Transcript for my conversation with Brendan B. Brown of Wheatus 11/20/2023

Speaker 1: Brendan B. Brown

Speaker 2: Mark Puls

[Speaker 2]

Hey everybody and welcome to another episode of Knocked Conscious today had the pleasure of speaking with Brendan Brown of the band Wheatus it was a great conversation Here it is. I hope you enjoy it.

[Speaker 1]

I Just started recording and I'm gonna clap There you go.

[Speaker 2]

Excellent. Thank you so much. Welcome to Knocked Conscious Brendan Thanks for having me man Now I know it's Brendan B Brown, right I I saw you on interview something about triple B doesn't sit right with you But BB works cuz it's in your new song, right?

[Speaker 1]

You know, I don't really care the band. They call me B I've been called triple B Whatever, you know, I'm not fussy about that sort of thing.

[Speaker 2]

Excellent. Okay. Well welcome I saw you in a picture with MJF the current AEW champion Did I see that you in the ring with him?

[Speaker 1]

Yeah, did you see a picture of me kicking his ass? I did see you with a booze face.

[Speaker 2]

What was nice about that? Do you notice that he calls the belt the triple B now?

[Speaker 1]

I don't know if you knew that well, I mean it's because he knows I I If he faces me again, they'll get another beat down like then that'll be the third So he's you know, he said what is it? What is it a little token of his little voodoo charm? He's trying to keep me away.

I mean The third you you beat him twice I beat him twice man. I beat him at Joey Janelle's lost in New York I stomped him there and I stomped him again at the clusterfuck the following April He just keeps trying and now he's like hiding on TV, you know, like yeah, he is hiding.

[Speaker 2]

He's hiding you know That's really awesome. So Let's I want to start off early here. Let's let's uh, what's that call?

[Speaker 1]

First of all, shout out to spider-nate web because that it would that was those are the matches both times I mean, that's the rivalry. That's the real rivalry, you know I mean MJF can't get a leg up unless he cheats and then I have to come in and like, you know Fix his ass.

[Speaker 2]

So, you know use the ring this weekend. I watch it. Yes Very nice.

So I saw you on Twitter something about name an innocuous thing on a hill that you're gonna die on Yes, you mentioned Van Hagar. Yeah You were born.

[Speaker 1]

My understanding is you were born October 13th of 19, but remember about I was born October 11, 1973 Oh 11th, I apologize.

[Speaker 2]

That's 13 11 mixed up. Maybe that's why I didn't send it to you, right? I don't know.

[Speaker 1]

That's okay Swift number so, you know, I mean we're halfway there.

[Speaker 2]

Well, I'm end of September So we're both Libra, but we're a year apart. So you and I basically grew up with all the same stuff, right? I grew up in Philly.

So, you know, we're both East Coast guys sweet.

[Speaker 1]

So what's really so much love for Philadelphia. Yeah I saw you tweet some things about it And that's what that's what reminded me about this is on your 18th birthday on the 15th of October four days after your 18th birthday Van Halen played in Philly and I got to see it and I've got my ticket and I gifted it to my friend my best friend, but I got a ticket and Matt Bruck who's now the CEO or the the founder the owner of EVH Event Ellen amps.

[Speaker 2]

Yeah, he was the roadie for Eddie Van Halen and he gave us the FUCK guitar picks Unlawful carnal knowledge guitar fix. I have one of those with the ticket I'll send you a picture of it, but I just thought it was kind of funny because you said Van Hagar and I'm like That concert was awesome.

[Speaker 1]

Yeah, I'm so you saw 5150 live or you suck for unlawful carnal knowledge That's the one you saw I saw for unlawful carnal knowledge.

[Speaker 2]

I did not see 5150.

[Speaker 1]

That's awesome I so so if I could explain why I would die on that Hill I didn't like David Lee Roth that much now. I've come to like him as a person after the fact. I think he's really entertaining He's a good writer.

He's an EMT. He seems like an all-around like a pretty good guy, you know But but the sort of like high kick in like spandex front man was definitely not my thing if I wanted a front man, I wanted Bon Scott or or Brian Johnson and if I didn't have a front man, if I had to have a My preference would be for a front man who play guitar as well or play an instrument because Rush Was my favorite band and I was like I was like there's no excuse for just standing there playing Singing your song unless you're like one of these guys who can sing something impossible and you know, Dave's a great vocalist But he can't sing things that are impossible.

He's got a nice high screech but we're not talking about Bon Scott here, you know, and I Always got the feeling with Van Halen that there was something being held back even on my favorite Dave record, which is Oh The one with the guy with the head it was got unchained on it. I don't know God fair warning even even fair even fair warning, which is my favorite my favorite pre Hagar record, um, I just felt like something was something was missing and In my opinion, it was the fact that Eddie's not just a guitar player Eddie's a an all-around, you know sort of virtuoso He's got like put those keyboard skills. Yeah, he's got he's got arrangement skills got piano skills.

He and his brother are the nastiest duo of rhythmic Peculiarity in heavy music ever. I mean those guys play what's effectively if you look at like drop-dead-legs or anything like that You're talking about jazz like they're playing jazz together. Yeah I hate to be like cliche, but like the beginning of hopper teacher is just such a great intro.

It's ridiculous, man It's totally awesome. Um, but like I said for my money, I would take something like the bridge to drop-dead-legs or The whole entire song 5150 that the title track, right? Um, I mean, that's Eddie Spreading his wings.

That's the real thing and I feel like Sammy Being able to play guitar so well and hold Sammy's like a triple threat right Sammy can write a song Sammy can sing Like, you know any of the Bon Scots of the world and Sammy can play guitar almost as good as Eddie Which is kind of weird right if you think about you can rock it for sure, right? He definitely has a chance great man. I mean and and when Sammy joined I was like, alright, this is the band This is the one that like got away from Eddie and Alex early on and poor Michael Anthony Just kind of like, you know holding down the high notes on the on the harmonies the whole time Arguably one of the greatest rock and roll bass players who ever lived Probably underrated probably one of the most underrated for sure so underrated and Ted, you know for my money I don't think Ted Templeman ever put enough bass on those records, you know, it was like They had this thing going it.

I mean I could go off on this forever I'm not sure you want this to be the whole set podcast, but well, hey, look we've got time

[Speaker 2]

So if you if you're willing to share I'm willing to listen because you've got knowledge of things that you know You've got things inside of you that you could probably share with the world

[Speaker 1]

so so for my money, I think that I think that when Eddie moved everything to the 5150 studio and they got away from Ted's bare-bones approach That's when it started to be really interesting and I think that 5150 oh you 812 for Norfolk on all those that triple set right there has the most interesting guitar keyboard drums Arrangements on it.

Now. Does that mean that Van Halen with? Dave wasn't great now man.

It's classic 70s arena rock shit Like that set the tone for there's no there's no Motley Crue without that There's no, you know, you name it poison winger Striper Brittany Fox kicks like all of the cheese metal like there's none of that happens none of them right up I mean, I remember rat and quiet None of that happens without David Lee Roth proving everybody wrong about that kind of stuff, right? So I I'm not gonna I'm not gonna stand here and shit talk But but as a person who is interested in more complex music perhaps some progressive rock at the same time that I love a great pop melody and an interesting pop arrangement Which by the way, I find in Ariana Grande songs and Taylor Swift songs and like I keep finding that stuff I I never stopped being sort of marveled by pop because pop can be very interesting

[Speaker 2]

But if you had that rhythmic there are some there are some like patterns that just drop pull you in to the yeah

[Speaker 1]

yeah, I mean, you know and And You know, I'm as influenced by pop music as I am by like, you know the B side of Hemispheres by rush, you know, like I could pick the most obscure weird shit that nobody wants you to put on at the party I'm just as influenced by that as I am by like third eye blind second record, you know, so So I I feel both those things and I feel like the one of the finest Cross combos of those two powers in music the pop side and the progressive side was started at the end of 1984 and then really bloomed on 5150 and OEA 1-2. I think that's That's that shit, you know So yeah van Hagar for me like 100% that's when they hit their peak now That's not because they sold the most records during that period has nothing to do with that That's no because it's first of all music is subjective.

I mean if you look objectively at a sales Come on, right boring like who cares like like, you know I mean lots of things that that can't that don't last that don't stand the test of time Have been very successful initially, you know, or like a lot of art posthumously successful Yeah, exactly. You know, the great Gatsby was not, you know necessarily a hit in in F Scott's like time I mean it was it was celebrated, but then it was like, you know went away it disappeared like, you know He spent most of his life thinking that he didn't have a second novel in him and it kind of he kind of didn't you? know, um But but regardless I think I think that I think that that the trajectory of Van Halen for me is much more about what they started Doing once Eddie was free once he had his own studio once he had his own creative space once you once he could start being the producer in earnest You know and if you read anything about the diver down process you realize that that's where he That's the straw that broke his back where he was like this sucks. I'm not doing covers anymore There's like five or six covers, you know, right?

[Speaker 2]

Well, that was that was my that would be my criticism I hate to say in a negative way, but I Was exactly what you loathed. I was a front man who didn't play an instrument but of a cover band So right. Come on, man.

Talk about a loser, right?

[Speaker 1]

No, but you're in some sense you're doing the Lord's work right because people people don't to recognize the song right so that's important Right, but anyway, go ahead.

[Speaker 2]

Sorry. I cut you off.

[Speaker 1]

No, it's fine. I mean like I Again, I don't want to stand here and be like like my other favorite band is AC DC, right? Now that's music that almost literally cannot be played in song at the same time, right?

