Quick Question with Soren and Daniel - Songs That Shouldn’t Work (But Do) | Ep. 307

Episode Date: November 4, 2025

Starting today, we're putting ad free episodes of the podcast on patreon! Get ad free eps + extra episodes a month for $5 at www.patreon.com/quickquestion----Daniel takes his parking ticket all the way to Zoom Court and learns that the judicial system runs on inconvenience. Soren applauds his righteous fury, then admits he once faked photo evidence to beat a ticket of his own. From there, the guys wade into the murky ethics of parking enforcement, the secret rules of tap-dancing arms, and why some songs you love make absolutely no sense.Follow the guys on Bluesky!https://bsky.app/profile/danielobrien.bsky.socialhttps://bsky.app/profile/sorenbowie.bsky.socialBonus episodes 2x/month at patreon.com/quickquestion OR Apple Podcasts

I've got a quick, quick question for you all right. I want to hear your thoughts on what's on your mind. I've got a quick, quick question for you all right. The answer's not important. I'm just glad that we could talk tonight. So what's your favorite? Who did you get? When will I be?

What's it out? Worded all that. Oh, forget it. I saw a movie Daniel O'Brien. Two best friends and comedy writers. If there's an answer, they're going to find it. I think you'll have a great time here. I think you'll have a great time here.

Soren, it's the podcast. It's a quick question. We took a little break, but we're back now with the show, and I'm here to tell you. that justice has been served wait oh good um let's see what were your grievances that i think might have been fulfilled here um you the man who who tried to get you to cut a bunch of wood uh for money no the man who is going to bring you wood for money is dead no no soren i'm just going to tell you um this this the story ends

and and begins with me being correct and righteous and victorious. It is still kind of a story about the system being broken and it's all incredibly petty. A couple weeks ago I went to the gym that I'd go to once a week to take

my gym class. There is between 20 and 24 people who take this class every session. The gym has seven parking spots and So you have to go to the lot attached to it or outside of it. And that is a paid parking lot. And I paid to park.

It's a dollar to park for an hour. And I paid my money. And then I went and I took my class. And I got out. And I had a ticket. And lots of people had tickets. Everyone that I walked out of class with, we were all like, we've got tickets. This is nuts.

And we're like, clearly the kiosk is broken. The machine that you pay is broken. Gets a pretty good scam, by the way. equipment that the ticket issuing officer, his equipment is perhaps broken. But we were all very chill about this. And some of the people in the class, they had their receipt because they're smart. I didn't have mine because there's no law that says I'm supposed to keep the receipt. I was like, okay, I will just contact the parking authority.

And in my head, I was going to contact them later that day. And they were going to say, let me stop you right there. you're taking about this. Yeah. Everyone's been calling us. And that didn't happen. And I called them up and I was like, hey, I got to take it. And I didn't actually park there.

And they said, great, you have proof that you paid. I was like, no, I don't. I don't because I didn't keep the ticket because you don't need to keep the ticket. But surely there are records in the parking kiosk that will either, like, you know, evaluate your machinery. either it will say that the machine is broken and no one parked all day or you could trace it to my license plate

and it will say that I did park one of those two things and then we can just miss the ticket and like unfortunately we can't do that just because you feel like the machine oh I said no we can't do that we need proof and I emailed them back and I was like what constitutes proof here is a screenshot

of my bank statement saying I paid a dollar to park on this date, surely that's going to be enough, because that would be an insane thing to fake. And they said, unfortunately, there's no timestamp on that bank statement of yours. And I wrote back again, and I was like, but let's just be human beings about this. A lot of us walked out of there with tickets. Surely you're getting other complaints from other people. there's obviously something wrong with your machinery if this happened to so many of us

and they said you need to call and schedule a court date because we will not respond to your emails anymore just because you feel like something is wrong with the machinery doesn't mean something is wrong with the machinery and so obviously I wrote back and provably they did not respond to my emails true to their word and so I called to schedule a court date and went through the whole thing with that person on the phone you could you try it emailing it was like yeah I tried emailing they no longer want to speak to me

and I just figured maybe we could figure this out over the phone she said no nobody else has contacted us saying the machines are broken and I'm like those fucking charlatans in class we all said we were going to fight this together and no one's doing anything or the parking agents are lying to me but either way I'm scheduling a Zoom court date

And here's some annoying things about the system. And like I want to, before I get into the annoying things about the system, I want to get ahead of what our audience is thinking. I know I'm being petty and ridiculous. I absolutely know that I've, at this point, with four emails and a phone call, is I've gone to way too great, measures to avoid paying, I buried the lead a little bit,

a $33 parking. Wait, stop. Stop for a second. No. I know $33 is only $33. It's not the point. And I know that I make good money. And I,

but you're right is not the point. $33 is not. A dollar, which is what I paid to park, which I already, just stepping outside of the bounds of this particular situation, is already absurd that we're paying for parking at a gym that I'm already paying for to take classes there. Yeah, ordinarily at a gym, they'll give you like a, there's a, you just go in there and you like scan your ticket and they're like, oh, no, you're at the gym, it's cool. And you get that validation. Not in Red Bank, New Jersey, doxing a place. So I call the person and I was like, I guess I have to schedule a court date. and here's some

some interesting things some ugly things about our judicial system that I am learning through this is just how discouraging they are of anyone seeking justice of anyone who wants to do this

