We're back after a short holiday break, and catching up on everything that's happened in the world of Bonnaroo and music festivals. In this episode, we reflect on our biggest moments from 2025, and how they shaped us as fans. Plus, does Bryan have a new favorite artist discovery from the 2026 lineup?
Then, the heart of this episode comes from you! We play some of the Bonnaroo contest entries sent directly from listeners, and honestly the stories, memories, and emotions behind them hit harder than we ever expected. From first-time Bonnaroo experiences to moments of connection, resilience, and community, these submissions capture what makes Bonnaroo and music festivals so meaningful beyond the lineup. Watch Reece's full video submission here.
There's still time to enter our contest for a chance to win two tickets to Bonnaroo 2026 with a camping pass! Visit thewhat.co/win for details on how to enter, or call the hotline at (423) 667-7877!
Listen to this week's episode here or watch it on YouTube. As always, subscribe to The What Podcast wherever you get podcasts for weekly updates on Bonnaroo and festival news!
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We Play Your Bonnaroo Contest Entries...They Hit Hard
one of the highlights of the year.
Like, if I didn't happen to turn that corner,
this is Festival Stuff 101, right?
That we talk about all the time,
the things that you could never plan
and that you could never know is gonna happen.
Youngblood is the best thing I've heard since Oasis, guys.
Youngblood is the best thing I've heard since Oasis.
Wow.
Okay.
["Berry's New Year's Eve"]
Welcome to 2026.
Happy New Year, everybody.
I'm Barry. That's Brian. That's Russ.
How are you guys? Happy New Year.
Hey, Happy New Year.
Yeah, yeah, it's one of the salutations
I continue for days after the holiday.
Like, I'll say Merry Christmas, maybe.
Happy birthday, if I think about it.
But Happy New Year for as long as...
I mean, it's a Larry David joke in there somewhere, right?
You can only do it for a certain amount of time, but...
Yeah, I did wonder what your timeframe was on that.
I'll give it a week or two.
It's a little late, frankly, for the Happy New Year, you know?
Why? Just happened a couple weeks ago, right?
Yeah, that's too long.
Statute of limitations.
Things kind of run out on the New Year.
Three days. Plenty.
Three days?
So, Happy New Year, everybody. Appreciate it.
Yeah. Hope this one doesn't suck as bad as last.
But don't we say that every year? Every time.
Get out of here last year. Bring on the New Year.
Yeah, that's right. Get thee behind. All that.
How was your holiday, guys?
We haven't seen each other in a little bit.
Yeah, you start, Russ.
Well, mine was great.
Let's see. Since we last talked,
I went down to Florida for a few days.
I might have said that my parents sold this house to me in Chattanooga,
moved down to Florida.
So, you know, it's a quick flight down there and hung out there.
Coincidentally, that's when Brad came to town.
So, you know, I missed last time when he was hanging out with y'all.
Got to see him before he left, though.
And then last weekend, I went down to Huntsville
and hung out with the Roobus crew for their totem event.
That was pretty fun.
They did a holiday party episode thing, and I was a guest on there.
So go watch that if you missed it.
That was kind of something to fill the time since we were off.
And then over the New Year's, I went camping at Fall Creek Falls with Lindsay.
Oh, nice. Nice.
How was the totem event?
And we need to we need to plan to visit with Daniel and Sharla
and and whoever they want to have talk about it,
because that totem thing has become a huge, huge deal.
If you if you're a Bonnarooo fan at all, you know about it.
They are longtime Bonnarooians who started
401 C3, 501 C3, 501 to give away
multiple tickets to people every year to come to Bonnarooo
and hopefully take
take the vibe and take the message and all that back home with you
and make it a year round thing. So
how did it go down there in Huntsville?
It was good. It was a little fundraiser.
So they did a little, you know, a little shilling, I guess,
you know, just promoting what they're trying to do and whatnot.
But yeah, it was fun. They had DJs and hung out.
Saw, you know, JB and Dan and Sharla and a bunch of other people
from our discord and some of our commenters were down there.
So it was a good time.
Yeah. Like you said, their their goal for 26 is to send six people to Bonnarooo.
So they're trying to raise enough funds to cover that.
So three is their yearly goal.
But they're because of the cancellation last year, they're sending
those three and three new.
So that's pretty cool, pretty ambitious.
And as you said, you moved, you're in a new house.
So this was is that the highlight of twenty twenty five for you?
Probably it was definitely unexpected because, you know,
this was like first week of November.
Last week of October is when all of this kind of dropped. They
weren't planning on moving anytime soon, but they saw a house
they like down there, put an offer in.
It was accepted. And then it was like, oh, well, now we really got to do this.
So I had to put my house up for sale, which was a process.
And, you know, then buy this one.
So, you know, it was a month of getting documents and paperwork
and every financial stuff, getting all that in order.
And then the actual physical act of moving, which always sucks.
But it's done. And just trying to get moved in and set up here.
I don't completely have it the way I need it to.
I don't have like a I'm trying to make a podcasting space.
I'm just in my office right now.
So this is still temporary. But I was going to say the the the shades
in the background don't don't hit as well.
Right. I agree.
Boss. I mean, I know you got to get this aesthetic cleaned up there.
Talk. Yeah, I'm working on it.
They do. They do better match your new Christmas hat, though.
They look a little more highfalutin.
Looks a little more what's the word grown up maybe?
Yeah. Yeah. Thank you.
Thrift store hat that you used to have.
Yeah. Well, like you guys saw on the holiday thing.
Yeah, I got a new hat for Christmas.
So I guess I think somebody took pity on me wearing that old
dirty dingy hat that I've had for years and got me this nice brand new one.
And I love it.
I like we're going to there will be a callback to hats later
when we listen to some contest contest entries.
So, oh, really?
Yeah. Put it put a pin in that comment right there.
I think, Rush, you know what I'm talking about?
I mean, I'm a hat guy.
I don't know how much we talk about it.
I try my goal is to wear a different hat every time we've ever done a show.
I don't quite have that many hats, but I do have a lot.
I got an old one if you want it.
I'll take it and put it in the collection.
I have 50, 60 hats.
I wear four of them outside of outside of when we record.
But you had a great.
Yeah, I was going to ask before you do.
And because mine, I mean, I had a great year.
I'm not going to complain.
Got a got a bathroom done, which was a huge thing.
But I do want to ask you, Brian, because
I'm anxious to hear your list, because you've had a
pretty fascinating year.
Oh, yeah. Well, before we get to that.
But yeah, we're going to do take a back look back kind of just some of our favorite
shows and things for the year.
But just to wrap up the holidays.
Holy Jesus. Like just so much going on.
Beth was in town for half of the month and
just it was nonstop.
It was it was fine.
Glad it's over.
The holiday part ready for January and the new year.
But I watched a bunch of cool stuff,
especially because she was in town and I was able to log in to all her streamers.
Yeah. So it's not just me watching modern marvels from 1999 every single day.
Nothing wrong with that.
For those that don't know, I just I don't pay for TV and I watch all those little
crappy little channels, and that's just one I'm stuck on a lot.
