Sitting Down with a Pro Cross-Dressing Idol Wrestler (ft. Ladybeard) | Trash Taste #44
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- Hello everyone. Welcome back to another episode of the Trash Taste Podcast. I'm your host for this week, for the first time in a while and with me are the boys as usual. And we have a guest. - Introduce yourself. - The Trash Taste Podcast. My name is Lady Beer. Thrilled to be here today on the Trash Taste Podcast. - Jesus Christ. Normally we have to like bring the energy to the guests. - I feel like I'm being brought up. - No, Lady Beer brought the energy, Dan. Bloody hell, I came with all the energy you can handle. You won't be able to shut me up.

That old lady at Denny's told us we had to be quiet. - We've never had that happen to us. - That's how this started for viewers at home. We had a pre-production meeting in Denny's and the old lady came up and told us- - It's a very generous way of wording it, pre-production. - It's just a lunch. - We ate lunch at Denny's before we did this and the old lady who works at Denny's made a point of coming up to us to tell us that we were- - No, no, she made a point of coming up

- I was just saying, we're regulars though. We can't go back there. - You can't, I've ruined it for you. - They know our schedule. We go there and there's a guy who just knows the exact time and like the exact day that we come. - When we come early, he's like, "Oh, you're a bit earlier than usual." - That's great, that's fantastic. You're regulars, that's wonderful. - Exactly. - Are we allowed to, am I allowed to say the general area of Japan which the studio is in?

- No. - No. - We're in Japan. - Oh, we're in Japan. In the same general area that we're in now, I actually have a reputation of ruining things for people because one of my best friends lives in this general area too. And so there was a night when I went to his house and we played this game where

- I'm scared now. - We played this game when we went walking out, it's the middle of summertime, we're about two, three in the morning, we went out to do the convenience store and the things you normally do. And we played this game of, you know, there's only certain institutions that are open at that time. So we made this game when we would go into the institution, you know, in Japan, they have the little tray to put your money in when you pay for it. We made this game out, we go and we, you know, do whatever, buy our stuff at the convenience store. And then we would flip over the tray

and see how they reacted. Because a lot of people in Japan, people working in the service industry,

- Can't handle that. - It blew minds you see. I remember saying to the guy at the convenience store, it was probably a bit nasty because my friend is this huge bodybuilder guy. So I'm a pro wrestler. So we're there and the dude behind the convenience, it's 3:00 AM, it's two foreigners. There's no other humans for miles around. He's this tiny little dude. And I'm like, but what would you do sir if I did?

And I flipped the tray and just waited. - While he was looking like he was maintaining eye contact. - This poor man freaked out. He freaked out. He will never talk to a foreigner ever again. Anyway, but then the game became, you would run into an institution, you'd flip the tray and run out. And you'd see what would happen. - So you're basically just ding dong dashing. - Yeah, well, it means now my friend can't go to Sutaya anymore.

- Well, because he's known as that giant dude who flips trays over. - Arnold Schwarzenegger, I mean, normally he's running with his shirt on. - Okay, so first of all, I think there's gonna be a lot of confusion. - We just jumped right into it.

- Let's dial it back a bit. - Let's go back a bit. Do you wanna introduce yourself to audiences who don't know who you are? - What do you do? - What do you do? Why are you wearing this? - Because to someone who doesn't know who Ladybeard is, they're probably just thinking, "Who is this white guy in a dress?" - Who's this random Aussie who just joined the Trash Chase podcast? - I'll be honest, I don't know anything. I wanted to come into this blind. I wanted to hear and meet you and experience everything. So I know absolutely nothing about you. - I'm Connor's biggest fan.

Connor has made me so happy in the short time I've known him. Let me introduce myself. Watch this. I'll do it like we're on TV. This is channel seven. Are you ready? Okay, go for it.

- My name's Ladybeard. I'm a heavy metal singer and pro wrestler from Australia, currently based in Japan. Today I'm thrilled to be talking to my friends. - This is the quietest you've been, it's very creepy. - What, creepy? - This is the quietest you've been in a long time. - That was like Australian news documentary narration voice. - It was, wasn't it? - But I didn't go up at the end of my sentence.

to why I potentially should have. - Like every Australian does. - To appear in Australian media? - No. - Where in Japan? There's no need to talk about the wonderful nation of Australia from which both Joseph and I hail. - We can get to that though. We can get to that. - How does this come to be? What is this? - So I am a heavy metal singer and a pro wrestler. - Wait, which one were you first? - And a cross dresser.

I was first a cross dresser. - Oh really? - And then became a cross dressing pro wrestler. - Right. - And then became a cross dressing wrestling heavy metal. - What is the journey? - I feel like you're saying these steps so casually. I'm trying to break these down. - That's like someone being like, I was,

- I'm a straight man and then I'm a straight man who became an astrophysicist. And then I became a straight man who did astrophysicist and does gardening every now and then. - Are you not those things? - Yes. - I thought that's what this was. - I feel like there's a story that gets for us from point A to point B, but I'm just not seeing it. - So I used to live in the city of Hong Kong and I was an actor and a voice actor and a pro- - Whoa, whoa, whoa.

- Whoa, whoa, whoa. - How did you get to Hong Kong? - No, no, no, no. Now you're adding like five more different points to this story. - I gave you an abbreviated version of the story so as to avoid these pitfalls. - No, you just created more pitfalls. - Okay, I wanna know what made you leave Australia? Let's start there. - Okay, so I went through acting school in Australia to be an actor.

That's mainly what acting school is for. - Yes. - Mainly. - Makes sense. - But I also am a martial artist. And so what happened was I then I moved from Adelaide, that's where I'm from, which as Joey will know is a small city, to Melbourne, which Joey will know- - Is a big city. - A big city. - This isn't a child's series, what is this? - And so I was training in,

in Hong Kong style, like cinematic action with this Aussie dude who was on Jackie Chan's stunt team. - Oh wow. - So I was on his stunt team. And basically there was no work factors in Australia at the time. So I'm there and I'm auditioning and things and I'm auditioning against like Aussie celebrities and things. So there's no way as a school leaver I'm gonna get a bloody job. So this stunt dude I was training with, he was like, you should go to Hong Kong. 'Cause worst case scenario, you'll go there, you'll get a bit of work because it's easier 'cause you're a foreigner. So you got less competition. Then you can come back here and be more employable.

And they'd be like, yeah, you're good, but you need experience. Cash 22, how are you gonna get experience? So it's like, they tell me somehow you have to get experience. We're not gonna help you. All right, so anyway, so I went to Hong Kong playing, just do a couple of movies and then come home. I ended up staying six years.

- You say that so casually. - There was much more work to be had in Hong Kong than there was at home. - Right, right, right. - You said it like you just stayed around a mate's house. - I went to Hong Kong, I flipped a tray and I ran out again.

- It was just a case of you just kept getting work in Hong Kong. - Yeah, well there was much more to do there. There was much more to do there. But so this is true. So I went in 2006. I had a brief stint when I moved to the Philippines 'cause I got a job offer down there to work at a movie studio. But then I was there for about six months and I went back to Hong Kong doing my stuff. But then, then- - And this was mainly doing like martial arts and- - Martial arts, acting, voice acting and stunt work.

- A little bit of everything. - Yeah, well, through an acting school, you learn to be an actor and you learn voice acting. And then I was a martial artist, so I learned stunts off the back of that. So then, okay, go 2006, six, seven, eight, I'm there. End of 2008, along comes that global financial crisis and wipes out everything I had going on. So I'm like, all right, well, nothing to go back to at home. Now there's nothing here.

what am I gonna do? And I made the logical choice of realizing the way to solve all my problems was to become a cross-dressing pro wrestler and heavy metal singer. - Okay, so how did you come to that realization? - This is not a natural thing. - Most people are like, "Pack it in, boys." - Let's take it one step at a time, right? So have you always had, I assume you've always had a fascination towards wrestling?

- Yeah, so a martial artist, obviously. - Yeah. - And also performer and stunt man. So really pro wrestling is a small skip. - Yeah, yeah. - I was always interested in wrestling when I was younger, but just due to where I lived in Adelaide and where the wrestling gyms were, they were miles away. So I never had the chance to actually do it. - Did you watch like WWE and stuff like that? - Yeah, but there wasn't, when I was at the age to watch all that, it wasn't on TV very readily in Adelaide. It was on like 1:30 in the morning on a Thursday. So it's like, you know,

- Only the naughty kids stayed up to watch that. - When I was up studying for my- - Yeah, catch some WWE sometimes. - Yeah. - But you're of a different generation than I, I think, without giving up too many things. So the wrestlers you watched are probably different from the ones I watched. - I mean, to be frank, I didn't really watch a whole lot of wrestling. - I think you assume I watched wrestling before, right?

- Okay, my wrestling knowledge of like back, you know, when I was like in teenage years, all of it comes from all the WWE games that my neighbor used to have. - Okay. - So like, you know, it'd be like back then when it was, I think it was still SmackDown versus Raw, right? Like that kind of like level. So it's like, you know, it's like very bad. I wouldn't call myself a wrestling fan. - But that's around the time when I was getting access to this 1:30 in the morning wrestling. - Right, right, right.

- I didn't have Foxtel to be able to watch the damn wrestling. I didn't have Foxtel. - Yeah, Foxtel is like a cable, like sky. - Yeah, like sky, yeah, basically. - Yeah, but in Australia, sky is that conservative news network. - So don't say sky 'cause it's a very different thing in Australia. - Is it? I don't even know that. - People use the same words for their media outlets. - So wait, okay, so then I wanna know then if that's the case. Okay, so you're like,

- So, okay, so you're like into wrestling and you're like, okay, it's just a logical progress to go into wrestling. - Yeah, so then- - So like, how do you, okay, I've always wondered, 'cause I know a few people who like used to be pro wrestlers or currently do pro wrestling.

how do you even start to get into an industry like that? - Well, you go to wrestling school. So you go to a wrestling gym and you'll do a tryout to see whether or not they will train you. And if they accept you, then they accept you and they start training you. - What do they look for? What's like the audition process? - Well, you need to have, you know,

physically you need to be able to handle the physical stuff. And then, you know, from a, I guess a presentation of performance perspective, you need to have some level of aptitude in that. - Have some showmanship. - Yeah, you don't necessarily need to be trained in anything already, but if you're super shy and you can't handle being in front of an audience, it's not gonna work out great. 'Cause wrestling is generally speaking about larger than life characters and many dresses.

- Or man in dresses. - How did you go from that to moving to Japan then? - So, okay, so financial crisis, all the work's gone. But around that time I started wrestling in Hong Kong 'cause there was a gym that was accessible to me for the first time. Started wrestling.

Started training a month later. I caught on fairly quickly 'cause the techniques are not that different from stunts. - Right, right, right. - A month later, I had my first match. And so we're getting ready. Yeah, that's too fast. Anyone who's training wrestling, a month is too fast.

- I feel a month is too fast for any training. To go from your first body slam to doing it in front of people. That's very fast. - So when you say first wrestling match, is this like a whole coordinated, you do this, I do this kind of thing? Or is it literally just you, like how does that work? 'Cause I have no idea.

- Well, so in wrestling it's, okay, so there's like a system, right? Once you learn the system, then you can work. So if I know what I'm doing, if I'm trained to the system and you're trained to the system, we can never have met before, but we know the system. - You figure it out.

- Okay, sorry, my bad. - It's all right, Connor. I don't mind. - I wanted to know as well. - It's an act, but it's not an act, right? - Are you telling me that wrestling is fake, Connor? - This is Connor McGregor, right? It's the real thing. Connor McGregor, I thought this was the Joe Rogan experience. Connor, what's going on? It's a podcast.

- I'm fine too. - What is happening? - I'm so confused right now. - Conor McGregor, Conor, Conor. - I'm losing my mind already. - I am Conor's largest fan. If your last name is not McGregor, what should I call you by your last name? - LadyBit is literally in every- - You can't pronounce my last name.

- Ladybeard is in like, and I say this in the nicest way possible, is one of the hardest people to work with. - Oh shit. - Like I just said, like I literally just said, this man is like- - Already destroying the set within 15 minutes of recording. - My legs, my legs, they can't walk.

- You cannot walk correctly. - All right, let's cut. - Sorry. - So what were we talking about before that calamity? - Wrestling. - We're talking about wrestling. - How it works and then of course you were saying about, you know, you had one month of training before your first match. - Oh yeah. - So then we're there and we're discussing before this match, okay, so what do you want your character to be? Your gimmick, as it's referred to at pro wrestling. And I have a long history in cross-dressing. - Yeah, so can we talk about that?

- Oh yeah, we completely missed that. We forgot. - Yeah, so how did that come to be? - So when I was 14, a friend of mine had a school uniform birthday party and I thought- - What's a school uniform birthday party? - Have you never been to a party in your life? - No, but like, what do you mean by school uniform? - That was nasty. - What's so special about it? - Cut that, cut the lady beard aggression. I didn't mean to be aggressive to Joey. I'm sorry, Joey. - No, that's fine. - I secretly love you. - It's okay. I just genuinely wanted to know what a school uniform birthday party. - What is that?

- School uniform birthday party is a birthday party to which everybody wears. - Isn't that just like a normal party? - Isn't that just like an after school party? - Yeah, but you don't go after school. It's like on the weekend or whatever. - What I wanna know is why you want to choose to wear a school uniform to go to a party. - 'Cause it was my friend's birthday.

It's her birthday and she can do whatever she wants. It's her party, she can cry if she wants to. You would cry too if it happened to you. - Okay, so you went to a school uniform birthday party. - I went to a school uniform birthday party and I saw all my mates went wearing what we wore to school. So wearing trousers and the blazer and the shirt and everything. And I was like, it'd be really funny if I wore my big sister's school dress.

- Right, okay. - So I did and it was a hit amongst the 14 year olds. - Yeah, that'd be hilarious. - Yeah, it was hilarious, right? It was, yeah. And so then what happened is I started then wearing that particular school dress to various other non-school uniform parties and rock and roll shows and things.

And what happens is I noticed that this is back in the 90s. So it's a different time from now. As a man in a dress, young man in a dress, I will walk into the room and the energy of the room would lift straight away. So you know how at the start of every party, there's like that two hours of faffing around when everyone's not really loose and everyone's kind of uptight. That would just disappear. Dude in a dress walk in, everyone goes,

- The party's on straight away, right? - Right, right. - Woo! It's 6:00 PM, woo! - So you were like the party starter at like every party. - I was the party starter. - Yeah, it was great. - I can see that. - Yeah. - I mean, that's kind of what I do on my YouTube channel. - Exactly, right? - It's fun, I don't know, it's freeing. You feel like when you're the clown, you can do anything, you know what I mean? - Wait, what?

- You do what? You're cross-dressing on your YouTube channel? - I've done a lot of cross-dressing on my YouTube channel, I guess. - Oh, I see. - Oh, good. - It's quite fun. I mean, I feel like when you know you're the butt of the joke, it's so, I don't know, it's so freeing. It's so control, 'cause you feel like you're the one in control. - Yeah, that's not how I felt it. For me, it was not butt of the joke, but I appreciate what you're saying though. I appreciate what you're saying. But definitely when you're the object of attention. - Yeah. - What I found,

- See, it's become a different conversation recently because the whole transgender movement is happening. So now it's a different conversation from what it was when I started. But for me, it was a case of, I was more successful at life

when wearing a dress than when wearing pants. - Right. - Which is an interesting thing really, 'cause a lot of transgender people would have the opposite experience. They say they wanted to express themselves by wearing dresses or whatever and then they felt they couldn't. But for me, I was dressed like a dude and it was like, duh! And then I put on a dress and everyone's like, woo! - I think there's a lot of insecurity out there with guys where like, if you say it's a joke, it's hilarious. But if you're like, no, I like this, they're like, oh, I don't know how to feel about that.

- I mean, just talking to you now, you definitely bring the energy wherever you go. - Thank you. - I feel like I played the part into it. - I don't think the dress is needed for the rest of the party. - I feel it's like the energy was there before the skirt came on. - But sort of like on what you just said, yeah, but I turn up in this and I'm all energetic. Everybody goes, well, that makes sense. But when I just turn up in pants, an old lady in Denny's tells me to shut up.

