[Music] welcome to ear biscuits I’m link and I’m Rhett it’s time for another conversation with someone interesting from the internet or someone’s to be specific that’s Pomplamoose a california-based musical duo consisting of real-life couple jack conte and nataly dawn okay now if you are a fan of music and/or you are so am i or if you like getting inside the brains of musicians then this ear biscuit is for you I like to do that sorry about this one I almost went to medical school to operate exclusively on the brains of musicians because they had a lot of money no just because I found their brains interesting and I wanted to press on it during surgery so they would make different notes and I could play music through their birth through their brains during surgery I guess all musicians don’t have a lot of it does it does get pretty deep in this conversation with Papa moose it doesn’t get that deep though there is no brain pressing that happens now here’s the thing we have been fans of Pomplamoose since way back I’m talking like mm Oh 8 pages of the internet mm oh eight so when we reach into them at playlist live in Orlando you know it was the first time we met him and we were ready to record some ear biscuits at playlist and so they were the first one and this wasn’t planned I gotta say that we that we tried to work out a few interviews at playlist ahead of time but we just saw Jack and Natalie in a in the suite and what was it the hospitality hospitality suite they were enjoying some of the hospitality we said we got to talk to Papa moose huge fans and we got to talk to them on ear biscuits and an hour after meeting them we brought him up to her hotel room and had this conversation and I gotta say I don’t know if we were like fanboying but there was about what fangirling beyond fanboying there was some sort of connection then I felt like we made so in listening this ear biscuit I think you can pick up on a friendship blossoming with Papa moose so if you don’t know them I’m I’m glad you get to know them along with us in this ear biscuit they gained attention through their incredibly creative covers of popular songs and we’re gonna play a snippet of one here yeah this is uh I think their most popular video to date this is their cover of Beyonce’s single ladies [Music] okay so that was the first cover I think but they went on to do a lot of other amazing covers including Michael Jackson’s beat it [Music] okay I think you can tell by listen to that this is no ordinary cover this is not just trying to make a song that sounds exactly like the original they bring a totally unique musical approach to all their covers but in addition to that they do something that we can’t display in audio form and that is the visual approach what they call video songs we get into exactly what that is and we also uncover what I guess I would call a chip on their shoulder surrounding the fact that they built their brand on covers when they are legitimate artists who have original songs which they want to get out there incredible original songs let’s play a snippet of one can you introduce it like a radio DJ yeah next up we’ve got an original from Pomplamoose band out of California if you think you need some lovin shrink it raise another sink well go if you think you need a fix to put me in the mix just [Music] and there’s more where that came from next up we’ve got also from Papa Moe’s Hail Mary [Music] [Music] I I don’t see any reason why we just don’t get into this conversation I hope you’re as excited as we are we also talk about their relationship why they disappeared from YouTube for a while and then while their what their plans are for coming back stronger I was especially intrigued linked with how they balance their romantic life with their musical relationship it’s really quite an eye-opening thing here it is our ear biscuit with Jack and Natalie of Papua moose owl [Music] so this is something that you’re that you’re encountering at this point though is a lots of messages coming in you read some of them you don’t what about fan mail it all comes to one spot which I know we need to we need to designate split off and have a separate you have a p.o box we do have a peel box yeah and you you read everything that comes to the PIO box no we don’t check the peel box that’s another problem so the main problem is we live in two different places right now I just realized we haven’t checked her mail since Courtney yeah it’s been like months we all shut it down and everything yeah the USPS right it’s actually not with it’s not a p.o box it’s a it’s a physical address through UPS so somebody’s house no it’s an it’s an actual box but you get a physical address it’s not a p.o box it’s a you it costs more but it still goes to because some people don’t deliver to peal boxes however okay as interesting as the mail situation is right now no we live together we live together if you’re living in two different place yes because you know yeah I’m doing the solo career you’re asking if they’re a couple I know that they’re a couple we Natalie and I live together in two different places sometimes we live where we record in just north of Petaluma in Sonoma County we live there together we that’s where our studio is and then the other half the time we live at the patreon office in San Francisco yeah so it’s we are splitting and right now your your split up from each other no we live together that’s always that’s what I asked every night we spend together and every day a lot of the nights I understand they’re a couple they live together but there’s two different places it’s like they both live at the same time it’s pretty simple even speaking the same time that’s pretty sweet okay almost eight years going on the ears together really what now you did you was that like a something you kind of had to the forefront right at the beginning of your career you were like we’re a couple because I remember asking like are they is this a couple and I no I don’t think so I think they just sing to girlfriends I don’t know a friend yeah that was kind of you to not assume that we were in a relationship because I feel like a lot of people who they do any sort of collaboration on YouTube it’s like they’re in a relationship right now and it’s like and then if and if you’re not then everybody disappointed and they’re not gonna buy your iTunes single or whatever yeah it’s like when I found out to the people from once weren’t really a couple how many movies do you watch would you thought they weren’t actors acting I remember thinking that too though I do know what you’re talking about it was so indeed it was so and it was like had to be real you thought it was found footage yeah the whole movie one scenario documentary you know how recording sea water doctor first take sounds amazing yeah go at it yeah the engineer looks up from his magazines like wow these guys are good and that’s how it is in a recording studio it’s messing around you know right now the projectors I want to start with the the last two videos if you guys put out are the are both the projector music videos things yeah so I want to pick your brain on that patent did this and then go backwards have not penned it you should I commented on the Lord back to POC mashup one yeah yeah I was just so excited I when I saw it I was like this is this is great this is amazing and I was like okay it’s already got two million views and I was like no it it doesn’t it hadn’t broken a million views yet so I was like still hasn’t this the least I can do and so I was actually frustrated for you guys being a long time fan with both the longtime fans for that one in particular to be so innovative in this particular projector type way I was like oh this is this is a this is another big one so I was gonna do my little part and comment but now you regret commenting cuz it turns out it wasn’t a big one but you’d approach in a million views and you did it you did a