James Pumphrey and Scotto Talk About Being Enemies, VWs and Other Cool Stuff - VERY VEHICULAR 006
Very Vehicular
James Pumphrey and Scotto Talk About Being Enemies, VWs and Other Cool Stuff - VERY VEHICULAR 006
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Term
Bluetooth connectivity
Bluetooth connectivity is a way for your phone to connect to your car without wires. It lets you make calls and play music through the car's speakers.
Term
Hill assist
Hill assist is a technology that helps you start driving on a hill without rolling backward. It keeps the brakes on for a moment so you can safely move forward.
Car
Dodge Vipers
The Dodge Viper is a super-fast sports car that people love for its powerful engine and unique look. It's designed for speed and is a favorite among car lovers.
Part
Toyo Open Country AT-3
The Toyo Open Country AT-3 is a type of tire that works well both on rough roads and in snow, making it a good choice for people who drive in different weather conditions.
Term
triple peak mountain snowflake stamp
The triple peak mountain snowflake stamp is a special mark on tires that shows they are really good for driving in heavy snow, meaning they're safe to use in winter conditions.
Concept
Hoonigan land
Hoonigan land is an idea for a fun place where car lovers can come together to enjoy cars and motorsports, almost like a theme park for automotive fans.
Concept
Freedom Factory
Freedom Factory is a racing venue made by a popular YouTuber where car fans can come to watch races and participate in car-related events.
Car
Can-Am X3
The Can-Am X3 is a type of off-road vehicle that can handle rough trails and is often used for fun activities like racing or exploring outdoors. It's built to be tough and powerful.
Car
Nissan 350Z
The Nissan 350Z is a fun sports car that many people enjoy driving. It has a powerful engine and is designed for speed and handling, which makes it exciting to drive.
Term
turbo
A turbo is a part that helps an engine get more power by pushing in extra air. This makes the car go faster and perform better.
Car
Land Rover Discovery
The Land Rover Discovery is a large SUV that can handle rough terrain and is great for adventures. It also has a lot of space inside for passengers and gear.
Car
Audi D2 SE
The Audi D2 SE is a luxury car that was made in 2002. It's known for being fancy but also has a lot of problems that can make it unreliable.
Company
FCP Euro
FCP Euro is a website where you can buy car parts, especially for European cars. They are known for getting parts to customers quickly, which is helpful if you need to fix your car fast.
Concept
JDM
JDM means cars and parts that are made for Japan. They can be different from the same cars sold in other countries, often with special features.
Car
Porsche 911
The Porsche 911 is a famous sports car that has been around for many years. It's known for its unique shape and powerful performance, making it a favorite among car enthusiasts.
Concept
RWB
RWB is a company that takes Porsche 911 cars and makes them look wider and more aggressive. They add special body parts to change how the car looks and performs, making them very popular among car fans.
Car
Volkswagen GTI VR6
The Volkswagen GTI VR6 is a fun, sporty car that has a powerful engine. It's known for being both practical and exciting to drive.
Car
Volkswagen Golf GTI
The Volkswagen Golf GTI is a sporty version of the regular Golf car. It's known for being fun to drive and has a powerful engine, making it a favorite among people who love cars.
Car
Audi S8
The Audi S8 is a fancy car that combines luxury and speed. The 2002 version has a strong engine and is designed for a comfortable ride.
Car
Mercedes-Benz G-Class
The G-Class, or G-Wagon, is a luxury SUV from Mercedes-Benz. The 2004 model is known for being tough and stylish, making it popular among celebrities and off-road enthusiasts.
Concept
VW Vortex
VW Vortex is a website where fans of Volkswagen cars can talk about their vehicles, share tips, and connect with other VW lovers.
Car
Saudi 4000
The Saudi 4000 is a tough vehicle built for driving in rough places. People like it for off-road adventures.
Car
Volkswagen Rabbits
The Volkswagen Rabbit is an older version of the Golf that was sold in the U.S. and Canada. It's known for being small and fun to drive.
Company
Bring a Trailer
Bring a Trailer is a website where people can buy and sell classic cars through auctions. It's popular among car lovers looking for unique vehicles.
Car
Nissan 240SX
The Nissan 240SX is a small sports car that many people love for its ability to drift and its fun driving experience. It was made in the late 80s and 90s and has become popular among car fans.
Car
Nissan 240
The Nissan 240 is a car that many people like because it's light and drives well, especially for racing or drifting.
Car
Nissan S13
The Nissan S13 is a version of the 240SX that many people modify to make it faster and better for racing.
Term
Mk3
Mk3 is a way to label the third version of the Volkswagen Golf, which was made in the early 90s. People like it because it's stylish and can be bought for a reasonable price.
Car
Honda Civics
The Honda Civic is a small car that many people like because it's reliable and can be made to go faster with modifications.
Car
Volkswagen I
The Volkswagen ID. Buzz is a new electric van that looks like the old VW buses but is made with modern technology. It's eco-friendly and perfect for families or road trips.
Car
Volkswagen Jetta
The Volkswagen Jetta is a small car that's comfortable to drive and has good fuel economy. It's a great option for people looking for a reliable and practical vehicle.
Car
Volkswagen Golf
The Volkswagen Golf is a small car that many people love because it's easy to drive and has a lot of space inside. It's been around for a long time and is known for being reliable and fun to drive.
Car
Toyota Supra
The Toyota Supra is a fast sports car that people really admire for its speed and cool looks. It's popular among car fans and is often modified to make it even faster.
Car
Toyota Rav 4
The Toyota RAV4 is a small SUV that's popular because it's reliable and has plenty of room for people and their stuff. It's a good choice for families and those who like to travel.
Car
Honda Ridgeline
The Honda Ridgeline is a pickup truck that's different because it drives more like a car. It has some cool features like a trunk built into the bed for extra storage.
Car
Cadillac Escalade
The Cadillac Escalade is a big, fancy SUV that lots of people like because it has a lot of room and nice features. It's often seen as a status symbol and is popular in music and celebrity culture.
Car
Volkswagen Vanagon
The Volkswagen Vanagon is a retro van that people love for its unique look and the ability to be used for camping. It's a fun vehicle that brings back memories for many.
Car
BMW E30
The BMW E30 is a popular model of the 3 Series that was made in the 1980s and early 1990s. Many people love it for its fun driving experience and stylish look.
Car
BMW E28S
The BMW 5 Series is a luxury car that's comfortable and fun to drive. It's packed with nice features and is popular among people who want a stylish and reliable vehicle.
Car
BMW M5
The BMW M5 is a fancy car that's really fast and fun to drive. It's designed to be both comfortable for everyday use and exciting for those who love speed.
Car
BMW F80
The BMW M3 is a sporty version of a regular BMW car that people love for how well it drives and how fast it can go. It's a favorite among car enthusiasts who enjoy performance.
LIVE
What's up everybody welcome back to another episode of very vehicular I am your host Brian scato and today
We have mr. James
Pumphrey who referred to himself as potentially my enemy he jokes
But there was a period of time where donut and Hoonigan were kind of rivals we talk about that
We talk about the business of making content
Obviously we dive deep into just Volkswagen nerdage and we talk about a lot of everything else
I didn't really ever know James that well we worked on two opposite sides and like he said we were sort of rivals
So this was a great one. It was good to hear sort of his side of things. I got to talk about my side
It was a great conversation. Hope you guys enjoy it
All right, so I invited you on this show like seven months ago, I was thinking about that on my way here
I was thinking about it on my way here because there was no traffic
We're recording this like four days after Christmas and I was like, you know what I'm glad I put it off
I'm glad I pushed it because I'm just cruising down the Long Beach
So I invited you then it's funny because at that time we knew each other a lot less than we do now
Yeah, because we one worked on a movie together and we'll get into that and then we also did chef punks together
And I think I just talked a little bit more
Yeah, but it's funny because the original idea was like oh we could just do a simple like get to know each other podcast because I
Think most people think we know each other. Yeah, we're very
We're two planets in the same
Galaxy solar system, but like honestly, but I think I don't think we could have been further apart
No, we were technically enemies. I think would you see it that way? I wouldn't but I think public
I don't know. It's interesting because we talked about this a lot like we were both
The biggest of who we're doing it. So without question, we're looking at your guys numbers, right?
You're sure back and forth and and I'll just say it off the bat like you guys are beating us on numbers
But we were like, but we also were like doing a very different show
The reason that we did a lot of the stuff that we did, okay
I think it's like two bands, you know, and I think like one of us is blurred one of us is Oasis and
Wait, which one are we? I don't know. I think we're blur
You guys I think you're although a quick little fun fact Oasis was one of Ken's favorite bands
I grew up in New York City working on cars and alleyways on jack stands
Which means I spent a lot of time on my back as I've gotten older and bigger
I realized I need a better creeper because I've been known to bottom out a few of the cheap ones
Enter Vipers man-sized laydown creeper as expected
They've got great casters just like their stools. The fabric hammock design is super comfy
And it even has a nice adjustable headrest, which is great for those undercard naps. Check them out viper industrial comm
That's viper with a Y a few years back
I had the privilege to set up the first collab between heatwave visual and hoonigan industries and I'm excited to see they're
Continuing this year with the new Travis Pastrana Jim Khanna future tech glasses. These look rad
Plus, they're super safe because they live up to ANSI Z 8 7 standards with 2 millimeter thick lenses
That's right safety glasses and shades all in one
The arms are wrapped in the brattery livery both inside and out and the high-troll nose pad makes these wearable all day long
Go grab your pair on heatwave visual comm while they last
Winter is coming which for many of us just means snow and church van is so ready because I got some Toyo open-country
AT-3s on there. This is a great off-road tire that also performs really well in the snow
It's got 3d multi-wave sipes and additional lateral grooves
Which translates to giving you more traction in both wet and snowy conditions
Plus it comes with a triple peak mountain snowflake stamp allowing you to access most chain only roads during storms
Also, it's available in elode ratings for massive beasts like my van as you can see
Toyo has me covered for my off-road rakes all the way to my soon-to-be-ready track ready outie
My sketch group when I was in my 20s like we loved Oasis really I think it's why I burn a lot of relationships early on
Because we were just like we're the best
We're not gonna be afraid to say it. That's our persona
We're just gonna like walk into parties and like mean mug people. It's like who says comedians have to be nerds
No, we're cool. We all like dress. So are you the no-gallagher of the group? I'd say I'm probably I'd say
I'm more of a Liam okay in my life. I think I always have a knoll
Yeah, like Jesse or Zach Redpath are my knoll right now. Funny thing
I would just jump on this so we were all sitting around it here again
And we're like it was a moment where we're thinking about expanding and doing more and
As making a list of people to call and hire and Jesse Wood was at the top of the list
And then I reached out to him like two days later and I was like, hey, man
What are you doing? He's like, oh, I just joined doughnut and I was like thinking like I wonder how different life
Like my life would be totally different things would have changed a bit
Yeah, so I would have been totally different because like Jesse was a ripper back then just in terms of like making like drift content
Like work with a bunch of people we knew so he was just this like guy
We knew from that space and then he went on to obviously go and build like this massive thing with doughnut
I want to give him his flowers because I feel like he doesn't get him often. Dude Jesse gets plenty of flowers. Does he? Oh for sure
You think so? Yeah, totally
All right, no flowers for Jesse, take them back
No, he deserves all of them
But everyone assumes that the guy behind the scenes doesn't get it, but totally he does
I make a point of it, but dude like yeah, Jesse's I think
What I've been looking for my whole like since I moved to LA it's just like a creative partner
Where like our relationship is I think what you and Ken had whereas like we really are
Additive to each other and I've worked with a lot of people when I was like doing comedy and writing movies and stuff and
But those guys were like trying to do exactly what I was trying to do
Mm-hmm, and we were like trying to do you feel more competitive. Yeah, and there's like ego involved and
Finding a creative partner who just like fills the gaps and is like really good at all the stuff that you're not good at but then also
Appreciate and like points out stuff. Yeah, you're good at was like, I mean literally it changed my life
I think also working with a partner and you were kind of getting at this
Like who doesn't want the same end result that you do right for themselves. Yeah, right?
Like I had no ambitions to be a driver
I really had no ambitions to be in front of camera that sort of came
Because of need when we were making stuff. Yeah, but you're in front of camera like a Spielberg type character
like I used to reference you like as I was
Like we were hiring new staff and like the cast at doughnut got bigger and bigger like
Before you know when I was planning on just like making that my career
We would talk about like how I would evolve and I was like, yeah, I'll be like
Maybe I'll just like be more like Scott. Oh
And I'll like roll in and then I'll go take a phone call
And so at one point like, you know, I come from like a mood like
Traditional media background. So like I like characters and stuff and everyone at doughnut had a character
and
I was like at one point. I was like, all right. So and I think Jesse came up with this but he's like, all right
So you're a mix of scato
And Kenny Powers
Michael Scott from the office. That's a good mix. Yeah, I'm by the way, I'm honored to know that I was part of that
For sure dude, but I it's funny cuz you know our history with doughnut goes all the way back to when Ben first
Like kind of came up with I mean the first time our logo ever appeared was on Ken's jacket and right before slightly different
But it's funny that you call it that way because to us that was before doughnut existed
Right. Yeah. Yeah. So it was like that was because we worked with ornamental conifer to do his jacket
And doughnuts were just almost like this joke. We had just done
Or we were in the process of doing Jim Connate eight
I think and it was just like there were too many doughnuts in that video and it was just like doughnut doughnut doughnut
And it was like we just started calling it like the doughnut videos
Right. So this joke like the origin of doughnuts really interesting to me because we were somewhat involved early on
I don't think we really talk about that much
But like Ben Conrad was at Logan was you know director for Jim Connate four through eight
I worked under him kind of coming up on all of those and and I said this in a previous episode like I owe Ben
So much because like he taught me a ton and gave me a route to be a director
And and I think the biggest thing I have to thank him for is like he just lacks ego in that way
Yeah, he totally just let me do my thing, right? He's the reason I joined on it
I was done being in front of the camera. Did you know him from before? No
I got a random eat like a cold email from his partner Nick Mosari. Yeah, and
They were like I've told this story before but they were like we just did a short film with your friend Josh Fadham
Josh and we asked if there were any
Comedians who liked cars and they and Josh said there's only one
Just one just me and like back then
Liking cars was sort of like a bit of a dirty secret
It was like a third date confession
If I was like sure that a girl was starting to like me I could then be like, okay, I
Drive a stupid car. Mm-hmm
Like we can't valet my car, right? Yeah
And so certain places we can't go because I'm afraid to park my car
Yeah, if we get certain gas stations
We can't stop that because my car is too low. Yeah, if we go to Palm Springs, we will be taking your car
Because I chose
And so I went in and met with them and like at that point I was just a little exhausted by
Auditioning and just playing that game and I was like dude Ben is the coolest guy I've ever met
Yeah, and I'm gonna do what he does. So he is that like just twirl his hair cuz dude. Yeah, exactly
And then like make big decisions and for some reason he was like, yeah, you can just all hang out with you and
Smoke cigarettes and yeah go to bars and I'll just answer any questions you have and involve you in
Everything I'm doing and I was like, okay, cool
this is what I'm gonna do and
It was like kind of a fluke that I ended up on camera because you came into doughnut like year two
I think right like they did a year of trying a bunch of different things and so they started Matt
This CEO donut quit his job
At like his his previous job in August. Yeah, awesome. I got my first email at the end of January
Okay of 2016. Yeah
It's just interesting to us because like we kind of were watching it from the outside and then
And I like I don't want to get into but some stuff happened with us like behind the scenes not with Ben
but with other people there and we just kind of distance ourselves and
Went on did our own thing and actually the original reason it was called doughnut was because Ben and Nick saw it as a company
that Ken and I were gonna be involved in and they offered us shares and
We already sort of had a plan of wanting to do content with Hoonigan
Like that was already in the line and when we looked at the business model
It just wasn't it wasn't it didn't really fit for what we wanted and also
I think kind of what the expectation they had for Ken to do stuff and for Ken early on that kind of media wasn't really interesting
It wasn't till later on it was more of something I wanted to do so it was like all right
Yeah, you guys kind of go do your thing and so on and then I feel like you know
Obviously doughnut really got it's like it's groove when you guys started doing like the you know
The explainer up to speed stuff and it was interesting because I kind of back to before being like we were the enemies was like
It was like I don't know if we ever saw you guys were definitely competition boat in the beginning
You guys did something completely different. Yes, it was more like a tie
It was more like if we were both on primetime television
We were in the same time slot, but it was like friends and Star Trek
It was like two completely different shows, but it just happened to be like Arctic monkeys in the strokes
I feel like they're a lot closer than that
Yeah, I think like enemies is the wrong word, but competition for sure and for a while the only competition. Yeah, and I think like
Did you guys ever see motor trend as competition? We saw them as
honestly like they were my I
Say it I was like I want to take out motor trend. Yeah, they were like
Like I had like my crosshairs on one hundred percent and
And because they were in our crosshairs, too
Like I don't think we looked you guys are doing something so different than us that we looked in motor trend
And this probably has a lot to do with like my history in print as like they were the evil Empire totally
Yeah, there are guys over there like Finnegan fry burger, you know, obviously eventually Tony Angelo
But I just looked at them as like you guys are the enemy totally
We were making stuff was zero dollars and they had a bajillion dollars
And and that like showrunners and all these extra people that I wish we had and it wasn't that like I
You know roadkill was the first thing
phenomenal like what I do, you know, like it was like
the
Like it was it changed the entire industry and it inspired everyone who's come after them whether they realize it or not
I would say them in mighty car mods. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, yeah, totally
But like it wasn't that I didn't like motor chen because I loved motor chen it was it was like proof of
What I could do. Yeah, like do as well as they were doing we we had
We did this like industry event where we invited a ton of people from the industry to
Hoonigan when we hit like some ridiculous arbitrary number was like
1.4 billion like minutes watched or something and
We invited one of the guys
Matt Boyce who is who is that motor tram?
