Joe Rogan Experience #1825 - Ali Siddiq

Narrator 0:00 (drumming music plays) Joe Rogan podcast. Check it out.

0:04 The Joe Rogan Experience. Train by day, Joe Rogan podcast by night. All day. (rock music plays)

Ali Siddiq 0:12 Uh, Padrons are the cigar of choice on A Short Storie. (swallows) And smoking cigars with DL so much, I know a good cigar. Oliver-

Joe Rogan 0:27 Mm.

Ali Siddiq 0:29 ... is a good cigar.

Joe Rogan 0:31 Yeah, this is solid. I've had Cuban cigars and I know they're supposed to be better, and I believe they're good, but I do not know if they're better. I can't tell. You could lie to me and give me a-

Ali Siddiq 0:42 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 0:43 ... you know, you could give me a good Dominican cigar-

Ali Siddiq 0:45 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 0:45 ... and I'd be like, "Damn, Cuban, nice." I don't know.

Ali Siddiq 0:49 You know what you like when you like it, you know?

Joe Rogan 0:51 Yeah.

Ali Siddiq 0:52 Like, I like ... I drink Cabernet and you know how they come to the table and they tell you, "This valley and this and this is from this."

Joe Rogan 1:01 Yeah.

Ali Siddiq 1:01 And I just say, "Eh, nine ounce." And then- (laughs)

Joe Rogan 1:07 (laughs)

Ali Siddiq 1:07 And if I like it, I like it, you know?

Joe Rogan 1:08 Yeah.

Ali Siddiq 1:09 But, you know, other than that...

Joe Rogan 1:11 Uh, there was a documentary of ... Talked about this before, but there's a documentary called Sour Grapes and, uh, it's all about wine connoisseurs getting hustled by this dude who figured out how to mix wine to make it taste like old wine, and he put fake labels on them and he sold them for hundreds of thousands of dollars. Millions of dollars worth of wine, this guy sold. Like bottles for a couple $100,000. And, uh, unfortunately he sold a fake bottle to the Koch brothers.

Ali Siddiq 1:38 Oh.

Joe Rogan 1:38 And one of the Koch brothers ... Someone was, like, going through their collection going, "What the fuck is this?" And he's like, "Oh, that's a ruh ruh ruh." And like, they're like, "No it's not," and then the next thing you know it, he gets his, uh, uh, wine examined and they're like, "Bro, you're, you, you have a bunch of fake wine in here." And then they find out this one dude had been making these fake labels and, and blending these cheaper wines together to try to create a taste that's similar-

Ali Siddiq 2:03 Mm.

Joe Rogan 2:03 ... to real expensive wine.

Ali Siddiq 2:05 That's ridiculous that, that ... Everything that he went through, he could've just made a wine.

Joe Rogan 2:14 You'd think so, but he made millions. Millions and millions and millions of dollars.

Ali Siddiq 2:18 To hustle people.

Joe Rogan 2:20 But he's, he come from a criminal family.

Ali Siddiq 2:21 Mm.

Joe Rogan 2:22 Like, when they, they went into the whole family of it, like, the family ... One of the brothers had, uh, stolen a bunch of money out of a bank and like, uh, like hundreds of millions of dollars, right? Wasn't it like some insane amount of money? Do you remember that part? And, you know, he's on the run. He's hiding somewhere and like, the ... So it's like the whole family's been con artists their whole life.

Ali Siddiq 2:44 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 2:44 And this guy just figured out a way to get in with these wine people, 'cause the way he did it was pretty genius. First he went and started going to auctions and buying up really expensive wine. So he became known in the wine community as this guy, like, "Oh, he knows, he knows the wines. He knows." And then he said, "I'm gonna get rid of some of my wines, you know. I don't need ... I have too much wine, nowhere to store it. So I'm gonna sell some of my choice wines to, like, Sotheby's." So they would auction off some of his choice wines and then the winery found out and the winery's like, "We never made that label on that year."

Ali Siddiq 3:16 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 3:16 Like, "This is all fake." It's wild though, dude.

Ali Siddiq 3:19 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 3:19 'Cause the thing, it's like people want exclusive shit. "Ah, Cuban cigars. Ah."

Ali Siddiq 3:25 With, with sneakers, they find out some people are selling fake sneakers.

Joe Rogan 3:29 That makes sense.

Ali Siddiq 3:30 It's like-

Joe Rogan 3:31 Yeah.

Ali Siddiq 3:32 ... I don't know. You can, you can make a sneaker, so...

Joe Rogan 3:35 Yeah, it's leather. I mean, once you get past the printing of the soles, everything else seems like you could kind of do.

Ali Siddiq 3:43 The only way that you can make a shoe exclusive, and this, and this would be just utterly ridiculous, if your shoe was tried ... Was, was put on the foot of the person that's buying it. Like-

Joe Rogan 4:03 Right, formed.

Ali Siddiq 4:04 Yeah. Like Ken Griffith Jr stepped in your shoe, or at least tried to put it on, held it in his hand, and then they sold it to you, and that's exclusive. 'Cause he, he, he dealt with the shoe. Like, "All these Ken Griffiths over here are regular Ken Griffiths, but these are handheld-

Joe Rogan 4:23 Right.

Ali Siddiq 4:23 ... Ken Griffith Jr sneakers."

Joe Rogan 4:25 And you would have to have, like, chain of custody.

Ali Siddiq 4:29 Where he-

Joe Rogan 4:29 From Ken to you.

Ali Siddiq 4:30 Where you see him. Where you see-

Joe Rogan 4:31 Yeah.

Ali Siddiq 4:31 Where it's a photo of him with your ... A video of him-

Joe Rogan 4:34 Yeah, video.

Ali Siddiq 4:35 ... touching your shoe, putting it in the box, and then it's coming to you.

Joe Rogan 4:38 And maybe, like, signing his name on the inside lip. Right? On the tongue, just a little bit.

Ali Siddiq 4:44 N- Not ... I wouldn't e- I wouldn't even tell them what it was. It would be something like they know when your shoe is authentic w- that you don't even know that it has. Like, "But you know this is an authentic shoe, you got paperwork on it," "But what makes it authentic?" "I don't know. Let me see your shoe." And then they turn around-

Joe Rogan 5:01 (laughs)

Ali Siddiq 5:01 ... and they put some light on it and they're like, "Nope. Nope. Don't have it." (laughs)

Joe Rogan 5:06 Oh.

Ali Siddiq 5:06 Like, then yes. 'Cause people ... I don't- I don't know. I don't know. It's like, what is exclus- what is exclusive? Like, if you're sitting first class on a plane, are you really getting anything other than-

Joe Rogan 5:24 Getting a bigger seat.

Ali Siddiq 5:25 Eh.

Joe Rogan 5:26 But you're paying sometimes, like, way more. Like, what is it? A coach seat can be 400, a first class might be 2,000.

Ali Siddiq 5:34 Yeah. It's ... And you going the same place. So if the plane went down-

Joe Rogan 5:39 (laughs)

Ali Siddiq 5:40 ... like, do you live? Like-

Joe Rogan 5:41 No, you're let-

Ali Siddiq 5:42 ... you're, you're more likely to die. The people in the back live. Like, do, do people say, "Ah, Joe I thought you was in a ... I heard you was in a plane accident. Everybody died." He's like, "Yeah, I- I was in first class. Like why would I- why would I be dead?" Like... (laughs)

Joe Rogan 5:55 "There are bags everywhere."

Ali Siddiq 5:56 (laughs) It's like, like, you and eight people, like, the plane had done-... all type, all type of flips and is on fire-

Joe Rogan 6:05 Yeah.

Ali Siddiq 6:05 ... but y'all have no idea. Y'all still in the, y'all still in the front. "Huh? Something's going on out there, I think." (laughs)

Joe Rogan 6:12 (laughs)

Ali Siddiq 6:12 And then, (laughs) and then you, you get out and you, you got, you have a box, a first class box and you're like, "Wow. Didn't know all that was going on. Everyone's gone and thank goodness this first class seat was available."

Joe Rogan 6:26 People love exclusivity though. They love to be above the herd. Above the crowd. "Look at me, with my fancy clothes."

Ali Siddiq 6:35 Y- y- I sat court side once and realized that I had to walk up to get out.

Joe Rogan 6:45 Mmm.

Ali Siddiq 6:45 And was pissed. Like... (laughs)

Joe Rogan 6:49 (laughs)

Ali Siddiq 6:49 Like, all these da- the, the further I start going down, I was like, "Man, shit!"

Joe Rogan 6:54 (laughs)

Ali Siddiq 6:54 Like, "I gotta walk back up that way to get out? Goddamn it."

Joe Rogan 6:58 Why don't they have a court side exit?

Ali Siddiq 6:59 (laughs) They... (laughs)

Joe Rogan 7:01 Right? That would be exclusive. Real exclusive. You go through the locker room.

Ali Siddiq 7:04 Ye- man, it was insane, all the steps that I had to take to go do anything. I was like, "Damn it."

Joe Rogan 7:12 I haven't gone to see a sporting event live in forever. And then I went the other night to, uh, an Austin FC, uh, soccer game. And it's like 22,000 people in the arena. It was great. It was a lot of f- I've never seen soccer live. It was great. Like, I appreciate it now. I watched it on TV, I'm like, "Eh, not enough action." But when you're there live and you see how fast those guys run and how much skill involved and tactics and strategy. But goddamn leaving is a pain in the dick. When there's 22,000 people trying to get out of the same two lanes, you're like, "Oh, Christ."

Ali Siddiq 7:43 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 7:43 And then there's a light up ahead, you gotta wait for the light to turn green. Oh, fuck.

Ali Siddiq 7:49 It's, um... I, I thought of this. Because I, I had this new special that just came out. I thought as soon as it came out that they was gonna invite me to a sporting event, like, to shoot the, the free throw if I'm on the list. 'Cause I, I-

Joe Rogan 8:04 Throw the first pitch?

Ali Siddiq 8:05 Throw the first pitch, shoot the... 'Cause in Houston, like, I see other people, I see lesser celebrities shooting the, the free throw from the line for charity and I just be pissed. Like...

Joe Rogan 8:17 (laughs)

Ali Siddiq 8:17 Like, why haven't they called me yet to... I'm like di- I'm on like special number four. Like, w- what's, what's the hold up? Like, what's the hold up on... Is th- is, who, who, who do, who is not picking up the phone for me to shoot this damn shot?

Joe Rogan 8:30 Do you have a publicist that calls people for that?

Ali Siddiq 8:33 Nah.

Joe Rogan 8:33 I think that's what it is.

Ali Siddiq 8:34 That's what it is.

Joe Rogan 8:35 The people that get that chase it. They chase that shit. Yeah. They-

Ali Siddiq 8:40 They, they do.

Joe Rogan 8:40 It's like Hollywood Walk of Fame, like the star, you could get a star. You just have to pay for it and have someone set it up. Like, there's a lot of people that have stars that are just, you never heard of them before. They just paid for it.

Ali Siddiq 8:52 (laughs) Like, the dude is walking by.

Joe Rogan 8:53 Yeah.

Ali Siddiq 8:54 "Who is Rudy Jackson?" (laughs)

Joe Rogan 8:56 Exactly. Exactly. It's not a joke.

Ali Siddiq 8:59 Like, "Who the, but what did he do?" And he, and he like right by the Starbucks. You just... (laughs)

Joe Rogan 9:03 Mm-hmm.

Ali Siddiq 9:04 And he's like... Yeah, walk, walk down Hollywood Boulevard.

Joe Rogan 9:06 And then you find out that the homeless person down the way is Rudy Jackson. You're like... (laughs)

Ali Siddiq 9:11 (laughs) "I used to be great, man." And then back. (laughs) The fuck you doing? Back in the day I was Samuel L. Jackson's stunt double.

