Ear Biscuits with Rhett & Link - 169: Has Touring Changed Us? | Ear Biscuits Ep. 169

Episode Date: November 12, 2018

From surviving through a traumatic plane ride to encountering brand new experiences with Mythical Beasts from all over, R&L discuss how touring has changed their lives and tease some upcoming ventures. Sponsored By:Pocket: visit the Android/IOs App Stores, or getpocket.com to download for free23andMe: Visit 23andMe.com/EARS to order your 23andMe Health + Ancestry Service kitSpotify: Download the free app and start listening to podcasts on Spotify (including Ear Biscuits!) today. To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This, this, this, this is Mythical. Before we get started, we wanna let you know that Ear Biscuits is supported by Pocket. Pocket is your space to absorb all the amazing content you find on the internet. Fill the Pocket app with those articles, long reads and videos that catch your eye and create a quiet, clutter-free corner

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to fit more reading into your life, even when you're offline. Transform the way you read with Pocket from Firefox. Download it free from the Android or iOS app stores or at getpocket.com. Now on with the biscuit. Before we get started today, Link has a trigger warning. If you have a deeply rooted fear of not flying

but crashing in a plane, you should probably skip to like the 20 minute mark in this podcast. We don't know how long we're gonna be. If you're still talking about it 20 minutes, you just threw them right into. Oh gosh. Welcome to Ear Biscuits, I'm Rhett. And I'm Link.

This week at the Round Table of Dim Lighting, we are asking the question, has touring changed us? Has it? Has it? Has it changed us? Has touring changed us? Changed us? Maybe that's an odd question, maybe that's a,

well, it's gonna lead to a lot of self-reflection and I think also, I don't know, from time to time, we like to verbally process our creative process. Cause spoiler alert, it has in a lot of ways. Yeah, so we'll be talking about how we're seeing touring in the future, how we're thinking about our music, how the way that we interact with music as individuals influences the music that we give to you.

All stuff about that. It's gonna be awesome. Is it? You're gonna love it. Yeah, I'm planting seeds in your brain and telling you how much you're gonna like it. That's good, that's good. A lot of this has to do with making the decision to do the concert that we did

at the North Carolina State Fair, which was a bonafide concert. It ended up being two hours. We can get into all that. Bonafide. But I've been saving, I haven't had an opportunity to tell you my near-death experience,

which was flying to the show. And can I just say that you know, if you've been listening to Ear Biscuits for a while, you know that a lot of times we have these stories that we hold back from each other and then we tell each other for the first time in your presence on Ear Biscuits. And this one probably more than any one

you've ever held back has been the most frustrating to me because the little bits that I've heard are that you had, this was an intense death-defying experience that may have changed you. How has my flight to Raleigh changed me? And you've kept it from me. Because it has. For weeks so that you could wait

to tell it on an ear biscuit. So hopefully all the steam hasn't been let out because. Well I don't wanna build up the story too much but I do wanna share it because I mean, it had me shook. Once again, I'm shook. Everywhere I go something happens and I'm shook. Shake it, shake it, shake it money maker. Is that a song lyric?

It's just parlance of our times, you know? I don't think of our times, maybe of a time gone by. Shook? Yeah, I mean, the way that you used it, I think you made it sound like it was from the 50s. Well, here's the thing. So you flew home a day or two before me because it was around your birthday

and then I was trying to minimize my time away from my family, your family was going with you. I flew in days later so you were not on this plane and I mean, it just so happened that the hurricane that was coming across the Florida Panhandle was predicted to cross over the Raleigh-Durham area where the airport, the Raleigh-Durham. International airport. The RDU.

What does the U in RDU stand for? Raleigh-Durham International? No, I think it's Raleigh-Durham. I think you're right. Yeah, otherwise. It's the U in RDU stand for? Raleigh-Durham-Ernt-ter-national? No, I think it's Raleigh-Dur-rum. I think you're right. Yeah, otherwise. It's the D-U in Durham. You don't have to go R-D because that sounds like Hardee's. Why is it not R-D-I, Raleigh-Durham-International?

Uh, no, it sounds too stiff. Who cares? Anyway. Raleigh-Dur-rum. You start to get a little shook, pre-shook. I got a little pre-shook because I'm like, am I gonna make it to the show? I mean, we're supposed to fly in, we're supposed to be flying into North Carolina same time the hurricane is flying across North Carolina.

Matter of fact, there's a hockey team there called the Hurricanes. Yep, they were, they've been very successful. And I was thinking at the time, I was nervous because we were playing this show and you were coming in the day before and then there was the chance that you might not be able to make it

because of the coincidence of the hurricane and there was like contingency plans potentially going to other cities and. Right, you're like, well. I was contemplating how I would do the show by myself because I did not want to disappoint the Dorton Arena goers, you know, all the mythical beasts who showed up, but then I was like, I don't,

we can talk later what that would have been like. Let's just say I'm glad I didn't have to do it. So we're flying in, I mean it's like a five hour flight and then in the last, I don't know, hour and a half, we start, they start, the pilot starts giving warnings You know, in the last, I don't know, hour and a half, we start, they start, the pilot starts giving warnings like we're probably gonna experience some rough air, you know, with the storm coming across the state. But he sounded very calm about it.

Yeah, he sounded very calm. But he said, you know what, I think we've been, it looks like we're gonna be able to land. We've been cleared for landing. Well it wasn't like we're about to land, it's like, it looks like we'll be able to land when that time comes like, you know, 20 minutes from now, whatever, 30 minutes.

Don't worry now, worry then. When we start making our descent, but it seems like we'll be able to do it. But it was kinda like that, it was like, it seems like we'll be able to do it. I don't wanna make any empty promises. Right. Just in case you all die. It was a little disconcerting,

and I'm sitting alone, there's no one in the seat beside me. That's convenient. Oh, you wanted someone to hold? I thought that was good until I didn't have anybody to grab. So we do start making the descent. Well, as we start coming into Raleigh-Durham, it's like, you know, it goes from being clear, you see all these clouds and I'm like,

well, that's the hurricane down there. You saw it from above? Well, it's the clouds. Clouds, it's gotta be a hurricane. Moving clouds, I mean, I've seen a radar of a hurricane, but you don't really see the swirl when you're in a plane, is what I'm telling you. Okay. I learned that.

Can't see the swirl when you're in a plane is what I'm telling you. I learned that. Can't see the squirrel when you're in a plane. And we start the descent and there starts to be some shaking. I was shook. Okay. Quite literally. And how did this initial shaking compare to? Normal.

Normal turbulence. Maybe a little bit more aggressive, but I never get worried. I never get anxious because I have this magical ability, like if there's nothing I can do, I just check out and I'm like all right, I don't have any control. I'm exactly the same way. I'm super worried about getting to the airport on time,

but as soon as I get through security, it's just like, you know what? This plane could turn upside down and I'm not in control. So they make an announcement where, okay, we're gonna be hitting some rough air. You need to buckle up, stay in your seat. And they start the descent. And then. Secure your peanuts.

We go into the clouds and it starts getting shaky and about that moment, a woman comes walking from the back up to the front. She wants to consult with the pilot? And then a flight attendant, stewardess, I was gonna call him but I'm not gonna do that. Yeah, you shouldn't do that. Who was buckling herself up, stands up,

and says, no ma'am, you have to go back to your seat. And the woman goes, I have been holding it a long time. I can't, I have to get in there. And she goes past the flight attendant. Flight attendant kinda like exasperated, shakes her head. Well, you gotta choose your battles. Sits down and buckles up. I'm like, all right, girl.

