Episode 1190 - Thundercat
Marc:all right let's do this how are you what the fuckers what the fuck buddies what the fuck nicks what's happening we all know what's happening i'm mark maron this is my podcast wtf welcome to it that was my citizens app oh i guess the world is ending is it did you guys get that on yours
Marc:It just came up.
Marc:World is ending.
Marc:Nowhere to go.
Marc:Nowhere to hide.
Marc:Huh.
Marc:I guess that's it.
Marc:I knew I would be notified on my Citizens app.
Marc:So... The King... Chaos Pig... Provoked and gave orders... For an insurrection...
Marc:a coup to a hodgepodge bunch of radicalized hate nerds and gamers, gun dorks, bullshit zealots, cosplayers of the fascist ilk.
Marc:Oh, yes, and Christians.
Marc:This is where it was going.
Marc:This was the parade he always wanted.
Marc:It's ongoing as I'm doing this because, you know, I do this the day before.
Marc:Who the fuck knows what happened overnight?
Marc:I'm recording this late afternoon on Wednesday.
Marc:I'm not a news operation.
Marc:I can't wait till tomorrow.
Marc:But it's pretty clear what's happened.
Marc:And it's pretty clear.
Marc:You know.
Marc:That we have a fairly large contingent of anti-American fascistic people in this country who are politically naive and utterly misinformed and excited to believe whatever bullshit honors their self-victimized state.
Marc:But I mean, there's no I mean, I can't.
Marc:What am I going to sit here?
Marc:I don't have any explanations.
Marc:I knew this motherfucker wouldn't leave.
Marc:I knew he wouldn't leave easily.
Marc:And I knew that he would break the fucking country and the world before he left.
Marc:I'm not saying that's good to know that.
Marc:I've just been talking about it for months.
Marc:But I got no explanation.
Marc:All the explanations are out there.
Marc:This was going to happen.
Marc:This is a hodgepodge, but not without momentum, fascistic movement within our country with a lot of followers and with a leader, our soon to be former president.
Marc:And they're willing to take instructions to overthrow the capital of the United States by the president, who will soon be no longer president, but still the leader of an American fascist movement.
Marc:That's what's happening.
Marc:There's no other way to look at it.
Marc:But the radicalization of the army of unfuckable hate nerds, the gamers, the disenfranchised young men, mostly, has been ongoing.
Marc:Militia groups have been around for a long time.
Marc:Christian evangelical fascists have been around for a long time.
Marc:The sort of amalgamation of many of them under the banner of QAnon, which is an ever-evolving spigot of bullshit connecting the dots of history into something that excites and angers and drives the disenfranchised, the racists, the angry.
Marc:So now what happens?
Marc:I don't fucking know.
Marc:I guess we'll see tomorrow.
Marc:It's like, you know, today would have been a nice day to be like, congratulations.
Marc:Congratulations.
Marc:Congratulations to Raphael Warnock and John Ossoff for being elected senators of Georgia.
Marc:An African-American pastor and a Jew and
Marc:are now the senators representing the state of Georgia.
Marc:Now that's a nice arc, a nice repairing dating back to the civil rights movement that sort of really kind of legitimizes and lands that journey in a way of these two people and these two backgrounds.
Marc:And it's also an amazing step in the correct direction of
Marc:Politically and on a human level, this would be the day for that.
Marc:Congratulations.
Marc:But no.
Marc:How can we get people who want to believe in fantasy that drives them to violence, to racism, to anti-Semitism, to misogyny, to perhaps murder, to try to overtake the government, to take the Capitol and stop the Congress from doing its democratic work, the work of the people?
Marc:How can we get the information correct once the brains are broken, when there's no barometer of truth, and when just the desire, the frenzy to believe becomes more important than what is being believed?
Marc:It's been around since the beginning of people.
Marc:Why is it raining?
Marc:Why is my house on fire?
Marc:Why did my wife die?
Marc:Why did my husband die?
Marc:Why is there so much pain and trouble in the world?
Marc:God, explain it.
Marc:Make it better, God.
Marc:Who did this?
Marc:What bigger force than me?
Marc:People want to believe in things bigger than themselves and things that are fantastical in order to feel connected to something or to explain something.
Marc:So once that valve or that portal or that gear in the brain is busted wide open and filled with fucking fascistic crap, what do you do?
Marc:He stormed the Capitol.
Marc:Well, what do those of us who know the truth do?
Marc:Be scared and hope there's more of us?
Marc:I did not mention today on the show, I talked to Stephen Lee Bruner.
Marc:Not ring a bell.
Marc:How about Thundercat?
Marc:That's what he goes by.
Marc:He's a bass player, singer, songwriter.
Marc:He's worked a lot with Kendrick Lamar, specifically on To Pimp a Butterfly.
Marc:And he has four solo records out.
Marc:Great, amazing, transcendent musician.
Marc:The most recent record is called It Is What It Is.
Marc:And that is nominated for a Grammy.
Marc:And I talked to him today.
Marc:Man, I wish people had something.
Marc:The plague thing, too, is bearing down certainly on us here in L.A.
Marc:and on us everywhere.
Marc:My mother got shot one of the vaccine.
Marc:I guess she waited a couple hours and had an appointment.
Marc:She's in the age group there in Florida.
Marc:So she's on her way to at least a little bit of relief from the fear.
Marc:Her sister already had the covid, as did my uncle.
Marc:But my mother and her boyfriend have not.
Marc:And they were both inoculated with the first shot, which is good.
Marc:It's making me squirrely.
Marc:That I know it's out there.
Marc:I don't know when I can get it.
Marc:And I know that it's everywhere where I live.
Marc:It's everywhere here.
Marc:The relief is so fleeting, man.
Marc:It's just the relief is so fleeting.
Marc:I appreciated President-elect Biden's comments.
Marc:He did say it was seditious, probably, which it is.
Marc:He did call it an insurrection, which it is.
Marc:I'll add anti-American.
Marc:You can add fascistic, too.
Marc:But he said, this isn't who we are.
Marc:But you know what?
Marc:I got to tell you, this is who some of us are.
Marc:That is what it is.
Marc:Some of us are fascists who seek single party rule and are brain fucked enough to other everyone, but people they see as within their belief system.
Marc:And that violence can get awful, historically speaking.
Marc:And we want to believe that it's a minority and it is, but
Marc:Symbolically, what the pig president did yesterday was signal quite clearly that he will remain their leader.
Marc:We'll see where that goes.
Marc:What happens now in the next two weeks?
Marc:That guy should be thrown in fucking jail.
Marc:After all this sort of projecting that they do, calling Antifa fascist, calling liberal Democrats communists, calling everybody the names evil, he calls us, calls Democrats evil.
Marc:They are the things that they are projecting.
Marc:That's the most basic deflection of like a five-year-old.
Marc:No, I'm not.
Marc:You are.
Marc:No, I'm not.
Marc:You are.
Marc:No, I'm not.
Marc:You are.
Marc:Why are you turning blue?
Marc:Because my hands are around your throat?
Marc:I'm not killing you.
Marc:You are.
Marc:Man.
Marc:He should actually be in jail.
Marc:He should be forced out of office.
Marc:Ted Cruz should resign.
Marc:Senator Hawley should resign.
Marc:They provoked this.
Marc:They all fucking stood there and helped this along.
Marc:Enabled it.
Marc:Let it happen.
Marc:Look, there's good and bad people everywhere, right?
