Latest / Corpus Christi Originals Podcast / EP102: Javi Luna - 14 Years, 10 with Chingo Bling, Finding Voice in Comedy

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EP102: Javi Luna - 14 Years, 10 with Chingo Bling, Finding Voice in Comedy · Corpus Christi Originals Podcast

0:00
SPEAKER_00: What's going on, y'all?
0:00
SPEAKER_00: It's Susaladio back to uh back at it again, Corpus Christi Originals Podcast.
0:04
SPEAKER_00: Uh full circle moment today.
0:05
SPEAKER_00: Episode one guest, Javi Luna, uh came back for the bull session on 79 featuring Chingo Bling and Lito.
0:12
SPEAKER_00: Uh now he's back again, allegedly as a San Antonio comic now.
0:16
SPEAKER_00: What's up?
0:16
SPEAKER_00: Three P baby.
0:18
SPEAKER_00: Uh Javi's been the pillar of corpus uh corpus community for 14 years, toured with Chingo Bling for a decade.
0:24
SPEAKER_00: Uh self-produced his special, not for everybody.
0:27
SPEAKER_00: Uh created tag your bit to give comics uh like me stage time uh when we had no business being on the stage.
0:35
SPEAKER_00: Uh today we're talking about the 10-year chingo journey, how his craft evolved, life on the road, and what's next after 14 years in the game.
0:44
SPEAKER_00: Let's go.
0:45
SPEAKER_02: All right, nice, nice, nice intro.
0:49
SPEAKER_02: Thank you.
0:49
SPEAKER_02: I'm tired just listening to it.
0:52
SPEAKER_02: I did that.
0:53
SPEAKER_02: Now you left some stuff off too, but it's okay.
0:55
SPEAKER_02: I'm not holding it.
0:57
SPEAKER_00: Thanks to ChatGPT for that.
0:59
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, you know what?
1:00
SPEAKER_02: Chat B GBT be helping out a lot of podcasters, man.
1:04
SPEAKER_02: I was just on one last week.
1:05
SPEAKER_02: I was like, where'd you pull that stuff from?
1:06
SPEAKER_02: You go on Chat GPT.
1:08
SPEAKER_02: I go, okay, you fact-checked it though, right?
1:10
SPEAKER_02: Some of that sounded like some booze.
1:11
SPEAKER_00: For real, man.
1:12
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
1:13
SPEAKER_00: Hey man, and I'll prompt and I'll prompt her back.
1:16
SPEAKER_00: I'll be like, hey, did you make sure that this thing is right?
1:18
SPEAKER_00: You need to double check.
1:19
SPEAKER_00: Double double check it, double fact fact check your own thing, man.
1:23
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, so episode one, episode 79.
1:26
SPEAKER_00: Now this uh that was the first one, huh?
1:29
SPEAKER_02: First one, bro?
1:29
SPEAKER_02: Okay, yeah.
1:30
SPEAKER_02: Original Gordito.
1:32
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah.
1:33
SPEAKER_02: That was that was uh we was that COVID?
1:36
SPEAKER_02: Was it that when it was?
1:37
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it was I remember we did it it was the it was we did it remote.
1:40
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it was the end of COVID, I want to say 2023 or something like that.
1:44
SPEAKER_00: Okay, and we did it on uh uh StreamYard or some some kind of Zoom.
1:48
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, okay.
1:49
SPEAKER_02: I remember I remember that we weren't like face to face.
1:52
SPEAKER_02: I remember that much.
1:53
SPEAKER_02: I had to man, we had a I remember I had to kick my kids out of the living room.
1:56
SPEAKER_01: Hey, get out of here, I gotta do a podcast.
2:01
SPEAKER_02: Stay in that room, don't get out.
2:03
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
2:04
SPEAKER_02: My kids are trained, right?
2:05
SPEAKER_02: Because I used I used to do my own podcast for my living room, so they already know they'll poke their head around the corner.
2:10
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, Dad, are you recording right now?
2:13
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and that's because we got a comment on that first video.
2:16
SPEAKER_00: Oh, I stopped lifting listening after two seconds because the sound audio was bad.
2:20
SPEAKER_00: I'm like, whatever, bro, it's number one.
2:22
SPEAKER_02: I mean, I mean, they're not they're not they're not wrong, right?
2:25
SPEAKER_02: Like, people like are there comments you should ignore uh on on social media?
2:30
SPEAKER_02: Absolutely, right?
2:32
SPEAKER_02: But you know, and was there a better way for them to say that?
2:35
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, but with podcasts, for sure.
2:38
SPEAKER_02: Like, like that was always that was always a thing from I and I was uh uh uh guilty of putting out episodes I shouldn't have because podcasts, well now it's now it's video and stuff, right?
2:50
SPEAKER_02: Too.
2:51
SPEAKER_02: But but back in the day, in the early days of podcasts, and when I got started, you know, if your audio's not good, what what are you doing?
2:58
SPEAKER_02: Like you have they have to be able to hear what you're saying.
3:01
SPEAKER_02: So so sometimes you gotta take some of that, like they are giving you some constructive criticism wrapped up in some some hater shit, right?
3:11
SPEAKER_02: But but what he's saying is it's saying, like, hey, the sound's off, and and it discouraged me from listening to whatever you had to say, right?
3:18
SPEAKER_02: Right, right.
3:18
SPEAKER_00: So yeah, yeah, it was good.
3:20
SPEAKER_00: I do I do definitely agree with that.
3:21
SPEAKER_00: Uh and it's kind of part of the reason why I came into the studio to have people face to face because you never know what type of auto quality they had on their end, if it was a Zoom meeting or whatever, you know.
3:32
SPEAKER_00: So that it's definitely been a game changer coming in here, man.
3:36
SPEAKER_00: Uh, so allegedly San Antonio thing.
3:38
SPEAKER_00: Is this a real story?
3:39
SPEAKER_02: No, it's not a story at all, man.
3:41
SPEAKER_02: It's it's me.
3:43
SPEAKER_02: Uh uh's for my own entertainment.
3:46
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, it's cool.
3:46
SPEAKER_02: That's for my own entertainment because uh, and really what what it is is it's not even it's not even like a recent thing, really, because it happened years ago when I first started like traveling a lot and um you know doing shows elsewhere other than Corpus.
4:04
SPEAKER_02: Because I, you know, starting out heavily in Corpus, I was I was the house MC for a couple comedy clubs uh as as they were coming up.
4:13
SPEAKER_02: So I would say like the first four to five years of my comedy career, corpus was probably about 60% of my my comedy experience.
4:22
SPEAKER_02: As that shifted, I started hearing the rumblings.
4:27
SPEAKER_02: People would be like, hey, so where are you where are you at now?
4:30
SPEAKER_02: Like, oh, I heard you moved, I heard you, I heard you moved to LA, I heard you moved to a lot of in San Antonio, a lot of people like, oh you're in San Antonio now, right?
4:37
SPEAKER_02: Like, like, like, no, like it was kind of like this thing, like Corpus believes that anybody that quote unquote makes it, whatever that means in their eyes, right?
4:47
SPEAKER_02: It's their own perception.
4:49
SPEAKER_02: Uh, but if they believe, if they see you're doing a certain level of thing, they almost trick them their own mind and thinking, like, oh, they he probably doesn't even live here anymore, right?
4:59
SPEAKER_02: So so it kind of became this thing, and I kind of uh I was like, no, dude, I'm I'm still here.
5:04
SPEAKER_02: Like I just travel, like I like I have to go to Houston to catch a flight.
5:08
SPEAKER_02: Like, like that was the shitty part about starting to travel and and and being on the road is is it's so expensive to fly out of corpus and and you're not making great money to start off with.
5:19
SPEAKER_02: So you're like, oh shit, where can I I can get a cheaper flight if I drive three hours to Houston or if I drive two and a half hours to San Antonio.
5:27
SPEAKER_02: Um and so and then um this past year, it it just so worked out 2025.
5:35
SPEAKER_02: I didn't headline a single show in Corpus.
5:37
SPEAKER_02: Wow, and that wasn't by design uh necessarily.
5:42
SPEAKER_02: It just normally the year starts off heavy on the road, and I normally don't get around to producing a show locally because it requires it requires my attention, right?
5:55
SPEAKER_02: I gotta I gotta pound the pavement and get the word out and call people up and remind people like, hey, you haven't seen me in a year or whatever.
6:02
SPEAKER_02: And then by that point, uh Mesquite Street, which has been my home club for for for years, you know, well over a decade now, um, they're going through a transition period where they closed down their south side location.
6:15
SPEAKER_02: They didn't have a big uh um I had was doing their big venue by that point.
6:22
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
6:22
SPEAKER_02: Um I wasn't filling it up, but I was I was doing doing decent enough numbers there where we were everyone was making their money.
6:31
SPEAKER_02: Wow, you know, and now they're back to the small room where I started out with them.
6:36
SPEAKER_02: Uh, but the capacity's kind of kind of low, you know, 60 seats, which is great, but at one point we used to be able to get 100 people up there.
6:45
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
6:45
SPEAKER_02: You know, and I used to I used to sell that out, you know, twice over.
6:50
SPEAKER_02: Um, so now it's like kind of like, okay, there's a gray area where I might do I do I want to wait, you know, uh do I want to go do that small room again?
6:59
SPEAKER_02: Do I want to go try to do something in Aurora?
7:01
SPEAKER_02: So it was just me kind of really not uh not commit, not wanting to commit to anything right away.
7:10
SPEAKER_02: I was just kind of waiting to to see how everything smoothed out, you know, and uh I ended up not doing a whole show here in 2025.
7:18
SPEAKER_02: I did a lot of shows in San Antonio though.
7:20
SPEAKER_02: Crazy, bro.
7:21
SPEAKER_02: And so the set so it kind of I started to to hear it again, like I heard it started hearing it again, maybe about June or July.
7:28
SPEAKER_02: Someone's like, so are you like in San Antonio now?
7:31
SPEAKER_02: And even the San Antonio comics, like I would go, like they started seeing me more often, like because there's a there's a lot of new clubs and and shows and things.
7:40
SPEAKER_02: The the um the big club in San Antonio, the A Room in San Antonio LOL Comedy Club, gave me my first headlining show uh this past year.
7:49
SPEAKER_02: Uh and so it was kind of a joke of of like, oh, you know, just I I just it's for my own entertainment.
7:57
SPEAKER_02: Like, oh, am I here or am I there?
7:59
SPEAKER_02: I don't know.
8:00
SPEAKER_02: What does it matter?
8:01
SPEAKER_02: You know, does it does it matter where where I get my mail at?
8:04
SPEAKER_02: No.
8:04
SPEAKER_02: You know, it it you know, it is what it is, and and the and the fact that the part that I'm not an active member of the comedy scene there here in Corpus, right?
8:16
SPEAKER_02: Which is say, like, I don't go out to open my ice, I don't do all the things you say.
8:20
SPEAKER_02: So so I don't, you know, while while Corpus is my home, my my heart belongs there, I I don't, you know, I don't lay claim to anything that's happening right now with corpus comedy because they're they're you know they're doing that all on their own.
8:36
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, it's definitely it seems it seems like it's definitely different nowadays as opposed to when you were really you know what I mean.
8:43
SPEAKER_00: Right.
8:44
SPEAKER_00: Uh yeah, that's cool, man.
8:45
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I put a post on uh on our Facebook page.
8:48
SPEAKER_00: What's something that impresses somebody somebody from Corpus?
8:51
SPEAKER_00: And then put and then I put wrong answers only.
8:53
SPEAKER_00: Oh yeah.
8:54
SPEAKER_00: And this one lady on TikTok, she's like, it impresses me when people move out of town and they'll come back.
8:59
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
9:00
SPEAKER_02: No, no, that's exact exactly what that's what helped me.
9:03
SPEAKER_02: People thought that I left.
9:04
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
9:05
SPEAKER_02: People thought that I left, and then they want you.
9:08
SPEAKER_02: And uh one of the first tours that I was on, uh, because Chingo Bling was not my first national tour.
9:15
SPEAKER_00: Oh, wow.
9:16
SPEAKER_02: Like a lot of people think like, oh, you got your start with Chingo Bling.
9:18
SPEAKER_02: I was already on a national tour two years before I ever met Chingo Bling.
9:23
SPEAKER_02: Wow.
9:23
SPEAKER_02: Uh in fact, Chingo Bling thought he was stealing me away from the tour.
9:27
SPEAKER_02: I wasn't exclusive to that tour.
9:29
SPEAKER_02: I was like, yeah, I can go with them whoever I want.
9:32
SPEAKER_02: No, no one owns me.
9:34
SPEAKER_02: I got the golden game.
9:35
SPEAKER_02: I was like, I was like Julia Roberts and Pretty Woman.
9:37
SPEAKER_02: I say who, I say when.
9:40
SPEAKER_02: You know, uh, but but yeah, I was already I was already on a tour called the Latin Comedy Jam.
9:45
SPEAKER_02: They they found me here in Corpus.
9:48
SPEAKER_02: They found you.
9:49
SPEAKER_02: Well, they found us.
9:50
SPEAKER_02: They found the bat the the Vatos Locos of uh the Vatos Locos of Comedy.
9:56
SPEAKER_02: Yes, yes, yes.
9:57
SPEAKER_02: Um myself, Jacob, Jacob Rodriguez, and David Cifuentes at the time, uh, Burst in Peace.
10:03
SPEAKER_02: And um they they found us, we had an active little presence on social media.
10:08
SPEAKER_02: We had sold out some shows here in Corpus.
10:11
SPEAKER_02: So when they came through town, wow, they looked up Corpus Christi Comedy.
10:16
SPEAKER_02: We were the first ones to pop up.
10:17
SPEAKER_02: They hit up my boy Jacob.
10:19
SPEAKER_02: They said they said, Hey, whoop-de-woo, we're coming through town, we're doing the Selena Auditorium.
10:23
SPEAKER_02: Send us a send it send it.
10:25
SPEAKER_02: We want to see you guys.
10:26
SPEAKER_02: Send us your clips.
10:27
SPEAKER_02: Send us your clips.
10:28
SPEAKER_02: Send us your clips.
10:29
SPEAKER_02: We sent the clips in.
10:31
SPEAKER_02: They hit me up.
10:32
SPEAKER_02: I said, Hey, you know, we we really like your video.
10:36
SPEAKER_02: Do you want to come host this show?
10:38
SPEAKER_02: Went to the, you know, did the show with them at at Selena.
