Latest / Rusty's Garage / Shane Jacobson

Transcript

Shane Jacobson · Rusty's Garage

• 0:02
  A listener production.
• 0:13
  I'm automotive commentator and journalist Greg Rust and this is Rusty's Garage.
• 0:30
  Shane Jacobson is quite possibly the busiest person in Australian entertainment right now.
• 0:35
  Stage shows, TV and of course movies.
• 0:39
  He's a comedian first and foremost.
• 0:41
  His love of a good laugh is only rivaled by an incredible passion for cars and bikes.
• 0:48
  Somehow he found a break in his crazy schedule to sit down for a coffee and chat about it.
• 0:54
  I'm one of those freaks which you and me both have the same disease of which there is no cure other than speed.
• 1:00
  And that is just we love getting behind a wheel of anything.
• 1:02
  And it's true, mate.
• 1:04
  Driving is a hobby.
• 1:05
  I mean, I hear those people out there.
• 1:08
  You and me don't like these people.
• 1:09
  But the ones that say, you know, cars are a necessary evil.
• 1:13
  There's hundreds of people laying on the ground with sore jaws that have said that to me.
• 1:17
  And I go, how dare you describe what I consider a love, a passion?
• 1:20
  It's like having to call a girlfriend ugly.
• 1:22
  You know, you can't be saying it's a necessary evil.
• 1:24
  There's nothing evil about them.
• 1:26
  They're pure joy.
• 1:27
  They're art.
• 1:27
  They're a hobby.
• 1:28
  They're a pleasure.
• 1:29
  They're a moment away.
• 1:30
  They're, you know, they're...
• 1:32
  form of escapism.
• 1:33
  You grew up in Avondale Heights, I think, northwest Melbourne.
• 1:36
  Is that right?
• 1:36
  Now, what were the family cars in those early years?
• 1:40
  Am I correct in saying sort of Hillmans and things like that?
• 1:43
  It's a head... God, I hate the fact that you know too much, Rusty.
• 1:47
  So we had a Hillman Hunter, which I was so embarrassed about at the time.
• 1:52
  But it did really well.
• 1:54
  Back in the day, it did pretty well.
• 1:56
  London to Sydney.
• 1:57
  I was going to say, London to Sydney, it did all right.
• 2:00
  I mean, having said that, I think Cortina's did all right in one of those once.
• 2:03
  And it was the TC, I think, went in there and did well.
• 2:07
  And no one ever got a TC Cortina to run well again.
• 2:10
  But, yeah, we had that.
• 2:12
  There was a Ford.
• 2:13
  I'm an out-and-proud Holden fan.
• 2:15
  There's no doubt about it.
• 2:16
  But we had a Ford in the driveway.
• 2:18
  But Mum also had a Mini.
• 2:20
  Not the Cooper S, just a Mini.
• 2:22
  So nothing flashed.
• 2:23
  It certainly wasn't the cars parked in our driveway that gave me the thirst for motoring.
• 2:29
  The truth is, and I've said it a million times, the car that twisted my head and I've never got rid of the rick neck is an EH Holden, a guy in the neighbourhood.
• 2:40
  It was the western suburbs.
• 2:41
  She was...
• 2:42
  pretty rough area.
• 2:42
  Anyone that had more than three teeth was a tourist.
• 2:46
  And a guy turned up with a candy apple red, I'll never forget it, it's like your first love kind of thing.
• 2:52
  We were eating potato cakes as you do on your BMX, sitting in the shopping centre car park in this candy apple red EH Holden with Centeline mags.
• 3:04
  And it had a 400 Chev, I'll never forget it, it was a 400 Chev.
• 3:07
  I never even heard of a 400 Chev then, but pulled into the shopping centre car park and stopped outside the fish and chip shop.
• 3:13
  And that was my first love.
• 3:15
  And I now have an EH Holden, but that was when, you know, and it wasn't, my family weren't into cars at all.
• 3:21
  We're all into music, we're all into acting and comedy and all that kind of stuff.
• 3:24
  But I'm the only one that's got this virus called, you know, the love of cars.
• 3:28
  We'll get to the EH a little later, but I want to start with your first car.
• 3:32
  T.E.
• 3:33
  Cortina.
• 3:34
  A Ford.
• 3:35
  You're talking about your love of Holdens, but it was a Ford.
• 3:38
  Now, they came out in the late 70s.
• 3:39
  Share the story because you bought it before you even had your licence.
• 3:44
  I did.
• 3:45
  I can't believe I've got to talk about this goddamn car.
• 3:47
  Wouldn't you go...
• 3:49
  If you gave me the DeLorean now and said, Shane, where are we going?
• 3:53
  The answer would be back to when I was 18.
• 3:56
  to get rid of that freaking te cortina because it's the most embarrassing thing because as a car lover we all know you can't help but go you know what was your first car look i got a loan um and had that thing sitting in the driveway before i had a license it was the it was the two liter uh te it was a station wagon i was i was singing in bands then and i needed something that had rear space it wasn't too overpowered which you know my parents were kind of looking for me to be semi-sensible
• 4:22
  Four-cylinder, not the six?
• 4:23
  Yeah, that was the four.
• 4:24
  You know, but it had...
• 4:26
  I used to tell people, you know, when you were a kid, you just, any sentence, you never checked whether it was true.
• 4:32
  But someone told me, oh, this thing has like a Bathurst quick change four-speed.
• 4:36
  And they were just words that someone gave me.
• 4:38
  There's no way that had it.
• 4:40
  And I used to say, no, it's got the quick-change four-speed gearbox in it.
• 4:43
  It didn't.
• 4:44
  It was just a manual gearbox.
• 4:46
  I don't even know where that came from, but I was saying that for years.
• 4:48
  Whatever happened to it, did you modify it?
• 4:50
  Because as a young man, yeah, you're inspired by that EH you saw before and the engine that was in it and things like that.
• 4:56
  Did you leave it standard?
• 4:57
  Did you modify it?
• 4:58
  And what became of the core team?
• 5:02
  So there's two parts to that.
• 5:03
  I didn't do any work to the motor, but that was kind of the days of...
• 5:08
  Well, now you'd go into an auto barn of the day or a Repco and you just bought bits.
• 5:13
  But it was never anything that made the car better.
• 5:16
  It was, as you know, I got stickers.
• 5:18
  I had stickers on the back window.
• 5:20
  There was a surfboard company called Shane, believe it or not, and their logo was on top, down under.
• 5:25
  Well, that was just too good to refuse.
• 5:26
  So I had two of those stickers on my back window.
• 5:28
  But I did little things, like you put a CB in it, but nothing to the car, but all that stuff, you know, and then you save for better seat covers.
• 5:34
  And it was all these things, and you just kept covering this pig of a thing in lipstick and makeup.
• 5:39
  It was still a pig.
• 5:41
  So I did nothing to the motor.
• 5:42
  But what came of it is it got stolen.
• 5:44
  Someone took it for a joyride and burnt the bejesus out of it.
• 5:47
  And the police knocked on my door.
• 5:48
  It was like 2 in the morning.
• 5:49
  I woke up, they said, are you the owner of a car?
• 5:52
  um beep god you remember it's funny you remember regos don't you what car people do i think bpw 120 and i always said it stood for the boy that people worship 120 that was how i remembered it and uh and i said yeah and uh they said where's that car and i said well it should be parked out the front
• 6:08
  And they said, well, it's not.
• 6:09
  They said, as we speak, it is still burning.
• 6:13
  So they...
• 6:14
  It was like in some remote part of the outskirts of Melbourne that had been taken for a draw ride.
• 6:18
  And I went and saw it because it was out in the middle of nowhere.
• 6:21
  They gave it to the location.
• 6:23
  And I...
• 6:24
  nothing's ever been burnt that bad nothing and it was all the glasses melted down on the floor there was no no rubber on the tires there was nothing this part of the all the alloy components of the car were pools on the ground so whoever took that thing hated it as much as i did did you get your license first go no i didn't god you're a bastard
• 6:47
  It was a hard marker, the policeman, I think, for memory.
• 6:49
  It was a driving one of those.
• 6:51
  So it was done through, I think, the RTA or however it works.
• 6:54
  VicRoads, you know, they had their licence testers.
• 6:57
  I got, I was on 99.
• 7:00
  I was either perfect or 99 out of 100.
• 7:03
  I'd made no mistake, right?
• 7:06
  It was like a head turn or I didn't look far enough over my shoulder or something.
• 7:08
  It was like one point I was on.
• 7:10
  And I was two blocks from finishing the test.
• 7:14
  And nailing it.
• 7:15
  And nailing it, yeah.
• 7:15
  And the guy said, like my instructor actually said to me, I can't believe they did that to you.
• 7:20
  But there's a street that every now and then they take you down, apparently, to fool anyone that's going for their driver's licence.
• 7:25
  Because it's a two-way street that becomes a one-way street, but it's not marked that clearly.
• 7:30
  And what happened was I went down the one-way component of it, which is where they go down, and then halfway through it switches the two-way.
• 7:37
  And all it was was I was centred of the road, because all the cars are facing one way, but my tyre, as I spotted it, I went on, it turns the two lanes here, I veered over a bit.
• 7:46
  But my right hand...
• 7:49
  front tyre touched the white line in the middle of the road and the driving inspector said that actually on paper constitutes is heading towards oncoming traffic even though there was nothing on the road an immediate fire wow and i think my instructor said that he hated the fact you were driving that well i think he was just looking to because apparently i looked a bit confident and because i drive a bit and i still remember
• 8:13
  I still remember absolutely allegedly that I got home so angry and my parents went home that I went and took that cool dinner for a drive around the streets anyway.
• 8:22
  I was so angry I just took the car for a drive anyway.
• 8:24
  So therapy's working, you've gotten over the veil, have you?
• 8:27
  Oh, look, not yet.
• 8:29
  But I'm in cancelling now and they reckon I'm only two years shy of being over that moment.
• 8:34
  You wrote about the long road to overnight success.
