BudPod with Phil Wang & Pierre Novellie - Episode 203 - Obsesionadoooooooos!

Episode Date: March 1, 2023

Shamima discourse! Phil is OBSESSSED with the El Savadoran Mega Prison, pro-rules Johnny Cash, country music vs pop music, correspondence from Chris the supporting artiste  Get bonus BudPod on Patreon! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

It's Budpod. It's 203. 203. Let us be free. Oh, nice. Let us be free. That's inspiring. Thank you. Let's be free to be ourselves, to speak as we want to, to go where we please. To believe what we want. To believe. And bring her home.

By which I mean Shemima Begum. Bring her home. Bring home Shemima Begum. We miss her. The ISIS bride of our hearts. The ISIS queen of hearts. ISIS queen of hearts The Isis queen of hearts Bring her back

I've been listening to News things about Shemima Begum For those of you who don't know Shemima Begum Was the 15 year old Back in the day Her and two friends From Bethnal Green In East London

They went on the gap year to end all gap years really they went off to to ISIS and joined ISIS and became ISIS brides and now

now there's a lot of discourse about whether or not Shamaa Begum is given her British citizenship back because it was revoked by Sajid Javid I think when he was at home

in the home office yeah they they were holding they crossed their fingers when they said no takesies backsies when they gave her citizenship when she was born and their argument was that oh she could in theory get Bangladeshi citizenship via a parent

yes which Bangladesh went we're busy we're being flooded right now, actually. We don't want... They've also... No, basically, Bangladesh said. Yeah, I think they might have also said, or people have said,

that they could execute her if she goes back there. And there's a law, well, not a lot of law, but there's a rule where the UK will not extradite Americans back to America if they

get a death penalty. The UK won't do it. So by a similar standard they shouldn't do it to Bangladesh. My position on this has always been that she should not have her citizenship revoked and that the nation is responsible for its citizens. Yeah, I think that's right.

And I'm happy for her to be you know, fucking Han Solo'd into Carbonite or whatever. For, you know, in some, some insane prison. Han Solo her here. Han Solo her here.

The Kurds have enough on their plate. Where is she now anyway? I think she's still in that mad, enormous, always on the verge of just breaking loose Kurddish-run prison oh really i think so yeah and the other two i think are just dead and then maybe they i don't know i mean initially i was fine with there being delays because you got to gather evidence but what i hoped was they she would come back and they would go well we we have evidence now eyewitnesses of you you

know helping enslave and participate in genocide and and because they there were reports in the papers that there was accounts of her being part of the team that helped soap people into their suicide vests and stuff so you can't take them off even if you have second thoughts and a lot of stuff counter to the narrative of like uh i thought it stood for international super girls you know like it's just no you didn't you know you you you went you made the decision to go there after you saw the beheading videos um you're right yes you know yes and i mean i don't i still think she should come back but then i what i find funny is like a lot of people,

this is spicy enough for the bonus part. This is very spicy. We've opened spice. You know what it is? It's because I don't know if you can hear this listeners. We both had our feet up when we started. Yeah. Yeah.

There's a big, what do you call this? I call it the cube. The cube. But there's a name for this thing you put in front of sofas to put your feet on. Is it a poof? A poof? A poof? I don't think so. Is it a pouf? A pouf? A pouf? I don't think so.

Is it a shashama? A shamaima? A shamaima? No, it's a chiffon. Chiffon, chiffon. Is it a chiffon? I think it's a chiffon, yes. It unfolds into a thin bed.

Wow. A cube. Does it make it a futon? A chiffon futon? Maybe it's a futon. A chiffon futon? Maybe it's a futon. A chiffon futon? Any French furniture makers, text in.

But yeah, we were lounging a bit, so maybe we were lulled into a false sense of spiziness. We were sitting back and going, here's the thing. All the people who want to be the nicest to her are often the kind of people who are the least nice about, say, 15-year-olds who maybe participate in school shootings or equally bad things. I see her the same as a school shooter.

Okay, okay, okay. Oh, but they're so young. Yeah, they are young, but I mean, you know, 15's not four, is it? Okay, yeah. You've got a bit of morality in there. I'd not thought about that comparison. But then I guess the question there is

to what degree was she groomed? Because I guess you'd say a shooter in America, a teenage school shooter in America, they have a responsibility because they haven't been directly groomed by... They are radicalized online. These guys all tend to be members of the same forums, go on the same websites.

That is also true. So you go, no, their brain went weird because of the internet. And you go, okay, well, so did... I mean, isn't that how most lone wolf terror works? So... Uh-huh, uh-huh, uh-huh. But I agree with you that she should be our problem. Yes.

Because, I mean, you know born and raised here yeah it's very much i think so the uk should um you know always pays its debts kind of thing you know it's like this is a kind of a debt that we owe yeah the world you know because i mean of course there's agency and individual agency there but a country does have some responsibility to to not have its citizens especially because a lot of the very sort of often not always but often more right-wing people who want her to stay over there they are the same people who are like why do we have foreign criminals in our system well that's probably what if the kurds say that yeah right right right so if you really think that about the uk like don't put them in jail here deport them and they should be in jail in

poland or romania yeah well then you should say put our money where our mouth is money where your mouth is even stevens yeah we get all we get all the heroin traffickers in those thai prisons or banged up abroad yeah there's fucking sky that sky show right do you ever watch that um no i've heard that i've heard the name a lot banged up abroad what's it about just like brits ago brits banged up abroad so someone up in mallorca or something no it's often people who are like uh i didn't look in my rucksack i was going to the full moon festival and then there's like a brick of heroin in there they're just getting beaten with ratan canes in some thai prison all the time yeah yeah yeah or like someone who's like a accidental in quotes mule or i don't know yeah started a fight or sometimes it's like