And then. Peeing on yourself or having your neck broke in the bathroom. And then. Which one's worse? We start going into the clouds and it really starts shaking. It was disconcerting. And then we come out of the clouds

and we are in a sandwich between clouds. We were in between two layers of clouds. It was very bizarre. You see the swirl then? Still didn't see the swirl, but then we start going through the second layer of clouds, and not only are we getting, is it bumps? But all of a sudden we're experiencing swaying.

Okay, that's new, that's new, okay. I've never experienced this on a plane. So a little bit of this. Not this. A lot of shifting. This? So if you, yeah. Turning on an axis that is going from your head

to your butthole. If you put your hand, yeah, if you put your hands flat. For you engineers out there who need the axis. Have you, if you've ever seen somebody do the twist, that's what the plane was doing. It was, the plane was wagging its butt. That feels like a problem to me. I have never felt anything like it.

And it was just, I mean, it made the plane, as huge as it was, feel small. Like all of a sudden. Was any part of it enjoyable? Not at that point, man. I mean, it was nasty. But you still weren't worried about your life. I started to be because a toddler.

Your wife was, let me just say. So your wife texts me while you're in the air. I'm currently on the ground in North Carolina. I'm in Fuquay-Varina at the time. This is one of her worst fears for herself, yeah. No, actually I was in Raleigh because I was eating, I went to my birthday dinner that I shared.

You were underneath the hurricane. With my 16-year-old nephew who shares my name, Isaiah Rhett, we call him, well we call him Isaiah, but. What, does he get it on the weekends or something? No, but we shared a birthday dinner together, I rode in a limo with a bunch of teens, awesome, smelled incredible. And I.

It wasn't the birthday celebration of Yacht Rock from last year. No, no, 41's a lot different. It's like a flat tire. Your wife texts me and says something about, I'm worried about Link being able to land. First of all, your wife texts me when she's worried, just FYI.

But, and so, and I'm like. Well, you're a friend, she can text male friends. I'm cool with that. That's why your wife texts me when she's worried, just FYI. And so, and I'm like. Well you're a friend, she can text male friends. I'm cool with that. I'm like, you know what, you don't have anything to worry about. I'm currently on the ground in Raleigh. It just feels like it's raining a little bit. It's not even windy.

It's not gonna be a problem. Well apparently, that's what I said. Apparently that's why they gave him the go ahead to land. But I mean, a toddler a few back, starts screaming, what's happening? What's happening? And again. A toddler? Yeah, a toddler.

Okay, like a two year old? Like a kid who can barely speak is saying what's happening. That's the best kind. Again and again and again. And I just, it took everything in my being to not turn around and say, shut up, we're crashing! Just shut up about it!

Everybody else is just kinda like, just getting quiet. What is happening? Now, the week before, I had decided to watch with the family to introduce them to the amazing television show that is Lost, starting from the pilot episode. Which I forgot that the entire pilot episode, matter of fact, the whole first season is just a reliving of the most cataclysmic plane crash

you could ever imagine. A plane literally splitting in two because of turbulence. And I watched this the week before, so I started to feel nauseous. Did you start looking around and think, am I gonna this the week before, so I started to feel nauseous. Did you start looking around and think, am I gonna be the leader? Am I gonna be Jack Shepard or John Locke? Well. Or Sawyer.

I'll tell you exactly what I thought. I'm gonna be Sawyer if I crash. Listen, the plane started to beep in weird ways. Like alarms started to go off in the plane. No, that's awesome. Wee-oop, wee-oop, wee-oop. Okay, never heard that before. Yeah, and we're still doing this shimmy shake.

Alarms. Yes. What is the kid saying now? What's happening, what's happening? Still saying that. Okay. I didn't have anybody to talk to. I just, I was literally feeling nauseous.

Like I was like, all right, I'm gonna grab this. Where am I gonna vomit, my shoe? No, that sack. Yeah, you got a sack. And I thought to myself, Link, make up your mind right now. You're gonna survive no matter what happens. I literally had this conversation with myself.

That's an interesting intent. And it was weird because again, it's like I know I have no control and I'm like, I haven't been watching those safety videos, man. All you gotta do is jump right before it hits the ground. Like an elevator. You'll survive. Right, right, a falling elevator.

Yeah, physics, man. But literally I thought to myself, okay, no matter what happens, just grit your teeth and survive no matter what. Like if you're gonna crash or whatever, just have an attitude of survival. I've never had that conversation with myself. Like just gearing up for it.

And then there was more swaying and a huge drop, like free fall, bam! Oh no! And we're in that second layer of clouds. That's when the plane splits usually. And I'm like, oh my gosh, please just let me see the ground. But please, just get to the ground. We can do this.

And then all of a sudden, we clear the bottom bun of the hamburger of clouds and I see the ground and that ground is a lot closer than I thought it was gonna be. Oh yeah. By that point. And that's not good, that's what you don't want. And then we're, and I'm like.

You need altitude. And of course I know the geography. So I know this is Jordan Lake and we're approaching in like plane speed, we're rapidly approaching landing, which is at least good that we're, well I feel this close to the ground. You know where you're gonna die. I know we're gonna.

You've got a landmark for your death spot. No, we're really close to the landing strip. Okay. But then, even though we were out of the clouds, we were still shimmying. Okay. I mean, again, it wasn't like once or twice. It was unlike anything I've ever felt in a plane.

I mean, it would be like side winding on ice in a car. Anyone throwing up at this point? Everybody was quiet except for that, even the toddler shut up. Yeah, good. Once we hit that big drop. That's what it took.

And so we're like going up and down and shimmying. I'm looking at the ground and I think I'm gonna vomit and die and do whatever it takes to survive. And I'm convinced that the plane felt so small and it was moving in such an unnatural way that I could totally believe that at any point it could just be slapped on the surface of the Earth. Just like whoops.

You know that drop we had a few minutes back, if that drop happened right now, we would slam into the Earth. We should have put a trigger warning on the front of this video. If you're like really, okay I'll do it right now. We'll slap this at the top, we've done it before, we'll do it right now. We'll slap this at the top, we've done it before, we'll do it again.

If you have a deeply rooted fear of flying, well not really. You should probably say, before we get started today. Yeah, do that. Before we get started today, Link has a trigger warning. If you have a deeply rooted fear of not flying but crashing in a plane, you should probably skip to like the 20 minute mark in this podcast.

Well, we don't know how long we're gonna be. If you're still talking about it 20 minutes, you just threw them right into the nexus of this conversation. I think that's the most dramatic part that we just talked about. Okay. We didn't get slapped into the surface of the Earth.

At that point, I see the runway, and I'm like, whatever you do, don't land. I'm like sending a message to the pilot through my passions. Just, I don't know what that means, but I was scared. Your passions? I was like, I was so passionately hoping that he would not land because it seemed impossible.

And then we're over the runway and we're about to land. No. Yes. Like how far off the ground? If like, I mean, I don't know. Definitely like hundreds of feet. Okay. 300 feet. All right.

And thank goodness he pulled up. He pulls up and he doesn't try to land and like people started clapping. A few people said, woo! and then I heard somebody say, don't clap yet. Yeah, was it the toddler? No, it wasn't the toddler. His voice got lower.

And he was right. He went all the way through puberty in that. He was right. The last five minutes. We had to traverse through both buns of that hurricane hamburger. Gonna go back up through the hamburger. And it was a lot of the same stuff,

but he seemed to power through a lot quicker, and then all of a sudden, we're going to Charlotte. We're gonna land in Charlotte because we're running out of gas, and the sun came out, and it was like, it was like utopia. Well, the sun didn't come out, you came to the sun. And then we went to Charlotte and we landed.

