Rediscovering Life Through Music and Food

What if witnessing a tragic event could redefine your entire life's trajectory? Join us for a heartfelt conversation with Tyler Gancos from Ashtabula County, Ohio, as he recounts his journey from growing up in a tough Cleveland neighborhood to finding peace in the rural serenity of Jefferson, Ohio. Tyler takes us through his high school adventures at Jefferson High School, where he navigated the complexities of adolescence through football, music, and theater, often finding refuge in the band room.

Discover how turning down football scholarships due to health concerns led Tyler to immerse himself in the dynamic worlds of music and culinary arts. From late-night jam sessions to mastering the art of cooking, Tyler’s Italian heritage shines through as he shares the joys and challenges of working in various culinary roles, including his passion for making pizzas. Listen to his tales of camaraderie and the creative outlets that shaped his adulthood in Ashtabula County.

Join our discussion on the artistic movement revitalizing Ashtabula County, from the vibrant scene on Bridge Street to the charm of Walnut Beach, even amidst the harsh winters. We also touch on light-hearted topics like the allure of lighthouses and adventurous exploits, bringing a touch of whimsy to our conversation. Wrapping up, we emphasize the significance of supporting local arts and businesses, fostering a strong cultural fabric that enriches our communities. Don’t miss this episode filled with Tyler’s inspiring stories and our shared love for small-town life.

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Transcript

Speaker 1: 2:18

Welcome everybody to another episode of the Ride Home Rants podcast. This is your special guest host, john Fittifo Coney, as I'm filling in for Mike Bono today as he's out on the road. Today we have a really great guest for you, coming a whole way from Ashtabula County, ohio. But before we get into this great guest, let's make sure we check out all of our sponsors in the pre-roll and the post-roll. A lot of these individuals are small business owners. Let's make sure we shop small and support these great sponsors of the show. At this time we're going to welcome our next guest as, again coming from Ashtabula County. He is a friend of ours and his name is Tyler Genkis. Tyler, thanks for joining the show, man.

Speaker 2: 2:58

Oh, great to be here. Thanks for having me. Yeah, absolutely.

Speaker 1: 3:03

Yeah, I know we've been talking about this for like months, since the last time I've seen you and we guys just scheduled quite a while out, so we are glad we are here recording this. Yes, everybody, the show is prerecorded. We are recording this a couple weeks out on a Friday night, so what a better way to spend a Friday night than hanging out with Tyler on Zoom.

Speaker 2: 3:22

Yeah, I'm surprised we actually came through with the plan here, because we planned this while we were drinking, so it's impressive we were able to, you know, follow through.

Speaker 1: 3:31

You know, I don't forget when somebody says they want to be on the Ride Home Rants podcast because they go on the list. And yes, everybody, we keep a list of all the guests that we schedule the whole way out. So but, tyler, you know, thank you for being here. We really appreciate it. So kind of tell us right, we just said you are from ashtabula, county um, but kind of tell everybody where that is at, um and then where you grew up within the county oh, man, ashtabula county, very, uh, you know, upper right tip of ohio.

Speaker 2: 4:00

Uh, grew up, born in cleveland, grew up out in the country a bit Towards my teenage years, moved up towards, you know, the city right on the lake and you really get a feel for the city once you're, you know, on the lake, because I mean, that's really the only reason we have anything going on here. If we didn't have the great lakes, you know, this area would just kind of be more cornfield. So it was a special area. There was a lot of music happening uh, around the time I was, uh, you know, getting into my teenage years, living down in that area and had all these like secret underground venues and everything. Kind of a raunchy town. It's not for lighthearted people, I would say.

Speaker 1: 4:52

That's fair, that's fair.

Speaker 2: 4:53

Definitely a friendly element. You know, everyone around here knows each other, but, like you, also know who to avoid. You know.

Speaker 1: 5:01

I think that's like that with any small town, small area in America.

Speaker 2: 5:06

So Tyler, I think it's charming.

Speaker 1: 5:10

I mean, yeah, usually small towns are charming, but usually small towns do have some interesting characters. So you know, before you moved to Ashtabula County, more specifically, you went to the Jefferson High School in Jefferson, Ohio. Where did you actually grow up? In Cleveland, before you moved out there?

Speaker 2: 5:29

West 93rd Street, I think, was our old house and around the time just not a very good neighborhood. From my understanding. Our paper boy and I say paper boy but he was an elderly man who had the job Not that it makes it any better, but he was stabbed on his route Ended up dying on our porch. I don't mean to get too graphic super early on here.

Speaker 1: 5:53

Oh wow, that's okay.

Speaker 2: 5:55

So, yeah, we got out of there pretty quickly and moved out to the country Like just, you know, okay, we need the exact opposite. Now let's move the kids to a cornfield. You know a lot less stabbings out there.

