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Don't miss this episode!
This week we talk Hip-Hop, Art, Comics, Chicago, Rap history, women in geek culture, action figures, sci-fi, fantasy, Oddisee, Little Brother, Rapsody with . . .
SEAN WYNN A.K.A. Baddwolfe A.K.A. CeriusBlaq A.K.A. Hank McCoy Beast MC
Comic enthusiast, Hip Hop Junkie, Marketing Nerd, Activist.
General in the Preytorians Army.
Owner of Strange Solutions Marketing & Consulting.
A Chicago Native that has been residing in Portland for the last 10 years making a name for himself the professional nerd industries.
Listen to the sound of the Preytorians here
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Transcript
Introduction to Podcast & Host Ken Balante
00:00:00
Speaker
You are listening to something rather than nothing. Creator and host Ken Balante, editor and producer Peter Bauer. Sometimes my guess in talking about popular culture, we're chatting, this and that, and then it's like the philosophy question and it's almost like
00:00:26
Speaker
He's like, why the fuck, why the fuck you just asked that? You know, it's like, you know, we were talking like all normal. And so anyways, however you want to, you know, however you want to handle it, you know, the, the background for it is like, I've liked to get into people, what people are creating, what they're into all that type of thing, but also to get into some of the questions like, you know, why, why are we doing this? You know, why, what compels us to do it? And, um,
00:00:54
Speaker
just to have a good conversation around that. I
Podcast Schedule & Audience
00:01:00
Speaker
tend to post like Tuesday night or Wednesday, they've been regularly on Wednesdays and
00:01:08
Speaker
You know, people are listening to it. You know, there's the people who are listening to the guest in particular, which I'm sure that, you know, there'll be a lot of people want to hear what you have to say. But there's also some regular listeners as well. And this will be, you know, the seventh episode. So it's still fairly new. But, you know, there's some people listening to it and downloading it. So.
00:01:33
Speaker
Uh, yeah, so that's the scoop. You got, you got any, any questions or just want to, I read over the questions ahead of time and, um, I made a couple of notes for myself. Um, no, man, I think I'm good to go. All right. All right. Let's, let's, uh, this seems like it's going to be fun. So yeah, yeah, let's, let's, let's do it. I'll do the intro when we're going to roll.
Guest Introduction: Sean Wynn of Praetorians
00:01:56
Speaker
Um, you listened to the something rather than nothing podcast. And this week we have a great guest, uh, Sean, when
00:02:04
Speaker
a member of the group Praetorians. He does a lot of work creating art, being around art, enjoying art, comic books, graphic novels, music, and hip-hop. And I can actually say that finally this podcast is going to get into some conversation about hip-hop, which is one of my great joys for a long time.
00:02:33
Speaker
I just wanted to welcome you, Sean Wynn. Hey, Ken, thank you so much for having me, man. I've been looking forward to this. I've always enjoyed chatting with you, and now I get to do it in the official capacity. Yeah, thanks for being here.
Sean's Chicago Childhood & Love for Comics
00:02:50
Speaker
Our first question, which we tend to ask is, what were you like as a young human? What type of things were you interested in?
00:03:00
Speaker
Oh man. So, uh, I think as you know, and maybe the listeners don't know is, uh, I grew up in Chicago and so in my Chicago days as a young man, believe it or not, man, I was kind of a loner. Um, you know, my, I was raised by a single mom. My older brother is seven years older than me. So as you can imagine, we did not like just hang out together a lot, you know? So I was kind of that kid who, uh,
00:03:29
Speaker
stayed in his room a lot and created his own world. Like, I've always been into action figures for some reason. So, you know, as a youngin, what you'd catch me doing is setting up battles in my room and just being in it a whole day. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And, you know, I mean, like any other kid, I still went outside and like, you know, rode my bike and did shit like that. And I was reading books, though. My mom's always brought me like some books, whether it be comics or like
00:03:58
Speaker
little prose novels. I think I read the Chronicles of the Narnia series like four times when I was a kid. So I was just like, wow, you know, sucked into the adventure. And, you know, when I tell people this next part, they always they always laugh at me because they think it's weird. But outside of, you know, the Sunday papers of Sunday Funnies or whatever, my first comic related anything that I owned was a compilation of Bloom County that my mom founded the thrift store. Thanks.
