Andy Frasco's World Saving Podcast - EP 278: Couch (a Flood City Music Festival EP)

Episode Date: July 9, 2024

Go Karting rules, you guys. Andy, Nick, and Beau discuss off-tour band/crew vacations, but why must there be such a dividing line between roles and who goes on vacation with whom? Can't we all just vacation... together?! If you're in the Pittsburgh area around July 26/27, why not check out Flood City Music Festival and catch Andy Frasco & the UN?? On the Interview Hour we got long-distance savy, Boston band: Couch! Let's listen in and learn how a horny, wildly danceable band can make it work via zoom... (Spoiler alert: It can be done!)  And guess what... now you can see a cool dog by the name of Denzel should you choose to watch this episode *exclusively* on Volume.com... now in color!  Generally speaking, we are psyched to partner up with our buddies at Volume.com! Check out their roster of upcoming live events and on-demand shows to enrich that sweet life of yours. Call, leave a message, and tell us if you think one can get addicted to mushrooms: [phone]  Check out our new album!, L'Optimist on all platforms Follow us on Instagram @worldsavingpodcast For more information on Andy Frasco, the band and/or the blog, go to: AndyFrasco.com Check out our good friends that help us unwind and sleep easy while on the road and at home: dialedingummies.com Produced by Andy Frasco, Joe Angelhow, & Chris Lorentz Audio mix by Chris Lorentz Featuring: Arno Bakker Shawn Eckels Andee Beats Avila 

Now, a message from the UN. Tonight, I throw myself into Out of the red, out of the head she said And I wonder When I sing along with you If everything could ever be this good forever If anything could ever be this good forever If anything could ever be this good again Ever be this good again The only thing I'll ever ask of you

You gotta promise not to stop when I say you will She said God, it's such a great week. Andy Frasco's World Saving Podcast. I'm Andy Frasco. I am feeling good. I'm feeling happy. I slept. I watched Netflix. That

show is so fucking good. Which one? The sports memorabilia one. Yeah. Golden. That guy weirds me out though. Yeah. He looks kind of like a sea urchin. He looks like he should just be selling used cars. Yeah. To widows. I mean, you're selling... It is kind of sad when the

art... When the athletes come in and sell their shit. Yeah, but I think some of them just don't care about their stuff anymore and they're rich. Like Joe Montana, there's no way that guy's poor. I don't know. They're not making money like athletes make now. Yeah, but he made a lot of money. Plus, he goes into speeches places.

He's Joe Montana. You know what I mean? I don't know. He looks sad. When they said, you could probably make $5 million, he's like, $5 million? Yeah, that is a lot of money though, even if you're already rich. Yeah. Yeah? I guess.

He would shit your pants if someone handed you $5 million right now. This is the Flood City Festival episode. We are sponsoring... Flood City is sponsoring the podcast for a few weeks to promote the festival in Johnstown, Pennsylvania.

They've already flooded the ground. They flooded the ground so we could swim to the stage. We're going to... They said, Andy, we get it. You want to crowd surf? We're going to make it easier. We're just going to make it into a big pool. They did have a huge flood there once. That's why it's called Flood City. Oh, really? Yeah. I didn't know that. It's like down a hill. I've been to play there once.

It's like you take this weird elevator down. You can take this weird trolley elevator. I can't remember what it's called. Let me find out who is Flood City. Flood City Music Festival. They got Jerry Harris. It's a good lineup. What is it? Jerry Harrison and the guys

in the talking heads. Jerry Harrison and Andrew Blue with Cool Cool Cool. Andy Frask in the UN. Yes, me and the band. Melvin Seals from Grateful Dead. Legend. Daniel Donato, Cosmic Country. Couch, who we have on the episode tonight.

I've been really loving this band, Couch. I just saw Danny D over at Red Rocks. How'd he do? Great. He's a good band. I saw his tour manager. He's a good hang. He's a good band. I saw his tour manager. He's a good hang. I'm so happy for Will Clark, the drummer.

He was in Funk U. Yeah. And he's like, fucking finally feeling like, has his dream come true, touring around. I thought you were talking about the 80s first baseman,

Will Clark, for the San Francisco Giants and Texas Rangers. He went to Mississippi State. But we do have Couch on the show from the fest. We're going to be interviewing two people,

two bands from the festival in the next couple of weeks. And then we'll do a recap of how the festival went. A recap? Yes. That'll be fun for me to recap a festival I didn't go to.

Yeah, it'll be awesome. You're going to love that. It was sick. Then we got Maggie Rose. I'm very excited for Maggie. I think we have Maggie on the show too. She's killing it. So happy for Maggie. I think we have Maggie on the show too. She's killing it.

So happy for Maggie. Runaway Jen. Oh shit. Runaway Jen's playing? They're cool. I like them. I don't know them. They're from Charleston.

I should get them up on stage. What do they do? Oregon Fairchild too. Remember them? I don't know them, but I've heard of them. Oh, this is going to be a fun fest. Who else is on this?

Billy the Kid? The Hillbilly Biscuits? Who the fuck is that? That's cool. Probably a new young regional. That kind of reminds me of like Limp Biscuit. Yeah. But like, you know, the porn stuff, like where you come on a biscuit. Yeah, I know what it is. Okay. Bo said he's going to Limp Biscuit

with Jason on your tour in D.C. Wait, you're going to Limp Biscuit? Yeah, there's days between festival. Yeah. They're playing D.C. Wait, you're going to Limp Bizkit? Yeah, there's days between festivals. They're playing D.C. What the fuck? I want to go. Why am I invited? Sorry, crew only. Fuck.

Did you hear the crew's getting all jealous that me and John are going on a vacation to Italy? No, you brought it up because you wanted the... Let's get Bo on the show right now. Bo Balinski, get over here. Bo Balinski, where are you?

Hey, Bo. What's up? Welcome back. Even though you don't want to do anything... He told me a couple weeks ago, he's like, please, I don't want to do anything regarding the podcast anymore. I just want more time to do my actual job, man. Okay, I get it.

I get it. That's all. Okay, so you do that, and then you. Okay, I get it. I get it. That's all. So you do that and then you're like, I want to go on. Then you get jealous that John and I are going on vacation. Now you guys have to have a crew vacation. Yeah, you guys are going to Italy. We're going to Greece. We're going to Italy and Greece. So where are you

going with... So tell me how this got brought up and the jealousy that ensues from me and John working so hard and having a little vacation. I got a nice phone call from our good friend Dan Snell the other night. He was drunk in the hotel room and he's like, you hear about this trip that John and Andy

are going on? I'm like, yeah. Is that definitely happening? He's like, yeah, it is. You and I need to take a trip. We're going to Mexico. So Dan Snell is the tour manager of Little Stranger. Yeah. And John Shields is on it.

He hates when we talk about vacation. I could see you staring us down. That's a weird thing to call your friend about in the kitchen. I know. Dan Snell does get a little jealous about shit like that. He wants to be... He's like always FOMO. If we don't invite him, he gets sad

as shit. He's not the rapper guy, right? No, he's the harmonica guy, tour manager. Kevin gets a little jelly when you don't invite him either, but now he has a girlfriend. He's chill with Sarah. So where are you guys going to go on your fucking crew date?

I don't know. He's talking. He says he's got a buddy with a house in Puerto Vallarta. Puerto Vallarta. Yeah. I can't have you be getting all strung out with Dan Snell. I think I said that to him. I was like, dude, I don't know if I can handle

a week in Mexico with you. Dude, you guys will be blacking out every day. You guys will be cleaning dishes from the cartel. By the end of that. They're like... Oh, and I'm like thousands of dollars. You're going to have to do dishes, dude.

We talked about having Jason come too. Jason can keep us in line. Yeah, yeah. No, don't... If you kill Jason on that fucking trip, his heart... He has bad blood pressure. That's true.

Does? Yeah. Yeah, but no, He'd just do it to himself. Bo has a girlfriend now. Okay. Did you hear about this? He's kind of has a girlfriend. Tell us about it. I'm calling you out, dude.

I'm calling you out. He didn't rob a bank. Yeah. I got a lady friend. That's good. Do you like her? Are you happy? Yeah, I am.

Do you guys go on dates? Do you guys kiss on the mouth? Yes, we kiss on the mouth. Do you guys... Dude, are you a wet kisser with her like you are with me? Everyone. Good. What a lover.

This man is a good lover. You could tell by his eyes, how he talks to people. You're a good lover. I like to make eye contact. It's kind of scary. When I kiss him, he's like, I'm coming in. I'm coming in if you like it or not. It's the same thing.

