20 Year Timeout

Jazz Roots Go Deep

Richard Marczewski Jr. Episode 5

In this episode of 20 Year Timeout, I reconnect with Anthony Fuller, an athlete, risk analyst, musician, and the son of a jazz legend whose life and friendships shaped generations of music.

Anthony and I had not truly connected since high school. In this real time reunion, the conversation moves freely across memory, identity, creativity, and personal growth. We talk about growing up in Worcester, elite sports, music legacy, financial careers, fatherhood, generational trauma, and the questions that shape who we become over time.

Anthony shares remarkable stories about his father’s athletic discipline, life on the jazz circuit, and growing up in a multigenerational, multicultural household influenced by some of the greatest musicians of all time. From football and academics to risk management, mentorship, and creative healing through music, this conversation is thoughtful, wide ranging, and deeply human.

This episode captures what 20 Year Timeout is all about: rediscovering people from the past and learning who they are now.

Topics include

  • Growing up in Worcester and early identity
  • Being raised by a jazz musician
  • Sports, discipline, and confidence
  • Creativity, music, and performance
  • Risk management and financial careers
  • Mentorship, education, and fatherhood
  • Curiosity, trauma, and personal reinvention

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20 Year Timeout is a podcast where I reconnect with people I have not spoken to in over twenty years to see what time has done to our stories.

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https://www.youtube.com/@richmarksthespot

Rich:

Well, thanks for coming on the show here.

Anthony:

Thanks for coming to my house. Coming to the mill.

Rich:

Thanks for feeding me uh fried chicken when I got here. Lisa? Come here setting up a couple cameras. All of a sudden I'm eating fried chicken.

Anthony:

Yeah. Yeah, she uh she gave you a little guff too. She was a bankrupt girl. My mom was a bankrupt girl. So yeah, you were one year ahead of me at uh Holy Name, but I went to Holy Name to kind of relax. So my mom and grandmother, I think they both were valedictorians at Bankroft. My sister went there too. She was older. She's four years older, my brother's five years older. So it was a little get dump jumping in right in there. But she did.

Rich:

She came up hot behind me. This is a private road. So I was like, oh, neighborhood watches on top of me. A stranger's in the neighborhood. And I was apprehensive to go down and just look because I was gonna. And once I saw the camera and I was like, if this isn't his house, you know everyone in the little neighborhood here is gonna come after you. So I turned around and I called you, and you're like, no, that's the road.

Anthony:

So oh, cool, cool. Yeah, she uh she keeps an eye on the house. She lives right in Sutton there. We got so my mom was one of ten, so there are there's lots of aunts and uncles in the area. So I don't live here, I live in North Carolina in Charlotte, and I just wrapped up an interview in the other room for I'm trying to get a new job or a different job. Uh so I had a uh uh virtual interview, but my sister lives in New York, so this house is pretty much empty. We use it as a vacation spot. So the aunts and uncles, they're they're the neighborhood watch, they keep a close eye on it.

Rich:

What's interesting is me and you aren't really friends, per se, like me and Billy were or my other guests. You were in my sister's class, so we knew each other, we had similar friends, you know, we went to the same school, but it wasn't until recently that we kind of linked up, so I was like, this should be an interesting way to talk to someone because yeah, we knew each other, but it's a totally different path than the other guests, so thanks for coming on. Absolutely. Dude, something that had me cracking up was your latest uh Instagram post. It might not be your latest because you post a couple of them, but um you were talking about how people were giving you um flack about where you went on vacation in high school because obviously we went to a Catholic school, so it's a private school, so some of the people we went to school with are wealthy. Uh I don't know your situation, I know my situation. I was located near the school, so I don't know if my mom got a discount or what, but three kids got to go to the school. I'm sure it was hard to pay for that. But they back to back to you.

Anthony:

Yeah.

Rich:

You we had vacation break, right?

Anthony:

Yeah.

Rich:

All the kids went on vacation, you know. Uh a bit of privilege to do that. And when you came back to school, they're all bugging you about where you went to vacation, you were like, didn't go on vacation?

Anthony:

Yeah, so the the joke actually was about middle school, but that same kind of attitude permeated. Like kids were so trying to be toppers, toppers, as my aunt used to say, Auntie Lisa, I learned that from her. She'd go, Oh, your Uncle Timbo's a topper. You know, people that like to come over the top of you uh and always try to one up you. So in middle school, that's where that happened. I got in trouble because I played sports all year round, multiple sports. Like I would be on multiple traveling soccer teams, football teams, baseball teams, and I didn't, you know, I went on a plane in high school, my best friend Prof. You remember him too? He's in New York doing huge things. So Billy's my best friend, though your last guest, Prof is my other best friend, and Eddie Domain, he's a Milby guy, was my other best friend, but he went to Auburn. So I met you. I wanted to, but we talked about we didn't really know each other. Billy told me one of those trips we went to Canaby Lake Park. He said he brought both of us, his mom would take us. Do you remember going to Canaby Lake Park with me? He's like, he said, you both were on Canopy Lake Park with me. And I was like, I remember the trip. But I'm like, I I don't know. I was like, I don't remember meeting him, like, but I knew you at high school, like I knew of you then. But it was funny. Billy's like, yeah, you guys, I I introduced both of you guys.

Rich:

Oh, so we have known each other for 30 plus years. Yeah. Then the show stands true. I'm not deviating from the plan.

Anthony:

Yeah. But uh well, yeah, the joke I made was about vacation. The kids like, when we came back from break, they were talking about where they went, and I played sports all year round, so I was saying I didn't go on vacation, and a girl thought I was lying, and she told the teacher on me, like, he won't tell us where he went on vacation. I'm like, sweetheart, I don't, Anthony Vol doesn't go on vacations. I play sports all year round. And like, I don't know. I was like, kids, just leave me alone. And then in high school, that kind of topper mentality, that's kind of like my freshman year. I went in trying to be popular. I was oh my god, curly hair. Like, I was big into Greek mythology, so remember Samson and Delilah? Remember, he got his strength to his curly hair, and then to defeat him, so like somebody shaved off his hair and he lost his strength. So I was big into that. My mom would buy me all the books and everything. So I went into holy name. I'd never grown my hair out. I could pull it down to my my chest here, and as you know, I had the over 30 touchdowns my freshman, yeah. Skinny's the same height, like just under 5'11, but 135 pounds. And uh athletic as hell, yeah. I didn't grow at all, but I was light uh lightning, and uh I got called up to varsity and stuff, and like one of the that quarterback there, I don't want to say his name, but he was giving like he would be teasing me wicked bad. I'm like, bro, there's one or two freshmen that were playing on varsity. I'm like scoring touchdowns and doing stuff, but he just didn't like how I was like goofy into Wu-Tang and stuff or whatever. So that guy, him like bullying me and stuff, that made me lift weights and be kind of quiet and reserved because I didn't like that mean girl, mean guy stuff. I was like, yo, if you're talking about somebody, go get in a fist fight with them. Like, go, like if I saw someone talking like you, like, oh, I don't like Billy, I would like grab you by the shirt and be like, go say it to his Billy's face. Don't tell me. Tell him. So the kids didn't like that. So I kind of was quiet. I just got my did my sports, did my grades. Because freshman year, I tried to be open and like hella goofy. And I'm getting into that now and be effusive and demonstrative and things like that. But uh kids weren't amenable to it, amenable to it, so I was quiet and reserved and just kind of did my books and did my grades and stuff. So like it I don't know what your impression of me in high school was. Like, people like, you're a mute, you don't talk. I'm like, all you guys are talking about is putting people down. I like to just laugh and joke about prop with prop and talk about video games and and lift each other up. Like I was not a b- I was anti-bully because of how I was bullied.

Rich:

I think my sister and her friends told me you were very smart. So I that's what how I thought of you. I was like, oh, he's athletic and he's intelligent and like level one classes.

Anthony:

So that's I'm glad they thought that because I was wicked quiet. I never raised my hand or anything. I got I graduated high honors, you know, like I somehow whipped out like a 1400 or something on SAT. I never opened a book at this house. In my mom, so my dad, he's a famous musician, we'll get into that. Curtis Waffle played jumbo and all that. He would stay here on the couch. My mother's room were there. So my my experience with relationships, my parents slept in separate separate rooms. I slept on the porch on the couch out there. So my whole take on relationships was weird. So I was like, I don't know, I there's a lot of yelling and fighting because they they stayed together and then we're married the whole time, but I was like reserved about relationships, so I was really kind of like afraid to do it. And I'm my first major relationship was when I was 30 years old, so but I'm surprised that they had that uh impression because I really didn't talk that much. I just kind of like handed in my assignments timely, and that's that's it. I kept to myself.

Rich:

Well, I th maybe it was like junior or senior year, you probably I feel like you were hanging out with them or Oh, I don't uh it was post-high school.

Anthony:

I started hanging out with like was she friends with Caitlin Yeah, in Devon? That's what I'm thinking. Yeah, so after high school, when I started drinking, I didn't drink in high school. I was just like work out, come home and work out every single day. And then after high school, I hung out with holy named kids more.

Rich:

That's like my sister's best friend.

Anthony:

Yeah, so she probably heard like I would see her at party, your sister wasn't a party girl, but like we partied after high school, so I reconnected with holy name folks that way. They're like, you drink and party? And I'm like, I sure do. I don't anymore, I'm so gonna know, but yeah, I sure did. Woof.

Rich:

You mentioned your dad is a musician.

Anthony:

Yeah, yeah, he was, yeah. You so that poster you see behind him with John Coltrane, he was best friends with Colt Chain. So when you speak about jazz, people know Coltrane.

Rich:

Wait a minute.

Anthony:

Yeah.

Rich:

Your dad was friends with John Coltrane?

Anthony:

They were best friends, he was the godfather to his children.

Rich:

Oh, that's a mate. That's they lived together. And he lived here in uh in New York.

Anthony:

So my father was from Detroit, he was actually an orphan. Uh the long like his mother died during giving birth, I believe, and his father died before that. And so they were in an orphanage, and then um his old his sister taught him. So my sister's one year older than me, and he's like, the relationship you have with your sister is like the one I had. So his sister was really the prodigal that learned music at like two years old and taught him how to do it, and he ran with it. But back my dad was born in 34, and it wasn't a viable career for women like that much. I know you had your Billy Holidays, but those are really one-offs. I think his his sister ended up becoming like a dancer or something. I don't know much about her. But um, I think her name was Marie Antoinette. I think that's why my sister's I gotta double check all this now because I didn't he didn't talk about his past too much. It was rough. He was born and raised in an orphanage, taught himself music, joined the the army like at like 16, when fought the Korean War, was the commander of a tank. But yeah, Coltrane found out who he was and paid for him to come to New York, and I saw a picture, my dad showed me, yeah, this is w when at some point in my life, and this the suit looked really big, and I'm like, dad's like 18 right there. Yeah, because my dad had me when he was 57, he was much older.

Rich:

I was just gonna ask you if he was born in 34, when did he have you?

Anthony:

Yeah, he was late in life. I was kind of so he had five older sons that I'm half-brothers, I just call them half-brothers. They're all like in their 60s, 70s. I was like a great uncle when I was like 10, because they had kids and they had kids right away, you know, those fellows that full of power, baby. Uh, but uh, yeah, so then he had three, he wanted to have a girl, so he had he had uh six sons, and then he finally had my sister, and then you know, then I think I was kind of the accident. I found as we were cleaning out the house, I found 1986 contraceptive pills. So I think my mom just weren't wasn't taking them, and I was the accident, you know, that just kind of snuck in there. Sneaky sneaky.

Rich:

That's awesome. Do you do you remember music being played in your house when you were growing up?

Anthony:

So he would always practice, he would practice in the dining room there. So he slept there. When this was our TV, we'd watch all the Tyson fights here. You know, every Tyson fight we ordered because he had to teach us how to fight. He knew we were growing up in a racist town and everything. But uh, so and he I think he boxed in the army too.

Rich:

Jazz and butt boxing.

Anthony:

And the little dumb thing I found out after life, uh after when he was old, about to die. So he actually was like an elite baseball player, an elite track athlete, like one of the fastest people on planet earth. He qualified for the Olympics and just he flew back from like living, he lived in Germany, I believe, and then he qualified. So if you run a fast enough time, you qualify for the Olympics. Like, you don't need to keep going to each race. I think he just didn't even go. And then he also got a tryout for the Yankees. So I met a guy that was one of the heads of the Negro Baseball League when my dad was getting his Jazz Masters Award in New York. I was maybe like 20 or 21. The head of the Negro Leagues was like, you know, your your dad, the museum. He's like, Your dad, like, tried out, you know your dad is, right? I'm like, no, he's like, he tried out for the Yankees and hit like a home run and I had a bunch of hits, and then he just didn't racism was too bad, so he like for black athletes and he wouldn't make enough money. So, like coming at it, like he wasn't practicing baseball and stuff. So I was like, yo, that's where our athleticism comes from. And like the guy that head of the Negro Leagues, because my dad is maybe like 5'7, 5'8, I'm like 5'10, 5'11. He said that he could grab a dime off a backboard, a basketball. And I'm like, get the hell out of here. And because my dad beat Jesse Owens in a race. Granted, Jesse Owens, you know who that he's like the famous black uh sprinter. He would think he was like like older. He was older when my dad raced him. He was probably my dad was probably like 20, he was probably like 30 or 40. But he beat Jesse Owens and qualified for the Olympics. But sports, and he could grab a dime off the backboard. I remember my dad getting frustrated. Like, I'm like, no, he couldn't. I said no he couldn't a couple times. Looking back, I'm like, damn, my dad was probably getting he was getting upset. And the guy swore he saw my dad do that. And I'm like, that's bananas.

Rich:

He was he born in the US?

Anthony:

My dad was, yeah. So he was born in Detroit. So from what I understand, his parents were one was from North Carolina, one was from South Carolina. That's probably why I was driven there. Um and they moved to Detroit with the four the Ford uh the jobs like being like they were they they broadcasted it so people could come work there. And then my understanding is like when all the black people moved there, a lot of the people moved out, and that's why the city went like I don't know, like the city was a ghost town, and that's why they abandoned the city because they didn't like these minorities moving there. And then like he moved into like some that's how a quick high-level story of how he ended up in an orphanage and stuff, and why they ended up in Detroit.

Rich:

So you were born here?

Anthony:

Yeah, I was born in Worcester, yeah. My brother was born in New York, but my sister and I were both born in Worcester, St. James.

Rich:

What drove you to Holy Name? Was it sports and academics?

Anthony:

Yeah, so my sister my older brother and sister, so I'm like the least inclined. Like my mother was like the Bancroft Valedictorian, and she went to I don't know why she didn't go to an Ivy League or something, but like for women, like my mother was born in 53 in the 70s and stuff, like she didn't like that stuff either. So I think that's why my mom and my dad bonded. They didn't like that, those civil uh injustices. Uh so and my dad went to college early too. My brother was like a prodigy who skipped like four grades, and then um something happened when he was a child, and then he went back to his normal grade, and he kind of had his rebellious years, but he went to Holy Name. Like, so Holy Name was like the school where you go and party and it's relaxed. Bancroft was like where you go if you're like my sister was studying or like winning all these awards. So I wanted to be relaxed. I didn't want to go to Bancroft and be like a like as I don't think I was as smart as my mom was.

Rich:

Bancroft uh private school? Oh, you don't, yeah.

Anthony:

It's like it's like one of the best schools in in Worcester. It's over by um like uh what do you what do you call Goldstar Boulevard? Yeah, it's like it's like the elite school, like they don't even have football there.

Rich:

They don't even let people who grew up in Worcester know about it. Oh I'd never even.

