This Past Weekend - #662 - Matt Rife

Starting point is 00:00:00 This episode is sponsored by Mountain Dew. Look for American Do, limited time packaging, or find it in stores near you at Mountain Dew.com. I want to tap in right here and let you know if you are somebody that enjoys merchandise, then we got a few summer essentials for you over there in the shop. We got those gang gang tote bags, and we got some trucker hats with that foam back, that mesh back. So you can, you know, you can get them wet. and get them dry, baby. You know what I'm talking about.

Starting point is 00:00:32 You can get them wet and dry. Check them all out if you want that. If you do, thank you so much. It's available at Theovon store.com. And thank you to anybody who's ever been supportive in any way. Amen. Today's guest is a stand-up comedian and an actor. He's pretty much, he's the Tim Burton of Rhode Island.

Starting point is 00:00:57 I think it's safe to say. He's got a new show coming out. later this year on Netflix called The Altruists. We're thankful to have him as his first time being here. And he's had quite a journey. And we're just, we're excited. Today's guest is Mr. Matt Rife. How are we doing here?

Starting point is 00:01:34 Fucking good, dude. Looking all right. Yeah. I just want to make sure I'll look fucking BLM adjacent. You what? I just want to make sure that I look. BLM adjacent. Yeah, I want to look BLM adjacent

Starting point is 00:01:47 Like you wouldn't protest yourself But you'd help make the signs I just want them to know that You know what I'm saying? Yeah, I'll pull up You know what I'm saying? 100%. But I'm not getting crazy out there

Starting point is 00:01:57 No, no Like I'll hit the barbecue But I'm not hitting the march You know Yeah, dude It's gotta be a line Yeah, because the BLM march also I think it just got too

Starting point is 00:02:05 I don't know It came at a good time In my life I had just gotten a whoop bracelet So I was all about my steps at that time Oh for the BLM marches? Yeah, I was kind of right on time Oh, that's a great point

Starting point is 00:02:16 dude, people don't think about, dude, I wouldn't be surprised, and this is a conspiracy theory, a lot of those were like BLM marches and like, probably the, you know, I don't know if also maybe

Starting point is 00:02:30 like the George Floyd protest, that was all kind of the same thing, I think. I think so. But were the BLM marches and stuff, was all that part of like just big propaganda for like the Woot Bracel

Starting point is 00:02:38 in some of those companies? Is that a real conspiracy? People would think it was just for the fitness aspect? I don't know. Let's look that up on perplexity if you can, dude. or what are they saying?

Starting point is 00:02:47 Is there... Because all I'm saying is that's smart. That's smart. Do we put out this thing? People need their steps. How do we get them outdoors? It's a black bracelet. I'm just saying it.

Starting point is 00:02:57 The bracelet could have been any color. Hey, you said it. I was way too early in the pod for that. I mean, bro, this pod's been through a lot. Oh, I know, man. I'm so happy we finally make it happen. I think we'll be fine, dude. Me too, man.

Starting point is 00:03:08 Good to see you, too. Dude, good to see you, too, man. Wow. I forget, dude. No, there's no credible evidence that the BLMarch's were a conspiracy to sell whoops. What?

Starting point is 00:03:18 Which is a little slangish, I feel like, for perplexity. Or that the protests themselves were pre-planned as a fake operation. Huh. What is true is that the 2020 protest happened in response to the George Floyd killing and, like, many large demonstrations that included a mix of peaceful marches and some incidents of violence, looting, and misinformation. I got to tell you, man, you're very good at reading out loud. You think? Your cold read skills are incredible. Really?

Starting point is 00:03:43 Oh, yeah. I was stumbling over those words, not even saying it out loud. out. Yeah, that was very impressive. I'm just glad to know that you don't have every skill, dude, because when you like, because you were like, dude, you kind of, you made things difficult on a lot of us, bro, when you were like the good looking comedian, dude. First of all, were hurt a lot. That was the meanest part of the sentence.

Starting point is 00:04:04 Fuck. Sorry. You changed a lot, bro, when you became, you just changed the whole role. It was like, because comedian was a safe place for, like, kind of regular looking. dudes who didn't have that thing, bro, who couldn't really go around, who couldn't just walk up to a woman and be like, ta-da. That's not true. You literally have that.

Starting point is 00:04:24 Everybody knows that. No. Yes. That's, I thank you. No, man. Amongst the comedy community, you're a piece of ass, dude. Everybody knows this. That's not true.

Starting point is 00:04:34 That's absolutely true. You've got to get out and ask more. Well, I mean, I mean, I don't think so. But what I do know is, there's a, there's only a, no, you did it, bro. you were like, oh my God. And people, dude, I remember a lot of comedians, a lot of us were, we wouldn't even go out of our houses for months.

Starting point is 00:04:53 After I came onto the scene, after I started doing push-ups. Yeah, people were like, we were making noises that we'd never even made before. This primal urges. Yeah, we didn't even know what to do, we were buying beer and just smashing the cans

Starting point is 00:05:09 and just all kinds of shit. People were just drinking Dr. Pepper and just like touching themselves in parks and stuff. People didn't know how to operate. They didn't know how to operate, brother. But yeah, dude. Anyway, good to see you, bro. I'm just kind of giving you hard time.

Starting point is 00:05:24 No, likewise, man. I've seen you forever. I know, congrats on all your success and everything, bro. Thank you, man. Thank you so much. So cool. It's wild, dude. It's a lot.

Starting point is 00:05:32 It's a lot, yeah? You know what, we did talk one time. Hold on, I'm not even done with this yet. Does it bug you that I say the good-looking comedian thing? Does that bug you at all or no? It doesn't bother me. It bothers other people, I suppose. It does?

Starting point is 00:05:45 I get shit for it all the time. People act like I'm the one walking around saying it. Oh, yeah. That's the weird part. Oh, no. Dude, yeah, because it was like, what do you mean? Because first you heard rumors as a guy and he's doing comedy and it's good and he's good looking and people are like, what are you mean? People are calling their grandfathers.

Starting point is 00:06:03 He didn't want. Grandpothers. And your grandpa would be like, what are you mean? And his woo bracelet would fucking start, you know? Not good. Not good. Call Edna now. like report to grandmother.

Starting point is 00:06:17 I didn't realize I was affecting families. Dude, you were just, it was just a lot for people, bro. Sorry. Because people had never seen that, the, you know, this is like, there's some people that have like skill, like a skill and then another skill, like, people are surprised when somebody has one skill and then they also have something else. It's almost like, like Justin Tucker, do you know who that is for Baltimore, the Baltimore Ravens kicker?

Starting point is 00:06:41 Can you bring him up? Yeah, yeah. He's an, I believe he's a, is he an, is he an, a, opera singer? He's a mezzo. He's a singer? He's a singer. No way. So we got that leg and that throat, bro. Just a full-body powerhouse. Yeah. They said it would take a man 40 years to get out of this here prison. But Andy Dufrain did it in less than 20. Bro, props to Justin Tucker. I mean, that's beautiful. What do you think is the bigger flex being an NFL punter or having that kind of skill set to opera sing? I think that you get you,

Starting point is 00:07:41 The NFL punter is just a mild thing that he's doing. It's a hobby. Yeah. Just to pay the bills while he pursues. Bro, when you got that kind of lung in you, bro, and you out there just, he's just all lunged. You ever try? You ever try to sing like that?

Starting point is 00:07:53 Like, to be like, I wonder if I can. Yeah, I think I have probably. Have you? Yeah, of course. It's always like when you're in your car, you turn the radio to, you turn to the volume down just enough to hear yourself. You're like, am I fucking this up? Then you can hear yourself.

Starting point is 00:08:04 You're like, I'm fucking ruining this song. Like, I know I don't have it in me. Because you have to try eventually. You don't know what skill set you might have. Good point. Yeah, you don't know what skill set you might have, right? And who even ever even tries? How many people could be, like, they never even tried? That's unbelievable. Yeah, like what? Yeah, like, ever there are things you tried? Are there some side quests that you've kind of tried? You know what? I feel like I've been so busy. I haven't had time to really explore a lot of other avenues, but I'd like to learn stuff. I'd love to learn like an instrument or something or fucking magic, dude. You fuck with magic? I mean, I think it's, you know, I'm kind of like, that's sort of black and me. shows up at the surface, bro, when people start

Starting point is 00:08:43 doing a lot of magic. Like, it feels like it could be too real? It just like, if this dude's doing this right here, what's he doing in his, you know what I'm saying? If he's willing to show us this, what's he doing at the house? That's a good point. But also picturing somebody learning magic in their house by themselves is also

Starting point is 00:08:59 one of the funniest things I can imagine. I can't picture anything lonely. Nobody around to see your wallah. Or your Kazam. Whatever your fucking power word is. Walla. I don't know. Is that not a magician word? Is that chef?

Starting point is 00:09:15 Is that chef shit? That's a good question, bro. Yeah, do chefs and magicians beef over their, like, over their, like, verbal, like, ejaculate or whatever it's called? Or, like, they're like, do chefs and magicians beef over, like, their, what is it called, do you think, Matt? They're like. It's not delivered. They are, it is a delivery, but, like, will be.

Starting point is 00:09:35 They're finishing syllables, kind of. Finishing syllables, yes. Is it onomatopoeia? Is that what it is? I think it is, dude. Is that, like, the word for? four sounds. Yeah, bring that up,

Starting point is 00:09:43 Anamonopoeia, dude. Annamanapia was like some kid that couldn't read good that had to go to the toilet or whatever. I remember that. We had a dude in our Sunday school when he couldn't. You just started looking at him,

Starting point is 00:09:57 and you could tell he had to go to the toilet. He was fidgeting. Yeah, his whole body would start shaking, bro. I'm not going to lie to you, I would have lost all my money on how to spell that word, Onamonapia. And you'd be like, damn,

Starting point is 00:10:07 Onamonapia soon, bro. So we got to get him out of here, bro. And Anamonopoeia is the process of creating a word that phonetically imitates or suggests the sound that it describes. I didn't even know there was a tea in there. I've been saying Anamonapia my entire life. Yeah.

Starting point is 00:10:29 Well, we can take a break if you need us to. Impacts and collisions. So like boom, bang, crash. You know what did it a lot was like those old comic books with like Batman? Oh, 100%. It's just the one big word, bang! Back when it was Adam West was like the original. You big comic guy?

Starting point is 00:10:48 You know, I'm not that big into it, but I think I liked it when I was a kid, but I never got into the comic books. I feel that. Did you? No, I can't do it. I don't know why. I'm not a big on paper kind of guy. Like, I'm not reading the Harry Potter books. I'm not doing it.

Starting point is 00:11:01 Yeah, now, I mean, I could settle. I think if I ever have to go to the hospital for a long time, I'm saving Sopranos and Harry Potter for when I got to go to the hospital. For a long recovery series. Yeah, hospital. If I get married and if my wife's in a coma or something, I've got to sit in there with her. You just have her propped up to watch the series? That's, uh, what's the, um...

Starting point is 00:11:20 Well, I mean, I'm going to have, just, I want to have something to be able to look forward. Because some people, that's such a scary time in their life if your spouse is in a coma or something, if your wife's in a coma. So I want to at least be able to look forward to something. So I've saved those things till then. What's that?

Starting point is 00:11:34 Is it Munchausen syndrome? Is it where you keep somebody sick so that they need you? I could see you doing that just to, Just to finish the series. Yeah, dude, like, my wife's like, she's starting, like, you're getting like a little bit of reading on her, like her like, be on the Harvey monitor? Yeah. Yeah. Like, oh, hold on, honey.

Starting point is 00:11:51 I'm almost done. Hold on, I got four episodes of breaking that left. Dude, you know that's happened to somebody. Oh, 100%. No, there was a guy, uh, I met a guy at a show one time who he faked being sick from work for three weeks to stay home and watch TV. That was like his full thing. Wow. His wife totally just allowed it.

Starting point is 00:12:11 Which was like a cool mom letting you skip school. That's got to be dope. Yeah, man. That's the one. That's the one. I want to find a lady like that. On the second day, she's like, oh, I see what you're doing. Oh, yeah.

Starting point is 00:12:21 He's not even faking anymore on day three. He's just living his life. She's on to him. Yeah. And she's like, I like it. How long are you going to be here? Dang, dude. Yeah, that's got to be if you get like a good partner like that.

Starting point is 00:12:34 But yeah, dude. So that's like, what are we even talking about? how the fuck did we get into watching TV? Onamonopoeia. Yeah, the bangs, the wallahs, magic. Oh, that's what it was. What would you're, yeah, yeah. What's your finishing term?

Starting point is 00:12:48 Oh, man. Because how did wala come to be a term? How did, uh, or what, ta-da? And I think it's ta-da. Wala is definitely a chef term. I don't know why that came to me first. Wala. Walla sounds like, uh, tells the audience the truth.

Starting point is 00:13:01 Oh. Oh, wala came from Vala. Al-cadabra. That's a, yeah, classic. It's magic might be the lamest one ever. You do it trick and you got to tell them what it is. It's magic. That's magic.

Starting point is 00:13:15 Hey, that's like if you're making love to a girl and it's not that good, you're like, it's sex. That's come. It's Weiner. She's like, it's barely weiner. It's like, okay. It's not dick for sure. Yeah, it's not dick. It's Weiner.

Starting point is 00:13:30 It's almost like one of those like, can't believe it's not dick. Yeah. How is that not like blue choose? motto. Blue chums pills. I can't believe it's not dick. That's weird. You don't pop one of those bad boys?

Starting point is 00:13:45 The blue juice? Yeah. Oh, dude. And dude, I'll even nibble just half a one. Half? Well, yeah, I kind of based on like how, what's going on or whatever. Like, because I used to live with my buddy's dad. I used to live, brother.

Starting point is 00:13:58 Wait, how could this possibly be? Where's this going? Yeah, it doesn't go anywhere. Okay. It goes to a straight place. There's no way it does. But it takes a gay route. Okay.

Starting point is 00:14:06 I'm listening. I'm following the curve. My buddy's dad, and RIP, my buddy's dad just passed Wally. And I lived with him, dude, right out of high school. I lived with him because he had a script for them wainer pills, right? And you just could, they didn't have blue chew at the time. You couldn't just be getting those uppers, bro. You know what I'm saying?

