BONUS The Marc and Tom Show #2 (from 2012)
Marc:Hello, New Jersey.
Marc:Yep.
Marc:Hello, New Jersey.
Marc:We're in New Jersey.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Tom Sharpling and I are in a hotel room in New Jersey.
Marc:I had a weird moment when I was laying on the bed.
Marc:See how these chairs are situated here?
Marc:I was just laying there when I got here waiting to take a nap, and there were just two empty chairs facing the bed, and I thought, that's a lot of pressure.
Marc:Like, no one even showed up for whatever those chairs are supposed to be for.
Marc:That's it.
Marc:Yeah, like Eyes Wide Shut or something.
Guest:You're supposed to be putting on some sort of performance.
Marc:Yeah, yeah.
Marc:And then a lot of people with masks came.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:With not even interesting masks in a large scene that went nowhere.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Do you like that movie?
Guest:No.
Guest:I remember seeing that movie, and...
Guest:Yeah, I've just been heavy into Kubrick my whole life.
Guest:Me too.
Guest:And just trying to, like, leaving the theater, trying to figure it out, and my wife just goes, well, that sucked.
Guest:And then I was like...
Guest:Yeah, I think it kind of did.
Guest:You think?
Guest:I think it kind of did.
Guest:But I was in the middle of like, I'm trying to piece this together and that together.
Guest:And she's like, yeah, it sucked.
Marc:When people said that to me, you're like, no, maybe we're missing it.
Marc:I'm going to have to sit and think about this for at least a week.
Guest:But I live my life kind of trying to...
Guest:fill in the blanks for for people who just make bad things sometimes if you love that person oh if i love the person oh yeah yeah i can't that's how i saw so many john candy movies that i would go see in in the theater and just be like well no that was kind of and it's just like no it's awful like it was just one of those really bad movies that he just grabbed the money and i don't blame him for grabbing the money but it was didn't mean he made a good movie
Marc:Did he just hold on to that one scene?
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:No, but that was brilliant comedy.
Guest:Two minutes.
Guest:There was this movie, Who's Harry Crumb, where he was a detective, and it was like, yeah, there were like two moments, like 40 good seconds in this entire movie, and I'm just like, no, he's still doing it, and he's still... And then after a while, you realize the guy is like...
Guest:No, he was just grabbing a paycheck.
Marc:Yeah, I mean, I wish that I could do that.
Marc:Just grab a paycheck.
Marc:Oh, man.
Guest:I wish.
Guest:You hear about these people who have, like, benefactors in show business where they just throw them work all the time.
Guest:It's like, hey, let me put you on this job, $5,000 a week.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Put you on this thing, we'll get you a thing.
Guest:We're friends.
Marc:I don't have any friends like that.
Marc:I think I have a few friends, but certainly not like that.
Marc:But I know those people, and that's always the awkward thing, is when you know those people.
Marc:I don't know if we talked about this before.
Marc:I feel like we're going to circle back around to these same themes of a couple of old guys.
Marc:But I tell you, to be honest with you, to be in New Jersey, I didn't think it would have this much of an effect on me.
Marc:And you grew up here.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Like your whole life?
Guest:Pretty much, yeah.
Marc:Do you realize that I was born in Jersey City?
Marc:Uh-huh.
Marc:And my grandfather and grandmother are buried right across from the Newark Airport.
Marc:Okay.
Marc:Right behind the Budweiser factory.
Marc:That's right, yeah.
Marc:And my grandfather's from Elizabeth.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:My grandmother was – they all come from this area.
Marc:So at some point, like maybe it's because I'm getting older, my genetics crawled out of the sludge just east of Secaucus.
Marc:This is my primordial soup, Sharpling.
Guest:There is something about New Jersey that has a –
Guest:It is always second place.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:It's between New York and Philadelphia.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And both of those places think they're better than it.
Guest:So there's two places.
Guest:It's like Philly comes in second to New York just in size and all that.
Guest:Right.
Guest:But they still just laugh at New Jersey also.
Guest:And it's also New Jersey is just divided between the top half is New York's half.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And the lower half is Philly's half, like where the people in South Jersey root for the Eagles and the Phillies.
Guest:And the top half root for the Giants and the Yankees or the Mets.
Guest:So it's not even its own thing.
Marc:thing yeah i don't even know what it is but i get like i my memories of this place are so young that i don't know any of that shit i in my mind like new jersey is like you know it's like big tomatoes in july yeah it's my grandma's house it's this weird even this haze in the air is making me nostalgic but not in a negative way so you don't have any you know i mean new jersey i feel like invented the townie
Marc:That what we understand is the classic American townie, I believe, is New Jersey.
Guest:I think it comes out of that the diner comes from New Jersey.
Guest:And the diner is very important.
Guest:Absolutely.
Guest:The diner, when you go, that is such a New Jersey thing.
Guest:And you go to other places and there's nothing that – it's either like a Denny's or a – Or if they have the one diner, it's like a retro thing.
Marc:You walk in and someone brought in – ordered a collection of nostalgia to hang on the wall.
Guest:Pictures of an Elvis.
Marc:Yeah, a lot of pictures of Elvis and one of those old jukeboxes.
Guest:Yeah, but there is no –
Guest:feel for what makes a contemporary diner anywhere else at least I've found I've gone to a lot of places across America and I just don't see that thing and I think that's a there's a strange communal thing that comes out of that where people go to the bars and then when the bars close up when you're driving everywhere then you drive to the diner and then everybody's kind of hanging out at the diner and there's a lot of good ones
Marc:Like, 90% of the diners in New Jersey are good.
Marc:You just go in, get a grilled corn muffin, if you want, right on the grill.
Marc:Rice pudding.
Marc:Pompton Queen Diner is where my grandmother... We used to go there.
Marc:She's like, we're going to Pompton Queen Diner.
Marc:It's like, yes, I can get rice pudding and chicken parm.
Marc:And it was good.
Guest:Absolutely.
Guest:My family, growing up, it would be a thing where it's like, when we would go out to eat, and this might say something about my...
Guest:Social strata, also.
Guest:We were middle class to shading downwardly middle class.
Guest:But it just was like, which diner are we going to go to?
Guest:Right.
Guest:Well, let's go to this diner.
Guest:I don't like the salad bar at that diner.
Guest:Well, they got this diner.
Guest:It's 24 hours.
Guest:I don't like the guy who runs that diner.
Guest:I don't like the waitresses over there.
Marc:Is Joe still working there?
Guest:I'm not going unless Joe's working there.
Guest:Every diner, you knew just the math of every diner.
Marc:And that doesn't happen anywhere else.
Marc:And people always wonder, it's like, why are these restaurants shitty?
Marc:Because no one eats at them.
Marc:If you don't have turnover, if people, I just, like out here, like even in New Brunswick, I don't know anything about New Brunswick, but it's mollified to a degree.
Marc:I know Rutgers is over here.
Marc:My father went to Rutgers.
Marc:I remember there was the sad journey back.
Marc:To New Jersey with my father, 20 years after the fact.
Marc:And I was living in New York.
Marc:He's like, why don't we go to where I grew up and where I went to college?
Marc:And I'm like, I'm going to do this for him.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:And that was, it must be like, I don't know, probably 20 years ago.
Marc:He's like, let's go to my house in Jersey City.
Marc:And at that time, it was not.
Marc:No.
Guest:Not a great area.
Guest:Well, Jersey City is just huge, first of all.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And there are some parts of it.
Guest:It's like if you showed people pictures of it and say, people who live in Jersey City, pictures of it say, hey, what town do you think this is?
Guest:They would not guess it was theirs.
Marc:And we drove by his childhood home, and he's like, I'm going to go see who lives here.
Marc:I'm like, why don't we just lock the doors and enjoy from here?
Guest:I had the same thing with my father.
Guest:He grew up in Newark.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:And we drove through this neighborhood, and he's like,
Guest:See that torched lot?
Guest:He's like, that was where we lived.
Guest:It's just like a raised... You know when they just level a block?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And it's just... You can see that there were houses and apartment buildings there.
Guest:It's like...
Guest:Yeah, I can see through where you used to live.
Marc:Yeah, I can kind of picture that.
Guest:So I'm not really connecting those pictures you showed me.
Guest:Yeah, yes, exactly.
Guest:With the bakery and all these things, it's like, all I'm seeing here is a lot of places that fix tires.
Guest:And, you know, it's always... If you question the integrity of their memories, are you sure this is where... Yeah, yeah.
Guest:But that thing is just like...
Guest:I just got to trust you on this.
Guest:I don't know what you're, I'm assuming, you know, you're not 90 and losing your marbles.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:I always wonder how it must feel for them though.
Marc:You know, I, and then my dad took me out to here to Rutgers.
Marc:He went to Rutgers.
Marc:And you only hear fragments of your parents.
Marc:You only get what they give you over your life.
Marc:If you really think about the number of things that your parents share with you about their life, it's a short fucking list usually.
Marc:Because you don't really want to sit down and talk to them until much later.
Guest:Barely now.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:There's so many years where it's the last thing you want to hear is their stories.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And then when you want to hear their stories, sometimes they've lost the plot on them a little bit where they're a little wobbly now.
Guest:Mythologized things are added.
Marc:And that's when we saw Barbra Streisand.
Guest:In Newark?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And then there's also their...
Guest:They've kind of informed the prejudices or whatever.
Guest:The things that have happened in the last 40 years in their life have changed the story now.
Guest:It's constant revisionism based on the current situation.
Guest:Had I known then... It's so weird.
Guest:I remember I asked my grandmother.
