#693 - Should Artists On Nostalgia Tours Play New Music? & RIP to an All-Time Great

0:12 Hey, welcome to another episode.

0:14 We're going to talk about these nostalgia tours that are happening. We're also going to talk about John Anderson passing away. I recently had Billy Corgan from Smashing Pumpkins in studio, and that interview will air in a couple weeks, but it was really cool for me because I was a Smashing Pumpkins fan growing up, and just to hear him talk about how they're blowing up again. So the interview comes up, but we're going to spend time first talking about all these tours that are going out. So My Chemical Romance, they're doing their 20th anniversary tour.

0:43 Wow, 20 years. I missed them by a little bit. I did too.

0:46 I was a little old for My Chemical Romance. When that Their big song, The Black Parade, came on. We worked at a music video place. I used to see all the music videos before we'd air them. I remember that one was pretty epic. That was kind of a.

1:01 By the way, I was in my 20s when this happened. I know that.

1:03 I wasn't 50, but I felt like My Chemical Romance was for sad 14-year-olds when I was in my 20s.

1:10 Right, you're already older than that. I do like the Welcome to the Black Parade song, but that was never my thing. You continue. I just don't want people to think I was... 80 when it came out. I'm with you.

1:19 All I remember was just kind of that theatrical music video that they had. It seemed like a movie at the time. And it was really cool, and I liked that song, but I don't really know much about them. Mike, you were a fan, huh? Yeah, I was a sad 14-year-old.

1:31 I loved them.

1:32 I went to go see them. It was My Chemical Romance and Alkaline Trio. Nothing but sad kids.

1:37 It was awesome.

1:38 As a kid, or did you go to the recent tour? I waited as a kid, probably in 2005. So they're doing a 20th anniversary show. Jimmy World is doing a 25th. Anniversary tour that celebrates the middle and sweetness, which is a really cool song.

1:51 Yeah.

1:52 You know sweetness? I can't sing it.

1:54 If you just stand there. If you listen.

1:59 Yeah, yeah, yeah. Everybody knows the middle.

2:00 Yes.

2:01 It just takes some time. So, they are doing a tour.

2:05 The Backstreet Boys are making a ton of money because of the Sphere residency.

2:09 That's crazy.

2:10 Like, I think, I don't know that their money dried up, but I gotta imagine that it was getting pretty dry because boy bands... were super cool. Then they were the antithesis of cool. And then whenever nostalgia hits, it doesn't matter. There's no such thing as cool. It's just, does it remind you of a time when you were happier? It takes you back to that time. And so they have made so much money on that sphere residency.

2:35 So something about the sphere, I was watching an interview with, I think it was, yeah, a member of Pearl Jam. And he was asked, will they do a sphere residency?

2:46 Pearl Jam.

2:47 And he said probably not because it costs so much to play shows at the Sphere.

2:52 So if you can do four, I think the number's four or five shows, it pays for itself. And then anything after that is where you really make your money. So John Mayer launched when he announced his Sphere shows. I think he announced three or four shows. And then they judge based on the sales of those if they're going to do more. So you make a lot of money if you can do five to 12 or 20 or whatever you can do. If you think you can only do three or four, if you can only do one, don't do this year. Yeah, you're going to lose money.

3:21 Yeah.

3:21 If you can do more than whatever that number is, that fixed number, you can then make your money back, their money back, and then start to profit.

3:30 Yeah. So maybe Pearl Jam doesn't think they'll sell more than four shows. Maybe not. It is expensive to do a few shows.

3:35 We were talking to Zach Brown about that too, and he's like, yeah, it's very expensive, but you have to do more shows. Because once you're already in, you're loaded in, you have to do all your own graphics. Yeah, but once that's done.

3:45 Yeah.

3:46 You got to break even to what you're saying is four shows and then the rest is taken home. What I hear is Pearl Jam, they're not confident.

3:53 Confident. Yeah, they're not confident.

3:54 Well, what he said was that they're just very cheap. You know, not so much confidence, just like we're a cheap band. We want low expense. It just doesn't seem like that's their fit.

4:05 The Chicks, Taking the Long Way, 20th anniversary tour. That's awesome.

4:09 The album in full. What's the Taking the Long Way album though? Is that the one where they were like, We're not ready to make nice.

4:17 Oh, possibly. Cause it doesn't sound familiar. The ones that I know obviously are like wide open spaces.

4:24 Yeah. So yeah. Not ready to make nice. Okay. The long way around Lubbock or leave it. That's a funny title.

4:31 Let me tell you though, man, when, when the chicks come on and my wife is in the room, she lights up, like she starts like, Oh my gosh, I haven't heard this long and so long. It's, you know, and, and that's to me, that's so worth it. Like wide open spaces fly.

4:44 Yeah. Those were home. Those are the three I think I know. Taking the Long Way had to be after that. Is that what I said? Taking the Long Way? Yeah. But I don't want to go if they're playing a whole album. I don't know. Yeah, they can't do that.

4:59 We're going to play an entire album from our fourth.

5:02 Most popular album. That's not nostalgic.

5:06 Next up is Everclear. The Lucky 7 tour is running this fall. So how does he, is his voice? You know, he's sick too.

5:13 I know.

5:14 That's kind of why I'm saying that. Like his voice is, it's rough. It's scratchy, you know, because he is sick. Does he have, what does he have?

5:23 Does he have? What were you going to guess he has? Lime. Oh, that's interesting. He has multiple sclerosis. Multiple sclerosis.

5:29 Okay. Yeah.

5:31 Because you bought me a cameo of his. which is so awesome. He's like, Hey, Hey Eddie.

5:37 And when you buy a cameo, usually the artists like does something fun or gives you like a tidbit about their day. And his thing was like, Hey Eddie, Hey, we're on the road all summer, man. If you want to come out, it was basically a one man commercial.

