016. - Jon Caramanica

All right, this episode of How Long Gone is brought to you by Stateside with Kai and Carter, a new podcast from The Guardian. And they are using this podcast to slow down the news and wrestle with the questions that we all have about what's happening in the world. And they do it three times a week. Jason, does that sound familiar to you? We don't really talk about, you know, a lot of international global news items and climates and cultures and sports and things like that. We do talk about fashion and wellness, but for everything else, Kai and Carter are a great place. All right, so who couldn't use more news? Listen wherever you get your podcast. or watch on YouTube. Want to make a podcast? Spotify's got a platform that lets you make one super easily, then distribute it everywhere, and even earn money. We like that. All in one place for totally free. It's called Spotify for Podcasters. And here's how it works. Spotify for podcasters lets you record and edit podcasts right from your cellular telephone or your computer. So no matter what your setup is like, you can start creating today. Then you can distribute your podcast to Spotify and everywhere else, those other places that podcasts are heard. Video podcasts are also available on Spotify. And when you want to take conversations with your fans to the next level, Q&As and polls are the best way to get them talking. With Spotify for podcasters, you can earn money in a variety of ways, including ads and... and podcast subscriptions. And best of all, it's totally free. Zero catch. We've been using it ever since we started How Long Gone. And ever since I discovered Spotify for Podcasters, I feel like having the option of turning off the Q&As and the polls on the user dashboard has really helped boost my creativity and take it to another level. I highly recommend giving it a try. Download the Spotify for Podcasters app or go to www.spotify.com slash podcasters to get started.

Hello, Jason. Oh, is this Chris? Oh, God. Sorry. Let me just fix this microphone here. I'm always caught off guard with this whenever you guys call me for the show. I know. It's such a surprise. It's not planned or anything. I have to time it with my... with my chores that I have to do around the house, you know? I feel like you've been doing a lot of chores, King. What was on the docket today? Some yard work? Some interior work? Like, what are we looking at? Today was yard work, for sure. We're doing some landscaping. So, like, all week long I've been digging dirt, digging grass out of our lawn. Is it landscaping like something you can hire somebody for? It is, Chris. Like a landscape architect. I feel like there's a sexy... A nicer way to say a gardener? Yeah. There's people that you can hire to pour your cereal in the morning for you, but in the times of core, I like to have... It feels very good to do manual labor, I would say. It's rewarding and enriching. absolutely positively could not be me but i understand what you're saying i know well you're not that you're not that kind of cat like i am i like i like using my body in my hands building okay digging but your your body well i mean i've been i say that because i've been been doing a little workout like i'll hit the workout button on my apple watch when i'm doing the gardening i'm getting i'm getting gains bro i just did an hour and a half of digging holes and i cracked a thousand cows so suck on that bitch that's pretty cool actually i love when you put things into terms that all understands but i was telling you this a day or two ago but our we have a neighbor across the street who's been upset oh yeah you're beefing they've been they've been upset like because we've had our garbage cans like filled up with like grass and

yard waste is what we call that so and they're like they're when they're full the cans are like two three hundred pounds of fucking dirt you know so we just i just leave them on the leave them on the curb kind of like every day and we just we just load it up and then we just leave it on the curb and then when we refill it when the garbage man comes blah blah And we were walking the dog a couple days ago and a neighbor across the street who we've never met and lived here for like a year and a half, never met, never seen, starts yelling at us from their doorway asking if we're going to bring our trash cans in this week because they don't like the can being out there all the time. And we had just hit the bong pretty heavy right before that. And we just started laughing. And we're like, oh shit, this is so good. And then we started walking away. And then she started yelling Bible verses at us. It's so fire. She started yelling Psalm 91. What's the vibe? What's the vibe? Like old white lady? Old white lady. The worst. They're basically like the Trump Bible Belt people of the street. The guy is this big fat guy who's very racist. Moses Lawn with an electric lawnmower, if you know what I mean. And then she's like a Christian fundamentalist shut-in person who I've literally never seen leave the house. So it's a good vibe. But now every week I'm trying to figure out ways to fuck with them. Have you had another run-in or has it been strictly firing subs? Sadly, I have a feeling that she's never going to show her face again for another year. I don't think she wants to smoke. But I have been... What's the app that all the nerds use? Nextdoor? Yeah. Is she on Nextdoor? Like Flaming Stretch and his Asian chick? No, no. I think this person is so... They're kind of older. She doesn't have an app. Yeah, I think they probably only...

They only have Facebook on a tablet that their nephew got them from Best Buy and not an Apple one. They got a Surface tab and they think apps is a section of the menu and Chili's. They got the Surface tab and they keep hitting the button and the waiter does not come. Why the fuck? I asked for some nachos. But she's definitely the kind of person that would not order nachos because that's what the damn Mexicans are eating. Oh, that's a good point. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. More of a Bloomin' Onion type gal. So my strategy is I bring the trash cans in even slower now. Yeah, I think you should absolutely abuse it as far as you can go. I'm going to ruin this bitch's life. Exactly. But that's kind of the overarching theme of all this is it's making... This person's craziness magnified and it's making my pettiness magnified. She's gotten to the point where she's yelling Bible verses at a stranger and I've gotten to the point where I spend most of my day figuring out hike and troll a poor old lady. Simply because she started it. That's better than staring out the window thinking about how we're going to die. That is true. I mean, it could be worse. You know, my friend hit me, a friend, I'm not going to mention his name, a friend of ours hit me today. He's got the pluggy on the COVID test. So when you think about me, I want you to know I'm the kind of guy that's got a plug on a fucking medical test in a time of crisis. That's how deep we're going. Well, we can start doing the Joe Rogan method where you test every guest before you interview them. That's pretty funny. It's going to get expensive, though. I was listening to a show of his. I was reading something about it, about how he's doing it. I think it's like he has a doctor that he just brings on staff, and he charges $200 per test. It's like a 15-minute pinprick. They get a blood test. So he can just have the guests in the studio totally normal. Yes, exactly. You wait in the lobby while this doctor...