Anthony:

That's one of the best high schools like in the country. Yeah, so like Oh, I know why I know. Yeah, so it's like it's even better than Worcester Academy. Wow. Yeah, like so it's like everyone, my aunts and uncles, it was it was either Holy Name, Worcester Academy, or Bancroft. The ones that really were had the proclivity for knowledge and education, they chose Bancrofter or or Worcester Academy, and like the partyers. I didn't end up partying, but the guys who like I didn't take school that seriously, I didn't like come home and study or do anything, you know. And that's why my mom would be always screaming and yelling, Curtis, he's not doing any work, Curtis, Curtis. So I'll be like why I'm like scared every time I hear 50 cent name, Curtis! I get shivers because you know he was the enforcer. But yeah, I didn't do I didn't like come home and do homework, so that's why I went to Holy Name. And then St. John's, it was like an all-boys school. I was like, eh. So that's why I didn't want to go there. But look, I wasn't talking to girls anyway, it'll holy name anyway, so it didn't matter, anyways.

Rich:

Yeah, I was talking to him, but I was just afraid.

Anthony:

Yeah. So girls become freshman year. A lot of the older girls came up to me. Like I was like, I told you I had over 30 touchdowns, I was playing varsity football. The quarterback gave me, like, was picking on me and gave me really hard time, and that's why I kind of shut down. But freshman year, like the junior, senior girls were always like the Latina girls and black girls would come up and give me numbers. So as as the years went on, I was so used to girls coming up and giving me their number. So I never like I just thought the girls didn't like me because they didn't go up and give me their number, but they were waiting for me to go talk to them. They were like, you don't like us. I had a question on mad girls, but I always thought if they liked you, they came up and give you the number. But that was more of the Latino black girl thing. The white girls like I but I'm speaking generally here. Like, you know, they expected you to go up to them.

Rich:

I really had no confidence in talking to a girl till I grew a mustache. So it until I was 25 and couldn't grow them. Then I grew the mustache, and then it's like a flip got switched at the bar because my buddy, we were there, and a girl bought me a shot after I got the mustache for the first time, and I was like, oh, game changer.

Anthony:

Yeah, that's why you you got that. I love the curls. So I had a COVID beard. I should pull up my ID. So I could pull my beard down to here because I always worked in an office setting, I couldn't grow it. But for me, it's funny you got your confidence through that. Like I drank really heavily in college and stuff, and then I would go up to girls and stuff. That's the only way I had to call confidence. Yeah, liquid courage. And now I've got that courage so uh sober, you know, and I could do something like this, no problem. But I didn't have that in high school and college, it's why I ended up drinking in college because then I could go up to girls and talk to them, but I would be all sloppy and drunk, and but it was so embarrassing. But that was my stepping stone to learn how to talk to girls. I did it while wacko drunk all the time, you know.

Rich:

Not throwing shade, but you could use the Al Bundi story. Scored four touchdowns in one game. I scored five.

Anthony:

I scored five in one game.

Rich:

Remember Married with Children?

Anthony:

Yeah, I do. I remember that's how people call me because I would fully scored five touchdowns. I scored five touchdowns against St. Bernard's. I see, and then we got smoked by St. John's, but yeah, I scored five against St. Bernard's, no big deal.

Rich:

Al Bundy?

Anthony:

Yeah. I should put my hand like this. Oh, if I can if there's a Peggy down the line all day. You kidding me? I always had a crush on Peggy.

Rich:

So, musician dad, what kind was there music always being played in the house, or was there like live music being played, or was there a record player, a radio?

Anthony:

So we had he did have like his old like with the vinyls, the vinyl player there, but it wasn't like crickety on his jazz right here. And this PL, it's we gotta refurbish it, but we he would he tried teaching me how to play my so my dad he practiced his trombone there, but he practiced really uh at late at night or early in the morning. So he would go to bed at like 2 a.m. and was up by like 5 30. Like he just didn't sleep. And he didn't like anybody to put play, like hear him play. But I would always kind of walk-I don't know if he was trying to preserve my own sound, because they knew each of us had our inclin uh either our proclivity for music. Uh but he never taught me music. I mean, I thought of him as dad, a military- I thought he was people would be like, What did your dad do? I don't know, he was a military guy. I didn't think of him as a jazz musician. Um, he was just a military guy, but he would practice and he would always play his promote. Do do do do do do. But I that I only heard him do his warmups. He didn't play any song, practice any songs or anything. My brother upstairs always played his piano like that. Like he went to Holy Name before me. He got kicked out of Holy Name, he was five years older. So that's like I went into Holy Name with a chip on my shoulder. Like, some teachers give me a hard time thinking I'd be a bad kid. Like he was like, he got he threw a desk across the room at Mr. Ma. And then Mr. Maher in the hallways was nervous because then I was the big big weightlifter. Um, because my brother was like, he was a fireball. So I was the opposite. I'm like, I'm gonna be quiet, get my grades, and take it out on the football field and smash. He was like, you know, he didn't play sports at that level, even though he was an elite athlete, he gave it up. But he played his piano upstairs, and my sister ended up becoming a DJ in college, like a famous DJ at Smith College, M. You know, I c I always try to copy her, but gamer tag is A dot.

Rich:

Smith College in Western Mass?

Anthony:

Yeah, and that's why I went to Amherst College. That's like, because I only learned about Amherst College while visiting her at Smith. Um, like I wanted to go Ivy League once I knew I could go to college. Like, I didn't like going I didn't know I was going to college till like junior year high school, and then all of a sudden, like you get all A's, you you're good. You know, I wanted to go D like D1, uh, but then I lifted weights and I got slower. Like, I wasn't a elite athlete anymore. Like, my fresh when I got the 30 years at 135 pounds, I went to um uh Syracuse football camp. That's where my mom went. I ran a 441 electronic after slipping in basketball shoes. I was lightning and I was like, my mom was so proud of it. 441. I remember I pulled it down. I'm like, I'm a 4'2 or 4-3 guy. But then once I lifted weights, I became like a 4-5, 4-6 guy. But I had to because we had no line and was getting banged. But it was long story short. Brother was playing piano up there. My sister was always listening to, she always was listening to a variety of different music, that's why she was a naturally DJ. My dad was always playing a radio with classical music. So the music that was in my head, he played it in that room. He always kept a radio on in the house 24-7. I don't know if that's just like what relaxed him or whatever. So, like now I'm getting into the music space and I'm you know I'm building beats with you. We can talk about that, but the beats that I was building as a little kid were all classical because that's what I was hearing the most. He always had the radio on. I slept on the other room down the hall. So, yeah, those I heard more classical than anything in this household.

Rich:

So, early on, did you see yourself as being like a D1 or D2 football player? Did you have a career in mind when you were younger?

Anthony:

I I always wanted to be an elite athlete. I was a dominant sprinter at everything, so I dominated every sports. You know, and that's why like my dad didn't come to games. I would dominate soccer games here. And then the white some of the white parents would say, look at that N-Word run. And my dad would go fucking go ballistic. Because I was going like in Hilbert. Yeah, I was scoring like eight goals, nine goals, a game. Like teams would come, people come from all around New England. Like, I would like being on teams, like I was dominant. And my brother was really good at baseball. I was always on the baseball all-stars, but I was never, it wasn't my thing. But soccer was my I dominated everything. I thought I was gonna be go to like Europe and everything. But then when I went to high school, I didn't want to be a skinny guy. Like, you know, kind of like the thicker girls and the curvy girls. So I wanted to play football, so I gave up soccer and started lifting weights in football. So I was wicked skinny freshman year, and then I started lifting weights. And then so my dreams were always about basketball and soccer. But basketball I was wicked nervous, and I never had the right shoes. I was sliding around, you know, and all that. I was with cheap older shoes, but uh, and then I got I got really good at football once I started lifting weights. So and then I dreamed about football when I was in high school, but before that it was like soccer, I was a soccer guy.

Rich:

How did you pick what to study in college? Did you have a passion or did you do something someone recommended?

Anthony:

So I always talked, I wanted to always focus on how can I make the most money. And um my other aunt, Auntie May May, uh, I I met up with her recently, and she said, Anthony, because my mom put me on a bus from Worcester to New York to meet her. She was like a marketing kind of like she, I don't know, she did she did something with writing. Uh all the people on my mom's side, all the women are like wicked smart, and like I got cousins that like one cousin Katie, like going to Thanksgiving with her. She teaches at Oxford now, and like everyone's like either a doctor. All my cousins are I went to Amherst, my sister got her I really MBA. So we all like we did really well because our parents pushed us. But um now I got loud, uh I got sidetracked there.

Rich:

Well, you should start a podcast and just talk to your family.

Anthony:

Oh, but oh yeah, with May May. Oh yeah, I I could just talk when the family everyone's doing like totally different things, like, but I we don't know, I don't talk to them, you know. Our family kind of it's half Irish and have to make it.

Rich:

Yeah.

Anthony:

I could in like some some of them live in Australia. Like my aunt cousins that I grew up with in Thanksgiving, they live everywhere. But I just had, uh oh. Um May May, she said, What do you when I I was couldn't have been older than like second or third grade. She said, when I stopped off that bus, she said, What do you want to do when you get older? And I said, Wall Street banker. So I saw the guys on TV and was like, Who's making the money getting the girls? The Wall Street guys, that's what I want to do. So I was always gonna be in high school when I was touring colleges. I want to be an econ major, and I was obviously an econ major, but the the Wall Street bros, it didn't work out. I work in banking now, but on the operation side, global risk management. But that that business side, like you know, uh eye banking and stuff, I just I couldn't. Once I got to college and see what those guys were like, I mean, I'm not a bro, you know?

Rich:

Yeah. Well, I mean, so do you creatively you're into you know making music and you're creative. But in your career, it sounds like you're analytical and you're math driven. Did you feel like you had the math down in high school and were you creative then also?

Anthony:

I think uh so my dad was a proclivity for math too. Like he went to college early too, in like the 50s as a black guy from an orphanage is pretty much unheard of, and then they he joined the army early too. So my mom was so they my dad spoke several languages. He lived in Japan, he lived in Germany, he lived in Latin America, so he spoke like four or five languages too. And my mom was the head of four languages at Assumption College. So uh I think music and creativity for me is wicked. I think mathematics is uh art and creativity. My dad was wicked good at math. My mom was really good at um English, but and then she, you know, she didn't really explore her side, but she was good at English and writing. But my dad was a wicked math guy too, who like, you know, he I could talk about uh my AP Calic and AP physics homework and he understood the equations, whereas my mom like was like, ugh, but like he was a wicked math guy too. So for me, I think the music that I make, and you know, as we're getting into it, I think music is really scientific. You know, looking at the different cadences, what people's proclivities are, like if you look at like the top 100 songs, like any time in any country, you're gonna find patterns there. Like certain beats are preferred, certain instruments are preferred. And to me, that's all science and analytics. So people think of it sometimes as being contrast. I think it's more, you know, they go hand in hand and go together.

Rich:

Did you have any random jobs when you were younger?

Anthony:

Oh, yeah, a ton, yeah. So my parents, my grandparents owned an oil company, Harris Oil, it's defunct now. So I would be doing Harris Oil deliveries, and to really help the business, like I was like the star athlete in town. And so my my grandfather would take me, even though I like wouldn't do the work sometime because some of the the kids I worked on, their parents worked like got oil through us. And if they saw that their grandson, their their son is friends with the grandson of the owner of the business, they should keep paying a little bit more for this small oil company because I'm gonna be friends with their it helps the team, it helps, oh, it helps everything. Gesticulating a little bit too much there, but yeah. So I worked with the oil company, and we had a um that's one thing. So going on the oil trucks, the deliveries, cleaning the trucks, cleaning the basements, and talking to the customers. And then we also had a uh a tree selling business. So my grandfather, he would go to Canada, buy a bunch of trees, and we would sell Christmas trees right up there on their land, too. So I was a salesman as a young kid, but I, you know, I was a wicked hustler and like hustling people out of baseball cards, football cards, like yo, I just wouldn't stop. Like I was gonna go be a I was gonna be a bro, but I didn't like who I was becoming, so I didn't I went away from that sales route and I I worked at a church, St. Mark's Church, being like a janitor and working at a my uncle's factory. So more like a whole host of factory and like manual labor jobs.

Rich:

Did you go to college right after high school?

Anthony:

I did, yeah.

Rich:

And you just went through four years or three years?

Anthony:

All four, yep, yep.

Rich:

And then what was your first job outside of college?

Anthony:

Like an internship or so I didn't even intern in college, so I was just like a full-time athlete, a full-time party guy. I remember my childhood more than I remember Amherst College because I partied so hard. Like I, you know, I hate to say it, but I used to wake up in hospitals all the time. Like I was that's why I don't drink anymore. I was a heavy, heavy drinker. I just couldn't stop, and I had all the childhood trauma that I've addressed it and worked through it now. But so the first job out of college wasn't a great one. I got I went through accountants and I worked at an insurance company on Highland Street there, making $10 an hour as a quality control analyst, yeah. So it wasn't anything glamorous, but I got I got to to to learn Excel and get my hands dirty on data, and then from there I did payroll accounting from their banking and from there, you know, from their compliance and banking. Now I do global risk management and banking.

Rich:

What is global risk management and banking?

Anthony:

So, like it's it's very similar to compliance, it's just making sure we follow the the laws, rules, and regs that you know that are designed by the regulators, etc. And just making sure we design these we we follow and adhere to all the policies, etc. And there's a big uh spotlight on on risk, like there's spotlights on us right now. Like, but uh because remember the 08 financial crisis? Because, you know, with the credit debt obligations in the real estate crash, because they they leveraged the real estate market through CDOs, these credit debt obligations that allowed investors to invest in these portfolios, and these big banks like Bairon Stearns and all this stuff, they couldn't answer when regulators came in and said, What is your exposure to this this crashing housing market? They couldn't say, So you've got billions and trillions of dollars, like not trillions, but billions of dollars invested, and you can't immediately tell us. So the whole reason why risk is really vi uh a really like you know hot industry right now, not only because with the data quality concerns, but so risk can I quickly identify to make sure they got the liquid assets to to account for their liabilities, right? And you know, to make sure the data is qual like it's quality data to make sound business decisions, etc. So because that oh that 08 crash, there was a really a big uh spotlight on risk in data specifically within risk.

Rich:

So how does data get pulled? Is it pulled from the banks that are all around the country or the world, or is data pulled from the people who are using products at the bank?

Anthony:

So it can like data's from everywhere. We get it from external sources, like you know, we got Bloomberg data coming in, and then we got people manually entering like the people our customers, like so you have to have the KYC data, know your customers, and the AML anti-money laundering data. And so people are entering it, we're pulling it in, we're creating it, we're transforming it, and it all needs to be, you know, quality data so we can't be trusted. So that's why risk is like a really vital.

Rich:

But who do you have to convince that you're trusted?

Anthony:

The government or uh the Fed, those you see, the right, the various regulators, they come in and there's various attestations, like so. One of the main attestations I worked on was FY14, like FR space, financial reporting space, Y-14. So it's a capital adequacy and stress testing attestation. So capital adequacy, making sure you have enough assets to cover your liabilities, as it's a 2052A test. There's a whole slew of regulatory reports, but just making sure you have assets to cover your liabilities in like various other attestations that that are align with like like various uh regulations that came out, like the RDA risk data aggregation attestation, uh, because that data is used to make business decisions, RDA. So uh they want to make sure that that's quality data. So there's attestations to that, etc. So any data that your executives are using to make business decisions, there needs to be quality data. So there's attestations around that.

Rich:

Do you think kids and schools should be taught like liabilities, assets, absolutely, risk, management of funds?