Marc:Know who they are.
Marc:I hope when you hear this, things have leveled off a little bit.
Marc:I can't really go on about it.
Marc:I'm just a comedian, folks.
Marc:But just know there might be fascists in your family and they're proud of it.
Marc:And they let everybody know that yesterday.
Marc:So Thundercat is somebody I always wanted to talk to.
Marc:I first saw him with Kamasi Washington at the Staples Center, I think, or the club at the Staples, Nokia.
Marc:Club Nokia, I think, is where I saw them.
Marc:Kamasi had a broken leg.
Marc:But I was amazed by him, and I've listened to his solo records.
Marc:I don't know everything he's done, but I enjoyed the album Drunk.
Marc:I listened to some of his earlier albums, and then this new one is great.
Marc:It's called It Is What It Is.
Marc:It's nominated for the Best Progressive R&B Album Grammy.
Marc:And you can get it wherever you get your music.
Marc:This is me talking to him.
Marc:How you feeling?
Marc:Hi.
Marc:Hey.
Marc:I'm all right.
Marc:Yeah?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Is it a rough day already?
Guest:You know, somehow.
Guest:Somehow between the internet and them showing Teen Titans in the morning.
Guest:It's Teen Titans.
Guest:I just can't.
Guest:I don't know.
Guest:I can't do it with this cartoon.
Marc:It's the worst cartoon ever.
Marc:Well, I mean, you have choices around cartoons.
Marc:You don't have to watch them.
Marc:True.
Marc:So many subscriptions.
Marc:So many.
Marc:What is Teen Titans?
Marc:Is that an old one?
Guest:I mean, it's an old DC comic.
Guest:But it's also like, I guess, the Cartoon Network kind of like...
Guest:That's their main cartoon.
Guest:They rebooted it?
Guest:Yeah, they rebooted it and it's just been booted.
Guest:That's what it feels like.
Guest:No good.
Guest:It's been boot oriented for sure.
Guest:I feel like I'm getting kicked in the stomach every time I watch it.
Guest:Did you grow up with the comics?
Guest:I mean, was that your thing?
Guest:For sure.
Guest:I'm a Marvel kid through and through.
Guest:Like, I remember the day I started trading Marvel cards in middle school.
Marc:Really?
Guest:Yeah, I mean, I was a collector of many different things, but Marvel cards was definitely, like, the beginning for me, you know?
Guest:Did you watch the new Wonder Woman?
Guest:Yes, I did.
Guest:And?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Goes right in line with this year.
This is
Guest:It's a great way to finish the year out.
Guest:Disappointed.
Guest:You know, the funny thing is I like an old head.
Guest:I went into a comic store one day and this old head, the guy that worked there was kind of like...
Guest:He told me, he's like, hey, man, you know, be open to stuff because it's like, you know, it's got to translate for the kids.
Guest:It's got to travel the generations.
Guest:It's got to go past what you know and all that stuff.
Guest:And he was right.
Guest:So, there's a part of me that's always open to stuff.
Guest:But as a Marvel kid through it, like, literally, I have a Marvel tattoo.
Guest:I have a couple of Marvel tattoos.
Guest:There's a part of me that was just kind of like, I was like, I was watching it with my family.
Guest:And I felt bad because it was like, it was like almost like vomit.
Guest:I kept booing in between moments.
Guest:And it was like...
Guest:I was like, oh, I hope nobody here is going to get pissed.
Guest:I was like, I couldn't do it, man.
Guest:I couldn't do it.
Guest:I watched it, and I was just kind of like, meh.
Guest:Did you see the first one?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I took my daughter to see the first one.
Guest:And you liked that one?
Guest:You know what's funny, too?
Guest:I'll say this.
Guest:I'll say there's something about it sucking so much more because of not being able to go to a movie theater.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:So it's like sharing the experience with my daughter the first time, it was kind of like it was an experience.
Marc:Right.
Guest:It wasn't just about Wonder Woman, the comic.
Guest:It was kind of like, you know, I could read between the lines with this movie.
Guest:And I was like, you know, it's it's a good thing.
Guest:You know, it's like it's like my daughter, she she vibed with it a bit.
Guest:You know, even though my daughter usually listens to like Slipknot and she kind of she had a vibe with it, you know.
Marc:I don't watch.
Marc:I didn't grow up with the comics.
Marc:I didn't read many comics.
Marc:I was later in life, and they were just like Swamp Thing, Sandman, Hellblazer.
Marc:I didn't grow up.
Guest:That's the good stuff, though.
Marc:Yeah, yeah.
Marc:Great.
Marc:And I don't know.
Marc:I was in my 30s, and I was like, this is the best.
Marc:Nice.
Marc:But I didn't grow up with it or caring about it.
Marc:Now, when I watch a Marvel movie, if I ever do, I'm always disappointed because I'm not expecting anything, and I'm a grown-up.
Guest:you know but it's an age-old tale i think i think that there's always a hard a hard thing for adaptation it's like something that you i said this to the another comic store owner friend of mine i was like there's something about the idea of fantasy when you when you solidify it or make it real that it just like dispels it for you you know it's like there's a part where even the pictures
Marc:Right.
Marc:You don't engage any of your own imagination.
Marc:You're just reacting to this thing.
Marc:Whereas for some reason, if you have the ability to contain a story that's written in panels, which not everybody does, that you don't really realize how much room there is in your imagination because these are just still panels.
Marc:And after some point, you're not even paying that much attention to them.
Marc:They're just to provoke your imagination somehow.
Marc:Exactly.
Marc:That's exactly what happens.
Marc:Right.
Marc:So the relationship is a lot different than having it all done for you and then, you know, having to trust that person to do it for you.
Marc:I mean, who the fuck is that person?
Guest:You know, exactly.
Guest:Exactly.
Guest:You know, it's like, you know, I mean, like a couple of the moments I was kind of like seeing the superpowers in real life.
Guest:You kind of go, I could I could probably kick his ass.
Guest:Yeah, that guy.
Guest:I could probably beat him up.
Marc:He's not scary.
Marc:I guess for me, the first one was good in ways that a lot of comic book people didn't like.
Marc:I like the ending, like all the big weirdness of the ending, but they thought that was sort of like a sellout or something, or something kind of overcompensating.
Marc:I said, well, what are we working towards if it's not going to be something great like that?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah, it's like there's so much to pull from with these stories.
Guest:It's like it could afford to go anywhere, man.
Guest:And, you know, one thing I will say, too, is that one thing that's dope is that it highlights a home guy, the guy that also plays the Mandalorian.
Guest:He was great.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:He was the best thing about that movie.
Marc:Yeah, he played a real creep.
Marc:The great thing about his creep, though, was like it was an insecure creep.
Marc:And you could see his insecurities from the get go.
Marc:So you kind of had this weird empathy, you know, which makes him a more interesting evil guy.
Marc:Because you're like, oh, he's just an insecure loser.
Marc:He's like Trump.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:He's just like- The comb over and everything, right?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Well, I mean, I don't have much empathy for Trump, but I mean, if you could, it would look like the Wonder Woman villain.
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:And I'm a huge Kristen Wiig fan, and it's always good to see her.
Guest:You know what I mean?
Marc:Yeah, I didn't understand that whole part.
Marc:I guess you have to know the comic books.
Marc:Why turn her into an animal when there's no real precedent for that?
Marc:Like out of nowhere.
