Latest / Booked On Rock with Eric Senich / Chasing Buttery Cake Ass: A Hilarious Hunt for Rock's Lost Legend [Episode 215]

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Chasing Buttery Cake Ass: A Hilarious Hunt for Rock's Lost Legend [Episode 215] · Booked On Rock with Eric Senich

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: We're totally booked rock and roll.
• 0:04
  Speaker 2: I mean, I'll leave you. You're reading little hands this.
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: It's time to rock and roll, Rock roll Out are
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  Speaker 1: totally booked. Welcome back to Booked on Rock, the podcast
• 0:17
  Speaker 1: for those about to read and rock. Find the podcast
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  Speaker 1: at bookdown rock dot com. Every episode there in audio
• 0:23
  Speaker 1: and video format, exclusive videos, links to all of the
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: social media sites. Let's find out all the latest rockbook
• 0:30
  Speaker 1: releases at booked on rock dot com. This episode's guest
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  Speaker 1: is author, comedian and musician Aug Stone. The audio version
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  Speaker 1: of his fictional comedy book from twenty twenty three, titled
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  Speaker 1: The Balance of Butterycake Ass has just been released. That's right,
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  Speaker 1: that's the title. It's the story of two music obsessives
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  Speaker 1: who embark on a hilarious quest to track down Butterycakeasses
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  Speaker 1: live in Hungaria. An album as legendary as it is obscure.
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  Speaker 1: The pursuit of one of the greatest bands ever Unknown
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  Speaker 1: takes them down many a bizarre path, teaming with grand
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  Speaker 1: ideas and grander egos. In this ode to record shopping
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  Speaker 1: and what it's like to be in your first band,
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  Speaker 1: packed with puns, illusions, and references across a wide range
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  Speaker 1: of culture, both popular and not, offers up a big
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  Speaker 1: slice of the fun and frustration of playing rock and roll.
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  Speaker 1: So let's talk about the book, our love of record stores,
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  Speaker 1: and more with aug Stone. Agg Stone, Welcome to the podcast.
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  Speaker 2: Hey, thanks man, thanks for having me.
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  Speaker 1: You're not far from me. You are in the same
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  Speaker 1: state state of Connecticut. That's right. Where are you checking
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  Speaker 1: in from tonight?
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  Speaker 2: Stratford, Cool, you know, about fifteen minutes off of new Haven, Cool.
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  Speaker 1: Which new Haven, by the way, is part of the
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  Speaker 1: story of this book. Here Cutler Records, a legendary record
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  Speaker 1: store of new Haven. Well, let's start. Tell us about yourself.
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  Speaker 1: Who is aug Stone?
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  Speaker 2: Well, I'm a musician and a writer. I mostly write
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  Speaker 2: these days because I've had his stream of books come
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  Speaker 2: out the past three years, and I've been promoting those
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  Speaker 2: torn around the country.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah.
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  Speaker 2: I grew up in Stratford, was in Boston for about
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  Speaker 2: ten years, London for about ten years, LA for a year,
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  Speaker 2: Nashville for a year, and then like the pandemic kind
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  Speaker 2: of brought me back to my hometown.
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  Speaker 1: Wow, a lot of traveling. Yeah. Yeah, what are the
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  Speaker 1: other books that you've written? Oh?
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  Speaker 2: My lad, it's actually a great video you got right here,
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  Speaker 2: yep is. It's called Sporting Mustaches. It's thirteen tall tales
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  Speaker 2: about the role facial hair has played in athletics over
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  Speaker 2: the years. Oh that's good. Yeah, and it's illustrated as well.
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  Speaker 2: My friend Alan did an awesome job. He I mean,
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  Speaker 2: this is one of my favorites. Is the speed skater.
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  Speaker 2: His name is Veloso, which means Harry and Italian, so
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  Speaker 2: he's now a be going on for his tash and
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  Speaker 2: in his chest hair. And I've worked in as many
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  Speaker 2: Van Halen references as I could.
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  Speaker 1: Oh, I love it.
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  Speaker 2: There's one story called in Early History of the three
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  Speaker 2: faced race, which is like the three legged race, but
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  Speaker 2: instead they tie their mustaches together and try and run,
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  Speaker 2: which is it makes you WinCE. But it starts in
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  Speaker 2: the early seventies and then the tradition kind of carries on.
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  Speaker 2: And when I get to the race for nineteen eighty five,
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  Speaker 2: I have a one team where black arm bands to
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  Speaker 2: show that they're in mourning for Dave having left the band.
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  Speaker 1: I love it. I love it. I oh man, Well,
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  Speaker 1: when we wrap this up, we can let people know
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  Speaker 1: where they can find those books. But let's talk about this.
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  Speaker 1: This is quite a title, the Ballad of Buttery Cake Ass. Okay,
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  Speaker 1: so when people see this title, they're asking what is
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  Speaker 1: behind that title? So tell us about this book, what's
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  Speaker 1: it about, and where is this title come from. So
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  Speaker 1: when I was in.
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  Speaker 2: High school, my best friend and I used to like
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  Speaker 2: to make up fake bands to ask for record stores.
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  Speaker 2: And the funniest thing I've ever heard in my life
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  Speaker 2: was one day We're at Cutler's and New Haven and
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  Speaker 2: I heard Brie ask the clerk do you have anything
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  Speaker 2: by Buttery Cake Ass? And the guy boy on the counter.
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  Speaker 2: This was winter break of nineteen ninety one, so like,
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  Speaker 2: you know New Haven, you know college town, lots of
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  Speaker 2: cool bands came through. Alternative music was on the rise,
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  Speaker 2: so there were lots of bands with like long, strange names.
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  Speaker 2: So the guy didn't even bad an eye. He just says,
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  Speaker 2: is there any particular album you're looking for? And I
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  Speaker 2: just said the first thing that popped into my head,
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  Speaker 2: which was Live in Hungaria, And the guy got really
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  Speaker 2: confused and he said, do you mean Live and Hungry?
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  Speaker 2: And Brian, my best friend, and I just shook our
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  Speaker 2: heads like got real serious, like no, it's definitely Live
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  Speaker 2: in Hungaria. And as this poor guy just walked away
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  Speaker 2: to go check their stock for like this album we
• 4:39
  Speaker 2: had just made up seconds ago. Like holding in that
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  Speaker 2: laughter was like the most joyous feeling in my life.
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  Speaker 2: And like whenever I do comedy, I always try and
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  Speaker 2: get back to that feeling.
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  Speaker 1: I love it.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, a couple of years ago, I had the idea,
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  Speaker 2: you know, to tell the Buttery Cake Ass story. And
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  Speaker 2: I've played in bands my whole life. It was amazing
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  Speaker 2: how much of my self went into a book called
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  Speaker 2: The Ballad of Buttery k Gas. But you know, these
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  Speaker 2: two best friends go on a quest to find this
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  Speaker 2: record that's impossible to find, like only three hundred copies
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  Speaker 2: where ever pressed, and most of those were destroyed. And
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  Speaker 2: like on this quest they kind of meet a couple
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  Speaker 2: of people who knew the band and they tell them
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  Speaker 2: the story. And yeah, it was a hell of a
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  Speaker 2: lot of fun to write. And at the end there's
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  Speaker 2: a fifty page fake discography of all just made up
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  Speaker 2: bands that I said were associated with Buttery k Gas
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  Speaker 2: in some way. And I had finished the book, then
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  Speaker 2: I had the idea to like just keep going with
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  Speaker 2: the discography, and it took me an extra month to write,
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  Speaker 2: but like waking up every morning and just like thinking
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  Speaker 2: up ridiculous album titles and song titles was just so
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  Speaker 2: much fun. I just really love doing it.