• 8:38
  You mentioned singing before.
• 8:40
  You mentioned about the fact that you were on stage as a youngster and your love of comedy.
• 8:45
  Is it true, mate, you worked in pyrotechnics for a time and even at a Dire Straits concert, is that correct?
• 8:50
  Yeah, I worked for, wow, back in the 80s, I got it.
• 8:52
  The first one I did was the Debbie Gibson Electric Youth Tour.
• 8:56
  But, yeah, I did Dire Straits, I did Guns N' Roses, Bon Jovi.
• 9:00
  Yeah, you name it, ACDC worked for all.
• 9:02
  I did pyro for probably 13 years, just, you know, got paid to blow things up.
• 9:07
  But, yeah, Dire Straits, that would have been about 86, I suppose.
• 9:10
  But, yeah, I just ran around just blowing stuff up and, you know, but I'd also do car events too.
• 9:16
  I got to do...
• 9:17
  stuff like the premiere speedway in warner bull you know that was the other thing is it got me to these great events i mean there was all the rock concerts which was great i've got to still remember bringing home two garbage bags full of teddy bears from a poison concert to give to my little sister and then i remember going into my room to show show my old man the bras and underpants that got thrown onto the same stage which all had stapled to them or written on them in text their
• 9:42
  I thought that was the weirdest thing ever, going, I've got a whole bunch... Because they used to sweep them off the stage and just put them in bags to throw them out.
• 9:48
  And I only did it once.
• 9:49
  I brought it home just to impress my little sister at the time.
• 9:52
  Older sister was too old, but, yeah, she would have got 100 teddy bears.
• 9:56
  But then there was this whole bag of underpants going, have I got that?
• 9:58
  And tip them out.
• 9:59
  He said, let's throw them in the bin, eh?
• 10:01
  What a combo, mate.
• 10:02
  A comedian who loves going fast, access to crackers and explosives.
• 10:07
  I mean, that is just your submission to Top Gear Australia podcast.
• 10:11
  Right there, isn't it?
• 10:12
  Well, isn't that funny?
• 10:13
  So when the Top Gear thing happened, I didn't know I was being asked really to host the show.
• 10:19
  I got told that they were doing Top Gear Australia and it had been done, you know, Steve Pizzardi, who's a great mate of mine.
• 10:26
  Both of ours.
• 10:27
  Ours indeed.
• 10:28
  And Pizz had already done the version on SPS.
• 10:32
  And Channel 9 were taking it over, and I knew some people there, and they said, look, we've got Top Gear coming to 9 now.
• 10:37
  And they were telling me they'd been overseas.
• 10:39
  And I honestly thought that meant it had been decided people were hosting it and they wanted to talk to me about being on the show.
• 10:45
  And I just assumed it was... Like a guest?
• 10:47
  Well, a star in a reasonably priced car.
• 10:51
  I honestly, not for one moment, thought I was going to be hosting this thing.
• 10:54
  And anyway, I got asked to meet Peter Abbott, who was the EP of it, and maybe I'm an idiot, but anyway, I kind of went to this meeting and I thought it'd be great to host it, but I just thought they were just looking to get the right people to be on as guests because they need to make a big splash on Channel 9 and all that kind of stuff.
• 11:09
  And obviously trying to be the Rolling Stones cover band when the Rolling Stones are still on tour, which is what being the host of Top Gear is like when, you know, Top Gear, when Jez and the boys are still going, with the real Top Gear, so to speak, the English version.
• 11:23
  So anyway, I get there and I turn up at the time.
• 11:25
  I had a six-litre V8 Calais.
• 11:27
  That was my daily drive and pulled up right outside the cafe and I was running a bit late, so I think I pulled in pretty quick, pit stop style, and jumped out of the car and he said, so you like cars, don't you like to go quick?
• 11:41
  And we started chatting.
• 11:41
  We immediately got chatting about cars and he said, so what sort of cars do you like?
• 11:45
  And we just started chatting and he said, you know, do you...
• 11:48
  like old cars i still like going quick but i like old cars and you know i've done a bit of amateur rally stuff and started going through my driving anyway before you know it at the end of the meeting you said that we'd really love to talk to you about hosting the show and i wasn't really that sure until then it was ridiculous but um yeah i just thought it was one of the guys however i missed that point so next thing you know we're talking about me hosting it and uh and of course dare i say it you know it went on to be that i hosted it for a couple of years you know
• 12:11
  We'll talk more about some of the crazy, fun stuff that you did because, I mean, it's such a great chapter.
• 12:16
  What I want to sort of come back to for a moment is what you listen to when you drive.
• 12:19
  Are you, you know, do you try and switch off?
• 12:22
  Is it music?
• 12:23
  Are you doing stuff that helps you learn your lines and practice?
• 12:27
  What do you do when you drive?
• 12:28
  Yeah, it's music for the most part.
• 12:29
  I've almost entered that phase of life where it's AM radio, which I didn't think would happen.
• 12:34
  Oh, ho, ho, ho.
• 12:34
  Almost.
• 12:35
  And every now and then, of course... 131873, let's go to Shane.
• 12:38
  Hello.
• 12:39
  I know, it's shocking.
• 12:40
  We've got Margaret from Moody Pums on the phone.
• 12:43
  Go ahead, Margaret.
• 12:44
  But every now and then, I found myself dropping across to AM.
• 12:46
  Now, look, I've shaved that off.
• 12:49
  So let's go on for the moment.
• 12:50
  It is music.
• 12:51
  And it's funny because...
• 12:54
  If I'm riding a bike, I've got an Indian roadmaster and I'm an ambassador for Indian motorcycles, so I get the joy of riding pretty much any bike that's in the paddock and I've got a roadmaster at the moment.
• 13:05
  The truth is whenever I'm riding, it's ACDC or Foo Fighters and I can't...
• 13:10
  get it out of my head, it feels weird for some people they say they always have to wake up and have a cigarette and a coffee well my version of that is if I'm on a motorbike I have to be listening to ACDC or the Foo Fighters so they are permanently in my ear when I ride and in the car, look it is music mate for the most part it is and I do love driving and as I said at the top of the interview but I also, for me it is a pleasure and part of that pleasure is having music having a soundtrack playing in your mind and
• 13:40
  you know, and cruising down the road.
• 13:41
  Because I do, I do, you know, I can vague out in a car.
• 13:44
  I really can.
• 13:44
  I'm, I'm... Can't on a bike though, Camille.
• 13:47
  Not at all.
• 13:47
  That's the thing.
• 13:48
  It's funny, I heard Ross Noble being interviewed by Andrew Denton recently saying, you know, Andrew Denton saying, I don't like motorbikes.
• 13:54
  And what is it about motorbikes that you like?
• 13:56
  And Ross Noble said to him, well, I've got a question for you.
• 13:57
  What is it about motorbikes that you don't?
• 14:00
  And Denton said that when he was a kid, he had a go at one and ridden straight to a tree.
• 14:05
  And Ross said, well, here's the thing.
• 14:06
  And him and me are probably similar.
• 14:08
  And I'm stealing his words.
• 14:09
  Well, more to the point, I'm agreeing with his sentiment, which is that I do have a busy mind.
• 14:14
  There's no doubt about it.
• 14:15
  My brain spins it.
• 14:16
  million miles an hour and and i'm kind of not happy unless it's doing that in a weird way um like the idea of having some time off in my mind is kind of let's not have my mind works so therefore i'm not looking for time off i'm looking for things to think about and ideas to solve and problems to solve but on a motorbike you're thrust you're forced into a situation where you have to
• 14:38
  But it's a beautiful handshake or marriage, if you will, that you have to focus, but you want to.
• 14:43
  And there's nothing...
• 14:45
  I mean, on a long ride, you can start to do what you do in a car.
• 14:48
  But for the most part, if you're doing it right, you are observing what you're supposed to do in anything on the road.
• 14:53
  But you are looking further ahead.
• 14:55
  You're looking through the corners, of course, which you're supposed to.
• 14:57
  But...
• 14:58
  You really don't let that stuff go when you're on a bike.
• 15:00
  But you're also looking at bumps in the road and everything else.
• 15:03
  But it sounds busy, but it's not.
• 15:05
  You're just concentrating on the ride.
• 15:07
  But you're not in the shell of a car.
• 15:10
  You're sitting on the roof of one.
• 15:11
  I mean, it's fantastic, and there's nothing...
• 15:14
  where you've come for us to catch up today and have lunch, mate.
• 15:16
  As you can see, we're in the Macedon Ranges in Victoria, and it's beautiful around here.
• 15:21
  And when you're sitting on a bike, it's like having God's hand just slowly, or a magic carpet just deliver you through the mountain ranges.
• 15:29
  It's fantastic.
• 15:30
  So it does, your brain...
• 15:33
  doesn't want to, for a moment, think of anything other than the joy of riding.
• 15:37
  In a car, it can be a little bit of an offer sometimes, whereas on a bike, that doesn't happen.
• 15:41
  So that's my love of riding.
• 15:44
  But I do, going back to it, I do listen to a lot of music in cars and on bikes, definitely.
• 15:48
  Invariably, mate, in the early years of what is a very hard business that you're now in, trying to make ends meet, et cetera, that often means...
• 15:56
  You're scraping money together, driving crappy cars.
• 16:00
  What were some of the cars in the early days that you drove?
• 16:04
  Maybe like the Cortina you regretted driving.
• 16:07
  I have a go at it.
• 16:08
  I think it's pride that makes me have a go at it.
• 16:10
  By the time, I loved it.
• 16:11
  It was a set of wheels.
• 16:13
  Plus, I've mentioned this before, but it did.
• 16:16
  I could put a mattress in the back.
• 16:18
  As we know, and I wrote it, and there's a book called It Happened in a Hole, and I wrote in there that back in the day when we were doing those things that...
• 16:25
  And this is not to cover up the embarrassment of having cars, but when we were 18, we all remember that moment, when you, you know, in my day, I had to be 18 to get your licence to be both known.
