House of R - Fictional Bands Hall of Fame

Episode Date: June 5, 2026

Jo is joined by Hrishikesh Hirway and Jessica McKenna to celebrate the greatest fictional musical acts in movies and TV. They hand out awards for the best songs, performances, band names, and more, plus a quick check-in on the upcoming season of ‘The Vampire Lestat.’ (00:00) Intro (05:45) Lestat Lestat Lestat Lestat (25:03) Fictional Bands Hall of Fame (01:30:26) The Potential Nominees Explore the exclusive collection at ⁠⁠Target.com⁠⁠ Host: Joanna Robinson Guest: Hrishikesh Hirway and Jessica McKenna Producers: Cameron Dinwiddie and Scott Lee Studio Production: Jacob Cornett Social: Jomi Adeniran Additional Production Support: Arjuna Ramgopowell Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Oh, and welcome to House of R. I'm Joanna Robinson and joining me today two very special guests. Jessica McKenna is here. Hello. Risha Keesh Hereway is here. And we are so thrilled to be talking about fictional musical bands. I'm so excited. Jessica, before we get started, I want to ask both of you, what are you feel like your bona fides are for being here? Oh, great. No, that's great. I think that I exist exclusively in fake music, I would say.

Doing like a musical comedian and most of my music is, I would say, pretending that I know how to be musical while wrapping itself around to accidentally having to learn a lot about music over the past like decade or so. I write music and I improvise music, but really borne out of a desire to pretend that I know how to create music. And then that pretending became true. Like, you're living the dream. Yeah, you know, it's a real fake it. Maybe make it kind of way. Hey, thank you so much.

Thank you. And your bona fides. I'm a singer-songwriter. You are. I put out a bunch of albums over the years and then had a long period when I wasn't putting out anything and making any music, but I started a music podcast called Song Exploder, where I interviewed other musicians about how they make songs. Yeah.

And then I started making music again, and now I'm doing both. Can you talk about what your current project, your current album that you're touring? I just put out a record called In the Last Hour of Light. That's the first album in 15 years. And yeah, I've been touring, doing album release shows. It's kind of like half band concert shows where I'm playing with my full band, but it's also kind of half a book tour because the album is kind of a memoir, and I wanted to treat it like a memoir.

So I've also been doing like a book talk style conversation or like Song Exploder style. conversation about the making of the album before we play. Excellent. Jess, what are you currently working on that you want to tell folks about? Currently in rewrites in year six of an original musical, my comedy partner, Zach Reno and I, along with David Wayne, wrote a musical that was originally conceived as a feature, and then we decided to pivot it to stage, and we did more than a workshop, less than a show. It was a show.

It was a show, yeah. Here in Los Angeles in February at the Chaplin Studios. And now we're doing some rewrites, re-breaking some songs to, yeah, I guess, send it to Broadway. I'm saying it here, so now it'll happen. You guys have someone in common between the two of you, Josh Molina, right? I tried to get Josh to let me get in to see that show, and I could not get a ticket. I'm so sorry. It was a hot ticket.

It was I, you should have come to me. Now you have the closer hookup. Sounds good. All right, so we're going to get into fictional bands and the Vampireless Dot right after this. This episode of House of R is presented to you by Target. Call it all trainers!

The Pokemon and Target Collection celebrating 30 years of Pokemon is almost here, and the lineup is kind of incredible. A few are sure to be fan faves. Pokemon starter jackets, mystery water-type Pokemon bottles, and even kaboodles.

which feels perfect, because Pokemon has always been about sharing the adventure. And Target is bringing fans together to celebrate that spirit. The first drop is in store May 2nd, online, May 3rd, with the second drop, June 6th. Explore now at Target.com. All right, so quickly, this is a spiritually a friend of the pod month sort of continuation. You guys are two of my favorite people, favorite creators. I feel very grateful that you both know that this podcast exists. And so that if I say, come on this podcast, you're excited to come.

So thank you so much for being here. Deeply a bad baby. Huge honor. Yeah. What a thrill for me. The Vampire Listat, the TV show, is almost here. On Monday, Mallory and I will be breaking down the first episode. They did their live concert in New York City this last week.

And it is sort of ostensibly the reason we are gathered here today. But we're not going to go in depth about the vampire set. This isn't like a primer for that show. It's just sort of like a tangentially, this is actually just his idea, a tangential sort of let's talk about fictional bands in general before this show that's about a fictional band. And then House of the Dragon is going to be here soon. So there's a lot coming up. Spoiler warning for music question mark. I know. Some of these musical moments have plots associated with them. But we're not talking about anything that feels sort of new, new, fresh, fresh. We're going back through the history of film and television. So I don't think there should be anything, anyone should be. worried about spoilerized. I don't think so. Spoiler, sometimes music is in movies. Sometimes. Sometimes people sing. Lip sync. Yeah. And a lot of these, though, they're not musicals, which is like, so if you're

like, I'm an opposite of a spoiler, but I just don't want to listen to this because I don't like musicals. This isn't about musicals. These are actually not about musicals. Yeah. So we got you there. There's like one. Got you. There's like one musical or, you know, a couple that I would call a musical. Yes. But I was trying to keep the musicals out of the mix because trying to keep this as like sort of fictional bands and rock stars sort of thing. On the Lestat front, if you're not up to date on what's going on with Lestat, we just wanted to talk about it like really briefly here at the top. Interview with a Vampire, Season 1 and season two came out. And then this is season three of Interview of the Vampire.

But they're calling it the Vampire Lestat because that's the book it's partially based on. Sam Reed, who plays the vampire listat. in this era of his life, of his life, long life, Lestat is a rock star, canonically a rock star. So this third season of the TV show has to be built around an actor they've already cast as Lestat becoming a rock star and having a band centering around him. Have either of you checked out any of the music

that they've already released for the show? What have you heard? What do you think? Yeah, I've listened to all of the music. I mean, it feels very real. Like it feels fully baked in and I like it for the era too. You know, it's kind of like it's very Iggy Pop, I think. Yep.

Like a more slinky Iggy Pop. I mean, Iggy Pop's quite slinky to begin. That's true. A slinkier, Iggy, wow. Yeah, I think it's like, it's such a perfect placement too, I think, because that feels like a heightened moment in rock music history, very performative, very about like persona as rock star. So it's really rich. Yeah. I'm so excited for this.

As I said, they did a live show New York. So Sam Rie's like, no, really, I can do this. I am singing into a microphone. I can do this. He has expressed a lot of anxiety because he is not like a trained singer. But I think he sounds great and not like heavily. His voice doesn't sound heavily manipulated. He's doing a lot of, you know, plenty of like talk singing on these songs.

Speaking of musicals, my dad always calls that style Rex Harrisoning like through something where you're just sort of like talk singing to get through. but he's also belting out on some of it and it actually sounds to my ear really great. What do you guys think of his musicality here? Yeah, definitely and also that just adds to like the authenticity. I think it's, you don't want like it's super overly processed. That's when you

start to get in an uncanny valley of like is this even a human? Well, I guess he's not a human. But I think immortal chords probably would have a little more you know, grit to them. Yeah, yeah. Moral cords, I love that. I think also like there's a confidence

in the talk singing. Yeah. You know, it's like, I don't need, it's the opposite in some ways of musical singing. You know, it's just like, I can do whatever I want. I feel like it goes well

with the character and the era. It makes sense to me. Yeah. The inspoes for the rock star list ad are many. Here we go. David Bowie, Mick Jagger, Bjork, Freddie Mercury,

Mark Sandman, Franz Liszt, Otis Redding, Moses Sumney, Douglas Dare, Red Cross, Lang Languang, Iggy Pop, St. Vincent, Prince, Florence Welsh, Jim Morrison, T-Rex got me really excited. Gustav Mahler, Brett and Flowers, Fiona Apple, Serge Gainesborg, Electric Light Orchestra, the Sweet Nick Cave, Rale, Rale, Jackie Cave, Rale, Charlie Rale, Jackie Adlercichie, who is Jacob Anderson, who plays Louis, Benjamin, Chappell. Benjamin Clementine, Chappell, Gustavo Dunamel, David Lee Roth, Ryan Katner, John Cale, Jeff Magnum, Paul Westerberg, and Daniel Hart, the composer.

Any of those stick out is particularly intriguing to you. I mean, Gustavo, let's go. Sorry to get real L.A. specific. Well, he's moving or he has moved? I think he's moved. Well, he's the conductor for the L.A. Phil. And I mean, I've seen him conduct the L.A. Phil a couple of times. But also, my heart goes to the mural on the side of the one of the one.

Including the famous violin lady. Google it. Who is that violin lady? This has been a big question I've had as a recent L.A. Transplant. Really important that you understand. My friend, she's so iconic. I don't know her name, but her visage is so iconic. My friend was her for Halloween.

Wow. Came to a crowded Halloween party and we were all like, Lournardin, what? So Gustavo, a very animated conductor. So that's like interesting. I mean, yeah, that's a very fun one. Any things to get to you? Well.

Gustavo. Yeah, Gustavo. Really jumped out when I listened. Two things. Mark Sandman. I was very excited to hear that name in there. I love morphine. Morphine is one of my favorite bands from Massachusetts. They were a very big. They were an important band. And then also, Daniel Hart, of course, is a composer for the show. He wrote these songs, and he's a great friend of mine. He's a wonderful, wonderful guy, incredibly talented. He plays on my album. And, yeah, I love him. He's incredible. So I was a huge fan of his before his work on Interview of the Vampire. He did great work on all the David Lowry films. I'm a huge Pete's Dragonhead among other things. But his work in The Green Knight, his work on that one is so amazing. So I was a fan of him as a composer. And then the composition, the score that he has done for the first two seasons of Interview of the Vampire, incredible. That intro that starts the, you know, it's like almost like an orchestra warming up sort of. sound that starts the episodes, incredible stuff. And then, yeah, and then he's written these

amazing songs. When the first song came out, I was worried. Like, I wasn't sure how this is going to go. I saw the Queen of the Dam the last time we tried to get a rock star list at and a film. And we're, this is a very celebratory podcast. We're here to celebrate things that we love and not, you know, crush things that we don't love. But that was, by all reports, not a successful film, you know, and I rewatched it recently, and I was like, yeah, this just doesn't work. So there's, you know, if the music doesn't work in this season, if it is not believably catchy, then the whole season doesn't work because it's built around a rock tour. Yeah.

Definitely. I just feel like also it's one of the traps of like having music represented in media is if you hang too much on how good the band is supposed to be. Right. Or how good a single song is supposed to be. Like I found myself drawn more to stories about like finding what we sound like stories. Because I think that just gives you a lot more latitude to not every song has to be like the best song ever. I know we're not talking about musicals here. But it's like it's such a sad issue I have with Hadesown, a musical that I mostly really like.