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  Speaker 1: I'm looking at it here. You got a favorite title
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  Speaker 1: album title that you came up with?
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  Speaker 2: Well, yes, I have a couple. Actually there's what. There's
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  Speaker 2: an EP title called Hairs of the Cold War, which
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  Speaker 2: is a reference to the line in Crazy Train Airs
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  Speaker 2: of the Cultiar, and then it's called close Shave for
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  Speaker 2: the hot Heads.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, I love it. This is good. I mean, but
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  Speaker 1: you have to have quite an imagination to come up
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  Speaker 1: with a full book based on this one moment between friends.
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  Speaker 1: I mean, is this something that have you done a
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  Speaker 1: lot of this type of writing? Just creative imagination running wild?
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, all my stuff is pretty out there. Like sporting
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  Speaker 2: Mustache is the same thing. It's just these tall tales
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  Speaker 2: about dudes with excessively long facial hair that they would
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  Speaker 2: like wrap around baseball bats or hockey sticks. It's like
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  Speaker 2: very much like what can I do with this? Like
• 6:42
  Speaker 2: once I have a title that intrigues me, I'm like, oh, well,
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  Speaker 2: you know this will be awesome. Like how can I
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  Speaker 2: make this work?
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  Speaker 1: And how long did it take to write it.
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  Speaker 2: It took about six months actually, like not very long.
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  Speaker 2: I was pretty focused on it, and yeah, it was
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  Speaker 2: a lot of fun, like, like I said, a lot
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  Speaker 2: of like experience from like playing in bands that you know,
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  Speaker 2: didn't really go anywhere and just sort of like those
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  Speaker 2: those huge dreams you have when you're like eighteen years old,
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  Speaker 2: but you have and you have like all this energy,
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  Speaker 2: but you really have no idea how to make any
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  Speaker 2: of that happen. Like I'm amazed when bands get popular
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  Speaker 2: that young and like write really good material because I
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  Speaker 2: remember like my early bands, you know, we had these
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  Speaker 2: huge egos, but like making stuff happen was just it's
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  Speaker 2: you know, very difficult and not you know, any level
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  Speaker 2: of professionalism.
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  Speaker 1: Tell us about the main characters in this book. Who's Hans.
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  Speaker 1: We got Hans Floral Nightingale, Hans Floral Anderson and Hans Yes,
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  Speaker 1: which I.
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  Speaker 2: Just thought was really funny, Like I like the idea
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  Speaker 2: of like a sort of a fairy taleeness to it,
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  Speaker 2: Like you know, rock and roll is kind of like
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  Speaker 2: one big fairy tale in a way, and so like
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  Speaker 2: you had Hans, I thought of Hans Christian Anderson, So
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  Speaker 2: that's where he comes from. And he Conscertion had written
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  Speaker 2: a fairy tale called the Nightingale, which is why the
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  Speaker 2: other guy's last name is Nightingale. But they have the
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  Speaker 2: middle name or the nickname Floral because when they meet,
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  Speaker 2: they're both in a band. They each have separate bands
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  Speaker 2: called the Florists but with two o's, and they have
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  Speaker 2: this whole like philosophy about you know, the floor being
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  Speaker 2: like rock bottom, like the kiss song and where you
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  Speaker 2: start up, but then you like sort of make it beautiful.
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  Speaker 2: And they that's how they meet, like their rivals arguing
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  Speaker 2: over like who's gonna have this band name, and then
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  Speaker 2: they meet up one night they live in the same
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  Speaker 2: town and decide to like put that to rest and
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  Speaker 2: then join forces and form a band. And then it
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  Speaker 2: takes them you know BCA or the initials of buttery
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  Speaker 2: k Gas. They kind of get it in their head
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  Speaker 2: that they want the band to have those initials because
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  Speaker 2: they know a girl named Becca, and so they go
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  Speaker 2: through twenty six tries of BCA before they land on
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  Speaker 2: buttery k Gas and that just kind of played into
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  Speaker 2: like thinking up a band name.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, and Becca's delivering. She goes to the rehearsals and
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  Speaker 1: delivers treats and some of the adventures along the way.
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  Speaker 2: Well, they they they see the thank you list on
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  Speaker 2: an early seven inch and they meet this they come
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  Speaker 2: to know of this woman named Cookie Dune, and then
• 9:14
  Speaker 2: they starts like searching phone books like it all takes place. Well,
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  Speaker 2: the band is actually in the early eighties, and then
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  Speaker 2: the quest is in the nineties between the two friends
• 9:23
  Speaker 2: kind of trying to find that record from ten years ago.
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  Speaker 2: And they start trying to find this woman Cookie by
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  Speaker 2: going through the phone book. They go to the library,
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  Speaker 2: go to like get every phone book out to start
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  Speaker 2: calling all the major cities to try and track her down.
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  Speaker 2: And they do, and she's living in New York. And
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  Speaker 2: they go to New York and they've they've saved up
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  Speaker 2: for a while because they think this butterycake ass record
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  Speaker 2: will be expensive. But they also are going to hit
• 9:47
  Speaker 2: you know, the New York record shops in the nineties,
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  Speaker 2: which I mean were great and like, you know, there
• 9:52
  Speaker 2: was just ton like you know, hundreds of records they
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  Speaker 2: really wanted to bring home.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, to get to get serious that those days were,
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  Speaker 1: those days are gone. Well, they're they're record stores record
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  Speaker 1: store day, and they're keeping them alive, but that that
• 10:05
  Speaker 1: adventure to search for a for a record at a
• 10:07
  Speaker 1: record shop. Man, nothing like it. We had one, do
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  Speaker 1: you do you know? The one in Waterbury was Brass
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  Speaker 1: City Records in Waterbury, Connecticut was legendary.
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  Speaker 2: Brass City was a huge influence on this book. Like
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  Speaker 2: I named the uh the owner of the record shop
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  Speaker 2: graft City Records where they the band rehearses and he
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  Speaker 2: puts out there first seven inch. I named him Walter
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  Speaker 2: after Walter who ran Brass.
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  Speaker 1: He's the one who passed away, I believe.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, it's he was such a great guy and he
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  Speaker 2: had such a huge influence on like me and my friends,
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  Speaker 2: Like we started going up when I think we discovered
• 10:38
  Speaker 2: it when we were like thirteen, like nineteen eighty nine,
• 10:40
  Speaker 2: like that time, we're like, you know, iron Maid and everything.
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  Speaker 2: It was just like, you know, that's what we wanted.
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  Speaker 2: And the first time we ever went there, he had
• 10:47
  Speaker 2: like a huge cardboard cutout of Eddie from the sanctuary
• 10:50
  Speaker 2: cover at the top of the stairs, and like I
• 10:52
  Speaker 2: remember like flipping through the racks that day, like seeing
• 10:55
  Speaker 2: a ton of stuff that I would later come to
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  Speaker 2: like love. When I got you know, a little older,
• 10:59
  Speaker 2: like mud Honey and Sonic Youth cool and like as
• 11:03
  Speaker 2: we would go up, you know, for decades afterward, he
• 11:05
  Speaker 2: would always like introduce us to new stuff and like,
• 11:08
  Speaker 2: you know, that was always a place to find great
• 11:10
  Speaker 2: records too. I found a couple holy grails there.
