Toronto Mike'd: The Official Toronto Mike Podcast - Brittlestar: Toronto Mike'd #798

Episode Date: February 9, 2021

Mike chats with Stewart "Brittlestar" Reynolds about his superhero origin story and what he's learned on the road to success before they kick out the top five Brittlestar jams.

Welcome to episode 798 of Toronto Mic'd, a weekly podcast about anything and everything. Proudly brought to you by Great Lakes Brewery, a fiercely independent craft brewery who believes in supporting communities, good times and brewing amazing beer. CDN Technologies, your outsourced IT department. Contact Barb, she's Barb at CDNTechnologies.com Palma Pasta enjoy the taste of fresh homemade Italian pasta and entrees from Palma Pasta in Mississauga and Oakville StickerU.com

create custom stickers, labels, tattoos, and decals for your home and your business. Ridley Funeral Home. Pillars of the community since 1921. And Mimico Mike. Learn more at realestatelove.ca. I'm Mike from torontomike.com and joining me this week is the man you know best as brittle star it's me welcome brittle star thanks so much for having me man that's a very

i feel very cool because i'm a small town boy you know what i mean like just drove it live in two hours outside of toronto and i only go to toronto for like to go to the big city and then to hear like be part of this is super exciting for me you're in the big leagues now you're on toronto mic'd that's what they say if you can make it in toronto you can make it in scarborough yeah yeah i'm actually uh we're in uh we're in etobicoke here this is southern etobicoke but you i mean we'll talk about this but like how small a town are you from? Where are you from? So Stratford, Ontario. So it's about 36,000 people roughly. And I was actually born here, but moved away for a bit,

then came back when we got married and had kids and all that kind of stuff. And it's a weird town. I liked it. I like Stratford actually quite a bit. And I would never have admitted that when I was a teenager at all, but I like it now though. Cause we know Stratford for, you know, theater, like productions.

And then, of course, Justin Bieber and Brittle Star are from there. That's right. And poor old Peter Mansbridge doesn't get a mention anymore. Or Lloyd Robertson. Peter Mansbridge is married

to a woman who went to my high school. So that's how we're connected. You're not allowed to say her name? Cynthia Dale. Of course, everybody knows. She's a star in her own right i think she's a bigger star than peter but that's uh she swears way more too and her sister of course talented actress also oh yeah my high school jennifer jennifer dale yeah yeah tremendously so you and i are connected that way uh i don't know through the dale sisters it's a loose connection but uh okay so

much to cover here but firstly uh your name is brittle star that's how i know you but that's not on your birth is that on your driver's license brittle star no it is on my lower back tattoo now but uh i had my real name scrubbed out of there oh the tramp stamp right i've seen that but we won't talk about that okay exactly uh you know You know, my actual name is Stuart Reynolds. And yeah, Brittle Star came about because it actually used to be a band name. And but 2004, I wanted to make an album and I was like, no one's going to remember the name Stuart Reynolds. It's stupid. Nobody cares. And so I picked this name out of my oldest son's marine life book when he was three. And I was like, that sounds cool. Yeah. They're like these spindly starfish so it's kind of you know yeah so it's like marine biology essentially you're

like george costanza exactly exactly yeah yeah you're a fake i was gonna say a fake marine biologist that's accurate okay there's the origin story for the name soon we're gonna get your superhero origin story but we have some housekeeping off the top. Do you know the name Garvia Bailey? Do I ever? I've known Garvia since I was eight years old. It's true. And Garvia's brother, Ainsley,

was one of my best friends growing up and was actually the best man at our wedding as well. There you go. Look at this. Because Garvia isn't well now you're an fotm fotm means friend of toronto mike you are now already i think let me see how much time into this episode yeah you qualify now for fotm status nice but garvey has been an fotm for a long time she's been on the show a couple of times i'm a big garvey of bailey fans so when she saw my tweet that brittle star was coming on she what did she want me to ask you about the band it's called Empty Shells

is that right? Empty Shells spelled M and T it's not spelled E-M no no she's got it wrong she's never been good on the details tell me about Empty Shells and then I'm going to play a little song that might have influenced this band

okay great Empty Shells I've got'm going to play a little song that might have influenced this band. Okay, great. Empty Shells. E-M-P-T-Y Shells. I've got a picture here. Hang on. I do. Hang on. This is exciting. I guess I should comment for the podcast listeners. Here we go. There you go.

Wow. The Empty... Okay, yes. She did have it wrong because she thought it was the letter M and the letter T. So who's in Empty Shell? Shout out all three members. So there's actually four members. So there's myself here. So I'm holding up a picture of us playing a show in the Stratford Art Gallery in 1984. And that's me in the middle there holding a bass, a McCartney Hoffner bass.

And then Jason Babstock playing guitar and then Jason Stanley playing guitar. And in the background here, because it's a black and white photo, it's hard to see and he's not lit, is Hainesley Bailey, Garvia's brother. And yeah, there you go. Awesome. No, dude, awesome.

What else did Garvia... So let me play a little, just a little taste here, just something to get me banned from Facebook because there's not going to be enough copyrighted music here. But let me just play a taste of something she tipped me off about. Hold on here. Oh, yes. Love it.

I'll break it down so we can hear your voice. But she tells me you're big on, big influence, heavily influenced by Joy Division and the new order. Yeah. I actually have, there's a Joy Division and the new order. Yeah. I actually have, there's a Joy Division transmission poster just over there actually right now. So there you go. Love it. I'll stop bringing stuff over because for a podcast,

a visual tour, it doesn't sell as well. I do play-by-play for that. It gives me an opportunity to test my play-by-play chops. Descriptive video, which is good. Right. So good taste in music. It's funny i just talked to a gentleman named johnny dovercourt also not his real name by the way much like brittle star but johnny dovercourt just wrote a he wrote a great book about like sort of the

history of toronto's music venues and music scene right and of course um famously uh the edge which was uh named after edgerton ryerson the guy ryerson was named after so it's by ryerson and it was being run by the gary's gary tops and gary cormier they of course uh as legend has it they had booked they had booked uh joy division for a concert their first tor Toronto appearance was booked. Tickets were sold. It was all ready to go. And as we sadly know, lead singer took his own life. I think the night before,

they were going to fly to North America. That's right. That's right. Yeah, tragic story. Absolutely tragic. One of the most exciting things ever for me was when I was 15, I went to see New Order in Toronto

at the International Centre and got to meet Bernard, the lead singer, Barney, and got to meet Peter Hook as well. And Bernard was like, super cool. He was like, he's like, what's your name? I was like, Stuart. And he said, I've come all this way just to see you. And I was like, oh, my God, I'm gonna pass out. And then a friend of mine, a young who was younger than me, who must have been honest to God about 12, he was wearing an Ian Curtis shirt and he said, does my shirt offend you? And Peter Hook, without batting an eye, said, no, but what's in it does.

That's great. Another question before I forget, because I'll kill myself if I don't remember, but there's a great fan of both of ours. I guess we can share this gentleman. His name is Al Grego. He hosts a podcast about Letterkenny. And he says he understands you're a big Letterkenny fan. So I'm here to ask you publicly.

So this is awkward for you, but I think you'll have to say yes because I'm doing it publicly. Would you go on Al's Letterkenny podcast? Oh, without question. If it's one more stepping stone on the path to me playing an OPP officer on Letterkenny, then yeah, definitely. Okay. I'm going to broker this deal. So there'll be like an email from me later to you and Al and then you guys schedule it. But that's exciting. Okay.