It's one of the sales guys and he came and he came up to me
I'm like, oh, how have you been, you know, and he kind of gave me the sob story
It was like this moment when like things were kind of rough over at motor trend and then he turned to me and he said
I'm not gonna ask you how you've been because all I hear from everybody who works at motor trend is Hoonigan this Hoonigan that
Have you seen what Hoonigan did and like that was the moment that I felt like we won
Yeah, because like I had someone from inside a motor trend like and like he's a really funny guy
And he was saying it in the very like self deprecating but fun way
Oh, just to give me that moment to be like, hey, you guys are kind of killing it and apparently you're killing it like
You know with like half the resources we are and I think that was what was the coolest part for me
Was like how little resources we had
Comparatively to what they were going and doing because they had more not I don't say TV size budgets
Not by any means but they had more of that structure than I think we did than you guys did
Yeah, I mean like I think you got to keep it in check
Because it can get out of control and you can end up being a dick and people not liking you
but I think it is at least when you're starting it's healthy and
Beneficial to create with a chip on your shoulder 100%
I actually
Didn't like once we got sort of in that top tier position to be like because then all you can do is fall, right?
Right like I heard this thing the other day and it was like something about you know, you chase a goal
You know, you're chasing this goal
But no one ever tells you that once you get the goal
Then you have to try to keep it and I'm keeping the goal is actually harder than than achieving 100% because you know like we hear
I've been thinking a lot lately about like all these buzzwords that we hear all the time like authenticity and community
Stuff like that and like what they actually mean and I think people misinterpret them and
I've been thinking about what authenticity
actually means
because I'm working on this new project and
When you're on the top and I had this realization with Donut like at one point
We were getting more views than any other automotive channel on YouTube. We were the biggest yep, and I was like we can't
Like
We can't
Act like what you used to like we can't right saying
That we're the little guy anymore because now we are motor trend. Yeah, and I remember thinking about that
I had we had a meeting with me Matt and Jesse in the conference room of
Our first office on Purdue and I was like I want I want to take Matt was like what do you want to do?
I was like I want to be bigger than motor turn and he was like all right
Let's do it and then we work and we were like bigger than everybody, but we were still
Like pretending that we weren't and we were pretending that we were still like the little guy and I like gathered everybody
I was like we got to figure this out because now there's guys like sea boys and
You know Jimmy Oaks and all these other guys with you know
I don't want to be like narcissistic and think that like I'm on their brain, but like
Motor trend was on mine and so like
Just like we were
Wanting to take out that empire. We were now owned by private equity
Mm-hmm and operating with like millions of dollars a year and we were the biggest and like in order to maintain
authenticity into actually
Act in like what that word means like I think before I left I was like having these conversations
Like what do we do now like what do we do as the biggest thing?
See I think the one thing for us at Hoonigan was always different was I would always just go do something new. Yeah
So I would either be like hey, let's create a new show, but then even outside of content like hey
Let's go do events like let's go do this on the apparel side
Let's go do whatever and a lot of that stemmed from me really enjoying the startup phase
Yeah, and the biggest joke was like Hoonigan was a startup inside of a startup inside of a start
It was like a nesting egg of startups
So like there was always this new thing to go chase with like a new goal
Which also allows you to no longer focus on like this one thing that feels so important
Like hey, we're number one if we're not number one anymore because like well you guys obviously had that with daily content
Like we had it with Jim Conant. Oh, there's still do like no one's ever touched that
Yeah, but like there was always that fear that someone would and someone eventually will or maybe not
I don't know in some ways. I think that the format is over
Like I don't think anyone's making that kind of content anymore
I think it's sort of like it I always say like that film is grandfathered into the algorithm
And I don't think it works for anyone new but you can make a better film than Jim Conant
But it probably wouldn't do as well. I did even when we were doing stunt stuff like I would call it Jim Conant light
Yeah, and it just it was something that just worked for us
I'm like we were happy if you go did on that but I think for us it was always, you know
Hey, what's this other thing we could go chase? What's this other thing we could go do?
You know the one thing we never got to that
I was really interested in was like building like a really cool destination like a place that people were gonna come and like
Experience it and we called it Hoonigan land and it was this concept of like how do we do this really cool place like a place that lives?
like
They're not like an event or like no like a permanent place like something like I would it was gonna start as like a
Traveling show and it was gonna be something that grew out from burn yard
But the idea was like it eventually becomes this place for other people and like I know like Cletus has freedom factory and like that
I thought was a brilliant concept
But this was more like what is the Disney world for guys look like right like how could you come and do this?
Because one of the coolest things and I don't know if you guys really ever got to experience this at Donut
But like with our both the Long Beach office and the Compton office
We had a store and like getting to meet people who just randomly would come to the store
It was crazy because none of them were from LA or OC
Everybody was like coming into town. Yeah elsewhere and it became this thing like hey
I came into town to go actually to go to Disneyland and while I'm here
I had to stop by and check out Hoonigan or the dad had to come by Hoonigan or whatever
And I realized like man
This just doesn't exist like there isn't this thing that brings everybody to one place in automotive
And there should be because there's all of us right there's so many of us here
And I remember when I came to LA for the first time like going to a couple dealerships
it really used to be this like motorsports bookstore on
Santa Monica Boulevard back in the day and like
You know you'd go check a couple boxes
But there wasn't like this one cool place to go and like that was this thing
We were working on like right as the company sold and then it never happened. I will say that like I think we
Got really good at
making
Like videos, you know, like you guys were hyper focused. Yeah, and we didn't do anything else
Yeah, like we made we did pretty well with you know apparel and stuff, but like as far as
like building out the brand like you guys had like burn yard and
We we were like kind of like just in the content mind
Yeah, but you guys were I mean your owners were media people
Yeah, right like I was a media person who kind of enjoyed branding Ken was a brand and marketing person who
Content was just something to tell a story with you know, so I think there was always this like hey
How can we do this? How can we do the next thing? How can we do the next thing?
Do you I think to actually is a bit of our failure because I think with some one point we were doing way too much
We're just way too much going on you think that was a failure point
Oh for sure
Yeah, sure because I was spread across so many things and I would start something and then I would move to something else and then
My void would be felt on that thing because like I didn't really ever replace myself
There were there was a lot everyone did their own thing and everyone kind of got to a point where like very few people were
Replaceable right like we didn't have a lot of redundancy and realize like Vinnie was on camera
But he was also our number one sales guy
Yeah, so it's like everybody was doing two jobs and it worked really well until it didn't right, you know
Like nobody was just talent
It wasn't till like the last few months that we started to move people's like talent only deals and that didn't work either
Because then they weren't in the building all the time and the vibe changed but like people
They didn't want to do all the talent and then also be at work all day. I'd say that
Was for me when the vibe changed at Donut, right like we all were writers or producers or like when I got hired at
Donut, I wrote like I was a copywriter. I just I wrote sales decks
Okay, and I think there is something to be said about like you're saying like startup mentality and
Kind of being involved in everything and then once you're finally on camera
You kind of like you're all sort of speaking the same language and right moving the boat in the same direction
And then eventually you're showing up to do a shoot and you're there for three hours
And like it just doesn't again. It's like I think it lacks authenticity and well
I think something that's really interesting is like our start was was not intentional, right?
Like we had all this camera equipment. We were doing a bunch of like agency work level stuff and
That was what the business like that was our business, right?
And actually we were making more money off of white label and doing that kind of stuff like we did
You know, we launched the new Can-Am X-Ray when it came out
We were doing all those kind of things as well as making Jim Conno films and one day
I was just like let's go make some cool stuff for YouTube like we have the equipment like let's just make it with the people
We have right and we launched daily transmission and that sort of became this thing
Yeah, and it wasn't intentional like we never sat there and like sat and like wrote out an idea
It was more like hey, just quick ideas. Let's go run with them
Nobody was supposed to be talent people just became talent, right?
Like it was all very sort of like natural
And that worked really well until I think the expectation was to make more and more and more and then all of a sudden
And it went from being, you know, very unintentional to very intentional, right?
And like I think some of that really intentional stuff was fantastic, but I think there's a lot of times you're just like
Okay, this was a lot more fun when we were just going out in the yard and filming it
But you can't do that forever. Like it's impossible. It just doesn't work like every I don't think it's because we hear from people
All the time. Oh daily transition was the best show like why won't you guys make it again?
It's like it's like a band's first album dude
I say that all the time like I watched the that first season of high-lows like the first time we built cars and we like rented
This shop in Santa Carita and we like turboed these two 350 Zs and like watching that
Series, there's no way any of us would do that. No, like we were up for like 48 hours
Working and we were all making like 60 grand a year and like there's just no way we would do that and
You know, we were that was like at the beginning of donut where we were also like working seven days a week because we just liked hanging out with each other
Yeah, and we were all just like really this group of friends
We all lived within like two miles of each other and would if we weren't in the office
we were hanging out in each other's houses and
We were just like we were at that point
we were just rolling cameras and working on cars and like just kind of stoked to be there and
I think the the magic of that really lies in
The time and I think you know leaving doughnut and starting speed like as a much older person and a much different position in my life
You know, I went through like a long
period of like sort of like resentment and then like kind of mourning the loss of this awesome thing that I did and then
Kind of thinking like oh, how do I do that again?
But then I heard like Jerry Seinfeld talk about Seinfeld and he was like it was lightning in a bottle
He was like that group of people to come together at that time when all of that worked
Like everything going on outside of the show and then for all those people to be at the point in their lives where they could like
dedicate
themselves in that way to that thing like what a
fortunate position to be put in by the universe and just like
You know, it's like where YouTube was where
Automotive content was where the automotive industry was where Jesse was where I was where Matt Levin was where like you were where hurt
Was where Vin was to all come together at that moment and like make this thing
Like dude, how fortunate we were to be able to just be a part of that thing
I totally agree people all the time will come to me like man
I'm so sorry about what happened such and such so I'm like and I just steal the cliche of like man
We were there for a good time not a long time
Yeah, like it was so much fun when it was going on
Yeah, and I look back at it now and it's almost like any relationship like I think like you get out of a relationship when you're first
Out of it. You're like you hate the person. Yeah, and you hate their new boy. You hate their new boyfriend
You hate their new this and you can't believe that you never like their dog anyway and whatever it is
Think that they're actually fucked up
And like you did you go through all of that and then you you hate your friends who still hang out
I 100 like why do you still follow dude? Why do you? Yeah?
Yeah, and you go through all of that and then you meet someone else and you you sort of fill those voids that were in your life
And then you look back and you're like, I don't know. Yeah feelings anymore
Yeah, and that's like a bit of where I'm out of like man
It was such a good time that I had with those boys and like got to do all this really cool stuff and would have fun like
punk rock DIY era of my life where we just got we had the
Privilege just go make whatever we wanted. Hey, you want to make a car show that's like mythbusters
We're gonna call it scumbag labs. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, great
We can do that like that's totally the kind of show
We want to make and it was like we got to take this time and make all the stuff that like
Discovery channel would have never greenlit for us because it was either too weird or it was too provocative
Or it didn't like land on the the steps that like a three-act show for them needed to be and you say that and I think it brings up I
Think both of us come from a
Place where like before we were doing YouTube videos
We were able like we were in the rooms and having those conversations like we could talk to discovery
Get a meeting with
Like a TV channel and the reason that we were doing the stuff that we were doing is because those guys
Didn't get it and like they would never let us so we both of us were like well
I'm gonna do it myself
Yeah, and in that time of and that's why we went into YouTube and in that time of us being like fuck it
I'm just gonna do it myself that entire industry just went away and now all my friends or all these people I know who are like
Doing that are like man. You really you really saw the writing on the wall
You really like got out and like started the YouTube thing like right at the perfect time and I'm like oh, no
I didn't do this on purpose
I was I was giving up. Yeah. I was just failing
I was yeah, I was giving up and I just like
Stumbled into the right decision dude Ben Conrad and I pitched Netflix a show in like
2015 so this is two years before Hoonigan ever does daily transmission a year or so before a doughnut
We pitched them a show with Chris Harris who then later on went on to go to Top Gear and Todd Richards pro snowboarder
as like
Anthony Bourdain type kind of like no reservation show and we went and pitched on the show idea and like we thought it was great
They obviously never made it and I think that was one of those things where I was like man
This show sounds so perfect like they didn't understand who Chris Harris was like they didn't get it
And then like then you go and you watch those pieces like work later on
You're like they just didn't understand it and that was like I guess we'll just go make stuff for YouTube. Yeah
Yeah, I don't know totally do you let me I want to kind of go back to something we were saying before which was you were
mentioning how
There's this lightning in the bottle moment like you're at speed now
I'm here doing my own thing and as like I start to think about working with new teams like how do you keep that?
Like how like even it may never be lightning in a bottle
But it could still be something pretty good in a bottle like how do you stop that from going away?
Like like as someone who went through it and I don't know and again
This is might be the longest conversation that you and I will have had
because you and I
Saw each other at events in between things
We obviously worked on drifter together
But that was like very focused on what we're doing
And I think Jeff punks was just like kind of like a cool like kickback kind of moment where we just got to chill a little bit
Right, so I don't really know that much on your your your perception
But I've heard from other people who've been in around on it like and it's anything at Hoonigan
You put too many people in the same room that are creative and and things change private equity comes in all this stuff happens
You eventually get to a point where?
It's sour as a bit. It sounds like it's sour like how do you stop that now?
Like how would you do it different? Do you have an idea? Do you think about that? Is it something that's in your brain?
I mean, I think like
We're only a little over a year into speed
But I mean so speed is me Jesse would Zach red path
SR and
Now Tim Moore, and then we have another editor this guy Tom, but like the four owners are me Zach Jesse SR
So me is me Jesse is Jesse
Zach is
Just an amazing director and a really great writer and just a guy that like I mentioned him in my why I'm leaving doughnut video
Just like we did season two of high-low
We all were like we got stuck on the side of a mountain like it was just sort of like I quit for a week
Zach was like I'm moving to Paris and
We were like well, we'll give you like a promotion like a full-time like contract like job
He's like no, I'm just gonna like go to Paris and
So like almost immediately like when we started speed
I was like we got to get red path and so like he was the first guy
I actually pitched speed to he was the first person that heard the name the first and because I was telling him
I told him and Matt Levin
Because I was nervous to tell Jesse and I thought if both of them liked it
Then I could tell him that they both liked it because he respected both of them right right so and then SR
Who is like just this amazing editor?
And the four of us own speed right now. Oh nice, and so I think
To me like
Donut we just tried so much stuff and we had no idea what we were doing and like I didn't even know like
The industry I was entering into all I knew was like I was kind of sick of doing what I was doing
And I really liked these guys and now I get to hang out
And so like it evolved so many times and changed what it was so much
Speed is much more intentional. I think and I think ever like we're older than we were and
All of us have a lot more experience like we all came from doughnut and so I think like
Speed is very much a second band
Like I have no desire to make speed as
Big as doughnut, right? I just wanted to be
cooler
Yeah, and more
Intentional and so I think that like all of us are on the same page with that like
Intentional like it's speed is on purpose
Whereas like doughnut was the only thing that we were playing like wanted to do is be bigger
Right, right and let's just like be more popular and be bigger and like we don't know what we're doing like this worked
Maybe that worked and I think like there's still that element with speed like I say like every time we
Make a video in a new genre
We're sort of asking permission to be able to talk about that stuff like oh, are we allowed to talk about clothes, right?
