Dunadonna

Dune and Madonna

I think I was thinking of Chris Cunningham and not Floria Sigismondi, and the line a link to MJ I think was a Janet line from their collab <3

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Hey everybody out there. Welcome to another episode of Jack Lila. So it's another day. It's another day in the world. It's another week. You're gorgeous. You're doing everything great. You're doing amazing. It's come to my attention. First of all, we're in a car. Just up top. Just FYI. We're in a car and I'm taking you on location. But okay, so it came to my attention recently. Well, just stepping back, I is it okay to record a podcast in a car? I think it is. I thought about this while you're driving because they did that series, Carpool Karaoke, you know, the James Corgan thing, so it's like a talk show while you're driving. And that's more involved than a podcast while you're driving. So I think it's okay. If it's not, let me know. If this is unsafe and unsavory, let me know. Because I don't want to be unsafe on the road. I'm big into road safety. It's one of my pillars. The five pillars of Jack, one of them is road safety. It really is. Road safety. I don't know what the other four are. I'm not gonna improvise. You don't come here for that. You don't come here for humor. You don't come here for uh glimmering wit. You come here for insightful commentary and and reassuring vibes. People don't know what Delilah is. I didn't realize maybe this needs explaining. Maybe this needs explaining. Um also welcome to I Don't Like This Podcast. In case you're new here, this is a podcast about things I like and don't like. Hence the title, I don't like this. No edits. Everybody else knows that. Everybody else is like, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, so I've been styling myself as uh gay Delilah. Gay Delilah is a great name, actually. First name gay, last name Delilah. Gay Delilah. Hi everyone, it's Gay Delilah. I'm here to spread some gay stuff in your ears. Queer Delilah. Gave her is queer. Ugh. Ugh. People who insist on being gay and not queer. Little brother. Oh brother. They write about it in the New York war crimes. That is where you write something like that. Or the Atlantic. The Atlantic. Those are the two places I think that you would write crap about being gay and not queer. Go off, sis. Go off into the abyss, perhaps. No, no, no, no, no. I don't mean that in a in a in a violent way. It's a love and light place. I just mean go off into the intellectual abyss that you seem to be on the precipice of. And explore it. Explore the abyss. Explore the unknown. That's that's that's a better thing to do than to write about being gay and not queer. That's what I mean. That's what I mean. People don't know what Delilah is, which is shocking. Does everybody not listen to the radio? Do people not tune in to Delilah on the radio? So Delilah is a call-in radio show that's been on for decades. And people call in and they have stories, questions, fables. Like, Delilah, I love this man with all my heart, but I know that he cannot be with me. And Delilah will interject questions and things. You know, she'll say, How old are you? Are you single? Do you love him? Tell me, do you love him? And they'll answer and say, Yes, Delilah, I do, but I just know that he cannot be with me right now, so he is with another woman, and it's not going well for them, and I pray for them, but I just know that he is the right man for me, Delilah, and I just I just don't know what to do. And Delilah will say something uplifting and reassuring, and say sometimes all you can do is trust in God and God's plan that if this is the person who's meant to be with you long term, then they'll be with you long term. It's a lot about God. She's very God focused. I've said before, it doesn't bother me. It doesn't bother me, I kind of enjoy it. I'm a confirmed Catholic from way back young. Not one of these, you know, nouveau converts. Not a JD Vance. No, sir. Not here. So Delilah's Christianity doesn't bother me. I find it find it somewhat soothing and reassuring. And she gives this advice, and then she'll give you a song. Then she'll give you a Lionel Richie song, then she'll give you a Backstreet Boys song, then she'll give you an Adele song. Something kind of on the theme, but sometimes it's very jarring. It's very jarring. I assume she's not the one actually picking things, but it'll be like. Um we're turning, sorry. It'll be like, you know, somebody'll be like, my son fell out a window because I didn't have him at my side the whole time while I was watching him, and then she'll like play like Don't Stand So Close to Me. Like some of the song choices are are raise an eyebrow. For me sometimes, sometimes not. And I think they're you know supposed to be on the theme, you know, she'll she'll play an Adele for someone heartbroken, that kind of thing. But it's so nice, so nice. Adult Contemporary Casuals, that's what she's playing. She's playing adult contemporary casuals, and she's always uplifting and she's always a positive force, she's always a beacon of light. She radiates love. Everybody, everybody calling in, I don't know how they scream them, but they all sound like they're on the verge of tears, they're at like a religious revival or something. There's a very church-like atmosphere to Delilah. And I think we need to bring that here to I don't like this podcast. First of all, I do like Delilah. So that's play the sound effects. There's no sound effects on Delilah. So it's it's a classy, it's a classy operation. It's a classy old school call-in radio operation. I do think call and radio is the forum that I should explore, that we should explore together. I keep