The Digression Sessions - Ep. 143 - Jared Logan (@JaredLogan)

Episode Date: December 1, 2014

Twitter! @JoshKuderna – Josh Kuderna @Sean_Joyce – Sean Joyce @JaredLogan – Jared Logan @DigSeshPod – For Podcast Updates! Hola Digheads! After a week off, we’re back! Our guest is the wonderful and hilarious comedian, Jared Logan! Buy his album, My Brave Battle, right now! And to sweeten the pot even more, our old lover, Sean Joyce, is back in the cohost chair. Sean is a funny dude as well and runs shows 7 nights a week in DC. For info on those, go to UndergroundComedyDC.com! While there were some technical difficulties (Josh forgot to record the first 10 minutes of the pod, like an idiot), the boys had a great talk in a basement before Jared’s show about starting out in Chicago, grown ups that are into Disney, is comedy art?, moving to New York, setting goals, and terrible TV gigs! Please do the Dig Sesh boys a solid and subscribe to and rate us on iTunes, or Stitcher! Say hi on Twitter and Facebook. And check out the rest of the Thunder Grunt podcast network!

Welcome to the Digression Sessions Podcast. Hey, everybody. I'm Josh Koderna. And I'm Mike Moran. And you're listening to the Digression Sessions Podcast, a Baltimore-based comedy talk show hosted by two young, handsome stand-up comedians slash improvisers. Join us every week as we journey through the world of comedy and the bizarreness of existence. As we interview local and non-local comedians, writers, musicians, and anyone else we find creative and interesting. Yes.

Who's the guest this week jared logan is the guest on this week's program comedian jared logan you can follow on twitter he's at jared logan uh he's been on shows like tj miller's mashup uh best week ever on vh1 love all kinds of stuff he has a new album out which is very very funny it. It's called My Brave Battle. Everybody should get that. It's hilarious. It is one of the better stand-up albums I've heard, like the way it just flows and everything. It's really good.

But, Michael, I apologize you were not there for this one. That's all right. This one came together last minute in D.C., so I literally drove from work to go record it before his show that he was doing with Sean Joyce, who is the guest co-host on this episode who's guest co-host before uh with the sean patton episode and uh you can find him on on twitter he is at sean underscore joyce and he puts on shows seven nights a week in dc which is pretty incredible um if you go to underground comedy dc.com you, you can see that, see where all the shows are.

And then occasionally he'll book like, you know, a bigger name for a book show like Jared Logan. And yeah, this was a really fun interview. The only problem was Mike, you should have been there. Probably could have kept me in check

because I did not record like the first 10 or 15 minutes. Really? With the recorder, you have to double tap the record button you press it once and then it shows you the levels and it was one of those things where he was starting to tell a really funny story and i was like oh save it for the podcast and i just hit the button once and i was like here we go and he tells this great story and then like time passes and i'm like shit i didn't record any of that did you tell him yeah i had to i had to um you didn't recreate it again i yeah i told

him at the very end i said guys i don't think we got that first part so like we rushed through the story at the end of what it was and um but yeah there was some believe me some good banter in the beginning just just imagine what it was what it was was um the uh we were talking about he was drawing something goofy in his notebook. And it looked like a Donnie Darko symbol or something like that. And we were joking around like, what if that's all his notebooks were? Like that's his set list. He's like, what am I working on here? It's just like the weirdest stuff.

And he said a friend of his was going to meet another friend of his for coffee. And he showed up to the cafe and his buddy was already there and his buddy's notebooks and stuff were out like i think they're gonna have a meeting about whatever like writing a sketch or something like that and so he goes he sees all his stuff and he goes over to his table and his buddy's notebook is open and it's just three or four pages about how he would fix indiana jones crystal skull wow and uh it's sounds like me but it's something like they never even talked about before it's not like they're like man that's not the type of thing you bring up to other people i think i think you could

like riff on it like man you know what would be cool i'd fix the movie like this and apparently it's one of those things like we come back to the table and like close it just like hey what's up with you so we were talking about that and then uh he has a really funny bit on his album about um adults that are into disney you know it's it's a weird thing yeah like uh you had a we didn't we talk about that yeah and i told him about i i work with a chick that's very into disney so we talked about that and i don't think that made it on there but um but yeah it was it was really good and then the batteries were gonna die so i had to pause it and re-record but uh it was it was oh man he was so cool it was nice to like talk to a guy about because he's one of those guys where he's like doing a lot of work and like getting on tv and on shows and stuff like that and then hearing about like his writing process and he gets a little uh uh self-conscious like

do people really want to hear about process and me and sean like yes definitely so he's one of those guys that like makes time to write every day you know like some people are just like well when it comes to me it'll come to me and that type of thing is into like establishing goals and stuff like that and it's a weird thing like i don't think anybody should feel self-conscious about that like yeah it's not that weird yeah i feel more weird about the indiana jones thing yeah like if if i had to explain to you all the movies that i've rewritten in my head or like albums that i've rearranged yeah like changed the marketing on retrospectively in my head, it would be really embarrassing.

Well, yeah. And I was picturing a notebook like in the movie Seven where Kevin Spacey's notebook's every word's like two millimeters big. And Morgan Freeman's like, if we had 19 officers working around the clock,

we couldn't get through all of this. And it's just all about crystal skull ah good times so uh so while the the beginning of this interview is a little bit abrupt it's still there's some gems in there very funny very cool guy and uh hope you guys enjoy it check out his album uh now some stuff to plug for for you and i uh we just uh we just uh had thanksgiving michael and that was nice. At my Thanksgiving dinner with my grandma, she cooked. It was me, my grandma, and

my dad and my girlfriend. And my grandma, she was happy to let us know that she was happy to cook for us, but it almost killed her. Had to let us know that she almost died. And I'll never do this again. Now enjoy. Nice Jewish grandmother had to let us know that she almost died and i'll never do this again now enjoy nice jewish grandmother guilt like oh enjoy enjoy guilt on the back side

and uh she uh you know her favorite comedian is michael uh louis ck yeah not me she goes i love him he is my favorite i go well grandma you know uh i do comedy she goes, I love him. He is my favorite. I go, well, grandma, you know, I do comedy. She goes, yeah, well, I've never seen your stuff. So I just changed the subject. Wow. How old is she? She's in her 80s. She's pretty cool that she's into Louis C.K.

