EP 431: Seth and JD Peel Back The Comedy Curtain

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Welcome to Episode 431 of The Clean Comedy Podcast! This week JD and Seth catch up, talk about the world of the comedy tour, the comedy business, and peel back the curtain of comedy clubs. It's an intense episode! 

Come see Zane and I in Colorado! You can see all the tour dates at ZaneLamprey.com

Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/the-clean-comedy-podcast-w-jd-creviston--4825680/support.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hey, real quick, if you're a clean comedian or trying
to be one, you've got to get on my Clean
Comedian Pro Tips newsletter. Every week I send out one
killer tip to help you write tighter, get booked more often,
and build your clean comedy career without selling out or
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and quick the link join up, sign up. It's free,
so stop guessing, start growing, go out there, be clean,

(00:21):
get some green. Hey, everybody, welcome to Clean Comedy Podcast.
It's Jady and I'm back with my boy Seth Lawrence.

Speaker 2 (00:27):
What's up?

Speaker 3 (00:27):
Seth?

Speaker 1 (00:28):
What up? Everydy feels like we should have that DJ horn, like.

Speaker 2 (00:36):
The airhorn, baby, dude.

Speaker 1 (00:37):
I don't know how long it's been since we've done
a podcast together, but it feels like a year for
some reason.

Speaker 2 (00:42):
A long time.

Speaker 1 (00:43):
Yeah, and I'm sorry for that.

Speaker 3 (00:45):
I don't know if it's your fault, really, I think
you're busy, you know it's uh, it's your headliner's fault.

Speaker 1 (00:52):
Zane Lamprey, and he is I guess. I guess it
could be his fault, but he is paying me and
taking me on the road, so I can't really can play.

Speaker 2 (00:59):
I think that's a good, good problem to have.

Speaker 1 (01:03):
Yeah. Yeah, so it's it's good to be here to
do it again. Uh So this we're recording this on Monday.
I leave again on Friday to go to Denver for
a for a week. From Saturday to Saturday, I'll be
hanging out with a cool Mark Masters one one show
where he's gonna come and do a set, drop in
and do a set. Uh So, it's crazy. I'm working

(01:23):
on a whole new project, so law School, stand up,
Family travel podcast, and then the new thing that's coming out,
and I'll announce it here so that you guys can
hear it. There is a I change the substack. It
is now called Clean Comedian pro Tips, and so it's
all about giving pro tips every All the stuff I'm

(01:44):
learning on the road I'm passing on to you guys.
I'm sitting in the car with Zaying for two four
six hours sometimes talking about stuff going over at business
or whatever, pitching things, all these things. So the substack
is not changing. But if you're a paid member, don't worry.
Some great perks are coming out of it from from
a f So if you were previously doing that where
it was the funny money things, the same kind of stuff,

(02:06):
but better tips. I think that I'm going through. I've
already written all the way up to June's stuff, so
that the official announcement for the for the website will
be on Thursday, and the website will send out an email,
will do all stuff, but I'm announcing it on the podcast.
If you listen to the podcast, go sign up for free.
Sign up free there. Don't worry about the paid tier.
Don't pay for it right now. I don't want to

(02:27):
pay for it. I don't know how to dismantle it.
So I apologize, but don't sign up for it. Just
do free. Everything's gonna be free on there. And I'm
developing a whole new comedy course and comedy stuff to
help people get paid being clean. I've been getting asked attitude.
I'm learning stuff from Zaane being on the road. I've
already been pitching for places for the next two years

(02:48):
that I'm gonna be doing my owns tour on. So
I'm all as I'm doing these things, I'm gonna be
giving you this information. First thing is gonna be a
free guide that I will people will sign up for,
and I'll give you that and then there'll be a
course leveling piece. It kind of like will tear up,
like you'll get this basic tear for Like I think
the first thing I'm pitching is like seventeen bucks, the
next thing is like forty seven dollars, and the last

(03:10):
thing is like one hundred and forty seven dollars something
like that. It's like it's but it's designed so you
can get all the information that you need. But go
sign up Clean Clean uh Clean Comedy pro Tips and yeah,
yeah it's fantastic. And so as if I needed to
add something else to my plate, seth, I guess.

Speaker 3 (03:28):
Are you feeling restless? I get with the idea of
coming back off with the tour. You're like, ah, what
I gonna do for the next two hours?

Speaker 1 (03:36):
Yeah? I mean that's the thing is, I had a
week off last week and I was kind of going
crazy where I was like, I didn't have any shows
booked because I kind of eat you the rest. I
was hanging out with the family, which is great, but
I found myself sitting down one day and I was
like I was looking at my substack and I was going, no,
something is there's something better than this? There's something better
that I'm missing that I need to fix, and I

(03:56):
just like started kind of going into that brain thing
of writing down stuff ideas I had and uh, and
my wife goes, what are you doing? I'm like, I'm
trying to fix this. There's something here that I want
to fix and I don't know what it is. And
she goes, well, what are you trying to do? Give
somebody tips or something? And I was like, well, yeah.
She's like yeah. She's like, well, you're a pro, I
mean you should be able to do it. I was like,

(04:17):
pro tips, Queen Comedy Podcast, Queen Comedy pro Tips I got.
I'm like, and that was down there rabbit hole literally,
I think froh. Saturday they went to WrestleMania was on,
but they went to a movie. They went to, like
See Little Women or No Pride to Prejudice, which is
back out theaters or whatever. I don't know what it is.
It's one of those things. It's something that I've not read.

Speaker 2 (04:39):
What's that which Pride and Prejudice is out?

Speaker 1 (04:42):
I think it's the original. Well like the Cure night
they won got re put out again.

Speaker 3 (04:47):
Oh okay, I'm gonna say, I mean, I guess that
is like the only film. Yeah, feature film. There's a
bunch of like A and E is EBC's Yeah.

Speaker 2 (04:58):
So I was gonna said, anyway, okay, gotcha.

Speaker 1 (05:01):
So I say that I had WrestleMania onto the background,
and here I am just banging away. I don't know
how many articles I wrote. Actually, I can probably go
tell you exactly how many articles I wrote. I have
scheduled thirteen articles and I have eleven drafts, so that
is twenty four articles that I wrote in about three days.

Speaker 2 (05:24):
Eez, Louise.

Speaker 1 (05:25):
And I was just everything that I had been writing,
because I've been writing stuff down while I was on
the road, just writing things down to like, oh I
should do this, let's write this. Yeah, I'm looking and
like reformatted it and like worked it into like talking points,
and so you guys are gonna get overwhelmed. And I
have it all the way I think they're They're already
set up to distribute all the way through July seventeen

(05:46):
as the one, and then once that passes that I
can add them because they will let me save it
for like four months up in advance or something like that,
or three months in advance, and then I have to wait.
But I have eleven more in my drafts that I
will be posting up that you guys will be getting.
So there will be no more Funny Money podcast So
I apologize to anybody who was excited about that. There
will be no more Funny Money podcasts. Green Comedian pro

(06:07):
Tips is just the written portion Queen Comedy podcasts, the
podcast portion there. The book that's coming is called clean.
Uh what is the called booked? Oh no, there's that.
There's that's a different one. I have this all written
down because I've done so much. Where's that. I'm great,

(06:30):
I'm broken. It's Oh, there's a lot there's it's like
it's it's yeah, it's a whole It's a whole clean
brewprint on getting booked, How to Get Booked Properly, how
to It gives you all the all the places you
get booked that are outside of clubs, all the guides,
all the all the the things I wrote to call

(06:51):
and email places, all that stuff, contracts, all those things. Uh,
so you're gonna get all that kind of stuff.

Speaker 3 (06:58):
Uh.

Speaker 1 (06:59):
That is just gonna be there to to build something.
So just just keep that in mind. You know, it's
gonna be amazing. It's just great good stuff. Uh, just
you guys. Once I get it going, and now I'm
learning here's the problem. I'm also learning click funnels at
the same time, so I can get all this stuff
set up so that way there's a process so I

(07:20):
don't have to be constantly doing stuff. Because one of
my good friends shout out to Christa Morelli is just
did a whole thing of I wrote a bunch of
ads for her. It was called She's a company called
Laugh Laugh Your Ads Off, where she does funny ads
for companies or whatever. And I wrote her a bunch
and I did some I performed a one that didn't
get released where I played a dog that attacked people.

