Transcript
Speaker: I'm Steve Brown. I'm Mark McBride. And welcome to season two of the Yo-Yo Player podcast, where a couple of dusty old graybeards grab some friends and reminisce about the 1999 Fiend Magazine Yo-Yo Tour.
Speaker: On today's episode, Tejas. Yee-haw! Barbecue. Barbecue.
Speaker: So let's let's take this minute. let's Let's real quick rattle off the lineup for the 1999 Warped Tour. ah The Black Eyed Peas, pre-Fergie. This is pre-Fergie Black Eyed Peas.
Speaker: Blink-182, who definitely proved to be one of the most popular bands on the tour. The Bouncing Souls were on the main stage. These are all, these is this are the list is main stage bands.
Speaker: Eminem. was on the tour, which would prove to be problematic in some cities. H2O played the main stage. Also, same time frame as 7 Seconds. So, July 14th through 31st. Ice-T, and he was with Body Count, right? No, this is just Ice-T. He was doing it. He was that again. This is the first year they had hip hop. So he was doing his hip hop set, not body. count So we had Ice-T. We had Less Than Jake. We had Lit played for couple weeks.
Speaker: Lunachix, Molotov, Pennywise, Royal Crown Review. In like the last dying death throes of the swing craze of the nineties.
Speaker: Yeah. Seven dust, the legendary fucking suicidal tendencies and the vandals easily. And as much as less than Jake tried, as much as less than Jake tried, the vandals were bar none, the funniest band on the tour.
Speaker: Oh my gosh. So this is all the main stage bands. And then on the bus stage, ah It was a really interesting sort of combo. You had ah yeah a lot of like, so like kind of up and coming like newer bands, but then you also had like old like stalwarts who were just had never quite hit it big.
Speaker: A veil played for like yeah a week, which was fantastic having those guys around. Dropkick Murphys were on the stage. Yeah. I thought they were like on the main stage. Nope. They were on the bus stage. El Centro, Phoenix TX, Frenzel Rom from Australia. And boy, there's a great fucking story there.
Speaker: That's right. So so there there were a lot of acts that were kind of, you know, massive acts, even like looking back on it, where like they hadn't yet hit their prime. um You know, even like like the one and done band lit was on that one.
Speaker: you know, the more resilient names, you know less than Jake, and even like, even like some of the more knit niche, hardcore bands like Avail was on for like half the half the um the tour. But, you know, first and foremost, folks just want to know kind of how it was hanging out with these guys, right? And I think there's, there's like, there's like two buckets of of musicians on that tour. There was like the the artists that made themselves incredibly accessible, you know, like like the less than Jake's, like the, the ice teas were like, they would come by and, you know, you'd have people from the band or like ice T himself, like, like wanting to genuinely expressing an interest on on, a skill toy, like, like a yo-yo. And, and you know, even even with like, like ice T remember, ah we had some of those like Chewbacca bandolier cases that you'll mega sent along. And I remember like we we would we filled one of those for ICE. And he would and he he came back the next morning to thank us. And I think at one point, he had like maybe brought his son along. And you know we were teaching him tricks. So like that that was super cool and something that was very memorable. But like but like that was like only like only like half the artists. The other half of like the big name artists, whether it was you know largely the guys from Blink, um maybe X Travis, largely Eminem. um
Speaker: you they they weren't really accessible. And like, like, i don't know if you guys had any interaction with those guys. I didn't. um And they kind of just kind of maintain their own world on their tour bus. so So that's kind of what people want to know is like, how were the artists, you know, was it cool hanging out with them? And I think, you know, what I come to is, you know, like most of them were very approachable and accessible and wanted to enjoy the experience. Then like a few of them, you know, it was just kind of a job and and they wanted to keep themselves.
Speaker: What do you remember about San Antonio and the kickoff? we started We started like San Antonio and then we went clockwise, right? More or less. um You know, what what I remember is, you know, we I think we kind of, we we may have come to the site originally and then went back to the hotel.
Speaker: um i i don't remember a ton about like just getting there in that day. But what I do remember is like like the the night of the actual Warped Tour kickoff, 99 kickoff.