sequel you’ve done another one well I think’s going you right what’s the thought process and kind of doing the projectors yeah well so you know first of all Papa moose is like getting back into the swing of it after not being a channel for like two years yeah and you know we took some time to like pursue solo projects and Pablos was like this thing that we did for fun and then it became the most successful thing that either one of us were involved with and then it felt like a burden because we felt like we had to keep it going and it was it stopped being fun and at a point the burden of artistry it was it got to be a point it got to be a we need to take this to the next level and we need to work with a manager and we needed to make a hit song and right and it was just like yeah and then we just drove we got sick and tired and depressed and we just took a break from it because it was too it’s too much we sucked ourselves out so we’re just getting back into it now and so that’s why I sort of don’t feel bad it’s like okay there’s like two videos and we’ll keep doing more and you know we’ll make a bunch and maybe and maybe as we make more you know they feed on each other like the more you release the better the previous ones do and so as we release more that you know those those are the ones are gonna I’m sure continue to do better so was the did the projector idea kind of light a spark to reinvigorate your channel or did you have a spark that this was the first application of it well we’ve been working on recording we we have probably about eight songs right now that we have released like the video as well no videos but just music so we deciding to get back into Pomplamoose was a hurdle and of itself because we we wanted Pomplamoose to be fun again and and there are so many things that get in the way of something being fun so we were trying not to plan too far ahead to just make it about the music and so we went back in we recorded these several songs for the last few months and then decided that it was time to start putting stuff out and the best way to put stuff out when you’ve been out of the loop for a while is to buy a bunch of projectors buy a bunch of project oK you’ve been watching well you kind of let you finish cover is like you know it’s that’s that’s how you write that’s cuz otherwise people aren’t going to notice that you put out an original so you start by putting out covers and so we’re gonna slowly start putting out originals with those covers in it but the projector part of it how did that come about so that was an accent yeah so on my solo channel I have been working with so EDM is a very difficult thing to make to do live I don’t know what it stands for electronic dance music really yeah that’s intuitive you’re wondering if I’m joking I was I was actually looking at you like that’s why I didn’t know that and if I if I know so it feels free to not know it I mean I I’ve can make my brain for something else that’s amazing that one doesn’t seem like it would have taken a much space not sure how you got through 2013 we’ve had this discussion I’ve explained it to him I don’t believe you it seemed too simple okay right yeah okay so it’s a difficult thing electronic dance music is a difficult thing to to do live right so how do you bring it to YouTube how do you create a live performance experience of electronic dance music the thing is it takes thousands of hours to craft those sounds they can’t be produced live I mean I record a guitar and then I manipulate the crap out of it until it growls and screeches and grunge’s and has sub base and it’s layered with other things and there’s a million and it’s impossible to show that like Papa Luis would show video songs right like we would do so so I you know I wanted to do have some kind of video where the the odd where the the visuals wasn’t the sound that was being made but rather it was a visual representation of that sound it made your brain go ah that’s the same thing so if it’s a yo-yo wobble bass then you see a line kind of wobbling with the bass or you see flashes of lights and boxes at certain times so that there was some kind of synesthetic you know correlation between the sound and the video so I was experimenting with projectors and lighting things and one time I held up my hand because I was going to I was using a projector and I went to hold up my hand to grab something and my face got projected on my palm you know and I was like woah and I moved my hand face there was my face and I did this know that and and it was it was just cool to see the the rest of the image I behind my why were you projecting your face in the first place I was rejecting my face because I was projecting myself onto a screen on I built a screen and I was playing a launch pad in front of the screen and so I was protecting my face onto the screen and I went to grab the launch pad and boom there’s my face in my head I thought wow that’s cool to see multiple dimensions with one projector and then I held up a white card and my face popped and was really clear now and then I put up a couple cards and just just literally just white car it’s like note cards and put them up at various depths and then dragged around images in Final Cut Pro until they were on the cards that’s a good feeling right when you discover something like wow it was so cool looking it was so cool just to you know to move around and see these things in three dimensions and then it was just kind of snowballed from there it’s like one video after the next just okay now more techniques more techniques more I do see you were doing them on your your personal channel yes a projector yeah okay I haven’t seen you you gotta check those out yeah those have over a million views really yeah really okay and what your personal channel is uh is is just as my stuff just jack conte music yeah my solo stuff got it yeah it’s more like whoa angry like EDM like yeah kind of stuff hardcore like electro okay so that was working on your channel so you brought it back over to go with this mashup that you guys yeah the poplu moves channel to reinvigorate it yeah okay so it’s kind of so it’s kind of a proven thing that it’s not it’s not just two of them there’s a lot of them on your channel that have gone viral yeah okay are you guys kind of oh I mean kind of own that concept as far as I can tell I have I don’t know if anybody’s emulated it but I definitely one of the things we struggle with is thinking about innovating and doing things that people haven’t done before and I think it was much easier to do that in o8 r o9 you know but now you’re like oh that’s been done that’s been done is it’s kind of rare to find something that’s that innovative that cool works that well for ya it works yeah it’s like oh you surely someone has done this before right but you know they have it and it’s just it’s amazing right there is projection mapping like people do projection mapping but it uses a lot of math and special software I haven’t seen people like just drag around and not like use mapping software to make it perfect I think what’s cool about the you know the projection videos that we’ve done is that they’re they look kind of bad does that make sense like it looked mannish yeah you can tell that it’s there’s there’s no fancy software or fancy know-how it’s just it’s just dragging stuff around and Final Cut I mean it you can see how it’s made it’s still got that very Internet II quality to it which arm yeah and you’re actually drawing attention to how you do the technique so that people can appreciate it more right exactly and I mean if we shift over to the video songs I mean you guys certainly innovated on that front as well in terms of coming up with that which there were rules involved in making a video song so take take me back through though or and let take me back through the concept of where you came up with that do you guys divide is this a collaborative part of it