Episode 107: Benny Capaul, Lead Singer of The Boy Detective.

A wise man once said, "ska is the music a 12-year-old hears in his head when Mom says there's pizza bites in the freezer." That’s the energy we’re channeling in this episode.

This week on The Most Millennial Podcast, we sit down with Benny Capaul, frontman of the punk/ska/emo outfit The Boy Detective, to talk about the past, present, and eternal afterlife of the scene that shaped our millennial souls. From sweaty basement shows to the enduring charm of checkerboard Vans, Benny shares what keeps the spirit of punk/ska/hardcore alive—and why it still matters.

Check them out and preorder their album (dropping in November): 

https://linktr.ee/theboydetective

https://punkertonrecords.com/pages/the-boy-detective

Follow us on Instagram @themostmillennialpodcast or email at podcast@mostmillennial.media

Check out our website! themostmillennialpodcast.com

Transcript

0:11

And welcome to the Most Millennial Podcast, a podcast where we talk about the things on our mostly millennial minds because that's who we are, that's what we talk about. And I'm joined here by my skank daddy, Reed. How you doing, my friend? Just skank daddy and around, know how it is Sean. Well, I figure it's appropriate for ah our guest today. Maybe Scott daddy would make a little bit more sense, but. dude, cause I've seen you dance baby, it's skank all day. The stank might be a little... right, well, all right, well. Yeah, ah we are joined by a very special guest tonight. We got Benny with us from the Boy Detective. so, yeah, thank you for joining us. Oh, it's an absolute pleasure. I kind of like Sky Daddy, but I also appreciate a good skink. Because what I am finding out there, not a lot of people actually know how to really do it right. But I'm finding because it's so inclusive, right? It doesn't really matter what you do, as long as you're going out there and you're trying. We love it. So skink away, guys. Just skanked. Awesome. My dancing's more like a funky beatnik. Okay. Not quite a skank, you know? Yeah. It's got more jerk in it. It's a little more jerky. There's some snaps and some jerks. It's not unlike Elaine Bennis. Not bad. So Benny, yeah, welcome to the Most Millennial podcast. One of the things that we usually jump in with is kind of sharing birth year. Do you mind sharing birth year with our listeners? I have no problem with that. Just to give you, was born in 1987. And if I did my math right and also my history right, that was when the animated series of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles came out. And it was a wonderful animated series. It just makes sense I was born there. And I'm a Scorpio. So that gives you two, a Scorpio and a 1987 baby. Another landmark from one of your lyrics is that your dad hadn't slept since 1983. Do you have older brothers? So I have, yes, I actually, that lyric was written specifically from my guitarist named Nick. Born in 1983, so there's another one. But he was talking about specifically when he recalls never seeing his dad ever get a full night's sleep. And his dad told him one time, was ever since you boys, because this poor guy had four boys, like, or three boys. So he comes from a family of three boys. come from a family of four boys. And uh so yeah, like our poor dads had to deal with uh a lot of Ninja Turtle fights, a lot of, you know, lot of he-yars and kicks and cowboys and moo maces and biker mice from Mars. I'm imagining a lot of like Renaissance Festival weapons in the backyard just full on melee. I want to like SWAT cats and street sharks and like those guys too. Street Sharks! Street Sharks are ruled. Battle Toads! Oh man, there's so many good games and so many great animated series. We did, we kind of had it made growing up in the time that we did. I mean, Saturday mornings were the vehicle to just shovel in the new shit. It was so good. wish I could be a kid again. I really do. I think that the matrix may have had it right that 99 was the peak of society, just being a nine year old and having access to all the street sharks and all of like all that stuff. was good. Yeah, exactly. um But yeah, I want to talk a little bit about Disco Lunch, your EP that you're releasing or have released actually by the time we're recording here. When did that one drop? Disco lunch. The actual the the singles or are we talking about the actual album? The album. The album dropped on November 7th. Okay, okay. So Disco Lunch came out on November 7th. had Beth Truss um come out, Goodyear, and then American Farts were the singles that came out. I'll catch ya. Okay. Thank you for clarifying that. wasn't quite sure from the original email, so I'm glad to have it. you're good. You're good. So if it's early, we'll say this on October 10th, American Farts will come out. If it already came out, I hope you enjoy it because it is a banger. then November 7th is when actual Disco Lunch comes out. Now, if it's before this or even after, you can go on punkertonrecords.com and get the album. You can preorder it now before or you can get it after if this episode comes out during or after November 7th. I am definitely going to pre-order. really enjoyed the whole album, but those um American farts. really liked Who Are You, The Shoe Police as well, just being a dad. uh a little bit about Disco Lunch. So this is technically our freshman full-length. We did have an album called Exhibition that came out, but it was technically two EPs put together. Art Theft and Band From The Bathtub were put together for exhibition. Wonderful album, wonderful full-length. You got 14 songs of just banger after banger, but we kind of cheated. um So, for this one, this is our actual first full length. We went out to uh Gainesville, Florida and recorded with Roger Lima from Less Than Jake. It's 10 amazing songs. We decided we were going down there because there was talk about, you need to have, because you know the rules that people talk about? You got to have a certain amount of songs to be a full length or whatever. Yeah. And the boy detective have always never really followed the rules. It's kind of our thing. Isn't that kind of like for your genre, like punk, ska, like. It is. It is. But it's also like, OK, but you also got to think of like from the the business side of like somebody is going to buy an album, right? And they're going to spend money on vinyl, which vinyl is expensive. um They should get their money's worth right at the end of the day. So when we were coming up with this, we decided that, you know what, instead of putting 12 songs that maybe the last two are worth something, maybe not, let's just give them 10 bangers. Let's just give them the. what we have that we know is going to be a wonderful surplus of the Boy Detective, which is everything and anything you've loved. Like I said, since 96 to 2006, we just like put it together in one recipe and then like gave it to you. that's Disco Lunch. Disco Lunch is absolutely, in my opinion, When I want people to think of the Boy Detective, as much as I love Darth Theft, as much as I love Band, as much as I love Dorcus, I feel like this is the full gambit of what the personality of the Boy Detective is. Gotcha. It would be hard to top. I'll put it that way. It'll be hard to see the next stuff we come up with because this is I'm on cloud nine with how good this album came out. The people we met such as like Roger, um the opportunities we're getting from these songs and just the incredible fans. um I'll be honest with you to something I learned so amazingly about the Sky Punk scene specifically. is they are a very tight knit community. Open. They're open to anybody. But what I find with them is they will go over the top for the bands that they like, specifically if you're good people and they like your music. Like that's the cherry on the top, right? So a lot of the um groundwork was done by them. Like a lot of like getting our name out there, getting our songs out there. kind of telling, you should you should go see the boy detective. They're absolutely bonkers in the pit, you know, on stage. And so it's it's this whole thing, which technically started in 2017 as a recording project between Nick and I, my guitarist and I has I would have never imagined it to be here and just still the trajectory that the boy detective are heading. And I can't think people like you two. for letting a numbskull like me come on and talk about millennial ah backgrounds. So thank you. Thank you both. Appreciate it. very well. Thanks for coming, man. And it feels so good to put out work that you feel proud of. And I can just hear like that pride in your voice as you're talking about it. Like this is something close to you that is like, well, we'll get into some of the lyrics, but like a very personal process, it sounds like. But could you describe that a little bit more as far as like some of the topics that you touch on in this album and why that might be a personal growth thing? So what's really neat about this album, I'm going to be completely frank with you too. When it comes to the actual lyric writing, a lot of that is done through Nick. So I'm not going to take credit for a lot of the lyrics. I will say this is the first album where I am a lot more lyrically involved than I've ever been. um Specifically, Good Year is 100 % my song from start to finish. When it comes to lyric wise, uh to be really, which is really neat is I got to go back a little bit in history here. I'm not going to go all the way back to 1987, but I'll go, I'll go back in around like 2009. I met Nick. I was already in bands before I was in a, I was in a a whore punk band called spaghetti zombies for years. Then it became Kapal, which is my brothers and me. I have an older brother, Chris, who was a drummer and then my identical twin. He plays guitar and I played bass and we had a band called Kapal. It's still it's still going on. A family band never really retires, right? It's just time off. And so I while that was going on, I was also forming a side project with Nick um called Carnals at the time. And then Carnals became Come On and then Come On really became the Boy Detective. So if you want to really understand where the boy detective. kind of got a lot of their like influence and stuff. You can go back to come on. Come on was really like the first representation of Nick