Freakscene.diy with Corbin and Neek

I'm joined by Corbin (https://www.instagram.com/corbincorbin/) and Neek (https://www.instagram.com/neek4freak/) from Freakscene.diy. We talk about the old internet, the new internet, and how the DIY ethos lives on in the spaces carved out online. 

Freakscene.diy is an old school internet forum where you can follow your local music scene, find bands, shows, and talk whatever on a site that isn't going to turn your information into a product. A true community online in a world of dead internet and AI bots. 

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:21

It's not really big enough for a house show, but we could do like a backyard thing at some point if our neighbors don't hate us enough. Anyway, welcome to Hey Smiling Strange. My name is Kyle. The song you just listened to. Hopefully, if I got it to work right, is uh Slime by How Strange It Is. So go check them out and thank them for letting us use their song. I am joined today by the brilliant innovators of Freakscene.diy, Corbin and Neek. Uh, how's it going, guys? How you doing? Good. Thanks for having us.

SPEAKER_02 0:54

Yeah, thanks for having us, Kyle.

SPEAKER_00 0:56

Nice. Uh, alright, so uh freaksine.diy, I have loved since I heard the inception of the idea as somebody that spent a tremendous amount of his uh developmental years on internet forums, the idea of like bringing that back as something for the DIY music scene, trying to recapture some of the magic of the old internet. I love that. Uh how did that idea come? Did you guys have it together? Was it like a discussion? How do you guys know each other? Who are you?

SPEAKER_02 1:26

Who am I?

SPEAKER_01 1:29

Yeah, um well, yeah, Nate and I both have uh, you know, uh he is in Los Angeles now. I'm I'm in Portland, but um both were ran house shows years ago that incidentally were about a block away from each other. Although we first met through Ileana, if you remember that, before like when you guys first moved to town, Ileana Little. Shout out I Little. Um so yeah, we've known each other for for a long time. Um Freak Scene's Inception was uh basically I was just getting so sick of Instagram for all the reasons that I'm sure you and anyone listening to this are aware of, especially if you're in the DIY scene, like find events, not be harassed by just like the most obnoxious fascists and like brain dead people on the planet in comments on every post. Um and I was just sort of venting and I post an Instagram story saying, like, does anybody want to help me build a PHP form? I actually don't know how to do any of this stuff. I just but it's gotta be something else. And um, and uh most people responding, they were like, You're you're an idiot. You should have a Discord channel. Like, why would you do this? What a ridiculous uh you know idea. Uh but Neek said, like, yeah, let's let's do it. That's awesome.

SPEAKER_00 2:36

Neek, have you built these uh types of sites before?

SPEAKER_02 2:39

Yes, yes, I've built so many of them, and uh I have a growing graveyard of uh you know, like like uh for for the the real heads who are listening, I had a site called StrangeAttractor.xyz. Uh PHP-based forum. I I've always wanted the I wanted to resurrect the sort of late 90s, early 2000s forum-based internet. It's a slower pace. We're not getting tumbled with ads everywhere. And I think that the real sort of motivation for Freak Scene uh was the frustration. Um it wasn't something, you know, this is a collective unconscious moment. I feel like everybody is frustrated with the state of uh of the the feed, the the the the the doom scrolling machines, right? Uh events on Facebook and Instagram. Um it just like kind of I mean no one's on Facebook anymore, but on Instagram they just disappear into the feed. Facebook actually had a pretty good event system in like early 2010, 11, 12. Um but uh nobody wants to post on on their their events on these these fascist platforms. We just like feel the need to. Like, how often do you uh talk to your artist friends and they're like, uh, I really want to delete my Instagram, but you know, I need it, I need it for work. I can't remember the last time I got a job from Instagram, right? And I don't want, you know, like you're you're posting your reels, they're they're doing a pretty good job on their kind of well we're gonna talk.

SPEAKER_00 4:24

This is why I wanted to talk to you guys uh about it, because it's like one, uh like talking about the Facebook thing, even the transition from Facebook to Instagram, Facebook's calendar system to like actually track the fucking events and stuff. Like, I would be like, oh, I want to go to this, and I'd click it and would remind me. And Instagram, it's just like, did I see it? Maybe I put it on a calendar. Uh fun little story when I was uh I'll use the word courting my now wife. I would literally just go on her Facebook page and see what event she was going to, and then I would show up at those shows and go talk to her and tell her that my roommates bailed on me. Can I hang out with you? And that is how we got married. So it's like, you know, obviously, uh Facebook itself is like that was always kind of a compromise anyway, because like you guys are talking about, this is the the Silicon Valley fucking bullshit machine that we all grew up in. Like the hardest thing to explain to Gen Z is like in the millennials, the internet was supposed to be good and better. It was always supposed to get better. And for the zoomers, they've always known the internet getting slightly progressively worse constantly. And it's like they view that on our end as like a fully naive concept that we trusted, you know, Facebook to bet get better and make the internet better. And that's why I like having something like freekseen.di. It's like just to show these kids like, hey, man, no, there was something there before they enclosed the commons that was like it did feel genuine. Uh Corbin, did you spend a lot of time on the old internet? Like, do you were you a forum kid back in the day?

SPEAKER_01 5:51

Absolutely, yeah. I mean, I my my earliest experience with with forums was was uh you know admitting a forum with I had a uh even back then I had a a friend who did the development because I didn't know how to do that as a as a team. You're an idea, man. You're an idea, man. Yeah, we had a forum with like all the like the local middle school kids in Beaverton School District called K512 would come together and and you know, these like nerds on the internet in the you know late 90s, early 2000s, like you know, talking about video games and music and and whatever we were into. And then um, you know, I was on something awful um for a long time, and that was a huge part of my life. I mean, I I have been I have been um you know terminally online as you know as long as I could be. You know, I had my my I don't know if you remember Angelfire, it was sort of the big competitor to GeoCities. I made my first website on Angel Fire. Angel Fire actually just shut down in March of 2026. My personal website lasted until March of 2026. I hadn't updated it in nearly 30 years. I happened to back it up in December. So I actually I actually still have a copy of it. I thought to download it just in case. But no, I mean the internet has has always been a huge part of my life. And I've at the same time, like, um, you know, like I was I was a very online kid. I didn't, you know, I had friends, but we would play video games together. Uh but it was it was in high school when I kind of discovered the DIY music scene, you know, here in Portland that that was where my my first real like experience with like real life community and like actually like engaging with people in in in that manner, and it it totally changed my my perspective on like you know a a lot of a lot of life. You know, I think I was a lot more of a of a jaded person before that because you know, even just in those the more more utopian early days of the internet, I was you know not really part of something in in that kind of way. And um, you know, and then uh obviously, you know, you're talking about like Facebook events was was really helpful. Like for a for a while there, like the it was inseparable, you know, being in the DIY scene, at least certainly here in Portland, and being on Facebook. Like it was how I mean I get invited to events from bands. I would, it's like, hey, it's Friday night, I don't know what's going on tonight. I'm gonna go on Facebook events, find a random house show with bands I'd never heard of, show up and have a great time. And it's like that's that was we we we did get to experience like a unique, you know, uh you know, certain age range of us got to experience like the the positive growth of the internet until it kind of got to that point of like, all right, now the money is there to be made, and like you know, we're cashing in on this. And I mean, I think we you know when when we started freak scene, uh, you know, the whole and shidification of the internet wasn't new then. We're now you know a years on down the line, it's not gotten any better.