You're talking about Angus Young playing solos Malcolm and Angus if they're not in the solo section They're playing these weird harmonic inversions of the same chord that are you know? Tricky as hell nobody's ever gonna be able to peel that onion and figure out what they did on those records But you listen to back in black right back in black just the first 20 seconds of it is Sounds like meat and potatoes rock, right? Yeah, bullshit Go ahead and try and do it right and make it sound like the record does or make it sound like they do it live They are doing Some tricky weird the bass is doing a harmony what want for through one pass of the riff and then the guitar takes the harmony for the next pass of the riff and it feels like That song is bending the chord and it's power It's toward power right there all everything in AC DC is about impact Yeah, and it's like driving right? Yeah Yeah, but they never then they know how consistently rhythmically rhythmic they are So in order to not beat your ear down with the same exact pattern every time they're making these subtle changes That I think they really started doing when they met up with mutt Lang around The end of the power who meets up with mutt Lang improves, don't they?

Right, right. You're talking about an ever and ever escalating Exponential complexity to what they're doing in their layers. Are they simply recorded records?

Yes, they are Are they simply arranged records? No They're not and people who talk about AC DC being simple or whatever is like you just don't understand You don't understand how hard why then does nobody else sound that good if it's that easy tell me, you know There's nothing like it.

[Speaker 2]

Oh Nothing I totally get it yeah, so so on that note and and to your point is like the David Lee Roth criticism and once again, we're not here shit Shitting on the guy. We're just Constructively saying hey, there were a lot of covers in the beginning and he loved doing that and when he left them He did covers on his own.

[Speaker 1]

Yeah, man, they're cool. I love and they're awesome Yankee Rose isn't even a cover and I love that song and you know, and there's three there's three ways I look at covers you could try to do it. I'd like an identical exact version like Africa from Weezer in my opinion It's almost like an identical sound no you can do one where it's like an Alternate sound where it still sounds like it like a reggae ska version of 8 6 7 5 3 0 9, right?

[Speaker 2]

Right, or you could make it sound so New age and so different but still have some core elements if you pay attention to it to pick it apart So there's many ways to do it and he just added flair to whatever he did.

[Speaker 1]

Yeah Yeah, you're pointing out something that nobody talks about There I'm glad because I loved I love that. Yeah, there's literally and then there is without a doubt physically factual limitless Possibility and infinity of versions of what you can do, right? But there's not that many right ones There's not that many that It's almost like it's almost like Earth being a planet that's in the Goldilocks zone that has life on it, right?

How many planets are out there? Trillions there are so many planets out there You can't even count them and they're all different But there's only a handful of them that have life and if there's only a handful of those then there's only a handful of intelligent Life, you know, it's like that you start whittling it down It's like well, actually that makes it really hard to do something like dancing in the streets the way that Dave did Yes, or I think just a gigolo and right just cuz cuz Louie Prima who's just so much fun

[Speaker 2]

I mean that original just such a great and he and he really kind of modernized that song in a really odd way But it still kept that purity of that that pop to it, you know that Latin kind of flair that

[Speaker 1]

Louie Prima was my grandfather's favorite artist Cool and mostly because of the the little chat scat that he used to do in between coming about coming but like that kind of Stuff because he would have a bit about yeah, he spoke he spoke Like my grandfather did he sounded like that was a say had the same voice, you know, they had the same, New York like fast talk Like get it.

Hope we can't get up here boy. Get it play Are you like come on come on with that saxophone boy like like and then you know making the guys play it between his legs You know the whole like let's not fuck around let's fucking do this is yes the phone solo goddamn it and Dave Understands that as a front man for a bit. Yeah, never he never came in half-cocked.

He was always an explosion, right now Performance is more than just musicality in some cases, right? Obviously for sure Dave doesn't need to be able to play the piano and the guitar like like, you know, like Beethoven, you know Which is how I see I see Eddie Van Halen like he's Beethoven.

[Speaker 2]

Like that's abs. Absolutely. They're Fine someone to argue that to be honest.

I mean, I don't think anyone could actually Argue that point.

[Speaker 1]

No. No, he's a per. He's a perfect example and his son is just as good like unbelievably talented people I'm so glad that that got passed down that like that way Yeah, like true true genius and And breakthrough style, did you ever see the interview?

It's not an interview is a performance that Eddie did for a Les Paul tribute No, I never saw that one. You can look it up online But yeah, they're yeah, they're in some kind of club and it's around the 5150 era I think maybe a little bit later and it's a tribute to Les Paul and Eddie's up there and he stops for a second and he starts to talk about Les Paul's Developed had the way he developed engineering of records right how Because Les Paul invented multitrack and he was the first one to stack tape heads on the like the whole and he and for a long time Record companies didn't know how Les Paul was getting these sounds because he he invented it and he had it in the studio and now that when having read what Eddie did with the 5150 studio and Finally getting to that place that made that that pairing on that stage at that tribute made so much sense to me what he was saying he's saying you had a Laboratory where you not only wrote but you reinvented the Aesthetic by changing the formula for making it go to tape right for making it record a recorded thing and that's an engineering level that I think Eddie got to on On 5150 I think that that happened.

I think that record is is what I would like call like an impossible record. It cannot be made By anyone else under any other circumstances There's you could have any number of infinite infinities of permutation and you'll never have that happen again, you know So I'm just smiling because it's like watching the passion of music.

[Speaker 2]

It's like because What what had me reach out to you? What's interesting is I just want to close the loop on cover Reason I brought I thought about that to the David Lee Roth question I thought it might have been a cover issue for you not a hundred percent but to some extent But I like did a cover Yeah, you did a cover those a little respect that replaced it.

[Speaker 1]

Was it freak on on the first album? Well, that's a really good question Because I watched you on an interview earlier in the summer or something and I watched your face I watched people's expressions and when they brought a little respect and you brought it up You gave a little stink face and I'm curious if you had a little and like just a thought no No, I didn't actually We had a lot of song by the way, that's a phenomenal cover. Thank you We had a lot of covers in the first Iteration of this band when we started playing live shows in 97 or so in New York City We had mama's don't let your babies grow up to be Cowboys.

We had Cheap tricks surrender. We had Jessie's girl By Rick Springfield when we were playing these songs As tight to the original as we possibly could we wanted to show that we could be chameleon that way like We can do Willie Nelson. We can do Robin Zander we could do these things and and There was a certain pride in that but the fact of the matter is that erasure is Too unique.

I shouldn't say too unique. That's the wrong terminology. They're too idiosyncratic and too Novel in their approach to synthesizer pop That they made it heavy, right?

They made things. Yeah feel Thumpin and prior to that those those those those Depeche Mode records. They're kind of good No, no, no, right nothing nothing hits as hard as like chains of love and a little respect those two songs and as There's a few others too that just pound they pound like rock and that's why it was easy for us to cover it because the energy Was already there in the in the arrangement in the composition So it's kind of cheating a little bit right because they had already done such such magnificent work and You know Just throwing a distortion pedal on instead of adding keyboard layers Is not as complicated or as challenging or as interesting I think as what the original did now I know that people appreciate our cover on a level that's quite different from the original and that that's what you kind of what you Were talking about like you can hit that note where you're it's your own and it's not it's not the original

[Speaker 2]

Right, but it is an homage for sure I mean, you know, it's you know, the song yours is more of a replication not replication in a bad way.

[Speaker 1]

Just a yeah a noticeable cover or recognizable cover than Well, so the other thing is is that's the vocal on that song, right? Yeah, that's not that's not how I naturally sing. I have to do something a little bit.

Oh, yeah Well, no, I do sing falsettos But the way that they crack from the mid mid-range tenors into the falsettos, that's not something I typically do Right. Yeah, that's not like a yodel. It is very much a yodel.

Yeah, and it's their own that own Vince and Andy sort of unique placement of the vocal in this ultra-passionate and bare sort of way and the vocal takes are always spot-on in an era when there was no Auto-tune by the way, like those notes are perfect. So I had to do James Laid.

[Speaker 2]

I know exactly Yeah, that's another Yeah, that's the one that pops into my head when you think of that. It's so pretty Right.

[Speaker 1]

Yeah. Yeah. Now you got a you got a chance there to accidentally show disrespect because if you goof that or you try to make it sound like You know a wind-up doll or some kind of like kitschy thing You can't disrespect their their approach to it because they they took a Huge risk putting something out like that not to mention you want to talk about like, you know Gender issues those motherfuckers walked out on stage during the Reagan administration with a pink g-string bikini in at Madison Square Garden in Nassau Coliseum in 1988 you know, we're talking like that was for lack of a better term balls, right like Balls talk about being brave like that's that's pretty sure and yeah So you're you're also you don't want to disrespect that movement that they were so out front on and And you're all you're also talking about a group that was openly Openly gay during an era where Freddie Mercury wasn't openly gay, you know Like you take he had to hide, you know what I mean?

[Speaker 2]

Mercury was my he was my yeah, just I bought a tape I remember buying a tape at a flea market best of Queen when I just started driving, you know, 1990 1989 Yeah, 25 cents at a flea market and wore through that tape back and forth and back forth

[Speaker 1]

What listening to that show he had it all he could do it all to Queen Queen is the thing Oh, you're like you have to write me Yeah the songwriting and the really interesting sounding records and him being an astrophysicist and knowing how to place Microphones and also that's all very interesting But the chops that those guys have is way more interesting energy.

[Speaker 2]

I mean, oh, is it the best 20-minute set? There's a live aid set.

[Speaker 1]

I mean, it's got to be arguably one of the no hands I mean like I'm even thinking about it getting chills chills You could you could refer to that to that as the greatest live performance that's been captured in modern history I would call it that okay.

[Speaker 2]

I'll give it our arguably other than the moon landing if it was real. How about that? Yeah, well so you just finished like a crazy tour where you went through some ups and downs you got you had some issues this And that do you want to share a little some stories about your tour how it went and what's been going on in the UK?

