Conan O’Brien Needs A Friend - Karaoke Tribal Law

Episode Date: November 4, 2021

Conan speaks with Marcus from Kamloops, British Columbia about his work as a land assessor and Conan’s mysterious improv technique. Wanna get a chance to talk to Conan? Submit here: TeamCoco.com/CallConan

Konan O'Brien needs a fan. Want to talk to Konan? Visit teamcoco.com. Okay, let's get started. Hey, Marcus. Meet Konan and Sona. Howdy. Hey, Marcus. How are you? I'm great. It's such a pleasure to meet everybody, honestly. I follow you guys like a lot with the podcast. It's like all I ever listened to. So I'm really, really grateful to be here. It's very nice. You said it's nice to meet all of us, Marcus. Let's prioritize. Let's do some kind of order, if you will. Come on. Well, I'm sorry. Is it really like, oh my god, is that really David Hoppin? I was going to say that Konan's replaced. It might have been better than Konan himself.

Oh, wow. Yes, Marcus. I'm just going to dig her through the heart, Marcus. No, I appreciate. No, that's exactly what I deserve when I become that crazy egotistical maniac. Marcus, it's nice to meet you. Tell us, you know, where are you coming from? I know nothing about you. Tell us about yourself. I'm in Camelops, British Columbia, which is in the south central part of BC. And we'll probably get to this bottom in Sukwepmik territory, my indigenous territory. Okay. What is the name of the territory again? Sukwepmik. Sukwepmik. Yeah. Is that the name of? So that's the name of the people and also the name of the nation. And then you add like little prefixes to that to like, to know, like the land. So Sukwepmikulu would be the land. Okay. Okay. So you are a member of the,

I want to make sure I say it right. Sukwemik? That's pretty good. No, you did really well there. That's the most condescending thing anyone has said to me in 15 minutes. I tried. Honestly, lots of people even are like, you know, people from the nation have different ways of saying it. And you've said it pretty close to a lot of. Oh, so well, sometimes you'll be talking to like one of the elders and they will say it wrong. You'd be like, no, man, that's not it. That's the other one. That's not us. That's the itinerary of which ones to like say per elder. So these are indigenous people in what you call it, Kamloops, British Columbia. Yeah. But then actually Kamloops is within the nation. Like the nation is like, I think it's the second largest nation in BC in

terms of indigenous peoples. Right. It's probably, I'm guessing I want to guess about a sixth or a seventh decide the area of BC overall. Okay. Okay. That's I mean, that's a huge territory. Yeah, it's huge. Do you know anything historically about your people? Are you are you well versed in the history of your people? Yeah, I think I think I know. I know a bit like I really want to learn more about it. I think it's really important to preserve. And I do know I do know quite a bit obviously compared to people who aren't within the community itself. But right. Yeah, I do know quite a bit. I know quite a bit about my family. I'm learning about the laws, the traditions, a lot of the practices here. That's very cool. That's right. Because I'm going to tell you I know nothing

about my people, my people. I think all we know is that we back in Ireland, I think my people stole horses. Oh my God. We took stones from other people's walls and tried to put them in our wall and we slept in. We slept in late. Yeah, I read about that. And we're not we're not respected. So your people are sounding much cooler than my people. So tell me what is your profession? What do you do? How do you occupy yourself? Yeah, so I have two kind of streams of things I'm doing right now. The first one, yeah, for work, it takes up most of my time. I enjoy it. I'm a it's called a Tumuk assessor. So Tumuk is actually an indigenous suburban quirk, meaning land. So land assessor, I work with the environment. And pretty much with that, I work for the nation, as someone

who looks at, you know, certain proposed projects, and I will kind of filter it through both the Western Science Lens and Indigenous Science Lens, meld them together, pass it on to a committee so that they're informed about the project in the most holistic way possible. Okay, yeah, then they can make an informed decision as to whether or not they they agree or consent to it. So someone comes along and they say, we want to put a water slide here. And you say, okay, here's the impact on the environment. But also here's the impact on what this would mean for, you know, traditionally, how our people would want this land to be used. So you're trying to meld it to. Yeah, I'm not proposing, I'm not proposing a water slide, by the way. Well, I mean, we did have a lot of water

slides, you know, 1200 years ago. A lot of fossils. Did they find a fossilized water slide? Is that true? It was a pretty large find. It's still there. We can use it still. Yeah, yeah, it'd be great if you found ancient cave drawings. And it showed this long slide and little stick figures shooting out the end. Yeah. And then one stick figure has diarrhea and they shut it down. Oh, come on, you know, that happens at water slides all the time. Even thousands of years ago, it happened. Yeah, chlorine was invented in 800 BC. But yeah, no, that's that's what that's exactly what it is. We look at it from environmental, but we also look at it from like how it affect our health, how it affects our culture or spirituality. We don't just look at it from like, how is it going

