The Montreal arts & entertainment podcast takes a break from our usual programming and invites Scott MacIver (from our other show 9ES) to talk about sports! We’re a Montreal sports show now! I’ll be totally up front though, about 95% of the sports talk is hockey centric. Scott and Chris talk a little about football and baseball towards the end there but we love in Montreal and this is a hockey town so this is kind of a hockey podcast.

Deal with it!

The three of us break down the first 25% of the season for our beloved Montreal Canadiens who are quickly becoming one of the most exciting iterations of this team that we’ve had in recent memory. We also spend a good chunk of time celebrating the woes of the Toronto Maple Leafs. We all knew the wheels were going to come off but so far it’s been even more dramatic than even my wildest predictions.

We talk about Team Canada, which Habs might make the cut for not only Team Canada but who else will be heading to Milan for their respective countries and Scott pretty much fixes the All-Star game.

We close things off talking about the Milwaukee Brewers and Chris proclaims the MLB playoffs and World Series to be the most entertaining post-season in sports.

Sports!

As always, a big thank you to the providers of our theme song: Leighland Beckman and Aural Turpitude!

Chris Venditto is another funny person in Montreal who you can see all over the place and if you don’t want to miss him take the stage you should follow him on all the socials. He’s @chrisvenditto on Twitter and Instagram so you should follow him on those two things. He also produces shows with the guys at Perfect Bite Productions who you should also follow on Instagram and on Facebook.

Keith does all sorts of things here on 9to5.cc, he works with the other founders on 9to5 (illustrated), co-hosts our two podcasts: The 9to5 Entertainment System and Go Plug Yourself and sometimes blogs here as The Perspicacious Geek.

The post Go Plug Yourself 325: “Sports!” appeared first on 9to5 (dot cc).

So the Trump administration has reversed their decision on not releasing the Epstein Files despite the possibility of a photo of… checks notes… “Trump blowing Bubba.” I can’t really be excited by any of this since I’m pretty sure if they’re releasing the files they’ve already scorched any ties that the orange man might have had with the pervert anyways.

I guess we shall see.

So Paul McCartney joined a bunch of other British artists to release an anti-AI album and it’s one part protest and one part tricking and misleading the algorithm. The fact that they are apparently also releasing the album on vinyl is somewhere between hilarious and insane.

Anyhow, Keith played all the way through 2022’s “Stray” and Jon watched Guillermo Del Toro’s Frankenstein. Those are two things that happened so we talk about them.

Finally, Dave Mustaine from Megadeth wants Megadeth’s last show to be actually in space and I really want that to happen. That is all.

Meanwhile on a brand new episode of Garbage Time we talk about the phenomenon aphantasia and discuss how Jon most likely actually has it. That’s right, it’s a 30 minute conversation that is mostly about how the three of us process information and remember things. I don’t know if this is peak garbage content or possibly the best Garbage Time we’ve ever recorded. We read a bunch of quotes from this article on CTV that references a lot of the actual studies on the topic.

If you would like to show your support and head over to Patreon and subscribe at the 9ES Deluxe tier to listen to this and all past episodes of Garbage Time that would be appreciated.

Our intro song is a brand new jam cooked up by OKU-DA just for us, do yourself a favour and check out his SoundCloud).

The post 9ES350: Small Fries appeared first on 9to5 (dot cc).

The Montreal arts & entertainment podcast that asks singer-songwriter Lou Laurence: “What makes baseball so romantic?” That question asked by Pascal Girard back in our last episode.

Lou Laurence is an incredibly talented (and funny) performer who you may even recognize from her last appearance on this podcast promoting her Fringe Show “Love, Sharks & Frenching“. Well she’s just released her first album “Montréal Romantic” and you can listen to it pretty much everywhere you stream music. You can even buy the album digitally on Bandcamp if you’re a really good person.

Lou Laurence joined Troy Stark and I at the back of Grumpy’s to talk about producing her first album, how thin the wall is between her and her neighbour and generally all the ups and downs of living and loving in the wonderful city of Montreal. Sudden snow storms, transit strikes and all.

Troy Stark also steps up as full co-host for this one because Walter “flaked” on the episode in a move that I’m sure was not prompted by the metro strike. Thank you Troy!

Oh hey, there’s never been a better time to tell someone about Go Plug Yourself than right now – we’re proud that Go Plug Yourself was selected to be part of Acast’s Indie Amplifier selections for November – check us out on Amazon Music Canada.

Enjoy the show!

As always, a big thank you to the providers of our theme song: Leighland Beckman and Aural Turpitude!