(07:42):
It was great, it was super fun. So just stuff
like that. And now she was like, she released her
book how she made money like sitting on the toilet
and doing stuff or whatever. And I was like, you
know what, this is your are your genius, Kristen. So
I gotta go and like, uh, work on that and
get this stuff. But there's a lot of there's a
lot of stuff here that I'm that I'm working on

(08:03):
that just is going to be a great, a great
thing for for everybody and stuff. So get get excited.
There's a lot of stuff coming. Just just know why
I'm I why I'm on the road. I'm not being lazy.
I am I am actually creating stuff.

Speaker 2 (08:19):
I'm sure that's what everybody was thinking there.

Speaker 3 (08:21):
Is what what a lazy sack of bones?

Speaker 1 (08:27):
And when I come back in May again. In May,
I'll be doing one show in a Gorey Hills, Californias
for the LA area. I'll be doing a show in
a gore Hills at the Candy Club. Come out and
support I'll be I think I'll be doing somewhere between
five to ten minutes, hopefully ten minutes or so. I'm
gonna try to push them to give me to be
able to do by the whole set that I do

(08:47):
for Zame, which is like fifteen minutes. But we'll see
fingers crossed and stuff like that. And Seth, what's been
going on with you?

Speaker 2 (08:54):
Jeez? Nothing?

Speaker 3 (09:03):
Oh man, No, I've been what I've been actually dealing with,
like homemaking stuff.

Speaker 2 (09:10):
We're in the middle of redoing our backyard.

Speaker 3 (09:13):
I've been digging that up and getting it ready for
the groundcover that we're going to put in.

Speaker 2 (09:22):
So that's just in my regular life. I start this week.

Speaker 3 (09:26):
We're recording this on the twenty first, but I'm teaching
a stand up workshop at the McGroarty Arts Center starting tomorrow,
the twenty second. It's a weekly deal, so every Tuesday
evening teaching people how to do stand up, where to go,
what to do, what not to do? Maybe though what

(09:46):
not to do is a pretty short list, honestly. Don't
wear shorts on stage.

Speaker 2 (09:50):
That's about it.

Speaker 1 (09:52):
Flops, no flipps, flip flops.

Speaker 2 (09:54):
Yeah, yeah, no shorts, no flip flops. What else.

Speaker 1 (10:00):
Where? Wait? Where is that? And how can they set
up for it? And like do you is it like
a class that happens every week or is it like,
oh's come for a one day drop in? Like what
sign up?

Speaker 3 (10:08):
I mean, the sign up is done, it's the class
starts tomorrow. You could go to the McGroarty Arts Center,
but it starts on the twenty second. So I mean,
unless you're releasing this today on the twenty first.

Speaker 1 (10:19):
Let's released on the twenty second, so we'll be released
right well maybe so.

Speaker 2 (10:22):
Yeah, maybe there's time go to the McGroarty Arts Center.

Speaker 3 (10:25):
Uh and McGroarty is spelt a little bit weird, is
let me look that. Let me just make sure I'm
telling you all the right things. So it's mc.

Speaker 2 (10:38):
G r O A r t Y Arts Center. Arts
and center are both spelled the same way you normally would.

Speaker 3 (10:49):
But anyway, it's a little it's a little arts center
in Tounga, California, so a little out of the downtown
a way, but beautiful location anyhow, So we do some
some stand up there. It's every week starting on Tuesday,
starting tomorrow, and then it's every Tuesday after that for
I think it's four sessions. I need to double check,

(11:10):
but yeah, for four weeks. I think it's basically all.
So it's April. It's like the end of April and
the first.

Speaker 1 (11:18):
Half of May, and then at the end of it
is there like a showcase show or something like that.

Speaker 2 (11:23):
Not going to work that out.

Speaker 3 (11:24):
But the problem is I'm going out of town. I'm
going to Denmark at the end of May, like right
after it ends. Okay, So I would normally try to
like put some of these people on, like most stand
up classes end in like a show. I haven't been
able to pull that together yet because I'm always out
of town right after the class ends. But we're this

(11:46):
is the second edition of this class, so I'll hopefully
be able to get that together the next time we
do this iteration, and I'll get people in on a
show and let them kind of showcase their talents.

Speaker 2 (11:59):
So anyhow, so that's just a little good time. Yeah.

Speaker 3 (12:04):
Other than that, my uh, I've taken also a hiatus
form my podcast. Just everything is like it's gotten too busy.
If you have if you have four kids, you start
to I was driving after dropping off my oldest at
Attract Me and I was driving home and I was like,
we had too many, too much, this is too much.

Speaker 1 (12:23):
So that with too bro with too I've been trying to.

Speaker 3 (12:27):
Catch up in life a little bit. Yeah, so I've
taken a hiatus for my podcast, The Self Help Yourself.
There are still episodes up. I still have a plan
for what I want to do with it. I still
have books that I'm trying to read and listen to
anyhow so I'm still trying to do things, but real
life has get getting in the way unfortunately.

Speaker 1 (12:50):
No, no, I don't blame you. I mean literally that's
I mean.

Speaker 2 (12:53):
So that's where we are.

Speaker 1 (12:55):
Yeah. See. The good thing is I know a lot
of communiys to go. Well, you could just vet job.
But like Zaan is not a veger, right, He's not
a guy who's gonna sit around whatever. So he's kind
of inspired me. Like why I'm in my hotel room
before we go do shows. If we're not, if I'm
not doing stuff to promote other shows or get that
stuff going or whatever, I should be creating something. And
so just you know, I did look it up. I

(13:15):
do have it written out. It's the Clean Comedian Booking System.
So it's designed to help you book gigs at places
outside of comedy clubs. It's like churches, AA centers, old
folks homes, communities, all these places, churches, all these places
that have a need for comedy, but a lot of
people don't do. And I didn't say that I think
you know this though, but I did. Last year I

(13:37):
did a bunch of retirement villages quote unquote, old folks homes,
retirement communities, all these kind of things. I did a
bunch of those for a couple hundred bucks to pop
and make good money. And was learning how to do
this so that I could take it and then teach
somebody else how to do it so they can make
money and that was my whole goal was to say,
all right, let's see if this works, Let's test it
out on me. I'll be the guinea pig. I'll make

(13:58):
it work. Actually had such a big list of places
that at some point I was like, I'm not I can't.
I can't do all these this is crazy, and actually
had some people that I booked to help me on
stuff or whatever. But it was such a good thing
where I was like, oh my gosh, this could be
a business unto itself. You know, you could be doing
a couple hundred bucks a week of worth of shows,

(14:21):
and that could be a business in itself. If you know,
if you did one or two shows a week at
one hundred to three hundred bucks a pop, which is
kind of the range for those it's not a lot,
but you're if you're the only one, you bring your
own stuff, you go and do it. Think about how
much money you can make, and then when it comes
to holidays, Christmas, New Year's whatever, you can amp the
price up a little bit more if you're gonna go

(14:41):
do a special show for them, maybe you're hosting something whatever.
And then it also led to me hosting events. I
hosted you know, fundraisers and community events, and then also
we produced that show in Bakersfield, and so all these
things came out of me trying these different things, and
that's great. I found, Oh there's a market for this,

(15:03):
and I'm only one man. I can't do it all
over the country. I can barely do it in the
LA Regional County area less. So there's gonna be more
you guys who could make money. And if you're in
some place that's not a New York or LA, the
opportunity is the ceiling is huge because you're the only
game in town, you know, especially if you're clean, if

(15:23):
you're professional, and if you are rebookable, you can make
a ton of money. Being rebookable is like the greatest
thing in the world.

Speaker 3 (15:32):
So yeah, yeah, well, I mean that's awesome. I think anybody,
for whatever reason, our business. I think there's kind of
two polar opposite. There are people who are like they
hoard all the information and they don't want to share
it because they feel that scarcity mindset, Like if I
tell other people that I'm out. So I think it's
awesome that you're putting it out there so that others

(15:55):
can benefit from it, because it doesn't mean that that's
less for you, you know.

Speaker 1 (15:59):
Not at all.

