Tunde Adebimpe

0:05Pushkin. This is an iHeart Podcast. In today's super competitive business environment, the edge goes to those who push harder, move faster, and level up every tool in their arsenal. T-Mobile knows all about that. They're now the best network, according to the experts at Ooclas Speedtest. And they're using that network to launch Supermobile, the first and only business plan to combine intelligent performance, built-in security, and seamless satellite coverage. That's your business, Supercharged. Learn more at supermobile.com. Seamless coverage with compatible devices in most outdoor areas in the U.S.

0:48where you can see the sky. Best network based on analysis by Ukla of Speedtest Intelligence Data 1H 2025. Every great music conversation goes beyond the surface. The influence that shaped an artist's sound. The moment that changed their creative direction. The story behind the story that fans never hear. Claude helps you discover those deeper connections. Upload interviews, liner notes, or music journalism, and Claude reveals patterns across an artist's entire journey, showing how influences become innovations. Whether you're a music journalist, passionate fan, or someone who loves understanding creative processes, Claude matches your curiosity about what really drives great artists.

1:29Try Claude for free at Claude.ai slash brokenrecord. Lexus is a company that believes in the importance of setting a standard, which I can appreciate as someone who holds themselves to lofty if not ridiculous standards, especially with the car I drive. The standard Lexus has set for themselves is to experience amazing. Lexus measures success by the feeling and emotions evoked in a driver, like exhilaration and joy. Amazing can only be achieved by knowing people on a deeper level. The standard of amazing results in a feeling in drivers that their car was built in anticipation of them. Machines that make you feel more human.

2:06Because a car that doesn't make you feel something is a car that stops short of amazing. Experience amazing at your Lexus dealer. Tunde Arabenpe is a creative powerhouse. He's a cartoonist, a painter, a director, a Hollywood actor, and for the past 20 years, he's been the lead singer of the band TV on the Radio. His latest offering, another of his many artistic pursuits, is a solo project called The Black Bolts. Tunde began writing these songs back in 2019, and after a stink composing music for the PBS kids' show City Island with producer Wilder Zobi, the two decided to set their sights on Tunde's growing collection of solo songs.

2:46Both Julio Buntin and Jafit Landis of TV on the Radio also contributed to the album, which sounds every bit as fresh and thrilling as Tunde's past work. On today's episode, Leah Rose talks to Tunde Arabenpe about how staying steeped in creative projects keeps him sane. He also recalls his days working as a stop-motion artist on MTV's Celebrity Deathmatch and why he thinks TV on the radio isn't cool enough to be considered indie sleaze. This is Broken Record. Real musicians, real conversations.

3:23Here's Leah Rose's conversation with Tunde Arabempe. so I have I have a theory about how you came to to record to finally put out the solo album so I saw that in the not so distant past you learned how to mix how to master how to produce and you started sort of like messing around in Ableton and you know you had been in TV on the radio for over 20 years so was was you learning how to technically use those tools was that what kind of like pushed you to do your own project not not exactly I think I I went into that I went to this yeah this place a friend taught at this this school um dub spot which I think is gone now and did some, you know, just kind of getting my head around Ableton and mixing and mastering.

4:26And I think it was more so I wouldn't have to wait for us to all get together while I was making something as a band and I could just be like, send people stuff and be like, here's a stronger basis for this. You can fuck around with it or do whatever. But I will also say that one of the things that that experience taught me of at least as far as the mixing and mastering end of it is that I absolutely am not the person who should be doing that with any of my own stuff I can do it but it's it would take me there are things that I'm working with Wilder right now who is just he is however he would put it I'm telling you that he's a person who's fluent you know doing that and i'm a person who like if i am pushed to i will sit there and do it myself but it is not it's not that end of it is not like i'm more a person who's making tons and tons and tons of voice notes and then taking those and making demos from them and And then kind of like sitting with someone and fleshing things out and leading, you know, like I feel like it's a skill to tag in the right people so things don't take forever.

