The Press Box - Ep. 171: 'The Writers’ Room’

Episode Date: August 20, 2016

On this week's edition, ‘AGW’ writers Travon Free and Cathy Lew offer up their winners and losers of summer ’16. Then, Pat Barker and Joel Solomon reprise their 'Get Off My Lawn' segment with some thoughts on the NFL's suspension policy. Finally, Brendan Lynch and Cathy kick off a new segment titled 'Hot Wrecks' and give a slew of recommendations, including "trash pizza" protocol. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Welcome to the Writers' Room podcast. I'm Trevon Fri. Back with my buddy, Kathy Liu and co-worker and co-writer at AGW. We're going to kick the show off talking about the summer's biggest winners and losers. And after that, Pat Barker and Joel Solomon are going to give you another edition of Get Off My Lawn, get cranky and old for you guys. And then Kathy's going to come back and wrap it up with Brendan. What are you guys doing?

We're giving some hot recommendations. Recommendations? Yeah. All right. I like recommendations. I like things. The segment's for you. It works for me.

I'm definitely between the end of that. But we're going to start off with the biggest winners and losers of summer 2016. It's winding down. It's been a very weird summer. Who's your winner for the summer of 2016? I can already tell that you're going to be. mad at who my winner is. I will qualify it by saying not the only winner of summer 2016, but a winner, I would give

it to Rob Thomas. Rob Thomas. You guys hear that in 2016? Rob, I think that's the first time I've heard his name this summer. See, that's why he's winning. He's quietly sneaking in there in a way that, like, you know, it'd be easy for me to give it to Arthur, like, shouts out to Arthur. Shouts to Arthur's fist. Yes, exactly. But I was thinking about this a lot because I was watching

all of the Olympics coverage and seeing the way that someone had matched up the song Smooth with Katie Ladecki's swim. And then also with equestrian, someone was prancing, well, a horse, not someone, was prancing out to a karaoke version of Rob Thomas's smooth. And I, had not thought about the song in years and then I realized like it is the perfect comeback story like you totally forgot about it you totally forgot about rock Thomas but he is quietly sneaking into america's households and he has like a good attitude about it has he commented it he said anything about this didn't want to talk to him see he has not really said anything I saw that he retweeted some dude wearing a shirt that references the song and I was like that's cool

He has a good, good hearty attitude about it in a way that I would be like, don't make fun of me, like stop bullying me. And instead he just, he had a great vibe about him that I appreciate. I also think that like I forgot actually how popular that song was. And something that I often sort of question is what would songs be like had the internet existed at that time? And I love that it's getting a second life. It's like the same thing for me with Ghost Town DJs and my boo where I'm like, yeah, just like you had your moment and now you're having another moment. Right. It's a great way to research. I love that. Get a few iTunes sales.

But what's crazy is I was looking into it and that song is actually Billboard's number one greatest adult pop song of all time. Is it? Which like caveat, I don't know what adult pop necessarily means. Right. What does that mean? But Billboard has named it the number one. So I was like, wow, Rob Thomas has been out here this whole time, and we didn't even know. Well, they owe a big credit to those, what, Maryland basketball players, I think it was, who started that running man challenge. Yeah, Ghost had DJs.

They owe so much. I think they started doing that during last basketball season. And then it became, it's not even the running man. It just started calling in that. I know, but such a soft spot in my heart for it. I'm also glad you brought up uh, uh, dressage because I fucking hate it. I think it's stupid. Dude, this is not get off my lawn. I just thrown it out there because I, uh, I mentioned that on Twitter the other day

that Drisage was the stupidest sport. The stupidest most elitest, dumb sport ever is what I called it. Did people come after you? And the horse community rose up. Oh. I didn't even know they had one, but they rose up and they were tweeting at me about how I didn't understand Drasage and I totally understand Drassage. It's a stupid sport. Like, do you know how bored you have to be as a rich white person to look at a horse and go, you know what?

I'm going to make that horse dance. And then that should also be an Olympic sport. It's like prancer size. It's stupid. And remember Mitt Romney had a horse, a drosage horse in 2012 in the Olympics? Yes, I do. I love that you know the name. That shows how deep this beef it really is.

You have to be, people don't realize you have to be so rich. To have a dressage horse. Of course. That's why it's like crazy that they didn't buy the rights to the real like Santana Rock Thomas. Right. And just use it. Yeah. No, I agree. But I digress.

For you, who do you think has been a winner this summer? I think the biggest winners of the summer are people in the Olympics named Simone. Yes. If you're a black woman named Simone in the Olympics, you are totally killing it. Simone Manuel first African-American woman to win an individual medal and gold on top of that. And now Simone Biles, who people are calling arguably the greatest gymnast of all time with four gold and a bronze medal. And she just finished her spoiler alert. Well, it won't be a spoiler alert on Saturday when this comes out.