You do that for everybody. I do close my eyes because I don't like intimacy. I'm like, that says something. Yeah, I'm scared of it. All right. So you're having fun. You're living your life. You don't want to be on the podcast anymore. I right. So you're having fun. You're living your life. You don't want to be on the podcast

anymore. I understand. So you're teaching us how to do it. I know this is the last week. It's like graduation. You're taking off the steering wheels. You know I'm still going to be here doing work and then you guys are like, hey, how do we do this? I'm just petty. That's all. I got to find...

Chad Zelmer is our guy now. Chad Zelmer. I'm still going to be here all the time anyways. True. All right. Get out of here. Go. Bo Kalinske. Thank you.

Get out of here. Get out of here. Damn. I didn't know Dan Snell was a little bitch. Dan gets FOMO heavy. Why do men in their 30s get so much FOMO? Because, you know... Life's passing them by.

No, I just think, you know, I think tour managers... I think there's a philosophy with tour managers. Like, where are you going? They are just like always seeing everyone else have a great time. Yeah. While they are just fucking working and grinding their ass off. Dan's never having a good time. Oh, yeah. Dan's having a good time. Dan's having a good time.

Bo's having a good time. You've been enjoying it lately. I did see the death in his eyes. They have all that power though. They control the guest list. They do control the guest list. They could ruin anything at any moment. That's true.

And Bo and Dan are the same because they're tour managers but they're also like stage managers. That's true. Well, stage managing little strangers like what? You put a melodica on a table? Yeah. Exactly.

Fuck you, Kevin. Fuck you, Kevin. I should have sat in a melodica that one night and just ripped it because I'm pretty sure I'm good at it. I've never played it before but I'm like, I get it. I can figure it out. It's pretty easy. You just blow and do the piano notes. Yeah. I already know how to blow something and I know how to do piano notes. Yeah. Oh man, I'm going to fucking go into the sphere this weekend.

Sphere. I kind of want to go. Do you sphere you're going to have a good time? No sphere. Vegas always stresses me out. I'm not a big Vegas guy. I look at my, a big Vegas guy I'm about to drop $2,500, $3,000 on food and booze and all this

bullshit to be in fucking Vegas, like I could go to Italy for that shit it's not like it's like you're not going to spend that much, are you? I mean, probably I'm going to gamble, I'll at least gamble at least $1,500.

Okay. Well, that's part of it. We're going to... I'm with Salkin. So he wants to go to all the fancy-ass restaurants. So I'm going to definitely drop another $1,000 on food. He does like to do rich guy shit. They got us a box, which is tight.

Who did? Sweet. This guy. I can't say who. Fair enough. But they got us... And they got us hotels at Caesar Palace. Damn, I want to go.

You should come. Do you want to come? Maybe. We said no girls allowed. Well, I'm not a girl, technically. People who have girlfriends. Who does? But you'd be fine.

She wouldn't come. I'm just saying it was single. Oh, okay. You guys said, I'm not going to go. I don't want to be with your little sixth grade girl chasing trip with Jeremy. I'm not chasing girls, but you know, he's a newly single man.

You're not not chasing girls. No. They out there and you trying to find them. I mean, I'm a single man, whatever. Okay, we get it. But also it's like the dead scene. It's like it's going to be like half our fans. Yeah, a lot of old people.

But a lot of older people. I don't know. You like that, though. I do like MILFs. But now I'm becoming a MILF. My age group, I'm 36. A man I'd like to fuck? No, just like I'm turning...

Now MILFs are just people my age. That's true. So it's like not even a MILF anymore. People your age have like kids in high school. Yeah, people my age now have like fucking five-year-olds. Do you have like, no, you're from LA, so they don't have kids in high school. No, yeah, they all have late. My friends have kids like going to college already because they had kids

like right after high school. Yeah, I'd be tight. Like if I like found a girl who's like had a kid who's like 17 now. Yeah, the Midwest. I mean, I'd be tight. If I found a girl who had a kid who's like 17 now. Yeah. The Midwest is... I'd be down. Then she has her second life and she's like 40.

Yeah. You got some 18-year-old kid coming around. Yeah. He won't care. He's in college. He's going to beat your ass. He's going to beat my ass.

That'd be funny. You come home and you're banging someone's mom. You have the Midwest people to start cranking them out. Plus, I went to Cadillac school, so they're all weird. They're building their army. That would be...

Yeah, dude, I don't get... I have a lot of kids. What's the deal? So, I'm always thinking like... Just cultural. Yeah, but is it accidental or is it cultural? There's a couple accidents in there, but mostly people are getting married

to their high school sweetheart. And then just banging out kids at 20. Yeah, but there's something to be said for getting it out of the way, I think, too. Yeah, because you're 40. That's what I'm saying. It's kind of a good life to just bang them out. And then you have more time with your kids.

Yeah, and you're 40, and then you have your own life again. Then you're not like Robert De Niro or whatever. Remember, he had a kid at 78. Oh, that's going to be me. I'm going to be old as fuck having a kid. Probably get convinced into it. Like Al Pacino.

That's just so weird. Yeah. Being 80 and having a kid is kind of crazy. That's a little crazy. What's the point of that? Mick Jagger too, right? He just had another kid. I don't know about that one.

Maybe. I know about De Niro and I know about Pacino. It's all actors because they're psychos. It's hot. They got to be a psycho to be an actor. De Niro's a good actor though. Pacino. Should I date Catherine Blanford?

I don't know. Couldn't care less honestly. Why? I need advice from you. What? I don't have any advice. I need advice. What's the advice? Because I had... Toby sat me down and said, you need to start looking for a girlfriend. Why did she do that? What? I don't have any advice. I need advice. What's the advice? Toby sat me down and said, you need to start looking for a girlfriend. Why did she do that?

I don't know. She's worried about you? She said, you can't just be fucking being single your whole life. You can't? I dream of it all the time. Sounds amazing. That's what I'm saying. I really do love my life. I enjoy being single. I look at my friends who have kids and who have wives

and shit, and they're fucking miserable. Not all of them. Most of them. Sean's pretty happy. He doesn't have kids yet. Okay, I see what you're saying now. What? They're stressed out. They have kids. I like to be... If I want to go sailing one day, I want to go sailing.

It does seem like having kids ruins your life forever, doesn't it? I mean, I'm not a scientist or anything, but kind of. It's funny how all these people, they tell you having kids is like, it's the best thing that ever happens to you, but everything they say about it is like, they're miserable.

I haven't slept in three years. You know what I'm saying? They do get a tax break. But you still have to pay for their attitudes and not sleeping your kid would be insane too women can't be horrid anymore but then I met this like cute couple with like these really cute kids

and they're just on a boat and they were wake surfing and she was like the kid was wake surfing with the dad you're falling for the Hallmark part of it. That's how they get you. I know. Babies are so cute until they're in your house. Screaming about nothing for hours.

I can't stand the smell of baby powder and oil and shit. Really? It's gross to me, dude. I want to vomit. Every time I... I never change a diaper. Every time I'm in a person's house with kids, I take a piss in the bathroom

and I smell that baby oil and shit. All our parent fans are listening to us like, these fucking losers. These fucking dipshit losers are never going to have a cool life. These empty lives talking about my life, how I'm the happiest I've ever been raising this child that I love more than anything. And they're like,

I don't want to change a diapy. Yeah, maybe I am being selfish. My goal in life is to never change one diaper. But I kind of want to... It'd be so awesome to have a kid. I'm like on the fence about it. Only if they're talented and cool. I don't want some

dork medium kid. I want a kid that's good at baseball. But how do you... You can't force somebody to be talented. My kid wouldn't be good at sports. I'm not athletic. I want a kid that's good at baseball. But how do you... You can't force somebody to be talented. My kid wouldn't be good at sports. I'm not athletic enough to have a kid that's good at sports, so I'm not really interested in having a kid. I'm not going to have some kid that's not the best basketball player in a school. That's stupid. I want something like that. You know what I'm saying?

Yeah, same. I don't want some dork theater kid as a kid. I would lose my mind. Dad, it's Pride Month. Shut the fuck up. Have I told you the story? Start shooting free throws in the... Oh, no. What? When I was a kid and I was like a really good athlete and... I could see that. You were big

too. Yeah, I was tall and I fell in love with musical theater and I told my dad... I would have beat your ass immediately. My kid will never do musical theater. I told my dad. It's not like a gay straight... I don't want basketball shoes. I want to beat your ass immediately. My kid will never do musical theater. I told my dad. It's not like a gay straight. I don't want basketball shoes. I want jazz tap shoes.

I want to beat you mercilessly. And my dad just took a deep breath, grabbed a pencil. By the way, he had to broke it over. Hell yeah, dude. Fuck yeah.

