My Pop Five
My Pop Five
Tony Smith: The Pixies - Doolittle, Hedwig and the Angry Inch, Freaks and Geeks, YouTube, and Stranger in a Strange Land
Have you ever stumbled upon a melody that catapulted you straight back to your first concert, the lights dimming, heart racing with anticipation? That's the magnetic pull of Tony Smith's music. Celebrating a special three-year anniversary mini-season, we sit down with the extraordinary Tony Smith of Tonyboyy, Teem and Sleeper Agent fame. Savor the infectious "Counting Sheep" from his debut album "Doll Me Up," and join us as we traverse Tony's musical landscape—from the vitality of his live performances to his excursion into corporate design. We'll wax nostalgic about fandom origins, relive the vibrancy of live concerts, and tease the exciting potential of a Sleeper Agent revival.
Remember the days when a friend's mixtape could redefine your music taste? Our chat with Tony Smith is a journey back to those formative years, examining how the music of Pixies, the storytelling of "Hedwig and the Angry Inch," and the authenticity of "Freaks and Geeks" infused into his own creative ethos. We share candid tales of musical peer pressure, the struggle of conforming to pals' playlists, and the evolution from staunch genre fidelity to embracing the colorful tapestry of all music genres. Stick with us as we unravel the threads of social dynamics that weave into our personal soundtracks and celebrate the liberation that comes with musical omnivorism.
Ever considered how a song or movie might influence your life's direction? Diving into profound art and literature, Tony opens up about the spontaneous bursts of creativity that fuel his songwriting process and how pop culture milestones have profoundly shaped his career trajectory. From dissecting the philosophical richness of "Stranger in a Strange Land" to connecting with the teenage angst of "Freaks and Geeks," this episode is a heartfelt exploration of the ties between our favorite media and our very identities. Plus, discover how YouTube's endless well of content has transformed learning and creativity, as we reminisce about the golden age of MTV and the pivotal role of physical media in our lives. Join us for an auditory celebration of the passion, resilience, and shared human experiences that music and art bring into our lives.
Buy "Doll Me Up" on Vinyl LP or CD
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Tony Smith Social Links:
IG: @tonyboyy_
Twitter/X: @iamtonyboyy
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Hello and welcome back to another episode of my Pop Five, the show in which we bring on artists to break down five pieces of pop culture that had an impact on them or helped shape them to become the artists that they are today. Today, we open up with a song from our guest. Tony Boy.
Speaker 3:I'm finally at ease. My darling Self-destruct tendencies are gone, so fill me with dreams To wash down the years. A time for liberty. I'm the post-traumatic and dreamless I feel.
Speaker 1:Welcome back. It's another season in our three-year anniversary mini-season, and today we have an incredible musician by the name of Tony Smith. Tony is the frontman behind the projects Tony Boy Team and Sleeper Agent. We enter today with Tony Boy's song Counting Sheep, which you can stream right now wherever you listen to music or by clicking the various links in our episode description. That song that we just listened to is part of their debut album Doll Me Up, and it came out last fall. This album is such a great album and I really recommend grabbing the limited edition vinyl and CD on their site, noirincolorcreativecom, which we've also included in the episode description.
Speaker 1:We're really so grateful that Tony joined the show today to break down his pop five and just showcase how art can truly shape the work that you do and the ways in which skills acquired can translate to other areas of your life too. We loved our chat so much with Tony and we know you will too. So, without further ado, here's our chat with Tony Smith. Tony, thank you so much for joining. This is like a dream for me, and I'm really just so excited to be talking with you.
Speaker 3:Well, thank you.
Speaker 1:Yeah, the story that I have in terms of coming across you and your work. I grew up in Albuquerque, new Mexico, was at a Cage, the Elephant concert, front row, super stoked and you guys opened for them and I was so captivated by your performance and I've been such a fan ever since. I don't think that celebration record had come out at that point. It was just like pre-order and I remember signing in, getting the CD in the mail and had my first pickup truck and I was just like listening to that on repeat and I had the chance before we started recording today to just go back and listen to some of those old tunes and records and it just took me back and it's just like so stinking good, oh, thank you.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I guess that would have been like 2011. I think that's when we were on tour with them initially, so that was like 12 years ago.
Speaker 1:Yeah, 2011. And, like I said, it was like one of my like first vehicles that I still had. At that point. I was like just getting out of high school and it just uh, yeah, it was a record that I look back on so fondly and so I've been a fan ever since, and team the war paint song. When that came out, I listened to it over and over again and I'm so excited that you're putting out new tunes again yeah, that's awesome.
Speaker 3:Yeah, um, yeah, it's really over the years. I hear people really still enjoy Celebration, which to me is great. I'm still kind of hoping, you know, for maybe some kind of renaissance one day, when maybe Gen Zers rediscover it and talk, or something. And you know there's demand for us to do a reunion tour or something like that. But that's all. Just you know, fantasy, no-transcript. Moving away from bowling green, I think he wanted to do like one last hurrah at the bar. We got, you know, our start and it was great. Um, we packed out the house and it was very surreal because I hadn't really been on a stage in that capacity singing in many, many years. Well, at that point, only like four years, yeah, and it was, it was good time. But then, you know, immediately right after that, the pandemic happened. So, like, yeah, further talk of that kind of went by the wayside.
Speaker 1:Yeah, oh, and such a bummer Cause, even though that those four years that you're talking about, you can lose it pretty fast. I mean, you go from rehearsing all the time and performing every night to having something really polished, to not doing it for four years. You can, it can. You can feel the rust for sure.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and for me it was just like you know. I'm so far removed from that, you know, when you saw me in 2011, that seems like it was somebody else's life. So I've been kind of like in a you know, a corporate design world for so long. That being back on stage is just like you know, it feels like somebody else, you know. So that was kind of my main concern. Doing it again was you know, can I do it in a mental capacity?
Speaker 1:doing it again was you know? Can I do it in a mental capacity? Yeah, and how did you feel after it? Was it a blast? Did it feel like it?
Speaker 3:came back or were you in your head. Yeah, yeah, it was wild. You kind of tap into a character that was dormant for a while. Um, you know a character that was essentially me in my twenties. So you know, tap back into that and it's all fine.
Speaker 1:Totally. Yeah. Well, I'm sure we'll get into more of it as we talk about your pop five here, but let's go ahead and get into it. I ask every guest that they come on here. If you need to pull up a list or something, you can. If you have it available, cool, but with no comment or no context. What was your pop five?
