The Digression Sessions - Ep. 188 - Astronautalis! (@Astronautalis)

Episode Date: May 31, 2016

Hola Digheads! This week, Josh sits down for a one on one in a van with rapper and business man, Astronautalis! Astronautalis is one of the hardest working dudes in the game and tells Josh about his touring and recording schedule. Great dude! Check out his new album - Cut The Body Loose! (And so sorry the episode prematurely ends! Fucking batteries died!) Check it out here - http://thesenatortheatre.com/movies/events/ Follow your boys, Mike Moran & Josh Kuderna, on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.  Josh - @JoshKuderna on Twitter and @JoshKuderna on Instagram Mike - @MikeMoranWould on Twitter The Pod - @DigSeshPod on Twitter The Pod's Facebook page - Dig Sesh on Facebook For live stand up and improv dates, check out - DigressionSessions.com/Calendar Thanks for listening, all! Do us a favor and rate and review us on iTunes & Stitcher plz!

hey everybody i'm josh kaderna 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. Oh, yeah. Who's the guest this week astronautalist is the guest on this week's program rapper astronautalist aka andy bothwell uh who has

a new record out called cut the body loose which you should check out it's very very good so pick that up uh also he's touring all the time and he puts on a really, really good live show. So you should see him. Um, so yeah, check out all that. He's, uh, at Astronautilus on Twitter and Instagram. And, uh, yeah, he's a really cool guy. I found out about him. Oh, Josh, Josh, Josh, Kaderna here, by the way. Uh, I found out about Astronautilus, uh, when I was, I think I just graduated high school. I talk about it in the interview, but I saw him at Warped Tour and he was, he would take five random topics from the audience and do a freestyle and interweave them all together into just a tremendous song that seemed like he was pre-written. So he's been a phenomenally talented guy for a long time and he's only gotten better. And it was cool to him to take some time to do the interview with me.

And we actually did it in his van outside of the venue. He was performing out in D.C., which was cool, but it sucked because I could not plug in my recorder to the wall. And I thought we were going to be doing it in the backstage kind of green room area, um something got mixed up in the times and i was actually late unbeknownst to me so the show was already going on so it was pretty loud so we had to record in the van and then my batteries died uh towards the tail end of the interview which is a total bummer and very professional on my part but um yeah but we still got a pretty pretty uh pretty good interview about 40 minutes and uh last few minutes get cut off uh which is a bummer but we were kind of talking about touring

and how he's evolved as a musician and even just as a person and what actually kind of matters and what you should make a big deal out of and what you shouldn't and uh yeah it was really cool to talk to andy we talked about touring and uh the recording process and how he does it um how he got started and also what it's like to be a musician for a living and then that means you basically have to be a business owner as well but then also have enough left in the tank after all that stuff after all the legal stuff to be creative and what that takes and also healthy competition between friends and getting inspired by other artists and stuff like that. So it was a really, really cool chat. I hope you guys enjoy it. And yeah, it gets abruptly cut off. So sorry about that. Yeah, but I hope you enjoy it. A couple things to plug before we

talk to Andy. Me and Mike Moran will be at the Mercury Theater this Friday in beautiful Baltimore, Maryland, doing the mashup at 8 p.m. on Friday. That's where we do stand-up and then an improv troupe from the Baltimore Improv Group improvises off of our material, which is pretty fun. So check that out. On the 17th, I'll be at the Metropolitan in Annapolis doing stand-up. Come to that. Jason Weems will be headlining, and I'll be there with my good buddy Umar Khan. So please come to that. And then later in the summer, in July, I'll be doing Artscape in Baltimore. So as that gets closer, I'll have more details for you on all that stuff.

Follow me on Twitter and Instagram. It's at Josh Kaderna. Mike Moran is at Mike Moran Wood on Twitter. You can go to digressionsessions.com for all of our other episodes. Rate and review us on iTunes. We appreciate it. Say hi on our Facebook page. The Digression Sessions is on there. We also have Twitter at Dig Sesh Pod. So say hello. I like that shit. It's great. But yeah, that's all the the plugs So let's talk to Andy From his band From DC You're a big baseball guy

Check check One of the Blue Jays got Fucking Just the most beautiful punch. Just got fucking decked by this ranger. It's incredible. It's this guy, Jose Bautista, who fucking sucks.

Oh, there was like a legit fight? Oh, man, incredible. Like, well, I'll show you the video. It's fucking incredible. Did it end up becoming a brawl? Bench clearing? Well, yeah, two of them in the course of the day. But this is what, like, sort of was the impetus.

Watch this fucking punch. It's amazing. Oh. Wait for it. That's like a comic book punch, man. Not only did his hat or his helmet go flying, but his sunglasses, too. There's this really amazing

photograph of it, too. The internet's going to destroy him. The gifs, the memes. What's even better about it, too, is this dude, Jose Bautista, to destroy him. Oh, it's big gifs, the memes. Well, what's even better about it too is this dude, Jose Bautista, and he is like

the biggest, he's the baseball's biggest prick. Like, he's like, he's like one of those like baseball's to be played the right way

kind of guys. Like, he's the fucking worst. Right, like the, I know there's a bunch of unwritten rules, like you can't like

step on the mound if you're not the pitcher or weird stuff like that. He's one of those dudes and it's just fucking hot garbage, and it's total bullshit, and everyone hates him for it. And it's really great to see this fucking shit get fucking knocked out. That's awesome.

