Take Me Back to My Happy Land | The Ska Podcast Mini Series Finale!

Chris Raub joins the show for this final episode to share his experience as a ska fan and musician from the 90's through today. For me, hearing from truly talented musicians on what stands out the most about ska is fascinating.

We also discovered that we were both at the same Aquabats show I talked about in Episode 3!

•Chris has his own podcast that you can check out!
https://www.therecoveryjunkies.com

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Mini Series Episode 6

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:34

Hello and welcome. My name is Tom, and you're listening to episode six of the ska podcast, or you're watching it because if you're a Patreon member or YouTube channel supporter, then you get a video version. And we do have a video version for you today, which is also why I'm using this bright green windscreen on my microphone, which I got specifically for this podcast, because for some reason, when I think of ska, bright green is a color that pops to mind. And I just figured anyway. Anyway, that's neither here nor there. Uh today I'm super excited because I have another guest. And wouldn't you guess that uh I didn't actually expect so many people to come on this show? Most of the episodes have not been just me, which is awesome. It's very different than other stuff that I do. And I've been having a lot of fun getting to know people and getting to know their stories and their experiences with this specific genre of music and music in general. And uh our guest today, I'm very, very excited to talk to. So, this is somebody who I have known through like online communication for a while, for you know, channel comments, Instagram messages and stuff like that, Discord, all that good stuff. Uh, however, we've not actually talked, quote unquote, in person until right now. And so this is gonna be, you know, our chance to get to know each other. But just like when I talked about my experience going to that one Aquabat show at the key club 20 years ago, and it was like as soon as you find people, you just feel like you click and things work. It's kind of the same thing in this case. So uh I'm very excited. I'm just gonna jump into it. Our guest today is uh Chris Robb. Not two people, but one person with the first names of two people. So uh good morning, Chris.

SPEAKER_01 2:17

Good morning. It's good to talk with you. I'm so excited to be here. And just to even jump right in, I was at that show too at the key club. Yes, which when you talked about that episode a couple episodes back, you're like, you meet people and things. I'm like, maybe we did. Who knows? I have no idea, but I was there too. That was my second Aquabats show.

SPEAKER_00 2:38

That was my and my second what was your first one?

SPEAKER_01 2:41

So my I so that was part of in the preparation for this. I tried to look up when it was and I can't find it. I went on like concert archives, or at least it's not like super specific. It was with Real Big Fish at the Hollywood Palladium. This was 1997. Um, so this was just right before they released The Fury of the Aquabats. Um, and K-Rock, the the the that was the local radio, that is the local radio station. You talked about it as well, kind of being able to hear that from afar from where you lived, of course. Me being SoCal native, that was my radio station. They were putting it on, and Aquabats were the opener, and then it was Real Big Fish. And so that was kind of my first seeing of both of them live. And so when I looked it up, it shows that Real Big Fish played there, but it does not show that the Aquabats were with them. But they were the opener. Yeah, that sounds about right.

SPEAKER_00 3:30

They wouldn't have been like on the bill at the point.

SPEAKER_01 3:33

I tried to find my ticket stubs because I've kept that stuff, and I spent weeks, and at some point I just had to give up and go like I know it, I know it happened because that was my first kind of foray into like the whole spectacle that is the Aquabats, of course, listening to them, but then like seeing them live and seeing just like you said, all of the different things that happen on stage, and it even connected the dots once the Fury of the Aquabats came out. Like when they would do the the thugs on the on the stage, that's when they played the fight song, which is in the album. So it's like when you're listening to that kind of on its own, you wonder, like, okay, this is kind of interesting and funny. But when you put it together with like theatrics on stage, totally makes sense.

SPEAKER_00 4:14

Absolutely. It's so cool. I have I have my old MacBook is off over here off screen, and I have a spreadsheet on there, which you just reminded me I need to save because I made a spreadsheet of like every date, the venue, and the opening acts and stuff. And I need to like dig so you would remember that at this show the opener was Digital Unicorn, which was Prince Adam, and that was where I saw Theremon for the first time in my life because he played the Theremon at one point. Um, I bought one because of that. That was like my next big purchase musically, and it's still it's right over here. And the crazy thing too is like something went wrong with it and it didn't work for like eight years. I don't know why. And recently, like a month ago, I just opened it up and just started just soldering stuff, you know. Like I don't know. Um, and it started working again, so now I have my working theremand back. So how crazy! So we're at the exact same very I didn't know that. I'm my mind is like blown right now.

SPEAKER_01 5:11

It's a small world, but it's not a small world type of thing. But especially when you think about just how big it exploded in Southern California, so it wasn't just Orange County, and I'll I'll talk probably about that in a little bit, but how far it extended, yes, it would have gone to all the way to India, to Burbank, California, where I was from. So that when there were big venues where these bands played, we all came from everywhere to them.

SPEAKER_00 5:36

Yeah, yeah. And it's oh my gosh, that's just so crazy. Um, and like speaking of India, which is my my hometown now, uh, the Aquabats, this is not just the Aquabats podcast, uh, but they they were dropped from Golden Voice Records in 1999, 1998, because the record company lost a whole bunch of money because they wanted to put on this music festival out in the middle of the desert, and it was like, who would want to go to a music festival in the middle of the desert in this, like at these, you know, near this Coachella Valley thing, and lost a whole bunch of money and then dropped the Aquabats, and that's they lost their record deal because of Coachella.

SPEAKER_01 6:16

Is that when they went to Orchada at that point?

SPEAKER_00 6:19

Well, yeah, well, I I don't that's like I don't know if that's like if that was like a real label or just their thing.

SPEAKER_01 6:26

I'm always like because it's always like they're so good at to where that yeah, that could definitely be something that was made up by by the Bat Commander or something like that.

SPEAKER_00 6:34

Well, because it's it's clearly Parker Jacobs artwork, so I was always like, is this is this your thing or not? But then it became a real thing, and then eventually they were on nitro records, and then nitro went out of business, and now they're just like I think they're just doing their own the self self um which makes sense.

SPEAKER_01 6:49

Um this day and age you can do that with anything, any type of technology. Any any prosumer, of course, those guys are pros, can put stuff out with the equipment that we all have nowadays.

SPEAKER_00 6:58

Yeah, I mean, yeah, it's so crazy. So that actually brings me to a good point. Can you tell us a little bit about yourself, like who you are, what you do, where you're at? Like let us get to know Chris Rob.

