Dan Debuf's Retirement Plan

Dan: Wait a minute!

Tommy: Frostface!

Dan: The Daily Talk Show, a conversation sometimes worth recording with Josh Janson and Tommy Jackett.

Josh: It's The Daily Talk Show, episode 241.

Tommy: We're in the Big Media Company HQ. We've got Dan DeBooth.

Dan: You guys say that like someone floating in the ocean just Like it's just them and a volleyball and they're doing their captain's log. It's day 241.

Josh: Yeah.

Dan: Alone on this wretched ship.

Tommy: It actually has been a good sort of energizer 'cause it makes you realize, fuck, we've actually done a few of these now and it's kept us going. It's been a good sort of staple for the show.

Dan: I've done 19 of my podcasts and every podcast when I record my little intro and I go, wow, 19. It's like how many radio shows I do, like hundreds. I've done 19 of these things.

Tommy: Have you counted how many radio shows you've done in your—

Dan: oh God, it'd be awful, wouldn't it?

Tommy: Thousands.

Dan: Yeah, I mean, I would have done my 10,000 hours.

Tommy: Definitely.

Dan: You know, that's the main thing, I think.

Tommy: I think so. You were doing 5 days a week. I was doing brekkie in Shepparton. You were in the city at that time doing the Drive show. And we worked it out, it was about 200 shows a year.

Dan: Sorry, what, you were tracking me?

Tommy: I was tracking you. No, I was tracking myself. 200 shows a year, you'd roughly—

Dan: actually, you probably got more holidays than us.

Tommy: We got fuck all. And it was—

Dan: I got great holidays. It was just, it spoiled me for life. Like, I honestly think the day I get to work, get a job in a real— get to work— when I find myself in the working way. Yeah, here for a work, please, sir. If I were to get a job in a proper company, I'd just be like, oh, I'm sorry, no, that's not how things work. Here's your task today, Dan. Oh no, I don't wanna do that. Well, that's your job. Oh no, that's not for me.

Josh: How do you explain to overseas people the Australian context of radio? Like how compared to other parts of the world?

Dan: How do you mean?

Josh: Like, well, I find that Australian—

Dan: Not like an ambassador.

Josh: Yeah, well, no, I feel like Australian radio, like when you were working in radio and you took, said to people, oh yeah, I work, work.

Dan: I had a really funny one actually when I was on holiday in Vietnam and I was on this tour and I got to talking with, um, just, you know, yeah, you talk to people in your group, just randos from different countries, and you're like, oh, what do you do, what do you do? And they're like, oh, what do you do? I was like, oh, actually, um, I'm Aussie. And they're like, oh, what do you do? I work in radio. And of course they go, oh, 'Did you see that storey about that nurse in the UK?' Because it had just happened. And I said, 'Yeah, I just signed a contract to work for that company about a week before it happened.' What do you remember?

Josh: What was the vibe like in the office?

Dan: I wasn't in the office.

Josh: But there was a sort of collateral damage after that. Like, I remember being at Fox at the time in 2015.

Dan: I was at Nova.

Josh: Yeah.

Dan: And then I—

Tommy: Adelaide, was that there?

Dan: Yeah, and then I left Nova and then I was on sort of when you have a contract, it'll say you can't work for another company for 3 months. You're sort of like toxic for 3 months after that. And then you're allowed to work for another company. So when Austereo, when I got like, I guess you'd say headhunted or whatever from Nova to Austereo, I couldn't start work until the end of March. So I had to spend— and they had signed me from the 1st of January, but I couldn't work until the end of March. So I spent 3 months not being able to do anything.

Tommy: But getting paid.

Dan: Yeah. That's genius. It's fantastic. I recommend it.

Josh: It'd be a good Fringe show. Toxic for 3 Months could be the title.

Dan: Radioactive Man.

Tommy: What happened when you came in?

Dan: Well, yeah, by then it was— it had been sort of months, and it was just such a completely different— like, no one on our show had anything to do with that, and we just sort of— we were like fresh, I guess.

Josh: Everyone was like, no prank calls though, right?

Dan: Oh yeah, that was— and that was such a relief because I hated doing prank calls. Yeah, first of all, I hated the pressure because it was like, I've got to call up someone and trick them. I hated doing it. I'd rather just talk to someone. And secondly, just— I don't know if people know this, but at least this was my experience, is it wouldn't always work the first time. You try a prank idea and it wouldn't work, and then you'd have to try it again and again, and you'd just be doing this same routine over and over again to try and see if it could eventually trick someone.

Josh: What sort of pranks do you remember doing?

Dan: We did some pretty good ones when it was me and Matt, Matt Saraceni. We were doing a show called The Action Battle Team and we had this late night show.

Tommy: Anything Flies Late Night.

Dan: Yeah. And again, this was in Perth, so it was a bit off-Broadway and it was pre-Royal Prank. So it was just like anything goes. And we did this one where And we got nominated for an Acura for it, so I don't feel too bad about it. But it was, um, there was— we had a word that the person on the other line, they didn't know obviously, but they had to say it. Um, when they said it, you would orgasm, right? And you had— so obviously you had to try and get them to say this word, and then you would just break out into orgasm. But up until then, what you would do is if they said "um" or "ah," you just had to do a sexual moan. So like, the one that worked really well was we rang a cinema and we had to get them to say the words "5 stars." Sure. If they said that, full orgasm. Until then, any "um," "ah," you just go, "Oh." Like that, just a little thing like that. And it's just quiet enough so they couldn't quite hear it. And they'd be like, "Did he?" "No." And they're in work mode, so they're trying to sort of, yeah, they're trying to get on with it. So you'd be like, "Have you got any good movies on tonight?" "Um, just let me have a look." And so like, and what would you say? How would you rate that movie? "Oh, it's pretty good." And you'd be like, "Oh." But you can't say 5 stars. You'd be like, "Ah." 'What if you were writing a review? What would you say?' And that sort of stuff. That was quite fun, actually.

Tommy: See, I like that because it's not too nasty. It's not.

Dan: But I still felt a bit bad about it because, you know, Muggins on the other line is, you know, just doing their job. And they don't know that they're going to be lampooned on Perth's third highest rating night show.

Josh: Yeah.

Dan: The Action Battle Team.

Tommy: You never would have known that something like that, like that. How many prank calls have been done in the world? And then that, the Royal prank, just getting through to a room in a hospital, getting transferred through, would cause what it did.

Josh: Well, it started off as a celebration. I remember when, when it first happened, as in when the prank call happened, there was a gap between when the prank call happened and when the nurse committed suicide.

Dan: And, and I mean, obviously it's just, again, no one would have ever predicted it, and It was also like the first kind of—

Josh: That was me referring to you, I'm joking by the way. Oh, nice. We're now doing it throughout the whole time.

Tommy: So what do you rate this podcast?

Dan: Oh no, we're not gonna get 5 stars. 5 stars. Yeah, there we go, get it done. But it was the first, you know, the sort of internet outrage culture that we all live in where everything is that, that's 100% wrong. And I mean, obviously it's an awful thing. No one's gonna go, "Oh, that was a fine thing." Like, it was one of the most awful things that could ever, ever happen to anyone in the course of their day-to-day work. You know, for that to happen because of you just trying to do a good job is absolutely just unfathomable. And I can't even understand, I can't even imagine how I would have felt going through that. But it was the first time— at least for me, the first moment where I realised that things can just get really horrible really quickly on the internet. I think of that Jon Ronson book, So You've Been Publicly Shamed, where— and the woman who wrote that, again, that awful tweet about, you know, going to Africa, "I hope I don't get AIDS," or whatever, and then got off the plane to find out she was the biggest villain in the world. And no one died from that.

Josh: Yeah.

Dan: You know, so it is just this thing where, 'cause people forget, right? That until the revelation that she'd taken her own life, Prince Charles was making jokes about it. Like, do you remember there was like someone came up to interview him and he goes, "Oh, you're not an Australian radio host, are you?" Like that. It was like, and you know, the Conan and stuff were doing bits about it. It was just seen as a funny thing. Now, we could also say like, oh dear, like we were all having a good laugh about someone prank calling someone in hospital with a slightly, quite serious condition. Like, and obviously the palace sort of played it down like, oh, it's just a bit of, she's a bit under the weather, stiff upper lip. But apparently, I don't know much about pregnancy or that sort of stuff, but apparently it was quite a serious condition in hindsight. But even then, like at the time, everyone was sort of like, "Ah, yeah, whatever." And then yeah, the second it went horribly wrong, it was, "Oh, well, I would never. I would never do that. And anyone who does it is awful." And it's like, you know, as with most things, a little bit nuance kind of helps and the truth probably lies somewhere in the middle. And yeah, I think it's kind of a good thing that since then I never really had to take advantage of someone over a phone line in that way. But I mean, you listen back to, you know, Matt Tilley's Gotcha Calls or Eric and Rosso, all these things. Well, I tell you what, this is one thing, right, is it's very easy in this modern day and age to forget, yeah, um, what things were like 10, 20 years ago. And I have this little thing that I always say is I'm like, well, every comedian over the age of 40 has a blackface sketch somewhere in their history.

Josh: Yeah. Well, Sarah Silverman talks about that, like, and the idea that these things get brought up from the past.

Tommy: Yeah.

Josh: In a new context.

Dan: Yeah, and we hold everyone to the standard of a woke city-dwelling, you know, millennial.

Tommy: There was Drake, black guy who did blackface.

Dan: Yeah, familiar with Drake.

Josh: Josh, I need to bring Josh up to speed. Did you say Jake?

Dan: No, Drake. Oh, so Francis Drake, yes, circumnavigated the world in the Golden Hind.

Tommy: Oh yes, he did blackface years ago, and he was— he's an actor, and he did it to highlight the, you know, the issues that were there. But he's a black guy and he got crucified for it. People used it as sort of some sort of bait to go—

Dan: me and my friend were thinking of writing a parody of '90s sketch comedy So, um, it's just super racist. Well, so what we did was we thought for research we'll go back and watch the best of Full Frontal. Yeah, on YouTube. And about— watch it for about 10 minutes and then it was like, oh yep, there's Sean McCarliffe doing his blackface sketch. Now Sean McCarliffe, right, like wokest dude ever, but go back 20 years and there he is, you know, he's pretending to be Eddie Murphy or something. Yeah. Well, should we lock him up?

