Episode 89: Winter Returns
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Transcript
Time Crisis, back once again.
This is a very special episode.
Jake and I check in with Winter, the god of starbucking,
to talk about the latest in Starbucks news,
Howard Schultz's presidential run,
and Ariana Grande's ongoing cloud macchiato disaster.
We also count down the top hits of 1977 and 1984.
That's right, me and Jake's birth years.
All this, plus a little Imagine Dragons.
This is Time Crisis, with Ezra King.
Be-be-be-be-be-be-beasts.
One.
# They pass me by
# All of those great romances
# The war I've felt, what we leave
# All my rightful chances
# My picture clear
# Everything seems so easy
# And so I dealt to the blow
# One of us had to go
# Now it's different, I want you to know
# One of us is crying
# One of us is lying
# Leave the lonely man... #
Time Crisis, back once again. What's up, Jake?
Uh...
Looking frazzled. Yeah, I'm tired, man.
Jake's rolling into the studio with a weary...
Just world-weary.
World-weary look on his face.
I'm beat, man. We got this beat. Hands covered in paint.
That's true. I got white, semi-gloss exterior paint on my hands.
So, exterior, that's house paint.
Yeah, I'm building, like, a small fence
that sort of is gonna divide our kind of little patio area garden
from our sort of sitting area, 'cause we just got a new puppy.
That's the big development, and that's the reason I'm so white.
But the puppy likes to run through the garden.
In and out of the garden, she goes? Is it a female?
She, yeah. In and out of the garden, she goes.
And Jake said, "No more." Why? Who cares?
Let the puppy go in the garden, man. Is she, like, eating your turnips?
It's hard to explain, because there's a solid, like, four-foot drop
from the garden down into this, like, seating area.
It's too much of a jump for a little dog?
Too much of a jump. Okay.
And to build and paint your own fence is cheaper than just, like,
"Can't you just go get some chicken wire?"
Or that's too unsightly? That was discussed.
Too unsightly? A little bit.
This'll be nice. This'll be classy.
You got some friends over for some classy cocktails,
and people are just like, "I gotta say, guys,
"the chicken wire's killing the vibe over here."
Backyard's looking great, but honestly, what's the deal with the chicken wire?
I mean, chicken wire, that just would've saved you a real headache.
Well, the fence is not the headache.
It's having the two dogs by myself at the studio today.
They're running around. It's just like--
I'm just figuring out a new rhythm, because we have an old dog, Marty.
He's mellow. Right.
He'll sleep for four or five hours at a time.
But I have two dogs now. Now you got the puppy.
Can we say the name of the puppy? Al.
Al, which is short for? Allie.
Which is named after? The Lady Gaga character from Starsborne.
[laughter]
No joke, folks. That's sick.
So Marty is the Jackson, Maine, kind of old.
Absolutely. Old, mellow, and then Allie is the star.
A lot of energy. Hunger.
A lot of hunger. Excitement about the world.
Trying to find her place in the world. Yeah.
Marty's a kind of world-weary old soul, seeing it all.
Kind of a grump. Kind of a grump.
So that's what I'm dealing with. I mean, it's great.
It's a great thing to deal with, but today was a lot of back and forth.
Is it just not worth the price to drop them off
at the Chateau Marmotte or the Sunset Bar-Cui?
It's going to be like a daily thing.
I mean, if you have a dog, you want to have a dog.
I'm just finding the rhythm of the dog.
I know all sorts of people who maybe they don't have a partner or something
and they occasionally have to take their dog to a doggy hotel.
Oh, yeah, on occasion. Yeah. Sure, on occasion.
But, you know, there's just a steep learning curve
that I have to contend with.
Today you were painting fences, you were painting paintings,
and taking care of two dogs. Yep.
Yeah, that's a lot. I mean, it's all good.
It's a lot to deal with. It took me forever to get over here.
I'm coming over at rush hour. Brutal.
We are pre-taping, folks. We are pre-taping.
We're going to be transparent about it because we're all--
speaking of busyness, my schedule is getting crazy, too, man.
You're hitting the road, right? Yeah, I got to go to England.
Fun. Yeah, it'll be cool.
Doing some press, doing some classic radio sessions.
Full band in studio. Yeah, a little stripped down, though.
Like kind of post-John Peel. Yeah, there's a lot of those.
I mean, they have them in the U.S., too.
I remember back in the day we'd do a lot of acoustic ones
where I'd just be like, "I can never listen to that."
Whatever we just did probably sounds--
I remember on the second album we got a lot of these acoustic sessions.
There's a lot of times like rolling into a radio station early in the morning.
And of course, it's like you want to do it.
If a radio station supports you by playing your music,
it's kind of like the least you can do.
If you're in town, stop by.
But then sometimes you're on tour and you're tired and you're worried about your voice.
And so just rolling in at 9 a.m. somewhere to do an acoustic version of "Cousins."
Yeah, I mean, especially if you're a band that puts all this work
into getting the sound down as a full plugged-in band.
And then to just do the sort of acoustic translation.
Well, and you never know.
Obviously, there are songs that there could be a richness to the acoustic version.
"Cousins" in particular was not one of them.
Like a fast rock song. Yeah.
Acoustic.
electric guitar plays
You will find a swell on the ocean floor
They're gonna find it if you didn't close the door
You and the small ones sit outside of each side
In a house on the street they wouldn't park on a night
That was a race, take a his was a shoemaker
You greatest since 2006, the list maker
A coach and a melody, you eat at the car
Or you were born with ten fingers and you're gonna use 'em all
electric guitar plays
Interesting girls, I discovered myself
If your art life was gritty, you'd be toast in my house
If an interesting coach, you should be lining the walls
When your birthright is interest, you could just do it all right
Me and my cousins and you and your cousins
It's a line that's always running
Me and my cousins and you and your cousins
I can feel it coming
I rarely post provocative opinions on Twitter,
but I did a few weeks ago say that
Nirvana Unplugged was the worst thing they did.
Oh!
A lot of the TC fan base was just like, "Terrible call."
Really?
"Rough stuff, folks."
I stand by it, though, I mean.
But Nirvana Unplugged, people like that
not because they like weird acoustic versions
of "Smells Like Teen Spirit," people like--
Which they didn't play.
The covers.
Yeah, they're probably--
"Man Who Sold the World," that was kind of a cool call
on their part.
See, even that drives me up a wall
because he's using that distortion pedal.
It's like--
Ah, no!
(imitates distortion)
If you're gonna do acoustic, do acoustic.
What about the lead belly?
♪ In the past ♪
Terrible.
♪ In the past ♪
♪ My girl ♪
It's awful.
I mean, that was kind of interesting
that Kurt brought lead belly to the youth.
Yeah, for sure.
'Cause lead belly's sick.
I mean, I am a Nirvana fan.
And that's one of their last recordings, isn't it?
I think it is.
I think it's like a few weeks or a few months
before his suicide.
So maybe also they were in just like a terrible headspace
and that contributes to it.
But whenever I just--
So you even remember when you saw that,
you were just like, "Sucks."
No, I was psyched.
I was super psyched.
And then I think maybe the way that the versions
of "About a Girl" and a few other songs on that record
became the definitive radio versions.
That bothered you.
That kind of drove me up a wall.
Yeah.
It sort of became the de facto Nirvana record
in a lot of ways.
It just kind of pissed me off.
But that's how it ended up.
I'm picturing you calling into a local Connecticut
alternative rock radio station, "We got Jake on the line."
[laughs]
♪ My girl, my girl, don't lie to me ♪
♪ Tell me, where did you sleep last night? ♪
♪ In the clouds, in the clouds ♪
♪ Where the sun don't ever shine ♪
♪ I would shiver the whole night through ♪
♪ Girl, my girl, where will you go? ♪
♪ I'm going where the cold wind blows ♪
♪ In the clouds, in the clouds ♪
♪ Where the sun don't ever shine ♪
♪ I would shiver the whole night through ♪
♪ Her husband was a hard-working man ♪
♪ Just about a mile from here ♪
♪ His head was found in a dry wheel ♪
♪ But his body never was found ♪
♪ My girl, my girl, don't lie to me ♪
♪ Tell me, where did you sleep last night? ♪
♪ In the pines, in the pines ♪
♪ Where the sun don't ever shine ♪
♪ I would shiver the whole night through ♪
- Van Burry Weekend didn't unplug.
- Really? MTV?
- It was kind of funny because there's the classic run
of '90s unplugs. - Yeah.
- Unplugged-eds. There were so many good '90s unplugged-eds.
- AIC. - Yep.
- Lauryn Hill. - There were some good classic rock--
Rod Stewart. - Yeah.
Yeah, again, Rod Stewart. I mean--
Oh, actually, Clapton, too, is so--
That one is so brutal. - Oh, I'm into the Clapton one.
- That's how I got started on the Twitter with the unplugged.
I was in an Uber, and I heard-- - "Tears in Heaven"?
- No, I heard "Layla." That is the worst version.
- Oh, yeah, I do hate that version of "Layla."
♪ Layla, where did she-- ♪
Yeah, and that's also funny 'cause I heard that
on the radio a lot. - ♪ On her knees ♪
- When I was a kid, and then when I finally heard
the original "Derek and the Dominoes," "Layla,"
I was like, "Oh, [bleep] this is so much better."
- Yeah, rips. - But I was introduced
to the Rod Stewart song "Reason to Believe" via his unplug,
which I always thought was a great song.
- Yep. - ♪ If I listen ♪
♪ Long enough to you ♪ - Yep.
- ♪ Knowing that you like-- ♪
I mean, he's, like, the perfect dude to do it.
Did the Eagles do one? - I don't think so, man.
I mean, they did an acoustic-- - They did some acoustic thing
in the '90s during the Hell Freezes Over.
- Yeah, and again, that acoustic version
of "Hotel California" from Hell Freezes Over
that you hear all the time in, like,
corporate retail environments is just terrible.
- Let's look up some of the classic unplugged dudes.
- Let's not lose the thread, though.
I want to hear about the Vampire Weekend one.
- Oh, yeah, yeah. Oh, there's a Mariah Carey in '92.
- I remember she did the Badfinger/Harry Nilsson song
"Without You." - Oh, yeah, a lot of people,
that's just a Mariah Carey song. - Right.
- ♪ I can't live ♪
♪ Livin' is without you ♪
- "10,000 Maniacs." Oh, Tony Bennett.
That was pretty classic when there was, like,
the kind of Tony Bennett comeback in the '90s.
Page and Plant. - Oh, wow.
- As Discussed, Nirvana.
Alice in Chains. And then Shakira.
And then now you're kind of getting out of the classic era.
- Did Pearl Jam do one? They did one, I think.
- Oh, interesting. The Eagles' 1994 live album
"Hell Freezes Over," which sold 9 million copies--
- Wow. - Good Lord.
Though not part of the unplugged series,
was produced by the unplugged producers
and followed a similar format.
Glenn Frey definitely called Don Henley,
just like, "Yo, Henley, turn on the tube, man."
- [whimpers]
- "You see these Nirvana guys? Oh, I don't like those guys.
They're real noise. No, but check it out, man.
They're doing--" - They're just playing punk rock.
That's all they're doing, Don. - They're just playing punk rock.
[both laugh]
But they're doing a cool little acoustic set.
"You know what? These guys actually got some chops, man.
Turn it on. We should do this, man.
Should I call up MTV? No, man.
We want to have primary ownership of the content.
I like the way you think, Mr. Henley."
[both laugh]
- Did the MTV unplugged series end?
- That's what I was talking about,
why the Vampire Weekend one doesn't really count.
- Okay. - Because I feel like
around the time Vampire Weekend came out,
which was 2008,
MTV was having, like, a huge identity crisis.
- Right. - I mean, when we came out,
it was such a funny time, because it was like
the major labels were all confused, MTV was super confused.
We hadn't settled into this, like, current version
of the Internet yet, so I remember, like--
and MTV was cool and supportive.
Like, we did this whole bunch of promos with them
when our first album came out, and I also--
I'm sure I've talked about this on the show before.
Briefly, Pete Wentz, who, by the way,
we're trying to get on the show. - Very cool.
- I saw him at a Neo Yokio event, and I buttonholed him.
I was like, "Pete, we gotta get you on the show, man."
He expressed some interest. - Some.
- We gotta follow-- [laughs]
We gotta follow up on that, but I think he'd be a great guest.
You know, he'll be perfect for--
to go on one more tangent real quick,
but because I'm gonna be gone so much,
we've been talking, we gotta bank shows.
