Solo Mailbag with Yasi. Plus, an interview with Elias Bender Rønnenfelt and Johan Suurballe of Iceage.

It's time for a loaded mailbag, and Yasi is handling this one solo. She’s tackling questions on skin-care routines, the importance of physical media, and the best venues for seeing a show. Plus: Learn whether 24 is too old. (Spoiler: It’s not.) Next, Iceage’s Elias Bender Ronnenfelt and Johan Suurballe Wieth join Yasi to discuss their new album, 'For Love of Grace & the Hereafter.' They talk about the Copenhagen music scene, the epiphany of direction, scoring films, and befriending crows. Check out Iceage’s ‘For Love of Grace & the Hereafter’ here Subscribe on YouTube CREDITS: Host: Yasi Salek @yasisalek Guest: Elias Bender Rønnenfelt and Johan Suurballe Wieth @iceage Producer: Rob Sundermann Editor: Adrien Bridges Additional Production Supervision: Justin Sayles Theme Song: Bethany Cosentino Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Speaker 00

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• 0:24Speaker 01

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• 0:59Speaker 02

  What's with this band anyway? I don't get it. Can you please explain? Wait, like, bandsplain? Never heard this band in my life. Oh, you haven't? I'd love that. Really? Why? Yeah, I love this song. Oh, I don't know that one. Bandsplain, bandsplain, bandsplain. I really hate this band. Whatever. I'm their biggest fan. Bandsplain, bandsplain, bandsplain, bandsplain. Bandsplain.

• 1:39Yasi Salek?

  Hello and welcome to Bandsplain. I am your host, Yasi Salek. This is usually a show where I invite an expert guest on to help me explain a cult band or iconic artist. But today, you guys, today,

• 1:57Yasi Salek?

  I am...

• 2:04Yasi Salek?

  Do you know what I mean? I'm doing a mailbag. It's Yasi Salek solo mailbag time. Thank you for joining me for this special episode. But before I get into the questions, I want to tell you that after the questions, please stick around. I did an interview with one of my favorite bands, Pinnacles of Danish Excellence, the band Ice Age, whose fantastic new album, For Love of Grace and the Hereafter, has been really heavily played in my AirPods corded recently. So definitely stick around for that. It was a good conversation. All right, let's get into your guys'. You guys sent in a lot of questions, so I'm really sorry in advance that I'm not going to get to all of them.

• 2:48Yasi Salek?

  But we'll save, you know, save some for the next one. And thank you for the diversity and the variety. I appreciate it. First question. To my dearest Yasi Salek, I'm writing in with a few questions in mind. Before I get to the questions, I want to preface by saying that recently, I worked at a company where I wrote manuals for robots that made glass. The only thing that kept me from throwing myself onto the running conveyor belts, which at any given moment were handling sharp glass shards that definitely would have cut up and made my face all sorts of whack, was your podcast, which I consumed 40 hours of per week for all 10 weeks I was employed at that company. This is, this is so much to unpack right now.

• 3:32Yasi Salek?

  Do you, sorry, I know we haven't gone on the question, but did you write the manuals, like, for the robots? Did the robots use the manuals? Or are these manuals for other people that use the robots?

• 3:48Yasi Salek?

  While they were making glass? And I know you can't answer. This is the one way, all by myself, mailbag. But it's just a question that came to mind. With that being said, I was wondering, what would you say were the most important decisions you made when you were a 24-year-old to propel you into your current beautiful, goddamn gorgeous profession within the arts? The rest are about my favorite kinds of questions, so I will not read on this podcast, which are, can you do this band? But I appreciate you. Okay.

• 4:20Yasi Salek?

  There's a couple of questions in this vein, and I'm more than happy to answer them. I love answering these kinds of questions. 24 years old, first of all, is very young. I think that we're living in some sort of new timeline where young people are like convinced that like, once they hit 26, they're like a washed-up old has-been hag and need to be thrown into the garbage can. Like, if they haven't become like an influencer entrepreneur or something by that point, or like, you know, started an AI company or whatever. But I don't think that's the case. I think 24 is like, you're really right at the beginning, the sweet spot.

• 5:03Yasi Salek?

  In fact, you have like a good six more years minimum to like fuck around and find out.

• 5:11Yasi Salek?

  What was I doing when I was 24? What decisions did I make? When I was 24, I was living in New York City.

• 5:24Yasi Salek?

  Absolutely not thinking about girl bossing. I had a blog.

• 5:34Yasi Salek?

  Yeah, I had a blog, Blogspot. It was called killercamel.blogspot.com. It's defunct, I believe. I've actually never tried to look at it at the Wayback Machine. I should try to look at it. It was kind of like one of those early party photo style blogs. Although the party photos were not of like everyone at a party. They were just of my party excavades.

• 5:57Yasi Salek?

  And I was working at Nike ID, which was a...

• 6:06Yasi Salek?

  Nike had opened like a concept shop. I think it was on Elizabeth Street, and truly, it's so long ago. Where people, in the beginning, mostly celebrities and VIPs could come in to customize shoes with the help of a Nike employee who sat with you and helped you pick out, you know, all your special little fabrics and colors and stuff. I was not one of those front-of-house people. They shoved me right in the back. I was doing administrative work.

• 6:38Yasi Salek?

  And also like kind of constantly getting in trouble because I would come in every day and like beat up Chuck Taylor Converse and not Nike's.

• 6:46Yasi Salek?

  And I was drinking quite heavily, probably because I was 24. This was like real max fish hours.

• 6:53Yasi Salek?

  And I think I was right, I was doing a bit of music writing, like very early music writing. Yeah, I guess like at that time, I would have been the editor, the music editor of Vapors Magazine,

• 7:06Yasi Salek?

  the graffiti and lifestyle magazine out of Sacramento. Mind you, that paid about $200 a month, so it wasn't exactly living large on that paycheck.

• 7:17Yasi Salek?

  What decisions did I make then? I mean, those are some of the decisions, right? That I didn't realize were sort of pertinent, but I was already following my interests. You know, I was really interested in music and I had always wanted to be a music journalist. And I kind of did what I could to achieve that, although I actually didn't achieve it. You know, I don't, while I did write for various publications over the course of a couple of years, Mass Appeal, I was interning at Complex at the time.

• 7:51Yasi Salek?

  Misbehave, may it rest in peace. Inked was a tattoo magazine. I didn't ever like really get any success and never got a job at a magazine that like had a salary and healthcare and stuff. But I was doing it as much as I could. I was going to shows. I was doing my blog, which is a form of self-expression, I guess.

• 8:16Yasi Salek?

  But I guess maybe the important decision I made at 24 was I moved back to LA.

• 8:23Yasi Salek?

  I just like,

• 8:26Yasi Salek?

  I was, maybe the skills of partying versus like living life and pursuing goals had tipped in the wrong direction. And,

• 8:42Yasi Salek?

  you know, I thought I would go back and then return one day. But going back to LA ended up being a really good decision for me. I don't think this is necessarily broadly applicable, but I guess maybe like, if I was to phrase it in an advice sense, if that's what you're asking, I would say like, number one, follow what interests you and do what you can within that space, you know, time and employment permitting. And also, maybe make a decision or two that is good for you, if that makes sense. Good for your,

• 9:27Yasi Salek?

  good for the longevity of your health and wellbeing. That being said, you're 24, so like, be out in the streets, you know? Have fun, make mistakes. The most important thing, I think, in my twenties was that I was unknowingly building the scaffolding of what would become what I would eventually build my career on, which was the people that I formed relationships with and knew, the knowledge I gained from just being around, being at places, being at shows, being at parties.

• 10:08Yasi Salek?

  Yeah, it all didn't feel like it was building towards something, but it ultimately was. I hope that's helpful. You're very young. I know it's rough right now and kind of always. And making money in a mindless, mind-numbing job like writing manuals for robots sucks. But I think like, you have so much time and...

• 10:35Yasi Salek?

  You're gonna be okay. As, as long as like, as long as you follow, I don't want to say follow your dreams, that's so hack and cheesy, but, but yeah, follow your interests, like, what lights you up? And figure out ways to involve yourself in that, paid or not, you know, like as, as much as you have the bandwidth for. Um, that question was from Maddie, thank you Maddie. These questions are kind of in the same vein, um. This one is, uh, from A, AE. Um, first of all, have Patrick on as much as fucking possible, please. Done and done, I'm pretty sure he is absolutely sick of me calling him and being like, can you please come down to the studio?

• 11:19Yasi Salek?

  But he is welcome anytime, he is a wonderful guest and a brilliant mind and sort of unmatched in many ways. Okay, second, I am 27 and sort of lost. Were you lost at 27? Did you start new things at 27? Make new friends? Are there any artists that had some sort of turning point at 27 that I could look into? It's not funny, but yes, there are several artists that had a very crucial turning point at 27 that we could look into. Um, the Madonna month really taught me to pursue my interests without shame, but I'm still concerned about doing so alone. I relate to Nikki in Times Square. Please look back to our Times Square episode with Patrick.

• 12:01Yasi Salek?

  Um, a bit more than I'd like to admit being 10 years her senior. Anyway, what do you listen to when you feel lost alone spiritually adrift? What brings you back to earth or helps you transcend it? Um, okay. Was I lost at 27? I kind of feel like, if you're doing it right, you should be lost at 27. I mean, 27 again is still quite young. Um, I don't want to infantilize, like, I don't think like you're a little baby at 27 and you can't be responsible for yourself and, you know, make good decisions, et cetera, et cetera. But at the same time, I do think you should be like still getting into fuck shit.

• 12:44Yasi Salek?

  Um, and I, and, yeah, I mean, my life from when I was 27 to now has changed vastly. When I was 27, what was I even doing at 27? Honestly, I barely remember. I think I was, not to retread, but it was merely three years after I moved back from New York. So I was doing kind of the same stuff. I, oh, I know, okay. I had another blog, I had a different blog called Cultist, which was like an online sort of, more of like, it was less party fun, here are my friends with my digital camera and more like, an attempt at doing like a music magazine.

• 13:28Yasi Salek?

  There was like different contributors. Um, I would interview bands, I had my friends interview bands, we would put up like photos from shows and festivals. Um, we would talk about new music videos. We, we did a lot of cool shit, like, um, Charli XCX had an advice column, I think, for like one or two posts. I literally can't find it, it's, the, the blog is defunct and I've poked her on the Wayback Machine, that's one I can't find, but, um, we would go to South by Southwest and like interview new bands and it was super fun. And we had like personal essays and stuff and I loved that. So I was, you know, doing something, but it didn't feel like something, because it didn't make money, you know, it wasn't, it wasn't like

• 14:13Yasi Salek?

  a career thing at all, it was a thing I did on the side for the love of the game or whatever. Um, and I had a job, I worked at BuzzNet, which was a sort of like a pop punk and scene website. I was a kind of woefully miscast, uh, if you will, in that position, but it was a job. Um, the answer is, yeah, like in a sense I was lost, but again, I think you should be lost. Um, not so lost that you are trending towards, you know, the artists that had the turning point at 27, which, I don't know if you were making a joke, but yes, obviously there's the 27 Club and it's a famous, um, age to, uh, die or end your life.

• 14:58Yasi Salek?

  And, you know, I think for my astrology girl is, that ties in, in my opinion, to Saturn return, because Saturn return happens once every like, what, 27 or 28 years? And depending on where your, where your chart falls exactly, and it's an incredibly difficult time in your life, it's like harrowing, it's testing and you come out the other side, hopefully more sure of yourself, stronger. Um, but it's fucking, it's a rough, it's a rough go for a little bit. Um, I definitely think you can make new friends. I made lots of new friends when I was 27. Um, you can do anything at any age.

• 15:40Yasi Salek?

  I know that sounds a little hack and it's kind of like when my therapist tells me that everybody is beautiful, which everybody is beautiful, but you know what I mean? Like some days when you're like feeling ugly and disgusting, you're like, okay. Point being, you definitely can make new friends at 27. And if you're feeling lost, I know this is a little bit, already I'm in reruns from the first question, but like if you're feeling lost, do something that you love and enjoy and that brings you some sort of gratitude or, um, there's a saying that goes around that's like, you build self-esteem through esteemable actions. And that gets really broad, but, um,

• 16:23Yasi Salek?

  for me, as stupid as it sounds, like blogging about music and like writing about loving a new song felt, you know, it gave me esteem because it was an esteemable action. Um, I think that the way to anchor yourself is to be close to yourself and the way to be close to yourself is to honor what you love and what lights you up. So again, sorry, I'm in reruns, but I do think there's kind of simple answers to most of these questions. Simple, but not easy. It's different. Um, it might be simple to explain, but it's not easy to achieve.

• 17:07Yasi Salek?

  But you got this, A, A, I'm sorry if I'm not pronouncing your name right. About what I listen to when I feel lost alone and spiritually adrift. Um, it kind of depends. Sometimes I just like, I'm like, okay, like, let's try to turn the ship around, like, let's boost your spirit, let's trick yourself into being in a better mood, kind of like, you know, when you fake smile and they say there's a scientific proof that if you make yourself smile, you, your mood improves. And so I have like a couple of playlists of just like more uplifting, like fun music. Yeah, maybe Call Me Maybe is on most of those playlists. None of your business.

• 17:50Yasi Salek?

  Um, or conversely, I sometimes take the, uh, only way out is through, uh, tactic and don't fight it, because I think sometimes fighting it when you are feeling really down, spiritually adrift, if you will, um, only makes it worse. It's like, it's like if you're tangled up in a net and you are trying to fight out of it, you just get more tangled up, but if you just kind of like untense and, and lay down, you'll eventually be free of it. Um, so I put on this totally normal playlist I have of two to three hours of crying songs.

• 18:35Yasi Salek?

  So I would give that a go. Um, okay, next question. Hello Yasi, can you let us know what your bedtime routine is, please? Thank you, Dana Andrew Hernandez. Thank you so much Dana Andrew Hernandez. I did sort of, um, ask on Instagram if people could ask me more, um, broader questions and that, um, reach into my other interests besides music, because I am a complex and layered person. Um, and I'm happy to talk to you about my bedtime routine. I personally feel like the bedtime routine sort of starts at dinner, so, you know, I cook most nights, I try to make myself a reasonably nourishing and healthy meal.

• 19:20Yasi Salek?

