Going Deep with Chad and JT - EP 406 - COBRA STARSHIP lead singer Gabe Saporta + Expert talks Social Media effects on the Brain.

Episode Date: September 17, 2025

Today we are joined by Gabe Saporta and Sean Barrett. Gabe is the lead singer for Cobra Starship and was one of the early contributors to the East Coast rock scene. Starting in basements and dining halls to touring in huge arenas. We also breakdown the history of the music scene around rock and punk and how it evolved into pop/radio tunes with autotune and technology. Sean has been the host of The Gathering of the Juggalos for the past 3 years so we dive deep in the culture and find out why all juggalos love Faygo. We also take maybe our BEST CALL ever. Our friend Ramsey, a social media expert and app developer, breaks down how social media companies intentionally keep you on their platform and create an algorithm for you that may involve fear or rage to keep you emotionally involved. To end the episode, we call the bro who drove JT home from the Oasis concert in a PediCab to find out more about the industry. #goingdeepwithchadandjt #chadandjt #podcast #cobrastarship   More about Gabe here: https://www.instagram.com/xbrotegex/ More about Sean here: https://www.instagram.com/mrseanbarrett/ Come see us on Tour! Get your tix - http://www.chadandjt.com NEXT BROS BEFORE JOES SHOW (SEPT 19) HERE: https://www.showclix.com/event/joes-september19th We are live streaming a Fully unedited version of the pod on Twitch, if you want to chat with us while we're recording, follow here: https://www.twitch.tv/chadandjtgodeep Grab some dank merch here:https://shop.chadandjt.com/ TEXT OR CALL the hotline with your issue or question: 323-418-2019(Start with where you're from and name for best possible advice) Check out the reddit for some dank convo: https://www.reddit.com/r/ChadGoesDeep/ Thanks to our Sponsors:Brotege: The Best Skincare products for bros - get started today for just 10$ Visit https://www.brotege.com/deep HomeChef: The Best Meal Kits! Go to https://www.homechef.com/godeep and get 50% off your first box + free dessert.  BILT REWARDS: Pay your rent with BILT and start earning points towards travel, fitness, restaurants and more! Go to https://www.joinbilt.com/godeep to get started today! Rag & Bone: The best Fashion and Clothing to look sharp and fresh. Denim Jeans, Shirts, Jackets & More!  Get 20% off your order today!  Go to https://www.rag-bone.com and use code GODEEP PRODUCTION & EDITS BY: Jake Rohret

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Go to homecheft.com.com.com slash go deep. That's homechef.com slash go deep for 50% off your first box and free dessert for life. HomeShift.com slash go deep must be an active subscriber to receive free dessert. Guys, we are on tour, the How to Be Stoked Tour. This is not your normal stand-up show, okay, guys. It's a multimedia presentation on how to get stoked. This will change your life, okay? September 23rd, Tampa, September 24th, Orlando, September 25th, Fort Lauderdale,

then we got Sacramento, then we got my one-man show back in L.A. on October 4th. Then we got Austin, Texas, Plano, Nashville, Columbus, Cincinnati, Pittsburgh, Pottstown, Philadelphia, Santa Cruz, Dallas, Fort Worth, Albuquerque. Get your tickets at Chad and JT.com. Don't miss it. All right, let's flip it up and rub it down. Here's... Crip and Rooker.

Yeah, dude. Welcome to the... Go to Dibu JT's a podcast. I'm here with my compadre, Jean-Tomas. What up? Boom, clap, Stokers. And we're here with... We got two guests today.

Two legends in the house. We got Gabe Supporta. Yes, thank you. We've got one legend, really, here. No, but... You're the legend. Oh, wow. Thank you.

We got Sean Barrett. Hi. His last name Barrett, right? Last name Barrett. Sean Barrett. Gabe, you're the... Not only are you the founder of Brodege, our sponsor. but you're also

the lead singer of Cobra Starship I am yeah yeah yeah and Midtown which I was listening to on the way here dude

dude that music fucking rips thank you bro yeah I've always been a midtown guy it's so good thank you bro

thank you yeah people are like hey are you gonna put on your music I'm like dude I've put out between my two bands like imagine the songs that did not come out

I'm like so done writing music I can't I don't think I can write anything can we track a quick journey through both oh a quick journey okay

So I was 13 years old Got a bass from my bar mitzvah That's how it all begins My friends were starting a band They're like, when you're baseball, I'm like, oh, I'll play bass I had no musical ability I didn't realize that I have a problem with my hand Like my pinky's really short

It's like much shorter than the other fingers Whoa cool So it's like so my dexterity is really bad So only three three fingers really work Is that hereditary? Do either of your folks have that? I don't know I think it means that you're really smart actually Oh yeah Is it any kind of that thing?

Yeah But yeah, so I just started playing. I started playing music really young. I went on my first tour, like summer of my sophomore year or junior year of high school. And you were from New Jersey, which has a pretty robust punk scene. Well, yeah, I think our, like, we helped create that. Like, us and all the bands were around. The thing about New Jersey is that it's like this big suburb between the two major cities of Philly and New York, right?

So when you're a kid, you want to go see shows. I remember, like, taking, like, the bus to Manhattan all the time to see shows. But, like, there wasn't a lot of stuff locally. There was, like, this kind of hangover of, like, the 80s, hair metal, Bruce Springsteen days. So there were, like, a lot of old rockers that were in Jersey. And they had, like, these old bars, but they were all, like, 21 and up. They might do a show that's all ages, but they had expected you to sell tickets. So it was, like, the worst of the worst.

So what me and my friends started doing is we just started renting out these, like, VFW halls. Because there's a ton of them in Jersey, VFW. W halls, rotary clubs, all these kind of like places that like old people just had. And what were these other bands that you were doing it with? Oh, oh man. So like all, it's funny. Like so saves a day comes from that same world.

My Kim comes from that same world. I think the dude from Mike Kim was in a band called Pensee Prep. I think that there was a lot of like good local bands. There was a band called Catch-22, which were like a big ska band that signed to victory. There's a band called Bigwig that was like a fat wreck band. So like this is like... Was brand new?

that scene too? Brand new were in like a sister scene. So the same thing was happening in Long Island that it was happening in Jersey. So Long Island and Jersey were kind of coming up at the same time, same philosophy, these young kids that, you know, listen to music, we're finding out about it. It's like early days of the internet. And like at the beginning of the internet, it was all kind of just like music heads. Because if you are a kid in your little town and you're the only one, you know, that likes

this music, you're not going to find anyone in your town. that's listen to that music but you go on the internet all of a sudden there's like thousand kids there so like they would all like get to know each other's like oh i live like four towns away i live here live there and we'd meet up in the city for shows and then we just started doing our own shows um and then that kind of like was it was there mosh pits what was the energy of the crowd full-on mosh pits dude my first like local show like flyer five dollar vfW show was like a hardcore show and my dad that kind of singing yeah it was more like youth crew hardcore So there's so many delineations between the different like sub genres.

There's a lot of sub genres. Yeah. I wanted to ask you about that. We can do that later. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, man. So like, you know, but I think the cold thing my jersey is that it was kind of like a melting pot. And a lot of different genres all kind of fucked with each other.

So like Thursday, for example, like Thursday, that's by the time I got to college, we rented a house on Hamilton Street, all went to Rutgers. And we did shows in the basement of the house. Like the house we got just had this first. big basement was full of just like garbage we spent a week clearing out and we did shows um and Thursday it was like one of the bands that played our basement and then there was like bigger shows at vfWs and i think their first like big show they borrowed our equipment and just came on stage and did like a few songs yeah so it was cool a lot of different styles of music a lot of bands played with each other and fucked with each other and it kind of all just grew from there jersey had a very very

fertile scene what's that like when you first at your first show and you first see the mosh pit well I was scared to be honest so like I was like I was like maybe 14 my dad like dropped me off at a VFW show as a hardcore show and it's like a lot of kids just like you know practicing all of their moves you know like hardcore had like some like the spin kicks the spin kicks you know the pizza toss there was I think there was like a sick of it all it's the pizza it was like you like do this while you're moving your legs there's like a great old I think it's a sick of it all video or something that shows like all the moves I've seen that yeah you've seen it picking up pennies yeah starting the lawnmower exactly exactly so there's a lot of that so

so hardcore was really big at that time too there was um because gorilla biscuits had kind of just broken up and after breaking up they became bigger than ever and that was like the new york hardcore youth crew kind of thing that was happening that was like right before my time that was like the early 90s and was that still like CBGBs and those kind of yeah they were doing like the sunday matinees at CBGBs those had stopped by the time I was um I was I was I was going to shows I remember once when I was a kid. So like the thing that was really big when I was a kid was like rancid was like huge, right? Yeah. Like and so like there's a lot of like these like summer squatters to call them like kids that would come from like Connecticut or whatever and just like hang

in the city and pretend to be broke but they were like really these trust fund kids. Yeah they're like they'd buy like three criterion DVDs. Yeah. No DVDs yet then bro. This is I'm ancient. Lasers. The sound was yeah. So so um and these kids like would spend a lot of time just like doing their hair i remember there's a moment where i had liberty spikes and it's crazy you know so you're you're kind of just like figuring it all out as a kid and then what's cool by jersey was it just felt less pretentious than than the scene in the city and um and gorilla biscuits had broken up but sieve which was a singer of gorilla biscuits had was like the continuation of that like walter from grillabiscuits was in quicksand wrote all the

records for the for the first SIV record and I was like it had a moment on MTV so that was like big on on the radio they had a couple hits and it was a cool hardcore record so that was like a lot of influence I think for the bands in the tri-state area we're influenced by that that's awesome so hardcore is like getting big at the time and then so you tour with midtown and those your notes yeah I took a lot of wow I love that okay you're prepared I'm not prepared at all okay he's a master interview he's like Charlie Rose without the controversy yeah I don't do zooms with my pants off. Well, I do, but I don't show it to someone. Um, so your closest buddies were a newfound glory. Yeah, yeah, there were some of our closestness. Exactly. So, okay, so what

happened was basically, so New York, you have like this hardcore thing going on, right? Hardcore's really big. On the West Coast is really where rants it comes from and like Green Day and then you have fat records popping up. No effects is getting huge. So that's kind of like infiltrating a little bit to the East Coast. But there wasn't like, the vibes were like a little different. Like the West Coast thing was more like skate punk just kind of like really just more nihilistic more like fuck you mom you know like fucking around and just like breaking shit and on the East Coast is very much like it was almost like it's like I don't I think it was like PMA if you ever heard that that the expression positive mental

attitude is very like straightage was big there's a lot of ideology a lot of idealism out of the stuff on the East Coast so it felt more serious like minor threat is that where that kind of derivated from? Yeah, Straight Edge came from minor threat. They started that. So that was D.C. in the early 80s. And they came about, I mean, while we're doing a whole music history thing, so basically the New York punk scene kind of started with bad brains, like in the late 70s, early

80s. And then it kind of died. And then D.C. popped up in like 82, 83, 84. And that became really big. And then Henry Rollins was in a D.C. band called S.O.A., I think. Yeah, state of alert. And then he got picked up to be the singer of Black Flag. So he moved to California.