Are we allowed to talk about?
Outdoors stuff both of those were yes. Are we allowed to talk about crypto? That was a no
And so I'd say like
To me it's just like a much smaller team
much
smaller like outward ambitions and
just like the project and
Like how it looks and how it feels and how it's like presented I'd say is like
Much more mature and much more intentional. So I think like
We're all I don't know just like very much on the same page
And I think we're all working on the same thing
I think the aspiration thing is the most important like when we were doing again
It was always like how do you get bigger totally? How do you get bigger? How do you have more audience?
How do you have more views? How do you have how do you sell more product?
And it was all about like this weird like numbers chase. Yeah, and
It wasn't until I left that I realized that
If you're like at some point like you know our total our total number was like this 25 million
You know audience number based on multiple channels all this stuff, right?
And you're like if you're trying if you're looking to reach 26 million what you're not doing is servicing like the original core
500,000 or the original core million people who who ride or die with you every day instead like you're continuing to broaden this audience
And how could that actually really be good, right?
Because if you and I think you and I go back to the same analogy you keep going back to your favorite band
The minute your band makes a song to sell on the radio or to be an MTV hit I might be
Dating myself, but you know or to hit those numbers on Spotify
It's like or to become a tiktok song
They are now losing the the whole thing that made you like them to begin, right?
And but it's also difficult because at the same time I respect from bands where it's like that first album
You don't want to make it anymore because you've already made it
So it's like sometimes repeating the first album over and over and over again is also just trying to like continue to capture
Lighting in a bottle versus go do something new
Totally and get that bag, you know what I mean
absolutely, but I think
It's just a different kind of project and I think like kind of culturally right now I
Feel like there was like this time for about a decade where
just everyone like had this attitude where it's like
Like you and I are similar ages like growing up in the early
2000 I have no idea how old you are. Yeah, I have no idea how do I was gonna say you could be anywhere from 35 to 44
Hell, yeah, you live in that you live in there. Yeah. Yeah. Thanks. You know how old I am 43. Oh, thanks. I'm 46
Appreciate the down
The other day heard told me I was 50. So, you know
I
Think there's this period where like
We all just kind of agreed where it's like if it doesn't
Like even if it sucks if a lot of people like it, you got to admit it's good
Mm-hmm, like whereas like I think we do that's true
No, yeah, I don't I used to but I don't think so. Yeah, and I think that
It's sort of an opinion. I'm trying to form
Well the other day because I want to the other day we were on a panel and you said something that I don't think it's a hot
Take but I think it's a take people don't want to say which is people will say like oh, you know, it's you know
My stuff's not doing well because of whatever because of the algorithm because of this or because of that and you said something like
It may just not be good. Yeah, right?
Like you have to like take that as a potential variable and a lot of times it can a lot of times
It isn't good and it's still popular
That is true. I'd say yeah, and like there's a there's different ways to be good
Like mr. Beast is very good at the algorithm, right? And he's very good at attention hacking
little kids
Does mr. Beast make good things? No, he sucks
He's a piece of shit and he's bad for just tell it right to the camera. There you go bad for culture
He's bad for kids. We should call that out and like
The dude sucks, but he's very he's technically very good at specific things and I think in YouTube
I think it's kind of maybe dying, but there was a period where like
Everyone was like, you know who the best is mr. Beast and you can't argue with the numbers. Yeah, I think that like
more and more
that sort of like proven to be damaging across culture and
I'm hoping that we're moving
more towards like a time when
When you and I were growing up where it's like you should call out shitty stuff and his stuff is like bad
We should say it and I don't I want to encourage people as much as we used to yeah
I agree. I mean, I think that you know, you hear this in the car world where people are like, you know, what's the
What's that saying? Like respect all bills. Yeah, like no dude
It's like I
Respect that you love your own car. Yeah, like that's cool
But like, you know, some kids are ugly like you just got to call it what it is sometimes
Totally, and I'm not here to like shit on other people's stuff, but like not everything's great either
So I think the same thing comes to content and I'm not here to say bring bullying back
Because I also think that a lot of the all of the people who make that statement is like bring bullying back
It's like motherfucker
You're the one I'd be bullying like you're the one who I think needs to shut the fuck up
You're the one who I think doesn't need a voice
You're dumb like you've never read a book quit telling people what to do you fuck from two white guys with beards on a pod
Yeah, yeah, but the thing dude
It's like I I won't apologize for it because I work hard and like I work with talented people and we study and we and you
Do too like you guys know what you're doing what I'm
Offended by currently is like there's just so many people
Everyone has a voice now, and I think that like
There's just too much fucking noise, and I and I think that like I
Don't know get good at something like you got to deserve it
I think and I think you does it you you earn it by
Learning how to do it so I'm over fake it till you make it and now I'm on learn it till you earn it
Okay, I'm into that one. I like that. I you know, I think you and I both also came from a world where
We were already on a media path before yeah
The internet became like before kids were like I want to grow up and become a youtuber
Like you and I were already doing media and I used to always say this like I may not always work in automotive
But like I'll always work in media because I just really enjoy media like media for me is the is the
Medium and it's like I just enjoy telling stories whether it's written whether it's podcast whether it's video
Hopefully eventually more feature films
But for a lot of other people
It's just like a route to success. Yeah, it's like hey
I want to go do the things I love and
Get paid to go do them which I think was like a massive appeal from vlogging
Yeah, everybody was like I'm gonna just go make videos about the stuff that I do and like that's gonna make me really successful
And it really over saturated the space and not everyone's really good at telling the story
Like I think that is the main thing that separates it and then other people just do the like hey
I'm just gonna do a really really hot take because it's
That's the thing that it's rage bait
If you want to go on vacation and like people want to watch you do it get the fucking bag, but I
Don't like takes
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And if you have similar habits, maybe you too should try FCP euro.com. I don't like takes
I don't like hot takes, but you're also a take guy though
I'm not really a take guy. Again, I the other day, didn't you say 9-elevens or like dunks or something like that?
9-elevens are like dunks, dude. Yeah, but I I think overall
Hot take culture is like melting our brains. Yeah, there's like no nuance and there's no real conversation
I'll have a conversation. You know subway takes. Yeah. Yeah, the most recently one of the most recent guests
He had on said the that hot takes are ruining culture. I was like that's
I don't want to shit on I mean, I support people and I just think like, you know, it's
It's rough out there in the world, man. So I'm thinking a lot about what's wrong. Yeah, I also think like I'm
I'm one of those people who have
To thank YouTube for so much. It's done for me in my life
But I'm also a little angry at what it's doing now for like the creative curve
Like it feels like YouTube really sort of flattens that like it forces everybody to make similar content because it
what's work it works well where
it when I first
Discovered YouTube it was this like non gate kept place that you could put anything up on you can make a
You know eight minute video of you know driving a car through an abandoned airfield and it could work
you can make a video about how to pronunciation eight words and
Where almost no clothes and it worked like there was all these like you could make this video about like how to build
You know a log cabin and it worked right still crush. They do crush
Yeah, I I don't want to get into that, but that's like a whole great space. You see the one where like the guy like digs out
Well, we'll talk about later. There's so many good asmr off-grid bills. So good. I just like
The best and they crush they get like eight million views
even if if I see a thumbnail of like a rusty revolver found at the bottom of a lake and then like right next to is the
Before-and-after like perfect finish. I'm like, I'm gonna watch this like I don't even like guns
But I'm gonna sit here and watch this for you know for two and a half hours as this guy painstakingly
Restores and like pops all the rivets out forward four-day lean to winter camp
Best yeah, but anyway back to it like I just think that that it sort of created a model where all the content like feels the same
Is that something that you feel I do but I think that
It's up to us to change that and I feel like so many of my peers
Are like, well, I don't know what to do like YouTube and like the algorithm and then just want us to make like
Crap and I think I told I was on calling in Samir recently and I said this where I think with YouTube
We've self-inflicted all of the worst parts about the Hollywood studio system
Where we can make whatever we want, but we're only willing to make hits
right and so like we're only willing to like
Nobody's telling us what to do like we're independent artists for the most part especially now
That I think private equity experiment failed in YouTube, but like I think there is like they're gonna be
especially after you know
You guys went through what you went through we went through what we went through and just like overall just like
It's not really a scalable business in the way that people thought it was it would be
Like you can't scale a band no, you know, and so I think that I
Think that there could and will be this like middle-class
YouTube creator
space
That doesn't
Play by those rules. I think like it got grotesque for a while
You know, and I think mr. Beast and guys like that aren't responsible for it
We're like all of a sudden you're introducing
Like the dude spending millions of dollars on a video like he's spending more money on a 20-minute video than
People spend on feature films right and he's getting numbers that
For whatever like there's no categories in YouTube so like even though like most of the audience is four to seven years old
We're still held to sort of like the same standard and it's like well
If this guy like locked a guy in a room and he got a hundred and fifty million views like what are you guys doing and I think
that like
YouTube is this amazing place where like we can make awesome stuff and we can self publish it
We can self fund it and I think the main thing that's standing in our way is us and like our
Just like agreement to make sloppy shit, you know, I want to encourage people to like I
Don't know
I think like where we did it last year where we took some risks and like kind of led with like I
Want to make this video and this year we're planning to do it more like
We just had our last meeting of the year and I was like alright next year
I want to continue to dare people to not watch our videos. Yeah, I'm totally into that
I you guys did the car heart video
I think was like the second video or something. Yeah, and I remember
Thinking like that was really smart because immediately you have told people this isn't just a car channel
Yeah, and we're gonna I'm gonna do whatever I want to do and just create this like different space than what I think you guys had
Very much locked yourself into his donut and I think for Hoonigan. We dealt with this a lot, which was like early on
We were just like
Burnouts and drifting and some rally stuff and then it's like how do you keep expanding the brand and at a certain point?
I actually felt like we were expanding it maybe too far like it was doing too much
But it was part of that grow grow grow grow thing and like how do you keep speaking to a bigger and bigger audience?
But on the flip side of things like with what I'm doing
Like I'm uploading two hour long podcast to YouTube. That is exactly what they don't want right like it's not the watch time
They want it doesn't check all boxes, but like I don't really care
Like I built my business model on it not being
Successful by being the most amount of views because I think if you build the model around trying to make money on YouTube
Then you are imprisoned by the algorithm in the way that all works
But if you sit there and say hey, I'm gonna make this thing and it's either gonna make money elsewhere for me
Or I've got partners that sort of understand what I'm trying to do
And I'm not sitting there chasing a particular metric and like or you you lower the bar of what you want
To go and do and then keep it there
It allows you to take more experiments and just like kind of go have fun stuff versus getting stuck in that
We always make this because this works like this versus that became that show. It was super successful
It was easy to make it was low-budget
It was the winning show for us on YouTube but averaged a million views an episode like and we could record eight of them in a day
Yeah, like think of how nice that is, right?
Really good
Yeah, like the the business people hear that right but
Arguably the views
Said that that was one of the most success not one of it was the most successful show we did on Hoonigan
The fan base said the opposite right like the audience that was watching it was bummed by it because they missed
The banter between people but that show had a ceiling of how good it was gonna of how big it was gonna get
So we had to do something else because we were chasing this other goal
And I think it goes back to your ambition thing before which is like setting lower ambitions. I think it's actually really valuable
I've do you don't mark Arsenal? Oh, yeah, so mark like
I'm one of the reasons I quit. Oh really? Yeah, why he's just like a guy who was
Successful yeah in
places that I
Wanted to be okay, just like I respected what he's done
and
Like he yeah, I think you were too like there are a few guys who are just like yeah fuck it man get out of there
So like without me prodding like I was kind of talking to him
But because we got the zoomies thing and I was yeah, I felt kind of burnt by that
He was like, oh, yeah, you should just leave and start your own thing. He's like I'll start a company with you
Yeah, it's Mark's got like a hundred. Yeah. Yeah, I was like, all right
So it's interesting. So I had a similar conversation with Mark and it was over zoomie
So real quick rewind, you know fat lace illus really kind of one of the first like
Universal automotive brands, right? Like something that wasn't specifically drifting or specifically one kind of racing or you know
specifically like JDM like I felt like they were somewhat broad and what they were doing and
So when Hoonigan came around they had already been around for like a year or two and I
You know, I met him through building my 9-11, right? It's because that was like the whole RWB thing in the US
so when it first started and
So he was great with me early on like considering that like you could think of us as competitors
Like he would just what if I had a question whether it was
Types of shirts to use or how different rollouts have worked or so on
You know, I would go to him and he was great. I was really I really enjoyed his sort of
Professional friendship through that period and then
Hoonigan started to like really hockey stick and like we ended up in zoomies before them did all the stuff so and so on and
You know from my side because I'm a big competitive person. I sat there going. Oh, yeah, we're winning
Yeah, like we're winning because like we're crushing them, right?
So he called me one night and he said hey, like, you know, I'm thinking about going to zoomies
You know, they've approached me and so on because Hoonigan was the first automotive brand in in zoomies
Yeah, we broke through that which was not an easy guys did crazy and we did crazy numbers
Yeah, we did all doors. We did a 40 door test and then
Within 40 days, we were all doors. Yeah, we were the fastest growing brand to ever go to zoomies at that point
We the only other brand that went faster than us was Little Wayne's brand
But there was like a stipulation behind it because they had like a major like spend to support it and it was like a limited time
So they've exploded and it was a good it's one of the reasons we did content
So like I thank it for that, but I think I wish we could have slow played it because it put so much focus on us
Just dealing with that like it was an expansion. We weren't ready for it
It was like 10 employees and all of a sudden we're in 600 stores in the malls
But anyway to go to get back to the mark story mark was
Going there and we were talking and we're talking about something and he just said to me
He's like, I don't know man. I just
He's like, I don't know. I just don't know like if I really want like illus to like grow that big
You know, like I kind of enjoy it at the size it's at now and when he said that to me. He's like, I just it's just easy
It's like he's gonna maintain and I didn't see it as real like I thought he was lying to being like
Oh, yeah, of course, that's what you say to the guy who built the more the brand that you know
shadowed their brand and then all of a sudden like I woke up one day and I was like fuck mark was right
Mark was right because like I don't enjoy this anymore. Right. I stopped enjoying this. This now feels like a job
yeah, and
The brand is also
Abandoning some of its early fan base to continue to grow and do all this stuff and it was it was this tough world because I
Did enjoy the success and like that definitely fueled me was the success of making something that did well
But I could look back at it now and go
Yeah, mark was right like yeah, keeping something to a certain size like for me 15 people was the greatest size
Hoonigan was not that I didn't enjoy the you know, 80 or so people who moved through the doors
like I loved working with almost all of them, but
There was certainly this like sweet spot
Around 14 to 15 and the way I say it is like if you can't
Fit your entire crew into like too many vans to go get lunch like it's it's the wrong size crew
Like if you still can't get a table to feed your whole your whole gang like at you know
Sizzler because soon if you used to run a sizzler was a good time
Like you you just don't like you've gotten too big right in the minute
We all started taking lunch separately was like when the business changed and like that's a just a nice size company
That I enjoy it'll never be as successful as something that's bigger, but like man
That's like a really good but it's not it's like what is success. Yeah, exactly. You know, I'm sure mark still likes illest
Well, he sold it
No, and I think I think he did let it get a little too big actually if you were to ask him
I mean he'd be a good person to talk to but he's no it's funny though
Both of us sort of had that similar moment with mark wonder if that was like a cultural like time thing just like scaling
Yeah, like if that was like a 2010s tech
Well, he also though came from Nike was working at a big company knew that I never really worked at a big company
I worked at like a medium-sized publishing company that ran like this chaotic
You know operation because it was mostly hip-hop and music like, you know magazines
So it wasn't particularly an organized business and then I went to go work for Hoonigan
So yeah, I never really had that experience of what wheel pros was which like
Yeah, they were just a big business and had like a lot of moving parts on a lot of zoom meetings
Not just what actually teams meetings, which is the worst. Yeah, you Microsoft. Yeah hate it so much
I mean do you think that like
Like for me scaling donut to that big like even selling
Donut was like
To me it was like validating, you know, and I think that there's
Like now that I've done that I don't
It's not that like I didn't like it, but like it's not the reason
Like now I don't have to do that like I've done that, you know, and you've done it
I think, you know, even more with Hoonigan where it's like, oh cool. I I
That with that project the goal was to make it as big as possible. Yeah. Yeah, and
Like under these metrics and I did that. Yeah, and that was cool
And so I think it's like
It's like smaller ambitions, but also like different ambitions because I think
Like with the current project before we knew what we were gonna do all we knew was Jesse and I were gonna do something together
and he was like, okay, so
We need to be okay with the idea that it's gonna be way smaller from the outside
But it's gonna feel way bigger on the inside like from the inside. It's gonna be bigger for us
I was like, that's cool. And so I think that like
there are more
Like the ambitions are still there. They're just like different
Yeah, I think like a consistency of like the artistry of all the videos. I think the voice is more consistent
I think trying to do
Again, like daring people not to watch our videos. I think that's in a lot of ways harder
and
so I think like
There's they're more nuanced
Ambitions rather than just like nuances everything like I live if you were to ask me what motivates me
It's nuanced like I love the little nuance stuff. It's like what's what makes everything I can tell with tref punks
That shit was like so well run
Do we want to jump subjects now because by the way, yeah
I like this is to me this podcast is just starting because I was literally gonna say
Like we don't really know each other that well
But like here's three topics we should talk about and then we just spun out on kind of
Donut thing the free I need it
I want to stop doing that because people keep having me on podcast and like ask me questions about YouTube and I'm like
I should like charge
Yeah, it's an interesting space
I'm happy to have that combo with you though because I feel like we both were I think you guys did the YouTube thing better than we did
Mm-hmm. I think you guys did the brand thing better. Yeah. Yeah, that was like where our focus was
I was unwilling to do things for the algorithm
We're like, I know that you guys were very
I'll go led because I knew Matt and I knew like how his brain worked
We're like I was only gonna do something if I wanted to make it and I would do thumbnails that were more
Like cooler looking even though they didn't work as well
Like all those things and it's funny now because now you get to a B test your thumbnails
I'm like, I don't even like how that one looks
Yeah, yeah, I'll still sometimes choose the one that I just
Like more even though it's gonna get me less. Yeah, we'll keep the big one for like four days
And then we'll swap it back to the one that's cool. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, just because it looks better. So
Yeah, so
So this is an interesting one because like you and I both started in Volkswagen's
I actually think there's an incredible amount of people who started in Volkswagen's or
VW Vortex who now work in the industry
Yeah, more so than a lot of other like sort of marks
I don't really fully understand why that is but there's a lot of us. I think it's because in order to
Like shine on VW Vortex, it was almost more important to be funny
Yeah, and it was to have a cool car. Yeah. Yeah, you had to be like really good at crafting a thread
Like it was its own little media
I mean in a way forums, especially those kind of forums were like their own medium
And you had like all these different kind of people like crafting the right post like running the right build thread
Or just being a really funny commenter like if you're a car lounge guy
And you were just in it if you didn't have like a cool car
You could be funny and you can be a vortex all-star. Yeah, there's this guy
Chapel, do you know chapel? Do you know chapel? Didn't he have like a purple?