Anthony:

Yeah, I I think our whole schooling system, like what it what is our takeaway from like our history books, like they're constantly changing and removing things. You know, Trump's hiring people to remove certain things from like, you know, the African American Museum, which is just ridiculous, absolutely preposterous. But uh, I never trusted books. That's why I never really studied that hard. I even worked talking with my mother, I would be like, who owns like she told me about publishing companies, etc. Because I asked her, I wasn't just lazy with books naturally. I was like, who is writing this information? And and I understood like the biases, like you know, whoever you you they get to whoever publishes the books gets to control the information. So that's why I never was big into like studying these history books. I'm like talking to my dad and learning how inaccurate some of these things are. So why would I go to school and try my hardest to learn this stuff that's I know is a bad quality uh inherently? So um, but but yeah, so the whole schooling system we should be taught how to do taxes, how to get a job after work, how to potentially be an influencer, a gamer, like you know, how to deal with trauma. Like these these these classes aren't taught, and I think they should all be standard, so that's that's my take.

Rich:

Nice. I don't know. I always think that you know, what should I try to teach my kids versus what school's teaching them? And I'm like, well, maybe I don't even know how to teach teach them that, you know.

Anthony:

Exactly. Like, and I learned like what we learned, like when my dad was telling me about the civil rights movement and all these things, it like it directly contradicted what some of these books were saying, you know, and slavery, etc. You know, he started to teach me, I learned more in Amherst College, like how Africans, Africans participated in the slave trade, like Europeans would come and they would look, we'll sell you these guns if you can go capture your other tribes and give us slaves. We'll give you money and guns and what whatever you want. And the other, you know, tribes were doing it, so you cut there were a lot of tribes were forced into it. So he was telling me about how the role Africans played and like it about uh colonialism and like uh like uh all that stuff, and and just it's just how bad it was. Like these empires like taking over these lands for their resources and things, like so. I was being told how bad it was. He wasn't trying to indoctrinate me or anything, like not saying anything like that, not or trying to over make me be like a for the mo power or for the man or anything like that, but he was like, make sure you're aware of this stuff. So we would always watch the history channel and things like that that gave us a more broader view. And my mom would buy me his history books and tell me stories about things and where the books the information and the books I was reading in school contradicted what actually happened. And as you can see, if whoever controls the information controls the narrative, and uh it's like you can just be watching some of these presidential debates and everything. People can say, no, we're being maximum transparent, everything's transparent, the files are transparent, like you're just saying that, but it's not. That's not what's happening, you know. So I always try to do my studying outside of the normal, you know, education route, you know. I try to be an autodidact and teach myself.

Rich:

Yeah, if and that's kind of how I was thinking, like, how to treat my kids as they get older and they're in the school, they're gonna obviously be involved with technology way more than we were. Yeah, like I just wanna like shelter them, put them in the basement with an encyclopedia and super and regular Nintendo, and just like, oh, there is no internet, you know what I mean? But you can't. And so it's like, alright, they're gonna have passions every year, something different. What's the harm in being like, yeah, school's important, you know, try to learn this stuff, but oh, you really love game development? Why don't you focus on that 20, you know, 20 hours a week? Yeah. Um, and grow your knowledge through that application. But you probably are gonna find it useful to uh learn what's going on in school too, because you're gonna have some math, some history, some technology, sociology, I don't know, maybe religion. But then, you know, I I don't know if it's Warren Buffett or Charlie Munger. Um but they I could get this wrong, I haven't read their biography in a long time, but having a knowledge of a lot of different things is gonna help you with a specific task. Like if you only study calculus, you're gonna have a hard time applying it. Or you're gonna you're gonna really know calculus, but you're not gonna see where other people are looking at calculus from because you're not gonna have like that grounded and you might not get a creative or game-changing idea of calculus if you didn't study, you know, uh the stars. Because you might be studying the stars and then you're gonna apply a method to calculus and maybe you'll come up with a new idea.

Anthony:

Absolutely, and that diversification of thought, and that's why I think diversity is such a good thing, and companies do too. It's proven companies like that have more diversity, you're able to think more critically and outside the box more because you're getting a different vantage point. So I totally agree with you.

Rich:

Do you have a journal from when you were younger?

Anthony:

I did I I remember I so I I would write a diary periodically, but I stopped that maybe sometime in middle school, maybe like second or third grade, maybe a little later than that. Because I was I was like, what? I I never would go back and read it. I just was it was more therapeutic just writing it down. I was like, I never I can't even read my notes. My handwriting was so bad, it was a little chicken scratch-o. But um, but my mom, so she they my parents knew I had a proclivity for music, so she would buy me those little recorders, like not what do you what would you call them like boy or yeah, yeah, yeah. Like hands. So I was I was recording in my beats even like since like second or third grade. She'd buy me those things and all the little tapes that went in there. I was like, whenever I got like a unique rhythm or melody in my head, I would just capture it on that. So it wasn't not so much my thoughts. I would sometimes, but all the unique beats, but I th those must be lost. But I know I was coming up with some bangers.

Rich:

Why can't that be in fourth grade? You know, like broadcasting class.

Anthony:

Yeah, totally.

Rich:

Maybe some schools have that, or you could do that at home.

Anthony:

Some schools do, uh, but yeah, but like it needs to be more like the kids that even that the schools that do have it, the kids that have that inclination, probably from a parent showing them. So, you know, it's a small like club or something, but it should be a standard class that's taught. I really I truly believe that. And one thing on like the curriculum of being taught, like you realize how outdated our education is, and you realize the people that have connections and like systemic, systemic things and how important that is. Because the people that are getting these jobs that are with skill sets that are very outside of what being taught in schools, they have parents or people outside of schools that show them. They're going playing golf with the guy's uncle. So they have our our curriculum in in schools being divorced from the skills needed to really succeed in today's workforce. It really is cre it's it's uh accelerating the gap with in between the higher class and lower class. It's harder for us to get these jobs because you know, some of these kids, their parents work in these spaces already, so it's easier for them to get in because their parents are showing them the way. Whereas so that with technology and things like that, so the the poorer kids are even at a more disadvantage because they're not being taught it in the schools and they have no exposure to it. So I'm I'm highly sensitive to this because I've always paid attention, you know. I've got to be as observant as well.

Rich:

And it's almost better to teach those kids like, hey, you need to find an in somewhere. Like it's not as important about being the best you can be at this because you need to do 50% of exploratory relationship building and mentorship so that you can get into that conversation with the right people so that you can be successful because you're already great at it, but you're not gonna be known as a great person for that subject or that career unless you're involved with the right people.

Anthony:

Exactly. And then for kids to even know what they want to do, they need that diversity of uh of curriculum, everything, so they can see I like this, I'm good at this, or maybe I'm not good at this, but I want to be. But we're not teaching these kids and showing them and putting them in a position where they can even decide what they want to do so they can make this decisions to help them out. So we really need to like I'm really a big proponent of like uh just you know, civic like programs that expose kids to these different programs.

Rich:

Mandatory mentorships from kindergarten to 12th grade every year, every student.

Anthony:

I would be on board with that. That's a hell of an idea, man.

Rich:

Yeah, mandatory mentorships, like you spend MM. MM.

Anthony:

Yeah.

Rich:

A month or three weeks away from school, just following.

Anthony:

Yeah. Yeah, that's you.

Rich:

No kids are gonna come follow me. They're gonna be like, this is what adult is. No, bro.

Anthony:

With that mustache, I don't give a like I would be, I would listen to at least what you had to say initially with that mustache. You would draw me in immediately.

Rich:

I'm gonna say, do what I say, not what I do. You're gonna be like, this this adult is uh doing what we, you know, he's playing video games in the basement right now.

Anthony:

No, with the curly mustache, I'd keep I would have kept an eye on you, but you definitely would have gotten my attention. Like, I don't know. I was always drawn to characters, you know, something new. Uh like I was always drawn to diversity, you know? Like because the half black guy, you know, with with with the age gap of 20 years between the Irish mom and the Jamaican dad. I'm kind of drawn to diversity naturally. I don't know what do you want from me.

Rich:

Did you ever do any type of theater or acting?

Anthony:

I know I I I I definitely had the passion for it as a kid, but like I think I had some so I know that I served as like a ring boy in marriages and stuff, so people would like I was like effusive and like you were saying earlier, like ring boy, fetch me my ring. No, but like putting the flag not in that way, not in that way, not in that way. But the putting the flair on it and speaking and stuff, and like I was like definitely like doing impressions and stuff. Like I remember somebody like this was this was bad, but one of my aunts or something like had me do the Gary Coleman impression, like, what you talking about with this? Like, I just I love doing impressions being proud, so but I think because of like childhood trauma, I really closed and and got quiet, and now I'm I'm retreating to the space, so it's not like I'm learning it new. And my dad, although he was a military and kind of hardcore and everything, he was effusive and demonstrative as well. And my mom was as well. And so we always were watching HBO shows and movies, and like you know, I was tra going to see my dad perform and seeing some of the best musicians in the world. They were coming traveling here, like Jimmy Heath, etc. Like Jimmy Heath was my dad's best man in his wedding, so uh I was exposed to that, but I think childhood trauma pushed me like his wedding? No, no, so when before you were born.

Rich:

I yeah, so the picture You didn't get remarried or something.

Anthony:

Oh, so so yeah, no, my parents stayed together there the whole time.

Rich:

You're just uh talking about a story they told you about.

Anthony:

Yeah, because I saw the picture on that John Culture in the corner of that picture is my is a picture, we can put it in whatever, but it's it's my dad, my mom, and Jimmy Heath. So I I'm like, whoa, no wonder why I'm so close with Jimmy Heath. Whenever he would call, I he was always wicked cool. He just was a wicked awesome guy, always knew my football stats and everything. And one thing people would ask me, it's a funny story, quick. Who's your favorite jazz musician? Obviously, come on, Kurt Dog, Curtis Fuller, Curtis Dubois. But um, but if I can't say Curtis Dubois, it would have to be Jimmy Heath. Because at my dad's Jazz Master ceremony, I hadn't seen I remember Jimmy Heath would come in here sometimes, and my dad his famous thing. My dad was jacked, you know what I'm talking about? So he would hold up his arm.

Rich:

Picture your dad looking like Miles Davis.

Anthony:

Ah, my dad was a good one. That was cool, guys. No, he's Jack. He was more hardcore. I cut you off. I'm sorry. No, no, no. He was more hardcore. He wasn't a big guy, but like his arms were like iron. Like my the guy said he could grab a dime off a Dakboard and he beat Jesse Owens and one of the fastest people in the world and hit home runs like after partying in Europe is coming in. Like somebody had to he didn't like say, let me pursue baseball for the city.

Rich:

So you're like describing yourself right now, but continuing.

Anthony:

I hope so. No, I he was to another level. I was, you know, but he stayed skinny. Like as a skinny athlete, I was dominant. But I was never I could dunk in between eighth grade and ninth grade. People, some people don't want to believe me. Of course I didn't grow. I stayed at so at 5'10, 130 pounds, I was jumping through the roof. Uh at the Syracuse football camp, I was dunking and stuff. Uh I was the shortest kid doing it. But um uh yo, so he I he would hold up his arm and I was I would do pull-ups. That was that we would work out all the time in this room. We would put on the TV, you know, with like with the white ladies' crew like hosting the classes. Kick, we would put that on and we would do our work because like my brother and sister would be at school, so it would be me and him, and my mother worked in Boston as it uh, I think she was like an executive assistant or something for some bank like Fidelity or something, something or Shaman Bank, Shaman Bank. And so we would do our workouts here. So he would hold his arm up and I would do pull-ups, and Jimmy Heath would watch his. But then so I hadn't seen Jimmy Heath since a child. So with the Jazz Masters, uh, it's kind of like the Hall of Fame for Jazz. My dad got indicted or whatever, accepted in like when I was a junior or senior at uh uh Amherst. And so when I went there, I was wicked shy, like all these world famous people, like I didn't know, they all knew who my dad was. And but Jimmy Heath came up and he's like, Carnis, Carnis, Carnis, yo, you this is your son, this dad, this six-four stuff. Because Jimmy Heath is only like 5'3. So he was like, he's like, damn, damn, homie, like, and he was gassing me up, he took me by the arm and was walking me, he paraded me around the Jazz Master ceremony, like, yo, check out Fuller's kid, check out Fullest Kid. It like I had like world famous lady musicians looking at me, everyone was like, yo, but then it then the it all came crumbling down when people were like, So what do you do with music? You're Curtis Fuller's son. I played football when I was college. I don't know, I don't know. But like, you know, he was parading me around, like he gassed me up. So Jimmy Heath would be my favorite if I can't say Curtis Dubois. Just because like that that moment like was so cool having to parade me around.

Rich:

Did you I remember moments in jazz like at a club before when you were younger? Would you go see shows?

Anthony:

The only sh uh I I saw like only a few. Um it was I Billy came to one of them, and I remember it was so loud I didn't like to go. Cause like he played hard bop. Like, it's not like low-key jazz. And when you you hear it live, this like you when you see like William Armstrong's in their cheeks exploding, a lot of these guys were like they they had natural, you know, advantages, like either expansive lungs or like dad, you know, was was was one of the world's like fastest people and like incredibly like best athletes, you know, a 5-8 guy grabbing a dime off the backboard. I'm like, damn, homie, but at the same time, you know, I'm like, I can only dunk, I could touch the top of the square, but not the so but at the same time, I never ran a 9.900 meters, so uh so maybe he could have. But um uh shows, jazz shows. Yeah, so these like he he's they he's his lungs were so powerful, he he would bl explode on that horn, and as a little kid it hurt my ears so much. Oh, it's so very loud. I didn't I i I just and then I always thought of him as a military guy, but yeah, his going to his a hard bop legend shows is gonna hurt your ears.

Rich:

I don't know if it's still open, but there was a famous jazz club in Boston that played jazz every single night or music every night.

Anthony:

He did some things in Boston I remember going to, but I don't remember where. But I remember going to Boston sometimes to see a player.

Rich:

I know he was in the military. Would he um do shows like would he have to leave for a day to go do shows in Boston like paid gigs, or was he more retired as you when you were born? Because you turned 60.

Anthony:

Oh no, he still was traveling. So he he he was traveling, so he would be gone for months at a time sometimes. So it would just be my mom and we'd give her hell. And then when he was coming home, she would say, The party's over. Because she's gonna tell old Kurt Dog everything we did, and that hammer was coming down. Uh, so she would say the last two days before he's coming home, the party's over. Oh, and she'd be doing a little crazy Irish laugh. It's all so funny. I watched 28 years later last night and see the bond between the kid and the mom. I guess with the Irish kids and the mom, like up with we had a very unique relationship. She was the friggin' best man. But uh, so he would be traveling for for months at a time. So when I was in second grade, he had terminal lung cancer, and he so he we sh he should have had VA care. He served in the uh in the Korean War and was in um and he did uh the guard, what is it called? Like National Guard. He did that for like 10 years or so. So he should have had lifetime coverage or whatever, but he had lung cancer, and he probably got it from like being all these like equipment and everything. He was an asbestos and all this. But they didn't have a oh yeah, and everyone called it. But he wasn't a smoker, but like second hand, second hand definitely as well. But um, they didn't give him coverage, so we had to take out a loan on this house that we're still paying for now. So you get to see like how because he joined the military early, I think he used his sister's birthday. He wanted to join at 16. Like, guys would do that back then. Like, that's why he would look at he would look at me sometimes, you lazy mother. Like, I wasn't joining no, I wasn't going to fight wars at 16. Get the hell out of here. But he won't want he was in an orphanage, he wanted to get out, and there was a jazz band. In a lot of the famous guys were in that band, and that was his opportunity. Like, he had to pave his own way. There was nobody was showing him this, but so that's why he joined the army early. But um, uh geez, I lose track, yeah. These these these Starbucks coffees really get you going. Whew.

Rich:

Starbucks, sponsor us.