Gives you a blood test. 15 minutes later, if it's green light, then come on in and then we're fucking smoking weed and talking about grizzly bears, baby. Let's get it popping. What if you come in? What if fucking Jerry Seinfeld or Obama comes in and they're like, sorry, fam, you're negative. You can't do the pod. I mean, I would risk it probably for the right guest. Unfortunately, we're not making those Joe Rogan dollars yet. Interesting. What level of celebrity would you to get them on the pod? would you get COVID for? Oh, I'd get COVID for like, I don't know, man. Oh, yeah, I'd definitely get COVID. Yeah, hell yeah. Yeah, whatever. You'll get like a nasty case of it for Sienna Miller. I'm on my deathbed. I would say, I mean, I don't know. That's really tough. I don't really care about Obama enough. Well, you don't have to give me an answer right now. It's something cool to think about, though. It is something. I know who it is. What? 6ix9ine. Oh, yes. We had the first 6ix9ine out of jail interview and I just had to go to the hospital for a couple weeks. I'm a hero. A four-hour 6ix9ine interview lays it all on the line. That's what the people need. Move over, Carolyn Calloway. That's going on the Patreon, bro. Yeah. Oh, my God. We would make a grip. I mean, I would probably do it if Elton John was going to come in and do a three-song set just for me, my requests. I would do it. You would get HIV positive for that? I mean, COVID positive for that? Bitch, that's not funny, but yeah, probably I would. It was not funny. It was insensitive. What's going on with you? Is it still snowing in Montreal? No, it's just gray and overcast now. Just another suicide weather day. Every day is like Sunday. Morrissey voice. Morrissey voice. Every day has been a little bit like that, but I'll send you a screenshot of the weather, but Tuesday, 73. Wednesday, 87. Thursday, we're hitting 91. Friday, 93. Oh, my God. Damn. I want to be laying out topless on the Tesla tanning. I know. You need to figure out your Airbnb.

your LA Airbnb situation. I mean, I'm sure a listener would donate a house, you know? I mean, I'm sure there's, I'm sure we have those kinds of listeners. You know, I'm sure we have, I think our audience, based on the research I got back from, you know, the higher ups, it's saying we have a very high income audience listenership. Yeah. High enough to donate a house for you. It's a big CB, but you know, like a mid century, I would, you know, I'm particular about furnishings, but we could sort that out when the time comes. Anyway, we should call our guests. Today we're going to be talking to the New York Times pop music critic, John Carmonica. Friend of the show. Also just a guy that I love talking about stuff with because, you know, as much as my life seems cool. I feel very lucky to be able to talk to guys like him and like Joe Coscarelli about music and the music business because they're the real guys on the front lines. Yeah, those two guys have very similar names and jobs and everything, right? Yeah, yeah, they do. I have been guilty of getting them confused in our early awareness of them or my early awareness of them. much like me, will die on a hill. He died on a Hootie and the Blowfish hill. He loves Sam Hunt. He'll just kind of go hard as hell for whatever he likes, which I really appreciate. You guys are two very tatted up, white, opinionated bros who have a lot to say about bad music. He went to Harvard and works in the New York Times. It's just a little bit different. A little bit different. Let's give him a call because we're about to talk about... Fiona Apple, because I got some shit to say. That's right. Yeah. Fetch the bolt cutters, bitch. I'll be right back. This episode of How Long Gone is brought to you by Squarespace. Obviously, Jason, you and I spend a lot of time on the World Wide Web, sort of our peers, our listeners, our friends, our colleagues, maybe even your parents if they're freaky. And if you're doing anything in the world...

writing, taking pictures. I do topless boxing. You need a website. Exactly. A website that works, that does what it's supposed to do, that allows you to be creative, but also business-minded. Jason, there's one place to go for that, Squarespace. Yeah, Chris, I'm over here. I'm modifying calculators and putting Claude inside of them so you could cheat at school. And I just want a place where I could have everything all in one place. I can have the SEO tools. So those future graduates can find me and, you know, I'm able to accept quote unquote donations for my services that might be gray area. You know what I mean? And then email campaigns. Hey, I got a new, you know, 2.3 version upgrade. Boom, boom, boom. Get the analytics going. Raise some money. Show your investor all of your cool analytics of what's going on. They're going to want to get in early and we can use Blueprint AI to make your website look as professional as your competition, if not more. So head to squarespace.com slash howlong for a free trial. When you're ready to launch, use offer code howlong to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or a domain. This episode of How Long Gone is brought to you by a new podcast from The Guardian. stateside with kai and carter this is covering a lot of our bases jason it's a it's trying to slow down the news and wrestle with the questions we all have about what's happening in the world and i know you particularly have quite a lot of questions a lot of questions but how often because we do this podcast three times a week and that's a sweet spot how many times do they do three times a week and i i have a feeling just based on the platform and these talking points that they're maybe going to be covering different stuff than we do that's just a guess the guardian is not some billionaire owned They're not afraid to say what they want to say, brother. Yeah, Rupert ain't sniffing around in what journalists Kai Wright and Carter Sherman are up to over there at Stateside. But yeah, listen wherever you get your podcasts. You can watch it on YouTube. It's three times a week. And who couldn't use more news? Especially when it's not from here, let's say. Give it a listen. Give it a listen. Oh, this is huge for me personally. This episode of How I'm Gone.

