Ear Biscuits with Rhett & Link - Ep. 56 DeStorm Power - Ear Biscuits

Episode Date: February 13, 2015

Musician, Comedian, Entertainer, YouTube personality, Viner, and all around Renaissance man, DeStorm Power, sits down with Rhett & Link this week to talk about the hardships associated with growing up in poverty in the Baltimore projects, living in the New York City subway system to follow his dreams in the music industry, how a gig as a personal trainer led to a successful career on YouTube, and why his Vine status allows him unprecedented access to a world that the majority of us never get to experience. *NOTE: This conversation contains adult themes and language. 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. Welcome to Ear Biscuits. I'm Rhett. And I'm Link. Joining us today at the round table of dim lighting is YouTuber, Viner, rapper, vlogger, the talented and tenacious DayStorm Power. DayStorm, he's a 2011 American Music Awards winner

with over 1.6 million subscribers on YouTube and he is the number 21 top ranked Viner with 4.6 million followers. I mean, we're happy to call Day Storm a friend of ours. We've collaborated on multiple occasions. We discussed the first time we met, which I had forgotten, but he brings up in our conversation. A long time ago.

I was glad that he brought that up because I certainly remembered that meeting that he brought that up because I certainly remembered that meeting once he brought that up. Once he made you remember it, you remembered it. Yeah. His YouTube fame really exploded when he started performing rap songs based off of challenges from his fans

and a schedule that he also shares with us. His catchphrase was, Another day, another challenge. It was a challenge from his fans and then he would just have less than a week to turn it into a catchy rap song, just like this one involving solving a Rubik's cube. You got a problem, yo, I'll solve it.

Watch me take this color cube and help you resolve it. Wanna solve your Rubik's cube? First you gotta pray. Nah, I'm only kidding. Let me show you the way. See, first you get the top, which is relatively easy. It all starts out with a simple TC. Align your T with the colors on the side. Let's finish up the top by these rules you must abide. Daystorm also writes and performs original songs for his YouTube channel. His most

recent one of those is Victory Dance. Go girl, shaker shaker like that. Go girl, shaker shaker like that. Like that. Go girl, shaker shaker like that. Yeah, yeah, oh, oh, yeah, yeah. I went hard for the whole summer, whole summer. I had to give them something that the people like. People like. You got bills on your mind, I got meals up on mine.

I'm assuming we don't think alike. But as of late, Day Storm's been getting amazing traction on Vine, rocking up millions of loops, six seconds at a time, actually up to six and a half seconds. I learned that today, I gotta say, I'm a little ignorant about that. With Vines like Robbery Gone Wrong, where Day Storm and fellow Viner, very popular Viner,

King Bach, approach a man to rob him, only to realize that when he turns around, he's a priest. Give me your money, don't make this hard. What did you say, my child? He said donate to God. Okay. Take a look at that. Nice watch, brother, thanks.

So the more that you watch this thing, it kind of sucks you in the funnier it gets. I mean, you can't do it justice just by hearing the audio. And there's just a fascinating science to the world of vining that Daystorm has not only experienced but helped dictate what is most successful on vine. I just, I love the fact that this is, that he's able to talk about it in such a detailed way

and that we can- To define vine. To define it and- That rhymes. Define it by his actions. So, I mean, it was really cool to talk about that. We talked to him about a lot of things, his bizarre kneecap injury, a detailed account of his amazing backstory. I mean, we're talking the type of stuff

that should be in a movie tomorrow. And if Days Storm wants to get into more acting, I guess he could play himself. That'd be weird. Or I could play him, that would also be weird. For another reason. You could play him, that would be weird. Let's not get into casting.

Yeah, let's not do that. My point is that his story is, it should be in a movie. Yes. But it's here on an Ear Biscuit and you're gonna enjoy it. And we also talked about his frustrations with YouTube and all the new opportunities that Vine is affording him. So keep listening for that.

90%, Link, that is the percent of your life that you're in your underwear. Oh, okay. I mean, you're in your underwear. Have you been keeping records? Because that's creepy. I think I'm 98, maybe 99, maybe even more than 99. I wear underwear pretty much all the time,

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And you look cool, but I mean, I don't see you in them, but you look like you. So you're keeping record of what percentage of my life is in underwear and how cool I look in my underwear. None of this is good. No, not you, just people who wear these look cool. I have a big mirror in my bedroom. I've seen myself in them.

Rhett has shared that he has gone full MeUndie. You have no other underwear. I'm on the verge of that because I have a good set of them. And I'm noticing a phenomenon when I go to my underwear drawer now, there's a telltale test and that's not a pun or I guess it was, and which ones I reach for and I always reach for the MeUndies

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Now enjoy our Ear Biscuit with Day Storm power. So how long have you been without eating? How starving are you right now? I'm starving. I got up at like 7 a.m. to. To start the day because, you know, with- You don't eat breakfast? No, just dinner. But I haven't had dinner because I had an interview at Fox.

None of this sounds right, K-Star. It feels- For me. No, you feel good after you eat that meal. But what about that theory about eating a bunch of little meals during the day? I mean, you're- It's a great theory. I'm a personal trainer. I believe in that theory. eating a bunch of little meals during the day? It's a great theory. I'm a personal trainer. I believe in that theory. You're doing the complete opposite though. Well, yeah.

It's just so I can just get really nice and sexy real quick. Okay. I want to hear, can you tell us the kneecap injury story? The kneecap injury, I was with Amir Johnson from the Toronto Raptors. Oh, really? Because this was two years, this is when we shot Christmas Sweats. Yeah, I was messed Amir Johnson from the Toronto Raptors. Cause this was, oh really? Cause this was two years, this is when we shot Christmas Sweats.

Yeah, I was messed up. Yeah, it had happened, you were just in recovery then. And so it's been over two years, one, two, over three years ago. No, it's been, it hasn't even been two years yet. So it must've been Christmas Face. It must've been Christmas Face. It was Christmas Face.

But I've been obsessed with this story. So I wanna hear it in its entirety. I was. What happened? I had been obsessed with this story, so I want to hear it in its entirety. What happened? I had a show that I was actually filming for YouTube called Make Me Hot, where I actually write a song for an athlete, and in return they have to make me hot in their respectable sport. So episode one was, what's the girl who won? Keri Shrugs, who won the Olympics. Remember she flipped and landed on one leg and won it's the girl who won kerry shrugs who won the olympics remember she flipped and

landed on one leg and won it for the girl so she was episode one she was showing me some stuff on the balance beam and in return i had to make her a hot song we did the song episode one was great episode two was amir johnson from the toronto raptors okay Okay. And my job was to make him a hot song in the studio, and then in return, we're supposed to do a little one-on-one basketball. We did the one-on-one basketball, then we decided we want to have a dunk contest. So we're up there, we're just dunking basketballs, and we're just going crazy with it. Hold on, how tall are you?

I'm 6'1", almost. 6'1", 6 1⁄2 to 6 To six one And you can dunk a basketball I mean I'm six foot And I couldn't I can't touch the net Oh yeah I could grab the rim From the free throw line

I'm black Oh well Yeah you seem kind of confused About this We need to go back there Okay Let's start with that You're black

Okay So you know Africa is a continent Okay so dunk contest And so Let's start with that. You're black. Okay. So, you know, Africa is a continent. Okay, so dunk contest. And so this wasn't part of the actual show. We were just showing off. And then we were outside, and I slipped on some gravel and hyperextended my knee.

And I guess all those years, because I was a professional triple jumper in my time also. Everyone knows I was Olympic development triple jumper. So I had a lot of balance. So I went up on that right leg. And when I went up on that right leg, you just heard this loud ass pop. It was like pop. And that was my knee in midair.