someone who wore a bikini in the wrong bit of dubai or something i think this is a time where i feel lucky to have grown up in a country with pretty strict laws about this stuff is yeah i'm like i'm i've zero patience with people yeah something's in the bag i'm like check your fucking bag check your fucking bag i i don't i don't have much patience really with like as much obviously i don't agree that there was that couple that had sex on a beach or something and or were cavorting around on a beach in dubai or qatar and they got in a load of shit yeah and i thought i don't agree with the rule like or the way that they're enforcing it i don't like those governments but did you not

believe them sure did you look at that country and go, oh, but there's wiggle room here. The country that has slaves has wiggle room for me. Well, in their defense, I think that's a fair defense. I think Qatar and Dubai need to decide how exceptional tourists are and whether they do live in a two-law state where there's one law for local people and one law for wealthy visitors i think

that is how the industry their economy is built i think if you go on holiday to here's a solution here's how's this for a solution to which to which to which issue faced both the the tourism dubai catalogue everyone including the locals but especially the tourists just wears horse blinkers yeah nice you only ever see what you're looking directly at and everyone walks around on Dubai Qatar thing. Everyone, including the locals, but especially the tourists, just wears horse blinkers. Yeah, nice. You only ever see what you're looking directly at. And everyone walks around in like there's railings and stuff. So as long as you don't turn, and everyone wears

a neck brace. You can't turn your head and ruin it. You're like a horse. So everywhere the westerners look and follow the railing, they're just seeing nice, oh, a frozen yogurt bar. An infinity pool. So everywhere the Westerners look and follow the railing, they're just seeing nice... Oh, a frozen yogurt bar. An infinity pool.

And the locals see whatever it is they want to see. Definitely not a lady in a bikini running around. Or at least not in public. I'm sure they have an appetite in private. What's it like to be a porn merchant in one of those countries, do you think? You'd make a lot of money. Exciting. Exciting, dangerous.

Yeah. It'd be like selling porn in the Victorian era or something. Yeah, just photos of ankles and stuff. Yeah. Which is the risk. In the UK, there's still obscenity laws in the 60s.

Yeah. Late 50s, early 60s, albums would get smashed up by the cops, removed. There weren't blasphemy laws here until what? Until Stuart Lee forced the House of Lords, basically, to get rid of them. Yeah, isn't that crackers? But yeah, Shemima,

bye, gum. She might... I don't know. they've they've said no again but i guess surely she can appeal again sure now i've heard the the the race the race argument be made and i'm usually quite skeptical about these um sort of accusations of britain being sort of this essentially racist place. But in this case, you know, it is hard to imagine a white Brit in a similar circumstance and having their citizenship revoked. True. Although what I don't like is when they bring up the example of like the white Brits who

went and fought for the Kurds. Okay. So people will say, well, that's a young British white man who went and fought for the kurds okay so people will say well that's a young british white man who went and fought for a foreign power and they're allowed back and you sort of go okay but we're not going to pretend that the kurdish free people's army is the same as the guys who that's a false equivalence blow up stadiums in manchester let's let's we're at war with one and we're allied to the other so apparently you know britain is second in the world for revoking citizenships do you know this is it after bahrain no yeah really yeah it's about 200 something a year we can't get enough of it yeah

love it no yeah i'll be having that yeah yoink but i think one of the requirements is that they don't the person doesn't become stateless. It's illegal to make someone stateless, which is another reason why the Shamima thing doesn't make sense. Because she is stateless now. Right, yeah. She doesn't have a Bangladeshi passport. Yeah, she just potentially could apply for one. And obviously the second that Sajid Javid or whoever the Home Secretary was said that,

the Bangladeshi government went, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. We would say no. Yeah. We're saying no now. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Hands up. No, actually. No no actually no thank you we're busy we have so many problems yeah like the fact that most of our country is going to be water yeah in 50 years so yeah she is stateless so they have broken the law though but the tory government just can't cope with the idea of her coming back and being given a council house or

something the fucking daily mail would it would it would be funny if he came back and being given a council house or something. The fucking Daily Mail would... It would be funny if he came back and got a penthouse. Like near Buckingham Palace. Every copy of the Daily Mail would look like it was on fire. That's how angry they'd be. You know when something in a video game

is flaming forever? Like it doesn't burn. It's just fire around the edges of it like a harry potter document oh right yeah yeah every edition of the daily mail would like it would just be the fury yeah it'd be worth it almost for the bands to be honest it'd be so funny so many people would be hospitalized with like like migraines from how angry it would make them it would be very funny the banter timeline demands it the banter timeline demands that she comes back rehabilitates herself to the extent that she can stand as a ukip candidate oh that'd

be great yeah yeah yeah everyone's brains had exploded But you know Her starting off and going there at 16 Does call to mind that That Dave Chappelle routine How old is 16 really? Yeah Apparently the UK also has one of the youngest Ages of

I don't know what the technical term is But the age at which Criminal responsibility It's like 10 I didn't know that the technical term is but the age at which Criminal responsibility Yeah It's like 10 or something It's 10 I didn't know that I assumed it was like 16 or something