Speaker 3:I did the Pixies do, little Hedwig the Angry Inch, which is a fantastic rock opera. The TV show Freaks and Geeks, which I was the correct age I was like 14, the same time those characters were, so that was very important. Oh, awesome, stranger in a Strange Land, yeah, very important science fiction novel. When I was younger I was really into sci-fi. And then finally was YouTube, because I was thinking streaming was really important, was thinking like streaming it was really important. You know whether it was like. My first really experience with streaming would be myspace. Um, because band profiles had like four or five songs and that was really cool because you could go to your favorite band. They'd have new songs before they came out. You have to go best buy and buy a cd. And then I was a little streaming doesn't really do it. You know, spotify, it's not really important to me. It's like, oh, what was important was the whole shebang, but you can't see the internet. So I think what's the cultural?
Speaker 1:uh, the cultural, like the center point of it to me would be youtube yeah, and even to today, youtube is still so big in the world of how people are consuming anything these days. So, yeah, video completely changed when YouTube came around.
Speaker 3:I have an Xbox that essentially I just call like a YouTube machine. That's all it does. I don't play games on it, yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean, I think that's a lot of people now. You know PlayStations or Xboxes or anything that can still access the streaming services and YouTube. Yep, that's about it. Well, let's go ahead and get into. I think the one that I was really excited about was the Pixies Doolittle record. The reason I was so excited about it and I'm curious to hear just why it was so impactful for you was because there were so many elements that when I was listening to it, it might be just be because my relationship to your music that I heard so many influences that I hope we can touch on. But can you tell me a bit about why that record was so impactful for you and why it's here on your Pop 5?
Speaker 3:Yeah. So a lot of people's entry point to the Pixies might be Fight Club, a movie that came out in 2000,. I think the ending credits play Where's my Mind. When that movie came out I was like 14 or 15 and my buddy burnt a CD with that song on it and I was like who's this? And it was the Pixies.
Speaker 3:And he bought Surfer Rosa, which I was a pretty big fan of Um, but it was kind of abrasive. It was kind of too cool for me and um I was, you know, had some extra cash when bought second album and it was more my style. It was in full color, whereas Serpa Rosa might have been more monotoned and muted and abrasive. This was like Dorothy walking out of Sepia into Oz. And that first song, debaser, it's on from there on, long debaser, it's just like I mean, it's on from there on. And it kind of just showed me that you could really be incredibly poppy but still kind of weird and freaky and abrasive and you can shout and talk about weird abstract lyrics and I don't know is this the perfect amalgamation of just being a kid and just wrecking stuff with a guitar and I don't know. It just like was beyond anything I could ever really conceptualize and it completely blew my mind.
Speaker 1:Wow, that, that's awesome. Um, I'm curious, though you you said you weren't the biggest fan of the first one. What do you think it was that prompted you to give even buying another one a shot, just cause you liked the? The liked the, the what he was showing you the first time you listen, yeah, I think my, my best friend at the time.
Speaker 3:Like your best friend, you kind of want to match.
Speaker 3:You kind of want to be twinsies with, and so he had that and I was like, well, what's the? What can I get that kind of compliments, that? And to me that was like their second record because you know, I still wanted him to think I was cool as well. Um, what's funny is like I bought a cure album one time and he made fun of it so hard I stopped listening to the cure. Yeah, I mean like I like them now. But he like I don't like Serpa Rosa. It just like it felt kind of like a little too rough around the edges a little too.
Speaker 3:I guess not poppy enough. You know like it's got stuff like Vamos on it which is like an eight minute weird jam which is great you know, if you're in the mood for it, yeah.
Speaker 1:But yeah, that's that social pressure is so impactful. The story you were just telling or just brought up an unlocked memory. But I remember when I was really young I was really into a Sheryl Crow record that was happening at the moment and I wanted it, you know, and I had like a birthday party, and the things you tell and admit to your family is not what you tell and admit to your friends. And I remember like having a CD wrapped for my grandma and like all my friends are there and I open it and when I see it's Sheryl Crow, I knew that like I was only going to get made fun of, you know. And so I'm like both excited internally but also just like in shame as I'm around my friends and like just that social pressure is so wild.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it's so bizarre, like you you know. I don't know if you know, kids these days have the same kind of you know, because the term guilty pleasure, they say it's not a thing anymore yeah if you enjoy it, you enjoy it.
Speaker 3:And now we have poptimism, whereas when we were growing up it was very clear like you were into indie rock or you were into pop, or indie rock was the only real music. Everything else was like bullshit yeah, totally. But now it's like myself included. It's like I'm a vacuum for all music and I like what I like.
Speaker 1:Yeah, no, that's awesome and I think it's. I'm thankful for it in the sense that it at least got you to come back, because who knows like if you would have ever put this record back on and it ended up being so impactful. But you talked about Debaser, and what I think is so cool about that song is that's where I started hearing some of the elements of, I think just the. It's melodic, but it also has some chaos and energy to it that I think I was so taken back by when I first saw you with Sleeper Agent was with Sleeper Agent, and so I guess my main curiosity is was it very intentional, when you were working in the early onset of the music you were making to be pulling influences from Pixies, or was it something that you felt was just like subconscious and just kind of came out of you naturally?
Speaker 3:Me and the rest of Sleeper Agent and our friends beyond that group. We just had, like you know, a collection of bands that we thought were the the end all be all, and the pixies were one of them. So I don't know if it was ever a decision, but it was like the pixies were rock and roll so we were trying to make rock music, um, and whether you know, you might see like the strokes come out in that album too.
Speaker 3:Our drummer was a huge fan of strokes and essentially you go all right. Well, these are the most important bands to us. Like, we want to make music, that at least we're you know, it's kind of on the same spectrum of like what we would listen to, and at the time when you're in your twenties you're, you know, kind of manic and crazy and you're agile, you can move pretty fast, and so we made really fast music that we could thrash around to, because that time of my life it was like the show didn't start.
Speaker 1:We had six beers yeah you know, like you didn't even like register to go on stage until you were half drunk, totally yeah, and I think even what's what's, I think, cool in that, in both what the pixies did and and what was happening in your guys' records, was, I think that one of the things that they're famous for is the like loud, quiet dynamics you know, and I think, like even listen to Celebration again today like just the variability in the sounds, but not only in the like loud, quiet aspects of the music.
Speaker 1:But I felt like with simple instrumentation, your standard guitar, bass, drums you know you had some keys and sometimes, like I remembered, like um, shoot, I'm break drum and stuff like that on stage with you guys, but um, also, I think with simple instrumentation, there's just these really full, beautiful textures. I think that that happened too and I think it was just something that you hear in this record so much, even back when it was recorded. But uh, I think that's.
