Nest Sessions: Nick Thorburn on Underground Comics

Welcome to our studio. Great place. Now we're just talking off mic that you are not an American. You are a Gasp Canadian. It's true. I'm secretly Canadian. I try to slip through under detection. But how long have you been here for now? Next year would be year 20. Yeah, you've adapted. Is that longer than you've spent in Canada? I would need five more years to I think make it even. It's scary when you hit those points we realized like there's more time like behind a thing than in front of it. Yes. I'm constantly, constantly doing those equations in my head. Yeah. Because you think about like, yeah, when you were a kid in the band you liked or the music, you met a guy who made a record in, you know, let's say it's 99 and you made a guy who put out a record in 84. You're like, oh, this guy's a dinosaur. But then now you think that's 15 years. That's, yeah, that's nothing. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That's 2010. Yeah. I don't like doing that. Which speaking of you, can you introduce yourself? Yes. Speaking of old dinosaur. Yeah. My name is Nick Thorburn. I make music. I draw and I write other little secret expressions of the self. But the primary one is music. Yeah. I've had many bands over the years and records released. Is that what bought you to the States originally, music site? It was for love. I came for love. I stayed. Lord knows why I stayed. When the love ran dry, I moved west. Yeah. Kind of a familiar tale, I think. Yeah. You go as far west as you can and then and then you remain. Then you remain. Yeah. Right. I'm like wedged against the Pacific Ocean. I got nowhere to go. America kind of does it though. It gets its hawkson. But there's so many amongst the chaos is so many good things here, I think. And so many sounds cheesy, but opportunities and people that are all fucking fascinating and you stay. Yes. For all my misgivings, the questionable history of the country, the people, there are some really special people here that I think have persuaded me to stay, I think. Is that opportunity not feel like it's there in New Zealand or Montreal? It's a good question. I'll let you go for it. Well, I think we have a similar expression in both regions, the tall poppy syndromes, what we call it. Absolutely. Yeah. I think it's called something else. Yeah. No. Same thing. Same. Yeah. Yeah. It's more of a mental. Yeah. I know. I agree. It's this idea that you can't get too big for your bridges or you're sort of getting embedded arrogant. And there's this idea that people will cut you down. And I think it's overegged. Like, I don't think it's anything like it was. Yeah. But it's certainly something you never really feel here. Like, I think America has given me more confidence that I wouldn't have had in New Zealand given my personality because everyone is so like. Yeah. Yeah. It's kind of a bit infectious. People cheer each other on, but it is a very individualized culture in America where you're rewarded for pushing to the limit of what you can do as an individual. I think because it props up this project of, yeah, of individualism, which which really is also shooting. It's very, I think it's detrimental ultimately, but yeah, I think there's a balance to strike. And I think the other thing I think about New Zealand is it's just small. So like doing a podcast, something as simple as this, doing a podcast in New Zealand, it's just hard to find, even though you're out on the fucking internet, it's just hard to find an audience. It's like, it would be the biggest podcast in New Zealand. I'll be insanely so. Yeah. There's a few, there's a few that will, well, there's a few New Zealand podcasts that get huge. But generally, like this would be a, in New Zealand would be like a bigger one. Decent New Zealand audience still. We do, like, I'd say half of our audience is New Zealand. Oh, cool. Because they always call them me out when I say something, um, derogatory, ignorant about my country. So David grew up, uh, Christian homeschooled boy, okay. So I'm a bit out of the loop on some certain things. So you'll be like, we don't have refrigerators or food trucks. Okay. Is he like a dog? No, no, no, yeah. A little bit dog toothy. I love that you know that film. So good. But yeah, occasionally, I'll learn that my surprisingly, my upbringing was not the same as everybody got it. That's funny. That's a funny way to realize. Well, similarly, when I came to New York in '07, I started how I adapted, I think so quickly, is that I was constantly being, it was being highlighted how I was saying words differently. You know, I would talk about my runners instead of my sneakers. I would talk about the expiry date instead of the expiration date. Anytime I said of thing that people, it would flag, people, people would, it would hit their ear funny and they would, um, tease me for it. And I just wanted to fit in and not be teased. So I, I just adapted and I stopped, you know, I stopped saying sorry and I stopped, I stopped saying all of these things that would kind of get a, get a laugh. Yeah. And