She won her floor routine. Had you been following her assent prior to Rio? I only heard about it right before the Olympics started because I don't. I don't know what's happening in gymnastics when there's no Olympics. So I don't know where they perform or what they do. And so when I started hearing about it and I saw the New York Times video, they posted of her doing her floor routine and why it's so impossible for anybody to do what she does. It was astounding to watch her do it. And it's pretty cool to see Simone Manuel do what she does because of the history of black people and swimming pools in America and black people in swimming in America where you go back to.

a time where black people and some white people were having swim-ins where they were doing sit-ins in pools and people were dumping acid in the pools to a woman winning a gold medal for that very country, a black woman winning a medal for that same country. It's such a crazy thing to think about. Well, I mean, I've been following it a lot as well and seeing even the way that headlines are written about both Samones and the way that, um, It almost becomes just a kind of subplot of a larger Olympics narrative. And so I was wondering from your perspective, do you feel like they've received the right amount of media attention, not enough? Do you feel like they are the best story coming out of this games to everyone?

I think women are killing it at the Olympics and Michael Phelps is getting all the attention. Right. It's an interesting, like I saw a headline that said, Phelps and African American make history. Well, no, not even that one, but that's just as bad, but I saw another one that said Michael Phelps finishes second and wins silver medal and in small print underneath that Ledecki breaks world record and wins gold. And you're like, how is that the subheadline to Michael Phelps winning a silver medal?

And it's just been across the board. those women gymnastics team is arguably the best we've ever seen. And to look at the fact that even in this very country where you have women like Gabby Douglas and Simone Bios, competing for your country, winning, racking up gold medals for your country, there are people in line who all they can talk about is their appearance, why their hair looks the way it does, why their body looks the way it does, why didn't she put her hand over her heart during the national end? All these things where these people have. done everything to prove their love for your country.

They're not only did they spend years practicing this sport, they are doing it literally wearing the flag. Right. And the amount of sacrifice. Right. Their outfits are literally the American flag and it's not American enough for you. So I find that pretty interesting and sad on some levels. But overall, I think the Simone's and slash women.

men at the Olympics are big winners. And I agree with you. And I hope that that narrative, I guess, continues past Rio. I think that that's always been the test of time to see if, if like our collective memory lasts long enough, especially in a world wherein like we refreshed Twitter and I'm like, oh, I forgot what happened yesterday. Yeah, totally. So then who's a loser for you this summer?

Well, that's funny. You mentioned that how fast we forget because it brings me to my loser of the summer, which is Melania Trump is my biggest loser the summer after her speech plagiarizing and then her sketchy degree that she got or didn't get. Trayvon's using air quotes in case you guys didn't know. And then her, even her immigration status where he just starts to find, it takes one plagiarized speech to just have your life kind of fall apart. And it makes you realize how well or how poorly her and Donald would hold up under scrutiny

if they were able to become the president first lady. And I'm glad it looks like they might not. But 80 something more days until we get there. But I just feel like because we live in this new cycle where we have the internet and Twitter and all these things, we so quickly forget about things like that. Like 20 years ago, even 25 years ago, that would have been a huge story that would have stuck around for months. And now that we have 24-hour news cycles and Twitter, we're like, how long do we hang

on to that for like a couple days before the memes died off? And we moved on to the next thing. The DNC started and we forgot all about the speech. And it was just one of those moments that reminded me of how where politics and media are today makes it so easy to forget things that would have ruined people's careers in politics or in any type of career had they done those things when there was no social media or internet. Yeah. And even, you know, to your point, it's, it was crazy to me. I was reading an article about George W. Bush's iPod because in light of like Obama and Biden putting out like their Spotify

playlist. They were talking about what George Bush loaded onto his iPod. And I just, I had such a hard time conceptualizing the amount of technology that has evolved from president to president. And just seeing the way that you're right, like had anything like that happened during the Clinton years, I mean, I just feel like newspapers in general would have held onto that story for so much longer than what we've seen with something like that, which, You know, you brought it up and I feel bad because I'm like, oh, yeah, that did happen. I'm like, that was bad. Obama really is the social media president.

Like there was no, when was Twitter, 2007, 2008? Whenever Ashton Couther was popping. Yeah, all these things came along at the tail end of the Bush regime and they weren't using them. Obama was the first guy to really use these tools like Twitter and Facebook and Snapchat. rap chat and Instagram. And I honestly don't think anyone after him will use it as well. I don't think anyone will be as good at her as cool with it as he was. Yeah, the fact that Chance the Rapper was at his 55th birthday party.

I mean, come on. Yeah, I'm like, it's safe to say we will never have a cooler president. That's true. I don't think like no matter how you feel about politics, cool and cool is cool. And I don't think we'll have another president for. the foreseeable future or if ever that'll ever live up to the coolness of michelle and baroque in that regard but i think that being said milania thinking of all the things that have happened and the obvious people we would consider losers of the summer uh i think she's my biggest loser

but we still have one more kathy we started with your winner uh rob yeah rob just giving him that gold Getting that go, but tell me about your loser. I would say the loser of the summer for me is quietly Katie Perry. Oh, Katie Perry. I think, you know, she came out with Rise, which was, you know, the informal Olympics theme song. And I think that even though she had that song, it almost solidified her role as like Schmaltz Anthem Girl. Like she's that person. I'm going to say, is she becoming Anthem Girl?

