Latest / Heavyweight / #50 Nick

Transcript

#50 Nick · Heavyweight

• 0:02
  Speaker 1: Yeah. Can I ask you a question?
• 0:04
  Speaker 2: Yeah?
• 0:05
  Speaker 1: Is it healthier to take a bath or a shower?
• 0:09
  Speaker 2: Is it healthier shower?
• 0:11
  Speaker 1: From a medical perspective, I think more relaxing. Okay, which
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: is better? Bacon or ham? Which is better for the heart?
• 0:19
  Speaker 3: Lake?
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: Which is more heart healthy?
• 0:21
  Speaker 4: That's a toss up.
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: Okay, we'll say bacon is screaming a good cardiovascular workout.
• 0:33
  Speaker 2: Gummy?
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: All right, Time to take a bath while eating bacon
• 0:40
  Speaker 1: and screaming my head off. From Gimblet Media, I'm Jonathan
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: Goldstein and this is Heavyweight Today's episode.
• 0:55
  Speaker 2: Nick.
• 1:03
  Speaker 1: Right after the break, Hey.
• 1:12
  Speaker 4: Hey, how's it going?
• 1:13
  Speaker 3: How are you?
• 1:15
  Speaker 4: The clocks move forward an hour so it's not all
• 1:17
  Speaker 4: dark anymore.
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: Huh. These two subdued dudes aren't on ludes. They're Canadian
• 1:26
  Speaker 1: and their lack of expression is an expression of their
• 1:29
  Speaker 1: proud Canadian heritage. One of these Canadians is me, Jonathan Goldstein,
• 1:36
  Speaker 1: and the other is Nick. Nick grew up in Ontario
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: with his older brother Chris. They had the same dad,
• 1:43
  Speaker 1: but different moms. Still, Chris would always say.
• 1:47
  Speaker 4: There's no such thing as a half brother, no matter
• 1:49
  Speaker 4: what anyone says, like we're brothers.
• 1:54
  Speaker 1: Chris split his time between his parents' houses, so the
• 1:57
  Speaker 1: brothers mostly saw each other on weekend, but I think.
• 2:00
  Speaker 4: Because of the rarity of his presence, it was that
• 2:03
  Speaker 4: much more special to spend time together. We'd stay up
• 2:06
  Speaker 4: until four in the morning playing video games, listening to music.
• 2:09
  Speaker 1: Nick says his brother introduced him to the music that
• 2:12
  Speaker 1: would form the blueprint for his taste. Chris loved electronica
• 2:16
  Speaker 1: and house music, but his special love was beatboxing, and
• 2:20
  Speaker 1: Chris was an amazing beatboxer.
• 2:23
  Speaker 4: It was like relentless, Like we would go to McDonald's
• 2:26
  Speaker 4: and the car ride there would be beatboxing, Sitting down
• 2:29
  Speaker 4: in the booth would be beatboxing. It would just be
• 2:31
  Speaker 4: like constant. I'm not taking the picture.
• 2:35
  Speaker 1: Nick sends me a grainy YouTube video from two thousand
• 2:38
  Speaker 1: and six. In it, a shaggy haired teenage Chris is
• 2:42
  Speaker 1: leaning against a wall with a group of friends outside
• 2:45
  Speaker 1: a bowling alley. He pulls the gum from his mouth,
• 2:48
  Speaker 1: and as casually as whistling a tune, starts to beatbox.
• 2:55
  Speaker 1: It's hard to understand how the sound of a whole
• 2:58
  Speaker 1: drum line is coming from the mouth of one seventeen
• 3:01
  Speaker 1: year old boy. In the YouTube, comments a twelve year
• 3:07
  Speaker 1: old Nick has written you were My Hero, only a
• 3:15
  Speaker 1: few months after the video was shot. Nick remembers coming
• 3:18
  Speaker 1: downstairs one morning to find his mom sobbing. She told
• 3:22
  Speaker 1: him Chris had been in an accident.
• 3:25
  Speaker 4: At which point I thought, Okay, Chris has been an
• 3:27
  Speaker 4: accident and broke his arm, Chris has been an accent
• 3:29
  Speaker 4: and broke his nose, whatever it might be. Yeah, you know,
• 3:32
  Speaker 4: when nothing that bad has happened to you in your life,
• 3:35
  Speaker 4: you don't jump to the worst case scenario when someone
• 3:37
  Speaker 4: says there's been an accident and then Chris had died.
• 3:48
  Speaker 1: Chris had been killed in a car crash. He was
• 3:50
  Speaker 1: seventeen years old.
• 3:58
  Speaker 4: I feel like I'm warned in the way a twelve
• 4:01
  Speaker 4: year old would like. I would often find myself doing
• 4:05
  Speaker 4: things that I would think that Chris would have thought
• 4:07
  Speaker 4: were cool to do, and trying to keep those parts
• 4:09
  Speaker 4: of him that I admired alive. So I got like
• 4:13
  Speaker 4: a little bit more into beatboxing, and of course listening
• 4:17
  Speaker 4: to music to music that he liked, like mostly Bonobo.
• 4:21
  Speaker 1: Binobo is a British DJ and electronica musician. He was
• 4:26
  Speaker 1: Chris's favorite, and so became a favorite of Nick's too,
• 4:30
  Speaker 1: and even as Nick grew older, Chris's musical influence remained.
• 4:34
  Speaker 1: Through the years, he kept an ear out for new
• 4:36
  Speaker 1: albums by Chris's favorite bands, always wondering what Chris would
• 4:40
  Speaker 1: make of them, which brings us to twenty seventeen. By
• 4:45
  Speaker 1: this point, Nick was in his early twenties. He was
• 4:47
  Speaker 1: at his parents' place having a beer with a friend
• 4:50
  Speaker 1: when the friend put on the newest Bonobo album.
