-Thank you so much for being here.
-Thanks for having me. -Fresh off the VMAs.
You performed last night. You closed out the show.
-Yeah. Does anyone have a Band-id?
I like, pulled giant piece of my guitar out of my hand.
-Just now? -Yeah.
But it's been -- Well, I did it last night.
But it won't stop bleeding, so I just keep wiping it
on the inside of my pant.
Maybe I'll just keep my hand in my pants.
-That's cool. Yeah, that looks very natural.
Unfortunately, they all know why.
-Okay. -We'll get you a Band-Aid.
You know, I'm actually genuinely curious
how long it takes to get a Band-Aid during an interview.
We'll see if we can even make it in time.
But you mentioned that you got a piece of your guitar.
I always get nervous when people try to smash guitars.
Were you nervous that you weren't gonna be able
to effectively smash it? You did a great job.
-Well, that was never part of the plan.
I kind of did it out of, um...
There could be a documentary about everything that happened
backstage at the VMAs last night.
-A documentary about how it went exactly according to plan?
-Yeah, yeah. I wasn't supposed to
close out the show. -Look at this.
-Oh, my God. Thank you so much. -Look how fast it came.
You weren't supposed to close out the show?
-No. -Seems to me, like,
at award shows there's usually a pretty hard locked-in list.
-Yeah, it was -- Yeah.
-So, they came to you and said, "Change of plans.
You're going to close"? -I was in my set piece.
I was in the grave. If you watch the performance,
I start out in a grave. And i got --
In the middle of the show, they took me out of the grave,
and it -- dude, story for another day.
-That is -- Well, I don't know.
Seems like this is a pretty good place for it.
[ Laughter ]
I do like the idea of somebody being, like,
"Somebody has to go tell Machine Gun he's not on."
It's like, "He's already in the grave."
-"Yeah, I was in the -- For real.
-So, were you fully covered, so somebody had to come over
and, like, knock-knock on the grave?
-No, the grave was an open grave.
-Did you then, when it was all over, it went well?
You won. -Mm-hmm.
-You got an award presented to you on television.
Did you then go out later in the night?
Be honest. -I did.
I ran into Pete last night. -Yeah, Pete did a concert --
a stand-up comedy show for 9/11 at Madison Square Garden.
So, you went out, you saw your friend Pete.
-I saw Pete, and I saw Chappelle.
-Had you met Chappelle before? -Well, funny story.
That was the first time me, Pete, and Dave
have been in a room since Dave flew me and Pete
out to his house to -- to smoke.
-To -- To smoke weed?
-And then he sent us back 'cause I had a show.
He found out Pete was going to Ohio for my show.
Christmas show. And he was like, "Oh,
you guys just got to come down and hang out."
I'm like, "Oh, you're like five hours away, driving."
He's like, "No worries. There's a jet there
waiting for you. You guys have to get on it."
And we got on. We landed.
He forgot it was his mom's 81st birthday.
-Uh-huh. -As we all do.
-Right, well, if you're the kind of person
who flies people in for weed, you tend to forget dates.
-Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly.
And so we went -- So, he picks us up.
We go there. And then --
I don't know if I can say all this.
It was just like -- It was -- I mean, it was
the most legendary -- it certified Dave Chappelle
as, like, the ultimate rock star, to me.
-And is this a photo from then? -No, this is --
-I was like, "This is not the photo I expected,
based on what you just said."
-No, that was actually from a couple days ago.
Pete flew in. I wrote and directed this movie
with a friend of mine, Mod Sun,
and he came in to do a cameo on the last day.
And he was like, "We should have breakfast."
And I got to breakfast. And we were looking at the menu
and both of us saw this drink. And we were --
You know, we're kind of looking at the name of it.
And we were like, "It looks so good,
but, like, I don't want to be the one to order it."
So we both looked at the waiter, and we're like,
"Can we get two Beach Boys, please?"
[ Laughter ] -The Beach Boys!
-It's so funny. -You guys are
the new Beach Boys. I love it.
[ Laughter ]
So you went -- I just want to get the timeline right.
You were doing a show in Ohio,
and instead of driving five hours,
Chappelle jets you to his place. -We fly back.
-How long are you there? -We do, like, a solid
Mom's 81st birthday -- -So, you went to the party?
-Yeah, which it was a party.
81-year-olds go hard.
-Absolutely, they do.
-Did that, two hours.
Chappelle has different man caves around the town.
So we stopped in there. Talib Kweli was in one.
We went to another place. It was the most random night.
We end up at his house. His wife was, like, furious
that we were still there, like, "Get these idiots out of here."
So he's like, "Alright, you guys got to get back on the plane."
So, we get on the plane, go, we do the concert.
And then me, Pete, and my daughter decide
to do an eight-hour road trip to New York
to go to his mom's house, and we spent Christmas
at his mom's house. -That's fantastic.
Well turned around. Your daughter is 12 years old?
-Mm-hmm. -And does she ever go
to your shows? -Yeah, yeah, yeah.
-Does she enjoy? -Yeah, for sure.
-Great. -She's a concert kid.
-And she can stay up late and do that whole thing?
I guess, 12, I would imagine, at this point, yeah.
-She looks at me like I'm a loser.