SPEAKER_01 7:11

Well, um, I uh I'm just a little bit older than you, so I'm about five years older, and I think that's where it's it's neat to hear our our SCOD journeys because while we listened and liked a lot of the same bands, a lot of some of the things that I experienced was just right before you. And because of it, certain things are a little bit different. Um, but I'm but as far as right now, I'm I'm married, I've got five kids. We're pretty crazy that we have that many. Um it's it's a chaotic household to be sure. Uh, but lots of lots of fun. Uh live in Southern California still. Um I was I was a music teacher for about 10 years. That was what I went to school for and got a bunch of degrees in in music and things like that. So that's a lot of my background. Um nowadays I work as a corporate trainer for I'll just say a fruit company. That's all I'm really supposed to say when I'm doing things like this. You can fill in the blanks for a technology fruit company um that we might be using some of their stuff today. Um, that's kind of what my day job is. Um but yeah, um, so I started out playing the saxophone at the age of five. So that was uh my main instrument that came from kind of a little side story watching Mr. Rogers Neighborhood. He um had like one of those little um tapes come from Mr. McPheely, who was the uh the mailman, and it was a a tape to show a factory on how they made instruments, and it showed how they made a saxophone. I was probably like three years old, maybe four. And at that point, I told my my mom that like I want to play that, I want to play the saxophone. So the next year, once I started in kindergarten, I went to a private school, a very small private school, but uh they even started band stuff for for elementary students. So I started playing saxophone and five, probably not well, but I started it then.

SPEAKER_00 9:03

That's crazy though, because I remember watching a Mr. Rogers segment where they went to an instrument factory, but it was trumpets, and I thought it it was like a super cool, those are always like my favorite parts of that show, but it's it's just so funny. I didn't start playing the trumpet after that, but um it was probably the same thing. I was like three, four years old watching this thing, and it was the coolest thing. This, like, there's keys and there's whatever, and it's metal and it's shiny, and you know, of course, it always ends with someone playing it really well. They pull it off the line and someone plays it. Yeah, yeah, absolutely.

SPEAKER_01 9:35

Super funny, anyway. Yeah, so I did that throughout uh my my formative years into high school was at a part of a very, very large music program in high school, uh huge marching band where I was in marching band during the during the fall season, and then in the spring season, we did like jazz band and like concert band classical type stuff. Uh, but kind of uh concurrently with that, um I started playing the guitar at age 10, uh just because I started to get into rock music. And so your like band that like changed you, which was the Aquabats, for me that was not a ska band, it was Pearl Jam, because that was kind of who came out in the early 90s, and that's where I was able to kind of take something that was mine. I have a sister that's nine years older than me, so I had been listening to music kind of since I was younger because she was so much older, but that was always her music, and that was the music from the 80s, things like Depeche Mode or even Devo or um, you know, Guns N' Roses, things like that. But that was always her music, and so this was finally something that I could identify as as mine. So I was living in kind of this like dual world from like the middle school into high school of I like rock music because I like playing that and I'm liking that I'm learning the guitar, but I also really love playing the saxophone, and then entered 1995 for me in high school. So that was my sophomore year in high school, and I had a fellow friend in band who played the saxophone. He was listening to something, and I saw the CD case because he had a compact CD, you know, a disc man, you know, that was what was back in the day. For the TikTok crowd out there, you know, you know, we got it, we got a compact disc player, and it was uh the album Question the Answers from the Mighty Mighty Bostones. And I said, What is that? And he goes, You don't know who the Mighty Mighty Bostones are? And I said, I don't. And he and he just and he handed it to me and he said, This is yours, which I thought also was kind of odd. He goes, You don't even need to borrow it. You need to have this. So just take this and listen to this. And what he ended up doing, like in another period throughout that day, he put in he he said, I don't want you to listen to it from top to bottom. He changed the order. He said, I want you to listen to this song first, and then this, followed by this. And so I went home that day and did, and it was just like, Oh my gosh, the the world, my two worlds can be combined. Because they were more, you know, they call themselves ska core, of course. They're they're a little more edgier than like kind of lighthearted aquabats, real big fish, things like that. So I'm getting my rock fix, but at the same time, I'm hearing this saxophone just kind of blaring right through through the chorus, or lots of times on on the um, you know, a little counter melody within the verses. And I was like, this is just absolutely amazing. And very much like you, I think you said you went to the warehouse when you uh Oh yeah, where the warehouse. Where the warehouse the warehouse. And I went there and I had to get all of the other albums, which at that point was was Ska Cor, The Devil and More, Um, Don't Know How to Party, and I think one other, and and was just kind of totally immersed in that. So that was really my first intro into ska music was the Mighty Mighty Boss Tones. Um, a little bit later, then it was kind of some of the early stuff of No Doubt, which that's I feel like that's a that's a touchy topic for a lot of people, whether or not without hesitation and be like, no, no, it's it's a car not. I'm always hesitant to because of the fact that when they were really at the height of their popularity, the horn players went bye-bye. Right. So that's that's a whole other debate, maybe at some point. Um, because that's that's hard for lots of ska bands, whether you know, as they moved in, you know, even even with the Aquabats was shifting kind of their having to to change into kind of some new wave sound, it was more with the keyboards and the synthesizers and kind of the horn players went. Um, and other bands have kept them. And so who who knows what's obviously the the best solutions out there, but uh but yes, some early no doubt where they did have the horn players still. Oh yeah, but then there's good stuff in there. So that was kind of my intro into it, but really um where things kind of shifted gears was uh in my junior year of high school. That's where I think a lot of people discovered that wanted to do the the classic, you know, high school garage band that hey uh all these horn players in and band, like we we want you over here because we want to do this ska thing, and so we need some horn players. And this thing that was seemingly uncool or geeky, you know, the term the band geek. Well, now we are being desired by the people who are like the the the rock cool kids, so to speak. Um, and it was just a very, very interesting time when different members of the band would be plucked out to play in a local band over here, a local band over here, and most of them didn't kind of amount to much, as as most cities probably did with kind of a amateur ska scenes. Um but but I joined a ska band and we were we were called nothing special, and it was comprised of the best musicians from our choir organization at school, which was kind of like the the guitar players, the bass players, the drummers, the singers that would accompany our our big choir program and kind of the best of the instrumental program, which was I what I was in. It was a two sax players and two trumpet players, and we formed a ska band. And that was really cool because at that point, as ska was starting to move from um Orange County up to SoCal, it really didn't hit until that 97 year. There was a couple years where we were hearing it, and K-Rock was playing a little bit of it, but these bands were not coming up to play in SoCal, it just wasn't happening yet, or at least from my purview, you know, when we would try to search for bands at local venues, it it just weren't wasn't happening yet. So we're wanting them to come up, and it just wasn't wasn't quite happening yet. So we would we would do our own thing. And um, and so then coincidentally, as they started to come up to play some of the smaller venues, even though they're they're pretty big, like the Roxy, the Whiskey on Sunset, the Viper Room, the Key Club, the Troubadour, um, that would mean that they would have some ska nights where they were the main headliner, but they wanted some ska bands to be the openers entered nothing special and people like us where we'd we we signed up and said we would love to do it. We would had to, of course, create demo tapes and things like that. Demo tapes, not CDs yet, demo tapes. They wanted to see our tape, and it's like, gosh, such a such a change can happen within within 10 years from like 95 to 2005. Because I knew a lot of what you experienced was in the early 2000s, correct?

