Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: In this episode, we react to claims made in a recent congressional hearing that multiple countries, including the US are leveraging alien technology as part of a decades long secret arms race. And later on, we'll weigh in on LL Cool J's recent claim that he, not Tupac or Jay z or Notorious B.I.G. or Lil Wayne, is the most important rapper of all time.
Hello, welcome to the Call Like I See it podcast.
I'm James Keys, and joining me today is a man whose deep voice, when turned up in a car, is known to rattle some trunks. Tunde. Ogunlana Tunde. You ready to show off that booming system today?
[00:00:56] Speaker B: Yes, sir.
All right, all right, I'll just leave it at that.
[00:01:03] Speaker A: Now, before we get started, if you.
[00:01:05] Speaker B: Enjoy the show, I should have inhaled a helium balloon actually for that.
[00:01:10] Speaker A: I just realized just for that, for that, for that, opening that intro.
[00:01:15] Speaker B: So yeah, there you go. Sorry, go ahead.
[00:01:18] Speaker A: Well, if you enjoy the show, we ask that you subscribe and hit like on YouTube or your podcast platform, because that really helps the show out. Now recording on December 3, 2024 and last month there was a congressional hearing that got into Unidentified anomalous phenomena, or UAPs.
And it was alleged that there's a program to gather information and retrieve evidence relating to alien technology. And it's called the Immaculate Constellation Program. And this program allegedly has been operating, you know, for a long time without congressional oversight. And it's withholding lots of juicy images and data about UAP sightings. And most shockingly, at least, you know, in my view, was that through this program or as a part of this program and others, the US is in possession of UAP tech and involved with, you know, with that tech, trying to reverse engineering and stuff, involved in a secret arms race with other countries, you know, you know, involving how we can deploy that stuff, you know, for arms and so forth. So Tunde, just to jump right in, you know, like, what are your thoughts on this claim, you know, of the idea of this Immaculate Constellation program and then also the claim of a secret arms race.
[00:02:35] Speaker B: I think I'll be serious first and I'll have a joke, because I want to answer the question seriously. I mean, I don't believe this, so I'll just kind of say it. From that standpoint, I don't disbelieve that there could be other life besides what's on planet Earth in the universe.
I may even be open to believing that there's intelligent enough life with enough of whatever equivalent type of technologies they have that could even visit Earth, whether now or whether A billion years ago. Because obviously time is illmatic, right? If you want to go talk about old hip hop sayings.
But the thing is that I just find this kind of fantastical to believe that this is kind of stories we've heard for decades. I remember since I was a kid in the 80s, these ideas that Area 51 and they're hiding this alien technology and all this stuff and there just doesn't seem to be any evidence for it. And this hearing, I know we'll get into it, but there was no evidence provided that stuck out to me a lot. So that's my serious response, my kind of joke response is this is what happens when a Congress of the United States is populated with enough people, maybe not a majority, but a high enough percentage of people that really believe in conspiracy theories, genuinely like QAnon conspiracy theories, and you know, who have a population in our country and enough people that are susceptible to this kind of manipulation of information. Because that's what I want to get into later in the conversation about what I really think this is a psychological operation.
And through things like Ancient Aliens shows like that, and you know, there's enough curiosity about these things that this Congress, one of its last endeavors in its two year tenure, is going to be to spend time bringing this stuff to the American people, which I'm not really sure what the whole point is. And that's why I'll share my theories on that as we get into the conversation.
[00:04:39] Speaker A: Oh, it's about wasteful government spending, right?
[00:04:42] Speaker B: Oh, yeah, I forgot. Sorry.
[00:04:43] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah. But no, I was. I'll start with being a little more so. Like, to me, this sounds like the plot of a Marvel movie like that to me. What? It, it tracks very neatly. Yeah, it tracks very neatly with the way that our science fiction is presented to us or Independence Day, you know, it almost kind of is exactly like, you wonder if these guys, maybe the guys giving this testimony, maybe watched that movie too many times and then, you know, slept enough, you know, enough dreams and all this stuff and started thinking that the plot of the movie was, you know, like real life and they'd actually lived it, which actually is a thing. Like you can immerse yourself in something so much that you can actually fabricate memories and so forth. I'm not, I'll put it like this, I'm a skeptic. I could be like, I think that there's. The universe is so vast and as you said, time, you know, like there's been so much time, you know, that at least we're Aware of, you know, at our perception of the universe that I'm sure, you know, things that are unexplainable to us or that are alien to us have gone on in the universe, but for the same reason of it being so vast and there being so much time, the time span being so, so large, like human beings have only been around, you know, like, and you know, like, particularly in our current form, you know, where we actually have technology, I should say that differently. Human beings with our current form, with like radio technology and stuff like that, where we can send signals and stuff like that, that's been like 100 years, you know, 150 years. So of all the billions of years that the universe has been around, we're looking at this really tiny window of time and then we're looking at this super small area of space. And so to think that with, yeah, for sure things have been going on in the universe, but to think that it's going to line up with us from a time standpoint and a location standpoint is kind of like the whole thing that's like the thinking of, you know, like the world's going to end when I'm alive, you know, like type of thing, like that's kind of that centering yourself on the, everything that's happening in the world or in this case, the universe. And so I just would need, I say I'm a skeptic. Like, I'm not a believer. Sight unseen. Yeah, I would just need to see, I need to see more, you know, like. And so, and I think your point, like, I don't think it's a problem to believe in conspiracy theories that evidence is presented on, but more so, like what we've seen with the Congress is that there's like an inclination or a desire to seek out more fantastical explanations for things. You know, it's not that you come at it from a discriminating mindset and say, okay, well, I'm willing to listen to you, but you gotta show me something. You know, it can't just be, you know, like again, like giving me some plot of a, of a, you know, sci fi or summer blockbuster movie, but you have to actually show me something that supports that versus, oh no, we can just make these claims and then, you know, they get picked up and so forth. I think it's interesting that you brought up that this is like a psyop because I know when we talked offline and I guess I'll set you back up with this. What was very interesting to me when you talked about how when these kind of reports would happen. We know this because of declassified intelligence reports, when public would start talking about seeing UFOs and things like that go back 60, 70 years, but the US military would lean into that and say, or would not discourage it because it was helpful to divert people's attention away from what they were actually doing. And so if people are running around chasing UFOs then all this new tech that they're working on that they're testing and stuff like that, that people are like don't, won't make that connection and they'll be doing other stuff. And so I thought that was a really good point and how like this type of information and you know, we just did Nexus a couple weeks ago and how information, again information serves purposes other than conveying truth. What the real question is why this information is out there. You know, particularly when the Pentagon. Another point you made, which I want to set you up with is that Pentagon is very tight lipped about stuff like this is what they allow people to get out and testify about now. You know, like if this was real, I'm sure this would be classified, you know, but nonetheless, you know, I just.