Speaker 2 (16:00):
Yeah, So I love that. That's awesome. I'm going to
check that out.

Speaker 1 (16:03):
Yeah yeah, and we'll probably be one of my first,
uh first test subjects, I guess, so to speak, beta testers.
But it's just been it's been crazy. And I know
that you were you toured before, so you've been on
the road, you know how that is. Man, I did
not realize the amount of how much I have to
watch what I intake on the road affects me, like

(16:23):
how tired I am, how well I sleep, all those things.
I really had to dial in my eating and my
process of like what I partake of on the road
because we go to breweries. If you've ever been to
a brewery, the food that they have there not health food,
not at all, not even closest to health food. Nope.
Not Joe's burgers, hot dogs, pretzels, pizza, like everything that

(16:49):
you possibly can be Like, oh dude, I probably should
be eating this right now, and you're eating it at
like seven, eight, nine o'clock at night. It's like bro
sometimes on the drive back that is correct stuffing our face.
Although if we have a really good show, and we
have a long drive, we go and stop and get
ice cream at like a gas station and we'll get
like ice cream bar and eat that and then make
fun of each other for eating ice cream so lately,

(17:09):
you know. So, but it's one of those things. I
just it was just nice to have time home, have
last week where I had nothing going on and I
could kind of just could just rest for a little bit. Although,
to be fair, I took my daughters to la on
Monday to like the Amiba, the Funko Store, all these things.

(17:30):
Like we did like a whole outing into Hollywood, but
on a Monday, so it wasn't too bad. On Wednesday,
we went to Malibu. I got my passport because we're
going to the Caymans this summer. And then and then
on Friday went to Santa Barbara and did a bunch
of stuff to get ready for Easter. And then of
course Easter was on Sunday, so another big thing like
family or whatever. And then WrestleMania was Saturday and Sunday,

(17:53):
so those are my big it was. It was a
busy week, but also a good week of kind of
hanging out with the family, relaxing and enjoying time like that.

Speaker 2 (18:00):
Oh that's great, well, good, good for you.

Speaker 3 (18:04):
On the road is exhausting, though, aren't you just like
wiped out coming back?

Speaker 1 (18:09):
Yeah? I sleep pretty well the first time I get home.

Speaker 2 (18:12):
Yeah, and then I get into a routine and I
gotta get stuff done. I gotta I gotta make a
new shit series.

Speaker 1 (18:19):
Yeah. Yeah. It's the problem is I can't. I have
too much going on in my brain that if I
don't get it out, it just drives me crazy and
I'll and I literally will not sleep. My brain will
be like, hey, dude, why are we not doing this?
You gotta do this thing. Let's do this other thing,
this thing, kid? Yeah, Like, dude, shut up, brain, I
love you, but also shut up. You know.

Speaker 2 (18:39):
That's hilarious. Yeah, your best friend and your worst enemy.

Speaker 1 (18:42):
Right, yes? Yes? So are you still doing your weekly
show and stuff or is that on hiatus too?

Speaker 2 (18:49):
Monthly monthly showy? Okay, yes it is.

Speaker 3 (18:53):
The next one is this Saturday, the twenty sixth at
the Glendale Room.

Speaker 2 (18:57):
So we've got a great lineup, and I'm trying to.

Speaker 3 (19:01):
Build a culture for the show to have kind of
bigger names drop in. So I've reached out to some
people who have expressed some interest in the past and
just kind of reminded them, hey, you're always welcome here.
So you know, these are blue check mark people. So
hopefully we can build that kind of buzz around the show.
That's the plan over the next few months is to

(19:24):
build the show up that way. But we still run
it at the Glendale Room the fourth Saturday of every month.
I still maintain it is LA's best clean comedy workshop,
maybe because it's the only one, but it's a good show.

Speaker 2 (19:39):
It's a good show. No.

Speaker 1 (19:40):
That's the thing is there's not a lot of spaces
for clean comedy, and so I think that's one of
the things that I keep getting told. This is the
funny part about me going on tourisine people will come
up to me and go They'll go, man, that was
a great set. Did you are you clean? Are you
a clean comedian? I go yeah, and they go, oh man,
that was great. I even noticed it until afterwards. I
was like, wait that got and say anything dirty.

Speaker 2 (20:01):
It's yeah, that's the best.

Speaker 3 (20:04):
That's the goal, right, is to have them enjoy the
show and then realize, oh wait that I don't feel itchy.

Speaker 1 (20:10):
Yeah, yeah, and I'm not saying Zane is a dirty community,
but he drops some words of it, like I wouldn't
say in my set. But that's that's the great back
counterbalance between us two, right, It's like he's going to
say some things that I would never say, and I
keep I bring a clean, fun vibe to the beginning
of the show, and he brings his fun vibe that's
a little bit dirtier to the end of the show,

(20:30):
and everything works out fine. You know. It's a great,
great time, you know. And one of the big bonuses
is he knows I don't drink, so then he can
drink and do whatever he wants and he never has
to worry about getting you ride home. So it's fantastic.

Speaker 3 (20:45):
And we talked about this on the podcast some in
the past, but a lot of headliners do want a
cleaner feature.

Speaker 2 (20:53):
Uh.

Speaker 3 (20:53):
And the added bonus of guys who don't drink like
you and I is that you are the designated driver
after they can party, they can have fun, they can do.

Speaker 2 (21:04):
What they want, be with their fans the way their
fans want.

Speaker 3 (21:07):
Them to be there and not worry about it unless
you know they've throw up in your car.

Speaker 1 (21:13):
Yeah, Now he has a thrown up. Here's the best
part though. People be like, hey, you want to be here.
I'm like, hey, I got to drive. I'm the driver.

Speaker 2 (21:19):
There you go.

Speaker 1 (21:20):
I can't. I can't. I'm sorry. Thank you, thank you.
Give it to say, give it to go ahead, give
z a my dream.

Speaker 2 (21:26):
That's funny.

Speaker 3 (21:27):
I use every opportunity I can to just push my
beliefs on people.

Speaker 1 (21:30):
Oh, yes, smart, that's the way to do it. I
wish I could. I can't do that. I'm terrible of that.
I have the worst I have the worst missionary of
the world. But so it is what it is. But
I think it's a great thing because I get to deflect.
I get to deflect everything.

Speaker 2 (21:48):
Absolutely no, no, I can't. I can't.

Speaker 1 (21:51):
You know whatever. I'm the designated drive. That's a great thing. Well,
as far as toury goes, what is what was your favorite?
What was your favorite at least favorite parts of touring?
I want to hear from you, like, what's.

Speaker 3 (22:04):
Your I mean, obviously there is the performing part that
that was by far and away the best part was
figuring out like oh and when I toured with the
World Series of Comedy, I was the first time that
I really toured throughout the country and it was really
nice to find out, Oh yeah, these jokes work everywhere. Yep,

(22:30):
So that was I think my my favorite part about touring.
Going on the road is just in general though, is
very fun when you're with a good group. If you
can be with a good comic like it's it's like
the best parts of hanging out on the job, you know,
with with fun co workers like that is by far

(22:52):
and away some of the best stuff and some of
the the hardest, you will laugh, is just chatting about
random stuff in the car with the one or two
other comics you're going on the road with. Yeah, it's
it's very fun building those relationships. It's very difficult to
beat that.

Speaker 1 (23:10):
Yeah, exactly right. What was the hard part? What's the
hardest part? What was the hardest part for you? Do
you have like a like me? Sleeping is the hardest
part because I've slept in the same bed with the
same purchase twenty years, right, Yeah, the oldest person. I
hear their breathing, I understand. I have to now sleep
in a bed by myself, in a cold room with
weird noises and a setup that is not my setup, right,

(23:33):
not a not a purifying fan and all these other
things that I have in my room and fooling shit,
just a random bed.

Speaker 2 (23:40):
Such a Prima Donna baby.

Speaker 1 (23:42):
I have a Premadonna baby.

Speaker 2 (23:44):
Yeah, I don't know.

Speaker 3 (23:51):
I never struggle really with sleeping, unless unless I'm like
super depressed.

Speaker 2 (23:55):
You know. The when I.

