The Best Show on WFMU

Stopped myself posting here today when I was paying the critique of Alec Baldwin interviewing Woody Allen. This show is like Tom venting his worst impulses. Maybe Best Show is the better for it. You can imagine the other guys making fun of him for all the negativity.

(was about newest "Double Threat")

I'm not on the Best Show Facebook, but I heard that Mike was trying to hush police abolition talk because it could hurt Biden beating Trump

That was a few days ago. I see now it's spilled over to Twitter..... Hiatus? Dang

hooooo boy the mike/fred/fb group friction is... something

mike tweeted to the effect of "stop being radical or trump will win again" and ppl got mad and he doubled down in a pretty shit way

the fb group got into arugments about it, which is incidentally like 80% white dudes, some agreeing, some disagreeing, some (and tbh the loudest/most angry minority) saying "TOM SAID THE SHOW ISN'T POLITICAL, KEEP POLITICS OUT OF THIS GROUP" which is hilarious because while tom keeps it immplicit it absolutely is a *political* show (albeit not a "politics" show). fred posted on the fb group for the first time... ever maybe? and read everyone for absolute fucking filth, which was fair, and let slip that there's a SECOND, SECRET best show fb group just for BIPOC/women/trans/nb ppl bc the main group is such Bad Company (lol) (also, incidentally, the name of the group) which made a few white guys mad also. it has been a series of temper tantrums and meltdowns since then. i don't think tom saw all of that but he must have seen mike's descent on twitter and yeah it was ugly. idk how many people unsubbed simply due to mike's comments (unsubbed as in the podcast, the patreon, the group, everything) but it's more than a couple. everyone's so mad. i've just been reading and kinda shaking my head and occasionally clowning the poor boys who can't make the same dave grohl "THAT GUYS EFFIN AWESOME" joke every 48 hours. why am i even on facebook jesus christ

Abolish social media

Thank you for that, Will, cuz there's no way I'm going to look into any of this stuff. If this is to be believed, there hasn't been a big loss of Patreon subs yet. I noticed Tom tweet that Patreon money is going to go to charity while the show is on hiatus, and he is still going to make some subscriber-only content.

So this has got nothing to do with the other "WFMU" thread here, and that meltdown? What other "non political" media has gone to shit this month? Might be worth a thread.

There's been a consistent culture clash between the pre- and post-Steven Universe fans. I mean, I'll be clear: Mike was completely wrong, dumb, and aggressive with his take, but I genuinely think he meant no harm and thought he caused no harm while talking down to a bunch of people who take his words as real harm. But it wasn't the show, and I don't think the hiatus is punishment as much as necessary to save the possibility of Scharpling-hosted comedy radio in the future. He's got PLENTY going on and doesn't need joking with his old friend Mike to be salt in anyone's wounds, so leave it for another time.

I forgot to mention that Mike is in the FB group too and was vvvv much stirring the pot

I'm far enough behind on the show (ran the gamut on FMU but still only about a year and change into the independent iteration) that I didn't even realize Tom had a Patreon until this thread hipped me. Well, I just pitched in to make up for the dumm oafs who are bailing out.

"So this has got nothing to do with the other "WFMU" thread here, and that meltdown?"

Well, Laurie from Miami, whose contributions since her return have primarily been about trash television and how sexually evolved she is, is tweeting about it, having decided that WFMU is worse than Conde Nast and must be destroyed, but no one is responding at all. No word on where the producers of Vanderpump Rules stand on BLM.

Abolish social media

― A White, White Gay (cryptosicko)

I wanted to love Double Threat but it just felt a bit lazy, like let's just read the news and bag on everyone.

I feel the same way, wish I liked it more but I feel like its the kind of podcast Tom would have made fun of 6-7 years ago - two comedians just kind of aimlesly riffing on and on until they bump into something funny. Although if there's an ongoing Best Show drought I suppose I'll find a way to get on board

I'm trying the Woody Allen episode of Double Threat, and a huge amount of it is just the two of them making fun of him by making general quacking noises in a "Woody Allen voice".

8PM EST. It's our country, too. pic.twitter.com/Xob2XXGGjb

— The Best Show (@bestshow4life) November 2, 2020

!!

do we know that it's not another "Bests"?

Whoa.

I'm still fairly behind and only just listened to the 2016 election show a little while back. It was...triggering.

wasn't that the fake "vintage" show?

Yeah, the conceit that started breaking down halfway through as reality began to intrude.

Jason said on FB that it's a new ep tonight

Yeah, the conceit that started breaking down halfway through as reality began to intrude.