It's on YouTube. I'm pretty sure you saw the video because we were shooting it for the YouTube video. No, I haven't seen the video. Oh, well, go watch the video. I didn't even know. Let me shut up. I can just stop talking. No, but I went down, bam, landed on my back. And I was't seen the video. Oh, well, go watch the video. I didn't even know. Let me shut up. I can just stop talking. No, but I went down, bam, landed on my back, and I was kind of in shock.

So I was looking for my kneecap. So I'm on the ground like, where the hell is my kneecap? Because what do you mean? You looked at your knee, and the kneecap was not there. It wasn't there. Therefore, you started looking on the ground? Yes. That's what you're supposed to do.

Because it wasn't capping the knee. When a part of your body is not, let me explain something. It's like when change falls out of your pocket. It must be on the ground. Exactly. When something falls apart from your body, you're going to look for it. Like you were looking for a lost contact. You're like crawling around.

If you were in the military, let me explain something. If you're in the military and a part of your body gets shot off in war, you're going to look for your arm or your leg, right? Okay. No? Yes. Okay. No? Yes. Okay. So I was looking for my kneecap.

It wasn't where it was supposed to be. I grew up with kneecaps for 32 years, and I wanted to know where my kneecap was. And it wasn't there. And it wasn't there. And then what? So I'm looking, and Amir Johnson stands over me, and he's like, there's your kneecap. It was in my thigh. Oh, God.

Okay. So where in the thigh? Well, my patella tendon, which is one of the biggest tendons in your body, popped. This tendon holds your kneecap onto your tibia bone, which is the bottom, you know, the bone in front of your calf muscle, so for the people at home. And it wasn't there. So it rolled up like a fruit roll-up. My quad muscle rolled up like a fruit roll-up, My quad muscle rolled up like a fruit roll-up,

and my kneecap was still taped to that. So I didn't see it because I didn't look as high as my thigh, and I was just looking on the ground for it. How many inches up your thigh are we talking? It was about four or five inches up my thigh. It was just like a kneecap bulge. It had to be about six inches. And when you found it, were you like, I found my kneecap.

It was about nine inches up my thigh. be about six inches. And when you found it, were you like, I found my kneecap. I think that's about nine inches up my thigh. So I'm looking for my kneecap, and he told me where it was. He gave me guidance. We called the paramedics. Did you start, like, working it back down like a tube of toothpaste, or what?

Smart. Smart. That's what I did. You did that? I did that. You see every human. I don't know, were you supposed to do that? Exactly. That's what I'm trying to say, because we're human. Did you Google this first? No, it's funny that you did the exact motion that I did when my kneecap was locked. That's exactly what I did. I would have fainted.

That's the motion I would have done. Well, you're in shock, because you don't feel anything when you pop something so big. Did it hurt immediately, or just shock? No, you don't feel it, because it's so big. It's like when someone gets stabbed 27 times, they just call the cops. They don't feel the stab. It's so much. It's so much pain that overwhelms your brain. So that's

what happened. Then when I got in the ambulance, I cried like a bitch. But before that, I was good. But before you got in the ambulance, you pushed it back down all the way. But it wouldn't stay. It wouldn't stay. It rolled back up because there's no tendon. It's like a yo-yo.

Like a window shade. Exactly. So they sutured it back together, and I had to do nine months on the crutch. Yeah, and that's when you showed up for, I guess it was Christmas Face. Christmas Face. You didn't have a cast on it then,

so the cast was off. Yeah, so I did nine months in, and I was just doing, I had a very weak leg. The thing is like, It got small. You showed it to us.

Atrophy did nothing, right? Atrophy, you know, you don't use that limb, so it was about the size of my arm. I can show you a picture where my actual right leg was the size of my arm,

because it was just bones. I had no muscle it's so it's funny how fast you lose muscle i'm gonna eat this granola bar as we speak it's so fast this is one meal right here this is part actually so you eat throughout the day and call that one big meal it's not really one meal a day i'm doing i'm doing you get to eat when the sun goes down okay i got you i i get it i get it the sun's down it is hey guys the sun goes down. Let's just say that. Okay, I got you. I get it, I get it. The sun's down. It is. Hey guys, the sun's down. It's definitely down. All right, this is risky

because you're doing most of the talking, so you're gonna have to swallow that thing. No, that's fine. I'll just hold it in my cheekbone like a chipmunk. That's fine. I think we've had eating before on this show. I've definitely, I've done my fair share of eating. This is the first time y'all had eating on this show.

Holla at your boy. All right, so we got to talk Vine. I know having talked to you over the years, when it comes to Vine, when it comes to YouTube, when it comes to any type of social media, you're a student of the medium. Your brain, like from the first time I ever met you, it's like your brain is going 90 miles an hour

and just laying claim to- Take a remote. Whatever, yeah, whatever the digital space has to offer. So I wanna be schooled on Vine. You know, we don't do Vine. Why? We've talked to some Viners, but I mean, there's only so much margin.

The videos are too long. Yeah, they're pretty long. Yeah, it just takes too much time. Vine is difficult, man. I find Vine actually sometimes more difficult than YouTube because you have six seconds to make millions of a**holes laugh. It's difficult to do that. So if your punch is not in, a lot of times when we're creating a Vine,

we get a team of people together, sometimes eight to ten people. We sit in a room, we come up with ideas and things like that, and you have to make it perfect. So sometimes a Vine can take hours to do just to get that six seconds so good that everybody would like you know this is funny because it's such there's such a limiting factor such a limiting factor what was your first reaction when hearing about vine five to six seconds like your first reaction first thing you thought well vine wasn't initially used for the skits that we did we

brought the skits to buy um because it really was just used we was doing like little quick spurts you know at first and then i saw some people doing like quick stories and things then when we started doing like the uh slapstick you know quick skits it was like whoa that's this is something but but why what made you decide to do anything? Is this because of who you are? Or was there something specific? Did you have somebody that you knew that was already doing it?

No, no, actually my boy Batch started doing it, King Batch started doing it a few days before me. And me and him kinda like started to challenge each other on it. Like, oh, now I got 1,000 followers. And I think I started with 3,000 followers by default because my YouTube was big. And he said he was gonna catch me

and I didn't want him to catch me. Did you start, were you like, okay, if we're gonna do this, we're gonna do it in this way. Like, let's do sketches. Yeah, because we didn't know what else, we started on just funny stuff. Then sketches just came about. We started doing tricks,

because back in the day you couldn't do effects and things. Yeah, so when you were actually using the app, you were using the constraints of the app, literally pointing and holding down... Point and shoot. Yeah, but we would trick the camp. We were trying to trick the audience and do things that we were trying to... Every day we would try to do something impossible with... Like an example.

So there were times where you would show up in one area and then stop violent and show up again and try to make it flawless. So you, like, try to make a flawless, seamless cut. You're, like, putting your iPhone or phone on a tripod? Like, how are you doing? No, we would just shoot straight off the hand. So we had, like, what we call shooters, like some of the best vine shooters in the world.

So we would just practice the craft of shooting vines. So we would practice, like, and then we had different pans that we had, like the whip pan. Then we had like the fish pan and we started to make up our own types of shooting pans to actually,

so a whip pan was something where you would act like you slapped somebody and they would turn into someone else. So when's the book coming out? So, I mean, you know, you can't really do

any of that stuff anymore because they allow you to actually upload now. So you can just, you know, and like these days do any of that stuff anymore because they allow you to actually upload now. So you can just, you know, like these days you could use iMovie. You're editing the videos. Yeah, you could use iMovie, you could use Final Cut, you could use Premiere, whatever you want. But there was an intermediary period there when you had to hack to do that before they allowed you to, right? Oh, you had to hack your way in.

You had to. In order to upload a pre-edited video. Right, it was called handbrake. So you had to handbrake the video. It was like three or five to six steps you had to- In order to upload a pre-edited video. Right, it was called handbrake. So you had to handbrake the video. It was like three or five to six steps you had to go through. But you can also do 6.9, which people would be like,

that's not a lot more to get a half a second. But a half a second when you got six seconds is a whole world of difference. That's a whole joke. Tell us about- You get an extra, hold on, you get an extra half second? When you was uploading back then,

you was able to do 6.9. So a lot of our Vines was 6.9, so you could make the joke more clear. You didn't have to do the restrain of 6.5. But now? Now it's stuck at 6.5. They won't allow you to do it anymore. Explain the genius of the loop.

