Wheatus Frontman Brendan B. Brown Opens Up About His Journey, Love of Music & More!

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
THEME SONG (00:04):
Vanity down with the heavy stars rock and rolling
through the cool guitars shopsgot the questions digging so
sharp feeling back layershitting the heart.

Unknown (00:21):
Thank you so much for doing this. No worries. I had
one yesterday, and there waslike, Zoom tried to update, and
then something stalled in themiddle of the update, so it
didn't I was like, I have myphone as a backup, and I
accidentally launched it on thephone. So sorry about that, but,

Chuck Shute (00:41):
oh no, yeah, no worries. I've had so many
technical difficultiesthroughout the years like,
thankfully, I'm always at leastable to get the audio.
Sometimes, if the video doesn'twork, at least the audio will be
there.

Brendan B. Brown (00:52):
So sure. How is the audio speaking? Speaking
of the devil.

Sounds good. Yeah.
Actually sounds really good.
Great. Yeah, you've got aprofessional setup. I mean, I've
had people that are outside, andthere's they don't understand
the wind makes a lot of noise.
So yeah, thank you for puttingsome effort into it. You think
that musicians and producerswould know these things, but
there's a lot of them that arelike, they're on their phone
outside. Like, yeah. So anyways,I was in the band. Like, what do

(01:17):
you what's, I can't hear you.
What? I

Unknown (01:20):
mean, how? How often have you been excited about the
topic of that you see a podcasthas on the title, and you press
play, and the sound is terrible,and you're like, Oh no, I can't
watch this. I can't do thisanymore.

Yeah. I mean, I feel like it's, it happens
sometimes less now, because Ithink people were getting to I
think 2020, that really is whenpeople figured out how to use
Zoom and all this stuff thestreaming. But, yeah, there's
still some rookies out therethat haven't figured it out.
Yeah, so you're doing it. You'vedone a lot of these. I've

(01:56):
watched a lot of the interviewsthat you've done, and you've
made the rounds for sure, yeah,

Unknown (02:03):
I think we just kind of initially were like saying yes
to the most interesting, like,non off, offbeat, kind of non
musical stuff, you know, nomatter what it was and, and that
kind of led to, you know, Moremore music stuff somehow, you
know. So I whatever. I don'tknow. I can't, I can't predict

(02:24):
it, but,

oh, really, so you'd rather talk because I do
it all. Yeah, I talk music, butI've spoke, spoken with authors
and doctors, and I find justpeople fascinating and so many
different topics. It's hard forme to just just talk music.
Although I do love music,

Unknown (02:40):
I agree with you. I think, I think just about
everything is fascinating. Whatif it's if it requires some sort
of endeavor, right? So, youknow, yeah, I'll tell chat about
anything. I'm just gonna flipthis light on real quick.

Yeah? No worries.
Yeah, no. I think for me, one ofthe most fascinating things
about people is just how theymake it, how they become
successful, like their story,like how, you know, grinding
through, like for your for yourstory, for instance. I mean, I
think whedis Was thattechnically your fifth band, you
know, like, how many years ittook you until you had some
success, or, like, a high levelof success, I would say, yeah,

(03:16):
that's

Unknown (03:18):
an interesting point.
I, I wasn't the founding memberof any of the bands that I was
in prior to wedis. That'simportant. I was mostly a guitar
player, and in one project, Iwas a songwriter, and never a
singer. Then, no, I sang alittle bit here and there, but
the and even the songwriterthing was in time I found out
that it was for hire, you know.

(03:41):
So it wait. This is the onlything I ever tried to do on my
own as the sort of prime moverof the whole thing. So yeah,

remind me again.
Maybe I heard the story, butmaybe I didn't. I'm sure my
audience has it. What promptedyou to do your own thing rather
than just continue to be aguitar player.

Unknown (04:07):
I had been in and out of a lot of projects that had
gone nowhere, even one thatsigned a big record deal and
went nowhere, and I wasn't quitecynical enough to think that it
wasn't, it was impossible, but Iwas sort of skeptical enough at

(04:31):
that point to think that, like,I don't want anybody screwing
this up for me anymore, anymore,you know. So it was like that.
It was and that required, like alot of you know, taking on the
responsibility of being the guywhose fault it is, and and all
that stuff you know. So, the So,the like, starting it from

(04:55):
scratch and being the oneresponsible for for everything
was. Yes, that was the firsttime I ever did that was, was
whedis,

right? It's kind of a gamble, too, because then if
it doesn't work out, like yousaid, like, then it's going to
be looked upon as your failure.

Unknown (05:12):
Well, yeah, I mean that that may well have been it, you
know, I'm sure I would havetried something else, somewhere
else along the line, justbecause I'm a stubborn fool, but
I don't think it would have beengreat if, if the weirdest thing
didn't happen, and if I'm beingcompletely honest, it kind of
didn't, at least initially.

Yeah, how long did it take from the time you
started the band till when youguys had a hit on the radio?
Well,

Unknown (05:41):
I started alone with a four track and a drum machine
for many months, demoing andworking out where my voice would
sit in the mix and what kind ofa singer I was and all that
stuff. So I was in the woodshedfor a long time alone, and all
the while, I had been involvedin other projects and made other
records with other people, butwas kind of keeping the sweetest

(06:03):
thing to myself, and got to apoint where I felt confident
enough to start trying toassemble a band that was, that
was The, I think, around 97 orso, and bumped into my friend
Phil, but if not for that timein the in the sort of

(06:29):
laboratory, I wouldn't have feltconfident enough to roll out
something that I was going to bethe front person on.

Did you have to take, like, a day job at that
point, or you said you weredoing other music things. Was
there were you able to pay thebills with all music things? Or
did you have to do

Unknown (06:45):
I had a day job. I was working at a VPN company in
Times Square. I was workingfixing printers on Long Island.
I was worked at a few musicstores. I cleaned pools. I
worked at a rest home. Worked ata fish market. I did, I did a
lot of stuff. I did a lot ofstuff that was subsidized the
music career, yeah, yeah, yeah.
That was, that was, it was allday jobs, until, as a matter of

(07:13):
fact, we signed our record dealin our Deal Memo in December of
99 and the full executedcontract was signed the
following February, and I keptmy day job until May.

Wow, yeah, I mean, so there was the time that you
thought this could not work out,because I think I read, or I
think you said an interview atone point you were, you were,
like, two years into pre med,which is, like, that's like a
very different route,

Unknown (07:47):
yeah, well, I finished college before I got into trying
to be a professional musician.
Oh, okay, I didn't reallyunderstand that I had been
trying to be a professionalmusician the whole time, just by
virtue of the fact that was themajority of what I spent my time
on. Right? So you the collegething was I went in pre med and
was at the University ofScranton, and got through two

(08:09):
years of pre med before I failedorganic chemistry. It was the
first time I'd ever failed anyclass. It kind of freaked me
out, because I had been applyingmyself, and I found out I had a
reading disability rotatednystagmus, which makes the long
peptide chain equations inorganic chem really difficult to
get through. So I was makingthese little mistakes everywhere

(08:32):
because I was losing my placeand I couldn't do it. I failed.
So I switched over to psych andhistory, and pissed my father
off big time, and started tostart to think about my own life
the way that I wanted it to be.
And I guess I was about 19 or 20when that happened so and that

(08:55):
was the beginning of getting theVillage Voice every Tuesday or
Wednesday, when it arrived atScranton, Pennsylvania, day
late, and reading at six o'clockin the morning and calling as
many people and leaving as manyvoice messages as I could on
answering machines, trying toget into a band, and then

(09:17):
auditioning on the weekends andin New York City and coming back
and doing class again, and itwas like that was the beginning
of me becoming a professionalmusician. And I wasn't. I had no
designs on being a doctor. Mindyou, it was just I was on that
conveyor belt from from highschool, you know,

was there something that you said your dad was
disappointed, so. Was your dadpushing you to be a doctor? Or
was there interest?

Unknown (09:42):
I think so. I mean, he, my father was an orphan, and he
didn't go to college, so he he,I was the first male in my
family to graduate from college,and it was like a big deal for
him, even though, in fact, hedid not know what he was asking
me to do or what path he had putme on. He had no knowledge of.
To himself. And I think, I thinkparents who grew up without

(10:03):
resource often fall into thatwhere they're putting, putting
their kids through somethingthat they think is the right
thing, but they don't have anyexperience of it in themselves.
So they're, they're, you know,so your dad didn't go to
college? No, he did. No.

