The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan - Mark Laita - Soft White Underbelly | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan

Episode Date: May 14, 2025

Billy Corgan sits down with Soft White Underbelly creator Mark Laita for a probing, in‑depth talk about why Laita documents society’s “invisible” people. Laita traces the project back to his Chicago‑area upbringing, teen fascination with street life, and long career as an ad and music photographer. He describes approaching subjects without judgment, the adrenaline of gaining their trust, and the hard lesson that most don’t want help. The pair dig into systemic roots of homelessness and addiction, the fentanyl surge, why real reform must start with kids’ self‑worth, and the limits of charity. They also touch on ethics, Studs Terkel’s influence, and Laita’s plan to broaden his lens beyond Skid Row. The conversation ends on lighter ground with shared memories of Chicago rock shows, cheap‑ticket discoveries like Cheap Trick, and a jaw‑dropping early Van Halen set—underscoring how music and storytelling intertwine in both of their lives. https://www.youtube.com/@BillyCorganTMO Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoicesSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

So if your work didn't exist, what happens? Are these people in a better situation? Does the world get better without your work? At least to me, your work is one step in the right direction. They act like they want help or you think they need help, but at the end of the day, they really don't. What is the default there? Is it a lack of self-worth? That's really why I'm doing this.

That's really the core of it. The solution is not going to be fixing all these people that are already broken. Thank you so much for being here. I've been obsessed with your channel. I found it on YouTube, which is softweight underbelly, but you also have softweight underbelly.com. I do. Which is the subscription portal.

For those that don't know, and I'm obsessed with your channel, and everybody I've talked to, because I said I was going to interview you, that knows your channel, is obsessed with it too. So I don't know what it is about your channel, but it's pretty funny.

It's like once you go in, you can't get out. I try to keep myself off camera as much as possible, and I don't really let anybody know. know who I am, but I still get recognized now. Yeah, well, your voice is very distinctive. So I was in getting ready, and I heard your voice in the hallway, and I knew you were here because I know that voice. But for those that don't know, your channel, and I'm going to give you my characterization,

but I want you to correct me. Sure. You basically talk to people who don't get paid any attention to. I mean, we know there are people who are homeless. We know there are people who are drug addicts. We know there are pimps. Heck, the cops in every city know where the, where the prostitutes and the pimps hang out. It's not a secret. And you give them a voice.

And to me, a very warm, open way to tell their story, which is sort of surprising. There's no judgment. It's just to share your story. I was taken by that because it was nothing to me that felt exploitative. It's like, this is the real world that operates on the edge of the other world that we all pretend that we're in. Is that a fair? Yeah, that's one of the best assessments of what I do. Oh, thank you. That I've heard. And I really, not to make it about me, but I really resonate.

Some people know my father used to deal drugs. So I kind of lived at different times in that world, not me personally. But, you know, I would be in the kitchen and open a bag looking for something. There would be 14 pounds of weed, you know. And we lived always. Which was illegal back then? Oh, yeah. Very illegal.

It's probably still legal. You might more say it was cocaine. Well, there was that, too, but he tried to hide that. But I would go, you know, I would be told as a kid go in the basement, and they would party all night in the basement or something. I'd go in the basement, and there would be like a black Sabbath mirror with Coke and it rolled up $20 bill. And I was, you know, I was nine years old, but I was told to clean up.

But it became this thing. I knew enough to know that the powder on this was like, I would be in trouble if I got rid of that. So it's this weird thing of like, and then I would ask my dad questions. Like, well, what is that? oh, we were playing a game, or just lie to me. But eventually you figure out what's going on. Did you ever get tempted by that stuff?

No, not really. When I come on your show, we'll talk about my issues with drugs. I want to talk about your work. So I know that you were born in Chicago. I'm born in Detroit. I born in Detroit, but I moved to Chicago right after the Tigers won the World Series in 68, so I was a little kid. So I moved to Chicago in 68, 69.

we moved to what was Hinsdale at the time, but it was actually Darien. Okay. Hinsdale is a very wealthy suburb. It wasn't that. It was the exact opposite. And they've since changed the name to Hinsdale doesn't want it anymore, so now it's Daring. Is this a parents needed move for work or type of thing? Yeah, my dad used to work at General Motors styling in Detroit, and then he quit that job to become a sales rep for industrial racks. And that's what he was doing, and he had to be based in Chicago.

So even though we're slightly different ages, we grew up in the same world, which is this kind of... No, very, what suburb do you grow up at? Glendale Heights. Yeah, so you're a bike ride away from where I grew up. Yeah. I grew up in Southern Elmhurst, which is just a bike ride from Glendale. So I think that maybe that's partially why I vibe with your work, because we grew up in the suburban sprawl of the 60s, the promise of the suburb.

Get your family out of the city, get away from all the danger. Yeah, but there's something magical about being in a city like Chicago shares this with maybe New Jersey in that we're not New York City. We are not the king. We're second rate. And because you're second rate, you're focused on what is...

Well, it's also... Sorry to interrupt you, but it's also the thing with... You know, when we were growing up, especially when you only had four channels or three, you know, all you ever heard about was what New York cared about and what L.A. cared about.

Right. And so you grew up with sort of a little bit of a chip on your shoulder. That's not how we're doing it here. We do it differently here. Chicago's got a big chip on the show. And when did you first get interested in photography? I was always into art since I was walking, basically.

And at 14, I discovered photography. My dad had a camera in his bottom drawer and under the stereo. I said, hey, can I borrow that? Yeah, sure, go ahead. So I got some film, and I started playing around. And I just loved how photography. we captured, you know, it was like a scientific document. Like, if I take a photo of you today, that's what you look like on this day.

It's almost a scientific representation of who you are. But then if you put a beautiful backdrop or certain lighting or whatever, then you're stylizing it. So it's a little bit of art mixed with science. Yeah, if I can give you a compliment, you always do this bit in your videos. And they're varying lengths. They could be 15 minutes. They can be longer. There's always that moment where you do the photo reveal.

Yeah, yeah. And it's so interesting to me, and I love photography myself, that you'll hear the person talking and you show this photo. I end up with a different more humanistic perception of the person talking than I did watching them talk. Well, a photograph of somebody is such a different thing than a... But it's so remarkable because I've just watched this person talk for 10 minutes or 15 minutes. And then you flash that photograph, usually doing slow motion. Yeah.

It's like kind of a, the Ken Burns crawl down, right? And I'm always struck that I end up feeling more empathy for the person. And I feel like that's the real person. That's interesting. Like somehow you capture, and that's why you're a good photographer, but I'm saying you capture something that even them talking doesn't. Yeah, yeah. Photography is still.

Very powerful, right? Very powerful. I mean, I'm still a photographer. And these are still, in my view, these are still photographs. Yeah. I'm just, like my first book of portraits, because I've always been a, I worked in advertising my whole career for decades,

and then I realized, like I was always into people and photographing people, but I never did it professionally. I was always shooting products. And finally I decided to do a little side project. My first book, which was titled Create Equal, which is a collection of American portraits, went to each of the lower 48 states

and photographed everything that exists in the U.S. all the iconic, like a cowboy, ballerina, auto mechanic. Oh, like kind of American iconography? Yeah, yeah, basically. And polygamists in Utah paired with a pimp from Chicago. You know, a pimp with his three girls and a polygamous with his two wives. Or there were some kind of pairing that was poignant, hopefully, or just funny or interesting. Yeah.

And after that book came out, I would see people look at it, and they would just be like, oh, what does he look like? I want to hear what he sounds like. I want to know his story. How did he become a cowboy? You want to know more. You want to hear more. Was that sort of the germ for doing video? That was the, and I realized if I ever do this again,

it was a monumental project crossed me tons of, took years off my life, it was so difficult. But I said if I ever do that again, if I ever get up the gumption to do that again, I'm going to have to do some kind of written word or video or something that explains who the person is. Oh, interesting. So then I kind of quit my advertising career

and I'm selling a house. I just sold it recently. And I figure, you know, once I saw that house, I probably won't have to do a whole lot more in terms of making money, but I just wanted to do something to occupy the three or four years.

