Segments - 400: Memory Lane

Episode Date: September 16, 2019

In our 400th EPISODE we reminisce about our origin story and brainstorm future segments. Thanks to everybody who's listened to at least 350 of these! Including the live shows, of course.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

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Hello, if you're listening to this podcast before September 27th, 2024, we're doing a live show in Philadelphia. You can still buy tickets at headgum.com slash live. Hope to see you there. Nice. Try one more where it's clear that I'm like the star. There's a reason I didn't have you say anything. Yeah. Because you're nervous, you're skittish, you're stuttering right now. I'm a little frightened. So I don't want you in this ad

at all. I don't want to be steamrolled, but I want the live live. So no, I won't be recording one. In fact, for you asking that, I'm going to keep this part in. Don't. This part is now the ad. Edit this part out, but let's do one clean ad no you will edit this part out you will absolutely edit this part out tell you what i'm gonna say my fucking social security number so you have to edit it out okay let's hear it oh nine one three six six two yeah now you have to edit it in but Keeping it in. But we'll see you guys there. No, no, no, no, no. If I were you, if I were you, if I were you, the show starts now. Wow. Old school. Beautiful.

Holds up. Holds up. I'll say that. That was you. It is aged like a fine wine. That was you on the guitar back in May of 2013. I think if you handed me the guitar, I would not remember the chords that I played. Yeah, it was very short.

And I didn't. And there was only two. I didn't even realize that I'm the one who said starts now. Yeah, I don't, that was, that was completely improvised. The starts now. Holy shit, that changed the course of podcast history. You know what the first episode was called our first episode um starbucks yeah it's the kill yourself at a starbucks joke that's

from episode one and that is still with us today yeah so this is episode 400 of our show uh we wanted to do a little walk through memory lane and what better place to start than at the top episode one starbucks a theme song that jake performed and sang oh yeah uh when listening for the theme song i just let the track play a little more and oddly enough the first minute of our first show it didn't sound as old as i thought it would I thought like we'd sound prepubescent for some reason as if we were 13 when it happened. Okay, dude. What should we do? Press record, man. Let's fucking talk about our moms, dude.

We're making a fucking podcast, bro. I guess I was 30 instead of 36, so not that different. Kind of the same. Some of the jokes we still use today. Let's play just the first minute of the show just to catch everybody up. This is the first minute of the first episode of If I Were You, May 8th, I think, 2013. That was awful. That was the first.

That's the way it's going to start. The first episode ever. That was great. I rehearsed that for a year. Before even thought of the podcast i was rehearsing that well the name of the show is if i were you and um yeah this is the first episode we're not always gonna have jake do the intro music though we should yeah well we just haven't thought of intro music yet and we wanted to get the show on as fast as possible so yeah for now

we're gonna be uh i'll be trying out a different intro song every single week until you guys hate me enough that you can someone can send in a song that we can use instead that's right so this is the first and only advice podcast on the internet from us hosted by us, exactly right. I'm Amir. And I'm Jake. And we are... Amir and Jake. You know, it's crazy. I had no idea that I said from us.

Yeah. That that's the origin of the intro that you make every single time. Right. And I can't tell if I was setting up that joke and then you said it, or if you just came in there and created a joke that we then repeated 400 times. I think you were, it was an alley-oop. We have the same brain. You knew that I was going to say it.

Yeah. I remember being scared because this was the first thing that we did, quote, out of character. Yeah. That was such a big deal back then. I remember you being scared. I remember that well. I was such a big deal back then. I remember you being scared. I remember that well. I was brave. I'm like, should we do a podcast where we're not in character?

Yeah. It was like a weird little leap. But I remember being nervous that College Humor was going to sue us. That's what I was nervous about. We're going to do this thing on the side. Can we do it on the side? I remember being afraid. Do we ask or do we just tell them?

It was a very meticulously crafted email to the CEO at the time, giving him a heads up that we were going to do it. It was like low-key asking for permission, but we never asked for permission we told him we were gonna do it ahead of time sort of testing the waters basically like this is happening so if you're gonna sue us for it tell us before we do it yeah please don't do it and he's just like good have fun or do it or whatever well you remember just to back up even a little bit, so like this was 2013. We had been doing Jake and Amir episodes for five years. And do you remember the origin of wanting to even start a podcast? Didn't it just come from our agent? Yes. Yeah, really, it was incredibly

prescient. Is that the word? And smart and good planning. Truly. He was like, you know, you guys do these live shows as Jakeake and amir we did even the live shows we did in character we never really performed as ourselves fully fully in character yeah and then he's like if you want you should create a podcast because a lot of my comic talent clients uh now instead of coming up with stand-up just do live podcast shows uh you guys can do that and then you don't have to go out as part of college humor live you could just um go on the road with your podcast and we're like oh huh but wait what what's that what would that aren't all podcasts done already i mean it's 2013 what's left yeah that was that was the thing that i remember

