Episode 134: Frederic Remington: Cancelled
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Transcript
Time Crisis back once again.
After many weeks with not a lot of guests,
we come hard with two.
Legendary uncle of Jake and musician Uncle Ted.
We'll also be joined by legendary writer, talk show
host, and podcaster Spike Ferencton.
All this plus art talk and the great music of today in 1995.
Time Crisis with Ezra Koenig.
[MUSIC - EZRA KOENIG, "TIME CRISIS"]
They passed me by, all of those great romances.
They were a friend, warming me, all my rightful chances.
But picture clear, everything seemed so easy.
And so I dealt you the blow.
One of us had to go.
Now it's different, I want you to know.
One of us is crying.
One of us is lying.
Leave the lonely man.
All right, Time Crisis back once again.
What's up, Jake?
Not much, man.
How are you?
You know, business as usual.
Yeah.
I guess since the last episode, we became candy influencers.
So we should probably talk about that.
That is true.
And also that's going to lead into our Hershey's Yingling
taste test.
Yeah.
I bet there probably is like a podcast, maybe not
an internet radio show, but I can
imagine there's a podcast somewhere that's
about beer and candy.
And then when the Yingling Hershey's comes out,
that's a big deal.
And they get to finally talk about both.
But I can totally see that person who's a candy
enthusiast and a beer enthusiast.
Well, I'm sorry, but there is one podcast called
It's the Beer Talking.
They do a Halloween candy and beer pairing episode.
There you go.
It's not a whole pod dedicated to it,
but it's definitely a hard 41 minutes about Halloween candy
and beer pairing.
Well, as a beer and candy enthusiast,
I only check in with that podcast for the Halloween app,
but it is good.
I do recommend it.
But I only listen once a year for the candy and beer app.
I wonder if you could do a study and be
like kids who are really into candy become adults who are
really into beer, if there's a connection there.
I feel like now it'd be like kids who are really into candy
become adults who are really into candy.
Yeah, you're right.
There's no you don't have to give it up.
And I feel like maybe back a generation or two prior,
you would have had to give it up.
Right.
And you shift to alcohol or something.
Yeah, like the Mad Men era.
Yeah.
Don Draper's not wailing on peanut M&Ms.
There's like a whole episode of that.
Don's just stress eating peanut M&Ms.
He has like this huge bowl of Skittles.
He has a beautiful mid-century modern coffee table
in his office.
And he's wearing this like tailored suit.
He sits down for the meeting with the big account.
And he pours two glasses of scotch.
And then there's like just a big bowl of Skittles.
Gentlemen, can I offer you a now and later?
Can I offer you some Sour Punch straws?
Or it's like he's lying on the mid-century couch
with his hat on his head.
Like 3 PM, the secretary comes.
It's like Mr. Draper.
And he's just like, leave me alone.
I had way too many Butterfingers.
Me and Roger had a three Butterfinger lunch.
Oh.
Well, so Jake, walk me through your--
I think we had slightly different experiences
as we became candy influencers last week.
Because I saw a big box delivered to my home.
And I opened it.
And there's this giant Kit Kat thing.
And I'm like, wait.
First of all, immediately, I go to Wikipedia.
And I'm like, who owns Kit Kat?
And it turns out Hershey's owns Kit Kat only in the US.
The rest of the world, Kit Kat is a Nestle product.
So I was like, OK.
Maybe it's our friends at Hershey's.
But then I hit up the TC people.
I hit up my manager.
Nobody had actually communicated with them.
So I guess they just used the CIA to just get to me direct.
Wait, Jake, you're already drinking the beer?
Yeah, sorry.
I had to get going.
What?
What are you-- this whole thing.
Jake's just making a-- all right.
Well, Jake already made--
I didn't want you to blow up my spot.
But when we got to the beer tasting episode,
I would have--
or portion of the episode, I would
have faked opening the beer.
And then I would have been like, oh, yeah.
I'm taking my first sip.
All right, well, you know what?
I got it out of the freezer.
It's freezing cold.
I want to take a sip right now.
[BLEEP]
We'll do it live.
Everybody just drink your beer at your pleasure.
This yingling Hershey's chocolate porter is nasty.
I'm going to agree with Daniel.
It's very chocolatey.
It's a bummer.
OK, well, hold on.
Anyway.
Yeah, let's get back to the Kit Kat.
So I got this big box.
And I was like, I guess it came from Hershey's.
But it wasn't totally arranged.
I wasn't expecting it.
And then I opened the box.
And there's a bunch of Kit Kats, a bunch of Mocha Kit Kats.
And then there's-- it's a very well-made, high-quality
cardboard box.
I'm sure producing each box--
you're using the really high-grade cardboard
to make it.
I'm sure producing each one of those is maybe $14 a unit.
Pretty good guess.
And there's a pair of socks, a mug,
and then a bunch of mint Kit Kats.
But I was still a little bit baffled
because there was no context.
But then I hear that you got one too, Jake,
but yours came with a card.
Somehow my card--
OK, yeah.
Walk through your experience.
I mean, yeah, I saw the big box.
And I thought-- I was like, oh, I ordered some shoes last week.
I bet they're here.
Because it's like-- it looked like a shoe box,
but even bigger.
And I'm sort of like--
And then I opened it up, and it was like this lush, gorgeous,
high-production-value box with just that beautiful,
kind of rich red, just a Jake category.
And I was like, what is this?
And then, yeah, opened it up.
Same experience with the shelving and the socks.
But then there was two postcards.
And one said, welcome to the Kit Kat Flavor Club.
You are one of the first 200 members of the Kit Kat Flavor
Club.
And then there was another card.
So I felt great about that.
I love being--
So there's only 200 people.
If I had seen that, I would have felt--
I would have understood the importance of the moment more.
So you're telling me there's only 200 people in the Kit Kat
Flavor Club?
Yeah, so that feels great for us to be all included in that.
I like to be involved in exclusive clubs.
And then there was another postcard, which I love,
that said, it's the Hershey Company Social Media
Guidelines.
And there's eight rules that we have to follow since we're now
members of the club.
Because if we're going to join the club,
we have to play ball.
This isn't just a free lunch.
Fair enough.
What is a club without rules?
So please abide by the following guidelines
when posting about incentives, such as free samples, premiums,
or prizes on social media.
Oh, [BLEEP] I posted about this.
I really looked.
I didn't see my card.
You must disclose your connection to Hershey.
Well, I would say your connection to Hershey
is tenuous.
What is our connection to Hershey?
We're public critics of the company.
We're basically journalists.
Oh, wait, did we compromise our journalistic values?
Let's get Glenn Greenwald on the next episode
of talking about candy and ethics and journalism.
Well, OK, we're going to have to unpack
a lot of the ethics of what it means that we're now
candy influencers.
We're journalists and candy influencers.
But go on.
What are the other rules?
Yeah, let me just run through these fast.
Number two is statements should be
honest and truthful opinions and actual experiences.
OK.
I like that.
Statements should be factual and able to be verified.
I will verify to you right now that this beer is terrible.
Number four, you must not disclose any Hershey
confidential information.
Do we have any?
Will we ever be given any?
You guys didn't get that other envelope of their stock?
We're arrested on insider trading
because we got to taste the mint Kit Kat early.
We're just like, this is a winner right here.
I have to say that mint Kit Kat was great.
Did you like it?
I really liked it.
Respect intellectual property rights.
You are personally liable under federal and state
law for your actions with respect to your social media.
That's a little scary.
That's a little scary.
Oh my god.
We reserve the right to ask you to remove content.
Lastly, you must follow the Hershey Company integration
guidelines.
Not sure what that is.
Sounds weighty.
Maybe they didn't send me the guidelines on purpose.
Maybe they were like, Jake's more of a loose cannon.
We could see him really going off the reservation
writing some wild [BLEEP] and maybe they
knew like Ezra's a little more respectful.
We don't need to like throw all the--
we literally don't need to throw the rule book at him.
[MUSIC - "HERSHEY"]
[RAPPING]
I came up in this bitch tongue, got wet out her front tooth
Now who they say is number one and flowing so he number two?
Yeah he dance good but guess where he got the moves?
But compared to me, look like he wear two left shoes
Boy I treat them love verses like the restrooms
Take my hand and dance with the devil
Oh boy you in trouble, rattle the lion cage
Oh gosh, break it down while you're praying on stage
Shit at your burial, smoke squares at your grave
Then repent for my sins like God I'm saved
He always forgive, later on I forget
I had my fingers crossed, so I'm back on that
Catch another body but a song didn't make
The ballets is the lyrics, turn the rapper to a spirit
Sing it with the angels, long gone
The songs like Bishop Eddie Long, where the thorns gone?
I'm the wrong one to run on, my mother's on her gig
Jack Nines, she playing bing bong
Seinfeld, he did?
I was gonna ask Seinfeld if he's looked up any
Online reviews of the Hershey's Yingling beer
I haven't, but I can look it up
But I have my own review, it's delicious
And I know that, I see that you liked it when you took a sip
I think this is disgusting
It's like normal beer but somebody put like a Hershey
No, I was gonna say the opposite
I feel it's a candy bar that people have poured beer on top of
Six of one
It's a little bit
Yeah, I can't finish it, I gotta switch gears
I'm gonna make a margarita
Ezra, weigh in
I legitimately enjoyed the mustard beer last time
Yeah, I wouldn't say this is great but I don't
I can't bring myself to hate it
I'm also wondering too like
This is a very naive question but
Very prominently on the upper label
On the beer
It says, very prominently, 21+ to enjoy
Does all beer say 21+?
No, no
I don't think so
No, I'm looking at a Pacifico
I think it's because it's candy
I didn't think I'd seen that before, 21+ to enjoy
Yeah, I wouldn't say it's great but at the same time
I'm legitimately curious
If I went to a bar and I wasn't staring at the Hershey's logo
And somebody was just like
I'm gonna get like a porter
Like some sh*t, I don't even really know what it means
Like I know a porter I assume is like richer than a pale ale
Than an IPA
If I was at a bar and some people were like
This round we're gonna get some porters, you want one?
And I'll say sure, I'll get whatever you guys get
And then somebody came down and plopped this in front of me in a glass
And I sipped it
I don't even know what I would think
I don't know if I'd be like
Damn, this is chocolatey and sweet
I think I'd just kind of like take it down
And barely even think about it
Like the first few sips I'd be like
God, this is nasty
But then I'd just be like
Well, I'm just gonna like adjust to it
And like, this is what I'm drinking
I don't think I would get to the point where I'm like
You know what? F this
I would just be like
Someone bought a round
It looks like Guinness or something
It's like really dark
You know?
Right
BeerAdvocate.com gives it an overall score of 88%
Very good
Damn
That's 138 reviews they've averaged that out of
The first comment says
Pours deep copper with a half inch tan head
Which dissipates moderate lacing
Aroma
Wait, what the f***
What is this psycho?
The top review says
Pours deep copper with a half inch tan head
Which dissipates moderate lacing
Hold on, what is this?
Wait, hold on
You gotta slow down, man
I don't even understand the syntax
Pours deep copper?
So it pours, the way it pours is like a deep copper
The color
Yeah, then the head is a half inch tan
Then aroma of dark cocoa, light roast malt
Taste follows nose
Dark cocoa, light roast malt
Also a bit of caramel
Thin body
Why does it sound like slam poetry?
The way you're reading it, it's like total slam poetry
Moderate lacing, pours deep copper
Hey, I completely agree with Peach63 on this one
Thin bodied, a bit sticky
Moderate carbonation, semi-sweet finish
Then they go on to say thin bodied for a porter
It is pretty good though
And I think they took the words right out of my mouth
Were the lacing?
Well, the lacing is really where I started to resonate
Wait, so what do you think lacing means?
Lacing is the residue left from the foam beer head
As you drink beer
If you pour this beer into a glass, you take a sip
The head is going to stick to the side of the glass
And if it sticks to the side of the glass
I guess that's a thick lacing
If it's lighter, if the residue is lighter
I guess that's a lighter lacing
Okay
Pours deep copper
That just makes me think of
Throwing copper
Dick, you know what throwing copper is?
Is that a live album?
Yes
Alright, I figured you'd get that
And for anybody who's not familiar with the band Live
This is not a live recording of some other band
This is a band called Live
It's actually a studio album
And you know what's cool?
That band is from Pennsylvania
Oh really?
Mm-hmm
Are they from like Philadelphia?
York, Pennsylvania
Yeah, like more rural
I feel like York is like greater Philly
Okay
That's not even that close
Interesting
Well shout out to Live
Ed Kowalczyk
When the rain crashes
Oh mother cry
This moment she's been waiting for
The angel opens her eyes
Pale blue colored eyes
Presents the circle
Puts the glory up to hide
Hide
Oh my feeling
Coming back again
Like a roller
Thunder chasing the wind
Force is pulling
From the center of the earth I guess
I can feel it
I can feel it
Alright, well enough about the beer
So Jake, have you just been eating the Kit Kats?
Have you worn the socks?
What's your relationship been like with this box?
I've made coffee using a pour over into the Kit Kat coffee mug
In my studio
Worked out great
Starting to cool down a little bit
So I'm starting to have hot coffee in the morning there
And so that's been great
I have not worn the socks yet
I'm loving the mint
I've had a few of those
And then the rest of them I dropped off at the art gallery that represents me
I dropped the box off with the rest of the Mocha Kit Kats
For the people that work there to enjoy
Because I don't need, you know, 20 Kit Kats in my house
Don't need it
You weren't interested in the Mocha flavor at all?
