← TBTL: Too Beautiful To Live
TBTL: Too Beautiful To Live
#4475 Brand Practice
01:09:03
Luke and Andrew reminisce about their experiences with The Magnetic Fields, grade school band, and strange things Luke has witnessed outside his hotel windows over the years. They also discuss HBO’s “bold” decision to call itself HBO...
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- [00:00]
Andrew Walsh
I will say this. I'm enjoying a long night of Miller Lite, everyone. Yeah, Miller Lite, sir. You know about this. All the kids are going crazy for Miller Lite. Miller Lite lets everyone know I'm here to have 17 of these. I'm going to gradually become a problem. In about five hours, I'm gonna be an issue. But until then, Miller Lite. Miller. The official beer of weekend custody, everyone.
- [00:40]
Luke Burbank
Miller.
- [00:41]
Andrew Walsh
Lyte. She's not coming back. Tbtm.
- [00:49]
Luke Burbank
Big news, sports fans. I've decided to start calling everyone sports fans. Yeah, I know I'm not exactly the jockey type, but I watched Hoosiers last night and I like sports. Sports. Now, I have no idea what you just said, but I feel totally transformed. Is this a joke? Because if it is a joke, I.
- [01:20]
Andrew Walsh
Just want to say that I get it. I get the joke. And I'm in on it also, and it's hilarious. Have a good show, dummies. What you do is so important.
- [01:29]
Luke Burbank
Well, all right. Hello, good morning and welcome, everyone, to a Tuesday edition of tbtl, the show that just might be too beautiful to live. We are living in the midst of a podcast boom. My name is Luke Burbank. I am your host. The word that comes to mind is ludicrous. Coming to you from Washington, D.C. yes, that's right, the nation's capital, just off of Connecticut Avenue or.
- [01:54]
Andrew Walsh
Oh la la.
- [01:56]
Luke Burbank
I'm out here to do some television filming with the band Metallica, but not before I bring you episode 4475 in a collector series.
- [02:06]
Andrew Walsh
Let the fun begin.
- [02:08]
Luke Burbank
We've been trying to talk about this for, like, two weeks, and we haven't gotten to the topic yet, which might mean something. I don't know. Also, it's. I'm laughing because whenever we don't get to one of the top stories, the thing that, you know, we were talking about instead of the top story is of such little consequence. It's almost laughable that it was what displaced an actual news event. But there's a sort of a news event in our world, at least an I told you so kind of thing, which is that the home box office company known as Max is trying to change their name again.
- [02:41]
Andrew Walsh
Oh, hey, y' all.
- [02:42]
Luke Burbank
Said my name back to the home box office folks. So we'll get into that today. Oh, and we're also going to talk to this guy, longest running cobra of the show, maybe best known for his depictions of the tall ship you face. Who are you facing? He's Andrew Walsh, and he is joining me right Now. Good morning, my friend.
- [03:00]
Andrew Walsh
Good morning. As I crushed the room. We're not doing video today. So I was turning off all of my Hollywood lights in here. So if I'm out of breath, it's because I just had to take three steps. I'm a large man. Hey, yeah.
- [03:11]
Luke Burbank
Enjoy. Enjoy. This being an audio only production, I am.
- [03:14]
Andrew Walsh
I'm taking off one piece of clothing for every joke and I have to.
- [03:19]
Luke Burbank
Guess what it is.
- [03:20]
Andrew Walsh
You have to guess what it is. Let's not start there today. Let's start with this. In one of our many sound checks this morning, because we had some technical times, you mentioned that you were in D.C. and you did something that I've never heard before. I don't know if you remember what you did, but you sang, you broke into song, you broke into verse for one second, and I am unfamiliar. I've been waiting to ask you on the show, what was that song you were singing?
- [03:46]
Luke Burbank
Well, let me favor the listeners with a another rendition of the song. Washington D.C. it's paradise to me. W A S H I N T. Did I spell that? No, that's not. Is that how you spell Washington? W A S H I N G T O N baby, there it is. That's. That we got there. That is a song by the Magnetic Fields called Washington dc. And every time I'm in Washington dc, I cannot help but think of that song. It's off of 69 love songs.
- [04:21]
Andrew Walsh
I was gonna say I don't know that song. And then it occurred to me, well, I know the album 69 Love Songs. It's just that it has 69 songs on it. And so I can never remember that.
- [04:28]
Luke Burbank
You got through about 40 of them.
- [04:29]
Andrew Walsh
Yeah, no, I think I've listened to the whole thing. The thing is that is that now that's a record. Now that is an iconic record in the annals of independent rock and roll music, if you could call it that. And I don't even know if you would call it rock and roll that.
- [04:43]
Luke Burbank
No, I wish you wouldn't.
- [04:45]
Andrew Walsh
But that is an album that you, I believe, were very obsessed with at one point in your life. Genevieve was very obsessed with it at one point in your life. And for me, it's an album that I know everybody really adores. I like it and I've heard it, you know, a handful of times. I think I used to have it on an ipod somewhere, but I just don't have that, like, real personal connection that I think a lot of people have with that record.
- [05:09]
Luke Burbank
I had the CD box set And I remember, I think when I bonded with that record was when my first ex wife and I, I believe, had a very, very long road trip up to somewhere in Canada and it was just hours and hours and hours on the highway. And it was sort of the perfect album for that or series of albums. You know, I can't say that word, by the way. Album.
- [05:34]
Andrew Walsh
Hmm.
- [05:35]
Luke Burbank
It's very difficult for me. And I'm doing this story this week. We're writing and producing this Seth MacFarlane story, the guy from Family Guy, and he's put out an album. And I keep wishing there were something else I could call it in the script because I can't say the word. Album.
- [05:51]
Andrew Walsh
Ah, that one album of all of the things. I mean, unless I do say it funny. And I just don't know.
- [05:56]
Luke Burbank
How do you say it?
- [05:57]
Andrew Walsh
Album.
- [05:58]
Luke Burbank
Oh, you gotta be kidding me. You don't hear how you're saying it? No.
- [06:02]
Andrew Walsh
I thought you were being serious for a while because every now and then you do break out one of those on me. I'm like, what? Like, no, no, no.
- [06:08]
Luke Burbank
I just have a real. I have.
- [06:10]
Andrew Walsh
Is it the way I say male?
- [06:11]
Luke Burbank
Well, I think you say the word P A L like a friend, a pal. I think you say pale, kind of similar to like a pail that you would carry seashells in.
- [06:20]
Andrew Walsh
Well, that pales in comparison.
- [06:22]
Luke Burbank
It does. But no, I. I think you're saying album correctly. It just somehow it's kind of got some r Jer qualities for. For me. And I keep re recording it this week in this script as we tweak things. And I keep having to say album. But anyway, that 69 Love Song Mitch.
- [06:38]
Andrew Walsh
Album, I blame Mitch Albom. I think that's what got in your head on this, right?
- [06:43]
Luke Burbank
Probably. It didn't help, but I just remember it's weird how you can have this connection to a piece of music. I have a specific. You know what, we might have been driving up to a music festival in Pemberton, British Columbia, or I don't even know, was it a festival? What I know is it was Jay Z was playing in Pemberton, British Columbia, and there was some other big headliner we were excited about. Might have been Wilco, believe it or not. And I just can remember being on this specific, very beautiful, but very kind of rural Canadian highway somewhere, going to Pemberton and just listening, Getting totally lost in the music of the magnetic field. 69 love songs in a way that I probably wouldn't have if I was at my house, you know, like, unless I had a very, very long all day project. Like, I mean, because it's three records, it's three Hedbergs. I blame Mitch Hedberg for this. For some reason. I can't tell you exactly why.
- [07:40]
Andrew Walsh
I love the way that you did get. You did have to work the word rural into this conversation as well. The Rural album. Yes, the Rural album. Sixteen songs. But I know what you're talking about, though. That idea that. That's how it, like, it really implanted itself into your brain.
- [07:58]
Luke Burbank
It was like the perfect, you know, prob. My. My. My marriage was in a relatively okay place for once. You know, there's a couple of windows of time where I've been married to people and it hasn't been the worst experience for them. And this might have been in one of those windows. And I was really digging this music. But also it felt kind of exploratory in a way, because, I mean, one of the things too, that helps with being able to listen to 69 entire songs is that the songs are so varied in how they sound, in fact, that that Washington D.C. song, it almost sounds like a cheerleading chant. It's super duper upbeat. And it's. The singing is by the female member of the Magnetic Fields as opposed to. Is it Stefan Merritt?