[Speaker 1]

from the year 2001 until 2019 we went back to the UK at least once a year and The pandemic stopped that for four and a half years So for us that was like man There's something really missing here like that cornerstone of what we have been doing To perform to be performers is gone for four and a half years. You can't atrophy like that now we got real lucky because Although we spent 2020 off the road art Alex Akis and the guys in Living color and who bestank those three bands wait living color. Yeah living color.

[Speaker 2]

They took us out on the road For those I hope to talk with you after this then I hope we can connect because they're coming here in February and I'd Love to talk to Vernon and oh They are I grew up listening to living color. That first album was absolutely amazing Yeah, it's it's miracle shit.

[Speaker 1]

They they quarry Glover's first solo album to just to be clear So, I don't know if you've seen them live lately I have not You're talking about Every night we watched the whole thing Had we heard the songs a million times? Yeah Do they ever play them the same way? Nope Welcome to school kids like that was like we were front and center for the greatest Improvisational pop heavy metal rock jazz Lessons that you can get You know and we were able to watch so we did and we I remember the first night wondering like I haven't seen them live for a while wonder what wonder what it's like, you know and Jesus I was instantly filled with two feelings first of all gratitude and then inadequacy And then complete and utter inadequacy. I'm like, what am I even doing here? This is like, you know I mean, I read I'm sorry.

I read a single Vernon retweet and my head explodes He's a walking encyclopedia Watching him dissect any kind of song this song of the day and and He's the best Conversationalist in the world the rest of the tour they were we broke down into two groups, right? My bass player and drummer would come by and see me and Vernon and my partner Gabrielle talking and go Oh, it's the heavy talkers again Cuz we were was straight into none of this small talk shit just right into like important political racial you know geopolitical like everything just a whole there's nothing we didn't talk about and And Just I had can't stress this enough the education level the privilege of that education Proximity was profound man.

It was like on there I'll probably never get to learn that much from a single person ever again and then watching them play I Can't even describe it. It's like I'm looking forward to it.

[Speaker 2]

I know they're coming here in February So and I'm in Phoenix. So when you come out to Phoenix, you'll have to reach out with it.

[Speaker 1]

Yeah. Yeah, definitely definitely Yeah, I would if I if you have the opportunity to buy more than one shows worth of tickets That's the way to do it. Why because because he's different every time it's not gonna be the same Yeah, so you're gonna get like a different CVs in Vegas, too.

[Speaker 2]

They might only do one in Phoenix cuz Phoenix isn't Right, we're okay.

[Speaker 1]

We're not and I was I was around I was backstage. I was eavesdropping I never heard them talk about what they were gonna do. I never heard them discussing what they just did it And I was trying to catch it man.

I was what the fuck are they gonna do tonight, man? How the hell are they playing? Open letter to a landlord this different from the way they did last night and it's like they've done this like they've rehearsed it like this And I know they haven't I know they have not you know, like I love open letter That's a great one Salsa you is the one that just like all the weight lifts off my shoulders.

[Speaker 2]

I hear that little intro the guitar Yeah, little tingling is like that's so pretty.

[Speaker 1]

It's so pretty and just I that's a good way to do and a little music It's beautiful.

[Speaker 2]

Yes, there's beautiful in its power and it's and and yeah So hopefully I hope I can reach out to you and we can connect that because I would love to have them over and break Bread and have a conversation like this. So I'll try I'll try my best I know those guys are busy these days, but I know they are but maybe when they're in town is my point, you know but Yeah geopolitically. I was I looked at a lot of your stuff geopolitically.

You're welcome to share that I think you and I might have some differences, but I'm very much of a You you know, don't bother anyone else as long as you can be you

[Speaker 1]

Yeah, I do think there's a stodginess of that side that is part of the responsibility that becomes like You know, you know my my grandmother was a depression-era baby, right and she was a devout Catholic and I always boil it down to She had her faith and she had her principles but she also Knew that you got a mind your own business, right? We have lost that we have lost touch with that Thank you. We are in other people's business talking about their crotches talking about their identities This is not up for discussion with her She was like don't you ever talk about people that way she with abortion, right?

She would say well I think it's a sin, but that's not a man's decision to make for a woman like, you know It was like mind your business, right? And I think I think 90% of the of the venom of our current political discourse That so many powers that be are really benefiting from our divisive Conversation is a lot of us.

[Speaker 2]

They love it Bickering about trans and about wanna smile.

[Speaker 1]

They want us in each other's business, right? They want us looking under each other's hoods, right and that is not they're not looking under their hoods, right? So we won't look at their shit and that's not American.

It's not American to mind everybody else's business It ain't so, you know, I feel like we could we don't have to have a political conversation We could just agree that we need to mind each other's business

[Speaker 2]

But that's the point is then we can have an actually open conversation about things because we we totally agree that regardless of what we feel

[Speaker 1]

We're not here to impose our will on another, you know, right and we're not that different, right? We're not that different. We're like 99% similar.

We're not that different We're genetically almost identical to chimpanzees and it's like how like 1% different we're shitting in our hands Brandon Come on. I know I know This is my point like how different can humans be from one another right if you just stop and think for a second about life And then there is divergence diversity too, right? It's like crazy how much the range is and how similar we are to it's like But why do you what's the best thing about America, right?

The best thing about this place ostensibly at least is that you can come here from anywhere else Start your start your shit over get a new identity leave and in the night in the 20th century This was really important, especially to my grandmother who was the child of immigrants that you leave the old world behind Right. My my grandmother's mother was an Austrian Jew who was disowned because she eloped with a Sicilian God Mason, right? This is this was back then in that country in those countries.

You couldn't do that. That was excommunicatable, right? But we don't fuck around with that kind of bullshit.

Why because it's not efficient, right? What if the Mason from Sicily learned something valuable from the Austrian Jew and they go make a business together, right? What if right and all of these?

prejudices they preclude the Possible hybrid that's better.

[Speaker 2]

Yes, like who could see who could see in 1984 when jump was on the top of the charts that that was the time to get rid of Dave Right, right No I heard this story behind that that kind of Eddie was holding it hostage a little bit because he had recorded all the masters in His studio and then threatened to burn them.

[Speaker 1]

Did you hear that for 1984 for 84 for jump?

[Speaker 2]

that's the whole point of where jump part of jump came out that way where allegedly David Lee Roth was like about jumping like jumping off the building like might as well jump and he made it like a double entendre because they were in a Big scuffle about it allegedly really That's what I saw.

[Speaker 1]

I'll send you some literature I don't want to get bogged down because if I'm wrong, I'm wrong But I thought I was watching this thing and that's what thing was Eddie was like, I'll burn them all I'll burn it all to the ground unless you do it my way because he had that that sold that beginning of Jump and he right couldn't get it out of his head and 1984 right and title track. Yeah, right Yeah, exactly. So he just could not get that all out of his head and that was he had allegedly held a hostage But it's a really amazing story though.

[Speaker 2]

I mean, I can't hold him.

[Speaker 1]

I can't fault him. I still listen to that I have I have several copies of 1984 on vinyl and I listen to it sometimes and I sit there and I go this was a really interesting choice to start the record that Followed a record full of covers with this sort of almost Stanley Kubrick style Magnum opus overture, right? But what it says is and this was the most important thing I think Eddie was trying to say you don't know Van Halen.

You think you know that you don't know shit get ready for this and That was the jumping-off point for a lack of a better term Absolutely for the rest of what they were capable of so I'm yeah, I don't care what he held on hostage under the bed with the Tapes, I don't know Well, that's the thing so to your point, I'm a first-generation American, but my parents are both German, right? I had a grandfather who was a Nazi soldier Right that don't came East Germany became communist.

[Speaker 2]

They escaped East Germany I mean, it's a crazy story that I'm here. My parents both met here that I'm here is like crazy. It's crazy I don't even know how but my parents when they had us my brother We had no brother and myself.

They wanted to Americanize us as much as possible integrate us because they chose America, right? When they chose America, they still had a community of Germans, but they chose to move forward within the American Experiment.

[Speaker 1]

Well, you know what Americanized names, you know, what's fascinating to me about that? They knew what Germany was they knew what old Europe was with the Alliances and the history of World War one and then how it led to World War two the treaty of us They knew what they were leaving They didn't necessarily know what they were coming to because what is America really? Can you describe it to somebody who's coming out of when there's no internet and there's barely any radio somebody who's coming out of the 1940s coming to America from from you know from there.

I Whatever they were leaving was bad enough to not need a full explanation of where they were headed. Think about it. Think about yeah

[Speaker 2]

Yeah, I mean that like we're talking about went from Nazi to communism to West German to America Yeah, I mean you can't go through greater ideological shifts than those four different types

[Speaker 1]

you know, I think I have a degree in history and I've always felt like The real question to ask people if they want to get the last 200 years of history, right, right Ask them why the First World War happened.

Not the second. We know why the second one happened. Ask him why the first one happened Can anybody you know give you a succinct detailed explanation of why the First World War happened?

And don't tell me some brat nephew got assassinated in Czechoslovakia. Don't tell me that Yugoslavia. Don't tell me that I Can take on that challenge Brendan, I just I I swear to God last month I had a I had a an hour conversation with Scott Horton of anti-war calm, right?

[Speaker 2]

So if you know Scott Horton is he's kind of speaks out against the current stuff going on in Israel And he's an end, you know, he's a libertarian anti-war guy. Yeah

[Speaker 1]

But yeah, he he speaks to what led up to that and then obviously how that then led into two, but you're right Yeah share with us You had a bunch of aristocratic Families who had allegiances with one another that the common folk didn't know about They had a sent signed all these pacts with one another that if anything happened, they would come to each other's aid this way Well, you think the farmer dying sounds like NATO, doesn't it?

Well Well, how about a post post Soviet NATO I would say I would say that I would say that the new model Specifically avoids this old model because they know no one's gonna fall for it again because you had the emergence of trade unions and and sort of workers movements and farmers movements after World War one was so Extremely powerful that we had the Red Scare Actually had Emma Goldman's deported and like all this shit, you know, so so what I'm talking about is There's no French farmer who died in the trenches in World War one who knew why he was dying. Not one of them knew what they were fighting for. They didn't understand they just knew that their Aristocratic overlords had told them get in the trench, right?