But I watch a little affair documentary,
watched there's a festival or a excuse me, a series on Netflix called This is Pop.
And it's just about different music industry things.
One of them was an entire thing on festivals and they had a big
highlight of like five of them.
And one of them was Bonnarooo. It was really neat.
And the the other one was one called Camden.
And it's Camden.
Well, London, I guess, right inside.
I don't know the geography of England well enough, but it's right inside of London,
I believe. And it's kind of like, I don't know, what is it?
Greenwich Greenwich Village. Greenwich.
What am I saying? In New York.
We're all the yeah, we're all the the Bob Dylan's and the Joni Mitchell's hung out.
Back in one sort of an art district. Exactly.
This is kind of their version of that, but almost bigger and
highlights all the usual suspects and then a whole bunch that you never had heard of.
One of them was Oasis.
Now, of course, Oasis didn't contribute much, right?
They didn't. It was a lot of B-roll footage that they used.
They didn't have time to sit down with a documentary with these guys, probably.
But one of the guys on the show on this series, it was like a four part
miniseries, was Youngblood.
And I've never heard of Youngblood until this Bonnarooo drop, you know,
a month ago, other than maybe I heard the word and name and just dismissed it.
Young kid, as we are, you know, anybody watching this already knows.
And this is how easily I'm persuaded and influenced.
He's going on and on. You can barely understand.
You need the subtitles.
And it's and they're talking about the Oasis part.
And he goes on and on about how much he loves Oasis.
And I was like, you know what?
This guy is all right with me.
So we set that set that hook.
And now, yeah.
And I was like, well, if he likes Oasis, then I like him.
And then so I started listening to it.
And I'm still I'm waiting to dive deep into the to the lineup
any time now, actually, in the next month or so or less.
But I think Youngblood is going to be my my new favorite.
And when when Brad Steiner was in town, right,
I we met up as soon as he got into town the day before we recorded.
And I don't remember how it came up, but it quickly
I was just like, man, this Youngblood is like, what?
You hate it, right?
Like, no, I love it.
And you like, dude, you don't make any sense.
And then he goes on to tell me about the all the the
the interview stuff and the little game show things
they do with Odyssey up in New York, which we've made its rounds.
And that was actually released that week.
So it's kind of a little serendipitous kind of way of a conversation
come together. And I love them even more now.
So I'm a big fan of Youngblood.
And I learned that in the last two weeks.
I'm going to ask you one question.
Please answer it in 36 floors.
If you succeed, you have a big prize waiting for you at the top.
All right. Cool. Go ahead.
Today on 36 floors.
Yeah. Youngblood, there are eight blood types.
Oh, you fuck. I don't know this shit.
All right. Go on.
The dumbest the dumbest questions that he can classic Brad.
Classic Brad.
Give the most ridiculous questions and the excellent editing
of the machine that is Odyssey.
It's a really neat little, I don't know what, 90 second video.
So yeah, Youngblood's got a real adamant vibe.
If you guys remember.
OK, yeah, I've got some adamant tapes.
I get where you're coming from on that.
And and yeah, so I'm really looking forward to that.
But one other thing from the holidays.
So I'm I am doing a bunch of things here locally that I plan to do a year ago.
I never got around to kind of being a tourist in my own town.
We got all kinds of like Rock City.
You probably heard of a lot of other things like that.
And for some reason, I've just decided in the last month to hit a bunch of those.
And on New Year's Day, I went up to the Lost Sea, which is a cave system.
It's very touristy.
Take the kids to the elementary school, goes there on field trips.
It's if you're a big spelunker, as they would say, it might you might roll your eyes at it.
But it's pretty darn cool.
And when I got home from that, my whole goal that with a big ham bone
left over from my family Christmas, I was like, I'm going to make some ham and bean soup.
And I and I don't know what I'm doing, but I'm figuring it out as I go.
And I go to taste and surely you've done this before, Barry,
in the many years you spent in the kitchen with your wife Kelly over the over the decades.
I tried the the broth taste testing three quarters of the way in.
And because I'm a dummy, burned the whole bleep and everything out of my mouth.
Yeah. And we're recording on the fourth.
Today's the first day I've had taste.
So you burn it good.
So it's New Year's Day.
My coffee, my bitters and soda waters, my very, very flavorful drinks just taste like cold nothing.
Wow. Here's the other part of this story that I love is now Bryan Stone is a tourist.
Bryan Stone and cooking chef Bryan Stone saw that five years ago.
Raise your hand.
That was the five years is the perfect time frame because it was my covid hobby was the cooking thing.
But yeah, I don't know. I just I it's all new.
Brian gone as the shots of of vodka and and joints.
Well, even the joints might stick around a little bit.
And then now off to a cliff to hang off of.
And I'm scared to hide and I'm scared of heights. What's going on?
I did want to say, since you mentioned Brad, because I saw one of the YouTube
comments from somebody who watched our episode and said is the most negative thing
he'd seen in forever. And I I didn't remember it that way.
Did you? I mean, I know we don't like to comment on this, but I don't just don't remember it that way.
That he was negative, that we were negative.
The show was negative. Oh, well, I don't know if it was the comments or if it was because we were
picking on you. And my thoughts is, I mean, welcome to the show.
That's just how that goes.
Probably just somebody not familiar with how we treat each other.
Yeah, I don't know.
Love, man.
No, no, I thought it was I thought it was fine.
And and I got a little bit of feedback saying they were really happy to see Brad back on.
Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah. Not overwhelmingly.
People love having Brad back.
Yeah. I mean, it just goes at 100 miles an hour, too.
Right. Like we like we can't even get a word in half the time.
It's just boom. But it makes it doing a show quite easy.
Well, I figured when we got there, we talked for 15 minutes and then we,
you know, have lunch or whatever. And what do we hour?
A little over an hour.
Yeah. The day before, he's like, I guess whatever my dude, you better not screw me on this.
I don't want to go meet up remotely and you not actually be there and do this.
And he's like, oh, I don't know what I'm gonna do or whatever.
Just shut up and be there.
Yeah. And then next thing you next thing you know, he hijacks the whole thing,
which is what we wanted.
It's exactly what we wanted. And I knew it happened and hoped would happen.
Yeah. He loves it. He misses it. He acts like he doesn't, but he really does.
I hate that you weren't there, Russ.
That's absolutely true. He does pretend.
Flying back from Florida.
He does pretend like he, you know, he hates it or doesn't care about it,
but he he misses it. He does. We know he does.
Also, did you get I don't know if you guys got one. I got my Christmas card.
Oh, I meant to send Bruce a message, a note somewhere saying,
thank you so much for the card because it's gorgeous.
His handwriting. I'm not even talking about the handwriting you're looking at here.
The writing on the outside of the envelope is beautiful cursive.
Yeah. That's another thing, Barry.
My old age, I've been working on different fonts while I'm just doodling.
So I now don't even know you anymore.
I don't even know you.
And so I notice these things more now. And I was like, oh my God, who sent me this,
this letter with this amazing cursive writing?
So thank you, David Bruce, very much for that.
Yeah. Thank you very much.