I tried it
Wait, you got it too?
Yeah, I'm part of the flavor club too
I think we all are
We're a majority of the flavor club
All four of us got it?
And Matt, the producer
Oh, you guys
There's five TC related people
Oh, I didn't understand this
Oh, I thought it was just me and Jake
I'm sorry
I didn't realize I was talking to fellow members of the Kit Kat flavor club
So, okay
So if it really is only 200 people
And five are part of the TC crew
Then let me get an actual number crunch
I think that makes us 2.5% of the KKFC
You are absolutely right, yeah
We're 2.5%?
Yeah
That's solid
We're the vocal minority
Wait, also, by the way
The Kit Kat club is a place
I guess there's a lot of places
There's a club in Berlin called the Kit Kat club
Opened in 1994 by Austrian pornographic filmmaker Simon Thor
And his life partner Kirsten Kruger
The Kit Kat club is said to attract patrons from all over Europe
And other parts of the world because of its music selection
Techno and trance music
And its sexually uninhibited parties
The motto of the club is
Do what you want but stay in communication
Guests are allowed to engage in sexual intercourse openly at the venue
Yeah, I'm just saying, Hershey's
You might wanna
I've never been there
I do remember being in Berlin
And hearing people talk about the Kit Kat club
I think also
Also famously
Okay, the Kit Kat club
In New York where Trump met Melania
In New York City
There's a Kit Kat
So there's Kit Kat clubs all over the place, huh?
I guess they're all named after
That's the name of the nightclub
In the musical Cabaret
Which I've never actually seen
I kinda wanna see it
But there's a burlesque theater
In Berlin in the 1930s during the ascent of the Nazi party
Also called the Kit Kat club
Okay, the original Kit Kat club
Was an early 18th century English club in London
With strong political and literary associations
Okay, so actually this raises a question for me
What does Kit Kat actually mean?
In 1705 Thomas Hurn wrote
The Kit Kat club got its name from Christopher Catling
Um, doesn't totally explain it
Oh, and I guess the nickname for Christopher is Kit
So, his name was Chris Kat
So his name was Kit Kat
So it's just somebody's name, I guess
Kit Kat
It sounds like you know what it means
Maybe because Kat is a word
I mean, this might be
For another episode we have to draw this out
I mean, what's the connection
Between the club and the candy?
Just real quick, I'm on the Kit Kat
For a type of food
Goes back to the 18th century when mutton pies
Known as Kit Kat were served at meetings
Of the Kit Kat club in London
And then Roundtree's
A confectionary company based in York
Whoa, this is getting weird
York, England
Not York, Pennsylvania where Live and Ed Kowalczyk are from
In 1911 a British company based in York
Trademarked the terms Kit Kat
And made the first Kit Kat bar
So Kit Kat comes from England
And it was a mutton pie?
The first food ever called a Kit Kat
Was a mutton pie served at the Kit Kat club
I love that
I guess that kind of makes sense
Like in the 18th century
We have a mutton pie called Kit Kat
And then 200 years later somebody's like
Kit Kat, it's like a fun name for a food
And now it's a candy
I love that
Does the Kit Kat flavor club
Go back to the original Kit Kat club?
Like have we come full circle?
Do you think that was an inspiration?
Oh yeah, no for sure
It's definitely like a literary political society
It says that members of the original Kit Kat club
In 18th century London
Were committed Whigs
Which was a political party
That actually existed in the US at some point
So the Whigs' origin
In constitutional monarchism
And opposition to absolute monarchy
I don't think that's true of all of us
I don't think any of us are absolute monarchists
Well Seinfeld, you're Canadian
So your relationship to the crown
Is a little different than us
But you're not an absolute monarchist, are you?
No, but I certainly feel an allegiance to the Commonwealth
Do you consider the Queen
To be your kind of like
Spiritual head of state or whatever?
Yeah, definitely
I mean she's on all the money
So it makes sense
Do you recognize her divine tower?
Okay, you're a constitutional monarchist
Maybe it isn't that
A million miles away
Alright, maybe we should hit up Hershey's and say
We've uncovered some sh*t
You guys starting a Kit Kat club
Is actually taking the whole Kit Kat journey full circle
And we'd like to do
A kind of literary salon
Pop-up in London
And we can invite
A lot of intellectuals and stuff
Wait, what if we found out
What if we found out
That the Kit Kat club
Is like five members of the Crisis crew
Salman Rushdie
[Laughter]
Carl Noseguard
Maybe the Queen
Prince William
When Prince Harry and Meghan Markle
Like renounced their titles
And moved to California
I think they also renounced their membership
In the Kit Kat Flavor Club
Interestingly
Ghislaine Maxwell's still a member though
[Laughter]
But I will say
That I
As far as these things go
Obviously outside of Seinfeld
None of us are huge fans of the beer
But I was very impressed
When we talked to Ryan Reese
Even though he wouldn't give us all the secrets
Of the Hershey's Corporation
You know I liked the way he thought it
Actually that conversation made me way more interested
In Hershey's as a company
And I gotta say the Kit Kat Flavor Club
As far as these kind of just like mail out things go
I think it was a very well made box
And the idea of being a member
Of a flavor club
Is exciting
Now I don't know if this is a one time thing
Being a member of a club
That kind of implies to me
That we're you know
Going to be regularly receiving
New Kit Kat boxes with different flavors
I posted about it
I didn't know that there were guidelines
I hope my post
On my Instagram story didn't break
Any of the guidelines I tried to keep it simple
But it definitely got me talking about Kit Kats
I did two stops
In my neighborhood
With people I knew
I did reverse trick or treating
Where I dropped off Kit Kats at their homes
So they basically got me
Poundin' the pavement now
Because I didn't want to eat all the Kit Kats
Because I try not to eat that much candy
That is the tough part of being a candy influencer
Is that we receive such a high volume
Of candy and we need to eat the candy
So that we can comment on it
And you know have hot takes
About the candy news of the day
But also as an influencer we have to look good
You know if you eat too many Kit Kats
You eat too much sugar
You can get kind of a bloated look
Your face doesn't look camera ready
So you know I've always been a little bit jealous
Of beauty influencers
Because everything's going in the same direction there
You're a beauty influencer
Your brand is beauty
You have to look good for the videos
It's all pushing in the same direction
Candy influencer you're being pulled in two different directions
You know what I mean?
It's hard work
And there are times that I regret becoming a candy influencer
You know I used to have a pretty good job
But uh
This is the life that we all chose
And honestly I'm very grateful
I feel like you could
I'm grateful too
You could easily use the candy influencer thing
To pivot into music
Or something though
If you wanted to use it as a springboard into entertainment
Just like the next time
There's a Vampire Weekend song
That is always a difficult one
We've all seen an influencer try to do it
Where I'm just like
Hey guys I know you mostly follow me for my candy
But some of you might know I'm also pretty passionate about music
Anyway my band's got a new single
Coming out
Please check it out
We'd really appreciate that
Stick to candy influencing dumbass
And then some people are trying to be nice
And they're like
Honestly I hear some Kit Kat influence in the music
And I'm just like
Uh well it's kind of a different part of my life
No totally
This is great music for when you're eating candy
And I'm like no
It's kind of it's own thing guys
And just like painfully trying to establish
Something outside of my life as a candy influencer
- You're listening to Time Crisis.
- All right, so we got some great guests today.
And the first one is somebody
who's loomed large on the program.
We've heard his name before, and this is Jake's Uncle Ted.
- That's right.
- And we were talking about him most recently,
I think because we were mourning the passing
of rock legend Eddie Van Halen.
You were talking Jake about the fact
that your Uncle Ted grew up in Pasadena
around the same time.
- And is about the same age as those guys.
And I definitely saw them play some early shows.
- So let's get Uncle Ted on the phone.
- Now let's go to the Time Crisis hotline.
(phone ringing)
- Yes, mom.
- Ted.
- Yes, hi.
- What's up, man?
Welcome to Time Crisis.
- (laughs) Thank you.
- How's it going, Ted?
This is Ezra.
- I'm good, man.
- I guess my first question, you know,
and I'm sure the audience wants to know too,
is how exactly are you guys related?
- Jake and Dave are both my sister's kids.
She had these amazing two monster kids.
I'm very proud of both of them.
- Thanks, Ted, that's sweet.
- And how old were you when Jake was born?
- I was 16 in 1974 when Van Halen came out.
Let's put it there.
- So Jake was born in '77, so you were probably 19.
- I was born in '58.
- So you were growing up in Pasadena,
in the city of Pasadena?
- Absolutely.
Hold on a second, I gotta plug this phone in.
Power.
All right, yeah, yes.
The whole Van Halen thing was so cool.
I mean, Eddie was a legend,
and we had all kind of guitar players
that were in his league that he pretty much blew away,
and they destroyed their careers.
- You were like in high school,
and you were just hearing about this dude, Eddie Van Halen?
Did he like go to your high school?
- This is the bottom line with Van Halen.
Quote me on this.
They were the kings of the kegger.
The best parties I've ever been to.
Giant, monstrous, thousands of people parked for blocks.
Then the police could do nothing about it.
It was just insane.
- I mean, this is the impression
that you always get from movies, like "Dazed and Confused."
In the '70s, high school kids could basically
just throw gigantic parties with alcohol,
and it was kind of like,
it wasn't some huge scandalous thing.
- For real.
- And it didn't get shut down very often?
- Oh, it got shut down.
The party would go on for like an hour,
and then the helicopters would show up,
and the cops would show up, and the kids would scatter.
We did it every weekend.
- And there would be live music?
You're saying Van Halen actually performed?
- Pretty much.
I never saw Van Halen in a club.
I always saw them in backyards,
at very large mansions, very expensive properties,
and they probably made a lot of money.
The keggers were just ridiculous.
They'd have 10 kegs and 1,000 people.
It was ridiculous.
And they charged five bucks a head to get in,
and guys would, you know,
they'd stamp your hand at the gate, right?
And then guys would go out and wet their finger
and try to transfer their stamp to the guy in the line
to get 'em for free, and then they'd both get thrown out.
It was just, you know,
teenage monstrous ridiculousness.
- And so you said that a lot of these parties
were happening at mansions.
So Pasadena's generally a pretty wealthy town,
or is there like a right and wrong side
of the tracks kind of thing?
- Well, there's tracks in every town.
Okay, there's one guy, his parents' house
was monstrous, and he had a Van Halen party
on their tennis court, and they put up a huge stage.
And, you know, the tennis court has a gate,
a fence around it so the balls don't get up.
But you could fit probably 300 people
into the tennis court area where the stage was,
and Van Halen was throwing down.
But the party was going on outside the gate,
and there was, I'm 16 years old, I'm 17 years old.
There was just chicks everywhere.
Everybody's free beer, Van Halen.
It's ridiculous.
It's like Woodstock in a really rich neighborhood
for a (beep) free.
(laughs)
It was great.
- Damn.
- I love the idea of Van Halen just performing
on a tennis court.
- Yeah, man.
- Tennis court metal.
- They put up a pretty legit stage on a tennis court.
♪ Jump in ♪
♪ What's that sound ♪
♪ Here she comes ♪
♪ Full blast from top down ♪
♪ Hot shoe ♪
♪ Burning down the avenue ♪
♪ Model citizen ♪
♪ Zero disobey ♪
♪ Don't you know she's coming home to me ♪
♪ You lose her in the turn ♪
♪ I'll get her ♪
♪ Panama ♪
♪ Panama ♪
♪ Panama ♪
♪ Panama ♪
- So let's fast forward six, eight years.
It's the '80s.
You're in your mid-20s.
And you're seeing the video for Jump on MTV.
Do you have a sense of pride?
You're like, "My boys made it."
Or are you done at that point?
- By that time, I'm in my band, The Pimps.
And we're doing funk music.
- Great band.
- So you were done with rock by that era?
- Oh yeah, we all grew up, right?
- Ted, I feel like you cycled through rock
into punk briefly,
and then you got really into like funk and like jocko.
- I was, while people were doing all the rock and roll,
I was kind of in the fusion jazz scene.
- Yeah.
- And I was like, Mahavishnu Orchestra
and John LuPonte.
That came out of my love from Frank Zappa.
Quick brush with greatness.
I got to sit in a box at the Hollywood Bowl
with George Duke and eat dinner.
(laughs)
- Legend.
- I will never forget that night.
- So as you're getting into all this fusion music and stuff,
were you not in to Van Halen anymore?
Or would you be buying like a 1986 Van Halen record?
- Okay, my father worked for Warner Brothers Records.
Actually, he worked for Warner Brothers Studios.
But he brought home boxes of records every month.
So we had every Warner Brothers release
that was ever released from like 1970 to 1990.
Yeah, I take that to 80.
But anyway, yeah, I had all the LPs.
- So you would keep up to some extent with Van Halen.
- Yeah, but the thing is,
I was exposed to all kinds of music.
My dad was a jazz lover.
You know, he was from South Africa.
Then I got interested in African music
and King Sunny a Day and Fela and all that (beep)
and then Jocko was all part of that too.