10:42
SPEAKER_02: Uh that time, Jerry Garcia, Roberto Rodriguez, Devin Garcia, who had just done Sand Up Revolution with Fluffy.
10:49
SPEAKER_02: Uh, I don't remember who the big headliner was at that time.
10:53
SPEAKER_02: Um might have been Johnny Sanchez or someone like that.
10:57
SPEAKER_02: And uh did my thing, had a really good set, and uh the the promoter was like, Hey, do you want do you want in?
11:08
SPEAKER_02: Like, I take these guys all over the country.
11:10
SPEAKER_02: Do you want in?
11:11
SPEAKER_02: Uh, we ended up becoming really good friends.
11:14
SPEAKER_02: You know, I I was on that tour for for two years.
11:17
SPEAKER_02: He was trying to convince me to move out to Phoenix.
11:19
SPEAKER_02: Wow.
11:20
SPEAKER_02: Um, but he was he came from the rap world too.
11:23
SPEAKER_02: Uh for some reason I keep falling in with these rappers.
11:26
SPEAKER_02: Uh and he was the one that told me, he goes, you know, he was from Phoenix, and he goes, you know, we didn't get big in Phoenix uh until we stopped performing in Phoenix.
11:37
SPEAKER_02: He goes, he goes, we stop he goes, one thing he goes, come comedians do wrong for themselves at home.
11:45
SPEAKER_02: Like unless you're gonna get famous, right?
11:48
SPEAKER_02: Uh then it doesn't matter.
11:50
SPEAKER_02: But he goes, if you're there every week, right?
11:54
SPEAKER_02: And this is insane, like the people starting out, because you need that stage time.
11:57
SPEAKER_02: But he was talking to me as someone who was hey, you already have an act, you're you don't he goes, if you're there every week, if you're on a flyer every week, there's somewhere I can see you for ten dollars, five dollars, whatever.
12:11
SPEAKER_02: What is people's motivation to go see you when the ticket is twenty-five dollars, thirty dollars?
12:17
SPEAKER_02: It's there's no motivation, you're too accessible, right?
12:20
SPEAKER_02: That you haven't it's it's just simple economics, right?
12:23
SPEAKER_02: Supply supply and demand, your supply is too high, so the demand's low, right?
12:28
SPEAKER_02: So so it so she's not wrong, and it's not it's not necessarily a negative thing, right?
12:34
SPEAKER_02: What she's saying is I like it when people move, go on, but yet they still remember to come back, right?
12:41
SPEAKER_02: Because then when they come back, well, I can't see them all the time.
12:45
SPEAKER_02: So so it increases that value for me.
12:47
SPEAKER_02: I'm I'm gonna pass buy the ticket because I don't know the next time they're gonna see.
12:51
SPEAKER_02: So I really I did adopt that after several years of being on the road.
12:56
SPEAKER_02: After watching my ticket sales, you know, yo-yo, sometimes it's great, sometimes it's not.
13:01
SPEAKER_02: What's going on?
13:02
SPEAKER_02: Is it me?
13:03
SPEAKER_02: Is it economy?
13:04
SPEAKER_02: Is it just does it depend on what time of year I do it?
13:07
SPEAKER_02: And it and it's really just almost kind of creating this buzz of like, hey, let's go now because if if we don't see him now, it's probably might be another year before we see him, or might be six months, or whatever, whatever it is.
13:21
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah, it's almost like you could do that, you can do that with the San Antonio crowd once you're there all the time.
13:27
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, San San Antonio also, right?
13:30
SPEAKER_02: You know, you know, it's just what what San But San Antonio, you're talking about, you know, 1.3, 1.5 million people.
13:37
SPEAKER_02: You know, so so there's uh it's a bigger, it's a bigger pond to play in.
13:42
SPEAKER_02: Wow, so you know, you know, to oversaturate yourself.
13:45
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, you know, and yeah, you have to do it some you have to do it somewhere, right?
13:49
SPEAKER_02: You have you have you know, and and we had that argument too with the with that guy, uh, you know, it's like comedy is different because it requires it requires you building material, trying out new stuff.
14:01
SPEAKER_02: You so you have to almost oversaturate yourself somewhere, right?
14:07
SPEAKER_02: Just to get just to get the stage time and and the reps.
14:11
SPEAKER_02: Uh what helped me out is I I feel like there is a pl there is a a diminishing return of that.
14:17
SPEAKER_02: Once you get once you get past I don't know what I couldn't give you a year where it happened, but it might have been COVID, honestly, which would have been year ten for me.
14:28
SPEAKER_02: Um I had never gone more than I think the longest I had been on stage, off stage in ten years was like a week and a half.
14:38
SPEAKER_02: And that's including my dad's death, the death of my death of my best friend.
14:43
SPEAKER_02: I was on stage the very next day.
14:45
SPEAKER_02: Wow.
14:46
SPEAKER_02: My divorce, I was on stage that night.
14:48
SPEAKER_02: You know what I'm saying?
14:49
SPEAKER_02: Like no no tragedy kept me from getting on stage.
14:52
SPEAKER_02: COVID was the first time I was for a surgery.
14:55
SPEAKER_02: You know what I'm saying?
14:56
SPEAKER_02: I I was on tour with a with a wound vac.
14:58
SPEAKER_02: I had to have a I had to have a bag.
15:00
SPEAKER_02: I would wear the bag over I'd wear the shirt over the bag, and I had the fucking machine just sucking out with you, that means sucking fluid from from this my stomach was gutted open.
15:13
SPEAKER_02: I had a hernia repair.
15:14
SPEAKER_02: And and I was on the road with that.
15:16
SPEAKER_02: So nothing, when I say nothing kept me off the stage, I mean nothing kept me off the stage.
15:21
SPEAKER_02: I got on stage with a boot on my foot.
15:24
SPEAKER_02: I got in a car crash over here on Crosstown on the way to a show, and I got on stage with it.
15:30
SPEAKER_02: You know, I had a cam boot on my on my foot.
15:34
SPEAKER_02: You know, it's just nothing kept me off stage, but COVID hit like a brick wall, and now it wasn't my choice to stay off stage.
15:41
SPEAKER_02: They said, stay, stay your ass home.
15:43
SPEAKER_02: Stay home, you're not getting on stage.
15:45
SPEAKER_02: And I think what part of what was that was I always had this belief, like, oh no, I gotta keep, I gotta keep grinding, I gotta keep working.
15:52
SPEAKER_02: And then when COVID forced me to stay home, and then it opened back up and I came back even stronger.
15:59
SPEAKER_02: Like my my material was hitting probably harder than it ever did.
16:04
SPEAKER_02: It it shook that fear from me, like, okay, have I hit a point where maybe I don't need to be as heavy open micing as I was?
16:15
SPEAKER_00: Wow.
16:16
SPEAKER_02: Can I then take that energy that I was putting into to, oh, let me hit every single mic, no matter what.
16:23
SPEAKER_02: Right.
16:23
SPEAKER_02: Stage time is stage time.
16:25
SPEAKER_02: If I take that same energy and I put it into writing or developing content or writing for other comics, or maybe I'm gonna try filmmaking, or maybe I'm gonna do something else, or maybe I'm gonna take that time and give it back to my give it back to my family because I've already taken so much from them being on the road three or four days a week.
16:46
SPEAKER_02: You know, I had I had to pivot during that time.
16:49
SPEAKER_02: Which so you know it that that was the kind of the changing the the tipping point for me.
16:55
SPEAKER_00: So crazy, man.
16:56
SPEAKER_00: Let's say I have some people in the chat.
16:57
SPEAKER_00: Uh stay hi.
16:58
SPEAKER_00: Francesca on uh YouTube.
17:00
SPEAKER_00: Thanks a lot, mama.
17:00
SPEAKER_02: Mesquite street pizza and squeeze Heartbroken, still joking, baby.
17:05
SPEAKER_02: Nice, they were there, they saw it all.
17:07
SPEAKER_00: Oh, that's what's up, they saw it all.
17:09
SPEAKER_00: That's cool, man.
17:09
SPEAKER_00: You got a you got a relationship with them, dude.
17:11
SPEAKER_02: And that's home, man.
17:14
SPEAKER_02: You know, and I and and that's it, you know, it's not where I started, right?
17:17
SPEAKER_02: Because I started maybe a handful of years before that, but uh, you know, it it's where I it's where a lot of people saw me for the first time.
17:25
SPEAKER_02: I spent like uh three years there, you know, uh help helping run the room, which which which means like you know, oh who's gonna feature for the we got so-and-so coming in, who's gonna feature?
17:36
SPEAKER_02: They need a ride from the airport, go get them, yeah, you know, which you know, and then hosting, taking tickets, you know, you know, making sure the stage is set up.
17:46
SPEAKER_02: And so it's a lot of the it's out of the first lot of people in corpus.
17:51
SPEAKER_02: That was the first place they saw me.
17:54
SPEAKER_02: And they've continued in their eyes, they saw me grow.
17:57
SPEAKER_02: Like even I you said you mentioned that that steakhouse I did on a Thursday night.
18:01
SPEAKER_02: There's people there, they're like, Oh, we've been seeing you for 10 years, we've seen you since the beginning.
18:05
SPEAKER_02: That's not even the beginning, but that's to them, they saw me evolve from hosting a show, wow, featuring a show, to to now you're you're your head, you you know, you headline your own show.
18:16
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, they they saw it, they're invested, they they they believe in it, you you know, because they saw the evolution.
18:24
SPEAKER_02: You know, uh uh I had one lady, you know, she came out on Thursday and she she's like, This is the most I ever kick.
18:30
SPEAKER_02: Expect to come see you.
18:32
SPEAKER_01: She goes, I spent$180 on tickets.
18:35
SPEAKER_01: I don't care though, like I paid someone's, I paid to go see you when you did the the brew, the brew ha ha at the Slina Auditorium, and and and this show and that show.
18:44
SPEAKER_01: And I don't care, I'll pawn whatever I gotta pawn.
18:47
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, you know, you know, to go and and you know, other and then some people, you know, some people are just new to it, right?
18:55
SPEAKER_02: Like one dude's like, Oh, I saw you for the first time with Ken Flores.
18:59
SPEAKER_02: That was maybe like two years ago before he passed away.
19:01
SPEAKER_02: Wow, you know, um at Mesquite Street.
19:04
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, you know.
19:05
SPEAKER_02: Um, so like I said, a lot of people, the first time, oh, first time I saw you was with Pauly Shore, or the first time I saw you was with Felipe Sparza or whatever, whatever it was, these big shows that Mesquite would bring in and they would allow me, you know, the working relationship I had with them, they would allow me to host, or or sometimes if they needed a feature, I would feature.
19:24
SPEAKER_02: Um and and foster a lot of relationships, you know, that way.
19:29
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, you know, so for sure.
19:30
SPEAKER_02: So yeah, it's definitely definitely home, definitely a solid relationship that I've always they've been good to me.
19:36
SPEAKER_02: That's I like to think I've been good to them.
19:38
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, bro, dude.
19:40
SPEAKER_00: That sounds like grind for sure, man.
19:41
SPEAKER_00: Like grinding at the bottom, like just getting it, getting it.
19:45
SPEAKER_00: And uh uh what you're talking about too, it reminds me, I made a post, another post about Corpus, if we're all hype, or do we do we support local businesses that have been around for years?
19:55
SPEAKER_00: It seems like it might be both.
19:57
SPEAKER_00: Because you're and and I'm wondering if that happens in in your will in the comedy world as well, like because you're what you're saying is they've been with you.
20:05
SPEAKER_00: That's legacy right there.
20:06
SPEAKER_00: But then there's also comics that come in that are hype, you know what I mean?
20:10
SPEAKER_00: And people go and see them, you know what I mean.
20:12
SPEAKER_00: Sure.
20:13
SPEAKER_00: What what are your what are your what's your take on that?
20:15
SPEAKER_02: Like, does corpus buy into hype more than artistry?
20:21
SPEAKER_02: Uh definitely, I mean, I've just in in in working the clubs and actually seeing what um what corpus puts their money on, right?
20:33
SPEAKER_02: Which which is really what as an artist you need to be aware of, right?
20:36
SPEAKER_02: Right.
20:36
SPEAKER_02: You're asking, you know, like I said, that lady she was joking, right, right, but she spent 180 bucks to go see me.
20:43
SPEAKER_02: Right.
20:44
SPEAKER_02: That that comes with a certain responsibility, right?
20:47
SPEAKER_02: You know, you're asking people to spend money, their hard-earned money.
20:52
SPEAKER_02: That that's that that's however many hours of work they had to do, a babysitter, whatever.
20:58
SPEAKER_02: So corp does corpus buying hype they they buy spend their money on whatever excites them.
21:04
SPEAKER_02: Right?
21:05
SPEAKER_02: It's not so much that there's hype.
21:06
SPEAKER_02: They they if if if if they're buying tickets to Mr.
21:12
SPEAKER_02: TikTok and not you, you can get mad about it and corpus just like corpus just likes the hype.
21:19
SPEAKER_02: Right.
21:19
SPEAKER_02: Ask yourself, what did what did what did what did Mr.
21:23
SPEAKER_02: TikTok give them that I wasn't giving them, right?
21:26
SPEAKER_02: What did they they w they they thought like, hey, well, this guy makes me laugh on TikTok, right?
21:31
SPEAKER_02: I laugh at all this guy reels or whatever, whatever it is.
21:34
SPEAKER_02: I'm just not picking on TikTok, but what whatever it is they saw, the hype factor, right?
21:40
SPEAKER_02: They know they had an expectation.
21:43
SPEAKER_02: I don't know you, right?
21:45
SPEAKER_02: Mr.
21:46
SPEAKER_02: Guy on a flyer.
21:48
SPEAKER_02: I don't know you.
21:49
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I don't care.
21:50
SPEAKER_02: You took a funny picture, I don't care how good your flyer looks.
21:54
SPEAKER_02: At the end of the day, I don't know you, I don't know that I'm gonna have a good time when I go.
22:00
SPEAKER_02: To your show.
22:01
SPEAKER_02: And Mr.
22:02
SPEAKER_02: TikTok, I don't know for sure either, but I have a better idea because I at least know a little bit about them.
22:09
SPEAKER_02: Right.
22:09
SPEAKER_02: So if you're an unknown artist, the best thing you could do is have some online presence, even if you're not having any views, right?
22:17
SPEAKER_02: Because one thing that's benefited me, Bass Trap Comedy Club.
22:21
SPEAKER_02: One of my best markets.