00:04:28
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. So I don't know. I mean, I don't think I got all the Reaganomics jokes, but I just enjoy. And, you know, and then, you know, I watched a lot of TV. Most of it was probably stuff I wasn't supposed to watch, like Cheers and soap and Benny Hill. The Tonight Show. I think I was supposed to be asleep, but I wasn't. Yeah, I think I think I was a weird kid, but also a normal kid. I don't know, man.
00:04:58
Speaker
Yeah. So like, uh, your, you know, like your, your own world. Um, I think, you know, I remember, I remember growing up, um, I quickly realized the power of like, for me, I was reading some science fiction when I was younger, you know, and, uh, you know, like war of the worlds and all that type of thing.
Comics Passion & Recommendations by Sean
00:05:17
Speaker
And I think there's people who are actually transported, uh, to, you know, whether it's in comics or in books that
00:05:25
Speaker
There's they're more sensitive to being transported to that world and then you want to you want to keep going Back to it. I think it's like that the role of fantasy, you know In in participating in that I definitely heard You know that in your answer You know one of the most important questions I have to ask you just my own selfish reasons and What comics you reading now? Oh Okay
00:05:55
Speaker
Man. Okay. So that's a tough question for me, man, because like, well, okay. So to start, I still work in comics. So every Tuesday I'm over at a Excalibur, uh, over on Hawthorne. And so I get to pick up all the new stuff, but I'll say lately, uh, I jumped on board the new Jonathan Hickman, uh, house of X and powers of X series.
00:06:22
Speaker
Just because Hickman can, you know, he's, he's pretty in depth when he comes to the superhero stuff, man. And I'm, I'm anxious to see what he's going to throw at us. Uh, I just finished images, little bird, uh, still reading black Panther, uh, XO man award, but I'll be totally honest. I'm biased as hell with XO man award. Uh, been buying it since the new iteration with Matt Kent, because I, there's a character in the book named after me, uh, which, which survived.
00:06:51
Speaker
So the character win is actually me. And it happened after I interviewed Matt Kent a couple of years ago and we just hit it off. I'm also reading The Wild Storm. And then pretty much whenever I'm at a comic shop, if I can find anything about Jeff Lemire, anything by David Walker, anything, any art by Ibrahim Mustafa, any anthologies or historical adaptations, I'm probably going to buy it, especially if it's an art cover.
00:07:22
Speaker
And then comics that I also buy, uh, for diversity sake. And I'll explain that in a second is, uh, moon girl and devil dinosaur, any miles Morales book, spider Gwen, uh, young justice, Naomi, and like miss marble just because like, and honestly I'm the little behind on most of the series, but I want to see them keep making them. So I get my money. Yeah. Yeah. I, um,
00:07:48
Speaker
I'm a couple of things. I've heard just some rave reviews about the Hickman work. And I'm a little behind on that myself. But I know a lot of people are excited about that. And I do share with Jeff Lemire anything that he puts together. In fact, I saw somebody wearing a shirt that I thought was of black hammer.
00:08:15
Speaker
It actually wasn't, and I realized that there had been some corruption in my brain where I was starting to see the characters in other places that they weren't, and then you know you're a bit infected. I ran into Craig Thompson's ginseng roots. I'm not sure if you've seen that yet, where he talks about growing up in Wisconsin, and Wisconsin being the biggest importer for some time of ginseng out to China.
00:08:45
Speaker
and in some of the rural areas in him growing up in Wisconsin and digging the ginseng roots and how long they take. I didn't know so much about ginseng. Yeah, it's a fantastic story. A little bit tough to find. I've read the first issue. I got to see him at the IndyCon that was there in Portland, where our friend Ethan Slayton was also there as well. Oh, okay. Yeah, they had some great stuff.
00:09:14
Speaker
They had some great stuff there. But
Sean's Musical Journey & Hip-Hop Exploration
00:09:19
Speaker
in addition, one of the other things I wanted to pick your brain about was what type of music is interesting you now? And related to that, with you producing material with Praetorians, has there been a change as far as what you listen to or what you're connecting with? Well, you know,
00:09:44
Speaker
To be honest, I think most people that are into music in general, man, there's no one genre that holds me. My heart is always going to be with hip-hop, for sure. But if you were a real hip-hop fan, a true to the heart what the culture is about hip-hop fan, then you listen to everything. And I've always listened to everything. Because I didn't even get into hip-hop until I became a teenager. Because before that, I was listening to
00:10:14
Speaker
uh, like Chicago underground house. Cause like, I grew up being surrounded by DJs actually. Uh, in fact, um, one of my mom's best friends is the world. Well, it was the world famous DJ Frankie Knuckles. Oh wow. And, uh, so yeah, the underground Chicago housing was like kind of where I grew up at. And that's all I did for a while. Then of course what we had disco in the house rock, you know, uh, classic rock. And we even had some metal.