SPEAKER_00 8:18

No, no, no, no, no, no, no. It's very aggressively going the other direction here. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 8:26

All the stuff that that just like filters through on media everywhere is just it's it's it's it's awful. I mean, it's just uh it's just shit.

SPEAKER_00 8:34

Neek, did you uh do you have a history with forums as well? I know you actually know how to code, it sounds like. Uh do you view yourself as kind of a cyber cowboy back in the day?

SPEAKER_02 8:43

Uh yeah, I'm a cowboy today too. I still never left me. Yeehaw. Um, yeah, no, I've I yeah, I I love the internet. I was raised by the internet. You know, uh I remember when uh my gateway Windows 95 computer arrived in a uh cowprint box uh to the house, and I I set it up, and I was the only person in my family who knew how to run the thing every reign of the internet. At six, seven years old. I was talking to strange men from Alaska and they're sending me pictures of them and their dogs going on hikes. It was weird, right? Um, like the forum. Love, love, love all forums. Uh I actually was one of the earliest forums I was on. The uh the the the guy uh or uh the person Chris Crocker of uh Leave Brittany Alone fam was on the forum with me. Shout out Cool Teens Forum! Yeah, and then uh another one of my favorite forums of of of times past, it's still kind of there. Uh collectedanimals.org, the Animal Collective Forum that punctuated uh the early 2010s for me. Um had a lot of friends there. But love the forum-based architecture because I think what that uh built into that architecture is space away from the machine, right? Like uh we're always online now, and it's you know, we're not gonna unring that bell. Um but you know, being able to go onto the internet like it's a place and then check, you know, the the little crab pots that you left uh, you know, asking people questions or maybe posting your new your new track or whatever and seeing that people actually responded to it, that sort of joy that's not so immediate, but like is it you know, it it takes a certain level of um I don't know. Maybe it's maybe it's my nostalgia talking, maybe it's I'm I'm aging out of the the pacing of things at the moment. Um but it is really a cadence that we're trying to strike with uh with freak scene that you really can't force, you know? Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 11:10

Um it has to be the sort of organic thing. I think this is the thing that uh our generation's our generation's relationship to the technologies, like what you were just saying, you were the only one in your family that like knew how to get the computer to work. That is something that a lot of millennials like know. Yeah, I remember in in school, whenever anybody would come into a classroom and be like, hey, uh my monitor isn't working, my computer isn't working, the projector, whatever. Does anyone know how to fix it? I always always just raise my hand because I I wanted to get out of class, and it was if it was broken, I couldn't make it worse. But I would always like go and try to figure out how to fix these things, and you get pretty handy at doing that. I don't know if things have gotten more complicated since then, but uh I really think like ever since really Apple was the one that realized like you could just make these things very simple for people to access so they didn't have to learn any of the infrastructure of how computers work. And what it's resulted in is that you have the people that are younger than us are actually on the whole worse at technology than we are, and that was all we were like the end of that line, whereas like every generation got better at computers until the millennials, and then it just got like I don't know, it seems like the internet I always just view it as an enclosure of the commons, where it's like they had this let a million flowers bloom thing where everyone would go and make their own webpage, and then eventually we figured out, you know, YouTube. Uh I don't know, I feel like YouTube might have been the the first one that like coalesced all videos into one spot. Corbin, do you have like a moment where you think you know the internet the old internet when did the old internet start to die, in your opinion?

SPEAKER_01 12:38

Yeah, I mean God. Right? Yeah, th think thinking back to that, the the the early utopian statements from like you know, Tim Berners Lee and these people who like really started the internet, like you know, they seem like so you know, like farcical at this point. Um But I mean I I remember as as a kid, like the idea of like e-commerce was sort of a joke. Like no one's gonna put their credit card on on the internet. Like, you know, you didn't you didn't use your name on the internet. Um you know, I I I do think that uh you know a big um you know part of the change probably was like the you know when Facebook came out. And I'll be honest, when Facebook came out, I was stoked. You know, I was I was in high school, uh, I I got on it like quite early on. Um basically as soon as they as soon as they moved on from universities only, they opened up to like certain employers and high school students. Yep. Uh and I and I got in got in right then. And you know, I in retrospect I feel foolish about this, but I I loved it compared to MySpace because I loved that it was clean and that it wasn't because people it's I didn't care for the aesthetics of a lot of people's MySpace people. I was like, I can't read this crap, you got all this stuff moving around. Now it's just like, where's the crap moving around? Come on, where's the where's the gaunty colors? You know, what are you doing? Um but at the time I was like, oh, this is so like this is so efficient and effective, and like this is this is like the future. And um, you know, then it was I went into college and it was like, you know, those early days of Facebook as a college student, like it was everything. And it's like you posted cards on there, and that's it's that's the world. And it was, you know, I think it was the a I think that was sort of the the you know, like web 2.0, right? That's what they that's what that that era was. And it wasn't distinctly away from you know the the early days of of the HTML internet. And then uh, you know, I think where you know things really um you know kind of went haywire for me personally was you know the the pivot to video, um where where you know you know specifically Facebook, you know, you know, we're pivoting to video, and it's like it's it's just it's you know, obviously we're doing a video thing right now. Like I don't not watch videos, I love movies, I got a bunch of movies behind me. But video is a so much easier um format for spreading propaganda and and bullshit. Uh and it's you know it's it's part of why you know you mentioned this transition from Facebook to Instagram. I've always hated Instagram.

SPEAKER_03 14:46

I hate Instagram because people just write something.

SPEAKER_01 14:49

Like what I enjoyed about Facebook was like uh you know posting like you know a little text quip, and then people respond to it and you engage in these conversations, and there and there was that digital commons, and it would be like, oh, like my you know, my aunt is like getting flamed by somebody I I know from a house show, and that's funny. Uh, because like what a weird dynamic to be that that doesn't happen anymore. These people don't interact in that same kind of space anymore. And like, you know, it wasn't the doom scroll wasn't the thing, it was much more like you sort of like lived in this in this environment. But when everything everything really shifted to video, uh, and then obviously that's grown to you know TikTok and reels and YouTube shorts and all this shit. Like, it's it's so this like passive consumption, it's so propagandistic, um, you know, uh, you know, talking about like you know, young people's experience, like they have no, you know, uh and I say that I I know young people who aren't like this, you know, right? Yeah. Uh they're they're music-stamed people. Um, but uh, you know, I think a lot of people young people who aren't uh connected to uh real life community, they see this stuff and they think this is reality. They think that like they need to be these like Miami hustlerpreneurs and all this shit. And it's like, well, this is like breaking our our like you know already like very dark, fucked up American culture in a way that's like, I don't really know, I don't really know where we're going going next.

SPEAKER_00 16:00

Well, that idea that like the internet is not real life is a millennial idea because everybody else is aware that like the reality is you are online every day. Everyone is online every day. It's an expectation to be online every day. Uh Neek, what are your thoughts on the changing internet here? Like, do where do you see uh a similar thing with the the pivot to video? Are you worried about the literacy rates of uh future generations of Americans? No.

