The Josh Innes Show - JIS: Craig Gass Joins The Show

Episode Date: May 23, 2022

Our friend Craig Gass joins Josh today. Craig was up at the radio station promoting his appearance at a Nashville club, so Josh talked with the comedian for an hour about a plethora of topics. There will be occasional snippets from the radio portion of the interview, but the rest is exclusive to the JIS podcast. Craig and Josh discussed:NFL Radio storiesCraig's admiration for JoshDave Chappelle Getting AttackedHow Craig Became Opening Act For Metallica The Radio Industry and Stories About Being FiredCraig's Relationship With George Carlin Of course we got a chance to hear all the classic Craig Gass voices such as Gene Simmons, Paul Stanley, Lars Ulrich, George Carlin, Christopher Walken and Sam Kinison. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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So today on the radio show, our friend Craig Gass stopped in, and we kept talking during the commercial breaks because I felt, hey, I want to give you guys a pod that is full of good stuff from Craig Gass, a little off-the-cuff stuff, nice little conversation off the air. So I'm going to play that for you. Now, the edits are going to be a little weird because, remember, we're talking for maybe 10 minutes during some songs, and then I have to jump back in and do some stuff on the air. There may have been some stuff left in from the air, but a lot of – so basically if there's a place where it goes in and it jumps to something else, you go, what the hell happened?

That would be the reason. I think, though, for the most part, I was able to eliminate most of that. So that shouldn't be an issue. I don't think it's going to be a huge issue. I did leave a little bit in from the radio show. But, yeah, so we talked about a lot of stuff in here. Comedy and life and radio and a bunch of stuff. So check it out.

Let me know what you think. It's me and Craig Gass from earlier today. Gotcha. All right. Well, hello to all those people. Thank you. Comedian here, usually funny. I'm performing in Nashville this weekend at the Wine Down.

That's the second time you've been there, i've been there yeah um i felt like a rock star because i sold it out uh the reality is it holds 20 people that's why it's uh it's like a broom closet in there so it's easy to sell the place out but uh we're talking about um my admiration for you sincere admiration that you got thrown out of the super bowl well and you're the only one because everybody else they're like you're a pos and you're terrible and everything else everyone at management yeah all the management people hate it and then the people who don't like me use it as well you're just a jerk you got kicked out of the super bowl i'm like you know 20 years ago that would have been a huge thing like if if stuttering john got kicked out of the

super bowl it'd be a story and it'd be funny and everything. It's like in 2020, 2022. When was that? 2018. Like it's a different world now. It's like everybody's like. It was a story, dude. Oh, it was a huge story.

I'm not disclaiming. No, it was a huge story. Like it happened on a Tuesday. So nothing was happening. So I was the big story. It was trending worldwide. Yeah, because I got a text saying, isn't this your friend? I went, oh, dude, isn't this your friend?

Which, by the way, I love getting texts like that when your friends are on TMZ, your friends are like getting arrested and news articles are being read. That's great. Yeah. So they did that. And we got kicked out, not because of that, but because of another issue that we had with the station. And we didn't have a table. It was a whole thing. But it became I got us kicked out not because of that but because of another issue that we had with the station and we didn't have a table it was a whole thing but it became i got us kicked out and instead of the radio station embracing it and being like well hell let's ride with this thing it was yeah we

might have to fire you i'm like but why i'm getting us a bunch of attention and i didn't do it on purpose like i gumped my way into that that was just a dude calls me out and says come over here you won't say that to my face bitch and i said yeah i will because what am i gonna do i've been talking shit about the dude the whole time so if a football player that i've been talking shit about says he wants to fight if i stay in the corner and go oh no then i'm like i'm a bitch so i had to go do it and risk getting punched in the face which i didn't in that moment were you scared yes god i was so scared like i had adrenaline so my hands were kind of shaking like that's i mean i'm sure you've

been in those moments too because you do a lot of like the wacky talking to people and like you know stunt type stuff right i mean when you're on radio you're you're um in your mind you know i gotta do this but you're thinking i might get my ass kicked correct so there's a little adrenaline and my hands are kind of shaking and there somebody was calling me out for that too saying oh you're looking at me scared yeah Yeah, I was. This dude played in the NFL. He might have CTE for all I know. He might destroy my ass.

But I had to do it because I can't talk shit about a dude for months. And then when he calls me out to have a face-to-face, I can't go, nope, sir, I can't do that. I had to get my ass up and go stand face-to-face. That's always been the yin and the yang is that funny people, funny people, creative people working at stations are being overseen by business people who are worried about advertisers and don't see the payoff of, but our number one advertiser who sponsored that trip thought it was the most brilliant thing ever. That guy's name is mattress Mac.

You probably heard of him because he's the guy that makes the billion dollar bets. Uh-huh. That's my friend. And he, and he loved it he called me tell you what he did he called me after that i get on the phone hey josh yeah mac i said all right mac you know what's going on you get kicked off radio really trying to fight that guy i said yeah i did he goes that's hilarious man keep it up no press is bad press but my boss is on the phone saying yeah we might have to fire you and they didn't fire you like they didn't fire me for that they eventually fired me for

whatever reason they decided to fire me for but yes that moment they decided not to well it's crazy to me because the nfl is so conservative i'm always being really careful because i'm a huge football fan and i love going to the super bowl every year talking to the players on both teams getting silly content. I noticed firsthand a friend of mine getting in a lot of trouble years before I met you. Yeah. And it was Artie Lang.

We were in New Orleans for the Super Bowl between the Ravens and the 49ers. And at that time, it was a big news story right before the Super Bowl that an active player had come out as being gay and of course was praised and and a lot of people it really um was inspirational but being that it's football yeah and being that there's you know the kind of guys that typically play football arty was kind of throwing it out there like hey what would you do if you heard

there was a gay guy on your team and of course everybody's answering it diplomatically so you really can't tell where somebody's feelings are yeah because they're they know what the answer should be but one of the players i think it was the dude from san francisco and i don't remember his name but he like he went off on it he said i would punch him he said he was a total caveman and said he was so his sexuality was so threatened by the concept of a gay man being in the same locker room as him that he said I would physically assault somebody, which is so like bizarre. And Artie just, oh, really? Oh, you got to keep it going. And he just kept pushing the mic closer to his mouth. Like, yeah.

So. So what about the gays? Like, what would you do? And the guy goes, man, if a gay guy ever came, it was like stripes, you know? And you almost touched me. I'll tell you. And lighten up, Francis. So Artie gets banned from all future NFL events.