do you guys work on the music together and then one of you is geeking out more about how we transfer this into a video how does that work and where did the video song idea come from it was Jack’s idea I could talk about it but it was Jack’s idea is is that cut is is that kind of a division between you two that yeah you two you’re taking more though okay this is this is how we’re gonna do this music video geeking out on that kind of thing is that more your thing so I have a film-like background so I mean I do but Natalie’s and she edited all the video songs she did all the really okay yeah on almost every single one of them so but not for the projection videos I haven’t done I haven’t edited those but I did at it almost all the the old Pomplamoose videos okay yeah so you came up with the split screen the video concept a video song concept yeah so with so subject to certain rules yeah okay so so are you guys familiar with the dogma shoot oh I camera don’t remember the numbers there is a group of four or filmmakers in the 60s who got sick of Hollywood productions okay and and they came up with a set of rules that you have to shoot on location you have to use direct sound you can’t overdub and they just wanted something that was more real they just wanted something that was more organic and more like life and less like fake art and I’m not sure I necessarily agree with that but I like the idea of coming up with rules and constraints and parameters you know help you be creative and and for us the trouble was okay you know here’s our stuff on MySpace and it gets three plays a day this is 2007 right so we’re like nothing’s happening on MySpace and we’re desperately trying to you know make music for a living and and we have all these songs we needs to figure out a way to convert it somebody sends me linked to a guy who on YouTube who’s got 350,000 hits and he’s sitting in front of a webcam playing guitar and it’s like what you know he’s got an OK voice it’s not great ok guitar not great it’s like why are we putting our songs in my space we need to putting our songs on YouTube so how do we convert music to video where people are right and so for me the video song was like a function it was like an equation that converted music to video and this sounds pity I don’t mean to sound when I say this way but it required not very much creativity to do it wasn’t it wasn’t it didn’t take creative juice to make each video we just would go in the studio and make the audio and once the audio was made the video kind of followed Natalie did an amazing job editing but it wasn’t that we had to come up with a creative concept for every single music video because you but you because he had rules yeah and what were the rules the rules were no so no lip-synching for instruments or voice if you see it in the video that’s the take that you’re actually hearing hmm so when you see Natalie singing those the takes that we used in the audio and the second rule is no hidden sounds no hidden sounds so so if you hear something in your earphones got a same point you you saw it in the video so there’s not every time it occurred but it’s somehow it’s something you weren’t you deme you showed people what was happening our words we’re not hiding stuff from you like you get to see how the music is actually happening as it’s actually recorded because I can tell you when Beyonce records she doesn’t do it in heels and full makeup she’s in that sound booth a freaking sweater you know write it with a bottle of water next her and she probably looks like crap right I mean was as much like crap as be on this bouncy can exactly so she looks at me are you saying I look like crap answer the question okay no fair question no you do not look like crap you always look amazing amazing no no you guys can’t run ads over this I just sang Bruno Mars oh this song we’re good we won’t tell her no actually Bruno’s the guy who runs ads over this for us okay he’s got he’s our ad guy side job his name’s Bruno Mars was the was this yeah I like the sort of the anti feeling of the philosophy because there’s so much that is faked on the internet and they’re in even lip-synching videos at the time that you guys were really breaking out I mean lip-synching videos we’re still a big thing on YouTube was there a part of this it’s like oh this is a great opportunity I see that YouTube is a great platform but we want to do it differently then it’s being done was that really is it was that sort of the philosophical approach definitely there there’s some of that and then there’s also just some of the feeling that I enjoy when I see art is I can do that as it was I’ll never be able to do that right like when I listen to a band who’s just cloaked behind marketing and and sort of unattainable veils I feel like I’ll never that’s something I’ll never be able to achieve they’re perfect they’re on a cloud making perfection and letting the world listen to it right and I’ll never be a part of that mm-hmm and I don’t want people to feel like that when they listen to our art I want them to feel like wow I could do that I feel like that’s a more inspiring feeling that’s a feeling that I appreciate when I see art that I like is a feeling of empowerment as opposed to belittlement I remember the first time that I heard Nirvana it was actually seeing the the music video for smells like teen spirit right and I remember my reaction was I can do that if there’s something about the way that it was presented and the way that it sounded was very the first time that I understood music is something that I could emulate now I actually couldn’t but I was under the illusion that I could and I think that was at least remote or something that was exciting that kind of drew me in I also think I can do what you guys can do no I cuz I can safely say that I don’t think that anything that you’ve ever seen in one of our videos is what you’re hearing I can safely say that we haven’t followed that philosophy but because I’m just thinking about how many how much footage you got to deal with are you guys what the number of takes that we owe you to sing something right yeah it would just be way too much footage in too much time it’s like I mean it’s frustrating enough for us to just go through the audio takes alone to add I don’t want to see myself struggling to hit that no yeah no well so I’m just wondering how you guys kind of keep it so fun and just light and cuz I know behind the scenes and this is this is like a challenge for us like I know there’s contracts and like negotiation business and lots of business and you know growing the channel and right and and okay more content and like right there’s all those pressures and and then yet when you tune in it’s funny and silly and how the F do you do that well it’s funny because you guys I think kind of remind me of Julian Smith you know he’s youtuber friend of ours who makes him incredible yeah he’s he’s make some incredible YouTube videos but he is how many sketches that look amazing he’s very much a filmmaker and he’s very methodical he’s I would say a perfectionist incredible artist so that everything that he does is is great and that’s how I see what you guys do it comes from an artistic conviction that if there’s not something struck within him that I hear you kind of articulate that there’s a chord within your you as an artist that has to be struck for you to continue to create right like we talked to him on your biscuits and one of the things he said was that there was a time when he kind of like last year he sort of stopped making videos because he felt like he was just like he didn’t have anything great to do on YouTube anymore and now he’s kind of back but he took this break and we were talking about however saying is we don’t have that chord know I guess what I’m saying I feel like we’re so practical not that we I mean I would say are we artists do we create that yes we we technically do that but