Speaker 3:What's really cool is I think you can have some beautiful textures and sounds that come from the basic instrumentation and I think this was a catalyst for, I think, people exploring that yeah, I think to me that record and you know, even ours included it just sounds like color to me, like I kind of view, you know, music and tones and colors, and so I'm always trying to like make something three dimensional, like kind of make it 3D color and like, so the Pixies Doolittle is kind of like three dimensional and colorful to me and I feel like that's always the goal. You know, try to create a world.
Speaker 1:Yeah, absolutely One thing I wanted to ask as well. But I think what's interesting about this record specifically, both in the history of it, is just like the friction and stress that existed in making it, and it's kind of like it allowed them to kind of take a hiatus after making this record as well. The ending of Sleeper Agent obviously had some of that too, and I think they talked about the financial stresses and the issues of just kind of keeping things going, and I know that's something that was ultimately true for you guys as well. And so was that ever anything that you put together in terms of those two comparisons of like what happened with you guys in addition to what was happening with them during the creation of this?
Speaker 3:I'm not really sure. I know they had two really big creatives in their group and I feel like there was a lot of push and pull there. Kim was clearly a songwriter and she had her band, the Breeders, later, and so I feel like Charles Thompson, aka Prank Black, there's only room for him. And so, yeah, maybe a lot of those early albums there's the push and pull because it's two people really trying to break free from the other. But I mean, I was lucky. My band was always marching behind me. They were like all right, yeah, let's do that. I was probably the worst musician in the band, so they kind of helped me. Uh, in the other way, I just had the ideas and they helped me. Uh, they helped me put it in the car and go with it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, um, you were the primary like lyricist, though, and I think that was one of the things that was also just incredible. And I think your vocals one of the things I was so captured by when I first saw it was just like, um, the compliment of both yours and alex's vocals, but I think even yours, like you, have such a cool vocal texture that I think is carried even into the team projects and your most recent one that I'm just like it's, it's unique and it's something I just want to keep listening to, and so I think, uh, sure, maybe the playing scales on a guitar or something, or feeling the facility on the axe might not be the same, but I think you carried your own in those other elements.
Speaker 3:For, sure, yeah, I think I mean back then I wouldn't take no for an answer, so I was going to be on that stage one way or another, hey.
Speaker 2:I wanted to chime in here, if that's OK, right.
Speaker 1:Go ahead, Daniel.
Speaker 2:Hey Tony, my name is Daniel. I work on the show with Ryan. Or, for people who might not be so familiar with the creative process, I'm curious when it comes to putting together an album or writing these songs, how do you feel like your influences play a part in that? Is it more of a direct like, like oh, I'm hearing this part of the song and I want it to sound just like, for instance, this pixie song. Or is it more subtle, like what are? What are your thoughts on that?
Speaker 3:I've never really been an active songwriter. I know that sounds kind of weird, but, um, I don't sit down and go. Today I'm going to write a song. Um, I do a lot of just living life and walking around and driving in my car and taking showers and then, like I hum something like, oh, that's kind of cool. And now that we all have iphones, you just go into the voice memo app and you mumble some nonsense into it and I don't think I ever actively go. Okay, well, this song is like a wilco song. It's just kind of like this is a vibe I'm trying to go for, I think, recently. I'm just trying to, like constantly be chill and not annoying.
Speaker 3:So I you know like for a while there I was like, oh, cigarettes after sex have a really cool vibe and so I would like I wouldn't call it an influence, but I'd be like be chill like that. But to answer your question, I don't think it's ever really an intentional thing to write a song like any other artist.
Speaker 1:Let's go ahead and get onto the other ones, cause I know I don't want to keep you too late on this one, but one of the things I had never heard of but I was so taken back by and enjoyed and then like just sat there thinking about it for a long time was Hedwig and the Angry Inch. Um, it's a incredible movie. I think there's so much to take from it, and the more and more I've sat with it, I think, the more and more I've like appreciated so many different elements of it. But talk to me, why is it on your pop five and why was it so influential for you?
Speaker 3:I don't know it's. It's funny now that I'm telling all these, you know, talking about it. It seems like at this pivotal moment in my life was around the age of 15, so much like uh. But yeah, so I think you know, me and my the same friend were in a blockbuster in the year 1800, um, but we were, you know, back then it was kind of like browsing the netflix queue, but you're doing it physically, and that was just a movie that I saw sitting on a shelf and this is at the time we were super into film, we thought we were going to be filmmakers. We were really pretentious and you know, you look for, like you know, maybe something that's not you know as popular and go to the indie section.
Speaker 3:I remember, like looking at that and just thought it looked really weird and cool and didn't know what to expect at all and when we turned it on, like I mean I didn't corny as hell, it's just like the most beautiful way I've ever heard put love before.
Speaker 3:Like you know, essentially he's describing something from the Plato Symposium to describe love, which is about, you know, there are three types of people the children of the sun and the moon and the earth, and it's essentially like all the genders that are among us and how we're always looking for our other half to put ourselves back together. It's really, I think it could be like a three hour conversation, but on top of that it's just like the music is incredible. Like I'm not really a huge musical fan, like I don't get into show tunes, but like I've owned four copies of that soundtrack and it's just also visually it's just incredible color palettes and the way that tells stories, kind of surreal. And I think just over the years I've just constantly gone back to it and for many, many, many years I would say it was my favorite movie so like I don't know.
Speaker 3:It's rewatchable and I think there's a lot to learn from it about acceptance and about love and about, like you know, what we expect from love, and yeah, I don't know.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I'm trying to put myself in the mind of a 15 year old saying this right, I'm curious like, was it at all like abrasive or shocking? I I don't know what other films you were kind of watching at this time, but I'm imagining just myself at 15. And I think, like seeing this, I would have been like this is just not an Adam Sandler movie, you know or something like that.
Speaker 3:Yeah, it was. It was strange because, like, um, also, you know, I come from Kentucky, not like a small town per se, but not really a Metro either. At this point in in time, people weren't really as open about sexuality uh, especially not in my hometown. I didn't even know, like, uh, anybody that was gay. And so, as I'm watching this, uh, I'm like, oh, am I? Am I allowed to watch this? Yeah, I'm allowed to think these things, am I allowed to like partake in this, hearing this story and I don't know. It's just like I remember for a while feeling kind of weird and like weirdly, like ashamed about it, like I can't tell people I like this, you know, very iconic queer movie when I was, uh, you know, a teenager. But now fuck it, yeah yeah one of my favorite movies ever.