All future NFL events. All because he asked a question to to the guy and the guy was the Neanderthal. The guy was the Neanderthal and and already got in trouble for it. So I've had moments where I remember being so high on myself at Super Bowl 50 in the Bay Area. Was that the one with did you talk to Tom? Did you do something with Brady? I've done a bunch of stuff with Brady. God, brady it's a constant you're so handsome sure uh tom like when you look in the mirror does your reflection ever just wink at you like is it and he'll laugh and because he laughs that'll end up on espn yeah and i remember starting a thing with because tom

brady was coming back so often to the super bowl that i had to come up with new and and more interesting questions i remember saying to him hey tom my name is craig gas i'm a stand-up comedian this is my friend jason that's my friend aaron we were discussing the four of us together and we were ranking the four of us from most handsome to least handsome obviously you're number one because you're tom brady but tom who would you rank as number two and i pointed at myself number three and number four and tom goes wait who am i ranking and i go me and this guy and this guy and he goes all right fan out and i go oh and we all fanned out and i didn't do this consciously subconsciously i started sucking in my butt and pushing my chin out so i could be more handsome for tom brady and then he ranked us

and then uh a year later he's back at the super bowl again and i said hey tom uh you ranked us for most handsome to least handsome uh last year and we've been fighting about our rankings and between the three of us we've actually lost five pounds and i wanted to see if it was possible to can we get a re-rank can we get a yeah so uh super bowl 50 i'm really high on myself because i had a moment with peyton manning that started going hyper viral within minutes which was i said to talk to uh peyton manning, Peyton, I have an idea for you called Peyton Manning Trivia, where it is impossible for you to get any question wrong. And he said, any question? I said, yeah, for you, it'll be impossible.

And we're going to do a speed round right now. What is the largest city in the state of Nebraska? Omaha. Where is the College World Series played at every year? Omaha. And every answer. That's great played at every year? Omaha. We're in every answer. That's great. Omaha, Omaha, Omaha.

We were going to try to do that with something similar with Shannon sharp. Right. Because skip, he does that skip all the time. Skip. So we were going to, we brought our guy in and he was just going to ask him everything that has to do with skip. Like, so like, what is that little, like, like whenever your CD,

there's a scratch, what does it do? Skip. Like, and like, we were going to do that same thing but we couldn't get backstage do we had it set up and everything so i'm with you that's that's funny though and that went viral hyper viral nfl on fox put it on espn put it on it went got three million views within 24 hours i'm already getting texts saying oh my god i'm watching your video and every time i reboot it it has another 20 000 views i'm like holy shit this thing's taking off wow i'm really on it this year yeah and the broncos walk off and then the panthers come out and i'm like oh man if peyton manning liked me cam newton's gonna love me i won't i walk up to cam newton and i said uh

cam my name's craig gas and i don't know if you know this do you know what cam newton named his son no it's like a legend or something it's uh uh oh god it's not let it's um uh cam newton's son name let's see what his son's name is chosen chosen that's it chosen and he's also got a kid named cashmere i believe i said cam my name's craig gas i'm a stand-up comedian i love that you named your son uh chosen um but do you ever worry about the other kids going to school with him and them feeling insecure that they're not chosen and cam answered it so seriously that i went but okay one more uh were you trying to one-up anybody who names their kid jesus and he goes what's your and he just went right down the line and looking at the footage i was so afraid of looking like a dick that i didn't even put the footage out it was such a funny awkward moment but i thought if the nfl sees this i might get kicked out. Which is ridiculous. It is ridiculous.

But he's a very self-important guy. He named his kid Chosen. He's like the most self-important dude. Yeah, he named his kid Chosen. Which is funny considering that he dresses like one of the Golden Girls. That's what makes it funny that he's so self-important. Which is one of the things that I love about him. Or he had the thing a couple months ago where he was talking about masculinity

and how no one's masculine anymore as he's wearing like a floral print muumuu yes dog nobody's masculine anymore like you hear the golden girls theme song in the background yeah so so the idea that guys like me and you goofballs um get in trouble with masculine aggressive guys is always entertaining it is it's all we need more of it but but the idea that you got thrown out of and what's funny about it is you called me up and you said uh um we were gonna hang out looks like we're not gonna be hanging no you said hey so we're gonna we're still hanging out uh i don't know oh yeah we went to perkins we went to a perkins hold on let's do that we do the part here, but that's great.

You're the only person that showed up at Perkins. Dude, it's Perkins, man. Who doesn't like breakfast at Perkins? It's crazy to me the kind of shit that guys like us can get into when we are mixed in with guys who, people who grew up differently than we did sure and don't have senses of humor oh absolutely like i'm i'm fascinated by again the the people that you've come in contact with like it almost feels like you've just kind of gumped into these situations

like they're absolute gump spots here you know what what I'm saying? Living with Eddie Van Halen. Yeah. Becoming, like, mentor and mentee with George Carlin. George Carlin. Being on the field with my favorite football team when they won the Super Bowl and being in the locker room with them. Being the opening for Metallica. Okay, so let's go there.

I don't know that we've ever talked about that. Dude, that is such a great story. That's a radio story. Okay, so let's go there. I don't know that we've ever talked about that. Dude, that is such a great story. That's a radio story. Okay, okay. We'll do that. Tell it on here, too. Why not? So tell me here, and then we'll do it on the air, too.

It's such a long story, though, that I think it should go, like, I think we should section that off for after George Carlin to go into how it got to open for Metallica. All good. Because, yeah. That's cool. Because I got to keep things on the air to, like, four minutes or so at a time, four or five. So with you so let's do that so i haven't watched uh what

is it perfect monster the perfect kind of monster whatever their documentary is the metallica documentary you've never seen it some kind of monster some kind of monster yeah i've never seen it and um i was watching something on reels you know one of those breaking the band shows talking about the near breakup of metallica and i'm like well now i want to watch this documentary like honestly they seem like assholes. And I don't know if they were assholes when you were there. Like Lars, Lars seems like an asshole. Lars has a reputation because people were mad at him for being the face

against the Napster movement. Sure. So people getting mad at him for like, oh don't you have enough money but it wasn't about just metallica it was about a business model that had been broken and lars stepped up as one of the most successful rock stars to be the face of it so it kind of made people go like fuck you man you've already got your money but the thing about those like he like james even though james could be an asshole too james's perception is he's kind of the nicer guy in the group, even though it may not be true. And Lars is kind of like the muscle of the group, if that makes sense.

Isn't it interesting, though, when you get to know people who have a public persona of of being seen in a certain light and getting to know that person and realizing it's because of how they go about things that they're seeing a certain way yeah and that there's a full picture of the person that isn't necessarily uh even in line with that public image sure so tell me then tell me lars then so lars's public image is almost like a tyrant like hates everybody and crushes the little guy and will sue over anything like, oh, wow, you used my Metallica song at a wedding. I'll sue you. Like that's the perception of Lars. What's the reality of Lars? I'm going to tell you the greatest Lars story when we get back on the air. But but after this great moment of him really showing that he has a great sense of humor, I end up doing a radio show with

him, a promotion called Late Night with Lars. And he had never met me. He bought me a plane ticket and flew me to Denver to co-host this radio show with him, where he's going to take over a radio station, a rock station in Denver, and it's going to be syndicated to 20 markets. And when he came in to do that broadcast, he, uh, radio station guys are standing by and he walks in and they go, Hey, Lars, welcome to KBPI. Uh, so, uh, uh, the, the Tom over there is your board guy. Just point to him when you want to go to commercials, he'll get you in and out of commercials. And Lars goes, no, man, I want to learn how to do the board. So tell me how to do the board and tell me how to work this.

