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by Jeremy,
staff writer 3/01/07 |
| DP Columns / Jeremy The Loner |
A Conversation With Jerky Boy Johnny Brennan
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"What the hell is that?" Johnny Brennan asks, his voice breaking up and almost fading out altogether. A loud squeal of feedback comes out over the speakers, and it startles me to the point where I almost drop the phone. "Is that on your end?" he says. "Because I'm hearing a really loud humming over here." Meanwhile, my friend Ord is frantically making adjustments to the microphones and soundboard, trying to get better sound. At this point, I'd say it's a safe bet that my dream interview isn't going as planned. I mean, here I am, talking to a guy who made a name for himself by releasing recordings of prank phone calls, and I can't even figure out how to record the damn interview. I'm starting to wonder if one of my biggest comedic influences thinks I'm a complete dipshit.
"Can you hear me?" Brennan asks. "Yeah, I can hear you," I answer sheepishly. "Okay, as long as you can hear me..."
Hearing Brennan's natural speaking voice is a surreal experience, and for the first few minutes it somewhat throws me off a bit. Like many great voice actors, his voice is instantly familiar, yet oddly unfamiliar. It reminded me of hearing old interviews with Mel Blanc; Mel's voice was fascinating, because it was like hearing all of his characters rolled into one. You could hear a bit of Bugs Bunny, a bit of Daffy Duck, a bit of Foghorn Leghorn. It's the same thing with Brennan. I could hear  echoes of Frank Rizzo, Sol Rosenberg, Jack Tors and all of those other characters I've loved since 1993. Well, I could somewhat hear it, anyway. The feedback problem was really starting to put a damper on things.
"Can you hear me?" Brennan demands again, his tone tolerant but increasingly impatient. "Because you're sounding really, really hot over here."
I find myself stifling a laugh, despite how badly things are starting out. So, my voice sounds "hot," does it? I half-expected to suddenly hear Jack Tors' effeminate voice squealing at me through the receiver, "Ooooh! Your voice is sounding so-o-o hot! I'd love to wrap you up in plastic and beat you with a stick!" Or maybe Frank Rizzo would get fed up with the technical issues and start barking, "What's goin' on over there, ya fuckin' wacky ass? I oughta split yer nuts off the side of yer face, ya fuckin' milky licker!"
Now, I'm really trying to hold it together, because the irony of the situation is finally starting to sink in. Think about it--I'm talking to one of The Jerky Boys on the telephone, and he's the one getting annoyed. That has to be a first.
The thing is, Brennan probably has no idea what a big deal this is for me. I'm not some casual fan that decided to interview him just for the hell of it. Quite the contrary, actually. I've been a big, big fan of his ever since I heard the classic first album back in the fall of 1993. I have most of the routines from the first few CDs memorized, word for word, and I do pretty decent impressions of all the characters. Starting with The Jerky Boys 2, I bought every new release the day it came out--and that includes both the coffee table book and the Don't Hang Up, Tough Guy! VHS tape. And yes, I even own a copy of the movie.
Unfortunately, Brennan has no way of knowing this. He's just trying to promote the seventh Jerky Boys release, entitled Sol's Rusty Trombone, which is due in stores March 20th. He doesn't know that I literally almost choked to death laughing the first time I heard Frank Rizzo call a hapless piano tuner named Eric for assistance in removing his rottweiler from a piano--all because he jumped up there and "got wedged down in the fuckin' wires." He doesn't know that my friend Tanz and I still greet each on the phone by saying, "Hi! Hi, sir!" in Sol Rosenberg's voice to this very day. And now, all these years later, I finally get to talk to the guy... and everything keeps fucking up.