Yeah, she's that person. that you turn to for like the pump up song and I think that as an artist all because of roars ever that were or there's also firework um but what I thought was so funny is that you know she's had so much of her catalog like blasted into the stratosphere because of the association with the Hillary Clinton campaign right and I think she's quietly the biggest loser because every time you hear roar or firework you're like why did we even like those songs to begin with And like I think about how when Obama would walk off stage and sign sealed delivered would play, no one was ever saying, oh man, that wasn't a jam.

Like everyone's like, damn, we've been sleeping on Stevie Wonder this entire time. And so I think that Katie Perry, now she has this microscope through all of these songs that she's written that I don't think she really asked for. I think she probably thought these are like some dope empowerment jams that I'm going to just share out into the world. and now everyone's like, wait, hold on a second. Like, who are you? And so in the same way that Rob Thomas had a good second life, I think that Katie Perry is suffering from kind of that second wave of criticism where people are, they're questioning everything.

So are you saying she might feel like a plastic bag drifting through the wind? I can't believe you're doing this. Wanting to start again? I'm so disappointed in you right now. I don't endorse the slow. It actually sounds worse when you actually. he talked the lyrics out. And that's what I'm saying.

I think that like people never thought about it because it's just like that song would come on. You're like, this is a jam. And now people are playing back the lyrics slowly and they're like, what? That makes no sense. It's used comically in so many movies and TV shows now. It was on Kimmy Schmidt last season.

But yeah, Katie Perry and Melania Trump are biggest losers of the summer. I agree. Even though you did a slow read of Katie Perry, I agree with you, Trayvon. We can still be friends. I take it back. I take it back.

Thanks for shooting the pop culture shit with me as usual. We do this all the time in the office. Stay tuned because you're going to get a lot of anger and resentment and shouting, I hope, from Joel and Pat. Coming up next. All right, guys, well, that was Trayvon and Kathy. And now it's time for everybody's favorite segment, Get Off My Lawn.

My name is Pat Barker and any given Wednesday writer. I'm here with the great Joel Solomon. And this is the segment where, we rant and rave about stuff that uh that bothers us but you are the lawn mower let's get that right you're ready to mow some things down oh look at you you're ready to mow the lawn i'll tell you what i do have an issue with uh i'm you know i'm reading the news and i see that uh the nfl and roger giddell have said that the players named in that aljazeera report that came out in december if they do not comply uh with mandatory interviews to discuss uh their their alleged uh you know

HDH and steroid use, they will be suspended. Not if they are found guilty, not if evidence surfaces, if they do not talk to Roger Goodell about it. Never mind the fact that all of them have now submitted sworn affidavits, which are completely admissible in court, but evidently not in Roger Goodell's court. He feels the need to talk to these guys one-on-one. It's completely insane. It's a total abuse of power.

I believe the term you were looking for is obstruction of justice, which by the way justice this was a report that came out half a year ago why are we just getting around to this now i thought this was over yeah dude first of all i don't know what obstruction of justice means i saw a few good men three times that's the that's the extent of my court knowledge um but that sounds about right uh it's it's just it's disgusting to me because first of all the aljazeera report uh let's let's go over the timeline of that they released it uh then immediately the guy who implicated Peyton Manning in the report says, I made that whole thing up. So right away, it's off to a great start. The guy who implicated Peyton Manning says he made that whole thing up. Secondly, two major

league baseball players named in the report, Ryan Howard and Ryan Zimmerman, have sued Al Jazeera for defamation. Joel, other than Lance Armstrong, have you ever seen a steroid user sue for defamation? Never. No. And you know why? Because then it goes to court and then information comes out that they don't want to come out. So if you're willing to sue, if you feel that strongly to prove your innocence, chances are the report is bullshit. So I'm calling bullshit on the report in general. Never mind the fact that Roger Goodell can't insist that these guys talk to him or he'll suspend. I mean, I guess he can do it. He is doing it. But it's a dick thing to do. And it's James Harrison, another guy that's kind of called out Roger Goodell, spoke, you know,

not so highly of him. And now we're here again, just saying, then I'm going to suspend you. It's Roger Goodell, you need to focus on the real issue here, why Aaron Hernandez has not been suspended for murder. That's a great question. That is a great point. You love to suspend people. You're missing a big one. I demand that if Aaron Hernandez gets 50 years, on the 51st year, he should be suspended for the entire season, his age 84 season or whatever it is. I want to see that in the suspension list. All right. I'm a huge Yankee fan. Love the Yankees, love the youth movement, but they disappointed me a little bit last week. I'm glad Alex Rodriguez, got a maybe not exactly a proper send-off, but a send-off nonetheless.