You know what I'm saying? Am I wrong? Am I wrong? - I am curious. I think the outfit wouldn't have mattered. I think she was gonna tell you to shut the fuck up. - I am curious, in the country of noise complaints, just how many noise complaints have you gotten? - Oh dear me, dear me. It's a nonstop stream of noise complaints. Walking down the street, "Urusai, Urusai, shizukaku."

- Constantly. - How do you not like, I don't know. 'Cause I guess, you know, you had that like voice acting experience, right? So I guess like the whole like, you know, using your voice and being loud and all of that, it's just like kind of ingrained into you almost. - I don't know, I just saved that shit. What do you mean? - Oh really? - That's optional.

- Yeah, but I think it's more just a personality trait. - Personality trait, yeah. - And on top of that, I'm a younger sibling, so I had to do something to get some damn attention. - Look at me! - Frankly! - So where am I in this story? Yeah, so okay, so I was a casual cross-dresser, and then when I moved to Hong Kong, I started cross-dressing in the same capacity, so just going out to rock and roll shows and things in a dress. 'Cause Hong Kong's such a conservative society, yo, if I lifted the energy in Australia, in Hong Kong,

- I would walk in and it was just, ah, people just lost their minds. You're like, you're the funniest person I've ever seen in my life. They went bonkers for it. So I'm like, damn. So there we are and we're figuring out characters for the first wrestling match. Every other wrestler in Hong Kong, their gimmick was, I am a wrestler.

- Like nothing interesting at all. - Yeah, he's a wrestler. Is that all? Yes. - So I'm like- - What are you good at? - I wrestle. - What is your name? - Wrestler. - The wrestler. - So I'm like, I'm gonna wear a dress and I'm gonna be called Ladybeard. So all the other wrestlers were like,

- Okay. - And they were weird about it, right? - Right. - First match I go in there overnight, most popular wrestler in Hong Kong. - Damn. - 'Cause I was the only one who had a character. - Right, right. - 'Cause everyone else was a wrestler, the same as the other 20 wrestlers they'd just seen come out before them. - So what I wanted to know, how is like, I assume this is like the amateur wrestling scene. How did they introduce new wrestlers?

- What's the process for that? - Well, okay, so like I say, you go through, you do a tryout and then they agree to train you, you start training. And then when you get, when you're kind of released publicly, as in when you're debuted, they'll find a way to debut you. So normally you do it with something public, like a wrestling show or like a video segment or something like that. And they'll just,

like whoever you are in the ring and however you're gonna fit into the company and the stories and so forth, they'll just find a way that works to introduce a character. So let's say for instance right now, let's say we've been training Garnt for the past year and Garnt's now a skilled young pro wrestler. - As you can see by my face. - You can see Garnt's been smacking at the gym on a daily basis. So, okay, so let's make a gimmick for you real quick. You are the, you're the tie elephant God. So, okay, here's the tie elephant.

- We're gonna tie it off at God and we've decided and currently Joey, who is the slightly colorful haired luchador. He's in a feud with Connor, the Welsh despair. So you two are feuding. - Just being Welsh. - You two are feuding. - Why does the Welsh despair sound so cool?

- I was trying to think of a word that started with W, but I couldn't think of it in two seconds. - I'm the multicolored luchador. Like what the fuck? - What would you like to be? - Anything else would be fine. - Really? - Other than what's your gimmick? I have interesting colored hair.

- Cool, thanks. - Was that the standard of Hong Kong? - Yeah. - That didn't even have a particular name. - Sorry, that sounded rude. - Okay, so. - I apologize to my wrestling brothers in Hong Kong. Anyway, okay, so let's say you guys are feuding. We'll find some kind of angle in which during your story, for some reason,

the Thai elephant God is paying huge homage to the multicolored luchador. And to that end, when you guys are in a match, Joey will hit his finisher and he'll like cover Connor and it'll be one, two, and then the lights will go off and they'll come on.

and riding down the ramp on an elephant is the Thai elephant God. - Right. - To let everybody know that the match is not gonna end like this. - Right, right. - Or just any damn way you wanna do it. This is one of the beautiful things about wrestling is a lot of potential for creativity and so forth. - So did you get to like, say for instance, like the entry, right? Like I think from what I've heard, like each wrestler, do they get to choose what song they enter with?

- Yeah, it depends on your company really. - Right, right, right. But like you, but like basically the wrestler, like every other time, like they get to choose how they want to enter. - I personally got to, but of course you're limited by what you're capable of doing. - Also copyright, I imagine. - Oh yeah, true, true, true. - That can be a problem if it's, well, yeah, it can be a problem, but it's kind of like if you're small time, you're often too small time. If you're big time, they've got the rights cleared.

- So what's like say like for you, for example, like what's like your pinnacle of entries that you remember?

because I've seen some, 'cause recently Aki has been getting into WWE. - Oh, okay. - Which is like slightly worrying as well. 'Cause I'm like, is she gonna be a WWE girlfriend? I don't know about that. But she was watching, we were watching like, I think it was like the top 10, like WWE, like most memorable WWE entries. And the one that fucking killed me was one that John Cena did where he literally somehow got a hundred John Cena lookalikes to come out in this like,

like just this fucking row of people. And they would part ways and create this like aisle. - That's the most extra thing. - They would part ways and create this aisle. And then the moment the fireworks went off, they all turned to each other and started doing this. - That's fantastic. - And then the real John Cena comes in and he just runs through them all doing this. - That's fantastic. - Did you ever get to do something like that?

- Let me tell you something, Joey. The budget that's been dedicated to . - Okay, well then what would you say is like, yeah, this is like the peak of my entry. - Of like a ring entrance? - Of like a ring entrance. - I don't know, I don't think I've done anything particularly special as a ring entrance. - You don't really like...

off the top of my head. No, I don't think I've done any. - You just kind of show up. - Get announced, come out, get a big light on you. Go around high-fiving the audience into ring. But you gotta remember when I come out, I've got pigtails in a pink and white bikini. So just that is somewhat a statement. - True, true. - I don't need to do this Joey.

- I want them to see me. - Only terrible. - Only terrible WWE jokes. So, okay. So we established the cross dressing thing. We've established the pro wrestling thing.

- So when I moved to Hong Kong, I started learning Cantonese 'cause that's the language I speak there. And so one of the strategies I had for learning languages was I would get music in that language, which I'm sure you guys have probably gone through here with Japanese. Not Connor from the look on his face, but you get music that you like in the language.

I started listening to Cantonese pop songs. Most of the music is pop. There's very little anything else in Hong Kong. So I'm listening to these pop songs and my favorite numbers are Metalhead from way back. Actually, my favorite songs, full stop, were always like metal covers of pop songs. So like metal covers of like Last Friday Night and Put Your Face and things like that. Because they're hilarious, right? Because you're so used to hearing Lady Gaga with, you know, carry my body.

And then you hear, "Garret, my bow, my bow." To me, that's so funny, right? I think it's fantastic. Because it takes what you're used to and it subverts it. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - So to me, that's a thing of beauty. So when I started listening to these pop songs, I was like, "These are really catchy songs. Who's done the metal covers?" Turns out no one had.

And I was like, well, someone should do that. - Free real estate, isn't it? - Three years later, it was after the financial crisis, everything had been wiped out. And I'm like, what am I gonna do? I was going through one of those exercises where you figure out your career and what you're gonna do. It's like, what are you passionate about? And I'm like, well, heavy metal and destroying things. So I'm like, okay, I wanna be a metal singer. And I was like, okay.

Specifically, I wanna sing metal covers of Cantonese pop songs because I think they'll sound awesome. No one else has done it, I'm gonna goddamn do it. - Yeah. - Yeah. - Wow. - So I did, and then what I said was, okay, so I've already got this fan base organized with the wrestling.

I'm gonna do this metal project as Ladybeard and I'm gonna bring that fan base over. And then I'm gonna try and do this amazing interesting thing of working the pro wrestling world and the heavy metal world together so that the storylines interlocked and they flow back and forth between them. - It's something you were like 15 years too early to TikTok.

- Yeah. - I feel like those heavy metal covers would blow up on TikTok. - Yeah, exactly. - Hearing you talk about the financial crisis is like this devastating thing is so bizarre. 'Cause I was just so young. I was probably shitting myself and watching "Finding Nemo." The thought of having an impact is- - Yeah, I mean, what? It was 2008, right? - Yeah. - I was 14. - I was in university. - I was probably 12 or something. I'm 24.

- Holy smooker-ooning. - Yeah, I mean like, you know, I- - I think I was 11 then. - Yeah, 'cause I had heard like from my parents being like, you know, like, "Damn, the world got fucked over that." - This is a big thing that's gonna happen. And I'm just like, I'm just trying to get through my degree right now. - I'm still probably eating Cocoa Pops and, you know,

- We got to realize the same kind of thing has happened now with COVID-19. All four of us are very lucky that we can still sit here employed. - Absolutely. - A lot of people are now in that position that I was in then and they're going, "Oh God, what am I gonna do?" So the next generation of ladybeard is gonna come out of COVID. - Couple of years from now, there'll be like a little 2.0 of ladybeard. - Ladybeard with a pink mask.

- Yeah, so that's how it came to be, I guess. - When did you move to Japan then? - So I started doing my metal covers of Cantonese pop songs and I started doing that in Hong Kong, very good. Did a couple of tours to some nearby places and I said, one of the things that kind of gave me the confidence to do it in the first place, because it's sort of, when you go full time as the cross-dresser, you can't ever really go back, can you?

It's kind of, it works or you're screwed. - Right, right, right. - So one of the things that kind of gave me the confidence to do it was, well, if I can't really get anything going on in Hong Kong, I know I can always move to Japan 'cause I'm sure they'll love something like this. - Oh yeah, of course. - Yeah, yeah. - So I did a tour to Japan after I got myself organized in Hong Kong, did Japanese songs. So I couldn't speak Japanese yet, just learned the songs phonetically. - Oh wow. - Put together a show, came over here with the handful of contacts I had,

three Japanese people I knew. So I put it together a show, but it popped 'cause I was doing like covers of metal covers of like, what's that girl who sings first love Hikaru Shida. What's that? No, that's a wrestler. - Utada Hikaru? - Yeah, thank you very much. Yeah. Doing like metal covers of that and so forth. So the audience, much they didn't know who I was, the audience who was at any of these shows would see this show. They all knew the songs 'cause they're famous songs. And they'd be the metal cover of course. They're like, ah, this is hilarious. So that tour went incredibly well.

So I'm like, okay, well clearly I found the chosen land. The promised land has risen in the ancient texts. The ancient promised land. - The promised land of milk and honey. - So I went back to Hong Kong and I'm like, all right, clearly the mission now needs to be moved to Japan and do the trade in Japan. And I did, and here we are. - Wow, man, do you know what it feels like? You know when you put your headphones in your pocket and it gets all tangled and you have to untangle it? That's literally what we're doing with your story right now.

- It all finally fits together. It all makes sense now. - It's all finally one straight line that I can understand. - So I came over at the end of 2013 and then at the start of 2014, my images went viral on the Twitter. And then in 2015, I was put in this pop group with these two young singers and we did a song called Nippon Manju and that blew up on the YouTubes.

And now we're riding high. - So, okay then, like, because I would say like for people who don't know Ladybeard, for instance, I'd say like, I would say though, like if there's one thing about you that you've done in your career, that's probably, I would say is probably the most well-known would probably be Ladybaby. - Of course. - Yeah. - Right? So how did that come to be?

So I was, it was me and my former manager. We're in Japan. We're only doing our stuff in Japan and so forth. And so I was on the cover of Metropolis magazine. Do you know that magazine? I've definitely heard of that. It's a free magazine. How can you guys be foreigners in Japan and not know Metropolis? It's like,

- You're gonna leave my house? You know what year it's been? - Okay, fair enough. There's a free English magazine, like a street magazine in Tokyo, I think in all Japan called Metropolis. - Is there? - I've never seen it. - I'm definitely afraid of eye contact with strangers holding things. I'm like, "Don't, don't, no, no." - I thought you Welshman loved a good fight.

- Give me the Metropolis magazine. I need my reads. - If I loved a good fight, I think I'd be deported very quickly. - So there's this magazine. - Wow, it's a very popular magazine amongst every foreigner in Japan except one, two, three. - Milly, did you know about this? - Yeah, right? - Ashley, did you know about this?

- Yes, right? There are five foreigners here who didn't know about it. - My friends who work at Metropolis magazine, I sincerely apologize for this negative press that you are currently receiving on the Trash Taste podcast. - Clearly the marketing strategy needs to be- - Dude, that magazine

- That magazine is everywhere. - Well, it's clearly not everywhere. - Well, where do you get it? Like convenience store? - Not only convenience store, but if you go to Tower Records or whatnot, they got that stack of free magazines. - I don't think I've been into a Tower Records in about a year. - You look at the free stack of magazines, I just see potential toilet roll. - When you get to the airport and you're walking from your plane to immigration, there's all those magazines and stuff. - I'm just checking my phone. - Yeah, you're just checking your phone, right?

- Young people! - Millennials. - Okay, so you're on the cover of Millennium. - I'm on the cover of Metropolis Magazine. The CEO of a Halloween costume company is getting off a plane, he's walking through the airport and he sees Metropolis Magazine with me on it. It's me in my pink and white bikini flexing. And he said, "What the hell is that?" - Don't go through shops in the airport. - Everybody.

- He's actually Chinese. So he probably said, "Ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-ch-

So he takes magazine and he takes it back to his office. And he's like, look at this. And his staff are like, yeah, that's this lady beard guy. He's foreign a dude. And he said, bring him in. I wanna work with him. Bring him in. - Wow. - So we get a contact from this company and we go in and he's like, I wanna work with you. I'm like, all right. I thought he was a Halloween costume company, right? So I thought he's gonna make like a line of my bikinis to sell on Halloween. He's like, I wanna work with you,

I don't know how. So we'll be in touch. - Okay. - Like, okay. - So he put you in his office. - Yeah, we go back to what we were doing and a month later he calls us in again. And he's like, I'm gonna put you in a pop group with a pair of idols. - Wow.

- Wait, how did that happen? - That's another jump. - How did he come up with that idea? - Well, I wasn't there for that. - Okay. - 'Cause he did that in the privacy of his own space. - Your life just sounds like a roulette wheel. What is going on? Why is this a show? - Well, that's what you get for waking up in Vegas. - It's just like, here's a bunch of money. It's like, oh, I don't even remember betting on black.

- Anyway, so this guy somehow manages to get you in this idol group. - Yeah, so he spoke to some people he knew and he's, "I'm gonna put you in a group." And then we did that first song and it blew up. - And that was Lady Baby. Wow, so he somehow knew Babymetal?

Wait, were Babymetal even established back then? Yeah, they were very popular at the time. It was recently after Gimme Choco. Oh, okay, yeah, yeah. So they were very hot and they were getting spoken about a lot in Japan. But it's like, I remember the meeting. He goes, he goes, because he's a heavy metal singer and they're idols. Yeah, yeah. So your Babymetal are very popular at the moment, aren't they? Yeah. So something just like Babymetal, but with Ladybeard.

Ladybeard. Babymetal. Ladybaby! That was the meaning! I'm like, right?

- Like cool, I guess. - This was the CEO of a Halloween costume. And they just decided to get into- - This is the same kind of CEO, Garb. With fast thinking like that. - That's the kind of fast thinking we need as far as CEO. - That's a decision making skills right there. - He's a smart man. He's from China. He came over to Japan like with no money, like 30 years ago or something. And he made his living, like he'd go outside Tokyo Dome, it's during the bubble, outside Tokyo Dome,

he would like sell like light sticks or something when they're sporting events. And he somehow made his business happen. - That is literally how like every entrepreneur in the 70s started. Like that, isn't that like every entrepreneur story from the 70s? It's like, I had no money when coming to this country. - Started on the streets, now we're here. - I sold paperclips and now I own a multimillion dollar corporation. - He did a good job. - Man, my dad was rich. - Gave me a small loan of a million dollars.