But I'm like a whole plot point is. And then Orpheus came up with the greatest song ever heard, ever of all. time and it's like no no we don't buy it and so I think it's like yeah it's a it's a tough trap if you if you know he is successful or like this tour is a monster hit that's a way harder bar to clear versus does this song just have to sound like an era feel connected to the character you know like there's I don't want to like get too far ahead but there's lots of of ways that we like use artists in fictional bands where we're maybe they're on a downside maybe they're on a comeback yeah they're finding their sound, which I think is, like, narratively a strong choice to make sure that you're not

putting too much pressure to invent the greatest song you've ever heard. Right. Yeah, I find this thing not just in music. Also, I think, with comedy. Yes, yes, fictional comedians is, like, really tough. Studio 60. Really tough. Yeah.

I mean, I think hacks runs into this, too, sometimes when, you know, like, just anything where, or funny people, you know, anytime you have to depict someone being funny and they're killing. Yeah. You have this pressure of like, is it also killing with the people who are watching this kill? Right.

Hacks is so much more successful when they're in the riff of like, maybe it's this, maybe it's that. You're like, oh, great, I understand their comedic brains. Right. But I don't necessarily have to like

six months later think this singular joke is amazing. Right, right. And that's why 30 Rock, I think was so brilliant because the whole premise was, you know, the girly show was like bad. You know, so they could have all the silly,

you know, farting robot jokes. Yeah. And they were always, a struggling show. And so you had all this freedom to like do whatever you want and you didn't have to live up to this pressure. Right. Or you're only dealing with like tops and tails of a sketch. You're never watching like a whole sketch, which is another thing about like fake music is like, can you end the recording session? And you kind of get a glimmer of what the song could be. Right, right. But not to hear the whole, all the hook and everything like that. Yeah. Yeah, it's

interesting. We were just talking about this on the on the Prestige TV podcast because in an episode of Euphoria this season, Sydney Sweetie delivers a Shakespearean monologue. And I was like, I was like, Is this supposed to be good or is it supposed to be bad? I was trying to like, you're watching the people watching her and like how are they covering them. But there's a thing that I often see filmmakers and people make TV do when they're trying to capture good acting, which is the camera does like a circle around them. And they're just like, this is really it. They're really doing it. It's this like camera language to try to communicate to you.

This is great. This is good. acting and then they capture some like wrapped faces or you get the standing ovation. But with music and comedy, it's so much harder, I think, because especially with music, because like we know a great song when we hear it. And we know either in a musical space or something like that, when something gets stuck in your head, when it has an actual hook that you can sing that you want to like listen to the soundtrack immediately when you get into your car, when you're home. There's no denying it. So I just think the stakes are so much higher on music. For sure. Yeah.

Can I say one more thing about Daniel? So I wasn't worried when I went to go play on the songs because if you haven't heard Dark Rooms, which is Daniel's own project, it's amazing. And he really should be a rock star. And also he's just uniquely qualified, I think, for this exact role because he's, he was a playwright. He has a playwriting background. And he's an incredible musician. He was also in St. Vincent. He was in polyphonic spree.

Oh, yeah. He has this crazy resume. Yeah. And I feel like this is a time when he gets to bring all these different parts of himself to bear in this one aspect. It's really cool. I definitely didn't mean that as like an insult to him at all. I was just sort of like I love this show so much. And I just wanted this to be incredible.

And then as soon as I heard Longface, which is the first track that they released, I was like, oh, oh, we're cooking. Like, this is it. We got it. This is another thing, though, is like, if you can use like pastiche or such a specific genre that's not current, that's the other thing that I think is the heart. artist is trying to write like current music, especially I think it's really hard to see the Forest for the Trees. I don't really know what the sound of right now is. That might just be because I'm old. But like, I'm like, I wouldn't know how to like write a song for right now versus if you asked me to write a song for like 2005. I'd be like great. Or stand behind like a rock glam

sound. You're just like you're working in a more refined palette that's going to allow you to, I think, have like a higher success rate. Yeah. In the, so the songs that they've released, they've released, They've released five so far as of the taping of this podcast. Butterscash, bitch. Great title. Love that song. Long Face, which is the first one they released, which starts with La Marseillaise, which is like a nice Beatles reference.

That's how all you need is love starts, but also like a nice like list out. He's French, you know. And has that great like, ooh, ooh, ooh, ah, like hooked to it. It's so good. All Fall Down, which they used on the trailer. So I've heard it a lot because I've watched that. trailer a lot, which is incredible. The Dancing with Myself cover, which they released on another trailer, and then your biggest fan, which is more of a ball. It's more of like a slowdown ballad with a

scorching guitar section on it. I'm just like, there's a nice amount of diversity here. And to your point about this idea of someone finding their sound, that's something that they've talked about a lot in the press lead up to this season of just sort of like, Lestad is working through a lot, a lot of centuries of psychological damage, emotional. And like centuries of musical reference he could be making. He could be like, I can't get this song from like 1682.

Yeah. You know what I mean? Like, talk about just standing on the shoulders of giants. He was like there to hear a lot of it. Yeah, exactly. So to your part about Daniel Hart, it's like as a playwright

having to write in the voice of the character of Lestat working through, you know, this isn't just like a fun pop song with a hook or a cool rock song with a hook. It's like he's processing his feelings about Louie or all of these other figures in his life via the music. And that's even, and even higher bar that they have to clear,

which I think they are so far. Yeah. Yeah. And you have to do that in an more abstract way with film scoring all the time. Yeah. You know, think about what's the emotional through line in this scene from the perspective of this character, whatever. But to be able to do it in a pop song context, there aren't a lot of people who can translate that from the film scoring world, but he's definitely one. Yeah. Anything else you want to say about, again, we're not, we're not We're not here to be negative, but anything else you want to say about when it doesn't work? I mean, I think I pop music for me is like one of the hardest ones. If it's just like this person's writing a music in a time that you're supposed to hear, it's reflect the sound that you're currently in.

Just think like distance is really helpful. And I think like limitations are helpful. I'm currently doing a girls rewatch, but realize that I never went beyond season two because I read. red fam sick and I was like I think I have to reassess my relationship to girls and so I've like finally got to the season where Marnie's in a singer-songwriter and trying to like place them in more like the stomp-clap like Luminers era I'm like yeah I guess this but I'm it's that it is a non-county valley of like how good is this supposed to be probably not that good but occasionally a little good Like good enough that they got on meeting at like a record label or whatever.

But yeah, I think distance is super helpful. Or like shorter versions of songs. But yeah, and all I can think of is that Orpheus song at the moment. Sorry, Hades Town. Really? EpicTown. Really? I have a lot of Epic Three thoughts that I would love to share with you sometime. But on the sort of like fictional band front, I just wanted to note who they've cast to surround San

read here. So they've gotten a bunch of musicians, actor musicians. So Noah Reed, no relation as far as I know, who played Patrick on Schitt's Creek and did that iconic, simply the best cover and was incredible in the fake caperet that they did, so like that. So like is a musician, is playing Larry in the band. Man, man, man, lead singer and lyricist, honus, honus, Ryan Katner. That's crazy. Oh. My friend plays in Man Man sometimes. Okay. So Ryan Catter, who's the music supervisor for the show is playing the character Salamander in the band. That's cool. He's in the band.

Sarah Swire, who performs as Sister Swire, is a musician. She's playing T.C. Tough Cookie, who's the drummer. And then Seamus Patterson is Alex, who's also a musician. So they cast a bunch of, like, they actually know how to play their instruments, musicians to surround Sam Reed, who has to play the guitar a bit, but mostly just has to be, like, shirtless in leather and sweaty and, like, hit his notes. And so in terms of, like, watching as two musicians, to yourself in terms of watching people.

I think about like, I love listening to behind the scenes of movies and TV shows and they're like, they sent us to band camp and we learned to play our instruments. Like, can you tell when people are not really doing it and does it bother? I don't think I know so little about finger placement and stuff like that that it doesn't bother me because I can't see it, but does it bother you when someone clearly doesn't know? What do you think? The thing that, you know, that really bothers me actually, it probably goes along with this, but it's when the sound changes completely from,

and I feel like this happens all the time where they go to the playback version of the thing, and suddenly you're supposed to be watching a band practicing in a garage, and it sounds like a studio recording. That always takes me out because I'm like, what space am I supposed to be in? How does this vocal have reverb on it?

Right, right, yeah. That always gets me. But yeah, for sure, the drums are really the big one. If you're listening to the drums and the drummer's hitting the camera somewhere else, I'm like, what are we doing? Yeah, it's so physically obvious. I was going to say piano more for me of like where are you placing. And it's just like just put the camera further away from the piano and just do an insert on someone else's fingers, like if you need it. Unless it's like a biop.

Unless it's like Rocket Man, we just shoot the other angle and let the actor know, hey, you're vaguely up here, you're vaguely down here, you're playing something percussive. You're doing this with your left hand. They don't have to know how to play. I mean, it's cool. I think it's always cool. And an actor's like, I trained for six years to learn how to play the banjo. It's neat. But I think, yeah, it's like easy to work around.

You don't need to do that. When you watch Timothy Shalamee on the set of Dune 2 being like, and I became punk. Yeah. He's just like, and guitar. I know. I know. Gosh, I mean, as an actor, though, Hollywood doesn't agree with that label enough for my taste.

meaning I don't have that many credits that was a confusing way of saying that I always have a dream that I'll get cast in something that requires me to learn like an insane skill or get really jacked which would just be really nice someone like paid you to be like... To be like super jacked?

Yeah, to get really jacked. I'm going to manifest this for you. Thank you so much. I just like can't do that on my own. You need a whole team. Without a roll, why would anybody go to the gym? Ever. Why exercise?

I don't want to eat that much cod. Yeah. I just saw the movie Tuna earlier this week where the actor Leo Woodall, there's two actors in that movie who are meant to be incredible piano players. And his character doesn't play until the very end of the movie. And what I really love about that is he has these, like very distinctive, like small but very distinctive tattoos on his hands. And then I was like, why are those there? Because the actors didn't have them. And then at the very end when they like show the cut in an insert of him playing, I'm like, oh, they put it on whoever has to play the piano.

They put like the little tattoos on his hands. So he could be like, oh, that's definitely. I'm always like the piano is a real one because like they're always like I'm like are those your hands actually playing I don't think so but I also love those shots on the other side of the piano when they're just like really feeling it like moving their arms around you're like totally okay I think you can kind of mark that like choreography like if you needed to mark that you were like an incredible tap dancer but they were framing like above your feet yeah you could probably like fake what the top physicality it looks like I mean with some effort it wouldn't be easy but you wouldn't have to like do a perfect like double time step you just be like okay it's like a hop Ben us up. You know, like, same thing. Like, okay, you're down in the, you're down in the base. Okay, now one hand is up here. You could learn it like a dance, I think.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. They should mark it on the keyboard for them. I'm sure they do. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Blue, blue, blue. Yeah. That's my expectation. My expectation is they're going to do a pretty good job of faking it.

Yeah. And that's enough for me. So when someone actually is playing and you can tell they're really playing and it's happening, I'm very, very impressed. Like, that's not my expectation that they should be able to do it. But if they can. But if they can, wow. Wow.