- [08:42]
Andrew Walsh
I think it's Steven Merritt, right?
- [08:44]
Luke Burbank
Is it Stephen Merritt?
- [08:45]
Andrew Walsh
Hold on. I think so.
- [08:48]
Luke Burbank
The book of love is long and boring. No one can pick the damn thing up. He's got like lots of songs that sound like that, but then you get some. You get some left fielders. Like the. The Washington D.C. song. And that's kind of nice. It breaks it up.
- [09:04]
Andrew Walsh
Now, the weird thing is I. I think it's pronounced Stephen.
- [09:07]
Luke Burbank
This is one where Stephen Fatsis and Stefan Merritt. Right, I've got that right.
- [09:11]
Andrew Walsh
Stefan Merritt does the New York Times crossword puzzle.
- [09:15]
Luke Burbank
Word freak, you word free.
- [09:19]
Andrew Walsh
You're to Magnetic Fields concert. Just to keep screaming word freak at him for some reason, it'd be very disconcerting for everybody. I've actually met Steven Merritt a couple of times. I think I've told you this. And the only reason it's notable, not because I've rubbed shoulders with the greats, is he has a reputation for being a very prickly character in any kind of interview situation. And the first time at kow, I would say that play he was. I mean, I was ready for a. For a growling grizzly bear to come in. Instead, he was just a little, you know, reserved, I would say maybe slightly taciturn. And by the time I met him a few years later at KCRW for an interview. He was what I would describe as a full on sweetie pie. Now he was also getting over food.
- [10:04]
Luke Burbank
Someone changed their meds.
- [10:06]
Andrew Walsh
Yeah, he was getting over like he had had a foodborne illness the day before. So he came in a little like kind of shaky and a little wobbly or whatever. But also. And we're just like, well, what can we get you? And it was just like, you know, you know, he seemed a little bit compromised sort of, but. But was very, very sweet about everything. You'd think like if somebody has a reputation for being a little bit prickly, they'd be especially prickly after something like that, dragging themselves into a. Into a public radio station. But he was really great. It also might speak to the reputation of kcrw.
- [10:38]
Luke Burbank
Sure. People probably because it's so influential, particularly in the world of music. I think people kind of are probably bringing their. A game of being as likable as they can. You know what he's like? He's like a kind of a sick. A sick toddler. Andrew, if you've ever had a toddler, which I know you haven't, but for our listeners who have, there is this thing that will happen when your toddler is kind of a little bit sick where they get very, very snuggly.
- [11:02]
Andrew Walsh
Oh yeah.
- [11:02]
Luke Burbank
Because they're just kind of not feeling great and they just want to like just lay their head against you. And you feel very bad that your child is sick. But man, you get some pretty solid snuggling. You are like, they're like attached to you. And that can be kind of a very sweet bonding thing as well. That's like how Steven Merritt is that.
- [11:21]
Andrew Walsh
That he did put his head on my lap and fall asleep for a little bit. That was really sweet. You know, that reminds me of when we brought Bingo, our cat home. Now Bingo has proven himself, even in non sick times, to be a very charismatic and very friendly and communicative cat. I could go on for hours and days, and I do talking about his qualities, but I'll. It's all justified. He's not one of these things where.
- [11:45]
Luke Burbank
You have kind of a lame cat but you're not seeing it. Yeah, no, you have an. You guys have an exceptional cat.
- [11:49]
Andrew Walsh
Yeah, no, I. Listen, I knew I was. And I loved Theo too, but I was telling you that I was pretty sure he was a libertarian on the wrong side of history on a lot of things. I was telling you that was asking questions.
- [12:00]
Luke Burbank
Can I. Can I just Very, very quickly. Shoehorn in a Bubbles Burbank anecdote from the weekend, which is.
- [12:08]
Andrew Walsh
Well, can I just. Well, let me just finish what I was gonna say about Bingo. Or. When we brought him home, he was so snuggly, like, on my lap. We had him in the carrier, and then we opened up the carrier and he just. I have photos of this tiny little guy, and he was so snuggly and zonked out, and it was really, really sweet. But I did realize later that, oh, you know what? I think he had, like, whatever the cat version of sort of not kennel cough, but he had. He had some sort of like, little cutie. A cutie cough that he was passing around. And so we realized, oh, he was sick, which made him especially snuggly in that toddler way that you're talking about. But anyway, that's all I had to say on that. So what's going on with your cap?
- [12:46]
Luke Burbank
Well, so I don't know if you've noticed this, but you also. You guys cut the cord with Amazon, right? You guys rarely, if ever, get an Amazon delivery these days.
- [12:55]
Andrew Walsh
Yeah, we don't. We haven't. We still are technically prime members, but we're just waiting. It should die in the next few weeks, I think.
- [13:02]
Luke Burbank
Well, I have not fully cut the cord. And so we have boxes that say, I have very mixed feelings about this because I actually think it's really clever branding. Yeah, I do, too, for Amazon. But it's also very upsetting because it's like the, you know, it's the anthropomorph. Is that. Are we anthropomorphizing this company that's, you know, making the world a worse place. When they send out a box that says on the side of it, without you, I'm empty inside. And the other morning I came out to find Bubbles fully cuddled up. I'm gonna send you this picture, like, just full on, precious moment. This cat, big eyes, cute as could be in the box looking at me. And the box says on the side, without you, I'm empty inside. And I mean, it was like a. It's like it looks staged, but it's not or looks Photoshopped. It's just actually what happened. And again, it's so adorable. But I hate that I almost. I put this on Instagram and I considered trying to learn rudimentary Photoshop to basically cover up the fact that it's an Amazon box. Like, kind of erase the Amazon prime logo that's underneath that statement without you I'm empty inside because it's so cute. I mean, it's so incredibly cute. But again, it's with this kind of tinge of dark corporate overlord kind of.
- [14:24]
Andrew Walsh
Characteristics, you know, what I could do without. And I'm going to speak slightly ill, but I'm going to speak slightly ill of a company that I like. But as I speak ill of this company, the listeners are going to take side with the company and realize that I'm just a crank. And that's the way to say I'm.
- [14:40]
Luke Burbank
Already siding with the company.
- [14:41]
Andrew Walsh
I can tell you that, as you should. But they're too affordable. No, the story I'm talking about is Grove, the online marketplace. Now, you and I used to be paid to do ads for Grove. I believe that's how I started using Grove. And the truth of the matter is we haven't received a dime from Grove in at least five years, if not more. And frankly, you and I never really received any dimes from Grove. Another company that went in between did. But anyway, I, you know, sampled their wares because we were doing ads for them. And I truly did fall in love with the, you know, the, I guess, service that they provide by bringing, you know, home goods delivered to your door. You can. It's one of those things where they really try to get you to sign up for a subscription service. Like, hey, we'll send you, you know, we'll refill your Mrs. Meyers hand soap every couple of months. I just like opt out of that shit. And I just use it as a place to go and buy stuff and have it delivered. And I do think they're a good company. They won't send you something under a certain price limit because they really are committed to not like just sending one small bottle of soap. Like they're trying to like, you know, like minimize their impact on the environment as much as you can. They really emphasize buying stuff that, you know, doesn't have single use plastic and stuff. But it's also. But it's not so crunchy that it's unusable for somebody like me, a kid who grew up in Ohio in the 80s and used to just use a full roll of paper towels to, to wipe up after one lunch, you know. So all of that is to say I find it very usable. But what they do that, I guess this, their sort of signature thing is the person who packs up the box, takes a marker and like writes a cute little note to you. Have you ever seen this? It's like, it's always like you're making a difference, Andrew. And they always put your name on it. And it's like, literally, it's not like just pre printed on boxes. And at first, when I first got that note, whatever the first box I received was, I thought it was because they considered me. Like they knew I was an advertiser or influencer for them. But no, they do that for everybody. And then. And this is where I just become a jerk. It's like I get a box and it says on the top, you know, thanks for doing your part, Andrew. You know, and then I started thinking, well, you wrote that on this one, What'd you write on the next one? Do you just break it down by hours? You write that same thing on everybody's box. Like, what is. What is Sarah down the street getting? You know, what's Clementine getting? I don't know. Like, you don't even mean it. You don't even mean it anymore. And now I'm just done with it. Just send me the box.
- [17:08]
Luke Burbank
Really? Just because you feel like it's you, you know, that there's no way that they could be writing a heartfelt, unique note to every customer. So to you, this feels phony in a way.
