Field Dispatch
Matt Connarton Unleashed: Ian Hemi presents Silicon Kong
Speaker 1: That is such a cool vibe. I didn't even want
Speaker 1: to talk over it at the end. That is Silicon
Speaker 1: Kong broken Down, really really cool. This is Matt Connorton unleashed.
Speaker 1: Of course, we are live on this Saturday morning, August
Speaker 1: twenty four, twenty twenty four. Jenny is here as well
Speaker 1: at the news table, present and account of our and
Speaker 1: we've actually played a few Silicon Kong tracks so far
Speaker 1: this morning, but we have is this the man himself
Speaker 1: joining us via SKYPEP Hello, Hello, welcome.
Speaker 2: Oh can you hear me? Yes?
Speaker 1: Yes? Can you hear us? Yes?
Speaker 2: I can?
Speaker 1: Very good, very good. Yeah. We played out England, Yes, yes,
Speaker 1: So we played Broken Down, and we did play a
Speaker 1: little bit earlier before the break Cosmic Groovepool, and I
Speaker 1: also played even though the let's see what was it computer?
Speaker 1: I'm trying to get back to it now. I played
Speaker 1: a couple of older things as well, because.
Speaker 2: Was that do you Compute? Oh?
Speaker 1: Yes, do you compute? I was listening of that last
Speaker 1: night and I was like, I gotta play this one too, because.
Speaker 2: That associated with downy Iris.
Speaker 1: Cover is it?
Speaker 2: I didn't realize that from Pittsburgh. Yes, I had no idea.
Speaker 1: I had no idea. I really liked that song.
Speaker 2: Thank you, thank Donnie Iris too.
Speaker 1: I'll have to check I'll have to check out the
Speaker 1: Donnie Iris.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: When I think of Donnie Iris, the only Leah Ah Leah,
Speaker 1: which is a personal favorite of mine, and what's the
Speaker 1: other one? Love is like a rock? Is that? Yeah? Yeah?
Speaker 2: Being that I'm a ynger and I grew up on
Speaker 2: in Pittsburgh, you know, I'm just so used to it.
Speaker 2: I grew up listening to Donnie Iris. I loved him.
Speaker 2: I mean, he's awesome, He's he's king cool to us.
Speaker 2: He's like, uh, he's like an icon. So, I mean,
Speaker 2: so it was only fitting that I did a suitable
Speaker 2: cover that fit him and hopefully he liked it.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Do you know if he's ever heard it? Like,
Speaker 1: have you ever met him or talk to him?
Speaker 2: You know, I can't say I have. You know. I
Speaker 2: actually just released that not too long ago, maybe a
Speaker 2: couple of weeks ago. Yeah, you know, because uh, I
Speaker 2: I do uh like my My covers are very as
Speaker 2: you can tell, they're very unique. I'm sure if you
Speaker 2: would go to my Reverb Nation page or my uh
Speaker 2: Facebook page, I do covers, but they're different.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, no they are. I also listened to maybe
Speaker 1: I'll play later I listen to your cover of Destroyer.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, it's awesome.
Speaker 2: Thank you very much, thank you.
Speaker 1: It's really really cool. By the way, So what is
Speaker 1: a Genser?
Speaker 2: Genser that's a pittsburgher. Okay, it's it's just you know that,
Speaker 2: it's a it's it's a form of identification for Pittsburgh, Okay,
Speaker 2: because you know, because we uh you know uh and that,
Speaker 2: and you know Yun's and you know, we have our
Speaker 2: own little dialogue out here in Pittsburgh's.
Speaker 1: Well, apparently I had no idea. I don't know what
Speaker 1: any of these things are.
Speaker 2: Well, I work with you know what. I worked with
Speaker 2: a lady here and she's actually from New Hampshire, and
Speaker 2: her accent is you know, I can tell she's definitely
Speaker 2: from New Hampshire. I mean, you have your own little
Speaker 2: dialogue accent thing going on up there.
Speaker 1: Right right, Well, we have the It's It's strange though,
Speaker 1: because in New Hampshire we have variations of it. For example,
Speaker 1: there's that classic well not just New Hampshire, there's that
Speaker 1: classic New England thing of which I think with every
Speaker 1: generation becomes less and less prevalent prevalent where people drop
Speaker 1: their rs, you know, like insaid of park the car,
Speaker 1: they say pack the ca ah. But but there's also
Speaker 1: but but there's also variations where uh, you know, where
Speaker 1: you do pronounce your rs. But but there's something else
Speaker 1: weird going on where people can still tell that you're
Speaker 1: from here even though you do pronounce your ours. It's
Speaker 1: it's strange, there's different, there's there's levels to it, you
Speaker 1: know what.
Speaker 2: A couple of years ago, I was traveling down south.
Speaker 2: This is just a cool story, and I stopped in
Speaker 2: this little mini mart. It was Bowling Green, Kentucky. Outside
Speaker 2: Bowling Green, Kentucky, there's two in the morning, and there's
Speaker 2: this nice little girl working the counter, and I was
Speaker 2: looking around, say, hey, where do you put the cigarettes at?
Speaker 2: She said, you're from Pittsburgh, ain't you.
Speaker 1: Oh she could tell huh.
Speaker 2: Yeah, because the jinns oh.
Speaker 1: So not not just so that's that's not like a
Speaker 1: Pennsylvania thing. That's very specifically a Pittsburgh thing.
Speaker 2: It is definitely a Pittsburgh thing, a Steel city thing.
Speaker 1: Okay, okay, all right, very good, And so Silicon Kong
Speaker 1: is from the Steel city of Pittsburgh.
Speaker 2: Well, suburb of Greensburg, Pennsylvania. It's about about twenty minutes
Speaker 2: outside of Pittsburgh southeast.
Speaker 1: Okay, okay, and tell us about now there's a movie
Speaker 1: coming right, the Steel City Architect.