But Yankee fans booed Joe Girardi. And Joe Girardi had his hands tied a little bit on this. Stop. It was a little bit mid-season. This came about very abruptly. They wanted Arad out. And Joe Girardy had to backtrack a little bit about farewell tours. That's not what he does.

That's up in the air for discussion. No, it's not. It's clearly what he does. But, Pat, you can't boo. Who, Joe Girardi. Sure. If I was there, I'd have boot him. Joe Girardi, by the way, a lot of his good players traded away at the deadline.

Beltran, Chapman, Miller. He's dealing with a lot of call-ups. Still in the wildcard hunt. And you're booing Gerardi? Yeah, because he's a clown. He's a clown. He's a clown. First of all, if your good players get traded, that's because you're underachieving.

That's when that happens. So if you're underachieving and your good players get traded, who's that on? That's on you. You're the manager. Like if the Yankees were winning the wild card, those guys would not have been dealt. So I don't feel any sympathy for him, you know, from that. He handled the entire A-Rod situation horribly. Like, the Yankees, the Yankees in general.

Wait, A-Rod didn't handle it poorly? A-Rod has handled his whole life poorly, okay? But if we're going into just specifically the last week, I put way more blame on the Yankees. You can't boo the Steinbrenners. You can't, they don't go on the field. I mean, they did for a ceremony. You can't boo Brian Cashman. Those guys, they orchestrated this.

They needed it bats for the younger's guys. Brian McCann is moving to DH. Listen, I feel bad for A-Rod, too. But I don't think I would have taken it out on Joe Jordan. Two things. Number one, I'm from Philadelphia. I can boo whoever I want. That's what we do.

Okay? So don't tell me, I'll boo you for that nonsense. Number two, I'm not saying that they should have kept A-Rod. I'm saying that when, you decide like, okay, we're going to play A-Rod in two more games ever. He deserves to not be treated like that. You know what I mean? I know what you mean, but the reason they're not in the wild card hunt is because of A-Rod.

He's batting 200 paddy fly balls. No. A-Rod, first of all, A-Rod has been one of the only $100 million contracts in baseball history that he actually performed up to the money. All right. I don't disagree with that. You know, right? I'm saying this guy doesn't deserve this kind of treatment.

They should have either outright released him or not let Gerardi come out and been like, yeah, he could do whatever he wants and then be like, well, I don't do farewell tours. Get your story straight, Yankees or just release the guy. You didn't like him anyway. Why do we have to do this? So you could sell A-Rod final game t-shirts for $40? No. Well, listen, he'll be on the Phillies next year possibly and then you can boo him then.

Yeah, he'll be in the Phillies AAA affiliate with new manager Joe Girardi. Let's talk about the Olympics. Let's. Okay, and I hope my Rio friends don't get too upset. This has nothing to do with Rio. So calm down. A Trumpian take is on the way. Before you start tweeting, slow your role, okay?

The Olympics, I'm upset because I turn them on, and it happens once every four years. So you know, there's a lot of anticipation. I'm really excited, and I turn them on, and what are they airing footage of, but ping pong. Okay? You have your choice if you're the Olympics. You can be the ultimate athletic spectacle where all of the greatest athletes in the world go to compete. You know, dating back to the ancient Greek days when dudes in togas or half naked were running around and jumping over hurdles and throwing rocks or whatever the fuck. You could be that.

You could test strength and endurance and athleticism or you could be a glorified Dave and Buster's tournament with fucking ping pong. You got to choose one or the other. Either get rid of ping pong and badminton and trampoline. Why is there an Olympic event that was a thing that I did in my backyard when I was eight? So you were not into that horse prancing around to Santana Rob Thomas smooth. You were not feeling that. No, fuck that horse. Fuck equestrian.

Get all of this nonsense. How is there no baseball? There's no baseball. There's no football. There's no karate. There's no racquet ball. There's no cricket. But this, see, this is where I throw it out to you, that is not like ping pong that you and I play.

That is Forrest Gump level shit, athletic ping pong. And I get it. They're not the most exciting event. But, hey, every four years, you don't think they deserve a crack? No. No. No, in the world ping pong championship, sure. I've been at bowling alleys where I've seen dance dance revolution players that would fuck your whole world up.

They would blow your mind. They don't, they're not Olympians. Right. Okay. Those are not sports. I don't, I, I, I have no idea why I'm watching ping pong on the Olympics. But you're watching it. But you are watching it.

I hate watching it. You are watching it. And, and see, this is, this is the dilemma. The Olympics keep adding sports. I think they want to change with the times. You know, as much as I like shot put. No one, I mean, I don't even know how. More interesting to me is who the hell?

How do you even get into shot put? Are you just at Home Depot one day throwing stuff under the shelf? and you're like, I should go out for shot put. That, as long as people are doing it and they can make a competition out of it, see, this is where I think the Olympics is going wrong. They keep trying to make it younger and maybe we're going to see beer pong in it one day and dude perfect trick shots. And that's where I think they can scale back.

