Transcript
Speaker: I'm Mark McBride. And I'm Steve Brown. Welcome to the season two of the Yo-Yo Player podcast where two dusty old gray beards gather their friends and reminisce about the 1999 Fiend Magazine Yo-Yo Tour.
Speaker: In this episode, the 4th of July.
Speaker: Is the statute of limitations up on this yet?
Speaker: Key of the stories like with Timmy and a couple others where but yeah we had We thought that every year was that way. Like every, that like, you know, you have a summer, you bring super soakers, you shoot things off the stage. that Why wouldn't you do this kind of thing? And then to sit there and have the one of my favorite compliments that I got on this because it was a fun indirect one was we had, we had like, you know, we showed up with three bags of fireworks.
Speaker: Like, you know,
Speaker: Early we had made friends with Ivo Lee, Ice-T's DJ. He was cool with the yo-yo guys. like yeah you know we were we were like He buddied up with us, and he was nice and nice to us and everything.
Speaker: And about a third of the way through the tour, we had um it was July 4th, and we pulled out our fireworks.
Speaker: Tell me about the 4th of July, Steve. 4th of July. right, basically, when we were on our way to Graceland, we went through Alabama and picked up this huge stash of illegal fireworks. Illegal fireworks, of course, meaning good fireworks.
Speaker: Well, that's what we thought anyway. The Roman candles. Anyway, that's another story. But basically, we ended up in Tahoe on the 4th July. like I had a bunk load of illegal fireworks. So I gave everybody their bags back. Milau and Mark each had like this huge bag of fireworks. Funny thing is, we didn't we didn't put them Like we didn't put them underneath the bus, like with the rest of our bags where everything was, because were worried about like getting jobs. Yeah, we were worried about getting too hot or getting jobs all screwed up. So guess what? I got to sleep with, you know, roughly a pound of dynamite right behind my head. And of course, my bunk was in the back, which was technically the smoking lounge.
Speaker: So here I am every night with people underneath me trying to smoke cigarettes and me sleeping on about a half ton of dynamite. it is just this was This was great.
Speaker: Wow. Fair. Fireworks. remember the fireworks. What do you remember about the fireworks? b
Speaker: Non-stop. It'd be, you know, late night, like, hey, let's go get some fireworks. I'm like, okay. there'd be a couple days where, you know, somebody wouldn't pull them out, and then there'd be a day, like, somebody would get a wild hair up their ass, and fireworks to get pulled out that night. so Depending where we are, it'd be either a good or a great idea.
Speaker: Amazing. We're in Tahoe. It starts to get dark. Shows over. Everything's packed up and ready to roll. We got like what was it like a 2 a.m. bus call.
Speaker: Yeah, we had the next day off, so we had a 2 a.m. bus call, which means nobody had to be on the buses until 2 o'clock in the morning. So we all bus out the fireworks. we're Basically what it had degenerated into is a bottle rocket fight. which if If you've never been in a bottle rocket fight before, it's kind of scary.
Speaker: What ends up happening is there's usually about 20 or 30 people who all have bottle rockets. The point is to hit as many of the other people as possible with your bottle rockets without getting hit. You've also got to protect your stash because if someone shoots a bottle rocket and lands in your stash of fireworks, which did happen, if somebody shoots a bottle rocket into your stash of fireworks, then what you end up with is all of your shit going up in flames really quick like you have no ammunition while everyone pelts you.
Speaker: But more importantly, think, when your stash goes up, you don't know where the bottle rocket's going. I know that that happened a lot of times, especially Tracy was the worst. Tracy was the worst. I don't know what was going on with him, but everybody who stood next to him found out really quick that Jason was the best target.
Speaker: Everyone just shot crap at him. He would just light stuff and throw it. He didn't even know where it was going. He just like had a bottle rocket and would light it and toss it and shoot any direction. He never knew.
Speaker: And then he pulled out the jumping jacks and would just light and throw them at me.
Speaker: Just in hindsight, i it's one of those things where you look back and you are amazed at the stuff that you managed to do and nothing terrible happened. you know like ah We have kids now. We're all like grown men with with children that we raise. and so The idea that I have to like look them in the eyes and tell them you know it's not okay to have like firefights with Roman candles in a parking lot with your friends.
Speaker: Just because think that's a good idea, like you can't do that. You know, I'm a hypocrite. So what I remember is that we had like, Steve Lau and I had bought three grocery bags worth of fireworks and brought on the tour.