5:54Yep. And just be like, you are great at that. You're great at that. You're great at that. And I want you to do that, you know, in conjunction with this project. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So how did you meet Wilder? Have you known him for a while or how did that relationship? Yeah, I've known Wilder for a really, really long time. I think we probably met in like 1998 or something. We just had a lot of mutual friends and just bands playing around in New York, like Brooklyn and the Lower East Side. But have just been like, you know, really been friends forever and have never worked together. and he does a lot of work with Run the Jewels and other projects and I actually got a gig doing a soundtrack for a kids show on PBS called City Island one of my degenerate animator friends from MTV as we all grew up is now just an incredibly generous and peaceful and wonderful person who wants to put good things into the world and made an awesome kids show and asked me to soundtrack it and so I kind of I called Wilder to kind of like you know split the there's a lot of a lot of music and just said would you want to like work on this thing with me and um and we started doing that just as as a gig and just kind of halfway through it I'd been you know I'd put these demos that I've been working on for my my own thing of these songs that i thought could turn into something else aside and i started thinking about them again and um i just let him know i was just like if you want to try something on some of these please be my guest and you know just like another thing to do and he worked on two songs and sent them to me just like even in the most like skeletal form and i basically was like if we could do this entire record ourselves together right here because it was funny because we developed this working relationship this kind of nine to five we got to get we got to get these notes in like we got to do all this stuff for peep for pbs kids yeah so then what it was a pretty natural jump to just uh working on these songs together kind of with the same attitude the funny thing about working for a show or soundtracking someone's like you know someone will call you about something you spend two days working on just be like this is great except all of it's wrong and you have to you have to change everything and you just realize very quickly that you can't get attached to anything at all you just have to it's hard but again it's also kind of freeing in a way because you're it's this thing of like as long as it sounds right in the end the, there's a lot of holdup I find either recording with the band or just other projects there can be a lot of pausing going like I'm not sure about this before something's done there can be a lot of hesitation so that's definitive feedback yes definitive feedback and it's also sort of like I know that this can go a million different ways and none of them are wrong and none of them are right It's just kind of like, you know, do something.

9:23Does it feel okay? Not sure about it. Step away for a bit. But also we had a while working on the record, we had a code for going back in and working on something or leaving it alone. And it was the code was, is this dry paint or is this wet paint? and there were it's great to have someone to bounce something off of where you're like no i really want to go back and fix that and they're sort of like i think it's dry paint and then you got to walk around for a second and just come back and be like actually you're right i don't need to mess with that and it's fine that i feel a little uncomfortable about it because we'll see that's the it's the whole part of putting something out too is like that's it's a circuit for someone else to complete in a lot of ways.

10:09Yeah, right. Like, this is, all these spots on the record that I'm not sure about. First off, no one's ever going to know. No, no one. Yeah, no. And also, like, when you're talking about engineering, like, I wonder if, I'm sort of fascinated by engineering because I don't think I have the tools to really distinguish, you know, like if something, you know, know people listen to albums like oh this is mixed so well and i'm like oh yeah like like i wonder if if you were to just mix the album like would it sound wildly different but now you know because you sort of have you've seen the back end sure i mean if i were first off it was if it was just going to be me mixing it it wouldn't be done by now it would just be it just would not and it wouldn't be good i'm i'm safely i can safely say i'm not like it would be muddy or it would be muddy and it would be uh i would scrap a lot of things out of frustration that someone who just that wilder would be like no just do this and this and this and keep working on it and it's done yeah yeah yeah i think most of the stuff that i was uncertain about on the record between the two was to be more kind of aesthetic choices where it's sort of like i don't know if this with me sometimes it would be lyrics and i would just say like i i like i'm i'm 80 percent on these lyrics thinking like this all lands really well for me and yeah some kind of sense because you know you sit with something forever and you're sort of like are these words anymore oh totally but it's uh but again it's like there's some things where you're sort of i feel like with tv on the radio i i would sit there for a very long time and obsess over certain things lyrically just because it's there's a there was something i don't know that was a that was a mode of being in all of that whereas with this um i feel like i didn't obsess a lot about things and if i felt myself going in to do that because ultimately it also doesn't really matter that much at the yeah but it matters to you yeah exactly it's me here yeah and also i feel like with tv on the radio it was sort of after a point you realize you're writing something that you're gonna have to sing literally hundreds of times yeah and so kind of like which is a bad way for me i i would say that's a bad way to think about writing anything you know like anticipating the torture of like saying this stuff that you thought was stupid before you recorded it and now you're like now it's stupid in public and it's great yeah well is there anything any songs that now when you're performing them hundreds of times that you're like oh i wish that i would have changed that the there are two answers and both of them are no um the first first the first part of it is i think i've been and it's worked out i don't we don't play those songs good call we just don't play that's a good solution and there there are a couple of songs where just on stage if i had a lyric that i thought was better that i never recorded i'll just sing that one.

