Ep 18: "Just doing bits to 10 people feels dirty" with Freddy Correa

Freddy met his comedy idols then bombed on their show. Freddy also filmed and witnessed a viral video real time.

Episode Transcript

(00:10):
Hey, what's up everybody? Welcometo Hacking Boo Bombing Stories with Jay Hollingsworth
today. My guest is a goodbuddy mine. He has a podcast called
Thanks for the Invite, which Iwas on with Yoshi. I was on
there with Yoshi, great comic.Uh, Freddy Korea, Yes, sir,

(00:30):
how are you doing, Big IrishJay? I love you, buddy.
I love you too, buddy.Nobody knows what the fuck is going
on? All right? By theway, when you you you studied,
as you said, Big Irish Jay, because I'm sure you're probably used the
same Big Jay. I posted anad for a show I have coming up,
and like two people got on there, like, who's this guy trying

(00:51):
to fucking ride on Big Jay Oakerson'scoattails? This guy Big Jay's way funny?
And I'm like Jesus Christ, allright, I'm I'm not gonna shot
on Big Jay. You know itis what it is. Anyways, Uh,
what is your story, Freddie?Give us your best bombing story?
All right? Well, actually hasto do with Big Big j. That's

(01:11):
funny, Big Jokerson, Big Jokerson. Now I j Big Jew J.
He's a jew. Yeah. SoI went to skin Fest in twenty eighteen,
just straight up as a fan.I bought my ticket. I told
my wife, I'm like, hey, I'm gonna go to his comedy festival
festival and scope it out. Uh, And I'm gonna save as much money
as I can to, you know, because she's not going into yours.

(01:33):
I'm going by myself. That's herdream to go to New York. But
I'm like, look, I'll stayin the hostel. I went, stayed
in the hostel, went to skinFest, and I got to meet Big
J and uh introduced myself and whenI said my name, He's like,
hey, your name sounds familiar.I'm like, yeah, you talked about
my video about the dude getting kickedin the chest um in Vegas. It

(01:55):
went viral and you, you andDan Tolder did a whole episode on there.
And I'm sorry to interrupt you reallyquick. Is that your video?
Yeah? Holy shit? Ide I'veseen that video multiple times. For the
people watching or listening, what isis there? Like? What would they
google to see the video? Hecklergets kicked by comedian and there's different people

(02:19):
that posted it, so you couldwatch any version of it. And that's
the best way to find it.Yeah I did. I had no idea
that was your video. Yeah,yeah, that's my video, bro,
Lizzie. So if you've seen itseveral times, you see that somebody's recording
from the back and then it cutsinto the side of you. Lizzie without
me even telling her, when sheheard a bunch of squealing, she she

(02:39):
just picked up her phone and recordedhorizontal, you know, like a good
girl instead of vertical back in theday. And then I came out of
the restroot because I heard yelling too, and I just immediately started recording a
splice both videos together. Shit.Yeah, go check that out. Felicia
is in the chat. Go checkthat out. That's a fucking crazy video.

(03:00):
Okay, sorry to interrupt, SoBig Jay uh and was it?
Uh Louis Louis J. Gomez.They were talking about it on the podcast.
Uh oh oh, Dan Soler,Sorry, that'd be good if you
guys, if anybody looks up thatvideo and type in the bonfire, they
actually do commentary, and it's likeit turned into like forty minutes of them

(03:22):
stopping the video and doing commentary.It's fucking great. Okay, all right,
sorry, no, it's all good. Bro. Um you don't have
to apologize all the time. Allright, sorry for apologizing. By the
way, am I too far fromthe mic? Because you're great, Okay,
You're beautiful. You're a beautiful man. You're beautiful beauty. So anyway,

(03:42):
I talked to Jay and and thenshe was like, so you're a
comic. I'm like, yeah,it's like you want to do a spot
tonight. And it was the kickoffparty and I'm like, I forgot to
mention they were having a basketball tournamutewith comics. That's where I ran into
him. During the day, hetells Christine, his girlfriend, Hey,
put this guy on the kickoff partyshow. Steve Wren is easy. Ri

(04:02):
Shafier can condon all kinds of peopleon the show, bro And it's it's
at the creak in the cave,and I think I went on like ten
or twelve leven something, But rightbefore I went up, they announced,
Hey, upstairs, the Legion SkanksPodet is about to go up, So
that fucking room clear. It gotsucked out, But I'm not gonna blame