Bruce Bruno. What do we call him? He's like, you're going to Bruno. You are too good to just quit. He's right. My mom's like, Bruce, stop yelling at him. He already had two girls. My sisters were fucking killer ass.

That's right. They were like badass. Big 10. Softball first. All-American softball pitcher. My other sister was an all-American soccer player. Where'd they play? IU or something? My sister went to IU.

She got a full scholarship to UCLA, but didn't want to do that. For softball? Shit. Pitching. That's insane. Then she's like, I don't want to play softball anymore. I get it. You're not going to be a pro softball player someday.

But free college. My other sister was a really dope soccer player. Really? My parents taught us all, you got to make money. That's cool. They're not wrong. I'm like, not today, Dad. I'm going to be a musician. I'm going to go travel to Indiana and Missouri. I'm going to go out there and play in Springfield, Missouri.

We're playing in Monroe, Louisiana this weekend, Dad. And I need new tap shoes. Yeah. Dad, I need new tap shoes. Yeah. 14 tap shoes. Did they make Travis Scott tap shoes? Yeah, exactly. What's the most expensive, stupidest looking tap shoes

you can get? I'll take those. God, if my kids... Because I wasn't a singer or I wasn't really a dancer. I was not talented. What did you want to do? Just the attention. You just wanted the attention. I just thought, well, all my friends were doing it, so I just wanted to be accepted. I forgot you were friends with a bunch of theater dorks. Daddy, I would like to be in the theater.

Yeah, my dad was pissed. Daddy, I can't go to basketball. We're doing our town. Yes, we're doing your intent, Daddy. Daddy, I am Mr. Bundles in Annie, the musical theater. It's like the towel guy. My dad's like, fuck off.

I'm paying $15,000 so you could be the side dude, Mr. Bundles. Is that really what you did? I was Mr. Bundles. I don't even know who that is. I couldn't sing.

I couldn't dance. They hit me in the back. Oh, yeah, yeah. But I loved it. You can't sing and you can't dance. What do you do for a living now? Facts on facts, Nicholas. Facts loved it. You can't sing and you can't dance. What do you do for a living now? Facts on

facts, Nicholas. Facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on facts on like spirit disorder. Yeah. Vegas always reminds me of my grandparents. You know, like every time I go there, gambling addicts, gambling addicts. I'm used to living in Vegas for a while, but back in the day it was free. Now I have to pay for everything. Yeah. It's much better when your grandparents are alive.

Yeah. It was fun. You get more free shit. Oh man. I remember going golf, go karting. It was so fun. Go karting rules.

They have go karting rules. It's huge in Indiana. Cause everybody likes race cars there. You know, I wonder if they have go karting in Denver. It was so fun. Go-karting rules. They have time. Go-karting rules. It's huge in Indiana because everybody likes race cars there. I wonder if they have go-karting in Denver. I want to go. We should do a company trip. But now we can drive a real car.

So I feel like... What'd you say? They got a go-kart. See, that's what we got to do. Damn, I haven't been... Let's take a company retreat. I haven't been in a batting cage in years. I think we need this

for our mental health. Let's not go to Italy and shit. Let's do a one-day shit. Let's do a one day go-karting. Kevin, we're not going to Italy anymore. We're going go-karting. We're going to play ski ball. He's from Philadelphia. He'll be fine with that.

Somehow Dan Snell will still be jealous. He'll be like, but we got to go go-karting somewhere else. We're not going go-karting in Denver. We're going to go in the South. Do you think Dan Snell listens to this? Yes, he listens. Dan, come on. Calm down.

Dan does listen to every episode. Noticing what other men are doing is soft. I'm sorry. We got to get back to men being men in this country and just not noticing what other men are doing. Why? Because. I mean, we're all sensitive people now

because of Instagram and social media. We We need to make America great again. Hold on. Are you trying to say something? No. Who do you vote for? I'm not voting. I'm just kidding. I don't know.

Who should I vote for? Amara's going to get so pissed if I don't vote for Biden. I know. She gave me a whole speech about it. She's like, you can't joke around about that on the podcast.

Some guy said, I played that song. Trump is funnier and more fun. I don't know. They're both completely worthless. Things won't change that much. I want RFK Jr. But he said, they say something that he hates the Jews.

I don't know. I'm not following everything he says. I don't like his speaking voice. It wears me out. I need an alpha male up there like Donald Trump. I'm just kidding. We should just have no president and be single for a while. That's actually perfect. We don't need

a president, dude. America should be single for a little bit. If we can have Biden for four years and be fine, that's basically like not having a president, right? It's just like a cardboard cutout of an 80-year-old man at this point. Did you see him at that Juneteenth celebration and they were listening to

Kirk Franklin and everybody's dancing around him. He's just like, this is good. He's just standing there rigid as hell. What, Biden? That was scary. Juneteenth, yeah. He was staring and smiling. Yeah, bro. Not Kirk Franklin. Maybe it was.

But yeah, it's like if that guy can't get you moving... Who is? You're dead. You're right. The Democrats are just annoying. I hate how they always say, yeah, but behind the scenes he's very full of light. Whenever you can't see him he has a lot of energy.

Anyway, men, you gotta stop caring what other men are doing. Men can go on he's very full of light. Whenever you can't see him, he has a lot of energy. Anyway, men, you got to stop caring what other men are doing. Men can go on vacations, okay? You don't need to have your own vacation. I also get... I mean, I get kind of jealous when people have fun. You get kind of jealous whenever anyone does anything. So you're talking about me too. Not just Dan. You're a jealous guy.

Jealous guy. Am I really jealous? Oh yeah, for sure, dude. I get jealous, right? I get petty. I do get petty. You're one of the most jealous people I've ever met in my life. Shut the fuck up. No way in hell.

I'm from Indiana. We don't have jealousy there. It doesn't grow. No, you just hold it deep in the fucking dark crevice that is your soul. We use it to fuel our farm. No. To fuel our John Deere tractors as we feed America. Fossil fuel just suppressing in your stomach.

So we can make fucking dairy-free, gluten-free bread for you people in Indiana. Am I really jealous? Am I really a jealous guy? Yes. Are you fucking insane right now? Bo, back me up. Am I like that? No, I got to stop being like that.

I don't realize that I'm doing that. It's a bad look. It makes you look beta. No, it's like... Is it? It looks a little beta. Maybe because I'm just so competitive. Yeah, that's fine. Being competitive is different than being jealous. I got to fix that about myself. Yeah, let's work on that. Maybe I should be more jealous.

All right, how about we switch roles? Start trying to be more jealous. Fuck truth sayers. I want a new tech gig. Damn. Am I a jealous person? I guess I am. Who isn't jealous?

Everybody's a little bit jealous, but it's like a thing with you. Really? Yeah. For real? You don't know about this? Are you doing a bit right now? I'm really not doing a bit.

It's that bad? I mean, remember I said, brought up a musician right before this. What am I going to lie to you? But he is really good. To you? No, he's good. Objectively, he's very good at what he does. Why can't I have my own opinion

on it? It's just how you have the opinion. Okay. You know what I mean? Okay. I respect that. You know what I'm saying? How I say it is kind of condescending. Yeah, it's a little bit real housewife-y. I think that's the LA thing I'm saying? It's like, all right, dude. How I say it is kind of condescending. Yeah, it's like a little bit Real Housewives-y. Mm-hmm. Yeah, I think that's the LA thing in me. Yeah, you guys are all just the worst.

Yeah, we're pretty fucking bad. Everybody, why are you guys all like that? Is this because there's so many talented people there? I think, yeah, they force us to be against each other. Maybe they should make every person in LA work at a gas station for a year before they're allowed to be an actor or something. I love that idea.

I think that's a great idea. I'm serious. Or, you know, a restaurant. What does Kyle Ayers say in his bit? He's like, everyone, instead of enrolling in the military, you have to work at Chili's or Applebee's. You learn a lot doing that, man. I never worked in a restaurant, but I did work in a gas station.

That's what I'm going to work on this year. I'm not going to be jealous anymore. There's no point in me being jealous. You're going to start working on that this year in July? You got six months to figure it out. I mean, a little jealousy is healthy. No, but just like something I can work on. You don't need to be mad that other people are successful. It doesn't really affect your success.