And they go, no, no, no, we'll take care of it. And he goes, no, it's supposed to be late night with Lars. So I want to learn how to actually do it. And they gave him a crash course in the studio on how to run a board. And he did it awkwardly. It was very clunky but he insisted this the whole thing is supposed to be this and that's what i want to do i really want to be a guy taking over a radio station and i really admired the humanity yeah so he um is a uber fan of music

and i think still retains that that fandom that he had as a kid because when he was a kid he used to drive around and follow motorhead around europe he used to follow them in a car and fan out on lemmy as a kid and he still maintained that stepping up to say hey there's something really shitty going on with how the music business is breaking down right now made him a target for people who were like, fuck that guy. It came off poorly to people who couldn't afford to buy albums. Sure. He wasn't wrong.

I mean, they're stealing music, and that's how he makes his living. I think what happens is when people are millionaires, they become easier to crap on because there's the little guy and there's the millionaires. So I get that. What when people are millionaires, they become easier to crap on because there's the little guy and there's the millionaires. So I get that. What made me laugh about him, and this is where I kind of changed on Lars, is he was in, what was the movie? It wasn't Forgetting Sarah Marshall.

Yeah, it was. No, it was the Get Him to the Greek. Was it Get Him to the Greek? Yeah, it was the sequel to that. And he's doing the scene where basically he's banging Russell Brand's girlfriend. Yeah. And he was really good in that it was kind of like when seacrest was in knocked up like you look at seacrest kind of like this

guy's a dope whatever and then they do the scene of him allegedly backstage at e and he's like you know what fuck this and he's like okay i kind of dig it you know what he's got a sense of humor about himself yeah it was like who's that guy that really straight got wayne brady on chapelle show yes riding around it changes your perception of people when they can make fun of themselves It was like, who's that guy that really straight guy, Wayne Brady on Chappelle show. Yes. Writing around. It changes your perception of people when they can make fun of themselves. And Wayne Brady knows who he is. He knows he's white bread, Carlton guy and all the white, white housewives love him. He knows that's why he's rich, but he can embrace it and make fun of it.

And that's why it works. I always remember hearing as a kid that the, the most, um, uh, the guys with the reputations as crazy, wild rock stars are not as crazy and wild as you think they are and the guys with the straightest images are not as straight as you think well let me give you an example it's not maybe a real example but there's a meme and on one half of the meme it's these dudes at a metallica show and they've all got like faces painted and spiky hair and they look just nuts they go fans of metallica and then the next shot is a picture of james hetfield and it says lead singer of metallica and he's wearing like cargo shorts and crocs with a burberry bag

and you're like and this is the lead singer of like it's true though like that dude's just someone's dad you know he's just hanging out like i'm sure at some point they were that those guys you know absolutely they were all leathered out like angsty then you get rich and you're not angsty anymore well also when you grow up it's natural to evolve and go from like i don't know why i was so angsty i was like i went to a dick phase where i really admired people who were assholes and i remember getting to an age i don't even know where exactly it happened but it was somewhere in my 30s where i was looking at my favorite bands as a teenager and just realizing these guys are dicks like i would never want to hang out with these guys they're all dicks but for some reason when you're a teenager you just you go through that phase where you really look up to anybody who gives the finger to the system or the finger to

the idea of a system you realize that they're eventually going to become someone who no longer gives the finger to the system you know they become the system i had a buddy i was into like metal i was into like metal hard rock and a buddy of mine kevin bird was a punk dude i remember him saying why do you listen to such shitty music? And I was trying to explain, I'm like, no, man, these guys are cool. And I told him a quote that I never second guessed. I just thought it was a cool quote. Never in any moment holding onto this quote, did I ever critique it? I took it as the word of gospel, which was a quote from Tommy Lee, where he said in the interview, when I go on tour, I like to leave my five-star hotel and just chill out with

homeless people. I believe this because I like, I, and he said some story about like being in the Bay area and going down by the docks and, and, um, and getting some booze and hanging out with homeless people. And I was like, man, he's really street. And I just thought that was really cool. And my buddy Kevin Burr looks at me and goes, that's one of the dumbest fucking things I've ever heard in my life. He goes, why would anyone leave a five-star?

And I never questioned it. And he quickly made me realize, God, that really doesn't make any sense and i've been holding on to this dumb quote thinking like yeah man they're cool they're just they're just regular people and like to hang out and i was like why did i buy into that why did i buy it that's great it's fascinating to me how in radio you will meet people who have bad reputation sure and you almost will be ready for the asshole or this unlikable person to come into your studio and sometimes it might be somebody you're not even a fan of and they'll be so fucking cool to you yeah that you will defend them for the rest absolutely but if they're not nice to you

that you don't like i used to work with guys in philly who had good reputations as they played a character on the air they're like hey i'm everybody's buddy right like they're almost like cousin brucey or something you know then off the air they're the biggest pieces of shit i've ever met and they're insecure and they want to get everybody fired like i dealt with that they're like me on the air i think people listen to me they go wow what an asshole then you meet me and i'm just some docile guy sitting here having a conversation stern i would imagine like a similar like absolutely peak stern like 90 stern where he's a madman then off the air it's a different world yeah and he would allude to it all the time on the air and say i'm not a social person i'm i'm

an introvert i feel very uncomfortable around people and that's exactly what he's like he's so quiet in public situations that they almost think you're being a dick because because they're so used to who you are on the radio that if you're not like hey they think like what the hell bro like this is something i did the hell bro like is this like i used to get that people would criticize me online and go guy's so fake on the air i met him and he was just sitting having dinner like he wasn't wacky or anything like well yeah i mean what am i gonna do like shit on colin kaepernick just at dinner like grab my megaphone and be like yeah i'll have the quesadillas and let me tell tell you about Colin Kaepernick. Like, what am I going to fucking do?

Like, it's a radio show. Yeah, it's funny. I get all sides of that. And it's crazy to me how people who you look up to and admire can sometimes let you down. And that's why sports I used to be so passionate about. But, like, you realize that they're human and you realize that they're human and you realize that they they they're not perfect.

And it almost hurts the image. Like a lot of these guys are now very open about politics and stuff, and they'll dump on people a lot and say, I hate this person. If you feel this way, you're a piece of shit. I'm just kind of like, I don't really admire you guys all that much anymore. Like, I don't need this. I think the pandemic led me to a world where i was like if there were no sports that would suck i like sports i love the saint louis cardinals i went to lsu these the saints like i love these things but like you know actors kind of the same way they all like talk shit really trump did it

with trump coming in in 2016 like it turned everybody like everybody became a lunatic and both sides became lunatics and it's like i don't need this shit you know it makes it makes things more difficult if that makes sense now hold on so we got about a minute till we do the stuff on air so where are we going with oh we're gonna do the george carlin story gotcha and then we'll set up the setup that we're gonna come back with an incredible metallica story gotcha which leads to how i got to open for metallica gotcha and it's a crazy i'm surprised i never told the story you may have might ring a bell i know that's the thing is when i i never have a plan when i come in with you but fuck do i love that you let me just do whatever i want yeah and that was the reason why