And so it's just my world opened up as a bass player
'cause it's so many things to be fascinated by.
- Sure.
- Ted, when did you first play the Old Town Pub?
- Okay, let's see.
Early 80s probably.
- Like did the Pimps?
- Oh, the Pimps, definitely playing there, yeah.
- Okay.
- Yeah, it's so much fun.
They're a great bar.
And I played there for many, many years
for many, many different bar owners.
- And now you come and see Richard Pictures there
when we play.
- And oh, sheesh, man.
The backyard at the pub when you guys play there,
it just turns into ganja central.
- Yeah.
- And I have to brag at this point in the conversation,
Uncle Ted has grown a beautiful crop this year.
- Nice, dude.
- Where do you grow it, inside or outside?
- Outside, yeah.
Yeah, in fabric pots.
- And just so everybody knows,
especially if you're a California resident,
I always forget, but in California,
you're allowed to grow weed.
What's the maximum number of plants?
- Six.
- Okay.
- I grew seven.
(laughing)
- Nice, dude.
- You're a rebel.
- We've also adopted chickens.
We're getting eggs every morning.
- Whoa.
- And we've got green onions going.
We've got peppers.
We're growing, it's like farmer Ted over here.
- Dude, I gotta pop by and check this out.
- You should.
- I love the idea of just a functional farm
where it is chickens, vegetables, and weed.
- But back to rock and roll.
- Yes.
- There were several cats in Pasadena
that were guitar player that sort of rivals
to Eddie Van Halen.
They kind of warped, ruined their careers.
Terry Kilgore had a band called Ready Killer Watt,
and they were just smoking.
They played reggae music before it was even known here.
And they had a cool chick singer named Debbie Diamond,
and they played just the same kind of backyard parties
that Van Halen did.
But Eddie just killed them.
(laughing)
But Eddie and Terry were good friends.
And then there was another guy, a guy named Tom Tortomasi,
who I played with in SVDB.
And Tom and Eddie were good friends.
He was friends with Kilgore as well.
And that was like kind of a guitar triumvirate
in Pasadena in the early '70s.
Those guys were badasses.
And so it was cool to sort of know some of them.
- Yeah, man.
I mean, I guess that's kind of just like, you know,
growing up in the same high school league
as like Michael Jordan.
- Had to mention them, man.
They were formative influences.
- Are those guys still out there?
- Terry, no, not really.
- Well, Ted, thanks so much for calling in.
We gotta wrap it up 'cause we got our next guest.
But where can people hear your music?
You got any new stuff up?
- T-E-D-K-N-E-C-H-T.
And yeah, SoundCloud, Tech Connect.
And I got some dubs up there.
I've been working on 'em.
I'm trying to learn Ableton and stuff
and working with some cats all over the world.
It's kind of fun.
- All right, sick.
Well, we'll post the link on the Time Crisis Twitter.
- Yeah, Ted, the stuff you sent today sounded sick.
- Yeah, man, pump that link.
- Will do, man.
- Well, great to finally have you on the show, Ted.
We hope you're calling again.
- I appreciate you calling me, man.
- All right, man.
Ted, have a good one.
- Uncle Ted, thanks.
♪ Take one, let's do this right ♪
♪ No, I'm not a pilot, but I'm taking flight ♪
♪ Take two, let's do this, boo ♪
♪ Hitting like a fighter with a first name, Foon ♪
♪ Now take three, rewind, repeat ♪
♪ Feeling like the fire when I zipping on the beat ♪
♪ Now take four, let's do this, yo ♪
♪ Hop into it, come on, let's go ♪
♪ Let's ride, let's bounce, let's move ♪
♪ Let's dip, let's slide, let's pounce ♪
♪ Let's groove, let's trip, let's ♪
♪ A hot tooth spit on a mother (beep) beat ♪
♪ Yo, stack that money like I'm Black Swan Shmino ♪
♪ Solo on the beat, then shoot you down like you Grito ♪
♪ Go, go, got your speed, I'm blasting off like Torpedo ♪
♪ I'm 21st century, it's Cuban Missile Crisis ♪
♪ Dropping bombs on all my songs ♪
♪ I'm packed with powder spices, whoa ♪
♪ Stunt in the band with the saxes, whoa ♪
♪ Just to spend a band on some taxes, whoa ♪
♪ Ride or spend a ride, got some new shoes ♪
♪ And 23 glasses, whoa ♪
♪ Jump on the 'Gran like I'm Baskin, whoa ♪
♪ Hunt for the 'Gran like a captain, whoa ♪
♪ Batter in the back with the blues tones ♪
♪ The melody magic ♪
- All right, well, back to back guests.
Now we have the legendary Spike Ferristein.
He's written on all the legendary shows.
Letterman, SNL, The Simpsons, and most notably Seinfeld,
where he wrote some very famous episodes,
including The Soup Nazi, The Muffin Tops, The Little Kicks,
which is the one where Elaine dances at her company party.
He also hosted the late night talk show
with Spike Ferristein on Fox from 2006 to 2009.
He's got a podcast, Spike's Car Radio,
and he also hosts a TV show, Car Matchmaker,
on Esquire Network.
Let's get him on the horn.
Oh, and of course, as Seinfeld pointed out,
he co-wrote Bee Movie with Jerry, absolute legend.
- Now let's go to the Time Crisis Hotline.
(phone ringing)
- Hey, Spike.
- Hey, guys.
- Welcome to Time Crisis.
We're so happy to have you on.
We really appreciate you taking the time.
We always record late,
and you're in the middle of watching the World Series.
So what's going on?
- Dodgers are down by a couple runs,
but this is my adopted team.
I'm really a Boston Red Sox fan.
You know, I like the Dodgers
'cause this is where my kids are growing up.
- I've always wondered about that.
Isn't it very easy to tell your children
your heritage lies in Boston,
and that's who you're gonna support,
that's who dad likes?
- It doesn't work.
They are Red Sox fans
because they know my heart is with the Red Sox.
But I do love the LA fans.
I've lived in Los Angeles now longer
than I've lived anywhere else in the world.
And I've seen the Red Sox win.
You know, I've seen them do it a bunch of times
after not winning for decades.
So I really want LA and the Dodgers
to have that win for all the folks
who've been waiting for the Dodgers to get it again.
- And this could be their year.
- It could be, but isn't a weird year to win anything?
(laughing)
- Yeah, I mean, will there literally be an asterisk
in the history books?
- No, but when they win,
I've been wondering, will the cardboard cutouts move
and go, "Yay, up and down,"
and will they throw them off the field?
I mean, how is that celebrated?
I know that the writing will probably be real.
(laughing)
But it's just such a, I don't know.
I don't know that I'd wanna win the World Series this year.
You know what I mean?
- I'm not a huge baseball guy,
but I think there should be an asterisk
because part of the stress of playing the World Series
in any baseball game is being surrounded
by tens of thousands of hardcore fans.
- That is true.
I know this guy, CJ Wilson, who pitched for the Angels,
and I ask him all sorts of questions like that,
but one of the things I asked him was,
out of all the kids who finally make it to the majors,
what percentage gets onto that mound?
And this is right after I had thrown a first pitch
at an Angels game and felt the weight
of being at the center of something like that
and how stressful it was.
What percentage of guys get to the mound
and then fall apart?
And he said a very high percentage of guys do,
that they may have the talent,
but they just don't have the psychology to pull it off.
Have you ever thrown out a first pitch?
- I'm sad to say the offers
never even come across my desk.
- It's not a big deal,
but they have usually a bunch of guys.
I did it once for a small game.
It wasn't like the crowd,
but when I walked out there and I look,
and my friend CJ was catching,
it's like you're in a zoo and everybody's staring at you
in that cage and the fans,
you're at the center and the stress point of the whole game,
and you feel it.
And I threw this, whatever,
I threw a strike or a ball, I don't even remember.
I just remember going,
"God, I really wanna see my family right now.
"I wanna get off this mound.
"I wanna get off this field."
- I can only imagine.
- Yeah, I just wanna eat a hot dog.
- Oh, I bet.
Anyway, that's enough sports talk.
(laughing)
- Do you know that a member of our crew on the show
is named Seinfeld 2000?
- I did know that, yes,
but I don't know which box it is.
- It's me in the box.
I don't know, I might be in the bottom corner
of your screen.
Spike, thanks for coming on Time Crisis.
- Oh, that's the little box, okay.
- Yeah, hi, how you doing?
(laughing)
- Oh, there you are.
- Hi.
- You're Seinfeld 2000.
I can never tell what's real Seinfeld Twitter feeds
and what's fake Seinfeld.
I assume you might be even a real guy.
I know there's another guy.
Are you the guy who's writing the new stories,
the new modern stories?
- I mean, that's part of what it is.
It's kinda like--
- Well, I'll chime in.
- Oh, thanks, Ezra.
- The fastest way to describe where Seinfeld 2000 comes from
is that there was a guy who started doing the modern stories
and Seinfeld, as a deep Seinfeld fan,
found that to be so corny and disrespectful
of the source material that he started a kind of
unhinged Twitter persona that became its own thing,
but started out making fun
of the new Seinfeld Twitter account
and eventually became a kind of meme,
bizarre meme account that created its own universe.
And he was the first person ever to take footage
from the real world, like Chris Christie
sitting next to Seinfeld
and do the curb your enthusiasm push.
- Are you @Seinfeld2000?
- Yeah, that's me.
Spike, you retweeted me, I think a few days ago.
- Oh, the little kicks.
- The little kicks, which you wrote.
- I can't believe how my episodes are turning up
with the Lincoln Project.
You know, the soup Nazi was the other day,
then the little kicks.
It's so odd to keep seeing this stuff happen.
- Let's break this down for the listeners.
So the little kicks,
Elaine goes to her company party with George
and he sees that she's an insanely terrible dancer,
which is what the little kicks refer to one of her moves.
She's doing these little kicks
and she doesn't realize what a terrible dancer she is
and George cannot believe it.
Seinfeld, you're kind of our meme correspondent.
The reason that this is back out
in the public consciousness
is because people are comparing Trump's dance moves
to Elaine's little kicks.
- Yeah, yeah, President Donald J. Trump
has recently been like doing,
pulling out the-
- I still laugh when people say that,
but go ahead.
(laughing)
- I don't know what's going on,
but there's some sort of collapse happening
where recently at rallies,
he's been doing these very unusual dances to YMCA.
It seems like some sort of sign that, I don't know,
maybe the end is near.
I don't know, but I guess it had been remarked on
that some of these moves that he was doing
were very like herky-jerky
and seemed very much like the motions
that Elaine was doing when she did the little kicks.
And so I had tweeted out a split screen
of the two things happening simultaneously.
And then the Lincoln Project, as you said,
kind of like did the thing where they tweet the video.
And then Julia Louis-Dreyfus, the queen herself,
added her own commentary.
And it was like a big-
- Yeah, it was a big moment.
- Oh wait, so the Lincoln Project
was kind of retweeting you, Seinfeld?
- Yeah, I mean it's- - Or they stole your content?
- No, they do steal a lot of content,
but this time they did the thing
where you can kind of like sample the original video
so that the credit still goes to the original.
It's very tedious to talk about.
- Okay, all right. - But I have no qualms
with the way the Lincoln Project handled this one.
But yeah, it's sort of like,
it got pushed through the Lincoln Project
and then Julia Louis-Dreyfus retweeted it.
And it was, you know, it really made my week.
It really made my- - Yeah, well, all right.
Shout out to the Lincoln Project,
a group of Republicans who are-
(laughing)
They were cool with-
- They do the best ads. - George W. Bush.
- They're so good.
- Ronald Reagan, the, you know, the Rack Lord.
- What is it?
It's like the enemy of my enemy is my friend kind of thing.
I think that's kind of what's going on.
- All we have right now.
- Right, exactly. (laughing)
- You just gotta hold onto 'em.
- Right, so Spike, this is,
I'm sure you've answered this a million times,
but this is kind of a basic question is,
let's use the little kicks, for instance.
On a TV show like "Seinfeld,"
and you came in in the last two seasons
or last three seasons, something like that.
- Three, season seven.
- When you write an episode, like how does that come about?
Does that mean that, did you get to write it
because you threw out the original idea?
Was it assigned to you 'cause it was your turn to do it?
Did it all get cooked up together,
but you're the one who put words to paper
and kind of formalized it?
What was going on back then?
- No, we would come in with the stories.
- Okay. - It's pretty much
the qualification.
You had to come in with stories, ideally from your life,
things that had happened to you that you thought were odd
or perhaps made you mad,
and maybe you didn't say what you wanted to say,
but you're telling Larry and Jerry,
but here's what I wanted to do.
She said this to me, and here's what I wanted to do.
So the very first story I was telling
was the story of this guy who sold soup
and everybody called him the Soup Nazi,
and if you didn't follow the rules,
he would scream at you,
and then Larry started laughing right away.
He goes, "The Soup Nazi?
"What did they, is it a guy they called?"
You know, and he goes, "This is your first story."
And I go, "I'm not pitching.
"I was just telling you what's going on in New York
"where we got lunch every day."
That's your first story, and they throw you out.
So you would then take that and go,
"All right, well, whose story is it?
"Out of these four characters, who's who?"
Well, George is gonna be arrogant enough to go,
"Look, I know how to order soup, right?"
