David Byrne
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Hey guys, it's Spadoodle. You can always go to davidspade.com to look at my tour dates because I bless a lot of cities in America with my hilarious stand-up act. Or you could not go to it and get on my enemy list. Up to you!

Yes, I have actually stayed at Airbnbs from time to time. And truth be told, I do really like them. I'm being totally honest right now that I've had great experiences with them. Yeah, I mean, you can have your look at you go get your own place, get your own pool, your own living room. You're not going to walk in an elevator. You're not going to see people when you're walking around in your undergarments. Yeah.

Yes. And if you don't understand what we're talking about, you should go online. What we're saying is you have a house with a kitchen and a bathroom and it's just for you, tailored for you. You liked your Airbnb over a hotel. Yes. And I do think I've had relatives stay nearby and sometimes it's very nice for them to do an Airbnb and have a little house and they're not underfoot. The last thing you want is your house guest to say, excuse me, um,

Where would I find a towel? That's a toughie when it's because they're naked. Well, it's like the 1800 time you say on the towel rack. Yeah. Thank you. I was going to look there. People don't even think hotels sometimes just go, hey, I'll go there. I'll get an Airbnb. So you won't regret it. So, guys, we got David Byrne.

Kind of a legendary dude in the music world, obviously with the Talking Heads and then solo stuff. It's interesting when Dana and I get to talk to a guy like this because he does have that wispy SNL connection because he was on with the Talking Heads in 1979 and then he went on solo in 89 and 2020. You have to be doing well to have that big of a gap in between. That means you're still...

churning it out and it's still working and people are still buying it and that's hard to do longevity but you hear his name all the time and you still hear it about you know Broadway um and the things he does he's such a smart dude this was an interesting one because Dana and I were in a little over our heads which is fine but uh

I have on my iPod or whatever old thing I have, I have Burning Down the House. I have Wild Wild Life, which is a real toe tapper. And it's fun to talk to a guy like this. He's just very bright. The dude is a genius. He wears those, he wore that big coat in that, I think, same as it ever was video. And I wore a big coat in Father of the Year, which is a huge hit on Netflix.

I'm not even saying that sarcastically. It was a hit. Look, check it out. Why does no one believe me? It was anyway. So we have that in common. Someone told me the other day we have being a Leo in common. And then they pitched me a show at breakfast. And I'm like, he goes, listen, I'm a good guy. Listen, we're both Leo. So I'm like, that's your wispy connection to me. First of all, I'm not a Leo. So our wispy, wispy connection is over.

You're back to a total stranger. All right, anyway. Here's David Byrne, and we hope you like it. You like it, Juice? When David Byrne comes on the Zoom. Dana, that's the guy. I'm on the Zoom. Wait a minute. I'm nearsighted. Hey, David. Oh, my God. I'm on the Zoom. How are you doing? Oh, we're doing incredible now that you're here. Nice to meet virtually. Yes.

This is, uh, is this your first zoom today? No, it's my second one today. Really? Did you, did you have one with Lorne Michaels earlier? You'll find David and Dana. Um, well, we'll try to make this interesting. Here's my first question, David. This is just to kind of be a little pithy. Has anyone ever used your last name against you in an argument? You burned me burn.

No, I don't think so. But yeah, there's been some probably plenty of articles where they did make puns, make puns like that, you know, burning down the house. But we like with my name. All right. Things like that. Yeah. Yeah. I was called Dana Carkeys in grade school. It drove me nuts.

Why car keys? Car V, car keys. It didn't even make sense, but it brutalized me. I'm still wounded. It's basic bullying. David, my name is David Spade. Nice to meet you. First of all, I'm a little nervous because David has such a vast...

career and it's almost too much and we it's almost like it is almost too much i i got exhausted doing too much too much you it well or not enough but you've done so much it's really kind of amazing i just i want to ask you things you haven't been asked for but what i observed when i was watching you in some of these videos is uh the way you move so i think of you as a dancer first

And then singer, songwriter, filmmaker, and pretty much everything artistic. So was that conscious? Because it's kind of Polynesian to me. It's sort of slow, but it's very graceful. And it's graceful and it's inside the loop. You never are frenetic. It's very interesting to watch. Anyway, am I the first person to ask you that? Or maybe the 20th? I have been asked. You're like, where does your dancing come from? I made a conscious. Looks like you're falling.

Uh-huh. You're constantly tripping. That's what it looks like. There it is. Yeah. Pretty early on, I thought to myself, I don't want to dance, move like other people.

kind of rock and roll. Mick Jagger or James Brown. Yeah. So I thought, oh yeah. I mean, that's where the bar was set kind of. Yeah. Those people and many others. And I just thought, well, there's no way I'm going to do that. And besides, they've kind of cornered that, but they do that and they do it really well. So I have to find something that works for me. So for a long time, I didn't do anything. And then gradually, little by little, I started kind of

Figuring out moves and things that kind of felt like they were coming from me and that they emerged from the music. And they didn't feel like they seemed like anything else that I'd seen out there. They seemed a little bit odd sometimes. Well, it's charismatic because there's no overt effort.

And it just seems to work. I was watching the Jimmy Fallon thing from your show. That's what humans do. And your little choreography with everyone and how you'd go up and do the chorus and you come back and you're barefoot. I don't know. It's very charismatic because it's ultimately asking us to go at you. You're not coming at us with a lot of energy. It's all just so relaxed. And you could do it till you're 90. Pretty much, I'm hoping. And then, yeah, I tend to go for things that

Don't look like I've had a lot of dance training, which I haven't had. So they're the kind of thing that...

I'm, I hope that other people see it and go, Oh, I could do that. Uh, I could be a dancer. If this guy can do it, I can do it. Yeah. Okay. I'm going to write that down. No, moving to the music. It's very charismatic. So anyway, uh, David, do you have a question? Not you, David Byrne, but you, I know that, uh, of course I, yes, I was a little nervous because he is, uh,

He's very smart, and I'm very smart, and Dana might feel weird on this podcast. I feel like a third wheel. I've got two giant brains in front of me. But I've seen interviews with you, and you seem like very light on your feet, and that was my first kind of thing because I grew up, my brother is smarter than me, and he's very artistic. He eventually got into design. He started that Kate Spade handbag company with his wife, and he was so, you were his favorite band, and so I'd hear it,

I didn't quite grasp the coolness of it. I just always thought it was surfacy, I like the songs, and then the older you get and you start to get in the words and what you're doing, there's so much going on there that it makes it even more layers and layers and layers.

