The Watch - Ep. 25: 'The Watch'

Episode Date: March 1, 2016

Chris and Andy give their winners and losers from last night's Oscars (4:00), discuss tone-deaf Hollywood (19:00), and propose alternate settings for 'Vinyl' (27:00). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Hello and welcome to The Watch on the Channel 33 podcast feed. I am Chris Ryan and I am Reditor for the ringer.com and with me on the other line, he really thought he was dating Bree Larson for a second. It's Andy Greenwald. You California It's a little close to home That's a little close to home right there

I told you a little tender today Am I right? You just touching the soft places I had to stay up so late watching that show last night And then and see like The handsomer, younger, more musically inclined version of me Just be like, yeah, that's

Wifey up there Who says there are in second acts of American life? That's tough. You know what? If you're that dude, it's all first act. It's all first act. Because like what's, what's worst case scenario for him, right? Like, we're, worst case scenario for him is American Eagle Outfitters is like, hey, can you stand here and wear this bomber jacket for a $10,000 today? Like, that's the worst case for that. Does he still kick up off of OC streaming money? I think he, I think he gluten-free cakes it. You know what I mean? Like, like sort of, uh, it doesn't clump up. It's like a clean deer insides. A nice nut butter. Andy, welcome to the watch.

Does anyone know what we're talking about? I don't think they do. Sorry, my bad. Welcome to the watch. You can subscribe to us on the Channel 33 podcast feed on Stitcher's SoundCloud and iTunes. I am Chris Ryan. This is Andy Greenwald. We are talking about Oscars, winners, and losers.

And we have a very fun segment for the second half of the show today. So fun. Do a little vinyl doctoring where we are going to suggest some alternative settings and time periods that vinyl, a show like vinyl could have taken place in. So that's a fun thing. But dude, we're going to start with the Oscars from last night. Very long show. I watched all of it, as is my want.

And then I promptly gathered myself and went and saw the legendary post-hardcore band Drive Like Jayhu play their first show in Los Angeles in like 10 years. And they pushed my wig back, man. They were so great. If anybody hasn't heard either of their two albums, self-title album, and Yank Crime, Yan crime is on Spotify. Oh my God, this band is so good. And if you get a chance to see them, I think they play like 10, 5, 10 shows a year in sort of major metropolitan areas.

I mean, they've been playing a lot in California, I think. But holy shit, they are good at playing music. Can I ask you something? How many members of the extended Fury Road crew were in attendance? Because some of those dudes looked like they like to party. They looked like they went full finestra. ball was not what they're about. Yeah, let's talk about the Oscars a little bit.

Let's break this up into winners and losers. We already mentioned Alex Greenwald, but I have written down here, Mad Max Finestra Heads. I want to talk about that. Can we just talk? Sometimes I feel like that's sliding doors. That really was best case scenario of me.

Now, as far as I know, I'm not related to him, just like I'm not related to, you know, international espionage provocateur Glenn Greenwald. What if you were? What if you guys were brothers? That would be amazing. Glenn, Andy, and Alex. That's like a Wes Anderson movie right there.

It is, oh, God, that would be terrific. I love it, mainly because. The Royal Greenwalds. Because Queen Bree would make an appearance. That's right. It was nice to hear the Greenwald name get a little shine from that stage. Yeah, I know. It's always good to.

But I'm actually going to take that point, and I'll make a larger point that we can help us get into this. because I think obviously Brie Larson was a big winner. She literally won her category. But I would actually put her in a little bit of a loser category as well, if you'll bear with me on this. You've already, you're blowing my mind already. First of all, can I just ask you really quickly?

Have you seen Room? Yeah. Oh, God, no. I've seen maybe twos of the movies we're going to be talking about. Should I admit that up front? I went on the Cornheiser show. this morning and I was like really giving some opinions about the state of cinema

and luckily they never asked me if I'd seen any of the movies so I feel I feel good about that I saw everything except for Bridge of Spies and Danish Girl and Bridge of Spies to my tremendous shame that I have not seen that yeah I feel like I want to see that one here's what I want to say about it every year we talk about award shows and we talk about the Oscars

and every year people in charge of producing them they worry about the host they worry about the montages the in-memory real, how they're going to juice this thing up, how they're going to make it entertaining, how they're going to make it stand out from the pack. The truth is, these things are what they are, and the only thing that changes year to year are the speeches and who wins the awards. Like, that's what makes or breaks an Oscars.

Actually, let me rephrase that. What breaks the Oscars is having Rob Lo duet with Snow White, but what makes any Oscars is always going to be something that hasn't been planned and is uncontrollable. And the biggest flaw of this year was I don't think anyone was particularly passionate about the movies in play or the likely winners. And when that happens, with the exception of DiCaprio. Now, I don't really care what DeCaprio says because he wasn't saying it through it, you know, an Alice in Wonderland caterpillar-style haze of vape smoke.