Marc:She's just an animal.
Marc:And as a guy who doesn't know the comics, I was like, well, that's a weird choice.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Cheetah.
Guest:I knew who that character was, but I was also just like, it's again, it was one of those moments where I was like, you know, it's kind of like, it felt like just like, it felt like a really bad cut and paste.
Guest:It was like, yeah, some of that stuff looks really bad.
Guest:It was like, Kristen Wiig's amazing, and here's Cheetah.
Marc:And it was just like, all right, well.
Marc:You know what else I just watched was I watched that Frank Zappa documentary.
Guest:Oh, nice.
Guest:Did you watch it?
Guest:No, I've been meaning to.
Guest:I've been completely just sitting here, just sitting here staring at the sky and then like watching Cowboy Bebop.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I'm like, I'm a total anime nerd, man.
Guest:I'm just like.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:You know, through and through.
Guest:So it's like the gist of this has been me sitting here tripping out watching hell anime.
Marc:But I mean, if fantasy works for you and it gives you relief, that's great.
Marc:Like, I don't have that.
Marc:You know, I just have, you know, dread and... Existential dread.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And you wrote a song about that.
Marc:Which album was that on?
Marc:Was that on the new one?
Marc:Existential dread?
Marc:That was the new one.
Marc:That was good.
Marc:Yeah, I can relate to that.
Marc:I can relate to a lot of the songs.
Marc:But but I was watching like I talked to Bootsy a couple of weeks ago and then I watched a Zappa doc.
Marc:So you're talking about Parliament and then watching what Zappa is trying to do and then listening to some of the stuff you've done.
Marc:And the first time I saw you, I saw you with Kamasi when Kamasi had his broken leg and he was sitting in a throne down.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Yeah.
Marc:Was that at the Staples?
Marc:I can't remember where we saw it, but you guys had been somewhere, and he had to sit in that giant chair because he couldn't walk.
Marc:It wasn't the Mayan.
Marc:I don't think so.
Marc:I feel like it was like you just returned.
Marc:It was in the small room at the Staples Center in the smaller lounge.
Marc:Maybe it was, I mean, and that was when I first saw you, and I was like, how many strings are on that bass?
Marc:So...
Marc:But I guess the point being is that, you know, my understanding of where music goes and what music can do, it seems something that you're highly aware of and there seems to be no real boundary to it.
Guest:Yeah, no, it's very open.
Guest:I blame it on how I was raised and, you know, I always feel like the somewhere between the lines is where we exist with the stuff.
Guest:So we got to always consistently blur those lines, you know.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Well, how does your upbringing relate?
Guest:Well, quite literally, I mean, basically me and Kamasi and my brother and we kind of amongst other people, we kind of we were kind of born together, so to speak.
Guest:Me and Kamasi's dad used to play together in high school or in college and stuff like that.
Guest:Your dad?
Guest:Yeah, our parents.
Guest:What was his instrument?
Guest:My dad's instrument was the drums.
Guest:Kamasi's dad's a horn player, right?
Guest:Yeah, Kamasi's dad is a horn player, yeah.
Guest:And then also another one.
Guest:Another one like that is George Ann Muldrow.
Guest:Our parents...
Guest:grew up playing together and they had us and it was kind of like you know you got that could go one of a couple ways you know you got the kids that resents what because it's always being shoved down their throat yeah but they right it it actually translated otherwise it turned into like you know it was it kind of passed down to us
Guest:So there's a part of it where we started taking it really serious at a really young age.
Guest:Like at a very young age, we got a chance to, with the likes of Reggie Andrews and the Thelonious Monk Institute and all these different things as we were kids were very, it kind of cultivated our ability.
Guest:And then on top of that, we were also doing stuff like playing in nightclubs and
Guest:You know, like I was the kid where, you know, I couldn't stand in front of or behind the club, but I would come in to play and then they would kick me out and throw me down the street.
Guest:Right.
Guest:You know, like we were those kids.
Guest:And but anytime it was a chance, anytime we got a chance to play and it was like we got a chance to grow, we would we would take it.
Marc:But you would go see your folks, you would see your fathers play a lot.
Marc:Oh, yeah.
Marc:I mean, you could go to the rehearsal space or whatever.
Marc:So, like, at that time, like, because, like, I don't, I've came, you know, I always kind of knew about jazz.
Marc:I listen to jazz a lot more now.
Marc:I've broadened my collection a little bit.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And, um...
Marc:I can't wrap my brain around theory or anything like that.
Marc:I play guitar, but I don't read music or necessarily understand things about it, but I can listen to stuff.
Marc:I have pretty adventurous ears.
Marc:Stuff doesn't bother me no matter how weird it gets.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:So, like, when you're younger, I mean, what kind of jazz were you being brought up with, really?
Guest:Everything from big band to jazz fusion to straight ahead.
Guest:It was kind of all embedded.
Guest:Like, growing up with Reggie Andrews, it was kind of like, you know, everything from we would listen to jazz in the morning, and he would always quiz us on it.
Guest:you know it was kind of things where we would have to be able to tell who was playing by how they sounded yeah yeah so he was sitting listening to the radio and he it would be little little incentive things like that that he would reward us for you like man who is this and you're like man that sound like that sound like ornette coleman or that sound like wayne shorter you know you hear certain types of note selection and stuff like that or certain and you can do it yeah you can tell these you most of them yeah it was kind of how you know from that to like the types of standards we would learn like kamasi's dad
Guest:We would practice at Kamasi's dad's house a lot.
Guest:And Cameron Graves is another one.
Guest:We would practice at their parents' house.
Guest:And Kamasi's dad would give Kamasi a task or give us a task to write a tune or learn a tune a day.
Guest:If you're going to sit back here and play, it's cool to be playing.
Guest:But challenge yourself with learning something new.
Guest:And it skews and offsets the comfortability of how, you know, all that kind of stuff.
Guest:And then from that to like, you know, we would compete in like the John Coltrane Jazz Awards and stuff like that.
Guest:We would do all kinds of stuff.
Guest:And we would just be involved.
Guest:That's a hell of an exercise.
Guest:Yeah, it was like it was a constant learning, constant learning.
Guest:Even when you're like sleeping, it was learning.
Guest:Me and Kamasi, I remember the day Amoeba.
Guest:I remember the day Amoeba set up and became a reality, and me and Kamasi used to live there.
Guest:Kamasi would go to UCLA, and him and Cameron would be in school, and then after they'd get out of school or when they would be on break, they'd come back to their – they stayed in a spot at one point, and we would just go get in the car, buy a burrito, and go to Amoeba and spend like five hours there and come out with this sea of music.
Guest:We'd be sitting in the car eating burritos, listening to some new Tchaikovsky or some –
Marc:You know, like, what is this?
Guest:Okay.
Guest:You know, just examining stuff like that and trying to listen with bigger ears, you know?
Guest:So it was all music and Marvel for you.
Guest:Oh, yeah, man.
Guest:That's in anime.
Guest:Music, Marvel, and anime.
Guest:And that was, when I say that to this day, it's kind of like that's what everybody is always up against with me.
Guest:Whereas just like in my most profound moment, I will still make a Dragon Ball reference.
Guest:you know it's embedded in me man i i think that's maybe that's some of this stuff that i don't quite understand on some of the records was a references to things that i don't know about yeah that's dragon ball dragon ball is life that's that's what it is you know dragon ball is what is it it's one of the best cartoons ever created in the history of cartooning it's like
Guest:You got Mickey Mouse, you know, you got Gundam, you know, you got Marvel, you got, I mean, I'm not going to fully be a hater.