13:42It doesn't matter. Great. Those are two brilliant fixes. Yeah, exactly. Don't do it or bend reality. Yes. I wanted to ask you about the title, The Black Bolts. How did you come upon that? I came upon it. It just came out of a lot of free writing. I'll just write just to shake the shake the garbage can of the brain out in the morning just free write whatever and look at it a few weeks later and think are these lyrics is this nothing am i crazy whatever and that was in there and the essentially it's the idea of a point of illumination in and some heavy darkness and um the idea of lightning actually realized like a lot of the songs ended up having this this mention of lightning or a theme of lightning.

14:44And it started to feel like the black bolts is a spark of inspiration that can come in the middle of a very heavy time or a depression or events that kind of seem to, you know, obscure the good things from your sight. But, you know, it's the whole, you know, thunderclouds can generate bolts of electricity that illuminates the whole landscape. And for at least for a second, you can see like the beauty in it, the tragedy in it, you know, all aspects of it. And maybe feel better about the, you know, and actually appreciate that darkness of it too. Yeah. It made me think, it's very evocative, the title, and it made me think that maybe you're making a metal album.

15:32I would, I mean, that's the other part of it. As I was kind of finishing it up, I was like, this is a very good name for a metal band yeah and maybe i'm a metal band now maybe that's yeah to do um but yeah no i feel like it's a it's a good uh it definitely works and it stuck as something that was like a good um like i think i before i even started um putting songs in order or knew that i was making a record i kind of had that as the a guiding a guiding theme and guiding set of words yeah yeah yeah that's cool what is the feeling in you when you realize like oh okay i'm about to put out an album are you excited are you nervous are you a little bit like do you get self-conscious i with this i feel like i was around it for so long because it just kind of got done and kind of in fits and starts uh they've been working on it from the end of 2019 until last spring so i feel like just you know with a lot of interruptions and and but i feel like that that's kind of the the timeline of all of those songs being created so I right now I just feel relieved that it's actually going to you know get away from me and out into the world and can kind of see what that what that does um and I feel like again another part of working on it for such a long time is that I'm not too attached or detached from any of the songs or the record I just feel like it's a really it definitely has the feeling of um we made something that feels like a really good gift, and now it's time to give it away.

17:31And it's up to whoever gets it. Whoever gets it physically or mentally or emotionally, it's for them now. After a quick break, we'll be back with more from Leah Rose's conversation with Tunde Arbempe. In today's super competitive business environment, the edge goes to those who push harder, move faster, and level up every tool in their arsenal. T-Mobile knows all about that. They're now the best network, according to the experts at Oocla Speed Test, and they're using that network to launch Supermobile, the first and only business plan to combine intelligent performance, built-in security, and seamless satellite coverage.