It's interesting.
My dad went to college, but hewould say he used to always tell
us, when we were kids, like, youbetter go to college or you'll
be working at McDonald's. Andit's like, and it's funny to see
how the world has changed,because I think maybe that was
true in his generation, but nowit seems like there's so many
people that are not collegeeducated, that are very like,
there's a lot of people I knowthat are my friends that have
less education than me, have amaster's degree, and they don't

(10:39):
even have a college degree, andthey're making more

Unknown (10:42):
money than me. I money than me, right? I mean, I don't
think that. I don't think thatcollege degree thing correlates
to success. I know that there nobut I agree, at least not in
every case and not for everyperson. And I, if I had to do
over again, I would have gottena job right out of high school
and saved up for all the gearthat I needed to make records
and started that process. But,or,

Do you think there's any sort of music
school? Because I've interviewedsome guys that there was one in
LA, I forget what it's called,but there's, there's kind of
some it's almost like a way tonetwork, though, more so than
you, you know, learning aboutmusic, it's better just to,
like, meet other people who aretrying to make it music

Unknown (11:19):
business. Yeah, that that is, that is the important
part. I believe I would like, Iwould like to have been sent to
some sort of conservatory as akid, a younger, younger kid,
because I showed a lot ofpromise on guitar and in other
realms. But I my parents didn'tknow anything about how to be a
professional musician. Theydidn't understand any sort of

(11:39):
career path. In that regard.
They had some friends who weremusic industry adjacent, but
they didn't really know how anyof it worked. So it was, you
know, it's tough for them. Ithink that they were scared of a
music career, you know, reallydying in the gutter, all that.
And the truth is, that's whatyou sign up for. You know, they
were, they were kind of rightabout that, but I just had, I

(12:01):
was on every other collegecareer path that you could be
on, aside for music, and woundup doing music. So,

yeah, no, but I mean, is it interesting taking
the psych classes and thehistory? Because my major was
psych, and I got, I got amaster's in Psych. I love
psychology. In fact, I love itprobably more now than I did in
school. And I feel like a lot ofthe classes I took in psychology
were not really what I wanted tolearn. I want to learn about
what makes people tick, like,like I said, their path and all
those kinds of things.

Unknown (12:35):
Yeah. Well, for me, that was history. My My minor in
Psych was because I hadaccumulated so many science
credits as a pre med major thatI didn't need them anymore. But
psych philosophy, after thefact, was really interesting,
not quite as interesting as aRussian revolution for me,
anyway. So Russian

Revolution, yeah, see, and now history is so
fascinating to me.

Unknown (13:00):
Yeah, yeah. Well, it's always been to me. I've always
been fascinated, you know, it'show you learn about human
nature, really, yeah,

you're right. It's fun. It just worked. Because I
remember being in high school,and I hated history. I thought
it was so boring. I remember,like, cheating on my friend, you
know, on his test, and, like,you know, just did not give a
fuck. And then now I just, Icould watch documentaries about
history. I could listen topodcasts. I could I read on just
for fun. It's weird.

Unknown (13:25):
Yeah, it is. It is a little strange. As you get
older. I think that thathappens, but I was interested in
it early, early on, strangely.
But, you know, I found

you were a good kid. Were you not out, like,
smoking weed and stuff in highschool and like, party?

Unknown (13:39):
No, I went to a boys Catholic school that was about
an hour and a half train ridefrom my parents house. So I
commuted on the Long IslandRailroad back and forth to high
school, and it was at some totalof three hours a day on the
train. Damn What

do you do on the train that was before, like
smartphones or whatever?
Sometimes

Unknown (13:59):
your homework, sometimes you daydream.
Sometimes you write weird,absurdist poetry. I mean, like,
if you have a Walkman or a discman or whatever, no, well, yeah,
sometimes, but you weren'treally supposed to have that in
school, so it was tough to bringtruth. Matter is that a lot of
the energy on the train wasspent trying not to get beat up
by construction workers. Theythey weren't crazy about kids

(14:25):
and ties, you know what? I mean,Oh, gotcha. So it was, it was an
odd, it was an odd thing. Youknow, it's funny. There was a
perception that my school wassort of hoity toity. But the
majority of people who senttheir children there were civil
servants, cops and firemen, youknow, people who, back in the
80s, didn't, didn't make a tonof money. So, you know, it

(14:50):
wasn't, it wasn't this like poshschool. It was like a working
class commuter boys school, youknow, in on the outskirts of New
York City, close to the borderof Queens and. Uh, you know, I
was, I was like, an adultcommuter kid at 13.

That's so, yeah, that's really crazy to think
about, because I grew up inSeattle, and I remember, like,
going from my small suburb todowntown Seattle, taking the
bus, like that was a big deal,but taking an hour train, I
mean, every day, that's crazy.

Unknown (15:21):
Yeah, it was, yeah, it was a long time. It was about
three miles from my parentshouse train station. Was about
an hour and a half train ridewith a couple of switches in
between, and then it was about atwo mile walk to the school
through, like, hostileterritory. Yeah, local high
school kids weren't crazy aboutus either. So, and there was,
did

you have some buddies that you could, like,
buddy up with, or were you justmostly by yourself? There were
two or

Unknown (15:45):
three other people who in my grade who, I said, only
two other people in my grade whowent from my area, and both of
them drove frequently, either intheir parents car. Or because
they were a little older, theygot worker drivers permits
earlier, so I was mostly on thetrain, quite often by myself,

(16:10):
but sometimes with others,sometimes with others. Do you

think like your dad sent you there because he
thought like this was gonnalike, help shape you and like
you agree with that? Or do youthink like it wouldn't matter if
you want

Unknown (16:22):
he was wrong. He was wrong, but he had no way of
knowing. You know. He pickedsomething that he thought he
would have been benefited fromin his own life, and he was he
was doing what he was could dowith, with what he knew. You
know. So no, he was wrong aboutthat. I didn't really benefit

(16:42):
from that place. As I said, Iwould have preferred to be in
some sort of conservatory formusic. That would have been a
more appropriate place for me tolearn what I would eventually be
doing, but with my life. But youknow, the result is that I come
at it from a very differentangle, and I'm sort of self
taught, not all that. So in thesame in the same breath, that I

(17:06):
would say I am incapable ofmaking music like other people
do, I would also have to saythat I don't know why or how,
because I don't understand theprocess from a learned
perspective. I understand it theprocess from a doing
perspective.

Have you had that issue when trying to make music
with other people, where they'relike, What are you doing? You're
doing it

Unknown (17:28):
wrong. Yeah, I had a keyboard player, one of my
favorite people on Earth, guynamed Mark Palmer, was in the
studio with me. This happened afew other times with other
people as well, but I was askinghim to play some harmonies on
the on the on a keyboard, on ona Rhodes piano. And he just
said, That's wrong. That's thewrong chord. Man, that's that's
not right. And I was like, Well,I want to hear it in the song,

(17:50):
you know? I want to hear how howit clashes. I want to hear what
it does. And we kept quite a bitof what he thought was wrong in
the final take. And I love it.
But which song is that songcalled tipsy, which is inspired
by Liam Payne conversation I hadwith him back in 2013 or 14, an
inspired song. We released it in2016 or 15. I can't remember

(18:15):
which, but yeah, so one of thesingles from our seventh album,
but has these kind of weirdroads layered with church bells,
harmonies in it, on thekeyboard. And I was kept pushing
mark to do these odd harmonies,and he was getting frustrated.
That's not how. And he's aneducated musician. He knows what

(18:35):
he's doing, he knows the circleof fifths, he knows what he's
talking about, but I preferredwhat I was hearing in my head to
whatever his teacher taught himwas right and wrong. Yeah,

that is an interesting yeah, because I
remember having this discussionwhen I was in high school, and,
you know, I was more into, like,the hair metal and, like, heavy
metal and stuff and, and myfriends would be like, it's too
perfect. It's, it's, you know,music isn't supposed to be
perfect. It's supposed to bemore. And like, you know, we
both like me and my buddy. Weboth like Faith No More, though,
and the Faith No More. Liketheir angel dust record. I don't

(19:08):
know if you've ever heard thatone is very like or like, Mr.
Bungle. That's another like,that same singer where, and if
you've heard that one withProject

Unknown (19:16):
Mike. Mike is in a million different projects.
Yeah, that is the

exact perfect example of not conventional.
Yeah,

Unknown (19:23):
very much. So yeah, he's, it works. He's one of
those guys who just seems tonever, he never stops moving on
his creative force, it seems,yeah. But Mr. Bungle was a
touchstone for me in inincredible ways, primarily
because it was, it was, it wasfunk and R and B at the same

(19:48):
time. So Mike is like an R and Bsinger, like in a lot of ways,
and the sensibilities in bungleare like that. Of course, it's
absurdist. But. You know, FrankZappa pornography, but it's, but
it's really, really veryinteresting in its in its
approach to R B and metal. So ithas a little bit of metal, but

(20:09):
it also like, this is anunderpinning of R B in there.