I think they came up with 10 with like petty theft in mind Right As in like by 10 you're old enough to know but don't steal from the shop Right, okay Yeah, we show you Oliver every year for a reason

Yeah, yes Exactly okay whereas yeah we show you oliver every year for a reason yes exactly do you want to go join a singing gang didn't think so yeah um yeah yeah that's incredible that's still that's pretty pretty young yeah and i'm sure that's not like a hard and fast rule no no no they'll always be nice to you and stuff it's not like if you're 11 and you steal a game boy you go to adult prison and you have to join the fucking aryan nation or something just a little kid with like sonic rings tattooed under his eye for every game boy he nicked i'm gonna punt the toughest guy in there on the first day yeah yeah you have to you have to steal the toughest guy's pokemon cards speaking of prison yeah my recent obsession phil is listeners is obsessed obsessed with a mega prison in el salvador A couple of days ago. Stacey Dooley cradling a shaven-headed member of the MS-13.

A couple of days ago. Look at those tattoos. I saw a BBC News story about a new mega prison in El Salvador. Mega prison. Mega. And by mega, i mean mega is it's it's going to house 40 000 of the most violent and dangerous gang members in el salvador and dangerous and they're all fully shaved and tattoos all over the body and there's 40 000 of them and there's all these photos and videos of them just like to get processed they just have to like stack them

all into halls and buses well and they literally stack them like to get processed they just have to like stack them all into halls and buses well and they literally stack them like traffic cones so they yeah they wrap them around each other skull to skull hand overhead like breast position but like knees like apart and the next guy in front of you is in between your legs yes it's like they've they've sort of sat down and figured out the most space efficient way to stack gang members human yeah people yeah um also it's just mesmerizing because they all look very very similar because they're all shaved heads and they all have very similar tattoos they all have those like black line tattoos of like numbers of the virgin mary or skulls or whatever yeah the kind of tattoos where when a character with those

tattoos turns up in breaking bad you're like oh fuck yeah things have gone serious you go uh-oh yeah he's been sent by someone like south of the border yes assassinate you and key point shaved heads they all match they're all like completely like shaven headed like the guys from fucking mad max but they're all wearing white baggy boxer shorts yeah yeah the raw and that's all they're wearing yeah and they sort of have to like march and these guys are kind of yelling at them in Spanish, and they're hustling them from buses into warehouses. And the prison guards all are in riot gear. The whole time? The whole time.

All of them are in full riot gear, riot shields, full helmet, all the time. All the prison guards look like the guys in the video game where you go, okay, these are harder to kill. No, it's like in Arkham Asylum. These guys are harder to kill because they've got the riot gear on. Yeah, okay, these are harder to kill. No, it's like in Arkham Asylum. These guys are harder to kill because they've got the right gear on. Yeah, yeah, you have to get behind them.

Level one, it's just like a normal cop with like a nightstick. He's like one shot. Yeah, yeah, yeah. These guys, you got to break the armor. Yeah, there's two bars. There's the red health bar, then there's a blue bar.

You have to break down the blue bar first. But I don't know why I'm absolutely mesmerized. You love it. I get love is an odd word, but I am obsessed. I am obsessed with this fucking... It's the biggest prison in the Americas, which must be... I guess it's something big in China.

Well, let's not go there. Well, yeah. But, I mean, the idea of of 40 000 of the most dangerous criminals can you imagine working as a prison guy working there it would be so weird for someone to just you're in a you're in a bar in el salvador and you see a guy just like who looks knackered at the bar just like waving over for another beer and you say to the bartender oh uh quienes uh el trabajo oh he works at the mega prison you'd be like oh send him a i'll buy him a beer yeah just some guy where do you work oh we're just at the mega prison yeah the mega prison yeah i work at the mega i work i work down the mega prison

where the 40 000 most dangerous men in the country are probably the 40 000 most dangerous men for many countries yeah yeah yeah that's it you know in the we live in el salvador where it was the a murder rate at like a higher level than most modern wars for like decades i like the bbc link you said listeners phil has sent me two links so far about this that's a good way to understand that you're obsessed with it the bbc article about it was like it's very controversial about the human rights of a lot of people say that you know the president rounding up these guys he's accidentally got a lot of innocent men and then the end is like uh the approval rating for this idea in el salvador is like 80 90 really yeah it's so it's so popular and you go right

right it's also like of course it is it's like what 40 miles or something southeast of the capital yeah it's like i don't know if i'd be thrilled about this basically gotham an army yeah an army of angry shaved men like in the suburbs you know i mean yeah a big army a big army i wonder if they're think of a thousand people what if they all 40 of that what if they coalesce into one mega gang or just one enormous gang member yeah like terminator just like they melt yeah oh man it's so eerie i think because they are all because they all look so similar they're like all clones it's like a bunch of clones and all dressed exactly the same it's incredibly dystopian yeah and the phrase mega prison

is incredibly dystopian it really is and it looks something out of judge dread i was about to say it looks like a latino judge dread yeah because judge dread we're used to seeing it like gotham we're used to cold weather architecture excuse me a lot of stone high buildings people in big coats smoking you know snow swirling gothic whereas instead it's just like palm trees and like uh yeah and and then in this like warm weather where people can just wear boxer shorts even though they're in prison yeah that's all they're wearing and bare feet yeah marching around it's it's trying a tropical mega prison for me the one was so very elements of it in these videos the the prisoners they they they

seem very pliant like they're very they rush to to stack themselves and get in line and get an order it's like military drill yeah and you and you think what what have them what's happened to them that they're you know what what do they know could happen to them that they're this uh disciplined do you ever see footage or like do you ever watch the sitcom porridge i've seen bits it's set in like an old school yeah with english prison british prison yeah yeah and like footage of old prisons like they kind of drilled them around the place like you had to sort of stand to attention and stuff they looked more like that in those days yes the british prisoners and i think it's just how you move if basically they're gonna hit you with stick slows yeah right beat the fuck out of you

you can't you can't complain there's no're going to beat the fuck out of you. And you'll end up unarmed. You can't complain. There's no rules. Yeah. You can't be like, excuse me, you were very rude earlier. You know, can't do that.