and I kind of stealing a lot of the nineties, late nineties stuff and incorporating it into our songs. Why I say that is because two or three, three of these songs have been around for a very, very long time. OK, they were never scoffed as I put it. That's I apologize. Both of you. have these things called Benny isms. They're like malaprops, but times a thousand. like, Taurus literally has a file on his phone where he collects them. So he'll listen to this and he'll collect them. Like, there's things that I just never knew. Like, instead of saying scot-free, I'll say scotch-free. Oh, okay. This is like Michael Scott, like almost the right word. And the problem is, I talked so fast, I'm already on another topic. You can't stop me to tell me, I think you said that wrong. think you got away scotch free for sure. Like the tape, right? uh You know what? When my grandmother is scotch free, you don't want to talk to her. But once she is scotched up, she's amazing. That's what you want. Anyway. So anyways, so I have lot of these Benny's and so they come in here, so I apologize. But three of the songs on the album, Beth Truss, Goodyear, and there's another one. Why am I not thinking about it? Oh, American Farts. Those three songs were technically Cardinals and Command songs. they, specifically Beth Truss has been around almost 20 years at this point. ah And it was funny when we were, writing these and putting like starting to come up with a new album. I remember like bugging Nick for years. I'm like, Nick, let's bring out that trust. Like it's a banger. People haven't heard it. And he's like, well, technically it was already recorded. I'm like, yeah, for the four people who actually listened to our stuff before, you know, they're going to be mad that we re released it with better quality. We have horns, which is, I mean, that's the other thing too, is I am surrounded right now. by extremely talented musicians for what they do. All the horns are actually horn majors from Eastern Michigan. that's cool. it really like brings everyone up a notch because now you're playing with like excellent musicians too. Well, Reed, I've never had like people talk like, that's in concert C. I'm like, I don't even know what C is. I just know what sounds good. Is that next to middle C? oh like, it's concert scene. I'm like, my gosh. They could literally be making it up and I would believe every word that they're saying. So it's really neat because they'll be talking in that, it's in the key of blah, blah, blah. And they go off that way. um Basically, what I always tell people is I'm lucky enough to have somebody like Nick Good, my guitarist, know that I'm just a really good salesman. That's what I do. That's what I do. I sell the boy detective. I do that with the way I present myself. I do that with the way that I communicate with my band. I'm their cheerleader. I'm their salesman. I'm there to make sure that they get everything that they need to be able to create something that allows me to be a theater kid that I've always been. And that's kind of that fits with the lead singer persona too, like being out in front and like leading everyone on. So that worked out perfectly. It really did. the one thing that I never I always loved lead singers like the Jay Navarro's of the world or, you know, the Mark and Toms of the world and Billy Joe. Like I remember being younger and watching Billy Joe just do his craft. You know what I mean? And just for an hour, you are entranced by this guy who's been doing it for 20, 30, 40 years at this point. And I would take notes like what are they doing that's that's working? What are they doing that's not working? And I just remember like the big thing that I always loved about certain musicians or athletes are like the ones that actually do take care of their fans. Right. Because that's another thing, too. You get a lot of lead singers that they they do the show and then they're gone. You know. I'm not calling out any lead singers out there if that's your thing. you time to rest. you need maybe there's a lot of mental things going on. Like I know the world. I'm a funeral director, so I understand grief and loss. But I will say that they're the reasons you're there. Like the reasons you are on stage and the reason you're playing in front of audience like that is because of them. And I just being a symbiote. 100 percent. Well, it's like, why would you bite the hand that feeds at the end of the day? Like I'm not saying you have to do everything for your fans, but I think if somebody is willing to, especially you two gentlemen can understand this. If we're willing to take a day off work to get a babysitter if we need it, to make sure that we have time to go to a show, we want to be entertained. And that doesn't, I mean, if you're going and you're playing exactly the same way that you're playing on the album, why do I spend money? to go see that when I could stay at home, put on the record, put on my headphones and just be in trance and that, or watch a live YouTube video at that point. Yeah, I think that the interaction with the crowd too, like working the crowd, it's almost like the crowd is its own instrument too. And when you have a skilled uh lead singer or performer out front who can kind of play the crowd and notice when their energy is dropping and like give them a break or like bring them back up to like the circle pit level, that's like a super skilled performer. It is. And then like I go even a step further. I want them to be a part of it. I want them to feel like they're the extra musician in the band or the extra singer or the extra dancer. So 80 percent of our shows, which is going to eventually probably be a problem for me. I'm not on stage like I am barely on stage. I've gotten in trouble by photographers. I've gotten in trouble by the Um, but my thing is, is like, I remember playing in a lot of pole barns and garages and basement shows, right? The things that millennials would completely understand what we used to do. but you know, the reason I love those was because you were actually in an intimate experience with the band. You were part of them and uh usually there wasn't a stage. So you were already on stage with them. And I just those are the nights I remember more than going to see Link 1A2 with a thousand people. You know what I mean? Yeah, I remember seeing local bands like I'm going to I'm going to name some names here that probably have nothing to do with a lot of people. the people in the know would know the radio pirate DJs of the world and the a la cards in all these like local bands, quit your lives and stuff that would play all these like local things. were free. So it was all ages and you were a part of it. And I remember those are the reasons why I wanted to be in a band. Not because like, I loved music and I love don't get me wrong. I understand when an artist gets so far, they can't do those anymore. Or if they do, they have to do it like the the uh what is it like the uh what's a band that's doing it right now in the in the backyards? The All American Rejects, right? They're like, like literally picking up. I did not know that that would be a dream show for me I heard that. Like, I've got a big fucking yard, man. Come to my- in your application, man, you might be surprised. It may show up. It'll be windy in the winter, but it'll be worth it. But I'm sure they have to like keep it almost a secret until the last second, you know what mean? They can't do what they really, you know, and I'm sure part of that they hate like I'm sure there's part of them that's like, man, I wish I could be back where people didn't know who I was at a grocery store. Right. You know, um I'm starting to slowly notice that I can't go to a punk or scotch show in Detroit without five or six people saying, you're Benny from the Boy Detective or you're in the Boy Detective. um And it's wonderful. Don't get me wrong. I'm not gonna lie and say, I hate that, blah, blah. It's cool. It's neat. Do you ever get called out as your twin or does your twin ever get like, aren't you the lead singer from the boy detective? So, so I have the blonde in my hair. oh My twin does not. And my twin is since we were probably in high school, he's always been bigger than me. Like he's just a bigger guy. He was like the full back and I would try to be the running back and I just couldn't get into like being hit or whatever. So. So don't take offense to this. he's the Arnold Schwarzenegger. You're the Danny DeVito. Perfect. I hope someday if I ever do get to the point where like that pays the bills for a little bit, I would definitely be like, Nick, you're going to be my like bodyguard. Like you're to go out in the crowd with me and make sure nobody stabs me or does something crazy. like, cause here's the problem with what I do. So I realized when you start playing for 600, 700 people, they have the barricades, right? Yeah. Which is a whole different experience. So I have to get over the barricades. And then the worst part is at the end of the set, I got to get back on stage. what people don't realize is those people that stay right at the front and don't want to give up their spots. They won't even let the lead singer back on stage because he's blocking his girlfriend, right? He wants his girlfriend to have that front spot. I'm literally like, dude, I got to get back up on stage. And he's looking at me like, who are you? I'm gonna ring them. You need this exactly you need to like form almost uh like. Exactly the detectives assemble. And they make like a human ladder for me to like climb up. I was thinking more like crowd surfing where they just lift you back up and then put you back up on stage. know what would happen though Sean, would push me to the opposite side of it. No, I'm going the wrong uh way. The bodyguard kicks me out because he doesn't know who I am. No crowd surfing here, mister. Don't you see the eyeliner? I don't belong on sta- like, like, I want and what I do is I find this poor people, I find the people that have their hands in their sweatshirts, their hoodies, and they're in the back of the room just like staring and they're probably just they just want to enjoy, right? They don't want to get in the crowd. They don't want to get sweated on. And all of sudden they start to realize, like, man, somebody's like yelling behind me. I can