Pheaturing Phile Alumni Wesley Schultz And Jeremiah Fraites From The Lumineers

Hey, kids, welcome to the Phile for a Thursday. How are you? We're living in two Stephen King novels right now... The Dead Zone and The Stand. If clowns show up, I'm done. I'm just done. Imagine en years ago someone telling you that Donald Trump from "The Apprentice" would be the President. A gun-toting gay zoo owner be the most popular man in America, we'd be quarantined for months die to a deadly pandemic and the highest paid running back in NFL history would be a white guy.
A mom-to-be was standing next to her super-good-at-sports-he-was-on-a-couple-varsity-teams-in-high-school-no-big-deal husband, awaiting the news of their child’s gender, which would be revealed to them after the aforementioned strong and very good at sports but it’s whatever husband took a swing with his baseball bat and MASHED THE HELL out of the ball so that it would explode in a cloud colored to inform them of the baby’s sex. This is all made up I have no idea if he’s actually like this. But things took an unexpected and unfortunate turn. The husband did indeed take his Mighty Casey-esque hack at the ball but instead of swinging and missing he made contact twice. First, with the ball, which burst into a cloud of blue dust. Here's a screen shot...

It’s a boy! Congrats! And, then, he made contact with his pregnant wife. In the face. No word on if he called catcher’s interference. Damn. You can straight up hear that forehead contact. Fortunately the wife was okay. No concussion or anything crazy like that, so they didn’t have to do the gender reveal again so she’d remember this time. While this isn’t a forest fire or a man being attacked by an alligator, this is one more piece of proof that it’s probably time to retire the gender reveal. To be fair, it’s a great reason to throw a party. You can only ever be so upset with being presented an even mildly good reason to drink... unless it’s a global pandemic. Still, there’s already baby showers and diaper parties. How many more pre-birth parties can there reasonably be? Also, the stunts to reveal the gender are getting either repetitive or out of control. I’m thinking that from now on a Facebook post or mass email will suffice. BUT YOU BCC EVERYONE. No one needs forty replies in their inbox.
Who says cows don’t like some music to bop their heads to? If you have ever wondered if cows like jazz, well, I am here to tell you that surprisingly they do! They enjoy a good ol’ saxophone jam as much as you do. Which is why an Origami man decided to pull the most dad move ever and play some tunes for them. According to Twitter user Erin Herrmann, her dad, Rick Herrmann has recently been learning some songs on the saxophone. Which is why he wanted to serenade a herd of cows with his rendition of George Michael’s “Careless Whisper," The Champs’ “Tequila” and Stevie Wonder’s “Isn’t She Lovely?” Herman caption the video, “My parents are such goofs they drove out to the backroads so my dad could play the cows the songs he’s been learning on the saxophone.” Apparently, the dad has been learning his musical skills by watching YouTube videos but their dog wasn’t really feeling the sound and even chewed up all his reeds once time. So, that is why the Oregon man decided to go towards a more… let’s say live audience and go serenade some cows that would appreciate his music more than Piper would. Well, safe to say he was right! As soon as he begins to play the cows are all seen coming towards him, and his wife begins to laugh at him for gaining so much attention. Hermann said that cows are her dad’s favorite animal, so yeah, it makes sense why he wanted to share his musical talent with them. Here's a screen shot of this...

Who would have known that cows like the saxophone, huh? It’s definitely news to me. I wonder what attracted them? Was it just the noise that they like? Or his sweet jazzy skills? Either way, keep rocking that sax, dad!
This well-known fitness apparel brand is losing severely in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic, and they only have their own employees to blame. Lululemon Athletica, popularly known to sell high-end, expensive fitness apparel, is doing some major back-tracking, after apologizing for an offensive t-shirt with racial slurs against Asian-Americans that isn’t even on their fashion line. Lululemon’s now-former art director, Trevor Fleming, posted the shirt on his recently deleted Instagram account.