I don't even I don't even know a car he had but he was like the hero of the car lounge
And it's funny because he's now on my patreon
He basically runs is like the moderator there because he's just so good at like running community stuff
Which I think is like it's funny, but no vortex was great for that. When did you get into Volkswagen's one was like your
Early 2000s, I think I got my first
Volkswagen like 2002. Okay. What was it?
A 97 Windsor blue GTI VR6. Oh, yeah. Yeah, nice. Yeah, mine was my first one was in
97 95
Golf I wanted a mark one
GTI really bad
But my parents didn't want me to have a car that old and I had raised enough money to buy it
I was like, you know for like working in a snowboard shop and like doing all those different stuff and my dad and my mom said
How about this?
We'll we'll match you dollar to dollar if you buy a newer car and it's to this day the newest car I've ever owned
It was only 1995 so it was only two years old. Yeah, it was only two years old at the time
So it's like the newest car I've ever owned like I've never owned my GTI was to I've never owned anything that close to yeah
The on sale date at the deal is mine. Yeah, I guess back then it was five years old. Yeah
It's great. My news. Yeah, my newest car now is over 20 years old
The newest car I own and right now is my 2004 van in my 2002 S8
2004 G wagon. Yeah, everything I have is two decades old. Yeah, this is totally normal to me and not to my wife or any of my friends
Yeah, well my non-car friends, so
Yeah, I don't know man
It's like but it's it's interesting because like you came to chef bunks and for those listening
My friend Jason Whipple and I we did this event called chef bunks. I'll let you explain chef bunks actually instead of me explaining
I'd love to hear you explain. Here's how I what I tell people when they're like well when they were like
So what are you doing this weekend? I'm like, okay, so they used to be I
Preferably like being like all right. This is like the nerdiest thing 100% and I was like, all right
So there used to be this Volkswagen website called VW vortex and now a bunch of us are
in our 40s and
We can afford to buy the cars that we used to have or want and so these guys
made a camping trip and a bunch of guys either bought
new
old cars before the year 2000 or got their old cars that were built before the year 2000 running and
we're all
driving up the coast of California ish and
We rented a summer camp. That's pretty much it. Yeah, we were calling it a summer camp for middle-aged men
Yeah, pretty much it was so good. It was so fun. I'm happy you enjoyed. Yeah, it was
Usually when you're the person hosting an event, you don't enjoy it because like you're just so busy with all the logistics of it and making sure
Everything's going well, but like I thoroughly enjoyed it and like so the Whipple like it was just chill like it was really good
It was like good food. It's fun. Yeah, it was run really really well
very mature
Like everything was it's like very tight like you could tell that both of you have like built massive companies
But then it was like also super fun and it was cool being around
Cuz like you can go hang out with like drift guys anytime you want or like even like BMW guys like almost anytime you want
but it's very rare at least for me to be around a bunch of
Volkswagen guys who like know all the front lips and side skirts that I specifically know and
So that was like a real treat or like people who remember cars that I remember
Like then like actually I know where that car is or like I built that cars
There was actually this peak moment where we had coffee the next morning after the first night and less brought out a box of old
Performance VW magazines and everybody just sat there
Yeah going through and like reminiscing and I felt like man
This is like such that high school reunion moment where like people pull out the year
Look at you. Yeah. Yeah, thank you like a bunch of guys there had cars that were in the magazines
Yeah, we're inspired by them or stuff like that. So like yeah, it was a lot of fun
We're definitely gonna do another one this year. We also did it invite only not to be exclusive
There wasn't really the goal although if you ask Whipple, he'll probably say that because that's just kind of person
He is but it was more like
Just to control it and I hate to use the word curate because I feel like that words used so much
But we wanted it to be small and like matter and this actually goes to like back to the media thing
Do you know Foster Huntington? Mm-hmm. So I've said this multiple times on the pod
So if you need to get up and take a leak and you're a normal listener, this would be a good time. I
Was having like a really hard time at Hoonigan. I wanted to leave
this is right before Ken passed away and I decided that I was gonna go pick up the Saudi 4000 I had bought in
in
Vancouver and drive it down by myself and just have like for me
The only way I can really sort of like meditate and have a good thing is driving like long distances by myself
Like I'll drive for four hours and realize I like never turn the radio on right
So I pick up this car that barely runs and like fixing it the whole way home
And I go and I stop at Foster's house and Foster has these like really cool tree houses and like all this stuff
He has a cool like scape
He's like a little pool set up on his property like it's just like really rad space and he's the guy
Who started the van life hashtag like he's noted for it
We were just chatting and like you know
He's had these ups and downs in his own sort of career both in front of camera behind and he just said the simple thing to me
And I you know, I'm sure other people have said this but he's the one who said it to me
So I'm gonna give him the quote. He said do you want to mean a lot to a little right?
I mean a little too a lot or a lot too little and at Hoonigan
We definitely got to a point where we meant a little too a lot right tons of trucks with big Hoonigan stickers on them
But like they didn't really fully like understand the vibe or the brand or whatever it just became this massive thing
We were the number one sticker sold at zoomies. I think for the entire time Hoonigan was there
So you guys got to the point where I just kind of like monster
Energy where or no fear when we were young totally. Yeah, like having a Hoonigan sticker
Didn't necessarily mean you knew what Hoonigan was. It just meant you were a kind of guy. Yeah, exactly
and it became that thing and
And then I realized like man
I really really want to mean a lot to a little like that is like the space that I really enjoy being and
And that's why like I went to go do podcasts because like not as many people listen to him
I mean unless you're Joe Rogan, but like most people don't listen to him on that level and
But the people who do absorb it and listen for like two hours like I listen to the podcast
I listen to like I feel like an understanding for those people in a way that like I don't normally
I actually just started listening to smart lists just like yeah, it's week
And it's funny because I've always liked Jason Bateman and like but now it's like it's almost weird
Like I feel like I know him better because you like you you can't act for that long
Right on a podcast. You kind of just like let out who you are a little more. It's kind of like an enjoyable space
Yeah, I don't know it's just one of those things
I think for me the same thing with Tref punks
It was like I wanted this to be really good for 30 people
Yeah, and it was and like we didn't make money on it
We just wanted to go do it right like it was one of those things of like hey
Let's just go and make this cool thing that we would really enjoy being at and it's funny because it's more of what I want
To do now like I want to make books even if only a hundred people buy. Yeah, we're like there was so much stuff
We couldn't do it Hoonigan because it wasn't
Financially viable my pot this podcast is a perfect example
I was I mean I ran the company, but still every time I wanted to do a podcast everyone would be like
It's just too much work for like not the same return. Totally Jesse gets frustrated with me because I keep
Pitching ideas and I preface them like okay, so this isn't an idea that's gonna make us any money
And he's like well someday you're gonna have to come up with some that will
But I think we got a couple years before we actually have to yeah, but like I don't know like but you guys are doing well
You got out you have to get out of your brain that you're like
You're not supposed to be doing donut numbers, right?
You're still doing way bigger numbers than most people. Yeah, that's doing well and you're doing the stuff you want to do
Yeah, which is like the best part of what you're doing the fact that you can go and do a was it like a
1920s camping trip or something like that
And you could go do that and then you can also go do like a rant about like where Volkswagen sits today
And you have an audience that will watch both you have
Transcended a thing I think a lot of people don't transcend on YouTube, which is it's not about the subject matter anymore
It's about you guys like they're buying into the thing this matters because we like this
And and that's the stuff we want to tell you and like that's where my
World started I started in at Massapil magazine Massapil magazine before vice became vice Massapil was the mag in New York
And the magazine was literally just things we thought were cool. Yeah, right?
That's what it was. It was just things we thought we're cool
We had literally had a section in it called hey, you're cool
Yeah, where we would just interview people we thought were cool
Yeah, and you might not have any idea who they were but by us saying hey
We think this person's cool means that you should stop and read yeah, right?
And this was before like sneaker culture exploded to the level it was and you know
We were talking doing everything from sneakers to like fashion
That's interesting because I see a lot of stuff you're doing now
And I'm like man this feels like a video version a bit
It is 100% a magazine. Yeah, like it's
You know, we obviously not struggled but like starting anything you you wanted to find it especially if you're trying to like
Make money from people like sponsors and stuff. They want to know what it is
And I think like eventually what we landed on is speed is a men's style magazine and cars are a part of men's style
Yeah, yeah, so like it went from being like well well originally it was just men
It was gonna be doughnut for menswear. Oh, really? Yeah, that was like the initial idea
and I was gonna do like up to speed on like supreme and
Stoocene stuff like that and then like a few weeks into it. I was like, you know what I really do
miss cars
You and I about the same journey because I left him again did non-cars. Yeah
Yeah, we're went and did animation with super plastic and
For the first six months. I was like, I love not doing
Yeah, this is fantastic. I mean almost two thousand car videos
Yeah, it's it's I can't even count how many we made at this point. Yeah, we did
380 of daily transmission alone and we stopped making that in
2018 yeah, so it's like it just it's incredible the amount of content that people say like do what you love for a living
And you'll never work a day in your life
It's like no dude if you do what you love for a living find something else to love or else
You'll just want to kill you and I are too similar because I've said that a thousand times
My dad used to say it my both my parents are scientists and my dad you'd said to me at some point
You know do what you love and you know, you know, you'll never work a day in your life
And it's fucking bullshit if you do what you love you will work every week
Yeah minute of your life last night. I had this idea
I don't want to say it out loud yet, but I had this idea and I was so excited about it
I stayed up for like another two hours writing in my notebook and it's like it's cool because that's exciting
But that was like two hours that I wasn't sleeping in bed with my wife
Because because I was so
You know caught up on this like idea of more work of creating more work for myself. So yeah
Let's get back to Volkswagen's. Why do you think Volkswagen's right now?
at least in my opinion are having a bit of like a
Like a reboot because I mean Hagerty just announced like the mark 3
Golf is you know one of the cars to get this year. Yeah, obviously we've seen a couple like mark 1 rabbits
You know hit bring a trailer at some good numbers
I feel like a lot of my friends who I grew up with are getting back into them
Like do you think it's like an age thing or do you think it's do you think it's like a response to something?
I don't know. I have my own thoughts, but let me hear yours first. I think it's a
I think some of it's an age thing I think
You know, I think trends are just like cyclical
You know stuff is popular then it's not and then it is again
Kind of like skips a generation or something
I
Think that like it's probably influenced by the market where once
At least recently like once something is
Universally agreed up on to be like a cool thing
It and like it becomes eventually like
Inaccessible and so therefore becomes less cool like I bought the
The golf was that are the GT. I was actually my second car
My first car was an s13 240 sx that I bought for $3,000
In and it had like
So you were early on that because that was before those were cool like Mike my good friend Trevor's
Sister had an s14 that we would take to 711 to get stuff while we were working on his Volkswagen
Yeah, yeah, like never did I think of that car as cool
It was just the car that we would drive back and forth to 711. Yeah, I got my first
240 apparently the same year that Ryan Turk got his
I'm really to I'm early to every trend. Yeah, you really just let me that I just a taste maker
I really pay attention to things and I care about it
but
So like yeah, those cars used to be so cheap and my GTI cost like
Three times the amount of my s13 and I think that like a $3,000 s13 is like really cool
$20,000 s13 like is way different. You know what I mean? And yeah, I saw someone
I saw a tick tock of someone saying that like our culture feels stagnant because there's no cheap rent and
And you need to be able to you need to have cheap rent so that weirdos aren't homeless
Because now in order to just have a place to live
You can't just be a weirdo
You have to go work a normie job and then like you're not just like creating culture and I saw something similar
Someone was like Broadway is dying because they moved it to Times Square now. They're making stuff for people in Ohio where like
Plays and theater used to be a thing that locals went to because locals and students could afford to go to the theater and they are
Now they're spending so much money to produce the shows that they have to charge so much for tickets that nobody local like young and like
Actually cool can afford to go do it and I think
that
And one thing I'm kind of dealing with is like cool is decided by broke
weirdos
totally and so
Things that are cool that influence culture are the things that are accessible to broke weirdos and so I think that
Volkswagen's are cool. They're inherently cool, you know
Amazing history they look aesthetically they're very neat and I think that like it's just at the point where like
One guys like us remember them and we're like, oh, yeah, maybe I'll get one but then also I can tell a kid
That's a broke weirdo. Like you can afford a mark 3 golf
Yeah, you can buy a $3,000 golf and it's like a good car. Make it pretty cool. Make it pretty cool. Yeah, there's a recipe book out there
I thought it would be more tax go check out the reform go blow off the dust
Boot up the 56k yeah, yeah, yeah
Yeah, I you know
I grew up in New York City and I remember when you could live in you know
Towns in Brooklyn and close to the water in Queens where it was 500 bucks for rent, right?
