Round three of the song game, and this time the stakes are real. Rhoni Mohanraj and Joey Simms rank the top ten first dance songs, blind. Each of them sent five songs to Aiden, who shuffled the whole thing and reads them out one at a time. Neither host knows what is coming, and once a song is placed it is locked. There was zero overlap between their two lists, which surprised both of them.

Rhoni admits his strategy up front. Two of his picks are pure cliché, the songs that pack a floor no matter what. The other three he chose on the strength of the lyrics, because he thinks couples pick a first dance on vibe and never actually read the words. He proves the point by reading John Mayer's XO out loud, over Joey's loud objection to turning the episode into a poetry reading.

The ranking exposes the real tension in picking a first dance: popularity today against how the song will feel in ten years. Alex Warren's Ordinary was everywhere last season, to the point where Rhoni watched three separate couples get lifted on the chorus, and both hosts suspect it will not age. Meanwhile Elvis has been getting couples onto floors for sixty years. That argument decides the top of the list.

Around the ranking there is a lot of shop talk worth having. The Taylor Swift saturation problem and why her requests have dried up this season. A DJ hunting down a Chris Taylor cover of I Hope You Dance that only exists on SoundCloud. An award winning Elvis impersonator booked for a wedding on the eighteenth. And a genuinely good idea neither of them can use: a surprise flash mob at a reception, which fails the moment you try to plan it for your own wedding.

It closes with a World Cup tangent, a bet involving Joey's beard, and a round of Things I Wouldn't where the topic is things you should never yell at a live sporting event. That segment gets away from them, and the editor gets some work.

=====

TIMESTAMPS / CHAPTERS

0:00 Cold Open: Let's Get Married

0:53 Welcome to Episode 63

1:41 The Game: Blind Ranking First Dance Songs

3:19 Where Would ABBA Go?

3:55 A Word From Trident Films

4:59 The Surprise Wedding Flash Mob Idea

5:45 Ordinary, Alex Warren

6:33 The Taylor Swift Saturation Problem

7:23 XO, John Mayer

9:01 Spin You Around, Morgan Wallen

10:37 Tennessee Whiskey, Chris Stapleton

12:08 Can't Take My Eyes Off You, Frankie Valli

12:54 Thinking Out Loud, Ed Sheeran

14:25 Can't Help Falling in Love, Elvis Presley

15:19 Elvis Takes Number One

16:07 King of Rock and Roll, and an Elvis Impersonator

16:56 You Are the Best Thing, Ray LaMontagne

17:42 Beyond, Leon Bridges

18:05 Amazed, Lonestar

18:28 The Final Top Ten

20:02 World Cup Talk and Joey's Beard Bet

22:27 Things I Wouldn't Yell at a Sporting Event

=====

SHOW NOTES

The final ranking

1. Can't Help Falling in Love, Elvis Presley

2. Amazed, Lonestar

3. Can't Take My Eyes Off You, Frankie Valli

4. Tennessee Whiskey, Chris Stapleton

5. XO, John Mayer

6. Spin You Around, Morgan Wallen

7. Thinking Out Loud, Ed Sheeran

8. Ordinary, Alex Warren

9. You Are the Best Thing, Ray LaMontagne

10. Beyond, Leon Bridges

Rhoni Mohanraj opens episode 62 by confessing to a grocery order that got away from him. He saw a picture, he saw a price, and he bought seven kilograms of bananas for eleven dollars. His mother's review of the purchase was short and devastating. Joey Simms enjoys this more than is strictly polite, and the two of them are off.

The episode proper is a game. Joey brings a list of wedding traditions from around the world and reads them out one at a time, and he and Rhoni decide whether North America should steal them. Some are gorgeous. Norwegian brides wear a crown to keep evil spirits away. Mexican couples get wrapped in a lasso shaped like a figure eight for infinity. Indian brides get henna, and Lebanese families kick the whole day off with a Zaffe, a loud procession of music and dancing before anyone gets near an aisle.

Others go sideways fast. In the Congo, the couple is forbidden from smiling for the entire wedding day, because grinning suggests you are not taking marriage seriously. In China, the groom shoots his bride with a headless arrow, several times, then snaps the arrows. In Mongolia, a couple cannot set a date until they kill a chicken and find a healthy liver inside, and they keep going until they succeed. And in one Chinese tradition, the bride cries for an hour a day for a month before the wedding, with her mother joining at the ten day mark and her grandmother ten days after that, until every woman in the family is weeping in harmony.