Guest:I'm going to say for most, for some, it's DC.
Marc:Gundam, is that the, is that the Western with the, with the, with the Sensi?
Guest:No, no, no.
Guest:You got, Gundam is a Japanese cartoon that's a, it's just giant robo.
Guest:It's kind of like in the earlier years of giant robo.
Guest:There's a lot of different giant robo, but, um,
Guest:You know, you got all these different things.
Guest:You got Hello Kitty from Japan.
Guest:You got all this stuff.
Guest:But Dragon Ball and Dragon Ball Z and now Dragon Ball Super, skipping Dragon Ball GT.
Guest:It's like, it's kind of like this, it's a story of this.
Guest:It's basically following this alien kid as he's growing and watching him learn how to be human.
Guest:It's got a lot of parallels to stuff that we recognize, like a Superman or just the X-Men and stuff like that.
Guest:It's like he's an alien.
Guest:What's the matter with GT?
Guest:GT, I don't know, man.
Guest:GT just felt really just...
Guest:It felt like neither here nor there.
Guest:There was some good stuff in it, you know, certain moments, but it felt like the trope of as compared to the feeling or the quality of Dragon Ball Z. So you would see, you know, like certain obstacles Goku and the guys had to overcome in Z.
Guest:like really like you could feel it you know Goku would die and like you have to wish him back and then they only had this one you know they can only wish certain people back so just executive decisions would have to be made about who they bring back and Goku comes back 10 times powerful he's been traveling astral and it's like he's been doing all kinds of stuff so the story of Goku from a boy starts at Dragon Ball and then Dragon Ball Z is him as a man and
Guest:And then Dragon Ball GT is just him after listening to Flock of Seagulls or something.
Guest:I don't know.
Guest:Wow.
Guest:And then Dragon Ball Super is him as a god.
Marc:But you explain it to me, and it's like, even if I'm interested, it feels like it would take a lifetime for me to catch up.
Guest:dragon ball z i mean it well you know there's there's a there's cliff's notes versions of it and the truth is the manga the manga is what it started as and if you were into reading like that you mean if you wanted to check out dragon ball it's it's always available it's like it's it's almost no it's like batman it's like it's a common there's a good right you could pick up at different points and it would still be like oh i get it okay yeah that's good that's good
Marc:Okay.
Marc:Well, how did this, when you look at that, when you think, do you have a whole room in your house full of vinyl and one full of comic books?
Marc:I mean, do you?
Guest:It's all in the same space, yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah, like it's all not separated.
Guest:It's all vinyls, comics, video games, toys.
Guest:It's just here.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Looks like Nakano Broadway in here.
Marc:When you think about it, do you feel that somehow or another whatever your love for comic and fantasy planted in you influenced the music or your ability to see music differently?
Guest:yeah man um the the cartoons i'm not gonna lie the cartoons inspire the music it's like it did like everything naruto and cartoons like naruto and cowboy bebop and dragon ball z they inspire me to push harder like to know that there's a there is more there you just have to push harder like it's always anytime i've ever watched naruto like uh it made me feel like i can be a better person like anytime i would watch it i immediately would start doing push-ups or like
Marc:you know or really yeah like i spent most of this year and like as we're talking about this year and i mean there was a giant weight loss that happened for me and yeah you look uh you look lean i remember when i saw you at kamasi you were uh heavier kind of bulbous yeah um bulbous with your big base with five strings
Guest:Yeah, it's like, it's one of those things where a lot of stuff- Was it six strings or five?
Guest:Six strings, six strings.
Guest:A lot of things, but every now and again, you can definitely catch me playing a five too.
Guest:It's like, it's one of those things where a lot of things had changed rapidly on the death of one of my best friends and also the loss of like a person I was really in love with.
Guest:It became really difficult.
Guest:So I went through a weird moment of being depressed, for real, for real.
Guest:And-
Marc:This was like this year?
Marc:You had some loss?
Guest:It started a couple years.
Guest:This started a couple years back.
Marc:So your friend died and someone you were in love with died?
Guest:No, they didn't die.
Guest:They just left me.
Marc:Oh, okay.
Marc:Both of them?
Marc:Or one passed away and one left you?
Guest:Yeah, and it was kind of consecutive.
Guest:And it was like...
Guest:it was like it started back then and i like yeah and when mac passed personally it changed my life that's right right yeah miller yeah yeah and um i think from that time period till now a lot of changes drastically happened that would result in me physically changing so i became vegan and i stopped drinking um
Guest:Because it's basically like, I feel like I had seen too much, you know?
Marc:Well, I mean, I noticed that with, you know, going through all the records, you know, from Apocalypse forward, that, you know, that, you know, when you talk from the first person, it's interesting.
Marc:There's...
Marc:There's a style of songwriting that I noticed a little more in jazz.
Marc:I was listening to Horace Silver's later albums where he incorporated vocals and stuff.
Marc:He had brought in people.
Marc:And, you know, there is a type of earnest sort of presentation in some of that more experimental jazz singing where, you know, no one's looking for hooks, but it's more philosophical and more straightforward, you know?
Marc:And it's not, you know, it's not based on rhyme or anything other than ideas, right?
Marc:So there's some of this stuff that I was listening to, and I was like, there were points in the work where I was thinking that...
Marc:Is he writing from the first person or is he creating a character here?
Marc:Because if he's writing from the first person, this guy's heading for a wall.
Guest:And so is life, right?
Guest:There you go.
Guest:All right.
Guest:Yeah, there it is.
Marc:It seems like you're drinking too much and you got a heavy heart and you're too sensitive and you get in trouble in Japan.
Marc:That's what I got out of it.
Guest:That is quite literal, sir.
Marc:That is me in real life.
Marc:Yes.
Marc:Well, that's good that you pulled it together, man.
Marc:But it's all in there.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:I mean, you're pretty honest in your work.
Marc:Once I get past the music, which is great, but just listening to you.
Marc:Because you work with Mac Miller a bit, right?
Guest:Yeah.
Yeah.
Marc:Yeah, he was one of my best friends.
Marc:Oh, he was?
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:It's hard, man.
Marc:Did you see the struggle with drugs with him?
Marc:Yeah, I was there for the most part of that.
Marc:And that was a wake-up call for you in the midst of the grief where you realized that even if you weren't doing the same drugs, that perhaps you were increasing your odds of mortality?
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:I mean, I really hate that it took, I hate that it took that when I look back in hindsight, you know, but it's kind of one of those things where it's like I just, something had to give.
Guest:Right.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And you don't want it to be your mind or your life, right?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:So, you know, and it seems like... You either get the lesson or you get out of here.
Marc:For sure.
Marc:One way or the other.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:But, well, I'm glad that you chose the art and the faith and the decision to change the life, find some hope.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:You know, watch a lot of Star Wars.
Marc:So, but what about the work?
Marc:I mean, is the album, it is what it is, the processing of that?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:It was like...
Guest:i think it was like you know somewhere between real life it's like you know again like we're saying sometimes stuff with me can be a bit literal and um yeah that was that was me processing it that was the change happening and yeah um
Guest:Again, it's like looking back on it, it was a bit traumatizing.
Guest:It was a bit emotionally traumatizing at least.
