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Show Notes
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2025 Rock’n Roll Hall of Fame –
Inductees – https://rockhall.com/2025-inductees/
Cyndi Lauper and Friends: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=crp4xZzOoDQ
Wu-Tang: An American Saga – https://www.imdb.com/title/tt9113406
The Last Great Comedy – The Other Guys
Director – Adam McKay
Writers – Adam Mckay, Chris Henchy
Wiki | IMDB | Rotten Tomatoes
Death of the mid-budget comedy
“There are many differing definitions of what exactly a “mid-budget” film is. Generally, it’s a movie that lies in the space between an art house indie flick and big-budget thriller, something like a “Home Alone” or a “Shawshank Redemption.” Some say they cost between $5 million and $75 million, others would say between $15 million to $60 million.” {article}.
Running Gags – Reddit Thread
Summary
In this engaging conversation, Vince Marotte and The J-Man discuss various topics ranging from the arrival of spring and personal experiences with bee stings to the latest Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductees. They delve into the concept of classic rock and its generational significance, explore the impact of music on culture, and highlight the artistry of Cyndi Lauper. The discussion culminates with a nostalgic look at the Wu-Tang Clan and their influence on the music industry. In this conversation, Vince Marotte and The J-Man delve into the cultural significance of the Wu-Tang Clan’s portrayal in the series ‘Wu-Tang: An American Saga’, discussing its impact on hip-hop history. They transition into a broader discussion about the decline of mid-budget comedies, particularly focusing on the film ‘The Other Guys’ as a representation of the last great comedy. The conversation highlights the importance of running gags and humor structure in modern comedy, reflecting on how these elements contribute to the overall comedic experience. In this conversation, Vince Marotte and The J-Man explore the evolution of comedy, focusing on the quotability of films, the impact of mockumentaries, and the changing landscape of how we consume humor. They discuss the importance of community in experiencing comedy, the challenges of modern media consumption, and the future of human connection in a digital age. The dialogue emphasizes the need for shared experiences and the role of humor in fostering connections among people.
Takeaways
Spring brings new experiences and challenges, like bee stings.
Bee stings can have different effects as we age.
The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductees reflect a mix of genres and eras.
Classic rock is a genre that evolves with time and audience perception.
Music can create a generational connection between parents and children.
Cyndi Lauper’s artistry deserves recognition beyond her hits.
The Wu-Tang Clan revolutionized the music business model.
Nostalgia plays a significant role in our musical preferences.
Live performances can showcase an artist’s true talent.
The impact of music is often measured by cultural significance rather than just popularity. The Wu-Tang series offers a unique perspective on hip-hop history.
Mid-budget comedies are struggling to find a place in today’s market.
‘The Other Guys’ is considered the last great comedy by many.
Running gags enhance the comedic experience in films.
Cultural humor often fails to translate across different audiences.
The evolution of comedy has shifted towards either blockbuster or stand-up formats.
The decline of mid-budget films is a significant cultural shift.
Comedic films are less quotable and memorable in the streaming era.
The structure of jokes in comedy films is crucial for audience engagement.
The nostalgia for video rental stores reflects a longing for a different entertainment experience. Jim Gaffigan’s humor can become tiring when overused.
Non-sequitur jokes engage the mind and enhance humor.
Spinal Tap and Caddyshack are quotable classics.
Mockumentaries have roots in Spinal Tap’s style.
Community viewing enhances the comedy experience.
Modern media consumption lacks commitment and connection.
Humor is essential for human connection.
The future of comedy may rely on community engagement.
Social media can replace traditional human connections.
The human spirit is resilient and will adapt.
Transcript
Vince Marotte (00:00)
suburban Kings. What’s up? Spring is in the air, which means summer is in the air in Austin.
The J-Man (00:03)
Hey buddy. It is full swing spring.
Yeah, it’s getting there. I mean, it’s right now it’s kind of cloudy and wanting to rain, but we’ll see what happens. But yeah, the temperatures are rising for sure more consistently, but the rain is interrupting things, which we need it. So bring it on.
Vince Marotte (00:24)
Yeah, now we might hit 80 tomorrow in Portland. So, you know, I’ll be out there getting a sunburn. Got my first bee sting in the season last week. I think it’s not riding my bike. I get stung by bees when I ride my bike. And, you know, I’ve probably, you know, I’ve been riding bikes out on the road for going on 38 years. I can count on one hand the amount of times prior to moving to the Pacific Northwest, I’ve been stung by bees. I guess we just have a healthier ecosystem here for bees and.
The J-Man (00:31)
Yeah, buddy. ⁓ dang. What happened? Were you just chilling and walking or? Okay.
Nuh-uh.
Vince Marotte (00:54)
Last year, I even started counting. I got stung seven times last summer, last spring and summer by bees. Most of them in the head. They stick into your helmet and then sting in the head. And then I think I got to do the, I got to figure it out. But I think as I get older, I’m becoming less, my body’s dealing with the bee stings. It doesn’t do as well. Like, you know, last year I got stung in the head twice on the same ride.
The J-Man (01:16)
You
Vince Marotte (01:22)
Went in there, stung me. It feels like you’re getting burned by a hot poker for a second, and then you’re good. And then a second time, same spot, another bee got in there a couple hours later. And then a couple days later, a typical person wouldn’t notice it. They couldn’t see the swelling, because there’s swelling up there. I could feel it, but then it kind of moves down my head, down by my ear.
The J-Man (01:26)
Yeah, yeah.
you
you
Vince Marotte (01:44)
And I could see it as kind of my glasses interacted with the side of my head and the way things were. I’m like, I got swelling. You can see it just kind of moved down. I was weird. I never really had a bee sting bother me, you know, um, more than just the next day, you know, just itchy. then, um, I had one sting sting me in between my toes. was playing volleyball and grass barefoot and one got me right between the toes. And that kind of my foot swell up a little bit the next day on a bike ride. Not enough to where like,
The J-Man (01:51)
dang. Reaction. Yeah.
Dang.
Vince Marotte (02:12)
Like I could tell the difference, but it was just annoying. And then this last week it stung me, like it hit my helmet and then bounced down and its butt hit me like in the arm and stung me there. Um, you know, like, ah, you know, it hurts for a minute, but then like it started swelling. got like a man boob for a day or two. Yeah. Like it swelled down my chest and down my arm. was, was, it was bizarre.
The J-Man (02:31)
Hmm. Well, now you can.
Now you have a little empathy on how I’ve spent the better part of my life, you know, having that. No, I’m just talking about the bamboo part. know, that’s crazy. I guess what are you just like riding through swarms and they’re kind of just sticking or they chasing you down?
Vince Marotte (02:41)
Are you allergic or? wow. yeah. So I had my first man boob. Got to trial it just on one side. Not a fan, you know, one star on that.
Yeah, and then
Well, you tend to
ride out in the country, know, when you’re at where there’s lots of farms and natural stuff, you know, lots of flowers and things like that, you know, and you just there’s just more bees and you’re just moving through air. And it’s like, I mean, he he didn’t hit me. I’m sure he doesn’t view it that way. You know, they probably feel like more like what happened? Something came out and killed my brother, Hank, you know. ⁓ You know, they have a different point of view on it, but.
The J-Man (03:12)
They’re there. They’re there.
Yeah.
Yeah, I mean, the honey bees are that type of bee up in Northwest, I’m sure much more abundant. Down here, we’re dealing with more so those red wasps, those dirt daubers and yellow jackets. When they do, they’ll let you know they’re there. I got hit by one of those last summer. They were going by a porta potty and I call their bluff. When they’re flying around, I just…
Vince Marotte (03:38)
Yeah, you got mud daubers and things like that. They don’t really sting you or… ⁓
Yeah.
Yeah.
The J-Man (03:52)
Whatever. I go
Vince Marotte (03:53)
Yeah.
The J-Man (03:53)
get ready. Porta Potty is already a terrible experience as it is. And then, you know, get hit by a dirt knob around the way end. was like, golly.
Vince Marotte (03:57)
Yeah, just let’s just get in and out.
Awesome. No. Yeah, so bee stings. So I keep track. That’s the first bee sting of the year We’ll see I think I was five I think I was seven last year six of them were on the bike one, you know one playing volleyball at the park So I guess we have a healthy ecosystem out here in the Pacific Northwest. It’s beautiful You know, so now I’m I think I’m have to take a like a like a Benadryl after I get stung by a bee Just to calm things down. I don’t know. Yeah, I don’t know but but there you go. So rock and roll Hall of Fame
The J-Man (04:15)
Dang. Good,
Right.
Jeez.
Vince Marotte (04:32)
You ever watch the show like they do in a duct tape? They big concert, you know? That used to be an event. You used to watch that.
The J-Man (04:39)
Yeah, I was gonna say used to. think I remember maybe back when we were on stuff together, there was one or two I was catching and it’s been a while. It’s been a long while. So I, I don’t know. It’s not really on my radar, but this is awesome. Let’s, I want to hear about it.
Vince Marotte (04:49)
Right.
Right. So rock and roll hall of fame. It’s you know, it’s in cleveland, right? It looks like the lube. It’s like a class pyramid kind of thing ⁓ And i’m trying to look i’m looking on the website for the date of the actual ceremony of the inductees ⁓ For this year, so they they announced the nominees in february and they announced the the inductees this week so, you know, I don’t know how they vote, you know, i’m not gonna go
dig into the details of who gets to vote and that sort of thing. ⁓ But the nominees are on here. you had, it’s kind of a mix of things. It’s a pretty broad spectrum, bad company. So classic rock, the Black Crowes, retro classic rock, kind of just Southern rock. Mariah Carey, pop, Shelby Checker. In his day, that would have been considered rock and roll, kind of pop, Joe Cocker, Poppy Rock, Billy Idol in there.
The J-Man (05:40)
Yeah.
Vince Marotte (05:50)
Surprise he’s not in already that that’s surprise Joy Division slash new order interesting. They’re putting them together It makes sense because our lead man died right near right after the Joy Division album ⁓ you know one of those albums that’s like It’s like the movie Citizen Kane where it’s like it’s important, you know, you should watch it ⁓ But I think it’s overhyped as to how good it is. It’s interesting, you know ⁓ Just simple music, know, maybe the
The J-Man (05:58)
Hmm. Hmm.
Yeah. Yeah.
Vince Marotte (06:18)
I probably piss some people off. talk I don’t talk a bad about Joy Division like I get it Cindy Lauper also surprised she’s not in there Mana there’s like a tilde over the a so I don’t know what Mana, you know not not familiar Oasis interesting Oasis outcast fish
The J-Man (06:23)
Yeah, I hear you. That’s cool. Yeah.
