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Look Back and Laugh: 2022 In Review with Renato Pagnani
89 Plays3 years ago
A special episode reviewing the year in art, music, clothing, and more with writer and friend of the show, Renato Pagnani.
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Transcript
Introduction to Apocalypse Duds
00:00:00
Speaker
Hi, I'm Connor Fowler. And I'm Matt Smith. And welcome to Apocalypse Duds. Today we wanted to bring you a special show to celebrate and possibly denigrate the end of the year.
Guest Introduction: Renato Pagnani
00:00:10
Speaker
We are joined by Renato Pagnani.
00:00:13
Speaker
a great friend of the show's show and the show's earliest supporter. He was and is a day one apocalypse duds goon. In fact, he was a founding member. Alas, his real life writing career got in the way. Renato, Ren, to his friends, has written for Rolling Stone and many others. We wanted to get some of his opinions and share some of ours. We hope you enjoy. So welcome. Welcome. Yeah. Thanks for having me.
Reuniting and Celebrating Season One
00:00:40
Speaker
Yeah, dude. This seems like a fitting way to end the year, just get the three of us with our original idea back together to shoot the shit, basically. Absolutely. And I mean, I've seen where you guys have taken it so far, and it's been really impressive. So I'd like to say, to begin with, congrats on the first. I'm not sure if you guys are doing quote unquote seasons or whatnot, but the first few episodes have been banners.
00:01:09
Speaker
Awesome. Thank you. Well, thank you. Yeah. And I guess we are sort of the first season. I mean, we've done 10 shows now. So, um, thank you. Yeah. And you have been here as cheering us on and telling us what to do. So I think it's been, I think it's been great. We could say you're the Don of apocalypse. He just, he pulled the strings.
00:01:34
Speaker
Well, I don't know if I'm the dog, maybe the conciliary, but yeah, right. Right. Right. Right. Oh
Renato's Year in Review
00:01:42
Speaker
man. Yeah. So, uh, how's, how's your, uh, year been Renato just kind of overall, I know you had, you had some exciting stuff happen, right? Yeah. Um, so I would categorize 2022 overall overall as a good year as, as good of as the third year in a global pandemic could be.
00:02:04
Speaker
Um, my wife and I, uh, Bailey, uh, we moved into a new house finally, um, in which we should have probably have been in six months earlier, but that's a, that's a different story, but we finally moved into a new house. We, we had gotten married last October, um, which was delayed thanks to the pandemic, of course, a year, but this year was basically spent moving in, um, getting settled into our new house, you know, getting things
00:02:35
Speaker
organized and doing some interior design as much as we could.
Cultural Shifts in Color and Design
00:02:40
Speaker
And yeah, that was kind of the big thing this year. And we're still not 100% moved in, but we're mostly moved in. So I'll take that as a win. Hell yeah. Moving is absolutely the worst thing on the planet. And the work is always so good. It's like you send these pictures and it's like, damn, how did you do it? I appreciate that. Yeah.
00:03:04
Speaker
I don't know if we actually have a good taste or not, but we're just not afraid of colors. So I think some people are fooled by just, oh, there's a bunch of bright colors. This must be good. Well, a lot of people don't have color in their living spaces. And I think that is a terrible shame. Like I sort of lucked into this house that has yellow and pink walls, not in a garish way, like they're soft colors, but like our bathroom on the main floor of our house is pink.
00:03:34
Speaker
um it's like a soft pink like a sort of uh octopus pink right yeah for me like and and bailey like colors have always been
00:03:47
Speaker
something that's super, just not even important to us. It's just something that's like part of the fabric of our lives and our wardrobe. She's as into clothes as I am and our wardrobes are both full of colors. In fact, I have very little that's not a color like my blacks and navies and grays are.
00:04:06
Speaker
you know the least numerous in my wardrobe but um you know I think it's a very sort of western phenomenon that like color has been gradually seeping out of our lives um I actually written some article about this the other week talking about the
00:04:24
Speaker
The disappearance of color, like if you look at the trends, and even in
Automotive Trends and Preferences
00:04:28
Speaker
like, let's say, colors of vehicles, right? Like there used to be many more colored vehicles, bright colors, and now they're all some variations of black or silver. Yeah. Yeah, except for the random like Ford Bronco. I feel like Ford Bronco and Jeep, like
00:04:49
Speaker
you'll see like an upright orange, but that's literally like every, every other vehicle is like white, silver, black, or some other very particular. That's like a particular marketing. I think like that's like for a particular person or for a few types of people. Yeah. Well, maybe that's why I want to Floyd Bronco because of the bright colors, because that is the vehicle I want for my next vehicle. Oh, that one of the new ones.
00:05:17
Speaker
the sport at least, yeah, the smaller. Dude, like my dad's a car guy. So I've been around vehicles my entire life. But that is maybe one of the only like designs of recent memory that I can think of that I saw one for the first time. I was like, fuck, that's cool. Like everything else, I don't know, it just all looks like
00:05:44
Speaker
all looks very mundane. And then that came out and I was like, oh, okay, car manufacturers can actually make something that looks cool again. Absolutely. Yeah. And it doesn't look as cool as the old one though. No, but I mean, that's, you know, it's a little more 2022, whatever, you know, but it looks like a Land Rover. I guess a little bit. Yeah. A little bit, but Land Rovers look great. Yeah. I don't. Yeah. No, no, no. And I'm not saying it in a, I'm not saying it in a bad way.
00:06:14
Speaker
I think I would just go more toward the absurd, as you know, as everyone knows, as everyone who has listened to the show knows. Is this how you're breaking it to us that you have a Cybertruck pre-order? See, that's too absurd.