It was brought to you by TaskRabbit. Oh, baby, let me tell you something. This is not a joke. I use TaskRabbit a lot because I can't do anything. You need some art hung? TaskRabbit. You need a fucking something put together? A cabinet? Got to reach that cheese grater on the top shelf? TaskRabbit. Anything you need, TaskRabbit can take care of it for you. How it works, TaskRabbit connects you with skilled taskers in your area. They can help you move. They can assemble furniture, repairs, yard work, mounting, and more. You can search for a tasker based on cost, skill set, availability, and past client reviews so you know exactly who's showing up and can have confidence that they know what they're doing because taskers have assembled over 3.4 million pieces of furniture, completed 700,000 home repairs. handled 1.5 million moves, and the numbers are just going up, Jason. Yeah, throw a little money at the problem. It's not so expensive. And that job that you really don't want to do is something that another person out in the world is very good at doing and would gladly do it in exchange for a little bit of money. So when life happens, your to-do list grows. Get ahead of it now and get $15 off your first task at TaskRabbit.com or grab the TaskRabbit app using promo code How long taskers book up faster, especially for same day tasks. So book trusted home help today. That is $15 off your first task using promo code. How long with the task rabbit app or at task rabbit.com. Okay. We're all here. We're just doing, okay. We're just going to get, we're going to get right into it. We're going to get right into it. JC was good, baby. You just doing blue backgrounds? What's really good? What are you trying to trick the algorithm? What's going on? That's called blue tape over my camera. Oh, my God. He thinks Big Brother's watching. Here's the thing, fam. They are watching. They already know what you look like. That's true. They haven't seen the new haircut, though. Yo, they like and subscribe.

John, your hair is looking thick and rich. Are you going to shave it or are you going to let it rot? See, what y'all don't know about me is in the early 2000s, this shit used to be extremely prolific. Did you have a white man afro? No, but it's like a 70s rock thing. It kind of goes full back. So I'm ready to go there if I need to. Shouts to my barber though, Rob at Mildred. I miss him, but... you know, it's, it's okay. If I've got to go back to, to protean man, I could do that. Is there ever a situation where you will need to do that? Other than like a Halloween situation? No, you mean to let it go? Yeah. Just to really let that hair go. Cause you're going to look like, I don't know what you're going to look like. No, no, no. First of all, luscious is a word. Well, I want you to have kind of the Pauly from Sopranos, the two gray stripes on either side. Well, sure. But, of course, we've got to start with the gray stripes right here and right here. Y'all out here, Chris, you think the algorithm can't see you because you're hiding in the bottom screen? No. I mean, I'll go face-to-face. I'm just saying. Mask off. I'll go mask off. That's exactly right. This is the only safe place. Fellas, we all go gray on our own time schedules, and that's okay. That's true. That's right. I shaved this week, but I have the grays there as well. Except for me, but most people do suffer from that in some way. Now, I will say from a beard care perspective, I tend to obsess over like, I'm sure this happens in your beard, Chris, not for you specifically, but in general, where you have like one or two hairs that kind of go in the wrong direction, like when everything's going away. So I tend to obsess over those things. And being in quarantine, I just... Every day, I just feel like I'm doing targeted assassinations of individual beard. So I haven't had to do a full trim because every day I'm getting like five. It's just tiny, just like real targeted. Beard Hive calls that the bonsai method. And maybe that's something to chat with your therapist about. Wow. Wow. I think the fact that you know that there's a beard hive is probably more of a therapeutic thing. He follows the hashtag on Twitter.

I joined Beard Hive when I realized one day that what I look like with facial hair and without is I can never go back to a clean shaven. My face just looks really punchable. It's bad. I just can't do it. If I'm ever so blessed as to get married, I want to... uh arrive at my wedding clean shaven and then just be like you're really about this life yeah yeah that's a good i like that a lot she's like i'm glad you did that before we um exchange the rings because i am not about this life that's what i'm saying um jason before you join the call uh we just had a few minutes there we were discussing the um we love discussing these beat battles on this podcast because i hate them and and i Chris, your connection to contemporary African-American culture is worrisome. Bro, they're playing songs that are already out. They're not battling. They're just playing songs. To your point, John, I might argue that more white people watch this shit than black people. Is that right? And how would you determine said demographic split? We don't have any hard data, but we both have brains. I do think the subtitle of this podcast would be, we don't have any hard days. We don't have any hard days. We do not traffic in hard days. I would say just based on actors in the comments section of them, we're like Adrian Brody being like, this is a dope beat guru. Then you're like, okay, I'm done. But you know Adrian Brody is out here producing Backpack Records. He's ahead. He's in his bed with a fucking NPC right now. Absolutely. I mean, he was doing that, to be fair, before quarantine. He's been doing that since November. I've revoked his hood pass, and Adrian knows that. Someone DM Adrian Brody. Since you cover this for a living, have you watched all of the beat battles? I didn't watch the Neo and Jante Austin battle, but I did watch all the major ones. There was a reggaeton one with Tiny and Looney Tunes the other night. That sounds interesting. It was actually very chill. It should have been way harder. They were just so...

nice to each other because it's kind of like a mentor uh yeah even though they're both super famous uh that sounds like a good vibes only situation is that true it was okay it's accurate uh one of them and i'm forgetting who did have the extremely luxurious like super you neck henley situation like it was like down to here, kind of like sternum level. The chains were falling on pure chest. It was glowing. I love chain skin contact. That's how God intended. Absolutely. You don't need a moisturizer. You don't need a toner. You just need 24 karat gold. Damn. Bars. So as a beat battle expert, what is the number one beat battle? Of this current group? If I had to go watch one because Swizz Beatz had a gun to my head, what would I do? I think honestly the one to watch would have been Lil Jon and T-Pain. Do you know, we had another guest who, it's a long story, but T-Pain was also his favorite. I think of the ones that have happened so far, that and the RZA Premier one have been the best. But the RZA Premier one, I don't know, man. It was a little bit – I want them to have a little bit of testiness to them. Yeah, same. And the only kind of funny part of the RZA Premier one was when RZA was talking about being vegan and Premier was like, you know – Some guy who's been with him for 20 years, who obviously RZA has met at some point, he's been making vegan meals. Then they started chopping it up about being vegan, which made me feel trash for not being vegan. If DJ Premier knows about being vegan, then you should be vegan. That's what I'm saying. I feel like I've learned about enough things over the years from rap music that I feel like I probably shouldn't be the last guy to become vegan. That's true.