You know, I mean, when you first hear about Vine as an outsider, the first thing is, five to six seconds, that's nothing, that's crazy. This could never be an art form. We would, you know, we never saw that coming, meaning me. And then, okay, and it loops? The loop made it phenomenal. I knew that it would be the next level

because the first time you watch it, it's like, cool. Second level, you're chuckling. And third, by the time you see it five times only is it can a jingle be stuck in your head but you're laughing out loud to something that you didn't see was funny or you miss things and you see it again the loop just made it ingenious especially business-wise so we we knew that i knew i knew that it would just be the next thing and i knew that's where instagram had messed up they tried to come back and and combat with video i laughed at it and I said, you don't have the loop. You messed up.

And they still don't have the loop. They don't have the loop. And Vine made it so that the loop was seamless. So the loop comes back around and hits you in the face every time. So what you have to do is you have to put your punch right on that loop. And when you do that, you're gonna make people laugh.

Yeah, that's when you've got like the face or, I mean, there's always something in each one of your vines that when there's multiple things, but it's just like, oh, look at the expression that he had. So you hit him with the expression and you know it's gonna loop him. Like we were just watching the one where you're moving the guy's scooter

and then he comes up from behind the fence and then you're like, oh, what year is this? You got a helmet, like it cuts you off in the middle. You have to be cut off. It's the cutoff. It cuts you off in the middle of the asking. It has to be cut off. It's the cut off. It cuts you off in the middle of the sentence and it's genius.

You have to get the cut off. Cut off is important. It's great. You know the slap has to cut off on a slap has to cut off in the middle of a conversation because that's what

people laugh at. If you finish the joke it's not a joke anymore. So the joke is the cut off. How did you discover what people liked? You know trial and error. I know within the first

three minutes whether or not I delete a vine. Whether or not you delete a vine. Well there's heaters and there's deleters. You know, you know you got a heater because you're doing your numbers. Your numbers have to be looping. You have to be doing a certain amount of numbers and a certain amount of likes or revines within a certain amount of time. If not, you know it's a delete. So off the top, even if you got team revine, which is basically your crew who revines your vines to help it blow up and make the top of the popular page, you know whether it's a hit or delete it. How much time? I've been doing long

enough to know in three minutes. Sometimes I wait till seven minutes. And what's the percentage of deleters? Because you're trying to do one a day, right? No, it um it depends well it's so much competition now but if you're if you're still in the top 10 of of um the comedy channel then I'll keep it up and I don't have to do one until the I can I can take a day off but if I'm not in top 10 then I know I fall down into like the top 20 percentile then I'm at the top 20 vine vines on the comedy page I know I got to do one the next day and And so what is the... But then the question of how many of them are you deleting?

What's the percentage there? One out of 10, one out of five, one out of four? Probably like, no, it could be one out of 10, two out of 10 sometimes. Really? Yeah, I do about 80%. I mean, it's certainly powerful in post when you go back through them.

It's like everything hits and there's not a dud in the back you have to have all heaters on your on your channel so your numbers can continue to grow because when someone new goes to your account you want them to see heater after heat i'm like oh my god this guy's the funniest guy in the world and all of these principles you guys invented slash discovered we made them up and who is the who is the crew, yours, that you're talking about? My main crew is about- I definitely know Batch.

Yeah, it's about 10 people. It's myself, King Batch, Clarity, Melvin Gregg, Alfonso, Anwar Jabawi. There's Max, Jerry, and Dan. Some of the, like Rudy Mancuso, maybe even Logan and his brother. But the main, Paige Kennedy, Leanne V, even my assistant, she's getting into it. It's really hard to find funny girls. Sometimes we're with Britney.

But the main crew is usually the hub of like 10 guys, like what's good. You know, whoever's in my group chat, I can tell you, I'm just looking at my group chat because we have like an ongoing group chat that goes on every day with us like homies and then we take the vines we throw them in the group chat and if everybody doesn't really approve you know we pretty much you know don't put it up so like you know i i think i named everybody but that's just became yeah but that's just uh to critique each other you're not you're not pulling together finances too right i mean is it it's more of this- We're just homies. We just critique each other's vines.

Like I'll throw it in a group chat. It's kind of like, you know, if these 10 people don't like- They don't like it, that's just feedback. Yeah. Now I definitely get the impression that there are more successful black Viners than there are successful black YouTube comedians. Oh yeah.

And do you guys, is that, what are the reasons for that? And do you think that you guys kind of forming this crew has been instrumental in that? Well, you know, at one point, kind of like YouTube, you had the LA Viners, you had the Detroit Viners, you had the New York Viners, you had the Miami Viners. Then they all clubbed and everybody's in LA now because Miami's so big. We, you know, our comedy troupe is just like, you know, we're like the LA Viners. I think it does play the point that we do work with each other and continue to help each other's audience grow. Kind of like you do on YouTube. But is it a black thing you wouldn't understand kind of situation?

No. That's different than YouTube? Is there something about the- It's because the type of jokes you could tell on Vine you can't really tell on YouTube. Because you could tell racial jokes and edgier jokes on Vine, you can't really tell on YouTube. Because, like, you can tell racial jokes and, like, edgier jokes on your Vine and on YouTube, the comments are just different. Like, if I tell the same joke on YouTube, if I did something where I slap a white person and then

they slap a black person back, people on YouTube are like, oh my God, this is racist, you gotta take this down. On Vine, it's just like, oh my God, they're so funny. It's just the way we led the audience to say Vine. Like, we say n***a so many times on Vine, they just laugh now. If you say it on YouTube, they're going to definitely pull it. You know what I'm saying?

Vine is just more edgy, and they allow you to get away with a lot more stuff on Vine because it's like the Wild West. So a lot of the jokes that we tell on Vine, I can't do on YouTube. My artists on YouTube is just way more picky than they are on Vine. They just cry babies more so. And on Vine, it's just like, okay, this is funny. Let's go. It's that type of comedy.

Is it a different audience? Do you have a whiter audience on YouTube and a blacker audience on Vine? Can you even tell? I don't think it's a different audience. I think it's just different people. I think it's different people all together. I never pushed my Vine for my YouTube

until I hit almost 2 million followers on Vine. I never even pushed it. So there's a lot of people on Vine that don't even know I do music. So they're like, oh my God, you rap? And I'm like, what? I've been doing this forever. So I never wanted to mesh audiences like that. I always wanted to get a new audience.

Even when I go to Snapchat or Facebook, I built a totally new audience. Where do all the fabulous-looking women come from in your Vines? Oh, well, Vine is 70% female, so you're always going to find Vine. And everyone wants to do a Vine. The thing about it is they don't realize how long it takes, but they say, it's just six seconds of my time. That's why we work with everybody. That's why we didn't contact anyone from Bieber to Floyd Mayweather to whoever we work with that we already work with. They contacted us because they don't mind doing six seconds.

But it's like YouTube, like, oh, they got cameras. I got to go here. It's just I think it's all in the mentality of how people think about it. You know, so people don't mind lending you six seconds when it comes to the ladies. So the beautiful women aren't friends. A lot of my friends. I'm always going to have beautiful girls in my vines because we know that's what sells. Beautiful girls sell and you get hit up by every beautiful

girl in the world wants to hit you up once you got those numbers. All right, so we'll go on, let's go back into business direction. Yeah, let's talk bigger books. Because I do wanna know, I've heard, I've heard people throw around, okay, well yeah, these vine brand deals are just going wild.

Brand deals are crazy old vines. Because there's no partner program. No. With YouTube, you can just slap ads around and over, and Google takes care of all that, and you just get your cut. Yeah, but with Vine, it's the Wild West. Like I said, companies hit you up.

