#65 The Early Comedy Years ft. Dustin Chafin & Nic Novicki
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Ryan Reynolds here from Int Mobile. With the price of just about everything going up during inflation, we thought we'd bring our prices

Hello, folks. Welcome to Nate Land.

All right, everybody. Welcome to the Nateland podcast. We're excited to have you guys here. Have a little bit of the first kind of different podcast. So sadly, Brian Bates is not here. He had a kind of family emergency. I'm sure we'll talk about it at some point. But so he could not make it. Prayers to, you know, Bates and his family and

his wife's family and all of them uh so uh we had in so you got aaron here i am at the end of the table in brian's chair brian's chair you ever see a room you've been in a bunch from a different spot yeah it looks like a new room yeah it feels very different people move furniture around a lot is that why just to shuffle things up yeah we were we laura does not

But I grew up and I think that's why I like things changing because my parent, we grew up just rearranging every day. I mean, we'd come home and there'd be the kitchen is now my parents, or the dining room is my parents' bedroom. And now we're eating in their old bedroom. Like it'd be that much of switching. And I feel like when you just have a small house, you know, we grew up in a very small house. It's like, that was the only way to like, be like, oh, look at it now. It's like a new house. Like a new house. Right. Right.

And so we did it. They did it a bunch. So, yeah, it's like that's fun. It's fun. Yeah, I like it over here. Yeah, it's nice over there, right? You realize the vantage point Bates gets. I know. And you're like. It's kind of wasted on him, huh? Yeah, yeah. I feel like I'm getting something out of it. You're getting it. You're getting it. And we have two guests with us.

These are very special guests. One you know, Mick. Everybody, Mick's back. Hello. Hello. There you go, folks. Hello, folks. There you go. There you go. I like to just kind of delay. Hello. Yeah. Hello, folks. Wear the sweatshirt with mustaches on it. Yeah. What's the point of that? Is that something? Just a little fun, you know? So you went into a store and you saw, you go, y'all got any mustaches on a sweater? And they go...

Yeah, and you're like, just one. They go, we got four. And you go, all right, I'll do four. Is that mustaches? Is it just mustaches? It's just mustaches. I don't hate it, but...

I kind of like it, but it's kind of... The whole podcast is just Nate staring at the mustaches. Oh, yeah. Well, you've wore it on stage. I mean, this is your nice shirt. Well, actually, the funny thing is, because we were out over the weekend, and the first time we see Nate, I show up and I'm wearing this in the morning. And he's like, why are you dressed up like you're ready to go to the show? Yeah. I was like, well, I'm not wearing this the rest of the day. I'm wearing it for breakfast. Yes. It was like I dressed up for you. Yeah. Yeah.

And you're wearing it today for breakfast, and then breakfast wasn't here. Yeah. So our other guest is our great, great friend, Dustin Chafin. We were roommates. Yeah, we were. We've all talked, which today we will talk a lot about, like kind of comedy at the beginning. This is the start. All of us was the start. We've been very close friends for, I mean...

16 years, 17 years. Wow. We all lived together. And so we were all on the road this weekend together. And it was very fun. And we're talking about all that stuff. So it's fun to have us here. Yeah, it was great. And the bus was bigger than our apartment. Yes. Yeah. Oh, man. We're talking about that apartment. It was something. So first up, we want to talk about...

Read your comments from you guys. Comments are from Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, Apple Podcast Reviews, and you can also email nateland at natebargatze.com. First up, Brent Cook. Nothing strikes me funnier than Bates being deep in the Wikipedia weeds. Nate murmuring his disapproval of where things are going, and Aaron doubled over in silent laughter. Gets me every time. Keep it rolling, folks.

That's true. I thought the last podcast was good, but there was parts where it was like, all right. I'm always reminded of your line, Nate, where Brian was reading something and he was like, you don't find that interesting? And Nate goes, I mean, it is, but people are listening to this. Something to keep in mind. Well, there's a difference. You do. You got to remember that people are listening. This is a little more high pressure.

of a conversation then yeah uh you know just you know there's conversations like yeah we should be doing this alone i've said that on stage sometimes sometimes you try a joke and it doesn't work and then you're like oh you're like i'm sorry i should have just like this should be something i should tell y'all like privately like it's like a funny enough joke if we were just one-on-one right but not for a room of people you know uh andrew uh councilman councilman

I don't know. Andy. That would just be... I would never want to marry you, Ant. I'd be like, so what is it? This has to be the only podcast to mention 9-11, Katrina, and the slinket all in one episode. I think that's true. America's three greatest tragedies. Yeah. There's the slinket right there. I talked to him this weekend about...

The guy that started this slinket. He had some friends that were going to come to his show. So it was very funny to get it. I was like, oh man, it all came together. I was like, we just talked about you. I take it he likes cards. He likes cards. That's the card one. That's the one we buy my dad. My dad would love that one. The card one. That would be his favorite. Slinket's the original.

Slanket. Who don't understand? Slanket's the original. Before the Snuggie? Slanket was the one that started it all. Snuggie came in with just big money and just said, oh, I like what you did, and you can't copyright it. Didn't you have one at one time? Yeah, yeah. We did a commercial for him, me and Giannis. Giannis was friends with him. And so, I mean, this dude invented this, and then Snuggie just... Like, what happens is people invent something, and then someone with a lot of money goes, well, I'll just use money to advertise it. So then he just swallows...

He doesn't buy them out. He just copies them, calls it something else, and then has the money to pay for all the commercials. Everybody just knows about Snuggie when Slinket was the original. Slinket's like a MySpace. It was first. More like a Friendster, actually. It was Friendster way back. All right, let's go back further. Kellogg. How about Kellogg the cereal? What?

lost to the other cereal do you see that post and cereal but what what food made us cereal yes what Kellogg and post is a whole crazy thing post cereal it's like uh what what food made us it goes on this whole crazy what food made us I think that's the name of it I don't know it may not yeah

But it's a whole crazy thing. Like Kellogg was first? Kellogg was first. They were living in, this guy from Post was working there as an intern. And they were like, ooh, this crunchy thing. And he's just an intern working there, steals it, and then creates this Post. This is the 1800s. Oh, really? Yeah. Is this the food that built America? The food that built America. I said the food that made us. Yeah, that made us. Yeah.

It was one of the titles they tried to go with, and they go, I don't think it makes sense. And the us was spelled U dot S dot. Aaron looks like he could have been in that recreation, though. You have like a 1800s. Yeah. Well, all I need is one of those mustaches from your shirt, and then I would be ready for it. I think they come off if you want. I thought you meant he's a guy who looks like he likes cereal. Yeah. I do love cereal, man. Yeah. But no, that's right. He could be in the 1800s. Thanks, man. Yeah. Kellogg. Wow. Yeah.

you made that good. Cause you took a turn at the beginning. I was like, what are we doing? We talked about Friendster. I know. I thought you were trying to name another social media platform. I was like, well, it's like Kellogg's. Well, you're like, yeah, the old post platform. What was the word post that threw us? Yeah. Yeah. And the whole thing, you know, down to the sweater is what I got confused. Uh,

They can't stop staring at the mustache. Now, I mean, you wear it on stage. I like it. It's because you, it's an easy, easy thing to pack. Because when you go, when Nick goes anywhere, he packs this one backpack that's a roller. And it's, if it's a one day trip to a four month trip, it's just that backpack. Okay.

Nice. And he's, I mean, he's the, you're the most compact Packer I've ever seen in my life. I've never seen you outside of that. And there's times you've been, you come to New York back before you moved to LA, you'd be there for, I mean, a few weeks. Oh yeah. And you would just have that. Yeah.

Is it a free-for-all, putting stuff in the suitcase, or is there a science behind it? You roll stuff up? How do you do it? Luckily, my wife helps. Before that, Nate would see it and look like. It was not rolled up. It was just jammed in. He always had luggage to the comedy club, even in the city. He wasn't traveling anywhere. He would just roll up with luggage. He was here for a few hours. He goes, well, you never know. I was a traveling salesman, basically. It was a couch sale. Selling cereal.

Somebody's couch. Joe Cicero. Favorite episode to date. I couldn't catch my breath because I was laughing so hard when Nate was unable to properly pronounce disabled.

Yeah, it's a tough one. I think some people got a little upset that we said that. But we were not making fun of disabled people. Yeah, the point was we had no idea what we were talking about. That's kind of always the point. That's always the point. I mean, I mispronounce disabled. So now is when I can plug my Easter Seals Disability Film Challenge. There we go. Boom. Easter Seals Disability Film Challenge. Go to disabilityfilmchallenge.com. Nate will spell disability wrong. D-I-C-A...

Yeah, it's a great thing you do. Everybody makes these videos and they make films and they win. These films are unbelievable. Yeah, unbelievable. Honestly, though, there are hundreds of films you can see. Go to disabilityfilmchallenge.com. Check it out. Great films that include people with disabilities. Yeah, there you go. We upped it up.

Brian Lee. I paused the podcast to look up the Atlantic article on Nate, the nicest man in stand-up, only to then unpause and hear him immediately start making fun of an old one-eyed softball player. Great episode, guys. Well, that guy's not in stand-up. I'm the nicest to the other stand-ups is what that article is. Only to stand-ups. Only to stand-ups. Softball players I'm brutal against because they would never let me play with them.

I told that where I lost. I got the yips in softball. No. That's where we need Brian. Well, I might have. When you struck out at the Royals game, right? Yeah. But, I mean, when I played church softball, well, I mean, it's crazy. These guys were like the best softball team ever, and one guy's one eye. Yeah. But they dominated, dude.

They dominated. I think just them four would play, and they would beat everybody. They would play teams of nine with just four people and obliterate people. Yeah, one of them was Don Mattingly, it looks like. Yeah. No, that's the guy, the king right there, the old guy. The old guy's the king. He's the best softball pitcher of all time. He's the pitcher, wow. Yeah. And he was so good. And the other guys you could see just jack stuff out. We think that guy ran, covered, the one-eyed guy we said covered first.

And he never saw anybody. Well, you were telling me yesterday you had a no-hitter when you were in. Well, I had a no-hitter in baseball. Oh, okay. In Little League Baseball. Game ball's up there at the top. The ball's somewhere over there. I got Harper's game ball, the yellow one in the middle. Very proud of that. Great. I told her, I was like, you got to let me put it up there. And then, yes, when I had softball, I went through a phase playing church softball. I played softball some in Chicago when I first moved there. And then I played in church.

You know, when you're playing with grownups, it's like guys that are like major league players. But I got the yips for a minute where I couldn't throw to first base and I would just sell it over. I'd be on, I'd either play short or second and I'd get a ground ball and then I couldn't keep it. I couldn't hit the guy.

And I would just launch it, and it would hit, you know, the open. There's no top on this softball field. It just hits there and falls in. And, I mean, it doesn't get more embarrassing than that. It's like me trying to chip in golf. It just goes every time. Red Goss or Goss. Goss, probably Goss, G-O-S-S.

I bet he got it. It's probably Reed, though. Probably Reed. R-E-I-D. Reed. Reed Gross. Nate's description of Avatar is why this podcast is amazing. It's like Blue Man Group in space. Everyone nods along like what he said wasn't absolutely nuts. Keep up the good work, Aaron, Nate, and Bean Sprout.

They always call Brian different names. So that's where all it comes from. Yeah. I still stand by that. It's like Blue Man Group in space. It's not bad. Blue Man Group did pretty well. Yeah, Blue Man Group, very successful. Avatar, very successful. Max Sigmund. Sigmund.

Brian Lee was the first one. And Brent Cook. Started off Brent Cook, and I was like, this is going to be an easy day. And then got beat up by the next two. Then Brian Lee was like, all right, we're back. Got my head above water.

And then now we're still just – and by the looks of it, we ain't getting out of it. I'm drowning. No, no, dude. Max Simon, S-I-G-M-O-N. The thought of Brian on the phone with Al Gore and asking him how far he can throw a football killed me. Thanks, Aaron. That was a very funny line. Yeah, yeah. I think it was a line that got – it didn't get the respect it should have got here, but they noticed it. Oh. I feel like I got some respect here. I got a laugh from both of y'all. I was surprised.

You're not ready for me to say a joke. Yeah. So it always catches you off guard. Yeah. Brian and I, I think it's a dead serious comment, but it's a very funny line to just picture Bates on the phone with Al. I called Al Gore and just how far can you throw a football? And he's like,

It would be a great line. Yeah. Can you imagine just calling someone and just like right when they go, hello, how far can you throw a football? Do you think they answer it? I think most people would give it. Most men would give an answer. Yeah. They go, excuse me. How far? You heard me. How far can you throw a football? Probably 40 yards. Yeah. I would think I'd hope 40 yards. 20 for me. And then you go, all right, do you want to buy insurance? And he goes, all right, yeah, I'll buy it. What a great, that's how everybody should call someone and just go, how far can you throw a football? Yeah.

I used to do cold calls for my job. I would have liked to have had some kind of... A line like that. Something like that to at least keep me interested. It's a great opening line. That's where I think you throw a football. My name is Aaron. How far can you throw a football? Yeah. That's it. And just to see if one guy ever goes 65 yards. And he goes, Steve Young? Jay Cullen. Do you want to buy in, Steve? Jay? Jay would just hang up on you. Annie Doggett.

Dog, then get dogget. Annie Deadgummit. That's what Annie's name is.

Annie, dead gummit. I'm an avid Errandland listener. Oh, well, dead gummit, Annie. I'm an avid Errandland listener who couldn't get behind the whole oughts is actually something people say argument. But then I heard it for the first time in class today. He's becoming too powerful. Wow. Well, I like that Annie disagreed with Errandland. And now she's surrounded by it.

Yeah. Yeah. That's crazy. Let me ask you guys. Can I float it to y'all? What do you call the decade after the 1990s? After the 90s? Yeah. 2000s? Y21. Y21. Y2K. I don't even think about it. You don't even think about it? Those years are just gone. They're just gone. 2000s. I did a lot of drinking. Yeah.

2000s. Yeah, you don't think about it. It seems like 90s, 80s. You never hear that. I would say 2000s. 2000s. I would know what you meant when you said 2000s. I've never said that. You would know what we meant because the world uses that. Yeah, exactly. That's what I'm saying. That's what you say when someone says, I call it the aughts. Have you ever heard of the aughts? No. No.

And you have the audacity. The audacity. The audacity. Good work. To go, I needed Aaron's help on it. To think, we say 2000s, you're like, all right, I get it. Yeah, I roundabout know what you're talking about. But the aughts were supposed to be like, yeah, yeah, yeah. That's exactly what it is. But it's being used. What if Annie, maybe she, I'd be great if her teacher was an Aaron Land fan too. Could be.

Daniel Fitzsimmons. All right. I know that because of Greg Fitzsimmons. Daniel Fitzsimmons. Dear Nate, Aaron, and Bacteria. Never heard of Bacteria. That's a good one. That's fun. I love the show so much. However, as an RN, registered nurse, I was aghast. What? Aghast. Aghast. Aghast.

Uh, at Nate suggestions that it's okay to just use hand sanitizer instead of washing your hand. The water soap and friction removes bacteria from your hand and is vital in man maintaining sanitation. Hand sanitizer simply kills some, but not all of the bacteria. And without the help of water and friction leaves your hands covered in someone else's excrement. When you leave a public restroom. Wow. Wow. Yeah. Yeah.