That's awesome. All right. So today's show, we're going to take a break here in a little bit.
We're going to come back. We're going to talk about, we're going to kind of do,
we're not going to do a spin magazine Rolling Stone top 10 things in 2025,
but I think we want to hit some highlights, kind of a look back.
With that and along with that, some, some current news.
And then we're going to round out the show after another break with all of the entries.
And I go ahead and tell you guys right now, if you're, if you're waiting, we've gotten so many.
And I mean, typically, to be honest, we would try to milk a contest like that for
weeks and weeks and weeks, but because there are so many and quite honestly,
because they are so personal and we know you guys want to find out who's won so you can make plans.
We will, we will draw for the winners at the end of the month. So we'll probably announce
on January 28th, which is Wednesday when we're typically come out, which means we will pick the
winner several days before. And just so you know, we will probably reach out to the winner and
ask you to be a guest. So yeah, so get, get ready. Don't be shy. But I can, I, based on,
you know, the submissions, we don't, we don't have, we don't have a very shy audience.
We'll talk more about the entries in a little bit, but I just wanted to let you guys know
upfront. So we're going to take a quick break and we will be right back to kind of talk about
the last year and we'll go from there.
All right. And we're back guys. It was a, as we mentioned in the last segment, pretty active,
busy. What's the word? Well, that's happened last year. I mean, we can start with the most
impactful thing in our lives, which was obviously Bonnarooo canceling on Friday because of weather.
And all of the ramifications and things that came with that. I don't think we need to rehash it too
much. Cause if you're listening to their show, you probably already, already know. I already went
through that emotional roller coaster. There's no reason to go back up and down. Yeah. Yeah. And
then as far as some Bonnarooo, like for the year, just highlights, I made some, a big list, not a
big list, but a list that is outside of Bonnarooo. But one of the things I put on here was the dogs
in a pile show on that Thursday. And it wasn't because it's kind of one of those, you know, in,
in retrospect, kind of the reverse engineer kind of things, it wasn't the greatest show I've ever
seen, but we had gotten to know them a little bit and, um, and had them on the show. And then
I've talked to them a couple more times since then they're very, they're very, they understand
the ecosystem and, and, and I really appreciate their management and their band. And, and since
there wasn't that many bands to choose from, they're the best show of Bonnarooo 2025. Yeah. And
they got a full show and they rocked it with a big crowd. And then, and, and they had a little
SpongeBob SquarePants thing that got everybody going crazy. And I didn't know what it was.
Did you, do you remember this taco? A little bit, but I don't. At the time I didn't know it was
later. I was like, what was everybody losing their bleep over? Oh, they played some SpongeBob
something. I was like, Oh, that makes sense. The, the, the, the super millennials were loving that.
So that's definitely on my list. I put them on my list because, uh, you know, they played here in
Chattanooga in April. Um, we got to go see them right after we interviewed them. And, uh, I just
thought it was neat. It was the first time Barry had been out of the house in three years. And so,
you know, just for all of us to get together and go out and go see a show together, uh, was pretty
awesome, I think. So I would like to do more of that this year, maybe pick some local shows and
let's all meet up and go do it. Well, similar vein. Uh, one of my highlights, two of my highlights
was the interview we did with Hey Nothing. Um, which was the only one we got to do at Bonnarooo.
We had several lined up, but they were incredible. And then, uh, Russ, you weren't there yet, but I
was back in media at Shaky Knees and they literally walked into the, uh, the media area,
two feet from me. And I was like, Oh, hey, I know you guys. And we got, we hugged and howdyed and
I did something I never do. I took a selfie with them. Uh, we talked a little while. Hey, look at that. I don't even know you now there.
I know, right? I told them, I said, I'm sorry, I never do this, but you know, you're right here. I'm here.
And they were super nice and then they're all super gracious, super nice. Yeah. Yeah.
Forget being nice and gracious and all that stuff. They're just really, really articulate and really
interesting kids. I'll call them kids to talk to their kids. They're young show, huge show, Atlanta,
dug it. You know, that's their hometown. Well, we talked about it with them at Bonnarooo. I can't
remember it well, but I remember thinking that was one of my notes. Uh, does everybody know how
impressive this list is of every, all the major festivals that you're going to this year? It was,
it was, uh, it's really was gotta be a huge year for them. So yeah, that was, yeah, I think, I think
we pointed out, I said, it's like, you know, that, that kid who's drafted and goes to the super bowl
his first year, it's not every year. You might be on last place teams the rest of your career. Yeah.
Man, what a summer they had. Yeah, no, no doubt. No doubt. So that was great. Uh, Shaky Knees also,
I got to see Devo, one of my bucket list bands. Uh, and it was great. I put, uh, Johnny Maher up
there on that, uh, festival too was a highlight. Absolutely. Um, I was, I was thinking it was earlier,
Russ, but I wore this shirt on purpose, but it was October of 24. So it doesn't really qualify
as a year ago. Oh yeah. Y'all stripped of the rhyming, right? Yeah. Got to see Beat. Thought
about that too, but that was technically, yeah, we saw Beat, which is a former members of King
Crimson along with Danny Carey on drums from Tool and Steve Vibe. That was 2024, huh? That was
October 2024. I know. And it was one of those, Russ, I keep thinking about, and, and there are
Bonnarooo shows that qualifies this. It's one of those, I knew what I was seeing when I saw it,
but the farther away from it, I get the more I appreciate the fact that I got to see those four
guys and that show at the rhyming and with you and my brother and my nephew. What a great night.
It was awesome. Super fun. Yeah. Let's do it again sometime. Those guys, Brian, if you get a chance,
I mean, it was one of those where you're watching it and you think, man, that guy's incredible.
And then the next guy starts playing, you know, a play does a solo or whatever. You're like,
that guy's incredible. I mean, all four of them are top of the game musicians. Yeah. I'm familiar
with the individual players, but the outfit, the beat and all that. I remember the time thinking,
the hell is Barry and Taco talking about? What is this? But yeah, Danny Carey and, and Blue,
right? You said that Adrian Blue. Yeah. I know he's originally from Kentucky, but he grew up
in Mount Juliet, which is right down the road from Nashville where we were. So,
and they played the rhyming before and they'd never played the rhyming. Yeah.
Well, I mean, you know, we got the precision plays, right? They got David Bowie connections
and Brian Eno connections and Frip. And so, yeah, for me it was, and Rush, you're a bigger fan even
than I am of King Crimson. I like him a lot, but you're a bigger fan. So that was pretty incredible.
Yeah. I've seen King Crimson proper, I think twice. One of those times was in Knoxville with
our buddy Travis Knight, who was in a band with your nephew and local artists here. So,
and then I also ran into his sister at low main over the holiday as well. So
lots of connections there. The other show I saw along those lines real quick,
complete opposite scale was XTC, E-X-T-C with the band's drummer, Chambers, with my brother,
Mike, again. And my brother, Mike, is older than I am and a musician, a long time musician.
And he casually dropped that XTC is his favorite band since the Beatles, which is wow.
Really strong. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Is he caught up in the moment?
