Toronto Mike'd: The Official Toronto Mike Podcast - Noel Casler: Toronto Mike'd #884

Episode Date: July 13, 2021

Mike chats with standup comic Noel Casler about The Tragically Hip and his years working with celebrities like Prince, Neil Young, Madonna, Michael Jackson, Aretha Franklin, Bruce Springsteen, Bono, and the 45th President of the United States of America Donald Trump.

Welcome to episode 884 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. Order online for free local home delivery and the GTA. Order online for free local home delivery and the GTA. McKay CEO Forums. The highest impact and least time intensive peer group for over 1,200 CEOs, executives, and business owners around the world. StickerU.com. Create custom stickers, labels, tattoos, and decals for your home and your business.

Palma Pasta. Enjoy the taste of fresh homemade Italian pasta and entrees from Palma Pasta in Mississauga and Oakville. Ridley Funeral Home. Pillars of the community since 1921. And Mike Majeski. He's the real estate agent who's ripping up the Mimico real estate scene. Learn more at realestatelove.ca. I'm Mike from torontomike.com and joining me this week is Noel Kassler. Welcome, Noel. Hey, Mike. Glad to be here, man. Thanks for having me. Hey, it's a pleasure. As we discussed just before I pressed the big red

record button here, you and I have been corresponding via email for, I think it's been about nine months now. Yeah, it's been a long time. It definitely around the election, I started coming on to Humble and Fred and speaking with you. And it's great to, you know, talk to my friends up in Toronto. I'm a big fan of all things Canadian. All right, let's start there. Yeah, again, so much love to Humble and Fred. I'm the producer of the Humble and Fred show. And I book you as often as they'll let me in there. So that's pretty much been monthly, because I think your perspective and you're just you're just great on the mic and you're entertaining and you're full of interesting nuggets of info. And then after nine months

of kind of hearing you on Humble and Fred, I'm like, I think the guys will let me have Noel Kassler on my show and be cool with it. So thanks for saying yes to me as well. Right on, man. Thanks for asking. I'm happy to be here. Canada. So let's start because of course, this is Toronto Mic'd and we look at everything from a Toronto perspective here. A little birdie told me, tell me if there's any truth to this, but a little birdie told me that you were a fan of the Tragically Hip. Could that be possible? Oh, man. God, do I love the Tragically Hip. I forgot to put the guitar here. I have a Hoffner, a 53 Hoffner that I like to think belonged to Gord Downie. I think it was one of his backup guitars because on his solo records, he played this exact guitar.

And I bought this at Kingston Guitars in Ontario before we lost Gord. But I just like to think that somebody brought it into that shop, you know, a crew guy or somebody. And they did the neck reset. And I got it on a Jackson Brown tour. I'd been touring like hockey arenas with Jackson Brown. So we played a lot of venues that the hit played. And I mean, you couldn't get a better band. It's amazing. Just amazing.

They're much more than a band, in my opinion. Well, dude, I'm getting literally getting goosebumps right now because for the record, because we haven't even introduced you at all here, except you are American, right? Born and raised. You a bonafide American. Yeah, I am. I'm as American as a guest. Whether that's a good thing or a bad thing, I'm an American, yeah. Well, it fills me with pride when I hear an American like yourself praising the Tragically Hip.

Because we here, as you know, we here in Canada adore the Tragically Hip. I've seen them over a dozen times in concert. And I just had Kevin Hearn on, who's actually the keyboardist for the Barenaked Ladies. This is last week. And he was playing on The Secret Path, which was the final project that Gord Downie worked on. And he also did play on Coke Machine Glow. And anyway, so there's been a lot of gourd talk here lately i'm looking you can't see it but to my left i've got a it's a chenny wenjack print and that was the the gourd downy uh that's part of the secret path but so it's exciting to me so how did you get introduced to the tragically hip you know i went to drama school in new york city in the in

the mid 90s in the early 90s and a And a lot of Canadians came down from Toronto, actually, to study acting in New York City. And one of them turned me on because the hip never really caught on in America. They could have been one of the biggest bands in the world. They were on par with U2 and Pearl Jam and all these other bands. You know, for one reason or another,

they never really took here, which is our loss, not theirs. But so I heard, you know, I think when Bob Cajun came out, I think that's Phantom Power record in the 90s. Yes. Yeah. When that came out, I saw a video because for a brief time we would get much music down in New York market. And I saw the video and went to school next day. I was like, I heard the best band yesterday that I've never heard of. I think they're from Canada. They're called the Tragically Hip. And of course, my buddy freaked out. And being a good Canadian, he sent me their entire catalog as a gift the next day. You know, I had like 12 CDs in my mailbox. And I just dove in and never stopped. And, you know, I didn't get to see them because they didn't tour here a lot. They played Woodstock 99 where I was working. And, you know, the whole reason I took that gig was to see their performance. And I ended up missing it because I don't know if you heard, but that festival was a nightmare and all kinds of bad things went down. So I missed their set, but I never lost the love for them. And when Gord passed,

one of the most beautiful things I'd ever seen, and it's now my Christmas tradition as I watch Long Time Running, the brilliant documentary about them, because one of the things that I've always responded to in life is a public show of sort of gratitude or affection. You know, the best thing art can do is bring us together and show us our common humanity. And when they played their last concert, and I'm going to cry now just thinking about it. Me too, man. You know what I mean?

When everybody in Canada took the day off, you know, and went outside and sang these songs that meant so much to them, you know, from the big cities all the way up into the Northern territories, you know, small towns were making an event out of it. And everybody came together in spirit and joy. And it's one of the most, that's the height of human achievement. You know, it doesn't get better while you're alive than something like that. And what a gift to give, you know, for the man who'd given so much to his own country, you know, to stay alive, essentially, to make that sacrifice to be able to do that final tour and,

and do that. I mean, talk about a way to go out, you know, it's just mind blowing. And also just I worked in the music business for 25 years, I know how hard it is for a band to stay together that long, that in and of itself is a miracle, you know, that they stayed sort of brothers in arms the entire time, kept the same crew, essentially. That's what I love about arts, when they're organic and generic, and the crew is a family, you know, and you can exist without the whims of popular culture. You know, the hip was going to sell out a show no matter what. If they had a radio hit or not, people were going to show up to see them because it was an event. It was organic and real. It wasn't something that someone's telling you to go see, you know? So well said,

August 20, 2016, that was the final show in Kingston, Ontario. And the whole country did shut down. And I openly wept, you know, when Gord was up there singing. I think it was Grace 2. There's a moment in Grace 2 where he's just kind of this guttural yell. And you see this man. And I was just bawling with my daughter watching that final show. And even now talking to you, I've got to be careful here because I could break down any moment here. But wow, that band meant so much to this country.

And I'm so happy to hear this band meant something to an American like yourself. Thanks, man. Yeah. And I know that moment you're speaking, it'll make me, I'm getting goosebumps now. You know why? Because it's the truth. You know, the greatest art always reminds us of something real. That's what you're responding to is that you sent something in yourself, you know, and it's reflected back to you. And that, that means everything. I'll tell you a story real quick. When I started in the business in 93, and my main career for your listeners is I worked behind the scenes and talent management and live television, you know, so I worked on the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductions and the Grammys and the VMAs and Super Bowl

halftime show I did for almost 15 years, all this kind of stuff, you know, and the firstmys and the VMAs and Super Bowl halftime show I did for almost 15 years, all this kind of stuff, you know. And the first gig I ever had, I was a PA on a show called the Kennedy Center Honors, which is our national arts medals where the president gives, you know, a lifetime achievement award essentially to great artists. And I'm working on this show and they say, here, hold this French horn and go stand out there on the stage. And I'm like, what? You know, like we're in rehearsal. They're like, we're doing camera blocking. Take this horn and go stand out there. So I grab this horn and I stand on this riser, not really knowing why I'm there.