and I think and maybe this is just her attitude because I'm fighting a parking ticket and it's a very minor thing but it seemed like she is reading from a script or like following a program where I'm saying that I want to I guess I want to do a court date. She's like are you absolutely sure because it's like you're going to have to it's early you're going to have to get on Zoom pretty early. I was like yeah I my computer isn't the kind

that needs time to wake up. I can do it as early as possible. I work from home. I could be available for a computer. I was like okay well because you're going to get your your thing in the morning when you're going to meet with a prosecutor and they're going to talk to you and then later you're going to have another time to be in front of Zoom to talk to the judge okay

excellent you're going to be in front of the judge and there's no telling what that time is going to be and it might be hours and hours like everything that she was doing was designed to get me to say okay no I'm not going to do this right I will pay this ticket even though it is unjust and I was like I understand

everything that you're saying to me I still want and need to see this through. But there was something still small in my brain that I was like, just real quick, though, if we schedule this court date and let's say, let's say my wife is at work now. And let's say she comes home

and I talk to her about this. And then let's say she says that this is a silly thing for me to do. Can I cancel my court date? And the woman said, yeah, if the voice of reason comes home and tells you not to. She said that?

Yeah. She really didn't want you going to court. I was like, okay, that's good to know. I would have dug my heels in. There's no way I'm not doing that court to. As soon as somebody's like, come on, man, just pay the unjust $33. I would be like, oh, this goes all the way to the top. I know.

Fuck all of you. And I did go to court. I went to the morning and I meet with the prosecutor. and in the time between when I'd parked and this meeting, I had accumulated more proof. The screenshot of my bank statement still doesn't show a timestamp. And so I chatted with a Bank of America representative explaining the problem. And they said, we have a charge for parking on this date that you say.

And it's timestamped at 9.17 a.m. And I was like, great. can you send me something on Bank of America letterhead that says that please because I'm taking this to court and the guy said no we can't do that

are you sure you want to take this to court you're probably going to have to get up pretty early we cannot timestamp transactions in a bank statement but he's a strange thing but he knows it but I'm not allowed to tell anyone and he said you are welcome to screenshot this chat that we're having

and try that and I was like brother I'm going to do just fucking that I thought you were going to be able to bring in a witness I was so excited I would like to call to the stand Jerry from Bank of America my plan was to send the screenshot of that conversation

and my bank statement and also if that didn't work I was willing to share my Zoom screen and do a live chat with someone else at Bank of America to prove like just in case you guys think the chat is photoshopped

because it seems pretty easy to do that here I am talking with a fucking person I didn't have to go to that I talked to the prosecutor and he was like you want to fight this

I was like yes and I have proof and I set the proof and then I waited for the judge the judge was an hour late to court and I waited with a lot of other folks

they call them one at a time and some of them have defense attorneys with them and some of them don't and the judge just goes through

like person by person by person by person my person And they get to me, and they say it's dismissed, and I say, great. And then I emailed the court after that, and I was like, hey, the, the judge said he talked to the prosecutor and my, my case is dismissed. Same woman, I hope. May I please have documentation of that?

She said, no. Really? I know. Wait a second. How does anything fucking get done ever? know how anything fucking gets done ever and I know that

this is that people are going to roll their eyes because I'm I am it's a story that's dripping with privilege

I have the time not only do I have the money to pay $33 I have the time to sit in front of a computer which is way more

arguably way more valuable yes but I'm but and as happy as I am that I won this thing it's really fucking infuriating

that because in the in the before we talk to the prosecutor we talked to um like a court administrator who's just going through like like doing some very basic admin stuff of like hey your zoom name just says like user number three or such and such iPhone so I need your your full name like a roll call basically of everyone who's in the zoom and there are people who are like yeah I'm here it's 830 like I was told to to come is this going to happen soon because I have work. And the administrator is just like

yeah, I mean if you have to go you have to go but this is this is it. This is this is court and there are so many people who don't have the luxury that I have of a job that is also a computer job that I can simultaneously do while sitting around and waiting for a Zoom court

and it just seems commenters will probably point out how it's a system that is made more unfair by people like me clogging up the schedule with my bullshit. I will point out that I was forced into this position, and I went to great lengths to not have to go to court. But it does seem like a system that is, and again, these are like the most minor of minor

offenses, it is a system that seems to bank on you not using it. They want you, they want this to be too inconvenient for you to. to fight for yourself. To advocate for your own rights, yes. And it sucks, and I won, but it still sucks. You don't know that you won. I mean, you won in the room, but who knows how this will actually shake out? There's like a single clerical error, and you're right back and back at zero again.

I know. It's just, I'm going to have to go through. Here are my screenshots with the Bank of America, robot named Justin. And here's a screenshot of my email where a person from the municipal courthouse said, no, when I asked for proof. Yeah. I do anything else you need.

I want you to be able to, God, I desperately want you for you to be able to talk to that person again. The person who was like trying to convince you not to do this, I want you to go to them and be like, I went to the steps of City Hall and I won. Yeah. I did this. What do you have to say to that?

I was ready to throw a lot of hardworking, presumably underpaid parking authority employees under the bus I was prepared for the judge to look at my case and say like this is just a parking error why didn't you email the parking authority so I could say

I emailed this named person at the parking authority and they said they will no longer take my emails and that I have to go to court and then the judge would say that seems like a huge waste of this court's time and I would say your honor I agree I don't know why this named person

felt it was so important that I come here. I was ready to burn it all down. Didn't have to get that far. This is, well, I'll talk about why this is so satisfying to hear, but I do want to hear a little bit more about this prosecutor. Was he harried and dishevelled?