That's a fair question. I don't know. I was like, wow. But it was a great show. That was a lot of
fun. Youngblood is the best thing I've heard since Oasis, guys. Youngblood is the best thing.
Wow. So you go from the rhyming, the mother church to barking legs with seats about 85 people,
and you could literally reach out and touch whoever's on stage. It's so intimate.
So yeah, if you're on the front row, you're basically on stage.
So those were two of my two of my better shows. And of course, the bluegrass thing that we all
three went to. Oh, yeah. The IBMA. Oh, geez. I didn't even think about that.
I thought of that this morning. Oh, yeah. Well, we were hanging out with Steve Martin.
Yeah, we had a pretty good year, guys. And I died.
Taco, you got any others you want to run through before I hit mine?
Yeah, I got just a couple more on my list. Number one was hitting 2000 subscribers on YouTube. We
did that back in August, and we're already up to like 2350 by now. So I mean, it's climbing fast,
but that was a pretty big milestone for me. And then my number one moment, I'll just go ahead and
say it, was interviewing Chris, the dancing man at Cave Jam back in May. Well, the 500 million views
had to help that at least a little bit, right? Yeah, it went a crazy huge on like TikTok and
Instagram clip of it. But yeah, go watch the whole thing. If you guys remember, you all came up for
that morning and we recorded an episode. And then I went to Mexico that night. Yeah, I went to Mexico
twice this year. I was going all the way to Mexico the first time. Yeah. And then I ran into Chris,
the dancing man, talked to him, convinced him to come over and just record a short bit with me. And
he had one of the best walk offs ever. So go back and watch that. Literally was a walk off.
Yeah, that was highlight for me. Nice. Well, I did have the dogs in a pile in the Bonnarooo thing and
didn't really focus on the festival that much. I'm glad that you guys did because we pretty much
covered that. But just I'll run through them very quickly. It's only three or four of them.
The Pearl Jam shows at the end of that Dark Matter tour to start the year.
It's a long segment as to how much that meant to me and why. But I just don't know how many more
times in that capacity I'm going to see that band in that way. And I was able to get on the floor
and I forgot to look his name up. I'm so sorry. It's just swirling in my head. I don't want to
give too much away because I'm not sure how much he was allowed to do. But I was helped onto the
floor for the second half and the finale of that show. I've seen Pearl Jam from every angle you
can see. From my favorite festivals, Los Angeles to New York to Chicago to Atlanta. And I've never
been that close. I was like 10 feet away from Eddie Vedder. And so it was kind of like, well,
this is a good walk off shot if it is. I don't know that it will be. So that's kind of a
retrospective look. Was it a great show? No, it's another Pearl Jam show. Whatever. Nothing
special. But that really made that. That's what made that really, really special to be able to,
for the first time, be that close. Cave Fest overall was just such a wonderful time.
Barry, you missed this one. But it was, forget the music, right? Like I'm not even talking about
that as much. It was just great weather, great friends, great setup. But the Sam Bush show that
night really rocked. It rocked as much as a, and he's not really bluegrass, he's more new grass.
Jam grass. Yeah. Jam grass. One of the best at what he does in the world. Yeah. I couldn't believe it.
I just was like, I've heard of Sam Bush. I'll go stand here and listen. And next thing you know,
I'm like, this guy is really rocking it. So that definitely falls on the list. And then
Fred Armisen from Saturday Night Live does a musical comedy act that me and Beth went to
at the Memorial here, or the Walker Theater here locally. That just is a very personal,
special, good moment. But the struts, finding out the struts, learning the struts at the Corona
Capitol Festival that I was so blessed, I'll use that word, to be able to go do. I'm wandering
around, don't know what, still don't know where I'm at or what I'm doing. Hardly can't speak
language with anybody. Kind of, I mean, loving it, but a little discombobulated. Next thing I know,
I hear a rock band. Who is that? I'll walk over here. Oh, that looks pretty good. That guy kind
of like Freddie Mercury a little bit. Looks a lot like the Oasis bass player. Who is this guy? What
is this stuff? This is, oh, I recognize this song. This is neat. An hour later, I'm hanging out with
a guy. And now I'm the biggest fan of the struts either. They're British, English, glam rock. Oasis
is the Beatles, what the struts are to Queen. And that was just one of the highlights of the year.
If I didn't happen to turn that corner, this is Festival stuff 101 that we talk about all the time,
the things that you could never plan and that you could never know was going to happen. I walk in,
I've never heard of this band a day and a half later. They're one of my new favorites. And,
you know, I know the guy's like my buddy, so not really. But so that was a huge, huge highlight.
And I really love them now. So a lot of really great things out of 2025, but that's just a couple
of them. You didn't even mention the Spear. The Spear, did you? That was 24, speaking of time flying.
Okay, wow. That was the towards the end of 24. So yeah, it's as a somebody told me,
Letitia Wolf, a local musician now and out of Nashville, when we were talking the passage of
time once, I was just like, man, everything just goes so fast. Like, it's really long. Life is long.
A year is long. Everything's long. It just goes by really, really fast. It doesn't mean that it
wasn't long. It just went by really fast. So yeah, that was 2024. Wow. Wow. Still great year.
Fabulous year. I mean, and the show was fun. And just, you know, you guys are great and just
really, really good stuff. Yeah, I'm glad you mentioned Russ, the us being able to do that
thing at Bonnarooo on Thursday. I somehow had forgotten that to put it on my list. But that was
absolute. The idea that we would ever be asked to do something at Bonnarooo, anything is incredible.
But to be on stage and to be on stage with Brad and to have the crowd that we had. Yeah, I don't
want to do that. That's what stood out. I didn't think about it either for some reason. And I just
brain doesn't work sometimes. Yeah, I don't want that to be short change or discounted or, you know,
anything that was that was incredible. And then if you do the retrospective of, and then the rest
of the festival got canceled right afterwards, basically. Yeah. So like, how crushed would we
have been because we spent all we were really, I mean, I was over the moon excited for that.
How crushed would we have been if we didn't get to do that? You know, so like Bonnarooo actually,
my Bonnarooo 25 was pretty freaking awesome. I know. Pretty awesome. So weird.
I got a girlfriend out of the deal for crying out loud. Got on stage, you got a girlfriend.
I mean, what else is there? What else do you need? What else could you say? Well,
MJ Linderbund show would have been good. But not just after that, after that, but the next day at
the beer exchange to have so many people come up and just say thank you for the show and how much
you help us. You help us prepare. You help keep us engaged all year long. I mean, that stuff means a
ton. And also, looking at that one in the rear view mirror, that was the last thing that anybody
did. Correct. That was the absolute last thing that anybody in that corner of the festival did
because within two hours we were all. Yeah. Poor Savannah Russ the girl. She showed up just in time
for that, right? Yeah. She showed up right Friday morning at the beer exchange. Got on the golf cart
with us and drove back to camp and then sat in the rain for the rest of the day. Yeah.