Josh: Do you actually get comfort from that?

Dan: That's my happy place.

Josh: Anytime you do something wrong, it's like, yeah, at least I wasn't Sean McCallough doing Black.

Dan: Like, I never said the phrase, at least I'm not Sean McCallough. If anything, I've said the opposite. Why aren't I Sean McCallough?

Josh: So what is the You know, with everything that's happening, say with even the moaning sketch, sort of, you know, the calling up, the prank call, do you think, I feel like it's a very common phrase now. It's like, oh, you couldn't do that now. Do you push back on that? Couldn't do it now. Do you think that we should embrace, be embracing all of it? Is there, what does that middle ground look like?

Dan: Well, what I reckon, I mean, I'm not some sort of edgelord saying like PC's gone too far and why can't I do X whatever. Um, but we will be— I think if you're judging the past on future standards, you're setting yourself up for a real horrible future. Um, because we will be judged in 10, 20 years' time, and who knows what we do now. Um, I mean, I could— like, there's so many things like in 15 years' time, 20 years' time, my kids could be listening to this going, oh my God, I can't believe, I can't believe, Dad, that you just did a podcast and it was just 3 white dudes.

Tommy: Then fuck those kids, go to private school with that accent.

Dan: Damn straight. No, opposite. I'm like, well, you can't say you have faith in a system if you're sending your kids to private school. No, it's a sidebar. But, um, Steiner. But there's so many things like There's so many things right now. We were talking earlier while we were having coffee about eating meat and the sort of ethics around that. In 20 years' time, are our kids gonna look at us and be like, "I can't believe, I can't believe." Or like, you know, if you're a parent now and you've got a kid and you're feeding them meat, in 30 years' time, are they gonna go, "Why did you put that in my body? Why did you put that?" awful substance that was, I mean, God, ruining the planet.

Josh: Yeah.

Dan: Another one is like, even think further, like, is the next generation going to look at us and go, oh my God, you thought there was such a thing as privacy? That's so lame. Yeah. Privacy. Oh yeah, everyone knows what my dick looks like.

Josh: Yeah.

Dan: Well, I mean, the government can see my entire medical record, but that's just like called life.

Josh: Not Conspiracy Jimmy's though.

Tommy: He opted out.

Josh: This is our mate. We've got—

Dan: this is well-trodden ground.

Josh: Uh, no, we did meet like Conspiracy Jimmy.

Tommy: Uh, he's opted out of that health.

Dan: Wait, is that one of you in a funny hat?

Tommy: No, no, no, he actually— he's in there.

Dan: Oh no, bloody Conspiracy Jimmy's here again. Oh yeah, g'day guys. Uh, Freemasons control the world.

Tommy: You did an episode about— and someone who— like, oh man, yeah, that's your first episode of your podcast.

Dan: Yeah.

Tommy: Are you, um, are you a conspiracy guy?

Dan: I, I'm one of those people who, um, this is so bad for breakfast radio, but I, I get really nervous about having strong opinions on things because I'm always open to change and I'm always really, um, interested in alternative arguments. And I would love to just get to the end of my life and go, can't wait to, you know, find out what the answers were because I never committed to one.

Josh: Yeah.

Tommy: Do you feel like you were pushed into— like, breakfast radio, you kind of, you have the yin and yang of the duo and you kind of need to come with a solid side.

Dan: Maz and I are really good at that though. Maz and I are really good at that. And, and because I remember people are always like— I remember when we first started doing Sydney Breakfast and people would do these interviews with me and Maz and be like to Maz, oh, do you have to try and shut him up sometimes? As if I was like Karl Sanderlands or something. Or that, oh, you can't say that, Dan. Oh, that kind of thing. And I was like, Maz and I would both be like, what are you asking that for? Like, we just get on air and be us. And there were so many times when we genuinely were 100% opposite on things, which are great. Right? Because you can just fascinate and bewilder the other person with your incredibly strongly held opinion. But there are other times where you could just sense that there was a boss or a producer being like, "Couldn't you just have the opposite opinion? Couldn't you just—" And it's like, I mean, I remember way back, way back, I'm talking the first year I started broadcasting and there was a—

Tommy: How old were you?

Dan: Uh, so 22, 22.

Josh: Um, and I—

Dan: we're doing this nightclub event and this kid— I say kid, why would a kid be in a nightclub? He was also 22, probably. No, it was a listener event then. Maybe it wasn't, maybe it was just at a nightclub. It was a listener event because I remember this, maybe this guy's like 17, 18, I can't remember, right? Good anecdote, Dan. This guy comes up to me.

Josh: We're not going to be able to fact-check it, so feel free. Yeah, true.

Dan: All right, so I'm talking to Charles Barkley and he says, Dan, you're the coolest guy. No, no, uh, so he comes up to me, goes, oh, did your mum like the CD? That's what I said, like an OB. It was like an OB. Do you mum like CD? I went, sorry, what? Did your mum like the CD? I know, I was going like, I have no idea what you're talking about, man. He goes, you played this song by like Michael Bublé, and then afterwards you were like, I'm gonna get my mum that CD for Christmas? Did she like the CD? And of course what I'd done is, you know how you want to try and back sell the music with a bit of a fun sort of joke? I've been like, oh, get that one as a stocking stuffer for Mum, or yuck yuck yuck yuck yuck, the news. But, um, like, obviously this, uh, wonderful fan of the show had latched on to any bit of information they could find about their you know, this radio host that they love listening to. And I remember the same thing watching Channel V and seeing like Yumi Steins, Andrew G, James Matheson. These— I was never a radio sort of, I love radio kind of person, but those were my equivalent, right?

Josh: Did you watch Band in the Bubble? Do you remember that?

Dan: Yeah, that was great. Jabba just went off the deep end because he was locked in Federation Square for a month with a regurgitator or something. Yeah, I've heard storeys about that. But yeah, it's just like from that moment I just went, I can't lie 'cause I can't handle people going out there. And what if he'd said to his friends, oh yeah, Dan bought his mama a BooPlay CD, and that's not true. That's not true.

Josh: So did you tell him, do you remember your response?

Dan: I think I brushed it off. I couldn't break the guy's heart. I mean, this guy has built his life around the fact that Dan bought his mom a BooPlay CD. I can't, I can't, tear down the castle that he's built in his mind.

Josh: I mean, 2018 in some regards is the year of the personal brand. Everyone has a personal—

Dan: oh, 2010 was the year of the personal brand for me, man. I was living in Darlinghurst, Sydney, 2010. It was like the centre of the media marketing world.

Josh: But yeah, and now it's like peaked, right? Like, my mum has a personal brand now. Like, she will say— she would tell my dad, hey, when you go to the Qantas lounge, make sure you cheque in. That sort of shit. Yeah, yeah.

Dan: Wine time. I mean, what is the—

Josh: I've earned it. What's your view on personal brand? How did you navigate it within, uh, radio land? What'd you think about, like, how did you approach, this is who I am, this is kind of lucky, right?

Dan: Um, I had a good string of bosses who were super Dan fans. Um, They were like, the more you are you, the better the show will be. And they say the same thing to Maz as well. The more you are you, the better the show will be.

Josh: And you understood who you were? Did you ever question, like, is this something I do?

Dan: Like, if there's always— am I a grape or a nectarine? If I put into an in-joke about a conversation we had off air, they'll never know. Guys, we can do it. You idiots, you'll never know how cool our conversations are just this lame one that we do for broadcast. Uh, yeah, I hate my fans.

Josh: Yeah, you are in these situations where it's like you have to go and interview these celebrities or people that you might actually not be that connected with, and I guess it's a, a good moment. Someone out there is.

Dan: Yeah, that was always the most interesting part is, yeah, you might hate an artist, but at least one person out there, that's their favourite artist.

Josh: And so what is then the filters? Are you looking at Did you have— this is who— did you ever write on a piece of paper, this is who I am? This is—

Dan: I do that every goddamn day just to get through life. And what did that look like?

Josh: What is it actually?

Dan: What did you learn through that? It's very scary, um, when you come from more of a sort of comedy kind of world and you're sort of staring down the barrel of a company like Nova or Stereo owning your soul in a way, because you are trading on your personality, right? You're basically saying me as a human being is worth your time. So if they don't like you, then are you a bad person? And all that sort of stuff kind of. And especially when you do grow up more in a sort of Channel V, Triple J, Big Day Out kind of vibe. And then it's like, how good is a Pink concert? And you go, oh, really? And you know, you're 21 and that sort of stuff is still super important to you. You can't distance yourself from work and everything's super important. And I remember that whole vibe. I used to have like, uh, I still kind of do have long hair, but I used to have like proper like Noel Fielding, Mighty Boosh, like long hair, like spiky on the top. It was, it was 2006, dear listener. Like, forgive me all my crimes. Yeah, okay.

Josh: I don't know if people were still doing that. Was that a 2006 thing. Bush. Yeah. Oh, okay.

Dan: Yeah, Mighty Bush is 2006, my friend. Okay, but, um, yeah, like I'm talking like Tommy Lee from Mötley Crüe, like long—

Josh: I don't know any references, by the way. Fringe. Put it in your multimedia.

Dan: What about—

Josh: I saw, uh, the Queen film the other day.

Dan: It wasn't like Brian May. Okay, you don't know the Mighty Bush?

Josh: No, I don't watch it. What's that?

Tommy: Yeah, what's the line from there on the boat? And it's wacky comedy.

Josh: The only thing when I think of Mighty Boosh, I think of— is Little Britain in any way connected?

Dan: It's super tangential, around about the same time making British comedy.

Josh: Pretty happy with that then. British comedy. So, they're both British comedy. That to me is a win.

Dan: Is that a pass mark? It is a pass mark.

Josh: Good work, Harvey. I actually know one Little Britain scene, which is—

Dan: Just gonna go get a glass of water while you narrate the plot of Little Britain to everyone. Ferrero Rocher.

Josh: Someone must be doing well.

Dan: So I had this haircut and essentially I remember someone said to me, "Nova will make you cut your hair. Nova will make you cut your hair." And I remember being like, "Well, that's— I will never cut my hair. It's my Samson-like hair. I will never cut my hair." Just stuff like that.

Tommy: Did you cut your hair?