I got on the ground and ate some fries from Wendy's, tried to settle my stomach. Just fries. Yeah, Jenna wasn't sitting with me, but she flew with me. So she was many seats back. And then when we got off the plane for a second, they said, we're gonna take off and go back to RDU, it's cleared up, but before we do,

you can get off for a second. I got some fries and she was gone. And then she comes back a few minutes later, she was like, and go back to RDU, it's cleared up, but before we do, you can get off for a second. I got some fries and she was gone and then she comes back a few minutes later, she was like, I just had to tell ya, I just had to get a shot of whiskey. It was traumatic. She seemed a lot more at rest at that moment and me after my fries and then we flew back to RDU.

I mean it was like two hours later and it had blown over, you know? Yeah, it always blows over, man. That's the life lesson, you know what? Oh but I forgot. It'll blow over. As we started the ascent and they said, don't clap yet and we're like going back through this turbulence, then the sun comes out.

Then you clap. No. Oh. Then that woman came out of the bathroom. No, no, no. I swear. No, no way, not a chance. I'm so sorry, I almost forgot, that's the best part.

Cannot be true. And I looked at her in disbelief and she strutted down that aisle like she was the one who was piloting the plane. Hold on. Like she had saved the day. You're not making this up. Cool as a cucumber.

She was in the commode the whole time. She was on the commode through everything I talked about. Well you don't know if she was on the commode. She may have been doing some sort of four point contact stance. Right, she's like Tom Cruise in Mission Impossible, whatever, whichever one that one was where he's dangling from the spider rope.

whichever one that one was where he's like dangling from the spider rope. I don't know if there's a seatbelt on a airplane commode. There's not, I've looked for it. But she walked out with her head held, she's like sticking her chest out like a proud rooster. I don't know why. Oh so she didn't wanna seem embarrassed. She didn't wanna seem embarrassed.

She wasn't bleeding. Look confident when you screwed up. Right. I always say that. Can you believe that now? Because now you think maybe she is responsible for all of us living. Oh my gosh. I made it, guys, but I've flown a couple of times

since then and I gotta be honest, a little bit of turbulence brings it all back. Like I started to feel nauseous when we hit just a couple of bumps before and I have a lot more empathy for Christy who has made a lot of progress on her fears. So I didn't try to go into the details with her. So you haven't told her the story?

I told her right when we landed, I called her in Charlotte and I was like, we made it. It was quite a ride. I don't think I need to tell you about it. Quite a ride. Okay. But I need to tell you about it, so thanks for listening.

I'm glad you lived. Hopefully you listening is therapy for me, so thank you. I'm glad you lived and made it to the concert so I didn't have to play the show by myself. That's the main reason. We're gonna talk about that, we're gonna talk about touring. But first, we wanna let you know that Ear Biscuits is supported by 23andMe.

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You've got connections. I'm not getting together with my family this Thanksgiving. I'm getting together with friends. Well you, as long, well. No, I mean not by choice, it's just I'm not going back to North Carolina, so. I am. You know, I mean, don't judge me for it.

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and start listening to podcasts, Ear Biscuits, on Spotify. Now on with the biscuit. Music is magic, man. Music is a big part of our lives and it's also a big part of our brand. I mean of Rhett and Link, of us being, we wouldn't be where we are today without music as an aspect of what we started to do on YouTube.

Well we wouldn't have started, we really wouldn't have started doing, I mean the core of our comedy when we were coming up was musical comedy. And we really liked making videos, but at first those things really weren't coming together. We would write funny songs or whatever, but we'd make videos for school projects.

But when those things came together, that's what gained us traction on YouTube. Right, but I guess what I'm saying is like the stuff that, I know that the first thing that sort of got views on YouTube was the Pimp My Stroller, which was a parody video, but the stuff that got featured, like the videos that got featured, the videos that went viral were those songs

that we had written, songs that we had written with never an intention to make into a music video, the unibrow song, the Facebook song are probably two of the best examples, songs that we wrote with a live audience in mind. The unicorn rap is what we call one of them. Actually, we didn't call it that until we decided to make it into a video

and we just added unicorns because we thought that would get the cakes. And that actually is a little different because that was only ever intended to be a video because it was like for an intro or whatever. Yeah that's true. But like you think about the ones that actually, because nobody really watched that one either,

but the ones that really got traction in those early days, there were songs that were written with a live audience in mind that then when YouTube came along, we created music videos for them and that was sort of the beginning of what Rhett and Link comedy was. And in a way, we are returning to those roots.

I think that's one of the things that is happening as a result of us touring. Well, you know, sometimes I enjoy kinda connecting the dots in what it is we're doing now, and what brought us to this point. Hopefully, as a listener, you will enjoy kinda tracing some of that if you're interested in our creative process.

I don't know why you're interested in this, but I am, so I guess I'm gonna talk about it. I mean, we decided, I guess the operable question that we're asking is, how has touring changed us? I mean, it's certainly altered and informed our career trajectory, even currently, and I'm actually very excited about where it's going. So I can unpack that a little bit.

We decided, I mean, we decided to do the show at North Carolina State Fair. Fair. And just to do a concert, just because we were itching to do a show, we were willing to do, we were willing to entertain their offer or their invitation to come because we had toured the previous fall

with our tour of Mythicality, which we were only willing to entertain the possibility of doing that because we had written a book and it's like if you write a book, you're supposed to tour in some way but we didn't wanna do a book tour so we did a stage tour and then we had to like make a whole stage tour thing. So this, even having a willingness to go on tour,

which is something that people brought up for years for us, is something that only writing a book pushed us over the edge to actually do it. Well, we had always shied away from it because one of the things that made YouTube so attractive to us was the fact that we could create things and reach a large amount of people without ever leaving a studio and being able to go to work and then come home

and be with our families and so that's what YouTube afforded us and then. And I do remember that we talked about this particular thing in a whole other podcast when we were, back when we were at some point in the process of the Tour of Mythicality. So it's not that we have to rehash that, but I will say that having gone through the experience

of the Tour of Mythicality, we're now like, hey, we find ourselves being invited to do more, have more stage appearances, to meet more fans and to travel more places. I mean, going to Australia was amazing. That was another Ear Biscuit where we talked about. And we knew that even though the show was based on the book and kind of goes through some different aspects of the book,

we knew, well, if we're gonna get an audience together and we're gonna perform for them, we know that we're gonna do some live music because in one sense, that's our bread and butter. That's something that we really enjoy doing and we think we do it well. But we did this exercise where we, for the Tour of Mythicality, where we said,

okay, well, we need to perform X number of songs, it's like five or six songs. We should at least write a new song for this. And they need to tie into kind of the narrative. Yeah, they need to be something that makes sense based on where we're at in the show. Right. But they also need to tie into kind of the narrative. They need to be something that makes sense based on where we're at in the show. Right. But they also need to be the kind of songs

that make sense to perform live and the result of that was picking some songs that, and this is actually the case for a lot of people, like how did you choose the songs you did for North Carolina State Fair, we'll get into that. But how we chose the songs for the tour is what songs can we confidently perform live, they will sound good, and they will be,

the jokes will work for a live audience. And as a result, we ended up going into places like, going all the way back to a song that we wrote over 15 years ago, the Middle School Girlfriend song. Updated it, made it what we think is significantly funnier than it was originally, and performing it, and then writing a new song, updated it, made it what we think is significantly funnier than it was originally and performing it and then writing a new song and then, anyway, it was a totally different process

that really whet our appetite for then saying, let's do this more seriously, take the show to the state fair. But not take the show. Not take, do a special show. We decided, I can't remember exactly what made us decide to say yes to that invitation because that's something we normally just wouldn't say.

Well we can't. We did it to put, I mean I remember because after having done the tour, which was incredible in a lot of ways, I mean we talked about it multiple times but like being able to be in the room with Mythical Beasts is very special, it kinda, it goes beyond what we've been able to experience, you know, just digitally with people online.