I don’t know. No, no, same. whoa. Okay. That’s cool.
Fish getting a jam band nod. ⁓ man. Soundgarden’s way too far down the list though. That needs to be higher up. True, true. Legacy.
Vince Marotte (06:43)
Soundgarden and the white stripes.
Well, when you think of all these other people, you know, they they broke out. think
their first album would have been 89 or 90. Everyone all these other bands had albums prior to that. Mariah Carey, maybe not. But, you know, and of course, the White Stripes not. all the other ones were around longer. OK, Oasis in 90s. So old and new mix in there, pop and rock. Then the actual winners here, Bad Company, Chubby Checker, Joe Cocker, Cyndi Lauper, Outkast, Soundgarden and the White Stripes will be inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. This
The J-Man (06:54)
Right.
Vince Marotte (07:19)
year, whenever that is. It’s usually a cool show, It’ll be, you know, these bands will be sitting up in the balcony, these groups will be sitting up in the balcony, and different artists will perform their stuff, and that’s always pretty cool, right? Like to see other people perform renditions on their things. But ⁓ what are your take on some of these bands? Obviously Soundgarden you liked.
The J-Man (07:36)
okay. So
yeah, I’m, I’m trying, I’m getting stuck somewhere here with this. So I just remember riding in my dad’s vehicle with them and he would put on the classic rock. so classic rock, you know, even backing up before that, but you know, there’s just a little bit of a disconnect. It was a little bit of like a force feed, like, okay, we’re to put this on. And I like it because my dad likes it. It means something to me because it means something to my dad. There’s context there.
Vince Marotte (08:05)
classic
The J-Man (08:05)
that exists with him.
Vince Marotte (08:06)
rock as a genre.
The J-Man (08:07)
Well, this is what I’m getting to. So as I’m looking at this, I’m feeling probably a little bit like maybe the way my dad felt. Like this means this list of names, I guess first of all, it’s making me feel old. you know, these bands mean something. So if I’m gonna go turn on, which my kids probably have heard a handful of these, because you know, they’ve been in the rotation. Like at what point does this become the classic, quote unquote, the classic rock?
Vince Marotte (08:10)
Okay.
Right.
The J-Man (08:35)
Because like when you go to the radio station, there’s a classic rock channel. But when you go to the alternative radio station, it needs to be classic rock now because they’re playing classic rock, because they’re playing music from when I was in high school. What’s going on here? How did that get stuck like that?
Vince Marotte (08:49)
I see that and I’ve thought that, I’ve thought that. Well, I’ve thought
that and I’ve kind of gone back and forth between the two points of view. One is does the age of it simply make it classic rock, right? So we were calling it classic rock probably by the mid to late 80s, definitely in the 90s. So let’s say 70s and 60s is that era of quote unquote classic rock.
The J-Man (09:07)
rate.
Mm-hmm.
Yup. Yeah.
Vince Marotte (09:18)
And so you’re talking so let’s say 1990 to set, know to 79 to 60 so music that’s 12 years old 15 years old 20 years old. Is that what makes it classic rock and it is rock, you know I would argue that it’s it’s guitar centric Or is it is classic rock a genre and it was the music like disco or it came out during a time period like grunge I don’t
And that’s kind of where I am now. Like if a band came out and sounded like early 90s grunge, I wouldn’t call it grunge because grunge was not only a sound, but a time period. that’s so I don’t want to turn on the classic rock station and hear Pearl Jam. ⁓ To be clear, I don’t want to turn the classic rock station on at all. So that’s where I am, but I get what you’re saying, right?
The J-Man (09:48)
That makes sense.
Yeah, right. Yup.
Yeah.
Vince Marotte (10:15)
It should have been classic rock, but I’m fine with saying, you know, grunge 90s rock, you know, glam rock was a period and and a sound, right? ⁓ You could argue that the darkness who’s playing here in Portland, I think next week, the darkness is glam rock, although, you know, they they’re from the 2010s, you know, ⁓ but I would call that like retro glam rock.
The J-Man (10:18)
These are the classics.
Right? Yeah.
Vince Marotte (10:41)
You know, which is even to say like, you know, we just saw that Black Crows is on there was on the nominees. kind of call them like retro classic rock. You know, they pull it, they have a classic rock sound and look. But you know, their first album dropped in 89.
The J-Man (10:54)
Yeah.
Yeah. I think, I think part of that, yeah, part of that feeling though is like there’s, there’s a point in time, a generation of music that reaches an audience and it stays with them. Then, then the genera, the next generations come around. So that, that time in that context to me is like the classics and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame is like included amongst
Vince Marotte (10:58)
90 was that Shake Your Money Maker great album
The J-Man (11:24)
the important, you know, people who push the needle forward or they push the art, you know, they elevate it, they create something new, they’re breaking the boundaries. So like, I hear what you’re saying, like the classic rock being a genre, which to me, that’s just weird. Like, because they defined, I guess that’s why it’s classic rock. They were the up and comers that really brought rock to the forefront. Rock and roll, yeah.
Vince Marotte (11:29)
Right.
It was rock and roll at the time. Yeah.
Well, that’s the thing. It’s, know, I think I’ve seen, you’ve seen the poster, like the rock, the music family tree, right? It’s chubby. Checker was considered rock and roll. So was Elvis, right? And so, you know, you’re those kinds of guys where they, the early parts of it. So, you know, what do you call that now? You know, it was pop popular, you know, it’s, it’s, it. Yeah.
The J-Man (11:58)
Yeah, yeah, right, yeah, yeah.
Yeah, well, the Foo Fighters are rock and roll to me, you know, like, like
they might be one of the ⁓ torch carriers through the disconnect of rock and roll. They bear, they bared that and carried it to me. Like they’ve really, even though they’re kind of pop around the edges and they’re overplayed, they’re just true rock and roll to me. And so it’s like,
Vince Marotte (12:26)
Yeah.
The J-Man (12:34)
but now they should be included in classic rock because they’re old and you know that that music landed you know in our time when we were up and coming so it’s just weird so i was processing all that whenever this list came up so
Vince Marotte (12:46)
Yeah. Well, it’s classic. At the
end of the day, I think when we had Josh Kempel on, when I was interviewing him, it’s the same thing. doesn’t, the label doesn’t matter. Do you like it? You know, we want to defy labels and it’s kind of one of the reasons behind the, what we do on the podcast here is we want to expose ourselves to all kinds of music and like what we like because we like it, not because it fits into a box. Um, but generally I, you know, I, I fallen aside of classic rock is a sound. is, it is a genre and
in at least in part a period of time when that type of music was being released and anything that sounds like that now like we said like a Black Crows or a like a Greta Van Vliet is like a retro classic classic rock I would say you know where it’s new and they’re just kind of playing an old sound you know and that’s that’s cool you know but yeah so classic rock absolutely yeah yeah just a retro band is what I kind of call them
The J-Man (13:19)
Yeah.
think the black keys have a little bit of a hint of a classic rock. Yeah, yeah,
yeah.
Vince Marotte (13:44)
And even if you ever seen the ⁓ band of horses live, they look, took a picture of them. If I took a picture of them and put it next to a poster of any band from the seventies that was touring, it looked just like them.
The J-Man (13:50)
They looked the part. ⁓ yeah. Yeah.
You just
slip a picture of them in and into the lineup of, you know, one of the festivals back in the day and they’re just there, openers.
Vince Marotte (14:01)
Yeah.
Yeah, so the
aesthetic goes beyond just the sound. It can be the look of it. So I love just the blurring of that. And to your point, I love that our kids have access to everything. Your kids are now in that age where have they ever played something for you that surprised you because it was old music, music from your era or before, and all of a sudden they’ve put this on in the car and you’re like, well, how did you get into that?
The J-Man (14:16)
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah. I think part of it really has to do with it being attached to, you know, their algorithm of videos that come through. So like there was that Linger Cranberries remake by some, you know, emo dude. And that got, they grabbed my phone, I’ll play a song. They put it on. I’m like, this is okay. Linger Cranberries remake, you know, okay, cool. All right. Well, that came back around unexpectedly.
Vince Marotte (14:44)
Right.
Yeah, no, I see that covers have it the other one where I see something similar to that is my You know one of my kids will put on a you know, a hip-hop song that’s utilizing a sample Or a melody and i’ll be like hey I know that sample and after the songs are i’ll go play, you know where the sample came from and it might be 90s 80s music and I think that’s cool. Like it’s it’s kind of fun
The J-Man (15:02)
Yeah.
Yeah, right. Wait a minute.
What’s that one song,
Girls Our Play Is Two? You know, it’s got like that P Diddy and know, B.I.G. ⁓ hypnotize loop. Girls Our Play Is Two. You know, I don’t, that was, that got a lot of airplay and that sample. was like, this isn’t the song. They did it. And I’m sure, you know, B.I.G. and Diddy got that from, you know, some obscure record that they sampled, but.
Vince Marotte (15:36)
⁓ yeah. Yeah.
Well, in, Dochi, her hit, which is just blowing up like every other Tik TOK has the, as the backing track, her anxiety song is Godier. You know, it’s just a straight, just straight backing melody. it’s, it’s, it’s a cover basically with different words and a little bit different sonics. Great song. Yeah. That’s another conversation. Godier, man, that guy came in, dropped an album and then just. Fucked off to space or something. Where’d he go? You know, didn’t care. Yeah. It’s kind of like the president’s United States.
The J-Man (16:00)
Right. Yeah. Yeah. yeah. Yep. Yep.
Yeah, exactly.
Hot. Boom.
disappeared.
Vince Marotte (16:22)
Yeah, no, love it. Love the inductees. Cindy Lauper. Cindy Lauper is someone who deserves a second look by a lot of people. ⁓ If you only know her hits, they’re great. You know, we as we learned under the cover song show, girls just want to have fun is actually a cover. But her music is just there. It’s good music. I don’t care what you like. You can’t ignore Cindy Lauper. She was kind of in that vein. She was kind of the alternative.
The J-Man (16:28)
I agree.
Vince Marotte (16:51)
person’s Madonna at the time you had Madonna, who was like your Taylor Swift at the time and I don’t know where Cindy Lauper is probably more like what the female rapper maybe the dochi of her era where she was just a little.
The J-Man (16:52)
Yep.
Right.
She had
that little bit of punk with her, you know, that look, you know, and that edge. And I’ll tell you, the opening Goonies song with her singing the Goonies song and it’s, you know, ⁓ my gosh, the nostalgia just hits so hard. I mean, when I hear that, man, it just like takes me back. It’s a good feeling. And what’s that slow jam she’s saying? ⁓ Like, Napoleon, yeah, come on. Certified.
Vince Marotte (17:04)
Yeah.
yeah, good enough.
