The Blindboy Podcast - Tunnel Dunkers

Episode Date: May 9, 2018

Dictators, Birdsong, Poetry Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Today's poem was written by Daniel Day-Lewis who listens to this podcast on cassette inside Newarkman up a tree in Wicklow. Do your juniper duty for the townsfolk. Do it in the car park. Make sure everyone can see. Let the juniper juice trickle down your chest until it makes your ankles taste bitter. Do it for the juniper jury. It's your trial. They want to wash themselves in your innocence. The custard judge watches you from a nearby

window, bending your sentence with a length of copper pipe, will you escape his dreamy guillotine? Welcome to podcast number 30, you bejeweled shoemakers, how the fuck are you getting on? 30 fucking podcasts, yart, the fuck? Yart. The fuck. Very happy to be at podcast number 30. And you know what.

And I stopped saying that after about. I think it was podcast 16. But we've been number one in the charts. The podcast charts for 30 weeks. May not have been number one every single day of the week. But this podcast. Has been number one in the podcast charts at some stage every fucking week for 30 weeks. So fair play to us, you bastards. So on last week's podcast, we had Hollywood actor Cillian Murphy chatting with me about repealing the Eighth Amendment. And us urging young lads to go out and register to vote so that you can vote to repeal the Eighth Amendment.

And there was a fantastic fucking response. There was a great response particularly from lads and I'm very very happy to see that it was relatively effective because it got lots of comments on twitter

and direct messages and all this carry on from lads going Jesus you made a great point yeah I think I'll register to vote so that's brilliant because that's exactly what we wanted to do to reach lads and

put the repeal the 8th argument into their ears from the mouths of men which is a good thing and I got one mail there last week which i shared on twitter and this girl mailed me i can't remember your name your name escapes me i'm sorry i screen grabbed the message and put it on twitter but she said my housemate burst into tears this morning

telling me that one of her male friends who she was been been begging to register the vote finally did so after listening to yourself and killian murphy he said he finally got it that this was a vote that could actually bring about change so thanks it made both of our days now that's class that's good news and when i shared it i was quite happy the responses underneath very positive but a few women pointed out something which I didn't cop at first but they pointed out something legitimate

the general kind of vibe was this is really good isn't it it's excellent that you did that and that it's actually reaching these young lads however it's very

just kind of tiring and disappointing that essentially what me and Killian did is repeat the words of women and then these lads only listen to us because we are men now that's exactly what we wanted to do essentially use the privilege of our voices that we know will be listened to so that they will be heard but it's part of the overall it's part of the overall issue it's part of the overall problem you know so what i want to do this week is to if you're a lad and you listened to the podcast last week and what me and killian murphy said if that changed your mind right that's step one step two right from now on actually listening listen to the experiences of women please because there's nothing that I said on that podcast last week that was original that was

out of my own mind I was regurgitating the opinions of women that I'd heard many women talking about repeal over the years and why it needs to be repealed I essentially took their words and translated it into man and you listened so if it had an effect on you and it worked

start listening to the experiences of women and that's step two do you know what i'm saying um because that's i can only imagine how horribly frustrating that is for women to have a message they've been roaring and shouting about finally get through when a man speaks about it you know if you want to be part of the. Any conversation which is. Like repeal is a. Repeal is many issues.

It's a human rights issue. It's a health issue. But it's also a feminist issue. And if you want to get stuck into feminist issues. Try and allow the conversation to be. Female led. Please. So that's just something I wanted to point out.

Because. Yeah I kind of missed it missed it when I shared that message I gotta say it did need to be pointed pointed out to me by women to go that's class however it's also a symptom of a larger problem

and wouldn't be brilliant if we worked on tackling that too. So please do. What did I want to talk about this week? Oh yes, today's date is the 9th of May. On the 12th of May, right, there is a thing called

Darkness Into Light, which is led by a suicide and self-harm organization called pieta house okay and i'll tell you what this is first off pieta house are a suicide and self-harm charity based in ireland they've been around i say nearly 10 years and they're fucking they are fantastic they're absolutely fantastic I've done a lot of work with Pieta House over the years and you know I'm from Limerick, Limerick's got the highest suicide rate in the country you know and Pieta House offer completely free counselling services and help for people who are suicidal or are self-harming and it's they do it all from donations you know it's charity because the actual mental health system in this country

the government-run mental health system is disgraceful so organizations like Pieta House they save lives they save a lot of lives so what they do yearly tradition is this year it's the 12th of May but on the summer, is it the summer solstice is that what it's called, it's the longest day of the year

anyway all around the country, actually it's now worldwide this darkness into light walk what people do to raise money for pieta house and to raise awareness around suicide and self-harm and to remember uh people who've died by suicide and to have a sense of community to destigmatize suicide to destigmatize self-harm what people do in the hundreds thousands sometimes is walk from darkness into light on the longest day of the year they set off from one point and end at another and during that walk the sun rises and it's an overall metaphor for hope um it's also like it's an overall metaphor for hope it's also like

as a ritual it's deeply rooted in the human condition you know it's a ritual of positivity that from darkness light can come but humans have been doing that for years you know before religion before anything the summer solstice

has been very important to the human brain. So please go to pieta.ie. Or dil.pieta.ie. And register for Darkness Into Light. Find one of your pals who is actually doing the walk. And sponsor them. Or go to the Darkness Into Light walk yourself. If you you can't do it speak about it on social media share something to do with the darkness pieta house darkness into light walk raise awareness you know something as simple

as sharing that on your instagram or your twitter you don't know which one of your friends is going through a tough period you know you don't know? You don't know what's going on in their head. And they could see you sharing that thing about suicide. And that could be that one little light that says, Someone gives a shit. Oh, there is hope. Oh, there is free counselling available to me. If I want.

