Toronto Mike'd: The Official Toronto Mike Podcast - Toronto Mike on Humble and Fred Discussing The El Mocambo Gig

Episode Date: June 3, 2026

This unnumbered bonus episode of Toronto Mike'd es an excerpt from today's episode of Humble and Fred with Humble Howard Glassman, Fred Patterson and Dan Duran talking to Mike about his recent El Mocambo performance. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Please welcome to our program. Formerly, you know, you think of him as a producer, an extraordinary podcaster, was a blogger still blogs, you know. But now he can add, I don't even know what that category is. It's not comedian. I mean, it's like one of those very rare things when somebody can stand on a stage for 90 minutes and hold the crowds attention. Mikey, tell us all about it. I did not die. okay good

well that's good great so anyways getting back to Vancouver so Vancouver it's four hours it's gonna be four hours for half the year

so right now it's three hours the time time yes yes right well Alberta's too so it doesn't go to two hours it's going to go to four hours right right yeah

because we're going to fall back well no wait a second no it's never going to four hours you guys it's never going to four hours talking about so if it's three hours now when we fall back an hour and they don't

wouldn't that be four hours so right now it's three hours right yes now it's three we're going to fall back though we're going to fall back we're going to we're going to so in the fall it's going to be two hours it doesn't add an hour no

okay yeah but you see guys if it's three hours now and we fall back so in the fall right now instead of it being 747 it'll be 647 and 447 in Toronto Vancouver. It'll be two hours. It's not going to be four hours. That would be

insane. Yeah. Let's do a Mr. goohead on this. Do you understand what, does it make sense? It's three hours now and we fall back an hour. We don't add an hour. So it's going to be two hours. And then in the spring, it'll be three hours again. He's making sense, Fred.

I think that Howard's got it maybe. We're wrong. Yeah. Okay. Dan was too. And that's rare. I was going to say the fact that Dan was wrong. Dan, think about it. If we fall back from where we are now, it will be two hours difference from 447 a.m. to, you know, it'll be, it's three hours now.

Okay. If it's nine o'clock in Vancouver, and it's six o'clock here. No, it's not, Dan, it's the opposite. We'll be noon. It's nine o'clock in Vancouver. It's noon here. Right. Okay.

And if we fall back an hour, it'll be 11 a.m. here and 9 o'clock in Vancouver. That's two hours. hours. So Fred, it's better for sports because we can watch those oilers game or whatever. We watch the Canucks. There will be overlap then. That's the problem. But anyway, well, they can.

Anyway, all I'm saying is guys, I read an article saying it's going to wreak havoc for professional sports scheduling. Absolutely. Well, they're going to have to adjust it. But yes. It isn't, excuse me, a four hour difference. Now, the Elma combo show. Yes, sir.

Give us some context. Do you, uh, had a plan. You went up there. I know there were some festivities. You had a bit of an adjustment too because the person that was going to open the show for you, one of the guys from the spoons, couldn't make it here. Right.

So Rob Pruse, we had been talking for months. And not only opened the show, because that's one thing, but he was on stage with me. And my 90 minutes had cues, like musical cues. And Rob Proust was going to be on piano. And the day before the event, 24 hours before the event, Rob told me his, his catalytic converter was stolen from under his car and he can't get to Toronto. He lives in New York State. And I basically, like on a dime did a little pivot where I got a new opening act, the wonderful

Blair Packham from Jitters. He was very good, but nobody on stage. So when I grabbed the mic from Blair at 9, no, sorry, at 8 p.m. that night, I did not give it up for the grand finale special guests until 9.30. It was exactly 90 minutes. Wow. that I talk to the crowd. And there's a good crowd.

I think it holds a couple hundred people or 150 people. You had almost 100 people there. Yeah, because we're in the Starlight Room, and they said 120 was capacity. But we had 85, like, boisterous, beautiful people. And I'll just say this. It was kind of like going to fantasy camp because your name's on the marquee outside the Elmo. But also, like, you know, the stairs going down to the washroom and they have, like, a blondie. And they have Steppenwolf and Rolling Stones.

