Episode 313 - Andrew W.K.
Guest:Lock the gates!
Marc:Alright, let's do this.
Marc:How are you, what the fuckers?
Marc:What the fuck buddies?
Marc:What the fuckineers?
Marc:What the fucknicks?
Marc:What the fucksikins?
Marc:What the fuckstables?
Marc:What the fuckaholics?
Marc:You know there's a long list.
Marc:Goes on and on.
Marc:I'm missing a lot.
Marc:What the fuckadelics?
Marc:How about one of those?
Marc:Let's throw one of those in.
Marc:I am Mark Maron.
Marc:This is WTF.
Marc:This is my show.
Marc:Welcome to it.
Marc:I'm happy you're here.
Marc:Today I have the amazing Andrew W.K.,
Marc:who I was not that familiar with until I met him a while back, and then I kind of did a little investigating, and boy, we had a hell of a conversation.
Marc:Covered a lot of topics.
Marc:Went the distance, man.
Marc:It was great, and that's coming up here in just a second, or a minute, or a few minutes, or right now if you're one of those people.
Marc:Before we get into that, let's do a little business.
Marc:I will be in Ferndale, Michigan at the Magic Bag Theater on September 29th.
Marc:Two shows.
Marc:I think the website is themagicbag.com.
Marc:Check that out.
Marc:I'll be at the L.A.
Marc:Riot.
Marc:That's not right.
Marc:Riot L.A.
Marc:On September 22nd, doing a live WTF that I'm trying to get booked now and some sort of storytelling show.
Marc:That's happening.
Marc:I'm not doing a lot of live out-of-town work because I'm busy working on my television show.
Marc:We are writing the scripts.
Marc:We are picking locations.
Marc:We are slowly moving into production starting in October, which is very exciting.
Marc:Doing the casting coming soon.
Marc:Never been in this situation before.
Marc:Thrilled.
Marc:Not freaking out.
Marc:God, I sound like Brody.
Marc:Brody Stevens.
Marc:Not freaking out, but everything's going okay.
Marc:I'm just trying to keep my mind on the work and hopefully we make some good television.
Marc:That's my goal.
Marc:Unique television that serves and honors who I am, if that's okay with you.
Marc:I am doing a lot of comedy in town, though, so keep an eye out for me.
Marc:I don't usually put that on my website because if I'm doing a spot at the comedy store, there's some part of me that doesn't want to drag you into that.
Marc:I don't want to drag you into that horrendous relationship that is on and again, off again.
Marc:I think it's a breakthrough.
Marc:I've always had my feelings about...
Marc:The Comedy Store.
Marc:And I think some of you can relate to this in a different way if you're not a performer.
Marc:I mean, I have a long history at the Comedy Store and certainly we've talked about it enough on this show, but I never really framed it in this way.
Marc:I tweeted something.
Marc:The thought was when I perform at the Comedy Store, it feels like I'm confronting my abuser.
Marc:And I think there's some reality to that.
Marc:I think it's clear that the way I look at life, I don't very few things, certainly things that had a profound effect on me in a negative way.
Marc:I think we can call that trauma.
Marc:Things that traumatized me become part of my personal mythology.
Marc:And anybody who was involved in these life defining moments, they become part of my personal mythology.
Marc:And
Marc:And that's who I am.
Marc:That's why I hang so much importance on even just meeting someone once or twice in my life.
Marc:I have created a relationship in my head because I've put them on the little Marin Mount Olympus, either way up top or along the bottom.
Marc:Wherever they are, that is the backdrop.
Marc:I don't have a spiritual belief system, but I do amplify events and people in my life to the realm of mythic.
Marc:And I always go back to that.
Marc:It's very hard for me to evolve relationships with people in my mind who I've put into my mythic spectrum of people that were responsible or part of some sort of cathartic event in my life.
Marc:But I had this moment where I went to the comedy store.
Marc:It was, what was it, Friday night in the original room.
Marc:I've been doing a lot of shows.
Marc:I've been doing hour and a half, two hour shows, really working through stuff with supportive audiences.
Marc:I go to the comedy store.
Marc:And, you know, I get on that stage that that in its in and of itself had is is a haunting sort of platform for me.
Marc:I mean, I was there and I was fucked up and I went through a lot of shit there and all I ever wanted to do was be on that stage.
Marc:And I felt like that club chewed me up, chewed my soul up and spit me the fuck out of this town.
Marc:And my brain was a mess.
Marc:So, I mean, I think if we transfer that language into, I think that club, when I was 21 years old, fucked me in the ass.
Marc:And did I volunteer for that fucking?
Marc:I did.
Marc:Was it abuse?
Marc:I think it could be framed that way in the insecure box that is my brain.
Marc:So, when I go back there,
Marc:That it's all hanging in the air.
Marc:The mystical element of the comedy store as being some sort of, you know, haunted, weird vortex of of demonic spirits inhabiting others.
Marc:That's gone.
Marc:But the truth of the matter is, is I was traumatized deeply by that place.
Marc:And I think that people who listen to this show with any psychological concern.
Marc:uh intuition could hear that in the way i talk about it but it really came it all came crashing down on me man i'm friday night i'm on stage it's not going well and i feel this thing that i don't feel anymore come up out of me this this contempt this anger this cornered sort of you know feeling of like i'm not going to let you touch me again not like that it's inappropriate and
Marc:So I literally having this this anger, this defensiveness that it's not just the audience sitting there.
Marc:It's the entire structure.
Marc:It's everything it represents in my framework, in my mythology, in my brain.
Marc:And I just found myself like I felt my heart drop and my shield go up and the fucking swords come out and I'm ready to just cut people up in that fucking room.
Marc:And they weren't even doing anything.
Marc:So it's arguable.
Marc:Maybe perhaps that was a bad night for the club and perhaps the mysticism is still there and the force of darkness was strong and it was sucking the spirit out of those people.
Marc:But why elevate it to that degree?
Marc:Why not just say I had a bad set and move on?
Marc:Because every time I go in there, I'm confronting my abuser.
Marc:Pow!
Marc:I just shit my pants.
Marc:JustCoffee.coop.
Marc:Available at WTFPod.com.
Marc:Get that WTF blend.
Marc:And I get a little on the back end there.
Marc:But I should say that I went back the following night, Saturday night, in the main room and just fucking killed it.
Marc:So there's that constant relationship.
Marc:So now, like, you know, who's the bitch now?
Marc:Comedy store.
Marc:That's right.
Marc:Saturday night, it was you.
Marc:Friday night, yeah, I left with a little... Yeah, I was bleeding a little bit.
Marc:A little bleeding.
Marc:What else?
Marc:Oh, look, the cabinet thing.
Marc:Thank you for all of the emails from people who work with wood.
Marc:Some of you look like amazing wood artists, and it's almost like I didn't respond to some of you.
Marc:Well, I didn't respond to a lot of you, but I have it all, and I was going through them all.
Marc:And some of it almost looks too nice for my house, but I appreciate all of it, and I will keep it all on file because I'm going to need other stuff.
Marc:What I'm saying is I did find a guy...
Marc:to do the work I needed, which was build a standalone piece of shelves.
Marc:But the reason it happened, I just want to share this with you, because I'm going to need more furniture, by the way, so don't take any offense.
Marc:I have all of your examples and your work, and it's beautiful work.
Marc:A lot of creative people listen to this show, and I'm very happy that you enjoy listening to me while you work.
Marc:And keep up the good work.
Marc:And I'm talking to you.
Marc:Get back to the lathe.
Marc:Is that the right tool?
Marc:So...
Marc:So I get an email like last week from a dude.
Marc:It's almost panicked from this dude named Patrick.
Marc:It just says, did you get the shelves made?
Marc:I'm coming down from Northern California, the Ukiah area.
Marc:I'll be there for two weeks visiting family and I'll build them.
Marc:So in my mind, I'm like, shit, that that means it's going to happen now.
Marc:There's no it's like, let's make this happen now.
Marc:He's like, I'll be there in two weeks.
Marc:I'm going to.
Marc:And he's he came by.
Marc:I'm like, all right, well, that's a time window.
Marc:There's no waiting.
Marc:This guy is he had an example of his work, some some pieces.
Marc:And I'm like, he seems to know what he's doing with the stain and with the saw.
Marc:Let's fucking make this happen.
Marc:So I get in touch with him.
Marc:He comes over when he gets down here.
Marc:I say, look, this is what I need.
Marc:And he barely looked at the place.
Marc:He kind of eyeballed it.
Marc:No tape measuring.
Marc:I drew a picture of the thing I had in mind.
Marc:He's like, OK, I think I can do this.
Marc:And I just got to get the materials.
Marc:And then he splits.
Marc:And my brother's over.
Marc:And he's like, I don't know.
Marc:Does he think he knows what he's doing?
Marc:I'm like, I think so.
Marc:Just because he didn't measure anything or take it.
Marc:He's just one of those dudes that's operating in the moment.
Marc:And then he went out and he priced me out on what it would cost for materials.
Marc:He said he picked up some other tools.
Marc:He's going to do it in his mom's garage.
Marc:He's taking a couple of extra days and he's on it.
Marc:I just love that thing, man.
Marc:Just a dude driving down in the car.
Marc:I got these skills.
Marc:Let's fucking make this happen.
Marc:I like that spirit of that.
Marc:I remember there was a dude named Ross Broccoli who used to hang out in New York.
Marc:He was one of those dudes that could do anything.
Marc:He could play basketball.
Marc:He could drink all night.
Marc:He could drive a truck.
Marc:He could do woodwork.
Marc:He could paint beautifully.
Marc:He was just one of those guys that just had all these hidden talents.
Marc:And I remember one time I had a full on, full size, like six foot, seven foot tall bookshelf.
Marc:That was the depth of a bookshelf.
Marc:And I wanted to make a CD shelf.
Marc:I wanted to build a CD shelf.
Marc:And he came over to a small one bedroom New York apartment.
Marc:And he said, let's just make it out of this.
Marc:And I'm like, all right.
Marc:So he brings a circular saw to my small apartment.
Marc:And we proceed to literally cut a regular size bookshelf in half.
Marc:you know, all around and keep the backing.
Marc:You know, we're basically cutting it down.
Marc:You're cutting a bookshelf in half lengthwise.
Marc:And he was very confident about it.
Marc:But needless to say, we did cut through a couple of books.
Marc:Somehow or another, we sawed 1984 in half.
Marc:I still have the half.
Marc:And my apartment was covered in sawdust for six months.
Marc:I could never get it all up.
Marc:But I like the spirit.
Marc:I like it.
Marc:Let's just fucking build this.
Marc:So I'll let you know how that goes.
Marc:We get into a big conversation, you know, WK and I about art and about, you know, just the creative spirit and where it's going to lead you and what you want out of it.
Marc:I think you're going to find that very interesting.
Marc:All right.
Marc:Hey, you know what time it is?