It was a spec house. So it's going to take three or four years to build. And while that was being built, I said, let me start this soft one underbelly thing. Let me just, I was playing around with video before that, but never did anything with it. And then I started this, and it just, I honestly thought,

I'm just doing this for the fun of it, 15 people are going to discover it and think it's cool. And then XCNO, I've got a thousand people. A thousand people find this shit interesting? I just, like, it's so dark and so clear. I just didn't think an interview of a pimp would be anything. But that one got 100,000 views. And I didn't look.

And then I looked like a year later and had 100,000 views. I'm like, I should do more of these. So then when I started selling the house, I started building the house, I got serious about it and just started shooting every day. You shot how many videos at this point? I've done like over 8,000 in five, five and a half years. One step back, I read that you started shooting people in kind of underrepresented communities when you were a teenager. When I was like a teenager, just getting into photography, I was fascinated.

We grew up in Chicago. I'm sure you were downtown all the time like I was. Oh, yeah. So you'd go downtown. You wouldn't see this in the suburbs, but downtown you'd see at the time, this was 70s, mid-70s, late 70s. you'd see these alcoholics on the street sitting on a cardboard. Yeah, just sitting on whatever with their paper bag with alcohol on it. And I'm like, what?

Like, I didn't grow up like that. I didn't grow up like the childhood you had. I had really solid parents, for the most part. My dad was a little rough at times. But I'd see that. And like, that's fascinating to me. I want to know more. I'm just, I was fascinated.

But I was also too immature. Did you see other photographers who'd shot stuff like that? I don't think of that. I don't think it was that. It was just I saw them on the street. Because you would see them every time you go downtown, kind of like you see homeless people now. And I would just remember being fascinated by it. And I'm like, I would steal photographs from them.

Sometimes they'd see me and they'd get upset or whatever. But it was always just like, oh, my God. How did you, because I was going to ask you this in a different way, but I think it's worth talking about now. It's like, when you see people on the street, would you approach them? No. I was too immature to do that. Would you do that now? No, I think I've told the story before.

and I went to the Hells Angels clubhouse in Oakland and just knocked on their door in the morning, woke them up, and still got them to do what I wanted. So I'm willing, I can go to anybody now. I can go to absolutely anybody. Do you find if you just ask them to directly, can I take your photo, they're cool with it? There's something about when you believe

that what you're doing is good for them and good for you and good for the world, then there's nothing to slow you down. There's nothing, like people can really, like if I'm here to like, figure out how I can get money out of you, you're going to feel that. Yeah. But if I'm here just to honor who you are and where you come from and who, like, what you want

in the world, I know that I believe deep down in my subconscious that I'm doing something that's good for you. Sure. And that will be, you'll pick up on that when I approach you. And that makes the whole thing flow. That's why everybody says yes. So as you mentioned, you walk away from this kind of career in commercial photography. And I don't know much about it, but I know enough about it to like, you know, some guy over

over your shoulder going, you know, the shoe doesn't look quite good enough. Yeah, that's what it turned into, for sure. And like you said, you end up doing this work, and it kind of takes on an organic life of its own. When you first started kind of like, let's call it, pulling back the Band-Aid a bit on this, let's call it a subculture, I don't even know what it's called. I think we all know it's there. We all see it when we're at the highway exit or something. The underworld of...

The underworld. And even I was struck the first time I sort of... traipsed into your world, you know, soft white underbelly. It's like it's a provocative title, you know, because it really is. It's this underbelly of the world. And I've had experiences in that world. And even there were times in my life where I was in not a great circumstance and I would encounter people who are doing sex works and stuff like that and talk to them. And it's fascinating because there's this whole kind of hustle thing. There's this whole kind of microeconomy that goes on. And of course, you often refer to the danger that these people are in

and how they'll put themselves in this kind of extreme circumstance. But what was your first reaction when you really started pulling back that did you find yourself? I can I put it, there's a voyeuristic aspect to the thing, right? For sure. Tell me about these crazy things. And you're still a passenger behind a window on some level, right? Yeah. But how did you start to, did it affect you?

Did you feel like I have to do more? Or like, what was the emotional? Well, see, I'm an adrenaline junkie. That's my, if I have a... So your dopamine guy. Yeah, yeah. Like, interviewing a... Are you a rock climber?

No, no, no. See, I'm not into any of that. Like, jumping from planes and all that. That doesn't do it for me. But going across the country to connect with some pimp that I know will be fascinating and he doesn't want to talk about it, but if I offer him enough money, he just might.

There's nothing I'd rather do in the way. world than that. Or it doesn't have to be a pimp. It could be the Ku Klux Klan in Tennessee. Sure. It could be a pedophile. But is the dopamine rush because you're, because you're, it's not, I'm not saying it's the danger of it because it's not quite the right word.

It's like finding something that other people, there's always something to learn from everybody, even the Klansmen. Like, what the fuck are we going to learn? We're going to learn that he probably was raised in a way that, they were very close-minded and he's not very open to other cultures, other lifestyles. So he just sees things this way and that's it.

And we're going to learn from that. And I just think that's fascinating. And to do it with no judgment makes it free. He almost thinks I'm one of them. Well, that's what makes it remarkable is you really resist the urge to proselytize or overly nudge. I mean, people, like I see it sometimes in the comments,

Mark, how can you not condemn him for all the terrible things he's done? That's not my job. That's your job as a viewer. You can do that in the comments. That's what the comments are for, full of hate. What I'm here to do is just make him feel comfortable. And you tell your story.

Yeah. So when I talk about, like, you're doing things with a young child, I'm not going to say, so what do you do when you rape that child? That's not going to get anywhere. He's just going to close off, and that's going to be the end of any kind of interesting conversation. But if I say, if I use a word, like, you know, so you're seducing this kid. Yeah. I'm not approving of any of this behavior in any way, but I'm just like trying to open up.

the conversation to think to show how he thinks and we're going to learn from how he thinks that right and it's and as 10 times out of 10 it stems from something that happened to him when he was six years old is there is there an altruistic sense that like you know what's the sunshine is the best disinfectant are you is you have a kind of a moral or altruistic hope yeah for yeah i'm definitely an optimist and i believe i believe in everybody and everything and i think it's all going to work out, which is a Pollyanna. It is, but the thing I would say, and I saw were, in some instances, people were critical of your work.

A lot of people are critical in my work. Sure. I'm not actually, obviously I'm asking you questions, but I'm actually not that interested in people's criticisms of your work. I don't find that very interesting because I deal with this a lot in my own thing. It's like, well, what do you get in the absence of? So if your work didn't exist, what happens? Are these people in a better situation?

Does the world get better without your work? At least to me your work is one step in the right direction. Even if it's just to confront the fact that we oftentimes in our beautiful, you know, air-conditioned SUVs, just roll past people without any consideration for how are these people ending up in these situations? And particularly out here in California, homelessness is a huge, huge, huge issue. issue and obviously controversially, state supported in many ways, you know, because there's a lot of controversy about whether it makes it worse or better. I was reading something recently, Paul Thoreau's books about a book about his travels through Africa. I don't know if you know

that author. He's a famed travel writer, and he had spent time in Africa in like maybe the 60s. And in early 2000s, he wrote a book, and he's very critical in the book of the African age agencies because he's basically saying they make the problem worse because the microeconomy just sort of figures out, oh, these people are passing out free money. So in a way, we get more money if our situation is worse. So they just sit around and just wait for the money to flow. Yeah. You're damned it either way. Right. So that's what I'm saying. And back to any kind of criticism you work. And I'm not here to defend you because I don't know you. But as somebody who's a fan of your work, to me, again, what happens if your work doesn't exist? Nothing happens.