we’re so practical that we’ve kind of created this like this is a this is what we do Monday through Friday we come into our studio we are gonna get this this and this done I mean we have engineering degrees both of us have an engineering degree so we don’t come from a very informed artistic background I think some of that there’s just this very practical approach the even that means sometimes we get ready to record our morning show good mythical morning and we are not in a good mood but we’re like this show is needs to be a Bryce button people’s day so let’s Center ourselves and let’s it’s not that we’re acting but it’s just like for this show even if I’m worried about this thing for this show I’m doing this we’re gonna be happy we’re gonna make each other laugh and that kind of thing yeah so I think it’s just it’s just a very practical approach that we just we’re not artistic enough I honestly I say we’re not artistic enough to get to the point where we would ever come to the conclusion like I I you know this doesn’t feel right so I’m gonna take a break hmm that’s just well I mean you know we’ve got a lot of we’ve got families and there’s a lot more at stake when there’s other people that’s true so that’s kind of a trump card but we also try to do other things at the same time that can be in a new creative challenge like doing your biscuits for us I’m not acting in any way I’m legitimately interested in you know who you guys are where you’re coming from what you’ve created because I’m a fan so for me this is kind of this is a creative outlet whereas you know maybe 15% of the time doing good mythical morning every single weekday for us is something that we I have to access something that I’m not feeling at the time so there’s you know it’s it’s performing right but it’s not so it’s creating in the moment but it’s not creating a whole album out of obligation I I certainly don’t think we could do that and I wouldn’t expect any great artists to do that you know you hear about people under contracts do I got to give Columbia Records another album like does that answer your question totally we’re not half the artists you are that’s why we’re talking to you I’m big to differ but well I want to find out you know I we we don’t have time to hear each of your entire life story but I want to find out the point in which your lives intersected and maybe some things that you think contributed to which we can kind of get into this the mentality that you have you know this this I would say it’s a it’s a pure artistic mentality that you bring to things that you had adopt a formula to bring to your your your work on YouTube and just as musicians in general I want to kind of find out what contributed to that yeah so how did you guys meet yeah well we were going to the same University and which was freshman Stanford Stanford I’ve heard of it [Music] so I was a freshman and Jack was a senior we’ve got a four-year disc discrepancy here that’s actually three because I was okay I was kind of read it agreed when I moved to France a different story um so he moved to France to redo a grade so people wouldn’t be like oh look at her she’s held back I’m about of France to do that great again I want to do this in French and see how different it is they’re great in France so you okay so you went to you did fifth grade in in America and you did fifth grade again in France which was better uh well France was less comprehensible for me because I didn’t speak French so that was why that was why I would I would um any class I didn’t understand first of all nobody spoke English in the whole school and I didn’t speak French and it was a little little country school where they would ring the bell to start classes and any time I couldn’t understand what was happening in the lesson they’d be like Natalie why don’t you go spend time with the kindergarteners and learn how to like write cursive and like play with puppets and so that was my second fifth year was well hanging out with French kindergarteners and then I learned French and then everything was great everything changed and then later on I did you stay in France like your parents yeah my parents were missionaries and so I was I was in France and Belgium from 10 to 18 and then okay well the formative years yes what flavor missionary are we talking about here Pentecostal evangelical okay Pentecostal Angelica picante I was trying to characterize it in a way that was like positivity what flavor Oh what flavor this surprising flavor spice of life comes with it so then at some point you decided and I would say that Pentecostal I would call that the spicy spicy you know reach out and bite you but you’ll be okay if it’s a snake you’ll be okay your parents were snake handling really good place okay French snake handlers got it so Stanford so then yes so then we met there I was I was opening for his band and he walked in and saw me playing the bass and singing as like solo solo I this is college so just picture me playing a bass you didn’t have a chance and it was over yeah literally it was like a it was kind of like smoky foggy in there Wow is this like tall beautiful girl on stage with this huge bass and bass and and just like so not a stand-up bass an electric bass electric bass and yes yes sorry yes it was an electric bass and I would play chords on it literally like we locked eyes and I literally like was looking at her for like four seconds just looking at me she says she doesn’t sing when she plays where her head is tilted down she like looks she’s looking at me and I’ll it was like one of those things where like I tripped over stuff and like and still I kept I contact and then leaned over to my ex-boyfriend right I didn’t know what was the next boyfriend and said he was like this was a relationship that you had ended kisses wow that’s amazing [Music] [Laughter] what were you singing I just you know just to just a girl with the bass alone singing boy Johnny Cash well no no no okay there were all things that I had written I figured out when I was when I was actually about eighteen that whenever I was writing songs I was hearing intertwining melodies and and so I asked my parents if they would get me a bass guitar because I wasn’t really hearing chords so much as melodies and so that I would play sort of meandering melodies and the so the vocal melody would sort of cross with the base melody and do you do it do you do this the same style and your solo stuff now um no not not really um but a bass is a really important way of how Jack and I write together yeah we basically Natalie will often write a melody in a bassline and I just kind of fill in the holes yeah really I wouldn’t put it that way I mean that’s often one way we one way we write that I feel like a lot of the time so what happens is you write a really cool chord progression and have an idea for a melody and say okay now now now write a really cool bassline right just write a bass line and then you sort of alter the you alter what you wrote to fit around the bass line right so is this an argument right now I think guys have our arguments you know how he did do they get heat it quantify that we never raise our voice our voices never grow things right okay never never raised voices never yell at each other but we do make each other sad sometimes as couples do right that’s a nice way to put it yeah yeah do you flee each other’s presence like I mean my wife and I when we we’ve kind of fixed it for the most part but early on in our relationship we would have these knock-down drag-out fights which would mean she would run and like into the garage and lock me out so like I couldn’t get to her anymore to have more of an argument Wow I would be trying to fix it and she would be trying to process dang that’s pretty that’s always intense she’s like just go away let me figure this out you guys don’t do that anymore no we don’t she doesn’t sequester herself we can’t we it’s not