SPEAKER_00 16:23

Yeah, yeah. That was I I think I listened to my first Aquabat song in the year 2000, and so everything kind of from there is what it's solidified because late 90s for me were a lot of like new metal because that was thing, but also like there was always uh the offspring were always in there, and so they kind of like had that sort of like a lot more of like fun songs, I guess, at least compared to like Limp Biscuit and stuff. Um, and then ironically, although it wasn't ironic at the time, my best friend got um like several smash mouth CDs, and I was like, oh, these are super cool, and I like this is before it became like a meme or whatever to you know, like Smash Mouth. I was like, this is just like super fun, upbeat, upbeat songs about walking on the sun and all this kind of stuff. And so that was like, yeah, but I it never occurred to me that like, oh, you really enjoy listening to this kind of music, you should actively seek it out instead of just you know listening to whatever happens to pop up because it's it's what is popular in the moment. And I don't know why it took me like years to get to that point, whatever. I was young and ignorant.

SPEAKER_01 17:34

Side note, as I'm looking at our our microphones, I know you said you that the you the screen represents ska, but really because I have the black one, you really should have a white um uh a white. You know what? You're 100% right.

SPEAKER_00 17:46

I should I'm looking around like I have one, I do not have a white wing screen. I need to have the white. I don't, I need to order it now. I need to go to reporterstore.com.

SPEAKER_01 17:56

You've been saying it. I was going to get the green one because you had the blue and the purple. I'm like, well, I can't do that. And Doc Rock has the purple, so I can't do that. And so I was gonna do the green, and you've taken did you just go to their website and buy every like colorful color?

SPEAKER_00 18:09

I should for the environmental impact of like not shipping all these things, but it's like, I'll get the blue one. The blue one's cool. Heather needs a purple one. Let's get the purple one. Now I want the green one. It's like I just need to go and get the rest of them because I know that's going to happen.

SPEAKER_01 18:25

I want the dark blue.

SPEAKER_00 18:26

Okay, I'll keep a light blue, which also like you could have the same color as me, I promise. It's okay.

SPEAKER_01 18:31

I know, I know. I know. I'm just I'm just messing with you. But yeah, so that was a little of kind of what ended up happening. And as we started playing more, we started getting started to get asked back to play for certain things when different of these up-and-coming bands came into town. And so a lot of a lot of um our playing for opening bands was was really two primary ones. Uh, we we did a couple a couple non-uh big names, but but the the hippos, that was that was uh one that we uh yeah that we would would open for and the mad caddies, and um that was just a lot of fun. Uh Mad Caddies are a little aggressive as far as like their their backstage antics. We'll just kind of leave it at that. For a young, impressionable 17-year-old, that was that was a little a lot for me. Um they're just about a year a year older than us. They were just out of high school. Um and that's where we started to develop a little bit of a friendship with them, primarily with their drummer, Kyle Briggs, who lived in Burbank, where we grew up, uh, where my all of all of us lived, and that's where we kind of made the connection. And he said, I have a little recording studio in like my little my little garage. Um, and we decided to record some stuff with him, and that we made some connections with that, and that was just super fun to to do that. And uh I was looking for that as well. Sadly, I I it's so sad as as I'm I've gotten older, all of my memorabilia that I know I've kept, I now just can't find anywhere. And somehow, I don't from from MacBook to MacBook, I somehow did not move over like the digital copies. I was like, oh, I'll bring some of our our stuff in. And of course, I can't find that stuff anywhere, but you know, such as it is.

SPEAKER_00 20:17

But this means I have to come back and and showcase like stuff like that. It was it was a lot of fun, yeah. It's crazy. Um I'm reaching off screen here because yesterday I had the this little focus right scarlet audio interface here, and um I on my personal podcast this week, my guest was Luis Vega, who he has a YouTube channel called Mr. Camera Junkie and stuff, and he talked about he was into video and cameras in like the year 2000, and then basically just took a break until like 2018, 2017 and jumped back into it and was like, oh my god, everything is like amazing now. And when it comes to recording music, I was big into it in high school as a kid, like around the time of those shows, and I, you know, everything from taking tape players and putting like a little Radio Shack microphone up to like a speaker somewhere. Um, my first instrument was a bass that I bought at a pawn shop, and I had I bought it like on a whim, and I was like, oh, I don't know what to plug this into. So I had like an old stereo speaker that I somehow plugged into like a video mix uh video audio mixer that I borrowed from my grandpa and like plugged it into this speaker, and I could hear the bass in there, and like it worked, you know, it worked. And eventually I got to the point where I had like must have been one of the first USB audio interfaces. It was like this big chunky thing, and it was like super heavy and metal, but you could plug in, you know, your guitar and record into like garage band one or whatever, and that was kind of it. And like I haven't done any music, and then just recently I got this thing, this little focus right, which has a nice quarter inch thing right there. So you plug your instrument right in, and then logic. Pro, I've been dipping into this podcast as my excuse to learn logic.

SPEAKER_01 22:04

Very cool. That's very cool.

SPEAKER_00 22:06

It's kind of amazing. And just yesterday, I was literally like just hanging out here, like, okay, you know, here's a drum track, here's guitar, here's bass, just noodling around, nothing crazy. And I was like, this sounds so good. Like, if I if I knew what I were doing, or I put more than 15 minutes of effort, this would be a legit recording that I could create just right here. And then, you know, Heather walked in and I was like, listen to this. And she was like, Oh, I thought that was a song. I was like, No, I just did it right now. Um, so when you guys talk about like, yeah, you have to find someone who has a recording studio and has the equipment, and that's what had to happen. That's so different than just like this was $140. Right, like and you're done. Um, you know, logic isn't for you.

SPEAKER_01 22:50

And if you wanted to, you could record a whole band using that and just do things piece by piece with just that two-track right there, focus right. You could record an amplifier, one microphone up, one direct, or you know, some overheads over drums if you just wanted that. There's so many different ways with just that. But then, and we did it by the way, also, it was on on two-inch reel to reel. He had a little read through. We wasn't we weren't going digital yet. This is like that thing we do over here. We weren't going digital yet. Uh not going yet. So, you know, we we got uh we got that and we had to take it somewhere to make CDs and make cassettes and things, and we had to press our own, and which which lots of people had to do. So I think that was just kind of a really neat thing. The other thing I really wanted to share is you were talking about I don't remember which episode it was, uh, but how you said you went on to like the Aquabats website or like their chat board or something. Yeah. And I was like, and at that point I was in college and stuff tr still trying to listen as much as I could to any type of music, especially ska, but wasn't as invested as I was in my late teens and the late 90s. And what we had to do then, because I I almost laughed out loud when I was listening to the episode, in order for me to contact them in the in the CD liner notes, they had a P.O. box where you could send and tons of the bands did this. Um, a lot of them from Asian Man Records. So a lot of the the bands off of that, any anything that was produced by Asian Man Records, in addition to the CD liners, there'd be a little piece of paper slipped in, and it would be a P.O. box where if you sent in like 10 bucks, they'll, you know, in four to six weeks send you back a whole bunch of swag, like some stickers or different things like that. And that's what I had to do for real big fish and for the Aquabats and for less than J. And I grew up in a youth group at a church, and so we listened a lot to superton and five on frenzy and all of those, and that's what we had to do for years, which I just I just blows me blows my mind. I show my kids that, and they think I'm just the oldest man in the world that I had to do something like that. I couldn't send an email yet, but so that's where you know I I have my little other camera angle here. It's not really quite showing some of it, but like these are all my stickers from from all of those years that I kept. I never stuck them on anything because I wanted to hang hang on to them. So I got a bunch of things from the Aquabats. I also got a letter which I can't find, and it was from and Jimmy because I'd I wrote to them and to the Aquabats and said that I played the saxophone. Jimmy the robot was the one that like said, Hey, thanks for supporting us. Just a little piece of paper, like some chicken scratch. Uh, and here's some stickers and stuff. And I just thought that that was like the coolest thing ever. Just even get a bit from it.