So the whole D.C. thing was getting really big in the early 80s, but straight edge came from that. But by the time I was playing music, that was kind of over. And Fugazi was really big. Fugazi is in McCa's other band, which is like a post-hardcore band. So post-hardcore was like getting mainstream. Like those bands like Helmet, like I said, Siv, Orange Nine Millimetre. A lot of like these bands were getting signed and going on the radio. And they were older. These guys were like, you know, 26, 27, maybe in the early 30s. you know, we were like 14, 15. So we're the generation prior to that. That was what's cool about straight-edge guys.

Those you'd have 30-year-olds hanging out with 14-year-olds because they shared a similar lifestyle. Oh, man. That's true, though, right? I don't mean in any kind of salacious way. It's just something I noticed, like, just in those pockets of culture. I don't know, Sean, do you know a lot of 30-year-old straight-age guys? I did.

Did. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Now they're not really loud out. Didn't you do a thing? I did a bit about being straight-ed? Yeah. Tell us about that.

I mean, explain a bit. It's never quite the same. It's just like a satire thing sitting with this guy talking about straight edge and how people usually make that decision before their like frontal lobe is fully formed. And then I'm with my buddy and I didn't even realize when we filmed he has two X's on his tank because he used to be straight edge. But yeah, then there's a video as well that explains a better. You did the video and you made fun of it and then like the comments where people were just like, I've been straighted my whole life. Yes. Yes. Yes. Okay, self-validate all you want. I used to do kettlebell workouts with the guy who's straight-edge.

Oh, yeah, he's probably intense. He was intense, but he was very gentle. Yeah, no, straight-edged. It's great. Like, there's no problem with it. It's great. You also just be like, I don't drink and you could just say that. Right.

Yeah, why do you have to be part of like a club? Yeah, that's the part I don't get is the- and they would get mad at other people. Like, I remember this guy Conley was straight-edge and he'd like beat you up if you were drinking. It's like, isn't it enough just for you have your own? There's straight-edge games. Right.

Right. Yeah. Yeah, so that's not happening a little later, you know, like, like, then Earth crisis came out, and that was like... It's like our version of, like, an Islamic fundamentalist. Yeah, for sure. It's just goes to show you anything that's done to an extreme is always going to go bad, you know. So, so I think I like the ideology. I mean, I was straight-ed-hage for, for my whole, like, punk career, quote-unquote, like, as a kid until I was 19.

Sex-wise, too, or... Because I know some people delineated between promiscuous sex and then just having hedonistic sex. Yeah, I guess, I mean, I was always like a girlfriend kind of guy, you know. That fits within the ideology. So, so, if it fits in the idea. As I remember it from my time. Straight age almost sounds more hardcore than parting because you were talking about straight edge.

I was like, wait, is this a different thing than just not drinking? That's what I'm saying. Yeah, that's why it's so confusing. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's like a very, that's what I'm saying. The East Coast, that's a very East Coast thing. That really was not happening on the West Coast until maybe a little later. And then you got signed by fueled by ramen.

And that's like the biggest label. yeah that was that was cobras so midtown was signed by a west coast like punk label called drive-thru records oh i know them they're huge like they would put out compilation albums that had all the best bands right right exactly so that was like the early early days and so that the drive-in on on that no the driving was on fearless um and is that how you got on those like punk goes records yeah those compilations were really big at the time because shoot i just listened like non-stop because they would give them away for free like that's how i learned a lot about a lot of bands because like you'd go a record store and it was like maybe like four bucks or like whatever like so record stores were like a big thing back then I used to love going to record stores and you just would hang out learn about new music learn about your bands like read zines at record stores like this is like before the internet or like early early days of the internet and zines were like kind of culturally specific magazines that just had like artists contributing to them they were like you printed them yourselves like I would I had a zine when I was a kid I just would go to kinkos and just like give it out you know oh cool so you just write it up you kind of lay it out it out it's

It's like hodgepodge, you cut up the pieces, and you make your master and then just, like, photocopy it. I loved your version of your love on the. Oh, yeah. That was, that was, that was great. Thank you, bro. Thank you. Wow, you went deep. That's the podcast.

Go on deep, baby. Wow, you're pulling the drive-thru? This is great. You're doing research at the same time? Who's doing that? And then did you, like, just being a little. This is, these are all the comments. Yeah.

This is great. So, very straightforward. So then did you just kind of see a limit to that scene? And then you were like, I want to break into a broader, like, kind of musical audience? That happened between Midtown and Cobra Starship. Like, when I got into music, I didn't know there's a thing called the music business. I just loved playing music, and I was having a great time. And I just wanted a tour and, you know, go on adventures.

I remember the first tour I did, I basically booked it by opening the phone book and, like, calling record stores in different cities and just been like, who are the cool local bands that sound like this, you know? And we just found other bands when we trade shows with them. And that's how we just booked a tour. very very DIY. And then like slowly our DIY scene got really big and like bookie agents used to call us when they needed a show for a band that was playing Philly, New York. They had an off day like on a Thursday or something and they would call us and we'd book the shows.

And those shows ended up being as big or if not bigger than their New York shows. So that's when it kind of started going crazy and started getting a little bigger. My brother had a collective called the Bombs Shelter Collective and they put on like huge shows. They did the get-up kits at the Jimmy World like big and it started becoming a big thing. They were like we're bringing a a stage until like a fireman's hall and you know like speakers and the whole thing and all of a sudden it became a much bigger thing yeah and then so how did cobra starship start so basically cobra starship started um so we signed we signed a deal drive-thru drive-thru ended up getting bought by a major um that major went and yeah hit that bro that major got um like got merged so this is the

beginning of mp3s so the whole business started taking it a nose dive. So people were getting fired left and right. That major label was MCA. It got kind of disappeared and absolved into Interscope. So all of a sudden we didn't have a label and it was just confusing and I just didn't like being on a major and having no control. Were you guys pissed at Napster too? I, you know, I think as a young band as a young, no, he's like the establishment, bro. Like when you're a young band where you care about us, people hearing your music, you know, you're not really making money anyway. You just want people to hear your stuff. right so you're in the right age bracket we're like this is good it's a democratization of music

everyone can get it now yeah for sure for sure um i remember that like my first meeting at like the big major label when you know we come from drive-through they like ran their business out of their house they're like friends like doing stuff it felt very like small organic and then all of a sudden it's like okay we're partnered with mca so you walk in and you're just like wow this is like a huge business you know um so you walk into this office and i remember the the head a andr guy played a record He's like, let me play you something. I'm like, okay, you hear that? I'm like, yeah.

He's like, how does it sound? Like, sounds good. He's like, that's not a CD. I'm like, what is it? He's like, it's like, it's an MP3. Oh, my God, I know MP3? He's like, but look how clear it sounds. You can't tell the difference.

I'm like, yeah. He's like, we're done for. Do you see a lot of existential dark night of the soul? Do you see a lot parallels from today with AI coming in and the kind of MP3 boom? In music? Yeah, bro. I think in music, it's a scary time for music right now.

Very scary time. Have you seen it help artists? Like, has it augmented the process at all? Where, like, if they're, like, missing just, like, a certain instrument or if they just need to add a note, they can just do that easier and cheaper? Or do you think it's, do you worry it's just going to be a wholesale replacement of artistry? You know, there's always this interesting thing about, like, does the art affect the medium

or does the medium affect the art? You know, and, like, you see it throughout history when, like, we went from, like, 45s, that were singles and it was like a singles led music business. It was just about like having a hit song, having a single, all of a sudden you get this long player of the 33 and all of a sudden artists are making albums, you know, which are experiences that people listen to for an hour. And then the artist, the fact,

the artist is back in the driver's seat, right? So I think that we're going through that shift right now. I don't know what it's gonna look like, but clearly, you know, AI is a tool, right? So there are going to be people who approach that tool with an artistic perspective that we can't think of. But what is an artist? An artist someone thinks outside the box about something

and does something different than uses something, not the way it's supposed to be used, right? So they will probably figure out something cool to do with AI that we can't even imagine. And maybe that'll be the new art. Like I'll give you another perfect example. Like here's a great analogy. Like when I started making records,

I'm so old that my first record was made on a reel to reel, on tape, right? There was no computers, like you really just recorded stuff on the tape. That was my first experience in the studio. And as I was, you know, my career was growing, pro tools and all this stuff and autotune and editing all started coming into the picture.

And at the beginning when these things came out, people were very against it. They're like, fuck that. That's not real music. That's not live. You're editing. You know, you're not getting the take live. You're not really doing it.

Like it was all just felt like a big, a big push against that. And then, you know, and then with auto tune, people like, oh, fuck you use autotune on a record. Now people use Autotune live. Like everybody uses. is Autotune Live.

And this is something I just discovered because I just played my first show in 10 years, you know, last year. And now everyone's using Autotune Live. I don't know that, you know. And if you're young and you grow up with it, you're not going to think it's bad. It's just going to be the norm.