• 4:53
  Speaker 4: And he started playing this track that opens like very
• 4:56
  Speaker 4: clearly with beatboxing.
• 5:00
  Speaker 1: It was just a short sample, a few seconds of
• 5:02
  Speaker 1: beatboxing that Binobo had looped several times.
• 5:14
  Speaker 4: And the second I heard that, I'm just like, I
• 5:18
  Speaker 4: was like, that's Chris for sure. The sound of his
• 5:23
  Speaker 4: beatboxing is like just totally drilled into my head, like
• 5:28
  Speaker 4: I just I just know what it sounds like, in
• 5:29
  Speaker 4: the same way I know what my wife's sneeze sounds like. There's,
• 5:38
  Speaker 4: of course, like the very logical part of me that
• 5:40
  Speaker 4: was being like, there's no way this is just some
• 5:43
  Speaker 4: random sample. There's no way that could be Chris. But
• 5:47
  Speaker 4: the other ninety nine percent of me, I'm just like,
• 5:50
  Speaker 4: that's got to be him, Like that's got to be.
• 5:53
  Speaker 1: Him in that uncanny moment as he listened to the
• 6:04
  Speaker 1: sound of his brother being brought back to life a
• 6:07
  Speaker 1: decade after his death. Nick looked over at his friend
• 6:10
  Speaker 1: and said, nothing.
• 6:13
  Speaker 4: I remember, not wanting to bring it up in the
• 6:14
  Speaker 4: moment as to not like kind of freak him out,
• 6:17
  Speaker 4: to be like, well, this song reminds me of my
• 6:21
  Speaker 4: dead brother.
• 6:22
  Speaker 1: Nick's modus operandi is to never impose a burden on others,
• 6:26
  Speaker 1: but as a result, even into his adulthood, he's never
• 6:29
  Speaker 1: quite figured out how to broach the subject of his
• 6:32
  Speaker 1: brother's death, even with some of his closest friends. Many
• 6:36
  Speaker 1: of them don't even know Nick ever had an older
• 6:38
  Speaker 1: brother at all. But in the weeks that followed, Nick
• 6:41
  Speaker 1: played the song in private over and over. The experience
• 6:47
  Speaker 1: of listening to it and feeling Chris's breath in it
• 6:50
  Speaker 1: provided him with a space to grieve. Since Chris was cremated,
• 6:55
  Speaker 1: there isn't a grave for Nick to visit, and so
• 6:57
  Speaker 1: the sonic space became all the more in value.
• 7:00
  Speaker 4: Feels like that sound came from a different time, Like
• 7:04
  Speaker 4: came from the time of my memories as a kid
• 7:06
  Speaker 4: with Chris. It's nice to hear a person's voice, so
• 7:09
  Speaker 4: you don't get to hear anymore.
• 7:11
  Speaker 1: But Nick wants to be absolutely sure that he is
• 7:14
  Speaker 1: hearing his brother's voice. Despite his initial certainty, a part
• 7:18
  Speaker 1: of him wonders is his brain just working through the
• 7:21
  Speaker 1: grief or is he really hearing his dead brother's voice
• 7:25
  Speaker 1: in a track by a Grammy nominated musician. Nick has
• 7:29
  Speaker 1: several points of evidence to support the latter. First, of course,
• 7:33
  Speaker 1: it just sounds like Chris. Second, Chris often reached out
• 7:37
  Speaker 1: to musicians he admired. In fact, at the Ottawa Jazz Fest,
• 7:42
  Speaker 1: Chris even navigated backstage to meet Binobo. The two ended
• 7:45
  Speaker 1: up chatting about sampling in a bid to further impress Bonobo.
• 7:50
  Speaker 1: Nick thinks it's entirely possible Chris followed up that interaction
• 7:53
  Speaker 1: by sending him beatboxing samples. Samples Binobo might have saved.
• 7:59
  Speaker 1: The third point of evidence the song's name Ontario, Ontario,
• 8:06
  Speaker 1: the Canadian province Nick and Chris are from. Bonobo is
• 8:10
  Speaker 1: from England, but he met Chris in Ontario. Nick has
• 8:21
  Speaker 1: tried everything to get a definitive answer. He searched online
• 8:24
  Speaker 1: for information about Bonobo's samples, and about once a year
• 8:28
  Speaker 1: he'll reach out to Bonobo. His management and his record label.
• 8:32
  Speaker 4: I'll like go on an emailing spree and I'll reach
• 8:35
  Speaker 4: out to like everyone who's ever sniffed Banobo, being like
• 8:40
  Speaker 4: I do not want to like say that my brother
• 8:43
  Speaker 4: deserves credit for anything, or.
• 8:45
  Speaker 1: Like you just want to know payment or anything like that.
• 8:47
  Speaker 4: I just want to know.
• 8:48
  Speaker 1: And they've never responded and never responded. I mean it's
• 8:51
  Speaker 1: not like the Rolling Stones, right, I mean you'd think
• 8:53
  Speaker 1: that he would be a little more accessible. Yeah, I'm
• 8:56
  Speaker 1: just looking at Banobo just to get a sense of
• 8:59
  Speaker 1: but all I'm coming up with a wow, amazing pictures
• 9:02
  Speaker 1: of primates. Oh yeah, that would also cow. I'm just looking.