5:49 He was promoting this tour you're talking about. He's like, yeah, you should come out and the lucky seven tour.

5:54 We'd love to have you out, man. I did see Ben folds five. They're playing for the first time together in around 15 years. They're doing a tour. Obviously the smashing pumpkins are doing the tour. The nostalgia tours are fun.

6:05 Ben Folds 5. Is that something you would be interested in going? Oh, yeah, for sure.

6:08 I've never seen a Ben Folds 5 concert. I've seen Ben Folds. So when we went together, that was just Ben?

6:13 It was Ben Folds. Didn't realize that. But I've never seen Ben Folds 5, which there are how many members of Ben Folds 5?

6:18 Five.

6:19 Three. Son of a... That's a trick question. Well, they were just being funny with the band name.

6:24 I know.

6:25 Have you ever met him? Yeah.

6:27 My best Ben Folds story is I've been a massive Ben Folds fan forever.

6:32 And.

6:33 we were living in Austin and he was, he had this song with Regina Spector that they were trying to make go pop. And it was a, you don't know me, you don't know me at all, that song. And so he was doing a little tour and he was coming by. They knew I was a fan and they said, if you just get a piano, he'll play that song and play another song, whatever you want. And I was like, this is cool because a lot of times they won't play, especially if it's in the morning. And so we get a big piano, we go out to the music room, kind of the lobby that we turn into a kind of a stage and, And he shows up and he's a little sick.

7:05 He's got a cold. And I'm like, oh man, if he has a cold, I'm not even going to ask him to sing. And he's like, hey, do you have a tea? And so we got him a tea and he's drinking it.

7:17 He says, I know that I had said I was going to play a couple of songs and I'm waiting for him to go, but I'm not going to. And he goes, instead of playing a couple full songs, what if you just called out songs and I just played a verse and a chorus of different songs?

7:29 I was like, oh, this is even better. Yeah, way better.

7:31 Like I'm a massive fan, so I get to hear like nine or 10 songs. And so that's what he did. And I think he just did that because he didn't want to put too much consistent pressure doing like a big ballad, having to do the whole song. And so- They, he did by himself on a piano. He, I, we started early and I was like army. And he goes, well, I thought about the army.

7:52 That's it. So he starts doing that. That's so cool. We got all, it was really brick. Uh, he did a part of brick. Yeah. That's amazing. White t-shirt. Did you do that one? Uh, I don't think I remember. I love that one. That's a good one. I don't know what he did, but we did seven or eight. That's cool. Yeah. I thought you were going to say, he was like, man, I'll play, but you sing. Oh, that'd be terrible.

8:14 You take it, Bobby. My one experience is really good with Ben Folds.

8:17 That's cool.

8:18 He did invite me to come out a few months ago to his place in North Carolina and do an interview.

8:24 We couldn't schedule it right. Dude, that would have been amazing. Yeah, it would have been. We couldn't get the time right. He was either on the road or I was on the road. That's amazing. He's a top five artist for me. Ben Folds is.

8:39 With all these tours that are happening, these nostalgia tours, Do we miss the music or do we miss being young?

8:45 That's a really, really good question. Thank you. That's why I asked it.

8:50 And I think because I've thought about this. I've thought about this when I look at my playlists, you know, on my streaming. And there's a lot of 90s. And I think that we miss being young. Sure, the music was great. But the music was great because that was the time where we really didn't.

9:09 It's just life was. Easy, man. I think life was.

9:13 We had big dreams that we hadn't had crushed yet.

9:17 That's good. Life wasn't easy. Well... Because we were awkward kids or young adults.

9:23 So I don't think life was easy, but I think we hadn't been told yet what we couldn't do. And that was in the real, like, formative, exploratory years.

9:33 Of our life.

9:34 Yeah, you're right. Because it was very... I can do anything I want. Like, the future is wide open.

9:39 And....

9:41 I listen to those songs now and it takes me back to those times. I think that's the purpose of nostalgia.

9:47 Yeah.

9:48 And that's why people enjoy it so much because it was at a time whenever all the harsh realities of growing older didn't kick you right in the nuts. Yeah.

10:00 That's so true if you heard the music for the first time today I think about this too would you actually like the music and I think with Ben Folds if I use him as an example or John Mayer who is still making current music like I think I would still like that music today if it came out I don't know because I was a massive grunge fan too I don't know that I would like all that the same.

10:21 Because that was a part of culture. I could go back to, I.

10:26 Don't know that I would have loved Nirvana if they came out today the same way I did then.

10:31 It was so different then.

10:33 And if it just existed today in a vacuum against everything else, I'd be like, oh, that's an interesting indie rock band.

10:39 But because of how they flipped what pop was and what rock was, because it was all hair and glam and Then Nirvana changed it to whatever the Seattle thing was, and then people were faking that too a bit.

10:51 It was very cool to be part of music changing. And it still changes today. It changes all the time. But to be part of that for those bands, that's why I think we liked those bands.

11:05 Well, we don't have the capacity now to be a part of that now because we have kids and jobs. And then it was a big part of our life where we would study and we'd memorize lyrics in a CD case because we actually had the time.

11:16 We would go to school, maybe have a job, but what else do you have to worry about?

11:20 Right.

11:21 But see, my son listens to someone named Tamed Impala.

11:25 No. The Naked Impala. Go ahead. The Tamed Impala? Go ahead.

11:33 And I listen to that, and I'm like, dude, he sounds so different than anything else I've heard you listen to.

11:40 I like it. Try again. The Impala That's Tamed. No D on it. Oh, Tame Impala.

11:48 Yes.

11:49 Looks like Jesus. And it's one dude. Yeah. Yeah.

11:52 And so I think I would be a Tame Impala fan if he came out in 93 when we were growing up and being like, this is so different.