00:10:41
Speaker
Um, folk music, whatever. Uh, if we, if it was on vinyl, we had it playing in the house at some point. So, but when I'm, when I'm doing now is, uh, as a hip hop enthusiast, um, I actually make it a point to study hip hop still, but not just American hip hop. So like every week I go through and I find whether it'd be on YouTube, Spotify, whatever, uh, whatever new hip hop songs I could find.
00:11:09
Speaker
but then I'll start looking for hip hop and other languages in other countries to see what has been adapted, what part they're at in the culture, if it's being represented properly. So that's like my passion there. But outside of that, like I'm still listening to, I wouldn't say I listen to a bunch of pop, even though like everything's categorized to pop, I don't even know who is these days, you know? Yeah, right. A prime example would be like, I listened to Kimbra a lot, right?
00:11:39
Speaker
And people will compare her to like, uh, uh, Miley Cyrus or something like that. But I think she's completely different. I think she's got a little bit more soul to her, but, um, still looking for new metal bands. Uh, let me, let me clarify that. Not new metal, just new metal bands. Honestly. Yeah. I'm looking for vocals. I'm looking for lyrical content. I don't care what it is really.
00:12:08
Speaker
If you got something to say that's important to me, I'll snatch it up. Yeah. Yeah. I definitely know what you're saying. I was thinking about, I was thinking about this as I've had a kind of on and off connection to, to hip hop. And when I was listening, I, I was just thinking about this yesterday that when I was 11, 12 years old and it wasn't hip hop, it was rap music right up on the East coast. And, um, you know, I remember scouring, uh,
00:12:38
Speaker
the the bins or maybe it was a local retailer trying to find what is you know what would be released and I'd buy a cassette and I'd buy everything that was released because it was so limited what you could find I mean you look in the soul section you look in the R&B section there wasn't a rap or hip-hop site there was none of those sections you kind of scour and look for it and I remember buying everything
00:13:04
Speaker
That that was that was there boogie down productions early african-bambada You know EPM D and of course, you know some breakthrough with you know with with run DMC Beastie Boys and that stuff from Def Jam, but um and After that I got into I got into a lot of metal and a lot of industrial but the one theme that I've listened to throughout has been rap and hip-hop and now
00:13:34
Speaker
My son listens to a lot and a lot of different styles of music, so he's kind of influencing me again, and it's great to have that kind of, if you forget about something, to be reintroduced to it. And I've really appreciated both the aesthetic of your work with Praetorians, the sound, the intense raps,
00:14:03
Speaker
and just the content in general. I want to drill in. Tell us who Pretorians is, who you are, and what you're trying to do with the group. Okay.
Formation & Inspiration of Praetorians
00:14:23
Speaker
Well, first, thank you. Thank you for saying that. It is a project that's very passionate to me.
00:14:29
Speaker
The Praetorians is actually something that came together from the creative juices of Mr. Keelan King. Now that's the leader of the Praetorians. He is the, if you've watched our video, he is the first one you see. Keelan and I had already worked together on a few of his previous projects. I'm pretty much leading up. Let me explain his previous projects first.
00:14:57
Speaker
So it's previous projects where a lot of like sci-fi concept, hip hop albums, like hip hop and R&B albums is Keelan and I are both nerds. Okay. That's not a secret, not a secret, but pretty much leading up to the last election. We realized that we were both pretty fueled with anger and needed to do something a bit different. Um,
00:15:25
Speaker
Like I said, his previous projects were, were nerd influence. We'd had like sci-fi joints, wrestling joints, uh, not nerd core per se, but hip hop made by like guys that like nerd shit. So this time we, we just felt like we really needed to let loose. Yeah. So, uh, when I say we too, meaning a lot of my associates as well, we were facing like an old enemy in a new form at that time.
00:15:54
Speaker
And so we were like, Hey, let's really bring it this time. Um, and he said, Hey, Sean, how would you feel about making some songs that describe the feeling of being at war and facing an enemy regardless of like who your enemy is? And I said, hell yeah, I'm on board with that list. How we, how we go about, about doing this. And so we just started like thinking of a master plan, you know, and, uh, I contacted my boy demand back in Chicago.