22:22
SPEAKER_02: Small town outside of Austin.
22:24
SPEAKER_03: Wow.
22:24
SPEAKER_02: Right?
22:24
SPEAKER_02: I sell that room out.
22:25
SPEAKER_02: They just had me out to do their four-year anniversary for their club.
22:28
SPEAKER_02: Wow.
22:29
SPEAKER_02: Why?
22:29
SPEAKER_02: The first time I went, the promoter did his work as a promoter.
22:35
SPEAKER_02: Actually, did a did a job.
22:37
SPEAKER_02: He took my video clips.
22:39
SPEAKER_02: He sent them out in the email blast.
22:41
SPEAKER_02: People were able to see this is the guy that's coming in.
22:44
SPEAKER_02: This is the jokes he does.
22:47
SPEAKER_02: One of the first times I went out there, the lady still comes out to the show.
22:50
SPEAKER_02: She said, I didn't know who you were.
22:52
SPEAKER_02: I put your name in Google.
22:54
SPEAKER_02: This came up.
22:55
SPEAKER_02: This came up.
22:56
SPEAKER_02: I laughed at that video.
22:57
SPEAKER_02: I laughed at that video.
22:58
SPEAKER_02: I laughed at the next video.
22:59
SPEAKER_02: I bought the tickets.
23:00
SPEAKER_02: Wow.
23:01
SPEAKER_02: You know what I'm saying?
23:01
SPEAKER_02: Like people will spend money on what they know.
23:04
SPEAKER_02: And that's what Corpus does.
23:06
SPEAKER_02: They know celebrity.
23:09
SPEAKER_02: I've never heard of this guy.
23:10
SPEAKER_02: Therefore, I'm not going to spend my money on it.
23:13
SPEAKER_02: You know what I'm saying?
23:15
SPEAKER_02: Corpus, I saw it with watching Mesquite.
23:18
SPEAKER_02: What will they do?
23:19
SPEAKER_02: They will buy tickets for somebody that was on a TV show in the 90s or did a movie in two in 2001 over somebody that's on their way up.
23:33
SPEAKER_02: Right?
23:35
SPEAKER_02: Because it's limited resources, man.
23:38
SPEAKER_02: They they they will support what they know.
23:41
SPEAKER_02: It's hard to it's hard to support the unknown.
23:44
SPEAKER_02: It's it's and it's unfair for us to expect that from everybody.
23:48
SPEAKER_02: Wow.
23:48
SPEAKER_02: Right.
23:49
SPEAKER_02: We would love to do it.
23:50
SPEAKER_02: Hey, I'm just gonna go out, you know.
23:52
SPEAKER_02: If you have the time and you have the resources to do it, great.
23:55
SPEAKER_02: You should support unknown artists as much as possible.
23:58
SPEAKER_00: Right, right, right.
23:59
SPEAKER_02: Right.
23:59
SPEAKER_02: But you know, but but it's part of pain to use, man.
24:02
SPEAKER_02: You're gonna spend your time in the muck and the mud, you know, try trying to hope and convince people, you know, like I said, like these people that hey, they they didn't uh come out to see me because they saw my name, right?
24:18
SPEAKER_02: Because when they saw me for the first time, they bought a ticket to see Pauly Shore or they bought a ticket to see somebody else, and they got me on top of that.
24:29
SPEAKER_00: Wow.
24:30
SPEAKER_02: Now they they know me.
24:32
SPEAKER_02: That's why they bought the ticket.
24:34
SPEAKER_02: Because now they hey, I know what he does, I know I like his shows, I know it's always a good time, I know it's new material, I know it's you know yeah.
24:41
SPEAKER_00: I'm thinking about local businesses like how, like, say food businesses that have been around corpus for years.
24:47
SPEAKER_00: People already know what to expect, they know the they they go there because they know it, like you're saying.
24:52
SPEAKER_00: And if you're just a new, a new business spot, you gotta stay there long enough to keep building what you're building to get to that point, and then eventually they're gonna keep coming.
25:05
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
25:06
SPEAKER_00: Something like that, right?
25:07
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, would you agree?
25:08
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I mean, I'm no I'm no restaurateur, yeah.
25:11
SPEAKER_02: So, so I'm really speaking out of out of turn here, but if I had to try to draw some some parallels, it it it's that, right?
25:20
SPEAKER_02: It it's that it's Friday night.
25:22
SPEAKER_02: I got X amount of dollars to take me and the wife or me and the family out for dinner.
25:27
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, do we want to go try the new spot we don't know we like?
25:30
SPEAKER_02: We might we might like it.
25:31
SPEAKER_02: I don't know, the pictures look good, whatever.
25:34
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, people say it's good.
25:36
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, or or do we just want to, you know, let's let's go to Chili's, man.
25:40
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, is Chili's great?
25:41
SPEAKER_02: No, but we know what it tastes like.
25:44
SPEAKER_02: We all know what we're gonna order there.
25:46
SPEAKER_02: Like some people are gonna play it safe.
25:48
SPEAKER_02: Yep.
25:49
SPEAKER_02: Because that's all because that's all they can afford.
25:51
SPEAKER_02: Hey man, I can't.
25:52
SPEAKER_02: This is the one night and one night a month I get to take the family out to eat.
25:55
SPEAKER_00: Interesting.
25:56
SPEAKER_00: Yes, yes, yes.
25:57
SPEAKER_00: It's like you're holding on to your dollars.
25:58
SPEAKER_00: Like, where am I gonna put this at?
26:00
SPEAKER_00: Where am I gonna put my money in?
26:02
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, real talk, man.
26:04
SPEAKER_00: That's awesome.
26:04
SPEAKER_00: Uh uh, I want to talk about real quick uh Premier Hearing uh Solutions of South Texas.
26:09
SPEAKER_00: They're our our sponsors.
26:10
SPEAKER_00: Uh, if you have trouble hearing, you're missing out.
26:13
SPEAKER_00: Conversations with family, your music, your favorite music, moments that matter.
26:17
SPEAKER_00: Uh Premier Hearing Solutions is located right here in Corpus uh on Bear Lane.
26:21
SPEAKER_00: You can check them out.
26:22
SPEAKER_00: Uh they do in-office appointments, mobile support.
26:25
SPEAKER_00: Uh so if you if you can't go to them, they'll come to you.
26:28
SPEAKER_00: Free uh they work with most major insurance and they'll work with uh your budget.
26:33
SPEAKER_00: Call them at 361-271-3575, Premier Hearing Solutions of South Texas.
26:39
SPEAKER_00: Uh also February 6th, during Art Walk, Corpus Christi Originals presents uh Comedy Night showcase format uh with Javi himself, uh Lito and Tina La Cochina, but all three veterans in the comedy community here, uh, each doing their set doing their thing.
26:56
SPEAKER_00: Uh February 6th, tickets at Corpus Christie uh CC Originals Podcast.com forward slash comedy.
27:02
SPEAKER_00: Get your tickets there.
27:04
SPEAKER_00: Uh back to it, Javi.
27:05
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, man.
27:06
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, man.
27:07
SPEAKER_02: Changing up costume change, man.
27:08
SPEAKER_02: I dropped it.
27:09
SPEAKER_01: I dropped my hat fell off.
27:11
SPEAKER_01: I didn't want to fuck up the camera views, you know.
27:15
SPEAKER_01: You still did it?
27:15
SPEAKER_01: I still like the band.
27:16
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
27:16
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, no, it was it's not a costume, brother.
27:21
SPEAKER_02: Like, oh, the bandanas like I didn't wear it today.
27:24
SPEAKER_02: Sometimes I don't wear the glasses.
27:26
SPEAKER_02: I wear I wear what I want to wear, what I wanna wear.
27:31
SPEAKER_02: You know, but no, no, sure.
27:32
SPEAKER_02: I still rock the bandana from time to tie, you know, like I said, it just depends what you know.
27:36
SPEAKER_02: Um sometimes like the bandana doesn't go with everything I wear.
27:39
SPEAKER_02: It's like I'm not gonna that looks kind of weird, you know, with that shirt, you know, whatever.
27:43
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, do you feel that affects your your stage presence?
27:45
SPEAKER_00: Like because you're wearing glasses.
27:47
SPEAKER_00: You wear glasses?
27:48
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I know these are these are prescription.
27:50
SPEAKER_02: Oh, yeah.
27:50
SPEAKER_02: These are prescription.
27:51
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, no, these are the these are prescription.
27:55
SPEAKER_02: Uh tinted on purpose.
27:56
SPEAKER_02: Uh, you know, I've talked about it on a on a few podcasts.
27:59
SPEAKER_02: Tinted on purpose.
28:01
SPEAKER_02: I I uh I probably uh about five or six years ago, I started uh experiencing like a lot of watering on in my eyes on stage, uh and like where it wouldn't stop.
28:13
SPEAKER_02: Like like I spent like maybe like five minutes on stage at mesquite one time, like doing my set and like having like wipe my eyes, like like it's just insane watering.
28:22
SPEAKER_02: My and uh and so I knew I wanted like some some tint, but comedy is very dependent on on your facial feet, you know, be people being able to see your eyes, whatever.
28:35
SPEAKER_02: So I was like, when I went to go get new glasses, I was you know, they always ask you, they're like, Oh, do you want sunglasses?
28:41
SPEAKER_02: And I was like, No, I don't want sunglasses.
28:42
SPEAKER_02: I go, but let me ask you a question.
28:44
SPEAKER_02: I go, what what a like like can I get sunglasses that aren't dark?
28:50
SPEAKER_02: Like she goes, what do you mean?
28:51
SPEAKER_02: I go, like, like, like they're light.
28:53
SPEAKER_02: Like, can you still see my eyes?
28:55
SPEAKER_02: Like, does it offer a little bit?
28:56
SPEAKER_02: She goes, Yeah, yeah, you can get like different percentage on on them.
29:01
SPEAKER_02: You know, I didn't know that.
29:02
SPEAKER_02: I just thought sunglasses were sunglasses.
29:04
SPEAKER_02: Like, she's like, No, no, you can get like 30%, 20%.
29:08
SPEAKER_02: Like, I think 20% was at least state.
29:11
SPEAKER_02: Okay, and I kind of broke it down for her.
29:12
SPEAKER_02: I go, I can get on stage, I'm a comedian, you know.
29:15
SPEAKER_02: I want people to be able to, I still want you to be able to see my eyes.
29:17
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
29:18
SPEAKER_02: And she's like, Oh, I would probably like this green or like this yellow.
29:21
SPEAKER_02: Oh, cool.
29:21
SPEAKER_02: And I dug the yellow, and I was like, Okay, well, I'll try it out.
29:24
SPEAKER_02: And if I don't like it, well, it doesn't matter.
29:26
SPEAKER_02: I'll just I bought two pairs of glasses, basically.
29:29
SPEAKER_02: Basically, and uh and I dug it, and I I think I was already there wearing the bandana at that point.
29:35
SPEAKER_02: So the bandana, I'll tell the bandana story because people you're the second podcast in like two weeks to like ask me about the bandana.
29:43
SPEAKER_02: Uh so I wear the bandana.
29:46
SPEAKER_02: The bandana was when I started growing my hair out, I started wearing the bandana, kind of just keep my hair back and keep sweat out of my eyes and that kind of thing.
29:53
SPEAKER_02: And we were in San Antonio, we do a lot of shows in San Antonio.
29:57
SPEAKER_02: Like, our it's it's our biggest weekend of the year on the Chingo Bling tour.
30:00
SPEAKER_02: We do we it's we very frequently have had to add shows to that weekend, like so.
30:06
SPEAKER_02: It's anywhere, six, seven, eight shows.
30:08
SPEAKER_02: I think it's the most we've ever done there.
30:10
SPEAKER_02: And um, you know, we're we're we're in the green room.
30:14
SPEAKER_02: I got the bandana on.
30:15
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, you know, I'm getting ready because I'm coming coming from the hotel and whatever.
30:18
SPEAKER_02: I got the bandana on.
30:20
SPEAKER_02: I'm fixing it, take it off.
30:22
SPEAKER_02: And Jingo was the one that he goes, he goes, Hey, why don't you just like do the bandana on?
30:27
SPEAKER_02: I'm like, nah, I'm not gonna go on stage wearing a bandana.
30:29
SPEAKER_02: That looks yeah, that looks like hacky or you know, you know, you know, whatever.
30:34
SPEAKER_02: Oh wow.
30:34
SPEAKER_01: He goes, nah, just wear it.
30:35
SPEAKER_01: It looks good, whatever.
30:36
SPEAKER_01: I'm like, all right, you know, whatever.
30:39
SPEAKER_02: Whatever.
30:39
SPEAKER_02: And then people kind of responded to to it, and then you know, it's always there's oh there was always uh this uh when I started comedy, you know, they were like, Oh, you do have to have a thing.
30:53
SPEAKER_02: You know, Gabriel wore the the Hawaiian shirts and so you know, so so it and I never found that thing.
31:01
SPEAKER_02: Wow.
31:02
SPEAKER_02: In it in I tried different things.
31:04
SPEAKER_02: Did you really?
31:05
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah, you know, you know, and I I I coming up, I I used to wear uh uh dick the Dicky shirts, like the the Dicky work shirts.
31:16
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
31:16
SPEAKER_02: I I wore I had those in like a bunch of different colors.
31:19
SPEAKER_02: Wow.
31:20
SPEAKER_02: And I would wear those.
31:21
SPEAKER_02: I wore those for a long time.
31:22
SPEAKER_02: Uh I had a Dolito uh um my homie uh rest in peace, uh Renee Renee Oridialis.
31:31
SPEAKER_02: Uh when the straight out of Compton movie came out, yeah, he did the straight out of corpus shirts.
31:35
SPEAKER_03: Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.
31:36
SPEAKER_02: And uh and I had bought one just for myself, just because I like the shirt.
31:41
SPEAKER_02: Uh ended up posting it.
31:42
SPEAKER_02: He ended up selling a whole bunch that year.
31:45
SPEAKER_02: And then he called me up and he goes, Hey man, like um thanks for like promoting the shirts.
31:50
SPEAKER_02: Uh, I have when you get a chance, stop, stop by, I have something for you.
31:54
SPEAKER_02: Wow.
31:54
SPEAKER_02: And uh I rolled I rolled up and he had the shirt in like five different colors.
32:00
SPEAKER_02: Wow.
32:00
SPEAKER_02: He had like red, blue, black, green one.
32:04
SPEAKER_02: And so that became my stage uniform for a long time, like on the road.