(04:28):
it on that, you know,I'm not gonna blame it on the only
a few people there. Here's here'swhy it's my worst bombing story. While
the show's running and I'm pacing aroundand I'm like, fuck, I gotta
go up on the show. I'mthinking, man, I made it.
I'm with Ari, I'm with BobbyKelly, all these people are here.
I'm on the same show. Andthen as I'm pacing this guy in the

(04:48):
back, he's like, hey,then he used to live in Reno,
Nevada. I'm like yeah. Andthen I looked into his eyes and I
recognized them and it was an oldco worker from the cable company up in
Reno Stacey and uh and and he'slike, what are you doing here?
I'm like, well, I'm acomic. What are you doing here?
And he's like I listened to LegionSkins and I had not talked to this

(05:12):
guy like in ten years. Bro, sweet guys, super cool. We
just never kept in touch and startedto interrupt you at this point as you're
like, because you when you weresaying like Bobby Kelly, Ari, Shpear,
all these great comics, and You'relike, holy shit, I made
it. How far are you inthe stand up at this point? Um,
I mean I'm eleven right now,going on twelve, So I think

(05:32):
this is yeah eight years, sevenyears, okay, all right, got
you? Sorry? Yeah yeah,yeah yeah yeah. So he didn't know
I was a comic. Stacy didn'tand and I told him, I'm like
I'm actually on this show. He'slike, no way, we gotta see
you. I'm like, hell yeah, dude, I'm like, okay,
I'm about to crush this shit.Um that that room was roaring, bro

(05:54):
and then New like up and cominglike myself. We're going up in between
the heavy hitters and they're they're fuckingkilling bro. So I'm like, this
is it. This is it.They might even ask me to do the
rest of the skining Fest. Yeahyeah, so, uh they may bring
you on the radio third chair.I'm not lying. I I in my

(06:15):
head, I had that delusion.I had the delusion of them invited me
on the bonfire and interviewing me aboutthe whole raid Zone video. Oh dude,
I can see it. Yeah,and uh so I go, um,
I'm about to go up. Hiswife is there, a couple other
friends. It was a crew ofthem, and then when the floor just
vacuumed out of there, I wasleft with maybe ten people or so,

(06:39):
but the guy behind me before me, he's still killed, so it's no
excuse. You're like, okay,it's still a hot room. And I
got some people. I'm gonna impresshim with my killer bits, and I
go up, bro, and fromthe start, from the start, nothing
but crickets. And then I hadI had another bombing story where the same

(07:00):
night, I saw Joe Rogan bombat the thirty twelve thirty and I thought,
in my head, Joe Rogan gotout of it. He pulled out
by addressing the situation. People left, and then he got him back and
it was just a pop in anyway. So I'm like, I'm duo Joe
Rogan. I'm gonna address that I'mbombing, and then I'll get back out
and get into my bits. AndI started addressing that I'm bombing, and

(07:23):
somebody in the bags like, yeah, you're bombing. I'm like, ah,
I look at my friends. They'resitting on the right side, and
I'm like, hey, anyway,this is comedy, and they have like
this face, like you know,like when the little kid's ready to open
a present. They're like just happyto see it. But then their face

(07:44):
went from happy to just like disgustit. Bro and and I get off
stage, I fuck up. Thenext guy's intro totally fuck it up,
and he has pissed that I bombed, and he's pissed that I fucked us
name right, So he goes offand tries to make fun of me.
Now he's bombing. So I turnedinto bomb city, Bro that I went

(08:05):
there for a mission. It waslike a suicide bomber. Jud did Jay
or did you see Jay? Afterthat? No? No, no one.
Everybody everybody as anybody was upstairs alreadygot you and and the creek in
the cave, the old one inNew York. The basement was a room

(08:28):
that could fit maybe a hundred peoplesquished in um and yeah, no no
one saw me. Uh And thatwas like a big comic. But here's
what sucks, bro. Afterwards,this is the kickoff party. So this
is Thursday night. It's gonna gothrough Sunday. The ten people that were
there and my friends, they keptrunning into each other like throughout skating fist.