Yeah, yeah, it’s
It is, it’s good. if you
Time after time. Time after time is just absolute, absolute
banger. ⁓ If you get a chance, she did a show some years ago, it’s probably a long time ago, where a lot of people don’t realize she’s a phenomenal musician, right? So she’s a pop star with kind of punk kind of look and aesthetic to her, at least for the time.
The J-Man (17:31)
Yeah
Vince Marotte (17:54)
You kind of forget the fact or didn’t realize that she’s actually a really good musician and can and can sing live I mean you had in in her day. They didn’t have the auto tune and she can she can just kill so she has ⁓ Did a live show in 2007 okay, so we’re talking, you know coming on 20 years now cindy lopper and friends and so ⁓ she’s in atlantic city has a bunch of people coming on. They’re doing her songs
The J-Man (18:04)
Right. Right.
Vince Marotte (18:24)
And you know, it’s it’s contemporaries of the time. So I think Scott Weiland is in there. ⁓ Shaggy is doing stuff, you know, and you get to you get to see how good of a musician she is because there’s no there’s no like, you know, there’s nothing disguising it. It’s not like a big production. It’s just musicians on stage playing. So Cyndi Lauper and friends all link it up. ⁓
The J-Man (18:34)
Mr. Bobarstein.
That’s cool. Well, with that, as
you’re linking it, the thing that I appreciate is the artistry of art. You’re not going to mistake somebody’s art, their expression of their art. A true artist, when you see it, you know it’s theirs. And her voice, I wouldn’t say love it or hate it, because it is kind of nasally. is kind of like, it has like a front end flavor that either you’re going to like or you don’t. But it’s her.
Vince Marotte (19:03)
Yeah.
Yeah.
The J-Man (19:19)
When you hear it, you know it’s her. So that right off the bat is like artistry. then, yeah, so that is something I appreciate about her. And I think that initially people didn’t like was that nasally kind of moiny kind of, I don’t know, I don’t know how to fully explain it, but just her sound, it stayed true. She didn’t sound like other people. Yeah.
Vince Marotte (19:39)
And like, a controlled break. She has a
controlled break in her sound, in her vocal, which is one of my favorite vocal capabilities. When an artist is pushing their voice to a point where it just kind of breaks and cracks, but it’s good. Like they have the ability to push that hard and be able to break there. know, there’s a Mariah Carey where she can hit these just, you know, otherworldly high notes.
without breaking and that’s interesting. But like I love, I love when they could just, when they push so hard that there’s just a little break and it has that edge to it. You know, and Citylopper has that capability. And when you see her live, you know, she has just great vocal control, unbelievable ability to just come up with incredible melodies, you know, like Chris Cornell. So just uncanny. So I’m excited. She definitely deserves it. Soundgarden obviously deserves it.
The J-Man (20:17)
Yeah, yeah.
awesome.
Vince Marotte (20:37)
You know, rest in peace, Chris Cornell. and I did see on the Reddit threads and music, you know, people talking about it whenever this happens, you know, between the nominees and the award winners, people are always a little butthurt and the fish people were butthurt because fish fish didn’t get nominated. And so I went over, know, this is by no means the measure of, of things, but I went over to the, to the Spotify just to see what kind of, what kind of plays is fish getting?
The J-Man (20:52)
I bet.
Vince Marotte (21:06)
their top tracks and their their top track Farmhouse 27 million plays on on Spotify. Almost all of the other acts in the nominee list have at least one track in the billions.
Okay, so it’s a completely different game. it popularity isn’t there the argument
The J-Man (21:27)
Well, it’s because it’s
because the fish is still at their festival playing the same loop in their track live right now in a, you know, DMT induced jam.
Vince Marotte (21:36)
Right, right. that’s, that’s what the jam band people always say. You’ll
listen to a Grateful Dead or a fish or, you know, some things and you’ll be like, you know, and they’re like, well, you got to see them live. And like, that’s fine. That’s fine. But you know, maybe the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame is more about your entire impact, you know, not just, not just your market success as indicated by the plays currently on Spotify and your ability to perform live or otherwise.
The J-Man (21:54)
For sure. Yeah.
The people
watching at the at the fish festival so that’s pretty high level like
Vince Marotte (22:08)
You can
you can get you can get a good look at that by just going to a Dave Matthews or like a Baylor Fleck So you’re going to get better music and you’re still going to get some some patchouli white people with dreads tripping so But yeah, the argument from the fish people was well, they have a cultural impact. You may not know their music, but you know them i’m like, ⁓ You know, I honestly and and maybe i’m a terrible music person I
The J-Man (22:14)
Yeah
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Vince Marotte (22:34)
Don’t know a fish. couldn’t I couldn’t come up with a fish song out of my head I had to go look that doesn’t mean if I heard one I go I know this song. I just don’t know it’s They’re just not they’re not on that level. I’m sure they’ll get inducted eventually, but they just have never had even grateful Did have had a couple hit singles. I will get by Fish has not they’re not they’re just not there. They’re in they are a niche and end Jampan people it’s a niche, you know, you get your own Hall of Fame
The J-Man (22:42)
Yeah.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Vince Marotte (23:03)
So there you go. I’m looking forward to watching that. It’s always cool to see, you know, just those kinds of things where different bands are playing other bands songs and that sort of stuff. I’m looking.
Alright, the Wu Tang. John, what’s your relationship to the Wu?
The J-Man (23:21)
And they were,
they were in the rotation in middle school and in high school for sure. And, you know, also just as they started going into their solo albums, you know, just following along each of their own, each of their own albums and tracks. that, yeah, they were a part of my upbringing. Their CD was in my CD binder or handful of Wu Tang or Wu Tang. Yeah. Yeah.
Vince Marotte (23:46)
36 Chambers, the first drop.
Yeah, everyone’s got that. That’s, know, that’s canon. is, you hip hop canon. We could probably do a show at NPR for, I’ll try it. Maybe I’ll link it up. But NPR did a whole series that lasted a few months where they just went through what happened in hip hop in 1993. So Rock and Roll has 1969. It’s like a special year for Rock and Roll. It’s kind of really when it transitioned from that pop.
You know, where we kind of let go of the Elvis, you know, type of rock and roll and went full like, you know, what we consider classic rock, you know, um, six 1969 is, you know, that year. that same, the equivalent in hip hop is 1993 and 36 chambers was a part of that, although released in 92, you know, it, you know, often an album is the year later is we’re really, when it blows up and that whole year, when you look at what was released, you know, in 92 and 93, it’s, it is.
The J-Man (24:20)
Yeah.
Yeah.
takes time. Yeah. Yeah.
Kind like getting a car,
you know? Oh, this is in 93. No, it’s actually kind of 94.
Vince Marotte (24:45)
Yeah.
Yeah,
so it’s it’s that year. So Hulu the Hulu. Hello Hulu had a three season series called Wu Tang an American Saga and It was recommended a couple shows ago if you remember Kevin our bartender homie Kevin Stewart He’s like is because I was I was a current earworm earworm on the on the X & Z show AJ and I every week Try and pick up earworm. What have we been spinning this week?
The J-Man (24:53)
Hello, yeah.
Vince Marotte (25:16)
And in that week, I was really listening to Liquid Swords, which is Jyzza. So if you know the Wu Tang, was originally eight members, became nine when they added… ⁓
Mastakilla in there and so he’s on that second album Wu Tang Forever. But so they had this five-year plan where they’re gonna release the first album and then everybody’s gonna have a solo album essentially ⁓ and ⁓ they ran it like a business where Wu Tang was a business, not a band. you only, one record label signed the Wu Tang as an entity and it has the members it does.
But all the individuals could get their own record deals and under this umbrella. So it created this really, they really changed the game in terms of the business of music for a group. And so over the five years, they were trying to release solo albums. And then on year five, they release, ⁓ for their, their second Wu Tang album. And so one of the, my favorite in the, even above all the albums, maybe not my favorite, but the one I listened to the most is Jizz’s solo album, Liquid Swords, ⁓ which
to find out he was very intentional about it because it has every Wu-Tang member at the time on it all eight of them rap on Liquid Swords and so that’s my that was my earworm and I was telling Kevin that he’s like you should watch this show Wu-Tang an American Saga I remember seeing ads for it when it first came out a year or two ago but it’s you know I just didn’t you know just too busy to get around to it so I watched it and it creates a it’s one very nostalgic you know you’re love it if you listen to some woo and hip-hop at the time ⁓ very nostalgic
The J-Man (26:32)
Nice.
Vince Marotte (26:55)
really well done. And a couple of actors, know, when you think of like, ⁓ straight out of Compton, where Ice Cube’s son plays Ice Cube, spitting image, perfect, like that’s Ice Cube. A couple of the actors, the actor that played old dirty, just spot on, like he was very good. He was a very good old dirty bastard, looked just like him. A couple other ones. There is a ironically, who’s kind of the point, he’s the focal, he’s kind of the leader of the Wu-Tang Clan. He wasn’t very
The J-Man (27:05)
Yeah.
Nice.
Vince Marotte (27:25)
⁓ Spot on for RZA their their method man was was pretty bang on He didn’t quite have the perfect like method man’s speech impediment, which is really endearing and makes his rap really good But he wrapped very well like him and it’s and from what I can tell these actors to just for ⁓ Just for continuity they actually do the rapping in the show so that the vocals sound the same as what they’re talking and they did a really good job it’s
The J-Man (27:27)
Hmm.
Right. Yeah. Yeah. Yep. Yeah.
That’s Nice.
Vince Marotte (27:54)
It’s an interesting show, not family friendly, obviously, but if you loved hip hop, you loved early 90s hip hop and the rise of hip hop, considering if you think of it in that context that 1993 is to 1969 what rock and roll was for hip hop. So 93, that’s the year. And so this is just an in-depth look at that and their rise and their hustle. And it’s an interesting show. It’s probably not perfectly well done. It has some pacing issues.
And it brings up brought up one thing that my wife and I struggled with is in the third season. They did three special episodes where they basically put the characters into different characters and kind of this fantasy world, you know, in one, they kind of go back and now we’re in the seventies and you guys are all like pimps and we’re going to run the story that way. And though I’m not a fan when shows do that, it just kind of breaks the thing like.
The J-Man (28:45)
Hmm.
Mm-mm. Yeah.
Vince Marotte (28:51)
I get maybe you’re bored, want to do something creative, but you know, don’t do a musical episode. Don’t do a, you know, I don’t want to see a retro episode of, you know, Breaking Bad where we’re going to go back to the old West. You know, have you seen shows like that? Where they do that?
The J-Man (28:53)
Right.
Mm-mm. Mm-mm.
Right.