Speaker 2: Yes, there is. I'm glad you mentioned that. Yeah, it's
Speaker 2: a movie called it's called The Steell City Architect, a
Speaker 2: Pittsburgh rockumentary. What that is. That's a movie that will
Speaker 2: be released in January. It's with with Drew Moreland of
Speaker 2: Improv Chills Studios and uh Santo's or Tess Patrick of
Speaker 2: downcast Burg. Now what that is. It's kind of like
Speaker 2: years and years ago. I'll tell you what I guess.
Speaker 2: I have time, I can tell you this story. Yeah,
Speaker 2: a couple years ago, a couple of years ago, there
Speaker 2: was a producerritter, like I said, her name is Drew Morland,
Speaker 2: and she was a filmmaker. She's she's won quite a
Speaker 2: few awards, and she's also an author of a couple
Speaker 2: of books, which I'll post on my Facebook page if
Speaker 2: I wants to check it out. But anyway, what happened
Speaker 2: was she was looking for she was doing a zombie movie,
Speaker 2: and I was like, well, you know, somebody contacted me.
Speaker 2: One of her affiliates to contact me, and I was like, well, hey,
Speaker 2: you know, I wouldn't mind doing like a soundtrack. You know,
Speaker 2: I do some songs for a because I love horror movies.
Speaker 2: I grew up with horror movies. And I was like,
Speaker 2: wouldn't that be really cool? I said, well, I'll tell
Speaker 2: you what. How about you know I'm playing this show.
Speaker 2: It was a place called Casey's in Pittsburgh, and I said,
Speaker 2: come out, check out the show, and you know, if
Speaker 2: you like it, maybe we can arrange something. I can
Speaker 2: do some soundtrack work. So make a long story short.
Speaker 2: She came out with her constituent at the time and
Speaker 2: she was like, I came out and had I come out.
Speaker 2: I'm a one man show, much like grim Rock. I know,
Speaker 2: you know grim Rock.
Speaker 1: Yes, and he's in the chat room by the way,
Speaker 1: and yes, we.
Speaker 2: Love Grimmy, we love me and grim got a lot
Speaker 2: of things going on, so people please stay. But anyway,
Speaker 2: back to the story, and she came out and she
Speaker 2: was like, well, hey, you know, I was like, we'll
Speaker 2: come out, and I come out. I opened that particular
Speaker 2: set with the Ballad of Dwight Fry cover by Alice Cooper,
Speaker 2: Oh nice, yeah, and I come out in a straight
Speaker 2: jacket and the mask and she was she lost it.
Speaker 2: She was like, oh my god, get my camera and
Speaker 2: she said, do you mind if I filmed this. I
Speaker 2: was like, no, you go right ahead and cool. I
Speaker 2: like to have a little video thing anyway and make
Speaker 2: a long story short after the set, after I was
Speaker 2: done playing, I was like, so, is there a chance
Speaker 2: of me getting in the soundtrack. She's like soundtrack? She said,
Speaker 2: I want you in the movie.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: And I was like, wait a minute, wait a minute.
Speaker 2: I'm just a musician. I'm not an actor. She said,
Speaker 2: you know what you was doing up on stage, that
Speaker 2: was acting and you should look into it to make
Speaker 2: a long story short. We've had a long, good, uh
Speaker 2: a long relationship with each other since then, and we've
Speaker 2: done a couple of movies Hidden behind a Veil, which
Speaker 2: was like by Drew Moron in Santos Patrick's Past k
Speaker 2: as well. We also did Pizza Musical. These things will
Speaker 2: be get released within due time, so if people just
Speaker 2: want to stay tuned to my Facebook page, I will
Speaker 2: be releasing the links to the YouTube in any anyway.
Speaker 2: So I was like, we know what I had this
Speaker 2: cool idea I wanted to do like kind of a
Speaker 2: spinal tap movie, you know, I want to do a song.
Speaker 2: It was basically Silicon Kong is totally a character, and
Speaker 2: what he is is he is a guy that has
Speaker 2: been in Yinzer, a steel city guy who's been trying
Speaker 2: to pound a pavement in Pittsburgh and trying to get
Speaker 2: recognition for years to no avail. So people just kind
Speaker 2: of overlooked him.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah, what it was was like, and I like to
Speaker 2: kind of do tie that in. I always had this
Speaker 2: cool idea of tying out into it like a movie,
Speaker 2: and I explained it to him. I told her about it,
Speaker 2: and she came back to me a couple of weeks
Speaker 2: later she said, let's do it. I was like, dude,
Speaker 2: what she said, Let's do this movie? I was like,
Speaker 2: WHOA wait a minute. I wasn't expecting that. Yeah, but
Speaker 2: to make a and uh now we started filming in
Speaker 2: twenty two. Okay. What she wanted was she wanted a
Speaker 2: nice timeline of a struggling musician in Pittsburgh. Okay, And
Speaker 2: we just finished the last scene I think a couple
Speaker 2: of months ago, and that's due for release and like
Speaker 2: I said, in the new year, it'll be due for release.
Speaker 2: Like sa If anybody wants to keep up on my
Speaker 2: Facebook page, I also have a Reverb Nation page, some
Speaker 2: music page, Silicon Kong. I always put the links to
Speaker 2: everything on that. So yeah, like I said, so that's
Speaker 2: exciting for me. I mean, it's it's uh, you know,
Speaker 2: it's it's it's just kind of kind of strange anoid
Speaker 2: because like I said, I was for years. I've just
Speaker 2: been a musician and I've all of a sudden, i
Speaker 2: see myself on camera and I see myself on and
Speaker 2: it's like whoa, yeah, but it's cool, it's cool, so.
Speaker 1: So so Silicon Kong is the character you Ian hemy
Speaker 1: are the are the You're the trayer, the portrayer trade.