12:00 It's cool. And that's where my son is today. I love it. It's so different.

12:03 I don't know that I would have, when I was 14 or 15, liked the kind of folk-y stuff that I like now, though.

12:10 Oh, that's interesting.

12:10 Because I don't think that's the case with me. But that too was different. The folk stuff was like, yeah, 60s folk and all that. But the way, say, Mumford and Son. I wouldn't have liked that as a kid. But you experienced that change, though. I don't know what you're talking about. There wasn't music like that before Mumford came out.

12:30 Sure there was. In the mainstream. You think Mumford brought in folk? No, he changed it, though. It wasn't like Bob Dylan folk. It wasn't like.

12:37 Yeah, but I think any sort of acoustic singer-songwriter-y stuff counts as that.

12:42 Like Tame Impala type stuff.

12:43 But I think like the Matt Nathanson's, you could go through all those guys that just played a guitar and sounded sad. Yeah. I think that's, and I started liking that, but I was in my early 20s before that got me. I wouldn't have liked that at 14 or 15 years old. I needed to have some sort of sadness or happiness or rage through something sonically dynamic.

13:07 And it wasn't that. It was not until my 20s that I was like, you know, I don't want to be dynamic anymore. Like I need, sadder music. I'm going to listen to R.E.M. Everybody Hurts 47 times in a row.

13:17 Yeah, Pearl Jam was weird for me too because I was so mad all the time. Yeah, against them and that corporation. And if they launch now, I don't think you would like them.

13:26 I probably wouldn't.

13:27 I probably wouldn't because I'm not mad at anything anymore. And if I'm mad at something, there's a reason why I'm mad at it. I'm not just doing it because Eddie Vedder said so.

13:36 I think though if Rage Against the Machine existed now for the first time, I think they would still hit as hard Because of what they represented.

13:44 Oh, yeah.

13:45 Dude, they need to come back. They need to do a nostalgia tour. Except it wouldn't be about nostalgia to them. They would still do protest-type music.

13:53 Correct.

13:54 And they'd do new stuff, and they'd throw in the old stuff a little bit. But I think they're one of the bands from the early 2000s and 90s that would come back, and people would go, oh, I still like it based on what they're about.

14:04 Good call. For sure. But most, yeah, I think I just liked where I was at the time.

14:10 But having political stances on whatever they protested against.

14:17 What do you think they protested against? All kinds of things. Like what? I don't know.

14:20 War and so-and-so and poverty and stuff. Yeah, the stealth. But if that's your thing, you can always have a thing. That is one thing that you can do forever and ever. You know, it's like Bob Dylan. Like, he was a protest guy. And then all of a sudden, he's just like, I'm not a protest guy. But if he wanted to come back and be a protest guy, now's the time.

14:46 I don't know that it would hit the same.

14:48 Sure.

14:49 But, because there's just so much more. And Raging Against the Machine was doing something so different. And people thought, and people now even, just people just like to work out to them without really knowing what they stood for.

14:59 Yeah, because it's just so loud. Well, yeah.

15:02 I mean, they were anti-corporate America, anti-racism. anti-capitalism after a certain point. I mean, that's the machine they're talking about. Even the band name is Rage Against the Machine. So, yeah, it'd be tough. Because Rage Against the Machine is a pretty liberal, like their concepts are pretty liberal. And you mostly see like tattooed weightlifter guys that aren't.

15:30 Going, I love Rage Against the Machine.

15:31 It's like, well, you don't know what they're, you like their music sonically, but you don't, really know what they're singing about and that's okay too sure when does a band earn the right to just play music and not create new songs and stop having hits oh brooks and dunn are going through this right now where they just like we're just gonna play the hits we're not we're not even putting out new music we're just gonna play the hits but now i think they're coming out with some new music because it's been a few years they even redid their.

16:03 Hits So explain this to me, because I've never really understood it. Because, yeah, I love the question, because I feel like the Rolling Stones, I feel like U2, I feel like.

16:13 They keep putting out music.

16:14 They could just... Like the Eagles. They could just tour and play the old songs. Why do bands feel like they have to put out a new album to tour it?

16:25 So if you switch the name band out with artist, I think that answers your question. Not to tour it. The answer is not to tour it. Why do artists... put out new albums so they could tour. It's not to tour it. But I feel like they don't tour it. You're saying they put out an album to tour it.

16:41 I think they have music they want to create, and then they go on tour with the music they wanted to create. They would have never gone on tour had they not created the music. I feel like they, a lot of, well, I mean, I don't know about every single, because I feel like the Eagles.

16:55 Don't put out music.

16:56 The reason I asked you the question is because artists still want to create art. Regardless of what age you are.

17:01 Oh, artists. I thought you meant like a solo artist versus a band. No, I meant like. Got it. Okay.

17:05 Yeah.

17:06 And if you approach it like that, artists have to keep creating art. I think that's where there's the understanding of why do they keep making new music? Like we don't care, but they care because they are artists and they're going to make it regardless.

17:21 So they're going to make it. And also you have to think they're around yes people all the time. Like, that's so good, man. It's so good, yeah. They're going to love it. You're going to love it. You're back. And they've been celebrated at the highest level. They're artists.

17:30 They've been celebrated at the highest level. So you want to feel that again. Like, I've created something new and awesome. I want to be current as well. It rarely happens. So was Frankie Valli putting out new music, or was he just coming out? You're asking me about something I have no idea. Frankie Valli? No idea.

17:44 Because he toured, right? Like, I don't think he's doing it anymore. I don't think he's putting out new music. Okay. But that's a bad one to ask me about. You don't have knowledge on Frankie Valli? No, none.

17:54 I just feel like every single time a tour comes out, they're touring an album, right?

17:58 That's kind of like the procedure. Anyone.