And it was a hometown gig, so we were open to, so well maybe we should go, it'd be cool, it's like we saw Merle there, it's like a lot of memories associated with that. But the reason we committed to doing it is because we said if we do this, if we commit to an all music show at the North Carolina State Fair. this, if we commit to an all music show at the North Carolina State Fair.

But why did we even think an all music show? Because I know what you're about to say, but the idea to just do a concert and not do another tour of Mythicality stopped. Because we think, because we wanna do something that is even further reaching and broader, more broadly appealing. That was my reason. And we didn't wanna, we're not gonna keep touring

with the Tour of Mythicality anymore. Yeah, do something that is what we feel is the best parts of the show, and we've got more songs where those came from, and we can write some new ones. And it's more expected. I think people, I mean, at least a segment of the fans, they were expecting, okay, if I'm gonna come to a show,

I mean, if you're gonna perform songs, isn't that a concert? Well, it wasn't. Yeah, well, I think a lot of people have always thought that if you come, a lot of people who've become Mythical Beasts in recent years think that when we say, when you hear Rhett and Link live,

they think they're going to see like good mythical morning live. They think that they're going to see like us on stage eating weird stuff, getting people on stage and you know, but that's because those people got into the game a little bit late and don't realize that. Well, the thing that we're passionate about, the thing that we love to do and we think the thing

that is the most entertaining thing that we can do in a theater or in a Dorton arena is music. And I think the other thing, well, and then here's the thing we found. I'll skip to after the show. Once we started meeting fans after the show, a lot of people had Tour of Mythicality shirts on. All they had been to that show.

And then they had been to this concert. So we would always ask them, which one did you prefer? And if they had a preference, where I'd say, maybe 60% of the people we asked did have a preference. The remaining one said, I love both of them. It's just like, they're just encouraging fans. But if they had an opinion, it was, I liked the concert better. I like what're just encouraging fans. But if they had an opinion, it was, I liked the concert better.

I like what I just saw better. And I think that felt good because it aligned with our own experience, which was, man, it was easier to do. And it was kind of, it was more of, it was in that wheelhouse of we're performing songs. Easier to do, I find that an interesting, you think that was easier to do?

Wasn't easier for me. It was definitely easier for me. So I guess for me it was like, oh, there was no pressure beforehand for me. I can understand why there's more pressure on you in like having to play, carry the rhythm on your guitar to play the guitar for all these songs and having to relearn them.

Or transpose some of them to guitar that never were intended, weren't written for guitar to begin with. Like I have a horrible memory, like we had monologues for the tour of Mythicality. And like that's really hard for me. But for some reason in my brain, like lyrics and melodies and all that,

that's very easy for me. Of course, I'm also not playing a guitar and singing and have to relearn that, but like I don't forget lyrics that much. Well, I think ultimately- I had it easy. I would say ultimately a music show is way easier I don't forget lyrics that much. Well, I think ultimately. I had it easy. I would say ultimately, a music show is way easier

once I actually get what, lock in what I'm doing, but I had not, in fact, again, it goes back to the reason we did it. We did it so we would have to force ourselves to learn how to turn these songs into acoustic songs that we could perform, be able to sing for almost two hours. And so I had a lot of questions about whether or not I was going to get through that and not forget things

and be able to play the guitar parts and all that. I screwed up a number of times, most people probably didn't notice. I definitely did. But so I think ultimately it will be easier. For as long as it's been since we've played those songs or having never played many of those, maybe half of the songs we had never played live.

And then a third of them had never been played on a guitar ever. I'll give it to you, man, you did a great job. Well it was all just a track. I was just pantomiming the guitar the whole time. You didn't know that? It was just a track. I'm just pantomiming the guitar the whole time. You didn't know that? It was just a track. I'm just really good at looking like I'm playing

exactly what you're hearing. That's not a bad idea. All the screw-ups are built in. It's just a big show. The whole thing's a facade. If you let me in on those secrets, then I won't spoil them for everybody else. Okay.

So I was encouraged that people were like, this is what, I love this, this is what I want. And plus, the banter in between songs is very much like those, the unscripted moments of Good Mythical Morning. So it is kinda like you're getting a Good Mythical Morning experience as opposed to like this theatrical, dramatic, scripted,

sculpted experience that was the book on stage kind of thing. But so, but you bring up the point that I wanna camp out on which is you said, you knew if we made a decision to do this concert, we knew in the most general sense, it would lead to something. Like every time we do something new, it stretches us, it challenges us, it aligns us.

You know, it's like we gotta hunker down and figure it out, right? And it's a new creative endeavor. And something will come of it. And I think that's what's so exciting is having done that once and having, you know when it was over, it's like, yeah, we can do this more, you know?

And we are. We should go to London and do this. We're gonna do it at VidCon London. And we're gonna do it more. And then we're gonna go from there. But it's, you know, it's exciting when, even if it didn't go well, it would lead to something. Everything you do leads to some other decision

that you have to make creatively. And I was very encouraged that like, yeah, that having done it, it's like, yeah, we can do more of it. And then the fan feedback was, yes, please do more of that. Yeah. So it, there was also an alignment there. And it also forced us to write some new songs,

which is something we haven't done. I mean, first of all. It's such a big part of who we were and then we stopped doing it. Well, we haven't stopped writing songs because. Well, that's true. We did an album with each season of Buddy System. And I even tend to forget that

because I feel like it's kind of. And that was a lot of songwriting. Buddy System is hidden over there. Like I act like Buddy System doesn't exist. We poured so much of ourselves into Buddy System. I know we talk about it every time and then so many of you haven't seen it but. Get YouTube Premium if you wanna see it.

We poured a lot of ourselves into it including a lot of songwriting. But it's a little bit of a, you know, it's a little bit of a shame in that so few Mythical Beasts have seen it. But I think, but what we have gotten away from is the songwriting process that we employ for the live performances.

And to me, Ever since YouTube started taking off. Yeah, because something happened, you know, obviously those first couple of songs were written with a live audience in mind, so if you were just to listen to this song, just listen to the lyrics, you would laugh. And then once we had the visual component added,

we started writing songs knowing that they were primarily going to be received as a music video and so you would write, we would literally be sitting there writing lyrics to a song and we would say okay well, this will be the lyric and this will be the thing that we're showing. Right.

And so it was this incredibly visual experience where we, because we thought we were. We weren't writing a song, we were writing a music video. We, yeah, we wrote things with a music video in mind from the beginning and that's a drastically different process and that's also, frankly, one of the reasons that some of the songs you may have expected us to play in our live show

we didn't play and then others for some people, you know, okay so one of the things we did in the show is we had an acoustic set, we started with an acoustic set including some old songs that people recognize and some new stuff that we had written. Then we introduced some very special guests who was rabbit lightning and we don't know if, we did that kind of as a special thing

for the North Carolina State Fair. We don't know if we're gonna keep doing that but it really worked for that crowd. And then we brought out the songs that we felt obligated to play. I mean, I'll give you my perspective. I know your perspective was a little bit different and I think that the fans reminded me once we talked to them

like how I should actually think about it. But we knew that we had to do Epic Rap Battle, Nerd versus Geek, Epic Rap Battle of Manliness, I'm on Vacation, Belly Button, and So Dang, we had a So Dang Dark, that wasn't necessarily a must play, but those songs that have the most views of anything that we've ever done. You know, the songs that,

if you don't know us from anything else, you might know us from those music videos. They have the most views except for, you didn't mention OCD. OCD. Which doesn't apply to this. Which is what we took a different strategy on OCD. We did play it, but we'll talk about that in a second.