18:13With Supermobile, your performance, security, and coverage are supercharged. With a network that adapts in real time, your business stays operating at peak capacity, even in times of high demand. With built-in security on the first nationwide 5G advanced network, you keep private data private for you, your team, your clients. And with seamless coverage from the world's largest satellite-to-mobile constellation, your whole team can text and stay updated, even when they're off the grid. That's your business, Supercharged. Learn more at supermobile.com. Seamless coverage with compatible devices in most outdoor areas in the U.S.

18:54where you can see the sky. Best network based on analysis by Ookla of Speedtest Intelligence Data 1H 2025. The greatest music stories aren't always in the songs themselves. They're in the late night studio sessions, the chance encounters, and the cultural moments that shaped entire movements. For music lovers who find themselves going down rabbit holes about their favorite artists, Claude, an AI thinking partner, helps you explore those deeper questions. Whether you're wondering about the connections between different scenes, trying to understand what drove a particular creative period, or exploring how social movements influenced sound, Claude works through these complex cultural puzzles with you.

19:35It's built for people who know that understanding music means understanding the human stories behind it. Claude doesn't just compile facts. It helps you see patterns across decades of music history, ask the kinds of follow-up questions that reveal deeper truths, and works through the nuanced relationships between artists, movements, and moments. Whether you're a music journalist, industry professional, or someone who just lives for understanding the stories behind the sounds, Claude matches your level of curiosity about what really drives great art. Try Claude for free at claude.ai slash brokenrecord and see why the world's best problem solvers choose Claude as their thinking partner.

20:12Lexus is a company that believes in the importance of setting a standard, which I can appreciate as someone who holds themselves to lofty if not ridiculous standards, especially with the car I drive. The standard Lexus has set for themselves is to experience amazing. Lexus measures success by the feeling and emotions evoked in a driver, like exhilaration and joy. Amazing can only be achieved by knowing people on a deeper level. The standard of amazing results in a feeling in drivers that their car was built in anticipation of them. machines that make you feel more human. Because a car that doesn't make you feel something is a car that stops short of amazing.

20:49Experience amazing at your Lexus dealer. There's a lot of life that happens between 2019 and now. Oh, totally. Was there like seasons in your life or things you were going through that are, you know, whether it's like personally or professionally that showed up on this album for you? Oh, definitely. I mean, the biggest thing was, basically, I'd started writing these demos in 2019 when TV on the radio took a break. And then when I started to really get into it and decide, like, okay, I'm going to maybe look around for some producers to collaborate with or some folks to collaborate with, the pandemic hit.

21:37And it was kind of like, I'm not looking around to do anything with anybody because everybody's freaked out and at home trying to figure things out. So that was kind of a rocky beginning to that. But during that time, you know, wrote a couple of songs and edging into the end of 2020. has shopped some things around like nobody wanted to do anything because i think there was a lot of uncertainty but there were a lot of labels who were kind of like yeah we're not really trying to get anybody on our label right now we don't know what's gonna i think it was the uncertainty about touring and how people would like make a return on their investment um but that was definitely a humbling experience where I was like, oh right, it's not 2008.