Anthony:

Yeah, but yeah, he was in the military, so he yeah, sponsor us. Uh they're probably like, this is the anti-sponsorship. Kids, don't drink, don't drink coffee. But this is all this is all I do. But um, he so he he didn't perform for a few years after he had that terminal, like they had a priest come in and read him his rights on the deathbed. So he he survived by a miracle. They they removed one of his lungs because and it was starting to metastasize or spread. But they were like, let's remove a lung, and that's the best we can do. So they removed the lung, because we took out a lung in the house, they wouldn't cover it, and then um it just the the cancer was gone. I don't even think he did chema or anything, and then it never came back. And then he he took maybe like a like not long, like he was put right back on the road right after that. But a funny story the day he came home when he had his oxygen tank and his mask and everything. I like I was like, yo, dad is old now. Like I was a bad, I was a rough kid. And like my mom and dad had to like to to discipline me, like, physically too. And so I was like, yo, you old, like I was like, Dad's old, he's got an oxygen tank. So I was standing and fucking around in the oh sorry, excuse my language there, in the kitchen there. We could swear, fuck shit. I got you, I got you. I try not to. But then the day he came home from getting cancer lung removal, after you know, after having a pre-speed of his rights on the death on his uh on his hospital bed, he they they removed the lung and it came in it eventually they said it looked like his lung grew back because he was performing immediately. But he called he's like, Stop jumping around, and I'm like, You're tied up to a tank, you can't do nothing. Like in my mom was like, see what it's like when you're not here. That motherfucker. So he started chasing me around through the house with an oxygen tank, and I had to run outside. And I remember I got to this corner of the house, he came flying around, he came flying out that house. He's in his like mid-60s after like he's got like diabetes, a whole list of things. And he was running full. I got to see what real Jamaican sprinting was because I was uh a speed demon myself. So I was here, he was running out of that door, he caught me, he oh, he was re- I remember like I was running around that house, I was running around the house there, and he read this is a funny story, he would tell his jazz friends, and I looked back and he was about to grab me. He grabbed my shirt, but then I then I put on I I hit the turbo boosters, ran down the street to my friend's house all the way. I swear to god, if you would measured my 800-meter dash, it had to have been one of the fastest times for a little kid. I'm running away from a former world sprinter. But he's like, he would tell the story. He just kept getting smaller and smaller, and like that that's how he described it. But I'm like, had he caught me, you know, my my health bar would have been getting smaller and smaller, I'll tell you that. Woo! What did he grow up in this house too? They moved here, so they had my brother, he's five years older than me, so I believe he was born in either '82, and uh he was born in New York, and then my grandmother convinced my mom to come back because she didn't want her daughter raised in a fan like a biracial family in the in the 80s, and it was like they like you know, they were getting pulled over at a gunpoint by cops and stuff. They had to like drive into gigs, they couldn't drive through certain states, and they would laugh at me. I'm like, what's this state like? Like, we wouldn't drive through Mississippi and everything. If we had to go to Florida, we they would drive around and they would laugh and make fun of me. Like, kid, you better learn what race is like in this country fast. And uh, so yeah.

Rich:

So is your dad's you said Jamaican?

Anthony:

He was pretty predominantly Jamaican and African. We did the test, but he's always thought he was all Jamaican, but he there was it was a lot of African name.

Rich:

And what is your nationality is your mom?

Anthony:

Predominantly Irish and also English.

Rich:

Okay, so they met he was they met at UMass.

Anthony:

So no, so they they lived in New York, they had they they had my brother, and then my grandmother convinced them to move to Massachusetts. Like, we'll give I'll give you this house calf here in Millbury if you move back. And so they moved back and had my sister a year l after my brother, and then they had me four years after my sister. Oh so he he he was living in they lived in New York for a for a few years, and they met at UMass Amherst. My my mom was visiting one of her siblings there, like a concert. My dad was performing at UMass, and they met there, and I think she jumped right on to 12 bus, and that was that.

Rich:

So, Black Guy Boston Accent, when did that start?

Anthony:

Black Guy Boston Accent, that's the name of my social media profiles I'm running with. That started, my sister hosts Thanksgiving every year in New York. Like, she pulls in all the strays, so anyone who doesn't have any place to go, she hosts it there. So I would fly in, and one of her friends, girlfriends, that she met in like business school or something, she's like, Whoa, whoa, whoa, she heard me talking. She's like, she was just looking at me, kind of like laughing and everything, and she goes, Whoa, I gotta say, I've never heard a black guy with a Boston accent before. And like they were all like, Yeah, and I didn't realize how bad I plus I was drinking too, so when I drink it, it becomes even more pronounced. So, and they were like, That's crazy. I've never heard a black guy with a Boston accent. And I can't think of any, can you think of any like famous black guys with a Boston accent? I like I really couldn't I was like, that's gonna be my sticking point, you know, my shtick. You know, it's not it's not a I have more of a Worcester accent, my mother would say. Boston is more obnoxious. I'm not gonna say, I'm not gonna pronounce my eyes, but I'm not gonna be obnoxious at the same time, you know.

Rich:

Was there a like what were you calling yourself something else before that?

Anthony:

Uh just your name. Oh, I think it was called my name like a dotfully, because my sister, I always try to copy her, like my dad copied my my sister learn his sister learning music. So she her her DJ name was M Dot. So I called myself a dot because Mary Mary fuller m dot and Anthony A dot. So that was my name before, but uh, and that's my gamer tag, so I'm always trying to copy her and be like her, you know. My sister was my mom was like, Who do you want to be like, your sister or your brother? You know, so I was like, Bobby, because she's the superstar. Even though my brother was acting up a little bit, but uh so a dot was my former name, but Black Eye Boston Accent Sticks.

Rich:

What growing up, did you play a lot of games? How did you get into gaming?

Anthony:

So my dad lived in Japan for a couple years, and like he was big over there, so he was hip to technology. In this household, we always had the latest gizmos and gadgets, and he would always buy us the systems. So my we always had the Sega Genesis and with the Sega CD and all whatever, whenever they came out, we bought them immediately. So and my dad would be playing them in there too, and we're like, So, like, when the new system came out, when Sega when Sega Genesis came out, because my brother and sister had that upstairs, they had their room upstairs, I would get the Super Nintendo. So the Super Nintendo came downstairs. Oh, it would be. So then when I, you know, and uh, you know, all the hand-me-downs. So I'd be playing in there. I mean my dad would play. And it was so funny when that man would play Super Mario, we would all laugh at him. Whenever he had to jump, you know the one where you jump from the castle and you jump with the flag at the end? The old one, just Mario Mario. Whenever you had to jump, he would actually he would jump and like we would laugh, and he did not think it was funny, but it was the funniest thing in the world to watch him play Mario be jumping. I would be laughing like that, and then he put the controller down and shut it off. I thought it was the funniest thing in the world. Oh my god.

Rich:

What are you playing now for games?

Anthony:

Oh yeah, but that that was how I, you know, the nascent stages and early stages of my life, I began game began gaming because we had it, and I gamed all the way through. And I always was like the best. So I would buy the the Mortal Kombat books, and I knew I would memorize all the the I was the the one that dominated everybody and then How do I do a fatality for saying shot? The fatality, the bay baladies. I knew how to do all I I love memorizing all that stuff. My mom would take me to Bonds and Noble to get me to read to be like my sister, and I and with the books I would go, I would get Mortal Kombat books in magic books. I used to be big into magic, but then I was like, I don't want to be known as a shasta. People were like, yo, you're a shasta, like because I like deceiving people, so I gave that away. But so memorizing the the the the the the game magazines and stuff that and then I got into big to computer games, me and Froth in high school. So high school I wasn't talking to everybody. I would I was be daydreaming about playing StarCraft, and I beat some of the best StarCraft players of all time, Red Nada, Oops Reach. I beat these guys, you know, like half black I know where you're beating the East Korean guys. Like so I've always been a game fanatic and um was one of the top 100 in Madden. When a Call of Duty, Modern Warfare 3, a Moab is 25 kills in a row, a Moab or a Nuke. I got thousands of nukes in Modern Warfare 3 right upstairs when my dad was still living here with jazz people coming, I'd be upstairs screaming and yelling, dropping Moab. So I always played at an extremely high level. It was always like top, top, top, like beating pro gamers and streamers, top, top, top. It's always been a part of my life. I still play Call of Duty enough.

Rich:

What do you see for Black Guy Boston accent? Um you do music, comedy, a mix of both?

Anthony:

Mix of both. I started with comedy because music it was a learning curve. But I once I connected with you, because Billy's my best friend, the guy you just did the last podcast with, I can't speak highly enough of that guy. Like, he's the smartest, like, he's an insane freak. Me and him learn fitness together. Like, he's like 148 pounds and benches to be 15 for like five reps. Like, I got up to be 248, or maybe like 200 right now, but I was never benching any like as much as he could. He's a freak. But um, oh my god, I get off track. But yeah, I gotta make sure we give Billy his kudos. Like, he he's an awesome guy, the guy we just did a lot of podcasts with.

Rich:

But you would you mind he he helped define your story like with Black Guy Boston accent?

Anthony:

Well, he with with with everything, like um is that what we were talking about? You saying where I got the name, or like I'm trying to remember like your last conversation.

Rich:

What do you see? What do you kind of like?

Anthony:

Oh, with comedy with oh, how okay, so I was talking about Billy. So I your name started, your profile was like a suggested profile. And I don't even know how, because were you connected to his profile or not? Like, I think so. Okay, because you must have been connected to him or some of the holy name friends. So I saw your name like a year ago, and um I wanted to do comedy and music, and you're the one who introduced me to the Suno app, S-U-N-O. And that app, all I come up with unique melodies. I just hum these melodies in and I I you know modify the prompts. Like, it's very extremely simple. I'm doing minimal work, but it's I'm bringing my music ideas to fruition much faster. I thought I was gonna have to, there's gonna be a huge learning curve having to learn all this stuff, like some of the music equipment you tried to show me in the other room. I'm like, ugh. I remember like doing that to my mom and dad, oh you know, like the cowli lion, if I only had the knife. Like when they that would be their take on technology, and that's how kind I am too. I get intimidated. But with Suno, you just hum it right in and it's spitting out fire beats. So now you just showed me that like two months ago. I switched from being comedy focused to now music focused because some of these beats are fire, are they not? And we're gonna drop some vocals down. Like I think he's like, absolutely, wink wink. But like, no, now seeing the quality of the output for my Suno songs, it's like I I think my path to success or potential success is gonna be through music rather than comedy. Comedy, but comedy was easy to do, I could just record myself, but with Suno, it simplified the process. So now I'm more focused on music because it's so so simple. Today's a seal.

Rich:

Do you incorporate that into like your so were you doing stuff like this before recently, or is this all new? Interesting.

Anthony:

So when I I got my iPhone in like 2018 or so, and it had the voice memos app. I I don't know how, but at some point I discovered the an emojis. You know the the you know the iPhone an emojis? Yeah. So I w I didn't even know I had the phone for like a year or two. When somebody showed me that, I'm like, yo, so I have a whole other profile with like five or six hundred an emojis. Have you looked at that one too?

Rich:

Yeah, yeah.

Anthony:

So with like the it's got this animated picture of an animal and with me talking, and I would do the different voices to match. I would have the lion, the tiger, like the ghost, like I have and the the dragon. So that got me into like I would to all my friends I would come up with ideas and would send them them. So that all I I just started posting those to a social media profile, and then I progressed to showing myself and recording myself, and then you know, now I'm progressing to music, etc. So that's kind of been my progression with social media.

Rich:

Awesome. You have any questions for me?

Anthony:

Oh well, yeah, yeah, I definitely do. So I met and your profile showed up. So it was so serendipitous. Do my connection with Billy, and it's like how funny and the how serendipitous or like how oddly things can work out in your favor by by chance, unintentionally. Like that's what I think of the word serendipity. Uh, is that I met with you and you showed me this app, and you know, now I'm taking music further. So I I I like to think of all the people in my life that have impacted me, and I'm like, and I stop and th and think and um uh how grateful I am, you know, just even this experience. It's like it wouldn't be possible through all my interactions with all the people. So the diversity, diversification, diversification of thought and everything, like that's how I've accomplished anything in my life is through partnering and you know, do you gravitate towards more hip-hop, classical music now?

Rich:

Like, what do you like to listen to?

Anthony:

Uh so in the last like year or two, I was recording my ideas. So 2018 I started recording the an emojis, and then I found the voice memos app on the phone. I started recording my melodies. So what what I produced on Suno within the last two months is just off the top. But I've got thousands, I think I got like a total of four or five thousand ideas. So I would just throughout the day be recording, like I would think of a unique melody, I would hear like a bit, like a dish drop, and I'd be like, oh, if I do to do to do, and like continue on with it. I would record the melody, like one day I'll come back and make this a song, and now it's Susuno, I'm plugging, I'm gonna start plugging in those things into to music to come back into it. So I've been doing it for like since 2019, like recording my ideas, but even in high school, holy name, I would be freestyling throughout in freestyle battling with like Rodrigo or like some of the other other black kids in the class, like that rather than focus on the materials, freestyling everything. As I learned a new word, like like I don't even know. I got an example, but I don't like gametes, like it's half your chromosome a gamete is like another word for your sperm, and it has half your chromosomes. So when I learned that in science class, I would be like, yo, I put my gametes on your girl's face, ask her how half my chromosome count tastes. That's like I will come up with bars like that in high school, I remember that. So like I was always freestyling when I learn something new, I like to interpolate it or insert it into like my creative, you know, focus.

Rich:

You do have a very large vocabulary. The couple times we talked before we came to do this, I was like, this guy's got vocabulary for days.

Anthony:

You wanna you wanna know quickly how I got that? Because I sucked it. English was not my thing in high school. So my mom made sure she wouldn't buy me a car, she would drive me. So she was we would play a game as a little kid. She would give me five dollars if you could find a word in the dictionary. She didn't know. All she did was smash books. All I did was dad was just smash. Like, she would smash a book a day, and uh, she was the head of foreign languages at Assumption College. Like, gotta be like people from the around the world, like would call in to ask her how to interpret like like Shakespearean novels, and she could write and that I couldn't understand what she was saying or writing. So she would on my car ride the holy name, she would be like, Anthony, what is What does serendipity mean? I'd be like, I don't freaking know. And she would be like, she would use analogies to teach me. Like, so like, like I was saying, I watched 28 Years Later, the unique relationship the Irish moms have. She had a droll sense of humor, and I suppose I do too. But she would teach me vocabulary words. So that's how my like by her driving me, otherwise I wouldn't have learned. Like she saw I was so lazy or my efforts were perfunctory, you know. But and then one analogy I'll just give you real quick is when I'll say if I'll try to read something, I didn't understand it, I would be like, Mom, what's this word mean? I'd be in my room yelling rather I was so lazy rather than go up and ask her, I would yell what the word means. And my dad could hear, he was sitting in here, my mom's room was in between us and I was on the porch. I remember one time, like she did not miss an opportunity to slam dunk on my dad. I was like, Mom, what does irrascible mean? I'm like, because I didn't know what it meant. And I rather than look it up, like she wanted to teach me to look it up, like, but just tell me what it means. Like she she wasn't here, like I a couple words before that, she wasn't answering me and I'd look it up, but irrascible, I'm like, Mom, what does this mean? And then she came storming out of her room and goes, Your father and your grandfather are irrascible. And then he went off, like, I'm irrascible, alright. It means just kind of like ornery, or like you know, you have like a bad attitude or something, but like I remember she's and I was like, Oh my god, my dad probably thought I did that on purpose. We set that up, but like she was so quick, she could dunk your dad, and I'll never forget that word. Your father and your grandfather are irascible. She was joking, but like she didn't miss a beat like that. Like, that's the kind of relationship we had.

Rich:

Are you an avid reader?

Anthony:

Uh I've always read articles and things like that, but not not novels. Not uh I'm more of a uh non-fiction guy. But I I do I prefer sci-fi in film. But I I not I don't like read, you know.

Rich:

I love sci-fi. What are some of your top five sci-fi movies?