Well, yeah, we're on, man. Oh, great, good. We'll just get right into it. Came right in on some baseball punches. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, Andy Bothwell, a.k.a. Astronautilus. We're in a dark van just outside of the DC 9 in DC, living that glamorous tour life. Yeah, it's always a dream.

How are you, man? I am tired, but I am good. Tired is part of the deal, though. That's just the way that it goes sometimes. I do stand-up and mostly local stuff like tri-state area, but I worked with a guy last night who was on show 28 of 30, and he was talking about how much he just hates it. He was like, I mean, I love stand-up comedy. I love blowjobs too, but if I had to do it in 30 different cities in 32 days, I'd be like, I don't like blowjobs anymore. Yeah, you can get burnt out on anything. He's like, I have to go to Baltimore to get blown.

Ugh, terrible. Not again. I got blown last night. What am I making this drive for? I just want a Netflix. Yeah, right. No, I understand. I actually, I mean, I really love it, but I do get burnt out.

But right now it feels good. Good, man. I'm not even that far in. It's only about a weekend, which is pretty easy. Oh, okay. But you're headed to Europe next, right? Yeah, I fly to London tomorrow and then to the final destination to get to vienna and then start the tour there in vienna nice man well yeah uh so i first actually met you i think 2004 or 5 warp tour i think in new jersey wow

holy cow way back yeah way back and uh yeah you were in a tent and you were doing your freestyle on five topics from the audience and i was thoroughly impressed and there's somebody going around selling your cd and i was happy to to find out later it was the unmastered version of you and your good ideas couldn't afford master and i actually i thought that was really cool it's like oh this is like the really underground shit the unmastered stuff. Straight out of my laptop. Straight out of a laptop. Astronautilus.

Yeah. But no, man. And ever since then, I've been paying attention to your career, and you've just been killing it, man. I remember when you came down to Annapolis. I was like, holy shit, it's that guy from New Jersey. He was great. That's hilarious.

That show was really funny. We got paid in... Wine corks. Yeah, mostly in wine cor funny. We got paid in... Wine corks. Yeah, mostly in wine corks. We got paid in yachts, actually. So it was just super tight. It worked really well for us. That's good.

Several, several yachts. Oh, dude, man. Vans, yachts. That's great. And now we're all members of the Naval Academy. Oh, dude. Yeah, it's cool. I totally climbed that grease pole, got away with it.

It was fun. Dude, I did not know that. Yeah, it was a busy day. You're so accomplished. Yeah, I got to get a lot done. And you did a show on Kent Island where I grew up with Bluebird, which regrettably I could not go to. But it was in my friend's backyard. On a skateboard ramp.

Yeah. No, totally. You're really running down the hit parade of all my biggest shows. I'm sorry. It's really cool. You're really big-upping me to the audience here. I'm sorry. No, you're killing it.

Yeah, one time I saw you serving popcorn in high school. Hey, man, did I see you sweeping the venue earlier? No. Yeah, no, I'm just mostly clean from the opportunity to perform. No, you're killing it. You just got a video on MTVU I saw. Yeah, it's true. It's true.

No, man, you're doing so great. I didn't mean it like that. No, I just meant it. I just meant like I've been paying attention for a while. I understood. I'm just fucking with you. Yeah, yeah. Now I feel bad geez and now i was late too oh it's all good it's all good all right what's the biggest thing you've done besides a podcast in a van what's the biggest thing you want the listeners to know about the thing you're most proud of the most proud of that

i get to do this as a job for like seven years now that's pretty the best thing i think there's cool shows and all that sort of stuff but the end of the day like I get to do this for a living now for seven years I haven't had a real job in seven years Wow my best friend is my manager and he hasn't had a real job in seven years my bandmates don't have to work for huge chunks of the year because they tour with me Wow yeah that's that's the best thing is that I get to be a business owner and a music and I make whatever the kind of fucking music I want. I do whatever I want and I play whatever I want, where I want.

And I get to do this for a living. That's the shit. I'm not rich or whatever, but like, you know, I get to do this and that's, that's the best. I'll take that all day.

Fuck. Yeah, man. Living the dream. Yeah, it is a dream. And, and that you're employing people too.

Does that add a pressure? You're like, yeah, this next album has to be pretty good or they, yeah, there's a dependency there that you're worried about um and it gets way more like the older you get too like because you want it becomes more acutely aware that it's not just a living that you're striving for but you need to make a career out of it you know right like and

that's there's a big difference like i'm making a living i don't have a career like i can't like i'm not like setting up to you know retire at 60 on this yet not quite there not yet no and so that's a good that's a big thing as well too um that's really tricky but you know and yeah and the more people that get involved the more money that gets involved the sort of more responsibility you have yeah it becomes it becomes super stressful when it becomes the job aspect of it yeah yeah get all that shit straightened out. Now it's like, be creative. Do something from the heart. Yeah, yeah, for sure. Oh, cool.