you and i talking about. If we do a podcast, what would the point... There are too many podcasts out there. Yeah, there's already Mark Maron's and Pete Holmes's and I think that... Yeah, there's three. All. And then we couldn't really figure out what

to talk about because what are our areas of expertise? It's not like we want to interview comics about their process like we felt like a little outside of that game like yeah we did not because all i think that was the other thing like most of the podcasts we knew in the comedy space were like guests have have a guest and it's an interview and we're like we don't want to book guests or write interview questions that wouldn wouldn't be fun. Yeah. Also, we can't be, quote, in character for hours at a time where we're just like pretending as though we're these Jake and Amir people that are having conversations because then

it would like step on what College Humor owned as a web series. Was there any other idea besides If I Were You? I don't know. I bet we were toying around with a lot of ideas but i think you came up with either an advice show or a dating advice show before we even started that's right i remember that i remember that g chat i remember pitching you the name if i were you oh all right because like because in my head i'm like it that's if if you say if i were you then like it takes away all credibility credibility from your advice because it's just like this is

the this is the dumb thing i do yeah and this is it was also when we recorded like the first 30 minute chunk that college humor fans got of us where we were not like being prescripted, silly dumbasses. Like, whoa, Amir doesn't actually shove McDonald's down his fucking throat 24-7. This is bizarre. This was the podcast where people found out that I'm the dumb one. Yeah, we tried to do a little reversal as much as possible. And then we didn't really need any guests because it was just us two recording. Do you remember where the first episode was recorded? It was your apartment at 34 Berry.

That's right, in Williamsburg, in my kitchen. Just like those green and gold microphones into a Zoom recorder. That's right. We still record on a Zoom. Some things never change. And then I would edit on Final Cut, which is a video editing software, because I didn't know any audio editing software. Don't you still edit on Final Cut, which is a video editing software, because I didn't know any audio editing software. Don't you still edit on Final Cut? Or have you moved over?

Well, I moved over to just another video editing software, Adobe Premiere. Oh, that's right. That's right. But it was so hard to make it sound good. Like I would ask Jeff Rubin, who had a podcast, like how he did it. And he would like use Audacity and like Levelator and all these like new softwares that I had to learn to make it sound normal. But like a lot of the times it didn't quite at first, especially when we recorded at your apartment, which was incredibly cavernous and echoey.

That's right. I remember being like, oh yeah, we can do like my place and your place. I was thinking it was going to be so convenient for me. I wasn't going to have to leave. And then it really didn't work. and then we also we i remember like hanging cushions and towels all around your apartment trying to uh get it to sound good yeah calling it the towel fort the towel fort that's right the first like six months was just a struggle in audio

quality more than anything else like i wasn't even concerned with what to say or how to say it. It was just like, how do I make it not quiet or too loud or too echoey? First guest, do you know who the first guest was? See, I thought it was Ethan Trex talking about his experience battling cancer. Yeah, which might be true, but that wasn't the first full guest episode. That was for one question. That was the first phone-off-frame thing. Yeah.

Our first guest was Ricky in episode six. Episode seis, RVV. And we have our first ever guest today. Wow. Very special guest. It's Ricky Van Veen. Hello. You know what's funny?

When I first started listening to this show, I've listened to all of them, by the way. Thank you. We told him to say that. Long time listener, first time guest. Long time. This show's been on for three weeks. So I was listening to it and I was driving in L.A. with Allison and I turned to her and I was like, you know what the best part about this podcast is? No guests. Was it like, hey, thanks for not suing us um would you like to be on our show was it like oh ricky is the person we go to with advice maybe a little bit of both yeah i do think i think we were that calculating that we're like okay so the ceo signed off and and the founder of

the company was on an episode this is obviously a okay're in the clear, and it's only one month deep. This is ironclad. But we still hadn't done any live shows with it. We spent months and months just doing episodes. Yeah. Oh, man. Do you remember our first podcast live show? No, I do not.

I think I do. Was it in London? I think it was at Littlefield in brooklyn 110 seats sold four no we sold well we sold it out but i remember and we were like super excited um like it was one of the it's funny now because like we do bigger venues and nobody gives a shit of our friends and family. But at Littlefield, both of our agents and managers were there. All of our friends came out. It was a big deal that we had a podcast. This was 2013 after all. And I believe the next day we were traveling to South Carolina for a College Humor Live.

Oh, I see. So we're still doing a little bit of both. Yeah. But that was like the beginning of the end because we were like, wow. Yeah. And November 10, 2013, Snail Trail live at Littlefield. That's right. I think that was the first ever live show. That was a great live show. I remember that question specifically, Snail Trail. Unless she's snail trailing the walls. I don't know how this happened. But my question is, should I not tell my girlfriend my discovery?