Dan: And did they make you? They make you cut your hair? Eventually. I ended up with far shorter hair. Yeah. And I look back on those photos and I'm like, this is, I'm talking drive breakfast kind of thing. I go, man, why'd I get my haircut so short? But you know.

Josh: Is it Stockholm syndrome that do you just sort of all of a sudden start like getting into, by the end of it, did you like Pink more at the end than you did at the start?

Dan: Hard to tell.

Tommy: Well, you'd met her and probably interviewed her a bunch of times.

Dan: Oh yeah, bloody hell, she wouldn't stop calling us. But yeah, she was in the country for fucking 4 months doing concerts.

Tommy: Get off your trapeze, man.

Josh: Get outta here.

Dan: I think, look, it's really easy to be like, oh, you become such a sellout when you do commercial media and that sort of stuff. And I'm like, come on, man. Like what does every office in the country, at least before Spotify, I don't know what it's like now, but like every office, they just turn the radio on and just have that playing in the background and on work sites. And you know, like also I turned 30, like you could be different between 21 and 30. 30. Like sometimes you just grow up. Yeah. And you've just become a bit more normal because you don't want to, you know, live in a share house your whole life. So it's very easy to be like, oh, you sell out when you do commercial radio. But also like people change. Yeah. Hairstyles change. Definitely.

Josh: And so how does that attach to the personal brand stuff, do you think? Like how does it—

Dan: I think, I think I was, as I said, I was really lucky to have— I hope you're editing this. Not at all. We make one podcast a day. We cannot edit. 'cause there are only so many hours. I was really lucky to have bosses, and I'm talking about people like Irene Hume, Sam Kavanaugh, Craig Bruce, who were just like, "Whatever you do is great. Just do whatever you do." And to Maz, do whatever you do. If anything, be more like you.

Josh: But that's what I'm trying to uncover, I guess, is to me that feels like a lot of pressure. Someone saying to me, "Be more like you," I think I would have a bit of a, crisis moment where it's like, well, what am I? Like, because it's when you were just you and you're just like day to day, it's like, well, maybe she's just saying compare yourself less.

Tommy: So don't look to— don't try and be who you think we—

Dan: well, it actually starts out creatively by copying. Yeah, like my first, say, 20 radio demos or like Midnight Till Dawn's or whatever, I probably sounded like 50% Hamish Blake, 50% Noel Fielding or Russell Brand. Probably, yeah, I'd say Hamish Blake, Russell Brand. I would listen to both their podcasts every day and just be like, that to me is good broadcasting, it's similar to my vibe. And I remember one of my mates who was living overseas and he messaged me one day and he was like, hey, I just randomly dipped into your podcast to see how you're going. He's like, you sound great and you sound like you. Like, and he actually said to me, he's like, I used to sometimes think, oh, that sounds a little Russell Brand or that sounds a little Hamish or whatever. And he'd be like, you sound like you. And I was like, oh, made it, made it, externally verified, made it.

Josh: Is that just like the constant doing it? Like I listen to our older episodes and I think that there's definitely a comfortability or whatever the fucking word is.

Tommy: What star rating would have you given those old ones?

Josh: Yeah, 3 stars. Um, the— but, um, I said um again. Uh, yeah, so I, I do, I do wonder about the— because you're, you're changing, like, you over a course of a career, you change a bunch of times. Yeah. That, and that pressure of—

Dan: I'm not doing those old blackface sketches anymore.

Josh: And so is it much of an internal— like, what was the struggle with especially being in a duo and understanding, like Tommy and I, I feel like we're having these conversations all the time where we had one end of last week where it was like, we'd been doing all this work on what videos we wanted to make. And we realised what we were trying to do is be more like each other. I was trying to get him up to speed with the stuff that I'm strong on. And he was trying to get me up to speed what he's strong on.

Dan: I mean, that's really important though. That's called learning. Like, that's like, like, I reckon, I mean, I remember when I started working in TV, what would that have been, mid last year? God, it feels longer ago than that. But anyway, when I first started doing stuff for Channel 10, and I just sent Maz a message and I was just like, oh my God, you taught me so much. Because yeah, when I must have started out with Maz in 2010, I was so green and I was probably pretty arrogant too. I mean, 'cause you know, Maz had been travelling the world with MTV and it kind of, you know, felt that was wrapping up and becoming a bit less, yeah, how MTV became a little bit less about music and a bit more about Jackass. So she was a bit like, oh, I kind of want to get out of there And she was like, 'Cool, I'll get back to radio.' But of course, you can't just start at the top. And she got teamed up with me and Matt, who are just these two 21-year-olds from Perth. Now, a bit older than that, but still, like, young. And I reckon in hindsight, she would have put up with so much of just me being like, 'Nope, that's not how comedy works,' or whatever, right? You know, I was never rude to her, but I probably would have been a bit like I, I've been doing improv and comedy for a decade— well, not a decade, but, you know, 7 years. And I just, I think she really would have had to do a lot of, I'll just let these two guys just sort of work themselves out. And she would help, like, here's how to— here's how the industry works and all this sort of stuff. But I feel like after however long we were on air together, for 8 years or whatever, she was so blisteringly funny, so unbelievably funny. Um, and I think we both sort of met in the middle because by the end of that 10 years, yeah, like, I knew how commercial media worked. I knew how to talk to clients. I knew like how to handle like, today this is your producer, today this is your producer. I just took it on my stride, 'cause that's just how the business works. Whereas if that had happened 10 years ago, I would have been like, "Ah, why isn't my dream 100% perfect?" So we kind of, you learn from each other and you get those best things from each other. And yeah, I mean, if she'd been paired up with, you know, like a proper presenter, you know, like a shiny floor, we'll see you after the ads kind of person, I don't think she would have— I'm not going to say I taught Maz how to be funny because she's bloody hilarious since day dot.

Josh: But you learned so much.

Dan: Yeah, like we just rubbed off on each other and she pursued that more. Yeah, that's—

Tommy: yeah, well, I think the realisation from these— Josh and I thinking maybe we sort of be the same or sort of find this. So we come from my background, Josh's background, meet the middle with both of ours and then do this thing together. The realisation was that it makes you double down on both of your own strengths. And then it's like, I kind of know my style and what I do, and then you sort of defining that for you. I think it's just like a— it's the journey of a duo.

Dan: Well, there's this thing of like, let's say, you know, like SWOT analysis, where it's like strengths and weaknesses. That if you look at your strengths and your weaknesses, right, your strengths in the next 10 years are gonna go ballistic. So my strengths when I was in my early 20s were like— Your hair. You know, my hair. I mean, look at it now, right? It's finally about, yeah. Still strong, really strong. It was the bush days. Things like improvisation or quick thinking or whatever. That was kind of what I was really good at. What was I not so good at? I don't know, let's say— Is it then structure?

Josh: Do you find that if someone who's good at improvisation, do you then have insecurities about being able to do the reads or have it make sure that you—

Dan: No, 'cause improvisation is all about structure. You just don't want it to look that way. It's like my hair. It looks messy, but I've messed it up just the perfect way. But yeah, so like your strengths, are going to go ballistic. But the things— let's say you're at about 80%, you're at about 80% skill level. In 10 years, you'll be at like 190%, more than double, right? Because you've just practised it so much, you're so much better than the vast majority of people. Your weaknesses, like let's say, uh, let's say organisation or something like that. If I'm at like 30% organization, like, oh, I'm forgetting to reply to emails and stuff, you'll get to 60% in 10 years. Yeah. So look at that disparity, right? It was like 80/30, now it's like 260. But the thing is you're better than half the population now at the stuff you aren't even good at, right? So that's the kind of thing is like, yeah, sure, you'll never be like, let's say to really simplify it, one is funny, one is business. Sure, the business guy will never be as funny as the funny guy and the funny guy will never be as business as the business guy, right? But if you keep rubbing off on each other and you keep like low-key polishing your weaknesses, you'll be better than most people at the things you're bad at, just because that's how it works.

Josh: Did you find it? I find that being in a partnership can sometimes uncover the insecurities in me, in that my partner being really good at one thing or being able to do one, and me feeling like, well, I should be able to do more.

Dan: As well, and because you see someone be so good at something and you're not, you're like, well, there's my problem. That'll be my undoing. That's what'll get me in the end. I can't coast by on my skills forever because my weakness will drag me down. So that whole thing of like, it's like a bias towards the negative. You can get 1,000 comments saying, this is such a funny video, and the one going, here's why this is bad.

Josh: Yeah, you focus on it.

Dan: That's the one comment you read and you remember for the rest of your life. Yeah. And that sucks, but I mean, at the end of the day, you could flip it and say, isn't it great that I managed to find someone to work with who fills that gap? So you kind of fit together like the two L-shaped Tetris pieces.

Josh: Yeah. Do you find, do you naturally lean towards positive over negative?

Dan: Or I try to, especially as I grow older. Yeah, probably when I was, you know, in my early 20s, I was a lot like, I suffer for my art, whereas now I kind of go, it's pretty good. Yeah, things are pretty good like that. Like, yeah, things aren't perfect, and yeah, I can see where things will improve, but it's not bad. Like, you know, I get to have a podcast and own a Lego pirate ship, you know, it's pretty cool.

Tommy: Do you compare yourself to other people?

Dan: Um, again, I probably try not to because I think if— so it's inevitable. Well, you've got to have a sense of where you are. Like, I don't know if I compare myself so much to other people, but I compare myself to what I, like my potential, like what I wish I was doing or where I wish I was, or you play that game of like, if everything from now on for the next 5 years goes absolutely perfect, where could I be? If every opportunity goes up exponentially, you know, if I, oh, I might put a podcast out and it becomes the best podcast in Australia, or I might have a meeting with that person and they give you a job. If everything goes 100% perfect, what could I be capable of? So I sort of, that's kind of what I compare myself. And then sometimes you'll see someone else already doing it. Yeah. And you'll go, you kind of have that. So again, positivity, negativity, half of me will go, damn it, they stole my dream. And the other half will go, my dream was on the right track. Yeah. Like I, had a weird thought that maybe someone like me could do something like that. And they, that person proves that I'm not delusional. Yeah.