No. These people aren't taking your spot. Well, I think also now that I am becoming successful, I could tone down that aggression. You used to be worse, I bet, when you weren't successful. Oh, fuck yeah. I bet you sucked. I sucked. I admit sucking. I thought I kind of when you weren't successful. Oh, fuck yeah. I bet you sucked. I sucked. I

admit sucking. I thought I kind of mellowed out, but I guess I haven't. No, you've probably mellowed out a ton, but you're still pretty bad. Yeah, I remember when... Yeah, you used to be a hater, I bet. I was a hater. I was a drinking hater. Didn't you get banned from Walker Russo for talking shit about that one guy, the evil

man? Bass Nectar. I said his laptop is all tuned up and he's ready to hit space bar. Give it up for Bass Nectar. Yeah. banned from Walker Russo for talking shit about that one guy, the evil man. I said his laptop's all tuned up and he's ready to hit space bar. Give it up for Bass Nectar. Yeah. While 30,000 people were waiting with bated breath to hear their favorite thing. I guess I got fired

from being there. He got fired too, didn't he? Yeah. By society. I call it how I see it. Well, you didn't know about that. That's not what you were calling at all. That's not true, buddy. We got to get out of this. This is supposed to be just an opening.

We're already at 35 minutes. Should I get jealous more? You do get jealous. You get jealous. You do in your own way, though. I know how you do it. It's kind of annoying, actually. What do I do?

It's like kind of shoo off the idea. Like when I'm really excited about something, oh, though. I know how you do it. It's kind of annoying, actually. What do I do? You just kind of shoo off the idea. When I'm really excited about something, I'm like, oh, cool. That's just how I am. No, but that's kind of jealousy. You don't want to talk about it. Because I know we're going to talk about it whether I want to talk about it or not.

There's no reason for me to bring it up. It's going to come up six or seven more times. I've been trying to ask more about your life. It's just not interesting. No, just like how you're... My life's not that interesting. It is. I think it is. I love you. Maybe my life's not that interesting it is I think it is I love you

maybe my interest life's more interesting than I think yeah I don't know so I'll just be jealous of Sasquatch that'll be the guy

I'm jealous of you are jealous of Sasquatch no I'm just mad when I said we're like we're he's just fun for me well everybody thinks

there's talks on the table for him opening like fucking Sasquatch everybody because everybody just texting me the thing with Sasquatch is everyone thinks. Fucking Sasquatch. Everybody. Don't love just texting me. The thing with Sasquatch is everyone thinks I'm Sasquatch.

You know about this, right? It's been around. Oh, yeah. Ladies and gentlemen, before we go to couch. It's a shorter interview, so we're just taking our time on this. There's a little beginning we can cut off. Flood City. This Flood City.

Flood City Barbecue. Head to Flood City Music Festival. It's going to be awesome, Pennsylvania. Flood City is a cool nickname. Yeah. It's cool. But I was thinking this. Tornado Alley.

Yeah, me and Bayless are announcing our tour. Bayless and Frasco tour. Now I'm jealous. Yeah, you can come if you want. Oh, yeah. I bet I can. Sean would be pissed if you came and I didn't take Sean. Why?

We play different instruments. It's true. I guess... Bayless plays guitar. I don't know. It'd be so funny if I took you and Ernie lives in St. Louis. Yeah, but me and

Bayless are buddies and stuff. Yeah, you're true. Okay. That's a good opening. What a great opening. Jealous bitch. I got to work on that. No, you're right. I do get like that. Just the LA in me.

Get those actor out of your blood. Father, I want to do the theater. Father, I want to do the theater. Fuck anyone else who wants to do the theater if I don't want to do the theater. I know I'm 6'1 at the age of 13, but I want to be a theater boy. I have no coordination. I can't sing a lick, but I want to be a theater boy, daddy. I coordination. I can't sing a lick, but I want to be a theater

boy, daddy. I know I'm a very good swimmer. Were you a swimmer? Hell yeah. Julie was a good swimmer. I kicked ass and swam. Julie was a good swimmer in high school. I did kick ass and swim. Do you know that? She was a competitive swimmer when she was younger. Really? She's got that long back that you need for swimming. Yeah.

She does have a good back. She's tall. She's got tall. I was like staring at her back one time. It long back. She does have a good back. She's tall. She's kind of tall. It's weird that I said that in front of you. But I was staring at her back one time. It's okay. You can lust over my bride. She's beautiful. You can be jealous of me. But she had really strong back muscles.

Well, she's been working her whole life too. She's just a hardworking gal. But no, she's very tall. Kind of has a long torso or whatever. I don't know. Yeah. She's got a swimmer's upper body. They have long backs and long arms.

Gangly. Head to volume.com. Speaking got a swimmer's upper body. They have long backs and long arms. Gangly. Head to volume.com. Speaking of gangly, head to volume.com. All the best live streams. All the best stuff. Man, they got good stuff over there at Volume. Go check out the stuff. Go check out the stuff at Volume. And if you're a creator,

go check it out. Create these nuts. This is a bad plug, but I'm telling you, they're better than nugs. I just want to start beef between volume and nugs like Tupac and

Tupac and Is your stuff on nugs though? It is, but That's just recorded. Just recorded. That's weird. You gave me shit about having a Patreon for my trivia,

but you have your music on nugs. Back to hating. Not about hating. No, back to hating. Okay. Yeah. Well, my thing wouldn't even work on the volume. They don't have like PDFs on there. back to hating not about hating just pointing out back to hating okay yeah well my thing wouldn't even work

on the volume they don't have PDFs on there it's just PDFs and forms so yep got you there all right

I gotta go I'm getting my ass kicked on the floor I kicked your ass today dude I'm the Lakers and you're the jazz all right guys

enjoy couch and enjoy the couch go to flood city music festival we'll be there Johnstown you know they're I'm the Lakers and you're the jazz. Alright guys, enjoy Couch. Yeah, enjoy the Couch. Go to Flood City Music Festival. We'll be there. Johnstown. You know their original name was Casting Couch. It's in Pittsburgh, right? Johnstown is in Pittsburgh. It's in that region. We played it a couple years ago. It was fun as hell.

Buy your tickets, Pennsylvania. It's going to be a minute since I go back. Let everyone know I'm taking a four-month hiatus. What's the date of the festival? What's the actual date of the festival? What? What's the actual date of the festival? July 25 through 27. 26 and 27.

Got it. Come on out. Grab your tickets. A month hiatus. I'm taking four months. Oh, four months? Mm-hmm. Oh, damn.

Yeah. That's pretty good. That's the longest I've ever taken without playing a show. We'll see. We'll see if anything pops up. I did get that offering for that solo tour. Are you going to

do it? Yeah, I confirmed. Just you? Me and Sean. Shane? Me and Sean and Bo, just three of us on the open road. Man, we might kill each other. That sounds fun. It'll be fun. I think it'll be fun. Just me, Sean

and Bo. We got to figure out. I'm trying to have them let us stay in their tour bus because they have two tour buses. They do? Yeah, dude. I didn't realize how big they are. My boy's in their band. He's a good dude.

Mine too. Yeah, he's cool. Toddy. I didn't say any last name. He's not famous. We're not announcing it yet. I know. I didn't give anything away there.

Should we take a van for that? Or should we do our own thing? You should just rent a minivan. I don't know. away there. Should we take a van for that? Or should we do our own thing? You should just rent a minivan. I don't know. It would be cool to have it. Really? For that? I just feel like that's a lot to lug that thing around.

True. True. Maybe I should just like... You're going to do a half... 40 minute... You're not going to be doing... But it's 2,000 cap rooms. What are you going to do?

Are you going to get on top of it and go up in the air and then play like acoustic songs? Yeah, you're right. We're not taking the party machine. Take a Nord, dude. Get your check and get the fuck out of there, man. You're right. All right, guys. Enjoy Couch. I'm going to work on not being a hater. You're going to work on

loving yourself. You're going to work on loving yourself. If I'm going to work on not being a hater, you're going to work on loving yourself. I don't want to love myself. Yes, you do. Boring. Alright, guys. Enjoy Couch. And enjoy this Flood City Music Festival presentation of

Couch. I want to be I wanna love easily I wanna be easy to love I wanna love easily Wow, here we go. Flood City Festival edition. One of the headliners. One of the headliners band has been blowing up the last two years. We have Couch on the building. How you doing, guys? What's up? We're good.

Good. Thanks for having us. Very relaxed. Do you guys take Xanax? What's going on? Do you guys just chill out? Smoke a lot of weed? What's the vibe of this band? We're pretty divided on weed. Some of you like it. Yeah.

I could say more. Do you guys take psychedelics? What's the deal? Let's launch right into it. We're pretty divided on psychedelics too. But we dabble. I think we dabble. That's cool. I'm just stereotyping

you guys right now because I don't know too much besides I love the music you guys are great songwriters like everything I've been all the all the songs that I've been listening on on social media guys like each other fresh they still like each other like each other is it a new

I'm glad it comes off that way though they're divided on that too divided on that so divided They're divided on that. We're actually divided on everything. That's what happens when you have eight people in your band. Exactly. I'm divided on whether or not we're divided. It's like United Nations.