• 11:13
  Speaker 1: I got Van Halen Pasadena Civic nineteen seventy six at
• 11:17
  Speaker 1: brass City Records, And yeah, it was just just to
• 11:20
  Speaker 1: describe it for those who don't know about Brassity Records,
• 11:23
  Speaker 1: It's just this little little shop on the second floor.
• 11:26
  Speaker 1: It was like an old bit building in the middle
• 11:28
  Speaker 1: of the city of Waterbury, and there was a seven
• 11:31
  Speaker 1: eleven across the way, and I remember when I parked
• 11:33
  Speaker 1: my car there it got broken into. I mean, it
• 11:36
  Speaker 1: wasn't like the best area, but you would walk through
• 11:39
  Speaker 1: the aisles and there would be like tour guides and
• 11:44
  Speaker 1: just a rare, rare like I got. I used to
• 11:47
  Speaker 1: get tons of Vanhalen, David le Ross stuff like us.
• 11:49
  Speaker 1: They had the single for stand up and on the
• 11:53
  Speaker 1: other side was damn good from the Skyscraper and then
• 11:55
  Speaker 1: the Van Halen's you know. But then there was a
• 11:58
  Speaker 1: little back room you have people playing live, you know,
• 12:00
  Speaker 1: some dude just hanging out there with his acoustic plan.
• 12:03
  Speaker 1: But anyway, sorry, I mean that's the spirit of this book, right,
• 12:05
  Speaker 1: I mean that at the core of this book is
• 12:07
  Speaker 1: that that adventure to track down a band and and
• 12:10
  Speaker 1: yeah in the record the Live in Hungaria. But yeah, anyways, continue,
• 12:16
  Speaker 1: I'm sorry you were you were talking about some of
• 12:17
  Speaker 1: the adventures along the way here.
• 12:19
  Speaker 2: Oh but that was totally it, like and you had
• 12:21
  Speaker 2: Phoenix Records on the other side of yes, Phoenix, Yeah,
• 12:23
  Speaker 2: where I found.
• 12:26
  Speaker 1: What's what's the Sunrisa? My friend Darren Paltchwitz who wrote
• 12:32
  Speaker 1: a great book on David Lee Roth, the d l
• 12:34
  Speaker 1: R book free plug for Darren. Yeah, he's he loves
• 12:38
  Speaker 1: and Sunrisa. That's like his thing. He's just, uh, he's
• 12:42
  Speaker 1: obsessed with Sunrisa. So yeah, you got that there. That's cool.
• 12:46
  Speaker 2: And actually speaking to Darren, like I was on my
• 12:49
  Speaker 2: mid West tour in May, I just I found the
• 12:51
  Speaker 2: d l R Cast and I was just, oh, yeah,
• 12:53
  Speaker 2: listen to a ton of episodes and like, you know,
• 12:55
  Speaker 2: brought up memories of that record. I've since been in
• 12:57
  Speaker 2: touch with Darren, Like we went to see the Afghan
• 12:59
  Speaker 2: Whigs in the church together in Brooklyn, which was.
• 13:01
  Speaker 1: Cool, very cool.
• 13:03
  Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, but like the whole spirit of it's like
• 13:06
  Speaker 2: I remember, like at least once a month in high school,
• 13:08
  Speaker 2: my parents had like a caravan, like a mini you know, minivan,
• 13:12
  Speaker 2: and me and like six or seven friends would just
• 13:14
  Speaker 2: pile in and we just go all around Connecticut. We
• 13:17
  Speaker 2: go up to dan Bury to Trash American Style, and
• 13:20
  Speaker 2: then cross over to Waterbury, hit Phoenix and Breast City,
• 13:25
  Speaker 2: and then if there was time, we would go down
• 13:27
  Speaker 2: to New Haven and then maybe to Bridgeport to uh
• 13:30
  Speaker 2: Secret Sounds. And yeah, I mean I loved it. Was
• 13:33
  Speaker 2: a great bonding, you know, adventures with all my friends because,
• 13:37
  Speaker 2: you know, a bunch of guys in the car, You're
• 13:40
  Speaker 2: excited about all the music you're going to get, and
• 13:42
  Speaker 2: you're going to talk about all that music for you know,
• 13:44
  Speaker 2: to like, you know, talk about everything that's going on
• 13:46
  Speaker 2: in your life at the time, you know, and music
• 13:48
  Speaker 2: is like such a central component to that. In nineteen
• 13:51
  Speaker 2: ninety seven, my friend Brian, you know, who had dedicated
• 13:54
  Speaker 2: the book to, who came up with the name buttery
• 13:55
  Speaker 2: k Gas. He had heard that the largest record store
• 13:58
  Speaker 2: in the States was in Chicago. He had heard that
• 14:01
  Speaker 2: was the Tower records. I don't think that was true.
• 14:04
  Speaker 2: I think Amiba is much bigger. At the time, we
• 14:06
  Speaker 2: didn't know any better, and this was ninety seven. We
• 14:08
  Speaker 2: didn't have the internet to really check. But we drove
• 14:10
  Speaker 2: out to Chicago that summer just to like see the
• 14:13
  Speaker 2: biggest record store in the States and hit all the
• 14:15
  Speaker 2: other Chicago starts as well.
• 14:17
  Speaker 1: That's cool. That's cool. So a lot of like true
• 14:19
  Speaker 1: experiences that happened with you are kind of incorporated into
• 14:22
  Speaker 1: this story as well.
• 14:24
  Speaker 2: Definitely, I remember my first band, my first like real band,
• 14:28
  Speaker 2: like my freshman year of college. I was I went
• 14:31
  Speaker 2: to school in Boston and the other two guys were
• 14:33
  Speaker 2: back here in Connecticut, and there was we really want
• 14:38
  Speaker 2: to push things when I got home that summer, like
• 14:40
  Speaker 2: play live as much as we can and record all
• 14:42
  Speaker 2: the songs that we'd just written. We're very ambitious. And
• 14:47
  Speaker 2: I booked a show for us while I was living
• 14:49
  Speaker 2: in Boston at this place called The Abstract and Water
• 14:52
  Speaker 2: Barriers kind of in your breast City. It was just
• 14:53
  Speaker 2: this art gallery that did punk shows.
• 14:55
  Speaker 1: Oh okay, I don't recognize that name.
• 14:57
  Speaker 2: It didn't last very long. This was like nine but
• 15:01
  Speaker 2: I had asked the guys in my band to like
• 15:03
  Speaker 2: make flyers and promote it because I was up in Boston,
• 15:06
  Speaker 2: whereas they were where the show was gonna happen. You know,
• 15:09
  Speaker 2: they could like promote in Connecticut, and like a week
• 15:11
  Speaker 2: before the show, I was coming home, it was very
• 15:13
  Speaker 2: obvious that they hadn't done any promotion and we I
• 15:18
  Speaker 2: booked a couple of other bands that I had to pay,
• 15:21
  Speaker 2: and the show was just like a complete disaster and like,
• 15:24
  Speaker 2: you know, no one really came, and a couple a
• 15:26
  Speaker 2: couple of our friends did and we all went to
• 15:28
  Speaker 2: RB's afterward and we're just sitting around. I'm really bummed
• 15:31
  Speaker 2: out because I expected this to go well. ID booked it.