Tommy: Extreme ownership of your situation. If you're looking to somewhere else in there, somewhere where you think you wanna be, but then you look at your own life and go, this is where I've got myself to. And so if the only way forward, what's it like thinking—

Dan: Well, you have everything you need to get to where you're gonna go, right? So I always think, one thing I always say to my girlfriend is I'm like, one day we're both gonna be in our 60s just sitting on a porch and I'm gonna turn to you and I'm gonna say, told you so, told ya. And she'll go, yeah, all right. And I'll go, yeah, I said it. I said one day it would all work out and we'd be fine. And look, how good is this? And that's like, I don't know what the journey is gonna be like in between there, but I can't wait. I think I might just set a date for it, like set a reminder. Told you so. And just look at her and just be like, told you so. She goes, gah! Like, yeah, it is pretty good. But that's what I reckon.

Tommy: Well, the as if mindset of living now as if it's going to work out really, really well. And so the decisions you make, the choices you make.

Dan: Yeah, so I play futsal, like indoor soccer. Whereabouts? What, are you stalking me now?

Tommy: No, my uncle owns indoor futsal Saturdays. Yeah, well, he's got the one at Albert Park. Brunswick, South Yarra. So you might play at one of these?

Dan: No, I play— it's in school gyms. Ah, but in school gyms, is that what you just said? Over there and over there. So Carlton North and Fitzroy. Yeah, but, um, I, I remember I was watching a game because I just like to watch games after I play, just because I like to watch games. And, um, I remember the goalie from one of the really good teams said something and he was like, to one of his players. He was like, just assume I'm gonna make the save. Love it. Because so motivation from the futsal corner. Yeah, right. So as in, because the ball had come down, Tony Robbins playing.

Josh: Yeah, yeah, playing it like Carlton. Um, but he's a big guy, he'd be able to cover the whole—

Dan: and he's fearless. Yeah, that's the number one thing in a goalie, fearless and big hands.

Josh: Yeah, huge.

Tommy: He actually puts coals down, so he's on coals.

Dan: Oh yeah, yeah, try scoring now. So, uh, the— obviously the defender had come back to stand in the goal because the goalie had gone out to make the save, and then the goalie then had no one to throw to because the defender was now further behind the play and then had to run it. I was like, mate, I'm gonna make the save, just get out there and wait for the goal opportunity. Um, so that's something I've always— well, not always, it only happened a few weeks ago, but, um, I've just been toying with my head, is the idea of just assume I'm gonna make the save. Yeah, it's good. Like, why plan? I'm— you, you guys on the show It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia? I've seen a couple of episodes. Yes. Yeah, cool. So, um, Charlie, the, the guy— his name's Charlie in real life as well— he— I saw him say this thing where he's like, I've never wanted to have a plan B because it'll muddy up my plan A. And it is that thing of like, look, I, I, I've I'm 33. Like, I've done all right and I've got a worst-case scenario in my head, right? Like, and I'm talking like it's even better than moving in with mum. Like, it's not even that bad, you know what I mean? So it's like, why not? Why not just go out there and make that save like why not just give it a go, make a really smart risk? I remember when someone said to me, they were like, I was at law school and I was doing these demos for radio and I was like, you know what, I think I'm gonna bloody do radio. I think I'm gonna, like I've still got 2 years left of law, but I can do radio at night and I can do law during the day. I think I can do it. And someone's like, it's risky, isn't it? It's risky. And I was like, I'll be honest, I think looking at my life right now, I think sticking with law is a bigger risk. Like I look at how my brain works. At the same, like I was literally, this is quite funny actually, but I was literally being investigated at uni for academic collusion because one of my essays was really similar to my mate's essay. And just so you know, I didn't get found guilty.

Tommy: It was just a coincidence. That doesn't mean that he wasn't actually guilty, he just didn't get found guilty.

Dan: Well said. And can you tell that I was a law student? Because you see how I phrased that? I feel like he didn't even do it. Yeah, thank you, Your Honor. Um, was this connected to the Mueller investigation? Yeah, exactly right. Not found guilty. Never found guilty. Um, but, uh, at the exact same time, I was literally sitting in this like top story, like a boardroom, in front of like 5 academics from the University of Melbourne sort staring at me across the table being like, justify why there are these similarities in these papers. Like the same day I got a phone call from Nova saying, we'd love to have you as the late night radio host on Thursdays from midnight till 2:00 AM. And I was just like, you know, you chase the heat, don't you? And it was so obvious that there was just this message from the universe. I sound like Maz now, but this is another way he's rubbed off on me. Um, just this message from the universe going, Dan, you're so much better suited to like sitting in a chair and saying what pops into your head than you are to sitting in an office like basically looking at documents all day.

Tommy: Like, and so what popped into your head and what did you say to them?

Josh: Fuck you, I'm out.

Dan: No, I stuck with it. I finished the degree.

Josh: Oh, did you?

Dan: Yeah, I got a full law degree. Full law degree.

Josh: Fucking full on. Fuck, that's more than a high school degree. So I love how he—

Dan: yeah, I got a law degree and then I got an English cultural studies degree. Yeah. And you show me a poem and I can analyse the shit out of that poem.

Josh: Yeah, actually, right, I've got a poem that he's written.

Dan: No, that D is for delightful.

Josh: No, I've— in my— in Chrome, I don't know if I've gotten rid of it, but there's— I had for, I think I may have, but for weeks and weeks and weeks, yeah, I literally, I did. There was a— Sending your poems? No, I had written down a name of a poem that I wanted to read. Anyway, that's a shit story. So how important was it for you?

Dan: It's called "Santa's Coming for Christmas." No, if you want a good book on poetry—

Josh: Yeah, can you please recommend one?

Dan: It's called something like "How to Read Poems and Fall in Love with Poetry." Something like that.

Josh: Okay, I'm just gonna write How to Fall in Love.

Dan: Edward Hirsch is who it's by. Yeah, just write it.

Josh: Okay, good.

Tommy: So how important was it to— so because at that point, I think I could speak for Josh and myself, we would have gone, fuck you all, I'm out of here, I'm not finishing this degree, you petty pricks.

Dan: But I'm not that kind of person, am I? Like I said before, I'm not like a big opinions person.

Josh: So what did you say?

Dan: Do you remember when they're like, please, please, please don't expel me, please, please, please, please, please, please. The only reason our essays are similar is because we both went to law at UWA and we're doing one year in Melbourne. So we're relying on the same case law. Like it was just hell suspicious because yeah, we literally cited the, I don't know how much you know about law school essays. I know a lot. But they're boring. Yeah, yeah. Mine weren't, mine were exceptional. But the, you basically everything you say, you've got to then do a footnote saying what case or legislation backs it up. Or which scene of The Mighty Boosh it's from.

Josh: Yeah, exactly, right?

Dan: Soup, soup, super tasty soup. Uh, so we cannot accept this. Um, so me and Matt, who were housemates and also doing radio together, um, had handed in these papers that we'd written separately. And of the whole— because we're from Perth, we'd done 4 years at Perth and now we're doing 1 year at Melbourne Law School. And, um, out of the whole cohort who'd all submitted these papers our two were like completely different to what everyone else had written because they had all these WA cases. Yeah, because that's what we'd been taught. Even the way that we, um, structured it was like, A, different to everyone else, and B, completely the same.

Josh: WA is a little bit like Texas, isn't it? Like, people who are from WA—

Dan: I wouldn't know, it's all I've known. But you—

Josh: so you have— but there's like, there's that phrase, it's like WA celebrities, like there's personalities Yeah, personalities.

Dan: I've just written a musical all about WA and personalities. Where is it going?

Josh: Where are you going? Per Fringe. Oh, awesome.

Dan: That's what I've been working on this year. Oh, that's cool. Yeah. But yeah, so I was like, this is what, I know it looks similar, but I cannot stress you enough. We wrote them like independently, but obviously they're gonna be the same like that. So they were like, did you ever have a conversation with this person? I'm like, oh, I live with him and do a radio show with him. I know, your honor, but it was just like, yeah, this massive moment where I was just like, yeah, at the time I was like, I know exactly what I wanna do, but I'm not gonna be like, fuck you, I don't want a degree. I was just like, I think I can have both. And I did. That's cool. So yeah.

Josh: What's the, Tim Ferriss has this question that he asks and he always adds a bunch of context to it like he normally does, but I'll just ask it straight. What's one thing that you believed a year ago to be true that you don't believe to be true today?

Dan: Ah, that's a good bamboozler. A year ago. Well, it's quite convenient doing this in December because like it's really easy to think. January.

Tommy: I've got one.

Josh: It's not about you. I've got one for Dan. Well, like, can we—

Dan: What, you know what I believed in January?

Josh: Yeah, but well, don't tell him. Let's just—

Dan: Nah, go on. No, it's from when we caught up.

Josh: It's from when we caught up.

Tommy: It's from when we caught up. Okay, from listening. You said you had that conversation with your girlfriend about the musical. And there was that time ages ago, I think it was around what you've written, what you've now done.

Dan: Yeah, actually, well, if you just fucking take what Tommy said, that was actually somewhere in my mind because I was thinking, uh, permit me, permit me, it's a hard question to stump someone with.

Josh: That's why I think it's very— literally like the, uh, I feel like I'm on the board of University of Melbourne or whatever. I feel like I'm watching Mum and Dad.

Dan: Fine. And you guys, there was no— sorry, there was no collusion here. I came up with my own independent thought. I was acting— you can't tell what was in my mind.

Josh: There was definitely, isn't this convenient? That's exactly what I was thinking.

Dan: One thing that I have really learned this year is that, um, the confidence. Yeah, yeah, you can, you can bullshit your way through anything. Um, but it is like, it's very easy to think of why things won't work, right? And I do that a lot. That's a very law school thing. 'Cause if you imagine like you go see a lawyer, what do you want to hear from them? Oh, you'll be fine. Or, okay, here's all the problems, so let's address them. That's why lawyers always want you to talk.

Tommy: Here's where they're going to catch you.

Josh: Yeah. Correct. Mr. Trump, right? So, is that the critical thinking sort of worst case scenario? Like what could go wrong?