Wow. There's worse things you can do in your life than. She still had a good time. Than drink and
smoke a little and hang under a canopy with your friends at Bonnarooo. But it certainly led to
heartbreak and despair and all those things. My other favorite moment speaking of was sitting
in Russ's bus basically talking trivia type stuff. Like, what was your favorite this? What was your
favorite that? And Brian's like, this sounds like one of those topics you do when you're sitting
around with nothing better to do. You mean like now? Right now? Well, I like doing capitals. We
were doing we were doing state capitals. That's what you gave me shit because I kept telling you
what it wasn't. Well, the capital of Illinois is not Chicago. Hold on. Let's see. The capital of
the of Tennessee is not Knoxville. Hold on. You gave me shit. This would be fun if, you know,
we were somewhere not having anything else to do. I wasn't in the best of moods that day. I think
that was clear. I could tell. No shit. It was funny. No shit. Exactly. All right. Want to do some contest stuff?
Yeah, let's take a break and come back and we'll play some contest entries.
All right. As we mentioned, we have gotten, been overwhelmed with the number of contest
entries. We have two tickets, two general admission camping and camping pass, one camping pass,
two general admission passes to Bonnarooo 2026 to give away. We've been, like I said, overwhelmed
with the number of entries and as Russ and I, I think we pointed out a couple weeks ago when we
first looked at them, we've been very pleased, very surprised at not only the number but the
how personal they are, but also at the number of people who say they want to win, not for themselves
necessarily, but for either a family member or a friend or a spouse who's never been or somebody who
just, they think just needs a break. Yeah. Yeah. That's what struck me too was just the amount of
stories that we got from people not wanting them for themselves. Yeah. Somebody special in their
lives that that's either going through a lot or just could use a break and a trip away. So
pretty amazing. Yeah. We're going to play some. We've, you guys can enter at what I always forget,
is it comments at the what.co or? No. There's several ways to enter. You can call us 423-667-7877
and then leave a voicemail, a short voicemail, please. We've going to play some here. You can
email us comments at the whatpodcast.com send us some pictures over a video and then the what.co
has a link. You can upload your own video, which we got some of those too. So lots of ways to enter,
enter as much as you want. One person called in 17 times. So, you know, we'll get to that.
Doesn't necessarily mean it increases your chances of winning, but it doesn't hurt them either. So,
so just so you know, this isn't like stuff the ballot box because now your odds go up. It's not
quite that way, but hey, feel free to do you do you as an entry to the, an entrant into the,
to the contest. There are no like no real rules really, not, not specifically. No. Making the
rules up. We are and how, who will pick? I'm not sure yet. I'm trying to think of something. I
know we've done it in the past. Last year winter, we were, we were pleased with the variety of
entries. The, not just the what was said, but how I think some, she did video, audio and
I don't know. She did a PowerPoint, a PowerPoint. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. No, Bosco was the facts.
Yeah. Bosco was the fact. We are going to announce the winner on the 28th. So we will not ask you
guys to wait too much longer. So there's, but there's still time. So put in, yeah, it's all
we might, uh, about two weeks. We might even get some, some, uh, swag, maybe some other prizes
to give away. So even if you aren't picked for the tickets, maybe we got something else to give away
too. Well, I did that last year. That was a lot of fun. So, uh, all right, Ross, you've got a couple
lined up. I know I've asked you to line up a couple of them. Um, let's do the one I've mentioned to
you last, if that's all right. The, uh, the hat. Okay. It's Pondo, you know, Pondo, I want to get
back to the farm. And so I figured I'd have to do something amazing and extreme and something
almost magical to get back to the farm. And this is what I'm willing to do. The first thing I am
willing to help Bryan Stone not wear a hat for a whole month. I know that this will be difficult
and hard, but I will have them go hatless for a whole month just so I can get it taken to a farm.
No, no, no, hold on. You're thinking, wait a minute. That's just one thing. Okay. I will organize
all of Barry's worldly possessions and you know how long that's going to take.
And not only that, I will do it in his order of whatever he chooses. Think about how much stuff
he has and I'm going to organize this. So let's do, so what can I possibly do to top that?
I am going to wean Lord Taco off of PBR. I thought that's what he was going to say.
If I can get all these things done, surely that has to be worth two tickets in a camping pass
to the greatest, most significant music festival in the United States, the Bonnarooo Music Festival
at Manchester, Tennessee. I hope to see you there in 2026 with Barry organized, Barry hatless,
and Lord Taco not drinking PBR. Yeah. All right. Gotta tighten up that script there, Bondo.
I thought he was going to say he's going to get me a bunch of new hats. I was like, dude,
you might be in. Go a month without wearing. He's chosen hard. Why would I wean myself off PBR?
Why would we do any of these things? That's funny. The only good thing, Barry might get his
basement organized. No, that might be a good, that might work. I don't know, but do you want,
Bondo, do you want rumoring around your stuff? All right. Order of possibility. What are the
chances of any of those three? What's the order of possibilities? A month without a hat. Like,
there's a lot of people who think I'm bald because I wear a hat all the time. I'm not bald,
me neither. Yeah, but I'm not going to go a month without wearing a hat. I'm not going to go an hour
usually, but we'll see. I appreciate that, Bondo. That's funny. Good stuff. That's good.
And the good news is, right, Russ, he is coming back, right? Have we heard? He is. Yeah, he's
had to miss a year because of his health issues, but he's working on overcoming that and he plans
to be back on the farm. And with his Viking horns and his big clock around his neck. He's got his
Viking horns and his clock. Yeah, that's awesome. We'll probably have to get him back on the show
at some point, I'm sure. Yeah, absolutely. All right, what else you got? Okay, here's another one
from somebody you may know. This is Caleb. Well, howdy, hey, it's me, Caleb, the Bondo Reel yearbook
guy. And I wanted to say, I love what you guys do. And I want tickets to go to a good home. And I
called before, potentially trying to get the tickets myself, but it has just come to light just today
that I will be attending the farm and doing content through them. So I got two GA tickets.
Well, you're out. To go to Bonnarooo. And so I figured, hey, if I win the contest, well,
then I'd have four tickets, and I don't need four tickets. And so I've decided the best thing to do
would be to probably pull myself from this contest and let it go to someone who really needs them.
Well, we've already kicked out. I don't need four. I really just want to bring myself and
my girlfriend in it. So yeah, that's all I wanted to update you. But I'm super excited. And I'm still
working on finishing the 2025 Bondo Reel yearbook, but it's almost done. It's in process. And
I'm so excited for y'all to see it. Anyways, happy Reel. Love you. Awesome. Hey, how cool is that?
Congratulations, Caleb. You're our winner. You win. No, how cool is that though? His socials do
very, very well. And Caleb, if you're there listening and watching, which I'm guessing you
probably are, I was actually going to reach out and see if you want to come on the show as a guest
between now and June. So how cool is that to be able to shoot content for the festival? So good job.
Quick recap, the Bondo Reel yearbook, I love his story. And you can go back and listen to the
episode. But he was what? A self-admitted, very, very shy person, not very social, very difficult
to talk to people and decided he was going to go to festivals and ask people to sign essentially
a journal. And then turn into the yearbook idea. I think somebody said, do you mean like a yearbook,
you know, like we all used to do when you'd get your yearbook in school, get everybody to sign it.