So tell me how the band got started. Are you guys Berklee kids? Are you guys Berklee kids? No. We're all from the Boston area. I'm the only transplant. Okay, cool. I'm the only transplant. I'm in New York, but that's a story.

Tell me how the band started. Let's get to know each other. Yeah, most of us are from Boston. I knew Danny. We used to teach music classes together on the weekends. Will and I used to play baseball against each other in high school. Who was a better baseball player? This guy.

You can tell. You can tell. I'll clap to that. I can see it. You can see he's got the long arms. He's got the long arms. Baseball guy hair. Yeah.

All the world knows is all you really need. He's quiet. What did you pitch? Yeah, I was better. This kid topped out in 91 in high school. Holy shit. You were pitching 91 in high school? Yeah, and then my arm exploded. You're like, fuck this. I'm going to chase girls and be in high school. Holy shit. You were pitching 91 in high school. Yeah. And my arm exploded.

You're like, fuck this. I'm going to chase girls and be in a band. Yeah. I mean, that's exactly what happened. Now I'm throwing 85, but I got a girlfriend.

Uh, no. So damn. So tell me that story. What happened? You're, you're going, you're going to be in the league or trying to be in the league.

And then you blew out your arm like Tommy John or what? No, it was like shoulder muscle issues. Baseball was my entire high school, entire childhood. I was doing music stuff on the side like jazz band and trumpet. Once my

shoulder and dreaded decided to do something more practical, which I guess was music. It's way safer. Yeah, I guess it's safer. You're doing the same thing. You're playing in Indiana and shit.

I mean, yeah. Actually, though, yeah. Travel ball. That's great. So you guys started to meet up in Boston. Tell me about the Boston scene. Was it good for starting bands? I know bands like Ripe and stuff that got their start out there. It seems like it's a good way to kind of get the juices flowing and,

and find musicians because there's so many damn good musicians in Boston. Totally. Yeah. I mean, we started, we met each other mostly in high school, so there wasn't even much of knowing what the venue scene was like or even really tapping into Berklee. It was kind of just, you know, play the pizza shop

in town, rehearse in someone's basement and stuff. Then we all went to college. Then we came back from college, started to pick up the band, and I actually learned what it was like to be a band here. All of our subs are Berklee kids. Our sax player did some classes at Berklee. Berklee in some ways is in the DNA

of us just being a Boston-based band despite really none of us actually being Berklee kids. Do you get pissed when people call you Berklee kids? No, we're from fucking Boston. We're not fucking Berklee kids. We're fucking Celtics fans. It's kind of nice to feel like, oh, you must be a Berklee fan. I'm like, no.

No, we're not. That's rad. One thing that's worth saying, though, is that while we didn't go to Berklee, several of us were in college bands at our liberal arts colleges, and I really don't take that for granted. I learned a lot playing in my pop band

and playing at parties and stuff. I think a lot of us took that experience in arranging and just playing in that sort of situation in those house parties to this couch experience. I don't know. Across the band,

there are at least four or five other bands you can listen to on streaming that were just our college bands. Like who? Yeah, I'll plug my own i let's go i'll clap to that let's go no yeah i i played in a band called orange guava passion like the three fruits next to each other orange guava passion in college and yeah it was great um you. We weren't nearly as serious as Couch, but we were still serious and we did relatively well on DSPs and

we played venues, real venues. Jam band? Sounds like a jam band band. A jam band? It's jam elements, not really a jam band. Sort of more like Couch than a proper jam band. Okay.

Sorry to let you down. It's so funny because it's like Boston bands are kind of jam band adjacent because like R.I.P., I don't consider a jam band, but they're in the scene. They're soulful. They write melodies. I wonder what that is. Maybe it's like Boston just wants to be their own identity.

It's all those good musicians. Yeah, they're fucking talented musicians out there, man. So what was the moment you wanted to take this thing seriously? Was there a show? Did you find the missing piece? When did she come into the existence? Who were the first founders of the band and then slowly got the horns? How'd that work out? out yeah a few of us

played in that high school band doing those pizza shops and stuff and uh we were all long distance different colleges tema our singer and i would write over facetime for the first couple years wow she was in chicago i was in dc where i met jared in jazz band at college and uh yeah we started putting out music you know recording remotely or quarantining it was first long distance college then long distance covid and so it was about three years of making music um holy shit rockwood and we did you know a couple nights at rockwood to start it off with matt curian those guys hooking us up and then it turned into you know let's try to find an, put some tours together and that's been

such a focus. You guys are the road warriors of the past 20 years. We're two years into it just trying to get our footing in that scene, taking what we learned from releasing music and trying to put that into now touring on all of it. Let's fucking go. Look at these guys.

Young and happy. We are young and happy. I want to kill every fucking member of my band. These guys are like, let's go. Look at these guys. Young and happy. We are young and happy. I want to kill every fucking member of my band. These guys are like, let's go. We're on the road. Maybe having eight people helps. They can section off. Is there one person that you just don't like in the band? We're starting

mutiny already in year two. I love it. Today's day one of the mutiny, by year two. I love it. Today's day one of the mutiny, by the way. I love it. No. So how, what was, how do you,

how's, what's your take on a zoom songwriting? Because some people love it. Some people hate it. I fucking love it because like, you know, you don't get, you could like sign off when you want to have a cigarette,

you know, like, and then sign back on, you know, like stuck in a room and you want to have a cigarette and then sign back on. You're not stuck in a room. You get to have that intimacy without having the intimacy. How was the process like for the first five songs? Yeah, go for it. I think it's way less pressure.

Like you said, you can take a break or you don't have to have that great idea in front of the rest of your bandmates. You can get for two weeks and then schedule the zoom and show the person the thing that you're already really proud of i think they're both good it's like it sort of taught us that we don't have to perfect something before showing it to someone else now that we're just creating from scratch in a room together that's a more intimidating it's a harder muscle muscle to, to work. Right. Um, it's just a totally different workflow,

but I, I like both of them. Now it's just nice where this is the rhythm section right here. So we can have a drum kit in the room and actually know what the song might feel like rather than maybe just an acoustic layered on top of a voice. And I'm a time of text did one of us or something. Do you all live together? I was about to ask that too. No,

but we actually different subgroups of the band do live together. It's like I live with our sax player, Eric. These two guys are moving in together at the end of the summer. Yes, sir. Hell yeah. So slowly, maybe there'll be a couch house in the future, but I hope not. Don't do it.

I would go the other way. Go the other way. Everyone has their own lives. It feels like we travel so much together and we're just together all the time. So there's a lot of trauma bonding there and it definitely feels like we live together for sure. So when did it start popping off?

Did you guys start... I really started seeing your videos on socials just start blowing up. When did that process start coming? Because you were at like 20,000 fans and all of a sudden you're up to like 120,000. Yeah. It happened pretty quickly, right?

I mean, there was a time where we... Obviously, over the pandemic and towards the end of it, when TikTok really started popping off, we had this plan in which we were just going to throw shit at the wall and see what sticks in terms of just being really consistent

and making as much TikTok content as we could. And something that we noticed really... which we were just going to kind of throw shit at the wall and see what sticks in terms of just like being really consistent and, you know, making as much TikTok content as we could. And something that we noticed really seemed to resonate with people was like, um, kind of the more behind the scenes type things. And obviously we're a big band, so there's a lot going on on stage at a given time. And we have GoPro set up and stuff like that. And we're like, Oh, this was kind of a funny moment. Let's throw that up.

And people really resonated with just like what it's like to be on stage with the band. And I think that was what really kind of stuck in terms of just what, you know, quote unquote made it on social media. That was super great. You should talk about the talk back shit. Oh yeah.

We, uh, or Jared, Jared, he's a talk back mic when he's playing that we can all hear in our ears. And, uh, yeah,

a lot of those behind the scenes videos was like oh what is jared saying in the talkback which is people can't hear that shit obviously so it's like it was cool i guess to see how people like see what he may be yelling at us at any given time on stage or like the communication like on stage communication with uh with years and whatnot yeah that specific jump in socials was like three you know what one of us was saying in a talkback and then they each got a bunch of views and then the followers

started stacking from those. People love to hear you count off a team. We don't know. We didn't even get a Sennheiser endorsement out of it. No, tell them to fuck off. We'll get you that fucking mic. We'll get you that mic, bro. It is so funny. People love the most boring stuff. People love the most boring stuff. fuck off. We'll get you that fucking mic. We'll get you that mic, bro. And it's so

funny. People love the most boring stuff. People love the most boring stuff. Is this counting off the tune or cueing the horn solo? That's so interesting. You know they wrote a whole song too, right? Yeah. You should make a video of outtakes. You should

just re-record what you think he's going to say. You dumb piece of shit. I can't believe you failed. We're firing you. Don't even get on the bus. Your suitcase is already packed. Was that translating well into ticket sales?