I know it was a good, natured thing when it would be brought up, but I just, I just want to like fit in and be like, get it. The sorry thing always apologizing is a very kiwi thing as well. And the way, and the accent, the like that, that long vowels way, get it. Yeah. The thing I always find about New Zealand that we do with so worried about saying no to something, we say, yeah, nah. So if if you say, like, do you want to go to dinner tonight, be like, yeah, nah, like Americans will hear the year and go, that's a yes. But we're too worried to give you a no. So we give you a little yeah in front of it. Well, there's a passive aggressiveness to that too, right? And a non-confrontational thing that Canada definitely suffers from collectively. I think this idea of like, like if I stepped on your shoe and you apologized for me stepping on your shoe, that, that feels very Canadian to me. Yeah. So that's kiwi and it's really fucked up. Yeah. It's good to feel see. We should find one. Yeah. Yeah. It's great. It is very similar. I was saying as well before we started rolling Canada was the only like family trip my family's taken when I was like seven. We all, all the farriers went Toronto and Vancouver. Okay. And it was great. Mounties. Wow. You really did the. I would be to the whole country and we never traveled again. That was it. So one family trip. Yeah. But I loved it there. I love Canada. It's a great place. You're like, well, they have because you went right from homeschooling to yeah trips. So you're like, they have buses and oh my god, electricity, electricity, Niagara Falls. That blew my mind. That place. Oh my god. Anyway. Yeah. This isn't a show about Canada. No, it's about America. That's right. In this particular show, you do like to sort of be schooled on something we don't know about and I understand you have a particular passion for a certain type of comic. Yeah. Comics in general or just specifically vintage. Not so much a vintage or a style, but kind of a philosophy. Okay. You know, I think when most people think of comics, they think of obviously superheroes. Yeah. It's me and Superman. Yeah. We've gotten to a point where I think people can also think of like art, Superman and Dan Klaus and like a lot of stuff that's been even been made into movies and kind of crossed over into the mainstream, like Ghost World, the Dan Klaus comic that became a movie and all that. So yeah. So underground comics is kind of the thing that has a very American. It's rooted very much in really like a lot of it in San Francisco in the 60s. Like our crumb and freak brothers and and that sort of stuff. That's kind of where I. Yeah. That was like a big opening. Obviously my entry to two comics was the superhero stuff, but as a kid, you were into comics. Yeah. Big time into comics and an illustrator and a and well, I was drawing as a kid. I wasn't in. Imagine if I was 11 and called myself an illustrator. Routine inspiration. It's Canadian. Yeah. No, I would just draw all the time. I mean, from the beginning, it was way before music, way before anything else. Drawing was just my outlet and it still is. And so once I got into the kind of crevices of comics with crumb and then pulling deeper into kind of more contemporary stuff at the time in the 90s when I was a kid, a lot of the stuff from phantographics, the publishing company that put out some crumb stuff and they put out some Dan Klaus and and Pete Bag with hate and that stuff just started to open up a whole world to me. And yeah, I remember being on a family vacation in Seattle. I was 13 because it was just down the board, you know, on the other side of the border on near Vancouver Island, going to Seattle and like, this is where phantographics are. And I remember I went to a pay phone and I like found their phone number in the back of a comic and I tried to call them and get set up a, I wanted to see their warehouse or something. - Yeah. - No idea. - It was just this fantastical, mystical place. And then, so then, cut to like eight years ago, and I published a book with Phonal Graphics. - Oh my God. - I published this. - Yeah. - And you guys can have it. - So that was a real. - Oh, like this pinch yourself. - Exciting. - Holy shit, moment. - Moment, yeah. - So, yeah, I probably did bring some comics, as like visual aids, but like, you know, this was like, is one from our kid, from the, you know, this, from 75. - And wait, so what, when you were a kid, what was appealing, like, what kind of stories are these telling that it perhaps a bit different to like the Superman's dream? - I mean. - X-Men's and Superman's and Batman's of the world. - It was the weird gory. - So I have a new book, I feel like I'm not doing super promo. - Not super promo, you know, all jazz for it, but. - No, we're allowed to promo ourselves. - Okay, great, right. - It's okay. - So this is my new book that's coming out in June, called "Pair Shape" on Phantographics. And it is very gory. - The man being soared in half by a few other people. - Yeah, he's being soared in half. He's, it's a really, you know, the