Speaker: there was, you know, there was like, um, yeah the the whole, the whole event had catering, right. But it was like the catering seemed a little sketch the first couple days, like they were still kind of getting, getting up to speed operationally. And so I remember going to like this, there was like a, you know, a post-show party. i remember like some grills bonfire. Um, you know, everyone's just kind of hanging out and I'm like, you know what? I'm like, I'm kind of hungry. I haven't really eaten anything today. Let me see what I can find.
Speaker: And, ah you at the time I was as a vegetarian, I'm still vegetarian today. And there was absolutely nothing. So, so what I remember in in this big like grill out that was going on, i remember I found, I found some, some white wonder bread.
Speaker: I found some Doritos and I made a Dorito sandwich. And that was, that was like all that I could eat, uh, that night after the first day of warp tour. ah Oh, that is miserable.
Speaker: The first day I remember just walking around, I had VIP access because guess I was in charge. Once again, the VIP booth, I met people that I'll never meet again and um listen to some music. But mostly I was paying attention to make sure everything was going. I wanted to make sure you guys had support. I was calling back to Tallahassee constantly every time I learned something where Stacy was running the ground show while I was gone.
Speaker: uh would uh take the messages and just make things happen i need this in the next city i need this year and we're just fine tuning it because i didn't know what to expect and i needed to have a feel about what you guys are going through and then the second day was houston it was at the astrodome do you remember that it was inside and outside and i was exhausted i'd flown in. i hadd driven four hours. I'd done a full event. I wasn't out there. And I helped you guys set up the space. And then you all disappeared. There was this table full of yo-yos and nobody was there.
Speaker: The gates hadn't opened. And I was the only one behind the table. And okay, I'll watch the table. And who walks over but Ice-T with his two bodyguards. Did I ever tell you this story? No.
Speaker: So I'm sitting there with him and I decide he's a customer. I'm going to teach him how to yo-yo. So i pull out a brain out of packaging. We're not supposed to give these away much, but I figure he's iced tea. I'm going to give him a damn yo-yo.
Speaker: And I teach him how to do a sleeper and I teach him how to do a forward pass. And he's actually excited, but trying not to make his face change. It's really funny to watch. And then he snaps his fingers and he's and the guy behind him opens his jacket and I see a gun because he's a bodyguard. I'm a little concerned. And he reaches into his pocket. He pulls something out. He hands it to iced tea and iced tea hands it to me. And he says, i really appreciate you showing me this. I want you to have this as a thank you.
Speaker: It was a two pack of color slides of a headshot of him, two headshots of him.
Speaker: To this day, it's been in my desk at the store every single day. The same desk. I moved it from place to place. Everything in the desk has changed, but I still have those two slides that Ice-T gave me.
Speaker: At that event, it is the most surreal thank you present I've ever gotten. Oh, that's amazing. But I just treated him like a customer because I figured he didn't want to be treated as an icon or whatever he was.
Speaker: San Antonio was really just ungodly hot. It was nasty and disgusting. San Antonio was the day that we decided that you could not complain about the humidity. You were not allowed to blame the humidity for screw and tricks. If you blamed the humidity, you got punched really hard.
Speaker: edit And you had to take it like a man. And you had to take it like a man, no crying and no complaining. If you absolutely had to complain about something, the only thing you were allowed to say is, boy, I really suck.
Speaker: So going back to the summerness of it, like, what do you remember as far as, like, it was, ah it was like, long, hot, and sweaty? Yeah, it was terrible. And, you know, Houston was, like, maybe some of the worst. I remember Houston being fucking...
Speaker: And it was because was like early on in the tour too. So maybe it was just we were getting used to it. and it was And so it was new. But I just remember Houston being so fucking hot and so humid and feeling like, oh, man, like people are going to die out here.
Speaker: And then just the whole tour. like And it was good, Steve, that you guys went and got new super soakers that day. Because like we used the shit out of those super soakers all summer long, right? like Yeah, we did. We really did. I was like a surviv survival mechanism more than anything. It's not a toy. It's a tool.