Which really is me.
That's what I did when someone told me about it.
I'm George, and then I became Jerry, which is,
"Look, trust me, you gotta know what you're doing here."
And you know, Elaine, of course, the guy's a misogynist.
She wouldn't put up with it,
and Kramer, a kindred spirit, right?
He's a misunderstood genius, this guy.
You would start with those ideas
and see if you could get to the act break, right?
And in this particular case,
the act break bumped into the other story, "Shmoopy,"
and all I knew was that Jerry has to make a choice,
the soup or the girl, and he chooses the soup.
So that's where I knew I was going.
And then you would map out act one and the scenes
and the basic idea of what's gonna happen in it.
You're not typing.
Dry erase boards.
And then you'd bring Larry and Jerry in and go,
"Here's what I've got."
And they would throw in ideas.
Before that, you'd bring in the other writers,
you know, guys, Gamble and Pross,
Berg and Schaefer, those guys.
It was very collaborative in that way.
They'd hang out in my office for an hour.
I'd go into somebody else's office, help them with theirs,
and we'd talk out these stories
until you had a solid act one approved by Larry and Jerry
and a direction for act two.
And who cares about the ending?
Nobody cares right now.
And then if you had that,
and Larry and Jerry liked where it was going,
they would send you to script and you'd do a first draft.
Second draft, they'd keep reading, they'd keep noting.
And then eventually they'd go, "You know what?
"Close enough.
"We're gonna shoot it.
"Let us do our pass."
And that's where it went from, you know, 75% to 110%,
if there's such a thing, right?
The real Jerry and George would take it by themselves
and jam on it in that, that's how season seven worked.
In season eight, it became more collaborative.
We would have teams of four writers working on a script
and whoever's script it was would EP it.
So essentially, if it was my script,
I would be the EP for that week
and I would, you know, pick my little team of writers
and Jerry and I would do it.
- It changed because Larry was gone.
- Larry took off, yeah, yeah.
He left after season seven.
So, you know, again, the guiding principle though
that Larry and Jerry put out was really amazing,
which was we don't want you to make up stupid stories
about who dates who or what happened.
We want you to bring in real stories from your life,
ideally from New York, where I had just moved from,
and just tell us those stories
and let us decide whether it's something or not.
I mean, you could exact revenge on friends.
You could have so much fun with that thing that,
you know, I remember the minute Jeff Schafer's like,
"You gotta listen to my friends."
- Yeah, yeah.
- And I was like, "I'm gonna listen to you."
And then we would play it.
We were like, "Play the answering machine message."
And it was that, "Believe it or not, I'm not gonna be home."
Some girly dude.
- Classic.
- And we would play it, you know, every day before we wrote,
we were like, "Play the answering machine message."
And eventually we were so entertained, you know,
"George, let's give that to George."
Look at how small that is.
That's just a girl living in Sherman Oaks
who made a bad decision for her answering machine.
And then we shoot the episode
and Schafer and I close the door
off "Seinfeld" tonight and just hang the phone up.
(laughing)
She had, you know, her mind was blown, of course,
but, you know, it was a really fun little environment
to work in, you know,
I've never worked on anything like it since, really.
♪ Desperado ♪
♪ Why don't you come to your senses ♪
♪ You've been out riding fences ♪
♪ So long now ♪
♪ Oh, you're a hard one ♪
♪ I know it, you got your reasons ♪
♪ These things that are pleasing you ♪
♪ Can hurt you somehow ♪
- So with "The Little Kicks," is there also like a story?
- Yeah, it's Lorne Michaels.
It's Lorne Michaels when I was working at Saturday Night Live.
I was an intern there
and he was a very intimidating character to me,
not because of how he acted,
just because I had grown up watching the show
and I was, you know, if he's the guy running the show,
I'm the intern and the receptionist.
So it's like, you know,
and I'd never seen anybody in show business
and he was, I just, I couldn't even look at him.
I was intimidated.
And then one night I saw him at the party dancing,
doing the dance that Elaine is doing.
Very accurate.
With these little kicks and-
- Like that extreme, that ridiculous?
- The kicks were the primary,
those were in the script, the kicks.
That's what it's called.
- Specifically the kicks.
- He was doing this little kick thing.
Julia, of course, took it to a new level,
but she didn't take it that much higher
than it already was.
You know, I kind of admired Lorne
that he was just out there.
He may or may not know,
but probably knew he wasn't that great of a dancer.
And he was just, who cares?
Having a good time out there.
But, you know, right away when I saw him
and some of the other, you know, PAs were like,
oh, he's not so scary anymore.
He's human, right?
It kind of humanized him.
And for the story with Elaine,
she at the time was running, you know, was a boss.
And we thought that'll be an interesting thing
for her to play.
She's got control and then she loses control.
And we changed it.
We exaggerated it a little bit,
but that was the basic idea.
- Spike, were there any stories from like your real life
that you thought, oh, this is really like a gold,
like this is perfect fodder for a plot line
that you pitched to Larry and Jerry
and they just weren't feeling it at all?
- Oh yeah, yeah.
- What could have been?
- The little kicks was the,
I pitched that in the first season
and Larry didn't understand it.
And it, you know, I get, it's hard.
These stories are really hard
to see how they're going to be funny, right?
And Larry would do the same for me.
I remember a story falling out and he goes,
he goes, you know what, just come up with a blazer story.
And I was like, what the (beep) are you talking about?
What is a blazer story?
He goes, all right, I don't know what this is,
but I think it's going to be funny.
I went to Barney's and I tried on this crested blazer
and I thought it was cool.
And then I realized it wasn't cool.
And I said, you know what, I don't want this.
And the guy made me feel like I couldn't afford it.
So I bought it out of spite.
(laughing)
And then I had this expensive blazer I didn't want
and I wanted to return it,
but I was too afraid to return it,
but I wanted to return it.
And that became that crested blazer story of his.
And I was dubious.
I did not believe that he had a real story,
but yet when we shot it, I was like, right,
you know, the smaller these things are, the better,
but they're really difficult to see.
You know, it's hard to put your faith
in a little story like that.
So, you know, I didn't blame Larry at all for that.
And I was happy to kind of repitch it.
You know, I can't take my mind off Jeffrey Toobin right now.
You know, that's the one.
(laughing)
- I bet.
- Boy, Zoom and those etiquettes,
and here's a guy who's touching himself.
It's, you know, that's a great little story area.
I'm guessing Curb is gonna hit this stuff,
you know, every which way.
The name, the unfortunate name, Toobin.
(laughing)
- Right.
- You know, we thought Anthony Weiner was the end of it.
Now we've got Toobin.
I've been thinking a lot about harebrained kind of,
you know, these scooter sharing programs
really make me laugh
as they're handing things
that people are killing themselves on,
just going, "Hey, it's Silicon Valley.
We don't have to follow the rules."
You know, it never turns off.
- There's a great, really small moment
in the new season of Curb
where Larry is just like strolling down the street with Leon
and there are those scooter shares
and he just knocks over a whole rack of them.
It was such a small thing that they don't even comment on.
- There are a lot of guys on Instagram
who that's their whole feed.
It's great.
It's just people,
scooters behaving badly is one of them
and they're just kicking scooters over all day long.
It's really wonderful.
But you know,
it's more about the arrogance of Silicon Valley
and just doing (beep)
we don't have to follow the rules, right?
That hasn't been written about enough, comedically.
- That is also one of the things you're just like,
"Why is this allowed?"
- It's not.
Their whole attitude is it's not.
They just do it
and hope that we'll love the stuff enough
that later when the fines come,
that the cities will negotiate.
- And they'll have so much money,
they can pay the fines and pay the politicians.
- Yeah, but I was talking to Jerry just today
and he was like,
"Do you have these motorized or electric scooters?
These ride on ones?"
He said, he goes,
"I saw like a dad with two kids,
no helmets, just whizzing in and out of traffic."
And I'm like, "How does it happen?"
He goes, "I don't know.
I don't know what's happened.
They just dumped the scooters in Times Square, Spike.
What are they doing?"
And that's where it starts.
And then we went on a long Tubin.
We were talking about Tubin
and how the funny part of,
is it okay to speak however I wish to speak here?
Do you have any sort of censorship?
- Yeah, yeah, no, no, no.
- We're talking about the fallout from (beep) to Zoom
when Russ from accounting suddenly comes full on your screen
at a peak moment.
(laughing)
Tubin, how is he timing stuff out?
(laughing)
- Do you think Tubin comes back from this?
Is there a Tubin comeback or is Tubin done?
- No, Tubin's done.
Tubin's a meme at this point.
- So Spike, now you have a podcast
and a TV show about cars.
- Yes.
That show is no longer on the air
'cause the network got canceled.
(laughing)
- Oh, they canceled the whole network?
- They canceled the network.
The show's fine, but there's no network.
You know, I thought I had seen everything in entertainment,
but I've never seen the show be a hit
and the network get canceled.
That's a first for me.
- Where can one watch it now?
- We have three seasons up, you know, on whatever sites.
It's still shown around the world and stuff,
but you know, the whole car thing is just a hobby of mine.
I'm, you know, still in entertainment.
I have a scripted, an unscripted TV company.
I'm writing scripted comedy.
I'm working on a movie right now.
The car thing is just a distraction
that started back when I was writing for Letterman.
Dave likes cars and that's what we were kind of doing
in our downtime, just looking at cars
'cause you never leave the office.
And then when I went to Seinfeld, it was the same thing.
Who drove it in the old Porsche?
Hi, new writer, Spike Fersen.
Oh, great, come here.
You gotta get rid of that car though.
It's a piece of (beep)
Like what?
Just don't fire me, dude.
So, you know, the whole car thing
looks bigger than it actually is.
Let me just put it that way, but I love it.
It's my golf.
- On this show, I don't think anybody is truly a car guy,
but we have talked about cars once or twice.
We don't know what we're talking about at all.
We're definitely out of our depth,
but I've always felt like I'm missing a well of experience
or information to make like, you know,
I got strong opinions about music and movies
and I can compare things and say, well, that sucks.
But when it comes to cars, I feel like it's a language
I don't totally understand.
I'll throw something at you.
Lately, I've met a couple of cool people
who are very into vintage land cruisers.
And there's something about that there.
I was like, oh, that's interesting.
Being into a Toyota Land Cruiser.
Then you look at them,
they kind of have an interesting history.
So I'm curious, to you, what does it connote
to be into a vintage Toyota Land Cruiser,
like a 60s or 70s Land Cruiser?
- Those are great.
I mean, they're very popular trucks.
- What's different about them and a Range Rover?
- Well, Land Rover, I have an old Land Rover.
It's like any guitar that someone chooses.
There's so much great stuff.
Like for me, the car thing is not, I like Jay Leno a lot.
I'm not a car guy like Jay Leno.
I'm not interested in how engines work
and I get bored during these technical presentations.
I'm more interested in the experience of using the vehicle.
Like the car thing for me began when I had a vehicle
to drive away from my parents and to put my friends in
and smoke a little weed and listen to Led Zeppelin
and Madison Square Garden on the radio
in the middle of the woods.
Like to me, that was like, wow, cars.
(laughing)
Right, 'cause I get away.
And then later on, it became a way to just be
with your friends and get out of the house.
So I've always just loved vehicles
because they do things like that.
The car community wraps its arms around pretty much anybody
at any level, whatever car they like.
If you like driving around in your Prius, that's cool.
Whatever, man, whatever you like.
The Land Cruiser guys, those do really well at auction
and they have a big audience around the world.
- What's like the (beep) car that you're into?
- That I'm into?
Then it wouldn't be a (beep) car.
Like, what do you mean?
- What's like the lowest level, least fancy,
least celebrated car that you have a personal affinity for?
The cars that don't do well at auction,
that don't even go to auction.
Is there, you know?
- I don't know that I like cars like that.
I can't remember posting something
that people were actually upset about.
(laughing)
- Or just like, I mean, is there like--
- Like a '92 Mercury Sable.
Is that when you're like, you know,
say what you will, but like--
- I would not be passionate,
no, I wouldn't be passionate about that.
I might buy a Ford Granada
because my dad had one growing up
that was filled with cigarette butts
and had cigarette holes in the seats.
And that would be personal to me
and I would get made fun of for that.
It's not at all collectible in any way.
And it's a horrific vehicle.
There is a car that I owned in New York
that is laughed at now, the Maserati Bi-Turbo
that Chrysler was involved in.
It was a horrible, horrible car
that broke down constantly.
And I am made fun of for that, owning that car.
- Isn't Maserati like super high-end?
- No, not necessarily. - No.
- Not at that period when they were making these things.
- Is there a minivan that people covet?
- Yeah, people like the Honda Odyssey a lot.
They're pretty passionate about that.
- I've had two of those.
But yeah, but those aren't collectibles.
- No, collectible things tend to be something
that numbers in the, let's say,
let's just call this line 1,500 made per year, right?
And ideally, you're talking about cars
one to maybe 20 were made are the most collectible things.
Anything that's a production car
where they're making tens of thousands,
then you're talking about,
you have to have the best of the best
with the lowest mileage, perfect condition deal
for it to be collectible.
But they're out there, right?
But it's never gonna happen with like Toyotas
and Hondas, Celicas, things like that.
Honda Accords, those are just cars that we buy to use
to get on with life and they get stolen a lot.