Speaker 1: But do you always are you always Silicon Kong on
Speaker 1: stage or are you okay?
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah on stage? You know what I've been, Uh,
Speaker 2: I've been around and pitt Like I said, this is
Speaker 2: my home, this is my home area. Like I'm definitely
Speaker 2: a Yen Durum from the Pittsburgh region. I've been in
Speaker 2: countless bands, Leaping the Bull, f six Aprils Full Still mana.
Speaker 2: You know, I've always been the singer and a bassis
Speaker 2: in a band of some kind of band. Yeah, but
Speaker 2: the Silicon Kong stuff. Actually, what happened there, uh, Pseudo
Speaker 2: Aniam was another one I was in. What happened there
Speaker 2: was I have I'm a multi instrumentalist, so everything that
Speaker 2: you're hearing, I play everything. Oh wow, Yeah, I play
Speaker 2: it all. I mean, I I play there's songs I'll
Speaker 2: play mandolin. There's songs I'll play harmonica. There's songs I'll
Speaker 2: play drum. You know. All the drums are me or
Speaker 2: were they're drum machines, but there's some kinds sometimes I
Speaker 2: use live drums as well.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah, all the intruments, I play them all. So yeah,
Speaker 2: that's and what happened was because I've always just had
Speaker 2: a love for music and I just enjoy it so much, right,
Speaker 2: So I taught myself every you know, And there's particular
Speaker 2: songs that I could couldn't really divulge with another band.
Speaker 2: You know. There's certain certain feelings with certain songs that
Speaker 2: I needed to get across in my own dialogue, in
Speaker 2: my own way. Yeah, and it just in a live band,
Speaker 2: it just wasn't working. So I credit, like I said,
Speaker 2: the new wave movement in the industrial metal music is
Speaker 2: a huge influence to me, so as well as the
Speaker 2: progressive rock. I mean, of course, let's go back to
Speaker 2: Pink Floyd, Yes, Crack the Sky, which actually West Virginia's guys,
Speaker 2: Cracked the Sky. Great band, if anyone has a chance
Speaker 2: to check them out. They were kind of overlooked, very
Speaker 2: very good progressive rock band. I actually covered one of
Speaker 2: their songs called from the Greenhouse. They could probably find
Speaker 2: out on my YouTube. So if yeah, family, almost go
Speaker 2: on my YouTube. I have a YouTube channel. Ian Hemy
Speaker 2: just pulled up and it'll pull everything up. I have
Speaker 2: I think eighty videos around. Okay, yeah, so and that
Speaker 2: is actually one of them. But anyway, and so I
Speaker 2: just started tinkering around. I built my own little home studio,
Speaker 2: and you know, much to my, much to my how
Speaker 2: can I put it? And well, my wife's used to it,
Speaker 2: so I've been married thirty two years. She's used to it.
Speaker 2: She supports it. But anyway, and I would just sit
Speaker 2: around and just you know, I get ideas. Sometimes I
Speaker 2: start with the drum line. Sometimes it's a bass line,
Speaker 2: a piano line, or guitar line of lyrics, and I
Speaker 2: would just sit down and tinker with them, and they've
Speaker 2: become songs, and they become the material that is now
Speaker 2: Silicon Kong.
Speaker 1: Well, it's it's got to be very sort of liberating
Speaker 1: to be able to do that. I mean, obviously I
Speaker 1: wonder what it would be like to do that. I've
Speaker 1: I've played in a lot of bands. I'm not currently
Speaker 1: active with that, but I've played in a lot of bands,
Speaker 1: but I've never done anything where it was just me creating.
Speaker 1: And I'm not although I'm not a multi instrumental, you know,
Speaker 1: I play bass. I can play a little bit of guitar.
Speaker 2: And bass is my actually bass is my primary primary instrument.
Speaker 2: That's why I start playing.
Speaker 1: Okay, okay, And so in the bands that you fronted,
Speaker 1: you were the the bass player and lead singer.
Speaker 2: Yes, yes, I was the bassis and lead singer.
Speaker 1: Did you get I'm curious about this. Did you get
Speaker 1: a lot of people who would be like WHOA, that's unusual?
Speaker 1: Even though it's not that unusual. I mean there are
Speaker 1: there are singing bass players like Geddy Lee and Tom Area.
Speaker 2: But yeah, yeah, book foreigner, But what would people come
Speaker 2: up to you and be like WHOA, I've never seen that. Yeah,
Speaker 2: you know what. The reason you do that is because
Speaker 2: I only play six string basses. Oh yeah, I'm a
Speaker 2: huge Primus fan as well.
Speaker 1: Okay that makes sense. Yep.
Speaker 2: So and you know Steve Harris, yeah, Getty Lee of course,
Speaker 2: uh Les Claypool. Let me see who else there's there's
Speaker 2: a Mark Antois the who I mean I've always uh
Speaker 2: what happened was from how I started out as I
Speaker 2: was fifteen years old and a friend of mine who
Speaker 2: was in a neighborhood kid excellent guitarist. This was back
Speaker 2: when Metallica was huge. Just was during the one Yeah
Speaker 2: Metallica and he was like, dude, we're gonna do man
Speaker 2: oh you And I was like, dude, I could play
Speaker 2: a guitar because at that time I could play a
Speaker 2: little bit of guitar. And he's like, oh no, we
Speaker 2: already have enough guitarist. I was like, man, if you're
Speaker 2: if you can play bass, you can be in So
Speaker 2: what happened there is my grandmother guard rust Soul. She
Speaker 2: went to a flea market. Okay, remember keep in mind
Speaker 2: I'm only fourteen fifteen at the time. She went to
Speaker 2: the flea market and found this old Gibson p bass
Speaker 2: and she brought her home. I told her, you know,
Speaker 2: she said, you know, I was actually talking to her
Speaker 2: about and I was like, well, you know, I wanted
Speaker 2: to be in this band, but they need a bassis.