Guest:I was reading that there was this book on Lindbergh that this guy, A. Scott Berg, wrote.
Guest:It was one of those huge books, and it was such a great book.
Guest:And I was just, it was like Thanksgiving or something, and my grandmother's there, and I'm like, yeah, I'm going to ask her about the old days.
Guest:Because this was like, you know, she was around for this stuff, and she saw this.
Guest:And because I really, you know, I have a relationship with my one surviving grandparent where she just...
Guest:doesn't talk a whole lot and it's she's still hanging in there but she's you know she's kind of likes to watch tv and that's what you're getting yeah so i just start to ask her about the old days and just like do you remember when all this stuff happened she could not have been less interested in it and she like shut me down it was just like you know like when you get blown off by someone and it was like she my grandmother blew me off like just like yeah well you know it was uh
Guest:Yeah, that stuff did happen back then.
Guest:That's literally all I got from her was.
Marc:Then you have to integrate that like it's a real emotional nugget.
Marc:Okay.
Guest:Now I'm just trying to figure out how to get off the couch and go back into the other room now because she's giving me nothing.
Marc:I don't know what we expect from them.
Marc:My grandfather, in my mind,
Marc:Like, they're both passed.
Marc:And it's so sad because they're buried in a small Jewish cemetery behind the Budweiser plant.
Marc:Off Route 1.
Marc:You know where it is?
Marc:Sure.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:It's like right in that area.
Marc:And you just know there's somebody sitting in a room somewhere going, I wish we could sell that lot.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Just like this.
Guest:You know what we could do with this?
Guest:Right.
Guest:Like this would be we'd have like whatever Budweiser is making.
Guest:This would be our, you know.
Guest:Right.
Guest:We could put the new vats here.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:You know, we could put, you know, the big ones, the new ones, you know, the quick fermenters.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Could be right where the people that are decaying are.
Guest:You know, they've probably contemplated.
Guest:It's like, well, you know, they did build things on top of Indian burial grounds.
Guest:Yeah, and nothing really happened.
Marc:How bad could it be with all Jews?
Marc:I mean, what's going to happen?
Marc:We're going to feel guilty, but that'll pass.
Marc:Get some poltergeists.
Marc:Some poltergeists, just like women feeding people.
Marc:Hey, you want some soup?
Marc:That would be the saddest ghost ever.
Marc:You could do a tour of the Budweiser factory, so occasionally there's a woman in an apron.
Marc:Is that the coffee?
Marc:Oh, can you bring it in, please?
Marc:Thanks a lot.
Marc:I don't mean to be rude, but we're taping a thing.
Marc:Here, you can just set it right here, and I will sign for it.
Marc:Do you need me to print my name?
Marc:Oh, just sign?
Marc:I don't need to fill out all this.
Marc:Thank you very much.
Marc:Thank you for appearing on the show.
Marc:I appreciate it.
Marc:No, no, no, leave it open.
Marc:You always want to have that open for people.
Marc:So they're there, and I know it's a little Jewish.
Marc:There's part of me that wants to go there, but I don't always know what to do at cemeteries.
Marc:You know what I mean?
Marc:When you're a Jew, you look for a rock because you put a rock on the grave, and then most of the time you're like, can I just take a rock off of that one?
Marc:That guy's got a lot of rocks.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yes, no, I know.
Guest:There's a thing where...
Guest:You know, with my father in law passed away and I'll just go by and, you know, put flowers out whenever I'm in on Staten Island where he's buried, you know, just kind of.
Guest:Staten Island.
Marc:That's another like these people came from places that no one goes to anymore.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And then they want to they want to be buried there.
Marc:It's fascinating.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:So you go?
Guest:So I'll go, and then it just, like, I bought this kind of cup to put the flowers in.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:So it can hold water or whatever.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And then I just go, and it's always gone.
Guest:It's always just, like... And I just know it's probably, like, two rows over.
Guest:It's just, like, people just stealing things in the cemetery.
Marc:It's, like... It's an afterthought when they got there.
Marc:That's a pretty good idea, the flowers.
Marc:Just, like, yeah.
Guest:I'm going to take those.
Guest:It's, like, let's...
Guest:Go pay tribute to, it's like, oh, look, hey, a cup.
Guest:And they're not going to miss it.
Marc:How often do they really come here?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:But that's the whole thing.
Guest:I kind of don't blame people either for taking it.
Guest:It's not like I'm there every other day.
Marc:Are you going to write a letter?
Guest:Excuse me.
Marc:Is there anybody watching that cemetery?
Guest:Going to hide behind tombstones.
Guest:Staten Island.
Guest:I don't know.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:See who's stealing the cup.
Marc:Ha!
Marc:Gotcha.
Gotcha.
Marc:My grandfather, when I was a kid, my grandfather, I don't know why I keep pointing out the window, as if to make a reference.
Marc:New Jersey's out this window.
Marc:Yes, yes.
Marc:It's that way also.
Marc:Well, he had a hardware store in Haskell, which was this little town.
Marc:It's like the Butler-Haskell-Pompton Lakes region.
Marc:It's where there are actual hill people there, from what I understand.
Marc:Do you know anything about the Jackson Whites?
Guest:I know that there's little pockets in the state I would always hear about as a kid just in the hills.
Guest:Right.
Marc:Where people had no electricity?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:You'd always hear, like, don't go up that road.
Guest:the McCoys and the Hatfields.
Guest:And, like, I'm in the suburbs.
Guest:It's not like I grew up in the country.
Guest:But still, if you go into a wooded, hilly area, which was five minutes away, which is also this misconception with New Jersey, because everybody lands at Newark Airport, and then they get on the turnpike and go in through the Holland Tunnel, and that's all they see is that stretch.
Guest:And it's like... They drive right past my grandfather's grave.
Guest:Yeah, but...
Guest:But they're not seeing any of the rest of the state, which is really – there's so much – there's a reason it's called the garden state.
Guest:Yeah, it's lush.
Marc:It's like in the summer you can literally feel the plants breathing.
Guest:Absolutely.
Marc:Like there's a haze in the air.
Marc:The thickness of the humidity is tangible.
Marc:It's great.
Guest:It really is a very diverse state.
Guest:Do you have the Jersey Shore in your childhood?
Guest:No.
Guest:Oh, yeah, yeah.
Guest:I used to go to Asbury Park.
Guest:How long ago?
Guest:Do you remember the amusement park?
Guest:I remember the tail end of Asbury Park when it had a boardwalk.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And one of the first shows... Broken rides.
Guest:Yeah, there were broken rides and just kind of games of chance.
Guest:And it...
Guest:One of the first shows I saw at the convention center was Elvis Costello in... That would have been 84, I think.
Guest:83, 84.
Guest:That was after the rebirth, really, or the beginning of it, right?
Guest:No, that was at the absolute end of whatever it was.
Guest:Of the original version of Asbury Park.
Guest:And from that point on, it just turfed out.
Guest:And Point Pleasant and Seaside Heights took all of the business...
Guest:And then there was just this horribly it was the scariest place ever, because it's also one.
Guest:If you go down there, it's like there's a boardwalk that's falling apart.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And then there's an ocean, which just makes it terrifying.
Guest:You're going to get walked into it.
Marc:People just go there.
Marc:They get to the boardwalk and go, this is bad, and then continue on into the ocean.
Guest:There's something so scary about a scary neighborhood is scary, but a scary neighborhood with an ocean at the edge of it is like the scariest.
Marc:And it's just scary in the form that there's nothing menacing around other than the desolation.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:My grandparents used to live, my father's parents had, they were in an apartment building that was literally at the end of the boardwalk.
Marc:It was the only apartment building down there in my recollection.
Marc:And you'd go outside and you had, I had these childhood memories, but I remember going on the boat ride in Asbury, which is a boat with a circle.
Marc:They went in circles in a pool.
Marc:My grandfather used to take me there.
Marc:And then at some point you go back and you're like, it's abandoned.
Marc:It's abandoned.
Marc:And it's almost like someone is slowly making your childhood creepy.
Marc:Oh, yeah.
Marc:You're like, I had a nice memory here, but now it's just scary.
Marc:I can't do this.
Guest:Oh, no.
Guest:There's so many things like that that having pretty much stayed in the same state that I see, I've seen the changes.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I don't come back to them.
Guest:Right.
Guest:But sometimes they just catch you like that.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:There's this place, Bowcraft.
Guest:On Route 22, it's this kind of low-rent... It's got rides.
Guest:But it's got the kind of rides where you see where they're plugged in.
Guest:You know what I mean?
Marc:It's only someone under four.
Marc:could suspend their disbelief to enjoy that ride.
Guest:You bring a nine-year-old there, they're like, what the fuck is this?
Guest:It was just looking at these.
Guest:It's like, that's half the size of how that is everywhere else.
Guest:That's a Ferris wheel with five cars.
Guest:I remember getting out of the car
Guest:And realizing it's like, I don't want to get into bumper cars or go-karts now.
Guest:It's like getting into a worse car.
Guest:We just got out of a better car.
Guest:Now I'm going to get into a worse car that we have to pay for?
Guest:But they had miniature golf.
Guest:And then...
Guest:And then I just, like, went back one time, and it was like, man, this place is so rickety and spooky.
Guest:And then I heard it was, like, run by, like, John Birch Society people.
Guest:And I'm like, oh, it's like the under.
Guest:So there's brainwashing going on on the rise?
Guest:I don't know.
Marc:The music had a weird subtext.
Marc:It was like, vote Republican.
Guest:Just my hope.
Marc:But you just think you're funding it.
Guest:Yeah, that's right.
Guest:That's right.