when we met in houston that i kept going hey man this is not going to help me at all but i just love hanging out uh like i sure i want to come on and just tell you some stories just riff yeah and fuck that was fun you'd let we got 20 seconds but my buddy that one year at that we met you at the super bowl he was dressed like mike ditka oh yeah and he walked around he had a mustache and a sweater vest they almost kicked him out because he would just go sit down on people's shows and start acting like mike ditka and they didn't ask you to come do this i just wanted to tell you the story about george carlin that i always think about when i think about what a wonderful human being he was he again taught me a lot about how to be funny as a kid i remember he had this mic technique where he would cup the mic for an exclamation point and go because you're a moron

like yeah and my friends and i would do that on the phone. We would like cut the phone to make an exclamation point and it was an event every time he had a comedy special out that we would talk about and plan for a month ahead of time. And as an adult, he taught me a lot how to be a decent human being. The moment I always think of

is, I remember hanging out with him. I was living in Seattle. George is my mentor now. He's letting his manager, Jerry, be my manager, which didn't end up amounting to anything. But George came to town to do an autograph, a book signing for this book called Brain Droppings. And while he was doing the book signing, I'm hanging out with Jerry. And Jerry said, did you hear about what happened to Brenda, George's wife? And I said, no. And he said, she just passed away. She was diagnosed with breast cancer and died three weeks

later on Mother's Day. I had no idea at that moment. And George does his book signing and he runs out the door and I said, hey, I need to talk to you. And he said, well, call me tonight. I'll be home later tonight. I called him in L.A. that night and he was very kind of. I hear what you're saying, you know, and I really appreciate the kind words I just you know, but I got a lot going on. And thank you. I understand what you're trying to say to me. And thank you. And he even hung up the phone by saying, all right. Yeah, I got you. I got you. But yeah, give me a call tomorrow. OK, but I understand what you're saying. And I love that you're saying it to me. All right. Don't take your dick out on the bus. And he hung up the phone and I go, what? What was that last part? And so I called Dennis

Blair, his opening act. And I said, is he okay? Is George okay? Because I had never heard a guy at George Carlin's age talk about his wife as much as George talked about Brenda. They were together for 40 years. And Dennis says, yeah, I think he's doing okay. You know, it happened a week ago and my wife and I went to George's house and his daughter came and answered the door and woke George up. He came out and talked to us for a little bit and said, listen, I really appreciate you guys coming over, but I'm really tired and I got to get some sleep. I've been up for a couple of days. And we said, yeah, yeah, just call us if you need anything. And George started to walk back towards his bedroom. And Dennis said, my wife and I both saw this. George Carlin walks down his hallway,

opens up the door to his bedroom. Brenda used to collect stuffed animals she had stuffed animals all over the house and when george opened up the door to his bedroom dennis and his wife could see inside the bedroom and saw that george had taken all of brenda's stuffed animals and put them all in bed with him and he was sleeping with her stuffed animals and that was george carlin and again that is not going to help me sell tickets to the wind down this weekend in nashville but i am usually a hilarious comedian i will not make you cry i like i just started my period it's the worst comedian i've ever heard in my life my favorite thing about you reading hate mail this morning when i was coming in is saying the names of the people who

like jeff pratt you're a dick fuck you jeff pratt i was like wow what the fuck we're really going after going we're going after our own audience well i mean look i don't consider them the audience if they're people that just message shit just to be, you know, a dick. You know what I'm saying? We're living in a weird time, though, now where people can troll you, can touch you. They can get close to you. Or they can run up on stage and almost stab you. Yeah.

And then almost be the sympathetic figure because they were doing it for something just and right. Like this guy that, you know, stabbed or tried to stab Chappelle. He was doing it for the LGBTQ stuff. And now they're like, you know, like basically Chappelle. I thought he handled it incredibly. He goes backstage. He talks with him. He's like, why the hell are you angry?

And the guy's like, well, you need to choose your words better. Like as if as a comedian, you're supposed to walk up to somebody you're gonna lampoon and go hey are you good with these five jokes because you know like come on like that's not gonna happen it's fucking odd and it's fucking annoying because it's stand-up comedy it's um even 10 years ago if someone had said oh my god did you hear about these people getting hurt at a comedy show what what happened it's like well their their feelings were hurt yes did someone get trampled what happened it was like the who show like no there was so well it happened this weekend with chapelle again so chapelle was playing the open for john millennia as a surprise because it was down the road from columbia yeah yeah and they lost their minds over like everybody runs to social

media i was not expecting this and i did not want this like come on i saw it i was i was reading tweets on a flight here to nashville and i saw something about a guy tweeting um uh i did not expect this but chapelle came out and made jokes and I didn't know what to do when 18,000 people were laughing at the jokes. And I replied to that person. I said, oh, why were the 18,000 people laughing? Was it funny? I think you're supposed to laugh. I'm not sure.

By the way, Chappelle, I remember after I met him in like 98. And I knew he had a place out in ohio and this is before the chapelle show i'm doing uh headlining a weekend at the improv in cleveland and i only knew that chapelle was in ohio and i called him up and i reminded of him this of uh when i saw him last summer he saw him do a show at uh in vegas and i said you remember what you said to me when i came to ohio for the first time? I called you up and I go, hey, dude, I'm in Cleveland, man. I know you're out here in Ohio.

So if you want to swing by and hang out or if you want to do a set, man, let's hang out. Do you remember what you said to me? And he goes, no. I go, you go, Craig, do you know how big Ohio is? It's like, oh, and he lived in a town that was like hundreds of miles away near dayton ohio and i was like oh shit i didn't know i thought i was like i'm in ohio you're in ohio let's hang out like i had no idea yeah but um but yeah people taking shit seriously have you ever been scared of a listener not really been annoyed but i've

never been like overly like afraid like so actually let's hold on to that because we got 30 seconds so metallica yeah no problem keep everything tight especially when i'm used to doing long form talk where i can go for like 40 minutes at a time it's like you got 30 seconds what can you do in that no worries at all cool thanks dude so again you've gumped your way into many things in life like you are like forced gump you show up in these places before you know you're living with eddie van halen or your best friends with george carlin or you're opening for metallica how does that happen how do you end up opening for metallica the way open for metallica is such a crazy crazy moment because i used to work at a rock station in New York at K rock in New York. Our midday guy there, Woody ended up doing afternoons in St. Louis. And when I came to

St. Louis to do shows, he told me, when you get here, you can come on and do my whole show with me. Just hang out, just come and hang out like you do with me. And I get into St. Louis on a Friday and I start driving to the station to hang out with my buddy. And on the way over, my buddy has a phone call in the studio from Lars Ulrich, which he knows is huge. So he keeps Lars on the phone without playing any music, without playing any commercials and with no delay. And Lars is dropping some doozies live on the air in St. Louis. And I'm entertained by it. I'm like, wow, this is crazy. They just came out with an album called St. Anger.

And so he's calling in to promote it. And I'm driving to the station for like a half hour. He's still on the phone. I get in the building. He's still on the phone. They let me up into the studio. He's still on the phone. I walk in.

