Toronto Mike'd: The Official Toronto Mike Podcast - Humble and Fred on 10 Years of Podcasting: Toronto Mike'd #920

Episode Date: September 27, 2021

Mike catches up with Humble and Fred before reminiscing about ten years of podcasting.

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I'm Mike from torontomike.com, and joining me this week... You are moving on a crowded street Through various shades of people In the summer's harshest heat A story in your eye will speak Humble and Fred. What's the name of that song? Ten Years. and burn to bed across another season. Humble and Fred. A fortune rises to a star. What's the name of that song?

Ten Years. Paul Simon. I believe Paul Simon wrote it for Oprah Winfrey on her 10th anniversary. And I repurposed it here today for you guys. Congratulations on 10 years

of regular podcasting. Thanks, buddy. That's a very nice introduction. Did you not think it was nice? No, I think it's great and fitting because I'm often mistaken for Oprah. Aren't you Oprah Winfrey, people?

They're like, are you working with Oprah now? Oh, yeah. That's who I'm doing the show with. First of all, thanks for having us. We just spent the last two hours. This is perfect because we spent a nice lunch reminiscing about the gentleman that got us started in terms of our sales. He was our first, I don't want to say employee, but the first person we worked with. A man named William Hertz.

And so we've been thinking a lot about the last 10 years, the last couple hours. Well, good. Then it's going to be fresh in your mind because we're going to hit some hot spots along the way. I feel I've got a pretty good perspective on this, like kind of a vantage point of watching it all unfold. But it's no small feat. I mean, we're going to get into the origin story very quickly here.

But the 10 years of podcasting, to me, that would be like if you were on the radio for 50 years. Yeah, easily. This is a significant podcast. We're the Wally Crowders of podcasting. Did you get that reference? Yeah. Fred?

No, I get it. I don't think Fred gets it. No, I'm just thinking about it. You know, how long it took radio to sort of evolve and how long it's taken podcasting to evolve i i think that's a pretty good comparison 50 to 10 to be honest and there's very few podcasts that make it 10 years like it's it's tough for a podcast to make it 10 episodes i find but 10 years is uh no small feat like i said so we're gonna hit some of the uh touchstones along the way. And again, I know Fred doesn't want a two and a half hour episode. So really quickly, though, this is very briefly.

Can you give us in one sentence? I'm here all day, Mike. I'll be here all day. We'll say bye to Fred. I'll give him his lasagna. And then we'll keep going. But can you guys in one or two sentences remind us how you ended up as a duo back in 89? Howard? Fred? Fred?

I was working in Montreal. A couple guys that, one guy that Fred knew, one guy that I knew, came to Montreal to see if a guy named Jeff Lumby and I would be interested in doing the morning show in Toronto. And Jeff was not interested, but I left a

message for one of the guys, Danny Kingsbury, and I said, hey, I know Lumby's not into this, but I left a message for one of the guys Danny Kingsbury and I said hey I know Lumby's not into this but I would be interested and they went back and took that information and said hey maybe we could put this guy Fred who was doing sports and part of the CFNY family for many years and we met I had never met Fred. He came to Montreal somewhere around, I'd say, late May or June of 1989. And in August of that year, we started the show. We are now 31 years of doing a show. Not continuously, but... But close.

I counted two gaps, really. So it's 32 years, I guess, but you leave... 32 years, yes. You leave for 99.9. I was gone 15 months in 91 to 92. And then there was a break from 2005 to 2011. Right. Okay. So let's, before we get to 2011, Freddie P. No, I just, as Howard tells that story, you know, I've thought about this from time to time over the years. You know, they brought, he was interested in coming to Toronto, Lumbee wasn't.

What if they'd have brought you sort of as a solo act, and my position didn't change? Having said that, I was sort of part of the morning show anyway, the few that preceded you, almost by default. Wouldn't that have been something if they'd have brought you to do the show on your own and I just did sports? Or did you want somebody to work with? What I've never told you until this very moment is I thought that's what it was. Yeah, one of the regrets. I said, what? Just imagine, given the atmosphere of that radio station, imagine if that had have been it.

Because I might have been one of those guys that thought, who the fuck is this guy? Right? You know, to be honest with you, that's, I've never, this is the truth. Because that was never how it was sold to me. I've never thought of that. Like, what if it was like, Hey Howard, you come to do the show. Cause they were coming to do, to talk to me and Lumby who were doing a two man show. Yeah. A duo.

A duo. They call it a duo. Do they? And so I thought you only wanted an hour. So you want to... Because it was never sold to me that way, I never considered it. But when you left in 2005, and for a period of less than a year, it was the Humble Howard Morning Show. That was kind of like what it might have been, where it was just like the Humble and Fred Show, except you weren't there.

There were other people being you. But no, I never, I, it was always like, we're going to put you up with this dude. That was you. And again, I, not to sidetrack this or anything, but I've thought about that from time to time, given the atmosphere of that radio station at the time and what was to come in the short period of time after you arrived

you know at least you sort of had me in your corner as opposed to just another one of those cf and y guys could have been a lot different yeah yeah enough of that now the podcast we're celebrating 10 years on october 14th but that takes us back to 2011. But I happen to know there were podcasts before 2011. So let's go back to December 2006. I know you guys remember because how could you forget? But we all got together at Dan Duran's house and we recorded a Christmas special, a Humble and Fred Christmas special. The first person who ever uttered the words pod and cast together in a sentence was you to us. You introduced us to the concept i'm not even sure i understood what it was i think it was just like hey let's do the show on the internet

i was glad to take nothing away from mike that's that's how the the first time i heard it was dan duran to be honest the idea of podcast yes because I was doing my blog and he had said to me, why don't you add some audio to it? And I said, oh, and he said, well, it's called podcasting. And his buddy, your buddy, Sammy somebody. Sammy James. Sammy James. Had told Dan about certain podcasts he had listened to.

This was way back, mid, like 2005 or whatever. So in December 2006, we record the audio at Dan's house. So Dan literally shared an MP3 with me, and I remember making this a podcast. I've just, like, obviously I have great memories of this. And then we did it once in a while. Like, I'd say over the next few years, it was once in a while we record a Humble and Fred podcast.

My recollection is between 2006 and October of 2011, we might have done, did we do 10 of them? Maybe, because there were a couple at Proud FM. At Proud FM. Yeah, there was one at the bar celebrating your 20th birthday. So there was two at Proud, one at the Dominion on Queen. Right, right, right. A couple at Dan's, so maybe it wasn't even 10.

I actually just discovered the audio files from those early days. Like we could like surprise people in the feed for your 10th anniversary. That was during our gay phase. No, really. We dabble a little bit with almost. We were fluid. Well, at the time we were fluid. Fred, of course, was gay for pay, as they say.

We gave A. Fred of course was gay for pay as they say but the problem is no one no one would pay we were open like you know we're open by the guy we gave it a shot but it didn't work for us Fred was like it's not for everybody he said I'll be gay if somebody pays me

anyway Bingo Bob be gay if somebody pays me. Anyway. Well, shout out to Bingo Bob. Bingo Bob Willett, of course, was the link, the hookup at Proud FM. Yes. It was fun to record there a couple of times. And by the way, it was great running into Bob at your TMLX. TMLX

8. It was nice to see you. I had two highlights. Well, many highlights, but two of them for me was running into Bob and also running into Jay Brody. Yeah, he's got your old gig. Yeah, I dig that kid. He's a nice kid. One thing I think about Bob is he was the first man

I ever saw in capri pants. Remember? Yeah. Remember that? Which was a bit startling at the time. He's always been a vanguard. Yeah, for sure. But that was also during the time where I was Capri for pay. So anyway. Okay. So we did some podcasts.

I'm sorry. I know you have a narrative, but I would say, and then. But this is part of the story. Yeah. So we did a few and enjoyed them. We had a lot of fun. Everyone got together. Proof of concepts almost.

Well, there was not beside Mike. There was Bob. A few of, I think Pete was there for a couple, Dan was there for every one of them. Right. A couple other former producers, I think were hanging around at some point. I know at the Dominion, Schwarma was there.

I saw him there. I think it's the first time I met him. And Andy Wilson would show up now and then. Where's Andy now? Is he in Ottawa? Where is he? I don't even know. Well, no, Andy came back from Montreal.