And all of a sudden, Billy Preston comes out from the left, the great keyboard, you know, B3 player with the Beatles. And then Aretha Franklin comes out. Right. Right. And then the Washington Gospel Choir fills in next to me. And I'm like, oh, you know, like something's about to go down. And she sings this gospel song. And it's amazing. Right. But it ends and the producer goes, hey, you know what? That was good. But I think you should try it like this other way. And I could see Aretha kind of bristle. Like people don't usually tell like Aretha essentially once more with feeling, right? But this guy does. And I'm like, oh shit, it's on now, you know? So they places, everybody goes

back off stage. She comes back out and it's as if she's reaching up into the heavens and grabbing thunderbolts and just throwing them down on people because now she's mad and she's really going to show you what she can do. And at the end of that performance, cameramen are crying. You know, these hardened grips are all crying like everybody was moved to tears. And I was like, wow, you know, like that's amazing. I get to see that kind of stuff in this gig, you know, because I knew at night, like for the TV show, it wouldn't be exactly what I just saw. You know, I knew I had sort of had a window into a world that most don't get to see. And it fascinated me because in the greats at certain times, you'll see things like that. Like you just said in Gord Downie, you know, he was calling on a

strength that most of us don't have in that moment, you know, because he perfected his craft in a way that he knew how to channel the real stuff when he wanted to, you know, and mostly did all the time, as many of the greats do. But Aretha gave a, you know, a master class in that in this moment. And I was just like, I'm hooked. Like, I want this gig. If I can get a paycheck and watch stuff like that. And it also broadened my horizons musically because you realize it's all good. You know, music, like no matter what culture, like you open with a great hip hop sound, it's like, it's all good, dude. If somebody's dancing to it, it means something, you know, in any culture, any language, like people don't show up and dance to bad stuff. You know, it's like food is people are like, I don't like that kind of food. Any kind

of food is good. I've traveled the world, right? If people are eating it, it probably tastes good. Even if it seems foreign to you, there's a reason they're buying it and cooking it, you know? Right. And I'm sure in your travels here, and we're going to get into this in a moment, but in your travels, you've seen the good, the bad and the ugly, so to speak. And that moment there of Aretha, that's more sublime than good, I'd say. But that's next level. But you get to witness some of these magical moments. Absolutely. You know, and shortly after that, you know, say like in 2000, like 10 years in or something

almost, I got to work with Bruce Springsteen. And I love, you know, listen to Springsteen my whole life, you know, sort of grew up in the New York area, like Springsteen and Billy Joel, like told you'd love, you know, listen to Springsteen my whole life, you know, sort of grew up in the New York area, like Springsteen and Billy Joel, like, told you your history, you know, and that's kind of like what the hip did, you know, they sort of meant so much to Canada, because they would write about, you know, Gord would write about these historical things that most a lot of Canadians perhaps didn't even know, you know, a lot of people like in my generation, learn about history and culture through the artists, you know. And so Bruce was like that for me. He sort of explained my time to me as I was coming of age.

And I worked on a Springsteen tour and the final 10 shows were at Madison Square Garden, you know, the iconic, iconic Madison Square Garden. And it was the end of the reunion tour. So we had the E Street Band back together and Jonathan Demme was making a film out of it, you know, who made a film with Neil Young, another Canadian. And I worked for Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young, too. So we can get into that later. But yeah, for sure. I'll tell you about Neil Young's ranch. But anyway, so I'm working with Springsteen and it's 10 shows. And every night during the show, there would come a point because he'd be giving so much on stage that I would say to myself like, Oh, he's retiring tomorrow.

Like he's going to come backstage after the show and be like, Hey guys, hate to break it to you, but I have to quit. You know, like I have some kind of medical condition. That was my last gig. Right. And every night I would get this feeling and then he'd show up and do it again the next night. And I was like, how does he do that? You know, how does he trick me in a way every night? And I'm behind the scenes, so to speak. You know, I'm behind the curtain.

I know how much of a show it is and what parts are rehearsed and how much he says the same thing every time. But he was so good at being in the moment, you know, and that's what the greats do. They give you all of themselves. They're present. They're not thinking about their laundry list or what they're going to eat for dinner. You know, they're, they're giving you everything they have. And when you, when you do that in front of an audience that responds, it, it, it creates something bigger than the band and something bigger than the audience, you know, and, and that's the best of stuff.

It's interesting to hear you talk about the boss there, Bruce Springsteen, because often when you're trying to explain Gord Downie to an American who's unfamiliar with the Tragically Hip, you might say he's kind of a cross between, like, if you took a Bruce Springsteen and a Michael Stipe from REM and you sort of mash them up, you sort of, that sort of gets you close to a Gord Downie, possibly. Yeah, I think that's a very apt description i mean and and gourd was a complete intellectual and a poet in a way that most weren't you know let's face it like he had a different level of sort of like intellectual poetry that just mind-blowing you know and those guys are great writers too i'm not taking you know bruce is like shakespeare in my

opinion you know but he had his own voice is what i'm trying to say but yeah in terms of the mold that you would put him in exactly it was alternative you know but he also had that moral conscious you know a bono and and also a great front man i mean like yeah obviously i mean but so it's just sometimes those elements come together in a certain artist you know and they find the right band of brothers that can support them in that. And it just grows. You know, it doesn't happen often. But when it does, boy, you know, it's for the ages. Yeah. Not too bad that these high school buddies from Kingston, Ontario, just sort of just sort of worked well together. And then the rest is history.

Just great. It's almost like, I don't want to compare him to those mop tops from Liverpool. It's exactly what I was thinking, man. And I got to tour. I was in Liverpool with Jackson Brown on a Jackson Brown tour. And he calls me up in my hotel room one night and he goes, hey, tomorrow, wake up at 9am, call this guy. I'm going to give you his phone number and bring the band down to this address. And I wake up in the morning, I this guy, I'm going to give you his phone number and bring the band down to this address, you know, and I wake up in the morning, I call the guy, he's like, yep, meet me at such and such in Mendips, you know, 10am or whatever. And it's John Lennon's boyhood home. And they give us a private tour, right? So the guy like brings us in the house that John Lennon grew up in with his aunt and uncle, you know, in Liverpool. And he shows us like Lennon's bedroom. And then he shows us this little hall, like a foyer by the front door,

where John and Paul first sang harmonies together, you know, at 14. And I later worked, you know, with CSN and Graham Nash was friends with these guys. He met him at 16 down in Manchester. So, okay. So before we get too far away from this because if so i mentioned there's a my gourd print to my left but upstairs hanging in my hallway is a print of uh neil young i'm a huge fan great canadian uh please tell me about your neil young uh experiences okay well i got a few you know i was i'm ready i got the time if you do buddy i was steven still i'm the reason crosby stills and mash broke up basically we're not gonna get into that now but i was on the last tour where it all went down and i'm basically sitting eating lunch and neil young calls david crosby and is like it's over

dude you know like we're done because crosby shot his mouth off about neil leaving his wife who i knew and toured with Peggy Young. Crosby said some stuff he shouldn't have said on a radio show. That was it. We'd been trying to put together one more CSNY tour, Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young. What year is this? Are we talking about here? 2015. Okay. Wow. Okay. No, 2014 is when Neil called up and said, it's done. The last CSN tour was 2015. It just, the wheels came off because a lot of reasons that involved friendships breaking up kind of, and people breaking up in long-term relationships.

And it was just ugly for lack of a better term, you know, but, and, and, and Neil, you know, obviously Neil was their guitar player and then became an equal member in the band. And, you know, but and and and Neil, you know, obviously Neil was their guitar player and then became an equal member in the band. And, you know, I toured a lot of that time with Stephen Stills, like Stephen Stills and I shared a tour bus. Stephen and Neil obviously formed Buffalo Springfield together and had the same manager, the great Elliot Roberts, who founded Geffen Records with David Geffen, you know, and Elliot Roberts management. So they had the same manager. So like sometimes it's funny, I'm playing a club in September called the Rams Head in Annapolis, Maryland as a comedian. And the last time I was there was with

Steven Stills on a solo tour. And Steven happened to be mad at Neil on this particular tour because Neil ended the Buffalo Springfield reunion earlier than anybody wanted, you know? So Stills was chagrined to say the least, you know, and he would go on stage and like kind of bad mouth Neil a little bit. And I remember walking out of a club, that club, and my cell phone rang and it was Elliot. He goes, no, I got Neil on the other line. Give the phone to Steven. And Neil gave him a talking to, but Neil's a cool guy. I mean, obviously. And I got to go to the CSNY, got together for the bridge school benefit, probably in like 13, I want to say. And it was great. We spent a week together in LA and I got

to stay in the same hotel room, you know, not same hotel room. That would be kind of weird. LA and I got to stay in the same hotel room, you know, not same hotel room. That would be kind of weird. The same hotel, right? With Kross and with Neil Young, the sportsman, which was a rock and roll hotel that no longer exists. But we rehearsed in like Burbank or something for a week. And I ran the teleprompter for the band too, right? Most people, most big bands will use a teleprompter. There's no shame in it. When you have that many songs, you kind of owe it to your audience to be able to look down. And if you lose your place, you know, when you're 70, it gets a little harder to remember stuff, you know, so no shame in that. But I always ran that teleprompter for CSN. And when Neil came in the fold, they said, No, you got to run it for Neil too. And I walked into this rehearsal the first day and his guy goes, here's