And so he's created a project out of it. And it's really cool. It's big time. I bought
one from two years ago and it's got superlatives and all kinds of people's notes to themselves,
notes to other people. It's really a cool project. The antidote that he figured the festival would be
to his coming out of his shell worked very well. He's not a shy guy anymore and he is all over the
place as evidenced now by shooting video and content for the festival itself. So again,
congratulations on that, dude. That's really cool. Absolutely. Congratulations. Yeah. He's
gotten huge on TikTok, Instagram, and yeah, to be picked from for Bonnarooo to go to the festival and
shoot content for them. Pretty amazing. So yeah, love it. Cool stuff. Yeah. All right. What you got?
Okay. I think this is our first video submission. So I'll play this. Exciting. How's it going? What
podcast? I'd just like to submit my entry for these tickets. I'd say, cause last year,
I've been a few years myself, but last year was taking my girlfriend who's been wanting to go for,
God knows, over six, seven years probably. I hadn't been able to cause just life coming at her and
stuff. And like I said, we were finally able to go last year. She's finally able to make her first
music festival ever. And yeah, canceled on her first day there. So she's super upset, disappointed
and pretty much gave up on it, which I said, don't give up on it. I mean, it's freaking Bonnarooo. You
know what I'm talking about? Like I know last year sucked, but there's still a lot of magic in there.
I just, I really wanted to see it. And this year just so happens, her favorite artist is
headlined Sunday, Noah Kahan. So I think that'd make it even more magical for her. But the issue
now is she's changed jobs. I've changed job. We got Christmas coat. We don't have the freaking
money. It seems like this year we might be able to make it cut it, cut it, but I don't know.
If we could win the tickets, that would be freaking awesome. You would make her year.
Thank you. Probably 40% of the ones similar to that. I was going to say this is a common theme
you're going to hear in a lot of these entries today. Yeah. Yeah. It's not, I mean, we talk about
this often and I mean it, we all mean it. Bonnarooo is a great value and it's one of the best ticket
prices of a festival that you're going to get. It's still very expensive and there's still a
lot of moving parts. And so it's, so yeah, we hear you, we feel you and thank you for your
submission very much. Yeah. Thank you. Oh, here's another one. This is Evan, not Evan Bonnarooo,
different Evan. Hey, my name is Evan Ferris. I'm calling in because I really enjoy Bonnarooo. This
would be, we keep calling it, this would be our third and a quarter for me and my fiance.
We just got engaged. So keep calling it the quarteroo. I'm a big fan of the podcast. I'm a
Chad News local. So every time you guys talk about anything Chad News, I always know you guys talk
about, I always love hearing about Lo Main. Love you guys. We're up in that place. Yeah, we're just
calling, looking to see, we're buying our first house. Houses are so expensive. So we're a little
on edge if we're going to get tickets or not. Just because of finances and everything, you know,
all these closing costs and everything didn't expect to be this much. So yeah, that's why we're
just calling. Just know we appreciate you guys always watch the podcast, especially right before
Bonnarooo for a couple months always gets us pumped. And that's all. I'll see you guys around Chad
Yeah, definitely man. Thoughts and prayers on a young couple buying a home. Oh my god. Yeah,
I know firsthand how expensive that is. And he's right. The closing costs are insane. They hit you
with stuff you would never dream that you'd have to pay for. So it's, you know, it's interesting.
It's a little bit. And Brian, you'll get it and Rush, you'll get it. But in a different way. Brian,
as we've said many times, has been to everyone since 2002 when it started. I've been every year,
more or less. But it's interesting how life continues. You know, I mean, we've talked about
before, you've got people now who are going who were not even born when it started. And you've
got people who it's become a rite of passage. You know, they, their older brothers, sisters were
going when they were in middle school and now they get to go. And then you've got people who got,
who met there, got married there. And now they're having babies and can't go, or they're trying to
buy a house and can't go. So let me give you the quickest story of not being able to feel like
you're not going to be able to afford Bonnarooo in like oh nine, eight or nine, not eight. Because
I was Pearl Jam year nine. I think it was nine. I was broke as I could be. I had just purchased
my house about a year and a half before that same kind of thing. Some of you guys are talking about
I was in my late 20s. And I was I don't have any money. Like I can't and I wasn't I wasn't
working in media in oh nine. It was after the market crash and I was out of a job. So I did not have
that that route to go. And, you know, I hope you have a mother or somebody in your life that's
like mine. My mom said I will buy you a ticket. It was 250 bucks at the time. And that's where it
topped out after fees. So that's, you know, pretty darn cheap these days. But I didn't have 250 bucks.
I was just like, I don't think I can go to Bonnarooo. It might as well be a million at that point.
I know. I was. You don't have it. Yeah 250 miles will be a quarter quarter mill. And
my mom said there's 250 bucks. Go to Bonnarooo. It's like, oh my god. So like, yeah, I sometimes you
got a hope and a prayer and and and and and a lot of times in this ecosystem, this environment,
it can work out for you. So thanks for your submissions. And I feel you. We don't I haven't
had luxury every minute of my life at Bonnarooo. At times I've been a very, very poor person who
could barely make it. Yeah. Yeah. Shout out. Well, he's a Chattanooga local, too. He mentioned
Lo Main. Hopefully we run into him there. Oh, yeah. Always. Every time I go to Lo Main, I run into
somebody I know. So Evan, the Chattanooga guy. Right. So we got Evan Bonnarooo and Evan Chattanooga.
Yeah, that's it. We're a lot of evidence, a lot of brads. Yeah, there are a lot of brads in Evans.
Too many brads. A lot of asshole brads, too. All right. Here's another video. All right.
Let me just get started by saying this is just coming straight from the brain, straight from the
dome. My name is Reese Carden and I'm trying to get in here and win some tickets. So let me tell
you my story. As you can see, today I've come for this interaction here. So let's first start off on
my Bonnarooo first experience. My first time at Bonnarooo. This was 2023. I was no, this was 2024.
I had no, no wish to go to Bonnarooo that year. And this random girl, right, she says,
hey, come to Bonnarooo. I have a free ticket for you. I said, okay.
Get there and lo and behold, she blocks me.
Some other dude, she got with him.
I was a deep, so funny thing to say, me and that guy later became friends because
this girl was crazy. Girl was insane even. And he also joined me later in the story.
He's one of my buddies that went to 2025 route. So we'll get to that.
Okay. I cut it off there. I was going to say, how long is the story going to go? It's long.
It's a 10 minute video and we can't play the whole thing, but it is a wild story. And I'll
tell you what I'll do. We'll go ahead and upload the whole thing to our YouTube channel. So you
can go watch it separately after you watch this, because you do want to hear the rest of the story.
I promise you it's, I absolutely do good work by the way, dude, like a little cheesy there.
I think the cuts are supposed to be that way. I like that, but damn chance anything I'm doing
is going to have 10 minutes that we, we don't have time for that. No, but that's a lot of plot
twists right there. And it, no, I'm going to watch, just get started and then you become friends
with the guy she dumped before. I'm not saying I'm disappointed in this story. I want to see it.