[00:08:37] Speaker B: Wrote down that kid. I don't, I don't even gotta waste time right now looking up the name for the purpose of not wasting the audience time on the show for that. But there's a kid that recently was, you know, he was arrested a while ago, but I think he was finally sent to jail from the Coast Guard. Sorry, not Coast Guard, the National Guard. He was where he served and it was because he leaked some kind of classified information on Ukraine. Whatever, you know, was going on back when the war was starting. And you know, we have the famous case of like the Bradley or Chelsea Manning who to leak stuff during the Obama administration. And you know, people go to jail for this stuff. Right? It was a, you know, we had a whole issue when President Trump took documents to his house that apparently contained nuclear secrets and where submarines are and.
[00:09:19] Speaker A: All that classified information.
[00:09:20] Speaker B: That's what I'm saying. And that was a big deal. And that's my point.
[00:09:22] Speaker A: Like the kid's name by the way was Jack to Shara and he was recently sentenced in November.
[00:09:28] Speaker B: That's what I mean.
[00:09:29] Speaker A: Like, like leaking secret Pentagon documents.
[00:09:32] Speaker B: Correct. And it seems like whatever he was leaking that was secret about Ukraine, I think that would be dwarfed in comparison to if we really had information about the government secretly hiding outer space aliens. Like literally like that's what I mean, like no one was proposing no one was when the whole thing happened with Trump and the documents in Mar A Lago, I mean, that was one thing. I don't think anyone serious was suspecting that there were files about UFOs, you know, in those boxes. It's just, it defies common sense and.
[00:10:03] Speaker A: Logic to being presented in this form in a congressional hearing. Like, yeah, you would you. If this was a report in ProPublica, then it'd be like, oh well, you know, like that, that's, that's kind of where this leaks. Yeah, like there's these leaked things and then they're leaking actual evidence with it and so forth. But if this is a Pentagon hearing or, excuse me, a congressional hearing, when in the House, it's like, well, you know, hold up, you know, like this sounds more like a distraction, you know.
[00:10:26] Speaker B: Like, go ahead, let me give you a couple. Because before I get this side, since we're on this, I was going to go in this direction anyway, but I'll go now because we're on it. Which is just. I was reading, I'm looking here at some of the quotes. So there's a gentleman that was one of the guys testifying, Mr. Gallaudet says I'll quote here the article. He described an email he received when he was serving as U.S. navy's chief meteorologist. The email warned about multiple midair collisions and attached a now declassified video of a UAP captured by an F18 aircraft. I'm thinking like, hold on. The Congress brought a guy to testify to the American people that didn't see anything himself. He got an email.
[00:11:05] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:11:06] Speaker B: About potentially mid air collision. So he's testifying about an email he read. This goes back to like when we see. This is why I'm saying the psyop, this is coordinated. When we see certain publications or cable news outlets acting like something that was posted on Twitter is a fact, you know that social media has been a.
[00:11:24] Speaker A: Source by virtue of it being posted on Twitter. Correct.
[00:11:27] Speaker B: That's my point.
Someone who calls himself a journalist, who was supposed to investigate things and make sure that they've accounted for certain ways that information has been presented to them is stating to their viewers or the American people that it's fact just because it was posted on social media. And here we have the US Congress bringing someone to testify about something very, very serious. And this person is telling us that they got an email about it. And the other piece of information is something that's already been declassified for years. So that's one. The next one was a gentleman who said he couldn't say that much because he couldn't talk any further because the information was classified. So I was like, okay, so he did his job. There's another guy, Mr. Elizondo.
It says Elizondo's concern related to national security, resting on the fact that much of the reported UAP activity has been around military bases and nuclear weapons sites. I'm thinking that goes back to what we just said is that, yeah, the military does experiments, and then they want to deflect people who might have seen him in the sky and say, oh, yeah, there was a ufo. It's just, you know, I mean, this.
[00:12:44] Speaker A: This is kind of. This is where we get. I mean, in the allusion to kind of a Marvel movie and so forth, was intentional, but this is where we get to that world of amusing ourselves to death. Governance and governing, by and large, is boring if you're doing the things that, you know, making sure the trains run on time and that's kind of a euphemism. But the point being is that, okay, well, is there anything else that maybe Congress should be, you know, the White House should be looking at or doing any. Any kind of. Any analysis, any. Whether it's working on bills or not or whatever. Now, in many respects, since, you know, lobbying and kind of the way Congress is bought and sold, maybe we want them doing this kind of stuff because whenever they get to be. Can be in constructive. It's serving some, you know, interest of. Some moneyed interest that's. That's lobbying them. But at least this is. This is harmless, relatively.