Joe Rogan 9:19 Exclusivity is a thing, man. It's like, people pay for fake exclusivity. There was this, uh, bust. They, they busted, uh, they said it was $10 million worth of fake Rolexes. And I'm like, "Well, if they're fake, w- how... Uh, well, they should be worth nothing."

Ali Siddiq 9:34 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 9:34 Right?

Ali Siddiq 9:37 Like, "What you, are you busting me for trying?"

Joe Rogan 9:39 Right? (laughs)

Ali Siddiq 9:42 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 9:42 That's it. That's-

Ali Siddiq 9:42 I'm the real loser here, sir.

Joe Rogan 9:43 The thing about a fake Rolex is, though, they can make a fake Rolex exactly like a real Rolex. Exactly. 'Cause they use 3D printing. So what they do is they'll take a model, like a, they'll do a computer model of every single part in a Rolex. They'll take it apart and then they make an, a duplicate version of it. Every part. Everything. Every screw, every little wheel, every little mechanical piece inside that moves. And then they put it all together. "Yeah, this is it right here." "U.S. Customs and Border Protection said it seized 460 counterfeit Rolexes shipped to the U.S. from Hong Kong." You won't even be able to tell the difference, man. First of all, my eyesight sucks anyway. 'Cause I'm, I can't like, I have to put reading glasses on.

Ali Siddiq 10:27 So there's a Rolex that I'm looking for that they say that's, um, that people, is hard to find. It's the silver one with the green face. It's a Oyster 41. If anybody in Hong Kong make one-

Joe Rogan 10:43 (laughs)

Ali Siddiq 10:43 ... making one of them, just so, you know? And shit and talk until I get the, the one I want. I'm like, you know, I be hearing, I be hearing about, um, women getting gifted things that's on their wish list.

Joe Rogan 10:55 Oh, yeah.

Ali Siddiq 10:56 I'm like, "That shit never..." If I put a wish list together-

Joe Rogan 10:59 (laughs)

Ali Siddiq 11:00 ... they would be like, "You fucking bum."

Joe Rogan 11:01 (laughs)

Ali Siddiq 11:01 "You're a fucking beggar, Ali." Like, like-

Joe Rogan 11:04 Women can do it.

Ali Siddiq 11:06 It's w- it's, and they always complaining about instant. Not always, but sometimes they complain about, "I'm, we, it's just, it's a double standard." It fucking is.

Joe Rogan 11:14 Of course it is.

Ali Siddiq 11:15 If, if I go on the internet and put on a halter top and, with a, and, and, and put a wet T-shirt, a wet halter top on, and then, and, and, and put it right up underneath my, my, my chest, I get no money. I matter fact-

Joe Rogan 11:31 (laughs)

Ali Siddiq 11:31 ... I get complaints of people, "Hey, I need $10 for the, for the shit you put on the internet." (laughs)

Joe Rogan 11:37 (laughs)

Ali Siddiq 11:37 I fucking got people requesting money from me. But you do it. Let a woman put on a wet halter top right beneath her breasts, I g- and just put on there, "Donate," I guarantee you could be a millionaire.

Joe Rogan 11:51 For sure.

Ali Siddiq 11:51 Easily.

Joe Rogan 11:52 There was a woman who was working for a friend of mine. She was just, uh, in production of his podcast, and she would take photos of her feet and put her feet on OnlyFans and she was making $100,000 a month showing her feet.

Ali Siddiq 12:06 The, the, the lady who does my feet-... has taken videos of my feet, and I've seen 'em on her vi- on her page of other Korean ladies laughing.

Joe Rogan 12:18 (laughs)

Ali Siddiq 12:20 (laughs) "Look at the toe, look at that baby toe, I think it's work." (laughs)

Joe Rogan 12:25 (laughs)

Ali Siddiq 12:25 Like-

Joe Rogan 12:25 You get your toes done? You get, like, pedicure?

Ali Siddiq 12:27 Hell yeah, I go get a pedicure.

Joe Rogan 12:28 Ah. (laughs)

Ali Siddiq 12:30 Like, yo, I, um, I took, I took one of the toughest dudes... Like, I always take some hood dude to something that they deem as some non-manly shit. And I'm like, "Yo, listen, my man." My man, Papa Doc, he said his feet has been hurting. I said, "Yo, listen, you gotta get you a pair of Hokas." You know what I'm saying? He, so he went and got them. Talking about, "Yo, I feel like I'm walking on fucking pillows." I'm like, "Hokas is the shit."

Joe Rogan 12:58 Hoka, like running shoes?

Ali Siddiq 12:59 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 12:59 Yeah, they're great.

Ali Siddiq 13:00 Oh, my goodness, great.

Joe Rogan 13:01 Yeah.

Ali Siddiq 13:01 The best shoe ever made. So I said, "Man..." He got plantar fasciitis. And I said, "Man, you gotta get your feet done. That's a part of mental health, healthcare, you know, doing, getting your feet..." He's like, "Man, I ain't fucking with it. I'm scared. I'm not doing it. I don't know why. And I'm ticklish. I don't want nobody touching my goddamn feet." (laughs) I'm like, "I'ma go with you." And he's like, "I don't give a shit who go. I'm not fucking with it." I'm like, "Listen, I got you. I'm gonna go with you. I'ma take you to my place." And he said, "Aight." And I said, "Listen, before we get in here, I'm, we getting the deluxe. We getting the highest package. The lady gonna put all type of shit on your feet. Mayonnaise, cucumbers." (laughs) "All type of buttermilk. She gonna boil the motherfuckers in acid. She gonna do everything to your feet. Trust me." Tough, one of the toughest dudes. I'm like, I've had situations I've called him and he showed up with no problem. Like, "Yo, what's up? I'm killing everybody." (laughs) But (laughs) but the, the... You would think that I was taking him to the electric chair. (laughs) I'm like, "Yo, man, are you gonna come in the place or not?" "Nah, I ain't fucking with it." He look, he looking in there like it's a setup, like it's a mob hit. Like, "Who all in there?" Man, listen. Elderly people come in here, women come in here. Women feet be fucked up, you know what I'm saying? El- listen. So he sits down, takes his shoes off, and as soon as he put his feet in the water, I'm talking to him the whole time, just trying to get his mind off of it. And he's like, "Man, fucking water on." The water bubbling. He's like... I see him easing up. Then she comes out with this tray of all sorts of fruit and oranges, put them on his legs. He's like, "Man, what type of fucking fruit salad shit is this?" (laughs) Right when he getting the cucumber rub between his toes and all that, he look over at me as he's drinking, 'cause they bring you drinks. I'm having a mimosa, he having an orange juice, because he talking about, "I gotta stay on my toes. I don't give a fuck." Going, "You can't stay on your toes in here, man. Your toes in the water." (laughs) Man, this, this-

Joe Rogan 15:11 He's on high alert.

Ali Siddiq 15:12 This whole experience is not... You, you're supposed to be relaxing. The lady come in and she, she, um, put his ma- his massage chair on, and he... (laughs) You can see it, you can see him easing up on it. Before I know it, he in there asleep. (laughs) Lady doing everything to his feet, just got... She sawing them, she taking off his toes, she doing everything. She... I'm talking about, the lady took his feet off and just took him to the back with her. She was like, "Yo, it was a lot of shit going on." (laughs) She went... He walked out. He walking out, he, and he turns to me and said, "Man, goddamn. Oh, that shit was amazing, man. Got me some new feet." (laughs) That's, that's when he-

Joe Rogan 15:54 You converted him.

Ali Siddiq 15:56 (laughs) Yeah. I'm like, "He'll be back without me. He will, he'll be back in there without me."

Joe Rogan 16:01 Yeah.

Ali Siddiq 16:01 He know where to go.

Joe Rogan 16:02 Yeah, but maybe. Sometimes it's hard. It's like going to the movies by yourself. It's a big leap.

Ali Siddiq 16:07 Is it?

Joe Rogan 16:08 Some people.

Ali Siddiq 16:09 Man, I can go to the movies by myself in a heartbeat.

Joe Rogan 16:11 But you're a comic and you go on the road. When you go on the road, especially if you got an annoying opening act.

Ali Siddiq 16:16 Oh.

Joe Rogan 16:17 You know? If you go... (laughs) Like, if you go on the road and you're going to Cincinnati and you've never been to Cincinnati before, and they got a local guy opening for you and he's annoying, you know, and you wake up and it's 11:00 AM. You're like, "Fuck, what am I gonna do today? I'll go to the gym. No one's playing in the movies. Fuck it, I'm gonna go to the movies by myself."

Ali Siddiq 16:35 And I, and I commandeer both seats on the side of me with, with vittles. (laughs) I'm eating... Because I, if I'm going to the movies, this is not a healthy experience. (laughs) No. I'm eating all the bullshit- Yeah. ... that's in there. I want- Sour Patch Kids. I, Sour Patch Kids. I want the Twizzlers. I want a, a... And this is the only time I eat a box of fucking Thin Mints, the, them Junior Mints. Mm. I eat a box of them shits in (laughs) in the course of the movie, with nachos. I need my nachos with jalapenos. I need my popcorn with jalapenos. I put jalapenos in my popcorn. Ah, man, I just... I'm just gonna have so much bad shit. And I need it in both chairs. And I'ma sit back and I'ma watch. And, and I, and I be on high alert too in the movies sometimes, but most of the time I'm just in there relaxing. And I already have an exit plan though. Somebody coming in with some bullshit, I got a, I got a exit plan.

Joe Rogan 17:33 This fucking kid shooting yesterday-

Ali Siddiq 17:36 Mm.

Joe Rogan 17:36 ... is just... That's when you, when you think about exit plan. Like, people always want to think, you know, "What would I do? What would I do if something happened like that?" Like this, uh, elementary school shooting.

Ali Siddiq 17:49 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 17:49 This elementary school, it's, the more I'm reading about it, the more fucked it is. They saw him go in. The cops didn't stop them. They didn't go in after him. He was in there for 40 minutes. For 40 minutes, the parents are outside. There's video of the parents screaming at the cops, trying to get the cops to go in. Finally, border patrol gets there. Border patrol goes in and they kill them.

Ali Siddiq 18:13 ... I talked about it the day of, because it, it was, um, I'm on the radio in, in Houston, and it said, comes across shooting on Uvalde, is what it said. So immediately, we start trying to correct people because in Houston, we have a street, Uvalde. And that's what people heard, so we went in correcting it, and it's in Uvalde, Texas. And w- I- I'm, the first thing, I'm like, the s- who, who, who went to the school? Like, and why? And why are we still in this same position over and over again when we... The level of concern that we have for children is really lackluster in this country, because why does this continue to happen? And why is it no security? Why is it... why was he able to even get in the school if you looking at him and you know he doesn't go in? You d- you don't want to stop him to even ask a question? I, I'm confused of why people with these issues go to the most, like what... and it's like, why this place? Why-

Joe Rogan 19:42 'Cause it's horrific.

Ali Siddiq 19:43 Like-

Joe Rogan 19:44 They do it because it's the worst thing you can do. They're shooting little kids. They're going to an elementary school kid. The, you're getting like eight-year-olds, 10-year-olds.

Ali Siddiq 19:53 And-

Joe Rogan 19:53 It's the most horrific thing. The most innocent.

Ali Siddiq 19:55 And we know that this, this, we know that this is a possibility, right? And we know that this has happened, so why don't law makers make the law allow it to be if you commit this horrific crime, if you, i- if you go any... The consequence is so dire that we, that this is the kind, this is a, like you get beheaded. This is the, once again, this is back off to like a, a-

Joe Rogan 20:24 Yeah, but these guys wanna die.

Ali Siddiq 20:26 Like-

Joe Rogan 20:26 That's a death sentence. They know, like if that guy's in there for 40 minutes, he's not trying to live. He's waiting for someone to come in and kill him. That's a lot of these guys, it's a suicide ru- m- run.

Ali Siddiq 20:36 I think some of, I think some of them feel like they gonna live and somebody gonna make a movie about 'em. I think that, that you, you, you-

Joe Rogan 20:43 Maybe. Yeah.

