S2 - Ep. 69 - Open Mike Eagle

Are you leaving?

I you wanna way back home?

Either way you want to be.

There, doesn't matter how much baggage you claim and give us time and a terminol and gay. We want to send you off in style.

We want to welcome you back home.

Tell us all about it.

We scared her? Was it fine?

Malborn?

Do you need to ride? Do you need to ride? Do you need to ride? Do you need to ride?

Do you need to ride?

Do you need to ride?

Do you need with Karen and Chris welcome to Do you need to ride? This is Chris Fairbanks.

And this is Karen Kilgariff.

Karen at the beginning of each episode for audio reasons, so we all sync up. She leads us in a clap, which sounds kind of religious because your hands were clasped in prayer. And so I just heard prayer and I got really nervous.

Remember sometimes, Yeah, right before the clap lead that I do. I say a quick prayer to the podcasting a patron saint.

It's convenient, Clia, Yeah, your hands are already in the prayer position through preliminary clap.

Why not ask for a little help before you start?

You know what, there's never not a bad time to ask a little from God.

That's right, Chris, Yeah, I guess Ris.

I went swimming today. I just wanted to say Jordan pressured me to swim, and I wore a swim cap, which is why I look like I got electrocuted. Okay, all right, and I've just seen maybe you had been swimming.

That's private. I don't reveal any private information on this podcast.

Karen, we're nervous.

We're both incredibly nervous.

I'm nervous because we have a real guest today that I look up to, that's right. Yeah, So I just want to get that off my chest because usually it's all just flippant and we're we're just talking to our pals. But I haven't met Mike yet. And see, I did the thing where before you introduce someone, you're not supposed to say their name, and I did that.

Shit, Ladies and gentlemen, our guest today. You might know him from his many music albums. You might know him from his podcast network or his podcasts he's been doing a while.

Please welcome open Mike Ego.

Hi, guys, I'm nervous too now because you guys are staying so much nice stuff about me yep, and I want to Can we just get to the pal thing? Can we just be pals so that so that we're not nervous.

I think we can do that. There's a setting that I can default to. Okay, it's buddy, it's been a while. Remember that last party we hung out at.

We remember when we swam earlier. Oh man, that was fun swimming.

Hey, next time, let's not wear the swim caps.

Huh right right? Your hair's your hair looks so healthy and good though, oh it's.

Dry and brittle. This is just complimentary lighting.

I uh.

I am a big fan of you, Mike, and I am a fan of your entire collect Project Blowed, and early on when I was a kid, Freestyle Fellowship is one of the first I wouldn't call it comedy rap at all.

Yeah, no, I think they would be offended. Yeah, of course.

But it was the first album that I'm like, these are these guys are just riffing. They're mentioning skateboards and I'm laughing a lot. And I know that a lot of it is sarcastic, and it spoke to me right away. And you are a part of that group. I don't know, Project Blowed is still happening, but.

It's still like a collective. We don't meet anymore. We used to have an open mic that ran every Thursday for many many years, but then a guy got stabbed in it, so it got shut down. But we're still a family. We're still a family.

Yeah, sometimes families there's a stabbing. That's it's hard. I wish I hadn't said that, Karen, you want to take over here?

You're seating the floor after the.

Yeah, yeah, you have been talked for a bit. I made that lighthearted stabbing joke.

Now you go, here's well, Ken, I'm going to ask the question because I've only known you from a already known of you.

I met you when you're at Bridgetown.

Yeah, that was fun.

It was such.

It was really a good year and I was It was when I was with Drennon Davis and it was the last night party and it was one of those things where it was like he was like, hey, I want you to meet my friend. And then I turned around and I was like who's this and you're just.

Gonna like what's up?

And it was like these are the people that are doing music at Bridgetown. Yeah, it was that vibe where I was like, this is I don't comedy music. Like I was kind of Chrystmas saying, it's like it's not the greatest label, so then you don't want to like be the personal I was like, I'm the guitar comic that's on eighth because you know what I mean, like you don't wanna And then but then suddenly I was like, hey, I'll be in this group and this guy's in it sounds good to me.

Oh yeah, it makes me nervous all the time. I lose my credibility and rap music a few times a year because I do funny stuff. You know, it's it's rough. That's why I really was prepared to hear about like freestyle fellowships like wait a minute, Oh, I can't bring that.

Right now, and don't let them see you don't let them see and oddly, yeah, when I bring that up, I stump most current fans of hip hop, I admittedly don't follow. I'm an early nineties hip hop guy and I like that and hieroglyphics and everything because it was in skateboard videos. That's kind of how I got introduced to it. So that's real.

Yeah, I mean there's an underground access point for a lot of people that had to do with stuff like, you know, skateboard videos and Atlance Bangs was doing about a bunch of that stuff, and like, yeah, a lot of people were brought together that way, kind of representing this kind of worldwide underground thing, you know, like even stuff like Tony Hawk the video game, like the underground songs that they were put in that stuff like that was the way a lot of people got on to a lot of artists.

Yeah, yeah, it was huge for a lot of bands and skateboarding. All of a sudden, there's regular people playing that game. I call them regular people, those that don't skateboard, right, all these raggies are out.

There, Mike, have you ever skateboarded.

I've tried. It's not good. I'm not good with wheels. Like I'm okay with a car, but like like when you put wheels on your feet, it usually doesn't work very well for me.

