WTF with Marc Maron Podcast - WTF Uncovered - Live At Now Hear This

Episode Date: December 23, 2016

It's not entirely accurate to say this episode has never been heard by anyone before. About 700 people were in the room at the Now Hear This podcast festival in Anaheim this past October to hear Marc and his producer Brendan McDonald reveal the secrets behind WTF. It's the first time Marc and Brendan ever did anything like this together in front of a live audience. Sign up here for WTF+ to get the full show archives and weekly bonus material! https://plus.acast.com/s/wtf-with-marc-maron-podcast. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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An epic saga based on the global best-selling novel by James Clavel. To show your true heart is to risk your life. When I die here, you'll never leave Japan alive. FX's Shogun, a new original series streaming February 27th exclusively on Disney+. 18 plus subscription required. T's and C's apply. This is a rare thing, okay? It was recorded at the live show that we did at the Now Hear This Festival in October.

Now, there's a few reasons, maybe one, that this is a very special episode. Well, there's two. It was never aired because the recording was played with audio problems, and unfortunately, it was all mixed onto one track by the guy recording it, which made it very hard to edit around the audio issues. There was also an audience Q&A section, but they didn't have an audience mic. Just a bunch of audio problems, which left us with about a half hour of usable sound. That is here. And that obviously wasn't enough to warrant a WTF episode, but since we're doing this thing on Fridays,

we might as well play it for you now. But the special thing about this is, this is the first time that myself and my producer, Brendan McDonald, and he's also obviously the co-creator of WTF, my business partner, been with me a long time. This is the first time that we ever really went on stage together to do a thing in an organized way.

Now, obviously, that meant that I scrambled and floundered and bumbled my way through it. And Brendan, of course, was highly organized and meticulous and had a presentation, a slideshow and everything else. So this is classic straight man, maniac dynamic. Well, I'm not overselling it. I mean, it's me and Brendan, but I guess the point is, we've never done one.

We've never done a live thing. And this was our first try at it, and of course, the festival fucks up the audio. But there's a half hour here, or so, of me and Brendan on stage together doing the Mark and Brendan show

which has never been done live so enjoy so what's the plan, Brendan? You have to understand, Brendan and I have been working together since 2004 when I entered the Air America ensemble, the morning show. If people don't know what that was, that was like a left-wing answer to right-wing talk radio. It launched in 2004 at the time of the presidential election. And we were ready to do big things. Yes.

We were going to stop Bush. Yes. That was the big plan. That didn't work. Yeah. I showed up there with my, like I was very insecure about my political knowledge. I knew I was angry and a reactionary.

And I showed up with my Democracy for Dummies book and thought that would get me through. That's right. Well, what we're here to do today is to go back as far as that and then get up to speed with today, kind of go through the creation of WTF, the process of what we do, you know, Mark and I together, and talk about some things that we've never talked about publicly.

In fact, some of these things are things that Mark does not know that I'm going to bring up. In fact, Mark does not know anything of what I've prepared for today. He is completely in the dark with this. We felt it was kind of like a meta-commentary on our actual relationship, where he does no preparation and I'm completely over prepared. So we'll see how that works out live in front of people. I'm ready. I'm probably more ready given my nature than you are. What does that mean? That means like, yeah, I'm not that

prepared and I'm going to roll with it. But if something doesn't pan out that you've prepared, I got to drive home with you. Well, I thought a good place to start. I'm going to put up on the screen here. Can we see the first photo there? Now, you're not going to know what this is with just looking at it, but I'll tell you the story behind this. That is a piece of paper that was handed to me by the U.S. Secret Service on, well, the date is right here, June 15th, 2015.

This was in advance of the president coming over to Mark's house. And it says, you probably can't read all the fine print there, so let me go through it for you. It says, place this under telephone. Become courteous, listen, and do not interrupt. If you can't tell, this is for if a bomb threat comes in to Mark's house at any time really ever we are now on alert for a bomb threat at Mark's house you're supposed to write down the time the call was

received the time the call has ended and they told me just keep at try to get through all these questions like everything that's there and it's not because it's like a Jason Bourne thing where they're going to like trace the call they just literally want me to do recon so that it's like makes it easier if they have to track down a bomber so the questions there are one when is bomb going to explode two where is it right now what does it look like what kind of bomb is it what will cause it to explode why did you place the bomb that would be very nice if he tells us that uh what is your name like if you get that far that's fantastic that means you're doing a good job with this sheet uh what is your address are you calling from a pay phone which should probably also say Are you calling from a pay phone? Which you'd probably also say, are you calling from the past?