Anthony:

Oh, gotta be uh Interstellar update. Oh, Matrix has gotta be number one, right? Because I do you I remember you and Billy talking about like yeah, be this being a simulation. Uh as I've gotten older, I'm way more open or amenable to that idea. I was I was like, come on, we there's there's obviously, you know, uh evolution and everything, but like we're just born when technology's popping off. Like, come on, like you know, and all these things, and there's so many, I've had so many potentially ethereal events, and there's so many uh coincidences. I'm like, come on, like I really don't think this is everything's just a coincidence. I really don't like and I only started thinking like this a year or two ago, but I'm like really open to spirituality now in uh things like that. But so sci-fi, matrix number one, interstellar's gotta be up there. Um I remember Minority Report. Do you remember Minority Report?

Rich:

I don't, but I'd watched it, but I don't remember what it is. Oh my god. Tom Cruise in it?

Anthony:

Yeah, it's Tom Cruise. So he's gotta be like one of my top favorite actors of all time. I know I know my family, they don't they don't like him or something. Like my sister's like, oh, I don't like that Tom Cruise. I'm like, come on, everything, he's like, I want the truth. You can't handle every every role Tom Cruise does, he smashes it. I don't care. I know Scientology is weird, but Minority Report was just as like around me, me and Prof, uh my other best friend. So you gotta do a series with him too, because he went to Only Name. Do you remember him as well, too?

Rich:

I do, like he was friends with my sister.

Anthony:

Yeah, he was and then we hang out with in that friend's group, yeah. But we would go and see movies, and we went to see Minority Report, and I was my mind was friggin' blown when that. So do you remember the prime?

Rich:

I'm gonna go cat. I'm gonna go watch that.

Anthony:

That was a game changer movie. I was like, whoa, but like, yeah, that was way ahead of its time, just like Matrix was. But yeah, so that would be up there. Um, and there's so many more, like, those would be the first top three, the top four and five spots are probably open, but yeah, I've seen I I like history pieces as well. I've always liked my history, like I told you about like Greek mythology, like Samson and Delilah, Benher, I like history and things like that. Like Bubble's, like the like King Henry's and all those. I love those. And oh, like, oh, like things like uh Beowulf and everything. I remember my mom, you know, that was the she's like, you should do an essay on Beowulf to get into college at Amherst College. That's what I did.

Rich:

I had to read that one too at some point.

Anthony:

Oh, yeah. So I did that on my own volition to get into Amherst College, like and here's an and I told you ethereal events and things like that. So when my mom was dying, there was a lot of like she moved with my grandfather down down the street just because like that house, it it was like it was more accessible, and she had like a bed and everything, and she was getting ready to die with cancer, like you know, right before she knocked out. Unfortunately, it was awful, awful. But I remember I went to go walk in the woods back there, and um I was walking into a uh uh an area that was formerly we called it the clearing. And I'm walking through the clearing, I'm like, yo, this is all growing in, and now it's all growing, you would never know that was cleared out. It was the gun range, and it was all bullets, you could go and find people go up there to just fire off their gun. And I'm walking up there, and uh, out of the corner of my eye, maybe from where me to where that camera is, there's a wolf standing there looking at me. And I I I grabbed a rock and charged that thing and almost ran off a cliff. I was like so not in the mood to be different with a grown male wolf. And like I was like, and then looking back at that, I'm like, well, no wonder why my mom was like, Beowulf, this is you, Anthony, you know, and I end up running and charging at wolves and it ran away. But that's just a little story. I had like little things like that. And I'm like, right as my mom's dying, and I'm coming into my you know adulthood, like the 28 years later, like they juxtapose the mother dying with the birth of a new child, so I'm big into that, you know. I so that movie really resonated with me. Awesome. I feel like I I I ramble, bro. You should feel bad for Billy, like you know, our childhood was all like this. AOL chat rooms, I was going bananas.

Rich:

No, it's all good.

Anthony:

But uh, so how about you? So, like, so you like how did you get into this space? Because I want to learn this as well, because as I'm getting into comedy and music, like what are your proclivities and like what led you to this space? Because I've tried to try I've tried to give a a a rough background of myself and how I got into the space, but how about yourself? Because your your journey is unique as well.

Rich:

Well, I was always told that I should be on ADHD medication. Like I had way too much energy as a kid. Actually, the impression my family used to make me do was Steve Urkel. Okay. So like I was a Steve Urkel guy all day, all night, love Steve Urkel. Yeah.

Anthony:

And then I got that a lot as a kid too.

Rich:

In sixth grade, I had a grade teacher who instead of like telling me to stop, she told me to go, and she got me uh passed to go to the Woodcast Art Museum and write about the art there. And then my article got put in the paper. Oh shit. So it was like taking someone's energy and like directing it for something good. Yeah. You know, and ever since then I was kind of like a changed. Um, and then in seventh grade, my si no, sixth grade uh at St. Mary's, my sisters were doing an after-school play, and I had to wait for them to take the bus. And the teacher, Joanne Warren, on Graffit Street, Joanne Warren Studio, she was the director, and she kept making me be a filler in the performance, in the play. It's like dancing in full.

Anthony:

Yeah. My dad would make that joke at dinner, I'd say, I'm full. He goes, No, you're not, you're fuller. I'm sorry. No, I would make that joke every friggin' day. And I'd like because I was really skinny as a kid, but I got so I I make that joke now a little more.

Rich:

I don't know how she got me involved so much, but by the end of the thing, I was singing, dancing, acting, performing. And then she invited me to do a summer camp, um, which she said, oh, it's like theater and acting.

Anthony:

Like at what age?

Rich:

So this was six girls that celebrate the summer.

Anthony:

Okay, okay.

Rich:

Oh, no, actually, the first she's like, Can you fill in for a dance for a dancer who broke his arm? And I was like, Oh, I don't dance. She goes, No, it's just you're just gonna do a cartwheel and we'll run around. She's you know, and I was like, Alright, I could do it. And then I walk into the dance studio, and there's just like 30 girls and leotards, and I'm like, Whoa. Yo, I'm uncomfortable.

Anthony:

Well, that was a gold mine back then. I could go back, I'd be doing some theater.

Rich:

All right, Rich, when the music comes on, I just want you to run and do a cartwheel. Yeah. I didn't know how to do a cartwheel, so I just ran and tried to, and I just fell like crashed into the room, and everyone's like, Yeah. But anyways, I filled in for this kid and went to a dance camp.

Anthony:

It's like a wood girl.

Rich:

And then she invited me to do the summer camp, and I was kind of like, ah, I don't really want to dance. And she's like, No, it's theater and acting. But it was dancing. Yeah. So then I did that camp, and then I was all in. I stopped playing sports in seventh grade, and everyone's like, So how did you get all in though?

Anthony:

Because you said your first impression, you crashed, it was a bad impression. So like you just became enamored of it like afterwards. Like, I mean, I just what was the turning point?

Rich:

You just going back and she's like, Alright, don't do the cartwheel. We'll just run and have you pop up like uh Peter Pan. So the summer camp, you know, and then I got friends there, and then I in seventh grade, everyone's like, Oh, are you gonna play you know baseball or basketball or something? I was like, No, I I dance now. And they're like, shut up. I'm like, no, I like full-on dance now. And then I just did like ballet, tap jazz.

Anthony:

Can you do like a spinner root? Like, do you still like what would you what would be your main okay, okay, like hip hop dancing?

Rich:

Like, no, my main was like uh like I don't know, like modern jazz dancing, kind of like theater. Think like Broadway. Okay, okay. And tap dancing.

Anthony:

Okay, yeah, it's bigger, it's Irish it's big in the Irish like uh community. So I I I was like, I want to do dancing, but I wanted to explore my Irish roots, but I'm definitely not doing tap dancing. And I would do breakdancing and stuff like you would love tap dancing, it's so rhythmic and like I know, but it it the stigma around it, you know. I don't know. For sure.

Rich:

No, that's the big stigma. It's like everyone thought I was joking, and then they were like, people would like show up to performance and they're like, no, rich full-on dances. Yeah. So it's like, I don't know. That's cool. I mean, that's a hell of a skill. Like you can't hide that. Yeah. If you get found out that you're like going to dance class as a guy, you everyone's gonna be real, like suspect, you know, you're gonna get hated.

Anthony:

It's a freaking gold mine. There's a few guys that I didn't do do that. I was like, ugh. And some of the girls are holy name that I really liked were in like theater and stuff, but I was so nervous and stuff. I could I was like, oh, I can't explore. I'm a football player, you know what I'm saying? So I never explored that side. But the girls I had crushes on were like the talkative girls that I do and all that stuff. I was like, oh, if only I could go.

Rich:

Oh, I totally digressed away from the point though. The point was Joanne Warren was a great mentor, yeah. And someone who instilled like such confidence into whoever she taught and just gave you great life skills. Like, you know, go to an audition in New York with 500 people and just go that all the time. Oh shit. Go to the front, perform your best, and like, you know, be confident in yourself. And we, you know, if you're the typecast, you're out, you know, you're not tall enough, you're too short. But if you're the right fit, they keep put passing you forward, you know, and it's just back to that mentorship idea. That's a hell of a if I didn't find that relationship early on, well, who knows what I'd be doing because I was kind of a lost soul. But that gave me such focus and confidence to you know apply to other things as well.

Anthony:

Agreed, yeah. And like now that you say that, my freshman year, like my mentor, so that's a hell of a story. Thanks for sharing that. When when I played football, my coach, he landed up, he lived on this lake. I'm like, how did he know? Because I I Milbury won when I played football, I started playing in fifth grade for Milbury. We we were a losing team. We played junior junior peewee's losing team fifth grade, sixth grade, losing team pee-wee's, and then junior midget, they made me a captain, and like we we started practicing all the freaking time. We went undefeated. I had about like four or five touchdowns, like at least two or three touchdowns a game, and the other teammates had at least a couple two. We barely finished games, we smoked everybody, it was a huge thing in the town. That's why when I was like, I'm gonna be a football player, because like yo, I'm good at this football thing. I was the I was the skinny, fast kid lightning. Like, I would be tight end, so I love running full speed and blocking the guys, and I love running by them because they don't look at the tight end, and it didn't matter if I'm a receiver, it didn't matter where you put me. So I always wore the Rainy Moss shirt. So, and we would do jet sweeps because like I started to get confident on the taking the hits, and I love playing defense. I had like my the the year I always had defensive touchdowns like almost every game, like I smashed kids. So I was a football player through and through. So my freshman year football coach, he lived on this this lake here, Dave Mong. I'll never forget that man. He started taking me to the weight room. So that's how I went from 135. I graduated about 235. Everybody about all the sauce to the gills. No, that was my mentor. He would come and pick me up like at least five days a week. I would design the workouts, I did the research. He because he was like old school holy name football player. He was probably around my age now, he was probably around 38. That's crazy. And he was like a salesman, everything, and like he we lifted weights every day, and he showed like seeing how strong and big he was a lineman. And he was like half Native American, like but had to have been Comanche or something. This motherfucker was iron. And um, yeah, he was my mentor that got me into lifting weights, and we lifted weights for a couple years, and then he had an accident on he would ride his speedboat around late night. I'd be upstairs in my sister's room when she went to college to get over, and he crashed on a rock and died until like junior year, I believe. That was traumatic, bro. Like him dying, he was like one of my best friends, you know. And we would we were at the gym, we were like superstars. Like, so that's how I got into weight with like my football proclivity, because he really brought that out. I was like, I want to be like him, and my mother like she really facilitated that too. And like just seeing them talk after my football games, like even them compliment me, you know. I was like, I like this guy, you know. He's an old school only name player who beat St. John's, and he's like, You'll beat him if you lift weights with me, but no one else lifted weights, so we ended up getting smashed. But he he played a uh uh seminal, uh he had a seminal role, you know, like in the early stages, nation stages a major material impact on my life for sure. I'll never forget him, yeah. So those mentors, like, we we had them and they they led us to our career, but like our past, but um, you know, I the other people aren't so lucky to have these older people show us.

Rich:

But you asked me, yeah, how did I get to this point to like being interested in video? And I started way far back.

Anthony:

But that's how it goes. Yeah, you found yours earlier.

Rich:

Fast forward to doing sales for a digital marketing company, yeah, and I was doing sales and like fulfilling projects, but mostly in the digital marketing space. Then the company switched to video first, only video, um, and I was doing sales for them. But having grown up making beats and stuff, and like having a love for a passion for like looping music and stuff and tap tap dancing, I caught on really quick to what they were doing, just like the way they would edit video was just like making music. So I started editing and playing around and being like, yo, let's go make something. And we we the first video I went out to make was uh buying four strangers faux for Thanksgiving, right before Thanksgiving, and that was like buy like the food faux.

Anthony:

Yeah, okay.

Rich:

I found four strangers to go eat faux with. Yeah, paid for their lunch. Yo, what up, fo? Yeah, and uh it went viral and Mass Live picked it up and it got like 300 shares and like 25k likes. It would and then after that, every video I put out just flopped. No, just kidding. There's no, but that was like, yeah, that your first tape.

Anthony:

You weren't as tapped in, you weren't as tapped in. That's what that's what curtis for like people. What was his humor like? He was a dad joke, and like you said tap dancing, like so. You would have been like, you know, that's tapped in, you know, that like I jumped like that too. But yeah, I'm listening, yeah.

Rich:

Yeah, that's it. That and it was like I wanted to move away from sales and do more marketing because it was creative, it was fun, and then I just started freelancing, working for free, doing some paid work. I was still waiting tables like one or two nights a week, and then COVID hit, and I just I switched over.

Anthony:

Interesting. So one thing that I that really stood out and was uh salient to me was um, you know, I know all these words, I'm like, thanks, mom, for teaching me all these words. Uh uh salient is obvious, or you know, or really important, is um, is you mentioned volunteering, you know, the the the altruism of benevolent activity of give giving four people to vote. So I'm my mother always would take me to volunteering events. Like we would go to the church, we do everything, and that's where I met a lot of friends outside of Holy Name. Like, there was a requirement to volunteer, was there not? Like you had to do X amount holy as I remember it, you had to like volunteer like 30 hours or your semester or something. I would always smash that number by the first semester, and they they would give a volunteer award. I got it each year at Holy Name because my mom we did that all the time, like she instilled that into me. So after college, I started to get into uh to volunteering, uh even in college too, as a captain of the track team. We did an annual event. We would go to a f uh uh a food bank in Amherst in Western Mass and do that. I love that. My mom always would take me to food banks and left privilege. And I remember one thing she always did when we were riding around because she was always pushing me so hard to be like good and successful and everything. Uh and I would get mad when we only had like five dollars in in because she would always donate it or put it in the thing at St. Mark's church, she would always give it away, and I'm like, oh, there's no snacks or didn't special dinner for Anthony tonight because she just gave away all that money. I knew exact exactly how much money I would steal my her money too, but only if she had a lot. So I remember one day after a soccer game, instead of going to get my friendlies Fribble shake, I would go to she would reward me with friends. Yeah, yeah. Well, this was when I was real skinny after soccer. Like, I love getting like all the parents would take me out to eat afterwards. You're scoring five or six goals at these games. Like, they take care of you, and they were buying me clothes and stuff. And that's another thing. Remember when like in c when I was in college, they were like, college athletes shouldn't get these things. Yeah, it's rich people saying that. Like, they'll you're not saying poor kids, it's like like they'll give us stuff, please. But I'll win you the championship. Give me some stuff. I used to love that. And the parents used to love me and like try to get it to wear off on their kids, but it didn't, you know, because they didn't grow up rough like with that desire. But so I I I appreciated growing up rough and in, you know, it it made me hungry. But in any event, we were coming over from a soccer game once. She saw a guy on the side of the road and she stopped and was like, you know what, and just gave him the money. She always would do this. And I was like, mom, it's a lot of money. We can't go give the friendlies now. And he's gonna go spend it on drugs. You know he's gonna go spend it on drugs. And she's like, she stopped and was like, Anthony, he can go spend it on anything he wants. You don't judge him, like, and she I remember her saying, like, he could have been like, he's a poor. I always thought this was when I was like 12, 11 to 12 years old. I was like, homeless people are born homeless and they stay homeless. And she she's like, What? She's like, he's been rejected by society. He's got the nerve to stand out here and ask for money. Like, Anthony, like, because we qualified for a lot of things, like when my dad wasn't working and things, but we never she didn't have the nerve to do to go out there and bag it. People do, they deserve, so that's why altruism is a big thing with me. If you look, even on my LinkedIn, I do, I volunteer. Oh, I used to all the time. I'm trying to get back into it, but it was just a part of my life. And she's like, You don't judge them what they spend their money on, like, you don't know what trauma they had. Like, what do you mean he's gonna go spend it on drugs? And I was so surprised to hear her, who's so proper that wants me to be a good kid. She's like, Don't you judge these people? He can spend it on whatever he wants. Why are you worried if he spends it on drugs? He's got nothing going for him. So altruism has always been a huge part of my life, and that's directly because of you know her and my father.