Tesla and Traditional Car Industry
00:06:29
Speaker
And I would be giving money to that devilish man. Which I refuse to do. Like, I'm enthusiastic about an electric car. Of course, an electric vehicle, let's say.
00:06:43
Speaker
But like, not to that guy. Yeah. One of the funniest fucking things in my ass will stop just drop. And like, I'm not a financial person. I don't have my stocks to play with the fuck. But just knowing that that asshole sits up late at night thinking like, well, maybe not. But as rich as he is, I would be thinking, holy shit, what the fuck's going on? How do I fix this? Instead, he's just shit. Oh, no. One percent of my worth.
00:07:13
Speaker
Yeah.
00:07:16
Speaker
Well, I mean, I think it's clearly, and I don't know much about these things either. So I might be talking out of my ass as, as I want to do, but like, I feel like it's just a massive course correction. Like this is, this is Tesla is at the end of the day, a vehicle company, not a tech company. And it was not been valued like a car company. I mean, it's been what valued so much more than like the second most valuable car company. Totally. Yeah.
00:07:43
Speaker
just kind of back in line to like what it should be, especially now that other manufacturers are catching up. And, and from what I've read, like surpassing Tesla in terms of electric vehicles is, you know, it starts to make sense. Yeah. Oh, totally. So it's definitely been overvalued and he is maybe the world's most janky and pretty. But alas, so what, uh, Connor had the idea to do what, uh, we might call an ensemble investigation.
Fashion Segment: Ensemble Investigation
00:08:11
Speaker
I, what we're all wearing.
00:08:14
Speaker
I like that phrase, ensemble investigation. I feel like it's a great euphemism for what we might colloquially know in other terms, but that's a good idea. Yeah. We've been kind of workshopped. That's what we've come up with. What the kids might call a fit check. Right. The kids these days. And their fit checks.
00:08:44
Speaker
So Renato, what you got under it? No one under the age of 20 has ever listened to this show. Probably not. Probably not. Well, you know, that's not going to change with me. So I apologize. I've got on.
00:09:02
Speaker
So I have not, and we'll get into this later, like I haven't bought too much, too many new clothes in 2022, but I've kind of splurged over the last week or two, now that there are a bunch of like end of the year sales, and of course Christmas, and I've received some wonderful gifts, most of those being clothing. But right now I'll start...
00:09:25
Speaker
with I'm gonna cardigan on from the skateboard brand huff actually. This was a recent purchase I made from a local skate shop. It's kind of a faux mohair cardigan that's a split design. So half of it is at least half of the front is like a kind of a caramel brown and the other half is a forest green and on the back there's a graphic of
00:09:53
Speaker
this woman smoking a cigarette from and she looks like she's like in the design style of like the 30s and I just it's super cozy and I've been on you know probably cardigans are my most worn garment of past you know a few years so I needed another one especially given the climate where I live which is in Edmonton Alberta and so I've got that on
00:10:18
Speaker
with a white Uniqlo T underneath. I got a pair of black Supreme Denim on. I honestly think the Supreme Denim is one of the better values out there. And then I've got some white Old Navy socks. For my money, I'll buy six packs, six, four packs of Old Navy socks. They're just, you know, kind of regular
00:10:47
Speaker
calf length or not calf length, but what's the one in between calf length and ankle length?
00:10:58
Speaker
But they're your standard, you know, length, uh, athletic sock. And it, there's like $12 Canadian for a pack of four. Um, so I'll just like spend a hundred bucks once a year on, on socks throughout all my old, you know, white socks. And, um, they last me for like another year. And, um, and yeah, that's pretty much it. Simple, simple fit today, but it's kind of a cozy, uh, you know, Prairie professor vibes.
00:11:23
Speaker
Very perfect. Very good. I forgot. I am wearing glasses. I have a pair of tortoise shell Tom Ford glasses on. I bet you do. Yeah. Connor, we're back. Yeah, I can picture the outfit. I think it's good. Same here, dude. You're definitely probably looking better than me. It's a toss up.
00:11:47
Speaker
Yeah, I guess we'll see. I guess we'll see. So I'll start from the bottom. I have these really old wool socks that my mom gave to me on that have a hole in them. And then my dear friend Matt sent me these 505s, which are awesome. I think I have worn them almost every day since I've got them. You may have noticed in my fits on my Instagram. And then I'm wearing
00:12:15
Speaker
rayon shirt that's kind of a monstrosity. I guess the print is like not quite tribal, maybe a little bandana. And I have this white, uh, cable knit sweater that I got for Christmas, which I think is nice. And I'm wearing my shoe ron. It's my shoe ron ronsier with a whip back, uh, ear cables, cable temple.
00:12:43
Speaker
Those are the combination of words, but really are words, but anyway. And Matt, you got to pull that out. Ah, man. So I'm wearing a green quilted Mavenham jacket, kind of similar to the Barbara Pete sale. A, like, 90s or 80, I don't even fucking know era, gray sweatshirts.
00:13:13
Speaker
a 60s all cotton thermal, a pair of Carhartt work pants and car qualities. So pretty, pretty standard. I very rarely step out of my little uniform boundary, which is usually like a t-shirt or a sweatshirt, a jacket, some like work style pants and you know, brown shoes.
00:13:43
Speaker
very exciting it's like the the olive drab guru kind of yeah i mean i guess so i'm just you know it's what i'm comfortable in and like yeah it's great for just like kicking around the house it's great and the jacket is and thermal are definitely overkill but i just didn't really feel like getting dressed
00:14:07
Speaker
Yeah, so Renata, you said you haven't bought a whole lot of clothing this year.
