Latest / SpaceTomatoes / Dead Stages George Fontes on Surviving the Shutdown and Changes S3-EP13

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Dead Stages George Fontes on Surviving the Shutdown and Changes S3-EP13 · SpaceTomatoes

• 0:00
  you probably met a lot of artists in your career, I'm sure.
• 0:04
  Yeah.
• 0:04
  And I've always heard the saying, don't ever meet your heroes.
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  Not that I want to place those people as heroes,
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  but is there any truth to that?
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  It depends.
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  I was lucky enough to meet Ronnie James Dio,
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  who was always one of my favorite singers when it came to metal and rock.
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  And he is what you would want someone to be, basically.
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  He was really cool.
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  You know, very cool.
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  Misfits was not like
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  they were always on my radar because of other band members
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  like when I was playing bands
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  but it wasn't like a go-to band but I'll tell you this
• 0:36
  about Jerry
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  that one gig I'm just
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  this one guy these guys come and go
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  All right, everybody.
• 1:06
  Welcome back to another episode of the Space Tomatoes podcast.
• 1:10
  Today we've got a special guest with us,
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  George Fonts of World Ablaze with George Fonts.
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  Welcome to the show, George.
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  Thank you, Havoc.
• 1:20
  Alex?
• 1:22
  All right, man.
• 1:22
  And so, you know, looking at some of what, you know, you were, you know, kind of going through, I think there's some really interesting stuff I'd like to dig into.
• 1:33
  So you were a small business owner.
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  Are you still on that business?
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  I still do.
• 1:39
  Yes.
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  Okay.
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  And going through COVID, I know, oh, man, I just that just decimated so many small businesses, you know, and I think that's a big part of your story, right?
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  is that whole fiasco really torched your business.
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  And maybe give us a rundown of what that looked like and what was going on.
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  Yeah, the that whole COVID pandemic thing was definitely a change for America, a change for business owners, more specifically small business owners.
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  You know, a lot of people lost their legacies, nothing their families that can handle, you know, they can't handle over anymore because they became of no value.
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  just because at the same time costs were rising, you know, for whatever reason.
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  It's almost as if the system was just taking advantage of us.
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  It's like, hey, now that they're down and they're locked up,
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  let's go ahead and raise the cost of doing business or, you know,
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  purchasing a house, everything else.
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  But to get to your question, my particular business was in the entertainment industry
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  or in the events industry, so we were not allowed to do anything.
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  We were the one industry that was shut down completely.
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  So there's no gatherings, concerts, weddings, corporate events.
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  Everyone tried to go to remote.
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  And that was kind of a thing for a while.
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  That was interesting, you know, trying to do these large corporate events remotely.
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  And all of a sudden, everybody was a Teams and Zoom professional, you know.
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  They were doing things that normally wasn't within their wheelhouse.
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  It's something that you'd sit at a desk and do.
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  And now you had to do it on a large scale and make sure that you could, you know, transmit this basically like a meeting to millions of people at once.
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  So it was something that I think kind of really pushed live stream in general after that because live stream was always around and that's technically what it was, but it wasn't as popular as it is, I think, after the pandemic.
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  I think that's what really pushed it.
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  And I think a lot of people that were behind it wasn't really the influencers, the podcast.
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  It was really the event people because we had to figure that out.
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  And when you have a large corporation like Samsung, let's say the 49ers, you know, whatever it is, and they're having this large event that they got to reach.
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  all other investors and stakeholders across the world, you're on the spot. You don't really get a
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  chance to mess up and figure it out. It's like, it's either going to happen or it's not. So with
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  that, it was very limiting. And, you know, I had a payroll of about 32 people at the time in that
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  events business. And it's been, she's 27 years now, but that time period was literally just
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  trying to hustle to save something you weren't really sure was worth saving anymore.
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  And what I mean by that is you're bleeding money.
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  You can't afford to keep it alive.
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  You're forced to turn people to 1099.
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  It's like, I can't afford to keep you anymore,
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  but I want to keep you on the list and basically gig work.
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  And that's usually how the art industry works a lot anyway.
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  It's really just hiring people like day rates, etc.,
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  depending on your technical skills.
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  And so that's what it had become.
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  the only thing that kind of saved it was an influx of installs because now the government's
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  just handing out money to houses of worship and schools, et cetera. And they're like, well,
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  now we can upgrade or add this stuff in house because we're going to save money and not rent
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  what we need from people So the other thing it did to our industry is it literally cut off a large portion of the equipment rental side Because now houses of worship churches were installing their own massive LED walls
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  And they're buying like these expensive wireless mics.
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  And you name it, it was crazy.
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  We did an install for a church that was about 375,000 or whatever.
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  And all it was, was a giant LED wall.
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  That was it.
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  And then we did some lighting and stage lighting and whatnot later.
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  but the installs kind of kept most of the
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  businesses like mine alive
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  that's how we made our money
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  and then you know as soon as
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  the pandemic was kind of over
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  and opened up then that fell
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  off because everyone who had the money to spend
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  on it that's done
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  so it was really tough because
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  you had to watch
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  politicians say you can't do this
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  stop the spread etc while they're
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  eating that French laundry and you know
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  it's kind of a jab but we don't have to go too deep
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  It's a valid one, but I mean, I also imagine it kind of, you know, so once people invest capital expenditures, right, they're actually putting money out for hard physical equipment.
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  So this is the difference between OPEX and CAPEX.
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  Operational expenditures, that's your subscriptions, that's your managed services, et cetera.
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  But once you put hard cash into like 300, you know, some odd thousand dollars for an LED wall, the next thing you know, you're looking for five years of use out of that.
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  You're not looking to go higher.
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  If not more.
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  Yeah.
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  You're not looking to go hire an event coordinator or an event planner, et cetera.
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  You're looking to in-house as much as you can.
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  Right.
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  So imagine that took a big chunk out of things, too.
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  No, absolutely.
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  That was understandable.
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  And, you know, that also happened with performing arts theaters because, you know, when they had that, what was it called?
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  It wasn't, I want to call it Save Act.
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  It wasn't Save Act.
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  It was called Save Something.
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  But that funding went to all these performing arts theaters and they started doing the same thing, upgrading.
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  Now, I get it.
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  You're going to make an investment.
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  You're going to save your money.
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  You're going to make more profit later over time.
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  But it really just wiped out a lot of the businesses like mine that were doing, like renting equipment, you know,
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  providing services with, you know, sound lighting engineers, technicians, the whole bit. And so for
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  a while, it was a bit of a struggle. Now, when the event started opening back up, you know,
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  and I barely saved it. I thought many times, I was like, why am I doing this? You know, because,
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  you know, we had the crash in 2008. And then we had, what was the other thing that happened?
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  Anyway, you know, it's like I had to try to reboot or keep things going multiple times. And after
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  this. It was like, why keep pushing? But then again, you're kind of stuck because when you've
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  invested millions of dollars into equipment, like literally, and people don't understand how much it
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  costs to run something like what we do. And I'm not like the giant, but I wasn't small. I was
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  pretty well known in my industry, at least in my area. And so the thing is you invest millions of
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  dollars over time. And the other thing that a lot of people don't see on our side is, you know,
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  it's not like a DJ where you can just go to, I'll just say that it's a guitar center, for example,
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  A lot of people recognize that, so that's why I use that.
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  But you can't just go there and buy a light and a little mixing board,
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  and then suddenly you're doing this giant corporate gig.
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  It doesn't work that way.
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  And the same thing with a concert.
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  So when you get a concert, I get a tour writer.
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  I get a writer from their manager.
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  It could be like Chris Stapleton, for example.
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  I'll get a writer for them, and it says exactly what it is
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  that I need to provide in order for them to perform.
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  And it's everything down to which console the engineer wants to use,
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  if they need backline, like whatever, what instruments,
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  what brand, you know, et cetera, the whole thing. And so in order to meet those demands,
• 8:53
  you have to buy stuff that is either closely related or acceptable. So if they want a Martin
• 9:02
  Viper light, for example, and I don't have that, I can say, well, I have an Alation Proteus. I'm
• 9:08
  just throwing these names out. And the lighting guy, you're like, yeah, okay, fine. I have a
• 9:12
  profile for it. I'll use it. And then I could just, you know, I can make it work. And so sometimes
• 9:17
  that happens on the audio side, although, you know, a lot of artists get more picky about some
• 9:20
  things, but you know, you have, you don't have a choice. It's either you have to invest to be in
• 9:25
  the game or you're just not in it. Um, there's a lot more leniency, obviously, like when you said
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  event planner, like if I was doing a party, for example, or a special event that featured, you
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  know, um, a speaker, like a guest speaker, way more leniency at that point, they're pretty much
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  trusting you because you have a reputation and all they know is, do you have what it takes to
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  let this person be heard in 2,000 seats? Yes. Okay. Lighting looks great. Cool. Is the video
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  going to drop out anywhere? Are we going to have any glitches? No. Okay. And then, so that's more
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  reputational. It has gotten to the point now though, like let's say if a Microsoft goes ahead
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  or Apple says we're doing this, and Google does a lot. If you want to do this corporate event,
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  they literally have another person now. They sourced out, but they are now giving you a rider.
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  It has to be this specific mic, and it's gotten to that point even in corporate sense now.
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  For just a speech right A TED Talk type of a thing That seems odd Like I can see that from a vocalist right Like you said Stapleton right I can see that right I need this mic I need this
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  you know, mixer. I need this profile. This is my sound. You're, you're, you're literally
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  monkeying with my sound and, and, you know, you know, you change one little piece and it just
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  doesn't it doesn't hit the same way no it and it's it's not even just the the mic like we're
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  just talking about mics offline like you know each one has a certain tonality and a certain
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  certain character it'll um lend to your voice for example but it when we're talking about the
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  other equipment having like when we're talking about like a mixer that a lot of times comes down
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  to i want this specific one because it meets a certain quality standard and it might be all the
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  engineer knows how to use. And we ran into situations where they'll ask for like a Digico
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  SD7. And it's like, we're talking about a half million dollar console, for example.
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  And we got to rent that because I don't buy one. I haven't bought one. So I'll sub rent that. We'll
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  bring it in. And then your own engineer doesn't even know how to use it. And they're like bugging
• 11:30
  my tech. Like, hey, can you show me how it's like, why are you? Why do you have the job? But anyway,
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  that's another frustration. But, you know, back to the pandemic issue. Actually, before I deal,
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  let me address what you said about the corporate thing.
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  Like it's,
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  it sounds crazy to do that for a speaker,
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  for example,
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  but not really because what you got to understand,
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  like this is their chance to get their message across.
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  And a lot of these are really just giant sales events.
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  Yeah.
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  And they're trying to sell their services and their technologies.
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  You know,
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  they're trying to present opportunities to people and network.
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  So I get why they have these certain standards,
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  but does it need to be at the level of a touring musician?
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  No,
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  it doesn't.
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  I mean,
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  I could see the standards being like, hey, at least this class or this grade or something like that for a speaker.
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  But spoken voice is a completely different thing from needing a tonal quality that is on point every time, right?
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  Yeah, it is.
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  And it's not just tonal quality.
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  It also comes down to what becomes very, very important there.
