Mr AMG on the BEST AMG’s & How He Makes A Living Driving Them!

Have you still made the right decision doing what you do then?

Starting a channel is actually a really tough job.

Why would I watch this dude instead of going to watch Chris Harris or

Schme or Henry Catchpole or Matt Watts?

Well really, I don't think I would.

Rise, you have driven pretty much every single AMG, BMW M car and German performance vehicle.

So I started off with your typical shit boxes like the first car was a Skoda Fabia.

I pinched myself like the kid watching Chris to this point of being with him

at a press launch for AMG's F1 hypercar.

Does this mean you're paid by AMG to talk well about their product?

I mean, if you were to send those three links to your dad,

who was so unsure about you doing what you do, what does he say to those videos?

He would have been so proud, he would have been.

He never got to see AMG1 happen, but I know he would absolutely love it.

Rise, you have driven pretty much every single AMG, BMW M car and German performance vehicle

on the planet.

But in your own words, who are you and what do you do?

Hey buddy.

Hello.

Welcome. Welcome to my humble abode.

You didn't ask me something before I got here, did you?

Yes, I did. I asked you.

Well, it's more of a statement.

It was to say that you have owned pretty much every single performance German car

that I've ever dreamed of, some of which I've owned myself, been lucky to.

But you are the guy that I come to when I want to see G-Wacken C63's dirty AMG

performance German.

So in your own words, who are you and what do you do?

Okay, I've sent me prepared for this because I watch your podcast and Matt,

Watson, if you're listening, I did prepare for this, even though you didn't.

And the reason for that is I like to look back and yesterday, literally yesterday,

I was looking back at the channel and thinking, who are we?

Like, who am I and what is this channel?

Because a lot of people ask me, what is removed before race?

What the heck does that even mean?

So the way that I've kind of defined this is I think I'm the superpowered car storyteller

that I have these abilities that you won't see anywhere else on YouTube.

But I love to tell stories about cars, whatever their stories might be, whether it's the newest

car, whether it's the history of a brand.

And I also like to say, looking at RBR, that we're probably the smallest car team on YouTube,

producing probably the, if not the biggest, but the best results.

And that's kind of how I've managed to define this.

And that I've literally defined over the last 24 hours bizarrely.

So, yeah, I think that's who we are.

Well, I know you, many know you.

Is that the AMG guy?

Because that has been something that's obviously flowed through your veins like horsepower.

I've seen you with pretty much every performance iteration of a Mercedes product ever.

However, I also have noticed over the past few years, you go into the BMW space more,

suddenly you entered the Porsche space more and started to see a bit more color on the

channel from sat-in-grays and sat-in-blacks most of the time with these other brands that

were joining.

But I still know you as Mr AMG.

So where did your passion for AMGs and German performance vehicles come from?

To answer your first point, I mean, a lot of people, whenever they see me and I'm,

you know, being in the YouTube space, you probably get a lot, you talk to people,

you bump into people and it is always, you're the AMG guy or you do those little effects

type things.

And the reason that it started predominantly with AMG and because people have this certain

perception is where I started from in this channel was from my own cars because starting

a channel like this, starting an entire, a brand of car reviewing is actually a really

tough job to get into those manufacturers to begin with.

So I was like, right, what do I have to hand?

What do I know the most about?

And the answer to that was AMG being an AMG customer.

And I can delve more into that if you want in terms of what the origins were.

But in terms of where the passion came from, it was all family related.

So I've got this, the story I always tell when I talk about our origins.

My grandfather was the first one who came to the UK and our family and kind of set us up.

And he loved cars.

He'd, he got an Opel factory made in Germany and then he went there and he picked it up

and he drove it back and in his later life, my dad would buy him a new C class every year

and he hardly drove it, but he would take such good care of it.

I've got this great photo.

I'll share it with you where he was famous for just getting a little tissue paper

and he would just clean the whole car with it and a glass of water.

And it makes absolutely no sense, but he loved his car.

The longest way to clean a car.

The longest way to clean a car, but there he is, you know, looking at it and admiring it.

I saw that my father was a huge S class man.

He had every single S class.

You know, he'd even look at a BMW and convulse it like, you know,

and even when I started reviewing them, he's like,

Raz, what is this piece of shit in the drive by my dad?

That's actually a good car, man.

He's like, no, no, no, get it out.

But I saw his passion.

I saw my grandfather's passion.

And as a kid, I think it just seeps into you.

So some of my earliest memories with cars was I was obsessed with hubcaps.

I have no idea why.

They loved hubcaps, but forced my dad to pull the hubcap off the murk.

I put it next to the sofa, like something like this.

And I sit there like, hey, look at me.

I'm driving my little Mercedes.

So it was very early on in that sense.

And he dipped in, I dived into like the SLK and the new CLK back then as well,

you know, the twin headlight ones.

So all of these cars very much ingrained into me.

And in fact, the first few cars that I had weren't your typical performance cars.

So I started off with your typical shit boxes,

like my first car was a Skoda Fabia manual that I learned on.

And then I had an A-class.

Do you know they did this semi-automatic A-class?

No.

Yeah, Mercedes did this semi-automatic A-class,

which was, it had gear shifts, but no clutch.

You make it sound like some sort of called automatic weapon of some disguise.

It was absolutely shite, but you could gear shift without the clutch.

Which is kind of cool, maybe.

I don't know, but the first cool car I got was a CLS diesel.

Because back then, diesels were like all the hype.

They had all this talk and they were considered good performance cars.

So very much that idea of a great Mercedes-Benz was already ingrained into me.

And that's kind of where this all started then.

Because I used to love taking photos of my own cars and I'd store them in something like

way back in the day folders on your Windows machine.

Then iPhoto, whoever remembers iPhoto, was such a great app.

And I'd have like, okay, here's my SLK55, here's this, here's that.

And I have all these folders and all my experiences.

Then Instagram came along.

I was like, wow, this is like a really great way for me to catalog my car journey.

Not for anyone else, but just like, I want to be able to look back and say,

I remember I collected that and that's what the first startup was like.

And that's when I ran it in or we went on this road trip.

And as I started doing that and talking about it, it resonated with other AMG owners

and other performance car owners.

And then as it often happens, when you're in this space, people are like,

oh, why don't you like try to do this in a professional way?

People egg you on, don't they?

You're actually quite good at that, which I wasn't.

I was absolutely horrific at the start.

So that's kind of where it began in terms of an origin and then how it flowed into,

I think quite naturally actually, into like doing this as a side hustle at least back then.

So what was your main hustle?

I was an accountant and I ran a insolvency firm.

But, right, this is the story, your brown viewers and your Asian viewers

are going to totally understand this, right?

The moment I was born, I came out.

This is what happens to all Asians.

I don't know the split of that in YouTube studio.

It doesn't categorize.

But they'll be in the comments, you watch.

And the moment a brown or Asian child comes out, the dad will be like,

doctor or this one, he smells like an engineer or he is an accountant.

From the moment you're out, right, that is it.

That's your path.

And you're like, actually, dad, I quite like shout out the slipper comes out

and you had 200 miles an hour like Captain America Shield on your head.

But that was kind of, although my dad was a great friend of mine,

and I was really close to him.

I did have that conversation like, dad, look, I'm so good at art.

And I used to make video games as a kid as well.

So there was this great fighting engine back in the day called Mugen or Mugen

or whatever people used to call it.

Have you pronounced it?

They used to make games for like Dragon Ball Z and these type of animes.