encouraging people to call in, they don't. I'm getting texts, people text fearless feedback, but they don't call in, they don't give me a voice note. That's all I'm asking for, folks, is a voice note. Tell me I'm wrong, tell me I'm right. Tell me I'm wrong, then you better prove you're right. Michael Jackson. So that's just something we needed to clear up. We needed to clear that up. Dune 3 new trailer. New trailer. New trailer dropped Dune 3. I'm a big Dune movie fan. I'm the Dene Villa Nuve. I think it's Villa Nuve. I'm not trying to be cute. I I just think I don't know how to pronounce it and I haven't checked, but I do think it's Delivanouve. Denis Villa Neuve. Colton, correct me. I like the movies. I like the movies a lot. I enjoy the movies visually. I had not read Dune before the movies. I have since read all the Dune books. The movies are good. The first Dune books are really boring, in my opinion. I would say the first four Dune books are a slog. And I think right now we're just gonna talk about Dune freely. So if you're concerned about spoilers, please skip ahead to I don't know. How long are we gonna talk about Dune? 10 minutes? 15 minutes? An hour? Who knows? I can go on and on about Dune. So let's break it down. I've talked a little bit about this before, but not in a little while, and not not so in depth. So the beginning is the weird Orientalist Lawrence of Arabia Hero Boy thing with Paul Atreides, played by Timothy Chalamet. And let me tell you, I don't remember that much about that section because it's in my opinion very boring. I think it's very boring. There's a lot about like fate and predestiny, which is like not a topic that interests me. There's a lot of that in like Dostoevsky, and I didn't interest me there. It's not, I don't really, it doesn't grab me for whatever reason. There's a dog with its head out the window. Cute. It doesn't grab me. And it doesn't grab me there. So he's the protagonist hero for the first couple books, but he slides away. Then there's a couple books, or maybe only one book, with the the sandworm man, his son, I think it's his son, becomes the god emperor of Dune. He's part sandworm and part human. So he's basically like a worm with a face. And those are also a slog because yet again it's like this uh this being who can see all and know all. What is he what remains of his free will, his choice, what does he allow to happen, what's the future, what's the golden path that he's gonna take humanity down? It's a little boring. It's a little boring. Eventually they assassinate him, pushing him off a bridge, into the river, and he dies. And it's it's kind of a relief because also you know it's coming, because you know everything is coming, it's really boring. It's boring. It's not it's not like fun, like it could be cool to have like a plot device where you know everything that's gonna happen. So, how do you keep suspense going through a story when you know everything that's gonna happen? But it's not really like that. It's just a lot of like him in a room talking to this woman and it being like, are they gonna worm fuck? But not even there is a bit of that, but like, then it's also like, no, we're not. It's really boring, it's really boring. So those two arcs have to run their course. Then only then does the Dune series start getting good. So the god emperor of Dune knows everything that's gonna happen, blah blah blah, and he sets humanity down on a golden path. His empire crumbles when he gets assassinated, and there's a scattering of humans throughout the galaxy, the universe, whatever. And it's like a dark ages, so all the humans like lose touch with each other, and you know, there's humans out there, there's humans here, but you know, civilizations in shambles. Okay, so cut two, however many years later, people start re-emerging from the diaspora. And so there's all these weirdos coming back from the wilderness. And you know, in Dune, there's all these like societies. Some of them, if you've only seen the movies, you haven't seen most of them. But one of them is the Benny Gesseret. There's the Benny Gesseret, who are the witches, the who you see in the veils and things, the old women in the veils and things. This is Benny Gesseret, there's the Benny Tlylax, who are the cloners who I think show up in this movie. And all these societies have like Wario versions that come back from wow, all these buildings are for sale, and some of them are gorgeous. Um can't afford it, never will. Thanks, boomers. Thanks, Obama. Um you know it kind of is partially Obama because in the bailouts after the mortgage crisis, Obama let the who was it, the the Fannie Mae director, whatever. Fanny Mae, whoever could have had the opportunity to bail out individual people's mortgages that were underwater, he refused because he believed in like personal responsibility and he wanted it basically to be a lesson. So it was under Obama that America really did get fucked. And of course, they bailed out all those businesses. All those businesses. So really they bailed out business and not people. Anyway, so it is thank you, Obama. We can't afford this. Partially, I mean, there's a lot of people, it's a whole lots, it's a whole lot, it's all lots, they're all bad. Um so they come back, these Wario versions come back from the abyss, from the darkness. And one of them, one of them is the honored matres. And the honored matres are who you want to keep your eye on. So at this point, the Beni Gesseret have become more powerful, and they're kind of steering the ship of society. They were always kind of steering a ship of society, but they're kind of holding things together a little bit. But these honored matres come back and they wear red catsuits, and they