The Best One Yet - 🎷 “Justin TimberFAKE” — Spotify’s AI boy-band. Michelob’s Gatorade beer. Soham Parekh’s 19 tech jobs.

Episode Date: July 8, 2025

The trendiest song over the weekend was by a fake band… Spotify’s 1st AI band has gone viral.The only major beer growing in America? Michelob Ultra… thanks to plagiarizing Gatorade.One tech guy is collecting 4 different full-time tech salaries… all at once.The untold origin story of… the Frisbee.$SPOT $BUD $METAWant more business storytelling from us? Check out the latest episode of our new weekly deepdive show: The untold origin story of… “Frisbee 🥏A Pie in the Sky Idea (Literally)”Subscribe to The Best Idea Yet: Wondery.fm/TheBestIdeaYetLinks to listen.TBOY Live Show Tickets to Chicago on sale NOW: https://www.axs.com/events/949346/the-best-one-yet-podcast-ticketsAbout Us: The daily pop-biz news show making today’s top stories your business. Formerly known as Robinhood Snacks, TBOY Lite is hosted by Jack Crivici-Kramer & Nick Martell.GET ON THE POD: Submit a shoutout or fact: https://tboypod.com/shoutouts NEWSLETTER:https://tboypod.com/newsletter SOCIALS:Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/tboypod TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@tboypodYouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@tboypod Anything else: https://tboypod.com/ Our 2nd show… The Best Idea Yet: Wondery.fm/TheBestIdeaYetLinksEpisodes drop weekly. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

This is Nick. This is Jack. It's Tuesday, T-boy, Tuesday, July 8th. And today's part is the best one yet. This is a T-boy. The top three pop business news stories you need to know today. Whoa, besties. Stocks dropped to start the week.

The S&P 500 fell 1% on Monday. Yeah, my eczema had a flare up this week. So has the trade board, apparently. Yeah, the stock market is actually highly correlated to Jack's skin condition right now. More on that story later. in the show. But in the meantime, Jack, we got three fantastic stories for today's show. What we got on the T-Boy? For our first story, the trendiest song over the 4th of July weekend, it's by the Velvet Sunset, which is a fake band. That's right, Spotify's AI boy band has

officially gone viral. For our second story, the only major beer brand growing in this country right now, Mickelope Ultra. Mickelope is winning because it's pretending to be Gatorade. And Jack and I got the receipts. And our third and final story. Last week, one tech company discovered that their employee was also working for another company. And another company. And another company. One man was working four full-time jobs at once, and his story will change remote work.

But yeties, before we hit that wonderful mix of stories. Oh, what a mix of stories for a T-boy Tuesday. Love the mix. Yesterday, we asked you a trivia question. We did. What product was originally not a product at all? but just the packaging of another product. Yeah, this product you didn't have to buy because one pie company gave it away for free.

The answer is the Frisbee. That's right, the Frisbee, the flying frisbee like that same one from Disc Golf. The Frisbee was born on a college campus in New England when kids took pie tins and started toss them around on the quat. And Jack, what was the name of that their pie company? The pie company was called. called Frisbee. The Frisbee Pie Company. That's right, the OG Frisbys weren't Frisbees at all.

They were tins of the Frisbee Pie Company. But today, over 300 million Frisbees have been sold. And yet, he's, even though 80% of you have definitely tossed a Frisbee. And 90% of you are bad at throwing a Frisbee. 100% of you have no idea how this frisbee came to be. Yeah, like the company behind the Frisbee, Whammo? They also invented the Hula Hoop. The story of the frisbee involves colleges, communism, and UFOs. And some major competition from that hula hoop. And Nick and I went deep into the textbooks to find out where the frisbee really began. And it's all part of our weekly show, the best idea yet.

We drop the link in the episode description to that latest episode on the frisbee. But in the meantime, Jack, like we said, we got three fantastic stories right here. You say we hit the pot? Yeah, my eczema has calmed down and hopefully the stock market has to. That's a buy signal, baby. That's a buy signal. Let's in our three stories. Hope the stock market is a steroidal topical cream like my eye does.