Marc:Like, I don't want to.
Marc:It just reminded me of those, you know, the rides that sometimes you would see in front of supermarkets where there was the Ferris wheel with the one seat.
Marc:That just goes up 18 inches.
Marc:Right.
Marc:And then every time that, because I don't have kids.
Marc:And, you know, if I see a kid on there, there's part of you, the cynic is like, that's fucking ridiculous.
Marc:And then you just see the joy at a kid who doesn't, he's too young to know that it's not fun.
Marc:Just having the time of their life.
Marc:And the parents just sitting there like, here we go.
Marc:Again?
Marc:All right.
Guest:That said, it's like, wouldn't you give anything to get to that place to where a simple thing like that could just be... The best.
Guest:Just the best without other things kind of, without second guessing it all the way down the line.
Guest:Without feeling that weird awkwardness.
Guest:It's like, I don't know if I should do it.
Marc:It's not cool to be on this single seat Ferris wheel.
Guest:I actively am working.
Guest:When I catch myself, when I catch that other thing flaring up in me,
Guest:that worries about what cool people would do or what anybody's going to think.
Guest:I mean, it's like, I don't care.
Guest:I really don't care anymore.
Guest:You don't, though, really?
Guest:I'm finding myself... I'm able to make myself not care.
Marc:Like, what are these activities?
Marc:Because, I mean, I'm sad that for so long...
Marc:It was a struggle.
Marc:I'm not going to do that.
Marc:I'm not going to enjoy myself in any way and be judged.
Guest:But I'm the exact opposite of you in the regard that if something is wrong, I will just take it where you will maybe be a little too.
Guest:You might say a little too much.
Guest:I won't say enough.
Guest:There is a person in the middle of us that is the perfect person in things where I'll just be like, well, you know, it's...
Guest:they're working pretty hard back there and I'll just eat this thing even though it's not what I want.
Guest:No, I'll ruin it.
Marc:This is fucking stupid.
Guest:You guys are idiots.
Guest:I don't want to be part of this.
Guest:But for me, it's now this act of like, if I'm at Starbucks, I've just trained my... It's like, just do it.
Guest:I have this voice in my head.
Guest:It's like, just say something.
Guest:It's like, stop being just such a coward in these situations.
Guest:It's like...
Guest:You paid for something.
Guest:It is wrong.
Guest:And they don't care either.
Guest:That's the other thing.
Guest:I'm making like they're just going to go, well, you just.
Guest:Like they're going to fight you on it.
Guest:You want another one?
Guest:You want three?
Marc:No, here's three.
Marc:They're going to get their rebellion out.
Marc:Like, I hate this place.
Marc:Take all of them.
Guest:Well, that's the thing with Starbucks.
Guest:It's like if you're like, well, you know, I didn't order an iced coffee.
Guest:I actually ordered an iced coffee.
Guest:Soy latte.
Guest:Then they'll be like, okay, well, we'll make you one.
Guest:Why don't you keep this one also?
Guest:Because the only thing they're going to do is pour it down the sink.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And then you got two.
Guest:Just speak in your mind.
Guest:Exactly.
Guest:I started to realize that.
Guest:I'm like, why am I such a – just a total chicken shit with these things running from moments that I'm –
Guest:the one creating the conflict in it i'm seeing the conflict that is just non-existent right well do you feel like you're you're going to be judged or they're going to give you what's the worst thing that can happen a 15 year old gives you a stink face yeah exactly yeah but you know it comes from it comes from i come from a family of people who have worked behind counters so i end up always sympathizing with the person behind the counter to an
Guest:to an abnormal degree.
Guest:I remember what it was like to have just the worst people on earth just come up to you and make your day horrible that I always feel like I have to compensate.
Guest:It's my duty to make up
Guest:for the worst person they dealt with by being the most amazing person they've experienced all day.
Marc:So you have a sympathy towards people that are in the service industry.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:Whereas my fear, I grew up with parents.
Marc:My mother, we would go to a restaurant, and she's made an eating disorder her way of life.
Marc:So we would go into restaurants where all of us could enjoy a good meal.
Marc:And my mother would be ordering off the menu, like every fucking place.
Marc:It'd be like, you know, can you do something with no salt, no garlic, no oil, just maybe a vegetable grilled with nothing?
Marc:And I had to sit through that.
Marc:And I took it personally.
Marc:I would order something amazing on the menu, and then we'd go around, my brother, my father, and then my mother would come, and I'm like, oh, fuck.
Marc:Here we go.
Marc:And it was almost like every time she opened her mouth to order food at a restaurant, she was cutting my balls off.
Marc:I don't know why that is.
Marc:So I carried that with me my whole life.
Guest:But where was the source of the conflict or discomfort or pain from that?
Marc:Oh, that's true.
Marc:That's a good point.
Marc:It was embarrassing because you'd be looking at the waiter going, I don't know.
Marc:She's my mother and I hate her.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:You'd have that moment where you commiserate with the guy in the service and you'd be like, I got to live with this.
Marc:I grew up with this.
Marc:You're only going to have to deal with this for one meal.
Guest:Exactly.
Guest:Yeah, 45 minutes from now.
Marc:It's going to be out of your life.
Marc:We're not going to come back here because she's not going to be happy with it.
Marc:God forbid you do it right, we might come back next week.
Guest:It's your worst nightmare.
Guest:It's like no good deed goes unpunished.
Marc:Exactly.
Marc:But then like now, I worked in a Jewish deli.
Marc:When I was in... What year was that?
Marc:I think I was just out of college.
Marc:It was one of the last Jewish delis, and that's where I learned... This is in Boston?
Marc:Yeah, it was one of the only real Jewish delis where there's no winning.
Marc:I still remember...
Marc:I still remember, like, I was a short order guy.
Marc:So I had these grilled onions that had been sort of perfectly caramelized, right?
Marc:And we were getting towards the end of the breakfast, and there was still a bunch of them in there.
Marc:And some guy ordered a Leo, a lox eggs and onions, which has to be approached with a certain amount of finesse.
Marc:Like, for a perfect Leo, for a perfect lox eggs and onions, the onions have got to be, you know, browned nicely before you mix them in with the eggs.
Marc:You can't just...
Marc:chop the onions up, and then throw the eggs in when they're a little soft.
Marc:They have to be brown.
Marc:It's perfect, right?
Marc:So this guy orders one, and I said, well, I've got these onions left.
Marc:This is going to be the best Leo ever.
Marc:So I got the lox going, and I whipped them all together, and the onions were perfectly brown, and I served this guy.
Marc:There was a pride in it, because I remember to this day, this one fucking order, like this lox, eggs, and onions, this is going to be spectacular.
Marc:And I give it to the guy, and he takes it, and he's at his table, comes up with it five minutes away.
Marc:He's like, there's too many onions in here.
Marc:And the pain that I felt, there's a couple of things that happen.
Marc:First, I'm like, are you serious?
Marc:I mean, those onions are perfect.
Marc:It's just too many for me.
Marc:And there's two things that happen.
Marc:I go, I'll remake it.
Marc:And he goes back to his table.
Marc:And then I have Fat Sonny, the guy who cooks the big stuff, the briskets and stuff.
Marc:I'm like, Sonny, I bring it back to the kitchen.
Marc:I'm like, this guy sent this back.
Marc:Sonny takes a bite off of the plate and goes, that's perfect.
Marc:I mean, I fucking knew it.
Marc:And there's that moment where you realize these people are never going to be happy.
Marc:They want to make me do this.
Marc:That's part of my legacy.
Marc:That's part of my religion.
Marc:So now, sadly, like I got a girlfriend who's not unlike you.
Marc:Well, you know, she'll sit there like she doesn't like onions in anything.
Marc:And I will sit there and watch her like precisely pick out onions of everything.
Marc:And you just see the meal takes two hours, you know, because it takes her that long to eat.
Marc:And then there's a nice stack of pieces of onion on the plate.
Marc:And I'm like, why don't we just send it back?
Marc:So now I send it back, and here's the issue.
Marc:Once you start sending things back, it might not ever stop.
Marc:And then you just become that Jew, for me.
Marc:No matter what, I'm like, this isn't.
Marc:Take it back.
Marc:Once you just have that empowerment.
Marc:Yeah, it's empowerment, but it's also like that thing you're saying.
Marc:I want it to be right.
Guest:And sometimes it's never going to be like you want it to be.
Guest:It's like you kind of maybe have to make it at home.
Guest:That's why I never go out.
Marc:Why go out when I can cook just as well at home?
Marc:What am I going to get if it's not Indian food or something I really can't make because I don't have a tandoor?
Marc:But believe me, give me a few days.
Marc:If someone sent me a link to a tandoor I could have at home...
Marc:That would be a project I would embark on.
Marc:If one of your fans brought one up to you after a show.
Marc:That could happen.
Marc:I got Mark a Tandor, and I know what happens to that Tandor.
Marc:Someone will come over to my house.
Marc:A guest will be out on the deck, and they're like, yeah, my property goes down to the bottom.
Marc:That's a Tandor.
Marc:Yeah, someone gave that to me.
Marc:I'm going to get to it.
Marc:Yeah, it's right.
Marc:I'm going to give that a try.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Now, do you...
Guest:Would you ever consider a gift registry for your fans at the WTF shows?
Guest:Just so you don't get duplicate things?
Guest:Look, the people who listen to my show, they send me records and things that are very nice.
Guest:I see this outpouring you get.
Guest:It's baked goods.
Guest:It's fantastic.
Guest:It's very nice.
Guest:What do you think?
Guest:Is that just a...