Yeah, I appreciate it way more now too, as I'm
because when I was a kid, I waslike, I just want to rock. And I
remember there were some songson there that were very metal.
But then some were like, yeah,it was more like saxophones. I
was like, what? I don'tunderstand this, but now I go
back and I go, Oh, this isactually, like, really
brilliant.

Unknown (20:28):
Yeah. I mean, it's almost like he, then they do
that Commodores cover. They doeasy, like, Sunday morning. You
can't you think that one'sfaith. No more, right? No more,
right, right. Sorry, but, buthe, you can't even tell it. It's
not the Commodores something,but both come on the radio. It's
kind of like, is that, which oneis this that to honor that the
different musical forms thatway, bungle being the primary

(20:49):
format for platform for hisexperimenting with different
formats is will always be thisthing where I'm like, you know,
Mike Patton taught you, man,anything's possible. Anything
can happen in music. I mean, youknow that song, the bungle tune,
um, squeeze me macaroni, yeah,face with my belonging. That's a

(21:11):
that's an art that's like asoulful R and B, like, love
melody,

squeeze me back, yeah? Not necessarily lyrically,
maybe, but no, that's

Unknown (21:22):
my point. That's, that's the irony of, right?
That's juxtaposition of thesetwo forms in one. And it's like,
it's two lines, but it's, it'sthe encapsulating, like, almost
the whole history of music inthere. Somehow, you know, yeah,
he's, he's a genius,

yeah, super smart guy. Like, he would be really
interested. I don't, or hewould, that's like, one of those
interviews where you're like,it's either going to be, like,
an amazing interview, or, like,he just some people like that.
They can't really verbalize, youknow, how they they just,
they're like, assets, likeasking, you know, Da Vinci, how
did you, how do you paint theMona Lisa, or whatever, you
know, like, they just, they just

Unknown (21:58):
do it. It's not their job to tell you how it's their
job, exactly. Yeah,

well, that's what I'm saying. That's why it's kind
of sometimes like, andespecially for me, I'm a big
enough you're a sports fan, butI'm a huge sports fan and, and
sometimes those guys, yeah, it'sjust like, like, I'm a big
Seahawks fan. Marshawn Lynch,like, he would just say, like,
I'm all about that action boss.
Like, he would just go out thereand just roll over guys. You're
like, how do you do that? It'slike, he doesn't think about he
just does it.

Unknown (22:21):
And basketball is, like, jazz. I'm a bigger
baseball fan than I am abasketball but basketball is
actually physical jazz, right?
Is there's an imp, is an improv.
Every minute there's an improv,you have to reset the whole
like, you know, a whole charge.
So it's like, I love

jazz and basketball. Yeah, there you go.
I mean, it's an interestinganalogy, though.

Unknown (22:42):
The guy who told me that made me think about as a
guy named Michael bellar, who'sa keyboard player, has played
with just about everybody, ArtGarfunkel and all kinds of
people, Lauren Hill, and he toldme, he's like, he's like, he's
like, how can we into baseball?
But not, but not basketball. Iwas like, I don't know. I just
baseball is democratic, and thedefense starts with the ball and

(23:02):
like, it can be really slow, andthen suddenly it'll explode into
this really complex problem forboth teams. And I just find it
fascinating that it has thatenergy underpinning it. He's
got, yeah, but basketball isjazz, and he said it while he
was pointing jazz chord on arope. Okay, you got a point
there,

man, you know, that is really cool, yeah. So then I
wonder, what genre of music isbaseball,

Unknown (23:34):
metal and progressive

rock? Progressive?
Yeah? Because there's a lot ofslow and then fast,

Unknown (23:41):
yeah, and it also requires some serious Motown
smoothness. Like, you gotta besmooth, right? You can't, like,
you can't be abrupt, or Herkyjerky. I mean, a bunt actually
represents the most Herky jerkything that happens in baseball.

But it is weird, yeah, bunting,

Unknown (24:01):
but everything else has to be this, like, like, Grace
matching, perfection movementthing, where you just kind of
think about what it takes to hita major league pitch.

Well, yeah, and just in the fielding too. I
think the fielding is somethingwe take for, like, they catch
the pop fly like, it's no bigdeal. But if you've ever played
baseball like you don't catchevery pop fly and grounder that
comes to you.

Unknown (24:24):
No. I mean, I remember when I was in Little League, it
was like, Oh no, they hit it tome, these guys, these guys are
like, you know, and I, I havehad that experience, the
experience of sort of turningoff your guidance computer, like
Luke, and just catching a ballwithout really looking at it,
because you kind of, becauseyou've been paying such

(24:45):
subconscious attention to theplay, right? And you just there.
You're just that you know whereto be when it's when it when it
unravel, when it unfolds, justpop. And that's the grace of
baseball, right? That's like thethe smooth Motown of baseball.

All, yeah, I think it's all with sports and music
and all this stuff. I feel likeit's also mental, like you got
to be kind of in the zone, andif you think about it too much,
then you can screw it up

Unknown (25:09):
exactly, exactly. You got to do a ton of learning. You
got to work, do your 10,000hours, right, and run every base
a zillion times, and swing thebat a zillion times. But when
you get to that point, you'reright. It's like, you got to
turn the machine off and justfeel it. And music's like that
too. You know, this is aninteresting sports music

(25:34):
conversation.

You're right. Well, I love two things. I love, but
it's fascinating. But I love thepsychology behind all of it too.
Like, I think that is, I thinkthat's something that doesn't
get talked about enough with,with sports and and also, I
think music too. I think thatthat is the psychology, the
mindset, is huge for both thosethings. Yeah, I don't know an
interview, I guess, podcastingtoo. Like, I remember when I

(25:56):
first started this dude, I wasso, I mean, maybe people say I'm
still bad, but I was really badwhen I first started. And I
remember, like, I think it wasin my first 100 episodes I had
Ann Wilson from heart on and Iwas like, I mean, it's, I It's
cringy to listen to some ofthose older episodes, but it's
a, I mean, it's a learningprocess. And like to look back
at that and go, Wow, okay, I'vecome a long way. I'm sure you

(26:18):
feel the same way about music.

Unknown (26:21):
Yeah. I mean, what's watched some interviews and some
and some videos of us playingback in the day. There's a lot
of it that I'm like, Oh man, I'mso glad I don't do that anymore,
you know?

But what, like, what did you do? What would you
do differently?

Unknown (26:38):
I would go, if I could go back, I would pay a lot more
attention to the audience.
Because we do, we do all requestsets. Now. We don't have set
lists if we're headlining, if wehave to play a festival where
it's timed, we have to makechoices. But when we do headline
shows on tour, we put it to theaudience, what do you want us to
play every night, that night,and we set up our own gear. And

(27:00):
while we're doing that in frontof the audience, I'm kind of
walking back and forth saying,what's the first song? What's
second song? What do you want tohear tonight? What you will any
deep cuts? Well, you know, likethat kind of thing. And you
know, all the deep cuts, yeah,we, we've worked as hard as we
can to have the whole entirecatalog. Now it's been, this is
the 25th anniversary, so Ishould put a little asterisk

(27:20):
here and say that the firstalbum has to be played in its
entirety. So there are cornersto which the deeper cuts have
been shoved for the for thisyear and this year only. But
okay, um, we hit the road in2026 The goal is to know
whatever we have on streaming, Ithink it's 80 some odd songs,
and be ready to play any of themif somebody calls it out. So

(27:43):
it's a lot of rehearsal, as Iwas saying that the 10,000
hours, and just keep swingingthe bat and and then you get up
there and you can do whateverthe audience is in the mood for.
And the upside to that is thatyou're not imposing this tyranny
of the set list onto everybody,right? You're not rolling up and
saying, This is the set listwe've been playing and promoting

(28:03):
all year. This is what you'regoing to hear tonight, the exact
same one that you can watch onYouTube from last night. Like,
no,

but there's certain songs, obviously, that you're
you have to do, right?