to impact five years from now? We look at it actually through a seven generations lens. So that's far more holistic. That's fantastic. I mean, I find that fascinating. So you had to study, it's like two branches of study you had to have, you had to learn about your people and their history, but you also need to know about geological impact, various environmental stuff, right? Yeah. Yeah, no, I definitely was grew up in a very scientific lens, but I've been having to learn, you know, my indigenous side as well. So it's like, yeah, it's, it's almost like taking on two entire ideologies and epistemologies and melding them together. It's, it's quite, it's quite an endeavor, but it's something that's extremely rewarding because it does bridge a lot

of gaps. So your name is Marcus. What is your last name? So I have some German ancestry. My grandpa, my father's side. Are you Marcus von Hindenburg? That's it. Yeah, I didn't want to tell you guys. My indigenous people, I must make sure that's a Suquamic, you know, people are looked after. What is your name again? Marcus van Bismarck. Exactly. No, my name is actually Marcus Scheer. So my last name is obviously a German name, Scheer, meaning to shear or something like that. Right. Right. Don't know much about that history. I should probably look into that a bit more. You know, I feel like you've got enough on your plate. Yeah. You do not need to go looking into that. You know, I think there's, there's a lot going on right now for you. You've got your blending, your melding, your, your intertwining these different

worlds. And you're looking out for the good of your community. So, I mean, let's wait a year or two before you do the whole, the whole German thing. God knows what's going on back there. Sounds good. I could just picture you going on like your, your German accent rantry now. Oh, my God, it would never, never do that. No, no. I swear to God, I when I speak in my fake German, we've had this a lot with a Fula Borg. Fula says every seven things I say is a real word. He'll say it's nonsense, nonsense, nonsense, potato, nonsense, nonsense, VCR, nonsense, nonsense, jeans, nonsense, nonsense, television show, mash. I mean, it's just weird. I don't know why, but somehow I'm channeling something. Well, tell me about you. I wonder about Marcus the man. This

is all very impressive. I'm very impressed with what you're doing, but I want to know what kind of guy, what do you like to do in your downtime? Definitely enjoy music. I love to listen to it. I love to play it. I'm not that great. So with that being said, I do karaoke instead. I love karaoke, my family. Doesn't that violate tribal law in some way karaoke? I'm just saying because anyone will use any reason to shut down karaoke. Actually, this goes against ancient tribal law. I think there is I'm always being told I can't do karaoke because it violates tribal law and I don't know what they're talking about. And then I realized people just hate it when I sing. Right. Maybe a different thing from a different nation in California somewhere,

probably. Yeah. But yeah, no, karaoke is definitely one of my main past times. It was I was going religiously at one point every Friday, I would go and sing karaoke and everybody knew my name kind of thing at that bar. It's addictive. It's really once you get started down that road, it's heroin man. Once you start doing karaoke, it's very difficult because you get up, you do a song, you do another one. Then you're like, Hey, wait a minute, they've got journey. I've got to do the lights in the city. You just can't stop. What would be your go to song for karaoke? I don't know. That's a really good question. I'm thinking Marcus, what's your go to song? Well, there was a go to song. It was a country song called your man by Josh Turner. And it's just because of a deeper

register. I can kind of sing it. So you're the deeper register. So you can sing that. Wow. That was fantastic. I always pick something in a high like a silent night. Oh, holy night. Holly's come. Holly's bright. I like to try and get that very high register. Lip roll in there with the little roll of the R or something like that. Yeah, I just choked on the lozenge. Oh, okay. Yeah, I said tribal law. No wonder people stopped. Yeah, tribal law. Wait, are there any indigenous people around here? No, but it's tribal law. Please never do that again. Every city. Everywhere I go, they invoke tribal law. When I'm in Germany, they're like, shut up tribal law. Are you a dancer as well? You know, I try to dance. Nothing as good as you know, you're into a dance in your show.

That takes a lot of practice, but a dancer on the house to the point where maybe I know it's my wife, but right, that's about it. Wives complain a lot. And I say it's just their way of saying I love you. Is that what you think? Yeah, when my wife says stop it, that's annoying. Be quiet. That's not funny. I just think that's her way of saying keep going. You're the best. I think it's a way of protecting me from embarrassments on my end just because I get to doing some really embarrassing things and I just get into the groove, can't stop. Now, do you have a question for me? How can I help you, Marcus? I'd love to help you in any way I can. Yeah, um, I have 12. So, you know, let's start at number seven, work our way down to one,

and then go back to 12 and work our way down to seven. Yeah, no, yeah, for sure. No, I do have, I do have a question for you. And it was, it's kind of a slightly unstructured question, but with my friends, like I realized like I'm always improving with my friends, like someone will say something and that'll just be the start of something. And then I'll just like go off of it on a tangent with the most random stuff and I'll see as far as I can go with it. Yes. But with you, I've noticed that you do that too, too, like an extreme, which is hilarious. But I'm wondering, like in your mind, like what are you going for? Do you paint a picture and then you kind of like place little things in there that make it funny or like you just, is it just interesting?