SPEAKER_02 16:23

I'm actually I'm I alright. So I'm hopeful. I'm like I am, I am, I am cautiously optimistic, hopeful, whatever. You know? I I think that like uh we always think about the worst things happening. Like we're we're we're we're scared, we're paranoid about the unknowns, but sometimes, sometimes good things happen and I'm delightfully surprised by things. I don't think it's a I don't think it's a generational thing. All generations suck. All generations are their worst things. It's true. If you're listening to this and your uh Gen Z, fuck you. If you're listening to this and your Gen X, fuck you too. Millennials fucking suck. Like give me some avocado toast. I'm never gonna be able to pay for a fucking house. You know? I I don't think it's a generational thing. I think it's a human thing. I know I think something that you brought up earlier, I think this is this is the precipice that we're on. It's like nothing the internet's everywhere now. Yeah, there's not a difference between uh, you know, the virtualized world, the physical world. Things are like like conceptually ambient. The the internet is everywhere, kind of thing. And I think that is, you know, that proofs your success, Kyle, with like just walking down the street and talking about indie music, you know, like and and guess what, Corbin? The the fucking video, like half the people we follow that we enjoy their content post images that are text, right? Yeah, people found a way around.

SPEAKER_01 17:57

I I do it myself. Like most when I post a story, I'll you know, half the time now it's it's it's a text post.

SPEAKER_02 18:03

Yeah, some Marshall McLoon shit, right? Oh yeah, medium message we're using a fascist platform to deliver our messages. So, like, I you know, what does that say about the message? It is tainted, right? We are a product on these applications. I don't know what you're listening to this on. I hazard a guess that you are listening to this from an iPod or an iPhone, definitely not an iPod, from an iPhone with AirPods, right? You're listening to this through uh a company's device that matches donations to the IDF for its employees, right? So we're fucked. We're just inherently fucked. You can look at all the ways that it sucks to interact with tech, or you can see the beauty of it, right? And I think that just like having a moment where I'm off, you know, doom scrolling, and in between that, I get to see like a hot take from Perezky, or I I get to see like a video of you listening to a song that I haven't listened to in the last 10 years, but now you're like triggering my nostalgia, and I want to look into what's going on in Portland, you know. Um that's the that's the the freaking uh uh hope core, whatever we all need, right?

SPEAKER_00 19:24

No, man, I always describe myself as like uh negative in the short term, but wildly optimistic in the long term. The way I've always kind of described it is like so before the uh before God, I feel like I talk about Communist China in every podcast, but uh before they took over, they had their revolution, uh they had what's called the century of humiliation. It was like the opium wars, you know, just devastation of the the Chinese people or whatever. Um I think that's what America's in right now is in the emergence of a multipolar world. And again, plug Michael Hudson's work, The Economist, go check him out, he's awesome. Uh but like in the thing that I think of though is in good old American fashion, I think that we can do it faster and dumber, and we can rip through a century of humiliation in like 20 or 30 years if we really commit to it. Uh but I'm also like a big believer in these negation of the negation things. The reason that I make all these videos is I'm trying to figure out like what the future what the world looks like right now. And what I have found is like I found a way to make a video that people seem to connect with. And I think uh my like takeaway from my experience on being a short video creator or whatever, is that I think people watch so many videos now, their ability to pick up on bullshit when they're being sold something has been trained to a level that was never anticipated, you know? Like in the same way that our generation was very good at not clicking on ads, because it was like, oh, that's a pop-up ad, but our parents would click on the ad every single time. This generation can kind of tell, like, when a uh a reel is trying to sell them something, when a real is being disingenuous. Because I can I will tell you from my personal experience, when I come into a reel with a thing to say already, it does worse than the ones that I think of on the moment. And I feel like you guys, whoever's listening to this, I feel like you guys can genuinely hear when I'm having a thought right now versus when I'm trying to sell you an idea that I thought of like two hours ago. And so I just stopped doing that. Uh now I just go on a walk, and if I can't think of anything, that's it. That's the walk. I just w I come home. So but I don't know, Corbin, do you get the same sense that uh you know, especially with this pitch, you guys are not the only people kind of recreating this retro internet? There's a whole movement online, especially with the ability to make uh websites with AI, instead of having geo cities or whatever, you can make whatever website. Everything is geo cities now. Do you see this change happening? Do you think that this is might lead to something more positive? Can we reclaim the old internet?

SPEAKER_01 21:44

Yeah, I mean, I don't I don't think ultimately we will reclaim the old internet. I I but I but I do think that um, you know, what that there that there can be positive things to come. Um and um, you know, I I I I relate to what you say, you know, negative in the short term and and positive in the long term, because I think I feel the same kind of way. Like everything will work out in the end, you just don't know when the end's gonna be.

SPEAKER_03 22:02

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 22:03

And sometimes that can be anxiety inducing. Like, how long do we have to deal with deal with this? And and I mean, um, you know, I I uh listened to a podcast last night and they're just talking about all these various different uh, you know, uh pointless wars that we are inflicting on the world right now for no particular reason. Um mostly uh at the detriment to the American people and the American economy. And yeah, and it's like, yeah, uh it it you know, uh century of humiliation is is is certainly the case. And I I think, yeah, we can we can we can do that, we can do that faster to a more heinous degree than you could have ever imagined. Uh and then perhaps um you know be reborn from the ashes of of the great pyre of this country. And and uh, you know, I do have I do have faith in in that, and I do have faith in the sort of um, you know, in the you know what DIY, the punk spaces to um, you know, always be ready to sort of like, you know, find a home in a in a new way. I mean, I think about just like how the rave scene in Portland, you know, blew up after COVID because the police no longer bothered to regulate, you know, uh, you know, where parties were happening. And so like parties happened in in ways that like I had never seen in the city. And and and you know, really cool things were were flourishing, you know, in in direct response to um, you know, certain certain kinds of um you know sort of societal breakdown going on around us. And say, all right, let's make the best of this. And so um, you know, I'm I'm I'm glad to, you know, you see that energy always continuing. And um, yeah, I mean, I I I think we'll continue to have an uh an unpredictable world and a lot of challenges to face. Um, but um, you know, I I I do think that humanity at least will come out on the you know positive on the other end. I I I think I I hope that um you know, to that point of multipolarity that you know the US Empire is not necessarily a part of the future that we're moving into.

SPEAKER_00 23:47

Oh yeah. I mean I could talk for a long time about you brought up like uh the US Empire does de it's detrimental to the US people, the same occupying force that's happening in these military bases. That's happening to us right now. We all share that in common. But uh let's talk instead more about uh music and DIY spaces. Uh you guys were talking about how you both ran house shows down the street from each other. Uh Neek, what's your history with music? What's your history with DIY spaces? Because I personally I found my favorite moments in life come from these DIY moments where it's just people. My wedding was pretty fucking DIY. People were like uh figuring out who was going to clear the tables and shit like that. Like this helping each other out, this community of like gift giving action or whatever. That was big for me. How did you get involved with uh DIY? Do you play anything yourself or are you just a guy that like rate liked running house shows, etc.?

SPEAKER_02 24:38

I love DIY. Um I I how'd I get how'd I get involved? I started going to shows when I was in high school. Um you know, San Francisco, Oakland, uh Berkeley, just like uh hanging around, bopping around. Uh lived in Chicago for a little bit. That's where I went to my first couple like proper warehouse shows. Uh shout out Dust Bowl, shout out uh Big Forever, the basement. Um yeah, there's there's just a lot of spots. Uh some that are still open. Um most that closed like within a couple years of me going there. Um and then moving to Portland, I was like, if we have a house that has a basement, we're gonna have shows from it. What brought you up to Portland? Uh I just the vibes. I I I was feeling I was in like an autumnal season mode, and you know, watching your videos makes me like, why'd I move to fucking summer all year place?