- [17:21]
Andrew Walsh
It seems a little extra at this point. It seems like I don't need it anymore, I guess is the way that I would say. Now here's the deal. We, you and I have a little bit of experience with this because one time. Were you thinking about the time we signed like, however many hundreds upon hundreds of.
- [17:36]
Luke Burbank
I'm be honest with you, that was a pain in the ass.
- [17:39]
Andrew Walsh
It was, but I really, it was.
- [17:41]
Luke Burbank
Very happy with the outcome. Man, I didn't know how hard it was to sign that many things, and.
- [17:45]
Andrew Walsh
It was tough to keep them individualized. And I did it as much as do you. I can't remember how many we sent out. Luke, is there a chance that you and I each did about a thousand postcards?
- [17:55]
Luke Burbank
I think. Oh, easily.
- [17:57]
Andrew Walsh
Yeah, I think so too.
- [17:59]
Luke Burbank
I think that I took the low road and you took the high road, I. E. I think, like you wrote a note and I think, did I just sign mine? I feel like I took the. I took the easy road. You did something that was actually more. More difficult. And I forget the specifics, but if you got an Andrew one, you were lucky. You got one of the good ones. I want to apologize to everybody who got a Luke one.
- [18:19]
Andrew Walsh
Well, I was trying. And that's the thing. Like, I couldn't write. I don't have a thousand individual Messages in me, you know what I mean? I got like. I counted the other day. I think I got like 97 or.
- [18:31]
Luke Burbank
That sounds high, honestly.
- [18:32]
Andrew Walsh
Might be in low 90s maybe. I don't know. It's somewhere around there. It was higher and then there was shrinkflation got involved somehow, I think. Yeah, I think I blame Biden. I don't know. But the point is, like, I also had a stamp. Genevieve got me to some. Just on a whim, ordered for me some TBTL stamp. There was a goofy ass picture that you and I took sarcastically of us posing back to back with our arms crossed like a couple of like cheesy radio guys. I don't know when, why or where we did that. But Genevieve got her hands on that photo and then had a rubber stamp made of it.
- [19:08]
Luke Burbank
That's great.
- [19:09]
Andrew Walsh
So I had that. So I'd stamp a few of them with that. And I was trying to mix things up so that each one so that if two people got a card, they didn't say the exactly the same thing in the exact same way. But it is difficult. And I did not achieve 100% uniqueness, for sure.
- [19:24]
Luke Burbank
Well, you would think that this would give you then an appreciation for the folks at Grove doing this, even if it is a little, you know, Matt, in a way it's very artisanal. But another way, it's probably mass produced because they got to just, you know. Also, is that the person who packs the box, presumably, or is there just a person who's sitting there with a Sharpie and the box is handed to them and then they have to. Because I'm assuming that Grove is sending out hundreds, if not thousands of things a day. Does that mean that person is signing as many boxes a day as you and I did with those postcards, which again, was a whole thing. I remember like dedicating two or three entire nights to that project.
- [19:59]
Andrew Walsh
Oh, yeah, certainly. I remember rewatching. I am trying to break your heart. And I remember like, I hadn't watched that in a long time and it was in the middle of the pandemic, remember? And so like a food truck. This. There's no need for me to say all of this. I just read. I just have such specific memories of that weekend. And they are connected to just parking up in the. At the like dining room table at our old apartment. This El Cam. Not El Camino. El Camion. Oh, yes. Just rolled into town. Everybody had told me it was so good. I was like, it's a burrito. I'm sure it's fine. I had my first one, Genevieve. I'm signing these postcards, I'm watching the Wilco documentary. And then Genevieve said, well, I'll go get a burrito from that new place. And it was like maybe literally the best, one of the best burritos I've ever had. And I just, can I just have a very specific fond memory of signing all those things. And the truth is, I'm not mad at Grove for doing that. In fact, I like to think it's the person who packed the box and then they get to just take a moment and like break up, you know, before they have to pack the next box and just think of something clever to say with their nice handwriting. Maybe it breaks it up a little bit. I don't want to begrudge them that. But I guess what I'm saying is, is I don't need that. You've sending me a lot of boxes over the years. I know that. I know that you appreciate me. The box is fine. I'm thinking for the show pick today. I don't know if this is a high enough res photo, but maybe if you could email me this. What if I take this. Oh, no, this is a high res photo. What if I take this photo of Bonk of Bubbles, who I almost called Bonkers?
- [21:32]
Luke Burbank
Actually, that would have been an equally good name.
- [21:35]
Andrew Walsh
I do like that name. But what if I hastily Photoshop over the prime logo and put Grove there? Do you think we'll get sued? So it looks like I'd rather Grove.
- [21:46]
Luke Burbank
Get the credit than Prime. Hey, by the way, I want to apologize if you're hearing noise in the background here in this hotel room. I am actually doing something very unprecedented for me today, Andrew, which is I am not perched at the window of this hotel room, which is. I mean, I have moved literally heaven and earth at times so that I can be staring out a window when I'm doing the show with you. It is a very important part of my process. So if I sound worse today, it's because I am doing the rare thing, which is I'm just staring at a, at a wall, basically in a flat screen tv because of two things. One, there's so much noise outside the window. My room faces some kind of an alleyway that appears to be a place where there's just a cavalcade of dump trucks just dumping stuff for some reason. And then there's like a giant like air conditioning unit that's probably related to this hotel. Also the air conditioning unit for my room, which Is very loud, is right at the window. So I had no choice but to decamp to this other little area of the hotel room where there's, like, a couch. But I'm not getting my normal visual inspiration that I have. That helps me, you know, bring in Denoise and Defunk on the show that people so look forward to. So if I seem a little sedate today, it's because I'm not doing the show in my normal, preferred manner. But I thought it would be better, sonically.
- [23:08]
Andrew Walsh
Because you're off your game because you can't perv on people out the window.
- [23:12]
Luke Burbank
Exactly.
- [23:13]
Andrew Walsh
Is that what you're saying?
- [23:14]
Luke Burbank
Listen, we all have our process. Andrew and mine just involved. You know, it's kind of surprising, to be honest with you, that I haven't observed any kind of. I haven't rear windowed anything in all of my many. I'd say, at this point. Would you say thousands of times that I've now done the show from a hotel room somewhere? Maybe Hunt, maybe. Maybe in the high 900s?
- [23:36]
Andrew Walsh
I mean, going back to the beginning of TB Tale.
- [23:38]
Luke Burbank
Sure. Like, for all the times that I've been posted up in a hotel room window talking to you and staring out the window, I've never seen, like, you know, a couple having an illicit time. I've never seen, in the style of John Mulaney, some organized crime guys hitting a guy with a lamp repeatedly over and over again in different apartments. I've not. I haven't seen anything cool or interesting as I've stared out the window of thousands of hotel rooms into the windows of thousands of other hotel rooms.
- [24:10]
Andrew Walsh
Now, I am going to make a mistake and try to correct you on that a little bit with very. With a very, very bad memory. But you saw somebody walking around on the roof one time in a way that surprised you. Somebody in a roof area where it didn't seem like somebody should be in a roof area. Right. Does that ring a bell?
- [24:30]
Luke Burbank
That does ring a slight bell.
- [24:32]
Andrew Walsh
And then wasn't there another adventure that you got in because you saw somebody leave a note on a car and then you went down and you tried to get involved to solve a mystery about a note left on a car at one point. But I'm really blanking on the details in case you couldn't tell.
- [24:47]
Luke Burbank
Yeah. Somehow you have more detail about this than I do, even though it was my actual life. But that does sound familiar. I guess I have had some adventures. There had been some hijinks.
- [24:56]
Andrew Walsh
You approached the driver of a bus who you thought Was cosplaying as a driver.
- [25:00]
Luke Burbank
That is true. On Hollywood Boulevard and took a photo and then tipped him $5 for the photo. That one I remember because that one was fairly recent.
- [25:09]
Andrew Walsh
Sir, I'm really a bus driver. This is not. This is not actual.
- [25:13]
Luke Burbank
I thought he was cosplaying. Who did. I think he was cosplaying.
- [25:17]
Andrew Walsh
I don't think you were trying to get a photo with Jesus. Somebody cosplaying as Jesus. But then he was the only character left down there. And then you realize afterwards he wasn't a character. He was just a driver.