They had Toronto mic on the stairs. Like they put your name on the stair. That was a mind blow. And it just, it was like amazing. It was like I was a big league performer. And it felt awesome. I wanted to ask, were you nervous backstage before? Well, I never, I refused.

I was told, go backstage and we'll do a big announcement. And I said, no, like, I wanted to watch the opening act with the people in attendance. So I was just in the crowd. And then literally when Blair Packham wrapped up at like 8.50, no, sorry, I keep saying, that because I have a time zone change. So what time would it have been in Vancouver? At 755 when Blair goes into his last song, that's when I

go to the side of the stage and then I just walked on, thanked Blair, and started my 90 minutes set. And I could say it probably took five minutes before I felt completely relaxed. But then I'll tell you the truth. For the 90 minutes, everything came out of my mouth and

the way I envisioned it when I was like visualizing this night on a bike ride. It all unfolded as I wanted it And the grand finale, which was a fake grand finale, which revolved around a cherry blossom, which you can no longer buy. They don't make these anymore. But this was the grand finale.

But then I had special guests in the crowd who basically, like there was a hostile takeover where they stormed the stage and said, Mike, that's not how you end your Elma combo debut. And then they broke into song. Lowest of the low were in the crowd and stormed the stage and played a song from Shakespeare My Butt to send us. home. Yeah, it's your theme song and it's called, what is it Rose? Rosie and Gray, which is the song that closes all 19008 episodes of Toronto Mike.

Right. So for 90 minutes, what did you talk about? Was this like Billy Crystal, your life like over, like, what was it? Yeah, last time you said that, I've never seen this Billy Crystal thing, but it wasn't my life. It's amazing. I've seen it. I'm going to check it out. But I did, so there's a guy named Doug McCleman, who's like a long. time. He records live stuff in this city. And he went and recorded everything through the Elmo board. And I literally dropped the entire 90-minute set into the Toronto Mike podcast feed. So like, anybody can go here, because it's unedited. Like, I didn't even edit a stitch. So you can hear it. But it's not me talking about my life. It's like part like vulnerability and it's part like humorous stories. And I tried to make it so all 90 minutes were stories I have never told in 1900 episodes.

of Toronto Mike. So if you listen to every minute of my podcast, I don't know who that is, but if you did, you would hear, everything would be new, like original content. It was all fresh material. Well, give us an example. Give us one of those stories. Okay, well, one that would be first of all, I do reference

your show a couple of times, and I talk about flying with Humble. And I talked about my phone call with Humble when he saw I was going to do this. And I talked about how you guys are interested in frequency of bowel movements and resting heart rate.

All of that is in the show. But a quick little thing is, when I was a baby, my scrotum expanded. It blew up like a blowfish. So my scrotum blew up like a balloon. I'm a baby. And they said it was because I was allergic to penicillin. So for like five decades, I've been telling every doctor and every triage nurse that I have a penicillin allergy. And they always ask me, what happened when you took penicillin?

And I always have to explain my scrotum. blew up like a balloon. So I kind of share this story about for 50 years thinking I was allergic to penicillin because of this story that my mom has told me about my scrotum. So there's some stories of that nature. It's

much better in the Elmo show. Maybe that explains Dan's dick. Maybe you're He takes penicillin every morning. You know, as you were trying to think, how do we relate this to Dan's? Dan is it a penicillin problem that you have? Does Dan take

penicillin every day. Mike, so did you find and what, that phone call, what was that phone call that I, I, oh, so you I said, okay, well, Humble Howard, he literally moved to Los Angeles to be a stand-up

comic, like you know the craft, and I talked about how you were explaining, you know, how you can, the timing and the beats and, and working out the bits and kind of the process and creating 90 great minutes for the stage. And then I talked about how I chose to completely ignore all this excellent advice.