Speaker 1: 6:05

So yeah, yeah, yeah, that's well. That's very unfortunate for the mailman and you know I'm sorry paper boy and definitely condolences out that way many years ago. But you know, definitely glad you moved out that way with your family though, because otherwise we would have never met and you probably would have never met your wife and you know we all became friends and everything in between. So, um, so you went to, you went to jefferson high school. You're one of quite a few guests that have been from that area on here. You know andy santiago. You went to school with, um, yeah, you, you went to school with uh, blake perry, uh, who's been on the show. You know his mom, danica.

Speaker 2: 6:44

So what was it like?

Speaker 1: 6:46

What was it like going to Jefferson High School? I mean, what was that experience like for you, and you know what kind of were you involved in when you were in school.

Speaker 2: 6:58

Involved in as much stuff as I could, honestly Football, music, mainly music and football, honestly. But Model United Nations got into theater for a little bit. That being said, didn't really enjoy high school too much. A lot of my time I would sneak away and go to the band room and just you know, like play some bass guitar or something. Play some bass guitar or something. You know I keep my grades like just well enough to where I could coast through and then skip a good amount of my days and go and just kind of like thump on the bass for a bit yeah.

Speaker 1: 7:30

And you know what? Hey, it's, and it worked out for you, right?

Speaker 2: 7:33

Honestly, yeah, surprisingly enough, it did.

Speaker 1: 7:37

You know it's funny. I've worked in a lot of a lot of different positions within education over the years and and the more people you talk to, the more people than not, I think, either disliked up to hated their high school experience and I don't know can I don't say I don't know if I can pinpoint one way or another, why because people all had different experiences with that but I think the more people you talk to in life, the more they're going to say that they disliked or did not enjoy their high school experience.

Speaker 2: 8:10

I think it's very different than when people go to college. You're like a still morphing human, you know, like the ages 14 through 18. There there's a lot happening inside of you that kind of makes it difficult to be like packed in a building with thousands of other kids all going through the same thing.

Speaker 1: 8:28

So yeah, no, absolutely. I agree a hundred percent with you on that. It's. It's definitely a very just odd time. If you look, you know back at it. I don't know if it really shapes anybody to the person they are today. I think that's learned through life experiences. But I mean, maybe it's just experience that helped us gain that experience to go in the life and become the person we wanted to become.

Speaker 1: 8:55

So you did mention it, though, you are friends with Blake Perry and everything. So how has that been watching him? You know, go from Jefferson to Baldwin Wallace and be a college wrestler to now be a pro MMA fighter. You know what is that like being his friend, watching him grow like that?

Speaker 2: 9:14

Oh, absolutely insane. And like anyone you ask you know, blake is the nicest person on the planet. Like does not have a bad bone in his body. Blake is the nicest person on the planet, like does not have a bad bone in his body. And just the fact that he, he, he fights like cage, fighting against you know other cage fighters and he is just the nicest human being you'll ever meet is just it's amazing to me.

Speaker 2: 9:38

And just such intensity and drive to the way I used to see this guy work out and like diet Like this did not look fun. Just such intensity and drive too. The way I used to see this guy work out and diet this did not look fun. Every day he'd come into school with these protein-packed meals and his microwave scrambled eggs. I remember that that was a big thing. Just to keep weight for wrestling, he had avocados and microwave scrambled eggs and they just smelled horrible. But he ate it every day and was super dedicated and just just yeah, pushes himself, drives, had his big 15 minutes of fame. Uh, there with that broken nose for a second, which yeah, that was.

Speaker 1: 10:15

That was uh quite the scene, and I think, if anybody didn't see that um, I think you should see that because I think it talks about the testament, of how tough Blake is.

Speaker 2: 10:25

Oh yeah, and just the fact he wanted to keep fighting too. He's like no, no, no, we're going. I don't care if my nose is in the wrong direction.

Speaker 1: 10:34

Right with his nose shattered on, his face bent all types of ways. But I think it showed a testament of how tough Blake blake is, and I think I sent him a message like literally right after that I was like dude, sorry you lost, but like congrats, that was so impressive on your toughness oh, anybody talked about too, and it's still.

Speaker 2: 10:55

I mean you type in, you type in worst broken nose ufc. Third picture that comes up and then you scroll it's just a sea of Blake Perry's so there you go, everybody.

Speaker 1: 11:06

If you want to see one of the worst broken noses ever in cage fighting, definitely, uh definitely, search what Tyler just said. You can probably find it on YouTube or even even Google. So one thing too and I and I know you, you know, you know her is Blake's mom has been on the show and for people that don't know Blake being an MMA fighter, well, his mom is a fan of combat sports as well and is actually boxed as a grandmother.

Speaker 1: 11:34

So can you kind of talk about you know, knowing his mom, you know throughout the years, and did you ever see her becoming like a boxer as a grandma?

Speaker 2: 11:44

I totally, totally did not. We actually saw her fight last year, I believe it was out in Cleveland, and she just like I thought, like I'm like OK, she could kick my ass. Like she just had this stance, like she looked like Tyson in the ring it was. It was scary because, like this is the same woman who would like pick us up and like get a snack. You know, and just totally did not expect that out of her, but like just, it's like a family of fighters, you know it's, it's, it's a cool thing to witness and like seeing Blake there just cheering on his mom the whole time and how they like motivate each other is very yeah, they're just such nice people. I could, I could talk about them all day.

