Russ Johns 0:04
Welcome to the #piratebroadcast, where we interview #interestingpeople doing #interestingthings where you can expand your connections, your community. #Kindnessiscool and #smilesarefree. Let's get this party started.

What a fabulous day to start a #piratebroadcast. Today's no different than any other day other than the fact that we got #interestingpeople doing #interestingthings in the room today. I have all the gratitude in the world for you being here if you're watching live. Thank you so much. Let us know where you're coming from. ask some questions getting bit involved in engaged in the conversation and if you are watching a replay, leave the comments, engage in the audience and let's get the party started.

Today we have Drew Stone in the house. Drew is Well, there's a lot of dimensions to Drew. We want to be able to highlight and interrogate him. I mean, interview him in a way that highlights his skills and his abilities. Drew, welcome to the #piratebroadcast. You're now a pirate officially. All right, silent applause.

Drew Stone 1:18
Ahoy Matties! Thanks for having me, Russ. and nice to see everybody out there. I look forward to being a part of your show and connecting with your people out there.

Russ Johns 1:30
Yeah, it's amazing because we connected through your sister Kelly. She's a firecracker. We were talking before the show and moving and shaking and doing some things and she introduced me to you and some of the work that you've been doing. For those that don't know you, you've done a few things. We have a kindred spirit in the music world. You're also in the film world and kind of walk us through some of the journey that you've taken over In the last little while to get you to where you are today because you have your own show that's rocking and rolling pretty heavy.

Drew Stone 2:07
Yeah. I mean, I'm a born and raised New Yorker.

Russ Johns 2:10
Yeah.

Drew Stone 2:12
I come from a filmmaking family. My father was a film director.

Russ Johns 2:17
Yeah,

Drew Stone 2:18
My uncle my my brother's a director right now. He's out on the road right now chasing ghosts on some ghost show in Washington State. My dad won an Oscar in I think 63 with Mel Brooks for Best Short film. So I grew up in the film business. I'm around around film sets. I went to Emerson College to study acting. When I arrived there, I got introduced to this new genre of music called American hardcore, which is a sub genre, a sub genre of punk. And that sort of took me on a journey. A musical journey.

I ended up in a couple bands, came back to New York and started a band here ended up in a band called antidote, which had some success worldwide. At a certain point from all my associations playing music, from see for me a job as a teenager always meant something in the film business. I worked in movie equipment, rental houses, I drove trucks, I learned how to fix lights. I did all the schlub work as a teenager did deliveries and all that. Job always meant something

Russ Johns 3:40
Go get that. Do this.

Drew Stone 3:42
Yeah. As a young guy I was there's always something in the film business I learned and I learned how to fix equipment, movie equipment at a young age and drive trucks and this and that, and eventually I was a stage manager on a film stage here in Manhattan.

Russ Johns 3:58
Okay,

Drew Stone 4:04
At a certain point, um bands started coming to me and saying hey, this was during the golden age of music videos when right when it was the Wild West you know anything went with music videos, and I started a music video career and had a really proficient music video career. As you can see those are some of the gold records behind me.

Russ Johns 4:29
I was just going to say you got a few

Drew Stone 4:34
A couple over here. And then that led into a career doing extreme sports films. I didn't nine films in seven years also directed to MTV, True Life Episode I live to ride. Then I started up doing music documentaries. I have a couple of films out I have a film on Netflix right now. A couple films On Amazon Prime, and then when this COVID thing hit. I was on someone show much like this on the very same platform.

Russ Johns 5:11
Yeah.

Drew Stone 5:11
I was sort of looking at going, Wow, this is kind of cool. I realized that through the years, the community that I built on one of the films I did is the New York hardcore Chronicles film, which is on Amazon Prime right now. I built a new york hardcore Chronicles page on Facebook that has 90,000 people on it. My YouTube page has 10,000 people on it. When I came on this stream yard platform. I was sort of looking at wow I built I should do something like this. I have these platforms just sitting there. I started the show the New York hardcore Chronicles live. Right when this thing has I mean, this thing hit the next day I figured out in the next day I started the show, and I'm blessed. The show is found a worldwide audience. People love it. I have sponsors. I'm just very fortunate in that regard. I'm doing something that I love, go figure

Russ Johns 6:17
Go figure you strike me as the individual that, that you you thrive in those environments, and you are total relationship. You remember names, you remember places, you remember incidents. You can actually recall those things, which is a huge gift in this environment. I've always, for the last 5 10 years, Drew, I've always been preaching, posting this thing is like, #youarethemedia, you have the ability, the opportunity to pick up a camera and start your own show your own thing. You've been doing it for years, you've been producing for years.