- Right. - And I actually wanna throw this out there
to the TC heads. Any ideas you have
for, like, bankable shows? 'Cause me and Jake
could probably confuse some people.
Jake and I could probably do a bunch of fake shows,
bank 'em, where we're just talking about this and that,
and people would be none the wiser,
but I like the idea that we use these pre-taped shows,
the deeply pre-taped, 'cause we need a few on deck
for when I'm just, like, gone. - Weeks, months in advance.
- I like the idea that we use those to be, like,
"Okay, we're doing two hours," or we just, like,
go deep with Pete Wentz. - Oh, fun.
- You know? - Yeah, that sounds cool.
- You know, like, just, like, walk us through, like,
what's your day-to-day like, man? 'Cause we've never quite done that.
Like, kind of, like, story of your life or something.
The other, maybe we go deep on a certain artist.
- The band Chicago.
- Two hours of Chicago.
And we can still have our classic tangents.
But maybe some TC heads have some ideas for--
Oh, I also have one idea that I want to do.
I actually wish that we did this a few months ago,
where I just want to, like, sit down and play you the whole album.
I think you've heard most of it, but I play you the whole album
and just talk about it, but almost like a time capsule
before it comes out. - Oh, cool.
- Before, like, before there's reviews and reactions and stuff.
- Right. - I just want to talk a little bit.
- And here's the thing. I've never heard the album in order.
- In sequence? Okay. - And I've probably heard, like,
two-thirds or three-quarters of it. - Mm-hmm.
- So there's probably a few songs that-- - Oh, that'd be perfect.
- A solid three or four or five that I've never heard.
- Okay, that'll be perfect. So, okay, these are all some ideas.
TC heads, if you have any other ideas for bankable shows,
we go deep, let us know.
- ♪ Big blue, for once in my life I felt close to you ♪
♪ I was so overcome with emotion ♪
♪ When I was hurt and in need of affection ♪
♪ When I was tired and I couldn't go home ♪
♪ Then you offered protection ♪
♪ So am I learning my lesson? ♪
♪ Or am I back on my own? ♪
♪ Big blue, for once in my life I felt close to you ♪
♪ I was so overcome with emotion ♪
♪ When I was hurt and in need of affection ♪
♪ When I was tired and I couldn't go home ♪
♪ Then you offered protection ♪
♪ So am I learning my lesson? ♪
♪ Or am I back on my own? ♪
♪ Big blue, for once in my life I felt close to you ♪
♪ I was so overcome with emotion ♪
♪ When I was hurt and in need of affection ♪
♪ When I was tired and I couldn't go home ♪
♪ Then you offered protection ♪
♪ So am I learning my lesson? ♪
♪ Or am I back on my own? ♪
♪ Big blue, for once in my life I felt close to you ♪
♪ I was so overcome with emotion ♪
♪ When I was hurt and in need of affection ♪
♪ When I was tired and I couldn't go home ♪
♪ Then you offered protection ♪
♪ So am I learning my lesson? ♪
♪ Or am I back on my own? ♪
So anyway, when Vampire Weekend was kind of on the MTV scene,
it was like this confused era, and the reason I thought of Pete Wentz
is because it was this funny era where they were about like
five or six years out from like the video era,
but people still cared a lot about MTV, so they would be like,
"Yo, when's MTV gonna show videos again, man?"
And I think they took that criticism to heart, and they were like,
"Well, you know, maybe with this new indie boom we can involve that."
And one thing they did was give Pete Wentz a show.
I forget what it was called, but it was like Pete Wentz hosted a show
that was all about MTV's newfound commitment to music videos.
And so I remember me and CT came to LA to go on the show
to present the Oxford Comma video, and the guests were Katy Perry
and a couple other people, and this is like real early days Katy Perry,
like maybe first album.
I remember the rapper Lil Mama was there,
'cause we chopped it up with her backstage a little bit.
And then--I think I've talked about this on the show--somewhere,
'cause I knew a producer at MTV who told me how one segment they did
was 'cause Lil Wayne was there, was they showed him all the videos of the day,
and that--I still don't know if this is true. I gotta check in with this dude.
- And they're filming this. - Yeah, but they didn't air it.
So somewhere at MTV, supposedly, there's video of Lil Wayne
watching and reacting in real time to the Oxford Comma video.
And supposedly, according to this guy, Lil Wayne--'cause that's a one-shot video
directed by Richard Ayoade. Shout out to him.
Lil Wayne watched, and he was like, "Whoa, that whole thing was one shot?"
Not that we invented that or anything, but he was watching that,
and he's like, "That's one shot?" He's like, "Yeah, that's cool.
I wanna do something like that." And then shortly thereafter,
he made a video for his song that was huge at the time called "A Milli,"
and that was a one-shot video.
So supposedly, it was inspired by Oxford Comma.
I gotta--we gotta track down this footage. I just wanna know--
- It's a direct linkage. - I wanna know what he was saying.
So there was that, and then I remember maybe on the second album,
they were trying to bring back "Unplugged."
So that's why I don't count it as part--it's not part of the classic "Unplugged" run.
- This was kind of like-- - It was branded as MTV Unplugged.
It was branded as MTV Unplugged, but you could just tell it was like--
you know, it wasn't the same crew.
So it was material from the first two records?
Yeah, it exists somewhere. I also remember being there and just being, like,
really burned out, and we were doing an acoustic thing.
And I think we had, like, some, you know, string section come,
and we tried to spruce it up.
But I have this memory of kind of ripping into A-Punk, like, on an acoustic.
[singing]
And then I'd just be like, "Joanna drove Sully into the--"
And I was like, "Whoa."
You know, and it's not live, so I was like--kind of, like, forgot the lyrics.
And then I had this, like, weird brain meltdown for, like, four minutes,
where I started three times, and I just couldn't get the lyrics right.
- Really? - Yeah, it was strange.
Has that happened before or since?
Yeah, my mind--one thing I've realized is if I can't let my mind wander,
I will mess up the lyrics.
Even if I start thinking too much about, like, the sound of the band
or my guitar playing, you know, my mind will wander.
Because sometimes you just, like--I'm just singing, and then I'm like,
"Whoa," I can snap back into it. It's like I was gone.
- Yeah, yeah. - You know, so I might mess up a word or two.
- Sure, and just keep going. - Or start the wrong phrase.
Like, I might just hit the wrong-- [singing]
- And kind of get back in. - Yeah.
- This was unusual. - Wow.
Maybe because it was a TV show, I was more in my head or something.
And was there, like, a studio audience watching you, like--
- Yeah. - --have all these false starts?
Yeah, and I was just like, "Sorry, guys."
And were the other guys in the band like, "No, the lyrics are this,"
- or they don't know the lyrics? - Yeah, no, no, I think--yeah,
I feel like I was getting some assistance.
Oh, man. That makes me think of, like, when, like, Second Baseman,
like, all of a sudden can't throw to first base.
- Yeah, it's just a mind game. - This happens every now and then.
- Yeah, they're just getting to it. - Or, like, in tennis,
like, somebody just wails two serves into the net.
Yeah, I mean, I'm talking about, like, this happens where, like,
some sort of switch is flipped, and, like, a catcher
loses the ability to throw back to the pitcher.
- Forever? - Oh, no, it's ruined careers.
I mean, it's rare, but it does happen.
Can't throw back to the pitcher?
It becomes, like, a mental thing of, like--
- they just become so psyched out. - Really?
It happened famously to Chuck Knobloch, who was a second baseman.
- Uh-huh. - And, like, he stopped being able
to throw to first base during routine plays.
And there was nothing physically wrong with his arm?
- No, no, it was just mental. - Whoa.
It was, like, the most basic thing you can do.
- So, it's going in other directions? - Yeah, presumably.
I mean, that's why sports psychology is a real industry.
Hopefully that doesn't happen to you this tour.
Oh, wait, I'm reading about it.
"During the summer of 2009, MTV.com
"officially revived the unplugged franchise
"with a six-episode season produced and directed
"by Matthew C. Mills of Space Station."
Shout-out to Matthew C. Mills.
"This particular season won an Emmy Award for Best New Approach."
That's an Emmy? Best New Approach?
"Artists in this incarnation were Adele,
"Silver Sun Pickups, All Time Low,
"Paramore, Vampire Weekend, and Katy Perry."
Katy Perry unplugged? Wow.
I mean, she could sing her ass off.
"And the shows debuted on unplugged.mtv.com."
OK, so maybe that's why I think of it as being...
Yeah, it was a totally different era.
It was revived, and it was for the website.
That really sounds like the bands I would hear a lot about
in early Vampire Weekend days.
"Adele, Silver Sun Pickups, All Time Low, Paramore, Katy Perry."
I still think I'm kind of like, those groups have more in common
with each other than we do with them,
but maybe I'm just being hard on ourselves.
That's an interesting question.
I would say you have more in common with Silver Sun Pickups
than you do with Adele.
Although we were on the same label as Adele.
But yeah, of course, we're a band.
Yeah, with guitars, sure.
Yeah, I guess I'm thinking of the other bands.
All Time Low, Paramore, Katy Perry.
They all kind of came from a little bit of a Warped Tour.
I don't know Paramore or All Time Low.
They got some good songs, but they kind of come out of more of a...
I guess a pop-punk emo tradition.
Dude, you mentioned when you were running through the earlier versions,
10,000 Maniacs.
I heard a song of theirs the other day that reminded me so much of Vampire.
Really?
Yeah, if you bring up 10,000 Maniacs, it's not their biggest song.
It was probably their second biggest song.
And this is the band that Natalie Merchant was the singer of?
Yeah, they're like an upstate New York...
Oh, right, they did Because the Night.
I like The Weather is the one that reminds me of Vampire.
Wow, 10,000 Maniacs, MTV Unplugged, sold 2.3 million.
Wow.
That's wild.
Collapsed it and sold 7.7.
This part reminded me of early Vampire.
It's a cool song.
# If my head found me pillow land and fall again
# Shivering my bones just thinking about the weather
# Quivering my lip as if I might cry
# By the force of will my lungs are filled and so I breathe
# It seems this bed is where I never leave
They kept going after Natalie Merchant left the band.
Oh, wow.
Yeah, I don't know much about them.
And then what were the big Natalie Merchant songs?
Oh, yeah.
Yeah, this is more like kind of coffee shop, like feel good.
Although actually, this is like a little crunchier than I remember.
That guitar like going wild.
# Doctors have come from distant cities just to see me
# Stand over my bed disbelieving what they see
# They say I must be wonder, no wonder, that's on creation
# And as far as they see they can offer no explanation
Good vibe.
Must have been a bummer for the band
because I feel like she hit her kind of commercial peak going solo.
Yeah.
I wonder what the backstory there was.
# Ah, ah, ah, ah, ah
# Ah, ah, ah, ah, ah
# La, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la
Oh, yeah, this one.
# La, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la
See, this stuff is kind of like adjacent to like Paula Cole or something.
Oh, yeah, I might have my timing wrong,
but I feel like Natalie Merchant really like paved the way
for the Paula Coles and the Sarah McLachlans,
the whole Lilith Fair crew.
I feel like Natalie Merchant was a contemporary with Sarah McLachlan.
Is it McLaughlin or McGlocklin?
I always said McGlocklin.
McGlocklin, OK.
# I don't know, keep on giving
But that 10,000 Maniac song from '87, I was like,
I heard it the other day and I was like,
oh, this is like a little vibe-ier.
# For your selflessness
# My admiration
Although I have to say, I'm pretty done with this.
Oh, this Natalie Merchant stuff, actually,
I haven't heard it in 15, 20 years.
It's a little vibe-ier than I remember.
Yeah.
# I'm bound to thank you for it
That's tight. Lilith Fair, Celebration. Something came up. This is at Lilith Fair, volume 1,
which is all stuff from Lilith Fair. Paula Cole. What year? Well this came out in '98.
I think that's when Lilith Fair was popping. Okay. McLaughlin. Oh, Tracy Chapman, sure.
Jewel. Indigo Girls. I haven't heard them in a minute. Indigo Girls are great. They
have some great songs. This is a cool road we're going down right now. We're just going
deep on artists who performed at Lilith Fair. I feel like there was a thing that Lilith
Fair was coming back. Yeah, it was like Liz Fair gonna play it? I feel like... Oh yeah,
this is a classic. Oh yeah, Closer to Fun. Yeah, this is a classic. You think Jerry listened
to Indigo Girls? Yeah, I bet he did. I could picture that. That's a sweet song, man. Jerry
Garcia band cover of this. That'd be tight. That four on the floor kick drum, they're
almost like the original Mumford and Sons. Oh wow, interesting. Does Mumford do harmonies
this tight? Like two part? Yeah, yeah. Oh my God, Nick just found the Indigo Girls opened
up for the Grateful Dead in Eugene, Oregon, August 22nd, 1993. That is so tight. That's
sick. That's awesome. Indigo Girls are definitely ahead of the curve, because they were doing
that stuff, I feel like in the 80s. They were way before that kind of 90s wave of Coffeehouse,
you know? I love that percussion in the background. I know, the percussion's almost like... Is
it like a beat off of a synth thing, or is it a very well recorded... Or they just got
a sick Latin percussionist who's just like... And then he just picks up the egg shaker.
