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Ep. 203 – Cigarettes = Slow Seppuku for Millennial Musicians w/ Ben Sooy of A Place for Owls
171 Plays1 day ago
This week we’re excited to welcome back musician, former pastor, and our friend, Ben Sooy! We discuss Ben’s vision for a less coercive and predatory music industry, some of the struggles facing up-and-coming artists and musicians, his experience playing with Christian rock legends Switchfoot, long nighttime chats with Sam over carcinogens, and the most despicable bird in the animal kingdom. Ben has a phenomenal band called A Place for Owls, and they have a new album dropping in November! For info and links to their socials, visit www.aplaceforowls.com!
Transcript
00:00:00
Speaker
In honor of Casey and in this episode, will you name one of your songs a song for penguins? and this In the future, sometimes i don't do. They don't deserve it. Yeah, yeah. I get about tanningers. They're pretty. But it could be like a song. It could be like a really dark, sad song. And it could have a double meaning. Like it could be about something something awful that happened. And you could interpret it as like a mass grave of penguins. If you if you were thinking about it like that. Right, right. yeah There's layers to the penguin side. I'm not going to write. There's like a good art that tells them what it means. You kind of want them to make it personal. You can't just be too obvious with it. yeah Yeah. Yeah. I can visualize the the penguin line at the Oscar Meyer Baloney factory.
00:00:54
Speaker
I can't, dude.
00:00:59
Speaker
The of like trying to be so goddamn earnest with you and and your own your only role seems to be, Casey, to derail. That is how it goes a lot.
00:01:34
Speaker
Hey, everybody. Welcome to another episode of Growing Up Christian. I'm Sam. I'm Casey. And we are joined again by our friend, our old college pal, Ben Soy. How's it going, dude? Yo, so good to see you guys. I know. Dude, honestly, it's disappointing to me, like, as we were talking about before we hit record, I was like, it's like a little over a year and you're like, actually, too.
00:01:59
Speaker
And it's crazy to me that we have not, ah I mean, outside of some Instagramming messages here and there that it's been two years. yeah It's a bit of a shame. It's a bit of a shame. It is. It's like i old friends, you don't see them nearly as often, but when you reconnect, it's like, I love you. I love you so much. it's and We've been through so much shit together. you know I remember multiple, ah ah I was thinking about smoking a cigarette on a park bench.
00:02:28
Speaker
and I was gonna bring that up just now too. Dude, that was so fun. that' a ah That is seared in my brain is just like one of my core memories now is you were coming into town and and it was the year I was living in Boston and you were coming in for some work with a non-profit you were working with and we just met up and we sat on a park bench and poisoned our lungs for a couple hours. That's right. It had a great ass time.
00:02:56
Speaker
as god intended Yeah, all like and it's always you know, it's all it is man. It's always like oh Hey, dude, it's been years big hug and then just get right into like the the deeper things of life There's just no wasted time. It was just like so what do you think's really going on here?
00:03:14
Speaker
that My favorite shit, dude, just, it's my favorite shit. I think that's why we connected ah back in college too. I think that's how a lot of us connected, just talking about what's really going, about how we're all living in a simulation, right? That's right. Yes. yeah started Before simulation theory really took off, started at yearly. That's right. That's right.
00:03:40
Speaker
but Dude, how have you been? i know like so Super excited to talk ah to you about ah you and your awesome band, A Place for Owls, has some new music coming out. Really excited to get into that. Before you do, after two years, I would be lying if I said I remembered every aspect of our conversation two years ago. so If I ask you what changed,
00:04:01
Speaker
i mean you I'm not entirely sure what was going on at that time, but what's going on, man? What are you up to these days? um I am, ah we're we're doing good. So I am taking some risky steps personally to focus more on ah creative work. So okay making music and then also supporting. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, here you go.
00:04:32
Speaker
ah Good thing you closed your window earlier. Yeah, they don't want to hear the sounds. ah Yeah, so just doing like focusing more on music, my own music, but also focusing more on supporting other working musicians and guys and gals and non-binary narrow pals in bands ah that are ah in Colorado and in Denver, broadly.
00:04:59
Speaker
So I'm still figuring out what form that looks like, but it's it's I'm kind of like making the next life steps intuitively, where like what makes me just absolutely just shut down and just like, this fucking sucks. And then like what makes me open up and like ah this is the best thing ever. And usually,
00:05:22
Speaker
Making art is one of those things that like opens me up personally. But then being the sort of person that just like celebrates and supports other people that are trying to do creative work musically, um that that shit is my favorite stuff to do. So um i'll I'll update you further if I figure out what for. What for that day? You're just going to like pay compliments professionally? I know. That's right. Yeah.
00:05:52
Speaker
You're just a hype band for Midwest emo bands now? I know, I know. ah So i'm I've gone back and forth. I thought about like starting a record label myself and having ah a roster of artists that I can really like hype up. ah Because the thing that I love about music is like getting other people into music that rocks. That's my favorite feeling is like having a recommendation that really lands with somebody else. right And so I think I would like to do some form of that professionally, whether that's running a record label or I thought about just like being a manager type person, but honestly, nonprofit level. So like, ah like literally, you know, like old school, like how missionaries used to get funded where they would just go and support raise so they could do the work that they they felt called to do or whatever. But like do that ah for
00:06:46
Speaker
ah giving artists decent advice and helping them network and promote and like helping them at like asking good questions about like what is like what's your niche and then what's your niche of in that niche and then figure out how to get the to be become the best version of who you're supposed to be right anyways it sounds fucking dopey when I say it out loud sometimes know it's It's funny because the music industry is such like what you hear a lot of course you hear from bands and interviews where they're like on a solid record label and they're like yeah they did right by us but like a large portion of the stories or how the industry just chews you up and spits you out.
00:07:29
Speaker
And I love the idea of wonderful, kind people like you being involved in it. i can As soon as you said starting a record label, I was like, that's the kind of guy who should. Just someone who loves music and wants to support people and and see people succeed yeah versus like, how can I make money off of them?
00:07:49
Speaker
Well, dude, and it's the it's it's hard when you're an emerging band. ah And even when you're, I don't know what it's like to be a big band. I know what it's like to be a small band. ah But like, even when you're a big band, the horror stories that you hear is like, there's no almost nobody in the record industry, the music industry, who's trying to help somebody else without taking advantage of them. like There's no help offered without fucking somebody over on some level. right So it's like your manager's taking between 10% and 25%. Your record label, if they're ah if you get a generous deal, they're taking 50%. They're fronting money. They're essentially a bank for you. right
00:08:29
Speaker
But then you're paying that back with interest and they own your masters ah often forever, if not, like they lease them from you for 10 years. So you can't do anything else with those with those recordings. And that's one of the, you know, the most famous example of that is the Taylor Swift, Taylor's version, right? right or like even like And every fucking band in the world did that after she did that, where they would do it. Four years strong, did it, dude? They came back and they did that in the world.
00:08:56
Speaker
Yeah, and you rerecord your classic album, ah but primarily as like a middle finger to whoever owns the masters of that classic album. ah So instead of them getting the royalties, you're getting the royalties now because you're an established artist instead of the wide eyed kid that signed a record deal at 18 years old or whatever. And so is just is that money upfront is that is as a Is it even as essential as it used to be now where that like recording is so much more accessible and stuff? i mean like and what kind of money Does anybody know like what kind of money we're talking about? like If my Crunkcore band gets signed to tooth and nail, like what what are they going to front me?
00:09:41
Speaker
Nothing. ah They're going to front you almost nothing. So most record labels, even some of these legacy labels like tooth and nail. And by the way, this is no hate to specifically tooth and nail. i If tooth and nail wants to sign me, I will say yes. ah but but But in your own stunner shades. That's it. Yeah. Yeah. But ah the reality is, is that ah most of us for somewhere between 600 and 1500 bucks, you can buy all the software and the gear to record yourself at home. Now, is that giving you an external voice of like a record producer who in the best case scenario is helping you make the best songs that you can? No, you're still grinding at home, right? But it's cheaper to record at home ah and
00:10:33
Speaker
No one, it's not the 90s or the 2000s anymore, no one's getting these upfront signing bonuses ah anymore. ah What record labels are doing is you record a record all yourself and then you shop it around and say, could you take money from us please on this thing that just that we just paid for, right?
00:10:56
Speaker
and so ah That's part of what I'm stewing on of like what what can I do different? can i like In the same way that like um Patreon as a website sort of changed the way that working musicians could relate to their fans, where it's like that model of just like, hey, just chip in five to $50 a month,
00:11:19
Speaker
to support the creative work that I'm doing. You get these perks, it's sick, whatever. But like, is there something that like a model for management, mentoring, the sort of like a replacement for the shitty record label model? Can there be something better? I don't know. It's like, you know, you'd be the change you want to see in the world or whatever. i I definitely see what needs fixing. I don't know quite yet how fully to fix it, but that's the sort of stuff that I'm stewing on.