SPEAKER_00 25:41

I couldn't do it. I need the shitty winter to like enjoy the summer. I need it.

SPEAKER_02 25:45

Yeah. I mean, I like it. I like it out here. I do love the the falls in uh Portland and I I love the greasy falls, which are sometimes summer, and the uh the cold falls, which are spring and winter. Uh you know, early spring and winter. So don't like the seasonal depression, and I love the beach.

SPEAKER_00 26:06

So uh California. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 26:10

But yeah, DIY. DIY is it's just a in my blood, it's like what I what I love to do. Um I was hooked after throwing the first couple shows at human flesh. Uh what COVID took from us during the moments of uh not being able to throw shows made me realize that void that this is actually uh an art practice of sort. Um and that uh when you take the community away from uh uh you know the art, it really like we we kind of all suffered for it. And that's why I don't hold anything against against the youngers that are struggling with the current state of like, oh, I need freaking engagement on my Instagram or TikTok account before I get signed by the label or whatever. It's because like guess who what like predatory labels were utilizing the the shutdown of the world to basically kill art. You know, it's like I don't know, we all went through it together, but then once uh once shows started happening again, I was like, heck yes, I lived in apartments, um it wasn't until I started building Freak Scene with Corbin that I started throwing shows again at a freak scene, and so it's kind of just this like uh virtuous cycle of like the thing that I love building gives me the chance to love building the thing that I love building, you know.

SPEAKER_00 27:46

The more you do it, the more you get to do it, you know. I think that's the best part about like I love that you started with because the one of the first videos I made was just talking about like uh people asking, like, well, how do you get to play in shows? How do you get to be in a scene? I'm like, just go to shows, go to as many shows as you can. Like, even if the first couple stink, you will find your people eventually, and then you have no idea what it will lead to. In this case, it's led, you know, you going to shows leads to you being on this podcast. There's a direct line from there to there. That's an insane thing to think about, but like, you know, these things all make sense in hindsight. Uh, Corbin, you're also uh like very famous in the Portland DIY scene for your photography. We have your book of photos, uh and it's it's a huge deal to be uh uh um featured in a Corbin photo. Uh has that always been a part of your DIY life and culture? Uh or is that just like something that started springing up later later?

SPEAKER_01 28:38

Um not exactly. So yeah, I mean, uh just like Nico, I got into this just from going to shows in in high school. Uh yeah I grew up out in Beaverton, so I was first, you know, going to the Crystal Ballroom and Ollie just shows like that, and then it was the the artist area for any Portland old heads was was the the DI my first DIY venue, and um and I just you know fell in love and you know that live music became sort of my my primary concern in life. Um, you know, I remember when I was looking to uh where I was gonna go to college, my main priority was that I lived in a city where touring bands would go through. I didn't want to be somewhere that I couldn't see architectural Helsinki girl talk play you know a week into uh column starting. And I did, and I had a I had a great time, uh moved to Minneapolis, moved to St. Paul, um went to DIY shows there. Uh and I I I have always kind of you know played around with with cameras. I started using uh you know digital camera and uh like middle school, um, but I didn't really actually combine the two until maybe 2014, 2015. I would I would be at shows, I'd go to shows, but yeah, I'd take a picture here or there. Um but then I really started doing it more actively. Yeah, you know, late 2014 when I when I I kind of serendipitously bought a large box of disposable cameras for cheap on eBay. And that's where it all kind of you know went from. And now I've got you know a thousand photos. And yeah, yeah, it it it it it went in directions that I could have never never imagined. Um but it was nice because I'm not I don't play music. Uh you know, ever since I I you know uh was finished with high school band, I haven't I haven't uh you know played my Twitter sex one since. Um but I but I I love being around it, and so um you know taking pictures is a way that I feel like I can be involved and engaged. I have I can uh feel like I have a good excuse for being at the front, which is where I prefer to be anyway. Yeah. Um best place to be for the show. Uh and I like being able to you know provide something that people can can use. I I always love when I see somebody using one of my pictures as a profile picture or on you know some streaming platform or whatever, that's always very flattering. Uh when people ask to use a picture for an album cover or something like that, that's great. I love that. So uh yeah, I it's it's something that that it's it's been a nice way to stay involved in in things. And then um, you know, sort of the same as what you know, Nika, what you were saying when you uh, you know, if you got a house at the basement, you wanted to throw throw shows. The moment that I moved into a large house in Portland um after living in apartments with my my then girlfriend, I was like, okay, we're we're throwing parties here, of course. Um and it was I was just I was so so stoked to be able to contribute to that because house shows had been, I mean, are such a huge part of my life. And still, I would there's nowhere else I'd rather be than a house show. You know, I've got I've got a 10-month-old baby now. I love when I can take him to a house show because at house shows babies are allowed. It's not a problem. I can smoke a joint at a house show and I can hang out with my baby at a house show. Like there are no other spaces, but that is really like the appropriate thing. And it's just it's just such a wonderful like facet of the community. It's something that I'm, you know, uh I'm I'm glad it. It's you know, it's you know, I you know, had those conversations also, but like, no, how do you get started in this? It's like, do you have a house? Does somebody play music? You can have a house show. You don't have to be involved in the scene. Um, you know, Neek, when when you got started human flesh, like you didn't necessarily know hardly anybody in the Portland existing scene, you just did your own thing, and then you grew, you know, an incredible community around that space that like you know, people who came to Portland, there were people who only knew Neek's house and didn't know anything else about anybody at the music scene because that's just where they spent all their time, and that was like their world, and then you know, eventually they'd start to like you know connect out, and you know, Portland has so many different music scenes kind of overlapping or not. Um, and that that's what I you know, I love that like the house show culture allows that that level of accessibility.

SPEAKER_00 32:01

Oh, yeah. I mean, that that is really the the best thing. Uh Neek, what was the name of that show uh venue that you ran? Uh, what was the history of behind that?

SPEAKER_02 32:10

Human flesh body world. Uh it's a fun place. Um 40 Northeast Fremont. Go and throw eggs at it. I don't know. Can I like I don't live there anymore? It's not my address. And if if it is if it is my address somewhere on the internet, it is my address. That is still my address. Um but uh yeah, we had uh uh he was right uh across the street from from News Seasons. You can go and get food from News Seasons. We had uh a duck, a duck named Spaghetti, uh rotating cast of freaks uh living there, um uh trash piles, giant paper mache sculptures, uh trampoline that bands would perform on. Uh gosh, so many of my favorite shows happened at that house. And then uh because of Ben Kaiser, the developer, I'm just doxing people. This is great. Ben Kaiser, the developer, threw up a five-story luxury apartment complex that blocked the the sun, it blocked everything from from our view. It was gross looking, and there were people that had paid a million dollars for each floor of this luxury apartment complex, and they would stare down on us while we were having shows and call the police on us, um, and we were just trying to have a fun time, and so it really quickly uh that escalated into us being kind of like soft evicted from the house. And so um if there is a DIY space that you love, if there is a house venue that you love showing up to, just every once in a while check in with the the people who run this space because these are ephemeral, these are uh they they can go, people can get evicted like farts in the wind, and it's uh uh you gotta you gotta enjoy it while it lasts.