Right, right. Yeah, it’s kind of comes out
of nowhere and it’s like, what? You just lost me.
Vince Marotte (29:12)
It’s just like
I get it. You want to do that. You want to mix it up your board your creative but you know, it’s kind of like Going to a concert and they don’t play any other hits. You’re like bro What’s the deal? You know, i’m out i’m out, you know, you you you missed it And so i’m kind of similar with last of us right now if you guys watched last of us Did you watch last of us?
The J-Man (29:23)
Yeah, I quit, come on. Yeah.
I got through, I think the first season and I need to pick it back up because apparently there’s some stuff happening. Like this last episode really got people.
Vince Marotte (29:45)
I don’t I don’t know if I
want to watch it anymore after the second episode season two my wife and I are both like, no, I don’t want to spoil it where we’re like Well, what’s the point of watching anymore? I don’t to give that away ⁓ But I get it. They’re trying to be true to the source material and it’s important for the source material but Not not knowing the source material other than I played halo and I kind of understand
The J-Man (29:54)
Right, right.
Right.
Yeah,
it’s hard to make a movie off of a video game, think. Although I am waiting for the Legend of Zelda. Maybe we can make that work somehow.
Vince Marotte (30:12)
So I’m curious if it works. I’m curious if this works.
I’m curious if it works so Wu Tang an American saga if you like If you like 90s hip-hop in it’s it’s kind of a cool history And it flows pretty well, it’s on it’s on the hulu. So there you go Wu Tang Wu Tang forever. So I’ve been spinning lots of Wu Tang and it’s funny my wife was like, I don’t know if I know any much much Wu Tang and Turns out she does you know, and you’re constantly reminded of Wu Tang tunes because the backing
The J-Man (30:34)
tweet.
Heck yeah.
Yeah, right.
Vince Marotte (30:48)
know, score behind most of it is just redone melodies and samples and things from the Wu Tang you like. And so you’re, it’s about to start a Wu Tang song, you know, but it’s just, you know, it’s done with like trumpets or something. So it’s pretty cool. Pretty cool. ⁓ But yeah, topic of the day.
The J-Man (30:59)
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Vince Marotte (31:06)
The last great comedy. I think we may have seen the last great comedy. We in our end of year predictions for 2025, one of the things I put out there is the death of the mid budget movie, but more importantly, the death of the comedy.
For many reasons, most of them are economic and we’re starting to see that. ⁓ One thing we see right now is for movies to get big money, they have to be a global success. And comedy doesn’t translate across cultures, right? So it’s, know, it barely does British humor do well in America and American humor doesn’t do very well in, and we speak the same language. ⁓ But a mid-budget movie, I kind of, I looked this up and tried to figure out what,
Qualifies as a mid-budget movie, you know, it’s that movie that’s somewhere between like an indie flick, you know, like I think the movie I just watched ⁓ Freaky Tales fantastic movie definitely an indie flick and and a blockbuster so it’s probably somewhere between like maybe you know, the numbers I have in the notes are a few years old so maybe somewhere between seven eight ten million up to 60 70 80 million definitely not a hundred million and that movie
Is tough to make You know, it’s and nowadays it’s going straight to streaming and so the comedy is even harder to make with that kind of budget and so What I think people ask me, what do I think the funniest movie ever made was right now in 2025? I’m going to say it’s the other guys You’ve seen it, right?
The J-Man (32:45)
Yeah, yeah.
Vince Marotte (32:48)
When and you know the other thing I always wonder like I would love to watch this movie again for the first time Because it’s so it’s got So many little surprises and nuggets and just things that we’ve never really seen Right your take anyway other guys remember the first time you saw it
The J-Man (32:54)
Mm-hmm. Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah. yeah. want to, man, I, there’s a chance I may have, yeah, I think we saw it together. and right. I want to say we watched it in your office or something. I don’t, all right, your house. think, I, probably that’s what it was. He had a little micro brew in his garage and.
Vince Marotte (33:11)
We might have saw it together.
And it was one where I don’t think we saw in the theater. Like, we just…
Yeah.
Or maybe Matt’s house, he had his theater, maybe that’s where we watched it. Matt’s Theater, that was it, yeah.
Yeah, so it came out in 2010 and you know, I was kind of in up to my neck in raising kids. So going out to movies was was a challenge. You know, and so you know, that was probably the early days of the mid budget movie starting to die in theaters. You know, the the the Marvel was taking over in 2010 and so on.
The J-Man (33:52)
What year did
⁓ Blockbuster and Hollywood Video and the movie, the video rental store, when did that?
Vince Marotte (34:03)
There’s still one blockbuster left. It’s in Oregon. It’s in Bend, Oregon. It’s still there. And it’s more of a tourist attraction than anything now, but.
The J-Man (34:05)
Aw man.
That’s pretty, there’s something to be said about that. And I wonder just,
I bet the museum, it’s in the museum district. ⁓ I just think there was something about, you know, I don’t think that going through like your streaming services, I spend more time thumbing through the library of streaming services than actually
Vince Marotte (34:19)
Mm-hmm.
We’re going to talk about that. We’re going to talk about that. That’s part of it.
The J-Man (34:40)
But then going to the blockbuster, there was something about that. they had your new releases and then when you went to go get them, they had 12 copies and all 12 were gone. The shell of the video was there and that was the hit, you know. And then you would go ask the guy, hey, go check the return box and see if they returned it because I’m looking for this movie. I want to watch it. And so I just like in this timeframe, you know, this is I feel like this was
Vince Marotte (34:59)
Yeah.
The J-Man (35:10)
Like the tail end of that where, okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay.
Vince Marotte (35:14)
Park that thought, park that thought. I wanna close the conversation with that. I wanna make
a note of the video store experience, because that’s important and that’s kind of the other side of the coin of what’s going on now. So the other guys, hilarious, hilarious. Adam McKay, director and writer, Chris Henchy also writing on that. You know him from…
The J-Man (35:31)
Yep.
Vince Marotte (35:43)
Ron Anchorman Right taladega nights. This is all these all the will ferrell hits with with Adam McKay either writing or directing or both stepbrothers obviously anchorman to daddy’s home where Wahlberg and ⁓ and ferrell are together ⁓ And daddy’s home to both hilarious, you know, but they didn’t you know, just didn’t have that hit This is the last movie and why I say it’s the last great comedy. It’s the last great comedy That enough people saw
The J-Man (36:06)
Yeah.
Vince Marotte (36:13)
that it’s kind of part of our vocabulary, right? It’s quotable. And I think that’s a big component of it, ⁓ the other guys. And so we don’t see that anymore in streaming. Less of us have seen a funny movie that’s straight to streaming because of all that noise. So we’ll talk about that, but I really wanna go ahead.
The J-Man (36:33)
Yep.
Yeah. As you’re talking, know, asking the take is for me growing up through the years and these generations are in these cultural, you know, moments. They had the heroes of comedy going all the way back to like my parents and the SEC TV to the, you know, Saturday Night Live to the spin-offs of like the In Living Color and these, you know, sketch comedies. And then
Vince Marotte (36:54)
Right.
The J-Man (37:02)
stand-up comedy has always been a part of the art, almost the theater side of the art of comedy. that’s, man, that is a really raw, difficult way. But ⁓ I look back on these genres and these time periods, and I can think of the heroes of the comedy, me growing up and my favorites over the years. then now it’s like, with this movie, my take would be
Vince Marotte (37:06)
Right.
The J-Man (37:32)
If you like Will Ferrell and you haven’t seen this movie, it’s a must watch. If you don’t like Will Ferrell, I’m little concerned about, know, maybe that’s why you haven’t watched it you never will. Yeah, let’s start with that. But and so even almost like with the last great comedy, I’m kind of wondering now with where things are, where this these these Mount Rushmore faces of comedians of our kids time. Who are they?
Vince Marotte (37:41)
Well, we probably can’t be friends if we don’t like Will Ferrell.
Well, standup is having a resurgence, it seems as well. They’re filling stadiums and garnering big paychecks.
The J-Man (38:04)
Right. Right.
But how
easy is it to take a clip from a standup, like to get a standup clip and get his joke bundled up in a 15 second moment?
Vince Marotte (38:20)
And that’s part of it. The distribution creation of a comedy show, know, even if you hit the road and you’re doing stadiums, you don’t need that Taylor Swift with a dozen semis. You just need a bus with a few people on it, a couple of openers, you know, maybe a couple of props on the stage. That’s it. You know, it’s an easy, so that it’s the middle class of entertainment is getting cut out. So it’s got to be affordable, fast, transportable.
Or it’s got to be global blockbuster massive. And so that’s, you know, it’s a victim of that, type of comedy. But to your point, there’s kind of these, there’s comedy movies that changed the game. Right. Throughout, you know, they changed what a comedy is. And so I think too, at least for Gen Xers, the two, you know, there’s, there’s somewhere physical comedy kind of took over, you know, in the seventies and kind of just some of the goofy stuff.
The J-Man (39:04)
Totally. Totally.
Vince Marotte (39:19)
But two movies that come to mind when I think of movies that changed comedy that become like and what gets us to the other guys Number one is Caddyshack Okay, where prior to caddyshack you had to have physical comedy you could have You could have dialogue driven jokes and things like that. They were a part of it, but the physical comedy had to happen so you think Richard Pryor in the toy. Yeah, I may have come after caddyshack but
The J-Man (39:48)
man,
holy smokes. I haven’t thought of that movie in forever.
Vince Marotte (39:49)
But that type of stuff where, there’s funny
dialogue and things like that, but it’s just a lot of goofiness or like ⁓ it’s a mad, mad, mad, mad world, you one of the older ones, those types of things. Physical comedy carried the movie, ⁓ you know, and slapstick, you think like airplane, ⁓ those types of movies. Yeah, so there was witty jokes in there, but Caddyshack came in and had like…
The J-Man (40:00)
Yeah.
Right.
Naked gun. Yeah.
for sure.
Vince Marotte (40:16)
Like the Godfather did for regular movies in that, you know, the lighting and the volume was more like real life. You know, the conversations were real conversations. wasn’t like this enunciated stage acting, you know, it was, was more like it was more real or catashek. Although it had some goofy gags and things like that, the bulk of the movie was carried by dialogue and story. And it really, to the point where it didn’t really even have a plot. It was just a vignette of life at this golf course.
The J-Man (40:27)
Right, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Vince Marotte (40:45)
And some of the people in it and it was just funny dialogue. and so that changed comedies where you didn’t have to do this physical stuff. You had to be better than that. You had to bring in some wit and you had to bring in some, some jokes that you had to immerse into almost like standup, like standup came to the screen and you had to follow on jokes. The next evolution came in the mid nineties. And I think it’s there’s something about Mary.