Speaker 3 (24:01):
Was touring with the World Series of Comedy that the
worst and toughest part was like the logistics and stress
setting up the show, taking down the show, taking care
of the comedians on the World Series, like you become
at least my role as host there. You kind of
become like this babysitter, and there is no worst group

(24:23):
to babysit than other adults. It is by far the
I hated it. I hated that aspect of it so much.
But a typical touring experience, like one that you just
went on, which is maybe some setup for the headliner
and some kind of takedown afterword, I would argue also,

(24:45):
yours is probably a step above. There's like the classic
just going with a headliner. Typically you don't set up
anything because you're just going to a club. You go in,
you do your set, you make sure not to step
on any of the topics, that your headliner is going
to cover and then you glad hand some of the
fans afterward, but most of them are there to see

(25:07):
the headliner, so you're just kind of there to hopefully
accept some people who are like, wow, that was really funny.
We had no idea. You know, that's great. We came
to see this other schmuck and you were really good.
That is really fun. But typically you're not doing like
a lot of logistics. You know, you go, you do
your set, and you leave for some of the less

(25:30):
conventional stuff like what you did just barely with Zane Lamprey,
what I've done with the World Series of Comedy. It's
a lot more logistical of a nightmare because you're like
setting up. Then you have to transition from set up
like techie guy to host to stand up to then
you know, filler like babysitter for other people.

Speaker 2 (25:53):
That part's not fun.

Speaker 3 (25:54):
Yeah, and that part is the worst, like making those
quick transitions, and you know, depending on who you're going with,
it can be really punishing to be with a headliner
or a producer who's not tuned in to that process
or is like so focused on how they want the

(26:16):
show to go that if you do anything wrong, they
are like, hey, that was or if not even wrong,
wrong's not the right word. Different from what they want. Yeah,
then it's you know, you have to answer to them.
So then it's like great, I got to turn this
around and now do a whole different set for like
this next show that's coming in in a half hour.

Speaker 2 (26:36):
That kind of stuff is a nightmare. That's not fun.

Speaker 1 (26:39):
Yeah. No, we have the logistics stuff to set up, breakdown,
dialed in, we have a checklist, we have all the stuff.
We know the order that's supposed to go in where
things go keep in mind to us. So I set
up all the audio, all the lighting, all the sound,
all that stuff. Then I have to go set up
a merch table. Then then he sets up cameras and
we make sure we have all the camera angles done.

(27:01):
So that's all set up. That's the last thing we
do is the camera stuff. So we have two cameras
filming every night, black magic camera six K amazing stuff.
Then before the show, even the real show starts, which
it starts at eight at seven, we let in all
the VIPs and Zane plays games with them from seven
to fifteen to about seven forty or so plays games
with them, and so I have to be the runner

(27:22):
to like get get the games, help people get seated,
see if there's ticket issues, also selling merch during that time.
And then there's a time where he plays flip Cup
with everybody, So I have to set up the table,
get the beers, put the cops up, do all the stuff.
Then when they're done playing flip Cup, I play music
to play them off, then go clean up that mess,
then go back to the merch table. Then at eight

(27:42):
o'clock I go up and host and then host, turning
into introducing myself to do stand up for fifteen minutes,
and then introduce Zane and then moved back to the
merch table, where I am for most of the time.
And then at the end of the show, stay at
the merch table, let him go through the meet and
greet stuff. When I get a break, when there's no

(28:02):
more people online at merch, start breaking stuff down. Sometimes
have to run back to the merch table because somebody
wants something. Then go back to breaking stuff down and
packing all that stuff up and putting in the car,
and then we leave. So it is are we get
there at most places, we get it there around five o'clock. Yeah,
VIP starts a seven, so because us two hours to
set up, which we use every second of that to

(28:24):
get set up. I've never been done early just hanging
back like this was easy. Never. Yeah, once I wish
and we have it down to a science. It's not
like it shouldn't be able to do that, because I
could break it all down at about thirty five minutes
max and even have it into the car by then
and driving off, so all that stuff and then selling

(28:44):
merch and doing that so I'm also counting merch stuff,
making sure we have all the merch things putting out there,
running the app like a square app to take it,
take cash, take all this stuff. It's chaos. And then
by the end, by the time I get in the
car at the end of the night, I'm like, I
sit in the driver's seat, the drive back to where
we're going, and I go and it's just like and
it's not even over because then I have to take

(29:05):
all the gear up to my room so it doesn't
get stolen out of our rental car, which is has
happened as a before. I'd rather be all into my room,
charge everything for the next day, all the batteries, all
the all the stuff, take all the audio, video off
everything and put it on a hard drive. Do all
this stuff, then get myself ready for bed. Then go
to bed right and I'm already amped. So it's like

(29:26):
I'm antier and I've got to like slowly work my
way back down. So the last thing I do before
I go to bed usually is take a shower, just
the long shower. Just stand there and kind of like
like let it all out, like the not the ace
mature shower. I'm crying in the shower, not that, but
a but a similar style of trying to just like
decompress in the shower.

Speaker 2 (29:45):
Yeah, Loise, Yeah, dude, I mean bringing back PTSD.

Speaker 1 (29:50):
I'm sorry, I'm sorry.

Speaker 2 (29:52):
It's too much.

Speaker 1 (29:55):
It's a lot. But you know, here's the thing. I
get paid. Well, I'm not going to complain about that.
I get great sages, I get great video and audio.
I'm learning how to run a tour, how to book
a tour, how to run ads for advertising a tour.
All those things I'm learning from zay are infinitely worth
more than what i'm being paid. Not that i'm not

(30:16):
getting paid good, well, I'm getting paid well, I'm not
gonna ever complain about that, but it's really a lot
more than I would have gotten, say, touring with Darren,
when we just go to a comedy club, right, the
comedy club puts it or whatever. Infinitely more information, and
now that information is going to go into the Queen
Comedian booking system to see it's all paying off for
you guys.

Speaker 2 (30:35):
Boo, yeah, yeah, I mean that's great. Yeah, that's great. Yeah.

Speaker 3 (30:40):
I mean I think the stuff that is in general
not fund about stand up is all the stuff you
have to do in order to do stand up, to
be honest.

Speaker 1 (30:48):
Yeah. The other the other thing is mae, now I
have to also take all that video and audio and
stuff put together and start making clips and stuff so
I can get my numbers up and whatever. Because here's
the crazy. So we're on tour and Zane has I
should go look at it. It's like I want to say,
it's close to two hundred yeah, yeah, go look about za.

Speaker 2 (31:09):
I'm on Insta right now. Let's see Zane Leapri.

Speaker 1 (31:12):
I think he's has close to two hundred thousand or
over two hundred thousand followers, yeah, two and one, two
to one. Now, don't go looking mine because min's terrible.
But I have less than a thousand followers, just so
you guys know, less a thousand followers, and I haven't
been putting up stuff. But now I have to get
all this material. Don't go look, seth, how dare you look?

Speaker 2 (31:34):
Go?

Speaker 1 (31:34):
I have to get all this material, start putting up clips. Yeah,
driving my stuff up to do it. And but we
were looking. There's a tool we can go look see
who has real how many percentage of their followers are
real or not real or whatever. So the average person,
like say big Celebrity could be the Rock could be,
Kardashian could be whoever, their average between twenty and thirty

(31:56):
percent of their followers are actually fake. Yeah, because it's
because there all these bots of people out there. They
have to follow people to make sure that one they
do the fake following for whoever it is. But you
would not believe how many comedians have hundreds of thousands
of followers that are fake.

Speaker 2 (32:11):
Oh is that right?

Speaker 1 (32:13):
Seventy eighty percent of them sometimes are fake. Yeah, we
looked up a bunch as we're driving, We're like looking,
he has the app, he like pulls it up, He's like,
oh my gosh, like Dwayne the Rock Johnson just you know,
twenty five percent of his followers on Instagram are fake Jesus,
And it's like that for the Kardashians, it's like that
for every And it's not that they're buying fake followers.

(32:33):
It's that the fake followers that other people do buy
have to follow real people in order to be seemed legit.

Speaker 2 (32:39):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (32:40):
Yeah, well, the comics, I would say most they're buying them.

Speaker 2 (32:45):
They're buying those fake followers, a lot of them.

Speaker 3 (32:48):
There.