Unknown (28:15):
Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.
We'll always do teenage dirtbag.
I don't think, I think there'sonly a handful of shows where we
didn't play lemonade.

There's a little respect that was a cover of an
erasure song. We

Unknown (28:25):
sometimes skip that song. It depends on what the
audience wants. If somebody'scalling in the audience, and I
will play it if something, ifit's not getting a lot of calls,
we won't play it. Was

that the one that was a you had a couple songs
that were bigger in Europe thanAmerica. Well, even teenage dirt
bag was bigger there. I'm alwaysfascinated by that. Why is
something a bigger hit in Europethan America? I don't get it.

Unknown (28:47):
Well, I I know specifically in our case, why?
Okay, and that was because theAmerican record label tried to
cross over teenage dirtbag fromrock radio, where it had been
moderately successfulrespectably. So they try to
cross it over to pop radiobefore it was, I think, before
it was time, and then paid thewhatever we had earned at rock

(29:13):
radio disappear because theydon't want to fight for the same
market. So they dropped us, kindof when they found out that the
label was hustling it to to topop. Really, I never knew

that. I've done like, 500 of these episodes. A
lot of musicians never heardthere was a conflict between pop
and rock radio at the same time.
In

Unknown (29:33):
2000 there was that.
And that's a little, I mean, I'mbringing you under the hood a
little bit here, right? Yeah, Ilove this stuff. This was the
pay all the days. And we didfind out that we were doing the
way that it all started was thatthe label wanted us to do
acoustic performances on moreand more and more radio
stations. And we were like,Yeah, sure, but we realized that
those radio stations, as we wentabout doing it, were not the

(29:57):
ones that were currentlysupporting. Banging the teenage
dirtbag single. They were otherradio stations, and we were kind
of curious about this, and say,Why is this hat? Why aren't we
doing like, you know, the Xstation across the city has been
banging teenage dirtbag 30 timesa week. Why aren't we there
doing an acoustic why are wehere at BCN where they're not
playing us at all? And and theywould be like, Oh, well, they're

(30:19):
going to add you, if you if youdo this. This is how it works,
you know. And we did that for afew, a few weeks of like, you
know, grueling 4am wake ups toplay on morning radio acoustic
versions of teenage dirt bag.
And we found out that we werebeing those acoustic
performances were being tradedfor ads for another pop act. So

(30:44):
are the our the currency therewas that they this pop radio
station was getting somethingthat the rock radio station
really deserved. So they burnedtheir they burned their
competition across across theway with our acoustic
performance, and then anotheract would get added to the pop
station on that favor. So wewere being traded. We were being

(31:08):
traded for, for ads, and it allhappened. We found out when we
were we were this radio stationin Boston confronted us on the
air because they accused us ofhaving been across the city, on
the other side of the city, atanother radio station. But the
fact is, is that that radiostation had just canned that

(31:28):
performance for a month that wehad done it a month earlier, so
they held on to it and played itthe day that we were supposed to
be on the rock station. Also,it's like a competition. Wow,
like we made it looked like wewere due time in the rock
station. That's so crazy. And weand we, we got confronted on the
air, what are you guys doingover at BC? You got heard you

(31:48):
were over, you were on the airon BC. And I was like, we
weren't we just got to we justgot here. We came from New York.
We didn't stop anywhere else.
And wow, that was what kind ofblew it up when we got into this
big, heated sort of argumentafterwards about what could
possibly be going on. And theguy who was with us, to his
credit, he broke protocol, andhe told us he was like, All
right, guys, I see that you'rekind of getting heated with each

(32:09):
other. This is what happened.
This, like your manager thatexplained this, or, Oh, it was
somebody who was working promoat the time. Promo, okay, yeah,
radio promo guy, and we kind of,once we knew what would happen,
we were like, holy shit. Howmany times have we done that?
We've done this so many times.
Is that why this is all is thatwhy every time we do an acoustic

(32:31):
performance, the rock radiostation stops, you know? And it
was like, it just, it kind ofall hit us at the same time,
like they had tried thismaneuver with using using our
performances as currency. So wewere kind of really pissed and
frustrated and didn't know whatto do. And it was a few months

(32:53):
after that that it blew up inAustralia and then Europe,
because none of that happenedover there, they went with their
own plan and their own sort ofstraight to rock formats, thing
and states eventually caught upafter one direction came over
and played dirtbag here, inthese in our football stadiums,

(33:15):
but, but the we or the firstdecade of that song's life in
America was as an obscure, nonhit.

Yeah, it's weird now to think of that because you
hear it. I mean, I think that'swhat prompted me to reach out to
you in the first place. Waslike, I heard it on a
commercial. I was like, Oh, Ilove that song. I wonder if
those guys would do my podcast.
And then I heard it, I hear inkaraoke, and I heard it, uh,
covered of a few weeks ago. Itried to record it for you,
because it was the coolestversion of this. It was like a
reggae version of your song. AndI was like, Oh, I would love

(33:49):
this, but I didn't. The theaudio was terrible on that. But
yeah, I mean, it's, it's, it'sall over now, so

Unknown (33:56):
it's an egg. What's that you need? Ska bag.

Yeah, it was kind of a slow, like, a Yeah. It was,
it was cool. I was like, wow,this is a cool version of this.
Do you do you enjoy that, likehearing your song covered and
karaoke, I mean, hopefully notbutchered in karaoke, but if
it's done, well, it's kind ofcool,

Unknown (34:13):
right? I I appreciate a different take on it. I really,
I'm really into that. I'venever, I've never recoiled from
anybody changing it up. I'veapproved a ton of
interpolations, which is whenpeople change the lyric or
change the perspective, orsomething like that. So, um, I'm
kind of game for for peopleusing it as their own in their

(34:34):
own story, you know, because thetruth is, it's like what I was
saying before, the fact that itwasn't successful in the states,
if it survived at all inAmerica, for that first decade
before one direction gave it apush, and it wasn't even it was
more, more than decade was like13 years. Then it survived
because people had it in theirhearts and in there as the part

(34:55):
of their own story, of their ownlife, right? And not, not
because they saw it on TV orwhatever. They might have
downloaded it from Limewire andjust held on to it in their in
their psyche for some reason,and the only continuing currency
that the song has is its abilityto have people see themselves in
the narrative and see themselvesin the song currently. So I feel

(35:16):
like, in some sense, the authorme is dead, because it doesn't
really matter what my intentionswere for the song. It's had its
own life in the lives of otherpeople, people who, you know,
lift it up so or claim it. So Ifeel like, what if they want to
do something with it, and itisn't offensive or stupid, even

(35:39):
stupid stuff I've approved. But,you know, like, like, I'm cool.
I'm cool with with people doingsomething with teenage dirt bag.
I'm not precious about it inthat sense, because that's the
that's the sustainability of itis people's take, people's other
take on it.