Yeah, yeah. She's very sharp. She's like, he has great structure to all his jokes and his setup. It's like, well, all comedians have structure. She's like, no, not like him. I'm like, well. She's probably thinking of the Vaudeville era. Yeah.

Confusing. Has anybody ever tried that observational humor before? Yeah, exactly. He talks about himself. It's interesting. I'm like, well, okay. Thanks, Grandma. Now I know why I'm a comedian.

So how was your Thanksgiving, Michael? It was good. It was good. Got together with the family. The fam? Yeah. The little kids came over and nothing much eventful happened. Uh-huh.

Brother-in-law was sick at home. Uh-huh. So that was the big news. Oh, boy. He couldn't attend. It was supposed to be my sister's. We had to switch to my mom's. Oh, last minute uh location change i did find myself in a conversation with my mom where

i felt like i was the adult uh commenting on her media intake and being like why do you like this crap because like you know we're talking about ebola and stuff and i find myself just being like now i'm like for all the crap that she gave me for being into like horror movies and heavy metal and stuff when it's rotting your brain michael yeah now it's like the opposite i'm like for all the crap that she gave me for being into like horror movies and heavy metal and stuff when I was rotting your brain Michael yeah now it's like the opposite I'm like why why are you watching this tabloid nonsense you know like you have to suck in this blood and guts media constantly yeah and what good's it doing you mom exactly I'm sorry like go do your homework yes get your act together actually go make Thanksgiving dinner well good that's right I like a dinner.

Just a low key, just nice hang. Yeah, that's great. Yeah, no, seeing my family is always a good time. It's cool that my, even though my family's like split, you know, mom and dad wise, they still like come together for the kids. Really? Oh, your dad was there? That's awesome.

I love that when people are like, yeah, we're still family. Yeah, they've always been pretty cool with that. That's nice. Cool. So your dad came up from Virginia? Yeah. Nice. Awesome.

All right. Well, we got a nice little catch-up session in here in the intro. Stuff to plug, right? We got some things to plug. Oh, we should say, too, we took the previous week off on accident. Right. But we have shows lined up. We just had Mike Lowry on the podcast.

He is the touring drummer for Future Islands. Excellent interview. And so that'll be out the following Monday. Yeah, so hopefully we can stay consistent. But we took a holiday week off. Is that okay with you? Come on. How much is this costing you again, listeners?

Exactly. God, we give so much. We give so much. That's going to return. For you to rate and review us on iTunes. Tell a friend. That's all we ask. That's all we ask. we give so much. We give so much. What do we ask in return? For you to rate and review us on iTunes. Tell a friend. That's all we ask. That's all we ask.

That's not much. Just pay for a billboard once in a while. Get the word out. So yeah, let's plug some shows and all of our Twitter stuff and all that. This week, I'll be at the front room of the Arlington Draft House on Wednesday Wednesday, December 3rd and Thursday, December 4th. I'll be hosting shows there. Come out to those. And then I've got a bunch of stuff going on for December. So check out

the website, digressionsessions.com calendar for all of our upcoming dates. Follow me on Twitter and Instagram. I am at Better Robot Josh. Michael? I am now. Hey now. And this is different. Hey. I'm Mike Moran Wood. Whoa.

W-O-U-L-D. Took me a second to think about that spelling. No longer Michael Moran 10. Why the wood? I don't know. I just was throwing stuff out there and it sounded decent. Okay. Okay.

And it's just, you know, it's a positive thing. Like, should I do this? Well, Mike Moran Wood. Mike Moran Wood. Wood. And it's just, you know, it's a positive thing. Like, should I do this? Well, Mike Moran would. Mike Moran would. Would. Uh-huh. Mike Moran would. You're getting in on that.

Who's would? You're getting in on that WWJD craze. I think it's from 2002. Yeah, I think I'm going to ride that wave. I think it's finally a good wave to ride. People have been asking themselves for centuries, what would Jesus do? Right. Now it's what would Mike Moran do?

Well, it's Mike Moran would. Jesus may not. Right. But Mike Moran. You always would. Always. Whatever it is. Yes.

Genocide. Chipotle. You name it. Mow the lawn. Right. You'd do it. This is your follow-up to Jim Carrey's Yes Man. Exactly. I knew it. I knew it. Sy it synergy right yes yeah excellent excellent okay uh shows to plug for this week um i can't remember nice sorry my man

all right just read my article at brightest young things dot com yes absolutely and uh so yeah this is uh this is awesome man this was uh this is a fun interview with with Jared, and it's nice to talk to people doing the damn thing and hearing about their process and all that stuff. What about yours, Chose? I just plugged them. You did? Yeah, Wednesday and Thursday. Thanks for paying attention, man.

Sorry. I appreciate it. I'm so deliriously hungry right now. Yeah, you're out of it. You are losing it. All right. All right, that's it. Thank you to everybody for listening.

Thanks, guys. Thank you for this rambling intro, but it was nice to catch up. Yeah, man. All right, let's get into it withared logan and mr sean joyce enjoy so i kind of moved there on my own and lived with this guy that i knew that was a grad student this gay guy named beau uh-huh who's a good guy who got me a job at this place was a grad student, this gay guy named Bo, who's a good guy, who got me a job at this place. It was a theater, right? It's where I did these lighting designs I was telling you about.

But this theater was called the Bailiwick Theater, and it was mostly, it was like a gay-owned, gay-operated theater. And one of its mandates was they always had a show going that was about the gay experience in some way. So I ended up being like a house manager at this place just to make you know

barely any money and i ended up working all the time this show called naked boys singing it was naked men singing with their genitals fully exposed uh-huh was that ever on broadway it was on broadway i've heard of that yeah i've heard of this and then there was the chicago run yeah and uh so you know here i am i'm like 23 i'm trying to get my life started and i'm just like every night i'm so confused looking at a bunch of cock and uh it was kind of actually to be honest with you it's like okay because like you kind of feel better about your own cock because some people have big cocks and some people have little cocks but it doesn't stop them from singing and dancing love the way you looked at me when you said big cocks and looked at sean some people have little

tiny cocks john oh right into your face there wow some people have even tinier yes brought it right around i don't think that's the case for me but these guys would i would i would have to kick people out of the uh i would have to kick women that look like my mom out of the show because even though it was a show about being gay, all these bachelorette parties would come. Yeah. So I learned hatred for bachelorette parties very early. That's right.