Speaker 1 (32:48):
There's way more. And I'm not gonna say any names
because I'm not throwing shade, but I was surprised. I'm
not gonna throw shade, but I was. We're laughing in
the car, like, I was like, how does this person
have so many followers. He's like, well, let's look them up.
We're like yeah, he's like, oh, sixty percent of them
are fake. And you're like, oh, that makes so much
more sense, you know. Or I think the highest what
we found was eighty one percent of one comedian's followers

(33:11):
were stadies. I'm like, but they're booked constantly. They're constantly
being booked off of those numbers, and I'm like, oh,
how are they selling the tickets. Then if that many
of their followers are fake.

Speaker 2 (33:24):
Well it's conspiracy. It conspiracy.

Speaker 1 (33:27):
I don't know how it works, but it was. It's
very interesting just to see what it is. So I
am now organically trying to build.

Speaker 2 (33:33):
Yeah, good for you.

Speaker 1 (33:34):
And so the goal is by the end of this
year ten around ten thousand followers plus. That's the goal.
I don't know if I'm gonna get there, but I'm
gonna give it my darkness. I'll say that right now.

Speaker 2 (33:43):
Nice.

Speaker 3 (33:44):
Yeah, No, I think we've all got to figure out
this social media game, which is quickly becoming necessary and
the worst aspect of stand up right now. Yeah, I've
talked to a lot of comics big and mall listen
to a lot of interviews of bigger comics who just
absolutely despise the social media game because it is it's

(34:10):
just an absolute game. You have to post. It has
to be like, it doesn't matter if it's good. There's
no rhyme or reason to what pops off versus what doesn't,
and it makes no sense.

Speaker 2 (34:21):
And and I had this experience. So I also run.

Speaker 3 (34:25):
An open mic in the Glen at the Glendale Room
every Wednesday and maybe that was the weekly thing that
you were referring to.

Speaker 2 (34:34):
Yes, that is still happening.

Speaker 3 (34:38):
Jamie Bliss, Heather z Inc and I run that every
Wednesday and it's it's a great mic.

Speaker 2 (34:44):
But we had somebody come in who just sat in
the back. I talked to her.

Speaker 3 (34:48):
For a moment before the mic started, and she was like,
basically she said, yeah, I'm She was trying to be
modest about it. She's like, she was like, I'm like
a kind of a big YouTube. I had no idea
who this person was. I still don't. I didn't ask
for a name. I was like, okay. And here's the
reason that I was a little put out by it

(35:09):
is because she said, you know, I'm a big YouTuber.
I wanted to come down here. I thought there was
a stand up class tonight. So I showed up. And
the Glendale Room does have stand up classes improv classes periodically,
but not at Wednesday, not on Wednesday night at seven
thirty because that's for Mike.

Speaker 2 (35:27):
So she'd shown up for this class and I was like, oh,
are you new to stand up? And she you know,
then it came out, well, no, I'm like a big YouTuber.

Speaker 3 (35:35):
I'm like trying to get into stand up because I
got like, I'm on the phone with a touring company.

Speaker 2 (35:42):
They want me to tour as a stand up in
like a month or two.

Speaker 3 (35:47):
And I'll tell you it took me everything I had
JD to not be like I hope you crash and burn,
to be honest, because this is the problem with stand
up right now.

Speaker 2 (35:58):
Yes, is you're gonna go out and do is not
stand up.

Speaker 3 (36:02):
And that's like, I wish you all the best, I
wish you the success, but do not call it stand up.
And if you're on the phone with a stand up
touring company, they should go out of business.

Speaker 1 (36:13):
Yeah, exactly right, one hundred percent.

Speaker 3 (36:15):
There are so many comics that they could be helping
and and actually providing a decent stand up show, like
do that?

Speaker 2 (36:24):
Why it? Anyway, it's all these people.

Speaker 3 (36:27):
Wanting shortcuts to ticket sales and they don't care about
the product. They just want to sell something, and it's
really hurting I think stand up in general.

Speaker 1 (36:37):
I agree, and that's why I wanted to That's why
I want to create this system because I keep hearing
these stories and after seeing all these fake things happening,
I was like, no, I'm going to take this away
from the powers that be. Yeah, take it away from
the gatekeepers. So the people that are they're saying they
have your best interests at heart, when they do not,
and give comedians the real power to go book their
own stuff and make their own money, you know, to

(36:59):
go out there and find places that are not clubs
that are not you know, the event centers and the
stadiums and the you know.

Speaker 2 (37:09):
Yeah, because most of us aren't doing those anyway.

Speaker 1 (37:11):
Yeah. Yeah, And the clubs are not paying most comedians.
If you go to Flappers, no offensive Floppers, although you
know what, some shade the Floppers. If you're working at
Flappers and the Chateau and those places, they're not paying
ninety percent of those comedians. The ones are paying the
headliners only, and not even that much. By the way.

Speaker 3 (37:29):
Yeah, I mean, I would say this, Flappers holds a
nice place. There is a place for Flappers. Yes, they
could be run better, yes, but there is a place
for a club that gives opportunities to rise in comics.

Speaker 2 (37:43):
I think that's great. The Chateau needs to burn, yes,
it does, to the ground.

Speaker 3 (37:48):
It is.

Speaker 2 (37:49):
It is not they don't provide a good show.

Speaker 3 (37:52):
They cheat their comics, they're not paying well and the
guests that go are.

Speaker 2 (37:58):
Trapped for hours, hours or.

Speaker 3 (38:01):
Hours during just awful, awful shows anyhow, So I could
go on about that place, but I think that place
deserves all the shit it needs to close.

Speaker 1 (38:12):
But I mean Floppers, for a long time their system
was bringer shows to get comedians to keep coming to
this and I think they kind of have backed off
a little bit from that. Maybe there's still a little
bit of that happening.

Speaker 3 (38:25):
Yeah, from what I understand, Flappers has kind of shot
themselves in the foot by moving to a.

Speaker 2 (38:34):
Gift like they paper the room. A lot of clubs
do this right. They want they want people in.

Speaker 3 (38:40):
The door because they can give a free ticket, and
clubs have this flexibility. There are two ways clubs make
money for everybody who's listening. They either make money from
ticket sales on the door or well really and they
also make money from the two ite minimum. That's why
every club imposes a two at a minimum in the showroom,

(39:02):
so they are guaranteed money. The reason they require those
two items is because they have over time lost people
ticket sales wise, so they give out free tickets.

Speaker 2 (39:19):
Now, there could be a whole number of reasons for that.

Speaker 3 (39:21):
Some of it is maybe they're not booking the best
stand ups, so then people aren't excited to come out
and see the stand up show. Economy gets bad and
people don't have as much discretionary spending, so they feel
like they're getting a deal if they get a free ticket,
but then they spend just as much, if not more,
on the two items in the showroom. But those are
the two ways clubs make money is on ticket sales

(39:43):
at the door and then food inside. And often clubs
will give out free tickets because they know they're gonna
make money regardless, because the people are gonna buy.

Speaker 2 (39:53):
The food and the drinks they have to.

Speaker 3 (39:57):
The problem for comics is that generally the deals are
based on ticket sales, not on the item minimums, or
it's just a flat fee. Right, So that is one
issue for comics going to clubs and expecting a big
payout when the room is full. The problem is the

(40:18):
room could be full for a whole number of reasons,
and generally it's not because people bought tickets, you know,
unless it's like a big comic, right yeah, but you
know clubs are so aren't like I don't want to
paint this picture of clubs being like healthcare companies, the
idea like just raking and dough and sticking it to

(40:40):
the lowly.

Speaker 2 (40:41):
Comics clubs are barely surviving. Yeah, and there's a whole
other host of reasons for that.

Speaker 3 (40:47):
But unfortunately what they do is they stick it where
they feel like they can, and that's to comics. Because
comics on stage time, they hope for fans, they hope
for a great opportunity or whatever. So generally we are
willing to go and play a show for little to
no money in hopes of something better coming along. And

(41:10):
the unfortunate reality is that often that isn't what happens.