And like that was normal and like that's all been pushed out
And that was definitely the broke weirdo error of like, oh, yeah
This is just a bunch of people who've all moved here and like want to go make something cool
That definitely doesn't exist anymore. Let's at least not in major cities
Yeah, I feel like it's moved to like other places and people are finding that in other small towns and stuff
And I I know you and Vinnie have a Detroit conversation. I don't know if that's public
We actually went back during the winter and I think we're less
I'm still I'm still into it. No, I like I get that like for me
I always like building the car. That's not cool. It's funny because I'll bring back up the 9-11 thing
You said the other day like obviously we're sitting right next to a 9-11. Yeah, but you had it when it was cool
Actually, no, but I actually bought it when it wasn't cool
I want this for so long and it's funny because Vinnie jokes that I only like things that other people don't like and that the minute
People start liking them. I don't like them. Yeah
I'll bitch and moan and complain like not a lot of not enough people like old Audis and because of that
There's a lot of parts and it's hard to find them and so on and so on but then the minute that they become trendy
I'm like, yeah, I'm done. Yeah. Yeah, totally. It's like that because you're you're a taste maker
I know I mean I'd love to hear that but I think there's also just something of like
I don't know if it's like just the striving to do it differently
Like even as a kid something as simple as jinkos were really big all my friends had jinkos literally and figured
Haha, yeah, and I would wear these other pants because I just didn't want to wear jinkos
Not because like and they were like the same price. So it wasn't like I bought the cheaper ones or the knockoffs
It's just that like everybody had jinkos and like there was something wired in me
That was like I don't want the same thing everyone else has
I think like my uncle had a lot to do with that when I was a kid like I would I listen
I like this one song because everyone else in school liked it. He was like that song's trash
Yeah, that's a bad song like why do you like it? It's like oh everyone else likes it
Mm-hmm. He's like, yeah, and then like he introduced me to like Led Zeppelin
He was like this is good music which it was but like it definitely made me
You know is one of those things of like I was very and it really stood out of like I
Purposely wanted to do be different. Yeah, they do something a little bit, which is almost impossible to do today
I think there's so much like there's so many people doing so many things
That the nuance is broader and easier to find it doesn't feel that different because to me
It's I listened to like I watched your one episode and I'll admit this and I'm sure the same for you
It was like I've barely watched any doughnut stuff
You probably barely watched any hoonigan stuff because like you're so busy
They're like you don't really watch other youtubers stuff, right?
But I watched your Volkswagen one because everybody was talking about it like in my community when you did it for speed and
I was watching I think one thing that was really interesting
Take that you had on it was I actually never thought Volkswagen's were cool, right when I was younger because Honda seemed so cool
To me right like you had super street sport compact car like Honda tuner
Like you know all of these magazines that were completely focused at the Honda industry
And like we had to buy our magazines at Barnes and Noble for $10 because they imported from Europe
Like it didn't feel like the culture was here
I felt like I was part of a culture that existed overseas and because of that it felt cool to me
Because when I went to you know, like Francis Lewis Boulevard in Queens
I was like one of few Volkswagen's and there was hundreds of civics
But it feels like your vision of it is a little different. Maybe that's because you came in a little bit later
Yeah, my vision of it was I lived in Louisville, Kentucky and
To me the exotic land where like all the Voltawagens were were like was like Long Island
Like Pennsylvania, yeah, and New Hampshire and all these like East Coast guys had these like
Sick builds and like, oh dude if I lived there like they all probably drive around with each other all the
weekend like all these like shows that you guys all like went to and
I was like some kid from the South that just like wasn't a part of it and like I don't know like
It's like a chicken or the egg thing
But all the music I listened to was from Long Island in New Jersey
So you big be a big emo fan. Yeah, well like post hardcore. Okay. Yeah
Yeah, yeah, like Bayside and thrice
Yeah, and so like and you know Voltawagens are the reason I dressed the way that I dressed and like the reason I started getting tattoos
And you know, it was just like I think I've always been attracted to
Sort of like a consistent aesthetic, right?
Like everything should kind of fit together and like contribute to like this one vision and to me I
Knew a bunch of Honda kids and
At that point again, they were like in Kentucky. So they're all like on house arrest
Like my friend wasn't where my head was going but no like my friend of Raymer like
Literally got arrested like I let him drive my GTI and he like just ripped down Shelbyville Road and
Got pulled over and had like a warrant and got arrested and like he was driving my car because like I had been drinking and like I
Yeah, like the cops arrested him and just like left me with my car
And I was like, how do I get home? Yeah, I'm just gonna like chill here
And then I guess I like called my dad or something, but like that was
Honda's to me and so like yeah having a Volkswagen. I was like
Classier, you know, like I bought my magazines
Barnes and Noble store. Yeah, you gotta go to a book. They had British pounds on them. Yeah, they're this big and
Yeah, like the the scene didn't exist where I lived. It was like close to New York
There's like a little bit more cosmopolitan
It's funny for you to say that because I ran a Volkswagen car club. Yeah, I know New York City
Long Island area called Auto Creek
Yeah, and like we did an event called full moon full throttle where every single month a hundred and fifty of us got together
Yeah, and thrash back roads and I'm so happy no one ever died because I look back at now as I'm older
I'm like man, that was so dangerous, but it was a lot of fun back then
So it was that community and it's interesting because I never thought about it this way, but here's the take
The Volkswagen scene was as close to
Skateboarding as car culture got before drifting
Oh, yeah, because I think that you really like created this like definition or maybe I think we had that like back in the day in hot
Rotting right like the greaser was like a look where like you could look at someone and be like that guy's probably into Volkswagen's
Because there was you're right like there was definitely a way everybody looked music everyone listened to I'm a bit older than you guys
But I listened to emo because I knew so many people in the Volkswagen community
So it was just like part of that culture like I grew up more on like, you know
Hardcore like New York Hardcore era and like punk rock and stuff like that and obviously 90s hip-hop
But like emo is this thing that I found because like guys like Mark Chiedemann was listening to taking back Sunday and his slam
Do you know mark through golf right? I mean what's more?
Subversive or like rebellious than doing something that other people don't understand and so like muscle cars you like get it
It's like they're at least back then is like they're fast. Yeah, that's it's a cool car
It's fast and then even Honda's and stuff like that. It was like well
They're faster or then a lot of even the muscle cars and they're cheaper and you know, there's all these like things you can do
Voltagons didn't make any sense. Like we were like, so why do you like it? It's like because I can barely even fucking drive it
It's so low I smacked the oil pan on the ground and I rubbed through my tires with my fenders. Is it fast?
There's only like four of them that are fast and those guys are barely even cool
It's actually true because a bunch of our guys we had fast cars
We had seen a performance
We had like the first nine second Jetta and all these things the guys were the more the faster your car was less cool
Yeah, totally Mark. She even had like a two-liter slammed, you know, Jynster with the fifth 15 inch
Yeah, yeah with the 15 inch. I see I know that car and there's a picture about this big in PVW that I
Yeah, like go over with like a magnifying glass to be like, oh look at those. I almost got 15 inch
TE or
TH TH's yeah, I almost got 15 inch TH line
Do you want to know a funny story about that and I mark if you're listening?
I hope I don't butcher this but Mark ordered those wheels. I think from tuning super horn, right?
And they show up and he puts them on the car and they don't fit
Yeah
So his mom is like furious at them because he's young. He's like 19 or 20
Yeah, his mom's like, I can't believe you did this like, you know, these wheels don't fit like you spend so much money on them
So she brings them down to like the local body shop and he basically goes to the body shop and says like hey
Can you make these fit and somehow some random guy at a body shop created a trend that pulling fenders that
Pulling fenders and like kind of the way that they did it that modified the way Volkswagen's looked
Yeah for like the next, you know, five ten years in the US right like that aggressively pull
Yeah, and look there were cars in Europe that had done similar stuff, but that car set the stage
It was a two-liter. It was really slow. Yeah. Yeah, but it was so I mean
It had to be a two-liter because if it was a VR
This is that weird Volkswagen nerd stuff
But you're like, oh, I could have more power, but then I couldn't go as well. I couldn't go as well
Yeah, or like you'd be like I could go to five log with bigger brakes
But then it pushes the wheels out. So yeah, you have a lot of suspension
You got plus suspension and while that's great for handling. It's not as cool for I think I'm gonna put a mark two rear beam on the
silver car
Is the mark two beam narrow? Yeah. Yeah, really? Yeah, I have I have the I've this set of
Schmidt race lights. Yeah. Yeah. That was on
Joey that white Jetta. Oh, yeah, and so like they're so wide that I have to like narrow the rear track
I love I just like the exact opposite of what everyone else does with cars like I want it wider wide body
You're like, no, I'm gonna narrow this run a bigger lip your wheel. Yeah. So well, I put 16 by 9s on it
I know we first put it together and dude
I am I have different tastes than I used to like I think the car looks it's really low now on 17s
But like my cortisol level was through the roof, but I don't know how you drove your car
So hammered on tref punks because your car was slammed. Thank you. Your car is slammed. Thank you
You don't you have no idea how much it meant to me to show up after years of like because again
I lived in Louisville, Kentucky away from like
Where all of these guys from BW vortex seemed to like hang out all the time
And I think I'm like younger than most of you guys
So like I like looked up to this group of people and like they were so formative and I think like the way I
Moved to LA and did comedy like it was a big part of like what made me different than everybody and to pull up
To a parking lot full of those guys ever them to be like hey your car's pretty low, huh?
Are you sitting here thinking oh my goodness, I've made it to an hour and a half and I could definitely use
Another 45 minutes of this. Well, guess what there is another 45 minutes of me and James talking
After the two and a half hours of this pod on my patreon another reason to join
By the way is being one of those guys on the other side
We all felt really old because I was like I don't think I could drive a car that low like it was the
Realization of like me looking at my car going. It's like pretty low like the tires and the fender and then you showed up just
Hammered yeah, which by the way, I feel like it's a term only folks like you guys appreciate your car is hammered
Like what does that mean? Yeah, it means it's so fucking low the floor that it basically doesn't drive
They get stuck on speed bumps
Like if you ever high-side on a speed bump and had to have everyone get out of the car to get through a speed bump
I had to on tref punks. I had
Because the driveway to our campsite was
You'd learn the obstacles. Yeah, learn the roads around you
And so yeah, I did kick someone I mean, I think owning a low Volkswagen
It's like you were like you wanted to like get into rock crawling, but I just wanted to do it like on a regular street
Yeah, like you need like someone to get out and navigate for you. You've got like go half up on a curve
Yeah, like you know, it's like you're doing the same thing as rock crawlers. You're just doing it on like a standard
Yeah, the two best ways to have fun going two miles an hour
Yeah, slammed Volkswagen or giant truck on 39 inch touch. Yeah, exactly. So what are you?
Are you gonna build another car for tref punks this year?
Are you gonna finish?
I would like to
Because you have two mark threes right now, right?
I do. One's really taken apart. The green car is basically a shell right now.
Is it rusty? Is that why you take it apart? Just start over with the new one.
Yeah, thank you for the permission.
I just hate to tell you like someone who grew up on the east coast
And now understands how sweet sweet sweet working on a non rusty car is and who just bought a mark three synchro
That's rusty. Yeah, it's like I just don't know why I'm doing it to myself again
Like the chassis is dry, but I'm removing everything else and it's just such a pain in the ass
But if the chassis is rusty just get something else and I like I don't have like a big warehouse to put cars anymore
I only want to own
So many cars and I really like how many is that many like what is that number?
I don't want more than five. I have
I really don't want more than three you sound like such an adult
Yeah, I want to I want to be able to fit all my cars
In my driveway. I have so many that I'm not really sure how many I have. Yeah, it's like either
24 25 or 26
I don't really but you have a farm if I had a farm it'd be a different
Yeah situation like I right now I want to like drive all of my cars
Yeah, and so like I really I haven't a mark three that I really like
Maybe I can I want to paint that one. I want to do the interior. I want to shave the bay
and I want to
probably
Do some like bodywork stuff. I really like bodywork stuff. I like doing the little things
And so like I don't know I'll either maybe like
Bring that back finished or I wouldn't mind something older
I was going to ask like do you like the mark ones the mark twos like you seem like a mark three guy, but
I had a westy mark two
I like those
On 13 inch th lines
By the way, for those listening a westy mark two is not something where the westphalia pop top
It is a car built in the westmoreland plant in pennsylvania that's shut down in 85 or 86
And then sold all of its tooling to china, which is why china still has jettus
Yeah, and so they'd had square headlights
Instead of round ones, but not the long and not long rectangles. Yeah, not wrecking. Yeah small
So that car was really cool. I had three speed automatic and ultra ultra lows and 13 inch th lines
um, and it was
Just like great condition at like 85,000 miles and like this just like perfect tweed interior
And it had exhaust. How many guys do you think say?
perfect
Like perfect tweed is such a that's a good brand name by the way perfect tweed
It's also a great name for a fucking postpunk post hardcore band. Fuck I'd go watch perfect tweed. Yeah. Yeah
Uh, and I loved that car. So I think I like a small bumper mark too. It'd be really cool
I think that's probably a sweet spot for me. Yeah, I'm um, I need to like cut down my collection and um
I'm actually thinking about doing it as a content series because it's not because I think it'll make good content
Although I do like I it's a story I want to tell
But I think it's something that'll actually motivate me to do it because like right now
I don't really have a reason to cut down my collection other than that it creates anxiety
Like I'm at the point now where I'd rather have
10 cars that all work
Then 25 cars where every one of them has a problem like even my cars that I drive a lot
Have issues that I just don't deal with because it's like
Oh, I could deal with this but this one has a bigger issue right now
Right, right like so I think like having a better collection of 10 is more important than having all of them
But then at the same time like I don't know I like having them all
Yeah, squeaky door gets the squeaky wheel gets the
Yeah, it definitely is and it's also one of those like so like for me like my perfect Volkswagen collection
Like I have my mark 3 that I'm building right now
um
My first my first Volkswagen, you know, my first car was a black four-wheel golf
And I then vr swapped it and if I could have synchro swapped that I would have I jumped ahead
You vr swapped it in 18 hours with two
You know this story because because dude, I did my
07k swap in the silver car. Yeah in 47 hours
Uh
Basically to go to trevpunks, which is incredible. Yeah, and I posted it in the whatsapp group
And I was like damn dude, that's so fast and you go
That's nothing
18 years old queen's new york dead of winter
All they had was
All he had was a harbor freight eight piece tool set two cans of oe
And a half pack of new ports did it in 12 and a half hours drove it to school the next morning
True story 17 hours, but true story me and my buddy my my buddy trevor did it. Yeah, so
Yeah, I just don't have energy like that anymore. Now. I can't even like change my oil in 17 hours
And he was just like dude fucking scato, bro
That's like the equivalent though of like me telling my albundi story. It's like I'm just trying to relive him
Yeah, which I still lived in like I wish I still was able to you know
Four touchdowns at pulp or whatever it was. Yeah. No, I um
I have that I have my mark three and like that's a cool project. I'm just gonna make it a driver
I think I'm gonna finally build my swallowtail this year for trevpunks because like that's a car that looks really good on the internet
My green rabbit. Yeah, it's a car that looks really good on the internet, but like he's doing an abf or you have that 1.4
I'm actually gonna build no
I'm actually gonna build an eight valve for it. So whipples
I originally was gonna put the abf in there and the more I drove the car
The more I realized like I wanted to feel like stuff like this gives me hope for like the going back to the youtube
Conversation we're having and like the algorithm and things like that
So many guys I know
Who have built the most insane cars?
Are now building like eight valve rabbits or have you seen stef papa docus is supra?
No, just like I've seen his rav 4 which is fantastic. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah his rav 4 he built himself like a supra
It has like 360 horsepower, but it's just nice. Yeah
And I think jason is the same way like jason's built an insane like y body jason's mark 3
Formula v. Perfect. Whatever. Yeah, his mark 3 is perfect. His mark 2
is
Probably my favorite car at trevpunks, which was basically a stock is stock. Yeah, which is like yeah
And so I think a lot of us whether it's
Older I really do think it is like a trend is like we're moving back into like these
Nuanced versions of cool because we were at a point and like you partook where it's like it was a big part
I once I once thought it was a good idea for us to take a Honda Ridgeline and put an indie car. Yeah. Yeah
and
you know
Now that we've made 3000 horsepower 1200 horsepower
It's not that fun. No, and there's other things that you can do with cars. And so I think like
seeing that
that movement in the automotive world gives me hope for
Just kind of like everything moving that way because everything kind of moves together in culture. Yeah, I mean
Like music is moving more towards like geese is like one of the biggest bands in the world right now
And just sort of like I think we're moving more towards like an analog
sort of like slower
More artistic
sort of like time
I agree and I also think people just like
Like tangible stuff more and can appreciate again to use the word nuance
That's like the pb playhouse word of the day of like just a little stuff like for me
I'll be very honest
I found an opt valve cover for an eight valve and that was enough for me to build the engine
To be like this valve cover is super rare and really cool
And I want to put it on something
And instead of putting a better engine with more power in the car
I'm going to put this other engine in and then just build it in a really cool way and whip will actually build it for me
So it's like because he really enjoys engine building. That's just like not how my brain is wired
But that's too nervous. He's good at yeah, he's really good at like just I'm going to spend hours measuring this
You know, so um, but for me, I think it's I've been enjoying that sort of
Going backwards from everything has to be insane
To like hey, this could just be a normal car
But like really cool to me and that's all that really means. Yeah. Yeah. I also think like this is
I think something that Vinny and I try to talk about a lot
um
And I'm going to get into a weird conversation that I think you you live in and you understand but
I don't think of myself as a role model
But I I would be not self aware to realize that like I've done enough stuff that people are like
Oh, I look good to see what those guys do for sure, right?