The J-Man (40:57)
Yeah.
Yeah. Right.
Yeah, your Ben Stiller, your man Jim Carrey. mean, when you talk about physical comedy, mean, he was, mean, golly, his animated movements and faces and yeah.
Vince Marotte (41:26)
Right. This
was, I want to say refined raunch. You you had meatballs, you know, you had, had that, you had to, you had revenge of the nerds, porkies. You had that in the eighties, but it was more like slapstick raunch where this was like the jokes themselves had, had took that. They, they took what was, they stripped all the physicalness out of that. And the jokes themselves were at a level of, of, you know,
The J-Man (41:31)
Yeah. Right. Yeah. Yeah. Porkies. Yeah. Yeah. Right. Sure. Yeah. Right.
Vince Marotte (41:54)
we would have been embarrassed by in the eighties and it was became norm. And so I think that that’s a tent, but you know, kind of this tent peg tent post post, you know, milestone, if you will, poll in comedy, you know, where now it took what started with Caddyshack dialogue and took some of the physical comedy of your Vengeance Nerds, Meatballs, Porkies, and packaged it into a dialogue driven movie that was very adult. And it was freaking hilarious at the time. I remember watching it. was the funniest thing I’d ever seen.
Luke couldn’t breathe kind of laughing something got married It was one that was on loop, you know had the VHS wearing it out in the apartment with my roommates in college It was that was the that was the movie to watch and then will ferrell adam and katie’s guys came along and Really refined all that stuff and just added layers and the other guys I think is the peak of that type of comedy
The J-Man (42:34)
Yep.
Vince Marotte (42:49)
Did you watch something about Mary? No. I want to go back and rewatch that. It was special.
The J-Man (42:50)
Yeah. yeah. yeah. Yeah.
Yeah, me too.
It’s been a while. ⁓ The Dumb and Dumber for me was probably the most watched comedy for me. When it landed, I’ll never forget, I was at a birthday party with my middle school buddy in seventh grade. Seventh grade Dumb and Dumber. mean, golly, it changed my life. I saw that so many times.
Vince Marotte (43:11)
Yeah.
yeah.
Yeah, domidomidomor.
The J-Man (43:23)
You know, I mean, even before that, like the Ace Venturo is so quotable, just the. Alrighty then.
Vince Marotte (43:28)
Wasn’t it the same year Ace Ventura?
Yeah, both of them specifically. I think the second one is one of the rare things where the sequel is better than the original. They were able to refine it, tighten it up.
The J-Man (43:39)
Yeah. But
before that though, like I would say maybe Eddie Murphy, like the Coming to America, on VHS, I think I may have watched that maybe the most and that talk about quotable. And then, you know, there is something to be said about the, what is the genre of it? Like the buddy cop comedy, where you’re like at 48 hours or like Lethal Weapon.
Vince Marotte (43:49)
Yep.
Yeah.
The J-Man (44:08)
You know, and typically it’s like a minority and a white guy and the tension always plays into it a little bit. You know, I think that that kind of set teed up teed up this movie a little bit. instead of them doing the token white guy, black guy thing, they did like the the nerdy guy, good cop, bad cop kind of thing.
Vince Marotte (44:12)
You
Yep.
Well, yeah, it was always the you think like dragnet or 48 hours It was always the kind of the the off-the-chain rule breaker cop and the and the guy who the veteran who follows the rules You know, we’re not like that was always that kind of Lethal weapon 48 hours even even you know, Beverly Hills cop it that was it and so they kind of They kind of just doubled it double clicked into that they had not only was the rule but he was like the you know rule
The J-Man (44:36)
Yeah. Yeah.
Exactly. Yeah. Yeah.
even
Yeah. What about what do you? What do you call Turner? Yeah.
Vince Marotte (45:02)
That’s his whole, you know, his persona is I am so strict, even way more than, ⁓ you know, ⁓ what’s his name? Yeah, then in ⁓ Dragnet, which I think they’re remaking, ⁓ Dan Arkard’s character is, you know, and so he was way more just super, super tight, war suit, you know, calculator, that kind of thing. And they just leaned into that archetype and made fun of it. And then Mark Wahlberg’s character, you know,
The J-Man (45:08)
Marky Mark.
yeah, yeah, yeah, gotcha. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Vince Marotte (45:30)
They made fun, know, same thing kind of not, not just instead of just being like the rebel cop, he’s just a bad cop that wants it too much. So they lean into that. So you’re so it’s right on the platform off that it’s a buddy cop. It’s got physical comedy. It’s got dialogue, but here’s the thing that I think makes it special. Like a good standup comedy, you know, especially a long form when you watch someone who’s doing a 40 to 60 minute set.
The J-Man (45:32)
like the hero,
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Vince Marotte (45:59)
You know, I think of ⁓ Dave Chappelle when they dropped those, those two and then a second set on Netflix, three of those four standup routines from Dave Chappelle are some of the best standups I’ve ever seen. And it has this connectivity through the storyline where there’s kind of a running gag or movement that keeps popping up and it gets funnier every time because you’re, bringing the audience in on the joke.
And so the next time you hit that same joke or connect to it, it’s even funnier and you get you get you get this buildup where the other guys. I don’t think there’s very many, if any scenes apart from some of the opening scenes or any time that it’s the first time we have, you know, the cold open with the rebel cops jumping off the building and then going into where we hoist and gamble, start to start to emerge and we follow them. I don’t think there’s a single scene in the movie.
The J-Man (46:27)
Yeah. They’re, they’re with you. Yeah.
Vince Marotte (46:55)
Where there isn’t a running gag that starts or keeps going The the the list of running gags, I want to watch it next time I watch it i’m going to have my notes out and i’m going to track the running gags because I I think ⁓ I think there’s very few if any scenes where there isn’t a running gag, right? so like In the show notes I linked to a reddit thread where people are talking about that and and it makes those jokes even funnier
Because you just keep diving into it like ⁓ you can probably think of one right now before I before I the gun. Yeah So his gun his gun gets taken away and he gets a fake wooden gun and then he gets a rape whistle And and it keeps running and then later he has to go back and get his gun You know gator needs his get and the whole thing is just hilarious and it sets this it it I wonder if
The J-Man (47:28)
Like the gun. the gun.
if
Yeah.
Vince Marotte (47:50)
They challenged themselves to do that or if it happened organically if I ever get a chance to interview Adam McKay That’s all I ask him. Like did you guys was that intentional from the from the start? Did you want to connect all the scenes with with running jokes, you know?
The J-Man (48:08)
I’d hope so. I think that that’s something that carries standup comedy. You tell the story and then as you’re telling other stories, you say the sentence or the thing that takes you like what you’re saying right back to it. there’s something very witty about that.
Vince Marotte (48:14)
Right. that’s,
Yeah. ⁓
Hits harder. It makes the joke funnier, you know, like dirty Mike and the boys keep popping up in there You know, he keeps you know gamble keeps trying to give Hoyt’s gifts and you’re just not getting it ⁓ You know gambles little river band obsession and his music ⁓ You know the fact that Terry Hoyt’s thinks everything is about you know drug cartels, ⁓ you know gambles
The J-Man (48:33)
Yeah.
Thank
I’m
Vince Marotte (48:54)
wife is hot and he’s constantly downplaying it. The fact that every hot chick in the movie is infatuated with Gamble. The fact that Hoyt’s, you keep learning about artistic things he’s learned just to be sarcastic, know, dancing and singing and all.
The J-Man (48:56)
Yeah. Totally. Yeah. ⁓
Yeah, like being in the bar
and singing harmony with those old guys like an old sailors tune.
Vince Marotte (49:18)
Yeah, or you
know and The water when they go to urshawn’s office, but he keeps getting water and they keep getting you know Keep getting you know bribed out of going it, you know Terry, know terry keeping, know kind of basically hitting on alan’s wife Of the fresh start stuff Let’s see, you know, his prius is a recurring character that keeps getting just beat up throughout the whole thing
The J-Man (49:34)
You there.
Yeah.
⁓
so funny they run over the cocaine
and then like one of the one of the people walked by it and just kind of rubbed their fingernail across it and give it a little sniff.
Vince Marotte (49:52)
But
you know, Bob, Bob walking into scenes at inappropriate times to try and discuss, you know, basic things, not only is it a joke, but it’s important to the plot point too.
The J-Man (50:03)
dude,
what about one of my favorite scenes in that movie is the at the funeral, the whisper fight. It’s like a quiet fight. it just Michael Keaton is I love him. I love him. He comes in there like, guys, knock it off. Like, you know, he’s like yell whispering. And then the lady walks by and they all stop and they’re like, ma’am, sorry, our condolences. And then they go right back to yelling at each other.
Vince Marotte (50:11)
Yeah, I mean that is just brilliant.
He steals every scene he’s in. Steals every scene he’s in.
Yeah Just
brilliant. Yeah in like the the hit, know, they’re struggling to relate to him calling him captain gene You know and that keeps recurring his TLC references throughout the movie like he keeps quoting a TLC song throughout the movie and it’s just It’s just you know, deadpan delivery and hilarious ⁓ And yeah, love it his bet his second job at Bed Bath and Beyond keeps coming up like every seed in that movie has
The J-Man (50:33)
⁓ my gosh.
You
You
Vince Marotte (51:00)
recurring gag. So next time I watch it, I’m taking making notes.
The J-Man (51:01)
think, yeah.
And one of the things that I think makes it really clever with what you’re saying, that’s your spot on, ⁓ is from the get go, I get the sense as a viewer of like, they’re gonna let you know, like we’re not trying to make this like meaningful and daring buddy cop comedy. We’re intentionally making fun of buddy cup comedies in this from the get go. So you don’t need to try to buy into it in that way. Like Turner and Hooch.
Vince Marotte (51:24)
Right.
Right.
The J-Man (51:31)
You know, like,
Vince Marotte (51:32)
Right.
The J-Man (51:32)
man, like there’s so many feelings of it’s trying to be a serious kind of buddy cop movie. And so in this, I think even they set the tone when, you know, the hero cops, you know, jump off the roof. It’s like, we’re going to just kind of just crush this from the get go and go along this wild kind of slap sticky. That’s the slapstick side of it is it’s like, we’re going to make fun of the things. Okay. So like, we’re not trying to be a serious.
buddy cop comedy. We don’t want you to buy into it being a buddy cop comedy. We want you to realize we’re going to let you in on we’re making fun of buddy cop comedies and we’re just going to like make fun of it the whole way through. Even like the bad guys are just so cheesy. That’s the slapstick side of it. So that’s what I, it’s like a nod to the old slapstick 80s films to me.