expression, like, it's all gone, "Pair Shape." So this would maybe suggest that I do like gory, but I actually, gory's not the thing that motivates me. In fact, you know, in addition to the Marvel stuff, when I was like younger, like 12 or whatever, in 11, I really loved Calvin and Hobbs, even like as a young kid, like Archie Comics. So, you know, I think I just want funny. Oh, nice, wow, that's good. - My son is named Calvin. - Oh, wow, okay. - Good to make a fan. - So you get it, yeah. I mean, and he was such a inspiration, I think. I even wrote Bill Waterson a letter when he stopped publishing like a thank you letter. And then I got a form letter back that was like, "Bill Waterson is no longer doing Calvin and Hobbs." So he can't, I was like, I know, I was writing to the reason. I'm writing to thank him for such a nerd. So I think I love, you know, humor is big for me with music. The songs you'll hear, there's like a comedic element, just playful way in, I think, to emotion. So I think for me the thing that hooked me with these kind of comics is the humor, is the playfulness. And it's also like, it's a different way to let you up storytelling and song, but it's a different way to tell stories, isn't it? And like this kind of form, like this interplay of words and imagery. Yeah, so that one actually has no word, penguin, the penguin's the goal was to try to tell these little stories without any text. Which is so challenging as well. Yeah, there was like an exploding penis on one of the pages. And there was this like big story in Australia actually, this big like news story, some woman, she had like a six-year-old kid who loved penguins, was obsessed with penguins. And so she found this book, maybe on Amazon or something, but she ordered it and then sitting with her six-year-old son and the first page she opens to is this like, herpes-infested penis that is exploding into a million pieces. She like, I guess she went to the local, I don't know, the newspaper, the radio station. Did you do? Yeah, and it made the like, it made like national headlines in Australia. That's amazing. I was like interview for some penises. There's some, yeah, those aren't even the ones. I love how they penises in there. Wound is way back to you here. That's incredible. Yeah, I do like the very influential comic that you find. Like I remember being a kid going to the convenience store and there's a comic called Skin Eaters. Whoa. That was about peeling skin off and eating it. And yeah, still remember that cover. Such an intense concept. Yeah, just see as itself into your brain as a kid. Yeah, because you want to be shocked as a kid, don't you? Or you want to be surprised and you're curious. And you want to know where the edges are. You know, you want to know what's off limits, what's dangerous, and you want to go as close to that edge I think as you can and then maybe even a bit further if you're a real freak. I didn't grow up with comics because homeschooled, right? But when I discovered that, the levels work. We don't have those in New Zealand. If you don't have comics in New Zealand, since they got to America, I've discovered them. But I feel like the only ones I've really gotten into, like Grant Morrison stuff, I guess more adults, sort of he does a thing called. You get the filth. He did this amazing comic and some of Alan Moore's stuff, which is I feel like, just like the Big E's. But I do like, I do like how with comics is just, you couldn't tell some of the stories that you tell in graphic novels or comics in any other format. Yeah, like it just wouldn't work and wouldn't work with words, wouldn't work with moving images. And there's something really cool about that. That's what I'm interested in. So I made that book in 2018, Penguins. There's this emphasis on important comics and lesser important in that graphic novels are like, yeah, they've got novel in the title. I mean, it's like, oh, it's serious. Yeah, it's telling a serious people typically autobiographical. It's like, heavy subject matter. And I tried to wrap my head around that as a way to tell a story. And I was sort of blocked for years until I did this, the new one, pear shape. I just decided that's not who I am. I'm just one, I want to do a comic that's just a pure comic. And it could only be in this medium. It's not a, it couldn't be adapt into a film ever. It's not a graphic novel. It's a comic book. And I think those distinctions are important, you know. There's a place for graphic novels. I love them, but I love the media, like what you're saying, where this thing could only be this thing. Yeah, it's not a failed screenplay that I tried to, that I was like, I guess I'll turn this into a comic. No, exactly. It's very specific and very clear what it can be. Yeah, you talk through the distinctions between graphic novel and comic? Personally, like a graphic novel, you know, good example. There's a really good one from Canada called Ducks by Kate Beaton. And it tells the author's story about being on the oil fields in Alberta. And just the destitution, just it's just a, you know, late capitalism, just