00:11:47
Speaker
Dude, and what you said about record labels and like what they can offer, right? Maybe they can front you money that you pay back over time to do your recording. Like, I mean, you could spend tens of thousands of dollars recording. People used to, people used to spend, I mean, I can't really even spit ball numbers. I just remember hearing numbers and being like, why?
00:12:09
Speaker
like mind-blowing numbers on how much it costs to record albums and then he said you can do a lot from home and I think it's always funny because there's always this conversation right about like how much the advancement of technology is making things better and how much it's ruining things. um So democratize bad music.
00:12:27
Speaker
ah is that and maybe in some way that's what has been ruined is like everyone's like we can record our band now and we're like well now there's an oversaturation of a lot of music that's really not good and it kind of chokes out some stuff that you might discover organically I don't know totally different conversation but what I am noticing is some bands that have been in the industry for a decade are now have made some moves to be like, i'm gonna we're going to just do this next album entirely on our own. Just fuck it. like ah Do you listen to Foxing? Yeah. i i we ah My band just opened up for that band in Denver. Oh, hell yeah. Yeah, yeah. I i went and saw them open for the hotel year. Yes, on the 10th anniversary tour. Yeah. yeah bo Yeah, I saw that same show in Denver. Yeah. It's so funny. i because i
00:13:18
Speaker
One of the kids in that band, I just was, I was in height. I went to, well, I didn't go i didn't go to high school, I was homeschooled, but I was friends within high school and him and I still stay in touch. So it was like, which guy in Foxing? Ben, ah not Foxing, the hotelier. Oh, oh, hell yeah. Okay. Cool. Yeah. Ben Gothi. He's a phenomenal musician. Like it's in, an he's another one. He's just one of those, like, it's, it's also funny cause he was like kind of a Prague metal kid in high school. You got into some Proggy shit. And then you're like, I mean, his.
00:13:48
Speaker
his musical mind is it's just one of those frustratingly good like why are you why are you that good at that and it's so funny because he's done so I mean he he worked he was doing some work on films to score music and shit for a little while and then it's just funny that he He was also doing the hotel year cuz it's so different than like where his mind would naturally drift musically. You're talking about foxing because they just sell this last record right yeah and man they were like we're gonna record it we're gonna mix it we're gonna master it.
00:14:25
Speaker
they didn't have a producer on it hands down the best shit they've ever done i mean phenomenal album self titled two which is a cool that's also a cool move when that you put that much work and effort into it and i just go like i hear that and i go Produce, like for most people who are in bands for a decade, find their way, they're like, and maybe their band fizzles out, but they find their way into other aspects of the music industry and maybe they become a producer and they have their own ear for what they think is good. And I understand that sometimes like when you're criticizing your own stuff or trying to make your own stuff, having that outside ear can be helpful, but I don't know, man, I just, I see bands like that.
00:15:04
Speaker
where they just go, fuck it, we're going to do our own thing. And then to put out like the most heartfelt, passionate, well-structured album they've done in their career, to me, I just go, I love seeing people like that kind of turn industry norms on their head and come out walking away with like with their heads held high and putting out the best show they've done. it's A band that has an established fan base, maybe they're not the biggest band in the world, but they've done the work of like Foxing for 10 plus years, grinding touring. They had, they were able to in the early 2010s leverage the benefits of being on labels or having those like connections and turned that through hard work and great art into a following that they then can
00:15:54
Speaker
ah turn into, we're going to do this all independent now. And you're right, it's the best record they've ever done. And that every record has been the best they've ever done for their entire discography, right? ah what The question that I'm thinking about is not only how to support those sort of artists who like kind of, they've established what a life, a sustainable lifestyle of creation is, because they just like fucking, they were very poor at 20, so that they could start to be financially secure in their like mid to late 30s.
00:16:24
Speaker
Yeah, there's a bunch of emerging artists, whether they're a 20 year old kid with a guitar and a heartbreak, or ah somebody who's thinking about songwriting and recording for the first time in their leader in life, whatever. There's a bunch of emerging artists who they are, going the record industry is different now. So there's like heavy emphasis on what can become a viral hit, which is so fucking stupid and transient, right? Right. It's gonna hit on TikTok. Yeah, exactly. But that's who record labels from indie labels all the way up to majors have their eyes on, right? But there's great, there is an oversaturization of like,
00:17:07
Speaker
mediocre stuff to be totally real. I agree with that, Casey. But like there's good stuff out there that is not making waves because they're not connected or not conventionally attractive or like whatever the whatever the fucking thing is. right um But they're also, even if they are sort of getting a buzz, that record label A and&R person like a vulture is going to come in and try to make them sign a deal that's going to kill them, you know, for the next 10 years. Right. And so like one of the things that I'm just thinking about is like, what's a way to encourage artists to develop a sustainable lifestyle of creation, even from album one?
00:17:52
Speaker
instead of having to go through that cycle of I got ripped off by a label or the industry or whatever for years. Anyways, that's my that's my hobby horse. think The money's in government contracts. That's right, yeah. We got to figure out how to write the song that makes the Department of Homeland Security just sets them afire. you know Yeah, the CIA's like customer service line, the song that plays in the background, you want to be like the Eric Prince of music.
00:18:22
Speaker
That sounds like a great and sustainable business plan, man. i'm'm I'm loving everything you're putting down. It's worked out for the worst people in the world. but What about presidential candidates hiring bands to write their campaign theme song?
00:18:38
Speaker
that's that's did you see Did you see the clip of Trump the other night where he was like, I'm done talking, let's just listen to music? No, about it I didn't see it. and then And then it just literally, he stayed on stage for 30 minutes, just swaying back and forth. To Coco Mellon? Yes, singing along to whatever song. he was like He was like, make sure you guys, in the back in the booth, make sure you play some some really good music. And then just like. Yeah, it comes on.
00:19:05
Speaker
He just put on like the scream scenes in like Texas Chainsaw Massacre, like ah American Psycho. Is it audible what music is going on? I want to know what he's like really swaying to. 100%. But I think he's just, he's just spacing out at this point, just swaying back and forth. And there and you know how he always- Or he found a zen and he's living in the moment. That's true. that's Let's be generous. Let's be generous to one of the worst people in history.
00:19:37
Speaker
Well, okay, if but if Trump was going to hire somebody to write his campaign theme song, who do you think he would go for me? Like perfect perfect band to do. Kid Rock. Yeah, that's an easy one, I guess. Kid Rock was like a Tom McDonald like ah rap bridge. Yeah, I could see Tom McDonald on that, but he's Canadian, and I could see Trump dismissing that entirely.
00:20:01
Speaker
I think if you could somehow do a dark right and raise Toby Keith from bringing back to life from hell where he is, ah I think. Now we're talking my language. If we could raise zombie, sweet zombie Toby Keith, I think he would be the ideal person. yeah I like that. but What about Kamala? Kamala. i say don't know i have I have nothing funny to say about Kamala Harris. I don't know. White noise. she's just What's the most empty sound? just yeah yeah TV static, really.
00:20:35
Speaker
yeah yeah yeah just ah Just a coin falling down a well. and I don't know. I was thinking some... I i i could see her branding ah herself with some like stomp clap hey music, to be honest. I could see that role in its way. Yeah, that's very corporate. Yeah, I think whatever whatever focus grouped well. yeah ah Which is incidentally looking like in the past couple of days,
00:21:05
Speaker
Hasn't been ah going so well for but we want to get into that he Just yeah I feel like her entire brain is like let's focus group what people want to hear and then it's like Recent polls are just every every poll every few days is just making things look a little I'm getting a little bit more and more scared each week as we roll up to election cycle as she released a playlist of do you feel like a thing. Is that a thing that people do? Barack Obama every every summer or whatever. Yeah. Right. last This was cool as shit. Yeah. Every time I see that I'm like, Oh, he's so cool. I wish he wasn't a war criminal.
00:21:47
Speaker
I know. Every time you see him, like he's just so even keeled. He just says what he's got to say. And he gets out of there without making controversial statements. Like you go, wow, this guy was great. And then you go, oh, and that's that's why. Right. The greatest politicians are the ones that make you like them, despite them making horrific, ah horrific decisions that impact, you know, the lives of hundreds of thousands of people outside of our country. Like I said, war criminal. Very, very rough clip this week.
00:22:18
Speaker
Did you guys see that? He addresses the brothers. It's, it's rough. It's like, he's like, got a wine and cheese mixer. And he's like, Oh, this is a splendid spread that we've got here. ah Really appreciate the champagne. And ah if you don't mind, I'd like to take a moment to address the brothers and basically kind of gave them like a, you know,
00:22:42
Speaker
pull up your pants and vote for Kamala sort of speech. It was real condescending and not cool. Like Cosby-esque? It felt a little that way. Yeah. Cosby loves telling people, young people in their 20s to pull their pants up. that Unless they were women. Oh, pretty much. What a cool guy. I've never been more uncomfortable on a podcast than the last five minutes. I just want i just want you to know that ever since you, ah when Casey said brothers, I was like, where the fuck are we going, man? like let's go
00:23:15
Speaker
yeah It felt off-kilter for me, too. yeah yeah it its like As soon as I started talking, I immediately was filled with regret. but Maybe we just cut that whole segment out. It's okay to say if i'm if it's a direct quote, right? Isn't that the rule? i the whole The whole thing just made my skin crawl. If it's a song lyric, it's okay to say, right?