  Um, it gets a little Jimbo in the, in the meals lately, it's, you know, a fish or shrimp, some sort of, you know, protein. Um, I don't put that in quotes, it's literally protein. Uh, we have like a really nice rice cooker, I can't remember the name, but I think you guys will, real rice cooker heads will know, it plays a little song. Um, so there's always kind of rice going, so I usually have rice and the protein and some sort of vegetable broccoli, asparagus. Um, and, you know, we zhuzh it up, seasoning, sauces. Um, sometimes it's Mexican, sometimes it's Asian, depending on the seasonings and sauces.

• 20:02Yasi Salek?

  Sometimes I do a ground beef bowl, again, Jimbo hours, but I try to make it fun. Fun. And then depending on the heat level, like sometimes I take, walk the dog before dinner, sometimes I walk after, it's probably good to walk after because you get that, you know, digestion walk popping. Um, I watch TV or a movie, depending. Um, I only like to watch like maybe max two hours a night, usually an hour, I'm tired. Um, and then I take my supplements, some magnesium and some glycine and some vitamin D and some other stuff.

• 20:41Yasi Salek?

  Uh, then I go on down to the bedroom, I take off, you know, my makeup, my whatever, my face, um, brush my teeth, do my skincare, and then I lay in my bed with my legs up on the wall. It's a bit of a emphatic drainage moment. You asked, okay, you asked and I'm telling you the full answer. And then I read while I'm doing that, it's like five or 10 minutes, and then I go ahead and turn back around, normal position and keep reading, um, about 30 minutes and then I put a little magnesium oil on my feet, a lip mask, lights out, usually around.

• 21:21Yasi Salek?

  Depends. 9:30, 10:00. If I'm really pushing at 10:30 last night, I went to bed at 9:00. Chris Ryan told me recently that I am an extremely unconvincing early riser. And I think that's a compliment, but I don't know. Something happened where it's my, my whole awake timeframe has shifted and it's quite difficult to stay up late. But that's it. That's the bedtime routine. Really exciting. Um, okay, next question. Dear Yossi, do you fuck with creatine? I've been taking it pre-workout for a month now and I think it's making me stronger, but like in a bulky way. I don't know. Also, I'm in the market for running shoes because I'm about to start marathon training.

• 22:05Yasi Salek?

  What are some actual Cuba functional shoes that don't make me look like I have moon boots on? Love you, Lucy. Oh my God, hi Lucy. I'm really proud of your fitness journey. Um, I do fuck with creatine. I think creatine is really great. I think it's heavily studied. Um, it's pretty known to benefit not just muscle mass, but also brain function. Um, I think if I remember correctly, the brain function happens like at a little bit of a higher dose, like maybe 10 grams a day instead of five. Um, but I do know that because of how, not, welcome to Huberman Lab. Um, I know because of how creatine functions, which is it like brings, I mean, I may all know about this.

• 22:50Yasi Salek?

  I didn't sound like a fucking idiot. Um, it pulls water from your body into your muscle cells. And so the bulk you're feeling isn't actually like weight gain or fat or anything. It is this fluid going to your muscle fibers. And that, in my experience, that goes away. Like, that's only kind of the beginning of when you're taking it. Usually, it should go away for you pretty soon. It's usually about two to four weeks. Um, but I, yeah, I can't, I can't recommend it enough, especially for women. Because as we, as women age, we are rapidly losing muscle mass. So anything that can help.

• 23:31Yasi Salek?

  And also for my brain, which is increasingly becoming addled and filled with worms. Um, Lucy, regarding running shoes, I literally have no idea. I don't really run. Um, I would recommend going to one of those cool running shoe stores where they like measure your foot and have you run on a thing. And I'll tell you what, I think they probably should be ugly because it's more important that they're protecting your foot. Sorry to sound like your mom. Okay, next question. Bon Jovi, oh my God, Bon Jovi. What are you reading outside of work these days? Love, Chelsea, a female listener. Thank you, Chelsea. Um, okay. In regard, like kind of related to the creatine point, I genuinely feel like I'm getting stupider every day.

• 24:15Yasi Salek?

  I think that's probably a function of perimenopause. Um, real heads know, real perimenopause heads know. And like also, can, like, can we talk about, this is very niche audience, but like, it's trapping my ass right now. Where is the estradiol? Where is, why every pharmacy is like, oh, sorry, we don't have that right now. Like, if men needed this, that would not be sold out. That, like, why are we having a shortage of a drug that people need? I mean, insulin, whatever, you can get into it. I just, it's, it's causing me great stress atop other stresses that I don't need to deal with. But I've digressed. Feeling stupider every day.

• 25:00Yasi Salek?

  And so I'm trying, because the, the books I read for work, absolutely bless their hearts and souls, are not, uh, they're not doing any heavy lifting in terms of sharpening my mind because they are extremely poorly written. An exception, by the way, recently is Stephen Hayden's New Strokes book, um, which is quite good. I'm not sure it's out yet. I think it comes out in September, but preorder that bitch. It's good. Um, anyways, point being that I've been trying to actively like work out my brain by reading more challenging books. Um, right now, I'm particularly interested in semiotics.

• 25:43Yasi Salek?

  Um, wow, this is like one of those episodes where it's like absolutely for the real heads. Like many people have been like, oh, you're not talking about Pearl Jam? Goodbye. Um, anyways, for the seven of you still here, semiotics is, uh, how words, it's like the study of how words and images and sounds and like all sorts of gestures, objects, uh, stand in for and represent ideas in communication and media and culture. It's like the study of signs. Um, so I am reading, I brought them actually to show you guys. I'm reading this book, which is, uh, Semiotics, The Basics by Daniel Chandler,

• 26:22Yasi Salek?

  which is kind of just like a straight, um, academic but explanatory book about semiotics. So far, it's very good. Um, I'm also reading Roland Bart Mythologies. I hope I'm pronouncing that right. My king, my French king. I, um, everyone knows I love, what is the Roland Bart book I love? A Lover's Discourse. That's like my favorite Roland Bart book, which I always really recommend because I think it's so incredible. But yes, I'm reading Mythologies. And then the third book is not a semiotics book. It is Hannah Arendt, The Life of the Mind, which is basically like a meditation on thinking. Um, I know that sounds maybe boring, but it's really not boring. It's super fucking interesting.

• 27:07Yasi Salek?

  I like have to stop every like two pages and jot down something she says, um, an idea she has. It's like, everything's like phrased really beautifully. Um, I wonder if it's like a little overkill to read about thinking in order to make yourself think better, but like, I'll do it. I'm doing what I can, babe. We're trying to preserve the mind. So the, that's, you just, you caught me at a very, um, intellectually annoying time in my life and that's what I'm reading. But I also, you know, sometimes when I want a secret third thing between workbook and challenging intellectual book,

• 27:49Yasi Salek?

  um, I do like a novel. Um, I just haven't read one in a while. Um, open to, I'm open to, um, suggestions, um, willing to take any of your suggestions. Oh, you know what? Another book I read recently that I really liked, um, was Megan Garvey's book, Midwestern Death Trip. It's her first book. Megan Garvey is one of my favorite writers. Um, she's brilliant. Her Substack is brilliant. Um, I mean, she's truly like the Hunter S. Thompson of, I don't, meets, um, Eve Babitz of the Midwest.

• 28:30Yasi Salek?

  She, it's, this is a coming of age memoir, um, that's like kind of set around a road trip through the American Midwest. And I say 100% yes, you should get it. Um, you guys, surprisingly, there weren't that many music questions, um, except for can you do this band? Which, yes, just let's say yes, for whatever band you ask for, let's say yes. Um, so if you, you know, don't be mad at me about these questions not being music related. Okay, next question. Um, hi Yossi, I've been listening to and loving bands, Lynn. You always do a great job of doing deep dives into my favorite bands and genres. Has really inspired me to learn even more about music and music history.

• 29:12Yasi Salek?

  You're welcome. How did you become such a good music historian? Dumb bitch, Ken Burns, babe. Can you suggest how someone like me could go about learning to become a music historian? How did you get started? What are some resources you use? I'm always impressed by the level of detail you have when you talk about some of these bands and wonder how you found that info. Always, anyway, I love the show. Thanks. This is from Andy. Thank you, Andy. Um, I love that you called me a music historian. I will take it. I don't, how did I become such a good music historian? I'm going to try to answer this sincerely. I, I think if you have a deep level of interest in something, you are naturally going to be prone to learning more about it.

• 29:54Yasi Salek?

  And this started for me very young, pre there being the internet at our fingertips. And so what it looked like back then was buying as many music magazines as possible, reading them cover to cover, reading liner notes to find out more about the artists and bands that I loved and maybe who they were thinking in the notes. So I could sort of go and look into those artists, buying books, um, that were about music or scenes or specific bands. I mean, I've talked at length on this show and I will continue to talk about Route 666, On the Road to Nirvana by Gina Arnold, which is a book that really opened my eyes

• 30:35Yasi Salek?

  and also showed me that you could do music history, but make it personal and voicey and be a woman. Um, highly recommend that book. So I guess like those are some of the first things I would recommend is like, if whatever it is you're interested in, I mean, you're saying music, it's 10 times easier now, you know? You have the internet. So like, I would say read whatever you can get your hands on. Um, I do recommend, and I've said it a lot on this show, out of print books. Um, again, not because they're particularly well-written and I presume if they were, they might still be in print. But also some of them are, it's just maybe they're kind of niche.

• 31:20Yasi Salek?

  Um, but there's tons of out of print music books about almost anything you could think of. And, um, great places to get those are like thriftbooks.com, eBay. I use in particular, I mean, I know it's like kind of basic bit shit, but like Wikipedia is kind of a, a great starting point because, um, the citations will take you to interesting places. Um, so I definitely use Wikipedia. I use the Wayback Machine quite a bit. Um, for broken links or, um, things like that, fan sites. Again, I don't know how much people are keeping up dedicated fan sites like they used to, like Angel Fire style.

• 32:03Yasi Salek?

  Um, but even the ones that are somehow still on the internet and even if they're not being updated are like wealth of information. Like a lot of them have entire sections of press where you can find like scanned or transcribed bits of press that aren't findable anymore online. Um, I do also buy, um,

• 32:27Yasi Salek?

  Old magazines from those eras, like on, again, on eBay. A, I just love them as pieces of physical media. I love magazines. I always loved them. It was like my dream to work in magazines. But there's lots of pieces and interviews and stuff from magazines that never made their way online. And so you can find those and buy them on eBay. I mean, depending how expensive they are. But those are, I, those are sort of my resources. I think it kind of boils just down to interest. I hope that helps. I love that you want to become a music historian. It's really cool.

• 33:10Yasi Salek?

  The internet made everything a lot easier. I could never, I don't think have done, I mean, I could do this job without the internet, but you would get like one podcast every six months, probably, because it would just take me so long. We'd be at the, up in the library looking at microfiche. Good luck, Andy. You can, I hope that you are the next dumb bitch Ken Burns in the lineage.

• 33:36Speaker 00

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• 34:00Speaker 01

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• 34:31Yasi Salek?

  Next question. Oh.

• 34:36Yasi Salek?

  She's stoked. She's excited because you guys did ask some makeup and skincare questions. And again, I have layers and I'd love to talk about some other things. So here we go. Hi, Ossie. Greetings from Brooklyn, New York. You've probably been asked this before. So my apologies if this is a repeat question, but what is your most recommended eyeliner and mascara? Thank you so much, Carolina. Actually, I have not been asked this before. I use the Westman Atelier I Love You Kohl Eyeliner. I also use this other eyeliner. Oh my God, I really should have taken a picture of this. I thought I would remember, but the name has escaped me. I use this other eyeliner

• 35:20Yasi Salek?

  that's like my roommate got me. Thank you, Bree, because her makeup always looks so perfect. That's like a little more for smudging. I want to say it's one size. So those are my eyeliners. And for, that's for pencils. For liquid, I use Stila. I kind of think Stila is the best liquid liner. I've used a bunch of them. And, you know, famously, people have pointed out that my, my cat eye is unusual. Or some people have said bad. They have said it. And I don't care. I like how it is. But that's my favorite one to use. And then for mascara, I use the YSL Lash

• 36:03Yasi Salek?

  Clash Extreme Volume. If you like, like a, you know, kind of extra over the top mascara, it's kind of smudgy, rock chick look, if you will. That's a good one. I used to be a Dior show girly, but I really hate the fragrance. It's like kind of heavily fragrance. And honestly, the YSL is better.

• 36:25Yasi Salek?

  So thank you for asking that question. I feel all validated. Another question that asked about the mascara, but also folded in a music question. So I'll ask the music question was, what is your dream singer, band, group to show out at Sphere in Las Vegas? I heard it wasn't called The Sphere. Is that true? Have I been saying it wrong this whole time? Why would you just call it Sphere? Why wouldn't it be The Sphere? It's so annoying. That's actually really annoying of you, Sphere. My dream band to, to play at The Sphere. This is such a good question. I know the one that I think would make the most sense. And in a way, it might be a dream of mine, but I wouldn't say it's my number one dream, but that would be Nine Inch Nails. I just

• 37:08Yasi Salek?

  think they have like such an intensely awesome visual world. And I think it really would lend itself to like the insanity of The Sphere. What would be like my dream band to experience there? I mean, Loki, I just want David Matthews and his band to play there. And I have, you know, a bit of mushrooms and some sanser and like get my whole life. But I understand that that's not probably a very satisfying answer. Okay, next one. Also asked about the mascara. Claudia, I turn 40 in a few weeks and I'm weirdly not freaking out about it. Good. Nothing to freak out about. Do you have any makeup tips to step into this new decade in glamour

• 37:52Yasi Salek?

  and pizzazz? Thanks. Glamour and pizzazz. I love it. I was like a very late bloomer when it comes to makeup. I just didn't know how to put it on. And I still, you know, again, some people would say I still don't know how to put it on. And that's okay. But I got really into watching TikTok tutorials or Instagram reel tutorials. I really like Katie Jane Hughes. That's Dua Lip's makeup artist. I feel like I learned a lot from her. But for a specific makeup tip for glamour and pizzazz, I love highlighter. If you guys,

• 38:37Yasi Salek?

  you guys can probably tell. You're like, you're shiny as hell, bitch. And I love a lavender highlighter. I feel like sometimes all I feel like I really need is a lip and a highlighter. And I'm like, good to go. I feel kind of put together and, and like glamorous and pizzazzy. And then lastly, in this grouping of questions. Hi, Ossie. I'm Erica, 27, writing from the OC. I must ask, what is your skincare routine, products you are loving right now? Also, bonus question, can you let us know your all time favorite music venues? Thank you. I sure can, Erica. Okay, skincare products. I have been using a lot of stuff. I've found this brand when

• 39:21Yasi Salek?