She recently asked if her house smelled like anything, and I said no, then later made the twisted realization, thanks, DJ Jazzy Jeff. The twisted realization, of course. Sherlock's deduced that, sorry, there's nothing else it could be. I think your mom's snail trailing.

Yeah, I think she's getting turned on, getting herself wet, and just scooting across the floor and wall. Like some sort of perverted sex Roomba. Like an air hockey puck being frictionless with her own mucus membrane sliding hither and thither. Oh my God.

Vertically. Just leaving tiny little traces of pee juice everywhere. Yeah. And I think we had been on like another College Humor live tour with Streeter when we had already started the podcast. And like on the tour, we're doing stuff like in Jake and Amir characters. And some of the people that had come out were like, didn't find it funny because we weren't doing stuff from the podcast.

All right. Like how many people just know us from the videos? And that was the majority of it. Also, we did a quasi live show even before that at Comic Con. Do you remember that? Oh, that was, yes, with Pete Holmes. Yeah, it was like a panel. We did this episode 27. We had never done a live show. Pete had never heard the show before. Yeah. And we had to do it in front of an audience that didn't necessarily know who we are because this was just Comic-Con.

So it was just like a panel of two dudes and Pete Holmes, and now we're doing our podcast in front of them. Yeah. In retrospect, that was a bad time. We shouldn't have done that yeah that was that was not our best that was episode 27 episode 27 damn and then your mom was on an episode fairly early on too yeah mom with laura hurwitz at episode 32 i believe because the early episodes of our podcast were like really trying to figure out um i was going through some shit personally you know i was like a a dating monster piece of shit type guy that's back when the uh mom turned down the podcast days

yes exactly now my mom can always turn the podcast up except when i talk about my sordid past i think a testament to how long we've been doing it for, my mom doesn't listen to the podcast anymore. That's fair. I think I'm down to like one or two friends that still listen to the show. Yeah, my brother and my sister, well, two of my siblings, at least two of my siblings still listen to the show.

Shout out to Sarah and Micah. What up, y'all? That's nice. I think my brother Ben still listens, but now that he's had his own child, maybe he doesn't listen to every episode. This will be a- Well, I think he should have his daughter listen for sure.

This is a really good test, actually. Let's just start naming friends of ours. And if they approach us and like, yeah, I heard your shout out, then we know they still listen to the show. That's right. That's true. Okay.

So Rami, if you're listening, text me the following alphanumeric code. It's like when you're trying to log in. Yeah. If he doesn't text you, you'll be mad at him next time you see him. And he won't know why. Okay. How about this?

I'm going to name some friends and then I'll give them a week to listen to this. And then I'll go one by one up to them with a gun and say, what's the code? And if they say the code, their heart is true and they can continue living and if not then i'll shoot him in the fucking throat you're you're under arrest now man oh come on it's just a goofy little game i'm playing to see which one of my friends still supports me which one should be about shooting somebody in the neck dude uh i wonder when matt damon started as a bit i feel like that was pretty late in the game wasn't it but like can't you imagine like matt damon when he eats a wrap it doesn't spill at all

yeah i wonder what like google what what does matt damon eat for lunch yeah when you see matt damon eating a burrito i don't see it getting everywhere because he probably doesn't overfill it uh no i think he just has a great bite and a lot of patience wait what am i googling what does matt damon eat for lunch he just i don't know there's a lot of twitter campaign we got our show we got our pilot shot i want to know what matt damon eats for lunch is that crazy hashtag what does damon eats for lunch. Is that crazy or bad? Hashtag, what does Damon eat for lunch? What, uh, it doesn't... Actually, we should have Matt in it. Mr. Damon.

Whenever I think of a bit, I imagine where we were when we came up with it. Yeah. Because we've recorded in so many places that it, like, acts as a memory palace. Like, I remember recording with Alison Williams. The first one was in her hotel room. So then we were still in New York. Wait, that was the first one in the hotel room? No, that's if, oh wait, her hotel room.

Her hotel room, yeah. Where was that? That was at the hotel with like circular windows, like the Maritime Hotel or something. Dude, that was my hotel. That was our hotel room. Really? Both of, so, all right. I don't know the first time we recorded with Allison. I'm not sure where it was. But I think it was at the rec room. That's right. And then the second time was at your hotel. That's another place

that I forgot we recorded. So we recorded mostly in my apartment, sometimes in your apartment. If it was at work, like for Ricky and Streeter guested episodes episodes we brought them to the office right and then and then we recorded and and then i think uh brian corber shout out to brian corber and shout out to adrian grenier who ran adrian grenier's record company which was in the basement of a house he sometimes lived at in bro. Yeah, so we went to Adrian Grenier's house.