Speaker 1: 12:27

Yeah, no, they've. They've been great, great for the podcast here. We were so happy to, you know, connect with them and get to know them and, um, yeah, just very, very, very nice people and I hope, I hope, I hope and I told Blake this I hope one day he can get a match here in Cleveland to fight MMA and I know myself would be there and my wife would be there and I know all of Jefferson and Ashtabula County would be so excited for that. So if we've got any MMA promoters fighting or MMA promoters looking for fighters to fight in Cleveland, definitely look up Blake Perry. You won't regret it. You'll have a huge crowd.

Speaker 2: 13:00

So me and Tyler will be there as the hype men.

Speaker 1: 13:05

So I'm going to wait a little bit off of that. Tyler, so you know, you graduate a little over 10 years ago and then you've kind of embarked on your adulthood, right. So you know, like we said, talk about the high school experience and you know football and the guitar, but then you graduate, and so what have you been doing all these years? As far as, like, your career, career moves, everybody usually has a pretty interesting story with this. So what has brought you to where you are now?

Speaker 2: 13:32

Oh geez, well, it's always been music. Like I got a couple offers in high school to play football in college. You know, at this time I was just like terribly unhealthy, like pushing 300 pounds, and these college recruiters are like we'll give you like a you know scholarship, but we want to get you up to 340 pounds and I'm like I appreciate it. I just think that would kill me. So I think I'm done with football, you know.

Speaker 2: 13:56

But continued on with music. Like all throughout after high school uh, ended up just kind of moving in with a group of friends jumping around place to place. We had this whole like little hippie enclave of musicians, you know, get together and it was just jam sessions for like hours at a time. The whole living room just filled with musical equipment getting lost in it, you know. And uh, it like it becomes second nature at that point. Like that was like our version of watching. And uh, like it becomes second nature at that point, like that was like our version of watching TV. And that wasn't like our job. We don't get paid for that shit, you know we. So we were all cooks. That was our main thing.

Speaker 2: 14:30

I got started, you know, restaurants cooking in a nighttime. You get off, you get, you know, go play some music, play an open mic shows. So you want to be a musician. But you also kind of get really good at cooking at the same time. So that's the career that's happening while you're trying to make the music work and go figure, you know, when you're cooking you meet so many people like, oh man, you want to hear my demo tape. Like I just recorded this beat man, it's so sick. We go out to my car and smoke a joint real quick.

Speaker 1: 15:05

And before we got to make these pizzas, you know, listen to my demo. Uh-huh, that's. That's funny. So so you said you know you've worked, you've worked as a a cook, and I think anybody who works as a cook is an unseen artist, right, because they're the people that make this food, that make the business go, and they're the ones that don't get t go and they're the ones that don't get tipped out right, they're the ones that don't get seen unless somebody says I want to talk to the chef and they make the chef come out. So can you kind of talk about you know where that, ultimately, that love of food came from? And ultimately, like, what do you enjoy making? You know outside of work, for you know, you and your wife, but what do you enjoy making you know outside of work, for you know, you and your wife, but what do you enjoy making the most at work too? So can you kind of walk us through all that?

Speaker 2: 15:48

oh yeah, I mean, well, I jumped around so many different jobs, like I find, dining. I was a pizza chef for the long time, you know, throwing the dough and all that and really enjoyed making pizzas and I think, you know, I got that italian heritage. So sticking pizzas in the oven I kind of I felt like a stereotype, but I was like happy about it. You know, I'm like I'm making the pizzas. That was me all day just behind the counter throwing dough, you know. So I always enjoyed that and I still make pizza at home.

Speaker 2: 16:12

You know, with the wife we uh we try to make a lot of stuff from scratch, uh, which that's been really beneficial, you know, know, just diet-wise, knowing how to make like anything, like I can throw together a cake from scratch, like just something I didn't kind of learn to appreciate until like now into my adult years, how much I actually learned cooking and how much I did appreciate it. But it is an art form, you know, and that's why so many artists end up being cooks, because you know you. That's why so many artists end up being cooks, because you know you have that drive to create something and at that moment it's the most feasible option for you to get paid and most cooks end up jumping around from restaurant to restaurant kind of just chasing that higher paycheck. You know, one place won't promote you past being a dishwasher.

Speaker 2: 16:58

But like, oh, I learned to work the fryer, so I want to work as the fryer guy now and you see wendy's is hiring a fryer guy. Then you kind of work your way up from there and, uh, I could have kept going with it, you know. But uh, I don't like working weekends. Most people don't. It's so damn lonely, like you want to hang out with your friends, so bad. And then you see a group of them coming in and they're about to just kill you with food orders, just to like spite you for not hanging out with them.

Speaker 1: 17:32

You know, I do get that People definitely hate working weekends and I think when you work in like that restaurant business or that hospitality business, you just have to have a flexible schedule. It's even more than people that work in beauty field. Even people that work in nursing or medical field. Even people that work in education still are kind of always on the clock or doing something, but when you're in hospitality and food and you will work any hour and all hour because there is no time off really.