Selective Clothing Purchases and Style Evolution
00:14:12
Speaker
And we know that you're also very into sneakers. So with what you have bought, what are some services?
00:14:24
Speaker
Yeah, so probably I think one of the biggest reasons that I've had to slow down was, as I mentioned earlier, moving into our new house where we had a lot of expenses. We mostly had things like furniture already and whatnot. But of course, we needed certain things to fill out the space, even if we technically moved from a bigger house into a smaller house.
00:14:51
Speaker
But, you know, a few weeks ago, we actually had to buy a new furnace because, of course, when you buy a house that was built in 1953, things like that happen. And overall, so we're really happy about that and we're lucky to find it. But, you know, that was an unexpected expense. And so I also think it's just kind of part of where I am sort of in my sartorial journey, so to speak. Like, I kind of feel like
00:15:21
Speaker
my wardrobe has kind of reached a place where I have most of the basics and even you know I've kind of filled in a lot of the gaps and I'm kind of happy where it is right now and also just getting older you know I've kind of become a little bit more
00:15:36
Speaker
picky and choosy in terms of what I'm buying. I'm trying to buy smarter, trying to buy more vintage, but it's a little bit difficult here in Edmonton, just the vintage options for men at least aren't great. My wife has better luck when it comes to finding women's clothes, but I would say,
00:16:01
Speaker
You know, what, what did I buy this year? Honestly, what I bought this year. Yeah. So in terms of sneakers, um, I probably have bought the least amount of sneakers, um, that I, that I have, I used to have a much larger collection, probably verging on 40 to 50 pairs. And, uh, which like in terms of sneaker heads is not that many and, and which sounds wild, but I kind of have consolidated my collection down to about
00:16:30
Speaker
12, 13 pairs, a much more manual number. I'm actually wearing most of them. Although, again, given the climate that I live in, I'm pretty much now wearing my sneakers for three to five months a year because the snow and the slush and the mud will ruin them. But I would say the two pieces sort of that stand out to me is I finally
00:16:59
Speaker
bit the bullet and bought an Arcterix shell for skiing. I was able to justify the purchase by saying, hey, I'm going to use it when I'm skiing and out in the outdoors in the winter, which is true. I have used it for those purposes already. But I was thankfully able to find it on the, I forget what they call it, but Arcterix has
00:17:26
Speaker
a website where they sell like refurbished items basically, or like items that have been returned. And so I was able to get this shell at a really good discount on their stuff, especially some of their most popular shelves don't go on sale that often. So I was able to find it at a very good price. It's their Alpha AR shell. So it's kind of a two toned shell that's kind of a
00:17:55
Speaker
a burnt orange with a kind of a lighter yellowy orange underneath on the on the kind of bottom of it. And that's just something kind of I've lived in all fall into the winter. And in terms of sneakers, I'd say my favorite pair that I acquired this year was a pair of New Balance 990 V2s as part of the
00:18:19
Speaker
initial sort of Teddy Santos design drop from the summer. Everybody was excited about the 990 V3s in the pack but as a man of taste and sophistication I think the V2s are worth a one from that pack but all three there was also a V1. I mean all three were great. They're basically
00:18:43
Speaker
a twist on sort of the classic, you know, New Balance grays, but there's sort of some negative details like a full sort of
00:18:53
Speaker
aged soul, kind of a cream soul with a nice sort of brownish tan patch on the back. And those are probably the two pieces that I acquired this year that have for me. Oh, okay. There's a third one and I would be remiss if I didn't mention them. And I'm not alone in this. I can't say I'm the only person who have bought these this year, but I also bought a pair of our Legacy Canyon boots.
00:19:20
Speaker
And I'm just a huge, huge fan of those. So they're essentially
00:19:27
Speaker
Um, modernized or not even a modernized version. They're literally a rip of them, but Marjela put out a boot in the early 2000s and our legacy essentially just resurrected that exact design a few years back. And I bought them in the olive colorway, which is kind of a nice greeny Brown. And yeah, they're just a great kind of boot. Uh, you can dress up, you can dress down. And I've been, uh, wearing those a lot this year too. Yeah, those are sick. Yeah. Yeah.
00:19:54
Speaker
You're definitely a man of taste and obviously like I'm not really a person but some of the new balance from this year have been so fucking good New balances, I mean they've been on a wave for a few years anybody who's interested in sneakers would tell you that and Which is great because I you know as much as I love Nike and You know
00:20:22
Speaker
Everybody understands that they're the top dog. I mean, it's nice to have, and it's not like New Balance is some niche boutique, you know, small brand or anything. They're not, they're massive, but it's nice to have brands that aren't Nike and Adidas, you know, have these good collaborations and have these and release this good product just to show that there's, you know, some A, competition in the space and B, like, you know, you're not always wearing a Nike shoe.
00:20:51
Speaker
Oh, for sure. For sure. I just bought some fucking Reeboks, which never would have had on the bingo card of any capacity. Which models did you get? They're the... It's like Kinetica Edge 2.5 or something. I don't know. They remind me of like 90s Adidas trail running shoes that I always used to wear growing up. Yeah. Like, I don't know. I've been on the hunt for something like insanely comfortable.