It's before this song. Two boys from the Northeast met in the dorm. They had an idea to cause a cultural storm. It's the best one yet, but that's it. 50% that's a fat tip. Tea Boy City on your at list. If you know, you know, because we're ready to go. We can't wait no more, so just start the show.

First, a quick word from our sponsor. For our first story, this weekend, a breakout new artist, admitted they're not real. That's right, this was the first ever AI rock star. The Velvet Sundown is not a real band. No, they're not. But they are making $20,000 a month because you don't care. Yeties, last week, Sabrina Carpenter and her man-eater took a back seat for the first time. Everybody at the water cooler was talking about the Velvet Sundown. The Velvet Sundown, the band that published their debut album back in June, they already have a million listeners on Spotify.

This band, The Velvet Sundown, is comprised of four groovy-looking guys. They kind of look like Mumford and Sons, but raised by the Beatles. And I listen to the album, it's kind of like the Eagles, the classic rock and roll band, but with a more modern-sounding vibe. Yeah, we jumped in T-Boy style of the name. It kind of sounds like Velvet Underground, which happens to be my mom's favorite band from the 1960s. But the look, the sound, the style of the Velvet Sundown.

Preach, Bobby Dylan, what do you think, Jack. It's all kind of AI-ish, isn't it? So, this past weekend, the band stopped being coy, and instead, The Velvet Sundown confessed that they're fake. They're faked, or as they put it online, they are now a synthetic music project guided by human creative direction. Even that description sounds AI generation. Yeah, it really does. But one million listeners on Spotify, that is a huge number, Which leads to this wild headline from the Atlantic magazine. Nobody cares if music is real anymore. Now, Bessie's, Jack and I listen to the whole musical oeuvre of the Velvet Sundown.

And we can tell you it definitely passes for real music, especially if you're not listening closely. It'd be solid background music. And for most people, just music to play in the background, that is enough. That's all you need. When you're jamming away that turnpaper, boom, you toss down to some of the Velvet Sundown over there. But we should point out, the music. community, they seem to hate this fake new band, The Velvet Sundown. Because the top 20 comments that we

read on their latest Instagram video are all negative. And some of the comments are very negative. But Jack, like we like to say, the devil is in the download. So what kind of numbers we're talking about here? Last week, there were 300,000 monthly listeners of the Velvet Sundown on Spotify, but today, that number is up well beyond one million listeners. Jack, can we sprinkle on some music industry math to this thing? By our math, this fake band is collecting $20,000 a month in Spotify royalties alone. Oh, we repeat, 20 grand from four dudes who don't have a pulse. Our prediction, soon, Spotify will begin creating their own AI-generated music to start inserting into your playlists. I mean, they already have the AI DJs. Why not have the AI artists too?

With AI-generated music, Spotify doesn't need to send royalties to a human artist. And as long as we all tolerate it, Spotify is going to start pushing those AI-generated. AI beats on us because of our takeaway. Because of our takeaway. So, Jack, could you please, this is human Jack? Just want to confirm. Yeah, unless my AI is taken over me against my will and is now pretending to be me,

pretending to be taken over against their will. I'm not sold, but Jack, what's the takeaway for our buddies over at AI Spotify? This isn't art, but there's a huge market for near art. Now, yeties, we wish we could play the music of the, The Velvet Sundown for you here, this AI band. But then this episode would get taken down because of legal! But we'll tell you right now, it's bland.

There's no meaning whatsoever to the lyrics of their music, and there's no thoughtfulness to the track order in the album. But Bessie's think about this. Most music you listen to probably is background music to begin with. It's there for the vibes. And if vibes are all that matters to you as a listener, then art is taking a backseat. Just look at the box office right now, right?

Like Jurassic Park 7, they sold $300 million. of tickets this weekend. I think it's Jurassic World Seven, but yeah, it's pretty much dumb fun up on the big screen. No offense to the T-Rexes, because we love and respect those guys, but CGI-generated dinosaurs eating each other is not exactly art. Tech platforms know that content engages users, but content created by humans is costly. And that is why we expect a boom in near art. AI-generated art that's more function than fashion. For our second story, Every major beer brand is seeing sales fall right now, except for one. Mickelope Ultra.

