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63. The Chinkees (w/ Aaron Carnes)
161 Plays1 month ago
It's another Ska Pod crossover! CP/SC welcomes on In Defense of Ska book author and podcast host, Aaron Carnes to discuss Mike Park's The Chinkees. First, Rob and Joey did a brief pick it up before talking to Aaron about his Checkered Past, the new edition of his novel and the early days of his podcast. Then the trio dig in on The Chinkees from their post-Pickle origins to their touring years as part of Asian Man Records to their brief reunion in the studio. It's all capped off with the return of Question the Answers!
Hosts: Rob and Joey
Engineer: Joey
Editor: Cutman
Skassociate Producer: Chris Reeves of Ska Punk International
Merch: www.checkeredpast.ca/merch
Patreon: www.patreon.com/checkeredpast
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Transcript
Introduction to Ska and The Chinkies
00:00:00
Speaker
On this episode, CPSC is coming. We're searching for a brighter future with a band that yearns for peace through ska music. The Chinkies on Checkered Past, the Skycast.
Show Format and Host Introductions
00:00:32
Speaker
What up, Checkerheads? Welcome to Checker past the Scott Castle, Celine and Rob. The show were ah Black White and ah Truth and Soul SE. Never mind. Explore the history and impact of a different band each episode. Hope to bring in new fans along the
Casual Banter and Car Troubles
00:00:46
Speaker
way. I'm Rob, and this is my co-host of the most toast, Joey. It's me. because Hey, Joey. Rome. Roma. Yeah, we're in Rome, right?
00:00:58
Speaker
that's what they say sometimes don't host a podcast yeah uh joey what'd you think of my absolutely brutal intro i hate it i really hate it i feel bad about it yeah so so like that was it that that was it right yeah it was really boring i did a bad job i'm telling everybody Like Rob tries very hard on these and then this time phoned it right the fuck in. So I'm not feeling great about that. Right up front. Right up front. I'll just tell everybody that I fucked up and I'm sorry. You're not getting your zero dollars worth out of this one. Uh oh. What's new what's new Joey?
00:01:39
Speaker
I fixed my shitty car with a drill battery yesterday and I'm happy about it because I couldn't drive my car for a couple days and because the window was stuck down. just The one thing that you were talking about that actually intrigues me a little bit is about your um dilemma with drive-thru.
00:01:58
Speaker
Yeah, I can't go drive through anymore because my window, the buttons don't work. ah So I used the buttons and they made the window go down and then the window stopped going anywhere. ah And I had to hotwire the thing with a drill battery, which is something you can learn to do off YouTube apparently. And it went back up and that was good. I was like, right on, it's getting cold here. and Canada in general, and I'm going to need my windows up to drive to work. ah But now I can't go the drive through because I can't.
00:02:31
Speaker
rolled the down my driver's side window, but also ah the particular car that I have, a Cobalt or G5, I have a G5. The doors are so fucking long that you cannot do the like squeeze out the door in the drive-through thing. Like I can't be close enough to the window and open my door, like basically at all. I might be able to get like an arm out or something. This is a good visual for- Yeah, don't worry. I got a visual bit coming up, so it's all good.
00:03:00
Speaker
I will say the thing that with Canada or at least in Edmonton for sure is that when it gets so cold our windows freeze shut so the the drive-through like push your door open and like you know whatever get your little card out a bit that's like a common thing that we all deal with.
00:03:17
Speaker
You get raised on that early. And now we can't have bags. Well, you have to pay for a bag. So some people are like, I'm not paying for a bag. And then they want to get their food awkwardly outside their door. With a little tray. With a little tray, pulling their cheeseburgers out of a tray. It is the wildest situation. So anyways, I'm going back to the days when takeout was takeout, I guess.
00:03:40
Speaker
Yeah, after you've got to walk in, right? Oh man, that puts a wrinkle in my D and&D night. My D and&D ritual is to go get Carl's Jr. drive through right before we play every Wednesday. So now I'm going to have to go into Carl's Jr. every Wednesday. Oh no, Joey, I feel so terrible. Oh man, life's about to get real tough for this guy.
00:04:01
Speaker
All right, well, we're absolutely thrilled to introduce our guest. He's a journalist, author, host of the podcast, In Defense of Scott, whose second edition of the self-same book is releasing everywhere on my friggin birthday, October 29th.
Introducing Aaron Carnes and His Book
00:04:14
Speaker
Aaron Carnes is here. Hello, hello. Hey, hey, thanks for having me. So we're going to start with the question we ask our guests, and I'm sure this has been ah done a bunch on your show, but tell us your history with Scott music, your checkered past, if you will.
00:04:31
Speaker
um i I think I had actually listened to Ska some before I knew what it was through Fishbone and Mr. Bungle and maybe a few other things, but I discovered Ska as a genre when I went and saw Skank and Pickle in 1992.
00:04:48
Speaker
That's where I, that's where I was presented with the fact that this was a thing called ska and I got, I was really into, I got really into skating and pickle and I got really into ska. And so from then forward, I was all about ska. This was, I was like a senior in high school or senior or junior. I can't remember cause I graduated in 93. So it depends on what time of year it was in 92 and I was already in a band called Flat Planet at that point, but we were not playing Scott. We were playing other kinds of music, like kind of more inspired by police and Rush and just other kinds of stuff that most a kids don't normally listen to. um I pushed hard for us to
00:05:27
Speaker
go into a sky direction, which happened fairly quickly. And then after a high school flat planet went, you know we went probably as hard as we went. we you know we We toured a few times. I was all about trying to make flat planet happen. It didn't happen. hey But instead, I became a sky journalist years later.
00:05:49
Speaker
but So yeah. i so i was um i became so But actually to connect to my current situation, I became a music journalist, a general music journalist around 2009. And nine and um doing that actually kind of like led me to pursue writing this book because I was kind of I was more confronted with the fact that Ska was being misrepresented and underrepresented. And I just, it made me want to put something out there about Ska that I felt like was completely missing out there in the dialogue, particularly this like, particularly this post two tone era. I mean, I love two tone. I love Jamaican Ska, but it's just like a dead land after two tone as far as journalism and as far as just, you know, pop culture is concerned. It's like,
00:06:36
Speaker
not worthy of like discussing in a serious capacity or really getting into the nitty gritty of it. So that's really what motivated me to write In Defense of Ska. That's kind of an interesting thing because I just read, um how was George Marshall's book? ah uh the two-tone story i read that one just recently and it was written in like the mid 90s yeah it's really short yeah it's really short and
The Underappreciation of Two-Tone Ska
00:07:00
Speaker
and it's a it's ah it's we're written in a weird sort of like he's got a lot of opinions in there yeah he's kind of like people will say something and then he'll like counter it with his own opinion um but you know the way he describes the two-tone era too was that uh that sounded like the journalists at the time also didn't have a really strong opinion about it like
00:07:20
Speaker
As much as the shows were driving a lot of young people, it seemed like people were like kind of like thumbing their nose a little bit at it, too. So we're almost like cycling back again where, you know, what like it took a decade or so for two tone to get a legitimate um sort of backwards look on it. And now I think like with your book, it's we're doing the same thing with sort of what was happening in the 90s.
00:07:44
Speaker
Yeah, a two tone in England was interesting because because it was so popular, I think it almost became not as cool in retrospect as punk or post punk and some of those other stuff. But I think that they they really kind of like got hip to the legacy of two tone like in the late 80s and early 90s. And that's when you really start to see England start to document it in a much more serious capacity.
00:08:12
Speaker
um But you know ah oddly enough, it wasn't until this year that Daniel Rachel wrote the two toe his two-tone book that I feel like it's been actually properly documented in the way that it should have been documented.
00:08:25
Speaker
long time ago. I mean, that's like the only existing complete work about two
Ska Memoirs and Documentation
00:08:30
Speaker
tone. Like mostly like there's a short books like you were mentioning, but you see a lot of like British documentaries or British series that touch on like punk or reggae or others things. And they just sort of piece, they just sort of throw two tone in there as sort of part of the story, like not really its own story.
00:08:48
Speaker
I also felt like, like this town, like the, that the show that just came out, like i also kind of like glossed over that quite a bit because it was a part of it, but it wasn't like really honing in on, on a lot of that. I guess it was more narrative too, in that respect, you know, the other books I read that kind of chronicled that were like first person accounts, like horse panthers book. And, uh, which I have kicking around here somewhere. Um, but yeah, I'm really excited to read that, uh, the new two tone book. It sounds awesome.
00:09:17
Speaker
It's a it's the all the memoirs are are worth reading, but they're very you know they're very focused on the perspective of the person, right? Correct. And none of them are like journalists or writers, so they're they're rough, but what you come to expect with a ah an artist memoir, Pauline Black's memoir is probably the best of them. she has a yeah She's led a very interesting life. Yeah, she's a led an interesting life, and a lot of it has to do with her own like experience being adopted and kind of trying to understand who she is because she was adopted. She was adopted. She's mixed race. She was raised in a what by a white family. so like
00:09:57
Speaker
She has a lot of like adult struggles related to that. And I think the book really hones in on that. And then the music is there. But I think that's true for most of the memoirs. Like Suggs wrote a book that was interesting, but it was like just kind of hopscotched around his life. Sometimes it was about madness. Sometimes it was about just stories he felt like telling. Uh, Horace's is kind of really much more of a, of a document, a very literal document of the specials. And I feel like that's interesting probably to people like us who were like,
00:10:28
Speaker
Nerds about this stuff, but I don't know how interesting that is to somebody who's like like a casual specials fan I Recommended it to some people like man horse panters books really good and they read in there like this kind of sucks and like its just for me All right um Madness's book, The Who who We Was, um that was pretty cool. it's ah It's a lot like Hepatitis Bathroom, like the the No Effects book where it's just like all just rotating through the band members. And then sometimes they'll like, um you know, they'll tell a story and then they'll go to another band member who then will like say, and that's not quite what happened. I think you're misremembering that. It's kind of fun to see them like ah try to remember stuff from like 40 years ago. And it's it's pretty entertaining.
00:11:10
Speaker
almost pretty pretty dismissive about Scott the whole time too, which is kind of a funny. Yeah. ah Like cause that's just how they are. Yeah. Yeah.