So because he didn't do that, it wasn't as interesting. But people like seeing people that they've invested in or grown up with have their moment and what they do with that spotlight when they get it. No best picture winner, pun intended, right? the problem with this was as much as I love Brie Larson not as much as my cousin Alex but a lot of people

like more than a lot of people like I've been a big fan of her and almost all of the movies she's in I think she's a tremendous actor and I'm really happy for her but I wasn't that interested in what she was going to say same with Alicia Vicander

like I think she's great she's beautiful but it's not like you shut your damn mouth when you talk about Alicia Vickander the the stalking horse problem with this though. It's not just that they didn't have that much to say because they're just young, talented people at the beginning of their career. There's not like an arc for them to be

explaining to us or for us to be, you know, viscerally experiencing. The problem is this whole thing is gamed out so much now. Brie Larson has won at least a dozen awards in the last two months. Yeah, that's what I was going to say. She's speeched out, dude. She's speeched out. There's two paths of this conversation. There's how to fix the Oscars in general and how to fix last night or what we what we sort of liked and didn't like about last night. But I completely agree with you. By the time you get through the PGAs and the DGAs, and the Sags and the Globes of the People's Choice Awards and Spirit Awards and every other thing, the New York Film Critics' Critics' Choice, whatever else.

Even if it's Rylance, Ruffalo or Stallone, if it's Leo or nobody else, but if everybody who is going to get a chance to go up on that stage has done the deal already. And I remember the tipping point for this for me, I guess, to the extent that I care about it, was when McConaughey had to do his Dallas Buyers Club, speech like nine times. And that is a very charismatic dude. You know what I mean? Like I would listen to Matthew McCona. He'd call a Brewer's game if I could. But after he gives the same speech, seriously, why the hell has that not happened? But after he gives the same speech six times, you're just like, either I need to look at my choices and think about what I'm doing with my Sunday nights,

or like he just, you just got to go up there and be like, I saved some stuff for the Oscars. You know what I mean? And to be fair, our colleague in front of man. You might be like, guess what? I killed a guy once. And I'm just, I have to get it off my chest. Can I say that you seem to be pitching alternate seasons of Eastbound and Down, all of which I would be into. The Brewer's game, the secret murder, the confession in front of Lewis Gosser Jr. I love all of it.

Matthew McCona would have done us all a big favor if he had done his Eastbound and Down character when he won his Oscar. Everyone should always be doing their Eastbound and Down character, especially Adam Scott. But let me say. Her friend and colleague Amanda Dobbins, I was listening to her on Jam Session podcast, shouts to Channel 33. And, you know, I think she was making the point. Or maybe she didn't even make it herself. Maybe this was on Bill's podcast. It's just all podcasts and incest here in my brain, my foggy brain.

But the point was, presumptive best actor or actress winners have a lot to potentially lose, particularly if it's their introduction on a national stage. And the comp was Hathaway, who had a lot of goodwill and then seemed a little, little, little, too cozy up there and maybe turn some people off. And to that end, both Brie Larson and Queen Vikander were delightful. You know, they were very polished, they were very appreciative, and they were very brief. So in terms of like curating career management, that's great. But honestly, what we all want is more of the Mad Max Fury Road costume designer, just letting the leather jacket out. You know what I mean? Just like, just unleash it. That makes it more fun. You take the next one. Well, yeah. I mean, I think what?

What could we say about the, here's a loser, was anyone who was unfamiliar with Ali G's work before last night. Because that must have been a weird choice, man. Really, really confusing moment for you. Like, that is not a character that I would say is in the lexicon right now. I mean, like, it is for us. You know, we remember those things. But I got to say, like, that was a choice.

And shout out to whoever is the Brothers Grimsby marketing team. I wonder if they're like, yeah, a little bit less Allie G and a little bit more like the guy that was supposed to be in a movie this summer. Olivia Wilde just she really had the wheel grip tight there up there. I feel for her. I can't tell you. Can we just like have one Sunday night when Olivia Wilde is not just forced to like have lockjaw next to a giant dude overdoing something? You know what I mean? Like let Olivia live.

Yeah. Let her be wild. B, I felt so bad. At what point did they tell her, oh, you're presenting with Sasha Barron Cohen, and she's like, ah, come on, guys. Like, I got a kid. Like, it's Sunday night. My TV shows on.

I don't have to do this. And then he's like, just Gilda Lily. He's going to be doing it in a character that hasn't really been noteworthy in 12 years. Like, what is the upside of this for her, other than, I guess, looking dynamite on the Oscars? I would love to know how much they knew about that beforehand. Like, you know, did she know, were they like, you're going to be presenting with Sasha Baron Cohen and she was like, that's great.

I love Borat. Or did they say, you're going to be presenting with Allie G. And she was like, I love Allie G. Respect. Or was she like, you're going to be presenting with Allie G. And she's like, did he just quit one direction? And they're like, great, go with a doll. Right.

