The Edge Breakfast - ONLY FANS Wheatus Brendon B Brown Full Interview

Episode Date: June 15, 2025

This is a podcast from Rover. Teenage turn back baby How exciting! Yeah, if you're new to the podcast you may have missed that a few weeks back we put together a band and we performed this song as the only song that we know how to play. And we got a comment from him via Cameo. You know the app where you can message celebrities and they'll send you a voice message if you send them money? But now he caught up though. So it's going to be on the show. We'll do a cut down tomorrow and play it on tomorrow show but you can listen to the full unedited 15 minute chat with him yeah right here yeah he's the man too he

seems so lovely doesn't he Meg yeah and he's very complimentary of our Meg mm-hmm oh my goodness I would be worried if I was his drummer I would be too I think if Meg was in America we would be losing her to Wheatus. Can you imagine that as an alternate life? Can you imagine? Meg's like requesting to go on tour with Wheatus. You know, he is so complimentary. You could imagine this actually being a reality of Meg's, where if they come to New Zealand and perform, and they come into a radio interview,

they G something up so that Meg gets pulled up from the crowd and jumps on the drums and plays. Like his suggestion. Yeah, like that actually feels like that could happen based on how complimentary he was. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. All right. Well, let's get into it. This is our chat with Brendan B Brown from Weedist, lead singer. Still touring around unbelievably busy despite the fact that most people will probably only know them for that one song. ["The New York Times"] Brendan B. Brown, you're a man we've been talking about for a very long time, but you're very elusive, although we did get your cameo messages.

Thank you very much. Yeah, that was fun. Hey, did you wear that hat? Cause I live in New York, in the Bronx, in fact. Yes, yes, I was. No, no. Is that just a coincidence? Sure you did. Because I couldn't find an all-blacks jersey. What is your connection with New

Zealand? Do you have one? Oh man, a desperate longing to be there. You guys have never come to New Zealand? We have never, sadly tragically, it was organized several times and fell through for one reason or another. Yeah, we're actually talking to somebody right now about it. But yeah, it's a life's goals thing, of course it's on the bucket list. It's gonna happen before we wrap. I think if you did come to New Zealand,

you would be able to sell out a concert because there'd be a hunger for teenage dirtbag at least here. Yeah, well if I had Meg on the drums If you if you guys can't get over here we might just do a tribute band just do one song Yeah tour the country. There you go a one band tribute song, you know, yeah That might work. I mean, it could. And the scheme of things, Brendan, because I'd imagine being in a band like Weedus, a big band like that, you see a lot of covers of your songs done by bands that are good and bad. Where would our cover rank in the scheme of covers?

Well, I'll tell you what, I'm the producer, and I wrote it, and I produced it and I recorded, I engineered it. So it's there's very little I don't know about that song. The kids on TikTok teach me new things about it all the time with the covers. But from a from a from the execution of the original standpoint, I, you know, I kind of feel like I can say what's going on and I have to say that I got to give I got to give Meg the MVP award on on this most recent Performance thank you if I'm talking about your cover. Yeah, right. Yeah. Yeah as well, I guess yeah Well, I mean, I mean like you said there's so many what which one are we gonna get into? Why not yours, right?

So I see a lot of people play the drums to that song and play it incorrectly because it has, there's a variation of the Purdy Shuffle happening there where there's a ghost note on the 16th on the snare drum. Nobody does that intuitively and you did. And I'm very impressed with that just right off the bat I you know, I know we had wait you're making me Like the hat thing at the start where it was a bit of a coincidence

Were you deliberately doing that thing me that he's talking about? Yeah, I will I I mean go on No, I got you you're the one who did it I I mean I didn't get I got one Lisa in the end and I, as you know, Brendan, none of us have played a musical instrument leading up, so we had 36 days to learn. I just watched and copied you. Well, you know the band, so I just, I mean, I like to think that I don't, maybe it was intuition from just listening to the song so many times over that I'm like, that's in there. But I didn't learn off anybody in the way of, like I didn't follow anyone, and that's why I guess it kind of sounded like my own in a way. I just listened and played.

Yeah. Authentic mag. Authentic mag. Yeah. Yeah, well well done. Thank you. I have to say, I must say. Thank you.

Yeah. Now Clint, you were on some kind of Nicky Six tip, I gather, over there. Nicky Six? Yeah. I mean he was, I mean Clint was playing some quite technical guitar. He was lead guitar.

So, the problem was Clint just- Oh yeah, right up until the point it got unplugged at the end there. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah, I was like, what's going on? Yeah, and Clint can't sing and play unfortunately, so he had to do one or the other. So I sang the verses while Dan played and then I played the chorus while Dan sang because it was, it's too,

like the fact that you can do both at the same time is incredible. Well, I mean, I'm no Getty Lee, but let's just say that I was impressed with how you guys really took care of each other on that, because you got there, right? Right? You got there. Somehow, in the end. Somehow. Yeah. It was a miracle we got there, but we got there. Yeah. Who's the most famous band you've actually heard do a cover of your song? You're like, oh my god, that's so cool that they're doing my song. Oh, boy.