Speaker: I don't remember what bus I was on, but I remember hanging out. I mean i mean i was on somebody's bus and it was somebody that I wasn't, you know, i I wasn't hanging out with regularly, but I ended up on somebody's bus and they had a whiteboard by ah in the front lounge. And every day they were making predictions on how many kids were going to get laid out by heat stroke at the show. wow yeah no like one of the guys and one of the guys was friends with like the you know would always just go by like the paramedics tent like at the end of the day and be like how many today and then and so all the guys in this band were like betting on this every day yeah like whoever whoever won everybody else had to like buy them a drink or some shit yeah it's a real thing tour was really godly hot though mean it was just disgustingly hot and of course don't get sent you black
Speaker: t-shirts, navy blue t-shirts, and like forest dark green t-shirts. Oh, God. I remember I killed him for that. Yeah. Yeah, so I said, I was like, look, here's my list of demands from the start of the tour. You I'm going need this, going to need this, I'm going some long string, I want some top string, I had yo-yos, and white cotton t-shirts. They sent you the three darkest colored t-shirts that are in production.
Speaker: So... Andrew's like, that's all we had around. that's Isn't that why you gave him that wedgie in Cleveland? and there was It was humid. Oh. Ow. Yeah, that was one of the rules.
Speaker: We're not allowed to discuss the humidity, otherwise we were punched. That's what the rules set out at the beginning.
Speaker: One thing as we kicked off was we had... um
Speaker: We had the the rules, like our tour rules. Okay. And I remembered three of them, but I don't know if that was all of them.
Speaker: The first one was that um it was use of the force. Now this is like when just like the first, like of the, you know, new Star Wars had come out. And so the idea was that if you went, we're not going to talk about that.
Speaker: and you write And you ran your hand like Obi-Wan Kenobi. If somebody used the Force, you had to obey the Force.
Speaker: Fair. I mean, dumb, but fair. Dumb, but fair. The other one was that you were not allowed to blame the humidity. Yeah. Also, accurate. Humidity was... I mean, it was summer. we were outdoors. like It was just going to be bad. There was no point in whining about it.
Speaker: You weren't allowed to blame you. eating And the other one was the the ranking was, it was the the order of importance went us, the tour, the company you worked for.
Speaker: That was the hierarchy that you had to respect. Yeah, fair. Which was, you know, again, at the time, won't say revolutionary, but it was definitely the idea that it was it was us before the company you worked for was, you know, it was not normal.
Speaker: ah Side note, were talking about the way I talk about the Warped Tour. that One of the sort of metaphors or or allegories or or what have you that I use, like I compare it to that um Cameron Crowe movie, Almost Famous.
Speaker: remember that movie, Almost Famous? Yeah. Like Kurt and Goldie's daughter and it. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Being the youngest guy, because I think I was like the youngest person on the whole Warped Tour, right? And so it's like...
Speaker: Being the kid on the tour, um sitting on less than Jake's bus, I was really into that band. And so I'm just kind of like, oh, wow, gee whiz, like, this is really cool. like So there's an ah obviously complete that so many plot points are quite, quite different. But um the vibe was very similar, right? Just like being a young kid on tour.
Speaker: watching rock stars be rock stars, getting to, this ah you know, you talked we were talking a second ago about Rick. Like, got to go with Rick on Ice-T's party bus one time.
Speaker: Like, not going lie, I've gotten a lot of cachet over the years from, like, being able to tell people about, like, yeah, no, I hung out, chummed up with Ice-T on the Warped Tour. and So tell us that story. Tell us that story.
Speaker: Oh, just I don't remember too much about being on the party. as You mean the party bus? Yeah. on People were there. i think Ice and others were in the back, you know, doing some stuff, you know, probably had but some allergies they were trying to clear up. Who knows? about that. Like Ice had the notorious party bus. He was also straight edge.
Speaker: Yeah, and then it was like, and it's cool. I like telling people how, like, yeah, man, Ice-T, he was on the tour, and he had his tour bus, and then he had two buses, his actual sleeping bus, and then his party bus that he hosted fucking crazy badass parties on. And I shit you not, it was like an MTV show.