This was Nate's solution to save water, was to get rid of sinks. Yeah. And just have hand sanitizer. I'll tell you something. We're not going to allow you to come on the tour with us on the bus. Daniel fits in with you. You're going to be eyeballing us the whole time. I got to walk in and hide my hand sanitizer use. It says 99.9. Yeah. That number's there for a reason. I'm there for that 0.1%. I'll fight that 0.1%. That's how much it is. Nick...

You put cortisone in your mouth this week. So, Daniel, what's your comments on if someone, as an adult...

Thanks cortisone toothpaste and then squirts it into his mouth and swigs it around. Did you do that on the bus? Not on the bus. No. At his parents house. So yeah. So we're stayed in Mohegan sun. I wake up early. My parents live in new Haven. I'm tired. I go there. I'm like, I need to rinse my mouth out. So I see this tube, what looks like toothpaste. And I just see the sea and I thought it was Colgate. And so I go like that.

Put it in. It was a red and white label. So that's how he brushes his teeth. He doesn't have a toothbrush. So he basically eats toothpaste. And then he puts it in his mouth. We've already had an incident with this before. So I start to swish like this. You have water in your mouth? Not yet. So you do it no water or anything? Well, first step is put the toothpaste in. Second step, go under the sink, get a little

water i like that you go under like you get i got like you're in it you gotta swim to the sink yeah well it's like you jump in it you just hold your nose and jump in the sink and then swim over there well usually i can't reach the sink so i gotta it's steps so i'm like i gotta do like a pull-up in

and then move. I do kind of swim a little bit towards the sink. So now on the way, I turn the tube and realize that it's cortisone in my mouth. I just spit it out like immediately. Yeah.

And now, ever since then, my front teeth have been hurting. I don't know if this is connected. Yeah, still today. Still today. I mean, it's been like five days. Two days of serious pain in my first teeth. They're going to fall out. Not before. Not before. But just right after the cortisone. Right after the cortisone, I'm like...

you know mind you i'm feeling like i'm better i think cortisone is gonna you know make you you know if you have pain yeah no pain except the teeth well yeah it could be against the teeth so you saw it was c for colgate so you probably got a pretty good look at the other letters on there too right well he saw the c and then the o you know i got it in a weird angle i got it like sideways and i could just see the c was it like wrapped up like

I did have to unwrap it a little bit. Okay. So they had it wrapped up to the C, maybe a little O. There you go. Well, obviously, you know, obviously everybody keeps their toothpaste under the sink. And they don't have it out. Was the toothpaste very obvious when you found it? I mean, it still looked identical. It was also Colgate. So in fairness. Wow. Yes. In fairness. And then it was on the sink.

Well, it was a drawer. So I go in the drawer. And then they have cortisone. I'm tired. So you'd like to blame your parents for being, why are y'all keeping those that close together? Yeah. Was it next to the Band-Aids? That's true. You could have had a word with your mom and dad and said, hey, let me talk to you guys for a second. Why do y'all keep these two things? Knowing that you have me as a son, why would you ever think that you would be allowed to keep those things too? They know you the best. Yeah. Right.

And I think I'm the third best. I would. I'm going to walk through your parents' house and go, hey, guys, you know, I know Nick's lived in L.A. for a while, but we got to clean some stuff up around here. All right. We got to keep these things farther away. I mean, I was I was almost so excited that it happened. Just knowing I'd be able to tell you what. Well, I love that.

His parents came to the show. We've met him before, but I haven't seen him in a while. It was wonderful to go. His dad's going to come out on tour with us. He was so excited. You know what his job is? What's that? Podiatrist. Oh, podiatrist. Podiatrist. He's a podiatrist. Oh, I didn't know that. Yeah, yeah. They're old New Haven. They're all five generations from New Haven, Connecticut.

Best pizza in the world. Best pizza in the world. Old money from New Haven. Oh, yeah? Oh, yeah. That's why they can afford strips. Y'all went to Yale? Any Yale people in your family? No. No. His dad's a big fan, though. His dad's like me with Vanderbilt, except his dad probably could have got into Yale. Yeah.

They're big Notre Dame fans. Oh, yeah. Oh, that's right. We've talked about that. I've got the Cortisone and the Colgate logos pulled up. So you can see here's Cortisone and here's Colgate. Okay. And you can see. It's pretty close. So here's a tube of Cortisone. And I could see how you'd think that was a travel size Colgate. Yeah. Especially if it's rolled up. It was actually the bigger kind, though.

It was like the big tube that looked like it was a legit... But you can see, yeah, yeah, they're red. Something a podiatrist would have. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's not a crazy leap. Fast itch relief.

What does it say? I mean, I think it's... Just please don't... It's got to be a warning label. I can't believe we would even say this, but don't put it in your mouth. For external use only. External. Right there in the direction. And you went internal. Yeah, I went... You went in. You know what? I'm going to lose a couple teeth on this tour. So the tube, when it...

Felt itself being squeezed and thought, where are we? It's pretty dark in here. I've never, you know, because he's not used to that. Yeah, the tube. Yeah. I'll be honest with you, the toothpaste probably isn't used to be just jammed in its mouth either. These are two things that see the light of day every day. And then they just go in like a spaceship. It's being like, God, it's getting dark back here. What's going on? You know, that's kind of crazy.

Before we get to the next one, let me read just a couple of these ads. All right. Come back to a couple more of those. Here we are. Jay Alberton. Alberton? Alberton. Alberton, probably. Probably. I think he's Canadian. Jay Albritton. My dad played briefly for the Toronto Argonauts. Yeah? Yeah. Argonauts. I don't know what that means. I don't even know what Argonauts are. I've heard of it. I believe they are middle-aged knights.

They're farmer astronauts. Farmer astronauts. I hope they're farmer astronauts. What did you say it was? Middle-aged knights. They're octopus. It's an octopus. But you believe me, though. Nate's eyes lit up, and he was like, oh, that's awesome. Yeah, I don't know what it is. I believe actually both of them.

But Dustin came up with a great joke. I believe you thought you were right too. Yeah. Mid-aged...

What do they mean, knights in their 40s? Kind of on the back end. It could also mean any adventurer engaged in a quest or a band of heroes, Argonauts. Argonauts is a good name. Yeah, it's fine. So Jay's dad played briefly for the Toronto Argonauts in the CFL when he was just out of college and was invited to try out for the Baltimore Colts in the mid-50s.

But I think the sports accomplishment he was most proud of was getting a foul tip against the King and his court in the mid-60s. Wow. That's pretty cool. I mean, that's crazy. So is that like a legit athlete that played in the CFL and then tried out for the Baltimore Colts? Johnny Unitas? Maybe didn't make it just because they left in the middle of the night. Was that the team that left?

Yeah, to Indianapolis. His dad showed up. He goes, where is everybody? That's his first tryout. He's just out there on the field alone, stretching. He's like, just a little late. Everybody late today? This is a tight-run ship. They're on a bus and stuff, just driving away. Yeah.

but that's crazy. He got a foul tip against the King. I mean, just a foul tip. Yeah. It's probably what caused this guy to have an eye patch. Yeah. Yeah. That was a hard foul, right? Yeah. He goes, he was not used to seeing that. Uh,

God, that's how fast, that's how good of a pitcher that guy was. Wow. They also look like they'd be great to hang out with, like very friendly. I bet they're fun. Yeah, yeah. I don't think they got a lot of sleep. They kind of got a Harlem Globetrotters uniform. Yeah, yeah. That's kind of what they did. That's kind of what they did. Okay, gotcha. They would come in and they'd be like, pick your best nine players and then they would kill them. Oh, wow. Yeah. So it was kind of, yeah. I mean, they did it a little more than Harlem Globetrotters. I think they would let people pick their team's.

If this guy's dad played against him, they'd go, this guy's dad played in the CFL. Obviously, you're like, yeah, we come play softball. He's like, yeah, dude, I'll crush these dudes. It's just four dudes? How would we not win? Then they beat them. They should get that going again. Was it mostly in the pitching that they would win? Probably. He was the best pitcher. Then you look at the other two big guys. I think they would...

it would just be home run after home run. Yeah, that Gronk looking guy. He could hit for sure. And then he's striking everybody out. So they probably have a guy at first, then some guys playing. You got a guy at first base, you got a guy playing kind of little mid-deep

Short and third and then mid, maybe right over second base. And then the pitchers are striking everybody out. If you can't hit anybody, I mean, you know, maybe a couple people get hit. But we actually probably need to look into that. I hope there's video. I hope there's video. Yeah, I hope there's video too. Michael Spirit Walker Mosley. Spirit Walker. Native maybe? Maybe. I know him. He's a comedian from Alabama.

Oh. Spirit Walker. Native American guy? I've done a couple shows with him, yeah. He goes by Spirit... He is Native American? Spirit Walker, yeah. Oh, so that's his real... Spirit Walker is what he goes by, yeah. Because if you're not, that's just, you know... Well, I mean, it's gotta be tough for him as a comedian for if he goes... I go by Spirit Walker. You're not like...

You're probably like, well, yeah, whatever, man. A lot of comics go by weird names. You probably don't think he's... Meanwhile, Earthquake's here next weekend. Yeah, yeah. You're like, yeah, that's fun. I'll have you featured for Earthquake. And you're like, I would love it. Please welcome to the stage Spirit Walker. And Spirit Walker brings up Earthquake.

uh and they close the show out ozone uh talent's doing a good spot talent yeah there's a talent I mean that is pretty crazy that's in in Philly where where I started and Mike Beccione is uh yeah he'll be there next weekend yeah uh there was a lot of guys there's a guy that went by sun572 sun 572 yeah and he had the greatest uh

it was the greatest at the end of it. No matter what, it didn't matter if you killed or bombed, he would go, "Sun-5-7-2, and the sun always shines!" And he would drop the mic. - After bombing? - If you killed, it was a standing up or a bombing. - This is like open mics. - Open mics, and it would be like, you know, it would be a guest spot, either way. Kill, bomb, he was a great comm, he would do good always. But regardless, he would, "Sun-5-7-2, and the sun always shines!"

And then the hands come down. And the mic. And you got to be like, imagine that's a guest spot. Like if people, I mean, I don't know if people don't know. So a guest spot is like, so typically like we were out this weekend. So it was me, Nick and Dustin, right? We are the show. And then say Aaron ends up being in town and he's like, oh, I'm gonna come hang at a show. And we're like, all right, dude, we'll throw you a guest spot. So you let him go up and he does that.

10 minutes, five minutes, whatever. And you're just like a buddy that comes in. You're like, yeah, we'll throw you up on the show. That's a guest spot. They're not getting paid. It's, but I mean, you're all you're doing is guest spots at the beginning. Yeah. Uh, but it was very fun. And so like, so for, but a guy that son five, seven, two, I have heard, I've heard you or Jay and all them talk about it. Uh,

for that guy to come and do that as a guest spot, it would be probably looked down on because you're like, all right, dude, like you're just here. You're not on the show. You're yeah. You don't drop the mic when you're doing four minutes. Yeah. You do four minutes, drop the mic. And now the host that is on the show has got to go pick the mic up.

and be like it's broken now you gotta put batteries back in it yeah if you're closing the show that's you don't even do it if you're the headliner yes do whatever you want they're there to see you they're there to see you yeah but yeah Sun 517 that's great Sun always shine yeah and your next comic and your next comic well it was Nick Novicki everybody

It was the greatest because we did have, this was, you know, it was talent night. It was open mic. And this guy, Legendary Wid, the best. First time I ever did comedy. He would do in between everybody. But he would have to come back on stage and get the mic because we're all doing five minutes. Okay, everybody. And all right. And that's on 572. Yeah. What if they made you always go after him? Because it was just like, you know, like the mic was easier for you to grab. And then everybody nods. I guess he does that. Yeah.

out of these being nice. So everybody was like fine with it. It's always the dumbest thing too. Cause like when you run a comedy show, the last thing you want to see is somebody breaking the microphone. Like don't hit your head with it. Don't drop it. Like that's, we all need that device so we can perform. Respect it. A lot of times it's your microphone. Yeah. You know, it's like the comedian brought the PA system. Yeah. And people with dental problems

Oh, yeah. You go grab a microphone and you just see it's got a big din in it. You know that came from someone's head. Yeah, somebody's this big. You ever walk in a room and it falls down and you're like, this guy just caved in and you're like, so we, and the rest of the show, we're all like, he's got a weird shake. It's like an ice cream cone, like half someone took a big bite out of it and you're like, all right. Someone's closer. Yeah.

You're like, I hope it murdered. He's like, it does all right. I can't say nothing that good. He's like, it's okay. Oh, let me read. Well, go check out Michael Spirit Walker Mosley as a comedian. You should look up Rosie Black, who was the pitcher for the Queen Intercourt softball team. They were also a four-person team that would play against other full teams and beat them. I've seen them play twice at Altus.

Never heard of it. Altus Air Force Base against the top men softball players on the base. It was so hilarious to watch these big brawny military men who were no slouches in fast pitch softball, and she would just smoke them. I've seen Rosie strike out men while she was wearing a blindfold, and she would even throw a pitch between her legs and strike them out. Wow. I mean. There's Rosie Black.

I wonder if they ever played. The Queen and King Tour. That's huge money. I mean, honestly. That's a mist. I might look into this and get this going again. What if we try to see, we just have them do a tour. They can come on the bus. They just have them tour with us. That's what we go do during the day. They come play your best. What if we could get it going? That'd be amazing. I feel like they would think Aaron's on the team. Just people walking by. He's on the team. No, Aaron would be the umpire.

You actually look like you could be the umpire today. Just all black. Dustin and I wear basically the same thing. That's what we do. This feels a little... He's got a little bit more... This feels like NBA. Aaron, they would just be like, so who wears this padding under his shirt? Comes off the bus. Oh, I guess it's a bulletproof vest or something like that. And you go, yeah, yeah, something like that. We can make fun of Aaron because Aaron's lost...

Yeah. 100 pounds. I like it. That's the crazy thing. I know. One Krispy Kreme challenge and then Aaron just- That's all it took. That's all it took. Oh, yeah. He's down. 13, huh? Wow. I mean, 60, 70 pounds? Yeah. I mean, not to say- It's not like he was ever this- He was just a big dude. Yeah. And then, I mean, just- You can watch it all. But I haven't seen you in a year. Yeah, I'll say it's been a while, man. I come back, you lost 100 pounds, you got married, and now you're in Brian's seat. Yeah. Yeah.

Things are really improving for all of us. We're going to look into it is tie into. Sorry. All right. Uh, Jason stop or stove. Nate, the story of your daughter's softball team named the nightmares had me laughing. I love the way kids think they're left alone to be creative with things like this. Uh,

Wait, did I read that right? I love the way kids think they are left alone to be creative with things like this. It reminded me of last year when the coach of my nine-year-old daughter's soccer team gave them the assignment of thinking of a team name. When they all returned to practice the next week to vote on suggested names like Pink Dragons and Pink Panthers, they were all like,

My daughter's suggestion was the one they chose. They were the Washington football team. That's so great. I mean, the whole season. I couldn't have been more proud. That's amazing. You love that. I love that. That's such a good name. That's so great. The Washington football team.