You're killing it. Andy, if I'm going to remember really anything from this, and there are other winners and losers we're going to talk about here. But the thing that will stick with me is the, closing moments of the show, which had some of the stuff that I really like about award shows, which is famous people acting normally, like Michael Keaton eating a Girl Scout cookie on stage when he won Best Picture with Spotlight. But then in the last few seconds, they chose to use the outro music to be Fight the Power,

the Public Enemy song that was obviously really prominently used to do the right thing and is an anthem of sorts over the last 30 years of rebellion. social justice. And I thought it was complete bullshit for them to do that. I think that you can't play, fight the power when you are the power. And there was a lot of self-flagellation going on last night

between Chris Rock's hosting and also just a lot of like, I think people basically being uncomfortable with what they were participating in, but at the same time wanting to be active participants in it. And I think you can break that down in a bunch of different

ways. But I basically rejected the idea of a like this idea that the Oscars somehow didn't have any control over what they were broadcasting and I know that it's not a homogenous body and that there are voters and then there's an executive board and then they're oh it's a little homogenous well it is a little homogenous but I'm sure that the president of the academy was genuine in her comments I'm just saying that like yes she was the way that they almost tried to then capture the zeitgeist of people being against what the Oscars stood for and flip it into a selling point for the Oscars itself seemed really, really disingenuous to me. And I kind of, just don't piss on me and tell me it's raining is basically what my attitude about it was.

And I just thought that that was like a really bummed note to go out on. I totally agree. And I'm glad you pointed out how strange it was particularly given how loose and real feeling those last few seconds actually were. Yeah, I was a surprise ring. surprise winner that I was very happy about. I love that movie. You know, if we're doing winners and losers, I think Chris Rock was generally a winner.

I thought that he was terrific, particularly in the beginning. And, you know, what was really interesting about it was that, you know, we as fans of Chris Rock and as fans of comedy and his comedy in particular knew that the advantage of having Chris Rock is that he doesn't give an F. Like, he doesn't care. He's not there to win friends or influence people. He's there to do the funniest, sharpest, smart. artists bits that he can to, you know, to get his point across.

And he was thrilled to grab the mic. You know, there are plenty of people, particularly types of performers who are in that room, who as soon as they find out what they're actually being asked to talk about would run as far away from the microphone as possible. And he's the kind of guy who would run towards. I think Jennifer Lawrence did do that. I mean, Jennifer Lawrence was conspicuously absent. She showed up late, didn't walk the red carpet.

I think that that was like a conscious, I can't, I'm speculating, but it seems like that would be a conscious decision for her not to have to answer questions for an hour before the show. You know, the thing is she wouldn't have had to because judging by a lot of those red carpet interviews, only people who were there, attendees of color were even asked about the diversity issue and white attendees were not, by and large, which is exactly the problem. You know, I really appreciated that Chris Rock was talking about the way racism works not in a pure good, evil 12 years of slave way, which is kind of the way a lot of people in this country still perceive it and even people who are otherwise, you know, well-intentioned or liberal-minded,

but in the way that it works systemically and ever-presently and constantly, and particularly in institutions that fancy themselves as forward-thinking, but in fact have just sort of been allowed to fester in their own homogeneity for a very long time. That comment that he made about, you know, we love you, you're just not a Kappa, was a, was pretty biting and I think was understood that that kind of cut through and people sort of understood it the strange dynamic there that was going on though is twofold one is you know everyone walked into that room eagerly wearing a kick me sign and partly because I think there are people who have you know well-intentioned and felt embarrassed about the fact that there were no nominees of color

for the second straight year but I also think other people were like well great we'll get spanked and then we can move on to the parties you know and then not think about it past tonight which is I think closing the circle to what you were saying, I think that's what that, that was the closing note in kind of a strange way. You know, the bigger picture to me throughout the night was we can criticize and we should criticize the Academy for who they nominate and who's more specifically who they don't nominate. I mean, but they're not the ones greenlighting the films.

Right. You know, they're responding in a way to what they are given and they're ignoring a ton, but it's an award show. Who cares about awards show? I mean, obviously we do. but I would much rather give them a much fuller buffet to choose from and then see how they deal with it. The problems are much deeper. You know, we heard people talk about that from the stage about, or Spike Lee, you know, from last week's stage,

talking about how we got a black president before we got a black studio head. And it still, it just speaks to a much wider disconnect in an industry that is very, very smug about, about its do-gooder tendencies, except when it's pointed to their face how they haven't been doing all that much good. Yeah, I mean. It's not all that much good for everyone. thought an interesting moment was the Girl Scout cookies thing, not at least because there was it was sweet. I mean, I like Girl Scout cookies as the rare Twitter. Did you do that tweet that I took issue with? And I apologize for spelling it Samosas instead of Samoas. It was like the both are fine with