And we were very self-conscious. First of all, we knew that we were gonna try to do a show that didn't cost us a lot of money, so that meant we weren't gonna have a big screen. The Tour of Mythicality shows have a screen behind us that's an integral part of the show, but that's a very expensive thing and it raises the cost of us actually doing the show

and we were like. Especially for a one-off show. If there's a way to do this show without the visuals, then we should try that. And so we were like, okay, that's just gonna be us up there rapping. And if you listen to a song like I'm on Vacation, especially I'm on Vacation, you're like,

oh, this is so much about the visuals. So many jokes are referencing what's happening on camera. If we don't have a screen, can we still do this? Does it make sense? Will it make sense? And also there was a- And my point is, well how many people are there who've never heard the song? Right, you're right, you're right. And I'm always thinking about-

Or seen the music video. I'm always thinking about the person who is walking in for the first time, probably to a fault. I'm always thinking about the audience who hasn't heard us yet. I thought this was the tractor pull. Right, and so- But I'm gonna sit down

cause they're singing about vacation. So, and we also felt pretty self-conscious about getting up there and rapping. And so we did a, you know, I don't wanna give away everything that we did because we'll probably do it again when we tour, but we have a way of couching the fact that we're performing these songs that are visually motivated.

Couple of notes, I'll say, in VidCon London for that show, there will be a screen, I believe. So it's not that whenever, don't assume that, if you really want a screen, I'm not gonna say there won't be screens for when we come to your town or whatever the case may be or for VidCon London.

But the other funny story, you know, when we left stage, then we do this quick change, well, we had this creative way to do, to come out as Rabbit Lightning to kind of make that transition, but my mom told me later that, of course, I'm Lon Lightning. I'm Lon Lightning. I come back out there and I'm talking and Louis, my mom's husband,

technically my stepdad, but I don't call him that because he married her after I was married and had a child. He's just my mom's, he's just Louis, okay? Don't worry about it. I love him. I love Louis. And that's what I call him, okay?

He's not my stepdad. You could call him daddy, probably think it's cool. You just call him daddy? Papa? That would be granddad. Okay, so anyway, my kids call him Papa. So it's cool. He leans over to Mom.

He's like, he's good. My mom's like, what? She's like, yeah, it's cool that they let him come out there and do it. Because we said we got some friends who are coming out here. We're gonna give them some time. They're trying to make it in the business. He didn't know it was me.

That's why he's not my stepdad. You should take that as a compliment. Yeah. Very convincing redneck. My mom spent the next five minutes trying to convince, that's Link, that's Link. Well it doesn't sound like him. It's an act, he's playing a character.

Well it's good. He got me, good. And you know he has that catchphrase. Good, good, good. Yeah he does, my kids like that. I'm gonna start saying it, man. Good, good, good. That's what he says, do your pushups.

You been doing your pushups? Yeah, Papa. Good, good, good. I didn't know that was you. Now, one of the things that I did after, so anyway, writing some songs that didn't have a visual in mind from the beginning, I feel like I'm always thinking about that like, that didn't have a visual in mind from the beginning.

I feel like I'm always thinking about that, the chance that we get to perform for an audience who isn't completely on our side from the beginning, right? So when we tour and we sell tickets to a show, we know that the vast majority of people there are gonna be pulling for us, they're gonna be fans, they're gonna know the lyrics to the songs, and that's just an incredibly fun love fest,

as Garth Brooks would say in the video that we just watched before this. And it's just a lot of fun, but there's a different dynamic when, let's say, we're going to, and we're not doing this yet, going to like a comedy festival, and it's just a bunch of people who came to be entertained, and you have to win them over like a traditional comedian.

Again, it's a- I'm always thinking about that crowd, especially when I'm writing something new. Yeah. You know? That's great. Because I mean, it's not like you're gonna lose people who are just gonna love us by making something that is the funniest thing we can make.

And I think that's why I was always, I've always been a little self-conscious about getting up there and doing the raps, because, you don't understand, this has over 30 million views on the internet. People really care about this. It's not just a couple of dads up here rapping. That's a personal problem problem because a lot of fans

said that was their favorite part of the show. But one of the things that I did after that State Fair show, I actually don't even remember the moment that I made this decision, but it was when we decided we were gonna do VidCon London and I was like, okay, here we go, we're gonna do some more which means we've got a few months to write some more songs. Pressure's on to write some more original songs.

Yeah. And now I have played the piano in ignorance for years, meaning that I can sit down at a piano and I can do some things that may fool a layperson into thinking that I know how to play the piano. I don't actually know how to play the piano. But if you play in the key of C

and you stay in the white keys, and you can make people think that you can play the piano, right? And I have written some of the instrumentals for our songs have been written on piano, but it's very much like, I'm not playing, I'm just kind of piecing things together because I know what the notes are. Ah, yeah.

But I was like, what would it do for us if we incorporated a piano into our act? Could I learn how to play the piano in time for us to actually write some songs on piano and perform them at VidCon London? Or my response was what if we incorporate a guy dressed like a piano in our act? Yeah, we talked about that for about 15 minutes.

No we didn't. So yeah, so this is just you in your own little space thinking about this. Well yeah, I mean, you, your space. First of all, we have a piano at the house, right? We have like a, Yeah you do. an upright piano. So what I did is, I also have one of those.

I sat down at the piano, as I do sometimes just to kinda mess around. Twinkle the Ivories. And I've written a couple of songs like that. Swirl the Ivories? The Buddy System Season Two Family Man's Family Song. Family Man's Song, that was written on the piano. But again, if you listen to it,

it's super very simple rhythm. I sat down to play the piano and I play for like 30 seconds and then Locke is like, "'Dad, could you not do that right now?" Because it goes throughout the whole house. Yeah. And at that moment, because I was also watching a YouTube video about how to play so that you can accompany yourself

singing because that was something I've never done because I never thought that I needed to perform it live. I was just like, I've just kinda chicken scratch, chicken peck this piano enough to then translate it to guitar or put it in Logic on MIDI or something like that. Right, right. But I don't have to actually play it and sing it at the same time.

But I was like, well, I'd like to learn how to play and sing at the same time. It can't be that hard if I'd like to learn how to play and sing at the same time. It can't be that hard if I can already do it with guitar. So of course you go on YouTube and there's like, I learned some mind blowing things that I had my hands backwards, not like this, not like playing like this, but I was playing the bass note,

I was doing it wrong anyway. No, I wanna know how you were doing it wrong because this is interesting. Well, so what I was doing is, and I think this is a way that you can play the piano, is so your left hand obviously is playing lower notes and your right hand is playing higher notes, to put it very simply.

If you're sitting in a traditional fashion. Yeah, if you're sitting backwards, reverse it. Also, turn around so you can see the piano. Is that the start of the tutorial? Yeah. Hey, we can make a funny piano tutorial. Yeah, yeah, yeah. If you ever learn how to play a piano, we'll make YouTube tutorials.

I can't yet. I've got a couple of months to figure it out. So what I had been doing when I sat down to write something is I would play a chord. I kind of figured out pretty quickly that, you know, if you just separate in the white keys, if you do every other key and you do three of them together, you're playing a chord.

Yeah, I knew that. Right, and then I would play some kind of melody with my right hand, which that is a way that you can play piano if you are playing a song that isn't to be sung because you're playing the melody in the upper keys. You're like playing the elevator version of Coldplay. Right. But if you wanna play so that you can accompany yourself,

and again, if you know anything about piano, you're like, this idiot doesn't know what he's talking about but I'm just, I am giving you my layman's understanding of this which, come to VidCon London, I'm gonna be playing the piano and singing so yeah, take that. We're also gonna charge you for this part as a tutorial. Like this is a paid tutorial from someone

who has not yet learned how to play the piano. But it's like, that's so you by the way. Like again, I admire this about you. Like you could become convinced to like, make a tutorial as you're learning. So it's just like, all right, day two of me learning to play the piano, this is what you do.