18:01 Garth isn't. Brooks and Dunn isn't. Like those legendary country guys. Garth doesn't have a new album that he's just touring for fun?

18:09 It's the 71st box set of the same records.

18:13 Is it really?

18:13 No. Like the remastered version? But artists like you two and Does Pearl Jam make new music?

18:21 Yeah, new albums. And I'm not... It's their right to do it. And I'm not about them. It's crazy.

18:26 But then you get to the concert and you don't want to hear a bunch of new music from a band that has 25 hits.

18:31 But if they're putting out a new album, they're going to play at least five of those songs. We saw Counting Crows and they played a few new songs. I know. But only a few new songs out of like 22. That's okay.

18:40 I know, but then you missed out on playing some of the songs that we really wanted to hear because you put in those two new songs that we didn't.

18:47 Want to hear. That's the trade I'll make by you not doing the whole new album. It's you give and take.

18:51 Yeah, if you do a whole new album and you don't make us suffer through six or more songs and you want to play three, that's okay. Spread them out, but that's okay. They also can tell when people are going, I might as well go pee. You could see the crowd go pee.

19:07 Yeah.

19:08 I think artists that are older and have a bunch of hits that don't keep making new music are one very aware. But even when Garth was doing a new album, He wasn't playing the songs. He might play one song. I saw him when he put out a new record, and he played one song, one new song. Then I saw him another time when he put out a new record.

19:24 He did none of those songs.

19:25 Yeah, I remember that.

19:26 And he said, you guys didn't come here to hear new music, but I have new music if you want to check it out.

19:30 Here's Friends in Low Places. That's cool.

19:34 So to answer your question, I think if you have enough to do a full set, right, like enough hits to do a full set, no more new music. Just come and play all the hits. But what if you don't want to tour unless you get to play your new art?

19:48 Well, then you can do that.

19:49 That's what I'm saying. I don't mind a couple. But your question was when can a band, right? Like when can a band tour without putting out new music?

19:58 If they have enough to fill up a whole set or they have some great covers.

20:02 That too. People like covers. People love covers.

20:05 Artists think they're too cool for covers sometimes because, oh, I don't want to have to play covers because I'm a real artist that did my own music.

20:12 If you get dumb like us, the fans, we love covers. We love it. It's a sing-along for us.

20:18 Yes.

20:20 And especially, do you like it when they make it their own? They just kind of sing it how I know it. Oh, okay, okay, okay. Interesting. If you make it your own, you play it on different instruments and stuff, that's fine. We can sing it how we know it. Otherwise, it's not a cover then. Like John Mayer doing Free Fallin'.

20:36 It's great. That's how we know it.

20:37 It's how we know, but he does the Fallin', Fallin', Fallin'. Okay, if you want to take slight liberties, that's okay, but the melody's the same. Everything's the same.

20:45 Yeah, yeah. Play it how we know it. I like it. Gosh, that's it, guys. Tour. Go tour and do all covers. Well, I didn't say that, though. I didn't say that either, though.

20:58 The Bobbycast.

20:59 We'll be right back.

21:03 And we're back on the Bobbycast.

21:05 What current artist do you think will still be selling tickets in 20 years? Even if it's nostalgia type tickets. I have Ed Sheeran. I have Luke Combs.

21:17 That's good. On the countryside. Obviously Taylor Swift. Oh yeah, Taylor. Wow, Taylor's going to be like Celine Dion. You know?

21:27 It's just going to be crazy. Thinking of Taylor in 20 years. Yeah, she's going to still probably still be doing it. I hope she's still doing it. And it's going to be like, oh yeah, we're going to go see Taylor, but she's not going to be running around or anything.

21:39 It will be weird when she's 60 doing teenage songs. Right. I wear short skirts. That'll be weird. That's funny.

21:47 But I think Taylor at 60 years old is still selling a lot of tickets. And a lot of it's going to be not based on the song she writes from now to then, but based on the massive library and the feelings that people had when they were younger listening to Taylor Swift.

22:05 What do you think about Adele? Adele probably, right? Oh, yeah, yeah, for sure.

22:08 Because those people that are known for the best singers ever, that's hard for them to just continue that, to.

22:16 Sing at that quality. Sing in different key. It's what I used to do. Bring it down. Just take it down. Don't have to go so high. Let's talk about John Anderson.

22:25 So John Anderson died this last week, and he had songs like.

22:29 Swingin', Roll, roll, Seminole. Which is great.

22:35 He's in the Country Music Hall of Fame. He was at this year's Country Music Hall of Fame ceremony. And Tim McGraw posted a picture with him just a couple days prior. That's crazy. Which was pretty crazy. And I think you're the one that told me that he had almost total hearing loss.

22:51 Yeah, we were doing research on it. Just kind of didn't realize that. And then got it back.

22:55 Got it all back. And then got it back. Pretty amazing. You're the one that told me that he worked on the Grand Ole Opry. He built it. Not by himself. He roofed it.

23:02 He was construction. And then played it. There can't be another person that's done that. I don't know that that's true, but that's a really good story.

23:12 You come back, Hank Williams Sr.

23:17 It's interesting because after he died, I just had a night of listening to John Anderson. And when an artist dies, it makes us listen to their music again.

23:26 I know. And I was thinking about why. I think there's a couple reasons.

23:31 One, we're just reminded of how many really great songs they had. And if there's no reason to be reminded of it, you're not reminded of it. And we're in a world where content and music is everywhere. And also, I think if they're alive, it still feels a bit like there's more time.

23:50 Like they never really died.

23:52 Well, I think that even after they die, it felt like they never died. I didn't know them to begin with.

23:55 Right.

23:56 And I'm not looking for new music from them. As far as our relationship goes with them, right? And I feel too like it's like a gift they left us. Like that we're able to just enjoy their life forever and ever.