And so that was fun. And then I, when I, when I saw that you were kind of fun and light in your feet, that was nice to see because sometimes you don't know what personality is behind all that when you're so smart like that. And it's, it's great that it made it less nervous to talk to you. Oh, good. Yeah. I'm glad it comes across that way. Yeah. I wouldn't want it to be like, oh, he thinks he's so smart. And, uh,

Yeah, because I'm really smart and I'm a little prickly to deal with. You're incredibly smart. But anyway... Oh, okay. I keep throwing that in there, but no one even agrees. I think you come off anti-pretence. There's no sense of like, look what I'm doing, you know, at all. It just feels...

And I think for an artist, first time I'm going to use the word, playful and childlike in some ways and loose. So I don't know. It's very interesting to watch. Thank you. Yeah, yeah. I really enjoy it. And I hope that your audiences can sense that I'm enjoying myself and having fun and sometimes having a laugh with it. Well, Dana, you know that he's got an Academy Award, a Grammy, a Tony, and a Golden Globe. So he's got an EGOG.

But a lot of people are going for the E-got. No, no. So, yeah. Oh, yeah. There's no E. Yeah, there's no E. So not quite. You've got a God-got. No, you don't have the E. You really need a vowel. You need something to keep this going. But Golden Globe is...

Good. So what's Emmy? Is Emmy on the future? Is this burning? Is this killing you that you don't have an Emmy? It's killing me that I don't have one. That's all I think about now. I'm in TV and I don't have one. And you might graze by it and win one. And I'm over here struggling every day in the salt mines. Well, no, I honestly, no, I don't think about it. I don't think about it. But yeah, I don't. You got enough stuff. I have a starting live question because this is sort of the idea how we tricked you into this, but-

But we don't have to talk about only starting live. When you go on, I always wonder with the music guests, and I never asked when I was there, do they tell you what songs to pick? Or do you say, I want to do these in what order? Because you get two songs. I remember early on, early on, I seem to recall being very pushy about it.

And saying, yeah. Oh, they were. I was very pushy. I remember myself being very pushy and going, I want to do this. I want to do this. And I think at one point, I don't know if it was on Saturday Night Live or Letterman or some show where I said, I want you to shoot it in black and white. Oh, bold. Yeah, it was really, I was really pushy, you know, say, you know, I want something that looks a little bit different, et cetera, et cetera. And it, they, yeah. Yeah.

So it was, but I go back and forth the record company where they say, we'd like this one sort of out there to help this album or whatever back then. Yeah. I kind of learned, you know, you learn after a while, you go, you got to give them the single or the song that's being promoted. And then for the second one, you can put in, you know, you can be a little more artistic and show them kind of the breadth of kind of the range of what you're, you're doing.

Again, yeah, of course. That's what I kind of remember is that the first one I usually knew, I remember when Pearl Jam was on and I, that was sort of my era when I was there and, uh,

But I was never one to get music right away, like I told you with my brother. So I liked Pearl Jam by the time they came back. And I liked Nirvana by the time they came back. And so I go, are you going to do a live? And they go, we did it last time. I go, you did? So by that time, I loved it. So then I started to pay attention. But I'm always about a year back, like Europe.

Um, so, well, I, I was introduced by Lorne Michaels cause I was staying at his house in 1986 before I was on SNL, but I was cast on SNL and I stayed for a month and the talking heads played. I I'm, I don't want to exaggerate. I'd say 12 hours a day throughout the house. Wow. You may find yourself, you may find yourself. And I fell in love with it. I was aware of you guys and I knew that it was new, you know, it was a new, uh,

Like your singing phrasing was like popped out to me like Sinatra or something. Yeah. You know, it's what when did you first get that? Was that always there when you started your first band that you don't I don't know how you describe your vocalization, but it's very you. There's no one else does it quite like that.

It was a little more Yelpy at first. Oh, I did want to say that. Yeah, it was a little more Yelpy at first. And then gradually, kind of listening to other singers on records and things, I thought, oh, you know, I can...

I can actually sing a melody if I have to, and I can do this. And that might be a way to get some things over. I thought the same thing, but it didn't work out. I might be able to do that. I remember the last time we were on Saturday Night Live, which is probably 2020 with John Mulaney, right? Yeah. Wow. Just before the pandemic, like weeks before, after we did the rehearsal,

I got invited or should I say called into the meeting with Lauren that the entire cast goes into. And I thought, Oh, this didn't happen before. What what's, what's going to happen. And yeah,

He gave me some notes, you know, single notes, sing me out and gave me some notes. What do you remember them? Wow. I think he probably camera. Yeah, it was. No, it was not about the moves. It was something about my vocal delivery. He felt it was a little too aggressive or something or other. There was some comment about adjusting my vocal delivery. Okay. And I wasn't sure exactly what he meant, but I thought, okay, okay, I'll just go.

Keep that in mind. Whatever he means, I'll keep it in mind. Yeah. God, I can safely say I've never heard of that. I've never heard of Lorne giving notes to music except, you know, Sinead O'Connor telling her not to rip up the picture of the Pope, but it was a little late. Yeah. He goes, you know, that's the stuff for rehearsal. And then he handed her some scotch tape and said, it goes back together just as easily. It was ripped.

Maybe no one will notice. But probably a lot of people would give notes in, you know, one word, you know, basically like we're about to start a sketch and you would just say, oh, it has to breathe just like that. You know, probably with you would be like if you could bring it down a notch and let it come to you or something like that. Usually there's some wisdom in it, but I, you know.

I wouldn't give you notes. I wouldn't have the guts to say, David, when it comes to singing, I... But Lauren... I like that you say black and white because you're sort of a pre-Kanye where these artistic minds come on there and it feels like it's a certain stamp. I know the look of where the music is. I know the coloring of the lighting every week. I know what it's going to look like. And it does take someone to walk in and say,

what if we shoot a little differently or what if we shot it over there or what if we shot it outside or what if we made it black and white? I like that because no one does that. They just come in, they do it and leave like you're supposed to. And I love that you're throwing things out though. It was, I didn't want it to have like the standard rock and roll lighting with the colored lights flashing and all that kind of stuff. I thought, how can I eat? How can I easily avoid that? And so that was probably the idea there.

But by the time we went in in like 2020 or whenever, there was much more. There was much more kind of a collaboration with the director and the lighting people and everybody was super accommodating. Like, OK, we've seen what you're doing, so we'll try and do that.