00:23:38
Speaker
yeah
00:23:41
Speaker
oh my god oh boy nobody else let's on on Sam or on Ben. These are solely the views of of me the soulless curmudgeon Well, anyway, what kind of owl is your favorite?
00:24:00
Speaker
I like a barn owl. I think that ah they're they're cute. um I like owls in general because we find them cute and like a metaphor a metaphorical sort of place holder for wisdom and intelligence and like all that sort of stuff. ah But also if you're a mouse, an owl is a monster. you know It's literally like a – Dracula. Yeah, it's Dracula, right?
00:24:30
Speaker
And so it's simultaneously cute. And if you are smaller than an owl, they're they're your predator. ah So there's just something about that that always really clicked with me. You ever find an owl pellet? Like a poop? No. An owl pellet. So owls swallow their prey whole, right? Like ah they'll swallow a whole mouse. And then I think it's in their, like their gizzard.
00:24:58
Speaker
They basically like digest all the soft material and stuff like that and then they land somewhere and they more or less like like puke up spit out this like dry ball of like hair and bones. Okay. It looks kind of like a turd but it came out their mouth and it's just like it's just all the.
00:25:20
Speaker
It's all the pointy parts of a mouse. Okay. What's the, I feel like you're the guy. I feel like you're Nathan Lane from mouse hunt Casey when he like is trying to find the mouth and he like picks up the turd and puts it in his mouth. I think it's Nathan Lane who does that. and them Yeah. Yeah. Hmm. You got to see if it's warm. I feel like that's you in your backyard every night. just I can. Yeah. Oh, this owl pellet is fresh. And then you start climbing trees looking for him and shit.
00:25:53
Speaker
ah Do you enjoy birding, Casey? Do you enjoy watching birds? Yeah, it's harder than you would expect. like I do enjoy it, but it's hard. I don't know. is i I have a lot of more respect these days for people who are really into it and that actually like mark a bunch of them off their list because even if you know it's there, like you can hear the call, you know it's in like this general vicinity, it's tough to put eyes on birds a lot of times. They have a natural camouflage. Yeah. Even if they're brightly colored, makes no sense. yeah But yes, I like birds. I like pretty much all animals except for except for penguins. All right. what who Who hurt you? What penguin heart do you come in?
00:26:37
Speaker
I just hate them and I feel like they get too much shine from the mainstream media. yeah Every single nature show, we got to show the penguins, they waddle around, they poop down the rock. Oh, sometimes they get eaten by whales. Who cares?
00:26:56
Speaker
i find a kind of repugnant I would like to, okay, so what I would like to open a puppy mill but for penguins and she' we sell them for culinary purposes. my god This is worse. This is worse than the Barack Obama. but' like Not even not even like a specialty like I don't want to sell penguins that are going to get sold in a specialty like hipster restaurant in like ah ah one of those towns like That sounds like Brookdale or something like that where, you know, it's, oh, it's a, it's an event. You go in and spend $80 to eat this, like, you know, uh, three hour roasted penguin, La Ronge or whatever. I want to sell like penguins to the wood chipper that makes McChicken patties. Just grind them up.
00:27:45
Speaker
no fanfare nothing but face right now just really wishing he didn't come back to do our podcast i don't remember i don't remember us being uh well let's let's say us generously i don't remember casey being this fucking that shit a I think what's happened is I feel like over the past couple of years, we've slowly like, you know, you spend a lot of time trying to figure out how to be like, yeah, you want to do something you like, but you want to make something other people like. So we were like, guest every week, this and that. And then it's like, guest every other week. And now it's like, guest when we feel like it, and then we'll just go off the rails. And if we burn this thing to the ground, then it's all over. Nope. No harm. Everybody's heard everything I have to say about original sin. I want to talk about penguins.
00:28:38
Speaker
The original scene of birds. Yeah. That's good. I am going to shift this conversation a little bit back to Ben. um ah We can make more space. If you have any final thoughts on penguins at the end of the episode, Casey, I do want you to share them. But I'm going to give you a moment to collect those thoughts before you speak out of turn and say something you really regret. All right.
00:29:06
Speaker
And just as the Lord, you know, it's kind of like the the the analogy of the lamb versus the serpent. You know what I mean? I feel like there's a similar sort of dynamic between the owl, this glorious magical wise bird, a proud bird of prey that, you know, is cute and makes fun noises, but also he kills. yeah And the penguin, which is just gutter trash.
00:29:31
Speaker
And their legs aren't even long enough to actually sit on their eggs. Good. Like that's what's crazy. Yeah. When they stand, their eggs are taller than their bottom. It's like, how do you sit on that? It's crazy. Yeah. All right. Learn to s fly if you want shine as a bird. Here's the thing. Hey, no one cares that you got this like annoying dual tone voice box. Like go get eaten by a polar bear.
00:29:55
Speaker
I'm, polar bears don't actually eat penguins though, because polar bears are at the North Pole. Penguins are at the South Pole. ah goody my yeah A leopard seal. Okay. Well, Ben, uh, now that you've learned everything you need to know about penguins, uh,
00:30:21
Speaker
We were talking about bands earlier who have been in the thick of it for a decade and they can finally do what they want to do. You've been making music for a long time. Right. I've listened to plenty of your bands. I've seen plenty of them play when we were in college. I've always loved and appreciated the music you've made. What now? so you weren't really i mean I don't know how much you were doing music in your spare time for a while, but there It seems to me ah like there is a period of time where you weren't pursuing it in a serious way. Correct. And you were pursuing a career, you were doing different, um like getting your job a job at different like nonprofits.
00:30:59
Speaker
um And at some point you decided, you and your friends decided to ah pursue a place for Owls more seriously. And you went and you recorded a full length album that's gonna be coming out that we will talk about in a little bit but you are what what when you think of these bands that we talked about that just have their career and they do their thing and then they decide to make their own music and uh, without the influence of a label or producer or anything like that. And then when you think of all the time you spent making music, writing music and like what feels different for you now in your mid thirties, late thirties, I forget, I think it might be a little older than me, who knows. sureha But it, what feels different now for you making this, like this, uh, commitment to pursuing music in a more serious way than like,
00:31:54
Speaker
the past 10 years. like hows that How has your desire and impulses changed in that regard? Well, there's I think there's two categories of folks that take quote, take music seriously. There's like someone who their definition of success is once I can make money doing music, then I'll be i'll feel successful. And this is my that's my you know sort of litmus test or whatever. And then I think that there's broadly a category for people who are like more of like the weekend warrior day job holder,
00:32:32
Speaker
like that I've sort of always felt like I've had these jobs, which a lot of them have been meaningful to me. You know, so it's like I've done, I've done like worked on environmental issues or trying to house ah homeless people or like whatever, like ah make the world a better place sort of stuff. And so it's been meaningful, but there's, um,
00:32:57
Speaker
There's not been this sense of calling to use a Christian, a very Christian word, right? like there's There's not been this sense of like, I'm the right person doing the right thing at the right time. It's like, I'm doing good work, but like what's the thing that I really feel like i and alive the reason why I'm alive is X.
00:33:19
Speaker
um and Dude, music has always been this thing that never made me any goddamn money, but I had so much fun doing it. and and it's just Also, songwriting is the way that I sort of like process my own life and sort of look at it. Am I doing good? It's through like writing songs or whatever.
00:33:39
Speaker
and so um I think I've just gotten to the point where I'm like, there is no clear path for me ah to make money doing music, it given the industry norms, like what's going on? Like there's just no way to do it. So I'm either going to have to carve out a life for myself where I can create more space to do artistic work and also support other artists, or I'm gonna continue to need to do like some form of day job.
00:34:10
Speaker
and you know you get into this binary like either or of like you if you sell out you get the day job and then you give up the dream or you like you know whatever and honestly i'm in a spot right now where i'm in this sort of nebulous in between spot where i'm like i'm doing I'm focusing more on creative stuff and supporting other creatives, but every other guy in my band is still a day job holder. you know and like every other guy in ah Most of the bands that I know are like, you got to work at Starbucks or wherever the hell you're working. You know like you you got to have health insurance that comes from somewhere.
00:34:46
Speaker
So like I think right now I feel appropriately foolish enough that like i'm you know being in your 30s and looking at 40 years old like coming around the pike, it like it clarifies like what you don't want to do for the rest of your life and what you do want to do for the rest of your life. right And so I definitely don't want to continue to work jobs that I don't feel like that's it's not it. I haven't found it yet. you know And so I feel old enough to feel confident in myself and my own ability and my skills and my perspective and like who I am as a person is fully formed, basically.