Yeah, specifically, heey's I don't know if you. I'm pretty good with wheels on my feet, but if you actually put them on my feet, I uh, I become some old timey slapstick comedy.

Sometimes if I pummis my heels too much and then moisturize my feet. It's like I have wheels on them. You're trying to walk across tile like slidy feet. Yeah, you have.

Wheels for like forty five minutes. You have to just watch TV.

That's a good floor too. You've got like no spaces between the tiles. It's all real smooth.

It's like a fucking museum in here. It's unbelievable. It's like marble, very dangerous, very dangerous.

I mean when I said comedy rat, I when I what you do? I feel, Yeah, I take it back. It's I mean, I can't stop thinking about those commercials where they're pummice stoning dry skin off a heel and what that does. It makes my mouth water in a way where I'm not hungry but ready to vomit anyway, I h I mean that when I like, you're doing stand up while intertwined with rapping, I've done that.

I've done that. It's funny. I did that like like five times, you know. And then sometimes there are much like I have songs in my live show when I do like a concert that like I have a little bit before the song, you know, but I respect stand up so much. Like I'm around a lot of comics, and like I know the amount of reps it takes to like be serious as a comic, So like I never call myself of that. Like I end up, you know, being put in that category, and I don't mind it

Yeah, they're just they're just listening for the flow or.

Yeah, or or just or just vibing with the beat or just putting their hands up when you tell them to. But yeah, like you know, they're not engaged in your you know, the way you've crafted a verse.

Yeah, yeah, which is what I always have appreciated with. I like wordplay, Yeah, I like turns of phrases. I like cadence, and you would do all that. It's great.

Well, also, isn't it like in live shows?

It?

Am I right to assume that maybe the goal is to get them to be quieter, start paying actual attention to what you're like, to the wordplay or to the flow. I don't want to use technical terms. I don't really know, but like that idea that like actually as as opposed to kind of the big party feel if people are going like whoa, whoa, whoa actually like following the lyrics, Like, is that.

Is that the goal?

Like at a music show?

Yeah?

Or like that when you're saying like rap audiences can not be particularly listeners as opposed to stand up audiences, is there a moment in like at some rap shows where you can actually hook them into being like listening to the words like that?

Yes? I think a big difference is this though, when that typically happens in a rap show, like you typically already have those people captivated in a sense because they've come to see you, or if I'm opening, they've come to see who the headliner is, but they're prepared to engage with some music that they already know. And and you would assume, I would assume me being booked, there's some inclination that they might be into my stuff as well.

I enjoy laughing.

Let's go to the last Let's go to the last place. Exactly. Nobody wants to go to the rap place where they don't know that's terrible and and and because of that, if you're if you're in a situation where you're wrapping for people who aren't necessarily fans of what you're doing there, it is a little harder to create that moment of like, Okay, here's here's what I'm doing. Are you going to get with it?

Or not you know, yeah, and join the build of it. I was watching her Tiny Desk concert, which was amazing. You but there's the first song you did. You did it, you did the first verse and then you went how are you doing this afternoon? And then right into the second verse like it sounded sincere, and there was not one moment for even people to collab or anything in the room. It was so it made me laugh out loud.

Is that that's a series? It's like in a bookstore, right, It's.

It's it's in the corner of an office at NPR. Okay, But the funny thing about it is it's a really big ass room, but the way they shoot it, it makes it look like it's in a corner somewhere. It's so funny. That's great funny.

Us A little bit was that like nerve wracking because it feels to me like it's so pared down at the it's almost just like it's you're either going to do it or you're not going to.

Do it in that moment.

Yeah, it's it's challenging as a rapper because, okay, I'm very used to have to performing with beats and having like a monitor so I can hear what I'm saying back at me over the beat, but they don't allow any of that, Like there was no amplification of anything allowed. So like I'm trying to hear myself over these musicians who I'm like not very used to playing with. It was challenging. But I also have learned that if you're rich, they let you do whatever you want. I didn't. I

Monitor yea that everything else, Yeah, it applies to all things.

Yeah, yeah, actually, yeah it was. It was one of those lessons. It was one of those lessons.

Hey, yeah, that's funny because that's that started with a trumpet, right, yeah, so like it was.

It must have been kind of loud. It's something to adjust to.

Yeah it was, and we practiced a lot and everything. But I think it was just like this stark realization we got there that like, oh they were serious, I'm not going to have a monitor, Like they really they really meant that, Like, no, you just have to be able to hear yourself in some way. That sounds impossible to me.

It almost feels like a musician test when I watch people were you know, like being able to being able to do it without hearing yourself and sometimes being drowned out. Is I mean, that's a real like it's a game show for musicians.

Escially, it's not easy and there's a lot to lose.

With that NPR crowd. Bye, Goodbye. How was your quarantine? Oh?

Oh gosh, gosh, it was so many things. So like I moved into an apartment and then like three days after moving into apartment, I went on a tour. And in the middle of the tour is when everything shut down, and so like my world had just changed. And then I went on this tour and then that stopped it and all of the plans, like all of the income everything like crashed like really quick, and there were a couple of moments where that were just like really dire

Okay, did you do zoom shows and drive in movie car car shows? Like?