They're never welcome anywhere, really. Yeah. Nobody wants them around at a bachelorette party. No. They would try to grab the guy's stuff. And so I would walk in and there'd be these naked gay men dancing and singing while trying to get my attention with little gestures and eye movements. Like, get her out of here.

So weird. Jazz hands. But thanks to that job, I know that I'm definitely not gay because I had tons and tons of opportunities to try it out uh many offers drunken gay men way out of my league yeah hey show me give me the private tour of the theater and i would always be like oh you're really going to see what's in here and then i would just open the door to outside and they would walk through nice because if you were super drunk i was allowed to kick you out um and you don't have to put up with that you don't i don't need to be harassed no you don't i'm the guy that sets up the chairs i'm the fluffer i'm not

here to service people i'm here to get people ready to go on stage and that's it and that's it and i and sometimes i help out of the concession stand and in the box okay yeah and that's where i'll touch some dicks but not not the talent. Yeah. It happens. Yeah. I'll touch a dick. Yeah. Why not? Well, you know the show.

I'll touch your dick. That's how the show ends. That's the ending segment. And now we touch. Now's the time of the show where we touch Josh's dick. Yep. And then, you know, you get your plugs in and all that stuff. Yeah.

It's good. It's a nice way to end it. So. Brings it home. Yeah. So how long in Chicago before you got where you had to stop doing the lighting design stuff? That was pretty early. So my first year, I had that job and another job.

I basically just worked all the time. I didn't really have very many friends. Like I said, my friends didn't really follow me up there until a little later. So yeah, after the first year in Chicago. So after the first year, though, I got a little bit of a better paying job. And then I have more time to just go out and do stand up. And that's when I got really heavy into it. So probably like 04.

How was the scene out there? Well, the scene, you know, when I got there, I was, you know, I'm still good buddies with Kumail Nanjiani. Pete Holmes kind of left right after I got there, but I kind of met him there. Kyle Kinane was already gone. Wow. I probably saw Hannibal do some of his first open mics. Hannibal Buress.

Bronger was already gone. Bronger was already gone. Gotcha. A lot of fantastic people. Still, yeah, that's a really strong... What about T.J. Miller? T.J. Miller did stuff with him all the time. Yeah,

so I know all those guys through that scene. Very cool way to come up. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. So, how many years in Chicago before you went to New York?

I spent five years in Chicago. You know, if I had to do over, I probably wouldn't have spent quite so long there. Really? Yeah, man, if you are a...

Just want to get to it? ...aspiring stand-up comic and you are listening to the podcast and the podcast go go go to new york or la just go really if you're doing well if you're not bombing all the time yeah and i know it can be hard to uh admit to yourself whether that's true or not but i think you pretty much know yeah if you're if you're doing well every time you get on now just go you know unless you want to build something out of a different place you know like and there's people that do that like the growlix build their whole thing out of denver and they're fantastic and their shows are fantastic yeah you know and they

do it all out of denver but if you're like on on one day I'm going to move to New York, don't wait until you're, you know, long in the tooth. Right, right. Yeah, the guys in Denver, they even got that pilot on Amazon. It didn't go anywhere, but still, it was pretty huge to get that out there. Well, they're extraordinary, though. You know, most people, you know, they stay in a local scene, and it's very insulating, and it's, like, nice and friendly. And, you know i was

telling sean the other day i went to new york and people are kind of like oh you were on uh live at gotham on comedy central that's interesting you get in line over here behind the guy that started open mics yesterday you know yeah you just kind of have to start over so go ahead and go and start over you know just get to it it made me a way better comic. Yeah. And I love New York now. Uh-huh. Are you based out of there all year? No.

Now we go back and forth a lot. I go out for pilot season to LA. What's that experience like? You know, I like it. I really like it. First of all, I love LA. Uh-huh. It's nice weather.

People are nice. Yeah. And they are. Sometimes maybe they don't mean it, but at least they're nice. At least they're faking it. They're going through the night. Yeah. I appreciate that.

Uh-huh. And then auditioning is really fun once you figure out, well, there's a little bit of a trick to it, I think. And my buddy had to tell me this. Yeah. I was very sincerely learning every word verbatim, you know. And then I was going in like, I am here to do the best job I can for you. This is my attitude.

I wasn't saying this. But hi, Jared Logan. Very sincere. How are you? Hi. Nice to meet you. Thanks for this opportunity, you know. Strong handshake.

And then I would do a funny scene verbatim exactly the way they had it written. And I think my scenes were funny. But the truth is you've got to go in and be funny as a person, be a personality when you walk in. And make them kind of stand up and pay attention a little bit. And one of my best auditions that kind of broke me of just coming in all sincere and quiet was I got L. la it never rains and then one day before important audition i got just poured on like just completely drenched head to toe and i was fucking furious at myself at the weather i don't know and i went and i was like hey how's it going like look at me this is a i was just cursing in front of this is a fucking mess fucking mess. It's a fucking mess. Let's do this. And then the other thing is, you know, don't do what they wrote. Usually, if you're a comic, you know your own voice.

The thing that you have is that you're super funny. So, you know, try to be funny and, like, change it to be funnier, you know. Right, right. My buddy who's been on a lot of things now kind of told me to do that. And, you know, of course, I'm not the star of my own NBC sitcom right now, but I can tell you that when I started doing that, I started getting callbacks and going,

oh, I'm learning how to do this. You mean once you started dumping a bucket of water on your head before? Every time. And then you went in angry every time. Every time. I'm always with my girlfriend like, okay, ready, and dump.