Right. When I was there, it was only, Dana, do you agree? It was only for blocking. Like they would come in on probably Thursday before we would rehearse. We didn't even get to rehearse until Thursday night, the sketches. That's how late in the game, if people don't know that. So music comes in and they get like an hour or two, but they do their songs. It's really cameras going to get here. They just want to see the song just for cameras, but it was always the same lighting pretty much. I think later in the years they started to play with it a little bit, but

I don't think there was a lot of thought. I do like when they play with it. And guys like you are great because, you know, that's what you want. You want different. You want a memorable. Is it kind of interesting you, David, like David Byrne? I never think you're talking to me. Don't worry. Just that when you have a long career and then it becomes long and then you come back and you look great.

you're at the top of your game and do people like in my little teeny world i'll go a little comedy club and i feel like i'm a museum piece like he's still here i still recognize him and he's doing the church lady so there's there is this people must respond in a different way i or just in a warm way or there's something and it's like lorna there's something about seeing you again

And you look great. You move great. The songs are great. Your voice is still there. Perfect. Voice is strong. You can comment on that or not. I'm talking too much. Go ahead. Yeah, there's always a portion of the audience that are kind of the original fans that are kind of my age or just a little bit younger maybe who have a kind of legacy sense of

All that. Their journey. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. That's part of their journey, too. And that's kind of nice. They I think they expect to see something different from me, which is a nice kind of opportunity for me. And of course, the younger audience that comes often has no idea what to expect. Yeah. Yeah.

I think they expect that they just picture one of their songs and they're going to do it exactly. That's the way I picture concerts. And when you come out, at least you come with that baggage of, which is baggage sounds negative, but they know that you are out of the box. And so anything's really possible when you're out there. So not to expect really anything. Yeah. Yeah. As long as you get on, uh,

you don't antagonize them or give them things, do things that are just like, Oh, I'm going to off the audience by indulging myself in, uh,

you know, a half hour of just talking to you or drum solo. Yeah. Yeah. The drum solo, whatever. Yeah. Well, I have a question about, Oh, go ahead, Dana. Oh, I, I would just like, you've managed to just always surprise. And so, you know, I just want one lane of show business is money and how to do that. And you keep reinventing yourself all around a certain general theme, but it is always new. Um,

And so how did you, did you ever get an offer to sell out? Yeah. Like in the 80s, a commercial and just for millions of dollars or something like that? Or how have you managed to stay an artist again, all the way through, stay totally cool and manage the business side of it all? Sell out? You mean like do a... A lemonade commercial or... Oh yeah, lemonade commercials and things like, yeah, there've been a few offers for...

I've done commercials, I'll be honest. And I'm of a generation where musicians kind of avoided that if they could. And I realize that now...

It's actually encouraged. It's like, if that's what you do to get your music to a larger audience, then you should do it. Yeah. Oh my God. It's like, first of all, I just in full disclosure, I've never said no to anything. Now also a lot of these musicians that used to be, but Eddie Vedder, you know, you remember that, you know, I won't even do Ticketmaster. I won't do this. All these things that made sense at the time, which was actually hard to run a concert. I'm sure back then.

When you're saying I can't sell out if I do this corporate, this corporate, but corporations own the arena. They don't, it's just hard to avoid. I'm sure. So you can comment on that if you want, but it is. Yeah. I'm I'm wow. I was really impressed at Eddie Vedder and that they kind of decided we want to do this tour without ticket master and whatever, because it's,

Our fans are tired of paying all these extra costs that get added on and all the scalping stuff that goes on with the – these ticket sales things are complicit with the scalpers. They were trying to kind of do the right thing, but it is – yeah, it's a really hard thing for them to do. And I admired them for giving it a try. Yes, I did too. I thought, wow. And then you look and you go, oh, Ticketmaster is –

It is kind of racking everyone. You know, if you get break it down and then when you hear they're sort of in bed with the scalpers and stuff or whatever, I don't know for sure, but you know how it is. And you go, so they buy some, they sell them right back and they give them the first third of the ticket. It's just so weird. Cause you go, yeah, every time I turn around one minute later, they're marked up to 800 bucks. You go, normal fans don't have a chance. And, and the artist wants the normal fans to be able to pay,

the real ticket price, that's bad enough really. And then just get in there and have a good time. And they feel like they're part of it being the bad guy when they're not, but that's what it looks like. And now there's the whole thing of, I guess what they call dynamic pricing where that doesn't sound, that doesn't sound good. No, yeah, yeah. It's a,

They've done it on Broadway for a long time, but now they're kind of moving it into concerts where, you know, with a big artist, like there was a big brouhaha about Bruce Springsteen tickets. Because if there's a high demand for kind of the prime seats for a show like that, they'll jack the prices up for those. Now, they might still keep some cheap seats in the back, but the ones up front will just go up.

They're kind of trying to beat the scalpers in a way. But that means that. Twelve hundred. Yeah. The prices start going up into the scalper range where it's over a thousand dollars. Wow. And yeah, the fans are just going, that's not what was originally listed. That's not really the plan. Like, I don't really get that because they're going to make the scalper money up front instead of the scalpers. They're saying that, yes, at least if we do that, the money goes to the artists.

But it's still pretty tough on the fans. As a Ford owner, there are lots of choices of where you get your vehicle serviced. You can choose to go to their place, the local dealership, your place, home, apartment, condo, your workplace, even your happy place, like your cottage on the lake. Go to your Ford dealer and choose Ford pickup and delivery to have your vehicle picked up, serviced, and brought right back.