• 9:06
  Speaker 1: Oh god, it's very moving. You haven't experienced true emotion
• 9:11
  Speaker 1: until you've seen a picture of two bonobos playing with
• 9:14
  Speaker 1: their baby. And then there's their personalities. Did you know
• 9:18
  Speaker 1: bonobos share food with strangers, or that they make love
• 9:22
  Speaker 1: face to face, or that female bonobos show a preference
• 9:26
  Speaker 1: for unaggressive males, that is, males who are subdued, not rude.
• 9:32
  Speaker 1: But Nick did not approach me to learn about bonobos,
• 9:35
  Speaker 1: even though they are wonderful. Nick came to me for help.
• 9:40
  Speaker 4: It would be amazing to use your fame and clout
• 9:44
  Speaker 4: and power to get a hold of the people that
• 9:48
  Speaker 4: I haven't been able to get a hold of.
• 9:51
  Speaker 1: Nick has an outsized view of my fame and clout
• 9:54
  Speaker 1: and power. But it's not like I'll be trying to
• 9:57
  Speaker 1: get an actual Bonobo on the phone, which by the way,
• 10:01
  Speaker 1: would be adorable. I'll only be trying to get Bonobo
• 10:04
  Speaker 1: on the phone. So I promise to try, and Nick,
• 10:09
  Speaker 1: in a subdued way, is thrilled. Awesome, thank you, thank you?
• 10:15
  Speaker 1: And in my own subdued way, so am I I
• 10:19
  Speaker 1: even break out a little beatboxing a mouse boosh? Did
• 10:23
  Speaker 1: you hear that?
• 10:25
  Speaker 4: Yeah, a little scratching.
• 10:40
  Speaker 1: Is it possible for a beatboxer to be recognized by
• 10:43
  Speaker 1: just a brief sample? Can one actually identify beatboxing as
• 10:47
  Speaker 1: one would a voice? In short? Does Nick's story make sense?
• 10:52
  Speaker 1: Before approaching Bonobo? I want to consult an expert, and
• 10:56
  Speaker 1: Nick thinks he knows just the person, beatboxing ic and
• 11:00
  Speaker 1: former member of the Roots Rozelle.
• 11:03
  Speaker 4: I remember Chris saying that Rozelle is the greatest of
• 11:07
  Speaker 4: all time.
• 11:08
  Speaker 1: I know this other guy named Devon.
• 11:12
  Speaker 5: Nice.
• 11:13
  Speaker 1: Did I mention him last time we spoke. Devon was
• 11:16
  Speaker 1: a Gimblet intern who participated in many beatboxing competitions. Every
• 11:21
  Speaker 1: time I'd run into him, like say in the bathroom
• 11:24
  Speaker 1: or about to go into the bathroom or coming out
• 11:27
  Speaker 1: of the bathroom, I'd say, hey, Devon, want to spit
• 11:31
  Speaker 1: a little something for me? And he'd laugh and say
• 11:35
  Speaker 1: maybe later. Yeah, Devon's pretty cool.
• 11:39
  Speaker 4: Rozelle is like beatboxing Royalty.
• 11:44
  Speaker 1: But Nick seems super stoked about this Rozelle guy.
• 11:47
  Speaker 4: But I mean no, like, in no way do I
• 11:51
  Speaker 4: mean to discredit Devon.
• 11:57
  Speaker 1: I send Rozelle an email, and when I don't hear back,
• 12:01
  Speaker 1: my producer Khalila finds a phone number for him, which
• 12:04
  Speaker 1: oddly is listed on his Instagram. Is it possible that
• 12:08
  Speaker 1: he's not aware of it, that he did it by accident?
• 12:11
  Speaker 4: That would be weird.
• 12:12
  Speaker 1: I don't know. Look at me, I'm constantly making mistakes.
• 12:15
  Speaker 1: How old is he?
• 12:16
  Speaker 4: It's fifty seven?
• 12:17
  Speaker 1: Oh fifty seven? What an inspiration?
• 12:20
  Speaker 4: Wow, here's more excited to talk to him because you're contemporaries.
• 12:24
  Speaker 1: He's fifty seven and he's still beat boxing away. Fantastic.
• 12:37
  Speaker 5: Leave your name and your number and someone will return local.
• 12:41
  Speaker 1: So I think we got the right number. The mailbox
• 12:46
  Speaker 1: is full.
• 12:47
  Speaker 2: I cannot accept any messages at this time.
• 12:49
  Speaker 1: The box it is, of course it is Devin. Remember
• 12:59
  Speaker 1: that I said I knew named Devon, great beatboxer, really
• 13:03
  Speaker 1: cool guy.
• 13:06
  Speaker 2: Hey.
• 13:07
  Speaker 5: Yeah.
• 13:09
  Speaker 1: After Nick's hero Rozelle crap the beatboxing bed, I was
• 13:13
  Speaker 1: blessed with the good fortune to get Devon on the phone.
• 13:18
  Speaker 6: For pro beatboxers, it's very, very easy to tell who
• 13:22
  Speaker 6: the beatboxer is just by a quick sample of their
• 13:25
  Speaker 6: beat boxing.
• 13:26
  Speaker 2: Right.
• 13:26
  Speaker 6: Your idea that somebody could recognize that just from the
• 13:29
  Speaker 6: beatboxing is totally on point.
• 13:31
  Speaker 1: After Devon tells me that I'm totally on point, I
• 13:34
  Speaker 1: asked if you could listen to the Bonobo sample alongside
• 13:37
  Speaker 1: a recording of Chris to see if it's the same person.
• 13:41
  Speaker 5: Let's take a gamber.
• 13:46
  Speaker 1: When you went, I thought you were going to launch
• 13:49
  Speaker 1: into some beatboxing. Now you've given me an appetite.
