I CRY IN SITUATIONS Ft. Jensen McRae | Episode 158
Summary
Jensen McCray is a singer-songwriter, songwriter, and all-around talented human being. In this episode of the Comment Section Show, we talk about how he got his start in music, how he transitioned from being a shy kid to being a singer, and what it was like growing up in a musical theater family.
Transcript
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well what i thought was i'm quitting music that was really my thought was three dollars three
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sweaty dollar bills for my troubles no thanks you want to put them in my g-string while you're at it
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hey everyone and welcome back to another episode of the comment section show sorry me your fave
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everybody knows me who cares about me on to the guest today we have the iconic the legendary
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the unbelievably talented jensen mccray thank you for having me oh my gosh it's an honor honor and a
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privilege i'm so happy to have you i'm like i'm beyond excited to be here like this is a little
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bit of a bucket list kind of a moment shut up i'm such a fan did you guys get that make sure you
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got it on camera and the check will clear yes and it will clear and thank you for the plug i appreciate
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it i'm so excited to have you i've been a fan of you for a while we've been moots for a minute yeah
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you've been oomph for a little bit yeah yeah we've been each other's oomphs for a while um and i
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discovered your music on tiktok which i'm sure other people have too but i know there's a lot
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more to your lore so i would love i actually have some fun facts about you but we'll get into those
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in a little bit oh my god is this nardewar did you get all the the deep cuts yeah i'm coming for
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his gig i'm coming for his neck nardewar i love him he knows everything i know it's honestly kind
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of frightening i know that's all i know i've made it is if i get the nardewar moment when he's telling
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me what i wore to my improv show in 2013 right right i know that's why i said i got a little
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chilled on my smile looking into me uh but i'd love to hear more about your lore how you got into
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music and kind of how you transitioned into the career you have today um i've like always been
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a musician i've wanted to be a musician since i was really little and my parents stuck me in
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musical theater when i was a kid recovering theater kid i apologize um and it was really just like to get
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me out of my shell because i was really shy which is like shocking now yeah that is shocking to hear
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i it's like my bit now whenever i like start singing to myself in public and people like oh
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my god you sing i'm like no i'm shy i'm a wallflower yeah i'm trying to be mysterious i when i was that's
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like an important part of my lore is being nine years old and like walking in the grocery store
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and like being like someone could be about to discover me and i just start singing you're so
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me and it's always miley cyrus giano oh every time what a banger that's a good one
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that was me so much like even walking around my elementary school campus there's no talent scouts
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there there's no talent scouts they're not coming for you there girl and i thought maybe i should
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just just to be safe i need to be singing all the time so that was a big thing i started piano lessons
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also when i was really young and i think like every kid is stuck in them but for me it really stuck
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and started writing songs through that and i started writing songs for school all the time like
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whenever we had like a creative assignment and i had the option to write a song i just would
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and i would basically hold my classmates hostage and like bring a full 88 key keyboard like into
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the room yeah shy where i'm not getting shy it was and that was when it changed it was the musical
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theater i did grease one time and i said spotlight you said my calling i was like i found myself i was
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doing the camp rock the disney knees gotta what's her name margaret dupree when she's saying this is
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real yeah whatever the the the star of like their talent show yes the winner the true winner the
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winner light skin queen right my girl wigged down mind you absolutely and and we'll get to that
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right but that was my that was my thing was just like bringing the keyboard and singing about like
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animal farm or whatever and like oh kind of deep yeah i was in when i was in seventh grade i remember
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so clearly that it was also like so we read animal farm we had to do like a creative assignment i chose
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to write a song it coincided with when i had to do the swim unit in pe so my my wig not laid my hair
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not a good situation right and i was still like i'm getting up in front of all of these people have
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to and i'm gonna sing this song about a pig doing propaganda and how'd it go and it did not go over
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well i mean the song's great turned my peers against me inevitably they didn't like it no i had
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like a couple of shooters who are still my friends now haters well i don't well i had a couple people
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who were like really down for the cause and then everyone else was like when is she gonna stop
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when is she gonna stop bringing in that keyboard they said we got it they let me just say it that
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that an 88 key keyboard casio keyboard hated to see me coming bringing that into a strap to your back
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cartoon character damn okay kid next door i had the symbols i was the monkey you just carrying
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that thing around like a gun you're like oh i'm so glad you asked i actually do have something why
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is she strapped why is she 12 years old strap with the keyboard and so i was doing that forever and
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then i did like talent shows where i would sing original songs not about books we were reading
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for english class love and uh then i went to grammy camp when i was 16 which is like at the time it
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was like a 10-day residential like overnight camp right that's a fun fact we have about you on here
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okay grammy camp it says for young music artists and she was in an improv group called the scene
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monkeys oh that's a brutal one that's actually so mean can we got that that's actually so mean
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and nardwart yeah no the scene monkeys wow that takes me back yeah i was that part of grammy camp no
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no that was my improv team in high school love and i only did it because i was i so i did musical
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theater as a child i stopped doing it when i was like 13 mostly for racial reasons i just like
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wasn't getting parts naturally and i started to notice a theme as to who was and i was like let
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me take the hint and just stop right and so but i was friends with all the theater kids because they
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were all like the kids who were singing in the middle of the quad and they were all like you have
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to try out for improv so i did and then i was the only one who made the team which of course was also
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a rift that was another it was world war scene monkeys right and so i did i did improv in high
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school and then when i got to college i tried to do it more but i ended up getting cut from the
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college improv team damn cold world it was fine why are you in so many cutthroat situations
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damn you competing all your life i literally all my life i've had to fight i'm literally just
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eminem and eight miles but going into improv trials yeah and college mind you yeah my college
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improv trials but that was i made a lot of friends through that um but the the college improv thing i went
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to usc for music school fight on smarty pants i try i try and the the way that the improv tryouts
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worked for that the team was called comedus interruptus and they like they spawned like a
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bunch of like snl cast members and amazing like comedy writers and stuff yeah and the tryouts were
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like this big mass audition everyone goes up and just like does improv for the improv group yeah and
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then it was very very desirable and then if you made it past the there was like a first round of
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auditions and then there were uh callbacks where they picked like six people to be like on the team
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like on probation kind of okay and twice a week you would go into like a gym at school and like do
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improv for you would be dance tap dancing for your life why are they running it like an nfl team