Oh, I see. Well, you know, it's all in there. When I called you, it was just, I was excited for you. And I just offered some perspective. And I, you know, I offered even to, hey, if you wanted me to help you order the, you know, stuff. But, you know, you order some sandwiches. No, it was all positive about your great. And, and because I, because I also know how, you know, long it is.

standing on a stage like I was telling the guys I did a keynote a few years back for a company 300 people and at breakfast at 9 a.m. had to get on stage with slides and a presentation that lasted maybe an hour, an hour and five minutes and I know that's a long time

to stand there. No breaks like no pee break and no water break. Did you have water on the stage with the stool or anything? I had a beer on the stage but I didn't. There's a part of my show where I take my blood thinner. The funny thing as I listened to, like, as I did it, I remember all these self-edits in real time, because I know

Rob Pruse is not on stage. It's funny, because I had this thing in my head, and then, oh, yeah, Rob's not on stage, so I had to self-edit in real time. And also, even though, like, I'm the one who invented the 90-minute, like, Target, like, I said, I'm going to do 90 minutes, but I could have done, I could have done, you know, 45 minutes. Like, it's my show. But I was so, like, into this 90-minute target and seeing if I can nail it, that in real-time, I deleted parts to make sure, because you realize it takes. longer to deliver on stage. Why was the 90 minutes your goal, by the way? Oh, it's probably some kind of obsessive compulsive disorder or something, but like I just decided it's 90 minutes and that's

what I'm going to hit. And I hit it to the minute, like Artemis II style. Wow. Well, you know, I've said this to Howard. Howard has said this to me over the years. We really admire your, I don't, is it fearless? It's a hootspah. Fred, not caring? Not caring your lack of, um, self you know what I mean? Self-consciousness or yeah, self-consciousness, whatever that is. Because, you know, I would never in a million years think of putting myself through that because I think, me, what is the point? But you just displayed there is a point to it.

I wanted to see if I could do it. And that's what Matt, that's all it matters. To you, it matters. And remember, this is in the show if anybody wants to listen to it. But I didn't initiate this whole thing. Like, I never woke up one day and said, I think I'll headline at the Elma combo for 90 minutes. Like, so because it was never my dream and it's not where I want to go and I don't ever intend to do this again. Like, it was a whole different.

It was more of like, I'm going to radically leave my comfort zone and see if I can get on that stage in front of 85 people at the Elma combo and deliver hopefully a good, compelling. I didn't see people were engaged for 90 minutes. But I'm going to see if I can do this and stick the landing. Well, and we admire it, and that's amazing. What was, speaking of the people, what was, what, what did, two questions, really, one and one A, one being, what was the reaction during? And then what was the response when you were finished? So during, like I, because it's not all funny, funny stuff. Like I'm talking about, there's a little bit of like, there's a tragedy.

Yeah, there's a tragedy. And that's Scroding story. That's, yeah. Yeah. The Scrode's story. That was pretty, yeah. By the way, also there's some stories about my mom and how she's susceptible to the last thing she sees on Facebook and there's some stuff there. Yeah, like that's unique.

And like there's a granola story that spins out. Like, so there, I liked, like, I couldn't see the last half. Like, I can only see the front half. Yeah, of course. So I, there was a VIP section in the back. I don't know if I couldn't see them at all or hear them at all. But the people I could see in that first half, like I was making eye contact of love. lots of people and seeing smiles and hearing laughs.

And there's a woman named Lily in the front who seemed to love the show because she was kind of like talking back to me. Ian Service had a couple of wobbly pops and he was sort of putting, you know, talking. I could hear his voice. So it's interesting what it's like to hear the voices and hear the laughter and sort of engage with the, it was well received and everybody, at least nobody told me, oh, that was just okay. Everybody seemed to think it was better than expected.

So you never, standing up there, you never felt like you were losing. losing them ever or never so for 90 minutes I felt like they were like I don't it's a sound I felt like they were clinging to every syllable Fred wow so did you mention did you talk about your son when you had a little bit of a scare with him and that type of thing no nothing that no that's like that's not my story to tell so uh did not tell I only told my stories and Dan Duran has a question Dan Duran from Humble and Fred news so the Elma convo the starlight room that's the one on the main floor right yes yes so there's no seats there right everybody standing with high top tables?

Well, they put out, yeah, well, they put out some seats. So there were, people were standing. Lawn chair. Yeah. It was a series of stepstools and lawn chair. Everybody was, yeah, there were some seats. People were comfortable. And they charged, I believe you were charging $60. Yeah, but after that service charge, it was $65.