Speaker 2: 18:03

Oh, dude, 2 am to 2 pm shift at Denny's. You see some crazy shit man.

Speaker 1: 18:08

You know it's funny. You say that because I've seen this thing on Instagram and I'm sure people can see it on TikTok or whatever it's like from like 10 or 12 years ago and there's like a death metal band in the back of Denny's. Yeah, have you seen that?

Speaker 2: 18:28

Oh yeah, man, that was everywhere on the internet for a minute.

Speaker 1: 18:31

And the guy's like what's up, what's up, what the F is up, denny's? And there's like people in a mosh pit and you're like did a guy just say what the F is up, denny's?

Speaker 2: 18:41

Like why are you at Denny's?

Speaker 1: 18:42

And what time is this?

Speaker 2: 18:44

Some Denny's are just lawless.

Speaker 1: 18:48

They are. I've seen some wild things at some Denny's from back at home to Boardman, ohio, to just places all over people fighting, people throwing drinks, cops coming, just crazy people working. Yeah, you see some wild things at Denny's, like after the bar, that's for sure. When you're a lot younger, that is for sure. So, um, the one thing though I do, you know, kind of want to get your take on with this. So when you are a chef, OK, and you are cooking all day right, do you want to come home and cook though too?

Speaker 1: 19:23

Oh, dude, no Is that something you want to do, or absolutely not?

Speaker 2: 19:26

God, no, no, that's the last thing you want to do. I would make like these amazing like Wagyu fillets and like foie gras and these amazing like reduced sauces, all day, throwing together these dishes, and then I'd come home and I'd have a bowl of Froot Loops because the cereal was just the simplest best thing at that point, because I like that's. The other thing is, I hated cooking. You do something for so long like that. You just you have a love, hate relationship with it.

Speaker 1: 19:58

Sure I can, I can definitely get. Get that I although I will say, tyler, like I wish I would have learned cooking sooner. I didn't learn it until I moved out on my own and I was like 27 when I did that. But man, trying to learn how to make like chicken and like scrambled eggs and steak and like all that stuff, when you have no idea what you're doing, you know and and then you just kind of get good at only a few dishes and even to this day I still only make like a handful of things. I wish I could have learned more in the cooking sense that I could have developed my skills over the years. But like being older now I'm like almost approaching 40.

Speaker 2: 20:38

I have, like you know, you know how many 40 year old dads like became chefs once the food network became a big thing? Like? That's not. You can. You can learn, man. You put on that fucking Gordon Ramsey show You'll. You'll be made. You'll be making amazing dishes in no time. Don't, don't count yourself out. That's a hobby you can learn in your later years and totally crush it.

Speaker 1: 20:59

I'll have to keep that in a keep that in mind as the future, future comes along.

Speaker 1: 21:03

I did go for the wife, man, they love it. Yeah, I mean we do like I will make. I'll make chicken, I'll make steak, I'll do like salads. You've always made the sides for us, we'll do pasta. But we don't really make our own sauce from scratch, and I know that's bad, being Italian. I don't make my sauce from scratch, but we kind of like to mix some of the other sauce out of the can. Who has time now? Come on. Yeah, I mean it's great but it's difficult. I haven't made chili in a long time, but I used to make chili in the crock pot. It never turned out right though, so got to try to get back to that. So I'm usually like a steak, chicken, fish type of guy, but my wife doesn't really like fish with that, so it kind of limits us, but, cassie, makes some really good things too.

Speaker 1: 21:52

I've never been big on the fish myself. No, not a fish guy. No, no, not a fish guy fish tacos maybe it's about interesting okay so you kind of hit it on this too, with with being in the cooking realm, your music right, and you talked about you know playing and and being in bands and stuff. Can you kind of talk us through then this like more in depth of your musical journey, you know, once you really got into it and you know what you're doing now with music?

Speaker 2: 22:18

Yeah, absolutely. So. I mean, you know it starts a lot of kids like obviously you know you're listening to whatever your dad's playing, or my older brother was playing at the time and fifth grade I just wanted to play an instrument and that was the year he could join band. So I picked trumpet and you know I excel in music. Uh, wish I could have excelled in like anything academic, but that that wasn't really the case. So, uh, I just kind of ran with the music thing.

Speaker 2: 22:46

Uh, high school you get jazz band and I got to play bass guitar and that was like that was like the first real like love and music was me playing bass guitar, you know. And like you start playing bass, you start like just looking at bands just to hear like these bassists you heard of like red hot chili peppers, flea, you know stuff like that. You start learning all the flea bass lines. You start bands with like kids from school you know just terrible little punk bands in your garage, shit like that. But uh, as I uh carried on with that, uh, meeting just all these people going to shows, local shows, you know, you just meet so many local musicians and so many of these guys end up, you know, living together, like getting these houses and just sharing the space, just so you can like hang out and jam, record music, like we've had the whole house set up mixing boards, amps, everywhere there like wasn't furniture, it was just a living studio. There were days we were just sleeping on the floors, you know, waking up and playing, but there wasn't any money coming in, there wasn't any like actual albums being made. We were recording these little like tracks and then would just kind of pass them on and try to make something better, and it got frustrating. So I just kind of started doing my own stuff.