• 16:33
  You know, once you got it, they weren't just a car then, especially I had mates with panel vans.
• 16:37
  So we would, you know, go down the surf coast of Victoria and, because it's different now, cars, you know, they rely, I've written about this too, but, you know, the reliability of cars has lost their personality, you know.
• 16:47
  The fact you had to hold your tongue out to your left to get the car to start and,
• 16:51
  We'd all do a dashboard dance.
• 16:52
  It was an ad lib I did in the film Oddball.
• 16:54
  I did a film called Oddball, which was about these dogs that save these penguins.
• 16:58
  In one of the takes, the car wouldn't start, the truck wouldn't start.
• 17:02
  They had this old sort of F-150.
• 17:04
  It actually had a Cummins diesel motor in it.
• 17:06
  But this thing, the starter motor, had to work its ass off to get this thing churned over, and it wouldn't go, the starter motor.
• 17:13
  And I said, put your tongue out to the left to the young girl that's in the passenger seat and tried it again.
• 17:19
  Yeah, to no avail.
• 17:20
  I said, no, go to the right.
• 17:22
  No, it wouldn't start.
• 17:23
  And it ended up in the film.
• 17:24
  But this happened.
• 17:25
  This happened.
• 17:25
  It was an ad lib.
• 17:27
  And I said, poke your tongue out forward.
• 17:29
  And I said, a little bit further.
• 17:30
  Boom.
• 17:31
  She fired.
• 17:31
  And I said, there you go.
• 17:32
  Out and forwards the way she starts.
• 17:34
  Yeah.
• 17:34
  And they kept it in the movie.
• 17:36
  And when they yelled car, they were all laughing.
• 17:38
  What the hell was that?
• 17:39
  I love that, mate.
• 17:40
  And she said, what was that thing about the tongue?
• 17:43
  And I said, well, as an old expression, when the car wouldn't start, someone would say, you're not holding your tongue right.
• 17:48
  Because as you know, you go, oh, your tongue.
• 17:50
  You're like when you're thinking.
• 17:50
  A lot of guys, when they're trying to concentrate or screw something in, it's a little bit hard to screw in.
• 17:54
  Your tongue comes out.
• 17:55
  I don't know why.
• 17:56
  But, uh...
• 17:57
  But that, you know, it's the reliability of cars, as I say, that I think have lost their personality.
• 18:01
  You know, they all had names.
• 18:03
  One of our cars didn't start the other day.
• 18:04
  My kids couldn't believe it.
• 18:05
  They could not believe.
• 18:07
  Because it just doesn't happen now.
• 18:09
  No.
• 18:10
  And so going back to the thing about cars, you know, I had a Mazda 303 and, you know, the Cortina.
• 18:16
  you know, answer your question, but they were, they got us to a location.
• 18:20
  So they weren't just transport, they were like a nightclub because everyone would get in and someone would go, this is the, I've made up a tape, I've made a tape for the trip.
• 18:28
  So it became, then became a venue, it became transport, it became a nightclub.
• 18:32
  And then, you know, let's be honest, there were your mates in the back that put an esky on the backseat, and for them it became a bar on wheels.
• 18:37
  And then we'd get to the beach and then my mates would back up.
• 18:40
  And it was the one time that Ford or Holden, Valiant, didn't matter.
• 18:45
  If it was a panel van, they could all back up and hold hands.
• 18:48
  They were allowed to be at that party together.
• 18:50
  You know, it wasn't like rivaling bike gangs.
• 18:52
  I mean, they could definitely be backed up to the same fire pit.
• 18:55
  And at that point, they became the venue.
• 18:56
  Like I say, they became the disco system.
• 18:59
  They became the hotel or motel.
• 19:00
  You know, there'd be mates pulling a barbecue at the back of one.
• 19:03
  It became the restaurant.
• 19:05
  Like, it was an occasion.
• 19:07
  So that was the thing I loved about Denny's.
• 19:09
  It's funny, when I look back on it now as a car lover, you know, I'm embarrassed to say I had a Mazda 303, but I'd come back from Europe.
• 19:15
  I had no money and $35,000 in debt.
• 19:18
  And my mate's sister had this car that she was going to let go of for $800.
• 19:24
  Well, I had $750, and a mate owed me $50 from before I'd left to go overseas the year before.
• 19:30
  I ran and said, you got that $50?
• 19:32
  He said, I got $45.
• 19:33
  I said, I'll take it.
• 19:35
  And then went around and I found another few coins in my top drawer, and I paid $800 cash, and I was mobile again.
• 19:42
  But that's what I loved about back then was...
• 19:44
  No one had the money.
• 19:46
  I came from the western suburbs and we always joked we were so poor we couldn't even afford to pay attention.
• 19:52
  In fact, my old man had us convinced at one point we were sponsored by a family in Peru.
• 19:57
  So we had no money.
• 19:59
  But if you could get in a car, if you had a car, if you had a...
• 20:02
  If you had three pedals in front of you and a wheel in your hands, you were kicking goals, you know.
• 20:06
  It was the keys, pardon the pun, to an experience.
• 20:09
  And there are things for people at your age and mine that are still like filming your mind, those experiences, those great experiences growing up.
• 20:17
  Let's go to Top Gear.
• 20:18
  You mentioned before working with Steve Bazzardi.
• 20:20
  You guys were nuts.
• 20:22
  You nearly got eaten by lions in the world's smallest car for that story in the UK.
• 20:27
  What was your...
• 20:29
  first reaction when they pitch that to you and give us some more details on the yard?
• 20:33
  Well, it all sounded okay, but it's that thing where when you're in the hands of supposed experts or professionals, you're supposed to feel calm.
• 20:43
  I mean, which still weirds me out.
• 20:45
  When you go to the show, when you go to the ECA or Royal Melbourne show or whatever your annual big fair is...
• 20:51
  We all get on those roller coasters, or we get on the, you know, whatever it may be, the Mad Mouse or whatever the ride is, you know what I mean, the pirate ship, and you just kind of go, oh, well, they know what they're doing, which is ironic, because you're looking at some guy stoned out of his mind, covered in tattoos with a pack of Winnie Blues shoved up under his sleeve, going, yeah, no, he's done all the safety checks on this.
• 21:09
  Bullshit, he has.
• 21:10
  But we kind of just get there and go, well, they wouldn't, you know, it wouldn't be open if it wasn't Ryan.
• 21:14
  Well, this was an open-range zoo, and there was this guy that was...
• 21:20
  that kind of was the guy we had to deal with.
• 21:21
  And I think he was the manager.
• 21:23
  He ran the zoo.
• 21:25
  And I still remember the thing that kind of lulled us into this false sense of security was he had that voice, that English voice, and it's that voice that narrated every documentary on the ABC through the 50s, 60s and 70s, whether it was on radio or TV or whatever.
• 21:40
  And it was that 1947, a year to remember, this man had this voice.
• 21:46
  He had us convinced the lions are fine.
• 21:49
  And he kept telling us stories about, I have shot lions and hunted in Africa.
• 21:54
  And the more I heard his voice, I'm like, well, this guy's on top of everything.
• 21:57
  He had us convince.
• 21:58
  He shakes hands with lions, dines with them, winds with them.
• 22:00
  Anyway, he didn't.
• 22:03
  So we're going to go in there and we've got to take these cars to the lion enclosure.
• 22:07
  Here's the thing.
• 22:08
  We went through in normal cars.
• 22:11
  Right?
• 22:12
  Petrol, you know, naturally aspirated cars, smell like fuel, they're old things, and the lines took no interest at all.
• 22:20
  None.
• 22:21
  Zero.
• 22:22
  In fact, they actually hung some raw meat off my car.
• 22:26
  I'll tell you, the producers hung some meat and threw some blood on the outside of my car to make sure they'd get some attention.
• 22:32
  And a few came over and ate a bit of meat, but they really didn't care.
• 22:35
  Then we'd come out of that thing, and that's when the Peel 50s turned up.
• 22:41
  Smallest car in the world.
• 22:42
  Now, the original ones were made of steel.
• 22:44
  These things were fibreglass.
• 22:45
  They had Perspex windows, no locks on the doors.
• 22:48
  And the seat is just off the ground by a few inches.
• 22:52
  It's like if you hacked the legs off a plastic school chair and then left two inches of legs, that's what you're sitting on.
• 23:00
  So I'm all bent over like a dog trying to root a cricket ball just to get in the thing.
• 23:04
  And then in we go.
• 23:06
  Now, these were electric.
• 23:07
  They didn't smell of fuel.
• 23:08
  They were small.
• 23:09
  There was three of them.
• 23:10
  They were identical in size and red in colour.
• 23:13
  So we, at that point, learnt that the lions thought it was three predators or something on a project.
• 23:20
  It just, the game changed instantly.
• 23:23
  And I remember saying at the start to this man, I think his name was Dale, and I said, so is there any guns or anything here if something goes wrong?
• 23:30
  And he said, we won't be shooting any of the staff here.
• 23:33
  And I went, oh, my God, he thinks the lions are on staff.
• 23:35
  But I got his point.
• 23:36
  He was right.
• 23:37
  We're the visitors.
• 23:38
  The lions work here.
• 23:39
  So, no.
• 23:40
  So he said, but I've got a wooden stick.
• 23:42
  And I remember thinking, well, God, where's he going to shove that?
• 23:44
  I think, God, he'd have to get pretty close to make that stop a lion from eating a human.
• 23:48
  And even then, they may not be interested.
• 23:50
  But at that point, the lions took great interest.
• 23:52
  And, look, it was kind of funny.
• 23:56
  It was scary, but it was funny.
• 23:58
  We then went into the orangutan, the shimp enclosure.
• 24:02
  They were the baboons.
• 24:04
  And they started eating bits off the car.
• 24:05
  And one of them, I famously told a story, which is the truth.
• 24:09
  There was one at my left window that put its hand on the door handle.
• 24:13
  They don't have locks on them.
• 24:14
  And this thing looked angry, right?
• 24:16
  And it was really curious.