  I was in Paris at the French Pharmacy. So annoying. Isn't French Pharmacy content so annoying? But it's called Ciblai. And they actually do, they sell it online. And I think they sell it at some dermatologist's office. They have a skin booster serum that I'm really into. I use mandolic acid and azelaic acid for like, you know, brightness and turnover. I don't do really well with tretinoin. I know that they say online, they put a gun to your head and say if you don't use tretinoin, you might as well just kill yourself. But I don't do all the tretinoin. And I have recently gone to an old fave, a Classique, which is the Clinique Dramatically

• 40:03Yasi Salek?

  Different Moisturizing Gel. It's nice and light, especially for summer. And this is annoying, but I'm just going to be really honest with you, Erica. I'm a biology girly. It's expensive, but it works. And I love their products. Not all of them. Some, they work to differing effects. But I use the elastin serum, the cream MSR H, and the mask VIP O2 pretty religiously. Also, just sort of related, if you're into skincare, I cannot recommend enough. My friend Alexis Page has an amazing Substack. She's like, probably

• 40:45Yasi Salek?

  the only person I would really listen to about skincare because she's like such a ball knower. And her Substack is called Self Involved. So if you're into skincare, I highly recommend a subscription to that. She is a genius. Oh, sorry. My favorite music venues.

• 41:04Yasi Salek?

  I'll just, I guess I'll just say in LA. Um, I love the Hollywood Bowl. I love the Hollywood Bowl. I love the outdoor ones. I love the Greek. I love the Hollywood Bowl. I really love the Ford, um, which you don't actually get to see shows at very much because they just don't have very many shows there. It's like a mini Hollywood Bowl and it's, uh, right up against like this cliffside. And there's all this like beautiful vegetation that like you're looking at. Um, those are kind of my three favorites in LA.

• 41:34Yasi Salek?

  I guess I have like kind of a soft spot for the Echo, even though it's not exactly the greatest music venue. I just like went there so much and had so many fun experiences there. I also really like the El Rey. What else? What else do I like?

• 41:52Yasi Salek?

  Oh, I really like, uh, the gorge. I've only been there a couple of times up in Washington, but it's so beautiful. Like seeing a band play there, like as the sun sets behind them into this giant, like beautiful, natural setting is amazing. Oh, and last but not least, in the makeup skincare corner, we have a question from the artist formerly known as producer Dylan, Dylan Tupper Rupert. Dylan writes in, okay, so I have a list of things I want to do regarding house, life, car, once I have spending money again. On that list is microneedling. But then recently I heard laser treatments get better results. What's the difference and what is better to spend money on between those two options? Dylan, I'm so glad you asked this question.

• 42:35Yasi Salek?

  How many people do you think have turned this podcast off right now? They're like, okay.

• 42:42Yasi Salek?

  I want to really, I want to take the time to answer this question properly. Um, this is my broad top level understanding as sort of a student of skincare treatments. Um, so lasers are basically a light concentration on the skin. There's two types. There's ablative and non-ablative. Um, ablative are the more intense ones. They sort of like vaporize the top layers of the skin. A CO2 laser is an ablative laser. Um, they're apparently really, I haven't done lasers, so I'm just, this is from what I understand. Um, they're good for surface level wrinkles, sun damage.

• 43:22Yasi Salek?

  Um, they cause fibroblasts, which cause new collagen. Um, I might not be saying that right, that they cause it, but you know what I'm saying?

• 43:31Yasi Salek?

  Um, ablative lasers have a lot of downtime because they're really intense, like maybe two weeks of looking Crayola bananas.

• 43:39Yasi Salek?

  Um, there is a one thing that's part of the reason maybe that I avoid them. And again, this could just be my, my takeaway, but because they use heat often, it can melt fat in your face and melting fat in your face, in my opinion, makes you look old. So, um, that's not my vibe. Non-ablative ones I know are very popular and I have a lot of friends that do them. Um, they use more like infrared or fiber wavelengths. Um, and like Fraxel is a really intense version. Moxie and BBL are like lighter versions. They have basically no downtime from what I understand. They're like really good for, like BBL is really good for pigmentation and like sun spots and broken capillaries, that kind of pigment stuff.

• 44:24Yasi Salek?

  And Moxie is really good for like bad texture. But I think, I think they both encourage like cellular turnover and you probably need multiple treatments. I mean, all of these things you are not one and done, like the only one and done, there's nothing that's one and done. Like even a facelift, you're gonna have to eventually go get another one. It's just you by yourself, like probably, I don't know, a decade or two, maybe two.

• 44:49Yasi Salek?

  Um, as for microneedling, that's the one I'm more familiar with. Microneedling is like using tiny needles to create micro injuries on your skin. And these micro injuries like trigger your skin like, oh my God, I'm wounded. Help, I'm gonna create, uh, collagen and elastin to like heal. So it's sort of, you know, you produce more of your own collagen elastin. Um, you can also pair microneedling with like various like juices and potions on top that get sucked into those tiny holes. Um, a really popular one is PRP, which is the plasma that they pull from your blood. That's super healing. Um, I've done that one. It's awesome. And then there's another one, which I recently started doing called Wharton's Jelly, which is stem cells that they take from umbilical cords. Who's umbilical cords? None of my business. Just kidding.

• 45:33Yasi Salek?

  It's all very up and up and legal and ethical, but, um, those are, I find them to be awesome. They have less downtime, maybe like a week. It's really just, I guess, depends what your goals are and what you're looking for. Um, there is also a secret third thing, which is called Softwave, which is like a high frequency ultrasound technology that is incredible for reducing fine lines, wrinkles, like plumping back out your skin because it gets to a deeper part. So you produce collagen from a deeper area. Um, it is very expensive and very painful. So, uh, depends what your budget is, depends, uh, what you're after.

• 46:15Yasi Salek?

  But if it's more, I would say if you're looking for more surface level, like texture, pigmentation, go with a laser. And if you're looking for more like plumping, filling out lines, in my opinion, I would do microneedling. Look at that dermatology corner. Um, okay, next question. This question's about physical media. Sean Fantasy Corner. Are you a vinyl girly? Question mark. CDs? Question mark. Cassettes? Question mark. If streaming only, is there any part of you that longs for the bygone days of holding an album in your hands? Just curious. Travis. Thank you so much, Travis. This is sort of a double answer. The answer is yes to all three. I love physical media. I love holding a thing in my hands. I love owning them.

• 46:57Yasi Salek?

  They remind me of a better time in my life and in history. Um, I, you guys, I brought it for you. I did bring it because I knew it would come up.

• 47:11Yasi Salek?

  Are you even ready for what I brought for you?

• 47:15Yasi Salek?

  Tiny violin. It's here.

• 47:19Yasi Salek?

  Um, ever since my house burned down, uh, I guess a year and a half now, I've like had to sort of, we've gone through many phases. One was like, let go, let go, babe. Okay, all that stuff is gone. Who cares? Move on. Um, because I had quite a sizable physical media collection. I had a lot of vinyl. I had a lot of tapes. I had a lot of CDs. And I could sort of just like, you know, like I said, put, moved on. We said, okay, you know, grateful to be alive, grateful to have everything have in my life. It's so fine. And I wasn't really gonna start another collection. It just felt kind of daunting and felt maybe a little bit unimportant.

• 48:01Yasi Salek?

  Um, but then like, A, so many of you guys, and thank you, I assume the kind of people that sent me stuff are the kind of people still here after, uh, an extensive explanation of lasers versus, um, microneedling. But so many of you guys sent me so much amazing stuff, vinyl, CDs, tapes, t-shirts. Like I was so touched. I know I've talked about this on here before, but like I cried every day for like two months going to that PO box and seeing the incredible thoughtfulness that you guys had and, and just like how you're, you're my kind of people. You know what, what that kind of stuff, uh, means. So I have been slowly rebuilding my collections.

• 48:45Yasi Salek?

  Um, and if anyone has any whole seven inches, um, I'm looking, uh, for those. But that's one half of the answer. But the other answer is I don't ever listen to them. I don't have famously, I don't have a record player. As I've said before, one of my maybe more controversial opinions is that record players come and go with boyfriends.

• 49:11Yasi Salek?

  Um, so I currently don't have a boyfriend or a record player.

• 49:15Yasi Salek?

  Um, I, you know, I have a CD player in my car.

• 49:21Yasi Salek?

  But it's just so much easier to plug in my phone and it's already plugged in because I have no sense of direction. So I need to be firing that ways up. Um, and I love cassettes and I do have a Walkman, but like I just, it doesn't come up. Like when would I use that? So I don't listen to music in physical form, but I love to have it anyways. Um, okay, next question. This question is about another physical object here. And dear to my heart, t-shirts. This is from Izzy. Please tell us your top five t-shirts that you still have or used to have.

• 50:03Yasi Salek?

  I was thinking band tees, but actually kind of open to any and also dropped three Holy Grail beauty products because you're so hot and cool. Oh my God, Izzy, what a perfect question. Well, I'll do you one better. I know you said five, but I'm so sorry, I couldn't limit myself. And I'm just gonna show you my faves. Actually, some of them I couldn't even find. Okay, this is not in any order, but this is a Dinosaur Jr. t-shirt. It's obviously a reprint, but I had one almost 99% exactly like this, that my friend Albertina got me for my birthday that I loved so much. It fit perfect. It was thin. I love this album, Green Mind. And it was one of the greatest sadnesses

• 50:47Yasi Salek?

  in my house burning down. And then I somehow magically found almost the exact same vibe of a t-shirt at Jerk's, which is one of my favorite, favorite vintage band t-shirt and vintage t-shirt shops and online situations. They're based in London, but they have a great online store, Jerk's London. You can follow them on Instagram. So this is near and dear to my heart. What else we got? Oh, yeah. Let's go. This is a real Holy Grail for me. It is a Portishead

• 51:25Yasi Salek?

  t-shirt. Shout out my guy Strip Tees Vintage in Manchester. Give him a follow on Instagram. He's awesome. What a great guy. He helped me procure this and it is one of my prized possessions and I absolutely love it. I have like a rule that I have for myself where I don't, because these t-shirt prices, I don't know if you guys are up on this, but they're psychotic out there. Like people out here being like, here's a ride long sleeve. It's $2,500. And it's like, okay, cool. That's, that's none of, I could care less about that.

• 52:07Yasi Salek?

  I'm not spending $2,500 on a t-shirt. So I try, I try to cap around 350, which is still a lot for a t-shirt, but you know, it's one of my, my great passions. I wear, whatever I do, I end up wearing band t-shirts like 80% of my life. Like as much as I love fashion and I do, and I spend quite a bit of money on other fashion, I still just default to band t-shirts. That being said, one time when I was on residual Xanax from a transatlantic flight, I did buy this, which is a Primal Scream t-shirt. And it was more than that. I don't think it was like a crazy amount more. It might've come out to about 500. There was a whole situation where perhaps I was not doing the pound to dollar conversion that

• 52:51Yasi Salek?

  well. And also, you know, I was, I was addled, if you will, but I don't regret it. I love this t-shirt. I wear it all the time. I love Primal Scream. It's really big, so it looks great with like, you know, a little, little shorts or a little skirt or whatever. Okay. This is would be a great time for you to be on, you looking at this on YouTube. Because I'm showing the t-shirts. If you're only listening to audio, I'm showing the t-shirts. This is Husker Du Metal Circus shirt. I absolutely love this shirt. I wanted to particularly

• 53:30Yasi Salek?

  shout it out because I had another one of this shirt that I got from a great vintage store in LA called Worship Vintage, a long time ago, like 15 years ago. And I wore it so much that it was like decrepit, like this, the screen was like starting to rip apart. And I think I mentioned it on an episode once and a listener, and I'm so sorry, I don't remember your name, your king, was like, I have an extra, I'll send it to you. So this is the extra. And I love it so much. I'm so happy to still have one. I actually

• 54:09Yasi Salek?

  have a great guy who will repair the damages in, in screens and stuff. And he's really cool. I'll try to find the Instagram so we can drop it in the show notes if you guys are curious or hit me up and I'll give it to you. But he's rad. Okay, next. Speaking of shirts that people sent me, I barely ever wear this Black Flag t-shirt. It's like a Black Flag, I think it's, I think it's from the eighties. I think it's an original eighties Black Flag My War t-shirt. It is so thin. I'm genuinely like afraid to wear it. Like I think I've worn it once or twice on the show, but I love it so much. It's, it has holes, it's starting to fall apart. But a listener sent this to me in like this

• 54:53Yasi Salek?

  incre, like a listener with incredible taste and cool as hell. I think these were his original t-shirts, like he bought in real time, but it was this shirt, a fire hose t-shirt that I wear all the time. It's blue, but I couldn't find it to bring it and a replacements t-shirt. And I just want to say thank you again for that, but I, I really cherish this t-shirt. Okay. You're like, oh, five? No, babe. I think I, I think I brought like 15. Sorry. This was a Cure shirt that I wanted for so long. It is, it's all, it's all very, you know, very colorful. It's the In Between Days t-shirt. I think

• 55:38Yasi Salek?

  they look so cool with these scary colorful faces. My, I had one, that Tiny Violin, and then my dear friends, Matt and Amanda, bought me a new one after Tiny Violin fire. So now it's like doubly special to me because it's just a reminder of my amazing friends. Okay, this John, oh my God, I'm from Philly all of a sudden? Apologies. This is, this is an old Slayer t-shirt from the Rain and Blood tour. Oh, it's a Clash of the Titans tour, but Rain and Blood era, 1991. This survived Tiny

• 56:22Yasi Salek?

  Violin because on my way out of the house, when I grabbed like six things randomly, this was one of them. And I bought this on eBay in like 2005 or six, and it was like $25. And that's what it used to be like before Travis Scott ruined vintage band t-shirts for everybody. You thought I was done, but I'm not. You guys, Happy Mondays, an original eighties, I think it's original eighties, Happy Mondays Tour, rave, not tour shirt, Rave On. I love this band so much. I love them even more after I did the two-part episode. If you haven't listened, Happy Mondays and Stone

• 57:04Yasi Salek?