Was social media, these social media ticks translating well into ticket sales right away or did it gradually happen? I see a lot of TikTok, people get famous on TikTok or Instagram, they get tons of likes and then no one shows up to the shows for the first year. How is that growth coming from big success

to getting people into the venues? Yeah, we had some people coming to shows who it was always these one-off things at first, like, oh, i saw you on tiktok that's how i got here tonight um and that spiraled and more and more it's become oh i found out it used to be we found out because of some song on spotify that the algorithm liked and showed them and their friends or whatever that was the first reason people were coming to shows then it was i saw you in this tiktok um and that was really infrequent or instagram whatever

and now it's just this big mix of you know all these platforms that we can criticize because they're not paying us what they should um or you know that we're just addicted to them and they're crazy to use whatever they are they are bringing people to our shows and giving us a living out of this so totally sweet it's awesome man it man. I don't know what I'd do without social media. How did bands promote themselves before social media? Radio? We took a big

lesson from the whole Wolfpack world and their internet branding and that vibe too. I don't think internet bands like us could... Or not internet band, but a band that mainly started on the internet with COVID and stuff. I don't think they would even us could... Or not internet band, but a band that mainly started on the internet with COVID and stuff. I don't think they would even be as popular if it wasn't for the Wolf guys

and what they were able to do with the online stuff, which is pretty interesting. Yeah, dude. They made band nerds cool. He changed everything, I think. Jack's a social media genius. Yeah. You have to be... Talking to Jack and stuff and just seeing how his brain works and how

even Corey, I mean, Corey Wong is another master social media genius. Like, yeah, it's also good content. You know what I mean? Like,

yeah, it's all a fire. I mean, you're all your content. Catcher is fire. It's really good content. And like, you know,

cause you give a shit, you know, like how long, like you care about the whole project. So now, what's the process like of... What's your process like with making a record now that it's out of COVID?

Now everyone kind of lives in Boston. Does everyone live in Boston? Yeah. So what's the process like now making records? I think we're still working it out. It's fun and exciting that everyone's in the same place and we have the opportunity to like, you know, write in person, maybe in a larger group.

But I don't think we have like a, I don't think I have like a one sentence answer for you. It's like each song on the last record we put out called Sunshower, that thing we made completely in Boston. But yeah, it's like different people contributed different things to different tunes and um it wasn't so much like yep we got together in several you know for several weeks and cranked it out and then produced it and it was good it was like each song has a completely different story and now as we're looking looking ahead to like you know just some other releases that we might want to do it's like yeah we just are trying to figure

it out you know we have a lot of a lot of individuals a lot of great ideas in terms of songwriting and arranging and we want to value all of those, um, while also, you know, actually producing content and just like throwing shit into the ether all the time. You know what I mean? Is there a leader of couch or is this socialism? Man, there's Zach is, is our acting manager tour manager and definitely um oh yeah puts his all into into everything we do in terms of quitting the day job and doing couch full time so zach is our leader

right now for sure um but definitely in terms of decision making i mean it's you know we it's all of us together kind of a democracy vibe. There's an even number of them, though. There's eight of them. So how do you vote on shit? Yeah, what if you tie? Is there seven? Yeah, there's seven. Oh, seven. Okay.

Unless you're trying to join and I don't know if that was a... Dude, I'll join the cult. I'd love to join the Cats cult, dude. I really love your band, dude. If you tell me to be nine, it'd still be us. They already have a simple joke. Dude, I'll join the cult. I'd love to join the Cats cult, dude. I really love your band, dude. You tell me it'd be nine, it'd still be hot. They already have a sax player. They do. I'll just be the hype man. I'll wave a flag while they fucking just get out there and do their shit.

Why I'm waving is no votes, though. Okay. I respect that, actually. Singers shouldn't get a vote. So, what was the worst gig you guys played together? What was the most awkward shittiest gig

this weekend this weekend is the gig we played Elkhart Indiana be careful I'm from near there one of our favorite gigs every year we love the guys who run it one of his favorite gigs I like it I think Zach loves it especially

for whatever reason. It's a good time. We were down a horn player and Tama was sick. We've been playing the same 90 minutes, you know, sort of down to a science for the past 18 months, feeling really good about the set. And that's what the set was supposed to be. And then we were down a horn player. We had basically half a singer for the show. So we just added like three solos into every song. All the forms were so confusing. We're all, you know,

everyone's yelling at each other in the talk backs. And then, you know, fireworks are supposed to go off in the middle of the set. And we time out the set to sort of hit this peak of like this guitar solo happens and fireworks in this big thing. We stopped playing to set up this moment. And then the fireworks for 15 minutes late.

And we're just like standing there in silence. It was also so pride because we have this moment in the set that we've been doing for the past few months, which is we do like a little three part harmony teach sing along situation. Yeah. And right as i was like teaching a three-part harmony i actually was like i was on like the second part like out of three and then like we hear from the whatever of any person like oh actually it's 10 15 not 10 30 so you have to cut it off right now they're like fuck so we ended up doing it that was like all right so like there's your part now remember that it was like it was like

inopportune possible time for that to happen but it is what it is you decided to take Indiana the Indiana Jazz Fest extremely seriously was that what it was? it was Elkhart Jazz Fest it's like a 16

hour drive there and then a 16 hour drive there. And then a 16 hour drive back. And it was a one-off. So it was just like doing that much driving over the span of, Oh yeah. Fuck that. And then this like weird gig, it was like,

Oh, 32 hours. Oh, fuck that. All of that being said, like the people at all car are so sweet. Yeah. They treat us so well.

And like, it is, it is a really great vibe. Like at that, it's just like a main stage, sort of on the main street of town as the sun's setting. It's nice because

you get a lot of people that were born and raised in Elkhart and they don't know cash and they just come for the festival. Then you get people who came from Houston and Oklahoma to come see us. That's obviously very moving. It's just a fun mix.

It's a good time. I like this guy. They talk shit and then they're good politicians. No, but it was a great sit-down. It's a great vibe here. With the best senator. I'm giving you art. Every band needs a congressman. Every band needs a congressman.

I don't have a filter and I get in trouble a lot. I like this guy. I like this guy. He's good. He's a good egg. The worst part of having a shitty gig is then driving 16 hours back and no one talking. That's the worst part.

It's like, fuck, we fucked that up, didn't we? I drive from Indiana to Boston. I've done that a few times. That sounds fucking horrible. It's a brutal drive. I-80 all the way. Pennsylvania, baby. Oh, yeah. And then, okay,

so you told us your worst gig. Tell us your favorite gig that really made the bond. I'm glad I didn't make fun of Indiana, by the way. I was going to turn the zoom off. He's from Indiana. I'm from Indiana.

Jazz fests are kind of awkward, you know, like these like city jazz fests, like, especially you guys have so much energy. Like you got, you're a fucking real fucking rock and roll band, you know?

Yeah. It's definitely, it's definitely sometimes a little bit of a, a weird vibe at first, at least it's like, you know, you go to a jazz fest and we, you know,

consider ourselves more of a pop band and it's like, all right, we got to like dig in and like in and sell it a little bit and convince them they want to stay for a set and not go to the jazz trio down the street. Right. So it's definitely an interesting vibe for sure. I love it. They get cool acts at that festival for

being in no cards. Oh yeah. I've heard it's really prestigious. Well, Selmer's there. They make all the sets. They made every set. Yeah, tons of instrument companies. Yeah. So all the instrument companies are from there. So that's going to... I bought my horn in Elkhart. Also, they're the RV capital of America, apparently. Which they got really hit.

They got really fucked when that... It used to be a much more booming town. Let's put it that way. Oh, then the economy boomed. No one can afford an RV anymore. Exactly. Yeah. The town's fucked. It's not doing great. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

You can probably get a good deal for a tour bus over there, boys. There you go. That's right. Yeah, we came back with three of them. Buy one, get one. Okay, who drives?

Who drives the most in the band? I'm always... I will happily take that trophy. I don't think that's true. I knew this would happen. This always happens when you ask him. It's crazy. We split it up.