Independent indies hit you up. Sometimes they just PayPal you a shitload of money, and then you just do a six-second Vine for them. There's times, there's some weeks. What's one you're proud of? I did some wonderful beats that I still kept up because I just liked the numbers that I did on it. You know, I did one for beats.

And what was the creative? Like, how did you put, was it the headphone? It was the headphone commercial thing that I did on the main commercial where the camera goes around the headphones. Mine was music changes through time. So I did something from the 80s um then 2000 and 2015 you're wearing the headphones the whole time and you you're it starts as a little wardrobe

a little no the wardrobe stays the same but it starts as a mini me supposed to be about i guess i'm like nine or ten or maybe even younger like five then it goes to like son who's supposed to be me again he's 14 then it goes to me you a grown man. And it's like the songs change. So it goes from I think a Michael Jackson song to maybe Bye Bye Bye to Young Thug where you can't even understand the lyrics. So you use these unlicensed clips. Well, that's because it's the Wild West.

You can use whatever you want on Vine. And Beats doesn't care. They don't care. There was no agency person or the brand person that you always have to deal with? There's no ads or whatever, so they don't care. You can use whatever you want. You can use any music you want.

People love when you use their music on Vine. One of our main jobs on Vine is to break music. I get contacted from almost every label out, from Universal to Capitol. We broke so many songs last year that you probably wouldn't even know, from Wiggle to My Hitter to whatever. Viners broke those songs. I got a check and I dispersed it amongst five or six Viners on my team

and we break the song. And so then, but then some of them you just say, okay, well, in the contract, I got to keep this thing up for a week and then I'm going to take it down. For a brand deal? Yeah, we keep it up. I mean, the contract is usually a week to 10 days

because that's when the Vine kind of like dies out and you pull it. I just didn't pull the Beats one because I liked it. But I've put up brand deals contract is usually a week or to 10 days because that's when the vine kind of like dies out and you pull it i just didn't pull the beats one because i liked it but i've put up brand deals and then after a week it goes down we pushed apps to the top of the app store you know we we push songs to the top of the itunes charts i put a song out myself and it's set on the top of itunes charts in the hip-hop section for two weeks you know so i mean so you've obviously asserted yourself in this medium and you've done so much with youtube and you know so i mean so you've obviously asserted yourself in this medium and you've done so much with youtube and you know we've got all the history there but i'd love to paint more of the derive the whole backstory and just go back to that so give us the day storm backstory

where'd you grow up i grew up in um i was born in Virginia, stayed there for like not even a year. And then my mom moved and I have seven siblings. We grew up, I grew up in Baltimore, the projects of Baltimore City. You know, Baltimore is a very unique town. Baltimore is one of the only cities in this country that they use to actually test new drugs. So like if you think about- Whose day? they use to actually test new drugs. So like if you think about it. Who's they? The government, whoever it is. Like if there's a new drug on the market, they just put it pumping in the black community in Baltimore.

So that's a lot of crackheads. Like when they say crackheads, that's like Baltimore. That's what pretty much was invented. I think of The Wire, the series. The Wire is like a very polished version of Baltimore. And it's super gritty. And it's super gritty. It's a great. I mean, have you watched it? Or you're like, well, I don't want to watch it. very polished version of Baltimore. And it's super gritty. And it's super gritty. It's a great, I mean, have you watched it?

Or you're like, well, I love that. I don't want to watch it. I watched some of it. And I was just like, oh, my God, this is not really my town. I mean, my town is worse than this. Worse than that? Oh, yeah. I can't imagine.

What do you mean worse? How could it be worse than what white people enjoy on television? As close as, you know? Because I actually saw it. That's what it is, huh? I saw like bodies in those row houses coming home from school. I would see dead bodies in the row houses. I seen like a seven-year-old girl get shot in the head in the bodega.

They don't call it a bodega. It's a bar in the corner store. You know, you see some crazy shit. How old were you when you see a seven-year-old get shot in the head? I was probably like 13. And this was just straight gunfire? Well, yeah, because some guy owed another got money, he didn't have it, and he shot at him and it hit the girl.

Did you know her? I didn't know the girl. No, she probably was from the projects across the street. But, I mean, in Baltimore, you're fighting every day. I mean, there wasn't a day that went by where we wasn't in some type of fight, you know, or me and my brothers wasn't fighting other kids and stuff, though. And you said in your Draw My Life video on youtube that your mom and you the kids you guys left your dad and that was when or your dad left well before i was living in the projects my my mom and dad was happily well not unhappily married and he was abusive

so my father was abusive man and he would hit on my mom so i would fight him and he would knock me out so she didn't want me to grow up and either kill him or him kill me so she left and took the kids and he didn't give her the house so that's when we moved to the projects so uh she took the kids we moved to the projects and then it's like whoa crap crap i'm 13 just becoming a teenager and i'm living in the projects now i gotta learn how to not be a suburban-ish middle-class kid. Now I got to learn how to be a ghetto kid. So from 12, I think I was 12, so from 12 to, you know, 17, 18, you know,

I'm growing up in the projects, trying to learn to adapt. And so at that point, was your dad just completely out of the picture? Yeah, he was bounced. He was some crazy liberalist who was, you who was a conspiracy theorist who just dipped. I don't even know if he's still alive. I heard a few years ago that he was dead somewhere, so I don't know. How did you adapt? To the projects?

You learn how to fight. My mom put me in things like karate, so I had my purple belt in taekwondo. And you learn how to just street fight a lot. We didn't have money. So we moved around a lot. I went to like five elementary schools, five middle schools. And we would just get evicted a lot. We was eating from behind the supermarkets.

Just ghetto shit. And to adapt, we would just fight. I had my brothers. My mom just taught us to stick together. You can't come in the house unless you bring your brothers with you. So it was one of those things where family was just tight. We're still tight today because of things that she taught. So, you know, you learn how to just become conniving.

I'd, you know, boost cars and running. You know, just things I wasn't too proud of. Breaking into people's houses and stuff, you know, to survive. You know, it's just what we did as teenagers. Did you get caught? Yeah, I got caught. I went, you know, I got locked up a few times. You know, I went to juvie first.

And then, you know, when you first get locked up, the first thing they say is you got to go in there and you got to knock somebody upside the head or you're going to become somebody's bitch. So I went in and I just had to knock some kid upside the head so they would know that I wasn't playing games. That worked?

Oh yeah, it worked. And so you were the youngest boy in the family, right? Younger sisters but all older brothers. Oh yeah, four younger sisters, three older brothers. One of my brothers was, he wasn't in the house as much because he was slinging, he was a street pharmacist. Oh, I get it. So I mean with three older teenage brothers in this, you know, the outcome of a black male in that situation, typically a lot of times you get killed or you go to prison.

Or you go to prison or you die of something like some disease or something. I mean, I don't have any friends that grew up in that area that made it out. But my mom, she was one of those types that kept us in activities. I think it was a blessing that we didn't have a TV and radio, so she kept us just doing creative things. We would make up songs and just rap about cars going down the street.

And we would just, and then she sent me to the School of the Arts on a scholarship because I was a good artist. So I went to Baltimore City School of the Arts and I started drawing murals on church walls and in mosques and things like that of The Last Supper and Allah. With permission.

With permission. I didn't just break in and do it, guys. So did the juvie experience, was that like the awakening and then it was the turning point to positivity or did it go further in the opposite direction after that? No, it went further in the opposite direction after that no it went further in the opposite direction after that um i think the awakening was you know um just just realizing how hard my mother was working to try and do something positive like she's she's busting her ass to get us to do something and just seeing

everybody around me die how bad did it get for you personally um it got bad but i think the music you know i was i was always running track but there's never no more money in in track and field but the music when a song hit the radio and my mother she approached me it's like god you got you know you boys you're talented you got nothing and you got a song that's playing in all those nightclubs oh really yeah we had you know they had baltimore club music like make way for the big girl all that type of stuff so we had had two hits on the radio. You and like a- Me and my brother. Okay. So my brother actually I felt was more talented than me. He was a better rapper.