Rich:

Do you plan on moving back up north or do you think you'll stay down south?

Anthony:

Uh I'm applying to um I'm in the final rounds for another role at Truest Bank in North Carolina. So it all depends where I land my next opportunity. Uh I'm open to coming back here, but I make really good money down south in North Carolina where it's low cost of living. So it's hard to be like, a lot of companies like they're gonna be like, oh well, we can match your salary. Well, because you make a good salary. But yeah, yeah, but like making the same salary in Boston is not the same. You should, it's like at least 1.5 times, you know. So I I got I got an offer or two, but at the same salary. I would have to live here to live in this house, and I'd commute to Boston. So I one of the pros about living in Charlotte is I walked to working back. So I for four years, for four years I drove to TJX and back in Framingham, and then for four years after that, I drove I drove to the train station in Grafton and commuted in. That was to Boston, that was a two-hour commute each way. So I'm I don't want to do long commutes anymore. So but if I move back here and I want to stay in financial services, I'll probably have to work in Boston. So but I want to live here on the Hamas on the Lake, so I'll have that major commute again, and I don't want that. So uh but I don't I have nobody out there. It's good to have family and bumping into the aunts like you saw Lily and and Mamie, I told you about her too, and Uncle Timbo up the road. So I I don't know if this role doesn't pan out, or if it does, but in any event I want to do music and comedy. So if I can pop off and do it like remote, I would come back. Here, but it in the meantime, it's I got a really good setup in Charlotte. Like walking and walking distance to all the major banks of football stadium, it's a five-minute walk, and I get paid well. It's a low cost of living.

Rich:

Like, you know, it's hard to beat the is the Tinder fire down there?

Anthony:

The Tinder. So like Is that what the kids call it? The Tinder? I d I yeah, so I haven't been on the uh I've just been like trying to like talk to like women from my past, really. So the last couple things I've done is all women. So I I w I was in a my first serious relationship when I moved down there. I met her through Tinder. Uh she was her name was Sarah, and then um that that kind of pain, like I don't know, she was withholding information and it really bothered me. Like she her husband that I think she was split from was living in the garage of the basement, but she hid that from me. And I I like I once I found out about that, I I I think I overreacted and was like, Oh, you're cheating on me with him and with everybody, and I went through like a really bad episode. So then I went met another girl through Bumble, but like I've been doing uh more so serious relationships. I've never met I only started really seriously dating in my 30s because before that I had too much trauma. I could I didn't know how to do it, and then with Sarah, she taught me how to have relationships and things like that. So as someone with trauma, like in high school, I didn't talk to you know the girl. I was so scared, like I wanted it so bad, and I was so scared, and I was worried about STDs, kids, and like these people only I needed to meet a mature and really educated women. Those are the only women I'm attracted to, so that's why it was hard for me to date when I was younger. Because as soon as I hear someone's be a girl a girl be a mean girl or be uneducated, like my mother was like top dog, my sister top dog. My grandma, all the women around me are like top in the like the world, you know. So I can't have like a girl, she's gotta be smarter than me. And I'm I'm not that smart, but I do have some requirements. So uh, but yeah, so I've done more long-term relationships on that. So Tinder and everything, Zana, I couldn't tell you. You know, I've only been in like two or three relations, serious relationships since I've been on a.

Rich:

I was just kind of messing around.

Anthony:

No, I and I went on a long diatra about it, so be canceling later on and I will rattle, motherfucker, I will prattle.

Rich:

Putting you on the spot. Sure. Do you have any when you do comedy, is it scripted out or is it like this kind of came to my mind, so I'm just gonna spit it out right now. So you can't really recite like something.

Anthony:

Oh, I just like do first, I just like, oh, I got an idea, and because they come so quick, and same thing with music, I try to capture it as quickly because you see how quick I operate. This Starbucks is really jet fuel, by the way. Um, because I'm not a hardcore, I've been drinking the mushroom coffee. The daily dose. That stuff really gets you locked in, but not like jittery and fired up like this. You're more focused. I like this caffeine boost, is like whoa.

Rich:

Same. I switched to uh Earl Grey tea in the morning. Okay, and oh, do I feel so much better by the midday? And that's when I have a cup of coffee. It's like one, two, three o'clock. I'll have not this much coffee. Yeah. This is a special occasion, yeah. But I'll have like a little half a cup of coffee, and then I feel great. When I have coffee first thing in the morning, I don't feel good. I get like shaky, job.

Anthony:

Yeah, yeah, and it suppresses my appetite, and then you know, you go into the bathroom right away, and like that's not how you want to.

Rich:

I bet there's like mold and pesticides involved somehow in coffee production, and I bet, yeah, and I bet it di upsets your gut, your biome. Yeah, for sure. Something funky with it, but when I switch to tea, I'm like, I you know what's even better? Nothing, just water.

Anthony:

Yeah, definitely. But like with the mushroom coffee, have you tried it though?

Rich:

I haven't.

Anthony:

Oh my god, it does dial you the hell in. So nice. Yeah, just caffeine in it, I'm assuming. It's very like nominal, minimal amounts. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's minimal. But like, like I don't use it, like I'll I'm gonna crash after this. Like, I used to I abstained, so I used to drink a lot of soda growing up. My dad always the typical black household. We had like the 12 packs of soda all up through the stairs. So I was smashing like four or five of Cokes a day is like throughout middle school, and I would like playing sports, I would be cramping and all the stuff. So when I got the holy name, I stopped drinking and I could barely eat. I stopped drinking soda in caffeine, and that's when I started getting bigger too. I stopped playing a million sports, I stopped drinking caffeine, my appetite kicked in, I started lifting weights, and that's when I really, really shined. And I wasn't like as jittery, like in middle school, I was always so I was drinking cocoa, you know, for like sneaking a coke at breakfast, sneaking a coke and lunch. It just I don't know, it's not a great way to start the day for me when I'm already naturally like this. You know what I'm talking about? My dad was too, but my mom was fired up as well.

Rich:

Are there any people in risk man you do risk management?

Anthony:

Yeah.

Rich:

Do you see any content creators in that space?

Anthony:

Uh no, not that I've seen, unless they're doing it, you know, kind of surreptitiously or quietly, you know, keeping it low pro. But uh, not that I've seen, no. Yeah.

Rich:

So maybe that could be another angle, you know, somehow that I don't know, you know, what I don't even really understand what you do. You could talk about it all day, but at the end of the day, I'm just like, I don't understand.

Anthony:

What you do in here, I saw you setting up all this equipment, it's far beyond what I'm doing, like in how advanced you are with like the lighting, the shades, the this, the this, the this. What I'm doing is pretty simple. Like, does the data match what it's supposed to be? Does it look like what it's supposed to? Are you following the loop, the rules? I'm looking at like what it's supposed to be and what it is.

Rich:

Okay, last work question.

Anthony:

Yeah.

Rich:

Are you developing you a software that you are taking the data to funnel into? Like I heard you say the word macro earlier.

Anthony:

Oh, yeah, so mac you know Excel? Yeah. Microsoft Excel. So the coding language or portion of Excel where you can automate tasks instead of like doing telling everything manually, if it's a repetitive task, you can create a macro that will you can assign a button that you push, like click, and that will run that that that that task automatically for you.

Rich:

So and you're connecting this data with the API into Excel, like data points?

Anthony:

With macros, you can you you can go into Excel, you can have it open go to data sources like a SharePoint site or another user request link or URL, fetch data from there, open up the file, pull it into the site, like you can do whatever you want. You can pull in data, like you know, it's you so I was doing that more at State Street. At at Bank of America, I was more so pulled like I was automating repetitive tasks that I was doing in compliance. That's what I was doing at State Street. At Bank of America, it's more like connecting to the back-end databases using like uh like a program like Toad Data Point or the API application processing interface using like structured query language, XQL, like fetching the data, and then pulling in it and analyzing it, or like using it to like produce reports, like you know, like sub summarizing it, like pulling all the data from from this database and counting the rows or whatever, and saying they have this that they have a row for each process, you can quickly summarize like it including and build tableau dashboards that like or BI tools, business information tools that like will display the data and manipulate it. So you can pull the data. Yeah, exactly, exactly.

Rich:

Okay.

Anthony:

So you you can pull data in, and I was using other tools outside of Excel to do more.

Rich:

So in your position, are you the one pulling in these tools and building this process, or are you given this process and you're just help managing it? Like, do you build that for the companies you work for, or is it already built and you can just make it more efficient, or you have to like create a report from that information and present it?

Anthony:

I would I would say a mix of both. So, like working with current enterprise reporting, the existing, you know, report inventory, looking at it, analyzing it, and then you know, coming up with ways to streamline it, optimize it, or coming up with new new views and new ways to look at that data that show what you're really trying to look at. Say that other enterprise report didn't show the angle of the vantage point you that you wanted to see, you know, creating new reports that show, like when the executive says, I want to see this data like this, you know, then you use those tools to build that new that new visualization, a new video.

Rich:

When you like show a visualization to someone and they're like, Oh, that data doesn't look good, run it again, and you're like, it's not gonna change it. They're like, just try it, run it again, and you're like, click, yeah, nothing changed. Did you watch The Office?

Anthony:

Yeah, yeah. Oh, yes, I did see all of it. Yeah, so wait, which one was that?

Rich:

Michael Scott, he's looking at his bills before he went bankrupt, and uh Oscar creates an Excel of all his uh numbers. Oh, yes, yes, yes. Maybe that's the one where they're trying to figure out if they have enough money to keep the Michael Scott uh paper company running. That's the one, and it's him and Pam and Ryan, and with the accountant, and the accountant's like, your business is failing, you have to close it. And they're like, Oh, do we run the numbers again? And he's like, It's not gonna change. And he goes, just try it, and he hits enter again, and it's like same number. Yeah, picture that.

Anthony:

It it does happen because you gotta say if you build a view and it's not capturing the data right, you didn't structure your uh your query correctly, appropriately. Like, so that can't happen. Like, they like the like the data owner is gonna say, Are you sure you built this right? You know, make sure that you build it right, but can you build it the other way so that it looks better? So, yeah, I mean, and they will sometimes identify, say you you rushed a view, or it didn't capture like some nuance, like, oh yeah, this query or this this view, it didn't account for this nuance. So sometimes it's good to have that partnership and they will be right, like, but sometimes they will be wrong, and you'll prove it to them that they're wrong and that they gotta fix the data. So it goes it it's good to have that two-way dialogue because it can help you improve the view, adjusting for you know whatever unique situation wasn't accounted for originally, I would say.

Rich:

Should we do something fun? Do you wanna make a beat on Suno live right now?

Anthony:

You wanna yeah, let's do it, hell yeah.

Rich:

So do you just use your phone?

Anthony:

Yeah, yeah. So I'll show you now. Oh, these wooden chairs, hoohoo, my poor bum-bum. I should have gotten some quit. I apologize. So, how do you want to how do you want to let's do this live? So, I I've been doing this for six years, so it's like I just do it as it comes to me. But though I draw influences, say if I'm listening to like a movie or something, and I hear the beginning of a song, and I'm like, I automatically build out how I think it should so sound, and I hear the song changed, I'm like, no, no, no, let me start with that rhythm, those first three beats, and then I'm gonna go say the song goes da-da-da. Oh, I'm trying to think of one like which one did I do the other day? I have so many examples, so it's hard for me to call.

Rich:

Well, I'm putting you on the spot, it's really hard. So like the Suno app, like, I don't know if this will make a sound. Can we like record that in there? And can you build off of that?

Anthony:

Yes, we can. So, oh shit, too. What did we do with this light? So when this light makes a cool oh ho ho ho ho I'm an old dog. Head over here.

Rich:

Well, oh, you bringing the light over for the big thing. Yeah, no, that's your percussion.

Anthony:

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm gonna get a concussion when I hit my head on it. I hope I don't give you one too. It's a percussion game. You must already have a couple. No, you got a good head. There's no good. I was a banger at football at for Millby and for Holy Name. When I would take my head, I wore a do-rag and everything, my head would be all black and blue, all blood. Like, my head was all purple. Like, because I was a banger, boy. I was one of those bruiser running back. So I definitely that's another reason why Amherst College, like, I stopped playing football because like I was like so confused and everything. And then like slowly after like I started to come into myself, like I told you, I remember my childhood better than I remember like a lot of high school in college, because that's when I was banging, boy. So I'll never let my kids play.

Rich:

Oh, you played for Amherst. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Anthony:

I played football there in every track. But yeah, so I stopped playing football. I didn't play my my CNE. I mean, I I didn't even try to play, and I was like, I should be a D1. I'm not even the starting running back, so I like all my efforts were perfunctory. I never even ran, but I'm glad I stopped playing. I'm glad I stopped playing. Yeah, because it really did negatively impact me. I definitely had like a lot of CTE or something because I couldn't focus or anything, and like I just really couldn't, you know. And then um I I discovered my aptitude for like knowledge and learning, my constant curiosity. It really started to kick in slowly after over the years after I stopped playing football. So that's a good thing I experienced that personally. You probably were bored, you're like, alright, now what I gotta do something. But I I do think it was not not being bored, but like I wanted to explore other things, and um it's just you there's a brain fog. I don't know how else to describe it. Like my brain wouldn't it didn't work as it as it did as a child, like it works now. You know, I'm just like dialed in. I'm just you know I'm tapped in, as you know, as you said, you're tapped in. So but that's it's that's my experience with football, so but so let's not get a percussion for concussion. So like no, I'm yeah, let's alright. Let's use it.

Rich:

You're starting, you're starting.

Anthony:

So what did you use? Oh, you want me to start?

Rich:

I'm thinking this could be like the bass, or I don't know how Suno. I'm guessing Suno, how does it work? We can record a bunch of different sounds and then hit prompt it, and it'll create a song.

Anthony:

Exactly. So let's do it. Different layers.

Rich:

You can do one layer, then this layer.

Anthony:

Yeah, well, I think it will record both sounds if we do it.

Rich:

So at the same time?

Anthony:

Yeah, yeah. So let me open up the app.

Rich:

You can't like open a track, record that, then open another track, record something else, open another track.

Anthony:

I'm not that advanced. I just do it all on one take, baby. That's like you know, I'm like one take. One take.

Rich:

They call me one take, tell me. I I told you about the app. Yeah. I never used it before. Yeah. I made an account and I knew other people were using it for what you were looking for. Yeah. And I just I haven't made I haven't got involved into it yet.

Anthony:

Yeah, I really think I'm the Suno whisperer because it's so perfect for someone like me who can capture these unique melodies. I just don't know these how to put the the beats I have in my head. So I can specify the genre. I say like rap. So let's so I want to say percussions. So we're looking at my photos now. You don't want to see what I was been sending. She asked for it. She asked for. I'm only kidding. I'm only kidding. That's the model. So tap out a beat. She did though. Oh, I'm just kidding. So yeah, you record right now.

Rich:

So this is the beat getting recorded. Boom, boom, boom. And then can you add another beat?