Honestly one of the most astounding acts of broadcasting ever.

indeed

a completely amazing hall of fame feat that i can never bring myself to listen to ever again

It's funny that this new episode comes almost exactly (+/- 2 days) 23 years after the original broadcast of the OG Rock, Rot & Rule episode which brought Tom from a regional audience to a national audience, and here 23 years later Tom has basically morphed from "Tom the straight guy" into a more basic Ronald Thomas Clontle.

i mean he's still the straight guy in wurster calls. everyone's fine with him talking shit about billy joel for years and years but they get awfully touchy when it's steely dan's turn

i haven't really been listening to any podcasts but i was excited to listen to the show live last week and then all i got was 20 minutes of him talking to the oreo lady before i had to turn it off

I just find his taste in music so difficult to parse. I don't mind him hating on Steely Dan, but I'm kinda amazed that he seems to like Car Seat Headrest. Like, really?

his appearance on analyze phish was v frustrating and the less i hear him talk about music the better. steely dan shits on billy joel from a great height, i say this as someone who listened to every record by both lol

lol yeah i did a double take when he mentioned car seat headrest too

tbh the thing i miss most from the 'old days' is the music talk, even if his taste is hard to parse and sometimes infuriating i'd rather hear him argue about records with people than talk about oreos or whatever 10 times out of 10

matador probably sponsors the show or at least sends him records to play

yeah ive assumed that since he left fmu he cant afford blanket broadcast licensing with ascap/etc and must have worked out individual deals with merge/matador/whoever else

Fair play and I don't blame him, but even within Matador I feel like there's better stuff to hype than Car Seat Headrest.

first time hearing that band tbqh, can't remember a thing about it other than the name.

my musical taste aligns with his pretty closely but he does have some odd opinions that don't gibe with my own. my problem with "call in and defend steely dan" isn't that i think steely dan is perfect but that it's a boring concept for a show. people have been arguing about steely dan for like 50 years, what else is there to say at this point? but maybe it's funny, i haven't listened yet.

It's not. That's the real problem with it.

i'd rather hear him argue about records with people than talk about oreos or whatever 10 times out of 10

― turn the jawhatthefuckever on (One Eye Open), Wednesday, November 18, 2020 3:58 PM (thirteen minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

100x otm

or candy bars wgaf?

his musical taste seems to have evolved on a pretty similar path to other aging indie rock/underground dudes from his cohort ive seen, where they end up listening to three basic categories:

-classic rock stuff they liked as a kid but spent their 20s and 30s hating/being embarrassed by
-albums by friends (or friends' labels)
-a random dartboard of new stuff that makes them feel like theyre not totally unplugged from whats happening (Lana Del Rey, etc)

(I'm a bit younger than him but not exempting myself from this eventual path)

i think of this genre as “journalist rock” i.e. when some blogger you really like decides to do a youtube embed because it’s Friday and you’re like..... oh no

I stopped listening to the Best Show a while back because I got tired of Tom's incessant whining about how underappreciated he is. I realize that's at least partially a bit, but it just got too tedious. And I was a big enough fan to have pre-ordered the Scharpling & Wurster box set.

okay, I *finally* got to the end of the show and admit I laughed more than I thought I would at his cover of "Deacon Blues". Wish Drag City would have used Tom's vox on the Callahan/Oldham/MacKay cover from a few days ago.

And also, he's right: Just listen to Can instead.

Yeah that was funny. Easily the best bit of the show.

I'm not sure who but a basic RTC couldn't written RTC... but your revive made me laugh, Al

could've*

I mean, he’s basically evolved into the Wurster “Musical Scholar” character who evolves into repping Limp Bizkit.

Really enjoyed his rant in last week’s episode about how people should be getting less conservative the older they get.

ITT we complain about the Best Show being the Best Show I guess?

Show would be great if Tom would stop complaining and if that one guy would stop calling for half an hour at a stretch pretending to be different people who somehow all have the same voice.

i think of this genre as “journalist rock” i.e. when some blogger you really like decides to do a youtube embed because it’s Friday and you’re like..... oh no

rude to call out Drew Magary like that

social media suggests tom and terre aren't together anymore and he's with a different woman now? i haven't listened to the best show in a long time, has he discussed this at all?

no. he went out of his way to avoid ever referring to his marriage before, i would doubt he would discuss it now

kinda figured as much since he's been in LA for over a year now and hasn't mentioned Terre or Dogmo even in passing in about as long or longer, but yeah, it would be out of character for him to mention anything about it directly on the show since he had (has?) that running gag about being married to Jillian Barbarie for so long to shield against personal talk.

I also just assumed this was the case because of the move

His new squeeze posts a fair deal of him/them on her IG.