It's weird to find a balance to sort of turn it off, and it becomes a different process entirely. But ultimately, you sink or swim on it. And right now, we're still treading water. Dude, no, you're doing great. I mean, that's kind of why I brought up that stuff of just seeing you at warp tour but then you know just seeing you pop up here and there and still just crushing it and like as far as touring goes i feel like you're like pretty much on the road all the time man yeah a little less than i used to be which is nice and i'm trying to kind of tone it down a little bit more so i can be more of a human being and less of a touring machine right but for a

stretch there it was probably eight to ten months out of the year i was on the road wow and now it's more like six which is man six is great yeah it's just enough for me to like not go crazy it's just enough like i need people to like applause for me every once in a while like i start to i start to lose my mind if i don't have like a group of people being like you're great i know really that is is very important. I've become deeply dependent on that level of validation at this point, and so I start to go crazy if I don't have a good round of applause every once in a while.

Right, right. I need a little hit of it, that's all. And just scratch your neck on stage. Y'all got any more of that applause? Maybe just one more round. Just a little bit. Come on, y'all. No, but it has to be good, too, to be playing music, too, as well, like that release.

And then having the crowd on top of that be into it as well. Building an audience over all these years. Yeah, it's the best feeling in the world. Having a bunch of people sing your songs. Having people really love a thing that you make is a really, really amazing drug. Yeah. It's really, really fantastic. It is a drug, though, isn't it?

Really, truly it is. And it becomes like, and you forget, and you get withdrawals from it. And it's hard. The comedown is hard after it kind of fades down. And right now I'm going through kind of the best high right now because the album is out. So it's when everyone's paying attention. Everyone's telling me how great the thing that I made is. It is really good, man you man and that would like kind of flicker away in like a

year or whatever down to kind of a dull little like roar or whatever so like it becomes a weird balance and you definitely become hopelessly dependent on it all right but there's not necessarily anything wrong with that though no no not at all i mean it's way better than being dependent on drugs or gambling or you know, like choking out hookers or something. There's a lot of other things I can do. Well, whatever fills that hole. Yeah, I mean, you got to find, you got to have hobbies. You got to stay fit.

Yeah, when you're not on the road, what do you do? Sometimes you got to choke a hooker. Astronautilus. Yeah, damn it. Yeah, I'll just cut it down to that, just a soundbite. Yeah, just that's it. The entirety of the interview is just me saying that over and over again. It's really weird. Astronautilus on the new album well sometimes you gotta kill a

pretty much story in my life sometimes man uh no i i totally identify with that of like um like performing because i i did improv for a while and then doing stand-up and you know a couple days go by of not performing and then I'm just like in a weird mood. Yeah, it's a drag sometimes. Like depressed but also anxious and angry as well. And then you're like, oh, I just needed to get on stage in front of strangers. Yeah, yeah. No, it's a drag sometimes and it wears you down and it gives you super hard.

And at the end of the day, a lot of times it's just like, I just need to play a show and have people clap for me. Please. Yeah, yeah, totally. So, yeah, you're in Minneapolis now. Yes, sir. You've bounced all over the country and uh so yeah you ended up there and i saw in some interviews like you really love the

scene up there so does that help when you're off the road to be like around your friends and like just a very creative yeah i mean that's one of the community main reasons that i've been wanting to tour less is that i live in a place i like now. Right. Like, I have a place I want to come home to. For the longest time, it was always just like, you know, yo, fuck this place. Let's go hit the road. What? That's how you feel about Jacksonville? Well, yeah.

And, I mean, a lot of places just didn't vibe for me. I lived in Jacksonville. I lived in Seattle, both as touring musicians. And Seattle's a cool city. I loved it. But at the end of the day, it was not my place. Yeah. I never felt truly at home there. And that's just because it's you know cities have vibes and it wasn't mine and

but moving to minneapolis over the course of the years it's um yeah i really like being home there and then on top of it too all of my friends are doing such cool and exciting things that a lot of times it sucks i mean i'm it's sometimes more advantageous to be home working on music with my friends than it is yeah because they're all right there. I mean, the whole like Rhymesayers crew and Doomtree and POS, and I know you're tight with all those guys. Yeah,

yeah. It's kind of like leaving your family. Yeah, yeah. I gotta go out on the road. There's stuff going on too, like, you know,

people work on songs and if I'm not, you know, I'll get a text and be like, hey, are you at home? What's up? We're working on a song together. I'm like,

nah, man, I'm in, you know, Germany or whatever the hell. So, yeah, you know, I or whatever the hell so um yeah you know i can't and so that's a lot of times it's always a bummer like oh god i really wish it

could have been it's funny that's the negative though like you know if maybe i don't know 15 years ago be like andy you're gonna be in germany playing music for people that people want to see you in germany you're like that's fucking great no it's still i mean it's still fucking great i love it yeah but there's a time it's like now it's just like uh you know there's not enough of me like i want to go a lot of places and now i'm at a point where i i mean at the end of the day the one of the main reasons i love touring so much is i love the travel like i love the places that i get to go and um but yeah at the same time like now it's i finally live in a place and in a community of people that are doing exciting things where like yeah i look back for

the for probably the first like 10 years of touring uh maybe you know i would look back at home and be like all right see you later i don't give a shit yeah and then now like i look back and i'm like ah man god damn it and it's like you know little things are big things like you know yeah um yeah it's it's it's a it's an interesting dynamic to start to figure out, um, how to have a home. Right. You know, and, and, and still be a touring musician.