Dan: Well, I spent a long time not putting out a podcast, right? I had the idea for my podcast in September last year and I didn't release it until August this year. And that was because I was thinking of every reason why I shouldn't, every reason. And again, like what we said before, or I said before about straight white dudes hosting podcasts, like that was literally one of my thoughts. I genuinely went, well, why do we need another podcast with a straight white dude hosting it? And I was like, oh, well, if that's the case, then I should just never do anything ever again, right? And also to make myself rest easy, I promised myself that the first 10 guests wouldn't be straight white dudes. But it was the same with the musical because it was my girlfriend's idea and she's the producer. And she has always been obsessed with this guy, Tony Gilardi, this personality guy who it's about, right?

Josh: And is he like on the news? Is he an anchor? What does he do? What's his—

Dan: Mate, he's a potato farmer/grocery entrepreneur. Fuck yeah. He's absolutely phenomenal. And he took on the corporate fat cats and he won. It's like the Castle meets the Wogboy meets Hamilton.

Josh: Is Frank Walker from National Tiles, is he a national hero or just in Victoria?

Dan: 'Cause I remember when I moved over here to do radio and everyone was like, "Hello, National Tiles." I'm like, "I'm sorry, what?" Mate, come on. Talk to me about Tony Gilardi, please. Tony Gilardi, okay. But yeah, and I remember I came up with 1,000 reasons why it wouldn't work. 1,000 reasons from, "Oh, we don't have enough time." to I've never, I can't sing or do music, even through to like, no one's gonna wanna work with a boyfriend/girlfriend creative partnership 'cause they'll be too nervous to sign on. And I mean, we all know how the storey ends. I'm putting a show on at Fringe next year. I've written my first ever musical, right? From go to whoa, I wrote the whole thing. And it's just like, there's thousands of reasons why you could go, Oh, here's why this might not work.

Tommy: When is a reason good enough?

Dan: I think, you know, I always have this thing that I always tell myself that is, if you're gonna do it, then you're gonna do it. So like I can, there are definitely things, my poor tax return is one of them where I haven't done it. And it's, I don't beat myself up about it. Like the podcast, like, as I said, it took me a year,, but I did it, but for a while there I didn't. And I think it's because it just wasn't the moment. It just wasn't right. Sometimes you need a shove.

Tommy: Well, we were talking about that, about, so I've done a few videos. There was one that did well this year for me. And I had the idea a year ago and I sat on it. And I feel like in hindsight, the waiting and the sort of umming and ahhing and do I have enough, was actually what got it to where it was.

Dan: And then it was, you know, went a bit viral and it was on the Project.

Tommy: And I was like, was it a coffee quest or something? Yeah, yeah, the coffee one. That's good, that was really good. So it's like, if I actually held— if I did it ages ago, would have it had the success that it actually did? And so you start fucking building this storey around, and no one knows the answer because we didn't have a crystal ball. And but your point was— what was your point? Because we were discussing about when you actually listen to that inner voice.

Josh: Well, I was just, I was thinking when Tommy was saying I needed to sit on it. Yeah. I was saying like, it's just like, that's a convenient storey for the time that you did.

Dan: Like you literally— I call it marinating. I like, I call it marinating. So it's like, you kind of, you know what you've got. Yeah. And then you kind of go, cool, I'm gonna go work on 3 other things while that just stews away. And I think as long as you've always got something marinating too, like I've got about, maybe 3 to 5 ideas right now that are super loose. Like, some of them are a sentence, some of them are a text document. Um, and I'd say, let's say there's 5 of them, 4 of them will never see the light of day, and one of them perhaps. I don't know which, but they're all just sort of floating loosely around for when I have free time, like post-Musical or whatever, right? Um, but yeah, there's nothing wrong in just letting that all just funk around in your head. And maybe one day, yeah, you'll just go, oh, oh yeah, or you, you'll say it to someone else, right? Like you'll catch up with someone else and you'll say it and they'll go, oh, here's how you could do that. And you go, oh really? Yeah, yeah, the timing thing can align.

Josh: Like the Daily Talk Show, yeah, was a bunch of like me thinking about podcasting for like 12 years of cotton doing bits and pieces, and it didn't feel like— this felt like the first proper attempt at giving it a go.

Tommy: But what I do know is that it doesn't have to feel good. So that Obike video I did that was last year that went well, I did not wanna make that on the day I made it.

Dan: I felt a bit shit. I love that so much when you hate something. Yeah, I felt a bit shit.

Tommy: I was like, yeah, I'm tired.

Dan: You know what I tell myself about that is that that's how everyone feels when they're doing their job every single day. You're not special. Sometimes you have bad days at the office, just do it.

Tommy: I know that's the thing. But then when it's a creative that, it totally relies on initiative. There's no one telling you go and do it.

Dan: Oh, that's 100% true. That's why I do the podcast every Wednesday it comes out, 'cause otherwise I'd just be like, bye. Yeah.

Josh: But I think there's the paradox too in you are not special at all and you are really special. Like the thing that I've been thinking about lately is 100 reasons why I shouldn't do something. And it's always pointing to all these examples of people saying, oh, look, this person did this. You know, like there's, All these advice, all advice around you've got a niche, you've got to do this, you've got to do that. If you're not doing these things, then it's not going to work. But then I've also been thinking about like, what if you are the exception? Like if you want to create something that's awesome and you believe in it, like, so that's what I'm trying to filter through now, which is that, which is almost the opposite of the you're not special, you can't do it. It's like I am actually in the position to do this. I think I can do it. And the only thing that's going to stop me doing it is the bullshit storey that I tell myself that I can't do it. And so, if I think about it like I am the exception and I'll make it work.

Dan: But also, like if you get away from that whole like, you know, Steve Jobs, what kind of dent do you want to put into the universe, all that sort of stuff. And I mean, I just find it so reassuring to just go like, Dan, what's your goal? And I'm like, to get to the age of 65 and go, that was awesome. And then relax from then on. That's my goal. I don't care about anything else.

Josh: Do you think that's a bit of a destination focus? Like, do you think about—

Dan: No, 'cause I don't know what I'm gonna do and where I'm gonna be.

Josh: But you can imagine retiring? 'Cause I could never imagine retiring.

Dan: Oh, I'm just so keen to retire. Really? I'm desperate to retire.

Josh: I feel like that's not a very common—

Dan: I finished up radio at the end of 2016, and it's now, I've had 2 years of just like freelance work And I tell you what, man, like if someone said to me, like, here's $10 million and— Make it last. Yeah, I would be like, I'll buy a nice house, I'll invest the rest, and I'm just gonna sit and read and hang out with my friends and eat cured meats and just relax. I know, right?

Josh: So you love the relaxing thing, 'cause there is the, I think especially Americans, American culture, it's like the, you know, working really hard and the hustle.

Dan: Yeah, Protestant work ethic.

Josh: Yeah. And it's also changed in regards to like, it feels like people used to really promote like the luxury lifestyle or like relaxing lifestyle now. But if you look at on Instagram, so many people are posting, you know, people who are super well off, they want to post about how they're working really hard. And like that has become almost a higher status than just having a podcast.

Dan: Yeah, I know, and that's why I kind of like this idea of like, I think a lot of that, but you're right, a lot of people work hard just because that's what they think they should do. Like I still wanna create stuff, I still wanna experience that sort of creative frenzy that when you have an idea in a brainstorm and suddenly everyone just leaps on it, it's like, oh my God, and this and that, and you're like, oh my God, the pathway's become clear. Clear and, you know, like that feeling and all that sort of stuff. And even like what we're doing today, like this is work.

Josh: Yeah, it doesn't feel like it, which is—

Dan: And also it's just us sitting around shooting the shit. We could do it for a few more hours if I didn't have to get a haircut in 45 minutes. Don't cut it, don't cut it off, please.

Josh: But like you just said, what do you ask for when you get a haircut, by the way?

Dan: I got a guy, so he knows.

Josh: You just say, yeah, I want to have a Dan, like Josh said, like you with your coffee.

Dan: Yeah, I'll just have a me.

Josh: Why did I sound awkward when I said that?

Dan: Because you were asking for a coffee called a me. Okay, sure.

Josh: Because I didn't, I didn't feel comfortable. I call it a Tommy. In the, in the moment, I didn't feel like I could do it.

Dan: My voice cracked as I said it. I just get a long black. I just go, just fill a cup with hot brown coffee and I'll drink it. I just— But, um, yeah, so it is that idea of like Here's your aim. Like you talk about, you know, am I special or is no one special or all these sorts of things. And it's like, I don't know, man. All you should wanna do is get through and have a good time doing it. Yeah, I like that. That's all I think. All I wanna do is get to the end and go awesome. Because if you worry too much about like, oh, but am I doing this right? Am I doing that right? Have I done, have I lived up to this, to this? What you're talking about, like, um, uh, the ideas that you have and you haven't done. Like, I've never done a stand-up set ever in my whole life, and I agonised through my whole 20s, from the age of 20 to the age of 30. Every— I'd say at least once a week, I would go, why have I not done stand-up? Why am I so scared of the judgment? Why am I so nervous? You know, I could do improv, I could host a radio show, I could be on camera, I could do everything, but something about stand-up just made my skin crawl. Just that vulnerability, the, the, "Hi, these are the jokes that I've written. I really, really, really want you to like them." And so what was the conclusion?

Tommy: The 10 years?

Dan: Well, I don't know. I just got to the age now of 33 and I go, "Oh well." Is it just age? Guess I'm never gonna do stand-up. Yeah. I don't care.

Josh: What is that realisation though? Is that in like—

Dan: It's not for me. It doesn't fire my pleasure centers. But how do you get there?

Josh: Like, is it going to therapy? Is it actually doing it? I didn't go to therapy about stand-up. No, but that's what I wonder, is it because like you've had that, like, so it's through doing or not doing or you getting to a moment where it's like, I could either feel these feelings or I can just like be fine with it?

Tommy: Well, regret's a bitch. And I think it's probably just a mindset shift. Do you regret anything? No, no.

Josh: Do you regret? I regret Tommy saying bitch. No, I'm joking.

Dan: Well, there's been far worse words said in this podcast. That's very true.

Tommy: So you get, so the shift of going, I'm okay with not doing that. Were you looking outside and thinking everyone else is doing it?

Dan: But even like I got my dream job. Like when I was a kid, as I said, in Melbourne, I'd listen to Hamish and Andy every day with a notebook open, writing notes, trying to teach myself how to do a drive show.