Finally, several minutes later we were able to sort out the sound issues and get going. And as it turns out, it was well worth the trouble. Here's how it went down; |
| Jeremy the Loner: So, when exactly did you first start making prank calls? |
| Johnny Brennan: It goes way, way back. To the '70's. |
| JTL: How did you end up meeting Kamal? |
| Johnny Brennan: Well, when we were kids, he lived down the block. |
| JTL: You're a little older than he is, aren't you? |
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| Johnny Brennan: Yeah, Kamal was like a man child. I think he's like six or seven years younger than me. |
| JTL: So when did you guys first start recording your calls? |
| Johnny Brennan: Like I said, I started long before any of the Jerky Boys stuff. I was recording calls a long time ago. |
| JTL: Was it kind of like the Tube Bar tapes, where you guys were big on the bootleg market before you even knew you had a following? |
| Johnny Brennan: No, actually The Jerky Boys started long before the Tube Bar tapes. As a matter of fact, what happened was Howard Stern somehow had gotten one tape where everything was lumped into a bundle, and Howard used to love listening to Frank Rizzo and all of that. Then, one day I guess they were playing all this stuff and people were telling me, "Hey, you gotta hear Stern. I'm telling ya, he's playing your tapes," and that's when I had to, you know, come out of the woodwork and say, "Hey, that's me doing that stuff." |
| JTL: Is that pretty much how you guys got your commercial release? Because it was, what, on Detonator Records back in '93? |
| Johnny Brennan: Uh, Detonator? There was no Detonator then. From what I understand, The Jerky Boys spawned all these record labels. |
| JTL: So what was the deal with The Musacha Tapes? Because I'd heard one interview where those guys were supposedly friends of yours, and then I heard another where you were suing them... |
| Johnny Brennan: (Sighs) The truth about all this is that it's really, really old news and it's, like, so far removed from anything that's going on today. The truth of it is he's a good buddy of mine, the Musacha guy. We're childhood friends, and still to this day we're friends. |
| JTL: Hey, that's cool. I'm not trying to... |
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| Johnny Brennan: Listen, you gotta understand. There's millions of stories circulating, you know what I mean? Lots of people really took The Jerky Boys, they loved The Jerky Boys and they loved the characters. It's always been character driven. And most people will tell you, they know someone like Frank Rizzo, they know somebody like Sol. They go crazy for the characters. So, with that being said, I've had every Tom, Dick and Harry for the last fifteen, twenty years just coming up with all kinds of stories about this and that. You know, there were stories that I was locked up for years over doing Frank Rizzo, and I mean... there's so many stories, I can't even begin to tell you. |
| JTL: Well, that was thing. When you guys first started out, you kept your identities secret. Nobody even knew what you looked like. |
| Johnny Brennan: There was a reason for that. That was because of the deal with Disney Pictures. |
| JTL: Tell us a bit about the new CD. It's been a while since you released something with all new material, isn't that right? |
| Johnny Brennan: Yeah, what's going on with the new CD is this; right after I finished the movie Big Money Hustlas, my dad passed away. This was in 2000. And then right after that, we had 9/11, so I kinda wasn't really in the mood to just get back down to being funny. You know what I'm saying? That's neither here nor there, it's just where I was at. So, a couple of years ago I got involved with this company doing personal stuff for fans on their cell phones. People can call them what they want, like prank calls, but they weren't really that. They were little snippets. They were Jerky Boys snippets. You know, like little quick things that Sol does, or Frank, and all the different characters. I'd do little things people could put on their computers, their phones and all different kinds of applications. So I put, like, 89 or 90 of those on this new record that they can use for home answering devices, computers, cell phones, ring tones... and there's also nine calls. |
| JTL: Is it just you on the new CD? Is there anyone else, or is Johnny Brennan The Jerky Boys now? |
| Johnny Brennan: That's the way it's been, dude. The way it's been for a long time. |
| JTL: Yeah, we're talking back to, what, the late '90's? |
Johnny Brennan: We're talking about going back a long ways. You have to remember something, though. The material was already pretty much laid down anyhow. All the characters were named and pretty much given by me. It's what it is, and what's it's always been. This is my kind of way of getting back in. You know, I've gotten so many e-mails, man, you wouldn't believe it. Just fan mail and stuff on the Jerky Boys website, from people who couldn't get their  hands on, uh... well, their phone carriers didn't carry my stuff. And meanwhile, it's the number one downloaded comedy stuff in the country for phones, ring tones and all that. So, what I did is I put this CD together, and it's got almost a hundred cuts for under nine bucks.
JTL: You know, for a lot of years, fans like me didn't know what exactly happened to you guys. The last CD I really remember seeing was Stop Staring At Me!
Johnny Brennan: No, no, the last CD was The Jerky Tapes.
JTL: Yeah, but that was older material, wasn't it?
Johnny Brennan: No, The Jerky Tapes is not old at all. As a matter of fact, some of that material was done just before the release of the CD.