00:21:22
Speaker
But yeah, I pulled the trigger because they were on sale when the colors are dope. Yeah. Reeboks had a good few years. I mean, I think when we're talking about sneakers, the brand that sort of jumped up highest in the power ranking, so to speak, is probably ASICS. Like, ASICS had a great year. The Gelkiano 14 was maybe the most
00:21:49
Speaker
you know, popular, um, non Nike silhouette, um, across Instagram and across, you know, certain, um, audiences. And they've had other, my favorite sneaker of the year was probably a New Balance, sorry, um, an ASIC sneaker. It was the
00:22:08
Speaker
ASICS collaboration house studios is a little boutique in Australia and they just put together a really nice collaboration on the gel 1130 with some kind of there's some hairy suede on the ASICS logo and just some
00:22:25
Speaker
some kind of nice and muted navy and cream colors. But they had a great year too.
Sneaker Trends and Culture
00:22:32
Speaker
And it's nice to see all these other companies doing this kind of really interesting sort of work, whereas you didn't see that outside of Nike and Adidas for a while. So it's great to see that. Yeah, you don't have, you can look elsewhere and you can also find something that's maybe a little more off the beaten path.
00:22:56
Speaker
And, and, you know, and it's, it's just great to see. Always remind me of two things. However, tennis team, because that was like the issue of choice for most people. And, uh, the early 2000s when the, like, uh, what is it? On the suka or whatever tiger that like classic shape was all the rage with basically everyone on the planet.
00:23:25
Speaker
I don't know why. Those two memories will always stick in my head. That that model in particular feels to me like kind of a vestige of like the original hashtag menswear movement. Oh yeah. Oh yeah. GQ is just using this with a suit. Like you can wear the Adidas Samba with a suit. Like which you can, but like not without spending a lot of money.
00:23:49
Speaker
Absolutely. And I just think that's also funny because, you know, one of the sort of movements of 2022 when it comes to clothing was sort of that hashtag mentor 2.0 sort of resurgence. Yes. Right. Yeah. Yes. And I'm happy. Like I'm happy that it's, that it's back. Like I'm uncomfortable all the time, but I would say that like,
00:24:13
Speaker
I'm less comfortable in sneakers than I am in whatever the fuck else it is that I'm wearing. So I'm a little bit happy to see it, even if it is like sort of dull or can be, can be very dull, but I guess everything can be dull. I don't know if I've seen you too often in a sneaker corner. I don't have them. I don't even have that many.
00:24:40
Speaker
like i've gotten rid of a few i just like um because of the working in this school it's like i don't want to get roasted by eight-year-olds you know not that i would but it's like i don't want to be wearing super duper nice sneakers to to the kindergarten class
00:25:05
Speaker
So it's probably a practicality thing. And I don't know, I mean, comfort is not very high on my list of priorities for dressing. So I'm just like, probably, what the fuck did I, I mean, I'm hiking boots up here. I brought wild bees up here. And of course I brought up penny loafers. Solid choices. I mean- Great, yeah, that's a great reputation. Yeah, yeah. It covers all the faces.
00:25:35
Speaker
Yeah, you know. Because you're wearing them, you're wearing them now, right? Yeah, yeah. I mean, they are not just being completely honest. I'm like, I've always enjoyed carts, like, distribution lobbies. Yeah. For more than like, four hours on either of those. You will absolutely wreck yourself. Like, that's, that's the only bummer about it.
00:25:59
Speaker
Yeah. Like, well, they have no support. Yeah. They don't really have any support. I mean, no, no, no, they have no risk. They have no, but yeah, I know what I mean. I make the mistake of wearing these to like the markets that I do. And, you know, a couple of hours into it, I'm like, I'm a fucking idiot.
00:26:29
Speaker
I need you to to sell me on the Clark Wallaby because that's one
00:26:37
Speaker
silhouette that I have just never gravitated to and it just has never clicked for me. It's just something about that shape and like the toe area in particular just I understand the why people love it and it's you know significance culturally obviously you know it's the footwear of choice for the Wu-Tang Clan but yeah it's something about that that is never sort of connected with me so yeah I need you guys to sound me on that.
00:27:06
Speaker
What am I missing? I mean, I got mine for free. That helps. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, in my opinion, it's an objectively ugliest sin chew, but I also like, that's kind of like the appeal to me. Like it is, I don't know how to sell you on it, but like it's ugly, but like in a cool way for lack of a better description. And they're a little, they're a little bit comfortable.
00:27:35
Speaker
Oh, yeah. I mean, for like, for like kicking around or like, if you, you know, if you're not walking or standing all day, like they're great, but.
00:27:44
Speaker
Well, and importantly, people are interested in ugly stuff now. They're more interested in ugly stuff, I would say, earlier in the pandemic. But even still, we see that the ugly stuff is here, at least for a while. And I would include the wallaby in that thing. But it's like, some of the kids at the school have said to me when I wear them into the school, like, oh, there goes Mr. Connor. He's wearing the white man shoes.
00:28:14
Speaker
They're not wrong. Yeah, they're not wrong. Renato, have you ever seen the paraboot Michael?
00:28:23
Speaker
I'm not sure if I have it now. I'm on my computer. Yeah. I'm going to Google this. It's a kind of like. Okay. Yeah. Okay. I'm familiar with this model for sure. It's almost like a, what are they, the toe, the toe is just like a, what do they call this? Like a Norwegian kind of style? Yeah, I think Norwegian toe. I could mess with that.
00:28:46
Speaker
more. Yeah, I feel like that's more up your alley than like what these are. And it's kind of like a similar shape to me. I've always loved the Michael shape. And I don't know, it's just it's another one of those things that like is is ugly. Yeah. Yeah. I don't know. Yeah. You just gotta, you know, I gotta test it out.
00:29:16
Speaker
It may not be for you. Yeah, that's fair. Not everything is for everyone. Exactly. So, so what about, uh, for you then music this year, which we said earlier, you have done some writing level about music.