  Roses. I'm pretty sure my guy Strip Tees Vintage also helped me get this one. And related to that is my Stone Roses t-shirt that I love. I love a small, a small vintage band t-shirt. They're weirdly harder to find, but a hot tip for my smaller people and girlies, they're cheaper. Because I guess people don't want them as much. But I love this shirt. I got this from some random vintage store in Atlanta, online, but I love it. I wear it all the time. Okay, this one, I want to give a big shout out to Jones Vintage, which is another amazing vintage dealer. My girl, she's rad. She gave me this. She is such

• 57:49Yasi Salek?

  a queen. I absolutely cried over it. It's, you guys already know how I feel about Red Hot Chili Peppers. You know, I have a Red Hot Chili Peppers tattoo. You know, you know the vibes. And this is like a very old Red Hot Chili Peppers shirt, like full sun bleached. I'm sure it was at one point actually black. It's got kind of this cartoon of the band on the front, and then it has the logo on the back. What do we have left? I only have two more left, you guys, okay? I love vintage band baby tees. Even harder to find. This is a PJ Harvey one from Stories

• 58:29Yasi Salek?

  from the City, Stories from the Sea. I fucking love this shirt. It's a women's shirt. I think I got it on Etsy. I also had one before that had, it was from Aha, Her's, a white one that had the Polaroid on it. That's, that's Tiny Violin, but I just, I love a, I love PJ Harvey shirts. I couldn't find all the rest of mine, but I have quite a few because that's the kind of one of the main shirts I collect. Okay, last but not least, this is an OG Green River shirt and it's like so old, the print is pretty much gone. A listener also sent me this and I love, I just love it. I love everything about it. I

• 59:11Yasi Salek?

  love how the print is barely there. I love the green color. It's kind of special, given my proclivities around grunge music and them being the kind of patient zeros in a way of grunge. And there's a bunch I didn't bring because I couldn't find them, but it's really, you asked me to pick amongst my children and it was, it was too hard. But I hope you guys enjoyed that, that show and tell. Okay, and three Holy Grail beauty products. Holy Grail.

• 59:49Yasi Salek?

  Like what works the best? It's a great question. I mean, I think I would say a red light mask. It's not really a product, but I, I use a red light mask almost every day and I, well, not every day because you're not supposed to, but probably like five days a week. I find them to be actually really effective.

• 1:00:12Yasi Salek?

  What else? Some sort of thing to turn over your skin. Like I said, I use mandelic and azelaic acid, P50 from Biologique is great. If you can tolerate it, try it to no end.

• 1:00:26Yasi Salek?

  And the third one is sunscreen. Go wear sunscreen. Let's go to this next question. Hi, Yasi. Long time, first time. You've been an ever reliable source of music recommendations, cultural insights and interesting perspectives. Whether it's an artist, an album, a book, or story behind the music, you've introduced me to things I never would have found on my own. It got me wondering, who were the Yassis in your life? I know you've mentioned Gina Arnold and Route 666 on this very podcast, but I'd love to hear the people, writers, musicians, teachers, friends, or other influences who helped shape your taste, curiosity, and way of looking at the world. Who introduced you to new ideas or challenged you to think differently?

• 1:01:06Yasi Salek?

  I love this question. Um, who were the Yassis in my life? Well, I didn't think of them as such. Um, one major influence on me in my life at a young age was my cousin, Seema. She was 10 years older than me. She was so cool. She is still so cool, but she, you know, she had purple hair. She worked for Greenpeace. Her roommate was a witch.

• 1:01:31Yasi Salek?

  I thought she hung the moon. And she was so awesome to me. I don't know, you know, she, she hung out with me even though I was a kid. I was 12.

• 1:01:44Yasi Salek?

  She took me to Lollapalooza in 1995. We had the best time. That's actually another shirt I should have brought, but I, I think I, that one is so tattered and in rags that I don't even want to like transport it anymore. But we both bought t-shirts from that Lollapalooza in 1995 and obviously my, my tiny violin, but she gave me hers recently and I cherish it. But she showed me a lot about culture, about what kind of person to be. She was such a good, is again, such a good person. She had a lot of musical interests. And then later she also had a boyfriend, turned husband, turned ex-husband, things happen, named Matt,

• 1:02:24Yasi Salek?

  who was also really into music. And I really remember bonding and bro-ing with him over like, I think he showed me the Pixies, um, definitely the Afghan wigs. There was like a lot of stuff that came via Matt that he was so cool. He was like a born and bred Burbank K-Rock guy. So those are a couple of people. A lot of it for me did come from books because I was kind of, uh, how to say, nerdy, solitary. I don't know nerdy, but solitary. Like, I

• 1:03:02Yasi Salek?

  also had a good friend in middle school named Fee, who had these older cousins who were like super into punk. And they put us on to like discharge and like, you know, it's like crust punk and stuff that I don't think I would have known about.

• 1:03:27Yasi Salek?

  There's a lot of people. I guess like, being curious, I haven't really talked about being curious on this episode and sort of move back to the earlier questions of feeling lost at 24 or 27. I think if you're curious, like, there are Yassis everywhere with, for those with eyes to see, if you will, or your version, my version of Yassis. If you're curious, yeah, I think you'll be led to different people that will show you new things. Recently, Patrick Sandberg, my friend Patrick, he's always putting me on. He has exquisite taste and he has incredible opinions and he is really smart. And also, we don't always agree, but

• 1:04:12Yasi Salek?

  I, I love to talk to him about stuff because not only does it sharpen my

• 1:04:21Yasi Salek?

  own opinions, having to sort of form them up against his, his like, sort of like,

• 1:04:31Yasi Salek?

  owning his thoughts and, and being self-assured has been so inspiring to me to like not second guess when I think something about music or a film or whatever, because I, I, you know, it's always been hard for me to overcome being tentative and being like, I must be wrong, you know? So he's been a great, a great teacher to me in that way.

• 1:04:58Yasi Salek?

  Thank you, Patrick. All right. Hi, Yasi. First of all, I just wanted to say how much I love Bandplain. Thank you so much. Going to skip this compliments, although I love them. One of the things I love most about your podcast isn't even the ridiculous depth of your music knowledge, it's your personality and especially your sense of humor. I feel like we have similar sense of humor, which makes me think we totally get along, or at least be completely insufferable to everyone around us. So my question is, what's something you find absolutely hilarious that you suspect most people would find deeply unfunny? And if someone who knew you only from the podcast met you in real life, what would surprise them most about you? Okay, let's go to the funny thing. Thank you for thinking I'm funny. I mean, there's

• 1:05:38Yasi Salek?

  probably a lot of things, but, um, one thing that came to mind was, me and my brother have a really similar sense of humor, and I'm sure that's a genetic thing. Um, he found this clip and it's very, I'm just looking at it right now on YouTube, it is, has 1.8 million views. If you want to look it up, it's called Just Normal Innocent Men.

• 1:06:08Yasi Salek?

  It's from a, I think it's from like a morning show in England. And it's this woman who's like the commentator, um, talking to a puppet that's a dog. And

• 1:06:25Yasi Salek?

  I don't even know how to describe this, but basically, he just says to her,

• 1:06:33Yasi Salek?

  "I'm just a normal man. I'm just an innocent man." And I don't know why I find it so fucking funny. Me and my brother say it to each other all the time. "I'm just a normal man. I'm just an innocent man." So that's an example of things I find really funny. One thing that maybe it's not exclusive to me is recently the Irish Zionism video by, oh my God, why am I blanking on his name?

• 1:07:00Yasi Salek?

  Can see his face. Conor O'Malley, a king, a genius. That's one of the funniest videos I've ever seen in my life. So those are a few, a few examples. Also, a film called Grandma's Boy. Me and my friend Alana have long been obsessed with this film Grandma's Boy. We have watched it multiple times. There was a brief period where I lived with my parents. Actually, there's been several brief periods, including post-Tiny Island, but this was a long time ago. And we would call them my roommates. I'd be like, the roommates are asking that I stay home for dinner. So I recommend that. If someone who knew me only from the podcast met me in real life, what would surprise them most about you?

• 1:07:40Yasi Salek?

  Probably a lot of stuff. Probably a million things because this is not, I mean, this is me, right? This is me, but it's also just one version of me. And I think there's probably a lot more going on than just podcast Yasi. Somebody asked, um, if we were gonna, there's a few programming questions. Are we gonna do 90s soundtracks? The answer is yes. Probably not till next year. We're gonna keep doing a couple more 80s ones to close out this year. Okay, here is the last question. As the proud owner of a Sprouse times Louis Vuitton

• 1:08:24Yasi Salek?

  keepall, oh, I don't have mine over here, but it's, it's over there. I bought one at the time in my twenties. I skipped meals to save up good times. What are your fashion grails, the things you never stop thinking about looking for? This is from Tim. Hi, Tim.

• 1:08:40Yasi Salek?

  This list is so long. I'm gonna just try to rattle off some, but I have a lot. Okay, Karl Lagerfeld for Chanel made these clear patchwork, um, classic Chanel chain bags that I always loved, especially the pink and nude ones. They pop up from time to time, but because they're plastic, they didn't hold up very well. But I'm dying for one of those. I really do want another Steven Sprouse Louis Vuitton, probably like a speedy with hot pink. I've always wanted a Dior. Dior did these pierced saddlebags. And I know it's like very, like on-brand goth or whatever, but I really loved those. I know it's like really basic bitch, but I would always love to have like a beat up Birkin.

• 1:09:23Yasi Salek?

  Not necessarily a new one, but like a beat up Birkin would be sick as hell. Hermès Birkin. Um, those are some of my grails. I have so many more. Oh, for contemporary stuff, I really love the Phoebe Philo gig bag. I think it's so cool. There's an Hermès bag that's like a mini bucket bag that has like the Collier de Chine studs on the side. I think it's called the Midor. I'm obsessed with that bag. I think it's so cool. It's so impractical. It fits like four things. It would fit my tiny violin and this errant kiwi that I found in my bag. But still, I would love to have it. And also really love

• 1:10:00Yasi Salek?

  the new Mathieu Blazi Chanel stuff. In particular, there are these like pony hair, classic Chanel ballet flats. They're like, it's not leopard, it's like spotted pony hair.

• 1:10:15Yasi Salek?

  Would do unspeakable things to get a pair of those. That's it. This is, sorry, this is not a fashion podcast, but I really was excited to be able to answer that question because I do, though it's not readily apparent, I do actually deeply love fashion. And if any benevolent Medici style patrons who are interested and invested in my personal fashion are listening, I'm, I'm, I'm listening. I'm open. The DMs are open. Okay, I think that will close it out. We'll save the rest for another one. Thank you so much for sending all these questions in.

• 1:10:59Yasi Salek?

  Please stick around now because we're, we're gonna go right to my interview with the excellent Ice Age, who also just announced tour dates. So take a look at those and enjoy this interview.

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• 1:12:41Yasi Salek?

  You guys, what an absolute pleasure and delight for me to be joined right now by Elias Ronenfalt and Johan Veet of the band Ice Age. Copenhagen's finest. Thanks for coming on the pod.

• 1:12:54Speaker 05

  Thanks for having us.

• 1:12:56Yasi Salek?

  Hello. Johan doesn't remember and that's so okay, but I met you guys like, I think it was 12 years ago now at Fun Fun Fun Fest.

• 1:13:07Speaker 05

  It might have been more, right?

• 1:13:08Yasi Salek?

  Yeah, maybe.

• 1:13:09Speaker 06

  Fun, that's the one in Austin.

• 1:13:11Yasi Salek?

  Texas, yeah.

• 1:13:12Speaker 05

  And you were with?

• 1:13:13Yasi Salek?

  Shannon and Black Chris.

• 1:13:15Speaker 05

  Rest in peace.

• 1:13:16Yasi Salek?

  You must may hear Rest in Peace. I think, yeah. And I was like, I guess I just didn't, it's not like I sit around Googling your guys' ages or whatever, but I was like talking to someone and I was like, wait a minute, were they like 20 then? Like, in my mind, you were my age because everyone's my age in my mind because I'm probably like self-absorbed or whatever. And then I was like, oh my God, they were like borderline teenagers. You guys have been doing this for so long.

• 1:13:39Speaker 05

  We started the band when we were 15 and 16 years old. And the first album, we were like 17, 18.

• 1:13:48Yasi Salek?

  You're like Menudo, like Scandinavian Menudo.

• 1:13:52Speaker 05

  Yeah, I mean, like last year, it crossed the threshold where we have officially been doing the band more.

• 1:14:00Yasi Salek?

  That you've been alive.

• 1:14:02Speaker 05

  Like if you chop it in half, in half our lives, there's more Ice Age than not, yeah.

• 1:14:08Yasi Salek?

  Does that, does that make you feel like proud or does that make you feel insane?

• 1:14:15Speaker 06

  Proud, I would say, yeah.

• 1:14:18Speaker 05

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:14:20Speaker 06

  I mean, insanity has been part of it, but yeah.

• 1:14:22Speaker 05

  I don't think that has to do with any.

• 1:14:26Yasi Salek?

  That's not really, the insanity's not related to that.

• 1:14:28Speaker 05

  But like, I mean.

• 1:14:30Yasi Salek?

  When you guys were like teens and you were forming this band, because I know you guys had like kind of a like punk upbringing. You hung out at a punk house, right, in your neighborhood? The youth, what was it called?

• 1:14:41Speaker 05

  Yeah, we were, yeah, we were kind of like squatty punk kids from when we were 11, 12 or something.

• 1:14:49Yasi Salek?

  Did it ever like cross your mind like, oh, we're going to be in a band and we're going to do it for 20 years?

• 1:14:53Speaker 05

  A hundred percent not.

• 1:14:56Speaker 05

  I think like the wildest ambition we started out with was getting something pressed on a seven inch.

• 1:15:06Yasi Salek?

  Right, just like one piece of physical music out in the world.

• 1:15:09Speaker 05

  Yeah, like, I remember like the first seven inch, we did the EP. It got back from the press and we went to this office that Eschau, the label that we're still involved with, had. And we were just like so agitated and like hyped up that we were like, we were running around with like a BB gun around the office, like shooting things and like, and made everybody a bit unsettled, I think.

• 1:15:46Speaker 05

  But like, and before that, like, yeah, we'd gotten from the press and like, my record there was broken and like somebody else didn't have one. And like, I think we were like running around record stores.

• 1:16:03Speaker 05

  Listen to it because, and like we had to go to like three record stores and they were like, yeah, fine, you put your record on. So we go like.

• 1:16:13Yasi Salek?

  It's like a scene in a movie. It's like such a good film scene, like the kids running from a record store to a record store.

• 1:16:18Speaker 05

  But yeah, we were just excited to like give that seven inch out to like 30 friends in Copenhagen and.