Oh, that's so good. That's such a good name. I do. It's so wonderful. That's maybe the one of the glorious thing of just seeing children and the pure innocence and what makes children so perfect.

is just let them choose their names. Yeah, absolutely. And what are they going to do? You know, I mean, the Washington football teams, which by the way, I love that name. And that kid's hilarious. Yeah, whoever did that is on point. I mean, they're playing soccer, football team. She knows it's called football. Technically, she's right.

Are they in Washington? Who knows? It doesn't matter. I hope not. I hope they're in Florida. Nothing would make me happier. It's better. They're in Florida, and they're the Washington football team. Who are we playing this weekend? We got the Pink Panthers playing the Washington football team. If you were just gambling on that, you're like, well, I got to go with the Washington football team. I got to gamble on that. We got the Frozen Gals. I love it. McKay Potter. McKay Potter. Two last names. McKay Potter. Mm-hmm.

You know, does it seem like that? Yeah. Adam McKay, Harry Potter. That's what I thought. So you thought that's what you thought. So maybe when he was named that it wasn't that. And then now it's like McKay Potter and everybody goes, yeah, what's your last name? Yeah. I mean, you know, what's your first name? He probably has to deal with this every day. If you have Potter in your name, chances are people think you're just a giant Harry Potter fan.

You think they think they changed their name? You think they changed their name? They changed their name because of it. Like, yeah, my dad was a huge Harry Potter fan. So he changed his last name, which is a little bit harder to do than at first. Uh,

Yeah, middle name maybe, but like you're saying. You got to go down, you got to fill out documents. Yeah, it's a big deal. That's how big of a fan he is. And that's what you think every time you see a Potter. I think a lot of them. He changed his last name to Potter, but McKay is his first name. Yeah. Yeah, he just went, he goes, he moved it. McKay was just sitting there on the bench and then...

You got brought up. He goes, I'm bringing Potter in. And then McKay goes, I guess I'm out. And he goes, McKay, it's your lucky day. And then Billy's like, so what does that mean for me? And Billy's throwing up the back. I like it. Changed his last name. He's a big Harry Potter fan. Hi, folks. First time commenter. Long time listener. Welcome to the show, McKay Potter, because we've given you the full service. I went to the dentist this morning to get a crown.

The dentist had one of those TVs on the ceiling where you can watch Netflix. I put on Greatest Average American, and the dentist was giggling the whole time. Pretty uncomfortable to have the dentist laughing while holding a drill in my mouth. But I made it out alive, and he got a new fan. He said he's going to listen to the podcast, so keep it up. Welcome to the show. That's awesome. That's awesome, man. That is. I mean, you know, if he's laughing at it.

just in there like, he's just, he's like, oh, sorry. He gets like four other teeth. Sorry. We're going to do five crowns now. Okay. Uh,

If it's all right to ask the dentist what cortisone does to your mouth, I would like to know. Yes, McKay, could you write us back? Could you ask your dentist? I mean, someone's going to... Anybody, truthfully, will let us know, and we'll let you know in the comments. What happens if you put cortisone in your mouth? We're not going to look it up. We would just like one of the...

One of our folks. I mean, we got a lot of smart folks. We do. And so they are definitely going to know. We got all the scale. We got the smart folks that will know the answer. And I think we got some folks that have also done this. Yeah, right. So we get everybody. And so let's get some from experience and then maybe just from some doctor stuff to figure that out. Saturday night, you know, we're doing the show. And after my parents came. Yeah. So...

I wanted them to see in their friend inside of the bus. Yeah. And there was, you know, I knock on it, but Ricky kind of went like this and didn't see me and just sees my parents. Yeah. So he was like, I'm not letting these random people. Yeah. And so he opened it up. He's like, oh, man. He's like, I didn't see you there. Yeah. Thanks for that. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

That happens to me all the time. He always knocks on my door and I just look and it's a whole sitcom every time. You're not a big doorbell guy.

There's no door on the bus. Why didn't you use the code to get in? I didn't know the code. You didn't have the code? We all know the code. No one told me. I think there was a meeting. I'm pretty sure you got a text message or something. There was something that's like, hey, here's the code. You get in and off the bus. Yeah, everybody. We're all on board. I knew it. I did it for Ricky. I wanted him to have that experience. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's good. You gave Ricky the experience.

We did. Uh, we had a fun, fun weekend, uh, this weekend. And, uh,

We, so we had, so I mean today was, I saw, you know, I usually work out Monday, Wednesday, Friday. We try to if I'm in town. And trying to turn a new leaf. I'm actually in great shape, but I eat still so bad that it's like, it just keeps it like, it's just my body's like solid. It's just solid. My fat is like...

It's kind of in a place. It's almost like I organized my fat. That's all I've done. It's because the eating doesn't help. It's all in the right cabinet. You're like, no, that's supposed to be up there. It fits in the cabinet now. Before it was out. Now it just fits in there. It's partially been organized by Krispy Kreme, I feel like. We had Krispy Kreme this weekend. Kevin Best is the best. So funny. I ate some of those Sour Patch Kids last night.

And we were almost out of them. Like, they were getting to the bottom. They were gone. They were gone. And so then last night, I was like, oh, I got those upstairs. And so I went to go get them. And they were full. And I kind of was like, I didn't really realize what happened. But I was like, I thought they were gone.

And I was like, these are back to full. And Kevin noticed that we were down and sent us a new box. Just from seeing it in the background of the podcast. Just seeing it in the background. Oh, wow. That's amazing. Kevin keeps an eye on it. He's a real fan. Kevin also is a Sal Pratchett fan. I like them. The movies only. It's the only time I eat them. Yeah, at the movies? Yeah. But why stop there if you enjoy it at the movie? Because I like to have that moment as a special moment. Yeah. Oh.

- Oh, okay. - I should do that. - Like milk duds, I don't do milk. You're not eating milk duds in your car. You know what I mean? - Yeah. - Oh, that's fair. - I eat- - There's certain food- - I eat in my car. - Do you? - On the couch, I eat them. Watching the news, I eat them. I mean, I eat a lot of them. - It's not my- - On the driving tour, I was eating a lot of them. And then I got cavities when I got back. - Oh yeah. - Wow. - Well, we got a dentist for you. - Put some cord- - Call McKay Potter. McKay Potter and be like, "Your dentist open?"

Does he got any room I can jump in there? Watch Cortisone be great for cavities. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, that would be amazing. If they're like, Nick, I'm not going to lie to you. Cortisone, you should brush your teeth with. I looked at the box. I thought it was Arm and Hammer. So I started drinking it.

What if we put bleach under the sink next to mouthwash? I mean, if it was in a mouthwash container? Well, obviously, that would trick everybody on Earth. I remember my dad told me in the 50s or whatever, they would put Ajax on their teeth to get them white. Oh, really? They would just rub their teeth with the Ajax. That's how we got white teeth back in the 50s. The 50s.

The fact that they figured that out. Yeah. And that word got around. I wonder if that's a type in Ajax, Ajax to get your teeth white. I wonder if that was a common thing or if it's like your dad's neighborhood. Oh, it's Texas. Wichita Falls, Texas. Big Ajax teeth whitening program. No, no, there's nothing, nothing officially written about it. Yeah. Yeah.

It's just one of those. It's like giving a baby whiskey. I one time used the white magic eraser. Oh, yeah? It worked pretty good, actually. You got a little bit of your dad in you. Yeah. You can't get it. You're like, I'm not doing Ajax, but you're like, that makes sense. Why would it not do it if it does it on the thing? Using white out on here. Yeah.

That's so great. Again, though, the food that made us. Yeah, the food that made us. I'm retitling it because that's a good thing. But Coke was started because it was all weird tonics that people were taking to try to home remedies. And then Coke, they put cocaine in it and all kinds of stuff. But it was just crazy remedies. Yeah, I don't think you know a lot about it.

I do. I had it on the background. It's the greatest show. This is all the same show. So it goes through different things, including Hershey, actually. We're going. Yeah, Hershey PA. We'll be there. We added a third show in Hershey PA on that Sunday. So if you want to go, Hershey PA, apparently a lot of fans there. Pretty awesome. Have you been to the Hershey world? No, we will go. I want to go so bad.

Is it a theme park? Yeah, it's a whole thing, man. But there's where the factory is, right? Yeah. It's all there. Oh, so we need to go. You should go for sure. Maybe we'll try to go Sunday because we have two shows Saturday. And then Sunday, I think we have it. Someone talked about golfing, but I think I'm golfing. I'm golfing Saturday morning in D.C.,

And then, so I don't know if I could golf in Hershey. I'd rather, honestly, I want to go golfing. But I would like to go see that because I've never seen there. So let's try to go Sunday to the Hershey. What is it, Hershey World? Yeah, Hershey. There's a bunch of different stuff there. The whole city is like Hershey themed. It's pretty cool. I did a weekend in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania at the Comedy Zone there. And it's equidistant to Hershey and Gettysburg. Yeah. And I was like, what do I do? I want to see Gettysburg.

But Hershey is your Silver War. You've had a battle with Hershey for hundreds of years. And so you're like, that one is more, it means more to you. You got to go on the road. I remember thinking, if I don't go to Hershey, it's like those guys died for nothing. Yeah. You know what I mean? I mean, your body's battled it for, that's what you're Silver War. That's what I meant by it. Like you go...

uh, Hershey world is like, you go, that's, uh, I've lost a lot of, a lot of stuff on this. You walk by, you see diet because now you've lost weight. So you go look by diabetes grave and you go like, I ain't gonna see you anymore. That's where gout, the gouts buried, uh, and all the things that you conquered. Uh, the, uh, he used to have a gal.

Might still have it. Afraid to get checked. He is 1800s. Yeah, he fits right in. So how far is Gettysburg? It was like an hour from, or maybe even less than that from Harrisburg. That's true. Would we choose Hershey's over Gettysburg? I think we might just because we're in the town. We'd probably do both. It may be on the way. I got to golf that morning. We got to get there. We have two shows Saturday.

And we're being DC. We're coming from DC. But maybe we can. Yeah. Cause I want to, we, so this weekend we were in Portland, Maine. Awesome. Awesome town. And they, Portland's, Maine's a, it's just very, very pretty up there. Beautiful. And so we got up there and, and so we ended up having one day off North Hampton, Massachusetts, which we apologize, North Hampton. They canceled that show. They canceled it on us basically the day before. Yeah.

is when we kind of found out about it and so we couldn't go they're doing other shows there i don't i don't you know who know the guy said it was because of covid but they were doing other shows in the town uh so i i don't know i you know i feel bad i don't want to just trash the guy there could be a reason he had to do it or he thought he had to do it uh so we're going back june 5th tickets are on sale now for that show we're going uh

We're doing the venue across the street from that place. No animosity. Yeah. It's total. Just coincidence. What do you want us to do? It's not the biggest town, and that's where the other place was. But, you know.

that place, I'm sure is a wonderful place. And, uh, it just worked out. It felt bad for everybody. I mean, we were very excited to go to North Hampton. Uh, we were, I mean, we're out there. We want to go do a show. And that's why we ended up going to Mohegan sun. Uh, so, uh, we will be back there, uh, June 5th, which they have to wait again. Uh,

so sorry uh but uh we were there and actually something that was going to come the batesville instagram uh she was going to come she runs it very funny very funny yeah yeah she's great uh uh and so batesville they were going to come to that show that gets canceled we then invite so we they were they but she lives in the middle of connecticut torrington and northampton oh and uh

So we were like, she messaged Nick. I talked to her. And then so we're like, well, just come to Connecticut. She was, I think, lived closer to Connecticut. And we're going to go meet and do some meet and greet. I was going to meet her and stuff like that. Batesville podcast. And a thousand followers. She's doing really good. And very funny. And then so she's going to come to that. Doesn't make that show. Misunderstanding. Kind of a mess up.

Not RM, but just with the venue. And like, it was just a kind of a thing. And Doesn't Make It, which is, which we, as Bates told her, is just perfectly on brand. And even makes it, I mean, sadly, but Bates is not even here today. It's all just kind of comes together. It all kind of works out.

and I mean, cause I wish she will, she will be at a show. We will meet her. Right. So I'm not worried about that. But I, it's, it's very funny to be the Batesville one. Batesville podcast doesn't make the show. You get in all kinds of Bates predicaments. You get in Bates predicaments. You have tickets to two shows and you can't get to either one of them. She was so excited. Yeah. Very excited. Uh, so, uh,

Yeah, she was wonderful. She was very nice. We messaged with her. And so we will meet Batesville next time we come through. It's just perfect, though. And she calls me Mick. Yeah, she calls you Mick. So Nick gets called Mick. We had some Let's Go folks yelled out. We talked about that last week, though. I love it. I love it every time they yell it out. I mean, it's built perfectly.

And so it's a fun, it's a fun, fun time. And that, that means great. The Aaron jacket, Aaron, the Nate jacket. I mean, that's perfect. Yeah, that's really good. Perfect. So very funny. So yeah, so we had, yeah, I mean this, so this morning was talking about, so I was supposed to work out. I didn't tell, tell, right. So nine, usually work out nine 45 in the morning, which I'll be honest with you. I usually roll out. I mean, I am waking up and working out within sometimes three minutes of waking up.

I don't know if that's good for you. Do you sleep in your workout clothes? Or you just throw them on? No, no. I just throw them on real fast. And we work out in my driveway. And so I just have to walk out there. But I come out and it's like... I always wonder, is that bad? To be... I am dead asleep. And then within three minutes, I am sprinting up the cul-de-sac. Yeah, you got to ease into the day a little bit, man. I think the water's probably good. Yeah. Oh, I don't have water yet. So I go...

I wake up, pee, and then I'm sprinting. Zero to 100. All within seven minutes. Yeah, that's a lot. And then lifting weights...

I mean, like, yeah. But it's just, I try to wake up at nine. I'm trying to make myself get up at nine. And 9 a.m. is a tough one. It's like, I'm trying to make myself, I want to go, I want to be like, 9 a.m. would be perfect. I'm not going to go to bed at one, even two, and get seven hours and just set the alarm for nine. But it's like, I don't fall asleep at two. It gets hard, especially we've been now. And so this morning,

I set my alarm for... I set it for like 927, I think, randomly, because there was a 927. You know when you look at all your alarm times, it's always kind of weird. I don't want to edit that. Yeah, and you're like, all right, 927 it is. And so I set it for 927, and...

I never, I don't hear it. Laura comes in at 940. I remember it was like 942. I asked her, I go, what time is it? She goes, 942. She goes, they're out there working out. And I don't know what I thought. I was like, all right. I go, okay. And then I wake up at 1120. I mean, I slept. I went to bed, probably fell asleep close to two. And so what is that? Nine hours, nine and a half hours. Yeah.

I think I was just, I think that I needed that more than I needed to work out. I wanted to work out. I just, you know, we were, I was very tired last night. We were all very tired last night. I've been going since we started this tour the 7th. I've only had one day home since then.

and it's just been, you know, it's hard to get back to sleep on the road. And like the weekend before we had double shows every night. So, I mean, I wasn't going to bed till four every morning. And then, you know, some nights I'd get, I'd wake up at 11, but sometimes I'd get, I'd have to get up at like nine or 10. And, uh,

And so it was, I think my body was like, it's just over. It was like done. Yeah. We were trying to hit the simulator thing. Yeah. I mean, last year, last night we went in and try to play some golf and, uh,

And it was like, we were all, I mean, you're seeing this futuristic machine and you're going, that's like you choosing to go to Hershey over Gettysburg. You go like, I just can't do this. And none of us were like, it's just. We were exhausted. We were exhausted. I was falling asleep. Yeah. So the last night after Torrington, we had a little mess up with our flight. And so we ended up having to spend the night in Torrington. So we found, we just went to a parking lot and parked the bus and had the greatest night ever.