So Al, you owe me one. Although he plays, I have these events, TMLX, they're called Toronto Mic Listener Experiences. This is pre-COVID, of course. Although we had one in COVID, but it was in a public park from like six feet. We were all six feet apart, but right. Uh,

at these events, at least three of them, uh, Al's band has played one time. Al's band actually opened for lowest of the low at, uh, Great Lakes brewery. So I owe Al a lot of favors already.

I don't pay him for these gigs. So, and Al tells me now on the live chat that he did record you saying you'd come on. So I think it's legally binding now. Oh, well, that's, yeah, I think it might be. It's contractually, I'm obligated now. So yeah, that's fine. Okay, so shout out to Garvia Bailey.

We did that one. Do you see the shirt I'm wearing? Do I ever. It looks amazing. Peace, love, Canada. Love it. So the fun, Peace, love, Canada. Love it. So the fun, fun, this is a true story.

Speaking of TMLX events, TMLX 6 happened in, I think, September 2020. So it was in a public park and we had sneaky Great Lakes beers and we were all six feet apart.

And Moose Grumpy, who is actually watching on the live stream right now and is a big fan of ours, she gave me this shirt because i always close with yes i always say peace and love okay so peace and love is the thing i have been i stole it from when ringo star told all his fans to stop selling him the damn stop sending him the damn fan mail so i've been saying it ever since like every time peace and

love and i'm proudly canadian and she got me the shirt and I actually until yesterday I had no idea you had anything to do with this shirt yeah it's it that's our merch line yeah peace love Canada not CA there you go I'm just plug in that shamelessly but yeah no it's uh I like for the past uh I don't know seven eight years I've been signing off certain tweets with like peace love Canada with the emojis and then I was like well this would be kind of cool it's and I didn't really want like we've had merch before what had like brittle star on it and on whatever and all that kind of stuff and like little catchphrases and stuff and it was like and i just like the look of the peace love canada thing better it's just kind of a fun cool look well it fit perfectly

again just yesterday i was chatting with uh moose grumpy via dm and i learned that this was like a brittle star shirt so i just i thought for sure i was going to wear it today and i had no idea and with Moose Grumpy via DM. And I learned that this was like a Brittle Star shirt. So I just, I thought for sure I was going to wear it today and I had no idea. And it's cool. I love the shirt. Thank you, Moose Grumpy. And thank you, Brittle Star, for pimping out your merch.

That's all part of the deal. You should do that. And again, that's awesome. A couple more questions. There's a gentleman named Bob who says, where does he get off calling a dune a cliff? So I don't know what that's about. You can explain that maybe.

Okay, here's what it's about. Okay, so this is the problem is that when you announce that you're going to be on a podcast and then the vultures like Garvia and Bob, they just circle. And they're like, this is our time to attack. This is it. He's going down. So Bob is referring to a story of mine that I've told maybe once or twice where I was

19 years old and staying in Godrich, Ontario, prettiest town in Canada. And the house we were staying at backed onto these bluffs, like a cliff, essentially a cliff. Okay. Okay. So like an 80 to 90 foot cliff. Okay. All right. And then I, I, we had seen something happen on the beach the night before in the darkness, a boat came in with a little light in the front and it was all like, what's going on? Right. We'll

go investigate tomorrow when it's safe. We had been up and down this cliff thing numerous times. Telling this story just to bother Bob. Uh, we would have been up and down this cliff numerous times. As long as you zigzagged carefully, you could go down this incline it wasn't like a 90 degree drop but it was like a like a 65 70 degree drop okay i know this well because i camp at pinery yeah almost every year and i know what you're talking about and i'll let you finish the story and then i'll agree with bob that these are dunes but please continue well i think the pineries is sort of where the chicken people theuss people go um when they want to fall off a cliff and uh so we we i took like two steps the next morning at 10 to 9 in the morning two steps

down and then and then lost my footing and instead of falling back into the cliff right i thought i can run it i can run this thing i can do it So I broke into a run and I took two huge steps, like massive steps, like good sort of like six feet jumps. And then I was like, nah, I'm screwed. And I blacked out and I ended up falling 70 feet and I ripped my face open, broke my collarbone. Oh, no, that's real serious. Yeah, I know. Exactly. I had plastic surgery.

I'm not even kidding. It's totally true. What did you look like before? Uh, Tom Cruise? A lot better. Okay. Honestly, I don't mean to make light of it. Cause that sounds like a serious injury. You're allowed to make light of it. Cause you're okay now. I can do that. Yeah, it's totally fine. So when I, I just finished the story, which was just when the, when the, uh, the ambulance came, there's only two ambulances in the Godrich, Ontario. It's a small town. It's like 9,000 people. The first ambulance came. They hadn't finished

that part of the beach. So if you're ever visiting Godrich, if you go down to St. Christopher's Beach and the Rotary Cove, which is down there, and it's lovely there now, but it was just like big rocks. That's all it was, was big rocks.

And I ripped my head open on one of these rocks. So they called an ambulance and the ambulance drove along the beach to get me, strapped me in, stuck me in the back of the ambulance and then tried to drive away, but couldn't get stuck in the rocks. Oh, of course. So they had to send the second ambulance. So I made front page news that week in Goderich.

It's like that Simpsons episode when Homer falls down the gorge and they drop him again. Great story. But I guess the fact is those are dunes, right? They're not cliffs. And Bob is irritated by this, I suppose. A dune is made with sand. This was made with bone-crushing rock. Oh, it's not?

I just assumed it was all that stuff on that coast. No, not sand. Okay. Well, you know, I never get the other side of Grand Bend is foreign to me. So I've never actually been to Goderich. But I see it on the map when I'm making my trip to Pinery. Well, it's very dangerous. So stay away from the cliffs.

And it's a scary name. Anyways, Goderich, it just sounds intimidating. Exactly. I don't want to go there. Like a Scrooge McDuck version of a deity. Bob has a part two here. I love this because it involves Mr. Dress-Up and I was raised on Mr. Dress-Up.

Will we ever get to the Mr. Dress-Up sketch? So yeah, yes, eventually. So it's been a year and a half coming up in two years now. I've had this plan to do a video, which is a gritty reboot of the Mr. Dress-Up franchise. Yes. Done in sort of like a Kiefer Sutherland 24 style. Okay. Mr. Dress-Up Dressed to Kill or Tickled to death is one of the other possible titles yeah

right um i'd be playing mr dress up i'd be playing ernie coombs and uh and then actually bob has been uh was initially and he's probably talked himself out of that i'll talk to himself out of this role uh he was going to play casey yeah and then and another friend of ours was going to play uh finnegan and i actually have the finnegan costume, like the full dog suit here. And it's been sitting unwrapped, or wrapped up, rather. So when are you going to get it? What's the answer? This is a great question.

Well. Let's do it. What are you doing this week? Let's do it. Listen, Mike, it takes a lot. It takes a lot. And there's a pandemic happening. I would have totally had this totally ready by March.

But otherwise, I just, you know. Right. I was concerned for Bob's health. So thank you, Bob. We got some definitive, you know, I'm not sure that was a definitive answer, but it's coming soon. Is this something that will happen in 2021? Vaccine depending.

Yeah, maybe. And we'll have to recast Casey obviously now. So, well, now that we're learning, right now, right. That's right. I'll play Casey. But now that we learned Al is recording this, so at least somebody's recording this. Thank you, Al.