JTL: So what can people expect from the latest CD as far as the characters and all that? I know you can't say a WHOLE lot about it, but...
Johnny Brennan: Nah, what do you want to know? Like I said, it's got so much shit on there, almost a hundred cuts. When you hear it, you'll see. There's a lot of really cool stuff on there. There's little mini movies of Sol, and I got a couple of pictures with Pico and Rizzo and a couple of different things where they're going at it. You'll like it, it's cool. I've got another CD too. It's getting me going, getting me rocking again, because I'm working on another one coming out in late summer. |
| JTL: Are you still doing your gig on The Family Guy? |
| Johnny Brennan: Yeah, uh-huh. |
| JTL: Has that helped expand your audience? You know, like my brother was never really into The Jerky Boys, but he's a huge Family Guy fan. Is it cool having that separate fan base? |
| Johnny Brennan: The creator of The Family Guy, you know, Seth MacFarlane? |
| JTL: Yeah. |
| Johnny Brennan: He's a huge fan of mine. He told me, "Johnny, I love your stuff." When he was a little kid, he used to listen to my stuff all the time. He loved it, he was a big fan. |
| JTL: So is it true that Mort Goldman is a cousin of Sol Rosenberg? |
| Johnny Brennan: Yeah, that's Sol's long lost cousin. |
| JTL: I don't want to talk too much about this, but are you and Kamal cool with each other? I know you're not together, but do you still talk to him? You read the Dean's Planet interview he did, and there seems to be some bad blood there... |
| Johnny Brennan: No, you know, whatever happens... I can't explain. I don't know why, I don't know the reasons. I'm at a loss for it myself, to be quite honest with you. Right around the time when I finished that movie in 2000, it's like all this weird stuff started going down. Friends would call me up and say, "Dude, he's on the radio, he's saying all kinds of crap," and I was like, you know what? Right now, man, with all this crap going on in my life, I don't have the time to try and and figure this out, or be brawling with somebody. You know, what am I gonna do? He's a grown man, let him say and do whatever the hell he wants. What can I do? I can't control him. There's some things in life you can control, and some you can't. |
| JTL: But as far as you're concerned, you don't have any fight with him. |
| Johnny Brennan: Man, I'll be honest, I have no beef. I never did. I don't even know what the hell happened, to be quite honest. I just know that one day he handed a note to the manager, and the manager said to me, "Johnny, he just handed me this note that said he didn't want to do this, or be a part of it anymore." And I said, "What the hell do you want me to do? What can I tell you? What can I do?" You know, I don't how to react to that. What am I supposed to say? I did say, "Look, dude, you've got millions of fans. You know, what's the point?" Maybe he just felt like he wasn't appreciated enough, or fans sometimes really didn't know who he was. They would ask, "Who's this guy?" when we'd do record signings and whatnot. You know, they'd say, "What do you do? What characters do you do?" He used to flip out. He used to flip his lid, man. He used to get really angry. And what am I supposed to do, you know? |
| JTL: But you guys both had some notoriety. I mean, you did the movie, for one thing. |
| Johnny Brennan: It is what it is. If you sell millions and millions of records around the world, that's notoriety. |
| JTL: That's what I mean. You went from complete anonymity to being really well known. I'm sure that at its peak you'd try to do a call and the person would know who you were. Did it get to the point where it became difficult to do what you did? |
| Johnny Brennan: Well, that's another reason why it's extremely difficult for me today. It's really, really hard. Don't forget, there's still plenty of people out there to get, but trust me, it's really hard for me today. Because everybody is so aware. Today, everybody's kind of on the edge of their seat, thinking that somebody's gonna be fucking with them. |
| JTL: That first album became part of pop culture. I'd say it was the most influential comedy record of the '90's. |
| Johnny Brennan: Well, it goes without being said. I mean, without tooting your own horn or anything, it's probably one of the greatest comedy albums ever. It's the only comedy record to ever hit number one on Billboard Magazine. That had never been done before. It's got so many records, it's just unbelievable. |
| JTL: It fuckin' went platinum, didn't it? |
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| Johnny Brennan: Oh, it's more than that. Now the first two are, I think, double or triple platinum. |
| JTL: Yeah, after that first one, every time you guys came out with a new record I'd be there opening day to get it. It would be like a tradition, where I'd sit down with a six pack and listen to the new Jerky Boys record. |