Marc:It's terrible, man.
Marc:And it's like I went through something this year, just terrible.
Marc:And there's nothing, when you lose somebody and your heart breaks both, however you lose people, it's heartbreaking.
Marc:And you get to a point, I'm older than you, where you're like, I don't know how much of this shit I can take.
Marc:How much are we built to handle this?
Marc:I don't know if I could do another one of these.
Marc:And when it's death, because that's a surprising one, then you're like, well, shit, there's no avoiding this and we're all gonna deal with this grief if we live long enough one way or the other.
Marc:But if it's people leaving or you leaving, then it's like, man, I don't have to do this again.
Marc:As my buddy Brendan said, you sort of earn your stripes as a human
Marc:when you process this shit without, you know, destroying yourself.
Guest:There you go.
Guest:Yeah, I wholeheartedly agree with that, you know.
Guest:And it's, you know, it's never easy, but you don't realize that.
Guest:You know, like, you don't realize it's always, like, you have to, it's gonna, you know, the consistent having to overcome and trying to, like, be able to still walk straight after somebody hits you in the side of the head with a glass bottle, you know, it's like, it's a lot.
Guest:It's a lot, man.
Marc:Did the work help?
Marc:I mean, when you were doing the music, did it help?
Guest:I mean, I remember it's always music has always been a bit therapeutic and a bit like it becomes that.
Guest:But I think in this moment, it really was it was like overwhelmingly painful.
Guest:So getting if I didn't have Flying Lotus there with me.
Guest:And he's always been there with me.
Guest:Like, I always talk about him, but it's the truth.
Guest:If Flying Lotus wasn't there with me to help me see me through some of these moments, it just would be me tailspinning, you know?
Marc:Yeah, he's a good friend, huh?
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:It's genuinely, like, beyond the music.
Guest:I mean, like I always say, when I refer to him, I always say people can hear our relationship in the music.
Guest:But beyond the music, it's one of these things where it's like, I don't know, he's just always, I feel like he's always cared for me, you know?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:It's important when you're in the grief.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:In those moments, he's kind of, you know, he would help me be able to stay standing straight when stuff would wallop me on the side of the head like that, you know?
Marc:Right.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:To hold you up in a way, you know, to get you like because like when my when my girlfriend passed away in May, I got a friend who, you know, he just started calling me and we talk every fucking night, man.
Marc:Even now, right from the get-go.
Marc:And it was just sort of like, it's grounding.
Marc:Because if you're just left to sit in it and you don't got no love coming your way in the form of just a guy going like, what's going on?
Marc:What'd you do?
Marc:What'd you eat?
Marc:What have you been thinking about?
Marc:You read a thing?
Marc:Whatever.
Marc:Just to be like, ugh.
Marc:get me you know out of it you know yeah for a minute right yeah absolutely man and then flying lotus so like that guy's a genius you're a genius so like you know you're swirling around in the possibilities you know i imagine that outside the friendship you're like well let's let's let's get into this thing what's that thing you were working on yeah right yeah yeah lotus can keep me focused man he really can
Marc:What's that guy's background?
Marc:Because I talked to Anderson Pack about him and then I went on a little spin with some of his work.
Marc:And I knew like before I knew you guys were buddies or work together like a couple of days ago when I knew I was going to talk to you.
Marc:I'm like, he's got to be with Flying Lotus because the groove is sort of similar where you guys are going.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:So that you kind of inform each other, huh?
Guest:Yeah, yeah, that's how... I mean, there's a moment where you see stuff in weird shades and gradients.
Guest:I still remember vividly meeting him at South by Southwest.
Guest:I remember what he was wearing.
Guest:I remember his sentiment.
Guest:I remember the necklace.
Guest:I remember...
Guest:I remember the shoes.
Guest:I remember how hot it was.
Guest:And it was like, it was one of the greatest moments, you know, not knowing, like, unbeknownst to both of us.
Guest:It was kind of like, it was kind of those things like, man, we should hang out.
Guest:And it was like, we should definitely hang out.
Guest:And it just, you know, like life changes and the different growth and, you know.
Guest:Did you know his work before you met him?
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:Oh, yeah.
Guest:We both knew of each other's work.
Guest:I mean, I feel like he... I was a little bit more spotty back in the day.
Guest:I didn't have albums.
Guest:It wasn't something that was solidified like that until I signed Brain Feeder Records.
Guest:But me and he knew of my work by way of the different things like Saw Rock Creative Partners and Erykah Badu and different people that I would work with.
Guest:And he was...
Guest:We both knew that there was something that was like, yeah, man.
Guest:And I was a very big fan of his work, of course.
Guest:This man is the sound of Los Angeles.
Marc:It's interesting when I enter the world that you guys live in musically because it's not really my world.
Marc:And when I go in there, I realize a couple of things like, well, this is amazing and deep and broad.
Marc:And where the fuck am I living?
Marc:This is happening.
Marc:all the time.
Marc:And every once in a while I walk into it, I'm like, holy shit, there's a whole other planet here.
Marc:You know?
Marc:Because all you guys kind of, like the world of him, Flying Lotus, and you, and Kamasi, and Kendrick, there's a whole amalgamation of different styles of music sort of constantly coming together among the crew that you guys seem to be with.
Guest:Yeah, no, at any given moment, you know, we'll get together and something comes of it.
Guest:You know, it's just, I think that's just kind of a somewhere between like, you know, that's like, I don't want to say byproduct of the environment, but as compared to just, it's somewhere between the actual relations and relationships that you have.
Guest:with each other and there's no way it's not going to translate musically you know it's going to it's because music is the way we communicate it's like there's a part of it where it's it's embedded in there you know it's like you know you're looking for a chance to oh let me accentuate you know you're like you're kind of like okay let me see if i can challenge me challenge this a bit or like oh let me uh you know it's like i'm constantly tinkering with each other's stuff you know and
Marc:Well, it's interesting to me, like you guys, like you and Kamasi, like when I first heard Epic, you know, I talked to him years ago, you know, he talked to me.
Marc:And I like, you know, I heard Epic and I'm like, holy shit, man, the production on this is insane.
Marc:And then I realized, you know, when you guys play, when I saw you play live, that like you're playing live.
Marc:Like, you know, all that stuff is not, you're not doing tracks, you know?
Marc:So I'm like, holy shit, you know, he's got the
Marc:choral group there.
Marc:He's got the strings over here.
Marc:He's got his dad and he's got you and another guy on bass.
Marc:There's two keyboards.
Marc:I'm like, what the fuck is happening?
Marc:Two drummers?
Marc:You know, like... But...
Guest:you gotta imagine that being wait you want to hear something funny you gotta imagine that in a small nightclub off of crenshaw boulevard like a whole entire without the without the orchestra and the strings but the whole band hanging out and trying to play at like fifth street dicks or leimert park or uh or uh we'd be hanging out the side of the club half the band would be outside the club
Guest:Oh, my God.
Guest:That would just be some of the funniest moments.
Guest:You know, you got Cameron and Brandon playing and me and Miles and, you know, Isaac and Terrence Kamasi, everybody.
Guest:We would just be playing.
Guest:It was like, man, there doesn't really need to be an audience because we're the audience.
Marc:So many of you?
Marc:Yeah, half the club would be the band.
Guest:A little small coffee house.
Guest:There's like 15 band members.
Guest:Like, who's getting paid from this?
Yeah.
Guest:Nobody.