hear the lead singer. I don't know where he is, but somebody's yelling. And then they realize me like ganking right behind them with in the in. And like, it's always like the girlfriend like thinks it's like the coolest thing ever and starts skank with me and the boyfriend's like, I don't don't know what to do here. Like, I didn't know what a Sky Show was. Like, I only listen to country. So I'm here. So, no, but so like, want everybody in that in that facility to feel like at one point, they're a part of the show and not just. somebody that was in the crowd at the Boy Detective show. I want them to be like, I was in the Boy Detective for a song, you know? I think those are the memories that we make when we go see bands. do you hear it all the time? Like you hear people say like, man, it was so wild. The guy from Our Lady Peace was in the top balcony for one song and that was it. can't imagine if Rain Maida was in the crowd the whole night. Like that would be wild to me. But I've had people that are like, We can't take pictures of you. Where are we supposed to look? Because part of me wants, cause this is the thing, right? This is the sad reality. Everybody wants to watch the lead singer. I have a bevy of musicians that are way more talented than me on stage, but everybody wants to just look at me. So there's also a little part of me that's like, give them a shot. Like they're going crazy up there. They're going crazy. Half my musicians come out in the crowd with me, the other half stay on like, You have something to watch. So you don't have to watch the lead singer all the time. But people are like, well, that's who I want to watch. I want to feel like I'm watching the lead singer. I'm like, that's such a weird situation if you think about it. And it's sad to all the rest of the musicians. Like, I see you, rest of you musicians out there, or at least in your ears. I see you out there. I think that's one of the most punk rock things that you can do is just shirk the uh stereotypes and the conformity of punk rock itself. uh yeah, you've got you've got someone here that hears a problem. got two solutions. First solution. ah Have you ever heard of drones, my friend flying around following you around? Boom. There's a one. There's college kids. That's your job out there college kids. Go ahead. You GoPro right here right in the old punum and then have that projected on a big old screen so while you're like Hopping around and doing your thing people can still see that face Yeah, but here's the problem, then it's still distracting from the rest of the band. That's true. I mean, hey. If you We'll cut to you, the man on the street kind of thing. Like, where's Benny? there he is over there. You know what they really should do? This is what they should do. If you're really that to find out where I am, they should just put a balloon on me, right? the older ladies in stores and stuff, they'll put a balloon on me you see like, okay, there's Benny. Okay, cool. He's having a thing. can move on. But here's the problem. Then we'll have secret detectives put up balloons and then everybody will be confused again. That'll be the whole thing. And I don't know if they'll let drones into, know. part of this is a joke but I don't know if they'll let drones into a lot of the places now especially with like metal detectors and stuff. mean I'm also saying that we're playing all these big venues so I mean I'm also kind of And again, always think oceans 11 anytime that you're these setups. So just think a couple steps ahead. Like obviously they're not going to let you in on the day. So you have to case the joint weeks before and then you have to read. send the blue points to the fans. is... I love this show. You've already played the show, it's- feel like this is your job for the Boy Detective. uh Reed, it looks like this is my last show. It's been real, I see that you're being called elsewhere. I think your talents were wasted on the most millennial podcast. To be honest, I haven't even asked about pay yet. That's an open case that may stay cold. You know what? I'm just happy for the opportunity. That's what college kids are for. uh You mentioned some or alluded to a couple of really cool bands and bands that I listened to in high school and like Blink 182, All American Rejacks, Green Day you mentioned, uh well briefly. uh Who do you think informs the sound that you guys are going for or who do you think are the inspiration for what you guys are working on? So it's really neat. uh This is a very hard question, Reid, because like I alluded to earlier too, we kind of have taken, like we took the special power from a lot of bands and put them all together. ah Absolutely. if you like, perfect example, if you listen to Drakkar, we call it Drakkar, it's a Dexter wearing. I'm sorry, our song titles can be pretty intense right now. oh I saw one of the song titles was I Got Scabies Once So That's Pretty Punk Rock. That's our hit, baby, because we have what's called the cuddle puddle now. I don't know if you've came across this yet. No, it was a puddle. That is our closing song. Every show we've started it. It's stayed that way. And there's an interlude in it. And I am so tired. You gentlemen, I am. I give every you know, those coaches that are like you either give 110 percent or not playing on the team. I'm that 110 percent. But the problem is, so when I get to the end of the show, I'm literally exhausted, like down the wall. So what I would used to do is sing one or two of the last songs on the floor because I'm just I'm literally exhausted. Like I'm trying to find any energy I have. so what happens... uh Helium. Sorry, I interrupted the cuddle puddle. the it with me as like this like cute thing almost like they're just laying on top of solidarity and then fans started to do it so that night it started with like two fans doing it and then we're like hey let's try this out right because that's the other thing too like I said it on a podcast where we're talking about networking and how to stand out. And one thing I always I always tell like young bands is like, do something, even if you think it's goofy, even if you think it's silly, even if you think it's a shtick, like do something that's going to be different from anybody else that's playing that night. Because the thing is, is like, how many times do we go see bands and there's like three or four good bands and like bands that I'd want to listen to again, but I can never remember their name. Right. When I get home. And a lot of times I'm lucky and I'll look at the poster and I'll figure it out later. Like, is it this one or this one? No, this one makes sense. This one's probably the one. But a lot of people don't do that, right? You miss it the next day. You're like, okay, it's gone. It's out of my mind. Obviously, it wasn't that important. But if you do something that's going to specifically make people like, resignate your name to something. like, we for our resignation, right? You're not going to get anything past Reed just to let you know. That's that's a superpower. You could send these to Nick Good and he'd love you for this. uh But you a special... Yeah, like do something that's going to make you stand out. So like for us, we put the Boy Detective, we actually chant the Boy Detective in a couple of our songs. So like regardless of if you didn't hear it the first time, you're going to hear it three or four more times. And what we found was like, vocals, Newfound Glory has perfected it, has absolutely perfected it since the beginning of time. So we have stolen their gang vocals. like we've stolen that chant stuff because that's what people sing. Because it's easy. Specifically if you repeat it a million times. So, Scabies is a perfect example. So in that song, during that interlude after it, we literally chant, we're all fucking doomed and we're wasting our time. We're all fucking doomed and we're wasting our time. We're singing this cute campy song, I'm laying on the ground with a bunch of my fans, and then we all get up and we scream that. And people go bonkers over that song. And so we kept it. And like this has become a thing. There's people who take videos of this cuddle puddle and then they'll send them out. And, you know, these are the things people will remember. They're not, they're not necessarily going to remember if you put your guitar behind your head and do a solo anymore. They're not going to remember you if you do that cool, like the first person that did the cool bass over the shoulders thing. You know what mean? Like do something new, do something different, stand out. So going back to your question, because I didn't answer your question. We have like the intro to Jakar has the Saves the Day from their first album. They literally open their open their album with that same kind of thing. It's different notes, but it's the same. We literally have stolen from Fall Out Boy, Good Charlotte, Blink-22, Alkaline Trio. uh But there's also like Nick and I are very emo kids. there's the Dashboard Confessionals or ah The Promise Ring. Nick and I have fallen in love with The Promise Ring because The Promise Ring are one of those bands that can repeat a line. And anybody else who would do it would be like, that's campy, that's dumb. Promise Ring got away with it and they made it sound like it is like it's a whole bevy of new lyrics, which is like, how do you do that? Right. Tell you how I'll tell you how they just went out and just said, hey, guess who we are at the fucking promise ring. What? What? The inmate did a thing. Emo band. They're crying on the way there as they tell you this. like, no, like there is so If you can combine that, because like you think about it, like go back. can't imagine going to see Saves the Day and Taking Back Sunday and they're doing flips and flops. And then all of sudden a guy comes out with an acoustic guitar and just. Entranced entrances, entrances everybody like Chris Corobit did with Ashburn Confessional. Like imagine that. Imagine going to see a punk show and then this guy comes out with an acoustic guitar and starts singing like wild. Like that worked. like it's all these all these interesting things too. you know, there was the uh there was a Metallicas of the world that hated what was the what was the streaming service that first Napster. Right. And Chris Carrabba was