Keith does all sorts of things here on 9to5.cc, he works with the other founders on 9to5 (illustrated), co-hosts our two podcasts: The 9to5 Entertainment System and Go Plug Yourself and sometimes blogs here as The Perspicacious Geek.

Troy Stark is yet another amazing Montreal comedian and promoter who indulges me in co-hosting this wonderful little show of ours. You can catch him pretty often at the World’s Smallest Comedy Night and Cheap Laughs at Rustik Pub, both of which he produces.

The post Lou Laurence – GPYS 324 appeared first on 9to5 (dot cc).

Two out of three of us are dads here on 9ES. When is it ok to show Zach Cregger’s Weapons to your kid? 12? 13 years old?

When is it ok to show Thanatomorphose to your kid? Probably never?

Weapons was pretty great and I can’t wait for Jono to watch Barbarian so we can dutifully compare and contrast. If Zach Cregger was a recording artist, Weapons would be an excellent second album. Which we know from many, many subpar sophomore albums is still quite the accomplishment. Barbarian is still the original though, the first break out into the world of horror film making and I think Weapons may suffer slightly from having too many echoes of Barbarian to truly break out and stand on its own.

Still definitely worth the watch though, don’t get me wrong.

As you do towards the end of October we watched a bunch of other horror movies. Scott showed Prince of Darkness to his kid which is exciting, while I watched Oddity, Wolf Man and started into Welcome to Derry. Tis the season after all. Finally we wonder out loud if Stephen King is the most recognizable author on the planet.

We will return to (slightly) less horror-centric content next episode probably. Maybe.

Meanwhile on a brand new episode of Garbage Time we talk about Stephen King some more while we talk about Edgar Wright’s upcoming take on The Running Man. Keith has made it to The Trial of Magneto as he plows through Marvel’s Krakoan Age and that leads us to talk about the X-Men.

If you would like to show your support and head over to Patreon and subscribe at the 9ES Deluxe tier to listen to this and all past episodes of Garbage Time that would be appreciated.

Our intro song is a brand new jam cooked up by OKU-DA just for us, do yourself a favour and check out his SoundCloud).

The post 9ES 349: Fred Savage & Harvey Keitel appeared first on 9to5 (dot cc).

The Montreal arts & entertainment podcast that asks comic book artist Pascal Girard: “What’s your positive vision for the future?” That question was asked in our last episode by Annie and Scout from CULT PLAY.

Chris Venditto and I were excited to host cartoonist Pascal Girard on this week’s episode of Go Plug Yourself.

Pow Pow is bringing the English translation of Pascal Girard’s latest book “Pastimes” next week.

From Pow Pow:

“From encounters with would-be swingers at the dog park to ferocious felines at the local cat cafe, in these short, snappy comic strips Pascal Girard delivers snippets inspired by his daily life, with a bittersweet humour that’s sometimes mocking, sometimes tender, but always deeply observant. Pastimes is a funny and surprisingly moving portrait of passing time in the modern world, one comic at a time.”

We talk about being obsessed with death, what it’s like to let a translator become your voice, surfing and the Blue Jays making us cry.

If you’re in the area you can check out the official launch party at Librairie D&Q on November 7th and Pascal Girard and other Pow Pow artists will be at the Read Quebec book fair on December 6th and 7th at Casa d’Italia.

Oh hey, there’s never been a better time to tell someone about Go Plug Yourself than right now – we’re proud that Go Plug Yourself was selected to be part of Acast’s Indie Amplifier selections for November – check us out on Amazon Music Canada.

Enjoy the show!

As always, a big thank you to the providers of our theme song: Leighland Beckman and Aural Turpitude!

Chris Venditto is another funny person in Montreal who you can see all over the place and if you don’t want to miss him take the stage you should follow him on all the socials. He’s @chrisvenditto on Twitter and Instagram so you should follow him on those two things. He also produces shows with the guys at Perfect Bite Productions who you should also follow on Instagram and on Facebook.

Keith does all sorts of things here on 9to5.cc, he works with the other founders on 9to5 (illustrated), co-hosts our two podcasts: The 9to5 Entertainment System and Go Plug Yourself and sometimes blogs here as The Perspicacious Geek.

The post Pascal Girard (Pastimes) – GPYS 323 appeared first on 9to5 (dot cc).

Tron is a weird franchise and Tron: Ares just continues the weirdness. From what I’ve read, none of the three movies were considered hits for Disney. But somehow three of them have been made and they made a really expensive roller coaster to celebrate the franchise in Disneyworld. Hard to figure out the actual numbers but allegedly it was in the same price range as the Guardians of the Galaxy: Cosmic Rewind ride and that cost $500 million USD.