Speaker 3:Yeah, but I think also just not being exposed to that was. I mean, it's very eye Like yeah, absolutely I was.
Speaker 1:I was taken back in in even now in in 2023, in some ways, just again some of it not knowing what to expect, you know. But, um, that it it's. It's loud in in every way, like right at the beginning, in terms of just like being honest and vulnerable with who these characters are and what their story is. One of the things that I think for the audience just to kind of explain, it's a story about a woman going through a lot in East Berlin when the wall is still up, and going through a botched sex change operation, which is what alludes to the angry inch that is in the title, and you're following the story through music and falling in love and storytelling and really the core being about finding your other half, so to speak, and being so driven by that and it's heartbreaking and it's funny and it's like rock and roll, in the sense that it's like energizing and exciting and you kind of follow the whole roller coaster of this life. And yeah, like I said, when it immediately finished playing, I stopped it and I was like I'm not sure how I feel about that. There were moments that I felt good and moments where I felt very uncomfortable and moments that I felt excited.
Speaker 1:But then I think, the more and more I've sat about it and thought about the relationships more, and just like the heartache that can come from being in those various different traumatic situations, Like it's such a beautiful character that you follow and I think there's a line in there that when I was researching after the fact it's told from the story of the soldier that brought her back to america, and like the line is like to be free, one must give up a little part of oneself. But then I also was reading that in the stage play version of it she repeats that to her husband later as like a way to be, like no, no, you need to be in the back and let me be the star of the show. And just like the heartbreak of like your traumatic experiences can lead you to live life and treat people in a similar way. Like there's just so much of it that I was just like, uh, loved after the fact and but it's soaked in melancholy.
Speaker 3:Oh yeah, and I think, uh, uh. I mean, there's clearly some weird part of my personality that is just consistently soaked in melancholy. I don't consider myself a sad person. I'm goofy as all hell, but I think like kind of more. I guess sad boy shit is what they call it now. It's always been very romantic to me yeah, absolutely I'm the same way.
Speaker 1:I think, uh, you know, a sad song somehow makes you feel happy. You know, uh, just like, sitting in that feeling feels good, it feels good to feel. I think, yeah, do you have any favorite uh moments or tunes, or like, when you think about it, what's like kind of the first scene that comes to your mind?
Speaker 3:uh, I mean it's like the song the origin of love is the, uh, the standout moment of that movie. It's just uh, I mean it essentially explains the whole idea. I mean in the title, the origin of love, um, and I just think it has some really great lyrics, um, and the way it's performed. If you haven't seen the movie, they perform all their shows at these seafood restaurants.
Speaker 1:Yeah, their tour is at different iterations of the same seafood restaurant in every different city.
Speaker 3:It's a chain called Village Waters and essentially they're playing right next to her former lover's much more successful band. So if he's playing the stadium next door to the village waters, like you know, I don't know it's it's really hard to like describe on audio, but like, I think, just like john cameron mitchell period, the actor who plays hedwig, it's just when, when he's on screen he's like magnetic Delivery line delivery movements, it's just. I think just the character itself is just. I don't know, I'm just, it's captivating.
Speaker 1:Absolutely. I was thinking about too. I don't know if you guys had this experience when you were first starting out, though Performing at the Bilge Waters was a little hit, too close to home for me when I was thinking back of my early tour days and those sad green rooms and two people that are there trying to eat their food but you're just trying to play rock and roll Like that felt a little too close to home yeah, I, you know, even at the height of our popularity we played some places like that.
Speaker 3:Um, I feel like that, never really, you never really lose that unless you hit a certain threshold of popularity. Yeah, but uh, yeah, I think you know there's scenes where they're all crammed in one hotel room, stuff like that that. I think maybe that's also part of why I love it so much, because it is kind of like a lot of the culture of being in a band and the sacrifices of being in a band and kind of kind of ripping of your soul and I don't know. It's just. I think there's so much of me in that movie. It's like and I think it was, you know, I saw it as such a pivotal age.
Speaker 1:You're talking about the soul in songwriting. I think one of the things also about watching them perform in those various different restaurants was from the outside if you haven't done it, it can be easy to look on that and feel like how sad. You know, these people are playing for nobody, you know. But I think, like what I was thinking about, of just like remembering like how beautiful it was that they were giving it their fucking all.
Speaker 3:Every show, the drummer is playing his heart out, everyone is performing at level 10, regardless, you know, of where they were, and I thought that was just so aspirational, um, and just like showed the care and love that they had for what they were doing, too, for sure I think that you know you really shoot yourself in the foot if you go to play a show and there's like two people there and you act like you're cooler than that and you're like, well, fucking, nobody's here so I'm going to turn around and do a half-assed performance. It's like you packed your gear up, you drug it on stage. You might as well have a good time.
Speaker 1:Yeah, probably drove hours and slept in the bus to be there, you know.
Speaker 3:Yeah, you know, I always said make it a good practice. Yeah, just like, let's just do it, let's practice the show for the next night.
Speaker 1:you know, yeah, mentioned seeing yourself so much in the movie. What aspects do you think like, either still resonate, or was it aspects of your past that you may be resonated with? Where do you see yourself most? In either the characters or in that film?
Speaker 3:I feel like the character Tommy Gnosis, who is kind of like a simple sheltered, small-town boy who is really drawn to Hedwig because of the music she makes, is really appealing to him and the song she writes inspires him and he's kind of naive and like an aw shucks kind of guy and I feel like that was me at that point in my life. Oh yeah, Cause he's also very, very raised in a very Christian, you know, household and that was also me. And so I feel like where I probably was Tommy Gnosis, in some ways I was. You know, I was that sheltered kid who did become, for all intents and purposes, a quasi rockstar. So that was me. But I also always wanted to be somebody like Hedwig, like a Bowie figure, a Lou Reed figure. You're just this incredible character that nothing can tear you down. Essentially is what she's saying in that song try and tear me down. So I feel like it's the duality of that which is just compelling to me and I feel like we all have that duality in us.
Speaker 1:You know like who we are and who we'd prefer to be is that the whole time she's talking about the finding your other half. There's many different ways to interpret the ending, but I like to believe that like it was like the combination and recognizing the duality of who you are, um, and except accepting that and like sometimes you can be your other half, just recognizing your other half, you know, and I think like that's also just a beautiful way to embrace the duality that exists. Yeah.
