The ever dynamic frontman for The Academy Is..., William Beckett joins us from the land of John Hughes to talk about wrestling, still not meeting Chris Carrabba, and of course - our pending Dave Mathews dance party! He also counts Warped Tours and reveals his most Epic Fail on stage and nerd alert... we do a LOT of Game of Thrones but hey, we're both G.O.T.!

The Academy Is... website

The HUGELY influential Dan Yemin of Lifetime, Kid Dynamite, Paint It Black and now, Bitter Branches, got real with us this week! Don't worry, you'll hear plenty of what helped put him where he is today but we also go off-track with plenty of psychology talk (his other specialty), New Jersey hip-hop... even a little Yiddish lesson.

Listen to Bitter Branches' new music

The Flatliners drummer, Paul Ramirez joins us from Toronto to discuss Canadian bagels, lobster, the danger of horses and Soundgarden. There's also praise for Jersey Pizza, Taco Bell and ringey snare sounds. We also discuss why he's always the designated driver at border-crossings.

American professional wrestler, manager of The Hurt Syndicate, the one and only Montel Vontavious Porter (aka Hassan Hamid Assad) joins us to talk about bad choices, good recoveries, meeting Zac Blair of Rise Against when Zac was still in his high school band, Japanese steak, Sasquatch, living in Hakeem Olajuwon's house... there is so much good stuff here, you've just got to listen.

MVP's Linktree

MVP's amazing TedX

Augusta Koch of Gladie joins us this week to discuss growing up in the Poconos (snowboarder), moving to Colorado with a bunch of skater-boys (didn't work out), Action Park, Catholic school and how the best songs are always borderline corny. There's also rockabilly whippitters and having The Menzingers as your neighbors in Philly. Yeah, it's a good one.

Everybody loves Walter. We live in the same neighborhood so I see him all the time but he's hard to miss - the guy won't slow down... Quicksand, Gorilla Biscuits - all still vital, hell Rival Schools just played a run of shows this week in South America! So why not revisit this vintage episode (almost 10 years old?!?) when Benny was still cutting his host-teeth? Enjoy.

Ever since we recorded this episode, back in 2018 with Justin Brannan, (founding member of NYHC band, Indecision), his political star has been on the rise. Now, he's on the brink of becoming NYC Comptroller where he would oversee the largest municipal budget in the country. Of course we're talking pizza and conspiracy theories in this episode but listen thru to the outro where we essentially endorse him for president.

Daniel Kohn, co-author of Tearing Down the Orange Curtain - How Punk Rock Brought Orange County to the World joins us to talk about Social Distortion, No Doubt, Offspring and The Vandals. We also go off-track on subjects like sports and how to beat the gambling apps.