32:09
SPEAKER_02: Like I was like I said, I was already nationally touring by then.
32:12
SPEAKER_02: So I would go on stage wearing a straight out of corpus shirt.
32:16
SPEAKER_02: You know, people kind of like, oh, it's straight, yeah, straight out of corpus, whatever, like cool shirt, still never like think.
32:23
SPEAKER_02: But for some reason, the glasses, the bandana kind of I don't know, it it kind of helped like people like, oh okay, that's what that guy looks like.
32:33
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, right.
32:33
SPEAKER_02: And I even it even became a shirt.
32:35
SPEAKER_02: I have a shirt that's it's not even my face, it's just my my hair, my hair with the with the glasses and the and the bandana, and people love that shirt.
32:44
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, you know, I tell them, I go, uh you know, a lot of people tell them it's Willie Nelson, like whatever.
32:49
SPEAKER_02: I'm thinking like Duck Dynasty, Doug Dynasty, that's uh like you know, LinkedIn on Facebook, uh Miguel, what's going on?
32:57
SPEAKER_02: Tuning in from the West Side West Side from Los Cincinnati's man.
33:01
SPEAKER_00: The G-O-A-T, the GOAT.
33:03
SPEAKER_02: Oh, thank you.
33:05
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, well, so what?
33:06
SPEAKER_00: Oh, you sorry, when you say something?
33:08
SPEAKER_00: No, no, no, go ahead.
33:09
SPEAKER_00: Craft Evolution.
33:09
SPEAKER_00: So episode one, you were talking about USA Today, uh riding 30 minutes daily writing over at High Hill Restaurant, right?
33:16
SPEAKER_00: Was it something like that?
33:17
SPEAKER_02: Oh my Theo's please.
33:19
SPEAKER_02: No, no, hi Hole, yeah, yeah, yeah.
33:21
SPEAKER_00: And then so, and then now you're like uh I was listening to shout out to uh That Dude Docks podcast, that dude talks podcast, Chris Longodia.
33:30
SPEAKER_00: Uh you said, I like not knowing uh what I'm about to say.
33:35
SPEAKER_00: So, like you like not knowing what you're about to say.
33:38
SPEAKER_00: Is that what you said on there?
33:39
SPEAKER_00: As opposed to writing 30 minutes a day or whatever.
33:43
SPEAKER_00: What's what's the so what happened between from there to there in that time?
33:48
SPEAKER_02: So I said I said what what not?
33:51
SPEAKER_02: I said reading USA today and like like writing 30 minutes uh off of the whatever you read.
33:57
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, like okay, so your craft.
33:59
SPEAKER_00: So when you first started, you were writing 30 minutes a day.
34:01
SPEAKER_00: Right, yeah.
34:01
SPEAKER_00: So now you're just kind of like oh, okay, okay.
34:04
SPEAKER_00: I guess the evolution from there to now, right, right.
34:06
SPEAKER_02: So I think the the last time we talked about the writing is I was telling you that that my my comedy writing had taken up a much more organic uh writing style, and that's still the case uh for myself, right?
34:24
SPEAKER_02: Um so when I first started, it's it's all about learning to write a joke and finding your voice, right?
34:31
SPEAKER_02: And and so so the first thing you need to do is you need to learn joke structure.
34:35
SPEAKER_02: And and the best thing I could still to this day recommend to to starting out comics is you gotta spend time, learn how to write about different things, right?
34:46
SPEAKER_02: You should know, yes, write your write your story, but you still should know how to write a joke about just something you heard on the news, some some something you saw in a magazine, something that that happened at work, like write it.
35:01
SPEAKER_02: Even if it's not gonna become part of your your set, it's still practice in in comedy writing.
35:08
SPEAKER_02: Now, once you find your voice, like I said, 10 years in, COVID happened, I go through this part where I'm not afraid to not be on stage all the time.
35:20
SPEAKER_02: I don't need it for developing material.
35:22
SPEAKER_02: When I write a joke now, one, it's not pen to paper, hardly ever, for myself.
35:30
SPEAKER_02: Uh it's more just a thought.
35:32
SPEAKER_02: Okay, if maybe I'll jot it down to my phone, like, hey, you won't joke about this.
35:37
SPEAKER_02: If if if I might peruse it before I go on stage, you know, for a show.
35:43
SPEAKER_02: Uh, but really, it's just kind of in in the moment, whenever I go on stage, uh, you know, I'll think of two or three things on the way.
35:52
SPEAKER_02: If I'm on the road, I'm like, oh, I'm doing Austin.
35:55
SPEAKER_02: What can I say about Austin today?
35:57
SPEAKER_02: You know, I'm kind of like thinking, okay, cool.
35:59
SPEAKER_02: And that's the first five minutes I'm on stage.
36:02
SPEAKER_02: It's whatever I thought of on the on the way to the car.
36:04
SPEAKER_02: If it works, great.
36:07
SPEAKER_02: Now it's that now I remember that joke and it's part of my set now.
36:11
SPEAKER_00: Okay.
36:12
SPEAKER_02: It's in my tool bag now, right?
36:13
SPEAKER_02: I can you know, and from there, you know, that's how one the show's always fresh because even if you saw me last week, the first five minutes were completely different.
36:23
SPEAKER_02: Wow.
36:24
SPEAKER_02: Right.
36:24
SPEAKER_02: And maybe and if I'm doing that for every single show or every single market that I'm going to, right?
36:30
SPEAKER_02: Every single week, then there's a good chance that I get a good bit out of that that I can incorporate into my set.
36:37
SPEAKER_02: Okay.
36:39
SPEAKER_00: So you work on that one particular joke with the different times that you show up on stage.
36:43
SPEAKER_00: Is that what you're saying?
36:44
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
36:44
SPEAKER_00: So that's interesting to me.
36:46
SPEAKER_00: And so is it memorization, like I'm a you know what I'm saying?
36:52
SPEAKER_00: Or is it just key points and then yeah, rocket with your voice for those through those key points?
36:59
SPEAKER_02: There's it's definitely a lot of muscle memory.
37:01
SPEAKER_02: I'm not gonna say that.
37:02
SPEAKER_02: Uh I'm not gonna tell you that I've never forgotten a joke.
37:05
SPEAKER_02: Right because that's not that's not that's not true.
37:07
SPEAKER_02: But for some reason, once I tell a joke, it's it's in there.
37:12
SPEAKER_02: I don't never completely forgot the joke.
37:14
SPEAKER_02: Okay.
37:15
SPEAKER_02: It might take it might take me a little bit to to get back to it, but it's always there.
37:23
SPEAKER_02: Wow.
37:24
SPEAKER_02: It's always it's it's always one once I tell it, it's it's it's always there.
37:28
SPEAKER_02: Like I I can maybe uh I'm not a mus musician like like you are by by any any uh measure, but I could I can kind of liken it to you you learn a song, you haven't played in forever, right?
37:42
SPEAKER_02: Right.
37:43
SPEAKER_02: But if someone starts playing it, you know, hum a few hum a few bars.
37:47
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, you can't, yeah, yeah, yeah.
37:50
SPEAKER_02: Okay, okay.
37:50
SPEAKER_02: And and before you know it, now you're playing the now you're playing the song again, right?
37:54
SPEAKER_00: You kind of jolt in that memory to try to remember it, right?
37:58
SPEAKER_02: It's it's always there.
37:58
SPEAKER_02: In fact, when I did uh my last big show at the big room at Mesquite, um, you know, it was kind of a probably one of the biggest shows I had done here headlining myself.
38:10
SPEAKER_02: You know, and and it was a big moment for me.
38:13
SPEAKER_02: A lot of people in the room.
38:14
SPEAKER_02: I knew a lot of people were coming out, they hadn't seen me in a while.
38:17
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, you know, I made it a point to where where at one point in the show I kind of like paused and stopped the show and said, hey, like, you know, I've been doing this for over a decade now.
38:27
SPEAKER_02: Yeah you know, um, just out of curiosity, 2011's when I started.
38:31
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I could just out of curiosity, who thinks in this room they've been seeing me the longest?
38:39
SPEAKER_02: Wow, right?
38:40
SPEAKER_02: And have people I saw you and I saw you with so so and so at what we're okay, that was probably like 2014.
38:46
SPEAKER_02: Any anyone can even be 2014.
38:49
SPEAKER_02: I think we got to somebody that had seen me like for the first time in 2012.
38:52
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
38:52
SPEAKER_02: I go, okay, guy they saw me in 2012.
38:55
SPEAKER_02: The first time you saw me, what was your favorite joke?
38:57
SPEAKER_02: Wow that you heard me say, you know, and he said something something about uh your cousin dating black guys.
39:06
SPEAKER_02: And I'm like, oh okay.
39:09
SPEAKER_02: So I had to go back to like I can know he goes, he goes, Oh uh, yeah, you you're about to your cousin, your cousin dating black guys, and then they come to the barbecue.
39:18
SPEAKER_02: It's like, okay, I know what joke you're talking about.
39:20
SPEAKER_02: I was like, let me I don't do this joke anymore.
39:23
SPEAKER_02: It's kind of I've kind of grown out of it, but let me, you know, kind of go, you know, you know, set it up and and and went back into it.
39:32
SPEAKER_00: Wow, man, that's awesome, man.
39:34
SPEAKER_02: You know, so so like I said, it's always in there.
39:36
SPEAKER_00: I don't I don't do the joke anymore, but you know how long did it take for you to find your like your voice, like your okay, so what is voice?
39:44
SPEAKER_00: Your voice is only specifically you because it's you, right?
39:48
SPEAKER_00: Is that what you would say it is?
39:49
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
39:50
SPEAKER_00: And then how how did you like how long did it take for you to develop that?
39:54
SPEAKER_00: You know what I'm saying?
39:55
SPEAKER_00: How do you get there?
39:57
SPEAKER_02: A voice again, I'm gonna keep drawing the parallels with music.
40:01
SPEAKER_02: If you know, uh I enjoy music, I'm not a musician, but but but it's like um I don't I don't want to say it's like an intangible, right?
40:11
SPEAKER_02: Because you you can in music you might call it like for a guitar player, you might say their tone.
40:17
SPEAKER_00: Okay, right?
40:18
SPEAKER_00: Yes.
40:19
SPEAKER_02: You know, you hear you you you put on a BB King record and you hear that you know it's King.
40:25
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, he can play one note, yeah, and you know it's BB King.
40:28
SPEAKER_02: Yes, right?
40:30
SPEAKER_02: You know, whatever.
40:31
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, you know, I'm thinking of Dying Bag Darrow.
40:33
SPEAKER_02: Dying Bag Darrow, you you know you just hear you hear it.
40:37
SPEAKER_02: You know it's him.
40:37
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, you know it's him.
40:38
SPEAKER_02: If you hear someone trying to emulate them, you know who they're trying to who they're trying to emulate.
40:43
SPEAKER_02: Uh, but like if you say that, like what makes a good guitar player, right?
40:46
SPEAKER_02: Their tone, uh, their phrasings, right?
40:51
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
40:51
SPEAKER_02: Um in comedy, we say we call it cadence, right?
40:57
SPEAKER_02: Comics cadence.
40:58
SPEAKER_02: You know, um Felipe Sparza has one of the probably the most probably second to Mitch Hedberg.
41:06
SPEAKER_02: Wow, right?
41:07
SPEAKER_02: Mitch Hedberg, every you you know, you do if you do a Mitch Hedberg joke, every everybody knows.
41:12
SPEAKER_00: Wow.
41:12
SPEAKER_02: You know, you can even do it in the style of there's a guy on uh the blowing up a little controversial off the Kill Tony show that it was like, oh, he's emulating Mitch Hedberg.
41:26
SPEAKER_02: He's not doing his jokes, but he he's his essence, right, his voice is very reprimand reminiscent of and it's so iconic, right?
41:37
SPEAKER_02: Um and then but there is an intangible to it because it's also you can tell when a comic's doing a joke that's not true to their voice.
41:51
SPEAKER_02: At least I at least I can.
41:53
SPEAKER_02: And I think and I think everyone else can too.
41:56
SPEAKER_02: Right?
41:56
SPEAKER_02: When you hear jokes, it's like it's a funny joke, right?
42:00
SPEAKER_02: It's not not a funny joke, but it's not on brand for them.
42:04
SPEAKER_02: Like that's not a joke I would expect to hear from so and so.
42:08
SPEAKER_02: It's like now I kind of tell these like my voice is I tell these stories about my family, about myself.
42:20
SPEAKER_02: There's a lot of wordplay, there there's you know, sarcasm, whatever, some like roasting, you know, um I I do things with my hand, you know, I'll I'll I'll do movements and act outs and whatever.
42:37
SPEAKER_02: If I if you came to see my show, you came to see me at uh Corpus Christi Originals thing, and you say, I'm gonna go see Javi Luna, and all of a sudden I don't take the mic off the stand.
42:52
SPEAKER_02: The stand's just there.
42:54
SPEAKER_02: The mic's there, and um So I went to the grocery store yesterday and blah blah blah.
43:02
SPEAKER_02: Whatever.
43:03
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
43:04
SPEAKER_02: Okay, that's funny, Javi, but that's not Hobby.
43:09
SPEAKER_02: That's not Javi.
43:09
SPEAKER_02: Javi's not a one-liner comic.
43:12
SPEAKER_02: That's not his voice, that's not the that's not his his style.
43:16
SPEAKER_02: Right.
43:17
SPEAKER_02: Right?
43:17
SPEAKER_02: It's like here, it's you know, and not that's not to say that I can't do those jokes.
43:21
SPEAKER_02: I can.
43:22
SPEAKER_00: Right.
43:22
SPEAKER_02: I can write one-liners.
43:24
SPEAKER_02: When I first started out, I used to write a lot of one-liner style jokes, you know.
43:30
SPEAKER_02: Um I got some advice from a comic that that advised me to consider going a different route.
43:36
SPEAKER_02: And it and it and it probably, you know, was a big part of my success, you know, in in for me.
43:44
SPEAKER_02: That's what worked for me.
43:45
SPEAKER_02: That's what what what your voice is, finding what works for you.
43:50
SPEAKER_02: You know, so he, you know, he told me, uh, you know, and uh I have no problem saying his name, like because it wasn't a bad thing, um, but Steve Chirino, you know, he he gave me a lot.
44:00
SPEAKER_02: Of advice the first handful of years that I was doing comedy, and I had done a show with him, and I was still doing very much one-liner style, quick, one-off jokes, not very personal.