22:30Nobody cares. Nobody cares about what I'm making. And that's fine. Which is fine. But, you know, kind of got it together, put some more demos together, and thought about Sub Pop because they are one of the labels that made me deeply interested in music and And also just the really foundational feeling of you don't have to be a virtuoso. You can make whatever you want. Just finish it. You know, that's kind of the mode. And you also, you know, it's very expansive. Yeah. It was a lot of teenage jet fuel from Sub Pop for me. and um yeah so we finally called them and they essentially said it'd be so great to work with you we wanted to work with you and the band forever which was not a piece of information that made it to me until i was talking to them i was just like if you if i'd known that like you know a while ago it probably would have happened um so they were really very down for it and two weeks after I signed with them and they were you know into making the record my sister my younger sister passed away very very suddenly like out of nowhere and um this is the person who I will say without um any hesitation is like easily the most important person to me in my life you know like sorry sorry everybody else yeah that's that's the uh that's the the case wow sorry yeah but thank you um yeah and it was heavy you know really a bizarre thing she was not you know was not ill was not um there was no lead up to it um so that you know going from oh i've got this record to make i just signed and like people are expecting something in a matter of months going to I don't want to do anything like at all I have to actually stop doing almost anything and just kind of regroup and take some time to actually process a lot of that because that was one of those things I think people had a lot of time to think in the thick of a pandemic of just like what is my life sit still and think sit still and think and have uh and they're they're also i think during that time there were there were a couple of other losses that i hadn't really processed that had happened in the last 10 years and i realized i hadn't really processed them because i was essentially in this band that was putting out a record and going on tour and putting out a record and going on tour putting at a record and going on tour and then this pandemic hits and this big loss hits and it's a lot of just kind of not i don't know if not not running away is the right way to put it but just suddenly having time and in that you know in the negative space of that time all of this stuff comes rushing in and you have there's no opportunity for you to not think about it um so that was a big my sister passing was a big thing but the other side of that is you know this person is such a humongous inspiration to me um the thing that they would want me to do yeah is to keep going and and writing and um do um yeah do the thing that like you know we my sister also was um a musician and and acted and just do the thing that we bonded over and yeah keep going and she would be like don't you can't you cannot fucking quit because then you would be a loser yeah that's my she's like and we are not losers we don't our family doesn't do that so there's a there is a song on the on the record that's dedicated to her the record is dedicated to her and to other family members.

26:47Which song is that? I can see the track list on Spotify. It's all grayed out. We can't hear it, but we can see it. It's the song. It's called ILY, which is I Love You. Oh, yeah, yeah. Very simple note to her and a thank you to her. So how has the grief evolved now that you've had a little bit of time? You know, if you've experienced a pretty significant loss, you know that it doesn't, it just, it gets better in some ways, but more than that, I think it just changes. And it, it sinks, it sinks into a place where it's on the level as, on the same level as the positive memories of this person or the positive aspects of, of your life.

27:34but I will say that making something that feels like you're you know that's a tribute to these people that you love or an offering to the spirits of these people that you love and lost is really at least for me was very therapeutic and I don't think art always has to be that at all but in this case for me it definitely it definitely was you know um and it was something to do besides the any number of horrible things that you could be doing to yourself totally to avoid pain or grief yeah yeah no being constructive and continuing to work seems like it could have a big benefit yeah no yeah and it seems like you have like a really healthy work ethic and it sounds like your sister did as well she she definitely more than me but yeah when i get around to it i've got i've got a pretty yeah where do you think the drive comes from i don't know i feel like it's kind of like what else am i gonna do there's a lot of it and i think if you conditioned yourself to put your whether you know you're doing it or not to put your messy feelings or bombastic feelings or basically any way that you kind of can't be in the streets like you can't run around screaming your head off about you know how wronged you've been you know by some by someone or how excited you are or how uh how you can revel in the nonsense of this world and events and people and feelings.

29:27But I think if you just through making art, if that's your way of processing the world or that's your anchor in the world is to be like, at least I can write it down or at least I can draw it or at least I can get a few friends together and make a short film about it, then all of it kind of makes sense. All of the shit that doesn't make sense, This is a place for it to make its own kind of sense. So when TV on the radio first started making music together, how long did it take for you to sound like TV on the radio? I feel like it's debatable because I feel like there's so many different ways to sound like TV on the radio.