Yeah. I'm just amazed I can keep track of them all. Yeah. Do you think they have a tattoo database? Sorry? Do you think they have a tattoo database? I think the US has that in some prisons. As in like they have a map of each prisoner's tattoos

Yeah, identifying marks Keep track of them But it is strange because you're being told These are the most dangerous men In the country of El Salvador A very dangerous country The point of origin for all sorts of incredibly Violent gangs that are very famous

I think MS-13 started there In El Salvador I think so Is it quite there. In El Salvador? I think so. Is it quite a small country, El Salvador? Pretty small. Yeah. For a small country to have a mega prison of 40,000. Are they getting people from other neighboring countries? Maybe.

I'm so obsessed with this mega prison. El Salvador. Let me see. Population... 6 million. Okay. So it's like Scotland, basically. Right, yeah. Yeah. Yeah, it's like a little dot on a map.

Wow, yeah. I mean, it's just... It boggles the mind. But I remember that El Salvador was one of the few places that was always, or almost always, more dangerous than Johannesburg. Right, right. Because it was just, it's just ungovernable almost like just complete like madness like you could live in a cartel area of mexico and probably

be like at least it's not el salvador you know just it's always seemed to me to be the craziest place in the world i think it's where ms-13 is from but yeah you're being told these men are men to be feared and then you watch them running around in their pants getting hit with sticks right yeah you go oh well not anymore not for now yeah i guess maybe that yeah i guess that's part of it in it but yeah and yeah and adding to it is all the all these like swimming tattoos of like the virgin mary oh yeah crosses and stuff well they look it's like russian tattoos. It's always old school eagles and religious symbolism. Yeah. Okay, so MS-13 started in LA,

but it was set up to protect Salvadoran immigrants. Oh. So the gang is ethnically El Salvadorian. So it started off almost like those crusade armies to protect travelers. Or just in reaction to all the other already there gangs in LA, I guess. Right, right, right. Global membership estimated at 50,000 to 70,000.

Oye! Yeah. That's a lot. Do you know what it means, MS-13? Marasalvatruja. What does Marasalvatrucha mean? Okay, so it's disputed. It might be a combination of Salvadoran and trucha,

a Caliche word for being alert. Truja. Alert Salvadorans. Yeah, watch out. Watch out, it's not all Salvadorans. Watch out, we're here. Yeah, watch out. Oh. Watch out, it's all Salvadorians. Watch out, we're here. Yeah. Look out, guys.

Why does... I'm being very ignorant here, but why does Latin America have this sort of especially intense violent criminal angle? Well, I mean, the cartels in Mexico, like the violence has just got worse and worse. We remember that a few years ago,

there was a big news story where like the Mexican, one of the cartels had just kidnapped like a bus of just 40 university students and just fucking decapitated them. Just that kind of level of insanity wasn't happening in the 80s and 90s. Do you know either the producer or researcher or something for Narcos,

that show, when they were want to do the mexican yeah series he got killed researching the area that they were going to film them i think we talked about that yeah they just fucking got him i think it just escalates and escalates and one of the mexican cartels started out as like the actual army special forces that's a very latin american thing yeah yeah and they were just like hang on a minute Our job is to Beat all of the other gangs With our amazing military skills And take all their money

And then just hand it over What if we just kept the money And just There you go yeah Gives me the Gives me the heebie-jeebies I wonder if I wonder if the chaos of

Where is El Salvador Is it like South America Central America Central Central okay Central yeah Like alright okay In the thin sort of bit ass of where is el salvador is it like south america central america central central okay central yeah like all right okay in the thin sort of bit uh just slightly above the thin bit and to the left okay i think that's what the other thing about it just gives me some fucking creeps this thing this this mega prison if you haven't seen it listen do do check it out you might not become

as obsessed with me but it's quite extraordinary it is amazing footage yeah it's really incredible it is so that's i think what that's what it is it is so um dystopian it is just so dystopian yeah it doesn't seem like it's from now yeah it feels like something that you'd put in a futuristic film to be like in the future when crime is out of control yeah which is what judge dread was based on was like how crime was just going up and up and up from the 70s 80s 90s just getting worse and worse and worse and so everyone was like well the future is just that why would this trend go down yeah and then you know that's where the freakonomics theory gave all the credit to legalized abortion and oh interesting the crime rates started drop crime

rates have basically been dropping consistently in the u and in the UK since the 90s. Yeah, yeah. In almost every category. Whereas everyone likes to pretend we're in constant danger, but... No. Not really. Yeah. Not now that they've built the mega prison.

Tough gig. Would you play a corporate or the mega prison? A corporate. Yeah. Big crowd, 40,000. that's like wembley yeah shit if it goes well you feel amazing um yeah that'd be sick i mean i have to you'd have to open the some local you couldn't go straight into material you're gonna go so i was on the bus here we're not allowed to get the bus. Yeah you'd have to tread really carefully.

