Episode 87: Despot Returns
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Transcript
Time Crisis, back once again. We're joined by a very special guest, a man from the East.
You know who it is. Despot. We also count down the top hits of 1946 and today. All that,
plus some Oscars talk, a dip in the mailbag, and a little sneak preview of Vampire Weekend's
upcoming tour. This is Time Crisis with Ezra King. B-B-B-B-B-B-B-Spotlight One.
Time Crisis, back again. I'm joined in our Los Angeles studio by Jake as always.
Hey.
And a very special guest, the head of Time Crisis East, Despot.
Hi.
President of TC East.
I didn't know I was the head or the president.
Well.
Or both.
You just got a promotion.
Thanks.
It's actually really winter here for the first time I can remember.
The whole time I've been here, raining and cold, and you guys don't know how to drive
when it's raining and you get scared when it's cold.
That's kind of true. Not me.
Yeah, well, you have a thicker skin.
That's right.
I barely drive.
I'm really excited about it. I'm wearing my New York, big New York coat around town.
It's good luck.
Gonna have a hot coffee, almost pretend that I'm back in New York here and there.
I'm here.
You're here?
It's like you're in New York.
I got the president of TC East here.
You know, slowly but surely, man.
Man, we got so much to talk about.
It's been an absolutely jam-packed last two weeks.
Well, one thing that you guys noted as we came in is that you're both openers
on the next Vampire Weekend Tour.
That is true.
Yeah.
The last show, we started talking about the tour a little bit, but we didn't go that deep.
Now the tix have been on sale for a while.
And I can talk more specifically about the bills because with both of you guys,
you're not doing like full legs of the tour.
Although that could be fun in the future.
That'd be tight.
Richard Pictures and Death Spot.
You're kind of dangling the carrot here.
Well, I know.
Who plays first though.
That's tough.
Because we alternate at night to night.
You're both busy guys.
I mean, at least Death Spot is just one man.
Richard Pictures is five men?
It's a seven person band.
Full seven?
It varies from five to seven.
By the way, all seven are in for Chicago.
Oh really?
Yeah.
Sick.
Yeah.
Because when you guys are the Novo.
Oh yeah, of course.
Yeah.
At the Novo, that was a five man jam.
Yeah.
Donna and Keith were out of town.
And you guys are a little harder to wrangle also because, well, you're not full-time musicians.
Not a professional band.
Right.
It is a hobby.
I know, but it gets confusing with the dead because you have some Grateful Dead cover bands.
That are pro.
Yeah.
Like you're J-Rads.
You're dead and ghost.
Right.
Who are pulling in.
That's a full-time job.
Some folks trust reason.
Others trust the mind.
I don't trust nothing.
But I know it'll come all right.
Say it once again now.
Well, I hope you understand.
When it's turning over, love matters just a man.
Play it.
Play it.
Play it.
Can't break all my love.
Actually today I was talking with like kind of like our touring team and somebody referenced
the Pink Floyd light show.
And then somebody was like, well, have you seen the Australian Pink Floyd show?
I was like, what is that?
And they're like, well, they're based in the UK, but they're a bunch of Australian guys
who started a Pink Floyd tribute band.
Sounds terrible.
Oh, you're already hating?
They're Australian.
Oh, we're not hating on Australia.
I am.
All right, well, yeah, Despot.
I got like three Australian friends.
I feel like you got a lot of Australian friends.
Three maybe.
So it's a touring Pink Floyd cover band and light show.
Yeah.
And so I was talking to this touring guy and I was like, because Pink Floyd was one of
the biggest touring acts in the world.
We've talked on the show that Roger Waters presents, you know, whatever.
Yeah.
Those are some of the biggest grossing tours of all time.
We went to the Staples Center.
Yes, we saw him at the Staples Center.
So I'm like, so what's up with the Australian Pink Floyd show?
And this guy, well, first of all, the fact that they're based in the UK is like, OK,
why?
And it's partially because I think they're so hot and Europe's such a big market for
them.
They can't be flying from Australia all the time.
So I was like, as any kind of a professional musician has to say, what kind of rooms are
these guys doing?
And one person said, well, last time I saw them, I think it was in Geneva.
And it was like, you know, they do like small arenas.
And I was like, how many people were there in Geneva?
And they're like, I think about like 6,000.
Wow.
And I was like, wait, wait, wait.
I know Pink Floyd is popular.
And I could totally imagine like a successful Pink Floyd band that's like, you know, covering
that, you know, making it a full time job.
Yeah, but 5,000, that's like bigger than Vampire Weekend.
Most bands.
Bigger than most bands.
And I was like, what's special about them?
And they were like, well, you know, they're really good at playing Pink Floyd songs.
And they bring some like Australian sense of humor.
And I was like, like what?
And they were like, if on their video screen, they put up like the dark side of the moon
prism, you know, instead of the triangle, it'll be like the shape of Australia.
That is rich.
That is really funny.
And they're like, they'll recreate Pink Floyd album covers with like Australian jokes in
it.
And I was like, you know, fair play.
I get it.
If you're Australian, you love Pink Floyd.
You're going to be making kind of inside jokes like that.
Yeah.
But again, is that a joke even?
It's a visual.
Technically, it's a joke.
But then they're playing at a 7700 capacity arena in the Czech Republic.
You're just like a Czech Pink Floyd fan.
You're like into that Australian Pink Floyd based humor.
It just sounds so specific.
Maybe you're starved for rock shows in Czech Republic.
Maybe.
Vampire's not going to Czech Republic.
Yeah, no one else is doing it.
They don't want to see us.
How do you guys sell that out?
That's 77.
We'll probably get an email from like the one hardcore TC head in the Czech Republic.
Yeah.
But what kind of attitude is that to say that they don't want to see you?
You're right.
We got Australian Pink Floyd is like, we know they want us over there.
They'll go anywhere.
Maybe I got to send the Australia Vampire Weekend band first.
Yeah.
To kind of play some scenes.
Actually, Vampire Weekend's never played in Eastern Europe,
which is a real shame because, you know, I'm Eastern European,
but we're going for the first time this summer.
Maybe you want to come to that one.
It's the motherland, Poland.
I've never been there.
You want to come to the festival in Poland?
Yeah, kind of.
I can't get you an opening slot because it's a festival, but you can come.
I'll just hang out.
Yeah.
Oh, is your mom born in Poland?
Yeah.
It'd be a fun mother son trip.
Doubt.
My mom was trying to go back to Poland.
She was there.
It wasn't so good over there when she was there.
Might be some bad memories for her.
Oh yeah, fair.
Fair enough.
But back to the US concerts, because that's where you guys are playing.
We've painstakingly crafted these bills.
So, Despot, you're playing the Madison Square Garden show.
Yeah.
Which is in September.
Yes.
And that's Despot, Angelique, Kijo, and Vampire Weekend.
I think it's a very strong bill.
Very excited about it.
Me too.
What are you going to do?
Is it just going to be you and a DJ?
Think so, yeah.
I'm going to rap.
All right.
Yeah.
So everybody, I know it's in seven months.
Get there early.
It could just be me.
I haven't really decided yet.
Because when I tour, it's usually just me, and I always think that's really funny.
And it's even funnier at Madison Square Garden.
With like an early 2000s iPod?
iPad.
iPad?
Yeah, I like to go iPad.
I'm kind of into that.
Yeah, with the nice little, you know, wire cable.
That's going to be tight.
Into some DI boxes.
I think, yeah, maybe you got to just lean into it.
Yeah.
Not trying to put on like a big laser light show.
No, I'm going to do that too.
Oh really?
Yeah.
I'm spending millions of dollars on this show.
I mean, it's the garden.
Yeah.
Legendary venue.
Once in a lifetime.
Because I think I'm going to die this year.
Oh no.
But not before September?
After the show, yeah.
All right.
Maybe that night.
All right.
Yeah, maybe on stage.
Oh no, then they're going to have to like clear it out, and then we won't get to play.
That's really disrespectful.
You'll still get to play.
They won't care.
Oh no, they'll shut it down.
No, Madison Square Garden is like, it's like the mob.
The show must go on.
I bet they have a place in there where they put the bodies.
There actually could be some bodies in there.
Yeah.
Anyway, the...
Damn, guys.
Let's lighten the mood a little bit.
So we're really excited.
So we're real excited.
The one thing about that show that I'm excited about is,
we normally don't like to play arenas too much.
And in fact, on the last album, we played a few here and there.
And I was kind of like, this just feels weird.
But the garden, you make a special exception for.
It's like right in the heart of town.
Yeah.
It's cozy.
It's kind of the best one.
I don't know that much about arenas, and we're definitely not trying to play too many.
But apparently in arenas, it's all about the angle of the audience.
So you can do like a 180 show, or you could do a 270 show, or you could do a 360.
Oh, wow.
Because you can picture like a typical show, the stage is back at like,
kind of like one of the baskets.
Right, right.
But we kind of, you know, I don't like handle all this stuff.
I have to check out a little bit with some of the touring stuff, because it's like so hardcore.
Yeah.
But our touring dudes were like, well, we'll put it up.
We'll see how it does.
And if there's a strong demand, we can go 360.
And I was like, oh, so what's that like?
And they're like showing me pictures of like Pearl Jam and Bruce doing 360 at the Garden,
which basically means you just sell the tickets behind the stage.
Non-rotating stage.
Non-rotating stage.
So in one sense, they're not good tickets.
They're significantly cheaper because they're like obstructed.
But it's also just kind of like a better vibe, because then like everybody's looking at each
other.
You know, you get that full like 360 round the room energy.
Wow.
Is there any way you could play to those people?
Can you like turn around and run to the other side of whatever type of curtain is there?
I think you can.
Because I'm going to do that.
You could turn around a little bit.
Yeah, especially you, because maybe you get a headset, Mike, so you can really work the
back.
Definitely.
The 180 tickets, because those are like the quote unquote good seats went real quick.
Yeah.
But now they're selling the ones like behind.
To MSG.
Yeah.
Wow.
So we're doing full 360 there, but it's like those ones go a little slower, but they're
cheap.
So it's kind of like if you got the right attitude, I think you roll up there and you're
like, you know what?
We're not going to be seeing all the action.
We're just going to feel the energy of the room of the room.
Found some brews.
Yeah.
If I was going to this show, that's where I'd sit.
Yeah, for sure.
If they were saying you could sit for free anywhere you want, you're going to go there.
It's like sitting in the bleachers of a Yankee game.
Yeah.
I mean, in some ways, it's a little vibe.
Yeah.
Sometimes you want to sit front row, but that's also like super intense.
You can just kind of sit in the back.
It's chill.
This little piggy got a house made of bricks.
Hand over hand over hand over fist.
This little piggy got a house made of bricks.
Huff and puff if you ain't flowing down.
This little piggy got a house made of bricks.
Hand over hand over hand over fist.
This little piggy got a house made of bricks.
Huff and puff if you ain't flowing down.
Running on fumes, walking on coals.
Pockets on road games, pulled out of control.
Green means go, red means go.
I'm colorblind, mother f***er, I don't know.
Beat a beat in the block, I'm pleading and squeezing the juice out.
Deezer screaming to stop, I'm fleeting the scene with the too loud.
Money talking, you showing off, then that money talk too loud.
Slap a gag order on the wall and cut Benjamin's tongue out.
Then get presidents from out.
Won't be no more discussion, go so hard in the paint.
I'm f***ing and busting under the bucket and run amok on you.
Quits and bits and cuss up in public.
My club up ain't one to f*** with.
Not for nothing, you nothing.
Stopping slime, y'all are snot rockets.
Got a lot of products stocked in the dockers, that's hot pockets.
Fresh out the car wash, still got a dirty trunk.
Out for that gold plaque like some old dirty front.
This little piggy got a house made of bricks.
Hand over hand over hand over fist.
This little piggy got a house made of bricks.
Puff and punch if you ain't blowing down shit.
Look down shit.
This little piggy got a house made of bricks.
Hand over hand over hand over fist.
This little piggy got a house made of bricks.
Puff and punch if you ain't blowing down shit.
One fish, two fish, platinum fish, gold fish.
So rich I burn bridges to keep a stove lit.
Put the queen's furrow in my pipe and smoke it.
Then scrape the road clean and blaze it to the roach clip.
I play them corners like a rook on a chessboard.
Couple thousand dollars worth of work in the guest drawers.
Up and down the block, play ring and run up a desk door.
Ain't bother asking coppers what I'm under arrest for.
I let it splatter in the batter till it's magnifique.
The motor roller blow up till battery acid leap.
A grand feast on the block, so let the man eat.
This one's on the house, I prefer it off the damn street.
This little piggy got a house made of bricks.
Hand over hand over hand over fist.
This little piggy got a house made of bricks.
Puff and pump if you ain't blowing down shit.
This little piggy got a house made of bricks.
Hand over hand over hand over fist.
This little piggy got a house made of bricks.
Puff and pump if you ain't blowing down shit.
It's the oh my god father of soul.
Rock and roll, stop, drop, lock and load.
Dot, dot, dot, you know the rest.
Holes in chest, lay souls to rest.
Close the mess, best protect next or you'll be next.
I hold weight, then distribute it post haste.
Get whole birds on a arm, I'm ghost face.
Making tall orders, taking no shorts.
How'd that little guy get on such a high horse?
But then also at the Chicago show,
that's the one that Richard Pictures are playing at.
Yeah.
I'm excited about all the shows,
but of course like these are cities we've played a lot,
so they're, you know, New York's very dear to my heart.
And then Chicago I'm psyched about
because it's on Father's Day.
I haven't hyped that up too much.
Because I was like, you know, let the people of Chicago
decide if they want to go to the show.
But part of the reason that I asked Richard Pictures
to come to that one, you guys are playing Hollywood Bowl,
makes sense, you live in LA.
Makes total sense for us to play the Hollywood Bowl.
Makes a lot of sense.
But then in Chicago, I was kind of disappointed
because last year on Father's Day weekend,
we did the Ojai shows.
Yep.
Which I think was a great kickoff.
Tremendous weekend.
That was a great weekend, legendary weekend.
And then I was kind of bummed to be like,
"Oh, the album's going to come out in the spring
and then we can't really just drop everything,
go back to Ojai."
But then it turned out like, "Oh, we're playing in Chicago
and it's going to be like a sick outdoor show."
So you guys are coming through.