Ali Siddiq 20:44 ... because if... I would kill you pro- before you even got in. You, you walking up is gonna be a problem 'cause you, you, soon as you walking up to the school, it's gonna be s- it's gonna be some resistance because they know that you're not... there's no resistance to these, to these places.

Joe Rogan 21:02 Yeah.

Ali Siddiq 21:02 So, you... we have to put up some walls of safety when we know that these things happen in this country and people's mental health, and peop- I'm not even blaming it on mental health, a lot of these things. It's, it's, it's this desire of sensationalism that these, that a lot of these people have.

Joe Rogan 21:19 Yeah.

Ali Siddiq 21:20 And, and, and, and you should combat it at all angles of it prior to it hap- protection is preventive.

Joe Rogan 21:29 Yeah. Well, somebody pointed out, and it's a good point, how do we have $40 billion to send to Ukraine and we don't have $40 billion to protect the schools?

Ali Siddiq 21:40 Ok- exactly.

Joe Rogan 21:41 How do we... wh- where's the money getting allocated? But I've, uh, I've said this about every single problem they have in this country. Every time there's like a report on the shootings in Chicago, I'm like, "How do we have money to send to other countries when we don't have enough money to fix whatever's going on in the south side of Chicago or Baltimore or"

Ali Siddiq 21:59 How's it po-

Joe Rogan 21:59 "parts of Detroit?"

Ali Siddiq 22:00 If we have f- if we have this money, how does it, how is it poverty-

Joe Rogan 22:04 Right.

Ali Siddiq 22:04 ... and this, uh-

Joe Rogan 22:05 Right.

Ali Siddiq 22:06 Okay, so you find money for, for, for other things, but you don't find money f- to correct the problems here?

Joe Rogan 22:11 Exactly. Exactly. It's almost like... Well, it has to be, uh, it's almost like it has to be profitable. Like you remember when we invaded Iraq and Halliburton got these no-bid contracts-

Ali Siddiq 22:24 Yep.

Joe Rogan 22:24 ... to fix all the shit we blew up.

Ali Siddiq 22:25 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 22:28 Give them a no-bid contract to fix Chicago. Go in there, fix it. Go in there, set up, set up community centers. Set up whatever you can do to protect people, set up whatever you can do to educate people, set up whatever you can do to provide people with better housing. Make, give them hope. Give-

Ali Siddiq 22:43 Do the country.

Joe Rogan 22:44 The whole country.

Ali Siddiq 22:45 Do the whole country.

Joe Rogan 22:46 It can be done. Like if you've got that much money to go into these other countries-

Ali Siddiq 22:49 (clears throat)

Joe Rogan 22:49 ... and fix things, and this whole idea of us being the police of the world, how the fuck can we be the police of the world? We can't even police our own backyard.

Ali Siddiq 22:56 How do I have a p- I have a plan to eradicate homelessness, but the smartest people in this, in this world don't have a plan?

Joe Rogan 23:05 What's your plan?

Ali Siddiq 23:06 Simple. So you ha- in most, in most cities, you have these abandoned buildings. You have a lot of abandoned buildings. You go in, you refurbish this building, and you start people right at the top. And it's a tier system that as you, you tier out the door. So whatever your situation is, whether it's mental health, you get that fixed there. Whether it's financial literacy, you get that fixed there. Whatever your situation is, you get fixed in this building, that this is what this ro- this recovery center is for. Then you put, you put them in jobs in, within the, within the building because it's f- it's gra- it's ran by grants. Within the building to, to heighten the skills that they already have and you, and you ask these people what are their interests? What do they want to be? What were you before this happened to you? How did this happen? You get all that back information and as, as, as they are tiering out, the money that's allocated for each particular client through this grant, half of that money is being put to the side for when they get ready to come out that they're... you're not let, you're not letting them out of this program just naked with just the skills that they acquired in this program. You're giving them-... a lease on, a new lease on life. This is the money that you acquired by being, by being to this program. Let's help you start your, let's help you start your life from this point. And you invest in the businesses that they're, that they're starting. You invest in their life, whether it's a trade center, you invest in these people. And with the, with the notion of they gonna reinvest a percentage back into the building to help more people. And you keep recycling people back into the world in that, in that, in that manner. So when you see somebody homeless, they're like, "I'm homeless, I can't help myself." Then they're like, "You bullshit." It's a building right there that helps every single person that even falls on hard time, and then you give people free healthcare.

Joe Rogan 24:52 I bet if you did that for several generations, you could put a massive dent in it. (clears throat) I don't think you'd ever f- totally fix it, 'cause you're never gonna fix abusive parents, sexual abuse, drug abuse when you're young.

Ali Siddiq 25:03 You get people, you get people out of there.

Joe Rogan 25:05 Yeah.

Ali Siddiq 25:05 You get people out that situ... Because the, I was in a, I, I had an abusive stepfather. The only way to remedy this is to get out of this, 'cause you can't fix him. You got to, you got to focus on me.

Joe Rogan 25:20 Yeah.

Ali Siddiq 25:20 And, and get me to safety. But if you cripple somebody thinking that somebody... You put a person in a position where they feel like they need that person, and so you make excuses for their behavior. When I see this all the time in people, like, why, why did this person stay? Why did this person do this? Because e- they were handicapped, they was crippled, and when you feel like you have no other place to go, you stay in positions that, that, that's abusing you. That's what people do.

Joe Rogan 25:49 That's definitely true, but the amount of resources you would have to have to take care of every family where every person is being abused.

Ali Siddiq 25:56 Th- we have it, because we can give it a, we can give it, we, we wa- we throw away more food in this country than more country- than most countries produce in a year. Our waste, our waste ratio, if our waste ratio change, then our condition change.

Joe Rogan 26:11 Yeah.

Ali Siddiq 26:11 Because if you allocate fu- if you allocate funds to the right thing instead of wasting funds, like even, even with, even with this, it's a, it's, it's, uh, people say it's a, it's a misinformation in, in certain things. Yes, it is, when you, when the federal government doesn't allocate funds to certain people to eradicate the misinformation, in me- in media. In media, it's federal funds that go, that go out to media companies. Why you don't give that to some, to some of the Black media outlets that you say that don't know what's going on? 'Cause you not helping, you not helping the situation either. You hurting the situation. You saying that people's num- if you know that the number one thing that cripples people in this country is health, and then you don't make it where they can have quality, free healthcare in this country, then you don't feel like the consumer that you're, you're, you're... The human being is the most important commodity on this planet. If you invest in the human being, and the human being does the good works that he's supposed to do with that investment, and they invest in more human beings, you create this utopia-

Joe Rogan 27:30 Yeah.

Ali Siddiq 27:30 ... of helping, and learning, and not being, and not having a phobia of, "Hey, Joe, I need your help." That doesn't make me less than a man 'cause I need your help with something. You d- you s- you supposed to give your fellow man a, a leg up. That's what-

Joe Rogan 27:46 Yes.

Ali Siddiq 27:46 ... you're supposed to do.

Joe Rogan 27:47 Yes.

Ali Siddiq 27:48 But we, we live in the what I'm not supposed to do.

Joe Rogan 27:53 Yeah, and helping people feels good. It's good for you, too. That, that, that's one thing we have to get into people's heads.

Ali Siddiq 27:58 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 27:58 Helping people feels good. It's good for you, too. It's like people are selfish. They, they only wanna help themselves. They feel like, "If I'm helping someone else, it's taking away from me." But that's not the case. When-

Ali Siddiq 28:10 Wh- where does that mindset come from?

Joe Rogan 28:11 (clears throat) They just, they just need a better sh- well, it's, it's a, it's a famine mindset. The famine mindset is there's not enough to go around. But there's enough to go around. There's enough for everybody, you know? Uh, this is one thing that I always try to instill in comedians. (clears throat) 'Cause comedians are like notoriously selfish. They think about themselves, wanna get ahead, narcissists. "I wanna get ahead, I wanna get ahead. Why is he doing that? And why am I not doing that? I wanna get it. I wanna get it." If you could help the people around you, you develop a community. When you develop a community, everybody wants everybody to do good. In our community, if one of us is killing it, everybody's happy. (clears throat) If one of us has a special and that special's killing it, like your special, which is out on YouTube right now, when that happens, people get excited. Like, "Goddamn, look at him. Look at this guy. Look at her. Everybody's killing it." That's good for everybody, and it gives the people coming up hope. Like, "I'm entering into a community, if I work hard, and if I continue to, like, honor the craft of standup comedy, I'm a part of this very small and tight-knit community of people." There's not that many of us. And if we do that and we help each other, it's good for everybody.

Ali Siddiq 29:16 That's the g- I think that's why Rodney Dangerfield was one of the ones for me. Like-

Joe Rogan 29:23 Yes.

Ali Siddiq 29:24 ... when, when people say, "Who your influences?" I'm influenced-

Joe Rogan 29:27 (clears throat)

Ali Siddiq 29:28 ... by more than just what you did on stage, you know? It's how y- your character, uh, how you were a- as a person.

Joe Rogan 29:39 Yes.

Ali Siddiq 29:40 And when he was not selfish, like, "Hey, man, I got a platform. Everybody is welcome to this platform if you funny. Let's do it."

Joe Rogan 29:51 Think about the people that he blew up.

Ali Siddiq 29:53 Oh, man.

Joe Rogan 29:54 Sam Kinison, Dice Clay, Bill Hicks, Dom Irrera.

Ali Siddiq 29:57 Roseanne Barr.

Joe Rogan 29:57 Lenny Clark, Roseanne Barr. Down-

Ali Siddiq 30:00 Bob, Bob Sanders.

Joe Rogan 30:00 ... the line. Seinfeld.

Ali Siddiq 30:01 Si- oh, Sein- man.

Joe Rogan 30:03 Dude.

Ali Siddiq 30:04 It's, it's-

Joe Rogan 30:04 So many people.

Ali Siddiq 30:06 It's... And, and why not, why not wanna be that-

Joe Rogan 30:11 Yeah.

Ali Siddiq 30:11 ... in comedy? Or why leave that to another entity-... oh, the, I'm on, I'm on the all-stars of this, I'm on the, I'm on th- the, the actors of that. Like, why leave it to other people in other crafts to heighten your craft?

Joe Rogan 30:27 Yeah.

Ali Siddiq 30:27 Why leave it to other people from other cities to say... But my, my, my biggest thing is to get the recognition from my peers. Like, when a comic calls me and says, "Man, your special, classic. Like, I'm putting it in this space."

Joe Rogan 30:47 Yeah.

Ali Siddiq 30:47 This is because they know the craft. There's not a... You're not a, you're not a spectator. Because to sp- to sp- (laughs) to spectators... Everybody looks good to spectators. But when the people who know the craft are looking like, "Nah, you don't know what you're looking at." Like-

Joe Rogan 31:06 Yeah.

Ali Siddiq 31:06 ... "You don't know how special this is."

Joe Rogan 31:08 Yeah.

Ali Siddiq 31:09 'Cause a special is supposed to be special. It's supposed to be a piece of the person. Like, and when s- uh, the, the people that call and say, "Hey, man, this is timeless," it's like, "Yo, you really put a piece of w-" Like, man.

Joe Rogan 31:26 You did it.

Ali Siddiq 31:28 It's, it's in- it's insane.

Joe Rogan 31:29 Yeah.

Ali Siddiq 31:29 It's-

Joe Rogan 31:29 And that's what we work towards. You think about that when you're putting your bits together, you're editing them, when you're going over them, going, "Maybe that's a little too long, or maybe I need a little something there. Maybe I need to trim that up, or maybe I need to explain that a little bit better." You want that thing to, when it gets released, you get those phone calls like, "Dude, that thing was awesome. That thing was awesome."