And I'd do the art.

I'd do the coding and I'd do like basically the whole thing with the team that I had back then.

And that was just for fun.

So I was really good at Photoshop.

All back then it was PaintShop Pro and coding and all these other things already.

So I was like, let me leverage that.

And he's like, no, I built this firm, you're going to run it.

Fine.

The money was good.

And for a young person at that time, you know, just coming out of uni,

like actually, you know, it makes financial sense.

And the money was good in it, you know, it was good in terms of, you know,

I'd say a lot of what I've earned to even up till today,

wouldn't be able to match where I was earning then.

But it wasn't satisfying for me.

And I just kind of went along with it as a lot of people do in their jobs

that look, you got to get it done.

It's just part of life.

And then this thing kind of came in as a side hustle,

just something I was enjoying doing.

And then it kind of blew up from there really.

So that's, that's what I originally was doing.

But I think I don't think I was ever really meant for it.

So it was the conversation like we did that then, when you were telling him.

So it didn't, it didn't want to do, didn't want to do that anymore.

Like I said, it was, I mean, he was being an accountant, you know, very logical,

pragmatic, thinking of the future, thinking of what's best and like

he's like, look, it's a gamble you could take if you want to go into design

or, you know, creative work or, you know, branding,

et cetera, that type of thing.

But do you really want to give away, you know,

the Golden Goosey would call it or whatever, you know,

I built this firm with this client list.

And I understood that, but by no means was it,

did I close my mind off to the possibility of doing something else?

Because I knew, you know, creativity or entertainment was kind of

what my forte was, at least in terms of the talents that I had to hand at that time.

So when you decided to take that full time and think,

I'm going to pursue driving my dream AMGs, dream empower cars,

go into amazing experiences across the world,

especially in Germany with these cars and creating content around them.

Did you fully understand how you were going to maximize

the earning potential of that to the maximum?

Like what did the channel look like in terms of size

and your other social profiles back then?

I mean, the one that took off initially was Instagram.

And Instagram was a decent size for what it was back then,

really good engagement.

We don't earn anything from Instagram, right?

The YouTube side was a gamble in the sense that

I had some idea that you could get good earning from it,

you know, based on research, based on some of the people I'd met,

like Shmi, who you've had a number of times, Tim on your podcast,

one of the best guys in the industry in terms of very humble and totally open with

newer people I found.

And even people who could be no benefit to him, if that makes sense.

He's always very kind and courteous.

And Tim gave me a lot of guidance and, you know,

an overview of what this all meant if you went into it.

And if you did it right, what it could translate into.

So that was, like I said, it was a side hustle.

And it took, I think our first year was just me experimenting

with what type of format would we do.

I've left everything on the channel, though.

If anyone wants to go back and see how horrific the initial stuff was,

you're more than welcome to.

We did one thing.

Our first video was called Episode 1.

And it had me and two of my other friends.

And they did not want to be in that video, but they tried their best.

And we tried to do this kind of trio thing and it just didn't work out.

Then you'll see some of my initial videos where I'm presenting and it's just awful.

And I found actually when you're presenting, I don't know if you've found this,

but you always try to imitate someone, even if it's subconsciously.

Like maybe your favorite presenter on a podcast or your favorite, like,

are you trying to, you know, be Chris Harris or Jeremy Clarkson?

Not, you know, on purpose, but just subconsciously you do it.

Instead of just being yourself, which is, which is always the best thing to do, as people say.

So check out those original videos.

If you think that, oh, God, will I be able to ever present or do something like this?

Because you'll see how horrific my presenting was.

Like, was there a particular video then or like experience,

but you've started to feel like you were getting somewhere.

I have this strange outlook when it comes to content.

And I mean, I don't think any of my initial videos,

maybe the first few didn't do incredibly well,

but they were still pretty good because the Instagram following was good and it was loyal, right?

So it wasn't like I was starting off with shockers of two or three K views.

Like everything was 10, in the tens of thousands, right?

So one of our best first videos was, I think, the E63 when it first came out,

that formatic one with the drift mode.

That was one of the first videos that really popped off.

But pretty much every video was good.

It doesn't mean that I was particularly happy with it.

That first year was very much experimenting with different styles

and trying to understand where we were.

And my most, the most important point,

I think if you look for a flash point in terms of the channel,

was the first press invite we got from AMG.

And this was at Bilsterberg.

It was the facelift of the C63S W205.

So like huge.

Like for me, being Mr. AMG at that time, that was the one to be at, right?

And I think it was actually one of their first ever,

because back then manufacturers weren't geared towards dealing with influencers

or as I call myself, like an amateur journalist.

So there was no structure for that.

That event was their first one that they did.

I think they called it blog house for the people who were attending.

Were they kind of catered for it a little bit?

So we went there, drone cameras and like me and Jamie.

There's one other guy on this channel.

Like I said, it's a two man team.

It's me and Jamie Britton who I could do nothing without.

I'm absolutely must name him.

If I can find a compromising photo of him in a minute,

I'll give it to you and you can put it on screen,

make him look like a right idea.

But it was me and Jamie there from day one.

And we took all the equipment we could more than we should have

and really went all out with tracking shots on Bill Stiver,

which is an incredible, it's my favorite track.

And I made this video that I thought was going to be incredible.

And it was really slow.

I was just like, damn.

Like I've made this achievement.

I've gotten into Mercedes press, which took ages, right?

And like I said, I just use my own cars until then,

fake it till you make it type thing.

I kind of stepped back and I was like,

why isn't this working?

Like I'm doing all the right things, I think.

But this is one thing I like doing.

I like to step back and reanalyze,

like I was doing yesterday and say like, where are we?

What are we? Who are we?

And looking at my videos, I was like, why would I watch this dude?

Instead of going to watch Chris Harris or Schme or Henry Catchpole or Matt Watson?

Well, really, I don't think I would.

And if I'm not convinced enough to go and do it,

why should anybody else be?

And it's at that point, I thought, right,

I've got other talents that nobody else has, okay?

I'm really good at art.

I'm starting to understand this presentation thing.

But I don't think I'm making videos that I would want to watch.

So what is it that I want to watch?

And that's when I started to figure out this whole,

we call it the VFX thing.

But really for me, it's about presenting

in the most entertaining manner possible for me.

So when you see all these great reviewers talking about things,

it might be Chris on a track talking about

how spring damper rates have changed in a car or this turbo has changed

or whatever the case may be, that's all cool.

But I never found it fulfilling.

I want to physically, I want to see what's happening, what's changed.

If it's a new turbo, show me.

Because to me, that's quite sexy to see a new piece of machinery, right?

And I know you love cars as well.

You know, to see a car stripped back is just a whole damn, that's cool.

I was awning over this as soon as I got here

because we've got so many new models of cars coming out.

I actually owned a Satin Grey.

I don't think anyone knows this on the channel.

Satin Grey, AMG GT R a couple of years ago.

And hands down, one of my favorite cars I've ever owned.

I go back to it in every conversation I have.

So to see the new version of the AMG GT, essentially,

with the rear seats, essentially, I was pouring it straight away.

It's just what we do as car guys.

That's right.

So it was that type of emotion, like you've displayed that.

I wanted to bring it to two people in a way that it would keep them engaged

because YouTube's all about engagement, right?

I've seen how you do the podcast as well.

You put some cool clips at the start.

You try to get people engaged and wait for those moments to come in the video.

And my idea was, look, I want to have those moments throughout the entire thing.