Vince Marotte (52:23)
Yeah, it what they’re doing and one great structure for jokes that I really appreciate and and you know some comedians really make a living off of this type of joke where You know a lot of jokes are are helping you visualize something or understand something and so you immerse into the something and it’s already funny and then they double click and you know give him a more detail on it and that’s kind of how they do
the characters here where they’re taking the typical buddy cop character and taking all the things that are just are standard about them and then just double clicking into it. You know, not only is Terry Hoyt’s kind of like a crazy cop will go into it. He’s just bad. He’s kind of incompetent at it. You know, not only is gamble like, you know, the straight, the straight man, you know, he’s he’s just he’s super straight at it. He wants to be and he tells that story. I want to be an accountant for law and order.
You be placed somewhere really safe, you know, then you look at his background, know They just double click into into the Gator thing and just make it it’s just that’s what they do. They take a joke and then they just keep Going to the layer deep another layer deep another layer deep and that’s some of my favorite types of joke whether it’s in stand-up or in a movie where you just okay that was that was funny and now it’s even funnier now it’s funny again, so
The J-Man (53:30)
my gosh.
And yeah, I love that.
Yeah. And one of my, like, I was wondering if you’re going to go down this path, but that’s a man. Like what you just pointed out was a really good point about that movie. Like one of the things I really appreciated about Conan O’Brien as a late night host is he, he was just straight up upfront about the poor production quality. He made fun of the things that they were doing and in turn made fun of himself. And that was probably my favorite.
heart about the show is every time they would do something in the crowd, their writers would come out with these goofy little characters to say or do something. He’s already like, this is the best we can do. Like, what are we doing? so it’s like letting you in on making fun of already making fun of it, the production quality or laughing at ourselves. And there’s a hint of that with that movie, a hint of it. I wouldn’t say that.
Vince Marotte (54:39)
themselves. Yeah.
Yeah, they don’t go too far. Like when I think of that type of humor, that’s kind of Jim Gaffigan’s, his eight percent of jokes are making fun of himself. To be honest, it gets tiring after when it’s too much. You go to her like, OK, I get it. You think you’re fat. ⁓ You know, cool. But yeah, it is it is got this stand up vibe to it. But at the same time, it’s super rewatchable. ⁓ Partly because it’s so quotable and knowing those jokes are coming.
The J-Man (54:54)
Yeah.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. True.
Vince Marotte (55:14)
Often make some some of them funnier and you see the different layers in there If you get a chance find some of the find the unrated cut ⁓ Of it. It’s it’s it’s funny because one thing ⁓ You you kind of see how the end if you can watch extra scenes and how they write jokes a lot of times They’ll they’ll say a joke, but they’ve said that joke with you know, a bunch of different punch lines you know, and then they take the best ones and put them in the movie so when the
The detective is breaking down the list of things they found in the car after the soup kitchen. You know, we found it. Use condom. We found this like in the uncut one, dude, he goes on for like four minutes and it’s ridiculous. It’s ridiculous. And so it’s fun to kind of see how Adam McKay works with his actors. just, they keep telling jokes. You, you probably seen it like with Talladega nights, you know, when he, when he, when he’s doing like, ⁓ you know, any of those jokes, he just, he’s probably
The J-Man (55:48)
The deer. It looks like human lips.
⁓ my gosh. Yeah. Yep.
Vince Marotte (56:12)
They’re ad-libbing, know, they’re improvising and just kind of clicking into just all these non-sequiturs and I love a non-sequitur joke and so it’s
The J-Man (56:13)
Probably riffing. Yeah. Yeah.
my gosh. That is
one of the, that non sequitur is a word that really makes that movie. Like that, would say that that is a top three descriptive word of the type of humor in that movie. Very non sequitur.
Vince Marotte (56:31)
And I love that. I
love it because it it it’s mentally engaging, which makes things funnier because you have to be like, what does it make any sense? And that’s why it’s funny. You know, Jersey Boys, you’re to get Jersey Boy tickets. What? And then then it makes sense later because, now you’re getting next tickets, you know, you know, it’s Mamma Mia. ⁓ And so it’s funny. The Russian Glacial Water, like that’s just non sequitur. But then they just double click into it and go farther. And so it’s super quotable. ⁓
The J-Man (56:38)
Exactly. Great. Great.
You
Yeah.
Vince Marotte (57:00)
It it makes me think I think it’s in the pantheon of quotable con comedy movies for me We’re like around my house and people close to me You know, this is kind of part of my vocabulary The two that have always been there for as long as I can remember our spinal tap and caddy rarely is a and I have ADHD so the the words you hear coming out of my mouth are
The J-Man (57:21)
Yeah. Yeah. Me too.
Vince Marotte (57:27)
Small selection of what I’ve what’s already been loaded up in my head that I just filtered out and almost every conversation I’m in thoughts pop in my head of spinal tap quotes and caddyshack quotes, but mostly spinal tap quotes and it and now it’s starting to become something with the other guys where it’s like, you know Gator needs his get like that keeps coming up or when I don’t need anything. It’s like, you know Gator needs his coffee cup, you know, it’s like so that it’s just become
The J-Man (57:49)
Yeah.
D-D-D-D-
Vince Marotte (57:57)
know Canon at our house, but spinal tap has always been one there which brings up the question Did you get into the mock you’ve entries?
The J-Man (57:58)
Yeah. ⁓ my gosh.
Yeah, I love mockumentaries. I love them, man. They’re so good. I love it. That’s one of my favorite type of comedy movie is a mockumentary.
Vince Marotte (58:08)
And the.
And the Christopher Guest, know, your things like The Office, know, Parks and Rec, shows that they, this is their grandfather, it’s Spinal Tap. It’s the first documentary. And for those who aren’t familiar with Spinal Tap, so Christopher Guest, may have heard some of his other ones where that same crew, know, it’s a bunch of people, know, the same people are in the movies playing different characters. Eugene Levy is in almost all of them.
The J-Man (58:21)
I love the office. I’m a huge office fan. Yeah. Yep. Uh-huh. Yep.
Vince Marotte (58:41)
Obviously obviously Christopher Guest is in almost all of them, but spinal taps the first one I don’t know the order but they did a mighty wind which is a mockumentary about a traveling bluegrass band they did best in show which is a mockumentary, you know about a Dog show so it looks like a documentary and if you didn’t know any better If you did if yeah, if you could turn back time I know you ever heard of this and I put spinal tap on at first you’d think it’s a document an actual documentary and if you’re not
The J-Man (58:56)
Dogs, dog, dog show, yeah.
you could fall trap to thinking it is.
Vince Marotte (59:11)
good at understanding humor. You might go a long way through the movie before you realize it’s not real. And so yeah, there’s that. Best in Show, Waiting for Guffman is about like a community theater in a small town.
The J-Man (59:14)
you
Yeah,
the reviewist or the critic is coming and…
Vince Marotte (59:26)
Yeah,
it’s it is a brilliant brilliant idea they came up with and I’m sure there’s a lot of You know kind of improv it based in that, you know And to the point where spinal tap, know some of their music they’ve done concerts, know Because they actually are musicians. They played the music in spinal tap They played the music in a mighty wind and so I remember ⁓ one of my favorite spinal tap homages if you will
The J-Man (59:29)
It is brilliant.
Vince Marotte (59:56)
So they do a song in the movie called Big Bottom, right? And the entire band plays bass. So their two guitars are playing bass and their bass player is playing bass and their keyboard is playing bass keyboard. And so in that band, to make it funny, know, as they’re playing a song, they’re like, oh, bass, you know, and they go through it. So you remember Live Aid from like 1988 or something like that where they did a concert like Four Continents. It was like.
The J-Man (59:58)
Oh my gosh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah. Yeah.
Vince Marotte (1:00:23)
US, Africa, Europe, and then like Australia. And it was happening, you know, basically throughout an entire 24 hour period. Bob, Bob Geldof did this thing to raise money to, to, to help, help fight AIDS. And they redid it in 2008. It was called live eight. If you remember that very important show, because it was the last time Pink Floyd played together all four real members. actually brought in, ⁓ what’s his name? I’m blanking. think, you know, they’re kind of estranged, ⁓ other lead man.
The J-Man (1:00:31)
Mm. Mm. Very good.
to you.
Vince Marotte (1:00:53)
Wasn’t playing with them. They played four songs together. But one thing it is they brought out spinal tap I I think they were at the American venue which was in New York or somewhere or DC they bring out spinal tap and They’re gonna play big bottom and so spinal taps out there and he introduces the band on bass, you know on And then he goes on bass MCA, you know, and so every bass player that’s at the venue ends up on stage and he’s introducing bass players
The J-Man (1:00:55)
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
⁓ cool.
Just going on and on.
Vince Marotte (1:01:22)
He’s introducing bass players for like five minutes
until there’s 30 bass players on stage and they’re all playing the big bottom riff. Cause if you’re a bass player, know that riff. You have to learn it. And so hilarious. You ever get a chance to watch the watch spinal tap at live eight.
The J-Man (1:01:29)
that’s awesome. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
The
amplifier scene is my favorite and I quote that all the time. If something’s turned up too loud or like I want something to go harder, I always say turn it up to 11 and very, it’s weird, very rarely do anybody get it, you know? And then when people do get it, they’re like, give me that now.
Vince Marotte (1:01:44)
yeah, everyone knows that, yeah.
That’s how I find my people by making spinal tap jokes. From that scene, the one that I always say all the time from that scene is, you he’s looking at a guitar that’s still new and it has the tag on it. And he goes, still got the old tagger on it. And so we say at our house all the time when something’s brand new, still got the old tagger on it. Don’t even touch that. Don’t even look at that one. that one’s part of our vocabulary. So you can’t really dust for vomit, you know.
The J-Man (1:02:01)
You
I got it.
Vince Marotte (1:02:27)
I’m not about to do 12 minutes of freeform jazz exploration in front of a festival crowd. Like it’s like you got to see it. yeah. It’s a danger of being trampled by a dwarf. So just hilarious. ⁓ That’s quotable. And like I said, the other guys has become one of the quotables for me. Like it’s it’s all in there and in Caddyshack, of course, to, you know, straighten the straight in lumber yard.
The J-Man (1:02:30)
The Stonehenge mismeasurement. God, that’s so good.
Vince Marotte (1:02:57)
Whenever I’m at a store and I start rattling off things I need, that Roddy Dangerfield scene always comes up. Give me two of those, three of those, six of Give me box of those orange balls. You box those naked lady tees. ⁓ Just hilarious and fantastic. And obviously the Cinderella boy, that whole scene, the goonga no goonga. It’s so good. But back to just the
The J-Man (1:03:16)
Yeah. So good. So good, man. Yeah.