SPEAKER_00 25:29

Make me like them even more.

SPEAKER_01 25:31

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 25:32

We need to do an episode that's just like cool merch and cool like that kind of stuff. Because I have like down in this little counter back here, I have my Aquabat stress ball, which is still in its original little box packaging. That's cool. But um, it's funny, when you were saying that, I couldn't remember what the message board was, but now I remember eventually the Aquabats had their own message board, but for a long time they were on interpunk.com, I think was the website. And the cool thing there was it was just a message board, and each band had its own forum. So the Aquabats was the one I visited, but you could venture out into other bands things and kind of see the vibes there. But um, what what the Aquabats were doing was to you could be an Aqua Cadet. I don't know if you okay, yeah, okay.

SPEAKER_01 26:18

Oh, and I got a pro I got a patch to like put on my backpack, and of course, I'm so mad that like it with like many backpacks in high school that probably wore out and I threw it away and didn't take the patch off.

SPEAKER_00 26:29

But oh, I still have my patch, I've never put it on anything, I don't know what to do with it. It's it's been like 20 years or whatever, and I'm like, I'll find a spot for it. But it was that was a thing where it was like, hey, if you want to be a cadet, like send uh you five dollars or whatever, and and uh you needed to send a photo so they can make your ID card.

SPEAKER_02 26:46

Yes, I have an ID card too.

SPEAKER_00 26:49

You got the little laminated thing, it just had your name written on it um and your cadet ID number and stuff. And it's funny, I didn't have a photo because the time that it was, it wasn't like, yeah, so so I took my school ID and I cut because the school ID was just like a laminated thing with a photo, so I just cut the photo out of that and sent in. I was like, this is a perfect size for things. So I sent in my school ID, and then I was like, I don't have anything on my school ID. So then I cut out, I did, I guess I must have printed, or maybe I took it out of a CD booklet. It was the bat commander's head that was like the right size, and I put that on my school ID, which never was a problem until one day I was going into campus and I don't know why. Like suddenly we had like police doing drug checks, which I was never in trouble. I never did anything like I never anything like that ever. And I was just walking into school one day, and I just heard them like over the radio go like guy in the blue hoodie, and I was like, huh? And they like grabbed me and threw me into this room and they were like, open up your bag. And I was like, What is happening? Like, it's a random search. And I was like, okay, like here's my backpack with nothing interesting in it. And they're like, Let me see your ID. I was like, sure. And I handed him that one, and he's like, What is this?

SPEAKER_01 28:06

And I was like, blacked-out tooth as well.

SPEAKER_00 28:08

Yeah, it was full, full goggles, helmet, blacked-out tooth. It was like one of the like, it was like the floating eye missing legends era, like a promo photo or something. And I was like, I don't know how to explain this, but I I like mutilated my D card. Um, and then I tried to like pull out my Aquabats ID to go, like, here's the photo that was there. Like, I promise it's it's me. And anyway, that that's the time that it came and bit me in the butt, but still worth it. Still proudly have my Alquifats ID.

SPEAKER_01 28:38

You were probably doing the search for that guy that sat next to you in class that said he was gonna murder you or something. So they must stab somebody.

SPEAKER_00 28:46

Oh my god, yeah. That was like the same school year. My association. Um, yeah, so oh my gosh. It's just the whole thing is is crazy. And then you were posting a thing. Um, I think it was on Discord the other day, because this past week has been a when we're recording this, it's been a crazy anniversary week of like albums and stuff. And so you were posting, I think you posted, was it Mad Caddies had 23 year anniversary? Yeah, and Real Big Fish turned the radio off, turned 20.

SPEAKER_01 29:17

Yeah, 25, and Duck and Cover was 23. And then a couple weeks before that, the Fury uh the Return of the Aquabats was their anniversary as well. I think we had posted that. Um which by the way, to your to again to call back uh so there's so many things. I I like kind of took mental notes from the previous episode where I was like, oh, this is I I too thought that that was absolutely hilarious. I fell for searching at the warehouse, where the warehouse for the um the first album of the aqua the debut of the aquabot. This is the return. This this can't be it. That's that's such a a perfect like um like bait and switch. I just love that. That's super fun.

SPEAKER_00 29:58

It's funny too because like it's when you think of when it came out in 1995 and even years later when I was finding it, there wasn't like let me pull out my phone, just like what's the first Aquabots album? So it's literally like you're going by the copyright dates and you're going by the titles, and you're trying, I was even trying to piece together like, well, the graphics on the Fury are better than the graphics on this, so it seems like it's newer. Like you're you're trying to Sherlock Holmes deduce everything to just figure out like what's the first album, and the the guy at the warehouse, you know, had no idea what I was looking at over here.

SPEAKER_01 30:34

And for me being what I would I without trying to sound egotistical, I even at that point I had had a very seasoned ear to sounds. I could tell, I'm like, well, but this album sounds not as produced as the Fury of the Aquabats. It sounds older, it sounds like something that would have been done kind of indie, and you know, the the horns aren't as predominant, and the you know, I can't, there's not a good mix sometimes in certain songs. I still love the album, but oh, it's definitely rough, though. Right, it's it's because it's their first, and so that was throwing me off as well. So uh that was super hilarious. Um, in addition, uh is is the name of this podcast. I love the the ska podcast, a podcast about ska. Just it's just trickle. It's perfect, absolutely perfect. Um you struggled with that one.

SPEAKER_00 31:27

Thankfully. Thankfully, can you believe that domain was not taken? Um so now I guess uh what was super interesting is a couple weeks ago when I had Mike on and we were talking about the history of Scott, is he was then going into like what he likes now and new stuff and everything. And I know feel free to bring in other musical tastes and stuff, but what are some things that have stuck around like in terms of your favorite bands, artists, whatever that that are still like in your regular rotation, even as a father of five Apple oh, sorry fruit company. Um, I'm using an Apple computer. This is irrelevant.