Ali Siddiq 31:50 From-

Joe Rogan 31:51 And then you, and then you get, "Thank you. Thank you, man. I appreciate it. Appreciate it." And then you wanna do that to other people too, and you wanna be able to call them up and go, "Dude, your special-

Ali Siddiq 31:58 Yo.

Joe Rogan 31:58 ... was amazing."

Ali Siddiq 31:59 It was... That, and, and that's... I remember watching, I remember watching Dan Sobel's A Son to Gary, and I'm sitting there in fucking amazement. I'm like, "This shit is good."

Joe Rogan 32:13 Yeah.

Ali Siddiq 32:14 I'm like, "Yo, this shit is fucking good." Like, "I'ma call him. This shit is fucking good."

Joe Rogan 32:18 Yeah, feels good.

Ali Siddiq 32:20 Like, I'm sitting there like, "This shit is good, man."

Joe Rogan 32:23 It feels good to call somebody and tell them that too.

Ali Siddiq 32:25 And I'm like, "Ah, goddamn it, Dan Sobel, you are fucking amazing." (laughs)

Joe Rogan 32:32 (laughs)

Ali Siddiq 32:32 Right? Like, like... And that's the thing, you know, um, I watched, I watched Earthquakes, and I felt good for Quake.

Joe Rogan 32:42 Yes.

Ali Siddiq 32:43 And that's the thing that you wanna do in this business. I remember writing with Bill Bellamy on his special, and when he's getting ready to go out and we talking, and I'm like, my last words were like, "Yo, man, just go and just do what you do." And when it came together, I called him like, "Yo, I watched it live. I was there through the whole process, and that shit is still good." The air was clear. I was like... And you, and I think that comics don't understand, I'm, I'm not chasing other comics in a aspect of the new guys. I'm chasing the class, like I'm chasing Carlin and Cosby-

Joe Rogan 33:40 Pryor.

Ali Siddiq 33:41 ... and Pryor and Eddie. I'm, I'm chasing them, so what you're doing doesn't affect me or change how I'm doing it, because man, Sinbad... Like, the memorable things that I'm like, "I want my, I want my special to be in that." When people say, "Hey man, Live from Sunset Strip, Elephant in the Room, Domino Effect, Ollie's Steak," I, like, I wanna be mentioned amongst that. And I tell people, "I'm, I'm not playing the game for riches and all that. I'm playing for that yellow jacket." Even though a lot of people, they, they satisfaction is you play football and you, you play through high school, you win a high school championship. Great. Then some people wanna go to college, win a high- a college championship. Great. Some people wanna go to the NFL, and get to the NFL, they wanna go to the All Star games. And that's fine. Some people wanna win a Super Bowl. But some guys are playing the game to, at the end of that, receive a yellow ja- They not cool with just being there.

Joe Rogan 34:53 Right.

Ali Siddiq 34:54 They want the jacket.

Joe Rogan 34:55 They want greatness.

Ali Siddiq 34:57 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 34:57 Yeah.

Ali Siddiq 34:58 It's-

Joe Rogan 34:58 Yeah, aspire always to greatness, 'cause even if you don't get there, you get pretty fucking excellent. 'Cause if you're trying to get pretty good, mm, you'll get pretty good. But if you're trying to achieve excellence, like real, true excellence, where you can be proud of something, you know, even if you get- don't get to where you wanted to go, you get a lot further than where you would go if you have low expectations.

Ali Siddiq 35:24 This is the first piece of work that actually changed my mind on something.

Joe Rogan 35:30 How so?

Ali Siddiq 35:32 People will ask me, "Hey man, when it comes to storytelling, who is your top people? Who, who the best storytellers in comedy to you?" I used to say, "Just like this." I said, "It would be Cosby, Carlin, Joey Diaz, Eddie Murphy, me." I, and I say, "Me, Joey and Eddie, all threes." Meaning we third, and then other people. I looked... When I put this special together and I looked at it, and I looked at the craft of the s- the ability to bring people into the story, this is the first time somebody asked me after that, and I said-... me, Cosby, then everybody else after that can sort their shit out. But I can't deny myself no more, to put myself behind somebody. When it comes to a story, to like bringing you into a story.

Joe Rogan 36:38 It's a different kinda art.

Ali Siddiq 36:39 Yeah, it's a different art. And I've gotten pretty goddamn good.

Joe Rogan 36:43 That's a thing where Ari, when he put together that Storytellers show-

Ali Siddiq 36:47 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 36:47 ... that was his idea. He was like, "These stories are too hard to develop when you're doing a 15-minute set." On a, like a stacked Comedy Store lineup.

Ali Siddiq 36:55 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 36:56 You know, you got 10 fucking killers, and you wanna kill two. And if you're trying to develop a story, and it's a story about going to the park with your dad, it's a long-ass story. Like people are like, "Where are you going with this?" But if you could do it on a show that's just people telling stories, then you could develop it and tighten it, and then get to the point where it might be your closing bit.

Ali Siddiq 37:17 Y- Man, we used to, me and Ari talked yesterday about, "This is not happening."

Joe Rogan 37:22 Yeah.

Ali Siddiq 37:23 And he was like, "Out of all them stories, all the shows I've done, 'Mexican Guy Don Boots' is still my favorite goddamn story."

Joe Rogan 37:38 (laughs)

Ali Siddiq 37:38 He said, "I didn't know you. We was gonna put you on the digital side of it. And we was looking at the story," and he was like, "Goddammit, it's like..." And he was like, "I didn't even know what you were talking about, and I was hanging on every goddamn word." And then he was like, "Oh shit, he's... This shit's crazy." Like, and I'm like, "Nah, I appreciate it." Then he said, "The next one was even more in..." Like Mitchell, it's like then I started thinking like, "He... His goddamn ability to tell his story, he's seeing it through a different len-" Like, whatever lens he's seeing it through, he's making me see it through that same lens.

Joe Rogan 38:18 Yeah.

Ali Siddiq 38:18 And I have no goddamn idea what he's even talking about.

Joe Rogan 38:20 That's the beautiful thing about someone when they're really locked in on stage. I've always said this, that I feel like I'm thinking through their mind, like I'm allowing them to take over my mind, take me on a journey. That's why when someone's shitty or hacky-

Ali Siddiq 38:34 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 38:34 ... or it's like, "Ah, why are you using my mind? Why are you bothering, why are you borrowing my mind?"

Ali Siddiq 38:39 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 38:39 You know, like, "I gotta get the fuck outta here. I can't watch this."

Ali Siddiq 38:42 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 38:42 I'm super sensitive to bad comedy.

Ali Siddiq 38:44 I, what? Like-

Joe Rogan 38:46 I can't, I can't watch it.

Ali Siddiq 38:47 Like, I'm not-

Joe Rogan 38:48 It's contagious. (laughs)

Ali Siddiq 38:48 I'm, it, it's like, it's like if I see you, and, and I, and I never, I never thought this before until somebody said it, "Hey man, I, this dude did a bad set and then he tried to shake my hand." I didn't, I didn't want him to touch me, like I didn't-

Joe Rogan 39:03 (laughs)

Ali Siddiq 39:03 I didn't want the shit on me. Like, "Don't put that shit on me." And like-

Joe Rogan 39:06 Yes. (laughs) It's contagious.

Ali Siddiq 39:06 And, and I was like-

Joe Rogan 39:07 Yeah.

Ali Siddiq 39:07 ... "Oh, that's rude as shit." And then somebody did a bad set, he, and he, and he walked up to me, I was like, and I start walking the other way like, "Ah, don't fucking touch me."

Joe Rogan 39:16 (laughs)

Ali Siddiq 39:16 "Don't do that shit. You gon, I'm, I'm, you gonna give me COVID. I don't want..." (laughs)

Joe Rogan 39:20 Wednesday night, Ron White had his friend-

Ali Siddiq 39:23 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 39:23 ... that he claims, he claims she's funny. I'm sure she's a nice lady. And, uh, anyway, she just didn't belong. She can't j- you can't follow Ron White when you're an amateur. You just can't. You can't, you can't. You gotta be a fucking touring, rock solid, like set up punchline, bam, bam, bam, good premises. You gotta be good to follow Ron fucking White.

Ali Siddiq 39:44 So-

Joe Rogan 39:45 She was not.

Ali Siddiq 39:47 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 39:47 And she, not only did she eat dick, but then she came-

Ali Siddiq 39:50 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 39:50 ... and hung out with us in the green room. I'm like, "Fuck, I gotta go up next."

Ali Siddiq 39:53 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 39:53 So Tony's on stage killing, and the first five minutes he's just roasting her. And I'm back there, and she's like making excuses and talking. I'm like, "Oh my God, I gotta get out of this room." He dragged her into the green room. Now she's back there just (choking sound) just coughing bad comedy at us. (choking sound)

Ali Siddiq 40:11 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 40:14 Like, "Oh, no."

Ali Siddiq 40:15 (coughs)

Joe Rogan 40:16 I'm like, "Oh, no." So I start playing music loud and I'm moving around. (laughs) Joe's shadow boxing.

Narrator 40:22 I wanted to leave.

Joe Rogan 40:23 You wanted to leave too, right?

Narrator 40:25 I, I didn't even look at her.

Joe Rogan 40:25 That's right, Jamie was there. (laughs)

Narrator 40:27 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 40:28 I'm not exaggerating, right?

Narrator 40:29 No, no.

Joe Rogan 40:30 And everybody felt it. Even Ron felt it. He said, "Well, you know, it wasn't the best set." (laughs)

Ali Siddiq 40:34 Mm-hmm. Man, w- uh, w- it, it's, it's weird 'cause, ah, my, eh, me listening... First, big up to Ron White. The, a classy, very classy man.

Joe Rogan 40:46 He's the man.

Ali Siddiq 40:48 Ron, I, uh, just imagine getting this phone call. I'm getting ready to do Orlando Improv. My agent, Joe Eshelman, who I love dearly, Joe calls me and says, "Hey, just wanna run this by you. Um, someone wants to, wants to feature for you." I'm like, "No, I'm cool. I got, I, I got my feature Marcus Wiley, I'm cool." He's like, "Just hear me out. He's working on some new stuff. He's coming back. He just wants to be around a comic who is a good comic." I'm like, "Joe, what's, who, who, who is this? You're taking too long." He's like, "Ron White." I was like, "I'm not fucking with some guy that has stole Ron's White name. Like, Ron White from Orlando? Get the fuck outta here." He's like, "No, Ron White, White." I'm like... (laughs)

Joe Rogan 41:48 (laughs)

Ali Siddiq 41:48 I'm like, and I was like, and I, and I doubled down and said like, "Ron White, White?" Like... (laughs)

Joe Rogan 41:52 (laughs)

Ali Siddiq 41:53 Like, like the fucking man, Ron White?

Joe Rogan 41:54 The man.

Ali Siddiq 41:55 Like, he's like, "Yes." I was like, I can't even get my yes together. I'm like, "Fucking yes." Like-

Joe Rogan 42:02 Yeah.

Ali Siddiq 42:02 Yeah, I'll get to fucking work with Ron White? Hell yeah. I said, "He wants to, he wants to metal?" He's like, "Yeah, he's got like 20, 25 minutes." I said, "Do he want to headline? Like, I, I'll let him headline." Like... (laughs)

Joe Rogan 42:15 (laughs)

Ali Siddiq 42:15 Just to fucking like relinquish my weekend to Ron White, just come feature or do some host shit or whatever. He's like, "No," he says, "he just wanna..." Yeah.So I, I get there and I'm, I'm already anticipating, he's a legend. He's gonna be in the green room, doing his shit, and everybody knows, like, I like to be in my green room first, and invite you in. But I'm relinquishing all that shit 'cause it's Ron White. I get there, Ron White is the fucking constant professional. Not in the green room. He comes to the green room, he knocks on the door, and he, "What's wrong there?" I'm like, and I'm sitting there in awe, like, "Fucking Ron White."