Right, right. But you feel like Minneapolis is like, you're getting closer to figuring out that balance. Well, no, I'm just going to stay there. I like it there.

And my girl's moving there. And like, and so like, I'm like really, I'm all in on that place. I have no desire to leave. That's awesome. and even the winters you're cool with.

Yeah, no, I like the winters. I mean, I have a sort of, I have a, you far as cold as it gets and it does get insanely cold um i'm not like getting up at six in the morning to go like deliver the mail or like hammer sheet metal or something like i used to hammer not anymore really no not anymore i used to hammer sheet metal in florida after college yeah it's like just hammering like duct work or

whatever and you get up at like six in the morning you'd be there the bell rings seven and you go to like you know four or whatever three and you know it's florida it's hot as fuck yeah and i would and now like i always think about like when the weather is super cold in the winter and i want to be like oh it's so cold like i remember like there's someone in minneapolis that's doing that job right now like someone somewhere is hammering fucking sheet metal like oh yeah fucking palms bleed and i like i was like i have no right to complain because when it's like oh it's super cold i like i can go out if i want or i can just stay at home and make some cocoa yeah just make some cocoa and work on some beats or something like i don't have a window i don't know thanks to go out if i don't want to yeah and i also get to leave all the time and go tour yeah it's like i'm really gonna complain about the

winter when every once in a while i get to go to like new zealand for a month like i can't really bitch about that shit right and so at the end of the day like the winter is it's rough but like i like it it's fun for me so i don't i don't really get to complain that's cool yeah and i hear like the springtime and summertime are beautiful up there so it is the best is the best ever yeah so uh at like as you kind of go along in your career would you say like having friends like that like musicians who you also respect but they're also your friends is that one of the best parts of what you're doing yeah i mean and i think it's also just one of the most valuable i mean it's one of the reasons that i left

jacksonville it's one of the reasons i left seattle is that i had like friends who are musicians i had a community there but it wasn't like the right community for me like it wasn't um you know there's good parts about it there's bad parts about them but it didn't like the right community for me. Like it wasn't, um, you know, there's good parts about it. There's bad parts about them, but it didn't just feel at home. Yeah. And to have a community like that,

like, man, it's one of the things I think is really rare about Minneapolis as well, too, is that the scene there, they really like, it is, um,

supportive to an insane level. And there's definitely a feel of like a rising tide lifts all ships there and like one of us starts doing well everyone starts doing well cause we all work to each other work with each other on stuff all the time and that's great cause sometimes there can be like resentment of like oh why is that guy getting on or what the fuck yeah it's pretty I mean it does exist you know like it exists anywhere but it seems

a lot smaller there and at least in the my community of friends we like there will be there always I mean there's artists will always be competitive and I think competition is good to be like, God damn it, I can't believe they got that in the sense that you're like,

you know, I have friends that are succeeding and when they succeed, I go, ah, sons of bitches, I can't believe they got that gig and you're saying it with a smile

and you're excited and happy for them. But then it also fires you up. Yeah, it fuels your fire and so at the same time, you think like, all right,

well now I gotta go, I gotta go back to the drawing board, I gotta work harder because I gotta try to come. Like this motherfucker. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, that's the attitude. Like this motherfucker is like a really good like yeah i think a real good approach because you don't there's no resentment in it it's just like all right i see you now and now it's time to like

step the shit up yeah and then then when you put your shit out next they'll be like okay andy all right yeah no totally and that's what's really cool too is like there's things that like i particularly kill it on that other people don't and there's things that like I particularly kill it on that other people don't and there's things that other people particularly kill it on that I don't and then there's like a sort of like

oh you know he runs this part of the thing and we sort of like help each other out and like hook each other up with agents and promoters and you know stuff like that

to sort of like tie up loose ends and so it's I mean to me that's why I moved there that's why I stay there because that community is just priceless to me

yeah and I honestly don't know why an artist like music or otherwise would not have that approach you know yeah to be supportive like you know sure there's might be like a twinge of jealousy but at the same time it's like like you said all boats rise with the tide man yeah i mean it's a tough thing it's um the the work itself makes you neurotic you know know, I mean, and you can understand that in comedy. Like, that's a huge thing in comedy with, like, jokes, theft,

and things like that. Oh, and there can be jealousy and stuff, too. Yeah, for sure. He's not that funny. I mean, yeah. She's not that funny. For as neurotic as musicians are, comedians are fucking ten times worse.

Oh, yeah, we're nuts. Yeah, absolutely. And so, yeah, I mean, it sucks that it has to be that way, but it's the same way, like, as if it's that way in science, it's that way in business. It's like there's always people that are the people that want to, like, reveal the things that they've figured out. It's thinking, like, oh, if I share this with other people, it's ultimately going to, you know, feed back into the entire system and make me do better.