- Right, there's never been like a surprise comeback
in the car community, the way that somebody's like,
are you kidding me?
All those comic books,
I threw out all my kids' comic books from the '60s.
Now you're telling me this is worth,
well, who would have thought that cost a nickel?
There's no car version of that?
- No, there is. - Like a Mazda Miata?
- A Miata's have a pretty healthy, they're raced a lot.
And so people make fun of them,
but they're the most raced car in the world.
So for instance, my 12 year old right now is like,
dad, we have to get a '94 Miata.
So I can hot rod it, maybe we can race it.
I'm like, yeah, okay, I'll go right upstairs after this
and try to find you one.
♪ I got a phone to pick something ♪
♪ I started noticing about you ♪
♪ I get suspicious ♪
♪ You switched up all your lipsticks for something new ♪
♪ You claim you're innocent ♪
♪ You say I'm losing it and you're right ♪
♪ I saw you getting out of the Mazda Miata last night ♪
♪ And ain't you right ♪
♪ I'll never get by on just enough ♪
♪ I'm still reaching out ♪
♪ He gets the touch ♪
♪ You got me on the side with half the love ♪
♪ But now I can see that it's you and me ♪
♪ And somebody else ♪
♪ Is it two or three ♪
♪ I never can tell ♪
♪ Sometimes just not enough ♪
♪ Between you and me ♪
♪ And somebody else ♪
♪ Somebody else ♪
♪ Count me out ♪
- What's your take on the PT Cruiser?
(laughing)
- It's a good comedy car.
- I always thought it was funny because the Volkswagen,
they had the new Beetle.
And then I felt like Chrysler,
I think Chrysler makes the PT Cruiser.
They decided we're going to take the 1920s
sort of Model T style and smooth it out for the '90s.
Am I way off on that?
- If you were an overweight family of five in Iowa
that was looking for something to drive to the buffet in,
I would say the PT Cruiser is for you.
It is a very, it's a much maligned vehicle,
almost as maligned as the Prius,
which I think is unfairly maligned.
It's a comedy vehicle for sure, like the PT Cruiser.
That's, if you're going to use it in comedy,
I would say use the PT Cruiser.
- We've talked on this show about how Grateful Dead T-shirts
probably one of the most produced band shirts ever
because they played such big shows or whatever,
that suddenly the value for real vintage Grateful Dead shirts
skyrocketed because of renewed interest in the band.
And I'm sure you had all sorts of people being like,
"Oh my God, I had this smelly old shirt.
You're telling me now I can sell it for $350."
I threw that out because at the time,
as far as shirts went, this held negligible value.
So with the PT Cruiser, you just can't see.
There's no version where in 30 years,
somebody's like, "You know, it's funny."
Like back in the day, everybody was talking about,
you know, Porsches and Ferraris.
And they're all talking about European cars.
But actually the taste of the car community
has really come around and a PT Cruiser, you know,
if you had bought 10 PT Cruisers in good shape in 2020,
right now you would be a billionaire.
There's no world where what you just said will ever happen.
I don't think anybody's ever floated that theory before
with PT Cruisers.
No, it's the car. Here are the cars.
There's the cars where they only made 20 of them.
The first part of it, you do have right.
That so many people in the past have had these cars
and have owned them for years and let them go.
And then they suddenly just pop out of nowhere.
Race cars from the '60s and '70s
are a really good example of that.
Because they were raced a lot,
they had different engines thrown in them.
Because they were raced a lot, they were crashed.
So right up until as recently as the '90s,
there was no market for used race cars.
And then, you know, people were like,
"Well, hey, that's Steve McQueen's race car from Le Mans,
and it's got a camera mount still on it.
That's a pretty cool thing, maybe."
And suddenly these people started buying these race cars
that had been passed around for next to nothing.
And now they're worth, you know,
like that Steve McQueen 917 is a $30 million car.
Whereas, you know, maybe in the '80s and '90s,
you might be getting that for nine or ten grand, right?
Right. Oh, my God.
So there's stuff.
The market does change,
but it always tends to go towards
the low-number rare vehicles.
Was there ever like a limited edition,
like Eddie Bauer edition PT Cruiser type thing
that had a low...
[laughter]
You're going to keep going now.
Okay, we can try the PT Cruiser thing.
Do you?
[laughter]
Did you corner the market in PT Cruisers?
Do you need me?
I'll change what I have to say.
I suck my legs for collecting PT Cruisers.
I really thought this conversation
was going to go a different way.
One actual question I have, though.
I'm interested in like what holds value and stuff.
And I know a lot of people are into Porsches,
and objectively, it's a beautiful car.
And yeah, when I've hung out with my friend
as a 1969 911,
and I'm like, I get it.
Like we're driving around,
and also like the conversations people strike up.
I'm like, oh, this is kind of like a cool community.
Just like at Dunkin' Donuts,
there's always like somebody's like,
oh, what year is that?
And I'm like, okay, this is like a secret society
that you guys are a part of.
But one question that I have is,
does the focus of the community
still stay pretty like zoomed in
on like the 50s through the 70s?
Or is like now that we're 20 years out
from the year 2000,
are they starting to be like,
you know, a 2003 911,
like that's actually skyrocketing value?
Or does everybody still kind of keep focusing
similar to, you know,
Rolling Stone just dropped their top 500 albums
of all time.
The highest percentage was the 70s.
Even though, you know,
now we're 50 years out from the 70s.
There's, you know, like in music,
there's still is a disproportionately
huge focus on the 60s and 70s.
Is there a similar thing with the car community?
- Yeah, but getting back to the PT Cruiser.
- Yes.
- In 2006,
they announced that they had made a million,
a million, think of this.
There are a million PT Cruisers
out there in the world right now.
All right, which means any one of us this evening
can probably go get one for a few hundred dollars
because there are a million of them out there.
- What about if you could get one
in truly mint condition?
That this has zero miles on it?
- Yeah, but it doesn't matter.
- That wouldn't matter to a collector?
That wouldn't matter to you?
If I told you right now,
I had it at $1598. - Yes, it would.
- It had zero miles on it.
- Yeah, but you're talking about a premium of what?
Maybe 10% above what they're worth?
So yeah, okay, instead of 700,
I'm going to give you 1,200 for it.
It just doesn't have value
because there's no market for it.
But getting back to your question,
after that, there are a couple of things
that I've noticed.
These are just my observations.
One, when you were in high school,
the car that you may have had on your wall
or the wallpaper on your computer
is generally the one that later on,
when you're successful in your 30s and you have money,
that's the car you buy.
So right now, it was 60s and 70s cars,
but I'm noticing lots of 80s cars and 90s cars
are doing really well in the market
because that group of guys and girls
now have a little money to spend.
Maybe they're settled in their family
and they want something cool.
And it's the thing they looked at
when they were 12 on the road
that they go, "Oh, now I want to have that."
And then there's, you know,
you see these old Bentleys and things,
the Rolls Royces that, I don't know,
they never really appealed to me,
but I find as I'm getting older,
I really liked brand new cars
and then suddenly I was looking at the 80s
and then suddenly the 70s and the 60s
and now I'm really interested in the 50s.
I keep suddenly going back.
- Ah, you go further and further.
- Yeah, and smaller and smaller and more mechanical.
No computers, no power, anything.
I really like that experience
more than anything else right now.
So that also, I've noticed,
happens with Friends of Mine.
- Is there a thing like with watches
where people want to get something
from the year they were born?
- Yes, that's very big in the car world
and the watch world.
It doesn't work.
It doesn't do anything.
It will not enhance your enjoyment.
It's a trap that we get.
We think I've done it
and I have a car right now that is '82
that I didn't buy
because it's the year I graduated high school,
but when it was offered to me,
I went, "Oh, absolutely.
"I've got to get it for that reason."
It does not figure into my driving pleasure in any way.
It's the car, the preservation example,
the way it drives is all that matters.
It's a very funny little trap
and it's a very funny question.
It does not work.
Here's what does work in the watch community.
I just find with people,
buying something to commemorate a moment in your life
or giving a gift to someone you care about
in a big moment in their life,
that I find enriches the ownership experience.
Your son's graduating high school
and you give him something he can appreciate.
He will remember that when he looks at that watch.
- You mean give him a watch
from the year he was born
or just give him a watch for a new watch or whatever,
just that it commemorates that moment.
- My personal experience with my watch collection
is the stuff in my collection,
I can look at it and tell you exactly what was going on
and why I have that watch.
It was never just like, "Oh, I want a shiny thing."
It was like, "Here's the first year of Seinfeld
"and I want to commemorate not getting fired."
So I bought that Tag Heuer watch.
And I remember it when I wear it.
I'm like, "Oh, I know what that watch means."
That's a good thing to do.
- It seems like cars and watches,
there's a huge overlap in terms of interest.
I can imagine for a variety of reasons,
you can get into the technical side if you wanted to,
the mechanics, just the design element, the history.
It makes sense that people would be interested
in both of them.
Do you find that it's like almost everybody
who's into one is into the other
or do you ever find, "I'm a watch guy
"and I look down on car guys," or vice versa?
- That's hilarious.
No, watch guys and car guys,
they're very closely related in their stupidity
and their addiction to these things.
Very closely related.
- Once somebody told me that they were like
a classic path for a guy, gets into cars
and then gets into watches
and then finally gets into guns.
And I was like, "Whoa, really?"
And he's like, "Yeah, but you know."
- Not in some creepy way,
they're just in that sense of being interested
in the mechanics of objects and the history
and the collectible nature.
Is that true?
- No, I don't see that.
- No.
(laughing)
- I see cars, there's kind of an Esquire,
kind of a European James Bond-y gentleman
kind of aspect to it.
I'll tell you what, cigars, I would put in that category.
- Right.
- Bourbons, specific alcohols,
they're all kind of in that world.
- And maybe guitars, if you like music.
- Oh, definitely.
I mean, I try and I've just broken my own rule,
but I try to avoid guitars and motorcycles
'cause I'll go down a similar road
and suddenly I'll end up having 10 guitars.
Now, I'm saying that to you as I now have five guitars
in my house all of a sudden
'cause my 10-year-old just started taking lessons
and that started me up playing again
and then I called up Taylor and I said,
"Hey, send me one of those 717E Builder Editions acoustics.
"I want a real acoustic guitar."
'Cause I've been playing my same guitar
I've been playing since I was 12 years old,
which was a Lark that I think my parents paid $28 for.
So I went from that old guitar to this one.
I'm like, "Oh my God, this is great."
And they go, "You know what?
"Let's go get the Telecasters
"and the Stratocasters out of storage."
And so now every room just got guitars and stands on it
and I've lost my mind.
I have to stop myself from asking you, "What's next?"
What do I get next?
- Art.
- What is it?
- Oh, art.
- No, I mean, what kind of guitar?
- No, do you collect?
No, I mean, what's next is collecting art.
- Yeah, no, that's it.
- Oh, that's nice to know.
- No, and also, clearly I have a contrarian streak.
I like PT Cruisers and for guitars,
probably like the guitar, I own very few guitars.
I mean, you know, like I played an Epiphone Sheridan
on stage a lot, I like Strats,
but I really love Silvertones and that was a cheap guitar.
But I really think that the Silvertones made by Sears,
Silvertone amps, Silvertone guitars from the late '60s.
- That's cool.
- I like how they look and I like how they sound,
but yeah, but guitars are,
yeah, it is kind of different than cars.
The experience of playing a guitar,
it can be so idiosyncratic versus like driving a car
where your life is in the hands of the machine.
You want something that's like really technically well-built.
Sometimes with the guitar,
you want something (beep) up and weird sounding.
I don't know if that's true with cars.
- This is exactly, your guitars are exactly the same.
It's what I call crow behavior.
You know how the crow sees the shiny thing
and every day it brings the shiny thing back to the nest?
That's what collecting is, really.
You know, you get the thing, you enjoy it,
the novelty wears off and you're like,
"Where's the next one?"
And you know, I could do that with guitars.
I could do it with motorcycles.
I've done it with cars.
Watches is way out of control for people.
You should see what people are doing with watches.
They're just acquiring and you know, you really have to,
and this is really where Spikes Car Radio is at its best.
It's discussing this thing we do
and the ups and downs of it
and the traps and everything else.
That's what we really, you know,
Gary comes on and I'm with Paul, my co-host.
We like to talk about situations like the lose-win,
when you're overheated about a car
and you don't win the bid
and the relief you feel
and the loss you feel at the same time.
Like, "Oh, I lost that thing I really wanted,
but it's a win because I didn't spend the money."
And then three days later, you're like,
"Why was I even thinking about that?"
Right?
Or we have this thing called Carnesia
where you get into a car
you haven't driven for six months
and you're like, "Oh my God, this thing is great.
Why have I not been driving this?"
Right?
That's, you know, the fun of collecting
is the psychology and the weirdness of it.
And I think guitars are exactly the same.
Everything you just said about your guitars
and the reasons why you love them
is exactly what I've heard
with people talking about their cars,
whatever they might be.
Spike, I don't want to interrupt the flow here,
but can I ask a question that's off topic a little bit?
As long as it's about Jeffrey Toobin.
It's...
I mean, unless he has a cameo for the B-movie sequel,
I just wanted to know what's happening with the...
That's funny.