4,000 songs, load them into your computer. And I go, okay, which ones is he going to play? And the guy looks at me, goes, he could call any one of those at any time. And I almost had a heart attack, and I'm 10 feet from where Neil's playing. He's got, what's his name's old Martin, the great Hank Williams is old Martin, D45. And I'm just like, please, God, please don't call something obscure. You know, I'd kind of like found in that database where the likely suspects were, you know, long may you run kind of. And luckily, that's all they did was the greatest hits. But I remember being terrified because Neil doesn't suffer fools lightly, as I'm sure you know. Neil is all about the art and the vibe. And if anything gets in the way of it, he'll let you know very quickly. Wow. Oh, my God. I love this, Noel. This is fantastic. Now, I'm just going to shout out a couple of people. We call them FOTM, so Friends of Toronto, Mike. By the way, you are now, I think you've served enough time. You are now officially an FOTM yourself, Noel.

So welcome to the club here. Brian Dunn says, love following Noel Kassler on Twitter. Looking forward to this. So shout out to Brian. You're a great Twitter follower, though. And I'm going to say it off the top, and I'll say it again at the end. But it's at Kassler Noel. So at C-A-S-L-E-R-N-O-E-L to follow Noel Casler on Twitter.

He's a great follow. Steve Leggett says, you have to ask Noel Casler about stuttering John. And then Steve says, was John as annoying to work with as it seems? Can you share with us, how did you work with Stuttering John? And is there a story there? That's funny. This guy's getting great Neil Young stories and he wants

to hear about Stuttering John. And I was about to tell you about going to Broken Arrow Ranch. Okay. Do the Stuttering John and I'm taking you right back to Neil. There's just good real estate here. Not everybody gets to go to Broken Arrow, you know? So Stuttering John, I was the co-host of his show last May, not this past one, but like May of the election year, May of 20, when the pandemic started, I was on as a guest and his producer asked me to come back every week and co-host. And I was helping him kind of like with the political guests. And, you know, we were getting a lot of political guests and stuff. And I just kind of ran its course for me. It was two hours, twice a week, man. That's a lot of time. He was doing it live on YouTube. So we're still

friends and stuff. I just, I have a writing project I've been working on for a year. So I just had to leave and, and go work on my book. And now I have my own podcast. So. Yeah. What's the, what's the book about that you're working on? Can you share? It's a memoir. A lot of these kinds of stories, like I'm telling, you know, mixed in with stories from my life. Cause I had a crazy childhood and all that kind of stuff too. So it's, you know, it's sort of a memoir, you know? And now you can tell me, please, I beg of you the Neil Young ranch story. Okay. So the ranch, you know, the legendary, you know, where he, where he recorded, you know, after the gold rush and stuff and where they would rehearse for the

74 tour in his barn and where Graham Nash heard the first pressing of harvest. And he goes up there and this is Graham's story to tell. He tells it all the time. I doubt he'll mind if I share it, but I loved it when he would tell me this story. So he goes up there and Neil wants to play him like the master, the first mastering of harvest, right? So he gets to the ranch and Neil's like, okay, get in the boat. We're going to go out in the pond, right? And Graham's like, what? He's like, get in the boat. We're going to listen on the pond, right? So we get in a boat or they get in a boat and he he rose out into the pond and the side one finishes right and that the the neil had set up speakers in the house and the barn you know like

big pa speakers that were blasting the music so side one finishes the engineer comes out and he goes neil how does it sound and neil goes more barn get get it more barn, like left and right, you know, more barn. So it's like the more barn story. So when I finally get to go there, I'm like, I got to see this stuff. And I end up in his dining room with Graham and we look out the window and I see the pond and I'm like, Graham, is that the pond? He's like, yup, that's the pond. But his house is like, you know, I drove there with Stills and it's sort of like he had this big ranch. He might have, you know, it may be like not no longer because he's kind of has is at a different point in his life now. But this is the ranch he had with Peggy Young and stuff. And he would you drive for like 40 minutes on his property before you even got anywhere, like on this little like road,

you know, on the side of the Redwood mountains. And so I'm driving and then we get to like this field and there's like a guy standing there with a clipboard, you know, and I roll down the window and I'm like, Hey, I'm Noel this I'm here with Steven Stills. We're here for the party. And the guy like checks our name off a list and he's like, okay, go park down there, you know? And we go down and park and I look and it was as if the hedge fund, you know, it was like if the Hobbit had a hedge fund, you know? It was like, the house was like, it looked like a tree house.

You know what I mean? Just like a really cool wooden, awesome house. And he had this barbecue. And I remember like going down to the basement and like running into like Tom Waits, you know? And like, yeah, like Ann Wilson came out of the bathroom. Like it was just so, so surreal was the best way to put it. You know, you're just like, I can't believe I'm at a party at Neil Young's house.

And I'd been to some cool places before that, but that's as rarefied as it gets in the business. You know, I always wonder, like, do you ever get jaded or like just get sort of numb to celebrity because that, you know, yeah, there's, there's, uh, Ann Wilson just strolling by, like, does it ever just become commonplace for you because you've been around them? Yeah, it does, but not in places like that. You know, I worked on the Grammy, so I would, I worked with Michael Jackson. I was his escort. I worked with you too. You know, I worked with all the boy bands, all the hip hop. So Madonna, you do get jaded in the business side of it, you know, but when you get in these special circumstances that, you know, you do get jaded in the business side of it, you know, but when you get in these special circumstances that you know, you know, that not many people get to see that's where you know,

I did a Barack Obama's inaugurations on the mall and stuff. That's where it all becomes worth it. You know, like, I have some crazy stories from doing that. And that is as jaded as you get, you better still have, you know, a passion and a reverence for the music and the art and for how lucky you are to be there. You know? Yeah. I was going to ask, like, you keep saying you work in these gigs, like Grammys, Kennedy Center Honors, the inauguration, these massive events. But like, what exactly would you feel like it's seen from the from office space? What would you say you do around here, Noel?

Like, what is it exactly you do? Well, it was very specific what I did. I worked in talent logistics. So I was like one of those guys who's running around with a headset, making sure the talent gets on stage. When you watch a big live show like the Tonys, which I did for 20 years, you got 200 performers in the course of a two-hour live event. So behind the scenes, such and such is up in her dressing room, you know, and such and such is sitting in the audience, but now he's going to be giving out an award and three commercial breaks and stuff. So there's a team that coordinates all that stuff behind the scenes and then delivers the talent to the DGA stage managers. They can't

really leave the side of the stage, you know. So I basically worked in what's called the talent department, which handles all the performers from the time they get dropped off, really from the time they get picked up in the hotel to the dressing room and all their needs and dealing with their management. So it's a very intimate kind of thing and it's a very specialized skill. So once you get into that world, you keep getting hired because you're not going to bring in somebody who doesn't know what they're doing to handle Madonna, you know, at the Superbowl or something, because it's, it's the kind of thing you can really only learn on the job, you know, cause there's a lot, there's a lot of like keeping your mouth shut,

you know, and, and smiling, you know, and pretending like everything is going great. No, we're just, we're just running a little behind, but I'm gonna get you to stage now. We got time to put on a little more makeup before you go on kind of thing. And that's a very specific skill and it's a very small industry. So I got in with that young and I stayed in it

until I left it for obvious reasons when I started working after the Trump years. Well, I was gonna say, we're gonna get back to that point you just made about keeping your mouth shut. We're going to get back to that. But I'll just make a quick point about Stephen Stills before we get too distant from that. Stephen Stills, that guy worked with a couple of my heroes. He got to record, of course, with Neil Young many, many times. That's one. But he also got to record with public enemy because yeah so he's doing the uh he's doing there's something happening here riff uh sample not really a sample i guess if you're

doing it re-recording it but he's doing that part on the you got game there by uh from public enemy which is pretty cool so yeah and that's neil i think the harmonic was actually neil that ding that harmonic ding ding i think that was actually neil think the harmonic was actually Neil. That ding, that harmonic ding, ding. I think that was actually Neil originally because that was a Buffalo Springfield, too. Right. That was a Buffalo Springfield. Yes, absolutely. For what it's worth, that's the song. For what it's worth. And I woke up, Stephen, once. We were in Italy and the riots were happening in the United States, in Missouri.