We also got Chicano Batman who's opening that leg for us.
That's going to roll.
So that's going to roll.
And we can, I mean, I'm excited about the music,
but I'm also very excited that we can bring back
the legendary Father's Day weekend t-shirt.
Oh yeah.
The long sleeve.
Oh yeah.
Which Jake rocks.
Version two.
Oh, all the time.
For people who don't know, this is,
I think this is the closest thing to a Vampire Weekend grail.
Yeah, I think it's the best shirt.
It's probably our best shirt.
Yeah.
It's a long sleeve t-shirt.
And in the Vampire Weekend Futura Bold font,
it says Father's Day weekend.
And then there's a big frog and a little frog on a branch.
It's just a real classic shirt.
I didn't get one.
I have a couple.
All right, cool.
That one also, it sold out very quickly at Ojai.
Is that like an afternoon show in Chicago or what's the deal?
Evening?
It's at night.
Yeah, it probably starts like early evening.
Okay, cool.
So it'll probably be like, you know,
sun will be up and then we'll go down halfway through.
Nice.
So anyway, I'm excited that we can bring back that shirt for Chicago.
That's going to be very special.
But in Chicago, there's like a similar thing.
In the last few weeks, I've, I really haven't thought about like venues and tickets in years.
Yeah.
So I kind of like really dip back in people like keeping me updated on some of this stuff.
And in Chicago, it's in a place called Northerly Island.
I've never been there.
I guess it's kind of like on the lake.
Cool.
And then there's like this kind of like terrace seated amphitheater vibe.
So I think more or less all the tickets are sold out for like the seats.
But then there's this like endless lawn in the back.
So now they're selling like these kind of relatively cheap lawn tickets.
Yeah.
I think if you're asking people to come just like hang super far back on the lawn,
you really got to provide a good atmosphere.
You rolling at dusk.
We're doing like a 10 minute bird song.
Yeah.
Well, that's going to be a good atmosphere.
That's a chill.
That's a soft landing.
But I feel like...
At the show.
That is.
That's going to be a good vibe.
Oh, I know a song like a bird within her sing.
Oh, I know she'll sing a little while and then through all.
Tell me all that you know, I'll show you.
Snow and rain.
When you hear that same song again, you know why.
Oh, I know she'll sing a little while and then through all.
I hear the sunshine sing right in the door.
Fly through the night.
Don't I know.
Oh, I know.
Oh, I know.
Oh, I know.
Is there going to be like a lot seen at the vampire weekend shows?
I don't know.
A lawn scene.
I mean, I think we got to create a lawn scene.
There was a bit of a lawn scene in Ojai.
Yeah.
Oh, I kind of had a good lawn scene.
We had our merch guys just like running game.
I think maybe to create a good lawn atmosphere.
Maybe it should be something like where Richard pictures merch guy is not at the official merch
booth.
Yeah.
But you got to find them on the lawn.
You guys should you got to do some special Chicago.
Oh, yeah.
We're going to do some Chicago merch for sure.
I got to hire a guy to come out and run merch.
Oh, maybe we need a local Chicago guy.
Okay.
Yeah.
Good call.
You got any Chicago buddies?
No, but I think we can ask her.
I think I think.
I like little Dirk.
Maybe we got it covered.
You know, little Dirk.
No.
You know any Chicago rappers?
Yeah, I know a bunch.
Not little Dirk, though.
I don't know if they want to.
That would be sick.
And also because it's Father's Day.
I was trying to think like when I was talking to like the touring dudes, I was like, well,
it's Father's Day.
It's the perfect day to kind of come chill on the lawn.
Good atmosphere.
But like the first thing I asked is like, well, if a dad's coming through with his family,
can he maybe set up a small charcoal grill on the lawn?
I don't think so.
I think most venues don't allow that.
That is a liability.
If she has someone's dad to sell the merch.
Yeah, that's true.
Get a dad.
Little Dirk's dad.
Let's get some dads out there.
All this talk of cover bands.
I was wondering, is there a Vampire Weekend cover band?
Have you heard of one?
Because it wouldn't surprise me.
In fact, it would surprise me if it wasn't.
It's got to be.
I don't know if there's like enough of a market for it, especially because we've been so quiet
for the past five or six years.
I mean, maybe depending on how this year goes, somebody could start one.
Wait, OK, here's what's not permitted in the Huntington Bank Pavilion.
Weapons.
All right.
Which a small charcoal grill could be a weapon.
That's true.
Yeah, you can f*** somebody up with that.
Alcohol, drugs.
Weak.
Well, I guess you could buy alcohol.
Umbrellas.
Long scene.
I mean, I think they should.
Well, umbrella?
Yeah, it's weird.
Laser pointers.
It's disruptive.
Umbrellas suck.
I hate them.
I guess they really, even when it's raining.
I think you're an a***** if you have an umbrella.
When it's raining?
Yeah, wear a f***ing rain jacket and put your hood on.
Stop taking up space and hitting people in the face and f***.
But you're still going to get your face all wet.
OK.
All right.
You heard of your first test on anti-umbrella.
No laser pointers, no skates, no wallet chains.
That's weird.
What could that be about?
That's a weapon, man.
That's a weapon.
To like choke somebody out?
Yeah, or you could whip it at them.
That's what I always do with my wallet chain.
No ice chests.
No banners.
What?
Also a weapon.
No flyers.
What?
No flyers.
No beach balls.
No frisbees.
These guys are just a complete bummer.
They could have just said no weapons.
All these things.
They could have just said don't bring anything in.
Well, wait, hold on.
No fireworks, no outside food or beverages.
Well, OK, maybe the whole vibe.
I think a lot of these venues, their whole vibe is like,
you got to buy it from, you know, it's like whatever.
Go to a basketball game.
You got to buy it from us.
So they'll sell like ninja stars there.
Yeah, I think you could probably buy all this stuff at the merch stand.
Yeah.
They don't say you can't bring a hacky sack.
That's kind.
That's a good vibe.
Maybe after you guys play, Richard Pictures could run like a dunk tank or something on the lawn.
I doubt they let you bring that.
All right, we'll figure something out.
Twenty twenty one.
We think about me.
I could wait, but I shouldn't wait.
Three.
I don't want to be.
Twenty twenty one.
We think about us.
Copper goes green, stay beans go rust.
It's a matter of.
Boy.
Boy.
Boy.
Boy.
Boy.
Twenty twenty one.
We think about me.
I could wait, but I couldn't wait.
Three.
Boy.
I don't want to be.
Boy.
Twenty twenty one.
We think about us.
Copper goes green, stay beans go rust.
It's a matter of.
Boy.
Oh yeah, okay.
There was some thing.
Oh, here we go.
In 2009, there was some story that there was a Craigslist ad about a Vampire Weekend cover band.
And it kind of just seemed like a weird joke, but somebody was like,
I want to start a Vampire Weekend cover band.
It's going to be called the VW Bugs.
And then I guess there was an interview where they tracked down the person who started it.
Wow.
A woman named Catherine.
And she said the group existed and they were practicing, recording and planning gigs and
will be the subject of a web based documentary.
So you got to keep in mind this is we only had one album out.
This is 10 years ago at the time.
And I guess they had a MySpace.
Is there music on it?
I wonder if they gigged.
I don't think so.
I think it was just like a weird joke.
And I think also like on the internet in 2009, something like this could get a little more
traction.
Today, that would just be like a tweet.
Somebody would be like, wouldn't it be funny to start a Vampire Weekend cover band?
Right.
There was no outlet for that back then.
Right.
This is like you saw something on Craigslist and you're like, I'm going to write an article about
this.
Okay, wait.
Then they got more into it.
In this post 9/11 internet age, we live in.
It's possible for the tribute band to usurp the power of the band to which they are paying
tribute.
Okay.
What?
The younger 9/11, the younger generation has grown used to not paying for intellectual
property and in so doing respects it less.
In this way, the vampire contribute band is a sort of thought experiment on the inherent
morality of the internet and what meritocracy is.
This is garbage.
Where was this article?
Cover bands are, I mean, predate the internet.
I don't want to say it, but it's kind of Borghese.
It's pretty Borghese.
Dude, imagine a Greta Van Fleet cover band.
Oh, that's.
Do we have Zeppelin covers?
Wait, that's sick.
Or even just like Paige and Plant busting out a Greta Van Fleet song.
Oh, that would be really sick.
I guarantee that the somebody at the Grammys floated the idea of Greta Van Fleet teaming
up with Paige and Plant at the Grammys.
Right.
Paige was in, Plant declined.
Yeah, seriously.
Oh my God.
I know, but a Greta Van Fleet cover band is a sick idea.
Did they play?
Maybe that's my next project.
Yeah.
Did they play the Grammys?
I didn't watch the Grammy.
No, they won a Grammy though.
Best rock album.
Best rock album, but they didn't win best new artist, which for people who remember.
That was disgust.
Who won that?
Oh, you guys did all this already.
It's all good.
Well, yeah, this happened a couple of weeks ago, but we were saying before that Greta
Van Fleet could not win best new artist.
Even though we respect their postmodern playfulness, if Greta Van Fleet won best new artist, it
would be a bad look for rock.
Because my whole thing is that rock needs to be humble.
But then best new rock, would they win band?
Best new rock album.
No, it was just best rock album.
No, sorry.
Best rock album.
So isn't that almost even worse?
Because then it's like targeted.
It's rock.
No, but I'm saying like, I don't like when people hate on them because it's like, whatever.
These guys love Led Zeppelin and they're doing their thing and they love the old world and
you know, they're having fun.
What's like a thing that in music, a band or even just an idea that you like when people
hate on?
Great question.
Wait, what's something in music that.
That you agree with the.
That me?
The hateration on.
Oh, because you're really.
I'm very, I'm very diplomatic and positive.
Which I guess I appreciate because I get I'm the opposite.
Maybe I only like dislike artists if like I know proof positive that they're like an
ass.
But even then that's that's not about being an artist.
That's about a human thing.
It actually has nothing to do with their art.
Slippery slope here.
Yeah, it's a slippery slope, but no, just somebody who like people say their music sucks
and I'm like, yeah, that sucks.
It does suck, yeah.
I bet it's nobody.
Yeah, kind of nobody.
I mean, the you know, I've got my opinions.
It's one thing to have your opinion when you're just shooting this with you guys.
Yeah, but it's another thing to be like, I want to go out and hurt this person's feelings
like go go write a review that's really cruel to Greta Van Fleet or leave a mean comment.
This is me being mean to you and anyone who you might have mentioned.
So you're not going to do it.
So I'm just trying to think like, you know, when I watched the Grammys, I didn't particularly
enjoy the whole show, but I didn't really like see anything that one where I was like
it all like more or less made sense to me.
Yeah, sometimes I was like, that's not what I would have picked, but whatever.
And as we discussed, I was unfairly locked out of Grammy voting.
Somebody pointed out that there was a tie in one category.
I could have been the tiebreaker.
What was the best traditional R&B performance?
That was a tie between Leon Bridges and PJ Morton featuring Yeba.
Also best rap performance.
It was a tie between Kings Dead and Bubbalin.
Bubbalins by Anderson .Paak and Kings Dead is Kendrick and James Blake and all sorts of
people.
Who are you voting for?
I think I might have never heard either.
Ezra didn't vote.
Alec, if you don't know the last day of voting, Grammy voting eligibility or whatever, I went
on the website and it was the day and they had already closed voting.
Probably only for you.
It's possible.
Yeah, too diplomatic.
I'm too diplomatic.
Okay, best rap performance.
The choices were Be Careful by Cardi B, Nice for What, Drake, Kings Dead, Kendrick J Rock,
Future James Blake, Bubbalin, Anderson .Paak, Sicko Mode, Travis Scott.
I would have gone Sicko Mode.
I mean, Sicko Mode is kind of undeniably the best rap performance of those.
Yeah.
But I might have voted for Cardi B just because I want to see Cardi B win.
Yeah, that would have felt better.
And Cardi B did win Best Rap Album, so that's cool.
Yeah, that is cool.
I wanted her to win Album of the Year.
That didn't happen, but it's all right.
Who won Album of the Year?
Kacey Musgraves.
And I like Kacey Musgraves.
I'm a fan.
But it would have been cool for Cardi B to win it, first album.
Do you know either of the two that were tied?
No, I don't know that Anderson .Paak song.
Me neither.
I might have voted for Kings Dead just because I'm so diplomatic and I'd say, if I vote for
Bubbalin, Anderson .Paak wins a Grammy.
If I vote for Kings Dead, I'd be giving one to Kendrick, J Rock, Future, and James Blake.
Yeah, Everybody Eats.
That's right.
So that's kind of one of those moral questions.
If you could feed one man or feed four men.
Is that the song from Black Panther?
Yeah, Kings Dead is one of the songs from Black Panther.
Tight song.
I don't know it.
Should we listen to it?
I feel like we should listen to both and then you can vote on it.
Hopefully it's the same song I'm thinking of.
You're hearing it here first, folks.
Two weeks after the Grammys, we finally decide if I voted.
Remember there was that OJ Simpson wrote the book that never came out called If I Did It?
Yeah.
This is my book.
If I voted in the 2019 Grammys, I could have changed history.
You know, his first line was missing me with the bullsh*t and I have a really good idea
for a female rapper that involves that phrase.
Missing me with the bullsh*t.
His first line was miss me with the bullsh*t.
I want a female rapper.
Her name is Miss Me, Ms.me and her first single is with the bullsh*t.
That's cool.
Come on.
That's good.
Someone got to do it.
And Miss Me is just kind of a good name.
Yeah, Miss Me, that works.
All right.
I get it.
Yeah, that song is sick.
It's pretty good.
We didn't hear James Blake's part.
I don't think.
You never know.
Definitely never heard this.
I think I maybe heard King's Dead for a second in an Uber or something.
Was that the same sample as Britney?
Oh, Toxic?
Yeah.
Could be.
This is Kendrick again.
Similar flow.
It's close.
It's probably just some other Bollywood.
Yeah, they're both referencing Bollywood strings.
If I'm honest, I wouldn't have affected the category because those are both good songs.
It would have been Sicko Mode, man.
I would have voted for Sicko Mode or Cardi B.
Yeah, Sicko Mode is a good song.
Yeah, Sicko Mode is pretty undeniable.
Yeah.
I mean, it's funny.
It's like in some categories, it's like popularity shouldn't matter.