as heated it’s more right just let’s just talk this talk about it yeah we have we have cycles of upsetting each other to things that we’ve had to like sort of break break the cycle when we get into an argument like I would I’d say something that would unintentionally upset Jack and then he would get frustrated me and then I would ask him why he was upset and then he would say why he was upset and I’d apologize and be like oh I didn’t mean to upset you and I hold grudges and then he would take me along you wouldn’t get over it and then I would get angry at him for still being upset with me for something that I didn’t mean to upset him about and especially after you apologized friend she’s totally in the right here I was like very willing to admit that Natalie is the better person here like absolutely it takes me a little while to forgive I don’t know what that is but I hold on to it I just I have emotional inertia it just takes a while to like to breathe out of me right yeah so I just have to give him the space and and not I have to not get angry at him for still processing everything but he’s gotten a lot better at like processing things faster because of you because because I’ll do something really dickish and you’ll and then I’ll realize how much of a jerk I am and I’ll say I’m sorry and you’ll say that’s okay I know you love me and then you’re like happy and chipper and talking about already Rocking I’m like what the because I would be like me are you for like a day yeah okay so and all of this came out in the in that that first meeting I assume right yeah so the kisses taste like jazz what happened next we dated for a couple years and we we didn’t really collaborate on music because that’s kind of like the kiss of death for a relationship we started by collaborating on music and I didn’t when we broke up right and then we got back together and we’re like no more music and together not separately we could do music but we weren’t collaborating on and you were still at Stanford and you had graduated yes and what were you doing at the time uh I was doing a couple things I started off right after I graduate stuff as an SAT tutor mm-hm not really proud of that then I started working as doing background music for for Google actually I did like I was a in-house composer and and did like directed videos and things for them for their like in-house video production department really yeah and they offered because you had a filmmaking yeah agreeing a film yeah well I didn’t have a degree in film a degree in music okay I I was actually going to go to film school after college I got in I was ready to go MSC fine school at the very last minute I didn’t go because I was in hot band and i wanted to do music so I not complement the other different band I’d been and were you studying music also no I was I wasn’t planning on being a musician I was I don’t know what I was planning on being but I was definitely planning on doing something that made money and where I could actually have an income and and like a but you didn’t have a plan what was a major well I was I was majoring in art and mastering in French literature at the same time and and don’t don’t really know what I was planning on doing with that I think I was just planning on getting two degrees right and then doing something that was not related to either yeah so so then what you guys music broke up your relationship was more important so you did music separately it’s kind of a hobby you were kind of doing the the music job thing but yeah and then Jack started posting some of his stuff on YouTube or myspace first I thought you said but then YouTube when did you when did you 2007 and at that point he he thought that it would be really good for me to have a youtube channel too so he produced my first song for me but you had made the decision just as a couple we’re not gonna collaborate on music because that was devastating the first time right right yeah and then what what was it that made us start working on music together I think it was the response to that video yeah what was the first video you’re talking to owner on her channel that with this song you produced yeah we ended up posting it on my channel okay because I had more subscribers at the time and we wanted to get people over to my channel yeah yeah and and all my subscribers said like you know Jack really liked your music man but this is really good it’s like no offense jack but this is this is like we like this and what what was you in it no no I was I was in it playing he was playing all of the ants this video but Natalie but see what and you were but you kind of saw it as I’m a I’m like a producer and I’m playing some instruments and yeah and I’m in the video a little that’s her video for her things I just kind of did some production on it right and it plays was an original so this was one of my originals this was it sort of at the end of producing it though we felt we both felt like it would be weird to call it a nataly dawn song because I had messed it up so much or not mess it up but made it just something else there’s a lot of jack in it there was a lot of jack in it yeah and and so so we we when we posted it we didn’t even have a band name right no we didn’t have a band name until we wrote our first song together right which happened I guess about a month later you were in my my dorm room and you were playing the guitar and I just started singing over I sang a melody over the guitar line that he was playing and he said what’s that and I said I don’t know I just sang something and he was like I’ll keep going and so then we wrote our first song together and posted that very naturally yes like alright let’s have a meeting are we going to collaborate it was just like no what just keep playing that I keep singing it and it kept doing better than either of our solo projects I think the way we rationalized it was that it was it was a side project it wasn’t either of our remain focus then it started really taking off and we weren’t super prepared for that what they might were the mechanics of that like what song or video really popped for pop Lumos well and why did you call it Pomplamoose by the way because because we didn’t care we if we would have cared no it’s true I mean a friend of mine got back from France and we were talking about learning French and she told me that the funniest French word that she’d learned while she was there was Pomplamoose which means great fruit and I thought oh yeah that is a really weird word and then the next day Jack and I were like yeah let’s I guess we should have a band name what do you think about Pomplamoose oh yeah that’s good I guess there were no other suggestions for abandon it was there was not a single other suggestion so we just went with Pomplamoose I got the URL well it’s I mean it’s a good band I like fabulous I’m totally cool with it but it has an animal in it before all the hipster bands had animal names in their band I’m happy with the name too but it was an accident in it it was totally an afterthought and what popped single ladies single ladies yes that was the first one okay that was it yeah we we had 500,000 views overnight in 2009 when that was a lot of views Yeah right we went from 10,000 to 50,000 subscribers in months yeah couple and was that you know a lot of people that we we talked to we get the impression that they sort of were just kind of studying YouTube and kind of figuring out what would work and they’re like oh well if we do this this is gonna like what was the thought process behind saying we’re gonna do this we’re gonna cover single ladies yeah we produce a record for an incredible singer songwriter that I love named Julia Nunes and and I was one day into youtube I just typed the Beatles and her video popped up before any Beatles videos and I was like what yeah what is happening here and you already knew her I did know her you’re like that’s Julia is the Beatles