Montreal. And I think he is, he might be in Ottawa. But the point is, a bunch of our sort of former colleagues, we'd all get together. The Dominion was a good point. And we also had, didn't we have a celebrity on? Was it? Oh, we had a few.

We had Tyler Stewart from Barenaked Leaves. And we had Nick Kiprios. That's right. And that, what is she, fortune teller? Psychic. Psychic Nikki. Right, right. Yeah, I remember that.

Who I think Dean tried to steal Psychic Nikki from you. He did, but he called her Nilly. No, let's be fair with that. We had Psychic Nilly. Nilly. Nikki on the show. Right. And then, you know, we didn't use her, whatever happened. Well, you on the show. Right. And then,

you know, we didn't use her, whatever happened or ours. Well, you had no show for a while. No show for a while. And Jason Barr was still there. Right. And he was tied to Nikki.

So I mean, that was all fair game. Absolutely. All's fair in love and war and in psychic Nikki and also psychic Nelly, her twin sister. He's very good. Nelly, who was, uh was not as famous.

So 10 years ago, that brings us, it's October 2011 when you guys start podcasting regularly. So what was your employment status leading into the fall of 2011? What made it so that you guys decided to do it daily and make a go of it so you could live off the funds? Well, I lost my job first in may of 2011 but but fred and i started to sort of hang out a little bit in terms of taking some meetings uh we had a was it lunch or dinner with the guys at boom oh i don't know so we um i was still at boom and they were getting ready to fire me this was a

couple months before i got fired right and uh i guess in a not desperate but they were sort of like maybe this show would work better if we brought fred on because it was colleen uh rush home and myself and uh i said yeah this be great. This is what this needs. You know, you want to talk about a good fit for us. Like that really would have been. Well, May Potts has been there forever. Well, yeah. Anyway, so we took a meeting with a guy named Chris.

I can't remember his name, but I guess there wasn't enough. They did some research and they found that there wasn't enough of an appetite for us to bring the guys back to Boom 97.3, which I think was a mistake. Although, listen, I don't regret anything that's happened in those 10 years, but that might have been a, as far as a radio gig at the time, it would have been good for us. So I lost my job. They didn't hire us. Right.

And then Fred. I was a program director at the wolf in peterborough yeah you know i got the golden parachute from the mix and didn't do anything for a couple of years and i went to the a couple of those those uh employment things where you know you have seminars and then they do a profile on you and what they think you're going to be good at. Right. And it came back that, you know, I might be a good manager on some level. So I sort of thought, yeah, management, radio, maybe I should be a program director. So that job opened up in Peterborough with chorus. I applied, I got the job and, uh, I was there what, 2008 to 2011, pretty much three years before they fired me. Things started

out well and then I knocked heads with the general manager a few times and that was it I was done. Knowing you the way I know you Mr. Patterson were you thinking okay this is a fantastic stepping stone to be program director at the edge? Like, was that the goal? Absolutely. Believe me, the money I was making in Peterborough, I was lucky I could sort of afford it. Right. But that was the strategy, of course. I thought I'm going to go, I'm going to sort of get paid to go to school. And it wasn't a lot of money, but I was still being paid to go to school. And the idea was, here I am in chorus.

That would be a nice story. I end up program director of that radio station. And while I was there, Ross Winters actually considered leaving for a while. So that opportunity actually presented itself. But then he decided not to go, and I ended up getting fired. But you are correct, Michael. I have a question for Fred.

May I ask a Fred question? Yeah, of course. So was your, and I've, but you are correct, Michael. I have a question for Fred. May I ask a Fred question? Yeah, of course. So was your, and I've never asked you this either, was your master plan to get in to be the program director of The Edge and then get us back together and put us on The Edge? You want to know what? On a serious note, when you're a program director at that level, you're more a people manager than like a like a bean count. You, you know,

you have a music director, you have a promotion director, all top-notch people. Sure. So it comes down to managing people and their creativity. And at the time it was the Dean Blundell show. And I know they had burned through a couple of PDs because, you know, Dean apparently wasn't the easiest guy to work with. And I thought, you know what? I bet you I could. I bet you I could do that. But obviously it never happened. So to be clear, the idea was to become the program director and then put me and Dean together. That's right.

Okay. Come on, Dean. That would work. That would work. So you guys are both without a gig. You're having these mysterious lunch meetings. The reason I brought that up is we were without a gig, but we had sort of been around each other

and talked. And then when I lost my job, I let him know. And then when he lost his job, we started taking some meetings with an online gambling company and there was a couple weeks where we were like these guys were talking about giving us a lot of money and we thought great we'll we'll do a podcast it'll be sponsored by this gambling company and we'd put together a pretty extensive i don't know not a sales package, but a plan, and it fell through.

And they were kind of like, well, now what do we do? That was very interesting because at the time, and I still believe, gambling companies, although the gambling rules have changed, there recently was single event and all that. But at the time, you could not advertise a gambling company unless it was gambling for fun. And you always knew it was.net rather than.com. Right.

Well, this was sort of going to be revolutionary. They were going to give us a whack of money and be the main sponsor of a podcast, which meant a podcast could actually advertise the gambling site as opposed to the fun gambling site. Right. It would circumvent. Yes.

Circumvention. Circumvention. Anyway, that didn't work out. And so we had no sponsors. Both of us were on very, you know, I think each of us had like a six-month out deal. We weren't making a lot of money. But we could afford to do the show starting in October of 2011 for no money,

which didn't last that long. I mean, we started making money pretty quickly, but it wasn't for, I don't know, you know, you've handled the money ever since we started. Six months or so or four months before we started taking any? Yeah. You know, I don't know exactly that. The first actual check would have been from who? Gary Slate. Gary Slate. Wow. Absolutely. So I don't know how many months into it, but I mean, that's, it's pretty cool when you have like a real check in your hands.

Like, you know, that's a, that was sort of a breakthrough moment because let's be honest, when we started doing the podcast in 2011, the idea was to do a podcast so well that a radio station would have to hire us. I was about to ask, was that the end game at the beginning was to get a radio gig? You know, whether it was overt or inferred or whatever the word is, I think it was, I don't know, maybe you can recall. I don't know that you and I ever discussed it.

Hey, let's do this and a radio station will hire us but i think collectively we thought oh after five years of no humble and fred in this market people would hear it and be like oh i've we forgot how good those guys were and you know what to a lesser degree it worked out sim it worked out that way because very quickly two things happened uh We started the show. Actually, we hadn't even started it. So we did a test show on Friday. Yes, I know.

I said the C word. I was there. So we did a test show on Friday. Actually, the 14th. Right. The first Humble and Fred show, Monday through friday show was the 17th right but that weekend venae menon uh we were the cover story of the toronto star entertainment section and what happened was a guy named bill hertz saw that had been when we just had lunch with him we sort of

were talking about this origin story he saw it and and called us up and that was october november december we had gary as a client and we'll tell you, it was a decent amount of money. Not enough to make a living, but enough to start paying some bills. Right. So it was only a couple months. The second thing that happened is, I don't know whether we had done some shows,

I guess we had, where Julie Adams, Adam? Adam, singular, I think. Julie Adam, who at the time was the vice president of programming for Rogers, heard a few shows and became kind of a bit of a patron saint in terms of getting commercials on 680 News, having us come in and be on the morning show with the fan.

Bob McCowan had us on. All of a sudden, we're on about 15 radio station, rock radio station websites. You know when stations had websites and people went to websites. But it was a real those two things as much as anything else including yourself your expertise

and help. But that really gave us a boost. Can I ask where did the billboard come from? By BMO Field there. A listener. I thought maybe Roger said something. No. We had a billboard for a few years.

And you could see it from BMO Field. We watched it. That didn't have anything to do with barter, did it? Nothing. $15,000 a month or whatever that thing was worth. Somebody was like, they liked what we were doing. They had the space. They weren't using it.

Right. It's wild. It is wild. But those two things. Okay. So Toronto Mike, obviously part of the triad that got us started. But Bill and Julie. Right.