But then it is weird when just like a generally beloved hit song like Sicko Mode is not honored.
Yeah, this song is a good song.
And also Sicko Mode is three songs in one.
Yeah, that's true.
Do you know this song, Jake?
I don't think so.
Is this Sicko Mode?
Yeah.
Good title.
Yeah, right?
Yeah, this is amazing.
It's never been in the top five for us.
This is like one of the biggest songs of the year.
Astro.
Yeah.
Sun is down, freezing cold.
Sun is down, freezing cold.
That's how we already know.
When it's here, my dog will probably do it for me.
Well, the cover of that single is tie-dye.
The mix of hippie and some black metal funk.
I tried to show.
So the first minute is this vibe.
And then...
Oh, not yet.
It's coming.
Yo, did you hear somebody remade this out of all Animal Crossing sounds?
It's sick.
They remade the beat with Animal Crossing sounds.
And they did the vocals with little Animal Crossing sounds.
So it's like...
It's sick.
That's my favorite song, actually, of 2018.
Sicko Mode, Animal Crossing.
This might be eligible for the Grammys next year.
Yeah.
What do you mean Animal Crossing?
It's a video game.
Oh.
That people play on...
Gotcha.
Facebook a lot or Nintendo DS.
I don't know, man.
It kind of sounds for babies, if I'm honest.
There you go.
Honest opinion.
Yeah, you know, I don't like to talk...
I don't like to talk...
It's the first time you ever hated on anything.
Because any artist that's out there sticking their neck out, I respect.
The artist in this case.
I don't know the names of the characters in Animal Crossing, but...
I'm not hating.
I'm just saying it kind of sounds like it's for babies.
Well, Sicko Mode doesn't sound like it's for babies?
No, it sounds like it's for adults.
Interesting.
I just think because Sicko Mode, you actually can hear the words and stuff.
And this is like...
You know, it's like...
What is that?
It suggests...
You know the words already.
Yeah, I guess you have a point.
Maybe this one's for adults, actually.
It's very sophisticated.
Because it's assuming you know the words.
Fair point.
It is kind of Borgesian in a way.
Yeah.
Anyway, we got a lot of Patrick World songs.
I don't think you've heard any of them yet.
I haven't.
For some reason, SoundCloud doesn't work on my phone.
Do you have the app?
No, I don't have...
I know.
When you play it off the browser on the phone, it's weird.
Yeah, it's just...
Because it's a widget.
Yeah, it's really annoying.
I don't know what that means.
So let's check it out.
This is a friend of the show, Patrick World, who's blessed us with so many great songs.
And he made one specifically for Jake's birthday.
Right.
It's called Shallow Birthday.
I think I know where this is heading.
Is that what it's called?
Shallow Birthday.
♪ Tell me something, Jake ♪
Wow.
♪ Did you enjoy some tasty birthday cake? ♪
♪ I know I missed the date ♪
♪ Classic TC, this is three weeks late ♪
Love that.
♪ Celebrate ♪
♪ The tasteful palate of an awesome guy ♪
♪ Born this day ♪
Very touching.
Yeah.
♪ 18 years after the music died ♪
Damn.
♪ For he's a jolly good fellow ♪
♪ For he's a jolly good fellow ♪
♪ Low, low ♪
♪ Jake's a jolly good fellow ♪
♪ A mellow and chilled out bro ♪
Wow.
Incredible work.
Touching.
Very touching.
Honestly touching.
Yeah.
Again, his attention to detail.
Oh yeah.
Mad love for that.
♪ For he's a jolly good fellow ♪
18 years to the date after the music died.
Crazy.
Okay, I think this is Patrick World's Jamflow Man rewrite.
Nice.
Shout out to Twiddle, friends of the show.
Mahali.
♪ Have you heard of the TC Man ♪
♪ Best internet radio host in the land ♪
♪ Talking fish and the dead ♪
♪ He's a jam band fan ♪
♪ Chop it up with Jake ♪
♪ That's his right hand man ♪
♪ The TC Man at the age of nine ♪
♪ Packed his bags, made up his mind ♪
♪ Left NYC, headed to LA ♪
♪ Wheels up on his first show the very same day ♪
♪ Seinfeld, used to crunch numbers, man ♪
♪ He's MIA, now he's on the lam ♪
♪ But the TC Man still does his show ♪
♪ Fortnite, Leon, Beats Radio ♪
♪ The TC Man also has a band ♪
♪ They fit into the Venn diagram ♪
♪ Of things that please the TC fans ♪
♪ And also stuff that they just can't stand ♪
Where is this guy?
This guy rules.
This is in Montreal.
It's gotta come out when a vampire comes to Montreal.
♪ Boy, this year's been kind of rough on me ♪
Wait, wait, wait, hold on.
♪ Lots of trouble, beer and trap country ♪
♪ Now I wanna go back in the shallow low ♪
♪ I miss my favorite show, my favorite show ♪
♪ I can't wait till January ♪
♪ Need a brand new TC ♪
♪ Boy, when will it be ♪
♪ Whoa, hold up, girl, you didn't change your calendar ♪
♪ Flip it over and see ♪
♪ It's 2019, 2019, 2019 ♪
♪ Baby, it's 2019 ♪
♪ It's 2019, 2019, 2019 ♪
♪ Baby, it's 2019 ♪
Wait, why doesn't this guy have an opening slot
on one of those shows?
We could bring him up in Montreal.
I think we're--
You kinda have to.
He really nailed my impression of Florida Georgia Line.
Wait, actually, hold on.
I forgot to tell you guys this.
This is crazy.
Florida Georgia Line's opening for Vampire?
No, because--
And you're opening for Florida Georgia Line.
You're in Florida Georgia Line.
There's this thing before the Grammys called the Clive Davis Dinner.
Is he the guy that manages Metallica?
No, that's Cliff Bernstein.
Okay.
Clive Davis ran Arista Records,
and he was instrumental in the careers of Whitney Houston or Reetha,
you know, just a legendary guy.
Sure.
And so he throws this thing that's this kind of famous
night before the Grammys dinner party thing.
I almost went once.
Oh, did you?
But I didn't.
It's interesting.
It's at the--
I wasn't invited or anything.
It's in the same place where they have the Golden Globes,
the Beverly Hilton.
Okay.
I'd never been before,
and my manager said, "You wanna come?"
And I was like, "Yeah, sure."
And you know, so we got there.
As a showbiz professional, I know at least a handful of people.
And there's all sorts of random people.
Our boss, Tim Cook, was there.
Did you meet him?
No, I didn't meet him.
David Hockney was there.
Wow.
It was like a real who's who.
Did you say hi to Hockney?
No.
Did you recognize him or someone was like, "That's David Hockney"?
A bunch of people were like, "We're gonna go say hi to David Hockney."
Why the hell is David Hockney at the pre-Grammys dinner?
It's in California, right?
Yes, he's a California guy.
He's a California guy, yeah.
I'm aware he's a prominent Los Angeles artist.
There were like guys from the Super Bowl there.
Wow.
Maybe he painted the party.
Yeah.
All like the old school music biz legends.
Rashida's dad was there.
Kind of funny, just like running down-
The Hockney just blew my mind, but anyway.
Joey Mitchell was there.
Really?
Did you say hi to her?
No, I don't know them.
Wait, did you say hi?
Are you leading up to who you did say hi to?
Okay, okay.
No, I mean, I saw people who work at the label.
But did you say hi to anyone that we would be like, "Oh, he said hi to him or her"?
Okay, well, so it's not that.
We go and there's kind of like this intense energy.
There's like a lot of security to get through.
Sure.
I mean, Hockney's there.
Yeah, Hockney's there.
Did he bring a painting?
No, but he was dressed like an artist.
Other people were more conservative.
He had like a cool hat on?
He had like a cool suit.
You know, whatever I see-
Like really colorful or just like an interesting shape?
Yeah, kind of colorful. No, colorful.
So you smoked a bowl with Hockney and Joey Mitchell?
Oh, yeah.
No, and I see at a distance, "Oh, there's Diplo," and all the usual suspects.
You say hi to him?
That's not interesting.
Nope.
No, I said hi to people from the label.
I said hi to Rashida's dad and stuff.
So there's all this schmoozing.
Then they start serving dinner.
So you're like, "Get to your seat."
So then I go with my manager, and I'm sort of like plus one vibe.
I'm along for the ride.
Assigned seating.
It's assigned seating.
Yeah.
So we sit down at our table, and there's only two seats left.
So we squeeze right in those seats, and I look around, and there's a bunch of guys,
and then there's a somewhat younger woman, and there's some older people,
and me and my manager just pop down.
And I'm just kind of like, "All right, well, I don't know anybody at our table."
You know, it's like being at a wedding or something.
Sure, sure.
I don't know anybody at our table.
And then I sit down, and the guy next to me is very nice.
I really appreciate this, because at the end of the day, I'm kind of a shy person.
Or I'm more just like, you know, in public, don't bother people.
If they want to talk, they'll talk to you.
But that can also sometimes, you're the person who should be saying hi.
You know, it's always hard to know.
You know, are you being weird by not saying hi?
But anyway, it's always nice, I think, when you sit down at some kind of bizarre event
like that, and the person next to you just introduces themselves.
Yeah.
And just gets it going.
Out of the gate.
Yeah, so then this guy, you know, a little bit older than me, just kind of turns to me
and says, "Hey, man, what do you have to do with all this going on?"
And I was like, "Oh, I'm a musician."
And he's like, "Oh, that's cool."
He's like, "What kind of music?"
And I'm like, "Well, I'm in a band called Vampire Weekend."
And he goes, "Oh, that's interesting.
Let me guess.
Alternative?"
And I was like, "Guilty as charged."
And I was like, "What's your deal?"
Or whatever.
And he's like, "Well, my name's Chief."
And I was already like, "Sick."
Chief Keef.
Yeah, it was Chief Keef.
This guy's friendly and his name's Chief.
I already just get a great vibe off this dude.
And I say, "Well, how about you, Chief?"
And he's like, "Well, me and this guy to my left manage these guys.
And then there's two more guys, but they are the other side of the table.
They're a country duo called Florida Georgia Line."
That's tight.
Well, then I realized I didn't know what Florida Georgia Line really looked like.
And then I kind of look at them and I'm like, "Yo, whoa, I'm two seats away from Florida
Georgia Line."
And I'm very familiar with their catalog.
I'm very familiar.
Well, at least a few songs.
Yeah.
I'm a little bit starstruck.
And I start chopping it up with Chief.
Super nice guy.
And we just start talking a little bit.
And I asked him where he was from.
He says, "Vancouver."
And I was so curious about this.
And I was like, "Vancouver?
That's got to be kind of rare in country music."
Because they're based in Nashville now, at least partially.
And I was like, "Man, how do you end up going from Vancouver to Nashville?"
And then he told me that for years, he was the longtime tour manager of Nickelback.
Which makes sense.
Nickelback's Canadian.
Potbeckins.
So now I'm fascinated.
Because I never knew there was a Nickelback FGL connection.
It makes a lot of sense, aesthetically.
It kind of does make sense.
Oh, and also another thing that's interesting is in the music industry,
and I was also pretty impressed by this,
is that it's very rare to go from being a tour manager to a manager.
If you work in live music, you often tend to work in live music your whole life.
If you're a really good tour manager for a huge band like Nickelback,
you might just do that for the rest of your life.
There's these old school tour managers, very well paid.
Because they're running a small army across the world.
So it's not a classic transition.
So you have to really have some drive, some ambition, some insight to do it.
And I'm like, "How does that transition work? I've never heard of that."
And then I looked it up.
This is public information.
He got to know Nickelback's main producer.
So he starts managing the producer, dipping his toes into the management world.
And then at some point,
Nickelback's producer is looking to find some new artists to work with.
And at a state fair or something,
he comes across these two guys who turn out to be Florida Georgia Line.
And this guy's immediately like, "Well, these guys are sick.
They start working again."
So I didn't realize that there's a producer and management connection
between Nickelback and Florida Georgia Line.
And this guy, Chief, and his partner, whose name I don't remember, unfortunately,
they saw these two dudes and they immediately saw star potential
and they started managing them.
And now Florida Georgia Line is truly massive.
Was this in Florida and/or Georgia that they caught this state fair gig?
That's unclear to me.
But it was truly that random?
Well, it was a little random, but it was via the producer.
But anyway, there's this whole interesting Nickelback, Florida Georgia Line connection.
So already I'm stunned.
And it's also just an interesting-
I'm stunned right now.
It's an interesting music industry connection.
And the Florida Georgia Line guys, I didn't really get to jawbone with them.
And they were also there with their wives or girlfriends.
But they seemed like they were just having a great time.
They seemed like kind of chill dudes.
Then my manager's to my right,
and he's striking up a conversation with a very elegant older man.
So he brings me into that conversation.
He goes, "Well, Ezra's from New Jersey."
And this guy's talking about how he does some work in New Jersey.
And I'm like, "Where are you from?"
And he's like, "Well, you know, I live on Staten Island."
And I'm kind of like, "Oh, that's cool.
You're like a New Yorker."
And he said, "Well, originally I'm from Europe."
And then I'm kind of like taking chief's lead.
And I'm kind of like, "Oh, what brings you to this event?"
And he's like, "Well, we're here with my daughter."
You know, and then he gestures to his daughter,
who's sitting at the other end of the table.
And I was like, "Oh, is she a musician?"
He said, "Oh, yeah, she's a singer named Bebe Rexha.
She's performing with these guys."
And then I realized that me and my manager,
the only people sitting at the meant to be table.
It's literally the meant to be table.
And you just got squeezed in there.
I mean, I couldn't believe my luck.
I mean, if Seinfeld was here, he'd be losing his mind.
The two people I met at the table were both very nice.
Shout out to chief from the FGL crew
and shout out to Bebe Rexha's dad.
He was a really sweet guy.
What's his name?
Like John Rexha?
I gotta be honest, I didn't catch his name,
but he was one over from me.
Was Bebe at the table?
Yeah, no, she was-
You didn't recognize her?
No, I-
I just found out she was from New York.
I wouldn't recognize her.
Seinfeld would have.
I didn't quite know what any of these people looked like.
I know what she looks like.
She's from New York.
She's from New York.
Dude, how sick would it be if the party planner
was actually a TC head?
Oh yeah.
And deliberately placed you there.
That'd be amazing.