Also, I would urge you. If you want to, you can donate money to Pieta House, right? You can donate two euros to Pieta House, really simply, by texting SUPPORT, in all capitals,

SUPPORT, to 50300, and that will give two quid to Pieta House. You can text as many times as you like. There's 250,000 of ye bastards listening. Imagine if ye all did it now. 1,000 euros. Raised for Pieta's house.

Pieta House. That 1,000 euros raised I believe. Can offer a person a full suite of counselling. Which I think is about 12 sessions. So. Always give money to Pieta House I donate to Pieta House once a week, twice a week just send a text, why not like

you know not only are you doing not only are you helping a good cause are you supporting a brilliant organisation doing acts of charity like that there's there's a selfishness to it and a brilliant organisation, doing acts of charity like that, there's a selfishness to it. And when I say selfishness,

I mean a good selfishness, you know. I always say that about acts of charity. You know, acts of charity, of course, there's an element of selflessness to it, but don't deny or ignore the selfishness to an act of charity by which i mean when you help another person you yourself grow it boosts your self-esteem do you get me it's and there's a selfishness to that and that doesn't it's not necessarily a a selfishness to that. And that doesn't. It's not necessarily a bad selfishness. It's a responsible. Selfishness. In psychology.

I can't remember the fuck in psychology. It's called responsible hedonism. Where you'll be hedonistic and selfish. But it's. For your own growth. Em. Just something I'm putting out there. You know.

Tis a good thing to support if you're not living in Ireland you can go to their website pieta.ie and that will

you can donate directly on the website p-i-e-t-a and it's interesting the word pieta pieta is a word that comes from

it's from Christianity it's one of the the scenes from thea pieta is a word that comes from it's from christianity it's one of the the uh the scenes from the passion of christ which is when christ christ's journey being crucified basically in the resurrection but the pieta is when holy mary cradles the body of christ in her arms and it's that scene is one of the I don't want to use the word cliche because that has negative connotations but it's

one of the most kind of visually represented scenes in Christianity is the Pieta the finest example of which of course is Michelangelo's Pieta in St. Peter's of course is Michelangelo's Pieta in St. Peter's Basilica where

Michelangelo he carved Mary holding Christ in Carrera marble I believe which is marble from the quarry of Carrera in Italy the finest marble in the world

that Michelangelo used to use and it's a beautiful fucking sculpture if you ever have the pleasure if you're ever in St. Peter's Basilica in Rome

get a crack at the Pieta in there by Michelangelo the way he was able to represent fabric in marble like what a lad

do you know savage fucking artist and he only had four fingers he lived in a sewer and he was amazing with nunchucks so

last Friday I was how was I doing I was in Belfast I did a live podcast in Belfast now I fucking love Belfast I've always loved Belfast it's the one place like when we were gigging

throughout the recession you guaranteed a crowd in Belfast they always come out so I did a live podcast there and the first ever live podcast there. And the first ever live podcast. Was with Donzo. That you will remember.

The magnificent Donzo. We had great crack. In the Duncarn Art Centre. So I came back to Belfast on Friday. For a live podcast. With my guest Glenn Patterson. Who's a very very accomplished writer. it was good crack but I don't know sometimes you do podcast gigs and I wasn't feeling it I wasn't feeling it I don't know why um I'm trying to I'm kind of I'm trying to learn I'm kind of learning my feet as an interviewer

I'm kind of learning my feet as an interviewer at the live podcasts and I think what it was is that there was a very large crowd there was a big audience now it was sold out there was a over 400 people there and I'm grand with that you know I'm fucking I have a thing like you know I talk about my anxiety, well my former anxiety, and one of my anxieties used to be crowds, I was unable to be in a crowd of any description, so when I find myself in a large crowd now, especially speaking to a large crowd, I relish it you know, I treat my anxiety like a bully, so I take it head on, so I'm not at all intimidated by crowds, my anxiety like a bully so I take it head on so I'm not at all intimidated by crowds but I think my guest Glenn was a little bit intimidated by I won't say intimidated but put off a bit by the crowd because when we were backstage chatting we had this unreal conversation about fucking everything from art to music the whole shebang and I was rubbing my hands together going this is gonna be an amazing interview and then we went out I think Glenn got a small bit nervous by the crowd or excited by the crowd and I just felt he wasn't as conversational as I'd like

it was more me asking basic questions and then Glenn answering and then me not putting it back, so I kind of learned a lot from that gig, I learned a lot about how I'm gonna navigate the live podcasts in future, because we've had a couple of fucking crackers, but the biggest fear for me every time when i'm choosing a guest is that you know i know i can you know i'm okay in front of a crowd but i'm not like i i don't i don't have like big celebrities as my guests um so i can't assume that the person i'm interviewing is fully comfortable talking in front of a large crowd so that's something i'm going to be flagging with guests from now on i think um like donzo was a tour guide so no hassle there kevin barry he's he does a lot of public public speaking so kevin was fucking unbelievable

but i'm going to be back in belfast uh in a couple of months, I don't have it, I can't announce it yet officially, but what I can say is that I'm going to be back in Belfast and my guest is going to be Bernadette Devlin McClaskey who is a hero of mine, a fucking

hero of mine, she is a civil rights activist and I can't wait to interview her so that is going to be good crack this saturday in limerick i'm doing a live podcast in dolan's warehouse it's sold out unfortunately but i'm going to be interviewing a local limerick historian called sharon slater who she's got a website called limerick's life and i've been reading that for years so i can't fucking wait to interview sharon and she's good crack and then what else have i got coming up i'm in kilkenny at the cat's laughed

in cat's laugh festival in langitons i think there's a few tickets left for that At the Cat's Laugh Festival in Lankton's. I think there's a few tickets left for that. Hold on a second now. I'll get you to date here. I'm just looking at my thingy. Where the fuck is it? Whished, wished. Two seconds, lads.