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  And I might start to get a little tiny bit technical, but not too much.
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  well what it becomes about then is not so much like whether the person is singing now we got to
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  get that voice amplified evenly throughout the venue which equates to now we're talking about
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  coverage patterns we're talking about speakers and you got to look at that system because if
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  you ever seen the the the sorry right here the row speakers hanging oh yeah at a concert on either
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  side you don't curved ones yes yeah you don't just connect those okay and and a lot of people
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  don't realize what goes into that. There's a lot of physics. There's a lot of measurements.
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  And thankfully, the manufacturers figured all that out for all of us. We don't have to really do that
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  anymore with like, you know, we're up there with dials and whatnot.
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  But now what you do is you do have to measure the venue. So you've got to measure your
• 13:20
  distance with, you can actually model in a software that'll give you like an overall
• 13:24
  like a rendering of the venue. And then by entering
• 13:28
  those things in, and then you say, okay, here's a distance to the first listener,
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  second listener third listener and if there's a slope on the ground for example or rise i mean
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  then you got to enter that rise um and if it's like a balcony you know you put all this in the
• 13:42
  software and then you tell it okay i'm using this system if it's like a jbl or or a db dnb system or
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  my or whatever it is and then and then that manufacturer has all of their everything that
• 13:55
  they need about their speaker system within their software so now that when you put that in
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  this is going to say, okay, which model speaker you're using, type that in. It's going to ask you
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  how many you're hanging. Okay. Because that's also very important. If you're doing an arena,
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  I can't just put like four boxes in the air. It's just not going to have the acoustic output
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  and more to the point, not the coverage because coverage is more important. So, so now I put the
• 14:19
  information and then it's going to spit out. Okay. Based on 12 boxes at a pick point also, by the
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  way, so it's going to calculate pick point, basically how high in the area you need to hang
• 14:27
  this thing. It'll calculate the splay angle of the speaker. So like if it does occur, sometimes it
• 14:33
  doesn't. Sometimes it can be straight. The angle of the frame, like, you know, the tilt aft, all that.
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  That's how technical it gets. And then you have to make sure that you reproduce that. And then
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  after that, also in the software, it'll have a predetermined EQ setting for all those boxes to
• 14:48
  sound coherent. You still have to tweak it. After that, they have a program called SMART, which
• 14:53
  measures the room. So now you're acoustically
• 14:55
  measuring the room using all these
• 14:57
  like pink noise
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  or white noise, etc. Taking that
• 15:01
  and measuring it, putting it against
• 15:03
  the measured response of the room and then you're
• 15:05
  applying your own EQ curve depending on
• 15:07
  the curve that you want to hit in the room with your
• 15:09
  ear. And so
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  it does get technical. It's not a run
• 15:14
  in, throw it up and it's done. Now in a corporate event
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  that's where that becomes important
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  is you want intelligibility
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  and you want coverage.
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  Unless you're motorhead
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  and then you just build a three-story wall of Marshall stacks
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  and go just pump it to 11.
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  Go.
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  The only thing is those are fake man Those are fake But okay side story here side story And I know I didn really directly answer your question yet but I getting there So side story here So we did sound for the Misfits one time
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  And those guys, this was about, I want to say,
• 15:50
  it wasn't a huge room.
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  It was like 1,500 person capacity, right?
• 15:54
  But still, you know, decent sized building, right?
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  And I was talking to Jerry Olien base,
• 16:00
  and we're up there like, well,
• 16:02
  usually would, you know, tie them into the system.
• 16:04
  And his drum ring, you don't need to put them in.
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  I'm like looking behind me going, I was kind of, you know,
• 16:09
  let's get everybody in here.
• 16:11
  Well, lo and behold, no, you didn't.
• 16:12
  So I was told, and I don't know if this is true,
• 16:14
  but they told me that he kind of builds his own cabinet,
• 16:17
  like they do their own custom stuff.
• 16:19
  And the base cabinet was like that.
• 16:22
  Let's say about that.
• 16:23
  It was not very deep.
• 16:24
  It wasn't a deep cab.
• 16:25
  It was a trip.
• 16:26
  But his tone was more like mid-range distortion, et cetera.
• 16:29
  so anyway once they started playing it wasn't in our system he he refused he turned it up i couldn't
• 16:35
  imagine being on stage with his bass rig he turned it up so damn loud you could hear it out the door
• 16:40
  and it wasn't like bone shattering but it was like it wasn't you could hear it it was there
• 16:45
  you know what i mean so i was like okay that was that one time him and the other guy would be like
• 16:50
  um if you guys know like ronnie montrose he was kind of the same type of type of thing you know
• 16:54
  he was just like we turn it up robin trower same type of thing he turns it up to 11 you let it go
• 16:58
  like you don't mess with them. So there are some guys who do that,
• 17:02
  but when you're in arena, that trick doesn't quite work.
• 17:04
  But if you're doing like a theater you know,
• 17:06
  you can definitely get away with it if you have the right rig for sure. Yeah.
• 17:09
  So back to the pandemic thing. Sorry, I think I'll try to circle back.
• 17:14
  So back to the pandemic thing, it was, it was hard. It, it did get saved.
• 17:19
  What I find harder though,
• 17:22
  wasn't the hustle trying to save the business then what I find harder is
• 17:25
  trying to survive it after six, seven years later.
• 17:27
  the economy, the economic effects of what happened finally cut up. And people don't have
• 17:33
  that free money anymore. They don't have that disposable income. So what we're finding is
• 17:37
  cost of business, again, went up, but clients' budgets went down. And it's really getting hard.
• 17:43
  And a lot of festivals have been canceled. A lot of corporate events have been put on the back
• 17:49
  burner or they're like, well, maybe next year, which, and it could be something they've done
• 17:52
  for 20 years in a row.
• 17:54
  Suddenly they're not doing.
• 17:56
  And so we're facing that right now.
• 17:58
  And so there's a lot of businesses like mine,
• 18:00
  like in 2026, that are either selling stuff,
• 18:04
  you're seeing them getting gobbled up
• 18:05
  and bought up by bigger companies.
• 18:08
  It's just a weird time right now.
• 18:11
  So that's where we're at at the moment.
• 18:13
  Another real interesting phenomenon going on
• 18:15
  that's touching a lot of areas,
• 18:17
  and it's really kind of pissing me off,
• 18:19
  is all the VC firms buying up, you know, service industry.
• 18:24
  So you've seen most of the veterinarian clinics go to these large conglomerate, you know, VC ventures.
• 18:34
  You've seen-
• 18:34
  Dentist office too.
• 18:35
  Yeah.
• 18:36
  Really?
• 18:36
  I don't know.
• 18:37
  You've seen a lot of that.
• 18:39
  And so what you end up with is what looks like a mom and pop shop, but what you're dealing with is a conglomerate.
• 18:46
  and you get treated exactly like you would if you were dealing with something like that.
• 18:51
  And it's, it's really kind of unfortunate, but you know, again, I think a lot of people got
• 18:56
  forced into that and economic conditions changed. Uh, you know, prices have just like, I don't,
• 19:03
  you know, I don't care who you, you talk to that's living real life, right? Like if,
• 19:10
  if you own a yacht, shut up, you know, you don't get to talk here. Um, but people that are living
• 19:16
  real life are going to the grocery store and going, man, I can't afford a steak.
• 19:22
  That's a real statement, man.
• 19:24
  That's a real thing.
• 19:25
  I was talking to someone on my show the other day, and it was, you know, it was a current
• 19:33
  event political, so I'm not going to get into that too much with you guys, but I will just
• 19:37
  say he was on one side, I'm on the other.
• 19:40
  But we're not so far to either side, you know, so we're able to have a nice conversation
• 19:44
  and sit in the center on things.
• 19:46
  But I made the statement very similar to yours,
• 19:49
  which is it doesn't matter your political leanings in this case.
• 19:53
  I pay the same price for gas you do.
• 19:55
  I pay the same price for food that you do.
• 19:57
  It's like you said, people living in the real world,
• 20:00
  I mean, a lot of that fringe stuff,
• 20:02
  those topics that they want to use to rage bait you doesn't even matter
• 20:06
  because we're all still dealing with it.
• 20:07
  So we can take the 10% we don't agree on and just throw it out there
• 20:10
  and try to take that 90% that we all have to deal with
• 20:14
  and figure out how to make that work.
• 20:16
  And I think that a lot more people need to realize
• 20:19
  we're dealing with more of the same similar issues
• 20:22
  day to day than we realize.
• 20:24
  I think some people are just too far gone
• 20:27
  in terms of their ideologies
• 20:29
  or where they want to lean to actually see that
• 20:32
  and then just look at this person over here as the enemy.
• 20:36
  And so what you said is very, very true and accurate and correct.
• 20:39
  Like we're all dealing with it.
• 20:40
  It's just, you know, and what I hate is how it's being swept under the rug as if economically right now, everything's so great when it's not.
• 20:49
  And I don't understand.
• 20:50
  how that's happening because as you said every time i go out everything's more expensive like
• 20:55
  why are my why did i why can i fill up two carts of groceries back in the day for between 100 to
• 21:01
  200 but now i get two bags for 100 yep makes no sense to me well you know obviously you're looking
• 21:06
  at it all wrong you you know the stock market's up so aren't you heavily invested you know you've
• 21:12
  got a few million in the markets you're doing well right that's that's really the the thing
• 21:17
  The markets, for good or bad, and that's obviously a point that can be argued easily, that's what drives what certain portions of society see as economic conditions.
• 21:35
  And it has nothing to do with the real world for 95% of the populace.
• 21:42
  So yeah, and it is expensive.
• 21:44
  And it's not just groceries.
• 21:45
  It's your utility bills.
• 21:47
  If you haven't gotten a rate increase, I'd be amazed.
• 21:51
  Property taxes, your, you know, freaking everything, your gas costs to get to work, right?
• 21:57
  Or get to a gig, get to a job.
• 22:00
  You know, everything has just gone up.
• 22:04
  And, you know, it's tough.
• 22:07
  I was shocked the other week.
• 22:08
  I was talking to you, Havoc, about we put some cameras around our house last year, exactly one year ago.
• 22:14
  and they take micro sd cards and we bought a 256 card for 17 bucks uh we wanted to add another
• 22:22
  card on the patio to watch the cat back there 56 dollars for the same exact micro sd card that we
• 22:29
  bought for 17 bucks last year it it blew my mind it's real the the camera is less expensive than
• 22:36
  the memory card to go in it it's crazy yeah at the same time an sm57 still like 100 bucks
• 22:42
  how do they always be a hundred bucks they've been a hundred bucks for like 50 years this is
• 22:46
  true i don't get it it's because they've been around for 50 years technically 109 i believe
• 22:52
  exactly 109 bucks yeah they're always 109 bucks i don't i don't yeah there's some things we can't
• 22:58
  explain um but you know what you said about the market's interesting because it's like
• 23:02
  sure if i was insider trading if it's on that five percent you know that belong to that club
• 23:07
  I'd be great.
• 23:08
  You know, but most of us aren't.
• 23:11
  You know, that's just the reality.
• 23:13
  So it's insane to me.