Or there's those people that just sort of clutch things to their chest. Right. Yeah, you would hope there isn't a scientist like that. is it's a big thing actually it's a real big thing they all hate on each other like this motherfucker's cancer for a long time and well now it's even worse i can really get really super into that break it down well no there was a period in the um the age of enlightenment there was a really big thing about like there was two schools of thought you're going back to the enlightenment brain yeah so people there was people that like um people that wanted to share all their information and people wanted to like uh uh um conceal all their information and

there was also this added like nationalism because the big two big science factions in the age of enlightenment were the french and the british and they were really um like uh super protective and particularly the french were very protective of their stuff they wouldn't want to reveal it and they were like would scoff at a lot of that some of the Okay, what's his name? They were really wonderful book called the invention air about him It's a really great book. He's British scientists He founded the first Unitarian Church in Philadelphia as well

He was like a Ben Franklin's best friend But he like he would discover things just share them with everybody and the French would always make fun of them because they were like this motherfucker he was just giving away his secret idiot yeah yeah totally and then even now like we're at a place too like with um medical science or whatever because medical science science is proprietary now yeah and so now it's like uh corporations don't want to reveal their discoveries because they um want to own them and make money off right yeah no that is the scary part about like pharmaceuticals and stuff like no i mean it's a it's a double-edged sword. I mean, I understand how that works.

I don't want people stealing my shit. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I can't sit there and rail against a pharmaceutical company. How could you not want to share this? But at the end of the day, it's just a product. It's a product, even though it's a product that may cure cancer or whatever. For humanity, yeah.

But it is, I guess, also- It's a pretty gray area. Yeah, because also, too, they're like, well, somebody else is going to get rich off of it. Totally, totally, exactly, yeah. But it is, I guess, also. It's a pretty gray area. Yeah, because also, too, they're like, well, somebody else is going to get rich off of it. Totally, totally, exactly, yeah. Yeah, so were you always into history and things like that? Like, throughout your raps and stuff, like, you'll have some pretty thematic stuff and some pretty particular areas of history and things like that.

Has it always been something you've been into, or is it just kind of like a casual, like this catches my eye? Well, I think mostly for my family, we've always put a pretty big value on a kind of knowledge, I think, in general. And it's, well, I really latch on to history. I think I'm just sort of just interested in things in general.

And yeah, as a result, like me and my family members are all real good Trivial Pursuit teammates to have. I'm just sort of just interested in things in general. And, yeah, as a result, like, me and my family members are all real good Trivial Pursuit teammates to have. I'm sure. Yeah, I just really like learning. I mean, I still, and the older I get, the more I really enjoy it. Yeah. And even, yeah, I hated school for a lot of years.

But once I started to get out, you know, out of just basic general education, getting into college and stuff, i really fell in love with learning and the way that you're taught and and focused learning um right sort of thing so as a result yeah it's just i don't know it's always been there in history is for me history is the most engaging because history is something that's um it's just at the end of the day history is just storytelling yeah storytelling with evidence and like for that's a great way to put it. Yeah, for a performer, you know, for a performer or an artist that is based around performance and entertainment,

like, that's, like, a really exciting thing. To know exciting stories is a really exciting thing. And I really put a high value on storytelling and oral tradition or whatever. Yeah, no, I love it. I was a history major actually so yeah because people be like isn't that boring like dude it's great especially when it's kind of explained in almost like walking the line of anachronism you know i mean it's just funny to be like this ben franklin guy you know what he was he was like bitch yeah no totally and it's

really good it's really easy to um contemporize yes contemporize things and like yeah it's a it's all very relatable um it just has to be told the right way and to me that's the most interesting thing about it yeah yeah absolutely they just repeat things the same we're all we're all arguing over the same shit for thousands of years i know it just keeps going yeah which is like uh kind of funny but sad at the same time as well at least they make good stories humans they ever gonna figure it out uh so yeah so when did you get into uh get into rapping and then like uh i was 12 or 13 my brother gave me a tape with a rapper named lord finesse on it and i heard that and i decided i want to be a rapper

nice and i was i was a theater kid and I was into improv and stuff. And so I learned about freestyling because Lord Finesse is sort of like one of the most legendary older freestylers. Right. And so knowing the idea of improv and hearing what the concept of freestyling was that was just the coolest, most exciting thing to me. Because, I mean, to be perfectly honest, improv is a really dorky thing. Oh, it's very dorky. And then all of a sudden it was like, wow, all of the skills of improv, but way cooler.

He's not freestyling about Zip Zap Zop or sound balls? Yeah, exactly. Really? What? Exactly, nail on the head. And so that idea of like, and I was a really dorky kid and a really shy kid, and I think maybe I latched on to the idea of like this is my ticket to cool next album title yeah and it funny it sort of was which is really funny long in the long con um yeah but yeah that that was sort of the beginning of it and i um just did i just

freestyled and battled for probably six years yeah before i started really writing music and then i started just kind of writing verses or whatever and then slowly you know transitioned out of the kind of craft and skill of freestyle and into like the the kind of work of you know trying to work create art or whatever through song yeah no it's it's cool to see you kind of evolve into like more singing as well and just kind of having like a full band and things like that too yeah yeah i kind of try to keep it um changing a lot as much as i can and how do you like uh pick the producers that you work with? Because I found out about Radical Face because of you, and he's

so talented, so good, and I always feel like the beats on your records are so well-crafted and layered, and it's just... Well, we take... They're all just my friends. I mean, Ben, I've known since we were 15. And it... Mostly, what I like to do is, for the most part,

I like to just go through people's sort of like trash piles, musical trash piles. Because a lot of times people, like everyone has like a, when you work on music, you always just have like a little thing. It's like, well, I've got this like one little snip of a thing, but I don't know what to do with it. Right. I made it on Fruity Loops.