I should have done this beforehand. Rather than making you wait on the podcast while I look for the word Kilkenny on a spreadsheet June July yeah okay Saturday second

second of June Saturday I am at the Kilkenny Cats Laugh Festival live podcast at the set theatre and my guest is going to be the author Louise O'Neill who's another fucking absolute legend, brilliant author, I've been friends with Louise on Twitter for a good few years, been following her, she's been following me so I can't wait to have a chat with Louise, she for a good few years. Been following her. She's been following me.

So I can't wait to have a chat with Louise. She's got two books out at the moment. One of them is a feminist retelling of The Little Mermaid. And then she's got she does young adult fiction and also adult fiction. But Louise is a legend. Looking forward

to that. Then I'm in Cork. Now this is technically my first live Cork podcast kinda I was at a festival a few weeks back it was a small little podcast gig it was called the It Takes a Village Festival

which was nuts, it was in Trebalgan in which is a weird holiday home place but it was a class little festival so I did a short live podcast there but my proper big Cork live podcast is going to be in

have I lost it again hold on St Luke's St Luke's in Cork which is a place I've gigged before and I don't have a guest for that yet so please if you have any suggestions of who I should be interviewing St Luke's. In Cork. Which is a place I've gigged before. And. And I don't have a guest for that yet. So please.

If you have any suggestions. Of who I should be interviewing in Cork. At St. St. Luke's. On the 20th of. June. Let me know please. And then.

I've a few other things. After that. But I'll tell. I'll tell you that stuff in good time. So anyway. I did have crack on the way up to Belfast. and then I have a few other things after that, but I'll tell you that stuff in good time, so anyway, I did have crack on the way up to Belfast, I got a lift off my buddy Dan, and Dan is in a band called Hermitage Green,

they're a limerick band, and a nicer shower of lads you will not meet, I love going on the lash with Hermitage Green, they're funny, funny people. So Dan gave me a lift up to Belfast and a lift back just for a bit of crack on the journey, you know. And he's a gas fucker. And we spent most of the journey talking about dictators, you know.

Which is an interesting topic. And we went through all the hits. You know. But we spent most of our time talking about. This mad. Bastard. He was a dictator of. There's a country called Turkmenistan.

Which is in Central Asia. Near. Uzbekistan. And Kazakhstan. And there was a there was a dictator in that country he died in 2006 and his name was Saparmurat

Niyazegov but he generally went by the name of Turkmenbashi and Turkmenbashi I think out of all the dictators in the world he is by far the most, or was the most eccentric of modern times, and that includes North Korea,

because he just seemed, he seemed a bit mad, do you know? But not only was he mad, he completely had full control over Turkmenistan, he was the president for life, and not Vladimir Putin style, where it's done very snakily with fake democracy straight up this guy was president for life and had the usual trappings of a totalitarian dictatorship with you know controlling the media and you know brutally repressing any dissenters but i suppose his the eccentricity starts with the golden statue

turkman bashy built a 60 foot golden statue a solid gold statue of himself on top of the building and it continually rotates to face the sun at all times. He also built a statue out in the middle of the desert, same crack, no one around for miles, just this gold statue of himself in the desert of Turkmenistan. And to get kind of a context for how this all happened, Turkmenistan was part of the Soviet Union from 1924 up until the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991. And these Soviet satellite countries, they had puppet governments, puppet communist governments. They were controlled centrally from Russia, but had these dictators that just did what they were told. So when the Soviet Soviet Union fell Turkmenistan was left with

this kind of new independence and had no one pulling the strings and the president Saparmurat Niyazov who was the leader of the fucking country he kind of

freaked out, he was like, oh shit I've got a country now five million people we don't know anything other than the soviets running us we we don't have a national identity so he deliberately went and formed a national identity for the country but based it around him so the national identity of the country became him Turkmenbashi and to make this stick he literally just changed the name of most things legally to Turkmenbashi the airport is called Turkmenbashi and it's almost impossible to use a road map in Turkmenistan because so many streets and towns and buildings are called Turkmenbashi. A meteor landed in the country. They called it Turkmenbashi. He did.

The month of January is called Turkmenbashi. He named the month of April after his ma. Is called Turkmenbashi. He named the month of April. After his ma. Bread. As in bread that you eat. Now this is a poor country. Under a dictatorship.

So you can imagine. If you're in this poor fucking country. Bread is pretty important. It's a staple food. Your life is bread every day. So he says. Well we need to change the name of bread then. So bread was called.

Chorak. So then he names bread. His mother's name. And if you don't call bread his mother's name. What was his ma's name? Gerbena. Gerbenasultanedze. So bread in Turkmenistan.

Is called Gerbenasultanedze. Which is hismenistan is called Gorbanasultan Edze which is his ma's name and if you don't call bread his ma's name he had you killed there was no kind of television in Turkmenistan during his rule up until 2006 people had televisions

and there was a Turkmenistani fucking TV channel but it was just a photograph of him all the time vodka is called Turkmenistani fucking TV channel, but it was just a photograph of him all the time. Vodka is called Turkmenbashi. I'd love a bottle of Turkmenbashi. I don't know how the fuck I'm going to get it. He wrote a book of philosophy,

Turkmenbashi did. Kind of like what Kanye West is doing. But he wrote a book of philosophy. And legally this book has to be displayed in. Beside the Quran in mosques in Turkmenistan. And if you wanted to get a job in Turkmenistan. No matter what it was. You had to memorize this book from start to finish. No exceptions.