like, thank you, Napster, because like that was a way for a thousand million people to hear my songs. Right. And I'm like, that's how bands should also look at things. Whenever there's a negative in your experience, a negative thing happens, it tends to open two other doors. And then the problem is, as we as human beings are like, well, it didn't go the way I want to, therefore it didn't go well. Which is like, no, maybe this show didn't work out. But now that that show didn't work out, now we have this opportunity to play with like a save Ferris situation that we just got to play with. like. those experience and sometimes even if you play for 20 people instead of 200, those 20 people might know somebody or might be your forever fans because you played that show. Anyways, we're going in a whole thing here, Reed and Sean, so I apologize. This is talk about how we're tangential and that's the most millennial podcast. So welcome. You are now the most millennial scob representative here. That's me, baby. Um, one thing that we also kind of circle back to with most millennial is AI. uh hate it. That's what I was going to say. You brought up Napser as, something that is like the new technology and, yeah, tell me why you hate AI. Cause I agree. There can be like some soulless music with it, but So I think just like everything else, if people used uh AI as like a spice, it'd be fine. It'd be absolutely fine. The problem is people don't use AI as a spice. They use it to literally write everything and to make everything. from lyrics, music, artwork, um literally you could be in a band and not do anything now. Right. You can have a I make the band name. You can have them make the artwork. You can have them put together a song. You may even have them sing it. You could have them the lore about which band member like fell into alcoholism and had to go through rehab. That is a Rick and Morty episode right there. I mean, I'm I'm trying to find the bad part because it sounds like greed and I can. Yes, you and Reed can have the best- But here's a deal. But here is the deal. You two know at the end of the day that it wasn't your art. Right? Yeah, it would be some computer bank somewhere, not me, that made it. Don't get me wrong. I know they felt this way when they were first getting um What am I thinking of the first recording? uh Mmm, it's gonna come to me ah When they were first doing like auto-tune and stuff, you know When they went off tape, right? It was like the same kind of idea when you get off tape if well We had to work so hard to do it all in one take and then if we needed to split it We'd have to split the tape and then go back and then read You know, they did a lot of work on an album. You know, I listened to albums like The Wall or Dark Side of the Moon, and I'm like, how the hell did they do this? Like, because they did it with tape. They did it with time. Obviously, a lot of drugs. um But, you know, there is there's almost an art to that, actual recording. So when you take a lot of that and then don't get me wrong, I Pro Tools, there you go. Pro Tools is what I'm thinking. When you have producers, and there are people out there still to this day that just have that amazing ability to hear something and know it sounds good. Even if there's no reasoning behind it. There's no reasoning, it's just in their mind, this sounds good, this feels good, right? There's a lot of those out there that don't actually know a note. They don't understand, their brain doesn't go, that should be a G minor, that should be a C sharp or whatever. They're just going, that's wrong. Let me hum it. And then they hear it. Like they can hear a whole song. So going back to I'm just the salesman, don't do that. What I do do, do do, what I do do is if you give me a template, I can sell the hell out of it. I just know how to. I know how to make people feel a part of something. I know how to put my emotions in something. You can call it acting. don't really know. absolutely. Absolutely. But there is some like breaking of the fourth wall. That's another reason why I'm in the crowd. This idea that we have to be on stage. Is performing a right. You nailed it. You absolutely nailed it. We're not the Taylor Swift's of the world. We're not like we're here specifically in the punk scene to stir shit up. Yeah, I like that. And AI is by definition, it's just going to repeat what's already been done, you know? And on top of it, I think it's it's too new of a tool to be robust in a way to to be used by an artist as an artistic tool, because right now it takes away the art, artistic sort of uh personality or whatever. I think there's wonderful things about AI though, because if you want to do a good speech or if you want to clean up a paper that you wrote, I'm talking about clean it up. I'm not talking about rewrite it. I'm saying you're writing a paper and you're like, am I supposed to use who or whom in this situation? Nobody knows. I don't even think English teachers really know anymore. that kind of situation, absolutely. for me, because I have Bennyisms, because I always love E.E. Cummings who was like, I'm not going to use pronounce. I'm not going to I'm not going to use. the way English should be. I'm gonna make my own kind of way of doing things. I've kind of always gone by that and it drives my uh English major guitarist, Nick Good, who writes all my lyrics nuts. Absolutely bonkers. uh Sometimes that goes back to the producer that knows how it's supposed to sound and sometimes ain't works way better than it is not. I think nothing should be perfect. Even the best albums have imperfections that make them what they are. Sean's rolling his eyes because I just moved to Texas this year and I just used the word ain't and so I think that's maybe where that came from. It's slowly going to be y'all too. You're going to slowly start moving into that. Now had my first natural y'all. I was at the gas or grocery store and y'all slipped out and I'm like, I've arrived. Welcome to Texas. How'd you say it? Let's hear the exact. I think it was something like y'all have a good day or it just it was actually very sweet and southern it felt very very natural Is it y'all? Y'all? Y'all come back now, you. the I didn't you hear me so that's it. I just assumed. I'm talking to whole pile. uh But no, I think that's what you're describing is AI makes things maybe too perfect as far as the grammar side of things. So it doesn't sound like a real person for lyrics. doesn't sound like. Textbook vs. Novel. What's up? Yes. Yes. Yeah, I want to talk a little bit about some of the lyrics actually, if you're down for jumping into that. uh My first question for you, what percentage of ibuprofen do you think you are today? So that was Nick's line. The next one was mine about how I love both of our lives because what is it? 30. I got to sing it in context. 38 % ibuprofen at this point or something. Yeah. Like it's so funny how he legitimately put the percentile in. Like I think it's the that's a millennial thing. Oh. For sure. And he also says like, only got four hours of sleep and I'm pretty jazzed about it. That is definitely a millennial. So my, was putting my daughter to bed tonight and she was doing the six, seven thing that everybody's doing. You guys know what I'm talking about? My wife is nodding her head, but no 6-7 anyways uh my kid did that and I would yes. Yeah, it means absolutely nothing. It's Seinfeld all over again. They just don't realize that they're literally stealing something, you know, that makes absolutely no sense. But I was like, oh, we did what's up, know, was that, you know, it's the same. It's the same good jargon. We're just kids being kids. Um, but yeah, he said jazzed in that I said, Oh, that's so funny. So then the next, the next weird pre chorus thing is I'm breaking down from writing all these breakdowns and my wife says I need a white write slower songs and I think she's got a pretty damn good point and I love that line too. Our wives are part of this. So three of us are married and our wives are very supportive but also they talk to each other. So after you've given it 110 % and you're like six ibuprofen deep the next day. Well, and like, so like I used to every I would use to jump off things eight feet high and do like the cheerleader split thing and then fall and not have any issues. Even if I did hurt myself, it was like, oh, whatever. I literally did that. And I literally had to leave because I was like, I think I just broke my leg. And within the next week, Nick did something to his foot. And then our literal bassist did one of his first on the first song at Forest Fest. He wasn't even on a stage. He just did like a flicker, like a flick shot, I guess, and landed on the foot and broke his foot. First song. And I'm like, we are getting we are getting older. And that's the other thing, too, is we turn the line is we turn 35 and started falling apart. And it's so true. You hear it all the time. I remember my dad saying 35 is when you're going to start noticing it. And then 50 is when everything starts falling apart. uh the oh the Now you have a good ankle and a bad ankle. So, Benny, please, just for me, as you guys approach, I'm sure some of you are 40 now. Just something I learned when I was 40 is now you're too frail to flail. So just keep that in mind when you're on stage. never and not age i'll be that guy that's in like one of those wheelchairs with like the arm elevated in the leg elevator singing with the micro i'll somebody else hold the microphone for I say just start there. Just start there. You're gonna finish there anyways. Why don't I just sing from a casket? uh looking to how your wife likely feels. She's like, you know what? I want it to only be six. I'd be pro friend from now on. I think nothing is more Scott than the image of Benny in this full body cast with like checks painted on it and maybe like a little pattern. I'm a millennial, baby. I'm having everybody in that show sign my cast, for sure. Thank you so much. Her only cuddle those new ones with like the weird liquid in the middle. Do you know what I'm talking about? I want people to have to put spoons down to scratch me. It's so funny that I work in medicine in real life. Okay. And I've cut open CAS and there's like six pencils in there and there's like the spoon and you look at the kid and he's just