The 13-year-old girl stays on the streets controlled by a gang member Pimp. Right. Have you seen any social or political action in reaction to your work? It would be nice if you saw some people saying, like, what can we do? And I really think the solution would require some major changes. Like, like, just look at, like, Chicago or L.A. has these. And I'm sure every big city has a community that is poverty-stricken. And very often that's African-American or maybe Hispanic too.

And you look at the, let's look at one family. You just plug one of the people I interview. Dad was in prison. Mom was on drugs or she was a sex worker. Sister was a sex worker. What am I going to do? My brother's a gang member. So it's like I'm just going to become a working girl.

There's no other options. no role models. There's no education. There's no option. She never saw a neighbor who was a nurse. She never saw somebody who became a lawyer or anything like that. Now, I've seen where, and I don't totally understand, so I need you to illustrate it, but you'll understand what I'm leading to, where you've gotten personally involved and tried to help people. I know there's GoFundMe's. Yeah, I'm not interested in some of the noise around that. I'm more interested in the, you know, like obviously, and I know you have children, you go home to your wife, you go home to your kids, like, what are you telling them, you

I mean, because now you're stepping past the camera. Now you're not a passive. Yeah, no, I mean. And how do you choose who to help? Well, I'm no longer married and that helps. Okay, I didn't know that, so I'm sorry. But even still, I started doing these kind of talks when I was still married. And this project was not the problem with the divorce at all.

I wasn't going to ask that question. No, it wasn't. But there are a handful of people who have gotten better either on their own or with my help. Okay. But you have to be really selective because for every of those 8,000 people, I can find maybe a handful that, like, really had potential to go from the situation they were into a situation that is really remarkable, remarkably different. But you have to, in that case, do you just trust your gut on that? You have to trust your gut. Is it a spiritual issue for you? Yeah, it's like you just, I'm not a spiritual person. I'm just, I don't believe in anything. I'm not trying to put anything out, but I find your work very spiritual.

Yeah, no, I believe in the things that. that Jesus taught, but I am the last person you'll see in a church. Yeah, I get it. But I'm saying it's a humanistic thing you're doing. Yeah, yeah. It's like I want other people to do better. I want to save them, but it's like you can only save so many and you'll go broke trying to save everybody.

So I'll find somebody who I think really has potential and I'll give them the housing, the support, the therapy. I think you'll know, because I don't remember this young lady's name, but there was a young lady that you tried to help. And then there was a follow-a video where you basically, she tells you that you're being built for thousands of dollars by her and her. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Can you talk about that a little bit? Sure. Because I think that would help people understand the dynamic of it. That's a great example. You do watch my channel. So this girl was a prostitute. And I have people on the streets who bring me people. So one day, like everyday people just bring me people.

And this one girl gets brought in. She was a very pretty young. And she was a very beautiful girl. Probably, well, here, I'll tell you what happened when I posted her video and you'll get an idea of how beautiful she was. You know, I did this interview with her and it was pretty boring, pretty straightforward, not as horrific as some of the other stories, not as tragic, but it was bad. She didn't have, like her mom was a sex worker and she went to the foster system very early.

I don't think her dad was even in her life or whatever, but just a really rough childhood. She became a sex worker at 13, I believe, and got pregnant with a sex, with a sex, a guy who's a sex offender, he's in prison now. I think she had two kids with him very early on. She has tattoos all over her beautiful face. Which is crazy. With the pimps' names on the... Yeah, that's the new thing, right?

They get the pimps name on their face. Well, the pimps are very rarely branding these girls with their names. It's usually the girls are so like, oh, I just love you, and I just want to worship you. And it's like, so I think it's that more than the pimps are forcing it. But it's... So I did this. interview with her is pretty standard, nothing really out of the ordinary, but I posted it, and it just took off. Ended up getting 20 million views. 20 million. So I didn't know that part of

this story. Yeah, 20 million views, and she got five marriage proposals. One of them was a guy who just listed all his assets, which were considerable. And he said, I would like to marry, offer. That's just as crazy in the opposite direction. People fell in love with this girl. And then, you know, I had this go-I-had, I no longer offer it, but I had a go-fund me that was connected with my channel. people watch these videos, they get heartbroken. Oh my God, I want to send her five bucks or 20 bucks or whatever. So you can do that. And it kind of relieves the...

Not to cut you off, but why did you stop doing it? Because it just caused too many headaches and problems. Too many. Yeah. So this leads into the story, right? I don't need what I'm doing to ruin my life. So, yeah, this is all connected. This was probably the first one that really went bad.

What's the young lady's name? Do you remember? Israya. But she went by the name Exotic. was her street name. Exotic was the very first video. But now I've done many more with her, and she goes by the name is Raya. That's her real name. And so I did that for his video. It got tremendous amount of attention, and she got $65,000 in donations. Every day, there'd be another $3,000, $4,000 coming in for her every day. What do I do with this? And I wasn't as an experience,

this was early on in my channel. I didn't know. like what to do with this, but it's her money. It's not mine. So let me, let me give it to her, but I'm letting her know, like, you, I'm giving this to you, but hopefully you're spending it in the right ways. And she'll always tell me the right things, but I'm sure she was probably coached by her pimp. And then at one point I got her housing. So she had like an apartment hotel type deal, away from the neighborhood. So I'm thinking I'm getting her away from the the bad I'm supporting her

financially so she doesn't really need to do anything other than take care of her kids and get her life straight and then she starts asking for more and more money and I'm like how much money does a 23-year-old kid need even though you have kids? And I threw some like just serendipitous things I found out that there was a black guy who was coming and going

in her apartment all the time and one thing led to another and I find out she's got a pimp. And then I eventually offered him a lot of money to come in and do an interview with her. So they're both on camera talking about how they scammed. That's the one I saw. Oh, they scammed me. Yeah. And so I had, it was her money. It was donated to her. So what am I going to do, not give it to her? Yeah. That's why I had to give her so much money. Well, what was hard to watch was not only watching her and credit to her, she's at least seems very honest in admitting that

she's been defrauding you. But you can hear your hurt behind the camera. Yeah, yeah. It's just, well, it wasn't my hurt. It's more my, I feel. I feel. bad for my viewers who donated their own hard work, harder than money. The way I took it was, you know, and I've certainly been in these situations where you genuinely are trying to help somebody and then you come to this kind of moment of like they don't really want to be helped. They don't want to be helped. It's a weird. I see that more often than like you take 20 people, 19 of them don't want to be helped. They'll say they want to help. Oh yeah, I just want to get better. I just want to go to rehab. I just want to get my family back. I want to get my life back together.

but when they're given the opportunities they self-destruct again. It's probably too broad a question, but it's worth the softball. Because I've experienced it many, many times, usually privately, where people reach out and ask for things. What do you think that is about the human condition

where it's like they act like they want help or you think they need help, but at the end of the day they really don't? What is the default there? Is it a lack of self-worth? That's really why I'm doing this. That's really the core of it. And I always like to get to the core of why people are doing what they're doing.

And why I'm doing this project, I think, is because, like, you look at a gambler, for example. But they're all the same, whether it's a heroin addict or a gambler or a sex worker or whatever. Why would you do this to yourself? You work your ass off, you make a lot of money, and you're gambling it all and destroying your own life. Like, what is behind that? That's just so fascinating to me. But you have a, I mean, we're just talking, but I mean, do you have a sense of why that is? It has to do with, like, how much love you received as a kid, how much, I mean, I think it's also some genetic component.

Like, sometimes people have borderline personality disorder and they're just reckless with their own existence. But if you're loved in a, like unconditionally by your parents, you're less, much less likely to do some of these crazy things that are just going to tear you down. So from your interest, you know, because you obviously have a level of personal perspective because you are talking to these people on a nearly daily level. What is your sense of what the state can do? Because obviously we're in a very progressive time in American politic. And certainly the American public by and large seems to want to figure out how to support people, whether it's immigrants.