[00:13:30] Speaker B: Well, we might be learning that there's a UFO lobby, apparently that there's.
The Andromeda Galax is occupied with beings that had to come all the way to Earth to lobby the US Government for money.
[00:13:43] Speaker A: That's exactly what's happening or influence or something. And yeah, this is their lobby that's putting this information out there. But, you know, like, it's like. It's almost like our government in many respects. It's the. The people that are in the government. At least some of the people that are in the government kind of go in with this, that the government kind of takes care of the governing part, takes care of itself. And you can follow all these fantastical, you know, loose, loose strings and so.
[00:14:08] Speaker B: Forth in order to get you for that governance.
[00:14:11] Speaker A: This. Yeah, exactly. But this kind of stuff gets. You talked about. Hey, we're. We're talking about it right now. And so it's like almost this is part of the attention economy type of Thing like, oh, well, Congress is doing something. This is going to make it back to people versus if they're debating, you know, how best that we. How best to. To. To bring down the national deficit, you know, like, or try to start paying down the national debt and things like, they're debating that kind of stuff, you know, it's not going to get talked about to the same degree. And so I wonder if this is something that's done for their own relevance. This is something they can go back and say, hey, you know, like, you heard, you saw me on tv, yada, yada, yada. And again, of all the things that are done for attention, this may be among the most harmless because a lot of times what's done for attention is fantastical and. Or truth adjacent or even lies about your opponents, you know, like, oh, these people are, you know, like, they got a pizza, pizza gal, a pizza restaurant, and they're doing all this crazy stuff in the basement. And like, that's the kind of stuff we've seen people use for attention as well. So I own. Part of me is wondering, is this kind of. If we're going to have clowns in the house, then maybe this is better for them to do because this at least is kind of harmless versus if the clowns in house. Like, at least this is clowns playing in a fun house, you know, but if, if we. Versus having the clowns with their hands on the steering wheel for real and just kind of, you know, so I, I wonder. But ultimately, I mean, it's still not a positive, you know, like, so it's.
[00:15:37] Speaker B: Interesting, man, because you actually are helping me.
[00:15:40] Speaker A: Let.
[00:15:40] Speaker B: I'm just going to get to the scop now because that segues into it because I think you. You hit on something interesting, which is. Yeah, I. It'll be better for them to be doing this stuff than like taking an ax to actually things that could help American people.
So I get it, like, you know, but like, you're saying it's probably not healthy that they're talking about this stuff too, but it's better than that just dismantling everything or whatever they would do.
[00:16:05] Speaker A: But yeah, let's get rid of the, you know, the FDA or let's get rid of.
Let's make it so companies don't have to label food products anymore. Like, yeah, yeah, like, they could be doing much better stuff.
[00:16:16] Speaker B: But here's where the. This is where I think this is why I think that this is a sighup to bring that into play in the long run because this is What I don't understand about this mindset of these people that are in the majority in the Congress right now. And I don't even want to talk about political parties and all that because this goes beyond that. This is really. These people have a different worldview about how the system is. They're paranoid as human beings. Meaning, you know, they have that personality. So they are looking at every. Under every rock is something, you know, like, like this, this conspiracy stuff.
[00:16:50] Speaker A: And so this and that. Plus they seem to be drawn to more like boring answers bore them, you know, and it's right. No, no, there has to be something that is kind of exciting, fantastic.
[00:17:02] Speaker B: Yeah. There has to be a reason why this, like, why you're lying to me. If you're telling me, like if you're some Pentagon person and you're telling me there's no real alien stuff from outer space, maybe we're working on new technologies. Because one thing that dawned on me, James, is remember in the 90s, early 2000s, most of the sightings were of triangle shaped objects. Right. And now what do all stealth fighters look like from the F117 to the F22? They all have that certain shape. And I have a client that told me, you know, he's in his 60s, that out of MIT. He was working on the F22 Raptor at Lockheed Martin and Skunk Works in 1981. Yeah, that was. That saw service in 2006.
[00:17:44] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:17:44] Speaker B: So. And he was already working on. Which means they probably had a blueprint started 10 years earlier in the early 70s. So what we're seeing now is probably some stuff that the military will be using in 20 years. You know what I mean? And that's just life.
[00:17:55] Speaker A: Very boring to talk to say, yeah, it'll be 20 years and that's very boring. You know, what type of.
[00:18:03] Speaker B: How much pressure do you need to have in the gas for the hydraulic thing for the flap of the wing? You know, like that's what really is the.
[00:18:10] Speaker A: When you're operating at that kind of speed and these. That many.
[00:18:13] Speaker B: Exactly. And exactly.
[00:18:15] Speaker A: You know, physics.
[00:18:17] Speaker B: Yeah. What type of paint goes on the surface of the thing, you know, to stop the friction of the air and heating it up. You know, all that stuff. Yeah, that's boring. And it's not as sexy as James Bond, you know, and what we see in the movie. So. But the psyop. Here's my concern, James, on the real psyop, is that this is another example because there is nothing there that they are laying the groundwork for the desire that we know is coming and when the administration changes to purge the federal government of actual federal employees who got there through meritocracy.
[00:18:49] Speaker A: Yeah, well, remember, that was the Project 2025 thing, is get extra.
[00:18:53] Speaker B: That's my point.
[00:18:53] Speaker A: Bring in loyalty and partisanship.
[00:18:55] Speaker B: Yeah, correct. Because remember who are what. We've seen this already just in his recent years. The most vocal people in our society are going to be the conspiracists. Right. Think about the big lie.