Not only getting a job. But according to Turkmenbashi. If you don't read his book you will not get into heaven legally there was like an answer to the Nobel Prize for literature in Turkmenistan em

the international prize it was called and it was a prize for you know the best pro-Turkman poetry and Turkmenbashi himself awards it. But also, he awards it to himself. So Turkman Bashy wins the national or the international poetry competition for poems about himself. In 2004, he banned all newscasters from wearing makeup.

Because one day he turned on the television and he said he couldn't tell the difference between male and female newsreaders and it made him uncomfortable so all newscasters could not wear makeup on television and it was punishable by death Turkman Bashy absolutely loved smoking fags he adored it

he used to smoke loads and loads of cigarettes but he didn't know that fags were bad for your health, you know. So in 1997 he got a pretty bad health scare because of the fags with his lungs. He was so shocked to find out that cigarettes could harm him that he then banned smoking for the entire country. Punishable by death. Cigarettes were also called turkman bashy he banned gold teeth and having gold caps on your teeth i don't know why he banned that um so it became illegal to have gold teeth and then what you what you legally had to do

if you wanted to preserve your teeth what you legally had to do was to chew on bones one of the one of the maddest things he did as well was like Turkmenistan is very very hot you know, it's pretty much a giant desert so in 2000 he was like

what are we going to do about this, you know, all this heat how can we sort it out so he got it into his head that he could cool down the entire country Like, what are we going to do about this, you know, all this heat? How can we sort it out? So he got it into his head that he could cool down the entire country. So he ordered that this gigantic lake be created in the middle of the desert, right? A gigantic lake and a huge forest of cedar trees. And apparently this lake, this giant lake and forest, would cool down the entire climate of the country it didn't didn't work didn't even grow nothing happened but then to prove that you

know how successful his giant lake and forest in the desert would be he tried to build a palace made out of ice in the middle of the desert, the hottest location in Asia. So he built this ice palace that had a lot of penguins in it. Didn't work. And if you're wondering, like, you know, how do you even run a regime as eccentrically as that and still keep the country running? And the reason is Turkmenistan has

some of the largest reserves of natural gas in the world so that's where the money came from to build the giant ice palace and the desert and the lake in the in the desert

or the forest i mean well now one of the cool things he did is that he gave all this every citizen in his country has free natural gas until 2030 while they eat their bread that's named after his ma but one of the most class things in turkmenistan it's it it's called the gate of hell right so in the middle of the desert in Turkmenistan there's this gigantic hole right

that when you look into it it looks like hell it's this huge flaming hole that's it's been on fire since It's this huge flaming hole. It's been on fire since the 60s or 70s. And what it is, is they were drilling for gas. And when they drilled for gas, for the natural gas, a fuckload of methane came out, which is deadly.

So they lit this gas leak on fire to stop the spread of the methane. But now you've got this huge crater, firing crater in the middle of nowhere. That's called the Gates of Hell. And it's one of the most bizarre things in the world and quite fitting for such a mad country. It's like, what's your biggest attraction? The Gates of fucking Hell in the world and quite fitting for for such a mad country it's like what's your what's your biggest attraction the gates of fucking hell in the ground so yeah in the car on the way up to belfast we spoke about tart manistan quite a bit and if you're wondering why um and this is where like dan did me a favor by giving me a lift up to belfast so when Dan did me a favour by giving me a lift up to Belfast so when someone does me a favour

I like to pay them back Dan's got this weird side project where he kind of runs bizarre tours so he's actually organising a tour to Turkmenistan for a very small a small group of people.

It's like a bespoke tour. Turkmenistan is not an easy country to get into. You can't just go there on a plane. You need to be with a specialised group to organise it properly. But Dan happens to be organising a trip to Turkmenistan on September 26th to the 2nd of October. And you get to see the golden statue and this giant hellhole. And it's only for a small amount of people. And as a favour to Dan, if you're interested, if you're the type of person who's like,

I think I want to go to this crazy eccentric country that has the gates of hell in the desert. If you're that type of person and you'd like to go to this crazy eccentric country that has the gates of hell in the desert if you're that type of person and you'd like to go there, go to Dan's Instagram which is at Murphantastic M-U-R-P-H-A-N-T-A-S-T-I-C and all the details of that trip are on it

if you are so inclined to see that type of madness but we weren't just talking about Torkman Bashy you know who was the lunatic dictator I mean it's easy to talk about dictators that were absolute pricks there's plenty of them but then we got talking about a sound dictator because there's not many not many dictators that people go oh they were actually alright but the one kind of dictator

that comes up when you speak of benevolent dictatorship is always Tito of former Yugoslavia now Yugoslavia was you know it was a communist country it was under the Soviet rule but Tito would kind of openly Yugoslavia was you know it was a communist country it was under the Soviet rule

but Tito would kind of openly oppose Russia even though he was under that control and while it was a communist country Tito practiced the kind of a relaxed socialism

a relaxed communism, national communism you know where there was an element of a free market to it socialism, a relaxed communism, national communism, you know, where there was an element of a free market to it. So under Tito, like, businesses were owned by the state, owned by the people. But there was a certain amount of autonomy within it. Kind of a communist cooperative, profit-sharing workplace democracy, things like that. And as a result, the people of Yugoslavia, nobody was rich, but there was very little poverty.