Smart 12-year-old can do it.

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there's never been a better time to go to Harry's. So go to harrys.com/trashtaste to redeem your offer today. - Thank you to Harry's for sponsoring the episode. Back to the show. - All right, gentlemen, I'm gonna bring us back in from the commercial break. I'm gonna do it as if we're in South Africa. I'm gonna do it in an Afrikaans accent. - Why South Africa?

- South Africa. - I'll tell you why in a second. Let me just bring us back in for this commercial break. You ready? Okay, I'm gonna do it like it's my show. - South Africans, rate these accents. - You ready? Here we go.

- Welcome back to the Trish Taste podcast on the voice of Africa radio network. I'm your host Ladybeard, here today with more guests Connor, Garnt and Joey. Gentlemen, how are you? - That's actually really good. - Thanks man. I got a thing for South Africa at the moment. - You sound like my math teacher back in high school. - Was he South African? - He was very South African. - Okay, good one, excellent, thank you. - It'd be awkward if you were like, no, he's not South African. - If any African.

were offended by my accent, I was not trying to appropriate your culture. I'll let you know. I'll let you know. I have. So my shower curtain. - What is going on?

- What is actually going on? - Stop interrupting, Tonya, oh my God. I'll tell you what's going on. - You know what this is like? This is the conversation equivalent of like changing tabs. - We have been like completely drunk for episodes so we're easier to follow than this. What is going on?

- The mini beards shower curtain. - Okay, talk about your shower curtain. - Is a very badly produced map of the world. - Okay. - So when I was buying shower curtains from whichever shower curtain dispensary I was buying from. - Right. - Probably wasn't Amazon 'cause I'm too old. So I bought the cheapest one and it was this very poorly produced map of the world. - Okay. - And like, it's like the borders are in the wrong places. The colors of the countries bleed over the borders. Things are spelt wrong. And,

One of the things it does is on a country, it does not highlight the biggest city or the capital city. It highlights some other city. - Just some random city. - And then other cities are left out. So for instance, in Australia, I think in Australia they managed to get Canberra. So that was right. - At least they got the capital. - Yeah. In Japan, it's Sendai. - What? - And no other city. - Right. - And then, so then, all right. - So how does that lead to your Afrikaans accent?

- This connection I wanna see. - When I'm...

sitting on the toilet and I won't go into detail about what's going on at the time. - Well, we can imagine. - You can imagine. - Yes. - My eye line is such that I look directly at that bottom part of Africa on this map. So it's like South Africa, Namibia, Botswana. - Right, right, right. - And on the South Africa, because it's a dodgy map, there's no Cape town, there's no Johannesburg, but there is Bloemflintin.

- Okay, which is just some random town. - It's personally, it's fun to say. Say it with me, you try. - What is it? - Blumflumpting. - Blumflumpting? - That was excellent.

- Can you say that in a Welsh accent? - You know what that sounds like? That sounds like something the Swedish chef would say on the Muppets. - This is a real place. - It's a real place. - Full fucking privileged people laughing at African sound mates. - It's the capital of a part of South Africa called Free State.

- Okay. - And Bloemfluentein is the capital of that. - The biggest city slash capital of Free State. And that's the city- - Everyone who's watching this from Bloemfluentein is like, "Why it's so funny?" - And Bloemfluentein is what I look at when I'm sitting on the toilet. - I'm gonna tell you shit. - Okay. - Okay. - And so for that reason, I did some research on Bloemfluentein. - Okay. - And now my current, my boom is South Africa.

- So that's why you did the Afrikaans accent. - That's why I did the Afrikaans accent. And you can call me, I don't know an Afrikaans surname. What's a common Afrikaans surname? - You're asking as if I know. - Dertenfort. You can call me Ladybeard Dertenfort from here on in. Joey, take it away. - I don't think I can take it away. - We were on the lady baby, right? - Yeah, yeah, yeah.

- Yeah, yeah, yeah. - I was about to bring us back. - You guys from now on can never give a shit for the amount of tangents we go on 'cause that was easily the biggest tangent we've ever been on. - I was about to say, we're quite famous for going on tangents and I swear there's like tangents within tangents within tangents like when you tell a single story. That was like moving onto a different shape. - No tangent has ever started as beautifully as my shower curtain. It's the greatest start to a tangent ever. - It's probably the greatest start to a tangent ever.

- Okay, so ladybeam. - So a Halloween costume CEO put me in a pop group. - Okay, and you were in Lady Baby. And how long did that go for? - Well, I was in Lady Baby. So our first ever song, Nippon Manju blew up on the internets and it got very, very popular. And so now we were the hottest group in 2015. - So when this was formed, you didn't have any say in who the two idols were. Literally just were putting with two people, be friends with them. - I was told you're doing this group, yeah. That's right. So that happened.

I was in Lady Baby for like a year and a half or something. So I did like four singles with them and then some other kind of B-side type songs as well. Due to a series of events I won't go into, I was unceremoniously relieved of my position in Lady Baby. - Right.

And now they don't exist anymore. - Was it because you were at the Denny's being a little too- - Bit too noisy at the Denny's. - Bit too noisy. - Did you get a noise- - Every time I was at Denny's, every time. You know what? Yeah, it turns out when you choose a heavy metal singer, you want him to be as quiet

- So then you did the lady baby stuff and then you kind of did a whole other bunch of- - Did a bunch of other stuff. My time in that group ended. They went on without me, but now they're done anyway. That whole thing has come to an end. I went and did some other stuff, but now- - You have a new group.

Finally got a new group. So everyone loved Lady Baby when I was there. So me and the two cute little Japanese girls, everyone loved it. I'm like, let's do that again. For a series of reasons we couldn't for five years. Basically sum it up Japanese showbiz politics, basically. We did some other stuff. I have been happy with the other stuff I've done.

But now we're in a position where we can do it again. So I'm like, sweet as, let's do it again. So basically what we've done is we've constructed as many of the parts that came together to make Nippon Manju as we could. We've reconstructed those. And we're doing the same thing again. And I'm very excited because for five years I've been

every day I've been told, "Why'd you leave Lady Baby? "I wanted you to keep doing it, I liked it." - Every day for five years. So finally I can do this formation again 'cause clearly it's what I wanna do, it's what the whole world wants to see. So brace yourselves, ladies and gentlemen, Lady Beard 2021 coming at you with brand new group. I'm allowed to release brand new group's name, correct? - What was the name? - Baby Beard.

2021 ladies and gentlemen, come here. - Baby Beard. - Baby Beard. - That makes more sense than Lady Baby. - It does, it does. - Like as a name, right? - I thought that. I thought that at that naming meeting, I was like,

- Why not Babybeard? - If you're gonna take that approach. - No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. Lady baby, lady baby. - Let's ignore the one person in the room who speaks English. His idea of a good English name. So Babybeard is unlike Donkey Kong. I'm so excited. - Have you done stuff with them yet? - Oh, Joey.

- I don't know if I said the good thing or bad thing. - No, you've done nothing, Joey. - All I have to know, we haven't done shit. - It's funny you ask that because this whole thing was ready to get up and get running at the beginning of 2020. - We all know what happened to that. - We all know what happened to that. So now we're in this...

unique position where we have a new group to release and we're not really capable of doing all the things you normally do to release a group. - Right, you're kind of stuck in . - Yeah. - So,

- What you need to do is you need to head down to the Baby Beard TikTok. There you're gonna see all the latest from Baby Beard coming at you full of updates and all the things we're gonna be doing as soon as we're allowed to do normal things like be on a stage. - I love how like, this is the first guest that we've had that's just like, fuck the end of the show. I'm promoting my shit now. - Hell yeah, I am. Oi, oi, oi, oi. - You're a true showman. - Oi, oi, oi, oi.

- Hey, go to social media. Look up baby bean. - Do the thing. - The twitty twotty, I should say that word. The twitty twoppy, the facey booky, the instant hair.

- We'll put all the links in the description. - All the links in the description. Smash the like button. That's what the young people say nowadays. - But they don't say it in the middle of the episode. They say that at the end. - You guys think we're ending? - This podcast is just starting, guys. - Where am I? - We're still going. - I'll bring us back for that interview. - Okay. - Welcome back to the "Fast Taste" podcast.

- We can't do welcome back every time. - Every five minutes, we're welcoming them back. Every toilet break, welcome back. - Anyway, I have a new group called Babybeard. Me and two adorable Japanese girls. It's gonna be fantastic. If you loved Nippon Manju, you will love this. Go watch it, please.

- I'm just glad you're- - What table is the victim today? You're fucking beating the shit out of us. - That's what happens when you bring a pro wrestler in, Joey's gonna get body slammed through this in a second. - It's a great table actually. - I'm just glad you're sticking with something familiar for once, not going to like fucking astrophysics or something. - Yeah, right? - I don't know much about it. - No, no, no. - It's fine, it's fine. - So I'm curious,

- When you made your previous movie, you said that you didn't even have a say in it. Did you get much say when you're making this one, like who you wanted to bring onto it? Or was it literally just find me two cute Japanese girls? - We held auditions. - Oh, okay.

- Oh, okay. - We held auditions. - And you got to choose and? - Yep, so I was on the audition panel. Tell you what, auditioning is a totally different thing as in being on the choosing side of the audition. 'Cause for my whole life, I've been on the doing the auditions side. - Right, right, right. - This is the first time I've been on the watching the audition side. It's a different game. - Yeah. - Oh yeah. - But instantly it's very interesting 'cause it kind of takes away any,

it means that all the times you've been rejected in auditions, it no longer feels personal once you're on the WAPworship panel. 'Cause you can see girls came in and they were wonderful. Like they were really good. I was like, I think you're fantastic, but you're just not what we need right now for this. A couple of them really good, but just,

like a bit too tall, things like this. But it's kind of upsetting 'cause you're like, I wanna give you a job, but I just can't. - So what were you looking for? What was the criteria? - Well, you had to make sure. - Not too tall. - That was the main criteria. Not too tall. - Nah, that's it. - Really? - No, no, no, no. - I was gonna say, there's plenty of grandmas here. They're perfect.

So were you like looking for like a certain like vocal style? 'Cause I assume it's like vocalists, right? - They had to be able to sing. They had to be able to dance. They had to be small enough. They had to be cute enough. They had to be willing- - Just a normal idol. - Yeah, but they had to be willing to go all over the world. 'Cause you know, when there's no fricking bloody death, flu apocalypse, we're planning to be going all over the world. - How do you make it sound worse than it is? - Death, flu apocalypse? - Death, flu apocalypse. - What if I add this sound effect?

- Deathful Apocalypse is like an amazing metal band name. - Hey guys, we're Deathful Apocalypse.

- That's what you should have called Babybeard. - Maybe I should. - Yeah, Death Flu Apocalypse. - That's our second single, Death Flu Apocalypse. That's actually a really good idea. Shiori, make a note please. Death Flu Apocalypse. I can't remember what we were saying. - The criteria for the girls. - Yes, auditions. So you had to be willing to go overseas.

They were the main criteria. And then it's also standing with me and the other two. Does that balance it out? A lot of it's like, you're really good. We really like you, but you don't fit together with me and any of the other girls. So the hard people had to get two of them. One is relatively easy. Two is hard. So you need two people who can...

Anyway, we did, we ended up with two fantastic girls. One called Kotomi and one called Suzu. And foreigners always think Suzu's name is either Susan or Suza. - Susan. - It's neither of those two. Think Suzuki without the key. - No, you should just commit to the Susan bit. - Susan? - That should be like her nickname. - Really? - Yeah. - She's not a librarian.

- Is every Susan a librarian? - Maybe they are. - I don't know a single Susan, so I couldn't tell you. - You know a single Susan? - Do you know a single Susan? - You know a single Susan?

- Nothing's like the 80s. - Suddenly a single Susan cannot be established in this. - All the Susans in the comments section, raise your hand. - I'm a Susan. - I am a big fan of Susans everywhere. Susans are wonderful people. - Which friends? - Susan, what do you think? - Susan, I love you, I'm not trying to offend you. The point I'm trying to make is Suzu.

is not named Susan. - Susan. - That's the point. - Yeah, but you made it sound like as if like, I love everyone named Susan, but these other names, yikes. - It's like, oh, I'm knackered. - You're knackered. - I'm getting tired just like. - I gotta drink some of my fluids.

- So like, okay. So I guess like- - Where do you even begin asking questions? - Yeah, right? 'Cause it's like- - This shit is so crazy. It's like, what the fuck am I- - We have got the same musicians who made Nippon Manju. - Okay. - And they have made a banger. - So Nippon Manju is like the famous- - That was the first, that was the- - That was the famous lady. - Can I say single? Oh, please. Check out. Same people as me.

amazing people it's musical madness it'll tingle with wonder you have never heard something as amazing as this adorable Japanese's one noisy cross-dresser screaming what more could you want in a musical

"Take a store commercial." - Our audio readout looks insane right now. - You just destroyed that microphone. - Why are we reading the ads? - Yeah, right? - I don't wanna read the ads. - What's the product we're advertising? - You just read your own ad. - You literally just read your- - You need talking points. - Yeah, you are the talking point. - Let's do an ad for a fake product that we haven't invented yet.

Like the South African survival kit. You ready? - Shitty shower kit. - But when I find myself lost in Blumflintin, it's always important to make sure that I've got a survival kit with me. That way, if I find myself without food, water or shelter, there'll be something I'll be able to do. - You make it sound like that town is like the woods. - Is this a fever dream? What have I stumbled into today?

- I've had fever dreams that are less weird than this. - I hope there are no South African ladies named Susan who have less of this. If you're a South African named Susan, leave a message in the comment box below. - Okay. - I'm curious. So you, you know, you obviously, you said that you're gonna be touring worldwide. - Yeah. - Where is the majority of your audience, Japanese? - So, well, obviously Japan, but you know, this is the group, yeah.

we have the death flu apocalypse at the moment. It's a little bit hard to establish physically where the audience is gonna be. Personally, I have a big fan bases all over the world, which is great. So we do the conventions like you characters do. - Yeah, characters. - Do you not consider yourself a character? Die, elephant god!

- I mean, the first time I met you was, oh God, yeah. That was, yeah, God, how many years ago was that? - That was 2016. - Five years ago? - 16, yeah, 2016, five years ago. - Five years ago. - And like, I had known about you, but then when I actually saw you in person, I was like, oh shit. - Oh, thank you. - It's that guy in the dress. - I feel like, you know, I don't know if this is rude, but I feel like a lot of people know of you, but they're not like quite sure, you know. - 'Cause your name, it's when you, you know,

- Your reputation proceeds you. - You're just a memorable character. - If I pop up on your feed, right? You know, on Twitter, you see my face like, great, another white guy. You know, you see you, it's like, it's kind of hard not to be like, I think I've seen this before. - It's either I've never seen this or I've definitely seen this. - You know you've seen it.

- What the hell is that? - Watch my videos, tons of them. They'll be like, they'll come up to me like, do I know you from somewhere? Yeah, I'm like every white generic white guy in existence. - You look beautiful. - Have you ever had anyone come up to you and being like, have you like dead ass ever had anyone come up to you and being like, have I seen you before? - All the time. - Really? - It's much more like, oh, lady beard. That's much more. - People are like, they're not sure if you're lady beard. - Yes.

- Yes. - Really? - Yes. - But what- - Because you're so like, how does that happen? - What's interesting about being a long haired bearded white man in Japan is there's quite a lot of long haired bearded white men in Japan. - Really? - And I have been confused with people such as Zach Wilder.

- He plays guitar for Black Sabbath, Black Label Society. - He's like a metal- - He's a heavy metal legend. I don't look like him. - You don't look like him at all. - But I've got long hair and a beard, so I do. - He's like white long-haired beard, you're Zach Wildman. - You can see the picture right here. It looks nothing alike. - I was standing at a bus stop in Shibuya

I'm standing there waiting my bus stop. And this lady, actually she was another white lady. I should say another one 'cause this is the first one in the story apart from South African Susan. She was a white lady. She comes up and she looks at the bus stop. She reads the times and she sort of looks at me, reads the times, looks at her phone. There she goes.