He's got that as well. Bob's got some. You've got to be careful what you commit to on the Mr. Dress-Up front. Beck, who's a great fan of Toronto Mic'd, and apparently likes you too. So we do have in the Venn diagram, there's Toronto Mic'd FOTMs,

and there's Brittle Starians. What do you call your fan base? Are they Brittle Star people? They're called the Starheads. Starheads. I love it. Okay. FOTMs and there's brittle starians what do you call your fan base are they brittle star people they're called the star heads star heads I love it okay so if the Venn diagram there is a good chunk in the middle so that's kind of exciting so Beck's in there she says if brittle and this is

interesting considering I just learned from Garvia that you have this musical background I'm surprised that you didn't become a famous musician instead of this funny viral video guy so we'll get to that though we'll get to that because i want to get to the your superman origin story here but beck says if brittle star could collaborate with any musician who would it be oh man um that's a great question uh i mean there's so many that i'd love to collaborate with i was lucky the first here's a little bit of trivia for you yeah the first brittle star record album as we used to call them

back in the day right uh it was actually uh done with the help of a guy named stephen duffy who was like my absolute musical idol he was the guy who started what was one of the co-founders with nick rhodes and john taylor of duran duran Wow. And wrote, wrote a bunch of stuff with Steven Page of the Barenaked Ladies and has an amazing band called the Lilac Time. And anyway, so I mean, I've kind of, I've been lucky enough that I kind of,

I worked with the person that I really wanted to initially, but most recently I've, I made this half-hearted pitch to Annie Lennox to cover one of my songs. I was like, oh man, she would kill this. Yeah. I'll bet.

For some reason, she hasn't gotten back to me yet. I don't know why. Well, try Anne Murray, maybe. Like, try Anne Murray first and then go for Annie Lennox. I would love Anne Murray. That's who, Anne Murray is my new answer. Okay, here's a true story.

I had on a gentleman, he wrote a book about Leonard Cohen. So Leonard Cohen, early years. And in our conversation, he revealed he had, he was very close with Anne Murray and had written a book about her as well. And I just, of course course just like al grego wanted to use this opportunity to get you on his letter kenny podcast i said hey could you hook i would love anne marie on toronto mic like she'd be perfect or whatever yeah so he he literally like pitched it and then anne had some follow-up questions which i answered and then it died on the vine like clearly anne marie made a

conscious decision like i'm not going to do this. I'm not going to go on Toronto Mike. And I don't think you should, don't take that personally though. How could I not? How could I not? I think, you know, I think there's like an automatic assumption that we have, that people have, have, have looked at our proposals and said no for, for some sort of like thought process reason, as opposed to like,

oh, I'm going to,, no, there's the kettle. I got to get the kettle. You know what I mean? You have to keep reminding yourself that people don't spend that much time thinking about you. You know what I mean? They don't process. The silence was deafening, though. The silence was deafening.

But anyway, just remember that story here. Wayne says, how come he's so good looking? So this is a result of your plastic surgery from that fall from the cliff. Yeah, like I was super good looking before and I felt bad because people had a hard time just standing next to me because they immediately looked like hideous. And I said to the doctor, can you tone me down a bit? And so he brought me down from a 12 to a 10.

So yeah, that was nice to hear. Now, I recently put you on the Humble and Fred show. And I got the vibe I was getting was, why the hell are you famous? Like, why are you more famous than us? That was the vibe I got. And I know why you're more famous than me, but I'm curious, like, how the hell did this happen?

Like, can you share your superhero origin story? Yeah, I mean mean it's funny because i on on humble and fred as well i remember i shared the story of how i had a meeting recently with these guys from la and uh because they can they can smell there's potential and they smell there might be money somewhere but they don't know how to get it and uh so they said to me during the meeting um nobody should want what you're offering but for some reason they do and i was like yeah okay that actually sums it up pretty good that's my new tagline on my website it goes against everything they've been taught everything they've learned you know this this goes against every single rule in the book why the hell do we know brittle star and watch his stuff?

Exactly. And he even said, you're no Brad Pitt. No, I'm not lying. He actually said, you're no Brad Pitt. And I was like, thanks? I don't know. Well, I would say, who is? That's, you know, yeah, I'm no Brad Pitt either.

Thank you very much. I just took him. I just sort of assumed he was wrong. But yeah, so basically what happened is back in 2013 i had started messing around with this app called vine and then uh in august of 2013 had a couple of uh videos that went like super viral one went massively viral then i did a couple more in quick succession who did just about as well and uh and then literally that month disney dm'd and said, would you mind doing some stuff? And I was like, oh, as I first of all figured out if they were legit or not.

And they were. And then we went to this event in California. And it was with a bunch of other social media all-stars. It was called the Social Media All-Stars Event. And it was really cool. They treated us really well. I was trying to think if there's a past tense version of treated, but there isn't. Is there?

Trot. You were trotot we were trot very well um and uh i was on the same like it was really a group of people it was like the most the the ridiculously good looking man was there uh grumpy cat was there oh wow uh it was just a really weird mix of characters from the internet and uh anyway during the one night we're like let's get together in the lobby and have a drink and we'll chat and get to know everyone else and so we did we went down there and my wife and i were like asking people so what do you do and they were like uh youtube what do you do oh i do youtube no no what's your job no no just youtube right and we literally had a conversation that night. We're like, um, I think we could do this too. This sounds pretty good, right? People paying us to go places and paying for our food and drinks. Yeah. Let's do more of this. And so we

just kind of tried to turn it into something and it, and it thankfully knock wood, uh, did. So that's basically it. Plus I'm, I have a, I have a saying, um, that I had to really convince myself of, and now I fully buy into it. And that saying is, shameless because shame don't pay. That's basically it. But I noticed, I should probably tease this right now, but we're going to kick out the Brittle Star. So, you know, I kick out the jams of a lot of guests. So I did it last night, did it with Steve Paikin last week. We have these pandemic Fridays with another Stuart, Stu Stone and Cam Gordon from Twitter Canada,

the aforementioned director of communications who can't get me verified. So we do this every single week. Powerless. Right. Yes. You said it. Yes. He's a great guy, though.

And he's handsome like us. So he's in the handsome man's club here. Good save. Because he actually listens. So he's in the handsome man's club here. Good save. Right. Hang on. Because he actually listens. So he will hear this. Got to be careful here.

But, oh yeah. So we're going to kick out the brittle star. So I have the top five brittle star and we're going to do this later. In fact, here's a special treat for you. I don't know if you're familiar with Mark Hebbshire.

Who is it? Of course. So Hebbsy has basically, he's going to be our countdown clock for this so i'm bringing in some hebsey and we're gonna do like a hebsey it's gonna be amazing just like uh sports line back in the day with jim tatty and mark hebser you're gonna love this and that's coming soon very soon uh what did i learn the humble and fred i thought was interesting oh yeah uh you've been to the white house like what's that story like how the hell so you're a guy in stratford

ontario making these vine videos and of course course Disney calls and you do something for them. And then you realize, Hey, we can do this. And the next thing you know, at your, you know, you know, bumping elbows with Obama or what the heck, tell me the story. Uh, so that was like 2016, I was invited to the white house and it was when Trudeau was doing his arrival ceremony, like, you know, his first big visit as a prime minister to another country. And it was to the White House with the Obamas. And the White House did a thing where they were looking for a social media person who had a good U.S. following, but was from Canada.

And so I was it. I was myself. There was also Taylor Jones, who was there as well, who was a dear photograph. He did that thing where you hold a photograph in front of like an old photograph. Oh yes. Yes. That's cool. You know what I mean? Yeah. Yeah. Taylor's a great guy. And there was like the head of marketing for Coke and like weird sort of people. And we spent the day doing the ceremony. We watched the speeches.