Marc:It's stamps.com time.
Marc:That's right.
Marc:I'm going to read a handwritten letter from a young lady.
Marc:Mark.
Marc:I don't even know why I'm writing this letter, but it seems that everyone is writing to you and you do seem to read them.
Marc:So it only makes me want you to read whatever shit comes out of my brain.
Marc:And the shit that comes out of my brain is pretty weird.
Marc:So we have to part in the shitty language.
Marc:Congratulations on episode 300.
Marc:I'm surprised how much I love the podcast.
Marc:Really?
Marc:I have no idea why.
Marc:But your podcast really has changed not only my view of comedy, but how I view life, stuff like existentialism, and my own brain, which, unfortunate for you and me, both kind of angrily keeping in our heads like the lovable douche you are and the obstinate, bullheaded fucking bitch that I am.
Marc:100th episode ended, and I'm smiling hard.
Marc:And that storm cloud that resonates harshly in my skull has dissipated for now.
Marc:I thank you for that.
Marc:Wow, that was extremely eloquent.
Marc:Now let me tell you something that has been bothering me because of you, you interesting asshole.
Marc:So I'm bipolar.
Marc:And when you're bipolar, you have a lot of energy and talents and creative areas.
Marc:For me, it's writing, music, acting, and it makes me a bitch.
Marc:I read about you in an article in Entertainment Weekly the summer of my senior year of high school.
Marc:Four months later, music wasn't giving me much muse, and I decided to find your podcast and listen as I do the monkey dance my band director has put me in because apparently the fucker's a sadist.
Marc:So it was the episode with Anthony Bourdain, and as I'm listening, my mind has gone to pure shock.
Marc:I started to like Bourdain because of you.
Marc:And because of you, I start to watch Bourdain's TV show, No Reservations.
Marc:Slowly, I start to change because of you.
Marc:Through the course of more than 50 podcasts, I begin to change in my tastes and such.
Marc:One, I watch Anthony Bourdain, No Reservations.
Marc:Two, I learned about Diablo Cody.
Marc:Three, I listened to Mary Mack and Bo Burnham.
Marc:Four, I own songs from The Shins and Jack White.
Marc:Five, I listened to Chelsea Peretti and Aziz Ansari's stand-up.
Marc:Six, I read Dave Barry and Alan Zweibel's Lunatics.
Marc:And the list goes on and on.
Marc:I also got addicted to downloading and listening.
Marc:When I was in school, it was like clockwork.
Marc:Every Monday and Thursday, I download it.
Marc:Then I listen as I do my homework or housework.
Marc:Or when I'm at high school, I would listen in the choir room section of the band hall.
Marc:Classes would go by and I would be the happiest ever.
Marc:Somehow your podcast would make me happy.
Marc:Still does, bro.
Marc:I had begun a cataclysmic reaction in me.
Marc:I'm now the most unassuming hipster queen.
Marc:And if you read this email on air, I will murder you.
Marc:No, not really.
Marc:Just don't make me have another complex, man.
Marc:I got too many already from a crazy-ass Mexican, Vanessa.
Marc:Right on.
Marc:Don't get a complex, Vanessa.
Marc:All right, are you ready to get into it?
Marc:Are you ready to get into creativity, music, art, sex, and the feeling of being alive?
Marc:Let's talk to Andrew WK.
Andrew WK.
Guest:I did a panel at South by Southwest this last time.
Guest:We go every year.
Guest:And the panel was about, I guess, esoteric thoughts in the music industry.
Guest:And one of the guys there... That's a little broad.
Guest:Well, you wouldn't think.
Guest:I mean, for most people, like, oh, that's a pretty particular topic.
Guest:And I thought, well, actually, that's the most broad topic.
Guest:But there was a professor there.
Guest:So I learned more.
Guest:I didn't actually have that much to contribute, despite being a panelist.
Guest:Part of it, one of the most amazing things he said, and I don't think it just applies to esoteric thought.
Guest:I think it applies to maybe life, or at least culture.
Guest:He said, the fact that you don't understand it is the point.
Guest:right because it's constantly provocative it's inspiring right okay yeah and i was like thank goodness because i felt like an idiot for all these years that i didn't get it well that that's uh that is very provocative it was a really it was a life-changing one sentence that this professor said and god you know i can't remember his name i don't know if that doesn't matter you don't have to you don't have to understand that
Marc:It ties right into it.
Guest:But, you know, it was a lot of fun, and I'm glad that you can relate to that same kind of vibe.
Guest:It takes the pressure off, you know?
Marc:Well, you know, you spend your life trying to crack some sort of code, thinking that there's part of you that thinks, like, I got to make sense of it.
Marc:Right.
Marc:How many times do you say to yourself, like, I just got to figure it out?
Marc:I want to know.
Marc:Right.
Marc:I got to figure it out.
Guest:Someone knows.
Guest:Someday it's all going to make sense.
Marc:Where is that book?
Guest:For folks, have people seen your library here?
Marc:Some people have seen pictures.
Guest:Yeah, because I don't ever show people my library.
Marc:Why?
Guest:I guess it's mostly the pornography.
Guest:You want to kind of keep that stuff.
Marc:Well, what kind of pornography do you have?
Guest:Mostly sexual.
Marc:As opposed to what?
Guest:That's a good question.
Guest:Mostly sexual.
Guest:As opposed to the other kind of pornography.
Guest:I'm just joking around.
Marc:I never look at porn.
Marc:It's okay, man.
Marc:You do look at porn.
Marc:I love porn.
Marc:Let's talk about that, man.
Marc:Where are you with that shit?
Guest:That's always one of the most exciting things to me about coming to L.A.
Guest:I don't live here.
Guest:I live in New York City.
Guest:There's a very, very small amount of adult industry in New York.
Marc:Yeah, you used to all be there, kind of.
Marc:That's exactly right.
Guest:I mean, in terms of purveying it.
Guest:Screw Magazine, Al Goldstein, 42nd Street, and everything else.
Guest:He was working at J&R Cigars for a while.
Marc:Where's that?
Marc:That's right on 47th and maybe 6th Avenue.
Marc:Oh, really?
Marc:Al Goldstein.
Marc:Yeah, he was down on his- Recently?
Marc:Yeah.
What?
Marc:He's down on his luck.
Marc:I go in there to get some sticks, right?
Marc:And there's fucking old Al Goldstein.
Marc:Oh, my gosh.
Marc:Smoking a cigar.
Marc:He was primarily there because someone got him the gig out of the goodness of their heart because he was struggling.
Guest:Oh, my gosh.
Marc:And there he was.
Marc:And he talked my ear off for a while.
Marc:They eventually let him go, I think, exactly for that reason.
Guest:That breaks my heart.
Guest:He is one of the most important figures in, I'd say, American pop culture, especially in the 20th century.
Marc:But where do you stand on the porn thing?
Marc:I mean, do you think it fucks with your head?
Marc:Hopefully.
Marc:Yeah.
Bye.
Guest:No, I know.
Guest:I want stimulation of any kind, physical, mental.
Guest:I want to be in a state of complete disarray and then be comfortable with that.
Guest:That's what you're driving towards?
Guest:I don't like comfort from culture.
Guest:I got comfort from blankets, soft pillows, warm baths, which I haven't taken in a long time, but the idea of it is still comforting.
Guest:My wife, a soft piece of skin, even my own arm.
Guest:I can just rub my own arm.
Guest:The skin's pretty soft.
Guest:off there you feel comfortable i get a lot of comfort but when it comes to music books art movies all that stuff you know entertain i want to be blown away and disturbed and shocked and excited and confused and all that good no sweetness i mean don't you like some sweetness i mean blown away i guess that's blown away is pretty broad you can be blown away quietly you can be blown away by sweetness
Guest:Sure.
Guest:Yeah, no, no, no.
Guest:I was thinking about that, too.
Guest:I mean, Bridge Over Troubled Water.
Marc:How great is that when fucking Art hits that high note?
Guest:What are you going to do with that?
Guest:When they go into Sail On, Silverbird.
Marc:Sail On, Silverbird.
Marc:I cry every time.
Marc:Right, yeah.
Guest:I'm crying a little now, just after saying it like that.
Guest:That's a song where any person I truly love and care about, that's a song that you can picture them, listen to that song, and it's like the greatest thing you could do for that person is just to psychically imagine it and connect them to that song.
Guest:It's one of the greatest things that any human has done.
Guest:So I agree.
Guest:There are times for that sweetness, but you know what?
Guest:It's still intense.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:That's the thing.
Guest:You want to feel.
Guest:I want it to be, yeah.
Guest:I don't want passive.
Guest:Blown away means feel.
Guest:That's right.
Guest:But you can be blown away by a lot of things.
Guest:can be blown away by a fan a really strong you know breeze i think literally you can sure i mean if let's just make it she's a good fan yeah yeah then hey you can be blown twice what i was talking to you about earlier a boy has never wept or dashed a thousand kim the last word k-i-m
Marc:The last words of Dutch Schultz.
Marc:And Sam Shepard used it as an opening quote to a play of his.
Marc:And this is like, you know, and William Burroughs was hung up on it and he wrote this screenplay about it.
Marc:And I used to, when I was younger, I would fester about this shit.
Marc:It's like, why is it important?
Marc:And basically it was important because Dutch Schultz, who was a famous gangster, when he was dying, just apparently went on this hours and hours of free-form, nonsensical rambling.
Guest:And had never shown that kind of thinking before.
Guest:No, no, because he was dying.
Guest:The lights were going out.
Guest:He was going delirious.
Marc:Yeah, and boys never wept nor dashed a thousand Kim.
Marc:I guess, you know, I don't know what that means, but there's a poetry to it.
Marc:And if you're talking about Burroughs, a guy who would write, you know, something in a paragraph, then cut it up and rearrange it to get the poetry out of it, and then think he was time traveling to extrapolate some deeper meaning out of that.
Guest:Profound truths.
Marc:Right.
Marc:That's a mind fucker.
Marc:But I mean, there's no answers there.
Marc:There's just sort of like, you know, you're like, okay, I'm going to move this shit around.
Marc:I'm going to take this out of context and boom, you get blown away like you're talking about.
Guest:That's what, you know, Dali, I think said some quote very similar.
Guest:I'm paraphrasing right now, but something about confusion is the truest state of understanding.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:But how long have you been married?
Guest:Well, I've been married now at Sherry Lily.
Guest:We met, actually, our singing teacher, a heavy metal singing teacher that we were both going to, and she was the student that had the lesson after me.
Guest:So as I'm leaving my lesson, I see this...
Guest:Angel.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And then our singing teacher, this wonderful woman named Melissa Cross, who is a singer out there.
Guest:I highly recommend her.
Guest:She basically set us up.
Guest:She knew.
Guest:And when you because when you sing and you work with the teacher on singing, it's a very vulnerable experience.
Guest:I did that once.
Guest:So, you know, I mean, you got it.