• 1:16:25Yasi Salek?

  Do you still feel that excited?

• 1:16:26Speaker 05

  And then first, I think the first thing that ever happened was some punk record store in Hamburg, Germany, ordered like four copies and that was mind blowing to us.

• 1:16:38Yasi Salek?

  You were like another, someone in another country is going to hear that.

• 1:16:42Speaker 05

  In Hamburg.

• 1:16:43Yasi Salek?

  Yeah.

• 1:16:43Speaker 06

  But I remember like even from that, when we, our friend Peter was going to pay for it, he came. We were, we were at a, we were at this like youth club. That's where our rehearsal space was at.

• 1:16:58Speaker 05

  We pretended to be members.

• 1:17:00Speaker 06

  We scammed, we scammed them, yeah. And we were a bit too old to be members and was like, because it was like preschool kids would like go there.

• 1:17:08Yasi Salek?

  It was like nine year old boys and you're like, no, no, we're a boy scout.

• 1:17:11Speaker 05

  We used to be members of that youth club and then when we needed rehearsal space, we scammed ourselves to be like still members in order to like get into the rehearsal space.

• 1:17:21Speaker 06

  And then we invite, and we invited our friend Peter and he, and he was 50 at the time. And then, and he came and watched us rehearse and he was like.

• 1:17:31Speaker 05

  He's a legend.

• 1:17:32Speaker 06

  And he's a complete legend, yeah, yeah.

• 1:17:33Speaker 05

  He's like such a hero to all of us.

• 1:17:36Yasi Salek?

  Is it Peter Peter?

• 1:17:37Speaker 05

  Yeah, yeah. He played in Stedham, my first punk band.

• 1:17:42Speaker 06

  He's like a mentor.

• 1:17:43Yasi Salek?

  Totally.

• 1:17:43Speaker 06

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:17:45Speaker 05

  But yeah, he came down to the youth club and the guy who worked there.

• 1:17:49Speaker 06

  He was like, how old are you? And he was like, I'm 16, whatever.

• 1:17:53Yasi Salek?

  He said he was 16, 50 full years old.

• 1:17:56Speaker 05

  Yeah, and we were like, and then they were like, you go, you go, you're an adult man, you can't be with these kids here. And we were like, no, but it's like, he's a legend and like, maybe he's going to like record a seven inch where there's like, this man has got to go right now.

• 1:18:10Yasi Salek?

  We're calling Child Protective Services, he's out of here.

• 1:18:13Speaker 06

  Whatever. And then Peter came and he, and he saw it and he was like, yeah, yeah, let's, let's go do this seven inch. And he, and he paid for like a day in the studio. And we were really excited. I remember like.

• 1:18:23Speaker 05

  Like three hours in the studio.

• 1:18:24Speaker 06

  Yeah, yeah, yeah, we recorded.

• 1:18:27Speaker 05

  Because we had done one recording, like just a shitty ghetto blasted recording. And we were already going to his studio. We were producing like, he did the Pusha trilogy soundtracks and stuff. And he had like a small studio where he was doing like movie music. And we all started like skipping school and just go hang with him.

• 1:18:46Yasi Salek?

  Yeah.

• 1:18:47Speaker 06

  I was really close to our school.

• 1:18:49Speaker 05

  Since we were like 12, you know? And, and we'd always leave there and he'd like burn CDs with like.

• 1:18:57Yasi Salek?

  Like showing you music?

• 1:18:58Speaker 05

  John Waters and Larry Clack films and like weird like horror movie shit and like.

• 1:19:05Speaker 06

  And this is about time you're ready.

• 1:19:07Yasi Salek?

  Yeah.

• 1:19:07Speaker 05

  Records and like, so he, it was just like the best thing to go there and like skip school and just watch him like bicker with the guy who was doing music with and like.

• 1:19:18Speaker 06

  You get to play his guitars, he has a very loud.

• 1:19:20Yasi Salek?

  Sounds like a true education. Like this is like pre being able to like just go look anything up on the internet. You had this like person curating what was being put into your like mind with like these films and music and stuff.

• 1:19:31Speaker 05

  Yeah, and we were already like really.

• 1:19:34Speaker 06

  Interested.

• 1:19:35Speaker 05

  Interested in like, like the library, the record shops, like early pirates, sites like Soulseek. Like just looking for like, like old garage, Soul Records, Soul Punk or whatever, you know?

• 1:19:54Yasi Salek?

  Giving yourself, your computer at your parents' house a virus so you could get your songs.

• 1:19:58Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:19:59Yasi Salek?

  We've all been there.

• 1:20:01Yasi Salek?

  Okay, um, I wanna start with two questions. Number one, I need to talk about how, I think it was you, unless you were making this up, and if you made it up, that's fine, that you lived one of my dreams.

• 1:20:15Yasi Salek?

  You rescued an injured crow.

• 1:20:18Speaker 05

  Oh, like, yeah, I just did that, like, thing where you're on the phone on a bridge, yeah.

• 1:20:23Yasi Salek?

  Was that a short story you made up, or did this really happen? Because if it really happened, I need to talk about it.

• 1:20:27Speaker 05

  No, that, that, that's true. That's like, um, me and my friend Anton.

• 1:20:33Yasi Salek?

  Was it a baby?

• 1:20:35Speaker 05

  I mean, like, I, I don't really wanna retell this story.

• 1:20:38Yasi Salek?

  You don't have to.

• 1:20:38Speaker 05

  I just told it for the internet.

• 1:20:40Yasi Salek?

  You guys, you need to go look. You need to go look on Elias's Instagram if you're like myself, interested in. I've, I've like, spent years trying to befriend the crows in my neighborhood, because I'm very interested in crows. And I was just very struck by this story, but yes, just TLDR. They took it in, and it became their friend, and they walked around town with it on their shoulder, and it just was a striking image, and I'm very jealous.

• 1:21:04Speaker 05

  Yeah, but crows are hard to get to, like, I, I, the last year or so, I've been quite into pigeons, and...

• 1:21:14Speaker 06

  The pigeons, the pigeons didn't turn out as like, romantic as the crow story did, though.

• 1:21:20Speaker 05

  Well, um, in a sense, like, like, it, it, the two pigeons did move in on my balcony, and then they had three babies, and then there was five pigeons on my balcony, and then they had two more, so there was seven, but I had to be a victim in the end.

• 1:21:35Yasi Salek?

  All seven of them.

• 1:21:37Speaker 05

  Because it got like crazy, um, but...

• 1:21:39Yasi Salek?

  That sounds a little disgusting.

• 1:21:41Speaker 05

  But yeah, I was reading about crows as well, and I think like, if you wanna get tight with the crows, like, you really gotta put in the work and be dependable, like, you, you wanna be able to like, be there every day at the same time.

• 1:21:52Yasi Salek?

  Right, yeah, because they're so smart.

• 1:21:54Speaker 05

  Not good for a touring musician.

• 1:21:56Yasi Salek?

  Yeah, for you, you can't really have that long-term relationship with the crow, I understand. Okay, so we were talking a little bit earlier, you guys have been in a band together for a long time, same people. I mean, I know you added an extra member in 2019, not extra, a new member. I, I, I was wondering, like, so many bands that stay together for this long feel like it's like a prison, you know? Like, they end up hating each other, or they feel stuck, or it becomes like business or transactional. And it seems from what I've read about you guys, and just like, observed, like, it's obviously not like that for you guys, you're still close friends, family.

• 1:22:33Yasi Salek?

  Does it, I guess, I have two questions. One is like, is, is there like, something that you feel like you guys do, or you approach the band that keeps that energy constant through these years?

• 1:22:48Speaker 05

  I mean, well, nobody has ever forced us.

• 1:22:53Speaker 05

  We've driven the, the band into financial ruin on, on multiple occasions, you know?

• 1:22:59Speaker 06

  There was never, there were never financial incidents.

• 1:23:02Speaker 05

  So, so that was it.

• 1:23:03Yasi Salek?

  You're not you two that has to like, stick it out, because you gotta make a bunch of money.

• 1:23:06Speaker 05

  No, it's like, uh, it, it's, it's kinda like our, um, doing.

• 1:23:14Speaker 05

  But...

• 1:23:15Yasi Salek?

  I guess then my follow-up question would be like, do, does it feel to you, this band, like,

• 1:23:22Yasi Salek?

  a constant in, in a sense that like, life is so chaotic and so much change happens, especially in 20 years of your life? Does this one thing at least feel like it's a through line? Like, you can, you have this like, one steady thing that is the same throughout your life? Obviously, it's changed and metamorphized with like, how the band has evolved, but it's still Ice Age.

• 1:23:44Speaker 06

  We have had periods, you know, long periods of not, of not being productive, right?

• 1:23:48Yasi Salek?

  Not being active.

• 1:23:49Speaker 06

  Yeah, yeah. I mean, well, well, we've been active because even though there hasn't been a record in, what, four, four years, five years?

• 1:23:57Yasi Salek?

  Yeah.

• 1:23:58Speaker 06

  We've still, we've still built, we've been to the rehearsal space, and we've played shows here and there, so you know, it's not like we haven't, we haven't been out of touch at any point with playing music in a room together. So that has been a constant for, yeah, 17 years or... And then, you know, we still talk on the phone multiple times a week, see each other, you know, it's, you know, it started out before music, it was just, you know, friendship.

• 1:24:28Yasi Salek?

  Yeah.

• 1:24:29Speaker 06

  And I think, I think that's like a key, the, the key to why it's, you know, it's been like this. And we've been able to keep it going. You know, we grew up together, grew up like, learning about music and being interested in music and being interested in the world, and we motivated each other and showed each other things, and that has been, that has been a constant, you know, we keep doing that still.

• 1:24:54Yasi Salek?

  Do you guys have a group chat?

• 1:24:56Speaker 06

  Multiple, yeah, yeah.

• 1:24:57Yasi Salek?

  Oh, you have like, a couple that you're like, oh, Dan's not in this one, Jacob's not in this one. We need to talk about Jacob.

• 1:25:03Speaker 05

  There's one for like, the practical shit and the stupid shit.

• 1:25:07Yasi Salek?

  Right.

• 1:25:09Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:25:10Yasi Salek?

  Right, like, business, business Ice Age.

• 1:25:12Speaker 05

  This business and that business and...

• 1:25:14Yasi Salek?

  Then there's one just for memes.

• 1:25:17Speaker 05

  We're not that big on memes.

• 1:25:18Yasi Salek?

  No, not a meme band?

• 1:25:19Speaker 05

  But we will talk a lot of...

• 1:25:21Speaker 06

  An endless amount of shit.

• 1:25:23Speaker 05

  Yeah, just deeply idiotic, uh, rambling, for sure.

• 1:25:29Speaker 05

  But, no, like, it, it, yeah, it's, it's been sort of a constant, but you, you move through phases, and like, there's been times through like, the last 15 years that like, you know, people have been going through rough spots, or like, it's, it's a trial to, to keep everything on track. And then, there's times when

• 1:25:53Speaker 05

  we don't really know where to go creatively, and it takes a minute to for us to like, all come in sync with the

• 1:26:08Speaker 05

  the epiphany of direction, and, um, and, but, but it seems like as things move, like, the tectonic plates will all shift, and then like, there's like, a path or something.

• 1:26:23Yasi Salek?

  Right, like, it always kind of reveals itself.

• 1:26:25Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:26:25Speaker 06

  Yeah, to, to amazement, it reveals itself every time, yeah, yeah.

• 1:26:30Yasi Salek?

  Very cool. Well, I'm glad I did this time, because I'm obsessed with this album, and I don't wanna like, play it cool with you guys, really. I've been an Ice Age truther for a long time, and Icy, what do you guys call your fans? Do you have a name?

• 1:26:41Speaker 05

  We don't.

• 1:26:44Yasi Salek?

  What do you think, Icy? I think it's a good one. Since, obviously, when you were quite young, and me and Black Chris were running in the streets. Also, you know who was there? It was the Black Lips, my, my, my dogs, my loves. This album reminds me a little, it's a little Black Lipsy, not that it's, you sound like them, but there's like, there's like, elements of like, things that I love about the Black Lips that show up in this album that I was like, oh, I, I love that, like, that feeling that, especially because I met you with them, and I know you guys are friends, right?

• 1:27:13Speaker 05

  Yeah, and we were listening to the Black Lips when we were like,

• 1:27:17Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 1:27:17Speaker 05

  14 as well, you know?

• 1:27:18Yasi Salek?

  Yeah, yeah. Because they have that like, classic garage Americana thing, like, kinda dialed, you know, from, from the beginning. I really admire that you guys do this thing, or like, you don't replicate your sound, and that you're not afraid to like, take these huge leaps from like, album to album, like, particularly like, I know people have talked about it a lot, but like, plowing into the field, a love was like this, like, big departure is like, the most annoying word, but you know what I mean? Like, people were like, oh, god, wow, they sound like this now, and then you were like, oh, guess what, bitch? This is Seek Shelter, we sound like this now. And I think that's like,

• 1:27:57Yasi Salek?

  I guess like, I, I was wondering, do you feel that's a necessity to not stagnate? Do you feel any, I often feel a weird pressure in just life that like, people really don't want you to be more than one thing, because it challenges their idea of what they've figured you out and placed you in, and it's quite difficult to like, break out of that? Is, is that ever a thought that crosses your mind?

• 1:28:23Speaker 05

  I mean, like, especially with the first three records, it's like, almost kinda hard to explain now in hindsight how pissed off people were.

• 1:28:34Yasi Salek?

  Right.

• 1:28:34Speaker 05

  Every time a new record came out, like, it was like, we've, whatever sort of like, fanbase we had conglomerated, like, we just chopped that in half for, for, for each record.

• 1:28:46Yasi Salek?

  They were like, you betrayed us.

• 1:28:47Speaker 05

  And, and then build up from there, you know? And it, it wasn't really like, this super calculated, um, oh, let's really surprise people, but I think it was like, the the driving force to, um, progress and, and do it at a pretty, um...

• 1:29:07Speaker 06

  High pace, yeah.

• 1:29:09Speaker 05

  Pace, yeah. And because, because also like, we got, we got catapulted and, and frung into this, um, pretty manic media, uh, attention.

• 1:29:25Yasi Salek?

  Very early, right? You guys were like, vice band of the, like, top 20 band of the year, or whatever, like, after your first album? I'm making that up, but it's something like that.