I did both of those. I did. I learned pretty early on that the zoom shows were not going to work for Yeah.

No, I just kept doing them. I just kept doing them.

I had to stop at some point because I don't know, you know, I learned a lot about what I get out of performing last year because I was getting it when I performed, and I just felt empty and dead every time, like for two days. Yeah, it was like a hangover it. Yeah, terrible. Yeah, So I learned the zoom shows wouldn't work for me. Those were excruciating. I ended up going on a drive in tour with Hannibal Burris last September where he was doing you know, his act and I was an opening act on it.

So that has to be a great audience that's receptive to suddenly saying hip hop, right.

Except that they're fifty feet away from the stage right in cars, yeah, cars, And when they applaud as we assume they were doing. Yeah, couldn't hear anything. Yeah, it was terrible.

See I did it on a hot night and you could hear windows were rolled down. They were being a little loosey goosey, and they were trying to honk like.

Bee beep beep.

It wasn't laying on horns, which would trouble me. It was like little spurts of honk. They have to be good honkers.

So Hannibal's tour, I think they thought they were getting ahead of it, and they had a lot of signage and instructions on the big screens around every show that said don't honk.

Oh really, oh no, that changes.

So people were when when instructed to or when they felt compelled to react, they would try to yell at the top of their lungs or try to clap, and it just it was lost.

Well, I understand, I understand someone saying no honking, because in traffic it it means hey, do you want to fight?

Yeah?

But what I what I didn't expect the improv did these drive in shows in Irvine and and right away I was like, oh this I need it. I like it already. It took a minute. It's weird to have a bunch of cars honking. But I immediately loved it, and I couldn't have predicted liking that. I understand someone making it no honk rule, but it worked. It works.

Yeah, I think in retrospect we could have used some of the honks. We should We shouldn't have told them not to.

It would booyed you as you performed. Oh well, oh yeah we did.

Chris and I did the same Zoom show one night because people were playing like quick lash games, you know, like uh and doing those comedy shows, and it just started to be to me. It felt like it wasn't just like, oh, we all wrote a joke for this phrase and everybody liked that person's more, which is a pretty hilarious thing to put yourself through when you're already kind of like isolated and questioning your entire lifts.

Suddenly you're in a competition.

Suddenly you're in a competition, and then you start hating everyone. You're like, this is a dumb game that were we all came together to play just for fun and to do something, and now it's like I'm super competitive and like that wasn't fucking funny and you're a hack and like it brought out in me all of the things that I was trying to escape from doing the show in the first place. I was just like, this is very ironic that I am this, Like I feel lonelier and worse and angry as I get off.

This stupid game that's just to bring people together because.

You're alone in your apartment, yet at the same time you're at a judge high school party, yes, where everyone's being categorized.

Yeah, yeah, I gotta say that. Those though, because I did quip lash stuff like a couple of times, those are probably the best of my Zoom experiences because really what it came down to for me was my my performance setup is like very like technical. There's a lot of like beat machines and stuff, and there's just no accounting for like if I press a button over here, there's no accounting for what people hear over the inn.

Was, Yeah, that's horrifying.

I'm putting out, you know, the energy I'm trying to put out in a song and the music that I put out last year and specific was like very emotional and into like you know, I'd get these texts afterwards from people who knew me, like, oh, the sound was messed up, like half of the set, Like oh, that's wonderful, fantastic.

You're like, was my heart messed up as I stuck it out there for fucking everyone in my whole life?

Oh?

Man?

Yeah? You just you felt? Yeah, it felt pitiful. A lot of those performances felt genuinely pitiful.

And that album is are you talking about the trauma divorce? What's it called? Sorry anime trauma and divorce? Yeah? Yeah, and uh and so you were finished with that before Quarantine, but then you felt you have to promote it and put it out there at a weird time.

Yeah it was.

Did you find it fit well? Because I look, I watched something else and you were talking about how it was more personal? Did it help that we were all going through a weird time?

Almost to I think it certainly helped helped the project resonate with people. Yeah, I think it did. It a lot of a lot of moments, it felt very like self centered trying to promote it you know, like like it was already felt kind of gross anyway, because it's like all personal and I'm trying to sell it, you know, I'm trying to like like point people to it and get engagement around it and all of that robotic stuff. But yeah, then on top of that, like people are

Yeah, I was going through a similar like while when my special came out that I felt I needed to tell people meanwhile marching on my street for something way more important than my comedy special. And I'm like, I'm not saying shit. I'll let it sit out there for a little while and then maybe occasionally mention it. But like you said it, it's a lot of things that we do resonated with people in the past year, and

Yeah, and that's that's that's the that's the part that I think is more and more becoming our job. As things, you know, everything gets more digital, it becomes us who are the like where the needle move is ultimately like what our social media on, how our products get marketed, and it's kind of just where we are.

Yeah, when did you You already had a pretty steady hip hop career, but when did you start intersecting with comedy? How did that happen? Was that in Chicago?

No, that was that was in La that first time that I was I was describing earlier, that first time I performed in front of a comedy crowd. It was at uc B. Oh okay, yeah, Like so I like wormed my way into being an asscat monologist.

Yeah, yeah, I've done that. It's really fun. It's self indulgent, but there at it's the best.