Joe Rogan 42:54 (laughs)

Ali Siddiq 42:55 "Please, fucking Ron White, White." (laughs)

Joe Rogan 42:57 (laughs)

Ali Siddiq 42:59 He got his, he got his bus outside, he's hanging in his bus, then he, he came over and started hanging in the green room with us. And he was like, "Look, I'm gonna go out here and do the raggediest 20 minutes that I just put together and trying to get this shit together." Now, I'm, I'm going out and I'm finna watch 'cause this is fucking Ron White. Stellar 20 minutes. Was fucking killing, ugh. I'm, I'm, I'm so caught up in what he ... And they about to introduce me and I'm st- I'm in the back talking about, "Look, shit was amazing." And, and we talking, and he's like, "Ali, you, you gotta go up." I'm like, "Oh, shit." So-

Joe Rogan 43:33 (laughs)

Ali Siddiq 43:34 ... I, I go up, do my ... And he comes in the showroom, and he's watching from the beginning. And I'm doing my thing after the show, he comes in, he's like, "Look here, kid. You are fucking incredible. Like, I, like I, I tried to give it to you. I tried to rattle you." 'Cause his shit was so crisp, like, it was still a class. Like, he's like, "Man." So the rest of the weekend, we just chatting it up and just ... I'm like, "I'm fucking kicking it with Ron White." And then I'm like, man, these places ... And every night, he's just giving me a little more something about, "Yo, you can go a little deeper in that story, you there, 'cause you had me, you had me, kid." Everything, and he, he noticed that I would start a story and stop, and start doing another story, and he said, "You keep leaving me, kid." He's like, "I'm still trying to figure out what happened with your uncle." (laughs)

Joe Rogan 44:38 (laughs)

Ali Siddiq 44:38 He's like, he's like, "I didn't go back?" He was like, "No, you fucking didn't go back." Like, like-

Joe Rogan 44:42 Ah.

Ali Siddiq 44:42 And I'm like, "Ah, shit, I gotta start going back." And that, and I'm like, like, if she knows him, like, why are you not picking up the jewels from him? Like, I-

Joe Rogan 44:53 She can't. You gotta watch. If you saw, you, well, you can't ... When, when did you come Wednesday night? When, what time did you get to, to the club?

Ali Siddiq 45:00 Right when I, right when I walked in the-

Joe Rogan 45:02 Okay.

Ali Siddiq 45:02 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 45:02 You missed the chaos.

Ali Siddiq 45:04 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 45:04 It's impossible. You can't fix it. It's like me breathing underwater. It's not gonna happen. It's not gonna happen. There's nothing to do. You can't fix it. I mean, maybe on another time, in another state of mind, with different material, maybe she could do well. But in that moment, there was no fixing it. There's no advice to be given. She came up with a notebook.

Ali Siddiq 45:25 Oh.

Joe Rogan 45:26 Yeah. She came up with notes and panicked. Didn't have the mic close to her mouth. It was, everything was wrong.

Ali Siddiq 45:32 Everything.

Joe Rogan 45:32 And I don't think she knew she was gonna go up until, like, right before Ron went up. Ron told her that he's gonna bring ... "I'm gonna bring you up. I'ma bring you up." 'Cause aft- he come in the back room with ... This is the f- this was the first problem. He goes, "She's a really good writer." Ooh.

Ali Siddiq 45:46 No, shit.

Joe Rogan 45:47 Don't say that. This is what I wanna hear, "She's fucking hilarious. She's fucking hilarious."

Ali Siddiq 45:52 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 45:52 "Can she do a guest set?" Okay. I didn't ... Well, "Friend of mine, is a really good writer." I'm like, "Ooh."

Ali Siddiq 45:58 Mm.

Joe Rogan 45:59 "Okay. What else? How is she at delivering this writing?"

Ali Siddiq 46:03 Yeah, I, I don't think any of my, any of my friends I've ever said that they ... Bryson Brown is from Austin. (coughs) He's fucking hysterical. Like, I'm like, that's how I introduce him. Like, "Yo, this is Bryson Brown, he's fucking hysterical."

Joe Rogan 46:17 Yeah, you want a-

Ali Siddiq 46:17 "He can grab a guest spot."

Joe Rogan 46:18 ... a overall assessment of their ability on stage. Not like a, of the little tiny area that they're good at.

Ali Siddiq 46:26 Um-

Joe Rogan 46:26 It's an important area, being a good writer, very important, but without delivery and timing and presence and every- it's ... Are you good?

Ali Siddiq 46:35 Hey, um, she's a good setup.

Joe Rogan 46:37 This-

Ali Siddiq 46:37 She set up jokes excellent.

Joe Rogan 46:39 She set up Tony.

Ali Siddiq 46:40 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 46:40 Tony destroyed that lady. That ruthless little motherfucker. There is no one alive that you want a bomb in front of when you're gonna bring up like Tony.

Ali Siddiq 46:50 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 46:50 'Cause he will ... He roasted her. I mean, he had seven or eight solid minutes just killing her when he went on stage. (laughs)

Ali Siddiq 46:59 Yeah. That's what you-

Joe Rogan 47:01 It was amazing.

Ali Siddiq 47:01 That's what you do. You have-

Joe Rogan 47:03 But you have to.

Ali Siddiq 47:03 You, you ha- you have to acknowledge the elephant in the room.

Joe Rogan 47:06 You have to.

Ali Siddiq 47:06 And I, and I hate ... I used to hate doing it. I used to hate doing it, especially ... I used to hate doing it, period. But Bill Bellamy, he's a nice guy, but he has a mean streak in him-

Joe Rogan 47:19 (laughs)

Ali Siddiq 47:19 ... that is outstanding. On the tour with him, I used to host his tour, and somebody would ask for a guest spot and he would come in and like, "Ali, triple seven." I'm like, "Oh, shit. Who just asked for a goddamn guest spot?" (laughs) So, so, so now people don't know what we about to do to you. Like, I'ma come out and usually I would do 15, I would just skate into it. But I'm coming out with seven minutes of straight fucking home runs. Bow, bow, bow, bow, bow, bow. I'm, like, I'm the, I'm not ... I'm stacking this shit on these people so ... Like you still, people still laughing at the first joke, I'm on joke number five. I'm fucking stacking it on. And when I leave them, I'm bringing ... People gonna be still laughing when I bring you up. They not even gonna fucking think about shit you saying 'cause they still laughing from joke number three. And I'ma bring you up. (laughs)

Joe Rogan 48:13 (laughs)

Ali Siddiq 48:14 And I'ma lead, I'ma sit you right in that fucking pressure cooker.

Joe Rogan 48:18 (laughs)

Ali Siddiq 48:18 (laughs) You know what I'm saying? And you're gonna, I don't give a damn, you're gonna die if you can't fucking-... surf, 'cause I put-

Joe Rogan 48:27 Yeah.

Ali Siddiq 48:27 … I put 100-foot wave on your ass.

Joe Rogan 48:29 Yes.

Ali Siddiq 48:30 And then you die, and then I go up, and I put another seven minutes of your dying-

Joe Rogan 48:37 (laughs)

Ali Siddiq 48:37 … on top of it. And Bill's like, "I hate when people ask us for guest spots." I'm like-

Joe Rogan 48:43 Yeah.

Ali Siddiq 48:43 … "Ah, you fucking evil man." (laughs)

Joe Rogan 48:47 (laughs)

Ali Siddiq 48:47 You sent the, the fucking junkyard dog to destroy somebody, and I'm like, "Eh."

Joe Rogan 48:51 But for that person that did that set and bombed, if they can figure out how to follow you when you're crushing, if they can figure out how to ride that wave, that is so important for... That lady, Mitzi Shore, that's what she did every fucking time. If you were a good comic, so she thought you had some potential and you were young, she would throw you on after a killer. "Who's on? Who's on the lineup?" For me, it was Martin Lawrence in the '90s. Dude, you never saw anybody eat it like seeing me going on after Martin Lawrence when he was in the leather jumpsuit days.

Ali Siddiq 49:24 Mm.

Joe Rogan 49:24 People don't remember.

Ali Siddiq 49:26 Mm.

Joe Rogan 49:26 They don't remember.

Ali Siddiq 49:27 He was the fucking sex.

Joe Rogan 49:27 '95 Martin Lawrence, 1995, my God, my God. His timing, his facial expressions, the power. Chris Rock, to this day, talks about a time where he bombed going on after Martin Lawrence, and it changed his career, 'cause he had been doing too many easy shows. He'd been too many, doing too many of those New York City, like cellar spots, like, you know, everybody's so happy to see you, you can kinda be casual. And he's headlining, and Martin Lawrence is throwing lightning bolts. Just... The whole room just... He was so good. He was so dynamic. He would pace the stage. He had so much energy. When he would hit his punchlines and, holy, his facial expressions, you'd be like, "God, I can't even watch this. I'm gonna, I'm going to my death, I'm going to my death." I went to my death. I followed Martin Lawrence dozens of times, dozens.

Ali Siddiq 50:20 You, you know what I... Let me tell you what I, what I love about a honest comic. You know how many comics wouldn't say that they went behind somebody that was just fucking a absolute monster? Like, "Yo, man, this shit is a problem." Like, "How am I gonna match this shit?" Like, I, I can imagine going up after Martin. He, uh, Martin's still hungry. He out there fucking getting it.

Joe Rogan 50:54 He was in his 30s.

Ali Siddiq 50:56 Ugh.

Joe Rogan 50:56 Martin Lawrence in his 30s with a leather jumpsuit on, you're fucked.

Ali Siddiq 51:00 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 51:01 You are fucked. People don't remember, man. If you go back to You So Crazy, th- goddamn, he was good. In my mind, he's like, you know, when you, you talk about the greats, 'cause, you know, he went and done, did the TV show, and he didn't tour as much, and he didn't put out as much comedy material. So, a lot of people that weren't around in the '90s forget how good he was.

Ali Siddiq 51:20 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 51:20 Dude, I ate dick going after that guy. But it taught me. It taught me how to ride the wave. It taught me how to start strong. It taught me how to cut all the bullshit out. All the... And to look at your act with like... Scrutinize it. Look at it with a microscope.

Ali Siddiq 51:36 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 51:36 Get, get rid of some of that shit that's not that good. Fix, fix the setup. You, you better do it right. You better sound like a fucking professional. You're going on after one of the best comedians walking the face of the planet. And back then, he might've been number one. He might've been number one in '95. He might've been number one.

Ali Siddiq 51:52 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 51:52 He was murdering. I mean, I would be in the back room terrified just hearing the roars.

Ali Siddiq 51:58 I, I remember times, being places and you going up behind people that are fucking assassins. Tony Roberts, I don't know if you know Tony Roberts, but he is so quick. Just rapid fire shit. And I used to... And people used to be like, "Man, you can't, can't nobody follow Tony. There's no, nobody can play, follow Tony." And I remember being at a spot and then people was like, "Yo, Tony's up right now. You going up next." I'm like, "Cool." I'd already been able to ride the wave of... Like, I'm not going up to compete with Tony, I'm going up to do my shit. And I remember being offended during this show that a person thought that I couldn't follow Tony, and they switched up the lineup.

Joe Rogan 52:57 Mm.

Ali Siddiq 52:57 And I was fucking pissed. And I said, "Okay." And I went out and I got a standing ovation. And Tony Roberts was the person that said he was... He said he was right there when the production person said, "So, the first comic got a standing ovation. What the fuck do we do now?" It was like... 'Cause you thought that I was... Like, they, they had played me like I was some fucking throw on on the show.

Joe Rogan 53:25 Right.

Ali Siddiq 53:25 And th- they was like, "Yo, Ali just got a standing ovation." And DL opened the door of his green room and said, "What did y'all think he was gonna do? You fucking disrespected him."

Joe Rogan 53:37 (laughs)

Ali Siddiq 53:38 'Cause he's like, "Yo, he don't... It doesn't matter where I go, because I know what I'm going to do when I get there." And I learned very early on, because I was going up behind people that... Benjy Brown at the Coconut Grove Improv, some... He was... He had motherfuckers laughing so hard that a dude came in the green room and sat down and it was laughing.

