Endless Thread - Endless Thread: The Musical

Episode Date: February 23, 2024

As Shakespeare once said...all the internet is a stage, and all keyboard warriors merely players. In this episode of Endless Thread, the members of the Nashville-based musical improv group Cherry Bomb stage an homage to their very active neighborhood Facebook group, and put some posts inspired by the Endless Thread subreddit to song. Credits: This episode was produced by Grace Tatter. Mixing and sound design by Matt Reed. Ben Brock Johnson and Grace Tatter are the co-hosts.

Support for endless thread comes from Mathworks, creator of MATLAB and Simulink Software, to design and develop engineered systems, accelerating the pace of discovery in engineering and science. Learn more at Mathworks.com. Support for WBUR comes from Is Business Broken, a podcast from the Mayrotra Institute at Boston University that explores questions like, why is innovation in healthcare so hard? Is ESG just greenwashing? And, of course, is business broken? Listen, wherever you get your podcasts.

WBUR Podcasts, Boston. Producer Grace Tatter, coming to us from underneath the podcast blanket. How are you, Grace? I'm good. Host Ben Brock Johnson. How's your blanket? It's very cozy. It's fluffy.

It's light. And also yet supportive in a way that Makes me feel at home. Well, Ben, I'm glad to hear that you're cozy and settled in because I have another question for you. Am I the greatest sandwich maker that has ever lived? Yes, I mean, you should know the answer to that. That was not my question. Valid investigation, though that might be.

My question is, have you ever been a member of a neighborhood online community, like a Facebook group or next door? Like part of an angry mob or something? Is that where you're? online. Like pitchforks? You were asking if I held a pitchfork or a torch? No, no, no. I'm thinking internet.

I'm thinking next door. Next door keeps trying to recruit me. I feel like either next tour got my email somewhere and it's arragging me or one of my weird own neighbors wants me to join so that I can like participate in the gossip about like the homeless guy who lives in the woods. And I'm just not here for it. I'm not interested. You're not here for it because you feel like it's going to be kind of like

Karenie, neighborhood watchy. Yeah, kind of. Yeah, it's like a lot of complaints about stuff that I don't need to complain about. Something that I always think is funny in these sort of neighborhood groups is people are every bit as like mean and abrasive as they would be in an anonymous online group, but you all know where each other live. Like, they'll go home and like type out some angry screed and then you're going to run into each other at the grocery store.

The NIMBYs are righteous AF and they don't. care who knows it. Exactly. So the neighborhood I used to live in in Nashville had the most active neighborhood Facebook group I've ever seen. It was also the most dramatic. Uh-oh. And truthfully, I'm like you. I love the drama. Was it like in a southern way, like a bless your heart kind of drama? Or was it like straight just ripping drama? Oh, straight drama. There have been multiple lawsuits that have come out of this private. Facebook group. Oh, my God.

Is there a warren out for your arrest? Are you, have you fled Nashville? That's why I left Tennessee. Oh, man. Secrets out. No, I'm purely a lurker in the East Nashville Facebook group, but it does always deliver. I literally left Nashville like seven years ago, but I'm still a member. Oh, you've been gone just long enough for the statute of

of limitations for crimes to kick in. That's perfect. Exactly, except I promise there's no crime committed in the state of Tennessee. My one crime is violating the policy of this Facebook group because I no longer live there. We'll see the next time you get pulled over in Tennessee, Grace. We'll find out. I no longer live in Tennessee, and that is a violation of the rules of this Facebook group. So it is quite possible I will be kicked out once this episode airs.

Oh, thank you for your sacrifice. You're welcome. All in the name of journalism. But the good news is I recently discovered a musical based on this Facebook group. Amazing. Amazing. East Nashville Facebook page, The Musical. And I am going to play you some of it. Are you ready for some musical theater? I mean, I've never not been ready for some musical theater. That's what I hoped you'd say. That's excellent. That's excellent. I love it. I'm in.

Where do I sign up? So East Nashville, Facebook page, The Musical, was staged for the Kimling Arts Festival in Nashville, but I came across it on YouTube. And as soon as I did, I was like, oh, my God, of course, the Facebook page has all of the fixings of the theater. I mean, I think a lot of online communities do. Like, they have a lot of drama, tension. Regular characters that everybody knows and loves or hates. Exactly.

You got your villains and your heroes. And in Nashville, you do have a lot of musicians. It just made perfect sense. So this really tickled my imagination, and I wanted to know more about how it came about. So I reached out to the person who conceived of the musical. I'm Emma Supika, and I'm an improviser. Emma is the founder of Cherry Bomb, the music. musical theater improv group that staged East Nashville Facebook page.