Do you think everybody's actually at home, or do you think these guys are sneaking out and hitting the stew? No. Well, RZA definitely – RZA was definitely at home. One or more of his kids were there, and he definitely said at some point that he had not left the house in more than two weeks, and he started talking about, like, animals outside, and he was just like, yo, bong bong, like, animals are coming back. I think these people – look, I think if you are a – basically, like, a 23-year-old, pop quasi SoundCloud post rap producer living in Los Angeles, you know, and your house is like three tiers down from Tyga's in the hill. You are definitely locked in with like 25 people or sneaking to studios. But I think if you are old and you like your mortgage is paid, like you're staying. Yes. You understand the gravity of the situation. Let's put it that way. Do you think. We're going to have an influx of fire tunes from this. Have you listened to really any of the songs that have come out that are specifically social distancing songs? I have not jumped into that genre yet. Do you mean in lyrical content or in musical content? I mean, I would say it's in lyrical content and it manifests musically because they tend to be a little less overdressed than like... You're saying there's already music out there by artists we know that is COVID content created in the bubble, released in the bubble. Yes! Chris Martin's probably putting in work right now is what you're saying. Chris Martin for show. Every Friday we do a new song roundup and I have put a couple of these songs in there. Pirellis, the OG, has put a couple of songs in these there. Look, it's like an interesting marketing pitch to be like, I made this song on myself in my basement. I didn't talk to my wife for four days. I suppose it's an interesting marketing perspective, but I just don't think – no one has any bars about it. You know what I mean?

I don't think there's bars to be had, to be honest. And that, I don't know, I'm sure you watched that special last night, but that made me hate music, I think. No, to be honest, I kind of, so here's the thing. Going in early on the Gal Gadot thing actually bought me a lot of- I forgot that you were the expert on the Gal Gadot. He was on the front, for our listeners at home, he was doing a street sweeper-like machine gun sound effect. Did your mentions get ruined? No, most people were really on board. But there's a few weird 50-year-olds who are on my IG mentions being like, how can you hate love? And I was like, first of all, have you never listened to podcasts? Are you unaware of my personal brand? God, catch up, losers. And they're like, what is podcast? Deadass, it's over for them. But here's the thing. Going early on that. actually is useful because i think if you set a bar that if you come if you come to my house with trash you're gonna get washed out like you're gonna when these things pop up and i talk to my editor about them and the conversation is basically like are we prepared for me to do this again because invariably this is gonna happen again and do i want to be the guy throughout you know month nine of quarantine or month year six of quarantine shitting every time this comes up I have to basically be like, well, excuse me, and then like... Yeah, yeah, yeah. Is that the right thing? So we're trying to pick our spots. Is someone right, but someone is right. John Perales, the God, he wrote it. He has a much more holistic viewpoint of these things than I do. He's been covering this for 40, [redacted address] of dismantling you without you knowing you've been dismantled. I'm not always so blessed. That's truly the gift of a critic, I think. So you're not ready to become the Jeff Ross of COVID-19 is what you're saying? I think I don't have enough track suits to become the Jeff Ross of COVID-19. Which comes as a surprise.

Oh, no, no. I don't believe in tracksuits. Come on, man. Is it really? Yeah, no, no, no, no. We don't dress down over here. Yeah, he only likes sensible separates, not suits. Yeah, no, no, no. We don't match. We don't match our top to our bottoms. Sensible separates? First of all, this is a serious question. Are you so comfortable that you feel like wearing sweatpants in public is a positive look? Like you would enjoy that? Jason is really tall and he's unable to wear. He wears shorts mostly. I don't wear sweatpants in public. Okay. See, all right. So then why are you putting that on me then? Because there's a big difference between a sweatpants and a tracksuit. That's true. No, I can't. It's not for me, man. Good for you. I know Briss Black is not here doing it. No, Briss would not do that. I think that I embrace shorts more than most people, but that's because I love my legs. Of course. I love my legs, too, to be totally honest. I love my legs as well. So if I can show off some gam, then I'm going to. Don't let me spray. What if I can get you in a short suit and some clogs? Short sweatsuit and some clogs. What can we do? I don't know if you've seen. I wore a Tom Brown seersucker shorts tuxedo to the VMAs. Yeah. It was an epic look. I'm not coming from an uninformed perspective. Looking like LeBron's dentist. Yeah. I'm calling back your greatest hits. This is like if this is your life for Fitbits. John knows exactly what he's doing. And he's good. Come on, man. Dismantling me. I'm not new. I've been wearing shorts this entire – I mean, have you – so wait. How much have you been – you're in New York, right? Yeah, I'm in Brooklyn. I'm basically – I left the house maybe let's say twice a week on average. for, you know... Supplies. Yeah, for supplies. Footlocker? Yeah, right, exactly. Modell's clearance. Modell's clearance. Herman's sporting goods warehouse sale. But you've been busy because we've tried to schedule this and you're like, bro, I'm fucking slammed. Yeah, it's been strange.