• 24:17
  So I had to hold the door handle on the inside, but not look down at the handle, because they're smart.
• 24:22
  It would have triggered them onto something.
• 24:24
  I had one on the bonnet of this car with its arse.
• 24:28
  And I don't know if you've seen them.
• 24:29
  I've always described it as it looks like Burt Newton eating a jam donut, right?
• 24:33
  Pressed up against the window, giving me its critique.
• 24:36
  So it's obviously seen some of my earlier work and didn't like it.
• 24:39
  And then there was one out my right window, and I've always had to be careful about how I describe this because children could be listening, but the one out my right window liked me a lot and had a visual display of how much he liked me and was busy with it.
• 24:54
  And I'm like, if this thing on my left-hand side gets this door open, I'm in trouble.
• 24:59
  Because the one on the right's got an idea.
• 25:00
  The one on the left wants to fight me.
• 25:02
  And I don't know what the one on the front window wants to do, but I don't want to be a part of it.
• 25:06
  So we escaped that.
• 25:07
  And then we went in with the rhinos.
• 25:09
  I don't know if he's spoken to Piz, but Steve Pizzardi nearly died that day.
• 25:12
  And there was nothing anyone could do about it.
• 25:14
  The rhinos was far more terrifying than lions because we spooked a mother because she had young.
• 25:19
  And that thing stood in front of us and they were swearing at that point.
• 25:23
  This guy who was like, it's all fine, he started screaming in the two ways, saying, don't effing move.
• 25:29
  And there's nothing they could do.
• 25:31
  They couldn't bring cars in between us.
• 25:32
  And so we had to sit in these plastic buckets with a Perspex window.
• 25:37
  No, why?
• 25:38
  and a remote-controlled car motor underneath us, of which the batteries were running low at this point because we'd been doing the whole safari thing.
• 25:44
  And we had to sit there and just wait to see whether the rhino decided she was going to kill us or not.
• 25:49
  And Piz was in the firing line.
• 25:50
  She was going to come through the light of us.
• 25:52
  So that was, without a doubt, the scariest thing I've ever done in my life, ever.
• 25:56
  And I've had cars, you know, lose traction around corners when I've had a young head on young shoulders in a quick car and all that sort of stuff.
• 26:01
  Nothing scared me more than those rhinos.
• 26:04
  The top gear guys, I've gone on to the Grand Tour now, I know, but Clarkson, Hammond and May, I asked Steve about this in an earlier episode.
• 26:11
  They are proper enthusiasts, mate, in every sense of the word.
• 26:15
  They are.
• 26:16
  And what happens on camera, well, I'll explain it this way.
• 26:18
  What happens off camera with them is exactly what happens on camera, which is they talk about cars.
• 26:22
  I'm not saying they live their life every minute of it talking about cars.
• 26:25
  You can go out to dinner and a car won't get mentioned.
• 26:28
  But if a car comes up in conversation, they will genuinely have an opinion.
• 26:32
  And they may agree or they may differ.
• 26:34
  And once they differ, the comedy begins.
• 26:36
  But it's not put on.
• 26:38
  As soon as they say, blah, blah, blah, Range Rover or something, Richard will go, oh, here we go.
• 26:43
  And that just means Jeremy's about to talk about how great it is, even though the reliability is not that great.
• 26:47
  And on they go.
• 26:48
  And it does.
• 26:49
  It turns into, it's an opinion piece, but it's a comedy piece.
• 26:53
  But they are passionate.
• 26:54
  But it's three mates wanting to dig at each other.
• 26:56
  But it's backed with fact and knowledge.
• 26:58
  So it is the perfect recipe.
• 27:01
  And it's pretty hard to replicate because they're not racing drivers.
• 27:05
  And they'll tell you, they're journalists.
• 27:07
  They're motoring enthusiasts and journalists that aren't saying they're racing drivers.
• 27:12
  And that they have a love of cars and they love the art of it, but they come from three completely different angles.
• 27:19
  They really do, you know.
• 27:21
  And James is a motorbike guy.
• 27:23
  Jeremy hates them.
• 27:24
  Like, hates them.
• 27:25
  Like, they're different, but they're the same.
• 27:27
  You know what I mean?
• 27:27
  It's sweet and sour, but it's, you know.
• 27:29
  Great combo, and it works, mate.
• 27:31
  Well, look, it works every time, and it's... And, look, I now know them very well.
• 27:35
  I think it's fair enough I can call them mates.
• 27:36
  I mean, my book called Rev Head, My Life as a Motoring Tragic, you know, he wrote the comment on the front of the book for me, you know, and he's... You know, you can imagine he gets asked a million times by people to do that and says no to all of them.
• 27:49
  He's been a great mate to me, and he said, of course, mate, and provided the quote for the front of my book, which says, if you read one book this year, it better be one of mine, but if you read two, maybe read Shane's.
• 27:59
  That's right.
• 28:02
  You drove here for this catch-up today in something a little special.
• 28:06
  You treated yourself very recently.
• 28:08
  Tell me about the new ute.
• 28:10
  So, Noisy Q, that's her rego, and that's what the HQ's called.
• 28:15
  So, yeah, I've got a...
• 28:16
  It's a HQ ute.
• 28:18
  It's got the Statesman front end.
• 28:21
  It was built by a guy called Luke up in Cairns.
• 28:24
  He's a mechanic.
• 28:25
  I don't know him, but I just saw it online.
• 28:26
  And I'm still the guy that goes to a servo and grabs magazines just for cars that are for sale.
• 28:32
  Anything, I still buy them.
• 28:33
  I think the only reason they're still in print is because of me.
• 28:37
  I'm aware there's a thing called the internet.
• 28:40
  And I do.
• 28:40
  I look through car sales and all that sort of thing.
• 28:42
  I just browse them.
• 28:43
  second hand cars for sale i just like it it's my thing you know and a lot a lot of car guys do you know just to see what stuff's fetching and what's out there and you know i kind of i like getting a sense of when stuff becomes less available you know you sort of watch price we've all been there and watch the you know ho's and they go up in value and it's kind of i don't know it's like some people watch the stock market i watch cars you know
• 29:05
  And the value of them.
• 29:07
  And anyway, this ute turned up and I had no thought.
• 29:10
  I mean, I've already got two utes on my farm.
• 29:12
  I don't need a ute.
• 29:14
  I've got a Land Cruiser and a Old Rodeo on the farm and a four-wheel bike which has a ute on the back.
• 29:18
  And, you know, Polaris six-seater with a ute on the back.
• 29:21
  So I don't need a ute.
• 29:23
  I've got three trailers, for Christ's sake.
• 29:24
  So it looks beautiful, mate.
• 29:26
  White, 308.
• 29:27
  Yeah.
• 29:28
  What's been done to it?
• 29:29
  So he spent 20 years getting it to the way he wanted it.
• 29:32
  And he was a Holden purist, this guy.
• 29:34
  And he said he wanted to build a HQ ute the way that he thought HSV would have done it if they were around in the day.
• 29:44
  And I reckon he's got it pretty well right.
• 29:45
  He's got a black pinstripe decal down the side that he kind of come up with himself, and it looks great.
• 29:50
  It's a VT308, so he's a purist.
• 29:53
  So it's the last of the GM motors.
• 29:55
  So he's got a V2 308.
• 29:56
  It's got a BM Turbo 400 shifter in it, which is, you know, built to code with, I think it's sort of 9 or 950 horsepower.
• 30:03
  So I've got one of those, and that does its job pretty nicely.
• 30:05
  He took injection off it and put Carby back on it because he wanted to, he's a bit of a purist.
• 30:11
  Hollies, what are they?
• 30:13
  No, it's not Hollies, because it's just been swapped over, and now you've got me this.
• 30:18
  Sorry.
• 30:19
  Now you've got me, because he's just, he swapped them over, and I think it had Hollies on it.
• 30:22
  Weathers?
• 30:23
  No No No He put the Hollies on it now So God I have to think then Because it's been swapped And come back It's got a true track system To stop axle tramp Because the thing's Ready to drag You know It's got the big Oversized taco on them
• 30:38
  on the floor there, ready to shift it to 6.8 in first gear.
• 30:42
  So does that mean that Shane Jacobson turns up, knocks at the door, you know, hello, I'm here to look at your car?
• 30:47
  Or did you go?
• 30:49
  You said someone, it was in Cairns, you said.
• 30:50
  It was in Cairns.
• 30:51
  No, we did a lot.
• 30:51
  Believe it or not, the photos look great in the photos, and it sounds stupid, but I kind of trust the guy.
• 30:55
  We had a lot of chats, and he knew the car back to front.
• 30:58
  I mean, every bolt, every nut.
• 31:00
  I reckon it's pretty hard to fake that stuff.
• 31:02
  I mean, you know, it's just the...
• 31:03
  He knew who I was.
• 31:04
  I didn't say, I'm Shane Jacobson.
• 31:06
  I said, I'm Shane, am I?
• 31:07
  It was about two minutes into it.
• 31:08
  He said, you're Shane Jacobson, I am.
• 31:10
  He said, I know that voice anyway.
• 31:12
  We spoke a fair bit about it.
• 31:14
  And again, I don't think... And he's a car enthusiast and a whole nut.
• 31:19
  And the detail he had was unbelievable.
• 31:22
  And it was a reluctant sale for him.
• 31:23
  He'd been through a breakup and stuff, and he had to sort some stuff out and know where to store it.
• 31:27
  And I think he needed the money.
• 31:29
  So...
• 31:30
  I was the receiver of bad news and I had great news as a result.
• 31:35
  But yeah, look, it's Mickey Thompson's on the back end of it and centerline welds that have been powder coated black and she's just a piece of art.
• 31:42
  I love it.
• 31:44
  She makes a bit of noise, custom 3-inch stainless steel 20 exhausts that drop out behind the back wheels.
• 31:50
  Yeah, she's a good thing.
• 31:51
  Although he tells me I can't call it a girl, it's he.
• 31:54
  He keeps saying you cannot say she's a good thing.