Are they named after the song? Cherry Bomb? I don't know the song. You don't know the song Cherry Bomb? I'm so sorry to disappoint you. It goes, hello, Daddy, Hello Mom. Chitchit Cherry Bomb. No?

Nothing? Why do you bet? I don't even need to know any of these songs because you'll always sing them for me. You know what? You go to hell. listen to the song when I have been. What does the Cherry Bomb Theater Improv Company do? So for the most part, they improvise musical theater based off of all sorts of prompts,

which we'll get to more later. But this was actually scripted because, again, the East Nashville Facebook page is such an institution, is so iconic, it needed a special treatment. I have had this idea for a very long time. like years of being in the group and just seeing characters. I mean, people who live here who present their lives, ask these questions, get into these ridiculous arguments. We already have this like cultural location

because East Nashville is kind of its own little city. It's like separate from Nashville. It's its own thing, separated by a river, culture, all of this. There's a lot of people who live on the east side who don't even cross the bridge Like, they just won't. And I agree. I'm like, I don't want to go to that thing. It's across the river.

I'm not going to do that. The Facebook group specifically is there's drama, there's comedy, there's love. There, I mean, there are all the themes that you need to make a great story. Just happen all the time. A musical, not just because that's one of my favorite art forms to play in. musical theater, like, can't take itself seriously. You know, I mean, it does. Like, we clearly have, but, like, the real world,

people aren't just breaking out into song randomly. You know, it's a little suspension of disbelief. And so that, it's already there. Like, all the ingredients are there for this to be a musical because it's kind of ridiculous, and so is musical theater. Is this someone who witnessed someone in the real world and is now writing about them on the Facebook group. That's terrible.

It was a verbatim missed connections post. Well, you know what? That's beautiful, man. Like Emma said, it all happens. All of the beauty happens in East Nashville. Yeah, people are witnessing each other farting in public and chasing each other down. I guess that's Nashville for you. Sure is.

Ben, I thought of you when she said that people don't actually break in a song I was like, clearly Emma does not work with Ben Brock Johnson. In my real world, we do. We do. Okay. Well, thanks for thinking of me. Always. So are you feeling inspired? Are you ready to write an endless thread the musical? I mean, yeah. I feel like that's what I'm trying to do all the time. I'm just waiting for people like you to join me in song, Grace. Well, since I'm not musical, actually, I enlisted Cherrybaum, Emma's improv group to help us with this. Okay.

So they jammed out some endless thread music for us at their most recent rehearsal. Oh my God. And it is a lot of fun. And we will hear some of it after the break. Oh my God. Okay. I can't wait. At Radio Lab, we love nothing more than nerding out about science, neuroscience, chemistry.

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partnership's team. Become a thought leader. Recruit new talent. Reach new audiences. Whatever your goal, we can help. Discover how the magic is made at WBUR.org slash creative studio. So we're back and we're going to hear some songs from Cherry Bomb, the Nashville-based musical theater improv group behind East Nashville Facebook page, The Musical. So they kindly allowed me to zoom in to their most recent rehearsal and they asked me to bring three separate Reddit post that they could sing about. They had no advanced warning. They had not seen these before. I just like dropped the links in the chat as they were rehearsing. And they made up these songs on the spot with minimal, like there was like a little bit of chatting beforehand, but like 30 seconds. Minimal chatting,

no rehearsing whatsoever. I cannot wait to hear this. Okay. Yep. So then the first post I gave them is a Reddit post that actually you have been wanting to do an episode about. Will you read it for me? Yeah. The title of the post is, What's Up with the Obsession over Stanley Cups? And it's from R-slash Out of the Loop. Non-American here.

Stanley Cups seem to be a big thing in the U.S. People seem to love and even collect them. Just watch this video here with a girl, happy crying about getting a Stanley Cup for Christmas. And there's a link. What's going on? It's just a cup, you know? What makes it so special?

Okay, so here is what they did with that. This is amazing. This is amazing. Yeah, I cannot imagine being that quick on my feet. Being able to rhyme on command like that. That was truly something. I'm amazed. Yeah.

I'm so into it because this is basically how I move through life all the time. So like I'm making up songs while I'm picking up cat puke off the floor in my house. You know what I mean? So this is, I'm in. I'm in. So the next post I gave them was from the Endless Thread subreddit, from user Captain of Trouble. And it is related to tunnels because we do love to talk about a tunnel.

Do you want to read this post for me as well? The title was, if you like tunnels. Have you heard of Colin Furs? He was a plumber who started making wacky machines and gathering a big YouTube following. In the pandemic, he started building a tunnel from his house to his shed. He's now connecting to the bunker man cave

he built at the end of the garden and to a massive underground garage where he plans to store as DeLorean, which will lift up out of the driveway. It's all really well documented on his YouTube channel, including how he turned a secret project into something with planning permission. Okay, a lot of potential here.