Location and or number, gender, race of caller. That could get dicey if you say that on the sheet. Age of caller, exact wording of threat. As we switch to the next photo, you can put that up. But I want, as we're switching that, you don't have a landline. No, I don't have a landline. And I don't remember you showing me that. No, I think I knew what would happen if I showed you that.

You've got to understand, Mark was away the week that we were preparing for the president to come over, and that couldn't have been timed out better. Because if he was there when they were like dropping massive lines of communication like these these giant boxes to have secure lines this is i can i can tell you how that would have gone what is that why is that there it's making noise i love his impression of me did i get it's always that same voice too what was it just go back for one second. When I got to Air America

and you guys used to do that package of all the news stories from the day. Our friend Dan Pashman would put together notes for you on what news you had to read. For that morning. Yeah, and the first day that he put it next to Mark, Mark said, What is this? I can't read this!

I'm so sorry about your levels there, but that's what happens. Now you, welcome to my world, by the way. Uh, so I'll just run through some of these real quick. Caller's voice. Uh, they're very distinct here. Deep breathing, disguised. Like that's the one I want. Hello, put the bomb on me here. There's also background sounds. Street noises, motor, factory machinery, crockery. A very dainty bomber calling from his kitchen.

What is that sound? I'm scrambling eggs. Yeah, yeah, just stirring the kale, don't worry. Come on. So anyway, we come through this whole process of doing the show that leads up to the President of the United States coming on. Now granted, that was over a year ago. We've obviously had many shows since then. But getting this bomb threat page was probably the moment where

i was like wait a minute what did we do how did we get here like why did this happen this is a like we literally like it's a good place to start to go back right and say like did you know what i was doing before we started working together you were at at WNYC. Did you know? With Leonard Lopate. Well, yeah, he worked there. Oh, you didn't work for him? I didn't work for him, no. He saw him in the halls and whatnot. Actually, can we play audio clip number one?

I figure there might be some things that embarrass you a little bit throughout this show today. So I figure right from the start, I'll embarrass myself. Oh, good. So can I hear embarrassing clip uh number one stocks mostly unchanged at this hour the dow is down just a fraction this is npr you sound and this is wnyc at 304 it's 87 degrees humid outside feels like 90 in new york city good afternoon i'm brendan mcdonald in this the 23rd hour i like that voice black yeah what was that the radio voice that's that that was that vr though yeah yeah that was what i thought you were supposed to do with the radio i thought you're

supposed to get on like like a microphone that's hanging down like this and you talk like those guys. Like that was the job. And I mean, it was super unnatural and I'm very glad my life kind of evolved out of it. And what I think what happened when we started working together, all the stuff that I had been doing in my life up to that point,

which was working as a newscaster, then writing news, then producing news in a newsroom, which brought me over to working at Air America, working with you. I think the kind of radio professionalism I brought to that, and then the style and the creativity and the talent you brought to it, we just started to kind of connect on those things. Yeah, yeah.

When I'd panic, I'd be like, Brendan! Brendan, what does this mean? Explain this to me. And he'd just explain it in terms that, like, me could understand. And I'd be like, okay, okay, I got it. Good. So it's much more simple than, I couldn't even understand basic fucking newspaper articles. Like, the tense of them at, like, four in the morning was sort of like, I don't understand whether saying this is good This is good or bad You realize you shouldn't be doing anything at that time like it the human a human, right? I'm sure I understand policy and shit and I'm not dumb But if you don't know the language it I was not I could not understand clearly what was being talked about right?