Like it's got to be from the moment someone goes in,

they know what they're in for,

they know that I'm going to show them every single little thing.

Even if it's a mild facelift, I want to be able to show,

actually, the teams behind this car have done a hell of a lot of work,

even if you can't see it.

But let me show you, because I can show you that in my domain.

So the first video I tried it with, I think,

properly was the Aston Vantage, the new generation one, or its facelifted.

And that did really well.

And at that point, I was happy with the content for the first time, I think.

You know, thinking, this is something that I would watch.

I would watch it repeatedly.

And that's kind of my measuring stick,

that if I'm going to sit there and watch it two or three times,

and I'm happy to do that, I don't care what views it gets,

I don't care what revenue it gets,

I know that I've done the best that I could possibly do,

so I'm happy to watch it.

And hopefully other people are as well.

So that's kind of my yardstick,

and that's kind of where the whole VFX thing comes from.

It's not just the point of a USB that is part of it.

The point is to entertain.

I need to entertain,

and I have this thing that I need to be able to inform people

of the facts in the most efficient way possible.

So guys, if you're enjoying this video,

please do make sure that you are subscribed to Road to Success,

and please do subscribe to Remove Before Race as well.

Well, you've clearly done that to a degree of success,

a very big degree of success,

because do you want to list off for me?

And this is when we can actually collaborate properly.

Yes, I know we've now got YouTube collaborations,

but we're going to do it right outside the van right now.

Do you want to list off some of the vehicles

that you've been able to have as a result

of the YouTube channel on growing, et cetera?

In terms of stuff I've owned myself.

Yeah, stuff you've owned over the years,

maybe the last three, four, five years, maybe three years,

because there's so many vehicles.

I mean, like I said,

a lot of the best cars I had was probably pre-Youtube.

That probably a lot of people haven't even seen.

I had two SLSs, for example.

So when the SLS first came out,

I had one in AMG Lemon Red with porcelain and black interior,

which was just incredible.

Then I went into an Alibim Silver one,

which I don't know if you've seen that color.

It's like a liquid metal.

It's the most incredible car color in the world.

That's what they use in all the concept cars.

That was a black and red interior with that one.

And I've had, I think, 11, 12, 13, C63s.

10 or 11 GTs?

Something crazy.

Because I remember, for me, when you got...

Because I wasn't a massive fan of the AMG GT, the new black series.

When it was released, I thought that it looked a bit bubbly

at the front end with the design.

I thought that it was a bit specific.

The black series position, specifically.

I thought it was a little bit OTT at the back, I wasn't sure.

And then I saw it in the spec that you chose genuinely

I was like, oh yeah.

I think, oh yeah, that's the one.

I actually think that's the only spec that car works in.

I think otherwise, you get a color.

And it contrasts with the bodywork.

Everyone came out with that phrase,

it looks very mansory at the start.

I don't disagree.

I don't think it was the purest AMG design

that they could have done at the time.

And that's partly the reason why I went for the satin black.

In fact, someone at press AMG said to me early on that,

look, go for satin black because you won't look back.

And I trust that person.

I said, okay, fine, I'll do what you're saying.

And she was absolutely right.

But yeah, I don't think that's a particularly good looking car.

If you ask me what the best one out of all the GTs so far,

it has to be the one you had.

I think the GTR was the best looking AMG GT that we've had so far.

Yeah, had a degree of elegance about that car.

But it was so angry as well.

So yes, it was elegant, but it quite obviously had so much muscle to it.

And the design, the great thing about that one

was that it was set apart from all the other Mercedes or AMGs.

None of them had the same bumper or the same exhaust.

You know, just look different, which is great.

I think special cars need to have the kind of their own language,

and that particular one did.

So you talk so passionately about these cars,

and we'll still get back into all the other ones you've owned.

G-wagons, because I don't know.

The bonofas are like G-wagons.

My other half, speedy ED,

this watching will absolutely shoot me because it's like a favourite car.

But does this mean you're paid by AMG to talk well about their product?

I was so glad you asked that.

I was wondering whether you were going to touch on that.

That's one of the most common questions or comments that I get in the videos.

Like, oh, you've been paid by Mercedes to say you like the new GLB.

Now, you'll know this.

That's not how that works, right?

I've not had a single penny from any manufacturer

throughout these eight years of RBR,

because one thing that this channel is based,

the foundation of this channel is that it's independent journalism.

And there's no big corporation behind us with funding,

there's no budget, there's no big team.

It's me, it's Jamie, and it's just my own views.

I script everything.

I edit every single frame that you've ever seen on RBR,

every single piece of VFX.

This is probably not something that I've communicated well enough,

I think, on the channel to say that, actually, I do.

This is one of the questions I get asked the most.

But, oh, you do all the editing.

I'm like, yes, that's why I don't get any sleep.

So that's not how that works.

And I've actually given talks to some of these manufacturers internally

on Teams meetings about where this influencer marketing is going.

And the relationship between manufacturer, PR, influencer,

and I've said to them very clearly that, look,

if you are bringing influencers in on a paid capacity to promote a car,

then you cannot invite them to press events.

For me, that is a big no-no.

Like, they will always have in their mind that financial incentive

to say something good about that car,

so they'll get another 20-30 grand deal to be on screen for five minutes.

I said, you just can't do it.

If you're going to use them, fine.

But then they have to be off the press events.

Because I think independence and having that, you know,

it is really, it's independence.

It's being honest with the audience.

And the audience, I think, that they drive everything.

And I say they power RBR.

All the superpowers I have are powered by them,

because they're so smart and they will see through stuff like that.

And the majority of my viewers know that,

no, there's no money involved in anything like that.

It's just purely whatever car it is.

We all have different opinions, right?

Online and in stores, because your personal best is greater than anything.

Is that because you grew up as a fan of Chris Harris?

Yeah, I think so.

Because I've heard you talk so passionately about the fact that you're

going to lean towards the journalistic side.

Definitely.

Being on the internet rather than the influencer side of being on the internet.

For the last, which is actually a very difficult place to be.

Ten years or so.

I think influencer has kind of been smudged a little bit of how cool it is.

It's kind of like the 53 version of something.

Not the 63 version of something, if you must.

However, I know that I've watched your chat with Chris Harris like five years ago,

and Chris is like an absolute, he was.

And Chris is like an idol of mine, absolutely love it.

But he's always made snide little digs and remarks,

kind of a lot of the influences that I've had on the podcast and the channel as well.

Because it's kind of maybe not fully understood or seen by those guys or

sort of judged with a degree of, oh, it's not journalism.

Correct.

Why do people look at it like that?

What's the need for the kind of sniggering side towards influencers versus kind of journalism?

I mean, I get it.

It's previously, before all of this started, the barriers to entry to this industry were massive,

right?

To get into it, to do something like Chris was doing, you'd have to go through a lot of hurdles

to get into one of these bigger firms with their big budgets and their magazines and

all the relationships they've built to even get into this type of industry.

Now, because of YouTube, because of all the social media networks,

you could have a farm boy somewhere down south in India with a phone,

just filming himself in front of a Toyota Land Cruiser and he could get a million views.

Right?

And if it's interesting, why shouldn't he get a million views?

In my view, the cream needs to rise to the top, which I think for the most part in the last few

years of social media, it's been that has been the case.

And I understand also the side of Chris and those traditional journalists that look

where these guys just propped out of nowhere.

Because I have from day one maintained, look, I'm an amateur journalist.

I'm learning as I go along.

But I am a journalist. That's how I see myself.