I will go to our YouTube channel as I suggest everybody else. Thank you, Taco for that,
for doing that. That'll be great. Yeah. Thank you, Reese, for sending that. Oh, the story is crazy.
His mom is involved and he does play a Drake song. At some point I had to mute that because
YouTube didn't like that, but yeah, I recommend you go check out the whole thing. God, I wonder
how long that took. Yeah. Yeah. Well, a lot of editing. I mean, he put in a lot of memes,
a lot of clips. So, you know, that's a lot of work. And that Spongebob thing almost blew my
ears out, but other than that, it was pretty good, pretty big, pretty good thing. Thank you. Thank
you. What else we got? All right. Let's, okay. So this is Kira, I believe her name is. She has
called in 17 times. Sometimes a couple times a day. Yeah. Just want to say hi. Yeah, pretty much.
We promise we won't take the phone off the hook. Yeah. Yeah. Keep calling. But she does kind of
explain her story and situation a little bit in this one. So we'll play this one from Kira.
Hey, the what podcast is Kira again. I know I just called you all earlier, but I was off work
making my lunch here and I was thinking, you know, if my fiance and I were to win, you know, the
pair of these tickets, not only would you all be essentially paying, you know, for our 2026 brew,
but you'd be paying for our wedding because if we win, we're going to get married there. I'm
putting that I'm speaking it into an existence. I'm putting that out there into the world.
Does he know this? I know a lot of pressure on us now, right?
I'd be giving us a brew and you'd be giving us the wedding. So that'd be pretty dope. That'd be
pretty cool. You know, supposed to a brew redemption was supposed to get engaged there last year, but
that didn't happen. So now, you know, we're going to get married this year. That'd be dope. Come on.
Y'all could be part of the wedding anyway. I'm down.
See ya. I don't think she knows our names because every voicemail she says, hey,
the what podcast podcast. I like the attitude. It's so good. Yeah. Where are people getting
married at a Bonnaroo these days? House of Matrimony is gone. They do that out. No, it's not gone. It's
been repurposed. Is it out in the campground? GA or something? No, it's there. But I don't know
that they do weddings there anymore. I thought that was the deal. I don't know. I haven't followed
up on it. Yeah, I don't know. You can get married anywhere you want like this. You have to have an
ordained minister. No, you don't. You can get married by your best, you know, you know, you're
just a dopey friend you met five minutes ago. So if you guys get married, invite me to your
wedding. I want to go. Absolutely. Yeah. And you call me what? He's clued in on the plan too. Yeah,
I don't know if he's if he might get surprised with this. Yeah. Yeah. And let's see. Okay. Speaking
of weddings, because that is also a common theme. You've got a lot of stories like Kira's. This one
is from Hayden. Hi, my name is Hayden Holcomb. My wife's name is Madison Holcomb. And I'm just
going to fill you in on our Bonnaroo story. 2020 rolls around. It's our first year going. We buy
our tickets as friends and we're with a huge group. Obviously COVID canceled that. It was heartbreaking.
2021 rolls around. We use our refund for 2020 to get our tickets. Still friends, but obviously the
hurricane ruins that. 2022 comes around and this is our first year officially going to Bonnaroo.
I decided to ask my now wife to be my girlfriend a couple months before Bonnaroo.
And it was that Thursday night under the Tennessee sky watching her dance her booty off that I realized
I fell in love with her. Roll fast forward to 2023. I have bought a ring and I proposed to her
opening night at Bonnaroo underneath the arch. We also that year applied to potentially get married
at Rue and we were picked. Some things didn't work out because we brought a huge group with us,
the first time Rubians. So we decided we didn't want to do that. We wanted to get married in secret.
We couldn't separate from them. 2024, we were picked to get married again. It also couldn't
work out because our group was way too big. Fast forward to 2025. We got married in March.
Beautiful wedding. We were going to use Bonnaroo as our honeymoon. We got there on Tuesday,
set up our camp. The vibes were immaculate. Then comes the torrential rain and it got canceled.
Our hearts were broken. We still made the best of what we had. We danced our boots off at the
Rue bus pre-party. We even party at the broccoli bar where everyone was. Then we spent all day
Friday watching some of the best mud wrestling we've ever seen. Unfortunately for 2026,
we are not able to fit the tickets into our budget this year because my wife has decided
she's going back to school to get her master's degree and all of our extra money is going for
that. It would be such a blessing to be able to go to the farm again this year to see my beautiful
wife where I fell so deeply in love with her underneath the Tennessee sky. Longtime listener,
first time commenter. You guys are awesome. Can't wait for the next episode. Happy Rue.
Well, you get an A for not effort. You get an A for performance. That was good. Good call.
Future will depend on that master's degree. Make sure she gets that, I would say.
Go with that.
Go with that. I wish we could get every damn one of your tickets.
I wish we had 100 tickets.
I think that goes without saying. Very good call. Thank you.
Kind of goes back to what I was saying a few minutes ago, how life,
the whole continuation of life, it's not just a one-time thing.
I thought he was about to say, I'm just kicking this down to the next Bon Rue to the next Bon Rue
forever get married. I was going to say, dude, you're never getting married if she has to wait
this long. She's leaving your ass. Kind of like, we'll do it when we can afford it.
Well, that's going to be an MJ Linderman song any minute now. She's leaving you.
Good point.
I don't know if you have it pulled, but I have it in my notes, Russ. One of the,
one of the, Callie, I just loved her opening line was I need to,
I should win because my dance moves are a public service.
It's pretty funny. I need to remember that one.
All right. What else we got today?
We got this one from Gabrielle.
Hi, my name is Gabrielle Jefferson. I go by Gabby. I am a second year student at Virginia
Commonwealth University. So I live in Richmond, Virginia, about nine to 10 hours away from the
farm. I packed all my stuff up and left for the farm this year in 2025 for my first ever time at
Bonnarooo. I had a very small group. We got there Tuesday, right when we could set up our stuff,
had an amazing time up until Friday morning when all the flooding happened.
Our campsite was about knee deep in water. We could barely move our car out. It was a really
bad time. You know, it was so hard to see the light during it all, but thankfully all the other
Rubians helped me see the light of the festival. Even, oh, I'm going to cry even within all that.
And so it's just a dream for me to go back and be able to experience the farm again and be able to
feel that love and compassion that everybody shares. But money is definitely a struggle for
me right now. As like I said, I am a college student. Being on the farm was one of the most
happy and safest times that I ever felt in my life. And being able to go back is, like I said,
a dream. I've entered many giveaways hoping to be able to get these tickets.
Regardless, I'm going to figure out how to go. They're going to see me on that farm because
I need to be at Hi-Fi Friday, obviously. But it's definitely a struggle and it's definitely
very stressful trying to figure everything out to get myself back there. So yeah, I would really
appreciate having those tickets to be able to relive that dream and have a better redo my first
time, really get to fully experience it. I'm really excited that Rainbow Kid and Surprise is
going to be back there. Rainbow Kid and Surprise is one of my favorite bands. And I'm also super
excited for Skrillex as Two Hollis is my favorite artist right now. And I saw him at Bonnarooo. That
was my first time seeing him on that Thursday. And Skrillex is his mentor. So it would mean a
lot to me to be able to see Skrillex as well. So yeah, thank you so much for giving us this
opportunity. I don't know how much more of this I can take. I told you. This is the first drift
for you guys out there. I mean, I've slackened the audience. I hadn't heard any of these. These
are all brand new to me. And I'm just sitting here like, oh, maybe we, I don't know what to do.