Creative Output in Music and Film
00:29:35
Speaker
So we were wondering what your top, whatever of this year was, cause I don't want to make
00:29:41
Speaker
or 10 if there aren't 10 albums to speak about this year, you know, which of course there are. Oh absolutely, and I do think that like 2022 was a great year for music, and I think for art in general, like I also think it was a very strong year for film too, and I think that's sort of basically a side effect of like nobody
00:30:06
Speaker
Well, one, nobody wanted to release things like in 2020 or 2021 necessarily because they wanted to hold off. And like, you know, especially if you're a musician, you can't tour. And when there's a global pandemic going on and although some tried. And also, you know, that's where most of the income for artists come these days. And even then, like I've,
00:30:32
Speaker
heard recently that touring still isn't able you know given the the financials and how how much things cost now and inflation and whatnot touring still you know they can't break even a lot of times let alone make a profit so um i know it's been very difficult for artists to make a living which is terrible but um i think not only have they been holding off release in some of this material but over the last year or two they've had time to to sit around and record new stuff so i think it's been it was a great year
00:31:01
Speaker
And, you know, this is something I've been thinking about and as I usually do it this time of year, kind of just bringing them what, you know, I listened to most this year, what was my favorites. And for me, I kind of think there were three albums that really sort of run the gamut in terms of genres and whatnot. So I would say, you know, my favorite three albums in no real order, but were
00:31:29
Speaker
Destroyer, who is Dan Behar from Vancouver, put out a really great record this year called Labyrinthitis. He's sort of in his mystic troubadour mode, as he always is, and his band sounds really tight.
00:31:52
Speaker
kind of a return to sort of a, not a dancey sort of indie rock, but there are definitely some, you know, cry rock influences there. And just the songwriting is really sharp as ever. I really, really love that album. I was listening to it yesterday. In fact,
00:32:09
Speaker
And then there is Sabrina Carpenter's emails I can't send, which is, for my money, maybe the best pop album of the year. She's actually a Disney girl, so she was on the same show that Olivia Rodrigo was on. Sure.
00:32:28
Speaker
over the pandemic. And she wrote maybe the best Ariana Grande song that Ariana Grande hasn't written in nonsense. Just kind of a really fun track that sounds like the collaborations between Ariana Grande and Victoria Monet.
00:32:49
Speaker
And I just, I think she's a really sharp songwriter. In fact, I think her, I think the project is probably better than Olivia Rodrigo's. Sour was, that came out, was that last year, I think? Yeah, yeah. That was 2020 or 2021. But it's a really good collection of, of sort of modern pop music that kind of spans a few different styles. And then maybe my most listened to album, and I've kind of,
00:33:17
Speaker
realized that just what I listened to most of that kind of ended up just being my favorite. Whereas, you know, in previous years, I'd be like, well, I didn't listen to this as much as, you know, album X, but, you know, it's better for the X, Y, and Z reasons. Or I should say Z. I don't know why I use the American pronunciation. But just for my American friends. But I would say my most listened to record was probably The Weeknds.fm.
00:33:46
Speaker
which I just think is probably his best project since his original trilogy, you know, 10 years ago. It helps when you have, sorry, one of the tricks point never, helping on the production side of things. So it's just kind of like, on one side is he's really accessible, you know, mainstream dance, synth pop, but at the same time you have his touches work, he's adding, you know, OPNs,
00:34:14
Speaker
magic touch and it kind of keeps it a little bit more interesting and I just think it's a really good collection of of synth pop and it's interesting I never would have predicted it but as somebody who is historically a big Drake fan but in 2022 the weekend is making better music than Drake and that's not something I would have predicted 10 years ago
00:34:39
Speaker
Yes, would you say with some authority as well? Well, I just have to say that, you know, I actually quite enjoyed, honestly, never mind Drake's house album I'm familiar with this year. And there are some good tracks on his collaboration with 21 Savage, Her Loss, although there are also a lot of just very sour and
00:35:03
Speaker
kind of frankly like misogynist, more so than usual. I know Drake's playing the villain on this album, but just kind of really sour, angry sort of stuff that I just don't really mess with that much. But there are also some good songs on there too. But honestly, I just give me the Weekends album this year over Drake. Yeah, no, excellent. And I think
00:35:34
Speaker
The Drake 21 Savage album was just like, not like I had extremely high hopes for it, but I just thought there has to be a limit to the amount of canned material that someone can release, right? But I guess not. If you have like a huge structure behind you that like furthers your production of music or whatever, whatever the art is,
00:36:01
Speaker
So I guess there's no end in sight to that sort of, to those sort of collaborations. Yeah, and I think Drake and 21 Savage have, they've done interesting collaborations in the past. They have good chemistry. And they have great chemistry, exactly. That's where I was going with that. Like they kind of balance each other nicely. 21 Savage is sort of dead-eyed, monotone, sort of like, almost like,
00:36:29
Speaker
horrorcore-esque, but it was also camp kind of whole vibe with Drake's kind of straight man, Don sort of, you know, character. But I just think like that balance really wasn't there on the project. And again, there's some, I actually think that the songs that are more successful are the ones, Lil Yachty was involved with a lot of the songwriting process.
00:36:56
Speaker
And the songs where his influences really shine the brightest, I feel like, are the best moments on that tape. And they also happen to be some of the solo Drake tracks, actually, which goes to tell you everything you needed about the project, if the actual collaborative tracks, aside from Rich Flex, whichever, has become immune at this point. But if the songs where Drake is by himself are the ones that are the most successful, at least in my opinion, it shows you the fatal flaw of the project.