I'm not an influencer.

That's not, I'm not talking about, I mean, this is called

Remove Before Race, right?

So what is the biggest difference between an influencer and a car journalist?

I'll get to that.

So the reason that this was called Remove Before Race, that's for you, by the way.

Oh, thank you.

And it wasn't called Raz's channel about cars or I'm not vlogging about.

The only thing I ever talk about myself is when I pick a car up.

The reason I do that, A, it's good views, being honest.

And B, people like to see that experience of specking a car, picking it up.

It's part of the emotions to do with owning a car, right?

New car day. Who doesn't love new car day?

It's brilliant.

But apart from that, it's not about Raz.

But I'm not important.

What's important is what's standing over there.

What's under the skin of that.

What, yeah.

The thought process was behind that car.

And I think that's kind of, that's one difference between the influencer

and what I would say, let's call it a new age journalist, right?

The other side of it is actually having an opinion about these things.

And you'll see this a lot now in that the influencers of 2024, 2025, who are coming up,

is the content that these guys are making.

You guys must have seen those videos where they go up to a car and they're like

ladies or this type of thing.

Or the German influencers with their black socks on the steering wheels,

pulling it off and then turning the wheel and then hazard lights on and then closing the boot

and all this honestly rubbish content that goes viral, right?

And I know some of the guys who actually started that content and they do it beautifully.

And they've just been copy pasted because it can be copy pasted.

But you can't copy paste is the opinion of someone who you trust and like.

And I think that is really the biggest difference.

And the sad thing is that a lot of these, the PR in the manufacturers,

they don't have the understanding of that.

They don't understand that, okay, this brain rot video is getting three million views.

Oh, that's great bosses.

Look, it got three million views.

We invited this person.

Yes, that's great.

Can we see the demographics?

Oh, 90% in countries that have got absolutely nothing to do with you selling cars.

Well, what you're saying is you could get 80 to 130,000 views on a video,

but in the comments you'll have like, oh, I've just ordered a new M3 CSL kind of thing.

It's a very specific demographic like RBR, particularly our biggest markets.

We are USA, Europe, South Africa, Australia, Middle East and our ages are between 20 to 60

and 95% male, I would say, a bit of a sad point.

I thought I had a bit more game than that.

But that is the car buying demographic, right?

And you'll see that throughout, like you said, the comments that people have either

decided to buy something or decided not to buy something, which is equally as important.

And they are that the market that the manufacturer is desperately trying to reach as well,

but you won't get that with the influencers, the actual influencers,

because they don't have an opinion about everything.

Even if they are talking and walking around a car, everything's great.

Look, it's got pink ambient lighting and look at this leather and how cool are the wheels?

And yeah, but it's got to force in the ship part engine instead of a V8.

What about that?

Which we're going to get onto because that was part of the AMG story of the last few years as well.

And it's really just going through a massive transformation, thankfully now in the right

direction. So that's a good topic to...

But while we're on the current topic, how hard is it to...

You mentioned kind of how amazing it was and you kind of threw everything at the experience

of your first ever press drive with AMG, which must have been epic for an AMG file.

It was incredible.

If you need to say something negative because you sit on the side of...

Oh, real, to be fair, honest, because you sit on the side of the journalistic,

rather than the paid to be their approach, how spooky is it?

Like, do you fully understand that relationship to be like,

if I say this, I may never get an invite to come back again?

Like, how good's that relationship?

It depends on the manufacturer.

It depends, honestly speaking, how much power you have with the audience, with that manufacturer.

And regardless of that, I've always tried to be as honest as possible.

If there's things I don't like in a fresh relationship,

let's say we've started a fresh relationship with someone, right?

I recently did Toyota Land Cruiser, my first Toyota on the channel,

which I'm super excited to talk about because they got such a great history.

Yeah, it's an iconic car as well.

It is, especially around the world because what Land Cruiser means in the UK is not what

it means in the Middle East or Southeast Asia where it's like an icon.

So you guys are going to love that.

But there's a few things I didn't like about that car, right?

Apart from the stuff I did love.

Instead of just saying, well, that is absolutely crap.

You kind of say, I don't like that.

If it was like this, it could be better.

But you have to say it.

How can you not say it?

Like with Mercedes, let's look at where Mercedes have been in the last few years,

with their EQ series of cars, which was their first tri-electric.

They're the most ugly cars ever designed in the history of the world, I think.

They're just absolute shit.

And I saw a quote by Gordon Wagner the other day talking about the EQS saying,

oh, it was beyond its time and you weren't ready for it,

which I thought was a little patronizing.

And I've met Gordon many times and this goes directly to your question.

How does that affect things?

I don't think it does, because I think there needs to be that honesty

so that the other side can improve.

You'd say it's in a bar.

I would say it's into his face.

And I've said it to other designers at AMG and Mercedes very clearly that, look,

that is just an egg with some lines painted on it.

And that is not a Mercedes.

Look at your back catalog.

Look at the Pullman.

Look at the 500, you know, SEL.

There's so much, they have the widest heritage of any manufacturer.

How do you end up making something that looked like it came out of a...

Because we had the years you owned for, I think it was seven years, right?

The iconic AMG GT Black Series, one of the C63 Black Series,

which is one of the coolest flipping cars known to mankind enough.

And that, the kind of base models of those, the C63,

you talk about the Asian community at the start on this podcast,

they're going to be very happy about this.

But they are the most kind of obtainable, widely known C63.

And look how they torpedoed that, right?

But if someone hadn't said to them,

that, look, you've torpedoed your...

That was their best-selling car, the C63.

But by a long margin, that alongside...

Let's not count the A45s and the A35s, which are very, very attainable.

And, you know, again, the Luton crowd, you know,

all those cars are there with their RS3s and stuff.

But they torpedoed it.

And what happened?

Thankfully, most people, other than clearly a few people who got paid,

there was this famous video.

Who's that guy, John Kramer or something?

The German?

I can't remember his name.

He did this video with AMG and everyone was like,

why are you saying it's great?

It's like, clearly everybody hates it.

But most people were like, nah, this is not it, man.

Like, you screwed this up.

And even in my first drive of it, at the end,

I pulled the badges off the car, BFX, and like walk off and say, look.

So was that W204 or was that the next one?

For the one you're on about, the one that was no good.

The four-cylinder one.

Yeah, because that's the one before that, which was 206,

which I think is what I add.

No, you had the four-litre V8.

You had the two-of-five.

Two-of-five.

The latest four-litre turbo V8.

Yeah.

I mean, that was a fantastic car.

I loved that.

And still, I think today, the car market's changing a bit now.

I think people are looking back to that era of cars, to buy things.

I think still today is such a great bargain of a car.

But that 206 car was awful.

And it goes back to your point of, you know, how honest should you be?

And I think you really have to be super honest.

It hasn't always worked in my favor.

So I did a video with Porsche GB on the Taycan.

And it was a longer term test on that car,

but it was around about the time where the electric car market just nosedived, right?

So I did a thumbnail of cash flying everywhere and the Taycan market has crashed.

So my first few minutes of that video was, but things are bad out there.

And the Taycan has taken a big hit despite being the best electric car for us

in terms of values and residual values.

And the rest of the video was actually a bloody good bargain to get at the moment

because it's such a flipping good car.

And here's a road trip to Scotland that proves it.

But I don't think they were very happy about that.

I heard down the grapevine that they didn't like the thumbnail

or, you know, whatever the case may be.

And sometimes I still think it's worth it.