You know, people, they also had freedom of travel. That's kind of the proof, really, of the benevolent dictatorship of Tito in Yugoslavia is that there was freedom of travel most Soviet countries you couldn't really leave because if you left you'd go Jesus that's a shithole I'm not going back but with Tito you could go away on holidays

and people returned because there was healthcare there was education everyone had jobs and people had a fairly decent standard of living and they liked him. Tito was liked and not only by his own people but the West kind of liked him too, mainly because he said fuck you to Russia a lot of the time. I don't know how he got away with that. For so long. He disliked nationalism. Within the Yugoslav republics.

What he was about. Collectivism. You know a few podcasts back. I spoke about. Collectivism. Acting for the greater good of your society. As opposed to individualism. Because, of course, he was viewed favourably in the West also.

This is what allowed the citizens of Yugoslavia to be able to kind of leave the country and go to other countries. He lifted the visa requirements to the country, so if you were were from the west you could visit Yugoslavia and then other countries were like alright come on over Yugoslavs you can do a bit of a holiday here which was unheard of during the Cold War you know but in general Tito is remembered as somebody who

actually cared about the country and the people that he was the dictator of and didn't wasn't obsessed with wealth believed that everything was genuinely the property of the entire people and tried to create an overall sense of community

and love and that's how he's remembered and in the former Yugoslavia today there's a Tito theme park and in the former Yugoslavia today, there's a Tito theme park, and people wear t-shirts with his face, like you would Che Guevara, people really miss him,

and, you know, that's the narrative we're told, he was a dictator at the end of the day, maybe he was a bit of a prick in certain senses, I don't know, but, the general narrative out there is that, Tito of Yugoslavia is the true kind of benevolent dictator.

There was a lad in Turkey as well, actually. Ataturk. I think he ruled the country for 20 years. When was it? Yeah, he founded he founded the Republic of Turkey and

he was president from 23 to 1938 when he died and he led a kind of a a secularist

country and he's looked back on as a benevolent dictator there was a class video game actually and I had I used actually I got kind of video game actually and I had I used actually I got kind of addicted to it

and I had to stop because not addicted it's just one of those games where you play it and before you know it nine hours have passed and you're like what the fuck happened and that's never a good thing em it's it's called Tropico

I was playing Tropico 5 and it's like Tropico, I was playing Tropico 5 and it's like remember Sim City it's basically it's a game where you are the dictator of a South American banana republic

and you get to choose whether you're going to be a hardcore no bullshit dictator who treats the people like shit or whether you're going to be you know a hardcore you know no bullshit dictator who treats the people like shit or whether you're going to be a dictator who allows a bit of freedom you know or you could embrace capitalism completely or you can

align you can align with a it goes through different eras so like you can align with the Soviets or the US you can have a little Cuban Missile Crisis if you like but it's good crack. It's a fun, satirical game. But I won't go near it again because it's like eight hours of my life gone.

Fucking trying to balance correct communism, the fiscal budget of a communist, a digital communist country. Eight hours of my day. No thanks. I'd rather be writing my book actually banana republics they're interesting i'm gonna save that for a different podcast if i haven't already spoken about it on the podcast i don't think i have in my book the book of short stories gospel according to blind boy i've definitely got a short story in there that is centered around the history of banana exports and honduras and banana republics and early american imperialism military imperialism it's a fabulously fucking interesting topic

and yeah i can't remember if I spoke about it on the podcast or not or if it's it's because it's in my book but if I haven't spoken about it on the podcast I will in a different one

down the line so thank you to Dan from Hermitage Green for allowing me to have a conversation about dictators which is a very interesting topic.

And Hermitage Green, actually, they're gigging in King John's Castle in Limerick on the 3rd of June. It's a day after my podcast down in Kilkenny. So I'm going to come back up to Limerick for that. And there will be crack. And supporting them, actually, are some buddies of mine.

Sheva, who's a brilliant singer from Limerick, singer-songwriter. And also my pal Dirt Davis, who's a spoken word poet and rapper from Limerick. The podcast you heard where I was interviewing Kevin Barry, Dirt Davis actually opened up for us. He did two two very amazing spoken word pieces and he's a genius

he's unbelievable actually do you know what I'll do for the fucking crack I'll play ye one of Dirt Davis' spoken word pieces because I think it falls into the remit of the podcast hug

so here's a bit of Dirt Davis for you I've been blessed with a philosophy to topple democracy a tyrant in this game it'd be a mistake to try mocking me, but these rhymes are just a dose of ferocious dynasty. I spit the social commentary most don't wanna see,

and even if they did, would they toast or admonish me? But if ignorance is bliss, why put fruit on the knowledge tree? See, I'm the type to ask questions. The world will acknowledge me. But do I sound like a lawbreaker or like Ambroke from some college phase? A lot of friends emigrated, made mates with the wallabies. I stayed, not what I hate from the wannabes. Don't bother me.

Just dealing with limimerick politics. Where just a drunken evening can lead to some holotips. And friends disappeared after words from O'Donnell's lips. Just a few words from him was a sentence to a lot of kids. I ask

who's to blame for our mindset? As ill as mob rhymes get. where they bill us as villainous killers For chilling and time spent on corners without potions Yeah we're your local anti-socials but just keep out your judging noses If you don't wanna knock emotion Society can't stand me, might be because I'm angry or it might be my Nikes and the hood on my Ganji long way from Dublin Zoo but monkey see monkey do

you tell us crime doesn't pay we view new BMWs being steered by the crews, that's selling gear to the youth. The picture painted by the rich is nowhere near the truth. You talk of kids being ruined by some evil influence, but you still buy as it grows. Now what I spew is the truest. Dispute is fluent narration if it helps you get through it but it wasn't my generation left Ireland's future in ruins. Try to upstep in our shoes

expecting to lose because you just can't get a job. Your girl is pregnant in June with interviewers calling it next. Upon addresses reviewed of broken homes and areas they only catching the news. Where kids kill for a hard name. Baddest man on the planet. Then they hit back. Your hard name is on a slab of some granite. And it's a cycle of violence. Blue lights and sirens.