• 1:29:33Speaker 05

  And, and, and the music media was really doing like, every, everything that is, especially like, the way the music world worked back then, um, what you would call like, kinda like the

• 1:29:45Speaker 05

  the hype.

• 1:29:46Yasi Salek?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:29:47Speaker 05

  Machine.

• 1:29:48Yasi Salek?

  It was very like, blog-driven at that time, too, like, online blog-driven.

• 1:29:52Speaker 05

  And, and, and I don't think we entered that world with like, kinda like, um, any

• 1:29:59Speaker 05

  intention of, of playing that game.

• 1:30:01Yasi Salek?

  Yeah.

• 1:30:01Speaker 05

  Or even knowledge that the game is even there.

• 1:30:04Speaker 06

  Yeah, I don't think I, I don't think I got it, yeah.

• 1:30:07Speaker 05

  Yeah, so we, we were pretty perplexed about, of, um, a lot of the things we were launched headfirst into, and, and, um, and we were also some wild boys, and, um, and we were also, um...

• 1:30:27Speaker 05

  I think quite protective um of because like we didn't really fully know what we were doing, but we knew that it was something that mattered to us and to sort of lean into all these voices in a, in a, in a, in a world that went from being Copenhagen to being

• 1:30:45Yasi Salek?

  Yeah.

• 1:30:45Speaker 05

  a lot bigger. Um, we kinda had to um have our guards up and um while we were also kinda like developing as, as young men.

• 1:30:59Yasi Salek?

  Like your like frontal cortex wasn't formed yet.

• 1:31:01Speaker 05

  Yeah, and um so, so I, I, I think like maybe some of that like growth were, were propelled, but it was also natural uh to our course or discourse. Um, but everybody in a whole media landscape trying to tell you you're a particular thing.

• 1:31:25Yasi Salek?

  Right.

• 1:31:26Speaker 05

  Like we just wanted to break all those.

• 1:31:28Yasi Salek?

  You're the second coming of the birthday party or whatever and you're like, okay.

• 1:31:31Speaker 05

  And we're something else.

• 1:31:34Yasi Salek?

  Yeah. Thank you so much. I mean, it's kinda like being a child star. You guys are like child stars.

• 1:31:39Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:31:42Yasi Salek?

  Except instead of Hollywood, it was Pitchfork.

• 1:31:46Yasi Salek?

  You know, the child star was a pitchfork. Um, well, I think, I mean, it's, it's still admirable that like, I think many less, I don't wanna say principal, that's not really the right word, but less like sure people probably would have succumbed to some of that attention or succumb to like trying to recreate it every time. Like, oh, what, well, they loved, you know, album one, we were vices, top whatever, like we better like, you know, we don't wanna lose that, we better make it again. And it doesn't seem like you guys did that.

• 1:32:21Speaker 05

  I, I, I think it became apparent to us like not that long into it, like that there was a whiff of like, okay, maybe this thing about making re- records is really interesting to us. And maybe that's something that in the grand scheme of things um could be like um a thing that could spiritually sustain us in, in, in life. So, so I think um we had, we had a um somewhat of a gut feeling that like, okay, this is, this is actually like a long game

• 1:33:03Speaker 05

  for us. And um, and if somebody's saying this or somebody's saying that, like, well, maybe they'll all shut up one day. Um, because yeah, I haven't seen nothing yet.

• 1:33:19Yasi Salek?

  Right, we'll show them. Also, you kinda bet the farm on it, right? You guys like dropped out of high school, so it's not like you were gonna go become engineers or whatever.

• 1:33:25Speaker 05

  No.

• 1:33:26Speaker 06

  I, I, I, I finished high school.

• 1:33:29Yasi Salek?

  You're like, excuse me, I have a high school degree, thank you very much.

• 1:33:32Speaker 06

  With, with, with a non, like.

• 1:33:34Yasi Salek?

  Wait, are, are you a teacher?

• 1:33:36Speaker 06

  I, I teach music in different, in different settings. Yeah.

• 1:33:41Yasi Salek?

  For children?

• 1:33:42Speaker 06

  Amongst other things.

• 1:33:43Yasi Salek?

  Amazing. That's very cool.

• 1:33:46Speaker 06

  Uh, I think we were also just really confident in ourselves and what we were doing. So it was, you know, no one was gonna tell us anything.

• 1:33:57Speaker 05

  Yeah, not, not in a, not in a careerist way at all.

• 1:34:01Speaker 06

  No, no.

• 1:34:01Speaker 05

  Like we know, like we'll burn the ship to the ground if it's needed, but like.

• 1:34:05Speaker 06

  But we'll do it while we do exactly what we wanna do and how we wanna do it. And yeah.

• 1:34:13Yasi Salek?

  Yeah, I guess if I was like, if I had your guys' talent and cheekbones and like cool clothes, I also, no one can tell me shit. I'd be like, I got those.

• 1:34:24Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 1:34:25Yasi Salek?

  But I didn't, I didn't have any of those things.

• 1:34:29Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:34:29Yasi Salek?

  It's not a question.

• 1:34:31Speaker 05

  It's the cheekbones that did it.

• 1:34:33Yasi Salek?

  The cheekbones did a little bit of heavy lifting, okay? You, like, let's, let's give them, let's take our hats off to the cheekbones. It's a beautiful DNA you have, and I just think you shouldn't turn your back on it. It came from your parents and you should be happy about it.

• 1:34:46Yasi Salek?

  No?

• 1:34:46Speaker 06

  Um.

• 1:34:50Yasi Salek?

  Is this not what your other interviews are like? Nobody talks about your cheekbones?

• 1:34:53Speaker 06

  No, I think it's the first mentioning of, of the cheekbones.

• 1:34:56Yasi Salek?

  I tried to get Jacob to come because randomly I was at his wedding.

• 1:35:01Speaker 06

  Right, yeah.

• 1:35:01Speaker 05

  And at the Roof and Skid Row?

• 1:35:03Yasi Salek?

  At the Roof and Skid Row. And I was like, I just think it's very.

• 1:35:06Speaker 05

  I was there as well.

• 1:35:06Yasi Salek?

  Of course.

• 1:35:07Speaker 06

  I wasn't there.

• 1:35:08Yasi Salek?

  You were not there. Maybe that's why we don't really know each other.

• 1:35:10Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 1:35:10Yasi Salek?

  Um, and I'm, it's always just hilarious to me. I'm like, why was I at the guy from Ice Age's wedding? And it was just like, it was like friend of a friend who was like close with the now ex-wife. And I was like, just always will have that in my heart and memory that I was at.

• 1:35:25Speaker 06

  The wedding in Skid Row.

• 1:35:27Yasi Salek?

  Did he get remarried? Is that a second one?

• 1:35:29Speaker 05

  Um, the, the marriage didn't last.

• 1:35:31Yasi Salek?

  That I know. That I'm aware of.

• 1:35:34Speaker 05

  She came with the, the new divorce papers backstage some years ago, but they're down good terms.

• 1:35:39Yasi Salek?

  Yeah, that's kinda sick, honestly. I think it's really sick to have several marriages in your life. I feel, I think it's glamorous.

• 1:35:47Speaker 06

  Yeah, I'm not sure if that was, that's probably the, the one.

• 1:35:50Speaker 05

  He's, he's in a, in a heavy relationship. Um, but um, yeah, that was, that was a mad wedding.

• 1:36:00Yasi Salek?

  It was fun. Okay, let's talk more about the album and less cheekbones. Can we talk about the title?

• 1:36:06Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:36:07Yasi Salek?

  Okay. For the Love of Grace and Hereafter. So that is, am I correct, a Shakespeare Hamlet reference?

• 1:36:14Speaker 05

  Yeah, the first, the first part.

• 1:36:16Yasi Salek?

  Yeah. Are you a big Shakespeare head?

• 1:36:18Speaker 05

  Uh, in recent years, I've, I, I've read like a bunch of Shakespeare. Um, the, the last solo album I did was like littered with um Shakespeare references and then I just wasn't able to stop that for, for this record either.

• 1:36:37Yasi Salek?

  A handful of Shakespeare?

• 1:36:38Speaker 05

  Yeah, I, I think it's just kinda like um, I've, I've, I've been always like lyrically drawn to um, to a language that is too dense and too ripe and like almost like um, it's, it's kinda like, yeah, that, I mean, that, that, that's the, there's like a deliciousness to, to the, the over saturated drama of it, you know, like, like there's a cruel humor, humor to it. And um, I mean, I, I, I always adored people like Leonard Cohen, for example, and people who, and.

• 1:37:23Yasi Salek?

  Fellow poet.

• 1:37:24Speaker 05

  And, and like, like people who are not too sparse or economic with the language. I like, I've always kind of um, were drawn to putting way more than necessary syllables within what the song we're asking for.

• 1:37:41Yasi Salek?

  Yeah.

• 1:37:41Speaker 05

  Um, in almost like a perverse way of trying to humor myself in um, in what, what I felt like I could get away with.

• 1:37:51Yasi Salek?

  Oh.

• 1:37:52Speaker 05

  Yeah. I know, it, it, it, it, yeah, it's, it's always been something that gave, gave me um, like a little spark of joy if, if I felt like I could inject something into a song that felt like it almost wasn't supposed to be there.

• 1:38:08Yasi Salek?

  Right.

• 1:38:09Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:38:09Yasi Salek?

  I'm a huge lyrics person, so I haven't, I won't like totally bore with it, but I have a whole list of my favorite lyrics. You know, we can just touch on a few of them. But I like, I think people do themselves a disservice if you're an Ice Age fan. I mean, sick guitar riffs, babe. Sick riffs. But also incredible lyrics. And like, it's like worth looking them up since you can and like listening along. Cause I just think like, it's exactly what you were describing as Shakespeare. Like, they are like so full, these words. They're like, almost like, they're all these round, like, the way, the way things are described

• 1:38:50Yasi Salek?

  is like in an elevated sense that, and also not just elevated, but in like an unexpected sense, which I think it's fine. I like songs too, when you hear like, when you can predict the next lyric, because that's also fun. That's like how pop music is written. But it's also so awesome when you're listening to a song and you're like, oh, I would never have thought that that would be the next lyric. Or like, I've never even heard that phrase, like these turns of phrases. Um, well, I guess with the Shakespeare, but like, have you always been like a super heavy reader?

• 1:39:20Speaker 05

  Um, not say like, um, like I started getting like more, more into, um,

• 1:39:30Speaker 05

  this issue when

• 1:39:33Speaker 05

  around after the first record. Um, I mean, I'd been reading things. I, I hated it in school, like everything they made me read.

• 1:39:43Speaker 05

  I didn't care for and many things I've, I've, I've found later on my own hand and I like it now, but like I, I just was not good with school.

• 1:39:54Yasi Salek?

  You don't want to be told what to do, it seems.

• 1:39:56Speaker 05

  I hated poetry because it felt like it was like a, like a thing where they kind of made you do all the work and having to

• 1:40:05Speaker 05

  read everything into each sentence and break it up and like, um, uh, but yeah, I think like twelve, thirteen,

• 1:40:16Speaker 05

  that

• 1:40:18Speaker 05

  Peter Peter and his band, so it's, we talked about before, their first record was called Minutes To Go. I borrowed a book about them on the library and I read that it was, the title Minutes To Go was taken from Williamus Borus. So I go back to the library and I steal a book of his and then, um,

• 1:40:38Yasi Salek?

  Wouldn't they just let you borrow it? Cause then the library does.

• 1:40:41Speaker 05

  I, I think I wanted it.

• 1:40:42Yasi Salek?

  You're like, I will keep this.

• 1:40:46Speaker 05

  And there was like a short story called Blade Runner, um, not the same story as the movie. Yeah, um, but something happened around when I was like eighteen or something where I kind of could, I found write books or something and that really like propelled me in a direction to, to, that fit into I S H and the lyrics. Where suddenly lyrics went from something you just kind of had to write because like, you gotta have, you gotta sing something, you know, and then, and then it becomes this, this more sort of like, oh, what can you actually do with language?

• 1:41:26Speaker 06

  And for the first records, we all pitched in with lyrics. Like I think even, even on some of the plowing stuff.

• 1:41:32Speaker 05

  You wrote, you wrote the total drench lyric.

• 1:41:35Speaker 06

  No, that's done.

• 1:41:36Speaker 05

  Was it done?

• 1:41:37Speaker 06

  Yeah, I wrote, no, I, I wrote some of, uh, remember, I think, and

• 1:41:44Speaker 05

  That's, yeah, that's right.

• 1:41:46Speaker 06

  And some other, some, sometimes where if I hear it, I'm like, oh, I think who did this, but like, and even up until plowing.

• 1:41:52Yasi Salek?

  You're sure you did the drench?

• 1:41:53Speaker 06

  No, that is done. I guarantee you, yeah. Uh, and I think even up to plowing, we were still pitching in cause it was like, oh shit, we have to finish, we have to do, we have to have lyrics for this and then, and then you got, you, you were like, you got more enveloped in it when plowing came, when we were doing plowing.

• 1:42:15Speaker 05

  Yeah, then, then it kind of became a thing where it was more difficult to have.

• 1:42:19Yasi Salek?

  Multiple verses. So that's from what I understand is, and maybe this is how you've always done it. You write, you guys write the music first and then you come back and put the lyrics on top.

• 1:42:30Speaker 05

  Yeah, um,

• 1:42:34Speaker 05

  I'm, I'm always kind of writing, um,

• 1:42:38Speaker 05

  but not with songs in mind.

• 1:42:40Yasi Salek?

  Right.

• 1:42:41Speaker 05

  And then I kind of have all these notebooks that become this sort of library of, of, um,

• 1:42:51Speaker 05

  of a place where I can steal from myself.

• 1:42:53Yasi Salek?

  Right.

• 1:42:54Speaker 05

  Um,

• 1:42:54Yasi Salek?

  A classic.

• 1:42:55Speaker 05

  And then, yeah, yeah. I mean, and, and this has kind of been the, the tradition or the method that, that I, I don't start writing lyrics for an album until the studio date is set and I'll start quite shortly before. So, um, I just build up like a massive risk of things becoming shit. Yeah.

• 1:43:23Yasi Salek?

  Or you perform very well under pressure.

• 1:43:26Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:43:26Yasi Salek?

  Like myself, and you, you need a deadline at the end. So then when you're writing the music, is there like ever like an emotional kernel that it's like,

• 1:43:38Yasi Salek?

  like, are you guys ever like, I wanna, we wanna write like an upbeat, like spiritual song or whatever, or it's just like what, however it comes together, it comes together.