Aaron Carnes' Journey and Ska's Overlooked History
00:11:20
Speaker
But you know like when i wrote when I published In Defense of the Sky in 2021, Mark Wasserman released his book and ah Ken Partridge released his books. And we were all sort of talking about US SCA. Heather Augustine has been writing books for a while, but she's mostly focused on Jamaican SCA. She's touched on American SCA a little bit, but her focus has always been on Jamaican SCA and really like women in SCA as well. um But it's kind of interesting too that
00:11:45
Speaker
Mark, Ken and I all sort of took a different approach to what we wanted to discuss with Scott. Mark had a very particular focus about this 80s Scott, which is sort of the bridge between two-tone and 90s, third wave, quote unquote. Ken really wanted to focus on Scott as a mainstream trend and a mainstream phenomenon. And mine in a way like kind of I kind of only talk about mainstream Scott a little bit. I, in fact, I, I kind of like wanted to talk about everything around it more so to really say like Scott is more than what you remember on TV and in the radio. Like this is why I think the genre is cool is because it's not just these couple of bands that sounded in a very specific way. Like there was the Emmy three thirties and the chinkies and all these other bands that to me are largely better than mainstream Scott was.
00:12:38
Speaker
And like to to that, to that we, I use all three of those books for my research for the podcast. And like, I think that's what's very valuable to me. It's like having those different um approaches to it. And those are the bands we cover, right? Like when we're, we cover MU 330 and we cover Slow Gherkin. And so being able to have some accounts um because the internet only goes so far and you know, you can deep dive through like various articles and interviews. um But ultimately those books I found like,
00:13:08
Speaker
I really told the story from their perspective and I thought that was a lot more important. so yeah um our episode go ahead joy our Our episodes that ah where we feature like Dark Age, Dark Age Scott bands as we refer to them are like notoriously difficult for Rob to research. yeah Like a lot of the time it's just like, while this is off the website from the record label and there's this mention of them in these couple of magazines and then the rest is just sort of, I guess what we just have from listening to the music. Like some of our trombone bonus episodes where we do like a band that just had a couple of albums or whatever and it's just really like, we just have no info. There's there's no journalism for any of these bands, right? Like it was just
00:13:54
Speaker
where that 10 years hasn't hit the spot where we're going back to that spot quite yet. You know what I mean? like it's It's pretty interesting. that's Yeah. Well, the second edition, which is ah like I've expanded and added a like 30,000 words.
Updates in the Second Edition of 'In Defense of Ska'
00:14:10
Speaker
that i do go I do go much more in depth about you call it the dark ages. I call it the lost years in my book.
00:14:18
Speaker
that period. so I cover that much more in much more detail than the first edition got covered. Sick. Because I really didn't cover it too much in the first edition. That's ah that's ah the best segue I've ever heard because my next question here was talk to us about the second edition of the book. Yeah.
00:14:36
Speaker
Well, that's not the only thing. I mean, there's a new cover, as you as your patrons will get to see, but not you non patrons. So you better sign up for that Patreon if you want to see this cover, me holding up this cover. Thank you. en yes You're welcome. It's a bun um it's been it's been fully re-edited. It's got a totally new layout. It looks like way more professional. that The photos are So if you're not watching the video, you can hear me flipping through it. There you go. Nice. The photos are fully positioned better. There's some new photos at the back, but I think the addition of 30,000 words is probably a pretty big feature. I think that even the stuff I added throughout the original book, like sentence or paragraph or whatever here, I think gives it a little bit better context than I had put in the original edition.
00:15:23
Speaker
that will help people that maybe weren't as deep into a lot of the stuff that I'm talking about. Like I kind of put it in time and space much more so than the original book was. That's cool. i I know that there's a few other like, um, you touch on like five iron frenzies, like Kickstarter stuff. And there's like a couple other things that really like was critical in the mid aughts. Um, yeah, I saw from like the little blurb there. So it seems like there's a lot of five iron. but mean Yeah. I talk about Kristen Scott, but mostly through the lens of five iron and they're like.
00:15:55
Speaker
they're returning in the in the 2010s and kind of why it was such a big deal because you know i mean i think it probably blew a lot of minds when like headlines were like reporting because i remember new york times had a headline about it like they broke a kickstarter christian ska band and broke a kickstarter or it's kind of like today everyone away from this like what is that like what is going on why is a christian ska band breaking a kickstarter record but you know there's a reason behind it which i get into um I talk at length actually about Bad Operations sort of origin story because they have a whole story that goes back to the 2010s with Fatter Than Albert and Samurai Deli and the the formation of community records and sort of the the the impact that Katrina had on all of them and and how that sort of changed the trajectory of everything.
00:16:45
Speaker
um block party and how it all eventually led to bad operation too which is like i think why that band is so good and why there's just it feels like there's so much soul and depth to that band is has a lot to do with where they came from and what that band means to them as people um so that i've talked about brooklyn rocksteady scene from the 2010s uh like the best of those bands in my opinion was the Frighteners, but they were sort of like the like the tail end of that scene. yeah um Talk about Tradska in LA, Blue Beat Lounge, Chris Murray, and kind of everything around that. Canada. Canada. Sorry, he's got the card. I don't know if you knew that or he he's allowed to do the Jamaican accent. Yeah. We we gave him his card. It's all good.
00:17:38
Speaker
What else we do, uh, you know, inspector seven a little bit and, uh, hub city stompers and kind of like the, the skinhead subculture, kind of how it existed in its own and how it continued on. Just a lot of little stuff like that. We're just kind of like, it's kind of like snapshots of the last years and and like how.
00:17:56
Speaker
To say it was dead or to say that it was not dead is such an oversimplification. So I really wanted to say like, here's just a cross section of things that were happening. You know, I'm not even saying these are the most important things happening in this time, but it's just to show you that a wide variety of things were happening in the last 20 years with all kinds of different sounding Scott with all kinds of different subcultures and meeting so much to so many different people.
00:18:21
Speaker
That's awesome. um And like I kind of want to tail that up with like, so you wrote this book and now we have a second edition coming up. The podcast is kind of like wedged in there as something that that came out kind of alongside. And your podcast started like not that long before we did ours. And I think it was
Evolution of the 'In Defense of Ska' Podcast
00:18:38
Speaker
kind of in a vacuum. But what was the ah impetus to starting it as a podcast? It originally was just ah as a way to promote in a fence of Scott. I started it.
00:18:49
Speaker
Uh, I started recording and like with Adam in, uh, like the end of 2020, you know, in anticipation of my book releasing on May 4th, 2021. And, and so, and a lot of that too was driven by this fact that I was releasing a book while we were still in COVID and not really knowing I've never really done this. And then I've never done this in a world where like the rules are all kind of different. So I was just like, I don't know, maybe a podcast, probably that's probably the best way to reach people right now.
00:19:18
Speaker
And I asked Adam cause he, he like listened to a lot more podcasts and he'd done some stuff before. So I figured he like knew more than I did cause I had very, very little experience with podcasting. And so we started working together and recording episodes and putting out like mid January, 2021.
00:19:36
Speaker
Uh, every Wednesday, we actually haven't not mixed an episode since we started. And then as it was, we're leading up to the release of the book. There's a couple of interesting things happening happened around the release of my book. Some of them related to the podcast. Some of them not. One of the things that happened was Jeff Rosenstock released Scott dream on, did he read said on four 20, right? Four 20. Okay. So my book was released on May 4th.
00:20:05
Speaker
And so we're looking at ah just a few weeks before my book came out. and and perfect timing yeah and Because his album like inspired a lot of like articles like, is Ska back? you know and I was fortunate to be considered a person that needed to be part of these conversations, even though my book had absolutely nothing to do with whether Ska was back now or not. It was like really mostly about wanting people to look back at Ska in the 90s and the 2000s and the 80s and sort of like reconsider its legacy. That was really what my book was about. But they they a lot of these places wanted quotes from me. And so my book got like kind of like part became part of that. And then to top that off, Jeff
00:20:48
Speaker
um wrote the foreword of my book, and he did one of his first full-on Scott Dream interviews on my podcast. And I think I released that right around when my book was released. So all of this. And then we got Patrick Stump shortly after there, and that like that episode completely blew up. So with all that stuff happening, the podcast is really kind of like doing better than we anticipated and becoming more of its own thing than I had anticipated as well. So we just kept doing it after I was outside of the promotions, you know outside of that window of promotion. Our our first episode also dropped May 4th.
00:21:30
Speaker
Oh yeah. No, I did it as a Star Wars thing. It was all in a vacuum. like I think at the time, like because i I conceptualized the podcast in December, and at the time, In Defense wasn't around. Scott Punk International wasn't around, but he was a radio show at the time.
00:21:48
Speaker
Yeah. And um so I was like, oh, no one's really doing like, you know, history stuff like we'll just like come up with this thing where and we were we wanted to do it kind of like um ah like Doughboys was like one of our top podcasts. We wanted to do it like and we're like, we'll make it kind of funny and we'll just kind of like chit chat and like talk about records and stuff. And then.
00:22:09
Speaker
Over time, we added guests and then, yeah, same. Haven't missed an episode since we started. um Easier said than done, but it's definitely been, now we've created a total system where it just keeps rolling. and it's it you hear something you like is that You'll probably find this funny. Since I didn't know how to podcast, or I didn't really know the first thing about podcasting, I enrolled in a podcasting course in the sort of spring of 2020.
00:22:36
Speaker
And there were some good things about it. Like some of the the basic structure of In Defense of Scott was kind of came from that sort of like an intro, like music and intro kind of transitioning into the interview itself. But there were certain things that they were telling me that was totally wrongheaded for what we were doing. And that like kind of created a barrier of entry for me for a while. Like they were like,
00:23:00
Speaker
Oh, if you're gonna do remote, you know, you if you're gonna do remote interviews, you gotta hire ah like an audio tech to go.
