at ten thirty, so back when I was an
employ at CBS had to be in around ten. John
usually gets in around the schedule changes depending on how
you feel with the band. How often you do live
in Manhattan? Please tell me I used to. I don't anymore. No, Brooklyn, Brooklyn.
You used lift two blocks away in Brooklyn. Look at

(01:30:22):
that belong in Brooklyn. Yes, I still maintain they want
me to live. Oh yeah yeah. John would roll out
of bed and walk to work in probably fifteen seconds.
Now it's like an hour. I just wanted to get
outside of it. And also I want I'm I want

(01:30:43):
to put a studio because I have so many things
I want to record. I'm putting the studio at the
bottom flow so I can kind of just roll out
a bit and go to the studio and then go
to work. Can I ask you just the rate your millennialism?
How what part of Brooklyn do you live in? So
it's like Clinton Hill, Fort Green, border Ball Place. What's
what you think, Bill, that's like Stage five? Great your

(01:31:08):
millennial He's living around the area where I used to
live when I first moved to Brooklyn and got priced out.
Can I ask you ever read any of the the
cons of Because we all know that Stephen is so
involved in the politics side of things, does that ever
come at you in any type of way? You know it.

(01:31:29):
It doesn't, but it's definitely um aligne to tread in
the sense that you have your identity, but your identity
is so closely related to the show and the content
of the show. So people watching the show probably know
what they're getting into. Yeah, but I don't know if
I don't know, that's true, But I didn't know if

(01:31:50):
you get those I'm sure he still gets me in
emails and and hate stuff. I'm talking about Stephen, not John.
I'm just saying, yeah, people still don't like they know
what he's saying. They don't like it. I love it myself,
but I feel like if you're watching Stephen Cober, you
know what you're getting you do. So anyway, what's the

(01:32:11):
cafeteria like that? Yeah? Yeah, yeah, Uh. There's so many
things I want to ask about this show. First of all,
what what's the degree level of the of the theater?
How cold is it? Damn it's like i'd say, probably

(01:32:32):
fifty eight degrees. Yeah, you can see your breath. Yeah,
they've kept it cold. They say that they keep it
cold to make people laugh. And back in the day
they kept it cold because the lights were so hot.
Now they're led, so they don't produce anything. Always got
a reason. They say, the strip level with the nipples
hard exactly. You got to wear a winter jacket when

(01:32:56):
you're in there. We we we should say that the
CBS Theater letterman was there first and he started normally
it should be sixty eight degrees and then when the
lights come on then it's hot. But as she said,
now it's led, that doesn't there's no heat, uh, emanated
from it. And now it's like degrees that's not. But

(01:33:21):
I think around there the other day it was factually
recorded at because the theater though there was, it's about
a five hundred sea really tall ceilings. There's a big
bigger than any the ceiling, That's what he ask Oh no,

(01:33:44):
because in my mind I thought you guys were playing
for like ten thousand people. It seems large as like
a little like four nineties something. It looks big on cameras.
The dome is the dumb is pretty massive. Yeah, seat wise,
it's I think it's under five hundred. Yeah, okay, nice.

(01:34:04):
You guys have to warm up at the beginning. Oh yeah,
are you tired of marching out and doing the It's
like a it's it's good for the band if we
keep it fresh. So if we we change it, how
do you change clothes? Exactly? So you gotta you gotta
come out and you have to do something that you
don't even know how it's gonna turn out. It's almost

(01:34:26):
like a way for us to warm up ourselves, not
even just the house. So we recently we've been doing
sunny rolins uh st Thomas Oh okay, yeah. But sometimes
we used to go out and it would just be
like here's here's the groove, let's play sky in G

(01:34:48):
and then will modulate on Q to be flat, right,
so you guys have your your code speaking. Yeah, okay,
since you're playing in close quarters, I will say that
for the roots, at least these last nine years had
brought us so close together in a way that is scary,

(01:35:08):
where we can now literally have conversations with each other musically,
which I mean just our our our level of code speak,
certain certain reference lines. It Mark plays something we know
you know, third row, five seats and certain anymore. Because

(01:35:33):
he's married exactly, just can't touch it's a new marriage.
He can't look. Yeah, my fault, Mark, But I mean
it was hypothetical. But the point is that, uh, there's
at least there's about thirty things we can communicate with
each other without saying a word to each other. I

(01:35:56):
could literally play something on the tambourine or or or
the symbol or something if I want Kirk's attention, I
know what riff to play if I want the horns,
and knows something I do a rhythm on the four.
So are you guys at that zen moment now where
you guys know each other that well, Yeah, it's it's
some wild just codes that we got happening with, especially

(01:36:19):
with the band who, the guys who are part of
the band before the show. We brought some of that
in because we developed a lot of cold when we
would play on the subways. Because when we play on
the subways, you couldn't always say something to the cat,
here comes, thus, let's go, you know what I mean.