Never saw him there. Which was really fucking nice. He probably, yeah, no. He didn't want to be around for our podcast recording. But they had an amazing recording studio in the basement, and they recorded for us. And I remember being so happy. I didn't have to deal with Echo because it was soundproofed and the microphones were music grade quality, recording label grade microphones. I'm like, this is awesome. I don't have to worry about any of this shit.

I have old Instagram photos of you in the rec room and calling it your happy place. I remember you really were, you were so happy in that, in that studio. It's funny. Cause when we made a head gum, I'm like, this is great. Now we can do, we can pull off the Adrian Grenier dream of having a room. That's a dedicated recording studio. That's right.

But before we did that, it was before we, we had, so I think in that summer that we started the podcast, that was hot girl summer, wasn't it? Hot girl summer. That's a, it's a meme that's going on.

I guess it's over now, but this summer was supposedly Hot Girl Summer on Twitter. Interesting. I didn't know that, but that's cool to know. This was separate from Hot Girl Summer. This was podcasting random dude winter. This was lame boy winter. So you were in your apartment. I was in my apartment.

I had like that, the loft nearby. And then we found out we were moving i moved out of the loft into the shrub remember the shrubberbs yeah and we used to record there in the basement with dave yeah i moved into this weird little like house in like near bushwick that had it's like a freestanding house that was covered in vines, and it had a creepy little basement. I lived with Dave Rosenberg, and we started recording in that basement because it was so dank. It sounded really good down there, right? Yeah, because it was cold and humid, and nothing echoed because everything was softened. There was cockroaches all over the walls and they didn't deflect sound.

And that was right before we moved because you moved there and you're like, shit, I have to move to LA like two months after that. Yeah, that was a weird little situation I put myself in. And then once we moved to LA, we recorded at your parents' house? Yeah, well, first we recorded in an RV or a hotel room while we drove across the country.

That's right. Then when we got to LA, we recorded at my parents' house, which was really embarrassing. I'm like, we should wait until my parents aren't home. I don't want them to just hear me record this radio show out of my childhood bedroom. Yeah, especially given the shit that I would say. What if my mommy came in and said that dinner was ready during the show?

And she would. What if she just came in with bananas for us? Get out of here, mom. You're embarrassing me and I'm trying to podcast, which is embarrassing enough. And then we would still do Jake and Amir videos in LA while recording the podcast in LA. That's right. Yeah, all this time we were still doing Jake and Amir. It was very much like a cross dissolve. Like as Jake and Amir ramped down, this would ramp up.

Yeah. And we timed it very right. I don't know if it was borderline accidental, but like the fact that we started the podcast like two, three years before we ended the show. Right. that we started the podcast like two three years before we ended the show right and i think we also talked about head gum with marty like right when we started the podcast because it because he was the one that sold the like the reason we did the uh pete holmes podcast at comic-con is because he had sold something because he was a sales guy at college Humor. So that was episode, what, 27 of the podcast.

And that was also when we first started talking about doing a podcast network, the three of us. And it just took another two years. Yeah. All right, let's pause right here because I think the end of Jake and Amir, the start of HeadGum, is a good second act. So let's thank some sponsors. We'll be back with a continuation

of this amazingly historic story. You guys will be brought to tears in the second act. And jeers. Thank you to Squarespace for sponsoring this episode of our show. Hell yeah. Jake, you've been building on Squarespace for decades at this point.

Exactly. Eons, it feels like. Yes. So you know how easy it is to use their simple, intuitive, drag and drop design technology? Yes, yes, yes. Easy to create, easy to sell, easy to promote. Squarespace is my all-in-one, first stop, one-stop shop. Yeah. It's kind of funny that they have also award-winning customer support because it's so intuitive that even Jake was able to figure it out. But if you have any questions, they can figure it out for you as well. Exactly. And I did need a lot of help. I needed a lot of help. It's easy

for everybody, but I still like to have my hand held. They even have AI at this point. You can update written content, product description, or email with Squarespace AI. You can even buy a domain name through Squarespace. Exactly. Like, you know that movie Freaky Friday? Yeah. How'd you like to own FreakyFriday.com? That'd be great. Is that available?

It's not available. Yeah. But how'd you like to own Freaky Tuesday? Interesting. Freaky Tuesday. So that's when like you run into each other and some parts of your personality change, but ultimately it's not a full body swap.

Right. Mostly you're just concussed. Yeah, which is new. It's kind of like having a new personality. Yeah. It's funny. I consider myself a vision lifter, which is why I recommend somebody buying visionlifters.com. Oh, vision lifters. Yeah. Vision lifters with a Z.