What's happening with the B-quel?
The B-quel?
Did you think there was a B-quel?
Well, I know that Jerry tweeted, you know,
a bit of like a teasing thing a couple of years ago,
"Should I do a B-movie too?"
And people got very excited
because the B-movie has taken on a new cultural significance.
Can you tell me what that is?
Because we're just not understanding it.
I think it's reached a new generation.
Maybe there's some nostalgia built in.
It's been filtered through the prism of the internet.
I just want to know,
has there ever been any earnest conversation
about actually following up that film?
There has, but it's mostly been fun and joking around.
So in 2016, I think, is the year you're talking about.
And if I'm wrong, forgive me.
But in 2016, I believe, for some reason,
B-movie, which came out in 2006,
in 2016, B-movie was the biggest movie on social media.
And it was because kids and teenagers
were putting the entire script on their social media,
on T-shirts, and, you know,
we're just sitting here watching this thing going,
"Are they making fun of us? Do they love it?"
We still don't understand what it was
and why it was happening.
But I said to Jerry, I go,
"Look, let's just have some fun with it."
He go, "Are we going to do one?"
I go, "No, we're not going to do one.
We already did it. We did one."
He goes, "I don't want to go through that again."
And I said, "All right, here's what I want you to do.
I'm going to have a B-movie 2 script printed up,
just something that says 'B-movie 2,
do not distribute some stuff on it.
I just want to arrange for you to come out of your apartment building,
and I'll have a paparazzi there,
and just kind of incidentally shoot the script in your head."
Oh, my God.
So it'll be small, but people will be able to see it,
and they'll go, "Geez, that's this B-movie 2.
They are doing it."
We've talked about lots of like pranky things like that very seriously,
as recently as yesterday,
as I was doing an interview with a Yahoo Entertainment reporter two days ago,
and he asked the same exact question.
"Do you ever talk to the B-movie writers about doing something?"
And we did talk about briefly--
and again, this is just like you and us talking right here.
We did get together and just chat about the idea
of some sort of eight-episode arc on a Netflix or something like that,
and just had a lot more fun with some of the ideas that we generated that we didn't do.
But again, it was just talk, just fun, right?
We were not, and I don't believe, are seriously pursuing it.
The fact that it comes up so often, you know.
Here's the reason we want to do it, so we can write Jeff Bezos.
[laughter]
We were dying to have a character Jeff Bezos.
If that continues to entertain us, maybe.
But I don't know, is DreamWorks Animation still even in business?
Nobody even knows who owns it.
We don't even know how to even approach anything like this.
Go straight to Amazon.
That's right.
Who owns the rights to B-movie?
Oh, who owns the rights to B-movie?
Who owns them?
Is DreamWorks Animation still in business?
It's a mess.
[laughter]
All right, we'll do some research and get--
We'll try to make this happen. Why not?
Come back to me with your thoughts, and we'll talk.
Well, thanks so much, Spike. We hope you'll come back again.
We covered a lot of ground.
And I don't know, it sounds like for your podcast,
you probably wouldn't do a PT Cruiser episode.
But if you-- I don't know if you're already into it, but--
[laughter]
If you do, we'd be happy.
And we'll really research, and we'll come correct.
Yeah, that would be good.
No, I would be happy to do that.
The show is mostly the intersection of entertainment and cars.
And sometimes it's just comedians coming on and promoting their specials.
And we're out there every Wednesday with a new show.
We had Jerry on last week, and this fella who's got a new book,
A Man and His Cars, on today's show.
But we've had Jason Bateman, Matt Damon come on,
lots of big stars, and then lots of folks you don't know
who we just think are great.
Well, everybody check it out.
And even though the Esquire network's been canceled,
check out the pre-season car matchmaker, which you can still stream.
Yeah, it's still there.
Well, great talking to you, Spike. Thanks so much for coming on.
Very nice to meet you guys.
Yeah, nice to meet you too. Have a good one.
All right, take care now.
Let's get into the top five.
It's time for the top five on iTunes.
This week on the top five, we're going to be comparing
the top five songs on Apple Music right now
with the top five Billboard hits of 1995.
Why 1995, Jake?
I was hoping Seinfeld could jump in here.
Oh, yeah, Seinfeld. Maybe this one's better for you.
Wasn't this the year that the Soup Nazi episode of Seinfeld debuted?
Yes, and actually very close to--
it's almost exactly 25 years ago.
That was November 2, 1995.
You know what's also wild is I graduated high school in '95.
Was there a big Seinfeld head at that era, Jake?
I wouldn't say it was a head. I was definitely a fan.
But I still have not seen every episode.
What the f***?
Is there going to be a problem?
No, I mean, it's cool.
Is there going to be a problem?
No, I mean, it's all on DVD. It's coming to Netflix next year.
Seinfeld just cannot control himself.
I would watch Seinfeld episodes on rerun after Yankees games.
WPIX at like 11.
I wouldn't watch when they were airing Thursdays at 8 or whatever.
I saw most of them in the late night ones.
I almost envy you because you still have unseen episodes.
I wish I was in that position.
I mean, definitely a fan.
It definitely was the only sitcom that I thought had any sort of voice or vision or anything.
It changed the game.
It changed the game, exactly.
Influential television program.
The number five song, Michael Jackson, "You Are Not Alone."
I remember this song well.
I can't believe 1995 was 25 years ago.
I know.
You know what? I was 25 years ago in October.
I saw Fish.
Oh, really?
At the Rose Garden in Portland, Oregon.
Fall of my freshman year.
Oh, this is a good song.
Yeah, this is a classic.
This song is produced by R. Kelly and written by R. Kelly and Michael Jackson.
So you saw it 25 years ago.
Yeah, I went to a Fish show 25 years ago.
It's the only Fish show I've ever seen.
And I went with my mom's college friend who was a college professor in Portland at a different school than I went to.
It was like she and her daughter, who were a few years older than me, they were like huge fish heads.
Wait, was it at the Memorial Coliseum?
Oh, maybe that's where it was.
I thought it was the Rose Garden.
Wherever.
Do you think it was Thursday, October 5th?
Yeah, that sounds about right.
I mean, definitely October.
I'm looking at the set list.
Shock, dust, torture opener.
A lot of classic stuff.
I do remember they played "While My Guitar Gently Weeps."
Yes, that was the encore.
They closed it out.
I remember that.
You stayed through the whole show.
Yeah, and my mom's college friend and her daughter were like, they're like classic Portland hippies, like '90s Portland hippies with tie-dye dresses.
They were just like twirling.
I was a little more uptight then.
Were they people passing you joints?
Probably.
I don't think I partook.
But I remember, here's the thing.
I remember I loved the dead.
And I remember, of course, and I remember asking Martha, my mom's friend, like, yeah, this is cool.
Do you like the dead?
She's like, oh, man, the dead were political, man.
She's like, I didn't like the dead back in the '60s.
The dead were political.
Interesting.
And I was like, what do you mean?
She's like, no, the stones were political, man.
Let it flee.
Jerry was famously kind of like, listen, do your own thing.
We're not here to judge.
Yeah.
I love that we've just had like a three-minute conversation about Jake's first and only fish show just over.
You are not alone.
That is a good song, by the way.
It is a good song.
When you find out R. Kelly wrote it, it makes a lot of sense.
It sounds like an R. Kelly song.
But I'm speaking as somebody who's-- I've seen one fish show and one Tray Anastasio band show.
But I think next time, when COVID's over and people are back on the road, we should all go to a fish show together.
It's a very fun show.
Oh, yeah.
No, dude, we roll.
We get the Richard Pictures guys to go.
Oh, yeah.
We get the Vampire guys to go.
We get CT in the mix.
Oh, yeah.
That's a fun night.
Let's roll deep.
We're at a party bus.
I'm in.
Oh, hell yeah, dude.
Apple's paying for it, right?
Apple will not pay.
Like, legally speaking, Apple cannot pay for shrooms in the lot.
However, Apple can purchase you items to trade.
And if you choose to trade them for shrooms in the lot, that's technically your call.
The number five song right now is called "Mr. Right Now."
Whoa.
Trippy.
It's 21 Savage and Metro Boomin, "Mr. Right Now" featuring Drake.
Let's check it out.
[MUSIC - 21 SAVAGE, "MR. RIGHT NOW"]
Whoa.
This is, like, beautiful.
I actually haven't heard this.
I've heard about this mixtape because I know Morgan Freeman narrates the mixtape.
Oh, really?
Yeah.
[MUSIC - 21 SAVAGE, "MR.
RIGHT NOW"]
Oh, yeah.
I've heard about this mixtape because I know Morgan Freeman narrates the mixtape.
Oh, really?
Yeah.
[MUSIC - 21 SAVAGE, "MR.
RIGHT NOW"]
I love 21 Savage.
He really is, like, one of my favorite current popular rappers.
I just love his delivery.
[MUSIC - 21 SAVAGE, "MR.
RIGHT NOW"]
What did he say about quarantine?
This might be the first song on the top five we've heard that directly references quarantine.
We're in quarantine.
On God.
But my Ms are long.
On God.
What does he mean by Ms?
Money?
Millions?
When this song was released, the world was in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic.
Fascinating.
Well, they're-- you know, I guess on Genius, they're creating it for posterity.
They don't want to have to revise it.
This negatively affected the financial situation of millions of Americans.
Singers like Savage were forced to postpone or cancel their concerts.
However, Savage indicates that these restrictions did not limit or stop his inflow of wealth.
As of this song's release, Savage's net worth is approximated at over $12 million and still
growing.
OK.
I understand.
He's saying it's a quarantine, but don't get it twisted.
I'm still rich.
Well, guess what, 21 Savage?
I read that this COVID pandemic created the greatest wealth transfer in history.
So you're in good company with many other rich people.
Nothing to be proud of.
Whoa.
Shots fired.
Getting more rich during a pandemic is nothing to be proud of.
I'm just going to throw that out there.
He's a savvy investor.
Look, that's just how Genius.com interpreted it.
He could also be like-- maybe he's saying-- well, because the line before is, "Got a pretty
girl that I'm feeling on. We in quarantine, but my M's long."
Maybe he's saying that he recently met a pretty girl and he wants to have her over to hang
out and we're in quarantine.
But given his wealth, which he acquired before the pandemic, he can afford rapid testing.
He could maybe even send a private jet so that this girl doesn't have to fly commercial
and be stressed out.
What was the futuristic treatment that Trump had that made him miraculously bounce back?
Regeneron.
He's flooded with Regeneron.
Right, because Regeneron is one of the best treatments, but apparently from what I've
heard, it's never going to be available to most people because it's incredibly expensive
and difficult to make.
Actually, that would rhyme.
It's experimental.
"Fridge full of Regeneron" is a great line.
That would even work here.
"Got a pretty girl that I'm feeling on. We in quarantine, but I got Regeneron."
He has a second fridge full of Regeneron.
The ultimate status symbol.
It's actually a third fridge.
"I got a third fridge full of Regeneron."
"I got a chest freezer full of Regeneron."
Regeneron is so RoboCop.
Yes. It's like unobtainium, that avatar chemical.
Wait, is it really called unobtainium?
Yes. The Regeneron Corporation.
Yeah, it's just like a movie made in 1989.
Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the 2011 Conference of Robotics.
We are here to...
Ladies and gentlemen, the year is 2014.
Thank you for coming to meet on the moon.
[LAUGHTER]
It's always funny when you look back on those movies.
It's never even that far in the future.
They're always like, they're very sure of themselves just to be like,
"Yeah, 30 years, sure."
But I don't know if maybe a lot of people do,
but 21 Savage seems to talk about Ms a lot
because he had a great song called "Bank Account."
It was a really big hit a few years ago.
Where he went, "I got one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight Ms in my bank account."
And then he goes, "I got one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight shooters ready to gun you down."
Do we ever try to do a rap song that was about listing how many fridges you have?
[LAUGHTER]
Maybe that's a better idea to throw out there and not even try to do it.
But it's like, "I got one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight fridges in my garage."
Fridges in my residence.
In my residence.
I got fridges in my residence.
That could be a great verse, breaking down what you use every fridge for.
Oh, yeah. And then it's like, "Eight fridge household."
[LAUGHTER]
"Eight fridge household."
That kind of weirdly reminds me of, there's a Jay-Z lyric,
"Got a condo with nothing but condoms in it."
[LAUGHTER]
Do you remember that one?
I mean, he needs the storage.
[LAUGHTER]
It's just bizarre.
Also, maybe I'm picturing late period Jay-Z,
where the fact that he's an art collector,
everybody knows and he talked about it.
But the idea of a condo filled with condoms,
it's like in the early '90s at the height of the AIDS epidemic,
the Whitney Museum had an artist in residence program,
and a conceptual artist, whoever, take your pick.
Felix Gonzalez Torres.
Is that a real person?
Yes.
Does that kind of stuff.
It's like in Felix Gonzalez Torres actually purchased a condo,
which the Whitney still maintains.
It's on the Upper East Side.
It's at Lexington between 78th and 79th.
You could still visit.
You have to make an email appointment.
You can't just show up.
But they have a few visitors a day,
and the condo is full of condoms.
And it was a statement about AIDS.
Like, that's totally believable.
And then actually the Whitney was running into some financial trouble,
and they had to sell some of their works,
and Jay-Z bought the condo full of condoms.