Trump won the election partially because the people who want to believe in these things are much louder than people like me and you. You and I aren't going to take the street about the Congress having this hearing, but if the Congress can gin enough people up in our society, even if it's only 10 or 20%, to be very vocal, that when Trump gets in, he needs to purge the deep state and he needs to purge the Pentagon and these agencies of these nefarious people who are hiding all this information about UFOs and all this danger because of things like you said, all this waste in the government. And think about what the Doge, you know, Elon Musk Group is going to do. They're going to be in there telling us that we got to get rid of people at NASA and we got.
[00:19:47] Speaker A: To get rid of the contract people at space.
[00:19:50] Speaker B: SpaceX. Yeah.
[00:19:51] Speaker A: SpaceX is going to be NASA.
[00:19:53] Speaker B: Yeah. And that's what I'm saying. That's why I say this is a psyop to just continue to dismantle the administrative state. It's everything they've told us they want to do. But this is how you do it. You. You fracture the country and get the loud, vocal people to intimidate the people like me and you that would otherwise not want to fight about UFOs. You see what I'm saying?
[00:20:11] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, I mean, I think that. I mean, and you say psyop, and that brings in, you know, like, baggage with it. And. But I mean, it's manipulation.
It may not be psychological operation. You know, it's kind of. It's just. It's an activity that it's meant to influence people, you know, like with information. And again, information can be true or false. Information is information.
[00:20:33] Speaker B: It's.
[00:20:34] Speaker A: It's agnostic as to how truthful it is. So it's psychological operations. They're used domestically, they're used in foreign, you know, places, but they're meant to influence people. That goes back to when we did the show talking about Denzel's comments about how people are all being manipulated. I mean, and so, yes, there is that. And so I think. But when people use a scar, it's psyop. It's like, oh, well, is this like a military or intelligence operation?
[00:20:56] Speaker B: Yeah. I don't mean it.
[00:20:59] Speaker A: I don't know exactly. I don't know where it's coming from.
It's definitely something it's meant to. It's meant for something. You know, like, it seems very random to be dropped in, in that sense. Now why and whose purposes it serves. Again, that stuff we'll see. As you were kind of throwing out some examples at when the other shoe drops, you know, like when this type of information creates a sentiment to get rid of NASA and just give all the NASA's budget to Elon Musk, who owns SpaceX, who happens to make the decision to do that.
Oh, okay, we get it.
[00:21:32] Speaker B: And who just openly spent hundreds of millions of dollars buying his way into the White House.
[00:21:38] Speaker A: Right.
[00:21:38] Speaker B: Like this is investment.
[00:21:40] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah.
[00:21:41] Speaker B: So he wants a return on his investment.
[00:21:43] Speaker A: Exactly. And so then we'll see. Okay, well, yeah, this is, this was laying the groundwork for that. But to me, you know, like, when I look at the way the, the psyop term gets used, I think it's one of those things it's meant to, to, to tickle that kind of, hey, something's happening without you. No. Even though it may be just kind of normal. And this goes back to the. Again, normal being. People are always trying to influence and manipulate people. Like people, people do that in their personal lives, you know, like people do that all the time. But I'll say this, like the, the, the psyop thing is also very appealing to the person who's looking for fantastical explanations, like I saw recently. And I know we want to get at it, you know, we get off this topic in a second. But I did want to throw this up once that term came up is I saw recently that like Joe Rogan is out there saying, for example, oh, the, the, the reason why Trump, a lot of people don't like Trump is because of Aaya. And which was very interesting to me because for anybody who's been in the public eye for 40 years, you're going to have people that don't like you and people that do like you. You know, like, that's kind of the nature of, you know, like the, the quarterback for any football team who, if they've been around long enough, is going to have detractors and they're going to have supporters. Like, so, like Trump of all people. You know, like, if you have somebody who just comes on the scene and then is very much unliked very quickly, that's going to be a, that, that's going to be the result of a psyop, more likely because you haven't been there and done enough things for people to really dislike you that much, you know, versus somebody if you've been there. Like, people could dislike Donald Trump because of the way he acted with the Central Park Five. You know, people could dislike Donald Trump except me did in 1995 or 2000 or 2. Like, so it was just, it was, it was really bizarre to me to try to say, hey, this guy that's been in the public eye for so long, it's because of a psyop. But again, that will, for anyone who has this kind of conspiratorial, who's drawn to these kind of conspiratorial answers versus kind of just stand. Again, it's pretty boring to point out that if you've been in the public eye and doing, you know, bombastic things for a long time, you're going to make some friends and you're going to make some enemies, you know. And is it a psyop that people in the boxing world like Donald Trump? Well, no, because he was part of the boxing world and hosting fights for, you know, a long time. So again, all of these things that have explanations that aren't very sexy and aren't very, oh, did you hear this? You know, like, kind of thing then, you know, like, they get pushed to the wayside a lot of times for people who want fantastical explanations. And I think that the UFO thing is, is that as well, like, it's not that the government's working on these things. They're always working, as you pointed out, they're always working on things when it's advanced in technology. They're working on stuff decades in advance. Then it's like, oh, no, no, no, we actually are harvesting UFOs or UAPs. And I don't have any evidence of this, but I got an email, you know, so like, so we end up in these kind of situations. And again, it, it may be relatively harmless, but we'll see, you know, because again, some, the, the right person might be able to use this kind of sentiment or this kind of information to further manipulate the public to more direct ends that benefit them and. Or harm the public.