44:12
SPEAKER_02: And he, and you know, he told he told me, he goes, You know, you gotta make people remember you.
44:17
SPEAKER_02: You they gotta feel like they know you.
44:18
SPEAKER_02: And your jokes right now, they're just jokes.
44:22
SPEAKER_02: Anybody could get up there and say that joke.
44:24
SPEAKER_02: Oh, and it would get a laugh.
44:26
SPEAKER_02: What does what does your material say about you?
44:29
SPEAKER_02: You know, um, Billy Crystal in his book, still folding them, he he talks about getting told something very similarly by his uh manager.
44:39
SPEAKER_02: You know, he told him, Oh, great act, funny.
44:43
SPEAKER_02: You're still you're st you're not leaving a tip.
44:46
SPEAKER_02: You're not leaving a tip.
44:47
SPEAKER_02: And that was his was his the way his manager put it.
44:50
SPEAKER_02: And and the same thing, but you're not giving them a piece of yourself up.
44:54
SPEAKER_02: Wow.
44:54
SPEAKER_02: Because that's what connects people.
44:56
SPEAKER_02: That's that's what people have.
44:57
SPEAKER_02: They they want to believe in something, they want to feel connected to you.
45:01
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, you know, so so if they can leave after that hour, 30 minutes, even if you're on stage for 10 minutes, you know, do they feel uh connected to you?
45:12
SPEAKER_02: They feel like they they they know something about you.
45:15
SPEAKER_02: You weren't just a guy that got up there and read some jokes off of a notepad.
45:19
SPEAKER_00: Oh wow, you know, like music where the the singer might share something about himself uh uh kind of in the same the same vein right there.
45:28
SPEAKER_00: Right.
45:28
SPEAKER_02: So someone someone that plays music versus someone that performs, right?
45:34
SPEAKER_02: You know, yeah uh yeah, for sure.
45:37
SPEAKER_00: Total differences, yeah, yeah, for sure.
45:39
SPEAKER_00: So you definitely gotta share stuff about yourself.
45:42
SPEAKER_00: How close well, you know, I don't know.
45:47
SPEAKER_02: Uh I I don't know that it's necessarily like does it have to be about yourself or does it have to be true to who you are?
45:53
SPEAKER_02: Like I said if I was to get up there and and try to like be overly urban, that's not who I am.
46:03
SPEAKER_02: You know what I'm saying?
46:04
SPEAKER_02: I I'm I'm I'm you know uh like don't like I think a lot of younger comics fall into the trap of trying to write what they think the audience will find funny, write what you think is funny and find a way to communicate that to the audience that will serve you a lot better than than playing the game of what are people gonna laugh at?
46:28
SPEAKER_00: Okay.
46:29
SPEAKER_00: So do you think it's in part because the audience knows people and they seem the type of person that you might be, and whenever you say it out loud, they're like, okay, I can relate because I've related to somebody that's like that.
46:46
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I mean familiarity uh is is a part, but also you can play with it too, right?
46:57
SPEAKER_02: Because people see what they see, they're gonna make they're gonna make their their judgments just off of what the way you look.
47:05
SPEAKER_02: The way you get as soon as you get there just uh before you even say a word, they've already made up some mind.
47:12
SPEAKER_02: So so you can play the game of okay, let me take them down the rabbit hole, right?
47:18
SPEAKER_02: Of let me give you a little bit of what you thought it was, and now let me show you what it actually is.
47:23
SPEAKER_02: Right.
47:23
SPEAKER_02: And by the end, you've kind of you've taken them on this ride of like, you know, when he got up there, I thought he was gonna say this.
47:31
SPEAKER_02: And he did, but then he said this also, and now I realize it was what I thought, but it was also this.
47:37
SPEAKER_02: And and and now I'm intrigued because I I I got it right, but I got it wrong at the same time.
47:43
SPEAKER_02: And I don't know what the fuck is is going on.
47:45
SPEAKER_02: Uh um uh Richard Townsend uh Meteor Man.
47:51
SPEAKER_02: Okay.
47:52
SPEAKER_02: He uh if you if you YouTube, I'm sure it still comes up.
47:55
SPEAKER_02: Uh and I don't remember what it was.
47:56
SPEAKER_02: It it wasn't on the Apollo.
47:59
SPEAKER_02: I think it was uh at a night on the improv.
48:01
SPEAKER_02: If you look up Richard Townsend Night at the improv, I think he um he did this great bit, you know, black guy, he he he he gets on stage and and I don't remember where he's wearing wearing, but he does the whole first like two minutes of a set in a British accent.
48:21
SPEAKER_02: Oh wow and like doesn't let up from the bit.
48:25
unknown: Damn.
48:25
SPEAKER_02: Like he's doing the whole first two minutes and then he finally breaks.
48:29
SPEAKER_02: It's like, man, can you imagine if I was up here talking like that the whole time?
48:33
SPEAKER_02: You know, you know, kind of like that, like playing, you know, you can you so is it always just like you, oh I have to be completely by by you know by the book, exactly who I am.
48:44
SPEAKER_02: No, you you can you can play mind games with the crowd, right?
48:48
SPEAKER_02: And and and play with their sensibilities.
48:51
SPEAKER_02: But at the end of the day, you can't you can't uh uh you can't you can't fake it, right?
49:02
SPEAKER_02: Latino comics talking to you the worst, the worst at it that I've ever that I've ever seen.
49:10
SPEAKER_02: Maybe it's because it's close to home.
49:13
SPEAKER_02: If you listen George Lopez is George Lopez because he's George Lopez.
49:22
SPEAKER_02: The stuff he talks about, his not being raised by his parents, his stuff with his grandma, his aunt.
49:31
SPEAKER_02: That that was him.
49:32
SPEAKER_02: He lived that life.
49:36
SPEAKER_02: Don't get on stage and talk about the chancla if you didn't live that experience.
49:41
SPEAKER_00: Nah.
49:42
SPEAKER_02: Because you think that's what Latinos want to hear.
49:45
SPEAKER_02: Because they will sniff you out.
49:49
SPEAKER_02: They they they know they know, hey, you're not about you're not about it's the same thing like like trying to act gangster if you're not gangster.
49:58
SPEAKER_02: Real recognized real.
49:59
SPEAKER_02: I know you're not about that.
50:00
SPEAKER_02: Right?
50:01
SPEAKER_02: Same thing, like, oh, let me go.
50:03
SPEAKER_02: If you don't speak Spanish, why are you gonna get on stage and act like you speak Spanish?
50:08
SPEAKER_02: Let me drop some let me drop some Spanish in my set so that they think you know, so I can get the Latinos on my side because they will sniff you out.
50:15
SPEAKER_02: I made that I'm not a uh a heavy Spanish speaker, I can get by, right?
50:18
SPEAKER_02: But I I don't speak Spanish on my daily life, right?
50:22
SPEAKER_02: I made that mistake in El Paso one time.
50:25
SPEAKER_02: I said something, a line in Spanish, and I it you know, and I I messed it up.
50:31
SPEAKER_02: Whatever.
50:32
SPEAKER_02: They call the crowd called me out on it.
50:34
SPEAKER_02: They're like, what?
50:36
SPEAKER_02: Like like you know, don't don't put yourself in that situation.
50:39
SPEAKER_02: Be true, hey man, if you don't if you if you if you you don't speak the language, don't don't try to.
50:45
SPEAKER_02: You know what I'm saying?
50:46
SPEAKER_02: If you if you if you're uh what's his name?
50:48
SPEAKER_02: If you're a fucking uh Papa Dot from Eight Mile, you know your parents' marriage have real good marriage.
50:58
SPEAKER_00: You went to a private school, you know, be that.
51:02
SPEAKER_00: Be that, be that it's okay, man.
51:04
SPEAKER_00: Wow, that's so crazy, bro.
51:06
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, but I'm listening, I was listening to a book.
51:08
SPEAKER_00: Uh I don't uh I don't remember the the guy's name.
51:11
SPEAKER_00: It's a comedy book.
51:12
SPEAKER_00: Robert Townsend, thank you for the correction.
51:13
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, Bobby Penya commented Robert's Robert Townsend is the man.
51:17
SPEAKER_00: But it was talking about how like Richard Pryor was using his pain.
51:22
SPEAKER_00: Absolutely, right?
51:23
SPEAKER_00: So do you do that?
51:25
SPEAKER_00: And like how close do you get to that pain?
51:28
SPEAKER_00: Or is something too painful to where you're like, nah, maybe I'm not gonna talk about that.
51:32
SPEAKER_00: Or like, you know what I'm saying?
51:34
SPEAKER_00: Like, what's the what's the border?
51:35
SPEAKER_02: Like, like what's the so Mesquite Street uh commented a little earlier, they said heartbroken still joking.
51:41
SPEAKER_02: That was that was one of my uh that that's one of my eras for my Happy Luna eras tour.
51:47
SPEAKER_02: Uh heartbroken joke.
51:48
SPEAKER_02: So when I talked about earlier, uh when when my ex-wife let me know it was over, um put me in a very deep dark place.
52:02
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, sure.
52:03
SPEAKER_02: Uh that night I had packed up all my stuff, I had my shit in the back of my car.
52:10
SPEAKER_02: Um John Roman, who who was who was running uh uh was running the shows at Mesquite at that time.
52:17
SPEAKER_02: I think it was still Chuckles Comedy Club back then, actually, if I'm not mistaken.
52:20
SPEAKER_02: Uh but anyway, they had Chris Catan in town that night.
52:24
SPEAKER_02: Chris Catan was a newer newer to the stand-up world.
52:28
SPEAKER_02: He didn't have a lot of time.
52:29
SPEAKER_02: They need to fill some time.
52:31
SPEAKER_03: Wow.
52:31
SPEAKER_02: They said, hey, John goes, hey, I saw you're going through some shit right now.
52:37
SPEAKER_02: Well, I could really use somebody fill some time in on your show.
52:41
SPEAKER_02: You want to come out?
52:43
SPEAKER_02: Wow.
52:44
SPEAKER_02: Uh so I went with with with all my belongings in the back of my Crown Victoria, I drove right down here, down the street to Mesquite Street, and I went on stage and I let it all out.
52:56
SPEAKER_02: And probably to this day, probably one of my most um memorable sets with left with the standing ovation.
53:05
SPEAKER_02: I thought I was gonna quit comedy that night.
53:06
SPEAKER_02: Wow, for that.
53:07
SPEAKER_02: Uh and um I ended up not.
53:10
SPEAKER_02: A lot of people talked me out of it.
53:11
SPEAKER_02: I I because I told the crowd that night this might be my last show, because I don't know if I could keep going after this.
53:16
SPEAKER_02: I just had to get some stuff off my chest.
53:19
SPEAKER_02: Uh a lot of people, a lot of a lot of comics that I look up to and respect called me and said, hey, like we know you're going through some stuff.
53:28
SPEAKER_02: Don't throw it all away just yet.
53:30
SPEAKER_02: Like, like you're just starting to I was still just starting to travel, you know, a bit.
53:36
SPEAKER_02: I was maybe about about uh just under a year into traveling.
53:40
SPEAKER_02: They're like, keep going, like do what you gotta do for your marriage or whatever, but but keep going.
53:47
SPEAKER_02: Um I was on the road, John and I had a show uh with Flo Hernandez up in Dallas at Hyenas Comedy Club, and um I remember being I was you know doing the whole recording thing.
54:02
SPEAKER_02: You might have I don't know if it was Snapchat or whatever back back in the day.
54:05
SPEAKER_02: Pre-Tik Tok.
54:06
SPEAKER_02: Pre-Tik tock days.
54:08
SPEAKER_02: Was it mine?
54:09
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I don't think it was mine.
54:10
SPEAKER_02: I never did buy it.
54:11
SPEAKER_02: But anyway, I was I was talking to the camera and I was saying, I was saying the things we were at a stop, like, hey man, just want to let you know I'm on Dallas doing the show.
54:20
SPEAKER_02: You know, uh, I know some of y'all worried about me.
54:22
SPEAKER_02: Thank you for the messages.
54:23
SPEAKER_02: You know, I'm out here, yeah.
54:25
SPEAKER_02: You know, I'm heartbroken, but I'm still joking.
54:29
SPEAKER_02: And something about that people really resonated with with that idea.
54:35
SPEAKER_02: When I was putting that divorce material on stage, people were like, oh man, dude, that stuff was wrong.
54:40
SPEAKER_02: Like wow.
54:41
SPEAKER_02: Like you could feel it, like, like, you know, man, how long you how long how long you been going through the divorce?
54:47
SPEAKER_02: Like, man, this just happened like last week.
54:49
SPEAKER_02: Like this has happened.
54:50
SPEAKER_02: What do you mean?
54:51
SPEAKER_02: Like, like this is happening real, real time information coming in.
54:56
SPEAKER_02: When I got off the stage in, you know, Dallas, you know, I had my cousin text me, like, oh, she went to so-and-so and said this, that, and the other about you.
55:05
SPEAKER_02: And, you know, my cousins are there.
55:07
SPEAKER_02: I'm like, I'm I'm off stage, I'm like crying and shit.
55:10
SPEAKER_02: Like, it's real, but like I said, it became people resonated with it, it became um merch, you know, uh people really kind of kind of bought it that even when I when I go and do a show in in say like Houston, I was out there maybe about a year or so ago.
55:31
SPEAKER_02: Had a guy like, hey man, glad to see you, been seeing you for years.
55:35
SPEAKER_02: You know, um, are you gonna do any of the the the heartbroken still joking stuff?
55:41
SPEAKER_02: And I was like, nah man, like I'm you know, I got I got married again, like I'm gonna I'm in a good place.
55:48
SPEAKER_02: And that go comes to being true to yourself, right?
55:51
SPEAKER_02: I'm not I'm not that guy anymore.
55:53
SPEAKER_02: As good as as good as that material was, as funny as it was, as raw as it was, I'm I'm I'm one, whatever animosity I have, whatever feelings I had back then about my ex, about the situation, yeah, I don't feel that way anymore.
56:09
SPEAKER_02: So if I was to get up there and say those jokes now, one they wouldn't hit as hard because it's it's not real for me.
56:18
SPEAKER_02: And because it's because that's not who I am.
56:20
SPEAKER_02: I'm I'm I'm happy about it now.
56:24
SPEAKER_02: I I I evolved as a person, the situation ended up being the best thing for me, for her, wow, for our kids.
56:33
SPEAKER_02: You know what I'm saying?
56:34
SPEAKER_02: How do you how do you continue to fake being angry about something like that?