And not where you think. And it's not biz with a Z. so if you're looking to buy a domain name for yourself or for a loved one build a store an online portfolio the greatest way to do that is to head to squarespace.com for a free trial and when you're ready to launch just use that coupon code segments to save 10 off your first purchase of a website or domain. Hell yeah. So again, you go to squarespace.com slash segments. Segments. You save 10% off your first purchase and then use the coupon code segments when you're ready to launch that free trial.

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And we're back. So when was it? 2015. Jake and Amir came to an end right around there. And we had the idea to form a podcast network because we were actually on a podcast network in 2014 called Podcast One. Do you remember that? I do remember that.

We did a round of meetings, including with Earwolf. In 2013, we were doing the show and I was selling ads by cold emailing brands. Yeah, and shout out to NatureBox. Shout out to Franking brands. Yeah. And shout out to NatureBox. Shout out to Frank and Oak. Yeah. To Harry's Razors, was it? I don't remember the name.

We didn't know what the hell to do, but I'm like, hey, I host this show. It was the number one comedy or whatever the day it came out because that's how iTunes ranked people. They just, you know, if your show debuted with more than like 5 000 listens it would be the number one show in their comedy section uh and uh we were down to like advertise and some people like yeah how much do you charge and i'm like i don't know a hundred ten thousand how much do i charge for an ad read we had no idea we were making ten thousand an ad read back then yeah god times were good turns out it was closer to 110,000. But then we were like, we should join a network.

That's what all these other big shows are doing. And so we took meetings. And I don't even remember where we took meetings other than podcast one. We had that meeting with Earwolf and Midroll in Tribeca. Oh, no, in Soho. Yeah, in New York. And then we chose podcast one because they introduced us to their CEO, who was like this lifelong Laker fan who had floor seats to every game. And he was like, you know, if you join Podcast One, I can take you to some of these Laker games.

I'm like, I'm in. 100% I'm in. The only reason we joined Podcast One is because you thought you were going to get floor tickets to one Laker game. And we signed a year-long contract with them. A year goes by and I never went to a laker game of course turns out the contract wasn't great and i realized like wait wait a minute we could probably sell these ads ourselves and that the ceo of that company like it got in trouble for uh pointing a gun at people yeah uh oh yeah but never at never at me branding it brandishing a gun yeah but that like kind of goes into the whole, you're going to shoot your friend. Yeah, that is where I got the idea. So then we left and we're like, let's just be independent. And then at a certain point, we thought, why don't we just start our own podcast network? least a year or two before we, before we actually acted on it.

Cause like we had talked about doing it, but the timing was weird because you and I moved to LA and Marty was still in New York. Yeah. And we were also at podcast one. You can't start a podcast network if your podcast isn't on that network. But I think when we were weighing where to sign, like we considered like if we sign this,

we can't do head gum for a year. And we're like, well, it doesn't really, but I mean, at that point we weren't calling it head gum yeah uh we were like but if we sign this we can't do anything for a year but we're like it doesn't matter we're in la marty's in new york we were still doing jake and amir so it didn't feel like that necessary and then 2015 comes around and we start head gum with just our show and nine others, including Twinnovation, still a show on our network. High and Mighty, still a show on our network. Your mom's show,

still a show on HeadGum. This is why you're single, still a show on HeadGum. Wow. So of the like nine or 10 shows we started, four or five are still around. Solid. That's really not bad at all. Yeah. And we've, you know, grown to 30 shows at this point, but we'll always remember the core nine. That actually reminds me, we have to fire your mother. What? Yeah.

Just numbers-wise, it doesn't make a ton of sense for her to stay on HeadGum. I mean, you get that. She gets ads. She gets ads. She owns 14% of HeadGum gum that's how we had to bribe her to start her show yes you can't kick her off she's gonna kick you off yeah i mean episode 100

was a classic the that's when ben and thomas were on together oh damn do you remember that two veterans you have the two veterans in here for number 100 but this is one of our first shows with four guests too so that'll be a terrible idea maybe too we might get to zero questions thomas uh one of the bits i did for my old one is we never got to questions i always ask to wait one more second oh so if we can continue that bit on this one without just like maybe i like the question oh well then this is gonna be weird we. It already begins. When we get to a question. Questions are my favorite part. Really? Yeah.

Oh, I just like talking. I don't like listening to anybody's questions. Oh, but I want to help the little boys and girls. We record, was that in the house on Mikkel Terena? That's right. That was pre-Headgum in the studio that we sort of set up at the solarium of this house because it was a glass room. But I guess when we shut all the shades, it worked, right? Or we just had set up at the solarium of this house because it was a glass room. Yeah, but I guess when we shut all the shades,

it worked, right? Or we just had to record at night. Oh yeah, but I mean sound-wise because normally a glass box would not be a good place. Yes, that's true. Then we moved houses, recorded some at that house. Remember Lil Dicky came over to that house and we recorded with George Basil.