"You look like Jesus." - You look like Jesus. I'm like, "Ah, thank you." She goes, "Can you do this? "I wanna take a photo and send it to my kids." - What? - I'm like, "Okay."

- Why her kids? - Yeah. - Look at what I made this peasant do at the taxi stand. I made him T-pose. - I'm an atheist, but I know you guys love Jesus. - Oi, I think as far as people to look like, Jesus is pretty good. - I mean, I've gotten that before as well. - You got Jesus? - When I had long hair, I definitely got that. - Japanese Jesus? - Yeah, Japanese Jesus, yeah. I feel like anyone with long hair and a slight beard,

- I'm sure they've brought us back on before. - You should grow yours out, grow yours out. You'll be a Thai Jesus soon. - No, it's literally long hair, beard, and you're tall. - Right. - That's the three steps to be Jesus. - The three steps to be Jesus. - Three steps to be Jesus. Long hair, beard, and you're tall. - Where's the wiki how art's going? - How to be Jesus. - How to be Jesus.

- Have you ever had like crazy requests like that from fans in the street? Like to be like, can you do this weird thing? - I've never asked to be T-pose before. - No, I've never asked a T-pose either. - I probably will do now. - It's good. - Yeah. - I'm like T, T.

- Is there anything like, I guess, okay. - That fell flat. - No, I was just trying to like formulate my question. - There's so many things going on. I'm trying to like make sense of this chaos right now. - Sensory overload for one source.

- Okay, so 'cause like, I would say like, I think anyone can agree, right? Looking at your entire history, you have done a lot of fucking things. - Done a heap of things. - You've done a lot of different things. Is there like any- - That's an understatement. - That is a total understatement. But like, is there anything that you would personally like to like kind of add onto that? Is there like another completely separate thing where you're like, maybe down the road, I'd like to do something like that? - I've injured myself now.

I wanted to do a fricking baby beard as in my time with Lady Baby was brought to a halt so prematurely and so abruptly, and I'm not gonna go into details, but look, I was not really treated very nicely in the process. And that was so unfinished that I feel a sense of incompletion if we don't go back and we don't finish that cycle off now. - Yeah. - Yeah.

So that's kind of what I want to do. Beyond that, there's many other things that I want to do. - That are completely separate from what you want to do. - Yeah. But I want to bring them up now. - Oh yeah, I mean, I guess you gotta hide it, right? And kind of reveal it or? - Look, yeah. - Or you just don't want to share it? - Well, I mean, if you say it now, there's pressure for him to do it. - No, it's not that. Look, let's just stick with one thing we're talking about at one time. So far,

We can't. We've been unsuccessful because you go on 17 million tangents. That was one accent that turned into a different accent halfway through. Hey, look, I just want to do a baby beard. That's the thing. I feel alive. When we finish, I'll do another thing. Right now, that's the thing. Mamma mia. Where do we go from here?

- How did we get here? - I'm like genuinely like, I've never been dumbfounded in my life. - Can I ask a question? - Sure. - Please, sure. - Garnt. - Yes. - Your individual YouTube channel. - Yes. - How do you pronounce the name of that? - Giguk. - Did you pronounce it Gig UK like everyone else? - I said Gyguk. - That's the third alternative. - And then I thought potentially GG UK. I thought just a huge Girls' Generation fan.

- G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G, G

- Get out of here. - LadyB discovers the YouTube algorithm. - You got spoiled by TikTok. - Yeah. - So the YouTube algorithm has gotten so good now that they can detect covers of songs when people are just singing it. - What if you're trying to sing the song but you're a really bad singer? - No. - Get out of here. - I've heard people, like I've actually heard stories of people humming songs in their YouTube videos and getting copyright claims for it.

Get out of here. What if you make an original song and purely by chance, you accidentally picked the same hook as a real song? - That's called a lawsuit. - No, seriously, you'll lose that. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - You'll lose that.

- Welcome to the YouTube ecosystem. - This is the first time on the podcast where I've seen you just be dumbfounded for words. - It's so bizarre 'cause I live in a universe where I have to pretend like music doesn't exist outside of copyright free music. It's so bizarre.

- Is there any questions you'd like to ask us? 'Cause I feel like we've asked like literally every question we can ask you. - It's been good. I feel a bit selfish for not talking about you people. - No, no, no, you're the guest. - All viewers know us, they're fucking sick of us. - I was really enthusiastic to hear about Gyguk/GGUK. So now that that's done, I wanted to sing "Girls' Generation" with everybody.

- I'm curious, have you ever had a normal job? Like quote unquote normal. I'm just wondering, because I'm sitting here thinking, right? You know, if I went into like, I go into like H&M and you're just there like- - I can't imagine- - That was your T-shirt, sir! - I can't imagine you were like a big W or anything like that. I can't imagine you were like a regular store.

- One of the reasons I've worked so hard on this career is exactly because I don't exactly fit in elsewhere. - Have you ever had a normal job? - Yes, my first jobs were normal. - What were your first jobs? - I worked in retail when I was like 18 or whatever. - What did you do? - You know, store in Australia, girls clothing store called Supre. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - I worked at Supre. - You worked at a Supre? - That's the first boy they ever hired. - How did that go? - Well now I'm stuck.

- Where do you think you learned the drip from? - I'm very bad at normal jobs. This is why I've got such a- - I cannot imagine you working at a retail at all. - I wasn't very good at it. And so I worked retail and then I didn't enjoy it much. So I stopped that. And then I became a dish pig in a restaurant. So I was a dish pig in like the nicest restaurant in Adelaide.

- Yeah, yeah. So that way one way that's a great, in some respects- - The finest establishment. - Welcome to South Australia. - We have one McDonald's.

- Yeah, so I was a dish picker at this restaurant. It was actually quite a good job. There are a few things about it that made it hard. I was bad at the plates, as in I was good at doing the pans, frying pans and that. I liked that, I was good at it. I was very slow at the plates and the knives and forks. So that ruined it for me. - Because it's like more like fragile? - I was just bad at it. Well, with the pans, you're there with your sink.

Pan goes, sorry. Pan goes in, wash pan, pan goes out. With the plates and stuff, there was like an industrial dishwasher that you had to load. Get the plates loaded, put them in, wash them, get them out, get them dried. - Wouldn't that be easier? - Well, I was just bad at it. - How do you be bad at that? - I was just crap at it. - Is it 'cause like dishes are more delicate? 'Cause I can't imagine you handling things delicately. - That's part of it, but also it's just, there's just such volume of it. You gotta go so fast.

So that's what I felt. I could do it, but I was just slow. - Right, right, right. - So therefore I could not work if it was only me. I had to be there with someone else and I would do the pans and they would do the machine. - Wow. - Yeah. But generally I actually quite enjoyed that job. The problem is it was always on a Friday and Saturday night. So you'd miss your social life. No more cross-dressing parties for me, Garnt.

- I was covered in slop. - This episode is sponsored by Honey. - We all shop online and gentlemen, we've all seen that promo code field taunt us. It keeps me up at night. - I can't stand it. - Thanks to Honey, manually searching for coupon codes like a peasant is a thing of the past.

- Tell me Joey, what does Honey do? - Honey is the free shopping tool that scours the internet for promo codes and applies the best ones it finds to your cart. It supports over 30,000 stores online. - 30,000? - 30,000. And they range from sites that have tech and gaming products to popular fashion brands and even food delivery. - I've saved over $30 on pizza and we all know how expensive that damn thing is.

- But thankfully, thanks to Honey, it's an affordable price. But Garnt, how does it work? - I'll tell you how it works, Connor. Imagine this, you're shopping at one of your favorite sites. - I'm imagining. - So when you're at the checkout, the Honey button drops down and all you have to do is click apply coupons. Wait a few seconds and then Honey will search for all the coupons it can find and apply it to that site. - It's that easy? - Yes, and if Honey finds a working coupon, you just watch as the price goes down.

Damn. Not just that, Garnt. Honey has found its over 17 million members over $2 billion in savings. B, billion with a B? That's B, Garnt. Well, if you don't already have Honey, you could be straight up missing out on free savings. It's literally free and installs in just a few seconds.

And by getting it, you'll be doing yourself a solid and supporting this podcast. And we would never recommend something we don't use. - So you can get Honey for free at joinhoney.com/trashtaste. That's joinhoney.com/trashtaste. Links down in the description below. - Back to the episode. - Maylene's killing it. Let's hear it for Maylene. Maylene and Ashley, killing it. Maylene and Ashley Shiori doing an excellent job. - Okay. - I quite enjoy it. I quite enjoy long flights.

- To the audience, you just went, I quite enjoy long flights. - How can anyone enjoy long flights? - Well, what do you enjoy? Are you in like economy? - When you're running around all the time and doing- - What are you doing? - Are you a person? - That did sound a bit aggressive. - No, no, no, because you don't fly in economy. - Riff raff, exit my studio. - No, no, no. - Cabbie R please.

- No, because in my mind, I don't enjoy, like I only fly economy and I don't enjoy that shit. - Yeah, I feel like when you say I enjoy, you know, people who say I enjoy flying. - Try to appeal to the little people. - If someone says I enjoy flying, my first immediate thought is, ah, Emirates first class. - Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly, exactly. - I bet you do. - My stance on the experience

- My stance on the experience is, you know, being the people we are, show business, busy schedules, busy lives, lots of getting up, running around the place, Tokyo trains, hectic, hectic, hectic, get to the airplane, no choice but to just sit there for nine hours. - That's great. - And watch a damn movie.

- Right. - Right. - So what's great about that? - Because it means I'm not running around like a psycho. - No, I do agree that it's quite relaxing. It's like the one time that you like disconnect from the world. - Yeah, because there's no other option. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - No one can get upset if you didn't reply an email 'cause you were on a plane.

- That's true. - Actually, like since they started introducing wifi to planes, I actually don't like it. - No, 'cause the worst part is that it's not even good enough. So it's just good enough where you can maybe load a tweet after refreshing like 10 times. So get your hope up. You paid 20 bucks for it and it's shit. - No, no, I completely get like the whole like disconnecting from the internet thing because like,

I remember like one time I flew, the one time I flew business in my life, I was like, oh, I get wifi and it's fast enough to load YouTube. Hell yeah, all I'm gonna do is watch YouTube. In the end, I slept for half of it.

- It's very comfortable in there. - That's the point, right? People get it to sleep, man. - Right, right. But I was like, oh no, I'm gonna be in the most comfortable position watching all the YouTube I want and there'll be no distractions whatsoever. I think I watched it for like two hours and I was like, I'm gonna sleep. - I don't know what it is about playing, but for me, sleeping on a plane is like nearby impossible. - Really? - There is just like,

I can't know how you sleep with your physique. I have trouble enough finding space on like a plane seat as it is. - You must scare everyone when you walk on that plane. Everyone's like, fuck, please, I hope he's not next to me. - Think I'm a terrorist or something. Honestly, I'm- - No, you're just like a giant dude. - If I see someone, I'm not gonna lie, if I'm sitting there in economy, right? And I see you walking down the aisle, I'm like, please.

please not next to me. 'Cause I'm like, I like it when it's an old lady. She's gonna be like tiny. - If there's a massive dude of this size sitting next to you, you're like, well, fuck, rip armrest. That armrest is going to him, not me. - Also the moment I asked you to move to go to the toilet, I've made like a fucking scene. It's like the whole plan is to reshuffle. - Oh, chickens are falling out. - Next time you catch a plane, you could try reading a book.

- That's another thing you could do on a plane. - That's what I do though. - It gives me plenty of time to read a book. - This sounds like one of those very pandering things, like 10 things you can do on a plane. - Read a book.

- Have you ever heard of one of those before? Life hacks, 10 things you can do on the fly now. - Books contain a wealth of knowledge you can access during your nine hours of sitting. - Do you read a lot of books? - I do now. I never did before, but it was about halfway through 2019. I suddenly became a bookaholic. - Why? - Oh, I don't know. Something snapped. Well, I was,

doing lots of shows in China at the time. And so I was back and forth, back and forth, back and forth. It's funny 'cause everyone on the management team is like, "Well, it's just like a three hour flight. "So it's nice and close. "So you just do it." It takes all day. - So you say three hour flight, but going to the airport alone is like a two, three hour flight. - So you go on to the airport, then you know,

get to the airport, go through all that at the airport, then the flight, then get off the plane or stuff at the airport, then get to wherever you're going. It's like a 12-hour process. It's a whole day, for sure. And so I just spent so much time on the planes. I've watched through all the movies of interest. And, you know, they only refresh them once every two months or something. It's only seven times you watch a Jason Statham film.

I watched plenty of those. I love Statham. He's a great man. He's fast and furious. But I watched through all of those. And so I switched to podcasts for a while. So I'm downloading podcasts and I'm just, hey, it's a Trash Taste podcast. Next time you catch a plane, don't forget to download Trash Taste first. So I went through that and podcasts are kind of good because you kind of fall asleep with them and then wake up and you kind of still know what's going on, sort of.

But I got to a point when my ears were sore from the things in them too much. And I was like, yeah. So I discovered the magic of books.

- Did you know that before podcasts existed, people read these things called books. - So there's these things, right? It's called audio books, but just written down. - It's incredible. If you miss something or if you don't understand, you can go back and read it again. - Just read it again. - It's so efficient. - So what kind of books are you reading? - What am I reading at the moment?

- Like fiction, nonfiction? - No, nonfiction. - Nonfiction. Like autobiographies and stuff like that? - Yeah, no, nothing that people wanna hear about. - Just nothing interesting. - I have a boring hobby.

- And I read books related to that boring hobby. - I mean, you have such an intense job. Like I don't really put it past you to have a somewhat, you know, quote unquote boring hobby. - Most people who are like, I feel like have like intense, you know, showmanship normally have like something that kind of rounds. - It's like people, you know, who like spend,

all day, every day going to like metal concerts, right? It's like, you can't listen to metal at home. You gotta like, you know, relax with some annual or something. - There was a very successful, he was a quarterback in the NFL and he was like one of the most feared quarterbacks in the league when he was playing. And his hobby was to knit. - Great for dexterity. - So he was a gigantic, like 200 kilo man.

knitting scarves for grandma and whatnot. - It sounds like a very therapeutic. - Yeah, that's what he said. He said it calmed him down. - Yeah, yeah. - What are your boring hobbies or interesting hobbies? - Funnily enough, like because our job is our hobby, or it's our job as a hobby, right? We've had to like, I guess, try to find hobbies outside. - Try new hobbies. - Yeah, yeah. - Yes. - Because every hobby that like at least I've pursued

I've somehow monetized it. And it's kind of like turned into a job. - I'm kind of the same thing. Everything that was once a passion for me is now the job. - Right. - So I know exactly what you're saying. - Exactly. - What do you do? What do you do? - Definitely exercise for me is definitely it. - Conor McGregor. Oh, Conor McGregor. We're not here to take part. We're here to take over. Oh, look at the Irish, the fighting Irish.

- I was gonna say, 'cause I guess in some aspects, exercise for you probably is part of the job, right? I feel like for me, 'cause I don't really fucking need to do it. I just do it 'cause for me it's very much a turn it up. - That's great, what do you do? - Cardio and lifting stuff. Lifting weights like a monkey, I guess, feels like. - Like a monkey? - That's what it feels like. You ever just feel like, I'm just literally just lifting things.

And I come back the next day and I come back and lift things again. And sometimes I sit there and I'm thinking like, this is so bizarre. - Why do we do this? - I literally just come back and I just lift things for an hour. Isn't it strange? - I feel that way on the treadmill where you just feel like a fucking hamster, like going around the wheel. - It makes you feel great. So it's like, I need to do this. But sometimes I do have this existential crisis of like, what am I doing? - I just imagine like aliens coming down to earth being like, what are you humans doing?