And it made me feel stupid remember that email that I got did you talk about that? I don't know what you're bringing up Oh my god We were at Air America and I was the idiot and I still do this today. It's a bad habit. No one went through the emails that came in. Why would you do that? Why would anyone go through those horrible emails that come

to the actual station? Well, I apparently had time to do it. So I would go through all these emails and one of them was just, remember that dude who was just sort of like yeah, Mark Maron, why don't you let the adults talk and just shut up for a while? Like, like he was just tell the child to leave the room, tell the child to leave the room. Me and like and like I couldn't let it go. So I was like, you know, what exactly about me do you is the problem?

And he's like, well, you don't know what you're talking about. You're not really funny. It's just like, why don't you let the grown-ups talk? And then I was like, what specifically is it that you don't think is funny? And I kept going back and forth with this guy until the guy actually said, why do you keep emailing me?

And I was like, how did I become the asshole? You'd think I'd learned the lesson. To me, though, all that stuff was like, in my mind, I'm like, oh, this is great. This guy is gold. And it kept us working together. Even when we were not working at Air America, we always kind of kept contact. I was trying to get Mark in at places I was working. We were always kind of, nah, we're not looking. Like, radio was in the dying days then. He was trying to get Mark in at places I was working. We were always kind of,

no, we're not looking. Radio was in the dying days then. He was at Sirius. I was at Sirius for a while. You did Rosie O'Donnell's show. Connections with other people that I could maybe try to pull Mark in with. It wasn't working. And we finally got a deal to go back to America for a, it was eight years ago, actually. It was during the presidential campaign again. We did a video show with Sam Seder, and that did not go well. The story behind that was, between us, Air America had fired me two or three times because of money problems. And then we get a call from a guy on the inside, this guy Carl, and he's like, hey, there's a new guy with money at Air America,

and I think we should do something. And I'm in the middle of a divorce that is breaking me, like I'm almost bankrupt, and I am just emotionally shattered, incapable of much of anything, and I'm like, well, I'm not in any condition to do anything, and I'm like, unless we can get them to give me enough money to get out of this fucking divorce, I'll do it, but I'm like, unless we can get them to give me enough money to get out of this fucking divorce, I'll do it. But I'm not capable of really functioning

on camera or on a microphone. That's the pitch. So then I start rallying for Sam Seder. Sam Seder is a very brilliant, funny guy, but profoundly annoying. But why did you rally for Sam? Because I Sam Seder is a very brilliant, funny guy, but profoundly annoying. But why did you rally for Sam?

Because I thought we had to do politics, and there was no way I was going to carry that. I think your brain was so wrecked from the divorce that you were like, I need someone to help. Right. I need a partner to do this with. And Carl, the guy who was bringing me in, was like, no, we don't want Sam.

Because Sam was very hard to manage and like and just just bright but annoying I love him I don't know how to say it nicely and but but I fought for Sam like I thought I'm not doing it unless Sam gets gets the job and and he gets the same amount of money as me I just want Sam there and then you fought with Sam forever like wait as soon as me and sam got together i was like oh fuck why'd i do this and and that was the dynamic there but they gave me the money up front i paid off the uh the x and i got through that and i don't think anybody watched that show no well constantly warring with your co-host does not engender a lot of audience sympathy i think it was it was like one of those things like you could watch it like the same way you watch like bum fights

or something like that. Like people really just go like watch YouTube things that are bad. Like they want to watch the brutality. We did it every day for a year. So that was canceled unsurprisingly. And as it was winding down, I think we saw the writing on the wall.

Like I think we just wanted to keep doing what we were doing uh but you know at this time that this was going on I was really listening to podcasts I was uh I wouldn't say I was like an early adopter but I was definitely like an early-ish uh bandwagon person like 2007 I had started listening to a lot of podcasts the thing is they were just mostly radio shows. Like, I would listen to This American Life and Fresh Air as podcasts instead of, it was just better for our schedule. The Best Show with Tom Sharpling, that was, like, a big one that I was, you know,

as an early proponent of podcasts, I was like, it's great. Tom's show is three hours, and you can listen to it whenever you want. But the real show that made me have the confidence to say to you like yeah let's do this was bill simmons podcast so like there probably be no wtf without or in whatever form it's in without the bill simmons podcast because i was listening to that as a fan of his writing and i was like oh this I've never heard this guy in my life I've only ever read him for a decade yeah and he has a podcast great let me listen to it and like his voice like in the way that we had been spending time in radio going in and out of

meetings with these executives who tell you like what radio needs to sound like and what you need to do and you heard my dumb voice on that thing, like this like mindset of what radio is. And like the first time I heard Bill Simmons, I'm like, oh my God, they allowed this guy to have a show? Like his voice is so not a radio voice. I listened to it for like five minutes, 10 minutes. I'm like, oh, he's sounding just like the stuff he writes. This is great.