SPEAKER_00 34:18

Yes, and uh I mean that's that one of the things that I talk about on this podcast a lot is uh you know, uh the emergent Pacific Northwest, right? This thing that is uh a unique part, a unique subset of an already emerging American culture, right? America is a civilization discovering itself. The Pacific Northwest is part of that, you know, I had a reel recently asking if like Boise, Idaho is considered Pacific Northwest or not, and there's a whole debate about that. But I do genuinely think that this DIY uh ethos, ethos, whatever, DOI spirit or whatever lives deep in the soil of like the at least the people that have ended up in the Pacific Northwest, you know. The fact that this is an area where a lot of people come because of the vibes, they just you know, they were on a road trip, they didn't know what they were gonna do with their lives, they ended up living in a hallway for a little bit, and then like boom, now they're part of, you know, Portland, they're part of the mosaic of of Portland. But specifically that DIY mentality, you know, uh, where it's just like, yeah, we're gonna take whatever is already here, we're gonna stitch it together into what we want to do, and we'll just wait and see if we can ask forgiveness and not permission. Uh but I think that like builds I think that is a thing that is building itself. I definitely am curious uh post pandemic because it does sound like it is getting harder for a lot of these people to get shows and to put up uh you know, uh put on house shows and have these things run long, but like part of the nature of DIY spaces is that they're like you said, ephemeral. They last for a short period of time. The this will be the biggest house show venue in Portland for five years and then it'll just be gone forever. But then part of that though is that that opens up a need and a space for somebody else to turn their house into the biggest house show venue. So, like to me, there's this constant push-pull struggle of trying to retain the things that have already worked while still leaving the space. Like, one of the best parts about DIY is that it leaves space for young kids to come in and do their own thing, not have to go through bureaucracy. They just go, Yeah, I got a basement, I'm doing house shows here. Uh Corbin, do you see that that kind of push-pull dynamic there of like yeah, exact. Go ahead.

SPEAKER_01 36:25

Uh yeah, I mean, uh that's something I I really noticed after, you know, after COVID, but you know, after the the the height of 2020, where a lot of people like they moved out of town, they kind of, you know, fellow millennials maybe sort of retired from the scene, they stopped hosting, maybe they stopped performing. And there was sort of a a vacuum in the broader Portland music scene, and it it did leave a lot of space for for the the new generation to come in and and do things. And there is, I mean, like I said, you know, my my my biggest familiarity with a lot of that is is the rave scene, uh, which is not something that I had you know had been to you know since I was, you know, that age. Uh and so I was like, wow, this is like so exciting. And just like the the energy, you know, from these kids who, you know, were the people who like were meant to be out there doing you know DIY when when it wasn't really an option for you know what seemed like an eternity, but was like you know, like a year or whatever. Um, but you know, that there was like so much enthusiasm and so much excitement and like just like commitment to like, you know, we're gonna we're gonna put on like the craziest outfits and we're gonna do the craziest makeup and we're gonna go party in like the craziest faces. And it's been really, I mean, to me, I think it's been some of the most exciting stuff. Like, um, you know, uh aside from perhaps places like Human Flesh Bottom World, the Portland music scene was pretty heavily psych rock dominated for for a good good part of the the 20 teens. And uh love a lot of my my dear friends in those bands, but it was sort of like, all right, like we need a little bit more like variety in the in more spaces, and and I feel like that's something that really has has changed in the past in the past few years because the new generation is is doing totally different things, and a lot of it is, I think, you know, so influenced by you know the their own sort of digital nativity around like you know, it's you know, there's maybe fewer uh you know guitars. There are still the guitars, but there was a lot of you know, really like crazy, I don't understand anything about how this music is like boops and boops and things going on that it's like wow, like you're you know, that this like maximalist kind of kind of approach to music that that is just it's really it's really cool. And and um I mean I love I love that that ephemeral nature of it, and you know, that yeah, as you know, something okay isn't happening. Well, there's you know the barrier to entry is just is just so low, especially in a place like Portland where there are a lot of people renting single family houses. Like that's just how a lot of people live, especially if you're living cheap with a bunch of other people, and there's a good chance that if you're living that way, somebody is a musician, and so it just sort of can can just happen. I mean, I can think of so many times where, you know, especially back in those you know, Facebook events days, where I would end up at some random house show. I didn't know any of the bands, I'd never heard of the house, I didn't know anything about it, and I'd be there and everyone is singing along to every song, and they're like, Coming to shows at Poop and Crab House, this is the greatest place of world. I'm like, who are you people? I've never seen any of you in my life, but like you're you are as enthusiastic about the scene as anyone else is in the scene, and and you're just doing your own like little thing over here. And like there are, you know, when I I always laugh when I hear people say, like, oh, the scene's dead. I have heard people saying that my entire life because it's like, no, dude, you're old and you can keep up. Like, I'm sorry. It's like I'm not as you know in touch as I as I used to be. I've got a a friend who's uh who's a sound engineer and does some booking, he keeps messaging me. Uh he's in his 40s and he's like, Oh, do you know a band that's like this? And it's like, I'm gonna try here, but like, dude, you gotta get a friend of younger than me who's like in it all the time right now, because like the energy, you know, not that there aren't uh you know older people still in the scene, but like the the over the overall you know, energy like it has to come from that new new generation. It it it certainly is happening here in Portland.

SPEAKER_00 39:51

It all shifts, it always shifts. Like you're always gonna have like I honestly view it as like uh what you were talking about with the rave scene getting a foothold again. Uh it uh COVID almost like a forest fire, and the old growth was cleared out and there was just those pockets for the new growth. Uh, but also like when you describe like going to house shows, one of the things that I've always loved about house shows, if you're a beginner band, if you're just starting out or something like that, playing a house show is awesome because everybody's there for the party. The band is also there, but they're gonna have a good time anyway, versus going and playing a show at you know, I love Turn, Turn, Turn, but it's a very different vibe. You're there to watch the music, and if you're a bad band at Turn, Turn, Turn, it's a bad show. You could be the worst band in Portland and play the best show of the year because everybody's having a good time at the party. That is really, really big early on when you're like trying to become a band, when you're trying to build that confidence, when you're trying to figure out why you're doing this. Uh but yeah, I mean Neek, the other thing that Corbin talked about was like the the little pockets of the more music scene. It's kind of like tide pools almost. Like they have these uh insular little things. Do you feel that DIY scene like in Portland when you were here? Uh is is it kind of do you feel that sense of uh I don't know, communication between different parts of the scenes, or do you feel like it was kind of sectioned off into these are your psych rockers, these are these guys, these are these guys? Like, was there a lot of interplay between all of them back in the day?