Yeah, well, I just remember, like, I said I was a
metal head, and so I justremember at that time in rock,
metal was not cool. And thenhere comes the song that's
really catchy and fun to singalong to, and you're talking
about Iron Maiden. And I waslike, Oh, that's so cool iron I
love Iron Maiden. And it's like,and you put that in the lyrics,
did you? Is that just because itsounded right, or because I

(36:15):
thought you said something aboutit was it was kind of more about
AC, DC, or my first, my first

Unknown (36:19):
favorite band is always going to be ACDC, right? Rush

that doesn't rhyme as well,

Unknown (36:25):
but AC, DC doesn't have quite the vowel movement that
Iron Maiden, right? So, it's,it's really, it's a, really,
just a, just an esthetic choice,really like how something is
sung and whether or not itcontributes to the hook or
subtracts. So, you know, I mean,yeah,

that's true. It wouldn't listen to AC, yeah,
that wouldn't, I don't thinkthat would work as

Unknown (36:47):
well. It's a mouthful, and it's a lot of consonants and
a lot of siblings, you know, youdon't, yeah,

no, that's, that's really cool, though. Yeah. I
mean, so do you you hear thesong? Have you ever just walked
into a bar and heard someoneelse covering it, or heard them
singing it to carry out

Unknown (37:05):
many, many times, is that that'd be a huge ego rub,
right? Um, it depends on whatI'm walking into the bar for. If
I'm looking to, like, sit andhave a quiet beer, that might
not be the place that I, youknow, we don't really drink
beer. But if I'm, if I'm, if I'mlooking, if I'm looking to sit
down and just have a quiet convowith somebody, that might not be

(37:25):
the environment I might turnaround, not out of, like, I'm
not cringing away from somebodycovering it. I'm quite happy
that it's happening. Like, Idon't want to disrupt that
energy with, like, oh, the guyis here, you know, make him do
it. You know, I like, it's thatkind of feels a little bit like
on the rare occasion that hashappened. I have done something

(37:46):
like that, but really, yeah,I've played it impromptu in
public before for people, if Iget like, so like, weirdly
discovered somewhere. You know,it's rare, but it's happened a
handful of times.

Yeah, I saw a video of the band lit, and they were
in Nashville. I don't know if itwas staged. I should ask them,
but they were walking by, youknow how Nashville has those
like, open stages, you know, andthe there was a cover band doing
their song, and they just poppedon stage and sang it with them.
It was pretty cool, but I don'tknow if it was staged.

Unknown (38:19):
That is cool. I saw all American Rejects do that Ooh
somewhere. I saw that on Tiktok.

That's cool. Have you ever performed with them?
No,

Unknown (38:32):
no. Unfortunately, I love that band. I haven't. I
haven't actually performed withthem or bumped into them
anywhere. I don't think Yeah,

cuz you played with some like, that's got to be one
of the coolest things about Tome, being in a successful band
and having a good song on theradio, and being able to, you're
able to tour with all theselegends. I mean, like, you know
you guys, you've performed withalmost every good band, at least
if you count the festivals andstuff.

Unknown (38:57):
Yeah. I mean my FA, my favorite Tour, where we weren't
headlining, was opening forLiving Color and Everclear and
Hoobastank

on I was going to ask you about that. Yeah, that's
I had the singer from livingcolor. I love that band. I saw
him play with extreme, and theyactually, extreme is good, but
they blew extreme off the stage.
They were

Unknown (39:18):
living you don't want to come on stage after living
color. Yeah, bad idea, yeah. Imean that they're, they're the
they're so the real thing, youknow, Doug, the bass player, was
in the fucking Sugar Hill gang.
I mean, like, like, it's, it's,it's, so they're so seasoned
that, yeah, and they're all jazzdudes too. That's the other
thing fucking around with theheaviest hitters in town, right?

(39:38):
So,

yeah, because they were just, they were jamming at
some point, and they were, Ithink they did a print song or
something. I was like, Oh, myGod, they're killing their
singers. He, this is, like, thisis recently. He can still nail
all the notes. Oh,

Unknown (39:54):
absolutely. He's in, he's in prime form. Um, no, he
did that. And they and they showno, a. Each in any sense of the
word, and they're and they'realso, they happen to be four of
the nicest guys I've ever met inmy life. I mean, they are
really, they were like, theytook an active interest in what
we were doing. We hadconversations. I made them

(40:14):
breakfast from time to time,because I'd make breakfast on
the bus, you know, and really,and it was a humongous honor to
not only get to go to this sidestage School of living color,
because that's like, a rarefiedspace, right? Like, who the fuck
gets to watch them figure it outevery night. And you better
believe that I wasn't lookingfor anything else to do on that

(40:37):
tour. I was like, living colorsound checking yet, like, and I
just be hurt lurking in thecurtain, you know, like, was we
just just soaking it up and andlistening and watching a group
of guys who are at a level I'llprobably never get to. I don't,
and I don't mean by notoriety, Imean by skill set and, and,

yeah, and that. And I talked to Corey about that
when I had him on, like, whyare, well, your, why was your
band not bigger? Like, what?
Because they had all the tools.
It's just really interesting. Iguess they just never had that.
I mean, they do have some hits,but, you know, I feel like they
should have been bigger.

Unknown (41:13):
Well, um, look what they did. They came, they came
out in the in the Reagan, late,late Reagan, early George Bush,
1980s with songs about urbanrenewal being a failure and and,
you know, just this incredibleperspective that they had also,

(41:37):
also they injected it right intoThe veins of, like white metal
kids, yeah, me, yeah. So, so,it's like, it's like, I they got
nothing to prove to me. I mean,like, they, they got him, they
got a meme, ified, you know,viral song, and they're all
there from the 1980s you know.
So, I mean, I don't, I mean,what can, what else can we hope

(41:59):
for? You know, I mean, yeah,sometimes you

don't know if it's gonna hold the test of time,
because at the time, it's like,okay, they're kind of moderately
successful. But then now, if youlisten back to those old albums,
like even the like the deepcuts, they hold up. They sound
great.

Unknown (42:16):
Oh yeah. I mean, look, man, if I was, if I was Green
Day, or if I was, you know, EdSheeran, or if I was Taylor
Swift, or if I was Justin Bieberor Olivia Rodrigo, I'd be trying
to find a way to get livingcolor to be on my tour, you
know, like, I'd be like, I'd belike, how did it, how do we get

(42:38):
this like, how do We inject thisinto these kids ears and get
this at part of it too.

That's noble of you. I like that kind of stuff.

Unknown (42:49):
Well. I mean, it's selfish of me, because I want to
learn. I want to learn andbenefit from like, you know,
like, this is, this is, this isthe real thing. I mean, there's
not a lot of the real thinggoing around that much these
days. I think that chapel Roansband is a real thing. I think
that Olivia Rodrigo is the realthing. I think Taylor Swift is a
real thing, but, but like whenhe with these, this crop of of

(43:11):
kids who are coming up on ticktock are not being given a
chance to develop their realthingness, right? They're just
being like splattered out thereby companies really quickly, and
then they're having to stay onthe hamster wheel and make
content, content, content,content, right? And it's like,
that's not how seasoninghappens. That's how emotional
breakdowns happened. Like, like,seasoning happens from stewing

(43:34):
in your craft without a deadlinewith it, with you know where,
you're where you're interestedin it, and your drive to create
something that you've neverheard before yourself, which is
every living color record I'veever listened to, or fishbone,
you know, or helmet, orquicksand or Everclear, that

(43:58):
comes from the work itself,right? Not and not night saying,
Oh, I at four o'clock thisafternoon. I gotta drop this
tick tock. I gotta go, guys, Igotta, you know, that's, that's,
that sucks, you know, um,

so you're saying, what, like, the the other side
of that would be like, I'm a bigGuns and Roses fan and, like,
you know, the Chinese Democracything, where they took, like,
whatever it was, like, 1520,years to make that record. I
mean, that's like, or, I thinkBoston was also, I think they
took long time in betweenalbums. Like, sometimes you
could take too long.

Unknown (44:31):
Yeah, I mean that, I don't, you know, I don't know
what kind of emotional stuff wasgoing on with Chinese Democracy.
I take a long time to make arecord because I'm trying to
find something new. But it's nota Chinese Democracy situation. I
don't know. I can't, I can'tpretend to know what goes on in
other artists heads in theprocess, you know, because I

(44:53):
have my own weird one that Icame up with with pop, seems

like with the Axl Rose in the Boston I know those.
Guys are really likeperfectionists, and it seemed
like they were just trying to,no, that's not good enough.
Let's scrap that. We got to redoit. And they just kept over
producing it and changingthings. And I think, in the
Boston case, I think maybe itworked, although I don't know if
the earlier versions of therecord would have made that big

(45:17):
of a difference. You know. Imean, the songs do sound great,
but,

Unknown (45:21):
yeah, I mean, well, you know, you got guys, engineers in
the band, and you also have thestate of contemporary music is
reminding you over and overagain, oh, it's shifting. It's
moving. The target is movedbecause you're trying to do
something. That's why it's,it's, that's why when I, when
I'm in the studio, I I don'ttry. I try not to listen to

(45:42):
other stuff because I'm tryingto do something that is and this
is how you can really swing andmiss doing this, by the way,
because if you're not comparingyourself to like, what is the
latest queen of Stone Age recordsound like on Spotify? If you
don't do that, you could makesomething that doesn't sound
like it competes or it doesn'tgo, it doesn't go with the rest
of rock or some such thing. Butyou can also come up with

(46:05):
something that was notresponding to contemporary
trends, right in any way, andtherefore is trendless, and the
hope is timeless, right? Like,that's, that's the that's the
hope. So I think prince didthat. I think Prince succeeded
at that,

yeah, Prince was amazing, for sure, that's got to
be hard to be original in thisday and age, because I feel like
almost everything has been done.
It seems like to me, rock isalmost like frozen in time, like
around 2007 ish or something. Itjust it like never really
progressed. I mean, it has, insome ways, but in terms of
popularity, a lot of the soundof like 2007 is kind of still a

(46:44):
lot of the if you look at the,you know, the charts of rock, or
whatever it sounds like thatkind of 2007

Unknown (46:52):
rock. So I, I have found that, with a couple of
exceptions, the vast majority ofinteresting rock post 2007 has
been done by women.