24:07 And a gift we gave them by streaming their music and buying their CDs so they could have a life.

24:11 Yeah. Buy a nice house down in Florida on the beach. You're welcome.

24:14 Yeah.

24:15 We did that. Yeah. Tom Petty, when he died.

24:20 It really got me back into Tom Petty because I just moved on from that. And then now I listen to a lot of Tom Petty. But to me, he's not dead because I never knew him.

24:32 Honestly, you just mentioned Tom Petty and I forgot that he was dead because we listen to a lot of Tom Petty. He just comes on a lot, you know, and you don't think about like, he's not someone that we saw on the daily, you know, so we know he's not here anymore. But that's crazy. I really had forgotten that he died. There was always a rumor growing up in the Hot Springs Village where I worked. It's near where I lived that Tom Petty had a house on the water.

24:58 I love those rumors. He's like, you know Tom Petty lives over there. And then when I got older, I wanted to get to the bottom of that. And you never found out? No, I did. Oh, you did? Yeah, he never had a house there. I don't think he'd ever been to Arkansas except to stop by and tour. Bunch of liars.

25:10 But somebody started a rumor Tom Petty had a house in the Hot Springs Village, and it just spread for years and years and years.

25:15 Dude, I love that. And Ronnie, too, like Ronnie Dunn.

25:19 One of the rumors growing up was that Ronnie Dunn was from Port Isabel, which is right outside of South Padre Island. And so every time we'd drive by, they're like, that's so cool, man.

25:26 He's from there. He went to high school there. But I don't know if he did. I have no idea. Well, now you have the internet. I never even thought about looking it up because I trust the people that told me. Well, I can tell you, if they're like the people that told me, they're liars. I think with John Anderson, too, it's one of those where an artist's one of his biggest songs or one of their biggest songs kind of gives you the wrong idea if that's the only song you know. Because if you only know John Anderson from the first version of him, which was the 80s, Swingin' was his biggest song. And it was kind of a funny song.

25:58 And so I think you would get the wrong idea about him if that's what you knew. It wasn't until the 90s, when he came back on a second effort, that he had a couple other bangers.

26:09 And it's not until you listen to the music that you can tell that it's from two different decades ago.

26:14 Oh, yeah, like the production?

26:15 The production sounds so 80s and swinging, you know, all of it. And then you get to the 90s, you're like, oh, wow, it does sound like everything else that was happening at that time.

26:24 Like Straight Tequila Night, Seminole Wind, both of those were 90s songs. Yeah. Like his second run at it. Swinging was from the 80s. What do you know about his singing style? Like, was that intentional? Because he's so known for....

26:46 No one sang like that. And so to me, John Anderson's very unique, unique style was that style of singing.

26:53 I feel like would John Anderson break through today with a voice like that, if that were the question? I think he had a better chance of breaking through today than he did back then.

27:02 Good, good answer. Because I was going to say yes, for sure. Because.

27:06 Now we're more accepting of things that sound different, interesting, even peculiar if the person that's saying it has something interesting to say. I think back then it was harder because you had three record labels looking for specific types of artists that sounded a specific way that matched what was selling. There wasn't the ability for you to find artists on the internet. So I think John Anderson, if he came today, would have an easier time At making it as back then, which tells you again how great he was as an artist back then because it definitely was an odd sound.

27:40 It was so unique. And that's why I liked Eddie Vedder. That's why I like Pearl Jam because he sounded so different than everyone singing.

27:45 I mean, Willie Nelson. Willie Nelson, very different. Dwight Yoakam.

27:49 Oh, yeah.

27:51 Macy Gray.

27:53 Like people you hear and they sing a few words and you're like, oh, I know exactly who that is.

27:58 Tyler Childers. Yeah. Probably a run out there.

28:04 I mean, Johnny Cash is a big one, too, because, like, very unique. Not a lot of people sang like Johnny Cash. Some people say he wasn't even really singing.

28:12 He was just singing. Barely singing. But, yeah, to that point, like, that's really.

28:19 I don't think anyone can talk about Johnny Anderson without doing.

28:24 It was interesting.

28:24 It was so interesting that you knew who it was immediately, but it had to be so hard for him to make it because, you know, there were some executives in the 80s. Smoking cigarettes inside. Who does that now?

28:33 Nobody. But they did it all the time. And their big fat ties. And some corporate office going, well, this.

28:38 Guy's... But then someone's going, well, he's selling so many tickets, like in Florida and Georgia.

28:42 Hey, let's give him a chance. And then his music hits.

28:45 And it probably is not a coincidence that the song that hit in the 80s for him was like a funny song. Because I don't know that because there weren't a lot of allowances of people that sounded different to make it that If it wasn't funny, I don't think he's able to do a slow song, a real heartfelt song as one of his first songs sounding that different.

29:07 That would be a little odd.

29:10 If you talk about songs like Swing, and if that's the only song that you heard from him, you'd have an odd idea of what he was. You hear the other stuff, you get it. I think of Joe Diffie. I just did a special on Joe Diffie is why I think about him. Like Pickup Man, massive song, but If you just hear Pickup Man, you think that's what all Joe Diffie is, but then you don't get a chance to hear Ships That Don't Come In or any of those. Because Joe Diffie was really one of the best singers, like George Jones-type singers. Vinsky. Joe Diffie, like the pure vocalists, but because he also had funny songs, people don't always consider him as that unless you were able to actually see that. Probably episode of the Jukebox

29:50 video is hilarious. But I think Joe Diffie is that. I think even Toby Keith, if all you hear is Red Solo Cup, You think he's just all silly.

30:00 Yeah, you don't know who's that man. You don't know. Even courtesy of the red, white, and blue. I mean, you stick a boot in your... Is that the boot in the butt? Yeah, even that's a... But I think that happens with artists. Yeah, and he wasn't really all about quirk. I mean, should have been a Cowboys, not quirk. Yeah.