And
I think we created this world through youtube where everyone thought they had to have a thousand horsepower car would be cool
And when I was younger even in my car club, like you could have like a ratty eight valve slammed on steelies
Yeah, and like it just had cool presence
And it was in and I think and like that's what I loved about dunk culture
It was like I came when I went to rides magazine, you know in order to be accepted in the world of like hip-hop
Car culture you had to have an escalade
So your entry point seventy thousand dollars. Yeah, and then you jump in fifteen thousand dollar wheels on the car
So it's like you like and that was the lowest level because most of what people were talking about were like
Rolls Royces and like all Bentley's all these crazy cars and then
Kids in the hood were like no we're gonna build my grandma's box Chevy and make that cool
And like the starting platform wasn't that was like again was cool
And you would go to the I would go to these spots like to go film these cars
And sure some of them were dope on 26's some of them weren't even on wheels yet
But they were still they still had a box Chevy
They still belong because they were part of it
And I think that there has been something that has happened in the past 10 years where everyone feels like they need
This crazy thing to belong and it's like man
You could have like a slammed civic or a slammed golf and like it's pretty cool, man
It's it's pretty cool just to keep it on the road
Yeah, it's just to keep it running and like do small stuff to it. Like I said, I think everything
culturally kind of moves together and
Like we both had youtube channels that sold for tens of millions of dollars during a time when like
like
Just money was fake. I think in like in the end it was fake for me
Yeah, yeah, it turned out that money wasn't even real
But like people were just like selling companies for like 80 million dollars and it's like, oh, I'm gonna like
Start a company. It kind of does this thing. It doesn't work yet
But you know, we just raised 80 million dollars in funding and I think it's just like that was just like a decade of
fake numbers and I think that
that's sort of
Proving to not be the you know, it's proving to be fake and everything's sort of like washing out from that experience like
For the whole world and I think the response is like this more analog smaller
kind of thing so yeah like
Bullshit companies were selling for a hundred million dollars and cars had 3 000 horsepower, you know
Everything was
It was all just like a good clickbait. Yeah, it was a gluttonous era
Ask anyone who owns a 3 000 horsepower car if they enjoy driving it like deeply
John force, you know, that may be a little different but like
By the way, one of the most badass men I've ever gotten to hang out with but yeah, um, yeah, man
I don't know. I'm just enjoying
Like the simpleness of cars right now. I just bought a vanagon and like I
Had all these plans because we I bought it because we were on tref punks
And we had like a camera support vehicle and I thought to myself, you know, it would be a really good camera support vehicle
A vanagon. Yeah, and that's like all it takes for me to go purchase a car
Yeah, I was like, yeah, that's enough of a reason because I can justify it
And that's like why I bought so many cars during the hoonigan era was I would justify it for content
Like oh if I go buy this f 600 like that'll be a really cool build on hoonigan never got built on hoonigan
Now I pay storage for it every month because I haven't even moved it to my farm
Um, but I bought the vanagon with that idea and I was like, oh, I'm gonna do
Uh, 996 engine in it with a 996 box like all these crazy mods and I ended up finding a vehicle that was well maintained and just works
Like man, I'm just really enjoying it stock and I realized like I may be crossing into this world where
I'm just enjoying like old cars just for being totally. Yeah, like I really enjoy the nostalgia
I'm starting to realize that there's no difference between my
My um father-in-law who has a Volkswagen thing and drives it to the beach listening to the beach boys
As me driving around in my 90s Volkswagen, you know, listening to mob deep like there's no difference
Yeah, just that guy now like it's like I'm just the same thing. Yeah, like I'm really um
Like I really want to build
Like maybe like a mark one shirako
With like uh carbs. Yeah, like a carved eight valve or something because like
The thing I want is like for the engine to be
Take up the least amount of space. Oh, yeah
In the engine bay possible. This is such a vw guy thing to want to be like
I want the smallest engine under my hood is possible and then have the least amount of things coming off of it
So that you look into it and it's like this like piece of art with like a frame around it
I once got pulled over by chp in the in the canyons and they they wanted to state ref me
In my rabbit and I'm like first off it's a 1975. So like
It's not really state repable because it's pretty smog
I was like, but you're more than welcome to pop the hood because like it's a stock engine
Like no, there's definitely something under there like we heard it. You know, he's like I heard that blowing by and like no
What you heard
Was a car that makes 50 horsepower stock from the factory trying to get up a hill
Like that's what you heard like it was just trying really hard
And he popped the hood and all there is is just this little carbureted eight valve in there
And he just looked at it and he looked at his motorcycle and he looked back and he said
Motor on my bike's bigger. Yeah, I was like, yeah, he's like, all right. You're good to go
That was all he had to see he was like it was so just like wimpy. He was like, I'm not even gonna write this guy a ticket
Yeah, the green the green paint makes it look
Yeah, it looks like it's it looks like a hot hatch, but it's a it's a it's a mild hatch
It's like lukewarm at best. Yeah, so you're gonna build that for the plan is to build up this year
Do an eight valve do nice paint it's original paint on it right now
But there's like enough rust spots and enough dings and dents all around it
I think it's like
I'll enjoy it as it is now like I originally I bought it
Um, and my whole thing was like I just wanted to get to run under its own power for a week before I pulled it out
and put the 16 valve in
And that was whatever three and a half years ago just kept driving it
Really kind of just fell in love with like what it is
But now it's like there's like a bunch of little problems. There's been problems all along
Like I always refer to that vehicle
It's like my it's like my escape room on wheels because like I just never know when it's gonna break
But all the stuff is like really easy to fix. It's all like four parts on it. Yeah, it's like a screwdriver and vice grip
We'll get you home. Yeah
but I
I wouldn't take it on tref punks right because like it makes so little power
That like it just wouldn't be fun at altitude or like doing anything like that
Are you gonna do a carb date valve again or no? I was gonna do a carb date valve. I was gonna do just weathers
Um, but Whipple has talked me out of it because Whipple's like so pragmatic
He's so like just build a car that is like fun to drive and that you're not kind of other problems with
I have those like wide-ass wheels and I was like, yeah, I'm willing to pull the fenders
He's like, why don't you just put wheels that fit your car
But like really he's like over 50 now
So he's like at the pragmatic part of his life, you know, we're just I'm all of his cars right now
Yeah, I know it's pretty amazing. But uh, well, not all of them. Yeah, but he's finished on his way there
He's on his way there. But um, anyway
Uh, Gen V makes um
They make a webber
Itb like a webber look alike or like a DCOE. They call them. I think heritage carbs
So I think whatever on those so they look like carbs, but
Underneath underneath their actual injectors. You're gonna be like an ABA. Nope. I'm doing uh original
I'm actually the engine I'm building is the engine out of his 85 gti. Got it. Yeah, so I'm building
So it's it's sort of like a
mid 80s kind of period correct other than the itbs
But it'll look that way like I'm trying to key and then most of the I've got a bunch of op parts for it
Which are like really rare for mark ones like you see them a lot for mark threes
But just weren't as
I don't know available
So I'm gonna do that and then like kind of keep it pretty much how it is
I want to do like a like a sort of like brown interior in it
I saw a brochure from japan in 1975 and it was that color car but with this like
Really sort of cool like carrot like caramel camel like interior
And I was like that looks really good. I want to put that together with I got some like old rickarros
You know just like
Kind of build this car that I wanted to build when I was 21 but couldn't afford to you know
So I'm not sure. I have a set of um
There are these old Audi wheels that were that I had
Um
I forget the guy's name now. You know the guy who does the split wheels down san diego. Yeah sham sham boy
Yeah, yeah, yeah sham sham. I don't even know how to pronounce this. I think even if I knew what it was
I'd forget but um
He made a split of this like old 13 inch Audi wheel for me. He made just one
And it looks pretty sick. So
I'll probably run that but I've been collecting wheels for my rabbit
So I think I have like nine or ten sets of wheels everything from like the classic rs's
to
Like our the original rml snowflakes like the og ones that rotiform made for them way way back in the day
Um to like just a whole collection of like weird like rally wheels like I don't know
I just like collecting like four by 100 wheels are pretty cheap. Yeah
So like they're they're a fun thing to collect. Yeah, so my cars are both my golfs are four by 100 still
Yeah, like people don't really care that much about like 15 by seven. It's not like a wanted size
Yeah, and Jason's like, why don't you switch to five? Look, it's like because what am I going to run like w or x wheels like
I like I think one of the main reasons I like
cars is finding stuff and my
Taste in cars. I think as far as like cars I've built
Has been 100% just like what I could find. Yeah, I never like set out with like an intention of like
Here's my vision for this and I'm going to execute it because it's just impossible
It's it's always like, oh, I have this and I have this and I'll put this on there too
Um, we're very alike because I'm kind of the same way. It's for me. It's like
It's like this weird pyramid of um
It's got to be something that like fits into a cool style in the sign
But it also has to be a good deal
Like I'm never going to buy that set of like I want oz futuras for something
I don't even know what car I want them for but I want them for something
But like I'm not going to pay 3200 bucks for 3500 whatever they're going for now
I'll wait till I find a cheap set somewhere and we finish them or get a bank or find them on a car
And literally buy the car just for the wheels and sell the car like I enjoy
The story of finding those parts
More so than anything and I'm over wanting perfect stuff
Like I like hella magic color tail lights and I have a pink set on the silver car
And people are trying to sell those for 1200 dollars
Um, I bought mine for 250 bucks and they have like a
Crack going down the middle of it. It's like hey chances are
This 25 year old piece of plastic sitting in the sun would crack anyway. So I'm just gonna like
Remove the middle man
I think I think like perfectly imperfect cars are a huge thing my uh 9 11 my
My wife before she was my wife, uh, knocked over my motorcycle and scratched the hood of the car
And she was horrified and she thought you know, actually like was calling the body shop like, you know
Can can you fix this and like we'd have to repaint the whole car like that's not like flat white paint
Like it's not something we can match easily
We have to repaint the whole car and you know, she told me I think she thought I was gonna like lose my shit
And I think it was a mixture of
One I really was into her so I was like I'm not gonna get
Madder over over something with a car. Um, and by the way, I've heard people
Like I've told this story before on who you're getting people were like, I would have blah blah blah
I'm like and that's why you're home alone in a basement. Um, but
I sleep in a race car bed
And it's like I wasn't gonna get mad at her or something like that
Plus it was probably partially my fault because I had too much crap in the garage
Um, but it also was like it took away like the worry of scratching anything
Because I'm like, oh well already got a big scratch on the car now
So like I just don't care as much anymore and I just found myself treating the car differently after that
It was like I didn't paint my e30
And I think if I had I wouldn't drive it nearly as much as I do. I like street park it on venice
This is my worry with painting my rabbit. Yeah, because like right now I drive the shit out of that car
Like I people tag me in photos of that car all the time because I'll just go somewhere and just leave it outside
I like like I don't know you that I mean, I know you know, we really don't know each other that well
I think it's okay to be honest. I'm like
I'm legitimately
I know of you from afar and your
History with owning a million cars that don't
Watching you drive that car as much as you do has made me as like a fellow car guy like proud of you
I'm like, man, it looks like looks like scottos like
Looks like his spirit's good, man. He must like really love that rabbit
One the car hit this nostalgia thing because that was at a moment at Hoonigan
Where we were just building thousand horsepower cars and simultaneously I was building a thousand horsepower outie that like still doesn't run
right and
You know, and I was chasing this thing that everyone was like, that's what you should be doing
And then like I bought this car off a quarry
Fixed it got it to run and I just enjoyed it
I just enjoyed it for what it was and it was kind of actually pretty private to me early on and it was actually this thing
I felt like I shouldn't share with like the Hoonigan audience because it just felt so on Hoonigan
Right 50 horsepower front-wheel drive car like what's cool about that?
Like it just didn't fit and I think it like
Got into an episode or in the background of one or something and like a ton of people gravitated to it
We're like, yo, what's that mark one? You know, we obviously started talking more about it
And I think it actually like freed me
Yeah from this world that I had created that like I could own as the guy at Hoonigan
I could only have like a nova a 9 11, you know in a thousand horsepower outie
Like I couldn't have these other things
Because that just didn't work because they couldn't you know do donuts, right?
Like it was like there was like this thing that like the cars had to do
And that kind of freed it for me being like yeah, people are into this too
And it actually opened me up to buying a bunch of garbage
Some of which I still own because I was like, hey people also think this really cool old front-wheel drive outie school apparently not
But yeah, but I also set this rule for myself
That I was gonna stop owning
Normal cars which is not an easy life choice right like to not own a daily driver
Right to be like every car I own is something fun. Yeah has to be fun
And there are days where it is tense because I have to go do a really normal thing
Like I have to go to a like a normal meeting that doesn't that no one's like clapping because I drove my cool car there
Or I have to go to a doctor's appointment or I have to pick my kid up
And bring my kid somewhere and my car breaks on the way and like that is really not fun
but
When you balance it out like it is fun to just drive something cool every day
Like I really enjoy that like the the most pedestrian vehicle I own is a
Is it probably my s8?
But like that car is like it's it breaks every day. It's it's such an unreliable vehicle
But I really enjoy it and then my other one is a ford van that's like lifted on 35
It's like totally nada makes like 700 horsepower. All my cars are
specific and old and I got to the point where
Like
I got access to press cars pretty frequently and it would have to be like a really special press car for me to
like
feel
Better about it than like my car. Yeah, I mean like like parking at the grocery store and like you get out of your car
And you're like, I'm cool. Yeah. I'm a cool guy
um, and so like
Uh, and when I first started working for done it and first started getting press cars like any press car
I'd be like this this this rules this rules and now it's like
It's hard for me to find a car that I like more than my cars
Yeah, I have a hard time. I have a hard time driving any new car that really gets me that excited
That's just like a thing. But when I was a journalist, I didn't
Other than the Audi, which was a project that didn't run. I didn't own a car
Yeah, it's like I was a you know, I had pressers every week. That was all I drove
Um, and you know, you'd get excited about just the new g 37 when it came out because it was new and someone else
Was letting you drive it and well when we first started doing uh auto like car reviews
Like we used to joke that Nolan just loved everything
They were new. Yeah, he's like, you know, the new ultimo is actually like pretty nice you guys
It's a lot better than not driving something. Yeah, he's like, you know, it's got ac
He's like, it's pretty good
It's funny because I at some point I wanted to get back into driving press cars
And I had driven a couple new cars and I realized that like the things I was
Excited about was like 10 year old technology because I'd be like saying to someone someone's like, you know, every car has that now
Like, I don't know man. Have you seen the things I drive? Like, I don't know like like wait, they all do this like
Wow, maybe I should look at new cars. I can see the top of the car
In the camera
Yeah, that's like new tech to me
I mean to me like with a new tech that came out when I was still a journalist were things like
Hill assist and bluetooth connectivity
Like that was new and like I really haven't like driven money like new cars since then
Yeah, whenever I have a press car, I'll make sure to drive it to like San Diego or something for like a
I'll like schedule a podcast or something right just to like put the mile traffic. Yeah. Yeah
I don't know if for me right now. I'm like anti new car
I'm sort of it's like forcing me to like make my cars more
Like normal drivable. It's making me fix things like air conditioning
Because otherwise I would just like my wife had like a newer s8
I would just jump in that and then I would just drive that every day and then
And then it just became the everyday thing or like my van before it was modified
I think there's something kind of fun about
That slight adventure that you just don't know where you're whether or not your car is going to get you there or not
Yeah, I don't know. I
Like for a different reason like I like the coolness of like it's an adventure
Yeah, like me going to Trader Joe's today is an adventure. Like there's a very good chance. I'm not
You might not make it back buddy
Stock up on the trail mix while you're there because we might we might have to get home
Yeah, better get a snack. Just better get rations. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I think it just at least needs
Some noise and like a smell
Yeah, and it's gotta just like rattle around a little bit
Yeah, like you it had you have to
travel with tools
Yeah, like it's got to be something that you're like, ah, this might break or like you have to be the kind of person
That's like can't wait till the end of the year so that your triple a toes re-up
Because you're like, oh man, I've used all my toes this year
Dude, I brought it up on the past few podcasts have been on triple a is the only thing in the world
That costs less than I think it should
I hope they're not listening. Yeah, because the amount I use all my toes every year
Yeah, it is such a great deal. Yeah, I love it. We should get triple a as a partner
Dude, we should and I just want it. Yeah, I want to work with brands that I support and triple a
Dude and don't sleep on the discounts. You feel a little geriatric typing it in but you'll save some money on a hotel
You get like 20 bucks off every hotel and they never even asked for the card
Yeah, literally just like uh, do you guys have a triple like? Yeah, yeah, they just punch it in like they only want to see your card
They've got it
So I also use them for insurance too. Uh, I have one of my cards insured. Yeah. This is not a triple a ad
But it could be triple a it could be
Um, no, I switched over to them. They're pretty good. Anyway, um
What other kind of cards are you in do?