Just kids moving product. We're products of our environment. Dealing our keys, scheming for early retirement. But was this the 1916 dream for modern Ireland? Collins is shit, it's here, but I'm not here to be your conscience. I'm in this city too, and it's clear we're all about options. powerful stuff there from Dirt Davis if you want to see that

that video just go onto YouTube and type in Shane Davis aka Dirty Harry it was a video that was filmed by Shane Serrano of Limerick a lot of Limerick talent but I'd like to have Dirt

on the podcast at some point for an interview because he's just, he's gas and he's very interesting he has a very unique way of looking at pretty much fucking everything, it's a gas character so I think 45 minutes

I think we'll have our ocarina pause now so this is where the app puts a digital hold on I'm away from the mic the app puts a digital advert into the podcast so what I do is I play my Spanish clay whistle

my ocarina and depending on your location you may hear an advert if you don't hear an advert you're going to hear me playing an ocarina and depending on your location you may hear an advert, if you don't hear an advert you're going to hear me playing an ocarina, so here we go on April 5th, you must be very careful Margaret

it's a girl, witness the birth bad things will start to happen evil things of evil it's all no no don't the first omen i believe the girl is to be the mother mother of what is the most terrifying 666 it's the mark of the devil movie of the year it's not real it's not real it's not real who said that Rock City, you're the best fans in the league, bar none. Tickets are on sale now for Fan Appreciation Night on Saturday, April 13th when the Toronto Rock hosts the Rochester Nighthawks at First Ontario Centre in Hamilton at 7.30pm. You can also lock in your playoff pack right now to guarantee

the same seats for every postseason game and you'll only pay as we play. Come along for the ride and punch your ticket to Rock City at TorontoRock.com that was a little bit more melodic than usual so this podcast is supported by you the listener em

it's a bit like a bit like Yugoslavia under Tito do you know kind of collective ownership there's no it's a socialistic model this podcast is supported by you and

if you'd like to donate some money to me for if you enjoy the podcast it's about 5 hours of content a month so if you enjoy the podcast you know it's about five hours of content a month so if you enjoy it and you're like I'd buy I would buy blind buy a pint

or a cup of coffee once a month for his five hours of podcast and the work that goes into it if you're feeling that way please go to patreon.com forward slash

the blind buy podcast and give me give me a couple of quid if you like if you don't have that money you don't want to you just want to listen to free listen for free you are also it's completely acceptable to do that that's fine i'm appealing to your sense of soundness only donate if you want other than that keep listening for free it's grand also I haven't asked in a while please subscribe to the podcast

and leave a review or a comment you know if you'd like to buy my book my book is number 4 in the fiction charts at the moment actually in Ireland the gospel according to blind boy the paperback is

in shops if you'd like to buy that um what else oh yeah I just noticed online there's a I think someone tagged me in it but there's a thing called the British podcast awards right and I'm certainly not fucking British but there's a thing called the British Podcast Awards. And there isn't an Irish Podcast Awards. Don't think there's not. But there's the British Podcast Awards. And you can vote for my podcast in it. So please do go to thebritishpodcastawards.com

and vote for the Blind Boy Podcast. If I win it, I'll just make a big song and dance about the fact that I'm not British. I think that's the best thing I can do. But then I was looking at it. It's not necessarily podcast awards for British podcasts. It's just podcast awards that British podcasts it's just podcast awards that are run by Brits because you can vote for any podcast in it

I think but it'd be class to it'd be class to win an award in it or get a nomination or something because I don't know we've got a fair amount of fucking listeners now we've got a roughly about quarter of a million listeners a week.

More or less. Goes up and down. But. I think it's about. She's nearly 150 in Ireland alone. And I've got a few international listeners. But they're mainly distributed in pockets. Like.

There's a good few thousand in America. Canada. Bizarre amount in Spain for some reason, Australia. They're all over the place, little pockets. But I'd love the podcast to really properly grow, you know. It's 30 weeks in. And I never, ever, ever thought this podcast would have as many listeners as it does just after 30 fucking weeks. So let's try and grow it globally for the laugh you know let's make it big globally let's tell stories about an otter from limerick

globally so please vote for me in the british podcast awards and if you're not living in ireland and you're abroad just share the podcast on your Facebook or Twitter or tell a friend about it because I want it to grow I'd like that you know purely because it's it's independent you know this is just the only technology that's needed to make this podcast is my beautiful microphone my studio but that's it there's no fucking cash injection or investors if this podcast had 10 listeners it would still be the same output and technology and it can be as big as i want it to be as we want it to be so please vote for it so i'm gonna move on to your delicious questions this week yum yum give me the questions i will eat them with relish before I do actually

em I went on a DM answering spree last week because I had a bit of time I get so many fucking private messages

whether it be on Patreon or Twitter or email or whatever maybe 20 a day 25, 30 sometimes more long em personalils from people who just like the

podcast or and want to tell me something and i appreciate every single one of them but there's so fucking many i can't get around to answering as many as i like and i don't want to give you shitty stupid quick answers so if you've sent me a direct like and I don't want to give you shitty stupid quick answers so if you've sent me a direct message and I haven't answered um please don't don't think that I'm ignoring it don't think that I'm I'm I don't give a fuck I do give a fuck I appreciate every message I get it fills my heart with joy but there's so many that I just don't have time to get around to all of them. You know what I'm saying? But thank you if you have sent a DM. Ryan says,