like, sorry. Yeah, but the doctor never cares. Like, I think the doctor, when I had, I didn't have anything in my cast. Thank you very much. When I broke my ankle and I think I got dirty looks from my doctor. Like, what the fuck? Does this kid not feel any? You Zee-a-ro-bit? Oh, I love that line, Reed. I'm glad you brought that up. It's what uh Haunted House is one of my favorite songs on this album. The theme song going into that is just quite the quite the journey. I'll put it that way for you listeners who haven't or will have it. We'll listen to it pretty soon. The first two songs are something. Well, when I was listening to it again today, getting ready for tonight, I was like, this is the millennial experience right now. like thinking back to blink 182 and you know, all of the bands of high school and now that has the sound, but is also complaining about the same problems that I have, like growing older and being an adult. And now I'm looking at my kids like, wait a minute, I'm supposed to be the dad now. I love it. I love it because I'm not saying nobody does like you have the the teenage bottle rockets and stuff out there that talk about these kind of concepts. But it is is so funny because it's so true. of all of our and a lot of our fans are our age. So they have kids, they have uh they they're in their 40s. uh We got it. We got to get out to the kids more, you know, we got to find a way. It's probably not probably singing about our frail bones and that we're not having enough milk. probably not the best way to get at the children nowadays. um But no, like it's real and I gotta give yet again, like I'm half, I basically have a fourth, like a quarter, a pie quarter of all these songs helped Nick kind of create when it comes to lyrically. um That one was one that we kind of split half and half. But the one thing I love about Nick is he talks about these things that are in somewhat goofy, but for some reason they don't come across They don't come across goofy. Weird. come across sincere, sincere, very sincere. But they're very like to the point, right? And I'm just like, and Nick, you do a wonderful and he's like, do you think it's a little elementary what I'm saying? I'm like, no, I think that's how I feel. Like I literally feel sometimes when I get out of bed, like I literally have been in a coffin for 10 years. You know what I mean? And then other days it's like no big deal. So it's like, we're still like pretending we're young, even though we're not. I have one more question before I want to transition to a little bit of your day job too. Last question on the punk side of things, the ska side of things. What sort of things are you doing to teach your kids to stick it to the man, to question authority, to be punk rock? What sort of tenets are you trying to pass on to them? So the one thing that, they have grew up listening to my songs, which obviously some are vulgar. Some are saying some interesting topics. I'm sure by the time this comes out or pretty soon you'll hear T-A-N-G-C. I was going to say it's a social commentary really. It's a very social commentary on this idea if one cop is allowing another cop to do something illegal or to just be a piece of shit, then they're all bad cops. And the end of the idea is like, it's like what the priests were doing for a while. You know what I mean? They would be caught and then they would just send them to another precinct. They'd send them to another. I'm a Catholic myself and I actually had an uncle that was uh doing that with children. It was absolutely disgusting and it was really sad or really heartbreaking. And I was part of that. I was like, hey, no, put him in jail. Do not give him, take away his priest. That's a power that he should not have. uh And it's the same thing with, they took an oath to protect and serve. And this idea is, even the song, in theory, there's a bad cop and then there's a good cop. But at the end of the day, they're not standing up to the bad cops and there really is no good cops, right? uh the same oink oink oink, baby. Dude, it's so I gotta tell you the story about this because this makes me laugh every time I think of the song So I remember nick writing the song and he sent it to me and he said what do think of this? And I said, that's awesome He said can we can we can we lay down some scratch tracks like absolutely so we get to the oi part and he literally put ois He didn't put oink he put and i'm like nicolas It's the lowest hanging fruit. And he was like, dude, this is why you're in the band. This is why I'm in the band. Like, I'm so glad. But I remember him like having like an epiphany that like me saying oink, adding two letters and little of a tch at the end was the big deal. And he was just like, I would have never thought of that in million. Because he was so, he was so... oh It work. It ties the whole song together really, honestly. So good. I want to wear those like little pig nose. Yeah, now that I know you have such an interactive crowd experience, that's going to be your time. There's gonna be lot of winks. Let me throw out those pig noses and shit. That's there that's like, like this too much. uh Exactly. There'll be like two cops in the back like and then that song will come out and be like, let's break it down. They just are beating me with like billy clubs or whatever. Or they just kind of shrug and they're like, yeah, that's, that's pretty hardcore. They're like, they take the mic from me. They're like, it's real. I guess. But yeah, so that was was a lot of that was a lot of fun. when it comes to my kids, the biggest thing I always want them to know, and so I grew up with boys. So I grew up with three brothers and I was the youngest. So luckily, I had a twin. So like we basically ruled the roost because we did it together. the uh Damn, that's awesome. But I mean, even just the personalities, like, I mean, you could have said Leonardo and I would have been like, I don't know if you're Leonardo, but you're definitely a Donatello. Maybe Michelangelo, maybe a little Mikey. I, here's the deal. I associate with the purple. I associate with somebody who is basically like, they couldn't go anywhere without the turtle blimp or the turtle car or any of the machines to get them in anywhere. Donatello was literally the shit. Like, I don't know if you guys read the show. Did you read the last, the last Ronin? So No, that's on my list. looks so bad. I'm not gonna go into it, but I will say this. So it is the coolest thing for a millennial out there. If you're a millennial out there, which 99.9 of you are, and the other 0.1 is the kid that has to listen to this with their dad or with their mom. Get yourself the last Ronin. If you had any liking of the old turtles or the cartoon turtles, it is the darkest and best Series that I have ever read when it comes to comic now. I know that's that's I'm jaded because I am a turtles fan through and through but the way that they did it and I won't get into it, but man Donnie is Donnie's well, I there was comic books before where I think Donnie was the one that got with April right literally like he gets April and It's Mike's not mine. It's Donnie, baby. He just knows he's he's he's brains, baby So don't want to be too graphic here, but turtle dick? I just want to, I've always considered kind of small. They're Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Sean. Mutant. It's mutant. And are we talking like 18, 19 or like 16, 17? No, no. April, Yeah, full consent. Yeah, they grew up together. I would say if any of is the story arc where April like grows up with the turtles doesn't find them as like a creepier hoarder that's like, I found a bunch of teenagers in a sewer. No, they're turtles. at its lowest. It's most wholesome? I don't know. I don't know. It's so interesting because it's a mutant. So and they obviously have some human characteristics. So there's a lot. There's a lot to go into. But basically, if anything, April. Yeah, April would be robbing the cradle because I April is probably in her. and that's where I was going with this. It's like, you know, yeah. But do turtles have different ages like dogs? Sea turtles get to like a hundred years old, but I don't think regular turtles do. Rather, terrapins. the oh we talk about this we'll do our research we'll come back together in the in the in the last Ronin this is years after that okay they're adults yeah They're adults. So this would be like, you know, year high school reunion, hooking up with your teacher sort of thing. No big deal. you. There you go. There you go. Hot for teachers as long as it's at the 10 or 20 year mark. It's fine. So our producer here looked it up. Some land turtles can live up to 191 years old. Okay, so they, wow, and turtles. So we're talking not even the sea ones that are like 100 years old. So they have a half year to every year. Jonathan the giant tortoise. They're fucking elementary school bro. April girl, you gotta check yourself. Did you two ever play D &D? Oh yeah. uh the That's awesome. Did you? Oh, I shit. No, it's a critical miss. Okay, here's the real question before you get to the other question. just not one day. What edition? Because I'm a second through and through. Oh, nice. I think we've been playing fourth, but Sean's been there second and advanced. the I didn't play first. I started on second. I loved Thaco. I hated it at first, loved it later. And then when third came out, I was like, dude, what is this? Somebody who can't play D &D anymore. You know what I mean? Like they nerfed it. Yeah. Third was nerfed. That's why you got to go back to Thaco, baby, or nothing. We'll say this. Psionics should not be in the game. Too power. Too much power. Yeah. I I kind of like what uh Reed and some buddies of ours and I did. um It was a Star Wars D &D style and it was like super stripped down, but it was like super story advanced. And I think Reed really like kind of creating his own sub story within, you know, the Star Wars realm. for that. you? I loved as a Deadlands. Am I saying it right? Yeah, with the cards. my gosh, like that game. you Deadlands. the You play with cards. So like instead of a dice, you play with cards. Well, at our cards. Really interesting and it's Cowboys basically and I'm I always grew up loving Cowboys. I they were the coolest thing literally when I found out there was an NFL team called