Like, I want to know what he's like. He was not harriet and dishevelled, but I mentioned that some people had defense attorneys who came and spoke on their behalf in the Zoom. Oh, right. You got to see a bunch of other court there was some real real harried there was the the judge called a woman's name and then her attorney came on and was like judge your honor i'm so sorry she's not here she was on zoom i can't find her she's not answering her phone this has been can i may i please

request the court just come back to me in a little bit and judge was like that's totally fine And the judge came back. I was like, she's here now. She's here now. And then she dropped off again. Turinus goes, it's been such a long week. It's Thursday. It's been such a long week.

He said, it's just, it's not hard. It's not a hard thing to do. Your Honor, may I please have more time? It's like, man, this fucking guy, he's got it way worse than I do. He's got to do this all the time. Oh, man. Yeah. And there's a whole new element.

I mean, getting people to court, I think, would be tough. But also, just, just, getting them to stay at court is not super hard unless you're over Zoom. And there are so many people who clearly like leave the computer come back and they're just

sitting in Zoom and everything is silent and you're just looking at like live feed of a courthouse. And so someone will every once in a while someone will just go hello Jonathan Ruff back? I'm here. Do I need to do anything? They're like no. We're still at the

sit quietly part, like, okay, great. Oh, my God, dear. My favorite person in the court was someone who wrote his bike on the sidewalk, which you're not allowed to do in this particular town. There are a couple of towns where you're not allowed to do that. I know in L.A., it was always a real pain in the ass because you would ride your bike through Los Angeles and in some towns within LA

it's legal and sometimes it's not I would ride my bike from West Los Angeles where I lived to Santa Monica where I worked and the law changed along that path and people who knew the law would yell at you if you were like on the sidewalk when you cross the border into Santa Monica they were very upset about that's true I'll say

the police have bigger fish to fry than a single cyclist and they will never pull you over for that kind of thing here but yes you're right it doesn't change from I don't know if it's yeah I guess it's from city to city here yeah well this guy got a ticket and it's it's very funny to me that the judge called him is like yeah got a ticket for riding your bike on the sidewalk it's a $57 ticket how do you bleed I think I pled guilty the judge was like okay that's $57 the guy's like yeah I'm gonna pay that your honor I'm not from here. This is crazy. Where I'm from, we ride our bikes on the sidewalk all the time.

This is crazy. And Judge was like, yeah, well, I mean, it's in the summer when this town gets very busy, it's less crazy because someone riding their bike could crash into someone and someone can get paralyzed that way. Is it summer now, Judge? So it's not, it's not that crazy. And actually, the fine isn't crazy. But this is, but if, but the consequences of riding on a sidewalk can be very crazy. I just goes, yeah, I know, but judge, come on. Come on.

I mean, that's just crazy. I don't know how you do things here, but that's crazy. And he kept saying it's crazy until the judge hung up on him and kicked him out of the Zoom. Oh, that's so wonderful. And I appreciate so much. He took his day in court just to do that. Yeah, all fucking morning. He was always going to pay the ticket, but he's like,

I just need to tell the judge that this is fucking crazy. And I just need everyone to hear it. And objectively, you're right guy. He wanted, I think he wanted the judge to be like, candidly, you're right. Yeah, there's... That would have felt so good to hear. I'm sure there was like an outside chance where he thought the judge is going to say, hey, you know what, you're right.

Let's change that law. But mostly it seemed like he wanted to just say, this is nuts. Who agrees? All right. Thank you for your time. Everybody raise your hand. Well, let's wait until Jared is back. He walked away for a little bit.

Let's wait until he's back. So everybody can be accounted for here. Who thinks that's nuts? So I like that you did this because I well two things two things happen to me that are very similar and one is arguably more petty. We were going to the convention center for the LA Comic-Con when we used to do that at Cracked. And I parked one second, you hear that vacuum? Yeah. Okay. Is it too loud or is it is it okay?

And Gabe, I guess this is more of a question for you. Okay, great. Great. Here we go. We went to the LA Convention Center. We used to do that for the LA Comic Con that used to happen. And I parked at a meter there because it's downtown L.A. And that's all there is is meter parking. By the way, I'm not against that. I think that it's fine that you don't offer free parking to people in cities because it encourages them to take other forms of transportation. Sure. Okay. But. Oh, like what? Like bikes? The sidewalk bikes. And so I parked, I go to the parking meter. I try to pay it. And then I get to the front of the screen is completely, there's almost condensation in it. And I can't see a thing. And I'm like, oh, that sucks. And I'm looking at the other ones.

And they're like that too. So I'm just like pecking buttons hoping that something works. I take my card away. I come back later. I've got a ticket. And I'm like, unfair. I couldn't see it. How could I possibly pay this?

And so I wrote them a letter, which I've done in the past where like I was, I missed a street sweeping day or whatever. I'm like, A. the signage was no good and they're like all right we're not going to send somebody out there to go look at the sign so we'll just take your word for it on this one so I wrote them a letter

and I was like hey parking enforcement you shouldn't give me this ticket there's condensation all over this thing no one could have possibly paid and they were like do you have proof and I was like that would have been smart

so I waited well first of I tried to go back because I lived very close then I went back the day after they got that letter and it was, there's no condensation in there. So I'm like, it has to be a foggy night. It has to be like a night where there's a lot of like dew in the air. And so I waited.