Can you remind everyone to get their lazy holes out of bed and go enjoy the glorious dawn choruses we are having at the moment? It's the peak of the bird mating season and they're making beautiful racket at sunrise. One of the most satisfying satisfying mindful experiences to just absorb the cacophony i could not agree more ryan there's some amazing bird song at the moment and ah stop morning evening whatever you want you'll hear it at the middle of the night at this time of year if if you if you can get the opportunity to

if you want to start meditating or just sitting down and relaxing get stuck into the bird song that is out there at the moment and our brains evolved our brains evolved alongside birds to

our brains evolved with bird song mainly as it's kind of think of bird song as nature's alarm do you remember sorry do you remember homer simpson when he had that episode where he was making inventions and he invented and everything's okay alarm so it's this alarm that keeps going off and then when something isn't okay the alarm stops as irrational as that sounds that's what bird song is to the human brain um we when birds are singing we feel a content safety. Our brains relax. But not just relaxed. It's a relaxed alertness. Do you know what I mean?

Not too far off meditation. Like when you meditate, you're as relaxed as you will possibly be. It's as relaxed as your brain can be. But you're also very aware of what's happening. You're not dozy, we'll say. And birdsong does that to the human brain. If predators, like if we go back 50, 60,000 years, if there was a predator that was present that would harm humans, then the birds fuck off. They stop singing. They're quiet. They don't want to draw attention to themselves. So when humans don't hear birds song deep within our unconscious our brains experience that it's

threatening and anxious but when bird song is present our minds go at ease and become calm and feel safe so please absorb the bird song especially if you live in a city because the noise levels that we're exposed to these days, the sheer cacophony is deafening. I want to do an episode at some point on the Futurists, which is a crazy art movement, very similar to Dada. But the Futurists were, they were big into Futurist music. I'm talking 1914, 1915. They were big into futurist music. I'm talking 1914, 1915. And there was a manifesto, a futurist manifesto,

called The Art of Noises, I believe it's called. And its author, Luigi Rosolo, claimed that in industrial society, that were someone from the 15th century to be exposed to the level of noise that you and I are used to in a city, that they would simply die of shock. So it's easy to forget bird sound because our brain tunes out all the noise of a city. And it'll tune out birds as well, the modern brain. But listen to bird sound.

It's nature's alarm clock too, you know. Some say it's because the bird song, I think it's called staccatic. I think the type of melodies that birds sing are staccatic. There's no pattern in a bird song. It's very arbitrary. And this arbitrary nature of how they sing consistently keeps the human brain alert. Because we as humans are perpetually seeking patterns of some description we love patterns because of faces it's you know there's a lot of complexity required to identify

another person's face so our brains and visual perception is geared towards recognizing patterns at all times and birdsong doesn't have a pattern some say that music evolved as a way to rationalize the chaotic and arbitrary nature of birdsong that it was humans way to get birdsong melody and put it into scales and rationality you know so get out there and you don't even have to get out there make a mindful choice to truly listen to bird song and pick your moments listen what does

it sound like in the morning what's it like in the daytime my my favourite birds songs, I think is, maybe four or five in the morning, just if I'm out very late, or if I'm walking home from a pub, and you hear, there's not a lot of it, just the odd few little boys, whispering into the distance,

you know, it's very minimal, if you're lucky enough, to be listening, if you get up at about four in the morning actually pieda house darkness into light there's your opportunity to hear the proper dawn chorus there is nothing better than hearing birds gradually develop a crescendo as the sun comes up in the distance that is true mindful living right there if you can do that that will if you do that you will have a good day it's such a rewarding experience for your brain john asks is entering

a state of flow during the creative process primarily therapeutic or do you see it as important to the quality of the work itself in In other words, if you were writing a short story but did not achieve a state of flow in the process, would the story suffer? Absolutely. Flow has, just for any new listeners, flow is, it's how I write. When I'm writing a book at the moment,

I just wrote a book last year, when I write I enter a state of flow which is like a waking dream state where creative ideas reveal themselves to me in almost like a trance it's controlled daydreaming but it's highly therapeutic it is fucking highly therapeutic it's like washing my brain, if I enter flow, then I'm happy for the rest of the day, but personally, if I sit down and do an hour or two of writing, and I do not enter a state of flow, then absolutely the writing is affected, 100%, to be honest, I had a bit of it this morning morning I sat down to try and write my 500 words and I didn't enter flow state because I had some shit irritating me some stuff was bothering me and I didn't enter a state of flow and I started to think about not entering flow and as soon as you think about not entering it it's not happening and the work is hugely affected because you're not writing from your heart you're writing with the front part of affected because you're not writing from your heart. You're writing with the front part of your brain.

You're writing with your critical skills. Your writing becomes contrived. My writing, sorry, my writing becomes contrived. It becomes not about what's in my heart and my feelings. It's what I think someone else wants to read or what I think I like to read and it's it's like my brain is running at fucking five percent capacity I don't have access to my vocabulary my grammar I don't have access to imaginative imagery creative use of words,

all the things that make decent prose, that make decent writing. And instead, I'm just going through the motions. Clichés, that's what happens when you're not in flow. Your work becomes clichéd. And it's why decent mental health is such an important facet of being an artist I think you know having a clear head being relaxed keeping an eye on stress and most importantly if you're an artist to strive every day to never allow your success or failure as an artist to define your value as a human being because if you feel that you are only a good or bad person depending on how good your art is or your creative output then that means you become terrified of failing because

failing means you feel like a bad person so that's the struggle um separate your personality from your art think about something you do that you don't give a fuck about for me it's making a fry up if i make a fry up in the morning bacon eggs and a few sausages I usually do a good job but if I get distracted I might burn it if I burn that fry up I'm slightly disappointed but I do not self-flagellate