56:39
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, for sure, man.
56:40
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, so you're so you're talking about family and kids and stuff like that.
56:43
SPEAKER_00: What what's your uh so family balance?
56:46
SPEAKER_00: Uh from episode one, your youngest was three.
56:49
SPEAKER_00: She's six now, what'd you say?
56:51
SPEAKER_00: Seven.
56:52
SPEAKER_00: Seven.
56:53
SPEAKER_00: Your son's in Portland?
56:54
SPEAKER_02: My son one of them's still in Portland.
56:58
SPEAKER_02: One of them graduated from high school.
57:00
SPEAKER_02: Uh he he's back, he's with me now.
57:04
SPEAKER_02: He moved to San Antonio for a little bit, which is why another reason why I was going to San Antonio a lot.
57:09
SPEAKER_02: I put the word out quietly to a lot of comics.
57:13
SPEAKER_02: I was like, basically, um, my son's in San Antonio now.
57:18
SPEAKER_02: I want to check up on him as often as possible.
57:22
SPEAKER_02: So you can get me for really cheap.
57:27
SPEAKER_02: Give me an excuse.
57:28
SPEAKER_02: Here's the caveat.
57:30
SPEAKER_02: Give me an excuse to pop up and check on his ass, basically.
57:33
SPEAKER_02: Because every time I was in town or passing through San Antonio, I've said, hey son, let's go grab something to eat and see how you're doing.
57:41
SPEAKER_02: You know, that kind of thing.
57:42
SPEAKER_02: So that that's how that was another part to the like the San Antonio story.
57:46
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
57:46
SPEAKER_00: Wow, he's 15, you said?
57:48
SPEAKER_02: Uh so how he's 18.
57:50
SPEAKER_02: Oh well, he'll be 19 next month.
57:52
SPEAKER_00: Oh my god, bro.
57:53
SPEAKER_02: He's 19 next month, but but he's now he's now moved back uh to Corpus.
57:57
SPEAKER_02: So he's he's he's with me full time now.
57:59
SPEAKER_00: Wow.
58:00
SPEAKER_02: My my other boy's still still in Portland going to middle school out there.
58:03
SPEAKER_00: So wow, 150 shows a year.
58:07
SPEAKER_00: That has dialed back a lot.
58:09
SPEAKER_00: Wednesday through Sunday gone.
58:10
SPEAKER_02: Yep.
58:11
SPEAKER_00: How long did you sustain that?
58:15
SPEAKER_02: Uh we did that probably about that.
58:18
SPEAKER_02: That was probably about the for three or four years.
58:21
SPEAKER_02: Um, so when you're uh a feature act for somebody, right, and you're working for them, their schedule becomes your schedule.
58:31
SPEAKER_02: So, so uh, you know, um I don't talk about anybody else's business other than my own, but for whatever reasons, you know, if they're doing less shows, you're doing less shows.
58:41
SPEAKER_02: You either fill them in, you either you either fill them in with your own, you know, or you or you don't you don't work.
58:50
SPEAKER_02: So that was kind of when I started to pivot when I when I self-produced the the comedy special to try to solidify myself as a I was already getting headlining work, but I was on the road so much with Chingo I didn't have to get my own calendar.
59:05
SPEAKER_02: My my dates were filled with him because we were like I said, 150 shows a year.
59:10
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, it's a lot of work.
59:12
SPEAKER_02: You don't need you don't need, you know, I'm saying uh uh you know in you know I'll I'll like uh uh Tyrese on on uh uh too fast, too, our pockets ain't empty cut, you know.
59:24
SPEAKER_02: We were living good, you know what I'm saying?
59:25
SPEAKER_02: Merch sells good, ticket sales good, everything was good, you know.
59:30
SPEAKER_02: So I wasn't trying to do too much of oh, let me go to XYZ town and and and do the whatever bar show on a Wednesday because because shit, I was I was trying to stay home and rest because I gotta fly out tomorrow.
59:45
SPEAKER_02: Wow, you know, um I was do I was doing uh uh on the weeks that I wasn't with with Chingo, I was doing uh a winery and brewery tour.
59:54
SPEAKER_02: Uh and that guy would send me out for like a week.
59:56
SPEAKER_02: If I had a week off, I'd go out and do that.
59:58
SPEAKER_02: So I was always working.
59:59
SPEAKER_02: Uh now, you know, uh with Chingo, I mainly primarily do his Texas shows.
1:00:06
SPEAKER_02: Um and uh I headline.
1:00:10
SPEAKER_02: I headline uh, like I said, Bass Trap Comedy Club.
1:00:14
SPEAKER_02: Wow LOL Comedy Club gave me my first first night this week.
1:00:18
SPEAKER_02: Uh, you know, I think I'm supposed to be going down to the valley again sometime here there.
1:00:24
SPEAKER_02: Uh hyenas comedy club in Fort Worth.
1:00:27
SPEAKER_02: I go out normally go out there and headline once or twice a year.
1:00:31
SPEAKER_02: Um Midland, Texas, you know, Houston, Victoria, stuff like that.
1:00:36
SPEAKER_02: Uh so uh that's that's what I fill my calendar up with.
1:00:41
SPEAKER_02: But is it is is it is a date heavy?
1:00:43
SPEAKER_02: No, it's not it's it's not, but it's still it's still really good.
1:00:48
SPEAKER_02: I'm still uh I've pivoted to uh a lot more writing.
1:00:52
SPEAKER_02: I do a lot more um consulting writing for for comics.
1:00:57
SPEAKER_02: I've I built up a nice little stable of comics that that will uh hit me up for either to rewrite some of their material for them or to work shop.
1:01:09
SPEAKER_02: I'll hop on a Zoom call and workshop with them, do a do a writing session.
1:01:15
SPEAKER_02: And these are these are touring comics that have the the resources to to to pay for for that.
1:01:23
SPEAKER_00: You mentioned in uh that dude talks podcast that like you know mine being the the second act.
1:01:29
SPEAKER_02: No, not at all.
1:01:30
SPEAKER_00: You know what I mean?
1:01:30
SPEAKER_00: Like you're it's like you found your groove, you know what I mean?
1:01:33
SPEAKER_02: Oh, it's a sweet spot, man.
1:01:34
SPEAKER_02: It's cool, man.
1:01:35
SPEAKER_02: It's it's it's it's it's it's it's the greatest job in comedy, in my opinion.
1:01:40
SPEAKER_02: Now that's I'm speaking as somebody that hasn't had the true top spot, right?
1:01:44
SPEAKER_02: You say, oh, that's easy to say.
1:01:46
SPEAKER_02: But but here's the thing I've been close enough, right?
1:01:50
SPEAKER_02: Right?
1:01:50
SPEAKER_02: I've been close enough.
1:01:51
SPEAKER_02: I have I've had a front row seat.
1:01:54
SPEAKER_02: I've seen the stress that these headliners have to go through.
1:02:00
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, right.
1:02:02
SPEAKER_02: Oh, the you know, even if even if this market's good, they're on their phone looking at the next market.
1:02:08
SPEAKER_02: Uh, but but man, ticket sales in Oregon are little light.
1:02:13
SPEAKER_02: What do we gotta do?
1:02:14
SPEAKER_02: Can we do a skit?
1:02:16
SPEAKER_02: I might have to go out, I might have to go out there a day early and do the radio, you know, in you know, uh do a few podcasts, you know what I'm saying?
1:02:26
SPEAKER_02: And and and I'm here like, oh man, that's crazy.
1:02:31
SPEAKER_02: I'm gonna go take a nap.
1:02:34
SPEAKER_02: Because ain't nobody coming to see me.
1:02:37
SPEAKER_02: Wow.
1:02:37
SPEAKER_02: Right?
1:02:38
SPEAKER_02: And and that's that's the best part, right?
1:02:40
SPEAKER_02: Because because yeah, maybe you're not making their their money, but you're not doing a fraction of their work.
1:02:45
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, you're literally just getting paid to, you know, do your time on stage.
1:02:51
SPEAKER_02: Maybe you're helping them write.
1:02:54
SPEAKER_02: If you're not doing that, maybe you're helping with merch, you know, uh, or something like that.
1:03:01
SPEAKER_02: Chingo was never the kind of he's never been the like I've helped him out with merch, but he's never been dependent on me to like, oh, you need to work the merch table.
1:03:08
SPEAKER_02: You know, but if they get in a bind or whatever, you know, so crazy, you know, I'll hop in.
1:03:12
SPEAKER_02: Um, but uh and the other good part is people show up to to see the show, they didn't even know you were there.
1:03:24
SPEAKER_02: So there was no expectation.
1:03:25
SPEAKER_02: Like, who is this guy?
1:03:26
SPEAKER_02: I don't know.
1:03:27
SPEAKER_02: I don't know, but hey, he's really funny.
1:03:29
SPEAKER_02: We like him now.
1:03:30
SPEAKER_02: Let's buy his shirt.
1:03:31
SPEAKER_02: Let's let's let's take a picture with him.
1:03:34
SPEAKER_02: And and now you have a fan, and now you have a market that you can come back to, you know, and now you can tell the club, hey, I see you have a small room over there off to the side.
1:03:44
SPEAKER_02: I can come back and and sell 50 tickets there, right?
1:03:48
SPEAKER_02: You know, and and you kind of play that game, and and now you're now you have a new market that you didn't have before.
1:03:54
SPEAKER_02: It's a sweet spot, dude.
1:03:55
SPEAKER_02: To be able to to to support yourself in an art that you love and not have to deal with fame?
1:04:04
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, that's the fucking best job, dude.
1:04:08
SPEAKER_00: That's so funny, man.
1:04:10
SPEAKER_00: And it makes me think of like like the guys that are putting on the show, is it the comics themselves?
1:04:15
SPEAKER_00: Do they have an agent?
1:04:16
SPEAKER_00: You know what I mean?
1:04:17
SPEAKER_00: How different is it in tech compared to you know like you want to talk about agent?
1:04:21
SPEAKER_02: Now that now you're paying the agent and you're paying the manager, yeah, and you're paying the tour man.
1:04:25
SPEAKER_02: You know, to to talk about stress, right?
1:04:27
SPEAKER_02: Because these guys that are there, yeah, they're they're they're at the the the pinnacle of of the crap of the craft as far as public eye goes, right?
1:04:39
SPEAKER_02: But now they they they have they're employing people.
1:04:44
SPEAKER_02: Like, could you imagine?
1:04:45
SPEAKER_00: Like having employees, yeah, yeah, yeah.
1:04:47
SPEAKER_02: Like other people's livelihood depends on me keeping this afloat.
1:04:56
SPEAKER_00: That's a lot of things.
1:04:57
SPEAKER_02: If I fuck up, it touches my money.
1:05:00
SPEAKER_01: Like now I'm a now now so now now so and so's daughter can't get braces.
1:05:08
SPEAKER_02: And so and so loses their their house or their apartment, you know, because uh because I wanted to fuck around and do some do some dumb.
1:05:16
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, it can't be my dog.
1:05:17
SPEAKER_02: My dog can't get shots now, and uh you know eating my dog my dog needs hearing aids from Premier Hearing and I can't get shot out.
1:05:28
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that's awesome, man.
1:05:30
SPEAKER_00: Wow.
1:05:30
SPEAKER_00: Uh so what's next for Hobby Luna?
1:05:35
SPEAKER_02: I'm gonna keep doing me, man.
1:05:36
SPEAKER_02: I haven't I don't have no crystal ball.
1:05:38
SPEAKER_02: I'm just gonna keep writing jokes.
1:05:40
SPEAKER_02: Cool.
1:05:40
SPEAKER_02: Um I'm I'm I'm gonna um um keep putting out content as much as possible.
1:05:45
SPEAKER_02: Right now, um I'm in talks with with the the riot comedy club up in San Antonio.
1:05:50
SPEAKER_02: It's a beautifully built room.
1:05:53
SPEAKER_02: When I say built room, there's a comic that he actually with his bare hands built built that room.
1:05:58
SPEAKER_02: The riot started in Houston.
1:05:59
SPEAKER_02: They They just opened up a a um a branch in in San Antonio.
1:06:07
SPEAKER_02: It's in the basement of a of a hotel down there.
1:06:12
SPEAKER_02: Me and Bobby Pena went and checked it out.
1:06:14
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, in the basement of the Alamo, basement of the Riverwalk.
1:06:17
SPEAKER_02: Fluffy's already stopped by.
1:06:19
SPEAKER_02: It feels like a comic club in a much larger city.
1:06:23
SPEAKER_02: Which is part of when they built Mesquite.
1:06:25
SPEAKER_02: The New York comics loved mesquite because to them it felt like what they knew.
1:06:28
SPEAKER_02: Right?
1:06:28
SPEAKER_02: Because you gotta go up the stairs.
1:06:30
SPEAKER_02: Right, right, right.
1:06:31
SPEAKER_02: Small dark room.
1:06:32
SPEAKER_02: That's where comedy is built.
1:06:34
SPEAKER_02: That's where comics feel at home.
1:06:36
SPEAKER_02: Give me a small dark room where everyone's eyes are on me with the lights, one mic.
1:06:42
SPEAKER_02: That's all I need.
1:06:43
SPEAKER_02: No flat.
1:06:43
SPEAKER_02: I don't need a fucking video screen behind me.
1:06:47
SPEAKER_02: Lights and smoke.
1:06:49
SPEAKER_02: Don't need, don't need it.
1:06:51
SPEAKER_02: Get fire on these bitches, you know, fucking Kevin Hart.
1:06:55
SPEAKER_02: You know, that's that's for stadiums.
1:06:57
SPEAKER_02: But comedy, comedy is done in a small dark room, and that's what the riot is.
1:07:01
SPEAKER_02: So I'm I'm I'm in talks with them because the name of the game now is is clips, man.
1:07:06
SPEAKER_02: Can you get and are you putting them out fast enough?
1:07:10
SPEAKER_02: And can you get them in a good controlled environment with good sound and good video?
1:07:17
SPEAKER_02: Yo, so uh so I'm gonna start dropping sets up there.
1:07:21
SPEAKER_02: Probably I'm gonna try to get my best to get out there once a month, do a couple spots.
1:07:27
SPEAKER_02: They do like 15-20 minute spots so I can start getting more clips.
1:07:33
SPEAKER_02: Uh specials doing what it's doing, but I got I got probably two hours of material since then that that hasn't gotten put out.
1:07:41
SPEAKER_02: And uh I don't know that I'm I I'm going to have the resources to do another special anytime soon, yeah.