Yeah. It was, I mean, it was, it was like 65 degrees.

It's 63 degrees. You wear a hoodie or you can wear some short sleeves. And we went out and played poker. Ricky, Ricky, wear a bus driver. This is his hat. He was in the Navy. And so Ricky saw me wear an Air Force hat one time. He goes, I got a Navy hat. And I kept asking. I was like, where is it, Ricky? You told me you would get it. Ricky gave it to me. So here it is. And so Ricky was out with us.

We got a... Chase sells the merch. 22 years old. He's... But we think he's like a Benjamin Button kind of thing. And so we think he could be 80. Yeah. Because he knows like too many things. Yeah. Like we play poker and we're like, you know, I play poker and he's 22. Like I'm learning poker. I've been playing for a month. Yeah.

So at 22, I'm like, well, he doesn't know how to play poker and he knows everything about poker. He's actually good at it. He's the only one that's like, oh, so he knew that the blind, the big blind, but he knows where everything goes. Yeah. We're all, we're still like, what? Yeah. What's his turn? Travis, my tour manager, uh, which I think I posted, if you want to follow Travis on Instagram, uh, I think it's Travis on tour 13 or something. Uh,

And then he, yeah, you can look up that. So he's been posting a lot of stuff kind of behind the scenes. There might be a dash in there too. I don't know. But he's been posting a lot of stuff. No, that's it. Travis on tour 13. There you go. So he's been posting. So that was our, so that's just a poker thing. Yeah. So that was us in the venue. Just, yeah, those three are good. And you can go look at more if you want to go look at it. And so Travis on tour 13,

Look at that top part, though, the Instagram. Oh, sorry. Just the very top. We had, that was the, what's it called? The flop or the river? Royal Flush. The river. No, but that's the river, right? So the river is the thing that's all in the middle. And so if you look at that, it's a queen. Like, can you click it? There you go. Right there is good. Yeah. King, Jack, 10, Ace, Queen was the river. It had the best hand. That's not a Royal Flush. That's a...

That's the next best. No, that's a Royal Straight. Second. Second best hand, I think. Royal Straight was on the river. Never seen that happen. Never seen that happen. Travis took a picture of it. I think the river's the last card. It's the flop, the turn, and then the river. What do you call the thing in the middle, then?

The flop. I just call it, that's what's on the table. That's what's on the table. But the first three are the flop and then the turn and then the river. Okay. And so you don't call it, that's not the river. That's a lake. Lake of cards. Well, yeah, it's the five that are on the, yeah, I get it. Yeah. I might not even be right. Yeah.

But Chase was, though. He was like, I never really played before. And he knew how to do everything where he would like, we're kind of like, should I bet more? He's like, just betting a little bit. And he has like the best hand in the world. He'd be baiting you in.

Oh, he was, yeah, he was great at it. There's also something great about just being in a parking lot because as a kid in Texas, that's all we did was go to parking lots, Kroger parking lots, and just hang out. I mean, we pulled the- It just felt so natural. We had a table. Travis had some poker. Travis is very, he's good at poker too. And so he plays-

I always say with Travis, Travis, if he ever gets low, he just looks at us like an ATM and he just goes, all right, well, I'll go get some more money now. And then he just gets it. And then he's like, Travis will be like, you're like, I think he's going to lose this time. Like we did one night. And we do, it's a very fun, we do $20 buy-ins. So when we were in Mohegan Sun, which is an awesome casino, we went down there, I played a little blackjack, got destroyed. We just all went up to the room and played poker. It's very funny to go to be like, well, how are we going to lose the least amount of money?

Go play in the room and play poker. And so we just do $20 buy-ins. So if you lose... So, I mean, worst case, you're going to lose $40. But if you win, you're going to win $30, which is a fun number to win. Yeah. Like having an extra $30 is like... You're like, man. But it is funny, though, that we play poker in Mohegan. We could have just gone to La Quinta Inn. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like we didn't need to go to this casino. We were in the casino. It was very fun. Well, we have a bus. That's always the hard part. We had a good...

bus, we got a parking spot. We got a parking in the bus. It's up on the bus. Yeah. This is what we did in that parking lot. It was fantastic. It makes it so fun. I mean, it was just, yeah, I was like music and we had music playing. I mean, no one was really around and it was just like, this is, this is what it's about. Like, you know, and so we've been posting stuff. Yeah. So if you want to go follow Travis, uh, is me and Travis grew up together. Uh,

Went to high school together. And he's now my tour manager. And he's been posting a lot of behind the scenes kind of stuff. So Travis on tour 13. So you can see stuff that I'm not posting that he does. And you see Chase. You go by Merck. Chase is great. Ask him. Ask him how old he is. I just think he just knows too much, man.

He's like, it's, it's, he knows everything. It is like a reincarnation thing. It makes you think, yeah, maybe he was somebody do before that dude. He's really 46. And he's like, look, guys, just go with me on this. Go with me in 23. I mean, look, he looks 22. Yeah. Yeah. That's why we think it's the Benjamin button. So we think he's on the back end of, and he's lived a life.

And so he knows everything more than us. Just an old soul. Just an old soul. I mean, the stuff we think he knows is poker and video games. Those are the two things that we were blown away by. Video games, we played NBA 2K, which me and Nick always have a running game. And he's like, yeah, I'll play it. Just...

Beats me immediately, which I lost because of Nick. Nick got in my way. How did Nick get in your way? Started asking me questions at the very end. Oh, he got in your way mentally? Mentally. He's good at that. Started just talking to me. I get a five-second penalty because I don't pass the ball in. And then Chase beats me. I just go up to him. I say, what does cortisone do to your mouth? Yeah. He says, give me a big cortisone talk. And I'm like, and I dive into that podcast. So, yeah.

Uh, so anyway, we, we ended up having a wonderful weekend, uh, uh, North Hampton. We're back Portland, uh, Torrington, Connecticut, two great shows. Uh, we met some, uh, wonderful people, Brent, I think Brent Stark, uh, it was his name. Uh,

I believe it was Brent's turn. And then, uh, yeah, it was Brent though. And his son, Austin, uh, they took me golfing out there. We went with them and it was, uh, I met his family afterwards. And so it was, it was, it worked out. I get a lot of messages about golf and people always ask, uh,

I, yeah, look, I want to try to, I don't always see them. And, but if you, uh, email, you could email, I mean, you could email the podcast, Nate land at neighbor gets you.com. If you have a place, uh, to go play. Sometimes I get to play. Sometimes when we have two shows, it's actually kind of hard for me to play with two shows. Uh,

I try to play and I can't say we're always going to get back to you but if it can work out I mean I went and played with them by myself like I don't mind playing with uh you know sometimes maybe I'll bring one person with me and then you bring two people it's fun you get to meet you get to meet some people it's cool uh you know uh it's a fun fun time these dudes were great they played great uh and so it was uh I got a Austin I showed him how I read greens felt felt

Felt great about that. Probably don't even do it right, but he, it made sense to him. And he actually just broke, he's, he's a man. How old was he? He's in eighth grade, I think. And he broke 90 for the first time after he did my re my green putting meth. And that helped. That helped. Wow. Wow. Good method.

I just say, I said, close your eyes and hope for the best. And he just drained them from all over. So it was, yeah, super fun. And then you were at, you had a big weekend. I did the Ryman. I headlined it. The Ryman here in Nashville. Headlined it. Can you believe that, man? Sold out. Sold out quicker than mine. Sold out. He's got three. I only did one. Yeah, he only did one. That's true. But sold out. Can you believe that?

just from this podcast. Wow. Yeah. No one knows it from anything else. Aaron's done the least amount of things. That is true. But this podcast, he sold out the rhyme in a couple minutes. Yeah, 13, 14 minutes.

But pretty amazing, man. Pretty amazing, yeah. So that was a lot of fun. And then you went to... I was at the St. Louis Helium. Did that last night. Drove in this morning. Who'd you go with there? Dustin Nickerson. Oh, yeah. I was there with him. Were you featuring for Dustin? Yeah. So, man, can you imagine that? That's the highs and lows of comedy. He headlines the rhyming. Headlines the rhyming. And then has to go be the middle act at the St. Louis Helium. Helium, so... That's just how it goes sometimes. Yeah, work is work.

Work is work. It's good. There's no bad labels. It's hard to get to wrap your head around that. 2,300 people chanting your name when he walks out.

Sun 572. Sun 572. Sun always shines. And then he goes to St. Louis Heatland with Justin Nickerson, very funny comedian, who comes out and meets Sum, and then just has to be the middle act. Yeah. Yeah. Man, that's tough. So. Now I'm here. Now he's here. So it's been a wild, wild weekend. Wild up and down weekend. Do you believe all of this? I believe it. Yeah. That's great. Okay. Well,

He opened for Kathleen Madigan at the Ryman. Yeah. Okay. I was happy for him. I was excited. You believe that he sold out the Ryman in 13 minutes, but in St. Louis can only get middle work. Well, you know, in fairness, St. Louis is tough. It's a tough city. That would be a tough, tough gig. I love how quickly Nate was on board to lie about that.

You were ready to go. I mean, that was everybody. Everybody at home got to watch that just to be like, yeah. It's so funny to think. I've done some gigs like that where I remember I did a show. There's a guy. I've actually seen him. He works for the FBI. And we got a tour of the FBI last time I was in D.C. And I did a show at his house.

I was in San Jose. San Jose, a weird city that I've been to quite a bit. Very early on. I don't know. I've actually, I haven't been back in a while now. But very early, I went to San Jose. I was like, that was one of the most cities I've been to. And just opening for people. Angela Johnson a lot. And she's from up there, so that's a big reason for it. But then I was able to have a corporate gig up there. It always just ended up being there. So he asked me to come in there and

headline at his house and he had a little microphone, little tiny room, you know, like 20 people in there. It was great. Uh, and then I went from, I flew from his house to open for Fallon the next night. Wow.

So within 24 hours, it was just a, I was in front of, it's just so, it's like so crazy. Yeah, I was just at a bar show in LA and then I was at the tour. Yeah. It's so funny to be like, that's what you end up doing is like, you're just in this kind of like, and all are great shows. But you go in and you're like, all right, I'm in front of 20 people. And now you're in front of 3000. And you're like, I was just, I was like talking to 20 people. Yeah.

that's show business though. You see me on TV and then you're like, I'm trying to, you know, open it for some five, seven, two. Yeah. Well, you're saying that about your first TV credit in CMT. Yeah. Uh, over here, CMT comedy stage hosts, Melissa Peterman, a lot of funny, great, uh, comics were on it. First TV credit. I got a shot at it in Nashville. Uh,

everybody on the show thought I worked for CMT. That's how much no one knew me. And I go and do that. It was in Nashville. It was very cool. Everybody got to go to it, my family and all that. And then I go back to New York, and we've talked about barking on this show. So we all barked, or you barked early, and then you ran the club. And so I went back to barking after that.

And I remember just thinking I was at the Village Lantern, not Boston, but I think Boston might have been already wrapped at this point. Yeah. We're at the Improv, I think. Yeah, we're at the Improv. And so I'm handing out flyers at the Village Lantern, and I was like, I was on TV. Yeah.

I just did TV and that's how much they little they thought of CMT. They still made me hand out flyers. They would still use my credit to get everybody in. This guy was on CMT and I would tell them that I was just on CMT. Would you like to come to the show? And then I had to bark them in. They're like in a music video. You're like, no, no, no, no. Did stand up comedy on it. Uh,

A couple people thought I was famous. The great Vic Henley was on there, right? Vic Henley. One of the best.

But the TV show Crashing was basically like the lifestyle. Yeah, it was our life. It was our story. He got to it first. Yeah. He did a great job. He did a great job. Dustin was in it. He put me on it. Yeah, you were in it. Boston Comedy Club. So I've talked about how we started here. And what's cool is you're getting to see this is it. This is how we started. Dustin, at that point, was running the Boston Comedy Club. Yeah.

And so it was a huge part of my career is because when I came to New York, I started in Chicago. I took the comedy class, but then I got like the real comedy class of learning. I always say, and it's kind of sad because there's not much of it anymore, right? Like that kind of...

that kind of mentoring or learning how to do it that way. It's changed a little bit. It's changed. Like, you know, the people, so back then, 2000, when I, oh, four is when I moved there. When did you go to New York? Full time in like, oh, five, but I was going back and forth for a couple of years from Philly. Yeah. So you wouldn't,

That mentoring and the fact, I always thought it was like, I got very lucky to be able to start. So if you've seen the show HBO Crashing with Pete Holmes, Pete Holmes was also with us all starting. And it was very, it's like, you know, it's just pretty rare to get that. Like we got like, you know, we had to pass out flyers. So you have to earn it, but you feel a lot more ownership in your career now. I do now. And the fact that you had to kind of go through everything.

And so you had to be like, we're out there. You're barking for the show that you're going to be on. And you're learning about these comics that, you know, before you get there, I don't really know who Bill Burr is. And everybody's got realized someone said in that article, they called, uh,

He was calling Bill Burr and Patrice up-and-comers like in the Atlantic article. They said that. But when I started in 04, they were up-and-comers. That's what he meant by that. Like they were the up-and-comers. They were the ones that were on the rise, been doing comedy 10 years and like kind of starting to get like, you know, but no one knew them. No.

They weren't household names. Yeah, and they weren't selling out because we would go. I would see Bill Burr. We all watched Bill Burr and Patrice. I mean, watch Bill Burr at Caroline's. They have a curtain in the middle. I think I've talked about it. They closed the curtain because it could make it be a room for 100 people or it could be a 300-seat room. But they'd have a curtain that'd go down the middle, which always is great for comedy clubs. Absolutely. When you have...

When the room is so big and then it's like if people are just sitting there and if you close that curtain of 40 people, it feels great. Yeah. And then if they open it and then you're sitting in 40, everybody feels like, oh, no one's here. But you can make a hundred room, you know, you can make a hundred seat room feel like, man, it was sold out. And you're like, no, there's 250 seats behind y'all. We just didn't show you that. And so a lot of clubs started doing that. But I mean, we saw Burr. I mean, I remember going and you could just walk in and there was

40 people there. Yeah. I mean, the Boston Comedy Club was like this magical place because it's like I was running the Village Lantern. They'd never done stand-up comedy there before. They just had one open mic. And then I started like... We were doing seven shows a week. Village Lantern is... What was else there? Was that a big...

Before it became that. It was just a bar? It was just a bar. They mostly had music upstairs. And it was kind of... It was close to the Comedy Cellar. And a lot of the guys would do the Comedy Cellar and then we'd come there. So this is all... Let's just set it where it is. So it's the West Village. Okay, West 3rd Street. West 3rd Street and McDougal. So... That's Boston. That's Boston. Is where Boston was. There's a fire...

apartment that was right next to it yes yes i ran it uh yeah yeah and so that's where it's now a wine bar if anybody ever goes well um anderson cooper bought it for his apartment yeah and that was that was a big deal like when it was still a fire station oh yeah they were selling it off and he bought it and it was his apartment i don't know i don't know if he still lives there but yeah

They had a very fancy restaurant next to us, too. Yeah. The curtains were always closed. It had no name. It had no name. Yeah. And famous people would go in there. You'd see Howard Stern go in. Yeah. There he is. There he is. And they'd go in there and eat. And you couldn't see inside of it. Yeah. I remember we saw Dennis Miller. Yeah. He actually told Dennis this story when I was on his podcast. I got his autographed in it. Yeah, yeah. Remember, I told him this story. I said, we saw you come out. And I remember we were all like, we need to go make him try to go up. Yeah.