It is not affiliated with Lululemon, but with his position at such a popular company, the fitness brand was immediately associated. Soon enough, calls to boycott Lululemon in the fight against racism towards Asian-Americans became trending, and the company quickly moved to correct the issue. So what did the shirt say? California artist Jess Sluder designed the shirt, with an image of bat wings coming out of a rice box mimicked to look like a typical Chinese takeout. On the front of the box is written “no thank you” and couldn’t be the most obvious racist t-shirt design. Sluder, who is not an employee of Lululemon, had written, “Where did COVID-19 come from? Nothing is certain, but we know a bat was involved,” along with hashtags #batfriedrice and #humornothate. The t-shirts were selling at 60 dollars a pop. Now how did Lululemon become involved? Trevor Fleming put the link to buy the t-shirt in his Instagram bio, promoting the sale of it. If you didn’t catch the racist part, this “bat friend rice” t-shirt implied staying away from Chinese takeout boxes or Asian-Americans in general because of the stories on how the coronavirus began. And although Fleming apologized for advertising the shirt, it only adds to the rising racist acts against Asian-Americans since the pandemic started. Since Sluder and Fleming used social media to promote this awful t-shirt, social media then did its part in spreading the word on boycotting Lululemon. Although Lululemon apologized, took action in firing Fleming (they have not released a specific reason for letting Fleming go), and reiterated in a public apology that they are not a racist or discriminatory company, unfortunately this is not the first time an employee of theirs has committed racist actions, especially against Asian-Americans. Lululemon’s founder, Chip Wilson, who stepped down from the company’s board of directors in 2015 and was advised to keep from making public comments, revealed the origins behind coming up with the name of the brand. By including the letter “L,” Japanese consumers would think of the brand as “innately North American and authentic” because there is no “L” sound in Japanese phonetics. “It’s funny to watch them try and say it,” Wilson continued, as if what he had just said wasn’t already racist enough. It’s no wonder Asian-Americans feel some type of way towards Lululemon, hearing that from its own founder. Maybe we can try to not associate such a massive company with two racist employees, but with the positions they held, it’s hard not to. Maybe the fitness apparel brand needs to screen its employees better, actually using Lululemon products to promote better concepts. This is not what the world needs more of against COVID-19.
Firefighters in Prince William County, Virginia were called to a home because one resident’s cabin fever manifested itself into a (comical) emergency. A kid got stuck in a washing machine playing hide and seek. Amari Dancy of Woodbridge, Virginia was trying to amuse herself and fight off social distancing boredom so she decided to play hide and seek with her younger cousins. Turns out Amari is real good at hide and seek. Too good, in fact. The 18-year-old thought the washing machine would be the perfect place to hide. Who would ever look there? Her cousins probably assumed she couldn’t even get into the washing machine. Well, they’d be sort of right if they thought that. Turns out Amari couldn’t get out of the washing machine. So the fire department had to be called but thankfully the firefighters didn’t have to take an ax or the jaws of life to what appears to be a pretty new, and pretty nice, washing machine. It’s all fun and games until you’re paying 500 bucks because your stir-crazy niece got herself wedged in your expensive home appliance and the local government had to rip it apart to get her out. Amari’s aunt, at least, had a good sense of humor about the incident. She was the one who filmed it and posted it to Instagram, along with a series of hysterical pictures. Here's one...

She can be heard in the video, from behind the camera, saying, “Kids will be kids” and laughing when one of the firefighters asks Amari, “Did you win?” I highly recommend watching every video in this post. Some people might think Amari was being dumb or foolish, but, really, she was willing to do anything to win. Michael Jordan used to punch his teammates in the face and we’re all like, “WOW! What a competitor.” So here’s a hearty salute to Amari, the world’s most dedicated hide and seek player.
This kid is for sure going places. The eldest son of social media mom blogger, Laura Mazza, has foreshadowed the kind of mischievous activities he’ll be getting into when he’s older. And boy, is his mom in for it. Luca Mazza, 5-years-old, came up with a genius way to fool his mom out of his homeschooling. Ever since the coronavirus pandemic put everyone on lockdown, school closings have forced all students (elementary, high school, college, etc.) to do their school work with online classes. This kind of social distance learning has really put a strain on parents everywhere because COVID-19 has forced them to take on extra roles. And with the coronavirus outbreak, Zoom and Facetime calls have been bridges to keeping the world moving. Laura Maaza, known through social media as a popular mom blogger, shared a specific prank that Luca played on her during one of his homeschooling sessions. As she was doing her work one day in her makeshift at-home desk, she kept Luca on a Facetime so that it would be easier for him to reach out to her if he had a question during his homeschooling. Although suspiciously quieter than usual, she told him through Facetime that he could take a break. She didn’t know if the phone froze or what, because Luca was making a funny face on the phone but not moving. What she found was so innovative, you have to respect it. Laura went upstairs to check on him and came upon quite the setup. With no Luca to be found in front of his online classes, Laura found two iPads set up. Luca had set up his sister’s iPad, with his own selfies, right in front of the camera of his own. His mom had thought that he had been paying attention to his online classes when really he was playing a prank on her! He took multiple selfies on his sister’s iPad to make it look like he was working on school while he went to go play with his toys. With as many memes out there about putting a still picture of yourself in front of your camera during a work Zoom or Facetime call, how are we surprised that a 5-year-old would apply that to his own schoolwork? Hilariously genius, Luca. Watch out, Laura! You might have a trouble maker on your hands when he hits his teens.
Since this whole COVID-19 mess some churches are being so clever with their church signs...