- [25:28]
Luke Burbank
He was driving one of those star tour buses that doesn't have a roof on it. But he was dressed. He was. He was kind of dressed like, you know, what is that like, I feel like the book is maybe Czechoslovakian, and it's about, like, a bunch of hats in a tree, and there's, like, a guy standing on the. On the COVID of the book, and he's kind of in, like, a tails and jodhpur or something. This guy looked vaguely like that. He had a black top hat, and he had, like, a kind of a red outfit. And I was like. And he was walking with people, and I was like, who is he caused? Because, you know, that area of Hollywood Boulevard is just packed with people that are cosplaying different things, including, I noted that day, Jesus. And Jesus was getting very little attention, which I thought was an interesting commentary on where we're at as a religious society. But then, yeah, I ran down to try to catch Jesus. He was gone. But then I saw the other guy who was fascinated with. I awkwardly took a picture of him, and at which point I realized, oh, he's just at work. And then I awkwardly shoved $5 into his hand as a tip, which he said thank you for. So, yeah, I mean, all this hotel room peeping has led to some content for the show.
- [26:32]
Andrew Walsh
I feel like you purposely do not want to drill down on this, and so I'm going to. You describing that book was like, I felt like I was living in a Magritte painting. You said a Czechoslovakian book featuring a guy in the top hat and jodhpurs in front of a tree that had many hats in it.
- [26:55]
Luke Burbank
Hats on Tree book. Let's see. What Hats on Tree book. Yeah, it's called Caps for Sale. Really?
- [27:03]
Andrew Walsh
You found it immediately.
- [27:05]
Luke Burbank
He's not in a top hat, by the way. He is just up in the tree. And it's written by somebody named Esper Slobodkina. Let's figure out who. Esper Slobodkina was Russian. Okay. Not. I'm sorry, not Czech.
- [27:20]
Andrew Walsh
Still, though we're able to find it in a moment. I'm very shocked by. This is a famous thing, huh?
- [27:26]
Luke Burbank
She was born in. In Russia in 1908. And I just remember this book. Yeah, it's called Caps for Sale. And it's this guy who's up a tree again, does not have a top hat, but he's dressed kind of formally. He's got, like, a bow tie on and stuff. And then he's looking at a stack of caps that are down kind of on the ground. And I just remember this book being. You know, I grew up in a. My God, this reminds me of a story that my mom told me the other day. I grew up in a very public library environment, not because my parents were particularly committed to the support of our library systems, which I think is just such a important and vital thing in society. And they're just. I mean, I can't say enough good about our library system. We just went to the library a lot because it was free. And, like, my mom could just park us there for hours and hours. And then later I would go there so I could watch PG13 movies in the media center because they didn't stop me. And those were movies my parents wouldn't let me watch. But, like, this was the kind of book that you would find in the Seattle Public Library Children's department. And children's department's a weird way to put it section. It was just around. It was just. It kind of was in the. In the ether. If you grew up in Seattle going to public school and going to the public library in the era that I did. Now, the story that my mom. I'm almost tempted to text my mom and ask her for the specific movie. She was telling me about a recent trip my parents made to a World Mark, the timeshare condo thing that they're part of. And she said, yeah, that was the trip that cost me $24. And I go, what do you mean? And she had checked out a DVD from the public library and then left the DVD in the DVD player at the timeshare.
- [29:10]
Andrew Walsh
Oh, no.
- [29:11]
Luke Burbank
Or no. And then had to pay for the replacement cost of the dvd. But there was something about the specific DVD it was. That was like, yeah, that's what I wanted to know.
- [29:24]
Andrew Walsh
Of course.
- [29:24]
Luke Burbank
Very. Okay, you know what I'll do? I'm going to text Susie. And then let's thank the dazzling donors and maybe if we buy some time that she'll get back to me if she's near her phone, if she's nearer her phone to the. And then I can give you. We can pay that off after the dazzling donors. What do you think?
- [29:40]
Andrew Walsh
Sounds good.
- [29:44]
Luke Burbank
We was hoping for some razzle dazzle. Razzle dazzle. That's right, man. Razzle dazzle. On your mark. On your mark. Get set.
- [29:51]
Andrew Walsh
Get set now. Ready? Ready?
- [29:53]
Luke Burbank
Go, everybody. Razzle dazzle. All right. Let's thank those dazzling donors. These folks are donating a dazzling amount of dough. And it is the way. This is the way, Andrew, that TBTL can exist. This is how. This is my job and your job and TBTL employee numero uno John Skloroff's job. It's because of the donations from folks like our friend, Broadcast Barry. Barry fought in Seattle, Washington. The man, the myth, the legend, Broadcast Barry. It's apropos that we would be reading Broadcast Barry's dazzling donor message today, because I have been, you know, I flew out here to D.C. and anytime I'm in. Anytime I'm traveling, anytime I'm in travel mode, I'm in constant conversation with our friend, Broadcast Barry. It's our love language. Analyzing each and everything. I feel like he is. Phyllis Fletcher is another one who's pretty dialed into the Alaska Airlines situation. But I feel like Barry and I are. We connect so deeply on a level around obsessing over if we're. He's the one that taught me that there is a special way that you can basically, like. What's the word for it? You can. You can sort of hack into the Alaska Airlines website and figure out multiple days in advance if you have a chance of getting upgraded like you can. There's. It's on Reddit, too. He pointed me towards this thing on Reddit where you can basically go in and change the URL in a way that allows you to get a little bit more information than Alaska Airlines is willing to share with you at that particular point in time. And that's something that I use on a weekly basis thanks to Broadcast Barry. Also. Broadcast Barry, of course, is so kind and generous, sends us coffee from Broadcast Coffee and sends us money from his bank account. And it's very, very helpful, Barry says. Luke, Andrew and John, thank you for transmitting such a wonderful production to the Internet. Wavelengths one to three hours a day, five days a week. I've been. I've been a supporting listener for years, and I can't think of a better way to continue to spend 1.25 fubos per month that's pretty good to support the numerous painstaking tasks and myriad crucial undertakings y' all do for the TENS community. I will say I don't want to do an ad for Fubo here, Andrew, but like, it really. That has really paid off. And the fact that that Mariners app, the Root Sports app, you know, for all the bad feelings we have towards the Mariners at times and their ownership and the way that the media is the actual media, like the games themselves are sort of held hostage and sort of doled out to different platforms. So you have to keep signing up for new things. I mean, it's kind of a mess in a certain way, but the fact that I can watch all of these games on my phone now, wherever I am, has been pretty life changing for me. Like, it means that, yeah, if I'm in an airport and the game is on, or if I'm, you know, and just again on a plane sometimes, like, it's a pretty awesome setup, I have to say. Mostly overall.
- [32:54]
Andrew Walsh
And Fubo doesn't black out the games when you are outside of the broadcast area. See, that's huge because I pay for the app. But the app only works if you're in like Washington, Oregon and maybe Idaho. You know what I mean? You have to be in the broadcast range. Otherwise the games get blacked out and you need to watch it on the MLB app. So I do have both of those apps so that I can travel and have access to basically every game. Unless it's on Apple or unless it's on Draft Kings. Unless it's on Grove Co. Slash this home runs for you, Andrew, but I have a way of patching it all together. But that is a huge selling point that you don't have. It doesn't Geo doesn't put you in.
- [33:34]
Luke Burbank
GEO jail, not that I've noticed yet. And you'd think if there was a GEO jail, it would definitely hit you at 30,000ft when you're crossing multiple state lines.
- [33:44]
Andrew Walsh
Yeah.
- [33:45]
Luke Burbank
So anyway, Barry, thank you for donating 1.25 fubos per month to our show. On a more serious note, Barry says since the 2024 elections, I've cut out the news and changed many routines to preserve what few strands of mental health I have left. TBT is pretty much my only media connection to the world, so thank you. Seriously, I know I'm not alone in this and I'm grateful for you and the tens. I'm not very active on socials, but I try to keep my ascendant social media platform Blue sky updated. I Mostly post my runs, but maybe I'll get more creative. If any of y' all want to follow along, I'm Broadcast Barry. So if you're on Blue Ski, go check out our friend Broadcast Barry on Blue Ski. I assume I'm following Barry. It would be a travesty if I wasn't. But I'll go back in and check that later today. Thanks again. Keep on keeping on. And remember what you do is so selfless. Love you guys. From Barry. Wow, that's a really nice way to put it, Barry. I. I want to agree with you on that. This is either the most selfless or self full thing.
- [34:44]
Andrew Walsh
Yeah.
- [34:45]
Luke Burbank
Any two people have ever done.