SPEAKER_02 41:15

Yeah, I think that uh I've always been stoked on setting up like very eclectic sets. You throw up the techno joint with the you know, psych rock, whatever, you know, like throw a performance artist in there, a stand-up comedian, make it weird, like all these people hanging out with each other, right? Um and I think yes, uh Pacific Northwest lends itself to to that sort of mixing and matching. Um I do that analogy of the old growth. Um Forrest, I feel like, oh man, like uh COVID we we we we fucked up. I think like I'm not trying again, we're showing our age. Uh the millennials out here, I'm talking to you. I'm also talking to Gen Z. We did not pass the torch properly to you because there was a global pandemic. Yeah. And we f we failed you. And we're we're we're sorry. We are sorry. Like, like, yeah, if if if all freak scene is, it is my apology to the music scene because there was uh you know pertinent things to deal with where we had to be inside and couldn't have shows anymore for a couple of years, right? It's my apology to the younger generation. They crave, they crave the vibe, right? And I also think there is something to be said about all these posts I'm seeing of like bring back the feeling of the early 2000s internet, posted by people that do not remember 9-11, that were definitely born uh like like these are people who would refer to uh uh you know the the like when we were born as like the late 19th century or 18th, whatever.

SPEAKER_00 43:05

That hurts. That hurts. We'll do that to me.

SPEAKER_02 43:08

Oh, like like I I I went for a job at uh Neopets because that was one of like my early and the literally the for the uh the intake for the job was first of all a video that somebody posted to TikTok, which is very showing of the times that we're in. But they were like, yeah, our entire code base was written in the late 1900s. And I was like, uh I don't like them doing that to me.

SPEAKER_00 43:36

That feels personal and pointed.

SPEAKER_02 43:38

I will because we're fucking old. We're wise, we're old, and we owe it to the younger generations to fucking pull ourselves up, buy our bootstraps, and just like figure the scene out. We can make these fixes now, like oh, like boo hoo! Mark Zuckerberg made like a really great fucking casino five gambling. Machine that makes us bet our own like uh social uh capital uh against each other. It's like, dude, no, you're getting brainwashed to think that these people like you and that that's worth any sort of resource, right? None of these numbers matter. And then there's this weird aspect. Sorry, I'm having like a fucking breakout. Let's go. Let's go. Come on. I I see the stuff you post, and like you posted this thing now. It's like somebody's like, hey, heads up, like, if you're in the scene and you're playing with a Tory band, you probably shouldn't play with the same band like two to three weeks before, or two to three weeks after. And I'm like, no, no, no, there's no rules. Like, what the rules is that shit? Like, I don't know. And I see shit like that all the time that just makes me seethe inside. I want to chuck my phone across the room, and sometimes I do, you know, this is how you break phones, but like I saw this shit where this it was this kid playing guitar, and he's like playing guitar, looking all cute and stuff, and like just wailing on his guitar, like and he's like, this is a hook. This is a hook. Like just wailing on a guitar, and he's like, if you're a musician and you want the people on Instagram to respond to your videos, you need a hook. And it's like, dude, fuck off with this shit. Fuck off with this shit. I hate you all. It's all I like cannot fucking stand it.

SPEAKER_00 45:31

It reminds me, I worked uh as a search engine optimization for like a year once, and I realized uh the job was me writing blog posts for the algorithm to read. No human ever read it. So I was writing blog posts to robots to read. And it's like I feel like when I hear uh, you know, the the other people make reels and they have the reels voice, they have the pitch voice, it's like, alright, you've you've turned yourself into an AI thing. Like you are just saying things that will get you the algorithmic numbers. And I mean, the one that you're talking about where I posted that Twitter link, I knew for a fact that I'm doing this to get engagement. I did that specifically because uh when I post one of my friends' bands, it gets less numbers. And so if I'm gonna post my friend's band as the song, I want to get something that people will talk about and maybe get some clicks. Because I want people to listen to How Strange It is. It was a How Strange It is song. It's a great fucking song. Now 15,000 people have heard 60 seconds of it. Thumbs up, thank you, Twitter post. But uh, yeah, Corbin, uh I I love this idea of uh this sort of obligation that we all feel to the younger generation. Part of the reason that I'm doing this right now and uh do the reels or whatever, is just I want to also help them because the idea that the stuff that was so important to me isn't gonna exist there for some kid who's 19, 20 right now, that actually like makes me incredibly sad. Uh do you feel the same thing? Like, or you feel like you're you're trying to set them up for success?

SPEAKER_01 46:52

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, it you know, I I I feel like this stuff saved me. I mean, like, I feel like if I had not like found like music and like you know, indie rock and then like the DIY community to follow it, I could have certainly ended up like an internet libertarian, you know? Like if I didn't have that thing to like break me into like actual human experience, like the internet I think can you know make it so easy to to go down some really dark pathways. And and you know, I think it's so important to you know treasure any any kind of like you know real life community, but I think that for a lot of you know weird, nerdy people who don't maybe fit into the a lot of the world around them, like that's gonna come from like the arts and that's gonna come from music, and that's gonna come from like doing smoking weed at a party, like whatever it might be, these things all all coalesce together in in in you know important ways that I think like you know, like there's that um uh uh Reddit post that I've seen reported on several times now where somebody they they they they share a video of a of a party from a movie and they're like parties like this never actually happened, right? This is just like a movie thing. And then people are like, no, parties happened like like that all the time. Like that was normal. That's that's what and it's like in I in a lot of ways they they don't. And I think you know, it's it's a real thing that people's anxieties around being recorded on their phone, and like that really changes like you know, a lot of things like house parties are what they used to be, but house shows will not stop happening because like you you try to stop a musician from putting on a performance, you know? It's like they can't. It's like that's just what they're gonna do. You know that. Um, you know, it's like it's it's it's that so like the it's it's sort of an inevitability, and it's it's a way to kind of like you know keep something of that alive, even if like the culture otherwise like is sort of being like sucked away by lots of things. I mean, I I I have I have uh you know family members who are in their their you know late teens uh who do not have any kind of life off their phone whatsoever, period. Um it's like I know he's not out of the ordinary. Yeah, it's you know, that's that's not uncommon. It's not their fault for like the reality that they're living in. It's it's it's they're they're victim to a predatory you know model that's like you know been you know very damaging, plus like the general like you know inaccessibility of the world and like lack of third place. You could go on and on about like you know how they're they've they've ended up the you know the the the victim of the society that they were born into.

SPEAKER_00 49:16

Yeah, I mean we literally spent an entire generation sending all of the people that were the most accomplished students to go work on algorithms to make it so that you would never stop looking at your phone. Like we everyone that graduated from Harvard, Yale, like the people that had this kind of potential that either went towards making money off the stock market was like number one, and number two, it was making you so that you can't stop looking at your phone. And it's like this is the repercussions of that, but it's like ultimately I I always think of like my larger political project would just be to the like free time and nothing else. Like everyone should just be given as much free time, and that comes from my experience in the DIY scene, which is if you give these people free time, if you give these people space, they will build stuff that will last forever. That is not monetary value, that is like intern uh social value, intrinsic value. But like if you give people this type of free time, and they'll make house shows, they'll make bands, they'll make websites to capture the good, you know. It's like that's ultimately what I think the DIY community can really teach you. If you have any interest in like if you're listening to this and you're thinking about going to shows, like this is what we're talking about when we talk about going to shows. Yeah, you're gonna see a good band, but like this sense that uh what is real uh is something you can actually be a part of, you can actually uh communicate with or whatever. Nico, uh am I am I rambling now? I feel like at the at a certain point I get a little too uh preachy here, but like do you feel the same thing in terms of your relation to DIY?