00:16:23
Speaker
Well, I used to wrap it back there because I know that he's has the same mindset as Keeling and I, you know, it was like, I know how he's feeling this political climate. Uh, he got lyrical skill. I hit him up in like two seconds. He was like, yeah, I'm in son. What are we doing? Keeling came out with the master plan. He said, Hey, we're going to do an album called war music. I said, okay, what are we going to be called? And he was like, I feel like we are soldiers and I don't want to pick any particular army.
00:16:53
Speaker
But we've been fans of the Praetorian Guard, but we didn't want to necessarily take the stills direct from history. So we switched it up a little bit. And now we are the Praetorians, an army that isn't from any particular time or place, but is fighting on the side of right. And that's just basically what we're about. So when we made war music, we tried to make every song
00:17:20
Speaker
as if anybody could be this soldier that we are representing, that we are rapidly as facing whatever enemy you have, whether it be like, you know, the political climate or your shitty ass job, you know, whoever's opposing you and your beliefs are something you're trying to go after. That's what war music, the album is for. And that's why we, that's, that's what, that was the whole base of the project there. Yeah. And that's,
00:17:50
Speaker
I like as simple as an unapologetic as it is. And I really connect to that element of it. And of course, the visuals with the music video. But it's obviously right there in what you hear. I want to play a track off that, Sean, to give folks a little bit of taste of it.
00:18:19
Speaker
The track off war music is called Dead and I'm just gonna play it and we're gonna listen to get the feel of Praetorians. Okay, let's do it.
00:18:59
Speaker
We gon' kill you tonight We gon' kill you tonight
00:19:09
Speaker
The butchers are here, turn your body into meat products I conglomerate as dominant if I'm being honest You use your body parts to beat bodies That's how you don't do my spear when you're near here But your army, we the best in this combat And you can't clap back if you don't know where your arms at You see, a plan of attack was well made You thought we was coming, but we've been here for days Watching you clocking, you traps at the ready Run, run, move your whole party as spaghetti
00:19:32
Speaker
Next we coming up on the treasury Mickey eat jewels, pass food and you're heavy Take it to the lake, kick you off until the crevice Make no mistake, they will document our presence Residents will pray to the gods for our blessing We shall oblige, taking eyes is a present
00:20:13
Speaker
We usher in the pain and suffering Touching you to sleep and bloody tucking you in It's your turn to bleed no matter how much you bleed Loot you and your crew too courtesy of the greed Under bridge, dynamosity, complete with the atrocity Shop edges at right angles and high velocity The world is ice cold, the flame hydrogen high Put you down on the spot in your new burial plot You show up to do battle, you ship like a new rattle Your time bustle when the negotiators deprattle
00:20:36
Speaker
Dude, your ranks surround your flank Swift F thank us, you hide and die anxious We up in the intensity, that's a making your infantry Brilliantly eliminated military efficiency After we divorce you from the rest of your force We turn around and scorch, remain a bit to your corpse We will help you
00:21:25
Speaker
We were made for turning you into the dead
00:22:07
Speaker
Yes. Yes. I tell you, I work in the, uh, you know, as you know, I work in, uh, for labor union and, uh, sometimes I, I feel the need and I do have to lead, uh, the troops into battle. And I tell you some of that music he got there. It answers the question for me, right? Um, you, uh,
00:22:34
Speaker
One of the questions I've asked guests is, you know, when you when you create an art, you know, you feel compelled to create something in particular, you've answered that question. I've heard that, you know, some kind of like minded folks, you feel in frustration, some need to express something, get out some aggressions and create that create that war music. Right. Yeah. I mean, you know, for sure, man, like
00:23:03
Speaker
That was definitely the basis for that particular project. You know, but when I make other music, like I'm still writing other lyrics that are just like about comic books, you know, stuff like that. But yeah, go ahead. Sorry, go ahead. When you're wrong. And so that was a particular you're saying there's this particular style and aesthetic that that that you're looking at with that. My next question has to do with
00:23:32
Speaker
in describing yourself as a geek, and I would do that for myself as well. Do you feel that whatever you're working on, whether it's this or other projects, do you feel you're creating that art from the outside? Do you feel you're creating it within geek culture? Do you think that...