Joe Rogan 54:03 (laughs)

Ali Siddiq 54:03 He was on his way from the bathroom. He just busted the green room, and he said, "Man, this motherfucker killing me." Like... (laughs)

Joe Rogan 54:08 He sat down in the green room? (laughs)

Ali Siddiq 54:11 'Cause it was on the way up like... And you could hear it, you could hear it, 'cause the green room was like right behind the stage. And you could hear it, like Benjy Brown is fucking destroying this room. And he's doing this, this character Kiki, and he was like, "Yo..." And it's this loud pitch ghetto girl, and he's fucking destroying this room.And then he stops, and says, "Let me bring up the next comic." You like, "Goddamn!"

Joe Rogan 54:41 (laughs)

Ali Siddiq 54:41 It's people, it's people dead in here. Like, it's like...

Joe Rogan 54:45 (laughs)

Ali Siddiq 54:45 You, but you gotta go out.

Joe Rogan 54:46 The Coconut Grove Improv is where I saw Joey Diaz put people in their grave, 'cause Joey Diaz would go up there and do half his punchlines in Spanish.

Ali Siddiq 54:54 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 54:55 And you would have like a 40% Cuban audience. And Joey Diaz would have j- "La benga!" And he would hit some fucking Spanish punchlines, and people would just throw their chairs up in the air. They were falling down to the ground, knocking over tables. It was chaos. And then, Joey was middling. So Joey, this is back in the day when Joey was coming up, and they would have like some bl- road act, whose, you know, did HBO in 1984 and, you know, kind of still has the same material, and they would have to go on after Joey. I saw people quit.

Ali Siddiq 55:26 Yes.

Joe Rogan 55:27 Quit.

Ali Siddiq 55:28 That shit is, that shit is fantastic when, when, when you like, "Yo, man, this shit is..." (laughs) Damon Wayans. Damon Wayans, I middled for Damon Wayans, 'cause whatever his middling act was fucking up. And he said he was too dark, so they called me, and at the end of the weekend, Damon... I never went in the green room. He called me in the green room on Sunday. Come in and I sat down. I said, "Hey, how you doing, Mr. Wayans?" He said, "How does it feel to be a fucking assassin?"

Joe Rogan 56:03 (laughs)

Ali Siddiq 56:04 I said, "What?" He said, "I used to do this. I used to do this to people. I used to fucking go on stage and destroy people. You're a fucking assassin. Are you moving to LA?" I'm like, "No, I'm, I'm right-" He's like, "Fucking assassin."

Joe Rogan 56:20 That's a nice feeling.

Ali Siddiq 56:22 Bobby Lee, Bo- Bobby Lee. (laughs) I'm hosting the show. Bobby Lee had a, a lady that was his middling act, and after the first show, Bobby, we at the Houston Improv, Bobby called me in the room, in the green room, he say, "Hey, I'm not gonna fire you, not gonna fire you, just want you to be honest with me. Are you a host?" I'm like, "I'm the host." He's like, "Are you... You know what the fuck I'm saying."

Joe Rogan 56:52 (laughs)

Ali Siddiq 56:52 "Are you a host?" I'm like, "Nah, I, I..." He goes like, "I fucking knew it. Improv's always doing this shit to me, giving me the strongest motherfucker in the city." (laughs) He said, "He doing 30 minutes." And I'm like, "I'm filling the rest of the time." He's like, "I fucking knew it." And Bobby was going out doing his closer first. He's like, he's so fucking insane.

Joe Rogan 57:13 Wow.

Ali Siddiq 57:13 (laughs) He was, he was, he was like, "You, come to the stage, Bobby Lee." Next thing, Bobby Lee's pants are off, like... (laughs)

Joe Rogan 57:20 (laughs)

Ali Siddiq 57:21 Dick's out, dick's out. I'm starting with this. Like, not fucking fixing to bury me behind a fucking host. I'm not doing it. Like n-

Joe Rogan 57:29 Sometimes you have to do that. You have to go out with your, your strongest shit first. You can't dilly-dally-

Ali Siddiq 57:35 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 57:36 ... when someone murders. You, you better take them up to the same RPMs.

Ali Siddiq 57:40 And the thing is, don't... I, I want, I want the young comics out there that's listening probably, don't think that you murdering a headliner with the local shit. Like, if it's local-

Joe Rogan 57:49 That's different.

Ali Siddiq 57:50 ... that's like, that's, nah, you're, you're not, "I'm on the, I'm on Martin Luther King," and no...

Joe Rogan 57:54 Right.

Ali Siddiq 57:54 ... get the fuck out of here. That, everybody got Martin Luther King. The, what, if you murder, you gotta murder with your shit.

Joe Rogan 58:00 Real shit.

Ali Siddiq 58:01 Real shit.

Joe Rogan 58:01 Yeah.

Ali Siddiq 58:01 It can't be the, the, the fluff.

Joe Rogan 58:03 You know, I lived in Boston-

Ali Siddiq 58:05 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 58:05 ... and there were some of the best comics alive back then, but they all had local shit. And when they would go on the road, like local shit in Boston would kill at 100%. You go on the road, it was 30%.

Ali Siddiq 58:15 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 58:16 It was like the same bits. Nobody knew what the fuck you were talking about. Nobody cared about that accent. Nobody cared about those references to like the Red Sox. Nobody gave a fuck.

Ali Siddiq 58:24 Yup.

Joe Rogan 58:24 And all those bits were useless. And those guys just stayed. Some of the best comics I've ever seen in my life, they lived in Boston, they stayed in Boston, and they got trapped. They got trapped by local shit. They were local celebrities, and they got trapped doing local shit, and they never did the road.

Ali Siddiq 58:40 If I, and I'm just saying, if you wanna know how not to be locked into local shit, even if you in a place where you started, look at my special. I shot my special in Houston. You can't tell it's Houston. I'm talking about things in Houston, but from a, a wide-eyed lens, but it's not about Houston. It's about-

Joe Rogan 59:09 No.

Ali Siddiq 59:10 ... life.

Joe Rogan 59:10 It's about life. It's good. It is very good. And it's, it's very intimate, which is, I like. I like a special in a comedy club. I really do. I think there's something better about a s- well, if I'm watching at home, I'm in my living room, I wanna watch it in an intimate environment. I wanna be in an intimate environment in the audience. If I'm watching someone on stage and they're in a fuck- Like, Kevin Hart did his shit in like 50,000 people. It's like, "Jesus Christ, how the, how do I even pretend I'm there?"

Ali Siddiq 59:35 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 59:35 But, but when I'm watching you, and I'm watching you on stage at a comedy club, there's a, a normal-sized stage, intimate with the audience. You're seeing the people in the front row, you're smiling, you're having fun. I'm like, "I'm there. I'm there."

Ali Siddiq 59:47 You locked in the moment.

Joe Rogan 59:48 You're locked in. Where'd you do it?

Ali Siddiq 59:49 Houston Improv.

Joe Rogan 59:50 Ah.

Ali Siddiq 59:52 And we-

Joe Rogan 59:52 Can't tell because of the curtain in the background.

Ali Siddiq 59:54 Yeah, we re- we pipe draped it-

Joe Rogan 59:55 That's a great fucking room.

Ali Siddiq 59:57 Yeah, it is.

Joe Rogan 59:57 That's a great fucking room.

Ali Siddiq 59:58 400 people and me.

Joe Rogan 1:00:00 That's nice.

Ali Siddiq 1:00:01 And we just went on a... And, and the, the crazy thing is when people know that they coming to see you do the journey.

Joe Rogan 1:00:09 Yeah.

Ali Siddiq 1:00:10 And it, it's weird 'cause the people who came... 'Cause I did th- I did it during the weekend that I was there, so the people who saw me, saw the show on Thursday and Friday is like, "That shit didn't happen." (laughs)

Joe Rogan 1:00:20 (laughs)

Ali Siddiq 1:00:22 So, so then the two, the people who saw it on Saturday got the whole Hollywood-

Joe Rogan 1:00:28 Right.

Ali Siddiq 1:00:28 ... thing, 'cause, you know, Eric Abrams, the same person who shot my stuff for, um, Comedy Central and, um, This Is Not Happening with, um, Ari, I got, I, I got them. I, I wanted that look. And Eric is a fucking great director, like...... it, it, it's really not about him. It's about what you want, and he just suggests shit, like, "Uh, what do you, what do you think about, what do you think about this?" And like, I wasn't thinking about it, but now, now I am. You know? (laughs) And so, and then he just suggests, like, "Do you really need that?" And you're like, "I don't." And it comes together. Him and, him and Jordan, Jordan did the, the lights and, it, it looks like... That was one of the things, and then especially when somebody notices it, when my guy called me and said, "Man, let me tell you the most amazing shit. It looks like a class- it looks like 1985." I'm like-

Joe Rogan 1:01:32 Pull it up, Jamey. Lemme see-

Ali Siddiq 1:01:33 I will.

Joe Rogan 1:01:33 Lemme see the video. 'Cause there, there's something about, get a, get a, get a look at it. Like, look at, man, that's classic. Classic comedy club. It's perfect. Perfect size stage, perfect intimacy with the crowd. I was thinking that, man, 'cause I just did Stand-Up Live with, uh, Tony. I did a guest set. I was not-

Ali Siddiq 1:01:52 It-

Joe Rogan 1:01:52 ... even supposed to be there.

Ali Siddiq 1:01:53 In, in, in Phoenix?

Joe Rogan 1:01:54 Phoenix, yeah.

Ali Siddiq 1:01:55 I fucking love that club.

Joe Rogan 1:01:57 I fucking love that club. And I was there, and I was thinking, "Goddamn, maybe I should film my fucking special here."

Ali Siddiq 1:02:02 Yo.

Joe Rogan 1:02:03 It's so good.

Ali Siddiq 1:02:04 It, it's, it's some, it's some comedy clubs that I think that are set up so perfect.

Joe Rogan 1:02:10 Mm-hmm.

Ali Siddiq 1:02:12 Man, stand-up, Stand-Up Live in Phoenix, Zanies in Nashville.

Joe Rogan 1:02:19 Yes.

Ali Siddiq 1:02:19 Oh, fucking-

Joe Rogan 1:02:20 Yes, Zanies in Nashville is flawless.

Ali Siddiq 1:02:22 Oh, my God, it's a great club.

Joe Rogan 1:02:24 Goddamn, it's good.

Ali Siddiq 1:02:26 Levity Live in, um, West Nyack.

Joe Rogan 1:02:29 Yep, yep.

Ali Siddiq 1:02:31 Though, like-

Joe Rogan 1:02:32 That's a great one.

Ali Siddiq 1:02:33 You, you, this w- this is, this is what we oughta do. I always put myself in shit. Like I just told Ari that we had to do, um, a festival, a s- festival. We travel to festivals around the world. He's Jewish, I'm Muslim, like, the Muslim-Jew festi- festival review, with me and Ari just going to weird-ass festivals. We oughta see, between me and you, take a month to go to all these clubs and see how many specials we can shoot in these clubs in, in a month. Thirty- thirty-

Joe Rogan 1:03:12 You mean just shoot all the-

Ali Siddiq 1:03:13 ... thr-

Joe Rogan 1:03:13 ... film all the shows?

Ali Siddiq 1:03:14 Thirty, thirty minutes, we go to these, these clubs and shoot a new 30 minutes in each one of these clubs.

Joe Rogan 1:03:21 So you s- you do 30, he does 30?

Ali Siddiq 1:03:23 No, me and you. This is me and you. Me and you do 30, I do 30, in each one of these great film clubs, and put it out as the, the, as a r-

Joe Rogan 1:03:32 (clears throat)

Ali Siddiq 1:03:33 ... as a series of going to clubs, the best comedy clubs to shoot a special in.

Joe Rogan 1:03:40 Comedy Works in Denver's another one.