• 23:17
  The cost of life is, it is what it is.
• 23:20
  I mean, we can whine about it.
• 23:21
  The problem is, is how do we get people together
• 23:24
  to come up with an actual solution to move forward?
• 23:26
  And that's what we keep missing.
• 23:28
  I think a lot of us complain, myself included, because it sucks.
• 23:32
  I don't like to work myself to the bone to like have nothing
• 23:35
  or not enjoy anything.
• 23:36
  Like, you know, I had to cut down my cigar habit.
• 23:38
  I mean, come on, you know, I can't, I can't.
• 23:41
  Now they're buying the drones and everything I like all the time.
• 23:43
  Now, you know, I had to find something good within a certain price range, which is, it
• 23:47
  doesn't matter.
• 23:48
  You know, I'm not an elitist by the way, guys.
• 23:49
  It's just, I work hard and I like what I like.
• 23:51
  So I want to enjoy what I can when I can.
• 23:53
  And it's not an everyday thing for me, but you know, we all have to dial back a bit.
• 23:58
  I have, you know, some people are in different positions, but I've noticed it.
• 24:01
  And as a, as a business owner, when you're seeing more going out and coming in and opportunities
• 24:05
  being lost to guys working out of their garage
• 24:08
  that don't have the real experience,
• 24:09
  but then you realize the client doesn't care anymore.
• 24:11
  They're just looking at their bottom line
• 24:13
  because they've got to save money for their boss.
• 24:16
  It's just where we're at.
• 24:18
  It's just where we're at.
• 24:19
  So I hope I see an improvement on the horizon soon.
• 24:23
  But until then, yeah, just keep pushing, I guess.
• 24:25
  Keep hustling.
• 24:26
  What would you say?
• 24:28
  Oh, go ahead, Alex.
• 24:29
  No, I was just thinking when the pandemic started
• 24:32
  kind of rolling down to slow down a little bit
• 24:35
  and they started opening up these venues.
• 24:36
  Did they hit you guys with any of that, you can work here,
• 24:39
  but you got to show your membership card to get in kind of nonsense?
• 24:43
  I mean, not to get too political.
• 24:45
  I'm just kind of curious.
• 24:46
  I handled that.
• 24:48
  Well, Alex, I mean, look, here's the deal.
• 24:50
  I'm in California.
• 24:51
  Oh, okay.
• 24:54
  We know the answer to that.
• 24:55
  Yeah.
• 24:56
  But I was defiant.
• 24:57
  I didn't comply.
• 24:58
  I can care less.
• 24:59
  And so I was also in a situation where with certain clients I had
• 25:04
  and my reputation that I can get away with it.
• 25:07
  And I never got the card, didn't care.
• 25:11
  I wore the mask respectfully because I had respect for others.
• 25:14
  I get it.
• 25:15
  Did I like it?
• 25:16
  No.
• 25:17
  But, you know, you got to pick and choose your battles.
• 25:19
  And at that time, the battle was paying the bills
• 25:21
  and keeping the guys working.
• 25:23
  And that's just where it's at.
• 25:24
  But no, I never did the card, never did the ID thing.
• 25:27
  You know, half the time, you know, a business like mine,
• 25:29
  we show up before everyone's there,
• 25:30
  except for maybe the steward or the venue owner.
• 25:34
  and then they just kind of leave us alone.
• 25:38
  It's a little different once it gets crowded with,
• 25:41
  if you're doing a fundraiser,
• 25:42
  we did a few during the pandemic,
• 25:45
  we did the Cancer Society Discovery Gala.
• 25:49
  Okay, well, we're in here at the Ritz
• 25:50
  and all these people with their suits,
• 25:51
  then they're going to expect that when you see you, me,
• 25:55
  you're going to be wearing the mask and complying
• 25:57
  and doing all this stuff So I can be the rebel and all time 24 or I you know where it makes sense to fight and where it doesn because you got to balance you know
• 26:08
  paying the bills, you got to balance guys that relied on you for work. And even if they work
• 26:13
  for other companies doesn't matter. I mean, I was some of these guys, I was like three quarters of
• 26:17
  their fricking income at the end of the year. So I still had to figure out, you know, who I could
• 26:22
  keep working and keep throwing those guys at work you know so you have to make those tough decisions
• 26:27
  it's just what it is it really made my eyes roll and like i just couldn't believe some of these i
• 26:33
  don't know if it was the artist or their production companies that you know requiring that the uh
• 26:38
  concert goers were having their cards and stuff and a lot of them were you know punk rock or
• 26:43
  whatever you know like fight these system people that were buying completely into the system that
• 26:48
  was yeah i agree with you i didn't like it i'm gonna say i don't think that band's really
• 26:53
  qualifying as punk rock anymore i'm just gonna throw that one out there i know who you're talking
• 26:58
  about no that's not the one i was talking about at all okay i didn't want to throw any names out
• 27:03
  there but all right so what would you say in general like and this is a tough one right but
• 27:09
  what would you say is one positive that came from that whole thing like you know it doesn't have to
• 27:15
  be a business positive, but what is one thing that you see that gave you a positive outlook?
• 27:23
  You know, I want to be positive, but I'm going to say if anything, it revealed exactly what's
• 27:29
  important and what you really want in life. You know, I honestly now realize like all the time
• 27:35
  and money I put in this business, is it still worth it sort of deal? Because that industry,
• 27:41
  you don't get days off. Okay. The time someone's having fun, that's the time you're there working.
• 27:45
  holidays. Like every year I have a festival. My birthday is at the festival with me working.
• 27:52
  Like that's just how it is. And you know, you're there literally probably rolling in
• 28:00
  at 5 a.m., 6 a.m. and leaving at 4 in the morning. I mean, that's just the life. You know,
• 28:06
  you're working 16, 18-hour days, 20-hour days sometimes, and then you got to wake up at the
• 28:11
  next venue. And it's hard, you know, it's even when you're not on a tour, even regionally, if
• 28:17
  you're, if you're a busy company, your, your life is, that's what it is. And you know, you don't
• 28:21
  really connect with too many people outside of who is in the business, for example. And so I think
• 28:26
  if anything, it just, I think the pandemic for everybody and not just me, everybody, I think for
• 28:31
  the most part, uh, made them realize what was important, what they really want in life. I think
• 28:36
  a lot of people realize, look, I've been doing this for 30 years, 40 years, 15, whatever their
• 28:40
  business was work relationships and i think moving forward the positive would be you finally figured
• 28:47
  out what you might want for yourself and then you just realigned who you were and then just went
• 28:52
  after it at least that's what i'm trying to do again there's still obligations hanging over here
• 28:57
  that i gotta meet but you know for the most part i think that positive is just revealing that
• 29:01
  you know to me and maybe to many other people i think yeah for me i think you know honestly one
• 29:07
  of the most positive things out of the entire thing was that there still is a healthy population
• 29:13
  that will push back that will say no i'm not playing your your silly games and and you know
• 29:20
  that's that's a reassuring and comforting thing for me because sometimes you look around and you
• 29:27
  go yeah it's you know it's it's you know red team blue team and they hate each other and that's oh
• 29:33
  the end of it but when you see like a healthy portion of the population you know it probably
• 29:41
  10 20 percent but still you're still squirrelly in the minority there yeah but still 10 to 20
• 29:46
  percent is is still in that lane of like no this is ridiculous i'm not doing this and for me that i
• 29:55
  think that was a very positive thing that i i you know it warmed my heart um honestly it gave me
• 30:01
  kind of like, you know, that rah-rah moment.
• 30:04
  Right.
• 30:05
  You know, I don't know.
• 30:06
  I just thought that was neat to see.
• 30:08
  Yeah.
• 30:09
  I think from that perspective, you know,
• 30:13
  let's take my personal out of it.
• 30:14
  Yeah.
• 30:15
  If you're talking about the country and the population,
• 30:17
  you know, at large, it did test everyone as a whole,
• 30:21
  you know, as a community.
• 30:22
  And it was good to see some people actually question,
• 30:26
  actually not just fall in line, you know,
• 30:29
  and it's because the whole thing didn't make any sense, you know,
• 30:33
  how this came out of nowhere.
• 30:34
  And then we suddenly had a multiple vaccines that were ready to go within a
• 30:38
  few months. It's like, that's, I'm not really sure that's how this works,
• 30:41
  but you know,
• 30:43
  the total buy-in to being your being locked in and not being able to actually
• 30:47
  even spend time outside. I mean,
• 30:48
  people are getting arrested for just standing on the beach.
• 30:50
  We're talking about open air, you know? So, so I, I say, yeah, that, that,
• 30:55
  that right there, like knowing there was at least maybe 20%,
• 30:58
  I would say maybe 30% to be honest of the people that were willing to challenge that and say,
• 31:04
  no, this isn't right. This doesn't make sense whatsoever. And it was a worldwide phenomenon.
• 31:10
  And they really didn have answers for any of it No real answers you know and fast forward and we got Fauci pleading the fifth after he got a pardon with a 10 year swing I guess right
• 31:23
  Either way in either direction and where he wouldn't be held accountable for anything.
• 31:27
  And he's still pleading the fifth.
• 31:30
  So, you know, yeah.
• 31:32
  The accountability is, is a lost cause to be honest with you.
• 31:36
  I can't tell you how many congressional hearings I've seen go on and, you know, a lot of, you know, clips and, you know, rile the base up, you know, footage and audio and everything else.
• 31:50
  But that's it.
• 31:51
  That's it.
• 31:52
  We had a hearing.
• 31:53
  Oh, you were a bad boy.
• 31:54
  Sorry.
• 31:55
  Okay.
• 31:55
  Continue.
• 31:56
  That's true.
• 31:57
  Whatever you're doing.
• 31:58
  You're right.
• 31:59
  That's exactly what it was.
• 32:00
  I bet you were one of those guys that walked the wrong way down the one-way grocery store aisles, weren't you?
• 32:04
  Without a mask.
• 32:05
  I absolutely did.
• 32:05
  Just because you're contrary.
• 32:07
  I know the kind of guy you are.
• 32:08
  I actually live rural, right?
• 32:10
  So I'm in a rural location, but I used to live in California.
• 32:14
  And oh gosh, I'm glad I didn't live there during that time.
• 32:17
  We're probably glad you don't live there.
• 32:19
  But I, you know, I literally, I wore a mask two times only.
• 32:25
  And that was because I work for a corporation and I had to go to a customer site and be on site with them.
• 32:33
  and the customer site required this thing.
• 32:37
  So that was it.
• 32:38
  After that, it was a no for me.
• 32:40
  I go to the grocery stores.
• 32:42
  Oh, you know, mask, you know, here, you can have a mask.
• 32:45
  No, thanks.
• 32:46
  And I just keep walking.
• 32:47
  And then, yeah, I absolutely purposefully looked at the little stupid blue arrows
• 32:52
  and walked the opposite way.
• 32:53
  And people would look at me like, what are you doing?
• 32:56
  You know, and I, you know, all that stuff.
• 32:59
  And it was just like, whatever.
• 33:01
  I mean, honestly, apply a little bit of critical thinking. No vaccine has ever, ever, ever been released that quickly. Most of them have have, you know, a decade of trials. And a lot of that is iterative because these things aren't always great. Right. And this one, I think, showed its true stripes later on.