Like if it was in volks wagons, what would it be? Well, it's like BMW is a lot. Oh, yeah
I've been 30 with an s54 engine in it. Yeah
Um, I want I don't get the BMW thing at all. I wish I did they're just square
They're square
Rear-wheel drive cars. I know I know I get it old BMWs. Yeah. Yeah. No, I don't like the BMWs
I can appreciate what they are
And I there's some that I think I would buy like I could see buying an eight series
Probably because they're like the least reliable version
BMW just like the least fun one I can um, I think I could see buying an eight series
I could see buying I could see buying an e30
Um, e30 rules and they're still you can still get a nice e30 for less than 10 grand
I like clown shoes. I think clown shoes rule. I don't think I fit in one, but they look cool
Yeah, might be surprised that I don't they must be like a stigma thing to it
I was just having this I had this conversation multiple times and I had this conversation with my wife
I don't know why I don't like them. It's like someone must have hurt me when I was younger who had a bmw
I think e30s especially are like e28s. They just like look
Like three boxes and it's rear wheel drive and it's just like car
Yeah, the e30 like older volvos the mark 2 jetta to me is like when a kid draws a car
Yeah, yeah, they're drawing that car. Like it's just a simple shape. It just works. So yeah, I love BMWs
I'd like maybe like an e34
Yeah, those are good and I want to with a v8
I'd like to do like a
E39 m5 engine in it or something or maybe like an e90 v8. What's that an s65?
Yeah, uh, like I think I want something with like a v8, but like a high revvy
Yeah, like small displacement v8. That'd be fun. I want to mark one shirako. I want like a bright
Like either like bright orange or like signal green
Mark one shirako
My rabbit signal green. Yeah, just they called it rally green in the Volkswagen color book
Maybe I'll get an orange one and then we can maybe be friends part
The other color car I really want in life is orange. Yeah, did you always like colored cars?
I think old cars can be bright colors and new cars that are bright colors look dumb
Interesting. I an orange 2002
That's sick and cool. That's a cool car like a
Yellow rabbit f8 but like an orange f80 and orange f80 is not a cool car. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, sorry if you drive one
Yeah, so I used to only like black and white cars right at a white 911 a black nova
Like all my cars were black and white and even when I first bought my rabbit
I was looking for a white mark one and I saw that rally green when I was like, man
That's just a really really cool color
Since I bought that all I want is colored cars now like I just really enjoy color
And in a time when you drive through parking lots and every single parking lot is like white
Silver gray and black
Like that's it. Like there's no coloring cars anymore
Like in the 80s and like the early
And like, you know all the way through really the 60s 70s and mid 80s like we had great color cars
I just don't think we have like good colors anymore. And if you do have a good color
It's only on an asshole car like there's really good Lamborghini colors
I like Lamborghinis, but they're fun assholes
My mark three is a silver arrow. So it's like a silver mark three golf
And back in the day like there weren't any silver cars. So like that was like a very
Sawed after mark three color. And so when that matt I bought it from matt crook when that car popped up
I was like, oh
Yeah, dude, silver arrow car. Hell yeah, and then like I got it and realized. Oh all cars are silver now
So it doesn't look as special, but no, it's cool to Volkswagen guys. Yeah, yeah, which all this is all it really
Yeah, yeah, it's like as long as like the seven people who know no, like that's the reason
Yeah, silver arrow four door with euro bumpers, dude. It's kind of fresh. Yeah, it's pretty good
Well, like I once painted a black car black magic just because and like for those listening
Black is in black black magic as in metallic black, but it was like a special Volkswagen color
I did a full respray like car stripped all the way down all the glass out
To paint it black magic just because Volkswagen guys would think it's cool
I remember my mom was like you did what because I I spent an inheritance that I'd gotten from my great grandmother
I'm repainting my car
Talk about the most irresponsible thing you could do at like 21 years old
And I got this money which was it was like 3,100 bucks and I like worked at a body shop
And the guy was like, all right, I'll repaint your car for that much
And it was just metallic black like I did went to all that work just to impress like seven guys who were like
That's a black magic car. Like you can't get black magic in the States
My e30 is painted
Like gmc 90s truck black because there's nothing in it. Yeah, there's no pearl
No glitter nothing. So my 9 11 is painted a pure white
I forget what white it was but it was like the purest white
But then we put a pearlescent on top of it
So that way it was like a because I felt back then like all whites looked off white
And I wanted like white white like absence of color white
But then but it like was almost too shockingly white and then we dropped a pearlescent on it and gave it this like
Marshmallow look which is cool. I like white cars a lot right now. Yeah, I still like white cars
I really hate black cars unless they're big body cars. Like I can imagine owning
Like a q-ship, you know, like a big sleeper
Like an s8 or like something like that. That's not black. Yeah, like it just works immediately
Lexus for a 30s. Like they just look cool VIP like a silver lexus ls. Isn't that cool? That's geriatric a black ls
That's yakuza. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. You need that. You need that as yakuza
Big body murder. Maybe I could get away with like a dark purple
Maybe like a dark dark green. Yeah, but there's got it. It's got to be dark. Like it has to feel
Menacing. Yeah, there's nothing menacing about a silver car. I think some cars like white cars can look
like
fleet
Yeah, yeah for sure, you know or they can look like really cool
So like a nice car in white is sick
Or like a lot of old cars in white are sick, but a cheap car in white is like more rental
Right feels like a rental car. Yeah. Yeah, that's how I feel about old trucks. Like
Old white trucks look like contractor grade trucks. Not as cool
Where like an old black truck looks really cool because they're actually kind of rare. Like I had an old black 7 3
old body style Ford and
Like that thing was really rare. You like to think a black truck is rare. It's like, yeah, they mostly came in silver
And like then a bunch of people bought them in red for some reason. Yeah, so yeah
Yeah, I don't know. I like I'm now on this thing where it's like I just want to own a bunch of color cars
So like I'm as I was saying before like I got these 24 to 26 cars
I want to make this
Concept and the name of the show is just going to be like does it run because I was like this big
Like joke was like is it scottos does it run was just like Hoonigan joke
And I want to kind of go through cut it down to like 10
But like I have like all these like mandates I need which is like I have to have a certain
Types of cars. I need like, you know, I need my
My sports car. I need my van. I need this. I need that
But then I also have like the color cars
I want to own and though this would all came off the tangent was I really do want an orange car
I had an orange opal at one point, but I sold it before I ever got it running
And but it was like that's such a quintessential like late 70s early 80s color. So good. Yeah
I want a bright old car
Maybe for tref punks next year
Because like old cars you can get away with a lot more
Without being a douchebag. Yeah. Yeah, I agree
All right, let's let's subject change real quick. Yeah
Drifter movie. Yeah, that was fun working with you on it
Let's talk too much about the movie because I don't know what we can say and what we can't say yet
And I don't know when it's coming out or anything, but
It was fun to work with you on something
In like kind of a space. I think that was outside of what the two of us spend most of our time in now
Holy and it's a thing that like
I came from that world right and I think
Like I I feel like I have my pre donut professional life than my donut professional life and then
starting speed and
Sung calling me out of the blue to
Do that movie kind of like
made
My post donut life sort of like combined my whole life
And I feel like that was a thing that like really made me feel
More like myself in a time that like I needed to and so it was like
Just like such a great experience like being on set
Really great car curation
I met people that like I hang out with all the time and it was cool because like I'm very
Aware of you and I'm very aware of like you're what you've made
But I've never been on set with you right and so there you directed second unit
But there was a day where like you directed me and I was like
That's pretty cool. And it made me
In like I want to make a movie now, you know, yeah
And like I think there's all this talk of like Hollywood being dead or whatever, but like
It's like, you know, we've made big projects that cost as much as features and you know
I make 45 minute youtube videos now. So just like how do we double that? And I think that like
it's totally
Realistic to think about like making a movie and I think
Yeah, and even like starting to think about like how what like distribution would look like
Like maybe we do it on youtube and sell tickets like in that way. I think
There's just creative ways to do everything. I'm pretty I don't know. It was like I just really really liked it
And I wanted to do it again. Yeah, I had a similar sort of like awakening like I always wanted to do a movie
And something that's always been like there
um
Back in the day David Ayer who like, you know worked on training day rewrote fast and furious did um
fury
End of watch a bunch of great stuff
He reached out to ben conrad and wanted to do a jim conna movie and that like planted this like seat in my head
Of like man, I really want to do this like this would be really cool to do one day
We chased it never really kind of came together and then I got that phone call from sung
Mine originally was to actually work on the initial d project
For various reasons that paused and sung was like, I just want to go bake something like I'm going to make my own film
and
I want to have the control. I don't want to have to deal with the studio like we're going to fund it
We're going to do this whole thing and you know, I want you to do all the action for it
um, which was just really really amazing experience because
Sung let me sort of run most of the second unit stuff just completely on my own and like kind of figure that out run
My own team will roge the whole group
But then I got I think the part of it that I was
Unexpecting was getting to jump in and help with some of the
Some of the narrative stuff like working with you
Got to work with michael. Um, you know got to work with a bunch of other people
you know
rosy like tamaris character and like
I wasn't expecting that and one of the things that went when I went there
I was I was a little bummed the first few days because I was so busy that I thought I was going to be able to get to
Like shadow
Sung and like watch what was happening on main unit
But honestly like if I wasn't if second unit wasn't operating
I was doing something else to help main unit for the next day or do something else or whatever
Or just continue to work logistic so
As the shoot went on and they started to kind of run behind schedule and sung and and uh, chris were giving me stuff to do
I was like man, I really like this. Yeah, right like I really enjoy
Not just the action stuff, which is something that feels very
Second nature to me at this point. I've been doing it for almost 20 years
But like I man, I really enjoy the narrative stuff and I immediately after that came home
Sat with you know will and was like I want to go do this like I want to go make a movie
You and I talked about I think on like one of the last days we had on set up in willow of like man
How do we go do this? Like we if there is anything that that project showed me
Um is that
I could go do this myself. Yeah, right or with other people but like but like this is possible
Right because it always felt like it was this other world
Like it wasn't close to what we were doing. It was like, oh, there's like what we do for youtube
And then there's hollywood. Yeah, we're not hollywood. Yeah, but in but like and granted that was like a low budget independent film
But I was like, man, and we could definitely go make this like this feels like something that's within reach
And I immediately went home and like bought all the books
Like like just save the cat. Yeah. Say red save the cat. I'm actually reading Roger Corman's like how I
Like how I made, you know money how I never lost money in making films or something like how I made a million dollars
I forget what the name of it is but Roger Corman. He's like king of the b films
And it's actually a really great read because he just writes about
Um, how to just make low low budget stuff and I think that I enjoy that creative
um
Kind of like sandbox because like that's how it was at Hoonigan
I was like, hey, we can't afford to do this. So like we have to do it this way
And that book is really like he he did all this stuff and there's all these like great actors and great directors who
Who worked with him, you know from Scorsese like and so on
But he was known for just like how cheap can you make it and just like an interesting look at it
Because when I look at what we've done, I think the reason why
You know Hoonigan was successful. Donut was successful. A lot of other people who are peers is because
We got to sort of bushwhack in a time where no one was doing it and like you look right now
You're like, yeah, Hollywood's falling. This is the perfect time
And they're telling everybody to figure out how to make it and self-produce
Yeah, I mean while we've been doing it for 10 years. Yeah, I think and it's like I don't think I don't think the movies
I don't think the theater. I don't think the audience is the problem
I just think that the traditional way of going about it's the problem and and this is the set standard bloat, right?
You get to
You know, there's too much money on the wrong thing. There's no there's no lack of money
There's a there's a ton of money. They just keep some people
want more of it and they want to charge like even like
That was another like subway takes that I just saw recently. Yeah, it's just like
uh, if you want to save the film industry
Executives and like the top of the bill. Oh, I did see that actors just take less money less money pay more people
It'd be fine. Fuckin idiots. It's great. Yeah, just like make cheaper stuff
Pay certain people less money. Yeah, and most people more money
Well, there's a couple movies that have done that model of like paying everybody's scale
Which is like the basic rate for the for the union and then everybody earns on the movie making money
And I think that's like really valuable like if I could redo Hoonigan, you know
And realize like I was I only own 10% of Hoonigan like it was Ken's company and and wasterman was our other our other partner
Um, I may have done
Most of the work because I was the one running it but that was my sweat equity that I was putting into the company
Um, but if I was to redo it now knowing what I did, I think that
I think at some point
there needed to be
Like a way that everybody felt like they were earning on the business doing well
I think that's the big yeah, but like but then but that being said, I don't think that selling companies is the goal anymore
So it's like you have to find a way to do that
Obviously with movies there
There's still an element where it does kind of sell at the end and oh every movie is just a business
And like you realize like each movie you make is its own business and you kind of figure that all out
But like man, there's such opportunity and obviously i'm sure you've been like seeing all the marty supreme stuff that's going on
Like I think that that you know, I think he's done
You know, I think he's done an excellent job in that marketing team
That's done it of like putting that movie out there for people to talk about I haven't seen it yet
So I don't know if it's good or not
Reviews are really good
But I look at that and I think about it from like a more micro version of like how people in the automotive industry can
Position a good movie in a completely different way than hollywood has ever like sinners
I think sinners is even a better example
Sinners is also fantastic. I just watched it this weekend first time
No, yeah. Oh wait. Yeah. Oh really? Yeah. Did you like it? Yes. Love it. It was so good. Yeah, but like sinners
had a better
Opening box office the marty supreme. Yeah, and the marketing
for sinners was a lot of like
technical film stuff 100 like coogler talking about like aspect ratios and shit and like
Giving the audience the benefit of the doubt that they're like interested in why this movie is good. And I think
You know like I think first and foremost
I think of myself as like an entertainer
But the way that I've always entertained is to like educate like the three e's and speed like we came up with this
after the fact, but it's like
I love this by the way. I love justifying something afterwards and being like, this is the reason why we didn't do it
But why we should have done it. Honestly, that's what they all mean. So first and foremost, it has to be entertaining. Yep
If it's entertaining
Then it also has to be educational. So if it's those two things then we can put it out
And then the third one
I forget the third one, but the third one is like extra. It's gotta be extra
The third one's like emotional or like endearing, but it's like that's it's like
basically
Like catharsis for Maria like sharing or whatever
So like it has to be those first two before it can be like super personal
Right, you know, or else it's just like masturbatory. But like first and foremost, it has to be
entertaining and then educational. So like I think
Yeah, the the press for around sinners. I thought it was like really great. Yeah, I think it spoke a lot to Filmmaker world
I'll give you two things or three things off of that first
I made an homage to sinners aspect ratio changing in the beginning of jim kana ozzy shreds
We go from what is like a scope like ultra wide into like regular wide
Midway through just because I thought that was such a cool thing that he did where you constantly are changing aspect ratio
And I didn't realize it like I watched in the theater and it wasn't until like midway through
That I realized it and the only reason I realized it was because I saw a post about different aspect ratios
And then I went and like was like, oh
And it was like a different experience depending on where you saw it
So like you get like the full experience. Yeah, I saw it on 70 mil. Yeah, do you change aspect ratio like on action?