We said this to Bill, like, having a guy like Bill Hertz at the time was a vice president of, of national sales. So he got a slate and through after that, he got a sleep country, pizza, pizza. And what was the other big one? Oh, um,

five hour energy. Right. So in a very, big brands, and they were all people that he knew and they bought us because they knew who we were, but they gave us money because of who he was so now you've got sales and we're soon i'll get a good update on uh where things are at with that

because i think that's a key part of what differentiates you from most canadian podcasts do you think well we're gonna get we're gonna be very very clear about all this well no we are gonna be clear and you know people and I had this conversation with Bill a few minutes ago, or we did. Yeah. He said, how much longer are you going to do the show? And I, we said, I said, indefinitely.

There's no reason to stop. And I always say this to people when they ask me when I'm going to retire, because I'm 65 now. I'd say, you know, if I retired, what I'd probably do for a hobby is have a podcast. And that, that is so true.

And COVID did, and we're jumping around a bit, but COVID sort of showed that you can do the show from anywhere. Right. I said that, I said that exact thing to Bill. I said, we've learned that we don't need to be in a studio anymore. Wait, wait, is this the first time you guys have recorded in the same physical space? Oh, probably. Since like March 20?

Probably, yeah. 20? Yeah. But anyway, let's get back to the monetary thing. Yeah. And I'm sure we'll touch on this. For sure. If we had not, like 10 years ago when I was 55, not ready to retire,

and was still thinking like, geez, I'm not across the goal line yet for retirement. If we hadn't have made money, it probably wouldn't have continued. You know what? Well, you were 55 when we started this, I was 51. You know what I mean? So if we were doing this every day and all of a sudden we turn around and said, listen, you can't make money from this. It would have ended and we would have had to do something else.

Be it a radio show or gone our separate ways and worked at Leon's. Well, that's what you wanted to do. I didn't want to. Yes, you did. I didn't want to. I was afraid I would have to. Well, considering. Well, how to put perspective there.

You were only four years older than I am right now when you started the daily recording. And Fred's right. Like I was in no position to retire. My kids were still young. I had a whack of dough, as you know, to pay in the divorce world. And well, and listen. So in 2011, we start, listen, of course you're listening. Listen.

Listen. In 2011, October, we start. By the spring of 2012, we have a radio gig in Kingston. Now, even though it has gone down as we were Kingston's most hated morning show. That's what they call it. But what it did is it gave us not a sizable, not real radio money, but decent money so that we could we could take money every month because what they did is they gave us an amount of money for the show and for eight months

that allowed us to put some money in the bank and pay some bills pay ourselves a little money right we yeah we've really been fortunate because again that money we banked and then we it just kept us a little bit ahead of the game all right so we got the we got the kingston money around the same time now we've got the slate money and then we get sleep country then you get divorced i get pizza pizza you should have ever got divorced you know have i ever told you that oh no no yeah i appreciate that i'm sure rachel will love to hear that um like she's gonna listen i'm gonna show. I was going to say, Rachel's never going to hear this.

Seriously. But Rachel, seeing that he did get divorced, I'm glad he's with you. Anyway. But all those, all that, nothing had added up to a sizable grown-up living, but as Fred said, it just kept us going long enough to keep

going. Because as most people who have heard a podcast or and we said this to bill the number one question everyone asks us and i'm sure it's similar for you hey i want to do a podcast uh how do i make money doing it and the three people that you're listening to are the one of the fewest podcasts that are on the podcast charts that make money independently. Well, look at all the people, some notable people that have started doing podcasts, and it doesn't turn into money fast enough for them, so they're not doing them anymore.

And that gets back to what I said a few minutes ago. If we had been in the same situation where there's no money there, we probably would have gone the same route. Okay, so you're on the air in Kingston as the morning show, but that's actually not your podcast because when you're finished with Kingston, you actually then record your actual podcast. So we were on from

I think 5.30 to 9 or 6 to 9 playing records, doing a show. And then at 9 we would stop that and then do another hour, sometimes more sure of the humble and humble and friendship how long did this because this is all of course part of the rogers alliance which i find rather fascinating because you start as a podcast and as you pointed out then there's this rogers alliance which includes you know hits on bob mccowan's primetime sports we were on every

friday morning on the fan morning show for a while. Was that like Landry and Stellick? No, Landry and Brady. Oh, no. Lang. Lang and Brady. Brady and Lang. Brady's here Wednesday, by the way. Nice. Say hi to him for us. So here's the Rogers plan.

And had Kingston just hated us a smidge less, the idea was we were going to become the morning show on a bunch of smaller market Rogers Station. In fact, they had lined up a meeting with us and the guy in London, we were supposed to talk to him on Monday, I think. And on the Friday, I think they canceled the meeting because Kingston hated us so much. And they hated you because you were in Toronto. Yes.

They hated us because... Which is weird. It is. Considering... And again, not to be braggadocious. Considering we were the best morning show that has ever been on the air in Kingston... We are. We were...

Statistically, we are. The fact that they hated us so much basically goat fucked us from being on in London in Saskatoon in Kitchener you know who they eventually did that with because that's the

Rogers did that with Roz and Mocha Roz and Mocha are in like a dozen markets across this country that's relatively recent. Like last two or three. Okay, we're talking 2012. No, I know, I know, I know, but eventually they did. No, and I'm not surprised because we could see back then where the business was going

and to their credit, they recognized it too and actually started to sort of bark up that tree before. and actually started to sort of bark up that tree before. But what really sucked about that was, how long were you on Kingston? Seven, eight months. It's like when I, it's not enough time. Yeah.

They would have grown to like us. It's, you know, I went through the same thing. I mean, part of the problem I had in Peterborough is I got rid of the morning man who didn't give a shit and I brought in TJ Connors right well immediately that market despised him young energetic attitude all it was no surprise that they didn't like him but I I used to say give this kid two years in this market and they'll love him and they just didn't give us enough time with that kingston and that was the only disappointing thing about that beside the fact we no longer were getting this money although they did pay us for a couple months afterwards afterwards oh yes

they gave us a nice severance but um it was disappointing because a couple of the people involved julie and another person that we know, we were sort of disappointed that they didn't give us a year. Like, give us a year. Come on, Kingston. Well, they gave the siblings a year at 102.1. The siblings. Remember the Brothers Sister Show?

So that was 2012. By the following, so 2011 we start. 2011 we meet all these nice people. 2012 we get a morning show. 2013, we meet all these nice people. 2012, we get a morning show. 2013, another Gary Slate hookup. Did you have a question, sir? Yeah, I was going to ask, is this the, because we talked now about the Rogers Alliance.

This is the Bell Media Alliance? No. No, one thing I'll say about Kingston too, just, you know, one example. One of our biggest sort of detractors or guys that didn't like us, out of the gate, one of the most vocal people about not liking us, ended up loving us or liking us. The beekeeper.

Is he a beekeeper? No, no, a different guy. It was Eric. Amherst, Thailand. So it just goes to show you, it was like immediately, it's like, hey, they're from Toronto. They can't come into this Kingston territory and think they're big shots. The thing was, it just needed some time.

That's all. No, so the Bell Media Alliance came later. Okay, then tell us about what you were going to have to do. Well, 2013, another great thing happened is Gary, who had a Gary Slate, who had not a minority share, but a decent-sized share of SiriusXM, arranged for us to meet those knuckleheads.

Right. And out of that came five years. Yes. Now, again, they didn't pay us a lot of money, but it was an amount of money every month that kept the engine going, because now we've got sponsors, and now we've got another sort of what would you call that um a syndication type of deal where we were getting

paid to do our show which was the podcast it also it was great and we just talked about this at lunch being on Sirius XM gave us a great story to tell people. Hey, Humble and Fred, we're on satellite radio. We have a podcast. You can advertise on the radio. Go ahead. Well, we missed something here. What did we miss? Before SiriusXM, there was a Bell Alliance.

Yeah, that's the Bell Media Alliance. The Bell, when we were... John Moore Show and... Oh, I see. No, you're right. I apologize. We had a Bell link to News Talk 1010 and would be on the round table every morning,

talk with John Moore. We were being run on News Talk 1010 two hours every night, 10 to midnight, on CKPT in St. Catharines. That came between, did that? Yes. Really? Before Sirius.

Because I remember, yeah, because when we were on Sirius, we were also still on News Talk 1010 every night. Which was a great deal at the time because, again, News Talk 1010, 10 to midnight every night. The problem was, you know, you'd like to revisit things. The problem was that show had to be beeped, edited for the swear words i would love to revisit that and and sort of made you know had an agreement we're not going to swear because we number where we number one we don't need to swear and it would have made that show a lot more friendly for those bell stations and

probably would have lasted longer i think after a, it was every night between 10 and midnight, it's beep, beep, beep, beep. Like, what is this shit? And so for a while, we were on News Talk in Toronto. CKTB. In St. Catharines. London, CJBK or something in London. And so we had that deal going.