(08:52):
Bro. There was a guy withthe giant beard. He's like,
hey, I saw you perform,Like, yeah, that was terrible.
It's like, but everybody was sonice though, you know, you would
have thought that people were gonna belike, this guy stinks, and they
were like, ah, man,you know, it is what it is.
I've seen a lot of comedy.It's no thing. And it made
me feel better. But then myfriend Stacy, after that, we actually
became good friends. We bonded overlegion skanks, so we became like traveling,

(09:18):
Like we traveled with them to goto Houston into skank Fest. Yeah,
we go. We went back toNew York the next year, so
we room in with them. Itwas totally cool because out of that shitty
bomb, I gained his friendship andhis wife's and they're friends with my wife.
So yeah, so that's crazy.As you blow up, he can

(09:39):
always be like I remember you atthat ten person show, Freddy. Yeah,
it's it was pretty embarrassing to seesomeone that you haven't seen in a
while, and then you just surprisedhim with hey, I'm a comic and
now I just totally suck bro,and and that part of the I guess
this whole overall the bombing is thatvideo you recorded. Can you talk about

(10:05):
that a little bit? Like sothat was an open mic, right,
yeah? Okay, yeah, yeah, okay, So it was an open
mic. My friend Sammy Saloio,who's a comic for me, know,
he was visiting and I want totake him out to hit up a mic.
He had just started comedy. Andthis is probably twenty fifteen or sixteen,
and I look on the Facebook page. I see Tino is running this

(10:28):
mic and downtown on Fremont. Yeah. I hit him up. I'm like,
hey, bro, can you pleaseput us on the list. He's
like for you, yes, Ishow up. There's nobody there, of
course you can put us on thelist. So I show up and you've
seen the video. There's like fivepeople in the audience. There's um raid
Zones walking around getting ready to dohis thing. Uh, Tino the guy

(10:52):
who kicked raid Zone. So Idon't know who is raid Zone? Is
he? So that was here inVegas? Yeah? Yeah in Vegas?
Is because I haven't seen this raidZone guy. He is he still do
stand up? Yeah? He does? He does? Really? Yeah?
I seen him a wise guys quitea bit. Okay, all right,
Sorry, I was just like,no, no, you're right. I

(11:13):
should have given a background. Ijust assumed everybody knew who raid Zone was.
As stupid I mean, um,raid Zone is a guy that's a
wacky dude. He puts on wackyshirts. He throws paint on his shirt,
like living color, just random splatsof paint, and hats with pins,
whatever, and he goes around witha little keytar. He starts playing

(11:33):
a keyboard and then um, sometimeshe brings a ukulele. That kind of
thing. You say sounds key tarted, Yeah, all right, yeah,
so so he would We knew himsince I mean I knew him since I
moved to Vegas in twenty twelve.And he would go around open mics.
He would always yell out shit,and I just thought it was an old,

(11:56):
crazy guy with turrets or something.I didn't think he was evil.
And then I started learning that he'sactually a dickhead. He's a jerk to
everybody. He thinks he's above everybody, above paygrades, Like he actually thinks
he's all Hollywood. I don't know, he's he's he's key tarted, you
know. And so he's there andI'm like, oh, this guy's here.

(12:18):
I didn't think nothing of it.Tino's outside barking, trying to get
people, luring them into the openmic. I got a couple that sat
in the in the mic, andwhen the couple the guy that I don't
know if you remember, but listento the video, and when raid Zone
gets kicked in the chest, there'sa guy in the audience that says he

(12:39):
pulls down his glasses. He's like, no, that's funny, and everybody
just starts laughing. It's just becauseit was so awkward. It broke the
tension. So this is how ithappened. Tino was pretty much trying to
figure out who's going to go outfirst, and he pointed in Rais Zone,
you want to go out first,and Raison was like, yeah,

(13:01):
but can you give me ten minutes? And Tino lied to him. So
so if people that say that Tinowas right and taking the mic away,
I'll be honest. He did promiseten minutes. So raid Zone is there
bombing his ass off, eating shit, and Tino's like, you know what,

(13:22):
it's over. He just grabs andtakes the MinC And that's why raid
Zone was furious because he was promisedten minutes and I heard it. He
is right. He's like, yousaid ten minutes. You say, He's
like, sit down, Raid andhe starts, you know, making fun
of him and it's not until hemakes fun of his mom, who's dead
that Raison had it and he runsover there with his tinfoil hat, right,

(13:46):
Sabbia, I was gonna ask you, is that a fucking tinfoil hat?
Is? Yeah, it sure is? And and and he's I don't
know what he's gonna In my opinion, I think Raidzone was just gonna get
up to his face and point hisfinger at his nose or something. But
Tino having Marshall, uh, whatis it? Jiu jitsu? Is that

(14:09):
what you did? Yeah? Thereyou go. Yeah, well, Tino's
instinct fucking kick and yes, stopshim with his foot. I don't even
think, yeah you him, Wellhe did kind of like, oh right
here at the bottom of the fuckingSparta kicked him. Yeah he did,
bro. I was trying to defend, you know, but he did.