It's like AI. That's what I'm saying. So all of these tools of editing and, you know, like the technology you have in the box to like fix stuff to make it sound better. Then all of a sudden, those tools by like someone like Skrillix, for example,

he took that stuff and made it an art for. And all of a sudden was using sounds you've never heard that aren't. possible to make on regular instruments, right? And that became its own genre of music, right? So I think a similar thing will happen with AI, but right now I think we're going to go through a lull before it comes back. And so when you switch to cover start, you went from like pop punk to like kind of dance music,

would you say? Is that the right categorization? I don't, I mean, I think our hits were like more in the dance stuff, but I think we had elements of both. Like I think for me, it's hard because I was in it, so I see it as a natural progression. So on the last Midtown record, for example, I was using this program called Reason, which is like you know, you get to program beats and make cool sounds. And like there's a lot of like interludes on that record that were made with that. Jimmy World was at that time, you know, they're like a real email band. But again, using weird sounds, programming things, making things sound cool that are not like

necessary things you do live, but just like, again, using the tools to make interesting records. So I was already doing that stuff. So I just wanted to incorporate that into the music I was making. And one of the things is like when you are always writing, song on guitar you're kind of limited to what kind of songs you're going to make i guess i asked more like did you have like was there any kind of backlash from your audience at all of course i've had backlash at every juncture and because i actually think of backlash brodege i get so much like people love to and punk fans are tough like they have a very like like when you talk about

like i'm not how tough they are like they're good behind a keyboard you know i mean like like like ian mackay right like people look up to him so much because he seems to have like these like unbending rules for his life yes you feel like impossible to to live by and bro people come after me ima kai all day bro and yeah they're like he's like his his like main thing is like i didn't leave hardcore hardcore left me you know and you know people accuse him turning's back on hardcore people accuse him being racist like he's got a lot of shit you know oh i didn't know that yeah i'm not a song called guilty being white you know oh wow yeah yeah i should have put that out today you know and probably would have done better

he's doing a re-release yeah sure so i don't know you know it's it's it's it's a tricky it's tricky you're always going to get shit. It just, you know, you have, for me, it's hard for me because I'm, I'm, I'm a cancer moon, so I'm very sensitive on the inside, even though I'm a sad, rising, so I'm, you know, very aggressive on the outside. Are you under this? Are you a horoscope guy? No, I don't know anything about it.

But when I hear something, like, oh, yeah, sounds like me. Sounds right. It does take the edge off, especially when bad things are happening in the world. You're like, you know, and I'm just a pebble in the river and I'm just floating, baby. I need to stop thinking it's my fault. You know, my, my fiancee was stressed this weekend. I'm like, look, babe, babe, I'm a Leo rising. like how can I serve you and just me saying that that's all she needed it took the edge of

yeah yeah just I was like let me give you some warmth right now did you learn about astrology through your girl uh I've learned a little bit but we had an astrologist on our podcast uh like four years ago nice guy nice guy uh and yeah he uh he told me he's like you are I knew I was a scorpia but he's like you are Leo rising and a cancer I think I'm a cancer moon wow that's actually very similar because Leo is also fire so we're both five like people see us as like fire signs but really we're just very tender on the inside dude yeah it's so tender nice so yeah it's actually it's actually really bad to be in a position of you know celebrity when you're our fire rising and a water oh really yeah yeah

because you just yeah you can't take it right right right right so how did that feel when when good girls go bad one of the greatest songs of all time i mean thank you so much like i've probably in my top 10 most listened to so i can remember me just blasting that for like a year straight how did life feel after that went kind of you know nuclear and it was everywhere it was crazy i mean like you also remember that the way corporate starship got big is the first song we put out was snakes on a plane for the movie right yeah which was like literally played in you know in the credits of the movie we did all these hollywood premieres so i go from like being unknown midtown put out three records we had a shot it like didn't work it was like i was like a dead

artist at 22 it's like go back to school or you know try to try to go for it and i had a friend who really encourage me she's like just fucking go for it get out of your own way stop being precious about shit and just fucking go for it and I'm like okay fuck it I'm gonna get on my own way so that was like my thing and a lot of you'll see a lot of the cobra lyrics are about me not giving a shit about what people say um which is really just like I'm trying to inspire myself to be that way yeah so so so yeah that was that's common point it's like I'm just gonna fucking go for it I don't really give a fuck what I was says yeah you like allowed yourself to be broad yeah to be broad and just like it's like by that time

I had been making music for 10 years. I think I put out my first like seven inch and I was 15 years old, you know? So I was like, I was like, I've done this for a long time. I've learned some skills to this. Am I just going to like throw it away and go back to school?

Or am I going to really give it a shot so I knew that I gave it a shot and tried my best? What was your most surreal experience after the success of the song? I think the surreal stuff was the snakes on playing stuff because that was also like,

you know, the music business is like cool, whatever, but the movie business is a whole different ballgame. You know, it's just like much, much bigger. You know, so when all of a sudden, you know, I go from like, I think that, you know, with Midtown, we were on the Spider-Man soundtrack and like some people heard us on that. That was a great soundtrack. That was the dashboard one? Yeah, yeah, we're on the soundtrack.

Yeah, even to this day, I think the most played song is from that soundtrack. So, like, to go from there. What is it your, what's name of that song? Give It Up. I think Give It Up is on the Spider-Man 2 soundtrack. I could be wrong. Someone's got a, you know, can, can. You're not on the Spider-Man soundtrack at all.

I don't know. But again, you know, it's far removed, like you hear you're on a soundtrack. but then all of a sudden we're like you know doing the the movie premiere for six on a plane walking the carpet we're in the movie like it was crazy you know that was very that was definitely like the biggest thing that felt like wow out of nowhere because everything else kind of felt gradual but that was really out of nowhere and that really posed its own set of challenges too because it felt like how hot you're doing this funny thing for this funny movie that supposed to be a joke it was like a novelty song kind of it was kind of I mean the song was in a novelty so what happened is after midtown I started writing all these songs I had all these records and um I had no band and no platform like these records are great I want to put them out. And my manager is like, you can't put them out right now. There's nothing, you have nothing going on. I'm like, I just want to get them out, which is like, it's so funny because that's like the challenge that I have now with young artists. They're all like, I want to put our record. I just recorded this record yesterday. Let's put it out. I'm like, yeah, you can do that, but don't you want like a strategy to put it out to get it heard? You know, so like it just goes

to show you like the marketing component is very important. And marketing itself is like, it's very creative. So I, you know, I think with Cobras, I learned to see the marketing component as an extension of the art itself. Like also it worked. It worked. It worked. Yeah, it worked. Thank When you were like dreaming up all of that, did you ever think those songs would become as big as they did? I felt like by time, so Good Girls was on my third Cobra record. So what happened with Cobre is is we had that snakes on a plane song. I didn't think they were going to be big. I thought I was doing something cool.

Like I loved like, this was like at the time like I'll see the sound system was coming out. Like I remember I bought the Phoenix record and I was in tour in Europe, the first album. I was like getting into like and I was going out. I wasn't like a 15 year old kid living at home. My parents. I was like, you know, 21 living in Manhattan going to parties like, you know, different. going to bars, like drinking, like going out, like trying to hit on girls and they're like want to dance. I'm like, okay, I got to learn how to dance, you know? So it's like that's, that really

is, is the beginning of Cobras, right? Like mixing that in. And what happened was, too, there was like a party in New York at the time called Miss Shapes, which is like, you know, now it's like a historic party, like Madonna DJ there at some point. But that party was started by all these ex-punk kids who were like at the beginning, they were like just playing like New Wave records. So they were play like New Order, you know, and like. That Manchester music scene kind of stuff. Exactly, the Manchester stuff. So that was kind of having a revival, like in the early 2000s.

It was really fun. And then all of a sudden you had artists coming out, like making music like that. And the killers came out and all this stuff. And that got really big. That whole world got big. So Cobras was kind of like the bridge of that. It's like, you know, we're punk kids and we like this music too. How are we going to marry them, they're both them together?

It was like a dance rock thing going on. The Rapture was happening, like all that stuff. Yeah. All right. Before we move into the Brodege and to Sean, I need your guys as help. So can you tell me what is the difference between pop punk and punk? One is much cooler. I wouldn't even know how to, Gabe is definitely the one who can explain that better than me.

But there's a lot of stuff you do too, right? Yeah, but I'm not a musician. I mean, pop punk is way like, you know, easier to listen to. Like, I think it's a little bit more accessible, whereas punk I feel like is a little bit more aggressive. It's alienating on purpose? Yeah, maybe not on purpose But I think it's got a little bit more I don't give a fuck

It's not like a cohesive radio song No, yeah, yeah I think that's kind of the difference Like pop punk is way more just easy to digest And then I'll give you this historically too Like historically like the core There was like almost no melody in the choruses Maybe a shout in chorus

You know like whatever The Ramones are kind of looked at As like the first pop punk band Right so they love the beach boys so they would actually put like sing-along choruses, but the music was punk, it was fast, it was dirty, it was kind of shitty, they sang shitty, but you could actually remember it and sing, you know?

Yeah, they had the rough edges of punk, but it was a little more, like, digestible for a normal person. So that's the beginning of, like, pop punk was their moans, like versus like an eggy pop that was like punk rock. And then, like, I think in the 90s, pop punk had a huge resurgence. Obviously Green Day is like the zenith of that, but before Green Day,

a lot of bands were doing that, like squeaching weasels, a band for Chicago, it was like very pop punk, love their hormones, like had really catchy courses. So you started getting like these like punk rock bands and they had the punk ethos. They would make their own records, they were torn a van, they were like, you know, crash people's houses, whatever, like,

but they were doing these sing-along songs. And then from there, it evolved as the medium change and records started sounding at the beginning when you were like from a punk band and your record was sounding too good, they would call it slick. Like they would call, like your record's too slick as a bad, There's derogatory.

It used to be a little crunchier, a little, like... Yeah, it doesn't sound punk rock anymore. It sounds slick, right? Yeah. So then now was, like, the beginning of, like, I think what you're talking about pop punk is like, good Charlotte, for example. Sure. Exactly.