00:35:31
Speaker
um Not that people can't keep growing and being dynamic or whatever, right but um i'm I'm me at this point in history. you know like i'm I'm myself. um and Then simultaneously, I'm young enough to be really dumb and stupid. where like like ah like kate's going to nursing My wife is going to nursing school next year, so she's not working. and I've literally right now got a 20-hour a week day job and plans to like start a non-profit, and that's my life. You know what I mean? It's like, this is so fucking dumb. It makes sense yeah like makes no sense.
00:36:06
Speaker
to like ah to But the the sort of work that I want to do is so clear um to me and the need that exists. There's so many artists and working musicians that I know out there that are so discouraged and neurotic and self-conscious and ah just like,
00:36:27
Speaker
there ah they have been run through the ringer by life and by the music industry and they need like some propping up and some ah you know just like someone to help them that's not trying to just screw them over you know so anyways i feel like that's where I'm at in life, musically, this definitely feels like, you know, Tom Petty, he like wrote his best songs when he was like 39 or 40, 45 years old, right? Like he just, it took him that long to like really get to the top of his craft. And I feel like as just a songwriter, I'm just like starting to to get there where a lot of the bands that you saw, you know, back in college,
00:37:13
Speaker
We're not, some of them were good, but not all of them were good. Not all the songs. We're great when you look back on them, you know, and I feel like now I'm able to like I've got more to say about the world and I know how to say them through song at this point, you know And I think one of the greatest advantages when you talk about these risks, right is I think it's funny I think boomers left us just the right economy where like we've had we have enough hopelessness where we can say fuck it and
00:37:47
Speaker
yeah know yeah At this age, you go, like when you think of where our parents were when they were pushing 40, it was like, and also maybe how unhappy some they were to some degree. I feel like most people I know are like, yeah, my dad was always mad all the time and never was home and worked a bunch. like there was a lot of they They traded in a lot of happiness for what they thought they were supposed to do. Made it less than their parents. but You know, that's all we're moving the needle a bit. But I think that it's like, it is funny when you just think of like, like, um I went back to school, right? I'm finished. I'll finish up my degree in the so ah the spring. $50,000 in debt took a lower paying job to do something like that. You just fuck it. We're all fucked. It doesn't matter anymore. You just and.
00:38:34
Speaker
to resign to just like having less and being happy with what you're doing versus like well we need the vacation house and the boat like what they did was they actually made it impossible for us to achieve that so we can just not have to worry about not getting it like none of my friends have that and some are doing well and they don't have that and you just Some of those things that they were trying to achieve and the lives that they were trying to build, I feel like we've just decided where, to some degree, impossible. And you just go, now I don't even, and you lowered the bar. and Now I can just strive for something that's more meaningful to me. And honestly, like, if we're, if we're being clear, boats are, boats were like- We're gonna talk about penguins again. No, no, no. Boats were made for hitting penguins. Face tattoos for boomers.
00:39:26
Speaker
but It's like that's the that's the straw that broke the camel's back and ruined their life. Yeah. Their boat. Yeah. They did a reverse mortgage on their house so they could buy like a 97 ski-doo. Yeah. And then 2004 they're living in a box in like Gary, Indiana. Yeah. Boats are the physical man manifestation of sunk cost fallacy. Yeah. yeah You're you're just so unbelievably correct.
00:39:58
Speaker
There's a, I think it's like, it's, so even home ownership is I'm, I live in Denver, Colorado, and I've rented the entire time I've been here because home ownership has just felt unattainable. It's a, it's a fantasy, you know, like there's, we're, we're ah in a spicier housing market than other cities, right? ah Like if we could make the same money and move to, uh, you know, Virginia Carolina or whatever.
00:40:28
Speaker
And if we're outside of an urban core, then like we could probably buy a home. But it's just like, there's a sort of, you're talking about a piece or serenity that sort of happens when you embrace the limitations that are in your life, right? Yeah. It's just like, financially, I'm never going to ball. But maybe existentially, I could ball, you know, I could like, you know, I love it.
00:40:56
Speaker
You're like the difference between us and like the again, the boomers is like the amount of like men providing for their families in that generation who are just like, just like riddled with depression, just miserable. You're like, it's not ah of well okay. I'll, I won't go that dark, but, um,
00:41:21
Speaker
I just, I think of like the amount of my friends whose dads were just like, I, it's, it's weird to think about like thinking back on it. Cause I look at my friends and I go, yeah, we're, we're all like in a similar situation with kids with whatever. But it's like, almost all of us have that shared experience of like the overworked depressed dad. Yeah. And it's like,
00:41:45
Speaker
Obviously, depression is a real mental health struggle, but there are aspects like of depression that are situational. and You're just like in this grind of a vortex where you're just like, I have to do this. I work seven days a week, 14 hour date. like yeah you're gonna be depressed i wouldn't want to live if i was working that much about yeah and doing that much when i just i the best thing about my job change was that i prior to working in the school i was driving an hour to work
00:42:17
Speaker
Working in eight, nine hour days, an hour home, home at like 5.30, barely had, didn't have time to really make dinner, which is something I love to. I love cooking. My favorite thing to do is to get, to just spend a few hours making a nice dinner. Um, so like to work and then it's dark when I get home, the kids are getting ready for bed. I was fucking miserable.
00:42:41
Speaker
Yeah. And then you just go, all right, I'll take out a bunch of money and student loans. I'll take a lower paying job. I'm home by four every day. I start making dinner. I put the kids to bed. I have time to enjoy something with them after dinner. We play games at the table. We play video games before, but like we just do stuff. And I'm like the happiest I've ever fucking been and the idea of going back. And then I think of what my dad went through.
00:43:06
Speaker
I was like, you give, I give him so much over a pass for the times he came home was angry and short and impatient where you're like, yeah, I get it. i I would, I would be an infinitely, I would struggle infinitely more as a father if I got home at eight o'clock at night and had to reheat my dinner and I just want some fucking peace and quiet after dealing with bullshit all day and your kids are screaming in your face. Like that's no good.
00:43:31
Speaker
it's such It's such a different dynamic now and I feel like it's a better dynamic. I feel like people are trying to make, there's less of that like, oh, only the guy, only the dad has to work while the mom can maybe work part-time but has to be over the kid. You figure it out. We've all figured out how to have kids with working parents and yeah, there are some challenges involved and yeah, after school, before a school program, it all siphons a little bit more money out of your life but You figure it out. I don't know. I'm rambling now. I want to ask you about something super fucking cool. You did, Ben. Yeah. You guys got to open for such a legendary band in Denver. Switchfoot. Yeah. Like what happened? Stance in some way, it was kind of just like it felt it kind of like came together in the most random ass way through a Twitter exchange, right? Yeah, man, you missed such a great transition opportunity there.
00:44:27
Speaker
because you were just talking about how we were meant to live for so much more. Fuck. I missed it. You've redeemed yourself of every weird thing you've said.
00:44:42
Speaker
All right, back to zero. yeah Does that mean we don't have to edit the whole episode now? yeah
00:44:53
Speaker
ah we did ah We did indeed open for Switchfoot. We opened for them ah in Denver and in Billings, Montana and in Salt Lake City, Utah. So they asked us to play three dates with them.
00:45:06
Speaker
It was one of the most surreal experiences of my life because growing up in Youth Group, Switchfoot was the coolest fucking band in the world. ah they That beautiful letdown record came out right when I was like Youth Group age.
00:45:22
Speaker
not and ah and i was even into switch footot from so I got into because of the Mandy Moore Walk to Remember soundtrack. ah so me and guy yeah so Mandy Moore starred in this like Nicholas Sparks style movie ah about, I don't know, I remember what it's about, but my girlfriend at the time made me watch it.
00:45:47
Speaker
and mandy moore covered Switchfoot's song, Only Hope on that on that in that movie and on that soundtrack album. And my girlfriend had the soundtrack on CD, but like that was my first, there were like four Switchfoot songs on that movie soundtrack. And it was some more of the ballads. It wasn't like, they weren't quite in the like guitar rock, drop D sort of territory yet, ah but like it was, um Honestly, life changing to get into that band because they were like Youth Group approved.
00:46:24
Speaker
but they still had riffs and they still were, they, I think they still are ah not trying to write propaganda, even though they were trying, like a lot of Christian artists, I think, are just about what's the Jesus per minute or like, are we doing an alter call at the end of the show? There's like an, ah there's a propaganda like agenda to their music making, which just feels,
00:46:50
Speaker
artistically just like I why would I ever model myself after someone who's making propaganda for the Christian white Christian evangelical industrial complex or whatever, you know, yeah, and so ah switch foot felt like to me and still feels like that to me of dudes that still are in the thing, right? They they they have not bailed or left Christianity or whatever. Bailed is maybe a and harsh way to put it, but you know what I mean. Yeah. K.C. bailed. There you go. That's right. It's dictuativeness. Yeah, that's right. they had
00:47:32
Speaker
But like they're still in it, but they're still trying to do it in a genuine way of like trying to write songs that they themselves want to hear, not necessarily songs that they think will be popular or whatever, even though they became very popular.