You know, another young black man had been killed by the cops. And there was all these days of unrest in St. Louis. And I saw it on my TV, you know, my hotel room in Italy, and I went to wake Steven up. And I'm like, dude, you got to wake up, you got to write a protest song, you know, and he goes, I already wrote it. It's called something's happening. He was like, half asleep. It was pretty funny. Great song. And if you're ever watching, it's almost like now when you're watching like a Vietnam movie or whatever, you're going to hear For What It's Worth by Buffalo Springfield. Like you're going to hear it. Oh, yeah. Defining song, you know, defining song of the era.

And that whole band wrote so many kind of chestnuts that defined an era. And it was it was wonderful like touring with them because, you know because people hear that stuff and it all comes back to them. But Crosby's got quite the reputation for being a little crusty, a little bit of a cranky pants. But what I think you would be good at to keep the job you had for so many years is adapting. You must be very malleable to adapt to all different types of celebrity because I'm sure you get the down-to-earth, humble you know, just a solid citizen and easy to work with. And then I'm sure you get what we might call like a diva or prima donna, no pun intended, but you must have to adapt on an instant to these different personality types.

Absolutely. And that was my forte. I mean, I was basically the guy who took care of divas and live television. You know, if you were hosting the Tony Awards or you were Madonna at the VMAs, I was generally the guy who got that assignment because I was good at handling that. I understood the first, you know, and on the Kennedy Center Honors, I took care of Kathleen Battle on that same first show. You may not know who she was. She was an opera singer in the United States who was particularly known for being a huge diva. And I was able to completely calm her down to the point that she wrapped her arm in mine and we walked into the after party together where Bill Clinton was dancing. And the talent executives noticed and they're like, that kid's a star in this business.

Hire him. Yeah. And that's why you kept working, which is amazing. A few big names you dropped here. I have to pick them up and ask you a bit about them. But before I ask you about the names you dropped, there's a name you didn't drop and I'm curious, did you ever work with Prince?

Oh, yeah. I did the Super Bowl with Prince. I did a lot of shows with Prince, but I did the famous, crazy Purple Rain Super Bowl. Which is, in my humble opinion, having seen all the big name ones anyways, I didn't the uh forget the early days with like the i want to call them hooray for everything but that was actually the simpsons satire up with people yes i missed all that but uh the purple

rain the when the rain comes down and prince is doing his performance that's the best halftime show i've ever seen at a super bowl oh it is by far i did the next like 14 out of them after that you know in a row consecutively and nothing came close and that was a you know because prince you know prince is one of those guys there's nobody else like prince like what a loss you're not replacing Prince. A Prince comes along, you know, like a Miles Davis comes along, you know, like a Mozart, like you don't replace a talent like that. And I loved Prince, you know, Purple Rain came out when I was 14. I saw it in the movie theater. It was mind blowing to me because I was a kid who grew up idolizing Hendrix, you know, and back then I was named after Jimi Hendrix's bass player, Noel Redding, you know, so,

you know, and back then I was named after Jimi Hendrix's bass player, Noel Redding, you know, so and I lived in Woodstock a lot as a kid with my father. And so Prince was the guy to come along and sort of like take the mantle from Hendrix, you know, and if you remember, music was somewhat segregated back then. Like if you're a white kid, you listen to Van Halen and Rush, you know, and if you were a black guy, you listen to Michael Jackson and, you know, Rick James or whatever it is that. And Prince seemed to come along and like kick ass on the guitar as much as Eddie Van Halen, but also bring in a funk, you know, awesome, like melodic thing. And it was that's what you need. It's what I was saying at the top of the show. Like you want music to bring everybody together and be so excellent that everybody's going to smile and get in on the game. An unbelievable talent.

But were you allowed to look Prince in the eyes? Yeah. Well, you want to hear some stories about that? I got friends who were out to dinner with him and he would talk through another person. She'd be like, tell Prince I like his hair. And they would tell an intermediary and then that intermediary would tell Prince, you know, so he did have those strange things. The first gig I ever did with him, he had a cardboard box. And, you know, like if you take a cardboard box, it's got four sides, they'd cut off two sides. And there was a security guard just holding both sides of the cardboard box

in front of Prince in the green room. So nobody could look at him. And I'm like, who's that? And they're like, that's Prince. I'm like, why is this guy got a cardboard box? You know, but I have a feeling that Prince did a lot of that stuff just to put just to get over on people. You know, he had like a devilish personality. Because if you think about how he lived, he lived in Minnesota. He didn't live on like a star trip kind of thing. Like he had his own compound, but he would drive around Minneapolis and like go into bars and listen to music at First Avenue, you know, 10 years ago, you know, as a big star. So he was as much. Nobody's ever going to accuse Prince of being a regular guy. But, you know, he didn't he didn't live that star trip, if that makes any sense in a way.

And I'll go back to the Super Bowll and I did the rock hall stuff. You know, I did cool things with Prince, but, and obviously that guitar solo is, is probably the greatest guitar solo ever. And that's a great example of what I'm talking about. Like he's on stage with all these other dudes and everybody's like, Oh no, you know, Oh no, whatever that was, I'm not following that. And Prince was humble about that. He just said my friend Jeff Young was the keyboard player in that jam. He plays with Jackson Brown. And it was, you know, Tom Petty and all these guys. And Prince was like, no, let everybody else, you know, have 12, 16 bars and I'll just hop

in at the end, you know, and he just casually walked on on stage and just tore it down. You know, he could have done that at the beginning, you know, and taken the first 16 bars and then walked off and made everyone else look stupid, but he didn't. He still served the song. Do you know what I mean? And that's who Prince is. And if you, I'll give you an example. You know, when we did the Superbowl, I was in charge of the FMU marching band, which was a Florida university, traditional African-American, you know, HBCU colleges, marching band, which was a kick-ass marching band, like one of the greatest marching bands in the country, you know, the brass and the drums and all that. And their director, Prince got in touch with their director three weeks before they were going to perform on the Superbowl.

They played on Purple Rain, if I'm correct, and worked out the chart with them, you know, went over every note that these guys were going to play. Like Prince took the time to make sure that the marching band was going to have the most kick-ass arrangement they possibly could for the performance, you know. And then he shared the moment with them. We had them all in these neon things. And I remember being on the field and like, it was raining sideways, as you know, you know, and guys are slipping around with their tubas and stuff and like stuff flying everywhere. And Prince is there with his guitar, like playing that solo. And originally he didn't even want to do it. Cause he, you know, that we always do a safety tape on the Thursday night. And when they first heard about the rain,

I was told that they were like, hey, just run the tape. And people are like, we can't run the tape. It was like sunny out on Thursday. Like nobody's going to believe that. Then when Prince got word of it, he was like, well, then make it rain harder. You know, like, so that's he's a baller, you know, like that. Well, literally, because as Charlie murphy told us he can he was a hell of a basketball player yeah he was he played on his high school basketball team you know and i'm five seven right i'm a short guy i got a basketball hoop out in the backyard like i couldn't imagine like the you know he would play in his heels he had a basketball court in his house in la and i think at paisley park too and when he got frustrated in rehearsals or mad at

somebody, he'd make them go down on the basketball court and then he just like dropped three pointers over them, you know, until their ego disappeared. And then he'd make you pancakes. I'm trying to remember the Chappelle story, but yeah, amazing. So that's Prince. Okay. But again, for the record, you were able to look him in the eyes. I just don't want to bury that lead there. You know, I didn't get any of that star trip. I never talked to a lot of the people I worked directly with. You know, Prince, as I said, I was in charge of the FMU marching band and stuff. So I was never like, hey, time, you know, like I don't I don't remember that.

I remember kind of getting him out of the trailer to go to stage with a bunch of other people. And I don't there was I've been with those people to tell you not to look at them. I could name you some pop stars that have people walk in front of them and say, such and such is coming through, turn your head and don't look at them. You know, and, and Michael Jackson, I had to do that for, I had to block down the hallway to bring him to stage at the VMAs in 2001 at Lincoln Center. And unfortunately, I had to tell you too, Larry Mullen, that he couldn't go back to his dressing room. And he didn't realize why for like five minutes. And then Michael Jackson crossed by and he goes, mate, is that the reason I couldn't go to my dressing room? And I'm like, yep. And he's like,

oh my God, I can't believe he pulls this stuff. We would never do that. I'm like, yep. And he's like, oh my God, I can't believe he pulls this stuff. We would never do that. Glad to hear Larry say that because I always remember this, the Brit Awards and there was, Michael Jackson was performing

one of his typical, like I can't remember, Earth song or something, but it's like he was doing this Christ-like pose, like Jesus Christ pose kind of deal. And Jarvis Cocker from Pulp like rushed the stage.