Mickelope Ultra didn't just turn itself into a sports drink. It literally copied Gatorade's marketing. We got the receipts. All right, Jack, I'm checking the calendars here. It looks like 2025, like 2024, like 2023. Yeah, yeah. This has been another bad year for beer, man. Sales this bring from Modelo, Coors Light, and Bud Light.

fell 2%, 6% and 9% compared to the year before. It's across the age spectrum. You got young people who are drinking less than ever these days. And you got old people who are drinking less because they're on Ozempic. Plus, Jack, you're getting competition from cannabis people just ain't popping a cold one like they used to. And yet there's one outlier, Mickalb Ultra. That Yeti's, we covered last year when Mick Ultra passed Bud Light to become America's number two beer. But here's what we found fascinating today.

While other beers are shrinking year by year by year by year, Mikkelope Ultra, it keeps on growing. Sales rose 3% this spring defying the rest of the industry. Okay, but we should point out something ironic here. Mickelope Ultra, by the way, it is actually owned by Budweiser. Yeah, Budweiser. I think there's like a slogan here about a friend handing you a bud that's basically Mick Alter in this analogy.

Budweiser's stock, it's up 40% this year, mostly thanks to this Mikalob Ultra rebound. Mickalob Ultra, they're looking like the 2007 New York Giants. I like that analogy. I thought you'd be impressed. The first time we beat the Patriots. Now, yeties, here's what Jack and I got curious about, how is Mickelope Ultra winning while the whole beer industry is down? It's simple, Nick.

Mickelope Ultra isn't a beer. Actually, we should point out, Mickelope Ultra is a beer. Although barely, it's like 3% alcohol by volume. But as Jack and I studied this beer, we noticed that Mickelope repositioned itself to be a sports drink. Now, for decades, Mickelobotra has targeted golfers. They had a sponsorship with the PGA Tour. But now, Mickelowaltra is targeting anyone sweating or even wearing like sneakers. Consumers, they're focused on carbs, alcohol, and calories these days.

So, Mickelopultra lower it all three. Put it on the label. Mickelow vultra's can. It's Red Bull style skinny cans. It's like a silhouette like athleisure leggings. Jack, I think that can fits perfectly in your Peloton cup holder. Or your leggings. And the sponsors for Mikulowlera are the same as night.

these days. Serena Williams, Peyton Manning, the soccer player Alex Morgan. Interestingly, we noticed that Mickelope Ultra is targeting soccer fans by sponsoring Lienel Messi, and what do we discover Jack? Well, the top beer being served at 11 a.m. these days, when European soccer is on TV in America

is Mickelope Ultra. Vesties added all up, and the entire beer industry competes with one singular message. Popularity, which is relatable. But Miculob is channeling Nike instead. It's talking about performance. which is aspirational.

The rest of the beer industry, they're selling in six packs. Mickelope is selling your six pack. And they're reminding you that you have Pilates tomorrow morning at 7 a.m. You better not get too buzz tonight. But here's the funny thing yet is Jack and I discovered that Michaelob Ultra's sports drink strategy, it actually goes even further than this, like way further. Borderline plagiarism further.

So Jack, what's the takeaway for our buddies over at Micahoevulture? Mickelob is literally copying the same advertising slogans as Gatorade. Word for word. All right, get this. Here's the plan. Yeties, I'm going to read off some advertising copy. And Jack hasn't heard this, but Jack, I want you to tell me, is this from a Mickelope ad or a Gatorade ad? You ready?

Okay, here's the first of the three. Sweat it to get it. I think that's Mickelope Ultra. Like, sweat on the golf course so you can get a Michelob Ultra. Okay, here's the second. for those who go the extra mile. It's got to be gatorade. All right, here's the final one.

Zero excuses. I think that's more like anti-hangover messaging for Mikhailob Ultra. All right, Jack, you got only one out of three. The first one, sweat and to forget it. That's actually Gatorade. The second, for those who go the extra mile, that's Mickalope. And the final one is Mikulab, too. Zero excuses.