And I'm not talking about the hyperbolic political football of it all. my sense is the American spirit is people genuinely do want to help people who need help. For sure. Whether it's the religious foundation of this country or whatever. There is a sense that, you know, there's a charitable spirit in America that I always find sort of endearing. But what is the role in your estimation of the state? Because you're obviously dealing with people who are on state aid or bilking the state or, you know. Like, I mean, if you were in front of a congressional committee, what would you want to?

want them to know. Here's what I would say. The solution is not going to be fixing all these people that are already broken. It would be so much less effort to prevent these stories from happening than to try to fix probably a million drug-addicted people that are living in the country. That's a major, major undertaking.

We would all need to quit our jobs and devote our lives to this. But if somehow we could pump a lot of resources, a lot of money, opportunities, education, just better, you know, creating these things in these rougher neighborhoods so that dad doesn't have to do things that end up, get him put away in prison. And mom doesn't have to do what she's doing. And drugs are not controlling everything.

And there's more hope in those communities. You're going to see it in a generation or two. Right. Where the kids are going to do better. Yeah. And then when the kids do better, it's like, you know, everything will heal and everything will get better. But it's not going to happen in our lifetime, you know.

It's not going to happen. That's the frustrating part. But so here, so you're going to have to give away half your money to contribute to this gigantic undertaking that you won't see the result of. Good luck. That's where it's difficult, right? That's where it's, that's the problem right there. Wow. How do you decide? Obviously, there's people, but let me just, but on that negative thing that we just, we made it sound like it's terrible, there are people who have climbed out of it and are doing great now and are doing beautiful things. But it takes a lot of financial help and patients, and sometimes it's rehab or therapy or medications or whatever to get them stable. How do you decide, I'm sure there are people come and you just think they're not right for your, I mean, you don't take everyone who walks. For an interview?

Yeah. Oh, yeah, yeah. And I seem to remember you talking where there's a lot of people that you don't even air the interview. Yeah, I mean, I've done 8,000 and I've used about 2,000. So where's the, walk me through sort of the process? They're on a hard drive that never will get used. Because. I'll probably delete them one day.

It's just some people are good storytellers and some people are not good communicators and they just don't, they, they, they mumble. They're just, they tell their stories and disjointed, like, tangents and all kinds of, it's like, what the fuck are we listening to? You know? And really, what I, a lot, you know, so what I'm doing is a mix of different things, but one of the things I'm doing is, is capturing great storytelling. Sure. So that's why I'm like branching out now, not just doing drug addicts and sex workers and gang members.

So what's your vision going forward? Just get interesting life stories. That very often incorporate a lot of the same things that these people have. Are you familiar with Studs Terkel? I am Studs Terkel, reincarnated. I mean, the best compliment I ever saw on the comments on my channel, I think Mark is the new Studs Terkel. Do you ever meet Studs?

I don't think I ever met him, but I feel like I knew him. Yeah. You know, we grew up in Chicago. Yeah, I met him. I got to meet him. He's the greatest. He appeared in this thing that I was doing, but I never, I haven't released this. So I, an unfinished document.

He was, like, one of my heroes. Because Studs Terkel, even in presenting the show that I'm trying to do here, one of, I mentioned Studs Terkel because I feel there's a lot of American stories that aren't being told. Should we, should we explain who Stutz Terkel was for the younger? Sure, please, yeah. I mean, he was a writer. who basically documented kind of similar stuff that I'm doing, but not so dark.

Everyday Americans. He was just as happy to talk to the guy who repaired refrigerators, the guy who got your ice cream. Or the lady who iron dresses for the rich person on Michigan Avenue. I loved everything about everything he did. And the way he did it. With zero judgment, I just want to learn. Well, that's interesting that we're both sort of on that tangent.

I mean, I literally mentioned Studs Terkel and Pitchell. this show. So it's interesting. You're coming at it from a different end. That circle was a genius. Because it's, again, repeating myself, but there's a lot of American stories that aren't being told. For sure. And the problem with that is we're allowed to kind of live in this kind of fake version of reality. Like your thing is more obvious, right? Which is, hey, we're ignoring these people who are over there on Skid Row. That's not really what I'm doing. That just is what's been put on me. And people say, oh, he's showing us the forgotten people of Skid Row. I'm like, I'm not doing that. It's a skid row happens to be in L.A. And I'm in L.A. And it's a good to. Well, I came to that perception by watching these videos.

It's not your fault. But I'm also the rat in the cage guy. You know what I'm saying? I get it. But I'm interested in your pivot. Yeah. See, what I'm doing now is maybe like now I have a little more time and money to just like, I'm going to travel to, like I just came back from New York a couple days ago. And I was in Kentucky before that. And I'll probably go to Florida and Texas and Wyoming and who knows where to get other content. And It won't just be Skid Row Drug Act. It's fantastic. And it's just a little more varied.

And I try to find interesting people, and I try to find things that are worth watching. Well, certainly in Middle America, the meth, fentanyl thing. It's everywhere, though. I mean, like, when I, like, I love Kentucky. Like, I remember as a kid, whether I was in Detroit or Chicago, my family would go to Florida or New Orleans for vacations. I remember going straight south and we would go through Appalachia.

And I just was fascinated. I could, my eyes could not absorb. That's where my family's from. Kentucky? That's my root. Really? Oh, yeah. What part?

My grandmother was born in Hopkinsville, Kentucky. Okay. That's where she's buried. Wow. So that's literally, and my grandma lived to like 103. Oh, that's great. And she got dementia later in life, but she still remember her growing up, and she was telling me stories about literally living in shacks and picking cotton.

I did. But the whole, like, she literally grew up in that, you know, this, you know, grapes of wrath kind of world. Yeah, yeah. It's still like that in parts. Oh, yeah. And just add vaping and fentanyl and you're close. Yeah, you add drugs and here you go. But I remember driving down and just looking out the window and you see this shack that, like, how could somebody live in that? It's like, it's leaning and all the wood is warped and there's, like, it can't be somebody living in there.

Yeah. But there's all this trash strewn down the hillside. Yeah. And it was just like, oh, my God. I'm fascinated with it, just like the alcoholic that's on the streets with the paper. I know your interest in the altruistic part, but are you also in some level fascinated by the decline of the American dream? Yeah, for sure. Really what I think I'm doing, people like to decide what I'm doing, but what I think I'm doing. I want you to tell me what you're doing, because I have my own impression, but maybe that's because YouTube keeps recommending all the ones that got all the views.

Yeah, you watch a drug addict and you get more drug addicts. But really what I think I'm doing is just capturing the whole picture of everything. Like I would interview a brain surgeon tomorrow. I would love that. A good brain surgeon who can tell a great story and talk about some of the dark stories, some of the sad ones, some beautiful ones. It's like, I would love that. There's nothing I would rather do than that. But I was going to Skid Row every day and getting great stuff. I keep going, like every day I would go down there and get more. So it's like, let me just do that again. I don't really have time to plan a trip. And if I plan a trip to Boston, and I don't even know who I'm going to connect with.

I was like, so if I go to Skid Row, I know I'm going to find gold. Sure. And the more I went down there, the more I got more integrated into that community. And the more I got more good stuff. So then I became the Skid Row photographer. And I haven't been down there in months. I still get people that, I have people down there that are finding people and they bring them to me in Santa Monica now.

But what I think, what I think I'm doing is just capturing like all these stories of American life. Kind of like Stead's Turkle is doing, but probably with a darker feel to it. It is a darker thing. The darker time probably. The world, you and I grew up in, at least from a propaganda point of view, was presented as a more optimistic. We had Walt Disney on television. We had people, you know.

The 60s and 70s were much more. Even Mike Reiko, who you would remember was a, you know, there was a sort of kind of a churlish, you know, we're still fighting for something. Post-war America. You know, we're redefining our place in the world and stuff like that. Now, I mean, the propaganda is we're going the wrong way, we're going the wrong way.