Yeah. I was like, hi. What is that? That's the sort of stuff I love because like I'll just plow through like people's trash piles and go no no no no no no and all of a sudden i hear a thing that just pops out and i'll start writing to it immediately once i get that sort of foot in the door and i'm on a piece of music um we then take it and then i have a producer that works on my whole record um this guy john congleton works on my records saint vincent's records modest mouse's records, Modest Mouse's records, David Byrne's records.

How crazy is that? It's awesome. Awesome. Super lucky to have him. That's great, man. Yeah, he's been working on my last three records, and he's the best. But we'll take that little piece of music

and sort of pull it apart, replace sounds, add stuff, totally delete things, rearrange things. And so I generally like, yeah, when the time comes for an album, I have so many friends that are making different kinds of music and so I kind of focus on,

for like, this is our science, I kind of pull from a lot of other musicians that weren't necessarily rap producers, people like Radical Face. I was like, give me your weird stuff. No.

No. Give me your weird stuff. Somebody was knocking on the door, by the way. Yeah, he's a nice dude he's a fan but i can't answer the phone right now we were gonna do this yeah um but uh yeah and so i'll just kind of pull things uh you know depending on the album depending on the context and depending on the style that i'm looking for at the time um yeah and that's you know fortunately like you know kind of going back to what we're saying before i have a big wide net of really nice uh you know people all over that are making all different kinds of music so i wanted you know and decide that i want to make a rock record i you know go to radical face for some pieces of rock music or whatever i want to make some rap

stuff i have a bunch of you know friends that are making you know gnarly ass rap beats or whatever yeah yeah is there is there a part of you that just wants to make like an all out kind of trap record or like EP or anything? Because I know that you're like into like the dirtiest like rap,

like just the... Yeah, I mean, and I do, I actually always have like a... I have tons of verses and stuff that are written over beats like that

that I just sort of kind of sit on and you know, maybe one day they'll find a place. Like a mixtape or something? Yeah, something like that. I'm always sort of working on a lot of little written over beats like that that i just sort of kind of sit on and you know i'll maybe one day they'll find like a mixtape or something yeah something like that i'm always working a lot of little odds and ends like that and there's probably five or six product projects that i'm kind of like skating around at times right and you know stuff that like that's the weird thing too is that you sort of um you know i've saw like i think people often think like um

and when i before i started really making records i didn't realize this either too but like a lot of times a lot of songs that I end up on a record, I didn't end up starting writing it for that record. I start writing it two or three years before. Or I write it, like some songs, like there's a song, The Till of Ambrose, my latest record, that I wrote back. I started writing in 2004. Whoa.

And I had pieces of it, and then I kind of got it to where I wanted it for another project, but it didn't really come to fruition until this album. Wow. And so it's been in existence for like that, you know. And so you sort of like, you kind of have a lot of pots, you know, on the stove at once. And, you know, there's songs that, I've had this idea for a song for three albums now, and it's such a good idea for a song, and I can't execute it.

And you can't beat yourself up over that sort of thing because you just got to accept that like one day it's going to come to you. Like one day it's going to be there. Yeah. And you just got to wait for it. And like that's it. So the songs, you know, while you're working on an album per se, you may write a song for that album or start on a song for that album or make a discovery while you're working on

that album. But it's actually not for that album at all it's for something totally different that you just haven't even thought of yet right and that's actually the really the the coolest part about it too is that you're like oh i'm glad i had to go through like x y and z over the years to get to this point to make it because i couldn't even conceive of it how it is now you know what i mean yeah yeah and ultimately like the song is going to be the song is going to be there's like for all of your good ideas and your planning um eventually you have to let learn to let go of some of that stuff because the song is going to you have to and just go where the song is taking you yeah and sometimes that's just and and that's the truth

for songs it's truth for albums um like you can plan to days in and all of a sudden you're in the studio and you realize well that doesn't work that's not going to work at all yeah and i think one of the things that's a big mistake is a lot of times you look at it and go what comes you try to force that you know square peg into a round hole and in the actuality you just kind of sometimes just got to let go of your best plans you know right and uh is that easy for you to do no no not at all um but that's what you know your friends and your producers are for and and you know um you know sometimes it is sometimes it's easy because like it's easy to do when you have a solution waiting for you when you have another option waiting for you right when you like go okay that isn't what i wanted it to be but those horns sound dope so we're gonna go with that yeah

like that's a real easy thing to do but it's what's really tough is when you're like you're looking at it and you go you have all these things laid out in front of you you realize shit none of this is right this isn't i thought all this through i planned it all and it didn't work out the way it was supposed to work out yeah and i don't know what to do to fix it like that is misery it's fucking terrifying and it's torture especially because it's like no no it's i've done the math it should all add up to a great song but here we are and yeah here we are and it's not there and you can crunch the numbers a thousand times over and over again, but it's not going to fix anything. Making a record can be a really, and is generally, a really miserable process. It's like super torturous.