• 33:23
  You know, whether you choose to believe that or not is your your deal, not you specifically speaking to the audience.
• 33:31
  But, you know, honestly, it was kind of like, I know this is it's literally under, you know, emergency use authorization.
• 33:39
  It's not gone through trials.
• 33:42
  There is zero long term data.
• 33:44
  It's a brand new technology that has poor, poor lab outcomes previously.
• 33:51
  And, you know, at the end of the day, it didn't take me much to just go, yeah, I'm not I'm not putting that in my body.
• 33:59
  No way.
• 34:00
  You know, don't be like that, man.
• 34:02
  Just trust the science.
• 34:03
  Well, and then the masking, the masking thing for me was so stupid because, look, here's the deal with those masks.
• 34:09
  You put it on when you take it off.
• 34:11
  It needs to go into a trash can and people are holding it up, putting it in their pockets, pulling it out, putting it back on their face.
• 34:20
  You know, tucking it under their arm when they need to do something and whatever the case, pulling it down under your chin and all this stuff and then putting it back.
• 34:31
  What's the point at that point?
• 34:33
  You've literally taken a moist environment ripe for, you know, bacteria or viral infection.
• 34:38
  And you've touched other parts of you and then, you know, folded in your pocket, taking it back out, put it back on.
• 34:46
  you're you're any kind of efficacy that may have existed which debatable in the first place
• 34:53
  but anything that could have you've actually introduced probably more problems than you've
• 34:59
  solved right using the logic yeah it makes no sense don't do that i mean the biggest easiest
• 35:06
  tell for anybody if they were using the even if they had one hamster running on a wheel in their
• 35:11
  in their brain is how often you see a surgeon reuse their mask never it's no it's a disposable
• 35:18
  mask it is a surgical sterilized mask meant for a single use it comes off it goes in the trash and
• 35:26
  a new one goes on yeah and for something that was such a uh may have even been considered deadly
• 35:32
  we can classify it as a legit biohazard would you not want to dispose of or burn those masks
• 35:37
  or anything exposed to it.
• 35:39
  I mean, I don't understand.
• 35:43
  You know, it's the psychology of the people.
• 35:49
  I mean, we're talking about,
• 35:50
  when you're talking about a group of people
• 35:51
  versus an individual, you know,
• 35:53
  they just go with the herd.
• 35:55
  They just go with the group, you know,
• 35:56
  because it's what's accepted.
• 35:58
  And maybe they felt the pressure
• 36:00
  of not thinking for themselves.
• 36:01
  They just felt, you know,
• 36:02
  I'm doing this for everybody.
• 36:04
  But you can't, it's like,
• 36:07
  when you get that pamphlet, when you go on a plane, like specifically, you got to put your
• 36:12
  floating, flotation device or your air mask on yourself first before you can help others,
• 36:16
  because you literally can't help others if you can't help yourself. It's just fact. You know,
• 36:21
  if you not ready to go and you not protected and you not thinking critically how are you yourself going to be effective in helping anyone else And in this case it was like I think most of the world just failed
• 36:32
  They failed at it.
• 36:33
  Now, if we want to get conspiratorial,
• 36:35
  I mean, we could also ask ourselves,
• 36:37
  because what you're saying is absolutely true.
• 36:40
  A vaccine, seven to 10 years, right?
• 36:41
  They got to go through trials, tribulations, et cetera.
• 36:43
  They got to be properly tested.
• 36:45
  But the only way I think they would have had a vaccine
• 36:49
  and they knew they had one is if this was planned.
• 36:52
  Well, so I don't know this. This leads me back to what I was thinking as you were talking. Right. So, you know, conspiratorial hat on there, but it's a reality. Right. I mean, this is an actual real thing.
• 37:07
  So there was a gentleman named Gustave Lebon who wrote a book called, I think it's in French, and it was Psychologie des Fouls, which translates loosely into Psychology of the Crowd, right?
• 37:23
  Uh, Edward Bernays tailed onto that work and wrote his books. Uh, and they were so good that I think Goebbels himself said that there is no better piece of work on controlling and manipulating crowds and ideas in society than this.
• 37:43
  So it's absolutely, you know, absolutely a thing that happens all day, every day. You can see it if you pay close enough attention when watching movies, TV shows, etc. What's called predictive programming, right?
• 38:00
  where they introduce an idea and people are shocked by it.
• 38:04
  But then by the third or fourth movie,
• 38:06
  couple of series out there kind of talking about this
• 38:10
  and kind of normalizing it in this fictional world,
• 38:13
  it softens the blow, right?
• 38:15
  And then when it comes out, you're like,
• 38:17
  oh yeah, you know, I've seen this.
• 38:18
  They did it and it worked out okay.
• 38:21
  Psychologically, right?
• 38:21
  You're not actually patterning that thought.
• 38:24
  But, you know, it's a reality.
• 38:26
  It's not a conspiracy.
• 38:29
  They use this. They have openly admitted that they use this. Bernays himself, you know, has admitted in multiple ways that he's used this to affect societal change when there really wasn't a huge desire for one in the first place.
• 38:47
  So, well, it's that how they get people to wear masks in their cars all by themselves.
• 38:52
  Absolutely. That's exactly what it is.
• 38:54
  So Bernays wrote the book and the methods.
• 39:00
  Goebbels applied it in a way that the world will hopefully never see again.
• 39:04
  But he was basically a standard of how to effectively.
• 39:07
  You could argue that we did see it, that the pandemic was that.
• 39:12
  Possibly.
• 39:14
  But it's basically, it was programming.
• 39:18
  It was behavioral conditioning, for sure.
• 39:20
  and the other people that adopted it to a very effective way
• 39:25
  in modern times to still use it is the Soviets or the Russians
• 39:29
  specifically KGB so this is a real thing and it's been
• 39:33
  admitted by, I forgot his name, you guys may know
• 39:36
  he was a KGB operative and there's an old video where he admits on how
• 39:41
  to basically topple society, you're shaking your head because I know you know what I'm talking about, I just can't remember the guy's name
• 39:45
  Was it Brzeznewski? No, it was
• 39:50
  I know exactly
• 39:51
  it's not coming to me right now
• 39:53
  it's not going to mind either but basically if anyone's
• 39:55
  watching just google KGB
• 39:57
  officer talks
• 39:59
  how to topple America for example
• 40:01
  I'm sure something related will come up
• 40:03
  but it is
• 40:04
  a slow drip method that starts all the way
• 40:07
  in K-12 education and beyond
• 40:09
  and it's all about the consistent
• 40:11
  messaging if you're curating
• 40:12
  the message controlling the narrative
• 40:15
  you are controlling and programming the people
• 40:17
  that's just what it is so
• 40:19
  society is going to get what you put into it. That's, that's where we're going to end up being
• 40:24
  the product of what we're being taught to be. And that's why education is so important and teaching
• 40:30
  critical thinking is so important and not, you know, um, basically whitewashing history or I
• 40:36
  don't mean whitewashing in the way that some people are thinking, not in the woke way, but,
• 40:38
  you know, not, not trying to hide what really happened, whether it was good or bad. You're
• 40:42
  like, we need to know it all. You know, don't, don't try to direct people to believe it only
• 40:47
  happen this particular way because it fits you know the narrative of 2026 for example or 2030
• 40:53
  whenever they hear this it's like we need to preserve what did happen so that we learn from
• 40:59
  it and also record what is happening now but it's it is it's a real thing havoc i mean you're spot
• 41:05
  on a lot of people never even realize it's happening to them at all yeah and i think the
• 41:10
  pandemic was definitely a result of those just as you said and those techniques in practice for sure
• 41:15
  Without question.
• 41:17
  Yeah.
• 41:17
  On a global scale.
• 41:18
  And that's what's scary.
• 41:19
  It is, but you know, it's also, you know, we, we cross that, that threshold, right?
• 41:25
  We, we, we broke through it pretty quickly too, uh, with the internet.
• 41:30
  Once the internet's live, you've got global reach, you know, it's easy to coordinate that
• 41:35
  kind of stuff and, and really push it out there.
• 41:38
  And, and, you know, it.
• 41:39
  It's, yeah, my gosh, we are so lucky that they didn't have internet back then.
• 41:47
  Yeah, and it seems like social media is the tool that's being used, you know, to do this exactly.
• 41:55
  You know, it doesn't matter if you're using Facebook or X, whatever it is.
• 41:59
  Those two probably be the most prominent in terms of spread and propaganda, I think,
• 42:03
  because it's such a groupthink type application either way.
• 42:06
  and that it's been revealed
• 42:10
  as you know, like bots,
• 42:13
  there's literally been
• 42:14
  big Chinese bot farmers just busted
• 42:19
  for trying to spread a narrative
• 42:21
  about data centers, for example.
• 42:23
  Whether you believe in data centers or not
• 42:25
  is irrelevant. I just brought it up because it's an example
• 42:28
  that yes, there are concerted efforts to try to change
• 42:32
  and shape your opinion on social media
• 42:35
  and you're not even dealing with real people.
• 42:36
  You could be dealing with like 10 programmers out there
• 42:38
  writing scripts and messages
• 42:40
  and then just letting these bot accounts just go for it.
• 42:44
  And then they're the ones going and commenting on your posts.
• 42:46
  They're the ones that you're going to see showing up in your feeds.
• 42:49
  And it's just overwhelming.
• 42:51
  I mean, it's like, I think it was Goblez that did say this,
• 42:54
  if you tell a lie enough and consistently enough,
• 42:57
  it becomes a truth, paraphrasing.
• 42:59
  But that's basically what he said, and it's absolutely the truth.
• 43:02
  It's true.
• 43:03
  and it's sometimes hard to recognize yeah those in engagement firming you know bots is all of that
• 43:11
  is is you know definitely a piece of this right yeah definitely and and you know i mean on the
• 43:17
  data center topic i mean i i have my concerns over that but it's not so much that we have data centers
• 43:26
  we already have like
• 43:29
  I don't know
• 43:30
  orders of magnitude more than
• 43:33
  any other nation on the earth
• 43:35
  but I think
• 43:37
  the bigger piece is where
• 43:39
  they're putting them and the fact
• 43:41
  that they're not considering
• 43:43
  at this point
• 43:45
  you know it's
• 43:46
  just got to get them in just got to do it
• 43:49
  we don't have the power for it we don't have
• 43:51
  power generation well we'll just run
• 43:53
  you know 400 diesel
• 43:55
  generators uh what yeah you're gonna what and then they're like yeah you know you know we can
• 44:02
  use uh you know all the water we need you know and and here's the here's the big piece to that is
• 44:09
  there is a way there are technologies that allow you to run data centers with
• 44:15
  pretty close to closed loop water resources um but they're not using those okay the majority of
• 44:23
  them or not. Some are, and that's good. Okay. You should have a lot less concern about those
• 44:29
  closed loop things because they are truly closed loop. Yes, there's a pull in of, of liquid for a
• 44:34
  period of time, and then it stops. It's recirculated, filtered, et cetera. Uh, the problem is that even
• 44:40
  the big ones, right? The big manufacturer is putting out these H 100 systems, which is the
• 44:46
  high-end GPU of today, unless something changed since I checked earlier, they are all, all
• 44:56
  of them specced to evaporative cooling.