You never know where-
I could see it.
TC heads are like a secret society.
Like then the waiter brought-
Skull and bones, dude.
Then at the end, the waiter brought me a second dessert
and was like, "On the house."
On the house, my friend.
It was that pancake from-
It was the pancake from the Harmony Hall video.
(laughs)
So anyway, yeah.
It's just popcorn and raisins.
(laughs)
He brought us a tray of popcorn and raisins
and then silently nodded.
The waiter came back and it was Seinfeld
and he just like went like, "Shh."
So anyway, I'm sitting there and I'm like-
Jesus.
At an event like that, I'm always ready
to just kind of like check out.
Yeah.
And then I'm like, "Whoa, now I'm back.
"This is exciting."
But then here's the downside.
Uh-oh.
I got to meet Chief and I got to meet BB's dad
and they're both super nice.
But you know, I'm an artist
and I love to have artist to artist conversations.
Oh, they wouldn't let you in.
And I said, "Chief, can you introduce me?"
He said, "Absolutely not."
No.
(laughs)
So we're just sitting there.
But then here's the thing.
Then the performances start.
Uh-huh.
And they perform "Meant to Be"
at the Clive Davis function.
So next thing you know, literally the entire table vanishes
to go backstage to get ready.
And actually they were so polite.
Like the Florida Georgia Line crew was like,
"Oh, don't worry.
"We won't leave you guys alone too long."
But then, you know, they had to go do their thing.
And normally I wouldn't bring it up
just to say like, you know, I'm a humble person.
I try not to show off too much
about like say meeting an FGL.
But the fact that I was, it wasn't just FGL.
I was at the "Meant to Be" table.
Oh yeah, no, I mean.
I mean, talk about "Meant to Be."
That's TC Cannon.
That's TC Cannon.
And then, you know, we watched them perform and-
How was the performance?
Honestly, they nailed it.
And actually made me want to go deeper on FGL
because I realized on that song,
one of the guys sings lead and one guy sings harmony.
I thought they both sang lead on that song.
Oh, like traded?
No, but yeah, only one guy sings lead on it.
Honestly, all their vocals sounded great.
I don't know if they ended up winning any Grammys,
but it's a shame if they didn't
'cause that's obviously one of the songs of the year.
You know, there's very few people
that I would go out of my way to jawbone with.
FGL and Bebe Rexha perhaps,
just for the TC-ness of it, I might have to.
But then it wasn't "Meant to Be."
It wasn't.
I think this is more the appropriate TC story.
Yeah, that's what was meant to be.
It's kind of a non-story.
Yeah, this is what was meant to be.
Yeah.
A solid 15-minute segment on TC.
Yeah, I almost forgot about that.
So thank you, Patrick World, for reminding me.
♪ Baby, lay on back and relax ♪
♪ Kick your pretty feet up on my dash ♪
♪ No need to go nowhere fast ♪
♪ Let's enjoy right here where we at ♪
♪ Who knows where this road is supposed to lead ♪
♪ We got nothing but time ♪
♪ As long as you're right here next to me ♪
♪ Everything's gonna be all right ♪
♪ If it's meant to be, it'll be, it'll be ♪
♪ Baby, just let it be ♪
♪ If it's meant to be, it'll be, it'll be ♪
♪ Baby, just let it be ♪
♪ So won't you ride with me, ride with me ♪
♪ See where this thing goes ♪
♪ If it's meant to be, it'll be, it'll be ♪
♪ Baby, if it's meant to be ♪
♪ I don't mean to be so uptight ♪
♪ But my heart's been hurt a couple times ♪
♪ By a couple guys that didn't treat me right ♪
♪ I ain't gonna lie, ain't gonna lie ♪
♪ 'Cause I'm tired of the fake love ♪
♪ Show me what you're made of ♪
♪ Boy, make me believe ♪
♪ Oh, hold up, girl, don't you know you're beautiful ♪
♪ And it's easy to see ♪
♪ If it's meant to be, it'll be, it'll be ♪
♪ Baby, just let it be ♪
♪ If it's meant to be, it'll be, it'll be ♪
♪ Baby, just let it be ♪
♪ So won't you ride with me, ride with me ♪
♪ See where this thing goes ♪
♪ If it's meant to be, it'll be, it'll be ♪
♪ Baby, if it's meant to be ♪
- You're listening to Time Crisis on Beast One.
- I was just gonna wrap it up and say
Patrick World continues to just drop top level material.
- Okay, and we got one more, so--
- We got one more?
- We got one more, we got a real backlog of Patrick World.
He's very--
- Prolific.
- He's very prolific.
Last time we were talking about Ariana Grande's tattoo.
Despot, you hear about this?
- Small charcoal grill.
- Yeah, small charcoal grill, yeah.
- So--
- What was this supposed to be though?
I forgot, oh, seven ring.
- It was supposed to be seven rings.
It actually said small charcoal grill.
I'm sure we weren't the only people who said this,
but we were saying that knowing that Ariana Grande
is a very kind of savvy pop star,
she knows how to kind of surf popular culture.
She knows how to weave her own personal life into her songs
and kind of use social media.
- Remember when we went to Ariana Grande's show at Barclays?
- Oh, that's true.
That was before she was like super cool.
- She had Barclays though?
- No, no, that was at the Garden actually.
- Was it?
- I think it was at the Garden.
- I think it was Barclays, but she had that glove,
remember, that modulated her voice
and it was like some imaging he--
- Yeah.
- That was sick, but she didn't keep doing that, did she?
- I don't know, maybe she does.
Maybe it's like just part of her live camp,
you know it's how like Fish will every once in a while
jump on trampolines.
- Right.
- Ariana Grande every once in a while will be like,
"Now, you know, I haven't busted out the glove
"in about three and a half years.
"Should I do it?"
That was also interesting 'cause it was like
she hadn't quite got the props she's getting now
as being like the super interesting one
or one of the super interesting ones.
- And she showed like a documentary of her
and Imogen Heap like developing these gloves.
- Yeah.
- Like they were actually working on them together.
- It was great.
I remember, yeah, I remember walking away being like,
"It's like Frampton, dude."
- She's got a great voice.
- Yeah.
- Well, everybody already knew she had a great voice
and you know, some big songs,
but it was kind of like,
"Okay, she's a little experimental too."
- Yeah.
- Now, flash forward to 2019,
she gets her Seven Rings tattoo,
turns out it's a small charcoal grill.
There's a certain type of person
who couldn't come back from that.
There's a type of weak singer
who would probably get roasted for that
and they'd be so embarrassed.
- Just folds.
- Who would that be?
- I'm not gonna say.
- I know.
- Maybe the guy who made the Animal Crossing.
- Sicko mode.
- That's f**ked up.
You know that's who you're targeting of all people.
- I just got a problem with that.
Oh, wait, no, I forgot you convinced me that it's good.
I actually like it.
It's not baby music.
- Yeah.
- So anyway, we were saying that Ariana Grande,
if anybody would know what to do
with a pretty embarrassing tattoo snafu,
it would be Ariana Grande.
And we started saying that she would probably
write a song on her next album.
- I feel like you wrote the song.
- We basically wrote the song
and it was like a trap song that just went,
"Small charcoal grill, small charcoal grill."
And then, you know, she would sing some R&B stuff
and, you know, talk about her hair.
- That's just a very literal song.
- Slab on my knob pattern there.
- Yeah, but she came back into fashion
the past couple of years.
Small charcoal grill.
(mimics song)
Yeah, something about like,
she'll kill you if you talk about her tattoo.
- Mm-hmm, of course.
- And she'll probably, you know,
I think lately in her music,
there's been like a real confidence
and kind of braggadocio.
- Yeah.
- So maybe there'd be something about like,
I don't need to know how to read Japanese, you know?
- That's a little...
- Yeah, that probably wouldn't help her,
given some of her recent stuff.
Like, okay, you know how to read Japanese.
I just bought...
- Japan.
- I just bought Japan.
(laughs)
Yes, you know, I don't know.
I don't wanna write, I'm not trying to write the song.
I'm just saying that if anybody would kind of
take something a little embarrassing or awkward
and turn it into gold,
I could picture that a number one,
like she did that with "Thank U, Next."
- Yeah, true.
- You know, don't be surprised if this summer,
there's a number one hit song, Ariana Grande,
featuring Lil Durk, "Small Charcoal Grill."
- Featuring Patrick World.
- Okay, so anyway,
I guess Patrick World actually cooked up.
- Ariana and Dirk would be good.
It makes sense.
- Yeah.
- He sings.
- Or maybe she would, yeah.
All right, let's check it out.
So this is Patrick World,
his version of "Small Charcoal Grill."
♪ Hosting a barbecue, what could be better? ♪
♪ This song is brought to you, sponsored by Weber ♪
♪ My tattoo artist was lacking in skill ♪
♪ So now I sing about small charcoal grills ♪
♪ Hibachi, I'm with 'em ♪
♪ The burgers, I flip 'em ♪
♪ I'm killin', at grillin' ♪
♪ These pork chops, so fillin' ♪
♪ Cook out with the fellas ♪
♪ Break out the modellas ♪
- Okay.
♪ Hitchhikers, and toothpicks ♪
♪ We havin' a picnic ♪
♪ The charcoal, get heated ♪
♪ It's ready, let's eat it ♪
♪ My neighbors, I shook ♪
♪ You come kiss the cook ♪
♪ The charcoal, get heated ♪
♪ It's ready, let's eat it ♪
♪ My neighbors, I shook ♪
♪ You come kiss the cook ♪
- Okay.
- Another smash.
- And Patrick World said,
"Guys, branded 'Small Charcoal Grills.'
"We get Arian on board, split the cash.
"Maybe Bayo does 'Seven Rings' remix
"with my guest vocal."
Okay.
- What is it, like eight or nine songs from Patrick?
- It's quite a few.
- Psyched for the TC vinyl.
- But that you can't just keep running with that flow,
'cause that's Soulja Boy.
- And that's 2 Chainz, really.
- Well, I guess she got called out for this song.
- Yeah, people were mad.
- But they were mad.
- Soulja Boy's really mad.
- They're mad, but it still hasn't stopped the song.
It's number one.
- Is it? I don't know.
- In many countries.
- I believe that.
That's cool.
Good for her. I like her.
- Aren't you allowed to steal flows in hip hop?
- Not really.
- Really?
- I mean, a lot of people do it,
but I think it's frowned upon.
- You gotta write new lyrics,
and they make a new beat,
and come up with a new flow?
- Yeah, man.
- That's a lot.
- I know.
- That's a lot.
- Yeah.
- It's a lot you gotta come up with.
- Yeah, three things.
- I got seven rings, but I don't have three things.
- Yeah, exactly.
- All right.
- What was "Seven Rings" about, anyway?
- That was a very confusing kind of black hole for TC.
It's not one of our proudest moments.
- All right.
- We were trying to figure out what the song was about,
and also unpack the controversy about the song,
and she got into it with the Princess Nokia.
- But did she get into it with her?
- Yes.
- Oh, I didn't know that.
- We at least know that much.
- I thought Princess Nokia was--
- Arielle was doing some serious reporting.
- Yeah.
- I thought Princess Nokia was yelling into a vacuum.
- No, apparently Ariana did respond,
but then she deleted it, and--
- Oh, I didn't know that.
Well, good for both of them.
- Basically, we were reading one of those crazy articles
that's kind of like gossipcop69xo.com
that just kind of like says like,
"Ariana Grande clap back, but then delete it,"
and it's just like, you just cannot follow the story.
- What was the clapback? Do you remember?
- Uh, something about how she's not racist,
she's solving racism? Is that correct?
- Oh, that's a bad clapback.
(laughing)
That is a take-backable clapback.
- I don't even want to try to get into that again.
- Well, I mean, good for her.
Solve racism.
So that's over?
(laughing)
Again, we're gonna have to crack open the books.
We need official confirmation from Ariana.
♪ Comes a time when you're drifting ♪
♪ Comes a time when you settle down ♪
♪ Comes a life, feelings lifting ♪
♪ Lift that baby right up off the ground ♪
♪ Oh, this old world keeps spinning 'round ♪
♪ It's a wonder tall trees ain't laying down ♪
♪ There comes a time ♪
♪ You and I, we were captured ♪
♪ We took our souls and we flew away ♪
♪ We were right, we were giving ♪
♪ That's how we kept what we gave away ♪
♪ Oh, this old world keeps spinning 'round ♪
♪ It's a wonder tall trees ain't laying down ♪
♪ There comes a time ♪
- You wanna hear something kind of freaky?
- Yeah, would love to.
- This is super morning radio vibe.
So guys, this is something kind of kooky and weird.
- Interesting item.
- This is something kind of flying around on the internet recently.
Did you know that three of the four last US presidents
were born in 1946, the same year?
And not only the same year, we're talking about a two month span.
Donald Trump was born June 14th, 1946.
George W. Bush was born July 6th, 1946.
And Bill Clinton was born August 19th, 1946.
- So Bill Clinton was like our beautiful young president.
- Well, now he's just as old as Trump and Bush.
- Yeah, but when he was the president, he was a dashing young man.
- We got him in his prime.
- Yeah, playing the saxophone.
- The US Census Bureau considers 1946 to be the first year of the baby boom,
which lasted until 1964.
And obviously Barack Obama is the one out of the last four
who was not born in 1946.
He was born in 1961.
- Still a boomer.
I'm psyched for a Gen X president.
- Oh man.
- Just a real ironic president.
- Do we even wanna start talking about the primaries?
- I think I should run for president
or like at least mayor of New York or something.
- I'd vote for you.
- I think I'd win.
- Why not?
- I don't wanna do it.
- Give it a shot, man.
- I think it's a bit of a thankless task.
- Yeah, I don't wanna do it, but I wanna win.
(laughing)
- You know, people are already starting to talk about, you know, Bernie.
- He's back.
- Bernie's back.
- Where are you at with Bernie 2019/20?
- I mean, he's running and you know.
- He's part of the TC story.
- He's part of the TC story.
I really got to crack open the books and see.
- You seem ambivalent.
- You know, I got scars from all the culture wars, man.
- So you're worried about it opening up a divisive fight within?
- Well, look, it's already divisive, so who knows?
But I guess, you know, we'll see who's left.
We'll see how people do, but--
- It's too early to get too fired up about it.
- We got like coded language right there.
We'll see who's left.