Guest:Pay us some coffee and sandwiches.
Marc:But that was the kind of the primal soup of the thing, right?
Marc:Yeah, that was us.
Marc:That's who we were, you know?
Marc:But my point was, when I listened to Epic, I was like, this is groundbreaking.
Marc:And it is, but then I listened to Mingus Aham, and I'm like, oh, well, that choral thing's sort of a precedent.
Marc:I mean, that's been around.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:I started to put that stuff together.
Marc:And then when I listen to you, like there's definitely like, you know, there's a Kamasi jazz.
Marc:And then there's, you know, what you're doing is a little different in your own way.
Marc:Right.
Marc:Your your approach is more fusion oriented, where Kamasi is like pretty much traditional hard bop, bebop.
Marc:Like he's coming from a different place in a way.
Guest:Yeah, absolutely.
Guest:It's all embedded in there.
Guest:Our first album together we recorded as the Young Jazz Giants when we were kids.
Guest:It was kind of like we would try to incorporate everything that everybody was into.
Guest:I'm playing upright on the album.
Guest:There's a song called Stephen's Song where we're like...
Guest:It was kind of like, you know, my electric bass, you know, and then there's like this giant drum solo at the end.
Guest:And then and then Cameron and then, you know, it's Cameron's insanely gifted piano playing.
Guest:One person I feel like I don't talk about enough is Cameron Graves, to be honest with you, Cameron.
Guest:And it's just growing up with a Cameron Graves also was it was a really big deal.
Guest:Between Cameron and Kamasi, they were always teaching me, you know, they were always showing me how to play through what they would be processing.
Guest:Oh, this is these skills go with this.
Guest:This is what fits here.
Guest:Like they would be from that to like, oh, no, man, you know, like the repetition, the part where I learned the repetition was growing up with Cameron Graves.
Yeah.
Guest:I would watch a guy sit and practice piano for nine hours a day growing up.
Guest:Literally, we could be having a conversation.
Guest:It wouldn't matter.
Guest:He had the metronome on.
Guest:He'd be chewing his tongue and going through the scales while you're trying to sit here and play Resident Evil.
Guest:And then he'd get up and play some Resident Evil and then go right back to playing.
Guest:That was my upbringing.
Guest:And I was very fortunate, very fortunate to have Cameron and Kamasi and my older brother as teachers.
Guest:You know what I mean?
Marc:And what like early on, you know, outside of those guys, you know, and living in the sort of world of jazz all the time.
Marc:I mean, who were the people, the artists that really kind of connected with you early on where you were like that, you know, like, I want to play bass.
Marc:I want to play bass like that.
Marc:Or, you know, I get it now.
Guest:It was definitely, definitely Jocko and Stanley.
Guest:Oh, Stanley Clark, right.
Guest:Jocko and Stanley, like, and again, of course, the introduction is to Jocko around the age, I'm around 10 or so, and the same thing with Stanley.
Guest:I was of a certain age, and then, you know, it's one of those things where I...
Guest:I had many different moments.
Guest:I remember everybody would always talk to me about different, you know, different cats growing up, you know, getting Ray Brown and, you know, Mingus, of course, and stuff like that.
Guest:Then I would, you know, Ron Carter, of course, and Miroslav V2.
Guest:But it's funny because I think that the place that it lies specifically for me was in the jazz fusion era because there was everything in being embodied in those moments from upright to electric.
Guest:And I felt like in that moment as a transitional part of the music, I think there was somewhere where I knew that there was a place for me that existed.
Guest:You know, I mean, it's like there's a part of it where it's like, oh, as a bassist, being able to do all of that, you know, like some like this is.
Marc:this is okay this you can do it was like almost like being introduced to what this is what you can do with your instrument right right you know right well yeah i'll get it yeah because like you know because of the way you grew up you realized on some level that there were limitations to traditional jazz right so yeah i imagine you know getting hip to stanley clark or jocko you started to like the departure from upright yeah to like almost any possibility at all
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:And then one, two other important ones are Anthony Jackson and Paul Jackson.
Guest:Anthony Jackson, like, changed my sense of melody and harmony tremendously.
Guest:You know, it's kind of like one of those things where all, I mean, there's only a few bass players that I would always say I wanted to be like growing up.
Guest:It was definitely Stanley and Jocko, and it was Anthony Jackson.
Guest:Anthony Jackson and Paul Jackson.
Guest:Anthony Jackson played electric.
Guest:I mean, I'd have my favorites, Eddie Gomez and Charlie Hayden and stuff like that.
Guest:I was very aware of different cats growing up.
Guest:But Anthony Jackson's relation to melody and how often he would be able to
Guest:how effortlessly he would change the course of music from the simplest place.
Guest:It just always was like, I want to be able to do that.
Guest:I want to be able to do that.
Guest:It was like you could hear him talking under the music.
Guest:It was crazy.
Marc:Well, I guess that's the opportunity that bass gives you, is that you can just sort of like almost quietly change everything.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah, it is.
Marc:It's like, where are we now?
Marc:I don't know.
Marc:The bass player just did something, and we're in a different place entirely.
Guest:There you go.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah, I always feel like, you know, we always say, you know, lead singers, guitarists, you know, sure, sure.
Guest:Like, we know deep down bass players around the world.
Yeah.
Marc:They do.
Marc:They do.
Marc:The rhythm section runs the world, really.
Marc:Right?
Marc:Yes.
Marc:Yes.
Marc:And I don't understand that relationship with the, like, you know, I learned about it later in life, just like listening to rock music that, you know, that if the rhythm section isn't tight, the whole project's a mess.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:You wouldn't drive a Lamborghini with a donut.
Guest:I mean.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:You don't have your wheels aligned properly.
Marc:Yeah, but where do you put people like, you know, I have to assume, only because I just talked to them a couple weeks ago, that Bootsy is important.
Guest:Oh, yeah, man.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah, man.
Guest:And to be honest with you, like...
Guest:Man, man, oh, man.
Guest:And it's like, again, Bootsy and Bernie Worrell, to me, that was also who I wanted to be like.
Marc:Well, I hear it.
Marc:All through your records, because you get a groove and you're not concerned with hooks, you're kind of concerned about movement.
Marc:But everyone, like, there's that Bernie Rorrell-style synthesizer that just pop in occasionally.
Marc:And you're like, oh, okay.
Marc:There's a reminder.
Marc:It's like something, you know.
Marc:An intergalactic reminder.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah, man.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Oh, man.
Guest:Bootsy and Bernie, man.
Guest:It's just...
Guest:And it's like somewhere between being able to vacillate between roles as the instrument is always like leaned on or it always has like this heavy anchor trying to find the ways that it like can also become texture, can also become progression.
Guest:It could also become, you know, percussive, you know, like finding those places.
Marc:Yeah, because I noticed that if you lay a couple of bass tracks down, because I noticed that yesterday, it might be on the new record, where you're kind of doing something very upfront with the bass as a single voice almost, where this is the bass singing here upfront.
Marc:But then all of a sudden, a different bass will drop that bottom beat as a percussion.
Marc:But you're still on top of it with the other one, or however you're working that.
Marc:And then you really kind of illustrate what you're talking about, the two differences to the approach and the possibilities of bass.
Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Marc:But Bootsy, what struck me about talking to him is out of nowhere on this last record, this new one that he did, The One, he's playing with George Benson.
Marc:And I'm like, George Benson?