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they're like this is the practice squad right here that we were gonna workshop you we'll see if you
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get out of preseason you know why are they running it though i think they were trying to see honestly
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if your first audition was a fluke and in my case it was my first audition i killed it and then the
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whole workshop i was kind of bad what'd you do for your audition do you remember i do i don't remember
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exactly what it was but i remember that i was doing like a voice like a southern kind of voice
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and i was talking about gators and i remember that that got big when i brought up the gators
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that got big laughs uh and then i the whole rest of the time i was in the workshop i just couldn't
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replicate that magic and i did get cut but it was fine because it was like it was twice a week from
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like 10 p.m to midnight after i would have all my rehearsals for my music school well damn what are you
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preparing for the coast guard like why are you practicing so goddamn late what's going on in
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the improv scene i feel so uneducated i feel ignorant as fuck i did not know it was that serious
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i don't think it's that serious in most cases like maybe that was a me i think it was a little i think
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it was a little bit extra i honestly a little yeah i don't think that they were doing and also there
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were other improv troops on campus that weren't doing it like that right they had work-life balance
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but they weren't like the one the group well there was so there was that comedians was the short
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form i can't believe how much i'm talking about improv i love it and when you see caleb tomorrow
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bring it up because he's he's an improv nerd too he loves improv it's like they're they're like the
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the treble tones oh my god true right yes like there's other acapella groups but there's only
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one treble tone this is kind of the truth well there was so the comedians was the short form and then
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there was a long form team they were called second nature so they did like the long scenes they did
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like a herald i think it's called and so it'd be like a really really long scene that kind of
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started off kind of straight they played a little kind of straight and then the comedy would come from
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just kind of sticking around and waiting it out right and that was when my best friend was on
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so i would go watch him after i got cut from my team i would just go watch him and lick my wounds
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after i didn't make it to hollywood like in america i did not get a golden ticket they're like
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you're going to hollywood make it to the lives and the voice that's crazy but that i do think that
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is important to i do think that's important to my lore that i did improv derogatory
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well obviously i mean you're a performer at heart that's really what you are an artist i live to i
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love to perform don't make me sing don't make me dance that's one of me and my family's favorite
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snl skits it's a good bit yeah that's one of my favorite we reference that skit all the time and
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i feel like you're also a performer you're an entertainer and like i feel like anyone who's
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like constantly on like that you go to a party and your energy is like you're always like a stone's
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throw from don't make me sing right right it's like it's like don't look at me but also like
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i love to pull focus and i know my angles and i know where my camera is exactly and then that
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being said i do love being the center of attention that being said so is that when you when you kind
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of pivoted away from improv is that when you kind of lean just solely into music or yeah i mean i
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always knew it was music like there was never i knew i never had like a future in comedy although
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it is i think it was i don't know who was caleb that said this but someone said like that all
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musicians wish they were comedians and all comedians wish they were musicians that's actually so i feel
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so red and it rings really true that's so true i wish i was a musician all the time and every time
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i'm on stage doing like my banter in between songs it's me kind of like testing in waters a little bit
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i'm like could i do a tie five no i did not know that about you i knew you were funny i i obviously
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every smart woman i know is hilarious this is true and every smart man i know is you know there's a few
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men the i feel like a funny man is kind of like a handsome man it's like when they get it right it's
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really right yeah and a lot of the times it's just not that right right right like when it hits it
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hits good yeah because it's so rare i was just i just had serena briar on the show and we were
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talking about men who want to go into comedy like and i always say like if you just get if you give
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them one little laugh whether it's like through the nose or like an outright guffaw they're
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immediately going to be like i should pivot to comedy and also any man who's ever like sang a song
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if you're like oh your voice like they're like okay that's my future now i'm quitting my day job
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and i am bob dylan and i am and it's like i was gonna say do you get mansplained a lot about music
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by men um or have you historically sure i mean there's definitely been i remember one time i was
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on a dating app and i like had a picture of me playing guitar and a guy messaged me and he's like
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do you actually know how to play guitar and i was like yeah like i i would like why would i like what
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like unlike men women are not posting with guitars to pull on dating apps yeah it doesn't work
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yeah that's not really how that works that that reminds me i got a comment that was like when
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women make men laugh make anyone laugh they they think to themselves oh i love making people laugh
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when men make people laugh they're like i should i deserve to be famous for this yeah that's how i
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feel they think about music like yeah women do it for the love of the game and they're like i just
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love it i just feel good it makes me feel good and then men do it get one viral video and they're
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like well obviously i'm famous it's really wild i've saw i saw a guy and i won't name names but a guy
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wasn't even a musician but a guy who just works in the music industry right posted a video about
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like giving advice unsolicited and it went i don't even know if i want to say viral it got some
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attention and then now then proceeded to make a string of videos talking about it's really easy
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to go viral i do it why can't you do it and i'm like really i need you to really look in the mirror
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no for real i need you to do a moment of that's how i feel when men tell me i'm not funny i'm like
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well if we were to check tape one of us is clearly funny one of us is getting paid for it one of us
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has quite a few like licks under my belt i don't know if we want to check tape we can
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if you'd like to but and in your words one of us is working at autozone right right exactly right
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right right right right i was like no for sure i take that that kind of commentary very seriously
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not like i'm like i'm not listening to an unfunny bitch tell me how to be funny
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i'll say i did find you i think the first video i ever saw of your music was your song about uh
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boston oh my god yeah that was the first one i ever saw of you and then i was like okay
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t period and i commented on it and then i went and saw you followed me and i was like and period
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immediately i said right for hammer yeah i'd love to know when you felt like it was actually
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turning into like oh my god i could like really make money off music and keep doing this for a
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living kind of the first thing that happened that was like a big like break for me i guess
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was at the beginning of my senior year of college um that my manager who's here my managers are here
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um but one of my managers just like found me on instagram and just like booked me for a show and
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was like do you want to play this random show in west hollywood and i was like yeah sure and she's