Speaker 1 (41:14):
That is correct. That is correct. They are the business
and you are the show, and those two don't always
come together to meet to make show business. They just
happen to be in the same vicinity. Right. There's a
lot of comedians who are in LA that have one, two, three,
four day jobs, drive uber, Jewelry's whatever, all this stuff
just so they can go and do their five ten

(41:37):
minutes on stage at Flopper Chateau Haha, improv comedy store
if they're lucky. You know, all that kind of stuff,
laugh actory if you're even luckier, I guess, because that's
a very slim way to get in there.

Speaker 3 (41:51):
Yeah, well, all the like, all the clubs are I mean,
I just found out that the comedy stores to switch bookers.
I was talking to a friend who was like trying
to make it in with the last booker at the
comedy store. And that's the other piece that maybe is
a little inside baseball for your listeners.

Speaker 2 (42:07):
But the club is not like a static entity.

Speaker 3 (42:13):
It is constantly changing, and the people, like the key
for comics wanting to get on a stage at a
club is the booker. So if you're like making head
roads with one booker at a club and that booker leaves,
there is no institutional knowledge at that club that lets

(42:33):
you progress as a comic. You start all over with
whoever it is they bring in as the new booker,
and that new booker has people and ideas of their own.

Speaker 2 (42:44):
You might not like it might be you just never
play that club.

Speaker 3 (42:48):
You were close, you were very very close, but that
was with the last booker and now you're out, completely out,
And it is that's the other piece that is so
infuriating as a comic trying to make it in the
business is that there are a handful of clubs that
can really help you in your journey, and they are
so difficult to pin down and get.

Speaker 1 (43:10):
In exactly right. Yeah, I mean I was doing what
I was doing the road with Darren. I came back
and a club, you know what I'm gonna say, Floppers
got a new booker. I came back and had to
re audition, and that booker did not like me. And
guess what. I have not worked at Flappers since then,
except for that other headliners that brought me as their
opener against the wish of that booker, and I performed

(43:31):
there and did well and whatever, but that booker has
not booked me since. I have not done Flappers in
probably two years, three years maybe yea, and okay, whatever,
you know, but.

Speaker 3 (43:43):
Yeah, yeah, well, and it's you know, the pandemic messed
up a lot of things for a lot of people,
and the comedy world is still recovering.

Speaker 1 (43:53):
And look, I'm not just so somebody knows. I'm not
trying to throw shade to that booker. I'm just saying
we didn't vibe. I don't know I didn't vibe. I
thought we had vied before I thought things were good.
Apparently I rubbed him the wrong way somehow, and now
I am persona now Granda at Floppers, which is fine.
I mean whatever.

Speaker 2 (44:11):
At some point, here's a reason for any of this stuff. Often,
you know, it's infuriating.

Speaker 1 (44:17):
Yeah, it's it's such a weird thing. And you know,
and I've been trying for years to get into haha.
I've had a lot of people help try to help
me get in there, and just has not happened, you know. Yeah,
and then why I've seen other people who I don't
know what the word is, I've seen other people get
in that. I was like really like, yeah, come yeah,

(44:37):
You're like, I'm like, what happened here? So there's a
lot of those kind of things that happened.

Speaker 2 (44:41):
You know.

Speaker 1 (44:42):
I've always wanted to get into the store. I don't
think that'll ever happen. I mean, I think Preacher Lawson
just got uh into the store and as a pig
regular or something like that. I think I saw that research. Yeah,
and that dude has been everywhere and done everything. It
has tons of credits since like yeah, TV shows, Uh Specials,
Big Giant Tours, America's got talent all these things. I

(45:04):
think he just got it, got invited to have a
spot like that. I don't think his name's on there yet.
I don't know if that's the thing yet. But you
got one of those spots. It's like, that's what it took.
Preachers way better than a lot of people that I
know that that have spots at places. And I'm like,
for real, but that's part of it, man, Like it
just is a thing.

Speaker 2 (45:25):
Yeah, I mean it is.

Speaker 1 (45:26):
Uh.

Speaker 3 (45:27):
I guess that is where comedy is very subjective. Yes,
is about who quote unquote makes it, and there's a
whole myriad of definitions for what making it means.

Speaker 1 (45:39):
That's true.

Speaker 3 (45:41):
But as far as breaking into the clubs as being
one form of making it, that is, it's such a
time and place kind of a thing.

Speaker 2 (45:51):
It's you got to be prepared. But then there's a
lot of luck that kind of comes into it as well.

Speaker 1 (45:57):
I consider it the everest portion of comedy because getting there, yeah,
you can, you can plan for it, you can plan
the route, you can do all the stuff. There's no
guarantee you're getting to the top of that bad boy, right,
there's no guarantee you're gonna make it all the way.
You might make a part way. You might see it
and go, oh, I'm right there, and then boom, something happens.
You're back down at the bottom with what I'm doing

(46:19):
and what I found and what I'm learning and what
I'm about to put out for the Queen Comedy booking system,
it's all about trying to do it yourself so you
don't have to do ever, so you can go climb
whatever mountain you want. You're building and then climbing that mountain.
So it's it's that's what that's what I want to
give comedians. You don't have to be behold to bookers
or clubs or the huge drink minimum or whatever. You

(46:41):
could be doing churches and community centers and AA meetings
and private events and commute rights, retirement communities and all
these things and make a living doing it and you
and all you have to do is comeable a good set,
have a good pitch, be able to talk to those people,
and be bookable over and over and over again, and

(47:03):
you will have opportunities come at you like you would
never believe that. Look, I'm not the best community of
the world one hundred percent say that I'm not the
funniest person. I'm not the best, I'm not the strongest.
I don't have their biggest following. But I make a
living at comedy, you know.

Speaker 3 (47:19):
Yeah, I think what a lot of listeners need to
understand is that there is there are a lot of
different ways to quote unquote make it as a comic
these days. And the classic I guess what we would
think of classic kind of eighties model of clubs and touring,

(47:39):
getting on the tonight shows, it's just not the way anymore,
not the only.

Speaker 1 (47:47):
Way, yeah, and not even the primary way anymore.

Speaker 3 (47:51):
No, right, not even the primary way. That is the
one benefit of social media is that you can kind
of create to an extent your own success on social media.

Speaker 2 (48:01):
That then leads to these other opportunities.

Speaker 3 (48:04):
Because the truth is, Hollywood doesn't know, like and Hollywood,
I mean just the entertainment business in general, they have
no idea what people want, they guess, and we accept
it because they're kind of the only entertainment industry, you
know what I mean. And the same thing is for like,

(48:26):
clubs are trailing popularity, they are trying to survive, and
so they're just booking who they think will bring them
ticket sales rather than the classic model, which was we're
giving we have a venue that has a following, and
we're going to give you an opportunity for those who
don't know. You know, the Johnny Carson Show, which was

(48:49):
The Tonight Show, took place in LA and Johnny Carson
himself and his writers producers would go to the comedy store.
They would pick people off stage to then go do
a set on The Tonight Show.

Speaker 2 (49:06):
That definitely does not happen anymore.

Speaker 3 (49:10):
And to the extent that it does happen, it is
happening more in New York than it is in LA.

Speaker 1 (49:16):
Because that's what are you.

Speaker 2 (49:18):
Know, Yeah, that's right, that's where all those shows are filmed.

Speaker 3 (49:21):
And even there they are, they are not discovering comedians
any longer.

Speaker 2 (49:28):
That used to be like your launching pad.

Speaker 3 (49:31):
Now everywhere is trying to trade like they are trying
to get eyeballs, So they're picking people who are already popular.
And that's why social media has taken over, is because
that's where you can prove I'm popular.

Speaker 2 (49:45):
Although you can also buy it, you can also.

Speaker 1 (49:49):
Fake it, tell you make it.

Speaker 3 (49:51):
So anyhow, I don't know if that brings a full
circle or not, but I'm glad that you're doing the
take the power back kind of movement that you're creating
there with the booking system, because that's the truth. We
have to book ourselves and create our own opportunities. And
if you're in an area that has an independent that
is non club comedy scene, it's probably really good to

(50:15):
be honest, those shows. You can find some really good
independent shows. Some of the best shows I've been to
are produced like I produce them or my friends produce them,
because it's just so much easier to find good comics
that way than to.

Speaker 2 (50:32):
Go to the Like if you want to see a
big name, go.

Speaker 3 (50:35):
To a big club. That's and there's definitely value in that.