And we all went over there and talked to him like, Hey, you want to go on stage? We're right. I mean, it's economy club right here. Do you want to, you can just, we're late, you know? And that was one of the greatest things I think I liked the most. And one thing that I think it's a little lost now, uh,

Something that you did that I always liked is if something like that where Dennis Miller wanted to go up, you were like, you want to go up now? Yeah. You would make it so easy for which he said no. But I mean, this time he's I think was one quick thing. And I remember he was on the sidewalk and I grabbed his headshot off the wall. Just like walking with a frame like on the sidewalk. Okay.

Signed the glass on top of his picture. Not only was he like, I don't want to go on stage. He's like, I don't want to see this guy. Who's this guy in a cowboy hat that's chasing me down with a frame? None of y'all talk to me ever again. Yeah.

So this is when he had a show on HBO. Yeah. So, I mean, he's doing that. I don't know if he's touring as hard at that point. He's still huge. He's huge, though. But it's, you know, I get it. He's like at a point where he's like, I don't really need to go up. Like, I don't really care. Like, he was, I mean, he was touring, but it was like. I think that's what it was about. And we surprised him.

Yeah, but that's the thing about Boston. I mean, I saw Chevy Chase and Dave Chappelle on the same stage. There was all kinds of stuff, but if somebody like that was coming through, that's who the audience wanted to see, and I think that's what has to be done. You see somebody that's on the rise or a star, you put them on stage immediately. You don't even think about it.

They can bump the Barker kid. Yeah, yeah. And that... I'm talking about me. He's like, who cares about this dumb Barker? You'll get it. Eventually it'll work out. There are a dime and dozen. I'll find another one. But we did get bumped all the time. As you should. As you should. That's supposed to be. Dude, there's like... So sometimes comics, they get upset about it now. So they get bumped. They're like, oh, why am I getting bumped? It's like a guy's doing comedy for...

five years or four years or three months. It doesn't even matter. And you're like the ego to think you don't get, you should get bumped is crazy. But getting bumped was part of the thing that I wanted to get bumped. It's like Dave Chappelle. Yeah, I got bumped by Dave Chappelle. How great of a story is that? You get to go home and be like, are you doing it? You're like, I mean, Dave Chappelle went up and I didn't get to go up.

So he was on the stage and I do shows on that stage. And you got to watch him. And I got to watch him. Watch how he works. Do whatever he want to do. Now we watched him in front of seven people. Yeah. It was amazing. It wouldn't be like that for long. Cause we'd go outside and be like, Dave Chappelle's on stage and it would fill up. If they believed us. If they believed us. Yeah.

A lot of times they didn't. I still think about those people. I think about them all the time. I told them Dave Chappelle was there. You could have been an audience of 20 with Dave Chappelle working out two hours. Two hours. I watched Dave Chappelle once walk out, and he put a hoodie on, and he almost ran into these two people. Just because he didn't see them, because you'd come down these stairs, and once you come out, these three were walking. He goes, oh, sorry. And they were, oh, no problem. And then he ran off. And I always think about them like,

They don't know. They could have been like, that was Dave Chappelle. We were there with him the night before he went to Africa. We were right there. We saw all of it happen. And he could tell he was getting freaked out because I remember these two Irish guys, they had these soccer jerseys on and they just took their jerseys off and they wanted to sign them and they were just kind of going off. It's in quotes from the Chappelle show and you could tell he was just getting really nervous around people. It was like...

The big thing when he left was it got too crazy and famous. It was almost like a Beatles kind of thing. He was a rap star. People would yell out and they'd say, I'm rich! Everybody yelling at him. Below it was the Bag of the Inn in Boston, which was this Irish...

uh, bar we talked about this weekend, uh, wild nights. Yeah. Got a little crazy down there. Got a little crazy down there. It was, you would go underneath it. I mean, so it was, is the, the, uh,

Where's that wine thing? It was on West 3rd. So you go up to McDougal and make a right. Go right. And then it's like two, yep, keep going. And then it's, stop right there. It's either, where was it? The wine thing? Where it's the Amity Hall? Is that it? Yeah, well, the Zinc Bar is where Boston is. It's where the Bagged Inn is.

Boston is now. Yeah. Where's the zinc bar? That's I think that's still there. Yeah. Right here. Okay. Yeah. So that's it. That's it. So that's it right there. So it's basically on third and Thompson, right? In between Thompson. Yeah. And I would, and I would bark, I'd go bark at third and Thompson a lot. And I would also, just on this intersection right here on that intersection, but that, that there you're kind of in front of the club. So you just kind of, you actually kind of work in the club to that spot. Yeah. And then I would also go down the corner of McDougal and,

and 3rd Street, which the Cellar was right there. Now, that was the biggest corner is you would stand there and you would be like, hey, we got a great comedy show. And then we'd also, where else would we go? Well, that's with Ben's Pizzeria right there. Oh, the Louis intro? Ooh.

Well, for a year, I would run on Bleeker Village Lantern, and then I'd run over and start at the Boston. So I was running both those clubs at the exact same time. Yeah. It was like crazy. I mean, just back and forth. Yeah, just running over. Yeah. Where would we go bark? Because you'd have some turf war on barking. Sometimes, yeah. Sometimes. I mean, someone would go in your spot, and you're like, yo, man, this is where we...

I got a lot of it in Times Square. It started happening. But it did happen too with Village Lantern, which I think you stopped doing it anymore. When you stopped it, you were just doing ball. And somebody else was doing it and you would be... Yeah, there would always be something ridiculous. And then it's at the end of the day, like, really? Are we going to fist fight over three people from Iowa? Yeah. I mean, it was... It's like, come on, man. We're just trying to get real people in the crowd. So that's where...

So that's the idea. People have always, this is the most explanation I think I've ever given it where we're showing maps and stuff of it. So McDougal Street, 3rd Street, Comedy Cellar is right there. Comedy Cellar was always there. Village Underground is now also part of the Comedy Cellar, which was not there when we first started. It was there, but it was a music.

Yeah, and no disrespect to the Cellar, but the Boston was kind of, it was, you might see, you know, some very competitive shows there, you know, to the Cellar. It was Patrice and Jim Norton and Chappelle. Yeah, some guys that were not in the Cellar. Yeah, it was kind of, yeah, I always say it's kind of like that was more of the CBGBs and

The Cellar was kind of the hard rock, more polished. Both two amazing places. The Cellar is obviously still there now. The Cellar is obviously the most famous club in New York. Sure, but there's the Fire. Yeah, there's the Fire. That's the restaurant, right? Yeah, the fancy restaurant. The fancy restaurant is where you would just see famous people walking out. Kevin Hart was there all the time. Oh, yeah.

So that's what I would say. That's why I wouldn't trade. I mean, I almost feel bad that the new comics don't have what I have.

Because I just don't think they would have got, they would have learned. I always consider myself a New York comic because, I mean, that's where I was the most. That's where I really learned. I was in Chicago at the beginning. Chicago was very important to be in. But I was so new in Chicago and I took those classes. It's like, obviously, I'm just getting my feet wet and just being like, all right, so what is stand up? And I'm in Chicago kind of doing that. And then I go to New York and that's where the learning began.

And without the Boston and being able to do that, the faux bar is it, right? Yeah. Uh, so you'd walk up those steps and then underneath it, zinc go down is where the bag it in is, was run by, uh,

It was an Irish bar. I mean, one of the guys we talked about was in the IRA. I mean, a good friend of ours. Yeah, yeah. I mean, this dude was like the real deal. Gave me a lot of whiskey. I mean, yeah. And just hearing him, like it was crazy to me. I'm just from Nashville. And then the world just opened up. Because then you're like, I don't even know what the IRA is. Like I'm just a kid from Old Hickory. Yeah. And then I go to New York. And then not that that IRA even matters. I thought it was the NRA. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Yeah, it doesn't, not that it even matters, but it was crazy to even be like, at that point you're talking to a guy and then you look at, you like figure out what the IRA is and you're like, you're in it? You were doing it? Like it was just, I mean, you couldn't ever imagine these worlds would come together. Oh, yeah. But, you know, talking before about what were the 2000s, this is a time too where there was no real cell phone cameras. Yeah. So all this crazy stuff was happening. It wasn't like people were posting a video of Chappelle and-

Before Twitter, before anything, really. MySpace. Well, I remember we were at the Boston Comedy Club and Patrice O'Neill was in the back. And we used to use this thing called phone books before we had Google. And they would deliver these big yellow phone books. And I remember there was a big stack of them at the Boston Comedy Club.

and patrice o'neill had grabbed a whole stack of them and kevin hart was on stage and kevin hart's not no he's he's on the rise he's on the rise it's like soul plane when he walks in everybody's like i think i've seen that guy but i don't know yeah kevin hart has no i think soul plane was his big move like it was something like that like he was on the cusp of like but he was still and i remember patrice o'neill was in the back and he was just throwing phone books he's like stand on this we can't see you and

He's like, throw them at the stage. It was amazing. Amazing. Yeah. They had, yeah. So, uh, the boss of the Boston comedy club was, uh, it was such a big deal for me, like I said, because it was like handing out those flyers. So you're having to earn, you know, my dad loved that. You know, my dad, he would have magicians, uh,

because he knew a bunch of magicians in New York. Because, you know, my parents were having to, you know, I mean, I worked at FedEx. I mean, that was such a crazy time because we'd hang out at Boston until three in the morning. And then I would just go home to Brooklyn. We lived in Brooklyn at the time. I remember that. And I'd go to Brooklyn. I'd go to FedEx and work there.

at 5 a.m and so i would go to bed 5 to 10 a.m then i'd go to bed at like noon and sleep until we had to be back at six seven yeah uh and so and then so that was my a lot of my time at the beginning was just like it's 24 hours of you're doing something you're you go sleep and the other route was to go do open mics and do that kind of scene which i had finn wexler who i moved there with

Like he would do a lot of that kind of stuff, which was there wasn't as many alt rooms. There was a little bit more, but they weren't crazy. It wasn't this. The clubs were the main thing. You had to get into the clubs now in New York. I mean, there's alt rooms. I mean, people don't even play comedy clubs in Brooklyn. Yeah. I mean, you're wherever you can get up in a million other places. Back then, it was like you need to be passed, which I think we talked about. Past is a good thing. You need to be passed, accepted, accepted.

by all these clubs. And if you got passed by them, you could call in the bells. So they get, you call it every week. Hey, I can do, um, so you call in the bells and you be like, I can do Monday, uh,

Tuesday, Wednesday, I can do after 930, not before 930. And I can do Friday, Saturday, I'm wide open. And so you'd call the bells in for the comedy clubs and they would tell you, call in all over the city and then they would come back with you. And that's how your week would be built. And so then you would look at it and you'd be like, all right, so I got to go here, here, here, all these different comedy clubs.

But being at the Boston was handing out those flyers and then getting people into these shows and then getting to watch, you know, Judah Freelander was always there. Judah Freelander, his credit was he was the hug me guy in the Dave Matthews band, which a lot of people might know that. But that was his big credit. I mean, a lot of people knew him from that. Yeah. I mean, that was a huge thing. It was a big video. Yeah. It was before 30 Rock.

People would want to hug him, too. They'd want to hug him. So he was the hug me guy in the Dave Matthews band. And everybody would know him from that. Ben Bailey was there before he hosted Cash Cab. Way before. Way before. We saw him get that over Gino. Yeah. He was another comedian. Yeah, yeah, over Cash Cab. Yeah. Yeah, when he got it.

It was such a big deal. And we're like, golly, you're just watching these people do it. Aziz Ansari. I don't know if he came through the Boston Babies. Oh, absolutely he did. He was more at the Lantern. But yeah, I was part of the crew. Just an open mic. And then when I did another one in Times Square before that, I think Ha or something. Yeah, yeah. I went up there. That was the craziest barking. I went up there.

I don't know if I barked for you there. I barked for Ha because that went up later. I think I was already, we were already kind of moved on. I would go with Ha. Sweet Carolines, I think. Sweet Carolines, yeah. It was before Ha, yeah. Yeah, yeah. And then they would, I remember barking in Times Square. That's the wildest thing you ever do. Oh, yeah. I mean, that was the first thing I think I did. And then I came to Boston.

Yeah. Because then Pete was like at Boston. Yeah. So I was like trying to figure it out. And Pete's at Boston. He goes, hey, come down here. And he was like, it's great down here. And I remember being Times Square. I mean, it's just chaos. And I just liked it because you had a Tennessean accent. I was a Southern dude. I had a cowboy hat. I was like, all right. He's from Texas. I was like, this is going to work out. I mean, you have to take care of him. Yeah, exactly. There was no choice. You're the only guy. Yeah, no choice.

We're the only Southern guys. It's like, I walk up, you're like, you can't turn your back on me. You have to make sure I'm going to be okay. I know. It was just like this instinct. I was like, all right. He's a terrible barker. Can't get anybody in. I was awful, dude.

No energy on stage. It's like Black Latino night. He's up there. Hey, guys. Hey, how y'all doing? Yeah, it was all rough. It was rough, but he had no choice. I was dropped off at his doorstep, and he had to take care of me. That's what we always think. Even when I see Southern Peoples comics now, you're like, you always got to kind of keep an eye out for them because you're like, I got to make sure they're okay, man. It's true. It's so funny that that's how it is. Texans, I'm like that all the time.

Cause you know, well, you're coming like you, you were a guy from Texas that's in New York city. You know, that shot, it's such a big shock. People treat you weird. They treat you weird. And so you're like, I got to make sure this dude, you know, Vic Henley was like that. Vic Henley, uh,

you know, bless his soul. Uh, but he was, he's from Alabama. He went to Auburn and he was super Southern and he was like kind of a older guy, you know, he was with Jeff Foxworthy. And so he was a comic that I remember first time I went to, uh,

The comic strip, I bought a ticket to go. We just moved to New York and we're just trying to see the shows. And Vic Kinley, I remember they called him. He was at his apartment. Someone didn't show up. And Vic Kinley comes on stage and was like, just tell us. He goes, I was in my apartment watching TV. And I get a phone call that's like, yo, whoever doesn't show up, can you come back?

host the show and he's like, I'm not supposed to be here tonight. Why am I here? And everybody's laughing at that. And I remember as a comic, that was one of the almost best things I could have ever seen. And it was my, it was my first kind of thing. It was the first time,

I want to say one of the first shows I went to and just to hear a guy and be like, everybody else just is like, oh, that's crazy and funny. But as a beginning comic, it was such a big deal to me to go. This is where I have to be. Yeah, that's crazy. That guy was at home and now he's on stage in front of everybody at this famous comedy club. I was like, I want to be that.

How do I become that? And it wasn't like, I'm not like, I want to be Madison Square Garden. I just want to be that. How do I get to be at home and get a phone call and now I get to go do comedy at the comic strip? Like, one of the most famous comedy clubs in the world. And you're like, God, how do you do that? And so then you're like, well, there's steps to get to that. So obviously, and then we started, then we go down there with you, and then you're at Boston and you're seeing people. There was levels. There was levels.