Speaker: And like, so by that point, we were like, we're not going to be, you know we were just hooking, hooking like the gang up. And I remember you had ah like, you know, we'd given you a whole load of them.
Speaker: And like just the the standard, like, you know, light and pop, like, you know, the standard ones that like you are ah like the on a giant chain of like the explosion. Yeah, the black cats. Thank you, Steve. And so we were in, it was 4th of July and we're walking around and you know, like, you know, it was going off and I remember walking by you, we you know, you had to fist these things and you're just like, and you're like, Hey, look at this. And you would just light him and throw it in a crowd and watch it explode and everyone jump. And I would be like, what the fuck is Jason doing? He's throwing fireworks into crowds. And I was like, ah did you just throw that into a crowd? He's like, yeah, but it's cool.
Speaker: Nobody's hurt.
Speaker: and And then that was when and you saw Evil E and I was like, oh shit. And so, and we're just like, dude, we're having shooting walk, I think. And Evil walks by and we're like, dude, E, come here. He's like, what? We're like, we got you for He's like, what? Huh? we're like, you want some fireworks? He's like, I guess. We're like, here. He just shoved fireworks in his hands. And I remember him going like, man, you yo-yo motherfuckers are crazy. Right.
Speaker: I felt so complimented. So complimented. yeah and i'm like yeah I thought we were just par for the course. i
Speaker: it's It's always like that you know in our younger days. like It was always the straight-edge kids that were like the craziest fuckers. You guys were the straight-edge kids on Warped Tour that year. you know That's Jason Tracy for that one.
Speaker: There you go. see and i'll I'll wear that badge. DJ Evo E. You some crazy motherfuckers. quote that Make that into like a, I don't know, a shirt or a patch or a bumper sticker.
Speaker: Well, and that escalated to him on top of Ice-T's bus shooting Roman candles at us on top of our bus. Yep.
Speaker: I about that. And all our bus drivers like up yelling at us on the fucking bus and they were furious. That sounds about right.
Speaker: Yeah. Oh, my gosh. Oh, Jesus. Yeah, those memories. Because I was actually on Ice-T's bus during that time. i was like, what the fuck? Do what you got to do.
Speaker: So, you know, it was one those craziest things.
Speaker: It wasn't as much of a spectacle as the party on Ice-T's bus that night. Oh, God. Oh man, Ice-T basically had Club Ice on his bus, which was you know pretty good sized buses, these are tour buses and all, but he had 70 or 80 people crammed onto this bus.
Speaker: So me and Roger from Less Than Jake go over there and Ice is like, hey, yo, you know you guys welcome to come in and join the party. you know VIP lounge is in the back, everybody else is in the front, go check it out.
Speaker: So we're like, all right, yeah, cool, no problem. So we get on this bus, Roger and I are basically, you know, looking these two wide-eyed, innocent little kids strolling into a brothel, which is basically what it was.
Speaker: We walk in, the lights are all out. There's a strobe going somewhere in the bunk area. And there's some guy who's just standing up on one of the sofas right as you walk in, just swinging a flashlight. That's all he was doing was just swinging a flashlight.
Speaker: And everybody was all drinking crazy and crazy and smoking and cursing and raising cane and just grinding all over each other. You know, and I'm standing there and I'm married.
Speaker: And Roger's just basically, you know, a kid for all practical purposes. And we're just both standing there looking really, really scared and trying to figure out, you know, what we should be doing here. We just got nervous and left, but it was it was crazy.
Speaker: It was awesome. Yeah, I got onto that for, like, just a little while. But it was so gosh darn crowded. All of us, you know, admitted or not, you know, we saw some shit we probably shouldn't have seen.
Speaker: and probably did some shit we probably shouldn't have done because, you know, I'm kicking it on the bus with Ice-T, Black Eyed Peas, Eminem, you know, all these different folks. and it was the it was one of those situations where, like, we're rock stars or they're rock stars and we've been thrown into this world.
Speaker: So how do we deal with that? Yeah. We had, so I got a taste of that briefly on Ice-T's bus, actually. And it was in, it was fucking Lake Tahoe. was that same night. yeah He had a party on his bus that night and he specifically came over and was like, hey man, I'm having, I'm having, you know, I'm having people over. I'm having a party on my bus. Y'all should stop by.
Speaker: Right. and and And it was me and Roger from Less Than Jake standing in front of Less Than Jake's bus when he came by and was chatting with us. And we were like, fuck, yeah, dude, let's go party on Ice-T's bus. That's going to be great. Right. So we walk in and, you know, we walk up on the bus and he's sitting in the driver's seat of the bus and greeting people as they come in. And he's just like, he's like, hey, good to see you guys. You know, like booze is in the front, other stuff's in the back. Go ahead hack yourself out.