Speaker 2 (50:39):
Go do that. That is very fun.

Speaker 3 (50:41):
But if you want to find new comics, clubs are
very difficult for that. And to the extent that you
are seeing a new comic at a club, they might
not be the best ones out there. There's a lot
that goes into that and they might have an off
night or whatever. But go to some independent shows, find
smaller venues. It is a different experience that I guarantee

(51:04):
will be a story because it's either going to be
really really good and you're gonna see some of the
best comedy you've seen, or it's gonna be horrendous.

Speaker 2 (51:12):
Yeah, and the.

Speaker 3 (51:14):
Best stories are gonna tell for the take friends of
the show and reminisce for years to come about the
guy who pulled out a turtle out of his hat.
You know, like that's crazy. Anyway, you'll see some really
crazy stuff.

Speaker 1 (51:31):
Yeah. And if you're in LA area and you don't
want to go see clubs in LA again, Glendale there
there's a Glendale room that Seth does. If you want
to go the other way, go out towards Ventura, go
up to Santa Barbara, sam Beart and all that community
in Santa Barbara. That comedy shows up there are amazing.
They're off the hook. They're one of my favorite places
to see not only see comedy, but do comedy. And
then if you're outside of the big cities LA, New York, Austin, whatever,

(51:55):
those kind of places in Chicago, there's plenty of smaller
areas around there the Midwest where you can create an
entire scene yourself and become the person who does comedy
shows and produces stuff and puts other comedians up and
builds those places out to be it. I have friends
in mind there building something in Tulsa right now. I
have a friend who's building a new club in Washington.

(52:17):
It's on the other side of Portland, Africa, Vancouver, Washington.
That's gonna be huge because he's taking the input from
comedians as opposed to other bookers and whatever. He's building
the cointic club he wants to go to. He wants
to see comedy at. So it's amazing. There are so
many people out there building it that their traditional club system,
that traditional style of kissing up to a booker, kissing
the ring, hoping you get booked for the host spot,

(52:40):
hoping they promote you to feature, hoping that somebody takes
you on the road. All those things. You could break
out of that stuff. You can do it yourself. And
it's stune Zane right now, who does have three three
stand up specials, tons of TV shows, lots of TV credits.
Isn't really known as a stand up That's not what
he's really known as. He's known as this drinking guy
who did all these drinking shows on Travel Channel Network

(53:00):
and all the stuff. But he is a legit stand
up comedian. Watch his stuff. He's amazing, and he's built
a whole ecosystem that is his that he owns. He
holds his mailing list, he olds his fan base, he
owns his ticketing he holds all those things. And guess what,
he's making a legitimately great living doing it. Is it hard? Yeah,
but anything worth doing doesn't come easy. It's that's not

(53:23):
how it works. So there you go.

Speaker 2 (53:26):
Yeah, I love it. I love it. I love this
this soapbox that you're on, and I.

Speaker 1 (53:32):
Don't want to be on a soapbox. I just want
to evangelize, I guess no.

Speaker 3 (53:37):
And I like the system that you're creating, the help
that you're going to put out there for people.

Speaker 2 (53:41):
I'm not kidding. I'm gonna check it out for sure.

Speaker 3 (53:45):
Have you talked about what it takes to make or
find a good venue, because Matt might be a good
topic for next or a future episode.

Speaker 1 (53:53):
No, I'm doubt Yeah, I'm down to you, and it's
gonna be part of the system. Definitely. That's one of
the things that I am going to talk about his
venues and finding a good venue. You uh, pricing for
tickets for that? If you if you're gonna sell tickets
for a venue as opposed to whether the venue is
paying you to come in and do it. So, like,
if you get a church, right, and we'll go into
this in a different episode, But if you get a church,
there's two options, right. You can either have the church

(54:15):
sell tickets to it, or the church can pay you. Well,
there's three ways church can sell tickets to it. The
church can pay you a flat fee, which they usually
will pay out of uh, you know, tithings or something
like that. Or you ask the church, hey, can I
have your venue? Can I perform for your congregation? But
can I sell tickets and then tithe a certain portion

(54:35):
of ticket sales back to the church. Right. Not every
church is okay with that. Some don't like that you're
selling stuff. Some would rather say, we want to sell,
we want to control the event, we want to control
the venue. Uh, we're gonna take donations for it or whatever,
and then tithe you know, that's a tithing, tithe offering
to you or whatever it is, and that way they
do it that way. But a lot of places, like

(54:56):
an old folks on retirement village, they're not gonna let
you sell tickets. They're gonna pay you a flat feet.
You're gonna come in and do the show for their
community and be out. If it's a brewery, like what
Zanana and I do, you don't want the brewery to
sell tickets because guess what, they're not gonna do as
good of a job as you are because they've got
a million other things going on. You're gonna sell the tickets,
You're gonna drive the traffic. They're just gonna give you

(55:16):
the spot, and they're gonna collect like the club food
and beverage while you collect all the ticket sales. So
now that's the hard part. Selling tickets is not easy.
That's where building an email list, building a social media following,
understanding how plinity goes in there. That is not going
into the county booking system, all that pieces, because that's advanced,

(55:37):
next level stuff. The basics here is finding venues that
are already needing entertainment and getting your foot of the
door to perform there. Not for you to learn to
sell tickets and build a following and do those things,
because that is ten levels above where every commutey should
be starting at. I want you to just make money.
That's the first step. Get stage time, make money. That's it.

(55:58):
I don't want to have to worry about selling yourself
and building a website and building a following and understanding
of rent Bright or ticket Master or whatever, paper tickets
and all those other things. Uh, Facebook ads, I don't want.

Speaker 3 (56:11):
No.

Speaker 1 (56:12):
No, that is way too much. Simple call somebody up. Hey,
are you looking for comedy? Do you need a comedy person?
I've got it. Oh, can I get your email? Oh?
Is this that person in contact? Oh? I'll send them
an email with all my stuff. Thank you so much,
have a great day. Put it, send it over. You
have an email already done with all your ePK stuff.
Send it over, next person. You just it's what I
call and what old sales people used to call dialing

(56:34):
for dollars, where you're just calling people as much as
you can to get the right person on the phone
to talk to them to pitch your product. And you're
what's your product? You you the stand up comedian? All
the products?

Speaker 2 (56:46):
Yeah, that's it.

Speaker 1 (56:47):
I did that for for I did that for one week.
That's all I did. One week of just calling places.
I booked twenty venues for the year.

Speaker 2 (56:56):
Yeah, one week.

Speaker 1 (56:57):
If I would have done that every week, every day,
But you and how much work I would have. And again,
I'm telling you, I'm not the best comedian. I'm not
the funniest guy. I'm not. I'm I'm not Seth Cev
performed Sell Yourself. I'm okay, I'm a bee. I'm like
a B. But Seth is a A plus. Seth did this.
Seth will make a killing. He's got way too many

(57:18):
kids to be able to try to do this. But
besides that.

Speaker 2 (57:22):
School, I'm firling the time the school give him to school.

Speaker 3 (57:25):
Next here, twenty twenty six, I'm gonna be out there
on the streets.

Speaker 2 (57:30):
I'm excited.

Speaker 1 (57:31):
If I if I gave Seth this and he was
able to start booking for next year, I guarantee you
he could. While his kids are in school, he could
be at old folks homes making a couple of hundred
bucks every day, doing a show with a one hundred
miles radius of his house, and then be back in time.
You drop his kids off, do the thing, do the show,

(57:52):
pick them up, start the day over again, go out
do shows at night if he wanted to. But always
making money and never worried about it.

Speaker 3 (57:58):
Yeah, hey, now I think it's a great system, and
I think people need to understand that there's so much more.
Just now you have an idea listener of what stand
up is, and that is probably the classic clubs at night,
gritty stand up. That is stand up that is also
not the same type of stand up that JD is

(58:19):
talking about. Agreed, And there are to be honest comics
who have made money doing bad gigs. It's like everybody
everybody does bad gigs. They are not all doing club gigs.
They are doing college shows, which are some of the
worst shows that you will ever do because they are

(58:41):
in the middle of the day and sometimes people are
there to listen to you. Most of the time they
are not. It's like during club week and you're out
in the quad scouting into the void while college students
are walking past you looking at you like you're insane
and trying to sign up for lacrosse or crew or whatever.