He just had more skills. And did that come from like mixtapes being passed around or from knowing somebody and having- No, we knew a DJ. We knew a DJ and we would just go into his studio and just do stuff. And then we had a song that just blew up. And then all of the radio just picked it up and then my mother was like if you can make it here

then just go to new york and see if you can make it there and i'm like 17 18 years old my you know my son's on the way and i'm like i gotta get out of here so he threw me a party and i just went to new york yeah so so how old were old were you when you had your son? I guess I was turning 18 when Tavion was born. 18 or 19 years old. I wasn't 20 yet. But you were, so before he was born, you went off to New York in order to take your mom up on her challenge.

Another day, another challenge. Another day, another challenge. I knew a guy named Doobie who worked at Bad Boy Records, and me and him would talk back and forth. And I remember being in Maryland, and I did like 100 drops for different DJs, and I would email them to them, and they were using them in their mixtapes. So my name was blowing up. It was like this Day Storm guy.

He's kind of like blowing up on the mixtape scene. And then Doobie heard my stuff, and he was he was like man you got to come to new york i work at bad boy and in your mind someone works at a label you're gonna go you're like oh like this is huge so i packed up my little eclipse um you know i got a little money to get that i was working at red lobster down in maryland and i packed my clips and i just went to um new york i landed i was standing this crackhead's house on 135th, 134th and Adam Clayton Powell. And, you know, when I got there, I'm working at Bad Boy as an engineer with him. And he got fired because him and I think like Harv, Pierre, I don't know who it was at the time.

They got into an argument. And then Doobie was like, man, you know, if you came here with me, we out. And I'm like, hold up, what you mean we out? I came all the way from Baltimore. I can't just be out. But my loyalty had, you know, I had to roll with him. So I didn't have that gig anymore. But I had my job from Red Lobster transferred

to New York. New York. Actually, I worked there with Alpha Cat from YouTube. Really? The same Red Lobster in New York? At the same time? That's where you met? At the same exact time. That's where I met Alphacat. So we were working at Red Lobster, Times Square or whatever, and I got fired because I had

these long braids in my hair. And I remember even Alphacat was like, man, you might want to cut your hair. It's your only job. I ain't cutting my hair. Samson lost his hair. He lost his power. I'm on some shit like that. And then next thing you know, I got fired.

But I sued the whole Red Lobster organization and I won. What? How long did that take? It took years. But the point is, I won. So I didn't get any money at the time. So I'm jobless. And my last check was like.

You got seven different types of shrimp. Shrimp. On one plate. The scampi. I was like, man. Lifetime shrimp. And Alfredo sauce and biscuits. Cheddar biscuits.

Cheddar biscuits. But at the time, you have braids, but you have no job. You have no bad boy connect. Had nothing. I had a check. Then what? I had a check for like $400. And with the $400 and some odd dollars, I forgot what it was.

I guess you got to watch my Joy of My Life plug. And so with the $400 and some odd dollars, I brought five items. I called my brother and i told him what i was going to do it was my master plan at the time i i think back and i guess i'm crazy but i i paid my cell phone bill for two months i brought two outfits i bought an amp and a keyboard i got tenant windows for my car and um i think it windows for your car right so let me tell you the plan so so the plan was i knew see the crackhead right that whose house i was living in she had this pimp and he was a big black dude right and i knew i couldn't take him or at least i didn't think i could take him so i

knew if i didn't pay his rent he was gonna kick me out of the house right so i said all right this is gonna kick me out of the house so i need to tint the windows on my car so I can have somewhere to live. OK, got it. Got it. So privacy. Right. So I brought the amp and the keyboard, which is ironic because it's an eclipse. That's good. That's good. You're right. You're right. I brought the app and the keyboard because I knew that I needed a job. I knew that I had a couple little bit of pipes on me. And so I said in New York, no one knows my face like that. I could go into the subways and I can

sing and make some money at least so I could put gas in the car and get food every night until I get back on my feet. So that was going to be my job. So I was the amp and the keyboard thing. Right. Right. So then I bought the two outfits because I knew I had to continue to do gigs throughout New York because I wanted to get a big break. So I was still doing shows in Harlem, Brooklyn, Queens, and Manhattan doing shows because, and you got to look good at these shows because no one's going to take your demo or anything if you don't look good at the shows. So I had to get the outfits. Got to look dope in New York. Got it? Got it. So finally, I paid my phone bill for two months because the scariest person

in the world to me is my mother. And if she can't get in contact with me and i don't have my phone on she's gonna whip my ass plus i was lying to her telling i was hanging out with diddy and stuff and she's like how's your phone off if you're hanging with diddy so i had to keep living this lie oh wow so i kept my phone on and said i would just keep my phone on so that was what i did with the last bit of the money so next thing you know i'm living in my car and everything started to work out. I told my brother what happened. He thought I was crazy and we continued on that road. So your brother was up there with you too?

No, he was back home telling me, bring your ass home and take that $400 and get on that Greyhound. And did it get worse before it got better? Oh, it got way worse. I came home one day and the car that i that i was living in the eclipse the eclipse oh come on man it's a dope car whoever has an eclipse man shout out to you um the eclipse got burned up so sorry for laughing so they what you weren't in it

i hope no i was coming i was i was coming home and they burned my eclipse was burnt down. They said it was some kids. Okay, so it was a solar eclipse. It was a solar eclipse. The tinted windows didn't help. Dude, I can't. It was a solar eclipse. This story is crazy. Hey, man. I'm going to eat some more of this granola bar. It was a solar eclipse. They burnt

my car down. The amp, keyboard, everything was in the eclipse. Your whole life was in there. My whole life. I had the outfit on my back and my phone in my pocket, but I had to pay the bill. I was with Sprint. You know, they cut you off once you go a penny over. Everybody was Sprint.

Y'all know that. This ain't AT&T or Verizon. They burned your. Okay, so what happened then? Who is they, by the way? I don't know. The cops said it was some kids who did it or they said it was an electrical fire,

but I didn't get it because it was the middle of February. It was freezing. Snow was like fricking five feet high. How does it even aflame at that temperature? Science. Science. I don't know. Definitely weird science. So then what?

You're homeless. I'm homeless. Eventually I find myself living in a subway, so I'm in the subway system and I was one of those homeless people I'm homeless. Eventually I find myself living in the subway. So I'm in the subway system. And I was one of those homeless people in New York. What were you thinking at that point? You know, I've always wondered when somebody is in that situation, are they thinking,

I'm gonna get out of this. It's only a matter of time. Are you thinking like, is this the beginning of me being this person for the rest of my life? No, actually you'd be thinking like, damn, I'm hungry. Let me find out how I'm going to eat. Right. That's all you're really thinking about. Pretty immediate.

You're just immediate. You're just thinking about your day-to-day. You don't think about your future. You don't think about your past. You just think about that moment. You're like, all right, I'm cold. Okay, I'm hungry. Oh, my God. You got McDonald's. It smells so good. So these are the thoughts that's going through your head. You're not even, because you can't think straight. You got to feed your brain.

So I would sit up, you know, until six, I would ride the subways, you know, throughout the day and just try to figure things out. And, you know, when you finally eat,

then you start to figure like, okay, now what am I going to do? No one's going to talk to me because I'm probably dirty. So I'll go to Macy's and I'll wash up and I'm like,

okay, now what am I going to do? So you're just trying to- In Macy's? Well, yeah, because they had great sinks and it was clean.

Hmm. So I go to, you know, 42nd Street, go to Macy's, what's 42nd? Whatever Macy's is on and yeah, because they had great sinks. It was clean. So I'd go to 42nd Street, go to Macy's. What's 42nd? Whatever Macy's is on. And I would just go up there and wash up in their sinks. Really? You know. And that was just my life for about six weeks, which is a long time.