When I waited, didn't have to wait long. It was its fall time of year. It's like that's when we're getting that kind of weather. And I got it. Went over there, got a picture of that same meter with condensation in it. And then went to Randall, who used to do all of our pictures for the site and got him to erase the metadata from the picture. Oh, crime. Because I, you know, I needed evidence and I didn't want the evidence to say from like five days later or whatever.

I mean, that would be great. I'm sure a lot of people would really like that. If when someone said, do you have any proof, they could just say, give me some time and I will have proof. And so I sent that in. I sent that picture and they were like, yeah, okay. And they erased my ticket. That, by the way, was. You know, like, I didn't pay 50 cents or like whatever it was.

And then the ticket itself was, I think, for around like roughly $30. Yeah. But I was like, I'm not doing it. That's, you can't, you can't charge me for this. This is, this is extortion. Yeah. And then I, when I lived in Santa Monica, I had parked my car. There was like, I lived on a pretty busy street.

And there wasn't always parking because there was multifamily housing. So if you went to the side streets beyond that, it was all single family. And there's a lot more parking on. those streets and I parked on one of those. I left my car there for three days and I came back to get it because I was riding my bike back and forth to work and I came back to get

my car one day and my car's just not there and I was like I think my car got stolen. It's like I'm like trying to call the police and stuff and like did you call me the impound lots and I was like no should I? And like yeah and so I called an impound lot and they had my car. My car had been towed

because somebody in one of those houses the minute I parked there, called my car in as an abandoned vehicle. And it takes 72 hours. If a car is there for 72 hours unmoving, then you are, it's considered, and from the time that it's called an abandoned vehicle, you get another 72 hours. Then after that, they tow the car. So there was just somebody on one of those streets who didn't like that there was a car in front of their house. And so immediately called it in as abandoned.

And I went to the police station hot. I was like, I'm bringing in statistics about, like, how much, how much worse it is for the environment just starting your car as opposed to driving it, like, moving your car back and forth and stuff like that and how I was, how much better it is for the community, for me to be on a bike. And I'm like, listen, I bike to work. Here's how I do this every single day. And everyone's normal I have to use a car. I don't have a choice because I live in Los Angeles. I should be allowed to leave my car somewhere for three days. And they're like, I agree you should be able to leave your car somewhere for three days.

But this person called you in. And if your car doesn't move within 72 hours of that, and they're like, do you have a history with this person, like fights with this person? I don't even know who this is. And they're like, we can't do it. Basically, they're like, our hands are tied. They don't have enough data in the system. I know they have it.

If someone says this car is abandoned on my street, they can look at that car and see to whom it is registered and what that person's address is to at least. say, no, this is probably the car of someone who lives here. Yeah, they're not going to do that work, man. At most, call the person to whom is registered and say, hey, did you leave your car on the street if they did that? Because most cars that are abandoned cars are cars that got stolen and then moved, and then the person disappears. I would be wonderful. It would be so nice if they actually did that.

But I think there are two different departments that are at work here that don't ever talk to one another, parking enforcement and the police. And like only when it really matters do they come in contact with one another. And here they're just like, well, we marked it, 72 hours later, it's no good, we're going to tow it. And so they towed, and I'm sure that they make a bunch of money this way too. It's valuable to them to keep the system this way. My two takeaways from my incredibly petty, incredibly privileged experience is that the system only works for the most privileged. people who can take the time and the energy into addressing it and be the system relies on people not falling up i think for like a pretty meaningful amount of revenue i imagine i don't absolutely

i i can't imagine it's so uh cut and dry of a scam that someone says hey it's the 15th issue 300 tickets for parking today. Yeah. And we'll just, we'll get however many, whatever percentage for those people don't fight this, we'll get that, and that's going to make up our quarterly numbers. I don't know if it's that cut and dry, but I also might think it's that cut and dry. There's got to be some degree of, you know, enough people. We know that that's happening.

Yeah. If you get some kind of accommodation at work, if you issue a certain amount of tickets for parking, And if you get no reprimand, if some of those tickets have a bounce back, then you were not encouraged to be very judicious with your ticket issuing. And so we know that this happens in cities where they're like, they don't have the right number of citations yet. And so like suddenly you'll just see police out in force that day. And they're just issuing tickety-tack traffic violations. all over the place because they need to and like people come that we know

that that happens so I'm sure that that happens in parking enforcement as well where you can't just walk in and be like I don't know what to tell you boss everybody's parking real good these days and like they're going to find a reason to ticket some people or be more authoritarian with it I think that a lot of times they aren't doing as much as they maybe

necessarily should be like they're just not out there as often but they're just going to have everybody roll the streets and find the single person or the first person who goes like a minute over a meter right So anyway, this thing that happened with the, it is not over yet. I had gone to the police. They were not willing to help me.

And so I started to take the law into my own hands in the pettiest way I could think of, which was. You had Randall Photoshop the entire police department in compromising positions. They're wearing, and they're wearing heart boxers. Oh, it's humiliating. I, every opportunity I could, because this other street didn't have a ton of parking. I would no longer park on my street. I would park just on the street in front of that house at every turn. And I would park there for longer periods of time than I ordinarily would, where I would, because I found out how they do it, how they mark the cars.