SPEAKER_01 32:08

It's probably fine. It's you know, the my brain goes to like my my um the like the business contact training I have to do and like what things like bleed into what like considers Apple proprietary. And it's I don't think Apple's looking to get into it. We just talked about how great logic is, so you know right, right, which that's where I was I was curious why you were using um was Adobe Audition. Like, he knows Final Cut. Why is he not using Logic?

SPEAKER_00 32:36

Well, the reason for that was because I had used Garage Band. That was my like um well back in my like pre-Apple days using a PC, like whatever hand-me-down thing I had. I think it was using cakewalk was like in high school what I was recording on. And and it worked, and it worked really well. And then finally I got a Mac and it had GarageBand, and I was like, oh my god, thank you. Like this is so easy. But when it came time to doing podcasts and things, Garage Band doesn't have just a labeled like broadcast meter so you can see how loud things are, it's just the color-coded green, yellow, red. I was like, I want to make sure everything is coming in at like negative 16 and real specific. That's one of the many benefits of logic, is you get that plus, you know. Plus everything else. But uh, and then I've been using Final Cut, but I just also have the Adobe Creative Cloud. And several years ago, I was working with some students to like do some training at a radio station for a thing they were like an event they were doing, and the radio station was teaching them how to do everything on audition. I was like, oh, this is pretty sweet. Um, and audition's really geared nicely towards voice, and it is actually like it's really it's kind of nice to to do uh spoken word editing and audition, but I've been wanting to do logic because uh I don't remember what the heck stream or podcast had talked about, so I'm sorry if there's a repeat, but one thing I've been wanting to do is I'm not bad at I'm not good at writing songs, but I'm good at writing riffs. I think it was maybe Patrick and I talked about this. And I wanted to at the end of my YouTube videos, you have 20 seconds to put up your subscribe button and next videos and things. And I was like, I would love to just make a bunch of 20-second little riffs in different styles and different whatever, and just record my own thing just as practice of like recording and mixing and and all this kind of stuff. Um, and I want to do that in logic because I want to know, I want to know logic because we Mike and I talked about SCATU Network and Jeremy and everything, and you can go on and watch these live streams where Jeremy's like mixing an entire song in Logic with like a bajillion tracks, and oh my god, I'm just like, this is so cool.

SPEAKER_02 34:45

I want to nuts, nuts, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 34:48

I mean, but but I'm at the point now in logic where every time I need to do something, I have to go to Google and go like, how to change a tempo, how to do this, how to do whatever. I'm like, oh, which is just like a growing pain. But it's really fun though. Um, and yesterday, let me tell you, like, how awesomely easy it was to like produce a really good sounding thing where just my playing was the weak part, but not the actual recording quality. Oh my god. It's and what did you record?

SPEAKER_01 35:19

What like like what instrumentation? Did you it just drums or was it?

SPEAKER_00 35:22

It was electric drums and then uh guitar and bass, like actual guitar and bass. Because I I've been what's been really cool lately. This is Scott adjacent, is uh Mark Hoppas has been doing these live streams um where he's just playing like Blink182 songs on his bass, just sitting at his computer just playing, and it's really cool um because it sounds really good. He talks about them, but the coolest part is you can just see exactly how he's playing everything, and so all the stuff I've been trying to piece, everything I've been trying to piece together for years, I can just watch him play and go, Oh my god, this is exactly how to play that that that thing. And so he's been my bass teacher for the past like four months. Um, but then I've been really getting into like you know, every time you learn a new thing on an instrument, it's like it it rekindles the excitement for that instrument again. And so I've been wanting to do bass and record bass, and I can actually record bass that doesn't just sound like a weird, like like a no definition thing. Like I can get more clarity to it. Yeah, and especially that I don't know. I I like to use a pick on the bass, say what you will. Um, but I like I like that sound, that bright, like I don't know. I like that sound, and I can I can make that happen now just with this little red box right here, which is so cool. Do you still do music? Do you still play music and stuff?

SPEAKER_01 36:50

I do on occasion. Um, I still have my my son now, which is really super cool. My oldest son, who's 15, he's he just started high school today. Today was day one. So everyone's out back to school, and and this is their first day back in uh you know, since since pandemic stuff. So everyone's in school, which is great. But he uh he has my saxophone. Uh he's now playing it. So I kind of like that it was bequeathed to him. I I feel very kind of special about that, that that's something that he can do now. And so he's he's taking an interest. And so I'm starting to play him some of those things. So maybe I'll kind of tie a little bit of that in with your question of what are some of the things you still listen to. I think what has stood out to me, kind of the test of time, uh, isn't necessarily a certain band, but a certain album and like how well the horn stood out. As as a horn player, first and foremost, before I was a guitar player and I was a bass player as well. That's actually the instrument I studied in college. Um, no picks, but that's okay. That explains your expression when I said that. But I get it because that's what Mark does. That's also what um uh bass player and less than Jake, you know, he's he's pick heavy. I get it. Like it's gotta it has a distinct sound, and so it totally, totally get it. Um but um I I could tell the bands who had really skilled horn players um and which ones had marginally skilled horn players, and definitely you know, Aquabats, Real Big Fish, Mad Caddies. I'm gonna just use those actually Mighty Body Boss Tones. There's there's several others as well, but but um these guys were just so uh in tune, because that's where some of my frustration came throughout the years listening to certain ska bands. I would listen and go like these guitars and stuff and the drums are all spot on, and I'm hearing like these harmonies with these horn players, and it's uh it's a little out of tune, and that was always like a like a a point of contention for me. I'm like, oh, this is uh and what really shifted was the first time that we played for the Mad Caddies, um, and they just have a uh at least back at the uh when with Duck and Cover and the album prior prior to that, um, it was just one trumpet player, one trombone player, just two of them. And when we got there, they were already warming up. They had with them on their tour a horn coach who was there doing warm-ups with them, doing like licks here and there, and having, and he had a little stick that he would just like like tap on a on a like a something to like keep them in time. And now I want you to do this, and I know I want you to get higher, I want you crescendo. Nope, you're a little out there. You need to you need to pull out on this this part of the trumpet, and you're a little, you know, you're a little flat, you're a little sharp, and adjust them. And the the the massive sound that these two horn players could produce was ten times louder than the four of us in my band could ever produce. And I was like, wow, these guys are amazing. And um and if you if you've not heard Duck and Cover, if you're listening to this podcast, uh Duck and Cover, the the first song on it, um, it's just horn heavy right out the get-go. It just like blasts you, and then it goes into like the the ska ska, you know, with the guitar later, but it's so horns at the beginning um that that's the kind of stuff that stood out to me. So kind of tie that into with my son, who's starting to become his own sax player and trying to find things that stand out. I feel like my job as his dad and as someone who knows stuff is to find him things where he can hear that horn line or that sax line, um, that wonderful sax riff in attacked by snakes at the end, you know, and go like, learn that, learn that, like just like you're doing with Mark Hoppas, like in the bass lines. Like, here's a song, and like if you can figure that out, uh, you know, what Neil the six snake are there any more? Whatever it is below there, like the the sacks are playing underneath it. You know what I'm talking about.