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A little, maybe a little more unusual in my world. Do you both go into clubs? Like you said, go into comedy clubs and different places and can try out new material that way and kind of make a surprise appearance somewhere and go, okay, I got, I got to try some stuff out. And the only way I know what works is to do it live. David does it a lot. Yeah. A hundred percent. Yeah. I have to, I have to, because I'm, I'm kind of on a tour right now. And when you're,

people are paying and it's a bigger theater uh you have to try but i've always done that because it's always the only way to even keep going so luckily in la there's the improv and the comedy store and the laugh factory so you can go in you can go in anytime i mean they're nice enough to say just come in whenever you drive by you can go up and do whatever you want and so you try it and there's a lot of great comedians there uh the only thing these days is

Some comics are having them put the phones in those zip bags because you can't work on a new special if people are leaking it on YouTube the next morning or put it on their TikTok or whatever. And then all your jokes are out there. So it's not like building up for a special. Someone like Eddie Murphy, I would see having a real problem coming back to stand up because where do you practice where people aren't going to film you and leak everything? And if it's not that funny because you're really working it,

they're going to see that and say, oh, he's not that good anymore. And you're like, well, this is how I used to do it in little clubs. And then the world sees it, but like a band, I don't know. I don't know. There's, that's the only way to do it. Well, for me, and I want to ask you a question, uh, music, David, uh, the, I started in small clubs and I didn't know I was, I wasn't really a standup. I was a sketch player, uh,

So the small clubs allowed me to go, I'm going to be a character for two minutes. And then as I got on TV and stuff, I played bigger rooms and I found it much more of a heavy lifting for me unless there were screens. So I love the small clubs and with comedy, it's always a surprise. So ideally you've edited it in a small room. So when you go to the big room, you don't go down, down, down, down, down, down.

didn't get a laugh. But did you, when you were in the 70s in those low ceiling clubs and your first band was just kicking in, there's a certain, some energy to that. But you've played all kinds. You have a show that you do occasionally where only 16 audience members can come in at a time. We'll get to that in a second, your fascination with the brain and neuroplasticity and all that. But in terms of rooms, what's your favorite size room or it's the room you're in, I guess? Yeah.

Broadway's pretty intimate in its own way. Broadway is fairly intimate. I like that size room. You can still, it's big, but you can still get a sense of all the people. I still feel like, as you probably do,

you're, I still feel like I'm speaking right to them and they're listening to me. And if there's a reaction, I can respond to their reaction. And sometimes I can, you know, as you might do, if you get a laugh, you're trying to say something else that's going to put a laugh on top of the laugh. And yeah, that kind of thing. But you can't, you can't like make that up at home. You can't like write that you have to,

See how the audience reacts. That's the best place to be is in the moment. Kind of like with us right now. And life is really about that. Listening and being in the moment, certainly performing, never trying to force it. Don't anticipate it. All I think before I go out on stage, the last word I say to myself,

is have fun. Because if I forget to have fun, it can unravel pretty quickly. If people are drunk or it's a shitty audience or I blew a joke, but always have fun. That helps me a lot. What do you say right before your show, David? What do I say? Ladies and gentlemen, American Utopia, David Byrne. Do you have any ritual or prayer or just like take a deep breath or you just walk out and...

uh usually the band and i are kind of backstage and we're all on like our mics and everything like that so we can all talk to one another but yeah but uh nobody else can hear us and so there's a lot of joking around like okay who's out there tonight right just people take a peek and go oh there's yeah there's

There's a really strange looking person in the front row or there's a kid, there's a kid in the front row who's sleeping. Yeah. To lighten it up. Yeah. Sure. Yeah. That's, you know, I do the same thing. I peek out in the front and try to go, is there anyone I want to mention or say anything? Cause when you're live, you can sort of,

I do one crowd work. I go at the audience and I go, what are you guys having? Nachos? And they go, yep. And I go, oh, is it an anniversary or something? And then I just, I go, that's my crowd work, folks. I get one laugh and then I move on. The worst crowd work ever. Yeah, because I go, I did. It looks like they really like it in standup and probably in music. When you're doing something that

They think is not the hand stamp show. So if you're in a crowd, you've been obviously in music, you just mentioned the city. They get excited. You know what I mean? Even though you're reading it off the back of a mic stand. But if you just say, you know, I saw the Eagles and they were like on a dark Arizona highway and everyone goes, Whoa,

Anything local. That's where we live. Anything local. And they go, cool Scottsdale wind in my hair. And everyone's like, my friend lives in Scottsdale. And they go, warm smell of ASU Stadium. And everyone's like, all right, just sing the fucking song, dude. Well, I always tell them, what's the rival town? So if you're playing Fresno, and I go, what? Oh, yeah, that's a good one. They go, we hate Modesto. Then I go out, and I just say, Modesto sucks. And I've got them.

It's the easiest thing in the world. Or you go, that joke was funny. This guy from Modesto doesn't get it. And then it's a running gag. David, you can use any of these. Any of them. Okay, okay. Just take them with you. It's so funny. Oh, I have a question about one of my favorite songs, Wildlife. The video, isn't the video, does it have a ton of cameos in it?

Uh, uh, yeah, it's people it's meant to be like a karaoke night or something like that where people are jumping up and singing a line. It's kind of taken off on that. And people, the audience members are kind of dressing up like their favorite singers or whatever. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That's a great one. And, uh, that one was Buscemi in it or am I crazy? No, it was not Buscemi. It was a local guy in Dallas that looked like Buscemi.

Oh, for real? Yes. Oh, my God. I was about to say, who is in that thing? Because that was such a fun video and such a great song. I still crank it on my iPod. Is iPod something? iPod's okay. I think that's what I have on my phone. Yeah. It's on my phone, but whatever. Believe me. And I'm one of these guys that I get those Apple songs and they're 99 cents or whatever. And so instead of joining something, I just go, well, I already have this. I don't want to learn anything new.

And I realized I have 20,000 songs. So I've spent 20,000. It's the dumbest thing I could ever do, but I just keep doing it one by one. And they're just adding up. I'm like, I think this isn't smart, but love that. Take me to the river has a great beginning. I'm just, I'm not, I mean, going through your songs now, which is,

I know you get bored by that, but it's great because I'm asking. So it's something different. Take Me to the River, Dana. You know, that one is such a killer beginning. Brilliant. And the only thing you need in the middle when you go drop me in the water, you could have me up there and I'll go. Oh, that's his best sound effect. So if I'm ever there, I'll jump up.

You could have added that. Everyone can't do it. And as we've said before, the MTV generation growing up with me, the V was for the videos and it was for the music. And it wasn't 24 Hours of Ridiculousness, which is a show, which is actually really good.

But they used to have more than one show on there and music videos. No one believes me. But that was a really fun time when you probably got a new song. It's probably kind of fun where they go. The next step literally is what's your video? Is that kind of how it was? Yeah. Yeah.

I really enjoyed making videos back then. You could, you had a song, you thought, okay, this might be the single and you could go out and do a video kind of cheaper, cheaply, kind of more cheaply than you can do today, actually. And you know, they'd run it. They were desperate for material.

And then you were getting all their material for free from the record company. So if you could give them a video, they'd start running it within a week, which was just kind of amazing for us. That's great. Well, yeah, you're a blank slate and you're kind of an artist. You are an artist. So that must be fun. You've got a song which you already wrote. You made that. That was one breakthrough. And now a song is working. And then you go, oh, now I get one more crack at it.