Okay. I was one for three. Yeah, that's it. How are the advertising slogans between a beer and a sports drink indistinguishable to me? I mean, Jack, it's the same enhancement messaging. One is for electrolytes, but one is for alcohol, and yet it's the same thing. Micolobulcher repositioned itself from a beer to a sports drink by mimicking the market leader,

Gatorade, and their messaging. And you know what? It worked. So, Basties, expect to see more of this in other industries too. Let's call it mimic marketing. Let's call it mimic marketing. I see what you did. I like it.

I like it a lot. Now a quick word from our sponsor. For our third and final story. This one's wild. Soam Perak is an engineer who is working for four companies at the same time. He just spoke publicly about his side, side, side, side hustle situation. And what he's doing is going to affect all of us. Yet is, it all began with a tweet.

There's a guy named Soham Perak in India who works for, three to four startups, beware. And that tweet got 20 million views, which led to this comment. Holy crap, we hired this guy a week ago. Which led to these comments. He was our first engineer. We just interviewed him. We're about to hire this guy. Get this. One startup just offered this man a $250,000 role in San Francisco. And did he accept it, Jack? No, because he refuses to relocate. He only does remote work. And this man, Yetis, is Soam, Pyrr. Based in Mumbai, India, he's been doing four tech jobs at once. He has four full-time jobs in tech at the same time.

This story got so wild. This weekend, a new website sprouted up called the Soham Tracker. It turns out he's worked 19 jobs in the last four years, most of the time, with many jobs at the same time. I mean, Jack, the only question left is, if you're working four jobs, which one do you put in your LinkedIn title? We actually saw this guy's resume because people are trying to out him and make sure nobody else hires him. His resume is tailor-made for like engineering tech job right now.

I mean, Jack, I think what you put in the LinkedIn title is builder, visionary, stealth mode. Right? Like you do that with a period after each one. Yeah. And now besties, what Jack and I found fascinating is that ironically, over the weekend, while you were not at work, everyone was talking about this guy's work. And here's the news. Soham has gone public. He is sharing his side of the story in a podcast interview, and he confirmed it's all true.

It's actually a bold strategy here, Codden. Let's see if it works out for him. What do you do exactly, Jack? He targets big companies that don't have much HR oversight, and he also targets small startups that are too distracted to notice that he's very, very part-time. The latter is where he found the most success, and he claims he did this out of necessity, not greed. He's got a sympathetic story.

He says he needs to pay off his student debts. And we should point out, Jack, he was not. a complete fraud, right? Like the sweat equity was there. He did a lot of work at these companies. He worked 12 to 14 hours a day, which is like three or four hours at each of his four jobs. And Elon Musk, he's like the CEO of five different companies right now, right? Although Elon is up front about his part-time and this. This kid wasn't. Well, yet he's in this economy. More Americans than ever are working double duty with two jobs at once. Not side hustle jobs. Like eight-hour hustle, eight-hour hustle. But the way we see it, this is actually a bigger story than all of that, literally.

Scams related to remote work applications have tripled in the last three years, but this is the biggest single example yet. So if your boss was skeptical of remote work before, she's now completely opposed to it after hearing the resume of So on Perrick. It's a shame if one role-breaking Apple could spoil the whole bunch, but people are going to remember this example. Although, Jack, as we're telling the story, I'm now realizing this. This is a story. This is a little bit of a little bit of man is the exact opposite of the plot of office space, right? Because office space is about a guy being honest that he works zero jobs. And this is a guy being dishonest about working for jobs. I guess we could say that. There might be a Hulu documentary in this guy's.

I think they're already on the screenplay check. So what's the takeaway for our buddies over in HR? Paradoxically, we are entering the IRL era. The IRL era. Yeah. Ladies, the biggest victim of the rise of the internet, it's been trust. We've lost trust in politicians, the media institutions. Now, we've even lost some trust in remote work. Oh, and by the way, like every other internet trend, loss of trust will only get amplified with artificial intelligence. So we think there will be a pendulum swing of real world verification.