He couldn't stomach it anymore like I always like it when these these reasonable artists are like can we stop like entertaining this this bullshit here yeah dude I'm with you on that and you know I've noticed that usually you know generally the cool guys are down to earth. And I've studied this stuff, obviously, since I've been in the business. And I have theories on that. Like you mentioned Crosby. Crosby is a crusty kind of guy and can be a bit of like entitled. Crosby grew up rich in Beverly Hills.

You know, his father was an Academy Award winning cinematographer. You know, whereas you get the guys like they grew up in England. You're Graham Nash's, who's as down to earth as possible. Paul McCartney, who I've worked with, Paul McCartney is as down to earth as you're going to get because these guys grew up in England after the war. You know, like they were broke. They were still like getting rationed and like didn't have food and all this stuff where America obviously completely prospered over after the war because we built all the things. So then we had this industrial sort of like infrastructure that made all these kids sort of rich. So the boomers that grew up in America when they became rock stars became like entitled adolescents. And the British guys are

like, hey, I'm not working in a coal mine. This is awesome. You know, like I'm just going to be normal. And I, you know, if anybody had a right to be arrogant, it would be somebody like Graham Nash. Cause the guy was in, you know, the Hollies, like he first met the Beatles when they were called the silver Beatles. You know, he used to ride around in cars with the Beatles, you know, Brian Jones would ride in his car. Cause he didn't like Mick and Keith, you know, the stones, they would all be on these package tours. And here's this guy 50 years later and every venue we'd walk in, in Ohio or whatever, he'd stop to the security guard and say, hi, my name's Graham.

How you doing? You know what I mean? Where these other guys, like you try to ask them for a picture and they tell you to F off. You know, I love hearing stories like that. And for the listenership, the FOTMs who are listening and like, hey, are you going to ever mention the 45th president of the United States? I'll just say that that is coming.

But I'm really digging this music chat here. Madonna, what can you tell me about working with Madonna? That's one I should plead the fifth on. You know, I've done a lot of stuff with Madonna, man. I've done a lot of things with Madonna. You know, whatever your imagination tells you is probably true. You know, I don't hate Madonna. You know, it's Madonna.

Like that's she is that kind of creation. You know, she is somebody where it is kind of a big public image thing, you know, and it's an empire and it's a big, you know, she's not the most talented singer in the world. You know, I think that's obvious to everybody. And you have to guard that. And that becomes... A lot of what I notice is that people that aren't supernaturally talented try to make up for it in diva-ish behavior. They hire people to sort of throw their weight around. And the last time I worked with Madonna was at the VMAs, probably in 2017, I came in to do a couple shows after I sort of left the business. And I was in charge of her. And you know, she was fine to me. But it was

the same thing. I couldn't let anybody ride in the elevator with her and I had to shut down everything. And I will tell you this, generally, it's like they're publicists and they're managers that kind of make your life hell more than the actual artist. You know, there's a lot of people that justify their jobs by making sure everything is perfect, you know, and there's some level you need of that, you know, but, you know, if you're a big star, especially nowadays, you need a security team and you need to be able to get in and out of the building sort of unobstructed. There's no shame in that, but there's a way to do it with a really low footprint. And the ones I admire, you too is like, you won't even notice when they come in and out of the building and they're very secure and they

got a whole team of guys or Springsteen or somebody, but there's a way to do it without attracting attention to yourself. And that's not Madonna's way. Madonna's way is like, pull the car up sideways in front of the stage door, make sure everybody knows I'm coming. And then I'll pretend like I don't want to say hi to anybody when I walk in the room, you know. Now, you mentioned you're, you know, to keep that gig for so long, you've got to know how to keep a secret or two, because what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas, I suppose. But what if you, I'm curious, if you're, what if you witness something illegal, and I'm not talking like, oh, smoking cannabis, you witness something uh illegal and i'm not talking like oh

smoking cannabis and that's not allowed i'm not talking that kind of illegal but if you see anything untoward illegal uh in a moral would you would you report that or i'm just oh without a doubt without a doubt you know and if i had known some of the things i know now about our former president you know when I was doing the beauty pageants, you saw things that were untoward and disgusting and misogynistic, but that was the business. That wasn't just Donald Trump. That's how people behaved. I came up in the industry when it was these awful people. And obviously I saw Trump snorting Adderall and stuff. I didn't know then he was becoming president. You know what I mean? So abusing drugs isn't like, that's part of the gig too. I've seen a gazillion guys, you know,

I worked with Lemmy, you know, from Motorhead, like he had to snort lines, you know, or meth before he went on and performed, you know, and more power to him. And between the two of those guys, Trump was the bigger speed freak, you know, he did more speed than the guy who named his band the bigger speed freak. He did more speed than the guy who named his band Motorhead. And Lemmy was a cool guy, no diss to Lemmy. But the Trump stuff, people did sign NDAs to protect the image that they created on Celebrity Apprentice. And that was the image of a billionaire. And it benefited the Russian government and whoever wanted to sort of destabilize the US to have a bunch of people in red states believe in this guy was a decisive decision maker and a billionaire who was married to a supermodel. In reality, you know, he was a 70 year old drug addict who wore Depends because he was incontinent from years of stimulant abuse.

He painted himself orange. He wore a girdle. He wore shoelifts. He couldn't read. You know, he's dyslexic. So any word more than three syllables, he couldn't read off a cue card and he'd storm offset, snort more Adderall because it made him feel in control like he knew what he was reading. He'd come back on, stumble through the thing and he'd leave. OK, you'd get maybe an hour a day out of the guy. He didn't decide who got hired or fired. Only if it was a person of color, he would say no way, you know, it's got to be a white guy who wins and he would use the n word and all that. So all of that stuff was hidden, you know, but at the time you're participating in it, you're like, it's a show. It's all fake. It's like Madonna

can't sing, but nobody really knows that she's at a 40 year career, you know, like, it's a it's, it's a product, and people get paid in that product, not just the guy who's the figurehead, but the, you know, the company that puts it on the air, the advertisers that sell advertising, you know, guys like me, you know, so crew guys, you know, so there was it was sort of okay to have an NDA and this kind of stuff until he ran for president. And once he ran for president, I called up my colleagues and was like, dude, this guy's a maniac, you know, and this guy's an active addict. And I want to make a distinction here because I'm not judging. Like if you can do drugs and do the gig, more power to you. You know, like if you're functional, I got no problem with it. The point I'm trying to say is real addiction is dysfunction. You only think about yourself. You live in

self-centered fear. You're writhing in resentment all the time. This story came out today. He wanted to find out who leaked that he went into the bunker last summer during the protest in Lafayette Park and have them executed. He literally said that to Mark. And that's the guy we knew, right? So I called up my colleagues in 16. I was like, look, this guy's a maniac. If he wins, he'll destroy this country. And most of my colleagues are like, he's not going to win and you'll never work again if you say anything. And I said, look, if he wins, there's no industry anyway, because he'll screw this country up so bad it'll shut down. And sadly, I was right. Right. There was no production in the last year and a half.

There was no TV shows. There was no concert tours, because when he was faced with his first real challenge, which was the coronavirus epidemic, all he could think about was his own political fortunes. Right. And he didn't lock it down right away. And then when he did, he was like, I'm not wearing a mask. You can wear one, I guess, you know, and he hit all the PPE equipment, you know, and doled it out to red states and instead of democratic states, like he couldn't have handled that worse. And it ended up killing 600,000 of my fellow countrymen. It ended up losing a year and a half of American progress. Like, are we talking about culture and stuff? We lost a year and a half of culture, right? Nothing happened last year. We sat around and watched the Lion Tiger King or whatever on Netflix. You know what I mean? There was no great tours. There was no Broadway plays. There was nothing that moves the ball forward in

terms of progress for humanity because we let a drug addict in charge. And now in many ways, he's more powerful than ever in the United States. You know, he just had a CPAC rally on Sunday. Like he's literally the front runner for the next presidential election. That's insane. You know, that's uncharted territory. We've never faced a challenge like that as a nation. And the only thing that'll free us from that is the truth. There's a lot to process there, Noel. Holy smokes. Okay, so there we are talking Trump and I knew it was coming.