| Johnny Brennan: With the second one... well, when that first one came out, everybody was like, "Oh my god, there's no way that they're gonna top that first CD." Sure enough, the second one came out and the friggin' thing sold something like 750,000 units in, like, six days. |
| JTL: Great choice, opening the record with Pablo Honey. |
| Johnny Brennan: Yeah, you know, there's a funny little story... |
| JTL: (stupidly interrupting) Who the hell is on that call, anyway? You or Kamal? I always wondered. |
| Johnny Brennan: That's me. Like I said, all the characters, from Curly G to Tarbash, came from me. Tarbash was my brother's name from when we used to have a roofing company. My brother Andy, that was his nickname. So that's how I named the Indian character Tarbash. |
| JTL: What about Frank Rizzo? Was he based on mobsters and all that? |
| Johnny Brennan: No. Frank Rizzo, that character is modeled on my dad. |
| JTL: That's the character that people think of when you talk about The Jerky Boys. |
| Johnny Brennan: Oh yeah, absolutely. |
| JTL: Mention the name and people immediately go into a bad "Hey Jerky" Frank Rizzo impression. Well, both him and Sol Rosenberg. |
| Johnny Brennan: Actually, you know, the one who does the best Sol I ever heard is Anthony, from the Opie & Anthony show. |
| JTL: (laughs) Oh, yeah? |
| Johnny Brennan: Yeah, he does a killer Sol, man. Not very many people can do that. A lot of people try to do a whiny, nasally kind of thing, but he gets it dead on. |
| JTL: It sounded like a Woody Allen type voice initially. Was he based on that at all? |
| Johnny Brennan: This is funny enough, actually, but Sol is modeled after my mom and my uncle. And the uncle I'm talking about is the one where the character Kissel is from. That same guy. I took a little bit of his features and his, you know, where he goes (Sol Rosenberg's voice), "Thank you. Thank you very much." That comes from my uncle, who Kissel's voice is modeled after, and that's the old guy who's like (Kissel's voice), "Whaa? What the fuck are ya doin'?" |
| JTL: (laughs) So do YOU do Kissel now, or is that voice retired? |
| Johnny Brennan: Kissel? I don't even want to do that name, because when we did the character, I let Kamal do Kissel, you know. But these were old family members of mine. |
| JTL: The character started off as "Puma" on the Uncle Freddie track. That was the first appearance of the character, right? |
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| Johnny Brennan: Right. |
| JTL: So that voice was always based on your uncle, and Kamal didn't even create it? |
| Johnny Brennan: No, no, that's my uncle. He was named Vince DeGotta, and he died in 1998. He was a wonderful guy. He was the funniest fucker you ever saw. That guy could make you piss your pants laughing. I always used to go around doing his voice and, you know, Kamal used to do it really well. It was like, "Yeah, man, knock yourself out," so that's how that came about. |
| JTL: (doing a very passable Kissel) "Yeah, I needed to get a hairpiece, but I don't need you talkin' to the guy." |
| Johnny Brennan: Yeah, a fuckin' hairpiece. For that little Mexican. |
| JTL: What happened with some of those characters you guys did that only appeared one time, like Rosine, or... |
| Johnny Brennan: Yeah, Rosine, I do Rosine now. I get so many people hitting my website, and they're fuckin' like, "Johnny, you gotta do this." I gotta tell you, man, I get the coolest fuckin' e-mail coming in, and fan mail. It's really neat the way people are saying, "Johnny, we really missed you, man. Welcome back." And the funny thing is, I never really went anywhere. I was just doing cartoon work for The Family Guy, and some other cartoon projects. But it's so neat to see the stuff coming in. Even the military, man. I've got so much shit coming in from the military, from Iraq. |
| JTL: Yeah. |
| Johnny Brennan: It's fuckin' insane. I can't even tell you how awesome these people have been. |
| JTL: So then, some of those more obscure characters like Pico, Rosine, Bob The Badass Massage Guy... will they be coming back? |
| Johnny Brennan: Absolutely. They're all coming back. Like I said, that album will definitely be coming out. I'm gonna keep my fingers crossed and hopefully have that ready by late summer. |
| JTL: Beyond that, do you plan on keeping this going? Will there be even more albums? |
| Johnny Brennan: Well, here's the deal. If I could show you some of the e-mails, you'd see it for yourself. There's a lot of people where things have happened, or are happening in their lives... they're fucked up, or hurt, or they got hurt, they're poor, or they have some disease they're living through... and you get an e-mail where people say, "Johnny, please don't ever stop, man. That laughter gets me through another day." That's fuckin' powerful shit. You know what I'm saying? |
| JTL: Yeah. |
Johnny Brennan: You know, if you can make people laugh, you've got something. Even if your albums don't hit number one, there's plenty of people out there who really need the stuff. Laughter is the best medicine, man. You see  all this shit out. You see how they do studies for lowering blood pressure and everything using laughter.