like, just extracting resources from the world at like without any care consideration. And then you've got these, so these shitty conditions, and then you've got these people that are just kind of at the edge of society and how they behave, and they behave kind of poorly in her case. She was assaulted, and so it sort of tells her story. It's a very harrowing, very serious story, very beautifully told, and you know, an essential book. And like, there's so many like that that are so good. And it's big, and you know, it's like it's 300 pages or whatever. And you feel like you're reading a novel in graphic form. And then so then a comic, you know, to me, like one of my favorite comics is Nancy, Ernie Bushmiller. It was a comic strip in the newspaper, started out as another character, and that she was, Nancy was just the, the niece of this main character in like the 30s, or the 40s. And then it just went until his death, and then it even carried on after that. But it's just a gag, you know, it's a gag comic. There's no like greater goal. I mean, sometimes there is with Calvin and Hobbes, I think there was like, he was touching on some like deeper ideas and stuff. But generally like more entertainment felt like. Yeah, and not in a disparaging way. Just simpler. It's not trying to say too much, or it's contained a little bit more. It's contained. And maybe it's a little more hidden. It's meaning is maybe a little more hidden. I think in New Zealand, like growing up in the paper, we had, was Gaffeild and it was Calvin and Hobbes. We had those like little tiny elements of those. And fucking Dilbert, who is that guy, and is that just being a fucking knobby? Dilbert took over. I remember when Calvin and Hobbes ended, because Dilbert was the replacement. That was her. And the guy that made Dilbert, I think, was a complete belly end. Just like a totally great, no great guy. Great, like I love his politics. Yeah, I was shocked when I found out I'm very late, found out about his politics. So it was just such a, oh my god, that's Dilbert. So I like Dilbert, my poster is down. Yeah, to tell you my Dilbert voices down. So I was always a Dilbert hater, because in my, this was like 95 when Calvin and Hobbes ended, and Dilbert took over. So I was like 13, and I felt like Dilbert was personally responsible. I'll feel like killing it. I didn't literally feel that, but this was the thing that I always looked forward to that time. And then when I got to like take the funny pages, and it was like, what the fuck is this? And it was just, so I always had an axe to grind with that guy. So I felt vindicating when he came out, it came out that he was like, being a pretty bad person. That's so real path. Like, yeah, we'll go. You mentioned penguins. Yes, you, and I might be wrong this, but I feel like your music and comics and everything. You like the ocean, right? You like little ocean creatures. Yes. Is that fair? Yes, I think it's just embedded in the, in my DNA a little bit. And I might read this somewhere, it might be right, it might be wrong. And I'll get to my point of why I'm raising this. But when you were a kid, you maybe there was like a famous whale in Canada or something. Yeah. Can you just talk through that a little bit? It was like a meaningful view. And I also know this whale met a bad end end as well. The whale did, unfortunately. So my dad was a fisheries officer, which is a title that doesn't exist outside of Canada, I think. we have it in New Zealand. You do. We have fisheries. So again, we should start our spin off. We care about the commonwealth. We mean to. Well, then saying that in New Zealand, we don't really, because we still have bottom trolling, which is crazy. But we're meant to care about the ocean, and how many fisheries we're getting out. This is the passive-aggressive thing. You just pretend to care. Whilst ruining everything. Avoid the sticky conversations. Well, so the whale, it's quite as tale. It's a long story, but this whale did show up in this little inlet where my dad worked. And he had to deal with it. It was like, there's a killer whale just showed up here. It's like bumping into the boats. It's like, it's being a nuisance. Well, so it wasn't stranded. It was just hanging out. They didn't know. It just had showed up. It showed up in this in this little tiny village on the coast of Vancouver Island. Nobody knew where it came from. Quickly, they discovered it had gotten lost. It was a calf or a baby whale. The story was that its uncle had taken. I don't know why that's funny. It feels weird that they have uncles and aunts, but you know, these whales are just like relationally, uncle. Right. Yeah. It's like when you say you have an uncle's dad's friend. It's exactly like his buddy. Yeah. He doesn't have a real uncle. But so his uncle took him fishing. So they left the pod and then the theory is that the uncle met his, like, end somehow on this little excursion. And the whale got stranded, lost and was like, ended up in this little bay. Didn't know how to get home. And then was, you know, they're very personal, personable