SPEAKER_00 40:51

Oh, it's so good. It's so good. That one stands out, and then the one in my skateboard, uh like right before the second verse stands out, just as like it's so little solo. It's just it's so good. There were um man, I I I guess one of the things too, like not to make it just all about the Aquabats, but around the time I started seeing them live was right around the time that like they were not having as many horns. Um, my first Aquabats concert was the first show they played without Cat Boy, who was their you know, one of their trumpet players. Um, luckily I've since been able to see him many times perform with them, but so it was he was gone and it was Jimmy on sacks, and then Prince Adam was there to do trumpet, but Adam was also doing synthesizer and guitar, and so it was like you kind of never knew whenever you saw them like is Martian Girl gonna be on synthesizer or is it gonna be on horns this time, or is it gonna be synth and saxophone? But there was a period of time where Jimmy was taking over everything, and so everything that would normally be trumpets and stuff was all done on the sacks, and it was so cool to hear these songs that I was super familiar with, but in a different way, like play-doh entirely on saxophone or super rad only on the sax. It was like it wasn't disappointing, like you would think, oh, it's not as complete. It was like this is just it sounds so different, it sounds so cool. I loved it. It it was it was amazing. And um, I was having a thought when you were talking about the the saxophone in your son, I can't remember what it was, but it's it doesn't attack by snakes. No, I think I just got I went on a tangent because of my my thought process got attacked by snakes there really quick, but just um but just the idea of oh the musicianship because when you were talking about uh mad caddies and being that serious about it, I remember the first time that I saw Suburban Legends live um because they it was their full band like back, it must have been 2004. Um, and so it was two trumpets and two trombones, but the way they play everybody's like it's kind of like front and center. So you had yeah, everyone's doing just this wall. It's a wall of people, yeah. And it was like Tim was on vocals right there, and then like it was basically Tim and then surrounded by horns, and then like guitar and bass, and everybody were like almost behind the horns. And I remember like the the curtain going up, and I think they started with up all night, which is it's like heavy trombone intro and trumpet intro, and it was just like the wall went up, I was like in the front, and they were just right there, and it was just like so like you could feel it like moving your your chest cavity, and it was just I hadn't felt that like power from like a horn section at a show yet at that point, and it was really cool.

SPEAKER_01 43:40

Yeah, that's a whole separate uh that could be a whole separate other podcast where I I found it interesting as as we moved into you know past third wave ska where some of the horns left. And and when you think about non ska groups, you know, if you move back to Let's say like Chicago or Earth, Wind, and Fire, they've never changed their sound to where, like, well, let's let's keep the the rock part of it that that people that has never left, you know, through the decades of guitar bass and drums, and let's just move those horn players away. But it has a little bit happened to survive because ska kind of got a bad rap as a fad. And you and I know that that's not true at all. But I think there was a stigma then if you had a horn player or multiple within your band, uh, which is just kind of a little unfortunate at times, you know. And so it's nice to see, like you say, with some of these, like the back to the beach where they're bringing the horn players back because you got all these people that were that are older now that are can afford the tickets and are gonna show up at these things, like we want to hear the sound that we grew up with, and it's super cool to see that when that happens.

SPEAKER_00 44:52

It seems like there's also been this thing too where um because because talking to Patrick and you having played music, you know, one of my regrets is like I don't like have live band experience. But uh, you know, Patrick was talking about it's just the practicality of having seven or eight people in a band is difficult because you you're trying to not only share the duties, but then literally you're not getting any cuts of money or any like you're not hurting anything from shows, and there's lots of personalities.

SPEAKER_01 45:21

A lot easier to take it between three people in Blink 182 than eight people in the Aquabats.

SPEAKER_00 45:26

Yeah, and and when people then need, you know, people start having families, people have career things. I do remember my first Aquabats concert that I talked about. It was one at UC Riverside. Afterwards, when we were meeting them, the the people like in front of us, they were talking to Crash, the bass player, and they were like, I guess they must have known him. And he was like, Hey, like, what's up, guys? And they're like, How are you doing? And they asked him, like, how's work going? And I remember he said, Oh, I had to go today, it sucked. I was like, Oh, I think he was working as like an electrician or something at the time. Like, I was like, Oh, you were at work earlier today. Like, this is not your full-time thing. Um, and that's that's tough, and so it's hard to keep a band with that many people going for that long, but it also seems like as time went on and things kind of settled down, that's when you see people then coming back, where it's like it almost seems like anytime the Aquabats play in Southern California, a bunch of the old horn players come back because they live there, and it's just like we can go on tour, but like we'll go out and play at the OC fair or whatever, you know.

SPEAKER_01 46:24

Yeah, that's totally true. It it there is like this this wave, and even that happened with me, where at once I got married and started to have kids, um, and you know, just kind of immersed in in young parenthood and job and stuff, things did do get kind of pushed to the side a little bit, and you have to for your own sanity at times have to revisit those things that you felt passionate about. But it's easy to kind of get swept up in the new things at times to where yeah, things things did fade away for for a period of time. And that's where when I initially reached out to you, I think um the the love again for ska really returned uh in the mid to late 2000s when my kids are now toddlers, and lo and behold, we're watching Nickelodeon. And I go, like, what wait, what I I know that guy, like that that's that's MC Bat Commander. And my wife's like, Who? And I'm like, from the Aquabats, and again she says, Who? I went like this. Is this something from we went to separate high school? She did not know my my ska stuff, and and I had to kind of explain to her, and I said, like, I guess, and I I'm trying, and with lip we didn't have, I don't think Wikipedia was there yet, but the while of course we had the internet, the searching for stuff and finding it right at your fingertips. I'm not sure it took some research to figure out like, is this really really what's going on?

SPEAKER_00 47:49

Like, they've created Yo Gabba Gabba on on Nickelodeon, then sure enough it was can't imagine because I I was so obsessive with the Aquabats that I was always like I knew when they just like yeah, I was in college watching the first episode by myself. I'm pulling up IMDV right now, actually, because I'm going to the Yo Gabba Gabba dance.

SPEAKER_01 48:08

With um from what's his name? Um from the Lord of the Rings. What was that? Wood was in the first doing dancey dance. Yeah. Which it was just I I my kid, I it warmed my heart because once he started doing dancey dance, my my two oldest kids at the time were probably I think it was they were you know um three and one or something. They're like crawling up and trying to do the dancy dance with with Elijah Wood and Broby and and FUFA. And I was just like, oh my gosh, like mind is blown, and like I probably even cried a little bit where I was just like, my world is now infiltrating again into my new world, you know, just so so crazy. Um, so much so. And I I sent you the picture that several years later for one of the for Halloween, I dressed up all my kids, all five of my kids, uh, as the five characters from Yo Gava Gava. And instead of a tall black man, I was a short white guy being DJ Lance dog.

SPEAKER_00 49:08

And that was what won me because you sent me this really nice message. That was like the thing, and I was I saw the photo, I was like, he's legit.