I see my buddy and I go, dude, are you, am I still coming on? And he goes, I can't get rid of it. Because I don't. And then, so we hatched a plan on how to get rid of Lars while Lars was talking to St. Louis. And then my buddy goes, hold on. He goes, he goes, grab that other microphone. Hey, hey, Lars, let me.

Yeah. That is incredible. Yeah, I got, I got you. No, no, no. Let me just cut you off for one second for those of you joining the broadcast we have lars ulrich from metallica live on the phone from his house in san francisco and lars you're not going to believe this but we have a couple people and he starts pointing towards the microphone he goes we have uh paul stanley and gene simmons from kiss

are in the studio and i'm waving him off like no no no and he goes yeah they're in the studio and I'm waving them off like, no, no, no. And he goes, yeah, they're in the studio and they're mad at you. They want to talk to you. And Lars goes, is that really Paul Staley, Gene Simmons from Kiss? And they go, yeah. Say hi, guys. Hey, Lars, this is Paul Staley. And this is Gene Simmons from Kiss. And I'm going to get right to the point lars a lot of people steal from kiss you know it i know it but i think on the new metallica record you've gone a little too far and i'll give you a perfect example i want you to name one metallica song on the new record that you think is completely original and he goes i think all the songs are pretty original right but if you had to pick one song what would it be and he goes if i had to pick one song i guess it would be and he gave me a song title and i said that's a great song lars but i'm gonna be honest with you i liked it a lot better the

first time i heard it when it was called beth and he goes how do you hear beth in the middle that doesn't make any sense that you hear Beth in the middle of a Metallica song. And he started arguing with a fake Paul Stanley and a fake Gene Simmons. My buddy who's on the air says, hey, guys, guys, we just interrupt for one second. Lars, we have a talk radio station next door that has a movie critic every Friday who reviews new movie releases that gets real movie stars to come into the studio. And we actually have his guest in the studio now. It's Christopher Walken. Do you mind having him on?

Is that really Christopher Walken? It is. I love Metallica because I love cocaine. And he starts arguing with the fake Paul Stanley, fake Gene Simmons. He's talking to a fake Christopher Walken. At some point,'m doing a fake phil and sammo and yelling at him and then my buddy goes hey you're not gonna believe this sam kinnison just walked in the studio and i said

hey um lars i don't know if you remember this but um we used to party back in the 80s until you stole all my coke oh and lars just went didn't that guy like die 15 years ago and we go yeah man it's really weird and then we finally do a big reveal hey lars sorry it's a comedian named craig gas and i said lars that was not my idea i'm sorry and lars goes are you gonna be in st louis when we get there and i said no i live in new york so i will not be here when you get here. And he said, well, I'd love to hang out with you the next time you come to Metallica show. And I said, I would love to hang out with you, man. That's awesome. And a week later, I'm back home in New York and our producer, Gary DeLamati walked up to me and said, Hey, so kind of a funny story, but, uh, one of the guys in Metallica is trying to get ahold of you, man. You better call

this guy. And I called this phone number and this guy said, I don't know who you are, but Lars wanted me to call you and fly you to Denver to host a radio show with him, which is a promotion for the new album. And Lars and I became friends. And then they announced shortly after that they were going to do a private show in New York, only giveaways. You had to be in Metallica fan club to get tickets. And I called up Lars and said, if Metallica had any balls,

they would let a comedian open for him. And just like the George Carlin messages, I saved my Lars messages. And he said, Hey man, it's Lars. I got your message. And yeah, man, I talked to James and Kirk and some of the other guys and let's have you come down and do a couple 10, 15 minutes, whatever it is you do. And let's have some fun huh

huh and i got to open for metallica by the way that was the clean version of that story if you want to hear the full uncensored version come out to the wind down this weekend and you'll hear it it's uh it's awesome all the infos that get gas playing stadiums at that point like are you in football stadiums oh my god not only was in a football stadium, this is a really bad story, but I go into the football stadium. It's at, it's where the Broncos play is where they ended up playing their show. And his assistant came out and got me and brought me backstage.

And Lars goes, Hey man, call me to meet everybody. James Kirk and Trujillo all sitting in one table with Lars and a security guy. And he goes to, this is the guy who does all the impressions. And Josh,

you know, this I've always been able to do any voice that I hear because I grew up in a deaf family and I couldn't learn how to talk for my family. I learned how to talk by watching TV and copying all the voices I heard on sure. And Lars goes, Hey man, this is Craig.

He's the guy who does all the voices. And check it out. His whole family is retarded. I go, they're not retarded. They're deaf. And he goes, deaf, retarded, whatever. His whole family is retarded. I go, no, dude, you are messing my story up. Yeah.

But yeah, so again, wind down this weekend. You know what? We've done this before. But if you have room, I want to come back in later this week and and join you why not why not uh wind down uh nashville.com or go to get gas.com get gas with two s's.com craig gas josh in a show stay there god damn i really enjoy the the large story yeah me too had you had i told you that story before did it ring a bell the uh not the one about woody because i know who would woody is on all the alt stations yeah yeah um so i didn't know i didn't know that story i knew the one about the uh like

this the guy that does the voices i knew that one but oh yeah yeah because his whole family's retarded yeah that's great shit yeah dude he uh woody went from middays at k-rock to middays in st louis then he did mornings in st louis with a another guy from our station named risuto yep and risuto used to be our promotions guy he was the guy i would hit up for movie passes and free cds and stuff yep and then um and then risuto uh after woody said well i'm going toizzuto stayed behind, and he took over mornings and actually got a successful morning show. He's got a huge morning show in St. Louis, which you don't – when you see one anchor, you can't see a co-host becoming the anchor. And he did it, and he's crushing it.

And now Woody's on on like a thousand radio stations as well yeah that's the gig i need to get like syndication like not even just syndication so much but like uh like in that format for instance it's a little bit younger of a format too not i really don't like alt rock i know that the states i don't really care about 21 pilots and shit like that's not really my music i prefer this music but like it's uh more current if that makes sense like you're more modern you're kind of talking to a younger audience if that makes sense you know does the business end of it annoy you do without naming any names is there any one program director that really stands out to you in other words the program director is the boss at

the radio station is there any one program director that just didn't seem to know what the fuck he was doing? I worked for a lot of smart people, even though we didn't get along. The people in Houston at the sports station I was at the second time, I don't think they even knew what I did when they hired me. They're like, oh, this guy just got fired in Philly. He was in Houston. He had huge numbers before in Houston. So let's bring him in. And then I don't think they had any clue what i did they just wanted me to be there to kind of you know they didn't want

me to be critical of the teams that were on the station any of that and i'm like whatever they had no clue what i was doing and then there was a lot of jealousy there my boss in philly used to run a radio station called wysp you know wysp it became wip the station i was on when they flipped it to sport in that building many times yeah the 400 market is where we uh were at the end there then we had um we also went in uh my he also programmed klsx in los angeles when it was talk right okay no keep i was like keep going because the conversation yeah yeah talking about assholes and radio yeah this is good people want to hear so we ended up uh he programmed klsx which was i believe the fourth or fifth stern market in the early 90s so basically my old boss andy

bloom is his name so andy bloom put stern on in philly and philly was the second market he was on there in washington yeah and then when andy moved from philly i believe he actually started in philly before he went to dc he did yeah that's what i'm saying so he was in philly then to dc and then they eventually added la in the early 90s like 90 91 and andy was the program director there that brought him on as well so he was my pd so he's very smart guy uh then they whacked him there when i was still there and then i just lost my mind and got myself fired they're just doing dumb shit because i just didn't want to be i was gonna say because by the time i got to philly andy was not there and by the time i got to la and he was not there either

yeah but i remember hearing early on from radio people uh some great advice that i remember uh getting to use shortly after which is i was sitting in on a huge radio show for a week in a town where i was performing and what was the radio show i i don't want to say because it'll give away who the program director okay i don't want to say but the um uh the program director grabs me in the hallway and they'd already said hey you know if you'd like to you could just be on the show for a week and i'd love to and the pd stops me in the hallway after day one or day two and says, Hey, Greg, doing a good job.