Speaker 2: And she said, what's a bassis. It's a guitar four strings,
Speaker 2: you know. Of course I had to explain it to her,
Speaker 2: and that woman came home the next week with one
Speaker 2: from the flea market, and I learned to play it
Speaker 2: nice and and that's where it all started. And I
Speaker 2: played bass in that band for a while. And the
Speaker 2: thing about a bassis is we're as hard to find
Speaker 2: as drummers. Sometimes I think we're harder to fine than drummers.
Speaker 2: And so I just stuck to it. But what happened there, man,
Speaker 2: It is like I perfected it within a year, and
Speaker 2: then I got bored. So that's when I started turning
Speaker 2: to Steve Harris, okay, Eddie Lee, and I started to
Speaker 2: really really perfect the base and in ways that played.
Speaker 2: I wanted to play it the way no one else
Speaker 2: did and with you know, locally, no one else late,
Speaker 2: and so I did.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah, I can relate to what you're saying about
Speaker 1: bass players being in high demand. You know when I
Speaker 1: was when I used to be really active. I played,
Speaker 1: and at one point I was in three different bands
Speaker 1: that were all actively playing out and I was I
Speaker 1: was kind of sought after in the scene. But in
Speaker 1: my case it was never because you know, I would
Speaker 1: rate myself as a bass player as average, you know.
Speaker 1: But but I had a good reputation, you know, I know,
Speaker 1: no drugs or alcohol or anything. People knew they would
Speaker 1: depend on me to show up and that went a
Speaker 1: long way.
Speaker 2: I agree with you there, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1: But but with drummers, it's interesting because you mentioned drummers
Speaker 1: being hard to find. A lot of the guests that
Speaker 1: we have on the show, and Jenny can attest to
Speaker 1: this too, it's like, you know, the drummer, if we
Speaker 1: have a band on the drummer will be the one
Speaker 1: member of the band who's in like multiple bands, because
Speaker 1: drummers are so hard to find. And my theory about
Speaker 1: it is when you're first, when you're growing up and
Speaker 1: you start to get interested in playing an instrument, when
Speaker 1: you got to have the conversation with the parents about
Speaker 1: how I want to start playing something. If you say drums,
Speaker 1: that's like the one thing, and maybe the tuba, maybe
Speaker 1: those are the two things that they're going to try
Speaker 1: to talk you out of, Like, oh, it doesn't have
Speaker 1: to be that because nobody wants all that noise. So yeah,
Speaker 1: drummers are really hard to find. Like every drummer I
Speaker 1: know is in like ten bands. It's amazing.
Speaker 2: Yeah, the drum I have a studio. Drummer's names Kane Cross.
Speaker 2: People want to dig him up. He's on Facebook too.
Speaker 2: But in the last due actually Leaping the Bull was
Speaker 2: a due or we was in. It was kind of
Speaker 2: like Royal Blood, but we as a more creepier, kind
Speaker 2: of gothy version of Royal Blood. We had a run
Speaker 2: since we started. What happened there was we started finished
Speaker 2: our first CD in November of twenty nineteen. Okay, now
Speaker 2: you know where this is going. I was like, oh, yes, dude,
Speaker 2: let's get out there. We're going to get out there
Speaker 2: and nail it. You know how many months there boom, pandemic,
Speaker 2: no one's doing nothing, yep. So what we did is
Speaker 2: we continued. What we did is we continued to do
Speaker 2: some really cool videos like say, femone goes on my YouTube,
Speaker 2: they can find them. They're Leaping the Bull videos. They're
Speaker 2: like many horror movies. Oh yeah, they're really really actually
Speaker 2: cool kind of both. They're cool to watch. It's like
Speaker 2: a mini horror movie. But anyway, so we continue doing
Speaker 2: that up until well, just recently he sustained an injury
Speaker 2: on a bike, act a motorcycle accident, so he's unable
Speaker 2: to play, so, you know, unfortunately. But anyway, so yeah,
Speaker 2: I mean, and you know, we was like, oh yeah,
Speaker 2: you know, but the pandemic came in. The pandemic, I mean,
Speaker 2: I'm sure effect that everybody as first being an artist,
Speaker 2: and we were all just knocked down one you know,
Speaker 2: and it was sad. It was really sad actually in
Speaker 2: this area. It's sad because I want to say, fifty
Speaker 2: percent of the bands that I used to play with
Speaker 2: and eighteen and nineteen yeah, never came back. Yeah, half
Speaker 2: of the venues never reopened. Yeah, you know, because it
Speaker 2: was that was really hard on everybody.
Speaker 1: Oh absolutely, absolutely.
Speaker 2: Yeah. So during that time period also whenever I was
Speaker 2: doing Leaping the Bulls, that's whenever I really started to
Speaker 2: focus on doing a you know, releasing more Silicon klong things.
Speaker 2: You know that I had lots of downtime because you know,
Speaker 2: I actually in twenty twenty we actually leaped in the
Speaker 2: bull was a schedule to play all year. I mean
Speaker 2: we had to cancel every show. Wow.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's heartbreaking. It's heartbreaking, you know.
Speaker 2: You know, what can you do though, I mean pandemic.
Speaker 2: I'm you know, I work in health field myself, so
Speaker 2: I know that it was terrible, you know.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, and who knows, I mean you might not.