there's like
No, it was great. I was I was fantastic. Then the other thing is um
You guys did three ease and speed. I'm imagining so it would stand out
That was kind of like a like a search optimization thing. Yeah. Yeah
Yeah, and just to make it like
A brand name. No, I get it. Yeah, because I always thought the issue with doughnut like when
Ben first came to me was like that name isn't very easily trademarked
Totally like Hoonigan was its own word
Like it was very easy for us to trademark it and protect it and it also made it very easy to like search it
Right because it was like the only thing that came up
So I was curious when I first saw that because we were like, why misspell speed and I was like, uh, it makes a lot of sense
Yeah, it was sort of like for a while. I was gonna call it power, baby
Right, sometimes they're not doing it
I mean is I'm assuming speed is sort of the up to speed connection. Yeah, so it was like an homage to that
And then there's another
YouTuber called I show speed. Yeah, of course. He's huge. Yeah
And so yeah, I think it was like seo, but also to like make it
Not
Just car. I think just to make it like like you said like its own word. Yeah
I will be honest. I'm like seven days old from realizing like oh up to speed speed
Like that just didn't click for me early on like it was just like car channel called speed extra e
That makes sense like visually. I liked it like I didn't question it and the other day
I saw like something feed up, you know feed to me. That was like an old up to speed. I was like
That took that was a little slow
A little slow for you to pick that one up. He's also a painter. I think his name's Darrell white
And he did like a lot of the peewee herman
Like set design and he does these like
Paintings where it's just like a saying and they like scale like really far away like that
And so I was like looking at a bunch of stuff when I started it and
I think the
Extra e sort of like lent itself. Yeah
And so like our first logo is like kind of like a force perspective like scaling back
Kind of thing
I dig it because I grew up in graffiti and a lot of times if you wanted to like fill space
You would just add more vowels
So like if you had a tag and then you wanted it to like, you know
But you wanted to fill the whole side of something like the side of a city bus
You'd like just add more ease
So you would just do like oh, I wanted my tag is whatever and I would add eight ease in it
Just to take up the whole space or something like that was like a pretty standard thing
And so like we add extra vowels to like we have merch that says cool with three right. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah saw that saw that
Um, yeah, man, but uh going back to making movies
So like I don't know is that do you want to do that next because like I want to do that next
I'm pretty honest about that. I want to talk to you about this
Maybe all fair, but like we want to do a magazine
Um for speed. Yeah speed mag
Um, I definitely want to make a movie
um, I wouldn't
Mind wouldn't mind. I'd like to like explore the idea of
Like making a series
like a comedy series
um
and like again
Thinking about interesting ways to like publish things
On my channel and then potentially licensing it to like netflix or something like that
I don't know. I want to do like I want to continue to
do what we're doing and kind of
Explore like the filmmaking aspect of
youtube and like
Encourage more people to like make things that they think are good because I do think that a lot of this
Uh algorithm jail is self inflicted and I I want to encourage like other creators to like
Do stuff that you like do stuff that you think is good because I do think that like
If you make good stuff people will watch it and people will find it
Um, and then I want to I just want to do like more comedy stuff. Like I kind of want to continue like combine
All of my experience
um
Like with youtube and then like comedy and stuff like that
On the comedy thing
So I was asked in a panel one of the panels that you didn't join on the drifter movie
Someone asked about your performance and I said, you know, I think the one thing
That'll probably come as a shock is that you may be showing up thinking that you're getting james pump free
From speed or from doughnut, but you're gonna get him playing a character. That's like very serious and like has a darkness to him
Um
Which is the real james pump free. Is it the real james pump free? No, I got a deep darkness
But like that was definitely it was like interesting because you called out that role
Like I know that you wanted you, you know, I know you've said this on other podcasts
You don't need to repeat it here that when sung gave you the script you're like, hey, I see one character
I think I can fit sung saw that for you as well
Sung also plays a character that is unlike any character that I think people know him as
He's not Han. He's not super cool. Right. Like there's this completely different piece to it
But you want to make comedy stuff
But like you know, you're really good at that role like because I think you did a very good job of that
and I'd love to do those roles too and I think that like
Like the best dramatic movies are super funny, you know what I mean? Yeah
And so like I I think I would just like I would like to continue to do
Everything that I can do to keep making stuff
Ideally some of those things that I make
Will give me some tape that someone can watch
And be like, hey, I think maybe he could do this other thing and then hopefully like I would love to be in other people's stuff
Did did you listen to the smart list with david decoveny? No, it's very good because he talks about how it's actually all the stuff
I didn't know about david decoveny. Like I didn't know he was like an academic
I didn't know he could care less about sci-fi
But he talks and and also like how influenced he is by charles bukowski
And but he talks about how like the greatest comedy comes in like really sad for like things, right?
Like he played these like you think about californication where it's like
His story in that which is a very bukowski like character is
It's really funny, but it's also really like it's really heavy and he's like that's like his zone
Like he really loves this like heavy comedy that like works really well
But you've played a lot of like really like
Topical fun stuff, especially for like for that other stuff
But I feel like there's this other side of you that like and again
I don't I will keep saying this like we don't really know each other that well
But um, this is now the longest conversation we've ever had
Um, but that other side of it is something that like feels like it you fit in really nicely
I appreciate that. I would love to do more of it. I really just I want to do
Honestly, I'm just getting clips so that when you and I make a fucking killer movie
They go back to this and they're like remember this moment where they barely knew each other now. They own an island together
With a racetrack on it
Yeah, yeah, yeah
Excepting our uh independent spirit award. Yeah. Yeah. I mean I just like I think I just I want to do
A bunch of stuff I want to do and I think I can do a lot of stuff and I just want to
Like I said, I want to do whatever I can to
Give people confidence
In the idea of giving me an opportunity to do stuff. I want to do you know what I mean
Yeah, I um, it's funny because when I left him again
I think a lot of people thought I retired because like I bought a farm
Yeah, which I had nothing to do with any of that. Well, it's like that's the yeah
Yeah, you bought the farm. It's usually mean to die
But like but the idea that like yeah, you're done like you're out the pasture kind of thing
um
The reason I bought the farm very quickly is because
In the couple years before ken passed he bought the ranch
He fucking loved the ranch to the point that I hated the ranch because we'd have these really important meetings
And he'd be like yeah, so anyway, look at these blueprints for the ranch. Look at this for the ranch
I got this design for the ranch and I'm like, dude, we have to have a serious conversation all you talk about is the ranch
but when he passed
There was this like ran there was a solace and like man
He really was enjoying life in the last couple years
I can't say he always was but he was and I know it looked like he was from the outside
But he was racing cars and doing all this stuff
But like he really seemed like at home
With his family on the ranch like doing cool ranch stuff like chopping wood
These things that were like not part of his public life
Right, he was just enjoying that time and I had always wanted something similar for myself
And I was like
Fuck it. I'm gonna buy a farm and I like over leveraged myself and like bought this property like did not
I did none of my homework, but I just was like I could die tomorrow
Like I'm gonna go get this place and then like I really
I still really love it
But like in those that first year I was just there all the time and I was it was like therapy for me
To be out of a city to be away from everything to like have quiet to like turn my cell phone off like all these things that
Um that were happening because I went in this like massive and I don't take the super dark turn at the end
But like I went to this massive like
Like just weird state of like what is my life now? I'm going through that right now. This is all over
I was like dealing with like all different things like depression all this stuff
But I was also in this like I fucking hate social media and I'm part of the problem
Right, right like I had read all these books and I was like like from you know, everything from like the jonathan height books to
I
Stolen focus like all these great books and I was like man
I'm part of this like I've created part of this problem for an audience
It's like I thought I created positive content
But still I created this like dopamine distraction instead of like going out and enjoying the world and touching grass
Right, so I was like just going and doing that on my own and trying to like kind of find find my way
Not all of it worked
But I went and really kind of enjoyed going and doing all that but people really thought that like I retired and like
It was over for me. I was I was working at another company
As a chief creative officer, you know for super plastic and doing that whole thing
But I was like, yeah, I was just off to go do something else
But what I realized
Was like, you know, and I don't know if you know this but like the
When hoonigan went bankrupt
I lost most of my money because my money was tied up in that equity
So like I did not do well off the hoonigan deal like it sold for pennies on the dollar for me
Right, so I wish it never sold because it would be in a better off situation if it was still there, but
um
So but even if I had made
Enough money to not even retire, but to take a break
It was very obvious to me that I couldn't take a break that actually one of the biggest issues
I had at super plastic was that like there wasn't enough going on for me
Like I it was like a very nice job
They paid me handsomely
But I was like started my day at 10 and ended it at 4 and there really wasn't much more expectation for me
And that like wasn't enough and I realized and kind of trying to land this plane here
I I think very similar to you. It's like I just want to do a lot of things
Yeah, I want to make shit. I just want to make shit like like magazines books movies
Podcasts, I mean the big joke is like I've launched a podcast and I already have an idea for four other podcasts
They all have me in them
Like it's like I just enjoy that and that was like the thing that I missed
There's two things I really miss from hoonigan
One is I miss like I miss going showing up to work every day and seeing my friends
Like that doesn't happen anymore. Like I wake up and I sometimes just spend the day by myself all day
And like that's just not as much fun. And like a bunch of us are trying to break that by being like, hey
Let's just fucking catch up for lunch. You know, like let's I can totally relate to that. I mean, I work at my house
And like my two friends come over to my house. Yeah, we're in my house right now. Yeah
And it's sort of like
Like just kind of groundhog day sometimes and so
I really want to focus on having goals and I like having goals that seem
Kind of like they need a lot of luck involved in them
so
I know you wanted that like
there's
something I thought when you were directing the two scenes that you directed me in
and thinking back on like it makes sense
Uh
That it contributed to I think like the success of the Jim Connors and just like Hoonigan in a whole as a whole
I think you're like very good
at understanding what the audience is seeing
And like what they're going to be thinking while they're seeing it. And so like just the way that you
Like set up the shop and then like communicated to like the actors as far. All right, so here's what's happening
Here's what you need to do
Like it felt like very old hollywood
Like it felt like in a great way. I was like, all right, great
Like it felt like, you know, like you being like, all right, so like
Hang the rear tire over that right, you know, and it like wasn't in like a disrespectful way like at all
I was just like, hey, this is what we're doing. Here's what you need to do to make that happen. I'm like, all right sick
and
You know, I think it's like the same
Like I watched some like BTS stuff of you guys talking about the latest Jim Connors where you were like
He drove when he drove across the water
It didn't look like water
Like it didn't look like it was deep, right?
So you like sunk the other car and like put the boat in there so that the audience would know that it was deep
And I think that's something
If like you take any advice if you're like some sort of creator watching this this you do I think like
Thinking about what the audience is experiencing in the thing that you're making
Is something that's like really overlooked and I think so I do how interesting and I think like very
Like the most important thing
Like that's the most important thing is like how the audience is
receiving the thing and I think that's something that we think about quite a bit and I think separates us from other people
and like you're very
Very conscious. I think like goat level of like here's what the audience is gonna see
You know
And so I appreciate the reason that like I would want to
Work on a big project with you because I think we like share that like
Okay, but then like
What are they gonna think? You know, it's very fun to like imagine that that's what it is for me. I appreciate that
for me, I think I
It's so second nature for me to just think about it through that lens
I've never even thought that that was not like that was not normal. Yeah, but now I
And coming from the world of magazines
You're constantly thinking what does the audience think of this?
But you like never had immediate feedback like so I'm one of those people who loves the comment well
Because good or bad it helps me sort of understand
Where the audience is at and I'm at a point now where like you could write negative comments
And like I can either take them for real like there's sometimes you're like, man, that's a really good point
But then those times you're like, yeah, you're just the outlier just like the same outlier who says everything you make is great
Right, like there's both sides of that though
Like there's those people in the middle that like really kind of find that and I think that's one of the best
Parts we have in modern day content is that you can get that immediate
critique sometimes bad
But like I think in general that immediate critique is so neat because it allows you to adjust how you make stuff
and like as much as
Previously I said that I hate things about youtube
Like I did really enjoy those analytics because you could sit there and be like well people stopped watching after this
Like what was it about this that wasn't good that I don't think like your average like movie directors get
Like they make a movie
It takes
You know a year for it to come out. Sometimes they're not even involved in the edit
So like what it actually becomes versus what they directed is like two separate things
The script probably wasn't theirs. It was someone else's script
And then the studio gets involved and reworks the whole thing again
And then it goes out to theaters and then they get like professional critique
And like like you can't like professional critique is so different than what the audience thinks
Like what the guy who's reviewing it for a variety is so different than what the audience is
And I think that's like a really unique thing
that
Me you and everyone else who's come up in this weird world that is youtube content like
You can really learn from because I know other youtubers who do not look at comments at all
Like they literally just don't even look at it. I saw you guys posted something other day about like
You guys are in the comments and you're reading them. We do. I have to manage it for sure. Yeah, like
Like I'm an addict and talk about like I
Don't know how I didn't realize this until like this summer, but like I like showed up and I was like guys
This is a terrible job for people who are addicted to like dopamine hits
We'll like work real hard on something for like two weeks
Then we'll put it out and like we'll either be like real happy or like kind of sad for the next four days
And it's just then then we'll like do it again and again and again. So I have to like
I actively manage
Filling my life with other reasons to be happy or sad
I can't imagine being a movie director and making something every two years and then having it fail
Like the greatest thing about daily transmission was well today's episode sucks. We got another one for you tomorrow
Right like I get to fix my mistakes
Imagine working for two years and you put something out and it's like not good
Like that's definitely something I worry about being said like if I could pick the things I want to do like number one thing
Is originally I was saying second unit direct
Action, but I think like I'm just gonna say it like I just want to direct a movie. Like that's the thing
I think you gotta be good. I want to be in it. Let's do it. Yeah, let's make a movie
Yeah, for sure. Should we end on that or you guys? Let's just fucking I know let's fucking make a movie. Make a movie, bro
Thank you everybody
I'm not accepting
Goodbye
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Typically on set I can't wear sunglasses why because I'm often
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But heatwave fix that problem these new photochromics
They adjust from almost clear to a pretty dark tint depending on the sun
Which is great because when I was in australia filming jim kana
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About this episode
James Pumphrey and Scotto dive into their past rivalry, the evolution of their respective automotive content careers, and their shared love for Volkswagen cars. They discuss the unique culture surrounding VWs, the importance of nostalgia in car ownership, and the shift towards appreciating simpler, more colorful vehicles. The conversation touches on filmmaking, the challenges of creating authentic content, and the desire to explore new creative avenues, including potential future projects together. Their camaraderie shines through as they reflect on their experiences in the automotive world.
Bluetooth connectivity
Bring a Trailer
FCP Euro
Freedom Factory
Hill assist
Hoonigan land
JDM
Mk3
RWB
Toyo Open Country AT3
Audi A8
Audi S8
BMW 3 Series
BMW 5 Series
BMW M3
BMW M5
Cadillac Escalade
Dodge Viper
Honda Civic
Honda Ridgeline
Land Rover Discovery
Mercedes-Benz G-Class
Nissan 200 SX
Nissan 240SX
Nissan 350Z
Porsche 911
Toyota RAV4
Toyota Supra
Volkswagen Golf
Volkswagen ID. Buzz
Volkswagen Jetta
Volkswagen Rabbit
Volkswagen Vanagon
Original notes
Today in the studio we’re joined by James Pumphrey! Whether you know him from his days at Donut or his new channel Speeed, there’s more than meets the eye, as Scotto discovers ‘The Real James Pumphrey’. They compare notes on their days as YouTube rivals and tell us what they make of the content world these days, as well as exploring the ethos behind James’ plans with Speeed, and why “Mr. Beast Sucks” ! So kick back and hang with these two VW nerds as they plot their takeover of the movie world. Enjoy!
Partners:
Vyper Industrial
FCP Euro
Heatwave Visual
Toyo Tires
Producer: Nick Rutter @nickrutterarts
Music: SlikSound
Patreon: https://patreon.com/u37266647
https://bio.site/321actionaction
0:00 - Welcome & Introduction
1:05 - The YouTube Rivalry - Hoonigan & Donut
2:50 - Sponsors: Vyper Industrial, Toyo Tires, Heat Wave
16:23 - Searching for Authenticity
23:10 - The Vibe Change at Donut
26:14 - Starting Speeed
39:04 - Why Mr. Beast Sucks
40:18 - Respect All Builds - Bringing Back Bullying?
41:20 - Too Much F**king Noise
42:57 - Sponsor: FCP Euro
44:31 - Hot Takes, are 911s Really Just Nike Dunks?
45:14 - The State of Content and YouTube Today
1:04:01 - Volkswagens and Treffpunks
1:12:07 - Speeed is 100% a Magazine
1:15:31 - First Rides
1:16:35 - Why You Need to Have Cheap Rent
1:17:36 - Youth and the Influence of VW Culture
1:30:11 - Check out the Patreon
1:32:20 - How Many Cars Right Now and Plans
1:42:10 - A Gluttonous Era
1:51:55 - Scratching a 911
1:59:11 - Using all your AAA Tows and BMWs - related?
2:04:52 - How to Misspend an Inheritance
2:07:55 - Concept - Does it Run?
2:08:53 - Making Movies - Drifter
2:18:06 - The True Meaning of the Three Es in Speeed
2:24:22 - The ‘Real’ James Pumphrey
2:27:22 - Why Brian ‘Bought the Farm’
2:33:23 - James’ Advice for Creators
2:36:38 - A Terrible Job for People who are Dopamine Addicts
Very Vehicular
321 Action Action
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