SPEAKER_01 49:17

If I'm gonna dress as DJ Lance Rock, yes, you know that I'm legit.

SPEAKER_00 49:20

It's not just words on a Brad Pitt dressed as DJ Lance once. That was like his Halloween costume one year, and I was like, this is weird because this is um and I what I was looking at is on.

SPEAKER_01 49:32

That's probably where he was.

SPEAKER_00 49:33

Which was so great because it's like you know, it there's a lot of reasons it's a good kids show, but also just the the kind of cool part of like, here, we're gonna teach you how to skateboard. That's cool, but Tony Hawk is the one. But yeah, the the three-year-old doesn't know or care, but the parents sure do. Like, it's it's a really cool thing, and and that's one thing that I've loved, like talking about the people you admire being decent people, is um you you saw as soon as that show showed up and had success, and there you could go to Target and buy merchandise, and they're doing live performances, it was a very successful show. You then saw like uh all of the Aquabats who were working on it then bringing in all the other people, so it was like that the the wealth got spread around, you know, as much as possible, and everybody was trying to get a platform. But the thing I was looking up on IMDb was I wanted to see if this was still the case, and it's not. There are seven trivia items for Yo Gabba Gabba. Um, two of them are mine posted when the show premiered in like 2007. But for like eight years, there were only two trivia items, and they were both mine. So I was very happy.

SPEAKER_01 50:44

Does it say like have you signed it? Like it shows that it's you.

SPEAKER_00 50:47

No, it's just the top two. It's it's some of the ones that talk of it's the Aquabats related ones. So it's uh it's one of them talking about how the the characters are like cuter versions of the villains that used to play with the Aquabats, and then there's one about Adam who voices Muno was also in the Aquabats. So those are my the two facts that are related to the Aquabats came from me. I was just like, I need to share this knowledge. But for years, those are the only two trivia facts on there, and I was so proud of that.

SPEAKER_01 51:18

Which which two are you yours? I'm looking at it right now.

SPEAKER_00 51:20

It's it should be the top two. It's there's only two that mention the Aquabats, and it should be mine.

SPEAKER_01 51:24

One with Muno and Broby and then the one for Adam Gosh.

SPEAKER_00 51:27

Yeah, those are mine. There you go. There's kind of the date though of when I posted those.

SPEAKER_01 51:33

But yeah, it's uh what I love about that as well is I I which makes just the the just all the all the guys in the Aquabats. I think why you gravitate to them, why they make why people gravitate to to them, anyone, myself included, uh why they're so likable is that they're just being like themselves at the core. And you mentioned that on a previous podcast as well, that that um I think you said something like any any any band is wearing a costume, whether it's you know the leather jacket or something like that, and they're just choosing to be themselves. And that if like if you want to manif if anyone wanted to wanted to find a manifesto for who the Aquabats are, it is the song Play-Doh. It's exactly it's everything in it. It's when I was a boy, I used to live in Corduroy, Opie shirts, which I wore too, and slip-on vans, which I wore too, the checkered vans. That was my that was like the uh my clothes of my youth in the 80s. And so when I heard that, I'm like, oh my gosh. And then he says, My life is so simple. It was made up of these plans, ride my bike to thrifties. I'm like, I went down to thrifties and ride my rode my bike every day and got chocolate malted ice cream. I'm like, who is this man who is talking to me about myself? This is bizarre to me.

SPEAKER_00 52:44

Yeah, reading guys' catalog, the whole thing, right?

SPEAKER_01 52:47

And then just talking about the the whole ethos of 70s Saturday morning cartoons. And so then what did he do as an adult? He created the new version of a Saturday morning cartoon that has so many throwbacks to the set 70s Saturday morning cartoons, and then even the song played, or even other songs that the Aquabats do, there they they, if you were to listen to the theme song to Underdog from that was a card, or or uh, you know, Captain Caveman or Grape Ape, like there's so many things that the Aquabats do that sound just like that. And it's it's it's an homage. It's not you know necessarily copying it, it's it's saying like this is who we are, and so that's all they do is always infuse who they are from whether it was from their childhood or to adulthood. But you can see that in every facet from the Aquabats, uh stage shows to Yo Gabba Gabba. So there's my box.

SPEAKER_00 53:41

I'm glad you brought that up because Play Doh is my favorite Aquabat song, um, hands down. And the thing about that, especially like in high school, when I like heard it for the first, well, yeah, I guess it was then when I heard it for the first time, was something about that song really stood out because it does have the like, here's childhood, here's where things are, but it's also like the kind of like, where did it go? I want to go back. But to me, it has the like, or at least it with just what they were doing as a band, it was not just sitting there going, like, oh, I miss it, I miss it. But it was if I if that's what I miss, then that's what I have to make right now. Like, I it's up to me to bring those feelings back and to bring that stuff back. And that was a really cool, like empowering turning point of oh, I don't have to wait, I can just do the thing. And that's what that song is is very, very big on me because of that specifically.

SPEAKER_01 54:34

And whether it's personally or on stage, what do they do when they're on stage? Where do they take you back to the happy land? And it's true, it's so true. And I guess probably that would be the last thing I would say about this is back to the my initial point of that being the first ska concert I went to at the Hollywood Palladium. I had been to Lollapalooza in '93 when I was you know really young to see Pearl Jam. And what was the the crowd filled with? Mosh Pitts. And that's that that was my framework for what's gonna happen when I go to a live show without seats, when it's just standing room only. This is what's going to happen. And the Aquabats opening up, what ends up happening? They they started, I believe they started and ended the show with that song. Um, and and it's so cool because it's like a call to to arms when you hear like you hear it and you go, Oh, it's gonna start. And then what ended up happening at the chorus is people did not mosh, but what did they do? They jumped up and down instead. Like, take me back to my house. And I was like, Yeah, oh this is different. This is different. And I was just so shocked again. It was just like another thing, like tying in my love for for for for music and and for guitar, and then now my love for for horns. And then this is this this crowd is doing something different, and they are the at the forefront leading it. They're bringing us into this show, and then we all are just kind of jumping up and down in agreement. It was just amazing. So something different.

SPEAKER_00 56:03

Yeah, that's such a good. I mean, we're we're basically at an hour. I have like a million points I could go on, but I think that's a really good, like, final thought. The the last thing I was thinking, which I'm just gonna say, which you reminded me of, like they started and ended the show with the same song, which is great. Um, I do remember there was a few years ago, because you know, like Real Big Fish has a lot of shtick in their act as well. Um, and for a while there were a couple of shows, I think it was when they were like, it was after Cheer Up had come out, and they were kind of just looking to not be stuck on that record label anymore. Uh, they were playing shows, and of course, everyone wants to hear sell out. So I forget what the order of the songs was, but they would do like take on me, beer, um, something else, sell out, beer, take on me, something else, beer, take on me, sell. They just kept doing the same songs like back and forth for the whole show. So they played each song like three times, which is like I it's one of those things where if you were at one of those shows, you know, it's either you'd be so mad because you're like, I this is not what I'm here for, or it'd be hilarious because it's so ridiculous and like stupid. Um, but speaking of crowds doing things differently, this will be the last note that I bring up. Um, I do remember the first time I went to to a ska show because there was the Aquabath, but then I went, I think it was them with Real Big Fish or something, where there were the full horns and the whole thing. Uh there were, I don't know if this is a common thing or it just happened there, but there were a couple guys like right behind me who were singing along with the horns.