Yeah, that's mustard gas. We don't know what that is yet, you know, like so Anytime you have if it's if it's an ungoverned if it's not a part of the government and it's still an extra governmental power Like an unregulated industry. I don't think Elon Musk is answering to anybody right now I think he just does what he wants How could you though?

[Speaker 2]

He's literally doing things.

[Speaker 1]

We don't even know what's going on. This is the problem Why does he have Starlink contracts with the with the American government? Why am I why are my taxpayer dollars going to his rockets that I've seen I saw the Saturn 5 go up I saw those missions successful.

That was 50 years ago My government already did spent that money in my name. What are we doing right now? What are we doing with those rockets right now?

You know, I mean, I love technology I am a technologist if you told me I can't tell from all the shit behind My guitar rig in a little thing. So what I'm the parallel I'm drawing is French farmers Belgian farmers in 1915 they had no idea why they were being sent to the trenches Because their overlords had deals with each other that the voting populace if there ever was such a thing didn't actually know about they had agreed to things that they didn't know that they were on a hook for and The banks tried that with us in 2007 you guys agreed to shit that you don't know you're on the hook for right?

Yeah, there's any time you get into a situation like that where there are allegiances and packs and contracts that we're gonna underwrite That we don't know about That's the problem that's what that's why people wind up fighting each other and not knowing why That's what one.

[Speaker 2]

Yeah, that's what it is. I mean, it's yeah chain. I think she was a Chamberlain He was kind of a mess Neville Chamberlain.

[Speaker 1]

He was he was the lead-up to World War two He was the appeaser.

[Speaker 2]

Oh, that's right. Yes the appeaser.

[Speaker 1]

There's interesting information about that That's pretty fascinating though about how he did actually know but he wasn't in the position Politically that Churchill would eventually be in and he knew it and had conferred with Churchill about okay. Well, I'll Carry this on the British are brilliant at chess you know the the way that they their intelligence services have already operated over the years, but I'd be fascinated.

[Speaker 2]

No one will ever know really there's no way to ever look under that hood, but Well, the Churchill was able to resurrect his career and I hate to say resurrect his career but he had that first battle in World War one that costs like 50 to 70,000 lives and that one straight where he's like We just got to do it.

[Speaker 1]

Yeah. Well, they were all those men at it. They weren't prepared the whole right and they were Disarmed, you know, I mean, right, right and But that he was able to come in that he came back from that.

That was just such a political just Horrible.

[Speaker 2]

Yeah, I want I wonder if I wonder if the British had any other alternatives Well, he was a phenomenal wartime president or wartime leader my ministry Yeah, look how bad he was in peace.

[Speaker 1]

I mean, it's like he was perfect for war but bad in peace, you know, right, right What's interesting to me more so than that is I hate to say perfect by the way, right? No, this this is one of the things we do as a society like we but we blame the victim a little bit like England didn't start World War two, right and everybody watched for nearly a decade while Hitler built a war machine And became this like overt racist Lunatic who was threatening his neighbors from the get-go, you know sarcastically threatening his neighbors Everybody watched everybody thought oh, he'll calm down or he'll he'll lose an election or something fascists True totalitarians don't lose elections. They don't have elections once they're in they do everything they can It's the same.

It's the same equivalents. Like if we give the profit motive to banks, it's where it's Completely unregulated and they make profits off of being underwritten what they're not gonna hire people with those profits They're not gonna hire advisors to keep them out of trouble to make better bets They're gonna go to Congress with that money and they're gonna pay off Congress for laws that let them take more gambling risk, right? That's exactly what they're doing like that.

Well, it's why

[Speaker 2]

No, we're looking at government regulation and it's like certain government regulations necessary and then you're like, well wait The ones that are paying off the politicians are already in the business So like for example the Googles and the you know, the X's and the whatever's they're already in the social media realm They're trying to regulate so no one else can get in at that point

[Speaker 1]

They're trying to put up a wall now if I have like I don't have fly-on-the-wall Recordings of anything it would be the conversations in the late 90s starting with the think tanks and leading towards the Graham Leach Bliley act where Bill Clinton and What's his name? Graham? I forget his first name is a Phil Graham Billy Graham.

No, I think Phil Senator they repealed Glass-Steagall which was the Law from the Roosevelt era that separated commercial banking from private bank, you know So that the banks couldn't gamble with your mortgage and sell it to 14 other banks, right? We merged and then the Freddie Mae Fannie Mae or exactly exactly So so why I would love to hear why they thought they didn't need Glass-Steagall anymore Who the hell was that? Like I know what it was.

They saw Russian the people paid for the foundation Exactly, but what they saw I think was they saw Russian finance finally let out of the cage, right? So yeah You couldn't do business in Russia for 70 years and suddenly they're doing business all over the globe and it's totally unregulated because it's a it's A you know kleptocracy. So right we need they thought we need to compete with that.

Let's repeal Glass-Steagall Yeah You know, it's this is the things like we because it's like the the terms are so short And it's not like I'm asking for longer terms because it's like a conundrum, right?

[Speaker 2]

Do we want a leader for 20 years or do we want four-year changes, right? But with four-year changes comes we're gonna go 90 degrees left and then the four years

[Speaker 1]

we're gonna jerk the wheel 90 degrees right and then we're gonna jerk it 90 degrees left and then we're gonna and what when when we When we had to convince the southern states to help us consolidate the Revolutionary War debt, we got ourselves into trouble right The compromise where we moved the capital to the south and Jefferson thought he got what he wanted But really Hamilton got what he wanted with the northern industrial capitals that would eventually win the Civil War was not the Compromise they thought it was because the representation is now such that we have this Electoral College mess where these states like Wyoming where nobody lives are kind of calling the shots for how Big cities are subsidizing their roads and their sewers, right? We have Idaho, which is I'm sure a wonderful place. But do you know how much it costs to keep?

interstate infrastructure in the state of Idaho considering there's not enough tax base there to support it in the first place a Business can only imagine just all of the costs that we have right? It's incredible what you and I as city dwellers or maybe even big-town dwellers have had to pay to subsidize these places And I've been to them. I've driven past an exit in Wyoming that says Bradford population 2 and the exit is the dudes driveway You know like did you have a show there he got an interview no, right I probably he he got he got an interstate highway sign for his address that's that's 45 you know, right whatever I'll marker 16, right and and you know Nobody wants to admit this but the the business decision is to give Wyoming back to the Native Americans That's the good business decision because we're just subsidizing this piece of land where nobody lives You know and it's like yeah Man, well, that's the thing. It's like so everybody does knee-jerk reactions.

No one's looking three steps ahead It's like if we push this in won't that pop out over here? Of course it will Okay, so so that's gonna pop out over here So, how do we resolve that next thing that pops out over here so that what that what's the result of this gonna do when? You push that in we just go to the next thing and it's like we're so myopic unfortunately Yeah, and it's like hey We're squirting out of the sides here and we've been sweating out of the sides for a while Why are we ever gonna stop and fix this like, you know?

Be nice. All right. Let's talk about something fun.

Sure.

[Speaker 2]

What happened? What's going on with this? I just saw a repost of a Rolling Stone article with was it Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce and their favorite song Is this?

[Speaker 1]

We don't know that it's their favorite song to the tabloids and I'll take that with a grain So first of all, I should I should preface this by saying I think that people talk about Taylor Swift in a way that they should Shut the fuck up All right Yes, your girl saved the music industry by herself She created more value in the touring and record streaming

[Speaker 2]

Businesses and then more money for ticket master, by the way, I'm good.

[Speaker 1]

I've got an opponent to pick with them Yeah, everybody does but we're talking about one lady here who has managed to flip the script on the overseers and the gatekeepers and turn it into Whatever she says They'll do That's unheard of in the history of music Beyonce is another one who has done a similar piece of work, right? You've got but in a crossover realm too because I don't even think the numbers are the same I think that they I think there's as Beyonce is yeah globally maybe internationally. I think they're comparable in terms of their impact on on Just straight-up culture.

We were talking about the music industry being dead 15 years ago and it was over it as well But these two people have single-handedly rescued the whole entire operation, right and they've done it artistically originally They have wrestled control back from people who had never ceded an inch of control to artists ever so they rewrote the landscape those two and Yeah, you've got Springsteen and you've got a few Male pop artists, but you've got to stop and say nobody's done what these two have done. Nobody has done that.

It's novel It's incredible and it's saved the whole entire business. And when you're talking about music industry, we've been talking about a Stadium show like Beyonce or or Taylor Swift are gonna do you're talking about? thousands of truck drivers You're talking about concessions people like you don't want to know how many people stay home and don't get a paycheck when they cancel One of those I heard the number of the generated the revenue generated and it was Astonishing.

I don't even remember the number but it was it's incredible. It's incredible It's like, you know, I saw a figure the other day that Disney holds down only 5% of the Florida economy But then I did a little digger digging a little deeper and it was like that's you're talking about the immediate employees But hold on.

[Speaker 2]

No, there's a trickle.

[Speaker 1]

There's a hotels and reservations truck drivers Concession people food people. It's like you're talking about subtracting 25% of the state GDP if you get rid of Disney and so I think Taylor and Beyonce are like that a comparable in the music industry, maybe even more so that's I'll say first and that the way that they talk about her personal life is just just Way overboard like you do that.

[Speaker 2]

Yeah, I don't I'm gonna be honest.

[Speaker 1]

I don't listen too much to the person I know who the fuck in their right mind would right because it's like what are you talking about somebody like this?

[Speaker 2]

Like I was just trying to figure out a name for them.