All right. Fictional Ban Hall of Fame. Less of a competition, more of a celebration. Here are the rules. We came, and by we, I mean, me, came up with 10 random awards that we are giving out. The rules are they can come from any film and television, you know, property that you choose. Each of us is going to pick one winner per category. If someone picked your preferred winner, you have to pick something else.

We're just trying to get a lot of variety here. So that's one rule. And then the other is you can only pick one winner from each property. I would say with the exception, and I didn't say this to you beforehand, but I would say with the exception of the Hall of Fame category, which I have at the end, which is just like sort of like a more broad sort of thing. So we don't have to get so picky about that. But again, in the interest of variety, so we don't just say, hey, I've seen almost famous 9,000 times and I have a tattoo about it, which I do. Like, let's just spread it around.

Spread the love around. Any questions about the rules or what we're doing here? Not a question. Just those were tough rules to work with them. Limits are helpful. That's what I think. All right. The first award is Best New Artist.

And this is Best Actor who is not famously known for singing, but sings very well nonetheless. And sure, maybe they were helped a smidge by attitude, but mostly, wow. Yeah. You're up first. Okay. I'm starting with, like, I think a... a hipsterish choice, as one would say, a deeper cut. I'm going to go with Paula Pell in Girls Five Eva.

Love it. I really loved Girls Five Eva, great music, and Paula Pell absolutely holds it down, and she's up with, like, some real singers. Right, like, Renély's Goldsbury's and that. Yes, and Sarah Borellas. So it's like two Broadway stars. Yeah, like, and you are at, and Busy Phillips also great in it, but I think Paulapel is like the further away from expectation,

one of the funniest writers on SNL of all time, like brilliant comedian, but not expecting her to be able to sing. And yes, they're mixed into a girl group sound, but I mean, I feel like she sells it. I love that.

And I feel like when you can pick her out, you can hear like, yeah, there's a beautiful, warm tone to her voice. Just a huge fan, yeah. For people who haven't seen that show, because I think it was like a really underwatch show. People were constantly trying to champion that show,

but it never really, like, hit wide. Can you talk a little? bit of more about what that show was. Girls Five Eva is in the Robert Carlock, Tina Faye DNA of 30 Rock and Great News and now the Fall and Rise of Reggie Dinkins, which I really also recommend. Fun. And it's about a girl group that now they had like some hits, you know, 15 years ago and one of the members dies and they decide to get like back together and now are like trying to

navigate being like in their 40s. And they, it's really funny and there's some great music in it. There's a song about a New York Lonely Boy that I think about a lot where it's like a decision to have an only child and all these examples of how it's okay if you're in New York because there's tons of New York Lonely Boys, including John Slattery makes a cameo. I think with maybe his real son of like, I've raised a New York Lonely Boy. So that's like one specific song. But yeah, it's a great, great joke heavy show with some really

successful music. And it does the thing I was talking about, which is like they're trying to find their sound. Their music in the past is supposed to be kind of bad, or at least like pop derivative stuff. So there's never really, there's not really a high bar ever for the music. It's allowed to be like comedic first, which is something that I, you know, recognize and identify with. But it's still like hooky and fun and you buy it as pop music. So it's like, it's carved out a really sweet spot for itself of what you're expecting the songs to sound like. Oh, I love that. We did get a lot of listener or email. saying, like, you have to, you know, give Girls Five of a shout out.

Out to gate. They were all from me. Yeah. All your burners. I feel like the Tina Fey world always has good music, I think, because of maybe her husband? Her husband, a huge, yeah, Jeff Richmond, a huge influence in the sound and then composer of the Mean Girls musical. But, yeah, I think there's a, so like the comedy lineage of Second City, the Chicago Theater, the Chicago Improv and Sketch Theater, it's, starting more in like the 50s, it was every show has an accompanist on stage, which is different

than if you see like an upright Citizens Brigade show or a show at Improv Olympic or I.O. Where that got like peeled away. But back when it was like this is, and I think they still do, but like that aesthetic of you're coming here, you're having a drink, you're going to watch a show. A pianist was on stage as like a key member of the comedy. And so I think that there's like a crossover. There's a lot of like Chicago comedy that I think overlaps with having like a musical sensibility because literally your sketch would be underscored.

Yeah. Yeah. All right. What's your winner here? Okay. I'm going with Carrie Mulligan. Oh, that's my answer. I love it.

Yeah, yeah. But in which movie? Because for me, it's Ballad of Wallace Island. I mean, she's kind of like an MVP. Oh, good one. Yeah, because she's so good. Good one. Give your, I don't want to step in your answer.

Give me your answer. Well, you know, she's also in Inside Lewin Davis. But I really wanted to talk about Ballad of Wall. silent. Yeah. Maybe this is a hipster pick. No, I love this movie. But man, that movie needs to be seen by more people.

I loved it so much. Yes. Maybe my favorite movie of last year. It's so beautiful. Yeah. It's about this band, Carrie Mulligan and Tom Bastin, were the members, and then they broke up, and then this eccentric, rich guy invites them to reunite. And then they play some of their old songs, and she really sings.

And she's got such a nice voice. And yeah, there's no need. You know, it doesn't have, she doesn't have to be that good. But I totally buy it and I loved the music as well as the movie. Great pick. I love her in Inside Lewin Davis. She also sings in Far from the Madding Crowd and Shame. Whoa.

And her performance in shame, she sings New York, New York, and is like crying while she's seeing it. And it's like one of the best things I've ever seen. But I just like, I love any time she sings in a movie. That's a great choice. hoisted by my own rules. I'm like, no one's going to pick Carrie a Mulligan. I will, I will zag. And I will say, yes, he was in Mulan Rouge.

Yuma Granger, I'm picking Yuma Griger not for Mulan Rouge or anything like that, but for Velvet Gold Mine, where he doesn't have to sing a ton. And I actually, like, I have heard Ewe and McGregor sing without autotune, and I actually don't think he's, like, tremendously on pitch all the time. But in that movie, which I think has a lot of DNA in common with the Vampire List stat. He is just like oiled and covered in glitter and gets literally naked at one point on stage and leather pants. And I just think it's like a huge inspo for what we're going to see in the vampire list at. So this is like, you know, pre-Moulin Rouge, pre-Obby-Won-Kin

Kenobi, like, Yuma, you and McGregor just like when he got naked and everything. He used to love getting naked. He loved getting off in movies. So often that guy was naked. Yeah. And when I saw Velvet Gold Mine, I was like so young and my jaw was just on the floor. I was like, I didn't know you could do this. I think I saw it after I'd already see. I mean, the first time he sings in Milan Rouge, I think, is maybe the most significant moment of my life. When he's like, My Gift is My Gift. It's one of like the only few movies I saw multiple days in a row. I was like, I have to go back for more. I'm going through puberty right now. Right now. I can tell you exactly. It was like hugely important. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But then I went back after and watched Velvet Gold Mine when I was like, I got to go see all these naked movies. If you never saw it.

The naked Uvra. It's plentiful. Plentiful. Yeah. Like, you know, the Danny Boyle movies. But yeah, Velvet Goldmine, which is about various glam rock stars of the era. It's got Jonathan and Reese Myers in. It's got Christian Bale in it, Tony Collette.

It's just an incredible sort of exploration. And there's some great songs in there, some incredible visuals of that, like, glam rock ethos. So, a huge fan of that. All right. Best Original Song, which is Catchy So, earworm originally written for the show or film Rishi Europe first. So the thing is you said best original song, but then you said catchiest earworm. And I'm sticking to what's on the page.

Okay. And I feel whatever the opposite of the hipster choice, but I am putting Golden from K-pop demon. Oh, yeah, yeah, nice. Great pick. My nephew the other day, he's eight, and I was on a FaceTime call with my sister and her kids. And someone just referenced that song. And he said, you cannot say that.

It's going to be stuck in my head for the rest of the day. You can't even bring it up. Yeah. And that's how I feel. Can't mention the color. Really anything in the yellow family. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's over.

Yeah. It's over for us. Yeah, the way that that film took hold and the way that, like, I mean, not since Frozen. I feel like children everywhere were just singing all of these songs constantly, and that's part of how it spread everywhere. It's just, it's response. You know, the music in that is responsible for how much of a massive phenomenon that particular movie came.

Yeah. And there was just the one second when my sister was like, hey, you should check this movie out on Netflix. It's actually good. And, you know, the briefest moment where I was like, oh, have I discovered this? I mean, I didn't even discover my sister. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm ahead of the curve. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Slightly before massive hype. Yeah, yeah. And I don't think I even actually did. I just hadn't hit me yet. And I think also K-pop as like this huge phenomenon in general, but like not, you know, necessarily. I feel like a lot of Americans like this was their first exposure to anything like K-pop. And they were like, oh, now I understand. Yeah.

What's happening here. But I was impressed by how they wove the plot into the actual songs. Yes. You know, they're singing, what they're singing about in that song, is actually like what they're fighting against. That was cool. Yeah, it's great. Shout out Huntrix.

Shout out the Saja boys. I'm going to pick, just as I can here, that thing you do from that thing you do, because that is the most important song in any of the things we're talking about because it is the entire premise of that movie is we wrote the best song ever and it's going to launch us nobody's into instant face. name and we're going to play it 200 times in this movie and you're going to be excited every single time you hear it. Some would say I think that actually I've heard it's referred to as the anti-Orpheus song.

By you? No, no, that's actually a common term in the biz. They're like, can you believe they pulled off an anti-Orpheus, even though it predates. Hades Town, the story, which is the inspiration from Mon Rouge. But, yeah, no, it's so good. When I first got a drum kit, that was all I wanted to learn was the, do-da-da-d-d-da-d-da. Like, it's so amazing.

And, like, what a thing to achieve. That song rules. I gave someone drum lessons where that's what they wanted to do. Yeah. Really? Yeah. Oh, they're like, I just want to be shades, man. Yeah.

That thing you do, and we might talk about this a bit more a little later on, but, like, that thing you do, every time I get mad that it didn't win the Oscar for Best Original Song, I have to go and remind myself what did win, and it's my heart will go on from a Titanic. Oh my gosh. Okay. That's wild. I guess I understand what happened there. Oh my gosh.

That's maybe the only thing that could ever beat it. Exactly. That's crazy. I know. Wow, we didn't know how good we had. I know. The 1997 Oscars. We had it so good.

She hit her chest so hard. All right, Jess. What's your answer here? I have to go with the 1995 eye to eye by Powerline from a goofy movie. just to really firmly set you in trying to date my age. I love that song so much, and Powerline is Tevin Campbell, backed up by Rosie Gaines,

like people who was supposed to sound like Prince, and so they got people who sing with Prince. Like, it was, it's like a forgotten movie that is held dear by a certain, like, you know, section of millennials who are just like this was, it's like as the Disney, like, A, Pex is starting to fade. Right.

It's post-Line King and Little Mermaid and all these great musical movies with actually phenomenal songs. And it's like considered this like sort of flop that is just this cult, cult classic. And that song is just like so good. I've had, um, uh, a very short time on like Twitter. And, uh, I think I only had two versions of Twitter bios. And one of them was the song I tie is my personal religion.