And I know you mentioned earlier about keeping the secrets. That's how you keep yourself employed in that industry. And then you've mentioned NDAs. So now that you're speaking so openly and honestly about your experiences of Donald Trump on both again not just Celebrity Apprentice but on what Miss Teen Universe is that the

have you ever received any it was two shows sorry to cut you off it's Miss Universe and then Miss Teen USA both of which are horrible ideas giving that kind of pageant to Donald Trump. Imagine the first guy to pitch that. Here's the deal. We're going to get the hottest 15-year-old in every state, fly him to Atlantic City, put him in a bikini, and let Donald Trump and his

friends tell us which one is the hottest. You know what I mean? That was the gig. He used it like his personal playground. You know, he would inspect the contestants. He'd line them up and stick his fingers in their mouth and check their teeth and stuff. It literally stopped production. So he could basically like manhandle these women. And you've actually witnessed this. Okay. Wow. Okay. So you haven't received any kind of lawyer notices about the fact you're spilling a lot of tea here? Any reminders about the NDA? Any threats of any action against you for talking about this? Not really. I mean, I get death threats all the time, but that's what he's done to half the country. You know, I had a lady write me yesterday on Facebook. I can't wait till they shoot you. Oh, my God. Yeah. Do you ever do you ever think, you know, because think about it. This you just really articulately described one of the greatest cons in in the history of your country that so many, you know, Republicans have bought into this portrayal of Donald Trump as some kind of like savior demagogue like like like like like that same person

who would believe all that and would think you know the COVID-19 vaccination is a hoax and all these things are dangerous the same person who believes all that is somebody you would I believe would be dangerous like would would potentially

do something stupid like we saw in early January, the insurrection? Like, are you at all, you must be at least a little bit afraid for your security. I'm not, you know, I'm not a fool. I understand it's dangerous. I just don't feel like I have a choice. You know, I don't feel like there's anything on the other side of this. January 6th is a perfect example. These guys are nuts. You know, in the last week in my country on the other side of this. January 6th is a perfect example. These guys are nuts. You know, in the last week in my country on the 4th of July, just because a hotel worker let herself into a room to clean a room, she found a loaded long rifle, an AR-15, five high volume

magazines and a loaded handgun pointed down onto a park where a 4th of July celebration was going to be happening the next day. Then later in the week on Friday at the MLB All-Star Game, the baseball All-Star Game in Denver, they found the same thing in another hotel room, but it was four guys with 10,000 rounds of ammo. Okay. So Trump has built an army. There's an army of the ignorant now that is being manipulated by, like you said, the GOP and these forces. Trump was the perfect beast to sort of stimulate these ignorant masses. Right. Because he's dumb. He's inarticulate. But he comes out at these rallies and he waves a flag and all the rubes can be like, hey, look, it's the guy from TV. like, hey, look, it's the guy from TV, you know, he's just like us, you know, like, and it's very psychologically powerful, because it's always about, you know, and Fox News makes it 10 times

worse, right? So these people are being fed poison and anger and fear 24 seven, to the point like he got him to not wear masks. That's insane. These people aren't taking the vaccine. You know, you're not taking a vaccine, you'd rather die alone in a hallway, you know, choking to death because your lungs are filling with life, it's this, the future of our country. Not to mention these idiots are standing in the way of dealing with the climate crisis. You in Canada, in Vancouver, it was 118 degrees two days in a row two weeks ago. That's insane. We're all going to die unless we fight this and unless we understand the forces behind it. Fox News is owned by, you know, an Australian dude who lives in London. OK, he doesn't have the best interests of the United States at heart. You know, Governor Abbott, who just put out a ten thousand dollar bounty on any

woman who gets an abortion in the state of Texas. You know, if a citizen turns in a woman who has an abortion, they get ten thousand000 per the Texas governor right now. You know, the Texas Democratic reps had to fly to D.C. last night to prevent voter restriction laws from being enacted in Texas, from taking away the right to vote for minorities. So this is a war for the soul of our country. And it's being waged by these ignorant people, you know, at the behest of hucksters like Trump. But the forces behind it are people like the Koch brothers, you know, big oil interests, big people who benefit from a dumb politic, you know, from a body politic that doesn't have critical thinking, that doesn't pay attention to humanities. You know, Reagan came into my country and took out all the arts funding. There's a reason for that. It's like what we were discussing at the beginning of a show. If people understand art and beauty and music, they understand there aren't that many differences between each other,

right? And all of this kind of conservative politics is about exploiting differences and making the other the enemy. And whenever you do that, it's cynical and it's for a purpose, but it's not a good purpose and it never ends well. Wow. Now, if you're looking for hope, though, at least, you know, if we just look at metrics here, you know, which are the only undeniable truth I suppose we have, Biden beat Trump by a greater margin than Trump beat Hillary. Like that is a fact that sensible people do not dispute.

I realize that's a whole hot button issue in your country right now. But that does, at least that does give you hope that this con man does, he has his loyalists, but they're, theoretically, there's not enough of them to give him another term in the White House. Well, you know, I hate to rain on your parade. You are correct in what you said, but that's in the popular vote. But my country gets determined by the Electoral College. And Trump came within 88,000 votes of pulling off another Electoral College victory. So he could have lost, you know, the popular vote and still named himself president.

Sure, sure. And that's what they're trying to prevent now. You know, that's why in Georgia and Texas, they're basically like, we're going to make sure this never happens again. We're essentially not going to let African Americans vote next time, you know, and that's what's scary is that these secretaries of states in all these countries and all these Republican states now are running and appointing themselves to office, and they're just going to overturn the next results where you do have a democratically elected person. They're going to say, nope, we ain't certifying those votes. We're sending Trump. And that's a real fear. And there is hope. I'm not trying to be unhopeful, but we also,

and it falls on people like me to be extra scary and cynical because i'm a comedian so it comes natural well but you know yeah you got to be diligent because uh you're basically at a you're at war fighting for democracy here in your in your homeland but uh you mentioned you're a stand-up comic now so so when do you go from being and i i'm gonna get back to celebrity apprentice because i got a few more questions there but where do you go from being and I'm going to get back to Celebrity Apprentice because I got a few more questions there. But where do you go from being this that what you were in the industry to stand up? Like, were you always a stand up comic on the side? And you tell me.

I went I, you know, I went to drama school in New York. I went to the American Academy of Dramatic Arts, as I mentioned earlier, with a bunch of Canadians. And I always did a lot of comedic plays. So sort of comedic acting came naturally to me. I did a lot of improv after I got out of school. I took classes at UCB, Upright Citizens Brigade. So I always, even when I wanted to be serious, people were laughing at me. And when I was a kid, my sense of humor was how I survived because I lived in a, you know, I lived in a pretty rough kind of multi-ethnic neighborhood as a little kid. And I was a little like white kid, you know, so how I survived. Where was this? Because, I mean, I've heard the, you know, Howard Stern talks about growing up in Roosevelt and he kind of shares his experience.