Guest:You can't because to touch the sound like Simon and Garfunkel.
Marc:Yeah, well, like, you know, to find that voice within you where you... Like the... Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Marc:Sad, right?
Guest:It's intense.
Guest:You might as well just be crying.
Guest:Well, anyway, she knew me very well, and she said, you...
Guest:Like you were born.
Guest:She knew that this was my soulmate.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:And I never believed in that.
Guest:Well, I mean, I thought I did.
Guest:You know how these things go.
Guest:And, you know, you found your soulmate several times now.
Marc:No, I'm a true believer in that.
Guest:The one soulmate idea is bullshit.
Guest:For you.
Guest:For anybody.
Guest:Oh, geez, Mark.
Guest:What?
Guest:Well, I want to think that it exists.
Guest:What?
Guest:Your soul is so small it has to limit itself?
Guest:It's extremely small.
Yeah, of course.
Guest:That's how I try to compensate for the other small... You're overcompensating for your tiny soul?
LAUGHTER
Guest:I gave myself a long, well, not that long ago, about 12 years ago.
Guest:To who?
Guest:When I moved to New York.
Guest:Come on, you did not.
Marc:You're full of soul.
Marc:You're all about the soul, man.
Marc:That's the trick.
Guest:Yeah, I get that.
Guest:That is the trick.
Marc:You make them think it, but... It's all about the... No, there's no trickery going on.
Guest:I'm having fun.
Guest:Sherry Lily is...
Guest:the best thing that's ever happened in my life.
Guest:And, uh, you know, if it doesn't last forever, I understand what you're saying.
Guest:And I respect that I'm enjoying it while it's going on.
Marc:I guess maybe I should rephrase it is that love can be found again and again.
Marc:It's not that your heart doesn't break and that the love that you had is still within you, but it does not, uh, it does not, uh, unless you get bitter, it does not stifle your ability to find love again.
Marc:I agree with that.
Marc:And everything counts.
Guest:Cause I had great relationships before that, that I gained from, you know,
Marc:Sure, and I'm sure they did too.
Marc:I'm sure you broke a couple hearts along the way.
Guest:No, I think my heart was always the one that was broken.
Guest:Is that true?
Guest:Most of the time.
Guest:Really?
Marc:A lot of the time.
Marc:Who was the first girlfriend?
Guest:Well, in high school, Christina, beautiful, really.
Marc:But who were you in high school?
Marc:Let's go back.
Marc:What were you wearing?
Marc:You're hanging out, smoking a cigarette?
Guest:No, I didn't smoke then.
Guest:I didn't do any drugs or alcohol or cigarettes or anything until I was 21 or 18 for cigarettes because it's not legal.
Guest:Yeah, you got to get started.
Guest:No, it's just against the law.
Guest:What, you were worried about that?
Guest:I don't think I'm worried, more just respectful.
Guest:Really?
Guest:I don't know.
Guest:That's how I was raised.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Who raised you?
Guest:A pack of strange vagrants who for some reason thought that they were going to make up for all their errors by raising me very well.
Guest:Oh, that's good.
Guest:They're called parents.
Guest:And they never quite pull it off, do they?
Guest:No, but it was a valiant college effort.
Guest:It was a good college try.
Marc:What was your parents involved in?
Guest:Wore their rackets.
Guest:Well, you know, my dad's a law professor at University of Michigan, and I'm wearing the U of M hat right here.
Guest:He makes me wear it.
Guest:I guess he gets like 20 bucks a week or something.
Guest:Well, hence the fear of the smoking age, I guess.
Guest:Well, he's a smoker, too, so...
Guest:Still.
Guest:Well, he's been.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Much to my, you know, of course, my my my mom's chagrin.
Guest:But he's good at it.
Guest:You know, he can smoke like a cigarette, like, you know, so, so fast.
Marc:I know.
Marc:But that's like, you know, that's like saying I'm good at punching myself in the face.
Guest:He likes it.
Guest:You know, I used to think it doesn't like it.
Guest:I don't like it that much.
Marc:No?
Guest:It depends.
Guest:You know, it's one of those things I enjoy.
Marc:All right, so you're in high school, you're hanging out, you're not smoking.
Marc:We're having a blast.
Marc:Yeah, perhaps what, you know, like drinking some beers?
Marc:No, not too late.
Marc:No, no, no, no, no.
Marc:So what were you listening to?
Marc:What music?
Marc:Who was your guys?
Guest:You know, again, like whatever the most intense stuff, whether it was death metal or, you know, crazy jazz or just pure noise.
Marc:Crazy jazz, like what, John Zorn?
Guest:Yeah, oh yeah, oh yeah, oh yeah.
Marc:Naked City.
Guest:Naked City, like... It's just like...
Guest:I was like, this is the shit.
Guest:Eisenstadt and Neubarton.
Guest:Eisenstein and Neubarton, yeah.
Guest:And Albert Eiler, of course.
Guest:And later, Eric Coltrane.
Guest:That's a funny thing.
Guest:You know, Wynton Marsalis.
Guest:Did you do the Fred Frith, Brian Eno matrix?
Guest:I like all that.
Guest:Yeah, the Kraut rock.
Guest:I like all music.
Guest:There really is not a track music.
Guest:Throbbing Gristle.
Guest:That's the best.
Guest:Is it?
Guest:That is the best.
Guest:Tell me why.
Guest:Have you listened to it?
Guest:Sure, I try.
Guest:Okay, well, you know, do you like... How about, do you like can?
Guest:I do.
Guest:Do you like cantaloupe?
Guest:What, the melon?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Sure, have I had some?
Guest:Hey, my wife doesn't like cantaloupe.
Guest:I don't understand that.
Guest:And that's how I don't understand how you can't like throbbing gristle.
Guest:You know what, listen to Hamburger Lady.
Marc:i'm writing it down that's a later song by them on an album called heathen earth you know they do have a few albums like i get can you know they got good grooves yeah they got good grooves and you know they're sort of the the the kind of front line of that industrial thing right uh well yeah pre eisenstein well throbbing gristle they invented that they invented the industrial thing
Guest:More or less.
Guest:It's all coming off of, in my opinion, if you trace it back to what people refer to as quote-unquote art rock, you're going back to Roxy Music, and you're going back to Bauhaus, of course, but you're going back to Velvet Underground.
Guest:Velvet Underground, sure.
Guest:Velvet Underground's probably what most people would consider the first art rock band, but there's also The Monks.
Guest:With the crying cello of John Cale.
Guest:There's a society...
Guest:If it doesn't sound good, that's how you know it's good.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:Well, I mean, but it's interesting because, well, at least you're well, a lot of your records are pretty straight up.
Marc:They're almost they kind of run the gamut of celebratory hard rock.
Marc:Yes.
Marc:I mean, there's like there's even a bit of queen in you, I think.
Guest:Own it.
Guest:I'm a bit effeminate.
Marc:No, I don't mean that.
Marc:I mean the band.
Guest:Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, yeah.
Guest:Okay.
Guest:Well, I took it as a compliment either way.
Guest:So thank you.
Guest:Yeah, no, great bands all the way through.
Guest:The thing about Queen, and I was just telling my wife this, they were playing, you know, we're staying at this hotel and they have a nice pool as so many of the hotels here do, which is always refreshing.
Guest:Again, coming from New York where I don't think I've ever been in a pool in New York City.
Guest:There are some out there.
Guest:And they're playing some music.
Marc:You've got to go out to Queens and swim with the filthy people.
Guest:You don't fill up the bathtub.
Marc:And I'm not saying that in any other way other than people bring their children from apartment buildings and put them in a public pool.
Guest:This is great.
Guest:We killed two birds with one stone.
Guest:We don't have to give Bobby a bath tonight.
Marc:And throw her in the pool.
Marc:That's all.
Guest:And he doesn't have to go to use the bathroom.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:You can just do it right there.
Marc:Exactly.
Marc:With every other kid in Queens.
Guest:They were playing that, you know, Another One Bites the Dust.
Guest:And I said, you know, there's so many Queen songs.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:There's so many amazing, some of the best music ever made.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And I like that song.
Guest:Yep.
Guest:But I would rather just listen to Good Times by Chic.
Guest:Mm-hmm.
Guest:So why, you know, the songs that have become so popular for them, and this happens with a lot of groups, it's not always their best.
Guest:And that's what I always try to encourage people, you know, go listen to, you know, I don't know, Flash.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:That one's exciting.
Guest:Really?
Guest:Flash.
Guest:I mean, triumphant, really thrilling.
Guest:So many of your songs are very triumphant, dude.
Guest:That's the feeling I want to get.
Guest:I want the feeling of the music to be like you're standing on top of a mountain.
Guest:that you didn't even have to climb and somehow you just appeared there and the sun.
Marc:So like you turn on the song and it's like, what the fuck?
Marc:How did I get up here?
Marc:I'm on a mountain.
Guest:You got your hands over your head and you just say like, you know what?
Guest:No matter what else has ever happened or ever will happen, this fucking rules.
Guest:That's the feeling I wanted to have.
Marc:acdc oh you know i love him right now it's not only one of the greatest you know how fucking good is rock bands i think we got guitar player i mean it's amazing to me that he's not always number one on those lists it's me too very bizarre i went and bought that fucking rolling stone with the hundred greatest yeah that's what i'm talking about yeah he keeps climbing though and and it's like in my mind it's like no one has brought the blues to fucking hard rock like that dude not to mention
Marc:fucking steady man performance no absolutely even start going in but the thing is is like like i don't even picture him playing when i hear him playing right but those fucking riffs are so solid they're not flashy there's no noodling they're fucking the the timing he's got god damn albert king phrasing man the sound of joy
Marc:Oh, it's the best.
Guest:It is the best.
Marc:When I was in college, me and my buddy used to do these things where we get a 40 and then we get in the car and we put on ACDC and we drive until the 40 is gone.
Marc:We call it the ACDC cruise.
Guest:That wouldn't take that long if you're sharing it.
Marc:No, no, two.
Marc:We got two.
Marc:And we had cassette tapes.
Marc:So we go and it was like a best stuff.
Marc:I fucking listen to them now.
Marc:Who do you listen to now, like driving up here?
Guest:I mean, on the drive, there's this amazing song.
Guest:It's called Blow Your Whistle.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Now, there's a new song right now by Flo Rida, who I also really like, called Blow My Whistle.
Guest:But this is an older song.
Guest:And I was trying to remember the name of the artist.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:If you could look it up there, maybe you could help me.
Guest:Or I could do it on my thing here.
Guest:I can do it.
Guest:It's a funk song.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:It's a funk song.
Guest:And it's one of the greatest songs I've, I mean, just thinking about the song, just like now.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:You got the rush?
Guest:You got the buzz?
Guest:Yeah, we can tell.
Guest:Just talking about ACDC.
Guest:It makes you feel better in your body.
Guest:I'm not talking about mood.