Speaker 1: You know, we have to find these silver linings where
Speaker 1: we can. And it did. It did kind of worse
Speaker 1: a lot of people to be creative in ways that
Speaker 1: maybe that and considered. And you know, some of the
Speaker 1: projects you know that we talk about on the show,
Speaker 1: different guests that we've had, you know, some of them
Speaker 1: found themselves kind of in scenarios very similar to yours,
Speaker 1: where they started just creating their own music on their own,
Speaker 1: where they didn't necessarily have to be in a room
Speaker 1: with anybody, and and really doing something like Silicon Kong
Speaker 1: where you know, like you said, you know, you're doing
Speaker 1: it all yourself and you know, which is which is
Speaker 1: pretty cool? Is by the way, so when you play live,
Speaker 1: because you talked about playing live, when you play live
Speaker 1: as Silicon Kong, are you with a band or is
Speaker 1: it all you or does it vary or.
Speaker 2: I'll tell you how I do that. I have a
Speaker 2: like I said, I have an a home studio. And
Speaker 2: what I do, like I said, I record, Like I
Speaker 2: said once again, I play everything. So what I'll do
Speaker 2: is I'll take my laptop when I have two or
Speaker 2: three of them. And what I have is I have
Speaker 2: those songs on a playlist. I use Sony products, recording products, yeah, studio,
Speaker 2: and what I'll do is take them, you know, I'll
Speaker 2: take the lyrics out or and and I'll just get
Speaker 2: up and sing to them. Or sometimes i'll play I'll
Speaker 2: take a guitar line out and play guitar, or take
Speaker 2: a bass line out and I'll play bass. I mean,
Speaker 2: it varies, I mean, but usually on stage. Yes, it's
Speaker 2: just me, okay, okay, some kind of outrageous outfit.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Like I'm also a very big Alice Cooper fan, so.
Speaker 1: Oh me too, me too. Absolutely. If you're just joining us,
Speaker 1: we're talking with Ian Hemy about Silicon Kong and uh
Speaker 1: Ian of course is a yinser? Am I saying that correctly?
Speaker 2: Yes, Matt, I just want to point out I know
Speaker 2: you're New England. Hey, just we can still be friends man.
Speaker 1: Okay, oh, why is there some sort of sports rivalry
Speaker 1: I don't know about.
Speaker 2: Now we're just referring to the NFL.
Speaker 1: Okay, see, I don't know. See I'm not I'm not. Bruins, Bruins, Bruins.
Speaker 1: Jenny knows her.
Speaker 2: I got it. I gotta, I gotta stay true. Steelers, Steelers,
Speaker 2: and speaking time.
Speaker 1: I have no clue. Jenny knows more about sports ball
Speaker 1: than me. I don't. I know nothing. I don't even know.
Speaker 1: I don't know how many Indians are in a football game.
Speaker 1: I don't know anything. I'm just again, I'm completely lost.
Speaker 2: But like I work with one lady. She's from New England,
Speaker 2: and we always discussed the football. You know, she's a
Speaker 2: huge Patriots and you know, me and her are always
Speaker 2: kind of going at it.
Speaker 1: So yeah, So, so I'm really curious to see this movie.
Speaker 1: I'm a huge by the way, this is Spinal Tap.
Speaker 1: Happens to be my favorite film of all time.
Speaker 2: Wow, and you'll love it. You'll love it, you love it.
Speaker 1: So I'm I'm very curious to see it. And this
Speaker 1: is this is supposed to come out in January of
Speaker 1: twenty five, is that correct?
Speaker 2: Right now? It's on YouTube and my producer, like I said,
Speaker 2: Drew Moreland is working on various streaming platforms. Yeah, she's
Speaker 2: working on those now. So by the time it happens,
Speaker 2: and by the time she's I mean right now, the
Speaker 2: movie is in post production, so by the time she's
Speaker 2: done with all of that. And I mean, the woman
Speaker 2: is awesome. I mean she does so much. Like I said,
Speaker 2: she's a producer or director, an actor or an author.
Speaker 2: Oh my god, like I said, I definitely. Like I said,
Speaker 2: I can't stress enough. But I'm going to put on
Speaker 2: my Facebook page after we're done here a link to
Speaker 2: her book. It's called The Horrific This is Cool, The
Speaker 2: Horrific Tales of Artificial Intelligence, and her full name is
Speaker 2: Drew Lenney Morland. And I will post that on my
Speaker 2: timeline on my Facebook, so if people want to go
Speaker 2: and check it out, it's an awesome read. Actually back
Speaker 2: to that real fast, and I'll get back to the movie.
Speaker 2: She actually started writing the book I want to say
Speaker 2: eight months ago, okay, and we was talking about it,
Speaker 2: you know, me and her were just kind of brainstorming
Speaker 2: about it because as Silicon Kong, as you can tell,
Speaker 2: has a AI thing going some kind of AI vibe going.
Speaker 2: And we was talking about it, and and she was like,
Speaker 2: you know, we was discussing how it just h mankind
Speaker 2: becomes a really dependent on u A in various in
Speaker 2: various reasons, in many ways. I was like, well, you
Speaker 2: know what, when you write the book, I will write
Speaker 2: a song. So when your book is done, we'll let
Speaker 2: people know, Hey, here's the book, and this is a
Speaker 2: song inspired by that book. Actually, I'll have to send
Speaker 2: that to you. It's actually a song called Cyber Jesus. Okay,
Speaker 2: And I will be releasing it here within the next
Speaker 2: week because her book, Like I said, you just finished
Speaker 2: her book and just put it up for Cell last week.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, yeah, so I will be releasing that. It's
Speaker 2: a brand new tune and it's pretty it's pretty cool.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, send it to us. You know something something
Speaker 1: that we love to do here on the show. We
Speaker 1: do world radio premieres. Okay, So we would love to
Speaker 1: be the first FM station to air it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, I said, I have I have an internet
Speaker 2: an internet station waiting forward to but the first FM.
Speaker 2: Yeah you can have the first FM. Yeah, you can
Speaker 2: have it.
Speaker 1: Awesome, awesome, we love it. Yeah, yeah, very cool, and we'll.
Speaker 2: Back to thee. Back to so what about the movie again?