And the way I did it, I just like did a couple of songs and talked about where the songs came from, and then you know, they they ripped the sketches off of those and it was just really it was very just fulfilling for me as a as a writer to be in that sort of environment and and

Yeah, And that's a perfect fit because Largo is the only place I've seen where music and comedy are married and it works. It's so hard to make it work and and it always works there.

Yeah, that audience has been trained over the years of like you might.

Because I'm definitely in the.

Old Largo used to do those nights where it was like Colin Hay from Men at Work and it's his night and his audience has no interest in comedy, and you have a half an hour to fill before he's going to walk out there. We were just like, they fucking hate my guts, Like they don't.

They just that's not the that's.

Not the plane they want to be on that evening. They're on a full different trajectory. And you're just like, I have some great observations about Sephora everybody, and.

They're just like, you know what, I'm not doing that with you right now.

It is night meritally hilarious, but it's almost like planning and got in there, and of course with all those people that just kept coming back, like audience and performers, because of course all musicians want to be comics and all comics want to be musicians.

So it was like he just kind of kept going, it's working, it does work, Just keep doing it.

Yeah, And I think now that audience is like, we're up for what you give us, like.

We trust whatever, Yeah, down for whatever. And it's a it's a it is a great place for that because I've been on the other side of that too, where like I do music that's too musical on the comedy show and you know, people aren't necessarily you know, into that either unless they put you at the very end. If they puts you at the very in it works. They put me in the middle so it can be rough.

I have talked to Chris about this a bunch of times, doing because I used to do like comedy guitars songs.

And you'll do it again. They're gonna make you.

There's nothing more painful than like you just finish the first chorus and you can see some fucking blonde twenty.

Eight year old staring at you.

It's always a blonde guy for me, where there's always just like no thanks, you still.

Have You're just like, why did I write four verses in this song? Like it's just you are trapped in your.

Own fucking idea and it hurts.

It hurts every muscle in my body.

Like that's the thing of the make or break of like when it goes great that for me, comedy music is like the best cheat in the world because you don't have to do the moment by moment speaking performance. You're just like and away we go, and everyone's gonna go with it. It's hy energy or it sucks and it slows time down, does.

You get. You get trapped in that in watching every lyric come out of your own mouth.

This was my idea, so was this? This is my idea too.

Oh my god, it can be so excruciating.

Yeah, what was the reason? Did they give you a reason? When Comedy Central canceled the New Negroes? Say, God, I said it and I don't. Did they cancel it because they were uncomfortable saying that word? Do you think the executives? You know, like, I can't say this anymore.

It's so funny, because man, that title ended up being such a story on its own, Like we never could have imagined how much, like how much we'd end up having to talk about about.

That really, like I was splitting the room.

Oh man, it was from the very first pilot test it it came to our attention at the title was a fucking problem. We ended up having to reshoot part of our pilot to address title like and and that didn't really work either, because what happened is that we had a title that people would have a reaction on, and they wouldn't if they had a negative reaction, they wouldn't go watch the show to see whether or not the title gets explained they were out.

Yeah.

Yeah, they were just telling other people to be out on Twitter.

Yeah. Upon reading that the first time, all I had to do was hear it said in Baron Vaughan's voice, and I'm like, oh, okay, okay, yeah, yeah, I know what this is.

You also, you'd watch that trailer where it's just like like.

Ask comic after kick ass comic after.

Kick ass musician, where you're just like, Lizzo was on that show, right, yep. I just it's just like, these bookings are very high level. They're not your average Comedy Central show bookings at all, and.

They didn't know how to really deal with any of that either. They didn't really know how to take advantage of the fact that we were able to like get Lizo like you know, like a week before she was like a worldwide Yeah. Yeah, like you know, they didn't really know how to but well, of.

Course they don't know. They're all just twenty five year old executives.

But sorry, there was stuff we didn't know too, honestly. Yeah, and like even like getting Lizzo, like the way we got Lizzo because she signed to a major label, so like the major labels typically don't let their artists do music that they don't own, you know what I'm saying, Like that's why they signed people to really expensive contracts. So to get Lizo, for instance, we had to have her giant record label Atlantic sign a waiver that they

Did she kind of blow up sometime in between taping that and when it was going to air.

Yeah, she was already like popping when we taped it.

Yeah.

I think our episode with her maybe aired in May, and in like by June she was Everywhere's absolutely everywhere.

I wonder if that was rape before she did that Coachella that like it was almost like people had been saying the name and then she blew doors at Coachella in a way where people just couldn't.

That sounds it sounds about right, Yeah, it sounds about right, Like The next thing I remember is like she was half naked at the Lakers game.

Next thing, yeah, it was, it was so ready.

Yeah.

So I think the story now is that you and Baron broke Lizzo and actually are responsible.

I like that.

That's what I would do.

I'll take the social credit percentage points. You know. However, that deal gets the.

Back end of Lizzo's career like a girl.

So will then sorry, go ahead, No, go ahead, No, I'll go ahead. Uh did you was that an audition thing where you just met Baron for the first time or were you already?

Yeah? We we had been working together for years and New Negroes was his concept that he built at Bridgetown. He was doing it there I think, going back to like twenty fourteen, fifteen something like that. Uh, and then he brought me on to that and we started doing it at different festivals around the country, and we started doing it as a monthly here in LA and along those Along that route. It developed as a TV concept as well.

So did you do that at Meltdown? Was that a Meltdown show?