Which is like, you know, that is when really pop punk broke, you know, to the mainstream a second time after Green Day. And why do you think it's so natural for these bands to start off? Like, I like the replacements. And then as Paul Westerberg got older, he went to, like, slower and more melodic stuff. Good Charlotte had a similar trajectory. It seems like you had your own kind of version of that. What is it in, like, just a human evolution that?

gets us to start off all like raw and yelling and then as hormones bro your your fucking heart rate literally slows down when you're a kid your heart rate's like twice as fast you just like dude i have kids my kids just will not stop bro like that you just have like this unending energy you have the gift of youth it's unbelievable yeah and then what's the difference between hardcore and easy core i don't know what easy core is i don't know what easy core is that seems like more y'all's thing what about do you guys know what dude core is dude core no yeah oh like five-finger death punch or something I was on Wikipedia looking at different bands and they all had these different like subgenres

attached to them and I was like maybe you guys could help me with like the... Is that like Ignite? Is that dude core? Is it like brocore? And then uh, but then you know, Emo. Emo, yeah. And then so what... I love Emo. What is Emo. And was Emo born out of pop punk? No, Emo is a precursor to pop punk. So Emo comes from hardcore. So basically, Emo, it's funny how many like different scenes Ian McKay created.

So he created like straight-age hardcore, you know, which was really post-punk rock. It was a play punk rock as fast as you can. And that became hardcore. I was like hardcore. They called that hardcore punk, right? And it wasn't, it didn't have breakdowns yet. Like, so I think like a signature of like what we know is hardcore today is like the breakdowns, the mosh parts. There were really breakdowns in early hardcore punk, right?

But it was just faster, faster, aggressive. And that was like hardcore punk. And then from there, then they slowed down. So I think what people regard as the first emo band was a band called Embrace that I think Ian Mackay was in Embrace, if I'm not mistaken. Can you fact check me on that? And they were from DC and they made like, I think, the first, or maybe it was right to spring. But again, all from that DC scene.

And the point of email, they called it, it was emotional hardcore. It was basically hardcore as opposed to talking about singing about, you know, like a lot of themes that were big and hardcore. Was he in it? Yeah. Yeah, he was in it. Great. Okay, I'm not wrong.

He nailed it. Nailed it. they were just talking about personal things emotional things you know and that's that's where the term came from and for a while emo was um was very it came from the hardcore thing so like i went like i was kind of an to me uh an antecedent of like it was you know how like everyone's like oh a lot of kids like identify as like non-binary now and stuff i'm like i think that there's always been a version of that that existed in in society and and when i was growing up the big thing was metrosexual and emo you know yeah metrosexual yeah so we had like football and

basketball players straightening their hair and wearing eyeliner and doing things that were ostensibly more feminine and that were kind of thwarting traditional masculinity but we just had a different kind of you know way that we packaged it and emo was extremely useful for us because I think we all felt kind of buried under like having to be tough and then emo came out and it was like all my dude friends who like could bench like two plates were writing in their bios like I just want to be sad and I miss her so much. It was kind of nice. Yeah, so that was like, I guess there's a great historian on Emo.

Oh, shit, what's his name? Oh, my God. Washed up Emo is the account. And he has, he really documents like, he's like one of the guys is like, that's not fucking Emo, that's just pop punk. But there's like a great article that comes out shows like the difference in the dress between like early Emo and later Emo. Yeah, that's a dude.

Tom, he's the best. Wash up Emo. So he really does. documents this stuff really well. So like early emo, kids were wearing like sweater vests and you know, like jeans rolled up. A little more like posh, a little more like East Coast like a boarding school kind of like not boarding school but like yeah like like you you went to college. It was like, it was like it was like. Vampire weekend. Exactly. It looked like that, you know, but that was before Vampire Weekend existed. So like, you know, I think a great band is like Texas is the reason is like

that's what like early emo looked like a lot of um turtle necks um that kind of look so so we got yeah is you see so so that's that's what early emo looked like and today you could see it a little bit today you would call that like indie but i think back then that dress was like that was but you see like okay so that's norman he was like an ex-hardcore dude so he's still he's like dressed a little nice but he still got like the choker hardcore necklace you know so it was yeah it's very interesting are we going dashboard or are we going willcoe they're kind of in between those two yeah They're at a crossroads. Did they, and then there were lyrics and it was still that kind of emo.

Yeah, and I saw them, the first time I heard Texas reason, they were opening for Siv, which was like a hardcore band, you know? So, so I think that is, that is a connection. That's like the early emo. And then I think what people know is emo today, it could also just be called pop punk, right? Because I think that happens. So, like, for example, like Midtown, I think we were a part of that of like, you know, being emo, but also kind of pop punk. It was like a mix of the two. So we were East Coast

So we looked a little emo So for the first Midtown record The back of the record We all wore like turtlenecks And looked nice And you know And that was actually for us That was like counterculture

Because everyone at the time Was like trying to look as punk rock as possible And we're like oh we're not going to look like that right Yeah Do you think Why you're going so deep Pop punk and emo I was about to just make a really broad joke

I was going to say Do you think it helped get Obama elected But Oh for sure Yeah I guess I don't know. I was there. Where's the back?

Get the back. I think the first album is called. Wait, what the fuck is getting on the first album? Save the World, lose a girl. Great name. When was your first? The back of the album,

you'll see what we look like on the back. When was your first pair of skinny jeans? Oh, man, around that this time. This is when everyone was wearing skinny jeans. I never banned in it. I'm sticking with them. I know. I'm not wearing them now.

Yeah, I never. My first pair has changed my life. Yeah, it's the first time I got called an F slur for sure. Where did you grow up, Sean? Santa Monica. Oh, you did? Oh, wow. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Yeah, the pants were much smaller back then. Oh, so you're in the belly of the beast. Yeah. And did you grow up like a music head just always going to shows and stuff? Yeah, going to shows and whatnot. Yeah, yeah, yeah. My generation was maybe a few years after Gables. Like, in Santa Monica, at least everyone I grew up with was all, like, everyone would go see this band Let Live,

the singer's Jason from Fever 333 now. And like that was, I guess, would they be post-hardcore? Something like that. I think so? Yeah. But yeah, we'd have to buy, we'd have to buy, like, girl jeans because they didn't make skin jeans. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And that's a consistent thing in, like, rock kind of iconography, right?

Like McJagger, androgynous, kind of beautiful to both sides. And then, like, the hair metal guy's also kind of wearing makeup, there just seems to be a... Yeah, I guess so. I mean, like, all that, like, 70s glam stuff, that was, like, not on my radar at all. I don't anything about that. Like, that's also, like, I wasn't born in America, so I, that's what I call... You're from Uruguay, right? This is what I call my immigrant holes.

I don't really know about culture in America before 1980. And what is Uruguay's just pinned right there between Argentina and Brazil? Yeah, bro. It's like a little wedge of a country. I think they set it up so they would get the Spaniards and the Portuguese to stop killing each other. They need a little like separator.

It's like a little DMZ over there, yeah. There it is. And you came here, how old were you? I was four. So Uruguay had a military dictatorship at the time. My parents had French disappearing, so they're like, we're getting out of here. Not cool.

Not cool, yeah. It's cool now. Uruguay is a great country. Yeah, sick. Do you speak Spanish? I think we talked about this, yeah. And your dad's a doctor, right? My dad is a doctor.

You share that with the Krogues, man. Oh, wow. Yeah, my dad's a doctor, but he, you know, he had to go to medical school all over again in America. So we like, yeah, yeah, we lived here. We were here for like three years without any papers. And he was just like getting by how he could. And, you know, it's like a catch one too. He couldn't enroll in school because he didn't have papers, you can't get papers because, you know, can't be in school.

So he actually found a little sneak. sneak he like i think to to immigrate you have to have yeah you are gay that was the best simpsons if you can find if you can find that simpsons that was like the biggest uruguay shout out ever homer simpsons once got here got a globe there it goes can we watch it live and that's not going to go and it's so good look at this country it's the best you got to put on the headphones it's such a funny are you seeing this no show

oh the Simpsons yeah do you have you heard of this shit dude they got a bunch of it yeah do more it's like low key people don't really know about it but it's goaded

I had a press an undergrad just distribution Uruguay that's awesome yeah it's funny I actually don't know a lot about Uruguay either like people are like oh you're from Uruguay

you love soccer I'm like I don't fuck with sports bro I don't know anything about sports I like music yeah is that like Diego Forlawn he's from there There's like a bunch of dudes. Is Suarez from there?

Yeah, I think Suarez is from there. All got a good striker. And he just won the first two World Cups. But you'd know better than I would, bro. I have no idea. 1950. Tell me if you're, I won the World Cup in 1950. There you go.

Wow, look a year. Why do you know that? How do you know that? Oh, your mom, you're into the stuff, right? You got the culture. I don't know how I knew that. Yeah. Yeah.

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slash go deep make sure to use our URL so they know we sent you and show you do a lot of like stuff online like um you pick on metal heads is that kind of the uh i did for a couple months yeah picks on everyone equally yeah yeah pretty equal yeah and is it sort of what we were talking about earlier with like just how like uh certain these like subgenres of music can be about like their lifestyle and like they don't want anyone else like gatekeeping kind of stuff very much that and to me with a lot of the things i do it's it's very obviously satire but then you know you put it out and it goes beyond the people that follow you and it's taken so so seriously like there's one where I do that like um like I don't mean any of it I don't care uh it was like

Metallica sucks for one reason because of Robert Trujillo the bass player I make a joke like the only thing his good fingers are good for is you know getting fingered or whatever and like that's there's always like a tell and then but then you go to the bio and it's like Brazil Metallica fans like I'll get messages like don't don't fuck with Metallica bro I will come get you but I always hit him with like the cheers fucking emoji and the thanks which just pisses them off more but yeah a lot of satire like in the metal thing like I did one we're like about being the most metal and I ended up losing a leg I lose my leg and it's so obviously a joke but then people think it's real so then I went away from that and then I did like for a couple of weeks I pretended

like I was in spiritual psychosis with the no leg and people really thought that was real and it would make me kind of mad that people would like think it was real so I was like all right well I got to take it further so then I went up on YouTube and figured out how to do cold sore makeup

so then I made myself like the worst herpes like ever outbreak and then I kept going up until I had to go to the gathering of the jugglers and I had to stop what happens if you search Sean Barrett herpes and you didn't did you actually go to the gathering of the

jugolos? Oh, he hosted. Oh, yeah, look at that thing. Yeah, I hosted it the last three years. Oh, wow. I've been eight or nine years. Yeah, check that out. That's supposed to be like a pretty fun and positive experience. Herpes and vape etiquette. That's unbelievable. It's insane, though. What are the juggles? Herpes and vape culture. You're friends with, uh, shaggy? Yeah. Um, yeah, yeah, yeah. Um, yeah. Um, yeah, so this is the third year I hosted the gathering of the juggalo's. Shaggy Too Dope One of the guys from Insane Clown Posse For people I don't know, the gathering the juggalo's

It's the music festival that Insane Clown Posse puts on every year A lot of big acts play Like Waka Flaco's this year Suicide Boys have played Yeah Waka Flaca is like super down Like he painted his... No hands?