Speaker 1: No, I'm really looking forward to seeing it.
Speaker 2: Okay, Yeah, I like said she's working on a Yeah,
Speaker 2: back to that, she's working on various streaming platforms. Uh
Speaker 2: we like I said. Her ultimate release dates she like
Speaker 2: to do January twenty five. Yeah, and uh, like I said,
Speaker 2: I mean, as soon as that's up, and as soon
Speaker 2: as the information is released to me, you know, I
Speaker 2: will be putting it up on all my social media's.
Speaker 2: I have Instagram, I'm on x TikTok, I'm on Facebook,
Speaker 2: i have YouTube reverb Nation. Like I said, all you
Speaker 2: gotta do is typeing I hemy on your Google time.
Speaker 2: It'll pull up everything, okay, and you can anyone and
Speaker 2: everyone can find me.
Speaker 1: Hey, where's the name come from? By the way, Silicon Kong.
Speaker 2: Ah, good story, I got time. I'll tell you.
Speaker 1: Oh we got time? Yeah?
Speaker 2: Yeah, okay, cook uh on a. See my general I
Speaker 2: grew up in the late late seventies and early eighties. Okay,
Speaker 2: so every year at I don't know if they did
Speaker 2: the same thing in New England, but here in Pittsburgh,
Speaker 2: Pittsburgh and NAT every year at Thanksgiving time, It was
Speaker 2: kind of like a tradition with my family. You know.
Speaker 2: Of course, Thanksgiving the big, a big bit, you know,
Speaker 2: big holiday for a lot of families. But anyway, every
Speaker 2: year they would play King Kong on Thanksgiving Day. It
Speaker 2: would be uh, I'll never forget. It was always uh,
Speaker 2: Wizard of Oz was first, and then they would play
Speaker 2: King Kong. That's back when we only had three or
Speaker 2: four channels to watch.
Speaker 1: Remember, yeah, I remember when they would play Wizard of Oz.
Speaker 1: They might even still do that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think they still do, but I remember back then,
Speaker 2: and they would always play King Kong right up the
Speaker 2: original King Kong of course, and King Kong was always
Speaker 2: kind of like my favorite monster movie. I mean, I
Speaker 2: love Godzilla and Gammer and all that, but King Kong
Speaker 2: was always the top. Anyway, back to the name. I
Speaker 2: was sitting around, like I said, uh, you know, coming
Speaker 2: in and out of bands like I've done, like I
Speaker 2: was doing, and I was trying to think of a
Speaker 2: cool thing. I was just like, well, maybe I just
Speaker 2: released you know these songs under Ian Hemi, and I
Speaker 2: was like, nah, it's not really that cool. Anyway, I
Speaker 2: was sitting down one day and I was talking to
Speaker 2: a friend of mine. Now, I was just kind of
Speaker 2: kind of messing around and the newest King Kong with
Speaker 2: Jack Black. Do you ever see that movie?
Speaker 1: Oh, I'm aware of it. I've never actually watched it though.
Speaker 2: It's a newer movie. I mean it was like the
Speaker 2: whole start of it all. But anyway, maybe was on
Speaker 2: and it was it was on a Sunday, and we
Speaker 2: was watching it downstairs, and I was just that's at
Speaker 2: that time my home studio was downstairs, and I'm looking around,
Speaker 2: you know, I was just kind of messing around with
Speaker 2: my music and that nutry and I was like wow,
Speaker 2: I said, you know, the new remake of the King
Speaker 2: Kong with Jack Black is excellent. So if anybody gets
Speaker 2: a chance, definitely check it out. Anyway, so I was
Speaker 2: like wow, you know, and I just kind of reverting
Speaker 2: back to my childhood how much I loved King Kong. Yeah,
Speaker 2: and wow, I wish I could use that somehow. And
Speaker 2: I was like, Kong Kong Kong, you know, I could
Speaker 2: be like I could be King King of the Electronics.
Speaker 2: And then my friend said, hey, wait a minute, why
Speaker 2: don't you go with Electronic Kong? And I was like wait,
Speaker 2: And jokingly I was Actually it came upstairs and my
Speaker 2: son was watching something on YouTube or something like that,
Speaker 2: and they mentioned Silicong Valley. Okay, I was going to
Speaker 2: the restroom. I went back downstairs and just half heartedly
Speaker 2: and I don't know where. I just said, how about I
Speaker 2: just go to Silicon Kong.
Speaker 1: And he was like, dude, yep, yep, yep.
Speaker 2: So I'm the king of the electronics.
Speaker 1: I can tell you. So Friday nights, I'm a co
Speaker 1: host on a show called retro Spectrum Radio with poly
Speaker 1: C and so during the show, Paul always asks me
Speaker 1: to plug whatever I'm going to be doing here on
Speaker 1: Saturday morning. And so I mentioned I said Silicon Kong,
Speaker 1: and he loved the name. He had not heard it before.
Speaker 1: He was like, that's great. He loved that.
Speaker 2: You know, Lass Halloween. Another local band, Jessica Bella band
Speaker 2: a good band. Check them out. You can find them
Speaker 2: on the internet. To Jessica Bella, She's a cute, cute
Speaker 2: little Pittsburgh pop singer. Anyway, Uh, we work, uh have
Speaker 2: a feel. They have a company called MP Records. Being
Speaker 2: being an artist, you know, an actor and a musician.
Speaker 2: We all try to help each other out here, you know,
Speaker 2: that's what you do. You know, if we can help
Speaker 2: each other out in some form artistically, we will. Anyway,
Speaker 2: she was doing a show and she invited me to
Speaker 2: come up to her show last Halloween, and h kind
Speaker 2: of make you know, I'm kind of promoting the movie.
Speaker 2: I've been promoting the movie probably really hard for I'd
Speaker 2: say about eight months now, because like I said, I
Speaker 2: knew we was wrapping it up and finishing it anyway.