me. It's just more like there's just thin mince and there's nothing else. That was an insane that. That's just not true. We can get we can do that on the Girl Scout Cookies pod. Fine. But it was obviously an effort to try to try. and sort of recapture some of the Ellen selfie kind of viral magic. I did think it was a little bit interesting that it was juxtaposed with the fact that Ava DeVorne and Ryan Cougler were hosting a Justice for Flint

benefit in which they raised over $100,000 and not an insignificant amount of money. And I'm sure many people in the audience are socially conscious and had donated for Flint relief. But it was an odd thing to see happen. Like in considerate it would have been, I thought one of the most. I think it would have been like a genuinely good moment if they had said, you know, like right now there's a justice for Flint benefit going on and, you know, we really support what they're doing.

And if we would like to put our money where our mouth is, so if everybody would pledge, you know what I mean? Like everybody in this audience would pledge, you know, to make a donation that would really help everybody in a, you know, obviously less fortunate part of this country right now. And the Girl Scout Cookies thing was cool. But when it's like, oh, $65,000. Yes, the Girl Scouts of Los Angeles totally deserve that money, but it was just sort of like a strange tone-deaf moment. You know, it wasn't a big deal. It's not like I'm really looking to litigate with this.

No, I think you're right. If you want to talk about an academy being out of touch, sure, we can talk about representation, but it doesn't always have to be racial representation. It's just who's going to see these movies? What movies do they care about? And when the part when Chris Rock was listing the nominees and the woman was like, you're making these up.

Like, those aren't really things. was so, so perfect, you know? Because to me, you look at the shockers that happened or the surprises that happened in the awards. And I'm not saying this on a judgment basis because as we've said at the beginning, I haven't seen any of these movies. But, okay, I've seen a couple of them.

But if you think about it, there's no way Mad Max Fury Road was going to win Best Picture, even though it won almost every other award it was nominated for it, right? but there's something that is inherently backwards-looking, traditional, and snobby about the whole affair where even if people love the movie, they're like, well, it's just a technical,

like it's a fun movie. That can't be our, that can't be our, that can't be at the front of the line. That cannot win best picture, right? Similarly, I think that's why Stallone didn't win. You know, it went against the redemption arc story that we thought, but at a certain point, they were like, this guy was in the expendables three last year. We can't have him on our stage.

And even with the Revenant not winning, even though it won best director and best actor. I think the older people in the academy got that screener and they're like, he gets eaten by a bear for three hours, hard pass. Spotlight's a movie like the movies I used to like, so I'll vote for that. Now, I'm happy Spotlight One,

but there is a lot of backwards thinking that is just baked into the entire thing. It is not just about who's getting nominated for the parts. Yeah, I mean, I think if anything, if you wanted to, my favorite, probably one of my favorite moments of last night were the montage they showed with the sound mixing and sound design awards. Yeah, it was cool.

They were so great. And even just like the brief moments during the cinematography, which is like, Chivo, we get it, man. Three back to back is not fair. You look at how to let Deacons eat. Roger Deacons needed to win for Sicario there, man. But everyone needed to win for Sicario. But they showed, you know, like that I would have loved, I would love it if, and this is not like something that's like going to ever get their ratings higher. but it was like a

the ratings were pretty far down this year I wonder how much walking dead had to do with it who knows but you know I would love to see them Academy Awards almost get dorkier about some of the craft stuff that they celebrate sure um and show more montages I love montages what can I say I'm a montage

don't you think be that this is what we said last year too it's like your movies people love you yeah like relax you know show us things that people like about movies. Show us something interesting. Especially, and here's the problem that's going to happen today, is the takeaway from a lot of people is going to be like, oh, Chris Rock wasn't a good host because the ratings were down,

and people didn't like controversy, so we're just going to shut up about stuff or real world political stuff. No, the ratings were down because no one liked these movies, and no one was excited to see Alicia Vicander other than us and Sean, right? Like, these people are not famous. They're not excited to see this happen. So I'm not saying that Star Wars Wars Awakens should have been nominated in every category or whatever, but there is, there is, As long as there is that disconnect between what's popular and what's, you know, and what's rewarded here, that's, that is inherently going to be an issue. So at least make a better show and own it. You know, I will give them some credit compared to the last few years when we would be having these conversations and we would just be laundry listing the ridiculous things that they had done.

Like at, you know, 10, 55 in the east, a tribute to dancing in the movies. Yeah, right. Or whatever. I'm just like, what are you talking about? I mean, at the very least this year, we only had, by my count, there was the Star Wars droids thing, which I know I just mentioned we should have Star Wars. But, yo, I said this on Twitter, too. Like, if you're going to have minions and Star Wars droids, do it early in the show. Like, do it before Sarah Silverman is making jokes about Daniel Craig's ding-dong.