SZA did it. Wow. Phoebe Bridgers. Wow. One Direction was probably responsible for playing it for more people than anybody else. Yeah, they did it on their own tour, didn't they? Yeah, indeed. Yeah, they played 200-something dates with each with a teenage dirtbag. And so it was, yeah, probably them in terms of just sheer size, because those stadiums were packed to the gills and it was all 70,000, 80,000, some even bigger. Do you get royalties for that? Do you get paid every time One Direction plays your song?

Depends on which country we're talking about. Oh wow. Because different territories pay those publishing royalties differently. And then of course, the tour manager has to enter the song into the set list for the performing rights society of whatever country you're in. So there are shenanigans that go on. You know, but you do get paid. You do get paid.

That's the answer. When you write a song like Teenage Dirtbag, do you know it's going to be like what they call I guess an Eva Green, like a song that just like stands the test of time is completely legendary, iconic. My mum knows the lyrics. I know the lyrics. My three year old daughter will soon know the lyrics. You know, it's it's it's spanned generations now. Do you know it? Do you get that feeling of like, shit, I think we've done it or did we use just the shop? No, no, absolutely not. I thought it was a peculiar song. It's four minutes and 20-something seconds long. It's got this character switch in the middle where the voice goes so, you know,

at the time there was nothing to reference on that except maybe Prince. But, you know, and I thought to myself, yeah, it's good. It's a good song. And I knew that because eventually when we're playing clubs about two years after we started recording it, there were people around the block who I didn't know were singing lyrics in front of me at the shows. I kind of knew something was going on, but I had been in and out of enough projects that had gone nowhere to understand that it took more than that you know and as far as the still talking to you about it 25 years later 30 if you count when it was written I no absolutely answers no absolutely not when was the do you remember a moment when you were

like shit it's got legendary like it's it's got to a point where this song is bigger than us now like do you remember a moment when you realized that? Yeah, I remember the I remember the moment where I where I kind of got back on how to sit down. During the first wave of TikTok videos. Yeah, there was Madonna, and Cheech and Chong and, you know, Chevy Chase, and like, like big Hollywood stars you know um doing this and then I they brought one they brought one in to me because we had got we were trying to respond to them as fast as we could Gaga you know duet and just say thank you and and they brought me the one Quincy Jones did wow that's incredible and that one one, that one, I had to sit down for a second.

I got a lump in my throat on that one. I couldn't believe it. I couldn't believe, you know, that this man who is responsible for arguably some of the most important records that will ever be made, right. Knew my, knew what we did, knew our song, you know, at all, enough to even do that. So it was, it was a. So it was a big moment. That was it. How many times do you play it,

if you are doing a gig anywhere, do you always start and finish with Teenage Dirtbag? Or do you just like, sorry, leave him wanting more? One time is five to me. We do tease it sometimes, especially if we're at a festival, you know? And there's another band here and up on another stage, we'll drop a little bit of dirt back so we make sure we're just...

Just to rile them up. But we don't routinely play it twice, we don't routinely do anything. Because we don't play with set lists. We've been doing all request shows since around 2007, right? So, um Yeah, we just put it to the audience and they call the set We we are responsible for learning our entire repertoire nearly anyway about uh, you know somewhere in the neighborhood of 80 songs So there's a lot of rehearsal work, but then everyone knows they're getting a teenage drip bag. There's no question about it

It's you know, I mean, we don't we don't mind playing it either It hasn't gotten old on us either. So it's and as Meg has proven It's a song with details and you really need to get them right or else it doesn't feel like it you know, I feel like something else so You know, we have been we have been Stopped in the middle and told to start over by crowd demand. We have been told to play it once early because the little kid has to go home. And we always do, you know, of course. We have been asked to just play it again, because sometimes

there's a bit of an encore, and the kids who like the other songs are having their way with the encore, and then we get through five encore songs and somebody goes, okay, do it again, do it again, and of course, like, you know, how are you going to say no, you know? We have played our song Lemonade twice for the same reason. Because they know that we take requests. I think this is still like possibility. Anything is possible. So yeah, the answer is yes, we do play it more than once sometimes.

Sometimes half, one and a half. You know what I mean? That's great. And is she a real person that you know, when you were like in the song? No. Yeah. How did the idea of it? Yeah, you're right Clint. Nah, I went to a boys school. There was no Noel. Yeah, hence why you sung the girl part. Yeah, there was a lot of contention around that.

Yeah, Noel. Yeah, there was a there was a person called Noel in my brother's second grade class, I believe when he was a person called Noel in my brother's second grade class, I believe, when he was a kid. She would have claimed it, surely. And I remember hearing the name, but I didn't really met her, I don't think, or knew who she was because I was in a different grade. So that's where I first heard the name was in my brother's class, is my brother's classmate somewhere.