Marc:really yeah and then like you but then you you know you got Kenny Loggins you got Michael McDonald but you've got this respect you know coming through fusion in the 70s for these cats that like in my youth I might have found a little boring right so like George Benson you know George Benson's all right you know I know him from the hits when I was a kid yeah Bootsy's like I always wanted to play with George Benson and I'm like really oh George can rip man
Marc:I know, he's great.
Marc:But I judged because of my association.
Marc:It's hard for me to sort of adapt to fusion, dude.
Marc:I don't know why.
Marc:Like, out of all the jazz styles, it's hard for me.
Marc:And I think one of the reasons is because there is a kind of softness to it, and I require anxiety.
Marc:And...
Marc:You know what I mean?
Marc:I need the jazz to have a Ritalin effect on my own trip.
Marc:I hear you.
Marc:You do?
Marc:Okay.
Marc:Yes.
Marc:But listening to you or listening to Lotus, if you want to go on the ocean and just take that journey, it's here for you.
Marc:If you want to be in a fucking storm, then go live there.
Marc:Right.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Right.
Guest:I hear you.
Guest:That makes total sense, man.
Guest:I'm like, I don't know.
Guest:And I go like this.
Guest:Well, here you go.
Guest:That's where enter George Duke and Frank Zappa.
Marc:Right.
Marc:You know?
Marc:Right.
Marc:Yeah, man.
Marc:Right.
Marc:Because like that stuff, like you listen to the production on that shit.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And there's there's no way it's it's not going to be hard on you.
Marc:It's not going to be harsh.
Marc:No matter what Frank's doing, the way that they put that stuff together, you know, stuff that is pretty aggressively dissonant and challenging.
Marc:But still, there's there's such a ring to it.
Marc:You're like, I'm OK with this.
Marc:It's not making me aggravated.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Marc:But what was it like, you know, I guess Jaco and Stanley would do it because that seems to be, you know, where you prefer to live is in that kind of, you know, starting with that fusion foundation.
Marc:Yeah, man, it's.
Guest:I don't know, because it's like, I think it's important.
Guest:I think it's important, man.
Guest:To a major degree, like the ability and prowess of the instruments, you know, like your physical ability.
Guest:It's like, it's important.
Guest:It's just as important, you know.
Guest:And...
Guest:i feel like there's a lot of i mean and like i said i always am a firm believer in the idea of somewhere in between you know like finding where it's almost like it's no different than a marriage or a or a love for something you know it's like the hard work as compared to the feelings and stuff like that and trying to understand how to balance those things it's literally always somewhere in between i think the same and when it comes to the music i think like okay
Guest:be able to have that but then also be able to pull back but then also be able to you know like intensify and and right have something to say you know it's it's a it's imperative and and also structurally like because of the way you've set up how you conceive of albums and music like you've really set up a situation where you can do whatever you want
Marc:You know, you have 30 second, 40 second, two minute pieces, but you can move through any any sound you want.
Guest:I mean, well, you know, one of my one of my favorite things is I always say, you know, like D.R.I.
Guest:can do a 20 minutes, a 20 second song and nobody will bat an eyelash to it.
Guest:It's like, yeah, it's like that's all in there.
Guest:I'm like, you know what?
Guest:That's sometimes that's all you have to say.
Guest:You know, it's like sometimes that one moment is it and it's not meant to be anything.
Guest:Why not let it be its own thing?
Guest:I think those moments are just as important, you know?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And you've probably gone over this before, but like talk to me about
Marc:Because it seems like you and Kamasi and whatever you guys, how that all came together with Kendrick on To Pimp a Butterfly, that there was something fundamental about... I now know the evolution out of jazz into hip-hop, into rap.
Marc:I watched a documentary on Blue Note Records, and I never put it together quite like that.
Marc:Now I kind of get that.
Marc:But it seems to me that...
Marc:when you guys did that album that you would really sort of discovered the, the kind of the, the perfect symbiosis between jazz and, and, and rap.
Marc:Do you feel that, that, that, that something was that like, because of, I guess, Kendrick sensitivity to, you know, what you guys were doing, or I don't know if he grew up with you guys that you created something, I would say almost totally original with that record because of the jazz element.
Guest:Yeah, man, that album, it was the definition of a perfect storm, you know?
Marc:Yeah, how'd that happen?
Guest:Man, you got, you know, it's the snapshot of everything that was literally happening at the time.
Guest:I mean, again, if we were going to keep it musically, it's one of those things where everybody's mind and heart was open in that one moment to trying to push into something new.
Guest:And the way he would go about bringing that about...
Guest:you know it's like sometimes it's like the part where yeah you got to get us all in a room together sometimes you know that's definitely a part of it you know man you know everybody's everybody um along with their heart and mind being in the same place it's like physically with the instruments and stuff like that you know we're spending a lot of time in different ways and stuff like that you know kamasi me and kamasi are always on tour in our own worlds and stuff like that yeah at this point i'm writing music like
Guest:every day and get on the computer and you know i'm digging around up here and you know digging around over here and yeah and and um it's a bit like you know it was kind of like everybody brought their best to that moment i think you know this is and did you guys know kendrick did you grow up with him
Guest:Not in the same way that I grew up with Kamasi.
Guest:I didn't know Kendrick as a kid, no.
Guest:But in the process of working, he reminded me or let me know the first time that he got a chance to interact with me.
Guest:And it was like, I think I was playing with this group, J. Davey, and him and his group, I think Black Hippie, opened for J. Davey at one point.
Guest:And he expressed to me how he remembers seeing me play with him.
Guest:And I think I met him, and that was, again, years prior to Pimp a Butterfly coming out, of course.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I mean, for me, it was hard for me to remember, too, because, again, mentally I'd be in different places back then, of course.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:But it was crazy because it was one of those moments where I think that this was a moment where he –
Guest:He just wanted to bring me in to what it was, I guess, a bit.
Guest:And I'm happy he did.
Guest:I'm very happy he did.
Marc:And it was open, right?
Marc:Because it seems to me that that generally is not...
Marc:Like you and Kamasi had a shorthand and, you know, and you were, you know, you were all, it seemed like the, the creative convergence was not, was not that common in that world in, in the sense that using real instruments and whatnot.
Marc:Is that true?
Guest:No, we, we, again, this is years and years of us having played together.
Guest:So it's like, it's one of those things where if you know, you get us in a room, it's not going to not happen.
Guest:You know, it's like, it's, it's,
Guest:it's that's what we've spent our life doing so it's like you know even if we hadn't seen each other in ages or like i was saying kamasi being on tour i'd be on tour you know miles doing his thing or however this translates it's like you know it's you know we would learn we've known each other's music since we were kids so you know you start playing a tune and i remember that tune or like you know you know right you know
Guest:and it and kendrick was just open to it because he knew what you guys were capable yeah or he would he would take elements of it and like you know you know you know he'd place it or he'd find places for it yeah right right right so what is the what's your relationship with japan man you know it definitely again it started when i was a kid uh they definitely started uh
Guest:Early on, you know.
Guest:Through anime?
Guest:It was definitely anime for sure.
Guest:Definitely anime for sure.
Guest:Realizing how much stuff was anime as a kid.
Guest:I always talk about it where it's kind of like, you know, all of our cartoons from like He-Man to Silverhawks to, you know, the Mighty Orbots to the Transformers to Thundercats.
Guest:Those were all Japanese animators.