So it was us that were Barkers. Who were you saying? It was me, Devanshi Patel, who's writing now in LA. Jamie Kilstein. John F. O'Donnell. Pete Holmes. Ali Breen.

I think, did she? Maybe towards the end. A couple of people I don't remember. Yeah, there's a few we don't. A little blur. Yeah, there was, yeah. A little while down there. It was our college. It was, yeah. Our fraternity, absolutely. We were fraternity. We're there every night. We get there at six in the morning. I remember going and printing flyers with you. There's a little bit of hazing.

A little bit of hazing. We'd have to go print the flyers. Oh, that was a great cut them. We'd have to cut them all. Kinkos, just cut flyers. Yeah. You'd have to make your own flyers. And we'd go there and then it's, we would go there and sit and do it. And it was, you know, and it was, yeah, it was such a new thing. And so I were there and you would like talk to us all and you were like, all right, we got to, let's get people on the show tonight. We would always get to go up last. And so,

Depending on that, it could be from midnight. Maybe even if you're lucky, it was 11. It was a night where not a lot of people were there. Not audience, but not a lot of comics dropping in. You go up from 11 to possibly 2 in the morning. The show would run from... I loved the show ran like that. I think places should run it like that.

or you know, Comedy Cellar doesn't do it, but it was perfect because it was the opposite of what the other, there was no shows. There was, during the week, it was, the show starts at eight,

you can show up at any point. Yeah. All night long. All night long. So it depends on how many people we would have stop by would depend on how long. And I think you were one of the first comics that treated the Bill Burrs and the Patrices with the respect that they weren't getting anywhere else because they weren't known, but they were starting to be known. And the fact when they would come in, you're like, yeah, yeah, we'll get you up in two. Yeah, Greg Giraldo was a big one. Greg Giraldo. Which, I mean, it's like they were guys-

louis ck louis ck was probably oh four or five he's like kind of like shame yeah he was writing for conan and yeah this was like i think this is a little different came out so like he was yeah he was kind of a big deal i mean he's probably he's selling out carolines at this point yeah about to start selling out the guard and all that stuff but it was he was the the top outside of chapelle yeah he was like the top guy because they hit about the same time they hit about the same time and then uh

So seeing, but I mean, you would show that respect to like, Ben Bailey would come and he was a big comic. And even though he's not hosting Cash Cab, but you would, those guys would get to, they could come, they knew they could come at 10. Yeah. And they would get on stage immediately. Yeah. I mean, New York's just a different animal. I remember one time at Gotham Comedy Club for two years, I was the standby comic.

and I would get $25, and I had to just stay at the weekend shows. Everybody was always late and stuff, so they had somebody just on deck at all times. So I got $25. It was amazing. I got $25, and I would just hang out all Friday, all Saturday, and just wait for somebody to be like, hey, I'm in traffic. I'd be like, yes! Sometimes I'd see him walking down the sidewalk. I'd be like, I don't know where he is. I'm like, come on, get me up, get me up. I'll go, I'll go. Yeah.

But that's part of the craziness, too, where certain comics, you're doing five, six spots in a night. And things have to work out at that, because it's going to take 15 minutes to get from point A to point B in a cab. And you're getting up, and you have to leave right away to get to the next. Here's what I can tell you. If you're at Caroline's, if you're a comic list in New York, if you're at Caroline's and you've got to go...

uh, to the village seller, whatever. And you got spots and you got to go back to Caroline's and then go back to the seller. Take the subway. Absolutely. No cabs. No cabs. Every time I did a cab, I missed the spot every time. And you got subway was just so much faster. Oh yeah. And you could do it. And, but then sometimes you're like, you know, you're making, I think we've talked about it. So you'd get $25 a spot during the week, uh, Sunday to Thursday. Uh,

75 to host during that week. And then weekends, you'd get 125 to host a show. Because the idea was if you're hosting, you always got paid more because you couldn't go run around and make money at spots. Yeah, and I also think it's somebody good. Yeah, somebody good. It's somebody good to be host. I mean, you'd go. The host, dude. I mean, we'd watch people headline at Carolines. And there's comics that are hosting. They're better than the headliner.

I mean, it's the real deal. Like maybe people, they're not famous. I mean, like they could be like, no one knows who this guy is, but you're like, he's a better comic than the guy you're coming to see. The guy you're coming to see is just famous. Vic Henley goes up is, I mean, a warrior that's going up every single night. But you would get, so then that 75 for your, on a weekend spot. Sure. So you'd run around, you know, and you know, I think if you were, you could balance it out. I mean, you could probably make,

If you worked every weekend, that was the grind of New York was just so tough. But if you, once you got past the clubs, I mean, what do you think? Two grand, 1500, thousand, two grand a week. Like you could probably make, uh, if you got a lot of spots. Maybe if you're like a Todd Berry type or something like it, it really depended though. But, uh, you know, but at least, you know, maybe five spots a night would be huge, but maybe more on the weekend. Yeah. You'd want two during the week.

two maybe three during the week sunday to thursday was good yeah and then saturday and sunday you wanted it you needed at least five a night yeah it's a big 75 spot yeah so it's like so then yeah so you could yeah like that's how you would really make your money because uh so you really had to go during the week you like at least needed to do two and then uh the weekend was like at least you need to go do five yeah

But most of us would go to Connecticut or Pennsylvania. Once you start doing some road stuff. But I think the road was before you were like a solid city comic. You know what I mean? Yeah. Well, you'd go do these one night. Yeah. We did some crazy ones. We did some ridiculous gigs. We did some wild, wild gigs. Yeah. Remember, we all did a gig together that I got through my brother's friend in Connecticut. Yeah. Oh.

And I was so excited about it. And I'm like, I'm going to get all our friends, especially Dustin. Yeah. He's all up all the time. You know, and just we're, I was so excited that I had this gig. And we show up after driving two hours and they're like, yeah, we canceled it on you guys. And I got to tell everybody because I was going to pay everybody. I'm like, oh, this is exciting. Was that supposed to be in a pizza place? It was like a town square kind of thing? It was in Connecticut. And the guy was like, this is, I don't even know where it was, but he was kind of like a tough guy.

Yeah. And so we were like, we're not going to really question this. Yeah. Hilarious. It's just telling us to our faces. No money. There's no money. We just drove back home. We just got back in the car and drove another two hours. Yeah. I think we hated you for like three weeks. That was a Nick gig. Yeah. That was definitely when someone goes, I got a Nick gig. We're like, I'd really dive into that before you drive all the way out there. I give you about a hundred spots a week, but yeah, whatever it is. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Thanks, bro. Thanks for looking out. So I want to just say the levels of it. So, all right, Barker was the very bottom level. So you're just handing out these flyers. Your payment is stage time, which is, I mean, it's just a beautiful thing. I think there's a level before that. I was a busboy and a cook. Oh, yeah. I did that in New York Comedy Club. I had to bake hamburgers and french fries, and they had like real fryers and stuff in there. And I would get like 25 cents off the burgers and 10 cents off the fries and then get five minutes on the checks. Yeah. Oh.

Wow. That's how you got paid. And I thought that was amazing because Pete Correale gave me the job. He was like, he was about, he was on his way out and he's like, hey, you want this? I was like, yeah, this seems awesome. I was back there cooking. It's the love of the game. That's how much we love it is we don't care. We're doing what,

we're doing, I waited tables. Remember the time I had to wait tables? Oh, did you get so much for me? Yeah. Like we, uh, the servers didn't show up. Yeah. And, uh, so we got to do a show and I'm like, well, I, I mean, I just waited tables in Chicago and in Nashville. And so I was like, well, I know how to wait tables. And so I, I waited tables and then I went on stage and did my five minutes and then got off and then, uh,

I mean, I literally was like, all right, good night. Thanks everybody. Good night. And I got off and walked to each table right after I got off. I was like a couple more beers. All right. And then I would, and I waited tables the rest of the night. And it was like, I didn't even, I offered that up. That's awesome. Like, it's funny. Like now you'd be embarrassed to do it.

just cause you're older, obviously, but like, then you're like, you're like, I mean, I was like, I can wait tables. And I was like, and he's like, great. You actually get paid. I get paid. Yeah. I should make some money. Uh, and I was like, Oh my gosh, this is great. When we went to New York comedy club, uh,

I would check all the girls out because I knew how to. You would close down the club. Yeah. I mean, I got basically, you know, I would run these comedy clubs because I knew who was funny. Yeah. Like I had a good eye for like the guys that were the next whatever, you know. But I couldn't manage it well. Math is not my strong suit. And so he would kind of be my ghost where I would pretend I like did the math. And like Nate would be like, I ran Applebee's or whatever. And then he would go in.

That's how little... And he did the math for me. I mean, that's how little we all know. He had my back. He had my back. Is that just a guy that's like, I waited at tables at Applebee's for a year and you're like, this guy's like, went to Yale for this. Like, he knows what he's doing. Way better than... I knew nothing. So you had my back. You were like, you... It was so funny. I knew how to check everybody out. Yeah. I knew how to check. Like, you know, you got to...

get the tips and so they all get paid in cash so we got to write down and you the girls get or the waiters all get like this money and then you go and we deposit the money we deposit al martin if you're listening as we deposited all the money and then we did it we were so i would split i would split my pay with you and they give you an extra five minutes on stage yeah yeah yeah

Yeah. That was my move up. You get like 12 minutes as opposed to five. Yeah. Which was big. Yeah. So he was like, I don't, I'll do the math. Yeah. Yeah. Like absolutely. All these backroom deals and stuff. Oh yeah. Under the table. Comedy's all backroom. Yeah. Back then for sure. That's when Boston ended. Yeah. I'd like to point out that that's when Boston closed, when Nate started to do the math. When Nate controlled the books. Yeah. Yeah. So to finish off Boston, let's, uh, uh,

we were at Boston. We're there. We're doing that. I was always, I was a barker and then your, your big move up. So yeah, it was work waiting tables and stuff like that was like the first kind of thing you can do. So I came in as barking. So I was doing the barking and barking. You just wanted to get to the point where you got to stand at the door.

So it was like, all right, that's the gig. If I can get off, because we're out there, it's 30 degrees, 20 degrees. And that's where you meet everybody. Yeah, that's where you meet everybody. Chappelle's walking through. Everybody has to walk through the door. Yeah, yeah. And so you're like, how do I get off this corner? And I just want to get to, you know, like you were never making big. That's why a huge part of my career, something that has helped me very much.

is I never had goals that were never unattainable because my goals were always just, I didn't want to be on the corner because I'm staying outside and it's freezing. How do I just get to the door? I just want to be able to stand in the door because you're at least getting kind of out of the weather.

And like you said, everybody has to come through you and they ask you, Chappelle comes in and goes, how's it going tonight? It's going great. You get that conversation. You get a response. You're like, I think he kind of knows me. And you're like all this kind of stuff. And so you were, you love it. So it was like the matter of just getting to that door.

And then I think I ran Boston a couple of times. Cause you, if you had a road gig, I was in enough at that point that I would then, you ran a lot of stuff for me. Cause you would start, you would, you were starting to get some road work. So you go do the road. And so on a weekend or something, I would have to do it. My biggest fear was like, and so I was like, so scared of what if Chappelle and Chris Rock walk in at the same time? I was like, what do I do? You had this crazy thing that I have to choose.

which now you just know you let them choose. Yeah, they're the best. They figure it out. Yeah. But I'm just, you know, I mean, I've been doing comedy, I mean, this point has to be, when did Boston end? A couple years.

I don't remember. Yeah, was it 05, 04, 05? Probably 03, 04. No, no, yeah, I was there in 04. 04, must have been the end of 04. Yeah, maybe the end of 04, maybe even a little 05. It says 2005 on their Wikipedia. Yeah. Okay. All right, so it was 2005. Yeah. I should be on there. Oh, that says us. Are you on there? Okay. Oh, wow. Look at that.

Starting point for such comedians as Sarah Silverman, Jim Gaffigan. Yeah. Schultz didn't start there. Nate Bargatze. Nice. Neil Brennan worked the door there. Yeah. Schultz didn't. He was a Village Lantern guy. Bargatze, I mean. He was a comedy. Well, cats didn't know you guys. This is what makes me angry. You know? Yeah. He gets all the credit on Wikipedia. Now he's taking it like, I took care of Nate. He's like, no, you didn't, dude. I took care of Nate. Cats didn't know me. Yeah. Yeah.

Barry Katz, you know he put that whole thing up. I met Barry Katz in, which Barry Katz was great. He was. He let us do whatever we wanted. He let us do whatever we wanted. He is. He yelled a lot, but I had to deal with it. You had to deal with Barry Katz. Yeah. You were the one that got all of us in. But I mean, he had a trust in you that he knew you knew what to do. Technically what happened was, I was at the New York Comedy Club with Al for many years, Al Martin. Yeah.

And then some guy was skimming money at the Boston Comedy Club, so they needed a new guy. And then Al Martin, he asked Al Martin, you know, who can I bring in, whatever, and then Al picked me. And that's how that worked. Some guy was skimming money, so that's how it got there. Yeah. And then, I mean, it would be, yeah, because you ran it. Yeah, I ran it. To me, you might as well have owned it. I don't know if I even at that point even knew there was someone else. I never even thought, I mean, I'm...

So 2004. Well, Barry opened it and then he moved to LA. I may be 25 years old or 26 and I have no idea that this even... I'm not thinking about an owner of anything. I can't even... I'm coming out of the subway and just hope I can find where Boston is at. Yeah, that's cool. I've never looked at that. Yeah.

But Barry Katz is a big manager. Barry Katz, I met him at Boston Comedy Club. Barry Katz did do, was always very, very nice to me. Barry Katz was someone that you did want, you always wanted him to know you. Yeah, that's why it was a big deal. That was a big deal because you were like, he was like, he had Dan Cook, he had all these people and he was a manager. And so he was like, you just wanted him to, he's got a podcast too. I think it's a pretty great podcast because he talks a lot of old New York stuff.

out of Boston, New York stories about a lot of the guys that he was, Jay Moore, he was with forever. Yeah. It was really funny because he would just show up and, you know, and not let us know and tell us when he was showing up. And because he was in LA and then he was just kind of sort of kept, you know, the Boston comedy club in New York. And then he would just show up like on a Monday and it'd be like three people like, dude, just come on a weekend, man. We're crushing it. Like don't come on a Monday. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah, Mondays are the worst. Yeah, don't come up in February, like in New York. Nobody's here. The fact that we're open is unbelievable. We got six people. Come on, that's huge. That's amazing. Yeah, there's a show. We're having a show. It was just so funny. I'd be like-

I performed for one guy. One guy. Remember that? What was that guy's name? That was the Village Lantern. No, no. He was like the boss. Was that guy arm wrestled or no? No, no. The guy that had the really great laugh. Oh, Bob, I think, or something. Yeah, yeah. He had an amazing laugh. The one guy had a great laugh? Yeah. Oh, yeah. He always came. He always came. Always there. We never charged him. Yeah. We gave him his own seat. I always said if I had a comedy club in New York, I was going to have a golden seat for Bob. Yeah. Just have it right. Nobody could sit in it. Yeah, he was awesome. He was a lifesaver.