I was about sort of 25 feet away from like Trudeau and Obama, which was really weird. And then we spent the rest of the afternoon doing these sort of like chats and meetings in the Eisenhower building, which is adjacent to the White House and in the war room there. And it was just really cool. It was just like, it was kind of like,

I mean, Washington DC is one of my favorite places in the world. It's just, it's an amazing city because it's kind of like America was like at the start, like let's build a theme park about America. Let's just like do make America land right here. And if America only consisted of those, like, you know, eight blocks, it'd be like, wow, that's fantastic. It's phenomenal. And they've got all those like weird Roman things where if you stand at the Washington monument, you can actually see every other major thing like the,

the Lincoln Memorial, the White House, the Capitol Building. They're all in direct lines that are unfettered. It's phenomenal. And that's a career highlight. Like that could go on the CV. You know, I never called it a CV. And then now I see everyone's calling it a CV. I always called it a resume.

At what point did the resume become the CV? I think it's when we're trying to be more continental. We're taking the UK's place on the continent and what's happening. Where can I see your CV? Like Thurston Howell III or something. I got a job. I moved to the UK and I got a job at Virgin Records in Glasgow because I walked in off the street and I said, do you have any jobs going? And they're trying to get rid of me.

They said, do you have your CV? And I was like, I do. And I had a whole bunch of them. And they were like, you do? And I got a job with an office. Isn't that crazy? That's crazy. Okay, so how long did you spend living in the UK there?

I was there for a year. And I worked for Virgin Records in Argyle Street. And I was the buyer for the store. Get out of here. That's amazing. Off the street with your CV in hand. Isn't that crazy? Well, there's a lesson here.

Never leave home without your CV, right? Like that's the lesson for everybody. The lesson is never leave home without your cv and remember that the bar is low the bar is low and remember don't call it a resume apparently that uh that's like if they if you had said i don't have a cv but i have my resume they would have booted you out of that store probably yeah they're like what's a resume what the hell is that and maybe that's why people don't use maybe it's too french like maybe it like, oh, we don't want to use that French. Resume.

Resume. I don't know why he's smoking, but he is. Because CV is Latin, right? Like that's. Yeah. Curriculum vitae. Right. Look at you.

See, you're showing off here. Are you university educated, Mr. Brittle Star? I was kicked out of university. Which one? Queens University. I went to Laurier for three years and I went to Queens and I was kicked out of Queens my first year. year okay i just need to take a note to i need to send

some money to queens it seems like they have high standards hold on here make a plan wow so you're like one of those guys who can go around saying you know i i got kicked out and look at me now i'm going viral yeah i think it's there's a there's a there's a small difference between being a university dropout, which usually go on to be very successful, and a university kicked out. I think that there seems to be a small but distinct difference between those two paths. El Grego says you're university exiled. That's what you are. You can put that in your CV. What's great, though, is that we went last year.

This is like the, that's a fall before pandemic. And we went to my wife's who went to Queens as well, went to her homecoming and all of the people, the higher ups in Queens university watch the videos. So they were all like fawning over me and it was lovely. And they're all very, very, very nice. And it was really, really nice. But in the back of my head, I was like, you kicked me out. Right.

No, you're a case study in why university means nothing now. You're the foster child for this. By the way, Smith Paul, because on Facebook, we're in real time here. So he says, Stuart. And I think he spells, you do Stuart with the W, right? E-W, that's correct. Okay, he's giving you this like British Stuart or whatever, S-T-U-A-R-T is what he's giving you. That's the Catholic spelling.

Oh, you see, yeah, that's the Catholic spelling. Okay, that Virgin store is closed now under the bridge at Argyle Street. I live one street from Argyle, and he says, yeah, he lives a block away. So it's a small world, It's somebody a block away from that virgin store. That's phenomenal. So he'd be under the bridge which is kind of close to heading close to Sloan's.

The restaurant Sloan's in our gossip. So many things there. First of all, I need you to do a parody of Under the Bridge by Red Hot Chili Peppers where this comes in there. And then you brought it. I'll do it in Scottish accent. Under the bridge dintin. that's where I went to work. Sometimes I feel like I don't have a brittle star.

And then you also mentioned Sloan there inadvertently, and they did celebrate their 30th anniversary yesterday. So shout out to Sloan. I know, at least 50% of Sloan are FOTM. So maybe we'll get the other 50% on side here. So I just think that's wild that we like maybe you should sing with me if you don't mind before we kick out your Brittle Star jams.

It's a small world after all. Like this guy's a block away from that. It's true. Like that's in Scotland right? Glasgow, Scotland. That's right. Right. That's a virgin story in Glasgow, Scotland that you worked at for a year or whatever. And you tell this story on Toronto Mike.

And this gentleman is now here to tell us that. So he goes next to the McDonald's, the four corners. Anyways, this guy's a block away in Scotland in real time communicating with me as I record this podcast with you. Think about that. But we have to clarify, though, because it wasn't right on the corner, though, because I know the McDonald's he's referring to on the corner of Jamaica Street and Argyle. But if you go a little bit further towards the west end of Glasgow and Argyle Street, then you'll get to the Lewis's building where Debenhams is and or was. And that's the building that the Virgin was in. Hold on. I'm going to Google Maps right now. I need to find out what we're talking about.

You know what I've done recently? Can I just sort of do a quick aside? I did. We've got an Oculus VR right at Christmas time. I need to find out what we're talking about. You know what I've done recently? Can I just sort of do a quick aside? We've got an Oculus VR at Christmas time so we try to save our sanity. And I got this thing called Wander and I can street view anywhere in the world. It's the best. That sounds cool, yeah. It's like you're standing on top of the Google car.

That's the only problem. You're like 15 feet in the air. Apart from that, it's great. Smith Paul says, the Debenhams just closed down. So you're getting a lot of bad. This is a tough recession for everybody and Scotland is no exception.

It's because I left. That's why. It's a small world after all. I'm giving you all these free ideas for future viral videos here. I can't do anything to disparage Disney. I worked for them. I can't do that.

But that was 20, what was that, 2015? When did you get the Disney gig? 2013 was the first one. We did like four more after that. Okay that was 20... What was that, 2015? When did you get the Disney gig? 2013 was the first one. We did like four more after that. Okay, what's the most recent one? Oh, that would be like 2016. Oh, that deal's dead, I'm telling you.

That's gone cold. Oh, no, it is. No, it's because... It's five years, man. At the time, we had cute children, and now the children are grown. They're just... It's like a bunch of adults living together now,

and it doesn't resonate with their market anymore. i was gonna say when you're at these influencer events i always wanted like you must feel like the resident dad because i'm guessing they're all half your age these you because my daughter is big on this this whole world of people i don't know these youtubers and and they're all like early 20s or whatever like oh yeah you know you're not no one should want what you're offering but for some reason they do um yeah it is really weird though because what's super weird about is i started uh doing vine when i was 43 and our first event when i was 44 and the majority of people who i because i i like to i think it's a really good idea as a parent as well right to consume the media that

your kids are consuming. You don't have to agree with it. You don't have to be like, this is the best thing in the world. But you need to be kind of aware of it anyway. Okay, but how old are you? I'm sorry, how old are your kids right now? So my kids right now are 19 and 21, soon to be 19 and 20. I have a 19-year-old, by the way, so we have something else in common besides Cynthia Dale.