Guest:I'm not talking about ideas.
Guest:I'm talking about the way it feels to live in your body.
Guest:It's the feeling of being happy.
Guest:I mean, and ACDC, I was telling my friend about this who also loves them.
Guest:It's not just one of the greatest rock bands.
Guest:It's not just, you know, discounting all the idea, which is a bit silly of genre.
Guest:So it's not only just the greatest music.
Guest:It's one of the greatest things that humans have ever done.
Guest:What, ACDC?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Oh, no, there's no doubt.
Marc:And I'm saying with landing on the moon and everything else.
Marc:What's interesting about them is that... What's interesting to me about you is that you seem to be embraced by a group of people that I wouldn't necessarily call party animals.
Marc:I mean, you have a lot of nerd credibility somehow.
Marc:Is that good?
Marc:No, it's fine.
Marc:It's good, yeah.
Marc:No, no, no, it's good because when I listen to your music, the one thing that you don't...
Marc:You're not an evil guy.
Marc:You're not menacing.
Marc:No.
Marc:Well, I mean, you're menacing in a good way.
Marc:No, no, no, no, no.
Marc:There's a sort of celebratory tone to it, almost like the Ramones.
Marc:Of course.
Marc:They're sort of like, let's go.
Marc:It's cheerful.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:is that alright please but you know sometimes with ACDC you're at the edge of some sort of menace oh that's true that's true and that like the thing I hate when people condescend ACDC like people like the lyrics are so simple and so filthy and so bass I know but even it's great it's fucking real rock and roll man when someone says stuff like that you know
Guest:Unfortunately, I've had a few conversations with people that would say this.
Guest:And this is, you know, again, everyone's allowed to think whatever they want.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:If you have certain ideas, I just don't really want to have that conversation.
Guest:When someone says something like that, oh, well, you know, like the three chords or...
Guest:What planet are you on?
Guest:How do you wake up in the morning and go out into the world thinking that kind of thought?
Guest:And it's so far removed from what I want life to be like that it's almost terrifying.
Guest:It's mind-blowing.
Guest:So in that way, it's a bit inspiring.
Marc:Yeah, it's like I say death to snark.
Marc:Fuck snarky.
Guest:All snarky is distancing yourself from life.
Guest:No, it's intellectualized apathy.
Guest:Protecting yourself by building up, like you said, an apathy, a willingness, or almost a conscious, aggressive effort to not care.
Marc:Yeah, an elaborate apathy.
Marc:There you go.
Marc:That functions as a shield.
Marc:But it can be very funny.
Marc:Yeah, I don't know.
Marc:Yeah, I guess so.
Marc:I guess so.
Guest:Well, I laugh at those.
Guest:I love crabby, funny people.
Marc:Yeah, who are you on Attack of the Show with?
Marc:Michael Ian Black?
Marc:Oh, no.
Guest:I wish.
Guest:He's pretty funny.
Guest:Yeah, he is crabby, I guess.
Guest:I wouldn't have thought about it.
Guest:He's likable.
Guest:That's what's amazing.
Guest:If you can be that crabby and still be likable.
Marc:Yeah, there's nothing better than a likable, cranky guy.
Guest:It is funny.
Guest:That's that New York tradition.
Guest:I'm hoping I'm evolving into that.
Guest:Well, I think you're well on your way.
Guest:Oh, thank you.
Guest:And I mean that as a compliment.
Guest:So where'd you grow up?
Guest:Ann Arbor so but you were you're too young to fucking you know jump on the legacy of that city musically aren't you what was going on there when you were there I mean freaky freaky stuff well you know the great tradition beyond you know the legendary rockers like MC5 and the Stooges Mitch Ryder and Detroit Wheels Bob Seger the Nuge and I think also Grand Front Railroad
Guest:oh really i think they are uh we're an american band man uh alice cooper oh spent a lot of good time there also uh george clinton and parliament fuckadelic although they weren't formed there but cooper is he one of your guys you know i haven't met him yet um i i do you have his records oh yeah because i gotta tell you the first time i was introduced to you your first album was all my ex-wife was all up into the shit of that record like you're my record yeah the first is that why you guys split up
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:It's just like I could not look at your bloody face anymore on my fucking dashboard.
Marc:Oh, my God.
Marc:She wouldn't shut up about it.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:What's that called?
Marc:I'm wet.
Marc:Is that the first one?
Marc:Something like that.
Marc:Come on.
Marc:I get wet.
Marc:I get wet?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:She fucking loved it.
Marc:She played it for me.
Marc:I'm like, I get it.
Marc:He likes to party, this guy.
Marc:Isn't that a little simple?
Marc:Can you not play any more of this fucking guy's music?
Guest:The lyrics are so simple.
Guest:Yeah, it's like, okay, everyone have a good time.
Guest:Come on, where's the darkness?
Guest:That's why they say people don't like math.
Guest:They're like, two and two is four.
Guest:So what?
Guest:It's so simple.
Guest:Lock it down.
Guest:Let's complicate this.
Guest:It's just numbers.
Marc:But when you were growing up, I mean, were you like... I didn't like any of that stuff.
Marc:What was rock and roll to you?
Marc:I mean, how did you evolve into this fucking monster world?
Guest:Well, I started with piano lessons, so from before I ever heard... I didn't have an older sibling.
Marc:So no one spoon-fed you what was right in music?
Guest:Or spoon-fed me anything.
Guest:You're an only child?
Guest:No, I have a younger brother.
Guest:Do you know him?
What's his name again?
Guest:no patrick we grew up together i have two older uh step sisters yeah they were too old like they already moved out of the house and all right so uh it wasn't until you know middle school junior high school uh and and high school when i actually got exposed like met older kids that had life experience that didn't have yeah and boy that was just uh once i found out what was out there i coming from piano lessons which was very traditional scales and
Marc:Do you remember the first dude that blew your mind musically where you're like, oh, that dude knows?
Marc:Yeah, I do.
Marc:I do.
Guest:Who was that?
Guest:Well, I had a friend named Jaime who played trombone in the jazz band in high school.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:And he took me to the local record store.
Guest:My high school, it's called Community High School in Ann Arbor and was right downtown.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And very liberal.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Too liberal.
Guest:Right.
Guest:You could go away from school.
Guest:Right.
Marc:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Marc:Take a break.
Marc:It really was.
Marc:I got to go.
Marc:I'm just not feeling it.
Marc:It's true.
Guest:And the teacher was like, all right.
Guest:It was progressive.
Guest:We call that ditching at my high school.
Guest:Right, exactly.
Guest:You get in trouble.
Marc:But not you.
Guest:This city with their hash bash, it's the most hippie.
Guest:I mean, there's really a few other places.
Guest:San Francisco, Ann Arbor.
Marc:I haven't been to Ann Arbor in a long time.
Marc:I used to do a club there.
Marc:I used to love that town.
Marc:What club would you go to?
Marc:Main Street Comedy Club.
Marc:Okay.
Marc:That's still there.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:I think.
Marc:I think it's called something else.
Marc:But yeah, it's like a dark fucking low ceiling.
Guest:It's called like Jokers now or maybe The Laugh Room.
Marc:Yeah, yeah.
Marc:Something like that.
Guest:Why do they call... Now, you know this.
Guest:Why do they make the names like that?
Marc:You know, it's the same as like a hamburger joint.
Marc:Well, there was an idea, I think, in the 80s when the comedy boom happened that they wanted to make clear what was happening inside.
Marc:You know?
Marc:Yucky, yuck it up.
Marc:Chuckles.
Marc:Laughs.
Marc:You know?
Marc:Giggles.
Marc:They just wanted to make it clear that what happened is what we're expecting of you.
Marc:Like a restaurant, food house.
Marc:Yeah, exactly.
Marc:Meal place.
Marc:Well, I think just the word restaurant.
Marc:You know what I mean?
Marc:They should have just done that.
Marc:It's like steak restaurant, this restaurant, that.
Marc:Well, it was like Giggles Comedy Club.
Guest:Wait, what were we talking about?
Guest:Jaime.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:So, yeah, he took me to this record store that we could walk to from high school, and the cashier, the guy, you know, the attendant that worked there, he became like my first mentor, like a proper mentor.
Guest:That's the fucking right one to have, man.
Guest:That's what you need.
Guest:Back in the day, you got a record store guy.
Guest:I need a mentor.
Guest:Knows everything.
Guest:He...
Guest:And I would go in it every day.
Guest:And then they had seven inches, of course, and we had CDs and they had LPs, new, old, used.
Guest:It's called School Kids Records.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And he worked in their sort of the side wing of the store where they had the weird, quote unquote, music.
Guest:So he was like a fucking cave genius.
Guest:One day he's like, here, you should check out this, Captain Beefheart.
Guest:Here, you should check out this, Einster's at a Neubau.
Guest:Here, you should check out this, it's called Hijo Kaidan.
Guest:Here, you should check out this, it's called CCCC.
Guest:And then he will, oh, and here's my band.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Marc:But he waited.
Marc:Good for him.
Guest:He did.
Guest:He was classy.
Guest:He wanted to give you some groundwork.
Guest:He didn't want to embarrass himself.
Guest:He wanted to lay the, what do you call it?
Guest:Set the table.
Guest:The foundation, yeah, in case I didn't like it.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And then when he gave me his record, and the band was called Couch.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And this gentleman's name is Jim Magus, who still performs under the name Marlon Magus.
Guest:Uh-huh.
Guest:And, you know, he changed my life forever.
Marc:Yeah, I mean, could have gone either way, dude.
Marc:I mean, you know, it's like you're coming right out of fucking piano lessons.
Marc:Who the hell knows how you could have ended up?
Guest:But, you know, there's that feeling, and I'm sure you've had this too, especially living out here and working in, you know, entertainment.
Guest:Destiny, it's not so much like you know what you're going to do, but you get these glimpses.
Guest:I mean, you have your passion, you have your likes.
Guest:I feel you get these previews.
Guest:And when you really like something, it's not that you like it and you're discovering.
Guest:It's your own destiny saying, hey, this is what you're going to be doing, so get ready.
Guest:Right.
Marc:Well, that's interesting.
Marc:So you felt that?
Marc:Oh, yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:yeah because like i you know i got music i got guitars around i play my blues i get beautiful gibson acoustic right there yeah yeah yeah and uh you know i i like i wanted to be music but it wasn't going to be music but i always felt that it was part of my life but i mean i'm a guy that like all right there's my destiny well i appreciate that but i'm going to take a left oh you subverted your own destiny sure dude oh yeah i am a destiny subverter
Guest:This is a more advanced version.
Guest:You are a little bit older than me, I think, right?
Guest:Yeah, 48.
Guest:Okay, I'm 33.
Marc:I used to be younger, which was... It happens to everybody, dude.
Marc:You're just going to have to deal with it.
Marc:You're going to have to slow down, man.
Marc:You're going to have to pace yourself.
Marc:What?