Yeah. And we let him do it every once and he'd come in by himself. And I mean, it would be six of us. He's just a great laugh. It was like someone that just was rooting for all of us. Yeah. He just wanted us to love comedy. He loved comedy. And he loved just seeing it, this ground floor of like, these guys are just chasing their dreams, man. Yeah. And, uh, he, when I did a show for him once, I mean, I remember where we were like being like, well,

Bob, I don't, I don't know if I want to do that. Like we knew him. So we're like, I'm on stage like, Bob, I don't know if we can do it. He's like, you can do it, man. He goes, it'll be great. And his laugh, he was so good at laughing that you could do it because you could be like, he would just have this great loud laugh. He laughed at the right parts. Uh,

he was just, it was great. And if we learn anything from zoom comedy shows, all you need is one life. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. We needed him. Yeah. He was, I mean, just a, just a, a one, the best dude. Uh, and then, so yeah, so, uh, Barry Katz. Yeah. So he ran that. I don't know. So anyway, uh,

So that was like the idea with Boston. And then they had... So a big thing was two that happened at Boston. I was there for that when Ted Alexandro and Russ Meneve, I think, started the... They kind of comics were going on strike. Yeah. For more money. Get us more money, yeah. And that was...

That happened when I was there. Yeah, I remember. And so they had all the meetings with all the comics. So they would all come to Boston. Yeah, the strike of 2000. Yeah. What was it? I don't know. Strike of 2004. It had to be four or five. Something like that. And so they did it. Oh, no. What's that? Comedians Union. Comedians Union. Yeah. This is in 2004, December 20th.

yeah that's that's kind of what it was yeah so i mean you can see it yeah so look so right up in the new york times about this yeah so that's cool so they're uh so the weekday pay at that time which was about 15 to 25 dollars a set uh as well as holiday pay for regulars uh would make up to 200 for a weekend gig as opposed to the current rate of 75 to 125 i thought it was less than that uh

Well, it was 60 some places. Yeah. And like, I remember I went to this, I went to the big meeting and it was just like, everybody was there, Colin Quinn, all these comedians. And I was kind of cranky about it because I felt like, you know, some of these guys, they weren't even paid guys anyway. They were just kind of trying to attach themselves to this thing so they could like get friends of comics and whatever. I remember. And then I was kind of, you know, I might've been a little hungover. I'm not going to, you know, a lot of sugar that night. Yeah.

And I think I remember I walked in and they wanted me to speak. And I was like, hey, I looked at everybody. I'm sorry, your development deals didn't work out. Like, we're just this is not where you're supposed to get paid. This is New York. You know, it's supposed to be the garden, not the you know, so it was like a whole thing. But Boston, we didn't we didn't have to pay because we didn't get the bar.

Yeah. Because it was the bag it in. Yeah. They got all the drinks. So the whole thing was the comedy clubs that make money off the bar should pay more because they're getting, you know. Yeah, you weren't. Yeah. Did you pay? We didn't have to pay spots for anybody? Yeah, we paid. I paid. I paid like 60, you know, a spot. Well, not 75, which is everybody else paid. Yeah. Because we didn't get, all we got was the cover. Yeah. So, you know, a lot of times we let people in free. Yeah. Just trying to get an audience. Yeah. And then, so yeah, we didn't, we, yeah, there's, it's not a profit.

Boston was not. And there was no comedy hub back then or internet where people were buying tickets. And so, yeah, they did. It was a good, they were Ted and them. They weren't going after Boston. They were going after the seller. They were going after all these places that were making real money. And these shows are sold out every night. I mean, they were like, this is crazy. We, there needed to be a raise. And they, I remember not going to this meeting and,

Because I remember just, I was barking. And I thought, I remember some other barkers or other people at my level. I mean, I'm doing comedy a year, two years. And they're like, I'm going to go. And I wish I would have went just to see it for the history of it. But I just remember I was embarrassed to be like, I can't go in there. Like, I'm going to look. They're going to be like, who are you? But that's also knowing your role.

though i knew my role this ain't this ain't i wasn't deserved to get i was like i'm not in this argument i don't know i'm lucky i'm getting the goal i'm lucky i'm almost paying to go on like yeah you're just at a point that you're like i don't i don't deserve this but i don't think this is always good because i think what happens this is a lot of guys like because i don't know i think that the idea of not paying someone a lot of money in the city makes you work harder and like

you know, aim higher. Yeah. Because a lot of guys, sometimes, like you said, they stay in this, they become city comics forever and they're amazing towns that should be kind of bigger names. That leave and leave New York. It's like, I don't know. I think it's important to do that. I don't, LA is like, you might get 20 bucks if you're lucky. I don't know if you get 20 bucks. If you're lucky. You might get zero. Maybe 20. 20 is like amazing. But they've started doing some shows now. Yeah.

where they run in LA where they do these outside outdoor shows supernova sure sure you get paid good for that out there like those they pay great some of those they pay like it's where you go that's too much I don't want that well they pay you that yeah yeah Nick and I are getting chicken fingers yeah yeah yeah

But there's something to be said, though, about working your way up and doing some things for free and learning things at a certain point. Because you do kind of need to do a certain amount of free work and work your way up. Because it's like, you know, when people are like, how do you get on TV? How do you get an agent? How do you get these things? You're like, well, you don't just get right to, you know, and acting is the same thing. That's why actors do theater. You have to do theater. You have to take certain things where you're...

oh, didn't I just see you on TV and now you're doing this thing? And you're like, there's a certain amount of that. And you also get stuff from people at your level more. It's like, right. Like we would be late at night when there was four people on a show, we would ride the subway back together at four in the morning. And it's like, that's where you really bond with people. And it's like, you have that lifelong friendship and camaraderie. We were looking at Aaron, we're like, does that happen? Yeah.

Playing poker in a parking lot. That's how you bond. That's how you bond. Well, that's why this weekend was so special because we were all together and we all lived together. That felt like we were all 20, man. That was amazing. I mean, we just haven't felt that in forever. And so it was so nice to be just to look at all of us and just remember it. Remember all that. We were running each other over.

A lot. I mean, you're around each other every single day. Cause I went with you to New York and then I went with you to improv. Yeah. And then you lived with me. We lived together. The three of us, the three of us lived together. So, I mean, if it was, you know, I mean, I would see y'all, even when I got married, I would see y'all probably more than my wife. Like you're just around each other for hours and hours and hours.

And yeah, this was a great, the thing with it, I do agree. That's why I don't think we should have went. I agree with all that kind of stuff, but I do understand that they were just trying to move it up

A little bit. And I get that. Because the clubs were starting to make money. I think each venue, it varies. Yes. Each venue, it did vary. But I get it. The Comedy Cellar, some of the bigger clubs. They have a restaurant. Yeah, they were selling out. And you're like, all right, dude. If y'all are making a bunch of more money, you do need to pay the guys more money. So it was a right for some of the places. And that's why I think they went to the Boston, because that was the only safe place to talk about it. Yeah.

Yeah. Because like the Boston was not, Boston was like, yeah, we don't have any money. Like in every club, everybody, every comic knew what the Boston was meant for. It was very underground. It was very, it was more of an underground kind of thing. It was more where you could pop in and everybody could get extra time. And so this was really kind of going after kind of the other comics. I mean, Ted, something I've, something he told me a long time ago that I think about all the time, where I remember Ted would always tell me,

90% of your work will come from other comedians. Oh, absolutely. And like he said that, and that's never been more true ever. Like if I remember hearing that at first, I was like, how does that even make sense?

and then you just look around and you're like, well, I'm getting work because of you. I'm getting, you know, we go to, we thought we'd get work from you. They're, that was about Nick, Nick, they go about Nick gigs. We go 90% will not pan out. It was the opposite. Uh, but it was, it was like, that's all your other comics would tell. I, I opened for Greg draw dough once. That was because, uh, I remember Pat Dixon would open for Greg draw dough and they needed someone to drive out. I think I done just talk about this with,

Talk about Pat. You mentioned Pat Dixon. That's great. He's got a great- Last week? Yeah, I think so. I think I mentioned this story. But like, so going out, so I got open for Greg once and I get to sit in this big theater and watch him. And he rode in the car with us. He sat in the back. It was just asking him all these comedy questions. It was this magical thing. Greg Droughter was my guy that I got to sit. I would get, remember, at the Cellar.

I would get paid to just sit there in case he didn't show up because Greg obviously had a lot of demons he was fighting. And so it'd be, it'd come back and forth where sometimes he would be cool. Sometimes he's not. Sometimes he'd kind of be off the rails and he wouldn't show up. So I would get to go sit at the cellar and just be like, is Greg going to show up or not? And yeah, here's the weirdest thing. Greg was my first sponsor. Yeah.

Oh, really? Yeah. Nothing contradicts itself. But he was great. In AA. He helped me out. In AA. Yeah. And so he was, yeah, yeah. And he was, you know. He was. He'd call me, make sure I was okay. And then unfortunately he kind of, you know. Yeah. He got off the path and you went back off with him. And then now you're back. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

We always talk about a lot of comics, as they get older, everybody kind of stops drinking, kind of gets off that kind of stuff. You know, I've talked about it on this podcast, which helps a lot of people at home do it. You're just around alcohol too much. It's just your world is too much of this. The audience sends you free drinks. Yeah, you're on stage. It's a show. It's too much. And you realize, like, I'm not going to get anywhere if I keep this up. And you kind of knew that.

And at the beginning, you would go back and forth. I mean, when you first moved there, you're having a good time. It's fun. It's your college years. And you're like, this is amazing. You're with Dave Attell. He hasn't drank now forever. Yeah. He was hilarious. Because that was the thing, too. We'd all want to drink with Dave. And a lot of times, he would go into a bar. He would buy us all shots and then just leave. And we'd do the shots and be like, we just were here because we want to hang out with Dave Attell. And then he's just gone. He was just like, I was gone.

Goodbye, everything. But they would have, you know, crazy nights with Dave. He hasn't drank in a long time. But I used to do these camp shows in New York for kids. Oh, I did those, yeah. And there was one that was four in the afternoon. This is when I was like 20. Oh, yeah. And I missed that like four in the afternoon. And I was like...

that late and crazy of a night. The 4 p.m. show. Where is he? I woke up. I was like, well, how early y'all doing these things? That 4 p.m. Yeah. I remember doing those camp shows. Stan in New York did a lot of those. Yeah. You go perform for kids. I love those. They were great because you, it was always so great because you're like, you felt like you worked.

And you're like, it's got money. Yeah. I mean, I do some at noon. Yeah. And you'd be done at one. And you're like, I already did a spot. And it was so fun to call you, tell your friends. You're like, what are you doing today? Like, I just woke up. You're like, I've already did a spot. I have one spot already. Cause you, as always, you wanted to be like, I got how many spots you get last night. That was the everything. Once you start getting into spots and you're not at ball, like you kind of just go run around doing more shows. Cause that's the kind of leads to is like stat. You kind of run the shows. Yeah.

And then you kind of end up going, like, now you're trying to get past all the clubs. And so then you're like, how many spots did you do? Like, I did five. Like, you got a lot in. I remember I did a camp show and I was at Gotham Comedy Club and the owner of the comedy club, I had a beer on stage in front of, you know, because I don't, you know, I'm not thinking it through. Yeah. That's,

The definition of comedian is we don't think it through. And he just walked up as I'm on stage telling jokes and just grabs it out of my hand and then just takes it and then just walks off. And I'm like, okay. And then I'm just like, hey, and just try to do jokes. Yeah, grab it.

He just grabs it off his face. It didn't disrupt me. He was real gentle about it. He probably doesn't even talk to you about it. He probably tells the place when he books them, hey, just a heads up. The people that go to these shows, they're not normal people. They don't think about stuff.

They would be professional, but stuff's going to slip in. The opposite of that was prom shows. Prom shows. The show would be at 2, 3 in the morning. And you had to wait there all night. You'd have to wait there all night. You never knew when they were coming, too. Yeah, so we'd just all be there. But you wanted prom shows. They paid more. Yeah, that was the big deal, especially for younger comics, because they always wanted somebody a little younger. So that's the advantage we had over the older guys. And the older guys, too, were not going to do it.

Like, dude, there's a point you got where you were like, I'm not going up at 3 a.m. I was like that older guy that kept doing it because I'm that guy that shows up like, hey, kids. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Well, it was good money. Yeah. And once you get to do it, you're like, oh, so you start, I mean, during prom season, you're able to go to Caroline's. Like, I mean, you get. 50 bucks usually. Yeah. If you were lucky. Yeah. It was a good. That was like a good. Yeah. I didn't think you, I thought you got a hundred or something. Maybe. Well, I think it was like a hundred. I think it was like something so crazy that you're like, dude, if I do these, that's like an extra hundred a night. Caroline's might've been.

that yeah but like some of the you know danger fields and stuff airlines i think might have even paid more than it might have been a couple hundred or three really i just remember it was something kind of crazy that you were like you you're like yeah dude i can't believe i'm getting to do this and then the other guys they were starting to do the road stuff where like oh i don't need that and i know it's not fun to be up at 3 a.m yeah i remember vecchione doing one one night and i mean these kids would come in and you know obviously no alcohol but they show up i mean they i

They somehow are finding it. And I mean, we remember we did a show and we're on stage. We just do the show. Mike Vigil and this girl,

gets alcohol poison or something, call the ambulance. Paramedics come put her on a thing, roll her out, and we're still just kind of doing the show. He's just on stage while I'm listening. Yeah, there's no stop. I mean, you got to like... These kids are kind of in a lock-in kind of thing. Oh, yeah. So they can't just be like, all right, everybody, show's over. We can't make them leave. Mm-hmm.

So they just like, we're still up there. Remember, maybe we kind of, everybody's talking. We maybe got a host up there. And then they're just like, excuse me, excuse me. Will this girl out on like a stretcher? And then he's like, Mike Vecchione, everybody. And Mike Vecchione comes out and just has to be like, yo, what's up, everybody? The kids are just kind of back in the show. And you're like,

Yeah, one of your classmates might be dead, but we can't send you home. The show's got to go on. And yeah, it was such a crazy, crazy time. We did prom boats in New York. I never did a boat. I knew they would do those. There's nothing worse than bombing in front of a bunch of kids and you can't leave. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You're just like stuck and they're everywhere coming at you. Oh man, you ain't funny. And like, you're just like, ah.

You just want to jump off. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You just trapped on the boat. Also, the kids' shows were great because they would be like, they were excited about it usually. Prom, sometimes they were like, they would rather be out drinking. Kids have attitude. They want to hook up. So they're in there trying to hook up and looking at that awkward tension between dates. And you're up there like, let me tell you about my girlfriend. And they're like, ugh.

Well, it was either that or it was junior prom where they're like 15. Yeah. You know, so that's the most awkward group of people you're going to perform in front of. Those 15 year old boys. Yeah. Just, they, you know, they have no idea what to do with the girl. This is the stuff that, that, that makes it all great. You know, you know, it's funny. I was just reminding me of Barry Katz. If you want to see him, if you watch comedian, uh,

uh, that's where I know him from basically. Which, uh, it's about Seinfeld. And I think I've talked about it here. If you haven't watched it, comedian is on Netflix. Now it's on Netflix. Now it's, uh,

It's perfect. It's one of the best comedian documentaries. It's what I watched and said, I got to go to New York and move to New York right after I watched it. I moved to New York a couple months after I saw it. I saw it in a movie theater. Some great scenes. And then that's kind of, you can get a feel for what we were kind of going through. Like a little bit. You've seen it through Seinfeld eyes, obviously, but you see Orny Adams, who's very funny. Yeah, that's actually a different experience, the Orny situation. Because I felt like he kind of got

kind of gifted something really cool. And then it was like, what do you do when you have it? Do you exploit it? Do you crush it? So that's what's really interesting about it. Because a lot of us weren't handed that situation. And so I think it was like, it was an experiment. It was an experiment, I think, for the documentary to see what happens if you give a guy, you know. Well, they wanted to show to someone like Seinfeld that when they walk in, he gets an applause. And then they want to show, well, here's what the other comedians have to go through.