People are like, oh, you were just homing for six weeks. I'm like, that's a long-ass time. Yeah, it is. To be on the street. I mean, I don't camp more than two nights at a time. Yeah, right. It's hard. Especially in those rat-infested subway systems,

you know what I'm saying? In February. February is cold. Yeah, yeah. In New York. Right. So from there, I was trying to figure things out. You know, like, what am I going to do?

I guess I got to go home. So eventually I decided I'm going to go home. And I was walking to make the phone call to go home. True i was going to go call my brother and say yo i'm coming home i'm not gonna make it and a card and then this is what i'm saying to my joy my life it fell into the snow and i'm looking down at this card and i'm like do i do i call this card a business card business card so i like they're calling them on a business card or do i call my brother and go home what do you mean just a random number on a business? Because because the thing is like when you don't all these shows people give you a bunch of business cards and things so I had

A bunch of business cards and one of the business cards fell into the snow I picked the business card up and I said I'm gonna call that number I called the number on the business card this girl. She answers the phone. She's like oh my god They storm my boss. He loves you to death. He loves you. Demo, he has to meet you. And I'm just this proud-ass dude. I'm like, well, if he want to meet me, he need to meet me now because I got meetings. And then she's like, no, you can't meet him now. I got to be at Macy's.

Right. She's like, you're going to have to meet him in two weeks. And I'm like thinking in my head, I ain't got two weeks. I ain't got two hours. I ain't have two minutes. So I was like, no, you know what? Never mind. Because I thought it was bulls**t. Because it's all bulls**t to me by that point. Everybody's bulls two minutes. So I was like, no, you know what? Never mind. Because I thought it was bulls**t.

Because it's all bulls**t to me by that point. Everybody's bulls**t. So I was ready to hang up on her. She said, no, no, no. Let me just put Jonathan on the phone. She puts Jonathan Feingold on the phone. And Jonathan's like, oh my God. They stole my love you demo, man. You got to meet me. He said, but I'm about to go out to the Hamptons and chill. I'll meet you in a week. I said, Jonathan, man,

f**k you, man. Whatever. I'm about to hang. He's like, no, no, no, whatever. I'm out the house. No, no, no, no. Come meet me right now. Really? I call this bluff. I jumped the turnstile, went to the Lower East Side, and I met with Jonathan. Go into his pad, his laced. He got platinum albums and stuff all over the place. I mean, could he tell that you were just off the street at that point?

He was going by my demo. I know. But when you walked in the room. When I walked in the room, I don't know what the hell he was telling. But I told him my story like straight up. He was just by my demo. I know, but when you walked in the room. When I walked in the room, I don't know what the hell he was telling, but I told him my story straight up. He was just running his mouth. I can do this for you. I was like, well, look, look, man.

If you could do whatever for me, cut me a check. I'm living on the streets, and he was shocked. He was floored. So he cut me a check right on the spot. And that was some sort of a deal too? From there, I went from a hostel to a little apartment to a studio to a bigger studio. He started getting me placements on shows on MTV, VH1. I did some backing music for Entourage.

I did a lot of stuff. What years are we talking about? This was, I guess, 2005 or 2004, 2005. Okay. And I started getting wrecked into my track and field, into my fitness and everything, just in case the music didn't go well. So I just became a better athlete. All the while, my family knew none of this was going on.

What did they think was happening? They thought I was just at the label working the whole time. was going on. What did they think was happening? They thought I was just at the label working the whole time. So,

so, for me to actually start coming up and them to start hearing things, they was like, wow, you really came up. And I'm like,

yep, I sure did. So, it was just one of those situations. I mean, I've been through poverty, so it was nothing, you know,

like for me to like live that lie. And then they found out later, they was like, I knew something was up. I knew it. You ain't no s***. Well, you talked about some of the jobs that you had. They was like, I knew something was up. I knew it, you ain't no.

Well you talked about some of the jobs that you had. I don't know exactly what. 30 jobs. 30 jobs. Yeah. You mentioned some interesting ones. Construction worker, pizza boy, security guard, stripper? I was a stripper.

I got into stripping because me and my boy Sean, this girl named Janae had a party in college and I went to Morgan State then I went to Bowie State which is a d3 school but she had a party in college and the stripper didn't show up so my friends Shana and Candice invited me and Sean what's up Sean they invited us out to actually dance for them you know because we were fit so they said why don't y'all come dance for us we'll give you 200 bucks a lot of money in college we eat ramen noodles so I was like you know because we were fit so they said why don't y'all come dance for us we'll give you 200 bucks a lot of money it cost me ramen noodles so i was like you know yeah we'll come dance for you so we crawled out on our hands and knees on all fours out of the bathroom and it was nine girls

in the room i get up on the bed i'm dancing in front of the girls and this big girl she pulls down my pants and they all start screaming i'm like oh first i was embarrassed but then i wasn't anymore so next thing you know my sean's in the corner with four girls entertaining them and i'm on the bed entertaining the other five girls they paid us to to pull on i was like oh my god this is amazing yeah that that's a stripper that's a stripper you're like that's when in the moment you realize i am a stripper i am a stripper me yeah right she stripped when you are stripped but but the thing like, five, then we started a company called Five Guys Productions. It was me, Sean, this dude named Drez, and two other guys. And we would just go to different colleges, from Coppin to Morgan to Howard.

And we would just go to all these different colleges, and we would just dance for college girls. And right then, I found myself, I was a stripper. So I started, like, dancing at the nightclub. And so that was between Baltimore and New York. That was the college experience. The college experience. The stripper experience. That was fun.

Okay, so then I'm trying to connect the dots or I'd love it to be connected between that music experience to YouTube. Okay, so I was doing music. When I finally went to Universal Records and I worked under Finsta, I went to Atlantic under Damon Eden, who cut me my first check for Trey Songz, first single. And from there, I started writing for a lot of artists.

I met with Whitney Houston, which was amazing, rest in peace. So I was just meeting a lot of artists I met with like Whitney Houston which was amazing, rest in peace so I was just meeting a lot of artists and stuff You met Whitney Houston in person in order to potentially write a song I wrote three songs and they enjoyed the songs actually but she was going through some things and stuff like that so that was kind of crazy

but I was actually becoming a more noted writer like Neo at the time um young writer in new york but music doesn't sell as fast and it takes a while to get the checks and the clearing and stuff so i i knew i was good at fitness so what i did was i got involved with fitness and i became a personal trainer i got my um nasm my ac um ace EASM, which is three certifications through fitness. I became a personal trainer and then eventually a master trainer. I got my strength, stretch, Pilates, and kickboxing certifications also. So I started to train a lot of clients at Crunch Fitness. Then

I went over to New York Health and Racket. Then I went over to New York Sports Club for a few years also. So I'm training at New York Sports Club in Brooklyn. And I had this old ass lady and she was like, daystorm. I don't remember my workouts. Can you put them on the internet for me? So I started putting workouts on my space. And what, do you remember her name? Because she needs a thank you note. I see where this is going. I know. Right. So, um, I don't remember her name though, but I remember putting her workouts on myspace and she didn't were you like talking to her specifically no no but okay hello gladys yeah i was like look gladys damn it let me put your workouts on myspace so you could stop forgetting damn it gladys man so i'm putting gladys's workouts on myspace but she was too old that she didn't have a myspace account you know

because it was young guys me tom you know Tom. So we're sitting on MySpace and all of my other clients were able to log in because they had MySpace accounts, but she didn't have one. So I was like, I got to find someone else to put their work out. So I'm looking for it and then I found YouTube. I go to YouTube and it's this whole new world. I put it on there and when I put it on there, it was like getting all these comments

with the fitness videos, was getting comments from people I didn't know. I was like, I have somebody from Germany just hit my video. So then I read an article and it was talking about guys like you and phil franco and stuff like that i was like who are these what do you mean what is a youtuber what does that even mean so i started studying you guys and i'm like wow these guys have like this is crazy so that was back when before you could just get a partnership by uploading the video this was like when you had to have those three stipulations a certain amount of views subscribe blah blah so i said i'm gonna fight and get these subscribers when i get my just get a partnership by uploading a video. This was like when you had to have those three stipulations, a certain amount of views, subscribe, blah,

blah, blah. So I said, I'm gonna fight and get these subscribers. When I get my first Google check, I'm gonna be the man. So I'm right. I'm right.