Starting point is 00:14:25 And so when somebody had, it was like, dude. So I was like, well, if I live with Wally, then he's got a script, then I can just pop them if I need him because I had a ton of sexual anxiety. And he wasn't using them all. he was using him He was going through him pretty quick That's what I didn't know I wish he'd have told me that

Starting point is 00:14:42 For we signed the lease So You were gonna have visitors Oh I thought Dude I thought I was gonna be living large Dude You know what I'm saying bro I'm just saying like his erection

Starting point is 00:14:54 Was getting its steps in You know So what I'm saying bro He's gotta whoop around it Yeah it's like yeah That's dick What was the sexual anxiety that you had? Oh just in my twine

Starting point is 00:15:05 I had a lot of sexual anxiety bro Just nerves. Yeah, a ton of nerves. What is it? But, like, I had a tough time talking with girls that made me nervous, bro. Like, super nervous. Because I think I had a tough relationship with my mother. So even just the interaction with, like, looking at a woman being looked at my worst, that kind of stuff was, like, made me super, like, nervous.

Starting point is 00:15:23 So I think that just, that didn't just, it doesn't just go away kind of. So then you move on through life. And now, now the women you're interacting with, it's like about, you know, dating, intimate, dating, sexuality, whatever weaner. And then... That's all, you know. So just some of that. But anyway, so I went to live... And I got to talk...

Starting point is 00:15:43 Dude, I have you here and I'm talking so much. No, I love the story already. So I went to live with Wally, bro. R-I-P shout-out. And so we were living already, and we were living in like a studio apartment too, dude. So... Oh, no, no.

Starting point is 00:15:57 No, it wasn't that bad. Sorry, it was a one bedroom, but the bedroom didn't have... It just had a little balcony. It didn't have, like, a full wall. Got it. Got it. Okay. So I'd sleep out on the couch.

Starting point is 00:16:06 and he had a car and he would let me borrow his car, but the car, you couldn't turn it off, you had to get it jumped. So I would drive the car to school and I'd park like, this was at Loyola and New Orleans. I would park up by the, like, teachers area and just leave it running the whole time. And for some reason, if the car's running,

Starting point is 00:16:22 they wouldn't put a ticket on it. Like, somebody just ran inside or whatever. It's genius. So I'd leave it running the whole time. I was at class. It would cost me maybe $6 in gas, but I would leave it running. Anyway, he got the pills.

Starting point is 00:16:33 I would try to nibble off him so he didn't see it. I would try to reshape. him a shit, bro. I was carving them into Crescent Moons. Oh, dude, I was trying to make them all smaller shit, bro. I was like, shizzling it. Yes, yeah.

Starting point is 00:16:45 I was like, shifting. It would be like an oval, and now it's just like a diamond or something. Like, it was trap shit, bro. Did he ever catch you? Huh? He never brought it up to me, bro. That's a gentleman. And he'd have ladies over sometimes, and I was learning the guitar actually at the time, and he'd have he go in there sometimes

Starting point is 00:17:02 at night and play tears in heaven for him. That's a song I can play. Who sings that? Um, I did at the time. It was, uh, Eric Clapton. There you go. Would you know my name? Being serenaded to that would, uh, I don't even know if I need the pills. Saw you in here.

Starting point is 00:17:19 Yeah, they'd be drinking orange juice and vodka in the bed and I'd go in there and just play it for them a couple times. Dude, it's, it's so hard to smash with a roommate. I remember my first, my first apartment in LA. I was living with my manager's son at the time. And it was, it was a, it was a, it was a studio. There was just no, there was no door into the bedroom. It was really an open floor plan. And I was asleep.

Starting point is 00:17:38 I lived on the couch and I had like the small closet. And then he had like what would be considered the bedroom. I remember he was out of town one weekend. And this girl wanted to come over. And I, um, we, we had, uh, we did sex in his bed. And she was like, wear all those clothes doing out there. I was like, oh, yeah, I let my friend live on the couch. Yeah.

Starting point is 00:17:54 Oh, always. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, of course. It's like, I'm doing a good deed. Yeah, he's passing through town. He's like, he's passing through town and he put all his pictures up on the walls and shit. You're like, yeah, he's the kind of guy he is.

Starting point is 00:18:05 Of course. Travels with his memories. Yeah, he travels his memories, dude. Wow, voila. Were you guys out this weekend? I knew you were here for CMA Fest, right? Yeah, yeah, I came down to do some stuff with Billboard with the Red Clay Strays, and then stayed in town for the shows, man.

Starting point is 00:18:20 I fucking love it here. You do? Yeah, I almost moved to Nashville, but I wanted land, and I wanted a lot of it. Right. And there wasn't anything within, like, an hour of the city that I really liked. If you live an hour outside of Nashville, you don't really live in Nashville. You live in fucking Chattanooga. Yeah, yeah, you live a little bit further out.

Starting point is 00:18:35 I agree. Yeah. Tonight there's some good land out there. Yeah, dude, what, yeah, what did I see with Ray Clay Trace? You were giving them an award? Yeah, yeah, I gave them the Groundbreakers Award for Billboard, which was awesome, man. So cool, dude. They're such good guys.

Starting point is 00:18:49 Oh, they're the best. Oh, there you are right there, dude. Bro, this, so there was no introduction whatsoever. They just go, and Matt Rife. Everybody's like, wait, for real? Turning away from the ball. There's a giant open pit of, like, I'm going to say 30 feet by 50 feet. People were just standing, like, it was a wet floor.

Starting point is 00:19:03 Nobody wanted to come close. It was the weirdest thing ever, yeah. It's like two minutes long To bring the guys up Dude, that's awesome You get to bring these guys up They're special bro You know comedy really

Starting point is 00:19:12 A lot of comedians really embrace them I think a lot of If you go to their shows It's almost music for men And young men Do you feel like that in a way? I do I do It's such a

Starting point is 00:19:22 I don't know It reminds me of music from like the 50s and 60s Which I think was like Music's golden age And I think there's a yearning for that Because everybody loves that Sound but there's no new production of that And I think they

Starting point is 00:19:33 They put that out It's refreshing I love those guys Yeah, they're so good, bro. Sometimes I feel... Dude, it's my favorite song. Is it? I'm still fine.

Starting point is 00:19:43 So good. Kyle and I would blast at my house for days. People are leaving it up, I think I'm mine. It doesn't matter of their mind. Oh, God, it's so good, dude. I love them. Shout out of Red Glac Strait. Pull up those lyrics, dude.

Starting point is 00:19:58 Let me see those lyrics for a second. You know, Brandon's brother, Matthew, wrote that song. He wrote it? Yeah, not even in the band, technically. He's writing hits, dude. I saw him the other night, dude. I knew he wrote some of their songs. Sometimes I feel like I can't feel.

Starting point is 00:20:15 Obviously, this is a song about being on antidepressants then. This is a song about coming off of SSRIs, dude. This isn't real. I should be hurting. This isn't really. I should be hurting. I was alone. I was a song, music and bone, God's perfect wording. People here living it up, I think they're blind.

Starting point is 00:20:32 I think they're out of their minds. Not one of them has had this. It's not giving up on me. No, I'm just fine. It's just a matter of time. I mean, there's bars in there, man. Oh, yeah. I think it's powerful stuff.

Starting point is 00:20:43 People here live in, I think they're blind. It's like, yeah, how can you be so positive and all this stuff's going on? Dude, I think that's kind of, sometimes it's where we are in the world, and I don't even want to get negative, but it's like it does feel sometimes like we are pretending that we're okay.

Starting point is 00:20:58 Does that make sense? Absolutely. I mean, I think I operate from a big position of just bliss. I try to stay out of stuff. Like I'm not a political person at all. Like I just, I don't get torn to shreds for even saying this, but like I don't pay attention. It seems so stressful. It seems like all bad stuff all the time.

Starting point is 00:21:14 And I'm like, it's either happen or it's nothing I can really do about it. Yeah. So, I mean, sometimes being uninformed leads to a little bit of happiness. Do you know, it's a good point. I think the more that I've, the more I learned sometimes, the more it hurts sometimes or something hurt. I don't know what it is. No, I think that's life, though. I think about like when you're a kid, you don't know anything.

Starting point is 00:21:33 Life is so blissful, right? You don't even know about all the problems going on. Yeah, dude, you're so right. Little kids are just like, they don't know anything. I think the more you learn as life goes by, I mean, I think the magic of life kind of gets smeared.

Starting point is 00:21:51 Yeah, you know, sometimes I wonder it's like, because sometimes we talk about stuff on here that's like kind of political or things that like we feel, a lot of it's like stuff that you end up learning about through technology too. And it's like we wouldn't know it if we were like back in like tribal time. we were in like these, you know, if we didn't have so much technology, we wouldn't know a lot of this stuff.

Starting point is 00:22:09 But do you think that's how we're supposed to be, though? I don't think it's how we're supposed to be. I think there will be a time in the future where we will look back and, or someone will look back. And they'd be like, what were they do? How did they even, what was happening? Do you think we're supposed to know about everything going on in the world? Like, do you think we should know what's going on, like overseas in different countries

Starting point is 00:22:30 with different people? It's tough, dude, because- Like as human beings. Well, I wonder if Sometimes I think that no, it doesn't do us any good I mean, a lot of times I'm angry about stuff That's not even in my area And then it's like where I could probably put that

Starting point is 00:22:44 Put that same energy towards stuff That is maybe more localized Yeah Or even in my own family and personal life To have a better effect on those things Or try to But then I also, I've heard people talk about like That there's no real separation

Starting point is 00:22:59 Like in between space and time So I wonder sometimes like if people like if you see something that's so painful in the world and you prayed enough about it or you really tried to channel like whatever good had been blessed to you or bestowed upon you, if you try to channel it towards,

Starting point is 00:23:14 like could you have an effect, you know? Because then that makes me think, oh, well, then there is some purpose to all of that. Yeah, absolutely. But I don't know. I don't know any of that, but it is stuff to think about. No, that's a good spiritual direction though.

Starting point is 00:23:26 I like that. You know, it's something to think about. But I don't think there's anything. I can't sit here and be like, sometimes, like sometimes I'll be like, well, why don't certain people say this, say, speak up somebody? But that's, that's me like trying to project or think some way. It's like

Starting point is 00:23:39 everybody's on their own thing. Yeah, of course. Sometimes I maybe have wishes. Yeah. But sometimes it's like, yeah, it'd be better just to like sit and laugh. Sometimes people just want their comedians to just joke around and not be, not be talking about other stuff. Yeah, sometimes just because somebody doesn't speak up on something doesn't mean that they're not

Starting point is 00:23:55 empathetic about it. Maybe they just, maybe they can't handle it. Maybe that's just not where they're they may have blinders on. that, you know, they have their sights on something specific or just mind on their own business. It doesn't always mean they're a bad person, I don't think. No, I don't think so either. Yeah, like, I have friends and my buddy's like, dude, I was like,

Starting point is 00:24:09 do you ever think about this or worry about this? He's like, well, you know, I got a couple of kids, my kids right now, and I have a kid who, you know, he has a kid that has some learning disabilities. Like, I just spend, I have this focus all on that. It's like, you can't fault that. It's like, no, I think that's actually better. I think, I think, I think, uh, focusing a lot of your energy on the things more direct to you, I think can be a good thing.

Starting point is 00:24:28 I think that's a lot more peaceful. Think about the things that get, like, people are complaining online all the time about something, right? Yes. All the time. And it's like, okay, is that thing you're complaining about to you personally more important than like, you know, your kids baseball game or whatever it is? Or their birthday party coming up or something that's more important to you directly? Right. If you're sitting in the stands, like, you're like mastering a tweet and you miss your kids like, you know, double or he gets a hit.

Starting point is 00:24:53 I agree. It's like, how do you even have time to do that if you're not focused on something more important? And sometimes we'll leave. I'll notice I'll find other things to worry about so I don't have to worry about my own shit. I don't know if that's healthy or not. Oh, I don't think it is at all, but I notice I'll even use worrying about other stuff sometimes

Starting point is 00:25:09 as like a method of like escapism from like not taking care of the things I need to be taken care of. That's a very good point. Next time my dick doesn't get hard, I'm like it's just with everything going on and I ran right now. You know what I mean? Like how can you even possibly expect me to be up right now?

Starting point is 00:25:24 Wait, you're expecting sex when there are people starving somewhere? I think it's a perfect out. Oh, my penis doesn't work. It's obvious, you know, that's, look, there's stuff happening in Gaza right now, and you're expecting, what are you, you're expecting a lot. Okay, you want troops on the ground over here, right? But you don't want it over there? What are we talking?

Starting point is 00:25:45 It is kind of, that's hilarious, dude. Yeah, that's a misdirect. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's that time. It's not time to get a divorce or anything like that. It's that time for prize picks. that's what I'm saying. Prize picks is America's number one sports picks app. The app is really simple to use to get started. You just pick more or less on two plus player

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Starting point is 00:28:48 can be volatile. So do your own research and trade responsibly. Yeah, I don't, it's, I mean, it is. I think if we didn't have as much technology, would we take on the world as much, you know? Yeah, I don't think it's healthy for us. I mean, obviously there's so much good to be learned, you know, but I do feel like it distracts us from a lot of things

Starting point is 00:29:09 you probably should be focusing on first hand. Yeah. I'll leave that open to interpretation. It's a more generalized concept, but I don't think it's good for us. Yeah, I think, uh, I think a lot of different things about it, you know? So what else at CMAZE you do? Have you spent a lot of time in Nashville or no?

Starting point is 00:29:26 I mean, I've been performing here since I was like 16. Like Zanis was one of the first clubs I ever got to perform at. Really? Yeah. Did you open up for somebody? Oh, a bunch of people. I mean, Tommy Davidson to Polly Shore to Jim Brewer, Bill Bellamy. I've opened four.

Starting point is 00:29:40 Oh, Ralphie, obviously. When I was like still living in Ohio, he used to let me come down here and do his shows right before Christmas at Zanie. and he would like, I mean, he would pay me about like $5,600, which I'm in high school, so that's like a million to me so that I could like, I could go back home and like buy my family Christmas presents

Starting point is 00:29:58 with that money. He was like the nicest guy. So I've been coming here for a while. I love it here. It's a good comedy scene too. Yeah, it's good people, man. It's some of the best people. I couldn't agree more. I can't believe you got to come down here and work with Ralphie. That was so wild. What was that like? Did you see him having troubles back then?

Starting point is 00:30:14 I mean, that was a long time ago. I mean, he was fat the whole time. Right. I never knew. him did not be gigantic. So, I mean, there was no, I mean, I was also 16, 17. So again, I'm not really like looking for problems. Wow. Yeah, that's at the...