• 15:33
  Speaker 2: I had wanted us to like make a good start,
• 15:35
  Speaker 2: and one of the guys in my band, just out
• 15:37
  Speaker 2: of nowhere says, you know, well it doesn't matter, like
• 15:39
  Speaker 2: you know, in a few months, we're gonna sign to
• 15:41
  Speaker 2: Geffen and everything will be fine. And I was like, what,
• 15:45
  Speaker 2: Like where are you getting this? Like no, two people
• 15:48
  Speaker 2: just came to our gig and we're signing together this summer,
• 15:52
  Speaker 2: So like yeah, lots of that went into like you know,
• 15:54
  Speaker 2: the the buttery. The guys in buttery K guys having
• 15:56
  Speaker 2: these like big dreams of like, you know, signing to
• 15:59
  Speaker 2: a major whereas they're really in this small town recording,
• 16:02
  Speaker 2: rehearsing at a record store and trying to make a demo.
• 16:05
  Speaker 1: Booked on rock podcast We'll be back after this going
• 16:09
  Speaker 1: up when you leave town. Are some of the bands
• 16:14
  Speaker 1: that you grew up listening to that inspired you and
• 16:17
  Speaker 1: in the bands that you formed that influenced the bands
• 16:20
  Speaker 1: that you formed and recorded music? Did you record music
• 16:22
  Speaker 1: or was it all live? No?
• 16:24
  Speaker 2: No, did we recorded? We made a record, We made
• 16:27
  Speaker 2: a seven inch that has still never been pressed. But
• 16:29
  Speaker 2: we were really excited about the songs. So we went
• 16:31
  Speaker 2: to a studio in Bruster, New York, where lots like
• 16:35
  Speaker 2: the hardcore bands in Connecticut were recording at the time.
• 16:38
  Speaker 1: Brewster very Well was the radio station in Danbury nine
• 16:41
  Speaker 1: ninety five. Oh yeah, right there, right there.
• 16:44
  Speaker 2: Yeah, So, I mean the band's influenced My first love
• 16:47
  Speaker 2: is van Halen. Like my mom was a huge influence
• 16:51
  Speaker 2: on me. Like when I was growing up, she played
• 16:52
  Speaker 2: like all the Beatles and the motown stuff, and I
• 16:55
  Speaker 2: loved all that stuff. But when I first heard Van Halen,
• 16:59
  Speaker 2: like on the radio in the early eighties. It must
• 17:01
  Speaker 2: have been pretty woman like. I just something about Eddie's
• 17:05
  Speaker 2: guitar sound just like resonated like deep within me. And
• 17:08
  Speaker 2: then you know, probably it was the next year. Like
• 17:11
  Speaker 2: I'm pretty sure I was eighty three, so like nineteen
• 17:13
  Speaker 2: eighty four woul come out the next year that summer.
• 17:15
  Speaker 2: It's freaking huge, and like, you know, all my cousins
• 17:18
  Speaker 2: were a good like eight years older than me, so
• 17:20
  Speaker 2: they were teenagers and they were just loving it. And
• 17:23
  Speaker 2: in fact, my cousin Keith was a big influence on me.
• 17:27
  Speaker 2: I remember when the nineteen eighty four was coming to
• 17:29
  Speaker 2: New nineteeny four tour was coming to New Haven. He
• 17:32
  Speaker 2: called my mom up and like begged her to let
• 17:34
  Speaker 2: me go with him, and she was like, absolutely not.
• 17:37
  Speaker 2: He's eight years old, Like you know, it makes perfect sense.
• 17:41
  Speaker 2: But two years later, when Eaedham and Smile came to Hartford,
• 17:44
  Speaker 2: she did go let me go with my older cousins. Wow,
• 17:47
  Speaker 2: I was ten. That was my first show.
• 17:49
  Speaker 1: So you saw that DLR tour in eighty six. What
• 17:52
  Speaker 1: a what a show man, what a show.
• 17:54
  Speaker 2: Freaking amazing, And like listening to the DLR cast and
• 17:58
  Speaker 2: reading Darren's book, like It just reminded me of how
• 18:02
  Speaker 2: energetic that was, like they were out to kill, like
• 18:06
  Speaker 2: Viy and she and just running all over the place
• 18:08
  Speaker 2: while saying the most insane like you've ever unbelievable to
• 18:12
  Speaker 2: ling guitar and bass solo.
• 18:15
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean thankfully that stuff. There's footage of it
• 18:17
  Speaker 1: on YouTube, but love to get an actual professional shot
• 18:20
  Speaker 1: release of that tour because Dave was he was like
• 18:23
  Speaker 1: he was fierce on that tour because he was looking
• 18:26
  Speaker 1: to prove that he could make it on his own.
• 18:27
  Speaker 1: And yep, and he did well for a while, he
• 18:30
  Speaker 1: sure did. Yeah. Yeah, what are some of the characters? Uh,
• 18:34
  Speaker 1: some of the other characters in here, Like, uh, let's
• 18:38
  Speaker 1: see Johnny Seizure. Who's Johnny Seizure?
• 18:41
  Speaker 2: Well, all right, this is a really obscure reference. Johnny
• 18:47
  Speaker 2: Johnny Sezear and the Romans are the band that buttery
• 18:49
  Speaker 2: kke Ass play their final show with and it's supposed
• 18:54
  Speaker 2: to be their record release party for Live in Hungaria
• 18:57
  Speaker 2: And at the same time they're supposed to record it
• 19:00
  Speaker 2: to make a record called Live in Hungaria Live.
• 19:05
  Speaker 1: That's great, that's like final tap in.
• 19:08
  Speaker 2: Yeah, but the Afghan Wigs one of my favorite bands
• 19:11
  Speaker 2: of all time. My two favorite records of all time
• 19:14
  Speaker 2: are nineteen eighty four and The Wigs Black Love Wow.
• 19:17
  Speaker 2: And I was reading an interview with Greg Dooley once
• 19:20
  Speaker 2: where he said, do you know the film Beautiful Girls?
• 19:23
  Speaker 2: It was the nineties film. I think it was Natalie
• 19:25
  Speaker 2: Portman's first movie. She was like she was young in it,
• 19:28
  Speaker 2: like thirteen.
• 19:30
  Speaker 1: Uh, I don't think so.
• 19:32
  Speaker 2: The Afghan Whigs are the bar band in that film,
• 19:36
  Speaker 2: and they do a couple of great covers on the soundtrack.
• 19:40
  Speaker 2: I read an interview with Greg Dooley where he said,
• 19:43
  Speaker 2: he said, I read somewhere that we are band in
• 19:45
  Speaker 2: that film was supposed to be known as Johnny Seizear
• 19:47
  Speaker 2: in the Romans, which I thought was a great name.
• 19:49
  Speaker 2: But I don't think we were ever even credited as that.
• 19:52
  Speaker 2: So I thought that is a great name, so I
• 19:54
  Speaker 2: stole it for the book.