Oof. What do you reckon food's like? In the mega prison? Bad. Drinking's bad. Plain rice. Yeah.

Even in a country even if it had good food in the country it's hard enough cooking for eight people. Cooking for like Cooking for the mega prison. Cooking for a mega prison.

I'd watch that Stanley Tucci series. Cooking for like... Cooking for the mega prison. Cooking for a mega prison. I'd watch that Stanley Tucci series. Cooking for mega prisons with Stanley Tucci. I'm here in the El Salvadoran mega prison where I've been told a certain prisoner has some of the most incredible toilet wine. I'd watch him patronizingly go from cell to cell sampling the toilet wine Gosh

Do you think You'd have to be like Johnny Cash when he drinks the water on that album Falsom Yeah, the Falsom Prison He asked the guard for some water Oh yeah In one of the recordings

and all the crowd goes wild while he drinks it Because the water that the prisoners got was from rusty pipes and tasted of metal and was disgusting and they never had any other water because they were just like well that's a tap water fuck you so he was drinking them drinking the bad the same water the prisoners got not the water that the guards got yeah i always wonder about that that album the life of the foursome prison album do you think the prisoner officers ever like at any point in the concert thought, maybe this was a bad idea? Because he seems to be kind of on their side.

He seems to be riling them up. He seems to be, I don't know, kind of romanticizing being a prisoner in his songs. But at the same time, is that good? Is he kind of giving these prisoners a validation as prisoners and making them more proud to be prisoners and less so less likely to try and break out or was it was was it just for like it's like saying uh unless you all have to do your homework for the whole year and then at the end of the year we'll we'll all get easter eggs or something all right we watch a movie yeah we'll

watch a movie well maybe did you let the did you hang that over the prisoners heads and get a year of better behavior right right and all enforcing it on each other as well like some guy starts yelling about his pudding in the cafeteria and all the other prisoners like jerry i'm gonna kick you to death yeah if you demean that johnny cash doesn't come yeah yeah you're dead man yeah maybe that was worth it must have been a fucking rush though imagine me johnny johnny, just like crushing at a prison. Must have felt amazing. Yeah.

It would have been so funny if he was like not on the prisoner's side. You should have stuck to the rules and you'd be outside. Your mama would still love you. She wouldn't cry. And they're all like oh he's right

i shouldn't have done the guards are clapping yes we agree you should have nice to the guards they do their best their jobs is so hard, they get no rest. Boo! Yeah! One guy really clapping, the warden waving his cigar. Yeah. The warden's dick is big and hard. This is a funny idea. Pro-establishment Johnny Cash.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm the boss of prison let's reinvade vietnam just really pro-vietnam war well elvis is basically pro-establishment johnny cash that's true that's very true yeah his big relationship with nixon yeah i really like that that's so funny if you stuck you should have stuck to the rules then you'd be outside such a like such a distillation such a child summary of the concept of prison you're all in here because you didn't stick to the rules and if you did you'd be outside anyway you can't go outside because you didn't stick to the rules.

You didn't stick to the rules. Is this observational? For the comedy, for the mega prison. You go on stage. Hey, you guys should have stuck to the rules and you'd be outside. Everyone's laughing. He's right.

He's got us. He's roasting us. Oh, fucking hell funny all johnny cash's songs start with the same dum dum dum dum dum dum dum yeah yeah dum dum dum dum you should have stuck to then you'd be outside pro establishment Johnny Cash is very funny he's still the man in black but he's wearing he's not wearing black until everyone gets equal justice

he's wearing black until everyone starts following the rules till then there ought to be a man up front dressed in black that's maybe his worst song the man in black yeah it's pretty lyrics are poopy it's our black for the poor and the destitute our black for the people who are sad it's just like come on man they don't someone online pointed out just how emo most country music is.

It's just that it doesn't seem emo because the guy's in a cowboy hat. And he's probably good at fighting. Right, yeah, yeah, yeah. But it's still very like... It is very emo. My wife said she didn't like me anymore and so I cried, cried, cried. Yeah, yeah, there's a lot of crying, yeah. There's a lot of crying going on considering that you're a cowboy, it says here.

Yeah, there's a lot of crying. There's a lot of regret. There's a lot of crying there's a lot of regret there's a lot of staring over a glass of whiskey at nothing yes yes it is very emo very emo I listened to was it was it one of Malcolm Gladwell's old podcasts or was it

An American Life or something it's about why why country and Western is usually a lot more emotionally affecting than other pop, than sort of pop music. And it's because of its, the conclusion is because of its specificity.

Like a country song is always about a very particular person doing a very particular thing. Yeah. And it becomes, and the song is, it becomes emblematic of a particular kind of sadness

or particular kind of tragedy. But in pop, you just be like, baby, you left me, but I loved you. And you kind of go, okay, this is a bit vague. But in country, it's like, I found a ring in the bin. She left when the sun came down. And it's a very particular story.

My third cousin kidnapped my dog. That's happened to me. But like Jolene, you know, very, very specific. Yeah. There are names. There are names. There are characters. There are stories.

Yeah, I like this. Yeah. Pop music is always vague. Yeah, there's no names in pop. No. Pop music. My boyfriend Jeffrey was mean to me. Going to the club to forget about Beth.