Yeah, they can go. We got kids who can go to the beer store. Cynthia Dale. Yeah, they can go. We got kids who can go to the beer store. And it was weird going to the first event because I was fans of a lot of these people, but I was oblivious to like how young they were. So I'd go talk to someone and they'd be like,

talking to this guy is 44 and they're like 16. They're like, hey, thanks. That demarcation line for me is 9-11. Like the crowd that, yeah, because when you talk to someone and they don't remember 9-11 because they only know it from history books i'm like oh yeah like i'm i'm the older guy now like this is that that's your lead that's that's your lead in a conversation to a child hi pleased to meet you uh the towers fell that day i remember and they're like oh we

learned about it in history class and i'm like oh yeah and i move on to another crap can somebody here speak to me about sloan or rusty or something anyone want to talk about the gandharvas i think the worst is when i'll make references uh but like abba i remember that happening the first time and and there'd be blank stares and i've i've had more recently i've made references to the beatles and be like ah that? And it takes them like a couple seconds to click in and they go, oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. They know it from Rock Band. They know it's Rock Band and that's about it. Yeah, yeah. You know, shout out to Rock Band. I don't know if they're

listening, the people there, but that, like my daughter got into things like the Beatles from Rock Band and it's like, you can kind of like, oh, yeah, oh, that riff from Smoke in the Water. She'll be like, yeah, I know that song and she'll be like, how do you know Deep Purple Smoke in the Water? I think, oh, Rock Band or whatever. I'm like, oh, thank oh, that riff from Smoke in the Water. She'll be like, yeah, I know that song. And she'll be like, how do you know Deep Purple, Smoke in the Water? I think, oh, Rock Band or whatever. I'm like, oh, thank you, Rock Band.

It's like bringing us all together here. I know, it's fantastic. It is. So much to cover. You mentioned going to the, sending your 19-year-old to the beer store. Yeah. We don't do that around here. We go to the LCBO.

You know why? Because we can pick up Great Lakes beer at the LCBO. Even the Stratford LCBO probably sells. I'm a fan of Great Lakes beer. The Canuck Pale Ale behind you is my favorite actually. That's the, yeah, that's the gold standard. So the Canuck Pale Ale from Great Lakes on Friday. So we're recording this on a Tuesday.

They're celebrating their birthday on Friday and unfortunately we have a pandemic. I don't know if you've heard, we're going to hear some of your greatest hits, which reference it. It's going to be like a virtual celebration but it's like GLB day is Friday and if I do

the math right they're like 32 years old maybe if my math is right. Happy birthday Great Lakes. I've got a beer. Sorry go ahead. I was going to say when I finally do meet you in person like when this all cleans up and I can meet you maybe meet you in the middle what's the middle burlington like where am i gonna meet you something like that no it'd have to be

like milton is that where you know where the hell are you strapped where okay so if you go for are you familiar with the 401 well i literally i've heard of it but um i guess i'm trying to think my son actually is in residence in Waterloo, the 19 year old. So as if you go to Waterloo and then you kind of just keep going West. So, okay. So why did I think, okay, I'm just picturing the map of Ontario. Cause I do every year I drive my kids to the Pinery. Like this happens.

And I often drive through Stratford on this way. I just do. You're driving through Burlington to get to Stratford? You're driving a very long way. I go to Google Maps and I say, what's the fastest way? And then it spits it out

and I literally do that. That cuts through Burlington. I don't know if it cuts through Burlington, but I've been driven through several times. Gord Depp is an FOTM. So share that.

Listen, Gord Depp recorded a song with me. He's a sweetheart. And you know he's in Flock of Seagulls now? I know. He does them credit. Replacing a guy named Paul. He's a sweetheart. And you know, he's in Flock of Seagulls now. I know. He does them credit. Replacing a guy named Paul Reynolds,

by the way. And he's no relation. No relation. Though my cousin's name is Paul Reynolds, who does not play guitar. Can you name, this is, I'm going to put you on the spot here,

but don't feel bad because I can't. Can you name a second Flock of Seagulls song? Well, of course there's Wishing. There's Iran. There's Photograph. Well, Iran is the one I know, but I can never, I can never come up with a second flock of seagulls song well of course there's wishing there's iran there's photographs iran is the one i know but i can never i can never come up with the second one but maybe that's because you have like a couple of years on me maybe that's the key i feel that was a setup as a setup oh you made that up i should google this and confirm if you made no it's true

elaine wants to know what kind of mic you're using. Thanks, Elaine. The mic I'm using is an MCA MXL 990. It is the cheap knockoff version of the Neumann TLM 103. Okay, Elaine, you asked, you got it. So there you go. It's on the record. It's a great mic, by the way. What were you going to say about Great Lakes before I interrupted you?

Because I was going to say it's one of my favorites is Great Lakes. And yeah, so Canuck Pale Ale is great. The Pompous Ass Ale is really good too. And but that's usually what we'll get if we go to like, if we buy our beer from Sobeys or something, we'll get the Great Lakes brewery stuff. But then here in town, it's Black Swan Brewing or Jobsite

or Stratford Brewing Company. And that's the biggest benefit. No, that's a terrible way to say this. One of the only benefits of the pandemic has been we've hardly ever gone out to buy beer anymore.

We get it delivered to our front porch, which is phenomenal. Right, yeah. And you're out of the free delivery range for Great Lakes, but they've been doing that if you live in certain, you know, if you live in Toronto or I think they've added. They've delivered to our oldest son a couple of times, actually.

I've had them. Whereabouts does he live? He lives right downtown in Toronto. Yeah, definitely delivery there. So shout out to Great Lakes. And next time, again, if you do make your way to the, I don't know, the backyard studio in a couple of summers, whenever you can do that, I got a Palma pasta from you, a frozen lasagna from Palma pasta. They're in Mississauga and Oakville and people can go to palmapasta.com to find out exactly where they

are. That's authentic food, family run business. Those guys are amazing. It's delicious. So thank you, Palma pasta. I have a Toronto mic. Let me show it to you since maybe i could stick it in the mail but this is from sticker you.com has made up a bunch of great toronto mic stickers and all these decals behind me and they're great people they're in liberty village but again online at sticker you.com uh great news about i always find this segue tough because ridley funeral home like i'm not here to say like if you die call this number and get a good deal that's not what I'm doing here but they're literally like I call them pillars of the community because every time there's like a community fundraiser or an event these guys are there the people at Ridley Funeral Home are just fantastic people and they're here in

our neighborhood which is called New Toronto but RidleyFuneralHome.com and I thank them for their fantastic support. CDN Technologies, if anyone listening has a computer network they're responsible for, you should consider outsourcing your IT to the experts at CDN Technologies. You can contact Barb Paluskiewicz, that's spelled exactly like it sounds, barb at cdntechnologies.com.

And last but not least, there's a brand new sponsor. So I want to give some love to Mike Majeski. He is also known as Mimico Mike, which my lawyers are looking at it because I'm Toronto Mike. Is it a violation of the trademark? I'm going to let it go because he's now a client, but he's in the know in Mimico. Go to realestatelove.ca, realestatelove.ca, contact Mimico Mike and tell him that Toronto Mike sent you. Fantastic. How was that? Now, my friend, we're going to kick out the Brittle Star

and this will lead to some more stories here. So let me, I told you I'd have some Hebsey in here. So I think I'm going to play everything in its entirety since you have nowhere to go. I have nowhere to go. By the way, there seems to be some, I'm looking at online here, whether this is a cliff or a dune.

There's a great debate that's been sparked in the Facebook. Bob swears it was a dune. He's got authority from someone who was there. No. Al Grego says, according to what you say, that's a cliff. So the cliff story, a lot of people said

they've heard this story before. I thought I was getting exclusive content. We'll talk about that offline, Mr. Stewart. But here, let's hear from Hebsey. Play your top five.

So Hebsey will introduce it. I play it in its entirety and then you're going to talk to us all about it. So I'll see you in 90 seconds here. Number five. As we all work together to get through these strange and trying times, one issue has become a sticking point, wearing a mask.

For some, wearing a mask isn't a big deal. Some say it's actually a small deal, a temporary inconvenience similar to sitting on your sofa and the cushion is comfortable but not perfect. For others, wearing a mask is a much more serious issue. The following are actual medical reasons you may not be able to wear a face mask. A severe skin condition such as a severe burn, a severe lung disease, or you're under two years old, in which case please give mummy her phone back. But what if none of those actual conditions apply to you? What if you maybe can't wear a mask because you suffer from one of the following conditions? Science-itis, acute wussness, selfish syndrome, chronic dickishness, pathological ignorance, or severe moron-ness.