• 45:00
  And that's where you run into any data center running this massive of a loop workload with
• 45:06
  evaporative cooling is going to blow through water like nobody's business.
• 45:13
  And so that's one of the big issues, right?
• 45:16
  And then they're taking these things and putting them in places that are already constrained by power, have power outages, are in droughts.
• 45:25
  Arizona, where is the water coming from, dude?
• 45:30
  You know what I mean?
• 45:31
  So it's one of those things.
• 45:33
  Data centers aren't bad.
• 45:34
  There's nothing wrong with a well-planned, well-thought-out data center that has power generation that's, you know, able to meet the needs and that there's water that's free-flowing nearby that they can use that isn't going to detrimentally impact the populace in a, you know, 500 square mile radius.
• 45:56
  You know what I mean?
• 45:57
  Did Skynet pay you off?
• 45:59
  No.
• 46:00
  I mean, it's just the reality.
• 46:02
  Are you sure?
• 46:02
  And it all comes down to the cost, right? Those liquid cooled systems are not cheap. But the H100s are designed to make use of front to back airflow. And they have the option to go fully liquid. But, you know, people are not willing to pay the uplift to do that, right? So there are valid arguments out there. There are also valid counters to it, right?
• 46:30
  I
• 46:32
  that
• 46:34
  shoot we'll just get into it I guess
• 46:36
  so the
• 46:37
  now if you want the big problem here
• 46:39
  and nobody's paying attention to this one
• 46:41
  guys
• 46:43
  if you wanted to surveil
• 46:45
  the entire populace and keep that in a searchable and usable form you going to need really big data centers Yeah that true
• 46:58
  The data center thing is,
• 47:03
  it's, we can't ignore it because we need it
• 47:06
  because it's now become,
• 47:09
  people keep calling it an AI race.
• 47:11
  It's not, it's an AI war between countries
• 47:13
  and who's going to come up on top
• 47:15
  and who's going to be the leader.
• 47:16
  and unfortunately my opinion by the way
• 47:19
  we've been in the digital age since the 90s
• 47:22
  and I think we've held off pulling the plug
• 47:26
  or flipped the switch
• 47:27
  to really pushing ourselves into that digital age
• 47:31
  and I think we're at that point where it has to happen
• 47:34
  because China's aggressively pursuing it for sure
• 47:37
  and they're just one of many countries that are pursuing it
• 47:40
  but it's really coming down to China and the USA
• 47:43
  Now, IBM has been ahead of this AI thing for many, many, many years.
• 47:47
  A lot of people don't even realize that.
• 47:49
  And so they are one of the big players.
• 47:51
  But when it comes to data centers, we've had them forever.
• 47:53
  I don't think people even realize what cloud server services really are, like AWS.
• 47:58
  They're giant data centers.
• 48:01
  Meta's had them for many, many years.
• 48:03
  They're all over.
• 48:03
  It's just a thing now because people are seeing it in the news and it's more prevalent.
• 48:10
  when we're talking about them, there's a few things that I have that I realize we need it.
• 48:15
  But at the same time, I have a few reservations. Now, Microsoft themselves, though, when you're
• 48:21
  talking about power and resources, Microsoft themselves, I think you may have to correct me
• 48:26
  if you know this, but I think they signed a 50 year deal with Chevron. It might be longer
• 48:31
  for gas and other resources for their plant they're trying to build in Texas.
• 48:37
  so some of the larger companies are already trying to be as self-sufficient as possible
• 48:41
  so they're not taxing the grid for example or taxing resources on surrounding towns and cities
• 48:46
  but there are others that are not taking that into account they're just rushing to get it done
• 48:51
  and those are the ones that are concerned what I don't want to see is this becomes such a thing
• 48:58
  that I'm no longer going to see like open fields of grass and trees because
• 49:03
  the government's going to say, well, we need to appropriate that to build data centers because
• 49:08
  we're in an AI war and we got to win it and we all got to push forward. And then we're just going to walk
• 49:12
  outside and everything's just going to be so urbanized and suburbanized. It's like, we're not
• 49:16
  going to have any semblance of individuality in any town,
• 49:20
  any city. I mean, we're already cookie cutter as it is. You see the same
• 49:24
  Home Depot, Lowe's and McDonald's in every dang town now. Like you don't see too much
• 49:27
  individual culture or unique culture anymore. We're turning into a giant monoculture.
• 49:32
  So I hope that the race to AI and data centers doesn't push us faster into that monoculture situation.
• 49:41
  But I don't want them, we need them, but I don't want them to be the priority to where we're living around a data center versus data centers, you know, going in for the benefit of us as humans.
• 49:55
  That's my reservation about it.
• 49:57
  And I think that's where the arguments are is like, how are we going to find that balance
• 50:00
  and where we're going to be able to draw the line and hold the line?
• 50:03
  Yeah.
• 50:04
  And then it's important to classify things, right?
• 50:07
  Data centers, nobody cares about them.
• 50:10
  Honestly, your standard typical data center, nobody cares.
• 50:13
  Nobody's going to have a problem with a standard data center.
• 50:17
  You know, the hyperscalers, the hyperscale data centers, those guys start to become like,
• 50:24
  wow, this is, you know, there's, there's resource problems, um, where it really comes in and really
• 50:31
  gets to people. And it makes sense. And there's a real valid reason here is these giga scale.
• 50:38
  And what you're talking about, I believe is their giga scale. And they're, they're,
• 50:44
  they're going to supplement 336 megawatt Watts, I believe, right out of the, uh, was it four,
• 50:53
  four or some number like four gigawatts.
• 50:58
  So it's neat that they're contracting and they're trying to offset that,
• 51:02
  but you're still eating up more power than most cities.
• 51:08
  Oh, yeah.
• 51:09
  And so I think it's important to look at that.
• 51:14
  And I think this is one area where maybe it's important to go back to the nuclear bodies
• 51:19
  and say, hey, yeah, you know what?
• 51:21
  I don't care about the rules and regulations now, but we really need to invest in thorium reactors.
• 51:27
  They're safe.
• 51:28
  We can use spent fuel rods and take them from a half-life of tens of thousands of years down to 300 years.
• 51:36
  In other words, we don't need a mountain to store them for the rest of the planetary life.
• 51:41
  And we can use the ones that are already being stored and reduce that and continue to use the output from the existing reactors.
• 51:48
  they don't require you know a you know staff of people right they are very very efficient they ramp
• 51:56
  up when when need goes up and they ramp down when need goes down and things like that that are you know regulatorily barred from investigation in certain areas You know I think it important at this point if you if you want to start using gigawatt
• 52:13
  plus power for a single building, you need to figure out how to power that building. And,
• 52:19
  and on the water side, you need to really figure this out because you can't put that stuff in a
• 52:23
  stage two drought location and then tap into an aquifer that, you know, 30% of the population is
• 52:30
  using for their actual drinking water and then go, yeah, well, so sad, too bad you don't have
• 52:35
  water anymore. Sucks to be you. Yeah. That's the point you brought up about the power is
• 52:41
  something I've never understood why we haven't been using nuclear. It's so advanced. You could
• 52:48
  use much smaller facilities now. And I don't understand this. Like as a man, we create our own,
• 52:53
  our own bullshit, our own hell. Like we're, we're basically stumbling on our own,
• 52:56
  our own feet here when we have the ability to basically take care of these issues,
• 53:03
  but we're choosing not to use them. And I don't even know how effective when it comes to water,
• 53:08
  like would desalination plants work? Like, could we basically just truck it from the ocean
• 53:13
  and how long before man empties the ocean? I know it looks like a lot of water, but
• 53:17
  water always returns. I mean, technically, right. You know, it goes in the atmosphere and come back
• 53:22
  down, but is it going to be usable water? You know, is it going to be tainted? There's the
• 53:26
  other question. So yeah, there are, there are actual real concerns, but it's either we give
• 53:32
  up on it or, or we find a way to adapt. I think humans are really good at adapting. It's just,
• 53:36
  we don't know what world we're going to wake up to one day, you know, and, and that adaption.
• 53:40
  So are we going to become like blade runner? Are we going to, how soon before we become that
• 53:45
  reality? Right? No, thanks. Who knows? I absolutely not. Nope. Not, not ever going to
• 53:52
  happen nope not even kicking and screaming that's that's the red line nope uh-uh i like
• 53:58
  i'm a little uh i'm a little curious and and nosy um sure you've probably met a lot of artists
• 54:05
  in your career i'm sure yeah and i i've always heard the saying don't ever meet your heroes
• 54:10
  and not that i want to place those people as heroes but is there any truth to that or
• 54:14
  it depends
• 54:16
  I was lucky enough to meet
• 54:19
  Ronnie James Dio who was always one of my
• 54:21
  favorite singers when it came to metal
• 54:23
  and rock and he is
• 54:25
  what you would want someone
• 54:27
  to be basically he was really cool
• 54:29
  you know very cool
• 54:30
  Misfits was not like
• 54:33
  they were always on my radar because of other band
• 54:35
  members like when I was playing bands
• 54:37
  but it wasn't like a go to band but I'll tell you
• 54:39
  this about Jerry
• 54:41
  that one gig I'm just
• 54:43
  I'm just this one guy.
• 54:45
  These guys come and go.
• 54:47
  And if you guys musicians, are you into music at all?
• 54:51
  I am.
• 54:51
  Into it.
• 54:52
  I'm not a musician.
• 54:53
  I like to, you know, used to play on my bass, but not a musician.
• 54:58
  So are you familiar with NAM then?
• 55:00
  National Association of Music Merchants, a big convention in Anaheim.
• 55:05
  All right.
• 55:05
  So I'm over there because there was also a time where I had a rep firm.
• 55:09
  So I actually was a manufacturer's rep for like orange amps and Spectre bases, all that stuff.
• 55:14
  I am familiar because I actually pulled a job when I was younger, uh, breaking down.
• 55:20
  Uh, so they, you know, the union will call in extra help to break down the arenas and box gear and, and move it out.
• 55:28
  And so, yeah, I, I did attend one.
• 55:30
  I'm like, I know that name.
• 55:31
  And then I was like, Oh yeah.
• 55:32
  Moving the crates.
• 55:34
  Yeah.
• 55:34
  I use a lot of these guys.
• 55:36
  I use a lot of people who did your work.
• 55:38
  um and and so anyway now i'm uh i'm walking across doing my thing and i hear yelling someone yelling
• 55:46
  my name and i'm like looking around like who the hell like i didn't see anybody and all the what
• 55:53
  was it was it um i forgot what he was using at that time anyway string manufacturer i don't
• 55:58
  remember which one it was but it's jerry yelling at me and i'm like i'm like i'm far away and i was
• 56:06
  like looking at him i was like i was like sure he's like dude get over here and i'm like so i
• 56:12
  walk over and he's taking pictures with people and i'm like do you even remember who i am he was yeah
• 56:16
  he said the town and everything i'm like oh damn this guy remember you know i was tripping out all
• 56:22
  that and he's just like all of a sudden i was with my dad he's like let's get over here he puts his
• 56:26
  arm out and he just like pulls us in and takes his picture and i was like damn that dude was a
• 56:30
  very legit like human being but you know yeah um it is and isn't okay to meet your your heroes i
• 56:38
  think or what might be considered your heroes i i i've always came into this business like i was
• 56:45
  never overwhelmed by a rock star or a movie star or anything like that personally i i just looked
• 56:50
  at them as people they're doing a job it was my job to make sure they can do their job basically
• 56:55
  and it's a reputational thing.