Yeah, you never hear a name in pop. That's true. Yes, that makes so much sense. I always laugh when pop is really vague. It makes me really laugh when you would get it in like 80s glam rock and then you get it a bit in in sort of more like dancey music when the specific thing that makes me laugh is vague assertions about what a good night it's gonna be yes or we're gonna have a good night or are you having a good night because it's it's it's urinal chat you know it's piss talk it's so stupid it's smoking area chat from like one incredibly drunk guy who's the worst

guy who you don't want to talk to yeah good night yeah pal it's a let me yeah there's a let me character let me get me good night you have a good night it's awful and this is a i love it like even when it's like kiss and they're all dressed up in this crazy gear and they're like, gonna have a good night, tonight, good night. That's all they're singing. Even Bee Gees. Me and night, me and night. We all like to boogie.

I guess maybe disco started it. Was disco the first one? I was going to say, is disco the first genre to self-reference all the time? Self-referential pop. There was a twist, I guess. There was a twist before that. Let's do the twist.

Let's do the twist. At least it puts it in a context of the the same twist we did last summer you remember last summer do you remember that one again it's nostalgia yeah do you remember the twist not really let's do it again really because this is a new song you go how can what this is a new song isn't this how did we do last summer have you only just written this song yeah no i swear there was a song called the... Yeah, it's like a... Who wrote this? Christopher Nolan?

M. Night Shyamalan's favourite song. But yeah, you said a really good bit about how... Going to the club. Yeah, and looking forward to when we'll have enough songs that all the elements of the club... Are fully described. Fully described. And we can move on.

Now we know who's in the club. Yeah. What they're like. How to get on yeah what they like how to get on the dance floor how to get on the dance floor to what end is it is it jumping yes yeah what are people wearing apple bottom jeans yeah eventually once the club's fully outlined this platonic ideal of the club. What's the cloakroom policy? What's the cloakroom policy? Got my ticket in my pocket. Okay. Take a photo of it just in case. Because my oldest sister had her back taken. Not in this club, but it makes you think.

Yeah. Yeah. Get it all covered. Get it covered. And then... Club covered. Yeah. I think Get it all covered. Get it covered. And then get them to the club covered. Yeah.

I think they watered down the shots but no one minds. Yeah. And then everyone can start singing about the bouncy castle or the trampolining place

or the church. We're going to move on. Shall we do some correspondence from our inmates? Yes. Prisoners of our chant. Here's a song for all you rule breakers out there.

So you thought that you could bend the rules And take the cops and judge the fools Well, here's some proof that you were wrong. A pro-establishment country song. If you'd been good, you'd be outside. If you'd been humble, free of pride. But instead you did something bad and now you're saintly mama's side. She ain't mad, boys. She's disappointed.

We all know that's worse. To letters, emails, phone calls, to your decking, your sister, to your best regards, to who you want to send letters. Correspondence. We'd love to get some correspondence from the megaprison. Would we? Can you? Yes. Yeah, we would. We'd love to get some correspondence from the Mega Prison Would we?

Can you? Yes! Yeah, we would, we would like to I'd be fascinated to know what life in the Mega Prison's like I hope someone makes a documentary about the Mega Prison They've got to I mean, the second that clip comes out Adam Curtis, Louis Theroux fighting in an alley Over the rights to do the first one, right? I...

No, I want to do it No no i want to do it no i want to do it just struggling do you do you have the colonies to make a documentary in a mega prison i i wouldn't want to step foot in there i'd be so scared i'd be so scared well you know that like they're only choosing the nominally most frightening but in reality best behaved prisoners for that right because they they'll say if you're nice to the man he'll let you have a soda i would do it really yeah i'd go to the mega prison i mean it's weird for someone who's obsessed with mega prison to say this but i don't think i'd actually want to go and make a person yeah but you know some people can be obsessed with roller coasters and afraid of heights phil it's okay um okay let's see uh we have a message from chris chris what's this that you've given us

it's a piece of face um hi filthy pier Yeah. I like that a lot. Chris here. Hi, Chris. Hello, Chris. Not quite a founding father here, but certainly a Medieval Pistorian. What does that mean? Start in the middle?

Hmm. Maybe. Yeah. I like that. Medieval Pistorian. I have to start by telling you that this grisly tale is not my own, but was passed on to me by its protagonist. Great.

Many years ago, I was an extra on a TV show. Oh, great. How fun. Very cool. And myself and the other background artists. I'm, of course, I don't know if people have seen the ads, but I am the BBC spokesperson for Becoming an Extra. Of course you are.

Yeah. Of course you are. I'm very pro-extra work. You're pro-extra work. I'm in the pocket of big extra. You're in the pocket of big extra. He's in the pocket of big background. There's a lot of shady people standing behind him.

Backing him up. um which by the way side note was a discussion was a point of much discussion on the frank skinner radio show that i'm on on saturdays what was the x the bbc extra well frank and emily couldn't understand what it was for and i was telling them that it was relatively simple what it was for yeah but they they were complaining that they couldn't figure out if you would get green screened in or actually be allowed to be in right okay okay okay and it came up like twice even they were just like but what is it for yeah yeah yeah i worry sometimes when i watch it like is it coming across are we being too sort of kooky here and the point's getting missed but tens of thousands of people have applied. So it's... More than enough. Yeah, it's great.

