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Ep. #226: Scharpling & Wurster

Scharpling & Wurster is a beloved and very funny comedy duo consisting of Tom Scharpling and Jon Wurster. While they mainly work together on The Best Show radio program and podcast, which airs every Tuesday from 9 pm to midnight ET at thebestshow.net, they’ve been making rare live appearances around North America since the Numero Group released The Best of the Best Show 16 CD box set this past spring. They’re closing out 2015 with three shows at the Mod Club in Toronto on November 28, The Sinclair in Cambridge, Massachusetts on November 29, and Union Transfer in Philadelphia on December 13.  Here, Tom and Jon and I discuss their busy 2015 and doing these live shows, comedy frontman versus drumming in a band, doing Late Night with Seth Meyers and condensing comedy for their appearance on the show, going out a different way, how the Scharpling & Wurster live show works in each city they perform in, whether the stage show is as interactive as The Best Show, what the live show brings out in Tom and Jon, Tom’s confidence, Jon’s physicality, local references, Tom’s history with Toronto and the city’s Best Show fans, their love of SCTV, when Jon met Tom, Tom’s history with Superchunk and Mac McCaughan, how Jon and Tom began working together, “Rock, Rot, and Rule,” the Newbridge infomercial, getting into more TV stuff together, what the Best Show box set meant for the trajectory of the duo, how the new Best Show feels, the future, the phone call “OnStar,” and then we hung up our Skypes.     

Related links: scharplingandwurster.com thebestshow.net vishkhanna.com

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Ep. #225: Tony Levin of King Crimson

Tony Levin is an accomplished musician who originally hails from Massachusetts. A noted bassist and master of a polyphonic chordal guitar called the Chapman Stick, Levin has appeared on over 500 albums by people like John Lennon, Alice Cooper, Paul Simon, Peter Gabriel, Pink Floyd, Sarah McLachlan, and Lou Reed among others. In recent years, he became a full-fledged member of the pioneering progressive rock band King Crimson, whose current tour includes a three-night stand at the Queen Elizabeth Theatre in Toronto on November 19, 20, and 21. Here, Tony and I discuss the strangeness of being off the road and at home, upstate New York, Big Pink, joining King Crimson in 1981 and staying in the same line-up for some years, being the fifth man in a four-man group, when the band broke up in 1986 and re-formed in 2008, meeting Robert Fripp during the 1976 sessions for Peter Gabriel’s first solo album, working with Robert as a band leader, the drumming of Bill Rieflin, Pat Mastelotto, and Gavin Harrison, musical direction and creative freedom, good and bad bass ideas, Robert’s trust, the meaning and connotation behind “progressive” or “prog rock,” why such bands seem to call upon Tony for sessions, Lawrence Gowan, punk and prog rock, playing bass on John Lennon’s final album Double Fantasy and what he and those sessions were like, revered musicians are normal people, not navel-gazing or admiring past accomplishments, musicians who predict the future of their own work, King Crimson’s touring and recording plans, playing new material live, “Radical Action” and “Meltdown,” plans an improvisation, touring the strange animal that is Canada, the song “21st Century Schizoid Man,” and that was it.

Related links: papabear.com dgmlive.com vishkhanna.com

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Ep. #224: Ian MacKaye & Steve Albini (Part II)

Ian MacKaye is known for being in bands like Minor Threat, Embrace, Fugazi, and the Evens and he co-founded the Washington D.C. based label, Dischord Records. Steve Albini has sung and played guitar in bands like Big Black and Shellac of North America and he owns and operates the renowned recording facility, Electrical Audio, in Chicago, Illinois. In this second of a two-part moderated conversation between Ian and Steve, we discuss the Independent Rock Music Label Festivals organized by Heather Whinna in Chicago that featured Fugazi, Shellac, the Make-Up, Blonde Redhead, and the Ex, Jay Ryan, the Rainbow Roller Rink and the Congress Theatre, confidence versus leadership, Ian on Steve’s interviews, how disempowered people feel, Ian doesn’t talk shit about people like Marc Ribot, exemplars, why Steve might call someone out on a position or argument, critiquing your own community, relating to “political correctness” today, the Reagan Revolution and ‘to care is selfish,’ being decent toward other people, biases and presumptions, the Fugazi song “And the Same,” which includes the lyric, “Yes, I know this is politically correct…,” derailing progression, charity was selfish and greed was good, growing up in D.C. without encountering many Republicans, Democrats can’t go radically left, why musicians play music, being attacked by others, Sylvester Stallone, the Urban Outfitters/Minor Threat thing and aquarium warfare, online pile-ons and Henry Rollins and Robin Williams, Steve defends Henry, internet distractions, making sense of the age of outrage, access and speed, super communication and one-way communication and real-life communication, anonymity, the Butthole Surfers, metrics, I can’t even, Steve belongs on twitter, the way Ian demonstrated how to be a decent, thinking person, the punk rock lawyer, creeping professionalism, custodial and active responsibilities, Dischord Records and Electrical Audio, the music scene in Chicago, it’s nice to be right, work and love, people don’t own their own time, the big payback, “The People’s Microphone,” and that was that phone call.

Related links: dischord.com electricalaudio.com vishkhanna.com

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