Don't worry, now there's a solution. If you suffer from one of those conditions and don't want to wear a mask, just stay home. Seriously, don't go out. Stay the hell away from me. Let the rest of us just get on with it. I'm only one person. I'm applauding here. Reasons to not wear a face mask.

And of course, I should point out the obvious, which is these are visual presentations on a podcast. So, of course, as you tell us sort of what inspired it, and you can tell us where we can find the actual video because people need to see these things, not just hear them. But talk to me about reasons to not wear a face mask. So, as we sort of hurtled ourselves into the pandemic, I found like this sort of need to speak up. So I would get like, you know, I'll get angry about things and frustrated. And but then nobody cares it's I'm not just going to be some some dork spewing crap on the internet like there's enough of those people uh but I thought if I can make it kind of funny that

might be good and if also if I can kind of use I think comedy is really good at at uh at mocking stupidity with and at the same time getting some stupid people on side. Cause it kind of makes people go, Oh yeah, that is funny. Oh, I'm yeah. Yeah. I'm not one of those people. Right. So that's, that's kind of the hope is to kind of do that. So the idea was to create something that was going to be a contentious reasons to not wear a face mask. And then from there, just kind of, you know, go on to be like, you know, of course you can wear a face mask, then uh from there just kind of you know go on to be like you know of course you can

wear a face mask get over yourself good message for everybody and these resonate with us uh but this is i guess it resonates with everybody i realize now because some of your stuff i've noticed is sort of like canadian centric and then some of it appeals to a broader uh a broader audience and i guess uh if you're looking for, I guess you mentioned it earlier, but like, like America is where it's at when it comes to being like an influencer, viral guy, making a living on it, you got to appeal to Americans. Is that, is that fair to say? I think it, I think it certainly was the case up until about 2018.

It's, it's changed a little bit now. And I think that like, for me, our bread and butter is branded content. So we do stuff for, you know, like for Rogers or Best Buy or whatever, like a larger sort of national brands. I mean, that's kind of where- That pays the mortgage there. Yeah, absolutely. And it used to not be that case. It used to be that sort of classic Canadian thing of like, you're a Canadian content creator. Well, who cares who's watching that?

I mean, the numbers are smaller, but at the same time, it's like, there's enough here. There's enough people here. There's enough people watching, you know what I mean?

So. Okay. Good to hear it. Cause I, I definitely appealed to a GTA base and I need to know there's enough people here to keep doing what I'm doing. Okay, good.

So that was number five. Let's hear from Hebsey again. And this one's about, yeah, about 90 seconds again here. Number four. Number four. Sometimes it's hard to find some peace and quiet so the bathroom's where I go Me and my bone on the throne, checking YouTube, hitting like on some videos I know this won't win me dad of the year, but come on, give me a chance now If the roll is done, I grab another one, set it right, set it overhand

And now I'm singing like Family, you know I don't want much much I even love handmade crafts made of macaroni Come on now, you should know me All I need is tasty craft beer, please Sometimes I might eat too much No worry about my weight, got the dad bod rockin' on me Sketches on my feet Cargo shorts look good on me

I'm a dad, that's what I do I get the groceries when I'm asked to the hair on my head's getting thin that's true but I got lots on my body me and your mom said clean your room but I'll probably forget about it real real soon you can find me with a beer by the barbecue I'm a dad that's what I do I'm a dad, that's what I do. Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh. I'm a dad, that's what I do. Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh.

I'm a dad, that's what I do. Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh. I'm a dad, that's what I do. You can find me with a beer by the barbecue. I'm a dad, that's what I do. Trivia. Trivia is the, if you go watch that video, which you can watch on YouTube,

youtube.com slash Brittle Star, just search for Brittle Star. You can actually, the gent with the fanny pack, that's Bob. Get out of here. The aforementioned Bob Roth here. Yeah. And Lisa wants to know, did you dance?

Oh yeah, he says, yeah, so Lisa's saying, did you dance in that video, Bob? You got a whole community here. Wow. And Lisa wants to know, did you dance? Oh yeah, he says, yeah, so Lisa's saying, did you dance in that video, Bob? You got a whole community here. Okay, great. Now, that's a great Father's Day jam. So does that get like

freshened up for Father's Day 2021 or do you simply just read? No, just let it ride, man. Let it ride. Okay, so. Interesting story. We were talking about

the Canadian-American difference. Yes. Is that that video was on Facebook initially and had 12 million views. Wow. And I had to pull it because Facebook Canada has no licensing set up at all for parodies. So it's like, oh. So basically you use too much of Ed Sheeran's shape of you. Is that what happened there? Essentially, they don't have any

differential... No, you know what I mean. They can't figure out the difference between a parody and a regular tune. Because it's just an algorithm, right? It just crawls and finds. This is similar. Thank you. I'm glad we're having this meeting here. I used to do Toronto Mic'd Always Went Live on Periscope

for years. I guess you caught wind that Twitter shuddering Periscope, like literally closing up for good in March, I believe, which is very soon. So I said, F that I got to find new home, but I have two types of episodes of Toronto Mike.

There's the, the episodes like this in which it's mainly us chatting and you playing your stuff. And there's, but then I also do these episodes like the pandemic Fridays and you know, when Steve Paken or whoever kicks out the jams where I play a lot of music. I'm going to play a whole, like, Frank Sinatra song or something.

I learned very quickly that Periscope didn't give an F, okay? It was like the Wild West, and that's why I loved it, to be quite honest. And then now I've tried Twitch, and I've tried YouTube, and I've tried Facebook. These guys, I get all this, uh sony music is making a claim because I played 59 seconds of simply red or something like that and they said we're gonna block it in these 248 countries and it's like every country you've ever heard of is in there okay so it's like what I've done here so this is what I've done a little so Ian service is a great fan of the show and he helped me with this

page called, basically it's live dot Toronto Mike dot com. So live dot Toronto Mike dot com. And when I'm doing an episode that's music heavy, like a pandemic Friday or a jam kicking like I did last night, we go live at live dot Toronto Mike dot com. I call it it's like a pirate radio

like you hear about these pirates, you know, back in the day in England. So we're pirates on live.torontomic.com where basically we can play anything we want and you can join in and chat and stuff. And when I do an episode like this, I throw it on Facebook because I'm confident. Although now that I just played some Ed Sheeran, we'll see.

But it's going to be pulled for sure. It's going to be pulled. Thank you very much for putting the Ed Sheeran. So that was great because, you know, there's a lot of a lot of dads and it's pretty damn accurate the craft beer and the barbecue great stuff so are you ready for number three oh my god am i ever number three hey neighbor oh hi america what's with the decorations it's's Canada Day. We're having a little get together. Canada Day?

Yeah, kind of like July 4th for you guys. Yeah, but we do July 4th because we got lots of stuff to celebrate. We got Eagles and Freedom and KFC. What do you have to celebrate? Did you just say what do we have to celebrate? Yeah, I, universal healthcare. So if you break your leg, you can still afford a snack

while you wait in the ER. The metric system. But to be fair, everybody else has that except you. Maternity leave. Because we think if a woman carries around another human for nine months, she might need some time off. Poutine. French fries, gravy, cheese curds. If angels owned food trucks, they'd make poutine. Bagged milk. It's more environmentally friendly, plus it feels like you're holding a cold, wet baby. So you... And beer. Actual beer. Not yellow water. Beer. And lots of it. Butter tarts. If you put sex and gold into a blender, you get a butter tart. Of course, hockey. We did it first, we still do it best.