Yeah, man. Okay, so what I learned, and that was a revelation to me, is that if you wanna play in a way that you can accompany yourself while you're singing, you're playing the bass line with your left hand and you're playing chords, basically rhythm, in chords with your right hand. And then you're playing the melody with your vocal chords.

And you're singing the melody. And a lot of songs, some of the most popular songs ever written on piano like Let It Be by the Beatles, is like when you break down the piano, it's like this is incredibly simple. Like it doesn't have to be complex. You don't have to be Jim Brickman. There's a shout out.

He's like a professional pianist. Is that right? Look him up. I used to have one of his albums. What? Okay. Yeah. Please keep going. Let's forget that shout out. I think I got it through one of his albums. What? Okay. Yeah. Please keep going. Let's forget that shout out.

I think I got it through one of those. Jim Brickman on Instagram. BMG music things. Anyway, so this was a revelation to me and by the time I finished this YouTube video. You were in tears. I felt like I was on my piano and I had gone back

to the piano and then the kids have been like, Dad, you've gotta stop playing. At that point, I went on Amazon and I said, you know what, I feel inspired. I wanna write some music on the piano, but I've gotta be able to do it whenever I want. I need a keyboard, because I need to be able to put my headphones on and play to my heart's content.

Keytar? Did you mean to say keytar? Keyboard. So I bought a keyboard, a Casio. I didn't wanna get crazy, you know what I'm saying? I didn't wanna get too expensive. Okay. Does it have the buttons for the beats? It does but I've not, Bossa Nova?

I've yet to activate those. Oh you haven't even activated. I don't play the beats. I own the keyboard at my nana's house. I'll play the beats for you so you can rap. Once I stopped playing with the Castle Grayskull, I wanted a keyboard and I put the stickers for the notes on the keys.

Have you done that to your keyboard? I don't do the stickers. The stickers are in my mind. Really? Here's something though, this is something that has been super exciting. Now, I don't wanna build it up because. We may get busy.

The song, I'm only gonna promise that there will be one song on keyboard. Oh gosh, that's gonna be hard to justify bringing a keyboard. Bringing a keyboard, okay. There's gonna be two songs on keyboard. Can I play two? Yeah, you can hit one, you can hit the high notes. I think this is a bit.

There's gonna be a bit about the keyboard. Yeah, yeah, we gotta justify bringing it, you're completely right. What about drum machine? We can get into that. But. I'm buying a drum machine. One of the things that I have figured out is, okay, so my guitar playing is pretty limited, right?

I can play a very reliable rhythm. I can play bar chords up and down the neck. I can play all the standard chords. I play a few chords that are sevens or diminished or whatever. And I do all this mostly by ear, so I don't really know, when I'm playing a weird chord, I have to go to an app on my phone and know what I'm playing.

I never took music theory, I just kinda know what chords I'm hitting. But you pretty quickly, in my experience, if you're limited like me and you never had a guitar lesson, you pretty quickly just kinda of get to the end of what you can do on a guitar in terms of writing a song. It's like, okay, I can basically play in any key in the standard rhythms or whatever,

but I can only do a few sort of altered chords. It's mostly just majors and minors, straight stuff, maybe a seventh or something like that. But when you sit down at the piano and you just. Does it spread for you? You combine a few things and you're like, oh well sometimes I'm hitting the bass note of the chord that I'm playing.

Sometimes I'm hitting a different chord from the bass note that I'm playing. And the cool thing that has happened is you begin to hear like a genre, like an era of music coming out of the piano. So like, you know, I'm playing like a, I don't even remember what the chords were,

but like I actually miss hit hitting a G and a G at the same time and the chord was a little bit too high and then I kinda like corrected it, but just going from that step up to the G, it sounded like an 80s pop song. And all of a sudden you just start finding that these, the world of music that can be explored on the piano, it just suddenly hit me and I was like,

why did I discover this at 41? Do you think that, because it makes me think, like we got a piano in our house and I invested in piano lessons for all three kids and we found a good piano instructor who I listen in on what she's telling the kids and it's like an inspirational,

it's like a college music appreciation course. She's amazing. Also teaching them guitar. And you know, it's, again, a credit to you. I think this is a difference between the two of us. I was making fun of like the confidence that you would start, you do a tutorial before you know how to do something.

I was really making fun of the fact that like you'll leap in and say, I'm buying it. I'm doing what you do. For me, it's like, well, I never learned the piano, but I wanna give my kids that. It's funny that that's been my application. Because I did have enough understanding, it's like, if you can learn piano

and understand music in that way, it translates. I just felt like it translates so much more in terms of like, okay, then you can move to guitar or even drums or whatever, because of what you're describing that you're discovering as a middle-aged man. I am curious if our kids are, if they're connecting those dots or if it's something that like is within you,

like all of our kids, and your kids too, they play for a while. But it's funny because like is within you. Like all of our kids, and your kids too, they play for a while. But it's funny because- They've done pretty well. You know, because my kids are very much like me and my wife in a lot of ways, but the things that I see in them, I'm like, okay, so both of them took guitar,

Locke took guitar, Shepard took piano. They took it for a while and then they kind of just lost interest, right? But when Shepard took piano. They took it for a while and then they kinda just lost interest, right? But when Shepard, and they both are still, they still both want to play from time to time. But both of them, maybe Shepard a little bit more than Locke took a very different approach, which is the same approach that I always took.

When I learned the guitar, I, yeah, I've got the books and learned how to play like some Eagle songs or how to do like some, you know, Lynyrd Skynyrd riff or something like that. But the technicality of getting it exactly the way that the record sounded, I lost interest so quickly. Yeah. I would get like an idea of what they did and then very quickly turn it into something original.

Right. I was much more interested in writing songs and I always been that way and I see the thing, Shepard will sit down at the piano and we want him to, he's supposed to play what's in the book, what the instructor's told him to play, but he's making something up. And that's great, that really is great.

I think for me it was. You really need both in a perfect world, you know, the training and then the inspiration to create your own stuff but. Yeah, you know, the training and then the inspiration to create your own stuff, but. Yeah, you know, if we go back to the wax paper dogs days, it was like, neither one of us could play and we were both lead singers in our garage band in high school, right?

So it was, and then you were the one that made the decision, this double lead singer thing ain't gonna work. Where I think for me, it's like learning to play guitar or do anything, it's like, if I feel like I can't invest enough to do it perfectly, like to invest deeply, and it be a lifelong commitment, I would just rather not do it. It's just, that's a subconscious approach that I have.

It's like, well, I can't do this, but I can give it to my kids. You know, it's very interesting, it's just a totally different, it's a way that we're very different. I just find it fascinating that without any particular point. Well and I mean, I think one of the reasons

I started playing guitar in the White's Paper Dogs wasn't just because it was a little cheesy to have two lead singers and we weren't in sync or anything like that. Was that, well, if I didn't start playing guitar, we were just gonna play the songs that Benny wrote. Right. Or covers, right? Right.

If we wanted to actually create, you had to get the instrument to enable the creation. Yeah, we needed fresh rip offs of the Eagles. And then that was when we started writing songs that were in no way, shape or form good, but were sort of the building blocks of like, learning how to play music together. Which, that's another thing that I wanna talk about

because it's something you said. So we were practicing for the concert at the State Fair and one of the songs that was not written on guitar and actually, so back when we did the Mythical show, we collaborated with Dan Avedon of Game Grumps and Ninja Sex Party, a good friend of ours. Before Game Grumps didn't exist. Game Grumps didn't exist.