Starting point is 00:30:28 That's you? That's the Brea Improv. Yeah, I think I'm 17 in this. Maybe 18. Wow. I think I'd maybe just turn 18 in that. But look at that watch. Wow.

Starting point is 00:30:40 Fake. Couldn't be more fake. I think it's supposed to be... What's it made out of, like... It looks like a goddamn Ben 10 watch, dude. It looks like it's made out of... of ivory. Is it real ivory? No, it's not real ivory, man. It's pure plastic. Is that real tusk?

Starting point is 00:30:54 Not at all, man. Oh, dude, look at Ralphie's smile, bro. Yeah, man, I miss him a lot. He was such a good guy. He started when he was super young, too. I think he started when he was 14. Yeah. He was full of black. He said he was so big because a lot of his inside had a lot of blacks. A lot of blacks in him.

Starting point is 00:31:13 Black people inside of him. I mean, you could fit a couple of black people inside of him. He said there was like a couple of black guys in the front seat and the back seat of it. Because you know, sometimes you give one brother a ride, a couple brothers show like, like, whoa, who's that? Yeah. You know, you got somebody hopping on the pegs, you know? Yeah, dude.

Starting point is 00:31:31 That was the craziest thing, bro. I used to bike through the neighborhood and on my way to school. I go through the black area and my buddy Jonathan would get on the back and then like sometimes a couple of his buddies would get on the front, dude. And so I was just this little, just like white little engine that could, dude, you know? Just like... Cavs just pumping.

Starting point is 00:31:50 I think I can. I think I can. I'm just sitting there, yeah. And they used to call me the N-word bus. That's what they call me. When they saw me pulling up, they're like, oh, here come the bus. And they'd all jump on. Do you not have to get like five guys to get the, you know, help them get their education or whatever.

Starting point is 00:32:06 And I was like, I can do it. Help them get their education. Like you're a public service. Bro, if I didn't get them there, it was like 11 more blocks to school. If I didn't get them there, they wasn't going. They stopped at block eight. Oh, bro. Yeah, one or two dudes got off, bro.

Starting point is 00:32:20 We never saw them again. That's so fucking funny, too. So that was wild, bro. But yeah, Ralphie was like, Ralphie was one of a kind, bro. I can't name somebody else that's like Ralphie. Can you really? No, man, I really wish I could see how he would have navigated like comedy today.

Starting point is 00:32:35 It's changed so much in just the 15 years that I've been doing it. And watching him, I mean, not give a fuck isn't the most articulate way to say that. But, like, he was just so unapologetically himself. And people fuck with it, dude. I had never been anybody who didn't like him. Dude, I remember I broke down when he passed. It, like, really hit me hard. Oh, same, man.

Starting point is 00:32:58 That was arguably my first, like, mentor in comedy. He, um, I was, I wasn't even, I think I'd maybe just turned 16. He was coming to Youngstown, Ohio. He was playing a theater up there. No, I'm sorry, it was Cleveland. He was doing hilarities up there. And this was like when Twitter, like, you could, you could reach any anybody on Twitter. Everybody was so accessible. So I had like tweeted out of it and I was like, hey, I'm this kid in Ohio and I'm doing comedy now. Can I open for you at Hilarit? And he was like, yeah, you know what? Fuck it. Come on down. But my mom ruined it.

Starting point is 00:33:32 Oh, why? Well, because she had no experience in this whatsoever. I mean, to her, this is just a grown man inviting her son up to Cleveland. Right. This is like pedophilia or whatever. Yeah, she had no idea. I mean, I had been doing comedy. Or humorous pedophilia. Humorous pedophilia. Maybe five months I've been doing stand-up, so I didn't know anything either. So she's asking like, where do I park? Do we need to buy tickets? What time do we need to be there? Where do we need to go? Do I need to talk to anybody? I end up asking him so many questions on behalf of my mom.

Starting point is 00:33:56 He was like, hey, man, it's actually not going to work out. So he canceled on me. And then maybe six months later, he was doing Youngstown. And he let me come up and do that. That was like my first theater show, paid me $100 for it. It was nice. Did you hold that against your mom? Oh, I'm like, I was devastated.

Starting point is 00:34:14 Because to me, I was like, this is going to be my big break. You know what I mean? I'm going to be this famous comedian after doing one guest spot in Cleveland. Oh, but that's all it takes, dude. You get three minutes of a video, somebody bringing you up a video, you get to bring Ralphie up, anything on. When you're that age, dude, it's bananas. I know.

Starting point is 00:34:31 It would have been awesome. The theater show was very cool. I actually ended up meeting Tony Hinchcliff's mom at that show. In Youngstown? Yeah. She was just like, yeah, I have a son who just moved to L.A. He's doing comedy out there open for, like Jeff Ross. I didn't think anything of it.

Starting point is 00:34:44 I didn't know anybody. moved to L.A. And he was like, you fucking know my mom. And why was she at that show? She was just a Ralphie fan. No. Yeah, it was totally, totally random. I was just taking pictures of people after the show

Starting point is 00:34:55 and she was like, yeah, my son lives out there. He said his mom still has, like, the piece of paper that I signed for her. She kept it, even after all those years. Oh, that's pretty cool, dude. So crazy. Yeah, I forget he's from Youngstown, huh? Mm-hmm.

Starting point is 00:35:07 Dude, was it a pretty urban show? No, dude, Youngstown was so white. It was so white, dude. But, I mean, this was also when he was doing, doing, Ralphie was doing this bit about the N-word, and I think it, I think it made it into one of his specials where he was basically trying to make a point that if you desensitize the word and make it mean something different. So he was like, I think we should name the most delicious flavored cookie, the N-word. That way you say, like, I love that. Oh, I see that. You can, you can say it

Starting point is 00:35:34 more optimistically. Um, but this was like a mostly white room with a few black people, but it didn't matter. Like, the joke was just great across the board. Like, he was for everybody. His crowds were so eclectic. And I love coming up with that. I never wanted to like pigeonhole and play to like a specific audience. I'm like if he can appeal to everybody like that's the main goal. Yeah, dude. Well yeah, just to be your, I think to try and try and be as close to your truth as what it is. And I think Ralphie was that guy. He was just like he loved like being accepted by black folks and white folks. He loved bringing them together with humor. And he loved just like being able to kind of be welcomed just in that space

Starting point is 00:36:15 because to be in that space also and navigate comedy it's important because you have like a you don't have a responsibility or something but you can bring people together if two people can laugh at the same joke that's a big thing I couldn't agree more I think sense of humor is so important dude dude that's so cool that you got to have some of those moments with him

Starting point is 00:36:32 yeah when I first moved to L.A. He used to pick me up to go to like a diner he made me order like three entrees and I was like is this fucking for you? He was like no whatever you don't eat you can take home with me Now you have like groceries for your week. Yeah, I've leftovers for it. The nicest guy, man. Wow.

Starting point is 00:36:48 I know. I know. Dang, that's big, bro. That's a big heart. He was mostly heart. Harding brothers inside of him. Yeah, mostly hard and brothers. He was one of those people that like,

Starting point is 00:36:58 I wish I could have got to share what I get to go through now with him. Because I knew him from like so, so young. And he was somebody that I looked up to. Yeah. Just to give his perspective on to see what advice he would have had, you know? Yeah, dude. Dude, that was a huge loss. What did he pass away from exactly?

Starting point is 00:37:17 Did he have pneumonia pretty bad? I think it was COVID. I think he had early COVID. I just want to get clear on that. It was not COVID. I'm pretty sure it was a heart attack. Yeah, cardiac arrest. Ralphie made out of cardiac arrest caused by hypertensive cardiovascular disease.

Starting point is 00:37:33 The Clark County Nevada Corner officially ruled his death as natural. I mean. He always said he was battling pneumonia at the time. Um, that happens a lot rough. He had our heart attack. His lung collapsed. Hmm. I mean, that lung was exhausted.

Starting point is 00:37:52 I mean, God damn, bro. I think I can. I think I can. I think I can't, dude. We got to get these brothers to school, dude. That was his long, dude. Oh, damn, bro. He would love that joke, though.

Starting point is 00:38:08 He would love that bit. Oh, he would love it, bro. Dude, honestly, I can, I'm not even joking. I can feel him smiling right now. That's one thing, bro. I believe that there is this, there's this, like, between space and time. Like, if we say, like, Ralphie, we love you and we miss you and thank you for all the times you made us laugh. I believe, I think he can feel that somewhere.

Starting point is 00:38:32 I think so. So I think that there's like a way that you, like, that you can transfer like a feeling or like a hope, you know. through space and time, you know? I don't know. No, you can call it prayer. You can call it whichever angle you want to come from. I think it does affect things. Yeah.

Starting point is 00:38:50 And here's the thing. Even if it doesn't, isn't it so much better to just believe it anyways? 100%. Isn't life just better to believe it? Yeah. I mean, I feel the same way about fucking Bigfoot. Just cooler to believe he's out there.

Starting point is 00:38:59 Yeah, dude. Is he? Probably not. But it's so much more fun to think maybe he is. Dude, what about the guy that just was on Joe Rogan that saw an eight for him? I think he was a Navy seal. Can you bring him up?

Starting point is 00:39:08 They saw an eight foot big. They said eight foot. That's pretty big. Well, how tall is Victor Wimbignana? He's got to be close. But his little ass, he would be kind of a punk in the Bigfoot community. He would just a runt. I mean, they would respect him for sure.

Starting point is 00:39:25 He's more of a slender man. Oh, you fuck with Sender Man? I mean, I don't fuck with him. Dude, that's my, that's my lane, dog. I love all spooky shit. Oh, yeah, that's right. You bought all this, you bought the spooky, you invested in Ed and Lorraine's. Yeah, their home museum.

Starting point is 00:39:40 Wow. Yeah, dude. That's right, dude. That's where you live. You live in... Rhode Island. In Rhode Island. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But their house is in Connecticut, so it's down the street, hour and a half drive, something like that. It's fucking awesome, man. How did that come to pass, man? I know some of this might be old news.

Starting point is 00:39:53 No, no, no. It's not a lot of people know that I'm even into this stuff. My friend and my business partner, Elton Castay, he and I started doing, like, he had been doing ghost hunting on YouTube for, oh, God, probably close to, like, eight years now. And then I kind of came aboard about five years ago, something like that. We've been like around the world to some of the most haunted places. It's so fucking cool. You have?

Starting point is 00:40:13 Yeah, yeah. We had Sam and Colby on here talking about that before. Oh, those guys are awesome. Yeah, those guys are fucking sick. Dude, one time I went to dinner with Rogan, I go meet him, Sam and Colby are, like, are they like... He's with Joe? Yeah.

Starting point is 00:40:25 Shut up. Bleu my mind, dude. They're good dudes. I was like, what the fuck are y'all doing here, dude? It's a smaller world than you think. Oh, they're like the, like, spooky in sync kind of. It's like, it's kind of what they seem like a little bit when you meet them, you know? Yeah, man, they're handsome for no reason.

Starting point is 00:40:41 Yeah. It's like, oh, you're handsome and your ghost hunters? They're a couple Justin Tucker's, dude. That's who they are. You can't even see bangs in the dark. There's no reason to even have good hair like that. It's just, dude, bangs. That's an anima pana pia, a bang.

Starting point is 00:40:56 I'm talking about hair, man. Take me through a little bit more of that. So you move, so you, so first you, why did you move to Rhode Island? You said you wanted some land? Yeah, I wanted land, man. I wanted some land. I wanted a city that is convenient.

Starting point is 00:41:09 for travel. And so like PVD is like my Burbank airport and then Boston's like my LAX if I have to have to have to go direct. Okay, so that's Providence in Boston Airport, yeah. And then I wanted some kind of a comedy scene and Providence has the comedy connection there, which is a fucking great A club. They've got a couple

Starting point is 00:41:25 of good theaters there that I'll do like our holiday toy drives at and stuff on the wintertime and then there's a ton of open mics. There's a bunch of don't tells out there. So like when I'm home and I want to work stuff out, like there's no shortage of stage time at all. So I mean, it kind of just checked all the boxes. It's awesome, dude. It's so peaceful. It's so beautiful. Like, it's quaint. It's got everything I need. Like I said, the airport's nearby, comedy's nearby, targets eight minutes away.

Starting point is 00:41:47 How far is it from the airport to your house? 17 minutes. That's good. Yeah, it's not bad at all, dude. And I mean, we're in the cities all the time for work, right? Like, we're always doing. I'm always in New York. I'm always in L.A. or Miami, Chicago, whatever. Like, when I'm not there, I just want peace. Like, that's what I actually have. What made you pick that? I mean, Rhode Island's just an interesting place. No, absolutely. You know, it's kind of like, it's kind of romantic. Rhode Island to me has like this like beachy kind of romantic scene, but also like this thuggish sort of scene.

Starting point is 00:42:15 Well, I didn't know how like mob deep it was, dude. I had no idea. Rhode Island was like run by the mob for a while, which was pretty fucking awesome. I was doing shows at Mohegan Sun in Connecticut. And this was around the time I was just starting to look for like, maybe I'll get a house someday. My life's starting to change.

Starting point is 00:42:32 And I was on Zillow. And I found a house like an hour away. And I was like, shit, I would just go check it out. before the shows tomorrow and I went, checked it out, just fell in love with it. No. Yeah, so I mean, totally random. Didn't know anybody there. A couple of my friends have moved out there ever since they live with me.

Starting point is 00:42:44 So it's kind of like a nice little compound. Oh, you've got friends living with you? Yeah, absolutely. Have you had to kick anybody? I don't think of what's that been like? You guys splitting wiener pills out there? What are you guys doing out there? Bro, it's like you live there.

Starting point is 00:42:54 That's good. To hit both on the head is pretty impressive. Yes and yes, man. We're rationing it up there, brother. Oh, yeah, dude. Now, I will say this. If the weiner pill factory ever closes, dude, there is going to be, the market is going to be hot for those, bro.

Starting point is 00:43:10 Oh my God, it's the new Kualoos. You didn't even get better with age. I didn't even think about that. I'm going to sit on a couple. I'm put some of my safe in a little time capsule. Give one of your grandson one day, huh? Hey, eat this. How your diaper won't fit.