And it was the moment that it clicked for me. Like, you don't have to do this bullshit that they're telling us to do. the stuff he writes, this is great. And it was the moment that it clicked for me, like, you don't have to do this bullshit that they're telling us to do. Like, let's just do what we can do. So this Air America thing wound down and you just, I think you had been on,

started to be on a lot of podcasts, Keith and the Girl probably, right? Not a lot, but I did Keith and the Girl. You did enough that you had this sense that it was out there.

You had to go all the way out to Queens to do Keith and the Girl, and they had this whole studio set up in their house, and I'm like, people are listening to this? And they're like, yeah, a lot of people. And I'm like, you could just set up, and I was like, holy fuck. Yeah. Let's do that. So like two days after we get fired, you send me this email.

Uh-oh. This is a good one. All right. It says, we should talk about the podcast idea Jesse Thorne offered some guidance and I like this part it seems that between your know-how and the ease with which we can move things

I don't know what that meant and make things on the computers we should start a pay podcast. It wouldn't kill us time-wise, and it wouldn't take much. It took a lot, actually. But yeah, that was... Poetic, poetic.

Move things, you know. We move through time and space, and we're good on the computers. That was almost like something from your dad. I think he sent that email. But the pay podcast, that was the idea. We were kind of basing it off Jimmy, off Pardo. Jimmy Pardo was doing Never Not Funny as a thing you subscribe to for seasons, right? And they would put like 10 minutes of it on iTunes and then you'd pay to have access to the full thing. I think that's what we thought

we would wind up doing. But do you remember that you actually wanted a co-host? Sure, I do. It seems to be a recurring theme. I need someone there to look at. I have this email from you from August 13th, 2009, the subject line, proops. And you said, you think I should approach Greg to do this podcast? I'm sure he'd be into it. And my response was, aside from guests that you are interviewing, you do not need anyone else.

To think otherwise is a fatal mistake for this project. Because all I was thinking was, oh great, we're going to do a podcast and he's going to be at war with Greg Proops for a year. Just like what we just went through. It's like Proops terrorizing me with words. Yes, I'm sure it would have been Proops terrorizing you and you just like,

why is he always doing this to me? Oh yeah, he came up to me once. You know that story, right? I knew Proops in San Francisco. We did comedy together and there used to be these live shows in the morning for radio Was Alex Bennett show on live 105 and we were at some show

Cobbs comedy club at like 6 in the morning and proofs is smoking pot and he had he got the hybrid pot before anybody He's like you want to smoke pot and I'm like, all right, so we smoked some weed and I'm like incapacitated and We go out there and he knows I'm not even functioning. And we're doing a live show at 7 in the morning, and there's four comics on, and I'm like... Like I couldn't even put thoughts together. And Greg kept going, he kept going like,

what do you think, Mark? And I'm like... And then after the show, he walked up to me and goes, I invented you. He was my first choice, huh? That's great. So we didn't use proofs, but we did... You were the one who said,

what do you think about WTF as a concept? Not just as a name. That was like the concept of the show. Yeah, I had this big idea. It's the most important philosophical question of our time. Like we could wrap segments around it and it just gives us

a big umbrella. I felt like it's broad and we can fit anything into it. Well, we tried to. We would have the WTF question of the day. Or no more Jew stuff. Yes, know this We tried, too. We would have the WTF question of the day. It was ill-conceived. Or no more Jew stuff. Yes, know this about Jew crap was a segment we, and it was no, N-O, this about Jew crap.