Playing music versus recording music is like completely different. Completely different. Playing music is like, touring is the ego reward that you get after suffering to make a record. Right, right. You make a record, and it's like you go through that misery, so at the end of the day, you can go on the road,

and everyone can clap for you for six months or whatever. Get some of that applause. Exactly. You work on that. I mean, it sounds so trite, but it's so necessary. No, it's true, man.

You're out there. I always think about, especially with stand-up, kind of like farming. It's like, all right, now I'm out there. I'm planting seeds. This sucks. I'm out really early. It's cold. There right, now I'm out there. I'm planting seeds. This sucks.

I'm out really early. It's cold. There's just dirt here. But I know I'll be able to harvest at some point. So the tour is the harvest of like, yes. Absolutely, for sure. So yeah, because it seems like for the... Oh, the horns, by the way, on the new record are so good.

Thank you. Especially the Kurt Cobain right out of the gate. That's such a... You always pick such good openers for your albums, man. Thank you, man. I knew pretty much from the jump that that one was you always pick such good openers for your albums man thank you man I knew pretty much from the jump that that one was gonna be

the first one on the record cause it has like a great build to it too the beat finally comes in and the horns yeah that's Reggie Pace who is in a band

called No BS Brass from Richmond, Virginia he also plays all the horns for Bon Iver and now his band is the horn section for Sufjan Stevens whoa

I was really stoked to have him on the record and then was gonna try and take him on tour and then fucking sufjan stole him out from yeah he's got so much all right does he need does he gotta take that guy i'm saying man let him let a motherfucker has a horn come on sufjan uh no yeah the horns throughout the record are so good i was gonna ask you if those were played live i'm guessing they were yeah they're pretty much the only live instrument on the record the rest is pretty much all like synthesizers and like uh yeah loops and stuff but primarily and i think there's one piano and it's the rest is just synths and organs and then the only live

instruments that was intentional i wanted even like the live drums that on the record are like we played live drums and then cut them up and destroyed them right right put all kinds of effects on yeah that's what i really wanted my main goal was like i wanted just really nasty drums and i wanted a full brass band was like I wanted just really nasty drums and I wanted a full brass band. That was all. That's all I really cared about. That's great.

And I kind of didn't want, I like made sure I wasn't allowed to use guitar. I couldn't have any guitar on the record. That was a rule? That was a rule. Self-imposed? Yes, absolutely. I do a lot of that. Because it's like, you know, like one of the things I think,

I think like it's really easy for a musician to slide into habit. And I think habits are not necessarily what you do when you're creating habits. The most important habits are what you do when you hit a problem. And music is more about solving problems. Making, recording a record is more about solving problems. Recording a record is more about solving problems than it is about creating, I think, a lot of times. Because it's basically you put a thing down and then, you know, the initial sort of ideas are always pretty easy. Because you're like kind of working with the core sort of sounds and aesthetics or whatever. Hey, man, we got the drums, we got the bass, let's lay some fucking synthesizers down.

Yeah. Like that's just like, you know, kind of next step stuff. Right. But then once you put that stuff there, you're faced then you're faced with some series of sort of subtle problems and sort of kind of nuance right it really has to be solved and that's i think where really talented musicians really shine and i think where musicians become boring is that they sort of start to solve other problems the same way every time and so it's like you know yeah you get this a lot of the same sound and and for a long time like I was solving my

problems by adding more it would always be like a stack some more vocals on it put some strings on it make it bigger make it more grand you know like make it this kind of big triumphant end you know double the drums of like just bigger bigger bigger yeah and so for this record it was really about of going back and looking at all the things that I'd used to do to solve problems on old records and then not allowing myself to do those things. And then through my own control and then my producer really strict about enforcing. And I was able to kind of do that where it would be,

this is a much, well, this is a significantly louder record. Yeah. It's a much more sparse record for sounds wise. Oh yeah. It's great. I mean,

there's, you know, there's bridges and breakdowns and like all the verses are kind of different to like kudzu like i love the kind of like breakdown in there like when you're talking about uh when you're like the feeling of uh like unprotected sex or when you jump off yeah yeah yeah exactly yes there's a lot more air and space in this record and then there's a lot less tracks i mean some of my other records like i have one song on my second record that i think had 120 individual tracks on it like there's a huge like fuck or like symphony levels of recording and like yeah um you know and this was like a lot of these songs were like five tracks like you know some vocals and

drums a sample and that's it um you know like that's and that was sort of the goal was to really keep it sort of sparse was that easier to work in that kind of paradigm once you're no no because it's new yeah and whatever and then ultimately the thing is when i come around and by the end of the session and by end of the album and you know i feel really comfortable in it now right and so then inevitably when i go to make my next record and i have a whole different set of rules that i have to apply and live by um you know it's gonna that this old way that it's gonna be so easy to fall into and it's gonna be so difficult to break this