Guest:Do you feel like you are the final piece of a puzzle for them that makes them just gravitate to you that passionately?
Marc:What I find fascinating, and I don't know if I know how to handle it really...
Marc:is the art.
Marc:People do a lot of art.
Marc:Some woman came to the show last night.
Marc:She was a nail artist, and she did her nails with my cats on them.
Marc:Wow.
Marc:And she had my face on one of her nails.
Marc:And I get drawings, woodcuts, sculptures that...
Marc:It's very gratifying, and I just can't wrap my brain around it.
Marc:Because I remember one time when I was in high school, I spent hours and hours drawing a picture of John Lennon.
Marc:And I was very, you know, it takes a lot to sit there and go, I'm going to do a piece of art dedicated to this guy's head.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:And when I get this stuff, I'm like, wow, that's amazing.
Marc:And I don't even know if I'm worthy, but I seem to be inspiring creativity in people, which I think is great.
Marc:But it's very interesting.
Marc:I should have an art exhibit opening of WTF art.
Marc:Of just things.
Marc:My girlfriend is now at the point where it's like another painting of your face.
Marc:Is there any way we can keep this all in the garage?
Marc:I'm like, why can't?
Marc:That's what happens when you move in.
Marc:I have to take down the gallery of me.
Guest:That's in my hallway.
Guest:The Mark Museum.
Marc:Yeah, yeah.
Marc:It's like I'm going to have to get a separate housing.
Marc:I'm going to have to build Elvis as a trophy house.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:Have you been to Graceland?
Marc:Oh, yeah.
Marc:We went a couple years ago.
Marc:Oh, so it's fresh in your mind?
Marc:Oh, yeah.
Marc:Let me ask you one question about that.
Marc:I went years ago by myself.
Marc:I'd done the...
Marc:After college, I'm like, I'm taking a train cross country.
Marc:That was a fucking mistake.
Marc:Amtrak?
Marc:Yeah, because I went Amtrak from Boston to Chicago, and then I wanted to see the South.
Marc:So I literally went from Chicago all the way down South, like in a vertical, completely out of the way.
Marc:Sure.
Marc:Just to go down there.
Marc:And I get to Memphis.
Marc:I didn't even see Chicago at that time.
Marc:I got my shoes shined.
Marc:I brought a bunch of books to read.
Marc:And about three or four hours into an hour, I bought sleeper cars.
Marc:And you're like, this isn't glamorous.
Marc:I'm like sleeping in a bathroom.
Marc:So I go to Graceland.
Marc:And the one thing I remember is getting there and having that moment where you're like, this isn't that big a house.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:No, it's like – especially not in New York or like in a major city.
Guest:It's like, yeah, this is a huge spread.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:The land, yeah.
Guest:But this guy had like much more land than this.
Guest:It was like –
Guest:It's kind of like I've been to people who live in the country who have the same house.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:And this is the guy who.
Guest:The king of rock and roll.
Guest:The king of rock.
Guest:And, yeah, it's like you had a rec room downstairs.
Marc:With the three TV screens.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:At the time, they have to sort of qualify.
Marc:Like at the time, this was really advanced.
Marc:And those are three television sets and a shag rug.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:This is nothing.
Guest:Anybody.
Guest:I think in the face in the crowd, he had three TVs in that.
Marc:And the audience machine.
Guest:Yeah, because you go into Graceland, you go in the kitchen, and you go down this...
Guest:four steps, and then it kind of zigzags, four steps, and then you're in his basement, and it's like, oh, over here to the left is the TV room, then there's the pool table over here.
Guest:It's like, yeah, this is like a... It's like a New Jersey basement.
Guest:Yeah, it's like a half-decent house this guy had.
Guest:It's like, you wonder where the money went.
Marc:This is like... And they don't take you upstairs at all.
Marc:I can't remember vaguely, but there's parties that sort of like, where's the bathroom that he... Yeah, you know that's like... That's off-limits.
Marc:They don't want the freaks to come.
Guest:It made me really...
Guest:I felt so sad seeing Graceland because you realized it was just a guy.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And that's an amazing thing.
Guest:And that's kind of the whole business of Elvis is kind of set up to make him anything but just a guy.
Guest:Right.
Guest:It's like they're making him larger than life, larger than life, to where he's just this symbol or something you just project with.
Guest:what it means to you through him.
Guest:Right.
Guest:But when you go there, you realize, like, this dude was just walking down the basement and watching these TVs.
Guest:Like, I do that.
Guest:Yeah, eating his sandwiches.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Wondering when his friends were going to leave.
Guest:Yeah, and the saddest thing, I actually talked about this on the radio once.
Guest:To me, the absolute, this defines...
Guest:show business to me where it uh you go through this one hall of all of his awards and the separate building the trophy place yeah it's like a separate bunker or like a like it's like a shed a giant shed yeah yeah back exactly so you're going through this and they have all the the different you know outfits he wore on stage and then you see
Guest:this, uh, TV and it has this plaque on it.
Guest:It says, uh, uh, for Elvis Presley, uh, from RCA, uh, for 50 million units sold.
Guest:Like, so RCA, this corporation, this guy sells 50 million records, 50 million records.
Guest:Imagine that.
Marc:Probably at that time it was still more than $150 million.
Marc:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:So what do they send over as a thank you?
Guest:They send over a TV that they make, uh,
Guest:Like an RCA TV.
Guest:There you go, buddy.
Guest:That's show business right there.
Guest:Even if you become Elvis...
Guest:you kind of like, they'll just be like, eh, what do we got laying around here?
Guest:Call Joe up in sales.
Marc:What's the hottest TV we got on the line right now?
Guest:It's TV that cost them $37.
Marc:And I think a sadder thing is that he was so proud of it as an award, he didn't even stick it in the wall to make a fourth TV.
Guest:It wasn't even that good a television.
Guest:No, this was like the commemorative television for 50 million records sold.
Guest:What a horrendous thing.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:I went to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
Marc:And have you been there?
Marc:No.
Marc:It's good.
Marc:It's good.
Marc:It's worth going.
Marc:Okay.
Marc:But they have a whole Elvis room.
Marc:And in a similar way, I was much younger when I went to Grace.
Marc:I don't think my head was in the same place that you were at as an adult.
Guest:You'd go there now and you'd be like wondering when you were going to die.
Guest:I'm sure.
Guest:If you went to Graceland.
Guest:Sure.
Guest:All you would think about is, like, you'd relate to Elvis 76.
Guest:Like, you know, like, in your whole life, you'd never relate to the guy.
Marc:Well, that's what happened at the Rock and Roll Hall fan.
Marc:But, I mean, the one benefit of Elvis is that he is buried in his backyard, unlike my parents, or my grandparents, who were behind the Budweiser factory.
Guest:And I could have used a heads up on that, by the way, at Graceland.
Guest:Like, I didn't know that.
Guest:And you walk, you see everything, and all of a sudden you just walk back, and it's like, and here's Elvis.
Guest:And it's just...
Guest:That wasn't in the book yet?
Guest:I didn't know that.
Guest:And I was just like, whoa, that's spooky.
Guest:It's kind of scary.
Guest:And here's his whole family.
Guest:It's like the whole family is laying there.
Marc:Right there.
Marc:Yeah, it's like some comic years ago.
Marc:I can't even remember who it was.
Marc:They said, how great could Elvis be?
Marc:He was buried in his backyard like a gerbil.
Marc:I don't know who said that.
Marc:I wonder whose joke that was.
Marc:Oh, but that's the moment I had at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
Marc:They had this Elvis room.
Marc:They had the car and the standard chip, but they had a film running of a Vegas show probably in the late 70s when you're talking.
Marc:And as a performer who's now been in show business 25 years, you know, I could see he was on drugs.
Marc:I can see his weight was already getting out of control.
Marc:But what I really saw was a guy that was doing what he had to do to put on a show.
Marc:Like, you know, it was clear that, you know, he was sort of a shell of a guy, but he still had his tricks.
Marc:He still had his charisma.
Marc:But he was medicating that, like, he was just doing his job because he had to do his job.
Marc:And it was clearly he was done with it.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:And he was still doing the job.
Marc:And that was what I respected is, like, he's a professional.
Marc:Look at him.
Marc:He's dead inside.
Guest:You know, like, in Brazil?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:In the movie Brazil, when, like, he thinks he got away with everything.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And then all of a sudden he just...
Guest:Like he thinks he's free.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And then he's not free.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Right.
Guest:It's like that's Elvis in that way where he's just like he made the run.
Guest:He got credibility.
Guest:He actually came all the way back.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Like the idea, like nobody ever comes all the way back.
Guest:And he did.
Guest:And then you can't come all the way back twice.
Guest:Right.
Guest:Nope.
Guest:Like you can't.
Guest:It's always for what it takes for him to have done that.
Guest:That 68.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:show oh with the black leather jacket sitting around playing the guitar yeah yeah and then to he to win everything back and then he just slowly let it just drip out again and then there was all gone again he was just he wasn't even doing the crummy movies he was just doing vegas yeah yeah and uh and you know and then you you talk to my grandparents or people you know where you're you
Marc:when you have that generation who went to vegas and you know like did you ever see elvis and they're like yes it was a good show oh yeah it was elvis and then when you go to vegas as a grown-up and you realize like well who's playing you know and they're just a guy in a room yeah exactly it's it's so it completely demystifies and heartbreaking you know like my my mother was like a
Marc:Wayne Newton puts on a wonderful show.
Marc:It's like, who the fuck is going to go see Wayne Newton?
Marc:But in their minds at that point, there's no differentiation.