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like you have to bring like 20 to 25 people and i was like babe i can't do that i don't have a draw
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i have my draw is none she's like can you bring three people and i was like i bet i can scrounge
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yeah i could definitely ruffle up some well because i was like i can bring my mom i can bring my little
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brother and i can bring one friend from school that's easy right and so my mom came my little brother
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had homework he was in high school couldn't go and then none of my friends from school came so i
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brought just my mom and you said you asked for three brought you one i brought one and i played
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the set played my heart out mind you played my heart out and then as it was over as i'm walking
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out the door the guy at the door stops me and he's like wait i have to give you your money and i was
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like i didn't know i was getting paid for the show and he's like you get paid based on how many
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people you brought and i was like oh no and he gave me three dollars right and you said this woman is
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worth so much more than that misogyny and i well i was just this is misogyny i'm witnessing it
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live what i well what i thought was i'm quitting music that was really my thought was three dollars
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three sweaty dollar bills for my troubles no thanks you want to put them in my g-string while
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you're at it get away from me i left that venue my mom drove me home and i was like i think i'm
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done trying to be an artist i can't do it anymore but of course my future manager was like can i send
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some of your music to a friend of mine who's a producer and that ended up kind of being the beginning
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of the end frankly they're stuck with me now um but i went i had a meeting with him and we had
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some sessions and the first session that i ever had with him i wrote a song called adam's ribs
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and then the second session i wrote a song called starting to get to you both those songs ended up
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on my first album and the third session that i had uh my manager was there and then my producer's
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manager was also there and they were like we would like to make an album with you and for you to be a
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pop star now and i was like i don't have plans after graduation it sounds perfect you're oh my god
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great because i'm unemployed because i was great it was the fall of my senior year of college and
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i had just started talking to one of my professors about getting an internship because i was like i
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don't have like a job lined up or anything like i feel like i need to figure out kind of what's next
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but you majored in music yeah i majored in pop music with an emphasis in songwriting um and so that was
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like the first cool thing that happened and then i ended up signing to a label like right after i
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graduated but like the first like really big like my first viral moment was in january of 2021 i went
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viral on twitter for writing a phoebe ridgers parody love that is also a fun fact on here too
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it says her song immune was inspired by a joke she made on twitter about phoebe bridges writing
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a song about the covid vaccine yes it was the height of lockdown and i was we were like six
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months out i guess from phoebe's last album and i was i just came up with this joke i was like oh i
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bet phoebe will write a song about getting vaccinated while waiting while waiting in line to get vaccinated
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at dodger stadium and that is something she would do and i felt right and i sent it to my friend and
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didn't tweet it and i was like haha and she was like you should post that that's actually funny so i did
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and it started she said everything else you've said this one though people should see this so i
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posted it and then it got like a couple hundred likes and i thought i was famous right and you
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know how like back back when twitter was was banging every single tweet that went well someone
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would link under check out my soundcloud right and i was like i need to do the jensen mccray
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equivalent of that so i was like let me just write this song so i wrote it i posted it and then
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it ended up trending which was like completely baffling like twitter was already kind of on the way
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out a little bit at that point yeah so to go viral in 2021 for us for a song yeah that i wrote
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was like completely shocking but that was like i kind of marked my career as like before and after
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that because it was all these amazing people that i really admired were reaching out and telling me
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that they liked it and um my following grew a lot and it was like the first time that i ever felt
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like a lot of eyes on me right and it was every viral experience since has been like much less
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overwhelming i don't know if like you got scared the first time you went viral but for me i was
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definitely like why are you look there's like two million people are looking at me like that
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spongebob thing with patrick and he sees the eyes coming out of the rock who are you people yeah you
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come back what the hell i literally was completely baffled but that was there was a good like test
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run for future times going viral including for massachusetts which like when that happened a couple
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years later it was much less intimidating um well that's good then yeah especially dry running it on
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twitter because twitter is real when you go viral there it could go either way and i was in i was kind of
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waiting for the shoe to drop honestly like the whole time i was like when are the negative comments
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gonna start rolling in when are people gonna try to dox me when's the racism and misogyny gonna come
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in and it just didn't happen miraculously like i got so lucky um and now like it wasn't until
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recently that i actually started getting any kind of negative comments on my videos and yeah i was
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gonna ask you about hate how that goes for you on any platform really i for the most part i don't get a
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lot of hate that's good which i don't really know i love to hear that every guest i have i ask they tell me
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that i'm like that's so great it's so cute hold on to that hold on to that but i did get my first i
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had my first kind of hate moment when i did um i did like a paid promotion for a company and um i
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made the video for them they posted it it got you know whatever like 10 000 views on tiktok or something
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normal small amount yeah and then they decided to push it and do promo right and when that happened
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i like opened the app and i just saw like all these comments on like this one video i was like that's
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weird that i'm getting comments on this video that i posted like a month ago right and i first i
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couldn't even really like parse what they were saying because it's all this like it was just like
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all these like disgusting sexual comments because i was wearing like a low-cut shirt in the video
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which is like my favorite shirt that i don't wear anymore right and um it was all these comments and
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i couldn't even tell what they were saying because i'd never but then i started to realize like oh i've
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seen these comments on other girls videos before yeah oh i know what that means yeah and it was
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like it was like probably like a couple hundred and i had never had that and it was in like
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an hour yeah yeah all men no profile picture men ruin everything they literally ruin everything
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they touch turns to fucking bullshit like fortunately the company was so great about it they're like you
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can turn off the comments we're so sorry they sent me flowers to apologize they were great but it was
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just like that was the first time i ever felt like really like a lot of hostility right like i was
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like why are you are you guys okay like yeah like on this ad i'm talking about like i was just
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talking about like music streaming like and they're like like the stuff i mean i won't even repeat it
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it was so gross yeah it was great you know what's funny is recently i was talking to my fiance
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about this but i was telling him my hate is like i fucking hate you fat ugly bitch which i'm like i'm
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cool with like that's fine you can volley that at me all day every day i i prefer that whenever i