They put a citation on that says, like, if you got to move this within 72 hours, and they chalk a wheel. And so I would go out there, I would pull the citation, and I would pull the car, I would reverse the car about 50 feet and then put it back in the parking spot so that it had moved. chalk a wheel they mark your tires with chalk like chalk hoard or sidewalk chalk okay yeah they mark it with chalk and they have it basically in accordance with like a clock basically where some cop is like i'm going to be marking these at 10 o'clock and so like he's marking every wheel at 10 o'clock and if you're as long as your car's that chalk isn't at 10 o'clock on your wheel anymore then you're safe and so i would every chance that i got like that's the only place that i would park that was my house as far as i was concerned and i parked and i parked and i parked there from the from that point on till I moved out of that apartment which was probably like another year and a half maybe two years and that's how petty I'm willing to get that's very interesting that you think that's taking the law into your own hands yes I was a parking parking Batman well should we get into the show yes we should I have a quick question for you shoot Daniel, what is, like, the cliff's edge of your musical taste?

Is there a song that you, it does not, it doesn't subscribe to your ordinary tastes? You have like a way that, what is going on here? You've got a headband on. Just putting a headband on because I found it. I'm not trying to be distracting. Over your headphones, I have it. It's looking really good. I bet it doesn't feel great, but, you know, stick with it.

It's going to come off before the episode. Okay. I want to know the song that is like a song that's so far afield from your usual taste that it's bizarre to even you that you like it but a song like you love like what what is the very edge of how far you will go in your musical taste and I can go first should go first okay because I have to send another song to Gabe you know that I I'm a basic bitch I I I like like pop music. I like songs that are predictable. Like songs that I can, uh, I know when the course is coming. Like, I like songs that I can dance to. That's who I am. But there's, for whatever reason, this song, all right, are you familiar with Animal Collective? Uh, I see that name a lot. Okay, Gabe, will you play this, the song? I'm going to talk over it.

Okay. And just turn it down a little bit. Yeah. All right. This is a song. called In the Flowers by Animal Collective. Now, Animal Collective, if you're not familiar, a lot of their songs... Has the songs started? Yes, this is the song. Oh, man. Songs have, like, ordinarily animal collective songs, it sounds like a bunch of different, I would assume, like, insects or some sort of animals, and it's all kind of discordant

like this. It's, I would consider this ambient music. There is nothing predictable in this. When are you listening to this? I will listen to this at the gym. I'll listen to this when I'm driving in my car. I'll listen to this late at night when I'm coming home from a party. Even like I'll take time out of what I would be like listening to songs I can sing along to play this song.

I love, love, love this song. Now, here's some lyrics. Okay. They're barely intelligible. Yeah. I do think that the lyrics are beautiful when I look them up. But go ahead, go ahead. Nothing.

It just hasn't until very recently hadn't even really introduced itself as a song. Right. It's more fair to call that sound shapes early on, like what we were listening to. But it says at some points it feels like it's going to like turn into a real song. And then he's got like a little jiggling that goes right back into like what it was. and there's no way to predict what's happening at any given moment. I think that the, that, that, that, that, that, that irrequality is, like, scratching a very strange itch for me. And then there's going to be a point here where you just get hit with this wall of sound from this song.

And I think it's so beautiful and good. Gabe, will you go to, like, two, uh, yeah, go to like 220. Yeah, right there. Right here. All right. I'm going to have you just listen to this part. I need to listen to it because there's... should have made the whole song out of nice.

I mean, I'm only half serious when I say that because there's, I do really appreciate songs with like kind of a massive payoff like this, where like there's a key change or like a complete sonic development that just, just suddenly feels really good. I don't think I've ever heard of, uh, song that does that kind of technique that has been quite as jarring and alienating as the start of this song has been. Yeah, Gabe, you could turn it off. That's like the most important part right there. But you can turn the song off.

He said off. He said, there we go. So, yeah, I would say that it wouldn't mean nearly as much if there wasn't also the lead up to it. I think that this was probably, I don't remember the circumstances of, which I first heard this song. I bet that that was important, but I was probably giving it a shot and then got that payoff,

like two minutes into the song and was like, that was my favorite song. The beginnings, I don't know that I actually enjoy even the beginning. I think that I've just tricked myself into now thinking,

I love all of this. I have gone back and looked at the lyrics and tried to understand the lyrics and really enjoyed them and started to think, like, I think that this is a really good song. And then it does sound like a bunch of crickets or like insects or animals all like kind of like kind of coming together.

And then there's a moment after that wall of sound where like the wall of sound just feels cacophonous. And then all of a sudden everything sinks in like a moment. And like there's like a good beat and it's clear like what what the progression is. And I love that moment. I think it's so good. There are what the song felt like to me until that moment. is there are a lot of, you could track down, like, very early, early, early experimental films. Like when cameras were invented kind of experimental film, where a lot of what we're seeing is, like,

someone wanted to see what they looked like laughing and what they looked like crying, or they wanted to see what, like, what will it look like if I crack an egg, or what will it look like if I cut a thing open and then something spills out? What if I open my mouth and there's a flower in there? Just like very clearly, you know, what a kid does with an iPhone. Except it's like an adult man in a suit with a cigarette filming himself silently laughing and silently crying. And so when you look at these videos in their totality, it seems like the ring video because there's no narrative to it. And that's what a lot of this song felt like in the beginning.

It really just seemed like early man. discovers sound and sees just try different things if I jingle these together it does have that sensation like nothing feels like it belongs together at all but you are totally right about the payoff of that wall of sound

happening and it wouldn't be as refreshing if it weren't so uncomfortable for so much of it so I do respect the choice for that reason I there's also like I think maybe the first time I heard there's like that lyric as soon as the wall sound comes where he says we'll be dancing and

you'll smile and say I like this song and I was like I really like that lyric too like I don't even know what the rest of the song is about but I think that lyric is so wonderful I think that I heard that lyric and I was like oh oh I think there's something really going on here and then sat there with the lyrics for a long time afterwards like just trying to figure out why the song exists which by the way I think could turn any song into a good song for you like anytime somebody now now I want to like ask people in my everyday life like what's the weirdest song that you're very into. Yeah.