Guest:You know, She-Ra, Princess of Power, freaking, what's the other one, Jim and the Holograms.
Guest:So we were already being fed that.
Guest:And then on top of that, my first introduction to Dragon Ball Z was a bracelet that I got at a dentist office.
Guest:And I remember it because I also, I don't talk about it as much, but I also illustrate.
Guest:I'm also an illustrator.
Guest:And it started back then for me.
Guest:I was kind of like intrigued with the shapes of the figures and stuff like that.
Guest:And then from there, from that moment, again, it's like it's so embedded and interweaved and stuff.
Guest:You know, I was there when Pokemon was incepted.
Guest:You know, it's kind of like the inception of Pokemon cards.
Guest:Huh?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Were you there in Japan?
Guest:No, no, no.
Guest:Like, I mean, the introduction of Pokemon as a kid, I was one of those kids from that to realizing the Power Rangers was a Japanese franchise.
Guest:You know, like all of that was like it would just be swirling around and at different points you'd tap in and be like, oh, wow, of course that's Japan.
Guest:Oh, that's Japan.
Guest:And then you get older and you're like, of course it's Japan.
Guest:And then, you know.
Guest:They're jazz heads, too, over there.
Marc:Oh, for sure.
Guest:For sure.
Guest:For sure.
Guest:And yeah, you see the connection.
Guest:You see the connection.
Marc:But do you go over there?
Marc:Do you spend time there?
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:It's kind of like, it's my happy place, to be honest with you.
Guest:I go there and just completely turn into a Japanese schoolgirl.
Guest:And then, yeah, no, for real.
Marc:The one, the Tokyo, what album's that on Tokyo?
Guest:That's on Drunk, I think.
Marc:Oh, man, that sounded like a pretty good night.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Restless nights in Tokyo, man.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I've had some wild moments in Tokyo.
Guest:Oh, God.
Guest:Oh, my God.
Guest:But it's like...
Guest:So all of that kind of going in and around.
Guest:And then like, you know, my first introduction to anime was like when the cognizant introduction to anime, I used to, the one job I ever worked was at a comic store called collector's paradise.
Guest:And it was what, it was my summer job when I, when I got here, right?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Collectors Paradise.
Guest:I'm pretty sure it's all around the States.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And I worked there when I was around between the age of 10 and 14 or something like that.
Guest:You know, when my grades were really good and I didn't have anything to do in summer and I wasn't practicing, I wouldn't practice 24 hours a day.
Guest:So my dad was like, you got to get out and do something.
Guest:So I would go work at the comic store.
Guest:Yeah, I would work at the comic store, and they would let me bag and board comics, and I had to make sure the displays were right and make sure kids weren't stealing stuff.
Guest:They would have to make sure I wasn't stealing stuff.
Guest:But one of the first things I remember, when they got a TV in the store, and they would play old crazy Korean horror films, and they would play anime.
Guest:And I remember seeing Fist of the North Star and Street Fighter first.
Guest:And I remember Street Fighter was so cool as an anime.
Guest:I was like, whoa, this looks insane.
Guest:These characters, this is insane.
Guest:And...
Guest:I remember maybe somebody in the store was like, oh, you like anime.
Guest:And I was like, okay, that's what this is.
Guest:And then here comes the flood of Pokemon, Dragon Ball Z, and all this other stuff.
Guest:And I'm just like, oh, my God, I love anime.
Guest:So they saw you, and then you became anime radicalized.
Guest:Yeah, man.
Guest:And I've been the same ever since, quite literally.
Marc:It's so funny that those moments were like, I imagine it was similar when you first heard Jocko, where you're just sort of like, what?
Yeah.
Guest:yeah it was like it it it put me on my put me on my ass you know it's kind of like whoa you know and yeah again as an illustrator or you know um something i do wish i went to school for illustration because it's like that's the i've been drawing just as long as i play bass but and i but i just don't have as much discipline in it um it's one of those things where it's like i the and the illustrator in me and like the
Guest:that part, it would be like, oh my gosh, like, whoa, you know, like, man, like, it was just the color, it was just, it was intense, you know?
Marc:Yeah, I get it.
Marc:It's all loaded up.
Marc:There's a whole, like, the style of anime, even though it's not my thing or I don't know enough about it, it definitely has, it seems a bit more sort of sexual than just regular Marvel stuff.
Yeah.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:No, I feel like in anime, a lot of the times they don't limit it to, you know, this whole idea that it's a child's thing.
Guest:It's kind of a thing where it's like, nah, this is an adult and child world.
Guest:And it's like, just like in reality, like this is also reality, you know?
Marc:Did you get sucked into the Reddits and stuff, into the communities around anime?
Marc:Because that seems to have gone kind of bad.
Guest:Yeah, no, no.
Guest:I would just watch cartoons.
Guest:Literally, I would just be watching cartoons.
Guest:I'm not one of those guys that likes to discuss it, unless it's with another anime nerd.
Guest:Right, right.
Marc:So the Grammy nomination, are you excited?
Marc:You must be excited.
Marc:It's pretty trippy, man.
Guest:Like, you know, I'm excited.
Guest:I'm definitely like tripped out.
Guest:I'm kind of like, whoa, you know, like, cool.
Guest:What is the category?
Guest:Progressive R&B, I think.
Marc:Now, who else is in that category?
Marc:jane aiko chloe and hallie jane aiko chloe hallie the free nationals um isn't that wild though like you know you can't like that you've got there's a whole group of you in your own different ways that have sort of entered this uncharted territory of music where they you know like even you can't label it you know it's kind of interesting
Guest:Yeah, no, and I'm really excited that, again, it's like, it's all family in there, you know, for the most part.
Guest:The Free Nats, like, those are my bros, like, for real, for real.
Guest:And so is Janae.
Guest:Janae is like, she's like family, you know.
Marc:Right, right, sure, of course.
Marc:And I guess Beyonce has been nominated in that category before.
Guest:Word.
Guest:Okay, there you go.
Marc:So it's a little more, so it's not like it's out of the mainstream, you know, in a sense.
Guest:Right, right.
Guest:It still meets, it meets, you know.
Marc:Well, I wish you all the luck, man.
Marc:It was great talking to you.
Marc:Damn, man.
Marc:Thank you for having me.
Marc:I really appreciate you.
Marc:Yeah, man.
Marc:It's, you know, and hopefully we'll have a better year.
Marc:Sorry for your recent losses.
Marc:And, you know, time does make it a little easier, buddy.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:All right, man.
Marc:Take care of yourself.
Marc:Thank you.
Marc:Thank you, man.
Marc:All right.
Marc:That was Thundercat.
Marc:Fucking brilliant musician.
Marc:And kind of, you know, a... What would you call him?
Marc:He's a real nerd in a good way.
Marc:Beautiful nerd man.
Marc:Amazing bass player.
Marc:The album is called It Is What It Is.
Marc:And the musicianship and songwriting is great.
Marc:Love that guy.
Marc:Just remember, fascism is bad and we're in fucking trouble.
Marc:God bless America.
Marc:Here's some guitar.
Marc:Don't get the plague.
Marc:Don't get the plague.
guitar solo
Thank you.
Marc:Boomer lives.
Marc:And monkey and La Fonda.
Marc:And cat angels everywhere.
Marc:And I fucked up right at the end there.
Marc:I just fucked it up just right at the end there.
Marc:But we're going to leave it.
Damn.