- [34:46]
Andrew Walsh
I would. I'm not. I appreciate it, but I'm not accepting the selfless compliment that. Incredibly sweet. You said before, Luke, that you don't want to do an ad for Fubo here. I will say I straight up do want to do an ad for Broadcast Coffee and Black Moon Pizza. And I know, and I apologize here because I think there might be. I don't know if there are more things in the works or if there are other names I should be throwing out here, but Barry is an entrepreneur with a capital. I mean, now the weird thing is I'm capitalizing the second E in entrepreneur because it's a little bit just to keep things kind of fresh and spicy.
- [35:24]
Luke Burbank
Yeah.
- [35:24]
Andrew Walsh
But literally right now, I am drinking the Broadcast coffee that Barry has gifted us. Cheers. I'm cheersing Barry across the.
- [35:32]
Luke Burbank
I am having the shittiest cup of coffee I've ever had from the Mayflower Hotel. It was, like, room temperature. It was $4.40. I meant to ask you. I tipped a dollar. I didn't know it was going to be terrible coffee when I got it. But, like, do we tip a dollar for drip coffee? If there is a. If she would have given me the coffee, I would have just taken it. But because I was charged for the coffee, I then felt like I had to tip.
- [35:54]
Andrew Walsh
Does that make sense? That's really interesting, isn't it? If you have free sometimes. Yeah. Like, that's why you have to be sometimes careful. If somebody comps you something on a restaurant bill or a bar bill, you have to make sure to remember that when it's time to kind of tally up the percentages.
- [36:09]
Luke Burbank
I'm super careful about that. Like, if there's ever a discount, I really try to make sure that I'm tipping on what the total amount was in this case. Like, had I walked up to this because it was, like, kind of in the bar of the hotel. But I just. I thought maybe they'd have a Starbucks. They didn't. So I just went to this bar and I said, like, can I get a cup of coffee here? And had there just been, like, a big, you know, carafe of coffee that she poured me some and handed it to me, I would have just said, thank you, and walked out. Instead, she goes, room charge. And I was like, no, I'll just pay on my card. Because it's a nightmare trying to separate out the room charges that the CBS does not pay for that. So I'm like, nah, put it on my card. It's $4.40. And then there's the line for a tip. And now I feel weird not tipping, so I tip a dollar. So Now I'm paying 5:40 for this coffee, which I get in the elevator and take a sip of it. And I'm not, like, I don't need my coffee to be, you know, scalding. I don't need it to be McDonald's lawsuit hot. But it was so cold, and it just tasted bad. Like, just kind of odd. And I just thought, like, well, that was a big old waste of $5.40 anyway. That would never happen with broadcast coffee, Andrew. It's temperature control.
- [37:14]
Andrew Walsh
It comes hot. It's always the perfect temperature. And also, I want to tell you a story, by the way, just a really quick aside. I have a story about Black Moon Pizza here for you in a second. But do you think in the. In the. I guess that would have been the 90s. Do you think people took advantage of the news about the McDonald's lawsuit to create cheesy pickup lines like, Girl, your McDonald's lawsuit hot. Girl, you're hotter than a cup of McDonald's coffee. Do you think that. You think that got anybody anywhere?
- [37:42]
Luke Burbank
Girl, are you a McDonald's lawsuit? Because you make me want to push for tort reform.
- [37:50]
Andrew Walsh
That was the next one I was gonna do. You stepped on my joke. You suddenly got.
- [37:54]
Luke Burbank
That worked for me a lot in the 90s. That's how I met a lot of young law students.
- [37:58]
Andrew Walsh
I was having dinner with, actually, a former colleague and friend of ours, Annie. Me, Veeves and Annie from 8:00pm we're having dinner. I think it was last week or the week before. And Annie kind of splits her time between Seattle and Boise. And Boise is where Black Moon Pizza is technically. And this is what I find fascinating. Black Moon is actually in the city that is in the center of Boise, which I want to say is I always call it Liberty City, but that's from Grand Theft Auto. Maybe it's Garden City. I think there's like a city within.
- [38:29]
Luke Burbank
So there's a city within Boise.
- [38:30]
Andrew Walsh
Eric know this, explain it better than me. It's its own tiny municipality. I think that is actually within the city limits of Boise. That's how I understand it.
- [38:38]
Luke Burbank
I think Garden City is absolutely right. It's 4.2 square mile urban enclave surrounded by the city of Boise.
- [38:46]
Andrew Walsh
He also does have a Black Moon Pizza in Liberty City, but there is so much violence.
- [38:53]
Luke Burbank
It's only to go. Only to go.
- [38:55]
Andrew Walsh
It's only to go. And quickly, if that. But I was having drinks and dinner with Annie and I mentioned Black Moon, and her eyes got so big. She's like, it is so good now. I have not had the opportunity to have Black Moon Pizza myself. Barry, for some reason, is not seen fit to ship that he's sending me.
- [39:13]
Luke Burbank
A pizza every week. He's not sending you a pizza.
- [39:15]
Andrew Walsh
No. Avoid the noid.
- [39:18]
Luke Burbank
But anyway, for real, he had Domino's Pizza, which is the strangest thing.
- [39:23]
Andrew Walsh
There was no reason for Annie to lie about. This is a private conversation. Barry was not there, and she was just giddy about it. So if we have listeners who are in that area and are somehow not aware of Black Moon Pizza, please do check it out there in Garden City.
- [39:36]
Luke Burbank
Yeah. Everything that Barry touches from a business standpoint seems to turn to gold. Has an incredibly adroit business mind, super hard worker person who was, I believe, recently reposted by Bridget Everett from somebody somewhere, one of our mutual friends, one of our mutuals DM'd me to say, did you know broadcast Barry had one of his Instagram posts reposted by Bridget Everett? I mean, that's. That's big time over there. So anyway, Barry, thank you so much for all that you've done for the show over the years. It really means so much to us. Maestro, on your mark. On your mark. Get set, get set now.
- [40:13]
Andrew Walsh
Ready?
- [40:13]
Luke Burbank
Ready, Go. We're also thanking Rebecca Butler today in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
- [40:22]
Andrew Walsh
Thank you, Rebecca.
- [40:23]
Luke Burbank
Lots of Philly references the last couple of days. By the way, update from Susie. My mother, also a product of Philadelphia, pa. The DVD that she had to rebuy for the Kitsap Public Library was the movie version of the book where the Crawdads Sing.
- [40:42]
Andrew Walsh
Oh, I read that book. I never saw the movie. I never saw the movie. I tried to get out of the library. They didn't have it. Yeah, they were out for some reason. Yeah, I read that Book when it was kind of. That was one of those really hot books once Buzzy.
- [40:54]
Luke Burbank
I didn't realize that that was. I was seeing it everywhere. I did not read it, but I knew it was kind of a. Kind of a phenomenon. So you actually read that. Interesting.
- [41:01]
Andrew Walsh
Yeah, it was a. It was a good read. I remember it was a very. It was like exactly what you want for kind of a summer read. It was, you know, I think it dealt with some serious stuff, but it was pretty breezy. Good summer read. Yeah. It seemed also like it was made that well. Maybe this sounds like an insult. It seemed like it would adapt to a movie very well. Let me put it that way.
- [41:19]
Luke Burbank
Right, sure. Like something starring Shailene Woodley.
- [41:22]
Andrew Walsh
Sure, yes, I feel.
- [41:24]
Luke Burbank
But I don't know if she's in that movie, but spiritually I believe she is. I will say this also about my mother. I was very proud. She said, yeah, I paid for it. She goes, but you know what, I love that library. And so I was happy to pay them back. That was a very mature response from my mom. Yes, I was proud of her because I could see her just literally having herself declared legally dead and creating a full new identity to sneak back into that library and not pay the $28 or whatever it was. We are talking about a woman who had a whole system for sneaking into the YMCA which involved having one earbud in and pretending like she left something in the locker room and then going back through. But because she had the one headphone in, she thought that the people, the like 17 year old working the turnstile at the Y would not question her. And I believe at some point she learned she could go there for free because of her age and she had been sneaking into the Y for essentially no reason.
- [42:17]
Andrew Walsh
I know I should know this because we've heard this story, but how did one earbud play into the sneak?
- [42:25]
Luke Burbank
I believe that her theory was it would look like she had just exercised. And we're not talking about AirPods here, we're not even talking about Apple branded headphones. We're just talking about some kind of a like in ear corded system plugged into God knows what. That for some reason having one of them in she thought looked like she had just been working out in the Y but had forgotten something and was just going back in for a moment. I don't know why one in as opposed to two, I don't know why that mattered, but in her mind that somehow conveyed a certain nonchalant, nonchalant nature that and Again, my mom's really good at this stuff, so she might be onto something, but there was something about the nonchalance of that that. That she thought would help her as opposed to having both in. And I don't. We could have her on to explain the difference.