result yeah and and that’s when I started learning about SEO and started thinking about covering songs and again this like people were covering songs back then but not like people are covering songs now I mean now like people just go through the iTunes top ten and they just crank him out like week after week in 2009 people were not doing that like cover songs was not a method like nobody was doing that there were some people who were covering pop songs but they weren’t like iTunes top ten it was like what songs do I like oh yeah like Mariah Carey song right and this old bela Fleck song and oh here’s a new one and I like the one that just came out on the radio I’ll do that one and then you know so so it wasn’t scaliness pandering to get views and now it very much is and you know I guess I feel bad about that we are partaking in that yeah I don’t know ah see I feel like it’s so important to be innovative and try something different and yet the system is optimized for SEO right it’s like we all know how the algorithms work yeah and ignoring it is honestly just shooting yourself in the foot like it really is I so it I’m not I haven’t figured out a way around it yet I would love to but yeah looks like but you found a way I mean not only would the fact the video format of the video song being this innovative creative expression but you found a way to do a cover of Beyonce or Michael Jackson or whoever the case may be that is very much uniquely your voices your the the pop lamu sound that I think that you know I mean I guess that was calculated but I mean that maybe that’s the redemptive aspect of it for you guys from an artists perspective yeah we don’t take a song and and not you know think about how to reharmonization it and and present it in a different size exactly we’re usually take one element of the song and then ditch everything else right so we’ll like take just the melody or just a chorus sometimes or we’ll combine pieces of songs that we like the course of this with the verse of that because they would work nicely together or the chords of this song with the verse melody of that’s right so yeah we usually just like take something and then we strip everything else away and I guess that makes it feel a little bit more creative yeah I tell ya I mean I definitely when you talk about it I see that just the way we talked about that the pure artistic approach did that pure artists in each one of you kind of has this like hesitancy to I well wish we didn’t have to do a cover song I wish we could just do the original things but at the same time like you feel like you’re apologizing almost yeah even here but in in and I feel like to kind of go back to the differences like the way that we think about it I think there is there is we definitely talk about how we want to be innovative we don’t we don’t want to do something that somebody else has done but we definitely sit around anything like if you want to you want to stay in this YouTube thing you have to look at those patterns and you have to adapt and you have to some people just flat-out just game the system game it and we don’t want to do this arms race but you have to take into account the reality and but the cool thing about what you guys do is you’re like man that was so there was something so innovative about that cover that wasn’t just a typical cover it it immediately draws you into the band and the originals you know it kind of moves you into that experience like oh what happened what else are these guys done because I can tell that they can write songs just because you know I can tell it there’s something else going on here this isn’t just somebody who has a producer good cover a good voice yeah thank you and I would go beyond that it’s like what I think we’re trying to convince you guys not to be great I would go step further and say that I mean you guys if it wasn’t for what you did I mean you look at the walk off the earth of the YouTube space now I think them being some of the you know the foremost most successful in that way of okay we’re taking this cover but we’re doing it in this extremely creative expression of it you know I haven’t talked to them about you guys but I have to assume that they wouldn’t they wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for you guys innovating in that way you know I think that it’s inspired people to be creative and there may be some gaming the system to it or working within the system but also doing that subject to your own yeah you know your own convictions so to speak I think it’s funny how how many sort of versions of the of the metaphor there really are four for the combination of gaming and true artistic creativity just in even in music when Natalie and I write music we think of a combination of tension and release right so like chords that sound nice and chords that sound a little like they’re not settled yet and then they settle and that’s nice and like having a balance of in and out and tension and release and gaming the system and not gaming the system and you know being creative and following the algorithm right you kind of have to apply in and out so you have every aspect of your business in your in your creativity because if you just if you’re if you are a hundred percent pure artists about it and you don’t do any you don’t at least acknowledge the system then you write beautiful songs that nobody ever hears yeah and that’s like one thing that we’re figuring out trying to figure out how to cope with is like okay we feel like a little bit ashamed but at the same time we you know we want people to hear our music because we’re proud of it mm-hmm you know and so so we feel like we owe it to ourselves to to take advantage of the things that we know how to do hey has anyone ever confronted you you know you seem to have this defensive stance but have you heard that from anybody totally really yeah like besides the comments because I mean like in face-to-face it’s mostly when we get lumped into the category of bands on YouTube oh yeah bands do great covering songs in YouTube but nobody can actually sell originals right nobody like none of them are actually songwriters they’re just car bands you know and then the listeners yeah like that whole media thing that yeah you know and the truth is like our original songs have just as many or more hits as some of our covers – um it’s not you know it’s just that you know people know us for the covers and that’s our own fault right we we made the covers it was that part of the you call it a burnout like that you guys that you guys experienced and when was that and what led to it was it was part of it like feeling like hamsters in a wheel if you want to do this you have to play this game and what led to the burnout it’s really hard to just pick out the juiciest most personal aspect of it and tell us about that juiciest most personal aspect of it what would that be what you’re actually thinking of I can think of a couple of pretty go for it one of them okay one of them was that both both Jack’s so Jack’s mom and my dad had cancer and were really sick and we were spending a lot of time dealing with cancer and the idea of writing fun pop material just wasn’t really speaking to either of us we were having trouble and and we even kind of associated Pomplamoose with the illness and a lot of ways it was it got I don’t know it was just that that’s probably the darkest element of it what do you mean I associated it with the illness I think because Jack’s mom liked Pomplamoose so much she she loved the band so much and and then her loss just sort of made it difficult to I guess appreciate the success of the band it was also sick for a long time so I have spent three years at you know at at her house you know and there there’s also an element of saria’s getting pretty heavy this is some heavy heavy stuff here but you know I I don’t regret the choice that I made of being of being there and being with