Podcast Setup Insights with Zencastr
00:23:08
Speaker
you know record the audio in person with them, and then you got to record it on Zoom, and then you got to sync it. like They're just talking about this like way that they probably did things pre-COVID before all the technology like but you know became so good. And I was just like kind of freaking out about this. And then I was talking to Adam about it. he's like He's like, don't. Just make it simple. Just do whatever you can do that it's going to let you do it and just
00:23:35
Speaker
Don't don't put these like high bars for yourself for it. And then we did it. And then like like it sounds good. And then, you know, like, I don't know, like at some point we got better mics that were like only like a couple hundred bucks. And I'm just like, we sound like we're in the same room. I don't even know what these people were talking about in this class. You don't need a boom mic operator with their own audio. Like you can sound on Zencaster or zoom. Well, zoom is not quite as good. But like on this platform, we use Zencaster also.
00:24:05
Speaker
You sound like we're all sounding like in the same room. Like it yeah it's good. Zencaster was a game changer for us. Like we use Zoom at the start. yeah But once we switched to Zencaster, we're like, oh shit, this is like, is it? because you I mean, this has been the weeds for all you ah would-be podcasters listening. Zencaster gives you local audio, meaning that even though I'm in California and they're in and Canada,
00:24:27
Speaker
they get the audio that would be recording on my computer. So there's no like artifacts like like you get with Zoom where it's like you can kind of hear the internet in it. And on top of that, just like for all you want to be podcasting, we've been using the same $30 mics for every single episode. How many episodes have we done? 160 some 160 some odd episodes and their $30 wish dot.com mics. Uh, and so let's get into like, I guess the meat of what we're talking about today. Uh, so the chinkies is what we decided to to do for, uh, for the episode. So what made you decide on that band?
The Chinkies and Asian American Ska
00:25:05
Speaker
um I was thinking that like my my entry point for Scott was Skank and Pickle. um You guys had already covered Skank and Pickle, but I was just thinking, like okay, well, Mike Park has always been like a pretty important figure in my life, both as like the music he's produced and as a person, as a friend. I like i lived at his house for a while in the late 90s.
00:25:26
Speaker
um He listens to In Defense of Sky and gives me criticism frequently, usually can quote unquote constructive criticism. So I was trying to think back and i I think that there's two parts of his catalog that I actually stand up the best and they are not scanking pickle.
00:25:47
Speaker
the Chinkies and the present day Bruce Lee band. Even though I think the original Bruce Lee band is great, the Chinkies was better than the Bruce Lee band. But ever since Bruce Lee band reformed and it's been Jeff Rosenstock and Dan Pothast and Kevin Iguchi,
00:26:05
Speaker
Like basically the death row that Rosenstock yeah, and it's that's yeah those are all amazing records I think it's neck-and-neck with though with his those three chinkies full-length spec in the late 90s early 2000s Yeah, it's a good choice. And you know what I I hadn't listened to the chinkies since probably college. I had a big run where I listened to piece through music a ton and ah you know whatever life happened and I was going through my different motions of it. And so when you brought that up, I was like, yeah, that's been a minute. And then it's been a really good re-listen because realizing there's like records that I probably should have been listening to a lot more.
00:26:42
Speaker
um And this is like a pretty ah essential part of the Mike Park chronology. And especially when you think about contextually, like what was going on in his life at that time, it was even more important, I would say, like from a historical standpoint. So it's really cool. Joey, have ah do you have any history with the chinkies?
00:27:01
Speaker
No, I had zero. i Yeah. I had, uh, the, the only, my only experience with them before was, uh, having heard a song here and there just from doing the pod. Uh, I remember the abruptors are big fans. Uh, but this was the first time I had listened through, uh, the discography. Yeah. It was a good time. You know, who is, uh, you know, who is it?
00:27:27
Speaker
A band, a current band that was highly influenced by the Chinkies specifically is Bad Operation. Oh, just circling back there, yeah. Yeah. That makes sense, because it's very organ driven. Yeah. Yeah, I think, so so so first thing I think that would be worth talking about Chinkies is the Sonic, like what they do musically, because I think what they did but they did musically was kind of unique in the era it came from.
00:27:49
Speaker
it was no horns or organ driven, like you said, and kind of this sort of like mid tempo Scott, but not it had a push to it. It wasn't quite what two tone was doing. it It had it had a drive to it, but it wasn't really punk rock, hardcore or pop punk or anything, even though occasionally they would break out into it. But it's really about that kind of fast.
00:28:13
Speaker
groove, that ska groove. It was very, very ska. I think it was very deliberately made to be highly focused on ska, which is you know why I love it. I mean i tend to prefer ska over punk in general.
00:28:29
Speaker
i And I would say that that's probably one of its like best qualities too, is especially like compared to like other Mark Parker ventures, like you get kind of in his whole discography, across his multiple bands, there's like almost a different kind of vibe to each one that you get, right? Yeah. um So I guess now's the time, Joey. Let's enter the time, Scoshine. Let's do it.
00:29:02
Speaker
All right, so the time Scott Sheen is going to take us back to 1998 to the Bay Area as we reenter the Mike Parkaverse. So ah my usual places that I went to for research here. So in defense of Scott. Yeah, I spent a ton of time on discogs on this one because it's nice to know who's doing what ah and, you know, whatever little bits I can pull from Wikipedia or last FM or whatever.
00:29:27
Speaker
ah But I think it's important to contextualize a few things before we get into the history of this band. um So Mike Park, for those who do not know, was a pivotal member of the aforementioned Skank and Pickle, a band that combined fishbone funk ska with Bay Area thrash metal, some maximum R and&R style punk, and some Oingo Boingo Devo kind of geekiness. As they were reaching their pinnacle and a ska was exploding, they imploded in 1997 and separated.
00:29:55
Speaker
ah Two years prior to that mike park hooked up with a bunch of florida nobodies called less than jake to back him for a band called bruce lee band but in 1997 they were not nobodies anymore so mike was able to gain the rights to his ah Dill catalog, ah and which was ah the Skink and Pickle DIY label, and then Forum Asian Man, ah which brought us to 1998. With one of his bands on hold and one defunct, he started a brand new one ah with a ska boom basically tumbling down at the time.
00:30:28
Speaker
Uh, and so, you know, we did episodes on skank and pickle. I don't, I don't know. Skank and pickle episode was like episode eight. It's probably not our best, but go ahead and listen to it. But the brufters episode of Bruce Lee band was pretty decent. You should go listen to that one. Um, but the chinks, the chinkies, uh, weren't going to be the same as the other two. So skank and pickle was really more out there and Bruce Lee band, uh, had more of the less than Jake pop punk DNA over it.
00:30:53
Speaker
ah The Chinkies were going to reflect Mike's songwriting as its purist with primary influences being Two Tone, Operation Ivy, and to some extent kind of the more modern pop punk emo stuff that was going on at the time that he was a big fan of. All with a focused lyrical content on the experience of Asian Americans in the USA. Mike put down his tenor saxophone and picked up the guitar and hired a who's who of other like-minded Asian American punks to back him up including ah Jason Thinn of Short Round on guitar, Mia Osaki of the Mugs on bass, Greg Akita on drums, and Todd Inouye on the keys.
Recording and Thematic Focus of The Chinkies
00:31:26
Speaker
The first record was the first thing that needed to be done as the songs were all but written, so Mike dug into his contacts to make the best studio experience he could. For the boards he brought in Robert Berry, a progressive rock musician from the 70s of the local studio that he would collaborate significantly with.
00:31:41
Speaker
ah Tons of guest musicians poured through, including most of the Nick Traina era, Link 80, and Slapstick, I mean Tuesday, and and this resulted in the record, The Chinkies Are Coming, number 22 on Asian Man Records. Let's play the first song I have queued up, ah You Don't Know.
00:32:04
Speaker
So I didn't listen to this record that much growing up, and then when we re-listened to it, I loved it. It was really fucking good. Yeah.
00:32:24
Speaker
You know, I didn't make the chinkies bad off connection before he mentioned it. And now I can't, I'm like, Oh yeah, that's very super obvious. Yeah.
00:32:59
Speaker
The that song you don't know. So I actually was living with Mike Park. the the The stint I lived with Mike Park was around the time he was starting this project. Oh, interesting. So I actually remember him like showing me some of the stuff like he was writing on the acoustic guitar and he showed me, you don't know, an acoustic. But it was just like the chorus and it was just like, you know, like strum down. You don't know. And I was kind of like I didn't understand what he was doing or what he was going for. I didn't realize he was in envisioning a whole like very Scott oriented thing. I thought he was just like writing this like I don't know, acoustic or punk thing. And I was kind of like, I don't know about this. But that song is one of their best songs. though It's a great song. Yeah, it's incredible. And it's like ah like ah you were kind of talking about how there's like a drive to their music. And I thought like that that really typifies that where it just feels like there's like an almost unbridled energy to it. So um just going back on your skank and pickle history. um
00:33:54
Speaker
If you want to get a little deeper into it, Mike Park quit Skank and Pickle before they technically imploded. And they kind of continued on without him for a little while. Interesting. And so he took, but his took his, so Dil Records was a band run thing, right? Yeah, it was a bunch of them that were connected, right?
00:34:13
Speaker
But Mike was largely the one doing it, and Mike was largely the one picking most of it. and so he There was a little bit of a whole kind of thing about like which ones got to go to Asian Man and which ones stayed. and the stuff like Lesson Jake was one that he picked. and I don't think the rest of the band were like super hot on that originally, and he was very much like, this is great, this is going to do well.
00:34:34
Speaker
so I think Emmy to 30 were a little bit a little bit cro caught in the middle at first because they were friends with all of them and and they all all wanted to 30 on Dill. So that's a whole deeper story to get into. But yeah, so then I think Skank and Pickle really struggled without Mike Park just as a person who was the most business minded in that band. Right. So and they did eventually um implode both Dill Records and Skank and Pickle. But I I mean,
00:35:05
Speaker
Was it because Mike Park quit? I think, you know, part of me definitely thinks that's a huge factor. Why? I mean, i cant and then some of the band members would go on to make 78 RPMs, right? Like that was kind of that was Lars and Lynette. Mike Park actually didn't. So what he tells me, um you know, and everyone's going to have their own story. What he told me is he didn't quit. He said, I need to stop touring so much. I want us to take a break from touring.