Trying to get my first Google check so that I can start making money on YouTube. And that's how I started getting on the whole YouTube thing. Just fitness. I was just doing fitness, not no music at all. But then like, but you even like,

if you go back now to your earliest videos, I, there's a, I think there's a lot that you made that are now private, but there's still some fitness videos there, but they kind of have a hook to them. Oh, yeah. I don't know if you changed the titles later or if you even knew from the get-go from your studies that you give it that title. What was the high jump one? Oh, yeah.

It was like the highest jump ever or the best push-ups ever. I knew that I had to give it a title. I i knew that early all those videos got millions of views i have some of the highest view fitness videos because i knew if i titled them i knew years down the road that people will watch them because of the title and thumbnail i just knew that off the jump because this was back when you only could pick with the three thumbnails you couldn't even upload a thumbnail right so um i was doing that and then then I said, I got to become a YouTuber and not just a guy on YouTube. I have to become a personality.

And that's when, I think it was like 789 was that, that was the final moment for me because that's when I met you guys, I think. Yeah. And it was 788.

And I said, I can write songs. I've been doing this all my life. I said, I'm going to make a song. It was 11 o'clock at night. I wrote the song. I'm not, it's 789, whatever can write songs. I've been doing this all my life. I said, I'm gonna make a song. It was 11 o'clock at night. I wrote the song. I'm at, it's 789, whatever that song goes.

And just to fill people in, 789, July 8th, 2009. July 8th, 2009. Was a YouTube gathering of YouTube creators. One of the first. One of the first. The first that we went to. It was just creator-led, like some smaller YouTube channels. In New York. Pull this thing first. One of the first. The first that we went to. It was just creator led, like some smaller YouTube channels.

In New York. Pull this thing together in New York. Right. We flew up there and met you and a number of people. That's when I wrote that song and I said, I'm gonna get all these big YouTubers, and I studied all y'all. And I said, I'm gonna get all these big YouTubers

to be in my song. I said, why would they say no? It's a gathering, this is the way you do it. And if I write something and I show them that this guy has all this talent, they'll jump in. And that's when I did that song. We were in it, right? Yeah, you were in it.

Yes. Yeah, I remember, I'd forgotten that. Yeah. Dude. I studied you. Again, a student and then just a voracious appetite for figuring it out and then a tenacious commitment to get it, that's what I remember from the first time I met you was

voracious and tenacious mentally. And you were gonna kill, like you knew it, you know? And I even made the lyrics so that everybody could wanna sing it, you know? I didn't know your backstory. I know you're probably wondering what I do. Then you could come subscribe to my YouTube. And then you think of subscribe to my YouTube.

And if you think I'm almost famous, and then I would just let them know that I'm almost famous because I knew one day it would crack. Right, oh, it all makes sense now. Yeah, so I just had a plan, and then it just all just formulated and came together. And so the next few years, you experienced some incredible success on YouTube.

And then you've been pretty public about this. In 2012, there was a change on the YouTube platform that impacted your views. You actually wrote a piece in Forbes about that. Yeah, it's like you're the another day, another challenge guy. You did a whole year of that, which was really sent you through the roof on YouTube.

But then in your own words that, I don't know if you use the word collapse, but you tell us. Well, I did like, I found my niche, which was doing the challenges. It was a hundred challenges. I did a hundred challenges. I just did them like every Monday and Wednesday. I actually talked to Joe Penn, the mystery guitar man, and he was like, I'm doing Tuesdays and Thursdays.

They stormed. Why don't you do Mondays and Wednesdays? And you just blow up. Just do it every two times a week. He's like, if you write a good song, and I said, I can write Tuesdays and Thursdays. They storm on Monday, Wednesdays and Wednesdays. And you just blow up. Just do every two times a week. He's like, if you write a good song. And I said, I can write. I just write a good song. And next thing you know, I'm making CNN and everything.

National Geographic. You name it. And I'm starting to work with collaborators. And I collaborate with everybody. From you guys to Justine to you name it. Every YouTuber. Then I think 2012 came around. Late 2012, they started changing the platform.

And this was back when when if you had good content especially as a musician you can compete against the you know the Rihanna's the Eminem's and if you had good content you'll make front page and just you just do it it was fair YouTube changed the platform on us and when they changed the platform on us I'm not gonna be quiet about it that so I said yeah you changed the platform and when they did that I think a lot of the grandfathered channels in there started to lose a lot of views and my channel was hit and i noticed i started getting all these comments from people saying oh really i didn't get your video and then my twitter started started blowing up and i was like how many of you got my video and

everybody like none of us so i went to my facebook like none of us so i i realized that so i went and i took a trip to actually youtube because youtube YouTube loved me at the time and they still do so I took a trip to YouTube and I wasn't supposed to talk about it as they say but I don't care man I make my own money I went down there and I said is there a problem with my channel they said yes there is a problem with your channel that we can't fix on the back end they said

only about 20-30% of your your subscribers are getting your videos and we can't really fix it I said well can you at least take this over a million subscribers I have and push them to another channel so that I can start, cause I'm tired of making content and it, and it failed.

Cause as soon as they changed the platform, I went from getting a million views of video to literally probably like 150 to 200,000 views of video. So I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm at the top of my YouTube game and I'm like, wait a minute. So this is not you know

it's not working for me anymore so that's when i did the they was like well we can't fix it i said well you got to figure something out because you know i'm losing you know six seven you know so much money you know and not even that just my fans are not seeing it so i got people complaining to me like oh my god we're not getting your videos you sell out you left us i'm like no i'm posting but you're not seeing my video what do you want me to do so it became a thing so that's when i did the article and for new and new media rock star just telling them about how youtube was broken and they need to fix it because youtube started focusing on doing so many other things with vivo and i get it it's business but at the same time they forgot about the little guys like and people who spent their life growing

youtube and putting their name behind youtube and i wasn't going to be quiet about it. But then what's the conclusion of the matter for you at this point? Was it, well, now look at me on Vine. How do you see YouTube? Did something change, or did you shift? No, it's just like when I see something blowing up, you know, like I watch the kids, especially like my son and him. They're like cool kids.

So I'm like, if I see them on something heavy, I say, wait a minute, this must be the next thing. So he's like, Tad, are you on Vine? I'm like, what i'm like what's mine so i said oh god these kids are watching it every day so i said if it's this audience is these of the attention span is that short and now they're watching vine i gotta get on vine but what happened on youtube and how do you see it now because there's well i see youtube now it's just a place i see it for my personal channel i see it as a place to put longer form content. I still love it. And I know my fans are still there, the ones that can see it. And I'm never going to probably get the views that I used to get unless I grow a new audience on there. But now that I've grown, I have almost five million followers on Vine already. And I can take those five million followers and just start telling them to go check out my YouTube videos and I can grow a new audience that will see the videos. And although the million that I lost or whatever on YouTube already are gone, I could get a whole totally new audience to start watching my longer form content.

And I knew that was the overall plan. So I put a dedicated year and a half into Vine and I grew 5 million followers. And I'm going to take those 4.5 million followers. I'm getting 300,000, 400,000 followers a month on Vine. And your YouTube channel is the home for your singles that you release. So now I use my music channel just to release singles and things. And a lot of them are pushed through my Vine and stuff. I put out a victory dance and it's already hitting 600,000 views. That's good for me on YouTube.