Like you have to be, I love the PR teams and I value my relationships with them.

But I value my relationships with the audience.

And I'm not bullshitting you more than that because if you don't have that honesty

and that credibility of, I know this is not good for you, but I'm going to tell you it is,

I couldn't sleep at night.

But I need to tell you if I think this is a black hole and your money's going to disappear

or this car's really bad and you're not going to enjoy it.

Many of you might not know this, but away from the recordings that I do in my van studios,

I've actually got a digital marketing agency now.

We specialize in a lot of automotive clients, but we cover everything really.

Our team is made up of PPC specialists, SEO specialists,

and the most talented designers I've ever seen, which have done work like the Starnagloss website,

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We've actually just built icon box for the auto Alex crew as well,

meaning that people that watch their channel can buy their favorite merch seamlessly and in style.

So if you're interested in starting a project and you'd love to speak to us,

just tap the link below and let's hop on a call.

See over the last six months to a year,

I thought it would have been extremely hard to kind of tell the audience there's any good

in anything, to be honest, because engine sizes are getting smaller, cars are getting quieter.

Like all the things that a petrolhead would love have seemingly been

being stripped back and taken away from us.

And I maintain that for me, my favorite generation of cars are between 2000, 2018, 2019, maybe 2020.

Like those 20 years, we just had, we're just incredible.

The Pico cars.

Incredible. And you even include in cars in there as early classics now,

you know, like the 360 CS and there's so many cars that kind of fill that portfolio,

but it's so good.

But I feel like there's been a little few glimmers of hope recently,

because I saw on your Instagram profile, AMG, we mentioned they brought in the four-pot engine

and everybody was just like, well, why the hell would you buy one?

And when I saw it, I was just like, well, you just, you just wouldn't.

You'd go on car gurus or a trader or something can go and find the V8 previous,

you know, because why would you buy that car?

But there's some glimmers of hope now, right?

Aren't they going back to V8?

Well, AMG, so the CEO of Mercedes-Benz, which is Olacol and AC today,

they had this investors press conference loss.

The CEO last year, I've lost track of time.

And he mentioned that AMG have now created a new, a flat plane crank V8, which is

my understanding is somewhat based on the four-liter V8 that we had previously.

So in the car that you had, but now with a flat plane crank rather than a cross plane.

So that's similar to the GT Black series.

There's some downsides to that, of course, because cross plane never,

flat plane never sounds as good as a cross plane.

It doesn't have that deep bubble, but it's still a V8.

And what he said is it's going to be coming into

current vehicles, it's going to be filling some gaps within the portfolio

and into new vehicles as well.

And then that engine will be Euro 7 compliant.

So you can expect, you know, another decade plus depending on market, the market,

that engine will be available.

So I mean, this is, it's great news for AMG fans,

but it's been a long few years of pain for us to get there.

Because it's not just AMG that's been through turbulent times.

You've obviously owned and got into a lot of BMWs.

And when BMW came out with their new design language,

I thought they had literally lost the plot.

Like I saw that initial M3, I was like,

not on board, don't like it, absolutely disgraceful.

Like that is awful, but it's so strange how

it's kind of grown on me now to the point that I do actually really like them.

To be fair, I was one of the first people to film it.

And I really liked it.

And I said that day one.

And I was talking to someone from outside of the brand.

I'd only owned a couple of M cars up to that point.

So I didn't really feel that I was, you know,

part of the Gen M community as they call it now.

But I liked it because I thought it made a statement.

And a lot of BMWs now do make a statement.

And I think you're right.

When you look at the comments now, even people joke about it.

And you must read the BMW comments section for some of this stuff.

They're like, I saw it went, you know,

these people who fixed the M3 and M4 front-end aftermarket tuners, right?

Read those comments.

It's really fascinating because you'll have people saying,

actually, we quite like the normal one now.

I don't think we need this anymore.

And I can't believe I'm saying this all these years later.

So it's interesting.

Sometimes designers are ahead of the curve.

And sometimes these risks, you know, they do pay off.

Well, your most popular video on the channel was a concept car.

Never could have predicted that.

Years ago.

And I just remember watching like Supercar Blondie blow up with her concept car videos

she used to do on Facebook, especially.

But that really was something incredible.

Did that not make you want to get into the concept car thing more and more and more and more and more?

Do you want to explain a little bit about that?

Because I want to see the concept cars of today.

I don't really think that I get to see them as much because that was nuts back then.

What are they doing now?

I mean, we've done some things.

But the unique thing about the Avatar concept was it was drivable,

which I think I think that's what pulled people in.

If it was just a static concept, it probably would have been quite boring.

But the fact that they had it at that airfield and we were able to drive it

and it had that cool hand lever, hand lever, etc.

You know, I think that pulled people in.

But YouTube is a tough master in that sense.

Like you never know what's really going to work.

And I personally don't unless it's something of that ilk where it's a movable functional

piece of work, I don't think it would do that well on RBR.

Because again, our audience, like I keep saying, they're very intelligent

and they are interested in things that are relevant in terms of,

okay, this is something that's going to produce something later on.

Or be relevant to me in the short term.

Or be something, an exciting new development in the car world.

I don't think they're that interested in the viral aspect.

I think a lot of those views were just, you know, the viral views.

I don't think it was our normal demographic.

I'm not chasing the views.

Honestly, I'm not.

You know, I want to reach the people who are going to love these cars and buy these cars

and have all papers of these cars.

That's who I want.

Now that was one hell of an experience with a Mercedes product.

But you have actually driven AMG1.

That's the best thing I've ever driven.

The best thing I've, I mean, it was weird in the sense of a very awkward gearbox.

And it's scary turning it on and turning off because something could go wrong

and then you hear all the stories about.

Do they break a lot like now, the ones that are out there?

That's a good question.

I've heard a couple of instances, but not as much as I thought I would hear.

Because that was one of those cars that I remember the story of the Lexus LFA

and how it took like years to develop and then they just ripped it all up and then redid it again.

And I feel like that was kind of the same for project one, right?

It was a really tough time, I think, for the development team because when that,

I think it was Frankfurt, was it 2016 or 2017 when they first showed it?

I can't remember.

I was there in a very unofficial capacity trying to get into this industry at the time.

And they brought it out on stage.

I think Lewis Hamilton was there.

And you think of that time when the regulations were being changed in the industry.

That was the time.

It was all about downsizing.

It was all about emissions.

It was all about noise regulation.

And there are AMG trying to bring a literal F1 engine onto the road.

And for them, it was like 10 steps forward, 20 steps back.

Because every six months the EU would change the regulations.

So like, what do you plan for?

What do you develop for?

That is actually going to...

There was a time where it just wasn't going to be shipped as a road product.

You know, it would have just been a...

I think that happened in the US even till the end.

Like, I don't think you can drive it on the road in the US, I think.

At least that's what some owners have told me.

But it might have just been a nice mantle piece for someone.

Luckily, they did manage to get through that.

And it's amazing that they did considering what that engine is.

But I tell you, as an experience, there's nothing like it.

Even the EV mode, if you watch that video again,

there's so much mechanical sound coming from the motors.

Because everything is stripped back.

That is just so exciting.

And then as soon as you get the engine on, I could barely hear myself talk.

I thought nothing was going to come through the microphone in that thing.

So let's pick that as an experience.

Let's imagine it here that it's playing as a video.

And you also got to drive with Nico Rosberg.

Yeah.

You also got to drive with Valtteri Bottas to the F1 fans watching.