(01:36:43):
So it's like taking that and then also playing together
every day. It's it's been a lot of little things
that when we play a venue now it just feels like, oh,
we're running down. We took the weight off our ankles.
It's like, oh, this is like way easier than it
used to be. All Right. One of my final questions,

(01:37:04):
are you tired of people asking you how long is
this going to be for? Oh? My goodness, how long
it's gonna be for? Well? I mean I mean black Hey, yeah,
I got every man, every thirty year old man that question.
How long you're gonna be here for? Because you know,

(01:37:24):
y'all like to broke out. I mean, I'll tell you what.
The the first part of the contract is five years. Okay,
so I'm there you and the rest we'll see. I mean,
I love doing it. I don't have plans to leave,
and so it's just it's hard to know because we're

(01:37:45):
actually doing the show almost every day, and it's like,
you gotta be thinking about that because you can't now
you can't do projects like you did the season of
Trema and stuff like that, but you want to do
you want to still do things like that. There's another
question I ask, wait, did you canny? Does each band member? Well,
it's this adject that does each band member have their

(01:38:06):
own backup sub just in case you get a call
about blah blah blah being in the hospital or someone
I'm I'm never subbed. I'm just damn y'all love each
other too. It was like shots fired of you. I'm
just trying to think of what would happen if we

(01:38:27):
needed a sub somebody sick. They just yeah, nobody been sick.
What kind of what y'all doing? Four years health regiment.
I've been sick on stage before. Steven's also been sick
on stage before. With y'all, it's kind of the show
has to go on. I found I finally found a

(01:38:48):
drummer that like, when I closed my eyes, I was like,
holy shit, I'm playing drums? Who was that? M Who
did I just ask you about? Raised Raise drummer Willie
Johan j Yeah, I want him to be. I want
him to be. Do you just want vacation? No, well,

(01:39:09):
I mean just in case you get a call or
something like. That's the thing. It's it's things gonna happen.
You know, when my father passed away and I had
to rush to to take care of stuff in Philly,
I need someone to send him for four days, and
I had that person. But there's other things to your
job besides drumming. Like yeah, but at the end of

(01:39:29):
the day, it's it's still I know that there's a
lot that revolves. But the way that the circle is
now the way that I planned it. You know, I
could as long as those twelve seconds are straight going
in and going out. My point is that your guy's
jobs involved more than just musicianship. You have to be charismatic,
you have to be funny. Yeah, but there's trek. See,

(01:39:51):
there's there's right, but don't who's here, who's the second
most charismatic person in the group? Just in case, would
you say would do that? Not like John? You got energy.
I could step in and be the front man. Yeah.
We I don't think we've ever. I don't mean forever.
I just mean like would do that. I think we're

(01:40:16):
messing them up because sometime, you know, I feel like
I was thinking, even even in situations where someone has
missed shows, we don't get a sub. We just played
with with the band without like like like Louis Cato

(01:40:38):
plays bass and then when he was out for a while,
we just did shows where there was no base, with
no rugs. We have tuba as well, So I mean,
it would be interesting to do this. I don't I
think this is dangerous. I don't know, but you no, no,
you should play for it. But yeah, I gotta think
about that. It's almost seven hundred shows. We on six

(01:41:00):
What are you guys on now? Like, we're on the number, No,
we are, We're back, We're coming up on two thous
We're on eight hundreds something right now? Right are in
the Yeah, we're nine fifty on the Tonight Show and
we did like nine seventy on the first one. Oh
ship I forgot about? But Who's Late Night? John? Got
about the first John? What's the Hollywood Africa? Oh? My good? Nice?

(01:41:27):
Well so in entertainment, Jean Michelle boskyot who I've been
researching for the last year because I'm doing a musical
inspired by his life for Broadway. I've been researching him
and that's one of his paintings from three fun Why
did not? Now? I feel ignorant that that's the title.