I don't think it was it. No, you know, we did it. We did it at a at a We did it at UCB for like two years, and then we did it at this place.

Virgil, Yes, the Virgil Yes, yeah, I a one hundred percent remember it at UCB because they used to have stand up there. There was that used to be a hang. It's still there, right, the.

One still there? The same the second one. The second one's gone. Yeah, the second one. I do believe the first one is there. I just don't know if it's not open, is it. I don't think it's open.

I don't know. I don't know.

Guys, go down there tonight. Yeah, it's time to reopen.

Let's egg it. Well that was just my sorry, that was just my idea.

I don't know too.

I was just going to ask in all of this then, is was it after your drivetime radio show that you started thinking about doing a podcast network or how did that come into playing?

So I had the podcast, like the Flagship Show, that was all taped, and so I had made the deal for the network all in a year prior the show that's the Flagship Show is called. What had happened was where I sit down with like a hip hop legend for a season and interview them about, you know, their

So awesome.

Yeah, I remember you tweeting about that and it was probably like it was probably two years after we started our network, where it was just like I was, you know, I think I said congratulations to or whatever, but what I really wanted to say is.

Like, get ready. Get ready.

Yeah, it seems like it's like it's a real thing, you know what I mean. It's like but it's such a great I mean, for me personally, it's such a thrill to be in this business because it's like it's kind of cutting edge. It's definitely different than everything we've done before, and every kind of way things have been done before. And it just feels like it's the one area of show business where creators really can have the agency and control.

Yeah, you don't have to ask anybody anything, like as long as you can press record, you know, like can literately do whatever you want. If you believe in something, you can make it and try to sell it. And yeah, I mean there's there's just no upward limit to the options you have as a creator in this field. I'm still trying to figure it out though, Like I still don't know how any of this shit works business wise, but like, but you know, it's it's it's certainly fun

Yeah, when you when you're started by uh, were you kind of making fun of the drive time radio, like the kind of radio you have to do at six in the morning to promote something, because that's Karen, that's our favorite game to welcome back to the Bean and the Dumb Girl. Did you want to that game?

Oh?

No, I don't know. I don't know how to.

The freeway connection coming up.

I mean, you know, I'm a guy I'm a Chicago kid and I grew up listening to Man Cow, so like, I have a special place in my heart for that stuff. But I didn't really I didn't riff on that theme so much as I just like wanted to program an hour sure. No, so like I just kind of rolled with with the with the drive Time name for that.

Yeah, No, it would have been a mistake to mimick it. I know that that's.

No one wants it.

That's what I want to do, is all. That's all. And so it's just coincidence that is Baron Van a Chicago comic.

No, he is from Las Vegas originally.

Oh wow, okay, I that's from Las Vegas.

That's that's not a real place at all.

It's not a place to be from.

That is so property Brothers of him to be from, that's insane.

Oh my god. What I performed in Vegas Open Him for Daniel Toush and Hannibal did a guest set and the we turned and the Property Brothers. I didn't know anything about them, but they were both in there with their shoulders were touching, and they kind of hovered into the room. Do you want to play Danny? And they both had these girlfriends that looked like sisters really, and I I backed out of the room. I couldn't remember. Hannibal and I were both freaked out by the property brothers.

They were like that, they were like the VIPs.

Yeah yeah, show Yeah, And they came in and and uh and Daniel made fun of him and said they slept in a bunk bed and then they left. It was like a but Hannal was in the room.

Yeah.

They bought the place, fired him, Yeah, yeah, hired themselves.

Yeah. Well that's probably why I haven't worked there since they owned the Mirage or whatever it was. That's right, But yeah, I just assume Hannimal's Chicago. I wondered if you were in the comedy scene back then, But it's interesting that you stumbled on it at UCB. I didn't know that.

Yeah. I was just a fan of comedy before before that really and not always been like a huge fan of it. But I'd never I never realistically thought that there was a way I'd be connected to it at all as funny.

Yeah.

Uh, well, it just made me think because Chris and I have talked.

A lot on this show, where which before.

Quarantine, I think we were both very like you know, happy, grateful or whatever for like comedy festivals and those kinds of comedy hangs were you And during Quarantine and doing the show, we talk about it like it was pure heaven, Like remember that one you're at Bridgetown when you put a refrigerator box on and you fought yourself in the street where it's like it's like these hilarious memories which I think I have always taken for granted because comedy

Very nurturing thing.

It gives you a lot, ye know, it's funny. So I was talking about I was on a tour last year and the world shut down in the middle of the tour. And you know, the first way that I knew that shit was real was that they canceled south By Southwest. I was likening because never fucking like people die south By Southwest and keep it going. Yeah yeah, yeah, cars, people get kidnapped. Big.

I was on that street from the people that God, I was.

Lost in line and then I walked away going, I'm not gonna wait for X when I can hear them right here, and then the car turned up the street.

Holy cow, Yeah I was. I was on a tour and we were driving into Austin as that happened, like that was wow. Yeah yeah. So you know, I talk about that south By being canceled usually because that was like I was gonna make a lot of money down there doing a bunch of things and so like it

Yeah, it's lovely, you find you find it way more like a friend group and nurturing among other comics and everything that maybe isn't in the hip hop.