30:16 That's a serious song.

30:17 But if all you know is Red Solo Cup, you probably have a different idea about Toby Keith than what he really was.

30:24 Same with those other guys. I feel like that with Kenny, too. Right? Like, Kenny.

30:28 kind of dumbs things down a little bit with his beach songs but yet he can really sing a serious song and like make it hit you should tell him his beach songs are dumb well it's silly like it's like what it's like Buffett like Jimmy Buffett name a silly Kenny Beach song no shoes no shirt no problem it's a good example silly it's funny that's funny it's silly and fun the same thing because I don't feel like that's comedy like the Joe Diffie stuff was funny I don't feel like no shoe your opinion I don't feel like that's funny I feel like that's fun would you say that i'm kind of silly or fun fun not silly no okay i feel like they can kind of be the same fun silly okay the venn diagram covers both yeah there we go and and i feel

31:15 like with kenny like when he sings a serious song you think oh this is this is so different like and you feel it well that's why i like emo kenny emo kenny that's hard to do that jimmy buffett couldn't be serious Good point.

31:29 Did he have serious songs?

31:30 He'd had a few, but they weren't great because you always just associated with him like, let's just party.

31:38 That has to be annoying.

31:40 And probably not so annoying you want to stop doing it and you regret your career, but there's probably days where you're like, I wish I could just sing something serious.

31:47 Yeah.

31:47 I saw a clip of him singing Wildflowers. You were just talking about Tom Petty. And it was weird.

31:52 That song? You belong on the wildflowers. And he's in his Hawaiian shirt and everything. I'm like, this is weird.

31:58 When's the steel drum going to kick in? When does the cheeseburger happen?

32:02 Right, right.

32:04 Is there a shark anywhere near? But to him, he's a musician. He's an artist, right? And he loves those serious songs. But we're all just like, where's the fun, Jimmy? And it can be a celebrity or it can be a musician. What celebrity's death hits you more than you would have expected?

32:22 And I have a couple.

32:23 And I think when Norm Macdonald died, that one hit me harder than I expected. One, nobody knew it was coming. I was a really big Norm fan, but I didn't know how big of a Norm fan I was until you started looking at his whole body of work, and you're only even examining it because he died. And I was a massive Norm fan, and that one hit me hard.

32:43 I didn't know him. I never met him. And then I would think Tom Petty, too, although I have a richer appreciation for Tom Petty because he died. It's interesting. I'm telling you, it's weird to me because I forgot he was dead. You don't have to pick him.

33:03 No, I know that, but I'm just going off of what you're saying. It's just weird to me because I'll still listen to Tom Petty all the time and forget that he's no longer here. Is it his daughter? Sometimes his daughter comes out and.

33:16 Talks. Richard Petty? No, his daughter.

33:19 Kyle Petty?

33:20 No.

33:21 Anyway, mine would be, and we were just talking about Jimmy Buffett. When Jimmy Buffett died- I didn't realize that years and years of my– and I wouldn't say childhood. It was probably like 17 years old and on is when I discovered Jimmy Buffett. And I was just a beach guy. I lived 45 minutes an hour away from the beach. So it was just my soundtrack of going to the beach always, eating boiled shrimp, living that parrot head life, which, dude, I loved.

33:53 I was a parrot head. I would go to see Jimmy Buffett.

33:57 All the time, when my wife was pregnant with my son, we took him to a Jimmy Buffett concert, and I worried because there was a lot of weed smoke in there. I'm like, is he going to get, you know, like, is my son in the womb going to get this? But it was such a part of my life that when he died, it was one of those where I played all the music for a long, long time and, like, showed my kids, like, I want to introduce you guys to Jimmy Buffett and, like, go through all the stages of Jimmy Buffett. And it was, I would say it lasted about three, three weeks of like, dang, I really didn't know him, but he was such a big part of my life. And the fact that no one knew he was sick.

34:33 Yeah. And that makes me think too of, and I wasn't, I mean, I wasn't not a fan of him, but I wasn't like someone I would consider a massive fan. But when Chadwick Boseman died, that was a weird one because nobody knew he was sick. And people were just commenting on the internet forever about how he didn't look good.

34:48 Like, come on, man, eat a burger. Wow.

34:51 And they kept it quiet. that he was battling cancer and he died. And that one to me was, I think I had the realization that, man, you never know what somebody's going through like a celebrity cause they look different or they've lost a bunch of weight or gained a bunch of weight or not that I'm in the comments anyway, but I think that really changed it for me on even having those thoughts.

35:17 I know.

35:17 I mean, look at Will Smith's wife, you know, Jada, Jada and the slap. Chris didn't know. What she was going through? Made a joke about it. Got slapped in the face. I think that was more about what Will was going through.

35:29 Well, that too.

35:30 But I mean, you know, no one knew why she didn't have hair. And obviously, we didn't know that she was going through that.

35:37 And Chris didn't know that. But yeah, you're right, man. We don't know.

35:39 And the thing about Jimmy Buffett too is that there was kind of a sign because he started doing these video blogs every, I'd say every day, every two days. And his daughter would film him. And it would just be him and his guitar talking about every song he wrote. And it was definitely like when he died, got it.

36:00 Now I know why he was doing that.

36:03 So probably while he was doing it, oh, he's just chronicling his story. Yeah.

36:07 Because he's not making new music. He's chronicling his old stuff. So it's always, but really it was like his last.

36:13 Yeah. And they were cool because his daughter would just be like, hey, dad, talk about this song. Ah, that one.

36:19 Yeah, 1970. It was like just talking to a grandpa. I think it was 73.

36:24 Yeah, 73.

36:25 And he just talked about it. And I loved watching him. I had no idea he was doing that because he wanted to.