use their legs to kill. So they're always kicking and killing people, they're extremely violent. When they get angry, which they do all the time, their eyes turn orange, and there is nothing that can resist the power of the honored matres. And it's all women, honored matres are all women, as their name implies, and they sexually subjugate men, so they use their sexual powers, and so in Coitus, they like hypnotize, sexually hypnotize men to do their bidding. So they enslave men, basically, and conquer worlds, and are on a like a killing rampage and are blowing up worlds, and their enemy is the Beni Gesseret, the witches. So that the honored matres call the Beni Gesseret witches, because you know they have all these powers of the voice, they can use voice commands to do things, they can force their bodies to destroy poison, they have all these powers, and then the Beni Gesseret called the Honored Matres whores, the space whores, because they use sexuality and sex to control people, control men. So it becomes whores versus witches, the space whores versus the space witches, and they fight and they go at it, and boy, oh boy, is it so good. It's all women. So the sixth book, which is the last book that the author, original author Frank Herbert of Dune, wrote, his son and then somebody else finished the series because the series wasn't finished. So there's two more books that come after, but they're not written by Frank Herbert. Outlined by Frank Herbert, but it's you know questionable how close they are to his vision or whatever. How much of canon they are. In the sixth book, it's almost all the main characters are women. It passes the backdrop test with flying colors because they don't care about men. None of them really care about men. Men aren't really in the picture or around. It's all women. They're all fighting each other, they're supporting each other, and there is, I think, I okay, so I think the sixth book is my favorite sci-fi book. My favorite sci-fi book I've ever read. And has my favorite protagonist. One of my favorite protagonists of any kind of book, Darwi Odreid. Darwy Odreid becomes the leader of the honored matres. No, sorry, not the honored matres, the the Benny Gesserit becomes the leader of the Benny Gesserit. And the sixth book, okay, so the sixth book, I'm really just going long. I'm just going long on this. Bear with, if you want, if you don't. I assume you're like falling asleep or something. Um, so the sixth book is so poignant because it's the last book that Herbert would write, and it's I think the book he wrote after his wife died. So his wife was a collaborator of his and supporter of his, and so she dies. And now, you know, he's writing a book that is all female-led, basically. And Darwy Odrade, his protagonist, this leader, faces an impossible choice where she has to figure out how to defeat the honored matres who seem undefeatable. And there's a new house being built. And she can't really defeat them, and she kind of knows this. And so she's on the hidden planet where the Benny Jesser are from. Oh my god, it's so beautiful where I am right now. I wish you could see this. I wish you could see this mountain of a peninsula in the middle of the lake. The sun's setting, it's like a pine forest all around, so the sun is just coming in horizontally through the trees. Lighting them up all golden. You can see the lake through the golden trees. She's overseeing the destruction of her beautiful planet. She sees out of time, and she's also seeing the approach of the under moderate, the inevitable approach of the under moderate to destroy them. Nothing is able to stop the undermoders. Civilization also the many deserts store her ancestral memories. So she has within her not just the memories, but sort of the whole people. She hears voices basically of everyone who's come before her in the society. So she has all the memories of everything they went through, and all the people are all stored within her. And a lot of the Reverend, I guess all the Reverend Mothers do, sort of the high witches. But they're all dying. So they're all getting killed, but then fleeing and trying to share these memories with somebody else before they can go. And there's, you know, when planets get wiped out, she's aware that not only are they losing everybody on the planet, but they're losing thousands of years of history that we're restored and uh the Reverend Mother is a very mournful. And she has to figure out what to do when she realizes what she's gonna do to save herself. The world, humanity. But you don't know. And she goes out on a tour of the grounds of this planet. She goes out, and also keep in mind, I uh so I listened to portions of this audiobook last year up here upstate when we were going through a big drought. So the lake here was dropping, dropping, dropping, dropping. It was dry, dry, dry. Things were dying. As things were on Chapter House, the homeworld of the Benny Gesseret. And she goes out and she takes a tour of the gardens, and everyone's like, What is she doing? This is so indulgent. Like, we have to be preparing 24-7 that the you know we could be attacked and destroyed at any second. Why is she going out and touring the gardens? And she goes and she takes off all her clothes, she gets naked, and she just walks into one of the lakes that's disappearing, and she just goes and she lays in it. And it's just a beautiful scene of her just laying in the lake, and her assistants and everybody being like, What is she doing? Hurry up, come on, she's wasting time. Like, we we could get blown up literally at any second. We need you to save us. And she just goes and lays in the lake. And she knows what she has to do, and you don't know what it is. You don't