It only makes sense as a conceptual art project.
Everything about it is just bizarre.
The number four song in '95, absolute classic,
Seal, "Kiss From a Rose."
Oh, hell yeah.
[MUSIC - SEAL, "KISS FROM A ROSE"]
It's from a Batman movie, if I recall.
Yeah, that's what I thought.
It clarifies here that it was first released as a single in '94,
and then came back on the charts a year later when it was on the soundtrack.
Whoa, cleaned up at the Grammys in '96.
Record of the Year, Song of the Year, and Best Pop Vocal Performance.
[MUSIC - SEAL, "KISS FROM A ROSE"]
Seal seems to be embarrassed by this song.
Have we ever talked Seal on the show?
Maybe.
Did we ever listen to, like, "Crazy?"
Oh, that's a good-- yeah.
Wait, so you just said Seal was embarrassed by it?
After writing the song, he was embarrassed by it.
And then even in 2015, he said, "To be honest, I was never really proud of that, of it.
Although I like what Trevor, the producer, did with the recording.
He turned that tape from my corner into another eight million record sales,
and my name became a household name."
I guess he recognizes that it's an important song, but it's just not his favorite.
[MUSIC - SEAL, "KISS FROM A ROSE"]
Mm.
Ooh, tasty.
Kind of prog rock.
[LAUGHS]
Yeah.
Harmonized riff.
Well, it's funny.
This is produced by Trevor Horn, who was briefly in "Yes."
Wait, really?
Yeah.
I mean, Trevor Horn, he's best known for--
like, he was in the Bugles, "Video Killed the Radio Star."
And then he became a really big producer.
And he had "Art of Noise" very ahead of their time.
But yeah, he was briefly in "Yes."
So this song is not a million.
It's literally one degree of separation from "Yes."
Matt did a number crunch, and the only time we've played Seal on the show
was his "Fly Like an Eagle" cover.
And that was around when we disavowed Steve Miller's version.
Wow.
[MUSIC - SEAL, "FLY LIKE AN EAGLE"]
Are you a big Seal fan, Jake?
No.
I've always been intrigued by him.
I mean, a guy that has a really interesting, distinct vibe
and plays very soft rock is--
there's an interesting kind of collision of abilities.
But yeah.
[MUSIC - SEAL, "FLY LIKE AN EAGLE"]
This song is prog rock.
It could be an '80s "Yes" song.
Oh, and this part's kind of like Peter Gabriel.
Yeah, yeah.
Couldn't you have seen Rod Stewart doing this in the '70s?
Yeah.
I mean, it's a little schmaltzy.
But like-- or maybe Rod doing it in the '80s.
Or like-- it's got elements of Kate Bush.
I mean, I think everything that we're talking about is English.
Yeah.
And so I think maybe that's it.
This is just English.
English vibe.
Seal's English.
I dig it.
It's a little soft, but I dig it.
It is one of those songs that you might have heard on an easy-listening
radio station in the '90s.
And those weird little turns, you know, like catchier.
And be like, oh, this one's like--
Yeah.
--kind of tight.
You'd be like, what's up with that one?
Like, if you just didn't have any context for it.
The number four song on Apple Music right now, "24K Gold" and "Mood."
I think we heard this one a couple times.
[MUSIC - SEAL, "24K GOLD"]
Yeah, this song's tight.
Oh, yeah.
[MUSIC - SEAL, "24K GOLD"]
Why are you always in a mood?
Oh, yeah.
It's in my head now.
Does this strike you as a summer song?
It's summer-y.
I just think that with COVID, like, we're going to maybe hear a lot of
summer songs in the winter, you know?
Mm.
Like, I just think that there's some--
I don't know.
Not enough of a reset?
Yeah.
I think I said this last-- maybe an episode or two ago, but that guitar riff
really does remind me of "Built to Spill," the original BTS.
I don't remember if you said that.
Wait, play it again?
Let's hear the beginning again.
[MUSIC - SEAL, "BUILT TO SPILL"]
You know what a modest-- like, modest mouse or some shit?
Right.
When the beat drops in, it's like--
Yeah.
--really diptych.
But, like-- yeah, I feel like Doug and the boys rarely use trap beats.
Very rarely.
With some notable exceptions.
Yeah, I feel like--
[VOCALIZING]
Yeah.
[VOCALIZING]
And they have, like, another, like, guitar part come in over that
or something.
[VOCALIZING]
"Why you always in a mood?"
It's funny.
That's one of those things where it's like, even with no qualifier,
it's one of those phrases where you use the neutral term,
but we know it has negative connotations.
Yeah.
He's in a mood.
Like, imagine if you learned English as a second language.
That's just, like, a weird-ass phrase.
And you're just-- somebody's like, he's in a mood.
And you just be like, I guess all humans are in a mood at any given moment.
What type of mood?
It's like, well, he's in a mood.
Yeah.
Why you always in a mood?
It kind of sounds like-- maybe just for me,
it sounds like something an old generation would say.
Like a grandparent, oh, they're in a mood.
It is funny that it's a very popular song by a young dude.
Yeah, it totally reminds me of, like, grandma.
Yeah, I think it's something like--
Maybe it's a fifth generation or two.
Right.
I picture somebody from Brooklyn in the '40s or the '50s.
Why you always in a mood?
I go out, I work hard, I come home, you always in a [BLEEP] mood.
What am I going to do?
You're always in a [BLEEP] mood.
Now I'm in a mood.
Now because you're in a mood, now I'm in a mood.
And it's like, no, this is just like a hot song on TikTok
for 12-year-olds.
The number three song back in '95, "Year of the Supa Nazi,"
Janet Jackson, "Runaway."
[MUSIC - JANET JACKSON, "RUNAWAY"]
Oh, yeah, this sounds great.
[MUSIC - JANET JACKSON, "RUNAWAY"]
So we've got two Jacksons so far on the top five, Michael and Jen.
[MUSIC - JANET JACKSON, "RUNAWAY"]
This is kind of like a weird form of '90s psychedelia.
It's like that Fruitopia '90s, like, optimistic tech psychedelic.
This is a cool, weird song.
This reminds me of-- you guys know James Ferraro?
I don't know.
He's a musician.
You could call him maybe a conceptual artist.
And he's very ahead of his time.
I feel like, Jake, you could--
I could almost see you getting, like, deep into him.
So he made an album that's, like, kind of iconic in 2011
called "Farside Virtual."
I don't know what the right song to play is.
But it all kind of--
a lot of his music sounds a little bit like--
OK, like, track two on "Farside Virtual" is called "Global Lunch."
I love that title.
[MUSIC - JANET JACKSON, "GLOBAL LUNCH"]
Sir, would you like to receive a New Yorker directly on your iPad?
As you wish.
So the music, it almost sounds like library music
from, like, the late '80s, early '90s for, like, stuff that would--
we've talked about that kind of library music,
stuff that would be, like--
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
--information technology.
Like, play track one on this album, "Linden Dollars."
But just that song is called "Global Lunch."
Amazing title.
[MUSIC - JANET JACKSON, "GLOBAL LUNCH"]
Yeah, he's worth checking out.
He has another album called "Condo Pets."
This isn't a million miles away from the new Mountain Bruce.
He also has this crazy album from 2016 called "Human Story 3."
And the cover is, like--
it looks kind of like clip art, but it's just, like,
a businessman dude, and he's wearing an Amazon box on his head
with the Amazon logo.
And, like, these are some of the titles from that album.
Track three, "Individualism."
Track four, "Market Collapse."
Track five, "GPS and Cognition."
In 2009, his album was "KFC City."
Wow.
OK, so he's--
Vibing on a similar wavelength.
Very different music, but, like, not a million miles away
from, like, the GBV world of, like--
Or the TC--
the TC aesthetic.
He should be, like, getting, like, Whitney grants.
I don't know if he just focuses on music or what.
Anyway, that--
The art world is impenetrable.
Right.
Tough nut to crack.
That's a great name for your record.
"The Art World is Impenetrable."
The art world is impenetrable.
Impenetrable art world.
The number three song in 2020, "BTS Dynamite."
'Cause I ain't a star tonight
So watch me bring the fire set the night alight
This is a good song.
First Korean band to ever hit number one on the Billboard Hot 100.
Right. They were-- Last show, they were number one.
Yeah.
Has Blackpink ever been on "Time Crisis"?
No, but I've watched a bunch of their videos.
It came up on YouTube.
"Blackpink in your area."
Yeah, that's a hit.
That's, like, their tagline.
Yeah, that's a catchy one.
Oh, do they say that in other songs?
No, I think they say that in every song.
It's, like, their tag.
Oh, [bleep]
Okay, I only know one of their songs, though.
I need some [bleep] like that.
"Vampire in your area."
Um...
The--
"The art world is impenetrable."
[laughing]
Like, "The art world is impenetrable."
[singing]
I just wanted to actually look at the lyrics to "Dynamite"
because it's interesting.
The songwriters--
I think a bunch of people in BTS are songwriters,
but this song was written by outsiders.
And I'm curious about what they're actually saying.
All right, 'cause I thought I heard the dude say, "Ding dong."
[laughing]
Okay, that's a little wild that they--
This is the line.
"Ding dong, call me on my phone,
iced tea and a game of ping pong."
Sounds like a cool hang.
Also, "Ding dong."
That's a doorbell.
Nobody says "Ding dong" on your phone.
Although, I love that.
I do kind of love it.
We have no reason to call Doug March from "Built to Spill."
Or Dewey.
Lil' Wings played a show with "Built to Spill"
in, like, 20--
I don't know, '15 or something, 2016.
If BTS, the Korean boy band, was, like, a big thing
at that point, if I had heard of them--
maybe they were a big thing, but they weren't--
they didn't cross my desk.
I would have definitely been like,
"Hey, Doug, how often does this come up?
I'm just curious."
Do people bring this up all the time to you?
Is this complete--
My apologies if this is completely whack
to bring this up backstage at this little show.
But I gotta know.
What's your-- You know.
How are you feeling about the global success of BTS?
Maybe we should try to get Doug March on.
Yeah, maybe.
We don't have to just talk about that.
We could also talk about "Built to Spill."
Of course. I would love to talk about "Built to Spill."
-Legendary band. -Of course.
All right, should we go the official route,
or should we-- Can, like, Kyle reach out?
I don't know if this is just, like,
an embarrassing, dumb thing--
like, road to go down.
I'm just saying, like, if I ran into him,
like, you know, five years ago,
we were in the same little green room for ten minutes,
I would have been, like, big fan, by the way.
You know what? Let's put it this way.
You could say that, as I'm imagining
the awkwardness of, like, a publicist
from Apple or something, emailing Doug March's publicist
and just being like--
It's hosted by Ezra from Vampire Weekend,
American Painter, Jake Longstreet.
Previous guests have included
Ryan Reese, head of marketing for Hershey's,
Jamie Foxx.
Who are our most illustrious guests ever?
Alanis Morissette.
Oh, Alanis Morissette.
The guy that wrote the Seinfeld theme.
Jonathan Wolfe.
Larry David.
Oh, yeah, we did technically have Larry David on.
Bono Bayhurst.
Oh, yeah, honestly, we've had--
I guess I kind of forget.
Okay, if you really tried to be serious,
if you tried to be serious and don't throw in, like,
all, like, the corporate food people,
I'm sure we could--
Which is-- What would that mean to Doug March?
He said, "The guys have had Jamie Foxx,
"Justin Vernon, Alanis Morissette."
Jonah Hill.
Jonah Hill.
What other--
We haven't had a lot of musicians on the show.
Dude from Radiohead.
Ed O'Brien.
Right.
Chris Baio.
Huey Lewis.
Chris Baio, and Huey Lewis.
I mean, okay, come on, that's legit.
Oh, yeah.
You guys think Doug March is gonna take this much convincing?
Well...
You see, there's, like, an impetus for the call.
And I just--
If the impetus is, "Hey, it's funny that
"the acronym of your band is the same
"as this huge Korean boy band,"
that's not, like, a reason for it.
You know what I mean?
Especially, yeah, like, I don't know if--
Maybe Doug doesn't f--- with Vampire Weekend
and he doesn't understand that, like--
No, Doug, actually, this came from Jake,
you know, who's an old-school
Built to Spill fan.
Yeah, 'cause maybe he's just picturing it coming from me
and he's just like, "I never liked those guys anyway.
"I want to f--- it."
Like, I don't know.
Wait, wait, wait, wait.
Built to Spill had a new album this summer.
You could, like, reuse it as--
What's it called?
Built to-- It's a cover album.
Built to Spill plays the songs of Daniel Johnston.
Yeah, I listened to that. It's pretty good.
You know what else we could talk about
is that Built to Spill and Vampire Weekend
are-- whether he likes us or not,
we are in a brotherhood, a fraternity,
of bands that have covered Joker Man by Bob Dumb.
Oh, wow, that is a good in.
And say, like, these guys actually got the dude
who created the Joker Man font
and they did original research
and confirmed that it is named after the--
He's just like, "What the f---?"
How about this?
The tone of this show is strange,
and we actually have so much respect for Doug Marsh
that we don't want to-- How about this?
It wouldn't be unreasonable that somebody listening right now
might be, like, listening to this and be like,
"Guys, I'm best friends with Doug.