Speaker 2: 24:06

I haven't like played with any other musicians, like jammed in so long, but it's just been me playing guitar, which I ended up learning. You know, after bass it makes it a little bit easier to learn one before the other. I'm playing this kick drum and a tambourine with my foot. I got the kazoo going, so it's like a whole one man band like who needs other band members. I'll just be every instrument which kind of started out of a necessity, you know, and a little bit of a little bit of bitterness, I think, like I can't find anyone around here to play songs I like or I want to play, so I'll just make my own band, and that's actually been going great. And it turns out when you're like a one man band you don't have to pay any other members of the band, so it's very profitable if you can find a way to play multiple instruments at once.

Speaker 1: 25:02

Yeah, definitely cutting down on the overhead cost on that one. So can you kind of talk about then your schedule? Where do you play at and where can people find you, and how do you find these different venues to play at, or restaurants, or whatever it may be?

Speaker 2: 25:20

Oh, word of mouth. Again, through working in the food industry too, you meet all these people who I just recently went back and played for one of the restaurant owners. I used to work for Fitzgerald's Deborah down on Bridge Street in Ashtabula. It was a beautiful wine bar and she had me coming for Mother's Day. I did some songs for the moms. You know that was really nice. I play Marco Vineyard a lot. They've been a huge help.

Speaker 2: 25:47

Me and this kid, ryan, who's working there, are just both really interested in kind of like bringing more like art into the area, trying to get more people out here to see a lot of like the overlooked potential in the area, and a lot of that comes from, like, the music we had out here and the art we had out here. There were so many amazing artists that lived out here that ended up, you know, going to school, moving to Cleveland, akron, but, um, just something special about this place that, like we really believe in and so we throw these, you know, shows together. He's got a whole string of musical events coming up throughout the summer at Marco Vineyard. Uh, just insanely talented musicians. Uh, honestly, it's kind of shocking for me because I'm one of those people who doesn't think I'm that talented. So when I get up there and play and people enjoy it, it's just like a genuine rush, a surprise. Every time, a great feeling like wow, I'm like really, people are enjoying this. I'm getting paid to play music. It's a surreal feeling.

Speaker 1: 26:51

No, that's that's definitely awesome and that and that's an incredible story that you were able to like will yourself, to do this, from basically never doing it and never getting paid to now being a one man band and having word of mouth and traveling all over and bringing the arts you know back to Ashtabula County and Bridge Street, and I think the one thing I really believe that's underrated in Ashtabula County and that area of Ohio and some of PA is Bridge Street, and I talked about this on another episode with Jordan Wetson with about Ashtabula and Ashtabula County. But Bridge Street is great. You would never know. Some parts of ashabula have issues if you're just on bridge street because you would think that's like the greatest thing ever and oh yeah, and I think with the restaurants there and you like the music and there's ice cream and I um, either they probably still are or they have built those like um condo high-rise townhouse things up the road um.

Speaker 1: 27:53

I think it's really, really cool for people to go see. I mean, is there anything you would recommend for people coming from out of town to ask to be able to do on Bridge Street?

Speaker 2: 28:05

Oh God, I mean just Walnut Beach alone, you know, going there seeing the lake, especially this time of year just starting to get really nice outside Favorite dive bar ever Iroquois. A lot of people have mixed emotions about the place. I personally am a big fan of, uh, kind of dimly lit, you know, semi-dirty bar that only plays rock music and just the mix of that, with, like, we have have Clovenhoof down there, which shout out to Ryan, you know, uh, he's brewing the most delicious beer I've ever tasted. Uh, local Astrobula musician, you know, being into the heavy metal and just making these delicious beers. Uh, all the restaurants I was working with down there, you know, parola brothers got to love that pizza, fitzgerald's, the wine bar, renick Uh, I'm I'm pretty much naming like every business on Bridge.

Speaker 1: 28:58

Street. Now I'm realizing, all right, but there's this great publicity for them, that's for sure yeah, yeah, absolutely so you know that. Definitely a really, really nice place, that's for sure like any great places to check out.

Speaker 2: 29:10

I'm yeah, all of them. Just go check out all of them yeah, except I would.

Speaker 1: 29:15

I would tell people to do it in the summer or the fall, because the winter is Like any great places to check out. Yeah, all of them, just go check out all of them.

Speaker 2: 29:20

Yeah, I would tell people to do it in the summer or the fall, because the winter is right on the water. There, though, it can get mighty, mighty cold with the wind. Personally, that's one of my favorite times walking Bridge Street in the middle of winter, when no cars can get down.