Because someone said that in an email. Because I don't know who I was talking to. It was probably me and Weiss or somebody. And I'm Jewish. It lit some fire in some dumb anti-semites head and he he sent that and we were like that's a segment yes those are less funny today yes considering what we're going through yeah nationally uh can we see a photo uh number four uh on there the original name was the WTF show with Mark Maron uh we very quickly did the

Facebook thing like like somebody Justin Timberlake that and was like drop the the and the show I I don't remember how but that logo which was done by a guy we're still in contact with Nathan Nathan Smith up in the Northwest we have not changed that logo despite you looking nothing like that picture anymore. Why is that in your mind? Well, because at the beginning of the podcast thing, there were podcasts around, but there was that menu on iTunes

and that turquoise just popped. It was like in the face. It demanded attention. There really was nothing else around it in those little tiles that looked like it. It's like, look at that thing. What the hell is that show? So we never changed it.

Now it's sort of a nostalgia thing. What am I going to put up there? Yeah, it's like it has good juju. I don't mean that in the Jew way. No, I know. There's a little of that, though. Yeah. So our first episode was September 1st, 2009.

The guest was Jeff Ross, although guests were not the primary driver. It was like to have a guest segment So our first episode was September 1st, 2009. The guest was Jeff Ross, although guests were not the primary driver. It was like to have a guest segment and then several other segments around it. Right, Matthew Weiss. Yeah, Matthew Weiss was a friend of yours who you guys would do kind of a little banter on. We wanted to kind of make him

like the Carl Pilkington of the show. Your dad would get some time on the phone. He didn't know he was on the phone. Did not know he was on the phone, as we have always done. We used to do movie reviews with him on the morning show. Your dad would get some time on the phone. He didn't know he was on the phone. Did not know he was on the phone, as we have always done. We used to do movie reviews with him on the morning show. This was illegal, by the way, that we would record Mark's dad and

put him on the air without him knowing it. He would never know, and I'd just be like, you seen any movies lately? And he'd be like, yeah, that... Hotel Rwanda was a good shoot-em-up. He goes, it was like Schindler's List, but with more action.

And we would make fake posters of them with those taglines on them. Or like, my favorite was Sideways. He said, yeah, that's Sideways. That GM Cento, he really tied the picture together never could get names right it's paul what's his name giamatti yeah that's a genetic apparently oh you'll do it to people like in front of them you're like in terms of names you're like you and you were jim they're like Paul I try

so that was the first show in an email from me to you that night September 1st 2009 the subject line was just as of 11.33pm and then the body of the email was 1836 downloads

and your response was whoa that's more than I thought you 36 downloads and your response was whoa that's more than I thought you and I said in less than 24 hours yeah that's more than I thought talking under 2000 downloads you said great maybe we're on to something

and I said right if we get a third of those people to stick around and pay 10 bucks a month it would net us $75,000 a year And I said, right, if we get a third of those people to stick around and pay $10 a month, it would net us $75,000 a year. So we should definitely hang on to this. We might be on to something. Now your response to this is actually something that has guided us through until today.

You said, well, let's just keep the quality up and keep consistent and try to build this out right. That's a very clear statement of purpose and i think that the consistency thing is like the most important thing we ever hit on in terms of of keeping the show going and making it uh something that people could develop a relationship with and rely on it was like one of the things we learned from working on morning radio every day, five days a week, to know people would know that you would be there for them and be there with certain segments at certain times.

And just that relationship was important, regardless of having an on-demand audio program. We knew people were going to expect it. And it was crazy because, you know, crazy because we're both workaholics. The shit we used to do, we had this Monday and Thursday thing from the beginning and we've done a new show every Monday and Thursday. We've never missed. We've never missed a show.

But sometimes... Thank you. It was crazy, the commitment we had because I didn't want him to be mad. I always thought that I better work as hard as Brendan. So there'd be times, I don't know if you planned this into the thing, like I'd be stuck traveling for stand-up and I couldn't get home to record the intro for the next day. I've done crazy shit.

There was one time where I'm like stuck in an airport and I've got my recorder with me because I always brought it with me in case I want to need to interview somebody or I got to do an intro and I had to get it to him and I wasn't going to get out in time. So I rented a conference room in the American airlines lounge to do the intro for the fucking episode. Renting American airlines conference room. I actually wrote that down. And then, and then there was the other time where I was at what I was in Buffalo. I was in Buffalo and I got snowed in. Buffalo College Studio. It says it right there.