I know him. I worked with him in some capacity.
He's a totally easygoing guy.
He would totally be down with the tone of the show."
If anybody's listening and has that relationship with him,
then maybe you can hit us up
or just reach out yourself and just let them know.
They were kind of sheepish on the show.
They felt shy about it.
If it came via publicist, it might seem kind of bizarre.
But I vouch for these guys.
I've listened a lot.
Like, you'll feel right at home.
They're actually fans. I don't know.
The small impression that I have of him
is that he would obviously--
He's a low-key, down-to-earth guy with a good sense of humor
that would totally get the show.
But going through publicist seems hilarious.
I'm sure there's somebody listening
who's at least one degree of separation from Doug Marsh.
-Yep. -All right.
Energizing the fanbase with a task.
The number two song--
Oh, wow. This is a very strong top five from 1995.
The number two song this week in 1995,
"Coolio Gangsta's Paradise,"
which was on the soundtrack for "Dangerous Minds."
Is that the Michelle Pfeiffer movie?
-Mm-hmm. -Yes.
Don't think I ever saw it.
♪ As I walk through the valley of the shadow of death ♪
♪ I take a look at my life and realize there's nothing left ♪
Sampling a song that was 19 years old.
"Pastime Paradise," Stevie Wonder.
Right. This song is closer to "Pastime Paradise"
than we are to this song.
Yeah.
♪ And where you're walking ♪
♪ You and your homies might be lying in chalk ♪
♪ I really hate to trip, but I gotta look ♪
This was, like, a very moving song when I was 11.
It's so dark and eerie.
Yeah. What's another example of a song from a movie
that's, like, fully eclipsed the movie?
I think we talked about once how--
and this is a strange one.
I think we talked about "Never Got to the Bottom of It."
I think "Tears in Heaven,"
the famous Eric Clapton song that's written
about the tragic death of his son,
was on, like, a random movie soundtrack.
Oh, really?
I'm gonna do my own number crunch on this one.
I think of that as an MTV Unplugged hit.
No, originally it was on the soundtrack
for a movie called "Rush" from 1992.
Like, do you guys know the 1992 movie "Rush"?
Oh, I remember that movie. Yeah, Jason Patrick and--
Jennifer Jason Leigh.
Yeah, they play, like, undercover, like, DEA agents
that get hooked on heroin or some [bleep]
Yep. Oh, it's a period piece in the '70s.
So I always kind of wondered, like, not judging,
but I'm just like, the song "Tears in Heaven"
is about, like, truly, probably,
one of the most brutal things a human being could go through.
Just, like, absolutely terrible, heartbreaking story.
And I've just always been--
maybe it says on Wikipedia--
I've always been curious about, like,
I guess maybe he was assigned to write music
for this movie, and his son had just died.
Assigned?
Yeah, maybe he already, like, said he would.
Just, like-- And then he's like--
One of the most famous rock stars ever, like,
"Oh, dude, you have to write a song
for this random-ass, like, movie."
Oh, wait, I guess maybe he scored the movie, too.
Okay, all right, so this makes sense.
So basically, this is what it says.
So even before his son died, in 1990,
two of his roadies and his friend and fellow musician,
Stevie Ray Vaughan, SRV,
were killed in a helicopter accident.
And then, less than a year later,
his 4-year-old son, Connor, died,
falling out of a window, tragic story.
Jesus.
Yeah, like, f---, how heavy does it get?
Like, terrible.
So he was in a real f---ed-up period.
He was isolated.
And I guess he had already been--
he was supposed to score this movie.
And he said of the song, "It was in the back of my head,
but it didn't really have a reason for being
until I was scoring this movie.
Then it sort of had a reason to be.
It is a little ambiguous, because it could be taken
to be about Connor, but it is also meant
to be part of the film."
So maybe he was in this weird f---ed-up place,
and he was like, just wanted to get back to work,
and he starts writing a song.
And he's, of course, like, thinking about death,
and he's trying to make it about the movie,
but it also makes him think of his son.
All right, so that makes sense.
It is like a strange place it ended up, but--
I only know the MTV Unplugged version.
I guess there's probably a studio version
that was originally on that soundtrack.
Which I've never heard.
Never heard?
I think I've only heard that song on the radio,
because it's been on the radio constantly for decades.
And I feel like the definitive version
is that Unplugged version.
Well, throw this one on.
I think it's not that different.
[playing guitar]
It's still acoustic.
Yeah, the studio version?
Oh, it's the studio? Okay.
[playing guitar]
♪ Would you know my name? ♪
Ooh, tender.
Yeah, very similar.
♪ If I saw you in heaven ♪
♪ Would it be the same? ♪
That's a wild lyric.
Yeah.
♪ If I saw you in heaven ♪
All right, well, we're not gonna listen to the whole thing,
but we're about to change gears hardcore.
The next song is Cardi B featuring Megan Thee Stallion with "WAP."
Hell yeah.
Oh, wait.
We have to play the Patrick World "Wet-Ass Burritos."
Oh, yeah.
Did you hear that again, Ezra?
No, I didn't hear that.
Throw it on.
Okay, so Patrick World--
'cause last show we did his riff about wet-ass burritos,
and Patrick World--
I mean, he really went above and beyond.
Patrick World, bless his heart, sent us a new song called "Wet-Ass Burrito."
I was like, "Is this the Sweet Chili Heat world premiere of 'Wet-Ass Burrito' by Patrick World?"
♪ Time crisis ♪
♪ This is the time crisis ♪
♪ Sweet Chili Heat ♪
♪ Sweet Chili Heat world premiere ♪
♪ Brought to you by Doritos ♪
♪ Sweet Chili Heat ♪
♪ There's some corn in the ground ♪
♪ I said certified beef ♪
♪ Seven days a week ♪
♪ Ranchero sauce treats ♪
Perfect.
♪ All up in your bed sheets ♪
[laughs]
♪ Yeah, yeah, fricking random ♪
♪ Yeah, yeah, you eating a wet-ass burrito ♪
♪ Bring your beer from your crib for this wet-ass burrito ♪
♪ Wipe your chin, ten napkins for this wet-ass burrito ♪
♪ Went out to dinner, just me and my wife ♪
♪ Where's margarita? I had 'em all night ♪
♪ Wet-ass margarita was dripping with goo ♪
♪ Gave it a two and a bad yelp review ♪
♪ Stain on my shirt, stain on my jeans ♪
♪ Loaded with cheese and with too many beans ♪
♪ Mushy tomatoes, too much sour cream ♪
♪ A whole lot of guac coming out of the seams ♪
♪ Something is off, the burrito was funky ♪
♪ Don't let it drip on my new chunky donkeys ♪
♪ Swing by, lawn, knees, dads ♪
♪ DeFrosted McRibs 'cause we're hungry ♪
Wow.
[laughs]
Whoa.
Fire.
I got a...
That's really good.
I mean, yeah, he has a very high batting average
of like deep TC references per like measure, you know?
I mean, like...
[laughs]
Without ever breaking theme.
Yeah, no.
Ever.
Yeah.
He's a master. I mean...
It's never a forced reference.
[laughs]
No.
Getting the wet burrito beans on your chunky donkeys.
[laughs]
And of course, he had the worst margarita of his life.
Yeah.
It all makes sense.
At this Mexican restaurant eating the wet-ass burrito.
[laughs]
You know how Ezra always talks about like the perfect
sort of narrative and never sort of forcing it?
[laughs]
This is, I think, yeah.
It's amazing.
It's putting it together.
Well done, Patrick World.
The number one song this week in 1995,
I guess, you know, I'm realizing something.
It's like, I guess this is obvious.
We've talked about it before, but it's like,
when we do mid to late '90s top fives,
I know it so well.
I know it even better than like when I was like college age later.
I don't know it quite as well.
But these songs, like there's something about being 11
where you just like, you absorb these songs.
So they all like strike a chord in me.
And number one, this is just a total classic.
Mariah Carey fantasy.
It's built on the Tom Tom Club sample.
Love this.
Hell yeah.
I feel like, Jake, when we first met on tour with Dirty Projectors,
I had like a big brick iPod and I remember this song was on it.
I feel like we listened to this a lot.
I remember, yeah.
This, you know, '95 is a funny days between
because you were 11, I was 18.
That's a weird days between moment.
That's a funny hang.
I mean, yeah, I was a freshman in college.
Yeah.
Incredible.
Such a feel good song.
Yep.
So it's not the remix with ODB.
Straight up original.
That was also such a classic verse.
It was still kind of novel at the time to have like Mariah Carey,
this kind of like, at the time her image was still pretty like prim,
you know, like, and then ODB,
obviously his name is old dirty bastard.
Just like bad boy.
Just come up, me, I'm a Raya.
Go back like baby just pass the fire.
This is incredible.
I remember even like when she put out Heartbreaker,
which was like, I don't know, late nineties or something.
And Jay-Z was on there.
Yeah.
I was like, oh, cool.
Like that's an interesting combo.
And he had a great verse on that.
It was like the perfect verse for like everybody.
You could be like a 10 year old, you know.
Kid just like rapping along everywhere.
All right.
Shout out to Mariah Carey.
You're an absolute legend, mate.
The number one song right now on Apple music,
Pop Smoke, Rest in Peace,
Four of the Night featuring Lil Baby and Da Baby.
This is the song with both babies.
Oh yeah.
I'm a thief in the night.
I did some wrong, but I'm always right.
Said I know how to shoot and I know how to fight.
If I tell you once, I'ma tell you twice.
I'm real discreet like a thief in the night.
If I call you babe, you'll be babe for the day
or a babe for the night.
You're not my wife, she want a killer.
So f*** four nine.
I want a f*** on a d***.
Four nine.
AP, Big Rocks.
In the hood with the realest.
5K on the dinner.
Damn.
I wonder where they went.
In LA?
I'm going to assume so.
Is there a place you could drop 5K on dinner
for two people in LA?
I think the thing with really expensive dinners
is it's always the alcohol that puts it over the top.
You get like a thousand dollar bottle of wine or something?
I mean, you could get probably a four thousand dollar bottle of wine.
Right.
Jake, what's the most you ever spent on a bottle of wine?
I don't know, man.
Not a lot.
I mean, 20 or 30.
We went to some nicer event and we bought a 40 dollar bottle of wine.
You end up just putting on the kitchen counter
and it just ends up sitting there being unopened.
Right.
That kind of vibe.
I don't just buy a 50 dollar bottle of wine to drink by myself.
We should have talked about that with Spike.
That's another thing.
Maybe I should.
He's getting into wine.
Yeah, he shut down the art vibe pretty hard,
but he definitely seemed in on expensive booze.
There's something about that that's a type of dude.
You know, there's a magazine called Guitar Aficionado.
I always heard about it from Dave Maklovich from Chromio.
He was always obsessed with that magazine he sang
because their thing is that their world view
or what they describe, what they write about,
is called the deluxe life.
I think it basically is like whiskey, guitars, and cars.
And I'm sure watches a little bit.
Motorcycles.
Maybe motorcycles.
Deluxe life.
So he kind of uses deluxe life as a shorthand sometimes
to describe that universe.
And maybe art is not totally--
I can imagine some art is deluxe life, but not all of it.
Art is too prissy.
I guess it depends.
What's that Western guy who made the sculptures of cowboys
that George W. Bush had in the Oval Office?
I don't know, man.
Remember every president brings one thing to the Oval Office?
Oh, yeah.
I feel like every president redecorates the entire White
House with art from the National Gallery's collection.
Oh, OK.
So like Carol Walker and more contemporary artists,
a lot of African-American artists.
I'm sure Trump was like full kitsch.
OK.
You know what he's been like?
If Trump had like Jeff Koons everywhere in the White House,
that would be amazing.
I'm sure he doesn't, but that would be perfect.
OK, so the thing that George W. Bush had in the Oval Office
was a Frederick Remington.
He's a fan.
He's like a 19th century artist.
He's a painter.
Yeah, great painter.
His sculptures are pretty interesting.
They're well made.
Like this one's called the Rattlesnake.
He had another famous one called the Bronco Buster.
You know, it's like these dramatic cowboys and the horses
like rearing up.
Anyway, they can kind of be deluxe.
Yeah, but I don't know.
It is like a funny thing.
Just like, oh, yeah, I just paid $800,000.
I don't even know.
Millions for a Frederick Remington?
No idea.
That's a good question.
I don't know.
The secondary market.
The lowest price you can pay for a Remington is $75,000.
Oh, really?
For a painting or for an etching?
For a bronze sculpture.
Cheaper than a Ferrari.
That's a good question.
How big?
Seems like they're kind of small.
Yeah.
That's the lowest price.
That's the bottom end.
You know, I think this is so deep that we're in the end of the
episode, we're talking about Frederick Remington.
He's definitely known more as a painter.
Okay.
He's an incredible painter, but it's real cowboys and Indians.
It's definitely the myth of like Manifest Destiny.
Right.
And like cowboys shooting guns at Indians.
I mean, he nails the dust and the sunlight and the heat.
But it's weird to see.
It's like a John Wayne movie.
I see.
Problematic.
Well, on that note, Frederick Remington, you're canceled.
This is the end of Time Crisis.
Thank you to our guests, Uncle Ted and Spike.
We'll see you in two weeks.
Time Crisis with Ezra Koenig.
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