• 13:53
  Speaker 6: Hey Ontario by Bonobo.
• 13:56
  Speaker 1: Devin forges ahead, ignoring my hint to rustle up a
• 14:00
  Speaker 1: hasty beatboxing Bouya Bayze Ontario by Bonobo. Next, for a
• 14:08
  Speaker 1: point of comparison, I send him the YouTube video of Chris,
• 14:12
  Speaker 1: and to my surprise, I've seen this video.
• 14:15
  Speaker 6: Really, I swear I've seen.
• 14:19
  Speaker 1: That how why would you have seen it?
• 14:23
  Speaker 6: Because YouTube was the only way people learn how to beatbox,
• 14:27
  Speaker 6: and this video is like, he has really really good
• 14:31
  Speaker 6: skills also for that time. It's shocking to me that
• 14:35
  Speaker 6: you would be this good in two thousand and six.
• 14:36
  Speaker 6: That's crazy. Those are really impressive boxing skills.
• 14:41
  Speaker 1: So impressive in fact, that Devin wonders, if indeed Chris
• 14:45
  Speaker 1: is being sampled on the track, why wouldn't Binobo use
• 14:48
  Speaker 1: a flashier example of his talent. Why would he instead
• 14:52
  Speaker 1: loop something that sounds so sedate.
• 14:59
  Speaker 6: Like just very basic, That sort of would be the
• 15:02
  Speaker 6: type of thing anyone would do as their first sounds.
• 15:05
  Speaker 6: So I just don't know why he would take some
• 15:07
  Speaker 6: random kid sample of the most basic version of beatboxing
• 15:11
  Speaker 6: and put it.
• 15:12
  Speaker 1: In Stylistically, Devon isn't able to link the Banobo sample
• 15:16
  Speaker 1: to the YouTube video, so I send him another example
• 15:19
  Speaker 1: of Chris's work, hoping it might help clarify.
• 15:29
  Speaker 6: Okay, I heard something interesting.
• 15:31
  Speaker 1: What's that right there? Okay, so is it that sound?
• 15:36
  Speaker 4: Yeah, he does that.
• 15:37
  Speaker 6: It's the same thing from the Lenobo song. It does
• 15:39
  Speaker 6: actually sound pretty similar now that I'm hearing just that part.
• 15:49
  Speaker 1: Now that Devin's confirmed the plausibility of Nick's story, reaching
• 15:53
  Speaker 1: out to Bonobos seems like a reasonable next step. So
• 15:56
  Speaker 1: email is record label, then an email is management. Then
• 16:00
  Speaker 1: I email his record label again, and his management again.
• 16:05
  Speaker 1: After waiting several weeks, I call in a favor from
• 16:08
  Speaker 1: a friend with music industry connections who gets me a
• 16:10
  Speaker 1: more direct email address. But just like Nick, I hear
• 16:14
  Speaker 1: nothing back. Thanks calling red Light management if you know
• 16:18
  Speaker 1: your part of the extension. So I try phoning Bnobo's
• 16:21
  Speaker 1: management company, but there's no operator, no directory. I have
• 16:25
  Speaker 1: no way of knowing what extension to dial. Let me
• 16:28
  Speaker 1: just try a random one maybe.
• 16:31
  Speaker 2: In Validentary. Try again, in validentary, Please try again one
• 16:39
  Speaker 2: one a ah in Validentary.
• 16:47
  Speaker 1: For God's sake, my fame, power, even my clout is
• 16:52
  Speaker 1: getting me nowhere. Why is it so difficult to get
• 17:00
  Speaker 1: a response. In all my correspondence, I keep explaining over
• 17:04
  Speaker 1: and over how this isn't about money or credit, how
• 17:08
  Speaker 1: Chris idolized Bonobo and Nick listens to Ontario as a
• 17:11
  Speaker 1: way to mourn him, and yet I still can't get
• 17:14
  Speaker 1: anyone to even engage. Maybe there's something about the whole
• 17:17
  Speaker 1: business of sampling and authorship that's making them touchy because
• 17:21
  Speaker 1: when sampling took off in the seventies, almost nothing was cleared,
• 17:25
  Speaker 1: but then about a decade later, the tide turned and
• 17:29
  Speaker 1: the lawsuits began. The Beastie Boys are still paying for
• 17:32
  Speaker 1: the samples on Paul's boutique. Kanye West was sued by
• 17:36
  Speaker 1: the parents of a child he sampled from a YouTube video,
• 17:40
  Speaker 1: and just last summer there was drama between Beyonce and
• 17:42
  Speaker 1: Calise because Beyonce used a sample for milkshake without Callis's permission.
• 17:49
  Speaker 1: Is it possible that for all our reassurances, Bonobo's people
• 17:53
  Speaker 1: still think we're angling for a lawsuit? And then, at
• 18:03
  Speaker 1: long last, Benobo's people finally get back to me. I'm
• 18:08
  Speaker 1: sorry for the delay in responding. The email reads, I
• 18:11
  Speaker 1: did get confirmation that the person you've emailed us about
• 18:15
  Speaker 1: was not sampled in the song Ontario, thank you and best.
• 18:21
  Speaker 1: There's no sense of who was doing the confirming, no
• 18:24
  Speaker 1: mention of Chris by name. He's only referred to as
• 18:27
  Speaker 1: the person you've emailed us about. I write back, asking
• 18:31
  Speaker 1: who and what was sampled so I can close the
• 18:34
  Speaker 1: loop on this whole thing. After waiting three months and
• 18:37
  Speaker 1: receiving no reply, I follow up, but I never get
• 18:41
  Speaker 1: a response. I did get confirmation that the person you've
• 18:45
  Speaker 1: emailed us about, you know, being your brother was not
• 18:48
  Speaker 1: sampled in the song Ontario. After all the waiting, all
• 18:52
  Speaker 1: I have for Nick is a generic letter that turns
• 18:54
  Speaker 1: his beautiful talisman, the song he's been listening to for
• 18:57
  Speaker 1: five years to dust. I wish that I even had
• 19:01
  Speaker 1: an email from them that was a little bit more considerate.