• 31:57
  He's a good thing.
• 31:57
  So I've got to call it a boy.
• 32:01
  This is Greg Rust and you're listening to Rusty's Garage.
• 32:04
  In this series, I speak to the most passionate automotive designers, collectors, riders and drivers I know.
• 32:11
  Matt Hall is not a driver.
• 32:13
  He's not a rider.
• 32:14
  He's not a designer either.
• 32:16
  In fact...
• 32:17
  He's not even living his life going flat out on terra firma.
• 32:19
  He prefers the skies.
• 32:21
  There was one time I was running on the deck in an exercise in an F-15 and I was doing about 750 knots at 100 foot off the ground.
• 32:29
  So we're looking at around about 1,300 kilometres an hour, about 100 feet in the middle of the desert, like near Area 51.
• 32:36
  And my fuel flow at the time was 110,000 pounds of fuel per engine.
• 32:42
  So 220,000 pounds of fuel an hour going out the back end.
• 32:46
  So, yeah, do the maths on that.
• 32:48
  Listen to the full episode with former Top Gun and now Red Bull air racer Matt Hall here on Rusty's Garage.
• 33:02
  Knock.
• 33:02
  Also referred to as detonation.
• 33:04
  This happens when leftover fuel air mixture in an engine's combustion chamber randomly explodes sometime after the spark plug is fired.
• 33:12
  Well, that's the scariest thing I've ever heard of.
• 33:15
  The ute is one part of a Holden collection that you are building, shall we say.
• 33:21
  Let's talk the H first, because I know you have a bit of a soft spot for that car.
• 33:27
  One of my best mates, Mum, had one when we were growing up.
• 33:30
  Didn't have spats like yours or the fender skirts over the rear tyres.
• 33:35
  Tell us more about it.
• 33:36
  Manual, hydromatic, what is it?
• 33:38
  So when I got it, it was literally the daily drive of an oldish lady.
• 33:43
  Her husband said it's just time to get her in a car with airbags, you know, just for safety.
• 33:47
  And she said, you know, I had her be nice and so would an air conditioner.
• 33:50
  I'm like, yeah, well, I have those in cars now.
• 33:52
  So when I got it, it had an Aussie four-speed on the floor.
• 33:55
  It's the 179 Special.
• 33:56
  It had the spats on it, the Venetians in the back window.
• 33:59
  Paint job needed a bit of work, but she was straight.
• 34:02
  I'm not the greatest at building a car and, you know, I've got mates who do that.
• 34:06
  So I've got a mate who does hot rod work and he only does steel work.
• 34:08
  He doesn't do fiberglass on hot rods, which I have no problem if people do that.
• 34:11
  But, you know, he doesn't deal with bog.
• 34:13
  He just deals with cars, so to speak.
• 34:15
  And so I took him along and he crawled under it and he got up and he said, well, if you don't buy it, I will.
• 34:20
  And that was what he said.
• 34:20
  And I went, OK, well, I'm definitely buying this thing.
• 34:22
  Anyway, so it had an Aussie force bed on the floor.
• 34:25
  It's the 179 Special, but it's got the 186 red motor in it.
• 34:29
  Nothing done to it, but it's actually still got the Peashooter exhaust, and it still does to this very day.
• 34:34
  And I always thought I'd do it up, but I got this thing and it was so rigid.
• 34:39
  It's been dropped an inch, which looks great.
• 34:41
  So what I've done is I've got it back in the tree, straight in the tree without synchrosing the first and all that, just to get it back to original.
• 34:47
  I had to get the front seat right upholstered so it's bench in the front.
• 34:51
  And I've just kept her all original.
• 34:53
  She still drums all round.
• 34:55
  Yeah, as I say, four idiots in a band room, four drummers all round.
• 34:59
  And...
• 35:00
  Yeah, so I've got to make a phone call to the streets ahead to say I'm coming, let me know if the light looks red or green because I'll have to put the brakes on now.
• 35:07
  But that's the joy of it.
• 35:09
  I've got to be careful because there's a mountain behind us as we can both see out the restaurant window here.
• 35:15
  And I've driven it over there and coming down after a while, you're on the brakes the whole way, and I'm like, I wonder how much time I've got left before the brakes go, and we're done.
• 35:24
  I wonder if that moment is when I get to the flat down the bottom.
• 35:26
  So I do drive around the mountain up here with it, not over it too much, but I might have to one day consider putting...
• 35:32
  some diss on the front, but I bet I don't.
• 35:35
  In addition to the ute and the EH is a Kingswood.
• 35:40
  We had one like yours in the family, very similar, in fact, to the one that you and Hoag's had in Charlie and Boots.
• 35:46
  My grandfather, Stanley Cecil Percival, owned it.
• 35:52
  Look at that.
• 35:53
  It was kind of Granny Smith apple.
• 35:55
  I'm not actually sure of the Holden colour.
• 35:56
  It might have been...
• 35:58
  Lena Mint or something, I can't remember what the thing is, but yours, if I'm not wrong, actually had a starring role in the movie.
• 36:04
  Was it the same car?
• 36:05
  Yeah, it is.
• 36:06
  So, me and Paul Hogan did a film called Charlie and Boots.
• 36:11
  And me and Paul are still mates.
• 36:12
  We've done a few...
• 36:13
  He's just done another film with me recently.
• 36:15
  So, at the end of the film, it took three...
• 36:17
  So, it's a HJ Kingswood, 6-cylinder, 202 auto, and it took three cars to make the film.
• 36:25
  So, we had...
• 36:26
  The one that I've got, it's the second unit car.
• 36:29
  We both used it.
• 36:30
  Me and Paul definitely drove in it.
• 36:32
  But there's one that has no motor, no wheels, nothing.
• 36:36
  It's bolted to a low rider truck.
• 36:38
  And when they've got to do shots of us inside the car talking, they've got to have cameras on the window and lights.
• 36:42
  So that's actually strapped to a low loader or bolted to a low loader.
• 36:46
  And you'll see that driving down a road with crew and lighting and stuff all over.
• 36:49
  It's like a city on the back of a truck.
• 36:51
  So that one was just a shell.
• 36:53
  But then there was two cars to make the film.
• 36:55
  They'd use one for, if they're doing helicopter shots, they might have that being driven down a freeway from a helicopter following that.
• 37:01
  And then they might, at the same time, there'll be a second camera filming that while me and Paul are pulling up on the side of roads to do another scene.
• 37:07
  So there was three, two cars and a body.
• 37:10
  And this one, the one that I took was the straightest, that was the neatest out of them.
• 37:14
  And oddly, what they have to do is, it sounds mad, but it's what they have to do.
• 37:19
  They've got continuities of thing in film.
• 37:21
  Everything has to look the same.
• 37:23
  If there was a scratch or a scuff on one car,
• 37:26
  And there wasn't that on the other one.
• 37:27
  They had to scratch that car or scuff that to look like the other one.
• 37:31
  So the one I've got was the one that actually hadn't had the damage to it, but they had to kind of fake it a bit and scuff the paintwork and dull it a bit for authenticity, yeah, to make them match, to make them a set of twins, you know.
• 37:43
  So I took the straightest one.
• 37:44
  Now, the thing was, I love HQs.
• 37:47
  HJ was never, you know, WBs, there's a whole bunch.
• 37:50
  There's a few that I love and a few like EJ I don't like, EH I love.
• 37:54
  H.J.
• 37:54
  's alright.
• 37:55
  H.Q.
• 37:56
  I love.
• 37:57
  You know, horses for courses.
• 37:58
  But this thing was so straight.
• 38:00
  And I said to the producers and the directors at the time, they're all mates of mine, and I said, what are you going to do with these?
• 38:05
  And they said, I don't know, I'm going to sell them at the end.
• 38:07
  I went, God, you know what?
• 38:08
  Some kid's going to buy this thing.
• 38:10
  And it's rigid edge.
• 38:12
  They're going to drop a V8 and they're going to, you know, give it facial tattoos and lipstick or give it a short skirt and they're going to put it around a treat.
• 38:20
  I said, it's going to kill me because, God, this thing's straight.
• 38:23
  And...
• 38:23
  They said, well, do you want it?
• 38:25
  And I said, yes.
• 38:27
  Yes, rather than have this thing destroyed, I'm going to take it.
• 38:31
  And now, of course, I love it.
• 38:32
  So I had the whole thing restored.
• 38:34
  In the film, we had Commodore bucket seeds in the front.
• 38:37
  I ripped it out and put it back to bench, got the carbons redone and got it all repainted.
• 38:42
  Phil Monday, who people from the V8 supercar world would know, Phil had the whole thing resprayed for me.
• 38:47
  Phil actually did the EH and did the HJ for me.
• 38:52
  And yeah, that now lives at the whole museum in Echuca.
• 38:56
  which Bill used to run that place.
• 38:58
  It's been sold.
• 38:58
  There's a couple of brothers that own the Holden Museum in Echuga now, which is a great place whether you're a Holden fan or whether you're just a car lover.
• 39:05
  Either way, it's worth a visit.
• 39:07
  But in the film Charlie and Boots, we actually visit the Holden Museum in the film.
• 39:11
  And just one day I just thought, you know, it's too good a story not to do this.
• 39:15
  I rang the Holden Museum and said, look...
• 39:17
  Shane Jacobson, and I think he thought I was joking at the start, and he said, oh, actually, it is really you.
• 39:22
  And I said, yeah, and I said, I remember you there, Bill.
• 39:23
  He said, yeah, and I said, the Kingswood that we drove in the film, I own that now, I've had it restored.
• 39:29
  Would you like it to be in the museum?
• 39:31
  He said, you're kidding me.
• 39:32
  He said, I'd love it.
• 39:33
  And it's lived there for, oh, to be four years now, and it's still there today.
• 39:36
  Was it nice to do a movie that kind of blended a road trip, working with a legend together,
• 39:43
  And it kind of brought it all together in some respects.
• 39:45
  Well, the thing is, I've said at one point, there's a story I always tell, one of my favourite moments filming it.