And they're just arguing about who's going the wrong way more, right? Yeah. Do you get numb or are you sick of having your heartbroken? I mean, like, it's got to be hard to hear some of these stories. And again, you're hearing them all. We're only seeing part of it. Yeah, I'm getting exposed to a lot more than other, the viewers do, perhaps. But I'm also not, like, I get criticized sometimes.

Like, I'll be interviewing somebody and they tell me that they've got a brother and sister. And I'll ask them, do you have siblings? I make mistakes because I'm not I'm doing so many I'm doing six, seven, eight of these a day and sometimes

the only way I can possibly do that and that maintains the quality of content for me to post every day which I probably don't have to do but that's what I'm doing that's what I decided

when I started is to not pay full attention so I don't absorb all the trauma of your story because I'd be suicidal I would have been suicidal three years ago if I just sit there

and tell me everything tell me about how your dad raped you I can't listen to all that. It's like it would kill me. I'd quit. So what I do is I kind of like, yeah, yeah, I'm listening. I'm listening, but I'm kind of not listening.

Yeah. I'm not really absorbing it. Because if you really absorb all that stuff, you're going to... Well, it seems to me that some level of detachment is probably good to you because I'm not accusing your subjects of lying, but everybody has a story. And a lot of times those stories are sort of, I work in wrestling. We call it worked. Yeah, yeah.

Embellished. Okay. That's what I call it. And sometimes they're outright lies. There's one video of a war vet. He was in Afghanistan or Iraq, probably both. He lost an eye. He had shrapnel wounds all over his body.

He was just torn up, and he was homeless on the streets in Hollywood. And I do this story, and it's a heartbreaking story, really well told as well. It was like, oh, my God, what a heartbreaking story, really beautifully told. Both his kids died and terrible accidents afterwards. And I'm like, this is hard. Horrific, man. This is perhaps the saddest video I've ever shot. And then after I was done with them and I edited it, I start, I got to do a little bit of research just to make sure it's not bullshit. I couldn't find anything. If both your kids died the way his kids did, there'd be articles all over the internet about it.

Like one was, I think, his wife drove the car with the kid in it into the river and the kid drowned. That's like, you just cry. Yeah. but there's not a single article about it. And so I asked him, hey, Hey, Will, like, what's, you know,

I looked up, I looked for your articles about your two kids' deaths. I couldn't find anything. I'm really nice about it. And he goes, oh, let me,

let me look them up and I'll send you some. So he sends me two links of articles that are like 12 years off. So there are, it's all bullshit. But what he's done, he probably lost his eye

in a fucking accident at work or got stabbed in the face or something. He's created this whole thing about how he's, a war vet, he's lost his kids, he's got the saddest story you've ever heard. And I'm sure he gets people handing him money on the street so he can spend it on drugs. Yeah. I'm not saying that's what he's doing. Did you put the video out? So I waited like a year or two before I put it out, and I finally did put it out. Just, I think I even put a disclaimer saying that I don't know how much of this

is real. I don't think much of it is, but some of it might be. And that's that. And I posted it. But since then, I've done a lot of war vets stories that are very real, and I feel bad sometimes that I'm posting this bullshit story that makes war vets look like they're not always honest. You know, again, I'm blaming the YouTube algorithm, but what do you hope someone like me takes from all this? That the solution to our country's problems is, it would look more like, you know, racism is a huge problem. It really is. Like whether we want to say we're past it or not,

we're just clearly not. And if you go into South Central L.A. or south side of Chicago or west side of Chicago, you see that it's white people do not even go there, let alone help them. We don't want to do anything with them except like put them in a cage and like separate ourselves from them. And the solution to all that is going to be pumping a lot of time,

effort and money, especially into them to, to help. And it's like, I don't know that's such a huge ask that I don't even know if it's possible. Yeah, because I've had that experience where, you know, there's kind of an addictive quality.

Maybe it's me, the artist or writer, you know, it's like there's, it becomes like a level of material and of course I have my own personal. You like the darkness of it? No, no, I'm actually not that interest in the darkness.

I live the darkness, you know? Somebody once asked me, if I'd seen some Nirvana documentary or something. And I said, no, I didn't watch it. And they said, don't you want to watch it? And I said, but I lived it. You know what I mean? So I think what I take from the videos is more,

and maybe it's my own. My father passed away a couple years ago, and he was a sociopathic drug addict, you know, just because he was clean at different times, doesn't mean he stopped being that guy. you know and maybe it's a sort of internal struggle with trying to kind of understand the sociopathic mind or so i find myself sort of looking for the tells um trying to understand why somebody who has every advantage you know when you have people on who are like mom's a sex worker dad's a pimp and all this stuff you think oh my god

this is all they know but then you have somebody else on it's like no my friend's parents are great. I had everything. I just just tried to immolate myself, like in slow motion for years. There's both. Right? You see both. Right. So what I'm saying is I find myself sort of fascinated with why somebody whites wants to light themselves on fire. And I had a therapist once. It was some sort of psychological device, and the rough version is there are people who light themselves on fire and... Figuredly. Inadvertently hurt others through the intensity of the flame.

And there are other people who will light you on fire to avoid lighting themselves on fire. And there was a third version of it. And I thought that was my father. He was more than happy to light me on fire. Really? Oh, yeah. And where was your mom?

My mom... See, now you're interviewing me. My mom was committed to an insaneness island when I was four. And I never lived with her again. Had a complete psychotic break. And when she came out, she was a totally different person. I don't know what happened to her. How'd you come out so good?

People would argue I didn't. You know what I mean? In fact, I would say most of the... What's your worst quality? My worst quality? Because you're a lot of great one. Now you're putting me on the spot. We'll save it for next time.

Yeah. I'll answer your question, though, because I don't mind. What's my worst quality? What's your weakest? What's your biggest weakness? Needing to belong. Yeah, but that's all of us. Okay, but I have a heightened sense of it. And by the way, I'm a, I mean, you know, I can create whatever reality I want.

Do you think that the, all the, all the, all the, all the trauma of obstacles that you went through as a kid are what created this intense ability to focus and create? Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, I do too. Absolutely. That's where it comes from. My dad used to say... Pain. Pain creates...

Oh, yeah. My dad used to say, it's good you had a hard life because it made you a great rock star. Yeah. And I told me he was wrong. I mean, he was right in form because here I am.

Thank you very much. But we'll never know who I could have been. Yeah. Because if you take someone who has a gift, and in my case I have a gift, say, for melody, Well, maybe if I wasn't abused, I'd be writing, you know, for the Berlin Symphony and not for disaffected goth girls in their basement. That's the, that's the, that's the heartache of anybody who comes from a hard circumstance. Yeah, but I don't get the feeling you walk around with a chip on your shoulder because of what you went through.

Not anymore. You did? Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. I was very angry. I mean, like, for me, like my mom loved me in a way that was just like, you couldn't. like it was perfect. It was probably the best thing that has ever.

Are your parents still alive? My dad is. He's 95. What does he think about what you're doing? I'm sorry to interrupt you. He doesn't even know. He doesn't even care. He just cares if I'm making money with it. And I tell him, yeah, I'm making a shit done.

Don't worry about it. Yeah. And he, that's all he cares about. He's not really tuned into the subtlety or the inner workings of it all. He's just kind of like, you're doing fine, you're okay, good. Do other family, like a sister? Blood family have any opinion? I only have a very small family.

I just have a sister. And now I have like a nephew, but in a brother-in-law. But they like what I'm doing. They support it, but they don't watch. They're not watching all the time. I have more friends who watch that. Isn't that interesting, sorry to interject, but isn't it interesting?

Because I go through the same thing in my own family. your family knows you're doing something that's really important, and you have the public data to prove it. And they don't really give a shit? No, they don't. They don't. I don't think my mom, if she was alive, would be watching it either. It's just so dark.