the Cowboys I just became a fan and then I realized everybody hates Cowboy fans everybody in this world. Yeah, I just love them because they were like a a gun and they rode on a horse like I didn't think anything of like but also like we're looking back Millennials because we're all Millennials right when I was growing up. The Cowboys were the powerhouse, just like the Chicago Bulls were. That was my favorite basketball team. ah The Red Wings, that was my favorite team because they were killing it back in the 90s. So it was just funny now that I'm like, okay, I was literally just a fanboy of everybody who was winning at the time without even knowing it. I just want to say the Red Wings did OK in the 90s. I believe the Avalanche did really well being a freshman team and all, but whatever. uh Unites you remember the Russian five. Do you know what I'm talking about? Don't bring don't make me call constee uh I remember very little of that. You Let me tell you my superpower, it's stirring shit and being like, I've got to know. You know what the power is? Is Patrick Wa getting put on the ice by both of our goalies both times. just... I don't know if you've seen those, but I remember... Gosh, I think it was all three of them. Or like Patrick Ow am I right? I don't know. He was spending so much time on the ice, know, with his butt on the ice. He's saving his goals. Anyways. I don't feel anything, eh? We're talking very millennial right It made a beanie baby of Blanche vs. Detroit... We're not through and through, uh I guess where I wanted to end up, this might be something for tonight. I wanna be cognizant of your time now that we're about an hour in or so. I don't wanna take up too much of your time. um But I also heard that you're a fourth generation funeral home director. Yeah. So I am a fourth generation funeral director slash embalmer. So I consider it a funeral professional because not all states, you don't have to be both. Right. But in the state of Michigan, we are, we are literally both funeral directing and embalming. What that means to you listeners out there, listener, see I'm talking like a podcast person. Yeah, dude. means that I'm doing everything from point A to point Z when your loved one dies. I'm going on the death call. doing the embalming if it's required or needed. And then I'm meeting the family in the morning, doing the visitation, doing the funeral and setting up the burial and all that. On top of that, because I'm crazy, um I also got certified as a death doula, which is somebody who also think of a birthing doula. So I literally am certified now where I can go into somebody's home and help them help themselves transition. basically the idea is they can have the hard conversations with their family, their family can have the hard conversations with them, they feel more comfortable going into like the hospice scenario. And then after the death, I can also help aftercare, meaning I can help them find all the military papers and all that. I can't do that because with the band and with the funeral directing, but what I wanted to do was be able because the more we educate ourselves on the jobs that we take, It's also understanding what everybody else is doing and what families really need. On top of that, I decided, well, that's not enough. So I went, I am now my second year of masters as a social worker, so I can also do therapy. So my identical twin is a psychologist that specializes in grief and loss. We have a podcast called Let's Talk About Death. There's the plug there. where we talk about this. We talk about the hard topics that nobody wants to talk about. We talk about suicide. We talk about disenfranchised grief. We talk about the five stages of grief that everybody talks about and how actually it was about the five stages of dying and not grief, but that's a caveat for another time. uh But we talk about every topic. We have guests. We talk about all that. But what I wanted to do why I wanted to be a social worker is everybody, I'm an existentialist, meaning I believe everybody's mental issues come from some sort of grief and loss, meaning a divorce, that's a loss. Losing a job, that's a loss. Being an alcoholic and then being sober, that's a loss. Like everything that you can think of, there is some sort of loss, some sort of meaning or something that has to do with the death of something. Maybe just the death of your old self. So basically what I wanted to do was be able to not only and then be able to do therapy, but actually be certified and legally allowed to do it. Even though I have been born and raised around death my entire life. realize even because I live next to the funeral. So I'm literally surrounded by death my entire life. My dad was his dad was and his dad was. So there has been literal death conversations. that are generationally and genetically. um put inside of my being, basically. So it's so hard when people ask me, you know, what do you feel about death? My version of death is probably 100 % completely different from yours, Reid, which is a completely 100 % different from yours, Sean. But because I was born and raised around this, have a, it's called good grief. It's literally like what Charlie Brown's been saying all these times, but it's this idea that there's beauty in death. Obviously, like if we were all living forever, like it's like I always tell the I go in and talk to high schoolers every year because I want them to understand that I care and that people want them to know about death and grief. And one of the things I say to them is like, have you guys seen any I used to be able to do this really easily because everybody was in Twilight about 10 years ago. We can't do that anymore. have any of you seen any vampire movies? You know, we got the five specific that are like, oh, yeah, Bronson, forever, you know, whatever. It's like die hard. oh the one kid that says no, skivvy D six seven. And then you're like, what? Six, seven. Or like the bubblegum girl that's like, vampire. Academy. Oh, yeah, or Wednesday, Wednesday. And they were going there. anyways, is any vampire happy? No, they're miserable. They're absolutely miserable because they've literally been alive so long that they they don't need to do it like everything. Yeah. So it's idea that like There's beauty in death. know, there's people that'll say to me, you know, I feel weird because I'm actually happy that mom isn't suffering anymore. I'm like, you don't have to feel bad about that. Like that's human nature that you don't want your mother that you love to suffer anymore. Yeah. But then because we're in the society that has these weird things like boys don't cry, right? uh They use that a perfectly all those years back. It is this idea that like it is unmanly to cry. So but here's the thing. You watch the Super Bowl and both teams are crying at the end of it. So. It's OK to cry at a game because that's manly and that's heroic and this is so great. But you can't go to your grandma or your mom's or your brother's or your or your or your loved one's funeral and start crying because the first thing you'll see people say is I'm sorry. And I'll come up to them and I'll say. You have nothing to be sorry about. anything, I'm sorry that you have to feel that way. This idea that like we're in this community where it is a problem to show grief. And that's a problem in itself. And then they wonder, why does all these high schoolers have mental health crisis? Why do all these people have all this weird uh mental hang up with closure? Well, I wonder why we don't talk about it. No, I think that's wisdom. um It's really funny when I was in high school and we did our aptitude test, the thing that came back for me was mortician. Oh, awesome. I know. And and I thought, you know, in high school, that's not a cool thing to come back on your aptitude test because everybody's like, wait, why is Reid the guy with the dead bodies? Yeah. I mean, better than mine. Mine was try again. That is awesome. Magic 8 Ball, ask again later. Approach me again. I so I work in medicine and I feel like it's as much about death as it is about life working in medicine. Yeah, because it's it's not just like live well, be healthy. It's also like live well, be healthy, maximize the time that you have sort of stuff and and be with the people that you love and talk about the things that you need to talk to and. so much grief like you're describing manifests in physical health problems for people. Whether that's physical pain or mental illness like you're describing or you mentioned alcoholism or diabetes, blood sugar issues. So many things can come because the grief hasn't been intended to. So it makes me really happy knowing that there's still Bennies in the world that are the fourth generation. caretakers for people's lives and death or lives through death as well. That's awesome. Thank you for doing what you do. That's true. mean, just truly the uh service that uh many of us don't even think about until we're faced with it. Yeah, I bet. I hear it all the time. I have no idea how to go through this. And the big thing is, just like every other job or occupation, oh There's bad, there's good, there's in between for every occupation, right? So I'm not saying that every funeral director out there, or even every generational funeral director out there is worth anything. I always tell my dad because he comes from the old school, a suit doesn't make a funeral director, dad. It really doesn't. um There's also this like old school respect that I do appreciate that he has given to me. This idea that we literally took an oath in our school at Wayne State University, go warriors, uh where our job is to give somebody the respect and value that they can't do for themselves. There's nothing more vulnerable than a dead body or a baby. Those two cannot defend themselves. They have no way of getting anything done without assistance. So the thing is, like we have this, we have this oath to take care of them. what most people, and I think even funeral professionals forget to mention is there's a whole nother part of our job, which is really the most important part of our job, which is to help people transition through grief because nobody knows how to go through it. And then the biggest problem and the biggest thing that we do know about grief. is that everybody goes through a different