All these people are getting used to working at home. I always work at home, so that's not the new part. You go to the office, but you also work from home, you're saying? Yeah, I would say primarily I work from home. Oh, I didn't know that. Yeah, yeah, primarily I work from home. I go to the office to record podcast, like and subscribe. I go to the office for meetings, but basically I'm working at home, but I tend to work idiosyncratic hours. I'll be up at 2 in the morning. I'm writing late at night. The way that... this has changed my schedule is when everybody is working at home and everybody feels really fragile. I'm trying to be more considerate. I'm trying to work normal hours so that my idiosyncrasies don't become like a stumbling block for everybody. That makes sense. That makes sense. So, so I'm trying to do that, but yeah, I've been writing a grip and, and the truth is part of it is it like pushes back the dread, you know, push it by the dread. And also like, People are steady doing weird or strange or fucked up shit on the internet. There's a lot of material. There's a lot of material. It's rich. You also wrote the Tiger King thing, correct? Tiger King, you know, optimum quark content. We said we weren't going to talk about that ever again on this podcast, but unfortunately it keeps rearing its ugly head. I mean, I do have the Seth Wadley cap. I don't have it on me right now, but I got the Seth Wadley cap. What did you think about the additional episode? I haven't watched it. I haven't watched that yet. I did not like it. It was upsetting for me. Did it feel too sentient? Because I feel like obviously part of the appeal of Tiger King is it's only half sentient. Did the follow-up feel too self-aware? It was absolutely too self-aware, and it just felt like we made a movie taking advantage of these crazy-ass hillbillies, and now we're going to do it again. But with live streaming and AirPods. Right. I didn't find it. I heard a lot of people talking about how it was exploitive. But I think his – I thought – I didn't get that. I thought he wanted this pretty badly. You mean like the actual Tiger King? Yes, yes. Yeah, yeah. No, I think – He was shooting a reality show. Have you also – there's a Reddit documentary about the guy who made –

who was making the reality show. About Rick Kirkham? Yes, that's insane. I'll send it to you. He was my favorite guy by far. Rick got into some methamphetamines. Oh, yes. Not that you couldn't tell by his teeth. Yo, Rick has seen things. It's an hour and a half long documentary about Rick on Reddit. I'm fucking ready. Nothing but time. But did you find it? Your final take is what? If you had to give the elevator pitch on Tiger King, your opinion of it? So there's two strains of it, right? And when I wrote about it, I tried to keep the morality question off to the side. I do think that it's possible to be exploited but also participate in your own exploitation, and that seems to be what was happening. Also, very clearly, the director... uh was not being transparent about the tone of what he was doing the director also i mean legend new york legend new york right exactly and out here shutting down restaurants uh shutting down b bar and not paying anybody because he was the hey look he it's okay he's giving us enough he's giving us enough B-Bar is also the most trash of his establishment. I mean, to be fair, that's accurate. As someone who had – I had a birthday party there once in the mid-2000s. It was trash then. That sounds about right. But he should pay people. He should pay people. He should pay people. You can't – Tiger King does not feed. He's been a turtle conservatist for a very long time. It's part of his personal brand. I randomly went to one of those galas a few years ago. Damn, must be nice. The only turtle gala I went to was involving the Entourage premiere. Wow. Wait, Entourage Maine or Entourage Films? Entourage, the film based on the television program. Maine, Maine. Entourage Grid or Entourage Stories? I need to know if it's feet or not. So it's quasi-immoral, but in an ecosystem where immorality is not in and of itself heretical. You know what I mean? But also sort of as aesthetics, it really reminds me, and I'm sure, Chris, you felt something similar to this.

There is an energy that certain people get when they are proximate to things that they should not be proximate to that then makes them behave in ways that are out of character. This is a five episode testament to the power of that thing. I'm near this. Therefore I am this. And that could go for, I hang out with lions and tigers, or it could go for, I buy leopard print pants. Like this goes, this works in either way. And, and that's what I was struck by repeatedly when I was watching it. I just kept, I kept thinking like, man, like here are people who had nothing, like, especially the people Joe would hire. These are people who had nothing, but just being proximate to these cats. made them feel like something larger than themselves. And for some people that was manifested in how they embody power and authority. And for some people it was manifested in how they dressed. And for some people it was manifested in how they spoke or their politics. But it really was an object lesson in that. Do you think it would have been such a cultural force if we wouldn't have been in quarantine? No. I also think that I think the backlash in a weird way would have hit Because there is a thing that happens when people are stuck in and they're watching, which is the immediate people you hear from about something like that are the, holy fuck, you hear from those people first. Yeah, of course, of course. And I think if people were just out doing their thing, I don't think you would have heard those people spike so intensely at the beginning. And I think you would have probably heard the kind of animal rights people and the ethicists. Just as loudly as the holy fuck people. Joe Exotic, much like Meek Mill and Roddy Rich, is beefing with PETA. Yeah. Although then he snitched and started working with PETA. I know, it's fire. I mean, I think that the whole thing is just, I'm exhausted by it. Do you wear fur? I would, but I don't. But you would.