Speaker 3:I don't really have a clear read on the ending of that movie. Yeah, I've seen it a dozen plus times and there's something about that movie and other movies where my brain turns off the last third, like what my memories do, and so I'm like, oh, I love that movie. And then you think about the ending and you're you're like, oh, I always figured about that part. Yeah, like I'm on the ride of the rest of the movie that, oh, yeah, when it's this really abstract, essentially like a 15 minute meltdown through through song, it's like my brain just goes oh, oh, yeah, that's right, this movie ends somewhere, but yeah, I mean I guess I always just, you know, kind of assumed for me the ending was that she accepted, uh, she became her own other half. Essentially is what I always thought Like you don't really need somebody, you just need yourself and be open to loving yourself as well no, she actually just died in the car crash and it's a fever dream at the end, you know.
Speaker 1:But yeah, I think it's very beautiful that it ends on like being reborn, the naked, walking up the alley to origin of love, which has been that through line throughout the entire film, and it's just like. It's beautiful. I like I said, the more and more I've sat with it and thought about it, I'm just like appreciating it more and more even though at first I was like whoa, yeah, I mean, if you do an elevator pitch, it's going to be an off-putting pitch.
Speaker 1:You know Awesome. Well, in a similar vein you know, in terms of just like the various different abstract feelings and characters you had a book on here Stranger in a Strange Land. Tell me about that book. Didn't have a chance to read that one in the time that we talked to now, but, yeah, I'm curious to hear about why it was so impactful for you.
Speaker 3:It's just a really cool story and I feel like also just the characters are super relatable just from my background. Essentially the short version is that they are sending people to Mars to colonize it very early on and they put a bunch of married couples on there so they can kind of populate Mars. Something goes wrong and they lose contact over the years and when they go back to rescue them, nobody survived except for one child that was born there and he was raised by Martians and so they decide that well, he's a product, you know, he's property of the US. So we kind of bring him back and essentially like it's just about this grown man who's only been raised by Martians and only knows of Martian ideas and assimilating kind of fish out of water into earth. And that sounds really silly because when you think of Martians they get a little green man, but these are more like philosophical beings. So yeah, I feel like that's probably what was.
Speaker 3:The big important factor for me is the philosophy of the book. I think a lot of science fiction is just like it's a front to just get across ideas. If you ever read much sci-fi, it's not the best written stuff. A lot of the language is really corny. It doesn't really age super well either and I feel like this book probably hasn't aged well.
Speaker 3:It was a really influential book for hippies Because it's a lot of peace, love, compassion, understanding, acceptance. It's a lot of that, yeah, in the face of adversity from like your government, yeah. So, but I think just the main character, who is the stranger in a strange land, michael valentine smith, is just a really you see his art from this kind of like embryonic martian who doesn't know nothing you know, I don't know nothing about anything and just kind of this wide-eyed toddler idea of like you know, why do people do this? Why is this the way that? And becoming this like, he essentially becomes like a christ-like figure with a huge following, and it's not in some kind of dark david koresh way, it's like this very giving but still kind of creepy way. Honestly, it's just a really, really fascinating character study, an incredible cast of characters, yeah, and yeah, I probably you probably need more in a couple days to get through it.
Speaker 1:Yeah um, it's so interesting too because it was written in early 60s and so when you're talking about the hippie ideals, you the research I'm seeing that the book was pulled out of schools because of the free love, commune living aspects and associations potentially with Charles Manson and just the different things over time, especially in terms of how that book kept getting received. I think it's interesting when you're talking about the author, who's probably writing about different ideas and things and his observation of the world, but from a viewpoint of someone who is observing it for the first time and can have a why do you do things this way type of mentality, and so just hearing about these different ideas is really cool. I'm curious what has stuck with you, or what are some of the things that you think you appreciated the most and how has any of it stayed with you?
Speaker 3:One of the hooks of the book is the phrase thou art God. Essentially it's like a greeting like thou art God, like you are love, you are God, we're all God. So not your Christian God or anything like that, but just the idea of God, something you know all encompassing, and I've always just really appreciated that sentimentality. I'm trying to think that that once you kind of all put each other as like the pinnacle of love, we can truly love each other.
Speaker 3:I think it's that kind of kindergarten attitude towards love and acceptance that is so appealing to me. Granted, life isn't that easy. There's a lot of really tough gray areas, but it's just all like that. They offer water to each other and it's a really beautiful thing, Because on Mars there wasn't a lot of water.
Speaker 1:So, yeah, I saw, I read a little clip of it and it was like water brother or something like that, being so scarce, that like it means so much when someone gives you water yes, awesome, that's beautiful and I'm excited to go and read it now In that book. I'm curious you mentioned like both with Tommy Nose's character and the attraction towards the raw personality that comes with Hedwig and, I think, being drawn to potentially some of the outsider feelings of this character here. What do you think it was that was so attractive about these various characters to you?
Speaker 3:I think there probably is some yeah through line to all this stuff. I was a very shy child and I had a speech impediment, um a lisp, and so through that I didn't really want to speak up very often, and when I did it was very quiet, and so I feel like I spent a lot of my adolescence kind of more observing, uh, rather than acting. So I guess maybe I just relate to characters that have been kind of off to the side, sure, yeah, and so I guess in a lot of ways maybe I just can empathize.
Speaker 1:Yeah, well, this is still on theme, with that Moving into your next one here, which is Freaks and Geeks, a beloved show created by Paul Feig and Judd Apatow. Tell me about your love for Freaks and Geeks. Beloved show created by Paul Feig and Judd Apatow. Tell me about your love for Freaks and Geeks.
Speaker 3:I had never seen a show like come close to it in terms of what it's like to be like a teenager. You know, I don't even know what was like. Probably in that time like Felicity was popular and Dawson's Creek and things of that nature, like Buffy In that time span of like Friends and Buffy the Vampire Slayer, here's this like single camera show that looks like it's, you know, a movie shot cinematically. It's got. Essentially everybody who became like an incredible comedic actor of today was in the show Seth Rogen and James Franco. I'm drawing a blank, jason.
Speaker 1:Segel, jason Segel, jason Segel.
Speaker 3:Linda Cardellini, linda Cardellini, busy Phillips, who had a run on that show. I never watched Cougar Town or something, yeah, but yeah, I feel like it's set in 1980. I feel like the main character is a freshman and he hasn't gone through puberty yet and, very similar to me I hit puberty super late. So I feel like for me at that time it was just the perfect. And also it showed you how the other half kind of live as well the freaks part, the tough kids. It showed kind of the layers of their personality. You can be a geek, but you can also still be, you know, cool, and if you're a freak you probably have these issues over here, but you're also nice and endearing and you have all these other qualities. And then the same thing with, like, the preppy people. I guess it really just kind of broke molds for me and it was also just really interesting and funny and sad and really intense storylines and definitely got canceled way too soon.