SPEAKER_01 57:40

That's me, that's me. Guilty.

SPEAKER_00 57:42

Yeah, and it was so I just remember in my ear. Maybe it was you literally, but it was just remember like and I was like, You're just making the trumpet sound. Okay, like I guess what else do you do? You know? Um, but I it just cracked me up like so much because I just I don't know. I was like, I guess that's what you do when these are here. I've never been in this situation before.

SPEAKER_01 58:02

Yeah, the really my most favorite people don't like I I think I someone one of your guests I think referenced uh maybe I don't think it was necessarily in a negative way, but why do they rock so hard? The third album from Real Big Fish. That's actually my favorite album because the horns are so killer on that album.

SPEAKER_00 58:19

I love I love how polished that album is.

SPEAKER_01 58:22

Yes. Oh my gosh, when that came out, I'm like, all right, this is this is their opus, I guess, because it's just so well done. Yeah, absolutely.

SPEAKER_00 58:30

Yeah, that's a big one. And well, whatever. Last, last points. I know, I know. Because what I've been what I've been doing lately, specifically with turn the radio off because of its anniversary, and then literally just yesterday with Why Do They Rock So Hard, is I've been diving into just the albums and not a mix list or a Spotify thing or whatever, but just like I'm gonna listen to this album the same way I used to, where I just put in the CD and you listen to the whole thing. Because it you do like it's it is, I forgot how different of an experience to listen to an entire album of work versus just a couple of songs here or there, bunch of things, all your favorites just smashed together, but to go through and live like you know, the pacing of this album, the way the songs are ordered, and the the the ride that you go on through it is like, oh my gosh, it's so different.

SPEAKER_01 59:19

And that's but that's been really fun lately is just to listen start to finish from Apple kind of ruined that with the with the iTunes 99 cent single song thing, like where you just are just kind of a la carte picking what you like. There's a progression.

SPEAKER_00 59:31

I mean, there's nothing wrong with that. I love I love having like Spotify's daily mix or whatever is amazing. They know exactly what I need. I've been introduced to new stuff, but it's very different than hearing, like, you know, there are especially on albums like that, there are songs where literally like the you hear the song ending in the beginning of the transitioning into the next one, of course.

SPEAKER_01 59:53

Absolutely. You hear the leader of the star or something as it's moving into the next one. You're right. Absolutely.

SPEAKER_00 59:57

Yeah, and it's really, really fun. And you kind of hear the story, like you mentioned, fight song, like on The Fury. You have like you know, three songs, three like really fast, I think it's whether like super rad Martian Girl or no, a super rad red sweater, magic chicken, and then I think it's fight song, so it's like crazy, crazy, crazy, and then here's it's it's very interesting, but anyway. Um, I think what this proves is that I will have to have you back so we can continue just talking about whatever because uh I had a ton of fun kind of going down these memory lanes here and and learning also from real musicians is a really fun thing for me to do.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:35

I do have a question for you.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:36

Sure.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:37

Because we haven't mentioned this yet as far as some ska things. So I'm just curious. You know, you know, just like six months ago, uh Ska documentary came out. Did you see it? It's called Pick It Up.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:46

The one that was uh like the one that was narrated by Tim Armstrong.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:52

Yes, I believe so. It's really good. You guys I forget what it's called.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:55

No, it because you had to like buy it on Vimeo, or I had to buy it.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:58

I did. I did, I did, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:00

Um, so funny story about that. I watched it.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:04

You have to watch it.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:05

No, I totally, I totally bought it. I loved it. I watched it. I have not finished the last 15 minutes, even though I started it whenever it came out, because like like it's one of those things where like I don't want it to be over, so I'm like, oh I'll finish it, I'll finish it. So I haven't seen the last 15 minutes of it yet. Uh, but now it's been like a year or something, or so yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:01:24

But when you talked about the pay, because they talk a whole bunch about like the the pay of like what the bigger your band is, the harder it is to split up the money. So I made me think about that.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:34

But yeah, I I need to go finish that. That's me my goal is uh before the next episode of this show comes out, I will have finished that documentary finally. Um but Chris, thank you so much for for hanging out today. If uh is there anything if you know someone wants to connect with you, is there anything you want to direct people towards or sure?

SPEAKER_01 1:01:54

Yeah, I the only thing I didn't really mention is one of the things I do as a as a side project, looking to make it more something new, is I've started a nonprofit with with a licensed clinician. We work with the addicted population. Um so we have a podcast as well called The Recovery Junkies. It's on my little shirt right here. Um you can't really see it, but yeah, there you go. Um yeah, we uh it's a bunch of us just kind of talking about um kind of concepts of of wellness as well as just kind of it's well it can be for the addicted population. We all have stuff that we need to work on. Uh, you know, we're we're not perfect people, and so that's kind of the stuff we took we talk about. Sometimes we delve into family of origin stories um or just why are things so hard, stuff like that. So it's it's uh it's really fun. Um, it's a little more on the serious route as far as podcasts go, but but you can find us at therecovery junkies.com uh or you can get us wherever you get your podcasts, Apple, Spotify, all those things like that. But yeah, that's kind of one of the things I'm doing. And and we we work uh outs outside of our podcast as well with people in person and in using using Zoom and all things. And that's of course where I discovered you, Tom, was how we wanted to, of course, as you say, level up, level up our our audio and camera stuff. And and uh that was that was really my introduction to you is as I was already doing some things, then I started finding videos of people like you. I'm like, oh yeah, I'm doing that, so I guess I'm doing that right. And then I find more of your videos because I'm like, well, well, if he knows how to do this and we're on the same page, well, I'm wondering, um I don't know how to quite do this. Let's see if I can find that. And that's kind of where we find those communities, you know, throughout the pandemic, because we had to move all of our support groups that we led uh to to virtually, and now we're looking to kind of build a bigger brand to do things more kind of uh across virtual stuff, even with things going back to quote normal, so to speak. But yeah, so therecovery junkies.com. Thanks so much.

SPEAKER_00 1:03:41

That's cool. I'm so glad it's so cool to hear you're doing something so positive for so many people. Uh so definitely check that out. That's right up my alley for sure. Um, so thanks so much, Chris. I'll put all the links and everything in the show notes. And thank you so much, too, for everybody else for being here, for listening, for being part of this journey. Uh, as we figure it out, I'm having a ton of fun. So I hope you are too. I appreciate you spending your time with me. And I guess that's it. I don't have a way of uh ending the show. So I'll see you next time.