Marc:It's like Elvis or Wayne Newton at night.
Marc:How do you get there?
Marc:The king of rock and roll.
Marc:Elvis or Wayne Newton.
Marc:Nothing against Wayne Newton.
Marc:But my parents, they're just sort of like, he can play every instrument.
Marc:No, he can't.
Guest:It's so funny you said he can play any instrument.
Guest:My parents went and saw Sammy Davis Jr.
Guest:And it was just like, same thing.
Guest:My mother was like...
Guest:And he goes and he just plays every instrument.
Guest:He goes up to the bandstand and my father is just like, he picked up a saxophone and played like two things on it.
Guest:And my mother is just like, in my mother's mind, he literally went row to row through the orchestra and played it.
Guest:My father is just like, he played like two notes on a saxophone and then hit a conga drum for a second.
Guest:That's show business, though, right?
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:But it does all of a sudden become... Everything just becomes equal in a weird way.
Guest:Because we can see it with bands from the 80s.
Marc:Yeah, show business is the great leveler because even when people can afford to stop, they don't.
Marc:And there's some part of you, as somebody who holds on to childhood memories, where you're like, I wish they should stop.
Marc:We kind of talked about that before.
Marc:But yeah, it's a great leveler.
Guest:Yeah, where just like you...
Guest:Now there's these groups from the 80s.
Guest:They just all play together.
Guest:Back in the 80s, it would be like, all their fans hated each other.
Guest:Absolutely.
Guest:And then now it's like, hey, we were around in the same time.
Guest:Let's just do it.
Guest:Yeah, exactly.
Guest:Now it's like Blondie and a flock of seagulls.
Guest:And REO Speedwagon.
Guest:What?
Guest:Yeah, exactly.
Guest:It's a weird thing where it'd be like, Howard Jones and REO Speedwagon and the Go-Go's and all these groups...
Guest:that had nothing in common.
Guest:It was like hits of the 80s.
Marc:Well, that's interesting because that's what radio does to your brain.
Marc:I've had that experience where you listen to classic hits, and now I'm with a woman that's 20 years younger than me, and we're listening to classic hits, and she goes out of her way to say, I'd say, this is when I was in high school.
Marc:She'd say, I wasn't born yet.
Marc:I mean, I get it.
Marc:I get it.
Marc:But just by listening, because people, because they're so nostalgia-driven in general,
Marc:You just put on that station that plays those songs.
Marc:So as you get older, those rivalries go away.
Marc:It's just what's on the radio every day.
Marc:And it makes perfect sense that Bob Seger, REO Speedwagon, and what's left of Journey, you might be doing a show together.
Guest:Because I remember when I would read Cream Magazine, when I first started reading stuff, I started buying records when I was eight and nine.
Guest:I bought...
Guest:I remember buying Armed Forces and Nick Lowe's Labor of Lust were like the two first records I bought with my own money.
Guest:And I would just read Cream Magazine, and it would be like, literally, you could not like The Clash...
Guest:And Led Zeppelin.
Guest:You'd read the letter section and people would be just like... Anybody who liked Led Zeppelin, Clash fans would write these letters saying old dinosaurs and old stuff.
Guest:It was a movement.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And then Led Zeppelin fans would just write in and any Clash fan was just gay.
Guest:Gay.
Guest:But now it's just like anybody looks back, it's just all...
Guest:Nobody's like, well, you can't listen.
Guest:You can't have a Clash record and a Led Zeppelin record.
Marc:But now, like you said before, as you get older and less hung up on being cool, it's okay to admit, I fucking love Zeppelin.
Marc:I love Sepplin and I love The Clash.
Marc:You get to a certain age, what are you going to do?
Marc:You got a problem with that?
Guest:Am I still gay?
Guest:But the dummies who got into some of those arguments, what was important then?
Marc:Because they had to see punk rock as a complete transition and movement against cock rock and corporate music.
Marc:At that time, this isn't about musical taste.
Marc:This is about principle.
Guest:But you're arguing against a band on Atlantic Records and in favor of a band on CBS.
Guest:People didn't think about that.
Marc:It wasn't against corporate America at that time.
Marc:They didn't realize that they were all pawns.
Marc:In a larger game.
Marc:Yes.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Well, now it's a little clearer.
Marc:But now people are even less ashamed about that.
Marc:I mean, since there's so many different ways to get music, I still don't hear a tremendous amount of reaction against corporate rock because it doesn't even exist anymore like it used to.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Now it's kind of this thing where everybody's just grabbing what they can get.
Guest:Right.
Guest:I kind of can't blame...
Guest:anybody for just, hey, whatever it takes to keep your head above water.
Marc:It's so weird that my first records, I remember having my parents had these cassette tapes and I had an Iowa cassette player that they didn't use anymore that actually had removal of speakers.
Marc:It was an old one.
Marc:But I remember they had these tapes that I listened to before I bought records, and they had Cosmos Factory.
Marc:Okay.
Marc:Okay, by Credence.
Marc:They had Johnny Cash live at San Quentin.
Marc:Sure.
Marc:Pretty good.
Marc:Pretty good so far.
Marc:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Marc:Then Jerry Vale's Greatest Hits.
Marc:So I was listening to A Boy Named Sue up around the bend, and God didn't make Little Green Apples.
Marc:There's the spectrum.
Marc:And then when I bought my first record, I bought the Beatles' second album, became obsessed with the song Roll Over Beethoven, and went on this weird lifelong search to have every copy of that.
Marc:So then right after the Beatles' first album, I bought Mountain, a Mountain record, because they covered Roll Over Beethoven.
Marc:Wow.
Guest:It's weird, right?
Marc:And then I remember making my grandmother buy Jethro Tull's Aqualung.
Marc:Those were the first three records I had.
Guest:Mountain, the Beatles' second album, and Aqualung by Jethro Tull.
Guest:And you're kind of exactly still that person in a weird way.
Guest:I think you're so defined.
Guest:I feel like when I was in fifth grade, I can remember at lunch, we would be able to play records, and this one kid had the first Cars album.
Guest:And we play the first Cars album every day.
Guest:And then this other kid had the soundtrack to Willy Wonka with Gene Wilder singing all these songs.
Guest:And I kind of think that's exactly who I am now.
Guest:It's like that put this stamp on me.
Guest:It's like I'm half this weird movie in a candy factory with this comedian singing these songs.
Guest:I'm half this kind of new wave record, too.
Marc:It's so true.
Marc:And my father's music, like, you know, we used to go on the car, and he had all these eight tracks.
Marc:And I think that really, in retrospect, that probably defined me more than anything.
Marc:Like, he had Buddy Holly's greatest hits, and he was hung up with the music at his time.
Marc:So I was hung up on oldies.
Marc:We had the soundtrack of American Graffiti, which I could probably still sing every song on.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Like, you know, get a job.
Marc:Sure.
Marc:great and i still love the stroll my dad was hung up on the song the stroll i had this vision that like if i ever do a record i'm just gonna do acoustic covers of the music my dad liked like you know peppermint twist the stroll and like and i remember all those songs and i was really hung up on oldies for a while and then uh and then like i i worked next door when i was in high school
Marc:That really changed my life.
Marc:And when I was in high school, I'm 15 years old.
Marc:I worked at a bagel place across from university, and next door was a record shop.
Marc:And the people who ran the record shop was this black dude who was married to this crazy white lady, and they owned it.
Marc:And there was always this struggle within there that the black dude just wanted to make it primarily an R&B record shop.
Guest:Uh-huh.
Marc:So they would get all these records and these promos that they're like, we don't need this.
Marc:And that was Elvis Costello, My Name is True, George Sheridan, The Destroyers.
Marc:So I was getting all these records for free.
Marc:And then they hired the wacko artist guy.
Marc:They had a guy there named Jim Regan who used to work there.
Marc:And he took me to his house.
Marc:It was a little uncomfortable because I didn't know what was going to happen.
Marc:And he said, you have to learn about soul music.
Marc:And we sat at his house for an entire day.
Marc:And he recorded on cassette, you know, Otis Redding, Sam and Dave, like all of these soul records that he had.
Marc:And he gave them to me.
Marc:So I had that.
Marc:And then the other guy who worked there, Steve LaRue, who was in a band that only played twice a year.
Marc:They were an art rock band called Jungle Red.
Marc:And they used to dress up in surgical scrubs, and they had a guitar on stage that had taped baby doll things to it.
Marc:And then they would break fiesta wear.
Marc:And it was just noise and sound.
Guest:Sure, sure.
Marc:But he turned me on to Fred Frith, Brian Eno, The Residents.
Guest:Okay, yeah.
Marc:So he was that guy.
Marc:And Bowie, to a certain degree.
Marc:John Hassel.
Marc:So I can sort of see how all that defined me.
Marc:But I was in high school, and I was like, holy fuck, there's other things happening.
Guest:It's always like... And it is always that thing.
Guest:You get taken into...
Guest:someone's house.
Guest:I just remember my name.
Guest:If you don't have an older brother, that's what happened.
Marc:I didn't have an older brother.
Marc:I resent those people.
Marc:They had the brother that was four years older with the records.
Guest:Like, hey, here's a Velvet Underground album.
Guest:What?
Guest:Oh, like you walked across the hall and all the...
Guest:Great records there.
Guest:I was going to some weird kid's house in my neighborhood.
Guest:The same thing.
Guest:I didn't know what was going to go on.
Guest:I was terrified.
Guest:I just remember a kid in my neighborhood was just like an older kid, probably like five years older.
Guest:And then he just...
Guest:He started playing, like, Dark Side of the Moon or something.