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would get that kind of attention or hate which is rare rare that men ever objectify me rare because
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they hate me but like when they do come up and they objectify me i've like seen a couple videos of
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men making videos about me that are supposed to be compliments but they're not they're just
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they're objectifying me i literally was telling my fiancee the other day i was like i'd rather get
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hate i'd rather you dox me dog like i'd rather you tweet me my address i'd rather you fucking do
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that shit than then talk about my tits i'll kill you oh in fact give me your address i'm gonna come
00:19:31.640
and i'm gonna come and take care of it uh that's like it that kind of attention incites something in
00:19:37.340
me that i have tried to bury for a very long time it's just there's something so weird about like
00:19:41.140
because you know that it's coming like you're like i'm a woman on the internet i know it's
00:19:44.140
possible at any moment and i see it happening to other women every day right but it's something
00:19:47.340
about when it's really turned on you like you just i i feel like i forget sometimes that that's
00:19:51.920
even possible because like i'm me both i'm moving through life i'm having a good time like i don't
00:19:56.620
know like i don't even really get catcalled that much anymore like i feel like i i've been able to
00:19:59.780
i haven't had to deal with sexual harassment for the most part in my day-to-day life recently for
00:20:04.560
whatever reason very fortunate and so then have it kind of come back around i was like oh man i'm gonna
00:20:08.460
have to think about this for a while i forgot i think i forgot i had a body i was like i'm a brain
00:20:14.480
in a jar i'm a head floating around singing my songs and then i look down i'm like oh right like
00:20:19.280
men are gonna see this and they're gonna have opinions about it yeah yeah a bunch of talk about
00:20:23.920
unsolicited commentary so so bad well that's good i'm glad i'm glad that being said that it's minimal
00:20:31.540
yeah it's pretty rare i'm glad to hear that i have really great fans and like great people
00:20:36.020
like following me and like most of my interactions with people especially in real life are so great
00:20:40.840
like i've knock on wood knock on whatever i have never had a bad like irl fan experience everyone
00:20:46.620
that's coming to me has been so respectful so kind like i'm so lucky to have the fans that have
00:20:50.960
they're like in my youtube comments doing like five paragraph essays mla format like they're all
00:20:54.680
nerds and i love them i love it i love it that's so sweet i think that's so wonderful and i would
00:21:00.180
love to know obviously on here which i already knew another fun fact that you've opened for muna
00:21:05.000
and noah khan on tour people but i would love to know how that came about and how that was for you
00:21:09.600
the experience i think the muna thing they also went to usc so they were there like right one of
00:21:15.640
them i think josette was a senior when i was a freshman and katie and naomi graduated the year
00:21:19.220
because all three of them are 100 years old they're all they're all 49 they're 49 bc i think
00:21:24.300
yes absolutely and and in their in their old age and their convalescence they pass a lot of wisdom
00:21:30.920
to me yes but i think that was kind of part of it because like i've been the first time i ever met
00:21:35.040
them was when i was a freshman i played in fem fest which is like the usc feminist music festival and
00:21:39.620
they were the headliners at that point their big claim to fame i think was that they'd been in a
00:21:43.040
buzzfeed listicle that was how i found them i was like wait they went to my school and they're on
00:21:47.660
buzzfeed it's 2016 they're famous that's fame buzzfeed was that girl yeah i love but i wanted
00:21:54.880
to be millennial so bad right i want to wait when did you graduate from college 2019 okay i graduated
00:21:59.580
2017 so i'm like i'm and i will claim my gen z status right because i'm 97 and i'm like right
00:22:04.660
there i'm with my with my old claws you are i'm like i'm on the cusp of millennial so i'm still
00:22:10.060
millennial but i wanted to be millennial so bad because of buzzfeed because they were making it look so
00:22:14.540
cool right and they claimed moona pretty early and so that was how i found out about them and
00:22:18.960
then i continued to follow them continue to be like truly the number one fan every time they played
00:22:22.400
la i was there they're so fantastic and then when they announced at the beginning of 2022 that they're
00:22:27.060
putting out their third album i just immediately messaged my agent i was like you're making this
00:22:30.300
happen i'm getting on this tour manifest manifest manifest it needs to happen i love that and um
00:22:34.580
yeah i was very fortunate to get to be a part of it and then like the third or fourth show i think
00:22:38.660
we were backstage and josette came up to me and was like hey do you want to sing phoebe's verse on silk fun
00:22:42.420
and i was like oh i've been preparing my whole life for this actually i'm so glad you asked and
00:22:46.680
they were like do you know the words and i was like do i know the words to silk chiffon i think
00:22:51.380
i could like scrape up something and figure it out i didn't play it cool at all i was like i've been
00:22:56.100
singing this song every minute of my life since it came out boy can i and but of course the first
00:23:00.980
time i sang it i was standing still like arms locked knees locked like terrified and then by the
00:23:06.500
last time i sang it with them because i think i sang it with the band like maybe six or seven times
00:23:09.700
on that tour by the end and by the last time i was loose i was having a good time on stage but
00:23:13.780
the first time i was like absolutely just a wooden doll i could not move my limbs
00:23:19.960
um but that was true dream come true it was so special and then i was just um like a month ago i
00:23:24.980
was at uh brandy carlisle's music festival in mexico and they were also playing and they had me come
00:23:29.840
up again and i was like it was like riding a bike getting back up there with my boys i literally
00:23:35.340
literally was i was like we needed this we needed this so bad but yeah that was great and then with
00:23:41.580
noah he and i similar like similar we just like met through tiktok i think i actually i heard him
00:23:46.200
for the first time when i was in college because he had a song with julia michaels in like 2019
00:23:49.900
love her and that song slays and um then i found more of his music kind of sporadically after that and
00:23:57.160
then i think when stick season like very first went viral on tiktok that was when we started following
00:24:00.540
each other a love and he so he announced his tour i think in like fall of 2023 and i dm'd him we dm'd
00:24:05.900
a little bit at that point and i dm'd him and i was like hey like just so you know like i'm so excited
00:24:08.900
about this tour if you need any openers like even for just the la show like i would love to be a part
00:24:12.720
of it and even if i can't be a part of it i'm so sad like just let me know no response and i was
00:24:17.640
like right right word word word word word and then hurt her and then like a few months later he swiped up
00:24:22.260
on my story like of like i had posted my little brother in the studio or something and he swiped up i was
00:24:26.040
like oh he's killing and i was like so you did see my message yeah i'll love you hey no and hey
00:24:30.600
while i still have well i have you for a second mr mr khan any but again i did but i i'm like i'm
00:24:37.260
very laid back when it comes to like asking for yours that kind of stuff and you know what's funny
00:24:41.200
is i know you're a virgo based off this and that's the truth yeah that's the truth yeah i like i don't
00:24:45.620
want to push it ever like if it's meant to be it'll be yes and like i was like i was talking to
00:24:49.660
someone like another person who had like who's grown a following because of tiktok and stuff and they
00:24:53.200
they had some collabs coming out i was like how'd you get that collab like oh i just
00:24:55.800
messaged them like immediately like as soon as they followed me i messaged them asking to collab
00:24:59.240
and i was like i could never in a million years like i'd be so embarrassed right so even just
00:25:04.320
sending that message i was so stressed and then when he didn't respond i was like oh i completely
00:25:07.500
like i ruined this he hates me and then like a week after that my managers were like by the way you're
00:25:12.020
opening for noah khan and i was like okay so i didn't i didn't ruin everything yeah so he does love
00:25:17.100
me he does in fact still love me that's still bestiana and um i mean that was like life-changing
00:25:23.140
so exhilarating when we were in the first leg of the tour that i did with him was in canada and
00:25:26.940
we were playing arenas and i never played in an arena before so that was like the walking out
00:25:31.860
during soundcheck and seeing a room that's gonna hold 20 000 people i was like this isn't real
00:25:36.100
right this is not real this is a hallucination i know this is don't worry darling i'm hallucinating
00:25:39.960
like i can't believe that it's happening i'm gonna be pissed if someone rips me out of the
00:25:43.700
simulation no one take no one wake me up no one don't wake me up and it was just like it was so
00:25:48.560
incredible his entire team is so nice like every single member of his crew like every member of his
00:25:52.720
band and his crew like unbelievably kind people and like so welcoming and like he's so down to
00:25:58.000
earth like he just seems like i mean he is just like a normal normal ass man like he is not he has
00:26:03.040
no ego like no agenda like literally just wants to make great music and is so good at it i love
00:26:08.260
that yeah i was gonna ask about touring how do you like touring it's a mixed bag yeah because the
00:26:13.020
travel is i mean you do a lot of traveling it's punishing yeah when you're on planes all the time
00:26:16.700
oh yeah i frequently talk shit on tour and and i'm just going up there and being a dickhead like
00:26:21.500
i'm not i'm not performing like you i'm not exerting nearly as many muscles and i'm like oh
00:26:26.360
yeah like the hour hour and a half you're on stage is incredible and then you're like and now i'm back
00:26:31.280
to the hampton garden inn yeah the hilton yeah oh i knew a hilton hated to see me coming in the tour
00:26:37.140
and you know what sometimes there's something sometimes they're an oasis sometimes it's manna in the
00:26:41.820
desert when you see that especially when it's like the home to the apartment style right exactly
00:26:46.460
when you have the little kitchenette me and a home to go together bad i love a home too
00:26:52.160
that's so funny i i literally told people i was like i feel like i'm living on the run
00:26:56.920
i'm constantly yeah i'm constantly packing and unpacking and packing and unpacking
00:27:02.020
and i'm and i wake up in different cities every morning i've heard too many horror stories of people
00:27:06.300
being on stage being hello dallas like you're in portland so i'm just like i will just i write
00:27:10.520
the tour i write the place that i'm in on the top of my set list a lot of times oh that's good
00:27:13.800
so you can reference it yeah yeah i have one song it's not like out like formally but i did
00:27:18.400
like a visual ep that i put on youtube a couple years ago and the first line of the first song