00:47:49
Speaker
I over those three dates got to like hang out with the Foreman brothers, Tim and John and the other guys in the band. And ah it was a surreal experience of like, basically, I play guitar partially because of your band. And now we're just like, we're just like hanging out.
00:48:06
Speaker
And the Tim Forman said this thing about one of their later records, which was got got a little darker and a little weirder. He was like, we just we just intentionally wanted to make ah music that wasn't bumper stickers. like There was no bumper sticker lyric.
00:48:22
Speaker
out there. And this was like late and late enough into their career where they they it was edgy for them to like make those sort of decisions and in songwriting of like they could have continued to write anthems that with lyrics that could be easy to put on a bumper sticker or whatever. so Anyways, that's me fanboying about ah the Switchfoot boys. But it was a the Denver show was sold out at our favorite venue in town, it's called the Ogden. It's like a 1600 capacity venue. Wow. Biggest show we've ever played. um We sold a lot of merch.
00:49:03
Speaker
And they paid us generously, Switchfoot did, for a small, like, nobody band. And ah just because they liked our music, I literally tweeted at the band and said, hey, Switchfoot, you should check out Denver Emo Band, A Place for Owls. And then they just, check they checked us out, and they liked it, and they said, you can open for us. ah And All that money that we made from those three shows, from them paying us generously and selling merch at all three shows, paid for everything we had to do for the next two years. like that like it was Well, that's an everything we had to do for the next year. We basically spent our last Switchfoot money dime paying for the first round of the first payment on vinyl, because we're self-releasing this next record.
00:49:57
Speaker
And so we were paying for vinyl ourselves and CD ourselves and we couldn't have paid for any of that or to hire a producer to work with us and record in a professional studio whatever without ah Without the switch foot boys. So i believe um it's so amazing. I love that story I feel like that is one of the most like it's just it feels like something from like a ah 90s sitcom like that doesn't happen like in Twitter is so Overlogged with just people saying dumb shit all the time Yeah that like the fact that that like I've been told by people I love and respect to check out bands countless times and I don't because I just forget so the fact that a stranger on Twitter is
00:50:43
Speaker
was able to get and like that they were able to read that and they go, you know what, I'm going to do that. and then they were like that's To me, I just find it one of the most mind-blowing ways to make ah an incredible connection like that. it just like It caught them on the right day when they were in the mood to check out something new.
00:51:03
Speaker
and then it just caught you know like the ah you know My buddy always says that ah good marketing ruins a bad product. so there's the you know like it It ruins a bad product quicker like ah because more and more people are checking you out. and so There's always anxiety as a musician to like what if like I don't think it sucks. I like it. i think um My band is my favorite band. I love my band so much. but like i'm like what like If it sucked and you and that like Tim Foreman or whatever checked it out on the right day because he was feeling like it, and he just went, o okay. you know it would
00:51:39
Speaker
and so It's like both the universe smiling on me because it just like the stars aligned that they checked it out. But then also it's like, well, I did i did make a good record that sounds really good and is really heartfelt and it worked. you know and it dude it It sounds incredible. I i think it's a fantastic album. I think the musicianship on it, um the it's like a subtle,
00:52:07
Speaker
It's like a subtle technicality to it, right? like where It's hard to explain, but it's just... um there's always a little something going on. And like, whether it's like when I hear like the picking, like the note picking and things, I just, that's the stuff that I find intriguing about music. We're like, yeah, you could just strum your goddamn heart out and and just do the right chords and it'll work. But there's more, there it's just, there's layers to it that I find intriguing. And when I'm listening to it, it's like, you know, I'm generally a ah vocals and lyrics guy, like,
00:52:41
Speaker
You could just be some generic ass music, but if your vocals are phenomenal to me, I'm in. I'm in completely. um i if ah If there's a band where the music's phenomenal and I just don't like the vocals, I'm probably out. so like thats That's a big part of music and what gets me. and I think I've always been a fan of you and your voice. Thanks, man. I think it's gotten just better with time. I think yeah this album,
00:53:11
Speaker
the recording is phenomenal on it. I think that like listening to it and the musicianship like I would just kind of zone out from even the ah the vocals at times and just picking up on the the guitar and and what's going on there. It's just, it's intricate. it's It's well thought out. It's well structured. I i love it. I i feel like ah when I have musicians on and we talk about music. I try to only have people on who I want to say good things about their music. I don't want to lie to anybody. He's lied a couple times.
00:53:44
Speaker
ah just We don't have to say who. ah only I would argue only once and I will tell you often when we stop recording.
00:53:57
Speaker
okay But that's the thing. like like it's just ah I don't have to talk to people I don't want to. and for me it was like as soon as I found out you were as soon as you told me you had some new music coming out I couldn't wait to listen to it I couldn't I didn't even have to hear it before I knew I wanted to promote it you know I just knew because you have such a big heart and you're such a passionate person and you're such you're just a thinking person I I knew it was gonna be fantastic and it is ah so when uh
00:54:31
Speaker
when I forget when you told me the release date was for it though. Yeah, so ah it's coming out November 1st, so depending upon when this airs, it might be out already or it might about to be. It'll be coming up. This will this will air this this week and actually. Great, good.
00:54:50
Speaker
Yeah, so November 1st, it comes out. The album's called How We Dig in the Earth. It's our second record. ah It is produced by ah my friend Dave Wilton, who is in a band called A Boy in His Kite. um And ah it is probably the the greatest creative accomplishment of my life, front to back. um It's ah it's ah it's The music is fun and like moving, but ah the lyrics often are ah pretty pretty heavy. so we One of the reasons why we added so much intricacy in like three guitar parts that are all going on at the same time, or like
00:55:33
Speaker
doing a banjo and a trumpet part that are just kind of barely in the mix that you can kind of like hear whiffs of when you kind of listen in is we honestly wanted to distract people from just the horror of some of the lyrics. But like ah the the the the music is, it's it's a weird thing because it's like heavy songs because it was songs written after like the heaviest couple years of my life where like just ah death after death ah and loss after loss and just like all this it just was like a the year from hell basically um and songwriting was like the way that I would process what was actually like going on um but it's weird
00:56:21
Speaker
to now take the, it's like alchemy, it's magic, right? Where you take all that pain and then now you're like, this album is sick and there's some really good riffs and ah it's probably the best thing I've ever done. And yes, it might make you sad, but yes, you should listen to it, right? um And so it always feels, it feels a little strange trying to promote a thing that was like born out of, um uh immense sorrow and hardship but uh i mean it is what it is i'm a working musician now so i gotta promote the hell out of it would you feel it's the perfect soundtrack for biden's lame duck term jesus christ no i wouldn't no
00:57:05
Speaker
oh
00:57:08
Speaker
Will you write on in in ah honor of Casey and in this episode, will you name one of your songs a song for penguins? and In the future, sometimes don't. do They don't deserve it.
00:57:22
Speaker
Yeah, yeah. it about tanings they're pretty But it could be like a song, it could be like a really dark sad song and it could have a double meaning like it could be about something, something awful that happened. And you could interpret it as like a mass grave of penguins if you if you were thinking about it like that. Right, right. yeah There's layers to the penguin side. I'm not going to write. There's like a good art that tells them what it means. You kind of want them to make it personal. You can't just be too obvious with it. yeah Yeah. Yeah. I can visualize the the penguin line at the Oscar Meyer Bologna factory.
00:58:05
Speaker
I can't, dude.
00:58:09
Speaker
the the experience of like trying to be so goddamn earnest with you and and Your own your own role seems to be Casey to derail is how it goes a lot We would dude we had Shane Claiborne on the other week and I i i I was silently dying. i you know We only put out the audio. I wish we had the video so you could see me doubled over back here. like Barely able to breathe over Casey making jokes that Shane either... hed some One of them he didn't get. A lot of them did not think was funny.
00:58:56
Speaker
yeah To me, the funniest thing of all time is when people are like, don't get it. Don't get Casey's jokes or put off by it. Because he swings. hes He's got big swings, man. And it kills me. I love it so much. I wish we had to put out the video for Shane's because if you could, I'm like, the recording is going to sound like there are these like,
00:59:21
Speaker
silent moments, like a few seconds and I'm like, no one's gonna see me laughing my silently laughing my ass off, barely able to sit in my chair, while Shane's just like, what the fuck is wrong with this guy? Like, why am I even talking to him? I wasn't able to stick one of them out. I made a comment about St. Peter chopping the guy's ear off and that being like his Kyle Rittenhouse moment. And he didn't like it. I'm like, I'm so i'm sorry.
00:59:53
Speaker
and It's so funny, but I'm glad, I feel like this is just, ah we're doubling down on on that at this point. I want to be honest, I'm being generous with you. ah I think you're a lot less funny than I'm pretending you are. that's what i'm i'm i'm I'm just, i'm I'm like going along to get along at this point, but there's there's been some comments where I'm like, i don't I'm not enjoying this right now, my friend.
01:00:22
Speaker
I think you're wrong to say that, yeah. I think that's fair. That's fair. That's what a good person should feel.