I, you know, I disagree. I mean, well, or, you know, do one or the other. I don't care. That's fine. If you want to do dude perfect trick shots, I'm okay with that. if the Algerian national team can throw a basketball out of a helicopter and into a hoop, you get gold medals. Congratulations.

I'm fine with that. I think you're just upset that we're not dominating these fringe sports. If the Americans, if you saw the medal count at 100 to nothing, would you be okay? Oh, if the American team was dominating trampoline, then I'd be all for it. But I don't think we are. So, yeah, then ditch it. Ditch it. All right.

Pat, I've been in a marriage for 11 years. And sadly, I think it's time to end it. This pains me to say it and announce this on the podcast that I, this pains me to say it, I think I'm over fantasy football. Oh, I really am. And Mrs. Solomon just dodged a bullet. She did. That marriage, the jury's still out.

What's your beef with fantasy football? I just don't want to do it this year. I love getting together for the draft and that's always fun. Wings. Maybe it's that the players I don't care about. or that it's not worth the $500, but I just, I could care less after the draft. Don't care.

Come week seven, I'm not bombarding my friends with trade offers and looking at the waiver wire. And it pains me to say it. I love the idea of fantasy football. I love that Matthew Barry's built an empire on it and that it's good for the economy. But, man, I'm just not, I don't know, Pat.

You're not feeling it. You know, I think you're not alone. That's why Daily Fantasy is like this, this juggernaut now. Because you're right, the only fun part of fantasy football is the draft. That's it. That's the only fun exhilarating part. And then you have to follow it up with like just six months of just like trolling the waiver wire, looking for like a backup tight end who might get to play like, you know.

I have enough depression in my life already. I don't need my fantasy team to be two and seven and dealing with injuries. I'm already upset enough that I have to deal with this fantasy team. It's not worth it to me. Is it possible you're just not good at fantasy football? Here's the other thing I've begun to think about. As I've gotten older,

I've now realized, I used to think, oh man, Ezekiel Elliott, this guy's a real sleeper. That I think it's been perpetuated that, wow, anyone can do fantasy football. No, it's complete luck of the draw. You deal with injuries. And now I'm like, who gives a shit?

Whereas in my 20s, I'm like, I'm really, I'm really good at this. I'm 100% with you. We're roughly the same age. And my interest in, I just sign up for a fantasy football league the air day. And I might as well just give the guy $50 and then, you know, turn my computer off. Because I'm not going to win. You know, it doesn't matter. I'm, I'm with you.

I'm not a fan. The saddest part about this is you're right. I'll do it again. Okay. Listen, that has been get off my lawn. I appreciate you guys tuning in. Now let's throw it to our last segment with Brendan Lynch and Kathy Lou. Hey, welcome to the final section of the Writers' Room podcast.

I'm here with Kathy Liu. Hello. And this is a new segment that we're calling Hot Rex. And we're just going to recommend a couple of things, Kathy. Just cruising for suggestions. This is based on what's the place that does the recommendations? I feel like there are many places that do recommendations. But this is really just an opportunity for Brendan and I to kind of throw out things that we've been really interested in, things that we think you might be interested in.

Brendan thinks it's important to specify that Rex is spelled like W-R-E-C-K-S, just in case you guys were wondering, because these could also be garbage recommendations. But we're willing to throw it out there. That's my first recommendation. Stumbling out of the gate. Kathy, what's yours? Your recommendation? I'm recommending Terrace House. Have you ever heard of it?

No. So I don't watch that much reality TV. I know that you dabble a lot in reality TV. Terrace House is a Netflix series that is essentially a rip-off of real world where it's six millennial, like haughty Japanese youth living in this beautiful home in Japan. It's all in Japanese. It is the most boring show I've ever seen in my entire life.

Like, it is so boring that it's actually recalibrated my mind for how I watch television. So the thing that I love about it is, as someone who doesn't watch that much reality TV, it made me realize, like, I have a lot of preconceived notions about it. To give you an example, like, whenever there's a fight between the two dude protagonists, I'm like, oh my God, he's totally going to punch him in the face. Like, this is when he spills the beer and, like, punches him in the face. And that doesn't happen. Like, they just have a very chill conflict resolution ses.

And it made me realize, like, this is how I perceive all conflicts, like, in general and on television. And it's made me realize that I had all of these ideas about reality TV that I didn't even know I had. That said, it is extremely boring. So just quick question. So it's like a reasonable people like on like a reality show. Yeah.

That's what makes it boring. Like it's actually people who aren't like going insane. Well, it's that nothing ever happens. And so every time you think something is going to happen. it doesn't actually occur. And so instead, you just have people who are working out their issues by talking about it. And it means that everything is heightened. So it heightens all of your senses because you're expecting this big blowout or if it's the male and the female

protagonists who are going to like maybe finally get together, that just doesn't happen. And so instead, you're left being on the edge of your seat by someone doing like a really heavy sigh. of just like disappointment. Ah, I got to check this out. It's like a cleanse. Yes. Actually, I thought of you when I saw it because it is so boring. And the color palette is so soothing that you'll either fall asleep, which is nice because,

you know, it's nice to have something that you can reliably count on for white noise, or you'll walk away from it. Just you'll never look at the challenge the same way again, is my suspicion. And it's called Terrace House. Teres House. Okay. That's a great one. So my next one is I don't like music.