(14:31):
And but the fours, the fullfours, you could see fucking raid Zones
all him just fucking it was anamazing kick. And I was like,
this is glorious. I just gotthis on my camera and and then I
zoomed into the tinfoil hat fell onthe side and I went in slow motion
and I got it bigger and bigger, and then that's how the video ends.

(14:54):
And uh, the reason I releasedthe video, by the way,
I never thought I was going torelease it. Um, we left because
we're like, the costler can gethere, let's just go to another.
So we went to another open mic. Bro. By the time I got
to the next open mic, theyknew, I was like, there was
nobody here. How the fuck theyknow? You know, comics are though.
Immediately everybody's like, bro, right, So I'm just got this shit

(15:16):
kicked out of it. Bro.It was like a big bully just got
a retarded bully just got fucking beatup, you know, because he would
bully other comics and now he gotfucking kicked in the chest. And and
people were begging me, dude,send me the video, let me see
the video. And I would letpeople see a video and make sure they're
not recording because I'm like, fuck, is it gonna um Uh. So

(15:37):
then I finally said, you know, fuck it, I'm gonna edit it.
And I did, and I putit out and that shit spread like
it went viral and I got Igot a lot of people loved it.
But then it got ripped off andsomebody ripped it off and put it on
World Star. That's when it reallytook off. Because my video has like

(16:00):
eight hundred thousand views. It stoppedbecause it got flagged for violence. But
on world Star it went over Idon't know how many. If it's two
million now, but it wentn't overa million. Can you do anything with
that or you just yeah, yeah, yeah, a little bit. I
got reached out. Someone reached outto me from Ridiculousness on them TV.
A comic reached down. He saidif they could have the rights to use

(16:23):
it, and I said, well, let me ask Tino. I ask
permission from Tino, and then theyworked out a deal with him and myself
and we got paid for it.They put it on Ridiculousness. O nice.
Yeah, so that was nice.Did you guys run it by a
raid zone? I cannot run itby raid zone. Bro, he thinks,
get the shit kicked out of him. They didn't even get a buck.

(16:45):
Oh my god, Bro, Ifeel bad bro, because as we
laugh, he thinks he did arebuttal. Go on YouTube and watch the
rebuttal. Yeah. He puts theTV and he over the commentary and he
does his own commentary and he's he'she thinks that he calls us illegals.
He's like these illegal Mexican He's likethey got rich because of me and this

(17:11):
and that. And I honestly thoughtI was gonna get in trouble with the
lawn because he sent us. Igot a subpoena one there, I got
served papers to go to court andhe was doing a civil suit and I'm
like, uh, the day thecop came up to me and he's like,
I need to turn these papers intoI need you to sign here.

(17:32):
I'm like, what is this about. He's like, there's a guy that
says that you guys jumped him ata comedy show. Jesus. And I'm
like, no, I recorded it, like he recorded it. I'm like
yeah. He's like, well,here's the papers for him. Like can
I share the video? And Ishowed the cop the video? Laugh.
Yeah. Bro, that video getsum. It pops up every once in

(17:57):
a while, some big people shareit. B J Penn, Michael Rappaport
recently, and I keep getting hitup by that video. People think I'm
the kicker because I put my name. Oh yeah yeah so yeah. Uh
going back to your your bombing storyat Skankfest is now you're a few years

(18:19):
out from it, uh and moreexperienced comic. Is there anything you would
have changed or that you learned fromthat, or is there anything you think
you could have done to where youwouldn't have bombed? Man, I listened
to your podcast and I was tryingto prepare for this answer, and I
think the best I could have doneis I should have started talking to the

(18:41):
people, because you know better.I mean, you've been doing this longer
than me, and you're a fuckingbeast, bro. I fucking love your
comedy. And I've seen you inbig crowds and I've seen you in little
crowds, and you know how littlecrowds it sounds gross when you're doing your
bits. I don't know. Yeah, yeah, I know, okay,
yeah, because it feels like itfeels the equivalent. That's such a fucking