00:35:30
Speaker
and kind of like focus on the label and focus on recording and then we'll go back to touring. And if you don't like that, if you'd rather not do it that way, you guys can go on without me. And they were like, all right, we're going to go on without you. Bye. Right.
00:35:47
Speaker
Yeah. And the the timing is just so bizarre. Like literally they missed Skye at its peak. Like potentially Skank and Pickle would have been a band we talk about in the same breath as like the Bostones if they had one more record and one more tour. It's just the tim right timing, right? It's just timing.
00:36:07
Speaker
And also, like I understand that they were all like making money off tours and they either were not working or working part-time jobs and they didn't want to have to spend the next six to eight months like working full-time probably to like stay alive. But you know if they had spent that time retooling and working on recording, just like Mike was saying,
00:36:28
Speaker
they probably would have been geared to have like a better sounding recording for the band for the ska boom thing that was happening in the mainstream and the label would have been more equipped to deal with signing more bands and doing better. i mean I mean, I don't know, Mike, Mike had the right idea. Yeah, I think he did. Yeah. I remember when he i reading that story, I think it was in your book ah where he walked into s slow gherkin recording and said, Scott's dead. You got to watch out.
00:36:56
Speaker
So I think he's prescient. He's always seems to be like ah yeah he's a little. So the so the the chinkies are coming. basically slapstick or Tuesday, however you want to look at it. I think it's primarily, I think it was basically Tuesday, but it's so much of slapstick. It's hard to do yeah distinguish it. But one thing that's interesting about the record is, um, what's the name of the song? I don't know if you have this queued up or not, not your pet. That's not, you know, let's play it up. I will, I will hit it right now. Okay. it's Just we'll listen to it. Then I'll discuss. Yeah.
00:37:41
Speaker
I love this song.
00:37:55
Speaker
And it's like upbeat, but somehow not summary, as Selim would put it. You know what I mean? Maybe that's the off-iviness. Yeah.
00:38:15
Speaker
I think when I listen to this song, I put on our group chat, punk ah Pop Punkeration Ivy.
00:38:35
Speaker
It's like, I think but the whole song is only like a minute long.
00:38:43
Speaker
Hell yeah. What a good team. So the songwriting credit on that wreck on that song is Dan on Adriano, it's solely. And so this song was actually originally recorded as a Tuesday song. And I think it was on the demo, but it and it wasn't recorded for Tuesday. Like in a Tuesday style? Like not in a- I don't know what the demo sounded like, but to me,
00:39:07
Speaker
This sounds like if, so slapstick another, is another band that basically imploded before things blew up for them. Right. To me, this sounds like what slapstick would have done. I think they all went on to do some okay things like, yeah. No, no, they, they did fine. However, they did fine, but ah they were They were geared up to be signed to Epitaph. Right. They had a deal on the table and they and two of the members in opposition of the rest of the band said no, because you know they didn't want to sell out. Right. Say Epitaph. Yeah. so Anyways. Get passed a blessed film like that. i Yikes.
00:39:47
Speaker
we We can't complain about what slapstick family tree has done, but um I think that slapstick on epitaph at that time period would have been one of the biggest. Scott Punk bands of that era, if they had just. Which we did. Which I looked into it when we did the last voodoo ah episode and voodoo glow skulls were the only sky band on epitaph.
00:40:09
Speaker
Yeah, that was until yeah. Yeah. and Well, unless you count Hellcat as a part of the that. But I guess that's where all the Scott bands went. But like they were just weren't signing like Scott onto the label proper. So that would have been they would have stood out as like a band that didn't really that would have fit the roster, but would have been doing something differently. So, yeah, another what if scenario, I guess, like you're on the Marvel side of things.
00:40:33
Speaker
But I think if you just picture Brandon Kelly's voice on that song, I think that's that's like that's the next wave of slapstick right there. Maybe we'll make it happen. We will come back slapstick, if you will. I think I have one more from this record. What was the other song I have queued up there, Joey? She's my friend. Oh, yeah, I like the song. It's good. She's my friend. This is like a pretty archetypal Mike Park song, like just the way it's like written in the. Yeah. Yeah.
00:41:19
Speaker
i like that he commonly does a mix of like it'll just like repeat one thing over and over and over again and then the other part of the song won't rhyme like at all it'll just it's just like stream of consciousness
00:41:56
Speaker
Oh, heck yeah. I left in some solos so no people can't get mad at me.
00:42:09
Speaker
The band does a lot of like the but that beat a lot of that going on. How did you feel about this record, Joe? I feel like we didn't get your two cents um after like I listened to the mall within like I don't know, two days, like just going back and forth and work because they're all like half hour albums. So they're pretty easy to consume um in the context of the greater of like all of the stuff. This one was not my favorite just because it was.
00:42:39
Speaker
The other ones just have come together more. but like the The band kind of comes together, the the concept of the band comes together. Yeah. Coalesce is better in the later albums. Well, it's not an Asian American band at this point. Yeah, like like like this this album is like... Kind of a fun, like, I don't know, I was like, this is like Op Ivy, but kind of slower, you know, it was like, was kind of my initial impression. Like it was enjoyable, but it was the the next couple of records that I was really into. Yeah, part of the part of the lore, actually, let's i'll get into a little deeper chinkies lore what that involves me. Like I said before, Mike was putting this band together while I lived at his house. I was renting a room at his house and
00:43:27
Speaker
He was started to put the band together, you know Steve Choi, Greg the guitarist, all these people, ah mia who Mia worked with for him. um And by the way, her band, the Muggs were an awesome punk band. I saw them open for Fugazi in Watsonville, one of the most memorable shows of my life. he did not He could not find a drummer though, an Asian drummer.
00:43:51
Speaker
And, um, they started booking shows cause they, they recorded and released the album. I think, I don't know if it was released, but it was definitely recorded, you know, before he had a band. And so there was a point where he was like, had shows coming up and they did not have an Asian drummer and he started, he was like starting to prep me as being his backup. He's like, it's like, we'll get, we'll get, um, we'll get a mask for you.
00:44:17
Speaker
And I was like, put me in coach, let's go. And then, you know, he found some dude. Some dude. is i I just love his plan B. He's like, I have this whole concept. Everybody's Asian-American, but I can't find a drummer, so I'm just going to throw you up there anyway. yeah
00:44:38
Speaker
It's like that does sound an a lot an awful lot like a mic. I love it. ah Cool, ah so we're gonna take a break and when we get back we'll go through the rest of the chinkies
00:44:57
Speaker
Welcome back to Checkered Password here with Aaron Carnes of Indefensive Scott and we are talking about the chinkies. Here is a quote from Indefensive Scott on Mike Park ah on the Scottagans Racism Tour. I felt Scott had become this corny circus act versus the political overtones of two-tone. I wanted to give it a kick in the right direction. I know how impactful music is on young people and I wanted to have a voice and influence in a positive manner.
00:45:23
Speaker
So, the year was a busy one for Mike Park and the Chinkies. It was also the same year as Mike's Blockbuster Scoggins Racism Tour that also included the Blue Meanies, Less Than Jake, Five Iron Frenzy, Mustard Plug, K. Murray, The Toasters, MU330, and Mike Park as a solo act, raising $23,000 for anti-racism causes and was not as easy a tour as would be thought with the message soaring in some areas or landing like a lead balloon in others.
00:45:48
Speaker
I felt like it wasn't doing anything other than being a slogan. I was turned off by the lack of activism at my own event. It became more about the fact that Scott was big and that's why we were getting the exposure. That's not a bad thing, but I wanted 100% inclusion in terms of everyone being on board for what we were doing, rather than it being a stepping stone to bigger and better things.
00:46:07
Speaker
Undeterred, Mike took his newly minted band and took to the road. Support acts with Voodoo Glow Skulls and Bucko 9 led to a tour of Japan with crossover hit K. Murray. Greg, me and Jason all stayed with Greg moving to second guitar and the additions of Roger Morin on the drums and then unknown Steve Choi on the keyboards who would go on to be critical in the RX Bandits moves to a more progressive sound.
00:46:29
Speaker
resulting album was once again produced by Robert Berry. It was a far tighter, more deliberate record in piece through music as Asian man number 43 in 1999, something as a reactionary album to the Scott against racism tour. Let's play big world.
00:46:54
Speaker
So this was like a huge flash in the past for me listening to this again.
00:47:02
Speaker
Is this more of what you had listened to, like this record more so? Oh yeah, this one was the one. Yeah. I don't even think I listened to the other two almost at all. This is the chinky song that Spotify really wants me to listen to. So it was actually the only one out of all three albums that I was like, oh, I kind of know this song. And it's just because it's what Spotify spits at me after I listened to like, I guess I don't know stuff for the pod usually.
00:47:33
Speaker
Yeah. Steve Choi. What a get. Incredible keyboard player. That makes a lot of sense. You know, the band he played a band he played in briefly before the Chinkies. Slow Gherkin. He played in slow Gherkin very briefly. Yeah. Yeah. You look through his his discogs and it is a fun ride.
00:47:52
Speaker
Yeah. What a what a what a killer discography that guy has. Yeah, probably like ah I'd say in my top five favorite like organ players, maybe of all time. Like so good. The um the name, the name of the chinkies, we talked a little bit about how it was meant to be, you know, kind of make people feel a little uncomfortable saying it and make them think about it, you know. Yeah. So I want to talk a little bit about that real quick. First is Mike Park.
00:48:22
Speaker
This is what Mike Park says about the origin of the name. And I got a different story from Margaret Cho when I had her on the show. So this is like one of those who remember how people remember things. So Mike said that Margaret Cho came up with the name because she had was doing the sitcom All American Girl back in the mid 90s and ah first all you know first sitcom for you know all Asian American cast. Right.
00:48:47
Speaker
Right. Side note also, she was she wanted to call the show the Margaret Cho Show and have Skank and Pickle perform the theme song. and That song is on Sing Along with Skank and Pickle, but it was not used for the show.
00:49:00
Speaker
right It's Margaret Jones. According to Mike, she was complaining that the executives were being ah encouraging sort of like racism and they had all these other saw ah show title ideas that were racist or racist adjacent or whatever. and that she She said to him in this frustrated way, like oh we should just call the show the chinkies. That's what Mike claims is the origin of the name.