He jugged up his face He was in the Mosh pit Oh what a great guy But then I think it was last year Riff Raff came maybe it was two years ago And he was like I think Violin Jay said he was like the only he was like the second guy ever who's come that brought armed security with him because he's really scared because

the jugglers will throw stuff at you whether they like you or they don't like you it can be like a sign of love or hate and they were ready to love him but he was just so scared uh that he ended up having to leave the stage he's scared of because they were throwing stuff yeah and you just kind of got to learn to dodge it um what do they throw uh usually fago bottles that's the that's like the thing they love fago i don't know have you guys heard about like when tequila tequila did the gathering no like i think this was before she had her like a little psychotic break i don't remember but like she was talking all this shit on juggalo's because she was booked to perform and like one thing like the jugglers take very seriously is like is you know respect

because like it's it is very like positive inclusive environment and she wasn't showing that respect so the juggalo's went ahead and um because a lot of time they'll like uh they'll do the parking lot for like a week before it opens because they're really excited so during that I think it was I could be getting this a little bit

wrong with the spirit of the story still there they're like they got a watermelon they're filling it with piss and shit and all kinds of stuff

and then they threw it at her on stage I believe and then she got chased to an RV and it could have got real dicey but I think she went

she got out of there that's how bad she got dinged up I don't know if that maybe she might have got something a little thrown on her but why was she talking shit

about the juggles I don't understand I don't remember I don't I don't know she's a nut like you know she went like she lost her mind it became like yeah she's had a couple psychotic she's had a couple psychotic breaks but the gathering of the juggloes and juggloes in general they get kind of a bad name of like being people they're not because it is the most like positive inclusive thing on earth you know they call it a juggalo like family for a reason because like everybody there is like very connected everyone kind

of knows each other for the most part everyone looks out for each other it's not a lot of police there. There's a lot of like, you know, free drug use and, you know, sex stuff all around. Like, you can see like a sign. I remember like this lady. What's the guy to girl ratio? The guy to girl ratio is pretty, it's pretty even. You know, you'll see a lot of signs of like little old ladies that like, you know, like $10 hand job, $20 blow job. So it's like Burning Man vibes a little bit. It is, yes. It's like Ratchet Burning Man? Um, it's, I've never been to Burning Man, but I'd say there, there's parallels. It's the most fun every year I've had for the past like eight or nine years. It's the best. It's insane. So they

threw a watermelon full of piss and shit. Yeah, you don't have to get the exact details, but then last year and this year, they also, they dip a squid in piss or something. They didn't remember what they did last year and they threw it on the stage and again this year. But they're all comfortable with like peeing on each other. It's not like they're just like kind of hazing. Well, I don't know how much they want to get pissed on, even though that thumbnail was a guy getting pissed on. Was it really?

Yeah, with that red one down there? Maybe it's soda. I don't know. It looks like a stream of piss. Oh, yeah. Yeah, and the big, like, saying there, show me your butthole. That's, like, another, like, sign of admiration. Steveo hosted it a couple of years ago, and they showed his butthole in the main stage.

That's awesome. And then I was doing a podcast with Shaggy from ICP, and he's like, did you hear Steveo showed his butthole? And I was like, no. And then he showed me a picture of it. it was like a lot it was like if you took one of those like big jawbreakers like that's how like it looked like a black cavernous cave and it was like a picture from so far it was huge right you're talking about stevo's butthole yeah you think it's like the the structure of it has permanently changed from all the things

he's shoved in there yeah it's diaper gang for sure a gape or yeah we've had stevo on and we he didn't talk about it but now yeah we shouldn't bring that a lot of you'll say it was our worst episode ever so oh awesome good good I'm glad that's cool that's crazy yes yes he does people tell me I look like steva all day really I can see maybe if you're a brother's or something you'd be the responsible one you know a juggolette is that what they're called juggolette yeah the female juggolets yes at the miss juggolette pageant last year um as a talent one of the women stuck a two-liter bottle of Fago up her cooter. That was pretty cool.

I mean, I think what's more exciting about that is that there are two-liter bottles of Fago. I didn't know that. Oh, yeah, they got it. They got it going on. It's like, it's a soda. It's like a Midwest soda thing. And like the juggalo's, uh, we're just, we're just obsessed. Love it.

Interesting. It's like an RC Cola, R.C. whatever kind of thing. And did the, did ICP, did they develop all of these like kind of, um, were they the guys who like hey drink fago no no that just came across like sort of I don't know how it came across I don't think that was like a conscious thing and I know like the owners of faggo

are pretty old and they don't they don't fuck with it at all I think like the younger generation of the owners do or whatever but like because they do they toss fago during the concerts they called fago Armageddon where it's just fago everywhere so they'll ship in on pallets

they go all over the country on tour because they don't get it for free or anything. They have to pay for it. Wow. Do you think the owners at Fago would show their butthole? I think their sons might. Yeah. I don't know that the owner, owner would. Who's in charge of the business today? I have no idea. Can we get them on the phone? Get them on. So that is like the right of passage then. That is how you like gain entry into the fraternity is to show B. Show your Bhole? Yeah. I mean, I think you'll feel a little bit more at home if you do it. I'd love to do that. So where do they do that? The last couple of years was in Thorneville,

Ohio. This place called Legend Valley. Interesting. I think they do, um, they do some big EDM festival there every year. I don't remember to it. Lost Lance. How many people come? It's like, uh, 10, 15,000, something like that. That's solid. And then, okay, let's go back to a, Gabe. So you sponsor the pod. Yes. Thank you for letting me sponsor your pod. Dude, honored. Well, dude, we're big into skin care. I've, I've recently

gotten really into it. Um, not just with the topicals. I'll even go beyond that. I'm struggling with large pores. But you've created a product that's for dudes. I think a big thing with guys is no one ever taught us how to apply. Like guys learn how to inject and like shave. Do they learn how to inject? Dude for sure. Yeah. HGHT, you know, whatever you're trying to get swollen. But, you know, our dad's never sat us down and we're like, hey, this is how you put on the lotion. You're kind of bridging that gap for contemporary young dudes. Yeah, I also just wanted to do something that was easy, you know, like, because I think you have kids, right? Two. I got twins. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's just

like there's just no fucking time bro especially between all the injections yeah he's so tired after before he's two three peptides you're like dude i just don't have the time i got to prep all your peptides but it is true if you look at like a typical ladies it's like cleanse uh then i do the vitamin serum then i'm going to do uh the retinol then i'm going to do another layer of lotion it's like it's like four or five steps in the hockey mask yeah yeah the light and i think i think just like you know when you're a young woman you're getting used to putting things on your face at a young age because you're doing makeup or conditioned yeah whatever you know but dudes you never put something on your face until you really have to until you're like oh there's something wrong with my face

i got to fix it so this whole thing came about because i had a buddy who was like the singer of this band super cool great looking dude um was always at every cool party one day he posts a selfie of himself and his lips are super chap in the selfie and he just starts getting dogged in the comments People were like, dude, what the fuck is wrong with you, bro? You never heard a chapstick? You just look like you walked out of Chernobyl. What's going on with you? And he's like, fuck that, chapstick, lotions.

That's all for pussies. And it really just helped me see just the misconception a lot of dudes have around putting in their face. When we got lunch, you told us the story about. Oh, that's you guys. Yeah, that's why I sponsored the pod because this is the first, the first time you guys spoke about it. You're like, yeah.

So, ever you told us that you get comments all the time where people are like, like, like gave your your face just looks immaculate you do have good skin it's kind of it looks immaculate but for my age i think it's pretty good you've been on the loch game for a while and you're like it's all loch i've been yeah that's all i've been doing is just like you know you got no 11s you got no crow's feet and your pores are small dog your tea zone looks clear as shit so much for how sure but yeah all i've really done is just the loach i think someone i had a girlfriend once who was like dude if you know it's like a baseball glove if you don't like oil it up it's just gonna crack and start getting shitty i'm like oh yeah i don't want to

crack shitty face. Dude, I was of the same, before Brodege came on board and he chose the product, I was in that same group where I was like, I don't wash my face. I even wrote,

was writing a bit. I was like, I don't wash my face. I don't, like I do ice bass. I don't, I don't, I don't,

I don't, I don't, I don't know. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And then I, and then, uh,

he says Brojette, now I look forward. I look forward. That's awesome. And I can see it in photos. You have a piece of loche. I can see it in photos where I'm like, Dude, the, this girl is kind of making me pop right now.

And you put the SPF in it too, which is so huge. I mean, because that's the number one thing that's going to preserve you. Yeah, actually, I really like you told me that you were happy that it wasn't too high of SPF because you want a bronze still. You still want to get some sun. So I think putting it 15 was the right level. I think so, too, because it doesn't make it too heavy, but a lot of people complain, like, we want higher fire.

They want the 30. I don't know. This isn't anti-nutrugina pot. Like, neutergina, my dad would just lather me up with neutergina. Really? Yeah. Like when you went to the beach? Yeah.

SPF 100. Wow. And, you know, because he's just, like my wife to my kids. They hate it. They hate it so much. Yeah. Yeah, he's a doctor and he's like, you got it. And I was like, fuck.