SPEAKER_02 50:41

Yeah, yeah. And and I I I know it got like a little bit tech techy uh paranoid for a moment there, but I I feel like it's you you see it everywhere, and we are also victims of the the tech feudalist world that's being foisted upon us, right? Like you you don't say it outright, Kyle, but like in your like in the post that you had to sneak your song in with the controversial, like you are actively being entrained by the algorithm, right? That is what they do, they're brainwashing us to be better at branding ourselves as a product on their applications, and you don't get anything from that. Spoken as somebody who's gotten millions of views on on my things, who's gotten hundreds of thousands of followers on on applications. I have never seen a scent from Instagram, I've never seen a scent from TikTok, I've never seen a scent from YouTube. So if you're listening to this, and like maybe like I I feel like this is gonna be like a small portion of your audience, but maybe people who look at you as like sort of like a music influencer or whatever. If you're listening to this, waiting for the advice on how to like break out on off of your takes on like indie songs, like like don't fucking use Instagram and TikTok for your fucking art anymore. Like they are wastelands, garbage. Like, we are not content creators, we are artists. We would do this in a a vacuum, we would do this in a void, we would do this in a padded room, we would do this in a cell, we would do this at the end of the world until the world ends. And the fact of the matter is we are currently in interregnum, the world is ending. It's just not a paranoid thing to say, and we're still doing it, we're still making art. You just like put out an album recently, right? So it's like I think that we just you just keep making your your stuff, don't be brainwashed by like I'm not like and and get out, get out to a show always, you know? You'll always feel better for it. I even the bad shows are inside the world. Absolutely, you know. I love a bad show.

SPEAKER_00 52:59

Oh, it's the best. I uh you know, I've I've played plenty of them in my life, but uh yeah, I always I always talk about like if you're making art, no matter what you think you're making art for, you're making it for the void. You're doing it to nobody, you're doing it to nothing. If you think you're doing it right now for, you know, riches, fame, glory, or whatever, uh, even if you get that, listen to everyone that has achieved that, what will they say? That's like, well, that actually feels kind of empty. It's you and the void for for making stuff. Uh, I'm just like, right now, happy to be able to uh help guide people towards some bands that otherwise don't have much that just have no interest in doing any sort of online presence thing. But even that, like you're saying, like, it doesn't really drive that many people towards it, you know. If if anyone's asking me for advice on like how to make a reel, my advice would be just go read books and have something interesting to say. Like, don't make a reel. Have an opinion that you think is, you know, something interesting and try to just talk to people. Because it can help do that. I think I've talked to some interesting people off these reels or whatever, but uh that's why I wanna I I'm trying to get myself more active on freak scene.diy because I miss I literally used to spend nights just on a forum clicking the refresh button to see if the person that I was talking to, like there was no like AIM thing at that time, it was just we were talking through the forum. Uh and I like I I don't know, I like the feeling of actually talking to a person in the dark internet that we live in. Uh I don't know, Corbin. Do you feel optimistic that uh we're gonna find ways to use this technology to increase that human communication, or is the AI dark web apocalypse uh too too impound uh impending? Is the impending future bad, good, I don't know.

SPEAKER_01 54:36

I mean, uh, you know, like I mean, Mike, you're saying like end of the world and keep doing the art. Like I I'm I keep adding to my website. I mean, I I don't know, I don't care if anyone else is even looking at it. I just keep adding to it. I keep adding pages whenever I have some free time. I sit there and I add some pages to my website. I you know, like uh, you know, my my my photo website, and and so I just like um um I I I figure as long as the technology exists and I don't think it's gonna cease to exist, um yeah, you'll you you know, the we'll you'll find the the the the good ways to to make use of it. And um uh you know, I I I've been online since I was seven, eight years old. Like I it's it's hard to imagine not being online. You know, like I've always seen it as like, well not always, but I've long seen it as a as you know, like humanity's greatest double-edged sword. I mean, like it's it's it's it's brought you know humanity together and and then split us into into horrible fragmented pieces in in record time uh in ways that you know like you know could never be you know conceived of. And um, you know, the the uh ability to both you know connect with people and stay connected to people and to and to lose connection with people. I'm I'm you know, I'm I'm fascinated by how often I'll look up people I went to like elementary middle school with online and I can't find them anywhere. It's like it's like they remove themselves from everything. And I'm always thinking, like, am I crazy? Like, because like I can't, like, what would I do if I if I weren't online? Like where like and I try and I and I and I and I try to be on less, you know, I do other people. I'm I'm doing other stuff, but but it's like but it's just it's just where things are. It's just where like I you know, like I how I connect with, I mean, I I have some people's phone numbers, I have Neks, but I don't know I don't but I I maybe wouldn't until we built Freaksine, despite having each other for a decade. Um but you know, it's just um yeah, I feel like we're just kind of I I I I think building freak scene is is um um you know uh a exercising what what kind of power that we we have in a in a situation where we're broadly powerless. I mean we can't we can't influence these platforms, we're not uh we're not billionaires, we're not part of any kind of ruling class or relevant um you know class in this, but like we we still can create websites, we still can build these things that complement, you know, our our real life community and and that um you know can be relevant uh you know to connect these these these things together. Like there's there is nothing stopping that from from happening. Um and then, you know, yeah. Doing that instead, or you know, in in tandem with the the you know horrible platforms that we're otherwise.

SPEAKER_00 57:15

I love that of just like well, listen, they haven't enclosed every corner of the internet, and until they do, I'm just gonna keep making stuff. And it's like it's just I don't know. I think uh I I love the idea behind Freak Scene. Neek, you feel the same? Like, do you feel like you're uh I don't know, uh not to put words in Corbin's mouth, but do you feel like this is all some something of a small revolutionary act to just use the thing that they're trying to use to encap in um in encamp us, sort of like uh colonize our mind or whatever to try to use that to instead create actual human connection? Do you feel like that is uh your goal?

SPEAKER_02 57:49

How would you describe your relationship to Freaks and the internet is an empathy machine, right? It always has been. It's how it's how I've learned about communities that I don't have direct access to, right? It's how I've learned about communities that I didn't know I had direct access to, and now I do have access to them, right? And that's kind of what I'm trying to share with Freaksine. A mindset change that I've been in lately is I was so focused on the features of the code. I am a computer-y, I am a tech person, and I default to working on the features of the site and building the site out because the feedback loop is so fast, I know what works and what doesn't, right? Probably like you with your videos, right? Get it out there, it's short form, it's easy, it's just what I'm thinking. Um but it's really the like the the actual like shit that gets me the gratitude of the existence of freaksine is when I go out to a show in public and random people come up and they're like freaksine, like my name is Freaksine. My name's not Freaksine, but people used to do it with human flesh. They would know human flesh before they knew me, you know. If you're in a band, you probably have the same experience of people being like, oh, like you're the the band name, you're not the person, you know? And that is kind of a cool thing about DIY is being able to transcend the individual corporeal form within an artistic community without the internet even. Yeah, like going back to like Freak Scene as a tool, it's like I've seen bands that have formed on Freak Scene since Free.

SPEAKER_00 59:30

Oh, that's sick.