30:13And it kind of kept evolving. It did. Hopefully it will keep evolving. but you know the first thing that came out under the name tv on the radio was pretty like probably a few months after dave and i met dave sidick when i met we both had all these four track tapes just weirdo stuff that we'd made and um when we that was kind of our point of like you know meaning and friendship was that we were both painters and both like made silly four track stuff or not so silly four track stuff and that was a compilation of that four track stuff which was all over the place and some songs that were a little more i guess like quote unquote produced that we we made together and to me that sounded like tv on the radio it's like this can be recorded in a basement with like one mic or it can be recorded in like a super cheap studio with you know equipment present and then and then with the young liars ep it got more real bandy yeah and that to me is also like you know that's to me i guess would be the a solid a solid version of the first iteration of a tv on the radio sound and then desperate youth like we didn't know what we were doing so it was kind of like is that why there's like two titles for the album well yeah yeah it's that and just like i feel like in a lot of ways it was a step backwards because we didn't know what we were doing not in a bad way really but just like kind of in a way of like well what are we doing because we went from working occasionally on this thing that turned into an ep that might have been a longer record except that someone heard it and wanted to put it out and then they're like we're giving you a record deal so let's make the next thing right now and we were sort of like i don't know what that is like i don't know how to you know like at least my my observation from it was there was a certain amount of new panic about what needed to happen and ideas about what it should be and all of that was that like inner band conversations or from the outside i think from both just what should this be now instead of just making it and saying that's what it is you know because what should this be is a real waste of time yeah you don't know but then after that cookie mountain became that's when you know we we locked in we locked ourselves in and we locked in and then that turned into a new iteration of of the sound but i you know i guess i would i would probably say like the first EP was pretty pretty locked down at least on on the recordings did you like it the first EP I really liked it yeah yeah which was no it was and it's a real you know it marks a certain spot in time just like emotionally and yeah just feeling feeling wise it's I actually haven't listen to I haven't listened to anything that we've done in its entirety like I'll listen to it when it's done being mixed and mastered probably I'll listen to everything the whole way through but I haven't look so I haven't listened to Young Liars like since it in its entirety since it came out but so why not just like throw it on one day like it's what's the why not listen to it?

33:59Because I feel like the, you know, the touch, I don't know, what was that? Was there a Christopher Walken movie? Is it The Dead Zone where he touches people and suddenly like a flood of emotions and like you can see everything that's happened to them and will happen to them? It's kind of like that, where it's like, I'll listen to them like, oh, this is good. And then I'll like hear one thing and just be like, oh, what a terrible time that was where I did this and did that and all that. but it's less and less but if I hear it if it's on somewhere I'm never very rarely am I cringing about it oh that's good I like the fact that we got it together and made this thing that didn't I know that people are just like it doesn't sound like anything else but that's the point no one should sound like anything else it's so good But it was also to be able to make, you know, get it together with your friends and make something that sounded like good and fresh and new and honest, you know, to you.

35:02And you knew it was fresh and new when you were making it. Did you have perspective? Well, the perspective was kind of. it was weird because it was i think the perspective was it was very shortly after september 11th that we started making that what ended up being that ep and i think the deal was this is the this is the most important thing to us right now is that we can we can create this reality that we can swim in and live in and like energize ourselves with so it was a you know For as much of a, whatever mood that EP puts people in, it was definitely an odd kind of pick-me-up for all of us to work on.

35:52It was like, this is something we have control over, and it's also something that we can do anything with. So that was a real, that feeling was inspiring, working on it. Oh, totally. Yeah, empowering. Yeah, that feels similar to what you were saying about the grief with your new album is having sort of some, you know, like a creative life raft at the time. Something to focus on and something to pour, you know, pour yourself into and process emotion through. Absolutely. Yeah, that's awesome. That's a great thing. Great thing to have. I saw when I was just like getting ready for this interview, I saw that Spotify makes different playlists and they have a cover image for the playlist.

36:41And I saw that TV on the radio is the cover image for the Indie Sleaze playlist. Oh, really? Yes, right now. What is the picture? It's a new promo picture. Yeah, is it a black and white picture? Might be. We're the delegates from Indy Sleaze? Yes. So I'm wondering now that, like, you know, I don't know if you saw that Yacht Rock documentary. No, I want to. I saw that recently. It's really great. But it turns out a lot of people who were considered Yacht Rock, which is a term that was made up by, like, an online comedy group. Right. A lot of the people who are in that category, that genre, you know, don't like that.