Ali Siddiq 1:03:42 I've never played it.

Joe Rogan 1:03:43 What?

Ali Siddiq 1:03:44 I've never played it. It's like I'm boxed in to some weird shit that's behind the scenes that I'm not, that I don't know what's going on. I've never played it.

Joe Rogan 1:03:50 What do you mean? You've tried to get in?

Ali Siddiq 1:03:52 I- I- I'm waiting to get in Comedy Works.

Joe Rogan 1:03:53 I'll get you in. I'll get you in today.

Ali Siddiq 1:03:56 I want, 'cause I, I heard so-

Joe Rogan 1:03:57 I'll call Wendy today.

Ali Siddiq 1:03:59 I would love to play your show.

Joe Rogan 1:04:00 Yeah, I didn't... Uh, yeah, let's do that. I'll fix that.

Ali Siddiq 1:04:02 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:04:03 Yeah, you need to be there.

Ali Siddiq 1:04:04 W-

Joe Rogan 1:04:04 That's one of the great clubs of the world.

Ali Siddiq 1:04:05 Man, it's a... What's another great club that... Like, these are clubs that people don't talk about. Like, I hear about The Cellar and all that, and I'm not knocking The Cellar, but, those, like, you know another club that they remodeled? He, he remodeled it and I think I was the first person in there when he remodeled it. It's weird-looking, but it's so fucking intimate, The Comedy Zone in Charlotte.

Joe Rogan 1:04:30 Never done it.

Ali Siddiq 1:04:31 Oh.

Joe Rogan 1:04:32 No?

Ali Siddiq 1:04:32 It's, it's fucking, it's so intimate, and they around you. Like, Improv is a fucking great club that you... Oh, 'nother club, DC Improv.

Joe Rogan 1:04:42 Oh, it's an amazing club. Amazing club. DC Improv's flawless.

Ali Siddiq 1:04:47 It, w-

Joe Rogan 1:04:48 Flawless.

Ali Siddiq 1:04:48 It's, it's, it's no... It's a, man, it's fucking, it's, it's nice, it's a-

Joe Rogan 1:04:52 It's flawless. It's perfect, perfect comedy club. Yeah.

Ali Siddiq 1:04:55 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:04:56 There's a few of those. Perfect height ceiling, perfect size stage, connected to the crowd.

Ali Siddiq 1:05:02 Rick Bronson's don't look bad, to shoot 'em in. Get some Rick Bronson's, they, they don't... But that fucking, eh, that Stand-Up Live is fucking amazing.

Joe Rogan 1:05:13 Stand-Up Live in Phoenix is one of the great clubs.

Ali Siddiq 1:05:15 That's-

Joe Rogan 1:05:15 And it's big. 600 seats.

Ali Siddiq 1:05:17 And it's, it is big. Um-

Joe Rogan 1:05:19 But the roar, dawg.

Ali Siddiq 1:05:21 Ooh.

Joe Rogan 1:05:21 The roar when you're killing.

Ali Siddiq 1:05:23 My, not, n- okay, they, they moved the Hollywood Improv to, I think it's, uh, Dania Beach. It's another, it's a, an improv in Florida.

Joe Rogan 1:05:32 So they moved it out of the Hard Rock?

Ali Siddiq 1:05:34 They moved it out of the Hard Rock. It's Dania Beach now. That's a nice-ass club.

Joe Rogan 1:05:38 I haven't been in a year.

Ali Siddiq 1:05:39 Oh. What you think about, what you think about, um, Cob City?

Joe Rogan 1:05:44 Which one?

Ali Siddiq 1:05:45 Cobs, Cobbs Comedy Club.

Joe Rogan 1:05:47 The old Cobbs was amazing. I used to take a pay cut to do the old Cobbs, because I used to do, um, I used to do the punchline, which was great. The punchline's still great. But Cobbs, the old Cobbs was so intimate. It was maybe 140, 150 people just stuffed into a room. And it was just perfect. It was so intimate. And then the new Cobbs, it's like this big, high ceiling, and then there's a balcony, but it's way in the back.

Ali Siddiq 1:06:20 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 1:06:20 And the balcony's way in the back and it's, like, elevated. It's weird. It's not bad. It's a great place, but it's not perfect.

Ali Siddiq 1:06:29 Funny, with (smacks lips) some of these, some of these clubs, I don't even think... Maybe it's me, 'cause I, I, I g- I guess I don't have a permanent audience just yet. But, some of these clubs, when you go in, it's not even the club. The club is fucking fantastic, but the audiences that's come there, you like, "Hmm."I don't, I, uh, uh, hey, look, do I need to read all the shit that I read first and tell y'all about it so I can come do, so you can be familiar with some of the shit that's going on in the fucking world? Like-

Joe Rogan 1:07:01 Like where? Like what-

Ali Siddiq 1:07:02 Oh, man.

Joe Rogan 1:07:02 ... what place?

Ali Siddiq 1:07:03 Um, right off the back, um, Toledo, Toledo, Ohio is like fucking pulling teeth.

Joe Rogan 1:07:16 (laughs)

Ali Siddiq 1:07:16 Um-

Joe Rogan 1:07:18 It sounds like a place where you'd be pulling teeth.

Ali Siddiq 1:07:20 Like, like-

Joe Rogan 1:07:21 Toledo.

Ali Siddiq 1:07:21 Fuck, man. Um, it's, uh, I'm, I'm gonna say sometimes Syracuse is fucking weird.

Joe Rogan 1:07:30 Upstate New York's weird, period.

Ali Siddiq 1:07:31 Yeah, Syracuse, Albany, you're like, "Goddammit, man." Um, ah, anything outside of Chicago, any of the clubs around, outside of Chicago, you like, "Goddamn, y'all don't read shit."

Joe Rogan 1:07:45 But that Levittown, the, the, was that what it is? The-

Ali Siddiq 1:07:48 Liberty Live?

Joe Rogan 1:07:49 No, no.

Ali Siddiq 1:07:49 Oh.

Joe Rogan 1:07:50 The, the, the improv... No, Schomsberg, that's what it is.

Ali Siddiq 1:07:52 Schomberg.

Joe Rogan 1:07:53 Yeah.

Ali Siddiq 1:07:53 Oh, that's like-

Joe Rogan 1:07:54 That's kind of Chicago.

Ali Siddiq 1:07:55 It's uppity as shit, it's like-

Joe Rogan 1:07:57 Like the suburbs.

Ali Siddiq 1:07:57 It's like, "Eh, I don't know what the fuck you saying." Like, you don't, you fucking know, like goddammit.

Joe Rogan 1:08:03 Chicago, though, Chicago's a great comedy city.

Ali Siddiq 1:08:05 It, it is.

Joe Rogan 1:08:06 Fuck, that's a great city.

Ali Siddiq 1:08:07 I miss Jokes & Notes, that was a place that I've... And I played the Zanies there once. It was a great cl- it was a great experience. I like, I liked some of the old nostalgic clubs too. When I go there, you know that it's been here for a long-ass time. And, or a weird, like a weird spot that I go to, The Punch Line in Atlanta where it's inside the Landmark, um-

Joe Rogan 1:08:31 Mm-hmm.

Ali Siddiq 1:08:31 ... the Landmark Diner. The, I, I hate the green room, but I like the fact that I walk through some crowded chaired room and it, and it feels like they still smoking in the room.

Joe Rogan 1:08:45 Yeah.

Ali Siddiq 1:08:46 Like-

Joe Rogan 1:08:46 Yeah.

Ali Siddiq 1:08:46 ... like (coughs) (laughs)

Joe Rogan 1:08:47 Yeah.

Ali Siddiq 1:08:47 And, and-

Joe Rogan 1:08:48 The old, the old Punch Line was great.

Ali Siddiq 1:08:50 Oh, man, it was beautiful, I loved it.

Joe Rogan 1:08:51 It was amazing. That was amazing. That was an amazing room.

Ali Siddiq 1:08:54 And, w- and they got rid of it, I was like, "Fuck."

Joe Rogan 1:08:57 Well, I think they lost the lease or something like that. It's just like being a comic and being a professional comic, being able to work these places and touring the road, when I was a kid, man, that seemed to me to be like an impossibility, to be a headliner and touring the road and being able to work these fucking amazing clubs like The Punch Line, like Zanies, it's like that was always the dream. One of the things I love about those old places too, like Zanies, is you get to like look in the wall and you'll see like old head shots.

Ali Siddiq 1:09:28 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:09:28 Head shots from the early '80s, faded.

Ali Siddiq 1:09:31 I, I think they, um... This is a room that I, that I like that I'm very, very comfortable in, what is it? It is in, um, it's in North Carolina as well, Charlie Goodnites.

Joe Rogan 1:09:44 Yes. That's a great room.

Ali Siddiq 1:09:46 Uh, I think they, they moving the building as well.

Joe Rogan 1:09:49 I think they did something different there.

Ali Siddiq 1:09:50 Oh, shit.

Joe Rogan 1:09:50 I haven't been to the new place.

Ali Siddiq 1:09:53 Man, I, I, I like, 'cause I would go down and look at the old pictures and then go play... Ah, it... 'Cause the, it's a nostalgia to some of these rooms, man.

Joe Rogan 1:10:03 Yeah.

Ali Siddiq 1:10:03 And I, I like going there, but the, when you think about shooting, so the room feels warm and you feel like, "I c- I can do some other things to the room to make it a little warmer and just go in and fucking crush it."

Joe Rogan 1:10:18 Yeah.

Ali Siddiq 1:10:18 I mean, they, they got good audiences in certain places.

Joe Rogan 1:10:22 Well, they have a long history of having sh- like Charlie Goodnites has been around a long time, so everybody's come through there. So all the people that live in that area know that you can go to Charlie Goodnites on any Friday and Saturday night, you're gonna get great comedy. They only get great comedians there. It's like it's, if you're gonna work there, it's a classic club.

Ali Siddiq 1:10:39 Yeah, it is, um-

Joe Rogan 1:10:41 There's also a next door honky-tonk bar that was my first experience with country western music, like live, like not even live, but just like in a place where people listen to it. We went over there, it was me and Duncan and I think Joey, and we went next door and they're playing music that I've never heard before, but everybody knows the words and they're all singing along, << down by the river >>. You know, like they're all singing along to these songs and like fucking hooting and hollering and like this is like I stepped into another dimension. I'm like, "What is this?"

Ali Siddiq 1:11:11 It is, (clears throat) man, it's weird that I can go into this same dimension. Alan Jackson, like, like I, I grew up, I didn't listen to country music, but I, I knew about country music because your, my granddad would watch Westerns and, you know, you listen to Hank Aaron and, and, uh, what, not Hank Aaron at all, what's his name?

Joe Rogan 1:11:34 Hank Williams.

Ali Siddiq 1:11:35 Hank Williams. And then this guy, Alan Jackson. I'm just flipping through the stations one time and I heard, you know, like when you go to another city, you put on scan and going through the radio stations-

Joe Rogan 1:11:50 Yeah.

Ali Siddiq 1:11:50 ... trying to find a radio station. And way downtown on the Chattahoochee, this is the thing they call me, A Whole Bunch of Loving in an Oochie Coochie. And I had to find out who the fuck sung this song.

Joe Rogan 1:12:03 (laughs)

Ali Siddiq 1:12:05 I was like any...

Joe Rogan 1:12:07 Here, look at him. Look at... (laughs)

Ali Siddiq 1:12:09 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 1:12:10 Look at that outfit. What, when did that fucking song come out? That must be like 1985 or something like that. Like look at the way he's dressed.

Ali Siddiq 1:12:18 No, this is the '90s.

Joe Rogan 1:12:19 No.

Ali Siddiq 1:12:20 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:12:20 It can't be.

Ali Siddiq 1:12:21 Got to be. (laughs)

Joe Rogan 1:12:22 (laughs) It seems like it's from another time.