He had just moved to LA, Stevie introduced us. And we were like, when we signed up for the Mythical show, we were like, this is a lot, we have to do so much, and we got no money because we didn't ask for enough money to make it. But we gotta do music videos. And so she was- Because that's part of what we do.

And she was like, well well I know a guy who, A, is a good musician, B, is very funny, who might be able to help you guys write all this music that you need to write for this. And so we were like, yeah, we've never done that. We've always written our own stuff and there's like this sense of pride with like not getting any help.

But then we were like, you know what, let's see what happens if we collaborate. So the Have You Ever song, basically the chords and in large part the melody was written by Dan. Actually I- And a lot of the lyrics. I think specifically they were written by Ninja Brian.

Because- Oh the music part. I don't think Dan, I don't know for sure, but I don't think he plays anything. I think he's like me. And I think that Brian is like you. And he. And he plays keys and plays all the multi instrumentalist is Ninja Brian from the band Ninja Sex Party.

Cause we said we wanted to do something that was like Hall and Oates. I don't even know. Or did they just, is that what they just came back with? Because that's kind of their sound at the time. Yeah, they have such a 80s soft rock sound. I mean, look at the, they put out two cover albums and they like got Toto and stuff on it, it's amazing.

So he just does that, they do that on instinct. So we, yeah we determined, we want a song called Have You Ever that's like, you know, things that you can relate to that then increasingly goes to crazy things that just like it falls apart. And we may have written some jokes that he could take and turn into lyrics but it was. And then he wrote, he came back,

they came back with a demo for us. First time we had ever collaborated with somebody musically, it was over email. And we were like. Because we never met Ninja Brian. Not at the time, no, and we were like, well, he lived in like England or something. He was like studying in England at the time, yeah.

Or he was a professor. I don't know, lots of weird stories going on. You can't believe those guys. Anyway, the demo came back and it had this 80s vocal effect on it, we're like, damn, this sounds like Hall & Oates. We didn't like the chorus so we rewrote the melody of the chorus and worked with our producer Mark on it. Okay, yeah.

That's a part of the process that I really enjoy. Again, I like to take something and tweak it. I like to perfect things. So starting from nothing, thin air is like, is a nightmare for me. It's like getting, it's like a plane crash. But, give me something. The thing that you said, when we were practicing,

and have you ever, there's a moment at the end where it kinda, you just start going nuts singing. Yeah. Now first of all, I had to translate this very Hall & Oates 80s rhythm that needs to be a drum machine and a keyboard into a guitar, which it loses a little bit of its Hall & Oates-ness-ness when you translate it to guitar, but you made the point when you were trying

to memorize that last part, and we kinda changed the lyrics a little bit from what happened in the video, that you were like, this is a melody that I never would have come up with naturally, and so it's difficult to lock into my brain. We had the same experience when Ben Bram, we partnered with him to write the.

He produced Pentatonix. Yeah he's a Pentatonix producer. Won a Grammy. Who helped, we basically wrote the lyrics for. Barbershop Quartet. If I Had Another Me. If I Had Another Me. Had Another You.

Buddy System season one song. And then he turned it into a four part barbershop quartet song. He gave us the individual tracks to learn, like they call them the stems and it was very challenging. It was so difficult for us to sing because when you sit down to write a melody, you are referencing a cacophony of all the music

that you have listened to and kind of sung along to that you've connected with and kind of your brain is melded to. And for us, if you reach into this jukebox of our past, there's gonna be this mix of things and one of those things is gonna be a lot of country music, right? Oh yeah.

So not just Merle Hagger, not just old country, but the, you know, Brooks and Dunn at the time that Brooks and Dunn was popular and Diamond Rio and Clint Black, Garth Brooks, there's a lot of that. There's a lot of country, it's not all country. It's not all country, that's one element of it, right? Yeah. But then you've got like R&B, soul,

even some like getting back into, for me and I assume you as well, like Elvis and Chuck Berry and that kind of thing. But these songs are all, for me especially, a lot of it is kind of coming from this like Southern rock, Leonard Skinner, Allman Brothers, country, R&B, but like a lot of Southern music.

You know what I mean? And if you just listen to like the melodies and the way that they kind of come out when I just naturally start singing something, they can kind of be tied back to all those genres that influence, and that's one of the things that excites me about the piano is that it throws you into a different place

that just naturally doesn't comfort somebody who's limited in what they can do on a guitar like I am. Yeah. But it leads to situations where if you're collaborating with somebody and they come up with a weird melody, it's very difficult. Like going from that note to that note, my brain has never made that connection before.

I would consider music my main hobby. I think that the main things I like to watch are music documentaries. I've started just the habit of just laying in bed and listening to music. And then I started not just listening to music, on headphones, while my wife is already asleep or something. She usually goes to sleep for me.

I'll just lay there listening, just analyze. I just love to analyze. But then starting to watch music videos. Like I got on this Chicago kick. I was telling you about this where I was like. You were telling everybody about it. Yeah, I couldn't stop talking about it. There were like three dinners that we went to.

I don't know when this is coming out, so I'm not gonna, we recently took a trip for the shoot some GMM in another place. I don't know when this episode's coming out in reference to when those are coming out, so I'm not gonna give away what it was. You mean Memphis? Can we talk about that?

I don't know, who cares? We went to Memphis. Went to St. Jude, we're talking about it. It was awesome, there's gonna be videos about it. I can. Went to St. Jude. We're talking about it. It was awesome. There's gonna be videos about it. I can't keep this stuff straight anymore. I went back to my, I couldn't wait to go back

to my hotel room and just listen to music by myself and have my own quiet space. But then. And I started watching Chicago, the band. The next meal, what I'm getting at is like the breakfast after the night. Like we would get together in the morning, we're getting ready to like shoot the next video and we're all getting at is like the breakfast after the night. Like we would get together in the morning, we're getting ready to shoot the next video,

we're all kind of like in the hotel lobby eating something. And you would start talking about what you experienced in the documentary and I would kind of look around and I was like, who in this group is actually listening to Link right now? And my impression was no one. Did you know that Chicago, the band, I mean the first lead singer,

he passed away in a tragic situation that I don't wanna go into. But then the second lead singer was Peter Cetera, this amazing vocalist. And then I'm watching this weird videos on YouTube where they're like, where he's leaving the band and it's really weird and the songs are amazing. You're my inspiration.

They brought in a third lead singer. And they like, Chicago revitalized their band across three amazing vocalists. Ah, that's just not something that anybody can do. Until the next night when I discover Genesis did it. Let me watch the VH1 behind the music on Genesis until I fall asleep. Are these just uploaded to YouTube?

Yeah, like they're ripped on YouTube, four three ratio. I guess the point I'm making is that, you know, I just, I love music, I love how it moves you. When you talk about melodies, I mean, I'm still, I'm so obsessed with hip hop because it seems to me to be changing so much quicker than how I've experienced any other music changing. And it's a puzzle to figure it out and to appreciate it

and not just write it off and then once you start to, once you hear someone who's amazing at it, like okay, you can reduce what Migos does to, again, you've got, I don't wanna go off on all these tangents. We should do this in another podcast. And you study the rhythms, it's like, okay, it blows my mind.

I mean, if I listen to Post Malone, not just because I've met him and he says he likes us and he seems super cool and that makes me super cool if I listen to him. I came to a conclusion one night in my cans. The dude is a melodic genius and I'm not saying that because he thinks that our show is entertaining. But that helps.

There's a certain moment where you can just listen to music and you're like, whoa, I get it. And I understand how difficult it is to invent what he did. But hip hop is a place where- And it's super distinct too. As is demonstrated by the episode that we had him on GMM, where I did Mary Had a Little Lamb in his style, you start realizing that, you know what?