And then she pours it on and I run right in. I'm starting to get a reputation. It wet guy the wet actor yeah now you're known they're like i love that wet guy coming to nbc this fall the wet guy wouldn't that be so funny you just see where i'm always drenched he lives in seattle nobody else is what you're the only what yeah uh yeah what a drip i don't know what's a terrible joke um uh yeah yeah who works uh you know i heard uh tj miller kind of does the same thing like eventually he just stopped caring and they're like well you're great did he eventually stop caring or was tj always built that way right tj's never to me, I've ever seen him pander to anyone. The only time I ever saw him, he walked on stage with a pitcher of Long Island Iced Tea,

took a sip out of it, and dumped it on his head. He was wearing a three-piece suit. Completely drenched. And that's just how he started the show. Yeah. And TJ's a true lunatic. That's what he did. One time I opened for TJ at the the arlington draft house here in dc

and tj uh was like hey uh so tomorrow uh i'm gonna make a sketch for my dvd that i'm coming out with do you want to be in the sketch i was like sure he's like okay we're filming it in new york and i'm like okay well we're in dc right now and we and we have a show tonight that ends at midnight and then yeah and then tomorrow we have a show at eight o'clock and he's like yeah so it's plenty i'm like so what are we doing and he's like well we'll take a we'll take a train back at two in the morning and then and i was like are you insane and then he just had like all these like weird dc friends and with him there they were like what the fuck's wrong with you it's your career go and i And I was like, oh my God.

Okay, I'll go. Wow. I was like, fine, sure, I'll go. I mean, what do I give a shit? I'm a single guy. I'm like 29 or something. I'll fucking go. So we went back to the hotel

and he was on the phone with somebody. He had some assistant awake and very late at night, I think, making these arrangements for us to get on this train yeah and then we went back to our hotel room and i swear we've been we've been drinking yeah i don't know what happened next thing i know i'm like i'm getting a phone call i'm waking up in my hotel room uh-huh and then i pick up the phone and it's tj he's like shit i fell asleep and i'm like i go yeah me too he goes come on let's go i go i'm not going now.

He's like, okay, well, I'm going to go. I go, all right, good luck, buddy. And he went and he got back in time for the show. Jesus Christ. Did you go back with him? I did not go back with him and I always regretted it. So if TJ ever hears this, I should have gone back with you, buddy. That was the show I was at when he dumped the pitcher on his head. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

I saw it. I saw you. I saw you open up for him. Yeah, man, yeah, yeah, yeah. I saw it. I saw you. I saw you open up for him. Yeah, man. He's amazing. He doesn't care. He does not care. He just never cared.

I don't think I ever saw him like, yeah, try to be with the audience once. He just does what he wants. That's awesome. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I love his show, too, the mashup show. Yeah. I loved your stuff on there, too.

Oh, thanks. Were those bits that you were doing on stage that they made, like the one where it was like, you were like the creepy, not like a pirate guy, but it was like the Shakespearean kind of guy. Oh, yes, the exquisite betrayals. Yeah, yeah, the parachute one.

Like you will see, it's full of forces. See, this is what I'm saying, like out of nowhere, like he didn't have to do this. They asked me to do it and then they were like, hey, do you want to be, are you going to be in LA around this time? And I happen to be and they're like, come in and do this meeting of ideas. And I'm just saying like out of nowhere, like you didn't have to do this. They asked me to do it. And then they were like, hey, do you want to be, are you going to be in LA around this time? And I happen to be in there like coming and do this meeting of ideas. And I'm like, okay. And then they were like, do you have any ideas?

And I was like, the only one I can think of is I've always wanted to do this. And they were like, oh yeah, we're doing that. And literally that was the idea that, that nobody I would ever explain it to like really understood it or got it or, you know, thought it was. They were like, what is it? I don't know. Super foppish guy. Yeah.

My mustache. And it's just it's just, yeah, me betraying people. And then when I found out they were going to close every show with it, I was like, wow. So just kind of touched and, you know, and I liked how they turned out. I thought they were funny. Yeah, that show was great. I thought it were funny. Yeah, that show was great. I thought it was perfect. Yeah, it was great.

I'm sad that they didn't keep that show going. Yeah, it was great. It had all kinds of potential. Yeah, it's such a great, did you ever see it, Sean? Yeah, yeah. Yeah, such a good idea to have. There's so many shows like that that are good,

that are weird and interesting. Yeah. And they just don't, they keep them for a year or two and then they're like okay let's move on i mean maybe it's better that it's like this little you know thing that people have to find you know i mean it really was a crazy show it was like uh yeah what do you want to do where we can do anything like i feel like even like fantastic shows like key and peel probably have like a little bit of some guidelines now.

Right. And then that show was just like, eh, you do stand-up. And then in between, who knows what is going to happen. Right. And you didn't have to burn that much material either. It was like one bit, you know? Right. You could act the whole thing out.

Yeah, totally. Great show, man. What is the coolest thing you've done, speaking of TV-wise? The coolest thing I've ever done would have to be TBS's makeover in a movie. I knew it. In between commercials of The Prince and me on TBS on Sunday morning, they had me getting a fitness makeover. Oh.

Now, that's the worst thing I've ever done. I was not even. What is a fitness makeover? It's like they just kind of do a lot of footage of me taking taking all these different we went to like four fitness classes in one day yeah dude it almost killed me yeah it almost killed me what are you doing like power yoga stuff or kickboxing there was hot yoga hot yoga no sorry this was hot dancing sure it was like that's just dancing african dance but like in a hot room it was like this whole thing then there was a sword class which i really liked which it wasn't you didn't get a

real sword you get like this big wooden sword and you could tell like it it works out your core and your arms it's like sword aerobics like it's like sword aerobics yeah are you still are you just like brandishing this thing while like there's moves, you know, there's moves. There's kata, you know, this sounds close to LARPing. It was not. I tell you what, I think if you'd mentioned LARPing to the very dour woman who taught it, she would be like, I don't know what that is. Get back in position. But she was the one that was like nice to me because like the producers

were like, we've got our couch potato. And she was like, do not call him a couch potato. Yeah, that's a bad term. I do not like that term. How do you feel about it? I like that she defended my honor in that case. She was a very strong woman. What else did we do? I don't know.