Speaker: and And he's, you know, he's drinking water because he's great. So like we grab a couple of beers and we're hanging out, chatting with people in the front or whatever and and having a pretty good time. But, you know, it's fairly low key. And then ah we're like, let's go check out the back of the bus. And so we head to the back of the bus. We're walking through the bunks.
Speaker: There's people screwing in almost every bunk. Yeah, absolutely. So we're immediately just like, whoa, whoa, whoa, God, that much sex smells really bad. And and we like cruise through, we get to the back of the bus, and the entire table on the in the middle of the back lounge of the bus is covered with enough drugs to...
Speaker: that it didn't look real. Yeah. It didn't look real. It looked like what, if you told a kid, like, draw a pile of drugs, and a little kid drew with crayon a pile of drugs, that's what it looked like. Yep. And Roger and I looked at each other and we were like,
Speaker: hey, I'm just going to go get another beer. and We turned around and left the back lounge immediately. we were like, dude, we we have been out partied. We need to get the fuck out of here. This is so much more party than either of us is interested in or capable of. like Let's just finish our beers and get the fuck out.
Speaker: No, we were definitely the... ah We were definitely the super soaker brigade for less than Jake. Oh, yeah. because I – in high school, we used to do drive-by shootings with super soakers.
Speaker: I even got like busted by the cops one night. And so I had an array – like so I had a minor arsenal of super soakers. And then at some point – They were dying and it was one of our days off and we went to the store and bought bigger ones.
Speaker: And Rick was like, you got to buy me the biggest one they got. Rick had Rick had the like Ghostbusters backpack. Yeah. It had like two liter like containers in a backpack that like fit around. That was, that was insane.
Speaker: We went into town and Rick, you said, buy me the biggest super soaker you can get. Right. And so we came back with, like, I got the nice, like, contained single, you know, like, pump action single unit thing, and you had a backpack. Yeah, yeah. I remember that one very well. um You know what?
Speaker: Actually, I still think I might have that Joker somewhere. It might be my dad's house. I don't know. But yeah, so it got used so much that i actually had to duct tape the backpack just to keep shit together.
Speaker: But um yeah, so it was just kind of the way it was. you know I just wanted to be that guy, just ornery. What it starts to end up happening is all these like dudes would roll through.
Speaker: You know, oftentimes freaking drunk and acting stupid. Like, oh, shoot me, me, shoot me. And so a lot of us took to going, okay. And we just shoot their crotch and their crotch only.
Speaker: guy i remember. That I do remember. bit of a dick move, but fucking hilarious. Fucking hilarious, you know? And in fairness, like it was going to dry in like 20 seconds. They were laughing about it. Nobody was pissed about it. No. It was part of the fun of it.
Speaker: um You know, we're just shooting everybody. So we would hit various stages. So I did it with Ice-T a lot, as far especially in the hot days. um Yeah, I'd hit, because the stages were side by side in some of the venues. And I'd stand on the side stage if I wasn't yo-yoing with whoever. So I did it with um Black Eyed Peas. I did it with Eminem.
Speaker: uh seven dust a couple times and iced tea a lot of times so just when we're when we went on you know when we went doing our our gigs and stuff like that so i remember remember by the end we started to get a little bit more uh we started getting more generous and seeing what we could bring out like with less than jake and that's when i brought out the water balloon launcher oh really
Speaker: So one thing that came up actually when we were talking about this is I felt like we ended up being your super soaker brigade as much as yo-yos. And I remember like I brought super soakers on because that was just part of my usual like shenanigans kit.
Speaker: And i remember thinking like, I felt like we were the only ones with super soakers, but that seems like why, that seems like the most common thing ever. Why, like, shouldn't like everybody have super soakers on a summer tour?
Speaker: And to make it worse, not only did you do the, you know, the the first punch with the super soakers, but then the second punch was always the confetti cannon. So they were sweaty, super soaked and just paper confetti just stuck to them everywhere. We got, and then towards the end,
Speaker: towards the end when we got a little bit more. Yeah. whispering And stuff like that. No, but yes. And the, what like, um, we've got the water balloon launcher out.
Speaker: That was something that I didn't do for a while. well Once we got, once we kind of like got in a groove and I was like, you know what? I've got time that we can go fill up some water balloons. And we started pulling water balloon launcher out for you guys. But you got to understand, it wasn't, it was like an industrial slingshot.