• 19:56
  Speaker 1: That's Cool. Davey Down, who's Dave Down.
• 19:59
  Speaker 2: Davey Down is their bassis who replaces their original Bassis
• 20:03
  Speaker 2: Dave up right, Davy Down actually is maybe the most successful,
• 20:10
  Speaker 2: like they all go on to do like solo stuff
• 20:12
  Speaker 2: after and Davy Down is just determined, even while Buttery
• 20:16
  Speaker 2: Cake ass is going on. He's the Bassis, but he
• 20:18
  Speaker 2: plays lots of solo acoustic shows, like making his own
• 20:22
  Speaker 2: songs which don't quite fit with the band, and then
• 20:24
  Speaker 2: he goes on to have, you know, to release a
• 20:27
  Speaker 2: ton of solo records, lots of which he has a
• 20:30
  Speaker 2: heavy led Zeppelin phase, which I worked at, like a
• 20:32
  Speaker 2: ton of Zeppelin puns into Well.
• 20:34
  Speaker 1: That's what I was asked. Yeah, is this band the
• 20:38
  Speaker 1: Buttery Cake? Ass are they? Are they? Is there is
• 20:43
  Speaker 1: there a well known band or is it a combination
• 20:45
  Speaker 1: of bands that make up this fictional band buttery Gas.
• 20:49
  Speaker 2: Like the running joke throughout is that I never actually
• 20:54
  Speaker 2: say what they sounded like. I always I will bring
• 20:56
  Speaker 2: up another band and say not that Battery Cake has
• 20:59
  Speaker 2: ever sounded any thing like them, Like I taught, I
• 21:01
  Speaker 2: bring him Maidens and the like the intro about that
• 21:04
  Speaker 2: I go on this whole thing because Maiden had you know,
• 21:07
  Speaker 2: that Live behind the Iron Curtain video in nineteen eighty
• 21:10
  Speaker 2: four that they released, and I talk about that, but
• 21:12
  Speaker 2: then I say, not that butter hi guess ever sounded
• 21:14
  Speaker 2: like Iron Maiden or any of the new way of
• 21:16
  Speaker 2: British heavy metal. And that's kind of the running joke
• 21:18
  Speaker 2: throughout that I never define their sound, which I like
• 21:23
  Speaker 2: because it can be you know, it leaves it up
• 21:25
  Speaker 2: to the imagination.
• 21:27
  Speaker 1: And you do mention Van Allen throughout the book, Like
• 21:29
  Speaker 1: there's one part in here where he's talking about traveling
• 21:33
  Speaker 1: to Indiana, Illinois, Wisconsin, Texas to catch the final US
• 21:37
  Speaker 1: dates of Van Halen's nineteen eighty four tour.
• 21:40
  Speaker 2: Yeah. Cool, that's their Brouse cousins. It's a friend of
• 21:46
  Speaker 2: the new guitar player who he comes into some money
• 21:50
  Speaker 2: and he wants to use it to put out a record,
• 21:52
  Speaker 2: and like he's very well meaning Brouse, but he just
• 21:55
  Speaker 2: kind of gets it all wrong, which is very I
• 21:58
  Speaker 2: think something young bands can late to. And he doesn't
• 22:02
  Speaker 2: end up checking the test pressing of the record when
• 22:04
  Speaker 2: it comes and then just okays it. And then it's
• 22:08
  Speaker 2: a just a complete disaster when the record does arrive,
• 22:11
  Speaker 2: and then he kind of this is all happening in
• 22:14
  Speaker 2: early nineteen eighty four. Then right after, like this old debacle,
• 22:17
  Speaker 2: he goes to see get as many of the last
• 22:19
  Speaker 2: shows of the nineteen eighty four tour as he can,
• 22:22
  Speaker 2: and then later on I mentioned that he has an
• 22:24
  Speaker 2: epiphany because they opened with unchained on that tour, and like,
• 22:28
  Speaker 2: I think that is the most powerful rock song ever written.
• 22:31
  Speaker 1: It's a defining song.
• 22:33
  Speaker 2: Yeah, yep, So Brusknson's has an epiphany that he's got
• 22:36
  Speaker 2: to get his life together when he realizes that they
• 22:39
  Speaker 2: came out did unchanged and then there was still an
• 22:41
  Speaker 2: hour and a half left for them to play.
• 22:43
  Speaker 1: Like, so, what was the overall when you finished with
• 22:46
  Speaker 1: this book? I mean what what what were you left,
• 22:50
  Speaker 1: you know, feeling after it was all done? I mean,
• 22:52
  Speaker 1: did you? I mean, because you talk about in the
• 22:54
  Speaker 1: in the promo here you you finish with you See,
• 22:58
  Speaker 1: I got to re examine my own testive record collecting
• 23:01
  Speaker 1: through a new lens, as well as revisit the ridiculous
• 23:03
  Speaker 1: aspects of playing in my first few bands, bringing me
• 23:06
  Speaker 1: to a greater appreciation and love for both. So is
• 23:08
  Speaker 1: that what she got out of writing this book? Yeah?
• 23:11
  Speaker 2: Yeah, it was. It was a great feeling. I mean,
• 23:13
  Speaker 2: you know, record collecting can be ridiculous, but I've always
• 23:18
  Speaker 2: I've always loved it. I mean, you know, you spend
• 23:20
  Speaker 2: countless hours looking for a slab of vinyl, like traveling
• 23:23
  Speaker 2: around the country or whatever. I mean, these days, you
• 23:25
  Speaker 2: can just order on discause, but back in the nineties,
• 23:29
  Speaker 2: you know, you had to find it physically and I
• 23:31
  Speaker 2: love that. And then I went on a bunch of
• 23:35
  Speaker 2: like little tours last year when the book was released,
• 23:38
  Speaker 2: and half of them the readings took place at record
• 23:42
  Speaker 2: shops because it was, you know, very relevant the subject
• 23:44
  Speaker 2: matter of the tour. And what was great about that was,
• 23:48
  Speaker 2: you know, it was kind of like my teenage years again,
• 23:51
  Speaker 2: where I would, you know, just be hanging out at
• 23:52
  Speaker 2: a record shop all day and talking to the people
• 23:54
  Speaker 2: who owned it and then telling me about what they
• 23:56
  Speaker 2: were listening to, and I'd be intrigued by that, and
• 24:00
  Speaker 2: that was fantastic.
• 24:01
  Speaker 1: Do you have any plans for a follow up to
• 24:04
  Speaker 1: this book? Is there going to be a sequel to this?
• 24:07
  Speaker 1: Can you reveal how this story ends?
• 24:10
  Speaker 2: Well, I won't give away the ending, but there I
• 24:13
  Speaker 2: wasn't expecting this, but coming from that discography all those
• 24:17
  Speaker 2: fake bands, one of my favorites is a band called
• 24:20
  Speaker 2: clown Damage. I just think that's a really funny phrase. Yeah,
• 24:25
  Speaker 2: and then a few months ago I just started writing
• 24:28
  Speaker 2: the history of clown Damage. Can getting the characters together
• 24:32
  Speaker 2: and like what they went through as a completely different.
• 24:35
  Speaker 1: Band, so that's coming next.