Josh: What did those notes look like, by the way? What would you write? Just like—

Dan: Driving you home. Nah, more like 2 sentences on, like recapping the news story, then a joke, and the jokes take the following formats. Um, and then like, uh, then you ask for callers. I just broke down the format. Yeah, and it's like you can work out how to make jokes pretty easily. Like, it's just stuff like, um, uh, like my favourite one— this is such, like, this is such low-hanging comedy fruit. Perfect. You're a grape. Do it. This is like the lowest-hanging comedy fruit you could ever get. I feel bad even saying it. It makes such good radio. Is any storey about an animal. Any storey about an animal. Yeah, be the animal and then it's funny. So if there's a storey about a, uh, let's say that giant cow, right? You go, oh, Maz, do you see this? Um, Nick is the giant cow. Giant cow. It's twice the size of every cow in the herd. Oh, hello there. I'm so tall. And everyone just That's hilarious. That's genuinely hilarious. The amount of times I've done a segment about a funny animal and acted it out and it's made the promo and it's made the best of the end of the year and people come to me and go, "Oh my God, when you were that spider." Like, yeah.

Josh: So it would be like the equivalent.

Dan: Just learning stuff like that.

Josh: Yeah. Well, no, actually there was a, I saw a mousetrap the other day and I was thinking to myself, I wonder if that mouse is like, "Oh no, not the mousetrap." Boom.

Dan: How much better did that storey just get? How much did you just laugh then? Tommy laughed. You fell for it. Was it good? I am a basic bitch.

Josh: You drunk the Kool-Aid. So do you feel like there hasn't been—

Dan: But I got to that job, right? So I got to sit in literally the exact same chair with the same producer for the same company doing the same time slot, right? It was phenomenal. I did it for 9 months.

Josh: Is it sort of phenomenally like 8, 10 months? Is it underwhelming in some regards? Like you hear people who reach the top—

Dan: No, it's the opposite of underwhelming.

Josh: So you felt that it exceeded all expectations?

Dan: I was on cloud nine for a year.

Tommy: And so when— So it was, it aligned, so that destination that you had in your mind aligned with when the reality of the destination was the reality in your mind, so it actually was great. Yeah, because I've set goals and got there and like, this is fuckin' shit, I'm a different person now.

Dan: Well, I mean, I'll probably never do that again. That's the thing for me is like I did my dream job for a year. Like my wildest dream, my wildest dream. If you'd asked me, Dan, think up the craziest possible dream you could about what you could one day do for a job. Like I remember when I used to work at Coles when I was a teenager and the walk from my house to Coles went past the 92.9 it's now Hit in Perth Studios. And I would walk past and think, God, I wonder what that— I wonder what's going on in there. Yeah. Or maybe if I look cool as I walk past, they'll be like, get that guy on the radio, you know. Like, it works. Crazy dreams. Crazy dreams. I got to do it.

Josh: Do you think that the, um, people who have a similar dream— like, what's the equivalent dream nowadays for people, do you think? Like, do you think that there has been a shift in how radio is perceived, or do you think it is?

Dan: I don't know. I mean, it's still bloody great, isn't it? I mean, you know, we're enjoying sitting here. Imagine if we were getting paid a million bucks to do it. Not that I was, I should say, but I'm sure some people are. Yeah, exactly. I would never sign a million dollar contract. Are you insane? Yeah. I'm sorry, there seems to be a zero missing off this contract. It's funny.

Tommy: I mean, hearing— what I've found underwhelming is meeting people who have had a lot of success and it's nothing how they sort of tracked to that success was nothing how I thought it was going to be of setting goals, fucking achieving, knowing what, you know, it's luck. It's like you literally had this dream that I'm sure so many people have had, be a Hamish, and you made it and you made it happen, but it wasn't some tactic, like the way you sort of break it down wasn't like this real—

Dan: No, I was just saying yes and work. It's this idea of like magic things happen when hard work meets opportunity. Yeah, right. And you can't control opportunity. Like, yeah, you know, you can hustle a bit or be in the right place at the right time. Like, I was with— working with my mate Matt, and we both knew that Nova was desperate for a Hamish Nandy. It was pretty obvious, right? Like, Australia had Hamish Nandy, Nova didn't. They needed a cool male duo. We thought, let's pitch ourselves. Um, but yeah, like, when hard work meets opportunity, when, when opportunity comes knocking and someone says, oh, okay, cool, I will give you that radio show knowing that, man, you know what, I might be 21, but I've done years of improv and putting on show comedy shows and all this sort of stuff. But I reckon, like, I remember my boss at the time, Todd Campbell, was like, oh yeah, give us a demo, I'll rate it from shit to really shit and we'll go from there. And I said, what's the rating? And he went 5 stars.

Josh: Oh geez, he just showed his hand about how you're disgusting.

Dan: So glad I don't have sex with you.

Josh: I panicked, I panicked. I'm sorry, that was a panic. It was a stroke.

Dan: Yeah, I know.

Josh: Yes, it didn't feel good for me either, just to be clear.

Dan: That's a typical orgasm as well. It was shameful. I could feel just Jesus standing in the corner with his arms crossed, just shaking his head.

Josh: So much shame.

Dan: So he rated it? Yeah, he said, you know what, it's pretty good. And all I could think was, we like it. I should bloody hope so. Yeah, so, but yeah, I mean, you just keep doing hard work and hoping for opportunity, and eventually you get Yeah, you're on that porch at the age of 65 and you're going, all right, let's cash in that cheque now.

Tommy: So if the dream was big back then, is there any sort of reverse engineering it? What do you mean? The kid that walked past the radio station that actually was on the Drive show replacing Hamish and Andy years later to now going, what's that for you now?

Dan: As in, what would I tell that kid?

Tommy: No, for you.

Dan: So for you looking forward now, because you got to that dream.

Tommy: But the next dream, are you trying to reverse engineer it?

Dan: I just have one of my friends— Has your house got a porch? You're gonna need a porch. It's got a shitty balcony. Okay. I've got a shitty balcony.

Josh: 'Cause you could almost do a minimum viable balcony now. Yeah, exactly right. Cassie, now.

Dan: Yeah. One of my friends said to me, and she said it a year or two ago when I was sort of just finishing up in radio, but she said it to me again the other day, and it is, um, the weird part is now is the job, that next job doesn't exist yet. Like, you know, um, the, the world is changing so much now that I just don't think there's any point in looking at a specific thing and going, that's what I want to do, because in the time it'll take you to get there, that won't be what you want to do anymore.

Josh: So what do you focus on?

Dan: Skills? Yeah, yeah. Oh, definitely. That's sometimes— yeah. And also, um, I focus on variety now because I spent 10 years just working on radio and nothing else. And I got to the end of radio and like literally they were like, oh cool, well we'll replace you with The Bachelorette. And I'm like, like, you know, Sam Frost, great chick, good on her. Like she's kicked so many goals. Um, but like you can get that job without the 10 years experience.

Josh: Yeah.

Dan: So I feel like I spent 10 years building up all this experience in something that was like, you don't need that much experience to do it. I was like, oh god damn it, I should have, should have spent that like learning how to code. Yeah. Well, so how good I'd be.

Josh: So that is part of it though. That is the— so that like, uh, you know, 9 months or whatever it was where you were on air Was the time when you worked out or found out that you didn't have a job, did you, what was that actual reaction in your head? Was it, I should have been doing the coding? Like what was the actual thought process?

Dan: Yeah, again, we talked about regrets before. There's very little that I regret. It'd be hot, you'd be a real sad person if you got to do your dream job and then were pissed off about it. And also, I mean, look, so how do you reconcile that? I signed a 2-year contract. Like, I'm a law student by nature. I signed a 2-year contract. So they didn't owe me anything more than that. They can tell me, oh, it's for 10 years, but they don't owe me that. So I'm fine with it, right?

Josh: But, um, so what does that actually look like then? So you were, as soon as you found out you were no longer on air, were you cool with it then?

Dan: Yeah, I was fine. Yeah. I mean, it sucks because, you know, you want it to be for 10 years. That's the dream. You know, you see Hamish and Andy and you see Kyle Sutherland and you go, that's what I want. But they're the exception to the rule. Yeah, right. That's also worth remembering. They are the exception to the rule.

Josh: And that is the whole— I guess that's to my point around the exception. Like if you want to do something massive, if you want to get somewhere really big, you've got to be in the mix. The path to do it is going to be probably different to any path before, because otherwise you're going to like— if I think about university, I think about like film school and all that sort of thing, the amount of people who go through that process and then out the other end looking for jobs.

Dan: Yeah, but then, you know, go watch a bad movie and stay for the whole credits. Yeah. All those people got work. Yeah, exactly.

Josh: Well, I think that's the thing. It's like the— that goal isn't necessarily being the Hollywood director. There's only going to be a small portion that actually can be the director. Yeah. There's a lot of people who are going to be the gaffers and the grips and being—

Dan: doing all that sort of stuff. And they'll still get to the Mythical porch.

Josh: You know what I mean? Yeah, yeah.

Dan: And they might have a really great time.

Tommy: So what about the kid who's growing up now listening to radio and thinking, I want to be like— they've got that.

Dan: Oh, that kind of breaks my heart a bit. Hey, like, that's just that idea of, yeah, someone right now listening to the radio going, oh God, I want to be— yeah, let's say, who's on the radio at the moment? Um, Fifi Box. I don't know who's— I don't really listen to much radio anymore.

Tommy: Who's on the Drive time?

Josh: Marty Sheargold. They want to be Marty Sheargold.

Dan: Yeah, let's say they want to be Marty Sheargold, right? I would say why? Not because his life is hell. He loves his life. But just like instead of committing yourself to a medium. Yeah. Like I always— it always broke my heart when I'd meet people in radio and they'd go, I've just been a radio fan since I was a kid and it's always been my dream and I love radio. And I'd be like, I don't know, I mean, I love like storytelling and creating and entertaining and writing and performing, right? So for them it's like I need to work in radio, whereas for me I need to be, you know, doing these things, making things. Yeah. So instead of it being like, oh, I, I really want to be the next Marty Sheargold or Hamish Blake or whatever, just go why go one step further? Why do you want to do that? And I reckon you'll really learn a lot about yourself and what you, you know, what you like to do rather than who you want to work for. Yeah, I mean, I'm not saying go be an Instagram influencer because radio is dead. Yeah, but I'm saying there are— and I'm only learning this now because like I said, I did radio for a decade— there thousands of possibilities in the world, especially nowadays. We were raised in the '90s where things were pretty, you know, straight and narrow. You did a job, you did it for your life, and there were categories of job. And it'd be like, I'm a lawyer, I'm a banker, I'm a bricklayer, I'm a radio host. And that was just what you did, and the company employed you, and you just did it.