And I want them to give me an honest answer. So then I can just sit there with a different approach to music. Like, sit there, listen to the song is like, somebody chose this as their very favorite song. I'm going to figure out why. Like, I'm going to figure out what it is about this that's like, that's like hooking them because maybe it'll hook me too. Yeah.

My turn, Gabe, please play the first one that I sent you, not the second one. This better not be some fucking lunch money criminals. It's not going to be lunch money criminals. Criminals, I swear to God. Because you said we're only allowed to bring one. Okay, so I'm going to play this in a second, but first I wanted to ask, Soren, do you happen to know what, like, political cause this song was made in benefit for? I didn't realize that there was a political lean to it at all.

Yeah, well, actually, political might not be the right word. It's more like, like, environmental. The song was made for the coral reefs. Is it really? you didn't know that you couldn't tell what on earth that is not i did so i've i've listened to it a lot i've listened i've looked at the lyrics a lot i would did not get that this is a song about like saving the reefs wait what elements of it in the flowers so i guess it's part of the whole project they did with um an organization called coral miracle logic uh that features time lapse of

a surreal coral in reef creatures. It does have an underwater feel to it. I'll give it the song that much. But that's so surprising. Because the song is, this is not the original version either. The Animal Collective is famous for changing their lyrics before they get to the studio release. So they'll play songs live and start like tweaking lyrics as they go.

That part where right before the wall of sound where he says, if I could just lose my body for a night, that used to be, I guess sometimes I just have to miss. my wife because it's about being away. It's like being off on tour or whatever like that. And he talks a lot about this dancer who's like, well,

dance no matter what and dances and never feels like sadness. It just dances because she feels good about everything and how he can't capture that. He can't do that. And then in this like one moment, he's like, if I could just like leave for a minute and just dance with her. And like he's sort of like, it's like fantasizing

about that and how like, well, I just couldn't care. I wouldn't care about anything. Everything would be good. You could smile at me and you could say you like the song. And like we, I know I'm selfish, but I won't be this way long. And like, and it's that over and over. And then it goes like back into the regular song as he comes out of this fantasy. But I had no idea that this is about Coral Reeves. There's such a, there's such a legacy of really strange songs that are weirdly about environmentalism that I love.

There's, there's a Bjork song. I'm going to, I'm going to tell you some lyrics. Your mouth floats above my, uh, forgive me, Bjork. Bjork featuring Rosalia Your mouth floats above my bed at night My own private moon Just because the mind can make up Whatever it wants

Does it mean it'll never come true Won't ever happen again Just because she can Please could I change that Is that the right thing to do Oh I just don't know I just don't know Is that the right thing to do

Oh I just don't know I just don't know This is a Bjork song About fish farming About the Wow The protest against extensive Open Net Pen fish farming

In Iceland No okay here's a thing. I think you can just write a song and then like afterwards

you could be like oh yeah by the way that song's about BLM and everyone will go oh okay all right

yeah just that's absolutely what I'm going to do I'm going to release a song that's going to suck shit and not make any sense

and people are it's going to get widely panned and I'm like oh really because this is about women's bodies and so like what you're really doing is you're saying that you don't care about about reproductive rights

so how does that yeah reflect very well on you now all right my song Gabe hit it the title kind of gives the game away If people are just listening, it's a tap dancer and an upright bass player, and then a third member is about to join in. Oh, wow. Yeah. So it's a cover, like, you know this song.

You've probably never heard a cover of it done with mostly fiends. Yeah. It's a cushion cover. There's, uh, So this band that has been, like, releasing albums and... Oh, wait, real quick. This is when you learn that it's a medley. It's a medley of tap dancing, pop songs.

So this band, Postmodern Jukebox, they got a lot of YouTube viral fame because they would do retro covers of pop songs. They were familiar. Yeah. They would, yeah. Beyonce, see ya, Lady Gaga. they would get like a full band together and everyone dresses up in suits and and like flapper dresses and they do like old school covers of pop songs with great singers and great musicians um

and i'm that is extremely my shit so i've been following them for a while and then they did this strange thing where they brought out a tap dancer as like in lieu of a lyric a singer or soloist they brought up a tap dancer who's going to tap along to this medley with a bass player and a drummer and very briefly a piano player and it came to my attention again because i've been following this band and i liked all the singers they were getting and then suddenly there's this thing and i'm like what is this this isn't these aren't the rules the rules are did you hear it or did you see it first i they both happened at the same time no i mean like oh so you were watching as a video You just wasn't like on Spotify.