00:27:22.560
is waiting for you in new orleans and so when i'm in a city where like the syllables match up i'll
00:27:26.720
change it to like be so like when i was in toronto i was like waiting for you in toronto and everyone's
00:27:31.060
like oh my god she's in toronto that's where we're at now that's where we are the leonardo
00:27:35.260
dicaprio thing that's the title of the movie exactly i know when we were going out because
00:27:40.700
my sister and i were doing a tour together like when we would go on stage i'd be like where are we
00:27:45.260
again yeah you have to be like okay gut check moment right right right just like recentering
00:27:49.380
yeah it's hard especially because like was on the noah tour in particular we were in canada the
00:27:54.280
whole time and like in the i know all most of the u.s cities not not to flex i know a lot of them but
00:27:59.060
canadian cities i'm not as locked in on so i was definitely like am i in saskatoon or am i in
00:28:04.820
calgary like i didn't i did not also they have a bunch of crazy names it was also so cold everywhere
00:28:09.500
like it was just everything was covered in snow because we were there in like the end of winter
00:28:12.300
beginning of spring and so it's like i didn't there were no landmarks like i was just like i
00:28:15.160
really had to just check the notes so that i would not say the wrong place people someone asked
00:28:19.900
me like in a live the other day like what was your favorite city i'm like all of they're all all
00:28:22.960
the shows are so good right all the it's very rare that there's like a crowd that i'm like oh that was a
00:28:28.580
bad crowd like usually that's true there's definitely cities where i'm like the weather
00:28:32.240
was bad that day or i just wasn't feeling myself that day but yeah the shows themselves like for
00:28:36.880
the most part the crowds are so especially i hate to say it in cities outside of la because i'm an
00:28:40.620
la girl yeah it's my hometown i love it so much i will ride for it forever but i will accept the
00:28:45.060
criticism that playing to la crowds is tough yeah tea that's tea yeah also too when you go like my
00:28:50.420
my manager was a tour manager for a really long time so like he's taught me a lot about tour and even
00:28:55.840
he's told me when he was like setting up tours he was like outside of la or like new york they're
00:29:01.340
really grateful like if you go to smaller cities because no one ever goes there yes so like when i
00:29:06.420
was in ohio they're turning up they're turning up all the bitches in ohio exactly because they were
00:29:13.600
like no fucking way you're coming to ohio like so they're like it i think that's what you're talking
00:29:18.540
about it's like people in la like my manager said they're spoiled so they're used to having
00:29:22.220
everybody come and do shows so when you go to like those smaller ones sometimes they're like
00:29:25.760
the best crowds it's really really special to go to a place where like people aren't going a lot or
00:29:30.300
like it's my first time being there yeah i have fans who like may have been listening to me for a
00:29:33.560
while and like this is their first opportunity to see me play like that's always really really
00:29:37.180
awesome and like i still do love playing in la though because i'm a glutton for punishment i'm like
00:29:40.660
i'm gonna i'm gonna win them over it's like a man that will take me back i'm like it's okay that's
00:29:45.080
fine no i'll just i'll just come to you it's a toxic relationship it is and i'm never leaving
00:29:48.940
i'm never like that's my wife la is my wife i love her so much what would you say was your most
00:29:54.100
memorable moments on the noah con tour honestly the first show in vancouver was it was like a
00:30:00.560
couple months before i put massachusetts out um and it was my first time playing it on tour with a band
00:30:05.560
because i played it solo i think maybe once or twice before that somewhere all that people had was
00:30:09.360
the snippet of the song but as soon as i started playing it people put their phone lights up and it
00:30:13.820
was like it was also the last song in my set so like when i started playing the venue's pretty full
00:30:17.900
by the end of my set everyone knows noah's about to come out so the venue's now basically at capacity
00:30:21.920
yeah and so the entire arena like 19 000 people has their phone lights up for a song that i haven't
00:30:26.960
even put out yeah and that i definitely started crying beginning butterflies no i'll be listening
00:30:32.100
to you imagine it's an imagine right for real me putting myself in your shoes
00:30:36.960
so i but that was like it was definitely like a it was a pinch me moment and like i'd had
00:30:41.960
love that fans sing lyrics back to me before like at my shows like at smaller shows but seeing
00:30:45.920
that many flashlights up like because i can't see anyone's face like it's all darkness and just
00:30:49.960
like the the flares and it's it was really really incredible and that was like i might have teared
00:30:55.480
up on stage other times as well but that was that was the very first night and the one i was most
00:30:59.780
scared for and so like having being able to end that set which by the way kind of a rocky set i had
00:31:04.300
been sick the week before and so we didn't get to do like our final tour rehearsals yeah so i went in
00:31:08.420
ice cold like having not played the set in like a week and also like again in front of 20 000 people for
00:31:14.040
the biggest crowd i've ever played for in my life yeah and also my voice still not at 100 and i'm
00:31:17.780
just like this is you being a virgo because you're over criticizing yourself oh yeah you're like by the
00:31:22.580
way not my strongest said here's why um i'll go down the list my manager's like i will literally come
00:31:27.120
off stage and they'll be like great show like how do you feel like well i was pitchy and like the third
00:31:30.180
measure of this and they're like that's not what we meant that's not at all what we meant no i said
00:31:33.820
great show i don't think you heard me i said great show but that's why you're gonna keep rising
00:31:38.660
because you're a perfectionist like that's excellence only the mark of a virgo is perfectionism
00:31:43.440
yeah i'm like yeah that's not right but i'm like not my best but you know you keep you keep striving
00:31:49.520
you keep rising what would you say it would surprise people about performing live like
00:31:53.800
either a part that's more difficult than it may seem or maybe more interesting um i mean i don't know if
00:31:59.420
this would be surprising but like when you start playing in front of larger crowds like i feel like
00:32:02.740
it's become more of a thing of having like medical stuff in the crowds and like that's definitely one of
00:32:07.480
the hardest things to know how to handle i would say is like especially at the noah shows because
00:32:11.300
those were huge audiences and like you don't ever want to be a like an artist who's like oblivious
00:32:15.880
and doesn't notice the people there's that are suffering in the crowd but you also don't want to
00:32:19.180
be a person who's like stopping the show like every five seconds because like someone looks like they
00:32:22.360
might be having a problem like you have to be able to like kind of discern like do i need to stop
00:32:26.440
does someone need attention are they handling it because sometimes there's like commotion and they're
00:32:29.960
handling it themselves so like definitely one of the hardest things is like knowing like what you're and
00:32:34.080
like one time uh the only time i've ever had to like stop a song fully because usually when i would
00:32:38.400
see something like that happen i would like finish a song and then as soon as i was done i'd be like
00:32:41.080
hey do you guys need help over here yeah but there was one show i think it was maybe the second show
00:32:46.300
in denver or in berkeley or something over the summer and someone had an issue during massachusetts
00:32:51.360
like in the middle of the song and it was again it's my last song on set so i stopped playing
00:32:55.280
got attention got like medical attention over there whatever and then i was like i i was on the fence about
00:33:00.240
like what i was supposed to do and i like turned to my band is just my brother and my best friend
00:33:03.320
that's the whole crew and i turned to them like what am i supposed to do and then the crowd was
00:33:07.000
like start over everyone's like do it just start over do it again and i really was like i didn't
00:33:10.640
want to because i was like is that like so cringe and like self-indulgent like i didn't get to finish
00:33:14.620
my song sorry someone passed out sorry anyways as i was saying and so i really didn't want to do it
00:33:19.880
because i thought that that was like i thought that was offensive but then everyone in the crowd was like
00:33:23.040
start over again again again so i did it one more time and um and then i and then i was done i hate to keep
00:33:27.940
bringing it back to you being a virgo but once again you're you're literally mothering from the
00:33:31.880
stage that's crazy and i'm a cancer rising too so it's i'm a cancer moon oh my god what do what's
00:33:37.460
your moon uh sagittarius i'm a sagittarius rising jensen i'm gonna i'm gonna throw up chills i just
00:33:42.400
pooped in my pants a little bit sorry virgo sagittarius cancer undefeated i'm telling you that's
00:33:48.080
two pretty best friends right here that's it's two virgo sagittarius cancers telling each other
00:33:52.000
yeah yeah yeah exactly exactly shit that's crazy oh my god combo yeah hell yeah i was just jerking
00:33:59.480
each other off it's just like two beautiful girls with beautiful long hair that's why we're beautiful
00:34:03.220
that's why we're successful clearly that's why we're tall that's why we're tall jensen's tall as
00:34:07.800
fuck girl how tall are you i'm 5'10 okay i'm six feet period my brothers like to tell me i'm six feet
00:34:12.660
because they're both i think one of them's like six two and one six three but they they like to goose
00:34:16.140
it they like to add a couple inches they're like no you're like six feet we're like six four six five
00:34:19.260
and i'm like that's not true they're like well because clearly you're six feet so obviously i'm
00:34:22.760
like don't put that on me don't put your issues on me also stop lying six two is a great height
00:34:27.980
why are you adding grateful like for those inches i remember like they're both in relationships now but
00:34:32.820
when they were on dating apps they would be like putting six four in their day i'm like who are you
00:34:36.020
lying to it's not necessary you already you're a big boy so you're coming out the gate a liar you're a
00:34:41.180
tall black king like just love yourself that's crazy bro that's funny my my dad my dad is six six my
00:34:48.980
mom is five three oh my god so my older sister's five four i'm six feet my brother's like six one
00:34:54.600
six two maybe uh when i was in high school though i was like when i was 14 i was five nine yep five
00:35:02.000
nine five ten yep so big as fuck really a body yeah and i felt like my mom anytime they'd be like how
00:35:08.240
tall are you which i got all the time my mom would be like oh she's like six two hey hey hey mom not too
00:35:14.420
much hey mom not too much on me okay yeah and i'd be like no i'm five six right because i just hated
00:35:20.240
being tall when i was younger a doctor told me that i was gonna be five six and i was sad i like cried
00:35:25.060
in the doctor's office my mom was like no she's wrong you're gonna be taller than that that's so
00:35:28.220
funny a doctor told me i was gonna stop growing when i was a freshman in high school and i was like