And then my buddies would be like, do you take your shirt off? I'm like, my shirt is off. And it's such bullshit. So that was also what turned me up against Loche or Leone was my dad was so adamant about it. Where I'm like, that was my rebellion. I'm like, if you like Loche, I don't, but now I do. Shit. It's flake away.

Yeah, but I just feel like the stuff that's out there for dudes also takes itself way too seriously. You know, and I think that's part of it too. It's like a lot of, you know, the more I research this, it's like half a dudes aren't doing anything. And I think part of that is because there isn't a company that's speaking to them the way that they understand.

It's just like they come at them. They're just like, okay, great. Now sit down and like, we're going to educate you about all these things. It's like too much. It's just like keep it simple. And as I say during the ads too, people should know like retinal. it's not some like kind of woo-woo thing like it's the only thing that's FDA approved to reduce fine lines

like it is scientifically researched it is backed we know it works so get on it early dude an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure come on brother wear some retinol that's why it feels good also you put on the brodage you get like a little bit of a flush that's the retinol at work yeah dude you give you nice fucking glow who doesn't want that people who look good get treated better it's a sad reality sadly yeah it's not sure it's not nice but check your privilege bro dude for sure when did you start brodagee how oh man um so i had i've owned brodagee dot com for like 20 years really oh that's right you told yeah yeah yeah so i was just like i just had it on the back of my head i'm just like this is like something cool i don't know what it's going to be and then about

five years ago i was like oh i should do a skincare company like what liquid debt did for water i should do for men's skin care um and then it took me a long time to just like research and figure out how to do this and you know the manufacturing component is is difficult it's not like you just go to your room and just you know record yourself on a voice memo and put up on spotify it's way different you got i'm actually like making shit that's physical like you know and then spf component was a whole another uh threw me for a loop because i don't know that's like fda regulated it's actually a drug did you know that spf yeah yeah you have to have like an oTC um license to do that yeah i don't know if I did know that but it sounded you know it was a comedy yeah I didn't know that

all sweet geez well dude thank you guys so much for coming on thank you guys you know what's this awesome I would have been much smarter for the whole uh whole we're jed up from the feet up your sponsor you get you get you get chaga you got lines man how long it's take to kick in you feel right away it's it's it once it once it goes in a little bit smarter those were good audible gulps yeah delicious no matter anything my whole life i've taken a sip up i can't help i go i chug i'm a big chugger i'm a big chugger i go aggressive reclaim your brain i like that that's cool where's this made here uh i don't know where they're

based here for sure yeah the main dude lives in venice yeah sick we're probably most neutropics exactly all the venice bros i know some venous pros are all into neutropics yeah it's a hotbed of a you know what mushrooms can do for you exactly all right sweet guys thank you guys so much thank you having bro dude it was a pleasure man oh it's good to see Sean nice to meet you as well guys I'm interrupting this podcast let you know that we are brought to you by mood an excellent new sponsor I am so stoked about mood is an online cannabis company that's revolutionizing how we deal with life's challenges from sleepless nights to stress-filled days mood dot com has created an entire line of functional gummies that target specific health concerns with a hundred percent

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That's 20% off at rag-dashbone.com with promo code go deep. When they ask where you heard about them, please support our show and let them know we sent you, rag and bone. Guys, we are brought to you by the legends at Brodege. Brodege is the best new Loche game in the big. Biz, Brodege, as you guys are hearing on this pod, they got us into the Loche game and I feel good with my Loche now. I feel good with my skin now. I was never a Loche guy until Brodege came along and they changed the game for me. They make it simple and easy and convenient and they're going to revolutionize the way you look. I guarantee it. Also, Broge is running a giveaway for an

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for dudes DM the word deep to broge at ex broogey X on Instagram to enter guys we're back that was Gabe and Sean but now it's just me and Chad chatting for a minute before we do some calls let me just I just need to get this Chad's posting a clip football yesterday my stealer

lost. I've been getting called out a little bit online. Who'd they play? Oh, Seahawks. Oh, yeah, that was brutal. Yeah, Donald. And we were up early. I will say this, part of me, I love the Steelers so much, but I don't have like a deep relationship with like Aaron Rogers, you know, and I'd love to see Tomlin get a title, but I'm, this is going to betray me to a lot of Steelers. I kind of would love to see the Ravens win it this year. I did, I mean, I'll always root for the Ravens. I'll admit when the, when the bills were playing the Ravens, I was rooting for Buffalo. Ah, okay. Because I love Josh Allen.

And I think Buffalo kind of, like they, it'd be great for that scene. I'd like to see Buffalo when, I just love Lamar. I think he's such a cool guy. I thought he handled that shoving thing so perfectly. Yeah. Like that kid was a dick, he shoved him and Lamar still apologized. Yeah. I think Derek Henry's the man.

Oh, dude, yeah, a tank. I'd kind of like to, but how was your football weekend? I mean, what I start off. I start off the Rams, big Rams guy this year, stoked to see the Rams win. I was a yeah I watched that game but it got to the point where they were up by so many points I was like I'm they already won I'm good and then and then dude I turned on the cowboys and giants game that was a wild one holy tomatoes that was sick I mean dude Russ went from looking like I thought he should get benched before the game then he was throwing some beautiful long balls the way he

did in his prime neighbors what a freak athlete but then he had one play towards the end of the game where I don't even think he was under pressure, maybe a little bit, but he threw it backwards, like uninterfeared with and created a fumble that basically cost them to drive. Well, and also, I think he, at the end of the game, in overtime, it seemed like he got so confident from that touchdown pass he had. I'm like, oh, he's, he got a little too, he was feeling himself too hard, and I think that's what caused the loss. Yeah, he threw that toss into like triple coverage. And that field goal too. That was pretty sick. The one that bent back and forth, the Aubrey one? Yeah, the one that tied it up. Yeah, I wasn't expecting him to make that. He's a beast.

And that guy, he comes from, he has a soccer background. Oh, really? I didn't know that. Yeah, I guess he's a soccer player. Makes sense. Those guys can boot it. Yeah, I guess he was, he wasn't playing soccer anymore. I don't really remember what happened, but his wife was watching football and was like, could do that and now he's the kicker for the cowboys this is what happens when you have a woman that believes in you dude like my lady believes me yeah um chat we should probably cover the big thing of the week too i don't know how much we'll have to add to this situation but uh the charlie kirk assassination dude it really um when you we were on the phone and i saw on the news like the first article I saw was like Charlie Kirk apparently shot or may have shot I saw

shot at yeah and so you're on the phone here like he got shot I'm like no it said shot at and then I got home and I saw the I wish I hadn't seen the video but the video I was I almost just sat there for a couple hours just it was the most horrific thing I've ever seen yeah I watched it a bunch of times it's it was hard not to watch it yeah i watched it a bunch of times too but after but like my when you didn't know if he was still alive or not i saw that for i saw it for the first time and i like i almost like couldn't believe what i saw and i just kind of sat there shocked some of the guys in the chat don't want us to talk but i guess they're kind of probably burnt out on it that makes sense i but we haven't talked about it i i haven't really talked to chat about it i am

yeah it was really sad and you just worry about the aftermath and like just uh how normalized violence seems and how extreme people have gotten yeah i think we got to learn how to like turn down the volume in this country and that's a collective responsibility we all have yeah and it's just um i think being so isolated you lose your humanity a little bit when everything's online just uh just are, you know, people cheering it on or, like, celebrating it, you're just like, what is... It's ridiculous. Like, yeah, it's dehumanizing to the person doing that, too. That's not good for your soul that right after someone dies, you, like, are happy about it or spewing hate.

Yeah. And it's real hypocritical. The thing that bothered me is just people talking about their team. They're like, this is my team. This is our side. You know, I'm like, has it always been that way where people have really identified themselves as like on a team you know like this is our side i i don't know it's just like it's it and who are the leaders of your team like are they really representing you yeah do they

really even care about you it's depressing but on the upside of it guys i think we're going to do two things we're going to one bring on some uh social media experts today we're going to talk to someone who works on the business side of it who's more of like uh he thinks the solution is more user based And then we're going to talk to someone in the future who thinks it's more policy-based. And also, I think if you're a listener, and we have so many listeners that are doing so much positive stuff, like I had a listener message me the other day. He's traveling to Africa to interview people who work at the mines and the diamond minds there. If you're doing stuff like that, message us and we'll shout you out on the pod every week.

Because I think we need to just start pushing more positivity and highlighting all the good stuff people are doing. And so today we're going to talk to a social media expert. he's going to talk a little bit about how the algorithm does drive extreme viewpoints and how it's kind of led to some polarization and normalization of violence. And then next week we'll talk to someone who's more on like the policy side. So yeah, let's call our buddy Ramsey right now. Guys, we were brought to you by Legends at Home Chef,

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I made a friggin' salmon with. I think it was like green beans or something Dude me and my later were doing it You didn't say it you did a home chef? Yeah we did a delicious pasta last week Oh you did? Yeah with some veggies in it and like fed it to the kids And it was the best they ate for dinner

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Homechef.com slash go deep must be an active subscriber to receive free dessert. Hello. Ramsey, what up, dude? How's going, JT? How are you, man? You're on with chatting me. How's going? Hey, Chad. How are you?

Good. How are you doing? I'm doing great, guys. What's going on? Now that we just wanted to talk to you a little bit about, so you've been on like Anderson Cooper talking about some of this stuff. Can you talk about your business dopamine ink and like what you guys were kind of trying to combat with just truth decay and how social media has driven a lot of extreme emotion?

Yeah, of course. So dopamine labs was the first startup I built. We started working on that right out of our PhDs at USC, flight on. And my co-founder now were neuroscientists who had studied the parts of the brain around making and breaking addictions and how behavior gets generated. Like, why do we do what we do? And around this time, we'd recognized, oh, my God, all of these tech companies are starting to talk like neuroscientists. They're starting to use, like, ideas from neuroscience about how the brain changes behavior long. term, how to get people going, how to make them do stuff. Wait, there's something there.