- [43:15]
Andrew Walsh
I love. I'll bet you she had a whole backstory, too. Not even that she wanted to tell it, but to inhabit this character. Like, okay, well, I.
- [43:22]
Luke Burbank
Character known as Gal who left something in the locker room.
- [43:26]
Andrew Walsh
Right, Exactly.
- [43:27]
Luke Burbank
Like, I'm Susie Burbank. I'm auditioning for the role. I'm five foot three.
- [43:33]
Andrew Walsh
Now, am I passable stage combat, or am I being brave for everybody?
- [43:38]
Luke Burbank
Do you want to try that again?
- [43:40]
Andrew Walsh
No.
- [43:41]
Luke Burbank
Rebecca says, I would like to express my thanks to Luke, Andrew, and John and all of my fellow tens TBTL Forever give someone you love a physical or virtual hug today, even if that is yourself. Rebecca. I love that message. I'm gonna hug myself here in this hotel room. And I'm not even being sarcastic, because what I have learned in my life is that when I am. Oftentimes when I am not being the person that I want to be as it relates to other people in my life, it's because I am not being the person that I want to be as it relates to myself. When I'm being the most mean to myself and the most kind of whatever that is, often then the thing that precedes me being not great to people in my life. And I think that's probably the case for a lot of us. So that's a really good message today. Be nice to somebody, even if it's yourself. That can have some really good. Really good. I was gonna say consequences. That'd be weird. That can have really good payoff for folks.
- [44:42]
Andrew Walsh
Hello, and welcome to Top Stories.
- [44:45]
Luke Burbank
All right, here we are getting to this story. I would say roughly two to three weeks after you sent it to me. I don't want to say in a. In a fury, but in a get a load of this shit. Kind of. Kind of a sort of energy, I think maybe. Did Genevieve initially send this to you or something? I feel like you guys were having a kind of a side conversation about this HBO Max story.
- [45:07]
Andrew Walsh
No. You know what I think? I mean, I do think that Genevieve told me about it, but I think you and I were on the line together. I think we're dialing up. Oh, right. And I got a text message because. Because here's the. Do you want to know the real dark secret about this? Which isn't going to shock you. But this came across our transom about a week and a half ago. I think maybe Genevieve texted it to me. I read the headline to you. I said, oh, this would be good for tomorrow's show because I think we're getting prepared to do a show that was already set up. And you're like, oh, that would be a great topic for the show. And I said, okay, yeah, I'll read it after the show. I at this point do not remember if I ever read this or if I just have always felt like I have all the information I need just from the headline. Know if I ever followed up and actually read this damn thing.
- [45:52]
Luke Burbank
Well, I'll tell you that the corporate speak from the Warner Brothers Discovery company that was passed on to Variety magazine is. It's kind of an all timer in terms of them trying to sound sure, like this is all going well. Now let's just remind everybody, at some point HBO decided that they were not going to go by HBO anymore. They were going to start calling themselves Max. Or at least they're streaming. I guess they're still on TV in some fashion, I think, depending on your cable package. Like I used to have HBO on television. Oh, that's also weird to think about, right? Because you know what I used to love about hbo, like many of us did, was that it was appointment television and that when it was Sunday night, it was time for the Sopranos. You were not streaming the Sopranos. Effectively, you were turning on your cable television. You were going to hbo, you were turning it on and you were very excited. It was a sort of a over the air broadcast network of sorts. And now that seems crazy to me. Like of course you would just go to the app to watch something. But they decided, Warner Brothers Discovery decided that they were going to start calling it Max instead of hbo. And I think my theory on that was because they had all of this Discovery content, you know, because like the Discovery Network and all these reality shows and all of these, like there was all of this stuff that they wanted to sort of like also try to pass through the hbo, you know, portal, if you will. And I don't know if they thought that it was beneath the dignity of HBO or that they thought HBO sounded too specific. I don't really remember why they thought they needed to change the name, but at the time I think we both thought it was a really bad idea. And it turns out that they now agree it was a really bad idea. And in a press release, Warner Brothers Discovery said, quote, returning the HBO brand into HBO Max will further drive the service forward and amplify the uniqueness that subscribers can expect from the offering. It's also a testament to Warner Brothers Discovery's willingness to keep boldly iterating its strategy and approach, leaning heavily on consumer data and insights to best position itself for success. Did you think that the person who, right when they. When they hit send on that, do you think that they immediately just walked into a river with rocks in their pocket?
- [48:15]
Andrew Walsh
They were like, well, should we sort of like, meekly, hat in hand, say, oh, we made a mistake? And somebody said, well, you could do that, or you could say, this proves how bold we are going into the future because of our flexibility. They didn't even say that. That would almost, like, give up too much of an apology. I feel like that is.
- [48:36]
Luke Burbank
Listen, isn't that that horrible?
- [48:38]
Andrew Walsh
The thing. I want to go back also to the original sin here of, like, packaging this as Max, because it was even a little bit more confusing than, as you put it, like, it was because of some merger where they acquired all kinds of new content. Or really, it was like whoever acquired HBO was kind of like, you know, kind of bundling it all together, but then still within the Max app, which also just like. Like just going at whatever. Just aesthetically, the calling it Max sucks and the font sucks. That X always drives me crazy. I don't know why. It's a little bit bendy. I don't like that. And X is a very cool letter. We can do better with our kerning or our font. Not kerning, but our fonts. But, like, then you would go into the Max app and then there was still an HBO tab where they had HBO branded content. And some of that HBO branded content was just. Were just movies, just studio movies. But for some reason those were considered higher tier. So they were in the HBO tab of Max. But then other movies were just elsewhere in Max along with. So they were like, trying to. Like, they were trying to put a little bit of a. Not even a wall, but like a divider. Like a. Like if you go into a cubicle farm, they just had, like, didn't even go all the way to the ceiling, but they tried to put these little dividers between the kind of premium feeling content of HBO and the Love Islands or whatever else is on Max.
- [50:07]
Luke Burbank
Right, The Discovery shit.
- [50:09]
Andrew Walsh
Right, Exactly. And so anyway, it was always a mess. It never made any sense. It always felt temporary. Like, I remember it was rushed, too. I remember when Max came out, it just felt so rushed, and everybody was confused by it. And just had to do with exactly like the people who write these kinds of statements. Like they're not think they're so far up they're own max hole that they can't even kind of tell like what.
- [50:32]
Luke Burbank
Is important up their own max hole.
- [50:35]
Andrew Walsh
Maybe, maybe I'll think about it. But anyway, like it's just. It was just so dumb. But okay, let me. Let me just. I'm. I realize I'm going to tear here, but let me give this example that is only relatable to you and that way the listeners will understand it even less. There is a style of writing for press releases that is so mind boggling because the whole point of a press release is you are wr to a journalist who just needs like kind of the. The top line information should be on the top line. Right? But usually, and I think you'll. You'll back me up on this by the time a press release goes out and it hits your desk as a journalist, the first couple of lines of press releases are so useless and weighted down with so much information that is almost. You almost can't even. And tease out what it's trying to say. Because the people who work for this organization know that there are all these internal stakeholders who have to get their fingerprints on the top line of the press release. Information that is so unimportant to the story will never make it in, but it makes sure that it states the entire. I don't know, Luke. L. I'm sorry, Luke. Christian Burbank Chair of economics department since 1993. Like all this just wait down shit that is. You can't even crawl through it. You're throwing away the press release before you get to the good stuff. And it's just because people who are writing it do not. They've lost all connection as to what is important to the outside world.