- Yeah, we'll see who's really left.
Who's ready to lead the revolution.
- Interesting.
- Obviously, we gotta support whoever would win,
but some people have said this.
It's kind of a bad sign if somebody wants to be president,
but somebody needs to be president.
You know what I mean?
- Yeah.
- It's like weird to want to be president.
- Yeah, it's pretty weird.
I want to be president.
- You do want to be president?
- Yeah.
- I mean, I guess the argument you would make for Sanders
is that he has a distinct worldview.
- He's consistent.
I mean, it would be great to just get somebody--
- I like that guy.
He's like a professor from a Disney movie or some (beep).
Like he's all clumsy and like (beep) falling apart and blowing up.
- He's invented flubber.
- He says like, "Gee willikers" or something.
Yeah.
- Of course.
Of course I love Bernie.
I need to see what else, what's going on though.
- It's too early to get--
- It is early.
- The primaries are a goddamn year away.
- Yeah.
Don't forget to register though.
- All right, that was--
- Don't forget to register.
- Our political coverage for the entire year.
- We'll have plenty more to talk about.
But I mean, don't you think this is weird
that these guys were all born in 1946?
- You think they all came from like the same--
- Within two months?
- Giant egg.
- Kind of.
- Big egg.
- Yeah, there's something shady about it.
- And they popped out of it and then they were incubated.
- What are you talking?
I mean, it's just the baby boom.
- They're all from like some weird fertility experiment.
- Do you follow the Instagram account, Illuminati Killers?
- Wow.
- I do follow a few conspiracy theory ones.
What do they have to say?
- I don't know.
Crazy stuff.
- You don't wanna share?
- Not really.
(laughing)
- Theoretically, you would think that maybe every president
would get like a little bit younger.
Or you would say like, you know, if people like Bill Clinton,
you might say, all right, people like a president
who's around that age.
- How old was he, like 50?
- I think he was in his 40s.
- He started in his 40s.
But then it's weird.
- So did Obama.
- It's just weird that, 'cause sometimes people talk
about the power of the baby boomers,
almost in like conspiracy theory terms.
You know, you sometimes see this framework
where it's like the boomers versus millennials.
And it's like the boomers hold power.
They don't respect millennials and the struggle
and they took all the good jobs
and they don't know how good they have it.
And they, whatever, they make fun of millennials
who clearly have less opportunity.
And you're kind of like, all right, well, obviously
we're talking about hundreds of millions of people.
It's more complicated than that.
And then you're like, but three presidents,
20 years of presidency so far.
We're all born in within two months in 1946.
I'm not trying to go to Alex Jones, but come on.
That's clearly some kind of weird phrase.
- I've seen the documents.
- Yeah, it's weird.
- It was in an egg.
It was probably in an egg, a big egg.
- I think it was a big egg.
- They all came out of the same big egg.
- They came out of the same big egg.
And we don't know exactly how these big eggs function.
- The big egg theory.
- It is definitely a big egg.
And for all we know, the spawn come out of the big egg
over two months.
- Right.
- That might seem kind of weird
in terms of what we know about human childbirth.
But in the big egg, it's different.
- Yeah, they incubate in the egg.
They hatch at different rates,
depending on a bunch of things.
- Exactly.
- Wait, hold on.
What does this say?
This says that 1946 was the year of the fire dog.
- What's that?
- In the Chinese year designations.
- Oh, you can't--
- You get an animal and you also get like an element.
Like wasn't it the year of the fire monkey recently?
- Oh, I didn't know that.
I just knew it was the animal.
I think I'm a dog.
- A fire dog.
- I know it's a pig right now,
but what is it, an ice pig or something?
I thought it was just a pig.
- It would be crazy though,
if the Democratic nominee was another baby boomer.
If it was like Sanders or, is Elizabeth Warren,
she's like 70, right?
- Younger than Bernie for sure.
1946 was the year of the fire dog.
And then 2006 was the next year of the fire dog.
So we probably got some 13 year olds right now
who hatched out of the same egg pod.
They got something going on.
The fire dog has an extremely active
and outgoing personality.
- Wait, what if I'm a fire dog?
- No, but you're not, 'cause you're just a dog.
- What?
- Because the only fire dog years were 1946 and 2006.
- But I gotta be a something dog, right?
- You're some kind of dog.
- Where do you find out your element?
What is this?
- I don't know, but I'm just on some--
- Oh, I'm a water dog.
- You're a water dog.
You're the opposite of these dogs.
You wanna hear some other famous dogs?
According to fengshuiweb.co.uk.
- Yeah.
- Sylvester Stallone.
- Sick.
- Donald Trump, we already knew that.
- Yeah.
- Freddie Mercury.
- Great.
- Elvis Presley.
- Not so good.
- I mean, but these are major dudes.
- True.
- Uma Thurman.
- I like her.
- Naomi Campbell.
- I like her.
- Kate Bush.
- I like her.
- Madonna.
- She's cool.
- David Bowie.
Whoa, that's a lot of major stars.
Freddie Mercury, Elvis Presley, Madonna, Judy Garland, David Bowie.
- These are all fire dogs.
- No, these are just dogs.
- Oh, okay, good.
(laughs)
- These are all just dogs.
- Well, I'm a dog.
- Wow, fire dogs taking over.
- What are you?
- It's a little embarrassing.
- You're a rat.
- Yeah.
- Knew it.
(laughs)
- But hold on, let's see what kind of rat.
Can you look up April 1984?
Can I get a number crunch on...
- So every month has an animal?
- It's every year.
- Oh, every year.
- Well, but I thought that the, I guess, does it just straight up
correspond to the Gregorian calendar?
- Well, it's a little bit, because the Chinese New Year is what?
The Lunar New Year is like January.
- Yeah, so I thought maybe it's a little different.
- Slightly.
- Oh, I'm a water rat.
- I'm a water dog.
- I guess we're two water dudes.
Okay, what about Jake?
You were born in '77?
- Yeah, February of '77.
Fire.
- Fire snake.
- That's pretty dope.
- Whoa, what?
- Wow.
- That's way better.
- I don't know what any of this means, but...
- I would have thought you'd be something chill, like an earth...
- Dog.
- Earth dog.
(laughs)
- Wait, no, I'm not in that year.
It's February 18th, '77 to February 6th, '78.
- When, what's your birthday?
- February 3rd.
- Oh, shoot.
- Whoa, okay.
- I'm 1976 then, what's that?
- We gotta get somebody on the show to actually explain this stuff to us.
- I knew you weren't a fire snake.
Couldn't be.
- Now we're getting conflicting information here, folks.
- Now earth dog.
(laughs)
Earth monkey.
- Are you guys stoked for yesterday?
- For the movie "Better World With No Beatles"?
I'll see it.
- I mean, when I heard the concept...
- I didn't even know that.
- It made no sense, but the trailer, honestly, kind of winning.
- It's kind of a feel good trailer.
- Yeah.
Fire dragon.
- Fire dragon?
- It's even more badass.
- Yeah, it's crazy.
- Wait, yep.
- Mid-late '70s was no joke, folks.
- You're a fire dragon, man.
All right.
- I'll take it.
- I wanna be something better.
Maybe I can lie.
- All right, you're a fire dragon.
- Me too.
- It's about time to get in the top five, but real quick,
Jake hasn't seen the "Harmony Hall" music video yet.
- Nope, I have not.
- And I gotta hype it up.
- Let's do a private screening right now.
- A private screening.
Wait, Alec, have you seen it?
- Yeah, I told you, reminded me of "Toad the West Rockie."
- I was seeing you some clips,
so I don't know if you saw the whole thing.
- Oh, no, I saw the whole thing.
- All right, cool.
- I watched it in bed.
- So this is the "Harmony Hall" music video.
- Mm-hmm.
Now, I did visit the set.
- That's true.
Yeah, it's a bummer that I didn't drag you in for a cameo.
When you got there, we were still kind of setting up the kitchen scene.
- I was too early.
- So you've seen some of this.
- But I'm recognizing this set you're on here.
♪ We took a vow in summertime ♪
♪ Now we find ourselves in late December ♪
- It's a real snake.
- But is that like a melon there in the foreground?
- Yeah.
♪ I believe that New Year's Eve ♪
- You know what kind of snake it is?
- I forget, the guys told us.
There's this Australian snake wrangler, dude.
I do remember that somebody was like,
"What's the snake's name?"
And he goes, "It doesn't have a name.
"Just a snake."
(laughing)
And she's deaf.
- So you guys had like a film green or what?
- It was on film.
- Oh, it was?
- Yeah.
- Crazy.
♪ Thought that I was free ♪
♪ From all that questioning ♪
- Oh man, that's very like Blind Melon.
- Yeah, the fish eye.
- Oh yeah, there's CT wearing the--
- The Father's Day weekend.
♪ Anybody with a bullet in mind ♪
♪ Can never forgive the sight ♪
♪ Of wicked snakes inside ♪
- I just got a text from my friend.
He just writes, "Chorus of the new vampire song is tight."
- Nice.
(laughing)
- Chorus.
- I like the chorus.
- I was like, "The whole thing is tight, bro."
You gonna split hairs here?
- Danielle headbanging.
- Oh, that's tight.
- And I love the way they shot these parts.
It's like a very specific kind of like '90s look
where it gets like out of focus super quickly.
Like it's just, I forget what it's called.
- Short depth of field.
- Exactly.
♪ Within the heart of the black ♪
- This is a real device.
We found this like pancake artist
who built the pancake spirograph
and he FedExed it to us.
♪ Beneath these velvet gloves ♪
- So why'd you shoot on film?
This don't really look curious.
- Look cool.
♪ 'Cause I still remember ♪
- You know, obviously like some of the references for this
were kind of like old school '80s, '90s videos.
- Yeah.
- So we just wanted that like kind of real look.
And also the dude who directed Emmett,
he did "Giving Up the Gun" and "Holiday."
He's been directing videos since the '90s,
so we thought it'd be kind of cool.
♪ Another one begins ♪
♪ And the stone wall was a vomiting albaricness ♪
♪ And it battered with the wood and iron ♪
- This fish eye also reminds me
of "Smashing Pumpkins" videos.
- Oh, totally.
- From like "Simon's Dream" era.
- Uh-huh.
That stuff was probably filmed
on a lot of the same equipment.
♪ I don't wanna live like this ♪
♪ But I don't wanna die ♪
- RL came through and Dev was in town
and we're just like, "Oh, you wanna jump in?"
- Nice.
♪ Ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh ♪
- Oh, CT wardrobe change.
♪ I don't wanna live like this ♪
♪ But I don't wanna die ♪
- Yeah, I love all those slow-mo parts.
♪ And the stone wall was a vomiting albaricness ♪
- Yeah, I knew I wanted to do
like a pancake and bathrobe video.
And I knew I wanted to wear this bathrobe.
♪ And it battered with the wood and iron ♪
- About as simple as that.
♪ Wicked snakes inside a place ♪
♪ You thought was dignified ♪
- So I wonder if like kids that are like 20
who are watching this
that weren't watching music videos 20 years ago,
how this registers to them.
- No idea.
(laughing)
- End of discussion.
- This part's so dope.
♪ Ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh ♪
- They're sending out fireworks
in our candlelit black room setup.
♪ Ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh ♪
♪ I don't wanna live like this ♪
♪ But I don't wanna die ♪
- To me, it's all about the twirls.
That was like one of those things we were shooting it
and we started doing those
and I was like, this could have been the whole video.
♪ What am I, never forgive the side ♪
♪ Wicked snakes inside a place ♪
♪ You thought was dignified ♪
♪ I don't wanna live like this ♪
♪ But I don't wanna die ♪
- Oh, that's nice.
I kinda like that moment.
- Oh yeah, it's fun.
You know, they played the music like super fast
and we're just running around.
Jonah came through.
- Oh, nice.
- He directed the next Vampire Weekend video.
- When's that coming out?
- We gotta release the music first,
which will be pretty soon.
- When are you doing that?
- Really soon.
- A little D-Lo guitar there at the end.
- That's right.
- Nice, dude.
- That's the Harmony Hall music video.
- Woo!
- At first, I was on the fence if I wanted to do any videos.
Just when people--
- Pearl Jam style.
- Yeah.
We haven't made a lot of videos in the past six years.
On the last one, we kinda just made one.
We made a video for Unbelievers
and we just like canceled it.
- You didn't release it?
- Yeah.
- Just 'cause you didn't like it?
- It was cool.
I like the director.
- It's tough, man.
It's like you put all this time and energy into the music
and then you're like, "Well, we gotta--"
- "Gotta slap together a visual."
- "We got one day to film a video."
It's like, "All right."
- Yeah, exactly.
And that's how I feel.
We take so long on the music.
- Yeah.
- And there's a part of me that I always focus on the negative
and I'm like, "The video, to me,
"seems a way higher chance of misrepresenting the song
"or something."
- Sure.
- And also, I was really happy with our official audios
where we had some bugs and frogs
and I was like, "Those ones feel how the music sounds to me,
"but then I was also like,
"people were encouraging us to make videos
"and I kind of knew it was a slight cop out
"'cause people wanna see the artist at least partially."
But it came together.
- Yeah, man.
- We did our thing and we got another good one coming
that we shot in New York with Jonah.
- Tight.
It's a good video, that video.
- Yeah, "Despot" came through.
- Oh, this one?
- Yeah.
(laughing)
- Yeah.
- Yeah, on the last album we made,
"Dying Young" was the one video we made.
It's kind of like fun.
Dave's in that one.
- Oh, really?
Cool.
- Yeah.
- I was in that video.
- In "Despot," that's right.
- Damn, I played the Wii saxophone.
- That's right, that was a classic part of that video.
(laughing)
I just felt, you know, it's like making a video too,
it's like too many years go by
and it's like time to make a video
and you're just like, "I don't do this."
You know what I mean?
I spent a lot of time over the past five years
like thinking about music, writing songs or whatever.
That's part of the repertoire.
- Yeah.
- But then it's like, "Yeah, now it's time to make a video."
It's like, "Ugh."
- Yeah, really?
- But there's something nice about, you know,
being forced to do something.
Or not forced, nobody forced us,
but just being encouraged and then you're like,
"All right, how do we make this fun?"
- You were forced.
- No, if I put my foot down, nobody would have forced us.
These days in like music, like label people
are like very chill.
- Mm-hmm.