This was outside of D.C. in the 70s. So basically Washington, D.C., you know, in the 70s, sort of, you know, in the aftermath of those race riots, and that kind of upheaval. And, you know, a sense of humor was how you survived, we had tough circumstances, but we all kind of stuck together. And you'd sit around and kind of make fun of each other, because you were poor, and you know, and you had struggles, but it also developed empathy, you know, and I was always the new kid, my mom moved around a lot. So that was how I sort of made friends and stood out was, was being funny. And then when, you know, when 2016 happened, I knew I was kind of done in the industry, I wanted to talk about it. I'd written protest songs, I'd always written songs and stuff. But

I felt instinctually, that music couldn't speak to the moment in a way comedy could now, right? Because stuff was happening so quickly. By the time you wrote a song or put together an album, you were going to be 10 tragedies down the road, right? And I have kind of a quick wit in dealing with that stuff. So I did a stand-up set. I talked about this stuff about Trump that we're talking about now. A friend of mine

kathy griffin and actually for a canadian mike mike smith one of my one of my best buddies he's bubbles in trailer park boys of course right a musician in his own right of course because curious by sandbox is a great jam exactly and and mike had you know he had uh the hip and they did a video with the hip yeah and i we met i could tell you you know trailer park boys stories we've done stuff in amsterdam and nova scotia and they're good buddies of mine in the music interest because i would have i would have like the trailer park boys sit in with jackson brown like when we played in halifax and things like that i had him sit in with csn in in in uh in in amsterdam and on the last tour ever and it was kind of a disaster

and crosby refused to participate in everything it was crazy but um any but so anyway they were down in new york doing a show at the beacon theater because they do a christmas tour that's really popular and i went by and we're hanging out backstage after the show and i said you know i know, I'm, I'm, I'm doing standup now talking about this Trump stuff. Cause I just want to get it out there. And it's also cathartic for me to talk about it and make people laugh, but kind of warn them like, you better watch this guy. Cause the dude I know would blow up the world without a second thought. And, uh, Michael send me a video, you know? So I sent him a clip and I remember it, you know, it was December, early December of 18. And I sent him the clip and he goes, hey, can I put this out on Twitter? And I go, yeah, but let me set up a Twitter account first, you know, because I didn't

have Twitter. I was like, let me get Twitter first in case I ever come to Toronto. Maybe I'll get a few followers. And he put it out and I woke up in the morning and Mike had texted me like a million times. My phone was blowing up and he's like, dude, McCartney's people just put it out. Kathy Griffin retweeted it. Tom Arnold retweeted it. And it went viral. It had like 4 million views in a few days. And, you know, now I have 300 something thousand Twitter followers. And, you know, and I started using that platform because as I was saying, stuff is happening. So I like to speak on it, you know, and comedy is a good way to do that. And by no means

is everything I say meant to be funny. You know, I'm basically trying to make you laugh every once in a while. I'm really trying to make you think. Right. Right. And I will give you this. I'll give you more than just this. In fact, if you were here, I'd be giving you beer and pasta and all this great stuff for being on Toronto Mic. But I will tell you that you are an excellent communicator. So just even just listening to you in the cans here for thewitted and you're a good communicator, and you're the only person I know who would know who's talking about the fact that Donald Trump wears diapers. You can see it, though. Don't even take my word for it. If you're skeptical out there and you're listening, do a Google search. And I don't mean like the fake video or picture of him on the golf course with the dirty pants. Look at the outline in his pants. You can clearly see the outline of an undergarment and an adult diaper. And I'm not trying to make fun of people that are incontinent

because every time I talk about it on Twitter, like incontinent, Twitter gets mad at me. Like, it's not funny, man. I'm sure I'll be wearing them someday. There's no shame in the game, right? What I'm talking about is a side effect from drug addiction and a guy who didn't share his medical records with you. The first thing he did when he was elected was he sent Keith Schiller and Matthew Calamari, his two security guys, to his doctor's office. They knocked the guy out of the way, Harold Bornstein, who was a doctor feel good on the Upper East Side, who supplied him with Adderall and Valium and also half the Upper East Side. He said, he lives near me. He died mysteriously in

January. But, you know, four years ago, Trump pushed or five years ago, Trump had his guys push him aside and stole his medical records, right? He did that not because he wants to hide that he's got high blood pressure, trust me, you know? So I'm trying to point out like the guy has an active, you know, psychological medical condition, you know, addiction. And it's not something to fool with. It's just one of his many maladies. You know, he's a narcissist and a psychopath. He's literally no joking, no hyperbole. He's the most damaged person I've ever met or seen. Okay. Let's go back. So celebrity apprentice, uh, did you work closely with Donald, uh, Trump on the celebrity apprentice when you were working there? Yeah, I was Ivanka's handler. Ivanka was the one I worked most closely with,

you know, Donald was right there. But as I said, he would, and I was, I did celebrity apprentice finales. I didn't, I wasn't there like day in, day out on the taping, like no offense, but that was way beneath my position in the industry. I did it when celebrities came in and we did these live shows on NBC. So we'd have Joan Rivers and, you know, Cindy Lauper and all these other people would join us for these finales. And I did what I explained earlier. We would deal with the logistics, moving everybody around. But even in doing that, you know, one or two days a year for six seasons, I saw enough crazy behavior. You can imagine that what the people saw that were in their day in and day out,

you know, and don't speak out now because they don't want Mark Burnett to sue him. But to answer your question, I was Ivanka's handler and she's even scarier than he is. I know Ivanka and Jared and they were around, you know, the whole time. And they're the ones that are really running the show behind the scenes. OK, they're the sort of like brains behind the empire. Trump wants music to play when he walks into a room, he wants to get high and he wants to hit on women. Do you know what I'm saying? He wants to fill that hole inside of himself in the moment. He doesn't have a big long game. It's all about like, you know, base needs, you know, addiction is like desire run

amok. So Trump can only think about what's going to make him feel better. That's why he has these rallies all the time because he needs people cheering for him. He needs constant reassurance. Those other guys are a little slicker. They can play the long game and kind of stay behind the scenes and manipulate it and pull the strings. And honestly, that's what you have to fear because Trump has created this thing that has allowed like all these other, you know, Marjorie Taylor Greene's and Lauren Boebert's and all these people that just say these keywords now and get instantly really popular within that party. But if you get somebody like a Ron DeSantis as a president, somebody with

some self-discipline and a little more smarts than Trump, it's game over for the United States. Game over. Wow. Is there anything specific? So Ivanka's just pulling the strings like in The Godfather, like the marionette? Like manipulating her father, like that soft breathy voice. That's all made up because he likes to hear her talk that way. Her real voice is low and she curses like a sailor. You can look up an old clip of her on Conan O'Brien and she's using her regular voice. So she would use that around her father to sort of assuage him and manipulate him. You know, she's his sexual ideal. As crazy as that sounds, he would ask what she was wearing when she got to set. When I did

those pageants, he would pick out all the girls that look like Ivanka. He would bring Ivanka as his date to events when she was like 10 and 11 and 12 years old in New York City. I'm sure your people have seen all those pictures. He behaved with her in a way that most fathers would not feel comfortable behaving with their daughter. And you've heard him on Howard Stern talking about how great her breasts are and how he'd be sleeping with her if she wasn't his kid. So she knew that, you know what I mean? And she knew she could sort of manipulate him and then step aside. And his desire, so to speak, would be foisted on another innocent woman, you know, in his

purview. And she played that game with him, you know, and she'll continue to play it because when it hits the fan, she still has sort of cards to play. She could play the victim card and say, I was scared of my father. I was just going along with it because, you know, these cases that are against him in New York, they're against the Trump org and they're money laundering. And she was in the middle of all that. You know, she was running the company too. You know, she was the figurehead of the company when they would do these deals like in Toronto. You know, they had a failed deal up in Toronto.

It was Ivanka that they send up there to pretend like she's going to buy a condo in the building and she's going to be moving into. And if you buy a condo, she might just be stopping by your house to borrow a cup of sugar. You know, she was sort of the disciplined, polished, pretty face of the later Trump organization grifts where they did Trump Baja, Trump Soho, Trump Azerbaijan, Trump Moscow. I mean, it was a corrupt criminal organization on an international scale. And did you have any insight into Donald Trump's relationship with Melania? Yeah, they hate each other. They hate each other. They would show up separately. They never would talk to each other. I was told they were going to get divorced before he got elected. And then once he was elected, she couldn't divorce him. So she had to go to DC, but she hates him. They all hate him. You know, the kids hate each other. Don and Ivanka,

you know, pardon me, Don Jr. and Ivanka hate each other. It's like a den of vipers, the whole family. But yeah, Melania was, you know, she was an escort, you know, she was his escort in New York City. And then he married her because she looked like this Italian woman that he had a big crush on that he could never get a, you know, get any attention from. Wow. The whole dynamic. I mean, succession is coming back to HBO, but they have nothing on this Trump family. I mean, this is a dude, the Trump family is game of Thrones, you know, and that's what I would tell people. It's like game of Thrones, you know, and you only know the half of it, you know, you have a kind of a lighthearted show.

So I'm not going to get into all the Epstein stuff and all that. But Trump's a bad dude. If his name wasn't on the side of buildings in New York City and if he wasn't a wealthy man, whether he's fake wealthy or not, he's more wealthy than most people. Right. So he got away with stuff that nobody else would get away from, you know, get away with. And without a doubt, my perspective here, again, speaking from Toronto, Ontario, Canada, Donald Trump must be the greatest overachiever in the history of the world.