Marc:Because I'm going to get older?
Marc:You're going to get older, and you might want to pace yourself.
Marc:Fuck!
Marc:You don't want to get old too quick.
Guest:yeah yeah please well i used to want to get older sure you know no you're right on the cusp right now you know i always heard people say this my grandmother was like oh it used to be so great to be young and i thought look you have a you know like 30 in your wallet yeah i had you know 50 cents on you know the top of my dresser drawer yeah so i thought being older was cool because you could buy more gum or yeah you know candy or a piece of bread or whatever have a little left over maybe
Marc:for a movie or something pinball yeah but subverting destiny following your heart so when you were when you were tapped into like you know like when you first heard like trout trout mask replica or whatever and you you heard the freedom there because all those bands like that particular world of of music is is sort of like this is what i'm doing go fuck yourself you know get on board or don't
Guest:No hooks here.
Guest:It's very confrontational.
Guest:Right.
Guest:That's what they would say.
Guest:The first thing actually was.
Marc:Well, it's more it's more sort of like either you're going to listen to it and be like, where does this come from?
Marc:Why is this happening?
Marc:You're going to be like, oh, turn that off.
Marc:Am I going to be like this forever?
Marc:Right.
Marc:But if you're enchanted by that shit, then then you're walking into the doors of freedom.
Right.
Guest:It's really true.
Marc:They're just a guy plinking on the inside of a piano over there, and this guy's playing a rock.
Marc:And he's allowed to do it.
Guest:Yeah!
Guest:Knock yourself out!
Guest:I mean, again, it made me not depressed.
Guest:And a lot of people have really struggled with bad feelings.
Guest:when I saw Captain Beefheart on a VHS tape, again, the same guy from the record store, Jim Magus, he gave me a VHS tape copy of Captain Beefheart's performance on Saturday Night Live.
Guest:I remember that kind of.
Guest:It's hard to find.
Marc:Was he wearing a trench coat?
Guest:And a hat, maybe?
Guest:He was definitely wearing a hat.
Guest:He had a scarf.
Guest:He played Ashtray Hart and a hothead.
Guest:And his performance, the band, I just, you know, how can you ever look back once you've...
Marc:encountered that and had it feel your soul like that i remember that i remember when my freshman year of college i had a little black and white tv that was sitting on top of a shitty dresser in the dorm and we were watching saturday night live right and william burroughs came on holy and and i'd never heard of him i'd never seen any of it who was he playing with he wasn't playing anything he was reading from naked lunch oh my goodness and he just sat there like dr ben way and i'm like where did what is this person
Marc:And you'd never seen him before?
Marc:No, and I had no knowledge of the beats.
Marc:I was like 18 or 19 years old, and it was like, what the fuck is that?
Marc:And initially I thought, is that the guy who wrote Tarzan?
Marc:You know, I thought it was William Coleman.
Marc:But that's what, like, I think his name was Burroughs too.
Marc:It is.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And like, you know, I'm like, this guy who wrote Tarzan's got something else going on.
Marc:You know, and then I had to go fucking look him up, and I was punched in the head.
Marc:And I had a guy like that, Steve LaRue, who would play- A mentor.
Marc:Well, I've had a couple over my life.
Marc:You hope to have as many as you can.
Marc:Well, I was fortunate in that my dad was relatively absent.
Marc:And when your dad's relatively absent, you're like, are you my dad?
Marc:You'd seem interesting.
Marc:So you got to pick the right dudes.
Marc:Right.
Marc:I feel for you.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And but there was a guy who worked in a record store who played in a band that only played twice a year.
Marc:They were they were surgical scrubs and they broke pottery during the performance.
Marc:And on stage, they borrowed my brother's Ibanez Westpall copy for the performance.
Marc:And all they needed it for was to tape baby doll parts to and hit it with a drumstick.
Guest:You know, there's something so amazing.
Guest:Jungle Red, they were called.
Guest:What do you do?
Guest:I play in this band, Jungle Red.
Guest:What kind of music?
Guest:You know, we break pottery.
Guest:That's sort of our thing.
Guest:But yeah, we also got a guitar.
Guest:We don't use it, but we got the baby doll parts.
Guest:You notice how baby doll parts.
Guest:Yeah, they come up a lot.
Guest:It's like that's the archetypal freaky art.
Marc:Well, I think it makes sense because there's a moment at some point in your childhood, depending on where you land with theories, at some point it went terribly wrong.
Marc:You break apart the doll, right?
Marc:Well, yeah.
Marc:Something happens and you're never going to get back to whatever that doll represented before it was broken apart.
Guest:End of innocence.
Marc:Right.
Marc:And there's some party that wants to strive to that clarity again.
Marc:I mean, that's the full circle thing.
Marc:There you go.
Marc:Right?
Marc:Yeah, you're right.
Guest:We figured it out.
Marc:But the fucking ironic thing about Jungle Red was that the Art Rock crew in Albuquerque, New Mexico.
Marc:Oh, that's a great place.
Marc:Sure.
Marc:That's where I grew up.
Marc:But you know Art Rock.
Marc:That scene, it's a mixed bag of gay guys and you know what I mean?
Marc:And drag queens.
Marc:Wild scene.
Marc:Right.
Marc:It's wild, but depending on how big it is, if it's very small, it's not so wild because there's a lot of weight on each individual personality to carry the load.
Marc:I know.
Marc:It's a lot of work to keep that going.
Marc:Exactly.
Guest:It'll stop immediately because no one wants it to exist.
Guest:That's the problem.
Marc:Exactly.
Marc:Exactly.
Marc:Because if they take one close look at themselves and realize how much bullshit they're putting on...
Guest:And you know the town of Albuquerque is saying, we've got to figure out a way to stop this.
Marc:Well, no, there's a college there.
Marc:I'm just kidding.
Marc:No, no, but that's what makes them, they think that's there.
Marc:It's like, we have to stand up for this.
Marc:He has to be able to have that baby arm on there.
Marc:But...
Marc:But the thing was, is like most of this crew was pretty gay and the pottery he was breaking was fiesta wear, vintage fiesta wear that he had collected.
Marc:So it was a real fuck you to this whole situation.
Guest:Like American, like standard American culture.
Marc:Right, McCoy.
Marc:Like pop culture.
Marc:Well, I think that McCoy, original McCoy stuff was a pretty standard...
Marc:gay collectible that fiesta wear early on like bakelite or something yeah well yeah it was like uh you know it was a collectible it was an antique and it was like oh my god it was supposed to be very pedestrian no right right absolutely like rubber tupperware sure but you know from the and it's it's very old but just like everything you'd break you just hear the sort of like faint kind of whimpers of these gay men going oh no that's so great
Guest:that's what it's all about man i'm that that sounds like one of the greatest things you could ever see oh man i'll never forget any of these moments and the longer i live which is what the beef heart moment or all of them like what's some other ones i'm thinking you know i had a friend you know dirty tony they called him who lived in a basement with a ferret um and uh
Guest:He, you know, put on some of the most amazing performances I've ever seen.
Guest:And when you're, I don't know, you're 17, 16 and seeing that there and he's your friend, it's I, I was in heaven, but you sort of think maybe like 30 years from now, well, I really think this was that great.
Guest:It's even greater.
Guest:What was it?
Guest:while he was lying on his stomach with his feet kicked up in the air.
Guest:You know that, like when, I feel like it's a 50s thing.
Guest:Like, Pat Boone, let's... Like when a girl... Oh, right, like going on the bed with a hand, like cradling his hand.
Guest:With the phone and... Right, right, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Guest:But he wasn't doing it in like a... Was he on the bed or was he on a... No, he was on the stage.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And he had an effects pedal that he made out of a sock.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Which was mind-blowing unto itself.
Guest:I don't really know.
Guest:He was very good at wiring stuff instead of taking old keyboards and breaking them apart and putting them about together.
Guest:Right.
Guest:He ended up doing a project called Maximum Cloud and another one called Mini Systems.
Guest:And for very deep in the know folks, he was one of the early members of a same kind of scene that the band Wolf Eyes came out of.
Yeah.
Guest:But anyway, he was playing this show and he literally was playing.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And I was thinking about this earlier today about when you play an instrument, you think like I'm manipulating the instrument.
Guest:Right.
Guest:But you're actually playing.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Like playing a game.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Like playing with a ball.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Like playing with an animal.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And he had, I think that was the best example I've ever seen of someone fusing, playing music and actually playing.
Guest:He was going.
Guest:With the sock?
Guest:Yeah, the sock and the.
Guest:What was in his hands?
Guest:Like he had a small toy, I think like one of those clear guns that makes noise.
Marc:Oh, yeah, yeah.
Marc:Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Marc:Sparks or no sparks?
Guest:No, no sparks, but I know those as well.
Guest:They smell fantastic.
Marc:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Guest:That burning gunpowder.
Guest:Yeah, Chinatown memories with that.
Guest:But he was so vulnerable, you know, and so open and just making such an idiot out of himself.
Marc:No instruments that we could identify.
Marc:No, not.
Marc:Just the noise sock.
Guest:Sounds, the sock effects pedal and him going.
Guest:And it wasn't like a concept like I'm going to play.
Marc:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:It was unfolding and revealing itself to you that that's what he was doing.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:That changed my life.
Guest:Again, you hope to have a few of those, but I feel very spoiled that I've had, I'd say at this point, hundreds of those mind-bending, life-changing experiences.
Marc:And that was one of them.
Guest:And I'm having one right now with you.
Marc:Good.
Marc:I feel like I should be doing something more.
Guest:You know, it's effortless.
Marc:I feel like I should be.
Marc:I'm trying to think.
Marc:The Jungle Red experience was pretty powerful for me.
Guest:It sounds very similar in spirit to what I'm talking about, too.
Guest:And I wish that for everybody on this earth.
Marc:Where you walk into a different time zone and you're open to it and you don't condescend it.
Marc:That's a tricky thing.
Marc:That is.
Marc:that's open-mindedness right but that's a tricky thing man you know i mean it seems like you were wired pretty well for it early on but you know as i get older and having been through some of those experiences having seen the the creative spirit and all these different manifestations and also you know sort of being victim to the commercialization of that spirit you don't realize how deep the mind of that is when you're watching something you're like well this is great what's he going to do with it right he's doing it right
Marc:So there's that part in the judgment.
Marc:And then there's also that fine line of performance pieces and ridiculousness.
Marc:That sounds like that guy was very aware that his vulnerability was sort of based in a kind of ridiculousness.
Marc:But the thing is, that's the thing.
Guest:It's easy to think that now with my description.
Guest:I don't think he was.
Guest:He was so purely in what he was doing physically.