• 56:58
  So if I'm not focused and doing what I got to do,
• 57:01
  then I'm pretty much done.
• 57:03
  And at the same time, if they get embarrassed,
• 57:05
  look, as I say, shit rolls down hills.
• 57:07
  Like they're not going to be held accountable.
• 57:09
  Even if they mess up, they still point it at,
• 57:11
  oh, it was the sound guy's fault.
• 57:12
  He the reason I couldn sing or he was the reason that I missed the snow or I couldn hear that all the time You always the bad guy believe me And then so you start to know who is and
• 57:23
  isn't cool. I don't want to really name the names that I thought were jerks, but there are some that
• 57:30
  definitely were. I could probably tell you some of those offline if you want, but I have met a lot
• 57:35
  of people, especially when I was a rep, because I was also a rep for PV back in the day too.
• 57:39
  and so they used to have
• 57:41
  it's been so many years since I've gone on them
• 57:43
  but they had like a two story booth
• 57:45
  and so there you know I did get to meet
• 57:47
  like Rudy Sarzo
• 57:48
  I have another story
• 57:51
  related to this so like him
• 57:53
  Michael Anthony
• 57:55
  bass player
• 57:56
  just tons of people
• 57:58
  Mike Schaasho is a guitar player
• 58:01
  I don't know if you're not familiar with him
• 58:02
  I mean just tons of people
• 58:05
  bass player for
• 58:07
  David Ellison,
• 58:10
  base player for Megadeth at the time.
• 58:12
  Him as well.
• 58:13
  And then some of these artists,
• 58:16
  what was cool is
• 58:17
  they had a contract
• 58:19
  when they were endorsed with Peavey, would have this
• 58:21
  ambassador program.
• 58:23
  And so it's like they worked with Peavey.
• 58:25
  It wasn't like they were on a salary,
• 58:27
  but it was kind of like the agreement was
• 58:29
  okay, and then you'll go out and
• 58:31
  help with whatever.
• 58:33
  Especially a new product. So I got to drive around with some of these guys
• 58:35
  in my territory, which was cool. So you do get to know
• 58:37
  them you know i've had their cell phone numbers for some of these guys for i mean i i don't even
• 58:41
  know if i still have them i was never that guy that just bugged you know coming over for the
• 58:44
  barbecue i mean that's not professional but i have met a lot of these guys now uh what is
• 58:49
  interesting is at nam out of nowhere one year at pb we're upstairs and upstairs is where they
• 58:57
  close the deals right with the artists and managers and they have this catering and i'm standing there
• 59:03
  talking to other reps and i'm and i'm actually literally having a conversation with rudi stars
• 59:06
  So we're talking about that.
• 59:07
  And he was, that is another legit cool guy.
• 59:10
  So I'm talking to him and I'm talking to Mike Scotia and all of a sudden out of nowhere,
• 59:16
  look behind Mike's like, he goes, that, what's he doing here?
• 59:20
  And we turn around and it's Ron Jeremy out of nowhere, just walking through the PV.
• 59:26
  And I'm like, what does he got to do with music?
• 59:29
  Right.
• 59:30
  And no one's stopping him.
• 59:31
  And he just walks upstairs and he goes, Hey guys, how are you doing?
• 59:34
  Cool party sort of thing.
• 59:35
  just like starts grabbing like appetizers and everyone's looking down.
• 59:40
  I'm not eating that now, you know, sort of thing.
• 59:43
  And I actually had a picture.
• 59:44
  You just act like you belong there.
• 59:45
  Nobody questions you, right?
• 59:47
  That's what he was doing.
• 59:48
  He was just acting as if, you know, it was like it was a trip.
• 59:51
  I actually had a picture with him on my old phone.
• 59:52
  I don't have any more though.
• 59:54
  I've always tried to find that picture just because sometimes people all prove it.
• 59:58
  Sorry, I lost the damn picture.
• 59:59
  But it happened and we just tripped out.
• 1:00:01
  I was like, this guy.
• 1:00:02
  it was such a weird
• 1:00:05
  thing because you know rock stars everywhere
• 1:00:07
  cool you get it but
• 1:00:09
  Ron Jeremy doesn't quite fit
• 1:00:10
  but okay there he was that was a trip
• 1:00:13
  who else
• 1:00:15
  Stevie Wonder
• 1:00:16
  many times never liked
• 1:00:19
  conversation but definitely ran into
• 1:00:21
  each other you know give the head nods
• 1:00:23
  shake hands whatever
• 1:00:24
  but we were never close I won't
• 1:00:27
  ever claim that but that was
• 1:00:29
  cool lots of different
• 1:00:31
  people, man. Lots of different people. I'm trying to think because there's been so many. I just,
• 1:00:35
  and then when you're doing sound and production, you know, like, are you guys country or rock guys?
• 1:00:43
  Yes.
• 1:00:44
  Rock. Cool. So I've done, I've done, I've done sound and production for Craig Morgan,
• 1:00:49
  Frankie Ballard. I've done Aaron Lewis. What else?
• 1:00:56
  What a shift. What a shift for that guy.
• 1:00:58
  Bootsy Collins. That was fun.
• 1:01:03
  I mean, I can't remember them all, but like Calexico,
• 1:01:06
  like there were so many.
• 1:01:07
  And then of course there was like Misfits.
• 1:01:08
  There was Chimera if you're into metal.
• 1:01:10
  Oh yeah, Chimera is awesome.
• 1:01:12
  Yep, we did two productions for Chimera.
• 1:01:16
  I want to say Black Delia Murder,
• 1:01:18
  but I might be wrong on that one.
• 1:01:20
  I think I was in a band where we opened for them
• 1:01:21
  is what happened.
• 1:01:22
  No, I didn't do production for them.
• 1:01:24
  And then what else?
• 1:01:25
  There was just so many.
• 1:01:27
  There really was.
• 1:01:28
  like after a while it was like i just look at the writer you know it's like whatever but you know
• 1:01:34
  chimera i'm a metal guy so chimera was cool like it was cool to work with the misfits you know it
• 1:01:37
  was um it's cool to work with some of these guys that that did stand out uh you know machine head
• 1:01:43
  uh and so there those were very cool gigs and then uh there were others where you were surprised
• 1:01:49
  like rappers for example you know when i worked with too short guy was super professional like
• 1:01:54
  you don't think rappers can be,
• 1:01:56
  cause we always see all the chaos,
• 1:01:57
  but some of these dudes,
• 1:01:59
  they are on their shit to be quite honest.
• 1:02:01
  So too short was great.
• 1:02:03
  E 40 was great.
• 1:02:04
  Um,
• 1:02:05
  uh,
• 1:02:06
  what was the other guy?
• 1:02:07
  Uh,
• 1:02:07
  I was going to come to me later,
• 1:02:09
  but anyway,
• 1:02:11
  I've worked with a few rappers that really knew what they were doing.
• 1:02:14
  Like they came in,
• 1:02:14
  they treated it professional.
• 1:02:16
  Um,
• 1:02:16
  they weren't yelling over each other.
• 1:02:18
  Each person saying,
• 1:02:19
  saying or wrap their lines,
• 1:02:20
  they complimented,
• 1:02:21
  they were even,
• 1:02:22
  they knew how to use their voice.
• 1:02:23
  They weren't just like squashing the microphone.
• 1:02:25
  And then when you, when you actually get to work with those dudes, then you have an appreciation
• 1:02:28
  for like, okay, I get it.
• 1:02:29
  Now I see how it's supposed to be.
• 1:02:33
  So yeah, I have a lot of other stories.
• 1:02:36
  My recall right now, I can't.
• 1:02:38
  I'm going to have to go back to my files.
• 1:02:40
  But man, yeah, I do have some stories that will probably come to me later for sure.
• 1:02:42
  So without throwing anybody under the bus, no names or anything,
• 1:02:46
  how prevalent is pitch correction, backing tracks, all that kind of stuff in a live show these days?
• 1:02:53
  These days, a lot.
• 1:02:57
  I've experienced it more on the rap side.
• 1:02:59
  because they all have like a backing track.
• 1:03:02
  Okay.
• 1:03:03
  And so for, who was the last artist I did?
• 1:03:07
  Saweetie.
• 1:03:07
  I forgot how you say it.
• 1:03:09
  Saweetie, Saweetie, whatever.
• 1:03:11
  But she was actually really good.
• 1:03:12
  I'm going to give it to her.
• 1:03:13
  She actually really knew what she was doing.
• 1:03:15
  But she did have backing tracks.
• 1:03:17
  There's vocals and things.
• 1:03:18
  And sometimes they'll ask you, not her,
• 1:03:21
  but sometimes the managers will ask you to like
• 1:03:23
  lower their voice to where it's almost underneath the back track
• 1:03:26
  because that is the polished track, right?
• 1:03:29
  which is a trip.
• 1:03:30
  So there is a lot of that.
• 1:03:31
  There's a lot of that in worship music, by the way, guys.
• 1:03:34
  Church bands.
• 1:03:35
  Yeah, we did a few bands that were touring worship bands
• 1:03:40
  from like Peru and the Dominican Republic.
• 1:03:44
  And they literally would come in and their keyboardist
• 1:03:48
  or even the drummer would have the machine
• 1:03:49
  and like 16 to 20 channels of just backtracks and layers.
• 1:03:54
  And then even the drummer, like everything they did,
• 1:03:56
  they had to have a live acoustic kit,
• 1:03:58
  but everything's triggered and it's all replaced by, you know,
• 1:04:01
  different sound effects and whatnot by whatever software they're using.
• 1:04:04
  Can I just say one thing that irks me beyond belief?
• 1:04:09
  What's that?
• 1:04:11
  Country musicians, I'm saying that exceedingly loosely,
• 1:04:17
  and auto-tune.
• 1:04:20
  Dude, stop.
• 1:04:21
  No, stop.
• 1:04:22
  Just, I'm sorry, but it just, like, if you want me to turn the station,
• 1:04:27
  if you want your song to be turned off yeah i catch even oak inkling of that and i'm gone
• 1:04:33
  you know who was um since we're talking country-ish the ones that stood out for me
• 1:04:38
  and these are why i remember these guys live was craig morgan now you can you can nitpick his pitch
• 1:04:44
  and tone but the guy was very even the the band was tight on time um aaron lewis was also very
• 1:04:51
  good uh but the guy that was the best that i worked with well there was two but the one that
• 1:04:57
  really, and I, and I worked with him, um, I would say four times, um, was, uh, Charlie Daniels.