Speaker 1: 29:30

It's beautiful man. You know what? It's funny too, because people are like is Cleveland cold? I'm like, yeah. They're like is it the coldest place you've lived in or been in? And I'm like no, I'm like the cold in Ashtabula County, in Ashtabula itself and in Erie, pa, are so much colder than Cleveland because it's all directly higher up towards Canada. It is so cold in Ashtabula compared to Cleveland.

Speaker 2: 29:54

Oh man, One of these houses I lived in with the musician friends. We lived right on the lake, we had a little beach and everything Every day. As we couldn't even open the door, it was just frozen over with a sheet of ice. Good excuse to call in work and jam all day though, yeah, for sure.

Speaker 1: 30:11

For sure, make some demo tapes and stuff. Another thing all day, though. So, yeah, for sure, for sure, make some demo tapes and stuff. So, um, you know, another thing I want to talk to you about and I didn't know this about you until we. You know, we we hung out and you talked about it, and really how we got connected with the podcast is you do some, um, stand-up comedy as well.

Speaker 1: 30:26

So can you kind of talk to our listeners, you know, because mike is a stand-up comic um how you got into to doing comedy and and what your background is with that uh, just lifelong fan, like in general.

Speaker 2: 30:40

I mean, I was watching stand-up specials. It's my. One of the things my parents had on constantly was you know old like george carlin specials and like ray romano and jerry seinfeld, so I I just always had like a love for it. And just last year, november, I just heard of this local guy who was kind of throwing local comedy shows together and that was one of the biggest things keeping me out of. It was like I didn't have time to drive to Cleveland. You know especially, you know working full time doing other shit. So he starts these shows and I'm like I'll throw my hat in the ring, I'll try it out. First show I just went over great. I'm like if this goes okay, I'll try it again. If not, whatever. I went up and I tried it, always wanted to try. It Went great. And since then it's just kind of been a building thing Jimmy Ward Wardy's Laugh Factory I got to give them a shout out there who I'm uh working with.

Speaker 2: 31:40

We got a little residency happening. We're gonna be doing monday nights at the cove nightclub in geneva. Uh, that's gonna be every monday, uh, june through july, through august I believe. But uh, yeah, and people have been loving it because there's just there. One thing that hasn't been happening down here is comedy, and everybody loves comedy. People don't want to drive all the way out to either erie or cleveland, so this offers like a good kind of in between, and you know it's it's local people. You know we're not getting huge celebrities out here or anything, but just seeing like that's an option now for entertainment, I kind of wanted to volunteer for it as well. You know, just because I am such a big fan of comedy, I'm like, yeah, let's, let's get up there.

Speaker 1: 32:17

Yeah, no for sure. And that's kind of what what Mike has done, you know, himself is playing some of these smaller places kind of. You know, all over a couple of times up here near the Cleveland area. Last year, him and one of my other I'm sorry myself and one of my other I'm sorry myself and one of my other buddies went over. He was at um sea bars in madison, um, so did a show there.

Speaker 1: 32:40

So, yeah, definitely, playing at this or performing at the smaller places, you know, with local talent, I think it's pretty cool, gives everybody a chance right, gets people to that area as well, and especially if you're having it like in geneva or ashtabula, with those being beach towns, you know, why not, uh, go out for the night, see the beach and, you know, listen to some some comedy and, you know, laugh a little bit. So with that, um, with that being said, you know, tyler, I do want to get your take on this and like, what type of comic are you? Are you like more of just standing up there and just off the cuff with the jokes? Are you prepping beforehand, you know? Are you doing crowd work, kind of? What is your style?

Speaker 2: 33:19

I've been working on the crowd work. But I prep beforehand religiously just every word I say and I I have just some lengthy jokes but it's all written out and like tweaked to the point where like I'll show I'm saying or there, but I should be saying and I'm starting to think maybe it's a little too much work, but it's been paying off on a lot of the material I've been writing. I try to keep it clean for the most part. I'm sure you've heard me curse a few times on here. I do apologize for that, but that's my native tongue that's the Ashtabula native dialect.

Speaker 1: 34:00

All good, don't worry about that on here.

Speaker 2: 34:04

I like to bring people together. That's my goal with comedy. Everything is absurd. I think we can all agree and find common ground. And just the absurdities of life yeah, for sure.

Speaker 1: 34:18

I mean, nothing in life is ever so like easy and straightforward and all that I mean. A lot of life is absurd and crazy things happen and I think you got to be able to laugh, you know, and joke about that and, you know, have a good time and things. I mean it's life's too short to always be stuffy and and serious with that. So, um, you know you mentioned it too right about doing this in, uh, in Geneva, and I think Geneva's another hidden gem that people don't know about, can you?

Speaker 2: 34:49

kind of talk to our listeners about what Geneva, ohio, was like oh man, geneva, if I, if I could specifically talk about geneva on the lake. You know, you know it's, it's fun for the whole family. You know some oldest putt-putt golf course in america is there. You know, you got foot long, hot dogs and t-shirts and then at night time it's, it's a place for, like, the wild crowd. You know, you got the hell's angels rolling through. Karaoke night at the Swiss Chalet. Oh God, what's the bar down there? Have you been to the Yankees?