• 24:38
  Speaker 2: That's coming next. I've taken a bunch of notes. I've
• 24:41
  Speaker 2: probably written like thirty pages on it. But it's gonna
• 24:44
  Speaker 2: be an oral history, like the guys of the band,
• 24:46
  Speaker 2: each telling their story. And it's what I find really
• 24:49
  Speaker 2: funny is they each have completely different takes on what
• 24:52
  Speaker 2: happened in the band, like you know, you know, they
• 24:55
  Speaker 2: all contradict each other, which I think is kind of
• 24:59
  Speaker 2: common for like, you know, for bands, they all they
• 25:01
  Speaker 2: all didn't have the same experience. But here I'm likes
• 25:04
  Speaker 2: it to be as funny, is it possibly?
• 25:07
  Speaker 1: Well, yeah, so we we can't say whether or not
• 25:10
  Speaker 1: the uh you find that at Live in Hungaria album,
• 25:13
  Speaker 1: We can't say.
• 25:15
  Speaker 2: I don't have to do.
• 25:16
  Speaker 1: You have to have to read to find out. Uh Yeah,
• 25:19
  Speaker 1: And I'm looking through, you know, all of the fictional
• 25:22
  Speaker 1: album titles.
• 25:23
  Speaker 2: Davy Down, he has a His last album is called
• 25:28
  Speaker 2: uh continuing on with his Zeppelin obsession. It's called Sunbeat,
• 25:32
  Speaker 2: which is the first line of Cashmere Okay, beat down
• 25:35
  Speaker 2: upon my head.
• 25:36
  Speaker 1: He just camel escalator.
• 25:39
  Speaker 2: I just thought that was a funny phrase.
• 25:41
  Speaker 1: The davy Down experience.
• 25:44
  Speaker 2: Yeah, he's been into Hendrix at one point, and uh,
• 25:46
  Speaker 2: you know work that in uh Motels of the Metaphysical.
• 25:50
  Speaker 2: I like like this the.
• 25:51
  Speaker 1: Holy Down and now Davy Down and Blaine Blanc.
• 25:57
  Speaker 2: Yeah, Blaine Blank was a friend of theirs who was
• 25:59
  Speaker 2: actually early version of the Florist. He's more of an
• 26:02
  Speaker 2: electronic music guy. And he ends up opening for Cake
• 26:05
  Speaker 2: Ass and Johnny Seizure on that last show, and then
• 26:08
  Speaker 2: he's reunited, and you know, he continues to make music.
• 26:11
  Speaker 1: I Love Hands Floral Nightingale, the Marriage Penguin album self released,
• 26:15
  Speaker 1: no track listing, August nineteen ninety nine.
• 26:20
  Speaker 2: Well there's a story behind the Marriage Penguin album. Okay, Fugazi,
• 26:26
  Speaker 2: I loved one, I still love them now. And the
• 26:29
  Speaker 2: day my friend asked for Buttery Cake Ass at Cutler's,
• 26:33
  Speaker 2: I bought Fugazi's Repeater, which was my first Fugazi album,
• 26:37
  Speaker 2: the first Funkadelic album, and Captain b. Fheart and the
• 26:41
  Speaker 2: Magic Bands lived like de cows Off Baby, and we
• 26:45
  Speaker 2: we went home, We drove home listening to those. It
• 26:47
  Speaker 2: was like just this really like life changing day. And
• 26:50
  Speaker 2: then a couple of years later, maybe my beginning of
• 26:54
  Speaker 2: my senior high school in on the kill Taker, it
• 26:56
  Speaker 2: just come out and Fugazi were playing at Yukon, and yeah,
• 27:03
  Speaker 2: that's about It's a little over an hour drive from us,
• 27:06
  Speaker 2: and one of my we really want to go. One
• 27:08
  Speaker 2: of my friend's parents didn't want us to drive there
• 27:11
  Speaker 2: and back the same night, so my aunt and uncle,
• 27:13
  Speaker 2: who live close to Yukon, said, oh, well, they can
• 27:16
  Speaker 2: stay with us. So we go to the show. We
• 27:19
  Speaker 2: have a great time. Get back to my uncles maybe
• 27:22
  Speaker 2: like two in the morning, and my cousin, Keith, the
• 27:25
  Speaker 2: one who would you know, took me to see the
• 27:26
  Speaker 2: intimant smile to her. He's just moved back home after
• 27:30
  Speaker 2: eloping with his wife in Vegas and he hadn't told anybody,
• 27:34
  Speaker 2: so like this is the first time anyone was meeting
• 27:36
  Speaker 2: his new bride. And you know, it was me and
• 27:39
  Speaker 2: three of my friends, you know, four seventeen year old idiots.
• 27:42
  Speaker 2: My aunt puts us in the room next to the
• 27:44
  Speaker 2: newly weeds, and we just kept thinking of things we
• 27:47
  Speaker 2: could do to like interrupt them during the night, like
• 27:51
  Speaker 2: knock on the door and like hey, you guys, like
• 27:52
  Speaker 2: need a glass of milk or anything. My aunt like penguins,
• 28:01
  Speaker 2: Like she had penguin figurines all over the room we
• 28:03
  Speaker 2: were sleeping in like penguin tea towels, and she had
• 28:06
  Speaker 2: this like four and a half foot blow up penguin
• 28:09
  Speaker 2: in the corner of the room. So like five point
• 28:11
  Speaker 2: thirty in the morning, we thought it would be hilarious
• 28:13
  Speaker 2: to all crouch down behind the penguin, kick the newly
• 28:16
  Speaker 2: weds door open, and yell, I'm the marriage penguin.
• 28:20
  Speaker 1: So that's where that came from.
• 28:22
  Speaker 2: That's where that comes from. We didn't do any of this,
• 28:25
  Speaker 2: but we found out of breakfast the next day. Our
• 28:28
  Speaker 2: laughter just suggesting it to each other kept everyone in
• 28:30
  Speaker 2: the house awake the entire night. Anyway, That is an
• 28:34
  Speaker 2: example of like the very bizarre real life stuff that
• 28:36
  Speaker 2: went into the book.
• 28:38
  Speaker 1: Book Rock Podcast. We'll be back after this. Can we
• 28:41
  Speaker 1: go now? Please?
• 28:42
  Speaker 2: People? A good plan today is better than perfect plan tomorrow.
• 28:47
  Speaker 1: Comedy is a part of this book. In comedy, you
• 28:50
  Speaker 1: are a comedian, not just a musician and a writer. Comedian,
• 28:53
  Speaker 1: what how long have you been doing that? Do you
• 28:55
  Speaker 1: do stand up?
• 28:57
  Speaker 2: Yeah? I've been having the interest to get back to it,
• 28:59
  Speaker 2: Like it was my New Year's resolution in twenty eighteen.
• 29:03
  Speaker 2: I don't really make news resolution, but I'd always wanted
• 29:06
  Speaker 2: to try it, So in twenty eighteen, I was like,
• 29:08
  Speaker 2: this is the year I'm just gonna do it. I'm
• 29:10
  Speaker 2: gonna go to Mike, I'm gonna do it. And I
• 29:12
  Speaker 2: was living in Nashville at the time, and I ended
• 29:15
  Speaker 2: up actually going out to Memphis, like a three hour
• 29:18
  Speaker 2: drive and trying it on the night I had decided
• 29:20
  Speaker 2: to try it, And as soon as I got that
• 29:23
  Speaker 2: first laugh, it was awesome, and like it was five minutes.