- I just think it's too much of a cliche
to be like on some "Bohemian Rhapsody,"
like, "You're not putting out that song."
- Yeah.
- "Oh my God."
You know, like that's too much of a cliche.
People generally who work at labels like music
and understand that it's personal for the artists
so nobody's too pushy.
Anyway, Harmony Hall music video, check it out.
New music coming very soon.
Let's get into this top five.
- It's time for the top five on iTunes.
- So this week on the top five.
- Harmony Hall.
- We got Harmony Hall in all five slots.
This week on the top five,
we're doing something pretty unusual.
I feel like on TC, we were getting stuck
in a bit of like a late '70s, early '80s rut for a while.
- That's just your opinion.
I don't think you're getting stuck in that.
I think--
- Jake is not complaining.
- I think that's a rich vein.
- Well, we're just switching it up.
- It's your show, man.
- I think we did one recently
that was in like the 2000s or something or the '90s.
- I think we did one from like 2013.
- Oh yeah, that was cool.
- Maybe two episodes ago
'cause that was the last time you put out a record.
And then last episode we did 1959.
- Yeah, so I like it.
We're switching it up.
Now we're going even further into the past.
- What are we doing?
- 1946 versus 2019.
Why 1946, Despot?
- Oh, 'cause all the presidents
were hatched from a giant egg that year.
- That's right.
So 1946, Billboard had a chart.
It had a slightly different name, but who cares?
Whatever, this is the Billboard 1946 top hits.
So we're gonna be comparing them
to the top five songs on iTunes right now.
So the number five song in 1946,
we're taking it way back.
Bing Crosby, well, he's famous.
- Yeah, heard of him.
- Heard of him.
- Yeah, I know who he is.
- The song though, "I Can't Begin to Tell You."
Not familiar.
(piano music)
Sounds about right.
- Yeah.
So these were based on record sales?
- Yeah, 'cause people were buying records.
♪ I can't begin to tell you ♪
♪ How much you mean to me ♪
♪ My world would end ♪
- This would be a funny one
'cause we're just fully before rock and roll.
- Yeah, all this stuff just sounds like it's a joke.
- I guess it's pop music though, right?
- Yeah.
- Yeah, this was originally recorded by John Payne
for the Oscar nominated film, "The Dolly Sisters."
- This is just like Christmas, someone's making a turkey.
You're a little kid, you're running around,
this (beep) is in the background.
Nobody likes it, but they're playing it.
- Burglars are trying to break into your house.
- Yeah, yeah.
- You're figuring out how to murder them.
- You're rigging up the Michael Jordan.
- Yeah.
♪ Whenever we're apart ♪
♪ But when you're near the words I choose ♪
♪ Refuse to let go ♪
- My dad probably likes this.
Nah, you know what?
He probably doesn't.
My dad's cool.
- I mean, it's not bad.
- Nah, it's fine.
- This spot's hating this.
- I'm sorry.
- Shout out to Carmen Cavallaro on piano.
- I don't dislike this.
♪ And make believe I've stood all day ♪
- Well, it's like, yeah, I mean, music from this era,
it's like so, the associations are so overdetermined.
It's like, yeah, either it's like Christmas
or it's like kind of a sad old memory of the past
or it's like a horror movie.
- Yeah.
- Like somebody's about to die.
- Yeah.
- In my neighborhood.
It's like even a little too weird for my neighborhood.
♪
- Oh no, I guess it could be.
- No, it could totally be.
- It's just a slightly different accent.
- Like the first 15 minutes of "Goodfellas."
- Right.
Brooklyn, 1946.
Anyway, out with the old, in with the new.
You know what I'm saying?
Here's the number five song on iTunes right now.
It's by a fella named Brett Young.
- The Bing Crosby of our day.
- And the song is called "Here Tonight."
- Brett Young?
- Yeah, what?
The football player or something?
- He performed this song on "The Bachelor" recently.
- Is that why this is a hit?
- Probably helped.
- Did he write it?
- With a few other people.
♪ In your eyes ♪
♪ Tonight ♪
♪ Please just let me stay ♪
- I like the Bing Crosby song a lot better.
- It's got a better palette.
- Now you're sorry you hate it.
- That was a hate, yeah.
♪ Underneath the stars ♪
♪ We are ♪
- What do you call that kind of voice?
When they're like, "How do, how do, how do?"
- Well, it's like country pop.
Technically, this is country.
- A guy trying very hard.
(laughing)
♪ We can just stay here in this a minute ♪
♪ Lose our drink and find ♪
- Yuck.
- Yeah, this sucks.
(laughing)
- Between me and Despot,
it's gonna be a real neg-head top five.
- Oh, yeah.
It's been a while since we've--
- Well, the Bing Crosby was like--
- Despot, I'm just saying, this shit sucks.
- It was pleasant, you know?
As much as I don't care about it.
- One thing I like that I'm reading
about Brett Young right now
is that he's from Orange County
and his album's called "Ticket to L.A."
- Okay, a little bit of a narrative there.
- This is probably a relatively inexpensive ticket.
- Yeah.
- From Orange County to L.A.
- Is that a bus ticket?
- Maybe.
How much is that, $9?
- Is there a flight?
No, right?
You can't do that.
- No, that'd be cool.
- No.
(laughing)
- Dude, that'd be tight.
Like, Orange County to Burbank flight?
- Yeah, what's that, a four-minute flight?
- You could drive there in 45 minutes.
- Well.
- Or maybe you buy a ticket
on one of those helicopter services.
- Right.
- Where you split it with some other dudes
and you only have to pay like $1,200 each.
- This guy's rich.
This guy was rich already.
♪ I'm a rich guy from Orange County ♪
- Brett Young.
♪ And I spent my last $1,200 ♪
♪ To split a ticket on that chopper ♪
♪ Landed on a helipad in downtown L.A. ♪
- Now what?
(laughing)
♪ And I spent my last 20K on a PJ to New York ♪
- Now what?
(laughing)
♪ I landed in the Hamptons ♪
♪ Now what? ♪
♪ Guess I'll get some breakfast solo ♪
(laughing)
- So that guy just sang that on "The Bachelor"
and then people watching "The Bachelor" were just like,
"I'll spend $1.29 for that song."
- Well, no, I don't, no.
Maybe he's already popping and they're just like.
- No, he's not.
- No, that's, he's not popping, dude.
That's just.
- You guys don't know anything about modern country?
- I wanna see what Brett Young.
- Wait, he was a college baseball pitcher?
That's tight.
- Dude, I say he sounded like a football player.
Same (beep)
- What are you talking about?
Baseball's a thinking man's game.
(laughing)
- He's 37, which is older than I would have thought.
- Whoa.
- Okay, I like him more now.
- I thought he was at least 37.
- He got started a little late with music.
All right, good for him.
- I've been doing it for a while.
- He looks like a (beep)
- Forgot about that, that's bad negative energy.
- I'm loving it.
(laughing)
- I'm a little outnumbered today.
Well, shout out to you, Brett Young.
- Let's keep it posi-core.
- The number four song back in 1946.
- Yep.
- Betty Hutton.
The song is called "Doctor, Lawyer, Indian Chief."
- Wow.
- What?
- I'm already.
- Compelling.
- Feeling like this is a song that should be left in the past.
(laughing)
But we can play a little bit.
- Well, see, now you're being mean to Betty Young,
Mr. Diplomatic over here.
- Betty Hutton.
- I forgot what you said.
- The lyrics are entitled,
"A Play on the Popular Counting Game, Tinker Tailor."
- This is a little more up-tempo.
♪ There's a doctor living in your town ♪
♪ There's a lawyer and an Indian too ♪
♪ Neither doctor, lawyer, nor Indian chief ♪
♪ Could love you any more than I do ♪
- What?
♪ There's a barrel of fish in the ocean ♪
♪ There's a lot of little birds in the blue ♪
♪ Neither fish nor fowl says the wise old owl ♪
♪ Could love you any more than I do ♪
♪ No, no, no, it couldn't be true ♪
- The song is just, "Nobody Loves You More Than I Do."
- Right, so it's just naming random things.
- Just random things.
- Using an offensive term for Native Americans.
- Yeah, and she even did the pronunciation
that is particularly offensive.
- Right.
♪ I saw my ticker text ♪
- Betty Hutton's canceled.
- Yeah.
(laughing)
- The number--
- She's dead too.
- Four, yep, she's been dead for a while.
- Yeah, that was--
- Well, whatever, she--
- Not everyone on this 1946 is dead.
- She didn't write this song.
That's actually a Hoagy Carmichael joint.
The Betty Hutton of our day,
with the number four song on iTunes,
is "Miss Ariana Grande."
♪ Yeah, breakfast at Tiffany's ♪
♪ And bottles of bubbles ♪
- I mean, this song references a song
from the early '60s, '50s.
- Oh, the Rodgers and Hammerstein?
- Yeah.
- They are two of the 10 writers on this song.
- Yeah.
- 10?
- It happens with the samples.
♪ I'd be a savage ♪
♪ Who would've thought it'd turn me to a savage ♪
♪ Rather be tied up with cars and not strings ♪
♪ Write my own checks like I write what I sing ♪
♪ You got this, stop watching ♪
♪ My neck is fussy ♪
♪ Make big deposits, my gloss is ♪
- This is a crazy factoid.
This week, Ariana became the first artist
to occupy the number one, two, and three spot
simultaneously on the Billboard 100
since 1964, the Beatles?
- Okay.
- So she's got seven rings.
- Three.
- Thank you, next.
What's the other one?
- "Break Up With Your Girlfriend," "I'm Bored."
- Top three?
- Now, keep in mind, that's Billboard.
We do iTunes.
- Oh, I know.
Still, that's crazy.
- Is that gonna be a headline?
"Seven Rings, Three Billboard Spots"?
- That'd be a good one.
- Yeah.
Take note.
- What if you just tweeted that?
(laughing)
- "Seven rings and three Billboard spots.
"Congratulations are in order to Ms. Ariana Grande."
(laughing)
- All right, I'll tweet that.
- Sign it.
Add Despot.
(laughing)
- Should I tweet that right now?
- Please do.
- All right.
(laughing)
- I like this other thing on this sheet they gave us.
"Recently squashed a beef with Piers Morgan."
- Oh, God.
- There was some dumb beef they had on Twitter or something.
- I'm sure it was mostly him.
- They bumped into each other at a restaurant
and cleared the air.
- Wonder what restaurant.
- That's the part I like.
- All right, I did it.
I'll let you guys know what the responses are like.
- We'll be checking in throughout the rest of the top five
to see the responses to Despot's uncharacteristically positive
congratulations tweet, "Tariana Grande."
Oh, and they took a picture,
and she said, "Turns out we really like each other."
- Who likes each other?
- I guess Ariana Grande and Piers Morgan like each other.
- Oh, that's cool.
Is he still on CNN?
- I don't know.
I thought he was like a total joke,
but he's on something.
He still has some kind of platform.
- All right.
- "The number three song back in 1946."
Well, this is a name we all know.
A guy by the name of Francis Albert Sinatra.
So this is some early Frank.
Oh, what it seemed to be.
He was 30 at this point?
- Yeah.
♪ It was just a neighborhood dance ♪
♪ That's all that it was ♪
- A neighborhood dance?
♪ But oh, what it seemed to be ♪
- Did your neighborhood have dances?
- They had a neighborhood dance, you know, back in the 40s.
♪ It was like a masquerade ball ♪
♪ With costumes and all ♪
- A neighborhood dance with costumes?
♪ You were at the dance with me ♪
- Is this about a dream he had?
Ball?
In Hoboken?
♪ It was just a ride on the train ♪
♪ That's all that it was ♪
- It was like a masquerade ball,
but it was just a ride on a train.
This guy's full of sh*t.
♪ But oh, what it seemed to be ♪
- Gonna get whacked for talking down on him.
(laughing)
- This spot's got seven likes already.
(laughing)
- How many followers do you have on Twitter?
- Like 20,000.
- Wow.
- Damn, son.
- Yeah, 19 and a half.
- I really stalled out on my Twitter.
- Well, another--
- Although I'm not really on it that much.
- Another kind of spooky song from the past.
- He was lying.
- Yeah, I really tuned that one out.
- He was just making stuff up again.
- I mean, Frank's got some great--
- The first lady was making up, like,
"I love you more than all these random things I made up,"
and then Frank Sinatra was like,
it was like a ride on the train,
it was like a masquerade ball,
it was like a neighborhood dance.
- But the song's called "Oh, What It Seemed To Be."
- All right, well, what was it actually?
- It was just some regular stuff.
- I don't know.
- The number three song in 2019,
we've been hearing this one a lot,
Post Malone and Sway Lee, "Sunflower."
[upbeat music]
- ♪ Eh, eh, eh, eh ♪
♪ ♪
- ♪ Ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh ♪
♪ ♪
- Sway Lee is like a beautiful angel.
- He's a good-looking guy.
- I meant the way he sings, but yeah, whatever.
- I'm both.
[laughter]
- I mean, yeah.
- ♪ Innocent say I keep her checked ♪
♪ She was a bad, bad, bad, bad, bad ♪
- ♪ Done with the list ♪
♪ Calling it quits now, baby, I'm a wreck ♪
♪ Crash at my place, baby, you're a wreck ♪
♪ Needless to say, I'm keeping her checked ♪
♪ She was a bad, bad, bad, bad, bad, bad ♪
♪ Done with the list ♪
♪ Calling it quits now, baby, I'm a wreck ♪
♪ Crash at my place, baby, you're a wreck ♪
♪ Thinking in a bad way, losing your grip ♪
♪ Screaming at my face, baby, I'm a killer ♪
- "Sunflower" is the first Hot 100 number one
from a "Spider-Man" soundtrack.
Sorry, Chad Kroger.
"She-Ro" from the 2002 film stalled at number three.
- Hmm.
- Is that, um...
- ♪ She wanna ride me like a cruise ♪
- That doesn't really seem right for a "Spider-Man" movie.
"She wanna ride me like a cruise."
- Yeah, that's some...
- Chill out. It's a kids movie.
- Why can't I saw some PG-13?
- Why can't "Spider-Man" explore his sexuality?
"Spider-Man" didn't...
- This is not an R-rated franchise, man.
- It's not really what "Spider-Man" is about.
Although there is some romance.
"Spider-Man" didn't say he wanted to ride her like a cruise.