And if I freaky Fridayed with a 10 year old boy, you wouldn't be able to tell the difference. So it's just I have to be truthful to myself I love that song If we listen to each other's heart We'll find we're never too far apart Come on You're so dialed into the bad bit You were like right

We got so many emails about Powerline They were all from me Yeah once again You have so many burners I'm really impressed I personally really spammed this episode I'm gonna be on Yeah I mean Powerline

It's just like he's a great It's also it's doing the opposite thing It's not that plot I mean it's a plot important moment Of the father and son like coming back together. But I think Powerline in construction is actually pretty smart

because it's like background to the story. It isn't our main character. And now Powerline's going to sing the best song of all time. It's like Max loves Powerline. You hear two songs by Powerline. But like it is background in a way that I think like takes some of that pressure off and allows it to just be like a really fun song where of course they have to do the perfect cast.

But yeah, I just love that song so much. It's been on a, it was on many a mixed CD even through. high school, you know? I think I just like slightly missed the goofy movie. Just like I feel like it's like a micro generation moment. No, it's so, I mean, even like siblings on either side, it's just like, no, it. You had to be like, you had to be like seven when it came out. And then be like that song kind of, and then later, like seven years later, be like,

am I crazy to that song slap? And then like another seven years be like, no, we're wearing t-shirts from Hot Topic about Powerline. So, yeah, he's really important. Powerline is really important to me. And it's vocally like, it's a really vocally impressive song, I think. I'm nodding, but I have no idea what you're talking about. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

This would be great for you later. The goofy movie, do you mean like the Disney character Goofy? I do, yeah. That's, it's the. Do you need to know the premise of the goofy movie? Please. Okay, so Goofy, he's starting to feel a little like he's losing his son, Max, because Max gets in trouble on the last day of school for pulling off an elaborate prank,

which is him performing the other Powerline song, Stand Out, to try to impress a girl that he likes, and he gets sent to the principal's office, and then his next door neighbor is like Max is going to end up in jail. They literally have, there is an animation of like a looming electric chair. They're like, if you don't get in and stop Max from listening to rock music, he's going to die. He's going to get the death penalty. Well, a call back to power line.

Yeah, there you go, very true. These are the stakes. A thematic through line. Yeah, exactly. So then Goofy is like, you know what, the time has come. I'm going to take Max on this road trip that I took with my dad. It's the perfect road trip. It's the perfect road trip route.

And Max is like, I do not want to go on this road trip. I want to stay with my friends. It has a great opening number. After today, my crazy. After today should be mine. Okay, that's great. And then you see Standout, which is him singing, lip singing as power line. And then it's one more song about being on the road.

And they start to go to some of the early stops. and Max hates them. Then they start to slow, ice starts to thaw and this classic father, son, friendship, relationship. And then Goofy decides to give him the power to reroute.

Like, you pick the stops, Max. This should be for both of us. And he trusts him, but then Max is like, I'm going to this fishing place. I'm going to route us to the Powerline concert because he told his crush back home that he's going to go to the Powerline concert

and he's going to be on stage and wave to her. So then Father son have to come to terms. And guess what? They end up on stage at the Powerline concert. Wow. A crazy random happen. I know.

Can you believe where they have to do the perfect cast? Bigfoot's in it. Hi Dad's Soup. Polly Shore voices his best friend. Leaning Tower of Cheese. No, nothing. Wow. Not even a trailer in the back of your mind.

Nothing. Yeah, it's important. No. Does Goofy's son exist only for this movie or is that a... They made a sequel where Max goes to college and also there was a There was a goof troop, Goof Troop TV show. Okay. That's where I know Max from.

Yeah. Yeah. I don't know why I know Goof Troop, but like missed the goofy movie. Yeah. I couldn't tell you. That's a real bummer for you. Yeah. It's real tough. Real tough for me.

All right. Best cover song is the next category. I get the first pick. I am not going to step on something that I know is important to one of you, just in case you want to pick it. No, no, you can do it. No, I'm not going to do it. Because I have a backup. But I have a front.

Okay. Okay. Okay. I'm going to pick. ballroom blitz from wayne's world this is crucial taunt is the name of the band Cassandra Wong is the name of the lead singer

played by Tia Carrere but this is like this is one of those I didn't know this is a cover until later in life turn into a ballroom blitz ballroom blitz ballroom blitz blitz like it's rules and it's not you know is it plot important yes because it's like a part of Wayne

falling in love with her and stuff like that but it is just absolute jam. What a badass rock babe, lead singer in this band. And I just love this song. And we listen to it all the time growing up. So that's my pick. Huge. Huge. Yeah. I cannot say or hear the words my drummer without hearing them in Tia Carrera's voice. Yeah. When she's answering the question, who's Anthony? Who's Anthony? My drama. Really good. All right. Jessica, what's yours? I'm going to go with Mustang, Sally, and The Commitments. Oh, so good.

I love that movie, and I think, like, that's, like, it's a nice, like, coming together moment. And it's just, yeah, they sound great particularly on that song. How did you watch that movie? I mean, are. Oh, yeah, yeah. Are you, like, how old are you? I know. It's a mystery.

I should say, besides, like, being, like, really setting my age so specifically that my Irish heritage is most of my personnel. Okay. And so I think it was like, I didn't catch it the first time around, but it was like, oh, do you know there's this Irish movie that you should see? And that's about the whole sentence that I require. Yeah. Yeah. So, yeah, it's just, I found it later. But the music is so great in it.

And Mustang Sally is like the one that I'm like, oh, that's the one that really sticks in my head. Yeah. So the commitments, which is a movie about an Irish band forming and in the, is it late 80s, right? mentally the commitments? The storyline or the movie coming out? The movie coming out. The movie came out in 91, I think. 91, okay.

But they're, yeah, they're trying to, like, capture this R&B sound. And the big story out of that is Andrew Strong, who was 17 years old, who plays Deco Cuff, and he is the lead singer. And, you know, you hear it on Mustang, Sally, and all of these songs, he has this, like, incredible voice. And when you find out that he was 17 years old when he made that. it is. I'm learning this right now. That's insane. That's insane. Also, he does not look 17. He doesn't look 17.

Yeah. But, yeah. Ireland's a tough living. But then, you know, the commitments was such a cool concert, you know, like Glenn Hansner's in it, Maria Doyle. And then they toured as like a band after that movie came out. Yeah. So, yeah. I was confused because, well, I'm giving away one of my answers later. Okay. But anyway, yeah, they're great.

They're great. All right. What's your cover pick? Okay. I was torn between a couple of things, but especially given that we're doing a vampire-themed reason for getting together. I have to go with Marcelline the Vampire Queen in Adventure Time doing Francis Forever by Mitzki in the Battle of the Bands. That was so many cool nouns. Yeah.

In a row. Yeah. I could not, my head exploded. I was like, I couldn't figure out who was cooler. Like, everybody was so cool for this thing existing. Mitzki is so cool to have her song in Adventure Time. Adventure Time's so cool to have the song in there. And then Marcelline is playing, and she's just so badass.

It's awesome. Yeah. Adventure Time has such great music in it. Yeah, really good pick. That's actually not the pick. I thought you were going to pick the other thing you talked about in that email. What was the other thing I talked about? Is it going to come up later, though?

I don't know. Oh, okay. Well, because my backup, can I say my backup? Yeah, of course. My backup was, Hey, You by Pink Floyd in Squid and the Whale. Oh. Because he presents it. Jesse Eisenberg's character presents it as if he'd written the song.

And then he wins the talent competition. And Anna Paquan is the only person who knows that he didn't write it. And when she calls him on it, he says, but I felt like I could have. Oh, it is. So good. Incredible. It's, you know, and for that character in like all the terrible lessons, he's learning from his father about, like, authorship. And it's just amazing.

I love it. Amazing. I thought you were going to pick. And this is my, this would be my runner up, which is the cover of the metric song Black Sheep in Scott Pilgrim. Yes, yes. Brie Larson, Clash a Demonhead. That's, I love metric. I love metric.

And I'm like, is that better than the metric version? And it might be. Honestly, it didn't even occur to me to put it in that category because like ballroom blitz for you. Yeah. For me, that song is canonically by the Clash Towers. I think that's fair. I mean, that's fair.

All right. Our next category is best fictional. band name. Yes. This feels pretty, this feels tough to use this

in this category, but I have to go with the soggy bottom boys. I'm sorry that that means I'm taking off like for me that means I can't

do any more oh brother, but it's just like it's incredibly, it's an incredible name. Yeah. And a now grown only more dear to me

post great British bakeoff that they, you know, that's a different type of soggy bottom. I like that it's alliterative. It has like the, it just sounds great. It sounds like the type of music. It fits perfectly and it's great.

Soggy Bottom Boys. Yeah. It's really awesome. Yeah. And also when you hear characters in the movie go like, Ha, dang, it's a soggy bottom boys. Yeah, like fun to say, immediately evocative of the right type of band you're trying to picture.

It's like, it's just, yeah, I guess it could be like Paul Hollywood's band. But other than that, it has. It has to be, like, in the Delta bluegrass. What kind of music with Paul Holly would play in his Soggy Bottom Boys band? Oh, gosh. He would play probably, like, yacht rock about bread. Yeah, yeah. Like, very, like, sort of, like, smooth, I think like a smooth vocal line.

I feel like he's very, like, buttery, you know? It's the blue eyes. Yeah. Yeah. I went to, the first thing I thought of was David Brent in the, the company retreat playing free love on the free love freeway. That's what I imagine. Oh, maybe I'm thinking that he would sound like Jerry Rafferty because Jerry Rafferty wrote

Baker Street. I can just see Paul Hollywood doing that. I'd love it. All right, Rishie. Okay. So controversial take, I think that band names. They're bad. Like, just generally.

Yeah, they're tough. It's hard to, they're just... I come from a worse area, which is improv names. Really bad. Really tough. Really tough. What's the worst, like, improv? I mean, they're...

I mean, when I was in college, I was on a team called Matador Now, where we all shouted now. I think, like, some, like, gimmicky, you know, part of that always feels... Welcome to Matador now! Yeah, got it. Yeah, exactly, yeah. Yeah. My first Herald team was called Mr. Town City, and a guy always always. ran across and did like a cool kick.

No regrets there, honestly. I mean, yeah, you just, you have to have it. Yeah. It's part of it, but it's so hard to have a good one. Yeah. And for me, like, there are really not, there aren't really many good band names, like magnetic fields, and maybe that's it. That might be the end of the list for me in terms of like, that's a great band name. The only fictional band name that I think that lives up to that is Pink Slip.

Yeah. Because. Freaky Friday. Yes. Okay. Like the magnetic fields, it works on two levels. And the meanings are so different between the two. And yeah.

We got a lot of emails about Pink Slip. So do you want to talk a little bit more about? No, I should not be the one to talk about it. It's just a great name. It is a great name. Yeah. No, please, not, no, no, no. Don't make me talk about the music.

Great band name. Yeah. Stillwater, I think, is similarly like... Stillwater's run deep. It's real. Of the time. Yeah. It feels like a real band name.