Speaker 2: So I got up on stage. Before I went on stage,
Speaker 2: I came out. I was outside of this place called
Speaker 2: Gerbils in Pittsburgh, and uh, you know, this one lady
Speaker 2: came up and she, you know, hey, how are you doing?
Speaker 2: You know, of course, you know, and we're talking. You know,
Speaker 2: I'm dressed up almost, you know, dressed up and everything
Speaker 2: except for my mask. So she knew I was some
Speaker 2: kind of some kind of artist there for a purpose anyway.
Speaker 2: So she said, oh, yeah, who you are. I said, yeah,
Speaker 2: I'm here. I'm gonna do a little thing on stage.
Speaker 2: She said, what what's your name is? Said Silicon Kong.
Speaker 2: She said that is an awesome villain name.
Speaker 1: I was like, yes it is, Yes, that's true.
Speaker 2: So that just stuck to me, I just kind of
Speaker 2: remembered that.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, no, I think it's great. And uh, I
Speaker 1: think it's cool that you're doing stuff with grim Rock.
Speaker 1: But you you you awesome Graham. You kind of you
Speaker 1: kind of hinted, but it sounds like you've you've got
Speaker 1: things in the works that you can't can't necessarily talk
Speaker 1: about yet.
Speaker 2: Or not right now, man, Grima, we have a plan. Okay,
Speaker 2: all like Italians. All Italians is your listeners and not
Speaker 2: just a state, you know, stay posted to me or
Speaker 2: grim Rock. Uh and for for further information.
Speaker 1: Okay, okay, did you say all like Italians? Is that? Uh?
Speaker 2: That's that's Pittsburgh right there, Pittsburgh Dialogue.
Speaker 1: Gotcha, gotcha. I do feel like I feel.
Speaker 2: Like I've got that in that and at N and
Speaker 2: that and that.
Speaker 1: Well, you really do have your own dialect there.
Speaker 2: Yeah, we do.
Speaker 1: That's amazing. Are there a lot of are you able
Speaker 1: to play out a lot? Are there a lot of
Speaker 1: good you did mention after the pandemic or during the pandemic,
Speaker 1: a lot of venues closed, but yeah, a.
Speaker 2: Lot of them just never reopened and it was just
Speaker 2: so sad.
Speaker 1: And what you're doing is unique. Are there still a
Speaker 1: lot of places to play, or do do you hit
Speaker 1: the road and get out of the area and play
Speaker 1: some places.
Speaker 2: I'll tell you what, Matt. I just we just recently
Speaker 2: thanks to grim Rock. Actually, you know, I'd have to
Speaker 2: say I have to thank grim Rock for that, but
Speaker 2: just recently I've been racking shows up left and right back.
Speaker 2: Now I can also say, like Silicon Kong was somewhat
Speaker 2: around during the pandemic and that, but prior to that,
Speaker 2: I was in a real quick story here. I've always
Speaker 2: kind of liked it strange musical combinations, Like there's a
Speaker 2: b I was an industrial metal band called F six. Now.
Speaker 2: What that consisted of was me playing bass and singing
Speaker 2: and a my friend guitarist at the time, Dustin Marx
Speaker 2: was guitarist, and we would come up on stage with
Speaker 2: just a computer, you know, wow, and we would play guitar.
Speaker 2: I would play bass and sing. So years and then
Speaker 2: after that, I also did another thing called Pseudo Ano
Speaker 2: with Jeff Kettemy and we would do the same thing,
Speaker 2: you know, we would he would do the singing part
Speaker 2: and I would kind of do the rapping, kind of
Speaker 2: creepier a rock vibe. The strange thing about that. Why
Speaker 2: I'm mentioning that is then this is we're talking. This
Speaker 2: is between two thousand and five, and I'd say fourteen
Speaker 2: or fifteen, and we would go out there and people
Speaker 2: would be like, dude, where's your drummer, where's your drummer?
Speaker 2: Where's your band? So at first we want like this
Speaker 2: kind of coincides with what I do. It really wasn't
Speaker 2: well accepted. People in Pittsburgh want to see bands. They
Speaker 2: see an old stage full people headbanging, playing ner infunts,
Speaker 2: whatever the case may be. So for me to get
Speaker 2: up Aaron grim could a'test this. He's he's actually had
Speaker 2: to deal with this as well. Getting up on stage
Speaker 2: as a just you playing something or what I back
Speaker 2: then was not accepted. But since the pandemic, I will
Speaker 2: say this, I mean that's nothing. Really, nothing good came
Speaker 2: of that pandemic. I don't care what analysts. It was
Speaker 2: terrible in every possible way. But the only thing that
Speaker 2: did come out is we decided, you know, going out
Speaker 2: on stage with a computer or whatever and like a
Speaker 2: like a lot of the rappers or hip hop artists
Speaker 2: would do. Now it's accepted. Now people are like, hey,
Speaker 2: that's pretty cool. Now, so it kind of works out
Speaker 2: for that. So because of that, like I said, yeah, now,
Speaker 2: because of that, and it's more widely accepted in the area. Yeah,
Speaker 2: I got lots of shows coming up. Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Well, plus I would imagine too, other bands must love
Speaker 1: playing with you, because when you get to play with
Speaker 1: someone who like like if you're if you're opening for
Speaker 1: somebody and they have to follow you and you're not
Speaker 1: going to take you don't have a you don't need
Speaker 1: twenty minutes to break down a drum set, you know
Speaker 1: what I mean?
Speaker 2: And dat And like I said, you know, the thing
Speaker 2: about it is, there's a few bands excuse me out here, uh,
Speaker 2: God hates Unicorns, prime Eate, there's a few of the
Speaker 2: bands that did survive the pandemic.
Speaker 1: Uh.