- So we're talking about how this girl
wants to ride "Spider-Man" like a cruise?
- Yeah.
- Maybe he's just bringing her somewhere.
- Is it Mary Jane?
- Maybe she's just grabbing on
and he's web-slinging her to somewhere safe.
- Is it Mary Jane?
I haven't seen the "Spider-Verse" movie yet.
- I haven't seen it either, but...
- Oh, is it Gwen Stacy?
- I saw a lot of tweets about how people, like,
cried while they were watching it.
- Oh, yeah, people loved it.
- I don't know what that's about.
- The whole soundtrack is very R-rated.
- I think it's the sex scene.
- Really?
- Huh.
- Yeah, for a kids movie.
- What's the film rating? PG-13 or PG?
- No, PG.
- Wow.
- But, you know, you have A Boogie with a Hoodie.
- Ooh.
- Singing "Look Back At It."
You have 6'9" on the soundtrack.
I mean...
- Ooh, that's a risky move.
- I think people were very moved in the film
because there's so much talk about riding Peter Parker.
Oh, no, it's not Peter Parker.
It's Miles Morales.
- I don't know.
Who's Miles Morales?
- One of the Spider-Men.
- Oh, right.
There's all these new Spider-Men.
- There's a lot of different Spider-Men,
so I don't know. I'm not exactly sure.
- Isn't there a pig? There was a pig one, right?
- Yeah, that might be the one that she wants to ride
like a cruise.
- The pig.
- Yeah.
(laughing)
Oh, wait.
Maybe she just meant she wanted to, like,
take a piggy ride.
Ride on his back.
- A piggyback.
- A piggyback ride.
Okay, it's PG after all.
- Well, that's what I was saying, yeah.
- Anyway, I kind of alluded to before,
all the TC heads, or at least the VW heads,
already know that one of our next songs
is called "Sunflower."
I wrote it way before this.
Should I care?
I mean, what are you going to do?
- No, you shouldn't care.
- And I love Posty and Sway Lee.
Despot's the first person to tell me about Post Malone.
- Well, I'm sorry.
- Shout out to Despot.
- You were one of the first people
who said Post Malone is good,
about a million years ago.
You heard White Iverson on SoundCloud.
- He played a show at Santos Party House
where Lil Uzi opened for him.
- Didn't you, like, bring him to Coachella to do--
but it wasn't--
- In an interview magazine party.
- Yeah.
- He didn't exist yet.
Then he started existing after that.
I paid Post Malone $500 to perform at that show,
and Uzi $200.
- That's crazy.
- [laughs]
- Man.
- It didn't sell out.
- For $700, you too could have a Post Malone,
Lil Uzi Vert show.
- If you find the new ones.
- If you find a time machine.
- Yeah, that too.
- Anyway, even though I think there's some mutual respect,
does it matter that we have a song called "Sunflower"?
It's a very different song.
- I think it matters, yeah.
- Different market.
- [laughs]
Well, you got to understand that we had a song called
"Flower Moon," and then I wanted a sister song
for "Flower Moon."
- Right.
- And the opposite of "Flower Moon" is "Sunflower."
- Okay, copy that.
- It's a good song too.
Well, whatever.
- It's also a pretty common--
- Flower.
- Flower, yeah.
- Yeah, there's probably a lot of songs called "Sunflower."
- I'm sure there are.
- There are.
There's, uh, what was there?
- If we had a--
- There's a Wu-Tang song called "Sunflower."
- Oh, yeah, yeah.
- I'm pretty sure.
- If there was a post song that came out called "Harmony Hall,"
that would be weird.
- Yeah.
Is there?
- Yeah, I think--
- You haven't heard it?
- Oh, no.
- Yeah.
- [laughs]
- Let's play that [bleep]
- [laughs]
All right, I think there's room for two.
Also, like I said, I've got to follow my own advice
I gave Greta Van Fleet.
- Well, that was "Sunshower."
- "Rocks Played Out," dog.
- Wu-Tang one.
- Is "Sunflower" going to be a single?
Or is it an album cut?
- It depends.
It depends how you look at it.
It's going to get its own, like, little moment.
- The B side?
Is it like the 2021 of the next--
No, I would say it's the A side of the next batch,
but this is like the funky batch.
- Okay.
- In a way.
I think it's a special song.
We're going to have a lot of fun with it.
Anyway, oh, this is an interesting one.
I'll admit that when I was double checking
that they had "Billboard 1946," I came across this.
- Okay.
- The number two song in 1946.
Now, keep in mind, what month is it?
- February.
- It's February.
So picture this.
It's February--
[laughs]
1946.
And this song is still so poppin'
that it's number two.
- Has anyone hatched yet?
- On the charts.
- In February?
- In February, we're still a couple months out
from the first hatchling from the president egg.
- All three presidents are in utero.
- But they're all in utero.
- Dark.
- They're all in utero in the shared egg.
- Dude, Trump's just in utero.
- Fetus Trump.
Anyway, so while Fetus Trump was gestating in Mama Trump--
or I mean in the egg.
- In the egg, yeah.
- This song was poppin'.
- Mama Trump.
- February.
- I'm going to write a song called "Mama Trump."
- Mama Trump, Mama Trump, Mama Trump!
[laughs]
Mama Trump didn't teach me better, Mama Trump.
I think we all know this one.
Von Monroe and his orchestra.
- This song.
Talk about cooking a turkey and running around.
- This is also in like a Christmas horror movie.
- Yeah, for sure.
This is in like, what's that show?
Black Mirror?
- Mm-hmm, American Horror Story.
- Yeah.
- This track was written in Hollywood, California,
in July 1945 during a heat wave.
The songwriters, Sammy Kahn and Julie Stein,
were thinking about cold weather.
You know the reason why I keep pointing out
that this was number two in February?
'Cause that's like so random.
Like today, a Christmas song would never still be up there
in the charts all the way through February.
- Maybe it wasn't a Christmas song.
- Well, that's what I was also thinking about,
is like how all winter songs kind of became Christmas songs.
- Yeah.
- Nobody's ever like, "Well, it's New Year's.
"It's time we say goodbye to all those Christmas songs
"and bust out our neutral winter songs."
(laughs)
Like you would never hear "Let It Snow" in February,
even though it's snowing.
- It'll snow, yeah.
- In parts of the country.
- Yeah.
- I think we need more--
- February-based.
- We need more February-based--
- Thematic.
- Winter songs.
(Christmas music)
But "Let It Snow,"
I don't think they're really talking about Christmas yet.
- No, they're just talking about how it's snowing.
(bells jingling)
- So everybody picture this.
This is how kooky the world used to be.
In 1946, we got three presidents gestating in an egg,
and it's February, two months after Christmas,
and people are buying up "Let It Snow"
78 RPM vinyl.
- Yeah.
- That's that old weird America.
- I wonder if by the next year,
it was already a Christmas song.
- Well, or maybe it started as a Christmas song,
it was just still popping,
and people are like, "Whatever."
- I don't think it mentions Christmas, though.
- It's like a chestnuts roasting on an open fire type song.
That also is not--
- That's not Christmas.
That's just about chestnuts and fire.
(laughs)
- Yeah.
- Oh no, that one says "Merry Christmas."
(laughs)
Jack Frost nipping at your nose.
♪ But the chorus, Merry Christmas to you ♪
- Though, this is just something you play
anytime the weather outside is frightful.
- Closing credits of "Die Hard" is "Let It Snow."
- "Let It Snow?"
- Oh yeah.
- What's it about?
Snowing?
- Also snowing.
- "Die Hard."
(laughs)
Classic snow movie.
- What's the end of "Die Hard?"
Is that Yippee-Ki-Yay, mother (beep)
Was that "Die Hard?"
- Yeah, that's that movie.
- That's that film.
- That's the end.
- After Bruce Willis kills all the bad guys.
- Yeah, and then he's gonna light the thing on fire
or whatever.
- And then he says, "Let it snow, mother (beep)."
- Yeah.
- That's the ending.
- He says, "Let it snow, mother (beep),"
as he tosses a match into gasoline
and kills all the hostages.
- Yeah.
(laughs)
♪ Oh, the weather outside's delightful ♪
- Frightful.
- Just picture it.
It's February now.
It's snowing in parts of the country.
I mean, it was snowing in New York last week, I'm sure.
- It was snowing in New York today.
- Up north.
- It's snowing in the mountains outside of LA.
- A few days ago.
(laughs)
- I'm sure it's snowing in upstate New York,
Minnesota, Michigan, places like that.
So guys, I just want everybody to know
that not only is it okay to play "Let It Snow."
So, you know, I'm picturing like
maybe there's a TC head in Minneapolis,
20-something, 30-something, got a few roommates,
and you're making coffee in the morning,
maybe play some music.
You should feel good about blasting this song.
And if somebody says, "Whoa, whoa, whoa."
- "Come on, dude, Christmas music?"
- "Jason, why are you playing Christmas music?
It's February."
And be like, "It's snowing,
and I'm playing a song about snow.
Why should we not listen to this feel-good snow music
all the way up until spring?"
And then he'll say like, "All right, all right, whatever.
Fine, it's a song about snow,
but obviously its origin is as a Christmas song."
You're like, "Do you even know,
have you even looked at the billboard charts of 1946?
This was number two on the charts in 1946.
February 1946.
I'll (beep) play it until April."
- "Let it snow, mother(beep)."
- "Let it snow, mother(beep)."
- And then he throws the match into the gasoline.
- And then he throws the match.
- And burns his house down.
- The number two song back in 2019, something new.
- "The Let It Snow of Our Era."
- "The Let It Snow of 2019"
is Cardi B and Bruno Mars with "Please Me."
I wonder if this is a winter song.
♪ Yeah, come on ♪
♪ Please me, baby ♪
♪ Turn around and just tease me ♪
- I've never heard this.
- This one's pretty new.
♪ You know I don't wanna be, baby ♪
♪ Let me hear you say please ♪
♪ Let me hear you say please ♪
♪ Please me, baby ♪
♪ Turn around and just tease me, baby ♪
♪ You know I don't wanna be, baby ♪
- Was this in "Spider-Man?"
♪ Let me hear you say please ♪
♪ Let me hear you say please ♪
♪ Lollipoppin' ♪
♪ Swerkin' in some J's ♪
♪ On the dance floor ♪
♪ No creepin' the way ♪
♪ I take my time with it ♪
♪ Bring you close to me ♪
♪ Don't want no young, dumb ♪
♪ Better pick me like we listen to the Jodeci ♪
♪ I was tryna lay low ♪
♪ Takin' it slow ♪
♪ Well, I'm pickin' again, ay ♪
♪ Gotta celebrate ♪
♪ That your man look good ♪
♪ Better put him away ♪
- They're kinda trying to, you know,
get in "Lightning to Strike" twice.
Another Cardi B, Bruno Mars throwback jam.
It's fun.
- I'm cool with it.
- I don't like it.
♪ And after that ♪
♪ Let's do it one more time ♪
♪ Girl, I ain't one for fake love ♪
- She's rappin', she's singin'.
- What is this, what era specifically
is this the throwback to?
'Cause the other one was like very distinctly
like late '80s, early '90s.
- This is like kinda mid '90s, I think.
- Okay.
- Yeah, the chord progression is.
- But then the bass, the bass line's kinda '80s.
- And that, "Wee!"
- Oh yeah, oh you know what?
People were sending this to me a little bit.
Or mentioning it on like Instagram
'cause there's a part where she says something
about "Your (beep) basura, trash, and my (beep) horchata."
- This is gonna be tough for the radio.
- Well, you know, she'll just bleep it out.
But you know, Vampire, we get a song called "Horchata."
- Aren't you allowed to say (beep)
That's pushing it.
♪ What's up now ♪
♪ Yo, yo, basura ♪
♪ My (beep) horchata ♪
- That's how they bleep it out.
♪ Your basura, my horchata ♪
- You could kinda read between the lines there.
- That's a good line.
- I saw she tweeted something about how she knows
that her (beep) tastes like horchata, but I forgot why.
- Oh, this is what she said.
"First time I drank horchata in LA,
"I automatically knew that the flavor of the drink
"described my (beep)."
- Right, that's what she said.
- "Please me, baby."
(laughing)
- That's the tweet, that's the tweet I read.
- That's a wild tweet.
- That is.
(laughing)
- She's the best, America's sweetheart.
- Yeah.
(laughing)
That's good though, that's actually empowering
'cause she knew it herself.
She didn't need anyone to tell her.
Good for her.
- Right, I appreciate that.
- Yeah.
- I love Cardi B.
The number one song in 1946.
Now keep in mind, this is February, 1946.
The snow is still falling.
People haven't relegated winter music
to Christmas time yet.
We got three presidents just sitting in an egg
and number one on the charts is Freddie Martin
and his orchestra with a song called "Symphony."
(orchestra playing "Symphony No. 1")
- Oh, that sounds real old.
- Someone's tied up on some train tracks.
Oh, now it's getting fun.
(orchestra playing "Symphony No. 1")
Ooh, some shredding.
(orchestra playing "Symphony No. 1")
This was in some movies, probably.
- Seems like it.
(orchestra playing "Symphony No. 1")
- They're gonna be vocals?
(orchestra playing "Symphony No. 1")
(orchestra playing "Symphony No. 1")
(orchestra playing "Symphony No. 1")
(orchestra playing "Symphony No. 1")
- Whoa.
- Long time for the vocals coming.
(orchestra playing "Symphony No. 1")
- You know back then everybody had their own big band.
So you get these crews of 10, 20 guys
rolling around the country.
It's all about who's got the best band.
- Crazy.
- So Freddie Martin's band was called by one jazz writer,
"One of the most pleasant, most relaxed dance bands
that ever flowed across the band scene."
So they were kind of the Grateful Dead of the band scene.
- That's sick.
- They were laid back, mellow dudes.
There probably were some more punk rock,
hardcore, up-tempo bands.
- Yeah.
- Freddie Martin, they're like--
- Nothing to prove.
- Yo, jam it out, man.
- I wonder if Jerry was into this kind of music.
(orchestra playing "Symphony No. 1")
Wouldn't have been that old at that point.
- He might have had a soft spot for it.
Wasn't his dad was a musician, so he might have played--
- I don't know much about his, yeah.
- It's his dad was a musician,
so he might have been playing music in this era.
Yeah, what do we know about Jose Garcia?
- Not much.