And the producer called you a couch potato? Well, that was the whole concept for the show. I was like, we're going to take a couch potato and give him a fitness makeover. And maybe kill him in one day. day yeah wouldn't that have been hilarious and they just ended it that way jared died of coronary at 4 14 p.m back to the movie now back to the prince and me uh the coolest thing i've ever done oh geez i don't even know or what was like the first one you did where you're like hey this

is kind of serious i'm kind of doing my thing here i might have a future in this thing i did uh i did live at gotham in 2008 that's that was my first time getting stand up on tv and you know i was i was proud of the set you know i it you couldn't lose i mean the energy was amazing you know so i get a really good response in the set, and then I call my mom and my brother after they've seen it. They saw it air, and my brother said, Just keep pouring that. My brother said, it's pretty good,

but you weren't really breaking any new ground. And I was like, okay. Ouch. Yeah. You weren't breaking any new ground. i was like okay yeah what uh no but what you really in the field of uh dropping out of college over and over you breaking new ground in that i was so hurt uh you know but my brother loves me and he likes to watch my act and he's you know now we have like a much better relationship but at the time he was just like it was all right i feel like you had most families you come from to go into comedy you have

to come from a family that talks to you like that yes i do because if i sit around thinking that everything i do is precious and and amusing yeah it's not gonna work out my mother said that she she thought it was okay but she was afraid people were going to think I was gay. Oh. Why? Well, because I was doing live oration. I was speaking to a crowd the way a gay person would.

People do think that sometimes. That I'm gay? Yeah. Maybe they do. You hear the people joke. Oh, yeah. Well, whenever I'm at a roast, the only two things people can go after is yeah well whenever i'm at a roast the only roast yeah that's what they the only two things people can go after is they say that i'm gay and then they say that uh that i'm overweight which neither are true right guys no of course not you look great yeah i'm not overweight so i don't know what from like couch potato to hero and like a day they just

don't have anything to make fun of me for because i'm like essentially i have like a i have like a day they just don't have anything to make fun of me for because i'm like essentially i have like a i have like a really good body and then i don't have any insecurities either so it's like tough for them to think of something i feel bad for them actually it's tough yeah hard on them yeah i go hey guys why don't you hit me on like how much i read you know like i'm like a heavy reader you know it's like you can get me on that like that that'd really be needling smart you know it's too smart um a hard i work too hard my penis too big a little too big tough to find my penis is normal size my penis is normal size maybe for you um you know i augment it with skill you know skilled penis knowing my way around that milieu uh-huh that's what that's what you call your penis the milieu the milieu yes um that's what i call the vagina actually okay yeah so i uh

what else uh what were we talking about like tv wise yeah i want to the the family thing i think is really oh go ahead yeah just uh my my dad love him to death very supportive guy but uh i don't think he he comes from like a sports background so I don't think he understands the performance part as much. Yeah. So I'd be like, hey, how'd it go last night? He'd be like, oh, pretty good, but I'm kind of working on new stuff, so that didn't really go that great.

And he's like, what do you mean it didn't go well? Like, no, that's a part of it. You're not going to do great every time. He's like, well, all right. You know, it's not like, you know, like, you know. There's your mistake. Why are you talking to your father about it? not like you know like there's your mistake why are you talking to your father about it don't talk to your father he's done i'm cutting him out he's

gone yeah no he is very supportive he'll like come out to shows and he'll just laugh at everything and that's cool it's great he's a he's a sweetheart of a guy one time my mom got really upset after i did a performance because i decided i was going to finally really show her everything that's really in my act. So I did a performance. Were you hiding it from her? Like would she come see you? I wasn't hiding it, but like yeah, if she was in town

for a long time, I would not do everything that I would normally do. Yeah, because on your album, you rip into religion pretty good and God and stuff.

I'm sure she wasn't too into that. That's exactly the thing that she doesn't like. So one time, well before the album taping, well before the release of the album, years ago, I just was like, okay, now I'm going to really show you what I

really do. And so one night I did that performance and you would have thought afterward, the look on my mom's face, it was like I had sacrificed a baby lamb on stage. On a pentagram. The blood gives us power. She was just so terrified. That's everybody. I'm Jared Lowe. On a pentagram. The blood gives us power. She was just so terrified.

That's everybody. I'm Jared Lowe. Good night, everybody. That would actually be fucking awesome. He's just covered in blood. And my dad, he's so in terror of my mother that he was just very quiet.

And then as her back was to him walking out, he was just like, Hey, good job, kid. Oh, nice. I'm like like why don't you say that in front of her you asshole so the mom wears the pants uh yeah probably in my relationship too um i mean with my girlfriend anyway like he called me a couple days later my dad and he was like you know what i don't know if i got it that much before but i get it now because i watched two funny people and now i get it uh-huh so he thinks you're adam sandler eating the lollipop he thinks i'm seth rogan oh and i wish i was uh gary shandling yeah what'd you think of that movie funny people yeah

i liked it thank you man people have a problem with the, I don't know, the whole subplot about the love story or whatever. Yeah. They think the movie's too long. It was a little long. It's very, very hard to make any kind of entertainment story about comedy. Like Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip. And then to have it that serious angle. To have the serious angle.

People don't remember. They're like, okay, funny guy. guy well also to simulate stand-up like you you know like even the movie punchline doesn't quite get it in some spots uh-huh yeah i've never never seen punchline but that's tom hanks right tom hanks is it good it's good i really loved it when i was a kid i i don't know if it holds up i haven't watched it in a long time yeah yeah um all right so what were we talking about they kind of just like cut away from tom hanks and then cut back with him destroying and you're like what's he saying probably something funny he's really funny i missed the premise but i guess yeah not that oh so they just cut back to the punch line yeah they were all muddy they're like ah of course they were of course they were all muddy they're like of course they were you're the best um sleepwalk with me

did a good job i think that was a great movie i liked that a lot they did go a little bit fast i think with him he's like i just started being me and it worked and he's like i'm afraid of marriage like yeah you are yeah but i guess you know like an hour and a half time to do a whole special in the middle where you see him figure it out. Yeah. That would be a great part of the movie. Just an hour and a half in the middle of him doing a special. And then they get back to it.

Yeah. Yeah. See the whole thing, you know. So your first album was this year. Uh-huh. How much material did you have before that? Like, do you have a bunch? I mean, because you've been doing it like 11 years.