- [52:09]
Luke Burbank
Well, because nobody has less chill than the team writing a press release or the person who's being described in the press release. Like they, you know. Because I haven't really been involved in the writing of press releases, but I've been around plenty of corporate messaging and it's like, you know, what they think is the most important, most salient details are almost rarely. They're rarely ever the important salient details of the thing. There's a guy named Scott Galloway who is a professor at NYU and I really like him a lot. Although he looks a little bit like he has different kind of hair. I don't think he has a ton of hair on top, but he looks a little Bit like this guy Jordan Peterson, who's just, just the worst. They're both very kind of trim, white guys in their late 50s, but. And they're both, I think, professors. But Jordan Peterson is like a terrible kind of like men's rights sort of troglodyte guy. And Scott Galloway is actually on the right side of politics and is a professor at nyu. But it is confusing. For the longest time, I kept thinking I was seeing Jordan Peterson saying intelligent things and, and I didn't know what to do with this information until I realized it's a different guy. But what he was saying because he's. His background is kind of business. He said that basically it was such a bad idea for HBO to blow up this brand, which was so successful, because what you knew is, I mean, as the tagline said, it's not tv, it's hbo. Like, and this is how he described it. He said that basically Netflix is like the Russian army, that they're just throwing thousands and thousands of movies up there, like, like cannon fodder. Like, it's just all about volume. And then he was said that HBO was like SEAL Team 6. They were like doing way more with less. And you just kind of knew you were going to get. If it was on hbo, you just knew it was going to be really good. And like, that is such. That's such a hard thing to accomplish. And once that's the space that you occupy in people's minds, why would you mess with it?
- [54:09]
Andrew Walsh
Right, Right. And that's the thing too. It is just such a. Such a strong brand. It's not even like, oh, this is confusing as to why some, I don't know, lesser brand, but it's like, I don't know, man. Coke, Pepsi, hbo. Like, they tell you so much about, about the products and the history and their, their connection to American culture. It's just such a bad brand to mess with.
- [54:33]
Luke Burbank
I'm trying to, on my computer, get into, because I have this article from Variety sort of saved, but it looks like there were some kind of funny tweets from the HBO Max account. It started with what's Dead May Never Die coming back, HBO coming back this summer. So they tweeted, what. What is Dead May Never Die. HBO Max coming this summer, same app, newish name. And then after that, they wrote V2 approved by legal.
- [55:02]
Andrew Walsh
That's kind of funny.
- [55:03]
Luke Burbank
I know. I'm trying to get to the. What V2 was. Oh, I see. V2 was. It says V2 approved by legal. And it's like, it's like the Spider man, you know, now there are two of us. Yeah, but it's a Superman, and it's basically three supermen pointing at each other. And then there's one. There's a Superman hiding in the background. It says HBO go on him.
- [55:23]
Andrew Walsh
So there's. There's.
- [55:26]
Luke Burbank
This actually would be kind of a funny show pick, too. It's hbo. Max was one Superman, and he's pointing at HBO now. And. And they're both pointing at HBO Ma. At Max, and Max is pointing at both of them. And then way in the back, behind some boxes is HBO Go.
- [55:40]
Andrew Walsh
That's pretty great. I forgot about hbo.
- [55:42]
Luke Burbank
It really was approved by Legal.
- [55:46]
Andrew Walsh
The HBO Go was basically. It served the same role that the baritone that I played in grade school served, basically.
- [56:00]
Luke Burbank
Do you remember any of the songs?
- [56:01]
Andrew Walsh
No. I mean, there was one about D.C. that I really liked. It was off of 69 love songs that I could play. No, no. I mean, what I'm saying here is unnecessary and so confusing, but when I was a kid, I got to choose my instrument that I wanted to play. It was always a given that I would play an instrument. I think we talked about that. My sister, who is several years older than me, was really gifted as a. As a musician. She played the clarinet starting in grade school and became very good at it, setting pretty high expectations for me to be good at something, like, anything. And unfortunately, I was not. I chose my instrument to be the trombone. It looked fun. It had the slidey thing. You could knock this music stand over, stuff like that. And then I played it for a while, and I think I. You know, I was as happy with it as I was with anything else. But I honestly think that it was. My parents were just kind of like, he's not. Doesn't seem super joyful. And it really just sounds like literal farts coming from his room when he's practicing.
- [57:03]
Luke Burbank
Now, some of that was farting.
- [57:04]
Andrew Walsh
Now, in my defense, some of it was farting. You just picked up the trombone to cover your flatulence.
- [57:13]
Luke Burbank
A flatulence issue.
- [57:14]
Andrew Walsh
So my parents were like, well, maybe he would do better with the trumpet. And I don't. Again, I don't remember having a strong feeling like I wasn't enjoying the trombone, but maybe I wasn't. I don't know, man. But they were like, well, maybe he could transfer over to the trumpet. And somebody in the music education system said, well, what he should do is don't just, you know, switch right from the trombone to the trumpet, because you're changing the size of the mouthpiece. You're changing how you make the. The sounds, which is essentially you're going from a slider to, you know, actual keys that you finger. So it was like. Well, if you get the, the. The baritone, that sort of splits the difference. It's still bass clef. You got the big mouthpiece, but you can start to learn some of the fingerings and you can learn how to play the valved instrument and then eventually move over. What is trumpet?
- [58:00]
Luke Burbank
What was the name of this, this in between instrument?
- [58:03]
Andrew Walsh
A baritone, I want to say, but it wasn't a baritone.
- [58:05]
Luke Burbank
Baritone is just a singing range.
- [58:08]
Andrew Walsh
Well, it could be a singing range. It could also be like a baritone saxophone. But I believe there's also just an instrument called the baritone. Am I wrong? Have I been telling this story incorrectly for my entire life?
- [58:18]
Luke Burbank
I don't know, but I'm looking. Here's what AI says, Andrew, which again, I'm. I'm seeing baritone is a voice type, but then there's also always a picture.
- [58:27]
Andrew Walsh
Of like a baritone horn. That's the word I'm looking for. Horn.
- [58:31]
Luke Burbank
Yeah. So I think you're right. Yeah, I think, I think this is called a baritone. A baritone horn.
- [58:35]
Andrew Walsh
Horn. Yeah. I had, I played this. So I played the baritone horn for a little bit. Oh, they have a silver one here. I. When I got my trombone, I eventually got my own, or, I'm sorry, my own trumpet. And I did get a silver trumpet. It was. I will say I was no better at the trumpet than I was at any of these other instruments. But man, that trumpet looked good. Man. What was the name brand? Maybe I'm asking the wrong guy. I don't. I've never heard you talk about. It doesn't sound like you would have some sort of woohoo deal of an instrument, probably.
- [59:04]
Luke Burbank
Well, I've told you, I mean, I've told my trumpet story, I think too many times on the show, but I had two different kinds of trumpets.
- [59:10]
Andrew Walsh
Do you remember this?
- [59:10]
Luke Burbank
No.
- [59:11]
Andrew Walsh
No. So I don't. Okay. Yeah. So tell me what was. I was trying to remember what is the. There was a common brand of like, kind of student instruments. I want to say king or something like that. It was a king trumpet. Does that, that ring a bell?
- [59:24]
Luke Burbank
What I knew was when. So my, my journey of playing the trumpet, which I was also very bad at, it was that the band teacher at Daniel Bagge Elementary School and I have told the story a million times, so I'll try to be fast. Would go around on like the first couple days of the school year and sort of go around recruiting kids to be in the school band. And he would impress us by coming into the room and playing the trumpet for us. Mr. Morrison was his name. And he played the Transformers theme song when I was in, like, fourth grade, I think maybe third. And I thought it was the coolest thing I'd ever heard in my life. And I went home and I told my parents, I'm going to join the school band and I'm going to learn how to play the Transformers theme song. Because I just had never observed. It was like the cartoon had come to life. There was a man standing in front of me playing a trumpet. That was the sounds of the show that I was obsessed with. So my parents went out and rented me a trumpet from, I want to say, Connelly Keys. And it was a shiny, beautiful brass trumpet. And this was a. I don't know how much this trumpet was per month as a rental, but this was a big outlay for the family at the time. Like, we did not.
- [60:30]
Andrew Walsh
Not.
- [60:31]
Luke Burbank
I didn't get to participate. Like, I was the. Again, this sounds like I'm trying to garner sympathy here or whatever, but, like, if I ever did a team sport and there was a participation fee, I had to go out and earn half of the money for the participation fee. Like, there was a lot of stuff that I just never even did because it was just perceived as expensive. And so being in the school band and having to rent a trumpet for probably $10 a month or something. I remember going there with my parents. There were contracts that were signed around this trumpet. And I remember it was so shiny and beautiful, and I remember bringing it home, and I remember kind of trying to play it and going to band practice or brand rehearsal or whatever we called it, and realizing it was going to be a lot harder to play the Transformers theme song than I thought. And then giving up the trumpet. Let's say two or three months in now. Cut to the next year. And Andrew. It's one of the first days of school. Mr. Morrison shows up. He plays the Transformers theme song. I think I'm rejoining the band. I have got to learn how to play that song. I go home and I tell my parents, I'm rejoining the band. I'm. I think I'm going to be able to learn the Transformers theme song this year. And they say, great, we're not getting you another trumpet, dingus. So they had a poor kid trumpet that was property of the school. If you wanted to play trumpet and you Were first in line and your parents would no longer rent you a trumpet. There was this beat to actually, to be honest with you, probably way cooler. Like, if I would have learned how to really play this trumpet, it would have been cool. Because first of all, it was. It was. It was more like silver. It was very dull and very faded, but it was not like brass like the other ones. It was silver.