Oh yeah, where'd the... Where'd the bongo go? That was cross stick. You know who's also
like a heavyweight in this scene is Melissa Etheridge. Oh yeah, she's... I mean, this
kind of reminds me of Etheridge a little bit. She seemed like she steered clear of the Lilith
Foundation though. What's up with that? That could be a good deep... Time goes going two
hours trying to get the bottom. Was Melissa Etheridge invited to play? I mean, she clearly
is one of the biggest female artists of the 90s. Seems like quite an oversight. Well,
first let's double check. I also love that you're just kind of like, "Oh, Etheridge steered
clear of the Lilith Foundation." I'm completely just making things up. But I'm looking at
the list right here of main stage artists. Maybe she felt a little too big. The money
wasn't right. That's funny. I mean, I'm seeing some heavyweights on that list though. Who
else? Put that list back up, the main stage. Yeah, who's on the main... Oh, Bonnie Raitt.
I mean, come on. Crow? Sheryl Crow. Cowboy... I was listening to some cowboy junkies recently.
Oh, Erykah Badu? Wow. Liz Phair, Lauryn Hill, Emmylou Harris. I mean, come on. I wonder
if it was Hubris. There's beef, man. I wonder if it was Hubris. Melissa Etheridge was like,
"I'm selling millions of records right now. You tell them to get the money up or they
can kiss my ass. They need me more than I need them." I don't need some hippie festival.
Yeah, fuck that shit. But Melissa, this is good for women's empowerment. There's never
been a female festival this big. I don't want to be pigeonholed as just some female artist.
I'm an artist. I only know one gender. That's green. It's me. It doesn't work as well when
you're talking about gender. I feel like this is like a classic in a movie where they're
appealing to somebody on racial grounds. I only see one color and that's green. Oh my
God. What was the big... I only know one sexual orientation. That's green. Okay. What is the
story? What's the biggest Melissa Etheridge song? Is it "Come to my window"? See, that's
not as good as those Indigo Girl songs. I mean, maybe I'm just... I'm talking crazy right
now. They're different artists. I mean, they're definitely two of the, especially in that
era of the biggest openly gay female singers. Right. Oh, I'm the only one. Oh yeah. Oh,
this is rough. I mean, I'm not that mad at it. I'm pretty out. This is kind of a bluesy
bar band. Oh, this is so gnarly. She's actually got a new album coming out April 12th called
The Medicine Show. Cool title. I mean, she's got a real set of pipes. For sure.
This would go great on a mixtape next to Dave Matthews Band's "Satellite." I feel like
this is a whole wave of kind of like chill out, 90s coffee shop music that always has
an organ. Right. That was a pretty sick change. This is a better song. Yeah. Jerry Gould's
Garcia Band, "Nine Minute Come to My Window," 1994. Right. Very late. Honolulu Civic Center,
Hawaii. They just did it once, folks. I feel like Jerry thought better of it. You come
across like that all the time. That's a funny list. Like the songs that The Dead or JGB
just did once. Right. That's a deep list. Let's see if any of the songs are out yet
from the new Melissa Ethel job, "Faded by Design." Her voice dropped a little bit. Yeah,
it still sounds good. Yeah, a little. It sounds good. Honestly, she's keeping that pretty
like tasteful 90s palette. Yeah, she's going strong with it. She had a kid with David Crosby,
right? Well, he's the sperm donor. Right. Which, yeah, that's what I mean. Yeah, yeah.
She and her partner asked David Crosby to be the sperm donor. I wonder how old that
kid is now. Maybe in their 20s. No, maybe not quite. We got to get on the phone to Winter.
Oh, yeah, yeah. We've been meaning to talk to Winter for people who don't remember. I
find that hard to believe you're true. TC had Winter as a legendary Time Crisis guest,
friend of the show. He's the inventor of Starbucking. He's been to tens of thousands of Starbucks
around the world. And honestly, Starbucks has been in the news quite a bit lately, and
we've been wanting to get the Winter take on it. So let's get him on the horn. Now,
let's go to the Time Crisis hotline. Hey, Winter. Hello. Hey, what's up, man? Welcome
back to Time Crisis. Hey, it's good to be here. Love talking to you guys. How are you,
Jake Ezra? Doing well. We're doing all right, man. I feel like with this appearance, you're
getting up there for maybe one of our all time most frequent guests. Well, you gentlemen
do talk about Starbucks quite a bit. I've been working my way backwards through Time
Crisis episodes and boy, I've been missing some great stuff. Well, and part of the reason
we wanted to call you is because, as always, Starbucks is in the news, maybe now more than
ever. I think they're always in the news. That's true. I guess to start, Howard Schultz
running for president. I mean, what is going on, man? I've been thinking about it since
you talked about it recently. And the fact is, I don't know if he can win. So I didn't
think about it too much when the announcement originally came out. But then he went and
gave that interview where he said that we can't afford health care for all. And he lost
me right there. No billionaire should be telling the American people that they can't afford
health care when he can afford the best health care for himself and his family that he wants.
Right on. Yeah, I agree. I mean, what's he thinking? I mean, he used to seem like a relatively
chill dude. Like, I feel like I saw a tweet or something a while ago where somebody said
he were getting excited about a candidate, maybe even somebody we love like Bernie. And
somebody said, you know, like, whatever. That's cool. But just keep in mind, anybody who actually
runs for president is insane. And, you know, I would cut Bernie some slack and some of
these people have truly been public servants for decades. At least that's as good as it
gets where you kind of like, OK, you've been doing your thing for a while, but these people
just throwing their hats in the ring. I want to be president. It's really bonkers. And
also, it's embarrassing. Howard Schultz is just destroying his legacy in a way. Well,
he's certainly got people riled up, that's for sure. And he's not doing Starbucks any
favors. So, Winter, I mean, you've been in and out of Starbucks nonstop the last few
months, I'm assuming. Have you talked to anyone at the stores about it at all? Has it come
up? It has not come up at the stores. I've only read about it online. And as a matter
of fact, I haven't been in and out of Starbucks that much. I had a bit of a crisis myself
with my family after I spoke to you guys in L.A. Oh, man. And I've sort of had to take
care of my mother. And that has put a real damper on my Starbucks. And I've basically
been working since last year to help pay for her care. But I'm hoping to get back on the
road either later this year across the pond and hit some Asian and European stores, or
maybe next year. Just I need to save up enough to ensure that she's well taken care of. And
I've been focusing on Scrabble, too, while I'm out here on the East Coast working because
this is a hub of tournament Scrabble, trying to get up to master ranking. Well, first of
all, I hope everyone's all right. And I hope that you can be back to. Sorry to hear that.
Sorry to hear that. And I hope your mom's all right and you can be back to Starbucks
soon. But back to the Scrabble, though, for a second, can you just prepare by playing
online Scrabble or you have to do something even more extreme? There have been some players
who have played online Scrabble exclusively because they don't have access to live opponents
and then they'll show up at a tournament and they'll do all right. But I only play with
the board. I never play online. Interesting. So, Howard Schultz, he lost you with his policy.
I already saw he had some quote the other day, the kind of corny thing where he said
how Donald Trump, Nancy Pelosi can't even be in the same room as each other. They hate
each other, which obviously they've still been in the same room. And he said, we can't
have a country like that. Whereas me, I'll have everybody come visit me in the office
and we'll talk things over over some coffee. He's a great dealmaker. Some Starbucks coffee.
He went his way to point out. I mean, I know Schultz probably thinks he's the anti-Trump,
but come on, man. In the mirror, bro. Look in the mirror. Yeah, he has a little bit too
much money. Although I do have one question for you, Winter. Part of the reason, as I
recall, that you got into Starbucking in the first place back in the nineties was because
when you first started experiencing Starbucks, you were impressed by how they were run, how
the business was run and the general vibe of the stores. Is that true? That's correct.
And the consistency of the coffee 20 years ago, it really was some of the best coffee
that you could find in most cities in America. Recently, y'all were talking about Omaha,
for example, and how you can get nitro good coffee in Omaha now. Yeah. 20 years ago. I
don't know that you could have gotten good coffee in Omaha. Starbucks might've been your
best bet. Exactly. Does that win Schultz any points in your book? Do you ever stop and
say, okay, universal health care, that would be nice. But if Schultz actually got reinvigorated,
maybe he's a little burned out on Starbucks and he wants a new project. And if he could
promise you that he could take America as a nation to that same feeling you had when
you walked into like a Starbucks in 96, could that maybe win you over to vote? Absolutely
not. I give Schultz no points towards the white house or the success that he brought
Starbucks. And I don't want that feeling. What I want is for people to have health care
and for the growing inequality gap to be diminished and for greater rights for disadvantaged groups
like women and minorities and homosexuals. So that is what I care about. Not the feeling
that I got when visiting a Starbucks straight shooter. I was in sense. I dig it. Okay. I
would say your priorities are officially in order. Although it does surprise me that if
he really wanted to try to spin his corporate experience into something, he could say something
like, listen, Donald Trump had a whole crazy real estate business. I ran a business that
actually was on the ground dealing with a lot of people every day. I wasn't just selling
apartments to rich people. I was bringing coffee to all sorts of people around the country.
And I want to use that experience to do something positive with healthcare and create universal,
you know, even that though he can't promise. And Starbucks was known for providing healthcare.
Yeah. That's weird too. You were, was 20 hours a week. Is that, or what? 30 hours? Right.
So yeah, that's exactly right. Part timers, 20 hours a week. Why can't he at least promise
the Starbucks model? As long as you're able bodied, you work 20 hours a week. Maybe, you
know, do a shift at the post office, maybe help clean up a part. That'd be, that would
almost be like the new deal. The new Starbucks deal. I think he's disconnected from the American
people. Schultz give up man. Bad vibes until Schultz stops running for president. Coffee
being all day. Oh, hell yeah. Third wave all the way. Make it at home. Oh, deeply.
Your breath is sweet with your eyes are like two jewels in the sky.
Your back is straight, your hair is smooth on the pillow where you lie.
But I don't sense affection, no gratitude or love.
Your loyalty is not to me, but to the stars above. One more cup of coffee before I go.
Winter, have you tried the Ariana Grande? I did. I heard you folks talking about it
and I decided to try it for myself. And I think I'm on the same page as you, Jake.
It is too sweet and it has too many calories and there's no way that I would have one of those at
every Starbucks, like you suggested. I've thought about you doing that, like
slamming like 12 of those in a day. Oh God. It's like just a true nightmare. Just cardiac arrest.
Oh God. I'd be in the grave. Yeah, you'd be dead. Now, if Ariana Grande was out there with me
to spend some time with her, might be worth it. But I don't know if I want to kill myself for that.
Okay. Wait, hold on, Winter. I like this angle. Are you a fan?
Oh sure. She's got chops. People dismiss her, but she can actually sing.
Oh, she can definitely sing. But hold on, Winter. There's a little more to the story that we found
out since the last episode. So as discussed, one of the prominent ingredients in the Cloud Macchiato
Ariana Grande Starbucks beverage is egg whites. Well, it turns out that Ms. Grande is a vegan.
Yes. There's a whole wing of her fan base,
which are vegan Ariana Nominators. And they're up in arms because there's no version of the drink
that they can make that's vegan. Even if you replace the milk with soy milk, there's still
the eggs. So she hasn't even vetted it. Well, that's what we don't know. I assume that Ariana
was very involved in the research and development phase of this beverage. What's your take on that,
Winter? Are the vegan Ariana Nominators right to cancel her?
Well, I mean, to come to her defense, she could have just legitimately missed it. So what she
needs to do now is own up to it and say that she's going to work with Starbucks to see if they can
figure out how to do it in a vegan way. I don't know if that's possible, but I do think that her
fans have a legitimate complaint. It's been blowing up my Google Starbucks alerts.
Oh, really? I'll tell you that. Yeah. It's all over my
Google News feed. I see it like every day. Oh, really? That's dominating the Starbucks
news cycle? Yeah.