• 39:51
  We were in Echuca, again, ironically, where the car now lives.
• 39:55
  Well, it is temporarily housed, of course, it'll come home at some point.
• 39:59
  We were driving down, my most Australian moment in my life, which goes to answering your question, like, it is fantastic.
• 40:05
  It's a road trip movie and me and Paul Hogan, you know, in Kingswood, it's going all right, and travelling out back in Australia.
• 40:11
  Yeah.
• 40:12
  We were going through Echuca.
• 40:13
  I'm in the driver's seat.
• 40:14
  We're in the Kingswood.
• 40:15
  Paul Hogan's in the passenger seat.
• 40:17
  And we have to do one voila shot before the sun goes down.
• 40:20
  We're losing light.
• 40:21
  And I had to drive the camera crew on a really long lens.
• 40:25
  Normally you're surrounded by the cameras and crew and it's pretty obvious there's a film going on.
• 40:28
  But for this one shot, they needed us driving down the main drag of Echuca.
• 40:33
  And on this really long lens.
• 40:34
  So when we take off away from the safety, if you will, of the camera crew, we're actually just out on a road, and they want us to go right down to the other main thing and do a U-turn.
• 40:43
  So we depart the film crew, and there's a two-way radio on the passengers in between me and Paul.
• 40:49
  So we drive off.
• 40:50
  There's only, at that point, there's only a couple of sets of lights in the chica, I think, and we copped one of them.
• 40:55
  So we're sitting in a set of lights, no camera crew around us, with me, as I said, in the driver's seat, and Paul in the passenger seat, and this old lady.
• 41:03
  And I tell the story the same every time, totally a few times, because I'll never forget it.
• 41:08
  And me and Paul both lament the same thing.
• 41:10
  This old couple pull up in a car beside us, right?
• 41:13
  We're in a left-hand lane.
• 41:13
  They're in the right-hand lane.
• 41:14
  They pull up beside us.
• 41:15
  The old lady sort of looks across and does what people do in the country, which is a bit of a nod, just, there you go, you know.
• 41:21
  A bit of a nod, and then she looks back forward again, and then her brain and her eyes have a little chat about what they just saw.
• 41:27
  LAUGHTER
• 41:28
  And then she slowly turns around and looks back at us again.
• 41:31
  And then while she's looking at us, we nod again.
• 41:35
  And I don't know what her name is, but I know, I still remember her husband's name was Doug, because while looking at us, she went, Doug, Doug?
• 41:43
  And he yelled at, what?
• 41:46
  She said, bloody Kenny and Crocodile Dundee are in the bloody car next to us.
• 41:51
  It was just my favourite moment.
• 41:54
  Me and Paul still laugh about it because then the lights turn green and as that's happening, the two-way radio sparks up.
• 42:01
  The director's saying, come on, guys, get down here.
• 42:03
  We're running out of sunlight here.
• 42:04
  We need this shot, you know.
• 42:05
  So we take off before old Dougie gets to spot us, you know.
• 42:08
  We still love the fact that at some point, you know, he would have thought she was mad in saying that there was, you know, Kenny and...
• 42:16
  Paul Hogan, Crocodile Dundee, in a Kingswood in the main street of Echuca.
• 42:20
  Because no one knew they were there.
• 42:22
  So he would have thought she'd lost, you know, Maud I assume her name would have been.
• 42:26
  Margaret's lost her mind.
• 42:27
  But, you know, eight months later when it came out of the pictures, she would have said, I bloody told you that was an emin.
• 42:31
  So, you know, of all the things, to go back to your question that sparked that, it was fantastic, a road trip movie with me and Paul in a Kingswood.
• 42:40
  I would do that if it wasn't for kids.
• 42:43
  If a mate said to me, what do you say we go from the bottom of Australia to the top in an old Kingswood, I'd go, shit here.
• 42:49
  Let alone throw Paul Hogan in the mix.
• 42:51
  So I would have done that for a holiday, let alone a jog, you know.
• 42:54
  You mentioned Kenny there a moment ago in the answer.
• 42:56
  You've had a stellar career, mate, and I know that there are many more great chapters still to come.
• 43:02
  But how pivotal, when you look at life now for Shane Jacobson and the ability to...
• 43:08
  indulge yourself with a couple of good cars and bikes and things like that.
• 43:11
  How pivotal is Kenny in all of that?
• 43:15
  Instrumental.
• 43:16
  It's the wheel nuts, the tires, the wheels don't stay on, it's the motor, it's the gearbox of my career, it's the windscreen, it's the roadworthy, it's the air in the tires, it's the fuel in the lines.
• 43:27
  It's...
• 43:28
  It's all of it because it's what opened the door.
• 43:32
  Look at this, it's hailing outside.
• 43:34
  Here we are having a chat as we stand here.
• 43:36
  Hailstones swamping us.
• 43:38
  Look at this.
• 43:39
  Welcome to the hills.
• 43:40
  But, yeah, look, without it, I wouldn't have a career.
• 43:43
  Well, I'd have a career, of course, of some sort.
• 43:46
  And it would be in entertainment because I was doing comedy and doing voiceovers and doing radio and acting.
• 43:52
  I was in TV.
• 43:53
  I mean, we could go back.
• 43:54
  You can go back and watch TV commercials where people will go, oh, that was you.
• 43:59
  So I was in the game.
• 43:59
  But, I mean, it catapulted my career and it gave me the full-time job of acting.
• 44:05
  Acting, me and Steve Pizzati, again, as you know, are a great mate of both of ours.
• 44:10
  The amount of times we've compared acting, I can't help but compare it to being a race driver.
• 44:16
  that it doesn't matter if you're good.
• 44:19
  There's a whole lot of luck and opportunity.
• 44:21
  A whole lot of ducks have to be in a row to make it work.
• 44:24
  And on any given day, you can get pipped.
• 44:26
  You can get pipped at a corner, or wiped out the corner before.
• 44:30
  And in acting, you're gonna have someone walk in, and believe it or not, you may be perfect for the role, but the director just wanted brown eyes.
• 44:35
  Had a vision in their eyes of brown eyes, and I got blue, so I'm out.
• 44:38
  And it doesn't, sometimes it's actually not so much about your ability, it's about how you go on the day.
• 44:43
  An audition,
• 44:45
  I mean, seriously, that's like coming off the start line, you know.
• 44:48
  You've got a great launch.
• 44:50
  I mean, you know, the throttle position, the difference between a good and a bad take-off on a throttle.
• 44:54
  I mean, what is it?
• 44:55
  Is it a mil?
• 44:56
  Have they measured it?
• 44:56
  Yeah.
• 44:57
  I mean, it's just so many things.
• 44:58
  It's tired temperatures, all that kind of stuff.
• 45:00
  And you're in control of all that.
• 45:01
  You're supposed to be the master of all that.
• 45:03
  But man, sometimes stuff can get you distracted, you know what I mean?
• 45:06
  And that's what happens in an audition, you know.
• 45:08
  The day before, you can be fantastic.
• 45:10
  Like, the day after,
• 45:12
  All of a sudden you're off pitch and you make one small mistake and all of a sudden that's on your mind.
• 45:16
  And the same with acting.
• 45:18
  You do one line battle, you don't think you were convincing in one thing and you're starting to think about that.
• 45:22
  So that's like setting yourself up.
• 45:23
  You get through a corner and you've missed the apex.
• 45:26
  Well, as we know, it doesn't mean you've missed the next apex, but if you spend too long banging on about that in your head, you will miss the next apex.
• 45:31
  And acting is kind of like that.
• 45:34
  And they're so different but so similar.
• 45:37
  So Kenny, you know, I got put in a great car.
• 45:41
  And we were surrounded by a fantastic crew.
• 45:44
  And people enjoyed it, you know.
• 45:46
  So they're the things.
• 45:48
  We got it made, and that can be impossible in this country.
• 45:50
  It was an Australian film.
• 45:53
  And, you know, quite often they're not well supported, and people loved it.
• 45:55
  That was a dream come true.
• 45:57
  So not only is it the thing that launched my career, you know, because doors that used to slam in my face were then held open, you know.
• 46:04
  And so that was amazing.
• 46:06
  But not only that, it's the most special thing.
• 46:08
  Everyone says, what's the favourite thing you've ever done?
• 46:10
  And me and my brother and my family will always say, Kenny, a lot of actors go, oh, you know, I'm sick of talking about that.
• 46:14
  We'll never be sick of it because we owe it everything, you know.
• 46:17
  And we prayed, hoped, you know, whatever it is, to the gods or to Russell Crowe or whoever it is that runs this planet that people would enjoy it.
• 46:25
  And they did.
• 46:25
  So for that, we'll never forget it, you know.
• 46:27
  Your first car was a Ford.
• 46:29
  We covered that earlier.
• 46:30
  You've driven Fords in movies.
• 46:31
  You mentioned the, I think it was an F-150 tabletop in Oddball and the troubles that you had with that.
• 46:36
  But you have a clear affinity for Holdens.
• 46:40
  What's changed in Australia in recent time?
• 46:43
  But there was this period when you and I were growing up whether you were a Holden family or a Holden guy or a Ford guy.
• 46:50
  What is Shane Jacobson, and am I putting you on the spot by asking you to answer that?
• 46:54
  Yeah, no, look, I'm absolutely holding.
• 46:56
  But I'm a car lover too, and it's, you know, you can barrack for your own football team, but it doesn't mean you don't recognise other great players.
• 47:04
  Do you know what I mean?
• 47:05
  And, you know, I did the launch of the, when Mustang got launched in Australia, I did the, at the same time, we did a universal launch of them, because it's a Mustang.
• 47:14
  I mean, it's a Mustang.
• 47:15
  And there's cars that do that, you know what I mean?
• 47:17
  Like the XB Coupe, I mean, come on.
• 47:19
  You know, if I wasn't in love with the XB Coupe, I would be a complete imbecile.
• 47:24
  So turn my back on that and go, whatever, I'm a hot man.