So that's the other thing is that these people bless their hearts. Like they coughed up. I saw, I want to say hi to a listener of you. yours, Richard Bullis and his wife. Yes. Yeah. Coffin up 65 each. Okay, that's what?

That's 1.30. And then you go downtown for the evening. That's, like, amazing. And did you get, did you see any of that money? Yeah. So it did not lose money. And then the woman who put it on agreed to split whatever was left over after all the expenses, with the big one being renting the alma combo for Thursday night.

We split 50-50. Nice. So I'm buying a Tesla, is what I'm telling you. So you. You didn't get the, well, that's interesting because, like I said, you know, like, it's a long time to stand there. And even though it wasn't billed as, you know, Mike Boone's, you know, doing his Chappelle set, but, you know, still, you know, you can feel the vibe in the room.

And if you felt like, you know, people were, you know, there's a saying in, you know, stand up now. It's like either be interesting or be funny while you. And so you were interesting. I mean, I'm sure you were funny at times. But people who came there, obviously. love you and are interested in you. One thing I can say, you're so hyper aware of when people leave, right?

So there was absolutely a moment. So I'm doing this thing. And I think I did it like almost stumble free. Like it was like as if I was, it was just a wild how it spilled out of me as if I had rehearsed it a hundred times and I had never done it in front of another human being. Like that was the first time I did it. But I did see Ralph Ben Murgy. I could see him.

He was in the front half. And I saw him walk away. And I said, I was thinking to myself as I'm delivering my, my set. Oh, I lost. lost Ralph. Like, I could feel that, so I could see how a comic could start to spiral when you sees a lot of people leaving. And then Ralph came back and I'm like, oh, thank God, it was just a full bladder. Like, it was like, oh, he just had to pee. Ralph came back. So, he just went pee. Well, it's very admirable. And, and again, a lot of people, you know,

would like to think they could do it. But, you know, it's a very difficult thing to do to stand there for 90 minutes. And I wanted to find out how difficult it was. And I didn't know any way to find out unless I did it. I don't know why just once. Why not across the country? Soft-seat theaters everywhere. Why not? I'll call Ron James and get some tips.

Yeah. Yeah. And was there an after party? Did you have an after party? Was there like a rock star at the alma combo and you're hanging out in your dressing room? No, I bikeed home. So I mingled with the people who stuck around who wanted to tell me like positive things and say they were proud of me or whatever.

And then I hopped on my bicycle. by the way, so I locked up outside the Elmo and somebody stole my headlight from my bicycle. Oh, come on. Yeah, so I have to go buy another $12 headlight from... Was Monica not there?

Monica was there. Oh, but she went... She was dry. So, okay, so the car had my mom, Monica, my son, and my brother and his wife. So five people in that car. So there was no room for this car.

There was no room for my car. I had to get there early for sound check. Right. I just want to back up to something you said. Like you never were, so I know you had some papers down on the floor. You never rehearsed it. You never went through it. Say again?

Oh, by myself on a bike ride, I would say it to myself on a bike ride. I never did it in front of a human. Okay, but so you, how did you decide in which order you were going to do things? Well, I was mean, you know, I think I mentioned this last time, but I had a Google document, like a living breathing Google document. And on bike rides, I would, uh, leave notes to myself as thoughts would enter my head. And then once in a while I'd go into the document and I would sort of like reshape it. And then I would work on the sequencing because there was a lot of segways.

It had a thread. Did you mention Howard's performance at your wedding? Did that come up? Oh, okay. Well, remember, it's all original content. That's not original anymore. Oh, I see. Okay.

I was doing stories that have never. Oh, never said before. Stories that have never been told. There's a guy named Michael Lang. I think, well, that's the bottom line, for the people who have heard every minute of the show, I wanted them to get new content. Well, it's like, dude, I, listen,

you know, let's, let's applaud that. Dan, do you have any, Dan Duran, Humble and Fred News? Any more questions from the scrum? I will just say that's even more impressive because the thing is you did 90 minutes, you'd think, oh, he's just going to lean on all these

stories that he's had over the past 10, 15 years, but all original content, my goodness. No, because that would be an easy 20 minutes on how on he way. Wow. Dan Duran, any final questions from my phone? I had one question.