Right. So we didn't prepare. So then I'm like, what the fuck am I going to do? I didn't have my equipment with me. I'm like, is there a college around? I'll just go to the college radio station, tell them who I am, and they'll let me use their shit. And I get there and they had no idea who I was.

I was just this crazy guy going like, I got to do an intro for tomorrow. And these students are like, I don't know, do we do, yeah, okay. And they lead me into this room and I record it. I'm like, do you have the file? What are you going to put it on? They're like, well, you want it on a CD? I'm like, that's not going to help me.

And then I think I got it on a CD that I had to rip onto my computer, but then I ended up getting home in time. Yeah, it didn't even matter. But that mania. I wonder if those kids remember me. That mania drove our desire to make it good. Like, we weren't going to put that time and commitment into it if it was a shit product. So I think that was those things, the consistency drove everything. Yeah. It was very important. It remains very important. Well, one month after we did the first episode, it's actually

just slightly under a month, September 29th. Yeah. You sent me a, an email. The subject line was just, dude. There are a lot of those, by the way. And this said, I think we really have something here. It seems to be spreading. Like, I read that when I was just going through old emails, and I'm wondering, what was it that you thought was, like that early on, a month, what was spreading? Was it comics coming up to you saying it was good or how did you feel so confident a month in because i i think what started to happen

was that i started to realize that comics were listening to it because of comics so and and and the stuff that wasn't normally talked about in public but just in general it became this weird thing where you know because of the comedic community and who we are, we all, well, not we all, but there's a lot of us that know each other from different points, and, you know, we, it's like a big campus. You know, I don't know a lot of people now, but this was a long time, 10 years ago almost. So it was this weird element of, like, I didn't know what that guy was up to. You know, like, guys we all knew that no one, you know, like, I hadn't heard what that guy was up to you know like guys we all knew that no one you know like I hadn't heard about that guy in a while it like I just

felt like it became this weird community service to sort of check in with dudes yeah and then other like I don't know when we did a tell but like I I'm pretty sure Dave no one has ever heard David tell talk for an hour ever and like in like I would get excited about that stuff. I've known Atel for at that point, like a decade and we're friends, but you know, I've never had a conversation with him. And I think that started to make me realize that a lot of the conversations I was having were first conversations with people I've known forever. And you don't really realize in your life just how that really is. Like you can know somebody for a decade and just like he said when he played that thing for me from WMIC I'm like I've been working with you

for over 10 years and I don't know that so when I sat down with Dave Attell by a swimming pool during the day which was unusual you know he was in LA he's like well that's that's that was all I would ever that's how me and Attell worked Like Attell, like the exchanges were like one time I remember like I got to stand up New York. I had a Honda Civic or Honda Accord that my dad had given me. And I walk into the club and Dave looks out the window and goes, where'd you get that car? And I go, it's my dad's. There was only 150,000 miles on it. And he goes, that's a lot of running away. But that was our whole relationship. So when I talked to him for a whole hour,

I think an entire community of comedians that respected him were sort of like, oh, my God. And that made me very proud to have that, to bring that community together, to reintegrate myself back into it, having been in sort of bitter Siberia for a while, and then to have it kind of like be this thing that we all could have. Well, you were right. It was

spreading, and if we could see photo five, you'll see the first three years of the show. That's the audience, and that's every episode. Like, every data point on there is an episode of the show. You can really see how the audience grew. That big spike there around 2011 was when the New York Times profiled the show,

which was as big of anything other than having the president on, as you can see, really jumped us up. That was a crazy day, that New York Times that day. Holy shit. day that New York Times that day. Holy shit. I don't not only do I not prepare but I seem to like, isn't that when I taped the album too?

Like I was coming to New York to tape This Has To Be Funny at Union Hall in Brooklyn. So I was going to interview with the New York Times and I had to do two sets for a CD and the night before I left for New York, I broke up with a woman.