If you were to send those three links to your dad,

who was so unsure about you doing what you do,

what does he say to those videos?

He would have been so proud.

He would have been.

I mean, particularly, I think, I mean, he was already proud when he saw Nico.

And to be fair, while he was around, he was,

if no one else watched my videos,

I would see him in the evening sitting there in front of the TV watching it.

And that always meant the world to me.

He never got to see AMG1 happen.

But I know he would absolutely love it,

particularly because on that particular drive,

there was just me, there was Matt Watson,

and there was Chris Harris there.

And even today, I kind of pinch myself like,

how did I get there?

Like from the kid watching Chris do those

awesome video in the 204 C63 with the spare wheels on,

to this point of being with him at a press launch for AMG's F1 hypercar.

I still can't believe it's sitting here today that that happened.

And I'm just so grateful that it's transpired.

Do you think you mentioned at the start

that you had to find a way of being different

when you started your channel?

Otherwise, things like that, clearly,

if we look at your road to success, wouldn't be a reality.

It's part of the reason why I decided to do these podcasts in a van.

But do you think that you're that single defining factor of the start of,

I'm going to bring in editing that nobody else has,

and I'm going to bring in a format that nobody else has.

Do you think without that, you wouldn't have been sat on that track?

I think so. I think that's a fair point.

I think the other side of it is,

I don't think the car ownership matters either.

Because a lot of, I have had a lot of stick

for getting rid of all my cars recently.

It's something we discussed off camera.

And I've now, I've just got the GT55.

Which I'm still annoyed about,

because we could have laid them out all day.

I'm so sorry.

And I've got that, and I've got the E53,

and I get a lot of abuse about how come Mr. AMG got rid of all these cars,

and you got rid of the C black, and the GT black, and et cetera, et cetera.

But for me, the ownership doesn't define that title of Mr. AMG,

nor does it define the channel.

It's really the mindset, and the passion,

and how emotional I get over these vehicles,

whether it's an AMG, whether it's a Porsche,

whether it's a BMW car, an Audi car, whatever it is.

I think that kind of defines me.

That with then the VFX.

It's undoubted that that had a massive effect.

But it's also been a real slog.

I think if I didn't have that element,

it would have been near impossible for me to break through the PR barriers.

Even today, I struggle.

I struggle even getting some PR teams to even respond to an email,

which to me is incredible, because I think where the channel is now,

and I'm not being bigheaded about it, but it's a good checklist.

It gets consistently good views.

We put out the best quality that we possibly can, and I think it's informative.

But some PR teams are such dinosaurs that they won't even respond.

And I do sometimes wonder, and I'm being completely honest about this,

if I wasn't a brown guy doing the same thing,

would the channel be even bigger than it is?

I don't want to be that guy, but I've had instances and things where I'm just like,

this is a very one-dimensional demographic we have on this press trip today.

And that's a real shame.

And it's something actually I've worked with Porsche GB a couple of years ago

on an event called We Drive where we brought in as many people as we could

who were from other demographics to try and be journalists and come in the industry

and we sort of taught them and showed them how to film.

Because you go to a lot of these press events and it's just a bunch of old white guys,

which is a real shame, because I think-

Do you see that landscape changed on Instagram?

On Instagram, yes, but what about the serious stuff?

I don't see it changing there, not really.

I mean, there's- I could- I can't name anyone else, really.

There's a few people I know who write for a few magazines here and there,

but where is the diversity at these events where someone with a slightly different outlook

can then present to a completely different demographic of people?

I guess Rory Reid would have been the first big step in that going on Top Gear, etc.

I think so, I think so.

I mean, Rory's a good example, but he's one of the very few, isn't he?

I mean, who else is there?

I can't think of anyone, really.

Which is a shame, because we've got other things that we can talk about and bring to the table

that would attract other people to come and buy these cars and appreciate these things.

Or actually, I understand that because I know that the Land Cruiser in Pakistan is worth more

than an S-Class because people have that perception, you know?

Or there's so many nuances to car ownership across demographics that you can't just get from,

you know, the classical, I call it the dinosaur way of looking at things.

Well, there is a lot of different demographics, which is why I always knew that there would

probably be other things other than AMGs showing themselves on your channel as well.

But do you love M cars in the same way that you love AMG product?

I do.

Do you?

That's a surprise.

Yeah, I have a lot of time for BMW and I think, particularly in the recent times,

they and BMW have shown a real understanding of how to deal with this changing market,

because they're the few who had that two-pronged approach of, okay, we're going to do the electric

stuff, but in tandem, let's do our normal stuff as well, because who knows where things are going

to go. And that's cater for everybody. A good example of that is the 7-Series, where you have

the normal 7-Series with all its hybrid and petrol versions, and then you have the i7,

which looks identical. So you choose which one that you want. Similarly, now we're going into

the new M3, which is going to be in that new-class design. I don't know if you've seen the spy shots

like no kidney grille and very wide body and totally different looking thing, right? With

that vehicle, again, they're going to have kind of similar looking ICE one to the EV one,

and they've done that consistently. And not only have they done that consistently,

the M cars that they make, everyone has been better than the other one. I mean,

you look at the M3 and the M4, incredible cars. You look at the new M2, absolutely unbelievable.

Then you look at the CS versions of those cars, like we had one, literally a couple of feet off

the front of the van on the way here. We had an M2 CS, it was being delivered somewhere on a lorry.

And literally, its doctail was down by the windscreen of our van at the angle we went around

about. Yeah, no way. It's very cool. What color is it? Blue. That new blue? Blue, gold wheels,

rock calipers. Yeah, it was a thing. Wow. But who else is making these cars? Audi sport just about

dipping into that, and I think they're going to start making more special things as well.

But AMG haven't. Look at what AMG done in the last few years. We had an E63 that was such an

incredible car for those eight years. If we're honest, it pushed the M5 to go for the whole

rear wheel drive system because they delayed that car at that time to kind of get it in.

And then it's really set the bar for everything to come in that generation in terms of, well,

you can have switchable four wheel drive to rear wheel drive. But they never made

like an M5 CS version of that car. They were just like, oh, fine. Here's a final edition with some

paint on it. But BMW don't do that. They go to the crazy extremes. Look at that homage car they

made based on the M4. Which is a shame because I remember one of my first SLS videos I ever watched

and you mentioned that you owned two SLSs. At one point when I watched a video with two SLSs,

which was the original Top Gear video, which was the normal SLS versus the

green electric SLS. And this was like 11 years ago. And they were actually very similar looking

cars other than the crazy green acid paint. So it's shocking to see that kind of Mercedes went

a completely different way with their kind of electric car design. Yeah, I think it was

like a bit of arrogance there as well. But we see, and I wanted to come on to this car because I

wanted to talk G-Wagon as well on this podcast because I'd say that probably out of all the

electric cars that do, G-Wagon electric to G-Wagon full fat V8, I'm going to drain your bank balance.

They're quite similar looking things. They are. And I've been unapologetic about the fact that I

love the electric G-Wagon. Now I hated the G-Wagon to begin with. I say I love the look of it, but

when I drove it when I was younger, I was like, what is this thing? It's like high and uncomfortable

and the steering is shit. And who drives this just by like a X5M or something, right?