But not one that I'm like, what a great band name. I don't know if this is an inspiration all, but I grew up in Mill Valley in Northern California. And there is like a slightly iconic bar in the town called Stillwater where like a lot of bands played. I have no idea if that had anything to do with what Cameron Crow did. But that's part of why it feels like because you wouldn't, it's much boogeier now as all of Mill Valley has become. But like when I grew up there like in the leftover, the hangover of like a lot of rock stars lived in that area in the 70s, like moving from San Francisco to Mill Valley. And so like you'd go into Stillwater, which was the super dive bar and there would just be like all these cool like band photos on the wall. That's cool.

But yeah, Stillwater. This is really hard to pick. I have three really good candidates. I'm going to give it to Dr. Teeth and the Electric Mayhem. Yeah, that's good. The Muppet Band. I love them. Yeah, really good.

I think Aurora Borealis shining down in Dallas is one of the best lyrics that has ever existed of all time. But the electric mayhem. Yeah. That's a great. That's really good. I also love a long band name. Yeah. Yeah.

You know? Yeah. I was just in Chicago and I saw a poster for annual Noah's by the Trail of Dead. And I was like, oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. There's something so great. If you can't be concise, just commit to.

extremely long. How do you feel about abbreviating that? Like should you say the whole band name or should you say KOL, which is not a long band name, but I don't know. KOL for Kings of Leon always bothered me for sometimes and I don't know why. Yeah, that doesn't hit. I mean, because you can easily just call them

electric mayhem. Yeah. And or like I guess we do the opposite with Sergeant Pepper. We take it down to Sergeant Pepper. Yeah. Sergeant Pepper's Lonely Club band. Yeah. Like we don't call it the Hearts Club band. But like, yeah, I think taking it to just part, I think abbreviation I don't really like as much.

Yeah, that's why my favorite K-pop band is behind the scenes. Yeah. And that's a real one. That's how you know you're a real fan because you respect, you respect them so much that you have to give them the entire time. Yeah. Yeah. My runners up here, I just want to mention them, are frozen embryos from my so-called life. And Dingo Zay My Baby from Buffy of Empire Slayer.

I think it's a good move similar to what. what we were saying about jokes and songs, like to intentionally name your band something ridiculous. Yeah. In the thing, you know, like mouse rat or whatever you're just like, it's, you're making fun of how bad. Oz should be in a band called Dingoes A My Baby.

Right. Yes. It's also like, it's a great, I mean, it's a classic scene in that thing you do of the own eaters versus the wonders. You know, like giving, it's also good if you can ever show us the people thinking of the band name and give us a couple variety of opinions on the band name so that you're like,

oh, great, They don't necessarily think it's great. Or if they do, and that's the point is for us to be like, oh, they're a little too high on their own supply. Yeah, yeah, yeah. What's the thing street? Oh, LaVie. Yeah, yeah. There's also Captain Geish and the Shrimp Shrack Shooters from that thing you do.

They're fictional fictional band. Right. Amazing. Would you just call them the Shrimpshack shooters or the shooters? Shrimp shooters, maybe? Shrimp shooters. Yeah, that's great. Something to think about.

I did want to share. This is nothing to do with anything. but one of my fondest memories is singing Kiss from a Rose with you at the buffering prom this last year. That was so fun. That was fun. Yeah. Are we, am I a musician? No.

Can I stand on stage next to him and sing Kiss from a Rose? I can't. Did you pre-plan the harmonies or did you just have to feel it out? It was a group sing, so you could just blend it in the background. You knew to. You know. No, there's 13 voices in unison. Yeah.

Unison. Yeah. I could just go as low as I needed to. It's fine. Absolutely fine. All right. Best animated band, Rishi. Oh, okay.

So I, you know, kind of used up my marcelain, the vampire queen. And your K-pop Divenhangers. I'm going to go with the Wagstaff sixth grade music class from Bob's Burgers, the episode. the plight before Christmas, where Tina Faye comes in as the substitute teacher. It is the single best episode of Bob's Burgers. Love it. Have you seen this episode? No, but I love this.

And they have one day to learn their song. Eventually, Gene comes up with the idea of, like, taking off all of the bars from the Glock and spiels that are not notes that they're going to play so that they can learn it. And then the song they play is. a Philip Glass piece. Oh, my God. And it is so beautiful and so emotional. I challenge people to watch that episode and not cry.

Wow. I love that when there's like, when you're watching something like a comedy thing and then they're like, oops, fooled you. We did something incredible. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. So emotional. Oh, my God.

Yes. What a great pick. He's like, yeah, I know. I killed it that one. It's a deep cut. But you can actually find the, they put out the, the recording of the Wagstaff 6th grade band playing that song. And it was on my Christmas playlist this year.

Is it just instrumental? It's instrumental. Wow. Yeah, and it's so nice. That's really cool. Yeah. All right. My pick is it ages and dates me.

I'm picking the beats from the animated show Doug. Yeah. They have two hits that I will always remember. I almost pick this for most for best songs. Is it killer tofu? Of course. Oohie, ooh, killer tofu. Wow.

Yeah. No? No. Oh, wow. And then there's, I need more allowers. Why? Because I do. That's a different song.

Yeah. But you both knew exactly where you came in. Well, that's the earworm part. I think that might be all you hear of those two songs are just the hook. But the beats, they're the Beatles, but like, you know, they're the beats. and spelled like the vegetable. Yeah, spelled like the vegetable. Gotcha, gotcha, gotcha.

Yeah. And I think... This is a Nickelodeon show. Yeah. Yeah. I'm both old and didn't have cable. This is, okay, I had cable, but we didn't have like HBO or Showtime or something like that. And I've discovering this as I, every time they call me on to do the rewatchables and I watch a movie, I was like, wow, there are boobs in this.

And I watched the, like, T&T cut or the USA cut. And I didn't know how many boobs were in this movie. Yes. So we all go through our own things. Just what's your answer here? Well, also really quick, the music and Doug, like the intro music is... It's great. It's really good.

It's like an a cappella sounding open. Yeah. It's great. Patty mayonnaise. Yeah. Oh, there's also, there's a great, when they make a band, banging on a trash can strum in a street light. Wow, you just don't know something in my brain.

One little voice keeps calling me, calling me. One little boy. And they're like, he dreams the music video because he comes up with the song on his banjo. And then everyone is like, Doug, we heard you have a band. We want to be in your band. And it starts to get too big for Doug because really he just had his one song on the banjo. But then he imagines that they have like this big music video where they're in sort of giant suits like the talking heads. And he wakes up and he just like writes down big suits.

I love Doug. I'm impressed by your recall. Well, I'm so sorry that I did have cable and I was a certain age that I would just watch it on absolute repeat. Doug was very important. I think I would know my day by the half hours of television. Yeah, yeah. Actually, I have that as well. Yeah.

But just, you know, no cable. Sure, sure. Just the hour-long block of the real Ghostbusters. Yeah. Yeah, totally. Yes. Very important. The beats were my first pick, but I have a strong second pick, which goes to my half hours of like, it was on at 630.

It was on at 730. You could sit through the local news in between and then primetime it started at eight, which is the specific episode of The Simpsons where they get recruited into a boy band called the Party Posse. Bart, Millhouse, Nelson, Ralph Martin. And they have a song that the chorus is Yvonneette Nij. And they reveal later that they have been put together to get to be propaganda to have people join the Navy. Yvonneette Nijh backwards says join the Navy So it's like it's height of in sync and backstreet boys

When this episode comes out They're just like doing boy band tropes about like you know And it's a great you know thing in an episodic Storytelling to just show the whole like arc in 22 minutes But their big song is Yvonneette Nijage which is join the Navy backwards Party Posse And again your recall of that hook is incredible Yeah really well I consider joining the Navy

I worked on you It's like Being on a boat? Yeah. With some of my dear friends. A jaunty cap? Jaunty cap? Yeah.

Join the Navy is such a funny thing too. Of like specific government propaganda. It's so pitch perfectly like insidious but not that insidious. Just be like, I don't know, join the Navy. Yeah. Think about it. I love that we all pick TV shows. That's fun. All right. Best Real Band Cameo. so a real band that showed up in a TV or film playing themselves is sort of the idea here so I'm going to pick because I can letters to Cleo in 10 Things I Hate About You Because it's plot, it's important They show up thrice, there's a concert, they play the prom And then they play on the rooftop of the high school

Over the closing credits, which is an incredible moment Really good That's my pick Yeah, that movie's perfect I'm going to also go Waze me right I'm going to also go with a teen movie I'm going to go with

the mighty mighty boss tones and clueless this is like what Joanna put together like an amazing list for us and then occasionally you'd be like I need something else here

and this was the one that I feel like I did the most ancillary like Googling about like I don't actually nothing's coming to mind and when I thought of this I mean that moment

of Scott in the 90s is so funny to me and it was so So, like, I don't know how Mighty My Bostones are from Boston, I think. Yeah. Yeah. Was Skaw big for y'all? Yeah.

Yeah. We had the Mighty Mighty Bostones. We also had the Alstonians. Sure. Yeah, we had a lot. Yeah, and we had a lot in SoCal. I mean, like, I feel like maybe we were the two epicenters of it, you know, and we started to go a little more pop punk.

It's like, obviously, like, then into no doubt, tragic kingdom, huge. But my brother was in a ska band called Whipped Gravy. You know, there was like, there was another ska band called Blue Raz. in our town. Like, it was just like... Moosh gravy. Yeah. It was like one year where...

Yeah, do you want to take it back about band names? Did I find the perfect one? I'm wrong. Their one song was called Calvin Crime. I'm sorry, I do remember its chorus as well. Calvin Crime! Crazy kid next door.

Calvin Crime, steal stuff from the store. Yeah, great. With the horns. Yeah. Burr-bur, bur, burr, bur. And then like the dedicated hype dancer. That's my favorite part about the Mighty Bostones sequence includes. Also, it's a great funny scene.

You know, Ties like dancing alone. It has the full-on Monet, which is just a classic line. And just to have the Mighty Mottones in this, like, Beverly Hills High School party is just so funny to me. Yeah, that's really good. I'm going to take back what I said about band names. All band names are bad except for ska bands, which are all good. They're all, yeah. What's the journey?

of ska into like gap ad swing band revival that happened at the end of the 90s into the odds. So for me you're a jump jiving and wail if you will. Yeah, exactly. You're cherry pop and daddy's

a band that I would just say in fourth grade. Yeah. Like weird. Those were words. Those were words that I was like, cherry pop and daddy's. Woof. Maybe it wasn't perfect in the 90s.

And just that one thing. That is one of the only good band names. I know, it's great. It's great. Yeah, I think it was like, okay, we can put horns in things, and we're like, yeah, horns, horns can be cool. Horns can be on K-Rock, and then we were like, no, they can't. I think we just like immediately were like, never mind.