Speaker 1:Yeah, absolutely, and I think everyone feels that way. Now, in hindsight, you know it's awesome that you were able to catch it when it was at its at its prime. You know, when it was live, uh, cause not a lot of people did, which is kind of why it got canceled, but you hit on a lot and I think one of the things that is uh, I went back and re-watched a couple episodes before we had our chat and the capturing, that true teenage experience is so, uh, so impactful because, like you mentioned, everyone is a caricature in high school tv shows. If you are a cheerleader, you are the cheerleader archetype and that is it and I love that.
Speaker 1:It captured the nuance and people in this, like the bully isn't just the bully, they even explore like why he bullies towards the end of these you know storylines and James Franco character at the end, you know, starts to embrace who he has been this freak this whole time but it breaks the geeky elements and realize he maybe had found his people towards the end of it. And just the exploration of just the nuance of what goes behind people and the loaded things that come with just growing up and, like we talked about earlier, the duality of life and personality and your front versus your inside self. And yeah, it's so beautiful, but captured in a way that's fun and reminds you what it's like to be youthful and make mistakes and have crushes and do all of the teenage living experiences, but have the realness in it as well was aired it's.
Speaker 3:What sucked is that I don't even feel like they aired the entire season or I didn't see it. So I had to wait for years for a box set to come out on dvd and I remember it kind of being a holy grail to me and at the time it was probably like 80 bucks and I was probably 17 17, but I think I got it for a birthday or something, um, and I just remember, you know it, feeling like the most cherished possession I own and going through it. But now it's like somebody gave me a DVD box. What do you want me to do with this?
Speaker 1:Oh, it's kind of scary though with things that are going on now where, like, streamers are just pulling stuff off. So like maybe physical media is important now.
Speaker 3:No, I mean, you're not wrong, i've've. You know. My wife wonders why I buy physical movies like um, like I'll buy it and not watch it. But I do that because, like, I'm a huge fan of the halloween franchise oh awesome the entire franchise like not not two or three of them but all of them daniel's in your company.
Speaker 1:He loves those movies too, too.
Speaker 3:Yeah, like John Carpenter grew up I mean he had part of his like. He lived for a while in my hometown, bowling Green. So when you're watching those movies, the streets he named stuff after, and like even the hospital itself, Smith's Grove is like a subdivision outside of Bowling Green. So it's like, oh cool, that just jumpstarted my interest in it. And then, over time, of course, I just fell in love with the, the lore and the multiverse, uh aspect of it, how you can watch it so many different ways. And anyway, all that to say, I went and saw um, the most recent one when it came out, halloween ends. Wasn't a huge fan, but it didn't really matter. Yeah, I bought it immediately. I've never watched it, it's, but I remember why I brought this up. It's because every year for Halloween I'd go to try to find those movies and they were always taken off streaming and they were like charging six bucks.
Speaker 1:You have to rent or buy.
Speaker 3:Yes, and I was like, fuck this, I'm just going to buy all of them, so, yeah. So now, yeah, I own them all. I own them all on 4K and you know you can only kind of you only kind of want to watch them once a year. But that's why I buy now, because you know, home Alone comes around Christmas time. Yeah, I'll be taken off streaming or you have to buy Disney Plus or something like that. Yeah, the things you love, I would say, go ahead and buy, because they might go out of print too and the rights might go away. Like Dogma, for instance oh, yeah, you can't stream that movie anywhere and you can't buy it anywhere. Yeah, so it's like you can thank Harvey Weinstein for that and, like you know, he's in prison, so he's not going to be like renewing his like contract with Kevin Smith anytime soon.
Speaker 1:Right, so buy on track with Kevin Smith anytime soon, right, so buy the movies you love, yeah, even if it's just to know you have it. That's when it feels good, like you, just like I know it's on the shelf, so I'm good.
Speaker 2:I think another troubling aspect to all of that, uh, the, the streaming and the physical media, is like I remember it being brought to my attention. I'm a big Star Wars fan, or at least of like the, the core kind of like six movies. I remember it being brought to my attention I'm a big Star Wars fan, or at least of the core six movies. I remember it being brought to my attention that all of the edits that George Lucas made over time and there's new special editions there's nowhere that you could legally buy or rent or watch at all any of the like original theatrical cuts of these movies. So like you have to go out and find like a vhs or maybe even like I think some dvds have like some of the original theatrical cuts, so like they can. Uh, you know the, the owner of this media can just kind of like change it and then it can never really be experienced in like its original form from then on out. You know yeah, um yeah I've seen.
Speaker 3:You know when I had to re-watch all the star wars leading up to the last one uh, what's that called rise of the skywalker it did suck to watch. You know, those special editions, man, like um. Now they're just so glaringly out of place. I feel like I saw them all in 97 when they came out and I was blown away. I was like, oh yeah, this is great. There's like computer generated stuff all over the screen. Now, when you watch it now, it just takes out like a sore thumb.
Speaker 1:Well, because they do so much practical effects that when they throw in that like rough 97 CGI, it's very apparent in our 2023 lens by the things you love. Yes, before we leave, freaks and geeks. I was curious, um, were there any specific characters in the show that you felt you resonated, resonated most with? I know you mentioned the like pure puberty aspect of the sam character. Was there, uh, maybe parts from different characters that you felt you most related to? What was your experience when you watched it back then?
Speaker 3:for sure, yeah, lindsey weir, who's linda cartolini's character, I feel like I was probably most of like her. There were aspects of me that were like sam, her brother, um, but I was never really into dnd and I never really had this obsessive like. I feel like him and all of his friends have this obsessive kind of like interest in like three things. You know, it's like Steve Martin movies, d&d and girls maybe. And I feel like my friends and I we had this wide palette. You know, yeah, we played football, we ran cross country, we liked rock music, we dated, you know.
Speaker 3:So, like those characters are more limited, like we. We were, we were sociable, we didn't have like a click, we weren't popular. We also weren't, you know, I guess, geeks but um, so, but lindsey weir is kind of like the stem cell of that whole show. She's a little bit of everything. She was a good student who's kind of rebelling and is, I guess her grandfather dies and she kind of realizes that life is fleeting and it's kind of bullshit and you shouldn't, like you know, spend all your time studying and that's how she gets introduced to the freaks and um, yeah, so I'm definitely probably like lindsey weir, but, uh, also I think, daniel who's, james franco's character. You know, everybody's got a little bit of that trashy uh moody guy in them. Yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I definitely saw myself a lot in Lindsay's character, but also Nick, the Jason Segel character, just like uh, I've had a lot of just that like jealousy or like very much like letting a romantic relationship dictate my personality in some ways. You know, like I ashamedly felt a lot of him too, but I shouldn't say ashamedly because, like we talked about the true teenage experience. They really captured what it's like to be a kid Cool. Well, let's go ahead and get into your last one here. Youtube. It is full of anything and everything you want to see and not see. But tell me about your intro to YouTube and why it was so impactful for you.