The scary thing is, what's everyone going to remember forever? Because you sort of, at my age, I would just picture the video when I hear the song. Exactly. So you had to be a little bit careful because you know that's what's going to be burned into people's minds. Yes, for sure.

Yeah, we discovered that there were songs that in those days, songs that broke because of the video. Oh, yeah. Yeah. The radio maybe wasn't really playing it that much. And then the video would people just they'd play it over and over again. And then the radio would kind of be forced to play it.

Yeah, for sure. Because it took on a new life. And it did seem, obviously, going back a little bit, your art school roots, like John Lennon, seemed like it was a natural fit for you. Everything had an artistic bent. And for a second, just American Utopia, the album and the show, it would appear to me that would be as satisfying as anything you've done, this recent Broadway run. Because the way you reinvented Broadway, I mean, you can speak to that. I mean, you reinvented it.

with that stage show by everyone being mobile. That's, that's pretty brilliant. I mean, go ahead. Talk to that. To me that, yeah. Starting way back with music videos, but being able to kind of do a stage show like that, it was kind of bringing together everything that got me excited, whether it was, you know, the staging or the choreography or the lighting and all those things, right. Kind of bring it all together in one package. And the trick with the trick with Broadway, I think was, uh,

getting the sound to be like not Broadway sound. The sound, the sound mix on Broadway musicals tends to be of a certain type. We thought, no, we want this to sound like, we want this to sound like a real concert. We need people to understand the words and all that, which is you can't always do at a music concert, but we need to do that. But yeah, that was, that was a little bit of an uphill battle, but it worked.

Really inspiring for the percussion section. So you knew you wanted the drummers to move. So you needed rather than the drummer behind the kit. So you had multiple drummers, almost like a marching band moving about in choreography. It's just how were you? Did you do every show, David? Were you starring in every show?

I had to. I'd assume that who could substitute for you. I'm not going if he's not here. How did you pace yourself with that? I mean, is that a beating? I mean, I do 60 minutes of stand-up and I lay down in a hammock afterwards and people fan me. I was packed in ice earlier today. I was packed in ice. I get packed in on my tub at the holiday. On a regular basis. But obviously you were having so much fun. That keeps fatigue at bay. You were enjoying it.

Yeah, I was enjoying it. I paced myself. Yes. Yeah. I ran into Hugh Jackman at a dinner once. So before I did the show on Broadway, I reached out to him and said, I'm not used to doing shows, whatever, six or seven days a week or whatever it might be.

do you think I can do this? And do you have any advice for me? Cause he's the only person I could think of who had done like a one man show singing the whole show on Broadway. Yeah. Yeah. And so I, uh, asked him, do you think I can do this? And he said, yeah, you can do, you know, how's your voice? Yeah. My voice is fine. I said, you know, uh, he said, uh,

Don't go to parties after. Don't go. Don't visit. Don't hang out with your friends at a bar after because you will end up talking louder in a bar that you are singing on stage. And that will wear. That's like doing a whole nother show. Smart. So he said, don't do that. Meet him for lunch the next day. Mm hmm.

Then he said, if you've got two shows, don't take a nap in between the two shows because that's your first inclination is, phew, got through that. Now I need to like rest up for the next one. He said, no, no, no, no. Because then you're whatever your energy and stuff will just drop down to zero and you got to build it all back up again for the next show. He said, you just got to, you know.

Push through it and then you'll be ready for the next one. Could I possibly, after this, get Hugh Jackman's information? Yeah, I need his number too. Because he seems to really be good about advising. I want my life coach. Just whatever, HughJackman.com. He also sounds boring. After the show, lay down in a hyperbolic chamber.

until the next show. I'm like, well, how can I go out and get my kudos? I need some high fives. I would have told you, pack yourself in ice before the first show, get repacked in between shows. So how did you come down then to go to sleep? Do you have a scotch on the rocks? Do you meditate? Yeah, yeah. I'd have a couple of glasses. I'd go home, have a couple of glasses of wine,

And watch some TV show. I call it brain candy, right? Just something that will- Yeah, brain candy. Nothing too heavy. Yeah. Nothing too emotional that would kind of make me dream weird dreams. Stuff like that. Just the Saw movie franchise. I usually watch that to doze off. Yes. If you want to put on movies called Clean Slate or Opportunity to Offset, I guarantee you, David, you are out within five minutes. You're like, what the fuck? Give me a little shard of-

That may, you may want to have a third glass of wine. Be careful about that. When you see an abomination, you know, it starts to tip. You know, Rosetta Stone, the most trusted language learning program. Oh, yeah. If you want to learn a new language, which no time like the present, it's always fun to learn when you get older.

I know. And it's not learning a language when you're older, you know, over the age of 20 is difficult. You know, I mean, all the high school Spanish I took a grade school Spanish, you know, all I can say is Ola and hasta luego. So it goes out of your head. So now you have Rosetta stone, David, tell them about it. Well, Dana, you know, more than anyone trusted expert for 30 years with millions of users in 25 languages. Uh, I mean, my gosh, uh,

They have Spanish, French, Italian, German. I don't think you can throw them a curveball. I think they're going to know. What don't they have? The language you want. Yeah. And immerses you in many ways. There's no English translations. You know what I'm saying?

I know no English. You need a Rosetta Stone for English. No English translation, so you really learn to speak and listen and think in that language. That's the whole idea of Rosetta Stone is that it sticks to your head. It sticks to your brain. I learned German out of a book. It just doesn't stick as hard, so this is the way to do it. Designed for long-term retention.

There's a true accent feature. It gives you feedback on your pronunciation. Yes. And of course, there's desktop app options. There's an audio companion and ability to download lessons offline. Yeah, so that's great. Lifetime access to all 25 language courses Rosetta Stone offers for 50% off. A steal! And I do think that the off-label thing that... I'm ad-libbing now, going off script.

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That's $50 off with CodeFly at BlueNile.com. BlueNile.com. There's two things I'm really interested in. One is your fascination with the brain.