Guest:yet of course there was awareness he's a genius but he's also kind of a crazy guy like he truly from his own personal experiences the way he lives like i would say he's he's been struggling it's just you know when some just the idea that he would even choose to spend the time of his life doing something like that like laying on his stomach on a stage out of all the things in the whole world that a person could do i think the effect sucks the effect sucks
Guest:that's pretty big it was and it worked yeah it was with me up you know clear packing tape wrapped around a sock I remember the sock was sort of one of those theme socks like had palm trees on it wasn't just like a regular white sock yeah so it was a special sock on top of that and I think if you hit it it just it sort of broke a signal or started the signal again or squelched it it was all sort of a chaotic embracing chaos in terms of audio and
Guest:Tony Miller, or Tony Connolly, as he prefers to be called now.
Guest:I hope someone, if you're not listening to this, I hope someone tells you, because you're the best.
Guest:Life changer.
Guest:For real.
Marc:Not just for me, for a lot of people.
Marc:I remember shortly before I met Steve in the Jungle Red crew, when I was in high school, I was in a band, but not really.
Marc:I think we knew three songs.
Marc:You know, and I think they were like, you know, some shitty version of Sweet Emotion.
Marc:Okay.
Marc:And a fairly, you know, chopped up version of Tush.
Guest:Oh, those are good songs.
Marc:No, they're great songs, but we were just butchering them.
Marc:And we weren't really into it, but we were asked to play at a party, so we schlepped all this equipment to the party.
Marc:And our bass player, who was this goofy dude who wore a floppy hat and just was a sweet guy, he couldn't make it.
Marc:Floppy hat.
Marc:yeah he couldn't make it so my buddy dave knew some other guy named monty who uh who he said played bass and he could come so this guy monty plays up and we've never played with him we don't know him in new mexico yeah okay and this dude shows up he looks tired like he had bags under his eyes of an old man how old is he he was he was under 20 he was in we were in high school he must have been 16 or 17 okay and and then it's revealed that you know he's smoking and he's like he's on acid wow
Marc:And that was not in our wheelhouse at that time.
Marc:Okay.
Marc:So this dude shows up on acid, and he's got this bass amp, and he's got this other box.
Marc:We don't know what the fuck it is.
Marc:A box?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:So we noodle through our two songs, and then we go get some beers and try to get fucked.
Marc:Right.
Marc:Or whatever I did back then.
Marc:A lot of dry balling.
Marc:Have some fun.
Marc:Right.
Marc:Sure.
Marc:Party.
Guest:Wait, wait, wait.
Marc:Dry balling.
Marc:uh dry humping you know just grinding somewhere you know in a corner like rubbing up you know with someone else or just with the bottle no with someone else i go find a girl okay all i'm trying to say in cryptic way was that i was not fucking yet okay i was doing everything i could i respect and it was messy so okay right so we take the break and then all of a sudden you know with the party's going on now all of a sudden there's this eruption
Marc:like it's fucking like looping man yeah yeah yeah right and it's fucking monty and he's like he is taking the stage by himself with this fucking effects box on acid and there's just fucking bass roar like bouncing all over the place he's looping shit and the entire party just stops
Marc:and it's like what the fuck is happening he opened a wormhole oh he certainly did oh my goodness it's one of those wormholes like you know when he closed the wormhole there's nothing you can say to him other than like what you just look at him and you're like are you done what you don't you don't even know what to say like he gets it's beyond criticism right no one can beyond comment no one could say anything and this is like a fucking townie party at someone's house where the parents were out of town wow
Guest:You were kept from speech.
Guest:You were speechless.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:No speech.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:You know, I imagine the first instinct of that crew was like, what the, who's this freak?
Marc:And then it was sort of like, what is happening?
Marc:And then you just got to sit there in awe and wonder if there's anything.
Marc:He did it, man.
Guest:He broke through.
Guest:That's huge.
Guest:And you know, I hope it'll be great.
Guest:Not that we can track these people down, but yeah.
Guest:I bet there's other people there that remember that.
Marc:I don't know, man.
Marc:I don't know.
Marc:How could you block that out?
Marc:It was just like one of those fucking things where it was like, I don't know what happened to that guy.
Marc:We never played with him again.
Marc:We never practiced again.
Marc:I'm not sure where he came from.
Marc:You should try to track him down.
Guest:Maybe.
Guest:Maybe I will.
Guest:Maybe he got sucked into that wormhole and never came back again.
Marc:That's completely possible.
Guest:That was the greatest thing he ever could do, ever would do.
Marc:I think that happens.
Marc:He left on a high note.
Marc:Yep.
Marc:Yep.
Marc:Like the saddest thing about those stories is like, even like my guitar teacher from high school is that eventually, you know, they're good people, but you know, the dream was the dream.
Marc:Right.
Marc:And then you run into him 20 years later.
Marc:You're like, you're still playing.
Marc:No, not really.
Guest:You know, I don't understand that.
Guest:I don't understand that.
Guest:And this is not as a disrespect.
Guest:Um, I admit that my lack of understanding comes from, you know, one being very fortunate, but two, maybe some kind of ignorance.
Guest:But when I learned music, it was because I, it's the joy of music.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:People say, like, how do you become a successful musician?
Guest:I say, well, do you play your instrument?
Guest:And they say, yeah.
Guest:And I say, do you enjoy it?
Guest:And they say, yeah.
Guest:I said, then you're a successful musician.
Marc:Right.
Marc:No, man, I mean, like, on a record.
Guest:Oh, then you're going to be a businessman.
Guest:Oh, then you're going to be an entertainer.
Guest:You're going to work in the show business.
Guest:Those are all very different things.
Guest:But you were aware of that at some point?
Guest:I never wanted to do music as a business until way later.
Guest:That's what I was saying earlier when I moved to New York.
Guest:Initially, I wasn't going to fashion design or painting or science.
Marc:Do you do those things?
Guest:Well, as you can tell, I'm extraordinarily advanced with fashion and style.
Guest:I think my clothes speak for themselves in that regard.
Marc:Did you make them?
Guest:No.
Guest:All right.
Marc:Levi's made them and Fruit of the Loom.
Marc:But there was a point where you were like fashion design.
Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Guest:I was working in New York when I first moved there.
Guest:My first job was at a place called Comme des Garçons.
Guest:I can't try to say the French pronunciation.
Guest:But, you know, it's actually the funniest thing is that it's a Japanese clothing company.
Guest:And, you know, again, this was the clothing equivalent of what we've been talking about.
Guest:This was the first designer, Rei Kawakubo, the first fashion designer,
Guest:to ever send models out on the runway basically wearing rags yeah uh i think john waters in uh his pecker yeah movie yeah made reference to them um it's sort of in an offhanded way didn't say their name but uh all the people from new york came to this small town and they're wearing like the most crazy ridiculous clothes it looked like like like rags right and i thought this is i gotta get into this again there's a it's a wormhole thing just
Marc:Like where I think you seem to have a fairly deep appreciation for people who throw the time zone off.
Guest:I don't want to be.
Guest:Linear time is probably my least favorite.
Marc:Right.
Marc:Where there's such a confusion in the room that it's elating.
Guest:You know, I don't remember when something happened, but I do remember that it happened.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And that's how I want it.
Guest:I want a spiral of time.
Guest:Not from left to right, linear.
Guest:I want a spiral.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I feel pretty spiraled right now.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I like it to jump around a bit.
Yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Pop over to here, pop back there.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:Have you noticed this?
Guest:I've been having dreams.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:I haven't noticed them.
Guest:No, not my dreams.
Guest:No.
Guest:It's not the dream.
Guest:Several days later, a very trivial memory will pop into my head.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:About washing the wall in the bedroom.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Yeah, sure.
Guest:And then I realized it must have been a dream.
Guest:Right.
Marc:Or it's a false memory or something.
Marc:No, that happens to me where like, there are those dreams where you wake up guilty.
Marc:Like, you know, like, like if you dream, right.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:You know, like I, I'll never forget that dream where like somehow or another, I, I didn't see the act, but somehow me and my friends had killed the dude.
Marc:I got a classic.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:I don't know if it was an accident or not.
Guest:Carl Jung.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:These are archetypal.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I've had that dream too.
Guest:And the guilt, but you don't remember the details, just the guilt.
Marc:Well, not now.
Marc:I remember waking up in that waking consciousness going, Oh,
Marc:trouble man it's dark i'm in trouble oh and that battle of conscience of trying to yeah yeah you know it's a good feeling in life but not in the moment i mean it's very upsetting no yeah of course but sometimes but the thing you're talking about where like or even the day after the dream like you wake up that morning and you're like oh what the fuck i dream about and then later in your day you're just sort of like oh my god
Guest:and you get that flash of it and you're like I did that to that person the brain doesn't know the difference you have to tell you use the brain to tell the brain that it wasn't real and I think that like some of the music you're talking about kind of breaks that boundary down hopefully yeah
Marc:you know like yeah like well would how come like on some level so how do you get from from this uh you know from this appreciation of the uh of the anarchists and the geniuses and the poets like you know where how did you build yourself into that uh into what you became well i first i can't compete with them you know they've already done it they've done a very good job of
Guest:all that they've done, and that's just sort of what I do for my own interests.
Guest:But my work that I do as E&WK has nothing to do with my own taste or hobbies or interests and things like that.
Guest:Why is that?
Guest:I guess just with the agreements that I made and the choices I made early on.
Guest:It's not like I don't... It's my dream come true.
Marc:Well, what are those agreements?
Marc:I mean, what was... I mean, you probably talked about it before and I apologize.
Guest:No, no, I don't... It's the most trivial and important stuff.
Guest:It's just contracts and business, things like that.
Guest:But what I'm saying is that you don't need... When you know what you were meant to do and you signed up to do it and you know what it takes and what you've agreed to in order to achieve that...
Guest:You don't have to involve... It's not that I have a separate life.
Guest:I don't look at it as a job, like a nine-to-five job.
Guest:But that is the business.
Guest:Meaning, though, if I like Captain Beefheart, I'm not going to try to make his song.
Marc:No, no, but I'm just saying that in the spirit of that, you chose to be inspirational and create that delivery upon the mountain sound.
Marc:The triumph.
Marc:Yeah, the triumph.
Marc:You know, is different than like, I don't know what that noise is.
Guest:What's that awful noise?
Guest:Why do they do it?
Guest:Wait, it's changing.
Guest:It's changing.
Guest:How can people listen to this?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Well, I wrestled with it for a long time because I also, as I mentioned, into punk and hardcore and especially grindcore and death metal.
Guest:And I remember very clearly I was in Turkey of all places with my family in Istanbul.
Guest:My dad has an old sort of academic friend that ended up moving there.
Guest:And we went on a family trip, and it was quite amazing, actually.
Guest:At the time, I didn't like it as much because it took me away from all the other stuff.
Guest:I didn't like vacations.
Guest:Still don't really like them.
Guest:It's hard to know what to do.
Guest:I'm like, this is... I'm working...
Guest:out of joy so just think i need a break from that um i've only recently begun to appreciate it because i like to uh you know to look around at stuff yeah and you get great ideas sure so that's that that i appreciate that but most of the time i like to be active anyway so we're in turkey and there was this moment i remember there was a girl there was two beautiful daughters first of all of my dad's friend and
Guest:And I had crushes on both of them.