00:49:23
Speaker
I asked her about it when she did our show and she didn't remember that, so who knows? Who knows if that's what happened. It's still fun lore. It's still fun. It's very good lore. The other thing that's interesting about the name and the legacy of Chinkies as a band using kind of repurposing a slur, specifically an Asian slur, is that there was another band called The Slants like many years later.
00:49:49
Speaker
who were all Asian. And they got so much press about that. like I feel like that became discourse for a while. like Is it okay for a band to use their like their own slurs, their band name? like like That was like a whole debate.
Cultural Impact of The Chinkies' Name
00:50:06
Speaker
And it struck me as odd because This was like a decade or more after Mike Park made The Chinkies, and I don't even remember a discourse to that extent at all about him and his band name. i And that I found and it's not the same, but sometimes I feel like in it maybe this is an in defense of Scott adjacent comment is that sometimes a lot of stuff happens in the Scott community that's kind of first past the post and doesn't get that kind of discourse.
00:50:37
Speaker
Like, you know, when Bomb the music industry which was starting and everything, unqu quote unquote, was free, like it was pay what you will. Right. Five years later, Radiohead does it and all of a sudden they're like, well, Radiohead's a bunch of industry geniuses doing a pay as you will thing. And it's like, this is this is just a thing that already existed with a ska band. yeah Like, yeah, and it just feels like because it wasn't Radiohead, nobody talked about it.
00:51:03
Speaker
Community Records also did that initially too. um They were definitely following in the steps of Bomb the Music Industry and quote unquote, and they were they started the days you know Greg and all those guys, they started that label to be kind of a quote unquote type of label. you know My favorite thing about the name is is that he chose to make it fun by doing the double E's like the monkeys.
00:51:28
Speaker
Like that that added that added touch of that for the name kind of makes it for me, to be honest. You know what? I don't know if I was clicking in there, Joey. That's a good observation. I like it. I picked up on it like like after the second day of listening, I was like, the double E has to be like a the monkey's reference, right? Like it has to be. That has to be the joke, for sure.
00:51:53
Speaker
It definitely helps to like, like, yes, of course, you feel a little uncomfortable with the name if you're not an an Asian American person. Right. But it isn't it isn't the slur. It's like a right it's it's a it's a it's a playoff of the slur. So I don't feel as uncomfortable saying it as I would have if it what didn't have the EES at the end. And if you're kind of in the know a little bit about the guy or even the general idea, it's not hard to get to why it makes sense. You know what I mean? Like why it's like kind of cheeky and jokey, but also is like an inflammatory slur. You know what I mean? Like it's it's a very well chosen name. And I think it's very funny. Like in the way that it's meant to be funny.
00:52:42
Speaker
mike Mike Park as a as a friend, as a you know as a person that in my life, i know I know he talked about this stuff in his music, but as a person in my life kind of educated me as a younger person as to how much racism non-white people experience,
00:53:01
Speaker
Like, you hear that, and you don't necessarily see it, right? Because no one is throwing slurs at you when you're a white person, but he would tell me, like, I'd be, well I'm walking down Santa Cruz, you know, liberal Santa Cruz, and just a car passes by me and just starts saying slurs at me. Like, I mean, some of these conversations he we had when I was younger were very eye-opening to me, just to be like, really? That that happens?
00:53:27
Speaker
like you're you're actually dealing with like just completely arbitrary random racism. He's like, yeah. And I'm like, wow, I mean, that is that's horrible. I think that's why it's important. I like have conversations with people about, you know, the stuff that they experience because they may not tell you about it unless you actually ask about it because it's not comfortable for everybody to talk about these things. But, you know, I guess that's the whole idea with these types of songs and this type of music is like start a dialogue, like as a person in your life. Like, do you experience this kind of racism that Mike talks about in these songs? Right. It's.
00:54:05
Speaker
it's I think that's probably another critical piece of this band is the the the lyrical content is very focused on his experience in that world. um What's the next song I have queued up there, Joey? I think I got Runaway. is Yes. All right.
00:54:25
Speaker
the song fucking rips bangs so hard yeah this was on uh ongoing playlists that i would give to people when i was trying to get them into ska
00:55:08
Speaker
They're a very melodically interesting band, like I love how they harmonize. yeah But also when they're not harmonizing and they're both singing the same thing and as like kind of a romanes kind of thing, how we used to they the vocals.
00:55:39
Speaker
Fuck yeah. Yeah, so good. Yeah. How do you feel about the record piece or music? It's a wonderful record. I forgot to mention this. We ah I kind of side railed the conversation after Big World. But um Big World, have you seen the music video? There's a music video for that song. Oh, no, I haven't. I know there was a music video. That's interesting. It looks I don't know who made it. I'm trying to remember. I can't remember. But it just looks like very, very DIY.
00:56:08
Speaker
um You know primitive at the time kind of like video technology and but I'm like 95% sure that Where it's filmed is in Mike's practice space ah Which was in his garage in Los Gatos in the house that I lived at and I used as well for my own stuff So I'm pretty sure that's just in that little practice, which was by the way tiny so tiny like the tiniest practice room. And so that same rumor, he would do mail order. ah He did mail order at his parent's scratch. Oh, is that what it is? And he still does. Still does. Yeah.
00:56:48
Speaker
Hell yeah. I think I have one more song queued up on this record and then we'll move on to the next one. Yeah. I'm no racist. I've never been a racist. I've never had anything against anybody in this whole world. And with God as my witness, that's the truth.
00:57:14
Speaker
Yeah, this one fucking rips too. Yeah, yeah, I like the story. Yeah.
00:57:24
Speaker
Also like the news clips and and and whatnot throughout all the records. Pretty big fan of that. Yeah, it keeps the cohesion. Yeah.
00:57:41
Speaker
And it helps it like the focus, how you're saying all the vocal or all the lyrics are very focused. It really helps you keep, keep honed in on the focus of those lyrics. Yeah.
00:58:05
Speaker
It's good stuff.
00:58:13
Speaker
Sick. So sick. Yeah. Yeah. Well, sir, it's a big fan. What a great song. but Fuck yeah. Joey, what do you feel about this record? We haven't gotten your thoughts on it. I really like this one a lot. It was like like two thirds songs like that, theyre like all bangers and the other ones weren't anywhere you know like not they weren't filler they're just weren't as banging I feel like I'd be remiss to get to the end of the second album without bringing up the entire techno album at the end of each album
00:58:52
Speaker
Oh yes yes. Because that was, I didn't expect the first one to be like 28 minutes long, but I listened to the whole goddamn thing. Okay, I got i a fun fact. I got a fun fact about the ah techno track on the first record.
00:59:10
Speaker
Yeah. Cause that's, that's the longest one. I was like, this is like, this is like ah the decline of like early nineties weird techno. It's so long. Do you, do you know who made that track? No idea. I'm going in totally blind. Okay. Adam Davis.
00:59:31
Speaker
Mike asked him to make a techno hidden track. And so he did. And here's another fun fact about it. The track he gave him is half the length that is on there. And somehow it accidentally got recorded that it's twice doubled. It was supposed to be as long as I was listening to it. I thought to myself, I was like, this sounds like, but I mean, it's pretty long. Maybe they're just repeating parts. but it The whole thing is repeated.
01:00:03
Speaker
That's incredible. Oh, amazing. But the but even the the more rap focused, I must say, or DJ.
01:00:14
Speaker
focused one at the end of the second record is also entertaining to listen to. yeah I did my due di diligence. I listened to all of the secret songs. Good for you. I absolutely did not do that because I was only aware that they existed. Oh yeah, and I knew they were there. I was like, not for me. There's and there's a secret secret song at the end of the third one.
01:00:36
Speaker
yeah Oh, is there? its still Yeah. I'll tell you about it after we talk about it. Yeah. See, I wasn't as good of a journalist this time.
01:00:47
Speaker
yeah Tours continued into the new millennium, with Mike intentionally bringing along label mates and new bands he wanted to elevate, including MU330 and Potshot as the Misfits of Ska Tour, and the Lawrence Arms, the latter of which the Chinkies would issue a split with in 2001. I know that's getting a bit of ahead of ourselves, but I thought I would play one single track off of it, because it wasn't part of the listening, I guess. But I have it there for you, Joey. It is called Run for Help, another run, part of the Run trilogy.
01:01:19
Speaker
in the NPCU, the Run trilogy. The only, uh, ska track that the Chinkies did on this split, the rest were Punggie Jones. Yeah. I have heard this one because Spotify was like, hey, you've been listening to a lot of the Chinkies lately, listen to this.
01:01:41
Speaker
Didn't recommend Lawrence Arms to you, hey? It started with this, it brought Mike up going, but I don't know.
01:01:55
Speaker
So yeah, this would have been when Lawrence arms are still on Asian man before going to fat. I i read i did ah this is not information I had prior to my own prep for this interview, but I read that. ah Fat Mike heard this record specifically, and this is what got him interested in signing Lawrence arms.
01:02:15
Speaker
Really? That's cool. That makes sense. This is a, it's a good, I mean, like I still think O'Calcutta, the last fat ah record that they did is their best one, but um this was a really solid Lawrence Arms cutout. Listeners, go back and listen to our slapstick family tree episode where I gush about the Lawrence Arms.
01:02:37
Speaker
Now, it was just that this split had the song, the chinky song, present day memories, also like kind of a more of acoustic song. Am I right? Oh, you might be. This has present day memories. That's it follows right after. That's correct. Yeah, I was really listening to that song and I was like, oh, yeah, because Mike starts singing about one true haircut in the chorus of that song. And that is such a such a deep reference for him, because that was a band that was a pre-skink and pickle band that he had.
01:03:06
Speaker
Oh wow. Or it might have actually been what turned into Skink and Pickle. I'm not sure exactly on the story, but yeah, before Skink and Pickle, there was a band called One True Haircut. And he just dropped it for the listeners. And he's just like, for the park heads out there. For the park heads, yeah. The real heads know. The real ones know. That's why they're grabbing a Lawrence Arms chinky split. there's if you You know what you're getting into.