1:07:48
SPEAKER_02: Right?
1:07:49
SPEAKER_02: Because it costs money to self-produce a special.
1:07:51
SPEAKER_02: But what I can do is I I I can get myself a good camera and I can edit my own shit and and put it out.
1:07:56
SPEAKER_02: I can do that.
1:07:58
SPEAKER_02: So uh that's what I'm gonna focus on on doing right now.
1:08:01
SPEAKER_02: Uh I'm still taking my cracks at it, man.
1:08:03
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, you know.
1:08:03
SPEAKER_00: How do you feel about like because I've heard comics say burn material?
1:08:08
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, that's yeah, no, I was Mr.
1:08:10
SPEAKER_02: Don't Burn Your Material.
1:08:12
SPEAKER_02: Like I was talking about my buddy David Sefuentes, rest in peace, dude.
1:08:15
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
1:08:16
SPEAKER_02: I used to I used to go back and forth with him all the time because the way I found David was I started comedy four weeks after him.
1:08:24
SPEAKER_02: I googled comedy in corpus Christie, where do I do it?
1:08:29
SPEAKER_02: Wow, and up pops this dude on YouTube, David Sefuentes' fourth ever open mic in Corpus Christie at House of Rock.
1:08:42
SPEAKER_01: I was like, I was just at House of Rock.
1:08:44
SPEAKER_01: I was like, this guy, I go, this he did this, he was there the day after I was there.
1:08:48
SPEAKER_01: Like, what did that his fourth ever open mic?
1:08:50
SPEAKER_01: I go, dude, why are you putting your open mic sets on YouTube?
1:08:55
SPEAKER_01: This is fucking nuts.
1:08:56
SPEAKER_01: Like it's not good.
1:08:58
SPEAKER_01: Like, why are you why would you do this to yourself?
1:09:01
SPEAKER_02: Right?
1:09:02
SPEAKER_02: And and I and he did that every single set this dude recorded.
1:09:06
SPEAKER_02: And we're talking about back in 2011.
1:09:08
SPEAKER_02: Wow.
1:09:08
SPEAKER_02: Every single set this guy ever did, he recorded.
1:09:11
SPEAKER_02: He recorded, I have a I have a uh DVD at home that some someone gave me one one of his one of his uh sets that he had him record.
1:09:20
SPEAKER_02: And um it's not it's not mine to do anything with it, but it but I have it and I watch it every now and then.
1:09:26
SPEAKER_02: Uh and um, you know, I was but I was that guy.
1:09:30
SPEAKER_02: Don't he don't bring your material.
1:09:32
SPEAKER_02: Man, the the once you start traveling a little bit, you realize not how big the the world is, man, and how insignificant your footprint is, right?
1:09:49
SPEAKER_02: When you when you when you think about you're talking about millions, hundreds of millions of people, yeah, right, just in this country alone, and you tell me you went viral because one million people saw it.
1:10:07
SPEAKER_02: If you have one million views and that's that is even really unique people spread out all over the globe, didn't nobody see your shit?
1:10:16
SPEAKER_02: You're talking about a fraction of a fraction of a percent.
1:10:21
SPEAKER_02: You're worried about burning material, someone saw it.
1:10:25
SPEAKER_02: You know what I'm saying?
1:10:26
SPEAKER_02: No one saw your shit.
1:10:28
SPEAKER_02: Even if, even if you did sell tickets off of one clip, okay.
1:10:32
SPEAKER_02: Let's say that you know, I what I realized then because I used because now, yeah, I wouldn't put out your whole set, right?
1:10:38
SPEAKER_02: Right, especially if you're still performing that set.
1:10:41
SPEAKER_02: Because yeah, cuz because if you don't have a turnover material, yeah, it's gonna be the same thing, right?
1:10:48
SPEAKER_02: You shouldn't record anything like like a special until you're ready to say, I got I got more.
1:10:54
SPEAKER_02: Wow.
1:10:55
SPEAKER_02: I got I got another hour already hot, yeah, yeah.
1:10:59
SPEAKER_02: Warmed up, not not not working on it, it's done.
1:11:02
SPEAKER_02: The other hour's done.
1:11:03
SPEAKER_02: You know what I'm saying?
1:11:05
SPEAKER_02: Uh but one minute clips, well, I hate to break it to you, man.
1:11:10
SPEAKER_02: If you're headlining and you sold tickets off of a clip that went viral, and that one minute is the best joke you got, then you're already in trouble.
1:11:23
SPEAKER_02: Oh, right.
1:11:24
SPEAKER_02: So what you what can you burn?
1:11:25
SPEAKER_02: Like I'm up there for fucking an hour.
1:11:28
SPEAKER_02: I don't give a shit if you saw five minutes of this because there's 55 other minutes that should this should be just as good, if not better, than that five minutes that you saw online.
1:11:38
SPEAKER_02: Wow.
1:11:38
SPEAKER_02: So no, I'm not worried about burning material.
1:11:40
SPEAKER_02: You probably shouldn't either.
1:11:42
SPEAKER_02: Uh, but you know, that being said, you know, um even even you know, I've had people tell me they're like, post the same, you can post the same joke over and over again because the algorithm's not going to show it to the same set of people.
1:11:57
SPEAKER_02: Right, you know, and I like to think that um people that really like you and support you, uh, even if you do post the same bit, hopefully a different recording of it, uh understand that hey, he's just trying to, they're just trying to get their name out there.
1:12:14
SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
1:12:15
SPEAKER_02: Like, oh, I already saw this.
1:12:16
SPEAKER_02: Okay, great.
1:12:17
SPEAKER_02: Keep, you know, thank you.
1:12:18
SPEAKER_02: Keep keep scrolling.
1:12:19
SPEAKER_02: This obvious this one, you know.
1:12:21
SPEAKER_02: Wow.
1:12:22
SPEAKER_02: You know, uh, keep them engaged.
1:12:23
SPEAKER_02: You know, come come to a live show.
1:12:25
SPEAKER_02: I guarantee you I have other stuff, you know.
1:12:28
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, you know, um, so it's like the foot in the door.
1:12:31
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
1:12:32
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, but basically, look, I look at content that way.
1:12:35
SPEAKER_02: It's just it's just my introduction, man.
1:12:37
SPEAKER_02: If you like it, just know if you if you see a clip and you like it, just know I I got I got I got more, yeah, and I got better.
1:12:45
SPEAKER_00: Awesome, man.
1:12:46
SPEAKER_00: You know, yeah, that's it's awesome.
1:12:48
SPEAKER_00: That's awesome.
1:12:48
SPEAKER_00: You had you had a show recent, I don't know how recent it was, but where you were on the stage with the c the comic.
1:12:54
SPEAKER_02: Oh, it wasn't recent enough.
1:12:56
SPEAKER_02: People are asking asking for it again.
1:12:57
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, that's probably I think it was might have been a year ago, or maybe even more than a year ago.
1:13:02
SPEAKER_02: Uh so you you that was uh I called it Tag Your Bit.
1:13:06
SPEAKER_02: It was an interruption style show.
1:13:07
SPEAKER_02: I didn't invent interruption shows, those those have been around for for years, as long as I've been around doing comedy.
1:13:13
SPEAKER_02: Doug Doug Benson probably has the most famous one called the Benson Interruption.
1:13:17
SPEAKER_03: Oh wow.
1:13:18
SPEAKER_02: Um and but I kind of took a different I like to think I took a different approach to it.
1:13:25
SPEAKER_02: Uh but um because the interruption shows that I would always see and when I would see comics try to do them, it was disruptive.
1:13:35
SPEAKER_02: Like in other words, a comic be doing a set and they would kind of like try to mess them up or like or like talk shit or roast them, yeah, or whatever.
1:13:43
SPEAKER_02: So I took so as like I said, I I have have a reputation now as a as a uh a writer, as a bit fixer, whatever you want to call call it.
1:13:54
SPEAKER_02: You know, chingo jokes around, you know, you you know, he he he's he's like, who's the one that took come to tell you see when the album sales weren't doing too good?
1:14:02
SPEAKER_02: You know, uh because that that that's how he sees me, you know, and uh so I was like, well, what if I took that, right?
1:14:10
SPEAKER_02: If I have an innate ability to one, I can find someone's voice very easily, I can I can write in other people's voices very easily.
1:14:19
SPEAKER_02: Um I was like, so what if I took that interruption I concept and I I put it on stage where I could in real time if someone's doing a bit and I have something that would work with that, that would elevate your joke in some way, and I'm actually up there with a microphone and I sp I I spit it right there live real time.
1:14:43
SPEAKER_02: I perform it the way I'll perform it, and now these and these younger comics, now hey, now you have a uh a bit that you essentially wrote with me live on stage, which is how I actually now y'all know that's actually how I really write.
1:15:00
SPEAKER_00: Wow, it's amazing.
1:15:00
SPEAKER_02: That's how I write my own material.
1:15:02
SPEAKER_02: So now now it's not even uh hey, let's go to the coffee shop and sit, right?
1:15:05
SPEAKER_02: No, you that joke was written exactly the way I would write my own joke, and now you have that, and then it also it allowed me to do a show in corpus that wasn't me headlining, not burning my material, right?
1:15:21
SPEAKER_02: And like I said, I'm very protective of of my audience because of it costs money, right?
1:15:30
SPEAKER_02: It costs money.
1:15:31
SPEAKER_02: You had to get you had to get the ticket, you had to get a babysitter, there's a two-drink minimum.
1:15:35
SPEAKER_02: That's interesting.
1:15:36
SPEAKER_02: You had to buy dinner.
1:15:37
SPEAKER_02: I'm very protective of my audience.
1:15:39
SPEAKER_02: When you come to my show, I don't want to give you amateur hour.
1:15:44
SPEAKER_02: I I want to be worth every single penny.
1:15:47
SPEAKER_02: I want the show to be worth every single penny from start to beginning, which is why I I I I only fucks with the best.
1:15:56
SPEAKER_02: That's also what I've always said.
1:15:59
SPEAKER_02: Okay.
1:15:59
SPEAKER_02: Um, but what tag your bit allowed me to do is I could take a comic that I wouldn't necessarily put on one of my shows.
1:16:10
SPEAKER_02: That's maybe not there just yet.
1:16:12
SPEAKER_02: I like you, right?
1:16:14
SPEAKER_02: You're you're doing good, but you're not you're not where I need you to be to be part of my show just yet.
1:16:22
SPEAKER_02: But if I put you on stage with me, it's okay.
1:16:26
SPEAKER_02: Because they get they get you, but they also get me.
1:16:29
SPEAKER_04: Wow.
1:16:30
SPEAKER_02: And if you're bombing, I get I get to the the pressure's on me.
1:16:36
SPEAKER_00: I'm the savior to save it, to save it, right?
1:16:39
SPEAKER_02: The pressure's on me to save it.
1:16:41
SPEAKER_02: So so that was what I liked about Tag Your Bit.
1:16:43
SPEAKER_02: Right, right.
1:16:44
SPEAKER_02: So yeah, and and it's a matter of of getting off my ass and and doing another one.
1:16:51
SPEAKER_02: And mesquite's the first place that gave it a chance, so it'll probably stay at mesquite until that's so cool, man.
1:16:55
SPEAKER_02: So I always say mesquite gets first dibs in anything I do.
1:16:59
SPEAKER_02: That's awesome.
1:17:00
SPEAKER_02: If they don't want it, they don't have the time, they don't have the space for me or whatever, that I you know, uh I'll consider going elsewhere.
1:17:06
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
1:17:07
SPEAKER_00: If you was to go somewhere else, how what would happen to the corpus comedy scene or or how would that affect the corpus comedy scene in the remains?
1:17:15
SPEAKER_00: If I were to go somewhere else, yeah, like say you say allegedly you would go to San Antonio.
1:17:19
SPEAKER_00: What would happen to the corpus comedy scene?
1:17:22
SPEAKER_00: Uh I would like to assume nothing.
1:17:25
SPEAKER_02: Uh um I would like to assume nothing.
1:17:28
SPEAKER_02: Uh I I don't think it would hurt it or help it uh in in any way.
1:17:36
SPEAKER_02: Uh I think I've rem like I said I've removed myself enough from the active part of the scene.
1:17:41
SPEAKER_02: Uh I tell them, look at me like a cheerleader.
1:17:44
SPEAKER_02: I root on, I believe in everything you're doing.
1:17:47
SPEAKER_02: I'm so happy to see everything that everybody in the scene is doing.
1:17:52
SPEAKER_02: Uh I I, you know, your successes and your failures, I celebrate them all.
1:17:58
SPEAKER_02: And that's to say, because if you're failing, I know you're learning, right?
1:18:01
SPEAKER_02: That's that's what I mean.
1:18:02
SPEAKER_02: Like, hey, that didn't work out.
1:18:04
SPEAKER_02: Great.
1:18:04
SPEAKER_02: Now you know what doesn't work.
1:18:05
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, right.
1:18:06
SPEAKER_02: Keep going.
1:18:07
SPEAKER_02: Keep going.
1:18:07
SPEAKER_02: Keep going.
1:18:08
SPEAKER_02: Right?
1:18:09
SPEAKER_02: Um, and um I came up in a time where there was one path to do comedy in town, and this is not to put anybody down, but that was just the facts.
1:18:22
SPEAKER_02: If you wanted to do comedy, you had to work with this one person in this one room and do comedy.
1:18:28
SPEAKER_02: And um that's not the way it should be, man.
1:18:32
SPEAKER_02: It's not the way it should be.
1:18:33
SPEAKER_02: Uh it shouldn't matter who's who's here, who's not here, because while we all root each other on, it's very much a solo sport.
1:18:43
SPEAKER_02: Like you you at the end of the day, you have to get up out of bed.
1:18:48
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, you have to write the jokes, you have to get up on stage and perform them.
1:18:53
SPEAKER_02: And if you are looking to outside sources constantly to motivate you to do that, you're you're setting yourself up for failure.
1:19:03
SPEAKER_02: So it shouldn't matter if I'm here or if I'm not here or if I'm somewhere else.
1:19:07
SPEAKER_00: For sure.
1:19:08
SPEAKER_00: It reminds me of like my because I used to play solo classical guitar in college.
1:19:12
SPEAKER_00: It was only me up there, yeah, playing, you know.
1:19:15
SPEAKER_00: And it was only me in the practice room.
1:19:17
SPEAKER_00: You know, I was the one that had to put in the chops, yeah, work on my performance aspect of it and and all that other stuff.
1:19:24
SPEAKER_02: Exactly.