You would. I protested. I mean, I was a PETA guy in high school. I was vegan in high school. I'm an animal rights guy. You were vegan before DJ Premier was vegan. Of course. Dude, I mean, look, we're talking to a trendsetter here, John. Come on, bro. I still call bullshit that DJ Premier fat ass vegan. I don't believe it. You say it to his face. You've got tape on your camera. Premier Primo is a studio vegan. He knows it. Twitter fingers vegan. That's what I'm saying. That's very safe from behind your duct tape. It is. It really is. We've covered Tiger. Another thing we've talked about on the show that Jason isn't on board with is I think the Weekend album is amazing. I love it. Incredibly well-timed, but I also think that bigger artists aren't releasing albums because they don't want to lose out on the secondary income of touring. It's 100% right, but this is what they're missing, right? What is fame? Not to be all fucking... Big picture. Damn, my man's getting heady already. Big picture is what we're looking for, buddy. That's what we're here for? Okay. We're not a granular podcast. Double down on that. We're a top-down podcast. Here's a philosophy for this fucking time. Fame is about mindshare. Fame is about how much someone can occupy the headspace of millions and millions and millions of people at any given moment. I'm close. You're almost there. I would say if you let the beard grow in a tiny bit, you're going to be right there. Then you'd be right over the top. So this is what fame is, right? You have an opportunity with a captive marketplace right now to inject something into the marketplace that would be fundamentally Beyonce lemonade style. Because Beyonce didn't do it during a quarantine, but she did it at a time when people were primed for it and they weren't expecting it. So when they arrived at it, they re-altered their realities to absorb it all at once.

Now, everybody's just sitting around waiting. If I'm Rihanna, I'm dropping my album tomorrow. Drop LP4, bro. Let's go. And this is the thing. But you want to know why Lady Gaga and all them are not dropping? It's not popping. It's not popping for them. It is quiet. It's so quiet for her. She's had to give for charity now. That's what she's doing. It's quiet like Brooklyn streets for her. It's COVID quiet for Gaga. So this is the thing. She knows perfectly well that if she dropped, it would just go away. It would go away immediately. Rihanna drops. All of a sudden, she's on every Spotify playlist. Radio, for people who still listen to radio, she'll be populating every radio station. Rihanna, Beyonce. you know, Drake, these are really the only people who are around who can take advantage of this. And I'm frankly a little stupefied that they haven't yet. I am too. I mean, it makes me think Rihanna is very far away from having anything actually finished. And Drake dropped literally a terrible song. A terrible song. It's mid. It's mid. It ain't mid. It's not terrible, but it's not good. It's mid. I demand more from my superstars. I don't want me. I totally agree. No, I look, I agree. And he said he was on someone's live like a week or two ago. And he, he implied that he was close to having something finished. Someone told me someone close to the camp has told me. that basically it's difficult to work with him because at this point he's so focused on money and fame. Like the art comes second and the success of something comes first. Oh, the art comes second. Exactly. And for someone like me, a patron of the arts and a person who holds creativity in such high regard, I don't want a throwaway song. Chris, you do marketing for brands. Don't come at me for the art comes second. What the fuck are you talking about? That's me giving back. That's me giving back. There's only one critic on this call. Wow. Don't talk to me about the art comes second. The idea that the art comes first is a fucking fallacy. That's not real. No, that's true. But do you think if Drake drank lean again, he would be better? I do. Wow.

Anything would help at this point. If Drake was gone, if Drake had the double cup in the studio with 40 right now, we could come out with some real shit. First of all, that might be sadder than COVID. Let's be honest. Yeah, but that's when Drake is at his best. I'm not sure I could take a So Far Gone or a Thank Me Later in this particular cultural moment. Fair, fair. And I will grant you that 2C Slide is an imperfect song, but this is Drake understanding this thing about fame, which is about mindshare. And if you can successfully propagate and continue to occupy mindshare, you will win. And that is why, if I'm Rihanna, I am literally scraping together 12 songs right now. Because 12 Rihanna songs is better than everything on Spotify New Music right now. Oh, yeah. I mean, it's rough out here. Speaking of new music, you know, I wanted to talk about fetching the bolt cutters. Man. Because I've never seen something get, I mean, it's getting, it's insane. It's insane. Look, I'm always skeptical of kind of like uniform critical approbation. That's not a good thing. People need diversity of opinion. You need to be able to talk frankly about artwork. Follow me on Twitter. It's at done to death. Just FYI. You said you had a hot take. No, it's not that. I mean, I've been a Fiona Apple fan since I was in high school. I really fucked with her. I think it sounds like a thespian. art teacher in exile that had her weird friends come over and beat on pots and pans so it's great it's not it's not awful by any means but it's not like again i this goes back to me thinking there's a problem with people not focusing on songs and yeah and it's the same kind of thing but she hosts songs she's off songs she's been on songs and now she's off songs well songs is out b songs is out that's right better she was better when songs

I don't know. I guess I experienced that record. How long have you had it? A week or a week. Okay, not super long. No, no, no, no. Not super long. I experienced it more as viscera. than pure song craft and you know i was trained i sort of alluded to this a little bit we had a round table at the paper uh where a bunch of us chimed in i kind of alluded to this but part of my ear training comes from like real experimental backpack independent rap of the 90s and those guys used to decimate song structure over and over and over again And it really taught me at a relatively formative stage of my critical understanding, it taught me that not all great music or not all great songs sound like the neatly structured stuff that I grew up on. And so I think I've had more tolerance for non-conventional quasi-pop songs. Well, as a person who grew up listening to hardcore and punk, I would say we also destroyed the typical song structure. But unfortunately, I am... uh just only drawn to to song structure i guess i'm i'm broken yeah yeah yeah and that's a real i think that's a real thing but i also think that part of what fiona is saying in addition to like fuck every man i've ever loved who did me wrong uh and and fuck my friends who let me down is also i you know i do seven minute yoko ono improv jazz now and you got to get on board But do you think people actually understand it and like it for the right reasons, or do you think people want to jump on the bandwagon? Because I think it's pretty dense to fully understand it from a lyrical and musical perspective. I think it's both. Obviously, a lot of the reviews that you see that came out right away were by people who also had the record for a week or two, and they've gotten a chance to live with it. I do think that...