00:35:32.620
do you promise do you promise i'm bigger than everybody doctor please it's did you play sports yeah
00:35:39.420
i see i didn't do any sports i was a disappointment to all those coaches they looked at me with stars
00:35:43.960
in their eyes and i said not today i'll tell you what i didn't play any tall people's sports okay
00:35:47.940
the ones you'd assume like basketball volleyball nope i played soccer you were just the tallest
00:35:54.040
girl on the side girl i was the biggest bitch alive they were like hey assistant coach is not
00:35:57.820
allowed on the field i said i'm 14 too um so sorry about that oh were they birth certificating you
00:36:02.300
yes all the time oh my god because i played travel ball so my mom would have to carry my birth
00:36:06.440
certificate everywhere because they never believed i love that my little brother so he was so he's
00:36:10.040
like i said he's like 6 3 but he played both my brothers were athletes and he always played with
00:36:13.340
guys that were bigger like one of his friends on his high school team was 6 10 damn big what'd they
00:36:17.880
play uh basketball oh nice yeah yeah they're like you don't remember i was like no well i was like
00:36:22.240
did i i have my brain just shut down i was like they uh yeah i think it was those guys i know pretty
00:36:27.840
sure my brothers and i'm pretty sure i think i was there like it was the those those big kids they
00:36:32.880
really got they had a tough run of it because it was always people especially when they were like
00:36:36.420
in middle school that like the parents were coming out from the opposing teams like there's no way
00:36:40.840
there's no way he's too big exactly when i was in middle school i went one year i was 5 4 which is
00:36:47.760
already ominous for a 10 year old extremely sinister and then when i like in a year i grew
00:36:52.040
four inches so i was 5 8 did you have the knee thing the osgood schlotter what sorry there's like
00:36:58.500
it's called osgood schlotter look it up there's this thing where when you grow really fast you have
00:37:03.640
like just like a lot of knee pain it's like a disorder that you can have both my brothers had
00:37:07.340
it because they both grew like six inches in the summer and it was like your just knees are just
00:37:10.640
messed up damn no i did i grew four inches in a year which is still scary as fuck like that's a
00:37:18.260
little frightening like i came back 5 8 like they like came back to school and they were like oh
00:37:22.760
built different who the hell is that and like for real it's i was thinking about that the other day
00:37:26.720
because like so both my brothers i think were a size 13 shoe which is like the biggest size you can get
00:37:30.640
in a normal store and like i was just remembering when they were kids like every year their basketball
00:37:35.240
shoes becoming worthless because their feet grew yeah there's no point that's crazy when you're a
00:37:39.720
kid like you just wake up one day you can't wear any of your old clothes like can you imagine if as
00:37:43.700
an adult one day you just woke up your feet were bigger you think you go to the hospital yeah but
00:37:48.160
that's just normal i'd join the circus just start cashing in i'd start i'm already i'm already i'm
00:37:54.080
already i've already got the clownery i know my my man is 6 4 so he he's a size 13 shoe uh and then
00:38:01.720
my dad is a size 14 so like anytime i buy shoes if i shop for shoes in the store i say do you have
00:38:08.260
any 13s or 14s that are not basketball shoes and do they ever know if they do they're like oh i have
00:38:14.540
like two and then they'll show them to me and i'm like those are ugly never mind thank you though
00:38:18.540
thank you though i appreciate it maybe that's the next business venture right you and i yeah we open
00:38:23.320
big big body clothing store big body big money yeah big body big money there's a market for it
00:38:29.920
just all about the laugh i love i i think that's beautiful though that you play music with your
00:38:34.540
brothers both of them or just just the little one my older brother unfortunately cannot sing or play
00:38:38.340
instruments um he's not a loser not i can't do it either it's funny because he's literally the
00:38:43.040
smartest person in the entire world like he went to harvard undergrad stanford law like just literally
00:38:47.260
like beautiful mind genius right and not to say that me and my little brother are also not smart
00:38:52.220
my little brother actually had the highest gpa of all of us and he'd want me to mention it so
00:38:55.020
you're welcome um but we uh me and yeah me and my little brother became we were both musical from
00:39:00.600
an early age my little brother actually he also so he played basketball because our older brother
00:39:04.160
did he did music because i did like very typical youngest child like yeah just copying what the
00:39:08.440
older siblings were doing and better than both of us at it um but yeah it's really fun having my
00:39:13.540
little brother on the road with me like when i first started touring i played solo and it was
00:39:17.900
you know it got isolating like being on stage by yourself like night after night and like now that i
00:39:21.580
have my brother and my best friend up there with me like i look to my left and my right and like
00:39:25.760
they're just they're usually laughing like we're all we're holding in laughter as some inside joke
00:39:29.380
that's like oh that's so great like one of the funniest performances we ever had was on the
00:39:33.920
noah tour we were in wheatland california which is i guess sacramento basically it was 114 degrees
00:39:41.780
nice love it and so we were all wearing our sunglasses on stage which i've never done before
00:39:45.080
i was like that's so corny you can't wear sunglasses but i was like i can't see so that's gonna be
00:39:48.560
necessary and midway through the set i start noticing bugs like little tiny bugs kind of flying
00:39:54.760
around and i'm like i hope none of these fly in my mouth while i'm singing yeah and my little
00:39:58.100
brother by the way definitely afraid of bugs his biggest thing he hates bugs he only now is like
00:40:01.940
starting to be able to kill them when he sees them like in the house but i'm terrified of bugs
00:40:05.200
a ladybug landed on him once he screamed i'm me with butterflies to be honest no way you're scared
00:40:10.360
of butterflies yeah i'm scared of most insects anything that flies i'm like i'm good i kind of
00:40:14.560
i mean i get where you're coming from i do i do love a butterfly moment but i mean there's some
00:40:18.640
there's something a little scary about especially in like a large group right a bunch of bugs i'm like
00:40:22.040
i want to admire from afar and so like we're playing these songs we get to the end of the set
00:40:25.880
my little brother holden is motioning to me repeatedly like he's trying to get my attention
00:40:29.640
every time i look over and i'm like did your keyboard stop working like what's the problem
00:40:32.000
he's gesturing at the keyboard it's on and i'm like then we're just gonna keep going
00:40:35.500
and then by the we get to the last song and i like run over to like what are you keep motioning about
00:40:40.160
he looked he gestures on at the keyboard covered in bug courses like maybe thousands he's like he
00:40:45.280
has tears in his eyes literally tears in his eyes and i was like we got a power we're powering
00:40:50.260
through yeah we're powering through so we play oh my god you're fucking fine you're fine jesus christ
00:40:56.400
you're like you're waving me over i thought you had a medical emergency and it but we uh we get
00:41:01.040
to the last the last last said the last song is massachusetts which we've been playing i don't play
00:41:04.180
to a click when i'm playing with um with just them because we didn't have drones yeah and so we
00:41:08.460
were playing kind of at whatever tempo i just decided in the moment and that night i decided to
00:41:12.340
play it very fast so that we could get off stage and away from the bugs so we're going
00:41:15.260
it sounds like it's on 2x yeah literally sped up it was a sped up edit and we get off stage
00:41:21.340
and he's just like in champ he's like he looks like he's got back from nom like he has a thunder
00:41:25.920
blanket on there were so many bugs so many bugs out there we used to do that to our dog we used to
00:41:31.600
have a german shepherd and she barked at our dad every single time he came in the room and so we
00:41:35.400
would put we had a bark collar that we would put on her and it would just like spray like something
00:41:38.360
that smelled bad on her every time she barked and she would just like freeze and that was what he
00:41:42.000
looked like like he just got he had his bark collar on now like whenever we're on stage together
00:41:46.520
like at any given moment we're going to be thinking about one of those incidents and just like unable
00:41:50.540
to hold back laughter in a serious moment which is crucial and now you guys are like you're literally
00:41:54.820
like billy eilish and phineas so so much i love that i mean i i kind of know phineas we he started
00:42:00.280
following me in like 2020 he found my music really early and so we've met a few times and i'm still
00:42:05.140
waiting for uh the moment when we can have our sibling collab right i think the the phineas spider-man meme
00:42:10.520
yeah the phineas x billy x holden x jensen it'll come one day i don't know when that'll be but
00:42:14.900
i'm rooting for it i also just realized you're also a middle child so am i and there's only three
00:42:18.900
of us exactly right that's what i said twins twin twin have you been also i'm obsessed with twins
00:42:27.080
are you me my weird way or me and my so my guitar player kevin my bestie for some reason we've just
00:42:34.400
become that's like one of our early inside jokes was like we just are fascinated by a specifically
00:42:38.700
adult identical twins right there's something about it that's like what do you mean you're
00:42:42.240
still identical yeah like grow up exactly you don't need to be a twin anymore we get it i just
00:42:47.220
says like how did that happen like how did you guys not kind of branch off and kind of find your
00:42:50.760
own thing like you're still kind of playing the hits yeah kind of still yeah we get it i noticed
00:42:55.960
you're a twin but we love we love a twin very much and my um my on one of my other friends put us
00:43:00.660
onto the there's a twin convention that happens every year i guess i saw where they dress the same
00:43:04.240
oh i didn't even know about that oh girl like the twins they have to dress they dress identical to
00:43:08.440
each other that's giving me chills that's beautiful girl my nipples are hard twins matching i love i
00:43:15.880
love making adults and the reason it came about so my friend telling you about the twin convention
00:43:19.040
she was playing a show in a town in the town where the twin convention was happening okay she had a
00:43:23.580
relative who was a twin attending the convention he goes oh like i want to come to your show can i bring
00:43:27.880
a plus one actually a plus two right and she's like bringing like his twin and then another set
00:43:33.500
of twins yeah and she goes sure and then he's like can i actually get another plus two just starts
00:43:38.320
trying to add on she's like how many sets what are you building an army like why are you bringing so
00:43:42.500
many twins to my show you cannot be bringing that many sets of the audience cannot just be rows of
00:43:46.680
twins that's unacceptable everyone out especially if you're all dressed in the same outfit not you and
00:43:52.140
your little twin uniform right one of my uh really good friends from college she's a twin like an
00:43:57.380