life. So we already know this consideration that what works for me doesn't work for Reed and what works for Reed doesn't work for Sean or maybe it works for all three of us. Maybe it doesn't work. And this is in its instead of just talking about it, which is a real answer, right? This idea that like, I'm struggling, man. I'm struggling because my grandpa died. Even when I was 10 years old, I never got the opportunity to say goodbye in the casket or even just say goodbye to him or say I'm sorry or all this stuff. And it's like, if only they had that 10 minute opportunity, that 10 minutes would do everything to that person. And I'm not, I'm not here saying that everybody needs a visitation or everybody needs a funeral. That's not, that's not where I'm getting at. I'm just getting at people don't understand how many people we actually like touch in our lives. like we were millennials. So our parents, a lot of us worked in the factory their whole entire life. They worked seven days a week, 10 hours, and then they'd get these weird weekends off maybe here and there. So in theory, they spent more time with their colleagues on the line at all these factories than they did with their families because they were making the living. So here's the deal. That lineman that's been working with dad for 30 plus years doesn't get an opportunity to say goodbye because he has no power to how to take care of the seed and at that point or Grandkids. Grandkids have no power to what's going to happen to their grandparents, but here's the deal. We're millennials. A lot of us were raised by our grandparents because our parents were working. So, but yet again, when it comes down to the end of the day, the kids have the power, the grandkids don't. It's just, it's in a conversation. And honestly, here's the, here's the answer, both of you. Conversation. A conversation with your wife, with your spouses, with your kids. Hey, if something should happen to me, what would you all want? Right. because it's only legal. It doesn't matter if it's a new well. You know what? So people, specifically every state is different. So I'm not saying every state, but I will tell you this. A lot of people will put in their will, they want to be cremated. But at the end of the day, their spouse has to be the one to sign off. If they don't have a spouse, then that's their children. If they don't have children, then it has to be their parents. If they don't have parents, then it's goes to their siblings. Like we have to know all this because what happens is mom dies, dad's been dead for years. There's two kids, one kid hasn't talked to mom in years. I need both of them to sign off or that mom doesn't get cremated unless while she's living, she does what's called the funeral representative and gets them to sign these papers before. But the problem is nobody wants to talk about death. So who's going to come in and get funeral representative papers at that I got it, I got it signed baby. I'm gonna be compost, don't you worry. Okay, perfect. I love that because it's also kind of like before working in medicine, I was in EMS and so you have to make sure you know where DNR is and you and then you have like this thing that you have to fall back on where you just basically there's the standard of practice unless you have it written and like the legal paperwork that says otherwise. So it sounds very similar even in the funerary side of things. It's so tough because they'll come in and they'll be like, Oh, I'm cremating mom. And I'll be like, how many siblings do you have? Well, there's, there's five of us. need three of you. Why do you need three of us? And I'm like, it's majority rule. Because the thing is, is that people don't realize is if I cremate knowing that now I only know what I know. So if you come in and you say it's only me. And then I find out 10 years later, there was another brother. You lied to me. Right. I didn't. You're not liable for that. You signed a paperwork that says you were the only one. But the thing is, like, if I know that that person exists, I have to go reach out to that person or else. And if I don't reach out to that person and don't get, I have to then not cremate that individual. Yeah. All right. I guess last question and then uh Sean and I do a segment that we end off with, which is called Consumation Corner. And ah it's basically just like the things we've been consuming, not like that kind of consummation. But last question. Exactly. Thank you for understanding many, Even our audience probably doesn't get it. Yeah, I think it's. they do get it and that's the problem. I don't know. Last question that I have is, uh obviously we've been having funeral rites for as long as we've had history. ah What do you think it is about not only our generation and our culture, but what do you think separates us from more ancient funerary rites and funerary beliefs? Or do you think there is a difference, that it's all about grief at the end of the day? I the answer to this question specifically, I'm going to get into the United States because it's not like this everywhere. really. Every culture is different. There's some really good books out there and the author that comes to mind, she does not pay me. She just did a wonderful job. name is Doutry. She wrote amazing books and one of them was literally one that I was fascinated with because she went to different cultures and found out how they do final disposition in all these places. And then kind of reading that and then realizing how we do it in the States. First of all, we have and I think it's a negative connotation right now in my opinion, because I'm also a mental health specialist and I'm going to be here pretty soon. We have gone from a community-based society to an individualistic society. Meaning, if you go back 20 years, when grandma got sick, you'd bring her into the house. So us grandkids would help grandma transition, is what they call it in the doula. Basically the idea is we would clean grandma, help mom and dad, clean grandma, help mom and dad, feed grandma, and we'd watch them die. And there's beauty in that. got to watch my grandfather who had Parkinson's. In my opinion, go from the smartest man to a drooling child. And it was it was very hard, but I'm so glad I got to experience that because there was beauty in it. There was absolutely beauty in that transition. It was hard. I'm not saying that it wasn't. not saying that it was yippee hooray, but there was beauty in it. um anyways, why why I'm saying this is because. The idea is nobody, it's not cares, they forget that a community exists. Meaning when they die, they'll say things to me like, I want this to be as cheap as possible and I don't want to have my grandkids have to deal with my death. Well here's the thing. Yes, but here's the reality. Your grandkids, your kids are gonna deal with your death regardless of if you want them to or not. And also, What's expensive to you or what's not worth anything to you might be worth every cent in the world to somebody else. And the thing that we come to that's the problem with today is we are under the impression that we are always the lead character of the story. And I'm the lead singer saying this. So this is. Hey, we're millennials. We're special, special boys. So yeah. But here's the thing, right? So, the funeral is not about you, the one that's dying. The funeral is about everybody else. Because you've already transitioned. They haven't. So they're dealing with this. They're struggling with this. And the big thing is, I think we as a society leave each other out. And then we wonder... why we're not community anymore, why nobody does things anymore together. Why do we? Because there's an idea that we want to do it ourselves, right? We live in this capitalistic world where we have to have all the money equals fame, which equals happiness, which equals the more money that I can have, the less money somebody else. And that's their fault and not mine. Right. It's this individualistic approach. We won't get into governments and all that. That's a whole nother topic. But I will say because of this, because we have forced that being the richest is the best, right? Right, that's winning. where what is in their opinion, what is losing is dying. A lot of hospitals don't let me go up on the floor to get a decedent because they don't want to affect the other patients. But here's the thing. So we're hiding. I'm literally going to basements and hiding dead bodies and their opinion out because for them, their hospital, it's a failure. It's a failure for them to be because their job is to make sure that they survive. So it's this idea that death has this negative connotation and we need to start spinning that or else we're going to continue to have mental health crisis. We're going to continue to have suicidality. We're going to continue to have people have extreme death anxiety. And therefore, if you have death anxiety to the point where you cannot literally go through life, it's called prolonged grief. It's actually in the DSM. you will literally not be able to live. So therefore you are so worried about dying, you don't actually live. I see this a lot with my patients and I think that was a beautiful way to say that. And where I want to leave this conversation is do you have a archetype as far as like a book or a culture or a resource for people to look at as far as these are people that manage grief and dying and death very, very well. So the first book was from the sixties and I literally talked about it just a second ago. It's from a wonderful doctor called Elizabeth Kubler-Ross. It's called Death and Dying. And it was basically this psychiatrist named Elizabeth Kubler-Ross who's a Swiss native. That's where I come from. And I'm not originally from there, obviously, but my family came over. But anyways, she wrote a book about she specifically spent time with over 200 patients that were dying. they call it, you know, read you understand this active dying. And she wanted to know if there was any correlation with what their experience was. And so she got all this information. That's how she came up with these five stages, right? The denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance. And that book is wonderful because she uses real life experiences and conversations she's had. She also talks about doctors who