Starting point is 00:43:25 That's ridiculous, dude. I kind of love living with the homies. It's nice. I mean, the house is big enough to, like, my boy, Kyle lives upstairs. I live downstairs. I live downstairs. Like, those days I don't even see them. Yeah.

Starting point is 00:43:36 We'll meet together in the kitchen for like an uncrustable around 4 p.m. That's about it, dude. It's so peaceful. It's just chill. When you're there, like, what types of things do you get involved? Do you actually have enough time to take off when you're there? Or what's that like for you right now? I know you just had it.

Starting point is 00:43:49 I saw you guys were filming and you were filming in Vancouver. How was that? Yeah, I was in Vancouver for like seven months last year. No way. Oh, dude, within a week I had to move. Like, I didn't think I was going to get this role at all. And then they called and were like, hey, you got it and need you to move to Vancouver. And I was like, awesome.

Starting point is 00:44:04 It was Friday. They're like, need you there. Monday. And I was like, oh, okay. I mean, things could happen that fast in this career. Did you have touring dates had to cancel and everything? I only had to cancel a couple for film dates, but luckily they let me keep as many of them as I could, which is

Starting point is 00:44:18 important to me. Yeah, for sure. Matt Rife among 10 cast in Netflix's FTX series. And this FTC it's about crypto, it's about the cryptocurrency. Yeah, do you remember like, uh, Paul Rudd? No, it's not Paul. Which one? Which one do you think is Paul Rudd? Which one of those?

Starting point is 00:44:34 Bottom middle? But you think that's Paul Rudd? Does it look like him to anybody else or just me? That's going to be just you. Not a shit. I wish Paul Rowe was in this. He's fucking great. Oh, somebody's Instagram.

Starting point is 00:44:49 You thought that was that guy. I don't know, dude. I need some help. I'm still fine. No, don't sing your way out of it, man. Sorry, dude. Oh, solo me. We can't.

Starting point is 00:45:05 You can't kick your way out of this, man. You'll hop your way out. I'm just saying, bro, things happen sometimes visually for people. I think some of those wiener pills got fucking got my optics off, dude. You got some side effects. You got some side effects. Some lingers. Yeah, bro.

Starting point is 00:45:21 Can't see. Yeah. Imagine you took so many wiener pills. You just don't, the side effect is you can't get celebrities right anymore. I don't think that's that bad. You eat like, like, what's up, Shaq? Dude, I met Shaq, by the way, for the first time. I did that thing with Bert for the Netflix festival.

Starting point is 00:45:41 He really is that fucking big. He's gigantic, man. Also, one of the best sense of humor of, like, a non-com comedian I've fucking ever met. Oh, really? Dude, he's funny. Loves a good joke about himself, man. You know, Bert was doing the whole, you know, the whole shirt takeoff thing backstage for this promo video. And Shaq took his shirt off.

Starting point is 00:45:59 And I was like, wow. Damn. Is he jacked? Yeah, man. Dude, look how ripped. man sometimes i like to uh i like to reminisce about summertime summer time summer time baby it was hot and mom would try to make the best out of things though and she said one day she said i'm going to take y'all to see the world's biggest ant hill

Starting point is 00:46:21 about 70 miles from us and so we sat there and we weren't really excited but we was curious and sometimes that was enough in the summertime to get you out of the house and mom didn't know but i'd snuck me a little deviled egg in my pocket so I could get had me a little snack I snuck a little D.E. down in my pocket with a piece of ice next to it so I could keep it cool in there and we got to that ant hill and it was I mean you couldn't even imagine how big it was you need you needed two people to imagine it at the same time to even to have the imagination of it it took two imaginations and they had all types of ants in there They had ants.

Starting point is 00:47:04 They had step ants. Ants once removed. They had cants. They had ants that just couldn't do it anymore. You know, they just had, they was dealing with impairments or high blood pressure. And we were about 95 minutes into the tour. We'd been, you know, we was coming around the east end of that ant hill. And I'd been bit probably 20, 30 time by now.

Starting point is 00:47:28 And they had a little rest area, a little bathroom area. I said, I'm going to sneak off behind these. toilets and had me that deviled egg, maybe had me a little cut of that DE that I had in my pocket. And I reached in there, those ants had picked my pocket clean, brother. I don't know how much devil was in that egg, but it wasn't enough to keep those ants away. So we had some times out there, man, and they were challenging and they were exciting, and they were adventurous. And that's summertime, you know. Anyway, cheers to Mountain Dew. Tastes like America.

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Starting point is 00:48:44 Vancouver's beautiful. I had a good time with that. Being a part of like that pedigree of a project is awesome. Anthony Boyle and Julia Gardner are the leads of it. And they're just such fucking great actors. Really? Like if they're not nominated for an award for the show, I mean, it's robbery.

Starting point is 00:48:59 They're so, so talents to like get to like learn from people like that day after day for seven months was just an awesome opportunity. It was so hard though. Like the dialogue was just not something I was familiar with. Like it's all about crypto shit. So like every line I'm having to like Google what I'm even saying. Oh really? Is that intense? Oh my God. So obviously memorizing the lines was a lot more difficult than just like a day to day conversation. But it was a good challenge. I love acting. I want to do more of it for sure. Yeah? Yeah. I think so. But the thing about acting is it takes away from that standup. It takes away from that stage time. It definitely does. It's. It's, it's. It's. It's. It's. It's hard to go. Because if you have those long days, where you're having long days? Oh, yeah. I mean, you're on set for sometimes a 17-hour day. You can't go do you stand up at the end of that day?

Starting point is 00:49:41 No, but, I mean, most of the seven months, I was filming Monday through Friday, and then Saturday morning, I'd get on a plane to go to a show Saturday night, fly to the next place, Sunday. And then I'd have to take, like, a red eye after this show Sunday night to be on set at, like, 6 a.m. Monday morning.

Starting point is 00:49:56 So there was some weeks where I'm showing up on, like, no sleep. Oh. But if you want to do all, if you want to do it all, like, that's the price to pay for it. But also with stand-up, like I've been doing it for, I mean, literally half my life. And I'm so, like, blessed to be in the position that I'm in right now. Like, it's fucking insane the opportunities I've got to have of the last couple years that there starts to become more of a question of like, what now with stand-up?

Starting point is 00:50:22 Like, I've sold out Madison Square Garden. I've done the Hollywood Bowl. It's like, what is supposed to be after that? Like, for me, that that's when, like, the fun of just, like, the creative behind it is what kind of has to propel you. Like, I still have, like, these funny thoughts and these stories that I want to tell. Yeah. Like, you have to just enjoy doing stand-up. Like, you find something to chase, but it's not always a venue.

Starting point is 00:50:44 Sometimes it's just expression. Yeah, dude, I think it's interesting you say that. Like, I've been at a spot right now where, like, like, we had, like, my friend and I made a movie that we did that we made ourselves, right? Yeah. That came out and we did the whole process. and then we just taped a comedy special. We did, like, there's been some things that have just come to an end, right?

Starting point is 00:51:04 And touring. Yeah. And now, and that's all finished right now. Like, for, like, the first time in 20 years, I don't have a tour date on the books, and I don't ever have to have one if I don't want to. How does that make you feel? It's a lot of things.

Starting point is 00:51:17 It's been, like, I had a little bit of depression. I didn't know what it was from. I think some of it was from, I don't, there's not a ton to do. Like, there's podcasting. Yeah. But I haven't really felt like, I don't know.

Starting point is 00:51:29 I haven't felt a lot of motivation. And I don't know if some of it's because, like, um, there's just not a ton to do, like, I mean, do you feel fulfilled in that field? Sometimes I feel like,

Starting point is 00:51:43 well, what do I, like, yeah, I think part of it's like, yeah, what do I, what do I want to do now? What have I,

Starting point is 00:51:46 did I just start stand up like 20 years ago when I've just been doing it and like, and then now what do I want to, you know, I want to keep doing it. I do know that I want to keep doing it. I don't know if I'm going to get on stage like right now. Mm-hmm.

Starting point is 00:51:58 But there is part of me that's like, yeah, else do you want to do? What else do you, you know, I think I kind of wish that there was like a, like a family aspect in my life right now, like wife and children, but that's not there. So it's like, that's okay. It's just like, you know, you got to wait until that comes along. But I do think there's some like, like having patience with like not the craziest days. And that's okay. And what's going to be next? And I don't know, right? I think having patience with I don't know is kind of tough for me. No, it's very hard.

Starting point is 00:52:31 I mean, it's fear of the unknown, especially when you're used to working for 20 years. You're waking up day after day trying to create opportunity for yourself, whether it's a tour, whether it's filming something, or producing something, developing something. I can't take a vacation. If I take three days off, I haven't performed stand-up

Starting point is 00:52:46 in two weeks. I feel like I've forgotten everything. I've been going crazy. I'm only home for like two to three days at a time. When I'm there, after the second day, I'm like, fuck, I feel like I need to be doing something. When I don't, like, it's okay to like take a break and just be healthy and you know be where your feet are at for a little bit yeah i think that's that that that's that that's the tough part for me right now a little bit

Starting point is 00:53:06 and then i think some of it's asking god like what does you know like does god want me to be doing what you know we're just like i think you know i i go to that place of prayer for like yeah where you know help me figure out what i what do i want to do because i'm not feeling like a ton of like um i just don't know that's a thing and so it's just kind of interesting you know i think I think it's totally fine, man. Yeah, it's just hard to be like... It's incredibly hard, man. When you've been chasing something for so long

Starting point is 00:53:34 and then you feel like you've accomplished isn't the right word, but you at least got to a place of comfortability to where you don't need to be killing yourself every single day. Yeah. It's hard, man. I'm going from 100 to zero or two, you know? Yeah. It's hard and you start to...

Starting point is 00:53:49 I mean, all the little things come in. Like, well, am I doing enough or I'm going to fall off? Or these things are... I have fallen off. Like all... And some of that's all just boring. It's all bullshit. It's all just whatever.

Starting point is 00:54:00 Yeah. But all those little things kind of come in. And you start, you put each one on the scale of you and be like, what weight does this really have? And sometimes it jumps on the scale itself, some of these fears or things. And you don't even know it.

Starting point is 00:54:12 And you're under the weight of it before you realized, oh, I didn't even put this there. This just kind of showed up. How much of it is ego? You know what I mean? Oh, dude. How much can I put that aside

Starting point is 00:54:18 and how much is actually important to me? That's the biggest thing is, yeah. No, it's so hard. How much of this is ego, too? And what's important? What do I need? And then what is my voice best, how can my voice best even be used moving forward?

Starting point is 00:54:30 For myself and for like anything, you know? All that kind of stuff. Does that make sense to you? That makes perfect sense. I can't thank you enough for even understanding what that feels like. Like most people just don't get that. There is a fear of slowing down for sure. Like, I mean, we, and I have slowed down a ton.

Starting point is 00:54:47 I mean, we were doing 40 to 50 shows a month between like 2024 to the beginning of 2025. I mean, six to seven shows, six or seven nights a week two shows a night, dude. Your schedule was scary, dude. It was wild. We spoke one time you were having a sleep,

Starting point is 00:55:03 you were having a sleeping disorder? Yeah, man, you called about that. I really appreciate that, by the way. You have a sleeping disorder. I have horrible insomnia. Like, I literally cannot fall asleep without, like, the assistance of something. Yeah.

Starting point is 00:55:14 So, how'd you even, A, I mean, I guess it's easy to figure out, but did you notice what was keeping up? Were you drinking coffee late in the day? No, no, I don't do any caffeine at all. Like, never have, cannot do. it. My brain just like, you know when you're about to fall asleep and then there's just like the light switch just goes off. Your brain's just off. Now you are like unconscious. Yeah. I can't fucking flip the switch. I can't do it. I can't do it. I can get so close. My brain just cannot do it. I'm not even like thinking about things. I'm not up anxious about anything. I'm not worried about anything. There's not anything in particular in my life that I'm worried about. Just can't do it. And I've been to sleep doctors. I've got therapists. What's that? Did you go to sleep doctors? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And they all, I mean, the problem is they all just want to, they want to just prescribe you medication,

Starting point is 00:56:00 but I'm like, that makes me feel even crazier. That makes, to make me feel like I have to have help to do the most basic human thing, feels fucking crazy. So, I mean, I do take something that does help me get to sleep. It doesn't keep me asleep, and I still don't sleep well. But they, most of my doctors think is probably just like an underlying anxiety, but I'm like, I don't want to take anxiety medication. I don't want to.

Starting point is 00:56:22 Yeah, and are you feeling laying there all horny or whatever? Are you just laying there like your brain running? Way past that, dude. My dick is like fucking tapped out. You're done. Oh, I'm empty, bro. Falling asleep with fucking Lego hands, dog. Oh, damn.

Starting point is 00:56:35 Yeah, man. What are you saying? You never jerk off to try to fall asleep? Oh, yes, dude. Yeah, what are you talking about? Probably less than 30 hours ago I did it. We shook hands as soon as I came out here, man. Now, I have showered once since then.

Starting point is 00:56:50 I mean, you ever do it, you ever accidentally get a wake-up nut, though, when you're trying to fall asleep? where... Use that boosts the energy on accident. Like, what do you mean? Like, if you jerk off in the beginning of the day...

Starting point is 00:57:00 Tell me about that. What is that wake up nut? A wake up nut is kind of like... Tell me about that. I imagine it's like a shot of B-12. It's like getting into a cold plunge. Like, there's just something that kind of shocks your system. You're like, okay, I'm ready to tackle the day.

Starting point is 00:57:12 So you wake up and do a nut? Sometimes, it depends on the day. You know what I mean? Depends on the weather. Wow, really? Yeah, man. If it's sunny out, I'm not gonna jerk off in the gloom. Oh, yeah.

Starting point is 00:57:23 Dude, I don't know, I'm more like emo. I think I'm that dude. I'm that Tim Burton nut monkey, dude. I think I'm more like, you know, it's cloudy out. We got a 40% chance of nut, bro. See, that feels depressing to me. Like, my dick's not going to give it, it's all. Dude, my dick gave up.

Starting point is 00:57:39 I don't think my dick ever even wanted to be a part, me and them in a partnership. But yeah, I agree. But on a sunny day, I'm jerking off. The Lord has blessed me with this beautiful sun, and I'm going to be like, oh, let me show you what I can do. Just would add a little something to it. You know what I mean?