I'm like, "Alright, it's 1:00 a.m.
I'm gonna tap out." She's like, "Pbht, dork."
-I have a quick -- I have a tattoo question.
I know you have a lot.
Maybe something that you and Pete connected on.
One thing that he's talked about on the show is, like,
sometimes you have one that you end up
maybe regretting over time.
You've gotten all your album titles tattooed on yourself.
Does that then put a higher burden of pressure on the title
when you're coming up with it, knowing that you're gonna
get it inked on?
-It puts pressure on how well the album does.
No one wants to put the flop on their body.
-Sure. I didn't think about that.
-It's done me well so far. It progressively
has gotten better, every release.
I'm just worried, if it turns into a Jay-Z situation,
where I have like 13 albums and then I end up having to be
like, "I ran out of space. I guess
I'm doing it right here on my nose."
-[ Laughing ] Yeah. -Or, like, my eye.
I have to sacrifice an eyebrow and just put --
-Yeah, you can't be that prolific.
You got to, like, tap the brakes a little bit.
-Like, lie that Seth Meyers' kitchen...
-We would love to do one of your live albums.
[ Laughter ]
Hey, this is really cool. You wrote this graphic novel.
You got a bunch of different really great artists
to work on it. -Yes.
-I've only done it the one time.
Bill Hader and I wrote a comic book a long time ago.
The most exciting thing for me was when the art comes back.
Was that just so thrilling? -Yes.
Um, uh... [ Sighs ]
Yes, and, like, it was really cool
being able to reach out to certain artists that I --
like, I love the way that the art looks
in "Ice Cream Man." -Yeah.
-And we were able to get certain people
that I was fans of to contribute to this.
I'm more of a cerebral comic reader.
Like, I love graphic novels that have --
that take you on, like, really intricate journey.
I like "Sandman."
We were talking about "Sandman" backstage.
So I'm hoping to turn this into something that becomes
a world, kind of like --
I love how Disney World is such a fantasy, like, place
that is -- you know, you can go to.
-This does not strike me to be like Disney World.
-This is a little bit opposite of Disney World.
-I don't want to show some of these pictures,
but it's very not-Disney World.
-The audience doesn't have to see,
but these are things we don't show the television.
-No, we don't show the television this.
Here, I'll just give a line.
"The man killed when I was 17."
-Ah. -That's my favorite ride.
-Yes. [ Laughter ]
-At Disney World. It's so great.
You start on, like -- you're on a roller coaster,
and on the way up, it's like,
"Tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, tick, thump!"
[ Laughter ] -Oh, my God.
-And then everyone on the roller coaster
is like, "Wait, what was that?" and then you just hear sirens.
-And the police come and arrest everybody.
Like, "Well, you just culled somebody.
You'll have to go to jail. You're a lifer."
-So, you -- you grew up -- I know, Cleveland.
-Mm-hmm. -Worked in a mall.
And this was when you were also -- you had mixtapes.
You were doing mixtapes. -Yeah.
-That's a very cool thing to be doing.
What were the stores you were working in,
at the mall, at the time? -I worked in an airbrush store
for many year. -What were people getting
airbrushed. back in the day, when you were there?
-A lot of "RIPs", and a lot of "free."
-Okay. -Whoever. "Free Chris."
-Okay. -You know?
-When someone got arrested, that was when a lot of money
came into the shop. -Interesting.
So that would be a bad time for the Chrises,
but a good time for the airbrush.
-There wasn't a person that came in
that I wouldn't rap for. Anybody that came in,
I was, "Enjoy this T-shirt. Now, also,
I'm going to rap for you for the next three minutes."
-Great. So, not "Here's a mixtape."
You were like, "I'm gonna do it face-to-face.
-I would also like to charge you 5 extra dollars
to leave with my mixtape."
-Wow. What was the sort of hit rate you had?
How many people were actually buying the mixtape?
-You'd be surprised at how many people in Cleveland
come up to me now, when I'm walking around,
that are like, "Dude, I remember you
when you used to rap in the airbrush shop."
-Really?! -'Cause Tower City is
the middle point of Cleveland between East and West Side.
All the trains -- there's one train station in the middle.
So all the trains would come up,
and everyone would come up in between their stops
and, like, after school and everything.
And so anyone that was --
And the movie theater was right there.
When "You Got Served" was in theaters,
and everyone came out, I was just in the hallway
the whole time, like, [Imitating drumrolls]
[ Laughter ] -So, you would just wait
for people to come out of a movie,
'cause you thought if they were at that movie --
-The movie theater was right next to the airbrush.
-And you would just, like, rap? And now how many people --
When people say, "I remember you rapping,"
are they saying, "I bought your mixtape"?
Or do you think now they regret that they --
-No, a lot of people bought.
Like, I was -- That was how people heard.
That was how the labels heard about me,
because I was a really big mixtape artist in Ohio.
-Out of Cleveland? -Yes.
And then some people remember me from working at Chipotle.
-Because you were a rapper, or you were really good at it?
-Because I was a burrito wrapper.
[ Laughter ]
-Well, I hate giving the last word to the guest.
But I don't think I'm gonna beat that.
[ Laughter ]
Hey, thanks so much for being here.
"Hotel Diablo" is available September 28th.