That was the one where I lived in the little cabin in the back. Yeah, exactly. And we recorded in the cabin often That was the one where I lived in the little cabin in the back? Yeah, exactly. And we recorded in the cabin often, right? That's right. Because much like the basement at the Shrubberbs, it was a dank little outhouse. It's funny how studios basically just need to be sad rooms

for them to sound good. Yeah, the sadder the room, the better the studio. Patting on the walls, insulation, that's one thing. But if you can feel the sadness in the air it really helps yeah it diffuses the audio the echoing uh and then we finally when we started head gum we're like let's all move in together and get like a four bedroom instead of a three and build a studio in like the den or the fourth bedroom yeah and that i think that in like now that i look back on it that really was like our cool-ass Zuckerberg-type thing.

We got such a silly house. Yeah, that was our hot Zuckerberg summer. We got a house that we couldn't afford to live in because we would pay some of the rent with head gum money. Right. Or it's like, it's an office-sl an office slash house so we can afford this mansion. We basically got a four, we got a, yeah,

we got a, like, a huge, a huge house and just split the rent four ways between three people because head gum

was considered that since one room is theirs, head gum pays. And it was, tax wise, that's fine. It was fully furnished

because the lady that used to live there didn't want to move any of the furniture out. We brought like an arcade machine in there just to complete the idea that this was like a Silicon Valley hellhole. Yeah. And just to show you how big that place was, when we moved out, I believe the owner was just like, I'll just sell it for $3 million. And she sold it in three days. Yeah. So we were living in a place and throwing parties at a place that ended up selling for

more money than we'll ever make in our entire lives. Awesome. Remember we had that party and the bathroom flooded? Yeah. Why did... Someone clogged my toilet in... Because that was also... When we were looking for houses, that was the beginning of the Raven's Nest bit and the beginning of the Master and the En Suite bit.

Yes. Because when we were house hunting, we were so hellbent on getting the Master and deserving the Master. And then at a certain point, people were just coming over to record at our house that we didn't necessarily know when they were coming because we didn't have like a producer yet. We didn't have super producer Mars. So it was just like, yeah, whenever you want to record, it's like, all right, Sunday at fucking 9 a.m. And we're like, huh, that's not ideal. That started making it. That was like when the beginning of the dream was over.

Because when you start a network and it's just your buddies, it's always fun. Yeah. And then you like pick up more shows that are just like, I mean, let's be clear. Everyone on HeadGum is a close personal friend of mine. Absolutely. But like you don't know everybody quite as well. And then you're like, I'm hungover and I just want to watch football all day. But then the doorbell is ringing and somebody is like well no you have to host podcasters because

it's also it's the host and their guests and sometimes the guests get there before the host and then you're just sitting there making small talk with somebody but you you just want to you just want to have your sunday you know yeah so we're like maybe we should get an office at a certain point and go our separate ways and then hunting for the office was super fun too. We saw so many places. We were looking in downtown in the arts district, just regular straight up downtown. I think we were looking at like Hollywood a bunch too. I will say we nailed it

because we've been in this office for like almost three years now and we have no notes. Yeah, do you remember? We like had a guide and we looked at so many places. Wasn't one of the places like on the other side of the river that was adjacent like we were sharing a space with a dog grew in the studio or something it was a place it was and it was almost a place that we went with because it was like so much so much space with like a backyard but it was it was on the other side of the highway

so you couldn't actually like walk to any of the cool stuff in the arts district. And then it was also a dog grooming place, and they were trying to evict the guy that was there. And when we were there, we were seeing it, and he was super suspicious. And the realtor was like, no, they're like gonna get the space next door but they want i want to show them this so they can uh see what they can do uh with the space and we're like i'm so sorry man i'm taking over your studio we're like walking around being like oh yeah this is nice we could do that next door but we were fully just gonna take that guy's cut two dogs they're getting groomed

give us like the head tilt what are you guys doing here you can leave the dogs do you want to talk about like the future what's what are the next 400 episodes like i mean there are things that we've introduced slowly but surely like the unsolicited advice yeah we keep taught we keep having grandiose visions like creating segments. So unsolicited advice was born from that. I'm like, oh, that was great. We should do more. And then we never did more.