[00:24:38] Speaker B: Yeah, and I think it's a great point you bring up Rogan and not to get off topic, but it's more like as you said it, I'm thinking in my head, yeah, Rogan could be doing a psyop too. Like it's. That kind of stuff comes from everywhere, right? So, but I just want to finish because I know we want to jump with this because I think this is where and anyone watching us still, that's what I'll say. Thank you our audience, because I'm going to assume that if you made it this far in, you're, you're similar to the mindset of James and I, whereas, you know, more intellectual, you're curious, you're also willing to challenge your own beliefs and look at things from different angles and all that. And we all have confirmation bias, but at least you can try and recognize it in yourself. And what I'm saying is I've learned a lot watching this whole drama play out in our society, in our culture in the last decade. And I just feel like this is the stuff that I used to laugh at. You know what I mean? I would see the congress doing this and these people with this mentality in the Congress and the people that believe in QAnon and I would just take it as a joke and call them idiots in my head and really just think of it as these people are. But that's what I'm saying. I now look at it different. This is dangerous. We do, all of us have to take this serious. And for those of us that don't believe in this stuff, we can't just laugh it off anymore like the Haitians eating pets and all that. It's effective and you make a great point. Information and truth don't have to be the same thing, but information will always win. So if we see.
[00:26:03] Speaker A: Well, information, yeah, information can be used for a lot of different reasons. It could be used to convey truth or it can be used to manipulate, you know, perform psyops or just general manipulation.
[00:26:13] Speaker B: That's what I'm saying.
[00:26:14] Speaker A: So I went to the, you know, I went to this place, but I really went to another place. You know, parents do that, or excuse me, kids do that to their parents all the time. You know, like. So, yeah, that's information. It's not necessarily truth. But.
[00:26:23] Speaker B: No, but that's why I give, I want to take, that's why I just want to finish with this serious thought. Because the way we came to this discussion was telling James that my 26 year old son was telling me that he saw, you know, the clips of these hearings on TikTok. And so I realized in that moment that I got, I can either Tell my son, ah, it's bs and just walk out of the room. But then that leaves his mind still in a vacuum that's open to receiving bs. So I sat him down and said some of the similar things I said on this discussion about how the military did in the 50s and 60s and the research and all this. And he left the conversation armed with it in a different way to look at this stuff. So that's all I just wanted to share with anyone still with us, is that you probably got the same mindset as us and we need to stop laughing this stuff off. We just need to take it serious.
[00:27:08] Speaker A: Assuming that people walk away understanding that again, whether you, you can outright dismiss it or you can, at least you can point and say, look, well, for me to embrace that, I need more. I need more, you know, to back it up. I'm not going to. I'm not automatically going to be drawn to any alternative explanation just because it's an alternative explanation or just because it's very entertaining, you know, and so that's, that's kind of the thing. So. But yeah, we definitely appreciate, you know, everybody for joining us. Anybody who's still here, subscribe to the podcast, Rate it, do it, tell us what you think, and please join us for part two as well. And we'll talk to you soon.
All right, our second topic today, we saw a recent claim by LL Cool J, who is, you know, a rapper, actor, entertainer. He has been around a really long time, you know, since the 80s and been very successful. And. But he, he was in, in an interview, he was talking about how he views himself, how he views himself and what he thinks society will come to, to view him as the greatest, or, excuse me, the. The most important rapper of all time. Now he's made it, did an album in 2000 called, you know, the Goat, you know, the greatest of all time. So him saying that he'd be the greatest is something that he's maintained, considered, you know, considerably for a long time. But most important rapper. And he pointed to how, what, what the things, the types of things. He introduced, you know, rap to us or made popular more, I guess, than introduced. And, and so we thought it was worth considering, you know, like, ll has been around a long time, been very successful, most important rapper of all time. Tunde, what do you think?
[00:28:40] Speaker B: I'm glad we're doing this as a topic because we can have some fun.
I was wondering, is there going to be a new definition in the psychological tomes, you know, the definitions that combines grass, grandiosity, and narcissism.
[00:28:57] Speaker A: Hey, hey, LL Part of his quote says, I will say this humbly.
[00:29:02] Speaker B: No, I know.
[00:29:03] Speaker A: So I know you can't do this. I'm just messing.
[00:29:05] Speaker B: No, so I highlighted that. So I thank you because I highlighted. I'm going to say this humbly. And then I highlighted the next part where he says. So then I highlighted a part two that he said something else that after he did that. The goat terminology. This is the guy who came up with all the goat stuff. I could go on and on is what he says about himself that he says. When it comes to the goat terminology, they're gonna say, this is the guy who came up with the goat stuff. I can go on. And I go, last time I checked, people that are very humble don't say, I could go on and on about how great I am.
[00:29:39] Speaker A: Well, no, he's more so saying, like, the throwing around that terminology because he also said one of the other things he pointed out is the integration of the love songs into hip hop, which he could make. I mean, that claim.
[00:29:49] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:29:49] Speaker A: I mean, you can make arguments there, you know, because he. I need love. And all that kind of stuff goes way back.
[00:29:54] Speaker B: How about Tupac with Heaven Ain't Hard to Find or Dear Mama?
[00:29:57] Speaker A: Right.
[00:29:57] Speaker B: Like I'm saying, we can all argue these days.
[00:29:59] Speaker A: All that I need. No, I need love predates those, you know, I'm just saying introduce those to popular hip hop. It can't be outright dismissed. Now, the goat thing, I'm with you. I'm not sure he introduced that to popular hip hop, you know, or to popular.
[00:30:13] Speaker B: You know, it's interesting, man, because I was approaching this in reading it when you brought it to me, you know, offline, as a potential topic of me gonna assume that we'll have this conversation about, you know, how it's hard to judge goats and the art and all that, which I do want to have that conversation. But it's what I found when I'm reading it. I realized I started thinking about, like, the famous athletes that I've liked and watched and famous actors, you know, just kind of in the arts and entertainment space that we all know those who have. We all consider at the top. And I just thought more of it's interesting people's personalities when they reflect them back to us as their audience. And I just found, like, I never had an issue with LL Cool J, and I still don't. I'm not gonna, you know, judge him off these comments like that, but I just thought it's very unbecoming that type of attitude, at least for someone like me, because I thought to myself, like, I think Michael Jordan is the goat in basketball.