But as I've got an older, I've kind of understood actually, it's nice to have a sofa seat in the

car. It's nice to sit a bit higher. Nice to have some massaging seats. And then the recent ones

have gotten so much better in terms of the steering and the 463 generation. And then now the semi-active

in the new facelift that I'm like, actually, I really want one. And I'm planning, I'm gonna,

I'm going to get one on the drive. Because you've had G-Wagons, right? I've had, quote,

if you have had under three or four, something like that. To many people, a G-Wagon is a men's

Louis Vuitton bag that comes around London. It's kind of developed that fashionable status

height concept thing. So is it more than that? Because I think everybody has this degree of,

oh, it's useless, but like, ever you need one if you go to London. The G-Wagon is such a,

such an iconic thing that didn't, shouldn't exist today, really. If that model went through

the progression that every other car model goes through normally, it would be some kind of bubble

looking standard SUV today. The fact that Mercedes kept that design, and have just built upon it,

and now they're making the baby G, for example, which I'm super excited about, is just incredible

because that car should not exist. And I absolutely, I adore it. And the electric one,

the great thing about it is, A, it keeps the iconic look, which is so important. It didn't have,

you know, a complete redesign or some silly other egg shape. But B, when you drive it,

it's actually a better off-roader than the standard one, because they engineered it that way.

And they've added this, this G Raw sound within it, which I personally love. I know the topic of

electric cars have. I'm on the no-fence today. You're on the no-fence. That's interesting. I don't

know why they just don't develop their own sounds and we get on board with it, which a lot of them,

some of them do. I've driven some electric cars with them. Why not both? Why not both? So I experienced

the car recently, right? I don't know if you've seen this video. If you haven't, go on the channel

and check it out. I think I have. It's the GT four-door, future one. There was a great spot recently

of George Russell and Brad Pitt, which was at Vegas, and he's drifting this car as the Hotel

Valley. And that was that car. So in this video, essentially, AMG in this car have created a system

that's not dissimilar to, you know, in the Ionic 5N, in the Hyundai, where they have gear shifting

pedals and then they simulate the V8. And that was just the best experience I've ever had in

an electric car. But yeah, this is the problem with it. Go on. Imagine you're on a date. Yeah.

And you turn and you used to have a C63 black series, 6.2, 6.3 liter V8 thunderous. Yeah.

And you didn't even have to say anything. Two down changes. Yeah. Squeeze up the M40.

Yeah, that's it. You get a smile. Yeah. Now, just imagine you're in that car,

but it's electric. And you say, do you want to hear my synthetic car noise? It's really good.

Look, I promise it sounds like the real thing. I promise you, though, is that not the problem?

If your date doesn't smile at the end of that experience, get a new date.

I couldn't stop smiling. And I'm the harshest critic of Mercedes when it comes to electric cars.

But that experience, what they'd done was they'd perfectly replicated the NVH of the V8

within that vehicle. So it was things like dashboard vibration, seat vibration,

the little pops and bangs, the fact that the power would build depending on which gear you're in,

the fact that if you hit the limiter, it would start bouncing off the limiter.

It wasn't just sound. The way I've described it to people since then is imagine you have,

it's almost like the ultimate car video game that you've downloaded the 4-liter V8 into your car,

and it's going to replicate the GT63 4-door today. Fine. Cool. What if tomorrow you download the SLS

version? Suddenly, the gears mimic exactly what the SLS used to do. Suddenly, the sound

mimics that. Suddenly, the suspension, which modern suspension is so clever, mimics exactly

what that car used to do. The rear axle mimics what that car used to do. What if they go down

that route? What if you could have a C Black Series download on your electric GT 4-door that,

you know, for the purposes of driving, let's be clear, for the purposes of driving experience,

is exactly or as close as you can get to that car in that wheelbase. For me, that is super exciting.

Now, you don't have to use it. Fine. Keep in normal electric sound, which they do offer in

their current EVs. No, that's quite cool. But I think the horizon on that is so vast,

if we're open-minded to it, that it could, you know, it could be super exciting. But do you think

we need to be as open-minded about it? Because obviously, you've had some amazing Porsches and

bringing up again the fact that you've sold some of them because your GT3 Touring was just.

I miss my GT3 Touring. Delicious. What a car. I miss it. I've got a Turbo S coming,

so that's putting a barn on it. I've got a Turbo S coming. See, but Porsche are probably the most

active in promoting that they're developing this whole synthetic fuel. Well, they're pushing

synthetic fuels. Yes, so much. Do you think they've played the right card? Is that where we're going

to go? It's a tough one with synthetic fuels because it's so expensive at the moment,

the fuel itself. I think it's a great technology. I think it's going to come down to economies of

scale. But I see a world where, I mean, my daily, the E53, which is a plug-in hybrid,

and my car previous to that as our daily family car was a GLC plug-in hybrid. And

that had 70 miles of a pure electric range, which may not sound a lot, but depending on your usage,

I mean, 77% electric I used over 14,000 miles, which is huge. I would never go back to a standard

ICE car for a daily. It's not happening. I don't care if it's synthetic fuel. I don't care if it's

a VA or a V12 for a daily car. Plug-in hybrid, very happy with it. And I love my Taycan as well.

I think there's certain scenarios where those cars are simply better than ICE cars at doing

a particular job. I also think in terms of luxury cars, when you look at things like Rolls-Royce,

Myback, S-Class, if the range can be brought up to where it needs to be, those cars would be better

as EVs than they ever could be as ICE cars, I think. Because the point of an electric car,

or sorry, the point of a luxury car is to be as coseting, as quiet as possible, but then

not to annoy the passenger by having to charge up. That's the problem with the current ones.

So, I don't see a world where there's just one. I see a world where there has to be two,

because we're very insular, I think, in the West, where we only look at our own problems.

So, we look at our UK charging infrastructure, and we're like, yeah, it's okay. It's not great,

but we can manage. And you look at Europe, and they've got a brilliant charging structure,

and they can go all around Europe and travel easily. And for them, coming here is shocking.

But you go to the second world or the third world, they're never catching up.

Very true, I've been to India.

But what are they going to do? It's just not going to happen. There's too many people.

They live in conditions where there's no chance that you're going to be able to charge.

And the amount that these cars cost today, new car prices, are insane.

I mean, this, I couldn't afford it for two years.

This is a great point. I would actually want to get on to this.

We need to get on to that, because the car market is absolutely mental.

But just to finish that point, I see a two-prong, it has to be a two-prong approach,

where we have cars like this on the driveway, but then your daily car, I think, as an EV,

Porsche is a very good example. Yes, they're looking into that. I don't know if you know,

you know the new Cayenne Electric?

Yeah, they've got the V8 sound in there.

I know that. I did not know that.

So they haven't communicated that brilliantly.

But I know a few journalists who had the code drives, as they do,

you know the pre-production drives, and they had the V8 sounds within there.

So there's no gear shifting at the moment.

But I did read an article recently that said one of the Porsche execs was commenting how the Hyundai

ironic 5N is just brilliant, and they're looking into bringing that.

So even Porsche, who are, let's be honest, they are the yardstick.

Right, for all of this. Even they're saying, well, maybe we should at least offer this.

But I see that two-prong approach, and I think the Cayenne Electric is a good example of that,

where you have that car, but you still have the IC and plug-in store, you know, a good time to come.

Okay, which is a really positive way of looking at it.

But the problem is, so as a YouTuber, I've obviously watched the cars that you bought over the years,

and part of the spike, part of the buzz with your audience was making sure that you had a new car

that was coming out quickly. It's the same as what Shmi's done over the years,

trying to get the new car quickly for the audience.

On it as possible.

But they're now depreciating a rate, and the cost, the starting cost is so high.