even you don't actually even know that she knows what she has to do. She's just going. It's kind of this mysterious, like, what is she doing situation? And then the book finishes, and you see what she has to do. She has to merge the Benny Gesserit and Honored Matres by letting the honored mantres win, and the Benny Gesseret become kind of like a invasive creature within the Honored Matres, and sort of take it over from the inside. And she has to die in the process. Or she does die. It's not clear actually that she has to die, but she does die in the process. And it's so beautiful because she knows that she has to go, she knows that she has to do this, not only kill herself, but also kill this whole society that she's dedicated her whole life to. That you know, all of her friends are in, and you've spent two books getting to know all these people and loving all these people and all these characters. And she has to basically kill them all. To save humanity. So that well, okay, yeah, she has to do this to save humanity because she has to go inside of the Honor Matre's, or you know, the whatever. The witches have to go inside the whores so that the whores can become super powerful and then take on the real enemy which is lurking outside and is what's pushing the whores to conquer the rest of humanity because they're escaping from the darkness from a greater evil that they've discovered out there in the darkness, which is actually an AI AI society, race, whatever, machines. But that's a whole other thing. That's in the last two books, which are not as good. But they're not bad. It's just really beautiful. It's just really beautiful and mournful, and just, you know, it's the last one that he wrote before he died, and after his wife had died, and there's a real sense of letting go and looking back and releasing sort of one last dip in the pool before it all disappears. Quite touching. Quite touching, quite moving, quite profound, I think. And it's all female-led, and that will be a movie that I want to see. I don't know that Denis Villeneuve is the person to do it, because he's sort of he's not good, I think, at like sexy weird stuff. He's more of like the visual grandeur. He does that really well. But he's not great at the sexy weird stuff, and there's a lot of sexy weird stuff there. The whores, the honored matres, have a race of like dog people, animal people, that they've animal men that they have genetically engineered or whatever, and that they control, and they're murderous, and they use them to kill, but also to fuck. The leader of the Honored Matres is a real freaky chica, as they say. And there's a scene where she takes like two of them to bed. It's wild, it's wild. So I don't know that Denis, Mr. Villeneuve, is really the one for that, but I think he's dipping out after this trilogy anyway. There is the only good thing I think in those early books is also some weird, freaky sex stuff. Where again, spoiler alert, so there's Saint Aaliyah, who is Anya Taylor Joy, played by Anya Taylor Joy. Who's what? He's Timothy Shalmay's sister, Saint Aaliyah. Anyway, she's what they call an abomination, so she whatever, she can remember all these past lives, sort of like the Reverend Mother's. She gets turned into Reverend Mother basically when she's in the womb, so she gets kind of overwhelmed by all these past lives, and they take over her. And the one who really takes over is the Baron Harkonnen, who is the big villain floating, you know, he's like the one who uses the suspensors to float around. He's evil, and so he takes her over. And in the books, he is an evil gay guy, which we love to see. And it's great because he takes her over and she becomes the lover of Duncan, Idaho, or whatever. He gets resurrected. It's complicated. Anyway, he's played by Jason Momoa, so she gets with Jason Mamoa, but he's possessed her. The evil baron has possessed her, the evil gay baron, evil gay guy's possessed her, so he gets fucked by Jason Momoa, basically. Jason Momoa doesn't know. Doesn't know that his wife is possessed by this evil gay guy. And it's freaky. It's freaky deekey. So that's good, that's compelling. And he actually comes back in the end, but he gets possessed by one of the Benny Gesserits. He's like Benny Gesseret Nemesis, who gets locked in his brain. And she's like, well, well, well. We're together forever now. Just you and I. It's really good. It's really good. It's really good. It's really good. It's really good. I can't wait. I can't wait. Thank you for coming on this journey with me. Thank you for coming on this journey. I just I think that poignant the poignant aspects of Dune 6, Chapter House Dune, are marvelous, the weird psychosexual stuff. It's really kind of a touchstone, I guess, for the book that I'm working on. Which is a lot of weird psychosexual stuff. And it's kind of poignant. Somebody dies. A few people die, actually. A few people die in the book. It's about war and violence and people's the psychosexual pleasures of war and violence for people committing violence. Fun, fun stuff. Um Madonna. Talk about psychosexual violence. Madonna. New album is out. What do you think? What do I think? This is really about what I think. What do I think? I'm enjoying it. I think there's I think there's stuff. The thing with me about Madonna is it's never quite as good as you want it to be, no offense. As I want it to be. I, you know, I'm rooting for like, you know, Michael Jackson caliber pop music and videos. Always. I don't know that Madonna delivers that. But she delivers charisma. She's always delivering charisma. And I love that. Moxie. She's got Moxie for days. And we love that. I like that she's looking back, you know, poignant. You know, we're in a