Along the way the guys get properly derailed. A Czech fertility ritual that involves placing an infant on the couple's bed turns into a full business plan for a baby rental service, complete with domain name brainstorming and a supply chain problem neither of them can solve. Rhoni goes on a genuinely useful tangent about hundred dollar bills and why nobody in Canada will take one. Two DoorDash orders arrive mid record. Joey checks in on wedding season, and reports eight or nine weddings and grads in June alone.

It closes with each of them picking a favourite and a worst, and a new round of Joey's Things I Wouldn't segment. For a show that started with bananas, it lands somewhere close to a real point about weddings: the traditions worth keeping are the ones that build the day up rather than putting the couple through something.

=====

TIMESTAMPS / CHAPTERS

0:00 Seven Kilograms of Bananas

1:10 Welcome to Episode 62

3:04 The Game: Should We Adopt It?

3:49 Wedding Season Check In

5:05 Norway: A Crown Against Evil Spirits

6:49 Mexico: The Lasso and the Figure Eight

7:34 Armenia: Bread on the Shoulders

9:35 A Word From Trident Photo

10:05 Congo: No Smiling Allowed

11:05 China: Shooting the Bride With Arrows

12:35 France and Greece: Heart Cutouts and Shaving the Groom

15:19 Brazil, Lebanon and Germany, Back to Back

16:51 Czech Republic: The Wedding Baby

17:38 Babies for Hire, a Business Idea

19:56 Nigeria: Breaking the Kola Nut

21:30 India: Stealing the Groom's Shoes

23:04 The Money Dance and the Hundred Dollar Bill Problem

24:35 Mongolia: The Chicken Liver Test

25:50 China: Crying on a Schedule

26:55 India: Marrying a Tree First

28:21 Sweden: Stealing Kisses

29:51 Favourites, Least Favourites, Things I Wouldn't

This is the one. After teasing a "fatherhood cliffhanger" last episode, Rhoni sits down and tells the full, jaw-dropping story: he is about to be a dad, and almost nobody, including Rhoni, saw it coming.The short version is that Rhoni and his wife had built a whole life around not having kids. She took a job in Dubai, they sold their house, and Rhoni started splitting time between Manitoba and the Middle East. Then, in the middle of a friend's wedding in Winnipeg, he gets an urgent call, hops on FaceTime, and sees a positive pregnancy test. What follows is a genuinely wild ride: a cryptic pregnancy with almost no symptoms, months of heartburn misread as a stomach issue across doctors in Sri Lanka and Dubai, and a gyno appointment that finally reveals she is 33 weeks and four days along. Due date: July 1st. They are filming this on June 11th.Rhoni tells it the only way he can, half in disbelief, laughing at himself the whole way, from thinking his wife was pulling the world's greatest prank to greeting her at the Winnipeg airport with the immortal words, "you are so big." Joey plays the perfect co-pilot, cracking up, keeping it moving, and floating the only logical follow-up: can the baby come on the next episode? Before the story even starts, the guys open with a chaotic cold open (popcorn basketball, a Snow White bit, and Mission Impossible set in India) and cap it off with a "Things Joey Wouldn't" segment. Warm, funny, and completely unforgettable.=====================================================TIMESTAMPS / CHAPTERS0:00 Cold Open: Popcorn Basketball2:07 Mud Brown and the Seven Bhangras3:12 Culture-Swapped Movies (Mission Impossible in India)5:16 Wait, What Episode Is This?5:47 The Fatherhood Cliffhanger, Answered7:19 Trident Music Ad Read8:27 Dubai, and Life Apart9:34 The Call: May 16th11:11 Two Tests, One Says "Real Pregnant"12:14 The Ultrasound and a Loud Heartbeat13:47 A Cryptic Pregnancy14:52 Sri Lanka, Heartburn, and the Gastritis Mix-Up16:56 "How Far Along Am I?"18:58 Four Hours of Waiting20:03 Butterflies and the First Kick21:37 Due July 1st, Filming June 11th23:17 48 Stairs and No Elevator24:53 Up All Night, Screaming Internally26:30 The Airport: "You Are So Big"29:37 Brandon, It Brings You Back30:39 A Bonus "I Didn't Know I Was Pregnant" Special31:10 Things Joey Wouldn't

Rhoni and Joey come in hot with one of the great restaurant rants in For The Record history. It starts with a five-spoonful bowl of soup, escalates into an investigation of the "chick wings" that fancy places try to pass off as chicken, and somehow lands on the correct, scientifically-approved number of chicken strips per order (four to five, for the record).