But American teams win the Stanley Cup. American teams, Canadian players. Oh, and to your KFC point, Colonel Sanders lived in Canada, so we made it even better by pronouncing it KFC. It's true, he lived in Canada from 1965 to 1980. Yeah, that is weird, but it's true. But you know what we don't have?

What? Pennies. Because they're stupid pocketweights. Y'all do have some stuff to celebrate, I guess. Yeah. Sorry. I like, that's great. That's fantastic. Yeah, that was the biggest video in the world Biggest branded video in the world in 2017. It beat out Nike by 10 million views.

So is that is that KFC branded? the agencies who represented KFC were like, hey, listen, would you make this about KFC? And I was like, you know, you guys know it's Kentucky fried chicken, right? As opposed to Canadian fried chicken. And they're like, no, no, no. But he used to live in Mississauga. And I was like, bingo, that's my in.

You sneaky bastard. I didn't even know I was marketed to in that video. You sneaky son of a gun. That's what I do. Now, of course, I'm listening to this fact, which I'm well aware of. Of course, Colonel Sanders lived in Mississauga. And do you remember his the, uh, now of course I'm listening to this fact, which I'm well aware of. Of course, Colonel Sanders lived in Mississauga.

And do you remember his, uh, chicken, what they were called here, his, uh, chicken restaurants, uh,

while he was in Mississauga. Do you remember the name? Was it, it wasn't Dixie Lee, was it? No, it was, uh,

Scott's Chicken Villa. Was it? Yeah, it definitely, because in fact, I mean, I'm, uh,

not too, not too much younger than you. And I remember growing up with Scott's Chicken Villa or Scott's Villa. I can't remember exactly how they were. I just remember Kentucky Fried Chicken. Because apparently... Yeah, go ahead.

Well, I know. Listen, this sounds like something you're passionate about. I don't want us to turn into a fight here. So I'll just let you have it. And they looked like... Thank you. Thank you. Let me have this one.

You have everything else. You have the good looks. You've got the clicks. Let me have this. But yes, they looked like KFCfcs i guess they were kind of like kfcs because colonel sanders was behind them but uh they were called scott's chicken villa so that's one to grow on all right and that's a great video so so happy that made the top five here that's number three and this one here okay so this is about a minute fifty on the other side, but you got nothing but time. Let's do this.

Oh yeah, let's do it. Number two. Everything is so divisive these days. Between the pandemic and politics and all of that being amplified by social media, it feels like we're constantly being forced to choose a side. Sometimes that

choice is easy. Agreeing that racism is stupid, for example. Other times it's a bit nuanced, like Elon Musk is obviously just a real-life Hank Scorpio from the Simpsons, but I still want a Tesla. And if there's one thing that our scroll culture does not do very well, it's nuance. Don't get me wrong, nuance can be and is still understood. You just can't be nuanced about it. Which can make picking a side on any issue these days a little tricky. But don't worry. Here's how to tell if you're on the right side of any issue.

If your opinion is shared by, say, scientists, doctors, people who have dedicated their lives to public service, and people smarter than you, and generally good people all around the world, you're probably on the correct side of the issue. If, for example, your opinion is shared by racists, Nazis, people who change their views based on their own personal gain, regardless of the impact on others, people who've never paused to ask themselves, wait, does that make sense? The spectacularly dim, despots, cult leaders, or generally bad people. It doesn't mean you're also one of those people, but it's not looking good.

And it may be time for a rethink. Take a look at who shares your views. A really close look. Actually, even a passing glance. Because as the old saying goes, you are the company you keep. I hope that helps. There you go. So talk before we kick out number one here, which is a little longer than all the others so it's going to take a few minutes but the tell us like the process like so you have a kernel of an idea maybe you're on a walk this is how i envision it you're on because it's on my bike ride for me but i picture you on a walk through beautiful strafford and you get this idea and you start noodling it a bit and you script it out and then so you tell us the uh the brittle

star process from like conception to delivery here. It's usually what happens is I'll be having a coffee in the morning, and I'll be staring out our front window into the middle distance across to Ed and Shirley's place. And they have some great landscaping, so it's nice to look at. And it's sort of zoned out a little bit. And then after I've consumed a bunch of news and stuff like that, and whatever is happening, and then it's like, oh, how do I feel about this? And then I go and I strip down and I have a shower.

And then I think about it through and I'm like, okay, I know what I want to say with this. I want, I know which side to come down on this. I know how I'd like to, to present this message. And, and yeah, that's basically it. And then I go, and then I go back down and I script it to present this message. And yeah, that's basically it. And then I go back down and I script it out on my phone. And then I just record it, film it as fast as I can from there. I like using analogies. My kids say I make the worst analogies in the world,

but millions of people around the world would disagree. So they're wrong. Absolutely. No, and that's another good another good one there no it's great and um the what so where's the skill set come from like uh i've lately been trying more video things because it's i've just never had the the bandwidth if you want like like the the time or energy to dive into video i've done other things and obviously i'm an audio man who produces a number of great podcasts and maybe even this one, but where the heck does your video skill come from?

Just like a general interest in creating that kind of thing. I like 2010, I can tell this story now cause it's now 11 years ago. Right. But I was kind of interested. I'd been messing around in the mid-2000s with the with the with music and creating videos and and trying to figure out things like aspect ratios which were really confusing to me like widescreen and compared to you know television 4-3 and all

that kind of stuff and uh and of course a lot of the equipment at the time was still 4-3 as opposed to widescreen um so you end up with these stretched out videos where everyone looks super fat or like super squished in one of the two. So just like messing around with it, but like 2010, I was asked by this organization to make a video for them for part of their pitch to get chosen for this event. And I was like, ah, I've never made a video, but I can recommend a couple of people who can do that kind of thing. Like, no, no, we'd like you to do it. And so I said, okay, I'll do it. And my deposit just happens to be the exact amount of money for a nice DSLR camera. And they gave me a check.

And I literally walked across the street to the camera shop and bought a camera. Wow. Yeah. There you go. And the rest is history. It turned out great, though. So it was good. Now, you know, the rest of the story.

Thanks, Paul Harvey. The late, great Paul Harvey. See, that's another thing. 9-11 is that demarcation line, but the Paul Harvey reference is another one. I think a lot of people in their lives would be like, there are two major lines. It's 9-11 and paul harvey

because i'll do that terrible for america right and a lot of times i'll because i like fun facts and a lot of my wife finds them very trivial and kind of mildly annoying possibly and then sometimes i do it a lot because they play me like a jukebox i'll say this did you know like the scotch chicken filler whatever and then every once in a while, I'll make, you know, I'll drop earlier. I dropped the, and that's one to grow on, right? So that's actually, that's another one.

But I'll say, and now you know the rest of the story. And if somebody's like, that's Paul Harvey. And I go, okay, I'm speaking to a fellow oldie. Cause you go to your, I know the rest of the story.