Starting point is 00:57:55 No, I want to be walking on sunshine, dog. Yeah, I guess you're right, bro. I'm trying to ride that high. Yeah, you're right, brother. There's different avenues to it for sure. Versus up, like, if you jerk off after like, I don't know, 7.30 p.m. That's more of a downer, I feel like that's supposed to relax you. That's to close it down.

Starting point is 00:58:11 Yeah, I think so. What did they tell you? What did they tell you? What was like, did you have any, did you try a CPAP machine? Do they do all that kind of stuff, too? Yeah, it's not a problem like that, dude. Honestly, they can't figure out the problem. which drives me fucking crazy. I'm like, what am I an anomaly? I'm like the one person in the world who has whatever

Starting point is 00:58:28 problem I have with my brain doesn't seem possible. Right, like you're like a awake squats or something. A what? A wake squats. You're like big foot, but it's like for like somebody that won't sleep or whatever. Like if you've seen him, he doesn't sleep or whatever. I think I have whatever Michael Jackson had. Maybe I've been a bit of Lago or something. Maybe that's keeping me up. Is that keep you up? Maybe. Dude, I just saw this thing the other day about when Michael Jackson went to Brazil. Can you bring that up? Dude, he did a lot of things that He like challenged the status quo Like he wanted to go to Brazil to the favelas to shoot Which video was it?

Starting point is 00:59:04 They don't care about us right here A song by the American single Michael Jackson In the initial release Man, he was a beautiful Asian woman Yeah, yeah, dude I saw him one time when I was on stage We used to do the there was a comedy club in Westwood

Starting point is 00:59:22 at, I can't even remember it now. It was like, Steve Byrne was there all the time. Adam Hunter, like a lot of like great, like comics in the LA scene. Dane would come in sometimes. But out the window, I was on stage on time, and out the window next door there was an Oz costume shop, A-H-H-H-H-H-S, like, ah. And, uh...

Starting point is 00:59:43 Onomatopoeia. Yeah. Onomatopoeia, dude. And he was, and he pulled up in a, with some security guards and got out and went in there. It was like after hours they let him go into the costume shop. No way. I'm on stage.

Starting point is 00:59:54 Yeah, you would open up the store for Michael Jackson. I'm on stage and I see, and I know he lived not far away, and it was just the craziest thing. I'm like, oh, that's Michael Jackson. And I'm on stage saying, because I can see out this window on stage, and the audience can't see. It's from the second story. Oh, they think you're making it up.

Starting point is 01:00:09 Yeah, they're like, you're a f***. I get some guy yelled and I'm like, whoa. Just because I saw Michael Jackson? Yeah, dude. He's really there. It's not my fucking sleep paralysis demon. Yeah, dude. Yeah. So people will just call you just that for anything now. Oh, I know.

Starting point is 01:00:24 Um, what were we talking about? Sleep and then. Oh, yeah. What were some of the modalities that they, because, because I'm assuming you went pretty deep down this whole trying to figure this out. Oh, yeah. Do I have like six doctors for at some point? Right? Right? Yeah, man. I had to cancel. I had to cancel shows in, um. You had how many doctors for it? I had like six doctors at some point. All doing different things in different categories or whatever. And like, what were they? Were they taking your blood? Like, what were they doing? Like, what were they doing? Yeah, I mean, blood tests, they check, they check all that kind of stuff. I was doing scans on my brain or whatever. They're trying to measure, like, what parts of it do and don't turn off, that kind of thing. Apparently, I'm normal, but I just cannot sleep, dude.

Starting point is 01:01:02 It's awful. But yeah, I did have to take a couple weeks off because I, like, passed out on the way to a show. And people were fucking pissed, dude. I mean, it was, like, an hour before the show was supposed to start, but, like, I hadn't slept for, like, five days. What was going on? Like, were you manic? Oh, incredibly. incredibly, dude.

Starting point is 01:01:17 I mean, I'm up, like, crying between the hours of, like, 4 a.m. and 9 a.m. Just because I'm like, I just want to go to sleep. I'm exhausted, and I cannot, I cannot shut my brain. I'm, like, journaling to, like, my fucking dead grandfather. I'm like, hey, man, send some sleep, talk. Something. Jerking off back to journaling, jerking off back to journal, doing everything I can.

Starting point is 01:01:38 And I was heading to the show, and I, like, nearly, like, fainted and, like, fell into the bushes. And I was, like, I cannot do this show. Like, I will not make it. Like, I might even be, I wouldn't even be able to sit down on the stool, so we had to cancel the show. I'm laying in the hospital. I'm getting, like, death threats and people, like, in bars in Indiana being like, we hope Matt Wright fucking dies. And I'm like, I'm going to, dude. Yeah, people did not care.

Starting point is 01:02:01 But it's bad. That's like Morgan Wallen just had a, they had a weather issue for his show. Oh, I saw that. But it's like, he's not a meteorologist. It's not up to him. Yeah, he's doing the best that he can and people just, they won't cut him a break. Was imagine, it was like a strong winds or something like that. think they were...

Starting point is 01:02:17 Well, he has a big set and it's like, you know, once, if something falls, it's... Bro, a tornado touches down in the middle of the concert and he didn't cancel it. Yeah.

Starting point is 01:02:24 He's done, dude. It's... I think that... People die at the concert. Yeah. It's over. He can't be on stage, you know? Guess, um,

Starting point is 01:02:31 the problem... And, like, people are getting hit by lightning. Of course. You get twisters touching down? Yeah, of course. Yeah. That's crazy. There's a twist just throwing people up on stage.

Starting point is 01:02:41 Yeah, man. It was like, people are passing by you in the air. You can't please everybody, man. He would be. Sand in my people are just flying people are wishing they had sand in their boots Because they're fucking would be anchored down better It's like cut the guy some damn slack man. He just wants to be

Starting point is 01:02:59 He just wants to do his best. He's fucking awesome. You know, I had Kyle Dress up as him for the for the AMAs Amas that was for? Yeah, because they had me presenting and I was doing- Kyle's here. He's sitting here with as one of the best photographers. Yeah, he does all my videography. He does a great job. Yeah, I I couldn't harm him because you had him. Well, sorry. Well, if something happens to...

Starting point is 01:03:20 You could outbid me. I guess, well... You're up on the block, boy. Yeah, now look, look, I'm not saying I'd get one. I'll make sure I get a friend with them. I wanted to. They say you can't have them be alone. They're kind of like goats.

Starting point is 01:03:34 We'll see about it, Kyle. They have me presenting for it, and they have me presenting in a country category, so I just wanted to do some kind of bit for it. And the bit was to basically get everybody to be like, oh, my God, Morgan Wallin is here. Where was that at? This was the AMA.

Starting point is 01:03:46 in Vegas. So he shaved his beard completely down. He had just the mustache and he had this big old mullet wig with a little hat down. He looked just enough like him. The bit was supposed to be that like the camera goes to him. It's so obviously not Morgan Wallen and that was going to be the bit. But he

Starting point is 01:04:02 looked so much like him that people were like okay cool Morgan Wallen's here. Like it completely fucking failed. Because he looked so much like him. Yeah. Is that online? Yeah, yeah. I think I posted it on my Instagram, I'm sure. And all the country pages and stuff picked it up and everything. They're like, oh, Matt Rive takes a dig at Morgan Wall

Starting point is 01:04:18 I'm like, that's the complete opposite. I'm saying he's definitely too fucking good to be here. He is too good to be here. He's selling out the moon, dog. Yeah, dude, that's hilarious. He gets snubbed on so many of these awards. I don't get it. I don't think he cares about it.

Starting point is 01:04:31 Well, I mean, what does it matter? You know you're the entertainer of the year. Who the fuck else is doing multiple stadium shows? I agree. It's like, wow, what, it's just for you. Yeah, 100%. We're talking about ego. Right. It's just for the ego of these companies, a lot of these things, you know, they want to keep this idea that some select people get to decide who the entertainer of the year is. It's like, let the numbers decide. Oh, 100%. You know. I couldn't agree more. It's like with the, they're trying to give a podcast in awards or something earlier. I think this is this year or last year. And like, do you want to be in the award? You have to pay to be, you know, you're. You got pay to be in consideration? They got you, gave you a nomination, but then you have to pay to be a, uh,

Starting point is 01:05:16 to see if you, if you, you'll be like one of the top five or whatever. That's so weird. And it was like, first of all, pay us to nominate you. It was,

Starting point is 01:05:25 that was part of the edge of it, right? You have to pay to continue to be nominated. It's like, and I can't remember who it was, but it was like, but that was part of it. And then they gave the award

Starting point is 01:05:36 to like, I think it was Amy Poller's podcast, which is great, right? She's one of the most talented, um, entertainers that there are. But if you're not given that award to Joe,

Starting point is 01:05:46 And what are you, what are we even doing? Yeah, it's like, right. And he wasn't even nominated for it because he didn't self-bid himself. Right. That's crazy. But it's like if you're not giving it to him, like, then what are we, we're just, we're, then we're playing some game of yours. 100%.

Starting point is 01:05:59 It's not a real thing. So you're playing algorithm in an award show. Yeah, yeah. So it's like, I think a lot of people see through all this shit. Like, I don't, like, I want, give me something that's real, that's fine, but I don't want something that's some made, I don't want to live in some made up type of thing where you decide who gets to be this thing. And that's why I think touring is so fucking awesome

Starting point is 01:06:22 because it's totally in the hands of like your fans, right? It is literally a physical, it's a physical, what's what I'm looking for. Fuck, it's proving that you have a connection with the people. Like those people are paying to come see you. That's harder in money that they saved up. They got a babysitter. This is their anniversary, whatever it is.

Starting point is 01:06:44 those people are coming to see that like that success speaks for itself if you can move people to come see you in real life what does it matter what eight people voted in the middle of Hollywood or Nashville or whatever it is yeah I agree dude um like that's the true success I think just let it be what it is mm-hmm you know why you know I don't know I don't know I think I also have like I get some angst towards some of that Hollywood stuff so I think I'll get it I have a little bit of a chip my shoulder about some of it I don't even know why all the time um let's show this clip though right here. And yeah, dude, Morgan could go, Morgan could literally go back in time before, before people even

Starting point is 01:07:20 knew him and he, people would like, I heard he's good, you know? 100%. He could go to like 40 years ago. And people were somehow like, yeah, I heard he's, I heard that guy's good. Yeah, man. Bro, look at this right here, dude. Is this AI? You get accused to be in AI a lot? All the time. All the time. I'm so AI.

Starting point is 01:07:38 Bro, you are AI. Yeah, I'm in Rhode Island right now. What the heck? I'd ever even realized it, dude. Dude, you're like my fucking hot lesbian aunt that's AI, dude. You have a hot lesbian aunt? Yeah. I'll turn her out, dog.

Starting point is 01:07:53 Let's fucking go. I don't know. You guys look too similar, though. Let me show this award show part. I think we can all agree that the current state of country music some pretty good hands, right? I mean, just tonight alone, we've seen Riley Green, Keith Urban,

Starting point is 01:08:13 and actually making his very first AMA appearance Morgan Wallin is here Morgan Fallen dog He's my little off brain That's crazy Yeah man That's hilarious bro

Starting point is 01:08:30 Yeah we first We realized he looked like this When he accidentally shaved his beard in Europe one time We were fucking tearing him apart I called him Phaler and Hart You did Oh dang it You accidentally shaved yours Kyle

Starting point is 01:08:40 Yeah That's hilarious He nicked a little piece of it And then shaved the whole thing off We were like oh I had to fire him for like three weeks I can't be around you right now. You got a vulnerable neck.

Starting point is 01:08:50 That's... Oh, yeah, dude, that's crazy, bro. Dude, that's funny, bro. Yeah, it was a decent bit. But then almost everybody when I got home, we were like, oh, no, we actually thought it was Morgan Wallen. I was like, well, that wasn't supposed to be the bit literally at all. He's pretty... He's wearing my tour. He's wearing my tour cut-off jean jacket, a red-clays-trade's hat.

Starting point is 01:09:09 People can't see that good, dude. I'll say this. Yeah. You had a couple too many wiener pills. Your vision gets bad. A lot of people thought he was Paul Rudd. A lot of people are saying it. All right. Walla. Wala.

Starting point is 01:09:28 Am I able to get one more? Yeah, let's get another water. Can we get one? Oh. Thank you so much. Yeah. Thanks, brother. Hey, we got that Michael Jackson thing here.

Starting point is 01:09:37 I think I found it. Okay. Oh, yeah, this looks like it. Let me see. In 1996, Michael Jackson shot a music video in Rio de Janeiro favelas. The world didn't know that this historic, shoot was only possible thanks to the approval of a drug trafficker. That's awesome.

Starting point is 01:09:54 Yeah, the government said it was too unsafe for him to come, but he wanted to come and be around the people. Let me see. Rio de Janeiro in 1996, Spike Lee's camera pans across the hills of Dona, Dona Marta, a favela clinging to the city's slopes. Michael Jackson has come to shoot his video, but the setting, a far cry from Hollywood studios is no ordinary set. The governor of Rio is against it.

Starting point is 01:10:14 The police refused to set foot in Dona Marta, and yet the camera. camera's role. That had to be pretty brave, bro. Yeah, man. I mean, to be that loved. Did it say that they looked out for him? I would imagine so. So when Michael Jackson arrives in Rio to shoot in a favela, it's not the mayor or the governor who has the final say. It's Marchino VP. The man hunted by police is also the one who ensures the king of pop safety. So he was the head of one of the most powerful criminal factions in the city, charismatic and ruthless Marchino had established himself in a world where hierarchy is carved out, carved in fear and cemented by weapons. What set him apart from other hill bosses was a strange intellectual depth, almost unsettling for a man at war with the established order.

Starting point is 01:11:01 It's just pretty wild that he went and shot that there. It feels like he could have did it in Burbank. Yeah, it does. But I think he, why do we even start talking about this? Do you remember? Not a clue. Oh, I just mentioned that I was wondering what my sleep problems were by the same thing at Michael Jackson. You said, hold on a second.

Starting point is 01:11:18 And then we went on a 15-minute loop. Go back a little bit, the tent shoot. I just don't want to see that part. The governor of Rio is staunchly opposed. Brazil is still dreaming of hosting the 2004 Olympics. There's no way to let the world see what's hidden behind the postcard beaches to show the poverty, the drugs, the bullet-ridden walls. It would be bad PR.

Starting point is 01:11:40 Jesus. He went and shot it there anyway. That's so gangster. He did stuff like that, dude. The deal is clear. No money changes hands. No one of the table bribes. Just an agreement. Wow. That's awesome.