And also, we were on with Tory in the afternoon. We really were part of the radio station. And if I'm not, so I must be getting mixed up because that summer of 2013, we filled in on News Talk 1010 for our one and only time. And it was the following year we went to Sirius. Because I think the News Talk 1010 bell thing. No, that sounds right because you did five years at Sirius before the Funny 820. So that's 2014 to 2019

was Sirius and then Funny 820 for a couple years up until 2021. So there you go. Right. So can we shout out just a few people

along the way here that made it happen before we get you to Funny 820 and then this new era that we're in right now. But I do remember at the beginning,

you know, I'd have it all set up and we needed a place for the podcast to be hosted. And basically we had some nice space given to us by the late, great Rick. Rick Randma. I can't believe he's no longer with us. Yeah, I know. It's a drag, man. Died two years ago.

Yeah, very sudden. What are we talking about? Okay. So we, at the very beginning. What are we talking about, Reno? Well, I'm the very beginning. What are we talking about right now? Well, I'm going to explain it. Who's Rick Randman? What?

I don't think he knew about the Rick Randman. Yes, he did. You were the Acme guy. No, what? Like, you worked at Acme. Yeah, I did. Oh, that guy. The guy that hosted the server that we hosted our show on.

Okay. But we smoked it. Like, we just blew it out of the water with the bandwidth of this program. Very popular, the Humble and Fred show. Oh, yeah. And then a gentleman named Pete McFedren for a while was hosting our show, Core Fusion.

Oh, yeah, Core Fusion. Remember that guy? At some point, we made a decision that I think was a good one. And Pete, we did a great job. Thank you, Pete, for your assistance. And that was great. But the gentleman who's still helping

with this part of the equation, I just want to shout him out now because I know he's listening. The wonderful, large-calved man named Ian Service. So unbelievable. So I just wanted to shout out Ian Service and thank Pete McFedren along the way and the late, great Rick Ranma. And then I also want to just touch on a few voices that have been heard on the show over the years.

And then I also want to just touch on a few voices that have been heard on the show over the years. One is currently the afternoon drive host at GNR 640, Kelly Catrera. So do you guys quickly, how does Kelly end up on your show every day? In typical Humble and Fred fashion, I said to Howard, she had been let go in Hamilton. And I said, hey, we should get Kelly on the show. Yeah, why not? So we called her down. I had worked with her, I think, at the Mix. I don't know if you were there when she was there, I think.

Yeah, so she would be the first news person that we hired. I don't know. Actually, I have no idea if you paid her. No, no, no. But she was on every day. Her voice was heard. And then she got a gig and didn't come back. But a couple of other voices,

one of whom is still on the show and does get paid. Phil Hong, maybe briefly. Hopefully Phil's listening. How does Phil end up? And he's been there almost the whole 10 years. He shows up very early. Yeah. Weeks into it?

Very, very quickly, yeah. We were speaking at a, we were asked to speak at a broadcast day at some college, a bunch of broadcasters on a panel. And we were on the panel with people and at some point we always say the same thing. If anyone here is interested in uh

we're looking for interns we just started the podcast and you know we talked about all the lovely men and some women that have been our on our staff over the years and uh phil showed up he was the only one and he's still uh there today and i remember the day he came to the office i was i was in the little studio, and Fred was out in the outer area. And he met Phil first, and Fred came running in, and he's like, you, you, come on, quick, you got to come meet this guy. And that was our Philly.

He was just, you know, when I first saw him, I just thought so many things it's you know he was smart he was sweet he was this warm guy and i knew there was a lot to work with from a character standpoint yeah and the rest is history isn't it and he only for the first i don't know if he would tell you he'd know because he's got an amazing memory you should get him on here um phil the friday intern he only came in on fridays this is when we did the show again podcasters when we started because part of our thinking was maybe we'll get a radio show we did it every day for years yep in fact it wasn't until we went to sirius when we had when stern i'm not comparing ourselves as that but when Stern went to four days and we got hired at Sirius,

we said, can we do that too? Because we don't want to work Fridays anymore. And we want to start at seven, not six. Right. Right. So Phil, and Phil has another job, but Phil is still, whenever he can, he's on your show for the duration. Yeah, he's on like three days a week now.

Still on the payroll. Oh yeah. So much love to Phil Hong. And one more voice that is a regular voice that's heard on Humble and Fred is Dan Duran. Tell us how Dan Duran becomes a daily part of the program. Before we get to that, can I just, you didn't mention Pete Cugno. Oh, I did not. But tell us about the scary Pete.

Well, no, I'm just going to tell you about Pete Cugno. Like he was on some of the podcasts, the early ones we're talking about at Dan Durant's house and Proud FM, and Pete, you know, from a technical aspect, a creative and a performing aspect, I mean, he's been there for us all, up until recently. He's always been there through the podcast through the radio show and everything i'd i would i would not want him to hear this without acknowledging him very very

significant he was in the room for the first one yeah and yeah he was at dan duran's house no no i mean the first one that we're celebrating the 10th anniversary of along with mike it was pete cudio mike wickson boone probably uh david white maybe for the first one yeah probably he would have been there and there were a few redfish people hanging around uh i can't remember their names and we should also mention you know eileen well no i'm getting oh we're gonna do it by the way speaking before i forget because i've been thinking about this this morning when I couldn't sleep. Are we going to... Are they going to make an appearance?

Barker, Eileen? Why don't you just let it all unfold? All right, all right. All right, okay. It's like a... Fuck your pushing. Let it happen, and then afterwards, you can complain about what didn't happen.

No, I'm not going to complain. Let's do that. Now, can I give you guys some gifts for coming this way? Before we lose Fred here, I have in the freezer right now, I have a large meat lasagna for each of you. So this is from Palma Pasta. Anthony might have been there day one. Do you know he might have been there that first day, possibly?

Anthony Petrucci from Palma Pasta. I'm just trying to remember that day. It was such a long time ago. I don't know. Maybe he was there. He might have been there. So, the Godfather. That helps you with your sponsorship. No, no.

I think he might have been there. I wouldn't do it for the sponsorship. But Palma Pasta has a large meat lasagna for each of you, so you're going to bring that home with you. Fantastic. Howard, I know you don't drink. Congrats on that by the way. You're looking great. But Fred, you're a booze hound, right? We have some fresh... Fred's gay for beer.

I'm willing to try anything. Can I have Howard's? Yeah. I'll give you mine. I don't want it. I mean, I don't like to have it in the house. I'm kidding. I'm kidding. Beer, of course. So Great Lakes Brewery, that's where TMLX8 took place

when you dropped by, Howard. It's in your hood there. But they sent over some fresh craft beer for you guys. So you guys are going to bring that home with you. I put some on the table there. Thank you very much. StickerU.com has a Toronto Mike sticker for you. I know you guys will probably get a stick out of your car. I'll put that on my fridge.

So that's on top of the red box there. But here's a cool thing, exciting new thing for September. I will email you a digital gift card. It's $75 for each of you. So each of you gets 75 bucks to spend at chefdrop.ca. So it's honestly, you'll love it. You go to chefdrop.ca. There's wonderful restaurants and chefs that have pre-kit meals.

What's that called? Pre-prepared kit meals. And you select what you like. You got the 75 bucks to spend. That'll get you a great meal and it gets delivered to you and you're going to love it. Chef drop. Do you not have a funeral home too? Ridley Funeral Home.

Absolutely. Now I'm 65. Would they have a gift certificate I could have? You should. Honestly, they'll take care of you. They'll take care of you. You just mentioned Toronto Mike and Brad Jones. Give me a $5,000 gift certificate to the funeral home, please.

Fred's gay for cremation certificates. They're just down the street. Great guys. Yeah, Ridley Funeral Home. I just want to tell the listeners, because the listeners can save 20% right now at chefdrop.ca if they use the promo code FOTM20. So FOTM20.