01:00:33
Speaker
at least he At least he can apologize. Well, he hasn't apologized. At least he can admit he's wrong. He doesn't have to apologize for it. ah Dude, you also you guys also made a music video and that's what made me think of our moment smoking on a park bench in Boston Common was yeah that ah you you light up a cigarette in the music video and I was like, I want to fucking smoke a cigarette with Ben Sully again.
01:00:58
Speaker
and know well that's So tobacco is is complicated because obviously ah ah it's killing you ah and that's kind of part of the appeal. because voaggu Kurt Vonnegut said that a cigarette is the last honorable form of suicide left to a man in American culture.
01:01:20
Speaker
So there's- Throw slow, Sapuku. Yeah.
01:01:29
Speaker
but so Just the slowest, most gradual. ah but it's But it's honestly, ah it's it's complicated because it's like, okay, there's a little bit of self-destruction that's going on with this. It's not like a happy thing, but some of my, ha especially growing up in Virginia ah and some of those porch life like days where like just being on a couch on a porch with 15 of your best friends
01:02:01
Speaker
just blasting darts together. like Honestly, it's there's i I don't know if I've recreated that sense of belonging and that sense of just like being here right now and being so happy to be where I was. right I'm still broadly happy to be with my friends, but there's just something about being young and dumb and smoking cigarettes ah that I think honestly and now in my 30s, where I'm trying to get not closer to the self-destructive instinct, because that is coming from a place of pain, but coming closer to that sense of camaraderie and friendship and belonging and just like things are fucking going right. like we're we're this is This is a good and beautiful and sacred moment as we are staying up until three in the morning, talking about life and smoking cigarettes, right?
01:02:57
Speaker
And so that's basically what the song's about, is like trying to, in the midst of like, it's kind of a love song to to friendship almost, where it's like you're trying to like reconnect with the most pure part of yourself. And for me, in my teens and twenties, that was just blasting darts with my with my buds, you know, on a porch somewhere.
01:03:22
Speaker
Yeah. dude Was that the first music video you've made? We did ah we did one last year ah or two years ago for ah for one song from the first record. It was directed by the same guy, our buddy Michael, who Okay, ah put it together. ah The first one was more like us cavorting around Denver and like kind of like random clips of us just being rap scallions in Denver. But ah this one we wanted to do like a one or you know, like a single take situation and it's not it's ah ah children of men or or or Steven Spielberg it is not you know, it's like it it's not it's not actually cinema but
01:04:07
Speaker
it is a one take of the beginning to the end of a cigarette ah walking down the street ah while the song's going on. So conceptually, the song takes as long, roughly as long as it takes to smoke one cigarette. And so like, we were just like, let's just do that. Let's just, the first shot is lighting up ah your smoke. And then literally the last shot is You know like ah grinding out your the butt on the concrete, you know And that would be look when we're thinking about roughly the time it takes to smoke a cigarette We're obviously not talking Marb Reds here, which are designed to burn down in 30 seconds
01:04:45
Speaker
No, these are these are ah I'm an American spirit. I'm an American spirit. Blue, man. ah Yellows are also acceptable in a pinch, but ah the American spirit ah has a longevity to it.
01:05:00
Speaker
And like frustrat for people who are smokers, like the the real smokers, they get annoyed with people who smoke American spirits because it's just like, what do you do? it you We don't do this for fun and enjoyment anymore. We do it because we're addicted. What do you do in sitting out here taking an extra two and a half minutes to smoke this shit? well its And you get back to working your nursing job.
01:05:23
Speaker
this
01:05:26
Speaker
That's right. The people who should know better, the nurses.
01:05:33
Speaker
ah the I think my favorite sort of psychological diagnosis of the tobacco users is like the cigarette smoker is like the functional addicted and like this has to be over. And, you know, the cigar, the pipe smokers is like, we're going to be thoughtful and cultured about this. We're having a moment here, right?
01:05:52
Speaker
which and I don't respect that culture, by the way. I could say a lot of shitty things about people who smoke. I feel like when you move, I feel like when you start smoking cigars, like I smoked cigars when I was younger, because you thought it was like, oh, because of that, because of what you just fucking said, Ben. yeah Oh, sophisticated culture. I'm a man now. And you go, one I also barfed my fucking tits off smoking a cigar one night and haven't really smoked one since. but i I feel like the personality type that even talks about smoking cigar, like if you do it and I've never heard about it, it's like a tree falling in the woods making a sound. and fuck it's like this It's like a vegan that didn't remind you that yeah that That's it dude, cigar smokers are just the vegans of tobacco addiction.
01:06:41
Speaker
Well, what i love about addict yeah what what I love about the American spirit is it's it's ever so slightly more thoughtful than a cigarette, but it's still ah a goddamn cigarette. It's still a working person's tobacco product. right it scars are like is It's like, okay, so you and your wife go on vacation or something, right? And you you go to like, ah you know,
01:07:10
Speaker
No, no, no, no. See, like, okay. You go to Myrtle Beach, there's a million things you could do and you Google things to do in Myrtle Beach. And it's like, take a historic segue tour. And you're like, well, that's good, clean, pre-packaged fun. I'll do that for 120 bucks or whatever. That's what cigars are like. It's like good, clean, pre-packaged culture.
01:07:34
Speaker
Like, don't think about it. You're fancy now. You're fancy for the next three hours at least. It's kind of like people who try really hard to be like wine aficionados. Yeah. where you're like i ah it can Do you do this in private? Like do you do this when no one's watching or only when you have ah an audience? Because I feel like I'm part of a performance here. Yeah. that's what That's one of the reasons why I'm drawn to the humble cigarette is that it's like it's, and you know, kids are vaping now. It's, it feels like rebellion, the cigarette feels like rebellion on both ends because you're rebelling against the sort of pretentious cigar pipe, whatever culture. And then also all the, all the
01:08:16
Speaker
teens and twenty-somethings that I know they're vaping and that's their main sort of like it's their main THC but it's also their main nicotine intake right and so ah to actually on a curb at a show pull out a real analog pack of cigarettes feels a little bit like a a like alright kid let me show you yeah You know it's gonna have a nostalgic feel pretty soon in the next couple of years here is the vapes that look like cigarettes yeah
01:08:47
Speaker
Those are the rage when it first came out it was like nobody will know that this is now's a game boyy You're literally sucking on ah on a handheld the ones that are like these giant massive mechanical dildos that they're just like Yeah and the whole time know yeah but on it real quick this yeah and they all um l lower that gives you disease I always think of ah there is this like, I don't know if it was an Instagram page, i it was like a hashtag vape goons was a thing. And it was just like, people doing like dance moves with their hands while vaping and then just like blowing raining going through it like, dude, it was just like watching someone do one of those like,
01:09:35
Speaker
one of those, uh, heaven, hell, Christian youth group type interpretive dances with a giant vape. And it yeah it was just, that's the equivalent. That's like hobby horse blowing scream and smoke rings and then blow and smoke through the rings. And um it was all about how big your cloud was. And you it's like, what, this is crazy shit. Like we've entered into a totally new territory.
01:09:58
Speaker
Well, there's there's a niche ah subculture for everything now, and so it makes sense that like the the vape community is ah is just like, well how can we just be as abnormal about this as possible? How can we be the most annoying? you know yeah what's like the newest like um'm sorry good ahead No, there's just 3,000 vape brands. like there's va Every time you look at someone and vaping, you're like, that's a new one. like how This is a raging industry. It's pretty c incredible. What would happen if you just like stole your brothers and filled it with canola oil? You would end up with an episode of Law and Order very quickly. I think you would die. I think you would kill him. What if we killed a penguin, let him out, put the penguin blood in the vape,
01:10:49
Speaker
What then? Yeah. You become stronger. Penguin tincture. You become penguin-like in your presence. What's like the weirdest like subculture you've discovered? it's that new what's the What's the weirdest like subculture you've gotten a glimpse of recently?
01:11:08
Speaker
Well, so there there's, I mean, if we're talking if we're talking about like people who are just into very not mainstream sort of sexual expressions, I mean, there's there's all that. ah But honestly- No, but like something fun.
01:11:24
Speaker
yeah But honestly, this is going to be a non funny answer, but sometimes being in an emo band feels like that, like I'm the guy doing the vape smoke rings to like more my normie, like coworker or neighbor or whatever.
01:11:42
Speaker
where they're like, oh, what kind of music is it? And I'm like, I usually say like, I don't know, it's like indie rock. Do you like Death Cab for Cutie? do you Do you like Jimmy World? you know And it's like, I try to like pull the most like normal bands that are even adjacent. ah But then if I find another weirdo who's like, I'm like, so Emo, do you sound like mineral? And I'm like, no, actually.
01:12:07
Speaker
It is funny. Emo does ah have, I think, a strange reputation. I think it's people who aren' who don't appreciate it or have a familiarity with it. Like they lump all emo into like one category. Well, there's still like there's like the mom jeans emo.