(19:03):
great point, Freddie, for thoseuh listening or watching, Yeah, when
you have a small crowd, that'sa I never thought of that, but
it is. It's like a grossfeeling because it it feels almost to the
equivalent of somebody like just in aconversation going oh, you're a comic,
Oh tell me one of your bitsand you and you never fucking are going
like, oh okay, cool,let me tell you one of my jokes

(19:26):
that just to you it. Yeah, that's dude, it's so true.
Sorry, all right, No,that's that's a great example. And another
example similar to that is let's sayyou're around comics and you know, when
you hear one comic going into abit, yes, and you're like,
oh, what are you doing?Yeah, it's like that one show where

(19:48):
the guy would set you up andaround uh comedians unleash or whatever. Oh
yeah, because everybody's telling funny storiesoff the top of your head. But
this guy going into a bit andit sounds it just feels gross. So
I yeah, it's just I thinkI should have went away from the material
and kind of talk to the peopleand weaved in my bit into the conversation.
And that's what I've seen people likeyou, people like Butch Bradley,

(20:11):
um, you know, Greg Wilson, people that go on there and they
just they it's like you guys seethe matrix bro. And I'm on that
path. I'm like, okay,oh shit, this guy, this crowd
right here, I'm gonna have todo a little bit of work to get
them. So I'm gonna talk tothese people and see which one of my
bits I could throw at them,you know, right right. But yeah,

(20:34):
that's that's something I think, andI think I've gotten better at over
the years. That's great. No, yeah, that's uh god, I
never thought of that though. Likeas far as that, you do feel
fucking gross if you just if youjust kind of go into cruise control mode
with a small crowd, you're justlike, Okay. And now I will
say I do and have done thatin corporate gigs, like dude, I

(20:59):
there was I did one. Ithink I've talked about it on this Uh.
I did a corporate gig in Bellevue, Washington, and it was on
a Sunday at like three o'clock,three pm, and the games were playing,
so I'm I just walked under Ijust stood under a TV that everybody
was looking at the game, justbecause I wanted to at least feel like
they were looking at me. Andthen I literally just fucking rabble them off.

(21:21):
I was like, I did myI think it was like thirty minutes,
and you know, I'd be inthe middle of a setup and like
the Seahawks would score in the wholeeverybody what. I'm just like, I'm
gonna keep going. My head's downand I'm just gonna fucking get through this
thirty and get my check. Butdude, yeah, it's it. Does
you do feel fucking just gross,Like with a crowd that you're just like,

(21:41):
okay, here we go. Yeah, especially with someone you've known for
Oh yeah, that's right, you'rethere, you know. I was like,
fuck, yeah, Like that's that'sanother thing. It's like I learned
a long time ago not to himby co workers to see you perform.
If they happen to be there,it is what it is. But because

(22:03):
if it goes bad, you're gonnasee these people at work during the day
and ship and it's it's bad.It's like they just give you that look
where they're like I was there.Yeah, Yeah, they lose respect.
I've had co workers on my currentjob loose. Literally they were treating me
a certain way because they knew itwas a comic. But when they went
to see me and I ate shit, they're they're added to change. They

(22:26):
stopped respecting what I said. You'relike, bro, I'm your fucking supervisor.
It's like when you stopped respecting yourdad or your parents, Like like
I don't need to listen to you. You're like you're like, don't let
the jokes fool you. I willfire your ass all right really quick.
So you have the podcast, Thanksfor the invite. Um, do you

(22:51):
have a website for it or justgo on iTunes or yeah, you could
go to Freddy Korea dot com.All my links are there, and uh
it's on YouTube. And so myname is Freddie Recker on social media f
f R E d R E kE R across the board, Twitter,
everything, so even on YouTube ifyou type that in you'll find my podcast.
Thanks for the invite, Podcast withFreddie Korea. And uh, I'm

(23:14):
doing I've done, I've done thetransition that you what you're doing video and
it's been great. I love it. So yeah, dude, it's fun.
Uh and also just if you're onlylistening to this, uh, Freddie's
last name Korea is spelled c OR R E A. Thank you Freddy
Korea dot com. Right, yeah, okay, thank you for doing this,
Freddy. I appreciate it. Loveyou brother, and then until next

(23:37):
time, guys, bombs away,fucking