More than enough. Myself and the other background artistes were whiling away the many waiting hours between shots on the obligatory on-set double-decker bus. Extras or supporting artists, as they're now known, do get treated like a kind of cattle yeah yeah yeah they they

yeah they're just packed into whatever room or vehicle production has to hand it's a very suddenly on some productions the very medieval mindset sets in oh yeah there's there's a real hierarchy i mean yeah it's a hierarchy actually you don't really see anywhere else in modern western society no and it wouldn't be acceptable in an office. Yeah, it's quite feudal. The principals, the stars who you never see. I mean, I filmed for something recently where there's a famous person on the call sheet,

which is the document you get at the beginning of the day just to line up who's in that day and the name of the actor, the name of the character. The name of that, the famous actor was just Cast One. So grand that he doesn't even get named. And the rest of us are

there with our earthly names. Pathetic, disgusting mud names. Yeah. I was a writer on something once and because i was i was kind of like a writer but i was sort of friends with some of the people in it or something or it wasn't clear where to categorize me yeah and i got like social credit of like oh for just going to the like the cafeteria that was on the film studio set and just eating there which was better

food than if i'd taken them up on their offer of getting Deliveroo to bring in like some cold pret. Right, yeah, yeah, yeah. And I was like, but why wouldn't I? Who did you get kudos from, from Defridium? Well, like when I was like, no, no, I'll just eat with everyone else. Oh yeah.

And they were like, oh, a man of people. The king dines at the inn. He must be disguised with his gray cloak. Quick, quick, quick, cover his raiment. But it was weird. I felt people being a bit like, oh, really, you're very down to earth. I was like, well, it's also better.

Yeah. Hot food in a cafeteria as opposed to sitting alone in a room. A tepid Wagamama's. Yeah. Mental. Anyway. Anyway.

So they're chilling out, these guys. There's so many hours between doing things as well It's very boring actually It is boring I don't know who said it but there's an old actor's adage That goes I act for free I'm paid to wait

There's a lot of waiting around I'm the other way around I love the waiting I love sitting, looking at my phone reading eating biscuits drinking tea and when they say uh phil we're ready for you and so i'm like fuck you and i love downtime i look i was thinking this earlier today i was like what is my main flaw oh i love downtime it's my favorite thing it's everything i do is in pursuit of downtime well we're sitting here recording on sunday the day of our episode of world's most dangerous roads airing on dave that's right in

a few hours it will have aired when we were filming that i remember a few times the crew were like sorry guys it's just going to be we're going to have to wait here for a bit and we'll just be like great great fantastic downtime yeah i love it's a bit where you make us drive on dangerous roads. That's stressful. The sitting still and eating biltong is great. Yeah, yeah. Anyway.

I love downtime. These guys are enjoying... Downtime Abby, that's what I'm going to call my house. I'm going to call my house Downtime Abby. She's the laziest stripper. Downtime Abby just sits leaning against the pole smoking and looking at Twitter. Downtime Abby just sits leaning against the pole smoking and looking at Twitter. Downtime Abby. She's a real Downtime Abby, that girl.

Gets nothing done. A few of us had connected and started to chat. Yeah, on the bus. Yeah, he says, I still do it in my woke voice. I suppose extras don't do that anymore. They probably all just look at their phones now, bloody communists. Very good.

The conversation ultimately led to urban... What does he say? Did he say in my woke voice? Yeah, like in the stars around it. Like, I should do it in that voice. The conversation ultimately led... I think of that as the Adam Buxton voice because he invented that voice

for the boring, established opinion radio guy. The conversation ultimately led to urban myths, and in particular, embarrassing sexual urban myths. Woman with lobster, whole dog in ass, etc. Such classics as woman and lobster. Woman and lobster. I have heard that one. You've heard of woman and lobster?

Wow. I've not heard of woman and lobster. A woman does herself pleasure with a lobster, and it fires a load of eggs into her. Fuck's sake. And then they all hatch and crepe and she'll pop out. Fuck off. Which is not true.

Fuck off. That's funny. How do you even pleasure yourself with a lobster? It's so pokey and sharp and horrible. I think it's the body. I've cut myself on lobsters. It's horrible. You know apparently lobsters will basically live for as long as they can.

It's the shedding that's the problem. They don't die of a weight. They don don't die it's because they can't shed they'll get to the point where they kind of like when they just burst out of the shell yeah they die from that because the shell's so big they can't adequately like get it off them so i saw someone online saying that if we just help the lobster shed and keep it in captivity we'll have some sort of eternal god lobster fuck yeah i'm in favor i'd love that lobsters and jellyfish brain jellyfish basically or they're sort of hardly alive anyway but yeah they don't ever need to die really yeah and therein lies the secret to immortality the humble jellyfish to

float to sting ah for chance to float the chance to dream um at peak amusement one of the quieter members of the ensemble piped up with a story that's a very that's a very good description of that point in a in a fun conversation yeah there is there is that moment where you go okay now now i'll tell this story yeah peak amusement peak amusement right Peak amusement. We're at peak amusement now. Where you step into the arena. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Proffering up that this is the pinnacle. Yeah, very good. At peak amusement, one of the quieter members of the ensemble piped up with a story that was no myth.

It was something that had actually happened to him. Gosh. He asked us to cast our minds back to an alpine skiing trip he and his friends went on a few years back. They had enjoyed a day on the slopes and then gone on to indulge in a heavy session of apres-ski, getting very pieced indeed. Nice. Very good.

During the evening, the young man had gotten lucky with a local girl, Heidi. Lovely. And after some light flirty flirty kissy kissy, they retired back to her place. At this point, the shy young man telling the story would start to quote his female companion in a feminine French accent, which made the story more fun. So I will try and do that.