Fiona Stannery is not that different from Rihanna Stannery, from Beyonce Stannery. Rihanna Stannery, frankly. It's not that different. People still have a need to boost themselves by association with Joe Exotic. It's like, I'm near this thing, therefore I am something like this thing. But I do think a lot of the writing I read about the Fiona record I thought was really considered. But to keep it a buck, When I first threw it on, the first song, I was like, yo, this is a Regina Spector song. It's weird. Regina Spector, Dollar Bin Queen. John, your mic keeps hitting your shirt collar. We're going to need you to take your shirt off, is what I'm saying. We're going to need you to get less animated. That's not possible. Regina Spector is truly an underrated queen. I wrote a profile of Virginia Spector for New York Magazine 15 years ago. We went to the park in Riverdale that overlooks the West Side Highway and the river. We had a very beautiful time. Very special day. She's like a Russian New York strike. Keep it a buck. Uh, so how special was it then? Uh, I, I, she was, she was, I feel like she was strokes affiliated. People kind of forget that. Yeah. Yeah. Cause wasn't it, um, uh, was it fab who she was, uh, like played on, played on. Yeah. Yeah. She played on it. She was, and she like opened for them a lot and stuff. What do you think about, what do you think about the new strokes? I haven't listened to the strokes record. My understanding is it's bad, but I haven't listened to it yet. The strokes don't, um, that's not your show. they just don't hit like a, an urgency for me. Like, did you, were you at the final quote unquote strokes, uh, like the Madison square garden strokes concert? That was like, I don't know. Yeah, for sure. I don't care about them that much, but I do think like I was there, I saw the first tour and stuff and I, that was like a very formative period. So I, I'm always going to check for it, but I don't think it's great either. Jason, did you listen to it?

I did not listen to it, and I'm in the same exact boat as you, Chris. When they first came out, it was a big part of my life and how I dressed and how I tried to get girls to have sex with me, and now I don't really care about it that much anymore. How'd that go? Really well. I mean, aside from 9-11 happening, 2001 was good for me. Wow. I can't wait to hear your 2020 review. But the fact that neither of you has listened to it is pretty interesting to me. Yeah. I mean, I don't feel... Look, the strokes are not near the center of any conversation, right? Like, I mean, are y'all out here listening to Julian Casablanca's solo records? No, that's absolutely put it in the band, mate. That is not it. What is the band called? The Voidoids? The Void? The Voids. Julian Casablanca's and The Voids. The Voids is a good band, I think. Yes, that's different, yeah. They probably play arenas in Argentina, though. Oh, for sure. Yeah, come to Brazil. Yeah, no, like come to Brazil, Kiev, they're jamming in Kiev, you know. Thank God for those other markets, man. I mean, look, we have to – look, it's like the pro golf seniors tour. It's like we've got to send them somewhere. You still fuck them. I thought that's what festival season was, but I see what you're saying. Wow. Kings don't go to festivals. The Strokes playing headlining Pitchfork Fest is not going to get them the bag compared to some soccer stadium in Mexico. Absolutely. I said salute to all our friends in countries that still appreciate the Strokes. Yeah, I mean, got to keep them in business. But yeah, I'm not out here listening to the Strokes album unless I absolutely have to. Wow, bro. Have you been participating in any IG Lives besides the beat battles? Or do you think that's like a silly way to spend your time? Oh, yeah. I mean, look, the thing that I dislike the most...

This is not quarantine specific. This is just life specific. Anything that's appointment. I don't do appointment things. Don't tell me. No wonder your hair is long as hell. You can't even fucking get a haircut appointment. First of all, again, shouts to Rob. At Mildred, he knows the challenges that I face with making appointments. You're a walk-in. Appointments are challenges for me. So I don't want to hear that you're playing five songs on your Instagram Live Sunday at 4 p.m. It's not for me. My general vibe with that is if it's hitting, if it's hitting, someone will have taped it and it'll be on YouTube and I'll track it down. I'm not going to sit looking at my phone all day. Well, I mean, Instagram has made it so you can watch it now on your computer, which is very smart, and I can't believe it took this long. It literally took for hundreds of thousands of people to die for them to understand how important that is. And Quibi still hasn't figured it out. Wait, was that in the press release, Chris? Yes, it was. On the occasion of the 100,000 COVID death, we would like to say. Exactly. Well, I want to talk to you about one other. queen of mine while we have you, and that's the new Phoebe Bridgers song. Really slapping, baby. First of all, here's some words about Phoebe Bridgers. She got a horn section, baby. It's popping. It's like Phoebe Lewis. Look, she's a solid seven. I'm a solid seven on Phoebe Bridgers, but here's the thing. Phoebe Bridgers on her Instagram story, when her... I think it was maybe the day her single came out. She posted a screen grab that someone had texted her of the Sam Hunt Pitchfork album review, which had gotten a 7.5. And then the score that she had gotten on her first album, which was a 7. And she posted these in back-to-back posts as if to say, like, ah, the indignation. Here's some country meathead. To be fair, I think I need to tell the listeners before you go any further. You're a known Sam Hunt Sam.