That saves you 20%. Mike, that's very kind of you. Thank you. I'm taking care of you guys. Alright, let's talk producers because the original producer was not actually Eileen Ross, but it was a gentleman named Jason Kinder and I was always curious, how does Jason end up as the first podcast producer of

Humble and Fred? I can't even remember. I do. He was working I knew him from the mix again, I think. I can't remember what he was doing there. Might have been in copy or creative. Same thing. He heard we were doing it. He didn't have a job.

You know, for a long time, I used to joke on the show that our studio at our Redfish Studios was kind of like a drop-in. Sure. Remember, like, every day there would just be a bunch of guys that had nothing to do. And he showed up and was our producer for, I'd say, a couple of years. Sounds about right. So Jason Kinder, the first years there with Kelly Kutcher. After Jason came Eileen Ross, again, somebody that I had worked with.

She definitely was. She was a writer at Standard. And she was one of those people that I didn't really work with. But you know, you get a vibe from somebody in the hall. I always found her funny. Once in a while, she came on the show because she was friends with Judy Kroon, who I was working with. So again, once Kinder left, somehow she reached out.

Or I can't remember if I did, but that's how she became our producer. And Eileen, again, Eileen would be, yeah, a third voice in the room, if you will. She was heard on every program, and then she left. I mean, we covered this in a previous episode of Troubled Mike and Humphrey. We won't have to do it.

She left. She left. And Amanda Barker took over the role. For a good long time. And Amanda Barker took over the role. For a good long time. And Amanda Barker produced the show for years. And she was also a voice on the program. And people would recognize her from many an ad that I see on my television. There was one where she was a cow.

There's a cow with udders and someone sucking the udders. No, no, no, no, no, no. It's a car with udders on the bottom. Is that what it is? And it's all about, they milk you dry. Okay. On car service or something.

But she's in some pretty prominent ads and shout out to Amanda Barker. And then yours truly is. And when did you take over? 2019? So the last time you were on Toronto Mic was October 2019. And very shortly thereafter,

I became the producer. Is that when you and Fred fought? We had a chat afterwards. Some crosswords. But the funny thing is... You were baiting me all day long. I recorded everything. I recorded everything. We can check it out. Well, whatever it was, after the big fight

which I was being... I was so thrilled that I wasn't involved for a change. Was it really that big a deal? Oh, yeah, huge. Well, none of that, none of the fight is on the recording. I will say it was very uncomfortable for me as a viewer. Well, what do you remember? But nothing.

I do, and then you started in 2019. November 2019. I probably started in October, but I think officially November 1st, 2019. We got hit by a curveball in March 2020 called COVID-19. And that's when, well, Howard, you were still manning the ship, if you will, from your home studio here, Islington and Queensway. But Fred started zooming in from Brampton, or if he was at the trailer, it would be in the Kawarthas there. And I mean, you sound great, by the way. Like, we never really skipped a beat with Freddie. It's like he's in the room with you. And I mean, you sound great, by the way. Like, we never really skipped a beat with Freddie. It's like he's in the room with you.

And, I mean, you guys literally recorded today. You recorded Humble and Fred. Little side note. Yeah. To the quality of the sound, even. Although I have good internet service at the Tin Palace. You know, we've sort of gone through a series of microphones. Like, trying to get that right sound.

Ultimately, the microphone I've ended up using was one that I bought back in 2005. Just after I got fired, I was doing my blog, Canadian Thinker. Of course. Started doing some audio and bought that microphone for like a hundred bucks. Wasn't that funny? And all the microphones we've bought. And then one day I said to Howard, let me just try this one. He said, that sounds great.

That does. Interesting. Very interesting, Mike. That's why I brought it up. No, it is interesting. In fact, it's the kind of thing I wish you would tell it again because I don't like the fact that story's over. No, whether he's at the trailer or in his basement or not basement, in your office.

What it's taught us, and we had this conversation with Bill, because of the pandemic, you know, we had often thought, could Freddie go away for a couple months, and what would it be like doing the show remotely? And now because that's all we do, you know, that's our new normal. But what it's taught us is that because of our history together, with very few exceptions, we have no trouble doing it remotely. Another story about the, are you prepared for another story?

About the revolution. The revolution. How revolutionary the industry sort of became, was expedited by COVID. You know, we're at the Redfield, we're at 146 30th street. We're renting that space. We want to get out of there. And then we have the idea, geez, Howard wants to move back into the city. Why don't we look for a place that we could do the show from? And he could live like the first day, almost he sees this live workspace, which is perfect. Because as you've seen it,

it's like a storefront studio. No, it's perfect, but he has to sell flowers during the day after the recording. I don't mind that. No, but seriously. Yeah, absolutely. In this beautiful condo above it

that he lives in. But that was 2016. By 2020, we come to the realization we don't even need a studio anymore. Like now it's just an investment because honestly, the show will never be done from there every day again, the late,

but just in 2016, it was a studio that we needed every day that people came to. You came to work just like you did when you were in radio and bang, just like that. The whole industry changes because I'll tell you, I know a few people still in radio. Their next negotiation will be to continue working from home rather than having to travel to the studio every day. And a lot of people are going to be in that situation.

And if you're playing music, if you're playing, I don't even know what they play anymore, like nine or ten songs an hour, why do you have to be in the building where the music's being played and of course these companies the bean cow we spent millions on these studios get somebody's ass in here right so but back to the idea that fred can do it anywhere now and and so can i i mean next winter you know we've had conversations about you know we're getting a little old to be here all winter and without really much technical technical difficulty, I can go away.

He can be somewhere else. We can do the show. Depends on the time zone. The only interruption will be that maybe the podcast is produced a little bit later in the morning in Toronto. But again, so back to, there's no reason to retire. We're making enough money to make it interesting and to, in my case, delay having to use my retirement savings.

And thirdly, we have the ease of production now. Why would we stop it? It's a well-oiled machine and you control the means of distribution at this point. Yes, and that was the last thing about, we told Bill this morning, or this at lunch, about getting rid of the radio station, and you reminded me, I'd forgotten,

that our, he's, I call him the sales manager emeritus, but he didn't like the fact that we were going to that AM station. No. Okay, well, let's pick that up, okay? There's a couple of threads here we have to kind of tie up here. So one is that you're at Sirius XM for five years and they decide not to renew your contract again there's a Toronto Magda episode of Humble and Fred in which we dive into the the details there but needless to say is that you are no longer

going to be on Sirius XM but you right away uh end up as the morning show on Funny 820 in Hamilton so how like this is almost like another Bell Alliance or maybe a continuation of the first. I don't know. But how do you end up at funny 820? Because prior to Sirius not renewing our contract, because they didn't really fire us. We like to say we were fired.

No, they did not renew your contract. No, no. And they had a programming. Listen. Listen. We got to be fair to them. Although they were a bit silly when they terminated us because they wanted us off the air right away

because they were afraid we might say something bad about them. No, to be fair, they thought I was going to say something. Okay, whatever. Which was so, you know, as we said to them, we're not going to say anything. We have sponsors. I mean, we're looking after our own ass here. We're not going to say anything disparaging about you

because then it's established that if you ever hire Hummel and Fred and then you fire them they're going to say bad things about it just it was just so ridiculous the whole thing so but prior to that yeah excuse me somewhere in the winter time this guy Mike Neighbors who for years had been a contributor I'll say this I paid him to help me write the Humble Report. Every day he sent me this prep service, and it was just great. So we had a relationship with him, and he reached out to us. And so we had sort of already had a little bit of a connection with him that when the serious thing ended, and again at the time,

we all, and you were part of this discussion, I think at some point, we thought we needed a radio outlet to help our brand sell advertising. We thought, you know, podcasts is not enough legitimacy yet. But by the time we pulled the plug on the radio station this past winter, or mutual plugs um we just felt comfortable at that point that we no longer needed any outside association we could just be fiercely independent just ourselves without any outside intervention and then fred made the point like it was just getting in it was getting in the way of our show. And I made the point, and it wasn't bringing us any money.

Right. So why are we doing it? Right. So Phil has taken another job since. A secret job. We're not allowed to do this. Which is fine. You know, he's married and he needs more income.

But we were literally paying this guy full time to cut up a show to make it radio friendly with zero return. Right. And all we were getting, you know, an AM signal at a Hamilton. Honestly, you could put Howard Stern on that station and it would have trouble getting ratings. It just, it's the nature of the beast. So, so we're going to all this trouble and getting virtually, it's not even like we could build radio numbers to support the podcast. So it really was.