Marc:How did this happen?
Marc:How did you guys develop the relationship?
Marc:I couldn't.
Marc:Was he, like, a weird kid, and you were fascinated with him?
Guest:He was a normal kid, but he was older.
Guest:Right.
Marc:And he liked you, and you were like, oh, the older guy likes me.
Guest:Yeah, that's exactly it.
Guest:You'll just do anything for the... Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Marc:You can't believe... Hanging out with the older kid.
Guest:Yeah, exactly.
Guest:He thinks I'm pretty cool.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Yeah, you know.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:But...
Guest:But I can remember just the fear going into that.
Guest:And it was just a house with his mother's in the kitchen.
Guest:It's not like I'm going into the catacombs of some place.
Guest:But just when you go into some older kid's bedroom and they got like a Pink Floyd poster on the wall and he like plays.
Guest:The thing, it's just life-changing.
Guest:There's those moments.
Guest:I honestly don't know if the way the technology is so transmittable now and so portable and so accessible.
Guest:It's like, does a 10-year-old have to go...
Guest:into some other kid's room some weird kid's room and sit there for an hour because like like because also if i could have if i could if i could have pressed a button i would have gotten out of there yeah you know what i mean like if it's like if it's just like just did not deal with the awkwardness exactly like i'm kind of scared and i want to get out of here i'm glad i went through it but me as the 10 year old then or whatever i would have just been like
Guest:Get me out of here.
Guest:Like, you know, can't handle it.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:No, this is sensory overload.
Marc:But I think what you're describing is almost like a religious experience.
Marc:You're sort of going into the inner sanctum of some dude that you respect, you know, like this guy's got the secret key.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:If I can just make it through the maze of hallways and his family's photos, I'm going to be given some secret information.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Absolutely.
Guest:And it's like what you wish you could actually have actual religion be.
Guest:Right, exactly.
Guest:As an adult, it's like, I wish I could get that experience again.
Guest:Like something where it's just like, oh my, I don't even know what world I'm on right now.
Guest:Right.
Marc:just blown right by that and and everything changes from that time on yeah like you're in i i crave that shit yeah just like deliver something into my head that will just switch the aperture yeah i mean that's sort of what happens like you have a lens your perception is what it is and then there are these moments in your life where it's like oh i didn't even know it clicked that far open absolutely and you just you all of a sudden are seeing things with new eyes everything's different what was the music in that room
Guest:That was Pink Floyd and just kind of trippy stuff.
Guest:And it was Jethro Tull also.
Guest:It was Aqualung and Dark Side of the Moon.
Guest:And it was just like, I didn't know that music could be so spooky.
Guest:Right.
Marc:And then you're sitting with the older kid and you're trying to be comfortable and you realize there's no place to sit but on his bed.
Guest:Yeah, I know.
Guest:I'm sitting on his bed or on his floor.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:The room's messy.
Guest:And it's...
Marc:yeah it's it's life-changing well yeah it's almost like uh it's it's you're taking this tremendous risk i mean there's a real a real fear to it i mean obviously your life is not in danger but you know all the parameters of what you'd establish like he's the older guy we're outside we're at the mall we're talking about things and now it's sort of like i'm in his room i don't really know this guy this is weird what does that poster mean yeah yeah and it's also music
Guest:They're like scary records, too.
Guest:There's weird sounds and stuff.
Guest:It's kind of spooking me.
Guest:Dark Side of the Moon, The Bells.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:Yeah, I just remember stuff like that.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And that song, After the Bells at Time, is a great song.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I came back to that...
Guest:album and to just to pink floyd in general after like i had them on ice for just decades after i liked them when i was you know 15 right and but then there was a point where i just had no use for it i liked all the sid stuff pink floyd you know the all the sid barrett stuff but i could not just relate to any of that stuff and um
Guest:But then it just, something happened and I just, I think I started getting fascinated.
Guest:There was this weird stretch with them where they, you know, when Sid Barrett freaks out.
Guest:And maybe it's a career thing for me.
Guest:I'm just relating to... Those guys were in the wilderness for four years where they're just... The guy who wrote the songs is gone.
Guest:Right.
Guest:And now they're just kind of looking at each other like, I think we're going to keep this thing going.
Guest:He was sort of the main guy.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And no one can recapture wherever the fuck he was.
Guest:And they're kind of like, so let's write a song, I guess.
Guest:And they're writing songs that are...
Guest:vaguely like his.
Guest:And then they have to start over and they're doing all these things like Adam Hart Mother and Umma Gummer and these weird albums.
Guest:Those were post Barrett?
Guest:Umma Gummer was post Barrett?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:But it's kind of fascinating to see them have to
Guest:learn how to be a band publicly it's like because they were already in they were a band and look they were popular on campuses and they would just play when anybody would just get you know people just be stoned out of their gourd and it would be okay but but they're trying to make records too and they're they're failing wildly sometimes in front of everybody yeah it's kind of interesting i think maybe i relate to
Guest:to that part of it because I feel like I'm that right now.
Guest:You're in transition?
Guest:Yes.
Guest:You're trying to make the band work?
Guest:Yes.
Guest:I feel like I'm in my Adam Hart mother phase of my career.
Guest:Yeah, where I kind of had a job that paid for a long time, and then now I kind of don't, and I'm figuring out what my future is going to be, and I'm hoping I come up with Dark Side of the Moon at some point.
Marc:And then have the freedom to do animals and wish you were here.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I started listening to that, and it's like... Recently?
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:I think it might be the most depressing album.
Guest:If you think about it like this, I can probably make a case it's the most depressing album ever.
Guest:Do you think you can tell Heaven From Hell?
Guest:No, I can't.
Guest:Just think these guys.
Guest:Well, just think of the larger pieces here.
Guest:Those guys go...
Guest:their lead singer flakes out yeah they go like four years struggling now yeah to get to just to succeed again then they come up with dark side of the moon yeah beyond anyone's wildest expectations it succeeds they're enormous now bigger than they ever were with sid barrett and then the album after that is just about how it's all just worthless and they're just like this is all garbage
Guest:Like, everything we fought for is meaningless, and we're all miserable.
Marc:And that album still sells.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:They make a million dollars a year on Dark Side of the Moon now.
Guest:Yeah, exactly.
Guest:But just imagine you actually hit the lottery twice, and they hit the lottery the second time, and then they're playing these sold-out shows across the world and everything, and then they look in the mirror, and they're just like...
Guest:It's all just garbage.
Guest:Like our lives are garbage.
Guest:And then they write this album about how fame is worthless and meaningless and like have a cigar.
Guest:And these songs just about like – The corruption.
Guest:Yeah, it's just all corrupt and it's a joke.
Guest:And it's just like no one actually knows who we are and we're just like –
Marc:It's like that's the most depressing thing ever To get all the success They got everything they wanted And then they realized it was just nothing Empty And then Animals comes It's like the most cynical album All I know is that there is footage somewhere Shot on a beta camera That I took from my parents to college Of me and my roommate Lance Him playing air drums And me playing air guitar For the entire first side of Animals
Marc:stoned out of our minds, on a couch in a dark apartment in Brookline, Massachusetts, completely committed.
Guest:And that's what, Pigs on the Run?
Guest:Yeah, Pigs on the Wing.
Guest:Pigs on the Wing, yeah.
Guest:That's just like... Yeah, that album is a... That's a colossal bummer of an album.
Guest:Because that's like saying humans suck.
Guest:Like, that album... Because, like...
Guest:I wish you were here saying business, our careers suck.
Guest:And then animals just says human beings, in their essence, are horrible.
Guest:They're horrible things.
Guest:Oh, but boy, is that a fucking great album to listen to sometimes.
Guest:But could you imagine, who could succeed with that kind of doomed...
Guest:Like the way it is now, it's like, is there anybody selling something that dark, dark and on that big a scale?
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:No, I don't think so.
Marc:And even if they are like, I think who would you think?
Marc:I think downward spiral.
Marc:by Nine Inch Nails was pretty fucking grim.
Marc:That might be the last band that had that kind of... Yeah, I mean, that thing, like, you listen to that, and it's, like, just a sort of, like, insanely intense celebration of the worst of everything.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:On a human level.
Marc:And I think that has that same effect.
Marc:But, like, now that you mention it, like, all those records, The Wall, then The Wall, that's no celebration of life.
Guest:Yeah, no, The Wall is just...
Marc:Saying, and now I'm going to kill myself.
Marc:And now we took on business and the gutting of humanity for corporate reasons.
Marc:And we've established that human beings stink.
Marc:And now if you're a kid, it's hopeless.
Guest:Yeah, exactly.
Guest:Good luck with everything.
Guest:Because it's almost like they did each one one at a time.
Guest:It's like, now we're just going to do all of them at once.
Guest:All those things.
Guest:Now let's take the heart and minds of the children away.
Guest:Let's kill their hope.
Guest:i remember when i was a kid like you know when you're first figuring out concerts and stuff i remember uh like oh pink floider playing at uh madison square garden i'm reading you know what am i nine i'm reading rolling stone and it's a seeing a thing it's like so i called madison square garden just like uh like yes hi i'd like to uh inquire about getting uh tickets to the show not realizing it's sold out in like a minute yeah exactly just like
Guest:Yes, two tickets, please.
Guest:To the Pink Floyd show?
Guest:Yes, when you have just no perspective on anything.
Guest:What did they say?
Guest:Did someone answer?
Guest:It sold out.
Guest:Kid.
Guest:Yeah, it sold out, kid.
Guest:There's a kid with a high voice like, boy, I'd like to...
Marc:I can only imagine.