And your oldest, 23, how old's your oldest? He's turning 22 next month okay yeah drop that and now you know you know call him up and say and now you know the rest of the story and see if that if he says paul harvey okay because it's really interesting because because my so my youngest is gregor my oldest is owen and owen is like been a big fan of like uh pop culture like through the 20th century. So he's like, he's very aware of a lot of that kind of stuff, but there's little pockets of things that are more my era that he doesn't

know. So it gets into like the late seventies, eighties. Cause I always say the best era of music was 79 to 85. That was it. That was it. And he's like, no, it's the worst era. So he's kind of blocked it out. So for example, he's like, he last night he's like, do you ever listen to like a lot of the B-52s? i was like oh no god yeah i love the b-52s they're fantastic and i was like you got to get you know listen to have you listened to uh private idaho that's like my favorite of the b-52 songs and he hadn't listened to it yet so he's kind of i think he's now getting to a point in his life where he's like okay i'm not going to consciously block out the things that are

important to my father i think i'm going to try to appreciate them so i think we're all growing as people awesome and of course b52 is one of the two great athens georgia bands i know and i introduced him to rem as well you never listen to rem crazy well you know that's what dads are for you're doing a great job uh and it's funny when you mentioned you know you're you know these references from whatever that just before him i was thinking yeah like flock of seagulls like you're the guy who knows all the flock of seagulls and then there's a young idiots like me who know i ran and then we have to you know wishing is a good tune i listen to that okay after this episode i'm gonna totally you can be i'm gonna listen i'm gonna go for a bike ride i'm gonna put it on a continuous loop like i'm gonna be like i'm gonna just oh it's got a great melody it's just it's

good little oh it it's top tune. Are you ready for your number one jam? I don't know if, like this has been a great convo, but I feel like. I can't even remember what I sent you. Okay, good. We'll find out.

So all those others are like, I don't know, like 90 seconds or so. This one, I'm just going to, not, I don't need to warn people because we're going to enjoy every second of this, okay, in real time. So I'm going to, it's about. Time for a pee break.

Three and a half minutes, FYI, and I'll talk to you on the other end, Mr. Brittle Star. Here we go. Number one. Said you won't wear one today Said it might make you look gay I said I don't think gay works that way Plus if everyone wore a mask

No one would even ask If you like kissing dudes Cause really no one cares We're literally in the middle of our own bubonic plague Of all the things that you could do That really hardly affect you Seriously, it's no big deal Grab one, strap it on

Just wear a mask Find one with a design you like Before you head out tonight Maybe one that says I'm not gay If that makes you feel better Just wear a mask You say that taking your freedom away is what I saw you say in your latest Facebook post. I don't think you understand.

Stop when you spit before it lands. All my face is really what I call freedom This just isn't some deep state plot to Keep grandma alive Of all the things that you could do That really hardly affect you Seriously, it's no big deal Grab one, strap it on, just wear a mask

Find one with a design you like Before you head out tonight Maybe one with a flag on it if that makes you feel better just wear a mask listen nobody likes wearing them they fog up our glasses

but our ears and our chile are bleeding ask yourself why you're such a boss Of all the things that you could do That really hardly affect you Seriously, it's no big deal

Grab one, strap it on, just wear a mask Find one with a design you like Before you head out tonight Maybe one with a flag on it If that makes you feel better Just wear a mask Of all the things that you could do That really hardly affect you Seriously seriously it's no big deal grab one

strap it on just well ask wow honestly where's my lighter when i need it uh honestly that's is that your magnus opus? I think maybe for the pandemic it is. It got a lot of attention, which here's something that's really sad about it is that I made that in April and it got like, honestly, like maybe like 3,000 views.

And then the thing dragged, the whole pandemic thing dragged on. I re-put it out in November and it like went up to like over 300,000 views. And yeah. Have you considered putting out a uh an uncensored version you can get both on spotify and or apple music if you wish to know because uh and again these are videos people should check it out is that one on the youtube page it's a twitter one that's on the yeah that's on both actually it's on the youtube page as well yeah okay cool cool, cool, cool. And that's an original composition? It is, yeah.

I wanted to do something in the style of Elton John. I was inspired by Elton John's pandemic performance for whatever it was, the Grammys or something. It was in his backyard. Right, yes, I do remember, yeah. And he was just really going nuts and there's like a basketball on the ground beside him and stuff. And I was like, I want to be that.

Fun fact, Elton was a big fan of the Scott's chicken Villa. Uh, whenever he came to town. Yeah. It was his hangout at the furnish household. What's the, I got to ask you a couple of last questions before I let you go here. But,

uh, what's this about the time warp? I'm supposed to ask you about the time warp. But the time warp, does that mean anything? There's a hashtag release the time warp. Does that mean anything to you? I was hoping this meant something to you. This is rather awkward. I don't know what that means.

Oh, the time warp. I know what he's talking about. He's talking about there's an unreleased video that was like a full-on production that we did for I don't know if I can say or not, so a theater that happens to be in the town we live in. Could be any live theater.

I'm going to Google. And they were doing the So a theater that happens to be in the town we live in. Okay. Could be any live theater. I'm going to Google. Yeah. Okay. And they were doing the Rocky Horror Picture Show and they had hired me to make a video. And Bob is actually in that video. Bob of the I'm a dad, that's what I do video. Right. And Bob, as well as the group of dads, had to learn how to do the time warp dance.

Right. And they ended up axing it. We still got, you know, everyone got paid, which is great, but it was like, they just never went anywhere. So they own it and we can't play it anywhere. I hear you. That makes sense now.

The hashtag that I see trending now is release the time warp. It's trending now. Wow. Blair Kerrigan, who's a great listener of Toronto Mike, says, how does Mr. Brittle Star plan to maximize the momentum

he's built with his online presence persona post-COVID? What's the plan? That's a good question, Blair. It's interesting because I've been really fortunate in the past year that my reach has expanded tremendously. expanded tremendously um and i guess that kind of speaks to the fact that i'm trying to be funny but also trying to be funny in like a measured way in a like on my point is always i'm me and the viewer we're always in the same team we're always on the same side um and i'm never going to make fun of the viewer uh it's like you and me together against the third party. So what will I do to maximize that? I mean, I think that there's a few things happening that won't directly capitalize on

my face, but there's like, well, I was meaning like, I've got a, I wrote a short story, which is being, if all goes well, being developed into a TV series, which is cool. I don't think necessarily would have had that before. I've been promised a dinner with Ryan Reynolds at some point. So I mean, I'll probably capitalize that way. So yeah, that's basically, that's all my plans so far. That's a big deal.

That question kind of stole the thunder from my very final question here, which let me read what I wrote here. I can act surprised if you want. Mr. Brittle Star, your career seems to have the momentum of a runaway freight train. Why are you so popular? Because no one should want what you're offering, but for some reason they do. I think what's happening is there's like a weird aspirational quality to what i do i think that younger people look at me and go he's old and he's still having fun right and i think old people

look at me and go he's younger than me and uh he's having fun um or old people go he's older than me still and he's still having fun um so i think there's like a i think it's people like to uh i'm not glamorous obviously and i'm not uh i'm not like i have friends who are instagram influencers who are really good looking and do amazing things and just look good holding a bottle of water i don't do that uh and it's not because of any disparagement against them but it's just kind of like no one wants to see some, some dude doing, you know,

this, you know, holding something and holding a product. So I think there's like this weird thing where people look at me and go, he's, he's like, he's like someone you could know. And I think the people who,

who are complimented lovely things about me and sent dirty messages, I think they're like, yeah, I think he's attainable. I think he's, I think he's, well, that's just it. You're inspirational

because if this guy can do it, I can do it. And that brings us to the end of our 798th show. You can follow me on Twitter. I'm at Toronto Mike. You've got to follow Stuart here. He's at Brittle Star.

Stuart, for the record, I know earlier in the program, you agreed to go on Al's podcast. Will you at some point return to Toronto Mike to kick out the jams? Absolutely. 100%. I just wish I had recorded that.

Oh, damn it. Okay. Our friends at Great Lakes Brewery, they're at Great Lakes Beer. Palma Pasta, they're at Palma Pasta. Sticker U is at Sticker U. CDN Technologies are at Great Lakes Beer. Palma Pasta. They're at Palma Pasta. Sticker U is at Sticker U. CDN Technologies are at CDN Technologies. Ridley Funeral Home.

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