I'm not a music person. I like to listen to like, I don't know, people talking. You're like a big cadence guy. Yeah. I like to just, I like to listen to people talk. but I do like rap mixtapes. That's my weakness. Datpiff.com.

And when I say it, it sounds ridiculous. But datpiff.com, I like to just go on there and just see what's going on. What's the new gangster grills? What's the new like? Because I just, I love sound effects. I love interruptions. And I just like, mixtapes are what I feel like what rappers really want to say. what the label want, you know, it's like you're getting the real them.

It's the purest form of music. So you're... And my mixtape that I'm recommending, and this is, dare I say, like, one of the greatest albums I've ever heard, it's a collaboration between two Memphis rappers, Gangstaboo, who formerly of Three Six Mafia, and La Chatt, and it's called Witch. and the theme of the album is like black magic. It's very dark. It's it passes the Bechdel test. It's the only mixtape that passes.

I didn't know that a mixtape could pass the Bechdel test. It is, it's wonderful. It is so great. Gangsta Boo is my favorite female rapper. I think she's so underrated. She's so brilliant. And please just give it a listen. Even if you don't like rap, I think you'll enjoy it because it's so different.

Like, just the idea of rapping about being a witch and, like, bringing up that kind of imagery is just... I feel like witchcraft has had a really huge resurgence in a way that it's become a cultural force. But I'm really interested, how do you think, as someone who doesn't like music, that dat Piff found its way to your heart and in a world in which like you hate all of their music. Great question. I love beef. Yes. That's something Brendan and I share in common.

It's just a deep, deep love of beef that I cannot stress enough. If two people are fighting, I want to watch. I want to listen. I want to sometimes instigate. And there's a series of mixtapes that someone's. told me to check out on that Piff, and they're called Street Wars. And it's basically just taking the rappers going back and forth at each other, and just, it's a compilation, basically.

It's a sizzle reel of beef. And it's great. And it's also fun because, like, there's so much more beef on the mixtape circuit, you know, just because it's unfiltered. Yeah. It's not as curated as the, as just, like. the wild beef out there. Yeah.

And it's also a lot of beef where it's like a guy is from a certain scene and he's beefing with like the younger guys in that scene who are just trying to get, you know, try to come up. So yeah, I mean, street wars, check that. I don't know if they still do them anymore, but which you cannot go wrong with which. I am so, I feel so strongly about. Were you a big like charmed fan growing up? No, I, maybe. I didn't.

I, my, I don't really, I haven't dabbled with which, with witchcraft a lot. That's actually something that's, that's good for everyone to know. The pop culture thing. But like, you know, maybe, charmed. What's the movie with Bet Midler? Hocus, pocus, oh, classic. That's actually our real recommendation. Maybe I'll just go on like a, like a straight one day, just Sabrina, everything, just knock everything out.

So what's your next one, Kathy? So I feel like I aged out of Snapchat, not in the sense that I don't know how to use it, but more in that I don't understand the etiquette. So if I ever don't understand the etiquette of something, I tend to just fall back and I just like to observe. So I don't send or receive Snapchats, which I now realize makes me sound sad. But instead, I've been using Snapchat when I'm lost because the geo filters that tell you where you are and what neighborhood you're in are so clutch. I don't like pulling out my phone and having to pull up like Google Maps or an app that shows so clearly to everyone that I'm very lost. And I just moved to L.A. So I tend to not really know where I am at any given time. But I guess as I'm saying this,

I realize that I'm kind of like a cranky dad who doesn't want to pull over and ask for directions. And so I've been using Snapchat as a way to understand, like, where I am in the city at any given time. Mm-hmm. So my recommendation is using Snapchat for all purposes that are not designed for the app. So using it to know the weather, very important, using it for geo-filters. And also just, you know, I tend to read the articles, too. Yeah, no. I mean, it's a fun, it's light, you know, you know what you're getting into when you do the

articles. Exactly. Just like, this is going to be a minute and you're not going to get sucked in. But that's interesting. I never even thought about there. There's so many little neighborhoods in LA. I didn't even think. And Google, Google Maps. It doesn't really tell you where you are. Like, it's been the same for a long time. And the walking, the walking directions on Google Maps, I'm always walking, I always walk 10 minutes in the wrong direction. It's just, it's, it's, it's, it's, really not set up for that. And in L.A., I like to walk around in L.A. Same, exactly.

It's not a popular thing to say. Like, I saw that entourage movie. And the biggest laugh on the entourage movie is, you know, one of the characters says, what are you doing? No, when he walks in L.A. And the whole, I saw it at the arc light. And you laughed. No, I was like, what is he?