poignant mode. Poignant looking back on her early career. It's it's it's it's fine. It's not blowing me away as I think it's blowing some people away. But I just I mean it's really not. The thing with Madonna. Here it is. The thing with Madonna is I think she's like Taylor Swift in a way. Roll with me on this. Alright, so you know how I feel about Michael Jackson was serving pop music of exceptionally high artistic quality. And that's what justified him being a star. Was that he was the best singer and dancer, he was the best showman. He put on the best show. That's why he was the star. You think about people like Bjork. Bjork is exceptionally talented, super gifted singer, writer, producer. That's why she's the star. That's why she's huge. Think about like Taylor Swift, and I think this is part of what makes her so annoying for many, or is she not the greatest singer, she's not the greatest dancer, I mean, she's not the greatest songwriter. I think she's a talented songwriter, she's not the greatest songwriter by any means. But so then why is she the star? She doesn't deserve it, quote unquote. But she still has something, obviously, that makes her into that. So what is it that makes her this huge global phenomenon? Maybe one of the biggest pop stars in the world, maybe the biggest pop star in the world. She has some other skill that's outside the musical performance. Whatever it is. Whether it's being trend savvy, whether it's gaming the music charts, you know, whether it's building a persona, whether it's building a personal narrative, whatever it is, she has that, but it's outside the musicality. I think Madonna has something similar. Madonna, not a great singer, not the best dancer, not an amazing songwriter. What did Cher say? Cher was on some talk show once. I don't know if you've seen the clip, but she's like, you know, God bless Madonna. She can't sing, she can't act, she's not that pretty, but I'll be damned if she lets that stop her. It's like, you know, that's kind of the thing with Madonna. She's not the most talented person in the room. That's not why she's famous, but she is famous and she is enduring and she's super successful, and she made herself a star. It's the charisma, maybe. It's the pivoting your career, pivoting your sound, pivoting your style, trend hopping, whatever. She's been able to do it successfully. And I think her and Taylor have that in common. I think it's part of what makes them both a little annoying in different ways and to different people, but it's that their musical talent is not undeniable. You know, Michael Jackson has undeniable had. Sorry, R D. Or not, if he's a bat person, I don't know. Um, you know, there's a musical talent. I think Bjork, there's an undeniable musical talent. Maybe you don't like her music, many people don't, but she can sing and she can write songs and she's an amazing producer. She can produce something that justifies where she's at. The other two, Taylor Swift, Madonna, I don't think can necessarily do that. I think they have these extra musical talents that makes them so successful. Does that make sense? And I'm not saying I dislike either of them for it, by the way. I already said in the last episode I'm here for the Taylor Swift music. I am, sorry. And the Madonna music. I'm here for it too. But the thing with both of them is it's like I can't, it doesn't take me to like some sort of like euphoria in the same way as other amazing pop music because it's always like this isn't there's it's not it's not it's not a full package or something, it's just there's the Madonna stuff. It's like this new video, the Dania. So Danceteria I feel like is one of the strongest songs on the album. You know, it's like hearkening back to Vogue, the lyrics are about her coming up and her emerging, and I think that's interesting hearing her look back on her musical roots and the point at which she became Madonna, the superstar. That's great. Love to hear that in a song form. And then the video. The video has Benedict Cumberbatch in it. Why? The video has a woman from Game of Thrones. Why? The video is like a grinder sponsored ad. Why? It's like what? It's not even a full video, I think. It's just like two minutes or something. It's like what what what? What? What? What? Like, you know, for an emerging up-and-coming artist, sure. You gotta do what you do. You you get who you can in your videos and you get who you need to sponsor them so you can make a music video, but like Madonna's got all the money in the world, I would assume, all the success in the world. Like, why not just put out stuff that's like reflective of your talent rather than something that's kind of half-assed. That's part of what gets me with Madonna sometimes. Is I'm like, why are we compromising on quality? Why? Why are we doing this? Why are we doing this? The other thing, okay, so I will say the other thing about Madonna that gets me is a Bjork comparison. So I think I think it's Floya Sigismondi, one of the video directors, I think is the video director for Frozen, did an interview once about how she directed video for Bjork and she directed video for Madonna, and she talked about Bjork as many of her collaborators do in glowing terms, saying, you know, Bjork invited her to do what she wanted to do. Bjork had a vision, but she wanted to hear my vision. It was a true collaboration, and she was so inspiring, and she had so many ideas, and she celebrated my ideas, and she wanted me to take the lead in places and let me go, and you know, some beautiful creation. And then she was talking about with Madonna, it's like Madonna really wants what she wants, and she has a clear idea, and she brings you in to kind of execute her vision. And I think that