01:12:27
Speaker
Yeah, it's like a whole different sub category of emo that I find detestable. I'm sorry to anyone who likes mom jeans. I can't. I can't do like the brand name.
01:12:39
Speaker
Yeah, like the overly intentional vocals of, there's this guy who like, who he likes a lot of that kind of music, but he also makes fun of it and is just like, he'll so he'll he'll just make these like, you know, 45 second emo songs and he'll do the overly specific like narration of his environment. So it's like, I spilled beer on my shirt and now I'm addicted to the smell of natty ice.
01:13:03
Speaker
i like the way you cough when you hit your vape too hard and shit like that like it's all just like kind of silly observational like and pulling it into an emo sound and i I think he's very funny with what he does but I also know he genuinely likes the stuff he is making fun of too. And I go, that's where I lose you because I can't, it doesn't work for me. I feel like when you try to sing a certain way like that, like especially the mom jeans type, no shade at mom jeans. Well, some shade, but yeah flood do my pod you're throwing lots of shade on mom jeans. But I can't, I find it, I find it so brutally obnoxious and I would imagine they have to know there's a lot of people
01:13:44
Speaker
who feel strongly one way or the other. Well, okay, so emo historically is supposed to be an earnest expression of emotion. That's one of the reasons like earnest earnest earnest expression of emotion. Now, there's a sort of like new wave that is there's layers upon layers of irony. um And There's layers upon layers of what I would call affectations. so okay so like When we were in college, Ray Lamontagne was a big deal. and I literally at Liberty would go to shows like open mic situations or like student you know the student union would put on a show, be a singer-songwriter, and he'd be this kid who'd be like, hey, thanks for coming to the show guys. and
01:14:31
Speaker
he he would When he would sing, he would put on that Ray Lamontaine affectation. And then when he would use his talking voice, it It would be like, why do you sing in a Southern accent? You're from Maryland. You know what I mean?
01:14:46
Speaker
like ah so There's an inauthenticity or whatever that like you can smell in a lot of music. Now, in the emo that you're talking about, especially if someone who's like making fun of it but also loving it, there's like There's layers of irony in there. But to me, it's like what really resonates about emotional music in general is like, can you just tell me how you fucking actually really feel? And if you if you really feel like you want to sing about getting high and and ah you know what you like are seen in the room right now, and that's a genuine expression for you, I can't judge that. I may not like listen to it because the subject matter seems boring as hell.
01:15:34
Speaker
ah but like I would still want to listen to it if it was an honest expression. Now, people hear that sort of music, that sort of like mom jean style emo, and then they're like, this is what I'm going to be. I'm going to do the riffs the same way, and I'm going to do the vocal affectation the same way, be really grating or whatever. and it just It's false.
01:15:55
Speaker
Yeah, there's an over intentionality to some of the way people try to make the- I mean that's what people- that's why people joke on Creed still. Like, there's no way you actually sing like that purely. Maybe he's the only one in history who does have the Yarl effect, but Yarlene became a thing for a reason.
01:16:13
Speaker
Well, no, he heard he heard a Pearl Jam record and he was like, that's it. That's it. Yeah, I mean, essentially. But like the the ah now the biggest irony of all time is how Creed's back in full swing and all the people our age are like, I'm kind of actually here for it ironically, but unironically, too. Like, also, this is just a huge part of my childhood and my life. yeah And du I know 80 percent of the songs and I'm going to sing them all until I don't have a voice the next day. Yeah, my own prison and human clay still go. like they The rifts are there. I agree. I had this conversation the other day. I tried to start the conversation and was like, some of therit like ah so yeah some of the I'm like, these are these are actually good rifts. They just became a caricature of themselves. And there was no way out for them until they took that long break and came back and we all went, fuck it. Let's go see.
01:17:12
Speaker
Let's go see them play. I don't know if I've ever intentionally listened to Creed. well I don't know any Creed songs. with arms wide open i know i do know under the sunlight Honestly, I don't think I have a good grasp on what emo is. I feel like I've never really listened to that. i feel like that' Yeah, I could see that.
01:17:36
Speaker
i Broadly, it's emotional rock music. there's i could you You don't give one shit about the history of emo and all the five waves or whatever. Which wave is ah clarity? ah Clarity is the end. ah Clarity, oftentimes, people talk about either the end of second wave or the beginning of third wave.
01:17:57
Speaker
Okay, so well, okay, so clarity is probably the end of second wave emo, which is so okay, actually, you apparently do give a shit I definitely do is before you go into there is mineral in wave one. No, they're, they're wave two. Okay. So I might not know any wave one emo then. So wave one is ah emotional hardcore punk music from primarily the DC era area, bands like rights ah Right of Spring, Right of Spring, ah Fugazi. ah yeah It was a sub genre of hardcore music, and it was but it was the lyric instead of being political or being um
01:18:43
Speaker
about primarily anger, it was more ripped from your diary style, ah contemplative self introspective style lyrics, but still not sung prettily, but like still aggressively like they're heavy vocals. But ah it's it's a it's a sub genre of punk and hardcore. And then second wave were some of the bands like ah Jimmy World, Sunday Day Real Estate, ah folks that in the 90s into the very early 2000s is kind of like the tail end of it.
01:19:19
Speaker
who made it more melodic, more of a twinkly riffy sort of an experience. okay um And so still very ah grounded and punk and DIY ethos. um But clarity is kind of like the ah the chamber pop of second wave emo. It's like the highest expression of what produced second wave emo could sound like. And then third wave is that mall goth sort of emo, the my chemical romance, yup ah Panic at the Disco. And so that's what when you talk about emo music, most people remember back from high school, liking on TRL one or two, you know my chemical romance songs or whatever. And so that's what that's what it people think about the gothy, swoopy hair and the hot topic sort of aesthetic, right? At that phase. Yeah, yeah at that phase, right?
01:20:16
Speaker
the ah The American Apparel striped really thin and clingy t-shirt and the skinny jeans with the deep V neck. Deep V's went hard. yeah Hard V. I'm too busty for those. yeah yeah But then, so mom jeans, what you're talking about is kind of in that fourth wave, which is sometimes called emo revival, because it was going back to that late 90s, early 2000s sound, ah sort of like functionally leapfrogged the mall ah emo sort of era, and went back to like what mineral or GME world or the GitHub kids or the anniversary were like doing.
01:21:03
Speaker
And so that was the early 2010s, like 2008 into like the early 2010s. Which the hotelier, the hotelier was emo revival and they were, ah my understanding is they had a pretty big influence on emo revival too, but I might be mistaken.
01:21:19
Speaker
No, you're right. Yeah, so Foxing was a big band. The Hotel Year was a big band. And a lot of these revival bands ah from the 2010s were not actually big when they were putting out those records for the first time. Spotify and the streaming age has sort of gotten a bunch of young kids in their 20s into those 2010s bands.
01:21:40
Speaker
And that's why it's kind of a big deal that like Hotelier and Foxy and whoever are doing these 10th anniversary tours of the album that came out to almost no noise and no response at the time. But now we look back and we think about them as these classic albums. um But it's mostly because it's like they've grown there.
01:22:02
Speaker
Now, depending on who you talk to, we're in the fifth wave right now, which is primarily marked by less genre, ah less being like sort of slavishly devoted to emo sounds this way. It's twinkly guitars and Midwest emo and et cetera, et cetera. It's more genre experimental, but in response. So people either alternatively call it fifth wave emo or post emo,
01:22:32
Speaker
Which is essentially like you're we're now getting beyond What just like you're no longer worried about fulfilling the rules of the thing and the tropes of the thing But you're just trying to buy it. Yeah, you're more inspired but you're in the same tradition as it that's very different than punk then punk arms rules Yeah still so song plus musical rules certainly and uh, like A set of values sort of rules too is very much- Like straight edge hardcore. It's like- Yeah, exactly. It's equal parts music and values. I follow a few accounts like- And crowd killing, equal parts music, values, and crowd killing. Yeah. I follow a couple of accounts that are like punk oriented on Instagram and it's very
01:23:25
Speaker
interesting and just super dumb to see people just fight over like the weird little like subcategories of this and that and the other like I've seen this like ongoing argument between these people about like, like, well, actually, if you look at the history of skinheads, it goes back to such and such. And it's got nothing to do with racism. It's actually precedes that. And that is just a commandeered version of skinheads. And there's like a movement of people there. But it's like, what are you guys doing?
01:23:58
Speaker
which she just i don't i get a wrong and What's the advantage of salvaging skinheads? I don't know what that's going to do for you. I don't know what anyone thinks that they're achieving if they can salvage the reputation of skinheads other than maybe they're just like guys with beards and no hair and they're just like, I need something and this is all I have left.