Gauze maybe likes to drive the most. When Gauze is not on the clock working his day job, he probably drives the most. Yeah, day job? I do. Most of us do which definitely makes our touring interesting

there's a lot of working from a hot spot and yeah are you all lawyers or what? hopefully my employer is in Washington but I should be working right now the homie on the left is like fuck y'all I'm out here quitting my job anything for you guys

I appreciate it we won't tell anyone. We'll blur out your faces. They're all corporate lawyers. If you can like muffle my voice like... Yeah, it's going to be like one of those Japanese... Like make me like a mob boss or something. Like I can't get whacked. Yeah, it'll be like one of those Japanese pornos where we just blurry the face. So it's like no one knows what's going on.

That's not what they blur in the Japanese porno. So who has the worst taste in music on drives that everyone just gets annoyed of? Well, dude. The blur in the Japanese porno. Who has the worst taste in music on drives that everyone just gets annoyed of? Well, the speakers in the van are broken. Oh my God. It's just silence for 16 hours? No, we keep ourselves busy.

We like sports. Oh, hell yeah. When it was NBA finals going on, we were watching it in the van go Celtics. Yeah by the way I'm a Laker fan you know that but congratulations No it's okay we'll give it to you You're big sports fans

We definitely passed the time in fairly unique ways we kind of got hip to making different types of brackets Okay I like this In this past drive this weekend, how many venues was it? 128.

There's 128 venues that we chose out of the X number of shows we've done over the past few years. And we went group by group and just decided which better vibes. Yeah.

What, what out of the March madness? Give me the final four. Yeah. Give me the final four venues. Independent San Francisco. Great one. Great room.

Royale Boston. Been there, played there. Calling festival. Oh, and, uh, what was the last one?

Maybe Lincoln hall. Oh, Lincoln hall. Oh, Lincoln hall is great room. What about, um Hall. Oh, Lincoln Hall's a great room. What about... Royale in Boston won and then we were all kind of disappointed where I was like,

damn, like, yeah, we're from Boston. No shit that won. That's it. Boring. It was maybe a cop-out. Is it biased because that's your biggest fan base

and it's like the loudest crowd or do you actually like the room? The room is great. They had video walls on the ceiling. The tour was sun shower tour. So we had a thunderstorm up on the ceiling when we walked in. Oh, sick. Yeah.

It's kind of more of the vibe of like a, like it's kind of seems to be more club production than, you know, music venue second, which actually serves itself really well to, you know, cool. Yeah. I got to do that. All we do is paradise. It's also really like, it's cool. Cause it's like modern technology, but it's itself really well to cool. I got to do that. All we do is paradise. It's also really cool because it's like

modern technology, but it's kind of an older building. It's got an old theater vibe to it a little bit. Yeah, kind of like a ballroom on the second floor. It's an old building. I've also been to the EM show at Royale and it goes stupid. That's what I did there. We opened for a new deal. I respect Homie with the

930 shirt on and they weren't even on the fucking list. They were on the list for a while. We actually opened for right there last year. It was super great. I'm also... They lost to MGM.

930 Club lost to MGM, which is new. Very Boston heavy bracket. Damn, it's a very Boston heavy bracket, boys. Home cooking. Home cooking. Home cooking. Love DC. Went to school there. You did? Did you go to Georgetown? GW.

Oh, yeah. George Washington. They had a nice tournament run not too long ago. Honestly, DC doesn't get enough love for how cool the fucking city is. It is cool. It's a cool city. This is a dangerous road to go down. We're going to finish the podcast. I can go on and on.

Talk about it because people don't appreciate D.C. as a music culture as much as they should. It's a really beautiful scene. Think about D.C. go-go music. It's insane. For sure, it doesn't get as much recognition as it surely deserves.

But it still didn't get into the top eight. I was thinking so hard. Damn. Maybe the other part of it ruins it. All the politicians. There's a lot of... The bad parts of DC are very corny. Yeah. I mean, my favorite comedian,

Dave Chappelle. Yeah, he's from there. DC. The GOAT. My brother lives there, so that's a down. What, um... yeah I mean my favorite comedian Dave Chappelle yeah he's from there DC yeah the goat my brother lives there so that's a down what um this is exciting okay so what was have you done any like super huge what's like the biggest show Boston Calling probably was the biggest show you've ever played or

what was the biggest show you guys ever done the biggest ticketed show was right at MGM opening for those guys it's crazy how big that band is. I'm so happy for them, dude. I fucking love Robbie, dude.

He's a fucking psychopath. He's like the new Huey Lewis. Yeah. Yeah. Everyone in that band is, is our great guys. Yeah. So how big is MGM?

It's 5,000, right? 4,000. 5,000. Yeah. Beautiful room too. It's made perfectly in my opinion. Is that by right next to Fenway?

Yeah, it's super cool. Oh, it's that new thing. It's actually attached. So when we were opening for them there, they literally used the same back corridors and loading docks as Fenway. Oh my god. We were loading in and once we had some time after loading

and they were like, oh, there's Fenway. The doors were wide open. We walked in until we got yelled at to go back, but whatever. Did you go into the scoring board? We had Fenway to ourselves. It was crazy. Did you go into the scoring board? No. We're huge Sox fans, though, so if we ever get big enough to play there,

we're going to put on our advance, like, we need to go to the Green Monster. Wait, have you guys done MGM? No, we did House of Blues. Oh, yeah. It's cool. MGM I heard is just a league of their own. It's like two years old, right?

It's all modern. It's very new. They made it. I think the capacity is perfect. It's great. It's just so pristine. It's the kind of venue where they don't let you sell stickers because they don't want you sticking stickers in the bathroom. It reminds me of The Mission a little bit here.

Have you played Mission here yet in Denver? No. We're doing Salt Shed in the fall with Corey Wong. Oh, you're doing that run with Corey? Yeah. Sick, dude. We were just talking about how much we love Corey. I love Corey.

Yeah, we just overlapped with him at Rooster Walk Festival in Martinsville. Oh them at Rooster Walk Festival. Was it Martinsville? Oh yeah, Rooster Walk's cool. Yeah, and they were headlining the night that we played. We played the slot right in front of them. Yeah, they came a little early, watched the set, and we talked to them for a while. They're all great. I mean, they're the most

talented musicians. They're incredible. What's the hardest part about keeping a band together? It's only been like two years we can't be talking about all the fun stuff we're not making this a puff piece boys we gotta get down to the nitty gritty what's the hardest part about being in a band

are you all dating each other yeah big band, a lot of opinions that's sort of the obvious thing i feel like covid opened up remote work so it used to be like how can one project and its revenue sustain seven people in entirety it's now like everybody came into couch picking up steam with a full-time job um or at least something that can cover their apartment and groceries. So, to this point, no one's dependent on Couch to, you know,

sustain themselves. We can just continue to reinvest into the project to make high-quality records and you know, finally staying at hotels and stuff. Let's go. So that that can be sustainable. You tell me, what's the hardest part of leading a big company?

One tip. I think... I don't know. I'd be pissed if everyone had jobs and I'm working my ass off. I'm working my ass off and everyone has jobs. I'm like, fuck off. I got to email this guy about Diet Cokes and the writer. If times get tough, you can always fire the horn section.

Yeah, if times get tough, just drop them. They're out. Superfluous. I think the hardest part is knowing what real life is. Because when you're on the road so much, your perception of life switches.

If you eventually... Any of you guys married, have girlfriends or anything? No. Keep it that way. Trust me. We're going to get you. It'll be like this World's Saved Podcast is like Raya.

We'll get you guys late out here. Jam band Raya, guys. We got you. We'll get you late for sure. I was thinking when you're switching, when you're touring, normal to you now is driving all day, being tired as shit, get into a soundcheck at three. And then right when you reverse it and go home for a week or two weeks, you don't know what normal is.

Like, how do you go to bed? How do you wake up at nine? And like, you know, like that's the hardest part for me. Yeah, you're totally right. And I think we, so obviously with us all having like, not all of us, but most of us having nine to five jobs, like personally, I work hybrid. So like we tour primarily like this kind of long weekend schedule where like we will leave Wednesday afternoon or Thursday and then come back Sunday. And I'm like Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, I'll be working in an office.

And it's like, we play, we play, I'll be working in an office. We play a room a Saturday night and 800 people show up and I'm back in my cubicle Monday morning. It's weird. It's a big dream. You're like, fuck. You woke up. It didn't even happen.