Speaker 3:In 2005, 2006,. My friends and I we'd always make little short movies and we shared them amongst ourselves. But beyond that, that was really it. We were constantly looking for a place to upload them and it didn't exist. Fast forward like a year later, saw YouTube Didn't upload any movies, way beyond that.
Speaker 3:But I remember at one point just being over a friend's house Cause I think by the time YouTube came out we were like almost 20. Um, and just like watching a never ending slew of just content and just being sitting there and being Friday night and like there's like vodka is pouring and like girls are coming over and everybody's excited to go out and pursue the evening and I'm just like stuck there, like all right, what's the next video? I remember he would come in and say like I'm not going to fucking sit around and watch YouTube all night again, but like it was incredible to me because it wasn't just like I'm not just watching David after dentist, I'm like I'm watching. If I can think of any type of subject, I'm going to listen to somebody talk about it and now, people are so incredible at editing.
Speaker 3:Now. I love video essays. I like how you can curate your own interests. If I only want to see some guy talk about rebuilding old 18th century bicycles, I can do that. You know. Whatever, yeah, and that's just something I pull out of my ass, but you know. But it's also it's become a really important tool for me. Like everything like recording music, I learned via YouTube. Video editing I learned via YouTube. I have a bachelor's degree and I definitely like got more use out of my YouTube subscriptions than I have, you know, going to college for four years, which is very interesting.
Speaker 1:Yeah, no, even even even musically, like you said, the things you learned recording wise or editing wise, but like even as a player, you know, I think, like just even being able having the access to watch some of the greats play or some of my favorite bands, like I maybe I lived in Albuquerque, new Mexico. Those rare bands were coming through there, but when I could start to see clips of live shows and see some of my favorite people play, like it just untapped a new level for me, like going to a live show would, but I never had access where I grew up, you know. So it also just gave access to so much that you never knew was possible.
Speaker 3:Yeah, um, and also I mean I don't know how old you are, but when I was growing up, MTV was still a thing and I remember like laying around all summer and just waiting for a video to play, like just sitting there and sitting through like you know eight Sheryl Crow songs, like you know just stuff that was not as interesting, like a lot of like I think boy bands are really popular at times you have to sift through like a lot of junk and then finally you'd see something you actually want. But on youtube it was like you know what, now I can go back and watch those. Most of them are in 4k now they've been re-scanned all those old videos and like can you imagine being that young and just having that? Like, okay, cool, let's watch a pavement video. Now let's watch you know whatever. So I think YouTube kind of killed in TV, but yeah, Look, man, you got a bit too comfortable with me.
Speaker 1:man, I shared my uncomfortable Sheryl Crow story and you brought it back to throw it back in my face.
Speaker 3:I'm just messing with you. She's good, I think. I think, like so many people have just straight up ripped her off over the years. Um bethany costantino just released an album and it just sounds like straight up cheryl crow.
Speaker 1:Yeah, are you hip to Soccer Mommy at all, you know like.
Speaker 3:I'm not, but I think she's from here, I think she's from Nashville.
Speaker 1:Oh, cool yeah.
Speaker 3:I get her and Snail Mail confused.
Speaker 1:Oh yes, so similar. I mean, there's so many of those artists kind of doing a lot of the same thing too, but she actually just like cover of a Sheryl Crow song and Sheryl Crow like tweeted it out and I've seeing that in my twitter feed and stuff for a while.
Speaker 3:But yeah, nice. Do you have a favorite cheryl crow song?
Speaker 1:oh gosh, no, I mean this was like eight-year-old ryan. That was like probably crying to first cut is the deepest or something like that. But, um, I really like like the lively, soak up the sun kind of stuff you know like, uh, it's like cool to listen to when you're driving to the beach or something, uh, but I don't think I go back and listen to her very often. Oh, um, makes you happy, I think. Is another like emotional one.
Speaker 3:I was gonna say that was the huge hit when, um, I was growing up. Yeah, she was massive when I was, when I was like 10 or 11 this is a pre-soak up the era. That was kind of like her just embracing pure pop.
Speaker 1:Yeah Well, what was the? Do you still have the same relationship to YouTube? Do you think you're still accessing it as much? Is it still like something you're probably watching?
Speaker 3:the most. Yeah, you know, it's, I would say, mostly daily. A lot of times it's background noise, all my subscriptions and they just, you know like when I was making this most recent album it was just on the background all the time, you know, muted. And I also use it for work and to access new functions of software that I don't quite understand, and use YouTube to build my PC. You know, just take a phone apart. It's just this incredible tool and it's kind of like, it's kind of magical that we even have access to it for free, you know it's like it's kind of become this like hive mind, Absolutely Well, we'll get you out of here.
Speaker 1:Before we do, though, we do have five quick, rapid fire questions that we ask everyone here at the end. Before we get to those questions, though, one of the things I just wanted to share with you that I think was like super impactful for me and I don't even remember where I saw it anymore. I'm positive it was you, though you were talking about, whether it was on a post or something, or maybe I heard you on another podcast or something. Somewhere. You were talking about your transition out of music, and you started working in corporate graphic design for a while, and you were talking about, like being able to like write a resume and try to think back on.
Speaker 1:Well, when I looked back at my career, like, managing a band included so much planning, so much like project management competencies, so much promotion and marketing and all this stuff that came into it, and it like allowed you to be able to write and include all this stuff on a resume, because, like, there are so much transferable skills in art, and I think there's so much of that now, I think, when we're talking about musicians and content creators, who are now really good video editors and really good at crafting story and doing copywriting, potentially for all their posts that they're having to write, and I was curious if you could speak on that a little bit about, like, how much your artistic career has translated into your corporate life.
Speaker 3:Oh, 100%. Yeah, I mean, you've seen the movie Slumdog Millionaire, love it, love it, okay. You know how he's like. Every answer to every question is based on some memory of his life. Yes, the exact same thing with my career. You go, oh okay, well, okay, well, oh well. So I'm in marketing now, so it's like, oh well, you probably shouldn't post at this time because people are at work and they don't really give a shit and it's.