Because there's it's just hard to like that. There's there's there's luminaries and independent hip hop, but it's there were

Hip hop is supposed to be competitive for some reason. There's always this like like you're in a battle with the next or not. I'm not talking about battle rapping or whatever.

It is, you know, just the ego thing. But it's funny. I experienced that in comedy as well.

Jesus Christ, that's all it is in comedy.

Yeah, I don't.

I guess it's funnier. It's funnier, there's a way to hang with it.

I never if someone's I I don't put up with a lot. Maybe I'm not. I don't know. It seems like I just don't like roast type battle comedy, and that, of course done better is a is a battle rap, uh, because you also have to rhyme usually. I don't know, it's just that whole element.

Uh.

I just want to be friends.

You guys, Me too, man, I bring to friends vibes too, in both worlds. I'm not I'm not roasting nobody. I'm not bad anybody, do you not?

You're probably good at battle rapping.

But yeah, I came up. That's that was my start in rap, was battling. I did battles before I ever even Yeah, wrote songs like that's just you always feature feel bad.

I would feel bad even if it was a good joke or a funny ride.

I would feel bad as a young person, and I was ruthless.

We used to.

I remember that. Somebody reminded me once because we had a friend group in my high school and we were all like the rapper, breakdancer, graffiti guys. Everybody knew we wrapped. And it was one day where like we were just like on the train in Chicago, like battling our female friends like for no reason, and somebody told me something awful I said about one of them, and I was like, God, it's terrible. But I thought about it, and I remember at that moment, I was so pleased that I came

Yeah, it's the name of the game. I mean, like it's it's almost like, yeah, it's just it's high level wordplay and then kind of like social bravery because it's like I'm about to ream you right now, and I also know you're going to try to do the same thing to me, and I trust myself that I can think of like the metaphor that's actually going to be funny, accurate, you know, those accurate ones are the greatest when you you know whatever.

But yeah, that's a one that I very much relate to.

Like if it's a great insult, then hurt feelings be damned, because I look at my accomplishment like that's my entire life.

Not Yeah, I'm not proud about how specifically mean I know I can be. Yeah I don't. It doesn't feel good.

I certainly I certainly could not like the things I used to say in battles back then. I don't think I'd have the energy to do stuff like that now at all. I don't think I'd be able to look myself in the mirror say say mean rhyming things to people the way I used to very easily.

It gets you.

It's an engine. It gets you places you know you can do it. Then you have it in your back pocket, but you don't better to not use than use. But yeah, that's that's kind of the maybe the I always think of Bridgetown in that the year where there it was like in a where the after party was in a warehouse area, so you kind of had to like travel there, and it seemed like it was very it had a real mad Max feel to it, where you're.

Just like, sorry, are we gonna walk out of here at three am?

Like where are we had like a dirt floor or something to there's different.

Yeah. I just remember the one year I went where famously, I was in a car. Everyone had done mushrooms and I jokingly said, because we're just going around there, go down this street on the railroad tracks. I announced that there was railroad tracks, and this car drove on the railroad tracks high centered on the railroad ties, and then we were stuck and I look down and it's an active down the tracks. There was lights blinking and everything so on on much Okay, I was on not t rooms too.

Oh h, thank you, thank you for being ho I was.

I took a lot of them, you guys, but I calmly without panicking in a way I think I would have panicked more of a sober found the party, grabbed fifteen people and brought them back to the car, and we lifted the car. Oh my god, swiveled enough of the car off the tracks to where it just kind of pinned the wheels so made the matter worse. And the cops came and they had guns out, but they were like, I'm not kidding. The cops were like, they

Gosh.

And yeah, it was insane. And the next guy, that guy was just he was driving. He was sober, by the way, he was just driving around. His car was fine, but they had to stop a train, it would have hit the car.

That's not like a real nightmare on mushrooms because and you feel like the everything in the world as bad as your fault, like on you.

I discovered that no, just saying the wrong thing in a green room is horrifying on mushrooms. When when shit hits the fan, all of a sudden, you're at a heightened performance ability or that's what I experienced, and then an hour later I'm jumping into dumpster or what all my stories about being fun at Bridgetown, let me know. I was an alcoholic and so during quarantine I'm like, yeah, maybe I don't need to be doing that stuff, diving into it.

I don't know, though, I will miss it.

It's a forty weekend and you're never gonna you know, you're probably you'll see these people again.

But they don't care.

Am I bleeding the next day? Bleeding? Oh yeah, I was punching that garbage in a jump I forgot well to make people clap what it's for?

I remember that that same year in the warehouse one it was like there was something. It was when someone's manager was trying to DJ instead of April or Chip and so the music.

What Hey fucking Wire.

It was like he was trying to do interesting radio head B sides on the dance floor.

Everyone's like, what are you doing?

Like we're ruining, and so of course everyone's like trying to come on to their drugs or whatever. So I went outside because I was it was like this, I'm starting to get too much of that anxiety of like CNB seen where I can do it a little bit for like ten minutes or say hi, and then suddenly I'm just like I need to be in a dark corner smoking something, or like just being separate and being

And I go, Howard train, and we both just started running and we fucking ran down to watch the.

Train go by, and it was like that kind of it was just a very it like I love when comedy because sometimes it can be so painful and so lonely and so like why am I doing this to myself?

Like what's the end result?