Starting point is 01:11:56 Yeah. Just kind of wow. Look at that, dude. Just to show up there be that close to people just who like... Would never have access to you. You know what I mean? Right. Would never have access to you. And also there's probably, you know, you get in some dangerous neighborhoods. It's dangerous. Yeah, but I mean, it sounds like the people he's getting approval from are like, nobody's going to fuck with you. We would be the people to fuck with you.

Starting point is 01:12:15 Right. No way's going to fuck with that. That's awesome. That's awesome, bro. That's what I'm talking about. That's the people you, like, if you're with the people, you're with the people. You know, it doesn't matter what these other, like, little, you know, fancy people say about this or that. I don't care, you know, say this guy's the number one award winner, this guy's this or whatever, you know.

Starting point is 01:12:38 The truth is the truth. 100%. There's no replacement for real life. Yeah. Anyway, sorry, I feel kind of, I don't know why I feel kind of animated about that. that. I like it. This passion. Take me on a little bit more of, so you bought this, Ed and Lorraine's house, take me on

Starting point is 01:12:53 the house that you bought and what you guys have done with it. I know there was like articles going around that you guys were doing like, you guys had turned it into a haunted Airbnb where people could go and stay. It is essentially that, yeah, we, we were approached by Ed Lorraine Warren's family, that they were going to sell the house and we were the first people that they wanted to offer it to and obviously we were fucking psyched about it I mean we have so much respect and love for their family

Starting point is 01:13:23 and what they mean to the paranormal community so I mean to get to be a part of arguably the most prominent piece of paranormal history on earth being the Annabelle doll in the Warren's house is fucking awesome dude and we got the house like as is we have all their old clothes all their old tape recordings. I mean, there's hundreds and hundreds of old recordings and letters from cases

Starting point is 01:13:47 that never got turned into movies and TV shows and stuff like that. And it's so cool, man. I mean, the house itself, museum aside, is fucking terrifyingly haunted. But there's like such a warmth to it. Like, regardless of what they did and who they were and what they were around all the time, like, it still feels like such a cozy family home. So we've opened that up to the public to be able to be stayed in as an Airbnb and it's attached to the museum which holds no god i think it's something like 700 artifacts or something like that in the museum as well as the uh the annabel doll and take me through like uh just a brief synopsis of the family and the annabel doll for people that don't know uh i mean they and lorraine were the most famous ghost hunters pretty much in

Starting point is 01:14:31 the the history of it i mean they helped i mean i guess documented i'm going to say a few hundred families and they were spousal they were married? Yeah, absolutely. She was a psychic medium and Ed was an author and they put out a lot of good books and they helped a lot of fucking people.

Starting point is 01:14:51 I mean, they are the family behind the largest scary movie franchises between Annabelle Dahl, the Conjury movies, Amityville horror, all that good stuff. And they, how do they help a lot of people? You said they helped a lot of people? Well, I mean, a lot of people dealt with possessions and haunted homes and a lot of haunted objects and everything and they would go to help these families

Starting point is 01:15:09 with either casting out the spirits via exorcisms. Sometimes it was taking an item like the Annabelle doll off of the family's hands and putting it in a more secure place, stuff like that. So you have the Annabel doll now? Yeah. It's pretty crazy. Bro. It's a pretty white thing to own.

Starting point is 01:15:27 Yeah. That is, huh? Yeah. I mean, do you believe in ghosts? Yeah, I believe in ghosts, but I get scared about it because it's like, you know, if you go summon ghosts, if you summon, like, if you look at it as like the devil, I think there's different ways to look at it.

Starting point is 01:15:42 If you look at it as like a spiritual thing, like maybe something that's in between here and there, but if you look at it as like satanic, you're trying to summon Satan and that stuff is a little scary to me. Oh yeah, I don't fuck with that stuff at all. Regardless of like there being a demon literally attached to that and doll, like I don't fuck with it. I'm not hanging out with the doll.

Starting point is 01:16:00 That was the crazy thing. People, I mean, that's a very passionate community and it's one that I respect that I'm happy to be a part of. But people thought I was like, because I'm a comedian that I was going to like disrespect this doll. They thought I was gonna turn this house into a fucking frat house and Annabel was just gonna be crowd surfing like a stretched out blow up doll.

Starting point is 01:16:14 Oh yeah, I could see that dude. People always want to like think about stuff like that. Did you do anything cool with Annabelle? Like were you guys able to even like have her like bring her out to have like a tea or something? No, God, no. We would never let her out of that box ever. We've only had to move the box a couple of times and I, even I don't fucking touch that. Really? I let Elton

Starting point is 01:16:30 and we have a couple of priests that help with that. Really? Oh yeah. I'm terrified of it. Wow. Yeah. I'm never there, by the way. Like, I'm not at that. People thought I was living at the house with Annabelle. I'm fucking never there. You're not? No. I check on Annabelle like, I look for racism on Twitter. I'm like, good. It's still there. Yeah. If it's going to exist, it might as well be like contained, you know what I mean?

Starting point is 01:16:53 Now where to find it. Yeah. Wow, bro. Yeah, it's pretty awesome, man. It's so fascinating to me. Do you feel like, do you want to create more stuff around, like, like, horror genre? Like, is that something you start to feel like? Because you said you're kind of at this space where it's like, you're kind of thinking, well, yeah, what else is possible and what else what I like to do and what direction? Yeah, absolutely. I mean, on the entertainment side of things, like, I would love to develop some kind of like a horror project, whether it be a TV show or a film or something like that.

Starting point is 01:17:21 But, I mean, we're also even expanding in that space. Like, we're moving the museum and expanding it to a location in Salem, Salem, Massachusetts. This, I think it's going to be this September or August that it's going to open up. So, I mean, there's a couple other properties that we could potentially be buying as well. So, I mean, I'm so fascinated by it. Like, it is so new to me that I think it's very exciting. It's cool just to learn about it. And this creates a lot of opportunity for people to educate themselves on that world.

Starting point is 01:17:52 People are fascinated by it, but they don't know a lot about it. So this is kind of like firsthand experience. Have you had it like a supernatural experience of your own? Oh, yeah, dude. Of all the investigations and stuff we've done, I've seen and heard so many things that, like, I couldn't possibly explain. I mean, I've heard my name be said. Like, I've, I like EVPs, which is like the voice recordings the most.

Starting point is 01:18:13 Like, to me, that's the most fascinating because, I mean, it's audible. It feels, it sounds tangible. You're getting a direct response to a question you asked. Like, to me, that feels so undeniable. Like, I'm in the room. I know who else is in here. I know this hasn't been tampered with in any kind of way. To me, that feels so as close to undeniable as possible.

Starting point is 01:18:31 Was there someone you were trying to talk to, or was it? Um, I'm trying to think of the most prominent one. Um, we were in, um, I think this was Mansfield Reformatory in Ohio, I believe. Shout out Mansfield. Shout out Mansfield. That's what actually they filmed Shawshank Redemption. No-uh. Yeah, yeah. It's fucking, it's a really, really cool space. Um, we were in what we used to be the old library. We were asking like, you know, what, they're like, what, what did this room used to be here loud, clear as day. Library. No.

Starting point is 01:19:00 Yeah, it's fucking terrifying. We were doing some in Lorraine Warren's house In the tunnel that goes from the house to the museum Our friend was in there asking like, you know, do you mean us harm? And you hear if possible It's crazy shit like that But it's still so fascinated to me Like I'm passionate about it because on a spiritual level

Starting point is 01:19:19 It helps kind of Reassure me that there is something else You know what I mean? Like I When my grandpa passed away I was I had like this really big moment of like okay, there can't just be this. There has to be something out there.

Starting point is 01:19:35 There's no way I won't ever see this person again. So the fact that I can go communicate with, like, other what I assume are people or spirits of people, to me that brings me like a little bit of warmth knowing that like, you know, maybe I will see that person again and maybe, you know, maybe everybody gets to see their loved ones again. Yeah. Yeah, was that, did you run my pathway recently or now?

Starting point is 01:19:55 It was, I think it's going on three years this October, maybe four, three years. Oh, man, I'm sorry to hear that. Oh, that's all right. That's him right. Gary, he's so young. Yeah, man, he was only 67. I know. I know.

Starting point is 01:20:08 Did he get pretty sick? Yeah, man. He had cancer, but it was like they found it out of nowhere. His dogs pulled him on his leash and it like pulled something in his like abdominal slash like rib cage a little bit. And it was hurting him. It was hurting him for a while and he got worse and worse. And he started coughing a lot more and everything. And eventually you went to the doctor and they were, I did a whole scan of everything.

Starting point is 01:20:29 And they were like, dude. you've got stage four cancer like lungs black yeah so he was he was perfectly healthy like five months before he passed I know Was that scary

Starting point is 01:20:44 Like at that were you guys really close Yeah that was definitely That was definitely like my best friend That was like my father figure Growing up and everything It was? Yeah yeah definitely I spent every weekend of my childhood with him

Starting point is 01:20:56 Every single weekend Yeah I definitely wouldn't have got into comedy If it wasn't for him Dude, yeah, it almost because your daddy's so young. Yeah, gee, that's, it looked like a Zika baby. Let's go. I got a dome on him.

Starting point is 01:21:09 Bro, BLM, dude. I know. That's what's up. Yeah, he fucking, he loved comedy. He's the one that used to take me, like, the open mics when I was, like, 15, and he would pay, like, the $5 ahead to, like, show, like, bring your show shit. He would, like, buy five tickets. Would he go perform?

Starting point is 01:21:23 No, God, no, no, but he fucking loved watching me. Did he get you into it? You mean, like, physically? Yeah, or, like, why did he, he took you over there? Because he knew you wanted to do it? Yeah, yeah. Like, he thought it was funny. Like, we would fucking kill each other to laugh every weekend my entire childhood.

Starting point is 01:21:38 So it was really cool. He got to see me, he got to see me sell out a comedy club. I think it was the Cincinnati Liberty Funny Bone before he passed, which I think is the hardest part. It's like you kind of like what we were talking about with Ralphie earlier. It's like if there was one person I wanted to share all of this with, it would have been him. I feel like he doesn't get to see this kind of sucks. He's out there. That's his name?

Starting point is 01:22:01 Yes, Steve. What's up, Steve? Shout out big Steve, my guy. Oh, dude, he fucking loved Ralphie, too. Did he? Oh, yeah. Oh, dude, that's so cool, bro. He can hear us.

Starting point is 01:22:13 I feel him right now. Steve's milling around, bro. With his 97 different haircuts, that dude's milling around. Bro, that was like the shortest his hair ever was. He used to grow it down to, like, his butt crack, dude. Total hippie hair, man. Dude, a lot of people named Rick have ponytails. You notice that?

Starting point is 01:22:30 mostly ricks and steves i would argue yeah yeah dude yeah my ponytail is a rick and steve it's a power move dog yeah bro yeah i'll still like i'll pray to him before every show and everything just being like hope you hope you enjoy it case you end watching amen bro that's awesome dude that's quality stuff i appreciate that um i'm gonna pivot a little bit some of your comedy specials your first few came out on youtube right yeah yeah put out the first two and then i did a crowd work one on YouTube as well. And then did you do one on a streaming platform now? Then it was Netflix. Yeah, that did natural

Starting point is 01:23:06 selection for Netflix. Did you feel any difference? Because like one is more, it feels like it's it feels like it's a, it feels like it's a, it feels like it's, it feels like it's, did you feel any difference between like doing some that way and doing one for Netflix? I mean, you do a special for Netflix for like self-validation to be like I have, I made it to what is supposed to be the pinnacle platform for comedy.

Starting point is 01:23:27 But I think the difference was the YouTube stuff, I did entirely by myself. It was just my friends helping me. Like, I directed the first one, that I'd got Eric Griffin to direct the second one. And even the crowdwork one, which was like a totally experimental thing. I literally did it with me.

Starting point is 01:23:43 And my buddy Elton actually ran camera by himself. It was me and one person did an entire crowdwork special. So, I mean, it was exhausting, but it was super, super fulfilling to, like, have a hand in a little bit of every piece of the creative for that. So, I mean, I think it was different in that sense. also the

Starting point is 01:24:00 the reach of viewership I think is different for YouTube and Netflix is not everybody has Netflix not everybody likes Netflix and you gotta have a subscription to it versus YouTube it's so easy to share

Starting point is 01:24:13 like I can text you a link you can watch it right now and then you could text that link to 10 other people so I think you actually reach you have a potential to reach more viewers on YouTube than you might

Starting point is 01:24:23 on Netflix yeah so I guess it's again like what does it mean to you right Yeah, it's interesting, dude, because yeah, I got one that's coming up, but I think about, like, yeah, what I'll like to do it on Netflix. Yeah. Okay.

Starting point is 01:24:35 And we're just, I'm looking at a cut of it later today, but it's like what I'll like to maybe do one in the future, that would be maybe just for YouTube. Yeah. That would be more just for like, you know, I do it myself completely, you know? I don't know. I just think about that sometimes and what that's like. Oh, no, I battle with it all the time. I'm doing my next special. It'll be towards the end of the year. I can't really say when yet, but I don't know what I'm going to do with it just yet.

Starting point is 01:24:55 I'm not 100% sure. there's different pros and cons obviously. Yeah. And you're at a place where now where you can kind of do what you can do what you choose. Yeah, absolutely. Which is pretty nice. Yeah, I just don't figure out what fits best. You got kind of like pinned with like being the crowd work

Starting point is 01:25:10 Like your crowd work started to kind of like Take clips and make it so that a lot of people are doing crowdwork. Do you feel like that that's kind of a true statement? Yeah, I would say so. I mean, I definitely wasn't like the first one to do it. Like Schultz was a big inspiration for me doing that. Like his crowdworks fucking he's amazing at that. He was doing this thing that

Starting point is 01:25:29 even made me want to start doing any of my YouTube specials where he was doing like a new minute every single week. Like he would post a new clip every single that's 52 minutes of material throughout the year. It was genius.

Starting point is 01:25:39 And he was sprinkled crowd working with that as well. And I was just like, holy shit, I see the importance of content in the stand-up market which I don't think anybody had really been paying attention to.

Starting point is 01:25:49 Like you put out specials but that's what once every year maybe once every two years. Yeah. But we weren't like, comedians weren't being in people's faces all day. Like, you weren't prominent on a platform

Starting point is 01:25:59 and people kind of couldn't avoid you, which I think is, you know, prominent for the algorithm. Well, especially if you don't have, if you don't have a regular podcast, like with podcasting you do because you just have clips, right? Of course.