- We lift heavy objects and feel great about it. They're like, okay, I get it. - You get the treadmill thinking that it's to generate electricity. - We spend electricity to make it work. - You do this for fun? - Yeah, personally, I just find that, you know, I'm not really trying to get like, you know, in any particular shape. I just find that I sleep better, I feel better when I do it, you know, occasionally. - Very good for you. Let's do some promotion of exercise. Trash Taste listeners, you should try exercising.

I feel like, you know, when I mentioned it, everyone's like, oh, he's trying to be like a Chad or some kind of meathead. It's like, no, it's just...

- What's a chad? - Oh my God. - You don't know what- - You are literally a chad. - You are a chad. - Hang on just a second. I feel like I'm supposed to be insulted. - Okay. - No, no, no, no. - Because I know that you people in the United Kingdom refer to a bogan as a chav. Is that a different- - No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no,

- What image springs to mind? - The kid who lived next door when I was growing up. - You don't think of like the American guy in the film who's like the kind of bully kind of, you know. - Like a jock? - That's where the meme came from. - Yeah, really. - A lot of like American films where like- - The bully's always a Chad or something. - Yeah, like the jock in the high school was always Chad. - Or like buddy or something like that. - So that's where the meme came from and that means like now it's kind of adopted into someone who's just like,

Now it just means like someone who I guess is- - Who exercises. - No, no, no, not even that. It's just kind of like a strong willed man, I'd say at this point. - Like very high self-esteem, like, you know, like, hell yeah, I'm the shit kind of. - Someone who exudes confidence. - Is Joe Rogan a Chad?

- I would say he's a Chad. - I feel like it used to just mean guy who's ripped and massive and it kind of like blurred along the way to just be like, yeah. - Guy who exudes self-confident energy. - But yeah, you know, a lot of sometimes people try and like mock them. - Why are you so confused? - You young people are appropriating names.

- Now Chad, we've already destroyed Susan. Sorry South African Susan for listening, sorry. - Yeah, and then it started, what was it? It was the Chad versus the Virgin as well. - Yeah, Chad versus the Virgin. - The Virgin was like the opposite of the Chad, someone who just was,

- Self deprecating perhaps. - Low self esteem. - Low self esteem. Couldn't get girls. - That's a virgin. - A virgin is typically pure and innocent and delightful. - That's the Japanese way of thinking about it. I would say that's the Japanese definition of virgin. - Hang on, what pure and delightful? - No, pure and like, you know, untainted. - That's everyone's idea of a virgin. - Not on the internet.

- The internet doesn't know what's talking. - Yeah, those group of hive mind of every people in every country. - No, I don't know what I'm talking about. Who's on the internet?

- Yeah, so you are- - One of their hobbies, you didn't get to their hobbies. - Yeah, right. - So anyway, yeah, your hobbies. - So you are a Chad. - Oh, okay. - You are officially certified Chad. - You changed my name to Lady Chad. - Honestly. - Honestly. - Honestly, if you want internet rebranding, it might work. - Could work. - Could work. - I didn't know I was Chad. Now I've been told I'm a Chad. - You know what that would be perfect for? That would be like a second channel name for a YouTube channel. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - Your main channel is Lady Beard. - My workout channel. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - Lady Chad.

- Dude, this is wasted marketing. - Everyone's on YouTube. - It's like, "What's up you fucking pussies? "It's Lady Chad. "Today, top 10 ways to lift." - One of the joyous things about being a cross-dresser and a martial artist is, probably Chad's actually when I was younger, jocks and the kind of dudes who wanted to fight.

They would come and they would wanna fight the cross-dresser straight away. - Of course. - Right. Since I'm a martial artist, it's a beautiful thing when a man in a skirt knocks out a Chad with a jumping spin kick.

- That's a thing of beauty. You just get Chun-Li on their ass, right? - Yeah, exactly. - It was good. - Okay, so like, that's the other thing I wanted to ask as well is about like the martial arts. 'Cause I don't think we got like fully into how you developed or you decided to kind of do that as like a,

- I still wanna find out your hobbies later. - There's so many things I wanna ask actually. - So like how did you grow? So obviously, you grew appreciation towards wrestling through watching WWE and stuff like that, right? So is that kind of the same thing with martial arts as well? - With martial arts, I took an interest in it from a young age. I think like probably like potentially you and yourselves as well bullied a lot as a child, younger sibling.

- I'm an older sibling. - I'm the middle sibling. - He doesn't have siblings. - I am an only child. - Well, you're spoiled. - Yeah, everybody hate God. No siblings. - I love how the one person you didn't point at is the youngest sibling. - The youngest sibling. - Yeah, the middle child. - Middle, yeah. - High five, middle child. - Yeah, wait, are you middle or? - I'm three in a lineup of four. - Oh, so yeah, I'm same.

- We both got red beards. Oh, oh, oh, me and Connor. Hey, Connor beard. - You're basically the same person. - We are, we are, you're Welsh, me not in a skirt. - Not quite, it is. - A bit lacking in that department. - It's like the Pokemon evolution. - Charmeleon Charizard.

- I can see the meme on Reddit already. You take one of your cosplay videos. It's evolving. - Of course, this is awesome. - Somebody make that on the summer. - This is awesome. - Anyway, martial arts. - From how it began, how it's going. - You versus the guy talking on "Towari" now.

- Anyway, martial arts. - I bullied a lot and I liked the karate kid movies. - You got bullied? - Yeah, man, I was a fat kid. - Oh, okay. - No one's ripped in school. Except that one kid who's really thin and has abs. Fuck that kid. That kid sucks. - Eats pizza, drinks beer all day, still got his six pack. - Somehow still has abs. - Ain't right. They say God doesn't have favourites, bullshit.

- So what like martial arts did you take up? - I started in Taekwondo and then I went into Kapoeta. - Oh wow. - Then I went into Muay Thai. And then from there, the floodgates opened. I even did Jeet Kune Do, Kali, freestyle grappling, Hapkido. - Where'd you find the time to do that? How long does it take to learn a martial arts? Or did you just like dabble in it and learn to do it? - No, no, no. I mean, it's, I hear that. That's not good. Sorry. Sorry, that was bad broadcasting. - That's okay. It's all good.

- No, you start training. The thing about training is it's just the thing that you do, isn't it? It's like I started training Taekwondo. They had Taekwondo at school. And so then on Friday after school was the thing that I did, just went to Taekwondo. - Yeah, but you also listed off about like nine different types of martial arts. - You start training and you develop your skills and you develop an interest. And so then you get exposed to other martial arts.

And you say, that looks interesting. Looks interesting because you have a space of comparison now with what you're learning and what they seem to be learning.

So now you can say, all right, well that looks interesting. It looks like something that could help with what I'm trying to achieve. - Right, right. - So then you kind of end up expanding, right? - So what would you say is like your favorite type, I guess, or like one that you learned from the most? - Well, like Taekwondo is my first love, you know? So that's kind of the one. And also because I did it when I was the youngest, it's the one that stuck in my body the most easily. - How young were you when you did Taekwondo? - Started at 13. - 13, wow. - Okay. - Yeah. And this is the thing, like I got flexible.

before I became a teenager and my flexibility was naturally taken away. - Right. - So that's allowed me to stay flexible. I can still do the high kicks and the splits. - You can do splits? - Yeah. - Oh my God. - I'll do them on this table if you want. - That's why I added if you want. - Yeah, so yeah, so yeah, starting Taekwondo. Can't remember the rest of the question. - Just wondering how you got started. - What's your martial arts?

I wonder, is there like a scale of like, this martial arts is more useful than this one? 'Cause I've seen in like a bunch of other stuff that there's just so many martial arts that seem like they're like, oh no, I actually are fake. Or like, but they're not, you know, is that controversial to say? I don't know if that is. - Well, look, this debate has raged in the martial arts community since the dawn of time. So this is, everyone has an opinion on this. And now that we've got, you know, competitive mixed martial arts, everyone,

the consensus seems to be Muay Thai for your striking, Brazilian Jiu Jitsu for your grappling. But then you got to understand as well, that's sports in a cage when there are rules. So then if there's no rules, if you're in war or self-defense in the street or something, then you have systems like Krav Maga, which is all based around murder basically. So like there are other styles like a particular Kung Fu styles where you never do anything except strike

the eyes and the throat and the groin. That's literally all you do in the whole art. - Jesus, oh my God. - So it'll just, there's no, in my opinion, there's no best system or anything. It just depends on what you're doing with it. And there are the different round pegs to fit it around holes and square pegs for square holes. - You ever done MMA?

I've trained MMA, I haven't fought. I was actually interested in fighting. We were gonna do it a couple of years ago. I actually started training for it. - Finally found a thing this man hasn't done yet. - I started training for it, but it just became apparent that it was like on a,

on a cost benefit ratio. It wasn't really good. Well, there's a lot that goes into it, right? I was gonna need a good two years of consistent training to properly get my skills back to where they need to be for fighting. But then also you gotta consider, okay, so what weight am I gonna fight at? Am I gonna do a big weight cut? Let's say I do that, then afterwards, okay, well now that's gonna affect my wrestling 'cause now I'm skinny.

And also, let's say I do the fight and it goes well. Well, what does that really lead to? More opportunities to fight. I don't really want to be a professional fighter, you know, but now I've organized my whole life for that sake. Right. So, you know, and yeah, and like-

And that's if the fight goes well, if the fight goes badly, I just need plastic surgery. You know, I probably need to go back home. - You trained for two years to get publicly beaten up. - Right, right, right. - God, that's tough. - So I thought about it actually, I've trained MMA and I really liked the training.

I was interested in fighting. - What's like the difference between training MMA and training just a normal martial arts? - Well, MMA it's everything mixed together, right? But also you have quite a specific- - Well, you've done so many already, right? - Yeah, but you got quite a specific like rule set in MMA that must be followed. You're fighting in either a cage or a ring. So it's built for that environment. So in MMA you do a lot of work against walls.

So there's a lot of grappling against walls because you naturally have a wall that you get to meet at some point and you can't go further than that. But then, if you were fighting in the desert, that would not be the case. So there's a specific rule set. So you train for that rule set and for the skillset required for that environment. Whereas like, if you're gonna do like street self-defense or something,

It depends on what attitude you wanna take. - 'Cause I've always wanted to get into martial arts, but I didn't know which martial arts to start with basically. - Right. - There's so many. - Training, I'll train you. - Yeah, sure. - Is there like a, is there, I guess like a kind of a difficulty or is there like, I assume, you know. - Difficulty curve? - Not so much difficulty curve. - Tutorial martial arts. - Well, it's more like, you know, like what is like the easiest type of martial arts to get into if you have like no prior knowledge in it?

- All right, 'cause I assume there are some martial arts where it's like, you need to have some base level of martial arts. - 'Cause they're all systems. And so when you start training the system, you start at the beginning.

- Right, right. - So no one's gonna put you in. - So there's no like type of martial art where it's like you need to have like prior knowledge of basic kung fu. - There's no 10 hit combo that you need to memorize. - There would be for particular like particular forms, not the art itself, but particular training environments. Like if you wanna go to this guy's school, you need to have 10 years experience or whatever. - Oh, okay, okay. - But not for the art itself, no.

And straight up, if you're jumping into expert level when you're a beginner, then you're just making a silly decision. - Honestly. - Like moving on from martial arts, stunt man. What does that involve? How do you train for that? What do you do on the job? - Freaking stunts is bonkers, man. Being a stunt man is a tough gig. - I bet. - All right, so for me, I was like actor, so performer and martial artist. So all those two things,

just naturally evolve into stunts and pro wrestling eventually. But dude, stunts is hard. Firstly, you gotta decide, are you just gonna do stunts? Like what I did was punching and kicking and falling down basically. So it was fight scenes. But then stunts also includes cars, boats, getting set on fire, things like that. - Some stuntmen have to flip the cars over while they're in it. - That's a whole new skillset. So it really like,

It's saying, what about stunts? It's kind of like saying how long is a piece of string? There's so many different things you can do. You can be like falling off buildings and things. - So what was like some of the stuff that you did? - So for me, I was doing fight scenes, right? - Right. - So like I trained in the Hong Kong style of action and my master, I shouldn't call him a master, the guy who was training me,

He was on Jackie Chan's stunt team throughout the 90s and noughties. So he did movies like he did a couple of the rush hours. He did Shanghai noon. Oh, wow. He did some of the smaller Hong Kong ones like the twins effect. Okay. The movies, right? But like the way they work in Hong Kong is like,

- I should stop saying like so much. That's not good. - You say less than us. - The way they like, oh my God. The attitude. Okay. The slogan of the Hong Kong Stuntman Association. He told me when he was in it, risk life, save money.

So that's the kind of attitude you're dealing with. - Wow, no bullshit. - I've never had a harder teacher in my life. This dude was so tough. It's like you're expected to back flip off a balcony whilst on fire into a pool of broken glass. And if you're like a little bit hesitant, he's like, "No, no, you're so weak. What's wrong with you? Harden up, harden up." - That is the ultimate challenge. - It's just like a psychopath. - Yeah.

Stunts attracts kind of this type A personality. - I think so. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - He was telling me stories about when he was back in Australia, he was from Melbourne. We were in Australia before he went to Hong Kong was with Jackie. And just the stuff he did just as a thing to do was bonkers. - Well, like as a hobby. - Not necessarily as a hobby, but like he'd kind of do it towards stunts sort of, but he was like, one day we were driving past a train station in Melbourne

And you know, there's like the bridge that goes over the train track. And then there's like a pole sticking up like 10 meters away from it or something. A pole with the dingy-dongy lights on it or something. And he's like, yeah, so yeah, when I was younger, before I went to Hong Kong, I was going to jump off the bridge onto the pole. Yeah, I was going to do that. Yeah, we didn't have a camera at the time. So I'm like, what? So yeah, I was like, jump off.

- What? - Just for fun. - Just 10 meter jump from this bridge to catch a pole. Just yeah. - To be like, I did it. - Here's a thing to do. I think his attitude was he would film it and then be part of his stunt show reel. - Right, right. - That was his attitude. But that's the kind of people, like just fearless men. - So you're doing stupid shit like jumping off buildings into like glass. - Yeah, how did you- - Yeah, where did you do it? - I did it 'cause I'm not that talented.

- What talent you need? I mean, like how'd you train for them? That's what I wanna know. - There's a natural level of talent that's required. So the guys who become career stunt men are generally speaking the kids who were the fastest runners in school. The kids who had naturally very physically. - Athletic. - Naturally very. I'm not, I was a fat kid at school. So I've got a level of skill just 'cause I trained but I don't have the natural talent for it. - Right. - These guys, man, like I've got friends who now are doing the stunts in all the like the Marvel films and so forth. - Right, okay. - And they're just,

just the moment they were born, they were better than me after a hundred years of training. You know what I'm saying? It's like my couple of teachers- - That guy could just throw himself off a building so God damn. I wish that were me. - It's like they back flipped out of the womb with a six pack and a charming smile. It's just ridiculous. My goodness. - God. - Yeah, so it's like, that's the level of natural talent that's required. But also when you get to that level, a lot of them just,

- Type A personality. - You have to be, you can't like. - If you're willing to be hit by a car, you know, like just stand there, we're gonna drive a car into you, okay.

- Good take, good take. - Was that good? - It was good again. - Just on the ground, legs broken, it was that good? - A lot of wrestlers as well, it's like, you know, okay. It's funny when we're pro wrestlers, you're backstage in the locker room, everyone's normally so mellow. Everyone's just like, oh, I wanna go shoot myself. So chilled out and then, okay, so we'll go into the ring and yeah, three minutes in or so, you can hit me with the baseball bat.

He's like, they hit me with it here last week. It's still healing. So you better hit me with it here. Really? Are you sure? That's what you want me to do? Let's take a quick break for this one minute break. It will be right back on the voice of Africa radio network. It's funny. Cause wrestlers will be in the locker room and they're all, Oh,

they're taping up knees and things they go into the ring and there's superheroes they go back and they're all bleeding and everything blood everywhere so good stunt people and pro wrestlers it's what a life

- What a life, what a life. - What a life, eh? - What a gimmick. - I mean, I suppose like pro wrestlers is just a natural evolution of stuntman, right? Because it's just like, it's more controlled stunts and you add a narrative to it. - I felt that way. And also the guys who tend to go into stunts seem to be much more like talented with the physical stuff. And I was better at the character performance type stuff. So for me, it seemed like a much more natural evolution. - What are some of the craziest stunts you've had to do?