And how much time and energy are you investing as a musician well you know music is my first thing so i'm always going to invest time but i'm not putting out eps or i'm not putting out albums anymore i'm just trying to get that one single because my job i already i already did a single that did a hundred thousand units i put out of a you know um a record and i sold 50 000 units. But is being a Vine comedian a real barrier to being a legitimate recording artist? No, I don't think so because of the type of comedy I do. Like, I'm not doing like, you know, I'm just being me

and they just find it funny. You know, it's not like me acting as a character. So it doesn't take away from me as a recording artist. And plus, in the beginning, I always established that I was a recording artist. So like, you know, I go in there and I just do funny stuff was a recording artist so like you know i go on there and i just do funny stuff and there's other you know musicians online that's just you know do funny stuff you know i'm saying so i don't think it hinders me i think but to be six but to be successful as either one of those things doesn't it take everything you've

got i mean especially with the way the music industry is today. No, because I've gained so many relationships now. You know what I'm saying? Like now, they're like, oh my God, now he's chilling with Justin Bieber now. Like, oh my God, now Drake's calling. Now Jake wanted to do a Vine. Nicki laughing at the Vines. Oh my God, it's so funny. You know what I'm saying?

So you got all the biggest musicians in the world who I think Vine is- All right, so hold on. We got to pause now because vine is is all right so hold on we got to pause now because you just dropped a couple of names and we gotta we got so you're talking hanging out with justin bieber well you're talking with drake well yeah because these are real experiences these are well yeah i got a vine with justin you know we did a vine with justin and at what point in in in his life was this? There's been many phases to the guy. He has a lot of phases. Actually, he's one of the coolest dudes, man.

We all go to parties. We just was at a party with him last week. So he's a cool dude. I think in his situation, a lot of people just don't understand. It's hard. I wouldn't want to live his life because he can't even go out in the street. And it's just difficult because when I go to his house, I see lines wrapped around the corner. It's like, can you go to Chipotle?

It's just hard to live that life. You just become this introvert and it's kind of a problem hanging around. But he's cleaned himself up a lot. I've seen when he went through the whole phases of messing with some hard stuff. Now he's good you know and he's working on music again he's he's he's doing well but when you talk about drake or nikki or any of these people i mean i guess your point is that your vine status is your is your access to everything whatever whatever you want whatever you want vine is with youtube it was more of an

underground uh movement but vine is more of an overground movement. The traditional really latched on to Vine. That's why you see them on Worldstar and things like that. And actually, in reality, I get more views from my Vines on YouTube than my YouTube channel ever got. Just by people putting... Like a compilation. Compilations. Yeah, my compilations do better than my entire YouTube channel.

putting like a compilation compilations yeah my compilations do better than my entire youtube channel so you know um vine opened doors that i never i never was able to touch you know the people that i wanted to contact even through my youtube you know that vine just opened those doors you know we work with everybody from kid ink to you name them we we probably work with them all on the vine because it it touched traditional media more than YouTube did. And now your son just passed a million followers on Vine. Yeah, my son had a million followers on Vine. Shout out to Tavion who had a million followers on Vine. So he's killing it too.

So, I mean, tell us about that. Cause we've got kids a little bit younger than him who are asking about starting YouTube channels, et cetera. And so far, they haven't done anything. But, you know, what's the status of your relationship with your son now? Does he live with you? How often do you see him? Yeah, it's just me and him.

We both live together. It's just me and him. I'm a single father who's raising him and his crazy-ass friends. I feel like I'm a father to everybody. But I raise him, you know, and he's doing well, you know, he, he felt,

he sees us vining and things like around there. So it makes him kind of want to do it. He got involved in it early and he was, uh, you know, um, now he has a million followers on vine. He's about to get,

you know, he just landed, he just did that national Jordan commercial. Um, um, you know, with Jordan's first commercial, one of Jordan's first,

um, shoe commercials that came back. My son was the main, main character in that. Um, and he's getting a lot of work, you know, jordan's first commercial one of jordan's first um shoe commercials that came back my son was the main character in that um he's getting a lot of work you know um disney nickelodeon now he's about to get like um a huge management manager who's gonna like really just try to push his career to the next level he's a little lazy tv i get off your ass but you know so what's your i mean what's your fatherly advice for him um i i just tell

him to do what he loves. You know, don't follow in anyone's footsteps. Do what he wants to do. Like if he wants to be a football player, doctor, astronaut, whatever he wants to do, I want him to do. I don't force him to do anything. And he just does it on his own account. I just want him to stick to something.

I just tell him don't be a quitter. That's my advice. Whatever it is he does, just don't quit. And he's doing well. You know, he't be a quitter. That's my advice. Whatever it is he do, just don't quit. And he's doing well. He gets his own brand deals. And I can't even control that little bastard, man. Well, I mean, you tell him not to follow in anyone's footsteps. But if he follows in yours, I think that he'll be fine.

He'll be just fine. Yeah, he'll be fine. So yeah, we appreciate hearing your story. And I would ask you to sign the table. But unlike any other guest ever. You just sat down and signed it. Oh, man. I mean, you know, hey, man, people at home, they tempt me.

They got water, coffee, and a magic marker, man. It's like, you know, what do you want me to do? So I grabbed the magic marker and I just had to hit the table. I mean, it's fine. It's done. It's good. Okay and all right. And this is done, I guess.

Thanks man. No doubt, thanks for having me. And there you have it, our Ear Biscuit with Day Storm power. I learned a few things. I think the main thing that I'm taking away from this is that if a business card ever drops in the snow, you should pick it up.

Call it, no questions asked. Well, you should call the number on the card. You shouldn't call the card. You should call the number on the card. How would I call the card? What do you mean, like a dog? I said pick the card up, you said call it. You mean the number on the card.

That's right, thank you for clarifying. I know that you're sitting there and whatever you're sitting in or on or listening to us and you were totally confused. Some of you are maybe jogging, maybe you're jogging. Thank you for clarifying that. Let DayStorm know what you think of his story and his conversation with us.

Tweet at him, it's DaySt storm and use hashtag Ear Biscuits. That's D-E storm, as in the thing where like lightning and thunder happens. Now in the TV movie that we're working on for this, for Day Storm's life, I do think that when the business card drops into the snow that there should be a beam of light on it because we can really sensationalize things.

Right, and then the snow starts to melt. No, no, the business card, when it falls, it melts all the snow around it and it can have a mouth and it can start talking. That's a little weird, that's going too far. And you really could call the card. A little mixed media action happening there. Special effects?

Claymation, it's gonna be a Claymation business card and it's gonna be like, Daystorm, call the number written on me. So look forward to that in 2018. But we're gonna start working on it immediately. We'll be Instagramming from the set. Yep, and you know what? That may be the final thing that causes us to start a Vine.

You know, making Day Storm the movie. Because I mean, I gotta tell you, I will say that every time we talk to someone who has a Vine presence, which I know we talked to Alphacat and then we've talked to Day Storm. Have we talked to anybody else who's really killing it on Vine? I don't know. Not yet.

We will do that more in the future. But- And you'll feel the pressure to join. I always feel this pressure like, oh man, it's only six seconds, right? I mean, we could do that more in the future, but- And you'll feel the pressure to join. I always feel this pressure like, oh man, it's only six seconds, right? I mean, we could do that. We can carve that kind of time out, right? What pressure do you feel having listened to this Ear Biscuit with us?

I hope it is a pressure to feel less pressure and just to lay back and enjoy what we're pumping into your ear holes. Negative pressure? Yeah. Feel the negative pressure. That's what we should have called the show. AKA the suction. Feel the suction. into your ear holes. Negative pressure? Yeah. Feel the negative pressure. That's what we should have called the show. AKA the suction.

Feel the suction. On your ear holes. Nope, that's not t-shirt material. Nope, okay. Just listen next week. Yeah, we'll be here.