That’s a lot of money for Tron.

So, Tron: Ares.

OG Tron:

Budget $17 million

Box office $50 million[1]

Tron: Legacy:

Budget $170 million[5][6]

Box office $409.9 million[6]

Tron: Ares

Deadline Hollywood reported a total cost of $347.5 million, including production and advertising, for the film and estimated that it ultimately should lose over $132 million.

Whoopsie!

Meanwhile, you know what else involved a lot of money? The Riyadh Comedy Festival.

We didn’t have the Marc Maron quote on the show, but here it is in all its glory:

“I mean, how do you even promote that? “From the folks that brought you 9/11. Two weeks of laughter in the desert, don’t miss it!” I mean, the same guy that’s gonna pay them is the same guy that paid that guy to bone-saw Jamal Khashoggi and put him in a fucking suitcase. But don’t let that stop the yuks, it’s gonna be a good time!”

You’re a legend Mr. Maron.

Meanwhile on a brand new episode of Garbage Time you won’t believe it but Jon and Keith talk more about Silksong! For the last time! Both of them are sitting at 100% game completion so they finally get it all out of their system… until the inevitable DLC is released. Keith also went to the Pounding the Pavement exhibit on now at the McCord Museum in Montreal (until October 26 so you’re probably already too late) and Scott wrestled a coyote.

If you would like to show your support and head over to Patreon and subscribe at the 9ES Deluxe tier to listen to this and all past episodes of Garbage Time that would be appreciated.

Our intro song is a brand new jam cooked up by OKU-DA just for us, do yourself a favour and check out his SoundCloud).

The post 9ES348: Close To The Vest appeared first on 9to5 (dot cc).

The Montreal podcast that asks playwright Scout Rexe and director Annie Valentina from CULT PLAY: What is the biggest hurdle in your creative process? That question asked back in episode 321 by Lucie Gee and Costs Tsimiklis from Le Grand Yes And festival.

CULT PLAY from Imago Theatre is having its world premiere at the Segal Center next week (tickets and showtimes here) and honestly it sounds like an incredible production. Playwright Scout Rexe (or Sax as their friends call them) got sucked into cult documentaries during the pandemic and began to wonder what it would take for them to be sucked into a cult. That thought process lead to the creation of CULT PLAY which Annie Valentina brings to life on stage.

From Imago Theatre:

Alex meets a captivating woman who is everything she’s ever wanted. Taylor opens the door to a thrilling new world… but what if it’s all a trap?

Cult Play immerses the audience in Alex’s journey and the seductive power of belonging. In revealing her dark archive, Alex invites you to step into a thought experiment that questions the boundaries between voyeur and participant.

Queer, enticingly playful and unapologetically bold, Cult Play is a multimedia solo show that explores the complex interplay of desire and deception, complicity and choice.

Annie and Scout joined Chris Venditto at the back of Grumpy’s to talk about CULT PLAY, politics and the importance of queer voices in art and so much more. So sit back, relax and enjoy the show.

Go Plug Yourself everybody!

As always, a big thank you to the providers of our theme song: Leighland Beckman and Aural Turpitude!

Chris Venditto is another funny person in Montreal who you can see all over the place and if you don’t want to miss him take the stage you should follow him on all the socials. He’s @chrisvenditto on Twitter and Instagram so you should follow him on those two things. He also produces shows with the guys at Perfect Bite Productions who you should also follow on Instagram and on Facebook.

Keith does all sorts of things here on 9to5.cc, he works with the other founders on 9to5 (illustrated), co-hosts our two podcasts: The 9to5 Entertainment System and Go Plug Yourself and sometimes blogs here as The Perspicacious Geek.

The post CULT PLAY w/ Scout Rexe & Annie Valentina – GPYS 322 appeared first on 9to5 (dot cc).

Credit where credit is due: We did not cook up the “firewatch challenge” but rather Scott listened to them do it over on the Confused Breakfast podcast and thought it was a good idea. And guess what, it was!

I went into the exercise thinking I might make a few bold choices here and there but at the end the day I think we all more or less decided to stick to comfort food. Movies we’ve watched over and over again already and safe bets to keep our mental sanity in check for 12 months of relative isolation.

It probably won’t surprise you that a number of films on The List feature pretty prominently although there are some glaring absences. Also, if you listened to last episode’s Garbage Time you’ll remember that 1999 might be the best year ever in cinema and that holds true here as well.

To remind you, here are the rules for our take on the “Firewatch Challenge”:

We each have been assigned to an isolated fire tower in Northern Quebec.