is maybe part of the problem from my perspective, just me, of some of the Madonna stuff. It's like you can't do everything amazing, you need collaborators. That's part of I don't know, I guess being an artist of any kind is you you pick good collaborators who work with you and they bring out the best. If you're a writer, you know you have a good editor, whatever. Um but you can't control them because you're never gonna be perfect at everything. So it's about like taking other people's vision and ideas in. I feel like Madonna sometimes it feels like she's trying too hard to just put out whatever ideas in her head because she's so sure of herself, but it's not always great. It's not always the best idea. Like that bitch I'm Madonna music video, which is sorry, it's tragique. It's tragique where she has like all the stars on a screen when everybody else is in a room. Watch the video. It's really, it's rough, it's rough stuff. And it's like I wish she could have collaborated with someone like young and cool who would have just brought something fresh and could have like twisted her vision and made it like cool, as opposed to like it reads as someone who's a bit out of touch trying to stay young. Love and light, love and light. I am a Madonna fan, I'm a Madonna supporter. That's kind of the vibe. It's it's a little too, it's kind of a lesson, it's a cautionary tale. I think Madonna is a cautionary tale in some ways of not trying to control things too much. And sometimes things are better if you let go a little bit more. And I think she could stand to do that. That was the advice that Bjork gave her in the song. Bjork, you know, wrote bedtime stories for Madonna, and Bjork has said that she wrote the song as advice for Madonna. So it's like, let's get unconscious, honey. This Bjork's advice for Madonna was like, let's get unconscious, just just stop the mind a little bit, follow your intuition, open up to things, but be a little less cerebral and intellectual. Just control, just let go. Let go and let God a little bit. Trust in your talents as an artist for the right things to happen. That's what I do with this podcast. There's a lot of trust. There's a lot of trust that I'm just gonna knock it out of the park. Boy do I ever. But only because you are my collaborators. You are my collaborators. And yeah, I mean, Taylor, look, I got some I got some feedback, I got some blowback. I got some blowback about my Taylor support. I do, I do a lot, and I get it. I get it. I think Taylor is more frustrating because I feel like her success comes. Her success is so much about like PR and publicity, I feel like. And I think it's very telling that one of the main people in the Taylor universe is her publicist, Tree Paint, her longtime publicist. Like that is a part of Taylor's creative team, is her publicist, and that seems really cynical and kind of gross and disgusting. And I've watched a Taylor documentary, one of her tour documentaries. I forget which one, don't judge me. I've watched more than one. And she talks about how when she grew up, she watched the VH1 behind the music, and she would always think about like the story of her life and what it would be, and what each beat would be and how it pivot, and how she would handle each moment learning from the musicians who went before her. And so she's a little too calculated, I think, in that way. And that's probably part of what's made her so successful and so enduring. But I think it is part of what rubs many the wrong way, is that she doesn't just let her musical talent speak for itself. She doesn't make the music for the music, seems like she makes the music as part of a product and a media narrative, which is kind of Charlie XX-ish about her. And that to me is just so depressing, and like that seems so bleak, but that's coming from someone who doesn't do any marketing at all for their podcasts. This one. Maybe I'll start. I'm thinking about it. Maybe I'll start doing some marketing. I don't know. I still need to get my Substack up and running. I have so many Substack followers for a dormant account. I haven't posted anything. Got a lot. I get a lot. Like I get new followers every week. So I need to get on there. After America, we need to get that up and running. There's a boat going by. It's just so beautiful here. Sun setting over Lake, Vermont, Burlington, Vermont in the background. The Green Mountains. Adirondack's on my left. Greens on my right. Oh, that's an R. Kelly line. People, I think, don't understand how ubiquitous the remix to ignition was. I don't think people get it. If you are too young, you don't understand how the remix to ignition would play at every party. And everybody loses. Every every party. You had to play remix to ignition. Is the remix to ignition? Uh-uh, fresh out of the kitchen. Mama rollin' and body every man. It was a necessity. Everybody would come on and dance to it. Sing along. Everyone knew the words. Unlock so what I'm drunk. Is the freaking weekend? Baby, I'm about to have me some fun. Our Kelly made some good music. It's unfortunate that he was a monster. Step in the Name of Love. I was walking down the street the other day, and there was a UPS truck blaring trapped in the closet. Which, if you don't know, I believe it was a hip hop opera. It was a multi-part song, an album about some man trapped in the closet, the physical closet, not the metaphorical one, while his girlfriend was like having sex with another man and they came out. There's a whole story. It was wild. It was a time we lived through things, millennials, we lived through things culturally. Well, if you don't know the whole Art Kelly Oove, I mean it's for the best at this point. But the remix to ignition was everywhere.