Vince Marotte (1:03:27)
What happens to the comedy movie will we see a comedy movie like this again that gets this kind of? ⁓ Distribution like I think they’ll still make movies like this But will enough of us see them to where it becomes kind of a cultural thing Right There’s probably been movies that are as funny or pretty close to this that I haven’t seen or you haven’t seen right that have been gone straight to streaming we just haven’t seen it, right or
The J-Man (1:03:54)
Yeah.
Vince Marotte (1:03:56)
I think of one that’s pretty funny. know, again, Netflix movies have always been hurt by them, but Mark Wahlberg has one called Spencer Confidential. And it’s very similar in this. It has kind of recurring gags, a lot of non sequitur. It’s got a funny plot point. It’s kind of a take on a buddy cop movie. I recommend it all the time as a comedy that a lot of people haven’t seen. I think, you know, if it got this kind of budget,
Released at that time when we were still going to the movies or maybe buying DVDs or renting DVDs Spencer confidential might have been one of those movies that kind of got that That kind of a hit highly recommend. I’ll link it up another one that similars that it’s funny. It’s similar title. It’s the nice guys so that’s ⁓ Russell Crowe and Ryan Gosling and That’s it’s a buddy cop movie. That’s that’s hilarious Not family-friendly
The J-Man (1:04:49)
Okay, okay, okay
Vince Marotte (1:04:56)
but it’s not as it’s drier. It’s not as immediate that it is a comedy. So if you didn’t expect it, and I think I had that problem when I first saw it and the ads came out, because I’m gonna admit, Ryan Gosling, I’ll watch a Ryan Gosling movie. He’s up there with like a Brad Pitt or Tom Hanks or Tom Cruise where like dude can do anything at this point. Like he’s really good. I’ll see a movie just on the weight of him and he was in it.
The J-Man (1:05:13)
Yeah, he’s awesome. He’s awesome.
Yeah, he’s really good.
Yeah.
Vince Marotte (1:05:25)
They’re private detectives in this case, and they’re getting into Tomfoolery and this sort of thing. It’s more plot-driven.
The J-Man (1:05:30)
Is it more action-y?
Vince Marotte (1:05:32)
More actiony more plot driven You could you could and like I said for the original marketing I didn’t think it was straight up a comedy movie, but in reality it is mostly a comedy movie ⁓ And I think that’s kind of this is the new breed of comedy that would that we’re going to be seeing is stuff like the nice guys Like spencer confidential, you know, this came out nice guys came out 2016 I think let me see. Did they call it a comedy on imdb?
Yeah, they call it a buddy cop, bumbling detective, slapstick, action comedy, crime thriller. It’s more dynamic. It’s got more going on. But what what makes it rewatchable for me is the comedy. It’s pretty freaking funny. but a lot of people didn’t see it. And so to go back to what you were talking about, the video store experience. You know, movie discovery has gotten really hard, just like music, music discovery, right?
The J-Man (1:06:29)
Yeah. Yeah, for sure.
Vince Marotte (1:06:30)
there’s not
someone to talk to, which is again, why I like this podcast. I wanna get recommendations. If you don’t get to spend enough time around creative people and hear their recommendations, you might just be scrolling through what streaming service is looking for. And like you said, how many times have you ever done this where you scroll, scroll, finally settle on something and then halfway through you just give up?
The J-Man (1:06:59)
Yeah, the majority of the time.
Vince Marotte (1:07:01)
See your band in a movie all the time.
The J-Man (1:07:03)
I, well, what I’m saying is, is I spend more time trying to find and look for something to watch than actually watching the things. Like, and I give up on watching the things because I get tired of scrolling. I’m like, I’m just going to leave my TV on, on the title page of the streaming service with the recommendations and the things. And I’m just going to like, it’s on. My, the streaming title page spends more time on my TV than
the actual streaming of the content.
Vince Marotte (1:07:35)
Right, right.
The J-Man (1:07:37)
And look,
yeah, as we’re talking to, I had a thought that that was like hanging with me. And, you know, this got brought back to me in the strangest of ways. It was the. The I’m trying to ⁓ hang in there with the highest value of our social media.
of like, that’s the thing is the social media. And I feel so old talking about the things of it. That it carries things in these short blips and there’s the sharing of it. When I see something funny or meaningful, then I’m sending it to you. And what that to me is, is a replacement of something that I think that we need.
Vince Marotte (1:08:07)
Right.
The J-Man (1:08:32)
And what that is, is that not just the connection of the human spirit, and that’s one of the values of like the comedies, or like the video store, is the guy behind the counter, the people in there, the frustration of the videos being gone, picking up the pack of Twizzlers, you’re doing the thing in there. It’s the connection of the human spirit through audience. Like jokes are funnier. When I watch…
Vince Marotte (1:08:41)
Right.
The J-Man (1:09:00)
comedies by myself, not, I don’t find myself laughing. Like I’m much more like desperate to give away these cheap laughs as an audience. And I found that when I observed it, when I took my youngest son to go see the, the Minecraft movie and that was a spectacle for me. Cause I’m like, ugh.
But it was funny though, there were moments where I think it gave nod to like the Napoleon Dynamite, which, know, in this argument of, we see a great comedy like this before. I mean, we got to give some props to the bell header of the Napoleon Dynamite and the Nacho Libres of the comedies. are, you know, they’re Jack Black, awesome. And so, you know, it was like the chicken jockey, you know? And now it’s become a stupid thing.
But like it, I want to say Bill Hader, Jared Hess, my bad.
Vince Marotte (1:09:51)
Jared Hess, you meant?
Yeah, he did those two movies and then just dipped.
The J-Man (1:09:58)
Yeah, but he then here’s but he’s got a part within Minecraft, right? Like he helped do Minecraft.
Vince Marotte (1:10:04)
Okay. Yeah, but he did this he created his own genre like a new type of movie It was was great. There were great movies like this kind of dry you know, Nacho Libre and and ⁓ and Napoleon Dynamite are kind of very similar and it’s definitely love hate like there’s people that I don’t get it stupid thing ever seen I love them and he did a he did another one that I tried I watched it just wasn’t as good Did a similar one, but I think it was just too meta Carry on. Sorry
The J-Man (1:10:08)
Right? Yeah. Like dork. Reality comedy. Yeah.
Yeah, very similar. I love them. I love them, but.
Yeah.
So yeah, no, I mean, I’m so to me, like that is part of the experience of, you know, going with your buddy or, you know, going to the basement, like you’re laughing at things that you wouldn’t laugh at if it was just you, you know, and you’re just kind of a more of an observer of the comedy than a participant of the audience in the comedy. And, and I find that because I do spend myself, spend a considerable amount of my time in front of an audience.
Vince Marotte (1:10:47)
Right.
The J-Man (1:11:01)
And in that environment, I find myself realizing how cheap the audience can be with the lamest of laughs. I can say the dumbest stuff that isn’t even clever. mean, it’s like dad joke goes a long way or the pun goes so far with an audience than if I, you know, by myself and I catch it. like, and now the way we, it is.
Vince Marotte (1:11:25)
laughter is contagious.
Yeah.
The J-Man (1:11:28)
We
want to, we want to feel it, we want to laugh. It’s that joy of it. so, you know, sharing it is where I find myself getting the laughs. Like I’m chuckling sharing something because I’m thinking, man, we’re going to like, they’re going to get it. Like, and they’re going to laugh. And it’s like trying, right. But, not really. Like you, you, a little bit, a little bit, but not like, like this, not like this.
Vince Marotte (1:11:44)
Because you’re laughing with them. Yeah.
Little bit, little bit. Yeah.
No, I think there’s two things there. The community viewing experience with people makes things funnier, scarier, et cetera, but also the commitment to watch. You know, there’s not much commitment involved in scrolling through streaming and watching. can bounce out of it. But if I drove to the store, walked around for 20 minutes, picked out a movie, paid for it,
The J-Man (1:12:17)
We’re watching it. Yep.
Vince Marotte (1:12:18)
home Damn it. I’m finishing that thing, right?
I’m gonna watch it and I’m gonna watch it with more attention Of course, we didn’t have the smartphone with us prior to about 2007 anyway You know then it really started to take over and so you’re you end up scrolling on your phone and you’re not you’re not tuned in You know, so watching movies like I have a nice setup of my house
The J-Man (1:12:29)
there to distract you.
Vince Marotte (1:12:43)
So this the one thing I really spoil myself with I have a nice audio system surround You know, not a crazy nice TV. I big TVs are cheap now But it’s hard to have people over To to watch a movie. So I’ve tried that what if we get together my house and watch a movie Like you have to really work hard to make hey, we’re gonna watch this movie You know put your phone away, know, let’s let’s let’s see Merce
The J-Man (1:13:10)
Let’s not
start up these side conversations about last weekend and what happened at the ballgame. Like, can we watch the movie together? You can’t do any of that stuff. Enforce. Yeah.
Vince Marotte (1:13:14)
Yeah Yeah But when you walk into a theater, know, you can’t talk you’re not gonna have these yeah Especially you go to a good theater where they where they’re gonna keep an eye on that sort of stuff
⁓ but yeah, it’s ⁓ It’s different. the commitment it’s it’s easy. It’s too easy to Switch stop watching the movie. There’s just no no commitment and we tend to watch things by ourselves now whether we’re watching on a on a smaller device or even on our TV at home, so
The comedy, know, and just movies in general are, we’re consuming them differently. And so I think that that’s one of the biggest impacts here on, on comedies where they’re good when we all watched them, or at least most of us watched them, or most of the people in my circle watched them because they get a life outside of them. But when I, you know, when I watch, you know, when I watch Spencer, Spencer confidential think it’s funny, and I tell people to watch it, nobody watches it.
And if we haven’t all watched it within the same amount of time, even if we did all watch Spencer confidential, it’s not as memorable because we’re not reminding each other about it, but we’re constantly reminding each other about the other guys. You know, we constantly reminded each other about Caddyshack because we quote those little lines and they just have this life. And that’s what I miss. And that’s what I’m not sure we’re ever going to see again. ⁓ If things continue as they are.
You know, how do we fix it? Should we fix it?
What do you think?
The J-Man (1:14:49)
man, I feel like it, what it boils down to for me is the need to fight for the connection of human spirit. Because I feel like this might be a weird take and it might be a conversation for another day, but I feel like that’s what we’re in danger of losing. And that’s what we are out butting up against right now is a pseudo, it’s fooled us into thinking that we’re connecting and we’re not.
Vince Marotte (1:15:17)
Yeah, yeah. Are we learning to connect in a different way? You know, that’s my favorite and most recommended book that nobody is ever gonna read because it’s 700 pages and it’s super deep and heavy, but it’s a book that has an impact on everything I do basically in terms of the way I think creatively about the future and my work and my personal life. And the book is The Empathic Civilization by Jeremy Rifkin.