Interesting question. I have to say I've been doing it my whole life and it is instantaneous. I don't know what it is, but my brain is a what if machine. So I just am always going off of someone will say something and then I'll go like, well, what if, and then it just keeps going and going and going. And I do it on text all the time where I just your tangents, my tangents. And lately I've been doing it so much because I haven't been on the air or the television show that it's all coming out in text form. And people will ask me a simple question and I'll go off on some long, crazy tangent and keep firing off. And people have started to say, you should, you should get another show. You really should get another show because I was just asking you,

do you have any mayonnaise at the house? And you did, you sent 40 texts that ended up with you being a wizard deep in a mountain looking for Lord mayonnaise. And it's just like, Jesus, shut up. I don't, I don't know if you have a big picture. I think you're sometimes I just think that it's like a, you're just spitting out everything that comes into your brain. Right. And that's, it's troubling sometimes. The other day. It's troubling. Just yesterday, I was texting back and forth with Adam Sacks, who is, is, I was calling the podcast whisper, but, and he was talking to me about some thing to do with the podcast. And I started, for some reason, I went right to what if there was a squid game, but the contestants who woke up from sleep just didn't want

to play and didn't give a shit. And I just kept texting back the guy in the mask going, so this is what happens. You will all have to, and they're like, no, we're good. And they just start leaving the mountain layer and getting into Ubers and leaving. And he's like, come on, get back. And they all know who he is. And he's, his mask falls off. And he goes to put it back on. They're like, it's okay. We don't, we just don't want to do it. It sounds dangerous and stupid and no one, no one wants to do it. And I think I later looked at the thread and it was whole screen, flip, whole screen, flip, whole screen, flip, whole screen, flip. And I showed it to my wife and she was like, yeah, you need to, you need an audience. You need an audience. This poor guy,

poor Adam has to sit there and listen to you roll out this fantasy. How about a squid game that no one gives, no one cares about and a frustrated guy whose mask keeps falling off. There've been times when you've texted with me and then it'll stop. And then I want to say like five hours later, you text something else that you just thought of that like goes along with the text like it just never ends. Yeah, I don't know. I need medication. I think that we can agree that a medication would calm this down. But until we find the right one, I'm going to keep annoying America and large swaths of British Columbia. Hey, I love it. Keep being you. I love that. Well, it was really nice talking to you, Marcus. And I think what you're doing sounds

very cool. It's very impressive. Thank you. Now, if I'm looking at a giant map of Canada, where are you? Just imagine the giant swath of Canada in British Columbia. Nothing. I love discussing geography on a podcast. That's so great. Well, there you have it, folks. Marcus is right there. If you dropped a plum line directly below Kamloops, what part of the United States would it hit? You know, like what's directly south of you? Like we're in the same kind of sliver of the Pacific, like the West Pacific. So we're in the same time zone. Like I'm not sure exactly. But if you were to go straight up, you'd probably be a couple hundred kilometers away from us, either West or East. So if I came to visit you and the

Suquamic people and just you and I knew it was a bit, but I came and pitched a giant water park in front of the like the whole, you know, tribe and all the all the people that assembled. Would you play along and say like, I think this is a really good idea? Use like the most like disastrous chemicals and don't just say like, oh, yeah, how would you rid of chemicals? We just dump them in the river. Yeah, yeah. Well, they just go in the river and then the river it float, it goes down and it gets to those other indigenous people. That's not a problem. And then I would want to say things like have a model and say like, well, first job number one is this really cool old mountain

that's part of our lore and has been part of our lore for 2000 years. First, we got to blast that thing out of here because you know, just just as people get angry and angrier, you would be there saying, guys, I really think this guy's on the right track. No, I will be an advocate for you 100%. This guy is an expert. He knows what he's talking about. Trust me, this is for the seven generations of happy water slides are the future. And then when they attack me as a group, would you step into protect me or would you suddenly just run out the back? I would I would prepare the, you know, that Jordan Slansky like dummy you gave him to give them that and then you and I could run away. I see you give them a cardboard cut out of me. Yeah, I don't think that would fool anybody for

very long. The safety dummy, the safety dummy would. Oh, that's right. Right. Right. With the hair and the mask. Yeah, a lot of life in his eyes. You've been watching too much very media ochre television, Marcus. Well, Marcus, very cool to meet you and continued success with everything and keep singing karaoke. And whenever, like I say, whenever your wife thinks that you're starting to irritate yourself or embarrass yourself, just double down, just double down. That's the secret to a long and good marriage. I'm gonna take that advice and run with it for the rest of my life. Good. And you'll be single in six months. All right, Marcus, take care. Thanks a lot. Thank you so much. Nice to meet you guys. Conan O'Brien needs a fan with Conan O'Brien,

Sonam of Sessian and Matt Gorley, produced by me, Matt Gorley, executive produced by Adam Sacks, Joe Anasoloteroff and Jeff Ross at Team Coco and Colin Anderson at Earwolf. Music by Jimmy Vivino. Supervising producer, Aaron Blair, associate talent producer, Jennifer Samples, associate producers, Sean Doherty and Lisa Berm, engineered by Will Beckton. Please rate, review and subscribe to Conan O'Brien Needs a Friend on Apple podcasts, Stitcher or wherever fine podcasts are downloaded. This episode was produced and edited by me, Brett Morris. This has been a Team Coco production in association with Stitcher.