Absolutely. The guy has failed upwards his whole life, right? He was a millionaire by the time he was 11 months old because his dad would cheat on his taxes and bury all his money, you know, his assets and his children. So he'd give them property and their names and all this stuff. So by the time Trump's, you know, three years old, he's a multimillionaire. He works for his father that he starts and his father basically builds for, you know, the Genovese crime family in New York. Right. So then Trump goes into the casino business. They all fail. Right. The old man dies. Trump forces his siblings to sign away, you know, to sign away their rights to his father's empire, which is a real estate empire

in New York City. Like you shouldn't sell that. You keep that forever. It's always going to make money for you, right? But Trump takes a one-time payment of like $736 million, then blows that, you know, he uses that to bail out his casinos. It doesn't work. He's broke again. NBC puts him on a TV show, a game show essentially, where he can't even read cue cards. And he makes that a success. And then he gets elected president. And now he's twice impeached president who presided over the biggest disaster in american history and he's still got a 70 approval rating you know and he's grifting people every day wow okay well said there yeah absolute overachiever uh but does he have some some

some intelligence that he's able to fall upwards as you say? Is he at all like a smart guy? No, no, he's the most unread stupid person I've ever met, but he's constantly underestimated. And here's the mistake people make. They sort of think, well, he's too stupid for that. He's not stupid in the sense of being a predator. Do you know what I'm saying? He always knows how to look out at his own best interest. If you listen to the tapes that have come out about him,

like Bob Woodward released some tapes when they were talking about the coronavirus, or Lev Parnas released a tape when they were talking about Ambassador Yanukovych, I always get her name wrong, over in Ukraine. And Trump goes, take her out, get her out of there. You know, they said, hey, this ambassador is standing in the way of us kind of getting dirt on Biden. We're trying to do this corrupt thing. And he's like, take her out, get her out. You know, and when he's talking to Woodward, he's got his self-interest at heart. You know, the thing that people don't get about Trump is it's an act like he doesn't care that you're laughing at him. OK, he doesn't want to be humiliated in the sense that like sneaking into the bunker and you think he's a coward, but he doesn't care about you making fun of his hair.

He knows his hair looks stupid. He knows he's painted orange. That's a costume, you know, and it's an effective thing because it disarms people. When you hear him behind the scenes, he's on it. You know, like people like say he's got dementia. He does not have dementia. Okay. He knows where he is all the time and he knows exactly what he needs in any given situation.

And it's all he thinks about. And again, that's what I was warning people about. That's not what you want in the president. You want a president who's going to think about himself last. You know, you want a Barack Obama or somebody who's like, whatever's best for the people. That's what I'm here to do. It's not about me. That's the ultimate it's not about me job. and all that. That's amazing. And we are going to talk about your podcast and the tour and everything. But can you share with me any stories at all from the inauguration for Barack Obama? Yeah, man, that was one of the most special days. I mean, that was a day where it all came to fruition. I'd been in the business probably almost 20 years. And back in DC, I'm doing this thing. And we did a big concert on the mall

the Sunday before he was inaugurated on the Tuesday. And it was on HBO and we had Springsteen and, you know, Pete Seeger, who I'd known, you know, most of my life and, you know, YouTube performed and all these like incredible bands, Stevie Wonder and everybody. And Barack at the end was like, hey, I want to meet everybody. So we all went in this little tent and got selfies with Barack Obama. But while the event was going on, I was standing just below where President-elect Obama was sitting with his beautiful family, you know, and I'm standing there and I noticed on one side of me is Sharon Stone. I'm like, oh my God, Sharon Stone.

And then I looked to the left of me because I wanted to tell like another dude next to me, like, yo bro, basic instinct over here, you know? And I look next to me and it's David Axelrod. And if your people don't know, David Axelrod was the campaign manager for Barack Obama, you know? So I see it's David and I, you know, I just say, Hey man, I'd like to thank you for your role in this, you know, thank you for helping make this happen. And he puts his arm around me and he goes, turn around. And I'm like, what? He's like, turn around. And he turns me around to face the mall and he goes, I didn't do it. They did. And he pointed out at 2 million people that were lined up in 10 degree weather as far as the eye could see to see our nation's first African-American president take his place in history. What a contrast from what we've been talking about the last half an hour. In terms of class

and dignity and intelligence and thoughtfulness, what a complete juxtaposition. Exactly. No, and you could feel it you know like i was talking about at the top of the show that feeling you know when when the hit played there it was like everybody became one and there's no better feeling as a human than being a part of a community that's what we all search for you know we all want if that's what family is that's what holidays are we're trying to all feel like we're together in this and we have each other's back. That's what love is. It's a big celebration of joy and you felt it.

So when he said that, I was like, oh my God, like I got to step away. So I sort of step off to the side just to collect myself because I'm like, I'm about to start crying in front of Sharon Stone. I got to catch myself, dude. You know? So I step over to the side and I'm sort of standing there, breathe and trying to take it all in. And, uh, and my friend Danny clinch comes over.

Danny clinch is a very famous rock photographer. He photographs Pearl jam and Neil young. He's he's Neil young's like main photographer. You've known his work. If you don't know his name, Pearl jam directs their videos. So Danny happens by and sees me standing there. And like he always Danny's known, he carries this little Rolex camera around his, you know, hangs around his neck and he sees me and he's going to take my picture. Right. So he lifts up the camera to take my picture and I give a peace sign. Right. And you two's play and Barack's behind me. I give this peace sign and

Danny starts like shaking the camera and moving around. And I'm like, what's happening. You know? And, and finally I take it down. I go, Danny, what happened? He goes, dude, when you were given that peace sign, Bono saw it, came over, took the peace sign from you and gave it out to the 4 million people. And I'm like, no way. What a, what a life. No, honestly, what a life. What a life, Noel. Honestly, what a life.

And does Bono, does he wear lifts in his shoes? Because I heard that once. Do we know? Does he wear lifts? He could. I didn't notice it. I've done more than a few gigs with them. Bono's a cool guy, man.

You know, like he's, I never noticed. It's funny. I was at a Pearl Jam show here in Toronto once where Bono went on stage to sing Neil Young's Rockin' in the Free World with Eddie Vedder. That's awesome. Yeah, it was amazing. And I love all, yeah, all fantastic here. Brother, I could honestly,

I could talk several hours with you. So much ground to cover. Please tell me about the Noel Kassler podcast. All right. So the Noel Kassler podcast is All right. So the Noel Kassler podcast is a weekly podcast wherever you get your podcasts. It comes out on Monday. It's basically like what you just heard here on this wonderful podcast. You know, it's just me ranting, talking about the week's events politically. And I pepper in some of those stories. And, you know, I got

some live shows coming up. I'm going to be at the Rams Head in Annapolis, Maryland, September 16th. And tickets go on sale tomorrow for a theater show in Norwalk, Connecticut at the Wall Street Theater on November 18th. And you can find me on Twitter and just Google me. I'm out there. Are you calling this your unverified tour? I am. The unverified tour. How do you like that? Okay. Because I always wonder,? I always wonder because I'm now, I should preface this by saying I'm talking about Twitter Canada right now

and I make all the brain, the operations run out of California, which is not Twitter Canada. But I'm very tight with the director of communications at Twitter Canada. If they were to verify you, would that fuck up your marketing plan here? Yeah, well then I'd switch the name to the no edit button the no edit feature tour no edit that's right uh i think they're working on that

too but uh again at castler noel you've got the podcast noel castler podcast and i'd be remiss if i didn't tell people that uh i've got you on humble and fred next week so uh you'll be talking to more canucks before you know it. Looking forward to it. I always have a blast in the morning with those guys. They're legends here. Dude, that was just a legendary debut on Toronto Mic. I got to say, I really appreciate it.

You kicked ass, you took names and love talking about all those stories. But I think what I love the most was talking about the Tragically Hip with you. That was amazing. I agree, brother. Thank you. Any chance I ever get to talk about the hip with a Canadian who knew them, I always take it. And that brings us to

the end of our 884th show. You can follow me on Twitter. I'm at Toronto Mike. Noel, again, he's at Castler Noel on Twitter. Our friends at Great Lakes. Noel, again, he's at Casler Noel on Twitter. Our friends at Great Lakes Brewery, they're at Great Lakes Beer. McKay CEO Forums, they're at McKay CEO Forums.

Palma Pasta is at Palma Pasta. Sticker U is at Sticker U. Ridley Funeral Home, they're at Ridley FH. And Mike Majeski is on Instagram at Majeski Group Homes. See you all next week. 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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