- We don't know a lot.
And the number one song currently on iTunes right now,
the Freddie Martin of our era, "Holdin' Strong."
This is kind of like the last month for Shallow,
'cause this is the awards month.
- Yeah.
- It won some Grammys, probably win an Oscar tonight.
- Drop off hard after this.
I mean, it's been going strong for four months.
♪ Tell me something, girl ♪
♪ Are you happy in this modern world? ♪
We were getting some tweets about this news item
that came out about the Oscars, which are tonight.
We haven't really talked about the Oscars,
but you know, enough with the award stuff.
- Yeah.
- But one interesting thing about it is
they perform a lot of the nominees for best song.
And of course, this is one of the major songs of the year,
so everybody's expecting that Bradley Cooper
and Lady Gaga will perform the song.
- Yep.
- And they are going to,
except they put out a press release or something,
or maybe did an interview where-
- That's right.
- Bradley Cooper was quick to point out
that he will perform the song,
but as Bradley Cooper, not as Jackson Maine.
(laughing)
And I've been thinking about that.
- I mean, Gaga's performing in his Gaga, right?
She's not performing in his Ally.
It's funny that he felt the need to do that,
'cause people generally don't perform in character.
- Right.
♪ Can I fill that void ♪
♪ Or do you need more ♪
♪ Ain't it hard keeping it so hardcore ♪
♪ I'm falling ♪
♪ In all the good times I find myself longing ♪
♪ For a change ♪
♪ And in the bad times I fear myself ♪
♪ I'm off the deep end watching ♪
- This part sounded like it's,
"I wanna dance with somebody."
- It's got a little bit of that Whitney vibe.
♪ Crash through the surface when they can't hurt us ♪
♪ We're far from the shallow now ♪
♪ In the shallow ♪
- Yeah, I mean, what do you think compelled Bradley
to issue that press release?
- Wait, how did he actually say it?
Oh, he just told Stephen Colbert
that he'll perform the song in his tuxedo,
not in his character's costume.
Okay, but that's bullsh*t,
because Jackson Maine could easily wear a tuxedo
to an event like the Oscars.
- Right, yeah.
- I also just kind of feel like,
I thought about this a lot.
I took a couple of days off to think about this.
At the end of the day, he doesn't get to decide this.
It's incredibly arrogant.
If I wanna imagine that I'm watching Jackson Maine performing,
well, it's the same goddamn face.
It's the same person, you know?
- So he just shouldn't say he's anybody?
- Yeah, if I wanna picture that it's Chris Kyle,
the American sniper, duetting with Lady Gaga,
that's my right.
And I think a lot of people will do that.
- Yeah.
- I'm just saying like--
- Both those characters are dead, but I mean--
- Yeah, but you can keep watching the movie.
They live on in art.
- I didn't see the movie.
- Do you think Bradley Cooper will speak
into the microphone at all,
or just come up and sing?
'Cause that would be the real test if he's Jackson or not,
if he's like, "Thank you."
- I think just sing,
because there's not a lot of time at these events.
You got a minute and a half to do
like a short version of the song.
I'm just saying--
- They're not gonna do a full version?
- I don't know if they're gonna give them a full 3.30.
- I need it.
- I mean, they gotta at least get to the big part.
(singing)
- Yeah, but you can't get to the big part too soon.
You gotta, you know.
- Okay, maybe they will.
- They're gonna do the full version.
- Yeah, maybe for this song,
they'll let him do the whole version.
But, so Cooper said,
"Doesn't intend to bring back Jackson's deep voice either,
"as he said he has fully retired the character.
"What are you gonna use a different singing voice?"
He's getting up there.
He's performing.
- This is so weird.
- I mean, it's kind of like, okay.
You know how like Beyonce has like her like onstage demeanor,
her onstage image are Sasha Fierce?
- Oh yeah, right, right.
- Okay, maybe a better example would be like a rapper.
Snoop Dogg's real name is Calvin Brodus, correct?
- Sounds right.
- Yeah, it's Calvin something.
- I believe it's Calvin Brodus.
Now, we understand that Snoop Dogg
is both simultaneously Snoop Dogg and Calvin Brodus.
- Yep.
- To some extent, Snoop Dogg is a character.
But, you know, there's also a huge intersection
in the same way that Bradley put his heart and soul
into that character.
And the character Jackson made only exists
because of Bradley Cooper.
- Yeah, but Calvin Brodus isn't like when I'm rapping
on Michael Jackson.
I should have said a different name.
(laughing)
- Wait, say it again.
- Like--
- No, Calvin Brodus says--
- I'm saying Jackson Maine is, what else is his name?
(laughing)
- I'm just saying if Calvin Brodus--
- If you take a regular-ass person like me,
it's different than being like,
my name is Alec Rhinestone,
but when I rap, I'm Snoop Dogg.
It's different than being like,
my name's Alec Rhinestone,
but when I rap, I'm freaking, you know, John Smith.
- Okay, what about Wiz Khalifa?
- Wiz Khalifa, what's his name?
- Cameron Jabril Tomas.
- Yeah, what?
(laughing)
- I'm saying these guys have like alter ego names.
- When Snoop Dogg became Snoop Lion,
- Yeah.
- If he's gonna drop a Snoop Lion song
in his Snoop Dogg set,
are we gonna like pretend that Snoop Lion never existed
and this is Snoop Dogg performing a Snoop Lion song?
- Wait a second, also,
Cooper did not issue a press release.
- No, he was just doing an interview.
- Okay, so that's way different.
It just kind of came out.
- I just think it's different
'cause you're talking about different types of pseudonyms.
Like if my name is Alec Rhinestone
and my pseudonym when I'm performing is like, Assman,
that's not like if my pseudonym was Andrew Thomas.
- I don't see the difference.
- All right.
(laughing)
- I'm just saying, how to put this,
I just don't think it's Bradley Cooper's choice, man.
Like, first of all,
if you wanna go see A Star Is Born
and watch the whole film,
and say you walked out of the movie
and one person's very moved by it and said,
"Man, when Jackson Maine peed in his pants,
"I felt that emotionally."
And you say, "What do you mean when Jackson Maine?"
When Bradley Cooper, the actor, pretended to pee his pants
and somebody say, "Well, aren't we talking
"about the same thing?"
It's like, "No, because when you watch a movie,
"you start calling them the characters by their names."
I also feel like, doesn't that happen a lot?
You watch TV with somebody and be like,
"Wait, wait, I forgot what happened in the last episode.
"What's going on?"
And you'll just be like,
"Yeah, so Russell Crowe's mom is mad
"because-"
I don't do that.
I do the opposite.
"Because Madeline Stowe is a lawyer and she's-"
Madeline Stowe reference?
I saw 12 Monkeys on TV the other day.
Okay, I was like, "Damn."
Yeah, yeah, you refer to the characters
by the actors' real names.
Or you mix it up because it doesn't matter.
Sometimes you do, but like,
I saw Kelsey Grammer in a supermarket
and I was like, "Oh, s***, Frazier."
(laughing)
'Cause I'm not-
Well, exactly.
And imagine if he said to you,
"Listen, you piece of s***,
"in here I'm not Frazier."
And you say, "You're Frazier to me."
Yeah.
I'm just saying, again, it's not his choice.
That's fair.
All right, I see your point now.
Especially when he's getting on stage
on Hollywood's biggest night.
I also think it's disrespectful
to Hollywood's biggest night
to get up there and say,
"I'm performing the song from the movie,
"but I wanna clarify something.
"I'm not acting right now."
Yeah.
Well, hold on a second.
There's an element of acting.
The only way that you can sing that song
is by embodying the character of Jackson Maine.
Right.
If he sings it very differently,
I'll give it up to him and say,
"Okay, this time he's saying it as Bradley Cooper,
"but I have a feeling he's gonna get up there
"and he's gonna give us that Jackson Maine performance
"that we know from the recording,
"the soundtrack, and the film."
If he wants to show us that he's going up on stage
as Bradley Cooper,
he needs to sing it with a different voice.
♪ Baby, it's time to let the old ways die ♪
♪ Baby, it's time to let the old ways die ♪
♪ Takes a lot to change a man ♪
♪ Hell, it takes a lot to try ♪
♪ Baby, it's time to let the old ways die ♪
Either he's not allowing the audience
to use their imaginations,
or he's being so condescending
that he thinks that we're such morons.
He's like, "That's not me."
He thinks we're so stupid.
I also just find like,
"Okay, when I perform on stage, I'm Bradley Cooper,
"but in the movie, I was Jackson Maine."
Right.
Okay, well, I'm pretty sure when I sat down
and watched that movie,
I saw Bradley Cooper flash on screen about five times
before the show even started.
So what are you doing here?
So you're insulted.
I am insulted.
I'm hurt.
But I (beep) with Bradley Cooper.
Oh, there you go.
You're like, "Oh, wait, am I hating?"
I like Bradley Cooper.
Anyway, maybe the moral of the story
is everybody's right here.
If Bradley takes the stage and he sings a song and says,
"I'm singing this as Bradley,"
and everybody else is watching and saying,
"Well, I'm seeing Jackson Maine,"
well, that's the magic of a Hollyweird.
And also, shouldn't this be a decision
that he makes with his duet partner,
Lady Gaga, aka Ali?
Imagine this.
This is a huge role for her.
She probably really embodied the character of Ali.
What's Lady Gaga's real name?
Stephanie Germanotta.
What if she wanted to be Stephanie Germanotta
for this performance?
I could actually picture that.
Like, that could be a cool sequel to "A Star is Born"
that's about a film.
It's got the tone of the trip to Italy.
And it's Bradley Cooper and Lady Gaga
get offered some tremendous amount of money
to take "A Star is Born" on the road.
Or I was thinking a weird corporate-private gig.
Or maybe it's a corporate-private gig,
but some of the tension in the film
is that Lady Gaga always wants to identify as Ali
'cause she's like, "I can't sing these songs
"as Lady Gaga nor Stephanie Germanotta.
"When I sing these songs, I'm Ali.
"I gave a whole bunch of my life,
"and you're the one who inspired me to become Ali.
"So when I sing in them, I'm Ali."
And she's always like, "Well, hello there.
"Wow, I can't believe it.
"I'm still on my first album,
"and you guys already are showing so much respect for me.
"My name is Ali."
And then he comes out and says,
"And my name is Bradley Cooper."
But then what happens?
They just play the song.
It's like a screwball comedy.
"I'm Ali, and I'm Bradley Cooper."
Something like that.
Then they do, like, "Tomato, tomato."
Exactly.
A lot of them just in the car and in restaurants
arguing about it.
I would love that, them just driving from gig to gig.
That'd be tight, Bradley Cooper and Lady Gaga in the car.
She starts doing Ali, and she's like,
"Come on, do Jackson Maine."
"Not gonna do it."
"I'm not gonna do it."
That's Bradley's normal voice.
"Stephanie, I'm not gonna do it.
"My name is Ali."
"Stephanie, will you just calm down?"
"Jackson, you know what?
"Forget you.
"You called me ugly.
"How dare you?
"I hate you."
"I didn't call you ugly, Stephanie.
"Relax."
"Oh, Jackson."
"All right."
And then he goes, "You know, there could be some fun there.
"There's fun to be had."
That's a 90-minute comedy.
Yeah, definitely.
Oh, I was thinking more like four and a half hour art film.
I like that too.
The real-time drive between Denver and Salt Lake City.
Oh, yeah, one take.
They have two giant corporate gigs,
and for some reason, they're like Snowden or something,
and they're like,
"If you guys want this check, you're gonna have to drive."
Yeah.
Oh, it's eight hours.
It's an eight-hour stage play.
There's no PJ available, so you're driving, just the two of you.
Do you think that there's such big stars
that if you did a one-take, six-and-a-half-hour--
Art film.
Art film with just Lady Gaga and Cooper in character,
just talking on a road trip, that people would go see it?
Yeah.
I bet if it was good, if it was as good as like the trip,
and I mean, they're both very talented,
but you know, Steve Coogan, that's like,
and Rob Brydon, that's really their bread and butter.
You ever watch those movies, Alec?
The trip movies?
No.
It's really like the English guys drive around
going to restaurants and just talking.
It's one of those movies--
Doing Michael Caine impressions.
Doing Michael Caine impressions.
Yeah.
It's one of those movies that I think of so fondly,
but I could also imagine being like,
"Oh, you gotta watch the trip,"
and then somebody watches it and just be like,
"This sucked."
"It sucked."
I love all the trip movies.
They're great.
Ariel is a huge trip head.
That's tight.
I think that even if things got a little awkward--
90 minutes of them just driving
would still be kind of like fascinating.
We're talking six-hour art film though.
Okay, but in the six-hour art film--
You cut it down to the 90.
But what's a six-hour drive, SF to LA?
Yeah, they hit the In-N-Out in Kettleman City.
That might be more on point.
It's like they're in San Francisco for something,
and then they have to get to--
So like weird tech conference.
And the next night's the Oscars.
We're finding it.
Long story short, they have to drive.
We'll get Tony Kushner to figure out that bullsh*t
when he sketches it out.
I think with just the roughest outline
of the arc of what happens with them,
these two talented performers would just like
kind of fill it in.
Okay, what do you think?
Should we do, let's say another 45 on Bradley Cooper?
Just a real slow wrap up here.
No, but he really is cool.
I do respect.
Have you met him?
Yeah, I've met him here and there.
I always thought he was super nice.
What context did you meet him in?
You know, just see him around people that I know know him.
And I always thought he seemed like a super mellow dude.
Didn't seem like some weird superstar ego.
Just actually seemed like a chill dude.
And actually, I did feel bad for him
that he didn't get nominated for best director.
That seemed a little unfair, didn't it?
Extremely unfair.
Let's get Bradley Cooper's whole filmography up
because I want to do another 45 on him.
Okay, that's enough time crisis.
That's enough time crisis.
Everybody needs to go.
Everybody's probably excited to go have their little Oscars party.
Put out some hummus and goldfish, invite the friends over.
Have some fun.
You said it like goldfish.
Goldfish.
Goldfish.
Why not on Oscar night, they're goldfish.
That's fair.
Thanks to our East Coast ambassador,
president of TC East, Despot for coming through.
You're welcome.
That's the only person to thank.
Me and Jake will see you in a couple of weeks.
Yep.
Peace.
Time Crisis with Ezra King.
One.
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