SPEAKER_02 59:32

I I see people playing tours in areas that they had no idea they could tour through, right? That's all I for one band to be formed from Freak Scene, we have done our job, but now it's like at this point where I'm just like, oh wait, like I could get I can it's it's fun for me. Like we talk a lot about the younger communities, right? We talk about like Gen Z. There's old heads coming up to me, being like, Look, like I set up a scene in Montana, and uh like all of our shows are being posted there, and I had like no idea there was so many people that are still trying to party this way. Like that feels good to me. Yeah, it's it's not an age thing, it's not it's not even an interesting. You don't need to be a computer-y person if you want to go out and go to a show and you don't have the means to, Freak Scene does have the means to right now. Portland is huge on there too. For all your Portland listeners, it is the biggest scene on Freak Scene.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:31

I mean, um Portland loves this type of shit.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:34

You're not on there, Kyle.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:35

I am you're you're not. I am. Oh, yeah. Actually, I was on real early. I just haven't posted in a while.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:42

You got an alias or something.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:43

No, you you guys uh I was on there. Uh I think I the name I use is because my online name is always Costco. Uh so I don't Yeah. Um but that was before fucking five months ago I was nobody online, and now all of a sudden I'm like this thing smiling strange. It's like, oh, okay, so I gotta maybe think about which name I use uh on everything. But yeah, I think I have an account under Costco because everybody loves Costco, which I learned from being online a lot, you know. Uh I would play Settlers of Catan on colonist.io, which is just like this is my COVID thing, and I would play as Costco, and everybody would say in the comment section, be like, hey, I love Costco, it's the best store. And I'd be like, Thank you, we try really hard. I just started taking credit for, you know.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:23

Um$1.99, you know?

SPEAKER_00 1:01:27

Listen, man, that's that'll that'll make me salute the flag is the$150 hot dog. That's a hell of a that's a hell of an invention. The European mind cannot comprehend. Guys, it's been an hour. Uh this was great. Um let's see. I I think this would be a good time to plug anything you got. Plug this could be shit you're working on, uh shit you want people to check out. Obviously, uh give a good spiel on freak scene, what do you want people to do with that? Um, but like also just like if your friends are doing anything that you think is cool, there we go. That's that's the bell. That was the end of podcast bell. Thank you, Corbin, for setting that. Um but yeah, uh this is the this is the time to plug any and everything you want. So go ahead.

SPEAKER_01 1:02:10

Um well uh that that was my main thing that I've been working on lately is the the baby. So that was the uh that was the function of the come back in, take care of this baby. Um well uh all I got to plug is my my own personal website, uh my my photo archive where I where I put all my pictures and I'm gradually building building out pages for every artist I've ever taken a picture of, every venue I've been to, every show I've gone to, uh, and then some I've got a couple thousand pages on there right now, so I'm always always adding more to it. That's just corb.in um website, just my name with a period in there.

SPEAKER_00 1:02:42

C-O-R-B, by the way, in case you're just listening to this podcast, uh I will I will put links on everything uh for this, but you know, some people just listen, so Corb.in, baby. Um there are pictures of there's a couple pictures of me. There's a good amount of pictures of my wife. She's in a lot of bands that are uh are secretly in there.

SPEAKER_01 1:03:00

Yeah, she's she's definitely she's definitely on there.

SPEAKER_00 1:03:02

Yeah. She's the one that actually gets recognized in public. Uh it just started finding switching. Some people have started to recognize me, and I'm like, yes, take it in. Uh but Neek, you got anything to plug?

SPEAKER_02 1:03:14

Get on freak scene.di if you've been listening so long. You haven't checked it out yet. All right, Kyle, you're on it. Apparently, it's Costco.

SPEAKER_00 1:03:24

I'll make a Smiling Strange account. I'll do that.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:26

I'll know it when I see it. Make a Smiling Strange account. Make it for bands that you've been in. Oh, yeah. You should have a page on Freak Scene. Uh you should have a Smiling Strange page on Freak Scene. 100%, yeah. Portland is the biggest scene on Freak Scene. I have so much respect for the scene in Portland. This is this this feels like my home scene, my origin scene. Um Mir Eye, Trigger Object, Sad Times Productions, Seattle area punk shows, a terminal from Denver. These are the real accounts on Freak Scene that are posting that are keeping this thing alive, right? Beautiful. Um it's there's so many people that are like just posting so many events all the time. Um, and that that keeps things going. And go on there and and and go in the forums, and you you can say shit that will get you banned on Instagram. You could say you could say things that would get you shadow banned so hard. Like, if also like in this podcast, like if there is any AI listening to it that's like ready to basically make Kyle's account not famous anymore because of some of the things I say.

SPEAKER_00 1:04:39

The freedom of finally being unfamous again, going back to being a nobody, it's gonna happen one of these days, so you know.

SPEAKER_02 1:04:45

I don't everything I say is a parody, okay? I I don't mean anything I say. It's in Minecraft, baby. It's in Minecraft. I love our tech feudalist overlords. They do great work, right? They made this beautiful app, Instagram. We didn't have Instagram 20 years ago. No.

SPEAKER_00 1:05:04

Um you would never have been able to hear me talk 20 years ago. I was dumb 20 years ago. I'm kind of dumb now, but I play a smart guy online. Um, real quick, we do have a lot of international people. Do you guys uh does freak scene work for international scenes or anything like that? Because I got people all over the world that uh comment now.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:20

Of course, we're looking into um uh making it like bilingual or a you know multilingual experience. That's like the one blocker right now for for uh you know globalizing this thing. Uh but we have the a UK scene, we have uh C DMX scene, uh I does Canada uh yeah, there's Canadians on there. Um Canadians exist.

SPEAKER_00 1:05:46

We've we'll we'll grant them we'll grant them that.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:50

But I love to see there's so like there's scene requests. So you request a scene. So if you're in Australia, if you're in uh you know uh ICE. Norway in Ireland. Corbin, thank you. Go take care of your kid. Make a scene request. We want to see it. I want to see your scene request. I'll make it, I'll turn it into a scene, right? Yeah, it's a it's a it's a global global experience. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:06:17

Well, thanks. Thanks again for uh coming on. Corbin had to run because he's got a baby, so uh that was you know, classic, classic baby interruption. Uh but honestly interrupting baby. Yeah, uh thanks again. Go check out freakscene.diy. Uh go set up a scene. I'd be super pumped if one scene came out of this podcast, if like one city uh somewhere started a scene on freakscene.diy. Uh let me know if you go on freak scene from this and you listen to this podcast or whatever. Let me know personally. I'll I'll try to promote that as well. Um and I'm gonna go on there, I'm gonna start posting things on there and see if people want to yell at me uh uh on the internet. I want them to yell at me. People are way too nice to me in the comments. I'm a hardened veteran of internet forum arguing. I've got I'm much meaner than I I could be much meaner if I want to.

SPEAKER_02 1:07:04

Yeah, yeah, I I don't know. You know, you gotta you gotta follow it, you gotta you gotta make make appearances for yeah but then this podcast is yours, right? You can say whatever you want and holds barred. Like um Yeah, I don't know. It's it's a weird world out there. Uh I thanks for thanks for posting cool stuff, Kyle. I wouldn't have I wouldn't have done this otherwise.

SPEAKER_00 1:07:30

So uh very happy to have you on.

SPEAKER_02 1:07:32

I was baited into the podcast.

SPEAKER_00 1:07:34

Perfect.

SPEAKER_02 1:07:34

Um, sweet.

SPEAKER_00 1:07:36

Thanks. Uh I'll just say what I usually say to end these things. Uh this is podcast. Podcast. Podcast.