creatures and social animals. And so it started to interact with humans. And obviously there's a novelty factor of like, oh, this whale, we can feed it and it'll hang around. It'll keep coming back. And so my dad had to be this in-between between the animal and people and keep it separated. But there was also the first nation's band in the area was like, that is the spirit of our chief. Chief McQuinnah, who had died very recently and said, I'm going to come back as an animal. Oh, holy shit. And I think he even said a whale. And so there was then you have the government who's, you know, historically the bad guy in these stories. My dad is working for the government. And so he's really between a rock and a hard place here where he's truly one of the like purest souls there is was trying to do the right thing by the First Nations community here, by the whale that needed to be reunited with its family. And also keep all of these lucky lose that were coming in to as tourists to like drop their baby in the mouth of the whale and like feed it cereal. And his new spreads probably more and more people coming for this like tourist attraction. Yeah, it became a bit of a circus. So I got to go out there with my dad while he worked and see the whale and how old were you then? I was a teenager that like so I was I was a bit older. But it like, you know, it went on for, it went on. I think the whale, they at some point they just sort of threw up their hands and said, okay, the whale, this is just where the whale lives now. Because the difficulty finding a way to get the whale reunited with its pod because these are like whales that, um, they travel so far. The resident, but they, they do do a huge journey along the coast. So you had to like time this reunification. Yeah, it just didn't work. And it's a very sad story and very complicated. Stay tuned for more Flightless Bird. We'll be right back after a word from our sponsors. Support for Flightless Bird comes from Wilder Laskin. Now we've talked about this on the show before, but we're not big fans. We're not experts at buying fish in the supermarket. Buying fish is hard, especially I grew up in the Midwest. You don't have access to a lot of good fish in the Midwest. So it was never something I was taught as a kid at the grocery store. Didn't see my my mom didn't eat fish. Same thing for me growing up. Yeah. And fish is one thing that you want to get good fish. Right. And as I got older and started appreciating food more, I do like fish a lot, but I still have no idea how to buy fish at a grocery store. And that is where Wilder Laskin company comes in. It's the best way to get wild caught, perfectly portioned, nutrient-dense seafood delivered directly to your door. And trust me, you haven't tasted fish this good. Yeah, you just got a big box of Wilder Laskin. I saw it when I dropped you off after the magic castle. It's the best. I ordered a whole lot of different like portions and sizes, and it's so, so good. And you've been cooking it on the top. I just did some salmon in my air fryer. Air fryer is very novel to me. We don't really have that in New Zealand. So air fraying the salmon. It's so good. Wilder Laskin fish. There are 100% wild caught never farmed, which means there's no antibiotics, no GMOs or additives. Just clean real fish that support healthy oceans and fishing communities. It's also sustainably sourced. Wild caught from Alaska, every order supports sustainable harvesting practices and your membership delivers flexible shipments, expert tips, and truly feel good seafood. And if you're not completely satisfied with your first box, Wilder Laskin company will give you a full refund. No questions asked, no risk, just high quality seafood. Not all fish are the same. Get seafood you can trust. Go to wilderlaskin.com/bird for $35 off your first box of premium Wild caught seafood. That's wilderlaskin.com/bird for $35 off your first order. Thanks to Wilder Laskin company for sponsoring this episode. The reason I bought it up as well is because in New Zealand we had a dolphin opo. In the words like Kid's Booker and about an opo, the friendly dolphin. And it was a dolphin that just turned up and everything you've just said clocks the same as opo. It was like people having to figure out, scientists having to figure out what we can do to get this dolphin back with its pod. Can't do that, how you stop people because humans just want a fucking pat. They'll pat a fish like they want to pat a cat, you know, not that a dolphin's a fish, but it's like people want to touch and that's not great, right? So just dealing with all of that. And then ended up just being okay, opo lives here now. It's always going to be here. And opo ended up dying from, I think, so too much like touching or there was a theory at one point that someone was fishing with like dynamite and let off an explosion. And opo was too close and got fucked up with that. Jesus. Fishing with dynamite. That sounds like a terrible thing. That's not a common thing in New Zealand. But that's one of the theories on how and all the fish just