37:33Don't like that classification. So I'm wondering for you now, sitting where you're sitting, like, how does Indie Sleaze sit in 2025? And was it even real? Is it a thing? I don't know I don't yeah I don't know I it's really it's interesting to me because I think when you're in something it's also very odd because you like I'll never have the bird's eye view of someone who like 20 years later can look at whatever set of images whatever set of songs or records or you know the first person accounts or rock critic reviews like i'll never have that overview i kind of just my overview is i started making stuff with my friends and we went to see other friends who made stuff with their friends and we all and no one had a cell phone there wasn't any internet we got to we got to kind of we we had really cheap rent and got to make things yeah but i personally don't feel like our band was cool enough to be part of the indie sleaze scene really i just don't i don't i don't i don't i didn't see it but it's also one of those things where people talk about electro clash and i feel like the electro clash movement was like five weekends at this this bar called luxe and then it was that was it it was over you know but it was this whole just like electro clash like you know blew through blew through New York it was this huge movement I was like it seemed like it happened in a month at least in Williamsburg yeah yeah yeah yeah so I don't know it's funny it's funny to me to see that that's a thing because it makes me think about it makes me think about Seattle and grudge and or even like the summer of love you know that was also a pretty short period that is like oh my gosh we're still talking about it we're still talking about it and i don't i mean and i'm sure like if you talk to someone from when that was happening they can give you a list of you know you felt like something was going on but it's also

39:56the i feel like with us in our and i you know i guess like speaking for myself but the feeling that all of that stuff was active and alive and fleeting and not something that like like we're making the stuff that we're going to preserve in a glass case and it's going to stand the test of time like i feel like it was very much this is immediate moment to moment after one last quick break we'll be back with the rest of leah rose's conversation with tunde out of Bembe. In today's super competitive business environment, the edge goes to those who push harder, move faster, and level up every tool in their arsenal.

40:41T-Mobile knows all about that. They're now the best network, according to the experts at Oocla Speedtest, and they're using that network to launch Supermobile, the first and only business plan to combine intelligent performance, built-in security, and seamless satellite coverage. With Supermobile, your performance, security, and coverage are supercharged. With a network that adapts in real time, your business stays operating at peak capacity, even in times of high demand. With built-in security on the first nationwide 5G advanced network, you keep private data private for you, your team, your clients.

41:18And with seamless coverage from the world's largest satellite-to-mobile constellation, your whole team can text and stay updated even when they're off the grid. That's your business, Supercharged. Learn more at supermobile.com. Seamless coverage with compatible devices in most outdoor areas in the U.S. where you can see the sky. Best network based on analysis by Ukla of Speedtest Intelligence Data 1H 2025. The greatest music stories aren't always in the songs themselves. They're in the late night studio sessions, the chance encounters, and the cultural moments that shaped entire movements. For music lovers who find themselves going down rabbit holes about their favorite artists, Claude, an AI thinking partner, helps you explore those deeper questions.

42:06Whether you're wondering about the connections between different scenes, trying to understand what drove a particular creative period, or exploring how social movements influenced sound, Claude works through these complex cultural puzzles with you. It's built for people who know that understanding music means understanding the human stories behind it. Claude doesn't just compile facts. It helps you see patterns across decades of music history, ask the kinds of follow-up questions that reveal deeper truths, and works through the nuanced relationships between artists, movements, and moments. Whether you're a music journalist, industry professional, or someone who just lives for understanding the stories behind the sounds, Claude matches your level of curiosity about what really drives great art.

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43:27Machines that make you feel more human. Because a car that doesn't make you feel something is a car that stops short of amazing. Experience amazing at your Lexus dealer. i'm sure you you are aware of this but um wolf like me was playing at the super bowl yeah no i heard a friend told me that too which is was it in a it's it's weird it's one of those things where you'll get an email like like three or four years ago or something saying just like Like, we're going to use this for a commercial for 15 seconds or whatever. And you're like, okay, that's that. And then you'd have no idea where it shows up.