Okay, wait, wait, wait. So who's talking about who at this point? So it's the extra. Yeah. He's telling a story about when he was skiing. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. And got off with this French Swiss girl. Okay, so the extra got off with the...

This is the actress' tale. Okay. Yes. On arrival at her petit appartement, dans l'immeuble, they were in bed in no time with clothes discarded, and she asked, Will you massage my shoulder and my back?

The gentleman obliged and struggled her applying his best techniques. After a minute or so of this he started to become aware of the need to do a trump. Oh. And he wasn't keen on breaking the mood by excusing himself to the bathroom. So in drunken logic he decided to chance it there and then. A sneaker.

Yeah. I can see you drunkenly thinking you could get away with it. Yeah. He managed to let it go quietly and almost fully controlled. But unfortunately for him, the fart turned out to be a lot more solid than he'd hoped for. And what can only be described as dirty matter dropped onto the bed sheet behind him. Oh my god. Oh my god.

No, No! Trying his best to ignore the unwanted... Ignore? Ignore. Just ignore it. Just ignore it. Ignore that. Ignore that. Did you just say... Ignore it. Ignore it. Just ignore it.

Ignore-e-vous. Trying his best to ignore the unwanted third party. Very good. Nice. He continued with the massage. Very relaxing. Until it came time to change things up, at which point he took the swift opportunity to give the poop a kick.

Hiya! Hiya! Like a real kick from the back Like a donkey kick Is it a mule kick? Mule kick At which point he took the opportunity to give the poop a swift kick To remove it from the equation

I guess you could call it the equation Let's remove this from the equation Let's change things up Let's try it without the poop Much better As I suspected Ever the gentleman, the storyteller spared us the details Of the remainder of the night

But needless to say, they engaged in filth The next morning he awoke Extremely hungover, the young lady asleep beside him He was immediately taken in First and foremost by the strong smell of poo in the room And started to remember the events of the previous night. It's like a

an odorizer. What do they call them? Like a humidifier kind of thing. Those things where you stick sticks in them. You buy them in Muji. Those guys. Oh yeah, the little scented sticks. Those sticks but just lodged in a crab.

He started to remember what happened. Knowing the offending article must still be in the room, but afraid to wake his friend, he carefully lifted his head from the pillow to try and spot it. Reader, it wasn't good news Oh no It appears his frantic kick the night before

Had been more effective than he could ever have imagined The poo had made it all the way To the white bedroom wall And was splattered across it Like a brown snowball fight had taken place Oh my lord God Hi-ya

Like the full mass was spread. So it's not like it went and knocked and like left a mark and fell to the ground. It's like it was pancaked onto the wall. It sounds like it was. Yeah. I'm struggling to imagine that there's none on the bed. Yeah, there's got to be a little Mr hanky footprint right a launch pad yeah mark yeah yeah from liftoff definitely um at this point the girl woke up and the pair went about

the most polite and amiable pleasantries bonjour bon matin as they both dressed and prepared to go about their respective days both fully aware of the mess on the wall and the awful smell wow what a what an understanding lovely woman or she's just as hung over and thinking did i poo so hard that it flew across the wall like a shotgun shell like what happened maybe you never know um both fully aware of it i'll head off then he said to her about to leave and be forever free of this ghastly scenario to which she replied i will drive you i have a little peugeot oh of course he said i had a little pujo nice bizarrely he accepted the offer of a lift and she drove him back to his chalet in complete silence

when the young man on the bus finished his story the rest of us lift and she drove him back to his chalet in complete silence when the young man on the bus finished his story the rest of us were left completely speechless and then we all burst out laughing not in a mean way he clarifies as he just shrugged and pulled the sort of what are you gonna do face i never saw him again that's a funny thing to say next but i always remember the sheer bravery of the chap who told such a personally mortifying tale to four strangers on a tv set a real life urban legend in my opinion anyway koji loved the podcast um great thanks chris thank you chris that is some good good bonding good onset yeah his ps is the correspondence section is now basically like the reader's

letter section of a porn magazine but if the porn magazine was actually a poo magazine and also it was a podcast Chris it's true it's true can't fault you there I don't know brave in a way but when it's funny enough and self effacing enough but then we're comedians our instinct to not tell that story

has been so withered that I wouldn't even question it. No, no, no. It doesn't even strike me as a weird story to tell. It seems to be precisely the right story to tell. I would say, why didn't you open with this? Before your name. Yeah.

It's a gamble, you know, because these are people you're going to have to spend a lot more time with. I can't imagine a group of people so unfun that if you tell that story in that bus, all four of them just go, well, that's disgusting. And then just turn and look out the window, all four. Unless you're filming on an Amish film set or something incredibly uptight.

Yeah, yeah, exactly. Well now, Phil, it's time to go to the mega prison of the Patreon. Oh, great. The VIP mega prison. Because that's how many Patreons we have. That's right. 40,000. 40,000

shaved, boxers, tattoos, shoeless. Yes. Big Bud Pod tattoos. Scurrying around the place. Full back panel of the Bud Pod logo. Marjorie over the heart. Yep. Lucky Kentucky whiskey logo on the thighs yes yeah um yeah so um please if you're a patron um we'll see on friday if you're not a patron become a patron

and see us on friday give it a go have that friday feeling eeg that that another chunk of this podcast has come out um but everybody um uh pierre and my world's most dangerous roads episode is available on uk tv play yes to stream where we drive around lissutu it's a good bit of fun it's bud pod on the road guys the dream with visuals with visuals for once um so enjoy and we'll see you soon bye