Well, that's, yeah, there's definitely a lot to be
said for that also, and also alot of the the retro sounding
stuff, like the struts and, youknow, bands like that, that kind
of like Greta Van Fleet do kindof a throwback, and the kind of
add a modern twist. I think thatis another thing that's been
cool for me, sort of,

Unknown (47:23):
that's a, sort of like, oh, a sound like, you know,
respectable sound like,situation. But then you have St
Vincent, you know, Annie Clark,who, I think she makes a record.
She reinvents music like that,that that shit is unassailably
original. And it's,

I don't think I've heard Who is this? Annie Clark,

Unknown (47:42):
yeah, she's the, she's the sort of locomotive behind

St Vincent. Okay, I guess I'm probably an idiot,
because people are gonna go, Oh,you don't never heard

Unknown (47:52):
of that. Fine. I mean, like, there's a lot of music out
there. Nobody's responsibilityto find it all. But I would say,
check out a song called birth inreverse. Okay, is it? Are these
big hits, or I would call it a,sort of, like a well known song
of hers,

okay, maybe I've heard and I just didn't know
that's who it was, or whatever.
Yeah. And

Unknown (48:13):
then you have boy genius, who also have a, sort
of, almost a grunge record, youknow, there's a song of theirs
called satanist that you shouldcheck out. Okay? I love, I love
getting recommendations, yeah,and then I would say my favorite
of all of it so far has beenJuliana Hatfield. Do you
remember her? Yes,

I do remember that.
That's more like when I wasreally paying attention to
music,

Unknown (48:36):
right? So Juliana Hatfield dropped a record in
2020, called Blood. I am stillnot even close to scratching the
surface of being sick of thisrecord like it is so fucking
great. She outdid herself ordersof magnitude. And there's one
song on there I would recommendyou start with, called dead
weight.

Oh, I love this.
Yeah, when I listen back to thisepisode, I'm writing all these
down, yeah,

Unknown (49:04):
but as you were saying before, but with Boston, that
that's the case that some peopletake a really long time to make
a record, to hold off foreverand ever. But then you have,
like deep purple, who I listenedto one of their records again,
from 2020 seems pandemic. Was asort of a pregnant space for

(49:25):
creativity, but, but deep purpledropped a record in 2020 that's
just incredible, man,

really? Yeah, who's the singer in 2020

Unknown (49:35):
let me just check, because I'm talking out my face
right now and I don't exactlyknow the answers. It's just
something I listen to on Spotifya lot.

That's, that's, I didn't know. See this. The
problem is, like so many bands,so many records like I can't
even keep track of them all. AndI mean, you'd be surprised at
how many, or maybe you're not,how many publicity notices I get
every day, an email of bandspromoting something that, and a
lot of the bands I've. Neverheard of but they're big enough
to hire a publicist. Yeah?

Unknown (50:03):
Well, the record is called whoosh, spelled O, sh,
exclamation point, and it cameout in 2020, and it's just
fucking smoking. There's thisone song on there called throw
my bones. It's the openingtrack. That's a great

title. Yeah,

Unknown (50:21):
it's just, it's like, I don't even listen to it. I
listened to it because we weresupposed to open up for them in
Australia last year. Oh, wow,that would have been what
they've been up to lately. And Iwas like, Holy shit, they're
still dropping, like, sick RockRecords. What? How old are these
guys? You know, it was just,it's one of those moments where
I felt like I really slept onsomething.

Oh yeah. It's like, it's still like a lot of the
original members, Ian Gillan andSteve Morse on guitars. And,
yeah, okay, wow.

Unknown (50:48):
Off to check that out.
Serious, serious stuff. That'swhat's

so sad about doing these interviews, is like, when
I listen to a band's newer stuffand I go, Oh my god, this is so
great. And then I try to promoteit, I try to help, and it just
doesn't get the recognition itdeserves. I mean, Living Color,
perfect example yourself. Imean, I was listening to because
I did all the deep cuts, and Iwas listening to so much of your

(51:14):
catalog. I was like, Oh, whyaren't more people hearing these
songs? These songs are great.

Unknown (51:19):
Yeah. I mean, people discover us in their own time,
right? Teenage dirt bags like agateway drug, sure. And I had
somebody say to me, somebodyonce told me, yeah, you guys are
one hit wonder status, but it'sa little bit more like no one's
gotten over your first song yet.
And I was like, yeah. Like, isthat? Is that what it is? It's

(51:42):
just like they get stuck on thatone, you know? And I feel like
we have a little bit of thatgoing on. We did have a second
charting single in the UK and inother territories, a song called
a little respect the cover, theerasure cover that we did on our
first album.

Yeah, and wasn't there? Was there a third, I know
there was a music video forwannabe gang Starr, and that was
funny,

Unknown (52:07):
worst music video ever made. I might ask. No one holds
that title, but us, we hold thattitle. We're not giving it up.
Yeah, it was a, I had a pitch tome that it would be the, it
would be Stanley Kubrick meetsbrother from another planet,

(52:29):
which I thought was, oh, man,yeah, let's see what happens
there. And they, I don't thinkwe got either of those in that
video, not even close. I thinkwe got a person in a in an ET
costume, sort of just reallystrange. It's a mess, but, but I
think, I think some people dolike it, which surprises me. I

(52:52):
will argue that it'sunironically bad.

Yeah, it was entertaining, you know, like,
well, I don't think I saw itwhen it came out, but, like, you
know, preparing for thisinterview, I went back and
watched it, and I was like, Oh,this is interesting. And you
know what I want to ask youabout is, like, you always had
that, uh, what is it? The it'slike, the blue and yellow
checkered. That was, like, abig, you know, that was the
album cover. I think that was inthat video. What? Why blue and
yellow? Like? What? How did youcome up with that? I don't know

(53:16):
if I know the story.

Unknown (53:17):
Blue, yellow and red are Superman's colors, right?
Okay, and I just always feltlike there was something global
about those colors together, andthat they weren't flag ish, that
they were just sort of worldish. And also, our original

(53:37):
artwork was done by a guy namedMalcolm Emmerich, who was a
anarchist and a graffiti artistin Manhattan. I worked with him
in my day job, and he paintedthis, I want, I said I wanted, I
wanted to be about a frog theme,you know. So he painted our logo
with a giant frog hanging offit. And it was oil painting.
It's gorgeous. I have itupstairs, and I thought it was

(53:59):
beautiful, but the labelabsolutely hated it. They
thought it was too dark. So mynext idea was, well, why don't
we do the logo that's been sortof graffitied onto a diner
placemat, because, like a clothdiner placemat that's blue and
yellow, because Long Island islike a diner capital of the
world, and that's kind of whateverybody ate and everything. So

(54:22):
I just wanted to tip the hat tothe diner world out there, and
so that's what we suggested. Butthat, I think that when they got
to their cheesy Photoshopdepartment, they kind of missed
the point on that, but werecreated it for our 2020,
version of the first album thatwe re recorded. So if you buy

(54:44):
that on vinyl, that's got thesort of proper diner place mat
on the front, and then on theback is the

frog. Oh, okay, I was gonna say I want to see this
frog picture. I don't think I'veseen this.

Unknown (54:55):
Yeah, it's, it's on the vinyl release. Yeah, it is.