(01:41:51):
The title the title of my album that we just
put an album out, um called Hollywood Africans. But the
idol is a homage to Jean Michelle Boscas nine eight
three painting where he's kind of it's an indictment of
the entertainment industry and the way that there's a marginalization
of African American entertainers and how they have to wear

(01:42:12):
a mask creating all these different things. Yeah, we talked
about speaking on the show last week. It was the
funniest thing ever on show because the actors that used
to be in The Hungry Games and now and yeah, yeah,
I forget. She was trying to explain what code speaking

(01:42:39):
was looked at each other like someone gets it? You know? Uh,
you know, are there any other Have we covered everything? No?
We don't cover everything? Now is there something that you missed? Uh? No,

(01:43:00):
it's just so ultra interesting, you know to hear about Um, wow, Steve,
what what was that? Way to wrap it up? Steve Well,
can I can I just ask like, I have to
do this for it just because I'm a female and
somebody's going to want to know you're single, should do Hey, nah,

(01:43:20):
I'm in a relationship, talk about all right, your marriage? Dude.
We don't put them on you know. You always do
that people anyone like people in a relationship. They they
hit you too when I ask you about your personal thing,
when they when you When one guest of ours was like, damn,

(01:43:41):
why does she have to put me in the altar
like that? Nobody heard that one. Congratulations and thank thank
you John for the the the Late Night Wars edition John.

(01:44:01):
Oh yeah, all we need is uh what's his name?
Formerly of mactub um oh um? I can't think of
his name. I can see his face, but I can't
afro um a mactub He's Reggie something Reggie watch. Oh yeah,

(01:44:24):
another late night music directors. Yes, we need to have
the a Late Night Symposium with all they that would
be so yeah, that would be Fred Armison. Yes, another drummer.

(01:44:47):
Or we'd like to thank you for being on the show. Yeah,
thank you you always come back to tonight show. Check
out John's new album on streaming on Pandora right now, Yes,
and didn't go look at the don't look at the painting.
I do have a lot of info and I do
have a question of course, God Steve, you guys have
a rehearsal room there, like, uh yeah, yeah, it is

(01:45:18):
pretty much the same size, years is a little. Years
is better because you have an actual mixing board in
there and you can record straight into We don't have
that snap Wait a minute, time out, I send this
show for three minutes. Wait a minute, you guys do
that show and don't document any ideas that you have

(01:45:40):
doing rehearsal. Oh yeah, we do voice memos on the iPhone,
you know, with an organized dropbox system. Again technology killing.
I'm saying, get a little recording system inside your rehearsal room. Yeah,

(01:46:00):
and then you can document. See I thought you man
in the office, because I have that in the office.
We are are dressing room is our studio. We mad
album inside of that dressing room. Studios always kind of
debunk the myth. Also, that's your just one dressing room.

(01:46:24):
There's y'all got like five like I just have. It's
like it's like it's like a gym locker room. And
there I mean because we have we have there's the
two dressing rooms and then one of them is the
band one half of it is the band rehearsal room,
and then I have the office, but that's on the
other side of the building. So that's what like the

(01:46:45):
drums and the recording equipment are. But in the band area.
I never thought to put a recording situation that way
and get you, get you a Steve, get you a Steve,
and then we and then have a computer on stage
wherever in there and then oh yeah, so that but

(01:47:06):
we just played the voice milmos through it. We record
and we play them telling me that you don't need
an engineer. Just let's drop it. I'm sorry. Random question.
Can the Roots appear on that show? And if you
if your album could appear on the other show, could
you ever be on the same show? Sad we have,

(01:47:28):
uh Jon Batiste on the Tonight show. Whether there's no
who's the new less Moons of Yeah, we don't hang yet,
have y'all y'all country without a president? Well you have
the c O step in, but we don't have No
one has been brought in. Um, I definitely know that,

(01:47:51):
uh the Roots aren't welcome to anything on CBS, including
the Grammys during the Less Moons speriod, because the the
proximity of the Late Night Wars was like a thing
in his head. I want you, wanted you wanted. No,

(01:48:14):
I'm just saying that I have zero qualms. And you know,
Stephen and Jimmy have done each other's shows before, okay,
and to me, one of the greatest things, like I
would love to do with April Fool's Day where it's
like both shows straight stupid, but man, that would be dope.