1:19:24
SPEAKER_02: It's great, it's great to have comrades, you know, it's it's great to have like-minded people and have friends and and to vent to and and to celebrate things with, you know, but at the end of the day, it's it's just yeah, it's just you, you know, you know, we we have uh on on tour, you know, uh one of my favorite things is to say, we and Jingo say to each other, you know, before we go on stage, is I see you on the other side.
1:19:48
SPEAKER_02: Because once I go on stage, we don't see each other till he gets off stage.
1:19:52
SPEAKER_02: Wow.
1:19:52
SPEAKER_02: Right?
1:19:53
SPEAKER_02: Because I go up, I I come off, the host brings him up.
1:19:58
SPEAKER_02: If anything, maybe when I get off stage, we'll give each other a little fist bump.
1:20:01
SPEAKER_02: Hey, whatever.
1:20:03
SPEAKER_02: But we don't really get to talk until until after the set, until after the merch giveaways, after after the mean greets, after after this and that, then it's like, hey man, hey, that was a good show, right?
1:20:15
SPEAKER_02: Like, like it's like, yeah, we're on the other side of this shit.
1:20:18
SPEAKER_02: Because because once once you're up there, you're by yourself.
1:20:20
SPEAKER_02: It's you, yeah.
1:20:22
SPEAKER_00: So a couple more questions, we're almost out of here.
1:20:25
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, or yeah.
1:20:26
SPEAKER_00: What do you what do you wish you you knew at year one?
1:20:29
SPEAKER_00: It's something you wish you would have known at year one, starting in comedy.
1:20:33
SPEAKER_00: Hobby Luna back, year one.
1:20:35
SPEAKER_00: It seems like there was only one open mic on at Mosquite Street or whatever it was.
1:20:41
SPEAKER_02: There wasn't even that.
1:20:43
SPEAKER_02: There was no open mics when I started.
1:20:44
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
1:20:45
SPEAKER_00: What what would you what what do you wish you knew?
1:20:49
SPEAKER_00: Or like um place hobby year one now.
1:20:53
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
1:20:54
SPEAKER_02: You know what I mean?
1:20:55
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
1:20:56
SPEAKER_02: Um I mean honestly what what what what what I what I wish I knew then I probably figured out.
1:21:10
SPEAKER_02: I would like to think that I figured it out pretty quickly.
1:21:14
SPEAKER_02: Probably by year three or four.
1:21:18
SPEAKER_02: Um comedy will always humble you.
1:21:23
SPEAKER_02: Uh it's a very humbling experience to do comedy.
1:21:25
SPEAKER_02: Wherever you think you're at, you're probably a step or two back.
1:21:31
SPEAKER_02: If you think you're ready to headline, you're probably a a solid feature.
1:21:36
SPEAKER_02: If you you know, if you think you know, and and and that's okay, that's not that's not a bad thing, right?
1:21:42
SPEAKER_02: But that's not a bad thing because because it's good to be confident in yourself and your abilities.
1:21:47
SPEAKER_02: And and it requires a certain amount of delusion to to do this, but uh it can also make you bitter if you're if you're always thinking, man, I'm I'm so much better than the opportunities that I'm getting.
1:22:05
SPEAKER_00: Oh wow, right?
1:22:06
SPEAKER_02: I'm so much better than the opportunities that I'm getting.
1:22:10
SPEAKER_02: Why does everybody have it out for me?
1:22:12
SPEAKER_02: Crazy, right?
1:22:13
SPEAKER_02: They don't want me to win.
1:22:15
SPEAKER_02: They they they it you know, so and so, you know, these people don't want to book me because this and that and that, and before you know it, you're just this bitter, damn, hateful mess that and and now you can't even see you you lack complete self-awareness to even do what you need to grow because it doesn't mat it's it's never now the blame's on on everyone outside of you.
1:22:41
SPEAKER_02: You're not getting any better because no, I didn't get that show, not because I'm not funny, not because I wasn't the right fit, not because of whatever, but it's because it's because they just don't see how great I am.
1:22:55
SPEAKER_02: You know, it's it's just it's it's just not a good place to to grow from.
1:22:59
SPEAKER_02: So, like I said, I like to think that I figured it out uh soon enough that it it's like um you're not for everybody, and it's okay to not be for that promoter or to not be for that comic or to not be for that room.
1:23:14
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, you know, it's it's okay.
1:23:16
SPEAKER_02: Go go go if you really think you're that good, go find where you're appreciated, focus on who does love you, right?
1:23:25
SPEAKER_02: I think we fall into you you asked about the hype and whatever does oh, does Corpus show enough for the local versus the hype or whatever?
1:23:33
SPEAKER_02: You know, you can spend a lot of energy going back and forth about that, or you can take that energy and you can focus it on the people that do support you.
1:23:42
SPEAKER_02: Why am I worried about the people that didn't buy tickets tonight?
1:23:45
SPEAKER_02: Oh, why am I gonna be mad at this audience because I only sold half the room?
1:23:49
SPEAKER_02: They showed up, they bought the tickets.
1:23:52
SPEAKER_02: I there my energy should be completely focused on them.
1:23:57
SPEAKER_02: No, so awesome, man.
1:23:59
SPEAKER_00: That's awesome.
1:24:00
SPEAKER_00: That's awesome.
1:24:00
SPEAKER_00: Uh well, coming to it.
1:24:02
SPEAKER_00: Is there anything that you want to share that you haven't shared or I think I've overshare it at this point.
1:24:07
SPEAKER_02: Thank y'all for those that are trying.
1:24:08
SPEAKER_02: Bob Bobby always shows up.
1:24:10
SPEAKER_02: That that that's the real Corpus Christi comedy cheerleader, right there.
1:24:14
SPEAKER_02: That dude never has a bad word to say about anybody.
1:24:16
SPEAKER_02: He's a good guy.
1:24:17
SPEAKER_00: He's running helping running the Corpus Christi comedy Facebook group.
1:24:22
SPEAKER_00: So fun.
1:24:22
SPEAKER_02: So man, I I honestly I love everything that all all the comics are are doing because uh I've mentioned him a few times here, uh, David Sewentas.
1:24:33
SPEAKER_02: That's my that's my best friend in comedy, man.
1:24:35
SPEAKER_02: Uh, he was my biggest cheerleader to start off, and he was he was Mr.
1:24:41
SPEAKER_02: Cheerleader himself.
1:24:43
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
1:24:43
SPEAKER_02: And uh every time I see y'all guys starting an open mic, starting a show with not having any clue what y'all are doing, but y'all are just doing it.
1:24:55
SPEAKER_02: Wow.
1:24:56
SPEAKER_02: That's David.
1:24:57
SPEAKER_02: So so so when I see y'all, I know 100% his spirits alive.
1:25:01
SPEAKER_02: Wow, you know, you know, David, I was always the no, no, no, we don't have what we need.
1:25:04
SPEAKER_02: We don't have the resources for that.
1:25:06
SPEAKER_02: We don't know what we're doing, David.
1:25:08
SPEAKER_02: We're gonna look stupid.
1:25:09
SPEAKER_02: You know, David was the kind of guy, he got, you know, remember the old school flip cameras?
1:25:13
SPEAKER_02: You know, he's like, no, let's go shoot a skip.
1:25:16
SPEAKER_02: I got this camera from Best Buy.
1:25:18
SPEAKER_02: Let's go shoot a script.
1:25:19
SPEAKER_02: We don't uh a skip.
1:25:20
SPEAKER_01: We don't have a script, David.
1:25:21
SPEAKER_01: No, we'll just shoot it and it'll be it'll be fine, it'll be whatever.
1:25:26
SPEAKER_02: And you know, he he'd be like, I'm gonna, oh, there's a tsunami, I'm gonna throw a benefit for that.
1:25:31
SPEAKER_02: Like with what, David?
1:25:32
SPEAKER_02: You don't know how to throw it.
1:25:33
SPEAKER_02: So and he would just do it, you know.
1:25:35
SPEAKER_02: You know, so you do, like I said, you need a certain amount of delusion.
1:25:38
SPEAKER_02: What do you think he would be right now if he was here?
1:25:41
SPEAKER_02: Um well about those locals would still be rocking and rolling.
1:25:46
SPEAKER_02: Uh and and who knows?
1:25:48
SPEAKER_02: Who knows where we would all be, man.
1:25:51
SPEAKER_02: I I I think, like I said, he was probably my biggest cheerleader.
1:25:56
SPEAKER_02: I I think I think I would probably be a little bit further uh where I'm at.
1:26:00
SPEAKER_02: Uh he would and he would be right there by my side.
1:26:03
SPEAKER_02: He wasn't the strongest comic.
1:26:05
SPEAKER_02: I'll say that.
1:26:06
SPEAKER_02: Wow.
1:26:06
SPEAKER_02: I'll say that, but but what he lacked, what he but he was getting better all the time, right?
1:26:12
SPEAKER_02: I I'll never I'll I'll never I don't pretend that like we we said that I was like, you're not the fucking most hilarious fucking person in the world, but man, that dude was enthusiastic.
1:26:20
SPEAKER_02: He loved everybody, they loved him, and uh, you know You're not gonna take the video down, are you?
1:26:26
SPEAKER_00: What's that?
1:26:27
SPEAKER_00: Did you still have is it that video that is it the video that you were like replicating like the way he was on stage?
1:26:34
SPEAKER_00: Oh yeah, old one.
1:26:35
SPEAKER_00: Do you know which one I'm talking about?
1:26:37
SPEAKER_02: Probably, yeah.
1:26:38
SPEAKER_02: I gotta show I've done a couple different tributes to that one.
1:26:41
SPEAKER_02: I I used to do his set, I used to do his set uh every every every year for a while.
1:26:46
SPEAKER_02: I that was something me and Jacob would do uh uh for him.
1:26:50
SPEAKER_02: But he'd he'd be out dude, he'd be out here at every open mic y'all had just loving every minute of it.
1:26:57
SPEAKER_00: So so yeah.
1:26:58
SPEAKER_00: Well, Javi, thanks for coming back on the show, man.
1:27:01
SPEAKER_00: Thanks for coming back, handshake, handshake.
1:27:04
SPEAKER_00: Alright, man.
1:27:05
SPEAKER_00: That's been Hobby Luna, you guys.
1:27:06
SPEAKER_00: Thanks for coming on the show.
1:27:08
SPEAKER_00: Third time on the show.
1:27:08
SPEAKER_00: Uh check out the other ones.
1:27:10
SPEAKER_00: I forget to look at my camera there.
1:27:11
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, check out the other episodes.
1:27:12
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, check out the other episodes.
1:27:14
SPEAKER_00: Hobby's got some other uh stuff that he's doing around town, uh, other shows.
1:27:17
SPEAKER_00: Um 28th, I'm thinking about uh the roast battle or something like that.
1:27:22
SPEAKER_00: Oh, yeah, yeah.
1:27:22
SPEAKER_02: Joe Hillier, Joe, another one of the guys' movers and shakers, Joe Hilliard, uh the Rockhard Roast Battle.
1:27:28
SPEAKER_02: Uh he it's his finale.
1:27:30
SPEAKER_02: I used to have a show there at House of Rock, a monthly show.
1:27:32
SPEAKER_02: There was a roast battle, also I feel like I was like, yeah, it feels feels like a like a coming home type moment.
1:27:38
SPEAKER_02: Like I would love to close out the the finals for you there and and drop a little set.
1:27:43
SPEAKER_02: It's gonna be like a short, like 15-minute set, you know.
1:27:45
SPEAKER_02: I think it's free, it's a Wednesday night.
1:27:47
SPEAKER_02: Come come come on out.
1:27:49
SPEAKER_02: I don't do shows like that very often.
1:27:50
SPEAKER_00: So yeah, something like that's gonna be awesome.
1:27:53
SPEAKER_00: Also, uh February 6th, Art Walk, uh Mesquite Street, Javi Luna's gonna be there.
1:27:58
SPEAKER_00: Tina La Cochina, Lito are gonna be there doing their set.
1:28:01
SPEAKER_00: Uh, thanks for joining the podcast, you guys.
1:28:03
SPEAKER_00: You can follow Javi Luna at uh uh Hobby Luna Comedy pretty much everywhere.
1:28:08
SPEAKER_02: Do that.
1:28:08
SPEAKER_02: Uh I'm trying to get more followers than my my niece who does makeup tutorials and she has more followers than me, and it's embarrassing.
1:28:18
SPEAKER_02: I didn't I skipped Thanksgiving this year just because I didn't want to see her.
1:28:22
SPEAKER_00: Do you okay?
1:28:23
SPEAKER_00: So we'll gotta do the HE B question.
1:28:25
SPEAKER_00: Which HE B do you shop at?
1:28:28
SPEAKER_02: I'm Horty Tory, man.
1:28:29
SPEAKER_02: Uh, I do curbside only for tomorrow.
1:28:32
SPEAKER_02: Uh at Alameda and Roberts, and that's not even the one I live closest to.
1:28:38
SPEAKER_02: Actually, HEB Plus is my is my thing, but I like Alameda and Roberts.
1:28:43
SPEAKER_02: I don't know what it is.
1:28:44
SPEAKER_02: It's my favorite.
1:28:46
SPEAKER_02: To order a flat screen from go to curbside plus.
1:28:49
SPEAKER_02: I've started to go to plus because I finally told myself I was like, this is silly.
1:28:54
SPEAKER_02: You're driving all the way down airline to go to like you're not even going inside.
1:28:59
SPEAKER_02: But I don't know.
1:29:00
SPEAKER_02: I I I like I like Alameda and Roberts.
1:29:02
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, but I grew I grew up on the Port Airs.
1:29:05
SPEAKER_02: Hey the old one, it's like a flea market or plasma center, yeah, something now, whatever, whatever.
1:29:11
SPEAKER_00: On the right side, remember they had that video they would sell VCRs and stuff like that.
1:29:15
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
1:29:16
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, they they had their own little video store back there in the corner.
1:29:19
SPEAKER_02: So crazy, man.
1:29:20
SPEAKER_00: Well, thanks a lot, Javi, for coming by.
1:29:22
SPEAKER_00: Um, shout out to Maya back there, the producer producing this first producer.
1:29:26
SPEAKER_00: Yes, sir.
1:29:27
SPEAKER_00: Uh appreciate you guys.
1:29:30
SPEAKER_00: Stay tuned for the next one.
1:29:31
SPEAKER_00: We'll see you guys next time.
1:29:32
SPEAKER_00: Bye.