I had fourteen kidney stones in my life so I know what that feels like. Not pretty. Without human traffic, animals are returning to the cities. Nature is healing, kids.

It's good to wear a face mask and gloves when you go out but some people are taking it just a little bit too far...

I love that. People are protesting about staying home and they sure have some dumb signs...

Sometimes I look up the word "Foghat" on Twitter and see what people are saying. This is one I saw recently...

That's not very nice, Farquhar. If I had a TARDIS I would probably end up running into Hitler wearing Hitler Lederhosen in the woods.

It looks cold. Why would he wear that? So, this is March versus April...

Hey, future kids, this was Mr. Potato Head...

Hahahahaha. Remember to wash your hands, people.

Kids, it's Thursday... guess what that means...

Haha. That one is not too bad, right? Still gross though. Okay, it's time to check on my favorite place in the world...

Again not a whole lot. One day there's going to be a lot of people at that harbor front again.

This guy who allocates lifesaving resources to states based on how nice their governors are to him.

Now from the home office in Port Jefferson, New York here is...

Top Phive Things Said By People Who Are Ready For Their Stimulus Check 
5. 1,200 dollars added to your account your new balance is 1,200 dollars.
4. I wish I wish, with all my might... that my stimulus check gets deposited tonight
3. Government: we will be giving out stimulus checks for you to afford groceries, rent, bills, etc. Me: that new Mac Book looks great.
2. Do NOT spend your stimulus checks at Taco Bell.
And the number one thing said by people who are ready for their stimulus check was...
1. OMFG, the IRS really just gave me $1,200 of my hard earned dollars back.

If you spot the Mindphuck let me know.

The 122nd book to be pheatured in the Phile's Book Club is...

Craig Ferguson will be on the Phile a week from today... next Thursday.

Two rabbits were being chased by a pack of hungry wolves. The wolves chased the rabbits into a thicket. After a few minutes, one rabbit turned to the other and said, "Well, do you want to make a run for it, or should we stay here for a few days and out number them?"

Today's guests are Phile Alumni and the founding members of the Lumineers. Their latest album titled "III" is available on iTunes, Spotify and Amazon. Please welcome back to the Phile... Wesley Schultz and Jeremiah Fraites.

Me: Hey, fellas, welcome back to the Phile. How have you been?

Wesley: Great, Jason. Hanging in there.

Jeremiah: Good to be back, man.

Me: So, your new album is called "III." Is it because it's the third album?

Wesley: The album, called "III," follows a family who's dealing with addiction and is divided into three chapters. Each chapter introduces listeners to a different family member, spanning three generations. When we sat down to write a new album, we dove into a subject we know well... addiction.

Jeremiah: It's based around some family experiences.

Me: Jeremiah, when did you guys start opening up to each other with these experiences that you guys have had?

Jeremiah: For a long time. I've known Wes for a long time. Wes was friends with my brother Joshua who did die of a drug overdose about twenty years ago. It's always been on our minds and ironically when we started writing songs together about 20 years ago there was a song about my brother, songs about different things that happened in Wesley's and my life that were on the sadder side or on the tragic side. And I think rehashing this stuff for me a lot of the stuff unfortunately has been going on recently in Wes's world and for me it brought up a lot of old feelings. Not that I forgotten about, as I never forgot about grief and trauma but it brought a lot of things from the back to the surface. In a weird way I think that was a good sign that if I'm feeling this raw, almost an apprehension about releasing something that is so specific about something that's a good sign. The more personal we get, the most universal it becomes. I think that's a good sign that I'm feeling raw right now, imagine how fans are going to feel.

Me: Wesley, what inspired you on this journey?

Wesley: It was just being really troubled by watching a family member a couple of different ways, particularly one spiral. It was someone we tried to help so we got her a little place, we thought that might fix the problem. Then we put her in rehab and she left rebab three different times and she ended up in jail, we got the call and now she's been on the streets homeless or in and out of seedy hotels. 

Me: I am sure this difficult to watch, am I right?

Wesley: It really is difficult to watch on a lot of levels because there's so much love there, even if we're not in communication. It's almost like a ghost haunting me where we don't now what call we're going to get or what's around the corner. Its like the boogeyman but in the worst possible way because we love the person. So I think writing the record the way we did not felt like a meditation on it but not in the way of relaxing meditation. It was like I can't figure this out and I'm very troubled by this so maybe if I exorcise it, like exorcise a demon. If I could put it on paper and say it out loud maybe it would take some of the power from it. Keep me up at night or for me obsess ever it.