Yes, yes, there is. I mean. Yes, there is. I'm just curious, actually, if you were to turn this into a song, do you know, like, what you'd latch onto? Oh, man, I'd be doing some like, dig, dig, dig. Like, I'd be doing some of that, and I'd be like, something around, like, join me in the tunnel.

I'd be, you know, I'd be very, I feel like it'd be very, um, I feel like it'd be very, very almost like militaristic, the Ansgar marching two by two. I'd be bringing some of that energy. And then I'd throw in some like back to the futures references, you know? I'd be singing about the DeLorean popping up. And then I'd be like, I'd have somebody off to the side, be like, Marty! You know, like I'd be throwing some of that in there. That's what I got.

Then we have to send you to Nashville. I think that this is your calling. Okay, without further ado. I feel like there's some things in there's a slightly different different approach than you but you've latched on to some similar details yeah yeah it's great it's great i mean i'm not nearly as talented as them so i'm just in awe of their Well, we have one more that they did for us. And this is something that someone had posted on the endless thread sub about suggesting that maybe we look into for a future episode about the rat hole in Chicago. Which is not as it turns out a leather daddy club, which is what I assumed.

But it's actually something else. I had assumed there was like a hole like that rats lived in or came out of. But in fact... It is a rat shaped hole. So I gave Cherrybaum this post from our Chicago. It's kind of long, so let's just read an abbreviated version. Okay. Hey, everyone. I live in the three flat directly in front of the Chicago Rattle. I came here to politely ask that you please stop congregating, partying, and getting married in front of our house.

My neighbors and I have been struggling. I'm sorry, I don't mean to laugh at this person. It's just... Since this thing went viral, here are some of the things we've had to deal with. Garbage piling up, including vapes, cigarettes, alcohol, and food. Vandalism, people filming videos to promote things like improv shows, radio stations, businesses, etc. And leaving advertisements and flyers on our property. I know the WBOR.

We didn't do the WBUR TikTok main character video in front of the rat hole. That's sad. Okay. Our mail carrier has been skipping our house. house due to the crowds and news crews. They're not getting their mail. People doing weird-ass quote rituals like prayer circles and chance late at night, question mark. This weekend was absolute hell for me and my neighbors. We have always liked the rat or squirrel. It was a cute, quirky little thing in our neighborhood. People would smile and laugh as they walked by and that

was it. It's been there at least 20 years as far as I know, but now the internet has learned about it and taken things way too far. What was once a fun little quirk has become a trashy, cheap marketing ploy. Okay. Are you ready for this one? So ready. This is very B-52s right now.

And I'm here for it. Rock lobster! I'm most! It was amazing. I mean, standing ovation for Cherry Bomb. Just, wow. Amazing.

So good. They did not hold back for us at all, and I really appreciate that. I know. That was huge. I just, how much does it cost for them to follow you around just for like a week? I will inquire. That's amazing. Truly amazing.

Thank you so much for listening along with me. I was delighted by everything that Cherry Blam did. And I think what drew me. initially to this was obviously East Nashville Facebook page, The Musical, because it was a group that I like a lot, but also because it draws attention to the blurry lines between life, online, and quote unquote, real life. Like, the musical is based on posts in the Facebook group, but it's not really about the Facebook group. It's about the community and the people who really live there. Or maybe it is about the Facebook group, but now that's kind of the same difference.

Yeah. I mean, to me, like, I'm just like, you know, it's sort of like an art imitates life, imitates art thing, right? Except like insert the internet. It's kind of amazing. And I feel like this, to me, this is like channeling the negative energy of like what sounds like exists on the Facebook group and trying to like disarm it in a way, you know, like disassemble it by using humor. And like I'm a huge fan of that. Yeah, it's just making the world a more joyful. fun place, which is the type of content that I'm always here for. Same. Same. Thank you for bringing

us this amazing, incredible example of joyfulness, born by terribleness on the internet. You're so welcome. And thank you so much to Cherrybaum for taking the time to do that with us. We really appreciate it. Oh my God. Cherrybaum, I hope you're available for Bamitzvahs and birthday parties because I'm definitely going to be spreading the word. please let us know if you have an improv musical theater group in your town because I think we should have a chapter in every city personally this episode was produced by me Grace Tatter and hosted with Ben Brock Johnson who also performed Chichich a Cherry Bomb by the Runaways

Mix and Sound Design by Matt Reed We played excerpts of the song that Cherry Bomb, the Improv Group, performed for us you can find the whole songs on our website, wb ur.org.org slash endless thread. Cherrybaum is Emma Supika, Mike Corey, Amelia Rossetti, Caroline Connor, Camie York,

Kim Herman, Mike Garvin, and Alex Dolazol. A talented bunch. We will see you all next week. Bye.