Josh: And that plays into the sitting at the porch at 65 as well too, don't you think?

Dan: Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Like, yeah, I probably have a bit of a 1950s sort of mentality around that. Um, but also I don't want to be working at the age of 70. I don't want to get up when I'm 75. Already I've got bad knees. Like, I don't want to get up the age of 75 and go, oh God, how am I going to earn money this week? But what about if it was doing—

Josh: could you imagine being 65 doing a podcast.

Dan: Yeah, that's the kind of thing I like to do.

Josh: Yeah, so it's almost reframing because it— do you not see that you've got your podcast Completely Obsessed? Totally, totally. Thanks for fumbling the credit.

Dan: Well, this is the problem. The only reason I did this shithole of a show— I love our show—

Josh: called the funny thing is you won't get it right. The funny thing was I said yesterday, I was like, obsessed.

Dan: Good to be on the daily shit show.

Josh: Sometimes it is. The funny thing is I literally had that in my head the whole time because I'd, um, I had said yesterday, I'm like, we've got Dan DeBooth from his podcast Obsessed. I just shortened it.

Dan: You're a nightmare.

Josh: I'm like, I've got to fucking remember the whole thing. And that was my version of remembering.

Dan: You know in radio what we do is we write it down on a piece of paper in front of us. There's a hot tip for you.

Josh: That's outrageous thoughts. But, um, totally. Words from the wise. Totally obsessed. The, um, doing the podcast versus radio? Is it scratching a different itch or is it one of the same thing?

Dan: It's really different. I think comedians would be really good at podcasts, and I think— actually, no, it's probably dumb, but I just don't know if commercial radio hosts are very good at podcasts. It's interesting because we get trained to talk for 3 minutes at a time, to be really concise. You're just fucking hating this experience because we've just got like—

Josh: we are very—

Dan: this doesn't— radio— I'd hate this if it was my podcast, because I'd be like, what the hell? Like, yeah, I'd be— I'm kind of following your lead. When I host a podcast, all I can think is, how does this all connect? Is someone switching off right now? And so if you are— that's not how people listen to podcasts. People, people do switch off and they don't care. They go, oh yeah, listen to half, there was something good there. There's no rule saying you have to listen to every second of a podcast. Yeah, only 3 people have made it this far. Yeah, that's— we're cool with that. Exactly, because they downloaded it, it still goes in your stats. Yeah. Whereas like With radio, it's like time spent listening. Hook them in for as long as possible. Don't— never scare anyone off. Never scare anyone off.

Josh: And that's, I guess, being like, if you don't want to scare, you go sort of like vanilla flavour in some regards, right? Like you, uh, sort of—

Dan: you just, you just get really formulaic. That's it. I mean, radio is super formulaic.

Josh: And so when you decide to do the podcast, what actually made— you know, you had the idea in September of last year, it was— make it in August this year.

Dan: What was the shift? Moved. It was just this idea of I need something that I do. This is what Sam Cav said to me. I need something that I do every week, rain, hail, or shine, that doesn't depend on anything else. Because at the time I was like, oh, you know, I do a podcast about Game of Thrones and I do a web series about The Bachelor and you know, there's all this stuff and I was like, cool. So you rely on that and it's, for a few months, you know, you do that for a few months and then you go, cool, I don't need to do that anymore. 'Cause I'm a very much, I hate doing anything repetitively. I love new challenges, I love different things. I hate doing the same thing over and over again. If we do a good phoner on the Dan and Maz Show and all the time without fail, the boss would come in and go, do that every week. And we go, no, 'cause then it'll suck. I wanna do something even better next week. So I'm like that. That's my curse.

Josh: Do you think that was the, and yeah, 'cause do you think it is a curse? 'Cause I guess there is something in repetition. It's like they say like within radio, it's the stuff that people remember when they're doing qualitative research. They remember Fred Bassett. They remember the benchmark that you know that you're going to hear every single week.

Dan: I think differently to that personally. I mean, that's, you know, that's one hypothesis. No, I think that is how people listen to radio shows, but I think more like that kid with the 'did you get your mum the CD' thing. Yeah, like I remember Hamish once just telling a standalone, just a quick storey about, um, when his partner was away. So he, um, sat in front of the fireplace wearing a dressing gown eating a roast chicken from the bag and for some reason in my mind I've never forgotten just that image. Yeah, and it's because you created an image. I reckon that's probably the key. But yeah, I think most people don't listen to radio the way that I used to. I used to listen to radio like it was a podcast. Yeah, I was— I'd listen to every second of every show. So what are the rules of pod—

Josh: if you were— you're a Formula 8 guy, you like that sort of formula.

Dan: There's a few things I've learned about podcast. Um, a few things I've learned about podcast. Yeah, so it's me, human. Um, I think, like I said, like people don't need to be hit with stuff straight up and then to get out as soon as possible. Like people, there's sure people have like a 10-minute briefing kind of thing. I think there are other media, like I've been doing a bit of stuff for like Google Home and stuff like that. And for that, people wanna get in and get out as quickly as humanly possible. If you keep them for 5 seconds longer, they'll hate you.

Josh: Is it utilitarian? Is that because they're wanting news or radio or—

Dan: If you put it on a spectrum, podcast at one end, radio in the middle, and Google Home at the other, right? But I think with podcasts, people kind of, they don't care. And if you listen to half a podcast, you might go back, you might just go to the next episode. It doesn't really matter. It's more just like, you know, if you catch up with your friend and you, don't cover off everything that's going on in your life, but instead you spend ages, I don't know, talking about, you know, what fruit you would be if you were a fruit. Oh, I'd be a grape, I'd be a nectarine.

Josh: Whoa, bro, don't give away the good stuff. It was a private conversation. Whoever stuck with us, we closed the loop. I don't know if we really did close. Well, we opened up.

Tommy: That's happening next. We just opened up the in-joke.

Josh: That's exciting. Is this a benchmark? It's In-joke open, guys!

Dan: Our first in-joke. Woo! Na na na Nova sounds different, moo! The moo cow was also a good throwback.

Josh: So the—

Dan: but yeah, so it's more like the listener can just listen to it whenever they want and whatever. It's a lot more relaxed. I used to edit my podcasts so much because I— my first few podcasts I would cut myself out so much because I was like, oh, it's more about the guest. People want to hear about the guest. You know, like if you've got One Direction on your radio show, they don't want to hear you talking about, you know, how awkward you get with barbers. They want to hear One Direction.

Josh: But then you get One Direction fans as your listenership who might not necessarily connect with you as well as people who are sticking around for you.

Dan: Yeah, whereas a podcast is like, they— yeah, you've got a guest on each week, but they come to your podcast. So yeah, it's a bit different that way. And it's—

Josh: I think for us, we don't frame our conversations like interviews. We don't want it to feel like we're just asking questions.

Dan: Yeah, mine's more interview. Yeah, mine is like, I want to— like, I specifically say to someone, I want you to do the talking, which is great for me because again, I can just react. Yeah. Yeah. Do you ever have someone tell you that in radio there's reactors and generators? No, I haven't heard that. So there's two types, right? There's generators.

Josh: This is definitely going on radio today. I'm going to get that headline and put it in a little—

Dan: Is this going on radio today?

Josh: Yeah, I think we should be able to get it across maybe. Can you speak to Brad March?

Dan: Oh no, is there going to be some— Dan de Booth weighs in on the royal prank.

Josh: Absolutely. We'll get a photo. Can we— We've actually got a Union Jack flag for you. Hold up. It's not too much.

Tommy: If we do headlines, Dan de Booth ruins woman's childhood dream of being on radio.

Dan: Yeah, Dan DeBooth, Shitcans, Marty Sheargold. Yeah, that was definitely—

Josh: I set you up with the Marty Sheargold one. I'm sorry. Oh no, no. Did you want to clarify anything else with the radio today, audience? Yeah, maybe Radio Info.

Dan: No, on the plus side, no one will listen this long, so I think we'll be all right. So what, what did you—

Josh: Yeah, you were talking about the generators and— Oh yeah, So yeah, yeah.

Dan: What were the two? Generators and reactors. And generators, you know, come up with stuff and reactors sort of bounce off that. And I think one of the biggest things for me was realising I'm actually a reactor. Like I get more excited about interacting with people and about discovery and moments than I do about, you know, like the whole stand-up thing, hi, here's my jokes, I hope you like them. Like I'd rather be like, oh, that's a great joke and this I'm interested in that. Yeah, cool, cool. You know, that sort of thing. And I think it's, yeah, it's important to know that sort of stuff.

Josh: And so what is that format then? If you were to take those loves of what you wanna do, is it in, obviously improv's a big one. And how do you just on the improv thing, I've always thought I would love to do improv. And 'cause I like that there's, as you were talking about like the rules type of thing, I feel like I'd be the type of guy who thinks I'm good at improv, but then I go there and it's like, you're not fucking doing improv at all.

Dan: Everyone does improv a different way.

Josh: Everyone does improv a different way. How would a beginner get into improv? Is it literally like, go to improv class?

Dan: So I'm part of a group called The Big Hoo-Ha, which is a sort of professional improv group in Melbourne. And they do classes called The Hoo-Ha Academy. That to me, if like, I know the people who teach, they're all brilliant. Yep, it's like a weekend thing. Nah, it's sure it's an after-school thing or something.

Josh: After school.

Dan: The fact that you say after school, I was doing that ironically, but yeah, I think it's evenings.

Josh: Well, I did Helen O'Grady, uh, which was like a drama school when I was a kid, and I just remember— care program.

Dan: Yeah, but I was just spewing because I was like, you're wearing— it looks like you're wearing your theatre outfit right now.

Josh: All blacks all the time. Either that or Steve Jobs. Yeah, a little bit of that vibe. The, um, but I, but I casual down below with my shorts.

Dan: I didn't need to see you flex like that.

Josh: I'm so sorry. I saw a right out there. I'm not used to it.

Dan: It's like Alan Partridge. Oh, I popped out again. Sorry, Lynn.