You're doing good. Listen, when you're, you know, you want to do more of this and less of this. Like he was telling me how to do radio. Sure. And I learned early on to go, oh, I didn't even think about that. You know what? That's amazing. And then just do the

opposite and just keep doing what you're doing keep doing what you're doing yeah and surprisingly after the next show still doing what i've been doing he sees me in the hallway and he goes craig good stuff team player but i think that's in any business i think in any business if you just let the boss think that they gave you the idea yes they're not listening like i got a good pd here like jonathan's a very smart guy that's our pd here like and he actually listens and wants to do good stuff the problem is like a lot of these guys they just they don't give a damn like i mean all they want to know is that they told you to do something and you're doing it right and i do think that's in any business like you could work at jc penny and say hey you want to ring this up a

little bit different over here you go sure i'll do that and then you just dick around and they go hey good job good on you it's just about stroking people i've that's what i that's what i've struggled to learn in life is it how to manipulate and stroke people because me i'm more of like a blunt like i'm not doing that shit like i thought i was big shit you know and feeling like i'm not doing the dumb shit you want me to do and then you know all you gotta do is tell them hey i'm gonna do this you're right um like i worked with a, like I worked with a guy, his name was spike Eskin is his name. And he became the PD after my boss got fired and I don't have anything against him anymore, but I was just trying to blow up my whole situation there and get out when my boss got whacked. And we were doing the show together at one point before Andy, we got fired there. And, um, he would, I would, I was the lead of

the show. And one day he goes, I can tell you didn't prep for the show today and you don't have any notes or anything and it just doesn't sound good i can tell that you didn't do it i said okay fine i come back the next day and i just hammer it at the opening because that was fucking great i go you want to see my notepad on that and i held it up there was nothing on it i'm like i don't need like the point is like it's not about prepping or writing a bunch of it was just whether or not i wanted to do it on that particular day and he would get pissed to me like you're a dick i'm really whatever you know it is what it is but yeah like it is stroke people if i just went like i should have just gone you're absolutely right i'll work harder on that that's a good idea let me come in tomorrow and do it better but

instead i'm like just so you know asshole i can do great when i want to and shitty when i want to and i'm shitty on purpose today like i'm just an asshole when it comes to that it's why i'm fascinated with people's jobs who are like uh like a record producer and the ability to finesse sensitive egos the other side of it sure because i have met great pds i've met program directors who are brilliant and have built powerhouse radio stations their balls are cut off now too i mean they're only a handful of pds seemingly in the world anymore and a lot of people are afraid of their own shadow too that's an important part here too is like they don't want to mess anything up they're just trying to you know get paid until the wheels fall off the radio basically like until it ends and when did you start in radio well let's see i started doing uh full oh six oh five okay and then i've been around

it my whole life though because my dad does radio yeah then i've been around it my whole life though because my dad does radio yeah so i've been around it since you know i was 10 years old so had you always wanted to do radio because your dad yeah oh i take that back there was a stretch where i wanted to do i wanted to make movies so about 1998 i wanted a video camera i was like dawson's creek i was like james vanderbeek and dawson's creek just wanted to make movies okay in particular i was really into hitchcock i wanted to make horror movies no shit so i had a video camera like me and my buddy would reenact the shower scene you want to talk about something that looked gay a friend of yours in the shower you come in with a camera and you're stabbing him with a fake knife and he's like he's in his swimming trunks in the shower all right now let's

pull each other's dicks yeah like it's what it was though like like why is this guy killing another guy in the shower and that's like a gay porn um and so it was so that's what we would do and i would make movies stabbing him in the butt with his dick i don't think that's a knife bro uh yeah so that's what we would do and that's what i wanted to do here's a story you'll find amusing so my dad bought me this video camera for christmas it was like i got a video camera finally and it was one of those the the recorders that has the little tape that goes in the big tape and you put it in the vhs so the vcr to watch it so he got me this for christmas christmas day my dad goes josh you need to borrow your camera for a little bit i go okay fine whatever you bought it no. So he sets the camera up in his bedroom on a tripod, right? And he and my stepmom go to the bedroom with the tripod set up.

It's kind of obvious what's going to happen. I'm 12, 13. I'm not dumb. So from what I gather, they go in there and they pound it out on tape, right? And then dad comes out. Yeah, whatever. I got to go. Whatever.

Leaves the camera set up in there and everything. So I go in and I don't know why i had this morbid curiosity but i went looking for the tape and it wasn't in the the the recorder and i go digging around and i find it my dad you know those old like metal coca-cola uh like um like coolers like old school that you buy in an antique shop and then he put the old crate on top of that, the bottle crate, the metal one, and made like a table out of it. I removed the top part, and in the little cooler was this tape. And I go, it's on now.

Because my stem on was pretty high. This is 1998. She looked good. She had like the big 80s hair. I mean, she's pretty hot. And I said, you know what? I'm going to watch this. I got to commit to it so

i put the tape into the bigger tape put the tape in the vcr and i'm sitting down i'm going popcorn i'm like well let's see what i got let's say pop some corn ready to go got my vaseline over here got my popcorn over here and i tell you i put that thing in and have you seen airheads with brendan frazier remember when they go into the radio station to get their song played and it's on the reel-to-reel and the reel-to-reel eats it yeah that is exactly what happened the tape got god and and sorry and i didn't see it but here's the problem now i have to go to my dad and explain why his homemade erotica has been eaten and is you can't watch it so dad you're not gonna believe this but i uh here's your tape it's like sorry i ruined your homemade porn tape lieutenant dan like that's what it was like oh man yeah so i never saw and people are like why did you want to see it like

your dad i'm like i don't want to see my dad banging it out i wanted to see my stepmom it wasn't my real mom what's there's no category on the hub that says real mom stepmom's a great one did you move around a lot we lived in nine cities i think by the time i was about 10 okay so i started in radio and stand-up in 1993 and every radio guy i knew was telling me dude you just missed it like it was such a party right before they always say that when i got in and when i started doing full-time stuff in 05 yeah a couple years ago man it was still rocking but now it's and i can tell you firsthand it's dead now like there's no party like so if i ever tell someone that gets into it today i'll be like yeah you missed the party when did it end 1993 yeah i didn't live it either because i do know that

they would have sex with listeners in the studio they do drugs in the studio they could play whatever they wanted yeah they had some autonomy they could actually uh hey i want to turn you on to a new band i've discovered and it just got more and more corporate over the years and and and because of the times that we live in you can't just invite listeners to come in and have sex. America. Let me tell you. Thanks, 2020. We're living in a different time.