- [62:09]
Andrew Walsh
Yeah.
- [62:10]
Luke Burbank
And again, it looked like. Like if I was, you know, Satchmo, if I was some, like, you know, like old school, you know, jazz musician that I was just bringing my horn around, it would be way cool. Because this thing looked like it had seen some. Some stuff, you know. But instead, all I could think the whole time was like, God, how much other kids spit.
- [62:29]
Andrew Walsh
Yeah.
- [62:29]
Luke Burbank
And now, here's the thing.
- [62:30]
Andrew Walsh
You probably had your own mouthpiece. I'm hoping you had your own mouthpiece.
- [62:34]
Luke Burbank
I doubt it. I mean, maybe I'd. Maybe we washed it out or something. I mean, here's the thing. The Canelli keys one also had spit in it. Just had rich kids spit. And now I was dealing with poor. I was dealing with my own kind of spit. It was poor kid spit, and I didn't like it.
- [62:45]
Andrew Walsh
And you thought to yourself, what a wonderful world.
- [62:51]
Luke Burbank
There's that baritone voice.
- [62:52]
Andrew Walsh
That was a terrible Louis Armstrong impression, by the way. Do you know that my theory on that song. And, like, it wasn't like a. I didn't think it was a hot take or anything. I think I was just wrong about it. But that song always sounded so sad to me that I thought it was sarcastic. I thought it was from a man who grew up as a black man and a black kid in a terrible, terrible time.
- [63:14]
Luke Burbank
Yeah.
- [63:14]
Andrew Walsh
Like, you know, I'm sure just blatant, probably at times violent racism. You hear about, like, in the jazz musicians who couldn't play in huge parts of the United States or had to, like, sneak through at night or whatever. And then him singing what a Wonderful World, I just always internalized that. That was more of a like, sort of. I don't know if sarcastic is the right word, but, yeah, I guess. Sort of. Yeah, more of a contemplation, I guess.
- [63:37]
Luke Burbank
Ironic.
- [63:37]
Andrew Walsh
Ironic, maybe, but I think I'm just wrong. I think I'm just wrong about that. I think he just was singing about what a wonderful world he saw.
- [63:45]
Luke Burbank
Well, I mean, yeah, who can know the mind of Louis Armstrong? But I will say I used to have this photograph of him where it was him backstage and he's, like, smoking a cigarette and he just Looks so world weary. And my takeaway from that was kind of similar to yours in that know, in order to make a living and in order to kind of, you know, further his career, he had this kind of like super avuncular Persona on stage. Whether he's singing with Ella Fitzgerald or he's playing his horn or he's just being, you know, singing. Hello, Dolly, this is Louis Dolly. You know, he just was always like. But you had to imagine that again, as you've already said, to be a black man in America at that time was just. Just one indignity after another. And there was something about this photograph of him backstage which felt to me like the mask. He'd kind of taken off the mask a little bit and just like, I felt like you kind of saw the, the real person behind, behind this kind of performative thing that he sort of had to do or, or chose to do. And so who knows? There may have been nights when he was singing what a Wonderful World and inside he was, was. He was, he was being sarcastic, if you will, because of how much this world was not wonderful for him. You know, I, of course, we just don't. We don't know. We're not inside the guy's head. I do think it was certainly, like so many things in this country, very much promoted as a very straightforward song of, like, how great it is on planet Earth.
- [65:15]
Andrew Walsh
Yeah. And it was, of course, it wasn't written by him either. It looks like it was.
- [65:19]
Luke Burbank
Presumably not.
- [65:20]
Andrew Walsh
Yeah. I'm looking at Wikipedia now, so that's something too. It's not like it's his own reflection. It's written by. It looks like a record producer named Bob Teal. So I. So yeah, it probably does not that song. Who knows what was in his head while he was singing it. But the song as it was written was probably not addressing kind of the. Maybe the ironies of being a black man in America at that time.
- [65:44]
Luke Burbank
Yeah. Did you notice that I just casually said Louis Armstrong instead of Louis Armstrong? I did clock that.
- [65:51]
Andrew Walsh
Is that. Is it Armstrong?
- [65:53]
Luke Burbank
Well, I don't know. I heard that's a shout out to Cynthia Doyon, Rest in Power, who was the host of the Swing Years and Beyond on kuow and was very, very, very detail oriented around this stuff. And she would always say Louis Armstrong, but I always forget to say Louis Armstrong. So I always say Louis Armstrong and then I catch myself and then I try to say Louis Armstrong, but it sounds so unnatural.
- [66:17]
Andrew Walsh
It's weird. I almost have the opposite. Well, your name is Louis because my middle name is Louis, spelled the same way. So I always thought it was Louis Armstrong, but I thought that I had been. Been corrected or heard it otherwise. So I feel like I had to train myself to call.
- [66:31]
Luke Burbank
I think you need to untrain yourself maybe. Because I think. And actually I'd forgotten that. Yeah. You have the same middle name, same spelling, and it's pronounced Lewis. So, like, why would. It would actually stand to reason that his name was pronounced Louis Armstrong?
- [66:44]
Andrew Walsh
Yeah, I'm trying to look it up, but it's really hard to get a.
- [66:48]
Luke Burbank
Find an old episode of the Swing Years and beyond.
- [66:50]
Andrew Walsh
Well, we know what that'll tell us. I need. I need secondary tertiary sources. Of course.
- [66:54]
Luke Burbank
Okay, well, here's. I've got great News. You've got 24 hours. You have 24 hours to figure this.
- [66:59]
Andrew Walsh
Out or the girl. Louis Armstrong pronounced his own name as Lewis. L, E, W, I, S. It's not, you know, it's not spelled that way. But according to. Oh, according to AI labs overview.
- [67:11]
Luke Burbank
Oh, good.
- [67:11]
Andrew Walsh
All right.
- [67:12]
Luke Burbank
It's happened. The singularity. You and I are now just freaking believing the AI labs. But, you know, he does. He sings in the song. Hello, Dolly.
- [67:20]
Andrew Walsh
I'm Lewis.
- [67:21]
Luke Burbank
He says, this is Louis, Dolly.
- [67:23]
Andrew Walsh
So, I mean, yeah, it's Louis.
- [67:25]
Luke Burbank
That's gotta be. You know, I think that's as strong as an indicator. Armstrong. Armstrong. I understand. Okay, thanks for coming.
- [67:32]
Andrew Walsh
So I got a Huey, Dewey and Lewis. Okay, sounds good.
- [67:37]
Luke Burbank
I understand. I was gonna say you have 24 hours to figure out how his name is pronounced before we bring you another episode of TBTL. But we just figured it out.
- [67:44]
Andrew Walsh
I only needed 24 seconds. So should we cancel tomorrow's show or are we gonna be back? Back.
- [67:48]
Luke Burbank
Let me give you some assignments. George Pash, Leonard Nimoy or Nimoy. These are all names that are graffitied on the wall of my hotel room, Andrew.
- [68:01]
Andrew Walsh
Oh, really? I thought you were going to say on the walls of your brain that.
- [68:04]
Luke Burbank
You'Re never sure how to pronounce. No, no. These are. Literally. They've decided to do something in this hotel very artsy, which is there's, like famous people. Signatures are. It's the wallpaper. And I assume there are people who are seeing, like, John Kennedy. Looks like he's up there. John F. Kennedy. It looks like they're all people who are considered to have been, you know, Bob Hope. I'm craning my neck around the TV to see some of these signatures. Anyway, I'll give you a full list.
- [68:31]
Andrew Walsh
Okay, thanks. You know, that I have a theory that Bob Hope's last name is ironic. Glad I got you with that one. That's great.
- [68:41]
Luke Burbank
That was really great. That almost justified the entire program for. For me. All right, thanks for listening, everybody. We're going to be back here tomorrow with more imaginary radio for all of you. In the meantime, have a great Tuesday. Take care of yourselves, and please remember, no mountain too tall.
- [68:54]
Andrew Walsh
And good luck to all. Power out.