[Speaker 1]

I think it's well Z or so No, no, no That's whatever. I don't know you know, there's been a lot of talk but but anyway, so back to the fun shit she and Her apparently new new relationship guy. I don't know his name.

I don't know a lot about football I'd be lying if I said I did His name is Travis Kelsey, and I'm okay to share that with you But I also know less don't know that much about football either Scott. Yeah So we're on the same team, I guess but They got drunk and sang teenage dirtbag around a fire pit somewhere and he relayed that story as part of their arc of their relationship now that News story broke on us Magazine and and the Daily Mail today and I saw it because they put teenage dirtbag in the headlines So it's like, you know shooting at me from all angles, right?

[Speaker 2]

Yeah

[Speaker 1]

Totally honored If it's true, fantastic, you know huge if true as they say

[Speaker 2]

I am going to start a bonfire in my backyard and I'm gonna invite the three of you to come over personally and Sing it and we'll do it together

[Speaker 1]

I will say this publicly if it is true and you guys do want to have a party Engagement party wedding birthday party bar mitzvah Whatever we're available That's all I'm gonna say I

[Speaker 2]

Think we just broke news. I think we just broke some headline news. So on on that Teenage dirtbag is obviously This thing it is its own Entity at this point, right?

I mean, it's it's bigger than everyone combined I've seen two sides of the people who have Something that impactful that happens to shadow over much of the rest of them because it's just so big I mean, it's so big right? Yeah, it's Ridiculous and obviously with the social media and the current stuff with the tick-tock stuff Was it two billion shares of some some some it's up there.

[Speaker 1]

I stopped counting when I realized I didn't understand the numbers, but Yeah, it's it's it's doing it's still doing a lot of work for itself and We are So lucky and there's there's only sort of one sort of real reason that we're very lucky Had teenage dirtbag come from like an A&R guy or a manager telling me how to write a song or a Suggestion from somebody that was not exactly what I was feeling in my heart if it came from a place of trying to protect an Existing career as opposed to like not really caring if you have one or not just trying to get out what's inside then I think we would probably feel a little bit of a burden around its

[Speaker 2]

Renewable resource, you know, because it's more of a commercial than entity than a than a personal entity

[Speaker 1]

Yeah, but but the fact of the matter is and no degree of commercial success or Obscurity we can so if you're talking about teenage dirtbag, you have to talk about the years. Nobody really knew about it after it came out either one of those Neither extreme has ever made me feel regretful.

And the only reason is because I wrote it alone It came directly from me and my feelings about what it was like to grow up where I grew up in 1984 about the process of finding a musical identity in that environment and about what it meant to be about to become an adult and Face the consequences of your life having not conformed to whatever was Being pushed back in the day, right? So I'm very familiar.

[Speaker 2]

Like I said East Coast grew up same thing when when I saw dirtbag It's like I knew what dirtbag was. It's kind of like there's a there were a lot of colloquialisms, right?

[Speaker 1]

Like back East we called out of work. I don't know if you called out or called in. Yeah, you call you can call out Yeah, yeah, we called out but but out here like 90% of the country calls in and I remember a conversation We're like, hey Joe called in.

I'm like, what do you have to say? And it starts like, you know what I'm saying? So like dirtbag to me meant exactly I think how you were depicting it

[Speaker 2]

But it's hard to explain it if you had like it's like a lived experience almost right

[Speaker 1]

so so when I was writing the song I did I knew I knew where I was coming from with the history of you know the murder and There being a satanic panic I was like, I grew up like in the epicenter the ground zero of this American satanic panic movement and I Remember thinking there's a way it has to be a way to infuse this narrative with that danger and that information without Making it a historical piece or referencing the murder directly And making it sort of lovable still fictional as it is, you know I went to a boys Catholic high school that was in an hour and a half away from my house I didn't have a Noel or any of that. So It was a fantasy on some important level and When I was finished with it, I felt like that was that was what made me happy about it is that the danger was there but the Ugliness wasn't you know, like the hint of the hint of something darker was maybe present.

But yeah So We've got really lucky We got really lucky with a song that made sense It still makes sense to me is a bit of a challenge to play live because you got to pay attention to how that whenever We have a new drummer. That's the one that takes the longest. I mean we have some tricky progressive rock drum arrangements in our cat

[Speaker 2]

Yeah, I can I can imagine that for sure

[Speaker 1]

Yeah But the one that everyone gets stuck on is dirt bad because we beat science that shit for four years before we had a drummer Play we were working on a hip-hop workstation called an MPC 2000 right and I know those yeah, we were moving Snare drums and and hi-hats like this until we felt that perfect Motown Hip-hop ACDC Phil Rudd Nexus, right? Where's like that made me feel like all those things at the same time and then when the chorus comes in it has to be Like Metallica just joined the band kind of thing But but Metallica with dinosaur jr. You know Yeah, yeah, that was shit that I was that was a guitar wise I was trying to find a spot between like and justice for all and and Start chopping by dinosaur jr.

Those two like that's guitar. That's the guitar that it needs, you know Bursting absolutely bursting like incapable of having any more Tube saturation, you know It's awesome. And it's great.

It's and it's funny because I always think about that.

[Speaker 2]

I I remember Edwin McCain talking about it He did I'll be right right one of those Solo hits it just outshines everything else. He could possibly do sure and he's like you could look at it two ways, right? You could have that resentment of that Amy Winehouse did not like Allegedly repeating the same song she liked that jazz free-flow style to your point So that living color being different every time that she had to do rehab every night like literally killed her in a weird You know, yeah, so you could do it this way, right?

But you know the the slave to your success or you can look at the way you've looked at it I mean like it's like the lottery ticket that goes Who complains about looking at their lottery ticket man this thing got me to do the rest of my life and I love the way you have this way of looking at it from a

[Speaker 1]

Gift and a blessing sense not a burden sense And that's one of the things that I wanted to touch with you about How do you how do you see the world that way or how is it?

Just well First of all, it's easy. It's easier It's easy for me to talk like this because I wrote that song and it didn't come from anywhere else And I still feel that identity and I still feel like that was part of who I was and remain, right? And I think a lot of other bands success in the music industry is weird.

It's floated with compromises you wind up in a situation That's out of your control and lo and behold your big hit doesn't sound anything like the rest of your catalog It's not a song you wrote. It's a compromised idea. It's a you don't feel it every night, right?

I feel teenage dirtbag every night. I feel a teenage dirtbag when I wake up in the morning because it's just me It's just me alone raw unfiltered, you know Am I a different person now and see the world differently? Hell?

Yeah, but what I'm not I don't feel the need to be dishonest to that person who's 19 years old working on that riff, you know, right and I have a lot of affection for that period of my life as hard as it was If for no other reason then I found my voice During that time on that song and and you know going back a few more years when I was Nine years old and ten years old. I remember watching Angus Young the couple of tiny little times I was able to record him on MTV, you know on a VHS tape little snippets I still have of the flick of the switch video and a couple you a couple other things and And the the maximum overdrive soundtrack when that movie came out like oh my god, you know and and that was when that was when I was I Thought to myself that is so amazing. What he does is so amazing if I can grow up and have any Version of that.

I'm taking it right? That's a win. That's a successful life and Obviously life and gets way more complicated than that what then when you're 10, but I do actually have some version of that and that song and The guitar technique within it and the vocal within it and the narrative within it all of which came from listening to Metallica and listening to Rush and Prince and AC DC and Huey Lewis in the news all that 1980s period of Wanting to be involved in that and not knowing the first thing about how that's all real for me now so complain I Don't know Seems pretty unrealistic to complain. I was I'll be working in a deli. Otherwise, which isn't that bad?

I've done stuff like that. I worked in fresh market and like all you know but I'm saying that like I Every every relative, right? Yeah, it's all relative I go on the road with my band and it's a you know, it's a lot of hard work We do our own loading.

We do our own merch. We do our own Everything, you know, we do our own tech We set up our own stage. We have like one stage tech sometimes when we can afford it but most of the time it's just us, you know, and I Love doing that work because I know I get to play that song for people and they're gonna give it back to me You know, they're gonna get something out of it.

[Speaker 2]

And so am I and that's a sacred Gift and I'm not gonna for one second feel like anything went wrong there, you know No, not at all And I and actually I think there's almost like a new generation not just the replaying of yours the re-recording of yours Which I'd like to get to right next but sure Jax, for example does a female Version of the of your character. Yeah So you come out on stage one time with her? I don't know how many times you're able to do that But that yeah a couple times a couple times.

[Speaker 1]

I had the honor of walking out on stage with her She knows she's she's different from us. She's in the pop world Yeah, she's got that that confidence that that certain confidence of like, you know, no one can fuck with her, right? No light like yeah, it's an air of lightness.

It's like I'm good I'm untouchable but not in an not in an overt like snooty way. It's I'll tell you what minute I've seen it up close It's simply skill confidence She can sing her fucking ass off and she can write a dope song and she's got Multiple instrumental skills and she's just great. So she's great.

Yeah, she's just great. And that's what it comes from I Think her song Victoria's Secret is like a gonna be a classic one day Like it's really gonna come back around and people are gonna be you know, like holy shit this this Girl wrote this song right hits so many important notes, you know, like this is like real shit So she's a pop star of substance and Absolutely, she's growing.

[Speaker 2]

I think she just got married too. So congrats. Yeah.

[Speaker 1]

Yeah, she did. I was she invited me to the wedding I couldn't go. Oh, yeah, I was on the road.

I feel bad Jax. I hope wonderful But congratulations Jax, maybe yeah. Yeah get them all together.

Yeah, so cool. Yeah, so You had to rerecord it. Yeah I'd love to hear the story behind it Obviously the second album hand over your loved ones was retitled to something.