You know what I mean? Like, think about who you want to watch. And people, I think people misread that tweet. People were like, oh, don't watch a show with your kids. I'm like, I'm not watching this with kids. I wasn't offended. I'm just saying I was offended by being asked to watch minions because I'm an adult at 11 p.m. on the East Coast.

Like, just front load it with fun stuff if that's of value to you. Don't put it at the end when we're already exhausted. Everybody knows that what you should be watching at 11 o'clock on the East Coast is Adam Driver and Jemima Kirk masturbating on a couch together. Can't wait to just like a normal adult in America in 2016. I can't wait to get to that. Two more things to hit before we move off the Oscars. Yeah.

What did you think about the scroll of thank yous that they added this year? That was cool. Apparently, the Kira Rosler, I'm not sure if I'm pronouncing her last name, right, was a dialogue coach or dialogue editor on Mad Max Fury Road. She used to play bass in Black Flag. But Rob Sheffield pointed that out. I thought that was amazing. I wonder how many other hidden cool, like names are in those that scroll.

went by pretty fast. It didn't seem, people still got played off. You know, which is crazy. Again, it's like, this is why people watch the show. You know what I mean? Like, let them do thank you. That's the only thing people care about. The only Easter egg I heard about was that Pete Doctor from Inside Out at the bottom of the list said to something as kids. Then he said, okay, fine, we can get a dog now. And that went by on the scroll, which is cute. the uh by the way just fury road thing the entire revenant Oscar campaign right was like boy we were cold like that was super hard and then all these mild men at Australians crashed the stage and they're like when George

asked me to move to Namibia for six months I was like wait what they still interview Charlize about this and she's they're like what a great experience that must have been and like do you want to make sequels and she's just like fuck no like I am not doing that. I'm not going back to Avergo to shoot an endless movie that has no plot when we're making it, and that they're just making stuff up and throwing me off of trucks every day.

She's literally calling up seamless and like ordering raw bison liver just to have a normal experience, just to calm down. She just crawled inside a horse just to get away from it all. Again, I just feel like they don't know what people actually like. And the thing that people actually like all of the sounds macabre to say it is people like the immemorial montage. You know, it's a nice thing. Like, these are people who are part of our lives, and we want to see them have their moments.

We want to see who gets lines. People take bets on who gets the hammer slot. Why is Dave Grohl singing Blackbird? Like, why? Who makes that call? They usually just play, like, out of Africa's soundtrack over it. I don't understand why they did a live bit for it this year. They should.

Well, they've done that a few times recently. I think Jennifer Hudson sang one year, and it's just like, that's fine. relax. Like, we don't need more. That's the part we like. That's working fine. You know, fix the other bits. That's my, that's my, that's my, that's my pull quote. Fix the other things. Andy Greenwald from the Tony Cornheiser show. Okay, we're going to take a quick break and we'll be back where we fix vinyl. Hey guys, I just want to tell you about our other sponsor. It's Vicerland, the new TV channel from Vice. It starts today, February 29th. And I want to tell you about a particular show on there that

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debuts today, February 29th. Check local listings. Okay, Andy, last night was the third episode of HBO's vinyl, which we have talked about the first two. And I think maybe we can talk about the third episode on the re-up later this week when we talk about some other shows from this week. But I wanted to do something a little bit fun here. Now, I am probably a bigger fan. I think it's an understatement to say I'm a bigger fan of the show than you are. But we both deeply care about what the show is about. And I am not just talking. about Andrew Dice Clay as a radio disc jockey. We really are interested in the sort of intersection of where music and a city and a time period

can come together and all this different, these different strains about society can come and run through that sort of channel. But vinyl is set in 1973, I believe, in New York City. And we were thinking it would be fun to kind of find other settings and other time periods for vinyl. whether it's in New York or not, but to keep it within the music industry and what an interesting kind of setting for the show would be. So we came up with a couple each, and why don't you go first? Okay, so the ones that I came up with have a theme, and I wonder if it runs contra to your theme,

which would make for great radio. It's not radio. It's podcasting, but you get my point, which is, I think even though I love it here, I live here, I'm fascinated by a lot of aspects of being here. out on New York City as a home for this show. Okay. You know, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, that I, that I bump up against with vinyl is that in 1973, it really feels like New York is the center of the rock and roll business. Because this is a show that is fundamentally about business in the same way, a lot of these great, you know, the same way that actually the Sopranos or Mad Men were shows about business and men at work.

Obviously, the punk scene is percolating there and hip hop is coming, although slowly, if it's 1973. So what we're getting a lot of is these touring bands coming through. there to sign contracts or play shows or, you know, crash buildings. So I want to go outside of New York. So my first one would take it back a few years, and I would like to go to Laurel Canyon, out by you in La La Land. I would like to go to the post summer of love scene in Laurel Canyon, where we have like, you have Joni Mitchell and you have the Eagles and you have Fleetwood Mac Cumming and you have... I feel a Jenny Lewis cameo.