my family and for three years everything else kind of stopped you no buts and I don’t regret that I’m I’m happy that that we did that but I couldn’t there I didn’t do much else in that time period and and and I feel really guilty about being angry about that too not to turn this into a therapy session but like I feel bad that that frustrates me right you know and so and all of that then gets wrapped in with Pomplamoose because it’s like I wasn’t able to do pop news I wasn’t out able to come out with videos weekly I had to be somewhere else and then I start feeling guilty that that makes me angry and all of that is wrapped inside pop loose in it yeah it imploded on itself so that was like twenty ten eleven and twelve or twelve thirteen nine ten and eleven okay I’m certain both of you guys who are going through that with nine ten so pretty much right when it was writing started right when I was getting started yeah okay and you were both going through that with a parent that’s what you said right I yeah my my dad’s my dad’s own this happened they were overlapping but a little bit later and it wasn’t quite as severe as Jack’s mom’s illness but yeah we were both we were both struggling with that and also the Pomplamoose business had been something that Jack was primarily running and that I wasn’t really taking the reins for during all of this and so that was frustrating as well I think you feeling like you were you were trying to you know pull the whole pull the whole thing and that we hadn’t really divided up roles successfully yeah and that’s something we that took a bit of time to figure out and now it’s a little better but we still have different like I’m I’m a total workaholic and and I just work like all the time and and Natalie like loves quality of life right and and at five likes to relax and and cook dinner and watch a TV show and write and like and that’s something I really need to do and and we do it’s it’s just it makes it does make the dynamic interesting and tough you know and and like that’s something that we talk about all the time is like is is our because I think well kind of what I do is almost like a healthy you know but but at the same time I feel you know like we like we got it I don’t know yeah I bet I feel like we’ve we’ve somehow managed to find some sort of a balance it’s good now it’s like it works well no it’s gotten so much better but it took several years of us figuring out our relationship and sort of actually rebuilding our relationship after Jack’s mom passed and and like oh you know before we could actually have a successful business on top of the relationship we had to have a strong relationship and now I feel like that now we’re there pomplamoose can take off again and do you feel that do you feel now that you know moving forward or now that you your musical careers are mortified by Papa moose and they are your individual careers separately for sure yeah I mean pomplamoose is is that is the yeah no one knows it’s my solo stuff I mean your solo stuff was taking off pretty pretty nicely though people people know me as half of Pomplamoose they don’t yeah but yeah you feel do you feel a need to for all the reasons that you said earlier to maintain the solo career because there that keeps things healthier there’s a separate outlet yeah it’s a different sort of expression yeah I think that there’s probably a good chance that that Pomplamoose will always you know sort of take take breaks it’s just it’s healthy to have other outlets of expression and to not always be working together right now we’re in a phase where we’re really excited to be working together and but you know after putting out an album and going on two or three times we might be ready to just sort of like go back to our separate studios and have dinner together but like not be working so closely together everyday and yeah we both kind of understand that and feel it out and um I think it was fortunate that for for the two years when we weren’t working on pomplamoose that we we were both good with focusing on our solo careers then it’s never it’s never like oh I really want to and the other person is like now in sync in that way yeah yeah so that’s that’s good so it sounds like this is the year of Coppola moose again yeah and are you are you talking about it that way on your channel yeah yeah we’re like um oh yeah yeah yeah like we’re calling the whole thing season 2 it’s like that was season 1 yep everything’s all done and now season 2 so what do we what can we look forward to what’s the what’s the plan what’s in the wings obviously more current covers but also we’ve recorded several originals okay so so that’ll be a combination of guilt right okay so what tension and release yes I like that analogy so how many originals do you have I think you already told us he had like six or so and then we’ve also got some some oldie covers that we’re kind of stoked about like five or six older covers and then we’ll be releasing recording and releasing timely we call them timely covers chart-toppers yes as we go on and promote the album and then a tour in the fall and then probably a European tour after that and then possibly another US tour after that so that the first portion of the year up till fall is going to be about releasing new material new videos and then after that it’s going to be about playing live for the rest of these for the rest of the now have you ever when you were touring before did you guys plan this much ahead of time like a year like this is here so this is the most significant sort of strategy that you’ve ever implemented yeah yeah we figured a lot of stuff out I feel like it’s so it’s so weird to look back and think about how little we understood when we when when Fame just sort of landed in our laps we were not expecting it yeah it’s a particular type of yeah thing yeah yes yeah next thing you know you’re in a car commercial what car commercial was it Hyundai we did Toyota but we weren’t acting in the Toyota no loyalty so you did a song or was it a cover that you guys did or were they originals they all covers in both commercials Toyota was mr. Sandman Hyundai was all Christmas songs yeah when was Christmas themed right yeah yeah three hundo and so and how was that for the the artists within because you know it doesn’t mean you know doing a commercial we really don’t feel that bad about commercials I actually have a thing about like I think a lot of people pegged me for for a hipster and like I’m I know corporations like I’m like not about that at all I’m total I think brand integrations are like one of the best ways for artists to make money I’d so much rather have a brand pay me to write a song than a record label because the brand isn’t gonna tell me what BPM is to write the song at right they’re not gonna get and say we don’t like that lyric the brands like okay and then they put it out yeah like they’re not dipping their toes in my creative pot whereas the label is when a brand gives you money you don’t have to pay it back to this that’s right yeah it’s not indentured servitude yeah Brant I’m just glad to hear that you’re not you don’t feel bad about that – oh yeah but you’re focusing your go really I got a magnifying glass trust me we’ve sold out many times over I actually I love I have a video from 2009 that I posted it’s a vlog where I’m like not it’s not like begging but I’m basically like saying brands like like there’s all these creative people making videos like use us like pay us to make cool stuff and do thoughtful integrations like you know if you whatever like the wine thing with Hanan and you know my drunk kitchen like that’s a beautiful integration it makes sense it’s native it’s it’s just awesome and like that’s a great way for the it’s a win for the wine company it’s a win for my drunk kitchen it’s just awesome and and I was trying to explain this in the video and now it’s like I feel like it’s brands are really