And it was not good. Like, you know, the police were involved. So, that's funny. But I created all this chaos, and I just remember sitting there with the New York Times guy and what turned out to be one of the most important things that ever happened to us, getting these texts from this woman going like,

I'm going back to the house when you're not there. I'm going to break in and live there again. So, but that was a comforting place for me. Like, at least I was grounded in some exciting stuff in preparation. Well, that definitely has been integrated into our process. Like, I think that let's get into our process a little bit because I think some people might not know

the way we do the show. We are sitting here together and we talk to each other virtually every day in some way or shape or form. But you're in L.A., I'm in New York, and that's how it's always been, aside from the first few episodes, and, you know, Mark does his recordings, we do, logistically, we work together with everything, set everything up together, but he records the interview, no one

else is in there, he sends it to me, I edit it by myself, no one else is editing it, and that's the show, that's how we put it together, and I does your does your process entail anything that you've now kind of like made regular for yourself like you know in terms of doing the show getting out there on the mic yeah it does like what well for a while there I had this habit of really being panicky that I needed to get into the garage with the guests walking in through the house behind me to turn on the mics before they knew they were on. It was very important for me to have that going. So it became this thing where,

and I think in a lot of episodes, you hear the guests go like, are we on? And I'm like, yep, we've been on for seven minutes. I feel like we invented that for podcasting. Really? Because everyone does it now. Yeah. Like I'll listen to any show and a guest is like, oh, are you recording?

I'm like, I know where you got that. It's better because when you say yes, they're already in regular conversation tone. Usually what I do, you're right, I do create a certain amount of chaos. And you know that I create chaos because because sometimes I call you, and I'm like, well, what am I going to talk to this guy about? So, because I do not know how to write questions down. It just becomes this collage of ideas that I'll, you know, splatter onto a paper. If it's a musician, I'll spend two days listening to every album they ever made for no reason, because how is that going to come up? You know what I mean? Like, when am I going to just go song for song? But I need to do it to understand the person. Like, I'll never watch other interviews.

I don't watch them on TV. Sometimes I'll see the movie. I'll watch a TV show. But generally, what I do is, like, I'll go to Wikipedia, which isn't even a good resource, but for some reason I want to know where they were born and where they grew up as children so I can see them as children in my head. And I go in and I'm like, you were a child once. That's what I'm thinking. What was that kid like? I don't say that. Sometimes I do.

But I need to see I need to see that they were human and I picture this whole thing and I think the the biggest thing that I realized and what I'm hoping to happen is that when you're talking to famous people or people that we have a an idea that we know their public personality you make assumptions about celebrities of all kinds you were you're only given really what they give you and maybe you get some sidebar stuff some gossip or whatever so you always go in with these preconceived notions and and I do as well and I'm always

amazed every fucking time that they're just people that's it like because like you know you like I'm talking we're gonna put up Roger Waters tomorrow and Roger Waters you know outside of his politics made some of the you know these albums that are you know I don't know about your childhood but you know Dark Side of the Moon and animals like they're magic they're like, what is that? This guy's a mystical warrior. He's a wizard. And then he gets there and you're like, oh, you're just an old guy. And it's so relieving to, like my need to connect with people is how I prepare. And that's when you hear me scrambling, which sometimes you do, is like,

if somebody comes into the garage and they're expecting to be interviewed, I'm like, oh shit. Because I don't interview anybody. You listen to any of those shows and tell me I'm interviewing somebody. It's me going like, what's up? Is that your car? You know, whatever it is. You know, I just need the conversation to turn into people talking because like sometimes if they're just sort of like they come in and like all right go ahead I'm like oh no I don't I didn't prepare any questions and I don't I have ideas so like if they can't meet me on those ideas sometimes for the first 10 minutes or so the most recent one in mind was when Patricia Arquette came in, you know, and she's

great, but she was just, she didn't really listen to the show. Her boyfriend sort of said it was a good thing to do, and she was just sort of like, and I'm like, what? You know, like, and it's sometimes, if you listen to it, it takes about 10 or 15 minutes. Like, John C. Reilly, he was right out in front of it. He said, like, I don't like doing this. I don't want to talk too much about myself. I don't want to ruin the mystique. And he was committed to that. And thank God I had a clown painting in my dining room. Because, you know, he noticed the clown painting. And then I asked him about clowns. He said, what did he say? He's like, well, if you want to talk about clowns, that I can do. And it was like 20 minutes on clowns.