00:37:26
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, and I think to 21 Savage is in Titan. It's like, it's in the name, right? Like he is the violent trap rapper. So to have him not be villainous, more villainous is kind of, oh, I feel like it would have been a better to go to return to the Drake thing.
00:37:51
Speaker
uh what a time to be alive was a good album drake was on it and that and that was good like that i thought was a good use of really of both of them um so just weird and i think what a time to be alive works because drake wasn't trying to out future future he was being drake he
00:38:11
Speaker
adapted to the surroundings, you know, like the, the codeine fueled strip club sort of ambiance. He was able to sort of, I mean, at the core of Drake, he's an actor and that's what he does. Like he can, he's, and that's what he'll always do. So like he's always, there's always been an element of sort of like play acting when it comes to Drake.
00:38:35
Speaker
especially later in his career when he started to you know inhabit the style of more of a more traditional rapper rather than like this sort of outsider Canadian guy who was like hey I'm not like these other rappers but
00:38:51
Speaker
on on that project yeah like there was a balance like future was future and Drake was like you know inhabiting that space and that sort of tension I felt like was one of the reasons that was successful project also it was eight songs which kind of helped um her loss is something like 17 18 I can't remember the exact number of songs but again you have Drake trying to basically
00:39:16
Speaker
be you know it's not a good cop bad cop here it's bad cop bad cop and like 21 Savage you already have that so um trying to sort of do the same thing um you know that's not the best sort of mode for Drake I think. Drake's just trying to you know reignite his acting career from Degrassi like that's you know
00:39:38
Speaker
That's where, that's where he comes from. Absolutely. And honestly, you know what, speaking of that, like I'm actually surprised that Drake has not been like, has not for able to film like by this
Drake's Career and Musical Evolution
00:39:50
Speaker
point. He is sure. I'm very surprised by that as well. He's a very decent actor. He was great on SNL. I forget if he's been a once or twice, but, um, you know, he, he, why nobody has put Drake in a rom-com as the leader.
00:40:05
Speaker
He would kill in that role, like opposite. I don't know who would be age appropriate for him. Um, um, he needs my 17 year old really Bobby Brown and Drake. Yeah. Um, but you put him in that role and you give him a good script and I think he would kill it. So I'm not sure why. I mean, he hasn't done that, but I don't know. Uh, I think, I think it'd be a no brainer.
00:40:32
Speaker
He's very charming. There's no denying that he's very charming. This whole discussion is making me realize that I have listened to maybe three records that actually came out this year. Well, one of those was Matt. Dude, the Archers of Loaf record came out in October, which I really wanted to love because that is one of my favorite bands.
00:41:00
Speaker
However, yeah, it just like, it doesn't sound, it doesn't sound what I would want from that band, which is fine. People change, people get older. This is the first record since like 98, I think. But yeah, that MJ Linderman, which a friend of mine sent me a track and I was like immediately just like, whoa, this is fucking sick.
00:41:28
Speaker
Um, and I think that was like on the, you know, wrong stone top hundred of the year or something. But if he's like, you know, kind of been like an indie all country in a way, like punk kids from like Ashland, North Carolina, good, good stuff. And actually I cannot think of a fucking third record.
00:41:53
Speaker
But my big thing of the year was discovering a bunch of bands that I've missed from the past decade and they've all broken up now. Yeah, what Matt likes to do is to this music and be very interested in it and then
00:42:11
Speaker
also discovered that the band is no more. That happens a lot. That's my special secret skill is finding a band that I missed somehow in the past 10 years and realizing they're great and they just fucking broke up. Well, what are some examples of these now defunct bands that you've recently discovered? Let me think. A band called Hacky Diving. I think they're still technically active. Sure.
00:42:39
Speaker
They put out a couple of records and I don't think they've played like one show in the past six or seven years. Them, a band called Iron Sheik that I think they're actually somewhat still active too, but I think they're like the record, the first record that I started listening to of theirs came out in like 2017.
00:43:04
Speaker
Those are the two that like kind of mainly come to mind, but I don't know. I just like, I stopped paying attention to like new music for a long time. And I'm now I'm kicking my, like myself about it, but you know, it's still, it's still enjoyable and it's at least it's still available. You know, keeping up with.
00:43:25
Speaker
new music or new popular culture is hard. Like, I mean, I know we have streaming services, and not only for which are bad, right? Could be an unlimited source of music discovery. And instead, they play you the same five songs that you don't want to listen to over and over again.
00:43:47
Speaker
Well, it's because Payola never died. It just sort of moved on to Spotify and off of the radio. But it's hard. So not only, yeah, the algorithm isn't as helpful for discovery as one would hope it is, but it's just like there's so much
00:44:08
Speaker
new stuff like there's been there's more new art released in a year you know now than there was probably for a decade you know if we're talking about in the 70s and the 80s because the the barrier to entry thankfully is is a lot lower and it's easier to start making art whether that's film or music um and it's just it's hard to keep up like i mean they say or when i say they say i mean i've i've seen studies that said most people stop discovering new music at 33 like
Music Discovery Challenges
00:44:38
Speaker
And that doesn't seem far off. I mean, I've listened to less new music than I would have 10 years ago. I'm 35 now. And even less music than I did five years ago. I mean, honestly, if anything, the pandemic sort of helped me rediscover listening to new artists and new music and new film and whatnot. Because I had time. We couldn't do anything else. But it's hard to keep up with new shit.