- Well, I wasn't that good. So I didn't get to do that much amazing stuff. Jumping off balconies, done some of that. It's not that hard. - I mean, I don't know. I wouldn't wanna jump off a balcony personally. - How tall are we talking here? - Not that tall. - How long? - Second story kind of.

- I wouldn't do it. - My trainer was like, "Yo, weak." He's doing like 20 stories of things. - This is how real Chad does it. - Oh my God, man. It was never good enough. - Some people are just like cockroaches, right? They just can't die. - Honestly, it's like insane. - In pro wrestling, I hit over the head with one of those fluorescent light tubes. That was good. That actually doesn't hurt, but it does cut you.

- That's very oxy. Have you ever gotten injured or anything like that? - Like properly injured. - Like, yeah.

- Well, I've probably been concussed but didn't realize. You know what I'm saying? - Okay. - How do you not realize? - I don't know what you're saying unfortunately. - If I get concussed, I immediately realize. - Do you really though? That's the thing about concussion. You don't know what's going on. That's the whole thing of concussion. You don't know what's going on. So you need someone to stop you and be like, "You're concussed." We need to do whatever happens after concussion. We just do what people who've done a first aid course.

- It's like people who play American football, like never know they're concussed. - Exactly, and they just die. - Oh, geez. - I think it's like they have like the most, I think they die early 'cause they have so much brain damage. - Right. - They're just hitting their head constantly. But they don't know. - So it's the same with MMA fighters. - Right, right, right. - In training, just getting jabbed, just getting a little punches, they get like compounded brain damage from that. - Oh, wow. - It's not from getting knocked out, it's from just little shots over and over.

Anyway, so light over the head, broken glass. Sorry, not broken glass, barbed wire. Did some of that. - You look like Jesus. - Yeah, I did in that video. Hit with a shovel. I got hit in the head with a shovel. - You got hit in the head with a shovel? - It was a great weapon. - Like how hard are we talking? Like just like a little like boop or? - Because like, boom!

- It's a great weapon, but if you hit it with the concave side, it's not that bad on your skull. The convex side would really mess you up. Concave side, you know, folds onto your skull. - Right, right. - But like to control that, right, in the swing would be, I feel a lot harder than it looks. - Because like there's an image of pro wrestling that, you know, pro wrestling is fake and everything like that. But obviously the stunts are real. Like how hard do you have to go for the stunts that you do in pro wrestling?

- It depends on you. I mean, you should give it hell really. - So when you're saying the shovel, right? In my mind, my immediate thought is guy swings shovel, tries his best to stop it, but it still hits you. Is that what's happening? Or is he literally going like, I'm gonna hit you with the shovel? - Hit me as hard as you can.

- 'Cause I guess like the audience needs to hear the sound, right? - Yeah. - Hear the sound and also it's, you know, like just- - Just get someone on a soundboard in the back. - Also you want to do it. When you're wrestling, you want to do it, you know? There's an element of, "Ah, come on." - No, I don't. That's why I'm not a pro wrestler. That's why I'm not a pro- - I'm a version.

- It's just Chad versus the version. - I think you're making anyone listening to this sound like a virgin. - Frankly, I don't want to be hit in the head with a shovel. - I used to love it. It's a young man's game. - You talk about this like it's a past time. - I feel like why is it when a kid says that, it's like, oh God, this kid's going nowhere. When an adult says it, wow, he's such a manly adult.

I feel like if my son comes up to me, age five, "Daddy, I love being hit in the head by a shovel." I'll be like,

- I dropped you one too many times. - No, it's you know, Chad's dig it. - Is it just the sheer manly energy and the testosterone going around? It's just like, just hit, fucking hit me. - I mean, I guess once you're on the stage, it's like. - It's the adrenaline going on. - The adrenaline and there's something somehow emotionally satisfying with it as well. So from an acting standpoint, acting is all emotion and so forth.

- Right, right. - Wrestling is the most emotional work I've ever done because there's so much emotion involved in being hit. - It's real, it's real. - Yeah, it's real, yeah, yeah. - So it's highly emotional and there's something satisfying about it.

But it's, you know, like I say, it's a young man's game. You wanna be doing that in your twenties. - Well, yeah, I think I was, what was it? Like the John Oliver thing on the WWE. I think I watched that and it was saying that they're like, they're all contractors in WWE. - Oh really? - Yeah, yeah. So they're contractors that can't work for anyone else. - Okay. - Oh wow. - And then, you know, once they're done, they don't really get much help

benefits or anything. So a lot of them end up being really injured later on. - Right, right. - Just like, "See ya." - That's getting fixed nowadays. - I hope so, yeah. - Back in the day, lots of that. But you know, there's something satisfying about it. This was not really dangerous, but we found, you know those plastic wet floor signs that go into a triangle? - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - Those are fantastic weapons. - Oh yeah, I mean, yeah. - Because when you hit someone with them, the two pieces of plastic clap together, so it makes a really loud noise. - Doesn't hurt. - So it doesn't hurt. So you can go, "Crack!"

He hits someone in the head with over and over again. So I did that in a match once. It was great. I got hit in the head a bunch of times. We did this spot. Then later on, I'm going home. I'm on the train. And there's some like young girl next to me. She sits down next to me. She's like, and I'm like,

I think she got up and changed seats or something. And I was like, that was odd. And then we got off at the station and I walked past some reflective surface. And I'm not talking about this. We walked past some reflective surface. My whole face had turned purple. The whole thing was purple.

- I'm having a casual chat. It's a nice evening, isn't it? - Scaring all the people from foreigners. They're like, "Fucking hell, these foreigners are fucking weird." - Yeah. - Jesus Christ. - I did a gimmick with fire once, but that wasn't bad from a pain perspective. - That's a particular word.

- You said it wasn't bad from a pain perspective. What was it bad?

- What perspective was it bad in? - From an insurance perspective. That's the perspective from which it was bad. - You'll never wrestle in this building again perspective. - Right, right, right. - I mean, doing anything with fire, most 90% of the time requires some kind of safety. - Fire warden type of thing. - We just started dueling. We just thought the swords would be fantastic. - We had a stick with a cloth wrapped around it that had been drenched in gasoline or something.

- And then we were safe. We had a bucket of water next to the ring. - That's not how fire works. - There's a fire truck right there. The bucket of water, the piss bucket on the side. - Or just go on stage and take taking your like insurance, insurance like, and just

- Just said that one. - We had a thing one time with just needles, reused needles. I thought it would be a great bit. - There's a shower at the facility. I can just wash it off. - Yeah, in Japan, that's what most of them are like, the death match workers in Japan. That's what they're like. They'll go into the ring, be bleeding everywhere, and afterwards, "Oh, I gotta go to the washroom." And then they go and just have a shower and wash it off. - Jesus Christ.

- Yeah, so you go to the shower afterwards, there's blood everywhere, all over the shower floor. - Oh my God. - Like, God damn, God damn. - There's only two times when there's like a shit ton of blood in the shower, and that's at a wrestling match and prison. - Oh my God, Joey. - I'll leave that up to your imagination. - I was not thinking that. That's not what I was gonna say as my second answer. - I did not expect that joke from Joey. - No, I did not as well.

- How long you been holding that joke in? - It's like, finally I get to say it. - He's like, "How long you been waiting to use that?" - The perfect set up. - He's been holding onto that joke for years. - Yeah. - It's like, I never found a place to say it. Today's the day. - I've hung out with you so many times on a personal level, but like, I guess like we never really go into like as deeply as what we, what you do, right? So it was like, I don't know. I mean, I for one have never met

- A pro wrestler who is also a metal singer, who is also a cross dresser, who also is a stunt man? - No. - A martial artist as well? - Voice actor. - Messiah as well. - Save your effect line. - Let me tell you about the time I split the Red Sea. - Let me ask you some questions. - Okay. - At what age did you begin your and one may person activities?

- You're in my YouTube channel? - Yeah. - I was, oh God, it's 2013. So I was 19. - You were 19? - Yeah. - How old are you now? - 26. - Are you? - Yeah. - Oh, I thought you, okay. - How old did you think I was? - Well, younger than that, but thinking about, I met you in 2016 when you were like 21 or something. - Yeah, yeah. I was like 22, 23. - To me, you're eternally 21. Forever 21. - Forever 21. - Forever 21. - Forever 21. - It's not quite forever, is it? - Yeah, I don't know.

- I think you're saying, so university. - Yeah, so it was my first year of university. So that was like a hobby. And then by the time I graduated university, I was like, oh, I can make this a living. - Ass kicking, cool. - What'd you study at uni?

I did, it was this degree called design computing, which is basically like think of a bachelor of arts, but more technology based. - That sounds- - So I learned like music production. I learned like 3D modeling, graphic design, website design, all that kind of stuff. - Surely that's coming useful in this life. - Well, yeah, 'cause I learned video editing from one of the courses as well. So I was like, oh, I like video editing. - That's banging. - Yeah. I'm no longer the host of this show now. This is Ladybeard featuring Trash Taste. - On the voice of Iffy the Cat.

- Let's be honest, it was Ladybeard featuring Trash Taste from the very beginning. - Let me ask another question actually. Ozzy, Brit, Brit. - Yeah, got the fucking ashes right here, man. - Explain the choice of this American word trash in your name. Why is the podcast called the Rubbish Rebel? - Unfortunately, we have to cater to Americans

with almost everything in our life. - Well, it's also because trash taste is kind of a term that we use in like the anime community. - Yeah. - Oh really? - Yeah. So like if somebody has trash taste, it means like, oh, you know, you're into like the crappier shows and like the more guilty pleasure type of shows. Oh, you have trash taste in anime.

- We haven't spoken about anime at all. - We haven't. - Have you watched anime? Do you watch anime? - Yeah, let me explain my anime bit. - Go for it. - Okay. - So I used to be quite an anime fan, but I had to switch all my content over to things that would help with my language learning as opposed to watching for the sake of leisure. - Right. - Right. - So for the past three years, my prime watching of anime has consisted of Peppa Pig dubbed into Mandarin.

I watched Mandarin Peppa Pig. I used to watch it every morning. - I didn't even know there was a Mandarin Peppa Pig. - I'd wake up and I'd put on Peppa Pig and Mandarin. - Right. - Yeah. - And that's how you learned Mandarin. - The idea was when my brain waves were still whatever they are when you're sleeping, like whatever, I'd absorb the language at that point. So you listen to it going to sleep and then also waking up. That was my strategy.

- Wow. - And also Peppa Pig, 'cause it's a children's show, means the language is nice and basic. - Easy to understand. - Normal life language as opposed to slaying dragons and stuff that happens in more interesting anime. And also the voices are recorded in the studio so they're crisp and easy to hear. - Yeah, actually that's one question I wanted to ask. How did you learn Japanese?

- Because I'm sure many people watching this podcast would like to know that. - I don't recommend you learn Japanese the way I did. What I recommend you do is you go get the school, get the teachers, get the books, just do it the traditional way. There's a big push in the language learning community to not do that anymore. That's what has worked for thousands of years. That's why it is the system. - Why is there a push to not do that? - Because everyone's like, "No, you should make learning fun."

No, you shouldn't. Learning should be boring and tedious and you should bash your way through it with your teacher and your exercise 'cause that's how you actually build the language properly from the ground up. What I did was I got Pimsleur's Japanese and I went through those programs and stuff. And then I did some,

lessons with a tutor, but it was pretty haphazard. I turned up in Japan and just tried to figure it out. Just no one around me spoke English. But now, now seven years into that journey, now my Japanese is full of holes and grammatical problems and things that Shiori is now trying to fix. So it's now much harder to go back and fix bad habits. And this just start our problem. So that's why we do that. You grew up speaking it. - Yes, it's my first language. - Is it really? - Yeah. - Damn.

- So you can't really participate in the learning conversation. How did you flogs learn it? - I mean, we're still learning. - We're still learning. - Are you really? - Yeah. - It won't be for the audience. - That's okay. - Sorry audience.

- Good point, you pulled that back quickly. - Well, I know, well, I mean, Connor goes to classes. Garnt, you don't go to classes, right? - I mean, it's been hard because there's no way to get around it without putting time into it. And time is, I feel like the hardest thing to find as an adult because

everyone I've talked to who's learned Japanese, no matter what way they went through, what path they went through, there's no getting around just putting the hours into it. And it's like difficult in our situation because with our situation, you know, it's different from your situation 'cause we can go about our day and just not speak any Japanese at all and be completely fine with it 'cause we work from home. So it goes down to having to find time outside of your schedule to like learn Japanese. - Yeah, 'cause I'm sure if Garnt and Connor were thrown into a situation where like,

You're stuck in this village in Japan when not a single person can speak English. So you just have to get, you know, make your way through it by trying to speak as much Japanese as possible. I'm sure anybody in that situation will be like,

- All right, I guess I gotta start speaking Japanese. That's one option. - It's unfortunate 'cause I mean, it's obviously great that we have so much work to do and that it is so successful 'cause I would love to take a year off and just do nothing and learn it. - I'd love to do that as well. - But unfortunately, it makes literally no sense right now to do that because everything's going so well. - Sure, I reckon if I had control of your schedule, I could get your Japanese learning stuck

- You gotta be ruthless about it. You gotta find little windows, little windows of time where you can slip it in. And the things like first thing in the morning, yo get Peppa Pig dubbed into Japanese. I'm not joking. I'm not joking. That's great because you can see

The situations they're going through are so basic. And every day, this is my mom, this is my dad. We're kicking a ball, you know? Go through that, that's gonna teach you properly. Then also get your damn books and your teachers in your class. - How many seasons of Peppa Pig? - It's not that many. - How long before you started learning Japanese to the point where you were like, "All right, I'm pretty fluent now."

being in Japan, it was one year before I was not a total more anymore. Two years before I felt somewhat competent, but I'd say five years before I really feel like I can- - Talk to anyone, talk about anything. - Yeah, but I don't even really still feel I can do that. If I don't know someone, they start doing something like weird, like talking keigo, see you later.

I can't do it. See you later, man. That's like a different language. - Oh yeah, it is. - You might start pouring out, "Kansai Ben?" I'm like, "Who's this jackass?"

- What you doing talking to me like some Kansai person? - Oh yeah, I mean like, you know, Kegel, I guess it's like, you know, everybody everywhere in Japan, you know, usually, you know, uses it. But when it comes to different dialects, like even sometimes completely lost if I'm in the middle of nowhere. - It's not very confidence inspiring when you talk to natives and they're like, I don't know what they're saying. And I'm like, what the fuck am I saying? - Like Kansai Ben, right, is like, because you hear it so much on TV and stuff like that. It's like one dialect where I'm like, okay, yeah, I can kind of figure out what you're saying. But if I'm in like,

you know, Okinawa or like middle of nowhere in Hokkaido. Then I'll be like,

I think you're speaking Japanese, but I couldn't tell you what the fuck you're saying. - Did you have to, so you grew up speaking Japanese. - Yeah. - But did you have, were there parts of the language you needed to study like particles or anything? - Yeah, absolutely. So like I did the JLPT. - Okay. - Which is like the Japanese language proficiency test. And I got N1, which is the highest level. I had to study for that. I got that when I was like 14, I think.

- What a badass. - 14, 15. But I studied like fucking crazy for that. - Good man. See, study, study. - That's the thing. People think that like, oh, fluent people or people who have it as their first language have it easy because you don't have to study. No, that's complete bullshit. You have to study just as hard as everybody else if you wanna get good at it. - Yeah, 'cause the thing is you also said you speak five languages as well, which is-

- So what, English one, five languages? - Fluent in English, half-arsed at another four. - What are the four? What are the four you speak? - I say Japanese, Cantonese, Mandarin, German.