I mean, it's just a dumb drink. They could just... We need Howard Schultz to weigh in on this.
If we have any political journalists listening, next time you're at a Howard Schultz press
conference being like, "How do you expect to run America when you can't even deal with Ariana
Grande's beverage properly?" I mean, that's a crisis. That's a bad look for Starbucks. It's
a bad look for Ariana. It's a bad look for Cloud Macchiato's. I was trying to think of some
charitable takes on this because I'm just a charitable guy. What do you think about this,
Winter? I'm not a vegan, but I've always respect the shit out of vegans.
Hell yeah.
Anybody listens to TC knows that I don't make fun of vegans. I think making fun of vegans
is weak, and I will be vegan at some point.
I do respect them. Yes.
I respect the hell out of vegans. And also just making fun of vegans is just so lame.
Who does that?
Oh, so many people. People associate vegans with being sanctimonious.
Sure.
And my one thing that I'll say is like, the earth is dying.
Yeah.
And-
They got cause.
People are sanctimonious about all sorts of nonsense. Honestly, your lifestyle is
creating way less pollution. Like you could be a little sanctimonious. I know some vegans very
well. I've never had anybody watch me like eat something and be like, what the fuck is wrong
with you? But if a vegan said like, Hey man, I know you eat a lot of meat. I, you know, I don't
want to bother you, but maybe you might want to know why I don't. I don't think that's overstepping.
That'd be annoying.
It'd be annoying, but I'd still, I wouldn't be irate about it.
For sure.
Oh, and also Nick said that he saw footage of her drinking it somewhere. So maybe she's not
even a real vegan and maybe Arnie Granny could say, guys, you caught me red-handed. I'm not a
real vegan. If you come by my house, I'll just be eating, you know.
Scrambled eggs.
I'll be eating scrambled eggs. I mean, she's originally from New Jersey, so she might go
straight to the fridge and get one of those pre-sliced packages of pepperonis and just pop
them in her mouth.
Meatball sub.
She's probably eating meatball subs. She's eating chicken parms.
She's saying she's vegan because it's like a chic, cool thing.
Perhaps. She's eating veal parmesan.
We're throwing her under the bus here.
No, no, we're pro. Hold on. I didn't get to the end of the story. You know I'm team,
I'm an Ariana and then a later. So, you know, deep down at the end of the day,
guys, you caught me red-handed. I'm a Jersey girl.
I mean, you really think I'm going to go more than a week without eating a veal parmesan?
Jersey girl.
And she's like, all right, guys, you caught me red-handed. I'm not a real vegan.
And people say, so did you say it just to win some clout?
Yeah, the clout was nice, but also I'm an influential person.
I don't personally have the resolve.
OK.
To go more than six, seven days without eating veal parm.
It's part of my culture, but I made a decision.
Veal is the harshest.
Veal is so harsh.
Also, there's something about a veal parm sub that's also the most brutal because it's like
the meat is so brutal and then you put it apart and you just throw it on a sandwich for lunch.
Like two in the afternoon.
So maybe her point is, you're right, guys, some of my motives weren't that pure,
but one of my motives was pure.
And that was knowing that I'm an influential person and I could eat veal parm all day.
But if I use my influence to convince even three percent of my fan base to go vegan,
I've decreased meat consumption in such a big way.
And I have to live with the guilt when I'm chowing down on that veal parm
during the break at my show.
Do I feel like an hypocrite?
The answer is yes.
And I don't feel good about that.
But I am helping decrease meat consumption by masquerading as a vegan.
And yeah, my wires got crossed with this whole Starbucks thing.
As I previously said, I am not actually a vegan,
but I'm going to continue to pretend to be a vegan because that's my form of advocacy.
I love it, man.
Is there anything wrong with that?
Winter, what's your take?
Oh, my God.
I think she'd be crucified.
Ezra, you are you are a brilliant, brilliant songwriter.
You are amazingly talented, but I'm not sure that working at the PR department
can work out for you.
If that's the advice you're giving.
OK, but hold on.
I'm not done, Winter.
And then she drops a trap banger called veal parm.
You know, I pay off some of my paparazzi contacts and we get a little sneak peek.
Oh, what's this?
Ariana Grande and Pete Davidson back together?
They got spotted eating a veal parm at a deli in New Jersey.
Dude, also, she's buying that veal cutlet at the deli.
Uh-huh.
Throwing it on that small charcoal grill.
You got me some type of way.
You choose to feel it this way.
I do not know what to say.
Yeah, yeah.
But you know I shouldn't think about it.
Look at your face.
Now I want to know how you taste.
Usually don't give it away.
Yeah, yeah.
But you know I'm already thinking about it.
Then I realize she's right there.
And I'm at home like damn this ain't fair.
Wake up with your girlfriend.
Yeah, yeah, 'cause I'm bored.
You can hit me in the morning.
Yeah, yeah, like it's yours.
I know it ain't right, but I don't care.
Wake up with your girlfriend.
Yeah, yeah, 'cause I'm bored.
You're listening to Time Crisis on Beast1.
Maybe my PR strategy won't work, but I'm just saying ethically.
Forget about PR.
I agree with Winters, she would get crucified.
But just you as a human being, do you buy the moral argument
that even though Ariana's, I would call it an addiction
to veal parm sandwiches, probably results in the murder of,
I don't know, 100 calves a year?
That ultimately her influence as a vegan influencer outweighs that.
You know, it's like one of those moral questions.
If you could flip the switch to kill one person or kill five,
you know, that kind of thing.
Well, as a matter of fact, Ezra, I was a philosophy major
in college in addition to a computer science major.
So your question really appeals to me.
And I want to say that, yes, the math works out in her favor,
but unfortunately, that's not the way that people work.
And so the outrage from the hypocrisy
would probably do more harm overall.
The outrage from the hypocrisy would just muddy the waters
about what it even means to be a vegan.
And suddenly all these people like to make fun of vegans.
I mean, there's been a lot of hoaxes in the news lately.
Right, I was just thinking about that.
The big college hoax or something.
And honestly, I've been saying for a long time,
they should just end college.
The whole institution's always been corrupt.
Now it's, you know, it seems even more rotten.
Now suddenly people just lose faith in the institution.
People often say that's what people who believe in Russian collusion.
The only take that I buy is not that the Russians are controlling the US.
It's that maybe they had a pretty good idea
that if you want to just f*** with the country,
you just make people lose faith in what's real.
And I guess if a prominent vegan was exposed to be a veal parmesan fraud,
the outrage and the controversy would make all sorts of non-vegans
even more adamant about the idea that veganism is just a pose.
And it would move even further away from what it really is,
which is a kind of moral...
Well, it's like global warming too.
Right.
If you're like a wealthy advocate for climate change.
DiCaprio.
Right, and you're flying around in a PJ.
Yeah.
People see that as hypocritical.
It's not as extreme as the Ariana Veal fantasy.
This is parody, folks.
Oh yeah, this is a total flight of fancy.
Although it does make me wonder in the real way,
has Ariana Grande ever eaten a veal parm sub on a PJ?
Maybe she just played Madison Square Garden
and one of her assistants ran to Jersey to get a really good veal parm sub
and they bring it back to her and say,
"You know, you can eat this on the flight back to Beverly Hills."
As much as I know there's so many ethical problems with that,
it does warm the cockles of my heart a little bit
just to see one of us make it.
We're off the rails here, Wendler.
Sorry, dude.
No, that's fine.
You want to bring it back to Starbucks though?
Let's bring it back to Starbucks.
So, you know, we've been mostly interested in Howard Schultz
and Ariana Grande in terms of Starbucks news,
but we don't have Starbucks Google alerts.
Is there anything else that we're missing?
What else is going on in the Starbucks universe?
Well, one big thing is store closures that they announced
right around the time that I spoke to you last.
They announced they were tripling store closures
from 50 to 150 for the United States this year
and I've been tracking that pretty closely.
In fact, I just posted up a list of stores that have closed
and they're already at 150 and they're still going.
So I think that number is going to be closer to 200.
Stores are dropping like flies.
New York, Manhattan has lost like 10 stores.
So is the Starbucks fleet down in net?
Like, are they opening more than they're closing
or are they closing more than they're opening?
They are opening more than they're closing.
Okay, so it's still going up.
They've opened hundreds of stores in corporate stores
in the US and Canada in 2018.
That's not even counting international stores.
I think when we spoke originally, they were around 28,000.
I think they're around 30,000 now.
So this is just a reorganization?
That's like Mickey D's numbers.
They were just too dense in the cities.
So most of the closures have been in cities like Los Angeles,
Southland, Bay Area, New York City, Chicago.
That makes sense.
I mean, Manhattan's a joke.
It's like Chase Bank and Starbucks, like every other block.
Now they're just going to be packed though.
Back in 2008, a decade ago, during the first purge,
when they shut down about a thousand stores,
a lot of those were in remote markets, smaller cities.
This time around, those stores have been relatively unscathed.
It's just the bigger cities that are getting hit.
Makes sense.
Well, we'll definitely be keeping an eye on that.
Well, thanks so much for calling in, Winter.
Gotta have you back in person next time you're in LA,
and we'll definitely have you call in again soon.
Absolutely.
It is always a pleasure talking to you guys
and love listening to your show.
All right, thanks, man.
Take care.
Have a good one.
Bye-bye.
Everyone could be here to cry
As it comes, this greening night
This beautiful creature must die
This beautiful creature must die
A death for no reason
Death for no reason is murder
And the flesh you so fantastically fry
Is not succulent, tasty, or kind
It's death for no reason
And death for no reason is murder
And the cough that you cough with a smile
Is murder
And the strife that you forcefully slice
Is murder
Do you know how unapologetic
I guess 'cause on this show now we do gross-out stuff.
We drink Cloud Macchiato's and eat Sour Patch Kids cereal.
Is that SPK cereal still around?
It's here on the premises?
Very stale.
I might want to try a bite.
I had a thought the other day where I was like,
"You know what this would be good for?
As a topping for ice cream."
What do you think about that?
Dark.
I'm not a fan of that concept.
But anyway, we've received a can of the Smartmouth Brewing Company's Saturday Morning Beer,
which is not officially licensed, but kind of branded as a Lucky Charms-style cereal beer.
It's all Lucky Charms colors and shapes, but it doesn't say Lucky Charms.
It says, and it says, "Magically Ridiculous" at the bottom.
So first of all, I gotta say that we're just falling for this stuff hook, line, and sinker.
I mean, I was watching Desus and Mero the other day, and they drank one can of this too.
Oh, really?
They tried, and I'm just like, "That's how stuff works these days."
It's like, I guess it's also similar to when we ate the Flamin' Hot Cheetos bagel.
A local company does some kind of stunty thing.
Next thing you know, shock jocks like us.
Yeah, this is the real morning zoo in us.
Yeah.
So guys, crazy story out of Virginia.
Some mad scientists over there.
It's always that thing where it's like, people are like, "Here's a crazy story.
Somebody's making a blah, blah, blah."
And it's always like, "What do they think of next?"
And it's always like, "Well, they thought of that so that you would do this piece."
Audio clickbait.
Anyway.
So where's the brewery out of?
What is Smart Mouth Brewery?
Norfolk, Virginia.
♪ Left my home in Norfolk, Virginia ♪
Vampire Week is playing in Norfolk later this year.
We're working on a cover of Promised Land.
Oh, really?
It crossed my mind in Norfolk, Virginia to bust out Promised Land,
but they probably get that all the time.
Right.
Are you guys doing any dead covers?
I think that'd be a bridge too far.
Maybe one day when the smoke clears.
I mean, we have all these people accusing us of being a jam band now
just because we dropped a little mixolydian.
Yeah, that was funny on the internet when you dropped Sunflower.
Like, it opened Twitter and it'd be like...
Oh yeah, there was like a moment that said vampire...
Yeah, you go to the like trends or whatever.
And it's just like this big picture of you and it's sort of like,
people are calling Vampire Weekend a jam band.
I mean, it's like, why is this a news item?
And then it's just like, Jared Kushner, like right underneath it.
Yeah.
I know.
Okay.
I mean, I thought it was kind of funny, but my take is that...
Well, the funny thing is, is that we stretched a few things out live, you know?
Right.
Now we've got some more musicians and that's kind of fun.
You can call that a form of jamming, but Sunflower is a funny one
because the song's like two minutes long.
Yeah, I was thinking it's more like kind of light prog.
That's interesting.
Not really jam.
Well, there's no guitar solo.
Right. It's very like...
But I think you also got to understand something is that people like us are interested in this
tasteful palette of the 1970s and the various tributations, if that's a word.