Yeah. They don't get the applause. They don't get the... Sure. I think there's one scene where Orny goes up to Jerry and he's like, oh yeah, of course Jerry's here. But that's how they get him at first because you see Orny get bumped by Seinfeld. Well, that's where our bump conversation. That's the bump conversation. Yeah. And Orny's a great guy. If you watch this thing, I know Orny now. Orny's an amazing comedian. Very, very funny. Just destroys. Mm-hmm.

and is a great dude, but he's kind of the guy that you see in that kind of thing. He's just kind of that dude. Well, he'll kind of roll his eyes at a famous, like he's not impressed. He just wants to go up. Yes, yes. Because I think the thing is he wanted to get a tape or something. So he was like, ah, every club, here we go. Yeah, he's trying to get a Montreal Comedy Festival. Yeah, yeah. And now he talks about doing shows outside. Yeah, yeah. It's my favorite stand-up documentary. It's cool. Mainly because I'm a big Seinfeld fan, but in that you see Barry Katz

uh uh talk to orny adams one of my favorite lines very funny orny adams because i you know you've all been dumb and say something like this where you go like talk about steve right he goes yeah what's steven right even doing and barry katz goes he won an oscar like and he goes oh that's cool yeah because what he says is where's steven right now yeah where's steve right and then in the dvd uh they have a section on it called where's orny now yeah yeah and they got him in a volkswagen doing a road gig it's just really yeah

But I get it. We've all been very frustrated and you say something. I love Orny. He's great. I just, I just say something very dumb where you're like, yeah, what's Rodney Dangerfield? You know, like at the time, Rodney Dangerfield was alive. You're like, you know, you say something. Yeah. Where's Larry the cable guy? How good's he doing? You're like, oh,

he's a multi-millionaire and he sells out arenas he's doing pretty good you know what it is it's like sports you know like you feel like you gotta like you take down the legends and like be as good and whatever so you get that cockiness where you're like okay yeah i got this and to get in and get out of my way get out of my way put back your place immediately always you ever see that clip is a clip that went viral of msnbc years ago and that the moderator is arguing with the guest and finally the

The moderator goes, do you have a degree in economics? And the guy goes, yeah, highest honors. Yeah. She was like, okay, all right. Oh, that's great. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. You always get kind of shoved into that spot. So, yeah, comedians on Netflix with Seinfeld. All Seinfeld's going to Netflix, too, by the way. Yeah. And so...

Still haven't met Seinfeld. That's my one. You haven't? No. I'm trying to start to ask around. I'm trying to be like, hey, can I open for it? I just want to go with him. Sure. Well, that's the thing in Comedian. When he's brought up,

and those girls kind of heckle him when they're talking about his notes. I bring him up. Oh, really? Yeah, I bring him up in that. It's at Gotham. And that was the weirdest thing because it was also one of those moments where he was the kind of guy, I think we talked about with Chappelle and stuff, I'd be like, ladies and gentlemen, Jerry Seinfeld. Everybody would be like, yeah, okay.

you know like like the audience just wouldn't believe you maybe like okay like it's some joke or something then he would come in and everybody would just go bananas yeah and uh but yeah i brought him up that and they of course you know yeah that girl was she from another country she's from ireland yeah yeah yeah i remember and then she was in the in the documentary kind of heckling because he's looking at notes she said something like you don't remember your act yeah it's something like is this your first show yeah first show yeah is this your first show and then yeah he's like so i was there for all that oh wow that you bring yeah i was in the room i knew that i

I was in the room. I saw the whole thing. Wow. It was great. You've seen it being filmed. Was everybody upset at Orny at that time? Like in an honest thing, was everybody like, man. Oh yeah. Yeah. Bill Burr was like, what's up with this? Yeah. He was like, what's up with that? Like a lot of us. Cause we were, you know, but like I said, it was like, you know, they just chose one guy and I think his attitude about,

it made it interesting was he in it made it because everybody else would just be like oh my gosh this is amazing where only you needed somebody to kind of be like whatever but he had that like it was almost like a reality show yeah somebody absolutely absolutely not always say what you want he was perfect he made it perfect he made it perfect he without him it's not as good yeah yeah

Any other comic, they would have felt boring. Yeah, we'd just have been like, thank you, thank you, thank you. Orny, you had emotions about Orny. Sure. At times, you could think you don't like him, and then you're like, no, I do like him. You go back and forth when you're watching it for the first time. It's interesting to think...

I'd like to see it again. It's been a long time. Oh, yeah. I need to watch it again, too. I've watched it again not too long ago, but it's... Go listen to the commentary, too. It's great. Colin Quinn. Oh, him and Colin Quinn. It's so funny. Talk about Barry and everything. Yeah, it's so funny. Cut his hair. Cut your hair, man.

they, so it's like, yeah, go watch it and then go listen to them. Talk about, Oh, that's way. So it's so funny. We go watch it first. If you haven't seen it and then go back and listen. Uh, but it's with Orny, uh,

there i'd imagine like everybody was pretty because at that point you're like everybody's trying to get something and you're like why does this dude get it yeah i've had so much jealousy yeah well you're like why so he gets whatever he wants i guess he gets whatever he's doing spots like that you would get so mad yeah and then you know it's funny to think burr if he was like i could i mean everybody would have been a little bit like why does he get to be the one chosen and you look in like burrs now the biggest comics yeah working uh

But yeah. But you don't know that. You know how this is. You have no idea where it's. Where anything's going. You have goals. You have ambitions. But you don't know. Everything is the biggest thing ever. So when you don't get something, you think, well, that's the worst thing that's ever going to happen to me. And I'm never going to make it. And like, this is so hard. It's so devastating. It's so devastating. It's all these things that you're like, you don't even remember.

And then you're like, but I would have been upset about that at that point. Yeah. Well, I was, yeah, I was just like, you know, cleaning the club and running shows. So it's like, it was that kind of energy where it's just like, you're just like, this guy's not paying enough dues to get this. And you know, yeah. You're like, look at all the dues I'm paying. Yeah. And you have that. Yeah. And it's like, that's yeah. It's not about you. It's not about you. He was past all the clubs at that point. Yeah. He was kind of up and, you know, up and coming, but he was in the system playing all the clubs. He was kind of past that point.

He was a killer. He was very animated. Just like the stool and everything. But the systems changed too because of social media and other things. Now people can just be famous and you don't have to. This was a long one.

Two hours, 18. It's pretty good. It's like a Chappelle set at the Boston. Yeah. Yeah. It's a, this one was a fun one. I mean, this was, uh, you know, it was great because we have y'all and just to go back and, you know, you forget, we all remember different things.

stuff sticks out to us. So it's nice to be able to go talk back with us and just be like, oh yeah, I remember you remember this and that. And remember, you know, one of the worst bombings I had was at Boston. Oh yeah. I remember that. I remember I had to go walk around. I

And I had a green button-down shirt, and I had it tucked in. And I never wore that shirt again on stage. I thought it was the shirt. Everybody was murdering. I've gotten rid of a lot of clothes because of that. It's funny how comics are superstitious. I got hats I just threw away. I'm like, I'm wearing that again. That's the reason. It's not our material. No, it has nothing to do with my hacky...

These people, I'm a great comedian. I'm doing comedy for a month. Taking your shirt off. You know how great of a comedian I am? The agents don't get it. Look at you, shirt. It's your fault. That's probably what happened to Chrysler. That's how it started. He just had a set. He's like, I'm not. Oh, Bert. Yeah. Yeah. You ain't gonna get to me. He's like, I'm taking my shirt off. How about that? Uh,

Yeah, I remember that night. I remember it was Boston. I remember I did it. I think it was so bad that we had another show that we had to bark for because it was on the weekend. And you let me just... You were like, hey, man, just go walk around. It was like you knew enough to go like... It was my first...

Obviously, at the beginning, you don't do good at the beginning, but it doesn't really matter because you don't know what good feels like. At that point, I've started to do good. And so this is the first time I kind of had... Well, everybody was destroying. And you think you're better than everybody. You're like, well, if they're doing good, I mean, I'm going to murder. It's the first time you have that thought and you allow yourself to have that thought. And then you go up there and it was...

And I mean, I was sick to my stomach and I walked out and like had to walk away and walk. I remember that night. Yeah. I like had to sit. I'm where I think went to some wine bar. I don't know what a wine bar is like walk in there and just like sitting alone and

And you're just thinking about every, I mean, you're just like, I don't know what's happening. And it was, I mean, I went back and did a show later. You just learn. You had a better set. You had a better set later. And then you're like, okay, this is just it. You got to shake it off. I mean, every boxer gets knocked down. Yeah. Just get back up. Just got to get back up. Man, it's a gut punch. It's a gut punch. It's tough. It's tough. But that's the beauty of it. And it makes you better because you reflect like, what did I do in that set that made that happen?

Out of all the bombs, that's the only one I really remember. Besides his shirt. Besides his shirt. What else did I do? Sure, you used this stuff. I didn't wear it on the second show.

And luckily back then I would wear two shirts. That was wise. Two shorts, two shirts, two shirts. Cumberland Farms. Yeah. Cumberland Surveyor or something like that. I had some Goodwill shirt. Yeah. Well, that's why I wore two. I was always prepared. It's your bombing shirt. Yeah. It's my bombing shirt. Get that one out of the way. Here we go. Boom. Yeah.

All right, everybody. Thank you so much. This was such a great episode with being able to catch up with you guys. Obviously also, you know, with Brian. Keep Brian, just prayers for him, his family, his wife's family. You know, we don't know everything that's going on, but just we're talking about where obviously we'll tell you guys. But

uh think about him uh aaron you got also bates is he what's his bait bates has been out leanne morgan he's doing a bunch of shows with leanne he's all over so check both of us out on social media we're out there on the road we love seeing podcast fans come out to see us saw one last night in st louis they came out it's great it's great when they come out yeah uh we will be uh in we're going to dc this weekend

Yeah, so you're, because it comes out Wednesday, so we're on our, no, we're going to Norfolk. Norfolk, Virginia first, and then D.C., Norfolk is Thursday. I don't know where I'm at. You doing the Lyric in D.C.? No. The Constitutional? The Constitutional? Yeah, D.A.R. That's pretty cool, yeah. And then, so I'm in, yeah, where am I going? Virginia, D.C., and then Hershey. Yeah, but we're leaving Wednesday.

I thought it was Thursday. Uh, yeah. Look at the schedule. I'm, I'm very confused. Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday. I know, but Oh, cause two shows are in. Yes. Three shows in Hershey. All right. So I'm right. Chrysler hall, Norfolk, Virginia, the dark constitution hall in DC. Uh,

Hershey, Pennsylvania. First show is sold out. Second show is close. And then there's a third show that we added on Sunday, on the 26th. So you can go to that. So those first two shows are about to be... First one's gone. Second one's about to be gone. And then that third show, go get tickets for that if you can do that. And then I'll be back doing another night in D.C. the next week of the 30th.

Oh, you are doing the Lyric in Baltimore. I am. Two shows there. And then, yeah. So, I mean, go to my website. You'll see all the stuff. We're out. We're running around. Everybody listens to this podcast. You guys come to these shows. A lot of you yell, let's go, folks. It means the world. Truly, we, as always, appreciate you.

we'll never not appreciate you guys. We're, you know, we're not, we're none of us are owed any of this. As we told you the stories, we don't think we're, we're owed anything. And so we're lucky to even be here. And, uh, we will never take that for granted. Uh, thanks for sticking to the ads. We did four ads this time. Um, we're keeping it. I mean, I, I don't, I think it will always be the most. I don't want to go too much on you guys. Uh, but it means a lot to how Aaron eats.

We're going to keep adding ads. We won't do more than four. I like four. It's like they get it. Look, I'm only giving you stuff that I actually use. I'm not just trying to throw anything on there. We've got to support your feeding window. I like how we're like, you lost it.

I like how you're like, he lost a hundred pounds and you're like, well, these ads are how he eats. And then, you know, it's very lean food. Yeah.

Aaron's done the best out of all of us. I mean, he's good. Thank you. My, my, by the way, my earlier fat compartment joke, just so people heads up, I might be able to do that on stage. So if you hear that on stage, same, my fat is now just, that was great. Oh, definitely use that. It's still there. Yeah. Or Nick will, you know what I mean? I try not to, if you come to my hour, I think I'm only, I, you can correct me, but I think I'm only doing, uh,

three things that I've something, some of them are just, they're now full jokes.

And so on the podcast, you would have just heard me talk about it. I've now made them jokes. Uh, so it's not like I'm not just telling fleshed out the bit on here. You just get the premise. But I think it's only three. I want to say it's maybe three things, maybe four, but I think three that I can think of. It's pretty good for an hour. So I'm not, if you come see the show, it's all stuff you never heard, but you probably be hearing this little fat, but the fat thing is just be a quick little add on. Uh,

uh because that was that's that's a joke that you're like i could work yeah that could work yeah so let's see so you're going to see it so if you come to this weekend i'll do it in norfolk if i remember if i don't but i think i'll do it in norfolk so norfolk show let's see how it goes we can all see how you know be like a behind the scenes like behind the scenes yeah it's like this is like our own comedian uh so thank you all that all came out again uh

Dustin Chafin dot com yes yeah your website you've been doing shows yeah check me out I have a show called Dustin's Vinyl on Twitch it's a podcast as well I go to record stores and we talk about vinyl records and stuff it's very cool dig into vinyl records yeah

Does show. Live in L.A. Do spots there. Yes. Nick? Yes. You can follow me at Nick Novicki. I'm very excited to do shows with you this weekend. Yep. And also check out, again, disabilityfilmchallenge.com. It's an awesome thing. Check out all the films. Support people with disabilities making films in front of and behind the camera. Yeah. Making amazing films.

Yeah, the least group that's used, right? People with disabilities, 25% of the population, even if you spelled disability wrong, still 25% of the population. Well, that's a disability. That's a disability. Exactly. But yet we're in less than 3% of film and TV shows. 95% of those actors are non-disabled actors playing people with disabilities. So the Film Challenge helps people with disabilities by making their own films, telling their own stories. Yeah. Wow. Yeah, that's great. It's awesome, man. It's a cool thing.

All right, everybody. Thank you very much. We love you. Shout out to Breakfast. And we will see you next week. All right. Goodbye. Let's go, bro.

Thanks, everybody, for listening to the Nate Land podcast. Be sure to subscribe to our show on iTunes, Spotify, you know, wherever you listen to your podcasts. And please remember to leave us a rating on comedy. Nate Land is produced by me, Nate Bargetti, and my wife, Laura, on the All Things Comedy Network. Recording and editing for the show is done by Genovation Consulting in partnership with Center Street Media. Thanks for tuning in. Be sure to catch us next week on the Nate Land podcast.