Crosby. Well, I mean, now you're talking my language here, but there's some of the Something about like a very, this is, there wasn't almost, a lot of these people are very well off at this point or were soon to be. But what you have is a scene that is fundamentally about people collaborating in all senses of the term, right? Like making, making music, having sex, cheating on each other, doing drugs, basically retreating into themselves so that the music that came out of that period, some great, some classics and some stuff that still look down on as basically soft rock. Yeah. Because the point wasn't collision. The point was trying to figure out something else. internal or just come down.

Sure. And I feel like there's something pretty interesting about that to me, especially because it's just, again, we've seen the New York spotlight, so we're taking it away. So I'm going to continue to stay away from New York, but you can do the next one. So there's a Barney Hoskins book, H-O-S-K-Y-N-S. If you're interested in, Waiting for the Sun, which is a lot, I think it has a lot of stuff from that time period, and that's a great book. I am going to stick with New York, possibly because I'm out here, and I long, I miss my

East Coast roots. Um, this is sort of a weird one. It's not entirely different from like the sex, drugs and rock and roll vibe of what we have now with the vinyl, but I thought it would be a really good framing device to set a show over the, uh, late May, early June, 17 night run of the clash at Bond's Nightclub in Times Square and New York. Nice.

So this is 1981. The Clash released, uh, their double album, San Dinaista the year before, which was this incredible like, uh, postmodern culture clash of, like punk rock, British arena rock, reggae, rap. And they, you know, they were basically like under the influence of American music at the time. They come to New York City and they play this residency at a small nightclub. They're a really big band, but they play a residency at a small nightclub in New York City called Bonds for 17 nights. And over the course of that time, they had all these different opening acts from like the fall, Grandmaster Flash, Dead Kennedys, Bad Brains, Lee Perry.

I think they had like I can't remember if Mikey Dread was like the in-house DJ for when people would arrive and leave but you also have downtown in New York that time the no wave scene and like Sonic Youth plays like their first show in 81 I don't know whether you make it about like the road manager for the clash who is trying to keep

Joe Strumber and Mick Jones from disappearing into the Hudson River and but you know they were notoriously like listening to BLS and you know just really really like taking in the city in a way that was incredibly voracious, to say the least. And I think it would just be an incredible way to experience the music and the culture at that time would be to see it through the eyes of a Joe Strummer-like character, if not specifically him. And it would be a cool

framing device because you would have like this limited amount. I don't you, you could even do it as half hours where you just sort of do 17 half-hour episodes. And that's still quite a bit of time. But still, I thought it would be a really cool way of looking at what was, one, you know, one of like the sort of high water marks for New York City. You also have just like New York City in the early 80s is that's most violent year territory. That's good stuff. I would definitely do that. You know, I don't know if you remember, but my, my only semi-joking pitch for the Mad Men spin-off was Sally Draper in downtown 81, basically.

Oh, God. Where she's like, she has a job uptown at art gallery, but then it keeps getting. sent downtown. Yeah, I mean, so much so much of the art stuff was exploding at that time. It would have been an incredible thing to look at. What's your second one? So let me build on that because my second one is also set in 1981. Oh.

But it is intentionally not set in New York City. And where I would set it would be Athens, Georgia in 1980, in 1981. College Rock. Now, here's why. The birth of College Rock, you have R.E.M. forming in like crazy. art school house parties played in an abandoned church. You have the B-52s doing the same thing. D-Bs.

You have bands that didn't quite make it from this. No, but that's the same era, but not happening there. But you have like Pylon and these other sort of more experimental bands. But what interests me most about this is when we think about cultural, underground cultural moments, the tendency is always to go right to the source, to go to New York or to go to London or go to Paris or wherever the place may be. What about the satellite towns? What about the college towns where you felt like you had nothing else keeping you alive

except this strange record that somehow made it to you or made it to the record store down the street and the clerk sold it to you and he gave you the flyer and then you went to this place? In a way, when I'm talking about this, I'm talking about our own experience of chasing down a rabbit hole and falling in love with underground music. But particularly in an era like the beginning of the Reagan era and in a deep south state like Georgia where all of a sudden there's the, you know, the college town, and where a lot of people who came, who go to school there, did not come from there. They came from maybe more religious backgrounds or certainly more conservative background.

So all of this happening at once with this fundamental thing that I think TV often misses when they're trying to capture artists or art movements happening, which is the uncertainty about being uncool or the deep assertion that even though maybe people like us will be doing a podcast, by the way, what's a podcast in 1980? but talking about you 30, 40 years later, you forget the fact that they didn't know that at the time. They didn't know what they were doing. They were literally disconnected from the places where the real stuff, quote unquote, was happening. So as much as I was into the idea of doing it in Athens, all the talk that's been going on this week about Bob Mayer's replacement's biography, Trouble Boys, which I cannot wait to read.