• 1:05:03
  And that guy and his band were amazing. Uh, the first time I worked with him was, um, I'll say
• 1:05:10
  early two thousands, but I was working for another company. I was a modern engineer. So I was actually
• 1:05:15
  the guy having to mix their mix on the side of the stage. And I was kind of, kind of one of my
• 1:05:19
  first bigger gigs as far as that, like working with that type of artist. So I'll just say that
• 1:05:23
  they uh they told me the stories and put the fear in me you know just to make me nervous that was
• 1:05:28
  fun but um what was really cool is uh talking to the drummer and he's the one that got me into
• 1:05:33
  gretch drums because i'm a drummer and so before then i never looked at them but man when i went
• 1:05:38
  over to his drums they're like these usa custom drum things i was like these are amazing so him
• 1:05:43
  the keyboard player had tails for and this was back then so he passed long before i worked with
• 1:05:48
  charlie again i'm sure he passed but he was already well into his years and he he already did like
• 1:05:52
  I guess he was with him with 30 years already
• 1:05:56
  when I saw him then.
• 1:05:57
  So he had a lot of tales about the big man
• 1:06:00
  they'd call him.
• 1:06:01
  But Charlie Daniels was awesome.
• 1:06:03
  Really was.
• 1:06:05
  And Oak Ridge Boys was actually really good.
• 1:06:08
  So they were really tight.
• 1:06:09
  You know, not quite my
• 1:06:11
  style or taste, but
• 1:06:14
  they were on it.
• 1:06:16
  Definitely. They were polished.
• 1:06:18
  They had it. But point being
• 1:06:19
  is these were people that weren't auto-tuned.
• 1:06:22
  They were old school musicians that learned that you had to know how to sing and play.
• 1:06:25
  And this is what it was.
• 1:06:27
  And you either can do it or you can't.
• 1:06:28
  You know, so.
• 1:06:30
  Yeah.
• 1:06:30
  It was really cool.
• 1:06:31
  Do you ever record the feed off the soundboard and make your own little bootlegs for your own personal use?
• 1:06:35
  I never did.
• 1:06:37
  And the only reason is because a reality is like on these bigger artists, they have their own sound engineer.
• 1:06:43
  Out front, at least.
• 1:06:45
  Now, there are often times where they don't have the guy on the side.
• 1:06:48
  And that's where I would come in.
• 1:06:49
  and it'd be like, well, we're traveling with our sound engineer
• 1:06:52
  who's mixing for the crowd and making sure the crowd gets what they're paying for,
• 1:06:55
  and then they don't always have a monitor engineer.
• 1:06:58
  So a lot of times I would be on monitors, and I'd be mixing,
• 1:07:01
  which is crazy because if you think about it, that is the more critical position.
• 1:07:06
  That is also the most intense because you're balancing everything.
• 1:07:09
  You're not just sitting out front and turning things up and going,
• 1:07:13
  oh, does it sound good in the room?
• 1:07:14
  I should turn this lead guitar up a little more, whatever.
• 1:07:16
  No, you have five, six, sometimes 10, 20 people who all want to hear something different in their monitor.
• 1:07:22
  Some of them have in-ears, some of them don't.
• 1:07:25
  And the ones that don't have in-ears, it's just a plethora of just sound everywhere.
• 1:07:31
  And you're fighting, like each mix is fighting for that one person to hear exactly.
• 1:07:36
  Like that guitar player has a monitor in front of him on the floor He wants to hear exactly what he hearing But like four or five feet away the singer needs to hear something a certain way so then you always fighting for like how do i make this clear but then balance the volume so i not pissing the singer off
• 1:07:50
  but yet the guitar player is not throwing his his guitar at me right so it was it was kind of like
• 1:07:54
  this this crazy thing and uh that's why i love in-ears because a lot of musicians eventually
• 1:07:59
  started going that way it just cleans up the stage you get to mix exactly what they want and
• 1:08:03
  it's like not all over the place. Um, but you still have to have like what they call side fills
• 1:08:08
  and stuff for just in case something happens or they want to pull it out, they can still hear.
• 1:08:11
  But anyway, I always got thrust in the monitor land. And I think what saved me was being a
• 1:08:15
  musician because I knew how things were supposed to sound. Like I knew how to balance how a band
• 1:08:19
  is supposed to sound. I knew what I wanted in my monitors. And as a drummer, I mean,
• 1:08:24
  you definitely are competing with a loud instrument and, and learning how to like,
• 1:08:28
  what do you need to hear versus what the rest of the band needs to hear so that I can get along.
• 1:08:32
  so I think that helped me a lot
• 1:08:34
  to be quite honest
• 1:08:35
  being a drummer in an actual band
• 1:08:37
  that really did perform live in big places
• 1:08:39
  and it was like that was cool
• 1:08:40
  because that translated to me
• 1:08:42
  being a good monitor engineer
• 1:08:43
  but we do everything
• 1:08:45
  we're not just mixing the monitors
• 1:08:46
  we're not making 5 to 20 musicians happy
• 1:08:49
  we're also balancing the wireless mics
• 1:08:51
  and it's not like you just turn them on
• 1:08:52
  you've got to scan the room
• 1:08:54
  you've got to do the RF coordinating
• 1:08:55
  you've got to make sure
• 1:08:56
  you don't have interference
• 1:08:57
  and then while the concert's going
• 1:08:58
  you're the one constantly monitoring that
• 1:09:00
  and then your monitor, their RF feeds to their in-ears,
• 1:09:03
  which is important.
• 1:09:04
  And sometimes you're running back and forth
• 1:09:07
  in case something happens.
• 1:09:08
  You don't always have extra help,
• 1:09:09
  so now you're also the guy that's patching all the cables.
• 1:09:12
  It's a pretty involved position for sure,
• 1:09:14
  but you definitely, I think it's underappreciated.
• 1:09:18
  It's like you always see the guy out front,
• 1:09:19
  they get all the credit,
• 1:09:19
  but it's like the guy on the side is doing 20 times more work for sure.
• 1:09:25
  It has a huge responsibility as the artist.
• 1:09:27
  So what would you say, what has been your favorite experience so far in doing your work?
• 1:09:39
  Which work though?
• 1:09:41
  Yeah, well, the sound engineering, the event coordination, et cetera.
• 1:09:46
  Yeah.
• 1:09:46
  If you had to pick like this particular one, you don't have to name the person, but what was it that made it good?
• 1:09:54
  Why was it so awesome?
• 1:09:56
  what made it memorable um as far as working with an artist or or what do i actually enjoy
• 1:10:03
  um yeah i i would say you know working with with artists of some form whether that's a spoken word
• 1:10:10
  or it's a musician or you know whatever the case may be a vocalist just you know i i'm not sure
• 1:10:20
  i have one that i'm not gonna lie to you i don't know if i have one that stands out because
• 1:10:25
  you're so focused on your job that a lot of times you don't get to really take it in yeah to be
• 1:10:32
  quite honest i because for for me especially as a you know half the time being on the monitors
• 1:10:38
  um a good job is one they didn't complain about or their manager goes oh that was awesome you know
• 1:10:43
  sort of thing it's you don't i'm not always able to go out front and really take in the
• 1:10:49
  the actual performance um i i can say like again there were rappers that stood out like um
• 1:10:55
  like tech nine, for example, I don't know if you know who he is.
• 1:10:58
  One of the most talented rappers out there.
• 1:11:00
  And when I saw him on the angelic tour, um, I was,
• 1:11:05
  I was providing the equipment, but at that time I was the guy, just,
• 1:11:08
  I was just the vendor. So I got to actually, you know, check it out.
• 1:11:12
  And everything they did vocally was just perfectly layered on time.
• 1:11:17
  And they were actually really using their mics. Uh,
• 1:11:20
  wasn't so many backing tracks as it was just like sound effects and things,
• 1:11:23
  you know, and, and of course the music,
• 1:11:25
  It wasn't really like other vocals on top of what they were doing.
• 1:11:28
  So that guy stood out again,
• 1:11:30
  too short stood out.
• 1:11:31
  E40 had,
• 1:11:32
  had it down.
• 1:11:33
  Um,
• 1:11:34
  and then again,
• 1:11:35
  like Charlie Daniels.
• 1:11:36
  Awesome.
• 1:11:37
  Uh,
• 1:11:38
  you know,
• 1:11:38
  stuff like that,
• 1:11:39
  where you know that these guys really took their craft serious and then it
• 1:11:43
  really translated.
• 1:11:44
  And I'll be honest.
• 1:11:45
  I mean,
• 1:11:46
  you may not believe it,
• 1:11:46
  but there's some EDM artists I work with where like,
• 1:11:49
  it makes you appreciate what a D and a real DJ does,
• 1:11:51
  but that way.
• 1:11:52
  Oh yeah.
• 1:11:53
  And it's like,
• 1:11:54
  okay.
• 1:11:54
  like there is an art to mixing music and keeping it timed correctly and
• 1:12:00
  transitioning. And so when we work with cash, cash,
• 1:12:02
  they were a big EDM artists. That was really cool.
• 1:12:04
  Really cool concert event. Those guys really gave their all.
• 1:12:08
  So I can't say there was one, like there's,
• 1:12:10
  there's like glimpses and glimmers of this stood out for a certain reason,
• 1:12:15
  for example, but I couldn't say there was one. It was just like,
• 1:12:18
  there was just moments, right. Collectively.
• 1:12:21
  yeah i got to uh go see randy travis in concert when i was younger and we were in laughlin
• 1:12:29
  and we were we stayed there for i don't know three nights or something whatever but
• 1:12:35
  uh was walking out of the hotel and you know walking down this path and i hear music and i'm
• 1:12:40
  like hey wait a second here and i walked up and like right there is randy travis doing sound check
• 1:12:45
  and uh i don know if you familiar with it but there a song called horse called music and the vocals on it are insane to me anyway I think they they beautiful Uh but you know he he belted this out and then he stopped and he was like huh I know
• 1:13:02
  it's in there somewhere. I could not for the life of me have picked out where it wasn't
• 1:13:08
  right. But to see an artist go, that wasn't right from his own vocals and then repeat
• 1:13:16
  until, you know, I think he did one or two more times was to me like, holy mackerel, that's,
• 1:13:22
  that's amazing to have that kind of an ear. You know what, you know, who was actually,
• 1:13:28
  you know, who was a standout and my wife is mad because this was one of her favorites.
• 1:13:32
  And at the time I wasn't really into him and she kicked herself because she could have went.
• 1:13:37
  It was, it was, it was a corporate event. So it was like a fundraiser, but they hired Michael
• 1:13:40
  McDonald. And so we got to provide production. So we provided the lighting and the video stuff.
• 1:13:46
  um actually no we did yeah they had a different audio company but we did all the video in lighting
• 1:13:51
  form and so i told her she can go and she's like i don't want to get your job you know you'll never
• 1:13:58
  be able to see you and this and that and so she kind of brushed it off and then i brought it back
• 1:14:02
  videos because i got to walk backstage and i'm on the side because i didn't have to be at a console
• 1:14:06
  and uh that guy is it was even at his age and this was um when was this was was right
• 1:14:16
  about this is somewhere during the pandemic so it wasn't that that long ago and he was doing this
• 1:14:21
  and he was just so effortless man like you know the whole band was just on it his vocals you know
• 1:14:27
  he had that that tone that's undeniable right and it's like he wasn't even trying it was a trip it
• 1:14:33
  really was it was just like he wasn't even trying and then all of a sudden I had appreciation for
• 1:14:37
  Michael McDonald so now I like him but you know it never really was my thing in terms of music
• 1:14:41
  before but now I'm like okay I you know like I said some things you have to experience to get it
• 1:14:46
  It can't just hear it on the radio.