44:09Is that like a nice check, though? Like, is that a good thing? Yeah, I mean, I don't know how many times they played it. I think I saw, so I looked it up on Reddit, and apparently, I guess, Fox NFL plays it in their broadcasts. Okay. I mean is it a nice check? I don't know I guess we'll see but it's a check yeah yeah yeah that's nice it's a check it's also like I don't know I got laundry lists I got subscriptions and issues with all of that stuff but I'm glad people are hearing the song the vessel isn't always awesome yeah yeah yeah totally But I'm glad people are hearing the song, yeah. Did you have an expectation?

44:58Because I know growing up you've always been into art. You've always drawn. Did you have an expectation at any point to make money? Or was it like a total surprise? I think I've always, well, I was at an expectation to have a job. Yeah. To turn it like where I knew it's like this isn't a, it's not a hobby for me. like for better or for worse because i'm incapable of doing anything else you know like well um or just this is what i've been doing and what i want to do but you know i think you have examples of like when i the first thing i thought i was gonna do was make comics like make underground comics or you know at first i think it was much younger i was like i'm gonna do a comic strip like calvin hobbs yeah of course like telling my dad that who's like an immigrant from nigeria who grew up in a village and worked his way up to being like you know a medical director in a in a hospital somewhere he's like well how are you going to make money yeah and i said i don't know i don't know do people make money doing that he said well of course and then he would you know actually be like here's the just there's actually a book in the library that shows what commercial artists make and here's what a comic strip artist makes poor strip here's who you write to to get all the stuff in so there was always this idea of just like there's a way to make yeah this thing i want to do like i would i will have to hustle and and make money doing it and but i and i also never like and i still you know was never there's never any part of me that was like i'm gonna do this thing and i'm gonna make so much money yeah so much money and that's exactly why i'm gonna do it because i'm gonna make so much you know it's like never it's the people that i looked up to who you know like i said these underground comic artists or even like superhero comic artists where They're just like, I make a hundred bucks a page and I turn in 30 pages and I'm like, you know, and you're like 15 and you're like, that sounds great.

47:16You'll realize it's like literally backbreaking work to sit there like at a table for like forever to do that. But, you know, there's always some idea of like, I have to turn this into a job however I can. Like I have to support myself doing this thing. and the idea that like you also don't like thinking like about make any kind of being an artist is there's no you don't really retire yeah no like i don't think there's not a point where i'm gonna be like okay that's it i did enough and now i'm gonna like yeah sit on the dock of the bay wasting time go to margaritaville watch a million a million sunsets yeah no but but it's the there's there's definitely always a part where it's sort of like i want to be doing this creative work i want to have this mode of processing you know being alive in events and feelings and i'd like to be able to support myself doing that and if i'm not able to directly support myself doing this creative work i i'm gonna hustle and find something else to support that creative work yep how did you get a job at celebrity deathmatch how did that happen and what were you doing there i was animating i was making puppets beat the shit out of each other for for a few years um yeah making that's that's what i was doing at deathmatch and i got the job because i i was at um the school in new york i was at nyu and i went there for live action directing and within two years realized that i was really not, I was not a good director because I didn't feel comfortable telling people what to do.

49:19Yeah. I would just be like, here's the scenario, just like, do what you want. Do what you want. And I'll just, you know, we'll film it and we'll edit it and it'll be what it's, it'll be what it's going to be. You know, everyone's like in their like teens or early twenties and like no one's listening to each other. And I was kind of like, I don't want, it's just, it wasn't, it wasn't for me and since I you know like drawing and animating I ended up going into stop motion like yeah like junior year and uh really like loving it you know like I think I saw the nightmare before Christmas it was kind of just like oh yeah like that that's what I want to do that's that looks great and so like I ended up like my my short film ended up winning an award at the end of the year and Everyone else was, you know, at that time doing really kind of early computer animation as they were graduating.