Yeah. Not the first one with a little bit of crying, I will say.
Not even the most emotional one. Some of them are, wow, they're tough.
Well, she did have a friend also call in in support. So this is Lacy.
Hi, my name is Lacy Muller and I'm calling in support of my friend, Gaby Jefferson,
who called yesterday. I just want to get these tickets because I want to surprise her if she
doesn't get them. She went to Bonnarooo last year and it got rained out and she had to leave
after a day and a half. And it really did upset her. And she was one of my best friends in the
entire world. And I want to do anything I can do to get her to Bonnarooo again, because even
though she was there for such a short time, she loved it so much. And she wants me to come with
her this year. And I want to go this year. I've never been to a music festival before.
And it sounds like a really great time. So I am very interested in these tickets and camping paths.
Yeah, I took a listen. Well, I gave a listen to the podcast earlier. I actually really enjoy it
and it makes me want to go to music festivals even more. So thank you guys so much. And yeah.
Well, we do make it look cool. We make the festival look really cool.
Yeah. How nice is that though? Calling to enter for somebody else.
For your friend. Yeah, that's pretty cool. And there's a lot of that too. Yep.
I've got one more here. I don't think this one had a name. So we'll play this one.
Hey guys. So maybe it's a little like basic pulling on the heartstrings here, but
my best friend, ex girlfriend. I know that's a complicated one right there. Yeah, it is.
But she's a single mother, not mine. Don't worry. I'm not that kind of a, you know, douchebag.
But, you know, I've taken her to like her first concert and we've had fun doing that.
But I think Bonnarooo would be super cool. Like she would fucking love it, bro. And so
if you guys chose us or chose me, that would be what the tickets go for.
A single mother and a broke dude who would love to go to Bonnarooo. Even if you don't pick us.
Thank you guys for doing the giveaway. Super grateful for the chance. Appreciate it. Bye.
That guy and the dancing man would get along real well. I think so. Yeah. Good point.
They would have a time. They would have a time. That's pretty cool. Thank you.
Okay. I've got one more lined up. If y'all are ready. Yeah. Let's walk off shot it here. Yeah.
This is Michael. What's up? What guys? My name is Michael 25 from Virginia. Been going last four
years ever since after the hurricane year. I've been going, I think I should win first because
I experienced the hell of what last year was. And in my little front wheel drive stick shift car,
the line to get out in that muddy, muddy line, I had a Good Samaritan, a mushroom shirt,
take his pickup truck and attach his tow hook to his tow line to my tow hook.
And for about two hours, he helped me do that stop and go traffic to get out. And the Good
Samaritan stayed, helped. It was an amazing night, honestly from that. But the real reason
is because you guys are offering two tickets and I just want my sister to experience it with me.
I've been trying to get her to go, but money's always been the issue.
And I just, you know, want to share the love. So that's why. All right. Thank you for what you
guys do. And I hope I'll actually meet you all one year. Yeah, thanks. Front wheel drive,
straight shift, stick shift, stop and go. I've had many of those.
That doesn't sound like that was going to work out well at all.
So luckily you got, you know, the Samaritan, the Good Samaritan helped and got you out of there.
But wow. Yeah. Reminds me. Remember me and Joe helped a guy who got his truck stuck in the mud
back at our camp. I had a chain and Joe had the truck. So we managed to get them hooked up and
pulled out. So it's amazing how many stories are like that. And, you know, he went through that
trying to get out and still wants to go back. I don't know what he's driving, but you know,
a front wheel drive, straight shift has got to be an older car. That's probably really light.
And so it's going to be, it's not going anywhere. It's not going anywhere. Yeah. It's getting
traction. Even if it's not light, even as a heavy, it's still your, but yeah. Well, good luck or not
good luck. Good for you getting out of there and good luck with the, with the tickets. We appreciate
it. Yep. The, uh, getting to know your neighbors thing is something we talk about occasionally,
but we should probably talk about it even more, maybe not on this show, but in the future. That's
part of the coolest there. That is part of one of the coolest things about Bonneville
is the friendships or in Brian's case, you know, more than friendship. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That you
make. And I'll take credit for that. Cause they were my neighbors. Uh, when I got in before you
guys, Nashville dudes and, uh, kind of ended up merging our camps together. Yeah. They've been
around a couple of years. I didn't care about them at all at first. Hey, here's these people. Okay.
Yeah. True. I don't warm up. I don't warm up to the neighbors quite as quick as y'all do.
The three of us are, you know, do this thing every week because of Bonnarooo. We weren't friends
before. So, um, it's, you know, Russ went down to Hartsville, you know, spent time with, uh, people
who you, you know, we know, uh, pretty well, you know, now I wouldn't have made that trip, uh, if
not for Bonnarooo, I wouldn't have been camping with, uh, Lindsay over New Year's, uh, if I weren't for
Bonnarooo. And so, yeah, you never know where this thing will take you. That's, I think that's the
bigger point to me is it's, it's more than just a four day thing. It's a, it's a year round, uh,
impact on certainly on my life. And I think on, I can speak for you two both as well. So,
absolutely. Yep. All right. Um, we will play some more entries probably next week or read some, um,
yeah, might as well until we, uh, since we're going to give them away sooner than we have in the past.
Um, yeah, we'll keep them coming. We'll, we'll load them up in the next couple of weeks and then,
we'll have a winner by the end of the month. Yeah. Who better to tell the story of Bonnarooo than
Bonnarooians. So we'll keep doing it. Keep sending them in. Uh, Ross, give those, uh, how to's again,
please. Uh, the voicemail line is open. It's four two three six six seven seven eight seven seven.
Um, you can go to the what.co slash when, and this has all the directions on there. Uh, you can email
comments at the what podcast.com. There's a link. You can send a video to us, which you saw some of
these videos, maybe not 10 minutes. Uh, but, uh, you know, it was a good story. So we appreciate
all the submissions. So keep them coming. And like you said, we'll pick a winner by the end of the
month and hopefully have them on the show. Love to get those, uh, subscriptions numbers up even. So
go ahead and hit subscribe and like, and do all that other stuff. So make taco happy. All right.
Yeah. Oh, I did pull some numbers, uh, speaking of 2025, we got, uh, on YouTube, 809 new subscribers
just in 2025. That was the biggest year we've ever had on that platform. Um, we got 343 new followers
on Spotify and 183 new followers on Apple podcasts. So probably our biggest year ever growth wise. So
yeah, we'd love to keep it going. Nice. Great. We really appreciate it, guys. All right. We'll be
back next week. Thank you all for listening. Thank you for entering, uh, radiate positivity
and, uh, let's look forward to a great 2026. See you guys.
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