01:24:21
Speaker
Yeah, I don't get it. But it's let's literally I'm not exaggerating like that is a thing where they're just arguing about online about like, what a real skinhead is and how it's got nothing to do with this or that it's just like, so I i remember in college, there was a kid that was around like the music scene and stuff. We all knew him. He worked at Hot Topic. And he got on this big kick about reviving and and restoring the original meaning of the swastika. No way. You know this kid, i Dave, that worked a hard hot topic. The guy with the massive gauges. Yeah. No fucking shit. It's actually a a, you know, Southeast Asian symbol of peace and harmony and this and that and the other. It's like, dude,
01:25:11
Speaker
what what for like one you're not southeat injur two it's had a long and terrible history of being the opposite of what it originally intended ah That's what's so funny to people about symbols is you go, what is your symbolism to me is arbitrary. It's as helpful and beneficial as that symbol communicates an idea. And if that is co-opted and changed and used to communicate something different to the point where it becomes mainstream and is acknowledged for what it has been perverted to originally be, you go that word changed just like the R word or any other like where you people would just commonly say these things.
01:25:54
Speaker
where you go, that's fine. When I was 12, I said that all the time. And then you just- As long as it's a direct quote. Or idiot. And then that word changed. Like, things words change and you go, oh, you know what? That got co-opted by a by bad people who are using it for nefarious purposes and now we don't do it anymore. And it's so funny to be like one of those apologists for like the original meaning of something. To be honest, that's why I have a hard time with the word Christian now anyway. And it's just like,
01:26:26
Speaker
even you mentioning uh talking about the word post post emo is like post christian is a thing now where it's like yeah it's rooted in a tradition that has some value to you based on what you like based on particular meanings and the way you erase it but i go post christian is a helpful way of me being like yeah rooted in this idea the totally separated from what it's kind of become in our culture in our time and place but I don't know I don't I have a weird I have such a hard time and like listening to anyone who wants to salvage the original meaning of something that's become perverted because it's like you especially with this one the swastika where it's like you're not even Southeast Asia you have no heritage by which to connect to the original concept why is this so important to you oh because you're countercultural and you have to just be a dickhead okay I get it
01:27:20
Speaker
Yeah. well that's ah As you guys are talking, there's so many parallels between um communities that are based in some sort of ideological purity and the sort of religious communities that we grew up in, right? Seeing a punk, you know, two punks arguing about ah like what is or isn't punk, or like seeing two kids that are in emo music argue about like what is or isn't ah emo in general or what is or isn't. And even me like saying, like I think emo music is earnest. like Who fucking cares what I think? If someone if someone wants to just go to camp or or you just safe yeah that's the only I care about scared scared stupid that was my jam dude scared stupid goes hard
01:28:10
Speaker
that But but like if who cares what I say is or isn't emo music or or whatever it should be. like someone like It's a word that means nothing and can mean a lot of things to people. yeah It's an indicator of Honestly, music has always ah been tied to community and culture and a sense of belonging. And when it gets twisted is when it becomes us versus them. And it's the same thing that religious communities do. Yeah, same trajectories. Right. We get twisted about like,
01:28:49
Speaker
Who is an insider and who's an outsider who's a rule follower in our sacred way and who's these evil rule breakers out there right and so like but. There's kind of two levels i enjoy honestly when people nerd out about like.
01:29:05
Speaker
some esoteric thing like back in, like if if someone is talking about what's their favorite Star Wars movie and they're like in a heated argument about it, like when it gets nasty, that's not fun. But if someone, if it's cordial and it's like, no, I thought The Last Jedi sucked and I really loved you know Force Awakens or whatever, it's like, that's an innocent conversation, who cares?
01:29:32
Speaker
uh but it's really when like we're just like ready to burn people at the stake over like you you you know deviant because you you don't think this is punk or whatever yeah that's why i'm you know at the end of the day i'm a new metal guy and new metal is a big tent everybody's invited i mean but not everybody has the spiked collars to prove it that's true yeah but turn on uh turn on you know Wake me up. Wake me up inside. Everybody's in. Everybody's part of the team. yeah Have you seen? Okay, so essentially because TikTok, um a bunch of people are conflating two genres that had almost nothing to do with each other previously, shoegaze and nu metal. ah So there's oh primarily because
01:30:24
Speaker
Deftones got really big on TikTok and they're a band that sort of they sprung out of that new metal sort of world. they were like touring you know They were doing tours with Limp Biscuit and whatever else.
01:30:42
Speaker
But they on their later records got really, really shoegazy and just like ah they were still playing seven string guitars down tuned. But like there was a lot of chorus on those guitars. Right. And so ah because the band Deftones got really popular and you could sometimes call them nu metal and sometimes call them shoegaze. Now there's a whole world of people just using those terms interchangeably, which is a wild thing. When you think about like, again, the word shoegaze originally meant one thing. And now it's being used to describe a genre of music totally unlike it. ah But that's just how language evolves, right?
01:31:24
Speaker
It's yeah, because what she gave the original thing was like all the pedal and effects boards, right? Because they're just looking down at their fucking boards the whole time. Is that that's the origin? of That's what it is. Yeah. And it was a lot of like British bands like Jesus and the Mary chain and like just bands that like ah were.
01:31:44
Speaker
the vocals were really buried in the mix. It wasn't particularly heavy you or aggressive. It was just kind of like this wall of sound washed out guitar. So a bunch of effects-laden guitars. and But Deftones, they play heavy music, but they also have huge fucking pedal boards with all the the guitar effects. So that's how it like, they're not solely responsible, but That's like where you can trace it back to what's the band that sort of intermarried shoegaze and new metal. I love that TikTok is bringing shit like death tones back for people who are 16 years old. that's know there i i can't I can't put my thumb on how this world works anymore at all. Like it's why like I drink is timeless.
01:32:31
Speaker
yeah When it comes to like social media and trying to like pump yourself up, like we used our how many I need to make a post a today. I barely make a post a week anymore. I don't care. I can't do it. um I can't do it. My brain is fried to think about how to make ourselves look cool to people who are on tick tock. I just don't give enough of a fuck, I guess. But I feel like that's where your plan really comes into action here. How do you promote these artists is like you need to think up a TikTok trend that you can map to one of their songs. Like, oh, we're doing the ah the the home dentistry challenge where you pull a tooth to like this Hotel Fox song or whatever. Hotel Fox. I feel like you two could, we could sit here and you two could make a list of a hundred bands and I would know three of them.
01:33:27
Speaker
well Probably. what the ah ah like you You just recontextualize and combine two words from other bands, and then ah like my ah my my next project, and it hasn't anyone is welcome to steal this, but please don't because it's the best band name I've ever come up with. But ah the I'm going to do like a lo-fi folk project with my buddy Dan. A place for penguins. No, stop. Get out. We're going to call it jazz rats jazz rats you could have some great artwork for that yeah that's right yeah yeah you could i love that oh my god well we've uh
01:34:10
Speaker
Hit a lot of different areas tonight, some of which made you very uncomfortable, and I do apologize for my friend Casey on that front. I hope you know that no one's listening will think it has any impact on you or who you are or what you believe in. I think that I appreciate that you stood your ground. ah I don't want to make another Kyle Rittenhouse comparison, but it's hard to avoid when we're talking about standing your ground.
01:34:40
Speaker
ah But this is why Sam's going down with me. you You called Casey out, but you also called him in and I love that about you because you are a kind and compassionate man, Ben. so One of the reasons I've always loved and adored you. I think you're the sweetest man alive. You're a new man with you. Fuck. I want to hang out again. I want our paths to cross again. I want to sit on a park bench and smoke a cigarette with you. We should we should we should do that, but in lieu of that, we can just we could if a podcast is what it takes for us to like actually hang out, let's ah let's just do the podcast again.
01:35:16
Speaker
and Absolutely. you yeah Hell yeah, i dude. i can't I would love to do that again within it ah in a shorter period than the two years' time. Yeah, that's right. But this was fucking awesome, man. I'm so happy for you. i love I love the music you guys have made. I cannot wait for everyone else to hear it. ah It's spectacular. You're wonderful, and I appreciate you hanging out with us tonight, man. Thank you, my friend.
01:35:44
Speaker
Where can everybody find info about your new album? Yes, that part. Yeah, so ah we're called A Place for Owls. ah You can go to placeforowls.com or you can go to bandcamp dot.com slash a place for owls and you will find all of our live shows that we're playing. You will see links to our social medias. We are one of the few that is still on twitter dot.com.
01:36:09
Speaker
ah and still ah still posting and obsessively online ah on Twitter dot.com. so ah Instagram will be the place where I will post a picture every time we play a show. ah But if you want to see what I think about modest mouse records and what's my ranking of them, yeah, you can go to Twitter for that. Dude, and speaking of shows, I hope to more than anything that you guys are able to come out.
01:36:40
Speaker
to the New England area, and I will make the God's honest try of trying to, I will make, if you're in like a three hour vicinity, I can guarantee I will. Okay, good. That's my hope. I want you guys to reach out to me. That was the most caging my, I will, and then you backpedal to God awful try, and then you, you know that I'm a father and a very sleepy man, yeah.
01:37:09
Speaker
like There's a lot going on, but I guarantee you, if you're with it if you were win within three hours of my home, i will we will be hanging out. I would love that. Yeah, let's do it. All right, everybody. Thanks for listening, and we will see you next time.