Me: So, has it helped you?

Wesley: It has helped to share it, but I think we are lucky as musicians to take something as painful and somehow that's cathartic for someone else. I used to listen, and still do, before every show extremely sad music. I don't know why, it's just what I gravitate towards. It's weird, it feeds me and makes me feel alive oddly. To focus on some of those emotions... to feel alive it to show emotion. 

Me: So, do you think some of your fans who like your happier songs be turned off by these "sadder" songs?

Wesley: I think we felt that we might turn a lot of people off by writing about this. I remember sitting around, and there was almost like a weird not a stand off, but I remember we were working on the third or fourth song and it was about the same thing again. I said, "Jer, I'm sorry. This is all I know. This is all I could really talk about right now." It's almost like I was stuck on it. The music was a way to get passed it maybe, or move on a little bit. Luckily I think we talked about it and communicated well about it to the point where Jer knew where I was coming from with it.

Me: Jeremiah, what did you think about all this?

Jeremiah: I was like why are you bringing all this up, man? I don't want to think about this and I bet you and our fans don't want to.

Wesley: Now we just look and we were both processing things. He's been through so much at a young age to now, and now he's a father and so am and I think all this shit you'll think we'll be singing about how lucky we are. That's really not what we use music for.

Me: You have a film that's a companion so to speak of the album, right?

Jeremiah: It's a film scored entirely by the album with no dialogue. In addition to it being about addiction it could be about intergenerational trauma. The way that trauma could be passed from one generation to another.

Me: Jeremiah, how much is this on your mind as a parent?

Jeremiah: I think a lot. In good ways and bad. There's only so much we could teach our kids and there's a lot they can just get from genetics. We were talking about that today, some people see a deck of cards and they'll just never get addicted to gambling and some people see a deck of cards and are like wow, they see this thing happening where whether that's with alcohol or sex, binge eating, gambling, whatever it might be we think of the scary world we are bringing our kids into. There's a scene I really love from this film where Junior Sparks, the youngest character played by Charlie Tahan, there'a a burning piano and the smoke is all going to one way and you see him get into a car and you see him driving towards the direction of the smoke and I bet you if we asked Kevin Phillips the director it's not a coincidence. Every time we asked him about something the amount of details he put in the film is so absurd. We thought that he missed something. Jimmy Sparks worked at the prison, he never mentioned that. He would be like, "No, there was a police badge." What? This idea that Junior Sparks was driving in the same direction as the smoke I think was little bit ominous and a little bit foreboding for the character in a sad way. I hope not. Junior represented that choice that we get. I think it's too much we try to contemplate as a parent in what's going to go wrong and what could go wrong. I just take it day by day. I literally can't go there thinking about if my son will succumb to what my older brother went through. It's really a place I couldn't go to.

Me: I understand. Wesley, what about you? Is it on your mind?

Wesley: Yeah, for sure. I think that was a part of the writing of the record making the videos was as much free will as we have. How much is the sins of the father, sins of the mother, are they passed down. How much is it passed down? People always joke that we always end up like someone in our family, usually a parent and I thought they were so out of touch when I was a kid. There's that but I think there's another component which is I'm happy that we made something like this. I think kids are way more intuitive and intelligent at a very young age and we could say some very wise things to them and they go right in the ear and out the other and over their head but the way we live and the example we set speaks way louder to a child. My parents were always telling me to be honest and when I was they awarded me. It made me who I am because how they lived. I think for us talking about this although there's a kid drinking out of a vodka bottle in a scene that really happens and to be honest about it is important. Instead of shielding kids from the image, not that he should see this when he's super young, but the more you shelter a kid I think we're doing them a disservice. I will curse in front of my kid, not over the top necessarily, but he has to know that those words exist and how to use them instead of pretending that it doesn't. So my dad was very communicative, he was a psychologist and he just taught us to be honest and to express ourselves. I hope both our kids look at what we're doing, not as anything but trying to be honest. Express that and maybe they'll live like that instead of hiding it. We keep talking about how it's an un expecting taboo addiction considering how many people are dealing with it. I just can't believe how many people are touched by it directly or indirectly. It's like six degrees of operation but even smaller.

Me: That's a good point, Wesley. Okay, so last time you were here we talked about the song "Ho Hey" which a lot of people know you guys from. How do you guys still feel about that song?