It's just so dark. My mom was never, like, a dark person. She was the opposite. So what's the, because you deal with clicks, right? You know, like somebody has to watch. Yeah, yeah, yeah. What's the bright side of the dark side for you in this content game? That I'm educating people.

I'm certain that people didn't... Sorry, I don't mean it in a... I'm saying is this like, you and I know, right, that the dark part is part of what attracts people. Oh, for sure. Okay, so how do you get people to click just as much on the bright side of it all? You don't.

You just accept that it's not going to happen. You just accept that it's not going to happen. Oh, that's interesting. Because I could do two videos. One is of a fentanyl addict who is... Can I swear? Sure. Sucking things to make a buck,

and she was molested when she was six years old and she has been on the streets since she was 14 and she doesn't have a friend in the world and she's homeless and it's just horrific. I could do another one of a person who you choose your flavor of positivity but somebody who went to college

and is now a successful accountant and whatever. It's like nobody's going to watch that video. But the first one, that'll get... So what... Okay, so we'll play it as a parlor game. Why... what is it about the human condition that would rather watch the negative story than the positive one? I mean, that's not why I do those stories. It's just... No, I get it.

But I don't know. I don't know what we love darkness. When you're driving down the road and you see a 16-year-old driver driving perfectly, stopping, coming to a complete stop at every light and driving perfectly, no problems. It's not interesting. But you see a head-on collision with, like... Everybody slows down. Everybody slows down. Wow. But I don't mean to be a...

I'm not really looking for the trauma stories. That just seems to be what I've gone into. Because I do find the stories interesting, but I'm not really looking for darkness. But if I am, I'm like the... I'm just like... I've got a whole bunch of dark, dark stories on my channel. So using the aperture idea,

to widen the lens out here, um, there's plenty of historical documentation of the underclass, especially in the, the post-industrial, you know, era, going back to like 1870s London and stuff. So if you look at that, like, 150, 170 years, we haven't solved this problem, you know, that there's this capitalism, and it's obviously a big political argument, that capitalism creates this underclass.

Everybody's willing to look the other way as long as they can live behind their gated walls or something. Do you have a kind of a historical perspective on the underclass? Does that translate as a question? Well, I mean, what I see going on is the rich are getting richer and the poor are getting poorer, and the divide just gets wider and wider. But, okay, I'll play devil's advocate, I'll play capitalist.

Whose problem is that? It's all of our problems. Right. Yeah. I mean, the wealthy don't want to do shit for people. They don't want to give away. Well, they want to go sip wine somewhere and donate and never have to talk to those people.

Right. They want to avoid them. Sure, that's. by and large the way it rolls. And that will serve them and their kids nicely, so they never have to deal with the riffraff. But if you want to help our country, you know, thrive and do better, the way to do that is to help a poor family.

And if everybody have helped some poor families, the world would be a beautiful place. But back to the cynicism part of it, and you even said so yourself, you have to kind of pick and choose so you help. how does let's let's say somebody's listen to this interview and they feel really inspired they want to help somebody yeah where would you even put that effort like do you do you want them to go down and meet people do you want them work in agency but no no but i'm but i'm but i was going to

but you are in contact with this community if i was going to try to help somebody i would take them out of the community they're in put them in a safer neighborhood where they're where the problems are not around them surrounding like drugs and prostitution and all that kind of stuff gangs and all that stuff. Take them out of that community, give them what they need to take care of them or their kids or their future. You're just going to take a lot of money and a lot of patience and you get them to therapy, you get them whatever they need to rebuild. Yeah. And you have to have a lot of patience. It's funny because you're triggering their memory. We had a recent employee in one of my various businesses. And we convinced the person to move out of the gang neighborhood,

gave them a job, moved the family up with the kids, and within nine months blew the whole thing up. And one of the daughters was back with the gang. Yeah. No, see, you really cannot change that subconscious view of yourself so easily. If you have a view of yourself that you don't deserve anything better, all the help and propping up and good luck in the world is not going to change. So when you say patience, is that a financial patience,

Is that as social patience? It's all of it. It's all of it. It's all of it. That's why I'm saying. If you, I call it wave of magic wand. I'm sorry, I'm the worst interruptor. But if you could wave a magic wand, what would you fix?

The self-worth of everybody. Right. But if you can't do that, what is it? Like, get the government to get involved? Yeah, get the government to get involved to really seriously pump a bunch of education, support, job opportunities into the rough neighborhoods. I feel like as far as well, we are down the road as a country, especially these Western countries, it seems like there should

be some sort of commission, like a bipartisan commission, like we're going to actually start tackling this problem. And we know it's not going to get fixed in 20 years. We're going to set something in the motion, because obviously whatever's happening is not working. In 50 years, it might be different. Sorry, it's slightly divergent, but it's connected. Obviously, fentanyl has seemed to supercharge this whole thing up. Yeah. Can you talk about this? that on a more granular level. I mean, I hear about it. So there were drugs, there were street drugs, like marijuana was one of them, but that's now looked at as like cigarettes almost. But there was cocaine, crack cocaine, which is a harder version of that. There's crystal meth, which is like speed,

and that's been around for decades. And there was heroin. That was, that's, I mean, there's PCP, and there's a few other drugs, but that's basically it. Those are the big three. But then about five years ago, roughly, the heroin kind of just went away and got replaced by another opiate, which is called fentanyl, which is fentanyl is used in hospitals, and when you're, you need to be sedated somehow. Isn't that what kill Michael Jackson, right? I mean, it's like something you use when it's super. Yeah, but you have to use a microscopic dose. They know how to administer that in the hospital, but on the streets, when you're doing it yourself, that's why there's so many ODs, because everybody's Odeing on this stuff.

I saw some interview you did with the guy, you say, OD 13 times. Yeah, and there's people that have done even more, and people have died. Like, every day there's somebody who dies down there. It's good row. Fentanyl is now the new opiate. A lot of people like the speed and the crack, cocaine drugs that give you an upper. But the opiates are downers, and they tend to mail you out.

And whatever pain and trauma you went through as a kid, it's all erased. Part of it is that fentanyl's cheaper? It's just easier to be. No, it's just what's on the street. That's what's there. And once you've tried it, you're like hooked on it for the rest of your life. These people snorting it, shooting it, all of the above? All of the above, yeah.

And now what they're doing is they're putting it in the other drugs. So plenty of crack addicts have died because the crack looks like fentanyl. They look very similar. And it's like, how do you decide which one's which? And you smoke it and you're dead. Okay, last kind of topic I want to dive into. been kind of a 50,000 point view. It's like, how do you separate character versus environment? You know, like, you mentioned this young woman, you know, where obviously there was something

there. If that young woman had been raised in a good neighborhood, would she had a different life? Absolutely. Which is still, you're convinced of that. Yeah. It's not provocatively voiced. I'm saying is. Yeah, yeah. No, I think she, if she had a mom and a dad who loved her, even if they weren't the most perfectly loving, unconditional loving parents ever, she still would have done a lot better. But she had no mom. Like no mom. Zero dad. So what do you say to the kid who's got everything and ends up smoking crack?

Well, I mean, we kind of touched on this earlier. I was going to talk, but I didn't get a chance to. But you know, look at the planet Earth. The lion eats the antelope. The hawk eats the rabbit. The snake eats the frog. This is just the way life goes. this planet. Humans are exempt from that? We're not exempt from that. So some of us are going to thrive

and our kids are going to go to big... So it is the predatory aspect of just human life. It's life on this planet. Some of us will thrive and our kids will go to great colleges and get good jobs and we'll drive nice cars and we'll eat good food and others will live on the street and they will suck dick to make money so they can spend it on drugs. I know it's not pretty, but that's the reality. Yeah, no, I know. It's that that's where it's... So you want us all to get the soccer trophy. We're all going to win and we're all just going to like, excellent. Yeah, that's definitely not how I roll, but. Competition trophy.