So the vinyl that's kind of a new thing that's
coming back after a hiatus. Anddoes that help you guys sell
record, official records?
Because, like, that's obviouslya struggle for bands today to
sell

Unknown (55:11):
music. Yeah, I think the vinyl audience is the vinyl
audience, right? So that's ifyou make something, you're
making it for them. You're notmaking it for people who
otherwise don't buy music.
That's not a thing like so we,you know, we service that, that
sort of subculture, because weourselves are in it. I like

(55:32):
vinyl. I collect vinyl, andlisten to vinyl. So, you know,
it's something we want. We wantour own product on, on the thing
that we like the most, right?
Obviously, there's nothing likedropping a needle on like a very
crisp, original cut of Highwayto Hell. I mean, when you hear
that come out of the fuckingspeakers, your heads gonna blow

(55:53):
off. It's so much better. Hmm,it's the real deal. So that's
kind of, that's how I feel aboutit's the best way to listen.
Really,

I should start listening to, I want to. I
should hear it, because, you'reright. It does sound different.

Unknown (56:07):
Yeah, man, it's very different. I think I actually
have, might have a copy of,let's see. Oh no, that's not it.
I think we have copies of our,of our new vinyl upstairs. You
want me to grab one and

show you Sure? Can we play that or is it? Are we
gonna get cognitive?

Unknown (56:27):
I can't play it here in the where I am, but I'll show
you that. I'll show you the cut.
Hang, hang tight for a second.
Okay, yeah, we'll do

just take a short break here, and I'll think I can
pause this recording. Actually,turning back on the record. I
paused it for us. So people haveto listen to dead air. I know
that's the one thing I knowabout recording is, don't know
dead air. Sorry. No, I canalways, I can always edit stuff
out too. But

Unknown (56:56):
hope I gave you a nice, clean edit. So here it is. This
is the reissue, the 2020,version, nice. And it's a,
there's the frog on the backwith the that's the that's the
scary, the scary dark frog.

Oh, that would have been so cool, damn. It's fucking
record labels. Why do they

Unknown (57:21):
always fuck up? They know they fucked it up. Man,
like this would have been. Thiswould have been way cooler to
find teenage dirtbag on thanthis.

Yeah, that is badass. Man

Unknown (57:31):
history. So it's a double it's double record
because we recorded 10additional songs in in addition
to the first 10 that, you know,because we had a bunch of tunes
from over the years that hadbeen sort of demoed or recorded
that sounded like they belongedon the first record. And that
was the reason we didn't releasethem, because they were like,

(57:53):
Nah, it's like, that's firstrecord, shit. So we kind of felt
like that was the move to tomake a double record, make it
twice as long, 20 songs in 2020you know. So that's, that's the
vinyl. And we, we sell this ontour and on our website, and we
just calm forward slash merch orforward slash store. Sorry. But

(58:17):
anyway, that's the story. So,

yeah, no, that's cool. Like, do you feel like you
kind of have to almost be abusinessman now to being a
musician, like, you can't justgo out and do shows. You got to
figure out creative ways tomake, not only necessarily make
a profit, but just make it makesense for you to go on tour,
because otherwise you can losemoney if you don't have all
these

Unknown (58:38):
there's a million ways to lose money and music, but
basically, like looking forsomething that you would want as
a fan, right? You seems likeyou're always a fan. You always
like, I'm always myself. WhenI'm thinking about our stuff, I
was like, I'm at the ACDC show,and I want to buy something
really special. What do theygot? You know? And so this was
one of those. And then, ofcourse, Joey, our backing

(59:00):
vocalist, and she's one of ourart directors. She did this,
like, beautiful collage of,like, through the years.
Everything has a little symbolfrom over the years of our
records, and there's all kindsof, like, Easter eggs in there
and stuff. So I love shit likethat. Yeah, that's like, we try
to try to make it like, almostlike it's a comic book, you
know? Yeah, yeah. Yeah,

no, that's great, yeah. And then did you guys, I'm
assuming you do the, I'm notsure if I remember if you do or
don't, but I'm assuming you dothe meet and greets.

Unknown (59:29):
Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, as as safely as we can, because, of
course, if I get sick, theshow's over, you know? I mean,
I'm 51 years old now. I've been,I've been on the road for 30
years, and I I got to startbeing careful about because I
don't bounce back like I used toif I get pneumonia or COVID or

(59:52):
whatever it is, you know, youjust, you wind up cheating
people, because you're phoningit in a little bit, because you
can't. Do you just don't havewhat it takes to do a full show,
right? Because, yeah,

Chuck Shute (01:00:04):
no, it's so crazy.
I remember in March of 2020,right before, I think the guy
had COVID. It was one of thesingers, and I'm spacing on the
band. It's a big

Unknown (01:00:14):
what mountains of Wayne? No, no,

it was a but, yeah, I know that story too. Yeah, but
yeah, they were at this concert,and the guy was singing, he only
did like, two or three songs,and he goes, sorry, guys, I
tried and he just and the bandquit. I've never seen that
happen, but it's because histhroat was just wrecked and he
just couldn't sing, and so theyhad to cut the show. And I was
like, it was a big festival, sothey were like, Weezer was

(01:00:37):
headlining, and whatever. Butyeah, that's crazy.

Unknown (01:00:40):
There's no sense in pushing through if you're in
that condition. And the reasonbecause, you know, if you, if
you get to the point whereyou're you're that ill, and
you're singing through it,you're damaging your vocal
cords, right? So it's like,never come back. You may do
actual permanent damage. Youmay, like, permanently alter the
way that your your your yourinstrument works. And no one

(01:01:01):
show is worth that, you know, soyou got to, like, really be
careful about that kind of shit.
I mean, you know, it's, I know alot of people would think, Oh,
come on, man, just fucking sing,you know, shut up and sing kind
of thing. But we all know whothose have been on the road.
Know that it isn't just, isn'tthat simple, you know,

right? No, for sure. Oh, I think it was, oh,
AR. I think that was the band Ihad. Okay, I know, if you
remember a few, yeah, but sothey, because that was a big
bit, there was a lot of people,I think, that came to see them
specifically, you know, like,that's the kind of interesting
thing about festivals, is, like,there's so many bands, and you
might some people are there justto see their favorite band, and
then the guy, they had to cancelafter like two songs. But,

Unknown (01:01:44):
man, I mean, you know, I, I was in a I was in Nashville
last month to see AC DC in andthey canceled the show we booked
for for weather, because therewas, like tornado weather
rolling in, postponed until thenext night, and we were still in
town, we were able to move, movea flight. So we got lucky there.

(01:02:06):
But, man, if I, if I got rainedout, on, on, like, seeing a CD
AC and AC DC is not easy. Man,like, they don't play a ton, you
know,

yeah, how was it?
Because I've heard that everyreview I've seen of this, this
tour, current tour is they stillsound amazing.

Unknown (01:02:22):
Oh, they're smoking it, dude. They're fucking totally
smoking it was killer, man. Itwas so good. And you know, like
the thing about ACDC, I don'tknow if you've ever seen it.
Have you

ever seen him before? I saw him in Seattle in
1995 on the ball breaker tour.
And it was probably the coolestentrance I've ever seen for a
band. They had this big, giantwall, a brick wall, and then
this crane with a wrecking ballis swinging back and forth, and
then it goes boom, and it knocksthe wall down. They jump out,
and they start doing back inblack. It was the awesomest

(01:02:52):
entrance I've ever seen for RockBand.

Unknown (01:02:56):
They know how to do that, man. They really do that.
They, you know, like it's just,it's just fucking AC DC. Man,
yeah.

I mean, it's funny, because you'd think that
somebody, for me, and I've seena lot of concerts since then,
somebody would have topped thatby now. No, I don't think so.
That was the coolest entranceever.

Unknown (01:03:14):
No, no one's ever top an AC DC. That's a lost cause,
man. You

know, yeah, are they your number one favorite
band,

Unknown (01:03:21):
yeah, yeah, hands down, yet I saw rush more times. Oh,
I've seen rush 28 times, but,oh, but I, but I, I've only, and
I've only seen ACDC six times.
So first time I saw them was1988 blow up your video tour.