Do you have a whole cache of stuff that you still have on deck i've kind of burned a lot of that i kind of am trying to not and i'm now i'm trying to like get off doing anything from the album but the album had stuff on it that i had written this year so i recorded the album in may and there were some things on the album that i had written you know between January and May you know and that I kind of worked out we did a southern tour on the way to the album yeah recording so yeah

right now I'm trying to get rid of all the album stuff but you know I'll still use like a couple things to get things rolling uh-huh you know get the get the juices flowing a little bit yeah to get just get you know people comfortable and then I'll get into some get the some of the new things i'm running yeah yeah i get it i get it uh so what is uh what's your plan for the next album like do you have a timetable yeah i would like to be ready uh to record uh next year here i'm getting married

next year oh shit congratulations thank you i'm going to columbia next year uh Oh shit. Congratulations. Thank you. I'm going to Columbia next year. The country. The country. For the honeymoons? No, that's for somebody else's wedding. I have a lot of things that are happening next year, but I think there should be time to get another album. By the

end of the year, I'd like to record another one. I want to make sure it's really good stuff that's tested. Right now, I have pieces of things that I'm like to record another one. I want to make sure it's really, really good stuff that's tested. And right now I have pieces of things that I'm cobbling together. Fly! Why won't you fly? Live, damn you, live! If you have to do

a headlining set, how much how do you make that transition from as soon as you're done recording your album you know when you're incorporating new material what is the first night of the of uh because i've done a couple weekends since i'm quite a few since my album taping so first night i really try all a ton of new shit and generally the generally after the first night of the club, let's like a Thursday or something,

I'm like, God damn it, nothing works. And then I'll find a little bit of a balance like Friday and Saturday, you know. Right. Probably there's a little more old in there because I'm getting paid money and I want the people to have a good time. Right.

And then Sunday again, I'll really try to make it all goofy, all new. Yeah. All weird if I can. Right, right, right. No, no, you. No, you, I insist. How long were you developing that material?

Do you have material in that album? Some of that's pretty old on that one, but it is my first album. So some of that stuff going back, well, half hour from 2013 uh-huh my half hour special so i i there were a couple things from that half hour that just fit perfectly i thought with the uh with with this material then you know that was going on the album so i included that cool but the next one will be all new so you're to try to do the year thing that everybody's doing? You're going to try to put out an album a year? I don't want to plan it too tightly.

I'll be honest. I do sit down and I make goals every year. Like what are my goals for 2014, 2015? But I'm not going to share them with you because they're none of your business. But I do do that. If you guys want to ask me later when we're not on the air, I'll tell you.

Okay. Yeah. I do have Jared's notebook which he left at my house last night. I'd like to share. No, Michael! Just all Donnie Darko bunnies.

Yeah. They're very dark. It has nothing to do with comedy. It's very scary. Yeah. When did you start doing that, writing goals? Because i know there's some people that like creative people that do that they're like i just do whatever man like i don't

write every day but some people are very regimented and then like there's comedians like sarah armor who's like just put it out to the universe you got to say what she wants her jokes from the universe yeah well clearly i mean you know clearly that's like, you know. Like I tend to be a little bit more regimented, you know. But, you know, I don't think that – I think it's just personal preference. I don't think that it – I'm not like, you know, people should get as organized as I am so that they can also be on TBS, makeover in a movie. I – yeah, I make like some goals. I try to figure out some ways to get there, you know. Uh-huh. Crap like that.

When did you start doing that? Pretty recently, honestly. Well, I can remember... Oh, gosh. This is so comedy nerdy. I can remember when I started first doing stand-up in 2003, writing something. I had a whole journal.

Because I was accumulating all these ideas and not using any of them on stage i hadn't really done stand up yet and i wrote down you know i want to be on tv in five years i was like 23 and i did it the universe i did it guys i did it yeah yeah what was what was gotham that was gotham and then i and then i subsequently ate shit for many years after that until I figured it out again. Well, you should have put some more stuff in your notebook. I should have put another self-fulfilling prophecy. You put the wrong thing in there, and you got it, and then you said you should have it. Magic notebook, a wish I make.

Yeah, I hope you kept that notebook. That's a good one. As soon as you got Gotham. Do you think Ghostwriter helped me? Yeah, I don't know. You know that old show? The film? Oh, yeah.

It's an old PBS show. Was it from PBS? Yeah. Yeah. We weren't allowed to watch PBS in our house. Really? No, I'm kidding. Liberal bullshit.

That's what it was. Really conservative family. No PBS. Only HBO and Cinemax. Yeah, no publicly funded bullshit in this house. My parents were really afraid I was going to be a pussy. Always for my entire life. Well, it looks like they did not succeed

in stopping it from happening. It was inevitable. How's it going staying at this creep's house? Is he doing anything weird to you? It is a nice house. Sometimes you go to a comedian's house and you're like, oh, jeez, what happened here? Wow. house it is a nice house you go to like a comedian's house and you're like oh geez what happened here yeah wow it's a nice house you should get all these old inner tubes off of the

steps what's happening now do we jump on them at night why do you guys have a broken skateboard hanging on the wall like what's you know it's just like yeah was there a karate fight in here and then no one ever cleaned up yeah it shouldn't shouldn't even be in the closet, let alone hanging on a wall. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I remember I lived with a guy. I had a young comedian apartment too. I lived with a guy who wasn't a comedian, but he was like a total nerd IT guy. And he liked Guitar Hero so much that after he bought his Guitar Hero guitar,

he just hung the box up on the wall as a decoration. What the game box? Unbelievably, gentlemen, I would bring women home to this place and be like, so here's the place. And they'd be like, oh, there's a guitar hero box on the wall. That's my roommates.

I'm not that lame. Come in here and look at my action figures. I have action figures on the wall. Yes. I need to change the batteries real quick. Do it. Yes. Okay, we're back.

Go to the prop room. I have a comedy question. Oh, finally. Comedy question. We've talked a couple times about comedy being art. Sure. It seems to be an idea you're interested in. Oh, I love it. Yeah, wow.

Do you want to get into it? I don't know. I have a tendency to sound pompous even when I'm just talking about gum on my shoe. So I'm not sure if I want to go too deep into that. Just do it. Just tell us your thoughts. Be you.