Guest:Right.
Guest:One was exceptionally beautiful, but too young.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And the other one was was was older and too smart.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:But also very attractive.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And, you know, how old were you?
Guest:This is right before I moved to New York.
Guest:So I just turned 18.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:I mean, literally two weeks after we got back.
Marc:There's nothing that makes you fester sexually more than a family vacation.
Marc:Because like, you know, because you're with your family and you're like, I just got to go take a walk by myself, you know, and then.
Marc:Right.
Marc:Because, you know, the next thing you do, you're looking at your mom.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:You got to watch that.
Guest:We're on a boat.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I mean, it has cabins and bedrooms.
Guest:It's not a big yacht or anything.
Guest:It's a small private sailboat.
Guest:But yeah.
Guest:What am I going to do?
Guest:Like go into the bathroom and then think about my mind.
Guest:God forbid she walks.
Guest:I mean, yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:You know, it's off limits.
Guest:But it's just also it's that freedom thing.
Guest:It's like, I'm fucking 18, man.
Guest:I'm going to go hang out by myself for a while.
Guest:Well, plus they're all wearing bikinis the whole time.
Guest:It's a boat trip.
Guest:So these two girls.
Guest:Anyway, so there was some flat right as the trip was ending.
Guest:The older girl, I had started talking with her more and we kind of had our late nights on top of the boat looking up at the stars and discussing life.
Guest:And she was asking me about my interests, which I don't normally like to talk about.
Guest:Were you just looking to get in there or what?
Guest:No, it seemed kind of obvious that that wasn't going to happen, and she kind of had bad skin at that time anyway.
Guest:I think actually, no, I was probably still with my other girlfriend too.
Marc:The one from high school?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah, let's get back to her.
Guest:Oh, she was top beaut.
Guest:Yeah?
Guest:Top beaut.
Guest:And you know what?
Guest:She's now had a baby.
Guest:I don't think she married, but she has a beautiful baby.
Guest:She looks exactly the same.
Guest:So I feel almost like proud in reverse.
Marc:Yeah, yeah.
Marc:Right, right, right.
Marc:I was on top of that.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:Both literally and metaphorically.
Guest:I feel like sometimes people think that you want them to look worse later.
Guest:Like, oh, well, look how they turned out.
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:I feel good that she looks that great.
Marc:Yeah, you got a good eye for talent.
Guest:That's what I'm saying.
Guest:Anyway, so we're about to leave this trip, and I was talking about music, and I'm about to move to New York, and I could tell something big was going to happen.
Guest:It had to if I'm going to be moving to New York.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:So I was sort of preparing myself.
Guest:But you weren't clear whether it was science or fashion design or painting.
Guest:I might even was thinking about going to NYU.
Marc:Sure.
Marc:Well, that makes more sense out of the three, unless you painted or you're a scientist.
Marc:Yeah, that was the problem.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:No, but, you know, I didn't know exactly.
Guest:And I was still playing drums in this grindcore band called Cathode.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:That's that fast, you know, like...
Guest:You can do that?
Guest:Well, maybe not anymore.
Guest:It was a lot of endurance.
Guest:I was pretty good at the time, though.
Guest:You know, you can find those songs on the computer.
Guest:But you can play drums?
Guest:Yes.
Guest:You can play everything, right?
Guest:Everything except clarinet, flute, cello, violin, accordion, harp, timpani.
Guest:Dulcimer?
Guest:uh no yeah that one no not that one either uh no i can play you know whatever basic instruments i need to make this this rock yeah right anyway so it dawned on me that i was going to have to give up playing grindcore drums if i was going to do i said it's either going to be i'm going to be in this band i was almost going to join the band mortician yeah um i auditioned for a band uh great cat who's the one of the fastest guitar players of all time a woman you know which is very rare and unfortunately in in metal
Guest:And then I decided, no, I just have to do the thing I was born to do.
Guest:And it was very painful because I thought, you know, all these great metal bands that I love, I'll never get the respect.
Guest:They're never going to like this music because it's not, you know, it's major key or whatever.
Guest:You know, it's not there.
Guest:It's not that heavy.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:But there was a very clear sense that it's triumphant.
Guest:You had to resign yourself to your destiny.
Guest:And, you know, it's the best thing.
Guest:Don't subvert your destiny.
Guest:No, you can't.
Marc:No, it's not a good idea.
Marc:No, you can do it.
Marc:Look, I think that what you're talking about is some example of being a creative person and realizing your limitations and pursuing what you can the best you can do it with your talent.
Marc:I think you said it very well.
Guest:And I feel very limited, so it was nice to find one thing.
Marc:But you're not that limited.
Marc:I mean, you've developed a theme and a tone and what appears to be a character for yourself.
Guest:I know.
Marc:What?
Guest:You see that sign?
Guest:What?
Guest:That says applesauce.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:No, I'm just kidding.
Guest:It says applause.
Guest:Will you flash that once for me?
Guest:You know what that is, right?
Guest:Now, remember, the better you do, the better Larry does.
Guest:That's right.
Guest:Okay, now he's giving me a sign, and that means we have five seconds.
Guest:So everybody enjoy themselves.
Guest:It's exciting, isn't it?
Guest:Mm-hmm.
Guest:Three, two.
Guest:Ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding.
Marc:no no no no um i would like to hear uh an andrew wk but not as andrew wk uh sound exploration album well i've done it uh as a younger child and uh that's very encouraging and i do appreciate that because uh
Guest:You know, you hope people want you to do whatever.
Guest:But you did a classical record for the most part, right?
Guest:No, I did a piano record.
Guest:But that was, you know, that's sort of an exercise in humility because I made it up as I went along and it's quite embarrassing.
Guest:I listened to it again.
Guest:Humility is important.
Guest:I like to be vulnerable.
Guest:I like that.
Guest:I think that's pretty much the best thing.
Marc:Okay, but the celebration records, the triumphant records, do you consider yourself vulnerable?
Guest:absolutely yeah yeah yeah i want that to be you know underlying all that but i don't really you don't usually talk about that kind of stuff yeah um but i am why not because it's what you think it takes away from it no no i think people just you know get that on their own you know it's better to sometimes keep those things inside right yeah keep the magic magic
Guest:Or whatever.
Guest:Come on, man.
Guest:I am working on a new rock album, and also your encouragement is very poignant, and I really do sincerely appreciate it because I have been working on some albums that maybe don't have drums or maybe don't have singing and things like that.
Marc:But, I mean, you're the guy to do it.
Marc:I mean, it's like, you know, when you talk about Beefheart, then you got to go back to Zapper.
Marc:And, you know, that's a dude that was like, this is the Zappa universe.
Marc:Go fuck yourself or get on board.
Marc:And I'm going to do whatever the fuck I want to.
Marc:And it's going to involve some doo-wop shit.
Guest:Yes.
Guest:i guess i feel like there's a time and place for it all and and and the gods will continue to guide me and you know my managers the people i work with here in you know this version of uh reality will also guide me and i'm patient do you have gods do you have them for real or are you just saying guardian angels however you want you have them everybody well i do yeah i mean are you spiritual cat no no no no no just just just more pragmatic
Marc:Okay, pragmatic and willing to mythologize.
Guest:Hey.
Guest:I can't discount the possibility of these things with the life that I've led.
Guest:It just would be really, I feel like, disrespectful to the forces that, you know, beyond myself and my mom and my dad, with all due respect to them, you know, and my mentors, there are other things at work.
Guest:You know, last night we played this show where I could have died, you know, very easily.
Marc:Why?
Guest:What happened?
Guest:Just very chaotic and very violent.
Guest:You know, I could have broken bones or whatever, and that's happened.
Guest:So knock on wood, any time...
Guest:that we get to do this, I think there's got to be something because I certainly wasn't protecting myself, you know?
Marc:Well, what happened?
Guest:You know, there's people going crazy and, you know, hanging from the ceiling and jumping on me and flying around.
Marc:But were these people that understood you or misunderstood you?
Guest:No, no, they were nice.
Guest:They were there to see our show.
Marc:So they're having a good time.
Guest:Oh, yeah, yeah.
Guest:No, it was always cheerful.
Marc:You don't get a lot of dickheads.
Guest:No, but that's always good.
Guest:You know, very fun entertainment as well.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:You know, that's not the point.
Guest:I'm not trying to make anybody feel any one way.
Guest:I'm just trying to make people feel.
Marc:Right.
Marc:Right.
Guest:Right.
Guest:That's very basic.
Marc:Now, when you were growing up, were you in some sort of struggle against sadness?
Marc:I mean, it's like this triumph of reaction.
Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Marc:Yeah?
Guest:Yeah, it was a way to cheer myself up, first and foremost.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Because I could tell that certain kinds of experiences, music, whatever, movie, a book, a thing, they made me feel better about being alive, you know?
Marc:Right.
Guest:And I wanted to stay close to that feeling.
Marc:Right.
Marc:Well, what was your, what was your experience?
Marc:Were you like, did you have the sadness?
Marc:Did you have this sort of like, I'm different than everybody else?
Marc:I mean, how did it manifest itself?
Guest:Uh, you know, it's like most people, I'm sure that people say it's a common thing for, especially that age.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:When you're a teenager or whatever, there's a lot of anger and a lot of, uh, real severe depression.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Like a paralyzing bedridden kind of shit or.
Marc:Yeah, pretty much.
Marc:What'd you do?
Marc:You didn't do no drugs.
Guest:Not then, no, no.
Guest:That was later.
Guest:I couldn't have handled it back then.
Guest:Holy cow.
Guest:I had friends, of course, you know, that was playing in high school that were in my band that would have their, you know, styrofoam cup with a straw full of vodka all day long.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:It disturbed me, actually.
Marc:Well, what were you doing to, like, you know, make it better outside of music?
Marc:I mean, were you fucking busting out?
Guest:No, yeah, masturbating and, you know, my girlfriend.
Guest:No, no, I didn't fight at all.
Marc:And you weren't breaking into shit and...
Guest:No, I actually did a lot of crimes, but not violent crime.
Marc:Just fucking off crime?
Guest:No, vandalism, shoplifting.
Guest:By yourself or with guys?
Guest:A lot of it by myself.
Guest:Really?
Guest:Yeah, but shoplifting, usually with friends, go to Borders when it used to exist, which was started in Ann Arbor, which is exciting.
Guest:I just realized that.
Guest:You go in, you make a stack of books, you just walk the fuck out.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:i would you know hundreds and hundreds i stole thousands of thousands of dollars from every job i worked at yeah um just for kicks or for the yeah it was weird because i would uh a lot of times like the money i would go and then you just give to one of my friends or give to the it was for that feeling that juice no it's because i wanted to say fuck it was that anger i was really had this just undirected animosity towards everything and everybody uh
Guest:Just a lot of hatred and anger.