Yeah. Okay, so I think she my brother's classmates somewhere. Yeah. Okay, so it kind of, I think she could claim it a little. Yeah. Oh, definitely. There's a little inspiration there. And everyone's going, what if? Oh yeah, she can claim, she can definitely claim the namesake. Sure. Absolutely. I didn't know her. There was no narrative around her at all. But, you know, I, in fact, I can't even remember if I ever saw this person. But

it was 1982. So And what does the calendar look like for the next like month or three for Brendan? And the How do you say you do you say chockers? Is that how you say chockers? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, well, I'm just I'm just taking a month and a half off because I had some surgery. No big deal, it all worked out just fine. But I have to get my abdomen back together and then we start touring again in August

and we don't stop, once August begins, we don't stop until December 13th, which is our final show with Bowling for Soup at Wembley Arena. The final show of the year, I should say. And there's all manner of 2026 on the schedule already. Between now and then we have lots and lots of festivals. We have an American tour bus run just headlining with ourselves. We have the 25th anniversary UK tour, which is on sale right now. That's Ireland and the UK.

There is talk of Australia being squeezed in and I would love to go to New Zealand as well. But I think it's probably going to be 26 before we get around to being able to get, uh, how do you, uh, was it anti-pedo, Pideon? Is that what it is? Yeah. Yeah. And to Pideon, is that what they say?

Yeah. Yeah. You're talking about three very thick people. Yes. I have no idea. We've never left the country. Sorry. We can edit that part out.

No, no, no, that's fine. Hey, yeah, just go. You take out the bit where Brennan made us look like idiots. Thanks, man. Have you ever come to... Hey, I might be the one who's wrong. Let's just remember that I could be the one. I think we're all wrong, to be honest.

If you do come to New Zealand, make sure you pop in and see us. We'll do the song. Oh, Clinton, I'll step back from vocals. No, he's definitely not. You know, if we actually do, Meg, you gotta do the drums. You know, you're coming up. Can you imagine?

You'd have to do the song twice then. You got at least a year to work on it and get real perfect, you know. We're confident you gotta get up there and do it. Okay, I'm just having a baby in between. That'll be fine. We'll just like, yeah, be totally fine. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Oh my god. Oh, that's amazing. It's been so great talking to you. Thanks for like having some fun with us as well. Yeah, we really appreciate it. You know, it's just been so cool. Yeah, I love that of all the songs that we were talking about doing, somebody actually suggested your song and it was one that we'd already been talking about doing, somebody actually suggested your song

and it was one that we'd already been thinking about doing. We're like, oh we just love it, like it's such a good tune, like everyone regardless of the age will get down to it and we're like please let it be easy enough for us to play and it was probably just pushing us enough without being like ridiculous outside of the having to sing and play at the same time that was obviously very difficult. And we did do a simplified version. It wasn't like we're playing your professional way. We did it in a simplified way.

Well, I will say that Meg was. Yeah, Meg was. Oh my God! Brendan, you have my ego. I mean, it's clear that you're new to being a drummer. That's not, obviously, but what I'm saying is that the attention to detail, nobody in the world can play my guitar part, right?

It's too weird. But, but, but Meg got the drums and that was really put, put like, lit my heart up a little bit really, because it's like, oh, wow, they're not just having a laugh. This is like, yeah, it's like, I think that's the three. That's the thing with the three of us. We're always like, we're having a laugh, but at the end of the day, we're all very competitive, and we also want to do a great job. Like, we were like, if we're gonna do it, then let's really do it properly, rather than it just be a joke, because then it's not fair to the other two that maybe put in all this effort, if one of us isn't taking it seriously. It looks like Meg took it more seriously than Clinton.

Yeah, she went way too high and made it a little bit. No, I think, no, what I was gonna say is the singing all across the board stepped up at least 10 notches from the TikTok, from the, what was it? What was it, the cameo? Yeah, the cameo. Yeah, when we sing to it, yeah. There's too many apps. There's too many apps in life. But yeah, it was, you guys really, like, the singing was on point, way better than before.

And it was clear that you worked on it. I didn't even think twice. 20 seconds in, I knew you worked on it. Great. Well, that's awesome. Thank you so much. I'm feeling very good. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I don't know about you, but my tires are pumped.

Pumped up. Yeah, there's so much smoke up my ass right now. We said we were one song and done, but now you're making us feel like we might have another song in us. Yeah, yeah. So that's a good question. What is the name of the band?

MCDC. So it was Clint's idea and instead of ACDC, it's Megan Clint and Dan and Clint. So he gets his name twice. It's not the best name. So if you ever do have a hit, Angus is coming after you. Yeah, it's worth suing probably. Yeah, and we're gonna look at a name change, which would be a nightmare. So maybe we will just stop at one song. Or let your new manager be in the band. Yeah, great.

That's an option. Okay, I'll get to thinking about that. Okay. Brendan B. Brown, our lead singer at Weeders, thank you so much, man, for your time. We really appreciate you being so accommodating, even just sending the clips a few weeks back and then taking the time to chat to us now We really do hope that you do make it across the ditch to New Zealand and don't do what Taylor Swift and Lady Gaga and all those others are doing and leading us out. Yeah. Yeah, please come

Well as soon as we can guys as soon as as we can. Absolutely on the bucket list as I said. The bucket hat list. We got that one. Cheers Brendan. See you mate. Alright guys. Take care. You too. Bye bye.