Speaker 1: 35:21

No, I've only been to Geneva a couple times. Usually it was to the Spire Institute for sports. I ate at a chinese restaurant there. Once and last, fourth of july, we went to some brewery that was in a very small parking lot that looked out on the water which I cannot recall the name I can't either, but I know what it is.

Speaker 2: 35:46

Shout out to them too bad. We can't recall the name, but yeah yeah, great, great view of the water.

Speaker 1: 35:52

But it was really hot on their patio that had no umbrella and we just talked about this in a show a couple weeks ago. It's about patios and if they're overrated or underrated and I said they're overrated if they don't have umbrellas and shade for people. So for every restaurant that doesn't have shade on their patio, get shade. It makes the patio that much better. Nobody wants to sit in the sun and sweat into their cheeseburger.

Speaker 2: 36:24

Oh God no. I do have some old bosses that would say like, oh, that just adds seasoning to it.

Speaker 1: 36:32

I guess it depends on what you're sweating out of yourself. Yeah, so could add some like a little bit of whiskey to it or a little bit of salt. It just depends.

Speaker 2: 36:43

Yeah, of course.

Speaker 1: 36:45

Yeah, but who wants to sweat into their burger? So yeah, every restaurant that doesn't have umbrellas or a cover on the patio, get it, people will love it because I'm sure, tyler, you can attest there's nothing worse than sitting on a patio with no shade.

Speaker 2: 36:58

No, no, although you did say who wants to sweat into their burger, and I think actually, like Guy Fieri would want to do that.

Speaker 1: 37:08

Yeah, I think he's constantly sweating because of all the food he eats. I think he just has the meat sweats constantly.

Speaker 2: 37:16

Yeah, just living with the meat sweats 24-7.

Speaker 1: 37:19

Just constantly. But, Tyler, it's been really really great talking with you and getting towards the end of the podcast. Here we have a segment called the Fast 55. And we incorporated this a couple years ago when we got going with the show and it is five random questions brought to you by yours truly and they really have nothing to do with the show, but they're so random. We try to be a little bit funny here and see if we can make people laugh, but you can answer as quickly as you want or you can elaborate as much as you want.

Speaker 1: 37:49

So if you're ready, we can get going.

Speaker 2: 37:51

Oh, dude, hit me, let's go.

Speaker 1: 37:53

Okay. So question number one is horseback riding underrated or overrated?

Speaker 2: 38:02

Oh, getting underrated or overrated? Oh, man, it's. It's underrated because not enough people do it anymore. Man, it's, it's fun. You know, get on the horse. I used to ride bareback all the time. I don't recommend that, that's not safe, but you know it's fun.

Speaker 1: 38:13

Yeah, I don't know. I don't know if it's like would be safe for me to ride with a saddle, let alone like nothing on the horse. I just I would have nightmares. My luck I would. I would just, yeah, I would fall off as soon as I got on, you got to build.

Speaker 2: 38:25

you got to build trust with the horse man. You got to trust the horse.

Speaker 1: 38:28

That's. That's a tough thing. Horses are are large and in charge. So question number two if you could have been named this at birth, which one would you have chosen? Godzilla or Blazer at birth, which one would you have chosen, godzilla or Blazer?

Speaker 2: 38:42

Godzilla 100%.

Speaker 1: 38:44

Yeah, I feel like that probably I should have picked something better than Blazer, but I feel like everybody would want to be named.

Speaker 2: 38:49

Godzilla in that case Alright.

Speaker 1: 38:52

question number three You're in an attack and you can say whoever or whatever is attacking you. But who would you rather have protecting you in an attack? 100 Navy SEALs or 10 elephants?

Speaker 2: 39:06

Oh, Navy SEALs, man 100 Navy SEALs. I've listened to a lot of Jesse Ventura interviews talking about being in the Navy SEALs and just it seems like an unstoppable force.

Speaker 1: 39:21

I think the elephant might be the other unstoppable force. I think the elephant, though, might be the other unstoppable force, so at least as far as nature goes.

Speaker 2: 39:29

What did he say? Howard Stern was asking. He was like what happens to a Navy SEAL if you're in a hand-to-hand combat situation? He's like, oh, that wouldn't happen. You know how much ammunition we carry on us, that wouldn't happen. That was a great impression you actually really sounded like jesse ventura there.

Speaker 1: 39:46

So yeah, wrestling fan, you know yeah, hey, he's a really cool wrestler. Jesse the body ventura, if anybody doesn't know, former governor of uh minnesota, ran as an independent but was a wrestling announcer for for a long time. Also for anybody who is a predator fan of that series he was in the original predator.

Speaker 1: 40:09

Yes, he was with uh. Rest in peace carl weathers, arnold schwarzenegger and jesse the body ventura. I still think predator one was the best predator, just throwing it out there. So question number four Better weather for you Sunny in 75 or cloudy in 90?

Speaker 2: 40:28

Sunny in 75, man All day, I'll swim in 75.