Geek Culture & Hip-Hop: A New Definition
00:24:02
Speaker
Do you feel the outsider or the otherness is driving the art, or do you feel a different way? Well, let me start by saying this. One, I've never actually felt like an outsider. Me personally, even when I was younger, I never felt like I was supposed to fit in anywhere, so I just didn't. And I didn't conform to a lot of what other peeps were doing.
00:24:30
Speaker
I'm not saying I did that because I was dope or anything. I just wasn't paying attention. But with the culture now, I don't feel like it's outside of that. The definition of geek itself and what geek culture is has changed so much in the last five years. To even be labeled a geek, I'm not even sure that I know what that is anymore. But is it just somebody who loves pop culture?
00:25:01
Speaker
Uh, it's just somebody who like, cause even nerd isn't the same thing, but at the same time, geek culture, the way it has been elevated to be quote unquote cool. You know, there's a lot of stuff that has been allowed to fit into it now. Like hip hop has definitely made his way into geek culture. That's how you ended up with even a genre called nerd core. Right. Right. You know, uh,
00:25:27
Speaker
So no, man, I don't feel like it's like at one point. Yeah, it probably this would have been like on the outside of that. And I probably would have said. I probably would have had my own biases about even saying that I operate within it because of. How it's viewed, I guess, but only on the hip-hop aspect, not not for me as a person, I don't really give a shit what people think, but like what would be accepted, you know. And I say in the popular format of culture.
00:25:57
Speaker
But now I don't think it actually matters, man. Like, well, let me, let me, let me back up and let me clarify that. Cause this is important too. Yeah. It doesn't matter if you were a dude in geek culture, if you're a woman in geek culture, then you can be questioned all day nonstop. Tell us more about that. Tell us more about that. Um, you know,
00:26:23
Speaker
I've worked with a lot of women in this industry. I've been in the, in the comics industry for 10 years. And let me tell you, man, the, the industry itself is not kind to people who are not dudes and especially white male dudes is just, that's just the way it's been for decades. And so like women have had to fight to be recognized of the, uh, having the equivalent skills and creativity.
00:26:50
Speaker
And so forth in this industry, just like everywhere else. And so with geek culture, like, you know, there ain't no term called fake geek boys, but they sure is one for fake geek girls. Right. Right. Right.
00:27:06
Speaker
Yeah. So you find it to be more pervasive in the culture than, uh, um, the culture as a whole, or is just a reflection of, you know, what you see out there is, is a more aggressive internally to, uh, say within. Well, I don't think so. It didn't originate in the culture itself. I mean, we're just like anything else, really. Like it's, it's, it's been a male dominated thing. Like comic books and nerd stuff and gaming and D&D.
00:27:34
Speaker
Like it was supposed to be like the boys thing to do, you know, where there was always ladies that were interested in this, but it wasn't like they weren't allowed to be interested in it. Or like it wasn't supposed to be talked about kind of thing. But, um, like here we are now that it's like, now that it's such a, a bigger field, um, that ladies have been accepted to a point.
00:28:03
Speaker
And not just ladies. I mean, people of color, ladies, people of different genders, whatever. The geek culture is so huge now, and it covers a lot of bases if you let it. But there's still a big faction out there who do not want that at all, because they had this perception that it was only for them, and they just try to keep it that way. Right. And a lot of the things we've been
00:28:31
Speaker
we've been talking about, I'll say that some of the particular, the objects, what I would say is the artistic objects, whether they be those, you know, the comic books, the graphic novels, the fantastic art that we see, the incredible storytelling in the combination of both words and pictures to tell stories. These hip-hop tracks, you know, I would quite simply say, I mean, these are
00:28:58
Speaker
Many of these are wonderful pieces of art. But for many, that begs the question. And it's also been a huge battle for acceptance within comic books, or they're called funny books, or those type of things.
Art as Personal Expression: Sean's Viewpoint
00:29:13
Speaker
Which is, they were thrown out, right? So they didn't have value. Moms throughout comic books. Yeah, they did. They seem to not have value. They certainly seem not to be art. So Sean, what?