36:30 Leave all that out.

36:32 I guess when you know you're dying, you kind of want to just tell every story that you know.

36:36 Right? I don't know. I would think.

36:40 It's like now that my dad passed, now that he's passed, it's like, oh, I should have asked him all these questions. You know, so kind of like maybe when you know you're dying, you're just like, I want people to know everything about me before I'm not able to tell them.

36:56 Maybe write it all down. I don't want to tip anybody off if I don't want them knowing. If I don't want them knowing, I don't think I'm going to tip them off. If I do want them knowing, I think I'll do that. So what would you, you think you would write it down and leave it somewhere? Like?

37:09 How would someone find it?

37:10 I mean, I wouldn't write it on papyrus like you're doing with your hands there, like a quill pen. I think I'd probably just write it like I'm writing a book, like I've written books. I think a lot of my stuff is out there in a couple of books, at least up to the last 15 years.

37:27 That's a lot out there. I just don't feel like I have enough to do another book. Hey, keep on living. It'll come out. I don't know that I want any more to come out. I'm good living. I'm just living.

37:40 I want to stay the same. Do you really think that you've told pretty much your whole story, like everything?

37:45 I don't know.

37:45 I haven't read the books back. I don't know what I said. I have no idea what's in those books. Like I have a general idea.

37:50 That's crazy. But I don't know if you were to say, hey, is this story in your book?

37:54 Like I know a few stories from my books because people will say something to me about them, but I don't know what I wrote in those books.

38:01 Is that because you wrote a lot of stuff and then some didn't make it and some didn't make it? Or just because you don't really remember?

38:06 That's probably a bit of it, but also it's been a long time, and I just never wanted to revisit it. Like the first book that I wrote was really about my life up until 2012 or so, and I.

38:21 Wrote it.

38:22 Some of that stuff was hard to write, so maybe a bit of it too is me not wanting to even revisit it.

38:30 But then also I just don't remember. It's both.

38:34 And sometimes I'm like, I don't need to tell the story again. I think it's in one of my books. And then I can go to AI and go, hey, is it in my book? And it'll go, no, that's not in there.

38:43 And I'm like, oh, great. I can still tell the story. I still have that one. Yeah, yeah. Thank you guys for watching. Hope you guys, I don't know if you're watching this on the weekend or not. We do it on a weekend. But I think, I don't know when you're watching, if you're watching at all or listening. Everybody on Netflix, thank you for watching. If you're listening on podcast, we appreciate you guys hanging out with us as well.

39:01 Rest in peace to John Anderson.

39:03 And Billy Corgan's Smashing Pumpkins interview coming up in a couple weeks from this episode.

39:08 So that'll be super cool.

39:10 Let's take a quick pause for a message from our sponsor. Welcome back to the Bobbycast.

39:17 All right, next up, we're going to talk about Halloween movies. So here is Movie Mike, since it's Halloween, talking about horror movies that you can stream at home. If you want to hear more of his podcast in general, go check out Movie Mike's Movie Podcast.

39:31 In my category of the most disturbing, I have Sinister from 2012. It stars Ethan Hawke. And I feel like I missed out on the hype of this movie whenever it first came out. This would be, out of all the movies on this list, if I could go and re-watch this movie in theaters... When it first came out, this would be on my list because it is terrifying still to watch this movie at home. But I can only imagine if you were in a dark theater with the big sound, this movie would hit so hard. But in this movie, Ethan Hawke plays a true crime writer who is in a bit of a slump. He, at one time, wrote a bestseller. He is known for this book, but it's been about a decade since that first bestseller.

40:11 So he is desperate for a hit. So he moves his family... in order to work on.

40:18 His next book.

40:19 And he moves into the house of a victim's home in order to dive into this case and really immerse himself in the story, trying to figure out what happened to cause all these people to die. And what he does in his research is he goes through a bunch of old film footage that is essentially a bunch of scenes of people being tortured. And it's what he sees when he watches this footage that is so disturbing. And the central figure in this film is so... Well, I don't want to use the title of the movie, but that is how I would describe the figure in this that is so haunting. It is such a sinister figure that never have I just seen something on screen.

41:03 That just the thought of that figure terrifies me.

41:06 And there's one scene specifically, all I'll say is it involves a lawnmower scene. That image has stuck with me.

41:14 And.

41:15 Something that happened as soon as I watched this movie for the first time is I had an eye appointment. And I remember going into that eye appointment whenever they put your eye up to where you have to see like a scene at.

41:28 The end of it.

41:29 And I remember that the first time I watched this movie, the next day I had to go to an eye appointment. And they do that thing where you have to look at a scene and it's like very far away. And I remember it was like a hot air balloon in the middle.

41:42 Of a road.

41:43 And they kind of move and switch you through all the. And you're supposed to look at it and tell them when it's the most in focus. And I'm like, okay, it's getting a little bit more focused. It's getting a little bit more focused. It was still a little bit blurry. But because I had just watched this movie, I thought, what if I just saw that figure inside of this eye exam right now? Because that's kind of what happens throughout the movie is he is watching things and then he sees something almost living inside of this footage. And then It starts messing with everything around the house and then it just totally gets crazier and crazier. But I thought that was a weird feeling for me to have of thinking that there was something about to be in

42:24 my eye that was terrifying me. And I kind of started to freak myself out a little bit, like on the verge of, am I about to have a panic attack at the eye doctor? But that is how this movie makes you feel. And just from the movie's poster where you see this kid kind of like, combing their hand on a wall and like smearing blood all over this old, dirty looking white wall. And you see the image of this figure. That's a really great silhouette. That is also a great poster. And it is a truly terrifying movie that that's all you really need.

43:00 To know going into it.