identical twin and like uh she comes like her i think her mom is a twin and her like aunt is a
00:44:05.000
twin so they have twins that run like crazy wow and one time she posted a family reunion picture
00:44:09.860
oh that picture almost made me go insane i feel like i felt like i was like i'm gonna be committed
00:44:14.500
to the hospital it's like a test it's like whatever you see it's really like find the difference between
00:44:18.240
these two pictures they're the same picture like i i messaged her and i was like this is an insane
00:44:22.620
like there's like 50 sets of twins in there it's crazy that's awesome right i was like so you're
00:44:27.080
fascination with twins maybe you should look into her and i will and i'll be locked in on my random
00:44:32.780
friend from college okay i'm gonna read some fun facts about you um let's see uh it says you have
00:44:40.620
back to the future listed as one of your top four on letterbox oh yeah what are the other three um
00:44:46.960
i don't i don't know if i finished filling out the whole thing i know before sunrise is on there
00:44:50.440
okay i love so the back of the future trilogy and the before trilogy which don't go together
00:44:54.040
thematically at all other than they're both trilogies that's all four um i just yeah i have
00:44:58.500
six movies in my top four it's two trilogies i think i have obvious child the jenny slate movie
00:45:02.840
which i don't see enough people talking about it's this movie jenny slate is like she's playing a
00:45:06.380
struggling stand-up comedian who gets pregnant decides to have an abortion okay and it's like
00:45:09.820
a great dark comedy like quiet little film i watched it like when i was visiting my brother
00:45:14.940
in college at like two in the morning i was sleeping on his couch and i was like this is a perfect movie
00:45:18.020
um but yeah i'm like not good at this is the first time anyone's ever asked me about letterbox
00:45:22.800
because i'm like not good about cinema like i keep seeing people on red carpets getting asked
00:45:27.020
their letterbox top four and i'm like i won't be prepared i haven't seen enough movies i definitely
00:45:30.660
haven't seen enough good movies again jensen you are me because i don't watch anything so when people
00:45:35.180
ask me like oh have you watched this like and they're all new movies i'm like oh you know for a
00:45:38.420
fact i haven't watched that i just don't watch new things i don't watch prestige i love watching
00:45:42.900
stuff over and over again that's gonna bring me comfort which is why i've seen the back to the future
00:45:45.800
trilogy so many times i've seen new girl so many times me too i just so i i criminal minds is one
00:45:51.360
of my comfort shows okay too and there's i just only like last week finished watching the two new
00:45:57.020
seasons of it i was re-watching the first 15 seasons over and over and over i knew every criminal
00:46:02.560
i knew every unsub's name me as fuck i was on the case yeah i could i could recite them from memory
00:46:07.780
like that was me with like the office with new girl whatever the modern family anyone who slanders new
00:46:13.280
girl i'm immediately like untrustworthy i swear to god me too i'm like you don't get it it's you
00:46:17.780
don't get the art form and i still i was talking to someone yesterday in a session like we were
00:46:22.200
talking about like i said i said one of my dork facts about how like laughing is mostly socially
00:46:26.040
performative and it's not actually about something funny and he was like do you so do you laugh when
00:46:29.980
you're alone and i was like actually yes i laugh out loud alone by myself all the time especially
00:46:34.260
when i'm watching new girl i will laugh even though i've seen every episode seven times i will laugh
00:46:37.760
i've seen some where i was laughing so hard at deposit because i can't hear yeah because i'm
00:46:41.880
fucking laughing the episode towards it was like towards the end of the series when uh winston's
00:46:45.820
accusing nick of being a procrastinator and he's like you drove across the country to see me at
00:46:51.420
college to ask me if i had seen a bug's life and every time i hear that line i have to pause it
00:46:57.340
because i'm like a bug's life that's how i feel about the prince episode that's like one of my
00:47:02.520
favorite ones god it's but the cold open when he's like what are you just hanging around the dryer
00:47:06.080
like some sort of pantyhawk that's comedic genius you're out of your fucking mind that's me with
00:47:11.460
like are you ever like pitching movies and you're like i promise it's one of the funniest movies i've
00:47:15.140
ever seen in my life and then sometimes it hits and sometimes it doesn't i can always i when i feel
00:47:19.500
it when i feel myself losing it i feel really i'm like i panic and i don't know what i'm supposed to
00:47:22.980
do because i'm like if you're not laughing already you need to be laughing already yeah laughing already
00:47:26.520
it's over you don't get it it's curtains for me yeah it's curtains yeah i take my recommendations
00:47:31.980
very seriously but i don't honestly i'm not a person who's because i don't listen when people
00:47:36.300
recommend stuff to me i honestly don't try to recommend stuff that often no me too um i never
00:47:40.800
listen when people recommend to me but if they do say like what's a funny movie you know and i tell
00:47:45.640
them and i'm like let's watch it and they're not laughing i get mad it's it's well it's rude
00:47:49.380
it's offensive it's mean and it's it's an indictment of my character yeah i'm acting like i'm in that
00:47:53.140
movie yeah i made that movie it's my life's work like one of the movies i pitch all the time that i think
00:47:57.620
is one of the funniest movies ever made is the heat with sandra bullock and melissa mccarthy
00:48:01.100
highly recommend highly recommend that fucking movie to the room anyone should watch that movie
00:48:06.160
i laugh my every time i watch it i laugh my fucking ass off and so many people have never seen that
00:48:12.080
it's just a stupid like buddy cop yeah slapstick comedy i'm lmaoing but that's the best that's the
00:48:19.500
stuff that's actually funny like honestly the one of the movies i laughed out loud in the theater
00:48:23.880
into the spider verse t i also cried i laughed and i cried that that movie took me on a journey
00:48:29.860
and i'm not ashamed to say it i'm not ashamed to admit it you're actually beautiful i will watch
00:48:35.260
the heat because i trust the recommendation from someone who doesn't listen to other people's
00:48:37.920
i really do and watches the same things thousands of times yeah yeah that means you're locked in
00:48:43.080
you've you've studied that you have phd in that film and i trust it a silly ass movie like
00:48:48.060
sometimes i'll i won't watch anything new that's popular but then sometimes i'll watch
00:48:51.800
the silliest one-off terrible movies because i'm like well obviously yeah uh like my sister was
00:48:57.120
like we should watch ricky stenicky you ever heard of that movie yeah exactly it's on prime
00:49:02.260
starring john cena okay and a bunch of other comedians but like i was laughing my fucking ass
00:49:08.600
off i was like telling people you gotta watch it you fucking gotta see it and then everybody i
00:49:13.260
told outside of me and my family were like yeah i mean i think i need to watch it with you
00:49:18.220
because i just like didn't really forget it you know what that's actually a part of it it's like
00:49:22.860
who you're watching it with like there's some movies that are gonna hit alone and like they're
00:49:25.480
just that good but there's some movies that like i and like tv shows whatever like things that i've
00:49:29.100
experienced i know it was funny because of who i was watching it with or like consuming it with
00:49:32.900
because like it's their commentary it's us going back and forth like during the i'll give you an
00:49:36.520
example the olympics summer olympics not a comedy routine but watching the olympics with my family
00:49:41.360
very funny right they've got notes they've got jokes they've got it running i got a lot of
00:49:45.560
criticisms they got a lot to say and that's and that's what makes like i was talking one of my
00:49:49.200
friends like i don't really get the olympics i don't like watching i'm like i like watching it
00:49:52.040
because my family is saying on the side that's how i feel about the super bowl oh my god i don't give
00:49:57.220
a damn but if like when i'm watching with funny people like my family i'm having a blast it's gonna
00:50:01.460
be good i'm enjoying it yeah are you a big crier at movies i cry about everything right i cry about
00:50:06.560
everything all the time um i was on a date one time i've told the story before but i was on a date one
00:50:10.920
time with this guy and i said i was a big crier and he was like oh yeah i cry a lot too and i was like oh what makes you cry
00:50:15.080
and he was like movies and situations right and that was kind of where i was at the kind of the
00:50:20.520
silence and i was like i said i said buddy everything's a situation so like just general
00:50:24.320
things but honestly and i think about it every day and it rings so true because i also be crying in
00:50:27.940
situations yeah movies and situations movies and situations that tends to do it for me i literally
00:50:31.720
cry about everything i cry yeah i cry i think i cried watching back to the future probably like you
00:50:36.080
think i'll at this point i mean the second one when he when he goes to the grave no spoilers 40 year old
00:50:41.640
song um when he goes to the graveyard i definitely cried about that the before trilogy will make me
00:50:46.380
cry that's like those are like beautiful it's like a beautiful romantic drama but like
00:50:49.760
this is just an ad for the back to the future well but i um but yeah i cry i cry at music too one
00:50:57.660
time i cried so hard to a song while i was driving that i couldn't see i had to pull over
00:51:00.960
right it was the cause by tommy lafroy by the way great song tea it's not even that sad of a song
00:51:06.880
there are just certain songs though that move you to tears yeah like even and i feel like you're a
00:51:13.860
big would you say you're more of a lyrics person or like a melody person definitely more lyrics i
00:51:18.980
think like i remember about it yeah when when folklore the taylor swift album came out like i
00:51:23.360
listened to it obviously the second it dropped and the whole time i was texting one of my friends
00:51:26.180
like we were doing live reactions and i was like can you believe this line can you believe this line
00:51:29.020
and she's only a melody person so she's like i don't even know what song you're talking about like
00:51:32.380
she had heard none of it she was only hearing like the melody and the music and stuff and i like
00:51:37.540
barely noticed that and i loved folklore for the same reason i love just sitting her lyricism is
00:51:42.140
really good she i mean listen i love miss taylor swift and i when when her lyrics are hitting they're
00:51:49.580
really hitting i i agree and i especially on first listen to like to new taylor swift i'm blocking
00:51:54.780
everything else out and i am just focused on the writing because i want to get the like you only get
00:51:59.440
to hear it first you only get to hear it for the first time once and i like really want to soak it
00:52:02.720
in yeah and well and like i said you're a poet at heart so like you really enjoy uh really well put
00:52:08.220
together lyrics like i think that's beautiful and symbolism and you know what i say this all the time
00:52:12.640
i talk about ed sheeran people are mean to him he's a good writer he is a good writer i i love his
00:52:17.840
like the way he writes his songs like the shit he writes i think it's beautiful he is a good writer and