But, you know, because I live in a generally wealthy area now. I didn't grow up in a wealthy area. And I'm even like... You're west of Addison. Yes, sir. Like five years ago, they had opened like a, like some kind of clinic because there were so many heroin addicts in my, at the high school. Really? This is fentanyl.

I went to Willowbrook. Yeah. I don't remember a whole lot of drugs there then. But I was... I live in Highland Park, Illinois, which is, you know, a very wealthy, bucolic. Oh, you're talking about where you live now? Yeah, so what I'm saying is I was surprised because I was walking down the street. I have a tea house there and suddenly there was this kind of, I don't know, some kind of drug outpatient, something, something.

You know, government base. Yeah, the drugs are definitely... And I asked the mayor, I said, what is that? And she said, oh, it's a... We have such a bad heroin problem in town for high school students. you know what I mean and these are these are the one

maybe they're maybe they're the two percenters but I mean this is it should be zero this is the right this is the top of the this is the top of the economic food chain in American life

so is it because these kids are exposed to no more trauma and they need to escape and the drugs help them do that or is because I don't have an answer to that question because I came from the other side of it somehow the drugs are sneaking in

and they're more accessible I think that's a big part of it too it's like trying to describe a mathematical number to the human condition. Like if you have 100 people and they're all given all this, you know, great circumstance, do three of them turn out to be drug addicts? You know, it's like, is there some mathematic formula? Well, I think there are probably some genetic factors that are just,

you're predisposed to just struggle in life. You're just, things are not going to, you're not going to, like I had to work hard. I'm sure you had to work really hard to get where you are. Oh, yeah. But some people just don't have the ability to focus and create like we did. And so you just, you struggle and you get pulled down. And you end up with the wrong kind of friends. And you end up lost.

Right. And you lose hope. Yeah, I don't know how you look at all that all day. It's hard. But I don't pay attention all the time either. Yeah. That's really the key because otherwise I couldn't do it. What do you do when, because obviously a lot of these,

I call them kids, but they're not all kids. Because they're hustling, right? What do you do with those who try to work you? Oh, I've gotten very good at recognizing hustles. Early on, I got played a lot. I would see somebody who had potential, and he was just on the street, so you just need to stop doing the drug, dude.

Let me help you. There was one guy that I met a black guy that was on the street, and he just seemed like a really good guy. He was like, let me help you. Let me get you into rehab. Let me get you the therapy and the rehab of in the housing and everything you need so that you can get out of this fucking streets. What are you doing down here?

Yeah. And I took care of all that. And it's just, he just kept going back, kept going back. It's like, finally just like, look, I can't anymore. But he still sees me as a possible source for money. And every year or so, he comes back and, hey, I just like, need this. It's like, oh, wow. And I get this constantly.

How do you deal with the dangerous aspect of what you do? Because sometimes I find myself watching one of your interviews, and obviously you're the the voice behind the camera. Yeah. But I think some of these people are pretty dangerous. I just posted a video with a guy who was talking about working with the Mexican cartels. And, you know, he wore giant sunglasses and a hat and a hoodie and a face, like a COVID mask. So he was all covered up.

And he did his interview and less than a week later, he got murdered, two bullets in the head, which I think is how the cartel does it. and I'm like, I deleted the video right away and said, man, this is like, I don't want any part of that. Yeah. But then also as a journalist or whatever I am, artist, whatever, it's like you, like, what do you back down from that? I don't know.

I mean, I know that it's, I don't think the cartel would come after a guy who just did a document. They would go after the guy, which they did, obviously. Or maybe it was just coincidence if you got two bullets in the head. Maybe they were just random bullets. ended up in his head. Studs Terkel sounds like a lot better right now when you say that. Interviewing a refrigerator repair sounds a lot better, right? But you're drawn to what you're drawn to,

and I'm drawn to these crazy dark stories. Yeah. I mean, I just did it. One of my, probably the favorite interview I've ever done was with an FBI agent. And this is not a drug story. It's not anything to do with drugs. But he infiltrated the New Jersey mob. Giovanni Rocco is his name.

He said, I think he's changed his name for witness protection. But he lived with him for three years. He's got a wife and kids at home who he just kind of like tried to stay connected with, but he was so embedded into this whole mob thing that, and he eventually put away like 10 guys, orchestrating murders and doing all kinds of things that they had, selling drugs and murders and all kinds of things that were just illegal. You remember you a story.

Fascinating, a great storyteller and fascinating story. We were somewhere in South America. I don't want to say what country. And one of my buddies at the hotel or something ran into these American government agents, but working in South America. And so we invited them to our concert. They came to the show. And then afterwards we went to have a drink.

And, you know, I started asking questions like, what are you guys doing down here? And they said, well, you know, we're basically doing, we're trying to keep the drugs from leaving here and going to the shores of America. That's kind of her job. Okay. So I started asking better questions. and I said, well, what is it, what is it you really do? And they kind of looked at each other and they said, well, we get flown over the jungle and he drop us and we do night drops into these drug camps. And we got to do it just like some kind of way they speed drop.

They wear like an oxygen mask. They come down low, low level. I think they have to do it super high level because of the plane. They want to hear the plane motor. Oh, I see. So they drop it like from 50,000 feet. And they wear an oxygen mask. They wear an oxygen mask and they do rapid descent, like straight down.

Like you put your head down and go straight down. Wow. And they got to know how to pull the shoot really low and drop in. Sounds dangerous. Oh, yeah. You know, by the way, middle of night, usually on moonless nights. Yeah, you're doing it in the dark as well. So then you, you know, like you and I would, we start going,

so what happens when you drop in the jungle? And then they looked at them and they said, you don't want to know. So. Yeah. So that's what I'm saying when I think about you even being at the edge of that. No, there have been some really dangerous situations. I've had guns in my face. I've had all kinds of things.

Wow. But, like, I'm always attracted to the things that are just a little bit on the edge of what's... I never take the safe route. Well, obviously not. Whether it's women or jobs or whatever. I always want something that's like, no, you don't do that. Are you attracted to nice women? or...

Yeah, I think I am. I'm not interested in being abused or anything like that, but I like challenges. Okay. Let's put it that way. So last question. It's hard to voice it because I feel like I've already asked it. I want to talk about Chicago music for about half an hour.

We're welcome to we can talk about it right or... Let me just ask this... Because we probably went to the same show sometimes. And we'll talk about that for a second. It's the existential question of like... Because I've asked it, but I'm asking it different. and I hope it comes across. Why are you doing this?

Do you understand? Yeah, yeah. Like, you're a good-looking guy. You know, you're obviously talented. Like, you know, like I find myself sometimes in my job going, why am I doing this? You just do what you do. I mean, why, like...

But do you feel called to this? Yeah, yeah, for sure. Like, ever since I was 14, I saw that alcoholic on the street. Like, I just wanted to... But you don't see it as a spiritual thing. I don't see anything as a spiritual thing. Okay. I might be...

If you look at what I do... do in my actions, you would say I'm some kind of saint, but I'm not any fucking saint. I'm just a jerk with a camera. I've said that a million times. I'm a jerk with a camera. You need to put that on a t-shirt. Yeah, yeah. Put that on my gravestone. There's your merch. There's your merch. I'm just a jerk with a camera. Chicago music. So, how old are you? A 57. 57. I'm 64. So I'm a little bit older than you. But some of my favorite memories as a kid, like I got into music. I started going to concerts. Let's say that. I started going to concerts.

in 76, when to see Richie Blackmore's Rainbow Mahogany Rush, not Rush, but Mahogany Rush. Frank Marino and Mahogany Rush, right? L.A. Jets, Hart, and there was one other band. Five shows on the bill at the Aragon Ballroom. I was really into Richie Blackmore. It was really into Deep Purple one of us in high school. Thus, argue we're one of the best guitar players of all time. Exactly. I thought he was the best until we'll talk about him too later.