SPEAKER_00 44:51

I'm gonna be with you everywhere.

SPEAKER_01 44:54

Some beautiful red cedars here. These look a little dry. That'll happen. That'll happen to you. Those things get a little dry. And there's a lot of this invasive honeysuckle. Okay, there is an article on the New York War crimes about native plants. The New York War crimes sucks. Not a controversial statement. But the whole thing. I need to get into it.

SPEAKER_00 45:28

Hey, how's that going?

SPEAKER_01 45:34

The whole thing is sorry, I just got past somebody. So that's the danger of podcasting in public. Um a real moment. A real moment for you all. No, the uh the New York War crimes, their whole thing is always like they're gonna swoop in about something they haven't covered a lot with some reporter who's gonna come in and be like the condescending adult in the room. Is it the same thing they did with the trans coverage, where they're gonna have like whoever, Maggie Hayraman, gonna come in and be write the magazine piece about what is what does trans really mean? By talking to like three people with no experience, and she's gonna be the adult in the room about it, and it's like fuck this. Fuck this. And they sort of did that with native plants. They had a science reporter. Write about native plants and talk to like two people. Oh, there's an animal. What is that? Is that a porcupine? I think it's a porcupine. Or is it a skunk? Where is it? I think porcupines can shoot their little Oh, I think it's a porcupine!

SPEAKER_00 46:42

Hey little guy.

SPEAKER_01 46:45

You're my little guy. I think they can shoot their wheels at you. So I don't think you want to get close to them. How will this drama unfold? Who else will I meet on this path? Head back to the car. Where is he going? I've only seen porcupines in trees. I've never seen them on the ground before. I think you are a porcupine. I'll take a little picture.