Is it possible to still do that easily?

Like, what was this brand new versus its previous iteration of the AMG GT brand new?

It's a good question. Like, I mean, the GT 55 is a more affordable version of a similar format.

But if you look at the first one they came out with, which was the 63,

that has 585 horsepower, so equivalent to kind of your GT-R.

And I think that's like starting price 160, 165, which is wild.

I think that was what they were charging for the GT-R Pro,

which was a limited track-based monster.

How do you justify that? How do you get customers into that car?

I just don't think I don't see enough of these cars around.

No, this is the bit that genuinely baffles me.

But I would just go out and buy an 80 grand AMG GT-R.

Exactly. And it's not just, I'm not singling out Mercedes and AMG, it's everybody.

I mean, you get a decent M3 spec now. What, 90 grand?

90 grand for an M3? That's wild. You could go higher than that.

You go for ultimate packs and all carbon ceramics and all that type of stuff.

How expensive is the M2 CS, the new one? 110 with options.

Yeah. With options. It's over 100 with options.

How do you justify this? It doesn't make any sense to me.

And I see it in every single brand now where the barrier to entry,

but if you had a GT, you're not getting the new GT.

If that was your limit. If you had a C63, or let's not talk about the C63.

If you had an M3 and you're on the new M3, you're not going to be able to afford it.

If you had the old 911, it's just where do you go?

And what I'm finding is YouTube content around these new cars is suffering as well.

So like you said previously, no, he's interested.

No one's interested. So Shmi or whoever, Joe Killies, etc.

We put up the latest video at the embargo date at midnight, etc.

Everybody come on, let's try and get as many views as we can, etc.

No one really cares anymore for the new cars because they're like,

yeah, that's great in theory, but very can't afford it.

Economy shit and finance rates are really bad.

And the starting price is, we know, 20 to 30% inflated.

Give it six months and it'll be back down to where it should be.

Good example is the new SL, which is a car I absolutely love, right?

This GT and the SL, I think are some of the best product that AMG have made in years.

The new SL, similar price when it came out, right? 140, 150.

I don't know how much it is. Something crazy.

Now they're on the market for what, $80, $90?

Which is where they should be.

And you're like, okay, I'll consider that car.

And like I said, like this car, the GT was out for two years before I thought, right,

now the deals are good enough on the Mercedes website,

where they're giving 10K contribution and a better finance rate and et cetera, et cetera,

et cetera. And in fact, they weren't even offering enough options.

That's the other thing that MBUK did read.

That's another, we'll hit that topic another day,

but we're quite constricted as almost like buying an iPhone,

that here's your colors and here's the variant.

So for a premium price, you're getting a constricted package

at prices that are just insane.

So does that make it extremely difficult to do what you do?

It does. And what we are planning for next year now, in fact,

we're going to start a series to do with buying the cars that you mentioned,

that peak era, between 2005 to 2020, where you had these awesome cars.

I want to go back and look at those cars in the way that we do now in my VFX domain.

And give those cars a bit of love, because everyone I talk to are like,

yeah, that car's cool, but actually,

Braz, I was looking at this car, an auto trader.

Well, what do you think, you know, 2015 C63?

I'm like, yeah, good. Well, can you do a video again?

Yeah, probably should.

So I think that's where we're going to pivot a little bit next year,

as well as doing the new stuff.

Like I said, we're here for the audience.

Like we have to cater for what people want to buy.

I don't see people buying new cars.

I think the prices of these things,

that's probably why the Chinese cars are doing so well.

I don't know about you.

I see so many of these jacos on the road and BYDs.

And there's people, to some extent, are price sensitive,

especially in, you know, the economy isn't as great as it could be.

We all know that.

So this is an inevitability.

And the sad thing is, you see these manufacturers, I'll film a video,

and it happens every single time.

And I'll have prices from the website or the press release.

And by the time I edit it, which is say a month down the line,

there'll be a price increase.

So what has been the toughest part of running your channel

and doing what you've done?

The toughest part.

I think the toughest part has been the relationships between us and PR.

Like breaking down, because this was never,

like I said, it's not the Mastray MG channel.

It was never meant to be about one brand.

It was always, what do car buyers want to see?

Well, cater to whatever it is.

I think it can be German, it can be Italian, it can be Chinese.

I really don't care.

I will review absolutely anything and be honest about it.

But I won't take money from anyone.

But the issue has been trying to convince people just to give us cars.

That's the toughest thing.

And like I said, I still struggle with it today.

Even with people who we've built relationships with,

they can be unresponsive.

And you can even have a back catalog of proof to say,

look, we've done so well for you.

Can we come on this event or do this car?

And they just get blanked.

So that that has been the toughest thing for us.

As an independent, no budget, no corporate backing,

grassroots independent journalist channel with just two guys.

The toughest thing is getting access and being taken seriously.

And I feel a little bit sad saying that because we put more effort in now than we ever have.

And I don't think we could put in any more effort.

And we want to do it for the audience,

because if a new car comes out, we want to be there for you and say,

we're giving you the content you want in the style you want it.

But sometimes that might be a year down the line,

because we're just too far down the pecking order.

And that sadly, when it comes to independent people like us,

I think that's something that we're always going to struggle with.

We'll never be able to match the pub culture,

seeker hand shakes, the money that gets thrown behind the scenes with the bigger corporate channels.

Have you still made the right decision doing what you do then?

Was it still the best decision you could have made for your life back then?

I love it. I mean, I don't make it as much money.

If I was doing accountancy or some other business,

I'd own more cars probably. I'd, you know, have a better lifestyle.

But I love these machines so much. I love presenting.

I love bumping into people, just randomly shopping centers,

wherever I am around the world.

I was in Germany and stuck up,

bumped into some engineering guys in McDonald's.

It's like, hey, how's it going?

We talked for like 15 minutes.

I love that aspect, and I would dearly miss that.

And I don't care if I'm earning less,

which YouTube's shocking at the moment, by the way, for, for CPM.

And I don't know if you guys have noticed that,

I mean, obviously there was a drop off since COVID,

but for car market, and I speak to a lot of creators,

it has been pretty shocking.

So yeah, it's, it's, it's tough.

We feel like we're working harder than we ever have for, for less.

I know it's, it's the case for a lot of people in a lot of industries,

but I wouldn't change it for anything.

I, I adore doing this, particularly because for me,

it's such a creative release as well.

I know it can get monotonous for a lot of creators

to do the same thing again and again.

I don't know if you feel that with, with podcasts as well.

But for me, every car is a, it's a new challenge,

because there's something new I can talk about.

There's some new component, or there's some new spin I can do on the VFX,

or maybe I saw some movie where I said, oh, that's cool.

Maybe I'll try and bring that into the next video.

So everyone challenges me.

Everyone keeps, every video keeps me awake and kind of,

how do I put a smile on someone's face on the other side next time?

Well, I think that's a perfect way to round off our conversation.

We'd be going for just over an hour and 10 minutes, believe it or not.

With a little thanks in the background that we've never had in these podcasts too.

So Raz, thank you so much for joining me in the back of my van studio,

talking everything performance car and how you got from where you were

to where you are today with everything in between.

I'm sure we will catch you in the future.

I would love to come.

Thank you for the invite.

And I think the time has flown.

Actually, that was really fun.

We enjoyed that.

I wish you the best as well.

This has been great.

Thank you.

Thank you, man.

Mr AMG on the BEST AMG’s & How He Makes A Living Driving Them!

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