• 1:43:48Speaker 06

  It's never, it's never vocalized like that. I think, I think.

• 1:43:51Speaker 05

  It's a temperament.

• 1:43:52Speaker 06

  It's, yeah, it's a temperament. And then, and then you can, you know, then when you work, when you dive into it and you kind of, you have, you have like, you're building a skeleton and you're fleshing it out, you know, then, then, then you can go like, oh, you know, this is how, this is how it should be. This is how it should be. But, but like, there's never anything, it's never like, let's go write this type of song, you know?

• 1:44:14Speaker 05

  Yeah. And a, after a record, like there might be a period that's a bit dry and we try out ideas and they're fine. They might even be pretty damn good, but

• 1:44:27Speaker 05

  they're not, they're not keeping you awake at night. Um,

• 1:44:30Speaker 06

  And they're not showing more.

• 1:44:32Speaker 05

  And then you, you eventually you tap into something that, that

• 1:44:38Speaker 05

  like, once you try it out in the rehearsal spaces, like, like it's some, some kind of like collective epiphany and like, you leave the rehearsal space kind of elevated with your arms in the air and like you, the, the shit iPhone memo recording you've made like before you get on your bikes, you go home, everybody, hey, remember to send that iPhone recording to the good chat. Okay. Yeah. Like, and, um, and you, you, you listen to it on repeat at home and it's like, the, the, the brain is already like, kind of like churning and it's like, oh God, that should be like half as long, but then we need something there that's not discord and like, and then like something is rolling and, and if that sort of like

• 1:45:17Speaker 05

  automatic, like, well, involuntary progress has started where, where you can't just, like, the mind just wants to complete this, whether you want it or not, then, okay, then then we have a direction.

• 1:45:33Yasi Salek?

  That's how you know that you've like stumbled into the place that you're meant to be.

• 1:45:37Speaker 06

  Yeah, yeah. And then you can have nights where you work on things and then, and you work on it another night, but it doesn't represent, you know, it doesn't, it doesn't reveal anything more. It doesn't show anything more. It's like, might, as you say, might be like, it might be a good, a good thing, but it just doesn't.

• 1:45:54Speaker 05

  And sometimes there's

• 1:45:56Speaker 06

  There's work in progress. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

• 1:45:59Speaker 05

  Process to go through before you reach that epiphany, but yeah.

• 1:46:03Speaker 06

  But when we start rolling, then it starts rolling and then we don't really talk all that much. Then it just kind of snowballs.

• 1:46:10Yasi Salek?

  Right. It's just you guys are all kind of locked into the same like.

• 1:46:13Speaker 06

  Yeah. And then someone has trouble with something like, you know, finding, finding their way. And then sometimes it takes me a second, you know, or someone else like what, what's gonna happen here, but then, you know, but it always, it always works out.

• 1:46:28Speaker 05

  Yeah. I mean, I think this, this record was probably the, the most talked about in terms of direction and there was very sparse. It was not much be, beyond like, we wanted things to be faster and the song shouldn't be too much longer than three minutes.

• 1:46:46Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 1:46:46Speaker 05

  Um, that was kind of like the,

• 1:46:50Speaker 06

  That was the main two.

• 1:46:53Speaker 06

  That was like the main two. Yeah. That was like the, the, the two darkness, I think that we work with. Yeah.

• 1:46:59Yasi Salek?

  And then it seems like that just kind of gave way to like more buoyant song. I mean, the songs are quite like,

• 1:47:06Yasi Salek?

  you know, like they have, they have a lift to them. Like when I listen.

• 1:47:09Speaker 06

  There's a pep to it. Yeah.

• 1:47:09Yasi Salek?

  Yeah, there's a, there's a pep in the stuff of the songs.

• 1:47:12Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 1:47:15Speaker 05

  Yeah, they're like very jumpy. Like there's a lot of, like the new concerts.

• 1:47:19Speaker 06

  They're, yeah, yeah. And you also, when we played.

• 1:47:22Speaker 05

  I have to jump so much. Like it's kind of like, well, you gotta do with these new songs.

• 1:47:25Speaker 06

  I started moving in a different way when we play these songs too. And then when we were in the rehearsal space, it was really clear. It's like, oh, it's this record. This is the kind of record that this is. And then moving into the studio was like, we know how to do this. Like this is, yeah. This'll be,

• 1:47:46Speaker 06

  it won't be easy, but it, but we, we can do it and we can do it exactly the way we want to.

• 1:47:51Yasi Salek?

  Yeah.

• 1:47:52Speaker 06

  Yeah. I think this is the time I felt the most clear about what we were going in with.

• 1:48:01Speaker 05

  Yeah. And also probably the most sort of, um,

• 1:48:07Speaker 05

  prepared we've ever been.

• 1:48:08Speaker 06

  Yeah, yeah.

• 1:48:10Speaker 05

  And probably also the least messy.

• 1:48:13Speaker 06

  For sure. Yeah, yeah.

• 1:48:16Yasi Salek?

  I guess I wonder then, like, given, I believe it's all, I believe all music comes from God and I, but we don't have to get into all that. But the idea that you've stumbled into this like vein, right? And they're like, oh, we're locked in, we're in the vein. And then you go back to your notebooks, right? And when you're plucking out lyrics to like, kind of help, you know, maybe, maybe place them in the song or maybe like give a direction.

• 1:48:44Yasi Salek?

  Are you trying to match them tonally? Like, are you like, oh, this song gives me this feeling. So like, let me see like what I have in here that like embodies that feeling of this song? Or is it more like it needs to fit into this like measure or whatever?

• 1:49:00Speaker 05

  Well, I, I think subconsciously, like, like the, when you, you're building a collection of songs like that, it's like, um, it's playing into some ground feeling of, of, of where you're situated in life. So

• 1:49:15Yasi Salek?

  Which is where all your notebook came from as well.

• 1:49:17Speaker 05

  E, even though you don't know what you're writing a, a record about yet, like there's, there's a total correspondence in, in the music and, and what ends up being the lyrics and, um, yeah, it's, it's, it's, it's never been a case of like,

• 1:49:36Speaker 05

  oh, what can I make up that would fit the mood of what we've come up with. Like there's, there's always been a perfect marriage of

• 1:49:44Yasi Salek?

  It's already there.

• 1:49:45Speaker 05

  Any given life situation and what it sounds like.

• 1:49:49Yasi Salek?

  Cause it's all coming from the same place.

• 1:49:51Speaker 05

  I suppose, yeah.

• 1:49:53Yasi Salek?

  What does grace mean to you?

• 1:49:57Yasi Salek?

  Oh, you thought I was only gonna ask about cheekbones? No, I ask real questions too.

• 1:50:03Speaker 06

  I think with, with, with, with like, with, with ad work and with, and with titles, I think it means different things to all of us. Yeah.

• 1:50:12Yasi Salek?

  Yeah, that makes sense.

• 1:50:15Speaker 05

  I, I think, I think like in terms of this record and stuff like it, it's, it's kind of like, um, a thing you can earn, but also allow yourself.

• 1:50:26Speaker 05

  And, um, and

• 1:50:31Speaker 05

  a lot of this record is about, you know, having lived through a lot and also it emerged through, um,

• 1:50:46Speaker 05

  A lot of these things that that perhaps is is hard earned and um.

• 1:50:51Yasi Salek?

  Like a lifetime of beatings, you mean?

• 1:50:53Speaker 05

  Example, yeah, and um, a- and and I and I think like um. Yeah, e- e- especially when when when when life is hard and like like you you get used to it and um. And perhaps it's it's um, it's a thing that you can come to a place where you can allow yourself a bit of levity.

• 1:51:19Yasi Salek?

  Yeah.

• 1:51:19Speaker 05

  Um, finally.

• 1:51:21Yasi Salek?

  Yeah, I get that's it's funny that you say that because I feel like the thing that resonates for me the most in this album is like kind of that exact feeling of like. It's almost like, I mean, also, obviously, art is just like interpreted by its audience and that's it goes and lives there and that's how they see it, but like just like it's very much like, yeah, life fucking sucks. Life is gonna beat your ass to shit. But that's beautiful. But guess what? On the other, you get to keep going on the other side and then there's beauty, you know, and you you get to continuously come out the other side and it's every time there's gonna be a new a new experience after life's beat your ass.

• 1:52:02Speaker 05

  For hun- a hundred percent, you get it.

• 1:52:04Yasi Salek?

  Yeah, and that's how it feels because there's a hope. There's like a hope baked in, but it's not saccharine and it's not like, you know, it's not like smoothing it over. It's just being like, yeah, like it's this, but it's also this. And I I would think that's like that's so much of what also grace ties in for me too. It's like grace is like just allowing things to be.

• 1:52:28Speaker 05

  Yeah, and it's it's like um. It's it's not a record that represents like maybe having worked through some things and like being in a place that is perhaps beyond the past place.

• 1:52:40Yasi Salek?

  Right, like not arriving.

• 1:52:41Speaker 05

  As as being this kind of like um, permanent um.

• 1:52:46Speaker 06

  State of catharsis.

• 1:52:47Speaker 05

  Not not, well, this permanent state of like, permanent state of grace, for example, but but but like, it's kind of like. Well, life is always a cacophony of of um of things that strides and go against each other and and and it it just presents a different kind of chaos.

• 1:53:08Yasi Salek?

  Or maybe like perspective gives you a different way to experience it, right? Because I mean, you guys are in your thirties now, like it's there's like there's art that you make when you're in your twenties and there's art that you make when you're in your thirties and that that's impossible to make the same kind of art, I think, because you've.

• 1:53:26Speaker 06

  And you shouldn't.

• 1:53:27Yasi Salek?

  Then you shouldn't, but you have perspective. You you've been beat down by life and seen multiple times that like, oh, wait, I came out the other side and like something good kept happening and like it'll probably keep happening. Okay, I have a specific question. I'm sorry, it is, you're like, yeah, I know, I wrote it, okay.

• 1:53:47Yasi Salek?

  Star, which I love so much. Why, what is the end refrain? Luciana? Is that about the museum and how it's about the guy had three wives named Louise and he named it after her?

• 1:54:00Speaker 06

  Um. Spilled differently.

• 1:54:01Yasi Salek?

  Oh, it is, okay, because on on the genius dot com, you guys need to change it.

• 1:54:05Speaker 05

  Yeah, I mean, I I.

• 1:54:07Yasi Salek?

  Or is that a name?

• 1:54:09Speaker 05

  Yeah, it's just the name I made up for what I'm.

• 1:54:12Yasi Salek?

  What you're feeling.

• 1:54:12Speaker 05

  Singing about, or is it being like, it just um.

• 1:54:17Speaker 05

  It just sounded kind of good.

• 1:54:18Yasi Salek?

  It sounds great.

• 1:54:19Speaker 05

  And then I've kind of had my own way of pronouncing it, but it sounded better than the proper one. But it's not about the state. It's just kind of like um.

• 1:54:27Yasi Salek?

  Or the museum, my favorite museum.

• 1:54:29Speaker 05

  It's and certainly not about the museum, but yeah, it's just a a made up name with a made up pronunciation.

• 1:54:36Speaker 06

  There was a couple of names run through, like when you were, when we were in the rehearsal space, names came up through songs.

• 1:54:42Speaker 05

  But they didn't sound as good as Luciana.

• 1:54:44Yasi Salek?

  That sounds so good. Well, it doesn't have to mean anything. Sounds good. I was just I'm glad because it led me down this rabbit hole where I realized that the man who made the muse or who first owned that property that became the museum had three wives and they were all named Louise.

• 1:54:58Speaker 06

  I had no idea.

• 1:54:59Yasi Salek?

  Is that not a name?

• 1:55:00Speaker 06

  I did, I hadn't.

• 1:55:01Yasi Salek?

  Three wives, all named Louise, and that's why you named it.

• 1:55:04Speaker 05

  Heard about anybody having a type that was a name.

• 1:55:06Yasi Salek?

  A name, it's crazy. No, I'm gonna attempt to determine it, so.

• 1:55:08Speaker 06

  It's kind of, yeah.

• 1:55:11Yasi Salek?

  Um, okay, just because I've spent like six months of my life in Madonna world because I did a series of Madonna pop.

• 1:55:17Speaker 06

  Oh, right, yeah, yeah.

• 1:55:18Yasi Salek?

  Podcast, um, is True Blue at all like a slight, was it even in your mind, Madonna?

• 1:55:25Speaker 05

  Uh, no.

• 1:55:25Yasi Salek?

  No, okay, even the the name.

• 1:55:28Speaker 06

  There's quite a few songs named True Blue.

• 1:55:30Yasi Salek?

  Yes, of course.

• 1:55:31Speaker 05

  Yeah, even Dirty Beaches had a fucking killer one as well.

• 1:55:35Yasi Salek?

  Oh, Alex.

• 1:55:36Speaker 06

  And we made a cover of that song.

• 1:55:38Yasi Salek?

  Incredible.

• 1:55:39Speaker 05

  To be taught with Dirty Beaches quite a bit back in the day, um.

• 1:55:43Yasi Salek?

  Does he live in?

• 1:55:43Speaker 05

  But. Is that, is that uh, is that the same Madonna era, so um, it's like the, it's like Catholic era?

• 1:55:51Yasi Salek?

  Just before. It's the album just before Catholic era, uh, Like a Prayer.

• 1:55:57Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:55:57Yasi Salek?

  Yeah. Yeah.

• 1:55:59Speaker 05

  But nah, it it wa- it wasn't a direct nod.

• 1:56:02Yasi Salek?

  Maybe perhaps a subconscious. Close to Nirvana, horn Madonnaism, I want it to be.

• 1:56:07Speaker 05

  Her name as well, that's true.

• 1:56:10Speaker 06

  Yeah, I hadn't thought about that either.

• 1:56:12Yasi Salek?

  There's a lot, I mean, I I think you're quite a Gothic band, for lack of a better, I mean, just like in, like visually represented and Scandinavia in general is such a Gothic place, but there's so much reference to spirituality and religion in lyrics all throughout, but definitely on on this. Is that is that on purpose? Like, is this just part of your, I mean, Leonard Cohen also a very.

• 1:56:36Speaker 06

  It seems you can't really help it.

• 1:56:37Yasi Salek?

  You can't help talking about the Lord's Prayer.

• 1:56:41Speaker 05

  Like, from pretty early on, like, the religious iconography and sort of like

• 1:56:50Speaker 05

  boring from from um, from that to to uh make sense of like whatever predicament I was trying to describe was just like a tendency. And um, and there's been times where I kind of tried to

• 1:57:06Speaker 05

  like, stay away from that tendency.