Starting point is 01:26:10 But if not, yeah, it's hard to find, like, what is that thing without doing a sketch or, like, planning this big thing? And that's why I like doing the bit of crowd work that I do in my show, because, like, it's new and refreshing, right?

Starting point is 01:26:21 Like, I'm not doing the same stories and jokes night after night after night, that you have to deliver like it's your first time ever saying it. Like this is something so new and spontaneous that I can post online and it's not burning any of my material. Yeah, dude, I saw the one where

Starting point is 01:26:34 you saw one of your teachers, is that, was that one of yours? You have a teacher that came? No, I think that was Trevor Wallace. Oh, that was Trevor Wallace. I think his teacher came. Sorry, dude.

Starting point is 01:26:43 It's okay. It's fine. You wrap this up? Yeah. I'm talking with you, man. Oh. I was like, yeah, we can. I'm just kidding, man.

Starting point is 01:26:50 That's okay, dude. Sorry, damn. Fucking Trevor, dude. No, I'm not going anywhere, man. Trevor impersonated you, though, I think. And it felt like he was, like, he was, like, trying to steal your shit. No, no, I'm just joking. I'm just fucking joking with Trevor.

Starting point is 01:27:03 He didn't even never do that. He's the nicest guy. I love it. He's very, very nice. Is there, I don't know if there's, he is so nice, dude. But did it ever feel like, like, then you had to be the crowd work? Like, you had to do that? Yeah, there's a little bit of that.

Starting point is 01:27:18 It's kind of, you know, I talked to Adam Ray about this recently, too. Because, you know, he's gotten so prominent with, like, his characters that he does, with, like, Dr. Phil and Biden and everything. We stepped into that and done it's unbelievable. Genius, by the way, to find, it's such a specific lane that nobody else has been doing. Nobody. I asked him, I was like, do you find people coming to your show

Starting point is 01:27:34 and like just wanting the characters? And he was like, all the time. Like, sometimes I'll be in the middle of a story and somebody would be like, do crowdwork. And I'm like, I'm going to fucking get to it if I feel like it. Okay, it's not, that's not all this is. Like, I'm a goddamn jukebox. Yeah.

Starting point is 01:27:48 It's crazy, man. But, I mean, I do it because I enjoy it, you know? Yeah, that's like when I was in, like, when I was, like, when I was, like, doing those wiener pills. It's like, get an erection. And you're like, I'm trying, man. Give me a few minutes. Yeah, let me warm them up a little bit.

Starting point is 01:28:02 Yeah, dude. Let me nibble off a freaking chunk of my roommate's wiener pill at an angle so he won't notice it's missing, you freak. There are only freaking five milligrams. Tablets. Do you ever, when you're touring, like, do you ever do any crowdwork at all? I do some of it more often now, and I really like it.

Starting point is 01:28:22 It's just fun. It's just something silly and spontaneous. It gets a bad rap for people being like, oh, you're just doing it because, like, you don't have the material. That's such a hack response to have to it. Like, by what means does that mean that? Yeah. Yeah, dude, yeah, like, I was shooting, we were shooting this thing in Lexington a few weeks ago and somebody yelled out, AIDS, right in the middle of the show.

Starting point is 01:28:41 And it was just like, if it's a woman, too. Jesus. And usually AIDS is more of a guy's thing or whatever. Yeah. So. And what are you going to not acknowledge it? I know, dude. I was like, oh, that's how bad things have gotten.

Starting point is 01:28:54 And it's like people just yelling at A, tell. Dude, that's the other hard thing as well is like venue-wise now. The smaller venue I do, the more people yell out. Because they want to be the person that gets talked to. Like, they want to be the next clip. I'm like, it doesn't work like that. It's usually the least assuming person you talk to. It's probably like you're going to get the best shit out of it.

Starting point is 01:29:11 It's not like the pick-me person in the back. That's true, dude. It's always like that. A comedy club is like so intimate. We all kind of feel like we're hanging out that in like a living room to where it's nobody really wants to be like the dickhead to interrupt. Like, that's kind of perfect. And an arena is so big that, like, I think they assume they, you can't hear them.

Starting point is 01:29:28 So they're not going to waste yelling out. But anywhere in the middle ground, like a theater, people are like, I know he'll fucking hear me. Yeah. We yell some wild shit. Yeah, dude. I think it's like, there is this weird thing where you yell because you kind of want to be heard, but you do not want to be called on. There's some of that energy, too, for some people. Oh, of course.

Starting point is 01:29:45 Like you want to be a part of it, but you don't want to be a part of it. Oh, I love the purse. I love like the, like, the wife brought her husband and the husband didn't want to sit up front. He's like, what if he talks to me and the wife's like, it's not all about you, Ron, you know what I mean? And then you end up talking to that guy, and he's like, this is my fucking worst nightmare. The wife's loving it.

Starting point is 01:30:00 I love that dynamic. Has it ever backfired? Like, take me on one that backfired. Was there, have there been one that backfired? Like, because when you open it up to the crowd, that's another thing, suddenly 40 people or they want to have a, you know, they want to offer a suggestion. It's very hard to direct a room full of people who are like, okay, now it's my turns. I mean, that, I mean, that does happen quite often.

Starting point is 01:30:19 I mean, usually I'm pretty good at shutting it down. and everybody can kind of be cordial, but it happens. But you also get duds, you know what I mean? Like you fucking, you interview people. You know, it's like to talk to somebody who you can't hold a conversation with. So, I mean, that happens all the time. I'm not going to post that clip, obviously.

Starting point is 01:30:34 So, yeah, it's not magic every time. But when you do get it, it's such a fun feeling to have that moment right then, right there with people. Yeah, dude, one time there was a guy in his white, he had a wife or girlfriend, whoever it was, had the craziest, like, like tits, right? I love you couldn't think of tits, okay.

Starting point is 01:30:54 And they, well, they were so crazy. I couldn't even, it was hard to categorize them. They were so insom. Onomatopias. Yeah, just he's just boom. Uh-huh. Bang, you know, just like some real, just onomatopias on it. Okay, okay.

Starting point is 01:31:09 Just like some damn fucking, just some milk tonsils, you know, just some, like L5S none. Like you have no cartilage left from holding those up. They were just, yeah, they were, you could just feel like, one of, you could feel one of her vertebrae having trouble. God damn. Yeah, you couldn't feel it, too.

Starting point is 01:31:29 Them Hindenbergs. Yeah, yeah. She had them damn blamps and front blamps. Front blamps. So anyway, dude, but they were craziest-looking tits. And the guy's like, I said, oh, what do you do?

Starting point is 01:31:42 He's like, you know, stock vending machines, you know? And I was like, and what do you guys put in him? And he's like, muscle milk, you know? God, damn. And he says muscle milk. But then you see where you think he's getting the milk from his wife's just sitting now quiet With the craziest tits like acting like she doesn't have crazy tits or whatever

Starting point is 01:32:00 And she was wearing a little bitty hat. You ever see somebody who like pins a hat on their hair and acts like it's a real hat? Is it a brooch? Yeah, of course. Yeah, it's a fucking brooch. It's a little, it's like toy story hat. Like, bitch, what are we talking about? And did you address some? Did you address the titties? Yeah, I said, well, what now I said, where are you guys getting the milk from, right? And that was just and dude there was nothing else through the rest of the night that was like

Starting point is 01:32:25 there's just something about that thing that's in the moment where and it was just simple there was nothing I really had to do it was just sometimes it just presents itself

Starting point is 01:32:34 bro I was in Philly yeah this was in Philly and there's a guy sitting front row he's got like these like slack pants on and just had the most

Starting point is 01:32:44 amount of dick sitting in the front of his pants like a conglomerate yeah man like a like a seven dick pile up right in his own pants. He melted eight or nine dicks on his dick. Like it was so

Starting point is 01:32:56 prominent. It stopped me in the middle of a story and I was like, you got, I took the camera off the cameraman's shoulder, zoomed in on it, it looked like he shit the front of his pants. Like it was so much dick. It honestly ruined my night. I was, I was upset. I was insecure for the next like 45 minutes. Yeah, dude. Oh, when somebody shows up with that

Starting point is 01:33:14 stepdad cock or whatever? Stepdad cock is such a real, as somebody who had a stepdad is such a real thing. I was so mad I wasn't his? Oh, yeah. For a few years, man. I'd have been afraid to come out of that thing, though. That's stepdad cock, do you can't?

Starting point is 01:33:27 That's why he doesn't have any kids, bro. A kid wouldn't make it out of that thing, brother. Oh, this is it right? Your biggest dick ever. Is this a video of it? It's probably a video, yeah. And put your fucking dick away. Put your dick away.

Starting point is 01:33:42 I know. Camer man, don't zoom in. You don't have to. I can fucking see it, dude. He's smuggling. Unbelievable A cameraman just like wouldn't get the shot of it And I was like, hold on

Starting point is 01:33:54 Why wouldn't he? Sometimes they're like Three inches away from somebody's face And I'm like, get out of their You have a zoom Hold on, it's tangled up in his dick Hold on a second, hold on Look at this fucking thing

Starting point is 01:34:06 You're moving the camera Wow Look at that thing, man Big bro got that front yard dog Remember an alien when it's coming out of her fucking stomach? Yeah It looks like Wow

Starting point is 01:34:17 Yeah That's a lot, man. Turtle neck dick is just a different confidence. And he's wearing a turtleneck too? Yeah. No. Yeah, man, he knows what's up. That's insane.

Starting point is 01:34:28 That's Christmas dick. Like Christmas dick. If you're wearing a turtleneck. A holiday hog. Tight pants, brother? Yeah, he knew. He got it. That's not comfortable.

Starting point is 01:34:38 There's no way. Oh, no. That's all tight, brother. I'm so glad my dick isn't that big. Yeah. So glad about it. Yeah. Same.

Starting point is 01:34:47 Same. But yeah, man, you get some some weird stuff like that. What about, are you married? You're not married. No, no, single. Okay. And do you start thinking about getting married or anything like that? Or do you even think about that kind of stuff?

Starting point is 01:35:03 Or like, does your mom bug you about that? What's your mom doing in your life these days? Because she was giving you a hard time about working for Ralphie. What is, does she still have that managerial energy or now she kind of trust where you're at? No, she's so happy with where I'm at, dude. I just got her second house. What? Yeah, the first woman just wasn't working out.

Starting point is 01:35:22 She was by herself in the middle of nowhere, Georgia. And she was like, nobody comes and visits. I'm like, no shit. You live in the middle of nowhere. So I moved her out to Colorado where my sister lives. Now she has her, she's there with her grandkids and stuff. My little sister's got kids. Oh, your sister has a couple kids?

Starting point is 01:35:38 Yeah, she's got two daughters. Oh, that's your mom right there? What's her name? April. April. April. You know it's so funny. If you look at Mom, Christina from Iowa is on the top thing.

Starting point is 01:35:46 She's actually more prominent than my own mom in most of these. Really? That's her right in the middle? Christina. Top right corner, the blonde hair. And who was that? Your ex... No, no, no, no.

Starting point is 01:35:57 That was, God, arguably, probably the most famous crowdwork thing was she's like this really hot mom, actually grandma, who lives in Iowa. And I met her on stage. She gave me, like, these cookies and this, like, really sexual shirt and everything. And, bro, I was, like, 10 minutes into the show when this happened. I did, like, an hour and 20 minutes just talking to her. And it was crazy, crazy good time the entire time. Like, we were great chemistry, great banter.

Starting point is 01:36:21 The crowd was fucking loving it. But at the time, you can only post a 10-minute clip online on, like, Instagram and stuff. So I had to edit it all down to that. Like, the whole show was that. Really? Which never happens, by the way. Like, that sounds like I didn't have material ready for the show. But, like, it was just such a really cool in the moment thing.

Starting point is 01:36:37 And what stupid. It's got over. Like, I'm sure, collectively, over a couple hundred million views. Dang. Yeah. Really? Yeah, it's awesome. No way.

Starting point is 01:36:44 She's awesome. Dude, that's the best. Where in Iowa was that at? Des Moines, the Funny Bone there. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, sometimes crowd work is, uh, it's different every time. That's the fun.

Starting point is 01:36:55 You don't know if you're going to talk to, you know, super hot mom or biggest dick you've ever seen or somebody, you know, somebody all crumpled up in the corner, you don't know. Yeah, it is kind of great. Oh, there she is right there. Yeah. Yeah, it is great, dude. With crowdwork, there's something really special about it.

Starting point is 01:37:09 It's just real and in the moment, you know? How do you get the, um, how do you get your cameraman now is you have a special, Camerman who's one who's like up right there Kyle he gets all do it all Kyle mm-hmm He does all the get all the crowd work stuff oh my gosh yeah, let me do a little collaborative editing system together yeah he shoots all of it this is man the comedy clubs that feels like a lifetime ago This is probably three and a half years ago maybe something like that wow maybe That feels like a different lifetime ago Um are you off tour right now are you going back out? Is there any new places that you're going that you're a little bit like um

Starting point is 01:37:45 new places this year? Not, I'm not like... Like new countries? We just got back from Europe, which was really awesome. We did England. We went to Romania. Romania was fucking awesome. Dude, my friend just...

Starting point is 01:37:57 You have a second guest in a row that's talking about Romania. Really? My friend just quit playing basketball. My friend Patrick was playing basketball over there. What? Yeah. He's white? White guy, yeah. Okay, yeah.

Starting point is 01:38:07 Can I tell him the story? Okay, so we get to... We have like five weeks in Europe straight. This is night one of a... landing in Romania of the whole trip night one. Five weeks is a long time. It's a very long time. Night one we're like, oh, we're going to go out, have some drinks. It's Friday night.

Starting point is 01:38:23 We'll see what Romania is about. Kyle gets roofied and robbed the first night on tour. How do you know you got ruthy, Kyle? I woke up in an ambulance, 50 minutes away from the hotel at 9.30 in the morning. My chain was gone. My camera was gone. And they spent three grand on my debit card.

Starting point is 01:38:41 Yeah, he couldn't like remember. And they had to carry him through the lobby and everything. He was fucked up. dude. It was pretty funny. That checks out. Night one, dude. Night, well, it was like, we got back to the hotel at probably like 4 a.m. or something like that, and we're like, hold on.