Speaker 1: 40:33

Okay, that's fair. Sunny in 75, like Joe Nichols said. So question number five to finish up the Fast 55. If you could go back in time and pick one of these careers to do the rest of your life let's say it's 25 years you have to do it Would you rather be the captain?

Speaker 2: 40:55

of a pirate ship or the innkeeper of a lighthouse. A pirate ship, man adventure. Come on A lighthouse. You're stuck in the same place all night, and I just saw the Robert Pattinson Willem Dafoe movie too, and it just did not make that lifestyle look fun at all, In contrast to the millions of pirate movies I've seen, where they're just having a ball. There's not been one movie about someone working in a lighthouse who looks like they're having a good time.

Speaker 1: 41:19

You know what that movie? I believe it's actually called lighthouse, isn't it?

Speaker 2: 41:23

yes or the lighthouse the lighthouse. Very, very strange like yeah, even though pirates of the caribbean and be like who's having more fun willem dafoe or johnny depp, and these two, if anybody okay, I'll give you one.

Speaker 1: 41:40

But if anybody hasn't watched a movie like the Lighthouse or Lighthouse, it's so, so bizarre. It's like filmed I don't know, maybe like six or seven years ago, but it's filmed in black and white with like the turn of the 1800s into the 1900s, about that. It's a very just, strange, strange movie, eerie. But I do like lighthouses, though. I will say that, tyler, I do like lighthouses. Oh, we have a beautiful one here in Astrobula. You know what? I've never got to see that one. I've seen the one, or seen both of them, but toured the big one on Presque Isle in Eerie, big one on presco isle in erie, and um, the one that's on the beach, not the one right on the small one on the pier or the one on the the hill, but the one on the in presco isle. But the other one I've seen is the one in fairport harbor. Shout out to fairport harbor and the fairport harbor museum. Have you ever been to that one? Oh yeah, a long time ago, yeah.

Speaker 2: 42:40

Go ahead, go ahead. No, I was going to say we used to jump off of lighthouses. I don't advise this. I was kind of thinking of it, you know. You said what's worth coming out and doing here in Astrobula and initially I was going to say, oh, come, jump off the lighthouse. But I don't advise doing that.

Speaker 1: 42:58

I don't advise doing that. Yeah, especially if you don't like heights. I don't like heights, I'm actually scared to death of heights. But I went up on both of those lighthouses but definitely, really, really cool. But shout out to Fairport Harbor. If you've never been to their lighthouse and their museum to all the listeners here in Cleveland definitely go up. The beach in Fairport is wonderful. You can get ice cream across the street. You can go to the Fairport Family Restaurant next to that. You can make a whole day of it. But I definitely might have to check out the lighthouse in Ashtabula there, because I forgot about that and I don't think people realize how many lighthouses Now we're on this lighthouse tangent, how many lighthouses there are on Lake Erie between Pennsylvania and Ohio.

Speaker 2: 43:43

Land of lighthouses and covered bridges.

Speaker 1: 43:46

It's a great way to look at what Ashtabula is the land of lighthouses and covered bridges.

Speaker 2: 43:51

It's like living on a giant miniature golf course.

Speaker 1: 43:54

You know what? You should just carry a putt-putt. You could carry a putt-putt ball and a putter everywhere you go, so it would be great. So, tyler, we give every guest here at the end of the show about a minute, just anything they want to promote, whether it's like your music, your comedy I know you do a little bit of that, but if you want to promote that even more, where people can find you, if you have any social media handles or anything you're going to be doing in the future to encourage people to attend, or if you just want to leave a good message, that's fine too. But we're going to give you about 30 seconds to a minute anything that you want, and the floor is yours.

Speaker 2: 44:28

Yeah, absolutely. I got some comedy nights coming up here, marco Winery, june 14th. We got some funny people. Teddy Bruno is going to be coming out, also a local from the area. We got music also happening at Marco going on through June, july and August. I'll be performing a lot of Fridays. We have open mic nights first Friday of the month, open to musicians and comedians.

Speaker 2: 44:55

So if you're local, if you're in the area, condi out at Astrobula, you know, even out in Erie, you want to make your way out, have some amazing wine. Get up on stage, please do um also, yes, the residency there. We have wardy's laugh factory at the cove nightclub in geneva. Uh, just a lot of fun, man, a lot of fun. So, yeah, make your way out, support the arts, please just support the arts in the area. You see a restaurant, you go out to eat and you see someone in the corner playing just like a bad bob dylan. You know, get, give him a dollar, give him a tip, you know, because it's not, it's not an easy thing to do and you got to do it to get better at it and the people who do it just want to do it to entertain people, you know, and I think that's an important thing we all need.

Speaker 1: 45:39

I think that's a great message to get out there, because, also, when you're supporting these artists, you're supporting their small business as well, and you know, we all know, that small business was really the founding of this country. So, tyler, thank you so much for being on. Thank you to all of our new listeners and our old listeners tuning in for this show. As always, if you'd like to show, be a friend and tell a friend. If you didn't like it, tell them anyways, because I bet they like it just because you didn't. This is your special guest, host Fitty signing off, and we will see you next week.