Tributaries.
Tributaries.
The mutations, the tributaries, the tributations.
To a lot of people, it's just kind of like you throw in one flat seventh
and they're just like jam band.
I don't always want to like comment on stuff in real time, but it...
Even with Harmony Hall, a lot of people are like, "This sounds like The Grateful Dead."
And I was kind of like, "That opening riff is more like..."
I don't hear that at all.
I know, but then I also take a step back and I'm like...
And a lot of people said in a complimentary way.
Sure.
So I also don't want to be like, "Um, actually, I thought maybe more almonds,
like the harmonized..."
I mean, maybe the solo at the end, but it's like palm muted.
So it's like, that's not a real Jerry move, but I'm just taking it too literally.
I know, I know.
It's more like, "Sounds like The Dead."
I'm like...
So on the one hand, it's...
Not real...
Sounds more like The Stones to me.
Like, the groove, like kind of the piano driven groove of Harmony Hall is super like...
Exile era.
Yeah, beggar's banquet era Stones.
But at the end of the day, it's also I'm kind of like...
I think that's why you can't get into this stuff in real time because you also don't
want to be like hitting people with actuallys when they're just trying to be like, hear
what they hear in music.
And that's cool too.
Yeah, that'd be so weak if you were just like...
If somebody's just like...
Yeah, I've gotten a lot of DMs from people like, "Loving the new tunes, it takes me back
to listening to The Dead."
And I was just like, "Well, you don't know what the f*** you're talking about."
Because the truth is, it's not like The Dead and The Stones don't have a lot of shared
DNA too.
None.
And I know what people mean because of course I love the jam band references.
I just kind of feel like you can't go too far with it because the true definition of
a jam band is live improvisational music.
Anyway, let's try this Lucky Charms.
Oh, jeez.
Bottoms up.
Very perfumey.
It more or less tastes like a real...
It's like an IPA.
Like a regular...
Yeah, and it is an IPA with marshmallows.
What does it mean with marshmallows?
Are there actual chunks in there?
No.
It's like a little sweeter.
It's okay.
It's not terrible.
It's not shockingly horrendous.
I would actually say that the Sour Patch Kids cereal is like way harsher than this.
For sure.
As I say that though, I do want to get one more handful.
Let me hit that SPK real quick.
I've been thinking about this.
Oh, yeah.
Sunflower.
Shout out to Smart Mouth Brewery.
And I'm chasing it with some SPK cereal.
You know it'd be tight if there was a micro brewery that did a Vampire Weekend brew.
I've seen this with bands.
Like there's...
I know.
Would it be...
I feel like there's so many now.
There's a Godify Voices beer.
There's a...
There's a Sublime beer I see everywhere in LA now.
Right.
There's a Dead beer.
Right.
It might just be like a limited...
I kind of feel like it's played out in a way.
But it'd be cool.
We got to find the right brewery.
Or maybe like a tequila.
I'm more into the tequila.
A Vampire Weekend tequila?
Yeah.
Vampire Weekend beer just doesn't feel quite right.
Like you guys are not a beer band at all.
What about like...
Vampire Weekend branded coffee.
But I feel like I see that a lot too.
Yeah.
I think tequila, dude.
I think tequila because that's the rarefied province of Sammy Hagar, George Clooney.
I also like the idea that it should be like impossible to get
and people start to question if it's real or not.
Very limited edition.
Very limited.
What's something that just nobody does?
It's like gin.
Actually, that's more on point.
Like a gin and tonic.
Just a fine gin.
I mean, that's more like old school Vampire Weekend.
Like first album era.
Yeah, kind of like preppy.
A branded gin and tonic.
Yeah.
It'd be super dark.
What?
Water.
Bottled water.
That'd be so harsh.
Jaden has a water brand that does...
Well, it's like sustainable.
Comes in cardboard.
Maybe he'd link up for a VW water.
What about like...
Seltzer?
Mm-hmm.
Maybe like a food product?
Popcorn and raisins.
I mean, this is just going full circle to Time Crisis branded Frosted Flakes.
I don't know why that's so f***ing hard.
It is a legal and logistical nightmare.
I've been trying for years to get that off the ground.
And look what happened.
Now I got to go put out a record.
Got to go tour.
Man, I could have been sitting on Easy Street.
Just raking in that Frosted Flakes money.
But my incompetent lawyers could not get the deal done, man.
Seinfeld, if you're listening, I hope that you figured out some way
that we can get this thing popping in Japan.
We have to call Seinfeld if he's not back next show.
Oh, definitely.
We need to check in from Seinfeld.
Okay, one thing that I've been meaning to talk about,
I want to get into this before the top five.
This story came out a few weeks ago and I didn't want to let it lie too long.
But this is a band that we've talked about quite a bit on the show.
And it's Imagine Dragons.
And I would like to think that outside of occasionally just being cheeky
and calling them imagination dragons,
just because I did that once by accident and then it became a thing.
I think we've always been pretty respectful of them.
I would actually say they've grown on us a lot.
Everybody's on their own trip, you know?
So I think everybody who's in a band or something,
you probably think that, oh, everybody's making fun of you or something.
Like Vampire Weekend, we've had our share of haters.
Sure, I remember.
And I've occasionally referenced that to somebody and somebody being like,
"You guys have had it so good. What are you talking about?
You're a very well-respected band."
Like something like that.
I'm just like, "Well, yeah, but the other day I saw somebody on my Instagram
and they're just like, 'What are you talking about?'"
And look, that goes all different ways.
So, you know, it's just like any field or just life,
everybody's on their own trip.
Everybody thinks that they're getting uniquely hated on or,
you know, we're all in our own feelings more.
And so, you know, you think about Imagine Dragons or something,
you're like, "Oh, they're massive.
Raking in the dough, playing big shows, hit after hit.
Like they're killing it."
Tons of fans.
Tons of fans.
Like they're on Easy Street.
I'd rather be Imagine Dragons than me.
Up to a point.
So anyway, you think about that and then you realize,
well, even they're on their own trip and they're kind of thinking,
you know, all that money and success goes out the window
when a mean-spirited comment cuts you to the core.
Same as for me.
Same for anybody at any level.
So anyway, I was kind of sad to see this.
A few weeks ago, Imagine Dragons frontman Dan Reynolds,
who we've shouted out on the show
because we know he does advocacy for the LGBT Mormon community
because that's a whole complicated thing.
He was pushed to the edge
and he felt the need to like drop a couple long form notes on Instagram.
This is what he said.
"For a decade now, I've dealt with critics and other bands
saying extremely harsh things about my band.
Not what I would call fair criticism,
which I always try my best to receive and learn from,
but actual clickbait horse s***.
Words filled with vile and hate meant to feed humanity's need
to laugh at each other's imperfections and fails."
So first of all, I know that a lot of people
when they hear a musician say something like that,
they're like, "Okay, all right, yeah, you're just mad."
But it's really true.
Come on, we all know that there's a difference
between fair criticism where somebody's just like,
"Honestly, I don't f*** with this.
Here's where I think it fails.
Here's what I think they're trying to do
and it didn't live up to it.
Here's why I think this is better."
That stuff can be painful,
but somebody says like, "Your song sucks."
It's like, "What are you going to do?"
-Yep.
-That's par for the course.
But he's totally right that there's something different.
And Imagine Dragons, I could imagine getting...
And I think Vampire Weekend got that in the early days,
maybe not at the same level.
Not just somebody being like,
"Here's what I think sucks about this.
I don't like the voice. I don't like the..."
Where it really becomes so obvious
that they're creating a whole spectacle.
They're performing hatred in this way to be like,
"This is the worst thing ever."
-Yep. I remember you guys.
-Oh, yeah. We had some brutal stuff.
-Yep.
-And then sometimes you meet these people down the road
and they're just like,
whether it's guys in other bands or writers,
bad people just be like,
"Oh, yeah. You know, I didn't really mean that or something."
And I also do have to say,
kind of like when I talked to Zach
about his kind of...
who made fun of Vampire Weekend as Vice Peace,
you also have to have sympathy too
that it's like writers have it really hard too.
I'd like to imagine if I was a writer,
I wouldn't be like writing clickbait things.
Not that that Zach piece was necessarily that,
but you know, just stuff like,
"Why Imagine Dragons is the worst band of all time."
I don't think I'd write that,
but the truth is this whole advertising universe,
the way that ad dollars are spent on the internet
incentivizes people to write like clickable, shareable stuff,
even if that means being a little extra or a lot extra.
So I think he's right to point out
that those are two different types of criticism.
So he says, "I've always stood silently
"and taken it for years.
"It has added to the depression
"I've dealt with since youth.
"I don't say this in search of sympathy,
"but just a fact.
"It's not the person that caused me the feelings
"of stress and depression,
"but what it does to the world as a band have created."
Maybe I'm missing something.
- What it does to the world the band has created maybe?
- I don't know.
"How could it possibly make a kid feel not cool
"listening to Imagine Dragons?
"I hate that thought.
"Wondering if my kids will be made fun of
"as they grow older because someone thinks
"my band isn't cool.
"That's rough stuff."
And I know some people could be like,
"Who cares, your kids are gonna grow up rich.
"They'll probably be going to USC."
- I'm trying to think of like earlier versions
of this same thing of like Glenn Fry's kids.
- We've talked about, I don't know about kids.
- Or like hanging out with some like punk indie snobs.
And they're like, "Yo, your dad's--"
- The dude from the Eagles?
And he's like-- - Lame.
- And they're like, "What are you talking about?
"This is great, it's volume two.
"It's one of the best songs I've ever heard all the time."
"Well, it sucks and you suck and your dad sucks."
- Whoa, that's just some teen stuff.
- I've also always found a little bit,
there's like a bit of hypocrisy.
There's like a type of person online who,
it could be a critic or it could just be somebody
who generally speaking has very strong feelings
about morality, which you can and cannot say,
which often is a good thing.
'Cause there hasn't been enough accountability
with some of that stuff.
But there's definitely the type of person who probably
if somebody made a joke about mental illness or something
would be like, "How dare you?"
But then might also say something incredibly mean
spirited to somebody they don't know.
And I generally think that as you get older,
you kind of realize part of the reason that you try
not to be harsh to people, especially people you don't know,
is not just be out of some sort of formality.
It is partially because you just don't know
what anybody's going through.
♪ Just a young gun with a quick fuse ♪
♪ I was uptight, wanna let loose ♪
♪ I was dreaming of bigger things ♪
♪ And wanna leave my old life behind ♪
Not a yes, sir. Not a follower.
Fit the box, fit the mode.
Have a seat in the foyer.
Take a number.
I was lightning before the thunder.
Thunder, thunder, thunder, thunder, thunder, thunder, thunder, thunder, thunder, thunder, thunder, thunder.
Thunder, feel the thunder.
Lightning and the thunder.
Thunder, feel the thunder.
Lightning and the thunder.
Thunder, thunder.
He says, "I've gotten over the fact that guys in other bands, the 1975, Foster the People, Smashing Pumpkins, Slipknot, etc. feel a need to talk badly about my band for
whatever reason."
That's so funny.
That's a hilarious list, too.
Slipknot and the 1975.
I know we're talking about being nice to people right now, but come on, folks.
[laughter]
Okay, you know I'm not gonna stick my neck out there.
I think all of those bands have good things about them.
But I would also say that all of those bands are very easy to make fun of if you want to be a d***.
You know what I'm saying?
I truly like things about all of those artists, and I think they're all interesting, and they've written great songs.
But it's not like he's like, "A lot of people talk s*** about Imagine Dragons."
Lou Reed, Paul McCartney, Elton John.
None of these people are either just unabashedly the greatest songwriters of their generation, nor are they just unimpeachably cool.
The 1975 "Throwing Shade" is epic.
That is epic.
I remember I went to go see--somebody took me to see Jeff Garland's comedy show at Largo.
You know, and of course I like Jeff Garland, because I love "Curb Your Enthusiasm."
Hell yeah.
And every night he has surprise guests.
So you never know who'll come out.
So the night I go, the guests are Sarah Silverman and Larry David.
Very cool.
So you know, I'm in heaven.
Yep.
And I remember at some point, Jeff is sitting there kind of interviewing Larry live, and they have this really funny conversation.
But it starts out with Jeff saying, "So Larry, you watch 'Saturday Night Live'?"
And he goes, "Yeah, yeah, yeah, sometimes."
And he's like, "Man, did you watch it the other night?"
And he's like, "Yeah, I watched some of it."
And he's like, "Did you see the musical artist?"