I think we should probably do a double-down book club or something about it. But made me think that a similar show set in Minneapolis in the early 80s would be, great too with the replacements forming and Husker do and again like the satellite cities where there are plenty of smart people and artistically minded people just coming there because they can't quite make it to New York Chicago or Los Angeles I don't think you can overstate how insane it is that REM became like the biggest band in the world well and you said before not just like from what they began as and playing radio for Europe where people were just like I just can't understand what this guy is saying like literally cannot understand the lyrics to these songs and and you know when they used to say like you'll

never make a big kid. I can't understand your words. Like that's about Michael Stipe. That's about R.E.M. And the fact that that band went from such an idiosyncratic cult thing in a very small regional way and then maybe on like a sort of sub, you know, an alternative nation way and became with you two probably the biggest alternative rock band until Nirvana is is so crazy. Yeah, it's beyond crazy. And, you know, I'm, Maybe we should do in REM pod at some point because they were my gateway drug. I mean, they were my favorite band starting when I was like 11 years old. And what's crazy about them, and we said this the time we periscope with Bill, but we never said it on a podcast proper, I don't think, is it's insane that they became the biggest band of the world from the vantage point we're talking about from 1980, 1981.

It's equally insane from 2016 on the other end of their career because, as I said then, I still believe, I think they've left no footprint. It's like they never happened. Like there's nothing on the radio. There's nothing particularly indie that. has even seems remotely influenced by them anymore. It's like it never even happened. Yeah. And God, were they good.

And God, were they important to a lot of people? It's pretty interesting. Okay, so what, you got? You got one more? Yeah, I have one more. Again, New York. Different genre of music. I think that, I think you could do an incredible show set in the rap industry from

02 to 05 because it was a time of incredible. I hate to use this word, but like if you want to talk about disruption, 02 is when Diplomats Volume 1 and 50 Cent's first mixtape come out. I think 50 Cent as the Future came out in June of that year. And I can't remember when Diplomats Volume 1 came out. So Cameron and 50 come through. And all of a sudden, those are like the early days of the music industry. Like in some ways you can go back and look at how that changes.

You can draw a direct line between the mixtapes of the early 2000s to the, the kind of like insane stuff that's happening on title and Spotify and these alternate distribution models that people have set up. And this idea that basically like the music industry is collapsing from within. To say nothing of the fact that 50 Cent in Cameron and Jay-Z who had sort of the year before that had put out blueprint. Kanye was on the rise. You had Atlanta burgeoning.

But really in New York from 0-2 to 05 and just the mixtape industry, this sort of like shadow industry within the music industry that kind of craters when there is the FBI RIA investigation to DJ Drama and we could get we could do a whole podcast about this which is just basically about the fact that you had this incredibly creatively very successful although nobody really knew how successful because it needed to be for promotional use only industry within a music industry that came to an abrupt halt and and even though we kind of think of like what future is putting out as mixtapes or whatever, what, you know, we think of, if you're reading this too late, is a mixtape release. It was much different back then, and it was much more Wild West, and it

was very cool. And you and I were both sort of, like, on the periphery of this stuff when we were in New York City and writing about music. And, you know, the scenes there were amazing. I mean, just like Jim Jones and Dame Dash and these characters who were, like, you know, just parading the earth, like, like true brontasuruses. It was just an incredible time. And it would be really interesting to view that through the lens of like an a and r person or a manager or a record label executive who was trying to keep his hand around you know this this this that this very difficult slippery thing and what's so first of all all in DVR series past set but what's great about that example and hopefully what we're saying in general is you know these are really really really

really rich canvases for stories and characters and evocative moments, none of them probably would make it out of a pitch session because no one, unless you were there or you're a fan of it, you're not understanding it. You know what I mean? Like you're basically pitching incredibly rich human stories, but you don't have Batman in the middle of it. Yeah. You know, in this case, I guess Batman being, you know, for the vinyl being Led Zeppelin or whoever. Like you don't have the, you can say New York 1973 and Mick Jagger's attached and then you name the names of the bands

you want to sort of approximate and you're like okay well that was a big thing I get that even if I'm a casual fan but if you're talking about like mixtape era early 2000s in New York you'd have to be handheld a little bit if you're an executive

and I feel like a lot of executives don't want to be handheld in those pitches because they don't want to be put on the hell if you want continuity you can make Richie Finestra Leor Cohen well that the Lear Cohen story would be great I got one more for you

that actually dovetails with what you're saying, which is I would really like to do 92, 93, 94, maybe up to 95, Atlanta. Because the beginning of like organized noise, right, like the first outcast record, Goody Mob, and everything that is to come. But what we're talking about in those years in particular is West Coast is completely dominant. New York had been dominant and it's chirping back, right? So we have, we're turning the corner into the, what turned into a total conflagration between bad boy in death row. That's hip hop, right? In terms of rock, that is the alternative era. So Nirvana is happening and Pearl Jam is happening. So everyone is paying attention to the other

three corners of the country and no one is paying attention to the South. And to basically to be, I mean, this is also completely forgotten, but I remember like when we would buy issues of the source magazine in like, I don't know, 1994, 1995, and then in the back where there would be classifieds and there would be full page ads for these pen and pixel designed covers. that no limit was putting out or cash money was putting out nascent companies. At first I was like,

this is just a joke. Like, what are these things? Where, what alien planet are these images coming from? This isn't as serious as rough riders. No, believe me, now I realize how totally clownish I sound and ridiculous I was.