00:52:22.120
he i think the reason that people love to hate on him is because he got he was so good and became so
00:52:27.320
successful he's a meme it's like he's not even a person anymore he's like a stand-in and a symbol
00:52:32.000
for a certain kind of music right but it's like you don't get that successful without putting in
00:52:35.660
the work and i was saying he was behind the scenes for fucking years writing hits for everybody else
00:52:40.460
he's really i mean i saw him at the staple center when i was like 16 or something i guess and he was
00:52:45.660
up there by himself in an arena with a loop pedal that's what i'm saying you know what i should have
00:52:49.840
known that my twin's gonna be a sheer head like me i should have known that you were gonna be a sheer head
00:52:53.720
like me i am constantly fighting his battles i'm like you'll be nice you are god's strongest
00:52:58.600
yeah i was like yeah you'll be nice to him he's nice he no he's and he also seems like a great guy
00:53:03.820
like my i'm friends with this um english singer songwriter named maizie peter she's amazing if
00:53:07.280
you guys don't know yeah maizie's amazing and she's like his protege like she's open for him on a bunch
00:53:11.660
of tours and like i think they wrote together for a couple of her albums and like she just says he's
00:53:15.240
the nicest guy and like i've only heard good things about this man talented as fuck so talented okay
00:53:19.720
i was like that one lyric where he talks about laying together in bed just like a drawer of
00:53:24.540
cutlery and he's talking about spooning yeah fuck all you no that's genius none of you bitches could
00:53:28.640
write that shit none of you could except maybe jensen i wish no he's playing four-dimensional
00:53:32.560
chess i'm playing checkers i'm playing go fish i'm so glad you're a sheer head like me okay on to
00:53:39.680
more facts let's see oh it says you have a poetry account on instagram i do jensen mccray writes oh yeah
00:53:45.300
i love poetry i just love words like i just love uh i i i'm always really impressed by people who
00:53:51.480
are able to say things in a new way because like yeah so much stuff is cliche so much stuff is like
00:53:55.660
overdone and oversaturated and when i see something that i've never seen before i'm really blown away
00:53:59.940
although i looked back at um like a bunch of screenshots i'd saved right after i went through
00:54:04.220
like a really brutal breakup and i was like the things i thought were profound when i was in the
00:54:08.140
trenches not that profound not that profound so actually it's pretty superficial take it was like
00:54:12.960
pretty dumb and i was just hurting thousands of them and you see and you're like this was meant
00:54:18.440
for me like every time i was like they're speaking directly to me and i look back you know two years
00:54:23.280
later and i'm like girl it wasn't that serious like my hands were covered in blood was it yours or
00:54:30.300
mine who's to say and i was like what it's like she she liked you know that one like he lied
00:54:36.900
she believed he lied and i was like like a stoner i was like oh my god damn that's so true retweet
00:54:44.760
retweet repost and i was just i like shuddered to think about what my reposts from that era look like
00:54:49.320
like it was just not it was not good but some stuff stands up some stuff stands up to the test of time
00:54:53.900
right where would you say you pull most of your inspiration when you are writing i mean i write a
00:54:59.220
lot about my life and i like to write about things kind of like out of time like i when i'm writing a song
00:55:05.800
like even if i'm writing about a specific situation it's not going to be like it's not the news i think
00:55:09.900
that's important for people to know like for i think for a lot of songwriters like we're not the
00:55:12.620
news it's not facts it's like i'm taking the seed of a personal experience that definitely happened
00:55:16.960
and then i'm adding in moments from other experiences i'm adding in moments from things
00:55:21.600
that other people have told me about their lives yeah and i'm trying to tell us like the big thing that
00:55:25.120
i always say is i'm trying to tell something it's not factual but it is true yeah like i want the
00:55:28.620
feeling to be true and i want the the principle and the premise to be true even if like the facts of the
00:55:33.840
story are not like exactly as they happened yeah because ultimately like i think because of how
00:55:39.120
like popular like diaristic songwriting has become i think people have come to expect like that they
00:55:44.800
can go on like a scavenger hunt and like find out exactly what happened in someone's life by listening
00:55:48.340
to their songs and i think for most people even the people who claim to be doing that like
00:55:52.640
they're writing fiction like it is a form it is a form of like kind of create creative non-fiction
00:55:57.480
or like auto fiction right where it's like yeah i'm i am the character in this story yeah but this
00:56:02.600
isn't exactly what happened so i like i like combining things and like combining events from
00:56:07.240
different periods of my life especially because like i feel like we all have experiences where like
00:56:11.660
we're experiencing the same thing over and over again like you get taught the same lesson in
00:56:15.540
different ways in different fonts yeah and so when i come to a point where i am writing a song about
00:56:19.400
something it's me reflecting on all the different times the universe has tried to teach me a lesson
00:56:23.760
and it's not just ever about the one thing it's about all the repeated times that i've been exposed to it
00:56:28.460
well and also because you're such a talented songwriter it's like it's making it more applicable
00:56:32.280
to everyone yeah like your your unique experience cannot always apply but the feeling can yeah most
00:56:38.840
times apply to most people just to kind of wrap us here like any advice like what your best piece of
00:56:44.300
advice would be for any upcoming like singer songwriters slash improv experts all of the above um any advice
00:56:52.780
you may have for them if they really want to get into the music industry maybe want to start writing
00:56:56.300
maybe want to start playing maybe want to start posting their songs any advice you may have for
00:57:00.840
them i mean one of the biggest things is to keep a journal like it's really good to be an observer
00:57:04.700
of the world and like write down the things that are happening to you and like just start paying
00:57:08.100
attention like that's one like i think one of the things that disrupts people in their writing process
00:57:12.760
is that if they feel like they don't have ideas it's because they're not paying attention there's
00:57:15.360
stuff happening everywhere in your own life and other people's lives you can latch on to
00:57:18.360
and then with regards to like posting and stuff like we have to one of the things that helped me a lot
00:57:23.360
was no longer viewing my social media as like an extension of myself like i no longer felt like
00:57:27.580
it was like an appendage like right it's a business card and it's a it's a factory frankly
00:57:32.920
that i clock into and i clock out of every day it's my nine to five yeah and like people will not
00:57:37.120
post stuff because like well i don't want to be annoying and post all the time or what if it flops
00:57:40.020
and people don't like it and it's like who cares you'll post another one tomorrow exactly and
00:57:43.760
like that was how i got to the point of growing a following was i was flopping for days and weeks
00:57:48.020
and months and then one day something got a hundred thousand views and then one day something got a million
00:57:51.180
views and suddenly people were asking me for advice about how to do well on social media i'm
00:57:54.320
like right we could have started at the same time and you just like we were both flopping and you
00:57:59.020
gave up and i didn't because i wasn't embarrassed i have no shame exactly you're so mean i've literally
00:58:04.180
told like whenever people would say things like well why does she have all these things i i get hate
00:58:09.760
and i delete my stuff well it sounds like you have no follow-through it's not for everyone yeah that's
00:58:14.260
right trust me and i've told people before i'm like if you care at all about what people think
00:58:18.180
about you if you're worried about hate don't do it absolutely that's not the place to do it like
00:58:21.860
at all if you're worried people are gonna think you're annoying if you're worried people are gonna
00:58:25.060
think you're embarrassing if you think it's embarrassing to post on social media guess
00:58:27.760
what you shouldn't be have a social media you shouldn't do it and also like i know that there's
00:58:31.840
a lot of artists out there who want to be above social media and i get it i get that you're like
00:58:35.780
it cheapens the work it cheapens the art but i think that the two things can coexist i don't think
00:58:40.940
that my art is cheapened because i'm able to be funny on tiktok i don't think that my art is cheapened
00:58:45.340
because i'm able to get more people to listen to it by doing like a stupid gimmick like yeah you're
00:58:49.360
not a social person turned artist you're an artist that is utilizing social media exactly and like you
00:58:54.600
said it's like it really is how you look at it like how you perceive it and how you utilize it and
00:58:59.140
like use it to your advantage and the same way that you said like i was a flop too it's like that's
00:59:03.140
not the point of it i i think the same way about it negates the point of making art if the only
00:59:08.040
reason you're putting out is to go viral yeah well i think you're fucking amazing i am
00:59:12.040
and we're literally a paper doll look at us we're fucking twins literally difference literally you're
00:59:16.900
literally freaking me out and i also wear glasses too i should have worn my i should have worn my
00:59:23.220
fucking glasses damn well thank you so much for your jensen mccray halloween costume you can that's
00:59:27.220
right i'll wear this exact and and if you think i'm playing it's on camera so you watch me run this
00:59:33.780
back this october this coming october well thank you so much for coming on the show i fucking love
00:59:38.260
you oh my god i can't wait i do want to say really quick i do want to give you your flowers i
00:59:42.140
think you're so fucking talented and i can't wait to see how far you keep going i've been a fan since
00:59:47.700
day one where the fuck were y'all at exactly not with me i've been in the trenches for a while with
00:59:52.180
jensen yeah you and i moots moots oomfs for real well thank you so much for tuning into this episode
00:59:59.060
of the comment section show thank you to my amazing guest jensen mccray where can everybody find
01:00:03.780
um i'm at jensen mccray most places i think um and i think when this episode's coming out you can
01:00:09.420
listen to my new song praying for your downfall everywhere and watch the music video and i once
01:00:14.400
again i'm gonna say i was on the ground floor uh of jensen mccray's fandom okay anyways thank you so
01:00:20.100
much to my amazing guests thank you so much to all of you for tuning in and don't forget new episodes
01:00:24.020
of the comment section drop every wednesday you can stream the audio on all streaming platforms
01:00:27.720
but the video lists for free and exclusively on our favorite platform spotify which is perfect because
01:00:32.460
then you can go stream jensen's entire catalog and her new single and you can go and follow her on
01:00:37.120
everything obviously do it because i said so anyways thank you so much for tuning in thank you to my