Thanks, liberals. And same thing, by the way, in comedy. I started comedy at the same time. Everyone was like, dude, you just missed it. apparently in the 80s it was very common to hear at the end of a week at a comedy club to sit down with the comedy club owner and have them get ready to pay you by saying uh do you want to get paid in green or white oh yeah and all the stories i used to hear about radio were like dudes would have blow just out on the board they're banging some chick from behind guys got like a rail on a record and just starts the record and he's like yeah yeah like doing a rail is that the record spins like everything it seemed like the

coolest gig ever and then you have to explain to people now like it really isn't i mean it's a very square job it's not i mean it's a job and it's a nice job and i make money doing it but it is a square job like it's no one does that kind of stuff. And most people aren't mean anymore. Like, like in the 90s, everybody was a dick. Man cow was a dick. Stern was a dick. ONA were dicks. Like, that's what it was.

It was edgy and you were dicks and everybody got made fun of. And now, like, everybody's just kind of nice. And like, hey, let me tell you this great story from today, man. I just saw that some 90-year-old woman got out of her wheelchair to help a kitten down from a tree, and the kitten was gay. And she's a Republican. I'm like, wow. And that's what it is now. You've got to be nice, and

people aren't jerks anymore. There's a podcast I listen to called How Did This Get Made? And it's with Paul Scheer and Jason Mantzoukas, and they watch shitty movies and make fun of them basically and I'm listening to an episode from about eight years ago and they're like it's from Justin to Kelly that they're breaking out Kelly Clarkson's movie okay and they're shitting on it and she's fat and

she's this and I'm like that's only about eight years ago oh it was a different world eight years ago eight years ago people were still dicks now if you're even remotely dickish it's like you're horrible and you're canceling your bad person you know it's a weird time to be living in uh also i want to point out when you're talking about radio some of the shittiest treatment like the worst i got fired stories are in radio sure because the radio guy getting fired is always the last one to know because you don't want someone to still have their job and a microphone when they have you heard the examples of the ones who have there's a couple there's a there's a top 40 chick there was a chick named ianetta the mood setter who was like bitch i'm out yes he goes ianetta will no longer be set in the mood.

And there was a rock guy down in like Tampa, I think, and he lost his mind. He was like, this fucking company is terrible, and they lied to my face, and fuck you. And then he just leaves. And like, Ionetta, she at least hit the jingle and went to commercial. Yeah. This guy just left dead air.

And he was, and in the middle of his rant, he goes, and you would think, you know how I know no one's listening i've been at this for four minutes shitting on these people and no one has even come down the hall to tell me to stop no one is listening he's like god this is great wow yeah i remember some of the um one of them was uh buffalo new york uh i don't know if i ever told you this one that um there was a a heritage rock station been around for decades and there's signs all over the station saying uh mandatory meeting this friday at 6 p.m at the mexican restaurant down the street sales people on-air people everyone's required to meet this meeting at

friday at 6 p.m and so at 5 p.m when the office closes everybody gets their stuff they head down to the mexican restaurant and their boss is standing in front of everybody and say, hey, so we wanted to have you guys get together here so we could talk to you. You might have heard some rumors. And it's true. Starting on Monday, we're going Spanish. And everyone was like, you took us to a Mexican restaurant to tell us that we're going like nobody. People were laughing. They were making jokes. They're pointing at the wait staff and going,

is that our new morning show? And, and they think it's a joke. It's it's so ridiculous that they think it's funny. And then it starts to set in that this is a real thing. And someone goes, I have a question. So we're all fired. Cause I actually need to go back to the office because there are some items from my home that are at my desk so i need to go back in the building and they said oh we actually took care of that and people started walking with boxes at 5 p.m when everybody clocked out they had people going through the office and throwing all your shit in a box and putting your name on the box and saying, here's your box.

Here's your box. Here's your box. To tell you the future of the radio station, we've got a mariachi band here, and they're going to sing. When I got fired in Philly, they brought me in. And firings don't take long. They take two seconds. You go in, they go, they had an HR person next to me, and they fired me. Their reason they fired me is because I posted a picture of Al Jolson on my Twitter. Let me rewind. So the other radio station was apparently using voice actors for calls. And

one of them was a white guy doing a very stereotypical black voice. So I was making fun of them. And it was a story in Philly, like, oh my God, it's a minstrel show. So I posted a picture of Al Jolson and I said, well, we found the caller to 97 five right here. And it's a story in Philly, like, oh my God, it's a minstrel show. So I posted a picture of Al Jolson and I said, well, we found the caller to 97.5 right here. And it's like, well, they use that as an excuse to fire me. So they brought me in and said, yeah, we're firing you for the Al Jolson picture. And I said, all right, cool. That was all they said. I got up and they said, also, we're going to need the truck. Cause I had a truck that was doing endorsement. So I was driving it for free, but they're like, we're going to need your truck right now.

And I go like, right now my stuff's in it. They're like, yep. We're going to have someone get that out of your truck for you, but you need to find a ride home because like, and to make a point, because I don't know why I did this because my, the station in Philly was maybe five, six miles from my house. Okay. I walked home. I said, fuck you.

I'm walking home. My wife calls. She goes, do you want me to come pick you up? I said, no, I'm making a fucking point fucking point i walked all the way on five miles you know how philly's set up with like the the river yeah so i walked down by the rocky steps i walked down by the the river i walked all the way to an area called manayunk the least inspirational rocky walk and all i'm doing is reading my social media, people celebrating that I got fired. Fuck this guy. This piece of shit's finally gone.

Yeah, fuck him. And my dad calls me. Did you get fired? Like, yeah. Like, what are you doing? I'm walking home, like five miles home. And, you know, that was in Houston when I got fired. I've only been fired twice.

People think it's more, but it's only been twice. Now, granted, I've only had three jobs, but I got fired at Houston and they bring me in me, my wife who was on the show and my radio guy, Jim, who did all the wacky stunts and stuff. And we, they sat us down and said, all right, we're going to let you guys go. I go, okay, is that it? Yep. And I go, why?