But then when you get everybody together that's doing the same thing to themselves and to like let off some steam, there's like those moments where you're like it's the greatest you know, summer camp vibe or whatever, where it's like truly people having the best time, the best sets, and then like the best party afterwards.

It's amazing that those parties ever end. Like that's like we're all fighting for that moment, you know, we get it, and I'm like, wait a minute, how did people go home? Like why why do people go home?

It was like Peanuts gang. There's no parents. We're just dancing in a warehouse.

You're just hoping there's somebody can get at least one uber to start coming down there, because that was one thing too. When it finally did and it was like three in the morning, and we're just like, yeah, all the ubers cost two hundred dollars or you know what I mean, like or they won't come to this the River District wherever.

Yeah, yeah, the warehouse stabbing area. Please come pick me up at the stabbing docs. I love that.

I figured out yet again another way to like a wax poetic about festivals. I really I'm having like that, like you know, these are the days of our lives.

Thing about it where.

It's like what's beautiful is because it feels like at this point, it's like it's been so long it feels like it's never gonna happen again.

Yeah.

Yeah, I'm afraid for it to happen again, even though I want it real bad. Yeah, I really, I don't know. I feel like I'm not going to know what to do with myself. Yep.

Yes, because even though we're all vaccinated, it's like, well that's not a ticket to just act normal. You can still get this. Yeah, it's hard to know. Are you going on tour? Do you have like dates coming?

I have dates in September? Yeah, and that that whole thing, the whole thing feels where like you know, so I start putting computers together during the damn pandemic, I started like trying to learn how to cook and shit, you know what I didn't do work on my set? Yeah, nothing new?

Well, of course, I mean, do you how much of your writing is literally writing it out it? If you're anything like me, you have to be doing it on stage. That's more than fifty sets for me, it's like eighty percent in point.

Well, you know, I'm I'm, I'm typically I'm not quite wired that way like I. You do write it all out, Yeah, everything's all written out, And you know, I'm always working towards like albums, so if I have some new songs, it's just stuff that I'm trying to refine or you know, test out. But you know, most of my work is done at home, and I didn't do any like I just started making songs like in the last two months.

Yeah, yeah, it was hard to be inspired. Yeah, I mean too. I got into cooking and making miniature houses and stuff, golf and things that don't help my career.

At all, exactly.

Like I'm seventeen again.

Mike, when you're when you have your first set again, don't forget your great line from the Tiny Desk concert, how's everyone doing this afternoon? You could don't forget you've written on the fly before. I'm just saying you're a bit waiting for you.

Because it might not be It probably won't be afternoon at that point, so I can't say that line exactly.

No, you've got a bang on it. That's the job that my part.

Do you know what my favorite line that I said that day was is that it smells like so many different kinds of soup in here. Because it did.

It did.

Everybody was eating their lunch per formant. It was great.

That is a set that looks like it would smelling soup.

It You imagine jobs getting.

Some smugs quiet, quiet soup, SIPs of soup.

In your desk.

Yourrd's logo sh just be a steaming mug of anything.

God, I can't wait for live shows again. Wait, so are you you're going on tour? Because I saw that you're gonna play at the Echo Plex, right I.

Am, yeah, Oh that's down my street.

Yeah I missed that place too. It's just in my head is a really giant cavern, and I don't know how we're going to find enough people to put in it.

Oh yes, I tried to go on the website and it's I couldn't figure it.

I'm just happy to hear their opening because it's been boarded up. Everything else in Echo Park seems to have opened up to a point that makes me uncomfortable, But I'm willing to risk it to go to the Echo or the Echo Plex.

Yeah, yeah, I miss those places so much, like such a formative part of my like LA performing experience. Like it's like, wow, I don't even know. Yeah, it's going to be interesting for me in twenty twenty one to intersect with that place again, just even see what that feels like.

And when you're on tour, are you do you do like you're in a bus or do you are you separate flying or is it like a big old group touring around every time?

It's different And we haven't worked out all the travel details of this one, but I think there's only gonna be like five people total performing, so we're probably gonna try to do like a minivan situation. Yes, and you know the whole like the old school traditional drive all day thing and get there and sound check that sort of thing. Like I've done the bus thing a few times when I've like opened for bigger acts. That shit

Yeah, it's funny how much of tour. I'm going to Portland that next month, and I'm nervous for a number of reasons. But I sometimes don't look forward to doing stand up and then I arrived there and I'm like, oh, this is this is great. I just don't look forward to flying. I don't like the travel logistics. That's what I never will look forward to. If you could take that away, it would be the best. I need to get a bus, is what I'm saying.

I love the idea.

I have always like had a very romantic notion of the bus because it, first of all, to me, it's like what musicians, how musicians do it?

Yeah?

And yeah, it like I love the idea of.

Keeping everybody together because it's the same festival vibe. But it is like, you know, whether you're it's business or you're just watching TV or or whatever, but you're still kind of it's like still the group.

Paying it is.

I think it's like that's so fun.

Do you sleep in bunks and then you sleeping you sleep in like fucking coffins man summer. That's great.

It's tight. It's really it really is dope, Like it really is dope, like that common area like during the drive and like you know, somebody's playing beach so somebody's playing PlayStation and you know, like you know, it's it's it is the communal thing, and it's on wheels and it's and you know, you're just waiting to stop and get a coffee somewhere and get back on the bus. Like it's just really nice, really nice. That's the good ship.