Wesley: I said this one night on stage, it feels like playing a cover song. It feels like we used to play cover songs in bars a lot. It feels like it's that kind of thing where it's in the fabric of something that is no longer ours. It feels like the peoples material. Not in a bad way, the other songs in the set actually get bigger reactions most of the time. Like "Stubborn Love" is an example, or "Slow It Down" or something like that. We have these songs where people have a relationship with but that one feels like we could hear it anywhere and we wouldn't be surprised. At one point it was on everywhere and so it doesn't feel like ours anymore, that's the best way to describe it.

Me: How does it feel now when you perform it then?

Wesley: I try to connect on it, it's just an interesting song because it's about a break-up and it became a wedding song. I heard the same story told by Bono about the song "One" years earlier and I thought that must be weird. Then it happened to us where people say they got married to that song.

Jeremiah: I was so certain a song called "Dead Sea" was going to be the single because when we made the album I don't think anybody was thinking it was going to be "Ho Hey." Hindsight is 20/20. Then we played "Ho Hey" on the Craig Fergurson show which I loved that guy but it was a smaller late night TV show and that was our first time playing it, then we were going to play Leno or Letterman at the time and it was our second time and I didn't know we just play the junket, like "Ho Hey" on all of them. I think Wes and I told management we were going to play "Dead Sea" on this one and she was like, "You just don't understand. You're going to play 'Ho Hey' or not going to be on another show for a really long time.'" Are we going to do that on all the late night shows? She said all of them so I was certain "Dead Sea" was going to be a huge smash.

Wesley: That would of been a good wedding song. If you are going to get married to that song you're making a good decision.

Jeremiah: I read in other interview too that artists are normally so far off from the song that makes it we just every song on the whole album as a snowflake and people are that's the single.

Me: Coldplay had the same thing with "Yellow," Foghat had the same thing with "Slow Ride." Do you guys resent that?

Wesley: I don't resent it but I think it's less personal when everyone's heard it in that way. I have a close relationship with songs that I feel is my little secret, it's mine and mine alone. I think it's just overplayed, that's what happens when something is played that much. I still think it's a really good song. It just got played to death and now we enjoy playing it and we're grateful with the doors it opened but we could also lose touch with it being a good song and we don't want to be defined by it so we look at it differently. We were lucky that we talked about crawling out of its shadow, it was like this monolith, this thing blocking the sun. The challenge was to write our way out of it. I'm really happy that people are asking us about our album. With the album two the only songs we ever gotten were, "So, were you nervous?" "Sophomore slump," " You're a big band, please explain, please justify this." If you go to our shows you'll see our fans know the albums from front to back. To be able to surprise people it's a joy to those people who are coming with a friend that thought they were coming to this type of show and find out they were coming to this other type of thing. I think for us that's been very gratifying on this album cycle. People want to know about "Gloria," they want to know about these chapters and it's fresh and we think it's important to talk about.

Me: Hey! I asked better questions than those. Haha. Jeremiah, what do you want people who watch the film take away from watching it?

Jeremiah: That's good question. I think if somebody is watching it it might be good to look at the signs of people. Gloria at this point in the film, she's long gone, she's lost. If you see yourself in Junior try to get out of the cycle. It's a good question, and I think it might be too much to try and answer.

Wesley: I think talking about it too, like having friends and talking about it. They come up to us and say something personal and I'm like why aren't they telling their friends that. I think it's because it's not allowed culturally or it's not encouraged. Part of it might be sitting their friends down and telling the truth about their home life or something they're going through and they might not hide it and be able to be held accountable. I couldn't know what it was like for them going through that but I would imagine it felt alone also which is an added burden.

Jeremiah: I think for people too they think they're the only ones going through it. It's like they're so close to the trees to see the entire forest. They can't see the entire picture and I think there's so many people going through it. If they just talk about it, acknowledge the beast, the monster under the bed. It's hard to imagine but a year or a couple of years they'll start to feel normal and not so isolated. Yeah, hopefully it could help people. It was not meant to scare people, it certainly wasn't meant to take advantage of terrible affliction of many people from all over the world. It shows a story and hopefully helps people break that cycle.

Me: That's cool. Thanks, guys, for being back on the PhIle. Please come back again one day. Stay well.

Wesley: Thank you.

Jeremiah: Take care.

That about does it for this entry of the Phile. Thanks to Wesley and Jeremiah for another good interview. The Phile will be back on Monday with singer Lennon Stella. Spread the word, not the turd... or the virus. Don't let snakes and alligators bite you. Bye, love you, bye. Wash your hands.

I don't want you, cook my bread, I don't want you, make my bed, I don't want your money too, I just want to make love to you. - Willie Dixon