SPEAKER_00 47:27

You're good. You're good. Okay, you're going that way. You're getting your tail inflated. Not at me. Not me. That was cool.

SPEAKER_01 47:43

That was cool. That was cool. How do we do everybody? A lot about Dune, a bit about Madonna. I'm gonna listen to the album. I like Dan Steria.

SPEAKER_00 47:56

Lower side girl.

SPEAKER_01 48:01

I could have used a little more profundity, I think. A little more depth. But it was good. It was good. It is good. It's good. You're good. Thank you for spending another 40 minutes. If you've made it this far. I adore you. I love you. You are very good looking. People are talking about it. Somebody has a crush on you. Someone has a crush on you. Well, maybe not. Maybe that's not even something we need to aspire to, really. But people do love you, that's true. People love you, and there are people who think you're a delight to be around. And there's somebody out there. Well, no, it's not about romantic love, but there is somebody out there who would just love to spend the day with you. Not even in a romantic way. Just uh just somebody who thinks you should be a delight to spend time with. Even if it's just quietly alone in a room together. Crocheting. Watching a TV show, maybe. I think a porcupine, perhaps. Turning into a space whore. No, no, I don't think violence is the answer. Oh, there's a little barn being built. So much work. So many people are so industrious. Oh, and they're living in a little camper while they do it. Good on them. Good on them. I wonder if the Amish are building this. There's lots of Amish folks. F-O-L-X around building things. Oh no, they're building like a house. I see. Oh, beautiful. Beautiful, beautiful. Keep it up, people. Abundance. No, no, no, no, no, no, no. No abundance. No abundance. Derek Thompson is a boogeyman. Alright, we're rambling. I love you. I adore you. Uh Audrey Hover. I've been listening to the Audrey Hobert songs. I do like um Thirst Traps. Not the most profound song in the world, sure, but she does capture something being young and obsessed with somebody and taking thirst traps and what was the line? Take thirst traps in the mirror in my room. I think I look bad so I take a hundred. I like that. I like that. You think you look bad so you take a hundred. It's true. You think you look bad and yet you take more, more, more, more, more, more, more. Cruel optimism. There's a cruel optimism about thirst traps, huh? Lauren Berlant. Call Lauren Berlant. Well, Lauren Berlant, rest in peace, or power, or whatever is culturally appropriate to say. Oh, there's a new A-frame. Or maybe it's just got a new roof. We really are sprucing up the homes out of here, huh? Money, someone's got money. Oh, no, there's like a log cabin. It looks like a unibomber cabin. It's kind of cool actually. There's no driveway. Maybe it is a unibomber cabin. Uh yeah, I like the Audrey Hobart, and I think that song is fun and sentimental. So we support the new generation. Go forth. Go forth. Go forth, go forth, go forth. Reading. Oh, I don't not into the book, but I'm reading, though I want to be in it more. Who wrote it? It's the gay guy, the gay sci-fi writer who also wrote. Okay, this house, no offense, is hideous. I don't know who built this, but it's so ugly. Vinyl sighting out here in the Adirondacks. Woof, it's also big. Um, some of these houses are not nice looking, but they are fine. We're going to attach the old camp style. Anyway. Anyway, money can't buy you. Money can't buy you class. What is his name of the guy that I'm reading? I don't know. But the book I'm finding it a little difficult to read. Like some of just the knit the on a line level, it doesn't scan super easily, which is a big pet peeve of mine. I love I'm trained in the art of magazine writing, so you know I love to write. So it reads very fluidly, and you can pick it up when you're sitting on the John or wait for an error line, flights. But that is not what he is delivering. And I'm not sure it's intentionally something. Oh, beautiful garden. Wow, there's so much to see out here, y'all. Come up, you all, y'all. Come on up, y'all. Come on up, come on up. Visit me. Visit me. I love you, I adore you. I hope wherever you are, you are doing well, and you are filled with love and light, and the people around you and your loved ones are all safe and happy and healthy and continue to be and will shine, and your friends are loving you, and you are loving your friends, and that good things are coming to you because you are a good thing, and like attracts like. And I may not like this, but I love you. I don't like this, I don't like this, I don't like this podcast.