And he traces the history of how humans have empathized with each other and it’s important and and what triggers that switch or that extra layer of empathy where you know to to shorten it and to kind of lean into what you’re saying and give some hope I want to give hope ⁓ know, we ⁓ initially we were in tribes, right? You know, we lived in our own little area in a tribe and we only empathized and related to the people in our tribe to the point where we were essentially a
Frightened of people in other tribes because we didn’t see them didn’t know them and they spoke a different language looked slightly different or whatever They were kind of the enemy so our our circle of empathy and the way we had to connect with our what’s called mirror neurons the community was smaller and Then we developed technologies that allow us to to annihilate space and time and that is in the form of a written word And we could empathize a little bit more and so cities started to in agrarian economies and the amount of people that we said
We’re all citizens of this city. We speak the same language. We write in a similar way. We all take place in this economy of the city with the farms around and that sort of thing. So we leveled up in it, but there was friction to get to that. There was probably wars. was probably, you know, there’s people thinking, well, this is the end of all things. Religions would speak doom to it. And then we developed ways to have transportation and to, ⁓
connect with people at an even larger scale when we got a printing press and steam power. And so now we’re empathizing across an entire nation. So the British Empire started to expand. And again, that created frictions between people who could read, people who couldn’t read, and power struggles and all that. And the same time, people were saying, this is the end. I don’t know how we’re going to survive this. The kids today are a mess. I don’t know how we’re going to survive this. They would say the same thing.
We had the broadcast ability first through like, you know, like, ⁓ like just the telegraph and then eventually radio and TV, we could broadcast to many. And now we could in real time communicate essentially across the globe by the time all the dust settled there. ⁓ but it was a one to many, basically, you know, the people that controlled the broadcast could communicate, but the average person couldn’t. were just consumers. We consume TV, consume radio.
The J-Man (1:17:50)
Yeah, right.
Global, yeah.
Vince Marotte (1:18:10)
And that changed everything in the energy system and transportation with airplanes and trains. All that changed how we interact. And two things come about with all of those. Everyone says, we’re going to have world peace. And some people say this is the end every time that happens. And the same thing now with, with what’s happening with the internet and new media and now new energy and new transportation, we are moving. We’re in that transition period where it’s chaos. again, people are doing what we’ve always done in this transition period. People are saying, this is going to bring about world peace.
Other people are saying this is the end. I don’t know. Jeremy, not Jeremy Rifkin, Clay Shirky predicted at a keynote I went to at South by Southwest in 2010 or 2011, said, based on what we’ve seen in history, I predict we’re going to have about 50 years of chaos. So us and our kids are living through this transition period where we’re learning how to essentially speak a new language and empathize with each other at global scale in real time.
to feel each other’s pain. And it’s terrifying because we don’t know how to freaking do it. Is it bad? I don’t know. Is it good? I don’t know. Like the Zen Master said, we’ll see. But we want for that, we want what we used to have where you could only have that community in presence. You had to go to your friend’s house. And now our sons are communicating on video games and it’s different.
The J-Man (1:19:17)
Yeah.
Vince Marotte (1:19:39)
And they’re struggling because we’re struggling too. We don’t understand it. They’re growing up in a reality we don’t understand because we didn’t grow up in it. And so I get that. think the community and through it all what Rifkin says and through what science says is we talk about our core instincts and I’m talking a lot here. I’m sorry, but I’m very passionate about this. Our core instincts is human. He breaks down all the core instincts that different philosophers and religions said we had.
The J-Man (1:20:00)
No, it’s great.
Vince Marotte (1:20:09)
the Judeo-Christian, you know, Muslim kind of worldview was the core thing of human is that you’re evil and we have to restrain that. You your psychologists like Freud would say the core thing is you want sex. You know, the core thing is different depending on where you are or blank slate theory, tabula rosa, or whatever our instincts are. Apart from just your initial survival, I need to eat, I need to not die physically. What’s the…
primary drive. What’s the most important instinct that seems to humans seem to have? And what he says is is beyond that, the strongest instinct we have is to be connected to each other, to have community. And so that’s why this hurts right now, because that’s apart from just everyday survival, the most core instinct of that we have as humans is being renegotiated in evolution as we create things. So we don’t know
What the fuck is happening? So scary.
The J-Man (1:21:10)
Yeah. I can
view it right on the edge of at the end there of the word play. You know, where I think that at the heart of that is where beautiful community begins, like it begins and ends like in play and where, mean, yeah, competition, you know, as a part of it where, but it’s some ugly things come from that of like, you know, me versus you on a, on a scoreboard on a field, but
Vince Marotte (1:21:19)
Mm-hmm.
The J-Man (1:21:39)
play more around the creative side of things where you’re bantering and a huge part of the secret sauce in that is humor. You know, it’s like, and yeah.
Vince Marotte (1:21:46)
Yeah, you’re right on. We can all connect on that.
So yeah, he brings that up. He quotes Schiller who says, know, I’m gonna butcher this quote, it’s verbatim. It’s on my website, it’s one of my favorite quotes and it’s, know, man is only fully human when he plays. It’s the most important thing we can do that separates us from the animals is that we play or recreate or recreate. It is how we can, it’s the most important.
Connection we have so when we go to that, you know our strongest drive apart from immediate survival is to connect The best the way we connect differently than than animals is we play All those other things are secondary and they come into being when we aren’t playing, you know, we’re not recreating We’re not sitting down for a meal together. We’re not sitting down watching a movie and we’re not talking. We’re not walking We’re not experiencing and just being together
and trying to enjoy. That’s the most important thing. And we’re trying to figure out how to do that right now and sharing. I don’t know what’s wrong with it. Sharing TikToks on Instagram is one way to do it. Let’s keep doing it. We’ve got to figure this out. ⁓
The J-Man (1:22:48)
Yeah. Yeah.
Great. Dude.
Yeah, no,
I mean, just thinking of going back to like one of my favorite comedies of all time and never forgetting when I saw it, where I saw it. I was in San Antonio at an embassy suites. We had an adjoined two room hotel. ⁓ It was my buddy’s birthday in middle school and we rented on the, know, Spectrevision, the ⁓ dumb and dumber. Not the other other stuff on Spectrevision, but.
Vince Marotte (1:23:29)
Ha ha ha ha
Right.
The J-Man (1:23:33)
But so
we watched Dumb and Dumber and you know, we had pizza and we were, you know, we had the fold out couch. We’re jumping on the bed. We’re watching it. We’re laughing it. We’re hearing stuff we shouldn’t hear. We’re seeing stuff we shouldn’t see. We were hiked up on Mountain Dew and candy. And then, you know, we opened presents and after that we’re outside in the parking lot. He got a sweet remote control car and we got a little bored. The trash of it made a little ramp up the curb and it like
That’s like the good old days with comedy. And we were quoting that movie. We immediately watched it like the following weekend. We had to go watch it again. And it became a part of our culture and our childhood and our upbringing. It’s just part of our language.
Vince Marotte (1:24:08)
yeah. Yeah.
So
it’s what’s next? How do we do what’s next? ⁓ And that’s what we’re trying to figure out. How do we play together in that? That’s kind of a low common denominator. As long as you have the language skills and mental ability to sit down with some people, watch a movie, that’s pretty low. We can all get around that. mean, obviously the most important one is to sit around and have a meal together. Everyone needs to do that. Everyone can do that. Everyone has to.
most important context for play for humans. you know, watching a movie that we can just all laugh at, it isn’t too hard to watch. don’t have to be thinking real hard about plot twists. It’s the comedy and it is kind of going away, you know, or do we just have to have dudes in tights with capes, know, superheroes fighting and green screen, you know, is that all we have left in terms of movies?
The J-Man (1:25:10)
Yeah. I think part of
my take in what that question is, is that I’m at a point where I’m trusting that, you know, this idea of the human spirit is very resilient. We found our way through the dark ages where I’m trusting this next generation and the next generations, they’re going to figure it out. I don’t need to be the old disgruntled grumpy guy complaining about it all the time. Like I’m seeing it. They did just, they got to find their footing. We need.
Vince Marotte (1:25:30)
Yeah.
The J-Man (1:25:38)
They need people like us to able to say, y’all got this.
Vince Marotte (1:25:41)
We should, yeah, it should be there. We have enough resources, the clamoring and fighting and struggling for resources in Rifkin’s book, that’s what he’s talking about. That’s driving everything right now. And there’s a concept called an extinction burst where when something is about to go away, gets, it’s ⁓ most noisy or it seems to be.
The J-Man (1:25:49)
It’s all there.
Vince Marotte (1:26:07)
You know super prominent and take over, you know, you think of like, um, I feel how a two-stroke engine works Like it it operates as at its best It puts out the most power just before it explodes when it just the mix of air and fuel and oil is just right but if you go just a little bit beyond that boom it blows up and so capitalism seems to be in an extinction burst right now, I mean the The wealthiest people in corporations. There’s not much left for them to gobble up
And so the people are kind of waiting around and that’s what’s been driving everything globally right now is capitalism. We’re in this tremendous shift right now. Everyone’s catching up to America. ⁓ and so we should be living the star trek reality. That’s we could live that right now, but we all have to connect and decide we’re going to be okay with each other and our differences, know, differences in religion and not try to get after each other for other reasons, not trying to get after each other because we don’t have the resources and we’re fighting for them.
⁓ you know, we’re in a post scarcity. There’s no scarcity anymore. It’s just by design, the scarcity because the capital needs to create scarcity to make money. ⁓ but there’s enough food, there’s enough energy for everybody to live a great life right now. ⁓ and we have to figure that out because what we’re doing with AI and robots, it should free us up. We should be working less. You know, we should be working way less.
Not working harder and we should be able to enjoy that play and that’s the future. I look forward to You know, maybe it’s pie in the sky You know whatever but that’s what we should be doing So anything short of hoping for that and trying to move towards that is stupid in my mind So the you know, just trying to I know the reality today is get resources acquire money And I feel that pain and I have to do that for my family and that’s just the current reality that we’re dealt
The J-Man (1:27:45)
Yeah.
Vince Marotte (1:28:03)
man, hopefully my kids or my grandkids get to that post-scarcity reality where they can just play and we can get art and we can do art and those sorts of things.
The J-Man (1:28:09)
Yeah.
Well, in
the wise words of one of the greatest other comedies of all time, the greatest comedy of all time, of the wild stallions say, just be excellent to each other.
Vince Marotte (1:28:22)
Be
excellent to each other and that’s a good ender right there.
The J-Man (1:28:27)
you