(01:48:35):
Would be Remember that, Charlie Brown, I think we battle
that was We weren't allowed to post that though, but
maybe we'll take it out of the archives and we're
not instagram the Late Night War. He don't like you.
I'm sorry. I'm wasn't real on us to do it. Yeah,

(01:49:02):
I don't. I'm not saying trying to look like I'm
supposed to know what's going on on the Lord Michaels level. Again,
this is what happens when executives and lawyers and red
tapes get involved. What we say, Well, we had some
we had a we had a like a Lucy Linus

(01:49:29):
via text message and it started out, how did it
started off. I think the James or James James. So
Megan Trainer was on the show promoting the Peanuts movie
and uh yeah, I go back to look on your
face Pill. That was like I wish the audiants canna

(01:49:49):
see your face right now, all of our viewers. Yeah's
taking a picture like that's what your face? I don't remember.
You can trade around. The Peanuts movie did like sound
track song on it. But long story short, we go
back and she texted me and she was like, I'm

(01:50:10):
at tonight show and I used to in turn there
back in two thousand. I don't know something something um
so she recorded James. Uh oh no, I recorded John
playing the Peanuts theme song on the piano and texted
over to her. Five minutes later, we get a text
from James. He's playing it back and he looks like
black Charlie Brown. He had it a little bit of

(01:50:34):
like he was like, okay, alright, let's go. So John's like,
all right, well we got send one back. So we
record John and he throws this like bluesy flavor all
and it's like I tried to level. So then James
sends back one again and his is even more insane
than John's. And we're like, all right, we're stepping it up.

(01:50:56):
Let's go. So we go to the rehearsal room. Were like,
tell the band, all right, guy, we're gonna send another
video to them. We're gonna reveal you when the camera
pans around. So I got my iPhone. John starts at
a little intro and then then we pan around. The
band comes in and we're like, all right, we got them,
we got them, send it back. We send it back. Um,
probably about like two hours past. We're like, all right,

(01:51:18):
we won like pretty much, they can't. They have nothing
on us. Get a text message and it's a close
up of a mirror and they're in the studio and
they start playing the Peanuts theme song. I'm pretty sure.
I'm pretty sure Keith film this or something. The phone
pans back, the studio is full with the audience and
they're all doing the Charlie Brown dance and this is

(01:51:41):
probably this was about i'd say two minutes before we
were supposed to go on stage. What are we gonna do?
But what are we gonna do? So we go on
stage and you got I don't want to say who
I thought one? I mean you guys like went around
the house and everyone was cheering going to the audience.

(01:52:02):
I know, I'm gonna say I think the Roots. The
Roots kind of had it down though with the Charlie
Brown dance and the audience that was that was tight.
But so we brought it to Stephen and we were like,
we did this thing. It was so random. It's funny
how it turned out, you know, like the late night
bands are friends, um, and he was like, oh, this

(01:52:23):
is a great idea. Do you know what we should do.
We should get we should do ours over and get
everyone to wear Charlie Brown T shirt and do something
like crazy like that. But then have the to have
John and the band march out of our theater and
into the tonight show theater joined them on stage and
make it like a charity thing around Christmas. So this

(01:52:44):
and three years of Beast we might bring it back,
which is big out of it. We still make it happen.
We will make it happen that I never knew what
happened with it. I thought, sitting on my computer. Wait,
but we didn't put it on Twitter or Instagram or

(01:53:06):
anything anything with it. Maybe Christmas bring it back? All right,
we shall bring it back. Continue, let's do it. No,
it's not late night friendship. That's the joke. I Rogers continued,
I was Mr Rogers was still here. Second starter war

(01:53:27):
between me and Mr Rogers. Some bloods and cript between
Mr Rogers Johnny Costa, Yes, John Costa, Yeah, alright, well
on behalf of our all questions. Thank you, all right,
thank you, John Fatitita amorous for going on the self

(01:53:49):
of seriously, even Boss Bill and and and and Boss Bill.
And I'm paid Bill. I forgot I'm paid Bill even here,
I know, and Bill for this week. Yes, you are
overdue Bill, I'm back. Fontacolo he's not here doing his
basement or so. He's definitely like Matt finishing the stairway. Okay,

(01:54:13):
well this is question love. Uh of course, love supreme
and we will see you on the next go round.
And I'm ended with But hey, that was waiting for

(01:54:40):
purchased all of Kyoto's all the scoring music. That was
like a Japanese stand in with the roots. Yeah he
sat in with us. Yeah, I forgot that. Yeah, you win.
And all we did was his songs. Wow, what I

(01:55:01):
want to get Yoko Shima Mora? Yeah, man, anyway, all right,
we're out. We're out, We're out of courts. Love Supreme

(01:55:25):
is a production of I heart Radio. This classic episode
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