And we should explain why our sales manager friend at the time didn't want us to do it is because he knew that people would be able to examine the infinitesimal ratings on that radio station and go, well, Humble and Fred have no listeners on the radio. How can they have listeners on the podcast when the irony is... Right, right.

We had way more listeners to our podcast. Yes. You've got 10 times the listeners to this podcast, maybe not this one because people hate us, but you have 10 times the listeners to Toronto Mike than that radio station had. So at some point, I think it was in the spring. I forget when it was.

Maybe it was March. I can't remember. But we, I know we didn't, we fired radio because we decided to fire radio before they fired you, essentially. And then we put out a press release. We made a lot of noise. And you've been fiercely independent ever since. Can we get like honest here about sales here? So we've kind of talked about how you guys are kind of special in the fact that you're making

an adult living out of podcasting in Canada, and very few independent podcasters can make that claim. What kind of money, and you don't have to give me the exact number, but what kind of money are we talking about here? Like, how much scratch is Humble and Fred pulling down for this podcast? Well, as if we're going to answer

that question. You guys are going to quarrel. Here's what I would say. Here's what I would say. In the 10 years that we've been doing this, I'm going to tell you this. Okay, look at me for a second. Huh? No, I wouldn't.

Okay, I've just conferred. I don't tell you this. There's nothing to be gained by that. Like it's, you know, how much money do you make? How much do you make a month? See, this is where it's going to break down. You don't have to answer the question. I'm fine if you don't ask.

How much money do you make a month off the funeral home and the pause? He doesn't want to say it. Listen, let me put it this way then. I won't give you a number. I'll just say this. That each of us are making enough money that and I don't even I know you've got tons of money yourself Patterson Estates but it's and Boone has confirmed this with me again I've never shared the number with Boone but there's nobody

in Canada that is making the kind of money from this except for one guy. And that's Patreon doing that. That's fine. But I don't think there's any podcasters in Canada that are making any kind of money that we're making. And I bet you a lot of the kids that are being hired in Toronto

on the radio major market aren't making that money. But that's not saying a lot the way they're being taken advantage of now. And put it this way, I worked in Peterborough as a program director. You may have heard that before. A what? But get a load of this, though. Yeah.

I kept my home. My wife stayed in Brampton because she had a job. This was an experiment. Paid to go to school. I rented a place up there. Barely breaking even. Went through a lot of headaches. I'm making way more money now doing this than I was being paid for that.

And the final thing I'll say, and I've said it a thousand times. This is not the most money that these two guys made in radio. But I will tell you this. This is the funnest, best, most satisfying money, I will speak for myself, that I've ever made. I can't tell you how thrilled I am when I can send him a note or I call him up and say, hey, we just made another sale. Another sale.

Every time, I can tell you this too, that every time it happens, I get excited and I'm grateful and I can't wait to share it with him. And every year since our inception, every year, our bottom line has been better. Amazing. Like I just emailed Howard a few weeks ago and I said, hey, here's the state of the union. We've never been this healthy. And I will say one last thing. in the month of August that just passed last

month. Yep. In the 10 years we've been doing this is the most money we've ever made in one month. Wow. Well, congrats. Listen,

congrats. Uh, and again, and that's as far as we want to go with that. I mean, you want to touch on the money. I didn't think you were going to answer the question. No, no, I know. And, and, And again, and that's as far as we want to go with that. I mean, you want to touch on the money. Well, I didn't think you were going to answer the question. No, no, I know.

And again, I think it's valuable information because I know a lot of older radio guys have started up podcasts and the one mistake if they're going to make it is expecting too much too soon. Sure, yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. Because even though, you know, we had some help out of the gate and maybe they do too. It takes a while to get to this situation. You know, it's like anything else you got to build and build and it takes time and be patient and not give up. Well, you've inspired me. Like I'm only doing this right now because I was watching you guys do it 10 years ago. And you went, I have no experience, but I think I could do at least as good as those two idiots.

Those guys. Those bricks. Okay, we'll do this rapid fire. I just want to ask you both. Listen, I've got a couple more hours. No, I know, but he's got me all stressed out over here. No, no, no, no, no. Don't rush. I want you to listen. Don't rush. You've got a couple more hours. No, I know, but he's got me all stressed out over here. No, no, no, no, no. Don't rush.

I want you to listen. Don't rush. You know, I was half kidding when I said, are we going to go much more than an hour? Hey, Mike, sit back, relax. You said I got you all freaked out. I don't want to freak anybody out. Okay?

I'm not a freak out guy. Oh, no? No. Okay. So listen to this. But wait, before you go on, we're going to do a weissblot episode here we're going to three four hours i dare you to i dare you to i dare you speaking

of howard stern okay let me just play uh a couple of here's a clip and then we're going to talk about this guest hello everyone my name is frank sinatra Jr., and I'm on an errand of mercy to warn you. I am with Humble and Fred, and listen at your own risk. Look out for these two guys. They're trouble, especially you don't want to ride in a car with Fred. That is the kiss of death right there, so watch out for that. If he has to give you a ride, say no. The other guys, there is some reason to believe that the authorities are investigating them,

and they're being fitted for straitjackets. Whether or not it happens, we'll see how quickly they can run. That whole bit would have been better about halfway through if he'd have stopped. You know, we had him on at least, I don't know how long he was on and he had no idea for the entire time. He thought he was on the radio. Yep. I don't know if you were there that day,

but we realized after he left that he thought he was on some real radio station. And how do you think he felt? The car drives up to this warehouse. He walks into a warehouse. And he walks in. The part of town where shit's going down. Exactly. Past a woodworking shop and some cheap jewelry places and into this room.

That wasn't even in the good studio. That was in like our little shit office studio. With the fish that were never cleaned. That wasn't even in the big space where it looked professional. This was the fish that were never cleaned. That wasn't even the big space where it looked professional. This was in like a shitty little office with a couple of microphones on a table and oh

look, there's Frank Sinatra Jr. When I look back at those early days, that's one of the memorable appearances to me and also one of your few guests who has passed away. I was thinking, who's died? So Frank Sinatra Jr. passed away, but Don Burns is the other one I think about

because Don Burns came on your program and is no longer with us. There was a time when we were on the radio where we had quite a run of people dying. And we used to joke about the Humble and Fred death chair. But that was around the same time we had Frank Sinatra Jr.

Around the same time we had Frank Sondra Jr. Around the same time we had Oswald's Widow on. And you made her cry. And I made her cry for some reason. I can't remember why. Wish I could, but I can't. There was a few. I definitely remember that era. Oh yeah, here's another one I need to ask you about. Hi there, I'm Gian Gabeschi. Welcome to HumbleAndFred.com. Today's show features me, along with Dave Borns performing,

and how Kelly is becoming a swinger. Yeah. Eyes and half-roofs. By the way, thank you. Tune in. All right. That's my laugh at the end of that one. I distinctly remember that day because Gian was a pretty big deal at the time and he was coming over to chat

with you guys i thought that was really cool it's part of the reason i thought about starting my own podcast actually but i remember fred said something like that guy gives me the creeps or something before we even had him on yes yeah i was never on him. There's something about him I didn't like. Well, there was that time he came on to you. No, no. During your period of experimentation. And I don't know, because this happens to us all. One night, this was, we had had them on the Humble and Fred show several times.

Moxie Fruvis. On the edge, Moxie Fruvis. Of course. And I saw him one night at the nose, not the one on Yonge Street, the one down on... Leslieville. Leslieville.

Yeah. And I went up to him and I saw him and I said, hey, Jean, how are you? And then he acted like he didn't know me. And it just rubbed me the wrong way because I thought he's got to know who I am. Again, I'll back up and say it happens to all of us, but he just seemed very aloof.

And I thought, is this guy fucking me over? But even before that, I was just, there was something, I don't know. I wasn't big on. Now. Was I right? Yeah, you ended up being absolutely correct, Freddie P. Was I right?

So I mentioned Frank Sinatra Jr. and Don Burns, a couple of your guests who have passed away. But you remember you had the wing walker on? The lady who walked on the wings of an airplane for the air show? That was a hookup from Dave. I'm haunted by that one. Yes, Dave White. Yeah.