Anthony:

So did you did you hit stop recording? Oh, so so then what it does now, so from here, it's gonna load in that recording, and you can either put the lyrics you want, or you can put so I go instrumental. So if you don't put lyrics, those they'll generate automated lyrics. So I like to do the style. So if you want to do all I like to do like underground rap, and I like to say hardcore. So so that's that's all I do. And and you've heard some of the beats. We can like I'm happy to link them uh after you post this video, but we'll we'll explore it. And you can load in those pre-recordings that you have. So I told you the last like six years or so I've been recording these these ideas. I haven't even touched my backlog. And you've heard some of the fire. It's just like as I hear something, you know, if I heard you doing that, I'm like, oh shoot, let me modify that rhythm, let me record it, put it in a suno, and I'm getting fire, bro.

Rich:

Oh, okay. And that's you just record that okay.

Anthony:

Yeah, so you can either you record new or upload it.

Rich:

What if we record like three minutes worth of stuff? Will it then collect that data?

Anthony:

It will, yeah. So I've what I usually do is I record like 10-15 seconds, and it it's pretty good at creating the loop, like the drop and everything. So it'll it'll like restructure your you can you you can sh uh uh uh specify how weird you want it to be, how much of a style influence you want to be, and how much of like uh true to the recording. Like you can say do you want it to be 20% like the coordination, and so the app is more flexibility, or like 100%. So if you go duh duh duh the the beat that it spits out is gonna be duh duh with whatever instrument or genre.

Rich:

How are you adding and you add the lyrics? You don't make the beat and then if you did make a beat in Suno, would you then upload the beat to Suno and record lyrics over that?

Anthony:

I believe I I don't think so. I don't know if Suno has that function functionality, but I there is an app Band Lab that I have. So I'm uh I started making my beats in Suno, and because I didn't see how to record over a song, I I download the track, upload it to Band Lab, and there's other applications that can do this, and then you can overlay it with the vocals.

Rich:

Alright, let's practice.

Anthony:

Okay, so like you're gonna put a percussion and I'm gonna do Alright, but like let's let's have an idea before you wanna just freestyle, like, so percussion, concussion, da-da-da, da-da-da, percussion, concussion, da-da-da-da-da-da. And do you usually say something too? One, two, three, three, four. So we just came up with that now, just talking, you know? Like, that's how I would say percussion if I'm trying to make that yeah, the sound that that needs to be refurbished. I don't know. Okay, you wanna alright, let's see. Alright, so I'm gonna do and I'll capture about 15 seconds. Okay. And then we'll we'll see what song we get. Okay, ready? One, two, three, go. Alright, good. Let's see here. And then I'll specify instrumental, and then I'm gonna say, style, you like you like underground rap eats, right?

Rich:

Let's do old school 90s rap.

Anthony:

Okay, so what would be the best way to write? So what I like to I've found the best results when you find a song that sounds similar or the genre that you like, rather than come like taking our guess at what the genre is? Fujies. So Fuji's. I want to see what what what Wikipedia said, like any specific song that you like, like, like the refugees, you mean with Lauren Hill?

Rich:

Yeah.

Anthony:

Okay, so like, hey Mona Lisa, can I get a date on Friday? You gonna need me busy?

Rich:

I'm gonna have to get Saturday. Or can you like prompt it to do a Yclef and maybe Q-tip style beat?

Anthony:

You can. The best way to let's huh. I've I've had these, let's try it. We'll do a couple different takes. We'll do well, okay styles. We're gonna do Yclef, John, and Q2.

Rich:

Yeah.

Anthony:

Yclef. And my sister went to Lorne to Smith College because of Lornail. Lorneel went to Smith. They have a great botany program, right? Uh oh, plants? Yeah, so last time I didn't know this. Last time I visited, like a couple of years ago, I was a big gambler as well. I'd go to the Foxwoods, and I mean all the because well, major major, yeah, and I'd be up and down thousands. One of the guys I gambled with, I guess he was like a professor there, and I saw him walking around. I was walking around with my sister for whatever reason. Oh, her one of her best friends was having a birthday. Uh it was uh why can I think of her name? Uh Brittany. Uh uh, it's Britt, uh, but she's got a nickname. But any event, we were walking around because we were visiting her for her birthday. It was on Cinco de Mayo. So we were walking around Smith College, and like I saw him walking around, and like, oh, we went through like the the botany, like all the different, what would you call it? Like where the plants are, what would that be called? The greenhouse? Greenhouses. We late, yeah, and it was wicked cool. Like, I didn't know that. Like, because I was when I was going to Smith College, I wasn't trying to get it.

Rich:

Was planted in 1896. Some of their cactuses are old growth stuff, is planted a hundred years over a hundred years ago.

Anthony:

I yeah, like I they like they gave us. I was like, whoa, some of the stuff was hella old.

Rich:

Cast iron greenhouses are all original. Obviously, the windows probably no, it's looks it's it was amazing, yeah.

Anthony:

And I think I wouldn't have known that if I wouldn't uh if I wouldn't have gone to her birth or a birthday party in Smith. But yeah, it's one of the best botany programs around. Like I learned that. So I'm trying to spell how do you how do you spell Y Clef? Uh it doesn't Y Y-C-L-I-F-F.

Rich:

No, I'm just kidding.

Anthony:

Why do you have a difficult name to spell Y Clef? W A. Yeah, I was spelled. That's how I was trying to spell it, but Suno was saying I was spelling it wrong. So the uh the autocorrect and Suno is needed a little upgrade, but that's not what it's so you gotta do a little due diligence before you're gonna do it.

Rich:

So do you just do you you create a prompt for two things or just one?

Anthony:

I'm gonna do comma. I'm gonna do comma, q-tip. Uh but what's his if I just do q-tip like it I don't think it's gonna know the artist's name Q-tip. It's gotta know. Okay.

Rich:

It's gotta know. Q-tip's okay, do C dash tip, okay. Trap call quest.

Anthony:

Yep. I'm gonna do Q tip. Uh okay, because his his vibe rent thing, a vibe rant thing.

Rich:

Well, do um so what is you don't have to click, you don't do anything under style, right?

Anthony:

Uh that's what I'm doing, that's what I'm specifying the style. I'm saying Wyclef John's, comma, Q tip. So my we're gonna do another iteration of this. It's easy, you pull up your previous prompt, then it'll pull it right back here with the same recording. Okay. So we don't lose anything. So Y Clef John Qt. Q-tip instrumental. You want me to do that?

Rich:

Why not do Y Clef Sean vocal and Q-tip producing?

Anthony:

Or just well we don't have lyrics. You want it to auto-generate the lyrics for us? It's gonna come up with a lot of.

Rich:

No, I want to I wanna do the lyrics.

Anthony:

Okay, so let's let's get the beat. Yeah, so Y Clef John Q-tip. Is that a valid query for you thing? I don't think so. I think we need more information. That's that's like I only specify one or two things because you've heard some of my beats and you like them. I used some thing like underground rap, hardcore, or like do Q-tip production style.

Rich:

Q tip production style.

Anthony:

Okay, let's see if it will production style.

Rich:

It'll clear RELs and Y Clef and do like no Y Clef that should be that should specify like a reggae style. Okay, let's run with it. Okay.

Anthony:

I'm going too deep into it. Well, and we're gonna do lots of different iterations because if this doesn't work, I say we pull up a like the genre of one of their songs, like hey Mona Lisa, can I get I like that song, that beat is fire. You know that's what I'm talking about, right? Yeah. Oh, you're saying you can reference songs. So I'll look up exactly what Wikipedia says that genre is. Oh god.

Rich:

Like, oh, when I was scrolling through Suno, you could pick the exact Afro punk dance. Yeah.

Anthony:

You could pick the exactly, but like rather than me and you getting and getting it kind of right, Wikipedia has like this is the genre for this song. Like, and the artist probably like corroborated or confirmed that genre. Got it. So I think Suno is is hip to that. So let's just see. Huh, come on now. Do you pay for the monthly subscription? Or is that a free version? Yeah, and it's like $30 a month. And it's like five, you get you can make like a million songs a month.

Rich:

Starbucks, get this sponsor going so I can get Suno.

Anthony:

Uh let me see. Did it make the song? Yeah. I just want to- I'm not seeing it right away. Uh we just do it again. Okay, now it's your groove is on its way, baby. It's saying oh, it doesn't let you do artist name. Tags contain artist name. It's an invalid prompt. I thought you could do that. So let's change. So what's the name of the album? I think it's called Saturday. So let's do Wyclef John Saturday. Right, like just to get the name of the song. Because like that genre is like, that's one of his the most fire beats. To the song Hey Mona Lisa, can I get a date on Friday? Can I get a date on Friday? And if you're busy, I wouldn't mind taking Saturday.

Rich:

So it would almost be helpful to take Chat GPT. Mona Lisa.

Anthony:

Yeah.

Rich:

Take Chat GPT and produce a document of all the musical genres that Suno uses for beats so that you could like copy and paste.

Anthony:

Yeah, there's definitely some chat GPT potential here. So its genre is called old school hip-hop. So, okay, so we'll go old school hip-hop in lieu or in place of white club John. Old school hip hop there.

Rich:

Could you do old school hip-hop with reggae undertones?

Anthony:

Yeah, so I'll do it, comma, reggae, and that's all we gotta do.

Rich:

Oh, okay.

Anthony:

Or like reggae rap. I'll do or okay, we'll do reggae, and then comma with and you say q-tip. Let's let's let's look up q-tip. Uh, I wanna see uh dun dun dun dun dun dun well you could look up like Tribe Called Quest is probably like a lo-fi old school. Ride. Uh I wanna cause like I I I think I see where we're going with this B, but you you know the song where he's talking about not five or anything, Q-tip. Got you pictured in it with a four point something with a low ride something. Four point something with a low ride something. I forget the name of that song. With a low ride something. Who's looking better? And damn, you looking good in it. I think with a low ride something.

Rich:

When he's on a song with Busta, Kanye. Let's ride. Okay.

Anthony:

Q-tip with yeah, yeah, he yeah, his beat his beats were with Busta were fire too. I'm trying to remember the songs now. We're going a mile a minute here. Q-tip, let's ride genre. It is under indie underground hip-hop. So is that what you're doing?

Rich:

Yeah, indie underground hip-hop is probably.

Anthony:

Okay, so I'll do old school hip-hop, reggae.

Rich:

No, I would just do indie underground hip-hop, no old school or reggae hip hop. Okay, okay. Because I feel like that's the vibe.

Anthony:

Yeah, okay, I agree with you. Indie, let me see exactly how they they formatted the.

Rich:

And you say you're not good at technology.

Anthony:

I'm all over the place, buddy. It takes me to see how long this took me to get here. But I got my methods because I can't remember. Like, I see you know, I'm like my father now. He's like, Who's that guy? The next light-skinned dude. John Starks? Yeah, who do you want past to? And I'll be like, uh, this guy, like, so I I we I I'm exactly like the man. It's like, it takes some years to elucidate.

Rich:

You like need me as your creative assistant so that I can set all this stuff up and then you just come in and bang it out.

Anthony:

Yeah, you've shown me the way, man. You have shown me the way. I can't be moving to someone. You are my mentor, you're my music mentor, you're my Eminem. Well, the real rich ones. Remember that, people stand up. Yeah, bro. You've helped me out tremendously, and I'm extremely grateful and appreciate it.

Rich:

My beats are whack as fuck, dude.

Anthony:

Let's hear this. No, they're not.

Rich:

Dude, it sounds like Raekwon and Wu-Tang. It does. Old school. It does sound like that. Criminology. Can you start it up?

Anthony:

This is my phone volume sucks balls. Literally.

Rich:

Put it in the microphone.

Anthony:

I'm gonna have to start rapping. We grew up trapping, ain't nothing happened. But now me and Rich together, we make it happen. Uh we be zapping all the time, all the time, cause we tapped in. Eric clapped in. We do it all not with guardars, but we can. We do it as we do. Cause we the captain, more the ship. Yo, there's more to this. You can't stop it. Yo, we the lyricists, who knows shit. Get on this tip because it's cute tip type style. But we do it wow. And he said it's shall in style. Uh, you got bars? Let's go, doggy. I don't got bars, bro. You got you got some bars. No, I used to freestyle all the time, but like aggressively. Like, I was more of a battle rapper. Like in Worcester going out to the bars, I'll battle anything. I'm trying to think of a hook. Oh, this is my auntie calling.

Rich:

Oh, jeez. Pick it up. No, I'm just kidding.

Anthony:

Let me just call it quick. Let me just see here.

Rich:

Yeah.

Anthony:

Lily. I'm the interview vote. It went phenomenal. Well, I'm I'm doing the I'm doing the podcast right now. May I mayor. I'm doing the podcast as we speak. Alright. Did you get into the bag? No, I didn't. I gotta, we gotta, because I've been vibing. The interview went extremely well, and then we jumped right into the podcast. So let me call call you after this and we'll we'll figure it out. You know what I can do, Ann? I can pick you up at 8.30 with a hundred bucks to go. You gotta have a little travel money. And I'll s I'll s I'll I'll send it to uh as however much you give me, I'll transfer it. I can still transfer money. So I can sell it to you. So but I'll I'll call you right after this. And I'll send it right to you. So you're net you I'll give you extra. I'll give you extra, extra, read all about it. Extra, extra, read all about it. No, no, I won't take it. Oh yeah. He's gonna gamble it. No, no, no. Shop. I'm gonna text you, call you in a minute after this. Alright. Thank you so much, Lee. You really saved the day coming in. You didn't have to do that, you did. I really appreciate you. I'm hunting Lee. I'm hunting Lee Lee. Come on, come on. Thank you. Bye-bye. I love you. Okay.

Rich:

Right, John.

Anthony:

Sorry, I don't you gotta, she she just got out of cancer treatment. I don't like missing calls, you know. Uh you pick calls up when people call you, you know. This ain't so each one thing is to also it gives you two. I don't know if it's the default settings when you s when you run the prompt, it gives you two examples or whatever. So we got another example. So I just played. Okay, let's get the other one.

Rich:

This has got a Q-tip vibe to it. Yeah. And maybe some Pharrell, because it's got that repeating.

Anthony:

Mm-hmm.

Rich:

Pharrell, you can tell.

Anthony:

Cast and spell. All the time. Shops like Latrell. Well, I was talking about the NYX, but this shit right here, yo, this shit really hits up. More like the Cleveland Cavaliers because we set the road as it newly appears. The road wasn't paved, but the mentors we connected with they showed us the way we hear to be. I like the first one. This is how we display like a tableau, you know, dashboard, you know. You like the first one a little better? Yourself. Let's run another uh rr uh oh another rendition, another you wanna like we'll get a do you wanna change the style or do you like because it could play it again? You run it again or play the songs?

Rich:

The same song, the first one.

Anthony:

And the first one, I like that one a little bit better than that second too. See here's the first one. I don't even think we need to change it.

Rich:

It's fire.

Anthony:

It is, but we could it's good to get a couple versions, just to see. Because like before yeah, so sometimes I run the prompt and I like a style. I like one of the output of the versions, but I'll run it like three or four times, you know. Because this one was shooting in the dark. With me, it's easier when you have the final output in mind. Like you and I are just seeing what we get. So let's let's it's it's more helpful when you you don't know what you want to get. So let's just see what Suno gives us. But otherwise, I'll continue to run the prompt until I get what I want to hear. I don't remember what note I hit, but we can hear let's listen to we can hear the prompt that we ran too. Yeah, yeah. Let me see what it captures.

Rich:

Get a couple going, see what see what comes out.

Anthony:

But listen.

Rich:

I'll think of a hook for our song.