You're like, I do like Postmodern Jukebox. Oh, no, yeah. I was consuming all of my postmodern jukebox songs via YouTube at the time. Okay, okay. And this came up, and it's an incredibly watchable music video, because it's all one take, and it's just, it's, like, fun and interesting and cool. And, like, I don't watch any other tap dancing in my life, because there's a part of me that isn't sure it's a valid art form.

but this is just really cool I think I've my understanding of tap dancing was was more in like the dance aspect of it than it was in the percussive aspect of it and seeing it used as like an extended extension of the drums is much more interesting to me and just gone for it this has gone from like a weird thing that popped up on my YouTube to something that I will occasionally watch nothing but the this for oh look at the clock and like hours have gone by and it's just been on loop in the background which uh which people might find a little crazy because so much of it is just tapping like especially if you're not if you're if you're watching the video sarah rice who was the tap dancer she is she's very good at selling it she's a professional tap dancer and teacher and she's like smiling and she's doing all the all the fun stuff and she's like got little bits that she's doing with the bass player and the drummer and it's like a very charming video to watch so you might put it on and think like okay i get it i understand this content you have to know i am not watching the

video when i'm listening to this song over and over again i'm not getting the charm i'm not getting any of the impressive footwork i'm just listening to a lot of what sounds like frantic people trying to get in through my window by banging on the glass a lot of foot percussion happening um Yeah, that is certainly doing a lot of the heavy lifting in that song. I'm enjoying it. I enjoy it for the same reason that I enjoy anybody. When somebody sings, it is essentially magic to me because I don't get it. I don't understand it, and it's not a thing I will ever be able to do.

To see somebody tap dance to a song like that as well and do it that well, it's scratching the same itch for me. I'm getting it there at the same thing. So it's doing the same job. So I understand that. I think I've noticed about tap dancing, arms are super important. Didn't ever don't understand that totally. There's this very specific type of dance that you do when you tap dance that's not like any other type of dance and boy, are the arms an important part of that dance? Yeah.

I think DOB devotees of this podcast will recall that in college, I was in an all-male a cappella group called Casual Harmony and I sang bass two and I would sometimes do vocal percussion, which you probably know more formally as beatboxing and I got really into learning how to beatbox and watched a ton of videos of beatboxing online and through years of performing with this group and going to other colleges and other competitions where we would perform I had seen a lot of beatboxes in person and the good ones the bad ones there's something that we all have in common no one knows what to do with the rest of our fucking bodies no one you will see some

beatboxers who will do like a little bit of drum miming, but they're not really good at that. And also you kind of need that breath control. You don't want to be exerting yourself too much, but you also know that you're like standing there. And there are some people who are like, when they're singing, they can like gesticulate with their hands in a cool way. And that's harder to do when you're when you're beatboxing. But you still, the body wants to do something. no one has ever figured it out no one looks good doing it

I feel like tap dancing has probably run into a similar problem early where it's like this is largely a feet based endeavor but there's still so much me that people are going to be looking at what am I going to do with the rest of this even though the arms aren't like making

the noise that you like they're not doing the thing they're still on this we share the same space as the feet and so people have just decided like I'm going to throw my arm arms over here. Yeah, I'm going to do a lot of wavy arms. Just make it look like I'm working.

Just until canes get invented and I can move those side to side, I've just kind of like throw my fucking crazy arms just so just to compensate because I can't just Lord of the Dance, Michael Flatley, I can't just keep hands pinned at side. I need to like show that the rest of my body is, looks like it's doing something even though it's not right it's having a good time at least yeah um i i want to know what what ideas lost out to this one to wavy arms because wavy arms is like that's the standard that's the gold standard of tap dancing is that you're doing like big circles with those arms it looks like a shoulder exercise yeah and um and they all do it and i also with their feet sometimes they do a little wavy thing with

their feet and that's also clearly just some pageantry that it's not it's not making the song any better It's not like, you're hitting the clip in such a good way on the boards that way. It's just like, this is a fun thing I could do too. Watch my, at my knee, I go wavy. Cap dancers will do that thing where they like, they make their feet go out real wide and then real tight over and over again. And they'll also do it with their arms. They're like, look how wide my arms and my legs are going. And it's like, yeah, those arms can take a breather.

They're not making the, it's the, yeah, I want to know. I wonder if there was somebody early on who was like, let me see what happens if I just put them behind my back and like did that. They're like, this is not, it's not working. No, one likes it. No, that's not it either. What if I did like finger guns? What are the things that they tried? And they're like, none of this is selling.

I think we got to come up with something new. I think we've got to, the arms have to be doing something big. I'm sure there are a lot of tap purists early on who are like, no, the feet, that's the show. If the feet are good enough, no one's going to care what the arms are doing. And the director was like, brother, I'm telling you, they're going to, people are used to see in the whole body. do stuff they're going to be really they paid for a dance they're going to want some of their money back if they only get feet you know you got to do hands and i was going to wait till you cooled down before i brought this up but you got a smile too you got to put your whole face into it you got

also has to be very busy it's not going to work if the face isn't also busy i think that it must have been it you're i didn't realize it until you said it but like it must have been a huge boon that as soon as like hats and canes were introduced in the tapping oh what a dream that is it's fine no it's fine she can leave it on she can vacuum yeah um and uh yeah i think it must have been like as soon as you like because i'm pretty sure at the hat probably predated the cane for that like getting a hat involved was like oh thank god a thing i can take off and put back on over and over again it's also it's it's it's probably reasonable to assume that um canes predate tap dancing as well well but i mean as an institute like as a part of tap dancing yes

I'm sure that they do, but still, like, putting them as part of the art form is like, oh, this is great. Okay, now I have a cane, because a cane's two hands, and you don't have to take it off the cane if you don't want. You just do that back and forth thing the whole time. No one's going to bat an eye. Everyone's like, and they're going to be like, the hands aren't doing enough. No, they're going to be like the hands are holding the cane, of course. The hands hold the cane. They're doing everything they can.