But I'm really glad that Michael Jordan himself doesn't walk around talking like that. You know what I mean? Like, I would just. It would diminish him in my eyes if he did. Or Tom Brady, the greatest quarterback. He doesn't walk around telling everybody, hey, you know, when this is all said and done, they're just going to say, I was the greatest quarterback. I was the best quarterback ever in football. It's like, all right, we know it. And the fact he has the confidence not to say that makes me appreciate him even more. And that's kind of what I realized in reading that I was like, yeah, I don't have a problem with ll, but you kind of. You kind of diminish yourself in my eyes. The fact you got to talk like this because, like, you know, we know who you are. We know you've been around 40 years. You're one of the pioneers of the game, and you are one of the greats. So you don't have to walk around telling everybody like that. Just shows more reflection.
[00:31:52] Speaker A: I think that's more about your personality. Yeah, I think it is. I think you have a blind spot because of it. Because, like, he's not considered this right now. We would agree, right? And so if he wants to be considered this, then the only way to make it happen for the most part would be for him to start talking like this. Get other people talking like this, get people debating on it and stuff like that. Bring it into the public consciousness. Like, honestly, a person who does this with great effect is Donald Trump. You know, he thought, well, we have the greatest economy. We had the greatest economy of all time. He didn't really have. But people. He says that stuff enough, and people walking around like, yeah, Trump did have the greatest economy. And it's like, so. And people stop looking at the numbers and just start accepting that stuff is true. And so if he's trying to change. Michael Jordan's not trying to change public perception. And another example of this is LeBron. LeBron is trying to change the perception that Jordan is on the top of the hill. And so he will throw out nuggets here and there that will allow people, his acolytes, to start running with it. Like, oh, yeah, yeah, like LeBron, he's doing this stuff Jordan never did. Jordan never was all NBA, 22 years in. And, yeah, like, LeBron, you know, he. And he had. He even has this campaign strategy focusing on the longevity of his greatness and so forth. So I think when you're trying to take someone off the top, whoever that is in the rap game, you know, and that's going to be different in different people's minds, this is the way you would do it, so to speak. And I mean, to me, though, the. Where this is where I find it, like the disconnect will be, is that ll, regardless of the case that you can make as far as the greatest or the most important. And we can talk if you want about, you know, the context of greatest in the form of art anyway, but versus, like the terminology of one of the groups. But LL doesn't have the acolytes, though. Like, he doesn't have the emotional base that's going to amplify this stuff and get it part of the public, like, conversation. More like one thing LeBron has in this case, or even like a Trump has in this case, is he has. They have the echo chamber that he can throw it out there and then he'll have a bunch of people.
[00:33:50] Speaker B: No, I agree. Sure.
[00:33:51] Speaker A: And like, the. The best example of this I can. I can think of, you know, at the moment would be like Tim Duncan and Kobe Bryant. By pretty much, by most objective measures, I would say Tim Duncan is a better player, NBA basketball player than Kobe Bryant was. But you'll never hear people making that case because people don't have this emotional attachment to Tim Duncan where they're going to go to the mat fighting for this guy. And people do have that about Kobe, like, every people mad that I just said that right now, you know, and so. But again, if you got it, if you look at it though, you know, if you look closely, but. But Kobe has emotional supporters that will defend him. They'll defend him against Jordan, you know, like. And so it's like with. Without that piece, which Ella maybe, you know, he needs to start working on that if he wants to really push this case. Because him throwing it out there, I understand what he's doing, but he needs other people now. Like, he can't keep saying it over and over again. He needs to throw it out there and then have his people so his echo chamber start peppering everybody with it and hitting it and retweeting it and. Or maybe he needs to get a bunch of bots to do this or something, but he needs it amplified if he wants.
[00:34:59] Speaker B: So you're right.
And you're right that, you know, that is definitely my personality, that I don't like it but, and so you're right about that. And I think you're onto something because. And I think that's why I don't like it, because it's, it's him. And you're right about LeBron. Trump's different and he obviously has a much wider audience now being president in kind of this last 10 years. But, but there was one of the 48 laws of power in the book. I don't remember the title of the chapter in which law, but I remember it was about this whole thing that if you want to recreate yourself in the eyes of others that you don't do it yourself. You can't go and like, let's say I lost a client for whatever reason and I really want to get this client back. I can't go directly to that person. That, that doesn't work as well. What I need to do is figure out how to get like others in that person's sphere to talk me up and to get this person really curious. Oh man, you know what? Maybe I should rethink about Tunde because man, he, you know, maybe I left too early or something. So I think you're right. Like the LeBron tactic of having kind of the minions and the bots and people online talking about him is better then if a lot of it does.
[00:36:09] Speaker A: Originate, like LeBron will throw it out like a. He won't go all the way, but he'll throw out something for them.
[00:36:15] Speaker B: And subtle.
[00:36:15] Speaker A: He can run with it. Yeah.
[00:36:16] Speaker B: And that's what I'm saying. Like to me it's just, it's just kind of ugly that ll is so upfront himself about it.
[00:36:23] Speaker A: He can't be subtle. Like that's what I'm saying.
[00:36:26] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:36:26] Speaker A: So he knows that he has to be more direct with it and hope either try to build up some more acolytes, you know, like, can I convert some people to then start riding for me or something. But he's not, he doesn't have a built in base to take.