Comedy as art. I mean, what do you... There are definitely people that do it as entertainment, and there are people that do it as a job, right? Right, yeah. Jared's at a podium now for those listening at home. Everybody gather around. Sit Indian style.

I pads off everybody. I feel like... Well, what do you... I don't know. What do you want to know? Well, I guess like... Stand-up comedy is weird because there are certain things that you do to get laughs. And there are tricks to it.

You develop a certain way of being on stage. You order your words in a certain way to lead them down up into a place where they're not expecting to go so that so in that way it's kind of like a craft yeah and and you're there you know they're just like there's certain topics or certain words you can say to elicit laughter which i guess i guess isn't which is art but i wonder you seem to be interested in some bigger ideas. You want to incorporate bigger ideas into your comedy and maybe do less of the easier, more simple things that you can do to get laughs.

Yeah, without putting any kind of connotation on anybody that does it as entertainment or does it as a job, just as a job. Right, like just a road comment. There's zero judgment here. But I would say that I think that it's a very good way to try to do something artistic because in order for something artistic to be good, you need all these hurdles and stumbling blocks. And there's got to be like a form and like yeah getting good at like a a form makes you like really refine how you do something and um it has a very definite

concrete yardstick about whether you got your form right which is did someone laugh or not yeah ultimately someone needs to be laughing yeah now you might have the kind of act where you're like well that one table in the back laughs so i'm happy but most of us are like at the most amount and the loudest amount right possible yeah so you know i just think you know uh the best movies had a bunch of hurdles to like getting made you know or you know that there's got to be something challenging about it i think think that it's very tough to talk about. You know, you say I have a lot of stuff about religion on my album. It's very tough to talk about that as a stand-up just because you're going to come off as like preachy, preachy, making fun of religion.

But you will, you know. But you know what you do, I think, what I do is if you just make it all about stuff that happened to you and that's your experience then you'll be fine you know right it's pointing the finger at yourself not at the audience saying like this is what this is instead of sitting and going like yeah the problem with religion like you know you're like right one day i did this and then this happened to me and then people don't there's that layer that likes, let's, let's it sink in and people to just enjoy it as a story,

you know? And so, um, yeah. Do you, what about the, I mean, do you,

do you feel like you have to make a trade off between stuff that you do that, you know, gets, gets big laughs. And then there are ideas that you want to get into but it's more difficult to get laughs you know where you feel satisfied that you've talked about them on stage even though they didn't get the big laugh yeah well that's the big trade-off right are you willing to maybe go for maybe less of a huge reaction to in order to get some idea across i kind of feel like that's a cop out

there's got to be a way to get that huge laugh i've seen people do bits about really cool interesting topics and get a huge laugh so if i feel like i'm like this is the quiet thinker part then i feel like that's a failure on my part i do i think in comedy you can't say well that was just i just wanted to get the idea across i just wanted to put that out there i think that if you start to have that idea you're gonna have a lot of places in your in your act where you're not getting a lot of laughs because you feel like it doesn't have to happen but it's yeah no it should it should be It should be like very hard laughter, I feel like, the whole time. I mean, if you're going to do a stand-up act for 45 minutes, you know, you can even like risk the other way.

Sometimes like the audience members who have a very refined palate and who are like deep thinkers, your NPR people, your… Shout out. Yeah, your music snobs, right? They're going to maybe hear you do something that's a little broader, right? That kind of gets the energy up and they're going to maybe go, not to my taste. Right.

So, you know, it swings both ways. It swings both ways. So, yeah. I mean, that's the whole thing is having those lanes to kind of get in between you know yeah yeah yeah when you're writing do you do you think about that no no no in fact i don't think that you i mean well if i you know what actually i do and that means i'm doing a poor job of my writing that you're taking into consideration like what would they like yeah if i'm doing that i'm probably

and certainly i've written with things in mind or the effect I want to have in mind. But, you know, so many things come out of how I, you know, it's verbal. So many things come out of what I just ended up saying on stage. You know, I go out with the idea, but then stuff comes out that I didn't expect to come out. And then you're getting real pieces of me, and then that's what people respond to and laugh at right right so you think overall even beyond what you're talking about kind of what you're saying like if you are talking about a bigger topic or something that's kind of more serious if it's related to you and honest that's going to translate if it's related to them people do things different ways but for me it has to be

something about me usually in order to. Right. I noticed most of your album is kind of like about stories about you or things that – were you always that kind of comic? No, no, no. In fact, even still I like to do occasionally like something just weird or silly. And we were talking about this, how it's almost like there's like great comics who do like a lot of very autobiographicalographical stuff but then they just throw in a weird pun or something like yeah how can they not do stuff like that he'll be like and here's a silly one just to kind of keep you yeah like you don't know what i'm gonna do i'm not one flavor you know right so that's important too so you know that's

the other thing about not sitting down and being like this is the effect that i am endeavoring to make like who i am it's just like you know there it's so hard to get good material if you find anything that gets yeah to work and it came out of your own head why would you ever go not progressive enough you know it's like no you gotta figure out a way to use it and that's the other thing i'll find out about my writing is i do write every day for a while and i write new things every day uh-huh it went you know and and then what i find is that i'll take up stuff i wrote that day or that i wrote last week it's okay but then i'll look at it again six months later and i'll take it up and i'll get a lot more mileage out of it for whatever reason i needed a little bit of distance on it or something i don't know sure right right yeah you come at it with fresh eyes you're like oh or you're working

on something else that maybe can link up with that yeah yeah that's awesome do you try to stay with your language as in like you tell them how how from one night to the next answer all these questions i feel like he's gonna listen to mine and be like, wow, Logan, you're such a pussy. Answered all these process questions. Oh, my God. If you want to trash best bars in America like he did, you can do that too. Yeah, you can just talk shit.

I think that's a cool job. If you don't want it, Sean, I'll take it. You might get his. Yeah, you can talk about how much you would like to be the host. There you go. Flip the script on him. I think it could be a really good opportunity for me. What do you like about bars? I love different beer flavors. How do you feel about America? would like to be the script on him. I think it could be a really good opportunity for me. Yeah.