Because she was an air show performer. And then she died. And then Dave, yeah, she died shortly after. She fell off the wing. It turns out that's dangerous. But yeah, I was going to say, you'd think if you're a wing walker every day, you're like, well, I guess this could be it. So that's three guests that I know of that passed away,

been on your show. Well, Gomeshi isn't dead yet, is he? No. But the three are Frank Sinatra Jr., Don Burns, and the wing walker. But just in passing. Is it true that Peter, and I remember this happening in real time but Peter Cetera was a big fan of yours and wanted to get on the show? That was kind of cool

for us even though I wasn't like Chicago wasn't my favorite band but we were on Sirius and it was really the first time that we kind of had this I'm going to speak for myself again this idea that maybe we could be a little bit like those guys,

Opie and Anthony and Stern to a lower degree, obviously, and have people all over North America listen to us. And of all the things that happened around the Sirius XM years, for me personally, it was cool that we would open the phones and somebody would be on the line from California or Georgia. And the, excuse me these were people that had no prior history with us that liked our show simply because of face

value one of them was peter satara interesting who had turned on his satellite radio outside of chicago loved the show sent a note saying hey when i'm in toronto could you had no idea who we were didn't know that we were you know broadcast legends and uh i don't know for me that was kind of a i thought that was kind of a thrill i think the story was driving his kid to school or something like that and just was punching around serious because we were on the laugh we were on the laugh um platform right laugh usa yeah uh, all those raw dog comedy. And so he was up in that area of satellite radio and heard us. Fred, can you speak to a, was there a squirmish of some sort with Lee Aaron?

No. Squirmish? Not a squirmish, but a misunderstanding. No, no, it was just funny. You know, and again, I'm making no excuses. She was on and said she lived out west now, and I said, you know, do they know who you are out west? Because to me, Leigh Aron was a Toronto goddamn bar band.

Brampton, yeah. Seriously? Yeah, yeah. Well, the band was called Leigh Aron, and then her name's Karen, and she took on the name of the band when she had the Metal Queen stuff and everything. So she moved in, and I just honestly said, I said, oh, do they know who you are out west? And apparently that was a question I shouldn't have asked,

and it still comes back to haunt me the odd time through Humble Howard. Just thought I'd touch on that one. I don't know what you're saying. I was just giving you the shit that day. I could care less. I thought she was from Lee's Palace. I was just giving you the shit that day. I could care less.

I thought she was from Lee's Palace. There is a guest you had that I've been podcasting for almost 10 years myself, and I cannot find this guy, let alone get a no or a yes from him to come on, but he's a highly sought-after guest. He came on your show, and I just want to ask you how it came to be and if you heard from him since, but I'm thinking of Chris Shepard. So Chris Shepard came on your show. Yeah. i recently re-listened to the whole thing he's trying to put on that accent he has you know i know he puts a little affectation that you have any idea where chris shepherd is no you know that toronto song you play at the beginning of your show yeah that's special that

was specially done for for you yeah ill vibe and you know when the guy says toronto yeah it sounds like it sounds just like shepherd when he used to do um the chris live dare live dare often imitated never duplicated that was chris shepherd on our show was just him was just a favor through our history with howard but i don't think he's done anything since your show and that that was 2014 maybe? Like that means he's been for seven years now. He hasn't done anything public. The thing is Chris and I go back a long way. Chris and I were friends and I didn't even really fully understand what he was doing. I had two little kids and I was up at, I did a morning show and then I was long in bed before he did his act.

But we always sort of got along and we were friends and then when i got the contact and we pursued it he it just you know out of the camaraderie out of the history of cf and why he did that and then he realized i can't do any show ever again because this is like the top of the mountain he's like he hasn't been heard from, and I keep my ear to the ground. And it's not true. I did not make him cry. When Chris used to do

those shows from those clubs and you'd know better than I. Yeah, I used to listen, yeah. Well,

he'd often reference me and say I was in the crowd that night, right? Club 102. He'd say, oh, there's Freddie Patterson.

Oh, he's no shirt tonight. There's Freddie Patterson shirtless here at the club. And it was like, people would tell me. I said, no, I wasn't there. It was just a little funny little bit. Well, that's a, if anybody wants to find out what's going on with Shepard,

the most recent archive we have. I think I heard Costa Rica. I heard that too. And then somebody said something less exciting. Like, I don't know, like, like, like King City or something. Rachel told me this recently. A lot of people are moving to Costa Rica, much like the migration to this cool... What's that?

I never said it. Oh, no. I just thought you passed some wind there. At least he's outside. Okay. But a lot of people are, a lot of Canadians are wintering or thinking of retiring in Costa Rica. Good health care. A lot of expats.

I've never been there myself. Well, who would there be? There would be Pat Holliday, Pat Stapleton. What other expats? Yeah, that's good. Pat Sajak. Pat Sajak. Pat Summerall.

Pat Summerall. I guess it's time to wrap this shit up. Almost done here. There is a question from our mutual fan listeners. I said, I said. YYZ Gord. Holiday Patsy. Did you know bean counters talk like this too? Anyway.

YYZ Gord was actually, was at TMLX8, and he listens to your program daily. His name is YYZ Gord was actually, was at TMLX8 and he listens to your program daily. His name is YYZ Gord. Oh, okay. His handle. Sounds nice. I'd be interested in who each of their favorite guests have been over the years of podcasting, podcasting.

And the one attainable guest they haven't managed to get yet that they'd really like to get before they retire. Well, obviously for me, it's Bobby Orr. I would love to get Bobby Orr in the studio. Although now that he's a, I found out that he was a Trump supporter, it's taken some of the bloom or whatever,

but I still would like to have a conversation with him. As far as a guest that came in that made me feel really good or made me feel like, you know, we hadn't lost her. I don't even know how to describe this. I just remember the first time that the Barenaked Ladies came in to the podcast. Oh, the podcast. Not the Humble and Fred show. Did they all come?

Who came from the band? It was a good amount of them. They came in and they played. Yeah, but Stephen was gone by then. Stephen was gone. Yeah, yeah. So it was just Ed and a couple of them. And I remember as they were playing, this was in the big studio,

not the little shit one. I just remember thinking at the time, not that I was getting emotional, but it was a really nice moment for me and us, I think, that they remembered us fondly enough remember not everyone knew what a podcast was and in the early days there was not only did people not know of it there was sort of a weird like oh you're doing an internet show i just thought when they came in that gave us a some legitimacy beyond just hey we're doing this show that no one ever hears anymore. Is that what about you?

Next to Paul McCartney. He was on our show? No, I was saying, you were saying who would we like to have on? Oh, yeah. Obviously, Paul McCartney. But right now, I'm a little fixated on Will Arnett. Yes. obviously Paul McCartney,

but right now I'm a little fixated on Will Arnett. Yes. Because I find him very intriguing and I think he'd just be a great guest on our show. He's from Toronto, right around this area where we sit. He's very successful. He's very irreverent. He has the best, he's part of the best podcast in the world right now with Smartless.

He's always referencing Toronto. He's always making references to things that I can identify, we can identify with, including his taste in music. And I just think he would be a neat guest because he wouldn't, not only a high-profile guest, but a very relatable profile guest. And you mentioned this to me. I agree with you. And there is a universe that we believe, since you brought it up,

that while he was in Toronto, he probably had heard of us. Why wouldn't he have? Because he would have been listening to The Edge. He would have been a cool music guy. So if we could possibly get our names in front of him somehow. Well, I have actually personally tried tweeting at him, but you never know if a star does their own tweeting. No, exactly.

Some do, some don't. That's a tough one. It is a tough one. But I think there would be name recognition, because how do you grow up in this area and not know Humble and Fred? And he's of an age. He's only in his late 40s, so, you know, he's certainly in the pocket. Yeah, he's in your wheelhouse.

However, he did move to New York in the early 90s, but I'm sure he kept coming home and giving his musical taste, I'm sure, prior to Humble and Fred through the 80s. He knows of the radio station. I would say for sure he's heard of the station. But who was the guest that you liked that we've had on the show?

Well, I agree with the Barenaked Ladies. I really enjoyed having Peter Mansbridge on because it was interesting and he's smart and profile. And he's coming back too, apparently. Yes. Very soon. And another to me, personally,

I thought it was pretty cool the first time we had Bob McCowan on. You know, I worked with Bob when I was first getting into the business and then he became who he became, which was pretty large. And then he left the business and then he became who he became, which was pretty large. And then he left the business. And I think really we were probably the first show that he was on after he was let go by the fan.