I'd love to hear the story behind Obviously how that all plays into itself with that and then the story I heard there was actually a little story behind how you got to the second title as well So the the the first album seems to be lost. I'll just say that the multi tracks for it Lost the tapes that I delivered I delivered with a note that said please transfer to Pro Tools logic or tape immediately because they were a transitional format from the mid 90s to the early 2000s that only lasted about six or eight years and they were moved on from that recording format so I Sent five copies of those Transitional style tapes for by the way, you couldn't tell that it was transitional at the time It later became obvious that that was a transitional digital format when Pro Tools

[Speaker 2]

Right it taken over and then and then yeah, it just didn't keep up

[Speaker 1]

Nobody knew that that was gonna be the case, but I I knew that they needed to be backed up to some other format But anyway over the years We would get requests for licensing that required Multitrack or instrumental or some alteration of the original parts of the song and Lo and behold somehow those licenses never happened and I began to suspect that it was because they didn't have them anymore Or they had lost them so the discussion of Rerecording them just for no other reason than to make ourselves whole on that work that we had spent so much time on at my mom's house was Begun in 2007 a couple of false starts And I came to realize that I wasn't going to be able to do this unless I had some vestige of the original Recording so I could get my head around how fast were these songs? What's the tempo, you know?

because mind you the CD is Not the same tempo or length as the original Multitrack recording and I'll tell you why it was mixed down to tape So you had this digital format, right? multitrack tape format that was mixed on an SSL console and then down to a half inch tape Right. Okay.

Half-inch tape stretches is an organic piece of Plastic so the front the finished product that Sony has came off of that tape and that tape is a different Stretch and and Wow and flutter from the original recorded music so you can't even get the original tempos off the CD Right, right because it's been altered by the tape process, so okay, I dug deep into my boxes of junk and found a set of the original multitracks That was about anywhere from 60 to 77 percent whole lots of Vocals were missing lots of guitars are missing. But what was present was the original click track and the drums and the bass Right, so you had to hear that because I hear that I hear the DJ scratch different I hear the vocals very different.

Well, so no, we can't use the originals. We had to replace them one at a time Oh, wow, but that led us to the right place, right? We had a fix like almost like when like a foundation like it got you to the you remember in you remember in Apollo 13 when Jim Lovell has to get the earth in the in the window so he can just fire the engines for a little There was a fixed point in space that we finally had where it was like, oh This is the kick drum sound and that's why we did this and that's why we did this and that's so on So like the target it So we began replacing the missing instruments first and then replaced the other ones Retroactively so we got the record back together in the original shape that it was in and we were missing the Click track for the song sunshine and we were also missing it for wannabe gangster but luckily my co-producer Phil Still had his original zip discs with the MPC 2000 tracks on them able to On its last legs held together with popsicle sticks and glue and tape we actually did a scuzzy Zip disc transfer to 100 megabytes. Oh, you don't even want to know how many times we failed and started over It was a nightmare But we were able to get the original tempo loops For those two songs and the upside to that was that those were sample free Samples that we used from a disc in the 90s called wall of vinyl so that Sony couldn't claim as an original piece of the Material so we were clear on that and recreated it now when I say it was a forensic process I'm describing like I'm I'm making this a short story. It was like Lord of the Rings it was like I heard about just the the original song and how you re-recorded it.

[Speaker 2]

Anyway, so you already went through How many like almost a decade's worth of journey to get to the song in the first place, right? Right, right, then you have to recreate it after 30 years of being a different person like good luck.

[Speaker 1]

Exactly Exactly. There was a lot of forensic feel different. Yeah tedious forensic re-examination And then it was like a couple things where we were like, you know what?

This snare drum is really cool for a late 90s early 2000s record. It's got that sort of piccolo Limp Bizkit vibe where it's or corn where it's like real spanky But I wanted something a little bit more thick and round and so we changed it's got a little more I don't want to say a little bass not bass heavy, but just a little more.

[Speaker 2]

It's warm to it. It's warmer It's got more for sure. It's it's round DJ part instead of the high I kind of it's funny cuz like you hear it And you're like you just get it right in your head You hear the new one and it's just different and it's just a little low and like a slower almost and it's probably the style of The DJ now that's different even from when it was when scratching was such a thing back

[Speaker 1]

Well, so the original we had was a guy named Pippi long scratchings and his and his he was a DJ and his his thing was he played his turntables through guitar pedals distortion wah He was crazy cool very cool, and so that was best recreated with Like guitar amps inside the computer. So Matthew our bass player spent a ton of time Rebuilding those from scratch.

That's awesome. Do a good job. He think he did really well I think it came out and it came out real good.

Um so much so that when we finally put it out in April of 2020 Sony claimed it as a Master's copyright They claimed it as the same thing and We had to get our lawyer took about five weeks to show them with a phase test that it wasn't the same thing So they were mine if I asked the cost of what that would have cost you just to get through that process Is that covering the lawyer?

[Speaker 2]

Yeah, I mean to do that cuz like cuz what we seem to find is right here You are an independent artist just putting out art putting out beautiful things and here's a company Claiming your heart right in a weird.

[Speaker 1]

Yeah. Yeah, it's expensive. I Would say that he did us a favor and it and it cost us about 15 grand just to just to get through the discussion But yeah, that sounds like a favor actually But I but I well because you got one guy.

It's like David versus Goliath, right? It's one guy talking to however many departments at the label who are responsible for enforcing their copyright You're talking about a multinational media corporation, right? And he's a He's a you have to make your case.

He's a very experienced lawyer, but they already think that they're right, you know They already think they got this locked and they're probably willing to go to court on it unless They know that they're going to lose and it's gonna be a waste of time. So we had to get real tenacious and Stick to our guns on it and I actually had This this saved the day. I had the original liner notes booklet from the sample free CD that we've gotten that intro loop off of and It clearly says on the inside This is a common-use copyright blah blah blah blah blah is all of what they needed to see right approved Not unique.

Yeah, so, um, right That was what did it that was what tipped it over and five weeks later They let go of the copyright claim on YouTube and we were able to release it. So So you guys broke up obviously? One thing we've never done is to do the wise breakup I know there's a lot of wisdom in a breakup and they always annoys me when bands.

Oh, this is the last time We're touring we're breaking up. We're going home blah blah blah and then of course three years later They're out on the reunion tour.

[Speaker 2]

But yeah, the Eagles actually I saw the Eagles recently Hotel, California And I remember hell freezing over being their reunion tour, right?

[Speaker 1]

I'd like very much to avoid that in our lives. But but anyway, this short story man Don't don't make any promises to stop. Just keep going.

Yeah, just keep going Um, they they let us go with it and we and we finished it now that now Now we have we're December 1st. We're dropping the entire 2020 reissue of the first album, which is the original 10 songs that were intended minus a little respect and punk-ass bitch replaced with the b-sides pretty girl and I'd never write a song about you and There's also 10 additional songs that we recorded during the process that were like Over the years they were tracks that I wrote that Sounded too much like the first record to release because it was like nah shit. That's like first album stuff.

We're going over again Let's put that aside Which made for a wonderful sort of alternate version of our first record over the years So it's a it's a double LP when I find when I finally cut the vinyl for it next year It's gonna be a double LP of the first record that everybody knows and then the alternate universe version of the first sweetest record So very cool, yeah, cool Yeah And also we felt guilty just putting out this same record again without proving that there was other stuff that could be Of interest to people so we felt like that was the move and it was I'm not gonna lie It was a pain in the ass and we'll never do anything like that again

[Speaker 2]

So, you know, but hopefully it's rewarding for you though because it gives you that sense of completion, right?

[Speaker 1]

It kind of closes a loop for you We feel like we fixed a big hole in the roof and And it's solid now, so, you know, that's important. It's important. So so you have hand Hand over your loved ones, right and then you change the type That's funny Or so did it did it not change or did it we did we did so we were in suck phony was the first idea for our second major label release and it was meant to be a live album why because we were booked to play a festival in Finland in the summer of 2001 and we were supposed to be direct support to Stone Temple Pilots and Green Day

[Speaker 2]

Well, don't have a pilot's another guy Wyland R.i.p. So good. I saw him a handful of times just absolutely ridiculous I saw him four days before he died.

[Speaker 1]

I saw him play in on Long Island and he was Amazing. He was he go back halfway through shoot up and come back out cuz I don't think I didn't see him do anything Like that. I didn't see any behavior like that.

He didn't seem high but I you know, what do I know?

[Speaker 2]

But no, no, it doesn't it was in Phoenix He what happened was he played a solo he slipped back and he came back out and he just saw a little different guy And it was like, oh, sorry. Sorry that just breaks your heart, you know, yeah, man.

[Speaker 1]

Anyway, what a talent but um, so Stone Temple and Green Day and three weeks before We were supposed to go over there and do it The promoter called and said Green Day and Stone Temple have pulled out Now, I think that at the time it was maybe your rehab situation that we were it was explained to us Whatever. I don't know but you know what doesn't matter things happen. Yep, right, whatever so but he said do you want to pick up the headlining slot because since I booked it you guys have a Top ten record in in Finland and let's you know, why don't you fly up here and do this?

I think you headlining. Well, what he didn't tell us was that he had moved His marketing and Just put us instead on to a black metal festival in Finland in the Arctic black death metal. Oh, yeah.

Yeah, like full-on like Bands that we couldn't plus play with under any circumstances You know, so my best friend knows all the names of those bands by the way, yeah, they're amazing I like them I love all this or whatever. I think Burn churches and kill each other. I love the legendary shit.

That's you know, don't forget where I came from I know I know what I know what that stuff is, but I don't play that music right and I don't claim to so Anyway We get there and we realize how fucked up this is because we're going on the at the end of a night of pure black metal, so We're playing our set doing our best trying to be friendly and I get hit with a half a Belgian block right in the chest somebody throws it at me from way back and I just boom knocked the wind out of me Four inches higher would have broke my jaw and all my teeth, right? It was like just knock bounce right off on my breastplate knocked the wind out of me I stepped back and I'm fucking mad.