• 47:27
  Toughest car.
• 47:28
  I've said, if the car out of Mad Max got in the ring, you know, with the Shelby out of going in 60 seconds, the XB would wipe its face and it'd smash it to bits.
• 47:39
  You know what I mean?
• 47:40
  It's that toughest car...
• 47:41
  So I do, I can look at a car like an XB Coupe.
• 47:43
  Like, you know, I wouldn't put a pass minute and end up with a mate of mine's got one around the corner on a block.
• 47:48
  He's got an XB Coupe sitting there.
• 47:49
  I look at it and go, man, that's a good looking car.
• 47:52
  So in fact, in one, in the English version of Top Gear when I was in the English version,
• 47:57
  us boys went over with them and did the ashes.
• 48:00
  Not in the Australian version, in the English version, me, I turn up in an XB coupe.
• 48:05
  So there I am as a Holden man sitting in a Ford.
• 48:07
  But man, what a Ford, you know.
• 48:09
  As you said just a moment ago, mate, like that thing of, you know, when you're growing up in Australia, Ford or Holden, Jeremy Clarkson has this fantastic story.
• 48:16
  Because he would always grill me and piss every time he came in.
• 48:18
  So would James May all the time when we were doing these live arena shows.
• 48:22
  They were fascinated by the Ford Holden clear division lined down the middle of the road.
• 48:29
  It doesn't exist anywhere else on the planet.
• 48:33
  that it's too...
• 48:34
  There's other people that love cars, and, you know, you go to Italy, they'll love a Ferrari.
• 48:38
  Yeah, yeah.
• 48:38
  But not where a nation is divided squarely and fairly down the middle, Ford or Holland.
• 48:44
  And that happens on one racetrack, and we all know where we're going with this Bathurst and all that stuff.
• 48:47
  It's been said a million different ways and a million different times, and for good reason.
• 48:50
  But he's fascinated by it, bewildered, shocked, confused, because he's travelled the planet.
• 48:55
  He said there's nothing like it.
• 48:57
  He can't walk into a stadium...
• 48:59
  Anywhere on the planet, and he does this for a job and does live shows, where you go who he's for, half the room, who he's holding.
• 49:08
  He can go to another country and go, Triumph, Ferrari, and you'll just get Peugeot, Renault, Volkswagen.
• 49:16
  There'll be pockets around the room, but not in Australia.
• 49:19
  So he's always been fascinated by it.
• 49:22
  So now we're going to jump to a story he told me because he kept trying to get to the bottom of it.
• 49:26
  He has a friend in the UK who's Australian-born but now has relocated his life and his work in England.
• 49:32
  And he works on the War Crimes Tribunal.
• 49:35
  This guy's amazing.
• 49:36
  This is a mine.
• 49:37
  He's a lawyer.
• 49:38
  He's all sorts of things, like an astute mine.
• 49:39
  Yeah.
• 49:41
  And I think quite the aristocrat, you know.
• 49:44
  And Jeremy knew him.
• 49:46
  And he said to him once, because he'd always quizzed me and peed to death about this.
• 49:51
  He said to him, well, you're Australian.
• 49:52
  So Jeremy said to him, here's this thing I find fascinating.
• 49:55
  And this is the guy over in England on the War Crimes Tribunal and many other things he does.
• 50:01
  Quite well to do and quite highfalutin.
• 50:03
  He said, the thing I've noticed about Australians, and I can't get it out of my mind, it always intrigues me, he said, is the Ford Holden thing.
• 50:09
  And this guy said to Jeremy, oh, Jeremy, I don't care about all that sort of rubbish.
• 50:12
  No, but he said, in Australia, he said, it always is, it's Ford or Holden.
• 50:16
  And he said, yes, but Jeremy, I don't care about that Ford or Holden thing.
• 50:19
  And Jeremy said, Bathurst, he said, oh, I don't care about all that kind of rubbish, I'm not into that sort of thing.
• 50:23
  And he said, so when you were young, what would have been parking your driveway or your dad drive?
• 50:28
  And he said, oh, my dad had a Ford.
• 50:30
  And he said, so would your dad have got a hold?
• 50:33
  He said, oh, most certainly not.
• 50:36
  And Jeremy said, you just did it.
• 50:38
  And he said, what?
• 50:39
  He said, you've just had an opinion.
• 50:41
  He said, yes, but he wouldn't have had a hold in the drive.
• 50:43
  We're a Ford family.
• 50:44
  And he said, you have an opinion.
• 50:45
  He said, well, so I do.
• 50:48
  I never thought of that.
• 50:48
  But no, we wouldn't have got a hold.
• 50:49
  Most certainly not.
• 50:50
  We were Ford.
• 50:51
  And he said, there you go.
• 50:53
  But it was out of the two of them.
• 50:54
  So it is, and you know, you've had the discussion ad nauseum with people with where it's gone now with the loss of manufacturing of Australian cars, you know, Australian cars made.
• 51:03
  It's terrible, and it is.
• 51:04
  It's like seeing two really healthy people get shot in the forehead right in front of us.
• 51:08
  Like, it was just...
• 51:09
  Imagine if they marched out Keith Richards and Mick Jagger and just shot them in the head right in front of you live on stage.
• 51:16
  Like, it just... That's how it felt to us, you know?
• 51:18
  And I know for people who aren't car nuts, it doesn't feel like that, but that is what it is to us, you know?
• 51:24
  That was our favourite band, you know?
• 51:26
  Are you Rolling Stones or are you The Beatles, you know?
• 51:28
  Or whatever you want the analogy to be, you know?
• 51:31
  Foo Fighters or U2, whatever, you know?
• 51:33
  And you had your thing, and then they just got shot right in front of us.
• 51:36
  It's not like we weren't turning up to watch them race.
• 51:38
  It's not like we weren't turning up to buy them.
• 51:40
  I know we weren't turning up to buy them in the numbers.
• 51:42
  And we all, again, anyone that listens to your show, mate, knows we know the story behind this.
• 51:47
  We know how it happens and everything else.
• 51:49
  But it doesn't make it any less sad, you know.
• 51:51
  But, you know, I do want to try and make sure we keep singing...
• 51:55
  the chorus that we have to sing now.
• 51:57
  It's a new song and it's not our favourite tune, but, you know, there's still engineers, as we know.
• 52:00
  There's people out there, you know, Holden's still doing things and, you know, there's the smarts that are in Holden HQ, so to speak, lending that knowledge and that experience to the, you know, the world car market and they're doing stuff.
• 52:11
  And I don't want them...
• 52:14
  to be looked over because their brilliance is still occurring.
• 52:18
  But, you know, it's great that they've got amazing roadies and road crew and the lighting guy and the sound guys in the background that made that band great still working.
• 52:26
  But I just miss the band on stage, you know.
• 52:28
  Not alone, mate.
• 52:29
  Not alone.
• 52:29
  Let's power through a few things to finish here.
• 52:32
  Do you do your own stunts on set?
• 52:33
  And are you the guy when there's a car involved that pesters them that you have to drive it?
• 52:37
  Yes, absolutely.
• 52:39
  And the stunts thing, they don't like it.
• 52:42
  So when we did Top Gear, we did a lot of our own driving, really.
• 52:46
  There were some moments where they might have big wide shots or they might have someone go around a corner, but we were driving a lot of the time.
• 52:54
  But in a film, they don't like it for insurance.
• 52:55
  I can't even ride my motorbike to set.
• 52:58
  So I rode one.
• 52:59
  I had a Victory.
• 53:01
  I do stuff with Indian and Victory as well.
• 53:03
  As you know, it's all under the umbrella of Polaris Industries.
• 53:06
  And I rode Chopper to set when we were filming Oddball.
• 53:10
  And it was a big lap, you know, 350 mil back tire.
• 53:13
  It was mental.
• 53:14
  And 250 mil back tire, sorry.
• 53:16
  And I pull up on set and I go into the make-up truck and the producer turns up.
• 53:22
  And he'd heard it because he was in a car, I think, and heard it because this thing, you know, pulled rain out of clouds.
• 53:27
  It was that loud.
• 53:28
  And he said, Jesus Christ, who rode that in?
• 53:30
  They said, Shane did.
• 53:31
  And he said, not quite.
• 53:32
  He said, but really, who was it?
• 53:33
  They said, it was Shane.
• 53:35
  And he said, no, he didn't because the insurance gets him quite upset.
• 53:39
  And he came and knocked.
• 53:40
  At that point, I'd moved from the makeup thing back into my trailer.
• 53:43
  I know that sounds very flash.
• 53:44
  When you're in a trailer in Australia, it's normally six by four and it's still got freaking firewood in it.
• 53:48
  But I had a trailer.
• 53:50
  And he knocked on the door and I opened the door and I said, how are you going, Rich?
• 53:53
  And he said, please tell me that's not your motorbike sitting out there.
• 53:56
  And I said, OK, that's not my motorbike sitting out there.
• 53:59
  And he said, is that the truth?
• 54:01
  And I said, what do you want me to say now?
• 54:02
  Because your last sentence, you asked me to please tell you it wasn't.
• 54:05
  He said, OK, then I want the truth.
• 54:06
  And I said that it is.
• 54:07
  It is my motorbike.
• 54:08
  And he said, you can't ride that.
• 54:09
  I said, yes, I can.
• 54:10
  Do you want to watch me?
• 54:10
  I'm great at it.
• 54:12
  But even then, they paid a guy to come and ride it back home and I had to get driven in a car behind the motorbike.
• 54:17
  Wow.
• 54:17
  Yeah, so they don't like you doing too many stunts in films, but I do do as many as I'm allowed to, and I do more.
• 54:24
  Because I love it.
• 54:24
  Because, you know, I've got a CAMS licence.
• 54:26
  I'm not the greatest driver, but I've got a CAMS licence and a National Rally licence, and I've raced in the Australian Rally Championship and had a crack at that in Bathurst and the Toyota 86 and all that stuff.
• 54:35
  So I like having a steer.