[00:36:40] Speaker B: Let's save the audience. Let's get off my personality quirks and let's get to actually interesting stuff. Like I think. But it's interesting. I'd like to hear your thoughts about because it is true. Like I feel like you're onto something with this idea that it's hard to judge. Like what is the greatest when you're talking about something that's kind of artistic, like music or art, canvases on the wall, like who's a better painter, Van Gogh or Picasso. That's a Very subjective.
[00:37:02] Speaker A: I mean, honestly, man. And the greatest, you know, like the point he's making on the greatest. And again, that goes bad. Like his. His album goat was 20 years ago. 20 some years ago. But the. I think what he really said in this moment is the most important. And I think that's even more fascinating from an art standpoint. Like, so, okay, who is the most important rapper or who is the most important painter or who is like any of those type of the most important actor, you know, like that kind of stuff. Because that to me seems to be a question that would be pretty much unknowable for any form of art that is constantly evolving, which. Yeah, you know, art forms of art evolve. And so he may be able to say that in a certain era of hip hop, he was the most important. But hip hop has evolved several times since. He was very, like, very influential. Like, he still is making music, but he's not overly influential now, you know, like, so when he was very influential, late 80s, early 90s, you know, even into the later 90s, he might have been like, as you say, late 80s, he might have been the most important rapper of that era in terms of taking it from what it was before he came out or right when he came out to what it became in the mid-90s. He might have been that. But that. I don't think that that buys you the whole span. That didn't buy you 40 years of the most. The most important. That buys you that because other people took it where he left it off and they took it even further. And so it's all standing on people's shoulders. But how can. I don't know that you can be the most important. Like, you know, da Vinci or Michelangelo might have been the most important artist in a certain century, you know, but what people are doing now, there's been several, you know, many, many, many evolutions and iterations and stuff like that, that they're not directly influenced by those great painters or sculptors or anything like that anymore. There have been many intervening things that have happened. So I think the conversation is one that maybe that makes it easy for you to claim that you're the most important because it can't definitively be refuted, but at the same time, it also can't definitively be proven.
[00:39:03] Speaker B: Yeah, that's what I mean. Like, it's even more difficult with music and art. I mean, art, like artworks like canvases on the wall, like you said about Michelangelo or DaVinci, because that is so subjective to the receiver of it, right? Music and art and visual things and music. And so remember, like we learned in Nexus, those are other forms of information. But the way we process those is very individual. And we can't. There's no way to measure them, like, with stats. That's why even an athlete is an easier conversation. Even though to your point, about other things, like you just mentioned, like, the NBA has changed over the last 50, 60 years. So, yeah, Jerry west might not have the same stats that he would in today's NBA. So it's hard to compare a guy from the 70s to today, but at least we have stats and we have certain things that we can measure against. But with music, I mean, besides things like how many Grammys somebody got or how many albums they sold, that's the only thing that's kind of subjective. And that changes too, because, you know, there's more people out there now than there was 40 years ago. There's more ways to distribute music than there was 40 years ago. So even album sales could not, you know, could be misleading based on when people were selling albums and how people had access to technology and things like that. So I think that. And that's why to me, it just, I guess reading it just stood more out his own attitude about it. Like, like, like, well, I humbly say that I'm great.
[00:40:30] Speaker A: Well, and if you go, well, he's saying that people, you know, believe me, you know, listen to me now, believe me later on type of mindset with this. But the other thing about it from, you know, most important that I'll say is that part of the evolution and the continued relevance of any art form is kind of breaking the molds that were set by, like, a previous era or previous generation. And so it's kind of like while LL did that, you can argue in the late 80s, early 90s, people broke his mold, then later on to continue to evolve the art form. And in fact, art forms that don't continually do that kind of die out. And so it's. Again, it's hard to. That just goes back to my point of. It's hard to really say of all time when you're talking about this influence, you know, like, and all that kind of stuff you can try to do. The only thing I would say, you know, if you want to try to compare across eras, is that you can try to kind of, you know, normalize it based on how influential you are relative to your peers in your era. What you see people do that with, like, baseball or, you know, like basketball is a little different because just the Depth of talent, you know, is just so vastly different, you know, throughout the eras. But how good were you compared to everybody else around you at the time? And then if you want to try to normalize it that way, you can kind of get to these discussions. But for hip hop, I would say it's so. It's so new, you know, relatively, that it's hard to really do that. Like, there are some differences in the world then, in the world now, but it's not like we're looking at classical music, you know, or even jazz, you know, like where at. You know, when. When jazz starts, you know, that. That it's really a different world. Like. Right. You know, there was still mass distribution in mass media when hip hop really got popular, you know, like, now, granted, it wasn't streaming entire music libraries, you know, for $10 a month, but it still was like, you could hear stuff on the radio, or you could get stuff widely distributed on the radio. You could get a music available to be bought and heard anywhere, you know, relatively. So it's. It's. In some senses, it makes it easier to compare, but in other senses, it's like, well, it's just a different game. And again, it. The comparison piece, while it's fun to talk about, you know, and then I want to ask you. But we'll get out of here. But I do want to ask you before we do.
Before we do, I want to ask you who you think it would be if you had to boil it down, the most important rapper of all time. But it's more of a fun thing to talk about that because, you know, like, in the same way that Jordan or LeBron or, you know, anything like that, because it's one of those things that it is about your personality and what you value and what speaks to you when it comes to these aesthetic kind of things. So who. Who do you. Who do you have?