00:29:28
Speaker
What is art? I'm going to call many of these things we've been talking about, artistic objects and art. You're an artist yourself. You consume art. You enjoy art. What is art? Man, you know, I'm going to say art is you, man. Art is anything created with a purpose to express oneself or to present an idea that you feel is not in the public eye sometimes. I mean,
00:30:00
Speaker
It can, this is the type of question that can get elitist and snobbest snobbest if answered by the wrong person. Cause some people will say like, you know, it's not art unless you've put your blood and you know, it's sweat into it. And you know, you're died for your art kind of thing. And, and honestly, art art can be as simple as you made a, a one panel cartoon that just says, but, but it means something to you, you know, and it, and honestly,
00:30:30
Speaker
with all the people in the world, it's going to mean something to somebody else who spies at least once. You could, that little stupid piece can change somebody's life, you know? And so to me, art is whatever somebody took the time to create and was willing to present. Yeah. I'm a really connect to that point around, uh,
00:30:54
Speaker
the time where I was starting more explicitly to try to create things, it was really a reaction or an adaptation of just needing to express things. So it was always, for me, a highly personal component to it. And I think the way you're describing it as a highly personal component and also the ability for it to transform
00:31:23
Speaker
to save. I've talked in other interviews about when people hear a song, sometimes people, that song saved me. That's a powerful statement, right? Or that comic book where, you know, that character, uh, that, that, that helped people even within popular culture, like Spider-Man, right? The kind of teenage, awkward teenage superhero, that whole narrative, which is a very true narrative of what Marvel did way back then, where people said, wow, this, this superhero
00:31:54
Speaker
Kind of feels like me sitting in you know chemistry class, and I believe there's tremendous power Within that I've seen some books that express You know you know your art can save you or the art that saves your life or even with politics and political art You know like this is the way I need to express who I am and I really think that's an important component to it and
00:32:23
Speaker
the highly personal part of both the creator and probably, I heard you say the person who receives it as well, right? The one person it speaks to or a million people it speaks to. Would you agree? I mean, think about this too, Ken, like think about all the works of fiction that are out there or that have existed where you have some sort of like powerful regime who is trying to take control of any environment, right? What's one of the first things they can take away from the people? The art.
00:32:53
Speaker
Yeah, because it didn't it didn't it inspires people to stand up for what they believe in to break out of their shelves to just do. So maybe sometimes do the things they wouldn't normally do. Like, I mean, shit, I can think of it. I can think of at least that I know you can at least three to four hip hop songs off the top of my head. And when you hear it in your headphones, you walk down the street differently. Yes. Yes, it takes a nation of millions to hold us back. I listen to that.
00:33:23
Speaker
I would block myself in my bedroom. I never heard anything like it. I didn't know if what was being said should be said. I didn't know if I was doing something wrong. It was that radical. It was that powerful and radical. And yeah, you walk differently, right? Yeah, man. I mean, you know, I guess the other day I was listening to, you know, that band, The Heavy. Yeah.
00:33:53
Speaker
Yeah. So I've been listening to them a lot lately too. And they just have such a groovy sound. I had no idea that I was like dancing at work. There you go. There you go. I had, yeah. And I was like, oh, you know, I'm surrounded by people right now. And, uh, your coworkers will, will comment on this podcast, whether they appreciated your efforts or not. I'd imagine. Yeah. I'm sure they'll chime in. Um, uh,
00:34:24
Speaker
Big, big, big, big question here, Sean. Why is there something rather than nothing? And you can answer that in an artistic way. One of the ways folks have listened to the question and heard it was, you know, when you're creating something, I mean, is that something completely new? Did it come from nothing? Or just in general, in creating something,
00:34:54
Speaker
Um, why are we doing it? Why is there something rather than nothing? Yeah, you know, so honestly, I say, what the hell does nothing get you? I'd rather have something that's a failure than having none. Haven't done nothing at all. I'd rather it like put out something or at least something that is just like, even if it's trash, then nothing, because like,
00:35:23
Speaker
I can't live with what ifs, man. I just, I can't do my life that way. And there's something because people have to release it. Whether it's like, like me where I'm making hip hop or doing all the other stuff I'm doing. Like you've got to put out some content. I don't care if it's a Crayola picture or if you're just like doing beadwork or something. Somebody has some sort of advice that they put out and it's something.