• 19:07
  Speaker 7: Yeah, for sure, but yeah, thanks again so much for
• 19:12
  Speaker 7: looking into it and really appreciate it. Well.
• 19:15
  Speaker 1: Nick's subdued reaction is to be expected. As a subdued
• 19:18
  Speaker 1: Canadian myself, I can tell the news hurts, but being
• 19:22
  Speaker 1: the kind of person who never wants to burden, Nick
• 19:25
  Speaker 1: shows more concern for my disappointment than his own. Before
• 19:36
  Speaker 1: this whole undertaking, Ontario could exist in a gray zone,
• 19:40
  Speaker 1: Nick could believe he was hearing his brother. Now that
• 19:43
  Speaker 1: that's been taken away from him, he's lost his place
• 19:46
  Speaker 1: to mourn. But maybe there's another way to provide Nick
• 19:49
  Speaker 1: with such a space. And so I brainstorm ideas for
• 19:53
  Speaker 1: a new Sonic memorial. Maybe I could get a remix
• 19:57
  Speaker 1: from that guy Devin, whom I think I already mentioned.
• 20:00
  Speaker 1: What about offers my producer Khalila, that other musical act
• 20:05
  Speaker 1: Chris liked. Do you mean Devin, I ask no, She says,
• 20:11
  Speaker 1: the erbalizer Khalila is contradicting me. Isn't due to insubordination alone.
• 20:18
  Speaker 1: She's referencing a detail from that story about Chris's meeting
• 20:21
  Speaker 1: Bonobo at the Ottawa Jazz Festival. Nick had mentioned that
• 20:25
  Speaker 1: when Chris first slipped backstage, he ran into another.
• 20:28
  Speaker 4: Group and He's like, Hey, can you guys tell me
• 20:31
  Speaker 4: where Bonobo is? Do I really want to meet him?
• 20:33
  Speaker 4: He's my favorite.
• 20:35
  Speaker 1: One of the men in the group turned to Chris
• 20:37
  Speaker 1: and said, in a pronounced British accent.
• 20:40
  Speaker 4: Banobo, like, fuck Bonobo?
• 20:41
  Speaker 1: Where the herbalizer, the erbalizer? Pottymouth Banobo? Hating the erbalizer.
• 20:49
  Speaker 1: The erbalizer would go on to become another one of
• 20:52
  Speaker 1: Chris's all time favorites and Nick's as well. And so
• 20:56
  Speaker 1: I email an address I find online and explain Nick's situation,
• 21:00
  Speaker 1: and then I make my request. Maybe the Herbalizer could
• 21:04
  Speaker 1: create a song that features Chris's beatboxing. Whereas I'd spent
• 21:16
  Speaker 1: months trying to get anyone even remotely associated with Bonobo
• 21:20
  Speaker 1: to respond I get an email from the Erbalizer that
• 21:23
  Speaker 1: same day. It's from the band's co creator, Jake Werry,
• 21:27
  Speaker 1: who explains that while the Herbalizer is now defunct, he's
• 21:31
  Speaker 1: working on a new project with a new partner. He
• 21:34
  Speaker 1: tells me they'd be up to hear more about the idea.
• 21:37
  Speaker 1: So a few days later, I get on a video
• 21:39
  Speaker 1: call with James Moss aka DJ Sterling Moss and Jake
• 21:44
  Speaker 1: Werry aka The Herbalizer.
• 21:47
  Speaker 8: With British and we say the Herbalize us sorry today,
• 21:50
  Speaker 8: an h you know none of this Herbalizer. Now look
• 21:53
  Speaker 8: look here, oh boy, this is the bloody.
• 21:55
  Speaker 1: Herbalizer Herbalizer, Okay. Jake has the vibe of a character
• 22:00
  Speaker 1: from a Guy Ritchie film, the ex rugby player who
• 22:03
  Speaker 1: works as an enforcer for a loan shark played by
• 22:06
  Speaker 1: Jason Statham. You know, scary, but he is well within
• 22:11
  Speaker 1: his right to be tearing me a new one. I
• 22:14
  Speaker 1: apologize for the faux pas.
• 22:15
  Speaker 8: Oh, I'm minded kidding.
• 22:17
  Speaker 1: I loved it. Sure, I've produced radio stories, but I've
• 22:27
  Speaker 1: never once produced a song, not even one of those
• 22:30
  Speaker 1: public radio premium ones. Ira Glass and Peter Segel singing
• 22:35
  Speaker 1: a parody version of Biggie and Puff Daddy's more money,
• 22:38
  Speaker 1: more problems, but with lyrics about how your money solves problems,
• 22:43
  Speaker 1: problems inherent to sustaining important journalism. So, with neither musical
• 22:48
  Speaker 1: training nor the slightest idea what I'm doing, I start
• 22:51
  Speaker 1: music producing, offering suggestions for the vibe I'm going for.
• 22:56
  Speaker 1: Elegiic might be overstating it, but like allowing some of
• 23:00
  Speaker 1: that feeling of loss into it.
• 23:02
  Speaker 3: Or you know, I think that the way that he
• 23:06
  Speaker 3: beat boxes is not wistful. The story might be, but
• 23:10
  Speaker 3: that's not the why that he performed.