Absolutely not. And it, like, went, I think that some of the rhythms stayed in, like, pop punk, but they got pulled, the horns got pulled out. We're like, this is too dorky guys. You band geeks tricked us for a few years, and now, you fooled us. Now the skaters are back, like, wearing our. Our bass is really low. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Love it. All right, what's your real band cameo? This might be a very deep cut, but for me... We love a deep cut. Just number one. Have you seen the movie Fall and Leaves? Yes. Have you seen that movie?

No. By Aki Karasaki, the Finnish movie. There's a scene with the real Finnish band. I'm certainly saying it's wrong. Mouse did it tot. Do you remember in the bar? Yes, I just didn't know that was. a real band. That's a real band. It seems so pitch perfect for the actual movie and how weird it is and

everything. They fit right in, but that is a real band called Mouse Titi Tot, which is finished for Spice Girls, which is amazing because they are the two most deadpan people, like in a movie full of deadpan people. Oh, that's so great. And they have a song, I'm not even going to try and say But you did Mose Titi Tots so well. Yeah, as far as I. I really think you crushed it. Do you want to see these, I'm going to ask Jess to say the name of this song. Oh my gosh. Sintintzern, yeah, puity, petty mishkin, born in sorrow, clothed in disappointment. Wow.

That's what it translates to. Incredible. The first word is just consonants. Yeah. Yeah. Wow. Incredible. Have you been to Finland?

No. I went to Finland and it was cold. and other lovely things about it. But my husband and I really wanted to try to see the Northern Lights. So we booked like one of the like a glass cube where you could just like stare at the sky all night. We did not see them. It was too foggy. And also they were all really expensive.

And we had two nights in Finland and we were like, okay, well, let's stay somewhere more affordable the night, the other nights that we can like really splurge on this. So we're just in like an Airbnb. And in our Airbnb is like, here's, we gave you soaps. We gave you towels. They also gave us vitamin D. Wow. They were like, hey, it's tough out there. It's tough out there.

You're not going to get any of this naturally. I was like, this is so thoughtful and also, oh gosh, I certainly could not live here. And yet, and yet voted as indicated by Mao Zedititza album title, the happiest country in the world. Do you know, I think part of that, though, is an acceptance of a certain, of a certain. certain hardness about life. Or just everyone maintaining on vitamin D. Exactly. Or they always take that survey in the summer.

You know, like, when they're like, oh, I don't know. I forget. I don't know who I was for the past seven months. But sun's here. Yes. But actually, I remember when we were driving around, we put like just local radio on. And it was like close to Christmas. And there were a lot of like, I was like, I think I have to look up some of these

finish Christmas songs. Like this has got some great kind of like hair metal. Like I could imagine if I could hear the lyrics that would be like, like Santa came on a dragon. Please, please write Santa came on a dragon. I think you've already started halfway there. No worries. Yeah, yeah.

Please let that be the end closing song for this episode. Santa came on a dragon. All right. Most impactful musical performance as story beat. Back to you, Jess. I'm going to go with, okay, I've, Okay, yeah, I think it's just, it is such an important hinge moment in the story. I'm going to go when they are writing, falling slowly in once.

My pick, yeah. It was, yeah, yeah, it's great thing. And I thought of, like, oh, the times when it's more like a culmination moment where someone finally, like, takes a stage and you know what they're singing from. But I think in the get-back documentaries, I think everyone's, like, maybe favorite part is, like, watching them think of things. get back. And just it's really hard to like show what a songwriting process feels like. And obviously this one's fictional, but they're both, you know, actually music. They just, it feels so authentic and it's so important in the story. And then it's just an incredible song. I was going to have to like have once on here somewhere. And I think what that does in the story is just so important

without being like particularly showy. And they're in like, you know, like a music store. And it's like, I don't have the words yet, but it's like, dum, dumb, done. And then even the same way that it feels very truthful where he takes it to double time to get her to the next section he's like you know and then it continues he ups the the time signatures so he can sing through the next part and then it's something like this it was like yeah this is pretty perfect and it's a great song it's a perfect pick and glenhancer already had uh chops of being in a movie because he was in the commitment i know which i didn't know yeah yeah yeah there you go um that song was almost in my favorite covers um from last man on earth yes yes an incredible scene.

Yeah. Also an under, a little slept-on show, I feel like. I agree. It's a great show. And it does that thing where it really barrels

through plot in like a really brave way. But yes, Will Forte and Jason Sudecas as brothers singing this song as karaoke over and over and over again. It's great.

Yeah. And then it becomes just like a trope running throughout the show until the end after that. Yeah. It's just so good. Yeah.

All right, what's your pick? My pick is the death of Queen Jane in inside the Davis. We lost her. Yeah.

Oh my God. Absolute life ruiner. Oh my God. It was right at the moment when my my writer's block, which at the time I did not know would last a decade, had kind of started.

And then that scene was basically like, I was like, yep, yeah, that's, there it is. That's it. That whole moment is, so brutal and so real. And that movie is a horror movie. And I just, the F. Murray Abraham reaction at the end of like, I just don't see a lot of money here. It just, that feels like so real.

Like, just like the swell season, once, you know, thing feels real in the creation. This feels like this is how dreams die. because his performance of it is absolutely real. You see him actually do it. It's good. It's competent. You have to wonder,

they don't do the camera panning around the thing to be like, this is amazing. You know it. Everett, Abraham's loving it. And you're just dying with the suspense of how this is going to go. And it turns out it doesn't go.

Just everything about that. Just one of the worst things I've ever seen in terms of my own heart. Yeah. Oh my God, that kills me. Absolutely kills me. And I love that song too. Oh, so good.

I'm going to pick, Remember Me from Coco, you know, which is... Really good, really good. Multiple times in that movie, but when it is, like, comes through the very end, it's just like absolutely on the floor crying. This is why you didn't want us to tell our answers in advance so you could have this.

Yeah. Oh, man. Oh, gosh. That's really good. No, I just love when people can like organically react to pics or be like, what the fuck is that? Yeah. That's great. I need to tell you the plot of goofy movie. But yeah, I mean, remember me is just an outstanding. And like the, you know,

I love that in a musical or a song of a music when you hear a song one way and then you hear it another way later. And you're just sort of like, oh God. Oh my God. And the meaning of the lyrics. I don't think I've ever cried more in a movie in my life than I did at the end of Coco. And it's still my favorite Pixar movie. Yeah.

Good one. Yeah. That's my pick. Really good. Thank you. My hardest cry is at a Pixar movie. You as well? All of them.

Yeah. Toy Story 3. Toy Story 3. Yeah. Toy Story 3 got me. I mean, Coco got me. The beginning of up. now, so I don't know what an achievement

it is for them, but yeah. They get you every time. When Bing Bang. Oh. Inside Out. Actually, a lot of Inside Out. Yeah. Okay, actually, Inside Out didn't get me as much

because it was, I think, too abstract. Interesting. I don't think the whole thing got me, but Bing Bong definitely got me. Yeah, your imaginary friend in the rubble. Come on. And then he sacrifices himself for you.

Yeah. Yeah. sacrificing yourself, that is, that's always going to get me. That's, like, Project Helmer. I know we're not out of this, but like. Well, I was just thinking of, I was making me think, I was just thinking of Project Hill Mary of like, oh, that sign of the Times performance also so good. So good.

Yeah, yeah. Oh, my God, Sandra Hewler. Yeah, beautiful. Yeah. Amazing. Yeah. I love that they were like, the story behind that where they were like, oh, Ryan Gosses is like, oh, she should sing.

And she's like, it must be Harry Styles. I must reinvent sign of the times So good I love her All right Big ones left Best album

Rishi you get the first pick here Mine was the commitments Yeah Yeah Because before I saw the movie I experienced the The CD My sister had it

I have an older sister And she was like This is great And so this was the spoiler That I was trying to avoid For that answer because I just listened to that album and I just thought they were a real band

and I thought they made the movie about the band with the band like I thought it was a biopic right you know I mean I was very I was a child yeah yeah yeah but yeah

you're like Jimmy Rabbit he's real yeah I just thought it was like how did they yeah I guess oh yeah they just asked the band to do sure I mean it's like a kneecap situation yes it's not my pick but yeah because I'm Irish yeah

And we just listened to that album over and over again. I was just like, this is great. It was actually how I got introduced to a lot of like soul classics. Yeah. Yeah, through this Irish band, Kaepern. I mean, movie soundtracks introduced me so much music in general. Yeah. So, but yeah.

Was it your experience that the year that Forrest Gump came out, everyone got that? Like, I feel like I was like fortunate son is my favorite song. It was just like I feel like everyone's, you got every dad you knew the Forrest Gump. soundtrack. The double CD. One was red and one was blue. Yeah. Absolutely.

For sure. All right. My answer is, I feel like I should, I'm like, should I just talk about O Brother again? Or should I talk about? I mean, I very like, you should because I feel like it's real category fraud that I put them in name. That's how I felt personally. I was like, wait, it doesn't take it off the table for the other people.

So someone can still talk about. I mean, I feel like, I will just say, I listen to. to the Inside Lewin Davis soundtrack it's like weirdly a Christmas album for me

I listen to it every year at Christmas I think because a movie came out at Christmas and then I just got you and so like

and folk is very cozy It's very cozy but it's sad but it's just sort of like in that like Charlie Brown Christmas kind of way Yeah totally

where I'm just like Christmas yeah and I'm saying Santa came on a dragon Oh gosh you've got to make this song

please make it a sad song I mean maybe you guys should collab maybe you should be be able to like be played multiple ways.

I'm in. I think this is going to be like a breakaway. I think so, yeah. Number one on the UK charts, Christmas single. Oh my. Santa came on the dragon.

That's all, that's, what's the song in, About a Boy? Santa's Super Slay. Yeah. That's another great. Yeah.

I always think about that with like, oh, if you could write a Christmas song. Yeah. Do you get this thing where you like get incoming emails like, do you want to write a Christmas song? when they come in July.

No, but if you want, you can. Yeah. Yeah. Do you get constantly bombarded in July? Not constantly, but in the summer, there'll be a thing where it's like every TV show or like all the things that are like looking for new original holiday music. Uh-huh. Those requests come, they start coming around now.

I do have to say that, I mean, this could maybe still happen one day, but a friend of Mine was pitching an animated holiday special version of snakes on a plane. And for where, like Samuel L. Jackson, as himself, saves Christmas. And for the pitch, he had Zach, my partner and I write. And we wrote in the style of like the cobra starship, snakes on a plane, snakes on a sleigh. And so it's kind of a bop. Wow. But yeah.

I'm sure it's a buff. I think we deserve a whole Christmas album for a video. Yeah. Yeah. Snakes on a sleigh and Santa came on a dragon. Yeah, absolutely. But I will pick, oh, brother. Just because, like, we get the soggy bottom boys tracks.