And so we built this company to sell that science and AI way back in the day, way pre-chat of BT AI about how to change people's behavior. We sold it to the apps that were good for you, like meditate and adhere to your diet and call your grandma. And we gave away a free antidote to tech addiction that we put for free in the app store until Apple kicked us out because they said, it is unacceptable to distribute anything that makes people use their phones less. And I got really pissed about that. Yeah, it was like a big, like, fuck you. I got really pissed.

So I stayed up in the most caffeinated 48 hours of my life. I rebuilt the app as a website outside the app store that still did all the same things. And then someone found that at the World Economic Forum's annual thing in Switzerland. And they're like, yo, 60 minutes and you talk to these guys. And so they brought Anderson out to the garage. and the rest was kind of history. But what we learned in doing all this was that all of the really big platform companies

who are making the apps we spend all our times in all day, they know what's going on in the brain. They hire brain scientists to come in and make the technology intentionally change who you are and what you value. And we looked at that and said, there's a reason that's actually going to be really good for people because most of the things that kill people

in the global West are not like cholera and dysentery. It's like type 2 diabetes and depression and anxiety and smoking. It's all behavior stuff. So we should have technology that changes people. That would be good. And people should be the ones in charge of making that decision about themselves.

But if some dweave in Silicon Valley wants to weaponize that to drive profit margin because he runs an advertising business disguised as a social network, then we kind of had a beef with that. And so we wanted to distribute technology for free to help people fight and combat that.

Right. And so it feels like humanity right now is we've kind of had our behavior modified by these platforms and I guess their overarching goal like you're saying is just to sell more stuff or to have us on there so they can show us more advertising

can you kind of explain why it seems to be going in such a like rage and like violent direction yeah it turns out that and like this isn't just me as a scientist but as like a philosopher and a lover of life. Like, it turns out that rage is a really activating emotion amongst us, and it's an easy emotion.

You don't need to have a really deep reason for rage. You don't have to be really brilliant or sophisticated to, like, get really mad about something. And there's lots of reasons why socially it's good that JT, if you saw Chad get really angry at something, it's probably actually culturally important that you get angry with him. That kind of like keeps people glued together. It keeps civilization kind of intact, but it's hackable.

Because if all you're showing people is content that makes them angry and the number that you care about is how many times did people click on share or like or repost, you end up with an incentive structure that's really gross because it incentivizes your machine to optimize for things that might not be true or beautiful or uplifting of the human condition or even quite frankly entertaining or fun. And so people end up stressed out, freaked out, with mediocre ideas in their head and beliefs that they don't value or aren't virtues aligned for them, but they can't help but just sit here and scroll against. And I think we're kind of collectively kind of cooked there. I don't think it's like an unfixable thing. And I think there is a way to fight fire with fire. But I think a lot of what aches everybody right now and why everyone's kind of like, man, I've got to get off my phone, is these platforms have learned that if they want to optimize revenue and by the, you're not the customer of Instagram like Coca-Cola is the customer of Instagram like you're not the customer of TikTok you're the thing getting sold you're the products getting sold your attention

your beliefs and your culture is the product if that's true then those companies are going to opt blindly optimize up to basically the last point of return on anything that can be done to get people to stay longer unfortunately we're the people who get stuck in that machine we're the rat pushing the button getting the getting the little bolt of electricity and think a lot of people are just kind of sick of that and then so what direction do you see it going because if it is cannibalizing its own like user base at some point that'll erode their ability to sell things ostensibly so this is like one of the things that actually cigarette companies have to contend with is you can't actually make cigarettes that deadly or else they literally kill your

customers so cigarettes are deadly but as long as it's kind of in a way that like yeah at some point nebulously in 40 or 50 years this person's going to die and it's probably going to be because they smoked our cigarettes um likewise these platform companies have to get just up to the line of yeah people are actually sick of this and what's fortunate for them is that because now all of us live in those places like i remember when the computer sounded like two transformers having hate sex to connect to the internet and like it lived in the corner of the room in a special wooden like little desk and that was the computer time but now we all live in the internet that's just culture that's just society

and they know that lots of other things we'll put up on there are inspirational or funny or encouraging or a part of a dynamic political process so they don't have to worry about getting like too close to the like poison line because they know it will naturally bounce itself out the problem is that to keep us in the loop part is that you don't know which post is going to be poison and which post is going to be chad saying something funny and because you don't know your brain can't make a mental model of And when your brain couldn't make a model, it becomes like a slot machine, and you become addicted to scroll, and the same way the people become addicted to pulling that lever, because they don't know when it's going to pay. And you don't know each time you scroll what's going

to happen. And then, so do you see the fix coming? Is there something that, is there like some policy that we could put in place that would force these platforms to shift their algorithm? We've tried for a few years. So the problem is that the platform companies, technically speaking, aren't publishers. So there are laws for publishers. If you're like, hey, I run a newspaper. I'm the New York Times. I'm the LA Times. I'm a publisher, so I'm accountable for the content in my newspaper. There are laws for that. The big platform companies have made very certain through lobbying that they are not that thing. They're just infrastructure, man. It's just code, bro. Like, you know, we're just giving people this platform. We're not publishing anything. And so they dance around it,

knowing fully accountable, like there's tons of reports from inside Facebook that even from as far up as like the C-suite and the board, they were aware that their technology was doing potentially irreversible harm to the psychological welfare of young women. And they're like, it's not bad enough yet. They just keep going because they know they're not going to be held to count to it. And now, you know, admittedly, kind of in the reality we live in, it's not like the government's getting any bigger. And we've got an awful lot of people who are looking at the government saying, what if we destroyed that part of it? Because that appears to be waste. And I don't understand. what Chester consensus are. Okay, it might have actually been that there was kind of a correct amount of government, not to like open up that can of worms, but it's not like we live in a place where suddenly there's going to be a lot of new laws. It's going to kind of be the opposite. So I'm not really encouraged about policy mechanisms. What I do think will work is fighting fire with fire. I think that there's going to be ideas that people are looking for that are better than the ones that are out there right now that are really bad and full hatred and vitriol that just going to naturally be sticky and funny and engaging and they will replicate as as little

mind viruses faster than these really shitty evil ideas and that to me is where I've got a lot of optimism is fighting fire with fire. Interesting. So you're basically saying it's going to come down to the user base. We have to like um have some kind of injection of like positive antidote ideas that will have more momentum than the kind of rage stuff we seem addicted to right now. Yeah, like I'll give an example. There's, of the gundo bros,

the technology guys who are doing cool, defense-ish companies in Los Angeles, there's a handful of the gundo bros that are kind of bucking all of these trends and saying things that are deeply optimistic and yet very honest about, look, if we don't get some of these things right, we're all in trouble.

And they'll have a hot take about politics he'd be like wow yeah man you stick it to him and then the next day wait a hot take from the other side but i just thought you just wait because it turns out ideas are kind of complicated and people are complicated but there's truth and beauty in these things and i think people are kind of hungry for that thing that comes next that's not just everybody retreating to their side but people saying look this is all very stupid and we've got to learn how to get along and there's people who are doing that and they're starting to become really popular wait who are the gundo bros The Gundobros are a bunch of venture-back technology brothers

who are in the greater Elsa Gundo and Redondo Beach area working on like hard tech, hard technology either like defense tech or weather modification or like really cool oh my God we're going to save America kind of stuff and they're all meatheads and deeply love their country they're really funny dudes but they collectively go by the Gundo Bros you should have one of the Gundo Bros on the show so they

how are they how are they kind of combating this social media algorithmic kind of disease because they're giving an example of the ideas that out-compete the bad ones okay it's one thing for someone on the

deep left say like yeah man we're going to have a talk about radicalizing young white men but it's another thing for like a young white technology man in defense tech to be like yeah I agree that is a good idea and suddenly now you've got this really like, wait, but weren't you supposed to be part of the problem?

No, you're not. You're part of the solution. Wait, maybe all these differences between people were kind of just manufactured by advertising platforms. Like, maybe we are all better than this. And so there are reasons to be optimistic and people who are pushing that optimism in really practical and useful ways. Those are the new ideas that we're seeing.

We want those to exist. But you've got to give us an example of guys who don't work in like AI defense contracting too. I mean, all the optimistic ones ended up doing it. that's why I do it but I know sarcasm aside look I think there's an awful lot of people who are deeply optimistic who end up trying to build stuff right if you and Chad didn't have a streak of optimism inside you you wouldn't be running this show but you guys are optimists and because I deal with I've I've almost every day I kind of I don't slam my phone down but I like kind of

find myself in a in a hole where I'm like god I got to get off my phone and like my eyes will hurt and I'm like and it's it does like what do you what do you what do you right now for people listening like how can we combat this technology addiction um i'd recommend going to the nearest body of water and throwing both your phone and your laptop i'm saying big not not sink not bathtub i mean get in let get on your bike go ride to the beach and then walk out walk out to the surf unless it's kind of strong and then throw your machines in the surf No, like, that's not really what I'm, that's not really what I'm advocating for, though I often want to do that all the time. Yeah, same.

Practically, practically speaking, I think all the things about like, oh, do a digital detox. Like, they're super well-intentioned. And I lived in Venice Beach for a bunch of years, so I know, like, the Venice Beach, like, tech hippie thing. It's all kind of a little bit of crap because it presumes that you're just going to, like, immediately come back straight into it afterwards. The reality is we now all live on computers. That now is real life. Like, there's no longer being a computer's person. We're all computers, people on accident now.

So the question becomes, are we comfortable enough? And do we have, like, the right internal, emotional practices as human beings and as spiritual beings to say, I know that this isn't real life. And that's hard. That's like a, hey, am I good with myself in the trajectory of my life question? The easy thing is also filtering and being very specific about, like, the same way that, like, you're careful about what you eat and who you hang out with. If you treated the internet like it was a person, would you hang out with that person? Would you invite that person to your party? If you're throwing a party and you're inviting really chill people to a party,

that's, that's, you know, you have an intuition how to do that. If you treated the internet like that and who you followed online, would you let that do through the door? Because he's saying shit that makes you feel bad all the time. Or he's showing you weird stuff you don't want to see. You'd be like, dude, get out of here. And you should treat your relationship to your phone like that. And, yeah, that's why it's so two-sided, too.