• 23:11
  Speaker 5: Yeah, I was just.
• 23:12
  Speaker 1: Thinking wistful beatboxing. What was I thinking? James and Jake
• 23:18
  Speaker 1: are well within their rights to be tearing me yet
• 23:20
  Speaker 1: another new one.
• 23:22
  Speaker 8: It should be more like a celebratory, positive, happy thing.
• 23:26
  Speaker 8: It should be about him living on through the music.
• 23:30
  Speaker 8: But I think to see what happens, rather than trying
• 23:33
  Speaker 8: to force it to go in a direction, just just
• 23:36
  Speaker 8: let that, let the vibe happen. Man.
• 23:40
  Speaker 1: Throughout our conversation, my mind keeps turning back to one question.
• 23:45
  Speaker 1: Why would two popular, successful musicians be so amenable to
• 23:49
  Speaker 1: talking to a first time music producer like myself. James
• 23:53
  Speaker 1: has performed for crowds that have numbered in the hundreds
• 23:55
  Speaker 1: of thousands, and Jake has had songs featured in Hollywood films.
• 24:00
  Speaker 1: Why would they entertain a request to write a whole
• 24:02
  Speaker 1: piece of music honoring someone they don't even know. But
• 24:06
  Speaker 1: it won't be long before the answer to my question
• 24:09
  Speaker 1: is revealed, And in the meantime, when I tell Nick
• 24:12
  Speaker 1: the idea, he's thrilled.
• 24:17
  Speaker 9: Walking through a really nice suburb of London, Oh my
• 24:22
  Speaker 9: way to see Jake.
• 24:23
  Speaker 1: In June, Nick travels to England to see family, but
• 24:27
  Speaker 1: knowing Jake lives in London and being such a big fan,
• 24:30
  Speaker 1: Nick nervously asks me if Jake might want to meet up.
• 24:33
  Speaker 1: I figure it's not a bad idea for the two
• 24:35
  Speaker 1: of them to get to know each other. It might
• 24:37
  Speaker 1: even help the song. So I asked Jake if he'd
• 24:39
  Speaker 1: be open to it, and once again Jake surprises me.
• 24:43
  Speaker 1: Not only does he agree, but he invites Nick over
• 24:46
  Speaker 1: to his home.
• 24:47
  Speaker 9: It's lovely little street. It's not where i'd imagine Jake
• 24:52
  Speaker 9: of the Herbalizer to live.
• 24:54
  Speaker 1: Nick records the visit and tells me about it later.
• 24:57
  Speaker 4: There's a little nerve wracking walking up there. Hey, Jake,
• 25:01
  Speaker 4: it's good, eh man, and this is surreal. That means
• 25:04
  Speaker 4: you have to say, honestly, I.
• 25:06
  Speaker 8: Wake up in the morning, I put my pants on
• 25:08
  Speaker 8: just like you.
• 25:09
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 25:09
  Speaker 7: I think I was a bit intimidated both it being
• 25:11
  Speaker 7: someone who I kind of admire, who's music especially I
• 25:14
  Speaker 7: mean I admire, and then also just like the fact
• 25:16
  Speaker 7: that they're British and you know, have that you know,
• 25:19
  Speaker 7: different sense of humor and a bit of an edge
• 25:21
  Speaker 7: to them and stuff. When I was here visiting my cousin,
• 25:24
  Speaker 7: he's like a diehard always sister.
• 25:27
  Speaker 1: Okay, right, Jake ushers Nick into the house and doesn't
• 25:31
  Speaker 1: bother standing on ceremony. Almost the second Nicks inside, before
• 25:35
  Speaker 1: he's even positioned his microphone, Jake gets right into it.
• 25:39
  Speaker 8: So how long is it since your brother poss uh?
• 25:43
  Speaker 4: Two thousand and six? I think, so, okay, I want
• 25:47
  Speaker 4: one two thousand and four.
• 25:49
  Speaker 1: My wife died in two thousand and four, Jake says.
• 25:52
  Speaker 1: And this, it turns out, is the reason why Jake's
• 25:55
  Speaker 1: been so open to Nick. He relates to him. Around
• 25:59
  Speaker 1: the same time Nick lost Chris, Jake lost his wife Mary,
• 26:03
  Speaker 1: also unexpectedly and also tragically, off.
• 26:06
  Speaker 8: Of the plane going to jailing Popeans and I got
• 26:09
  Speaker 8: a call from my nigh by saying get to the hospital.
• 26:12
  Speaker 5: Case hospital.
• 26:13
  Speaker 1: The neighbor had heard Jake's two sons, only four and
• 26:15
  Speaker 1: five at the time, crying next door. An hour later,
• 26:19
  Speaker 1: the kids were still crying.
• 26:21
  Speaker 8: She heard my little one say it's a pillow under
• 26:24
  Speaker 8: her head.
• 26:26
  Speaker 1: It was then the neighbor jumped over the back fence
• 26:28
  Speaker 1: and found Mary lying on the floor dead. Mary had
• 26:32
  Speaker 1: been emptying the dishwasher, hanging the utensils up on a
• 26:35
  Speaker 1: rack when she suddenly collapsed. It would take a few
• 26:39
  Speaker 1: days to work out what had happened, but it seems
• 26:42
  Speaker 1: to screw on the utensil rack had connected with a
• 26:44
  Speaker 1: live wire under the wall. Mary was electrocuted. It was
• 26:49
  Speaker 1: a freak accident, amazing.
• 26:51
  Speaker 8: Mary was really tough, but I had two little kids
• 26:53
  Speaker 8: and so it has a testament to my love to her.