And I was curious what your thoughts are with the studies about psilocybin or ketamine in terms of helping with addiction and helping the brain. Because you've done a lot of stuff around the brain. You have that show where you come out with the brain, you talk about the brain. Oh, yeah. And so where are you at with that now? What's your thoughts? Where are you at with the brain? What are you doing with the brain? I haven't tried any of those therapies. I watched the Michael Pollan show.

show about psilocybin and stuff like that. Yeah. Oh, you haven't done that? I haven't done them, but I kind of watched the show. It was, it was all about that. Yeah. Treating those things as therapy and all that stuff, LSD and everything were used pretty successfully. It seems for therapy. Mm-hmm.

Until it was, you know, made illegal. Yeah. And then then it was just like silence. No more research. Right. Couldn't touch it. Yeah. Everything. Any kind of beneficial stuff that it did was all denied and shoved aside. Yeah. It was all this government propaganda about how you would have babies that looked like fish or whatever. Yeah. And.

But now that's kind of people are kind of getting back into it and kind of treating it seriously as a therapeutic thing. And it's, I've sort of thought, okay,

Probably have to monitor it really carefully, see how people respond. But for some things, yeah, like post-traumatic stress, things like that, it seems like it does help people. I was told this. I'm sorry to interrupt, but I want to hear your response to this. It's just that non-psychoactive psilocybin drops.

over time daily create bigger neural pathways. And the metaphor was told to me is that if you're stuck on a cycle of thinking,

that's negative or whatever. It's like a little river going down or a little stream going down a giant canyon. When you do these psilocybin drops over a period of time, your thoughts start to emancipate and you're seeing a gush of water, a big giant whoosh of water going down and it frees open that negative pattern. So anyway, thought.

thoughts either of you guys yeah i could definitely see that that could be the case that yeah we we do get stuck in in our ways of thinking if somebody's had a traumatic experience they just kind of play that movie over and over again and they need to kind of find a way out of it and people are non-trusting the uh pharmaceutical companies more and more so they're trying uh

you know, Eastern medicine, there's different things that everyone wants to try just to say, what if there's something from the earth? What if there's something that I'm just haven't tried that they don't, they don't seem to want me to try, but it might be great for me. And I know a lot of people doing special K now and microdosing and,

I really didn't know it was for real treatment other than just recreational, but they are saying. Special K is ketamine, right? Ketamine, yeah. Okay, special K. But you hear it's a horse tranquilizer, so you go, well, I mean, I can't even do Z-Quil. I can't even do a full teaspoon. So I go, I don't think I need that because a horse is bigger than me.

The last horse I saw. Ketamine is supposed to like, you go on a pretty heavy trip. And I guess if it works for your brain, what I'm told is that it, you're able to get outside yourself and you're able to laugh at yourself. And you have these revelations that last, even though you have a bit of nausea for a couple of days. And for three months, you're just freed from that locked negative thinking. So what are you, David, David Byrne, if you have the blues, you're feeling kind of down. Do you go on a bike ride? Cause you're a big bike guy.

You're always hungry. I'll do that. Yeah, I'll do that. You know, I don't get the blues. I don't get depressed that often. We all do sometimes. But but in general, I'm pretty upbeat. And if if I'm going through a difficult period, I'll just kind of go, OK, just keep going. So just keep going. Yeah. Yeah. That thing you did is look. Yeah. That thing you did failed or it looks like it's not going to happen or.

Yeah. Could you possibly work that into a song? Like, I don't ever get the blues. You know, it's a blues song about a guy. I don't ever get the blues. You might find yourself not getting the blues. You might find yourself. Sorry, I had to do that. Same as it ever was.

No, I don't think people want to hear that. They don't want to hear like, oh yeah, I'm a super happy guy. Blues does better. My life is great. And it's kind of like, well, fuck you. My latest self-talk, David, both Davids, is I just say big life, big life. Big life if you try a career, if you have children, if you have marriages, if you travel, if you buy things, if you make money, you can lose money. So big life,

Up and down. So you just accept it when problems come. This is big life, big problems. And that's your own self-talk, right? To yourself. Yes.

And that helps. I'm interested in this because you seem so future all the time. Ask about that art stuff. Well, the robots have arrived. They're here. They're studying us. They're manipulating us. They're making everybody angry. And they're doing all kinds of things. And now they're in art. They're riding the hook. They're all over music. You don't have to write

You don't have to sing the music. You point to guys with AIs on computers and then they put it together in a lab. And now in art, in visual art, recently an AI drew a painting. They put in all this information and it won first prize at this art show. And the real artists were really angry. So it just seems to me that since you're always future future, are you going to incorporate with AI or what are your thoughts about that integrating with art? Yeah.

Sorry. Sorry. Oh, yeah. It's his favorite things meeting together. OK. Oh, no. To be honest, no, I haven't thought about doing that. And I remember reading about that, seeing the picture and thought, oh, picture is kind of nice. Picture is kind of nice. I saw. Yeah. It's not not exactly what I would do, you know, but OK, that's nothing wrong with that. I blame the guy buying it.

Because I blame the person who would buy that art or pay a lot of money for it because you don't want to make a market for that. There is something about what art is about coming from someone. Is that the picture, Dana? Well, just one I did recently. Could a robot make that? No, that's good. Yes. I sort of doubt it.

Yeah, no, but a four-year-old could. Someone was really bugging me. That's the person on top in the bubble, and I was on the bottom, and they were- I love it. Dana's got good art. That's real. I like that. No, it's just heartfelt. It's a cliche. I'm not the artist, but I do do it for my own processing of thoughts.

But I doubt that a machine would do that. Yeah. That's the greatest thing anyone's ever said to me. David Byrne said a machine could not do my... No, I understand what you're saying. And I agree with you. I don't like it. I still think the human...

soul or the human brain can create stuff. And I think when I was reading your exit essay after American Utopia and about, you find out later, and it doesn't sound pretentious, but you find out later kind of what you were writing about commonly in your writing and in your art, that you're kind of doing it spontaneously from some place that

And it may be not literal. And then a year later or whatever, you kind of figure out what it was. And I was interested at the very end, you said American utopia. It's not ironic. Yes. So it's just kind of a surprise coming from me because some of my material is ironic. Yes. But in this case, I thought, no, no, no, no. I want to really hold out some kind of

either visually or in the songs and in the way we present it, the whole attitude, what I say, I want to hold out some kind of hope that all the things that we wish we could be and what we could be as a country and all that, that they're not all entirely out of reach, that we do have possibilities. Well, for me, I just read history and then I feel better

You know, right when the pandemic hit, you know, I read a book, The Splendid and the Vile. It was a brilliant book, but it was a new one about Churchill and the Blitz in London. And, you know, it just helped calm me down or read about the plague or the Middle Ages. And it gives you perspective. I've seen people on an iPhone with a latte.