Yeah. I mean, maybe there's like some kind of throwback 15 minutes, you know? The throwback 15. 15 with a TH. Yeah. The follow-up pup is something that we do occasionally, but not really with any regularity that we can call a segment yeah but i kind of like the idea of i mean well maybe maybe get

repetitive but it's fun to be nostalgic like i mean that's like what the patreon is a little bit us getting to talk about like the stuff that we've made in the past shout out to our patreon yeah maybe there should be something that's more like future centric on it. What about the first segment idea will be us soliciting segment ideas, whether it be on Twitter or on our subreddit. Every time we release a new podcast, there's like a sticky post at the top. Leave a comment. Let us know what segment ideas. Just like a fun five minute

conversation leaping off point could be i like yeah i like that like an icebreaker a game a game to play yeah a mini podcast within the podcast um you know what i also just realized that the the initial concept of this show i've said this before but it was based to me off of Car Talk because Click and Clack from Car Talk, it's like they know a lot about cars. But the premise of the show, you don't have to know a lot about cars also because it's just the way they communicate with each other and the way they interact with their callers. That's what the fun of the show is. I would listen to them do anything. It's not necessarily about cars. So I was like, what is something that just makes Amir and I talk?

Anyway, that show, they had a segment just past the midway point of their show, which was the puzzler. Every week they would read a quiz, a puzzle, a riddle, basically, and tell anyone if they knew the answer to write them a postcard, and they would reveal the winner on the next week's show. Well, they would come up with a riddle,

or is it like a famous riddle? I believe they would come up with the riddles, and they would have riddles submitted. And one of the guys was like a puzzle guy. So like sometimes the riddles would be submitted and he would be like, but it wasn't perfect. I fixed it. And so he would like edit them too. Yeah.

He was sort of a puzzle curator. This is like how we wish we came up with hey riddle riddle which is another podcast on the head gum network right in which three funny hosts actually solve riddles oh you know what this section a new segment could basically be podcast pilots so every single uh every episode we we just spend 10 minutes piloting a brand new podcast oh Oh, that's good. Or stealing another podcast show. Right, because it would still be the first ever done by us. That's right. So we'll steal the Riddle one, but

only for 10 minutes. So by the time they get mad, that podcast is over. Yeah. And we also say the name HeyRiddleRiddle as we've stolen their idea. Yeah, it's almost like it's an ad. If 10 minutes of... like it's an ad. If 10 minutes of, yeah, sorry we recorded an ad.

As long as we shout out who we stole from, it's just an ad. And then we can invoice them. That's a good segment. So the segment is Podcast We Wish We Hosted. And then we host that show for about 10 minutes. Interesting. That's good. But I think we should also come up with,

we can steal and come up with original. Okay? Thievery and Brevery. Is the name of our new podcast. Why, there's nothing more brave than creating a podcast. I'm the breathest of all. All right. How about a segment called Cousins? Okay. I don't know. Where does that take you? Well, we don't have to figure it out.

Oh, actually, I would totally be interested to look at your family tree. A genealogy segment of sorts. Yeah, a little family history. We find out what your great-great-grandfather did as a hobby. Yeah, I would have to figure that out first. I know, but that's one of those things that's, like, interesting for you. You should do that. And then I'd love to hear.

What about, you know, like sometimes, maybe it was just once, but I created a musical. What? You like asked me about this fake musical that I was producing. Oh, yeah, that's right. The house, the garage, the Pixar movie. The moon's like in your sky, in your

eye, and I'm the tree, and I'm the guy, and in your eye, it's a tree, it's me. The moon is also the tree? No. It sounded like the moon was the bad guy in that song. The clicker's the bad guy. Who plays the clicker?

I mean, there's the dream casting role, and then there's the person who we're probably going to settle for. Let's hear both. James Earl Jones. Yep, and you settle for? My cousin. Yeah, exactly. So you almost have to ask me questions. gonna settle for let's hear both james earl jones yep and you settle for my cousin yeah exactly so like you you almost have to ask me questions like i'm pitching you a movie that's see this is this is all rolls up into podcast pitch podcast pilot yeah the 10 minute end of our show where we just

try out like all right that was if i were you that was pretty good now here is another show that we could do let us know if you guys like it better and this is just an example of one segment or a bunch of segments that we can do this is the segment that is constantly changing because it's it's always the same but it's always different podcast pilot two truths and a lie you know then we play that play. That's good. All right. Podcast pilot, what should I drive? Oh, that's good. And we talk about me leasing a car, which I still haven't done. Yeah.

Oh, how about I give an update on my garbage disposal situation? Oh, yeah. Tell us, please. So as many of you know, if you listened to the last episode, there was a quarter stuck at the bottom of my garbage disposal that prevented the blades from spinning and effectively ruined the garbage disposal. Correct. Oh, it was ruined? Well, not ruined, but it was stuck to the point where I couldn't use it anymore.

Right. It was in ruin. That's right. So I went, like I said I was going to do, I went to Baller Hardware and they gave me two tools. The guy looked at it and he's like, this is what you want to do. Try this Allen wrench, which is that little S-shaped wrench where you stick it into a hole at other tool called the garbage disposal unclogger, which looks like just this thick wine bottle opener, a corker, that you jam inside your garbage disposal and just fucking jackhammer until something breaks or jars loose.