Speaker 2 (59:00):
It is.

Speaker 3 (59:01):
So not every stand up gig is the late night
comedy club gig. Some of it is just you're telling
your jokes to people who are half listening.

Speaker 1 (59:16):
Yep, yep. So have you ever have you ever done
though the corporate lunch room the corporate lunchroom shows?

Speaker 2 (59:23):
Have you ever done done a corporate lunch room worst worse.

Speaker 1 (59:29):
That's the worst. I don't care what anyone says. That's
the word. I'd rather take an angry bar show full
of bikers who don't want me there and want to
roast up at me and murder me in the parking
lot the afternoon corporate lunch room show. David, That's how
much I.

Speaker 2 (59:42):
I've heard stories. They do sound terrible, they are terrible.

Speaker 1 (59:48):
Well, thank you everybody for listening. Seth. Where can people
find you?

Speaker 2 (59:51):
Man? Go to my website Seth Lawrencecomedy dot com. I
just updated it. It's at the pinnacle of updated this
right now.

Speaker 3 (59:59):
You can also find my podcast, though I have taken
a slight hiatus, I'm getting back into it very soon.
It's called self Help Yourself Podcast. Anywhere you listen to
podcasts and who doesn't want more podcasts?

Speaker 1 (01:00:12):
Huh.

Speaker 3 (01:00:13):
Other than that, you can find my drive Bar special.
It is the proudest thing I've done so far in
my stand up career. Go to Drive Bar Comedy dot
com and my special is called Ready or.

Speaker 1 (01:00:24):
Not Perfect, And you go clean comedy podcasts. You go
to Genie Crebston dot com. You can even go to
Fatfonsie dot com, which I have these stickers made for
one of my jokes that is killing on the road,
and so I decided to make stickers for it Fat
Fonzie dot com. If you go there, it just directs
to by pop by uh to my website. I'll go
back to J Crebston dot com. But just type in
fat Fonzie dot com if you're if you're watching this,

(01:00:47):
you'll be able to see it. I'm getting these made.
These are gonna be going on the road with me soon.
I'll be hanging them out for free. As long as
people follow me on Instagram, I will be giving them
a sticker. Though, if you're at a show, you follow
me on Instagram, you show me you're following me. Boom,
you got a sticker. It's the fastest, easiest way for
me to advertise. I think dieselill get me to a
thousand followers. But then after that it's really it's really
unb I really got it. But what be the sticker?

(01:01:10):
This is a cool sticker, right, good sticker?

Speaker 2 (01:01:12):
I put that on my water bottle?

Speaker 1 (01:01:14):
Is I mean, can it's anything sticker? Honestly, it's like
you put it on whatever you the cool thing is
when I ordered them, I ordered two sizes, so I
ordered a little one and a big one. But I
like the bigger. I like the big one better.

Speaker 2 (01:01:26):
Sure, bigger is always better.

Speaker 1 (01:01:28):
I'll send I'll send Seth a sticker so we can
put it somewhere that he wants. Maybe you'll put it
in the background on his on his wall. There something
blue tar fund? No, what about this? What about underneath
one of your plaques? What are your plaques there?

Speaker 3 (01:01:40):
The yeah, yeah, yeah, we could frame it there.

Speaker 1 (01:01:45):
You go, well, thank you everybody, and get ready go
Make sure you go check out Clean Commedian Pro Tips.
It's the old substack for Funny Bundy. I'll put the
link in the show notes, but go check it out.
Sign it for free. Do not pay for a paid
tier if you're already a paid tier member. I'm trying
to figure out how to so I apologize, but I
will make it up to you on the back end.
If something happens and it doesn't work, I'll make it
up to you and you will be one of my

(01:02:07):
free testers that comes in it takes the course for
reduced fee feet one of my Yeah, you will be
one of the way three five three to five beta
testers that will come in for a reduced fee to
take the course. Uh the Queen Comedy booking system, you'll
get all the stuff for reduced fee, probably like half
off or something like that, fifty percent off because you're
been a member and I cannot figure out how to

(01:02:28):
refund your money and I apologize to that, and I
can't turn it off. I don't know how to turn
it off. I'm trying. So if anyone knows how to
do that in substack, hit me up. I've looked it
up on substacks thing. It's like, oh, you can only
just disconnect your payment thing, and I'm like, I don't
want to do that either, because then that seems stupid.
Where what if someone pays me? Well here, no, here's
the other thing. What if someone pays me and now
it's stuck in limbo and I can't give them their

(01:02:49):
money back but also can't accept it, right.

Speaker 2 (01:02:50):
That's that's not Yeah. Yeah, I just sign I just
signed up everybody I went. It was very easy.

Speaker 3 (01:02:56):
Just go to Clean Comedy pro Tips, comedianpro tips dot com.

Speaker 1 (01:03:01):
Yeah, Queen Comedian Protips dot com. So you'll be there.
You sign up, you'll get the sub stack. It'll come
out the first the first one, the announcement page with
some stuff in it comes out on Thursday, and then
every Thursday after that you get one and all the
way for forever. And I've been working hard to form
at them and make sure they make sense and have
a tip, have a little pro tip, have a little
thing to do, like a little homework thing to do here. Actually,

(01:03:25):
you know what, I'm gonna give you a preview of
the first one.

Speaker 2 (01:03:26):
How about that?

Speaker 1 (01:03:27):
WHOA Paul? The number one mistake clean comics make trying
to be clever instead of funny. That is it. But
there's so much more. The clever trap I talk about,
the fix, the formula you need. There's a drill of
the week. Every week, there's a drill of the week,
something you need to do, a pro tip of the week,
mic drop moment, and then a links you back to

(01:03:49):
the Queen Comedy podcast and then you know, just as
little thank you at the end of it with a
little silly, funny note for me. Every single week you're
gonna get this. And there's a great graphic that I've
been creating for each one. So for this one is
a giant one. That says, don't be clever, be funny, right,
and it's there, so you remember what I'm trying to
teach you. The one main point is in there. Whatever

(01:04:12):
it is every single week. So after the announcement one
which is big news and even bigger laughs ahead the
next week May first, you'll get that one, the number
one mistake new clean comedians make, and so you'll have that, uh.
And then the next one that you'll get is my
wife gave me this joke for free. It's a story

(01:04:33):
about how I got a joke from my wife. The
next one is bombing is a superpower if you do this.
Why dirty comedians secretly respect comedians? Uh, clean clean comedians?
Three clean topics that always keel that you can steal
and use for yourself and just constantly stuff like that,
These little bitty things that give you here's the insight,
here's how you apply it. Here's a funny information about it.

(01:04:55):
And here's a great graphic. You know, I love this
because this one that the why dirty comics secretly respect
clean ones is deep down everyone knows clean is hard.
Everyone knows that, and so that's why they respect us.
So there you go.

Speaker 2 (01:05:09):
Yeah, I've talked to a lot of comics who say
that explicitly.

Speaker 1 (01:05:13):
Yeah, and that's that's the thing is. But why they
get mad at you, They're scared. They're scared that they
can't do the same thing. That's why they get mad.

Speaker 2 (01:05:23):
Yeah, they they do. And just in daily life, you
realize a swear word almost always can be funny. Of course,
that it is more difficult. It is more difficult to
be funny clean than it is not.

Speaker 1 (01:05:39):
And so that's why I make all these graphics and stuff,
you know, Yeah, I mean, and I just met so
many great graphics, like the one about my wife, like
giving me the joke. The graphic is listen to what
people say in real life.

Speaker 2 (01:05:54):
That's gold.

Speaker 1 (01:05:55):
And you could eavesdrop on people. I've got some of
the funniest lines that I've ever heard people say in public,
out there, and I write it down like that was funny. Now,
how do I take this into a joke that's mine
using whatever the funny thing they said or did or
whatever and stuff.

Speaker 2 (01:06:07):
It's crazy, so beautiful. Well, I'm excited for this series
to come out.

Speaker 1 (01:06:12):
Yeah I am. Thank you guys so much for listening.
Please go like subscribe, have a good one I want
to talk to you shoot Thank you again, Seth Bue