Going, is this the worst time to be alive? You know, and there was no medicine until like maybe 50 years ago. You have a heart attack. They'd shake your hand and give you a baby aspirin. See you later. Now they can put all this stuff in you. So you're kind of on this this wavelength because you have this reason to be cheerful online thing. You're on this sort of happy, cheerful, you know, if American Utopia means it's possible, that's very up message. Yeah.

Yes. What are the reasons to be cheerful, David Byrne? Well, we report on a lot of stuff. I haven't done a lot of writing for them recently, but we have a group of writers. They look for places around the world where people have found solutions to like, if

some place in Italy where the sea was getting overfished and they kind of, the fish communities, the fishermen communities, they get together and then go, okay, we're going to manage this because we know if we overfish this, we're all screwed. We don't, that's our livelihood. So we have to kind of manage it. And they kind of figure out a way to do that, a way to kind of look out for people who were kind of

breaking the rules or whatever. And sure enough, the fish come back and their catch increases. And so they end up making more money than they did before. You know, happy ending. Good news is not reported. Yeah, go ahead. Yeah. It's nice to hear that stuff. Yeah. We're biased towards bad news. We like to hear bad news, scary stuff. It feeds part of our brain, right? Somehow. Yeah. It's part of our brain. We like to

Be aware of what kind of lions and tigers are looming around the corner as opposed to the nice stuff.

So it's a little bit of an uphill battle, but, but you know, this stuff is happening. I'm surprised at how much of it the writers are finding. You're right. I mean, it's probably an old standup bit, but there's never a newsflash breaking news. 200 million people are relatively happy in North America. It's always going to be death and pain. And I call, I get, I get it on. I'll go down the rabbit hole a little bit in the morning and I go to myself. I said, I'm being hypnotized into darkness. I,

- Yeah. - 'Cause whatever is bad, with a robot stirring it,

is going to be presented 10 times as bad. And it's a trap to be unhappy your whole life. Because I know tribal people, we don't really talk politics here, but they're in both camps and they're both just so angry. And I'm like, what good is this doing right now? All this fury. But you're right. What part of the brain is that feeding? Is some primal part of our hypothalamus?

It seems like it is. It's some sort of primal part that obviously evolved for something really useful to us. War. Yeah, to be aware that what's that moving in the jungle? What's that moving on Savannah? Fight or flight, yeah. Yeah, yeah. I'd rather... If I run away...

It might not be anything, but if I run away, I'm going to be all right. But if I stay and wait to find out, I might be dead. So better to run away. Better to be fearful and suspicious than to just kind of sit it out and go, well, let's wait and see what it is. And it's a bioevolutionary. It's a Darwinian proposition because the people didn't run away, didn't live long enough to have kids.

So we're predisposed all of us to be a little kind of jumpy because the ones who weren't are dead. Exactly. Yeah. And the algorithms on all the stuff kind of feed on that, can feed on our propensity. Yeah. COVID was a real boon for them because it was like the first case got to America and they're like projecting 10 million dead. I go, well, someone just sneezed. That's it. One guy tested positive. We don't even know what's going on. They're like, no, no, right now you better, you know, make funeral arrangements. I'm like,

So it's like that where they, it's like a half truth or there's a piece of a truth where they can run with it and they run hard with it and they don't run the other way. It's always could be worse, might get worse, probably worse instead of like, hey, we might pull out of this. And that's a tough one to live with every day. And that was hard, especially during COVID because nothing else is really happening in your life except bad news on the TV 24 hours a day. It's tough. Yeah, you could just dig really deep into that. There's not much else to do. Yeah.

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Yes, David. Are the audiences back? You know, they are. And they're excited. And it seems like they want to laugh. And they don't really want it super PC. They seem to appreciate that.

If you're a comedian, the ones that come out to the clubs that aren't on Twitter 21st day complaining about it. There are some people that just say, just go do it. We'll decide if we like it or not, but give it to us. And if we don't like it, we'll boo. And that's part of the fun or we'll not laugh. But as a comedian, I,

is sort of an art also. And, uh, you want to say whatever you want. And that's usually how it was working for a long, long time. And then people are being scared to get canceled and they don't want to say the wrong thing. So, uh,

We don't want the world to turn into the eight, everyone's telling the same eight jokes that are approved by America. And that's what happens. You go, okay, I walked out and everyone was happy. People go, it wasn't funny, but I didn't get mad, thank God. And you go, well, whatever.

You got to sort of crack some eggs here. Yeah, you got to... I don't get mad. I never try to get complaining comedians when they're not funny or they do something too far. I'm like, I would say they probably won't do that again or they might tweak it, but it's not my place to tell them to complain about it and say, get off stage. It's stupid to me. Yeah, and I've been to shows where somebody's...

Done some stuff where I go, oh, I think they crossed a line. Just across the line right there. But the rest of the show was really great. And I remember I'd been to some shows where I had to put my phone in the bag. Yeah. I have no problem with it. But...

Do you go to comedy shows, David, or music? Every once in a while, yeah. Oh, I love it. Oh, I want to see you sitting in the back one day. That'd be awesome. I'd be nervous. I'd bring up this podcast. No, I'm there to laugh and have a good time.

I think your original idea, David, was that, yes, we've run into a little roadblock now with Ukraine and the economy. But there was a period, a short period pre post covid where the roaring 20s had it after the Spanish flu of the let's dance and get drunk and just because this could go away. So I think there was a gusher of ticket sales initially to and then it went away.

Well, now we're not having a war and we're having all this other stuff again right now. And COVID, who knew, as Dr. Fauci would say, who knew there were so many mutations? Yeah.

I didn't know I thought you'd be dancing in the street. But for me personally, being someone who does impressions as part of what I do, political comedy is the hottest oven of all, of balancing, that balancing act. Because you've got, you know, it's tribal and stuff. But, you know, I try to do Biden and I do Trump, but it's a delicate dance. I mostly want to have my true North Star to be funny. But have you found that in...

Any of your work now, you're doing art exhibits at the Pace Gallery, trees and things, which are awesome, on gigantic walls that are beautiful.

um so where are you on the political spectrum can you uh who are you voting on don't go there no but do you do you bring it into your are are you careful about anything when you're out there you stay away from things wow uh when i was doing american utopia there was yeah i would do some talking stuff sometimes about issues and things in between some of the songs and a lot of those were kind of political although i

made a point never to endorse a politician or a particular party. I tried to keep it bipartisan and to just talk about issues. That's smart. I talk about getting people to vote. And can we talk about that? Can I challenge was, can you figure out a way to talk about that? And it's funny. Yeah, that's true. If it's funny, then it doesn't come off as a teacher, you know? Yeah. Yeah. Yes. Can I get some information across, but in a way that's funny? Yeah.