Is there any plans to ever do more Project Blowed stuff like with Acy alone and those guys do you talk to them? Are they your friends?

We get together at least once a year. We have an anniversary a party slash show that we do over here in the Mert Park there's always like the biggest dopest like family reunion every year. And there's there's something I talked to him more than others, Like I talked to Abstract Rude a lot and Mike and nine a lot, you know, like and those are just like my big homies. And I'll and I'll do whatever anything he asked me anytime, I'll do.

See. Yeah, that of those guys that make I nerd out so much thinking about you being friends with them, because like I said that, that that and the fire Side and you know that everything that nineteen ninety three era of me loving all that stuff.

Did you see Gift of Gab passed away today? Did you see that?

I did not see that.

Yeah he did. Black Delicious is oh no gap passed away today?

Yeah? I love Black Delicious.

Yeah, They're amazing. He was an incredible writer and rapper, you know. So rest in peace. Yeah, come too soon. Like so many others, so many others. This year, it's been really bad. Yeah, it's been really.

Yeah, it has been.

That's why I think live performance experiences for both the performers and for the audiences are going to be so important. It is like that these are the feelings people you know, like want to get when they go to those shows. It's it's people are needing full on injections of like positive up, you know, kind of like high vibe energy because there's just been it's just been like a series.

Of surprise terrible early.

Deaths or just shock or just the fucking the after effect of the Trump chaos where every day I was just like, this can't go anywhere but so much what like we're gonna spin out, Like this is all getting so insane, and it's like we all finally landed, rested now we're all kind of like coming to terms, and then it's like people need escape.

Yeah, I don't know.

I feel like it's.

Teed up so nicely for big ship, like good big ship at the Echoplex. I want to stand in the echo flex and listen to people fucking scream at the top of their lungs.

Yeah, making out with wallpaper for each other, garbage.

Yeah.

I can't wait to get into another trash can and dance with wood with nails in it.

When and when are you doing that show you're whining that's in September. The date on that one is Septimber. I think eighteenth.

Well, I'm going to be there, and so is Karen. Karen, you're coming. Yeah, absolutely was the nineteenth.

I'm sorry, so the nineteenth.

What's your website? I mean, mama as well? Do these conclusionary things?

Oh? Yeah?

Is there?

Well? Wait, is there any last topic that we haven't hit a play like that you'd like to discuss.

I don't have nothing in mind. Sure, I'm just roll with the breeze.

Well, I hope we were windy enough.

A lot of winds. That's the one thing we can't guarantee.

Yeah, you're You're the coolest and nice and it was really cool to have you on.

Man, it's pleasure. It's great to talk to you.

Yeah, tell a c alone high high for me.

Okay, whether I met highs, don't do it, don't do it, forget about it.

And it wasn't the Virgil. Yeah, you were probably at the Virgil that night. It was like, oh god, I mean it was ten years ago, but it was.

Is it back when they had the when he was doing the Weekly over there? Yeah?

Yeah, it was as serious. And who's the Vermont the grouch guy, the I don't know. There was a bunch of I don't know. It was a great night, but uh yeah, maybe you were there. I don't know.

I didn't know you. I used to be over there as much as I could in that era. I was like helping them put that on and like, yeah, doing design stuff and all of that. Man, I was that. That was my part of my formative years here in the city.

Oh cool, well Virgil with their signature cocktails and they're copper mugs to drink things, or just like, really, guys, you're all and you're all wearing suspenders.

Okay.

I love the suspenders and the old timey tap histories behind you.

I just having to walk through the stage to get to the yeah.

Yeah, and the stage. I used to get really self conscious and.

I realized this stage is sized.

Down like one quarter. Like I normally don't walk on a stage.

In my head brushes, it's walk stage.

Yeah, it's a complete it's like a it's like a grammar school performance stage.

It is the I don't like this.

I do the sync in sync. It's up and try stage.

It is.

You thought I wouldn't talk about in sync.

Maybe you got it in there. You always have to sneak those assholes in here.

Yeah, I'm always sneaking in the sink. Well yeah, thanks, thanks a lot for being on Mike, Thanks for having me. It's great.

And Mike's podcast network Stony Island Audio, Corn Island Audio.

Yep, that's us and your album again.

With Anime, Trauma and Divores, and that is the most current album. That is the most recent one.

Yes, yeah, I mean I'm not pushing prep. There isn't one new where's the new stuff?

It seems like I haven't written.

Breaking away on it though, making all sorts of stuff that I can't tell is good or not.

Well, I think I use your words. I think when I say thank you for fucking with us? Absolutely absolutely delightful, delightful. Indeed you've been listening to Do you need a ride?

D y n A R?

Are you leaving on?

You want your way back home?

Either way we want to be there, doesn't matter how much baggage you claim, and give us time and a termino and Gaby, we want to send you off InStyle.

You wanna welcome you back home?

Tell us all about it.

We scared her?

Was it fine?

Malcorn?

Do you need to ride?

Do you need to ride?

Do you need to ride?

Do you need to ride.

Do you need to ride?

Do you need do you need to ride?

Do you mean.

With Karen and Chris.

Mhm.

I was just trying to show off mouthhorn to mic. I'm pretty good at mouth horn