He actually, he invented something. Like it's completely. Everything comes from something. It's derivative and I understand, everything is derivative, right? But that's what's intriguing, I mean if I'm. And he pushed it into a place that's original. To bring it back to what really matters, us.

Yeah. I get a lot of joy out of that. I mean, it gets very frustrating, I know, many times when it's like we're trying to, hey, is this song, why isn't this song written? It's over, we've got it. You know, it's like, because, you know, it's like painting, man.

I'm not gonna tell you how. Well, it's like painting, man. I'm not gonna tell you how. Well, it's fun. I'm just really glad, I think the answer of the question for me is what did touring do for us is it reconnected us with our passion for music, our connection to music, and how that's a part of what we create. It's just such a different way to create.

And I am specifically. And then the live, the live performance of it. Yeah, I'm specifically excited about, I mean, even the songs that we wrote that those of you who came to the NC State Fair show heard, the songs that were written with a live audience in mind and the songs that will be written with a live audience in mind,

it's just, not saying that they won't then one day be put, turn into a music video, but it always works. I believe they will, by the way. It always works that way. So if you write something that is funny with just sound, you can, you better believe that adding a visual is only gonna make it funnier. It doesn't always work the other way though.

If you start with the, and you have the video handicap right from the beginning, and then you try to perform that song live, if people don't have the visual reference, they may not get it. So I'm super excited about that because I think it's, the comedy quotient of those songs is that much higher. But it's also just, we're kind of discovering that we didn't think it was gonna be a part of our

greater strategy, but I think that playing music live for people, at least in moderation, not crazy world tours where we're gone for months at a time, but short stints in places is a part of what we're gonna do creatively. In the next phase of our creative endeavor. We come back around to it. Yes, I think that's the answer to the question.

That's the huge takeaway is as we think about 2019, that's an aspect and it's, I mean, some opportunities start to come out of the woodwork, you know? It's like some really cool stuff that, like, I mean, we got an email two days ago that was like, it was to play at a particular venue that's like, oh, that would be exciting. Yeah, well, and you know, the interesting thing

is that we, that was very vague by the way. I love the vagueness of that. Yeah, they've got a certain venue that would be very exciting to play at. I can't say that, I can't say that. I am very excited about it. Because if it doesn't happen, I don't want anyone besides me to be disappointed.

An interesting thing that I could not have told you, because you go back 10 years, we've been doing YouTube 12 years, but you go back 10 years, we've been doing YouTube 12 years, but you know, you go back 10 years and that was when we were already like in the throes of full-time YouTube, 2008, we started our business, we were doing this thing full-time, we're doing a bunch of music videos,

that was our bread and butter. And at the time, Flight of the Conchords was kind of in their heyday, like, you know, their special had come out, I don't remember the exact years, the two seasons on HBO, but it's right around that same time, right? It's been like 10 years. Yeah, I think it was 2006, though.

And so in terms of like comedic, musical comedic acts, you know, you had Tenacious D, you had Flight of the Conchords, you had Lonely Island, of course Weird Al. I'm sure there's others that were missing. But interesting thing is is that 10 years later, I would have told you that there were a bunch of musical comedy duos out there

or trios that are playing music and doing what we thought we were gonna do back in the day and then kind of YouTube sort of changed our plans. But you know, here we are in 2018 and Flight of the Conchords has a new special, Tenacious D just released a new album and the YouTube series. The YouTube series that's got Jack's,

Jack drew all that. I watched the first episode the other night and it was hilarious. Oh it is? And the animation is so crazy because he just drew these pictures, it's actually genius the way that he did it. It's like, it's not animated, it's just,

it's like a storyboard. It's like watching a storyboard but it totally works. I mean when he was here and he told us about it, he was like very, he was like apologetic, comedically apologetic. I love the approach. But I say that to say that a decade has passed, all this incredible entertainment has been created,

but really when you ask people to name musical comedy acts, it's kind of the same people. We kinda got lucky that, I'm super excited. I just don't, I honestly don't consider us in that group. No, I don't consider us in that group at all. At all. Which my point is, is our aspiration, ever since we saw Flight of the Conchords

in the HBO special, we were on the road doing like a college tour in like 06, or maybe even before that, maybe 04, and we saw that special on HBO in the hotel room and we both got mad because they were so much funnier than us, like just so much funnier, right? And I still think that they're a lot funnier than us and I aspire to be that funny, but what I'm getting at is that I am at the age of 41

getting ready to learn how to play the piano so we can perform a song in London. Two songs, you can hit the high keys. I am super excited about what this next phase can bring. I mean, and hopefully we will be mentioned in the same breath with those guys at some point, right? My point is that they got old too, and they're still doing it.

Nobody came along to replace them. Now we're old too. But we got a lot more music to play, man. A lot more music to play. We got a lot more music to play, man. A lot more music to play. We got a lot more music to play, y'all. I'm excited about it. Yeah, I'm so grateful that we decided to do the NC State Fair show.

And then it led to, hey, let's do more of this. And that it's a sense of momentum. I need to do more of this. And that it's a sense of momentum. You know, and it's not at the expense of anything else. Good Mythical Morning or the other things that we're writing. Yeah, we found a way to- Because there are other things that we are writing.

Lots of things that we're working on that we can't tell you about yet. But music is one of them. And those of you who've been asking is there gonna be more of this, yes, there is gonna be more and hopefully at some point, we're gonna be coming to a place near you. Can we end this with you're the inspiration by Chicago?

We can't, can we? I think that's illegal. We can't, you know what you need to do right now, right after this is over, you need to play Chicago. Well bring it up in a different tab right now. You're the inspiration. And just play that. You can play it right now. Play that for yourself.

You hate that, Feldman? You hate your, listen man. You hate that song? You gotta approach it with an open heart, man. You're the meaning of my life. The vocal treatment. Is that what I gotta do? And then go over and listen to some band of horses and you tell me you don't like them either? You don't like them either.

That's your problem. You don't like Fleet Foxes? Listen to some band of horses and see how that vocal treatment is like a Chicago ripoff. Oh, I abandoned them. Yeah, that's why you hate both of them. I'm not talking to you, I'm talking to. Whoa. All of a sudden you're responding as if I'm talking to you.

I know I'm looking at you. So anyway, you're the inspiration. Music is the inspiration. I think that song was written to music. If you listen to the lyrics you can tell it's not, but let's just say it is. That song was written to music. If you listen to the lyrics you can tell it's not but let's just say it is. That song was written to music? I mean.

There's a good chance of that. Do you know that, there's that average white band song. I don't know what you mean. Well I'll illustrate. There's that average white band song. Pick up the pieces. No. Not the one without lyrics you dummy.

Listen. It has a few lyrics. He wrote a song. Pick up the song, he wrote at least one song, maybe multiple songs to music. Whoever wrote the song was like, loved music so much that he wrote a song to it. Music, sweet music. Oh, a song written to music.

Queen of my soul. Music, you're the queen of my soul. Wow, that's powerful. And so, all right, so now we're developing a playlist now. So that's You're the Inspiration. Inspirational songs. Leads to some, no, leads to Band of Horses with that same vocal treatment.

Ooh, a playlist that starts and then goes through influences, influences, influences. That'd be hard to do. No, we're just gonna skip to average white man. No, you can do it. You're the queen of my soul. That is an interesting playlist, though. You would go back to like, you know.

Are we still recording? We'll talk at you next week. Like a fiddler in the Middle Ages. Thanks for hanging out with us and for indulging in us just analyzing our own creative. Yeah, that was very self-indulgent. I know. That won't happen all the time.

Sometimes you just need to talk about yourself. It's like therapy. And then you do, you go out and talk about yourself. Yeah.