They're just trying to keep up. Yeah, I don't. tap dancing is one of those things where I'm like I don't totally understand can you improvise tap dancing do you have to memorize just like in percussion when I used to play snare drum in middle school

I had to know like I couldn't just improvise I had to know like when the beat was supposed to be and like when I was supposed to be hitting that stupid fucking drum like is it the same with tap dancing do they have to memorize and do they have music like sheet music where they're like oh I should be doing a

that's a great question I imagine they must be able to improvise 30 second notes. They must be able to improvise. This, Sarah Reich, who you can find online with Sauer Taps is her Instagram handle. She teaches workshops and also does a lot of things like this where she is just tap dancing with a band. That might just be a thing that she owns. She might be like this very specific using tap as percussion thing.

And she can probably improvise. I don't think she has notes. I think it's probably closer to like dance routines where you learn choreography. I also, my only other final thought about tap dancing. It is, yeah. And why I think it might not be a valid art form is the, in high school, we did the musical chorus line,

which has a lot of dancing. And there's a whole specific number where it's like everyone goes through a, pop dance routine and everyone goes there's like a ballet section and there's a tap section and the ease with which i learned tap assures me that it's not real dancing because so much of dancing never connected with me but tap dancing was like oh i'm really good at this in fact most of our guys in this school are pretty good at tap dancing huh tap dancing must be bullshit there's no there's no way we're all really good at this and none of the other dances i used to have a bit

that i would do when conversations with lull and we were all standing around at a party or whatever where i would just start tap dancing and if you're on a a linoleum or like concrete surface or whatever you can make enough noise with your shoes you can make it sound pretty good and if as long as you're doing all the arm stuff and you're doing like the tap behind your foot with a toe and like doing a lot of like that that big stuff, little stuff, you can make it sound, where you, like, hit your toe and your heel kind of all at the same time, you can make it sound pretty convincing. Absolutely. And it was enough that I was like, I think I would be really good at tap.

But maybe the secret is, there is no such thing. Everybody is good at tap. I think you would be great at tap, Sorin. I think you would, you would crush it because it's, it's very easy. And it's just following orders, and you don't really need to look good doing it. Yeah. The bit, I'll say, was impressive. Impressive enough that people would be like, they would be mad.

They'd be like, what the fuck is going on? Why do you know how to tap dance? And I would be like, that's the secret. I don't. I just watched some people and I made it and I copied them. That's every tap dancer. I like that song. I don't know that I would listen to that on my own.

I do like that you also used to listen to, you would like mow the lawn and listen to levels of Sonic the Hedgehog, too. yes 100% is it too I can't remember if it was two or not I don't think it was limited to two it was the same artist behind both games yeah

yeah but you independently of the game be like and now time to relax to a little bit of casino zone or whatever the fuck you're listening to rules so fucking much there are some big bands like big big bands are doing like covers of video game music too

like eight bit orchestra and stuff every once in a while do like a sonic medley that's extremely my shit that rule is so hard yeah i could see that thing huge for you um all right well i'm going to listen to this song i'm going to take my time i'm going to lie on a bed and listen to this song and decide if i how i feel about i'm going to revisit yeah in the flowers what i am a collective animal collective was or did because it's it's a name that I've seen enough that my brain tells me

it's Spotify must think I like them I'm sure I've heard more than a few animal collective songs I didn't I don't know what I thought they sounded like but it's certainly not not what you played today. They do have it is cacophony like it's a lot of it's

cacophony but it all kind of like their songs are very very hit or miss for me which I'm now realizing is true of all my favorite bands are the ones that are that are some songs i find completely unlistenable and other ones i'm like oh i get this one so is true of you did you see the words is a wonderful animal collective song and reverend green is also a really wonderful animal collective songs but this in the flowers one was like so shocking to me because i was like unlistenable i hate this song i hate

this song oh my god i love this song this is the best one of all of them yeah well all right that'll do it for today thank everybody for listening go listen to these songs and then also I would say it's a good icebreaker man like find out what songs what the weirdest song is somebody likes and then spend some real time with that

song and be like I'm going to figure out why you like this because I think you learned a lot about the person but also you might end up liking the song a lot and my apologies to anyone who thought just this no fuck him my apologize apologies to anyone who

thought just the music portion of this podcast was interesting enough to send a friend of to send to a friend of yours who will now also have to sift through 25 minutes of man versus law parking ticket privilege there is no order to these is there i'm sorry for remember us the title this episode which will probably be gave harder yeah thank you to game harder who is obviously the glue to this this podcast he's the one who played all these songs for us and what a segue he he is the sound engineer editor producer the social guru he's everything for us uh and um if you'd like to from your own if you want to hire him for your own podcast tough titty that you can't find him who's not available uh and if you liked our theme

song that's by me rex they also have some really great songs that are very unique uh that you could really sit with and explore marinate in i would say um you also like this video, no. If you like this podcast and you wanted to watch a video version of it, you can do that on YouTube. If you like this podcast, you want more of it. Obviously, you can do that on Patreon. If you would like a more streamlined version of this podcast where you don't listen to ads, that will also be available on Patreon. There's a no ad version of this podcast on Patreon. So, another good icing on the cake reason to join. That's it. Goodbye. what's on your mind

I've got a quick, quick question for you all right the answer's not important I'm just glad that we could talk tonight so what's your favorite who did you get when would I be remember

what's it out where it all you go to we know oh forget it I saw a movie Daniel O'Brien two best friends and comedy writers if there's an answer

they're gonna find it I think you'll have a great time here. I think you'll have a great time here.