Starting point is 01:38:56 Kyle wasn't with us. I checked the location on my phone. He's still at the bar. We thought he had left earlier. This is why I'm texting with him. I'm like, yo, like, do you want Jackson and I to come? You know Jackson McQueen. Oh, yeah.

Starting point is 01:39:07 He's so funny. He's hilarious. I was like, do you want Jackson and I, we'll come back and get you right now. And he goes, no, it's all good. I'm heading back to the hotel right now. I was like, are you sure? He goes, yeah, I'm heading back to the hotel. Go to sleep.

Starting point is 01:39:18 I wake up at 9.30 in the morning. My phone's ringing off the hook, and I'm like, fucking what? They're like, yeah, Kyle's in the back of an ambulance right now. It's like, no fucking way. Could you communicate with him, Kyle? No, I could barely open one of my eyes, and I was, I knew I got beaten up by strippers. I remember that. That's all I remember.

Starting point is 01:39:36 Do you have a grill in right now? Yeah. Yeah. Okay, that's interesting. Bro, we're sitting in the van day one after his recovery, and it's all quiet. We're trying to ask him little things about it. we're trying to give him some space, and he just goes, I think those strippers were mean to me.

Starting point is 01:39:50 It was so, so somber. We're like, what? He goes, yeah, I think they pushed me down a lot. It was one of the meanest things I've ever heard. That's wild. To say that specifically, I think they pushed me down. It was heartbreaking. Yeah.

Starting point is 01:40:03 And all you got was that grill. The worst part is, dude, and just the bottoms. Not taking the grill is hilarious. I'm going to leave him something. But, dude, you did a show in Romania? Yeah, Romania was awesome. We had two shows there. Wow.

Starting point is 01:40:17 I guess comedy is like a new, growing thing that's like people are starting to go and perform a lot more. If you get an opportunity, they were a fucking awesome crowd. I would love to go back. And do they speak? Is there enough English spoken there? Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, everybody there speaks English for the most part. Oh, yeah, Dracula's Castle.

Starting point is 01:40:33 Is that close to Estonia, I wonder? I mean, close-ish. I think Estonia is a little bit further north, I think. Because we had Ari Maddie, and he's Estonian. Yeah, do Ari's the best. He's a tornado of comedy, dude. Europe crowds are fucking awesome, man. I love performing overseas.

Starting point is 01:40:52 Thousand miles apart. Yeah. Oh, yeah, good time, dude. Sweden was awesome. Oslo was really cool. I love performing in England. And the crowds are so much fun. Oh, dude, yeah.

Starting point is 01:41:04 We had some good, we did some good spots over there. Ireland. Ireland's the best show of the tour every time I go there. They're fucking great. Scotland was amazing. You can't crowd work in Scotland, though. dude. Yeah, why not? I can't fucking understand them. Oh, yeah. What is you? Dude, I'll say

Starting point is 01:41:18 something. They'll say something back, and I don't understand it, and the crowd is like, they're fucking cooking me, dude, and I have no idea with what they're saying. Yeah, it's legendary over there. What's up? What's in the news, dude? Anything in the news that we wanted to look at? Oh, yeah, what's... Anything good to talk about? Oh, what do you think about these data

Starting point is 01:41:38 center and stuff? Do you think about that kind of stuff? Like, because that's kind of crazy. I just had to help stop them from putting in one In Rhode Island. No way. Yeah, they had like a whole town hall meeting

Starting point is 01:41:47 and everything like that. You went to it? I couldn't go, but my friend went and spoke on my behalf, which was very nice. She was very passionate about it and, I mean,

Starting point is 01:41:54 she had my approval. I couldn't agree with her more. It's just, it's so peaceful out there. It's gonna, it's just fucking up what we have, man. I mean, I don't know too much about them.

Starting point is 01:42:02 I'm not even gonna pretend like I do. Yeah, for sure. But, but the one thing, the most prominent thing that stood out to me because it wasn't gonna be that far from my house was there was going to be like a nonstop humming

Starting point is 01:42:12 coming from the building. I was like, I love that. I love like I can hear birds outside, dude. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, well, especially, yeah, like something just humming in the distance, dude. Yeah.

Starting point is 01:42:24 New York passes data center moratorium and consumer protections as environmental and housing proposals stall. So what data is going into these things? Why did the data centers need to be so big? Do we have anything about that? This is perplexity. Data centers are built for

Starting point is 01:42:42 Continuous operation power cooling and network paths are duplicated so a failure of maintenance event doesn't drop workloads, having parallel systems and physically separated paths. Well, my thing is just this. So we're already keeping a lot of data, right? Like our phones, we record stuff all the time. It's on the cloud. The amount of data that they must want to store now must be astronomical compared to to what we're doing. Yeah.

Starting point is 01:43:14 So that's what I don't understand. Unless we're going to go into like a surveillance state, right? Where, which is, that's what it feels like a lot of times. It feels like they already are. Right. Because then they're going to have to record

Starting point is 01:43:23 around the clock everywhere, everything. Yeah. And they're just going to put these, there's going to put these storage places and random places around the country. That's so strange to me. Yeah.

Starting point is 01:43:33 Aaron Brockovich, I know, was just talking about it. I want to get someone on to talk about some of this data centers just to learn a little bit more about it and what's going to be, going on. Yeah, let's see what this says right here. This is Tech Billionaire Oracle CEO Larry Ellison confessed as a dy-a-i-mass surveillance network. Citizens will be on their best

Starting point is 01:43:52 behavior because we're constantly recording and reporting everything that's going on. And it's unimpeachable. The cars, the cars have cameras, you know, cameras on them. I think we have a squad car here someplace. But those kind of applications using AI, if we can use AI, and we're using AI to monitor the video. So if that altercation had occurred, it occurred in Memphis, the chief of police would be immediately notified. It's not people that are looking at those cameras. It's AI that's looking at the camera. No, no, no, you can't do this.

Starting point is 01:44:28 It would be like a shooting. That's going to be immediately, that's going to be an event that's immediately, an alarm is going to go off. And we're going to, we're going to have supervision. In other words, every police officer is going to be super. It's going to be wild. What the fuck, man. Play that beginning part again. Play the first 20 seconds.

Starting point is 01:44:50 What does he say this one part? Citizens will be on their best behavior because we're constantly recording and reporting everything that's going on. And it's unimpeachia. Because we are constantly reporting. It sounds like they're going to be reporting to hand. That's the thing. It's so fucking weird, dude. I mean, do we have to be watched all the time?

Starting point is 01:45:14 I don't know how we can stop it now. That's the scary part. Why do we need it? I mean, I understand they're pushing the agenda of safety, but like, we have to? How much safer is it going to get? Is it just going to be for accountability, you think? I think that's, it's like,

Starting point is 01:45:30 and also there'll be a level of control there because... Yeah, I would say so. Yeah. If you don't do certain things, then you're entering this space. Well, you didn't do things the right, the perfect way, this exact way. Yeah.

Starting point is 01:45:43 So then what are the repercussions of that? It's fucking weird, dude. I don't even, I don't even want to live in this time, to be honest. I know, it feels just kind of like... It's too futuristic. It's too, it's too invasive. When would you have liked to have been alive? If you could, like, pick a couple of decades to have been, like,

Starting point is 01:46:02 prime you. I think probably born in... Because I think you... But part of you does, I feel like... want to kind of know it's weird you want to know how it you want to be a part of the world in the sense you want to like you you hope that the world ends well because otherwise you feel like what's the point i think that starts to happen yeah you for me anyway i'm like you want to i feel like for past generations i bet if like let's leave it better we're we're all building towards

Starting point is 01:46:34 something and then now suddenly i feel like we're all standing in a cul-de-sac and we're like what the fuck are we building towards anymore our grandparents are like doing only fans now, they're like, we're checked out, we don't care. It doesn't even matter. Like, everybody, like, I do feel that way. Some of that energy is like, what are we doing? I don't know what it looks like, a

Starting point is 01:46:55 generation after this one, you know? I have no, like, I have no idea what that looks like. Yeah. I think I would have, I would have liked to have been born maybe in like 60, 1960. Yeah. Grow up in the 70s, and then you're a young adult in the 80s. And like the music culture alone

Starting point is 01:47:13 that would be fucking awesome. It's great for film. Everything was magical. I've heard good things. Yeah, everything was magical. And then you get to see how dystopian it's getting and be like, yeah, I'm glad I'm leaving. Dude, I feel so weird being like the last generation

Starting point is 01:47:28 of people who wasn't chronically online. Like, I didn't, this isn't young for some people, but like I didn't get a cell phone until I was like, I think I was almost 15, something like that. It's like I still got the childhood of like, I got the privilege of boredom. Yeah. I think that's good for your brain to be a kid and have nothing to do and have to figure it out.

Starting point is 01:47:49 How to entertain yourself. Go make up a game. Go play pretend. Go walk around and go throw something through somebody's window. Yeah. We have to go break some shit. I think that's good for you. Yeah.

Starting point is 01:47:59 Your mom came home and you're like, you got arrested? You're like, yeah, I don't know. What else was I supposed to do? Yeah. I threw someone's window. I didn't know it would break. Just shit like that. Like, you just didn't know anything.

Starting point is 01:48:09 And I think that, I think it makes you a better person. Oh, dude. So now. Wondering or. around just bored hoping something would happen. A car drove by you just watching it go by. Just watching it, dude. Laying on your floor

Starting point is 01:48:21 and like hoping your mom wouldn't come home soon, but also hoping your mom would come home soon. Somebody's around. Just to hear some racket. Yeah. I think it's good for you, man. That's gone. People will never have that again. Taking a thousand naps. If anybody came to the door, you would go talk

Starting point is 01:48:39 to him. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You know, a registered sex vendor. Whatever. Didn't even matter. You keep the chain on and keep them out, but you still at least talk to them because it was somebody to talk to. Of course. And they were charming. You know?

Starting point is 01:48:52 Yeah, they were good at what they did. I remember having to like ride your bike across town to see if your friend was home? Oh. And they weren't. Oh, God. And you just had to go back. Yeah, dude. Across town.

Starting point is 01:49:04 You biked miles. Oh. Across grass. Dude, it was. Yeah. Oh, yeah, you'd find a new way to go. What is this video right here? We'll watch this and we'll get you out of here, man.

Starting point is 01:49:14 I need to get a show tonight. Okay. You heard about these flock cameras popping up? I have heard about these flog cameras. This is, these are like some of the early, cameras are going up everywhere mass surveillance, public safety. They are linked to the new AI data centers. Let's play it.

Starting point is 01:49:31 You won't believe the stickers I found. Somebody is putting these buggers up on every flat camera in town. Not enough people know that these are not just licensed plate readers. These flock cameras build profile. on individuals that are walking by and in vehicles. They use things like gender, clothing, behavior, and even biometrics to build profiles on you for their Nova platform. Even integrating social media profiles, email data, and places that you go.

Starting point is 01:49:59 And flocks data feeds directly into Palantir's Gotham, which already powers ICE deportation. What if this is GTA6? Like, they're scanning everybody in real life and the real world, everybody's going to be in the game. That's why it's not out yet That first of all is the excuse that they need for why it's not out And two, that would be absolutely amazing, dude I mean they just change a little feature about you But you're like, you know that's you

Starting point is 01:50:26 But in the future they could do that Some of these companies could then license Your existence somehow Or where you add in certain areas Into a video game like that And that gets kind of crazy, dude That's pretty sick Yeah, let's finish out here

Starting point is 01:50:39 Let me see, flock cameras have exploded across the U.S. Because they're cheap, turn to key crime fighting tools that let even small departments tap into a national vehicle tracking network. Flock sells subscription packages that include the hardware cellular back call. Their cameras continuously capture plates, timestamps, and vehicle metadata, push it to Flock's cloud where cops can run searches and set alerts on hot lists. Flock has marketed directly to police, HOAs, and private business centralizing all plate reads. By 2024-25, the company said it had cameras in roughly 4,000-plus cities and over 5,000

Starting point is 01:51:12 in communities. What? So, bro, it's here. Oh, it's already in. Yeah, it's done. That's the new Annabelle, dude. And she's out of the box. Talk.

Starting point is 01:51:22 Matt Reif, man. You have your new to your gorn at tour. I'm on tour right now. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Stay golden tour.

Starting point is 01:51:30 Amen, bro. We're going through the rest of this year. So it should be fun. Yeah. There's been fun cities ahead. Nice, dude. I'll be back here in Nashville in October for Bridgestone. Okay.

Starting point is 01:51:38 Yeah. You're in town for you got to come through, dude. Dude, yeah. I will be in town. Now my friend, is somebody dying or getting married? What's happening in October? Same thing. October 10th.

Starting point is 01:51:47 Yeah, October 10th, something's happening. It's my grandpa's birthday. It is? That's creepy. Dang. That's creepy. Shout out Steve. Steve.

Starting point is 01:51:54 Steve. Steve. Bro, yeah, thank you. Congrats to everything. FTX is coming out. You don't know when yet? The FTX series comes out this December. Is that what it's called?

Starting point is 01:52:06 No, it's called the Altruist. The Altruist. That'll be on Netflix. And then we've got the movie with Owen Wilson coming out in October. so it'll be a nice little end of the year. Oh, Rolling Loud, the movie, that's what it is? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Dude, that's crazy, bro.

Starting point is 01:52:18 What do you play in this movie? I play his work colleague who happens to also be at the festival. He's like a big festival head, and he helps him look for his lost son in the festival. So it's just me, him, and his girl, Christine Coe, who's a hilarious actor.

Starting point is 01:52:32 She was on Dave. Yeah. So we kind of help him look for his lost son. Amen, bro. Yeah, dude. Best of luck, man. Congrats on everything, dude. Dude, thanks for stopping by and spending some time with me, bro.

Starting point is 01:52:43 It's a pleasure. I know we've been trying to figure this out for some years now, so thank you for finally making the time. I appreciate it. It's a blessing, man. Your life seems active and busy. It seems like you stay active in your own life as much and just, you know, show up for yourself and get things done.

Starting point is 01:52:55 That's exciting. It's inspiring. Thank you, man. I appreciate that. Yeah, it's the truth. Matt Rife. Thanks, brother. Now, I'm just floating on the breeze,

Starting point is 01:53:03 and I feel I'm falling like these leaves I must be. Cornerstone. I'll share this piece of me. Mom I found I can

This Past Weekend - #662 - Matt Rife

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