• 29:28
  Speaker 2: I did five minutes. It was all really funny. People
• 29:30
  Speaker 2: came up to me afterwards and like the difference between
• 29:33
  Speaker 2: that just being you and a microphone on stage versus
• 29:35
  Speaker 2: being in a band we have to carry equipment and
• 29:37
  Speaker 2: like do all that stuff. It was like really freeing.
• 29:40
  Speaker 2: And then in twenty nineteen, I was I moved back
• 29:43
  Speaker 2: to Connecticut. I was doing as many I wanted to
• 29:46
  Speaker 2: do as many sets as I could. I did like
• 29:48
  Speaker 2: one hundred and sixty seven that year. I was like
• 29:50
  Speaker 2: in New York, Boss.
• 29:51
  Speaker 1: Wow, Okay, yeah, did you do any Dangerfields?
• 29:55
  Speaker 2: I did do danger Field Yeah, yeah, I think there's
• 29:58
  Speaker 2: a video of it on my website. Cool, which was
• 30:00
  Speaker 2: a lot of fun. I mean, I love Rodney, yeah,
• 30:03
  Speaker 2: and I actually moved out to la in February of
• 30:07
  Speaker 2: twenty twenty, thinking, I'll, you know, I really want to
• 30:10
  Speaker 2: be back in LA. I really want to give comedy
• 30:12
  Speaker 2: a push. I like lined up a job out there,
• 30:14
  Speaker 2: moved out there, got their mid February, did a bunch
• 30:17
  Speaker 2: of open mics, and then three weeks later, you know,
• 30:20
  Speaker 2: live performance just wasn't a possibility anymore. And I haven't
• 30:24
  Speaker 2: actually done stand up since the pandemic. But like when
• 30:28
  Speaker 2: I did the reading in Nashville for Sporting Mustaches, I
• 30:33
  Speaker 2: you know, I told a bunch of stories behind the
• 30:34
  Speaker 2: stories and read a story I was opening up for
• 30:37
  Speaker 2: a band I really like, and there's a pretty good audience,
• 30:39
  Speaker 2: and like afterward people came and said, you know, I
• 30:41
  Speaker 2: really wasn't expecting a book reading to be so funny.
• 30:44
  Speaker 2: It was like you were doing stand up comedy. And
• 30:45
  Speaker 2: I was like, yeah, that's kind of what it felt like. Again.
• 30:47
  Speaker 2: It was like really nice having to stop for people
• 30:49
  Speaker 2: to laugh, and I aned you to try it again,
• 30:51
  Speaker 2: so like, hopefully I can, you know, just find some
• 30:54
  Speaker 2: mics and start.
• 30:55
  Speaker 1: Yeah, you're able to incorporate that into promoting the book, Yeah,
• 30:59
  Speaker 1: what's the well? And there are stories in there that
• 31:02
  Speaker 1: it's like only a comedian can really come up with,
• 31:04
  Speaker 1: like the one with the pinball machine in the back
• 31:09
  Speaker 1: of a Dots and cherry or is that what was
• 31:11
  Speaker 1: the story?
• 31:13
  Speaker 2: They there was a pinball machine at the record store
• 31:15
  Speaker 2: they're rehearsing in, and they want to incorporate the pinball
• 31:18
  Speaker 2: machine live, but none of their cars are big enough
• 31:20
  Speaker 2: to transport it, and anyway, like the records turner doesn't
• 31:23
  Speaker 2: want them bringing his pinball machine to a venue. You
• 31:26
  Speaker 2: know it seriously screw it up. I read the band
• 31:29
  Speaker 2: the crowd rock band Faust used to use pinball machines,
• 31:33
  Speaker 2: like in the early seventies. They would have like one
• 31:35
  Speaker 2: on either side of the stage and mike them up,
• 31:37
  Speaker 2: and that just always seemed like a really cool idea
• 31:39
  Speaker 2: to me.
• 31:40
  Speaker 1: Well, tell me about the audiobook. We were mentioned that
• 31:42
  Speaker 1: just before we started recording. The book itself came out
• 31:46
  Speaker 1: in February of twenty twenty three. But now we have
• 31:49
  Speaker 1: the audio book. So where can people find that? It's
• 31:51
  Speaker 1: on band camp right, It's.
• 31:53
  Speaker 2: On band camp, It's on Audible and like all the
• 31:55
  Speaker 2: major audiobook distributors audiobooks dot com, you get it through
• 32:00
  Speaker 2: your library as well, someone just told me they found
• 32:03
  Speaker 2: it there, so that's cool. I love audio books and
• 32:06
  Speaker 2: like being on the road so much, I listened to
• 32:09
  Speaker 2: lots of them, so I really wanted to do one
• 32:12
  Speaker 2: for Buttery Cake Ass, especially since, uh, you know, I
• 32:16
  Speaker 2: do a comedy character, Young Southball, and he kind of
• 32:18
  Speaker 2: has like a Southern drawl, which I don't know why,
• 32:22
  Speaker 2: but my voice, my whole life is kind of like
• 32:24
  Speaker 2: slipped into that. So when I was doing comedy, I
• 32:26
  Speaker 2: kind of like pushed that aspect of it. And when
• 32:30
  Speaker 2: I wrote the first draft of Buttery Cake Ass, the
• 32:33
  Speaker 2: narrator was actually Young Southball because those sort of stories
• 32:36
  Speaker 2: are very out there as well. And then when I
• 32:38
  Speaker 2: revised it, I kind of wanted to be a little different,
• 32:40
  Speaker 2: but I still heard that voice in my head. So
• 32:43
  Speaker 2: for the audiobook, it is me, you know, performing and
• 32:46
  Speaker 2: it's a real performance and doing that voice.
• 32:48
  Speaker 1: You sent me the audiobook yeah as well, and yes
• 32:51
  Speaker 1: you are. It's you're putting on a performance.
• 32:53
  Speaker 3: The Cake Ass has collectively received the idea to make
• 32:57
  Speaker 3: up the Pinball Machine.
• 33:00
  Speaker 2: A god get this revelation.
• 33:01
  Speaker 3: They set about doing so positively, walking on air with excitement,
• 33:06
  Speaker 3: Walter coming back, putting the zas down and calmly explaining
• 33:11
  Speaker 3: to the eager asses that Faust had already done this
• 33:14
  Speaker 3: on their first UK tour in seventy three. Although the
• 33:19
  Speaker 3: band are crushed for the remainder of the evening, eating
• 33:22
  Speaker 3: those cheeseless zas with no zest whatsoever, it does save
• 33:28
  Speaker 3: them from the increasingly tiresome argument about adding a further
• 33:32
  Speaker 3: member to play yet another new instrument, and also from
• 33:36
  Speaker 3: having to transport a giant pinball machine, which Walter definitely
• 33:40
  Speaker 3: doesn't want moved from the store in the first place.
• 33:43
  Speaker 2: Think of the.
• 33:44
  Speaker 3: Tilts, something not possible anyways. In Max Beta's Dots and
• 33:48
  Speaker 3: Cherry that you'll remember, has trouble even fitting the boys in.
• 33:53
  Speaker 2: It killed my throat, so I could only do it
• 33:56
  Speaker 2: like about two hours at a time.