You get back Sunday night and then you get back to your office like, oh, shit. That's how I feel about the podcast. It just, it, it, at least for myself, I can't speak for the others,

but I mean, it's like creates this weird dynamic where it's like, you kind of can't settle into one lifestyle or the other. It's like you're in your own home, but like, it's not worth unpacking your suitcase. Right. You know,

cause you'll be gone in two days again. Yeah. It's weird. Yeah. And, uh, I think what helped this type of lifestyle you guys have, what COVID helped is Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday shows

kind of don't exist anymore. Yeah. Unless you're a really big band. If you're like a developing band, those are the shows that are fucking horrible. Lose money. So what's the point? I think as a business, those are the shows that are fucking horrible. Lose money. So like, what's the point? So that's,

I think as a business, you know, doing the long weekend runs makes sense. You know? Yeah. Yeah. A lot of those conversations with our, our booking team is now like, if we want to hit these secondary markets,

not as their own distinct tour, you know, squeeze them in between Boston and New York and everything. It's like, we're not going to go into Des Moines on a Tuesday, but we're also not going to give up our Saturday in Denver or something. Right. Yeah, it's tough to... Because you kind of need to play ball

because you can't play the big markets three times a year and you have to develop the second tier markets or third tier markets. So how do you juggle that? Or driving all the way to the fucking West Coast to build those markets. you juggle that? Or driving all the way to the fucking West Coast. To build those markets.

We did that in November. Wait till you got to buy seven flights. Yeah, dude. That's when homie on the left is going to be like, fuck all this. You're all quitting. Horton section's fired. You're all quitting your jobs and we're going to fucking Oregon. Yeah.

So you guys don't take psychedelics? Nothing, huh? No blow? Nothing? You guys are good boys? They don't need blow. They're in their 20s. Yeah, that's true. I need blow. When was the last time we did? We took shrooms with our agents at...

I fucking love that. Were you guys at Hilli Winnin' this year? No. No, we're on it this year. No, he means last year. Last year we weren't. Oh, you weren't the year before? Okay.

Yeah, I mean, it's pretty crazy. The way they dress up Hula Winnin' around that lake. You guys have to do it. Oh, yeah. We played a bunch. It's fun.

It's definitely super fun, and it's fun it's definitely it's super fun and it's it's a little scary too I mean especially like when you're on a little shroomy

it's like you know it's so cool but I mean other people want to speak to this well I know a band I'm robbing next year I may arguably be the

the most sober. That's why he's driving. That's why he's driving. That's why I'm driving. Yeah. That's actually a good point. Yeah. You're the drummer.

Anyway, those types of experiences of me being the sober one is always interesting too. But I guess in a different way than being big high. What's it like talking all this sports and then you have that one girl in the band? She's into sports? Yeah. That was amazing. She puts up with so much bullshit from us.

I fucking bet. Stupid bits in the van for like eight hours and she'll pull out a headphone, see what we're talking about, put it right. That's hilarious. There's never anything of substance. It's always us tackling each other. She's like, can you guys just stop? Yeah, yeah, yeah.

That's fair. I love that you like sports. We've been traveling for a while. I think we... I mean, over time, we've learned our boundaries with each other and we've done a good job, I think to this point of respecting each other's personal space, especially when on the road and learning what is too much.

And, you know, when that, when that happens kind of backing off and letting people have their space. I mean, that's really important, I think, and definitely contributes to like the longevity of the group is just knowing

each other as individuals and being able to respect. Yeah. And especially in the beginning years when like you don't have budget for five hotel rooms, you have budget for maybe two when you're like stuck, you know? For sure. I mean,

for a long time, I mean, Zach mentioned this earlier, but like we finally started staying in hotels, which actually has been huge. Let's clap for that. Let's take a W boys. Let's take a W.

Let's take a W. It's still amazing. We, for a very long time, we were crashing on couch fans places. Sleeping on leather couches and sticking to it all night. But now, it's nice to walk into a Hilton

with fresh cookies and a free breakfast in the morning. He's such a mastermind with farming Hilton honors points. We're dealing it right in terms of the most efficient way to get free rooms. Yeah, and you're not at the

Hampton Inn. You said cookies, so I know you're at the DoubleTree. DoubleTree, baby. You're spending that money, baby. We know the game. They don't got no cookies at the Hampton Inn. They got cookies at the DoubleTree. Horn players still sleep in the van. Horn players still sleep in the van. Horn players will sleep in the van though, right? They got to keep the gear.

They're going to listen to us be like, what the fuck? This old guy tried to get me fired for an hour. He also is a horn player. Well, guys, I can't wait to meet you guys. I think we're playing the same day at the Flood City Festival. You guys excited for that festival? Have's going to be, have you, have you done it yet? No, it is so fun, man. July 25th and 26th. Grab your tickets, go see couch.

So my one last question and I'll let you go, you know, when it's all said and done, what do you want to be remembered by? Number one. They're like 70 years I want to be remembered by the fact that I can make pasta really well I love it

are you trying to learn or are you already good at it I think I'm pretty good at it this guy's like the Bernie Sanders of Boston this guy's a great politician he should be the spokesperson of the band he's like a PR person like the Bernie Sanders of Boston. Bernie Sanders. This guy's a great politician. I think he's actually... He should be the spokesperson of the band. He's like a PR person more than Bernie Sanders. Yeah.

It's like one of the band members is like, man, fuck this town. I mean, what do we really want to say? The sun was nice. The sunset was fine. What else, guys? What else you got? Yeah.

I mean, in terms of the band, I guess, not in terms of pasta, I would maybe say... I would maybe want to be remembered for just being like a well-oiled machine and just sort of like firing on cylinders whenever we can. I love it. Especially like load-in type of shit. I love an athlete. I love an athlete.

I'm going to take a little more of a personal approach, but I come from a long line of drummers and musicians. I think for me, it's like I always look back at my family and be like, damn, we're touring with Joan Baez and doing all the cool shit. And I want to have kids eventually and be like,

damn, dad was really cool. He's kind of boring now, but he was really cool when he was younger. I love that. This guy's very type A I'm picking up. I like this guy. Yeah, yeah. He's got like a day job. I like this New Yorker.

It's good balance with the Boston people. Who played with Joan Baez in your family? I keep everyone in check. I like it. He drives. They're making spreadsheets of venues like the March Madness. I fucking like this band. Cube.

He works in a cube. He works in a cube still. He shows up strung out on Monday and is like just fucking doing spreadsheets. I like this guy. Oh yeah, you're the one who doesn't take drugs or drink. Yeah. It's fine working on the spreadsheets. Fuck yeah.

What about you, sir? I just want people to have fun at the shows, have fun listening to the music. Life sucks. Eric and I suck. And if we can just stop that for 90 minutes at a time or five minutes for a song or whatever, then

we're doing our job. Let's fucking go. These guys are fucking good guys. They're good. They don't need us. They don't need you. They might want to avoid you actually. Wait, wait, wait. You mentioned something about Raya and we need to connect. We'll get you some ladies. Ladies or men of the World Saving Podcast,

Couch is looking for a lover. When I mean lover, they're looking for someone who could understand their lifestyle. And as fans of the podcast, you know about how this life is hard. You know what trashy dirtbag men are like. You know what trashy dirtbag men are like.

Like me. These guys aren't that. They're Boston. They're good boys. They're not racist. Well, we don't know. They weren't racist for this hour. They weren't racist for an hour. For this hour. They did good. But go follow them and let's find them love. Let's find

them love. All right. We got sex. Drop this and put it on all my dating apps. Just like... It just says not racist. It'll be everywhere. Yeah right. We got sex. I'm going to crop this and put it on all my dating apps. It just says not racist. It'll be everywhere. Yeah, just the not racist. This is everything for me. Yeah.

Well, guys, keep up the great work. I'll be rooting for you and I'll see you in a couple of weeks. Appreciate you guys very much. Thank you so much for having us.

Thanks for having us. I just want to plug that Corey tour one more time. Okay, do it. Do it. Yeah. Corey, Dan Rosinski, his whole team

are the best to us. We're going to be doing a bunch of shows with them. Some more that haven't been announced yet. Just go on his website, our website. All the dates are up there. These guys got to go. They got jobs and shit. We got to get them out of here. Love you. I'm going to get back to work.

Later, guys. Enjoy the day. Keep fucking killing it. Thanks. Bye-bye. Help us save the world and spread the word. Please subscribe, rate the show, give us those crazy stars. iTunes, Spotify, wherever you're picking this shit up. Follow us on Instagram at world saving podcast for more info and updates. Fresco's blogs and tour dates you'll find at andyfresco.com. And check our socials to see what's up next.

Might be a video dance party, a showcase concert, that crazy shit show. Or whatever springs to Andy's wicked brain. And after a year of keeping clean and playing safe, the band is back on tour. We thank our brand new talent booker, Mara Davis. We thank this week's guest, our co-host, and all the fringy frenzies that help make this show great. Thank you all.

And thank you for listening. Be your best, be safe, and we will be back next week. No animals were harmed in the making of this podcast. As far as we know, any similarity, junction, or knowledge, facts, or fake is purely coincidental.