- German? - I learned German in high school. - Oh, okay. - Do you remember it? - Yeah, but I haven't spoken it for a long time. I went there on exchange. So I got that native exposure. - Right, yeah. - But now I'm just big time out of practice. So if I start trying to talk, I would need, like if you dumped me at a German village somewhere, I'd get it back a month or two maybe. But I'd need to go through remembering a lot of vocab, specific bits of grammar, how it works. Interestingly, German grammar is not that different from Japanese grammar.

- Yeah, a lot of Eastern European languages actually are kind of similar to that, yeah. - Would you say that after you learned your first language, it was like way easier to learn other languages? 'Cause that's what I've heard. - See, because I've heard that that's the thing. Like I've heard, 'cause my granddad could speak seven languages fluently. - I think you just learn what system works for you. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. But like, I've also heard that like languages are a lot similar to instruments where the second one is always the hardest and then it gets,

easier and easier because with every new thing you learn, you use your base knowledge from the previous thing you've learned to kind of build upon it. So it's like, oh, this is a completely new language, but I already know a language that has kind of the same base sentence structure or same vocabulary rules as this one. - I have found that to mess me up. - Oh really? - Because now I'm just confused.

Now I'm going into, let's say if I'm going from like Japanese to Mandarin. Now I'm trying to do Mandarin grammar, but I'm instinctively picking Japanese words. - Right, right.

- Not that head Ashley, good man. Ashley knows what's up. I imagine she already nodding the head. I can't see her past the monitor. So, but hang on, but you watch anime for like a thousand hours a day. Surely something comes from that. - No, that's a fallacy, right? - I never ever intended to learn Japanese. When I was like 17, 18, I thought, oh, it's cringe to wanna learn Japanese from anime. - Look at this guy.

- Yeah, that's what I thought. And then now I'm like, fuck, I'm such an idiot that I thought it was cringe. - I mean, to be fair, it was like looked down upon in the anime community. 'Cause we had like the whole, the whole like,

- It's like weeaboo movement where- - People will then start like trying to talk Japanese to you online and it's like, "What are you doing? This is cringe." They're not really trying to learn the language. They're just trying to learn a couple of phrases to qualify. - They just want it to be like their favorite anime characters and people would just like- - Because let's be real, like the Japanese you hear in anime, like 99% of the time is not the way Japanese people speak. - That's why you can't learn from it. - Right, exactly. I mean, I think you can learn from it, but you shouldn't,

completely base all of your knowledge off of. - It's a different level. It's once you've already got your base. You can talk about slaying dragons and stuff. - Yeah, I would also say that watching anime with subtitles is a wholly different experience from watching anime to learn it. Because I've realized this now as I'm trying to learn Japanese that the subtitles are just distracting. I think it's actually worse to learn Japanese with subtitles on because you either pay attention to the Japanese or you read the subtitles. And it's really hard to concentrate on doing both.

And your mind works differently when it's just trying to hear the language as opposed to just reading the subtitles. - I think actually having the Japanese subtitles helps more. - Yeah, I would say so as well. - You see the sentence, you recognize some kanji. - I reckon you get a sentence, you watch it and you listen, then you stop and you go back and you play it again and you read.

- Yeah, but the average anime watch is not gonna do that. - Yeah, because they just wanna listen to the story. - So we gotta study. - Yeah, because the trade off you have to do if you wanna learn Japanese by watching anime is just to not enjoy the anime. - Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. - Which is the unfortunate part of it. And it's what I realized as well. - Do I wanna ruin this thing? Is it one of the last escapes I have? - So I guess the only like,

- The solace to that is just like use an anime that you already know inside and out. And then rewatch it again to be like, all right, I already know the story. I'm just gonna use it as like study material. - That's a good idea. And you can take like foreign movies that have been dubbed as well. That's another good strategy. - Yeah, exactly.

So what anime are you flogs watching? - Well, they know what we're watching. What are you watching? - We never got to that. - What's your favorite anime? - Hang on, which one of those sentences am I asking first? - Okay, what's your favorite anime? - Bacano. - Nice. High five. - That's a really good taste. Why are you on a show called Trash Taste without great taste? - I dubbed Bacano.

- Well, when I lived in Hong Kong, one of my jobs there was I was a dubber. So we dubbed anime. - Well, you're the Hong, one of the Hong Kong voices in Bacana? - Back, yes. There was a main, one of the main kids. - What the fuck? - Young handsome guy, Friel or something was his name. - Friel, that sounds really familiar. - Something like that. One of those kids.

- No, it wasn't Scarboy. - Jacuzzi? - Young, handsome, not Jacuzzi. He was one of the main kids. - Fero? - Yes! - Okay. - Fero. I'm Fero. I'm the old Russian man who was doing all the reincarnation stuff. - No fucking way. - Really? Can I have a look at your resume?

- Is this on IMDB somewhere? - Did you just give someone that resume? - Ladybeard is a fucking anime dub voice actor. - What the hell haven't you done? - Ladybeard, I was- - This is so insane. - We did the English dubs for Animax. So like say you're in Hong Kong or Singapore or something, you can watch Animax in three languages, Japanese, local language, like Cantonese or English.

So we did the English dubs for Asia on Animax. - Yeah, so that wouldn't be the English dub that played. - No, not on the DVD in America. No. It's amazing going to conventions and talking to American dubbers. 'Cause they're like, "Yeah, one episode, "we take about five weeks to dub it." We were like, "We did six episodes a day." Get 'em done, get 'em done. - I have seen clips of a lot of the English dubs for the Asian market.

- Yeah, there are. - We don't have time to mess around. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - But so I was Tomozo in Chibi Maruko-chan. - Really? - I was Nezumi Otoko in Genghis. - This is fucking insane. - I was Grell in Black Butler. - You're Grell in Black Butler? - I'm Grell.

- I'm bloody grill. - That's so funny, what's going on? - If for Chinese listeners in a pleasant goat and big, big wolf, I was the wolf. - You did it in Chinese? - No, we dubbed into English, but the original show is Chinese. Big time in China.

We did tons of it in, we did Gundam Age. I was the flirty dude in Gundam Age. Can't remember his name. Gundam Sango Kuden. - You must have really been bashing these out. - Yeah, Jesus Christ. - You're like, fuck I did, I just turned up. - You do, you do. You show up, what is it? All right, the thing, okay. All right, let's knock him out. - Jesus. - Yeah, so you turned, did you even know who you were playing, what the characters were, or did you just turn up and there was a script there and you just had

- Normally at the start of the series, we'd get to do a little bit of research. And we get told, okay, here's approximately what happens in the story. Here's approximately who your character is. And then we figure out the voice. We sit there with the director and we figure out the voice we're gonna do. - No audition process.

- Audition was to get hired by the studio. So you've been hired and now you are good enough to do it. But then we did like Inazuma 11, right? 'Cause there's so many characters in that show. Everybody has like a hundred characters.

So you kind of, you run out of voices, right? The soccer teams, 'cause they rotate through, and you team every few episodes. You just, your team from three episodes ago starts, their voices become the new team's voices. - You're like forced, everyone's forced to be Mel Brooks, basically. It's just like, let's do a hundred voices. Let's just pull them out. - Big time. That was a great job, but that was wiped out in the financial crisis, you see.

- Oh Jesus. - So I had a killer life before then. Stuntman, voice actor, act was dope. - I can't believe you're an anime dub voice. - They say like the Jack of all trades, literally the embodiment. - You know Omni productions? - Oh, they have the funniest Transformers dub. - Yes, really?

- That's what they're notorious for. - Because this Transformers dub is fucking awful. - Is this the same company that dubs Dragon Ball Z movies? - I think there is, it might be, but yeah, Omni Dubs is like- - Yeah, that was what they were notorious for. - There's like Twitter accounts dedicated to just posting clips from it, just out of context. - What's happened to the headmasters? Can't they fight without Chrome Dome? - So I just showed the boys some of the Transformers dubs and-

- That was before my time at the company. - Okay, okay. - Did the quality actually go up? - I don't know. Depends on what you think. - Okay, listen, when I'm doing voice acting, I know when I'm in a project there's garbage, right? - Of course, 'cause you're a voice actor too, yes. - Yes, I know when I'm in something that I'm like, this is not good on the resume. You know what I mean? - Right, right, right. - Did you get that feeling when you're doing any of these dubs? Or you're like, this is like, this is okay. Or this is like, no, I don't think this is good. Or you're just like, it should work.

- Well, you know, it's like maybe sometimes, but you gotta do what you gotta do. - I mean, I guess the fact that we just found out that you used to be an anime voice, I can say something. - Yeah, but like,

- Look, there's dubbing and there's dubbing. There's kind of stuff that you get sent to do and it's some commercial thing and the script is written in broken English and you're just like, "You just record, okay." And you just do it. And then there's shows like "Black Butler" which were actual shows. - Right, right. - So there's dubbing and there's dubbing. Tell me about your voice acting life. - Just started when I was, oh my God, how old was I?

- 15? - Holy smokes. - From like my room though, like just doing it for fun, 'cause I loved it. - What, just doing like fan dubs? - Yeah, just doing like anything. And then went to, started doing that for a while, got better equipment, had zero training for a while, and then managed to get some roles very luckily.

Oh my God, one of the most embarrassing ones is that I've voiced like, I couldn't do this now. I think you know what I'm saying. - I know exactly what you're talking about. - You're gonna fucking love this. So I voiced a Nigerian. - Oh dear, you can't do that. - I can't do that now. So what happened was is that, again, I was like 17 when I did this. It was like "Age of Empires." I'm sure you know that game. They literally were doing a competition where I was like, "You can voice in the game." I was like, "Fantastic." - Wow. - It's a big IP, right? - Yeah, so they wanted Nigerian accents.

And so I quickly open up Google tab, go to YouTube, Nigerian accent example. Listen to some guy who's Nigerian speak and I was like, I'm pretty sure I can get close to this. Submitted an audition, didn't think anything of it. A year later, they're like, yeah, so yeah, we use your lines in the game. And I'm like,

"Can I rerecord them?" They're like, "No, no, they're in the game." - The game came out yesterday. - It's out now. - It's out now, I'm like, "What?" - That's amazing. - But I didn't sign any contracts or anything, so I don't know if like- - Did you get paid for it or? - They paid me like 200 bucks. I'm like, "Thanks, pat me on the back, get them out of here." - Right, right, right. - I was gonna say, that's called getting it done for free. - Yeah, right? - Yeah, yeah. - But it was so long in between when I set- - Is that legal?

- Can they just use your voice without you signing anything? - Hey, it's a competition. - I'm pretty sure when you send in the competition, they're, you know- - The fine print probably says something, right? - That's amazing. So you got into League of Legends as a Nigerian. - No, sorry. - Age vampire. - Sorry, sorry. - I mean, Riot Games did redub. - They both have alliteration in the title. You can't blame me that much. - It was weird 'cause like, you know,

- I'm voicing some Archer in some DLC that like never appears. And my mate is obsessed with "Age of Empires." - Right. - And he messaged me one day, he's like, "I think I found you." And he sends me an unlisted YouTube clip and it's like,

'cause you know Age of Empires when you're moving around the world, it's like a dark circle that comes visible. And there's the Nigerian archer walks in and he's like, "Hello." It's literally like the Ugandan knuckles meme before the meme. I've shown clips of it before 'cause I just think it's so fucking embarrassing and stupid. - That's not PC. - There's no way you could get away with that today. - It's questionable it was, but even in like 2015, there was still no problem with it.

- Right, right. - And so there was never a discourse about that being even problematic. Like now I would never dream of auditioning for a Nigerian.

- I mean, you're also 17. - I was like a little fucking child. I thought I can be a Nigerian archer. - When I first did my like actor registry stuff in Australia, you have to list accents you can do. And I went through the ones I thought I could read. - You just bullshit. - Yeah, German, French or whatever. But then it comes over like Korean. Yeah, just do an impersonation of my Taekwondo master, tick. Japanese, just do a person that's my friend Yuji, tick. - Yeah. - As many languages as I would need.

- Never, ever, ever need to frigging voice. - So I was doing that and then yeah, just came into a thing and started doing classes, got workshops, got more experience, did professional work at London for a while. It was pretty, yeah, it's pretty chill. - You did London? - Yeah, London. - So now, are you voice acting here? - I have done some things here. I think that we talked, the one thing we did, I can't talk about yet. - Yeah, yeah, Connor and I did something recently, but we can't talk about it.

- I don't think it's been recently. I remember you guys talking about it ages ago. - It was ages ago. - But it still hasn't been released. - That happens a lot. - Yeah. - I shot a thing in 2016 that came out like a few weeks ago. - I mean, I feel like what you do is you just record these things and then it's a pleasant surprise like two, three years later when it comes out. - I was like, oh yeah, I did that.

- Oh God, I wanna redo all my lines. That whole fucker sucked. - Let's hope the world hasn't changed around you too much in the time. - Yeah, I hope not. - Not breaking any laws by accident. - Hey guys, this is my newest Nigerian role. I recorded that seven years ago. - Hope you like it. - Today on the voice of Iplica Radio Network, we're interviewing Nigerian voice actor Connor.

- Did you have to do like an Afrikaans accent or did you have to like ever put on an accent for any of the anime voices you had to do? - All the time. - All the time? - All the time. - Yeah, because I can't really imagine like an Australian accent. - The problem with accents is that you always think you're better at doing them than you actually are. Because even if you're very good, a native will be able to pick it up

and they'll be like, that's the next. - Yeah, because when I did the, I did a voice for Pop Team Epic, but like the character was- - American. - An American. - It was the mayor of New York, right? In the story. - Tony Giuliani.

It was literally the mayor of New York. And I was like, and I said to the director, I was in Japanese. I was like, so do I have to like do it in an American accent? Like I can do an American accent, but it's not great. Like I'm just letting you know. And he's like, no, I just fucking say it. I'm like, all right. So I was like, okay, I need to see like how far the limit is. Right. Because usually they don't take the first take. Right. So I can just kind of test the limits to see like,

how far I can go before I have to eventually redo it again. So my first take was dead ass like, I'm the mayor of New York and yeah, welcome everybody. And they fucking took it. - They don't know. - Yeah, because they don't know. They were like, yeah, that sounded really New York.

- No, no, no, no, no. - When I thought I was better than I was, you always listed all these accents and I very quickly started dropping to like less and less. Even now, I could definitely do an American speaking role, but I just don't want to 'cause I'm scared of getting rinsed by Americans. - Right, exactly. - So I'll only do it if I'm like, I'm 100% sure I can pull this off. - Yeah, right. - But even then I'm like,

- I mean, there's a lot of actors out there who are so good at doing an American accent, but for some reason, like when it's the other way around, like- - Yeah, true, true. Yeah, Americans doing British. - Yeah. - But the thing is, right, is that it's,

when you're in this really contained environment where you get the script before, you can really sit down and nail the accent in these words. You can go with it. You can sit down with a native speaker. You can be like, walk me through exactly how to pronounce this. And then people on the spot are like, do an American accent. It's a totally different thing. If you coach me, I can definitely perform an American accent or probably even like other European accents if you gave me time to do that one line. And that's why I think actors, it comes off like that. I mean, some of them are talented as fuck and just whip it out and just start doing it.

- But they have like linguist coach. - Yeah, but that's when you have like an accent inside of you, right? - Yeah, yeah. - It's just like, it's natural. - It's really difficult to like actually just on the fly switch to an accent 'cause you're rewriting the whole coding of the language. - Yeah.

- Are you a voice actor too? - I am not. - I'm the odd one out here. I've not done any voice acting. - That was how I got my start, doing everything that I do. - You should have a crack. You should do what he did. Then you could be a voice actor too. - No. - You could do it. - No? - I'm not a good voice actor. - I mean, Garnt's voice acted in his own things. - Yeah. - Yeah. - I mean, like the problem with me is that there's no way for me not to sound like me. And also I'm shit at doing accents as well. - That's sometimes good though. Like some people do want like very distinct voices.

I hear like my voice acting, which is like, I've done like bare bones voice acting because like I did like, do you know what an abridged series is? - I think so. - Yeah. So it's like a parody dub kind of of an anime series, right? And so I did that for fun and I would like cast all the main roles as like other voice actors.