• 33:57
  Speaker 1: I was gonna ask you that too, the experience of
• 33:59
  Speaker 1: doing you really have to it's it's a long distance thing.
• 34:02
  Speaker 1: You got to take some breaks in between.
• 34:04
  Speaker 2: Oh yeah, we started last August and finished it in
• 34:08
  Speaker 2: this June. Like there were just so many factors, Like
• 34:12
  Speaker 2: I recorded at Sansorief Studios in New Haven. Sam Carlson
• 34:15
  Speaker 2: runs that is a great guy, and he was engineering
• 34:17
  Speaker 2: it and it was great having him like help along
• 34:20
  Speaker 2: the way, because you know, when you record words, your
• 34:23
  Speaker 2: mouth makes sounds that you might not be aware of,
• 34:25
  Speaker 2: and like sometimes he had to be like, you know, Hans,
• 34:27
  Speaker 2: floral sounds really weird, like when it's recalled, like you
• 34:31
  Speaker 2: know you have you have a lot of set foot sounds.
• 34:33
  Speaker 2: And I was like what, And then you're like, dude,
• 34:34
  Speaker 2: I think that's just how it is. You're gonna have
• 34:36
  Speaker 2: to accept that. And then like like I traded him
• 34:40
  Speaker 2: in one of my amps to get studio time at
• 34:42
  Speaker 2: one point because I was low on funds, and then
• 34:45
  Speaker 2: he got COVID twice, and then in January, I got
• 34:48
  Speaker 2: a concussion at work and I was like just out
• 34:51
  Speaker 2: of commission for a couple months. So there were all
• 34:53
  Speaker 2: these mishaps, but and like when we finally like finished,
• 34:57
  Speaker 2: it was like we felt like we had been through
• 34:59
  Speaker 2: such a struggle. But it's like it's exactly the way
• 35:02
  Speaker 2: I want it to be. I hit every joke, every
• 35:04
  Speaker 2: like rhythm of the words how I wanted them to be.
• 35:06
  Speaker 2: I'm I'm thrilled with it.
• 35:07
  Speaker 1: It's like, Yeah, tell us about what's your the website
• 35:10
  Speaker 1: that we can go to to check out more of
• 35:12
  Speaker 1: your work and obviously this book.
• 35:15
  Speaker 2: Oh yeah Alstone dot com aug st on e okay,
• 35:19
  Speaker 2: and that's got you know, thanks to my comedy. My
• 35:22
  Speaker 2: music writing is my journalism.
• 35:25
  Speaker 1: It's a fun read. It's also but it also brings
• 35:27
  Speaker 1: people back to especially people our age. It brings you
• 35:30
  Speaker 1: back to those days of the adventures of tracking down
• 35:33
  Speaker 1: a record and but also what it's like to be
• 35:35
  Speaker 1: in a rock and roll band. And and I urge
• 35:38
  Speaker 1: people to get a copy of this book and check
• 35:40
  Speaker 1: out also the new one. Now we got the Sporting
• 35:44
  Speaker 1: Mustache Sporting Mustaches, which I'm looking at it here. You
• 35:46
  Speaker 1: got it on your website.
• 35:48
  Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, thanks for having me on. Man, it's great
• 35:49
  Speaker 2: to talk about it. I'm psyched the audiobooks out and
• 35:52
  Speaker 2: moting it. And yeah, great thing about writing it was
• 35:55
  Speaker 2: like lots of people like got in touch with me
• 35:57
  Speaker 2: through Instagram or whatever, like because it did take them
• 36:00
  Speaker 2: back to those you know, there's only a really small
• 36:03
  Speaker 2: period of time where like record stores were like a
• 36:05
  Speaker 2: really thriving thing. But there's a huge part of my youth.
• 36:08
  Speaker 2: And you know, it's nice hearing from other people who
• 36:11
  Speaker 2: that meant a lot to them as well.
• 36:12
  Speaker 1: Actually, before I forget. Do you have like a prize
• 36:15
  Speaker 1: possession purchase at a record store because you've been to many,
• 36:19
  Speaker 1: is a one that's like your your your ultimate find, Like.
• 36:24
  Speaker 2: My ultimate find was I found this at Bress City
• 36:28
  Speaker 2: in the autumn of nineteen ninety three on one of
• 36:30
  Speaker 2: the lower shelves they had I Love the original lineup
• 36:35
  Speaker 2: of Public Image Limited with Keith Levine, Yeah, Wobble, John Lydon,
• 36:41
  Speaker 2: and then after Flowers of Romance they were recording what
• 36:45
  Speaker 2: became what the one with this is Not a Love Song.
• 36:48
  Speaker 2: My memory is a little weird with the concussion sometimes
• 36:50
  Speaker 2: with that fourth album with This Is Not a Love Song,
• 36:53
  Speaker 2: And Keith Levine released something called Commercial Zone, which was
• 36:57
  Speaker 2: his own mixes of that record, like right he left
• 37:01
  Speaker 2: the band and then put out like I think there're
• 37:04
  Speaker 2: you know, this limited edition pressing of the record is
• 37:07
  Speaker 2: called Commercial Zone. And I was really like looking to
• 37:09
  Speaker 2: find that when I was seventeen, and like one day
• 37:12
  Speaker 2: it just came out of nowhere at Brass City, like
• 37:14
  Speaker 2: I just flipped there and there it was, and yeah,
• 37:17
  Speaker 2: it's so awesome, like that feeling like you know, I've
• 37:19
  Speaker 2: been looking for this forever and there it is.
• 37:21
  Speaker 1: There's nothing like that thrill of finding tracking down something
• 37:24
  Speaker 1: you've been looking for a long and that's what's you know,
• 37:27
  Speaker 1: unfortunate now because everything's we're in streaming era and YouTube
• 37:30
  Speaker 1: and it's it's it's not that hard to find pretty
• 37:33
  Speaker 1: much anything that's out there. So those yeah, I definitely
• 37:36
  Speaker 1: miss those days. You have a favorite record store? What
• 37:40
  Speaker 1: would be your personal favorite nowadays? Brass City, Brass City
• 37:44
  Speaker 1: of all time? Yeah, I mean time such a formative
• 37:46
  Speaker 1: of my part of my growing up. But Red Scroll
• 37:51
  Speaker 1: in Wallingford.
• 37:53
  Speaker 2: Is continuing on the fine tradition of Connecticut record stores.
• 37:57
  Speaker 1: Yes, and I mean I'm sure you've you've seen in
• 38:00
  Speaker 1: high fidelity right read the book.
• 38:02
  Speaker 2: I never actually watched the film.
• 38:04
  Speaker 1: Oh my god, you got to see it. Man. Jack
• 38:06
  Speaker 1: Black's character is like it's perfect, Like he is that
• 38:08
  Speaker 1: dude that you see at a record shop. Yeah, classic, right, yeah, classic.
• 38:14
  Speaker 1: Agg Stone, thanks so much man, all the best on
• 38:16
  Speaker 1: the audio version of the book, and again congrats on
• 38:19
  Speaker 1: the original version and people go out and get that book.
• 38:23
  Speaker 1: Augstone dot com is the website.
• 38:25
  Speaker 2: Thanks Saric.
• 38:31
  Speaker 1: That's it. It's in the books.