Anthony:

Let's listen listen to what it recorded. If it will let me. I'm hitting the play button. Of course, as we try to do it live, it's not. Of course. Well, let's let's try, let's just do another another rendition. I'm gonna ask me until we song. Okay, so it's generating two more songs, so it's like that. Boop boop pop pop. That's exactly how you do it. When you download a sumo, the first thing it says is boo-boo-bop pop. Like this is pretty fire too. It's got Wu-Tang. This has got me giving me Wu-Tang vibes.

Rich:

I don't know, something about the first one. It's got one too. I'm a very like prolific over perfect person, so when I hear something the first time, okay, but that bridge right there was pretty fire.

Anthony:

Sometimes it's the last one. It's the same prompt, it's a different version of the same prompt. I hope you'll unvive it off this one a little bit more. So it creates the bridges for you. When you just put like what you want loose, it will like it takes a stab at creating that bridge. It's you it's fire, like an overwhelming majority of the time. In a lot of times with these different versions, I'm like, yo, I like that beginning sequence, but I like the hook on this other version. So what you you and I are gonna have to do is mix and match the songs.

Rich:

That's why I'm sure that other software will come in handy. Garage band.

Anthony:

Exactly. Well, I think BAN Lab uh Band Lab is what we want for that. But I was messing around with Ban Lab and it was so intuitive that even I, you just upload the song and it immediately gives you all like it's extremely intuitive. Like, I'm like, like my parents, I'm like, oh, technology. You know, I'm like, I get intimidated. So with the so the easier it is, the the better for me.

Rich:

What do you do now with the when you pick a beat? Well, uh, add lyrics to it. I've only I added one, so I made a song.

Anthony:

I I don't even know if I want to play it.

Rich:

Well, can we add lyrics to this one?

Anthony:

Yeah, you want to do it live? Yeah, yeah, let's do it. Like, let's download it. We'll download it right now. Right meow. Do that shit, right meow. It was the the last one or the first one, you wanna do both. Like the first song you liked and the last song we liked. Do we want to start with the last one? Sure. Whatever one you want. Because I know you got what time you need to, it's 508. I want to be respectful of your time as well. What time do you need to scoodle?

Rich:

508, respect.

Anthony:

Oh, 5.08, yo shit. Yo, that's that's good. Oh my god. So I'm so into like, like, you know, I don't know, the I don't know if you want to call it serendipity or coincidences, but like we make a beat, and as soon as we look at the clock, what time do we see 508? You know, we're rapping, kid. But uh, let's see. And the sun went, where'd the sun go? We started this with sun. The sun went down, the boy is coming out, baby. It was okay, it was that one. So I'm gonna, right? I'm gonna hit the ellipsis, the dot dot dot guy. And then you can download it. I'm gonna put it right in my files there. So easy. Anthony Ford can do it. Save the files, put it right in the spot, my downloads, baby, babang. Uh oh, we put it in a new because that's the same output name as the it's just untitled. Because I didn't title it. Uh so let me put it in a new folder. I gotta I can do that. I can create a new folder. Come on.

Rich:

I a hook comes to mind, and I don't know musically what it would be, but like, because you were talking about like dodging hate earlier. So how can we like put a hook that's like I gotta bop and weave when I'm coming up with a brand new thesis? Okay, so they're throwing hate at me, so I gotta bop and weave, and I'm coming up with a brand new thesis. I don't know, like that's the theme was going on in my head of like dodging, dodging and weaving, okay, bopping and weaving, and then producing a brand new thesis. Like trying to rewrite the way history has. We'll do it live.

Anthony:

Well fuck it, we'll do it live, we'll do it live. Uh I should have just specified a different folder. So I'm gonna go to one with uh only like a few items in it. Yeah, I'm gonna go to I have a folder named files, boom, save it there, and then I bop over to the band lab. Oh so you so we should write the lyrics in like notepad or something.

Rich:

And then Suno goes and makes it a song.

Anthony:

If I haven't tried that. So the way I don't think you can edit like current songs. I haven't tried that. Like, I I thought I tried a real a little bit, but it wasn't intuitive, so I said, huh, so get away, get away, shoo shoo. I shoot it away. So with Band Lab, it's like uploaded and like you can immediately start adding lyrics.

Rich:

Oh, like you can record it. It's not gonna auto generate our lyrics.

Anthony:

After we recorded it, I don't know if we can in Suno.

Rich:

Okay.

Anthony:

But like, look, so I don't know, I'm not describing it the best, but I'm I'm learning it myself.

Rich:

Yeah, why don't we try to make one more Suno with lyrics? Or no, you can only do instrumental? You can do both.

Anthony:

It will, if you can put you can put in lyrics and it will sing it for you in like whatever voice jump decide. Okay, so you wanna let's let's let I wanna see if we can let it let's see if we can hmm. Like, see, I'm looking at the options here. We remaster? Would it be ma like which option would it be to add lyrics? Like, I don't know.

Rich:

Cover? Like, I don't know what that means. Cover music. Um, options.

Anthony:

When I click the ellipsis on the song, like with the option.

Rich:

This is the beat we just made? Yeah. Edit song details, maybe? Is that what is that?

Anthony:

That the show the or the remix origin, that's the original clip we used to generate. The the song we recorded. That's just the display lyrics, yeah. Alright, so I really So you you want to get some lyrics onto this song. I say I open up Nopad, we listen to the song on the background, we like the lyrics we want. Then we we look, we we we write it down on an external device so we can read the lyrics, or I have that both apps open, but we need to be flipping around, and I could it's making me nervous even thinking about it. And then we we hit record in band lab, and then we just we sing the lyrics, and it'll overlay the lyrics of the song.

Rich:

What if we record you saying like a couple bars, and then I'll sing that ridiculous chorus I just made up, and we'll just tell it to make a song out of that.

Anthony:

So you will freestyle freestyle live. You really put me on the spot here. I was having freestyle in years, so I'm like I was just meant to be. I mean, you just don't I mean we can't, we can't.

Rich:

Theme is hate and like try and overcome preach.

Anthony:

Like freestyle on the spot, and I'm like, oh, it's going right on YouTube, buddy. Uh, let me see here.

Rich:

Well, I mean, speak it. You don't even need to freestyle it. Just like say it with your chest. Right with your chest. Recite some like poetry, and it'll Suno's gonna do the work, anyways.

Anthony:

You know Suno. Everybody knows Suno. Here, let me okay. I now I gotta now I'm all flustered here because I'm gonna get ready for a uh YouTube freestyle. I'm trying to I because I did this extremely easily.

Rich:

Give it to me and I'll do it and see what it makes.

Anthony:

New. So I go to projects, you click new, and then prepare in the studio.

Rich:

Oh, what is this interface?

Anthony:

It says BNLab.

Rich:

Oh, okay.

Anthony:

So is it connected to Suno? No, but I've downloaded the song from Suno and I'm just gonna import it. So there's gotta be a way, some API that we could connect, but for now we're doing it the rough, the old-fashioned way. Oh, because we're gonna trusty dusty.

Rich:

We're gonna make the song.

Anthony:

Well, we got the beat, and now we're gonna just hit record and record a lyric singing to it. But the thing is, I don't think it plays the beat in the background while it. What's file? Oh, I put it in files, that's right. So here, untitled. So the song has been uploaded here. Let me see. And then let me let me just do something with it. I don't know what the hell I just did. Well, I already I just uploaded it.

Rich:

Yeah, now add a vocal track. Oh back. Yeah, yeah. So one track is gonna play a beat, and that's the volume. What is that? Okay, that's the volume. Okay, I thought that was like that that, yeah. And then you add a vocal vocal.

Anthony:

Voice audio. Um can we Oh, so it does. Is it re Oh, so you can't? I didn't even see that play button. Okay, here we go. So let's just overwrite this. Okay. So I'm gonna stop, we'll go back.

Rich:

Yep, so I'll hit record again. It should overwrite it.

Anthony:

But I want to hit play and then record. So my uh so you can hit record. If you just hit record, it's not gonna play.

Rich:

Yeah, look.

Anthony:

Oh, it does.

Rich:

Yeah, because record and play is linked. Oh, it is! So how do we clear the um we can just overwrite it if you I think.

Anthony:

Oh, oh, there you go. Boom. Were you showing me? Oh, thank you. Yeah, see, thank you. Appreciate you. I mean, sure, show me, show me the way. I told you, I'm very rough with this. That's also what you think.

Rich:

It's always a learning curve with all that.

Anthony:

It really is. But like, you know, I'm you know, I'm trying to get do a million things at once. So you want me to what's your hook? You gotta have the hook down first. Like, you can't.

Rich:

I'm gonna, I'm just gonna have to go for it. Just start going and I'll throw the hook in when it comes in. I don't know. Alright, let me think it's a fair. I can't. I'm not lyrically talented, like the hook over here.

Anthony:

I'm Peter Pan, you're Captain Hook. Alright. Alright. So you said it was bobbin and weaving and dodging hate.

Rich:

Is that what you said? Bobbin and weaving, and I'm coming up with a brand new thesis.

Anthony:

Oh, yeah. Not many words rhyme with thesis, but yo. Alright, alright, I'll just start with that. Let's just go do it live. Fuck it, we'll do it live. Alright, throw me. Yo, bobbin and weaving, coming up with a brand new thesis. Go and peep this. Me and my dog, we buttheads, you beat this. But we ain't pairing up because you can't compete, kid. You try to, you left in the past, but that's what we do with everything that we do don't like, you won't last. We on that new perennial. We doing this shit in the advisory parental. Yo, we get down on instrumentals and girls too, but that's just more parental. Now look at anything serious right now. That's how we get down. Y'all we do this shit ultrasound.

Rich:

Got me bopin the weaving. I gotta come up with a brand new dick. Throwing hate stone bobbin the weaving. And you know, we're coming up with that brand.

Anthony:

The new thesis, the thesis, we bobbin' and weaving. That new track, the hard lyrics you can't believe in. Put your faith in us, you you trust, and we will do this shit strictly ass disgust. Off the cup, we straight deluxe. Yo, we do this shit ultra surplus. That's more than requested. That's how we deliver. We do this shit, yo, way more than little slivers. Little slivers, you little quivers. We big bass. And we do that shit, we kick big ass. And that's how the girls we like them to possess that trait. And we do this this that cause that's a mental state.

Rich:

I gotta bop and weave to throw in the hate. So while I'm bopping and weaving. Anthony's coming up with a brand new, brand new, brand new thesis. Yes.

Anthony:

Yo, that's a track right there, bro. And that's really rough. I mean, I haven't freestyled info. That's rough?

Rich:

Come on, bro!

Anthony:

Yeah. No, that was good.

Rich:

But that's just, you know, a creative brainstorming session. Did you just delete it?

Anthony:

No, no, no. I hope to God I didn't. Here, you take over. Jeez. Is there a save button? Is that the save? That might be the save at the top right there. Let's see what it does. Yeah, save. New project. I'll just save. You can specify the name. Did you put a name there?

Rich:

No, but it's in project save view. So it's in your library today. Okay, yeah. So if we click it, can we go back to that whole um how do we go? Oh, the studio's right here.

Anthony:

Okay. You just want to play it, right?

Rich:

And then you could add another vocal or something. If you wanted to do like ad libs.

Anthony:

And I you know, I wish I I wish I had to practice my freestyles before this, giving it a break. So hey, I normally my freestyles are bad. But I haven't done I've been more like producing beats and stuff, you know. You really gotta get in the flow. If you want to freestyle well, you gotta be doing that all the time. I just want to make that software, but that's not what you said. Well, actually, I'm gonna go oriented under this. I don't know.

Rich:

Follow us on SoundCloud.

Anthony:

You do favorite Soundcloud rappers with a Tuna World. Full skipper. Yeah, yeah. Teams keys, fleece goes. We did that. So it was five keys for Tuna. Anthony was out full speed for the follow-up. It was Devon's, Devin Devski, Kate, it was Kate Speed's. It was teams keys, we put skies on everybody's name. So Rich E. Oh, I didn't catch you. I can still hear you.

Rich:

Yeah, that's obvious.

Anthony:

That was mad. Oh, is it still recording here? I don't know what's going on here. Were we recording there? I think we just recorded another layer. You want to do it?

Rich:

But you can go back, save it. I'm sure you can um As a different version. Either delete it or you can What's this? Time signature. So you can like mute it. Oh, you can add effects to it, so um, like vocals right here. You got vocal effects, 70s ballad, 808 heartbreak. What is it? Is that is that heal swift? It says it's auto pitch. Probably the uh it's probably like a Kanye vocoder. I wish I knew how to make it. Oh, because if you're wearing headphones, so our vocals are being are picking up the beat too when you're recording. So you want to wear headphones and use a microphone when you're recording so that the microphone isn't picking up the beat.

Anthony:

Okay.

Rich:

And look, here you can mute the tracks. That's just the beat.

Anthony:

That's why that's why probably I naturally the first time I tried messing with it, I recorded it. I I somehow figured that out and I did it without the thing playing in the background. I think, okay, because I did it a couple days ago. So that's dope. So we got our song right there. Yeah. Snow Whispers.

Rich:

I'm gonna work on that. Snow Whispers. Yeah. Good shit, man. Hell yeah. So this was dope, man. Hell yeah. Appreciate you uh joining me for a quick for a talk here.

Anthony:

Yeah, I appreciate you coming in and setting this up, man. You're really doing me a favor. And uh um, thank you for helping me out with my music and comedy. Like, I really want to take it to the next level. Hopefully, I get this this uh you know new gig and we'll we'll take it.

Rich:

Follow Black Guy Boston Accent. Yeah, TikTok, YouTube, Instagram. I think you're most live on Instagram. Tinder. Tinder.

Anthony:

I just give you grinder. So you know, bbwdating.com. No, I'm only playing the only plan. I get a different name there. But uh yeah, Craigslist.

Rich:

Yeah. Lost connections.

Anthony:

Classified, yeah. Lost connections. Classified. Oh my god, that was really a thing. Do you know anybody that ever did that? I've never had the nerve to the knife.

Rich:

I think we would just go on it and like read them.

Anthony:

Yeah, I would I would go on there and read them, but I I definitely like messaged one and two, but I was like, there's no way. Oh, guys.

Rich:

It's like prank calling. Yeah.

Anthony:

Because Billy said with the prank calls, we did Billy was the meeting him with the king prank calls. Like, I oh my god, he would have me dying. Like, he could just come up with things on the spot. Like, we would just call random people. Like, we should have been doing like comedy skits as kids, like, because you did prank calls with him too on the podcast. Yeah. Oh my god, but you did it when you were younger. We would do a nice like early, maybe like in freshman and sophomore year high school. It was hilarious.

Rich:

And then I my my gay friend, I sent him the Billy interview, and I was like, They're getting sexier. Like each guy bring on, I just try to get like a sexier.

Anthony:

After the first one, it went down. Because Billy was my dog. We would go anywhere. Like, we was like, I struggled. Like he he thought he said he struggled. So me and him would just go and stay because I lifted weights, and we like had MySpace pages we'd be flexing. I was, you know, Picardi and Cola, they get the job done. The commercials that came out, we were Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. It was like a black guy and a white guy. So I was I was cola and he was Picardi, and that was uh MySpace profiles, and we would go out and they'd be like, Yeah, what's Bacardi and Cola? Like it was kind of getting low-key, lightweight famous. Like people will invite us to parties. But yeah, so I didn't have any game, so I just lifted weights and posing was my game, and that would get girls to come up. So being with him was good. Like I didn't have game, but like let's just pose and like YouTube definitely went down because Billy is definitely who the sexiest 20-year timeout guest has been so far. Me and Billy going out, he definitely got more girls than I did. He that I will give it to him. He's one of the only few people that did that. Billy's a stud. He's a stud. Italian stylion. But yeah, hell yeah. You're you're the you're the number two stud, my guy. I'll be I'm happy with number three. I'll be bronze. The bronze laureate. But uh, yeah, man. I really appreciate you. Um let's do this, let's do something like this again. Hell yeah. Alright. Alright, cool, cool. Fuck yeah bro.

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