We get the Sirens song. The Go to Sleepy Little Beach, and then we get down to the river and pray. And all of it is sort of, is this cheating? Is this just a soundtrack? But, like, it's all dietic inside of the, you know, the O death song, like, all this incredible. then like what that album did with that album what tibone burnett did for um you know folk music or appellation

music and stuff like that and that whole revival but i like burnt a hole in that CD and that was like i don't know if i still if i still would put it in my top five um favorite movies but for a long time i put oh brother in my top five favorite movies and now you can count this as odyssey prep exactly right exactly right and i'm always thinking about odyssey you know what i mean it's the last The last great depiction of The Odyssey in cinema, right? Truly is. Nothing as clear since. Do you know about the Odyssey musical?

No. Okay, I've been getting a lot of emails about it. They're from me. More burners, more burners. All right, Jess, what's your pick? I, similarly, it's like soundtrack-y because there's multiple artists. But I have to go with Pop Star, which I just had to have. Never Stop stopping.

Yeah, never stop, never stop. stopping. I have to have it on the list somewhere for me. I love Lonely Island. Also, like, the songs that they write for Hunter the hunted, the Chris Redd's sort of odd future inspired character is are also really great. They play in like a bunch of genres really well. Like, there's, the songs are legitimately like so good. And another movie that I think it has like grown, grown, but just shock to me. that it isn't like the biggest movie ever. It's so funny.

The songs are so good. And yeah, his songs as Connor for real. I'm so humble. And like the production value on it is really great. And sounds like that is a time period. I do feel like I understand what the sound is supposed to be. Yeah. And they just do it so well.

Yeah. Yeah, I'm glad you got them in there because usually, I mean, they're just so good at making music. Making music, yeah. But in a sketch, you know, it wouldn't really qualify for most of these. But yeah. So good.

Best fictional band. Would you look at that I get first pick? Honestly, this is random. I randomized this, but here we are. Which means I get to honor my tattoo and pick stillwater from almost famous here. Heck yeah. Thief dog. Like incredible stuff.

I mean, in terms of movies about a band, there are so many that I love honestly and we haven't even covered them all but almost famous is so important and I believe in Stillwater I believe in Jeff Bebe, I believe in Russell Hammond, I believe in all of them and yeah, that's my pick

yeah, it's a great one. It's also like a great one about being a fan I think like and loving something and I think that's like a great part about movies about music is that I think it is ultimately the thing that we all understand the closest. Not everyone you meet is going to have like an encyclopedic knowledge, but everyone has like a favorite song.

Yeah. And so, yeah, almost famous is perfect for that. Yeah, we can come back for another episode just to talk about how great that movie is. Okay, great. Let's do it. I'll figure out a way that it's house of art, Jason. I'll find a way. It's Odyssey prep.

Yeah. There's a moment, you know, when they're doing the bus ride, tiny dancer, yeah. I was, when that movie came out, I had gotten really. really into, for the first time, I had just gotten into Red House painters. I was listening to so much Red House painters, but I had no idea what Mark Kozlack looked like. And then they go into that song, and then suddenly I hear this voice. And I'm like, wait, what is happening? What?

You know, it's unmistakably him. That's amazing. Oh, it's Mark Kozlack is in. Yeah. Is in the band. Yeah, yeah. Oh, my God. It's amazing.

I remember when they, the one and only time I went to the Oscars, they did a flex they did a they did a montage of sort of like music in movies and I was like what are they going to do

what are they going to show tiny dancer and they showed it and I burst into tears this is not a cool story that's the Oscars in like formal wear like crying at the Dolby theater because like Tiny Dancer

was on the screen and I'm like yes Cinema matters it's so good important to me Jess best fictional band Okay, I think I'm going to go with Mitch and Mickey from A Mighty Wind. That's a sound, that's not, I think my favorite is waiting for Guffman, but A Mighty Wind like holds a super special place in my heart.

And the music is so good. That's an album that I like played on a million times. A million times. And like the songs that they feature about them are great. But also the soundtrack has a song that isn't in the movie called The Ballot of Bobby and June. about a Civil War soldier that is so beautiful that I have like on many a road trip forced people to listen to. I'm like, do you know about this song?

It's like actually just good. It's a track from a Mighty Wind that was not in the movie. Yeah, so. It's great actually. Let me teach you something here. About music. About music, okay? Obviously, I felt like, yeah,

I wanted to honor the late great amazing Catherine O'Hara, who is, I think, a great example of, like, bringing an authentic voice when she sings. Both of them, like, they just, they sound like humans. I do think there is, like, a through line here. I think folk music is a more successful genre to sometimes put in films because they're story songs. They don't necessarily rely on having a vocalist as being front and center. It's about, like, telling a story.

There's plenty of folk voices that we have in the, like, Uvra that aren't good voices. So there's a lot more forgiveness for how they should sound and they should just sound like themselves and Mitch and Mickey are just like kiss at the end of the rainbow and then are they going to do it. I love that part where the folksmen are like, I remember this.

This is that really pretty one. How are they going to do the kiss? How are they going to handle it? And they all like walk out to watch. They all run up to watch it. Yeah. And also a movie about an era and then who's everyone's favorite?

Like who's the musician's musician, you know, in the way that they feel about Mitch and Mickey. So I love a Mighty Wind. That's a soundtrack I've played. thousand times. And specifically within it, Mitch and Mickey are just god tear. We watched that when Catherine O'Hara died. That was sort of like the project we picked to rewatch. And I was like crying during kids at the end of the rainbow. It's so beautiful. Eugene Levy. And yeah, and then like everyone is in the wings of the theater waiting to see what they do there.

And it's just like so tender. It's so beautiful. Yeah. My pick is not the band whose music I necessarily love the most, but the one who I want them to win. I want them to succeed the most. And it's school of rock. Oh, yeah, that's great. Yeah. I just love them.

And I don't know that I've ever felt. I had my version of, you know, just like crying because of feeling so. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. When in the scene, it's like, I shouldn't be in the band. Why? I'm not cool. and the way that Jack Black just absolutely rejects that instantly. He's like, what are you talking about?

You're cool. Like, it's just, it's a good, it's a good B-side with almost famous, the only real currency, the only true currency in this bankrupt world. Is what you share with someone else when you're uncool? Yeah. And is it Linus? Is that the character's name? What's the character's name?

Who plays the keyboards? Anyway, when he, or Lawrence. Lawrence is like, I'm not cool and he's like, you are cool. Yeah. Yeah. So I love this. That's a great pick. And like a great use of Jack Black and his whole like commitment to, you know, music inside of his comedy.

Yeah. I'm realizing, yeah, he is, he has one of my favorite voices. Like, I love his singing voice. His range is unbelievable. Unbelievable. Like the rock high belts that he can hit are just insane. Yeah, he's so, so good. Yeah.

And makes it effortless. Yeah. Yeah. I became a Jack Black fan for life after that. Yeah, perfect. Perfect pick. All right. Lifetime Achievement Award. This is an award I made up just so I could talk about one person, but we can talk about a number of people here. So, Jess, what do you want to talk about? Well, I'm glad that you made that adjustment, and I'm glad that I already interpreted it that way, because I'm going to say Christopher Gess and Michael McKeon. Because I think also it's like you got to talk about spinal tap somewhere.

And then the through line that they are the duo that wrote, you know, a lot of the music for a mind you wouldn't, even though. I love the way Mitch and Mickey perform it. I just think that their music is beautiful and, like, their ability to write in multiple genres, their ability to have it play comedically but also sincere is they're huge for me personally. Michael McKean played it at the Oscars, right? Like when they did, he and maybe his wife or I don't know, but he played it because, yeah, he wrote it. And it's so good. It's so good. this, one of the great

bands of movie history. But I think for me, it's more the Mighty Wind was more connected to me than Spinal Tap. But yeah, they write incredible music. That's a great pick. And I want to cede my time so you have, so you can talk about yours because I know it's very important

to you. Well, let's all talk about Adam Schlesinger, the late great Adam Schlesinger, who not only wrote that thing you do, but also some of the music for Josie and the Pussy Cats, which is incredible. We haven't talked about, but is one of my favorite fictional.

I could have nominated them in every single category. And I also wanted to jump in on your time so that we could also talk about Crazy Ex-Girlfriend. Oh, yeah, of course. Yeah, so he,

part of Fountains of Wayne, a band that I love. A lot of people know Stacey's mom, but like there's just incredible other songs. I love the song Hackensack so much. If I ever get back to Hackensack. It's so beautiful. Yeah.

Hey, Julie is like an absolute boss. I know, like their music does not sound like Stacey's mom. No, at all. Like, Stacey's mom is like such a funny outlier. Yeah, like a real novelty that hit. But I love Fountains of Wayne. And so, yeah, he did the song for That Thing You Do. He did pretend to be nice from Jesse and the Pussycats and, like, collaborate on some of the other stuff.

But that's like, that's a great. That's supposed to be the song in that movie. And that's sort of like Popstar, a movie that did not hit when it came out and has really grown in people's estimation. I have a du jour bumper sticker. on my car. I have the vinyl that they put out. Like, I'm a huge Josie and the PussyCass fan. Three small words, which he

didn't write on, but, like, Babyface, like, produced all the music on that album. But the fact that he wrote Pretend to Be Nice, which is their their, like, hit, where it's like, ooh-ee-o-you. Like, it's a really great pop song. And that thing you do is insane. And then talk about his work on Crazy Ex-Girlfriend. Well, Crazy Ex-Girlfriend, just, I think

that the music in that show is similar to, I think, a lot of the picks that we've had, is, like, than it needs to be. Yeah, totally. You know, like, it just needs to reach a certain level to serve the function of whatever. And, but those songs were legitimately great. And they play with genre really well.

Yeah, I'm buds with Rachel. She's a genius, but she would, like, you know, Adam and then another one of their significant co-writers, Jack Dolgin, incredible music. And just, like, a total span of genre, not playing necessarily into, like, musical theater tropes, even though characters are breaking into song. Yeah. Incredible stuff. And Zach Sherwin, who did the, you know, epic rap battles of history.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And did the Jap battle on it, which is an unbelievable. Yes. Yeah, that's a great one. I mean, I had some honorable mentions that we got from listeners before we call a day, unless there's any else. A. A.k.a. me. all of Jess's other burners.

I will say the other people, like I was, you know, Christopher Guest is one that I was thinking of for this. John Carney. Yes. You talked about Sing Street. Yes. And once. Yeah, I didn't end up using Sing Street, but I love Sing Street. Sing Street is amazing.

It's beautiful. like some of that music. Brown Shoes was my second choice for impactful musical performance and like switches into music video mode. Yeah. But that's a great. We're finding our sound.

And they play in genre. So it's such a great device. Drive it like you stole it. Yes. Riddle of the model. Yes. Yeah, great stuff. Love Sing Street.

Riddle of the model is a song that they come to too quickly, though. Yeah. You're like, that's a true bob. Yeah. You did not just write the whole thing. He's like, and then for the chorus, I was thinking maybe this, here are the chords and all the melody. You're like, no.