Speaker: So like this wasn't like, you know, oh, like we're going to shoot water balloons like 15 feet. No. You're up there like, because you got to be part of the part of the whole shenanigans is part of the act too. So like they realize, like, so the crowd knows what, they can see what's happening. Boom, we're shooting water balloons kind of stuff. So I'm calling my shot like Babe Ruth.
Speaker: You know, really going out there like, yeah, yeah, here we go. book Kind thing. Like the first time we pulled it out on stage, like Mark, you pulled that thing all the way back. There was like two of us fucking holding it. You pulled it all the way back and it went so far that as soon as it released, you looked and the fucking horror on your face, as you realized that it was going to hit somebody really far back who was probably not even watching the band.
Speaker: I mean, it was bad. It was worse. Yeah. you worst The worst was because at one point, I think it might've been that one, like the like really early, I landed one like 18 inches off of the sound booth.
Speaker: That's a good way to get kicked off the tour. Exactly. I launched it and I watched it and I'm like, oh, fuck. Yeah. And then luckily it landed like, Right? Just have a, oh, God, thank God.
Speaker: Oh, thank God. Yeah. I think that's why it didn't come out very often. You you learned, yeah, you did a ah couple of mishaps at the beginning and you're like, I'm going to leave this as a trumpet. You know what? No, you know what? After that one, I was like, I'm always going to pour back this far.
Speaker: if
Speaker: I was like, we're just going to do like the 20 foot.
Speaker: No fun. Yeah.
Speaker: Dude, that last show with the water balloon slingshot, we actually tagged the PlayStation booth from the main stage. That was like 200, like, who was it that was giving me flack about my water balloon slingshot launches? that we We were in a store, and don't remember where we were.
Speaker: And they said, it was in Atlanta, and they said, yeah, look, the water balloon slingshot launches 200 yards. I said, that's what mine is. They're like, what? We don't shoot that far. i'm like, well, you know, they rate those things downhill.
Speaker: went to your back and stuff yeah well we were downhill with the window our backs we must have been because freaking we there's the funny thing is is the playstation booth was set up right next to us that day yeah so we actually laugh we came within like two or three feet of hitting our own booth from the main stage which was literally it was so far away that we couldn't i mean we couldn't actually like read the writing on our tent we were so far away all we could see was the playstation logo barely was it was nuts I mean, Let's put it this way. We shot it so far that the airtime was a good seven or eight seconds.
Speaker: was that down and it was It was insane. Literally, I mean, at one point, i actually heard Roger in the middle of a song go, holy shit.
Speaker: from high school on, that was my like mischief kit, was you know water balloon launchers, super soakers, other you know general tool, like toys of mayhem.
Speaker: and I felt like I was surprised. i felt like the only people with water balloon launchers and super soakers on the Warped Tour. I'm like, how is that possible? Did we just miss the other guys or you know? Yeah.
Speaker: yeah I was kind of surprised by that too, but I think um the other thing is that like, you got to remember like our, our kind of specific booth vibe. So the bands, there wasn't any reason for them to bring them because, you know, unless they're shooting them off the stage, they weren't walking around hanging out. They didn't have a, they had a merch booth, but like they, you know, their merch booth was just there to sell merch. um And then all of the other like, you know, vendor booths or whatever, like they were just there moving product.
Speaker: Like we were in this unique position where we were just there to cause mayhem and show off yoyos. Like we didn't have anything to sell. So we weren't, we didn't have to worry about that. So we could just cause mayhem. You know what i mean? Like the, the guys at the yoo-hoo booth couldn't just start hosing people down with fucking, uh, super soakers. They needed to get them into the booth and give away yoo-hoo.
Speaker: Right. Yeah. You know, all these, like all these different booths that were like selling stuff, like they needed to get people in and sell.
Speaker: You know, the thing I've learned in the last 25 years, you know, um um been i work I work in education and stuff and spend a lot of time reading about neurodevelopment and everything. Turns out our brains aren't fully formed. Our decision-making abilities, our executive function comes really fully comes online when I'm about 25. Right.
Speaker: so you know If you want to think about it in those terms, like I was you know i had not a fully formed brain. And the frontal lobe, some of those cause and effect, responsible decision-making neurons were still a couple years out.
Speaker: Yeah, not every Synapse was online yet. No, no. They weren't even, yeah, they didn't even know they existed. few broken pathways there. Yeah, definitely. But and like much of what happened in the late 90s, it all worked out just fine.
Speaker: It was, yeah, it was of a time.