didn't listen to their patients or this idea that we are so caught up in the medical field about saving them, that we forget that they actually have their own rights. They want to talk, but they're basically hushed like, you're sick, we'll take care of you, you need to just, but no, no, I want to have autonomy, right? That's the biggest thing that we've started to get rid of with people who are dying is autonomy. And so that's the book. If you're a clinician, if you're anybody in the mental health, profession or if you're in any of the mental or clinical fields or health fields, read Elizabeth Kubler Ross, Death and Dying. It's from the 1960s and it still holds true to this day. If you are, uh as I say, the lay person, which I'm not saying a negative connotation, but somebody who is in the mental health profession. Obviously, listen to let's talk about death. uh Yes, you're Nicholas Kapal and Benny Kapal. And we talk about these. We talk about a lot of books. We talk about these topics that nobody talks about like YouTube, what's the Werther effect? What's the Papa Gino effect? I'm sure you have no idea what the hell I'm talking about. Nope. But basically, it's the healthy way to talk about suicide and the bad way to talk about suicide. Gotcha. Bad place joke, I'm so sorry. You're good, but I did like the Papa John's. Okay. It's gonna hot and ready. I'm like, no, that's Little Caesar's. So like we're, we're pizza. But let's guess who plays at the Little Caesar's arena. I did have a quick question, maybe a not so quick question. um Do you see dead people? all the time. Are you talking about like souls or are you talking about literal dead people? I mean, obviously, obviously you see. somebody who has died, right? I see people at the as a funeral director. I see them dead at the hospital. see them dead at the funeral home. I see them dead in their homes all the time. do you see the the recently transitioned like as in a literal Bruce? Now here's the funny story that I always tell people. If ghosts were going to haunt people or they were going to exist in this world, they wouldn't be at a funeral home. Right. That's like going to the DMV. That's not where they, they didn't die here. Right. You know what I mean? They didn't have any memories here. So unless you believed in the idea that the whole soul is trapped, but even still we're then burying or we're cremating. So at that point, that would be where they would haunt. We don't have a crematory here on site, nor do we bury on site. Um, so. I don't, but I will say that I have been told and so has Nick, my twin, cause we have ESP, right? We were, I'm literally talking to him right now. Um, that we have the third eye, which I don't know if you've, I do, I have it. have mine. I've been told mine's blind. there you go. Sorry, you got to open it. basically, the idea is here too. When we become adults, we jade our third eye, because we're told that it doesn't exist, right? That's why children have imaginary friends. How do we know that that's not a guardian angel or somebody who's communicating with them, right? This idea that like, or like pets when they like stare off in a corner and they're barking at Yeah, you're like, haha, dumb dog. But who's to say? I feel presences I have, I don't communicate, can't see them. I'm not, my third eye is not that strong. um But I will say that they exist. It is so absurd in my mind how we can't even tackle the human brain yet, right? Let's be honest about it. We only know like what the 10 % are. So the idea is like, we don't know shit. So like the idea that like we die and there's nothing in my opinion, in my opinion, here's my subjective opinion. I would rather believe in something than nothing. That's just my belief. I'm not saying anybody else is stupid for thinking anything different. think, but I do think there's things that cannot be explained, that can never be explained, that can't just be random. You know what mean? There's things that I think there's times in even my life that I'm like, I don't, I don't know how I did that. Yes, we have, we have the natural ability to protect ourselves. got it from the caveman, right? So there is certain things that like turn on, but there has been times and I'm sure you both can say this. There's been things that have happened in your life that you're like, of, yeah, instead of just, what if we just were like, that wasn't weird. That was just normal. That's just somebody saying hello or that's my grandma or that's somebody we might not even know or it's our guardian angel or it's God or it's, don't know. I have not, your answer is I have not seen, I have not heard, but I think I have felt would be the way to. Fair. That is the perfect segue into Consummation Corner because that was beautiful. It's like you read my script. ah I have been uh watching this podcast called American Alchemy and uh Jesse Michaels is the host of that show and he had a physicist, Hal Putoff, onto his show to be interviewed by Eric Weinstein. uh physicist Hal Puthoff was in charge of the Stargate project where they tried to do remote viewing stuff uh from like the 70s until the 2000s. the program that he ran, he got the remote viewers trained up to where they could have a 70 % accuracy rate with whatever targets that they were looking at. And this was all CIA funded through SRI, Stanford Research Institute. um And he was a physicist. He started off with like quantum chips and had remote viewers affect the quantum chips. Then it ended up being like finding downed planes in the middle of the Congo jungle. And it was uh finding Soviet subs and like looking into Soviet um safes to see documents and things like that. And so. Very, very interesting stuff. he actually goes through, he helped put off, wrote a book about how to do some of the remote viewing stuff because he posits anybody has that. It's just that they don't train the ability because we rely on so much other stuff these days versus like what you're describing of the third eye. Like there's not that intuitive thing that we connect to anymore. So yeah, really cool podcast. Check it out too. That's awesome. Yeah, no, it just reminded me like we have had shamans for the beginning of and some people could say they were all charlatans. But this idea that I really think it's like it's like the Buddhist, right, that they can meditate and actually hit Nirvana. Right. You have no idea what that actually means. We have no. But the idea is, and I've done it ever since I am actually a sober alcoholic. uh I've been sober now for four years and I remember meditating was a big thing when I was seeking therapy and I realized that that's a skill to meditate. It's not something... See, people just assume they can close their eyes and they can meditate. And they are, in some ways they are. But people who actually meditate, meditate every day, multiple times. painting, like how good at painting are you? But it's like they can basically lucid dream. And this like, I remember I was talking to some very, very smart people talking about lucid dreaming, right? This idea that they train themselves to be able to do whatever they wanted in their dreams. And I'm like, dude, that's so impressive because like they say, right? It's like double the time in dream. Like your brain can like, it's longer. So. in theory, they could be living every life they want to be living while they're dreaming and then be content with the life that they're living outside the dream. But then the question becomes, the dream is better than reality. Therefore, what's really reality? What's really the dream? It's like, know, I got a bottle full of blue pills baby. Like, I was like, what if you woke up tomorrow and you were 12 year old kid in a coma? Like, and you're like, holy hell, I lived my life. And it was just a month in a coma or something wild, like inception stuff, right? At that point. I had the dreidel and it kept spinning. Like, I guess I'm still in this. Where's Leo when you need him? Leo! Yeah Gentlemen, thank you so much. It's an honor. Yeah, I don't want to take any more of your time. Thank you so much for like jumping into this. You are a fascinating individual. thank you, Benny. It's been awesome. We're looking forward to the launch of this album. Definitely check out your podcast. Any socials or anything that you want to plug before we let you get to your night. Yeah, so you can check out Let's Talk About Death, the podcast on any streaming. You can literally just go to letstalkaboutdeathpodcast.com and you can go there. actually have a thing. We have an open email at letstalkaboutdeathpod at gmail.com if you have questions that you want us to bring up actually on the show. So feel free to do that. As for the Boy Detective, we are everywhere and anywhere that's possible. We're on the Tiki-Taks of the world, the Instagrams, the Facebooks. We're not on Blue Sky. It's a little new for us. It's a little it's a little unmillennial for us. But we'll probably get there. And but you can literally if you really want the easiest way you can you can go to our link tree or you can also just go to www.punkertonrecords.com. You can look at the awesome basic the awesome teams of bands we have on that label there. It's an absolutely wonderful DIY label that has really taken off. Brandon does a wonderful job and he is a part of our family, our little close knit family there, but go to punkertonrecords.com. can buy our album, you can pre-buy our album. You can also get some merch there. Listen to us on Spotify and the Apple, put the reviews and the likes and the stars and all that. And also, while you're on this podcast, make sure you... Subscribe, make sure you give them the stars, give them an awesome review, tell them that the Benny episode was your favorite and you want more episodes like that where Benny Kapal comes on and just talks and rambles for hours. Wonderful. That was help, help read and Sean out. You've been wonderful. Thank you guys so much. Yeah. And thank you for like the early uh listening of your album. is, you know, such a pleasure. Thank you. Well, I think that was perfect place to end it. I'll drop our email, is podcast at mostmillennial.media. If you like what you heard here, give us a subscribe, follow, all that good stuff. And as always, Most Millennial. Da na na na na na na na na Most millennial, da na na na you