These kids can't be genius. Our listener Ian wrote out about, wrote in about Hedwig and the Angry Inch, which is something that I really thought of. That one's a little tricky because that was a stage musical, which became a movie and then back to a stage musical. Yes. Is it a musical? The lines are blurry on that one. Yeah, that was mine sing as well. That one in Dream Girls, like the lines are kind of blurry on, like, musical versus, like, yeah, because obviously, yeah, when it was like impactful musical, it's like,

yeah, it's probably got to be effie singing. But then you're like, that's definitely, that was the closing act of the Tonys that year. That's like musical theater. I felt the same way about Hedwig, even though Origin of Love is one of my favorite songs of all time. Yeah. Yeah, incredibly good. That song is so long. It's like, what, five minutes or something like that?

Yeah, I love a long song. Couple movements in it. Yeah. Really good. Storytelling song. Yeah. Santa came in on a dragon. That's right.

Santa rides a dragon. It'll have multiple movements. Well, no, it was definitely Santa came on a dragon. It was definitely that. Okay, Gervid. Yeah, no, no, I won't wreck on. It came on a dragon. Very important.

And that's how he birthed the elves. Oh my God, it's going to be a Lord of the Rings crossover. Yeah, probably. The dragon is small. Yeah, definitely. And then it could be house and art. House of R-Coded. Oh, it's very, like, lying the way to the wardrobe,

when, like, Santa's just did Narnia. Yeah, that's just where you live. No, Santa is Gandalf, known by another name. Absolutely. I mean, Santa does have many, many names. Bro. This is why we had a shake on it. This is why it's a co-lab.

And it's not even July yet. You have time to get it done before the charts. I love it. Mouse rat, our listener, a shout-out of Mouse Rat. I mean, bye-bye little Sebastian is an incredible song. HEP Alien from Gilmore Girls, I thought was a fun pick because Sebastian Bach becomes part of the cast of that show

and that's just like really fun. One of my picks for worst band name though. Yeah, absolutely. I don't disagree. I couldn't co-sign this because I have not rewatched this film because it scarred me so much but the a eight rights from Green Room a punk band.

That movie is one of the toughest movies I've ever watched. is incredibly good. But our listener wrote in was like, this is like, this is what a punk show really like feels like. And it's so hard to capture that. So they really wanted to. We got a lot of all of Jess's burners. And then this isn't a really interesting one. I don't want to like, again, we're celebrating. We're not nagging anyone. But we got a couple shoutouts for Daisy Jones on the Six. And that's like, that's actually like a really tough one for me because I was obsessed with that book. I loved that book so much. And that's tough because that story lived in my

my head where you couldn't hear the music and I just imagined what these songs would sound like and what the collab of these two songwriters would sound like. So like, though the Amazon show was like good in many ways, I think I just had the book too like huge in my head. So when I finally like heard those songs, I was like, that's not what I was imagining and I'm sure they're well written, but they didn't hit, you know, the way that I wanted them to. Does that make sense? Totally. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It happens. Any shoutouts for Wolfbird? No.

No, none for Wolfbird. Not yet. You should get on those burners, you know? Yeah, exactly. Yeah. You have to steer these episodes, don't you know? This is the last one. It's from Kelly.

And she wrote, I feel compelled to put forth a fictional band that brought more joy to my childhood than any other. The Irish band in third class from Titanic. Oh, absolutely. The band The Real Life Band, Gaelic Storm, who have a fabulous. And I've been to a Gaelic Storm concert. And they have a song called Don't Let the Truth Get in the Way of a Good Story. And one of the lines of that is, I was in some blockbuster movie and I didn't make a dime. So I just like that lore from Gaelic Storm that they were like in Titanic and perhaps got paid a day rate or whatever.

Sure. We're in like one of the biggest movies of all time. Because they're probably just playing like reels. They're probably just playing like folk music. Yeah. Are you going to be in trouble because you didn't mention? Yeah. Because of your people.

Yes. I will. Unfortunately. I got a kneecap. I got one. Sing Street. Please just watch Dairy Girls. All right.

Do we do it? Kind of, as best we could. Rex Manning. I have to throw in one more honorable mention, which is the one that I replied in our email chain, which is a song that actually does stick in my head from the Britney Murphy movie Uptown Girls with Dakota Fanning. And there's a pop star in it who has a chorus that is,

Na, nah, na, na, na, na, na, na. Sheets of Egyptian Car. that I think literally anytime I'm shopping for sheets. I had never seen that movie, even though I was aware of it. I mean, it's like a, yeah. Yeah, it's Britney Murphy, Dakota fanning and, um, Jesse Spencer from House. Yes.

Or as I know him, Jesse Spencer from the Olson Twin movie winning London. There you go. Yeah. I'm still trying to figure out your age. I know, right? Yeah. But I watched the clip that you sent and it's a real powerful moment because like basically the premise is she's like your song needs a hook.

Yes. Because he writes this very like maudlin, like sad, and she's like, well, there's no hook. And then he puts a hook in that is na, nah, na, na, na, na, na, na, nah. Sheets of Egyptian cotton. I think it's born out of their like love trist weekend, because she's the daughter of a rock star. Okay. And she's like, if I know one thing, it has you need a hook. And then it takes off.

Yeah. And she tries to make him a cool jacket and he gets mad. Yeah, because doesn't she, she ruins. She ruins his job. with her cool fashion sense. Oh, no. It's a weird movie. But that song, I'm like, why is this song in there and thus in my head for decade?

I will say that the clip you said where he like plays it for her, he hasn't told her he's written a hook and he just like plays the recording for her. And then he like looks up and he's like, yeah, I put that hook in for you. For you. And she's just like, oh my God. Was Rudy's powerful. Yeah. Is there anything we haven't mentioned that you want to make sure? Yeah.

I wanted to shout out an amazing moment in an amazing movie, but also personally significant to me, which is, In the movie Short-Term 12. Yes. There's a scene, do you know that movie? Short-term 12. From 2013. Brie Larson. Yes.

The cast is insane. It's a lot of people just before they get really famous. Brie Larson, Rami Malik, Stephanie Beatriz, Lakeith, Stanfield, Caitlin Dever. What the heck? It's crazy. Yeah. And there's a scene where Lakeith is, he's about to, it's like a foster care program,

and he's about to age out of it. and sort of like exit interview. Oh, John Gallagher Jr. is also in it. And he performs a song that he's written called So You Know What It's Like, which is on the soundtrack and is just devastating.

Like it's in character, he's rapping about his mom. It ends with him saying, look into my eyes so you know what it's like to live a normal, to live a life not knowing what a normal life's like. And it's so brutal.

I saw the movie when it was at South by Southwest. Oh, really? Yeah, yeah. And I... We were on South by! Yeah. That's cute. And I went and I asked a question during the Q&A about that song.

Yeah. About like, who wrote it? You know, because I was like, Destin is an amazing screenwriter. But do you have that? And he was like, oh, no. You know, and Lakeith answered it. And then I talked to Lekeith afterwards about it. And then we started a band together because of that.

Oh, this is your I went to the Oscars. This is the band of Lekees. Wow. Oh, my God, I didn't know that. Yeah, we have a, I mean, we put out one EP. That's amazing. And a few singles, but we have a project called or had a project called Moors. That was because of that.

That's awesome. That's cool. Yeah. Have you seen I Love Boosters? Not yet. Lekeith is so good. I've been on tour while it came out. So now that I'm home, I got it.

He's really good at it. Anything we haven't mentioned, any incredible actor that you started a band with? Oh, yeah. Well, when I was at the Oscars. Yeah. You met Leonardo DiCaprio. Yeah, and he was like, I think what's missing from my career is a holiday band. Santa came on a try again.

Oh, okay. We write the song. We get Leo to say it. All right, let me just like zoom through to see. Oh, speaking of Jack Black, Barry Jive and the Uptown 5, high fidelity. Oh, yes, yeah. A very important band. And I almost picked Marie LaSalle from that movie doing,

Oh, baby, I love your way for the cover because it's like so good when they're like, wait. Yeah. Is this that song? Yeah. It's fucking amazing. The Blues Brothers we haven't talked about

but that seems important to talk about. We talked about Ska and they addressed like they might be in a Scobo. And we talked about the influence of Chicago comedy in music. Very true. Yes. And they're both from Second City.

The Dan Aykwright's from the Toronto Outpost. Yeah. Yeah. I love it. Chris Victoria's, Friday Lights. They just did a reunion in Austin. Amazing.

It was incredible. So I want to mention them. Drive shaft from Lost. You all, everybody. Very important. Yeah. Very important to me. Over the Garden Wall just has like such beautiful music.

So I wanted to mention that as well. Chris Isaac sings. Yeah. Yeah. Oh my God. That's such a magical little thing. The whole separate category is I also love like a something that has supposed to be like a folk song in a different, like a different timeline or something like Game of Thrones will, you know, or Lord of the Rings, like any of these like old story songs moments, those are also like always so. You love the bear in the maiden fair.

Yeah, I'm like, of course. Yeah, we did talk about Jonzi or Ed Shearin. Yeah, I thought about that. But it was like, yeah, but it's like, but that's also another great where it's like, oh, this is a different universe. This song could be like a thousand years old. older five, like you don't have a relationship to it, so it exists in its own place. Yeah. I felt this way about the recent sea shanty in Widows Bay.

Yes. The last man. Yes. As written by Arcade Fire. Yes. And Neil Casey is my buddy. And so I was texting like, can I get like just can I get some demos of this? Like I want the back.

I want the deep cut. Yeah. That show is so good. It's so good. Have you watched Witches Bay? Yeah. Yeah. I haven't seen that.

I think I'm up to the first three episodes. Okay. Yeah. It's like episode five. Yeah. It's really good. So good. Almost done here.

Oh, I would be remiss. Lustra featuring Matt Damon from Eurotrip, Scotty doesn't know. Yes. A very important song. Yes, this is the one thing my husband said when I told him about the, he was like, where are you putting Scottie doesn't know that Fiona and me? Yeah, it's very like Matt Damon is lip syncing. The real band Lustra is playing.

He's lip singing the lead singer. Damon being there is really like part of what makes that whole thing pop. Yeah, I've never seen Euro Trip, but I've seen that. That clip. That clip. He's just like airlifted in from somewhere in Europe where he was filming and his head shaved for some reason. He's just like, like does this song where he lets our main character know that he's

been like fucking his girlfriend this entire time. Sometimes in a car. Yeah. After, after, while you were at church or like whatever. Yeah. I think we did it. I really think we did it as best we could. Shout out sex babalm.

And that's it. Wild Stallions, Bill and Ted. That's the end of my list. Okay. Ramona by Beck, that almost made it up to my list. Oh my God. Yeah, from Scott Pelagrim. Scott Pelgram rules.

Such good music, yeah. All right. Well, thank you to Scott Lee and Jacob Cornett, who's here. Cameron Deadwitty, who is editing this podcast, to Mallory and Absentia so that I could get away with making this episode while she isn't here. Thank you, Mallory. Thank you, Mallory. Thank you both of you for being here.

Thank you. This, like, filled my heart with such joy. You guys really crushed it. I love that we're going to get a whole. whole new holiday classic out of this. This is the lab I'm really excited about. It's a handshake. It's real. Finding it's on camera.

We'll be back with our coverage of episode one of the Vampire Listat. And we'll see you soon. Bye.