You just said that this wasn't your idea. I always thought it was. No, never. God, no. No interest in it, really. Like, never had an interest in. Explain to Dan or remind everyone how it came to be. Yeah, yeah.

So this is in the 90 minutes, but I'm going to tell you that it was a woman named Melissa Stein, lovely woman. I've got to know her quite well over the last while, who basically listened to episode 1800 of Toronto Mike, where I did it live from Casilloma and decided I was hilarious and then basically called me up

and I know this woman beyond being a listener but she said, I rented the Elmo combo for you to make your debut and I think she always envisioned I think she envisioned like Jerry Seinfeld or something like I'd go up and be funny for 90 minutes but of course I never, that's not what I do I'm not a stand-up but yeah so this woman

paid for the Elmo she set the ticket price and she handled the ticketing and basically all I did was focus on what my event would be get get an opening act do 90 minutes and then have a grand finale with special guests. Was you happy with the result then? Yeah, I talked to her yesterday.

Yeah, she was, she was happy. I think she might have had a bigger vision where maybe it does go across the country in a small seat, but she has no idea who she's dealing with here because my interest level is close to zero. So she actually, she thought, so how it started was she thought you were very funny in that episode. Right. Thought you could do 90 or do a thing.

She never said a time. She just said, I'll rent the Elma combo, and she called up the Elmo. This guy, you know him. I think Mike Shalute, do you know this name? I know, no. Okay. So Mike, this guy who runs it, he doesn't own it because I don't know who the hell owns it now. But he basically, they worked at a deal, like X,000 dollars.

You can have it for the night. This is what it includes. And then basically, I just knew that on that night, I was able to set, like, whatever. I said, okay, I want doors to open at 630. I want the opening act at 7. I'll go on at 8. I'll wrap at 930. a little grand finale, everybody's going to be out of there by 10.

Well, congratulations, my friend. There you go. Thank you. Hey, why does Rob live in New York State? He worked on Broadway. He works on Broadway. Like, so he did Mamma Mia, for example, in other big Broadway productions. Like, he's a keyboard player in the band, in the pit band and stuff like that?

He did that, but, like, he does. Yeah, I think he runs the music that you hear at Broadway and stuff. I think that's what he's been up to the last. He was in honeymoon suite after Spoons, and then he went to New York to become a. So just to be clear, the entire 90 minutes available at Toronto Mike. Yeah. Go to the website and you can hear what happened at the Elmica. Subscribe to Toronto Mike.

And it's like a couple episodes back. I think I did a couple since then. But it's a couple of episodes back. Well, you know, it's fitting you had that big scrotum because it took big scrotum. That's absolutely right. To do that. Yeah, seriously. Did you take a little penicillin just before he went on stage?

Well, that's the thing. It turns out I'm not allergic to penicillin. That's the, uh, the, the, the, the, the, the, and, you know, the, the, and, of that story is I was never allergic to penicillin so who knows why my balls grew early well listen that'll be for your next 90 minute show my big fat

Greek scrotum all right thank you guys for your support and love love to all of you me's in love and here's this is your theme song are you hearing this yeah there it is and people are going to be wondering why we didn't go it's like there were no free tickets that's right

if it had been three we'd have taken three take it three take care Mike thanks felt all right all right uh Dan Duran still with us dad around Dan Duran yeah yeah man oh yeah that's a lot that is a lot uh I've done uh yeah I did the keynote I've done it a few times it's about an hour and 10 doing stand up the longest I've ever done is around an hour I was supposed to do 45 but it was going well and I was headlining so I could go on as long as I wanted but I'll tell you I know what it's like I know what it's like it's not an easy thing to do. And as far as, you know, I think that's Mike's special skill, actually.

It's not, like, sometimes, you know, you feel the crowd's vibe and you can kind of, you know, as a comedian, if they're laughing or not laughing, it's a pretty, you know, it's like pass fail. But when you're just talking to people, it's, you know, it's interesting that he kept their attention and he did it for an hour and a half and good for him. So they're not giving a shit. Well, that's it. That's his special. That's it. That's not, yeah, not caring to the degree where you'll just say, yeah, fuck it, I'll just tell these stories for 90 minutes.