00:35:53
Speaker
doing nothing. I think I imagine to make somebody go bananas. I think it can make you go bananas and I think it happens to a lot of folks. I really connect to how you answer that and how you look at it. Sean, I know you're up to a bunch of different things. You're busy working on some new project. I want to open it up. Can you tell
00:36:22
Speaker
Can you tell the listeners about where to find some of the stuff you've created? What's coming up? This is your space right now. Yeah. Well,
Sean's Ongoing Projects & Artist Recommendations
00:36:33
Speaker
okay. So the current Praetorian's music is available actually on Spotify, iTunes, SoundCloud, YouTube, wherever, man. And not just the Praetorian stuff, but anything that Keelan King has done before. Some featured on some of his previous albums.
00:36:52
Speaker
They were called Star Pilot. And if you like sci-fi, you need to listen to those because that is straight up a three album project of him being a star pilot, traveling through space, fighting aliens and rapping and singing about it. I'm on board. I'm on I'm on the ship. Go ahead. So, yeah, you can find that stuff like less than any music thing. One of the other things I do to release getting in and out
00:37:20
Speaker
I think a lot of people notice about me, but some don't. But I also make custom action figures. Because like I said, I've always been a toy dude. And so when I'm feeling creative juices and I'm not really in lyric writing mode, I'll break out a box of action figures. And next thing I know, I've made a new character, or I've made some toy that they're not making. Especially for diversity's sake, I tend to make a lot of female characters or people of color or whatever, because the big toy companies just aren't making enough for me right now.
00:37:51
Speaker
And then, I don't know if this falls under creative lines, but you know that I've been in comics for like 10 years. I was working at, you know, Tifa and Dark Horse about a year and a half ago. I parted ways with them to branch it on my own. So like, you know, I started a marketing consulting firm.
00:38:18
Speaker
called Strange Solutions Marketing, and where we offer advice and marketing service to popular culture businesses. I mean, that's my wheelhouse, and I know business, so I have to bind the two, and we've been operating ever since. And that's the release for me, too. Yeah, I like that. And I like the title, too. I think a lot of time in life, I've looked to Strange Solutions to solve complicated and
00:38:49
Speaker
pernicious problems. I'm glad our whole stance is really like, I mean, cause there's a ton of marketing companies out there too. And those companies will give you like, you know, the synergy talk and the statistics and all that. Not that we don't do that, but at the same time, I might think a little bit out of the box because I've been on the ground, you know, in this, especially in nerd culture to see how things actually work. So I'm trying to offer that perspective. And you know, they can, people can find strange solutions on Facebook,
00:39:18
Speaker
Twitter, Instagram, because we're at every comic convention and we're at like, you know, all the nerd book signings and all that stuff. So. Sean, it's, it's, it's, it's been a great pleasure to talk to you and also the, to, to catch up with you. I mean, it's a, it's a good excuse for, for us to have a scheduled phone call at the, at the very least. Um, but, uh, you know, the ability to learn about more, what you're working on.
00:39:48
Speaker
and the things that you've done. I've appreciated you. I've appreciated the work and the art that you created. And I really hope that a lot of the listeners really to connect to that as well, because it's really been a pleasure and a joy to know you, but also to have that extra layer of enjoying the things that you create. I just wanted to thank you, Sean.
00:40:15
Speaker
Hey, I wanted to thank you for having me on here. Cause like, I don't know if I ever told you, but like, uh, when I was working at the comic shop, you were always like a highlight to like, when I see you walk through the door, cause I was like, Oh great. I'm about to have a good ass conversation. You've always been genuine and legit. And I felt like we connected in a lot of ways. And though with that in mind,
00:40:40
Speaker
I wanted to give you, before we go, a couple of artists that I want you to check out. Absolutely. And if you're not already listening, you need to listen to Odyssey. That's O-D-D-I-S-E-E. A pretty new-ish dope MC, though. I think you'll like him. Rhapsody, if you're not listening to her. Let me tell you, she's right up your alley, Ken, because she just dropped a new album this week, right? She's produced by Nice Wonders.
00:41:09
Speaker
She's got a new song with D'Angelo and Giza, right? Yeah. And she's got another song with Queen Latifah. The Queen. All right. Yeah. So check out, check out Rhapsody Odyssey. And then there's a new little brother albums to drop this week too. So that's your three. Thank you so much. I mean, uh,
00:41:32
Speaker
Even at the end of our time here, I get some nice gifts at the end and maybe that was my intent all along. I know what you have to. Thanks so much, Sean. Hope to talk to you again soon and it's been a great pleasure. It's been a great pleasure. My pleasure. Thank you. Thank you. Take care now. Take care. Bye bye.
00:42:00
Speaker
You are listening to something rather than nothing.