That was kind of like, they were kind of like, on
the downside, a little bit atthat, right? That wasn't a very
popular album,

Unknown (01:03:50):
still selling out Madison Square Garden. But,
yeah, but, but they that waslike, there, you know, Malcolm
was in rehab. The first time Isaw them, it was, it was Stevie,
who was on Malcolm's position.
So, yeah, it's, it's shit. I wasjust getting a text from Jared
Reddick from Bowling for Soup hewants, oh

yeah, he did my show. He's super nice guy. Great
man. Toured with them tons.

Unknown (01:04:16):
Oh yeah, yeah, he's lovely guy. Yeah, we love what's
he up to? He wants me to do.
Well, I can't, I can't give itaway, but we're gonna, he and I
are gonna discuss our agedmedical condition as part of a
promo video. And of course, youknow, with him, everything is
always hilarious, right? Becausehe's like Johnny Carson, who

(01:04:37):
many plays guitar. And you know,I mean, it's going to be
whatever Jared is involved in.
It's going to be great, like,you know, yeah,

no, I wish. I need to see what I should kind of
seen some of those tours thatyou guys have done together.

Unknown (01:04:54):
Oh, yeah, they were both overseas. They're both in
the UK. Oh, we did one in theStates. We did one in the states
in September. Of last year, justjust under a year ago. Yeah, and

you guys have some shows coming up, but I think
it's just your headlining shows,right? You're not,

Unknown (01:05:09):
yeah, we have, we have a bunch of touring in the
States. If you go to wheat Comm,forward slash shows, you'll see
all this information. But we'retouring a bunch of acoustically.
We're doing a bunch of festivalsin August, then acoustic tour in
September, a couple of festivalsin September as well. Oceans
calling is one of those. Yeah, Isaw that's a huge one. Yeah,
it's awesome. Then we're doing abunch of bus touring in the

(01:05:32):
states in October, and then wetake a couple weeks off to
rehearse for the UK tour, whichis going to be happening
November, starting November 17,I think, and we're going to be
touring all the way through toDecember 13, and that's we're
going to wrap it up at WembleyArena with Bowling for Soup.

Oh, nice. And who is this person that you're
taking out on tour? Gabrielle,is it stubborn? Gabriel Serban,

Unknown (01:05:57):
she's one of our backing vocalists. She's my
partner in life. And she's asinger songwriter in her own
right, and she gets up there anddoes her sort of like Americana
set. She's kind of like a crossbetween Paul Simon and Linda
Ronstadt, okay, yeah, with alittle bit of Emmy Lou Harris in
there and and a little bit ofrock guitar, so like that. Yeah,

nice. It's just the and that she the only opening
actors or

Unknown (01:06:22):
other. There's a few.
There's a handful of otheropening acts, but they're
locals, okay? The only touringacts are myself and Gabrielle.
That's the acoustic run, but thethe electric run is all the full
band, okay?

And then any other future plans that haven't you
want to announce on the podcast,there's a

Unknown (01:06:43):
couple of guys in England trying to finish a movie
about us called, you might die.
Oh yes, I was gonna ask youabout the documentary. Yeah, it
goes through some of the darkerperiods it was, was filmed
during the darkest periods ofour existence. 2010 2011 2013
those are really that was likeevery tour we thought was going
to be the last. And I mustadmit, is not my finest moments

(01:07:04):
captured on there, but, youknow, it's a sort of warts and
all documentary, so we're goingto figure out how to tie it up
and put it out. The problem is,we keep having a new chapter of
gets written for this, but thethe touring after that, we're
going to try and make a record,album seven. There's three songs

(01:07:25):
from album seven. I mentionedbefore that, tipsy. There's
another one called lullaby, andanother one called Michelle, and
they're all streaming right now.
So there's three songs that showthe direction of album seven,
where it's kind of headed. Andyeah, we're going to, we're
going to try to wrap that up andget that out in 2006 but lots of

(01:07:48):
touring, lots of recording, allof it, some guest appearances
that I can't talk about, butstuff, yeah.

Okay, fine, yeah.
Well, I look forward to that.
And then, yeah, if you ever cometo Phoenix. I'll try to try to
catch it. That would be, I'venever seen you guys live. It's
now that I've really gone intothe the deep cuts and stuff. I'm
like, Oh, this, this would be,because, like, You've so many
catchy songs.

Unknown (01:08:11):
Thanks, man. I really appreciate that. That means a
lot coming from a guy who haswhat you have on your wall back
there.

Yeah, no. I love, I love, I love catchy stuff. I
love pop metal, but I love, Ilove all kinds of stuff you talk
about jazz. And I remembertaking a history of jazz class
in college because I thought,Oh, this will be an easy credit.
And then the guy made me fall inlove with jazz. I was like, Oh,
this is I love jazz. I love theblues, like, I love all that
shit.

Unknown (01:08:35):
Yeah. I mean, Willie Nelson, for me, was the gateway
to jazz. For me. He's justWillie Nelson. Yeah, Willie
Nelson is an incredibly hardhitting jazz guitar player. He's
never thought of that. Oh, mygod, yeah. You ever, you ever
seen him live? No, no man. Hecan just medley in and out of
any jazz standard from 3040, 50years ago. I mean, he's, like,

(01:08:57):
he's, he's the best in theworld. You know? He's just
killer.

Yeah, that's another thing. Like, I used to
hate country music, and I stillthink I kind of don't really
like the era of the 80s and 90spop country. I think it's not
the greatest, but some of thenew country stuff, like, like
Oliver, Anthony and those kindof guys that it's almost like, I
don't even know what you wouldcall like, folks soul or it's
like, more emotion and more raw.
That stuff is amazing. I think.

(01:09:22):
Familiar with Rustin Kelly? No,but I've got another one to add
to the list now. Yeah, I

Unknown (01:09:27):
find out about I found out about him because he did
teenage dirtbag. But he's a guythat fell in love with the rest
of his catalog. You know whoelse is killer? Lucas Nelson,
Willie's kid is, oh, just, justgot so many killer songs, man,
he's got this one tune. I'lltell you. Hold on. Oh man,
what's the name of that? Lucas?
This song you gotta hear tobelieve this is just, you're

(01:09:51):
gonna be like, What the hell

yeah. I'm trying to think I always forget the songs
that I like, but there's somesongs that I've heard. That
there's a guy, Brent Cobb. Idon't know if you've ever heard
of him, but it's almost like70s, like James Taylor kind of
stuff, but it's with a countrytwist.

Unknown (01:10:09):
Did I say Lucas Wilson?
I think I screwed it up. LucasNelson. Hey, no, you said

Lucas Nelson, yeah, Willie's

Unknown (01:10:15):
kid. Willie's kid, yeah, that would make sense. So
he's got a Oh, man. These tuneshe's got are just so sick trying
to find this one

I love that you still love music. That's always
disheartening to me. When Iinterview a musician and they're
like, I don't I don't listen tonew music, or they don't listen
to any music, because they livemusic so much that during their
free time, they would ratherhear silence or a podcast. Hell
no.

Unknown (01:10:49):
Oh. Find yourself.
Listen to find that is a tune.
What a tune. I mean, it's likeit sounds like a fucking Otis
Redding wrote it, or somethinglike it's so it's so cool. It's
so cool. Find yourself by LucasNelson, check that out.

Okay, I will do sounds like I got a lot of
homework? Yeah, man, I like it.
It's fun. Homework. Okay, cool.
Anything else you want topromote? No,

Unknown (01:11:13):
man, I think we're good. I mean, just go to we just
calm and check out the shows. Wejust come forward slash shows,
and we just calm store. And I'll

put the website in the show notes so people just
don't even have to type. Have totype it. They just

Unknown (01:11:23):
click it. Yeah? And when you come see us live, you
shout the songs you want to hearand we'll play them. That's, you
know, that's how

I love that. Yeah, I'll be there front row when you
come to if you come to Phoenix,don't come here in the summer,
though, obviously, I don't thinkyou have that schedule.

Unknown (01:11:35):
Made that mistake before, yeah,

you're like, oh, wow, this is they're giving me
such a good deal on this,renting out this place in
Phoenix, like the hotels arecheap, we should go to Phoenix
in August. Yeah, that'll be a

Unknown (01:11:47):
good idea. Oh, my God, there's a hair dryer in my face.

It's rough. All right. Well, thank you so much.
Yeah, no worries. Thanks forhaving me, man. All right. Nice
to meet you. See you later. Takecare from

THEME SONG (01:11:57):
the rockets to the wise men, soon as men soon and
Fauci.

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