• 1:57:09Yasi Salek?

  Right.

• 1:57:10Speaker 05

  Not succeeding that well, and then on this record, I I just did not try and stay away from that at all.

• 1:57:15Yasi Salek?

  Yeah.

• 1:57:16Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 1:57:16Yasi Salek?

  I don't, I mean, I don't think you need to. I think it worked quite well. I think it's, you know, I think people are sometimes made uncomfortable by it, but it's like it's like one of the oldest and greatest myths, you know, like it, there's a reason that it.

• 1:57:29Speaker 06

  Strong figurative language.

• 1:57:31Yasi Salek?

  Yeah, it perpetuates our language for a real reason.

• 1:57:36Speaker 05

  No, we we we don't, we don't shy away from religion, this is for sure.

• 1:57:40Yasi Salek?

  You know what else you didn't shy away from that I was absolutely screaming? I'll just say, hashtag Ale, not many men know about the uh, old pregnancy test that you had to kill a rabbit. Well, the rabbit would die regardless, but you had to inject the rabbit with the urine of the woman to see if it was pregnant.

• 1:57:56Speaker 05

  Yeah, yeah, yeah, that that old expression, yeah.

• 1:58:00Yasi Salek?

  Missed the period, so the rabbit's dead.

• 1:58:02Speaker 05

  Man, I I I kind of wondered if anybody was gonna get that.

• 1:58:06Speaker 06

  I I I didn't know that. Right, I, yeah.

• 1:58:10Speaker 05

  Yeah, missed the period, so the rabbit's dead.

• 1:58:12Speaker 06

  What the, what the, what?

• 1:58:13Yasi Salek?

  It's really arcane, like it's a, I think it's from like the thirties or the twenties. It was like the one of the first ways they knew how to do pregnancy tests, they would take the urine from the seemingly if maybe pregnant woman and because it has the HCG, it would change the rabbit's ovaries.

• 1:58:28Speaker 05

  Oh, right.

• 1:58:29Yasi Salek?

  And then they would have to kill it and do an autopsy and that's how they could, isn't that nuts?

• 1:58:32Speaker 05

  Whoa.

• 1:58:33Yasi Salek?

  I didn't, I mean, not many people know about it, but I like, it struck me right away. I was like, okay, yeah.

• 1:58:38Speaker 05

  Yeah, that was, that that, I mean, like, this song kind of, you know, tells a story about pregnancy.

• 1:58:46Yasi Salek?

  Yeah.

• 1:58:46Speaker 05

  In in a harsh environment and and like that.

• 1:58:52Speaker 05

  Yeah. Speaking of what you can get away with, that was a, I felt like that was a neat.

• 1:58:59Yasi Salek?

  I thought it was neat.

• 1:58:59Speaker 05

  Expression to drop, yeah.

• 1:59:01Yasi Salek?

  I enjoyed it. Do you guys have, and I think I read this and you don't seem like people who have favorites, but so now that you've been playing a lot of the songs, like do you have a favorite to play or do you kind of, is it all just clocking out the song factory like?

• 1:59:16Speaker 05

  Huh?

• 1:59:16Yasi Salek?

  Do you have a favorite song to play when you play live?

• 1:59:19Speaker 05

  Well, I mean, I mean, ever since the record came out, we've been, like, all the shows we've been doing, we've been playing, um.

• 1:59:25Speaker 06

  We played the record from start to finish.

• 1:59:27Yasi Salek?

  Thank God.

• 1:59:28Speaker 05

  And then and then we do like all the songs for along the encore, but like, we haven't really been. I mean, we we we're still still so.

• 1:59:39Speaker 05

  Ecstatic about this record, like it feels great to us.

• 1:59:44Yasi Salek?

  Yeah, because you made it really fast, right? I know people have talked about it a lot, but like you insisted on kind of like, we're recording it fast and we're putting it out fast.

• 1:59:49Speaker 05

  It was a big, big, quick turnaround. But for now, like, like, it seems like the only right thing is to, to play it front to back because it's like, that's what we are right now.

• 2:00:03Speaker 06

  And it's the, and that's the first time that we felt about that, about a record, like playing a record that where, I mean, if we, if you've talked about doing that with Seek Shelter, like, oh yeah, let's go and play it like that, never, never.

• 2:00:16Speaker 05

  No, like, there, there, there, every other record.

• 2:00:20Speaker 06

  We had an aversion, yeah.

• 2:00:21Speaker 05

  Songs where we didn't play live for more than like twice, and you're like, well, that song's not for live, fuck that, you know?

• 2:00:29Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 2:00:30Yasi Salek?

  Yeah, well, I think it makes sense to me because a lot, I, again, I love all your albums, but I think some of the other albums are like, an experience, like a journey that you're going on and it has like highs and lows and some parts are challenging and some, you know, you climb the mountain, you come down the mountain. But this album, not that it's like simplistic, but like, it feels like it came like fully formed, like, I listened to it start to finish because it's like, one experience. So it makes sense. And there's, and there isn't, you kept it short, you kept it punchy. So there aren't parts like where it like lulls in a way that maybe would make the live show hard.

• 2:01:07Speaker 05

  Yeah, that was, that was kind of the, we wanted to be this fucking banger.

• 2:01:12Yasi Salek?

  Yeah.

• 2:01:12Speaker 06

  The most, the most lolly part is probably True Blue.

• 2:01:16Yasi Salek?

  Yeah, that's the end. Perfect. Wrap it up.

• 2:01:19Speaker 06

  Yeah. I think we talked about like, oh, how should we do this? Should we, should we mix it up? And I was like, nah, fuck that. This would, it was made to be played like this.

• 2:01:28Yasi Salek?

  Oh, I can't wait. I guess I have one or two last questions and then I'll free you into the world.

• 2:01:36Yasi Salek?

  Yohan, do you have other side music projects?

• 2:01:39Speaker 06

  Um, yes, yes, but nothing anyone's heard in a long time. Yeah, I'm making, I make, I'm making some scores for like some films.

• 2:01:51Yasi Salek?

  Oh, amazing.

• 2:01:52Speaker 05

  You, you've been doing various like live constellations. There's been like live pieces and stuff.

• 2:01:57Yasi Salek?

  That's so cool.

• 2:01:58Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 2:01:59Yasi Salek?

  And what?

• 2:01:59Speaker 06

  I played a lute concert.

• 2:02:00Yasi Salek?

  Lute?

• 2:02:01Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 2:02:01Yasi Salek?

  Like the, oh, oh, wait, this is a, this is a pipe. I'm thinking of the pipe piper. Oh, lute is like this. Okay. I don't know about music. I don't know how you got this job.

• 2:02:10Speaker 05

  Any of the flute concerts.

• 2:02:12Speaker 06

  I didn't do a flute concert. I, yeah, I've done different things.

• 2:02:15Yasi Salek?

  Okay, how many instruments can you play?

• 2:02:18Speaker 06

  I can act like I can play quite a few of them, but I could, but it's, it's, you know, yeah, I'm, I'm faking it, but a couple, I have quite a few, yeah.

• 2:02:26Yasi Salek?

  Do the other members of Ice Age also have side musical interests and projects?

• 2:02:31Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 2:02:31Speaker 05

  Dan has a killer band with his brother where they both play drums.

• 2:02:35Yasi Salek?

  Oh, sick. I love double drum bands, like the OCs. It's so sick. What is it called?

• 2:02:39Speaker 06

  Thicket.

• 2:02:40Yasi Salek?

  Thicket.

• 2:02:40Speaker 05

  Yeah. It, it, it's usually just the two of them, but it's like a, like a force of nature when they play together. And it's like, I think that they have like some elements that are planned, but a lot of it's improvisation, but it sounds like it's sort of like more composed than it is because they just have this

• 2:03:01Speaker 05

  brotherly hive mind synergy thing. And they're such beasts when it comes to like, playing in each their own respect. So like it, it's kind of a, it's kind of like a grout shaking thing to witness.

• 2:03:14Yasi Salek?

  That sounds amazing. Jacob running a construction company, but does he have, make time for some music?

• 2:03:20Speaker 06

  Hmm, he, he, he's been to touring and, and, and painting quite a bit more than, than music. I think he's toying around with different stuff.

• 2:03:30Yasi Salek?

  Yeah.

• 2:03:31Speaker 05

  And Casper has Les Win, that's a, a long going group.

• 2:03:36Yasi Salek?

  Les Win. Casper is, Casper's older than you guys. Casper's like closer to my age.

• 2:03:38Speaker 05

  He's a few, yes, yeah, older, yeah.

• 2:03:41Speaker 06

  And he also, Casper's also a, a very, very gifted flamenco guitar player.

• 2:03:46Yasi Salek?

  Whoa.

• 2:03:47Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 2:03:48Yasi Salek?

  Is he Spanish?

• 2:03:49Speaker 05

  Half.

• 2:03:50Yasi Salek?

  Half?

• 2:03:50Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 2:03:51Yasi Salek?

  That's sick. Okay. So a lot going on with you guys. Obviously Elias can't sit still for two seconds.

• 2:03:56Speaker 05

  When we asked him to be in the band, he, he was in a state of set. I think he had taught himself that he had abandoned rock music forever and was just gonna be flamenco from now on. But then, then he reconsidered, thankfully.

• 2:04:12Yasi Salek?

  He was like, okay, for you guys, I guess I can do it. Elias, you've obviously famously made two solo albums, plus the album with Dean Blunt, which we loved here on this podcast. Me and Chris Ryan, my colleague, both put it in our top 10 of last year. Obsessed. Do you ever, and you wrote your book of poetry, which may at rest in peace, burned in my house fire. We don't have to talk about that. I didn't, I didn't bring my tiny violin, you guys, so we don't, you don't have to play it right now. Um, it's fine. I can, I can purchase another one. I was just like looking, I, I, this happens every time where I'm like, I'm like, oh my God, I'm gonna go grab the poetry book to bring to, then I'm like, god damn it. Um, but I went to your reading and it was nice, very lovely to hear just the reading. Um,

• 2:04:55Yasi Salek?

  clearly you have like a, a deep well of productivity, the creative essence, but like, are there even other avenues that,

• 2:05:06Yasi Salek?

  that you haven't, that you have an interest in creating with them that you haven't, like,

• 2:05:12Yasi Salek?

  dance? I don't know. You know, like ballet.

• 2:05:15Speaker 05

  Like, um, hopefully, hopefully, um, hopefully.

• 2:05:20Yasi Salek?

  You guys all seem really into film and when you're scoring films.

• 2:05:23Speaker 05

  Yeah, yeah. We, we just went to the screening of a, a film that used Star Song Vendetta. It's called Our Hero Beltesa.

• 2:05:30Yasi Salek?

  Oh, cool.

• 2:05:31Speaker 05

  Where they used to both in the scene and for the credits. That, that was quite cool to, to have it be purposed within like a, a story like that. Um, but I mean, hopefully, you know, like, um, I, I'd like, you know, our, our interests are all quite wide spanning and, um, and, but I, I just

• 2:05:53Speaker 05

  hope to see, you know, the unknown of the future to be lettered with a bunch of curveballs and, um,

• 2:06:02Yasi Salek?

  Things you can't even expect. That's right. And it probably will be. That's how it goes. Okay. Last, last question. Um, what's going on in Copenhagen music scene right now? I'm in, I'm a massive Lust for Youth fan. That's my, that's my dogs. Love, love them. I've only been to Copenhagen once and I was there by myself for a weekend and God bless Hanus, he was like, I'm bartending, you could come sit with me. And I just like sat with him at his bar, like, so, but like, and then there's a couple of newer artists that I've gotten into, like Hekt is really cool. Do you guys know that? Hekt? It's like an electronic artist.

• 2:06:37Speaker 05

  Don't know.

• 2:06:37Yasi Salek?

  He might like it. It's, he put, I think it's, I think it says.

• 2:06:41Speaker 06

  How do you spell that?

• 2:06:42Yasi Salek?

  It's H E K T.

• 2:06:43Speaker 06

  Okay, yeah.

• 2:06:44Yasi Salek?

  It's very cool. And then Erika De Cassiere.

• 2:06:47Speaker 05

  Yeah, she's great.

• 2:06:48Speaker 06

  Yeah.

• 2:06:48Yasi Salek?

  She's great. Like, what's the vibe? Like, what, because you guys all live there still, right?

• 2:06:52Speaker 05

  A lot of people doing cool shit these days and it feels like it's, um, there's like, uh, I, I, I don't know, like, you know, things go and like, there's a common feeling of a lull and then things feel sprawling, but like, there's a lot of people doing interesting stuff, you know, like, Nadja Teyan did a, a really cool record that's not out yet and Erika's great. Soli City just did a cool record. Halo Plus is killing it and, um, Fina is writing such good songs and the list kind of goes on.

• 2:07:29Yasi Salek?

  Okay, I wanted to look into all of them. I'm so excited. Um, are you guys like the Peter Peter now of Copenhagen? You're the 50 year old Ben better?

• 2:07:37Speaker 06

  He's still the reigning, yeah, yeah.

• 2:07:40Yasi Salek?

  All right. Well, thanks so much for, uh, coming on the pod and chatting with me about your cheekbones and also some of the music.

• 2:07:48Speaker 05

  Thanks for having us.

• 2:07:51Yasi Salek?

  Okay. Come back next week for a new episode of Bandsplain.

• 2:08:03Yasi Salek?

  If you liked what you heard today, subscribe for more episodes of Bandsplain. Our guest today was me, Yasi Salek, and also the band Ice Age. This episode is produced by Rob Sunderland and edited by Adrian Bridges with help from Justin Sales. Video production by Jacob Cornet. Executive producers for Bandsplain are Gina Dalvec and me, Yasi Salek. Our gorgeous and catchy theme song was composed and performed by Bethany Cosentino and Jennifer Claven and graciously recorded by Carlos de la Garza in Los Angeles, California. Special thanks to our producer emeritus, producer Dylan, AKA Dylan Tupper Rupert, and also Sean Fantasy, the Farah Homedy Lip Oil, and you for all your awesome questions.

• 2:08:43Yasi Salek?

  Come back every Thursday for a new episode of Bandsplain on Spotify or wherever you listen to or watch your podcasts.

• 2:08:57Yasi Salek?

  You guys never laugh, so I'm like, okay, they hate it. They want to die.

• 2:09:03Speaker 00

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