• 26:57
  Speaker 8: So I'm not going to fucking destroy me. Yeah, the
• 27:00
  Speaker 8: best style I can.
• 27:01
  Speaker 3: Like.
• 27:01
  Speaker 7: I was essentially a stranger walking into his home and
• 27:04
  Speaker 7: he told me his life story within five minutes, which
• 27:06
  Speaker 7: is admirable. You know something that I wish, I really
• 27:09
  Speaker 7: wish I did have more the confidence just to be open,
• 27:12
  Speaker 7: just to be brutally open with everyone.
• 27:15
  Speaker 3: Well.
• 27:15
  Speaker 1: Nick often worries that talking about his grief might be
• 27:17
  Speaker 1: a burden to others. With Jake knowing he's been through
• 27:21
  Speaker 1: something similar, that burden disappeared, and so Nick was more
• 27:25
  Speaker 1: open than he usually is. He and Jay chatted about
• 27:28
  Speaker 1: their respective losses.
• 27:29
  Speaker 7: There's something he said at one point that really stuck
• 27:32
  Speaker 7: with me. This like, you know, once you hit a
• 27:34
  Speaker 7: certain you know, a certain low point, you just can't
• 27:37
  Speaker 7: get any lower than that, you know, you kind of
• 27:38
  Speaker 7: bottom out. And and I related to that. Despite the
• 27:42
  Speaker 7: fact that on paper his hardship seriously pelt Weigh's mind,
• 27:45
  Speaker 7: you know it, it felt like I've been where he's been.
• 27:55
  Speaker 7: He guys the most lovely little backyard with a cherry
• 27:58
  Speaker 7: tree in it and a few cherries, and my.
• 28:02
  Speaker 8: Answer check clumps. There's a fucking pain growing your own vegetables.
• 28:05
  Speaker 7: And then in the back backyard there's this studio, which
• 28:10
  Speaker 7: is like also equally magical. It's a big, big shed,
• 28:13
  Speaker 7: got everything that's got a full drunkit inscene, collection of vinyl,
• 28:17
  Speaker 7: all sorts of other instruments.
• 28:19
  Speaker 8: That's one of my favorite ones.
• 28:27
  Speaker 1: In the studio, Jake plays Nick some of the things
• 28:30
  Speaker 1: he's been working on. As they continue to talk, I've had.
• 28:33
  Speaker 8: Some fucking down, down down moments, days, weeks, months, years,
• 28:40
  Speaker 8: and music has definitely really been very cathartic for me.
• 28:44
  Speaker 1: When he was at his lowest, Jake couldn't bring himself
• 28:46
  Speaker 1: to make any music at all. It was a drought
• 28:49
  Speaker 1: that lasted years. But lately he's been on a tear.
• 28:53
  Speaker 1: He tells Nick about a night last January, just after
• 28:56
  Speaker 1: leaving the studio two.
• 28:57
  Speaker 8: In the morning, I was pretty high and went to
• 29:00
  Speaker 8: bed and I was just playing the tracks on my
• 29:02
  Speaker 8: phone on repeat. I was just like, I found myself
• 29:06
  Speaker 8: chuckling aloud to myself with this like deep belly laugh,
• 29:10
  Speaker 8: with this profound sense of just joy that the music
• 29:15
  Speaker 8: I was listening to sounded fantastic, and the realization that
• 29:17
  Speaker 8: I had made it.
• 29:19
  Speaker 1: I just couldn't believe it.
• 29:20
  Speaker 8: So this sounds amazing, and I've made it.
• 29:24
  Speaker 1: Jake's collaborator James, stops by to also meet Nick, and
• 29:29
  Speaker 1: Nick tells him about that fateful meeting backstage at the
• 29:32
  Speaker 1: Ottawa Jazz Fest.
• 29:34
  Speaker 10: Noble Worth of Herbalizer, and that's a fair responded it.
• 29:50
  Speaker 4: I mean, he made me a Keish.
• 29:52
  Speaker 7: In all fairness, it was a microwave Keish, but it
• 29:54
  Speaker 7: was a very good microwave.
• 29:56
  Speaker 1: Keish.
• 29:56
  Speaker 7: Threw together a little salad fa We made keish and
• 30:01
  Speaker 7: salad in his backyard, and I think that was one
• 30:03
  Speaker 7: of those real moments where it's like, you know, I'm
• 30:06
  Speaker 7: not particularly religious, but if Chris were watching down on
• 30:09
  Speaker 7: me in that moment, he'd be having the laugh that
• 30:11
  Speaker 7: I'm having Kish with the fucking herbalizer.
• 30:14
  Speaker 5: Yeah.
• 30:15
  Speaker 7: If Chris could see this, he'd think it's insanely cool.
• 30:21
  Speaker 1: Nick is a husband, a new dad, But no matter
• 30:24
  Speaker 1: how life moves along, and no matter how old he gets,
• 30:27
  Speaker 1: it'll always continue to think of Chris as the cool
• 30:29
  Speaker 1: older brother, his hero, and eating Kish with the fucking herbalizer.
• 30:35
  Speaker 1: Chris would definitely approve.
• 30:43
  Speaker 8: We're gonna have to go to train.
• 30:45
  Speaker 7: At the end of all this, Jake offered to drive
• 30:48
  Speaker 7: me to my train to the airport, which was so
• 30:50
  Speaker 7: so nice of him, and I honestly I don't think
• 30:53
  Speaker 7: I would have made my flight if it wasn't for that.
• 30:58
  Speaker 4: Thanks again, man so much for all this.
• 31:02
  Speaker 7: The moral of the story is, indeed, fuck Binopo verb Flaser.