• 1:14:47
  You got to see them perform and what they're doing.
• 1:14:50
  So I would say he would be one guy that would definitely be a standout.
• 1:14:55
  And if we're talking about concerts, I didn't get to work these.
• 1:14:58
  But as far as what I saw, I met Dia once, but I actually got to see him too in Black Sabbath
• 1:15:04
  when he got back together in the 90s, the 92 Dehumanizer tour.
• 1:15:08
  So I got to see that.
• 1:15:09
  That was really cool.
• 1:15:10
  And then I got to see Sabbath with Ozzy when they did that reunion and they had Pantera open.
• 1:15:15
  And that was really cool as well.
• 1:15:17
  So, you know, that, and then when I saw Dream Theater Live,
• 1:15:21
  that was great, you know?
• 1:15:23
  And so it's, there are certain bands that stood out
• 1:15:25
  for what they offered in terms of what they stood for
• 1:15:29
  and their musicianship.
• 1:15:30
  And then there was others that was just a presence
• 1:15:32
  you had to experience, you know?
• 1:15:35
  Yeah, I actually got to meet Dio as well.
• 1:15:38
  And I'll mirror exactly what you said.
• 1:15:40
  We actually drove up to KNAC,
• 1:15:43
  where he was doing an interview and we hung out and he came out.
• 1:15:47
  There was not that many people, believe it or not, which was weird.
• 1:15:51
  But he came out and just hung out with us for probably a good 15 minutes,
• 1:15:55
  just talking to people and was just genuine and just a real human.
• 1:15:59
  And I was like, that's pretty cool.
• 1:16:02
  He was just a cool guy.
• 1:16:04
  And again, I didn't get close to him.
• 1:16:05
  It was just, it was just what the encounter I had was just a very,
• 1:16:09
  very cool encounter.
• 1:16:10
  And for me, him being my favorite metal singer,
• 1:16:13
  and, you know, it was just one of those things where it was like,
• 1:16:16
  oh, wow, okay, guy's not a jerk.
• 1:16:18
  He's like, you hear the stories of how cool he was,
• 1:16:20
  and he really was that.
• 1:16:21
  Now, the guy that was a trip was Carmine Apice.
• 1:16:24
  I don't know if you know who he is.
• 1:16:26
  Okay, he did play for Ozzy before.
• 1:16:30
  He was in, what was that other one?
• 1:16:34
  Vanilla Fudge.
• 1:16:36
  His brother's Vinnie Apsey, who's the other drummer
• 1:16:39
  that played in Sabbath and with Dio.
• 1:16:42
  But that guy at NAMM one time, this was this one.
• 1:16:45
  So this is at the time where I was actually starting to get endorsements.
• 1:16:48
  Not big, but there was some smaller companies
• 1:16:50
  that were starting to give me stuff, which was cool.
• 1:16:53
  And so I was at this booth.
• 1:16:55
  What were they called?
• 1:16:55
  They were called, not Metalworks, something else.
• 1:16:58
  But anyway, they made like these, they weren't quite cymbals.
• 1:17:01
  They're like almost like noisemakers you hear with a stick.
• 1:17:02
  They were like crosses and stuff.
• 1:17:04
  So it was like stacked metal and different things.
• 1:17:05
  and it had really, really little cool, like punchy,
• 1:17:08
  like in and out tones you could use,
• 1:17:10
  like especially when you're playing with like rock or metal.
• 1:17:12
  So I'm over here and they're working something out with me
• 1:17:16
  and it was really cool.
• 1:17:17
  And then he comes up behind me, right?
• 1:17:19
  And his attitude, man, he was just like standing there.
• 1:17:22
  He had the glasses on and he had like the,
• 1:17:25
  I think the hair was poking out, you know what I'm saying?
• 1:17:27
  Out the shirt and he had the butterfly
• 1:17:28
  and the whole thing with the jacket.
• 1:17:30
  He's just sitting there with a gold chain.
• 1:17:32
  He's like chewing his gum.
• 1:17:33
  and then he's like the owner of the company is right here and he sees them and they're like oh
• 1:17:38
  man okay and they're trying to be respectful to me but at the same time i get it i was like well
• 1:17:43
  i mean you go talk to him talk to him right and then i was like dude it's cool he's like okay
• 1:17:47
  sorry i was like nope take care of him and then he goes there and the whole time the owner's
• 1:17:52
  trying to talk to him carmen's just doing this looking up looking up and the guy's trying to
• 1:17:57
  tell him oh yeah we'd be willing to work with you and offering some percentage thing and he looks
• 1:18:02
  down takes a glass he goes just looks at him And then the owner just looks looks away and he looks back at him he goes okay here here you go just just just take it it was like i not gonna argue with him just
• 1:18:16
  take the stuff and use it whatever that's cool that was something you had to see it was it was
• 1:18:21
  it was like out of a 90s mob movie or something it was weird you know i think that's really
• 1:18:27
  wonderful well i think we're probably getting close to a good place to wrap it up this has
• 1:18:31
  been a wonderful conversation. I really have enjoyed it. Um, one of the questions we, one of
• 1:18:37
  the things we like to do is give our guests the opportunity to give a shout out and a way of giving
• 1:18:42
  back. And, you know, basically throughout our lives, there's someone that has had a massive
• 1:18:48
  and lasting impact on our lives. It could be a historical figure and author, sixth grade science
• 1:18:55
  teacher could be mom who would you like to shout out um i think there'd be like two people
• 1:19:02
  honestly because it's there was one my third grade teacher uh i'm sure she's been she's passed away
• 1:19:09
  a long time ago i'm sure uh her name was uh i didn't forget her first name but miss mizzanti
• 1:19:14
  and uh she was my third grade teacher and i was not an easy one and she was one of those
• 1:19:22
  I take no shit type of people and constantly was challenging, you know, and she talks straight.
• 1:19:30
  Not, not what you get from teachers today. She was a straightforward, straight shooter type of
• 1:19:35
  person. And, you know, whether I liked her or not, it did make me go, oh, fine, you know, sure. I'll,
• 1:19:41
  I'll go do it sort of thing. And, and just the way that she handled that and handled me was really
• 1:19:46
  Nicole. And then my dad actually shaped a lot of, you know, not, not that I'm not going to shout
• 1:19:51
  out to my mom either, but you know, my dad was also a musician and you know, basically that's
• 1:19:58
  kind of what got me into music obviously. But, and he was a man who had opportunity twice to sign
• 1:20:04
  record deals, to go on tour and everything. And he chose not to because of his family, you know,
• 1:20:08
  raising the kids and all that. And yeah, you know, he's, he, he, he's one of those people that,
• 1:20:14
  you know when I was about to be born turn his life around to just make sure that he could be
• 1:20:18
  the father he needed to be sort of thing so yeah miss Mazzani and my dad for sure and of course my
• 1:20:23
  mother I mean you can never not shout out your mom I mean come on but yeah that's I think that's
• 1:20:29
  where I'll I'll leave it is there well that's awesome so what do you got going on what are you
• 1:20:35
  working on where can people find you um what I got working on is slightly different than what we
• 1:20:41
  just had in terms of conversation. So my actual podcast is politics. It's the current events,
• 1:20:47
  politics and geopolitics. And I try not to get trapped into the rage bait things,
• 1:20:52
  but, uh, I, I do some deep dive research. So I, I will, I will present facts and data,
• 1:20:59
  whether you want to believe or not, it's well-researched stuff. Okay. And I, I'm not
• 1:21:03
  one of those people just talk out of my ass, so to speak, to be quite honest. And so that is what
• 1:21:08
  I do. And I've had many guests. I've had
• 1:21:10
  intelligence professionals, like
• 1:21:12
  actual people still working in Intel. We're offering
• 1:21:15
  it through a private sector
• 1:21:16
  and have contracts with government.
• 1:21:18
  I've interviewed many people that were
• 1:21:20
  special ops, special forces type people,
• 1:21:23
  politicians, Emmy award winning
• 1:21:24
  journalists, you name it. And what's
• 1:21:26
  cool about it, what's cool about it is
• 1:21:28
  I get to learn from these people, right? So
• 1:21:30
  aside from doing research, I'm also getting first-hand knowledge
• 1:21:32
  from them. The one thing I'll say
• 1:21:34
  about the podcast is this. I am definitely more
• 1:21:36
  conservative.
• 1:21:37
  and there are some episodes where I get,
• 1:21:41
  I don't hold my tongue when it comes to certain language.
• 1:21:43
  So if anybody wants to check that out,
• 1:21:45
  just be forewarned.
• 1:21:47
  And that podcast is World of Blaze with George Fonson.
• 1:21:51
  I mean, you can find it at worldofblazepodcast.com.
• 1:21:53
  That's probably where you'll find a lot of links
• 1:21:55
  like the socials and everything and check out episodes.
• 1:21:58
  And so that's the current thing.
• 1:22:00
  Outside of that, I don't know where I'm going to go with business.
• 1:22:03
  I'm thinking about getting out of the current one I have
• 1:22:04
  and going into something else
• 1:22:06
  because I've been doing it for 27 years.
• 1:22:08
  But outside of that, yeah, just focusing on the podcast,
• 1:22:11
  just talking to people like you,
• 1:22:13
  talking to subject matter experts, guests, historians,
• 1:22:17
  anybody that I can learn from,
• 1:22:19
  and anything that's along the veins of politics and current events.
• 1:22:22
  And definitely hope that what I do and through conversations,
• 1:22:25
  we can keep America on track.
• 1:22:27
  And I don't know how you feel about that,
• 1:22:28
  but that's pretty much my goal at this point.
• 1:22:31
  Sounds awesome.
• 1:22:33
  Well, you heard the man.
• 1:22:34
  Go check him out.
• 1:22:35
  World Ablaze with George Fonts.
• 1:22:39
  Thank you very much for giving us some of your time.
• 1:22:42
  It's our most precious commodity.
• 1:22:44
  And thank you for giving us some of your time.
• 1:22:48
  You know where you can find us?
• 1:22:49
  We're everywhere podcasts play.
• 1:22:51
  YouTube, X, Telegram, Nostra as well.
• 1:22:55
  Go check out Nostra.
• 1:22:56
  It's pretty cool.
• 1:22:57
  The anti-censorship platform.
• 1:22:59
  There's no owner.
• 1:23:00
  You can't be banned.
• 1:23:02
  You cannot.
• 1:23:02
  It's not possible.
• 1:23:03
  so give it a shot
• 1:23:05
  and remember
• 1:23:08
  wherever you are
• 1:23:10
  whenever you're watching this
• 1:23:12
  have an amazing day
• 1:23:14
  thank you for stopping by George
• 1:23:16
  see you everybody
• 1:23:17
  thank you
• 1:23:18
  bye guys
• 1:23:19
  Thank you.