Speaker 2: And we're all really all of us are really tight
Speaker 2: in the area. Yeah, Curshiables. There's a couple other bands,
Speaker 2: like I said, And the thing about that is we
Speaker 2: just all even though we may be different, different styles
Speaker 2: and different genres, we all support each other. I mean,
Speaker 2: there's a handful of us that support each other. Of course,
Speaker 2: it's just like any of the big city there are
Speaker 2: some bands that are like, yeah, great, shown as soon
Speaker 2: as you turn around there stabbing me in the back. Sure,
Speaker 2: you know, there's there's quite a few of those two.
Speaker 2: But the thing about it is like these guys, like
Speaker 2: I said, back to the God Hates Unicorns and Prime
Speaker 2: Aid and Parcial, these are guys that are really down
Speaker 2: to earth, excellent human beings.
Speaker 1: That's good.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so we stick with that. We basically like to
Speaker 2: stick with our low circle of various bands that we
Speaker 2: like to play with. So yeah, and we we enjoy
Speaker 2: playing for each other. I mean I've opened up for
Speaker 2: God Hates Unicorns. I've done stuff with Prime Eate uh,
Speaker 2: you know, and we always had a great time. You know,
Speaker 2: we loved it. We all support each other.
Speaker 1: Yeah, no, that's really cool. God Hates Unicorns. I've heard
Speaker 1: that name. That name came up on the show recently.
Speaker 1: Grim might have might have mentioned them.
Speaker 2: But awesome. I will say, I can't really prevey much
Speaker 2: better just to be saying they'll be they'll be around
Speaker 2: with us in one form or another. Yeah, just stay tuned.
Speaker 2: Like I said, people just gonna have to go on
Speaker 2: the Facebook pages mine and Grim's and Grim's website and
Speaker 2: you know, just keep keep posted because there's some surprises coming.
Speaker 2: That's all I got to say.
Speaker 1: Oh, very cool, very cool. Well we look forward to that.
Speaker 1: Well listen, uh Ian hemy also known as Silicon Kong.
Speaker 1: We're gonna have to let you go in a moment.
Speaker 1: But it's been wonderful having you on. I've really enjoyed
Speaker 1: talking with you.
Speaker 2: I enjoyed being here and.
Speaker 1: I'm I'm a big fan of what you're doing. I
Speaker 1: love your music.
Speaker 2: Thank you very much, and I really appreciate uh you
Speaker 2: for supporting you know, guys like me and grim. Uh.
Speaker 2: It's awesome because every little bit helps. And like I said,
Speaker 2: back to the Facebook pages, you know, going to Facebook pages,
Speaker 2: likes are cool, shares are better, you know.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, absolutely absolutely. What should people know about where
Speaker 1: to find you online?
Speaker 2: Like I said, really back to what I said. You
Speaker 2: just type in Ian hemmy and every anything that has
Speaker 2: is affiliated with Silicon Kong in any possible way, we'll
Speaker 2: pull up on one of the if not all. I'm
Speaker 2: on the id MB, the actors thing on you know,
Speaker 2: the Hollywood actors thing. I mean, I'm also a producer
Speaker 2: and a writer, you know, like I've done things with
Speaker 2: Mow and stuff like that. So anywhere you type in
Speaker 2: Ian Hammy and pull it up. Just click the link
Speaker 2: and I'm sure you'll find a link to take you
Speaker 2: to everything that I do.
Speaker 1: Yes, yes, you are very googleable.
Speaker 2: Yes, very googleble I like that.
Speaker 1: Yes, yes, very good, very good. I'm gonna close out
Speaker 1: this segment with it. This is another track that I
Speaker 1: found on Reverb Nation that I really like. Twitter padded,
Speaker 1: I really.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you got real quick. I'll tell you the story
Speaker 2: behind that. You know where that came from? Jen? Do
Speaker 2: you know where I came from?
Speaker 1: Oh, she's she's actually out of the room for a moment.
Speaker 2: Okay, all right, well growing up you know Disney. Let's
Speaker 2: go back to you and growing up Bamby the movie Bamby,
Speaker 2: Remember ever Bamby's like, what's wrong with them? Oh? They're okay,
Speaker 2: they're just Twitter paid.
Speaker 1: Oh okay, I got you.
Speaker 2: Cartoons are my life. You know. I love Kromedi's and cartoons.
Speaker 2: I'm very animated, as you can tell.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and that's also the John Burrows remix. Oh okay,
Speaker 2: you know John Burrows.
Speaker 1: I feel like I do.
Speaker 2: Look it up.
Speaker 1: All right, all right, very good? All right, Ian Hemy
Speaker 1: aka Silicon Kong, thank you so much, my friend. I
Speaker 1: can't wait, I can't wait to see the movie. And uh,
Speaker 1: I'm sure we'll what's that?
Speaker 2: I'm sorry? I select some people, ye have I said?
Speaker 2: Just find me mainly A lot of that stuff will
Speaker 2: be released on my mainly my Facebook pages. Okay, so
Speaker 2: people just follow me, friend me, whatever you want to
Speaker 2: do if you want to get more information on it,
Speaker 2: and also on my Facebook pages, you can scroll through
Speaker 2: it and know take you. I had to also have
Speaker 2: a Facebook page for Silicon Kong. Okay, so I also
Speaker 2: have another Facebook page for the Still City Architect of
Speaker 2: Pittsburgh documentary itself too, oh on Facebook.
Speaker 1: Excellent, excellent. All right, ian Hemy, We'll let you go
Speaker 1: for now, but I'm sure I'm sure we will talk again.
Speaker 2: In the future, I hope. So thank you, all.
Speaker 1: Right, man, thank you, take care bye bye.
Speaker 2: All you take care now, Matt.
Speaker 1: All right. That was ian Hemy, Yes from Pittsburgh.
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