And I would cast myself as just all the filler characters that I couldn't be bothered to look for. And I just sound like myself in every character. - It's either that or generic American action, like 101 that like no one can imagine. - Right, right. Like I can record, like anytime I used to watch like a giga bridge, like I could immediately tell. - Oh yeah, you can tell when it's gone. It's so obvious when it's gone. - But that has a charm to it, I find. Where it's like, it's like, it's like that, it's like, you know, watching something and then all of a sudden you hear your favorite voice actor, right? Being like, oh shit.

- There is. - I am Morgan Freeman. - Yeah, exactly. - I actually am. Pull my skin off. What are your favorite animes? - Oh my God, here we go. - It's the question. - Yeah, that is the question we get asked all the time. - It's the Hong Kong back in a job. - Saying your favorite is a little bit 14 year old. So can I rephrase the question? What are you watching at the moment, Joey? - At the moment?

- I just caught up on "Attack on Titan." - Okay, so it's the whole damn thing. - Well, I mean what it's up to currently. - Are you watching "Attack on Titan?" - No, I watched through series one. I haven't watched it since then. - You're doing yourself a disservice. - It just gets better. - Does it really? - Yeah, it just gets better. - 'Cause I started series two and there was a lot of talking and not much happening. So I was a bit like, oh, okay. - Season two is like, they throw in a lot of politics into the story. And it seems boring at first.

- No, no, trust me. I think everyone was at that point when season two came out. - Don't hear me watching Peppa Pig and they put the fucking politics. - Don't get me started. Don't get me started.

- No, but like, I think everyone was at that point when season two started, they were like, "Oh God, where's the action? Where's the high octane action everyone came for for season one." But then after a while you quickly start to realize, oh, this is very important to the story. And it just gets you more invested in that world. - It makes the world more and more interesting as you go along. So by the time you get to season four, it's got the same action packed kind of rollercoaster ride, but then you also- - The stakes are so much higher now. - Yeah, the stakes are like way higher.

- Right. - So what season are they up to now? - So it's currently up to four. - It feels like a conversation with my dad. My dad is so anime, it's great.

- Calm down young Connor. - So what is the last anime that you watched? - Connor, you know what you need to stop doing Connor? Stop watching anime and read a good book. - Kids these days, they watch too much anime. - I'm one of, now I do not want for a second, want to take away from the seriousness of the health crisis of COVID-19.

but one of the advantages of this pandemic has there's been a lot of time at home to do things such as catch up on anime. So I've been catching up on Aggretsuko. - Aggretsuko is fantastic. - And Kenganashira.

- I haven't seen "King of the Natural." - You should watch "Baki." - Oh, it's killer. - Have you seen "Baki?" - Please watch "Baki." - Everyone keeps telling me to watch "Baki." I started watching "Baki." - You're a martial artist. You should love "Baki." - I somehow didn't get into it at the start for some reason. - Keep going, keep going. - Here's the more important question. Do you watch "JoJo?" - I don't. - Oh! - You would absolutely adore "JoJo." - You are literally a "JoJo" character. - You are a "JoJo" character. - Why have I not been put in this anime series yet?

- You could have been in the Hong Kong dub for all this. - Nah, I haven't, but you are now number X who's told me to watch that. - You would absolutely love it. - If you go on the internet, you get told to watch it. - I potentially have no choice. - I mean, I think you'll genuinely love it. And I think with "Barky" as well, like if you give it a little bit of a chance. - But I got a feeling the reason I didn't get into "Barky" was like the DVD was broken.

- I got a feeling that's- - It's also on Netflix. - It's on Netflix, yeah. - That's why now this excuse doesn't work anymore. Yeah, but I'm watching "Ken Kanashida." You watch that? - No, I haven't. - This is blasphemy to say, I just thought it was inferior Baki. - Did you watch it? You watched the whole thing? - I watched like two episodes and I was like, no. - It's 'cause of the 3D. - I don't know, I just was watching it and I was just like, every itch was scratched better by Baki.

- I feel that main character whose name I can't remember. The little weenie dude who's watching. - From Baki? - No, no, no, from Kenga Nashida. 'Cause you haven't seen it. - I know, yeah. - Whoever he is, I look at him and I'm like, I know this man. There are so many Japanese men who are like that, you know? - Oh really? - Just like,

- I wish I was awesome. Look at these awesome men. I wish I was one. - And therefore I think I have a person. - God, I hate it when I'm on the train and someone's just choking. How awesome I am. - You know what I'm saying? - No, we don't. Not gonna lie, we don't. - I feel that something like that has a certain essence of Japanese in the Senate. And there are so many people in this country who have been

forced into a profession or a series of activities that they are not into. Right. And they just yearn to be a different person. Right. And then they, there's, there'll be whatever they are the otaku for pro wrestling or anime or idols, whatever it is. It's like they get to totally embrace that fantasy. So to that end, Kengan Ashita actually, despite the ridiculousness of it feels quite real to me. Right.

- And I think I appreciate it now 'cause I've lived in Japan for a long time. - You're really selling King on us right now. - I feel bad for calling it. - You know what? You should. You should my friend. - I'll give it another shot. - Do it. Give it a shot right now. - So you said you watched "Igreco". Have you caught up to season three? - No, not yet. See, I'm getting through them you see.

- I would be very interested to see what your opinion of season three is. - Yeah. - Well, now I have- - Actually, yeah, yeah. You're right. I don't wanna spoil you, but let's say,

- The parallels are astonishing. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - What, the parallels between that and "Kengan Ashina"? - No, the parallels between season three and you. - Yeah. - All right, all right, I got it. - Yeah, I'll be interested, I'll be interested to see. - Well, I'll watch the rest of our Gretsch score, you watch "Kengan Ashina", we'll come back and do another podcast. - I've always wanted to, I've just hadn't had the time to sit down and watch it. - So now, it was my understanding that you watched literally every anime.

- No, actually. - Well in that case, my understanding was incorrect. - Yeah. - So- - Where did you get that understanding from? - Where did you get that understanding? - Was it from his name? - Was it from my name? - The anime man? - Yeah, I remember when I first met you, I remember you being like, "Yeah, I watch every anime." - Well, yeah, that was-

- Well, that was also during a while way to help me out like that. That was also, sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry. - No, no, no, but like, I think because when I did meet you, it was like what, 2015, 2016, right? Back then I literally did watch everything, but that's because that was also the time when I also wasn't as busy as I was now. Like I think the one reason I just can't anymore is because I just have,

so much shit going on. - And I was wondering how you managed to maintain that level of sitting on a couch when you're doing so many things. Like, oh, by the way, I watched the video of you guys riding bicycles across Japan. - Oh yeah. - It's very clear to me. - Oh God. - It was wonderful.

- Wonderful, was a masterpiece. But I was wondering how you managed to keep up that level of consumption when your output was so great. This is- - He doesn't. - I don't. - He doesn't. - Now, this is interesting. I think one of the interesting things about becoming content is the lifestyle that is required to be content is the opposite of the lifestyle required to consume content. - Yeah. - 100%. - 100%, I'd agree with that. - And I think the best way, the best like,

metaphor i guess for it so you think about professional sports the lifestyle of the guys on the field is the polar opposite from the lifestyle of the people in the stands yeah people in the stands with their beer and their hot dogs swearing and screaming yeah guys in the field getting up at 5 a.m and doing sprints right but salad i feel that's the same way when you're doing content because like you say what you got into it as a consumer you then become the content right and

and now you are to be consumed. - And that's the problem, right? And that's, I guess the dilemma, right? Well, I mean, exactly. But like, that's also just the dilemma of being an anime content creator, right? It's like, I need to watch anime to create content, but because I'm too busy creating content, I don't have time to watch anime. - It's a paradox. - It's the catch 22. - It's the catch 22, exactly. And I've just been trying so hard to, I guess, like just try and keep up as much as possible, but without having to go down to like a video every two months. All right, so it's just like- - Call me out.

- Well, no, you're getting way better at it recently. Yeah, you're getting way better at it recently. - Are you a bit slow with your uploads? - I mean, my upload schedule is like way longer than either of these two. But I mean, that's because- - But he also like jam packs like a lot more into one video. - I was gonna say, your videos are quite long, aren't they?

- Yeah, and they're all scripted as well, where these two just turn on the camera and just start talking. - Talking shit. - Yeah, literally, yeah. - Yeah, I remember the first time I helped, I think Joey record one of his videos and we recorded like a tier list. And he turned on the camera, we just started talking for an hour and a half, turns it off and he goes, "All right, done." I'm just like, "What? That's a video?"

- Just send it to my editor now, we're good. - Those are the rare instances where you're like, this is just amazing 'cause I got one of my weekly uploads done in an hour and it required no planning. But then other times it's like, I have to set up so many fucking things. - Yeah, yeah, yeah. - It's like, I gotta go to X time with X person, film this, blah, blah, blah. - Get permission, it's an absolute nightmare sometimes. - So how did this transition happen from doing anime content into your going out into the world and doing interesting Japan things content?

- I think, I don't know about you, Joey, but I never wanted to be stuck in my room doing stuff. But it's like, it's the means that you have at that time. It's like when I was creating content, I always envisioned something bigger that was more involved with me doing stuff and moving to Japan and having agency help was pretty much the key to allowing me to do that.

- I think for me it was more so because I have the problem with my name being the anime man. People just expect me to just be every video I'm in my room talking about anime. So I always, 'cause I always had like so many ideas to do other things that no matter how much I thought about it, I was like, there's no way I can twist anime into this. So I might as well just not make it. But then this year, especially I was like,

- Oh fuck it. Like if I enjoy it and it's just seems interesting enough and I can, you know, have a fun time doing it, then I'm just gonna make it. - That drifting video you did was fricking cool. - Yeah. - Thank you very much. - I watched that drifting video. I was like, I wanna go drift.

- It's really fun. - It's expensive. - It's really expensive. - It's very expensive. - Beyond the shinkansen, it's expensive. Like the drifting itself. - Yeah. - Is it really? - Yeah. - I mean, Alexi, who we had on as a guest, he's a professional drifter, but like, yeah, he said like, it's one of the most expensive hobbies.

- You're basically tearing apart a car. - Yeah, you need a car. - It's not a go car. - We were able to rent cars, but most of the time, if you want to drift, you have to buy a car. - Because they expect that car to be just totaled by the end of it. - Yeah, yeah. - Damn. - So you buy a car and it just sits in that parking lot and you can use it whenever you want. - And then you gotta replace the tires. - Of course, and I imagine there's safety standards that have to be maintained like a beast, yeah?

- Surprisingly. - Not seatbelt regulations and things? - I think the safety is like, it's up to you. I don't know if I could be completely wrong. I kinda got that vibe. - I got the vibe when you didn't even need a driving license to be able to go on the drift track. - It's private property, so you can...

- It's like driving in someone's backyard. - Yeah, because Garnt doesn't have a license to drive and Joey doesn't have a license to drive. - I do have a license to drive. - But you've got a license to thrill. - I do. - Right. - So they turned, we booked this thing and I remember there was a big concern. We were like, wait, these two don't have licenses. What are we gonna do? - Yeah. - And then- - 'Cause we thought we needed like a manual license and Garnt and I don't, we only have an automatic license. - Oh no, Garnt can drive manual, right? - Yeah, I can drive. - Oh, okay. - I just haven't done in years. - Yeah, I don't have a manual license. So I was like, well, I'm gonna be screwed. And the guy was like, no, you don't need it.

- Just jump in. - You're fine. - Just learn. - You're fine. - So I had to learn manual like on the spot. - It was very funny. - Oh God. - When I learned manual, it was for a movie I shot in the Philippines. - Right. - And... - The tangent. Here comes the tangent. - Wait, for fuck sake. - I was shooting in front of my South African cut. - Okay, wait, wait. - And I learned how to drive manual. - I briefly lived in the Philippines. - Okay. - And I worked for a movie studio. - Right. - I was a producer and an actor.

And so I was acting in a particular film. - What haven't you done? - I literally asked you like half an hour ago, is there any other like job that you haven't mentioned yet? - When did you go undercover in a gang and bust the drug raid? I'm curious, can tell me about that. - That's why I'm on this podcast, to bust the anime man, to list an anime trade. - Jesus. - So the way I learned manuals, I had to learn it for this movie and I'm not a stunt driver. I'd never done stunts in cars ever. - Okay.

They're like, "Yeah, yeah, so that's the car. "And we'll get this guy who will teach you "how to drive a manual." I never drew a manual. Keep in mind, it's also on the wrong side of the road from Australia. So it's on the other side of the car. So I'm there and I spend a few days clickety clacking, bunny hopping away, learn how to do it. And then in the movie, the scene that I have to shoot with me in the car

is like dirt track in this dodgy like countryside Philippines. It's like through the middle of like a rice paddy. So it's like, there's the road and then like a drop on either side. - Right, right. - And I have to like come around this corner, speed it up, get up to like 60 or something going directly at the camera crew. - Right.

And then they're gonna pull back on the dolly at the last second I see go boo boo and like whiz around them. - Jesus Christ. - And I'm like, you want a non-stunt driver to do that? You really want a non-stunt driver to do that? - Did you have to sign any health and safety stuff or? - The Philippines? - Nothing happens in Japan and you think the Philippines is gonna be a health and safety disclaimer? Bruhs, so we go for it. And I'm sitting there before the first take and I'm like, well,

Rip cameraman. - How long is that? - I'm having an adventure if nothing else. So, but what would happen is this camera crew as they pulled out on their dolly, one of the guys would jump out onto the road to pull the freaking camera. Didn't tell me he would do that. - Right, right. - So, okay, your directions, you speed up, get to 60 that are the last second, just whiz around him. - Right. - No rehearsals?

I'm up 60 at this guy. Okay. Getting there. Freaking out a little bit. Do my zing to get around him. And then a man jumps in front of the car. Jesus Christ. Did you hit him? Did you kill him? I think finally I didn't. But then another take on homeless man jumped onto the road. Out of the rice paddy onto the road. Oh my God. Oh my God.

- You have lived like the experience of like 10 different lives at least. It's fucking crazy. - Oh, it's ridiculous. - Oh my God. - I just wanna sit in front of a fire with a cup of tea. - Yeah, I do too. After the interesting talks you've told us. Jesus Christ. But I guess to wrap things up,

Where do you want our viewers to go check your stuff out? Go check out Ladybeard on the social medias. Ladybeard, that's one word, underscore Japan. Ladybeard underscore Japan on the Twippy Twoppy and the Facey Bookie and the Instamagram and the old Ticking Talking. And don't forget to check out Ladybeard's new group, Babybeard, coming at you at all those same places. 2021, prepare yourself, world. It's on like donkey meat.

- I love the G rating self-censoring lady has the G rating right there.

- I would like to say a huge thank you to you members of the Rubbish Rebel podcast for having me on your establishment here today. - Thank you for having us on your podcast. - This might as well have been your podcast. - When you see the comparison between your subscribers and mine, you will quickly realize it's your podcast.

- I'd like to thank you gentlemen, sincerely. It's wonderful to have this conversation. - Thank you. - I'd like to thank our behind the scenes crew. Let's just have a round of applause for our behind the scenes crew. They've done an excellent job. And lastly, I'd like to thank you, the viewers of Trash Taste podcast. Without you, this show- - We don't have to do anything. - Yeah, we don't have to do anything. - Without you, this show isn't possible. - You gotta thank the patrons. - You gotta thank the patrons. - You gotta thank the patrons. - We got patrons? - Yeah, we got patrons. - Thanks.

- I like to thank our patrons. - Don't forget to like, comment and subscribe. - Shout out the Twitter and subreddit. - What? - We have a Twitter and a subreddit. - Shout out to your Twitter and your subreddit. - And we have a Spotify as well. - Spotify. - Don't forget to subscribe to the Trash Taste podcast on Spotify.

- There you go. - I'm Ladybeard and I'll see you next time. - He just did our job for us. - I guess that's it, bye guys. - Bye.