Ali Siddiq 1:12:25 Chattahoochee.

Joe Rogan 1:12:25 << Way down yonder on the Chattahoochee >> Way down yonder.

Ali Siddiq 1:12:31 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 1:12:32 I just was stunned by the fact that there was like the whole, a whole nother world that I didn't know about, this country western world, and all these people were into it. And then I would do local radio and they'd want to talk to me about NASCAR. "Did you see NASCAR? Did you see what Dale did?" And you're like, "What are you talking about?" Like they were, everybody knew. They knew about NASCAR the way most people know about the Super Bowl.

Ali Siddiq 1:12:54 Yeah. I, I've been to NASCAR.

Joe Rogan 1:12:56 ... was it like?

Ali Siddiq 1:12:57 One- one time.

Joe Rogan 1:12:57 One time?

Ali Siddiq 1:12:58 And Dana was the, this was the first time that she was the lead car. So, we get there. It's an amazing experience. Like, you, like, we went into the pit, we went into the, the trailers. Like, they have enough stuff in a trailer to build another car. Like they, they, like, they tell you how many cars they carry with them, just in case this, something happens to ca- And they have ano- they have enough stuff in that trailer to rebuild a car. And they ... Some of the pit crews are ex-football players that, that got in this just for competition. Like, they, I didn't know they had pit crew competitions to see who can change everything the fastest, and a lot of these people are ex-football players that still need the competition, and they (buzzing sounds) get- getting it on. And so we get there and I, I never forget about how when the race started, all these cars take off and it's so loud (imitates engines revving) , and how I was rooting for the last car. So all these cars went (imitates engines revving) , then this one car come (imitates fast music) . I'm like, "Go!" (laughs) He, he, he like la- they lapped him. He's like, he's fucking last last. But the incredible thing was Ray Lewis did the startup, did the s- the start. Walt Frazier was there, and all the attorneys. All the attorneys for NASCAR were young Black women that, that graduated from law school, and, uh, they were all the attorneys. Like, they did all the legal stuff. I was like ... But the audience is all white people, just everywhere. It's food, everywhere. It's just like they campers that ... And some of the littlest shorts you'd ever wanna see on a, on a human being. Like, "Goddamn." Like, all this shit was exciting to me. I'm like, "Yo, why does she have on boots with these shorts?" Like, this shit is fucking ...

Narrator 1:15:03 (laughs)

Ali Siddiq 1:15:04 (laughs) But it (laughs) like-

Joe Rogan 1:15:05 Y- you know what I wanna go to that I haven't been to? The Kentucky Derby.

Ali Siddiq 1:15:10 I was in town one time when the Kentucky Derby was happening.

Joe Rogan 1:15:12 I heard it's wild.

Ali Siddiq 1:15:14 Could not find ... I, I, I had to stay in, um, across the river. Like, it was no hotels in town. I was trying to stay at The Sill BACH and all that. They're like, "No." Uh. And it was so ritzy. Like, I didn't get a chance to go, but I would love to go to watch it.

Joe Rogan 1:15:31 I heard it's wild. I had no interest until I read The Kentucky Derby is Decadent and Depraved by Hunter S. Thompson. I read that and I was like, "Jesus Christ." And his depiction of all these rich, fucked up people gambling and, and, and betting on these horse races-

Ali Siddiq 1:15:48 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:15:48 ... and what the, the, the scene is like. That it's this wild social scene of these decadent, depraved people all getting together. And I was like, "Oh, my God. I gotta go." I need to book a gig around it.

Ali Siddiq 1:16:03 Our, our, our interest in the same thing comes from so far different places. (laughs) Like, like, like you wanna go to the ... I hear all the rich people doing so much. I wanna-

Joe Rogan 1:16:14 I wanna see the chaos.

Ali Siddiq 1:16:15 I wanna go to the Kentucky Derby because the first 15, when I read about the Kentucky Derby, how it started, the first 15 were all won by African American jockeys. And how the purse came about and the history of it, and that's why I wanna go (laughs) 'cause like-

Joe Rogan 1:16:33 Really?

Ali Siddiq 1:16:35 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 1:16:35 I wanna see the chaos. Well, I'm a giant Hunter S. Thompson fan, you know? And so like, when I read his writing about it, it just like brought me there. Like, I could, I w- I was appreciating his appreciation of the, the s- just the fucking scene, just the wild scene of it all, and how crazy it was of him as a writer, as a journalist going there to cover it, and he's covering it on acid and he's all fucked up and they're drinking all day and, you know.

Ali Siddiq 1:17:01 (sighs)

Joe Rogan 1:17:01 And, and Hunter's writing was always like that. It was always this wild mixture of pure exaggeration and fiction with fact and reality, and like a, an assessment of the social dynamics, like a, a psychological examination of the people that were involved.

Ali Siddiq 1:17:18 When did he write about it?

Joe Rogan 1:17:20 (sighs) That was one of the first pieces that he did befo- I v- believe he did that before he did his big Sports Illustrated piece, which turned out to be Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas.

Narrator 1:17:29 1970.

Joe Rogan 1:17:30 Yeah. So that was-

Ali Siddiq 1:17:32 Yeah. They had, they had merged with that one-

Joe Rogan 1:17:33 And then Fear and Loathing was when?

Narrator 1:17:36 No, I didn't have that.

Joe Rogan 1:17:37 I think Fear and Loathing was his breakout thing. They hired him ... I feel like they hired him for Sports Illustrated to go and write about like a-

Narrator 1:17:45 '71 is when that was published.

Joe Rogan 1:17:47 Yeah.

Narrator 1:17:47 So that was like the same time.

Ali Siddiq 1:17:49 And-

Joe Rogan 1:17:49 So he-

Ali Siddiq 1:17:49 And when was the first Kentucky Derby ever ran? Like how, like how-

Joe Rogan 1:17:52 Oh, God. Let's take a guess, let's take a guess.

Ali Siddiq 1:17:55 I'm gonna say 1920 ...

Joe Rogan 1:17:59 I'm gonna say 1890.

Narrator 1:18:00 Yeah, I think it's like a 100 and sh- they've done a 100 and plus, a 1875.

Ali Siddiq 1:18:05 I can't remember. 1875.

Joe Rogan 1:18:06 But when a thing becomes a thing, like a place where people go and they know they're gonna go get fucked up, and they know they're gonna gamble and like it becomes a thing. They wear the big hats with feathers and shit, and the ladies wear all their jewels. What is going on here?

Narrator 1:18:19 Uh, it's-

Joe Rogan 1:18:19 Is this at the Kentucky Derby?

Narrator 1:18:21 Yeah, they're just running, being-

Ali Siddiq 1:18:21 (laughs)

Narrator 1:18:21 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:18:21 He's running across porta-potties?

Narrator 1:18:23 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:18:23 And people are cheering him on. Like this kind of shit.

Ali Siddiq 1:18:25 They- and they throwing bottles at him.

Joe Rogan 1:18:27 Yeah.

Ali Siddiq 1:18:27 Like they bing, boom, boom.

Joe Rogan 1:18:29 Well, there he goes. He's down.

Ali Siddiq 1:18:30 Like, it's so far different from the original Kentucky Derby.

Joe Rogan 1:18:33 Yeah.

Ali Siddiq 1:18:33 Like, did he fall in the shit?

Narrator 1:18:36 Oh, it looks like it.

Joe Rogan 1:18:36 Oh, no. Did he? Is he covered in shit?

Ali Siddiq 1:18:38 Yeah.

Narrator 1:18:38 It's probably raining. It could've been raining. They could've been doing like mud sliding or something to-

Ali Siddiq 1:18:40 Ah.

Joe Rogan 1:18:40 He's drinking? Oh, God.

Narrator 1:18:41 It looks like he fell in the shit.

Joe Rogan 1:18:43 Jesus Christ. Oh, Jesus Christ.

Ali Siddiq 1:18:46 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 1:18:46 That, he definitely fell in the shit.

Ali Siddiq 1:18:48 Ah.

Joe Rogan 1:18:48 Oh, that's so unnecessary.

Ali Siddiq 1:18:51 (laughs) It's all right.

Joe Rogan 1:18:51 That's so unnecessary.

Ali Siddiq 1:18:52 It's like a farm.

Joe Rogan 1:18:52 But that's ...

Ali Siddiq 1:18:53 He rode a bike-

Narrator 1:18:53 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 1:18:54 I wonder if Hunter like caused more people to act more crazy there ...... 'cause his writing was so influential and so popular. I wonder if he probably accentuated the experience for people that wanted to go to just get fucked up, and just watch. Bu- but it's like you have the aristocrats, the socialites, you know, the people that go there and they wear their expensive suits and their big rings and then they pu- they pull up in chauffeured cars and they get out, and-

Ali Siddiq 1:19:19 And do a bunch of debauchery right after, like-

Joe Rogan 1:19:22 Debauchery, yeah. Debauchery.

Ali Siddiq 1:19:24 ... uh, just right after that, just, "Ah."

Joe Rogan 1:19:26 Yeah.

Ali Siddiq 1:19:26 "I don't have on underwear."

Joe Rogan 1:19:28 Huh? (laughs)

Ali Siddiq 1:19:29 (laughs) Got on all this shit, but I don't have on underwear.

Joe Rogan 1:19:33 Like, you think about these experiences that people have at the- like these kind of places. Like, if you're one of those people, you know, like some oil baron and you got crazy money and every year, you go to the Kentucky Derby, I imagine you just get used to being around all those other kind of people. And then every year, everyone kind of ramps it up a little bit, you know?

Ali Siddiq 1:19:51 Oh, man.

Joe Rogan 1:19:51 Ramp up the chaos, ramp up the cocaine.

Ali Siddiq 1:19:55 So that- is that how Mardi Gras started?

Joe Rogan 1:19:57 That's a good question.

Ali Siddiq 1:19:59 Mar-

Joe Rogan 1:19:59 How did Mardi Gras get started?

Ali Siddiq 1:20:00 I- it- Mardi Gras is g- like-

Joe Rogan 1:20:02 That's what-

Ali Siddiq 1:20:02 ... Car- Carnival is a pretty intense-

Joe Rogan 1:20:05 I've never been to that.

Ali Siddiq 1:20:06 Oh.

Joe Rogan 1:20:06 Have you been in Rio?

Ali Siddiq 1:20:07 Yes.

Joe Rogan 1:20:07 Really?

Ali Siddiq 1:20:08 Yes.

Joe Rogan 1:20:08 That's wild.

Ali Siddiq 1:20:09 Oh, man. The ... Oh.

Joe Rogan 1:20:13 (laughs)

Ali Siddiq 1:20:14 (laughs) It- it-

Joe Rogan 1:20:15 It's like you're famous-

Ali Siddiq 1:20:16 It-

Joe Rogan 1:20:16 ... for people g- it's like New Year's Eve on steroids.

Ali Siddiq 1:20:19 It's- I went to this club called HELP!Discotheque, and you need it.

Joe Rogan 1:20:25 (laughs)

Ali Siddiq 1:20:27 Like, HEL- HELP!Discotheque, I rem- I went on Adam and Eve night, where they give you a leaf. You put your clothes off and they give you a leaf, and you in the club, just a leaf on and-

Joe Rogan 1:20:40 That's it?

Ali Siddiq 1:20:41 And this club holds like 4 or 5,000 people.

Joe Rogan 1:20:45 All with leaves on?

Ali Siddiq 1:20:46 And it's so crazy that the- that you- they know that you cannot get to the bar. They know that you can't get to the bar. They have bartenders with coolers strapped to them where they- they in the- like on the floor in different places and they flip the cooler up and they make your drink right there, 'cause they know you're not gonna be able to get to the bar. It's insane in this spot. It's a live band. It's like twelve-piece live band co- and it's fucking insane. And you- if it's 5,000 people, it's 1,000 men and 4,000 women. If it's 4,000 people, it's 3,000 women and 1,000 men. And I know when we went in, it was, meh, maybe