I was offended. But the whole crowd laughed. was like I walk in LA like in my head it never really got back into the movie after that but um the yeah google maps not good you can't ways doesn't do anything ways doesn't help you and so i would much rather be spotted as someone who's way too obsessed with snapchat filters than someone who's lost that's my big pet peeve what is your next recommendation it's an experience it's an app it's It's a lifestyle. It's just so I, the other, this weekend, I was like on my own for food.

And I said, you know, I want to do something different. And I love trash pizza. Like, you know, people who talk about like, oh, the best pizzas in New York, the best pizza. No, I like a chain pizza. I like rewards points. I like delivery. Like, I don't need that like when some. Someone's talking about like, oh, the little trickle of grease and the, you know, if you call it a slice or a pot, like get out of here.

I want it made by like if it's not on a stock exchange, I will not eat your pizza. Okay. So I hadn't messed around with Pizza Hut in a long time. I've been doing a lot of Papa Johns, a lot of Domino's. And I said, you know what Pizza Hut? I'm going to give you another shot. I download the app. Great experience.

Then I start just messing about on the app and I see that they have all these. these new things. And, you know, I knew that they brought back stuffed crust. I didn't know that. A 90s fave. And then they have the pretzel crust. And I said, can you stuff the pretzel crust? Yes, you can. Whoa, that's a bold ass, too. Yeah. So I order stuffed pretzel crust Hawaiian. And then at the very end, there is a balsamic drizzle, a drizzle. And I said, what the, what the heck? Did a little balsamic drizzle. So this pizza, like as it's, pizza is my nightmare. This pizza, I mean, it's bad pizza done, it's like a madman created this pizza, right? I see it and I'm almost like, oh, this is like, I would not go in and look someone in the eye in order this, right? And I also got jalapinos on it.

So, good addition, good addition. Yeah, I can't leave that. out the devil's in the detail so I order this pizza and I'm waiting and then I get the call and I walked down and there's this delightful woman from Pizza Hut and I had my tip in my hand and she said you know I had to sign I paid with the credit card because it was on the app and then I always tip in cash because you know classy move did respectful so I give her the tip and she said oh man you you know when this order came up like we were wondering what you were going to look like and you don't look anything like we thought. And I was just like the fact that I brought a pizza hut in LA, like the employees together with my horrible order, like I was like, I ate that pizza

with pride. But how do you think they thought you looked? I have no. Well, she also said one last thing. Like she was like, yeah, we thought like, because we're having some problems with the app that it was like, the app like like your app just misfired because it was you know and I was like no that's exactly what I wanted but she thought it was like they were going to have to you know I mean there was a bug in the system or something because my my order was so horrible but download the pizza the Pizza Hut app there's a lot of fun stuff on there they got cookie pizzas and they have this weird like three level thing and you can stuff all these different kinds of crust it's a fun night try to beat a Hawaiian jalapeno stuffed pretzel crust with a balsamic drizzle. Try to beat that in terms of

just train wreck and get back to me if you'd like. That's an aspirational goal. I also think that the best part about this is it shows so much about your greatest beef of all time, which is beef against the city of New York. That's the subtle undertone that I really respect. I am not built for New York and I do not pretend. I'm not one of these people who pretends to say that it's the greatest place on earth. You know, New York is not for me. I respect that.

But in L.A., by saying like, yeah, I'm not the biggest, like, New York person, it's, there's tension there. There's, yeah, some debt-piff quality tension. And when you say, I like Domino's, that's what I like. Someone from New York like balls their fist. You know, they don't, I like, you don't have always have to like the best of everything.

Sometimes something that's just consistent and familiar. You know, I grew up like eating trash pizza. Why all of a sudden am I going to change as I get older and start to pretend like, oh, the dough, the water is different? I mean, come on. I agree. You like what you like. And what's your last one? My last recommendation, I guess, is also an experience.

So recently I was with a bunch of friends and we started to try and guess what the top, like, viewed YouTube videos of all time, what videos those actually are. Do you know the number one video? This might be something we've talked about before. I should know. I mean, just quick little disclaimer. I, in a former life, was an employee of ebombsworld.com. That took a lot. That took a lot.

So I am very familiar with viral content. And no shots at ebombsworld.com. Only love for ebombsworld. And but is it the, The most view, the history of dance? No, it is Gungnam style. And it is the most viewed, like, it blows all of the other videos out of the water. And so that surprised my group of friends and I so much that we ended up watching all 40 of the top YouTube videos of all time.

And I would highly recommend it because it's not what you'd expect. Like the top five, Argonam style, See You Again, which, I mean, Wiz and that dude Charlie were never even in the same frame of that video. It's not a good music video. Uptown Funk, which classic wedding song, like, I'm not going to knock it. Sorry by Justin Bieber and Blank Space by Taylor Swift. What I thought was super surprising is that all of those are fairly recent hits. And on top of that, they're all music. So all of the top videos for all of the, you know,

sort of commentary that we hear about viral content and comedy videos, actually all of the top viewed things on YouTube are all music, with the exception of a Russian cartoon and little wheels on the bus, which I love because it just totally means that parents shove that in front of their kids and just let it pre-roll and just like, have a great afternoon. So I did an analysis, if you will, of the top 40. And I highly recommend that people just sit and devote some time to watching all of them in a row because you will emerge from that experience questioning everything. Do you ever, quick question, do you ever do YouTube repeat?