float to the surface. But that was like, and that was national news. The day opo died. And just knowing what I knew about you and that whale, I'd sort of thought of that as well, because the whale ended up died died. Yes, it was hit by the rudder of a boat. It just got chopped up into like a million pieces. No, I think one, but it was just a fatal head blow to the head. And my dad had a theory that the whale wasn't happy. I want to make it clear that like the first nations that Mucila, I think I'm pronouncing that wrong, but the community there, my dad was working with them and they had reasons to be suspicious of the government because certain section of the DFO, the Department of Fisheries, I think there was some and I don't want to be getting the facts wrong here, but there was the Vancouver Aquarium where certain whales were being sent to live in captivity. And I think there was a fear that if we can't reunite this whale with its pod, we're going to put them in the aquarium. It would be taken and put in a tank. I think there was suspicion whether how hard they would try. And so my dad was in a really difficult situation, but we handled it really well and respectfully. And it just at the end, it was just kind of an unfortunate situation and it was an accident. But I think it's just the consequences of having a ton of people around a creature like that. And it was that did that kind of lead a bit to your love of ocean-related things? Was that part of that journey? So the first island's record, there is a song titled "Sukey," that's the name of the whale. The local first nations gave the animal, but the it was known as Luna in the press or whatever. So that first island's record uses more of setting than a theme, I guess, with the ocean. And it kind of tied into that because the whale was still alive when we made that record. Yeah, right. And then imagery is occasionally popping up in your comics as well with penguins. I guess so penguins to me is if I don't even think of them as aquatic, I think of them as just a sad, I think the fun way in for that was it's just a bird that can't fly. I mean, it just feels like a curse, you know, it feels like a cruel creature. Cruel nature. Yeah, that's it. It's so sad. Oh, weird. Yeah, that's good that I brought. Really the title of the show. Okay, credits. We're out. No, it is. It's sad that these birds can't fly. It is something a bit like God, I wish you guys could fly. It's the one thing. Yeah, don't have it. Another thing we like to do in this show is I want to be educated about sort of American drinks and snacks. I understand you're bought in something. I brought it very important to you. Well, it's very, it is important to me, but it is very much, it's very niche. These are homemade. I don't know if that freaks you guys out. It does. Okay. There's a level of trust here. And they're in like these little drug bags. So this is just popcorn. Popcorn. I know this. We have this in New Zealand. But it's what I brought my own seat, just seeing I'm not poisoning you. A smaller bag. Ooh. It's different. But. Okay. This is my proprietary blend. It's the seasoning that we love popcorn. I do love it. I have a text chain with people about popcorn. You do? Okay. Yeah. Rob will sometimes go to a cinema by like good cinema popcorn to take home. I've seen people watching stuff. Yeah. Rob is one of those. I've seen people go to those fields through just to buy the popcorn. They do good popcorn. They do. Yeah. So what I do is I bring my little tincture with my secret blend. And then I go to a movie theater and now you obviously can't give away the ingredients. But what is the vibe of this? I would say umami is the leading kind of profile. And then you've got a little bit of a tang and tart and just a dash of sweet. How long have you been manufacturing this fool for a friend's family, yourself? I keep it personal. It's I haven't like franchised it yet, but I guess it's been about 10 years. Yes. This is great. I'll have X, you know, X's come up to me to like I don't miss you at all, but I miss that popcorn. Go ahead. And he begs. The popcorn. How are you? Are you making popcorn? Microwave popcorn? What's your process for making popcorn? I use kernels on the stove, but I do like to just go to the movies, order a popcorn, ask for no butter, and then add my own. Oh yeah, because there is, you know, they're just carrying this around in your pocket and just sort of shake it in. I have a little tincture. That's great. With a little dropper. Yeah. Because there's some liquid to it. There's there's some liquid and then there's nutritionally used as is the like dry component that's in there. This is great. Oh, and there's toad venom. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Just in about 35 minutes, you guys are going to get it. This podcast is going to get. It's going to get weird. And you've got a beverage to wash this down with. I do have a beverage for you. Sorry. I only have one. Sorry. We'll share. You're bored. Those are hard to come by. It's been drift. Yeah. The specific flavor. This is passion fruit, orange, guava, none alcoholic. I didn't think you'd get an alcoholic, it's been drifted. For a while, you could. It was a period period where they had spiked spin drifts. I remember seeing them at Albertsons, but they just stopped. This is an island punch. I didn't even, you know, I'm not doing these things consciously. The flightless bird penguins, the island thing, coming to get in this cleaning. What is it about spin drift that you enjoy? Well, look, I don't want to say you have to bleep all this out until they agreed to send me a shit ton of spin drifts because I'm not giving free publicity, but it's just really good. I don't know how they do it. I mean, I do know how they do it because I've infused my own fruit and soda water. Oh, really? Yeah. So you're infusing everything in your life. I don't feel like I'm except these little potions that you're shifting and do everything. I go crazy for guava. I discovered guava like last year at a farmer's market and it just made me, it opened a portal in my brain. This is great. It's crazy. This is a great flavor. Yeah. A little sip. Yeah. It's crazy how good that is. Now, the other main brand, I feel like certainly in Los Angeles, what's the other main Fizzy One? They ever on his? La Croix. La Croix. La Croix was the one, the writer's room from like 2015 or something. Is there a distinction between the two between the spin-dress and that? Yeah, those are that's Fago without, I'll probably get sued for this. Oh, wow. Allegedly. Yeah. It's Fago without the sugar. I've never heard that before. It's very funny. It's bottled in the same facility in Michigan or it was. That is great. Allegedly. Intel. So those are like essences of varying, it's very, like what is it? It's in this. We don't really know that it's, you know, it's kind of like my popcorn is proprietary. But the, spender, it just tells you like in this, I don't want to be given as fuckers free averages. I do this sometimes. I just be talking about something enthusiastically in this. I'm doing it ahead. Yeah. I don't. And they're not giving me anything for it, which doesn't rage me. I guess I can send them this episode. And then they'll reach out, offer to the ad, but you've already done it. Like in Vizeline, they, you got an offer to do in Vizeline, and he's like, I already started fucking in Vizeline as a 43 year old. It's just like squeezed fruit in there. And that's kind of, I mean, it goes well with the popcorn as well. I have to say, this is a great, this is a great combo. Okay. We're just watching a movie right now. It'd be perfect. We just put it TV right here. We put it TV right here, put Nirvana, the band on and just, or dog tooth, or dog tooth. Does there anything you really miss about Canada when you're here? Because when I think New Zealand, just like New Zealand makes a really good coffee, we have some really good oceans, and so it's really beautiful jumping in the ocean there. What is it about Canada? The only, oh man, I wish I had a bit of this around. Canada's got a lot of problems, but I do think in general, we talked about the bad side of that, like, sort of non-confrontational, sometimes passive-aggressive way that Canadians and maybe New Zealanders can express their feelings. I do sort of miss this slightly more gentle way of existing, but I'm not a patriot, I don't have any national sense of identity. I have my own experience, and my own experience is particular to Vancouver Island, which is by the ocean, and I do feel very drawn to that particular climate, I guess, and you know, I guess I miss, I guess there's just a certain temperament that I sometimes miss, although sometimes I go back and it just drives me nuts because it's time to go. It's time to go. So I do feel kind of like a man on an island, I guess. I feel like a man without a home sometimes, like I don't really belong anywhere. I get it. What does it say? Harm is where the hat is, isn't it? That's what they say. I think the evident Airbnb I had that was on and it's a needlework, eat prey. What is it, eat? Live laugh. Live laugh. You're going to play some songs. Yeah. Before you do. I think you're going to tell us about one of them. Three songs. You've got three songs. I got three in the chamber. The one I can talk about, the first one I'll do is called Ready to Die, and it's one of the first songs I ever wrote from my first band that I had with two other fellows called The Unicorns, and that record came out in 2003. We were in high school. My friend Alden and I started this band and we took it as far as it could go, but it really it burned kind of bright and we had one record and then we just, that's all we could kind of do, but it has this sort of, it kind of works for the band. I mean, it's called The Unicorns, and it's this mythical thing like did it ever exist and you know, it's kind of maybe extinct and who knows, but so it's sort of a fitting thing. And death was a big or some ridiculous reason, death was kind of the concept we were going with on this album. It's a big one. Like school motif. Yeah. I guess we're a little bit, yeah, moody and