00:45:08
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, I think what you said about, you know, just the sheer volume of what's being put out is a huge part of that too. And, you know, like the streaming streaming services are great for, you know, accessibility, like, you know,
00:45:25
Speaker
20 years ago, we would have had to buy all of these CDs and you didn't want to spend the money. It's like, well, shit, I'll, I'll go to the, uh, you know, CD store and listen to a few songs like on their little trial or go to the library or something. But you know, like that, that's definitely a positive, but then it's just, it's just overwhelming.
00:45:50
Speaker
You got to find someone to aggregate it all for you. I mean, I really look forward to this time of year because like I am annoyingly on the pulse of music, hip-hop almost exclusively, but like I miss shit even still and so I'm excited to see always the year-end list, right? And I can remember like
00:46:13
Speaker
like Rolling Stone and whatever like UK music magazines that you send lists and I would like write them down and go home and torrent them, you know? So I'm not like cursing the streaming services totally, but they leave a lot to be desired, especially like because I give them money every month. Oh, for sure. For sure. So Connor, what's your top of this year?
00:46:40
Speaker
So I did write this down and this is obnoxious because like I am so musically far from even like March. Like I saw Pusha this year. He released an album this year. He's one of my favorite artists. But I don't think I would put his album at the top this year. So I wrote down five, but I will keep with the three.
00:47:05
Speaker
Killing Nothing by Boldy James was excellent. Tremendous. I mean, I think he released four albums this year. So my number two album is also a Boldy James album. Fair Exchange, No Robbery with Boldy James and Nicholas Craven, which has all the weird samples, which like that's pop, that's rap music, right? It's like weird samples, but these are like kind of ethereal, like
00:47:33
Speaker
really out there, beautiful piano, like the kind of stuff that I like. And Boldy is just like doing his over top of them. And then I would have to include Sick sweatshirt in my ranking this year as well, which is insane that that album came out this year, but it did.
00:47:54
Speaker
Nice. Good. The Boldy James thing goes back to the accessibility of putting out a record. He put out four fucking albums this year. That's crazy. And they're not all amazing, but at least two of them were very, very solid. Yeah. I mean, you've sent me a few tracks, and I'm not a huge hip hop or rap person, but it's very enjoyable.
00:48:20
Speaker
It's old-school enough, you know? Yeah, oh, totally. It's old-school enough and, like, it has, it has, like, some, you know, it benefits from modern technology, but it still is definitely, like, an old kind of music. Right, totally, totally. Um, so since we have all shared our music, I was going to say, uh, finally, I guess, Renato, do you have, do you have a, like,
Renato's Writing Highlights and Future Plans
00:48:50
Speaker
was there a piece that you enjoyed writing the most this year without like throwing someone under the bus or whatever? Well, thankfully I'm in a place in my writing career where I get to be pretty selective about what I write. I've been doing this for a long time and also like the editors I work with like are great and they understand what I like to write about and what I'm good at writing about.
00:49:19
Speaker
and so they tend to throw me pieces that I'm going to enjoy writing and I think that was the case for 2022. It was I stayed busy writing and I was able to do a really or do a few really cool pieces. I would say two stuck out for me in particular. I've been
00:49:49
Speaker
I kind of began back in the day writing about music exclusively, writing album reviews, writing profiles of artists and things of that nature. That's kind of how I broke into the game. And since then I've sort of started to become more of a generalist just writing about
00:50:09
Speaker
things that interested me in general and lately have started to write more about fashion and, you know, menswear in general, which has been really satisfying for me on a personal level. As much as I love music and it's one of my biggest passions, I would say clothing is probably even more of a passion than the music or at the very least the equal passion. So I've started to write for this Canadian magazine called Sharp.
00:50:37
Speaker
which is essentially the Canadian GQ, maybe with a little bit more
00:50:45
Speaker
kind of yeah it's essentially the Canadian GQ and there are two pieces I wrote there in the fall that that stood out for me one was a profile of a Canadian brand called Lebarrow which is free in Italian and it's just kind of a really neat small
00:51:08
Speaker
brand that's making some really cool pieces that does a lot of really great storytelling. And basically it was a profile of the brand. So I got to interview one of the co-founders of the brand, Adam Apoliese. And I wanted to tell the story too, because there was a good human interest angle. Not only do they kind of make good, great pieces,
00:51:31
Speaker
that are all made by a 75-year-old Italian nonna named Michaela, which I thought is a great story to the brand. But the co-founder of the brand was Adam's best friend, Kadeem Johnson, who tragically died by suicide a few years ago. And Adam kind of made that his sort of driving sort of motivation to make the brand
00:51:58
Speaker
successful and take you as far as he could as a tribute to his best friend who you know was instrumental in the founding of of Libero and that that was just a really interesting story for me and I was able I was glad I was able to tell it and kind of um you know share that story because it's you know
00:52:20
Speaker
this product. And then there's, you know, what's interesting to me is sort of the storytelling behind it. And, of course, Ray Burrow just has a really good story and I wish him all the success. And it sounds like, you know, their recent collection is doing very well. So I was really happy to tell that story.
00:52:40
Speaker
And then the second one was I got to interview Jonathan David, who is a Canadian soccer player, who plays in France for Lille, in Ligue 1, so the premier division in France. And he also plays with the Canadian national team, who
00:53:01
Speaker
made their first appearance at the World Cup at the men's World Cup, I should say, in 36 years. The last time was in 1986. So until until last month, Canada had not been in a World Cup during my lifetime. So that's crazy. Yeah, it was really like,
00:53:19
Speaker
just a monumental achievement for the program. And so he was on that squad and ended up playing in the tournament. So I got to speak with him in the hall and just kind of talk to him about, you know, his career and also relating it back to his personal style. So that was kind of a really cool opportunity. Now I can forever say that I've interviewed a World Cup player. Hell yeah.