Marc:It's so funny, though, that whole idea, getting back to the service industry thing, that it would be nice if someone answered the phone like that.
Marc:There was always the old guy that understands that you don't quite get things yet.
Marc:Listen, kid, you're too young for that.
Marc:Those people don't even exist anymore.
Marc:I think it's interesting what you brought up about the difference between having to take that next step
Marc:that what the internet offers people is completely disengaged from the menace of taking risks in life.
Marc:Not dangerous risks, but like I talk about on stage, even porn, it's like when I was 14, the first time I saw porn, there was a lot of things that had to happen in order for that to happen, and now it's just a click away, so you don't get any of that weird menace and morality of crossing this personal line
Marc:Where you're going into some kid's house, or you find that picture of people fucking.
Marc:You're like, oh my, why didn't anyone tell me about this?
Marc:You're generally in the woods.
Marc:Right, yeah, and it's by accident.
Marc:You're ditching school and smoking cigarettes, and you're like, what's that on the ground over there?
Marc:Oh, I know, it's what's changed my life.
Guest:Who put that stuff there, too?
Guest:Did some old guy just be like... I gotta go to the woods to jerk off.
Guest:Or was he just like, let me throw these magazines in the woods?
Marc:Yeah, I talk about that porn troll.
Marc:Oh, is that?
Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Marc:That's right, yeah.
Marc:But let's distribute the filth for the children.
Marc:They have to learn somewhere.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:But then you realize, like I wrote about this recently, that that's where people, the reason it's out there is that that's where people used to go to jerk off.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:They're like, I got to go somewhere far away and get this done.
Guest:Oh, I remember there was...
Guest:It was, it was like, uh, you know, January 2nd, probably of maybe, you know, I don't know, six, seven years ago.
Guest:And I was just, you know, the new year coming and I'm trying to just get my head into like the possibilities of what a new year can be.
Guest:And I just, I'm driving around and I'm just like a trap.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Oh, it was a tough.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Never, never pans out.
Guest:Not in a car.
Guest:No, but I'm just looking at everything.
Guest:So I pull into this kind of – I drive up this hill into this rest area, and it's just one of those where you go up to the top of the hill in New Jersey, and you can just look out, and it's just an enormous –
Guest:vista of just all the woods and everything.
Guest:And I just go up to this park and I'm looking out.
Guest:And then I realize after a while I'm interrupting all these dudes who are trying to all hook up in this park.
Guest:I think I was the one guy who was just standing there.
Guest:It was a gay cruise area?
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:I realized.
Guest:I'm trying to be in this spiritual headspace.
Guest:The future's going to be okay.
Guest:What is this year going to be?
Guest:What can I do to make this a better...
Guest:better planet and to help my family and everything and i see just guys like looking at each other and they're just they're like waiting for me to like leave so they can because they're running from each other's car they're running from one car to the other and it's like and i looked and all of a sudden i just like oh oh my god i'm like i'm in my moment here and these guys i'm the only one you're just this weird cock block
Guest:yeah and i was just like oh sorry guys just like i'll stop this moment yeah yeah happy new year yeah exactly because it was like it was just it was like five it was like 4 30 in january and the sun started to set crisp out yeah and it's just like wow this is this year is gonna be something else why is that guy looking at me like yeah why are these guys walking just back and forth
Guest:Did you see that as an omen for the new year?
Marc:It might have been an omen.
Marc:I'm just an interruption.
Marc:My existence is an interruption.
Marc:That might have summed up a decade.
Marc:That'll be the name of the first Sharpling book.
Marc:Sorry, sorry, I didn't know.
Guest:Well, I think you did just name the book.
Guest:That...
Marc:oh those like now i think we should q wish you were here yes could you bring that up yeah so well so i'm over here we're in new jersey and like the other part of the tour that my dad took what went to his college and he brought me to the fraternity he was in zeta beta tau okay which i think they call the zionist bankers trust
Marc:It's a Jewish fraternity.
Marc:Now, my father's life didn't, you know, it didn't, he had a good arc, but it didn't pan out the way he wanted.
Marc:And then, you know, we had had a brief conversation.
Marc:I don't remember.
Marc:I think it was on the phone about these fraternal organizations or these institutions of higher learning.
Marc:that seem to insulate themselves and take care of their brethren, you know, all the way through their lives.
Marc:And I think that like, it's interesting because like when I listened to you and I talk, it's like, no, we didn't have any guidance.
Marc:I was not in a fraternity.
Marc:I don't, you know, I was not able to maintain personal relationships in any, any professional way at all.
Marc:And, and networking was like, I didn't even understand the idea of it.
Marc:I mean, it's like, it wasn't even a matter of asking for help or expecting some sort of fraternal brotherhood.
Marc:It was just sort of like, I'm here, I'm doing good stuff.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Deliver me.
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:Oh, yeah.
Guest:The Harvard thing where – look, I have plenty of friends who went to Harvard and they are as talented as can be.
Guest:I think they have one.
Marc:More of that went to Brown, I think.
Marc:Brown was the artier of the Ivy League schools.
Guest:Yeah, but that kind of just – it's like a –
Guest:organizational parent, right?
Marc:Well, if you really think about it, it's how the world is structured.
Marc:That's one of those weird portals that you realize, like, it's like an institutionalized rite of passage slash summer camp for the global aristocracy.
Marc:I mean, when you really start to realize why the Ivy Leagues were set up, you know, it was primarily, like, for years they were like, we don't need any Jews.
Marc:And then someone, like, said, well, they're smart.
Marc:All right, well, if they act like people, you know, well... So, it was...
Marc:fine yeah but but it was really set up to to guarantee global domination on a corporate level and and then you but you don't realize any of that when your parents are asking you to fill out uh college applications you realize like i fucked off in high school completely and you people have no clout and and so now i'm going to go to some weird fucking uh small college outside of boston because you could afford it but you know the only thing they're known for is a program in dyslexia and and and and and pandering to to uh middle class kids who fucked up in high school yeah
Guest:Well, I went to a community college.
Guest:You don't have to tell me about that.
Guest:It's like I was at a school where I drove there every day.
Guest:And you didn't talk to anybody.
Guest:I was at a thing where it's just like... Because you're talking about community at the ultimate...
Guest:The highest level where you're here, and you're here for life.
Guest:You're one of us for a lifetime.
Marc:And they let in poor people occasionally, and they celebrate them because, well, he made it.
Marc:He made it through our test.
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:We've let one in.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And then I'm at the other end of the spectrum where it's kind of like...
Guest:you're like yeah i talked to this guy in the parking lot i think he's in a class with me yeah he's got some good records i'm going over there exactly like he had a t-shirt on and he had an rem t-shirt on and we'll talk to this guy yeah it wasn't it wasn't because of him i wouldn't have had that bootleg album yeah and these people were like if it wasn't for him i wouldn't be the head of goldman sachs yeah
Marc:Exactly.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:That's the world we run in.
Marc:But what's amazing to me is I didn't realize until I was an adult that that's the way it was set up.
Marc:It's like royalty.
Marc:It's like planned marriages.
Marc:All that stuff is still intact.
Marc:And it's got no bearing on quality.
Marc:The only thing it manages is maintaining the established order.
Guest:Yes, yeah.
Guest:Well, do you feel that these things resonate with you because there might have been an under-parenting going on for you?
Guest:Well, yeah, because there were a lot of the— Because I feel that way for me.
Marc:I know there was— Yeah, there was a lot of upper-middle-class Jewish kids that went the direction.
Marc:They applied their talent and their—
Marc:They're disciplined to things that enable them to have a much different life than me.
Marc:I'm not really complaining, but I would have enjoyed perhaps a little more discipline and guidance at some point.
Guest:Yes, absolutely.
Guest:Look, for me, it comes out of that thing where it's like...
Guest:Whatever you want to do that makes you happy makes us happy.
Guest:And it's like, well, that kind of... I think I needed more than that, though.
Guest:That's too much freedom.
Guest:That's so close to sort of like, we don't know what to do with you.
Guest:We have no idea.
Guest:Once in a while, my father will say like...
Guest:look, if you would have been a garbage man and that's what you wanted to do, it's like, then that would have made me happier than anything, as long as it's what you wanted.
Guest:It's like, look, I'm not putting down garbage men, but it's like, I kind of had a skill set that was making itself pretty clear at a pretty early age that should have taken garbage man off that list.
Yeah.
Marc:And it's like – Don't you have just pushed me a little bit in the direction outside of like giving me the freedom to be a garbage man?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:It just was – and look, it comes out of that thing when you come out of a family that is not – higher education is just not a part of the equation.
Guest:It's like I was the first one to go to college.
Guest:And what kind of business was your pap in?
Guest:They just – he worked in a newspaper plant, and then they started just doing imprinted T-shirts and stuff.
Guest:Oh, that's right.
Guest:I remember that.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:Silkscreen business.
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:So it's just like they come out of that, and it's like my grandfather made fences.
Guest:You know, it's just everything was just like service with the hands and everything, and it's just – But business building.
Guest:Yes.
Guest:So I learned, and I'm sure that that has helped me –
Guest:That has definitely helped me when when there's been the lean times and I have to go pound the pavement to figure out work.
Marc:Well, we're obviously both driven, but I think that the lack of the discipline like my I think higher education was something that I think my parents just expected that.
Marc:All right.
Marc:My dad made money and we have these children.
Marc:We're very selfish, but there's there's a little bit of money here.
Marc:They'll figure it out.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:But it's not enough money to just cover all the sins.
Guest:No, of course not.
Guest:It's not like old money.
