Ari Shaffir's Skeptic Tank

Sal Vulcano and I both went to WWE's Smackdown on September 10, 2019. It was Sal's 80th WWE event. It was my first. I had SO many question. So Sal came over to my apartment 6 days later to tell me all the ins and outs of that world so I could make sense of what I had seen.

Road Dates (tix at arishaffir.com)

Madison (Sep 19-21)

Winnipeg (Sep 22)

Brea, CA (Sep 26-28)

San Antonio (Oct 2)

Dallas (October 3)

Houston (October 4&5)

Chicago (November 16)

The Music

Weezer - El Scorcho

The Novas - The Crusher

Motorhead - The Game

Beth Orton - Stolen Car

Adbusters Editor in Chief, Kalle Lasn met me in his office at the magazine to talk to me about the revolution. I see it going down only with violence but he is far more hopeful about the ways in which we're going to change the systems in place. He's a brilliant man and it was such a treat to get to sit down with him and hear him say out loud some of the ideas he's been putting forth in Adbusters.

Tour Dates:

Madison - September 19-21

Winnipeg - September 22

Brea - September 26-28

San Antonio - October 2

Dallas - October 3

Houston - October 4-5

Nashville - October 19-21

San Jose - November 7-9

Detroit - November 14

Chicago - November 16

Cincinatti - November 17

The Music:

Gil Scott Heron - The Revolution Will Not Be Televised

T. Rex - Children Of The Revolution

Black Sabbath - War Pigs

H.A.L. - Daisy, Daisy

Pete Seeger - We Shall Overcome

Let me tell you about the month I took off from screens. All July. No texting, no computer. Only a land line. It was weird for sure, but it was also kind of glorious. 

Check out my patreon page at arishaffir@com

Xavier Himma met me on the roof of my apartment to tell me about his amazing bike ride from Ottawa to Argentina. I've never even heard of such a thing. Be aware that the first 3 minutes of the interview the sound goes a little down and up but then it evens out for the remainder. Regardless, it was such an interesting conversation and an amazing adventure to hear about. It makes me want to get out into the world again.

Check out Xavier's Vlog on YouTube at YouTube.com/HumOfTheEarth where he shows video of all the crazy places he's been on that damn bike.

The new Skeptic Tank Patreon is up at: https://www.patreon.com/skeptictank

Sam Morril and I went to see Tarantino's new movie "Once Upon A Time In Hollywood" and then came back to my place, got drunk off scotch and talked about what we saw.

There are spoilers in this. They start at 51:00. So only listen to this if you already watched the movie, if you're never going to see it, or if you don't give a crap about spoilers. 

We definitely also meandered a ton so it's probably about 42% about the movie. 

Check out @SamMorril on twitter and instagram. And listen to his podcasts, "Keeping Joe" and "Pod Don't Lie."

Ari's Road Dates

Atlantic City - 9/7

Madison WI - 9/19-21

Brea CA      - 9/26-28

Dallas TX     - 10/3

Houston TX - 10/4-5

Nashville TN - 10/17-19

San Jose CA - 11/7-9

Detroit MI    - 11/14

Chicago, IL   - 11/16

Cincinatti OH - 11/17

A homeless non-binary person let me sit with her and talk about what it's like to live on the street and beg for change. Spange is a homeless term that means spare change. I think it's a verb. Anyway, that's what Tall Boy does. Spange for food money. It was interesting to hear some actual humanity from people we often see as invisible. 

Chuck Palahniuk had me over to his Portland writing office to tell me about the heyday of the Portland Cacophony Society. It's this crazy group that pulled large scale pranks on the minds of normal people. I mean I am full on in love with these guys! You gotta hear the great stuff they pulled. 

I am going offline for a while. I want to clear my head of all the noise and clutter that the internet has been throwing at me. It's become a net negative in my life and I want to find myself and my own thoughts again. So I'm taking a digital vacation. A detox, if you will, from all the noise. I'll be back in August but I scheduled two podcasts to go up that month so you're not completely without content. Subscribe and you'll be notified when those go live. See you around.

Steve Simeone and I sat on the balcony of his new apartment and broke down his new album, Jabba. We talked about the origins of the bits, the messages he had in them, what his theories are on the delivery styles, and much more.

You should all go buy a copy of Jabba from iTunes or ApplePlay. It's a really funny album that would make a GREAT Fathers Day present. Buy it today and send it to your dad. This really was made for him. Unless your dad is dead. Then I guess SUCKS TO BE YOU!!!

https://music.apple.com/us/album/jabba/1465387916

Bill Ottman came over to my apartment to try his best to get the idea of crypto currency through my fat skull. For a Jew, it's almost shocking how little I understand about monetary things like this.