that sort of thing. So the album opens with a song called I Don't Want to Die, and it ends with a song called Ready to Die, and so it kind of ties in and that band broke up and I started with the drummer Jamie. We started a band called, we started islands and the first song that is called Swans, but in brackets, life after death. So sort of this big notorious B.I.G. thing of like the life after the thing. And then yeah, on an island in the sea, this weird sort of subconscious thing where I was almost like foretelling my future. But yeah, it's just one of the first songs I wrote and so I thought it was, it's kind of nice to go all the way back sometimes. Before the music, what are you doing now? So I have a new record with my friend, Mike Stroud, who had a band called Rat Attack previously. And we've been working on this record for a little while and it's finally coming out. So it's very exciting and it's called The Cream. We have two songs out and Taste of Cherry and Goodbye. The album is available for pre-order and it's kind of a blend of Rat Attack and Islands, but kind of kinksy, ELO, Beetlesy sort of thing I guess, overrated, but no, just kidding. But 60s sort of thing, we want to go even further back in time. But it's a fun, it's a really fun record. So I'm really, really excited about that. That's coming out June 5th. and then 11 days out. June 16th, my comic pear shape on fanographics is coming out. So cherry and pear, you get all your fruit. I do love that you are releasing on this favorite label that you had as a kid. That's pretty special. It feels really special. They finally took your call from the phone box. Did you get to go to the warehouse? I went to the warehouse years later to when this, when penguins came out and they let me grab a bunch of stuff, which was exciting. Just running around on the shelves. Yeah, and I still all the time order, like I'll always, if I go to a great secret headquarters really nearby, I always go there, comic book store and pick up comics and we'll always find good stuff on fanographics. So I'm like still a fan. It feels like two versions of myself. It's a very kind of surreal thing. It's like, oh, I'm actually, I actually in the club here, but I feel like still like just such an outsider who just loves the work that they do. So yeah, it's a huge privilege and honor to be in the in the fold. Awesome. Yeah. What can I? Thank you. Thank you guys so much for having me. That was really sweet. It's amazing to be able to do this because you can just listen to you play music. It's like, great. I'm going to eat popcorn. Right, you have something to snack on when I play. All right, this song is called David Geffin's Jackson Pollock from the last island's album. What occurs? I found David, Geffin's Jackson Pollock. We fell off the truck near the beach. At least that's where I got it. Try to move it. For record, 200 million dollars. But these jackals, these vampires, they offered me something much smaller. There's a notice. Information lead into the return of this abstract impressionist work. Whatever you call it, it was David Geffin's Jackson Pollock. So when I showed up lifted my coat up to reveal the painting. I was excitedly rolled up. I'm afraid that this might happen. Took out my box cutter. Their face is slacking. It's pushed against the canvas. I'm now down as I climbed back in what might have been. The world's slowest getaway. But I still had David Geffin's Jackson Pollock. I still had David Geffin's Jackson Pollock. Okay, this song is called Ready to Die of the Unicorns album from 2003. I woke up thirsty on an island in the sea. I woke up hungry with hungry cookers surrounding me. I hit the soft spot in the soft spot in my head. It made me tired, so I sung from my bed. I'm ready to die. I'm ready to die. I'm ready to die. A sword of switchblade, anyway, you cut it. I'm not afraid. I know I'm gonna get it. Old maker of such fine products as palm trees and the dead sea. Don't pardon me. There's nothing rude. Things conclude. Things conclude. As I slurred that chorus, the ghost got biggie small sounds like a drill. The death sweat suits me. The death the threat provides a thrill. I've seen the world, kissed all the pretty girls and I said my goodbyes. And now I'm ready to die. Look what they've done to my song. Well, it's the only thing that I could do. I'll fight and it's turning out all wrong. Look what they've done to my brain, Mark. Look what they've done to my brain. Well, they picked it like a chicken bone and I think I'm half insane, Mark. Wish I could find a good book to live in. Wish I could find a good book. Oh, well, if I could find a real good book, I'd never have to go out and look at what they've done to my song. Maybe it'll only be all right, Mark. Maybe it'll only be okay. Well, if the people are buying tears here, ♪ I'll be rich someday in my heart ♪ ♪ Look what they've done to my son ♪ ♪ Look what they've done to my son in my heart ♪ ♪ Look what they've done to my son ♪ ♪ Where they tied it up in a plastic bag ♪ ♪ Turned it upside down all ♪ ♪ Look what they've done to my son ♪