pattern and so every record is like not only are you trying to create something but you're trying to erase something as well too god um and that's so tough yeah it's so tough because you don't want to make the same record twice it's like i know how i can operate in this i can be successful but if it's going to be more of the same not really fulfilling yeah and you always forget you know it doesn't matter how much you know intellectually you always forget emotionally how hard it was for you last time to create a whole new thing and erase that old thing and so like while i'm like working on a record i'm like beating my head against the wall thinking like yeah this is shit i'm never gonna be able to pull myself out of the old record sound you know right i feel terrible for it and terrible for it

and then it's you realize like um you know you always it doesn't matter how much you tell yourself intellectually that it's this all it's always this way it doesn't make it any easier it still sucks to fucking have to try to reinvent the wheel every time yeah but it's important yeah in the long run though i mean that's really that's something really cool you can hang your hat on that you are at least really trying to push yourself you know like always i mean that's the goal um are you are you happy with this record like i think it's the best thing i've ever done dude that's great man yeah and it's i'm it's the one i'm the most proud of i think it was the biggest um risk i've ever taken um and and to

me that's sort of the core of it all like if i'm not being scared by my own music if i'm made uncomfortable making my own music yeah um then i'm then i should be really worried like because if i'm comfortable with the music then i then i should be then i should be nervous um because that means i'm making something boring interesting so if you are so is it are you scared that you're like i like it but i don't know if anybody else will like it is it just scare you because it's just a different process yeah well both but primarily i mean there's definitely an element of like everyone's gonna hate this but you know you that at the end of the day is bolstered by the fact that you go well i've got to do this this is what i want to do and so i'm doing it and like yeah um but then there's also just like um then you get to a point where

you go do i even like this like is this even cool after you hear the song a million times yeah yeah it's like does this even sound good like am i doing am i an idiot like because and that's a real like that's a huge part of the process is like am i an idiot and that's where you have other people around that's why i have a producer because you can be like no man this sounds great this is good you're doing this this is good you're not an idiot you're not an idiot it's gonna be okay you're maybe an idiot about other things not this this is fine uh so yeah it's got to be tough too because it's all on you as well for the most part i mean you are working with a producer and other people but but at the end of the day yeah it's a i mean it's a benevolent dictatorship it's i make all the calls right well i mean dude

that's so great like do you feel it with each album you've kind of progressed though yeah it culminates with like this album yeah i think it's all built up to this yeah and then hopefully this is built up to the next thing whatever that is that yeah and you know it feels like um you know it must it's i think it's probably a jarring it's always a jarring thing for listeners because it's like one of those instances where um like you know your your brother has a kid or something and you don't ever see the kid except for every like holiday so every time you see the kid the kid is just like giant and all of a sudden talking and then all of a sudden the kid's a teenager and it's got its own opinions yeah and you don't see these like transitions or whatever but for the parents like they see it slowly over time and

they don't even recognize that the kid is getting that much bigger it just kind of dawns on them eventually so for me like right there's a real clear through line in my mind through all the albums i've made yeah where but then every time i you know every few years when i just pop up and i go here's my new thing and it's totally different from the last thing everyone's like whoa jesus christ man yeah like andy's kids in college yeah you gotta warn me next time holy shit but like you know and most of the time and i feel really lucky to have the fans that i have and i feel real lucky that they'll all even when they hear hear like you know the first songs from new record like a lot of people really freaked out when they heard psych um and then

i think ultimately people have started to understand it in the context of the record as a whole yeah but like uh you know i feel really lucky that i have the kind of fans that will listen to a whole record like even when they hear a song they go yeah i don't really get this but i'm still gonna listen to the whole record a couple of times and see if it maybe makes sense to me. And that's, I feel really lucky to have that. It's a real fortunate place to be in. That's great, man. But yeah, I feel like your records,

you focus on making something that should be taken in in its totality versus like, you know, it's like you want to have like dope songs here and there, but the whole thing usually flows really well. I hope so. I mean, that would be the hope always is to be a cohesive record. I'm a guy that grew up listening to records and so records don't matter

to me yeah absolutely that's cool man uh so let's uh as we uh wrap up here uh like what are how do you stay sane on the road what keeps you um well i have a good group of people that i travel with that's really really helpful uh-huh And then I think it's really crucial. Touring, you have to learn your needs. Yeah, I would say, what's your first tours compared to now? What have you learned and what's different? There's a level of efficiency that's required. And there's a level of understanding of, I'm having a shitty day.

I'm cranky for no fucking reason um i it's not correct for me to take this out on people maybe i should just go for a walk maybe i should be away from other people and that's one of the things that's really crucial with like when you're touring with people you're sort of like um you're sailing on a ship together you're you're like nose to toes for months on end there's a big um you know the people that get it start to learn about personal space and understand like oh that dude just probably needs to be left alone right and you leave them alone for 24 hours and they're back to their you know and it's not a reflection on you or anything it's just them they got their own shit and that's just the way you

sort of balance things out and it's like it's taught me a lot about being patient with people. It certainly made me way, I was a way more opinionated, um, and way more kind of, uh, aggressive about my opinions and my feelings on things when I was younger. And now from touring, I've become much more relaxed and just sort of,

digression sessions, come on to an end. Thank you. Oh yeah, oh yeah