• 54:36
  You know, I'm in the Polaris race series, and, you know, I've raced those and rolled them and all that sort of stuff.
• 54:41
  So...
• 54:41
  I do love having a steer.
• 54:43
  Molly Taylor reminded me about you rolling the Polaris.
• 54:46
  We won't go into that.
• 54:47
  She reckons you'd incriminate yourself.
• 54:48
  That's another story.
• 54:50
  You mentioned the CAMS licence.
• 54:51
  I reckon the first time you and I met each other was at Calder Park at a round of the Australian Championship.
• 54:56
  You might have driven an Evo 6 Mitsubishi back then.
• 54:58
  Yeah, it was, yeah.
• 54:59
  Rally or circuit racing?
• 55:01
  Oh, man.
• 55:02
  That's so cruel.
• 55:04
  That's like beer and wine, meat and cheese.
• 55:07
  It's, um...
• 55:09
  Oh, they're so different.
• 55:12
  Oh, look, I love them both.
• 55:15
  When I was a kid, I liked to go sideways.
• 55:16
  When you're on a road, you like to do a burnout on asphalt and do all that sort of stuff and get it sideways.
• 55:21
  And then once you get the experience of trying to keep a car under control and getting as quick as it can go and keeping the traction under your arse, that becomes the addiction.
• 55:31
  So driving neat, smooth, is fast, all that stuff.
• 55:36
  circuit work is fantastic and putting together as we know, there's a few people who've put together the perfect lap and the boys in the main game I know they have a go at themselves but I think they do it amazing every single lap and I can't hold a flame to any of them and I've been around with them all as we have and you just go, man, God, what a gift and it's a gift and I know they work hard at it but for those that watch them, it's a gift they seem to have been given and they've worked their ass off to afford that gift or learn that gift but
• 56:04
  Once you put together an okay lap in a car, it feels amazing.
• 56:07
  So rewarding.
• 56:11
  You know, for some it's golf and for us.
• 56:12
  And then you put a perfect lap together and you do another lap straight after it and you stuff it up again.
• 56:16
  Oh, shit, you know.
• 56:17
  And every time I've written a bit in a book called Rev Head about what happens in your head doing a lap, you know.
• 56:22
  Oh, my God, here comes the apex.
• 56:23
  You know, get it right.
• 56:24
  I've almost got it right.
• 56:25
  Oh, hang on, is there a car behind me?
• 56:26
  Oh, no, we're good.
• 56:27
  I've missed.
• 56:27
  Oh, shit, I've missed the apex.
• 56:28
  Can't live I've missed that apex.
• 56:30
  Oh, Shane, don't have that thought because look where you are now.
• 56:32
  You're on the wrong part of the track.
• 56:33
  It's so busy, but it's so much fun.
• 56:36
  So that's circuit.
• 56:37
  And then the opposite, then you do rally and you spend most of it side-most.
• 56:40
  You've got to go into a corner completely out of control to come out of the corner under control.
• 56:45
  Like, it's just fantastic.
• 56:46
  But, and again, it's different because you don't, I mean, sure, you do your pace notes, but you don't know that track.
• 56:53
  You don't.
• 56:54
  I mean, you trust the voice in your ear and you know what a, you know.
• 56:58
  left three is but but yeah you don't really know it but you know it's again it's such an amazing art form so i'm gonna say i love them both for different reasons but it is it's beer it is beer and wine the answer is i'm drinking both and you can't stop me
• 57:14
  Rev Head, My Life as a Motoring Tragic, the book's out, but also very recently an audio version was released too, which is just fantastic.
• 57:22
  Quick final ones.
• 57:23
  Things that other drivers do that annoy Shane Jacobson?
• 57:27
  The number one thing, I'm emerging as one, that I just, I'm not going to say it annoys me, it drives my wife mad, that people just have to understand that the traffic they're about to come to is most likely doing 100.
• 57:40
  If you match it, if you imagine a zip...
• 57:43
  That's what you can do.
• 57:44
  The truth is you can merge.
• 57:46
  I'm just giving people a wave.
• 57:47
  People listening to this know this, but if I can find the sentence that can best explain it and we can tell people, you know, if it was a third world country, I'd say don't go to the toilet upstream from where you get your water.
• 57:58
  and I go, oh, there you go, thanks, I think you've saved half our village from getting sick.
• 58:01
  Well, the merging thing is, if you are doing roughly the same speed as the traffic you're about to get to, you only need the length of your car plus a few metres front and back to fit in.
• 58:12
  But the slower you go, the bigger gap you need.
• 58:13
  And
• 58:13
  when they turn up doing 20, as you and I know, they need a massive gap to merge and they won't be able to merge, so they're stuck there.
• 58:20
  That's the bit of information I'd like to pass on.
• 58:22
  But the thing that makes me angry and always has, I've got all my licenses and I've got a truck, semi and forklift and scissor and boom and all that sort of shit, motorbike, car and whatever.
• 58:31
  I've got a truck license too and I've driven semis and rigids.
• 58:35
  When people pull up, the space in front of a truck that they see as a gap when trucks are trying to pull up is not a gap.
• 58:42
  It's every bit of that distance the truck driver most likely needs.
• 58:45
  And they've planned, and cars that keep darting in front of trucks, literally, you may as well dress as a duck on shooting season and lick the end of a bloke's gun.
• 58:55
  Because seriously, the risk you're taking is massive, folks.
• 58:58
  Because that's the one that does my head in.
• 59:00
  When I watch people jump in front of a truck that has 50 metres in front of it and they're trying to slow up.
• 59:05
  And I have said one thing I would love to do is before people get on the road with their licence, just before you hand it to them, you go, come with me, we're just going to jump in a truck and then get them to sit in a truck and try and pull that thing up.
• 59:19
  in 40 metres, well, when you think you've got 50 and you apply the brakes, and then all of a sudden, oh, no, you don't have 50, you've got 45.
• 59:26
  Oh, another car's jumped in, I've got 40.
• 59:28
  And have your braking distance decreased without your permission while you're trying to pull, you know, 20, 30, however many tonne of truck, depending on what's in the back.
• 59:37
  And the thing is, people have to know that with a truck, with air brakes, as the thing's slowing up,
• 59:43
  We have to have to take your foot slowly off the brake because the slower the truck's going, the less braking pressure it needs to pull the truck up.
• 59:52
  And you actually, it sounds weird, but as we're coming towards a car, we're coming off the brake.
• 59:57
  It is the weirdest thing.
• 59:59
  And if they got a chance to experience that, they'd never pull in front of a truck again.
• 1:00:03
  That's the thing that doesn't just annoy me.
• 1:00:04
  It shits me to bits.
• 1:00:07
  The Grail car.
• 1:00:09
  Do you have it?
• 1:00:10
  And if you had an unlimited budget, if you don't have it, what would it be?
• 1:00:15
  It's a funny one, that one, because we've mentioned the EH Holden before.
• 1:00:18
  For so long, it was the dream car.
• 1:00:21
  And it's funny, it was not about money.
• 1:00:22
  And people say to you...
• 1:00:25
  You know, it's the Alan McPherson versus Pamela Anderson versus Elizabeth Taylor.
• 1:00:30
  You know, it depends on what you're into.
• 1:00:31
  You know, as far as looks and beauty, you know, is what I'm saying.
• 1:00:35
  And for me, the EH was it.
• 1:00:38
  And it was in my mind from the age of like eight until I bought it like seven years ago.
• 1:00:42
  So that's the thing I wanted.
• 1:00:43
  So it wasn't money related.
• 1:00:45
  And people who say, you know, is it a good car to drive?
• 1:00:46
  No, it's shocking.
• 1:00:48
  It's terrible.
• 1:00:49
  You know, inside, trying to keep...
• 1:00:51
  I mean, I've had the steering box neatened up now and tightened up a bit, but, you know, trying to keep that straight submission, you know.
• 1:00:56
  Inside looks like you're flipping pizzas, as Pisa would say, you know, just to keep the thing straight.
• 1:01:01
  But the car, you know, your question was the whole, you know, the untouchable one, what is it?
• 1:01:09
  Look, it's Aston Martin, I would feel like too much of a tosser to be in one.
• 1:01:15
  But, you know, a Vantage is probably if I had money sitting in drawers that I had even...
• 1:01:23
  I had so much money that I've even forgotten which drawers I put them in.
• 1:01:26
  And they had hundreds of thousands in them.
• 1:01:27
  I'd probably...
• 1:01:28
  I'd probably... You know, whether it's the DB9 used to be it and then the Vantage came out.
• 1:01:32
  So I'd probably grab one of those.
• 1:01:34
  But see, then my brain starts going, you know, if I did that, I could probably get like an XB...
• 1:01:41
  Coupe.
• 1:01:41
  See, then I start to divide it up and go, I might be able to go out and just get a California Mike for Rippin' Ran here as a joke and then get an MG, because I used to like the sound of him, and then I could probably get the XP Coupe.
• 1:01:52
  And then before you know it, I go, God, imagine how many Holdens I could buy with that.
• 1:01:56
  And then I'm off again.
• 1:01:57
  I'm going to buy old cars, which is how I do it.
• 1:01:59
  So...
• 1:02:01
  I'll just buy more.
• 1:02:02
  That's why I keep making money.
• 1:02:04
  Start building that bigger garage, mate.
• 1:02:05
  You've done some incredible things.
• 1:02:08
  The comedic stuff, I know, is close to your heart.
• 1:02:10
  But outside that genre, you're doing some brilliant things as well.
• 1:02:14
  And even blending charitable initiatives with your love of cars.
• 1:02:17
  It's been a pleasure to sit and chat with you.
• 1:02:19
  And we wish you continued success.
• 1:02:21
  Thank you very much.
• 1:02:21
  Thanks, mate.
• 1:02:22
  Pleasure as always.
• 1:02:28
  Rusty's Garage is written and presented by me, Greg Rust.
• 1:02:33
  Series producer and editor is Alex Mitchell.
• 1:02:36
  Audio production by Darcy Thompson.