I'm like I'm like, that's a cowardly thing to do and I like a green first time in another country artist Challenged the guy who threw it to a fistfight on stage Like a fucking idiot, right? I would have done the same thing and it would have been the same mistake. I'm sure well Well, let's see.

Was it a mistake 30 seconds later? security for them are on a Viking who's two heads taller than me and About as wide as I am high, right? So the mountain is basically the mountain is coming down He's got blonde hair down to here.

He's built like Thor He's fucking drunker than like human beings can actually get because obviously he's a Norse God. So I and like He's ready to fucking kill me and I mean kill me it was over, right? So he gets up to the front and he's screaming Suck, you suck phony.

You suck. That's his only English, right? That's all you can say in English is you suck phony So I get off the stage and I go to our monitor guy I'm like, did you record that show on a dat and he's like, yes I was like, did you get don't fucking was it rolling when the guy came up?

Cuz I can I know I could hear him in my in-ear so he's on tape and he goes Yeah, and I was like we are putting this out as a live record and we're calling it suck phony that's where that came from and then later it evolved into let's retitle the second album when the when Sony Refused to release the second album. We thought okay. Well, let's repurpose that title because now it makes more sense like this.

So right Just that was the original intention anyway So but handle your loved ones was was always the real title for it the suck phony idea that was fun for a little while but the but the real the real album was handle you put hand over your loved ones and I'm still very proud of that record. It's it's it's I think it's our best-sounding vinyl cut because it came off of a one-inch tape reel It's my favorite three songs in a row it's which are Anyway, okay freak on and lemonade.

[Speaker 2]

I don't know why but something about I think it's that order. Yeah, that is it

[Speaker 1]

Yeah, yeah

[Speaker 2]

and it's just something about it like I literally go on a walk and I can just loop those three and it's just they give You a different vibe a song's different and like I I think I mentioned I think I tweeted even or some ex posted whatever Something about like anyway is almost like after the breakup between Noel, right, right, you know

[Speaker 1]

Yeah, I was I was really really trying hard to avoid anything. That was teenage dirtbag ish I also wanted to stretch our legs a little bit on arrangement and get Instead of a double guitar sound I wanted to get a keyboard sound and a guitar That was more like what deep purple does then then just you know, just repeat the same formula from album one Oh, it sounds totally different and your harmonies are phenomenal and like there are so many places that I hear on Like for specifically anyway that you can throw so many of these extra harmonies in there that I'm like hearing them in my head Cuz yeah, one of those songs that like it's like alive. Yeah, you know, it's like always constantly I wrote that song sitting on a toilet in France

[Speaker 2]

That makes me feel great about great I picked the most sophisticated song you're taking a shit and that's my look man

[Speaker 1]

Taking a shit can have the thoughts can be real you you know, you know you really finally get some quiet some peace and quiet, but but yeah, I mean that was that was how it was then we were doing so much press and and Festivals and shit that the only quiet time was on the toilet So I was always bringing my guitar into the toilet with me, you know But the yeah, that's that's where that came from and also that that feeling of like a bunch of different vibes on the same record that are glued together by this sort of like It's pop, but it's gnarly enough to be like, you know A piece of candy and a poison wrapper kind of thing Like it's like it's like you want another one, but you're not sure you want to take the first bite kind of that's how I wanted it So it is a caught is a bit of a caustic record at times sort of Shreddy, I guess you could call it. Yeah But it's still thumping the guy who mixed the most recent Beatles record mixed it guy named Spike Stent. He did.

Oh cool he's famous for mixing most of the Madonna catalog and and a lot of other great great records, but but most recently yeah, like I Love that bass on freak on it's just one of those songs where it changes tempos I like there's a couple songs that like when I'm 64, right it changes Yeah, and scenes from an Italian restaurant Billy Joel changes, you know what I mean? And I get that kind of vibe from it, but it it transmutes the transitions are still smooth and yes cinematic cinematic Oh, yeah, I wanted a Paul I wanted it to have a dance Motown pulse and still be cinematic in its scenery, right? It was like change change the room every once in a while, but you still feel the beat and that's what it was That's what I get from that.

Yeah. Yeah, I'm glad to hear that man. Thank you.

Thanks. I you know that record way I Love music, but I'm not good with the verbiage. So like I try to use English layman terms for no, you're good You're that you probably are you're taking perfect sense to me, man.

I get it. Um, it's all matters I hope that record was real obscure They only put out a thousand copies of that somewhere in the UK and the American label didn't even put it out So it was crazy. It was it got it got a Almost no release.

Have you found in any of this the stores in the UK? Yeah, I see I see CDs sometimes on the used rack in in the UK kids send me pictures of them when they find it you know, it's like a Gold to them. Yeah.

Yeah, but um But we reissued it on vinyl and the vinyl cut is just is the definitive, you know, my friend Paul Gold at salt mastering he did a direct transfer offer to offer one It's a and it's it's as analog as it gets it was slamming, you know It's a true vinyl and so important analog.

[Speaker 2]

It's just such a different feel to it the warmth.

[Speaker 1]

Yeah, it's thumping That vinyl is thoughts. Awesome. Yeah, it's cool Well, I'm so glad you spent you shared your time with me.

I could talk for hours So if you if there's anything else you want to share if you want to share any stories about your trip or any You know, whatever you want to talk about man, well we got we got Christmas dirt bag just dropped today I don't know if you saw the video for that I did not see the video, but I listened to it a couple times on Spotify already So yeah, excellent. That was fun. My partner Gabrielle wrote those lyrics.

I was at a loss I had no I know no way to go because it's just been teenage dirt bag for me for so many years I just I couldn't even have an imagination about something else but she did it to the point where I can still remember how it goes, which is a feat but um and then I'm Like I said, we're dropping the whole entire re-release of album one on December 1st all on streaming and in addition to that we are hitting the road with I'm hitting the road with art Alex Sackas from Everclear. We're doing a little Australian acoustic tour together He's one of my favorite songwriters. So that's gonna be like going back to school as I said, you know No, ever clear.

Well, yeah. Yeah, man, so awesome and And Then there's a bunch of touring on on the burner for next year that I'm not allowed to talk about quite yet but I I keep getting surprised by People wanting us to come out and do our show so we will be there with bells on Anytime we get invited to go do these shows. So I'm you know, it's it's like like I said living the dream kind of still you know, um, but uh In addition to that there's a movie that a couple of guys in the UK are making about us called you might die in particular it was filmed during the toughest years on the road 2010 2011 2012 when it was really Touch and go when we weren't sure if it was gonna happen again next year kind of thing

[Speaker 2]

And I saw an article from 2017. Yeah, it said something about shutting it down.

[Speaker 1]

Yeah Yeah, they've been they've been they've been doing this For us for a long time and there was like I mean this band was hanging by a thread financially from about 2006 through to 2017 2016. Oh When we started to see some of the One Direction royalties coming in your stint though. Yeah, man, it was raw It's a long time.

It was a long time. It was a long time saying to the band I We got to take six months off I'm not sure about when we're coming back, you know that kind of thing and Matthew and the other guys we've worked with over the years were patient enough to wait and improvise their own financial lives until this Became a thing that was not as touch-and-go and we're kind of emerging from that period now with all that's going on We're learning how to be a band that's not living on the edge of the cliff, you know Which is new and we're not getting that one right yet, but I'll let you know, you know this transition to the online stuff

[Speaker 2]

I saw you do like an online cover thing. You did like a Q&A. I thought that was really good Did you get a lot of reception from that or I'm not sure which one you you're talking about?

But uh, but it was probably during kovat.

[Speaker 1]

I think you guys had just Just literally just like I had a Q&A after doing maybe 10 or 15 songs like yeah Cover so I know I hit me with your best shot was oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I think I think I know what you're talking about You're talking about our little like I said, like you got on the rabbit hole.

I like typing I'd literally type in weedus and boom, you're just There's yeah plenty of stuff to sit through. Um, yeah, it's interesting I think I think we're I think we're beginning to focus more and more on Just being as good as we can be at the music. We we do all requests sets live.

We don't make a set list So if you're at our show, you get to call out whatever you want to hear and it you know An interesting niche, but yeah niche market focus on your music as a musician. Imagine that like And man you you've got some crazy tempos on some of those double beats that you there's a new song that you have with the dog and I heard you playing on tiny desk and it's just like there's a lot of I think you're talking about lullaby. Well, yes lullaby was I said to myself during the during the winter of 2015 I said, you know Somewhere over the rainbow that's jazz, but that used to be pop, right?

That was what was popular music Right, and that's a country was back in the day.

[Speaker 2]

Yeah.

[Speaker 1]

Yeah, that is a complicated arrangement Can you write anything that complicated that fits? within The three minute and a half, you know moment and is also accessible from a vocal. Can you sing along to it?

And so that was lullaby was that experiment for me? Yeah

[Speaker 2]

it's cool that you get to do those experiments and get to play around and some things take and

[Speaker 1]

you never know exactly that I mean if we were still on a major label or We got a second chance at a good second record being released and all that stuff I don't know if we would have been able to make a song like lullaby like that's That would have been too far afield for for our partners, you know But as it stands we've been free of management and record labels since 2005 So we that that's a feat in itself though.

I mean It's weird. It's weird up against the big boys all the time Yeah, man, I mean tiny fish in a big pond all all the time. You know, that's that's our that's our career, you know Excellent.

Well, i'm so grateful for your time If there's anywhere anytime you want to come back on again, if you're ever in town in phoenix, please Reach out. We definitely love to have you come over and i'm gonna be doing it's not announced yet But i'm gonna be doing a lot of acoustic solo touring in 2024 It's a lower 48. So we're getting my favorite kind.