And it's like the greatest thing because, and I said this earlier, it's like most people, you can get information on people, but the thing is is that, like, you know, it's much better if John C. Reilly talks about clowns for 20 minutes because, you know, how are people going to judge that as an interview? It's like, they're just going to go like, that was fucking weird. It's kind of interesting that he's interested in clowns, but passionately interested in clowns.

And I didn't write that down on the piece of paper. Make sure you talk to John C. Reilly about clowns. But while it's happening, I'm like, oh, God, this is beautiful. He's talking about clowns, but while it's happening, I'm like, oh, God, this is beautiful. He's talking about clowns for 15 minutes. Now, some of the stuff that you, you know, we've grown this to a business. We do ads on the show, sometimes for Casper, and I would say that that is probably where, when I'm editing the show, I hear the most kind of, I would almost say it's where you vent the most is when you're doing these ad reads. Because like if you're in an interview and something's not going right, you're going to have to figure out a way around that, right? Or if you're doing

a monologue and you're not on the ball with where it needs to be, you might need to stop and start again. With ads, you're just plowing through it, and you're getting furious. And that fury is allowed to happen because he knows I'm going to edit it out. So why don't I play for you right now? This is audio clip two. I'll be there for a live show with my producer, Brendan McDonald. Plus more shows like...

Plus more shows you love like The Moth. Just... Fuck me. Just post once and watch your qualified candidates roll into ZipRecruiter's easy... Just post once and watch your qua... Fucking cunt. It stars real comedians and real life wives. Cameron Esposito and Rhea Butler. Butcher. fucking cunt. It stars real comedians and real life wives. Cameron Esposito and Rhea Butler. Butcher.

Fucking cunt. Squarespace gives you all the tools you need. Squarespace gives you all the tools... Cunt. Squarespace gives you all the tools you need for top... Squarespace... And if you... And if you want to sell stuff on your site, Squarespace

gives you all the tools. Oh my God. Fucking balls. And if you want to sell stuff on your site, Squarespace gives you all the tools you need for top-notch. God fucking cunt. So I hear that a lot. And it just has made me sad that you never hear it.

So like, now you do. It's great. I also hear this. The way that I edit the show, I like to take two passes with each episode at least. And so a lot of times when I want to get just a lay of the land of what was talked about or what's going on, before I go in and finally edit it, I'll listen to it in double speed. So like I hear the show a lot.

Every time I listen to it, I hear this. Can we hear number three? All right, let's do this. How are you? What the fuckers? What the fuck buddies? What the fuck news? What the fucksters?

What the fuck tuckians? What the fuck Americans? What's happening? I'm Mark Maron. This is my podcast, WTF. Thank you for listening. If you're new to the podcast, welcome. If you've been here a while, here we go again.

So that's like you just doing your normal intro, but when you hear that with that other stuff I played for you, can we hear that? Number four, it's like the most profane chipmunk. Squarespace gives you all the tools you need for top... Squarespace... And if you want to sell stuff on your site, Squarespace gives you all the tools...

Oh, my God. Fucking fellas. And if you want to sell stuff on your site, Squarespace gives you all the tools you need my God. Fucking fellas. And if you want to sell stuff on your site, Squarespace gives you all the tools you need for top notch. God fucking cunt. That's my job.

That's the fun part. I love you. It's great working with you. I love you and thank you everybody for coming. Fuck the game. Lock the gates! That was that. That was me and Brendan McDonald.

Have a happy and safe holiday. Don't hurt yourself or others. Try to think about the future a little bit in terms of what your responsibility to it is and to your fellow human beings. Okay? Merry, merry. Boomer lives! Thank you. Hi, it's Terry O'Reilly, host of Under the Influence. Recently, we created an episode on cannabis marketing.

With cannabis legalization, it's a brand new challenging marketing category. And I want to let you know we've produced a special bonus podcast episode where I talk to an actual cannabis producer. I wanted to know how a producer becomes licensed, how a cannabis company competes with big corporations, how a cannabis company markets its products in such a highly regulated category, and what the term dignified consumption actually means. I think you'll find the answers interesting and surprising. Hear it now on Under the Influence with Terry O'Reilly. This bonus episode is brought to you by the Ontario Cannabis Store and ACAS Creative.

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