Marc:It's just like they don't have to do anything.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:I don't have much envy for those people, but there was just no structure.
Marc:I don't even remember doing homework.
Marc:I have no recollection of my parents ever sitting down and helping me with a math problem.
Guest:Uh-huh.
Marc:Or managing any sort of anxiety I had.
Marc:I slept through almost all my classes because I was paralyzed with anxiety.
Marc:Now I'm learning that now because I read a book.
Marc:But I think that because of our drive...
Marc:It's just like what really drives me nuts, and I think this was what the undercurrent of the Harvard thing is, is that unless we do something that is the equivalent of splitting the atom in our respective disciplines here, which is talking into microphones, we're not going to be allowed.
Marc:We're not given access.
Marc:Unless we do something where people are like, holy fuck, that can make us all money.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:We're going to be in hotel rooms talking in microphones.
Guest:Like novelty acts.
Guest:We are like, in the scheme of things, we're like novelty acts.
Marc:Yeah, it's like, oh, that's funny.
Marc:And I haven't talked about this ever publicly, but I think I'm going to do it.
Marc:Like, you know, I've had this, you know, forever, you know, kind of mostly one-sided rivalry with Jon Stewart.
Marc:And, you know, I had this phone call with him, you know, because I thought, like, this would be great.
Marc:You know, I just busted that guy's balls forever.
Marc:I thought he was a sellout.
Marc:And this is in the 90s?
Marc:Yeah, all the way back.
Marc:Like, you know, when he first started breaking on MTV and everything, like, he would walk into a comedy club, I'd be on stage, and I'd be like, oh, there's the devil's cocksucker, you know, like that.
Marc:And we've had words over the years, but it's a long time ago.
Marc:So here I figure I'm going to reach out to him.
Marc:I'm the guy that apologizes now.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:So you'll come on my podcast and we'll make this right.
Guest:Are we good?
Guest:Yeah, yeah.
Guest:Are we good?
Guest:Like you could have a button.
Guest:On an instant replay?
Guest:What did I do wrong?
Marc:Yeah, yeah.
Marc:I'm sorry.
Marc:We good?
Marc:That's where you know that the podcast is over.
Marc:That would be your doll.
Guest:If you had a doll with a string coming off the back, it'd probably be like...
Guest:What did I do wrong?
Guest:We're good now, though, right?
Marc:Yeah, maybe that's what I should make.
Marc:So anyway, so I call this guy, and this exactly speaks to the difference, because he's obviously been given access.
Marc:He's a Jersey boy, and he's done great, but he's not unlike us.
Marc:He didn't cheat.
Marc:He made it on his own terms.
Marc:But now he's definitely through the door.
Marc:Not only through the door, he is a facilitator of the established order one way or the other.
Marc:They trust him.
Marc:The global ruling class trusts that they can go talk to John, and they might take a couple of punches, but it's going to be a fun time.
Marc:Now,
Marc:So I finally get hold of him.
Marc:I call his office.
Marc:And, like, you know, I don't get hold of him.
Marc:And then, like, I get a call on my phone, you know, just like, hey, Mark's Jon Stewart.
Marc:And I'm like, how you doing, buddy?
Marc:He's like, I'm all right.
Marc:What's up?
Marc:And I'm like, well, I just thought maybe you'd come on the show.
Marc:And, you know, we talk things through and he doesn't really do much public thing.
Marc:I really didn't expect it to happen.
Marc:And quite frankly, I have not really processed my resentment.
Marc:Sure.
Marc:Really.
Marc:And he's like, you know, I don't know if you remember what a dick you were to me, you know, in the 90s.
Marc:But, you know, I'm not actively angry about it, but there's no love here.
Marc:And I'm like, all right.
Marc:He goes, you know, if you want to have a cup of coffee or something and talk about it, I'm open to do that.
Marc:And I'm like, OK, man, you know, I get that.
Marc:And you're right.
Marc:You know, I completely understand that.
Marc:And I learned a lesson there.
Marc:It's like just because I'm ready to apologize doesn't mean that.
Guest:Oh, no, it's not.
Guest:It's not up to you to say it's apology time.
Marc:Come on.
Marc:Let's fix it.
Marc:And he's like, look, you know, I've always thought that, you know, you've been you've always done very creative things.
Marc:What?
Marc:I was so far off his radar.
Marc:Even with this podcast, I'm like, I'm finally arriving.
Marc:He's like, yeah, I know you're up to some, you've always been creative.
Marc:But that is it.
Marc:Until you make someone money, you're just like, yeah, it's interesting.
Marc:He seems to be, I saw he was in the newspaper.
Marc:It doesn't have any bearing on the world of business.
Marc:really no no you're just like oh yeah that's interesting so people like that thing what is that what do i got to do yeah no well it's it's like you're shoveling coal into an engine on a train that like my father refuses to listen to the podcast right i don't get it i'm like i went to his house and i said look here you go here and push that button he's like oh all right
Marc:Nothing.
Marc:What do your parents think about what you do?
Guest:It's just that thing.
Guest:Very creative.
Guest:Yeah, I think it just goes back to like, hey, if you're happy and you're having a good time doing it, it's like, that's okay.
Guest:But it's like, that's fine now, but it's not what I needed then.
Guest:Like now as an adult, it would be like, hey, that's awesome.
Guest:They're supportive and stuff.
Guest:But it's just like, I kind of didn't need the...
Guest:Just the wide open part of just like whatever.
Marc:Right.
Marc:Isn't it weird, though, that I often wonder about that.
Marc:It takes a tremendous amount of parenting to be selfless enough to really let your kid develop into something, to give them a little guidance and let them develop into something great.
Marc:I do think that at the core of most parental child relationships that ultimately what they want is to either subconsciously or consciously say, say you're just like us.
Guest:You're one of us.
Guest:Yeah.
Marc:Here we all are together.
Marc:Isn't it great?
Marc:Well, no, I could have been.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Come on.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:I look, I go to like the New Jersey thing.
Guest:I go down to Princeton a lot and I'll go down and I'll walk around the town.
Guest:It's an amazing town.
Guest:It's just absolutely beautiful.
Guest:The campus is amazing.
Guest:And I'll just walk around and I'm looking at this school and it's like, it's like, why didn't I go here?
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And it haunts me.
Guest:There's times I would go down there and be like, oh, this is a really great place for me to just get my head straight and just take in the beautiful campus and everything.
Guest:And there's times when I just walk around and I'm just furious.
Guest:It's like, it's in my backyard.
Yeah.
Guest:Like, Bill Bradley was my hero as a kid.
Guest:He went here, and it's like... Meanwhile, I'm at this community college, and it's like... That you have to drive to, and you could have walked to Princeton?
Guest:Yeah, I could have just... It's like... But it's like, if I'm writing my story out, it's like...
Guest:This is like a lock in terms of what my arc should have been.
Guest:And it's like I walk around and it just haunts me.
Guest:Like this school that should have been, this should have been my life.
Guest:But then I just start to think like...
Guest:Man, if I went here, I probably would not be where I'm at now.
Guest:And it's like I wouldn't trade that.
Guest:I'm happy I'm where I'm at now.
Guest:And I'm happy that I've kind of got the skill set to stick up for myself in whatever weird version of sticking up for myself I do.
Guest:I still do it in terms of a career and you navigate through things and you take punches and you get back up.
Guest:It's like I don't know if I would have had that.
Guest:If I had gone to an Ivy League school and had the ideal experience, I don't know if I would have the skill set I've got now that's helping me get to do exciting things where a lot of people who went there, that was their exciting period.
Marc:Yeah.
Marc:Well, I think that one thing we have to appreciate about ourselves in retrospect, and certainly I don't hear any blame in your voice, and I'm not blaming anybody for my trajectory, really.
Marc:But if you really think about who we are, now and then, I barely am able to work well with others.
Marc:which is sort of a necessary skill to have that life you're talking about.
Marc:At some point, you had to not only go to that institution or whatever institution, but you had to say, yeah, I want to be part of the team.
Guest:That's not... See, I get from... I think I got a sense of...
Guest:being so willing to work to work well with others it's like coming out of it it's like you know in the beatles it's like paul mccartney was the guy who's like hey let's do a fake band the sergeant pepper hey let's strip everything down back to our roots get like and meanwhile like john lennon's just like i want to get out of here like i'm done with this yeah i want to scream and get my shit together exactly but it's like
Guest:I think you come out of those things either you're just – you want to be the one keeping the club together or starting the club or you're the one who just doesn't believe in the concept of a club.
Guest:Yeah.
Guest:And I think that might be the difference between us.
Guest:Oh, between you?
Guest:Yeah, where I'm just kind of like –
Guest:Let's all work together and make everybody happy here.
Guest:And then you're just kind of like, well, that doesn't, I don't believe it.
Marc:How does this meet my needs?
Guest:Yeah, exactly.
Guest:My needs are being met by like, we're all happy, right?
Marc:Everyone's life got better.
Marc:My needs are met.
Marc:This is how a shift in my needs go.
Marc:It's like, it's no longer about me.
Marc:So I have to go over there.
Marc:But as I get older, I learn how to work well with people.
Marc:So what do you say, like right now, we do something that I don't know how it's going to affect either of us, but my buddy Brendan is here with his baby.
Marc:You want to go look at a baby?
Marc:Sure.
Marc:All right.
Marc:Well, this was good, right?
Marc:It was great.
Marc:It was a good one.
Marc:Oh, yeah.
Marc:It was a lot of fun.
Marc:All right, buddy.
Marc:Good talk.
FBI CIA FBI CIA
Guest:Now it's gone, now it's gone, it's gone