I love different beer flavors. How do you feel about America? American can go fuck itself. Okay. All right. Well, we'll call you. And I demand that I be allowed to say that at the beginning of every episode.

Yeah. America can go fuck itself. Says the wet guy. The wet guy. sorry i will answer it what is it well no i don't even forget it whatever fuck your process now i feel bad where do you get off that's my next yeah what do you want to talk about we have uh we got four minutes probably four minutes left yeah we gotta oh We have... No. We got four minutes, probably. Four minutes left? Yeah, we got to... Oh, okay. Yeah, you got a show in four minutes.

Yeah, you can... Oh, fuck. However, whatever, wherever you want to take it. Okay. You got the plan. You answered the things you want to answer. Oh, now I'm deciding the agenda? Yeah, well, yeah.

That's how we end the show. You decide the agenda, and then they talk to my dad. You know what I would like to talk about that no one will ever talk with me about uh-huh i'll give you a couple topics the crusades um 1930s universal monster movies okay uh renaissance history okay let's go crusades okay what do you want to know what uh is why should anyone care about the crusades at this point in time well because they're still happening. Sorry, that's all the time we have, Jared. Sean, thanks.

No, I'm just kidding. Good. No, I mean, people in ISIS or in the Al-Qaeda call the Westerns crusaders all the time in videos and stuff like that. Because they connect connected all together just because somebody says something that doesn't make any sense doesn't mean we're you know it's still happening the perception of the thing though is is important right and and so they perceive us still as these guys that and i just wrote it read a book about it who like you know came into the you know syria and like the 1100s, killed a bunch of people, raped a bunch of women,

took all the riches, set themselves up in a kingdom. Classic crusade. Classic crusader behavior. Very typical. You'd expect nothing more. They still think that that's the same thing. Yeah. I don't have any sympathy for ISIS, you know?

I'm just fine. I'm very sympathetic to ISIS. If I can get one thing out on this podcast, it's I'm pro-ISIS. I was going to ask you about your ISIS t-shirt. They get a bad rap. Yeah. You know what? People give me shit about this t-shirt, and they go, I hope that's not the Islamic terrorist

group. And I'm like, yes, it is. I hope it is. It Islamic terrorist group. And I was like, yes, it is. I hope it is. It is that. I like them. Well, it looks worn in, too. You've been wearing it a while. You're not like new school ISIS.

You're old school ISIS. I liked ISIS in 2004 when they first started with their real classic stuff. Yeah, I love the old shit. I love the old shit. Right when they're getting kicked out of Al-Qaeda. Yeah, totally. I was like, oh, these guys

kind of have a wild hair up their ass. Like, what's this about? You know? And I just got, I got on board then. I've seen him a ton of times. And yeah,

if you get a chance, check him out. Like join him. I want to join, but I don't know. I'm busy here with the stand-up comedy. Right, right.

I'm getting married, you know. Yeah, you're busy, you know. I'm busy here with the stand-up comedy. I'm getting married. There's a lot going on. You're busy. See him live, though, right? This guy knows how to close out a podcast. He really does. You don't know Isis until you've seen him live. They'll blow you away. I just cracked

an egg on my face. He carries one in his cardigan wherever he goes. Splash. Dumps the bucket of water on my face. He carries one in his cardigan wherever he goes. Splash. Splash. Dumps the bucket of water on his face. To wrap this up, I'm worried that we didn't record the first like 10 minutes. So let's just squeeze that in real quick.

I work with people that are one woman that's really big into Disney and like that relates to your album. You started out in doing improv and stand up in casinos. That's right. Sean wasn't here now he's gonna leave again is there anything else we missed in the first 10 minutes oh your buddy's story or about the uh the notebook yeah we can talk about that you we just need a cop like do it again no i mean you can just well i'm just recapping for everybody i'm not gonna like put it in the

beginning i just i in the intro i'll say that we missed and we'll just kind of jump in okay but just real quick can you tell that story again? I'm sorry. Sure. No, it's just I have a buddy named Nate who went to visit one of my other buddies. Yeah. He went to meet with him at a coffee shop. And when he got to the coffee shop, my other buddy was in the bathroom.

But he had left all his stuff out on the table. And one thing that he left out is a notebook which had like four or five pages of just written how he would fix indiana jones and the temple of the crystal skull that's amazing and my buddy nate was like it was terrifying terrifying yeah because someone's people's obsessions if you see their secret obsessions are always terrifying yeah especially because it's it's like wow has this been there the whole time? Yeah. Well, no, I mean, certainly it's only been there since the release of Indiana Jones and the Temple of the Crystal Skull. I assume that's when their friendship started. They went there as a meet-up group to see the movie.

No, no, they'd been friends for a long time. He didn't know this. He didn't know that he was so obsessed with the film. Okay, okay. All right, well, I think we got it. That's what we missed in the beginning. Jared, thanks for doing this. Hey, my pleasure.

You want to plug Twitter? The album's called My brave battle yeah and uh it's good tunes it's on itunes that's where i got it it's great who put it out was it a special thing you can get it on amazon as well yeah mm-hmm sean uh yeah check out underground comedy dc.com show seven nights a week seven nights a week that's's awesome. You can see people like Jared. Yeah, yeah. And then you have other shows coming up too. Mike Lawrence is coming through, right? Yeah, Dan St. Germain.

When are those shows? Dan St. Germain and Mike Lawrence are on December 4th at Beer Baron Tavern. Nice. You can get tickets at undergroundcomedydc.com. And there's a special show here this Friday, the 28th. Randy Syphax, Sarah Armour are going to be here. What is that? Keep Seinfeld White? That's what it's called. Black Friday, Keep Seth. Randy Syphax, Sarah Armour are going to be here. What is that? Keep Seinfeld White? That's what it's called. Black Friday, Keep

Seinfeld White. Okay. I don't know what that means. I don't either. I don't either. It sounds racism. Racism. All right. Well, check out digressionsessions.com. Also, our network, Thundergrunt Podcast Network. A bunch of live shows are listed at digressionsessions.com. And thank you again for

you guys for doing the show. Thank you to everybody for listening. We love you. Bye. Bye. you