Yeah. And sometimes that took a little bit of trial and error. Let's see where the laughs are and how people react to that. Yeah. So you're kind of a comedian in a way when you're out there. You have a monologue section. There's room for that, right? Yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah. I wouldn't say I'm a comedian, but I'm learning some of the challenges that you all face.

You know, people like a little levity and when they're out having fun and they already like you, I mean, that's half the battle being comics. So they like you, they're there to see you. And in between songs, I think we asked McCartney, was that like a nerve? It's a nervous thing to, he tries stuff. He goes, Oh, I'm going to say something here. And sometimes it turns into just part of the show because if something works, he locks it in, you know? Exactly. And that's great. Cause the shows are so big, it's like hard to mess around with it. But yeah,

yeah, there is a little room that must be fun or one night go, uh, I'm going to say this at this part. And it's something to think about. Yeah. Or something's happened in the news and you feel like you want to acknowledge, not pretend like it didn't happen, but, uh,

Not turn the whole show into being about that. Yeah. It is. It's a delicate dance. So what's David. Yeah. I have something and we'll let him go. I only have like 500 questions, but that's. I just, I just researched you and you kept doing so much stuff. You can't stop. My computer goes, all right, give me a break. The dingbat drawings, the tree drawings, the stuff during the pandemic. Yeah.

It's just, it goes on and on artistically. You're just, you're ping-ponging in all these different areas, it seems. I'm very lucky and I'm having a good time. I'm lucky that in a way people accept that I can try these different things. Yeah.

They don't always work, but people kind of allow me to try that stuff. Well, you look 30 years old. I mean, it's like you have drive. And if you still drive, that's where the whole trick, you still like it. And I'm scared one day when I was, when I'm writing jokes and scribbling stuff and going, and if it gets hard, I go, well, what if one day I don't want to do this? You know, I don't have that in me anymore. And that's what you don't want. You know, you always want to still

It's fun to still do that stuff. I just don't want that fun to go away. So I think it's nice that you still think of a germ of an idea and go, there's really no limits. It doesn't have to be this. Yeah. Cause you, you, you could be out there now with just bald face talking, the talking heads review show, uh,

And just playing all your hits. You could. And people would pay a lot of money for that. Of course. Yeah. Yeah. I've gotten offers for that. But at the same time, I know that you're not going to be happy. You're not going to be happy there. It's a Faustian deal. Is that part of the equation too now?

Being happy? Oh, I hope so. Yeah. No, you're right though. But a lot of people don't think that way. They think they get scared and they move it out of fear. I get it. I mean, of course it would make sense if you went out with those, that again. But yeah,

There also is, you've got other things you want to do and it makes it seems more fun to do that. I think you started, you were yourself from the beginning and you never fell into that trap. And I think it's done you well. It's probably why you look so young and fresh. And, you know, what do you get? I mean, how big a couch can you buy? You need 20 bicycles. I mean-

There's a level to money where it's, we all, I love my healthcare and I would wish it on everyone in the world. That's my most prized possession, but I don't live in a giant place. I have one car, one wife. So he lives in a dump, David. I, I just, everything you own owns you back.

It's true. It's true. I realized, yeah, at some point, okay, I got enough bicycles. Yeah. My apartment's big enough. I'm fine. Yeah. Well, that makes you rich in reverse. Exactly. Yeah. That also gives me the opportunity to try things that might fail. Yes. You don't have to make...

400,000 net every month. I just put out a specific number in order to make ends meet. Wow, that's a cover everybody. That's pretty big. Yeah, that'd be crazy if someone had that much. No, I'm not there. But your expenses can creep up and then you can become a slave to them. But I do think I'm so admiring and a little bit envious that you keep reinventing yourself and you never stay

stagnant. With me, a lot of the characters I did on SNL, the audience would like to see them and I push them out there to a point and it is a little, you know, and also in comedy, you have to feed the beast. You can't come back to the same city the next year. You have to have a new hour and,

but I do think your path has been really fun to watch. I've been watching you a lot the last day and a half. Yeah. And my research. Thank you. This guy is having fun. He can't be cooler. I know that's not your quest, but so it's good to be cool though.

Well, it just means you're following your true North Star. I don't know if you had a lot of therapy early on. I finally got into therapy at 60, a little bit too late. But it seems like you had a sense of yourself and a confidence early on. I tried therapy for a while when I was having some relationship, marriage stuff. But other than that, I think my therapy is, yeah. Let's roll some video from that therapy session. Going for a bicycle ride or whatever. Yeah.

I think we've, thank you, David, for bearing with us. I know this isn't a typical sort of interview thing, but you're a lot of fun to talk to. It's been really a pleasure, David. Thank you. And you keep it up. If you happen to want to bring your Broadway show back, I would make my way to see it. I don't know if you're not the type to repeat, but...

The reviews on that, I'll just say they were off the charts. I don't know if you have plans to bring it back, but don't do it for me as my only message.

Don't mount. I did this for Dana. Dana wanted to see it. Do it for me. It is on HBO live streaming right now, right? Isn't it? Yeah, it is. So that's available for everybody. Let's do housekeeping at the very end. David Byrne, he's got albums out. He's got art shows. He's at the Pace Gallery, trees. Yeah. Yeah, Pace Gallery in New York City. I'm going to be there soon. I'm going to check that out.

He does neuro society. I can't, anything you want to add? No, that's good. That's good. Fans can consume. All right. Well, good luck on, on your next podcast, David. Thank you. But this was, I'm going to go buy some more bicycles. Great to meet you both. Be well. Thank you. Because he said, you don't, you don't need more bicycles.

This has been a podcast presentation of Cadence 13. Please listen, then rate, review, and follow all episodes. Available now for free wherever you get your podcasts. No joke, folks. Fly on the Wall has been a presentation of Cadence 13, executive produced by Dana Carvey and David Spade, Chris Corcoran of Cadence 13, and Charlie Finan of Brillstein Entertainment. The show's lead producer is Greg Holtzman with production and engineering support from Serena Regan and Chris Basil of Cadence 13.