And there were certainly smart, smart people who were paying attention to UGK and other things at that time. Yeah. I cannot pretend to have been one. But just the stones that it took to be in a place that was sort of culturally ignored and denigrated

and been like, we're going to do our own thing and it's going to be weird and it's going to work. And all the ways those different clicks and sounds must have crossed over, you know, because when the New Orleans guys probably tried to go to Atlanta or vice versa, like that is such a fertile time period. It's fascinating, especially considering how crazy rich the people in charge became. You know, some of them didn't keep it. But Master P and Birdman and the people who really stayed on top of it, you know,

Look at the empire ratings and imagine what a drama that did not give half of its energy to creating soap bubbles could do. Here's the thing I would throw back at you is that what do you think would happen if you made a show? See, the thing is about vinyl is that it's very much in the madman tradition of there's already a modicum of success for the characters that we're watching. It's not about like, will they get out of the basement? And I almost wonder whether that's what's sort of, that's a halt and catch fire problem where they kind of are in the garage still. And you're watching them grow from something very small to something very medium instead of a fall from a great height and then a redemption.

It's almost a situation where I wonder whether or not television shows, at least the ones that people want to make. They want to work from a higher level and they have like a fall and a redemption rather than these people are nobody's. and you might not even ever hear of them anyway, but here is their story about how they were almost somebody's. It's such an important point that you're making. I think we talked a little bit around it last week for this, you know,

on the very same reasons, which is it's easier to pitch the biggest stakes possible. You know, you want to see God's fall. You want to be operated. You want to be on the private jet with Bobby Axelrod. Like that, you know, that is incredibly sexy or exciting. It's certainly sexy and exciting when you're trying to pitch it to a network and the people who are actually paying for these things. The problem is, I think you lose a lot of potential human stories in the process.

And it's asking, you're right, though, it's asking a lot of audiences to say, like, are you going to invest all this time in this person? And they might not turn into the greatest musician of all time, or they might not turn into the greatest gangster of all time. The worst case, you end up like Boardwalk Empire. We were like, this guy you're paying attention to, he won't. But everyone around him will, but just don't look too closely at them. Right.

I just continue to believe. I understand why these things don't sell and why they don't get made and why they might struggle to attract an audience. But we're living, you know, this is a utopian situation where we're just dreaming here. I would much rather take the bet on the human stories we haven't seen before. You know, it's what we were saying about Broad City, where it's like a story about having to pay for something. Yeah. Seems pretty mundane. But there's so much in it, so much potential in that story to be unpacked in a way that I think is really potentially exciting.

Yeah, man. So we'll get back later in the week. Maybe we'll talk a little bit more about vinyl, like specifically. We'll talk about girls and a couple other shows. Better Call Solve? You can't leave me hanging on that. Alex, Alex, I'm still thinking about Alex Greenwald, man. God, I hope they just got some room service today.

I hope they're just enjoying themselves today. You know, it's been a long awards campaign for them. No, for, you know, what's his name? Adam Driver and Jessa. I'm not leaving you hanging. They're my favorite couple of all. time. How am I leaving you hanging? I'm just saying both of us are so charged up on this. Like, I cannot believe a show that we didn't leave for dead, but we left for less creatively

interesting, right? They're like, oh, here's the most fun and creative couple, period, on TV right now, super into it. And I have to think that they must have all fallen in love with it, too. I like the second episode of Girls the season better than the first. I'm just, this is my plea to Alina Dunham and Jenny Connor. Just like let them be happy. Like I, because like the sobriety and like the hand of finding out and everything that can go wrong with them and they know everything they can go wrong. I just want them to love one another and stay at Coney Island forever. You just want to let these little fictional lovebirds fly, you know?

They don't even have to touch as we found. We found that out. They're fine, you know, whatever they're doing together, as long as they're doing it, you know, more or less simultaneously and on the same sort of horizontal plane, then they should be okay. All right, man. We'll talk more about girls, vinyl, a couple other things. Better Call Saul. We'll keep up on Sam Piper.

We'll be back later in the week. Andy, thanks for getting through another award season with me. Thanks, buddy. Great job, Beretsky. Hey, guys. Thanks for listening. Remember, our sponsor,

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