And then Larry goes on a hilarious bit about how he's never watched any musical artist ever on 'Saturday Night Live.'
And Jeff goes, "What about when you were a writer?
Weren't you like on set?"
He's like, "Yeah, yeah, I'd always go to the bathroom then or something."
But anyway, then Jeff goes, "Well, okay, you won't believe the band that I saw last weekend."
And Larry's like, "Yeah, what is it?"
And he goes, "It's this English band called the 1975.
It was the worst thing I ever saw."
And Larry's already checked out because he's like, "Okay, I don't know what you're talking about."
And then Jeff goes like, "This guy was wearing leather pants, such a wannabe rock star.
It was pathetic.
He had his shirt off.
He could barely sing.
The song was terrible."
And he went on this like epic kind of like old man rant about how much the 1975 sucked.
And just as like an artist who like knows how much it sucks to put yourself out there,
which I would like to think a stand-up comedian would know as well,
I really came close just on some like artist **** to almost being like, "Yo, shut up, Jeff.
Like chill the **** out, man."
Yeah.
You're decades and decades older than these dudes.
Like, whatever.
Who cares?
Can't you just be like, "I didn't get it."
And he was just like ranting in front of all these people and he was trying to get like Larry in on the cause.
And I remember at the time, I didn't even know of 1975.
I just felt kind of protective of them.
Because I was like, I just knew that feeling of like,
"You're going on this TV show where all sorts of random people are going to watch you and judge you."
And I understand a stand-up comedian's job is to also kind of like make fun of ****.
So maybe I got to chill out a bit because I do admire stand-up comedy as a profession and a medium.
And then also I could totally picture too,
I could just immediately picture myself like young and having just performed on Saturday Night Live.
And maybe those guys are curb heads.
I mean, it wouldn't...
They probably are.
It wouldn't be crazy.
I mean, you know, I know some English people who are curb heads.
And just imagine like, you're like, "Oh, I like that show. Oh, it's so funny. Larry David's a legend."
Then you're just like, "Well, you know the other guy, Jeff?"
And they're like, "Yeah."
It's like, he talked about how much you **** sucked on Saturday Night Live for 10 minutes
in front of Sour Silverman and Larry David.
And you'd be like, "Really?"
It'd just be kind of brutal.
♪ A fool in a car, shooting heroin ♪
♪ Saying controversial things just for the hell of it ♪
♪ Selling murder in a van, suffocate the black man ♪
♪ Stop with misdemeanors, someone make a business out of it ♪
♪ We can find out the information ♪
♪ Access all the applications that are hard to get ♪
♪ Positions based on miscommunication ♪
♪ Your fiendish truth is all he hears ♪
♪ Say we're just left in the UK ♪
♪ But then the team has failed us ♪
♪ And our love lives remain ♪
♪ It's our love lives remain ♪
♪ It's our love lives remain ♪
♪ It's our love lives remain ♪
Okay, so anyway, back to his note.
So all these people feel the need to talk badly about my band.
I don't feel anger towards them, actually.
Just more of a sadness that this industry embraces,
even celebrates with this mentality.
I wish it felt like a place where artists stood by each other
and supported another.
Dan, I **** with you, but that's never gonna happen.
'Cause this industry just pre-selects a lot of nutty people.
And then even within that crew,
sometimes the most competitive, harsh, brutal people
end up being the most successful
because of those very traits.
"Regardless of our different tastes and voices,
my bandmates are some of my best friends.
We are authentically ourselves
and strive to bring positivity and empowerment to the world.
We'll continue to do just that."
I mean, I'm sure he got a lot of sympathy for this.
So hopefully it was a cathartic experience.
But I do think that if he really kept quiet about this
for years and years through all their big success,
it must've like really got to him at some point,
just to feel like he had to write this.
And the sad part is,
I don't think like the dude from Slipknot
is gonna read that and be like,
"Whoa, sorry, man."
- My bad.
- "My bad, I have kids too.
And I've also struggled with depression."
And you're right, it's really hard putting yourself out.
I think this is gonna be like,
it's not gonna change anything, but I don't know.
- Tough to be positive and emotional, but also hip.
- Right.
- Those are sort of contradictions.
- Yeah, unless you're like a pop star.
- 'Cause they're going for like aspirat--
Yeah, but if they're like a band,
they're going for like aspirational.
- A rock band, yeah.
- Yeah, like they said, what did he say?
He said, "Strive to bring positivity
and empowerment to the world."
- That's a hell of a goal.
- Well, and I'll say--
- It's antithetical to like what most bands try to do.
So, you know, that's the rub.
- There is a type of character
who exists in the music industry.
They make music that some people perceive to be corny.
- Yeah.
- And they're also really big.
They can't just be cool with that.
They're also (beep) and competitive too.
And that is a very toxic combo.
So like for instance, there's a version,
and I don't get this vibe at all,
but there's a version of a guy like Dan
from Imagine Dragons, who's in Imagine Dragons,
and he knows that people don't think his band's
that cool or something.
And it's maybe antithetical to being hip,
but the person won't accept that.
And they're like, "No, I am hip.
And actually I'm (beep) cooler than the 1975.
And actually, (beep) those guys."
You know, it'd be like some weird combination.
- That's some Corgan.
- Right, that's more like--
- Although he doesn't try to go for empowerment.
He's just like, "This is my macro level big rock band,
and we're huge, and I'm resentful of those
who have much smaller audiences, but."
- Right, "You think you're so much cooler than me,
Stephen Malkemis?"
So there's a version of a Dan Reynolds that's like that,
but I don't get the impression that he's like that at all.
And I think like--
- It's kind of a new model.
Can you imagine some rock star back in the '70s?
Like, you know, like Zeppelin or Queen got bashed critically.
- As we saw in "Bohemian Rhapsody."
- Although I didn't finish the film.
But those bands had huge audiences,
but got bashed critically, and it's just funny
to think about Robert Plant being like,
"We're just trying to bring positivity."
- But we also talked on the show about how like,
from articles that I've read, Phil Collins--
- Oh, that's a good one.
- He's also held this negativity in that he's always
kind of like, "I know I (beep) suck, right?
I'm so uncool."
- He's a perfect case study.
- Yeah.
- I mean, his music in the '80s was so uplifting,
and like, I think it's great, but it is kind of corny.
- Yeah, well, compared to Peter Gabriel, it seemed corny,
but these days people probably look back and be like,
"Oh yeah, I (beep) all that stuff."
- That'd be kind of a weird bottle episode,
like track Phil Collins' career.
- Oh yeah, I do have Phil Collins' one.
- Like starting with his Genesis stuff?
- Yeah, honestly, that'd be a grail episode
if we got Phil Collins on the phone.
'Cause I've always been so interested in him,
ever since I read this Rolling Stone piece,
where it seemed like he was this guy
had all this success, and it kind of seemed like
the haters won in the Phil--
- Yeah.
- And I was like, but that, it's so crazy,
because at this moment, all the musicians that I know
have at least a few Phil Collins songs
that they think are like, incredible.
- Yeah, it's cycled back around, I think.
- Like you and I differ on Limp Bizkit.
You think that's irredeemably bad.
- It's true.
- But I kind of listen back to some of those songs,
I'm just like, yo, there's some energy there
that seems a little bit fresh in retrospect.
And I could totally imagine in 20 years,
the next generation looking back and making music
that semi-ironically, or just in a nostalgic way,
has like an Imagine Dragons feel.
And somebody's like, "Whoa, you know, back in my day,
"we thought the 1975 was cooler than Imagine Dragons."
They're like, "Really?
"Why?"
(laughing)
You know, just that (beep) happens.
- Sure, sure.
- Anyway, I hope some of these people reach out.
I wanna find that out.
I wanna find out if any of these people reached out.
I mean, I would think at least the 1975
and Foster the People being like the kind of younger crew
might take pause when they read this and be like,
"Oh man, let me clear that up."
I would like to think.
I'm gonna do some research.
I'm gonna hit up my music industry contacts
and say, "Has anybody from the 1975
"or Foster the People reached out?"
At the very least to say to this dude,
"Hey man, like, for all I know,
"maybe they didn't actually talk (beep)."
That can happen too.
Maybe they made a throwaway comment,
- Sure. - And he saw it,
and it caught him on a day when he was really struggling
with depression or his kid came home from school
and was like, "Daddy, somebody said Imagine Dragons suck."
And then he sees a comment, he's like,
"Well, who knows?"
We'll get to the bottom of it,
but now let's blast through the top five.
- It's time for the top five on iTunes.
- And we're doing something special this week.
- This is a canned episode.
- Because this is a canned episode,
it's as canned as a Lucky Charms beer.
- This was taped in mid-October of 2018.
- This was taped in 2009.
- This is the first TC ever.
- Yeah.
You're listening to the first time crisis recently unearthed.
We're listening to the top five songs
in each of our birth years.
- We've done this before.
- Did we do just like--
- I think we did another canned episode,
and we did the 77 versus 84.
- Okay, so we're doing this week more or less
in our respective birth years.
- Yep.
- I'm pretty sure 84 is gonna kick 77 in the pants, but--
- Well, we'll see.
- All right.
- So--
- I don't know what's coming, so.
- Well, Jake, 1977 is off to a strong start.
At number five, ABBA with "Dancing Queen."
- Oh, geez.
- Major.
- Great one.
- Love those piano octaves.
I mean, this is a stone cold classic.
- Yeah.
- I think ABBA was considered deeply uncool
in the late '70s.
- For sure.
- Just imagine like a dude from some totally like,
what we'd now consider middle of the road punk band,
railing against ABBA in 1977,
and then like today, just look back and be like,
dude, your band sucked.
- Yeah.
- You were like a third tier punk band.
ABBA were like pop geniuses.
- Cool that you put out one seven inch on stiff records
in '77, bud, but.
- You know that song from MGMT's first album
that's like an anecdote, they based the groove off this?
♪ I'm feeling rough, I'm feeling raw, I'm in the ♪
It's called--
- Like "Electric Feel"?
- No, no, no, it's the other one called,
oh, it's called "Time to Pretend."
- Oh yeah.
- It has like a similar tempo and groove.
- Wait, so they said that they based it off this?
- They based the groove off it.
Actually, you know what, I want them to hear that
back to back.
- MGMT is a tight band.
- Oh yeah, MGMT talked some mild (beep)
about Vampire Weekend.
- Did they?
- But it was also one of those things--
- They're tight, I mean like that second record is sweet.
- There's some throwaway comment that at the time
I was very sensitive and maybe traumatized
by some harsher things, and then when I first met them,
I was like, I don't know about these dudes.
But then they always turned out to be cool.
And also their record label was very competitive
with our record label.
- What label?
- They were on Columbia, which we're on now,
although, you know, this is 10 years ago.
So it was a totally different crew.
- That's funny 'cause you went there.
- Oh yeah, after all that (beep) talking,
I was like, I wanna see what's going on over here.
- No, but you also went to Columbia University.
- Yeah, no, that's what I'm talking about.
Oh, right.
- Weird.
- Columbia Records versus Columbia University.
- What kind of strings did your dad pull?
- Yeah.
- Get you in there, man.
- I played a water polo.
- Kaiser was a really good rugby player.
- Yeah, oh yeah, I played.
There's one picture of me.
There's one photo.
- Right.
- Wait, hold on, this is a G-Song.
Iconic synth part.
- This feels way slower.
- It's got that same kind of (beatboxing)
I see the basic idea.
Anyway, the MJMT just had some throwaway comment
and some thing, and I just didn't know how to take it.
And especially because behind the scenes,
I remember somebody at our label kept telling me
how every time they'd see Columbia people,
they were hyper competitive.
And I was kind of like, "Why, we're on an indie label."
- Probably these Ivy League bands.
- Yeah.
- Just going in on it, throwing shade.
- I mean, that's why--
- 'Cause they're from Wesleyan, right?
- They went to Wesleyan.
That's why I'm all for canceling college,
'cause it makes the bad worse,
and it makes the good bad,
especially these types of schools.
- Perpetuates these class hierarchies, man.
- It's (beep) up, man.
Anyway.
- Anyway.
- Anyway, no, I always (beep) with MJMT.
They're a good bad (beep) with their second album.
I listened to the new one a little bit,
and I was like, "Damn, these guys, they write songs."
- They're doing their thing.
- They're doing their thing.
- You heard it here, folks.
- MJMT, solid group.
Back to '84.
So you had Dancing Queen, ABBA, Strong Start.
- Strong Start.
- But I got Eurythmics.
- So March 24th of '77, I was a month and a half old.