From there the guys wander into comedy itself: why crowd work exploded over the last couple years, whether the funniest people on podcasts would survive a prepared stand-up set, and a genuine appreciation for the physical comedy legends from Charlie Chaplin to Mr. Bean. A tangent about the printing press turns into a bit about handing someone from the 1500s an instant Polaroid and watching their soul leave their body.

Then things get personal in the best way. Rhoni pulls up a high school photo he was slipped from the group chat to roast Joey, except the two of them slowly realize, live on the mic, that the photo is not actually Joey. Christine calls in, wedding season looms, and the episode ends on a cheeky cliffhanger about a big life update coming soon. Classic grab-bag FTR: no plan, all vibes, plenty of laughs.

=====================================================

TIMESTAMPS / CHAPTERS

0:00 Fancy Restaurants and the Case of the Chick Wings

1:41 Tricked by the Breading

2:43 The Correct Number of Chicken Strips

3:22 Crowd Work Takes Over Comedy

5:31 Prepared Sets vs Podcast Funny

6:33 Steve Harvey, Family Feud, and Reading the Room

7:04 Physical Comedy: Mr. Bean and Charlie Chaplin

8:07 The Printing Press and the Instant Polaroid

9:41 Trident Films Ad Read

10:45 Cousin James, the Knowledgeable Friend

12:47 Pilates Princesses and the Group Chat Roast

14:22 The High School Photo That Wasn't Joey

16:28 Lookalikes (and Christine Calls In)

18:01 Wedding Season Is Here

20:09 A Fatherhood Cliffhanger

22:15 Things Rhoni Wouldn't Say

No theme, no plan, just the good stuff. Episode 59 of For The Record bounces from a spare can of beans to a full expiry-date conspiracy to a behind-the-scenes recap of a 480-person jungle-themed gala, then closes with Rhoni and Joey predicting the songs of the summer. Somewhere in there is a genuinely useful conversation about how events actually get made.CHAPTERS0:00 The fanny pack and the can of beans0:50 Welcome to 59 and zombie-apocalypse prep2:24 Expiry-date conspiracies5:34 Why do credit cards expire?7:11 Bean styles and the great vanilla con8:03 Joey's greatest joke ever9:35 Recording a podcast in a kiddie pool11:57 Trident Photography ad12:46 The Chamber Gala recap (jungle theme)13:32 The all-salad jungle menu15:10 Everyday Joes vs the pros16:02 480 people and Carson crushing the videos18:24 The hardest skill in events: adapting on the fly19:16 Every wedding is different20:05 Hands-off production and the mood-board process21:40 Wedding season is front-loaded this year23:16 Condensed timelines and first-look advice26:27 Predicting the songs of the summer29:33 A Justin Bieber summer and Ella Langley32:50 Christine calls mid-podcast34:24 "We're the ish" and the outroCONNECTWebsite: https://tridenteventgroup.caNewsletter: https://newsletter.tridenteventgroup.caYouTube:    / @tegfortherecord  Instagram:   / tridenteventgroup.ca  LinkedIn:   / tridenteventgroup  For The Record is a conversation between Rhoni Mohanraj and Joey Simms of Trident Event Group, covering pop culture, the event industry, and what really goes into pulling off a great event.#ForTheRecord #Podcast #EventProfs #WeddingSeason #SongsOfTheSummer

The song game is back. On Episode 58 of For The Record, Rhoni and Joey blind-rank ten massive songs by pure party power (Don't Stop Believin' did not have to fight for number one). Plus a real conversation about cancel culture and Kanye's surprise stadium comeback, and the return of the "ABBA is niche" debate.CHAPTERS0:00 Cancel culture and the artists it skipped1:36 Closing in on 60 and designer bag bingo2:26 The grill master bit3:59 Kanye's surprise comeback concert5:34 Morgan Wallen, Chris Brown, and the double standard7:07 The undiagnosed-bipolar letter8:39 Trident Music ad10:15 The game returns: blind-ranking 10 party songs11:46 Poker Face kicks it off13:19 Blinding Lights and the TikTok effect14:09 SexyBack and a Timbaland appreciation15:40 Sweet Child O' Mine: danceable or just iconic?18:01 Don't Stop Believin' locks number one18:49 Vienna and the Billy Joel debate20:21 "We Are the People" is niche (so is ABBA)22:00 Smells Like Teen Spirit and I Gotta Feeling24:13 Young Joey and the Ford Focus radio25:44 Daft Punk's curveball and comeback28:03 The one-second song game28:49 The final Top 1030:19 Podcasts you talk out loud to31:50 Kool-Aid pitchers and the outroTHE FINAL TOP 101. Don't Stop Believin', Journey2. I Gotta Feeling, Black Eyed Peas3. Smells Like Teen Spirit, Nirvana4. SexyBack, Justin Timberlake5. Sweet Child O' Mine, Guns N' Roses6. One More Time, Daft Punk7. Poker Face, Lady Gaga8. Blinding Lights, The Weeknd9. Vienna, Billy Joel10. We Are the People, Empire of the SunCONNECTWebsite: https://tridenteventgroup.caNewsletter: https://newsletter.tridenteventgroup.caYouTube:    / @tegfortherecord  Instagram:   / tridenteventgroup.ca  LinkedIn:   / tridenteventgroup  For The Record is a conversation between Rhoni Mohanraj and Joey Simms of Trident Event Group, covering pop culture, the event industry, and what really goes into pulling off a great event.#ForTheRecord #Podcast #EventProfs #SongRanking #PartyPlaylist