01:03:32
Speaker
ah All right. So continuing on, but by the way, I like that. I like the song on the split that you played. I wasn't a big fan of the non-skaw songs of the for the cheekies for this record. No, it's a better Lawrence Arms ah album than it is a chinkies album, which is yeah uncomfortable to say, but it truly is. But, you know, that's why Fat Mike signed Lawrence Arms and not the chinkies.
01:03:57
Speaker
but That in is only one mic rule. He he has a rule where he's only allowed to have one mic in that label. One mic rule. He puts it on the napkin that you sign, right? when yeah the Yeah, one mic. Not allowed to have a mic park here as well. Change your name, Mike? You'll be Michael Park.
01:04:17
Speaker
In 2000 was the Scott against racism follow up the smaller, more focused plea for peace tour ah named after Mike's not-for-profit organization meant to be less of a big name tour, more of a place for bands to have a space to deliver their messages openly, primarily involving Asian-man adjacent groups such as the Chinkies, Potshot, MU330, etc. ah Mike said this plea for peace was a little bit more heartfelt i felt like we were stressed ah the I felt like we stressed the importance of the cause more on that tour. And so the tours would continue on, and if it wasn't abundantly clear at this point, Chinkies had become Mike's primary touring band.
Touring and Activism of The Chinkies
01:04:53
Speaker
The Bruce Lee band was still on hold, and No Scankin' Pickle Reunion was on the horizon. ah The Chinkies would do more world-hopping dates in the US, s Japan, Europe, as the Monsters of Ska with Link 80 and MU330.
01:05:07
Speaker
The same band as it had been before I entered the studio in 2001 to do it all over again, and the slightly more laid back and wistful Searching for a Better Future was released as number 88 on Asian Man Records. Let's listen to the first track I have queued up there, Marketplace.
01:05:35
Speaker
This one's very sing-along-able. I remember singing along to it immediately in my car.
01:05:43
Speaker
Scall bands just love talking about markets. That's a thing. Markets and gangsters. Yeah. you should do like ah He should redo this song and do it about Facebook Marketplace.
01:06:01
Speaker
The context has changed in the last decade or whatever. Since talking about just like selling to like use tables. Yeah, scuffed $10 pickup.
01:06:17
Speaker
Don't know what I got.
01:06:22
Speaker
All right, let's talk about it. the The final album in their trilogy of records, Searching for a Brighter Future, Aaron Carnes. I like it. I actually um wasn't super familiar with familiar with this record. I didn't realize that I hadn't really listened to this record. I knew the first two records backwards and forwards. you know This one, I don't know how much I'd ever listened to it because it was very it just all felt unfamiliar to me.
01:06:49
Speaker
But I you guys were right. It is a little more laid back. It doesn't have quite the drive to it, but I think it's still solid record. And I think lyrically, like you look at the year it was released and kind of the content of the song of very Bush era ah record, like I think.
01:07:04
Speaker
It's still got that um that discussion about sort of the Asian American experience or like just racism in general, but it's really filtered through what would have been a pre slash post 9-11 kind of Bush era USA. It's got that lens on it. The plea for peace you mentioned the plea for peace tour. um You know, in my book there's a we talk about you know the Skoggins Racism Tour, which you read a little bit of, and Mike had his own mixed feelings about it, and some of the bands had mixed feelings about it. I talked to some some of the members of Blue Meanies about the plea for peace, and they felt like it was a bit more on the target.
01:07:48
Speaker
Like it it it was much like they felt like, OK, this is more clear, like what it's about, what it's doing. And I think there was a lot more effort to like have booths present to like distribute materials. I think because some of the maybe some of the problem with race against racism was that. the The call to action part of it was a little unclear and you know, you can you can understand, I mean, when you start doing a tour, it's there's a lot of things to think about, you know, and you can't anticipate everything.
01:08:18
Speaker
But yeah what one of the good things, though, that Scott against racism did, aside from sort of raising the awareness of that concept of being against racism, which I think is valuable, um is that it raised a lot of money, though. So I mean, that's yeah four causes. But play for peace, I think, was a little more it was a little more clear and had a lot more, you know, call to actions involved. And I think some of that, though, came from the fact that it was deliberately made to be a little bit of a smaller thing. And as as it's kind of easier to control the messaging and the the impact when it's smaller. I like to also look at like so we just did an episode on the blue meanies. That was our our last like mainline episode that we did. And you think about the timing to like in 98 when Scott against racism was happening. ah Right. That would have been the time it was them doing full throttle.
01:09:14
Speaker
And then plea for peace would have been post wave like yeah there were there would have been a largely different band to go see at that time. Like it's kind of weird to you know, we're talking about this from a historical lens. But also if you think about like where that band was at that time, it also kind of changes kind of how you think about it. Yeah. um Which is very interesting. And the plea for peace had more flexibility, probably partly because of the time and also the name of it that it wasn't like it wasn't a full on scoffing either.
01:09:44
Speaker
yeah Yeah, definitely. Yeah, the the like, ska against racism kind of is like kind of like a rock against bush sort of like ah ah like bordering on corporate sort of vibe to it, whereas like the the second crack at it seemed a little more focused and I got the message across a little more clearly, I think it sounds like. Are your favorite to a rock against communism?
01:10:11
Speaker
ah Love that one. Yeah. Hey, listener, Google something. That's a fun rabbit hole to get into. That's a fun rabbit hole. Tell me about Screwdriver. Let's listen to the next song.
01:10:31
Speaker
I like the song. Another angry man, he goes to war.
01:10:42
Speaker
this album had like kind of uh almost like a the clash sort of vibe yeah i feel like in comparison to the other two like it's just more of like a Like his vocal delivery delivery is a little more like kind of Joe Strummery and a lot of the slower songs and stuff. And it's a little more reggae influenced, I would say. Like we're not quite dipping into reggae. It's still Ska, but it's definitely a little slower and reggae-er, reggae-er, you know? That's the word. Yeah.
01:11:19
Speaker
Asian Man had released 40 releases between the previous Chinkies record in this one. Wow. Just for context. Jeez. Holy smokes. Yeah. So if you want to think about like how much more the label was meaning to Mike at the time in the early 2000s and the type of records they were releasing then too.
Asian Man Records and Musical Diversity
01:11:41
Speaker
Like I think you can also see like I don't want to say that the Chinkies were beginning to take a back seat, but I mean, there was only a one year difference in the release of those two records and they put out a ton of stuff. I would say that from from the day Mike started Asian man records, the label has always been the priority over any of his own music. yeah And like, you know, with the chinkies, he probably toured on that more than anything post skink and pickle that he's ever done. But the label was always, always first.
01:12:13
Speaker
And I think it just, interest it's an interesting label to look at from historical lens because it can be seen as a ska label in a lot of ways, but it really was post ska that it was, it's most prolific. And I think it's variety is kind of, it, it precedes itself over that 25 year span, I guess. So roughly how many bands were on the roster at this point in time?
01:12:39
Speaker
If they had 88 releases at this time, you can imagine probably it had to be like 15, 20 bands or something, right? Yeah. had I mean, more than that too, because of singles and whatnot. But I'm going to think like if we're to look at the entire Asian man catalog, what percentage of the releases or SCA has to be under 20%? I agree. I mean, it might not even hit 10%, honestly.
01:13:06
Speaker
Yeah, I i know i think ah when we did the the slapstick family tree episode, it really like reinforced to me where I was like, oh, yeah, it's a lot of folk punk, emo pop punk. Like there was just and kind of a little bit of everything, but really dove in on that um sort of subsection of and in a lot of ways before any of those bands would become like kind of majorly popular later. So Yeah, and I feel like he was thinking five steps ahead. and i I don't know if it was conscious. I think that you just really like this music. Yeah, and even now, I mean, look at there's more interest in Ska now than there had been in a while, and he's got the abruptors. I think that's the only Ska band that he's got right now, but he definitely could be signing Ska bands and selling records, but he just isn't. You have to beat Mike and Chris off with a stick, I think.
01:14:02
Speaker
Um, okay. I got one more song from this record. I got the Op Ivy cover. Of course I did.
01:14:20
Speaker
Like, seriously. Just like a just a little surfier and just a little like little cleaner and, you know, slightly better musicianship.
01:14:36
Speaker
But still very much in the vein of the original. Yeah. An all timer. Yeah. I consider part of the the canon. This is like a standard at this point.
01:14:54
Speaker
Yeah, bank shots definitely like a like a ghost town at this point, right? Yeah. It's gotta be. Gotta be. And replacing the guitar solo with organ? Oh man. Like, forget about it. We can all just go home with this.
01:15:10
Speaker
We're all there, I think. We're all at home. Oh yeah, I guess so. No, I'm in somebody else's home. Weird. That's why it's dark.
01:15:28
Speaker
Joseph Woods, how do you feel about searching for a brighter future? It was good. ah Like I said, a little more groove, a little closer to reggae, I would say. I think I liked the second one better, yeah but only marginally, I would say. I think if you like asked the average listener piece through music is the one that usually gets the top. I think when we put posted this on our group track, Chris was like, oh yeah, it's like S tier, but everything else is A tier.
01:15:59
Speaker
i'm I'm going to say though, I did listen to the most recent EP and it was my favorite out of all of it. <unk> Interesting. Interesting. Yeah. I don't know what it was that I liked the most about it, but I was like, this is fucking solid. It was very good. Before the result if we go to the 2020 EP, we should we should just touch on two releases that happened in the era we've discussed.
01:16:25
Speaker
um There's the karaoke with the chinkies EP. Oh, that is yeah, I wasn't familiar with that. Didn't that come out before the first record? It's it's same year, so it was either right before right after, but it's like so it's just like songs from the record. It's just like I'm kind of a gimmick, but a good gimmick. Right. I'm all for a karaoke gimmick. Yeah. Because it's like the song and then a karaoke version of the song. Two songs. Oh, that's fun. I love that. And then. Yeah, Joe. 2003. So a year after Searching for a Brighter Future, there's a plea for peace, the best of chinkies.
01:17:00
Speaker
which I didn't know this existed. Apparently, it was a Europe-only best of comp, so it's it's wild that there is a best of chinkies comp out there in the world. After the second record? third After the third, so it's stuff from the three LPs. Okay. Best of. And and it was released on Kung Fu? What the heck? What the heck was Joe Esalante doing with this?