Do you ever, will you ever, you know how you can just put like at the end of YouTube? You can put repeat and you can just watch a video over and do you ever do that? I've never done that. But there's something in your tone that suggests that you have. Oh, I'm the king of YouTube repeat. YouTube repeat. I'm glad because I was just about to go off and be like, who would ever do that? And then I checked myself, but why? I don't, I, I can get hypnotized by stuff.

Like, I watched a Bill Ambir, like, highlight film, like, literally 20 times in a row. And it was set to, like, this really bad, like, bad electronic song. horrible footage but something about like I'll just put it on and it will just, it just focuses me if I get something like going over and over those top 40 those the official, what I always think

it's funny when I look for a song on YouTube is those other people who have uploaded it and then they have the weird lyrics videos. Yeah, the weird lyrics video or just the weird like it's like pink like and then it's like has like white cursive writing and like I think there's one person doing that. I would love to track that person down.

Because like what a life you just, you're uploading stuff to YouTube, putting on this horrible. And it like the background slowly moves. It looks sort of like clouds. You know what I'm talking about? Yeah. Oh, of course I know what you're talking about.

Because the only, the only way to access some songs without like a ad before it is just going on those lyrics videos with the pink background and everything. And it is, it's hypnotic in a in a certain way it adds a little something in another life i mean i'd love to just up be an uploader to you just to you know like just you were like one step away at ebombs i know they never let me upload i wrote like uh captions and stuff i was a caption writer and i would like i was also like i would find viral stuff like i would try to find the next you know

charlie bit my finger and i realized there that i have my taste in internet videos is not like what most people want like because even eBom's world is a little like skewed away from normal but I would bring them stuff and they would be like too weird yeah like what are you we're not going to upload this to eBom's world which like says a lot you know that must sting in a way like was that hard for you to reconcile like when your boss would be like hey man sorry this this cat video, it's just a lot better than whatever sort of video you found. Yeah, I never, I mean, you're competing with cats is my point. I never did like, I never did cats or any of that.

Like I, too mainstream. Yeah. I admire you for that. I was like sitting like, this was, you know, years ago, but I would sit there and be like, oh, you know, because, you know, it's viral video. So like, I definitely came with sort of a pretentious eye like, oh, cat videos. That's so hack. You know, I like to fight.

I like fight videos. I mean, I'll be honest. It's not a good thing I like about myself, but I like a good, like, just search like Oakland Raider parking lot, like the day after a game. And it's just fun. It's just a good time. I mean, you know, a bottle being broken over someone's head. I mean, it's just like, I like, it goes back to beef, you know?

Yeah. It all, that's the thing that I, I truly believe is that it all goes back to beef. It really does. Yeah. What is your final recommendation, if not Raiders videos? It's a song that a lot of people cover on YouTube. It's a Bjork song called J-O-G-A-J-G-A-J-G-A. But I really like this song.

It's a great Bjork song. It's sort of like it's on her greatest hits, but it's a little bit of an obscure song. It's not like a song you hear at a bar or whatever. What Bjork song do you hear at a bar? Um, human behavior. Okay. So for someone who doesn't like music, you're a pretty big Bjork head. I do.

I like I like Bjork. I love her, that movie, dancer in the dark. Yes. Um, I like that her, she was married to that weirdo artist for a while. I mean, I just like, Iceland as a country, I'm in. If anything Iceland, sign me up on it. This song, Joga, just search it. J-O-G-A and there's all these people on YouTube who cover it and there's some great covers and

there's some awful covers but it's just it's it's really interesting and there's some like professional people like you know who've covered it and it's just really interesting to hear all the different interpretations of it top of the lake you know that show the main actress covered it for the soundtrack and um But I was into that song. God, I can't believe I'm saying this. I was into this Bjork song before that. But, um, no.

O.G. Bjork fan. Yeah, I get it. What's great is that like, I think it's a really hard song to sing, but it looks easy because there's some attempts on it that have like three or four views. I've watched every cover. I've watched every single. Once a month, like I'm paying my cable bill. I look at Joga.

And there's always something new. You know, a kid's doing it with a kazoo or like a March. bands doing it. And it's this weird, I've never talked about it. I've never asked anyone, hey, do you like, what's your, you know, favorite song? I've never heard anyone even talk about this song. But on YouTube, for some reason, YouTube loves this song and people are always trying to cover it. So take a look. And you know what? Have fun. upload your own Joga or Yo. I don't even know how to say it. And let us know how to say it. So when you upload your own version, please help us understand how to pronounce the name. Yeah, I have no idea. This was Hot Rex. Thank you for listening

to the Writers Room podcast. And please make sure to watch any given Wednesday, Wednesday nights, 10 p.m. HBO. Thank you very much. And we will see you soon.