Speaker 1:And then you know, like you, you figure out what merch designs are most appealing to people and invoices, and all that you know being in a band is just being a small business, small business yeah like you know it all transferred over yeah, yeah, I I find it so much today like I even like I did a lot of teaching um, where I I was, I grew up and went to music school, played jazz, drums and stuff, and I did a lot of teaching and taught like school band and um stuff like that, and taught drum lines and things like that when I was growing up, easily transitioned into management, because it's just like when you're having to teach a concept, teaching people how to do a business process or how to work with people and coach them and develop them, like transfer so fast just from like having music experiences there, yeah, so I just I remember hearing that at the time when I was transitioning out of doing music full-time and also working in the in the workforce and just like hit me right at the right moment and so, uh, yeah, it was super impactful for me and so, uh, thank you for kind of sharing that too.
Speaker 1:Yeah man.
Speaker 3:I mean I'm glad because you know, a lot of people really put a lot of um. You know, if I don't make it in music, then my dreams are dead. When that's not true at all, I think a lot of times people pursue music for the wrong reasons and pursuing something else can give you it, can help you refine why you love music so much, and that's what's happened to me. Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 1:Well, we're happy for it, for both elements, as you're still creating as well. But last rapid fire questions for you before you go. Tonyony, if you had to choose to be on a reality tv show, which one would you choose?
Speaker 3:either present or pass I'm the ones I watch. Wouldn't make sense for me, like I watch teen mom you'd be a boyfriend on teen mom yeah okay, um, okay, no, um okay well wait, I got okay the real world, uh real world's a good one.
Speaker 1:You're just living life at that point and there's some cameras on yes, just hanging out Free alcohol, love it. If people have never consumed any of your pop five, what's the one that you'd want them to go experience right now? Oh, do a little all the way Awesome. Tell me the first thing that comes to mind when I say favorite onstage moment or performance.
Speaker 3:One time I, uh, I went down to the front of the crowd. You know where the barriers are um, I went down there just to like, I guess, put a microphone in somebody's face. It was. We had the song called um, be my monster on celebration and it has like a a crowd interact part where you just kind of do this whoa sound. So even if you don't know our music, you can just kind of like, you know whoa, whatever. Um, so I went down there to do that and they grabbed me and they just pulled me over and surfed me from the back to the front. I was like, oh shit, this is what I'm doing, that's. So here I go, you know, in, like you know, you're just soaking like all in that moment. Everything goes out the window. You don't care about know, you're just soaking like all in that moment. Everything goes out the window. You don't care about comfort anymore, you're just trying to be safe. And it's just so surreal, just like a, an ocean of hands.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 3:In every crevice of your mind.
Speaker 1:That's awesome, though I mean, that's rockstar moment, you know.
Speaker 3:Well, yeah, I mean like I I'd done it a few times like intentionally, but that time it was like almost like the universe sucking me in, yeah that's so cool.
Speaker 1:If you knew that. Uh, the performance you were about to go do was your last one. What are you closing with the last song that you're playing of yours?
Speaker 3:I mean, well, it's kind of unfair, but, um, the title track off my new album is kind of like my final word on, not only like my last song, but also, if it were my last breath, sort of Okay. So it'd probably be that Cause I feel like this album that I'm about to put out it was kind of a written from the perspective of like what if this is the last time I do this?
Speaker 3:or what if this is the last chance I get to say what I want to say, and so everything I I tried to wrap it up in about 40 minutes. Yeah, and probably yeah, the title track Doll Me Up.
Speaker 1:Doll Me Up. Wow, well, I'm excited to hear it. Doll Me Up. Doll Me Up. Sorry, doll Me Up, I'm excited to hear it. Awesome. Okay, and last one here what habit or quality do you think has contributed most to your success?
Speaker 3:Stubbornness, yeah, yeah, stubbornness, yeah, yeah, just being stubborn, and so many times when you probably shouldn't continue, yeah, you just, you just do. I remember like there's so many times where I was like all right, I'm done, and then the next thing you know you're, you're back in it, yep, so, um, I don't know. I guess if something, if you're drawn to something, there's probably a reason and I don't know. There were many times starting out when I was like 15, 16, where I sucked really bad and if I had stopped because somebody told me I sucked because I did, um, that would have been, I would have missed out on so many great things. Yeah, like, saw the whole country like five times. Um, I appeared on the in the ed sull Sullivan Theater where the Beatles played.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you played on David Letterman.
Speaker 3:Yeah, yeah and so, and shared the stages with people that I was into when I was a teenager. And, like you know, you're in these moments where you're opening for Weezer in Rivers Cuomo, I was just hanging out dribbling a soccer ball, you know, next to the stage. Yeah, if somebody told me when I was 16, like, hey, you're never going to make it, and I'd be like, oh, you're fucking right. All right, that would have been awful, but I was just, you know, naive and stubborn, and I guess that's just how I've always been and I'm going to continue to be.
Speaker 1:Awesome. Yeah Well, thank you so much, man. We'll get you out of here. Everyone, please go listen to all of his tunes. But uh, more importantly, uh, day drinking is out now. Um, you could find that tony boy t-o-n-y-b-o-y-y on your streaming platforms. Also, go back listen to sleeper agent. Both of those records are incredible. Uh, listen to team t-e-e-m. War paint is one of my favorite songs that you've ever done. But please go listen to all these tunes. If they want to keep up with what you're doing, where can they follow you, tony?
Speaker 3:I feel like I'm most active on Instagram, which is at Tonyboy underscore, and that's with the two Y's. Yeah, probably Instagram, awesome, that's where you found me.
Speaker 1:Yep, well, I'm so excited, man. I've been a fan for years and just so thankful for you doing this, so we're so thankful for your time. Oh, thank you. This has been great, awesome, thanks. That'll do it for today's show. Thank you so much for listening. I want to send you out with one more great song by Tony Boy. It's certainly one of my favorites on their latest record. This song is called Get Lost lost. As a reminder, please follow, share and listen to all of Tony's music and find links to his work in the episode description. If you want to purchase the vinyl and CD for Doll Me Up, you can do so again at noirincolorcreativecom. That's N-O-I-R-I-N-C-O-L-O-R. Creativecom. We'll see you next time, but until then, what's your problem?
Speaker 2:Six without I'll never let you down, your words didn't over, and we're still around.
Speaker 3:I just wanna get lost. I just wanna get lost. I just wanna get lost. I just wanna get lost. Don't you ever write down on me, and I feel the weight of your anger From a history you once escaped.