01:17:27
Speaker
ah making Making them euros. We've said it on the podcast before, but Kung Fu Records is bananas. Like everything they do makes no bloody fucking sense, man. They started as a reason to sign assorted jelly beans and then just kind of did whatever they wanted. It's like as a vanity label for the Vandals, ah it really does speak to the mindset of that band where they just didn't give a shit about anything.
01:17:56
Speaker
I would love to know the conversation about you know that they had with, I assume, Mike, about releasing a comp, a Europe-only comp. like um What was the thinking behind it? like there is It was just their demand for Chinkies, but not you know not not three records worth, just one Warren Fitzgerald was just in Germany and he was just like, people are crambling for the chinkies over here, buddy. no baby Maybe they did a short tour and rather than bring three cases of records,
01:18:33
Speaker
They just pressed one case of a record that had songs from all three records. And I'm looking at this album art and it looks like they, uh, sorry, this is on my friend discogs dot.com and it, uh, it does look like they may have pressed it out locally.
01:18:50
Speaker
yeah 21 songs though, man. If you're in Europe, you got, you got a pretty good chunk. Yeah, but I mean, that's yeah, that's a pretty good portion of the song. I feel like that's like the least worst of the suicide machines, like greatest. it's out It's like, that's got just all the good songs from those records.
01:19:13
Speaker
and even some of the bad songs from the bad some of bad ones. yeah ah Speaking of which, ah the resulting tour of that record included Potshot, Lightyear, and a much maligned Suicide Machines, touring on their controversial self-titled record.
01:19:29
Speaker
This tour would all but fold the band as they hung up their guitars while Mike Park refocused on his solo work label and activism in the aftermath of 9-11 in the Bush era invasion of the Middle East. Steve Choi would begin his work in the RX Bandits, but he wouldn't be gone for long as he brought most of the RX Bandits back to Mike for the beautiful world EP under the Bruce Lee band banner. ah You listen to our episode on that as we talk about that.
01:19:52
Speaker
And that is the end of the Chinky Psych. Mike and Steve would reform the band in 2020 for a brief EP that also included Kevin Higuchi of the Death Rose and Stock Band and hardcore punk bassist Roger Camaro. The brief studio project was called KA Music. It was issued exclusively as a 12 inch on Asian man. Let's listen to the one song and that will close up our discussion on the Chinkies for the day.
01:20:22
Speaker
Yeah, this as soon as this song kicked on, I was like, oh, this synth is cool. And then it's got like organ later in the song. The screaming is awesome. Yeah.
01:20:35
Speaker
What is that in an 18 year gap between the two records? 19. Yeah, looks like about that. Yeah.
Jeff Rosenstock and Kevin Higuchi's Contributions
01:20:52
Speaker
2020 era Mike Park likes to do his little like quiet singing Maybe this was the one that i got a little more of that Joe strummer kind of the thing from
01:21:18
Speaker
do-to-dos in there. Yeah. It's certainly two decades of a bunch of people who knew how to run a studio and be able to craft some songs out of there. Like you really get it as an experienced studio project. One of the things that Jeff Rosenstock told me in relation to the present day Bruce Lee band, but I think it applies to this EP as well, is that he feels like Mike Park has really come And this era has come to embrace sort of more of his like real anger in a much more raw way. And then he feels like that's, you know, like, so like some of Mike Park's strongest songwriting is happening right now because of that, which I agree. i That's one of the reasons why it's not just because Mike's working with death, death, Rosenstock now that the new Bruce Lee stuff is so good is that he's different. He's like less polished. He's a little bit more just like
01:22:13
Speaker
I'm gonna say what's on my mind in an unvarnished way. ah Like definitely you can hear that too like I feel like there's less jokes like before everything kind of was like clouded behind like an air of satire like yeah certainly it was like a grown-up Gen X person like you can tell like there's a lot of that kind of aspect to his music and songwriting and I think in the You know, like he's embraced that anger, like you said, and just kind of like it's not funny anymore. You know, like I'm I'm actually mad. Yeah. Yeah. So Kevin Aguchi, the drummer on this specific release and the death Rosenstock drummer, he's an interesting person. He's in a phenomenal drummer, like an amazing drummer. Right. But I used to live in San Jose, California. And that's where Mike lives. Basically, San Jose, the San Jose area. Kevin was just like
01:23:06
Speaker
a band dude in San Jose, pre working with Mike Park. And he was in one Scott band called the Whiskey Avengers. He was in like all kinds of local bands and they were all fine bands, but they were all bands that would play bars and would draw like 25 people. Right. Right. And I remember because I was living in San Jose and I was writing for the paper at the time.
01:23:34
Speaker
I remember watching him one night being like, my God, this drummer is so fucking good. Like what is he doing in this bar band? Nothing gets the band itself, but this drummer needs to be like, you know, be seen, be heard, be playing with like, you know, a band with an audience. And yeah, so Mike Park likes to brag that he saved Kevin and, you know, he got him plugged into the Mike Park machine slash death Rosenstock machine. So.
01:24:02
Speaker
Just want to throw that out there. Good old Gucci bar band purgatory. and Yeah, he got out of bar band purgatory because of Mike Park. I've seen him like I've seen him. He's toured with AJJ before. um I saw the first show I saw coming out of Covid was in 2020. I think it was in 2021. Yeah, like kind of late 2021.
01:24:27
Speaker
and they had Kevin playing with them. And I've seen AJJ several times at different iterations, but that was like the most punk I'd ever seen them before or after was when they had Kevin Aguchi playing with them. It was like kind of a different experience because AJJ are not like, you know, people like myself included very drawn to them for their songwriting and for their lyrics and the, the singability of their music, but never really thought of them as this like tight,
01:24:56
Speaker
Unit of music musicianship, right? But yeah, put Kevin Aguchi in that band and that's all of the sudden they are All
Public Reaction to 'In Defense of Ska'
01:25:03
Speaker
right. Here we go. We're gonna do the next segment, which is question the answers I haven't done this one in a minute, but we have a great guest. So we're gonna ask some questions um Flip asks, uh, what do you think about the book in defense of food? Every single book that's called in defense of and it's not ska is I just get angry. How dare you? Also, the books that came out before my book. How dare you? How dare you? Especially those ones. Yeah. That's how we spell out that podcast checkered past. Yeah. They're not way longer than us. But you know, it's funny about all the other. There's plenty of in defense of in defense of looting. I think there's one in defense of food. Every single other in defense of is sound serious.
01:25:49
Speaker
but in defense of Ska, just like if you hear the name, you're like is this serious? What is this? like This guy's really writing a book defending Ska. Also, I mean, all of those things are categorically less good because they do not feature Ska. Yeah.
01:26:05
Speaker
so fuck We don't know that. We have to do the research. Maybe in defense of food is full of scoff acts. We don't know. Maybe being a food. Sorry, go ahead. Before in defense of Scott came out um and I was i was getting building up to publishing it, I was ah i was at a friend's event and they were doing some book stuff and I helped kind of host it. And so they introduced me And I was introduced as the forthcoming author of the book, In Defense of Ska. And you could hear the audience listening to this sentence going, the forthcoming book, In Defense of, and then the word Ska landed and they all laughed. Like they were anticipating, they didn't know anything about me, just thought I was an author. They did they were anticipating something more serious than Ska and it was just really cracked me up.
01:26:53
Speaker
that's Where is your favorite place to eat Mexican food and why is it El Paso, Texas? I would love to come to El Paso, Texas and eat Mexican food. I have not been to El Paso since the 90s when I toured there with Flat Planet and I'm sure I ate Mexican food and I'm sure it was great. um Here in California, we got lots of great Mexican food in San Francisco, in Oakland. Adam constantly claims that Oakland has over overtaken San Francisco.
01:27:20
Speaker
Um, I'm going to take his word on that. I know I've gone to, there's a specific food truck in Oakland that he likes to go to and I gone with him sometimes. It's pretty amazing. Even here in Sacramento, we've got plenty of great Mexican food, California in general. I mean, come on. Some guy named Chris asks, what's your favorite SPI release? Hmm. Wow. He's really okay. I'll, I'll, I know, I know he's trying to put me in a position, uh, to anger some people, but I think this, I think this one will be accepted.
01:27:50
Speaker
but Everyone will agree with me. The came away release. Oh, yeah. Pre-cure album. Yeah. Yeah. Gotta be right up there for sure. Uh, Robert Boal sent us a couple. He said, uh, when will Scott be safe? Oh, yeah. Um, ah so if I'm going to approach this question and as a, as a, as a serious question. Right. When will Scott not need to be defended, I guess is really kind of the, what we're getting out here. And yes I think that.
01:28:20
Speaker
Let's say we get to a place where a whole bunch of new bands kind of help redefine Ska for everybody. I still think it's going to take a while. And I do think that there's going to be people from sort of the Gen X slash millennial. I think it's each actually the worst for millennials because they were like young when Ska went mainstream. And so they were most affected by Ska becoming uncool.
01:28:45
Speaker
So I think that there's just going to be a lot of people in the millennial age group that no matter what happens, they're going to be carrying around this sort of perception with Scott. So they they are the 13 year olds whom's heads are filled with real big fish when they get the extra monster stick. Yeah. like And then they're the ones yeah and they're the ones that, you know, grow up and become that sort of like age where you start to outgrow your high school self at the same time that Scott becomes just completely uncool. So they kind of carry that, they're reliving that moment. And I think it's going to take, it's going to take some time to rehabilitate them. And I think hopefully between, um, in defense of Scott and checkered past week, we can hope to rehabilitate them. We're all working on it. It's a team effort. What's a, what's a dream guest? That's a good question. Who's somebody you would love to have on the pod? Weird Al. That's a dream. Yeah. Yeah. Hell yeah. He's got, he's got a Scott song.