We can “rent” one movie a month and it will be the only thing we can watch on our crummy little televisions.

If we try to rent the same movie as one of the other hosts the other hosts will sub in a movie they deem to be close enough.

There are no special features on any of the movies.

We have access to a “little bit” of weed if we want it, but only really in the summer months.

Wrestling Pay-Per-Views are allowed.

Meanwhile on a brand new episode of Garbage Time you won’t believe it but Jon and Keith talk more about Silksong. Keith took a bit of a break and Jon is definitely right at the end game. We also take a look at the White Wolf 5th Edition Humble Bundle deal that’s going on right now.

If you would like to show your support and head over to Patreon and subscribe at the 9ES Deluxe tier to listen to this and all past episodes of Garbage Time that would be appreciated.

Our intro song is a brand new jam cooked up by OKU-DA just for us, do yourself a favour and check out his SoundCloud).

The post 9ES347: FIRE MOVIE BURN appeared first on 9to5 (dot cc).

Interviewing Mick Foley back in 2012 was crazy. We had been doing this show for less than a year at the time and the circumstances of sitting down with the Hardcore Legend at 3:00 in the morning still blow my mind.

But we did it.

The fact that in the ensuing 13 years Walter would go on to hang out with Mick Foley multiple times, including opening for him a few years back at the Montreal Comiccon is extra crazy.

We’ve gone from a few hundred (if we were lucky) downloads a month to several thousand. We’ve grown as a show and having amazing guests like Mick Foley definitely helped put us on the map.

I don’t think I’ll ever get over being allowed to just set up a computer at a Just for Laughs party and record with whoever wanted to chat. The other crazy thing is that at the time of recording Walter and I were both still in our 20s and Mick was in his 40s. Time flies.

Anyways, the more things change, the more things stay the same. Mick Foley is back in Montreal returning to the historic Café Cleopatra TOMORROW NIGHT October 2nd. As of recording this episode there are still some tickets available so get them now! Multiple tiers of tickets available now at Eventbrite.

Enjoy this blast from the past!

PS: That lovely illustration of Mick is from 2013 when Sophie got to meet Mick Foley and had uh… dreams about him.

As always, a big thank you to the providers of our theme song: Leighland Beckman and Aural Turpitude!

Keith does all sorts of things here on 9to5.cc, he works with the other founders on 9to5 (illustrated), co-hosts our two podcasts: The 9to5 Entertainment System and Go Plug Yourself and sometimes blogs here as The Perspicacious Geek.

Walter J. Lyng is a stand-up comedian based out of Montreal, you should follow him on Twitter @wallygoodtimes and on Facebook: Walter J. Lyng

The post GPYS Rewind: Mick Foley (2012) appeared first on 9to5 (dot cc).

I guess we’ll never know whether or not Disney suspended Jimmy Kimmel just to make some noise and piss people off or something but boy is it a wild time for free speech.

You know you’re getting pretty crazy when Joe Rogan looks at what you’re doing and is like “yeah – this is a little crazy.” Ted Cruz and Joe Rogan being voices of reason is a pretty clear sign you’ve done something pretty messed up.

Anyways, free speech reigns forever on the 9to5 Entertainment System!

They will never silence our right to… umm.. Talk about the Spiderman movie from 25 years ago? Never I say!

Jono watched the James Gunn Superman flick and I think we will only probably talk about it once more after Scott watches it. I still don’t understand how Scott hasn’t watched Peacemaker yet, but that’s another story.

We also finish up setting the rules for the “Firewatch Challenge” and I’m going to type them out here:

We each have been assigned to an isolated fire tower in Northern Quebec.

We can “rent” one movie a month and it will be the only thing we can watch on our crummy little televisions.

If we try to rent the same movie as one of the other hosts the other hosts will sub in a movie they deem to be close enough.

There are no special features on any of the movies.

We have access to a “little bit” of weed if we want it, but only really in the summer months.

Wrestling Pay-Per-Views are allowed.

Meanwhile on a brand new episode of Garbage Time Jon and Keith talk about Silksong some more because it’s really the only video game that matters anymore. Keith watched a documentary about Devo on Netflix and Scott watched a documentary about how 1982 was one of the best years in cinema history. We quickly decide that 1999 was even better.

If you would like to show your support and head over to Patreon and subscribe at the 9ES Deluxe tier to listen to this and all past episodes of Garbage Time that would be appreciated.

Our intro song is a brand new jam cooked up by OKU-DA just for us, do yourself a favour and check out his SoundCloud).

The post 9ES346: A Big Stand appeared first on 9to5 (dot cc).