43:01 And I would highly encourage you this be one of those movies where you turn off all the lights and just allow yourself to have no distractions and fully focus on the story. And I think you will have an equally scary time watching this. Again, it came out back in 2012, Sinister. And it is available for you to watch on Hulu. It is my most disturbing pick for this list. The overall best Halloween movie category, I'm going to go with 1979's Halloween. That is my favorite horror movie of all time. The bad thing about all the Halloween movies is there's not one place to watch them all.

43:37 They're all on separate streaming services.

43:40 I wish they were just all in one location because around this time is when I would love just to do a Halloween, just continuous watch because back in the day when we still had cable, which we kind of still have cable now, it's just all spread out and more expensive. But when we had cable back in the day, AMC, every single Halloween season, they would just play all the Halloween movies continuously. They would start at one, go all the way to Halloween H2O. So at any time in October where you would click on AMC, it felt like there was always a Halloween movie playing, and especially on the days leading up to Halloween, where I would try to watch as many of these movies as possible. But we don't really have that anymore because this one in particular,

44:25 the 1979 version, you can really only rent it. And it is a movie I think I have on DVD somewhere, but I wish all the Halloween movies.

44:33 Were available for you just to watch somewhere. In one place.

44:37 But I loved this movie so much when I first watched it as a kid.

44:41 The score. The iconic scenes.

44:44 Laurie Strode in the closet and Michael Myers breaking in with the knife.

44:48 So many iconic moments.

44:50 And I don't really like to use that word as freely as some people do. This is truly an iconic horror movie. So to me, the overall best Halloween movie. That it's not Halloween unless you watch Halloween.

45:02 It's Halloween. The best family-friendly.

45:05 Movie, in my opinion, is 1993's Hocus Pocus. This was, growing up, the essential Halloween movie. If you didn't watch this movie as a kid, growing up every Halloween season, it wasn't Halloween yet. It has the best characters. It has the best story. It has a little bit of comedy. At this point, it feels very 90s. The two villains in the movie, well, I guess they're not the villains, but they were villains, in my opinion, growing up because they were the bullies. The one dude had the ice sketched into the back of his head with clippers.

45:37 Those two dudes, to.

45:38 Me, were the villains because they were jerks. They were mean to everybody for no reason. I didn't even care so much about the Sanderson sisters doing all the awful things to all the kids and to the parents. To me, the biggest villains of Hocus Pocus were those two bullies because I thought, man, those bullies would have been so hard on me. So maybe that's just a little bit of personal feeling for me, but The fact that they made a Hocus Pocus 2 straight to Disney +, that was an abomination. And I'm not really one to say that whenever a sequel is made that it ruins the legacy of the first one. Because oftentimes I end up forgetting about the Hocus Pocus 2s, the Dumb and Dumberers, the sequels to really great comedies or really great iconic films.

46:25 I've learned to move past that.

46:27 And maybe at one point I was like, don't make a sequel because it ruins the legacy of.

46:30 The first one.

46:32 I just burned those movies out of my mind. I get they're trying to make some money. They're banking on nostalgia. But this was a movie that does not need any sequel.

46:41 It is a.

46:42 Perfect Halloween movie. There's not one thing I would change about it. And it also, to me, has that feeling of Halloween night. And probably because they actually go trick-or-treating in the movie. From my memory, it does take place entirely in one day, aside from the flashback scenes at the very beginning, whenever the Sanderson sisters.

47:01 that.

47:01 Spell first is cast. I love movies that take place in one day. And I think if you're making a Halloween movie to have it take place on Halloween, that is what you.

47:12 Have to do.

47:13 And I also think there might be like a curse word in there. Back then in 93, you could get away with that. But I still think to today's standards, it is an acceptable family friendly movie. So in this category, I have Hocus Pocus and you can watch that on Disney +. In the category of the newest horror movie, my pick has to go to Hocum. Came out earlier this year in 2026, and actually probably in the last week or two, was just added to Hulu. If you've listened to this podcast this entire year, I have rated this movie the scariest horror movie of the year. Scarier than Obsession, scarier than anything else that has come out so far this year. And Hocum stars Adam Scott, who you would know from Parks and Rec.

48:00 or maybe Severance on Apple TV.

48:03 He is a novelist who goes out to a remote location in Ireland in order to scatter his parents' ashes. And while he is there, he gets consumed with the tale of a witch that haunts the honeymoon suite at this particular inn that he is staying at. And as a writer, he is trying to find his next story. So he starts investigating what is going on in this suite.

48:28 And soon, he starts seeing a bunch of scary, disturbing visions. It is a little bit of a slow burn at times. It is not a movie that relies heavily on jump scares. And I do feel like it is one you have to allow yourself to be consumed by. Because there's nothing over the top that is going to jump out at you.

48:48 There's not a lot of blood and guts. But it's the characters you uncover, the very, to me.

48:55 Bold horror images.

48:57 that stick in your brain that are unlike anything you have ever seen.

49:01 This movie feels very novel to me.

49:04 It comes from an Irish director named Damian McCarthy who has a really unique vision when it comes to horror. I think the fact that he's not American, he doesn't tell horror stories in a traditional way that feel to me like get repetitive at times. This story feels very fresh. The entire look of this movie feels different and there's something off from the very beginning, the opening scene of this movie that makes you feel like, okay, I.

49:29 Am ready to take this journey.

49:31 So out of all of his movies, I would say start with Hocum now that it's available on Hulu, but follow it up with Oddity. So there are two right here that I'm going to recommend from the same director because there are some elements of oddity that I feel are even scarier than Hocum, but fitting in this category of the newest horror movie that I think is great, that's going to become an essential scary movie around October for me, I am going with Hocum. If I would have been doing this episode last year, it would have been a battle between weapons and sinners, which both of those are on HBO Max.

50:05 Love this episode of The Bobbycast?

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