Jesus. I was very skeptical about that second one. Fortunately, tried the first one, used the Allen wrench, wrench rotated it blades moved in the opposite direction coin came out picked it up with scissors cleaned it off sent you a photo posted it online so I didn't have to use the garbage disposal easy peasy worked right away

at first I didn't know which direction was clockwise versus counterclockwise so I tried really hard in one direction that didn't work I tried really hard in the other I'm like huh should I just try extra hard and hope to god that i'm not like smushing the coin or breaking the blade and then i did that in the counterclockwise direction and eventually like loosened up rotated the blades removed the remove the coin scissors perfect home improvement show that's another segment oh yes we should definitely do that did we talk about this when

you were talking about your yeah your garbage disposal i would i just want to reboot this old house and have it be me and you right because we don't actually know how shit works like what if we had to build a wall from scratch yeah it's it's a good it's a good premise for us well i don't know how you grew up but like my parents were often like don't do it yourself hire somebody smarter and more professional to do it like you can't install that you shouldn't do it because you don't know how don't learn just hire a professional that's different than i i mean i grew up i'm i'm in the same position as you are that like i'm i i'm inept um but it's not because my parents were like hire somebody it was just because my my dad was just like i'll do it i'll just move i'll do it

yeah both our parents didn't want us to learn shit the hard way yeah i think my parents didn't have time to teach anyone anything because there was six of us and they just needed to keep us alive yeah it's not like here this weekend i'm to teach Amir how to change a tire. It's like, I signed you up for AAA, now go take a tennis lesson. Which, I mean, especially now with the gig economy, it is kind of true that you can just, it's almost, I think it's still really valuable to know all this stuff and one should and i'm slowly learning as i become a homeowner and stuff

but it's also worth like just teaching somebody how to like be smart when it comes to like hiring the right person and price comparing and asking the right questions because those are adult things yeah it's like why why learn how to cook when I can click a button and have Pad CU delivered to me for $11? Yeah. And it's worth instilling in your children the idea that sometimes the delivery fee plus the tip plus the baked in service charges make the $11 pad tie $24. And at that point, it really is worth it to go make a bunch of pad tai. Yeah, but then you make the pad tai and it takes six and a half hours and there's grease all over your kitchen. But you make enough for the whole week.

Alright. I'll make the fucking pad tai. Jesus Christ. Just never tastes that good. That reminds me we should do a cooking show. Yeah. It's like how much money do you spend on a fancy smoothie or acai bowl that you can make for 98 cents at home? I went through this exact same thing.

I just made an acai bowl for lunch here. Yeah. And then how does it taste versus the one you can get for $14 at Backyard Bowls? Well, I mean, Backyard Bowls is the goat. I would do that in a heartbeat if Backyard Bowls were in New York City. There is not a good acai place in Brooklyn. They don't fucking exist. I wonder why that is.

I mean, I would kill, I want to franchise backyard bowls and open one at the bottom of my building. That's my fucking dream. Also, you look at the ingredients of backyard bowls and it seems pretty easy. It's like fruit and peanut butter. How can we not make that shit?

I don't know. It's crazy. The backyard bowls makes the perfect blend of everything. And everywhere else, every other acai and smoothie place I go to, I'm just trying to create the backyard bowl. That's what I'm trying to do. In a perfect world, they're all backyard bowls. Can you take this out, add this? I don't need that. I don't need that. Actually, can I just pull up the menu of don't need that. Actually. Instead of this. Can I just pull up the menu of a place called Backyard?

You're in Hawaii. There's this place in Hollywood. It's perfect. All right. So that's a bunch of options for you guys just to get you started. Indeed. Yeah. Feel free to send us.

So send us your theme songs, your questions, and now your segment pitches. Keep your segments coming. All right. That's it. Enough dwelling in the past, thinking about the future. That was episode 400 of If I Were You, the only advice podcast on the internet, hosted by us. I'm Jake.

And I was Amir. Yeah, send your questions, your theme songs, everything to ifirewshow at gmail.com. We'll be back, of course, next week, and then the week after, and the week after, and so on and so forth, until we're all dead. Yes. Bye, everybody. I feel like a lot of people will listen to the first podcast, and then it'll slowly dwindle and then plateau at the amount of people that will actually be listening to the podcast. Right, until it's zero and we're just killing ourselves in a starbucks and that's

that'll be our last episode all right remember to write in if i were you show at gmail.com that's right all right play us out if i were you if i were you if i were you worse show yeah what happened there dot com oh we do have a website, if I were you, show.com. That's perfect. The show. Dot com. See you, everyone. That was a Hate Gum podcast.