Guest:And, you know, it was finding ways to deal with it.
Guest:I would go and, you know, steal $200 from the job.
Guest:And then on my dinner break where we could actually go and walk around the city because we were working downtown, you know, I go eat the fanciest restaurant and then steal all the silverware.
Guest:It was just very I don't know what I was thinking.
Guest:OK, it's embarrassing.
Marc:No, it's not embarrassing.
Marc:Were you ever able to sort of track down the source of that shit, the anger?
Marc:I mean, did you get to sit down with your folks?
Guest:Like, you know, maybe you ought to... Oh, they sent... Well, this is the funny thing.
Guest:The worst trouble I got in was through mail fraud and check fraud and forging baseball cards and things like that.
Marc:How did you do that?
Marc:With Xerox machines?
Guest:Dover reprints.
Guest:You know about Dover reprints?
Guest:Dover is a fantastic company that uses public domain artwork, old clip art, baseball cards.
Guest:So I was forging baseball cards by using their reprints and then aging them with tea and scuffing them up and all that stuff.
Marc:So you were in it.
Guest:I was trying to find something to do at this point.
Marc:It's creative.
Guest:It's creative.
Guest:I guess so.
Guest:13, 14, 15 years old.
Guest:And then it got more targeted where I would find someone that I had that anger towards and thought, I hate this person.
Guest:Usually my friends.
Guest:And then...
Guest:try to harm them through uh sadness so i would uh you know like they might run a record label a little record so i would i would i would make a fake check yeah and that could take like six hours of meticulous uh computer work at that time was very primitive computers um you know hand drawing hand canceling the stamp to make it look like it was sent from japan yeah where inside there's a check for sixty thousand dollars to order you know a million copies of the new album whatever right and i just wanted them to to
Guest:To try to go and cash it and then to realize it was fake and then just to be so sad.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And I was confused by this.
Guest:So my parents sent me to several child psychologists and I went, you know, like every week for several years.
Guest:Didn't like it.
Guest:And at the end, the guy I saw the most, who was a really nice man, Indian man, he gathered me and my parents together, and he said, well, after all the discussions, my final diagnosis is that Andrew has a devilish side.
LAUGHTER
Guest:I was like, that's what we told you when I came in.
Guest:And we paid him, God knows, I mean, you know.
Marc:But you weren't ever able to trace it.
Marc:It wasn't because your parents were negligent or any of that shit.
Marc:It was just you were just full of the beans.
Marc:You seem to be possessed by a certain genius, which is sort of.
Guest:That's very kind of you to say.
Marc:Well, no, it's taxing.
Marc:I mean, you know, it's hard to have a fucking unguided genius spirit within you.
Marc:Wow.
Marc:it is yeah maybe he's had to find out where to direct that you know well it's like that like they're like that song uh like that bong water song and magnuson and uh and what's what's what's the what's the guy's name that we had the label in new york that kramer right yeah shimmy disc yeah shimmy disc like there was a song where there was called talent is a vampire and and like wow well yeah i mean i haven't thought of that's that's a good title
Marc:Yeah, but it's like, yeah, poetically, I think it's sort of a real thing that like you were going to either like there was going to come a moment where, you know, that energy, because obviously we just spend six hours to craft a check that looks authentic enough to fuck your friends up.
Marc:But it's not stupid, but it's meticulous.
Guest:It's focused.
Guest:It takes creativity.
Guest:I mean, that's a very nice way to look at.
Guest:I don't think the bank thought the same thing.
Guest:No, but I mean, but you can make a painting and hang it on a galley wall or you can do, you know, gosh, I did other things.
Guest:I mean, Kmart gift certificates that really looked good.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And you were doing this on your own.
Marc:You weren't like with a friend and like.
Guest:No, that was the part that was most disturbing to my parents.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:They didn't think they could really tell that it was not good natured and it really wasn't.
Marc:It wasn't like, let's do this, you guys.
Marc:It wasn't peer pressure and it wasn't trying to impress anybody.
Marc:You just wanted to... I felt really bad about it.
Guest:I still feel bad about it.
Guest:When you say, have you figured out why you were doing that?
Guest:I don't know that I have.
Guest:I think I just figured out a way to use some of that same...
Marc:inspiration or whatever it was and try to direct it into something more cheerful like show business you know or whatever no but I think it's clear why I mean you're hooked on fucking you know having a feeling having an extreme feeling make people feel something well no but you yourself I mean to fuck with somebody that deeply and then to beat the shit out of yourself for it afterwards I mean that's some that's some heavy fucking shit
Guest:i guess so i didn't feel too bad after all right just confused then you're just a sociopath you you have a devilish side i just felt confused yeah well for sure the the k-mart thing especially because the friend that i did that one too was going through a really hard time he was basically having a psychedelic uh crisis he had been taking a lot of acid yeah and uh you know if you do it every day yeah for prolonged times as you know you don't have to do it to know what that would uh
Marc:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:Due to your brain.
Marc:Once you get past Sid Barrett, you're in a special realm.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:So he was in that state, and I thought this would be a great time to really make him feel awful.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And that's the thing even now thinking back is I don't know why wouldn't I do it to a teacher I didn't like or why didn't I do it to someone that was trying to bully me.
Guest:There were those kind of people.
Guest:I always chose people that I could monitor their reactions and manipulate them as they went through it for my own entertainment.
Guest:And it was pure cruelty.
Guest:And I feel really bad.
Guest:And the one thing is after all that, and that again was in the teenage years up until I moved to New York, then I stopped.
Guest:and now i've been trying to do something you know cheerful and fun yeah you're using your powers for good i don't normally talk about this stuff so thank you for uh giving me a chance to look at it again have you have you gone back and apologized yeah yeah yeah i'm still in touch with most of most of those people and you know the nice thing they were very nice about it yeah even people i wasn't that close uh they were more just very perplexed like why
Guest:would you do this to me right and I said I don't know and I guess they they saw an earnestness in that at least do you have any outstanding sort of like I'm never gonna be able to make that right
Guest:Um, no, I don't think so.
Marc:That's good, man.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Well, I had one, the last girlfriend or one of the last girlfriends I had before I got married.
Guest:Um, I've never spoken to her again and I don't care to.
Guest:So like, I was thinking like, Oh, is that the one thing?
Guest:But I know like if I saw her, I'd be fine.
Guest:Like who cares?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Isn't that weird how much your brain does that?
Guest:What's going to happen if I run into them?
Guest:You're going to say hello and be uncomfortable.
Guest:How are you?
Yeah.
Guest:You look good.
Guest:Congratulations on your baby and all that.
Guest:No, no.
Guest:And the only other one was a guitar player that was one of my best friends we played with in the band for years and left the band in kind of a bad vibe.
Guest:But I saw him and it was great.
Guest:And it really is satisfying to do that.
Guest:It's a good thing to do.
Marc:Sometimes time clears this shit up.
Guest:It does, because you get older and you realize that everything doesn't matter.
Guest:I mean, everything's absurd.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Or that everything does matter.
Marc:Yeah, yeah.
Marc:There's some grudges that stick, but, you know, what do you do?
Marc:You have grudges?
Marc:Yeah, I think that there's a couple unresolved things that, you know, like after a certain point, people are like, you know, you got to let that go.
Marc:It's just stupid.
Marc:Yeah, yeah, there's a, I think there's a piece on me in Rolling Stone coming up where I brought up a thing that is probably going to bite me in the ass.
Guest:Oh, jeez, Mark, why?
Guest:Did you realize it as you were saying it and it was too late and you're like, I'm just going to go with it?
Guest:Or had you planned out to talk about it?
Marc:No, I wanted to get it out of me.
Marc:That's cathartic.
Marc:Yeah, but not if it bites you in the ass.
Marc:Then it's inflammatory.
Marc:Yeah, it might be inflammatory.
Marc:Hemorrhoids.
Marc:Yeah, I think I created a hemorrhoid for myself.
Marc:We'll see what happens tomorrow.
Guest:Do you want to talk about...
Marc:No, because I don't know when I'm going to put this up.
Marc:Don't fan the flames, right?
Marc:No, I don't know when I'm going to put it up.
Marc:Well, look, man, it was great talking to you.
Marc:Thank you very much.
Marc:Do you feel good about it?
Marc:Yeah, I feel really good about it.
Marc:Considering this started with a dead squirrel.
Marc:That was a bit ominous.
Marc:I was just standing out there waiting for you, and I'm just sitting on the stoop there, and I look down, and there's that fucking squirrel.
Guest:There's a lot of flies around here.
Guest:What's going on?
Marc:I thought to myself, what's Andrew going to make of this?
Marc:I think this is a moment we should share.
Guest:Like, what am I going to make?
Guest:Like, oh, I can't do this, Mark.
Marc:Well, I'm trying to think like, you know, because, you know, your brain goes a lot of places.
Marc:So I'm trying to think like, is this part of it?
Marc:Is this is this is it sad or is it life?
Marc:I mean, is the bugs, you know, the ants and the flies, you know, hovering around this thing who clearly fell out of a tree made, you know, just made a bad judgment call on behalf of the squirrel.
Marc:But, you know, what does it really mean?
Guest:Right.
Guest:How do we interpret this?
Marc:yeah it's just you know it's like there's so many animals we don't i don't know where all the dead things go sometimes they end up under my house but it's just going to end up going into the ground you know it's not a horrible you were curious how i would look at that as the kickoff to our yeah and then we didn't kick off with it you know uh now that we're wrapping up with it i think and to circle back to what we did kick off with i don't know what to make of it and that's fine with me yeah i i felt jarred by it that's a good feeling
Marc:you know like it was like i look down i'm like well you know like there's that moment where you're scared of a dead thing like oh god but then you're sort of like i've never gotten a look at something you get drawn yeah because like they're usually just bouncing around they do move quick and they go with their tail goes yeah yeah yeah not anymore not that guy you know what you don't we don't have to understand things to experience them enough said i think that sums up this entire interview so right on thanks buddy thank you
Marc:Okay, that's our show, people.
Marc:That's it.
Marc:Fucking interesting guy.
Marc:I felt like I could talk for a while.
Marc:Maybe we'll do another one because that just kind of took off and kept going.
Marc:I dig it.
Marc:Go to WTFPod.com for all your WTFPod needs.
Marc:You can get on the mailing list.
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Marc:There's new posters up there.
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Marc:It's all there at WTFpod.com.
Marc:Do it up.
Marc:No Boomer today.
Marc:It's too hot.
Marc:But I know what's going to happen.
Marc:As soon as I get off the mic, he's going to start scratching at that fucking door.
Marc:Oh, God.
Marc:Okay, what else?
Marc:What else?
Marc:Oh, Ferndale, Michigan, September 29th.
Marc:Ride LA, September 22nd.
Marc:I've got to read some scripts.
Marc:I feel nauseous.