He's back! After a three-month hiatus living on the other side of the world, Rhoni returns and Episode 57 picks right back up. We get into the reality of running a hands-on business across time zones (3am Notion events with no context, anyone?), the buddy group chat that keeps generating AI photos of Rhoni on a horse at war, the great kitchen glassware debate, and a full investigation into why nobody in the Middle East owns a dryer. The back half turns into a genuinely great conversation about weddings as the clearest window into any culture, why who-pays differs around the world, and a geography quiz none of us pass. Half real talk about systems and delegation, half total chaos about camels and clotheslines. Welcome back.

(00:00) Three months, board games, and rough mornings

(04:32) The AI group chat (Rhoni on a horse)

(06:47) Why Rhoni actually moved overseas

(07:32) A day in the life across time zones

(11:19) Facing your faults: where the systems broke

(14:22) The great glassware debate

(15:52) No dryers in the Middle East

(22:45) Weddings as the pinnacle of a culture

(23:30) Who pays for the wedding?

(25:46) Nobody knows how many countries exist

Listen, follow, and tell a friend. Find us on YouTube @tegfortherecord and at tridenteventgroup.ca.

In Episode 56, the Joey & Rhoni dive into the universal struggle of thermostat wars, with Joey recounting his "chilly" household battles and his insistence on wearing a 16-year-old high school trekking jacket. The conversation takes a turn into nostalgic food history as they review social media comments about Subway’s old "V-cut" bread technique, which the hosts hilariously describe as the "ass crack" of the bread. Joey also shares his recent experience at Pilates and spin class, where he showed up in "tight Pilates shorts" to lead by example among his NBA fantasy group.The center piece of the episode is a blind ranking of 11 iconic songs, including hits by Michael Jackson, Britney Spears, and Queen. Tensions rise during the ranking as Rhoni makes the controversial claim that ABBA is a "niche market," leading to a heated debate over whether Dancing Queen deserves a spot in the top 10. From discussing a drunk fan at a Christmas party who congratulated them without ever listening to the show, to debating whether the Moonwalk is more iconic than the Thriller dance, this episode covers it all

In Episode 55, the Joey Simms & Rhoni Mohanraj open with a passionate "gripe" about parents who choose creative or "stupid" spellings for traditional names like Michael, Aiden, and Britney. While looking ahead to the 2026 business season and previewing an appearance by venture capitalist Arlene Dickinson, the duo engages their production crew in a spirited round of "Most Likely To". The team reveals their hidden sides, debating who is most likely to launch a rap career, become a runway model, or perform heavy metal karaoke.

The episode takes a hilariously graphic turn as Rhoni recounts a story about offering to eat a discarded, half-eaten McDonald's Junior Chicken for five dollars. This leads to a viral-worthy debate with producer Aiden regarding the exact cash price—ranging from $500 to one million dollars—it would take to intentionally soil oneself on the podcast for the entertainment of the viewers

Happy New Year from For the Record! Hosts Rhoni Mohanraj and Joey Simms ring in January 1, 2026, by attempting to "smash" a Terry’s Chocolate Orange while debating the merits of pulp in orange juice. As they look toward the "bottom five" of the 2020s, the duo shares hilarious stories from the gym—including a lifter in denim jeans and a client who tried to strip on the floor—before taking a surreal detour into a modernized "Gen Z Bible" where Jesus wears sweatshirts and does reformer Pilates. The heart of the episode is a deep dive into the music of 2025, where the hosts critique the year for its lack of truly "danceable" hits, revisiting tracks like Alex Warren’s "Ordinary" and the polarizing viral song "Anxiety". Between Rhoni’s massive 2026 travel plans and Joey’s milestone of booking 40 weddings, the "yolk boys" reflect on how the industry has evolved from sing-alongs back to the old-school dance floor fillers.