Josh: Another reference. Yeah, but no, with the Helen O'Grady thing, I remember I was spewing because I was expecting that we're going to be doing drama and we're going to be doing all this stuff, and it was a lot of games, and I just thought it was a little bit, um, we do a lot of games stuff as well, but that's mainly because It's like saying, oh, I wanna play, I wanna be out there playing footy and you've got me in the gym.

Dan: You know, like, yeah, you'll play footy, but you need to spend the majority of time in the gym and doing drills.

Josh: Ball skills. Strength conditioning. Totally obsessed. What's, so you're just gonna keep doing it every single week?

Dan: Yeah, the last, I mean, is this podcast going live today? Yeah, so the last episode for the year comes out on Wednesday with Ryan Shelton.

Josh: Great. What's Ryan's obsession?

Dan: Back to the Future.

Josh: Oh yeah, he actually, yeah, he went to LA or whatever for the whole—

Tommy: He's got the jacket, does he?

Dan: He's got some— Mate, hold the gold. This is, this is great.

Josh: Completely and Utterly Obsessed is the podcast.

Dan: Fundamentally and Paramountly Obsessed. Yeah. And then I'll, I'm going away over the silly season, and then when I get back, I'll kick it back into gear again. What's it like?

Josh: Are you part of a network or something? Were you part of Acast or something? Like—

Dan: no, no, no, he's doing all independently.

Josh: It's just me.

Dan: Fucking great! It's so stressful booking guests. Yeah, it's just, it's so draining.

Josh: How do you reach out to most people? I don't know, email.

Dan: It's all just been mates. That's good.

Josh: Yeah, that's a good way of doing it.

Dan: Yeah, I I kind of, part of me is like, I don't want to rely too much on my mates because I want to keep them up my sleeve for when it gets really grim. Yeah.

Josh: But there'll be enough momentum. Like, it's almost like you build the momentum. It's pretty good.

Dan: But yeah, it's generally you rely on the kindness of strangers. What was the deal?

Josh: I, how did you find out about, you got onto the Top Podcasts?

Dan: What are you networking now? You know, that was a pleasant surprise. Yeah, that's great. Yeah, I just, um, some of my mates just texted me that morning. This is on iTunes. Yeah, there's like iTunes had their top podcast of 2018 and like it was literally like Teacher's Pet, Lee Sales and Underdog Crab, me. Did you see a big spike?

Josh: Like, I'm curious whether— Yeah, yeah, that's really interesting.

Tommy: Um, Daily Shit Show didn't make it on.

Josh: Yeah, we didn't. We're too— We've got— I like to think the reason is because I've marked our show as explicit, but it's probably— I've got that more to do at the show level. Fact is hypothesis.

Dan: Yeah, no, I think it's to do with the fact—

Josh: content—

Dan: no, I— it's not to do with content generator reactor. No, I was just, um, I released my podcast sort of in that second half of the year. That's around about the time when people start going, oh, we're probably gonna have to put a best of out at the end of of the year, and I was just gaining a bit of momentum there. Then around about September, October, I got onto the New and Noteworthy. Yeah. And that was because of a few friends that I know and like just sort of persistent emails.

Josh: In Apple? Yeah. Okay, cool.

Dan: Well, I don't know anyone at Apple, but I'm friends of friends and that sort of stuff. And you know, just things like giving them the artwork in the right format quickly as possible and stuff like that. And then yeah, I was like, oh wow, that's so good. And yeah, I got a little spike from that just being in the new and noteworthy and I was like, well done, Dan, you've really done a good job. And yeah, about 6 weeks later, boof. Yeah. Yeah.

Josh: That's cool, that's very cool.

Dan: So what's the moral of the storey there?

Josh: It was a good one. Yeah. Not sure.

Dan: I call that my career Christmas present. Getting on that list was my career Christmas present. It was Anta delivering me a nice little career boost in December.

Josh: That's a good Radio Today headline. Yeah. Hi@thedailytalkshow.com if people want to send us an email. Just very quickly, what's my email address? No, I've got your email address.

Dan: Oh no, he's bloody released my phone number on air. Oh no, get your hand off it, Anta. Oh, come on, mate. Oh, the people want to hear Bassett. Come on, mate.

Josh: The, um, no, we got a, uh, we got an email from someone from the last show. We do a shit job of when we have guests on, we don't— we struggle to bring in any of the stuff that we are doing at a regular basis, so they feel a little bit compartmentalized. Okay, makes sense. So I just wanted to bring up the, um, what is this, a mailbag segment? Yeah, this is a mailbag.

Dan: Crows Nest, New South Wales. Is that aggro? That was everyone. Nicky Logan. Crow's Nest was Channel 9, I think. Channel V as well. I remember when I— yeah, yeah, because I remember when I first went to Channel 9 in 2010 when I first was working in Sydney and the address said Crow's Nest and I was like, you're going to the Crow's Nest? Oh my God, I might get to meet the Crow. Who's just— was this Channel 9 or 10? Oh, welcome to my nest. Oh, see, it's funny, right? Isn't it? Yeah, he did it.

Josh: Thank you. That was seamless too. We got an email from Gemma. The subject line is bombonnerie. We were talking yesterday about bombonneries, and she just said she was concerned about my spelling. She was at the 22-minute mark when she wrote this email. She was saying that I read it out with an N instead of an M, which was giving her hives. And she tells this very quick— She's a copywriter. Yeah, she tells this very quick story. She said, went to a wedding of one of my girlfriends last year, and her fiancé, now husband, is this big former rugby-playing investment banker, as alpha as alpha as they get, she said. He'd been taking secret candle-making classes as a form of stress relief. So we all were given a handmade candle from the groom as our bonbonnière. That was 18 months ago, and he's still making candles for shits and gigs. That was from Gemma. Have you received a bomboniere?

Dan: I reckon my granddad, rest his soul, was Giuseppe Biasin. So, he's Italian. Joe Bison to his Aussie mates. And I reckon, yeah, as a kid, I would have been to a few Italian weddings because I was really frustrated with the bomboniere because I was like, I thought they were little Easter eggs.

Tommy: Well, I thought they were little Easter eggs, but we've turned almonds coated in sugar into fucking candles. I think it's taken the piss.

Dan: I was furious because almonds coated in sugar, disgusting.

Josh: They actually taste quite good. No, I think maybe they've been changed. I hate nuts, man.

Dan: Oh really? I hate nuts. Is almond a nut? Chewing on bits of wood. Oh, when you go to the Chinese restaurant, oh yum, chicken stir-fry. Oh, cashew! Oh, this is a great bit. Yuck. Um, so imagine almond rave. Imagine. Yeah, I know, Dan almond rave, 6:45 AM.

Tommy: We need more of that, Dan, next week. More almond rave.

Dan: Do you think we could do a benchmark on nuts?

Josh: Dan's most hated nuts.

Dan: Mate, loved, loved the almonds.

Tommy: Dan, taste some new nuts.

Josh: Yeah, every single, every single week.

Dan: This is exactly what I was like, and this is what I'd be like in meetings. Oh, just get through it, just get through it. But once the mics go on, you can say whatever you want. That's what I always do. You'd be in meetings and everyone would say these things and you go, I don't want to do any of that, and you just let them put it all on the run sheet. And the second the mics go on, you go, don't want to do any of it, it all sucks, I hate it, I don't want to do it. And they're sitting out there going, what? You're going, haha, yeah, you're stuck with this now, you're stuck with Kyle does that all the time. It's live, it's live, suckers.

Josh: And the other correction, our first real apology for the show. We don't do apologies much. Yeah. Oh, thank you so much. I was wondering when you were gonna apologise to me. No, to Lynn Jansen, my mum. That's your fuck-up. Yeah, I was making, I was laughing at her because she was saying bomboniere, which is the correct way of saying it. I was saying bombonere. And, uh, slight—

Tommy: it's a slight difference. It was the twang she had at the end.

Josh: Yeah, it's quite funny. And so, um, Scooter Derek, we saw him downstairs at the cafe and he was saying you should apologize.

Dan: So I love how you bury all your shoutouts right at the end. Well, that's at the—

Josh: do you know what we can actually also bury? We've— we haven't asked for this in about 6 months.

Dan: We don't ask for an ID. No. Hey, what's up? It's Dan and you are listening to The shit show of the day. Do I get it? Thanks guys, bye.

Josh: No, do you know what we haven't done?

Dan: No way, random. One more. Can you do a—

Josh: Boing. No, the one thing that we haven't done at all, I reckon it's probably 6 months we made an effort where we're like asking people for ratings is just bullshit. We don't need to do it. And we since I said that. Below us. Yeah, it was a bit below us. The thing is that since we stopped saying it— yeah, we stopped getting them. No one fucking rates the show.

Dan: And you shall receive. I say get on iTunes and give this one a 5 stars. Oh, there we go.

Josh: It's a daily talk show. Hi@thedailytalkshow.com if you want to send us an email. But yeah, we've got 61, uh, ratings so far. They're all 5 stars. The good thing about asking it— why do we all stand up just there?

Tommy: Because I'm about to piss myself.

Josh: I need to go. That's what That's how you do it. But the good thing is that the, um, it's, it's because we're really— it's like a, um, fucking NLP. Someone stood up.

Dan: Oh yeah, you know this though, have you noticed when you hang out with radio people they always make a joke and they just walk away? Yeah, that's always— you're out 3 minutes. Yeah, so that's what I just did then. I made my funny joke about 5 stars, and this is what, um, I used to do is our chairs would have wheels and I would just push back from the desk. Look at this guy, done. And if the break kept going, I'd just be like, no.

Josh: Were you panelling or no? No, no. Who was panelling?

Dan: We always had different people. We had MC, we had—

Josh: Would you fucking point at them when you'd want them to? Like, were you that control— like, if you did a good joke, would you fucking— Out. Yeah, mate, that was—

Dan: no.

Josh: How many conversations did you ever have a time where you're like, mate, could you imagine that?

Dan: This being like 100% I would do that.

Josh: Fucking bam, got a mic drop. But the good thing about going at the end is you, um, rarely get get negative reviews because if they've stayed this far, unless they're a hate follower, which we don't know how many have come from that space. But anyway, hi@thedailytalkshow.com. Catch you guys, have a good one. Thanks, Dan. That's all right.