- March 24th, 1984, I was--
- In utero.
- I was two weeks out.
I was two weeks out from being born.
- Okay.
- But I remember this.
- I was seven.
- A muffled sound awakens me from my slumber
through the layers of placenta and flesh,
separating me from the outside world,
a mixture of new wave and R&B.
♪ Here comes the rain again ♪
♪ Falling on my head like a memory ♪
♪ Falling on my head like a new emotion ♪
- Were your folks living in the city
or in Jersey at this point?
March of '84.
- Upper West Side.
- What year did they move to Jersey?
- It's like '85 or '86.
- Okay, right after.
- My infancy was up there.
♪ Into your ocean ♪
♪ Is it raining with you ♪
♪ So baby talk to me ♪
♪ Like lovers do ♪
- Also great.
- This song's okay.
I mean, it's good.
- Yeah, tone shift between the verse and the chorus.
I mean, Eurythmics generally rules.
- Yeah, not my favorite.
- Of their songs.
- Eurythmics.
- Yeah.
Back to '77.
Well, this is crazy.
It's that guy (beep) Bob Seger.
- Oh, cool.
- Who, as we talked about last time,
we saw the form.
- '77, huh?
So it's before "Against the Wind."
It's like, is it like "Beautiful Loser" or?
- It's a big one.
- "Rock and Roll Never Forgets"?
- It's not the rockers.
- Main Street?
- It's not the rockers and it's not the ballad.
- Down on Main Street.
No.
- I wouldn't quite call it a ballad, but it's a mid-tempo.
- Okay, is it still the same?
- Nope.
I'm gonna play it.
You see how quickly you can guess it.
- Okay.
Oh, okay, Night Moves.
I thought this was like '74.
- Album came out in '76.
- Huh, all right.
I mean, obviously this is,
I guess it's the most famous song probably.
I thought this was a couple of years earlier.
Well, '77's coming strong out of the gate.
- Yeah, that's pretty strong.
- Bob and to Seeger.
♪ A little too tall, could've used a few pounds ♪
♪ Tight pants, points, all in the now ♪
♪ She was a black-haired beauty with big dark eyes ♪
♪ And points all her own, sudden way up high ♪
♪ Way up front and high ♪
♪ Out past the cornfields where the woods got heavy ♪
♪ Out in the back seat of my '60 Chevy ♪
- Wait, this is the one that kinda reminds me
of Van Morrison.
- Oh, sure.
Great singer.
- He saved this one for the second encore,
I believe, at the show we went to at the Forum.
♪ Working on our night moves ♪
♪ Trying to make some front page driving news ♪
♪ Working on our night moves ♪
♪ In a summer town ♪
- It's kind of like a very mellow chorus
for like a big hit song.
Simple.
- You know, a lot of his songs are like that.
I remember we were listening to "We've Got Tonight."
- Oh yeah, it's all about the verse, kinda.
- Yeah, and the changes are subtle.
- Yeah.
♪ We were searching for some high-disguised song ♪
♪ We were just young and restless and bored ♪
♪ Living by the sword ♪
♪ And we'd steal away every chance we could ♪
- Strong.
Back in '84, Kenny Loggins, "Footloose."
- Okay.
- I mean, not mad,
but so far, '77 mopping the floor in '84.
- Which is no surprise.
- He's Wikipedia, photos tight.
Loggins in '95, standing in front of the Capitol building
with like a solid mid-'90s goatee.
- Just a very thick goatee.
- Yeah.
♪ I'm working so hard ♪
♪ I'm punching my cards ♪
- I always thought he sounded like
Lindsey Buckingham on this track.
- Oh yeah, this is very Buckingham, this whole song.
♪ I got this feeling ♪
♪ That time's just a-holding me down ♪
- Oh, he contributed to the "Star is Born" soundtrack
back in '76.
- Really?
- Whoa.
♪ I got this feeling ♪
♪ Or else I'll tear up this town ♪
♪ Now I gotta cut loose, footloose ♪
♪ Get my thoughts in the Sunday best shoes ♪
♪ Please, Louise ♪
♪ Pull me out of my misery ♪
- Have you ever seen that movie?
- Not in like 25 years, so in a way, no.
I think I've never seen it.
That's the one about like dancing.
- In like the '50s?
- In the town band dancing.
Kevin Bacon joined, right?
- Yeah.
- I mean, I can't believe how strong
"Out the Gate 77" is coming.
Check this one out.
Daryl Hall, John Oates, "Rich Girl."
- Oh, wow.
♪ And you're gone too far ♪
♪ 'Cause you know it don't matter anyway ♪
- This is like a song that had like such a deep renaissance.
Like, obviously it was a hit back then,
but I just feel like when I was in college,
this was one of these songs that like,
it's weird how just like something kicked in
and you're just like,
I'd be at so many parties or hanging out in somebody's room,
he would just like throw this on.
- Whoa.
- Just had like this 2005 renaissance.
- Huh, I guess I missed that.
♪ Don't you know ♪
♪ Don't you know ♪
♪ That it's wrong ♪
♪ To take what is given you ♪
♪ So far gone ♪
♪ On your own ♪
♪ You can get along ♪
♪ If you try to be strong ♪
♪ But you'll never be strong ♪
♪ 'Cause you're a rich girl ♪
♪ And you're gone too far ♪
♪ 'Cause you know it don't matter anyway ♪
- We've done "77" on this show like,
probably six times and it's always sucked.
So, I have to say, this is a thrill.
This is just a thrill.
- A God (beep) thrill.
♪ Don't matter anyway ♪
♪ Somebody, buddy, won't get you too far ♪
♪ Get you too far ♪
♪ High and dry ♪
♪ Out of the rain ♪
♪ It's so easy ♪
- This song's about when Daryl Hall
found out that his USC girlfriend
got in via that big college scam.
He was irate.
- Who did you displace?
What working class person did you displace?
- Is Daryl Hall a working class?
- I don't know.
- His Wikipedia does not indicate whether or not
he was raised working class.
(laughing)
♪ You can rely on the old man money ♪
♪ You can rely on the old man money ♪
♪ It's a bitch girl ♪
♪ And it don't do you harm ♪
♪ 'Cause you know it don't matter anyway ♪
♪ Say money, money, money ♪
- His father was a professional singer
and his mother was a vocal coach.
Okay.
- Probably not raking it in.
I mean, it depends.
Well, clearly he didn't identify as rich.
- Great song.
- I mean, I assume he didn't identify as rich.
That'd be a real shocker if somebody was like,
what's rich girl about?
- It's from the perspective of a rich guy.
And whoa, wait, what do you mean?
And he was like, well, you know, it's a rich guy, but--
- He's looking for a rich girl.
- He's actually making a strong case for her
why they should just like, you know,
grab their parents' credit cards and hit the road.
You can rely on the old man's money.
When he says it's a bitch girl, he's being ironic.
♪ Don't you know ♪
And Billy Joel Uptown Girl is actually written
from the perspective of an uptown guy.
When he says, I bet she's never had a downtown guy,
he's just making a statement.
- Yep.
- He's not the downtown guy.
He's like, I hope she's never had a downtown guy.
- You know how like in movies like Titanic,
there's the rich girl and then there's the working class guy
and there's always the rich guy who's a total prick?
- The Billy Zane.
- The Billy Zane.
(laughing)
Rich girl and uptown girl are both from the perspective
of the rich guy who's like, guys, I'm not that bad.
- That would be amazing if they remade Titanic,
but the POV was from Billy Zane.
- Yeah.
- So there's this like dirtbag kid named Jack Dawson
who's trying to get with his fiance.
- Right.
- And Jack dies.
He freezes to death in the ocean and it's a happy ending.
- Jack Dawson is just a total piece of (beep)
- It's a dirtbag.
- And it turns out that the whole time,
where's the Titanic?
Was it going to New York or to London?
- Yeah, it was from like Ireland to--
- To New York.
- To New York.
- And the whole reason that Billy Zane
was even on the Titanic is 'cause as soon as he got
to New York, he planned on establishing a trust
for at-risk youth using his family's vast income.
- Yep.
- And it turns out that this piece of (beep)
Jack Dawson got wind of that and said,
"Oh, this guy's got a lot of money?
Well, maybe if I start (beep) his lady."
- Knock her up.
(laughs)
- "I can work out some sort of situation."
Said, "Well, hold on, Jack.
Billy Zane wants to change society.
He wants to give money to not just help
one working class guy, he wants to dismantle capitalism."
That's the whole point of why he's going to New York
in the first place.
- He's actually gonna get politics.
(laughs)
- He's gonna be the first socialist for the president
of the United States.
- He was--
- Deeply egalitarian.
- Billy Zane was gonna be the first socialist mayor
of New York and then go on to the presidency.
But this scumbag, Jack Dawson, yeah, maybe.
- He has to dress the part.
I mean, he looks like an uptight rich guy,
but he's just doing that, he's in character.
- I know you see me in my tuxedo and tails
and you think I'm just another rich guy.
- He's rich, (beep) this whole thing.
But listen, you gotta dismantle the system from within.
And that's why I, Billy Zane, although I am a socialist,
will be running on the Democratic Party ticket
when I get to New York.
And now Jack, even though Jack's a working class guy,
he's kinda like, "Well, I make my money picking up crumbs
by exploiting these class divisions."
- I mean, Jack's gonna be a small business guy
that just runs as a Republican.
- I think it's one of those classic things
where it's like the college boy, wealthy guy
is actually like super socialist.
And he's like, "Well, Jack, surely you understand
as a member of the downtrodden working class."
And then Jack just says like some crazy racist (beep)
and Billy Zane's like, "Whoa, whoa, whoa."
You know, look at it through another lens, guys.
I'm not saying that Billy Zane's necessarily right.
I'm just saying it's more complicated than we thought.
I'm a rich guy.
Okay, finally, a strong one from 1984, a really strong one.
Cyndi Lauper, "Girls Just Wanna Have Fun."
- Oh my God.
I mean, I would say all in all, both years included,
it's just a strong batch.
- This song is incredible.
I love that palm muted guitar.
- Oh yeah.
- And like the right headphone.
We're not the fortunate ones.
This is also about like-
- Oh yeah, remember in the video,
it's like she's like in her kind of like crummy
New York apartment and everybody's making noise.
Such a crazy, amazing voice.
I love Cyndi Lauper's voice.
♪ All the women, the girls, they wanna have fun ♪
♪ Oh, girls just wanna have ♪
♪ That's all they really want ♪
♪ Want fun ♪
♪ When the work and day is done ♪
♪ Oh, girls, they wanna have fun ♪
- This is a really cool mix of like guitars
and then like synth.
This is a really cool solo in this song too.
- Oh yeah.
- Like synth solo.
- Kind of popcorn synth.
- Yeah.
Here we go.
- That's so cool.
It's almost a cliche at this point.
People have written about this song so much.
Like the classic rock critic thing is to point out
how this song is just like so melancholy.
- Sure.
- This is written by a guy named Robert Hazard.
- That sounds...
- He's like a Philadelphia like rock,
like singer songwriter guy.
Or not singer songwriter, but like a rock...
- Oh yeah.
Oh, she's not a writer on this.
This is a straight up Robert Hazard joint.
♪ It's all for ♪
♪ When the work and day is done ♪
♪ Oh, girls, they wanna have fun ♪
♪ Oh, girls, just wanna have ♪
♪ Fun ♪
- I don't know if he had a band or...
I think he just put out his own stuff under his name.
- Robert Hazard.
- Yep.
♪ They just wanna, they just wanna ♪
♪ Oh, they just wanna ♪
- He made some country albums late in life.
That's an interesting guy.
- Profiled in Rolling Stone in '81 by Kurt Loder.
- You gotta find that article.
- Wow.
Started out as a Dylan era folky
then spent eight years singing country and Western.
- The fact that Cindy Lauper, "Out the Gate" comes out,
girls just wanna have fun, plus "Time After Time."
- Plus "All Through the Night."
- Oh, I don't know that one.
- That ballad?
You know that one, dude.
That one's really good.
- Oh yeah, yeah, yeah.
♪ All through the night ♪
♪ I'll be awake and I'll be with you ♪
♪ All through the night ♪
♪ This precious time when time is new ♪
♪ All, all through the night to die ♪
♪ Knowing that we filled the sun without saying ♪
♪ We have no past, we won't reach back ♪
♪ Keep moving forward all through the night ♪
♪ And once we start the beat to click ♪
♪ And it goes running all through the night ♪
- I mean, now we just gotta play a little "Time After Time."
- Yeah, this combination of synth and palm muted guitar
is just like, so tasty.