Basically, don't trust it if you can't touch it. So, Jack, how would we see this play out in the real world? For interviews in the future, they will be face-to-face, not on video. investments. You got to meet the team at the headquarters before the deal. You've got to kick the tires a little bit. Even in dating. Face to face or assume their profile is fake. We see it now in education. Term papers are out, but oral in-person presentations are in. We're going back to those little blue books again and the proctors watching you actually right into the exam. Trigger warning, besties for all the remote digital solutions we have gained. Welcome to the IRL era. Jack, could you whip up

the takeaways for us for Tea Boy Tuesday. The Velvet Sundown has over a million listeners on Spotify, and their human owners confess the whole band is fake. It's not art, it's near art, but there's a market for near art. For our second story, Mickelope Ultra is the one big beer brand that's actually growing, because it's now being marketed as a sports drink. Micahoev literally copied the same ad language as Gatorade. Let's call it mimic marketing.

Let's call it mimic marketing. Finally, Soham Perek collects four salaries working four full-time jobs all at one. His story is the perfect example of why, paradoxically, we're entering the IRL era. But Yeties, this pod's not over yet. Here's what else you need to know today. First, the president signed the big, beautiful bill on Friday. But despite huge tax cuts included, stocks actually fell on Monday. But stocks fell for a different reason.

They fell because of tariffs. That's right. On Monday, President Trump announced that starting August 1st, 25% tariffs would tax trade with five different countries. Those five countries getting new tariffs are Japan, South Korea, Malaysia, Kazakhstan, South Africa, Laos and Myanmar. I don't think that's five, actually, but that's okay. We're going to round up on it. Of course, it is a threat, though. The countries could announce a deal before the August 1st deadline. No tariffs then. I'm not sure if that qualifies as Taco, but we'll see. And second, Tesla stock fails 7% on Monday because the CEO just can't stay away from divisive politics right now. Remember a month or two ago when Elon said he was stepping back from politics and Tesla shares rose as a result?

Well, Elon pulled a 180 faster than a self-driving Prius. He is now bankrolling and promoting a new political party, the America party. Classic Elon, he's doing it because he asked his Twitter followers if he should, and 65% said yes. And second, Jurassic Park 7 is now the best performance. opening weekend of 2025, it ate Brad Pitt. It's technically Jurassic World Rebirth. There's no seven in the title, but it did bring in $318 million in its opening weekend.

Better opening weekend than Minecraft, Leland Stitch, or Formula 1F1. The reviews were bad, but the CGI is good. It's a funny correlation here we've noticed. The worst the reviews, the bigger the marks office. At least when it comes to dinosaur movies. Now, time for the best fact yet. This one sent in by the Abbas family from lovely Chicago where they do logistics.

We are now officially closer to the year 2050 than to the year 2000. That's right. The full span from January 1st, 2000 to December 31st, 2050 is 50 years. And the exact midpoint of those 50 years was on July 2nd, 2025. So that means Yeti's congratulations. You are officially closer to 2050 than you are to the song, Who Let the Dogs Out? Yeties, you look fantastic today. Jack, Real Jack, AI, Jack, you both look fantastic today as well. My AI is so good.

It has an eczema flare up too, which is exactly what an AI would say. Now, Yetis, now that you've done this show, we have the perfect place for you to go. Go check out the untold origin story of Frisbee. We got a link in the episode description. It's for our other show, The Best Idea Yet. You're going to love the best idea yet. Go check it out now, and Jack and I will see you as all. Always tomorrow.

And before we go, a happy birthday to Yeti David Nodden over in Oxnard, California. Congratulations, David. Congratulations to Eli and Karen in Boston, Massachusetts. For their honeymoon and for getting accepted to MIT's master's program. And Kidar Shaker is turning 23 years old in Duval, Washington, who also participated in the World Rubik's Cube Championship. Do we have a winner here potentially? I hope so.

I've never gotten, like, anything close to one side to the correction. colors. I got two reds once. I got two reds, Jack. And a shout out to Allison Hebden and Parker Alfred, who are getting married in Louisville, Kentucky. Congratulations, guys. Can't wait to see the picks. And a big shout out to Soham Parac from Mumbai, India. It's our newest employee on the T-boy team. Oh, we expect a full-time effort for this full-time role. Did you wire the signing bonus yet, Jack? This is Jack. Nick and I both own stock in Spotify and Peloton. We both own ETFs of the S&P 500 and Nick own stock in Nike. You're like, no, I'm not AI.

I'm me. It's like, that's what AI would say.