Because I know he refused to do a lot of stuff. And I just thought sort of full circle that day. I enjoyed those moments. And I did too. I can tell you too though, I think about like having the Arkells on or having another band from

Peterborough, Three Days Grace. Sheep Dogs. Alex Lifeson. Alex Lifeson. I don't think people understand, you do Mike, but I don't think people remember how do Mike, but I don't think people remember how to use your analogy at the beginning of this, how many years ago,

10 years of podcasting is, it wasn't even something in the, I'll say that in the zeitgeist of our culture, it wasn't even a reference. I mean, you look at there's 700,000 of them on Apple Canada. Smartless, Mark Maron, Joe Rogan, all of this. When we started, there was no Maron, Rogan. There was Adam Carolla was number one, and we were like, wow. We could be the Adam Carolla of Canada. But we got all these people on our show because they had an affinity and a recognition

of us. And I always thought that was pretty cool. Back in the day, when we first started doing podcasts too, there was no like apps to go and make it easy. It wasn't easy to get a podcast. No, exactly. In the early days. Now it's just, you hit a couple of buttons and it's there.

I forget what, I'm not sure what the rest of that point is. There's almost like I always think there was a pre and a post serial era of podcasting. Yeah. The demarcation line there almost when the asses discover podcasts. And the thing is, I know what I was going to say. In the early days, you asked somebody to be in a podcast. It was that funny little thing that i've heard over here well now who doesn't listen to it who doesn't have their favorite podcast who doesn't pass time by listening to a podcast so now when you ask someone to be on the on your

podcast it's just part of the vernacular now it's it's it's it's where we're at and that's why i reference those guests and others i know there's a there's dozens of others that were way famous for us that did us a solid. When you get Alex Lifeson on your show, that was pretty cool for us when we had less than 100 episodes. A big one for me, too, was Lisa LaFlamme because I remember watching her do the news on kitcheners and thinking boy that woman's gonna go somewhere someday and just watching her evolve and how much

i enjoy watching her ctv national news and then one day she's on our show having a conversation it was great so 10 years of podcasting you're having a special on, uh, 7 PM on, uh, October 14th, live on your Facebook channel, Humble and Fred. People should follow on Facebook to get notified about that. It also will drop as an episode of Humble and Fred.

People should subscribe to Humble and Fred to get a real time notification. There'll be two episodes that day, by the way, there'll be the, uh, the original one, the original one in the morning, and then we'll,

we'll do the one in the evening. And I'll be, uh, at your studio there at Queensway in Islington for the 7 p.m. episode, and that will be the second time you two have recorded in the same physical space since COVID. It'll be the first time that Fred comes back to that studio since COVID. Wow, for recording, right. And then we're done now.

I'm just so proud of you guys for making it 10 years. And I know you guys can do another 10 years standing on your head, but I think that, well, actually I have enough, I have another hour on the cutting room floor, but the, no joke,

but I'm thinking of over the years I've been listening, not just as a producer, but I've been listening as a friend. And I'm thinking of like the lady friend era. And then I'm thinking of the Tinder fuck rampage era. And now there's this calm GFR era. There's golf. Go ahead.

Have you ever had that guy in your podcast? Who is it? It's Kareem. No, it's your neighbor. Shout out to Kareem. He does show up on Pandemic Fridays now. Absolutely. Go ahead.

No, but I was going to say, yeah, there is a lot of things have changed well for you but not it's not so much for no no i mean things in the show have changed and the people have changed but you know we got to 10 years uh for a couple of reasons one was obviously you know we had some brand equity in the market and the other was and i'll give fred this compliment like we have a i think both of us have a pretty good work ethic. We're pretty conservative that way. And I don't mean politically. We just were sort of brought up that,

you know, you do your job the best you can. You show up every day prepared to do something. And I think that more than as, you know, I think we're pretty talented. I'm not going to lie. I think we're pretty funny.

And then we do a good job, but I i think and maybe you would agree or not but i think the fact that both of us are very we're just we we do our job every day the best we can like we're very um regimented that way and i think of all the things we've talked about, one of the things that has been contributing, that contributed to our success was that, that we just had this work ethic built into us. And we've been, and we've been fiscally responsible where, you know, you could get sucked into this thing. It happens to a lot of people. you spend what you make. We never really did this. We always put money behind us and we always keep on reserve money so that if we do hit a downturn, you never know what's around the corner economically, what could happen, that we can survive. That's enough to keep you going while you build it back up, so to speak, or find more

sponsors. And I know a lot of guys in our situation would have made a big mistake by spending everything they make because it's very tempting. Believe me. Well, and early on, that was what we used to say to one another that, okay, we just got a new sponsor. We can keep this thing going for another couple of months. And now we're in a position where, you know, again, it's not a tremendous amount of money, but we have some comfort knowing that, you know, if everyone,

if everyone stopped sponsoring us tomorrow, we could actually continue this for quite some time. And would you? Yeah, probably. Sure. Yeah. Yeah. What else are we going to do?

I can't golf every day. Seriously. are we going to do? I can't golf every day. Seriously. I'd like to, but I can't. The thought of getting up in the morning with nothing to do seven days a week scares the shit out of me. It really does. Thanks for doing this, guys. It's good to see you in person.

I've seen you on Zoom, but this is nice to see you. That's nice. You look great, by the way. Remember back when this started, you were chubby. We were both. You and I were probably both. I was 30 pounds heavier than I am now. And before we leave, we really got to take the opportunity, honestly, to thank you.

Because you, honestly, Mike, from the very beginning, you have been a supporter. You've helped us out technically. Now, producing-wise. Listen, it didn't matter when I called you for whatever. Howard's the same way. You answered the phone. You delivered the goods. You've been a great supporter.

You've been a great producer. So don't think... You know, we've had some arguments along the way. But don't think for a minute that we don't appreciate the Greg McAboon. And I would say that, echo those comments. And that's all I have to say. We thank you, Mike.

Because we, honestly, the last, since you took over as the actual official producer, seems so natural because you've sort of been behind the scenes helping to produce the show for as long as we've been doing it.

And for that, we're internally grateful. I'm sorry I said you used to be chubby. Hey, do you think that funeral home would let Howard witness an embalming? Yeah. Because he's into that kind of shit. And do you think your wife will ever forgive me for the horrible things I said at your wedding? I'll get her out of here before you go.

She doesn't like me. Don't do that to her. She may want to come out and see me, not him. Not me. My God. You should have seen the eyes she gave me

at the get-together at Great Lakes. Wow, you destroyed her wedding. I know. I'm a terrible memory for her. Oh, well.

And that... That brings us to the end of our 920th show. Do you want me to speak like a bean counter again? You can follow me. I'm on Twitter.

Pat Tabler. Right. I got more. Oh, there's more. Pat Matheny. Uh-huh. Yeah, yeah. Pat Oswald.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Pat Quinn. You did Pat Quinn. No, I did Pat Burns. Pat Burns. Pat Burns. Yeah. You can follow me on Twitter.

I'm at Toronto Mike. Now, Humble and Fred are at Humble Fred Radio. Howard is at HumHow. Fred quit Twitter. You just quit, right? Fred's off everything. I quit social media. Fred quit it.

He's gone. He's gone. Our friends at Great Lakes Brewery, they're at Great Lakes Beer. Chef Drop, they're at Get Chef Drop. Again, FOTM20 saves you 20% right now. McKay's CEO Forums, they're at McKay's CEO Forums. you 20% right now. McKay CEO forums. They're at McKay CEO forums. They have a great new podcast called the CEO edge.

Subscribe and listen. Palma pasta. They're at Palma pasta. Make sure I get your lasagna before you go. Sticker you is that sticker you Ridley funeral home is that Ridley FH and Mike Majeski of Remax specialists, Majeski group. They're at Majeski group homesax Specialists Majeski Group. They're at Majeski Group Homes on Instagram.

Follow them. There's some fantastic stories he puts out when he puts out a new listing. See you all next week. Maybe I'm not and maybe I am But who gives a damn because This podcast has been produced by TMDS and accelerated by Roam Phone. Roam Phone brings you the most reliable virtual phone service to run your business

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