00:53:47
Speaker
Yeah, add a feather to your cap. Yeah, dude. There's many feathers in that cap. I appreciate that. Maybe, yeah, they're small, small ones. Well, I follow you, right? I mean, so I see what you are writing. Yeah, I think that they're good pieces as well. I mean, of course,
00:54:19
Speaker
Yeah, you did tell the story and it's the I'm speaking about the leave a row one. Then I'm like, because when did this come out? Not very long ago, even. Yeah, I remember this. Yeah, that piece would have been in October, I think. Yeah, October 14. I remember this shirt. I'll have to check it out. Yeah.
00:54:46
Speaker
Yeah, they do a lot of cool sort of, you know, like a blend of sort of classic menswear, but on the more casual side of things, but updated for 2022, like through a kind of a unique lens, like the most recent collection that they put out was all based on like the work work that Adam's dad would have worn. I think he's a carpenter and maybe perhaps a jack of all trades, you know, a lot of those
00:55:16
Speaker
especially immigrant fathers you know we had did everything so to speak but you know like so there's a cool work jacket that's like kind of like a more luxurious version of like the Carhartt Detroit jacket. It's like a waxed
00:55:35
Speaker
wax cotton material and actually that is one of the pieces I would like to buy in the next little while and you know there's some other some other cool pieces in that in that drop but um yeah. And how many like publications do you regularly write for at this point?
00:55:55
Speaker
There are a few right now. I would say there are maybe two or three at this point. One's a local magazine here in Edmonton called Edify and you know, read a lot of like sort of local focused
00:56:15
Speaker
content for them, which is great. They're one of the, actually probably the only publication here in Edmonton that pays their writers a fair wage, so that's nice to be able to do. And then there's sort of the things I've written for Sharp recently, and I'm still branching out. I've got some things in the works for 2023, hopefully,
00:56:43
Speaker
I'm always trying to expand sort of the repertoire of publications I'm writing for, but basically it's, you know, wherever, whoever will say yes to a pitch I have. And as I tried to write more about, you know, men's fashion, I'm starting to write for some of those publications as well. And hopefully, you know, that continues in the new year. Yeah, I was going to say finally from
00:57:12
Speaker
The pieces that I have read of yours that are about sports do have enough fashion or clothing, I guess I should say, in them that I'm still like, yeah, I'm going to finish this article. Yeah, we're definitely excited to see what the new year holds for you, dude. Well, thank you. Yeah, of course. Of course. Yeah, dude, thank you for coming on the show and just kind of
00:57:41
Speaker
I don't know, kicking it with us virtually. Do you want to shout anything out, your Instagram or whatever? Sure. If anybody is interested in following along with my, you know, writing journey or just want to take a look at the fits and hopefully appreciate them. Or, you know, you can come and leave comments and
00:58:09
Speaker
control me, that's acceptable as well if you think the fits are trash. But you can find me on Twitter and Instagram at the same handle as kind of the same handle I use on all social media platforms.
00:58:24
Speaker
The handle is renovate, so R-E-N-N-A-V-A-T-E. And yeah, I will usually post links to, especially on Twitter, any piece I write. If there are pieces that end up in print, I'll usually make posts about them on Instagram as well, but that kind of is where I hang out digitally and kind of just make posts and kind of post photos of my outfits and whatnot. So that's where you can kind of find me online.
00:58:55
Speaker
Awesome. I gotta follow you on Twitter. I don't know why I'm not. Well, in the off chance that Twitter actually survives another couple of months, but we'll get to that.
00:59:05
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, yesterday, my wife, who does social media for a living, was working and was experiencing issues on the desktop version of Twitter. So I don't know. That makes me a little bit nervous. Yeah, same. I don't even really post. I just use it for various ways to keep up with things.
00:59:31
Speaker
Oh, absolutely. Like Twitter is probably how I've, my primary news source, um, for better or worse, uh, these days. Right. And I don't think I'm alone in that. No, I don't either. It's the main reason I'm not reading the news. I mean, I haven't been on Twitter probably in a few months, other than like to send stuff back and forth with Matt. But other than that, I mean, like a platform that I really like, I love Twitter.
01:00:00
Speaker
is just, and it before the Elon Musk thing, but like I do think that it's probably dead and gone. Yeah, on that note. On that note, thanks everyone for sticking with us through whatever the fuck if the season one or whatever. Oh, the season one finale is spectacular. The season one finale is spectacular. Renato, thank you again for coming on.
01:00:31
Speaker
I am yeah I'm stoked that we did this and it was you know it's a nice way to end the year for us I think. Absolutely I mean I've seen I've seen the journey of the podcast and it kind of feels like a little bit of a full circle moment for me you know I kind of was around in the the brainstorming phases and I got to to be privy to some some of that work and and then hearing you to you know take this where you've taken it so far and
01:00:59
Speaker
produce some really good episodes has been really satisfying. So again, I, I want to give you guys props for that. And thank you for having me on. Well, everyone, thanks for listening again. We're at apocalypse studs on Instagram, apocalypse studs at gmail.com, which is just going to be a running joke that we still haven't gotten an email.
01:01:23
Speaker
Yeah, so someone email us, please, God. Even if it's just a stupid meme, just send it our way. I am Matt Smith at Rebels Rogues on Instagram. And I'm Connor Fowler at Connor Fowler with one ad. And yeah, Happy New Year, and we'll see you in 2023. Ho, ho, ho.