I don't tell myself I'm a bad person so therefore why should I do the same thing when it comes to writing a piece of music or writing a short story you know you can write from pain you know you can experience great loss or hurt in your life and you can write from that you can write from anxiety you know you can write from you know mental health issues you can get creativity from that but it's very difficult to

get creativity from stress do you know it's hard to get creativity from stress and you kind of eat yourself if you if you create from a stressful position you'll only come up with cliches your work will be contrived and and this is where this is where self compassion comes in so when I had a crack at my 500 words today and I got

about 300 words and I knew it was crap so I didn't want to continue the process of pain instead of beating myself up instead of defaulting to when that happens if you don't watch yourself your brain can go very negative and your brain can say to yourself oh that's it now you're not going to have any more good ideas you're done that's it now you've lost your creativity you're useless and you know i knew you were useless all along you're a fraud all right

and anything good you've done before was an accident and you're a fraud all right and anything good you've done before was an accident and you're a fraud that's how that's how my mind can go if i don't have self-awareness around my own creativity and it can be crippling so part of the skill of my mental health process is to stop that line of thought and what i say to myself is that is objectively untrue. There is no evidence for these thoughts, these negative thoughts, these extreme thoughts in my head. That I only arrive on good ideas by accident. That my creativity will dry up. That I'm worthless as an artist. These extreme thoughts, that's my anxiety speaking.

That's my own own my insecurities so I don't allow those things to define how I am I just go no I'm just frustrated and that's how my mind is and there's no rational or objective evidence to suggest that any of these toxic thoughts are true so I discard them and part of my process of self-compassion is to say to myself I just don't have it in me today today I'm bothered by something my brain doesn't want to do it and you know what it's okay I think what I need to do is feed my unconscious and this is something that took me a while to kind of develop and feeding the unconscious as an artist is basically you step away from the art and you allow yourself to do whatever you

want if you want to fucking go on YouTube and look at Britney Spears for 8 hours or go on a Wikipedia binge or rub a dog or do you know what I mean it's

it's not always procrastination basically is what I'm saying. There's nothing wrong with, if you're an artist not creating today because you want to enjoy other people's art, go and do that thing that your heart is telling you to do. If your heart is telling you to actually binge on Netflix, do it. Because it's a hell of a lot better than sitting down writing if nothing heart is telling you to actually binge on netflix do it because it's a hell of a lot better than sitting down writing if nothing is coming to you you'll only self-flagellate and

become upset so that's what i did today i said right words aren't happening went on a lovely binge, looked at some trash on YouTube and most likely what will happen is because I naturally allowed myself to enjoy that thing on Wikipedia that I was reading, to actually chill out and relax and absorb it and experience it as pleasurable, that goes into my unconscious, into the back and whatever thing about that wikipedia article or that youtube video that excited me that made me feel happy that will somehow find channel its way out in a couple of weeks time as flow and arrive into a short story and i won't know where it came from and that's how the creative process works but I can't do that unless I allow myself self-compassion to basically go you're not a

piece of shit just means that today you weren't up for it chill out relax enjoy something you want to enjoy go back to the drawing board tomorrow and have another 500 words and there's no guarantee there'll be flow tomorrow no guarantee there might be but if there isn't just means you're not ready for it and it's okay it's grand you don't control it these are the type of things that i say to myself you know um but i certainly i won't allow myself to get stressed out and to self-flagellate and allow toxic toxic thoughts lead to toxic emotions you know that's one of the cornerstones of cognitive behavioral therapy that's what i use that's my self-talk method you pricks okay last question from mark why doesn't guinness taste the same anywhere else in

the world does having a pint in your local make it better than anywhere else because of the setting is it a placebo effect because it's shit in melbourne um i'd say some of it is placebo effect especially with modern brewing technology but you know different guinness around the world and only uses different water like you hear a lot of people speak about nigerian guinness apparently nigerian guinness is incredible West Indies Porter now it's brewed differently, slightly stronger that tastes different to regular Guinness but it's a mix of the both, I know historically

travelling with Guinness was a huge issue like the breweries down in Cork like the likes of Murphy's Limerick had a couple of Porter breweries as well there used to be a lot of Stout and Porter breweries down in Cork, like the likes of Murphy's, Limerick had a couple of porter breweries as well. There used to be a lot of stout and porter breweries around Ireland in Victorian times. Because Guinness was being made in Dublin, Cork is at the very bottom of the country. And they used to have to bring the Guinness down on horse and cart.

And by the time the Guinness got down to Cork with this bumpy ride it was just shite it had been shaking so much on the journey that it was horrible by the time it got to Cork so Cork was like fuck that we'll make our own porter and they had Murphy's Brewery then the Guinness family

with the Industrial Revolution built canals up and down Ireland and it absolutely destroyed Limerick Limerick had four or five breweries they all disappeared because the Guinness family

brought a canal and the Guinness was coming down on barges nice and fucking slow with no major disturbance getting to Limerick and it was tasting delicious and the Limerick breweries closed down

and Cork managed to hold on to Murphy's probably because of the distance and probably because Cork just I know the way Cork are there's no way they're fucking closing down a brewery to get some Dublin stuff that rivalry is too strong alright

I'll leave you going now have a wonderful week enjoy yourselves I'm going to be back and we'll have another podcast hug hope you enjoyed it this week God bless Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. rock city you're the best fans in the league bar none tickets are on sale now for fan appreciation

night on saturday april 13th when the the Toronto Rock hosts the Rochester Nighthawks at First Ontario Centre in Hamilton at 7.30 p.m. You can also lock in your playoff pack right now to guarantee the same seats for every postseason game, and you'll only pay as we play. Come along for the ride and punch your ticket to Rock City at torontorock.com.