I think I was probably maybe it was 75, 76. I wasn't driving. My parents drove me there. My parents who have no exposure to any of this shit. Take me there, me and my buddy. Not the best neighborhood. No, pretty bad neighborhood, especially in the middle of the night. And my parents were there waiting for us at the end.

I guess they probably went out to dinner or did something. And, you know, it's a long show, five shows, five bands. It's two in the morning probably. We're getting out. My parents show up. And they said, we're so. worried about you. We see all these people coming out on stretchers. Like, one after the other, after the other, an ambulance is left and right, just all night

long. Like, what's going on in there? And I'm like, I don't know. I didn't see any of it because I'm up front. But that was, that was just the beginning of it. And it just blossomed from there. My photography and music just took off. And I just started going to every single show. Even bands I didn't like. I went to see everything from Frank Sinatra to George Burns to the plasmatics to like on the same night I'd see these crazy like extreme difference

bands. Did you get to the point where they would give you photo passes and stuff? No, I never really got that. I would just always, I was really good at getting the very, very best seat.

So it's almost like better than having a photo pass sometimes because I was right in the front row and I would shoot like sometimes a general admission. I realized well this is a better angle than being dead center. Yeah.

And if I'm going to see Van Halen and it was just for personally use the photos or did you publish it? It was just for me. I just love doing it. I wasn't making money. Did you ever publish those photos? Yeah, I mean, like, I did some, the first thing I did was a cover of Guitar Player magazine with Alex Lison from Rush.

And I did cream magazine a bunch of times. I was on the cover, I think. So I did a bunch of that kind of stuff. Oh, wow. See, doesn't that sound safer now? Oh, yeah, it's safe. And it was cool. Sociopathic rock stars are a lot safer than sociopathic.

Actually, sociopathic rock stars and sociopathic drug addicts may just be the same thing. Probably very similar. But like, you know, going to the Riviera, going to the uptown. going to the Aragon Ballard. You know, the Uptown's been closed for 20, 30 years. They still hoped to fix it. I saw a lot of great bands there, yeah. I remember seeing, like, so many great shows.

Seeing the police for a book, $0.98. Yeah, because it was probably the loop. The loop, yeah. That's the rock station. Tom Petty with Elvis Costello opening up for him for $98, I believe. It was just crazy shows. And I went to all of them, like every single thing

that came to them. Yeah. I missed all that. And I grew up with, like, Cheap Trick before the first album came out. They were a big club band. Oh, they were a big club band. And I discovered them when they opened up for Rush. I was going to see Rush at the auditorium.

And there was this band who came out. Two of the guys looked like, you know. Hunts Hall and your smoking neighbor. What was his name? From the Satch from the. Yeah. The Bowery Boys? Yeah.

Is that who it is? Yeah. But his real name was Hunts Hall. Hunts Hall. That's right. Yeah, yeah. So the guitar player was like Hans Hall. You got an accountant playing drums. And then you got the two most beautiful pop stars. Amazing, right?

They were just, what a fucking genius idea. Just a genius idea. A great band. Oh, my, the best band ever. Still going. I just saw them the other day. Yeah, they're like my band. They are, like, I love cheap. I saw Cheap Trick so many, like, I can't even count how many times.

Great. I don't go to concerts anymore, but they were just like, that's like I lived and like if they did three shows at whatever I'd see all three I'd go I'd fly up to Rockford I'd go to Rockford

I'd go to Madison I'd go to Tarahoeh see them wherever they're amazing So last last last question But the best thing I ever saw Best thing I ever saw in music Go to see Black Sabbath

and 78 And Black Sabbath was a dinosaur at the time But Van Halen opened up for him That's right And Eddie Van Halen That would have been first album, right? Yeah, the album had just come out.

Was that he wearing the knee pads? I heard it on triad, you know, the 106. But there was early tours he would wear knee pads and they sort of run up the amps. Yeah, that was the second tour, though, I think. Okay. But the first tour, I don't think he was doing the knee pads yet. But it was just like, it blew the lid off of, like, guitar and heavy metal and whatever the fuck that was. It was just like an amalgam of pop and heavy metal.

Did the crowd respond to it that you saw? Oh, God, yes. Yeah, they, it was like, Black Sabbath probably, it was pretty ballsy of Black Sabbath to keep them on the tour because, like, if there was ever a band that blew away the headliner, that was it. Yeah. It was pretty cool of Ozzy to say, let's just keep on. Yeah.

Because that was the best thing I ever saw. Eddie Van Halen was the best thing I ever saw. I got to interview Eddie once. Yeah, I know that. It's amazing. He's just a genius. Spent four hours with him in his studio and it was one of the great highlights of my life. But people don't understand.

They just think, oh, he had a great sound. or great. Sound was unbelievable. Like, nobody's ever sounded like he did. But you look at, I listen to some of these early, early, early,

early Van Halen club tapes like from this, like playing somewhere in Paso de. Magic Martin, Magic Mountain and stuff like that. 76, yeah. Yeah, and he's doing like, they're doing,

Aerosmith, Zeppelin, Zizi Top, Deep Purple, all these old songs. Yeah. But Eddie's playing them better than the people who wrote. I got introduced you to Pat Kenny of the NWA.

It's my brother. wrestling company. He only talks about Van Halen, too. Yeah. No, Eddie, Eddie, like, I used to play guitar. And then when Eddie Van Halen came out, it's like, this is clearly not my lane. So I'll tell you a quick Eddie's story. So I'm interviewing him. And, you know, he knows

who I am, but he doesn't, he's not listening to the smashing pumpkins, you know? Yeah. And he's got cigarette, he's drinking a beer, and he's just sitting there playing guitar. You know, and when you're sitting this far away from Eddie and he's playing guitar, you're just like, he makes it seem so easy, right? Oh, yeah. I mean, he's laughing and joking while he's playing jokes.

Laughing, laughing, and he's playing the hardest shit you've ever seen. So at some point he goes, you play guitar, right? I go, oh, yeah, he goes, here. And he hands me the car and goes, play. What do you play for Eddie Van Halel? Do you choke? No, I thought, okay, all right, I can play guitar. So I played like how I play.

And he goes, you can play. You can play. He said that. I passed whatever fucking test, you know what I mean? That's great. He was like, oh, you can play. And then after that, the conversation changed because he realized that was a musician.

Oh, is that right? Oh, yeah, totally different conversation. As soon as he saw, I could play guitar. I think he thought it was some alternative way to help. You take your dad for that. Oh, God bless. And I'd be too. I mean, I used to sit there and play to Van Halen 1 all day.

You listen to that. The first three records, first four records, it's just, how could it, it couldn't be done any better. Why don't you do the soft white underbelly of rock? Yeah, I would love to. You should do that. It would be full circle because, like, done these, like I started out shooting photographs of musicians. Yeah, you should. But you love music.

I do, yeah. And I think the story is like Mike Ness would be a fascinating interview or Perry Farrell or you or so many people. I can tell you to encourage you, most people in rock that interview rock stars, they want the drama, but they don't want the real stuff about what makes us tick and how we got here. Does it make sense? They want the shiny end of the story. Yes, yeah, I could carry. less about that. Right. I want the real stuff. Yeah. So I think it'd be interesting if you could find people to talk to you about like what really goes on. Yeah, yeah. Because I can tell you 99.9% of the journalists don't give a shit. That's the only thing I'm interested in. Here's my favorite story. Here's my favorite question. Tell us a great, tell us a wacky thing that happened on tour.

That's my favorite question. Yeah, that's not what I'm like, I'm not giving that story to you. I'll tell my friend, you know. Everybody, whether it's an accountant or a whoever, rock star or a doctor or a homeless prostitute, they've all got a great story. Oh, yeah. You just got to ask. You've got to find somebody who's a good storyteller to in the house. I enjoy talking. Thanks. Billy, you're amazing. Thank you.

Thank you, brother. Thanks, man.