Yeah, okay

[Speaker 2]

I'm a big i'm a big fan of like edwin mccain david david ryan harris is my absolute favorite singer Yeah, uh with the john mayer trio, you know, and yeah, just some of these guys just The acoustic stuff's where it's at

[Speaker 1]

I'm looking forward to the to the woodshedding because when you go out there by yourself You got to relearn the song in a way where you're not leaning back on your band and all of the tricks and bells and Whistles, so it's back to basics.

[Speaker 2]

It is pure. It is just a pure You know, it's kind of like it's kind of like the cover band thing. It's like if you can't recognize the song Oh, you can't be a cover band.

You know, you're right

[Speaker 1]

You just can't be a cover band and when you're an acoustic I see acoustic cover guys, you know doing doing Coffeehouse gigs and i'm like man, that's some brave shit because if you fuck up, yeah

[Speaker 2]

It's on you they loop the stuff with their pedals and stuff and they've got some drill like they were playing on the back of The it's amazing some of the stuff like ed sheeran's really good with the looping and stuff

[Speaker 1]

like how he holds that in we were in we were in ireland about a month ago, and we were uh, We were walking past the the venue next to us after we loaded out And there's this guy in there and he's doing ariana grande and he's doing uh, Just you name it michael buble songs and like the whole entire pop canon and he's his voice is just perfect and he's killing it And he's playing along on the guitar and he's great.

I saw it to myself I ain't that good Like I I can't do that.

[Speaker 2]

I can't it's like a different skill though

[Speaker 1]

because like you have the originality right like Once again, it's like one of those things where it's like can you copy something really well or just emulate it very well Still make it sound great and be that technical or can you be original and make something new, you know, it's I don't know All I know is I have a lot of respect for guys who can who can really nail somebody else's tune You know, like that's I agree people. I think it does take a lot of skill.

I just coming from that side I don't like I like to have a little more humility about it too because it's like I didn't write the fucking thing So how the hell can I?

[Speaker 2]

Well, you know what good is me singing that damn thing if I can if I didn't write it, you know, right?

[Speaker 1]

One of my favorite acoustic songs in your eyes the peter gabriel version, uh, jeffrey gaines version And I got to see gains is a genius. I got to sing with him on stage.

[Speaker 2]

Whoa He uh, it was it was at the tin angel in philadelphia.

[Speaker 1]

I don't know if you ever heard of the tin angel It was above a restaurant called the serrano And it only sat 110 people And it was like, you know wpix whatever that uh, you pen radio station is that independent radio station? It was like the 10th anniversary. Jeffrey gaines was there And david david ryan harris opened for him and I heard his voice and melted.

Yeah, never heard it before He's one of them like underrated gems of american music man, he is like martin sexton always like Yeah Just a powerful song.

[Speaker 2]

So he goes.

[Speaker 1]

Hey, does anybody want to come up and I used to I sang it in my cover band So i'm like i'll do it and like genuine entertainer. I saw him do a show At irving plaza, and he was the first act on for a big night And I think he's maybe he maybe got 120 maybe 150 tops people who had filled in already And I thought oh man, this is going to be awkward. Nope.

He came out there like that was the biggest Best crowd he'd ever seen and he made us all feel like we were watching something that we should have paid a lot more money for like and it was it was a good lesson and he was just chewing gum and Just playing his guitar and he was perfect and his pitch was perfect He's just like and the lights went off and malfunctioned at one point He made a joke about like it was just like Is that who is this guy man? Because I suck compared to him like straight suck, right?

[Speaker 2]

um, well, it's crazy because like these stories of how the connections are between artists too is Edwin mccain tells a story about his song beautiful life Well, he said he was picking up jeffrey gains at the airport when he drove by a strip bar That was serving breakfast and it like gave him the inspiration for his song. It's like All you guys are connected in these crazy ships in the night kind of way but also universally connected from the I see you a lot of tweets with like eve six for example Which was like one that I did I did inside out like crazy used to change the lyrics up and do have fun stuff One of my favorite covers is their cover of the divinals. I touch myself.

Oh god. Yeah Absolute favorite I hear that that live recording And it is the most absolute perfect cover of a song and it's just an acoustic guitar now, you know, you know max max talks about He he's very self-deprecating but i've been on tour with that band.

[Speaker 1]

I know that they're the that they're really good They're really good.

[Speaker 2]

Wouldn't he like 16 17 when this whole?

[Speaker 1]

Oh, yeah, they were kids They were like little kids when when it all happened um You know in some sense it's a miracle that they're still alive and and because that that la music industry does not treat teenagers very well and and I I you know, I feel like uh Eve six is kind of an american treasure and like ways that people don't really fully understand yet, you know, um But uh, I would I would kill to get out on the road with those guys again. That would be really wonderful.

That would be great we we have talked about it, but um It's got a lot a lot of a lot of sticks have to get tossed into the fire before we can actually pull it off you know, we're gonna have to have an early 2000s type show because like my my cover band days were like 98 to 2002 so dirtbag wouldn't have been in the repertoire yet because I went from plugged into acoustic Right. Uh, well do us all a favor and examine the standpoint of from that period 99 To 2007, right? That's not even that's that's that's not even 10 years, right?

that period of time Is the most transitional upheaval? Of media and music that has ever happened

[Speaker 2]

Right since is that even worse than the disco of the of the late 70s early way more way more

[Speaker 1]

Way more no, you had you had formats change over you had oh master was stealing music record labels Finally realized that well, they too late that they were selling software and the cat was out of the bag just And if you were a band back then if you were an artist you really in order to survive you really had to have a healthy sense of skepticism because Nobody knew what the fuck they were talking about At all. Everybody had a lot of ideas about what was going to happen. None of them were right.

None of them were right and you know Examine that ask ask ask 90s ask late 90s early 2000s bands about The shit that they heard that was supposed to happen that didn't you know, have you thought about it? Maybe a documentary about that. Maybe we somebody's got to tell that story eventually because it's so profound I think it is because You don't look into that.

Yeah, like the restructuring is You know, it's like the financial crisis hit the music industry eight years early You know, it's true.

[Speaker 2]

Well, was it really the shrinkage of the all this big ones eating up the small ones?

[Speaker 1]

Basically, it was that it was it was exactly that it was it was they came they became monopolistic the 1996 communications bill allowed them to consolidate uh too many different aspects of the business under one roof, so you had monopolies that were nationwide and if an artist trashed a dressing room and In uh, ohio, they got banned from clubs and in san diego and and it was just it was Wild what was going on back then and I got a title the day the music almost died Yeah, I mean it basically it had it had to die They were charging they were charging 27 for a cd that had nine songs on it, right? like right it was another world that no longer exists and I was being told in no uncertain terms in 2005 That cds are where it's at that this digital thing is temporary that is gonna blow over trust me people are gonna be buying physical music again, and I was like No, they're not man. No, they're not it's fucking over.

This is software. We're selling not physical stuff Vinyl another story that's not what i'm talking about.

[Speaker 2]

Well, that's a like a aficionado.

[Speaker 1]

That's a different a different experience But that's audiophile stuff. Yeah, but like I mean the the just the it was so crazy the bullshit that got spewed During those years because we were on sony until 2003 And in 2007, we opened our tune core account and started distributing our music directly to the streaming services You realize how short a period of time that is that's nothing like like so so like it It is profound and our our deal with sony was a six album deal. Wow that we got out of It would have taken us past The year that we were able to start distributing ourselves think about that for a second.

Oh my god Yeah, you would have just been stuck in some we would have been stuck in a major label that had crumbled. Yeah Yeah, yeah my gosh Yeah That's crazy.

[Speaker 2]

Well, I mean it's it's amazing what What online stuff did because it almost crumbled it in like stealing music, right? Like right? Also created all these new creators of music.

Yeah Coming out of it. It's amazing. But that transition it's always the transition to the new thing.

It's always the problem, right?

[Speaker 1]

Yeah, that's where the bullshit is the bullshit and potential is the highest during the transition. There you go Yeah Well, thank you again for your time man. Is there anything else you wanted to share?

No, man, I appreciate you having me on, you know, thank you so much. I I this was really fun. I I got to yap and like i've never yapped before and I I really appreciate knowing you and talking to you.

Thank you mark Thank you.

[Speaker 2]

Absolutely.

[Speaker 1]

I I appreciate your time brendan if you ever want to talk this is this is a place man I'm I I allow everyone to speak their mind because I don't need to believe in what you believe in to believe in you Yeah, whatever. That's what it's about, right? You know, yeah, if you want to do something that's more song specific I'll grab a guitar next time and we'll go through some How how things work on on the songs and shit, you know if you want to get into that that's I love that The thing is I I just want to get to know you because we've never met and you were just so gracious with your time So thank you so much for this.

Yeah, man. No worries. Well, listen, you have a wonderful holiday and and uh, And we'll see you again.

I hope really soon. Yeah Yes, good luck much success with uh everything with uh dirtbag christmas is it christmas dirtbag christmas dirtbag, yeah So if if I may just end on a story, it's funny because dirtbag comes out and my best friend I met in 1992 93 And his name's chris. If you look at previous podcast episodes, he's my co-host on most of those previous podcast episodes and

[Speaker 2]

He literally follows iron maiden everywhere he goes on tour with them He goes he's gone to the last 10 shows this year He went last year and it's funny when that song came out and I you don't hear it Then you hear I got two tickets to iron maiden and it just it like for me

[Speaker 1]

Personally, it's that You know what? I mean?

It's like that for me So that's thank you for bringing that Please give chris a hug for us.

[Speaker 2]

I will give you I will give him a hug He's still around so I will give him a hug but it's because of that Like that connection of music where I don't listen to ac uh, acdc iron maiden I don't listen to that But my best friend does and it's like you're connecting that and it makes me think of him every time I hear the song And it's played a lot. So thank you so much for bringing that to my life.

[Speaker 1]

Yeah, no worries, man. We appreciate it We'll we'll see you again.