I asked him why? Like business decision. I said, okay, fine. What do you need? Well, we have to escort you out. Like, what am I going to do? Like, do do they think i'm gonna like shoot up the place do they think i'm jerry mcguire am i gonna like deliver a mission statement to people and who's coming with me it's like i know you guys why are like they basically grab you by the arm and say sorry time for you to go and they

take your key card they kick you to the curb and then it's over it's so demoralizing it's such a shitty way to treat people but it feels like when bob dole got his got kicked out of the real world on the the norm mcdonald bit on snl oh when he was on north when he was doing bob dole on the real world he's like well bob dole's gonna take bob dole's chair like that was me i'm like well i need my wacky wheel somebody give me my wheel that's another set of stories i got to come back with is some norm stories because norm was uh the best norm told me a really funny but depressing story about rodney dangerfield that uh rodney was uh the more you learn about rodney the more you realize he was very depressed and he was he was like a miserable i think that it shows though like if you really

like look deep into the comedy i think it's it's kind of noticeable right like do you have to be kind of miserable to be a comedian in a way i don't think so well you don't seem miserable but i i don't watch you cutting yourself every night either listening to the cure i'm pretty easy going and my comedy comes from a pretty happy place was carlin angry like at the end and the end he was the angriest like uh it's bad for you was the stand-up dude and i'm watching this and i'm like i don't know that this is funny it's just really angry it was so unhappy even when he took that turn in 92 with jamming in new york which is brilliant which is early 90s stuff it's it's very good early 90s

where he says screw the planet screw you know we think that after all these billions of years of all these things that have happened on the planet that a couple of plastic bags are gonna save it and it was brilliant but starting to get angrier which is where he started to lose me a little bit yeah and he was so angry in the end but why why was he angry you knew him i you know it's weird because again he i have this friend named shelly who's one of my best friends and i don't know why i passed along this message but shelly says to me hey the next time you talk to george can you do me a favor and tell him i'm not happy with the whole thing he did about fuck plastic bags and fuck recycling and i was like okay and i don't

know why i don't even do comedy for a couple years at that point i go hey george and i fucking told him i said my friend shelly doesn't like your comedy piece about recycling and he goes well you know i do recycle and i said you do and he goes yeah it makes me feel good he goes, well, you know, I do recycle. And I said, you do? And he goes, yeah, it makes me feel good. He goes, my garbage guy. He goes, my garbage guy caught me and said, hey, George, I didn't think you did it. I didn't think you did this stuff. And I looked at him and I said, every little bit helps, right? And he said, and it's because he said, I love people.

I love people so much. And I think he was disappointed in us as a society because of what we do as groups is what he was disappointed in and he didn't like what we became uh as groups with an agenda that's what he was disappointed in but i still am an optimist i'm still a glass is half full person so i don't relate to that but he was so dark in the end and i regret that and he just looked and he was old and hunched over and wearing like oversized you know black shirt and sweats and black shoes it's bad for you and like but like if you go to those early 90s ones he's looking fit he's got the shirt tucked into the black jeans slicked back by like right off of bill and ted yeah he

looked really good he did have a dark sense of humor i remember when i first met him was in 93 90 yeah it was 93 that new year's eve george was doing new year's at bally's and i went to the show because my biggest thing was i now know George Carlin and my comedian friend, Josh Wolf would say, you know what that means that George wants to help you. And I said, yeah,

it means I'm never paying for a George Carlin show for as long as I live. That's all I cared about was going to see George Carlin perform over and over again for free. So I went to go see him on new year's Eve, the early show, someone had a seizure and had to be carried out on a gurney. And I remember telling him,

this is 1993. I go, there was a woman that was carried out on a gurney and i remember telling him this is 1993 i go there was a woman that was carried out on a gurney i don't know she survived and george goes yeah good and he and i go what and i'm only doing comedy for a few months at that point and he goes you know think about all the years i've been traveling around the country and around the world doing shows and if you think about the hundreds of thousands millions of people that have come to see me over the years statistically you realize there has to be percentage of people who

went to the shows that never made it home and if i never came to town they'd still be alive and i went jesus that's terrible and then like it took me time to realize there is humor in everything but i just thought that was a little too dark for me at the time and where he landed. And I don't want to give anything away, but you're heading right towards it right now, because in part two of the documentary, they cover all of what you're saying and all the way to starting right now.

Yeah. And several comedians, including one big surprise analyzes that they think that George is actually a good person. And the person they think that George is actually a good person. And the person who says that George is a good person is going to blow your mind. But the, the story I wanted to tell you though, Norm McDonald before I leave Norm had Rodney showed up to do a hit on weekend

update when Norm was doing weekend update. And then when Rodney showed up on Saturday night, he was upset about having to do a rehearsal uh saturday night live at 8 p.m every saturday does a two and a half hour show in front of a live studio audience and then they cut an hour of stuff that doesn't work and make it a 90 minute show at 11 30 at night okay so they actually do two performances that night uh where they run through all the sketches and more that's a pain in the ass um yeah but it's also getting an idea of like what what works when you see in front of a live audience what actually is working all right so we'll keep this keep this cut this cut this cut this sure and uh rodney didn't want to do he's

like i know what i'm doing why do i have to come back twice like let's just i'll just be here at 11 30 and norm was like yeah but you can't they you know this is the way we do things you just got to go through it and you and we just need to see what works and rodney goes i know what works i know it works because yeah but you can't and so they sit there in the in the in his dressing room and he said rodney goes yeah i'll tell you it's all shit norm it's all shit tv is shit movies are shit comedy that's all we got me and you comedy is where it's at and then they sat there in silence for two minutes and rodney goes yeah comedy shit too what the fuck man what are you that it's a funny story but genuinely makes me sad oh that's great

rodney couldn't see the beauty in stand-up comedy and how what a fucking gift it is but it's also weird to look back at a guy like rodney and realize that guy's not sharing anything about himself he's just standing behind a barrage of one-liners yeah it's all one-liners and it's all like generic one like oh let me tell you about my wife type of stuff there's no like his is not raw comedy where you're digging deep into a guy's soul to get the humor which is what comedy is today correct well i comedy today is that and it's also like anti-trump shit all the time which is i'm not like pro like saying i'm pro-trump or anything but what i'm saying is like it's lazy it's like well let me tell you

about the conservatives it's like well give me something else you know late night talk shows lean more that way but stand-up comedy that's going right down the middle will avoid uh trump stuff and and politics in general because you want to sell tickets to both sides you want to sell tickets everybody sure and comedy like to get a special is more personal now sure more about there was a gal i watched on netflix i watched about half of it and i forgot her name but she's just telling stories about how she's on antidepressants and i'm like laughing my ass off at this i'm like this is good like about how her dad doesn't get that she has anxiety and stuff forgot her name i wonder who that i don't know she was a cute chick and she was doing i forgot what it was you know who i love though is uh nikki glazer i was gonna say nikki glazer i love her i'm trying to think of what was the funny every time i hear a good line i always want to share it

and for some reason the only one i can think of right now is a line that i heard from flea that i just started calling so many people about. They were doing an interview with Howard and Howard goes, you know what I loved is I love when you guys did that music video where from the beginning of the video, you are in black and white, you're a sixties band, like an Ed Sullivan type band. And then you turn into a hippie band and then they kind of go through the eras of like 80s they have the big hair and makeup and then the 90s and and then chili peppers today and they discuss the making of this video and flea said he goes the one era that i had a tough time with on that video shoot was the 80s because i didn't like any music from the 80s and i told john our guitar player i said how do i look like an 80s rock star and john sincerely thought about

it and said um you want to look surprised all the time he goes like you're really surprised about everything you want to look really like shocked and surprised i thought that was the funniest fucking line that's great but uh yeah dude i'll be back later this week and just text me and let me know when you want to come in thank you sir