I think the right way to phrase that is I'm a person that appreciates greatness no matter where it emanates from. And it happens to emanate from Sam Hunt. So if I can continue, if you're going to be out here whining about Sam Hunt getting a 7.5 and you only got a 7, I don't really have a lot of dismantle space for that. That's fair. I don't think that's Phoebe Bridgers. I like Phoebe Bridgers quite a lot. But that said, Montevallo and the new Sam Hunt record, Southside, are both excellent. The fact that you honestly work for the paper of record and convince them to pay you to write 10,000 words about a rap country artist is honestly the biggest grift. It's incredible. First of all, I've done this multiple times. You can't talk about one finesse in isolation. You have to talk about series. I don't know who Sam Hunt is. As a member of Hunt Hive, can you... Cool take. I'm just saying, can you tell me... who he is or what what he does sam hunt is a guy who was basically the first person who was a nashville country performer but who had a tremendous amount of hip-hop influence and basically seamlessly wove talk rapping and traditional country singing into kind of a new novel package there were people who were doing sort of like quasi hip-hop stuff early you may remember florida georgia line and nelly doing a record together do i remember that was that was the day that music died yeah my favorite is um is is bone thugs and harmony ghetto cowboy Get Out Cowboy, very important song. I would point you to the historical list of rap country collaborations that I did for the paper last year in the wake of Old Town Road Remix. I think you might take something away from it. Wow, we're dealing with a king self-promoter right here. Yeah, you are very good at that. I've been doing this for a long time.

If you're going to come out here and try to quasi-drag me for a small thing I did today, I'm only going to tell you how it ties into a thing I've done before. No, no, no. I'm actually jealous of it because I think it's – I mean, you did it – the Hootie and the Blowfish one lasted for like a year, I felt like. I literally felt like I couldn't stop hearing about Hootie and the Blowfish for a year. You know, kings are both born and made. Bars. Well said, sir. Do you guys play music on this podcast? What's up? You want to play some Hootie? We don't play music on this podcast. We talk about music pretty often, but Jason and I have similar tastes, but it diverges at a point because he's into electronic music and I'm not. We also did have a little DMC whatever takedown for some artwork that we did and I'm not about to risk our I don't know if you're familiar with this. Legal credibility over Hootie and the Blowfish right now. A little newspaper that you may be familiar with sent us a cease and desist because our artwork resembled their, and I quote, award-winning podcast The Daily. No, are you serious? This is very serious. We got our podcast straight up kicked off of iTunes and Spotify and all that shit, and we had to change it and get... the times to approve our artwork selection. Deborah was a doll. We're all sorted out now. But I can't play Hootie. Shouts to our copyright team who I have spoken to on several occasions. Very diligent folks protecting the integrity of the brand. Calling your own property award winning is so cool. Because also, what podcast awards exist? I'm confused on that. Look, I have not worn it. They're probably getting a Peabody or some shit like that. That's true. It's journalism. Podcasting is for broke boys. Journalism is award winning. That's accurate. As a podcast. As a journalist. I know where the status goes. It seems to me like you're holding up pretty well, King. Here's the thing.

I think having tasks to do really helps. That's number one. I'm already, my predilections are like very indoor mouse already as someone that was like extremely outside in my twenties and in my thirties. Damn, are you selling drugs, bro? That's cool. I'm just saying, I just knew where to be and I was in the places where those places were. Now, I didn't think you sold drugs until you said that. And now I kind of. Now, just the last four or five years, I've already kind of been moving in this direction. And so it's not, structurally, it doesn't stress me out that much. But when I, the news is a dumpster fire and it's hard, that's the challenging part. Do you guys find the same thing? Do you find that like when you kind of open the spigot of news, it's so destabilizing, you kind of have to close it up again? It's the only way I can climax, baby. Yeah, that's true. That is one spigot, I suppose. Spigot. I'm able to, I'm able, I don't, I like can unsee it now. I can just go on Twitter and see the memes and like avoid the news because I don't think it's, I'm so tired of people I know telling me what to think about something that they don't know about. That's fair. It's impossible to avoid at this point. All right, Della Rocha. Exactly. You can't do what you told me. Speaking of De La Rocha, look, there are many casualties of the coronavirus, and I was going to go to the opening night of the Rage Against the Machine tour in El Paso, which is not happening, obviously, and I did not get to go to. Fucking bullshit, dude. Yeah, I know. The fucking man shut it down. It's terrible. This is another issue I have with the revisionist history of a band like that being cool when it was just like alternative radio rock. I agree. And I wasn't going to go because I loved Rage Against the Machine. To be honest, as someone who approached Rage Against the Machine from an hip-hop perspective, I always felt that they were corny. But I was prepared to kind of go for the kind of historical moment. I would say El Paso. El Paso is probably the place to see them. Well, that's the other thing is why wait?

why would I want to see them with a bunch of like quote unquote cool people in New York? I want to, you know, I want to see them out in the fucking country. So I love seeing a warmup show on the tour. You know what I mean? It's an incredible thing. I want to see Sam in the Walmart parking lot. Like I need to be where, where they feel at home, you know? Exactly. Well, where else are you going to do donuts to it? Good point. John, thank you for joining us. This is it. This is all you want. It's been a pleasure. That's all we want. Jason has a hard hour. No, we want more, John. Frankly, we could do this once a week with you. Maybe you can stop doing your podcast and you can just kind of hop on with ours or they can mold together as one or something. If you want to come over to where the producer ain't all up in the videos, you know what I'm saying? Come on over to How Long Gone. Come to Death Row, bitch. Yes. What a joy and a privilege to moisten the airwaves with you guys. I'm happy to get some updates from you on important topics because I feel like I talk to you a lot because I see you on the internet so much, but it's nice to actually have a little discourse. Tap it. I mean, you know you out here being shy about tapping in. I should tap in more. Tap the fuck in, man. Good advice. John, would you be down to come back on again and maybe we can explore the Lyricist Lounge side of you a little bit more? I would love to. I would love to. Only if you promise to listen to both Sam Hunt albums front to back. We can do that. All right, I'm out. But it was great meeting you. You seem like a cool cat. And I wish you all the best in your future endeavors. Bye, guys. Thanks, John. Later, bro.