Like, you see this revolution happening in Nepal, but the catalyst for it was that they outlawed social media and the youth revolted. And it's like a positive thing that these kids are, you know, disrupting a corrupt government. But then it also feels like it was kind of motivated by this technology addiction. It is. And I think this is kind of downstream. Like, let's not pretend that YouTube came out yesterday. like this has been long enough that like there's kids that have only ever known this world and now they're going to start coming a voting age pretty soon and they're going to have a really unique politics and they're going to have really unique definitions and expectations of the way culture and technology should work together and they're going to be not just making decisions they're going to be participating in the economy and running stuff pretty soon they're going to have definitions of good that maybe don't look like yours and eyes and they're all going to be downstream these platform companies so i'm never telling anyone

Don't use Instagram. Don't use YouTube. I mean, definitely people don't use TikTok, but that's a different defense bro kind of topic. Sure. I'll never tell someone don't go laugh at funny things on Instagram. It's your relationship to the technology should be,

hey, this thing's going to shape me into someone new. Am I making decisions where I'm going to like that new guy based on what I'm I think of the thing that scares me most is the way the medium is changing the psychology of the user and primarily negative. ways it seems yeah that that's the pretty just part because again if these platforms have a kind of a thing for showing rage baits and you're spending a few hours a day kind of just sucked in are you basically just butt chugging rage bait all day yeah um well so that's not that's not a that's not a

that's not a good place to be no that that's uh like i i i got rid of uh x because i don't follow anyone on X but it's just you know I had had it because I'm like I feel like I got a post on there but it's just everything it serves up to me is it's either murder

I like hyper extreme political views conspiracy you know none of it is good and but on but to your point on like YouTube and stuff all like

you know subscribe to a lot like philosophy channels or like you know you know just positive stuff overall and I feel like it can serve as like you know a great teacher I was going to say mentor teacher and then that you can have like kind of online mentors people who yeah you know like like good like smart authors and stuff have YouTube channel stuff like that so I I think that's a really good point yes I but you got to go out and you got to do that I think we're going to find with time is that we're right now in like the awkward puberty stage of technology in the internet

yeah and where like a few years ago it's like oh man this is easy and fun everything makes sense but now it's like ah things have changed i suddenly don't like this now and we know we're going to get through to the beautiful other side but in the meantime we've got to kind of get our shit together yeah and i think that's really gonna for most people like the thing they can do dude go through your feet and just start muting stuff just start blocking stuff yeah just start unfollowing stuff you're not gonna heard anybody's feelings it's about your experience of it you're in charge sounds good all right well ramsie thank you so much for dropping him and you're the best we'll have you back on and we'll talk more about this stuff that really appreciate the time that sounds good you both have a great day

talk to you great chat with you likewise good to meet you jad you too um do you want to call so dudes we got one more call coming up this is a special interest human interest story we're going to talk to a taxi rickshaw driver and see what his work life is like and I want to Leroy, Leroy in the chat. Can you tell us what the thing you got hired to do was? This was cool. This could be our first positive story of the week. I want to shout you out.

You got to point it to the Historical Resource Commission of your hometown or of your town. That is awesome, dude. Thank you for picking up a gig with civic responsibility. You're a beast. And you're making the world a better place. Hello?

Joe, what up, dude? It's J.T. from after the Oasis concert. How's it going, man? Doing well, man. You're on with a Chad, too. What's up, man? Hey, Chad. How you doing? Recovering. Mondays are always kind of a rehydrate and get some food in my stomach situation. So you drive like a rickshaw transport where you have a bicycle and then there's like a wagon behind it where you carry people.

Yeah, yeah, we call it a petticab. To me, like a rickshaw is the one that you hold with your hands, like in the Seinfeld episode. But yeah, we call it a petticab. They've been around for a while. I've been doing this like nine years, so it's progressed, it's changed, and it's... What got you into it? So my story is that I actually worked in political campaigns for like seven years. Whoa.

And I was trying to get Democrats elected in Texas and Georgia. and it's just a frustrating situation to be in. And so one day, one of my clients lost, everybody I wanted to win lost during like a primary. And so I kind of rage quit. I just walked away from this election after party and never looked back. I got a job like delivering sandwiches on my bicycle for Jimmy Johns in Houston, Texas. and then one day I was riding my bike home and I saw a guy on a tricycle I was like wait you're getting paid for this and within our industry like we don't like to bring in a whole lot

of new people more bikes more competition more mess more potential for all the bikes to get kicked out and it was my good my good friend niaz from Houston he said bro you looked so poor I had to help you. No, that was nine years ago. We started with no motors, with small bikes, and the whole industry has progressed to, you know, bigger motors, bigger bikes, and, you know, bigger events. And you're out in California now.

Is that the best place to be if you're doing this gig? I really enjoy it. It's very fun. There's always something going on. I mean, OAS did like one West Coast spot this year, and Southern California attracts a lot of fun stuff. I actually, I've tried to quit this job two or three times to be a personal trainer or to sell one thing or another, and I always wind up coming back. when I moved out here actually I had a job you know selling software over the phone and that didn't that didn't work for me and I just wound up doing this again so it's it's a very hard job to quit

I wound up you know doing it here accidentally I didn't move out here to to pedicab but that's what I'm doing how much can you squat I haven't actually squatted in a while but are your quads just massive what's the question are your quads just massive uh they're they're doing great uh that's I think when I was when I was squatting I was I think you know like when I was a personal trainer which was one of the jobs I tried to use to quit petty cabbing uh I was over 300 it's not as much as you think that's a lot and then so in your experience which demographic like which band which age group is like the craziest after a show um it it depends uh you know sometimes you get

like an older crowd that this is the the one weekend a month or per financial quarter that they're really letting loose and you know they go crazy uh i've had i've worked events where everybody was so crazy and intense and just intoxicated that i i just wound up telling most of them like no like you're too rude i can't i can't help you right now and what's the relationship like generally like like a classic rock crowd is going to be pretty crazy Oh really So the older folks They tend to get out

Yeah Yeah Because like they don't let loose all the time Right Like they're just So they're really emptying the tank Baby Cobra style Yeah it's built up

So you What kind of Do you play jams while you While you work For the passenger Yeah I think the The music choice

Changes Depending on the crowd I have playlists set up and try to find something that works for both of them and me. Like, you know, if it's a kiss concert, I don't really want to play just kiss beforehand, but people like it. If JT. and I were going to get in the cab, what would you, instinctually, what would you play? It would depend on the event. a lot of times I want I wind up defaulting to you know some sort of general playlist but I've also been known to like be fairly chaotic and listen to Mambo number five for three

hours straight oh dude so that's sick that's insane the customers love it but the other petty cabers I think it annoys them and sometimes That's what I want to do. Yeah, you've got to get ahead of your competition. And so is there a community of pedicab drivers, and what's your guys' relationship with, like, regulators and cops? With, like, regulators and cops at events, what I do and what I try to tell my crew to do is, like,

stay, please and thank you, be nice, be someone that they, maybe if they don't want us out there, they at least don't mind us being out there. um every you know all the operators are different and people who ride a tricycle for a living generally are not able to they're not great at having a regular job so their relationship with authority is unusual um so some some guys are you know they'll you know they'll argue or yell they'll start it before it happens a little bit yeah i mean everybody's tensions are high there's you know 50,000 people trying to get to one place so it's very chaotic and then uh do you ever

listen to the show man i've been too busy to check you guys out y'all are so cool though no not our show not our show the concerts you're you're taking people to oh oh uh sometimes you can hear from outside uh but like for the most part i mean i'm i'm i'm hanging out outside I've been offered tickets to a few shows, but ultimately, like, I wind up not doing it. And have women ever hit on you? Yeah, man, that's like, that happens. Nice. And it's not like Uber where people are leaving a review, so you kind of got free range to make a move.

if i if if if i you know yeah that sometimes it happens uh i'm not i'm not sure what to say dude classy you know i i think i think uh i think on my sign you know it says like touching is extra as a joke uh the sexual harassment used to be pretty bad out in texas but california is a little more uh polite which is nice and do you ever get scared of on the roads. Like, which state do you think is the safest to driving and what's the most like dicey you've ever felt pulling someone? Because you've got people in your car. You're on open road. There's cars everywhere. Yes. Yes. And you would think that there would be more accidents than there are, but remarkably like it's, it's pretty safe. But the place that like I regularly

feel pretty intimidated on the road is in Las Vegas. Where the, the taxi drivers have chosen to have like this vendetta against petty cabs and they're just they're going around you at 45 miles an hour and just cutting you off um Vegas is not designed for bikes and it's very scary to ride there sometimes and the drivers the taxi drivers are a little territorial they're trying to kind of intimidate you off the road yeah for sure and you know it's I don't think it's competition at all. You know, the distances that we're taking people are not really even distances that they would want to go. Right. Yeah. Have you, uh, maybe somebody told, maybe somebody told them that were the competition and they believed it. Who knows? Do you ever, I remember I was in New Orleans and this guy, um, my, uh, we were at a concert. My brother and his friends took a pedicab and they left us, but then someone came through on a golf cart. And he was like, this is illegal, but

I'll take you. Do you ever deal with competition like that where you're like, dude, you got like a swarm of golf carters coming in? You're like, you report them to the authorities? The natural enemy of the pedicab is the golf cart. I used to ride in Arlington, Texas

at the Cowboys Stadium and they would allow petty cabs and then they allowed golf carts and the golf cart guys were just very aggressive and for whatever reason it seems like guys who ride golf carts is pretty aggressive and it just leads to tension which leads to everybody being banned from you know the city of arlington right on man well dude that was

awesome dude thank you for jumping on and talking to us he gave us a great ride me and my bro after oasis appreciate you keeping us safe and playing good tunes and being open to doing this man you're a good dude absolutely guys catch me at the next one dude dude great chat with you all right thank you guys later brother all right good shit dude good guy

yeah it was a good guy all right anything else that's it thank you stokers cross house stokers caught stealing very good movie

I'm going to need a voice I think you guys are really nice You want to know What took you and close to go You're going to You're going to be I'm going to be

I'm going to be I'm going deep. Throwing deep. I'm going to be. I'm going to be. I'm going to be.