JTL: Any chance of you ever appearing on Crank Yankers? It seems like everybody else is on it.
Johnny Brennan: Years ago when they started that show, it was actually Jimmy Kimmel. I don't know who the hell is doing it now, really. But I'll tell you the truth, this year we almost had a deal where they were gonna do eight to ten Jerky Boys episodes.
JTL: With the classic stuff, or newer stuff?
Johnny Brennan: Well, they wanted to do classic stuff and see what they could put together. And they were very excited, but all those old record companies, you know, kinda fucked things up at that point.
JTL: So did you ever think about taking your act on the road? Like on stage, or whatever?
Johnny Brennan: You know what, to tell you the truth, I wouldn't know what the fuck to do. I mean, it's kinda silly. What I do is all about the characters. A lot of fans are going back and forth about seeing the characters interacting with each other, like from cartoons. |
| JTL: Is there talk about turning the characters into a cartoon, like on Cartoon Network or Comedy Central? |
| Johnny Brennan: We're working on projects right now. Storyboards and things like that. We're putting some guys together, so we'll see what happens. |
| JTL: Can we assume this cartoon would be more of an, shall we say, "adult" nature? |
| Johnny Brennan: It'll be cutting edge. You know, today you can do so much. You've seen some of the cartoons out there... kids can't watch them. |
| JTL: Like South Park, maybe some episodes of Aqua Teen Hunger Force... |
| Johnny Brennan: Yeah, yeah, like you could say Family Guy. I mean, come on, Family Guy is funny stuff, man. Too many kids were watching it. They're under 13. You say, "Oh, I don't know about that," but there's plenty of them watching. |
| JTL: Yeah, you have a point. They get away with a lot of shit on that show. |
| Johnny Brennan: Right. |
| JTL: Plus, you're talking prime time on one of the major networks. |
| Johnny Brennan: Exactly. |
| JTL: Listen, I appreciate you taking the time to talk to me. But before I let you go, can I ask you one thing? |
| Johnny Brennan: Sure. |
| JTL: Could I be so honored to have Frank Rizzo cuss me out on the phone? |
| Johnny Brennan: What do you need, a line? A tag? |
| JTL: No tag or anything. Just to hear you doing the voice would be so fucking awesome. |
| Johnny Brennan: (as Frank Rizzo) Hey, what do ya say there, you slap happy prick?? It's Frank Rizzo! Open yer fuckin' ears, jackass! |
| JTL: (laughing) That's awesome, man, thanks. |
| Johnny Brennan: Absolutely, man, I appreciate it. And if you could, please do a big shout out to the fans. |
| JTL: Definitely. What would you want to say to your fans? |
| Johnny Brennan: The fans have always been fuckin' top shelf, man. The fans have always been behind the Jerky Boys projects, so just a big shout out to the fans. And if you could, this would be really important to me; a big, big hello to all the young men and women in Iraq serving the country. |
| JTL: All right, man, will do. Thanks a lot, Johnny. It's been really fuckin' fun. |
Johnny Brennan: Thanks, I appreciate that.
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| JTL: Thanks again to Johnny Brennan for doing the interview, and also a BIG thank you to his site administrator Bob for setting the whole thing up. He's a really, really cool guy. Don't forget to check out the new Jerky Boys release, Sol's Rusty Trombone, which will be available on March 20th. Go out there and buy it, ya fuckin' fruity ass bastards! |
The Jerky Boys Official Site
Johnny Brennan on MySpace |
-JTL
Think you're a tough guy? Drop me a line HERE, so I can show you what it's like to choke on your own nuts!
Jeremy the Loner on MySpace |
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