• 31:19
  Speaker 8: Hey Hey, Hi, Nick, Hey, how's it going.
• 31:21
  Speaker 5: It's good.
• 31:22
  Speaker 4: I miss you guys.
• 31:23
  Speaker 1: Three months after they bonded with Nick. That day in London,
• 31:27
  Speaker 1: Jake and James get back in touch and they've made
• 31:31
  Speaker 1: a song, a song featuring Chris's beatboxing. So we all
• 31:35
  Speaker 1: get on a call together to listen. Okay, here we go,
• 31:38
  Speaker 1: sona up Nick. The track is called We Are the Paradox.
• 32:02
  Speaker 5: Twitch.
• 32:06
  Speaker 3: You know, we wanted to build something around your brother.
• 32:10
  Speaker 3: He's the engine, and I had this really real feeling
• 32:14
  Speaker 3: towards the end. It was like, you know, he's back.
• 32:17
  Speaker 3: He's here now and it's great to work with him,
• 32:21
  Speaker 3: even though he's not here.
• 32:26
  Speaker 1: Leaving Jake's one day, James said he had this lyric
• 32:28
  Speaker 1: rattling around in his head. Put the beat in the box.
• 32:31
  Speaker 1: So they added it to the song.
• 32:33
  Speaker 3: And there's a lyric that says, cut the phone, stop
• 32:36
  Speaker 3: the clocks, which is a reference to a W. H.
• 32:39
  Speaker 3: Jordan poem called funeral Blues. It's an odes to a
• 32:43
  Speaker 3: lost loved one. We are the Paradox, which you can
• 32:55
  Speaker 3: interpret however you like. It will mean when it means
• 33:00
  Speaker 3: to you as it means for what it means to us.
• 33:16
  Speaker 1: Later, Nick also plays the song for his dad, unbelievable.
• 33:21
  Speaker 8: Twitch and then at the end everything drops out and
• 33:48
  Speaker 8: it's kind of like sending Chris back to back to
• 33:52
  Speaker 8: the world that he's in now, so kind of everything
• 33:54
  Speaker 8: fades out and then Chris kind of goes to the
• 33:57
  Speaker 8: distance as well. It's it's saying goodbye again. Sorry.
• 34:13
  Speaker 4: Just incredible.
• 34:15
  Speaker 7: To have that much life and energy in the track
• 34:17
  Speaker 7: was something Chris would have been happy about.
• 34:19
  Speaker 5: You know, I don't know.
• 34:21
  Speaker 4: It just feels right. It feels right, and I'm glad
• 34:24
  Speaker 4: to feel like like it's mine.
• 34:29
  Speaker 1: We're all a mess of paradoxes, believing in things we
• 34:32
  Speaker 1: know can't be true, missing the dead, but also whunwilling
• 34:36
  Speaker 1: to talk about them. We walk around carrying feelings too
• 34:40
  Speaker 1: complicated and contradictory to express. When it all becomes too
• 34:44
  Speaker 1: big and words aren't enough to help get it all out,
• 34:48
  Speaker 1: there's always music. This episode of Heavyweight was produced by
• 35:19
  Speaker 1: senior producer Khalila Holt and me Jonathan Goldstein, along with
• 35:22
  Speaker 1: Mohey mcgauker. Our supervising producer is Stevie Lane. Special thanks
• 35:27
  Speaker 1: to Chris's parents, Steve and Stephanie, as well as to
• 35:30
  Speaker 1: Emily Condon, Steve Marsh Liz Fulton, Max Green, Ellen Frankman,
• 35:34
  Speaker 1: Natalie Russell, Alex Bloomberg, and Jackie Cohen. Bobby Lord mixed
• 35:38
  Speaker 1: the episode with original music by Christine Fellows, John K.
• 35:41
  Speaker 1: Samson and he himself, Bobby Lord. James and Jake's new
• 35:46
  Speaker 1: group is called The Brilliant. Keep an eye out for
• 35:48
  Speaker 1: them in twenty twenty three, and in the meantime, check
• 35:51
  Speaker 1: out our own Brilliant, Christine Fellows' new album, Stuff We
• 35:55
  Speaker 1: All Get. Additional music credits can be found on our website,
• 35:58
  Speaker 1: gimlipmedia dot com. Slash Heavyweight. Our theme song is by
• 36:02
  Speaker 1: The Weaker Thans courtesy of Epitaph Records. Follow us on
• 36:06
  Speaker 1: Twitter at Heavyweight or email us at Heavyweight at gimbletmedia
• 36:09
  Speaker 1: dot com. This is our fiftieth episode. Next week fifty
• 36:13
  Speaker 1: one is our final episode of the season and if
• 36:17
  Speaker 1: I'm not mistaken, I believe it is our longest episode yet.
• 36:21
  Speaker 1: So see you then.
• 36:32
  Speaker 5: Twitch cut got the.
• 37:09
  Speaker 11: Look the trap look down.
• 37:28
  Speaker 5: The part Then drop.
• 37:38
  Speaker 12: Boss what trop trop.
• 38:14
  Speaker 11: Wijn the drop look Come on the particle, the Trop
• 38:29
  Speaker 11: down the particle, the trap, moss in the mossssch moss
• 38:48
  Speaker 11: in the moss.
• 38:55
  Speaker 5: Twitch twists.
• 39:13
  Speaker 13: H twork, she was, she was, she was, she wash,
• 39:23
  Speaker 13: she was, she was.
• 39:25
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I'm being foxing even he loots.
• 39:30
  Speaker 13: Yeah, be being boxing even heavy loots.
• 39:37
  Speaker 1: I'm I'm I'm being foxing.