01:29:45
Speaker
Yep. Mustard Plug opened for him in the early 90s. In our Mustard Plug episode, the first 15 minutes is devoted to them telling their Weird Al story. And it comes in like three phases. like The open forum, then they see him later in the career, and he comes up to them. like He goes to their show at South by Southwest at one point, and he he's wearing a shirt. like There's a whole thing going on there. um Plus, recently he was doing a made a playlist and he put Fishbone on his playlist, so I feel like he's got a lot to say about Ska. Hell yeah. He's definitely a Ska fan for sure. and I'm a huge Weird weird Al fan. i mean oh yeah um well I don't really know. I can't really put my finger on it because I'm not like
01:30:29
Speaker
I'm not like all about musical comedy. It's not like, it's not like, I don't like listen to musical comedy otherwise. And I don't literally listen to Weird Al Records, but as a live performer, he there is no one that can top him as a live performer. He is takes the cake for the best live performer. And my number one live show I've ever seen was, was, was Weird Al, like full stop.
01:30:54
Speaker
Yeah. Every song's got costume changes. Like it's, it's awesome. He knows what he's doing. Yeah. Yeah. And his band is immaculate. He's had the same band forever live and in studio and each of them are incredible. And he like,
01:31:14
Speaker
is really humble and thanks his band and appreciates how like big a part of his success his band has been to. He genuinely seems like he'd be like a super fascinating person who seems to embody a lot of, I feel like, what we kind of would like the ska.
01:31:34
Speaker
Seem to be, you know what I mean? I got to see. ah So I know I think this is a uncommon thing that happens, but it does happen at his shows. And I saw it if his band messes up, he goes into he he kind of stops them and and then they play radio radio by Elvis Costello. Cool. That's like a thing that he does. But he only does does it if the band like fucks up to the point where he's got to stop them.
01:31:59
Speaker
And that's funny. Yeah, I saw him at the show, the one I'm referring to, my favorite show of all time. I'm an amazing production, otherwise flawless. And I got to see the fuck up and ah radio radio performance. And it was and it was done in in this way where it was like, you know, everything is such a big thing. And it's such then like it's like they became like a little bar band almost in a way where they just played radio radio like straight.
01:32:28
Speaker
and with no like accompanying like video or costume. and And then they just went on with the show after that. That's so rad. So, this up this next question is good because ah we talk about this on our podcast that not everybody gets on our wavelength when we have guests on. And so we always we always have our core group of guests that we always try to bring back because we're like, hey, like they locked into our groove. They kind of understand what we're going for. um And so in your case, when you're thinking about like what makes an ideal guest, like what what makes an ideal ideal guest?
01:33:05
Speaker
I would say like 90, 95% of our guests, I feel like vibe with us. And I think it's just like if they're sort of willing to just be like, I don't know, like conversational and like with us. I mean, we kind of, we kind of go out of our way to catch their vibe and match their vibe.
01:33:27
Speaker
So like when we have very serious, like historical kind of guests, well, that's this of the vibe we're in. If we have somebody who's like comedian and they're they're kind of wanting to joke around and and make a sides and we'll kind of do that with them. So it's a pretty flexible vibe, but I think it really seems to boil down as if if they have Um, if they're cool, they have a sense of humor and they're just like, a just a little bit self-depreciating. They don't think highly of themselves. Like any, the only like negative experiences we've had, I feel like our guests that you can kind of tell have like some ego issues. And that's the only thing I think that really rubs against our vibe because we we can go a lot of different directions with them.
01:34:08
Speaker
But when the ego kind of takes over, yeah, all right, I get that. That's kind of that's kind of interesting. I think we're less flexible. I think that's our problem. If I'm going to yeah kiss are you have of a clear vibe and a clear thing, like I think right we're kind of unique in that way. And so I guess we're definitely ah come on and and do stupid bullshit ah kind of podcast.
01:34:31
Speaker
Yeah, like there's a reason why we had Ike on twice before I had dropped that freaking Sugar Ray episode where every fact was bullshit. um Like, you know, I would only do that with somebody who I knew would pick up on it. Like it would never be a first time. People haven't listened. Oh, yeah. Every last year, I mean, that wasn't real. Yeah, no. shit I kind of I kind of call my ah publisher about this Sugar Ray biography I wrote.
01:34:57
Speaker
where Your primary source was me. I'm sorry. I'm going to get sued. So many paragraphs about gorilla, tortilla, flotilla, whatever it was.
01:35:11
Speaker
ah Yeah, I forgot the numbers. Anyway, it doesn't matter. I didn't talk about. podcast I wrote. um I guess the last question I will have, and this is more ah from me, is, ah so we both started our podcast around the same time. We're still going. Some podcasts have come and gone, but I've started to have people recently that have said that they're interested in starting podcasts. And I've given advice here and there, but I think it'd be interesting to hear your point of view. So for a new person that wants to come on and start a podcast, what's like the biggest piece of advice you can give them to start from the ground up?
01:35:44
Speaker
Well, if you're, if you're really interested in starting a podcast, I would suggest that you either do it like full on or just don't like, and, and doing it full on might not equal any money. So you know, and you don't have, don't plan on making money, but if you're going to create it, like really put the time into create something that's worth people's time. I think that some people,
01:36:12
Speaker
make half-assed podcasts.
Advice for Aspiring Podcasters
01:36:15
Speaker
And that might have made sense like 10 years ago, but at this point, there's so many podcasts to listen to that you got to have something that's really worth listening to, to really justify taking people's time. And that means the quality of your doing it, like the editing, like when we between takes, we were discussing like the how long and and difficult it is to edit. Editing is difficult, whether you're going to pay some to do it or if you're going to do it yourself, ah preparing questions, if you're going to do interviews,
01:36:47
Speaker
It takes a really long time to as like actually come up with good questions. And do you have something unique to say? like We are both doing Scott podcasts. There's not a lot of Scott podcasts, and we both do Scott podcasts differently. So I feel like we both stand in a position of offering something that's not really out there.
01:37:08
Speaker
Right. Maybe it's a niche thing. Maybe it's not going to blow up and be the biggest thing ever. But at least it's like if you're looking for Scott podcasts and these formats, we we exist for that. Right. So yeah, we're not like the 50th like political like analysis podcast. Right. Unless you have something absolutely totally unique and special to bring to the table.
01:37:27
Speaker
and And again, to bring it back to it, do it well in whatever capabilities you're able to do it. And I i will i echo the whole thing about like either go in or don't. like I actually think it's something like when we we started biweekly and then at one point we kind of came up with this, we realized that it's hard to it's hard to gain an audience when you don't release enough content. So we kind of reached a focal point where we're like,
01:37:52
Speaker
Well, let's start going weekly, but we all have to understand that when we go weekly, that's what we do. We have a weekly podcast now and we've gone into places where we thought of compromising that a couple of times. But I think ultimately we landed on like, no, like if this podcast exists, we do it weekly. That's that's what keeps it going. And that's what keeps the people engaged. And that's what keeps the whole thing fresh. um It's not easy and it's difficult. And to your point, like um the research takes a lot of work. The editing takes a lot of work, like There's also money, like stuff's not free. You pay for your Zencaster, you pay for your mics, you pay for everything. um I would say like the barrier of entry is low, but the commitment to it is high. Yeah, I definitely agree. I mean, it's it's a lot, you're committing to a lot of work.
01:38:38
Speaker
Yeah, that being said, if you have the drive and our and the time to put in, you can make a high quality podcast on your own and you can make it sound good. you just need it It will just take time. like it it is It's a time consuming process, but if you if you learn or if you have some knowledge of some recording stuff or whatever,
01:39:03
Speaker
to get you started. um if If you have the time to put in, you can put out a high quality podcast for sure. and I don't want people to feel pressure like you have to start out being awesome. like i also There's also value in doing things in order to figure out how to do things. but don't I would say like if you don't know anything what you're doing and you just want to start doing it just to see how it's done and to do it, that's fine. But don't like promote the hell out of it until you feel like you have something worth sharing with people. like And don't start trying to invite like you know like good guests until you feel like you have a legitimate good platform. That's the only thing I would say about that. like Go ahead and just jump in and do it you know to see if you like it or any of that stuff. But yeah. good Good place to end it on. So Aaron Karnes,
Promotion of the Expanded Book Edition
01:39:50
Speaker
over to you. What would you like to promote? Thank you for being on the show.
01:39:54
Speaker
Well, the expanded second edition of In Defense of Ska is releases on October 29th, which is a checkered Rob's birthday. So make sure you grab a copy of my book and then also get a present for checkered Rob.
01:40:09
Speaker
um But seriously, like you can buy this book, you can pre-order it now. And if you pre-order it, that's great because authors, or I constantly ask you to pre-order because it it really helps the whole process. you know It helps the algorithms know that this book's out there and it helps launch it better into the ether. you know You can go to bookshop.org, you can go to Amazon, you can go to your local bookstore. and they'll If they have it, you can buy it. If they do not have it, you can order it and they will order it for you. If you do not wish to purchase a copy, you can go to your local library and either get it if it's there or request it. If they do not have it and you request it, they will get it and I will get another purchase. So it's great for me too.
01:40:51
Speaker
um I highly encourage people to request copies at the library. That's the book. so The podcast, Indefensive Ska, please listen to Indefensive Ska every Wednesday, new episode. um Wherever you get your podcasts and ah follow Indefensive Ska on all the social media platforms, it is at IndefensiveSka.
01:41:09
Speaker
i I would highly encourage that as your two for for the week. Tuesday, you get checkered pass. Wednesday, you get in defensive Scott. oh yeah You get all the you get all the Scott pod you need right at there at the beginning of the week. So it's awesome. we We really lucked out that we did not land on the same day, otherwise we would be mortal enemies. But now we can collaborate and work together.
01:41:30
Speaker
Now we can now we can three years later. The hatchet is buried for all those people who are trying to Try to track the the years-long rivalry between the two podcasts hit us up on Instagram Twitter YouTube and tick tock at checkered past pod Send us an email checker pass pod gmail dot.com support the pod and get bon bonus content. Oh my god I fucked up this thing I say every time To support the pod and get bonus content, including a full length and unedited video of this episode, sign up for the checker head, patreon at patreon dot.com slash checkered past. We also have merch available at checkered past.ca checkered past is edited by cut man engineered by Joey. Until next time I'm Rob. I'm Joey. And the immortal words of the in the immortal words of the chinkies. Now you've got to run away far away from this pod.
01:42:23
Speaker
You're listening to Checkered Past. We're not the one about Silver Age DC Comics.