doing this like there’s so many integrations now and there and a lot of them are natural some are as natural but I’m so thrilled about that it’s so much better than signing a crummy contract and giving away your your you know future revenue for 10 years and the thing about Hyundai especially was that when they came to us first of all I got an email I thought it was a joke I opened up the email and it was probably two lines and said hey writing you on behalf of Hyundai like your videos was wondering if you guys ever thought of being on television being on television on television and it was for real it was for real sure what are the details here’s my lawyer you know and they go back crazy person and and they wanted us to make music they wanted us to cover public domain songs which we would then own we own those songs so we get to sell them and you know put them on an EP which we did and we did an entire album we didn’t sell them we gave them away and raised about a hundred and thirty thousand dollars for in charity or after the after the Hyundai campaign for four books so different school district yeah and but so so we got to make the music we got to film the videos at home with a very very little intervention from them in terms of them even being in the room they gave us nice cameras but then they just sort of backed out and then I got to edit the commercials just like I edit all of our video songs and so really just felt like making three very short Pomplamoose videos and that they were gonna buy the airtime for ya is like hey can we put my videos on television yes yes sometimes it all works out beautiful it was awesome yeah I wish we got more stuff like that yeah okay so last question from me at least I don’t know how many questions you have if you could have anyone cover your song an original song and feel guilty about it who would it be anyone Tom Waits hmm really yeah drop that voice on it yeah yeah Tom Waits Tom Waits if it if I’m gonna get into Tom Waits what album should I buy first cuz I’m still an album guy rain dogs rain rain dogs do GS dogs yeah two words two words rain dogs Wow he’s he sounds like an 85 year old hermit and he’s 32 you know but the smart thing about singing like that is you always sound good no matter how old you get when you start singing like right yeah we saw Kris Kristofferson with Merle Haggard at the Greek and Merle didn’t hold up as well as Christmas table person cuz Chris was kind of always that Sunday morning coming down kind of place yeah so it’s pretty works it was pretty great it’s a good strategy what about you Natalie if anyone were to cover one of our songs cash and feel guilty about it I do it who should it be I’d hope for I would honestly I’d be happy if someone like like Beyonce covered our songs that’s what is grip yeah which song huh which song I don’t know single ladies that was a really good I think she’s done it’s a great video would never work in the genre of R&B alright well this is uh it’s been fabulous and great we would ask you to sign the we actually get people to sign the table but since this is a hotel room table I mean you could our credit card is going to be held responsible I have to say this is a very weird thing I feel like you guys know so much about us really and and yeah it’s usually now dimly lit so it doesn’t feel as weird okay I feel like our sole interview us no we don’t know you guys well we’ll be on your podcast yeah yeah next episode you have a psyche assed will be your first guys and there it was our hotel based conversation with Pomplamoose could you feel the relationship blossoming with them over the course of the conversation you mean the cop their relationship with each other their romantic relationship no their relationship with rhettandlink I feel like we were we really became friends you know having never had a conversation except for that one that was recorded for the ear biscuit family they connected well with me but let me know and all I got to do is connect well with one of us and then the other one get the other one gets in automatically I’m just kidding I thought they liked me I think they made equal eye contact with you so I mean you know and I think maybe our relationship who knows well you know I will say and I love it when this happens and it happens on a pretty regular basis and it just reminds me that why I love doing this show and that is after we got through that conversation Jack and Natalie said you know what we didn’t know we were gonna end up talking about some of that stuff you know even the stuff with their parents cancer and they had they hadn’t really you know it’s not that it’s not public but they hadn’t talked about it in that way before in a setting like this yeah I’m glad they felt comfortable talking to us because we’re such good for yes yeah yeah and so you know maybe you know maybe the next time I go into the DJ voice I will be introducing some sort of collaborative musical thing yet haven’t you I mean we’re such good friends we could write a song about friendships we could write a song about two guys who are friends who were friends with a couple who sing together yeah it’s a great relationship that we’re in with a couple relationship my relationship with a couple I I think that that is probably a book third and fourth wheel but I bringing up the rear yeah I think we should probably not try to write songs just in the moment on ear biscuits I think we should think about things before we try to do that again but I unabashedly on the fact that ear biscuits is our ploy to befriend even more people who are we who are interesting on the Internet and hopefully you feel like you are forging a friendship along with us that you’re sitting at the table with us or in the hotel room if we happen to be filming from somewhere Elser let us know what you thought about this ear biscuit a great way to do that it helps us out a lot is if you leave a review on iTunes if you leave a comment on SoundCloud that helps us out a lot continues to send those are the ear biscuits up and where other people can discover it another thing you could do to help people discover it is just tweet the link that we share we always share a link over on our tumblr page which also goes to our Twitter and our Facebook and you can just use the hashtag ear biscuits and share that with your friends so everyone could enjoy the biscuits yeah thanks thanks for your help there also tweet at poplu moose pump la moose how your spellings pop blah moose let him know what you thought that she appreciated the friendship ization yeah and if you want to say that you know rhettandlink are really big fans they’re probably gonna listen to this but you know you can remind them on Twitter and you can talk about we need to musically collaborate to guys the friend in a couple we’re in a Quadra ship with Tom for a move first of all we should probably consult our wives before we start a consequence to their Quadra ship we got in similes you know what we should just go maybe we should do a triple date I think that’s what it should be that would make it a lot less awkward why are we not have why we thought about that until right now just triple date with our wives or Papa moves could keep our kids and we could just go on a double date No or we could each just date our wives separately but I get my wife right yep you can help your wife I’ll have my wife Jack and Natalie we’ll keep our children and then they’ll write a song for us and then when we get back we’ll record it our kids this is a good relationship with Papa and blues we should just break up on a date where that wives I like the this sort of the lounge singer directionless vibe that the song that we know that we’re gonna co-write with Papa Luis is taking off since none of the music sounds like that but we’re gonna be a Vegas act with them this sounds good okay all right thanks for ear biscuiting with us here you next week [Music] [Music]