Speaker: music video or something as you know it was hip-hop video walking on the bus and there were fucking women in bikinis standing up on the sofas like on the sides dancing it was like there was lights going and music pounding and people are like on their way you know i wasn't going to the back room nobody asked me if nobody invited me and you only go if you're invited But it was cool.
Speaker: Sitting on the party bus with Rick for a little bit was really cool. one Definitely one of those special high-water mark moments of my life.
Speaker: Oh, beautiful, Laura. ah beautiful, Laura. A moment of reflection for Laura.
Speaker: Oh. Okay. And she had a twin sister, she said. she had a twin sister that didn't show up. oh Because she was working at a yo-yo cart. How hurtful is that, man? That's like so much bad car went down in the back of us.
Speaker: Bad juju. could have gotten you and Jason Leigh right off the bat. Always the opposite. That's why I like you, Steve. um talking about highlight you know because you're talking about highlights low lights and that crushes and all that i do recall like you know so i was like the goofy right y'all i was the far side kid um everybody yeah you were i remember that you did you look like the far side kid would be
Speaker: You know, round-faced glasses and freckles, looked like the Farside Kid. um You kind had the haircut, too. You You know, i I had it going in in that direction.
Speaker: But I remember getting, you know, everybody, like Steve wasn't, because he was married, like you said, Mark, but all, you know, and especially Julie. They were all horn dogs. Everybody's horn dogs on tour, right? Like, it was all about meeting the people, pressing the flesh, making... making fun right and that I remember people on tour, the yo-yo people, but also other people like beyond our circle, other people on tour, were impressed because like I managed to... like
Speaker: Hook up with this one pretty good-looking girl in Houston. I was hanging out and she was hanging out with me after the show That night and I remember getting a lot of like mad respect and props from like other people on the tour like yeah that move Whoa, look at this guy with this girl. Oh, check it out.
Speaker: All right, so not exactly the crush you know like the tour crush for the whole tour or anything but I do remember that was somewhere between the tour crush And the highlight, I wouldn't paint it as the highlight of the whole tour, but that was definitely one of the cool moments where it was like, hey, check it out, guys. Like, you know, Farside Kid can score too.
Speaker: And I got some sweet guy. Farside Kid got a little smoochy smooch. Yeah. I got some cred from the rest of the people on tour for the rest of the tour.
Speaker: thankfully from all of that. So it proved I was, you know, I earned my spot on the tour. Kind of how think about it. i think
Speaker: You made it through Houston. Then you you cut out. i made it I made it to Dallas, but I could only do a few minutes because something happened with my flight. i think the airport was much further away from the field than I had thought. I sort of thought that the city was like, yeah, it'll take 20 minutes to get to the airport. Dallas isn't laid out like that.
Speaker: No. Crazy. And then I headed back, and that was it. That was my three days on the Vans Warped Tour. And then I had a deal with upset sponsors on the phone. And there weren't a lot of them. Most of them just ignored me. One of them, I probably shouldn't say who is who in a lot of these places. I will for at least one of them because I know you want to talk about it. But ah some of them are going, what did I pay for? What are these guys doing? Are they all drugged up? I just talked to my thing. Can't you do this? And I'm going, they're adults. I'm not your chaperone, dude.
Speaker: You hired them. They're your employee, not mine. It was like they all thought that they were and that I was in charge. And I was just providing, I felt, a venue for them to do what they wanted to do.
Speaker: Go out and demonstrate yo-yos. And I don't think they any of them, like you said, because of the manufacturers, did a great job at proselytizing for their brand.
Speaker: But they all did a great job for proselytizing that yo-yoing was not just for kids, that yo-yoing had a different aspect to it, that yo-yoing, as you once told me, Mark, was something in your pocket that you could pull out and just do when you're hanging at a corner, but two people can't do it, it's not cool. Only one can do it at a time. I remember you saying.
Speaker: ah Where yo-yoing was a little bit cutting edge. Yo-yoing could be like skateboarding and in addition to skateboarding, but didn't have to take you someplace. Didn't need the facilities. You could just do it for five minutes while you're waiting for buck.