[00:43:10] Speaker B: I. I don't have a one. And that's why, like, I'm just. I'll say there's a kind of a satellite of a few names that swim in that. In that. In that. In that pool. And. And part of it, to your point is, you know, we're all different. Like, I've got friends that are only about beats. They're not really big on the lyrics. I'm more like. I actually am probably a little bit mixed with both, but I actually will give a rapper a nod if they're really tight lyrically, so. And also, I think we're influenced by just our ages, and when we were Most influenced by this stuff, which is usually around your high school years. And so my high school years were to early to mid-90s and going to college in the late 90s. So that period was Tupac, Biggie, Nas, Jay Z, those type of rappers that, you know, lyrically were creative. You know, Common is another one, I think had great lyrics. And so. And then when you put someone like Common, a couple albums he had, let's say in the late 90s, early 2000s, and put them together with a producer like Kanye west, that was like magic to me. You know, great beats and the lyrics worked out. So that's why to me, I can't say there's one that's the best. I just think there's. There's like the few names I mentioned, there's probably a couple more that if I thought hard, I'll get them out. But you know, that. That's why I say to me it's much more difficult. It's like if you ask me who's your favorite canvas artist, and I probably have five or six of them, but if you ask me who was the greatest NBA player, I'll say Michael Jordan. Because I'll be able to lean on certain stats that I would then defend with an argument which I can't defend music or art in that way because there's no kind of tangible thing to touch.
[00:44:51] Speaker A: You know, it's interesting to me that you default this question to best as opposed to. Because, you know, like, it's the question of being important. It could be best, but it also gets into influence and all that kind of stuff.
[00:45:03] Speaker B: Just for me. Just for me. I'll say. Because that's a good point. Just to distinguish. I'm looking at them both very similar in that way that best and important. Because you're right.
[00:45:10] Speaker A: Yeah. See, I think influence, like, best can be skill based, you know, like. And. But influence, which specifically with art makes a big deal because again, art isn't con. Our art constantly evolves. And so how important are you to the evolution of your art form matters, in addition to how well that's a great. Skillfully and so. But I want to keep us moving though. So like, for me, the. The most important I would put at. I think. I don't think you can put one. I think it has to be two. It's. It's Tupac and Notorious B.I.G. now, granted, I was, you know, young in that time frame, so I'm going to be biased towards that. But the reason I have is that I think it was a sea Change in. In two ways, a sea change in hip hop music. One, their deaths kind of changed the trajectory of hip hop a little bit, which was it still. It still does embrace, you know, like the kind of gangster rap mentality, but it gave the consequences of going too far with that. It made them very clear for it, which for something that lasted for at least a generation or so, you know, like, hey, you rap about different stuff. You do, you know, you live a certain way, but this stuff can. Like, it's not. If two titans like that can go down like that that quickly, then I think that influenced. So their death, I think influenced very much. I think their. Their life also was very influential in terms of the. The skill, the ability to connect with people and inspire people and, you know, and the ability to take all that stuff commercial, you know, like. And so I thought that they were very influential in that way. I mean, they're very good, you know, they're very influential. And then lastly, them leaving, creating the void that then, you know, like that other people and maybe a Jay Z or something like that, people started filling and so forth. But that, like the. I wonder if they are. If they don't prematurely leave us. What is. What. What's Jay Z's career? What's Lil Wayne's career? You know, like, things like that. Like the people that arose kind of in the immediate aftermath of that. When two titans go away, you know, it's like, okay, like, and NBA comparison again, but like. Like when Jordan leaves. The NBA struggled for a while to try to find, you know, its next stride after that, you know, and then, you know, it's Kobe and stuff like that coming in after that. Now, sports is a little different because of the cyclical kind of. It's not an abrupt, you know, with. Least with Jordan, you know, it's not an abrupt thing. Like, we saw him fading away, you know, kind of, you know, because he would always leave, but. But nonetheless. So I look at it, I would consider them to be the most important because of all of these different reverberations that in addition to being very good at what they were doing, their lives and their deaths, I mean, I think dying abruptly affects this calculation, unfortunately. But, you know, just looking at, as, you know, from an analysis standpoint, there's so many reverberations from them as artists in hip hop. So, I mean, that's kind of where I look at that.
[00:47:59] Speaker B: No, it's interesting, man. It's. And I can see the distinction also. I'll say this and we'll get out of here, Kanye west, to me, would be an interesting guy. I would distinguish between best and important because I'm not a Kanye fan in the way I'm a Tupac or Biggie or Jay Z fan or Nas.
Because for every one song of his I like, there's probably eight that I think are terrible.
But I do think, I respect the fact that he has been one of the most important figures in hip hop in the last 20, 25 years because he's a great producer of music for others that have, that have had him on their albums. And then, and then, and then the way that he, he opened up hip hop to outside the culture, really. So, you know, that's. It. That's. To me, I see your point about that distinction. So.
[00:48:45] Speaker A: Yeah, so. So. But yeah, I mean, and I, I mean, I thought I did like Kanye a lot, you know, in the beginning, but like, he spun in a different way or in a different direction, I think, than the art form was evolving, you know. And so, you know, as time went on, you know, I, like, there was a disconnect there that I couldn't bridge anymore. I wouldn't put him up in that, you know, like. But I do definitely see what you're saying, you know, but that's what I'm.
[00:49:11] Speaker B: Saying about importance into.
[00:49:12] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, I, I wouldn't argue with your, the case you made. You know, Like, I, I would, I, I wouldn't. Well, I would equipple with a little bit as far as how much he opened it up, you know, because I think it was pretty open by then. But at the same time, I get the point, you know, and I think. But, but nonetheless, I mean, I think you. You could. We could spend another two hours doing this. So, yeah, I think we're gonna get out of here.
[00:49:32] Speaker B: Don't worry, we won't. Guys. We.
[00:49:33] Speaker A: We're done.
We. We definitely appreciate everybody for joining us on this. On the call. Like, I see it. Subscribe to the podcast, Rate it, review it, tell us what you think. Send it to a friend. Till next time, I'm James Keys.
[00:49:45] Speaker B: I'm tuned to.