- And there's so much stuff from like '84
that's, even like Kenny Loggins,
like the drums are too, it's just like, it's too overloaded.
This is like, uses those elements in a very balanced way.
And I think Cyndi Lauper did write this one, right?
- Like a co-write.
- With the guy who was her boyfriend in the band,
Cyndi Lauper and Rob Hyman.
♪ The woman dies, almost a lovely dying ♪
♪ Soon it takes the glamorous ♪
- Oh, he's from CT.
- Oh, wow.
- Hey-oh!
- Ding, ding, ding, ding, ding.
- Oh, Connecticut love.
- Okay, a guy-
- Rob Hyman.
- A guy from Connecticut co-wrote one of the best songs ever.
That's something.
- The Hooters.
I think I've heard them referenced
in those like "Sharpling Worcester" calls.
- Oh, yeah.
- I think I've heard Hooters referenced.
(laughing)
♪ The second hand done wide ♪
♪ If you're lost, you can look and you will find me ♪
♪ Time after time ♪
♪ If you fall, I will catch you, I'll be waiting ♪
♪ Time after time ♪
♪ If you're lost, you can look and you will find me ♪
- Oh, and that synth bass.
- Boom, boom, boom.
- Iconic.
- Is that fretless bass or is that like a synth?
- Sounds like a synth.
- My uncle Ted is really into fretless bass.
- I love fretless bass.
- Great sound.
- Jocko.
- I mean, this also has another 1984 song
with similar energy.
- Oh yeah, I was thinking the same thing.
- Kind of like similar groove, minimalist drums.
Also makes a synth and guitar haunting vibe.
♪ Hey little girl, is your daddy home ♪
♪ Did he go and leave you all alone ♪
♪ I got a bad desire ♪
♪ Oh, I'm on fire ♪
♪ Tell me now baby, is it good to you ♪
♪ And can he do to you the things that I do ♪
♪ Oh no, I can take you high ♪
♪ Oh, I'm on fire ♪
- Song from the point of view
of a very wealthy New Jersey man
pursuing a working class Jersey girl.
With Bruce, it'd be even funnier
just like doing his like Broadway show
and just talking about like all his like iconic songs.
He'd be like, "A lot of people assume
that all my songs, you know, are about working class guys.
But one thing people don't know is 'I'm on Fire'
is actually about a very rich guy
just kind of having a rough week, man.
Those guys get it bad too."
Actually, the video of this is the same as "Uptown Girl."
The "I'm on Fire" video, Bruce plays a mechanic
and like a hot rich woman brings her like sick car
into the shop.
- Wow.
- It's actually like a really sad dark video.
And like, then at night he fixes the car up real good.
And then he drives the car to deliver it at her house,
like to special delivery.
And he goes up to the door and like, it's at night
and he's like about to knock on the door
to like say what's up to her.
And then he kind of thinks better of it
and just walks away.
- I've never seen the video.
That anecdote makes the song,
that's why I'm not a fan of music videos.
Like the song is so atmospheric and like open and beautiful.
- And you don't know if it's a working class guy
or a rich guy.
- Or a middle class guy.
I mean, he could be, have a stable career
in the insurance industry, you know, I mean.
- No, "The River" is about a working class guy.
"Born in the USA" is actually about a middle class guy.
The guy from "Born in the USA"
later after he got back from Vietnam,
he went to work at ConAgra Foods,
worked his way up as an executive.
- Did pretty well for himself.
- Did pretty well.
"In Ground Pool."
(laughing)
♪ In ground pool ♪
Song "Mansion on the Hill" is about how
if you work hard enough in this equitable nation,
you can get your own mansion on the hill.
You can go from being a down and out Vietnam vet
to upper middle management in ConAgra.
- That's like such like a novel,
like such like a late 20th century,
like I don't know if it's quite Philip Roth kind of.
- Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- Like a Robert Stone novel or something.
- And then his life falls apart somehow,
but "Hangover," the whole story is how like the big thing
that he's working on at ConAgra is acquiring Fiddle Faddle
to add to their Crunch and Munch portfolio.
'Cause it's like the mid 80s and ConAgra has an obsession
with taking over the sweetened popcorn and peanuts market.
- Playing the margins of the snack food industry.
- We gotta buy Fiddle Faddle.
- Where are we?
- In the top five?
- Yeah, are we 1977?
- Speaking of music videos, you know what,
maybe we'll do that on the next one.
- Oh yeah, you had a video drop.
- Yeah, but it's already been a while,
so we'll kind of, we can give it a second life
on the next episode, but we dropped the "Sunflower" video,
which you still haven't seen,
so we'll drop that next time.
Back to 1977.
I mean, this is one of the strongest late 70s.
This is crazy.
- Enemy of the show.
- Enemy of the show, but this is still a tight song.
Steve Miller.
- Yeah, '77 is a tight time.
- It's crazy.
Although I will say,
because Steve Miller is enemy of the show now,
because he talked (beep) about Jerry after he died,
when you compare this, which is a cool little pop song
that has some vibey moments and a good groove,
if you compare this to what the dead were doing in '77,
I mean, this--
- It's a joke.
In terms of psychedelia, in terms of surrealism,
in terms of exploratory, spacey, vibey stuff, this is--
- Not exactly help on the way, Slipknot.
- Nope.
- Franklin's Tower.
- Not even close.
- Jerry listening to this and being like,
"That's a sweet little song, Steve."
- Yeah.
That's probably why Steve never got over it.
He's like, "Hey, Jerry, I finally wrote a cool psych jam,
"Fly Like an Eagle," and he's like, "All right.
"That's cool, man."
- Steve Miller has a cool voice, though.
All shade aside, Steve Miller has a dope voice.
- We're getting a little too positive on Steve Miller,
and as of recording time,
he still has not publicly apologized to Jerry.
- Or to us.
- Or to us, the fans.
More importantly, to us.
Now, turns out Steve Miller's not the only person
to perform that song,
so we actually don't have to give him any more air time.
We can play the version by Seal--
- Whoa.
- From Space Jam.
- Interesting.
- Which Time Crisis is gonna explicitly say
that we are issuing a statement
that the Space Jam version of Fly Like an Eagle by Seal
is now the definitive version of Fly Like an Eagle.
- Far surpasses the original.
- Far surpasses the original.
(laughing)
- That Steve Miller Fly Like an Eagle
is a mere historical curiosity.
♪ Time keeps on slipping ♪
♪ Into the future ♪
♪ Say ♪
♪ Time keeps on slipping, slipping, slipping ♪
♪ Into the future ♪
- Dude, what are you playing?
- It's a Steve Miller version.
Who's that?
- He wrote it, dude.
I'm pretty sure Seal wrote it.
- This is so straightforward as a cover.
Just with like a little bit of like--
- Yeah, they could add a little more fun.
- Yeah.
- But it's still the definitive version.
- They added this like 90s like trip hop beat or something.
Ooh, harmonies there.
♪ I can't get enough to eat ♪
♪ I wanna shoo the children ♪
- Shoo the children?
♪ I wanna shoo the children ♪
♪ I wanna house people ♪
- Oh, that's what he says, I wanna shoo.
- Shoo is a verb.
I wanna shoo the children who have no shoes on their feet.
♪ I wanna shoo the children ♪
- I think he's with Steve Miller,
who obviously is a very bitter, cruel person is saying,
I wanna like shoo those street urchins away.
- Ah, shoo them, oh wow.
- Yeah.
You know, Jerry would see a bunch of shoeless kids
and say, what's up man?
Let's go get you some shoes.
How about a hot meal?
Steve Miller would shoo them away.
- So true.
♪ I wanna shoo the children ♪
- Anyway, back to my year, 1984.
This is a funny song.
Rockwell.
Remember this one?
- I don't know if I know this one.
- Kind of a spooky song.
- Very stiff.
- Michael Jackson sings the chorus.
- Oh really, MJ, okay.
He hasn't been in the news at all recently.
- Terrible.
Maybe this was on one of our top fives a while ago.
- Yeah.
A masterpiece of 1980s paranoia.
♪ I'm just an average man with an average life ♪
♪ I work from nine to five ♪
♪ Hell, I pay the price ♪
♪ All I want is to be left alone in my average home ♪
♪ But why do I always feel like I'm in the twilight zone ♪
♪ And I always feel like ♪
♪ Somebody's watching me ♪
- Yeah.
♪ And I love the privacy ♪
- You see, this is the '80s production
that just, I can't hang with.
- It's still better than "Footloose."
- Eh, lateral move.
- Wait, wait.
I think this song is explicitly about a middle-class guy.
- Wow.
- All I want is to be left alone in my average home.
Every end of the wealth spectrum in this country.
- From Billy Zane running as a socialist
to Bruce Springsteen touting his cheddar
in his mansion on the hill.
- I've been born into a family with a lot of money, Jack,
but I intend to use that money for good.
And I won't let you stop me.
- This is a song about an average guy in an average home.
- Rose.
♪ But why do I always feel like ♪
♪ Somebody's watching me ♪
♪ And I have no privacy ♪
♪ I always feel like ♪
- So MJ came in and guested?
- Well, I think part of the story is that
the artist Rockwell was part of, maybe not so average,
he was part of the Gordy family.
You know, like Barry Gordy found in Motown.
- That's hilarious.
- You know, obviously there's a Michael Jackson connection.
But he came out the gate with a hit for his debut single.
♪ Somebody's watching me ♪
Solid song.
And get this, Jake.
So, so far, I wanna say, you've had a hell of a year, man.
1977, March, late March '77.
We had Abba, Dancing Queen, Nightmove, Seeger,
Rich Girl, Hall & Oates,
Fly Like an Eagle, Steve Miller, Ben.
- Four for four as far as I'm concerned.
- And now, I don't know if--
- Are we gonna end on a kind of a bummer note?
- I don't know if this song is a good one
'cause I actually don't know it.
It's a Barbra Streisand song.
- Ouch.
- But it is from A Star is Born.
So that's kind of cool. - Okay, there's some
symmetry there.
- Let's check it out.
(gentle music)
♪ Ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh ♪
♪ Ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh ♪
♪ Ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh ♪
♪ Love, soft as an easy chair ♪
♪ Love, fresh as the morning air ♪
- I don't understand the appeal
of Barbra Streisand, I have to say.
Like, what does she bring to the table?
- Well, I guess people like her movies.
I haven't seen very many.
I guess people like her as an actress as well.
And she's a good singer, sure.
♪ Like a rose under the azure sky ♪
- '77 came in with a bang, went out with a whimper.
(laughing)
- That's kind of true.
- I mean, this is that real late '70s (beep)
that we normally get. - This is what I thought
we'd have five songs of. - We'd be getting a lot of.
Four out of five ain't bad.
- I'll take it.
(gentle music)
- Where's this going, man? - All right.
- Okay, '77's canceled.
- That was legitimately terrible music.
- You had the lead, but going in on the home stretch,
1984 jumps right out.
And you know what's even cooler?
This is from an album called "1984."
- Oh, oh wow.
This is a real nail-biter, this show.
- '84 pulled in the lead.
- I think you kind of edged it out, though,
with the lopper and then this one.
- Yeah, yeah, I agree.
- This is such a triumphant end to this top five.
- I guess we just go out on this, huh?
- Yeah, normally we wrap it up and say a few words, but.
- I think we just go out and jump.
- All right, everybody, take care of each other,
believe in yourselves, show a little love
to Dan from Imagine Dragons, drop him a nice note.
That'd be a cool thing for TC heads to do.
Just randomly tweet or leave messages
for Dan from Imagine Dragons, like,
yo, we (beep) with you, man.
Don't let the haters get you down.
And we'll be leaving you with "Jump" by Van Halen.
We'll see you in two weeks, TC heads.
♪ Here I got my back against the record machine ♪
♪ I eat the words that you've seen ♪
♪ Can't you see what I mean ♪
♪ Now might as well jump, jump ♪
♪ Might as well jump ♪
♪ Go ahead and jump, jump ♪
♪ Go ahead and jump ♪
♪ Oh, how you, who said that ♪
♪ Baby, how you been ♪
♪ You say you don't know ♪
♪ You won't know until you hear ♪
♪ Can't you see me standing here ♪
♪ I got my back against the record machine ♪
♪ I eat the words that you've seen ♪
♪ Can't you see what I mean ♪
♪ Now might as well jump, jump ♪
♪ Go ahead and jump ♪
♪ Might as well jump, jump ♪
♪ Go ahead and jump ♪
♪ Jump ♪
>> Time Crisis with Ezra Kanin.
>> Peace One.
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