Drew Stone 6:56
Absolutely. I know there's a lot of People that might not be familiar with hardcore which is like I said hardcore punk or American hardcore, it's really a sub genre of punk or heavy metal. It's but one of the early sort of the ethos of hardcore, is get up, get out, make it happen. Don't wait for something don't wait. Don't wait for a record label to come and sign you don't wait for you can do it. Go record yourself, put the record out yourself. As a teenager that really empowered me and inspired me and it's these things that I really I carry as an adult to this day, and really everything, everything I do

Russ Johns 7:48
It's the samething you're doing now, it's like you just pick up, you turn it on and you make it happen. It doesn't have to be perfect. It just has to be done right. Get it done. Yeah, absolutely. I love that.

Drew Stone 8:05
You can't win if you don't play.

Russ Johns 8:07
Well, I grew up in the end of the disco era. I played for anyone that you know could would hire me to play and I played a lot of country going out there doing that I actually played reggae I played rock and roll of corporate rock anything that I could play just to get out to play and it was really one of those things that I just love to do it's the only thing that I wanted to do. I just continue to pour myself into it and until I had Attorney in my life where I shattered my arm and and then I decided to get into but still I got electronic instruments here I used to play. dubs dubstep in Houston, perform live in Houston. Just same thing go out there and do it make it happen. You'll figure it out.

Drew Stone 9:02
Well, I think it carries over into what we do. Now, you and I is that being a part of the musical community and being a part of that fabric translates really, to what we're doing now, here on the internet on this platform reaching out to people around the world. Those are strong ties that bind.

Russ Johns 9:27
Yeah. I want to also talk a little bit about because this is so important, and I love the live music scene, and I love and enjoy some of the things that are going on in the creative process, what I don't see though, is the expansion and maybe it's just because I'm not out in the field as much

Drew Stone 9:55
like Alan Lomax, you're not out in the field

Russ Johns 9:58
I'm not out in the field. I'm not seeing the live venues expand to the degree that they that I used to imagine as popular as they used to be, there are a lot of club owners if they could throw in a DJ and a DJ can come in and turn some tracks and creates a medium. It's a different feel it's a different environment than than a live band, going into the club and setting up and doing work. What are you seeing in terms of the landscape in New York as well as around the country on what that looks like and where that's headed?

Drew Stone 10:35
Well, it's absolutely a different world we live in now. It's like what you mentioned before, it's like, when we were younger, or when we were kids and teenagers, your musical identity. Your the music you were into was your identity. It was like, are you just go are you rock like what are you? It's like get him he's a disco guy. I remember going to record stores, you know, on Tuesdays, and poring over the new releases. Despite reading everything on there and album, big artwork, and this was hey, yeah, I live for this. Now, it's a bit of a different world. I mean, music to a lot of kids is sort of, like what you hear in the video game and lot And sadly live music. It just, it doesn't have the power of inertia that it had all those years ago. It's different. It's changed. It's a different kind of world now, and I don't think there's a lot of kids that are picking up instruments, like when I went,

Russ Johns 11:55
It isn't the same way as it used to be

Drew Stone 11:58
no, it's not. It's Different.

Russ Johns 12:00
Yeah. However, I do see on YouTube, I see these people that are looping they'll create loops and retire, they'll pick up a guitar and another track and then they'll pick up a bass. Then they'll sing into it. They'll play keyboards and I'm thinking, multi instrumental, and you're in your bedroom, or your studio, just creating this music and I just love the idea that they're just picking up and creating music, they're just picking up and creating something.

Drew Stone 12:31
Absolutely

Russ Johns 12:34
Regardless of the type of music that you love, or enjoy or are drawn to, whether it be hardcore punk, rock and roll, EDM anything. I love the fact that people are still creating music, what I would love to see are more live venues that are that are expanding in it and it's just I don't know how long this thing is going to last or where it's going to go. I just shows like this keep, I think the connection open and draw people in the conversation. So,

Drew Stone 13:10
yeah, absolutely. I'm on my show yesterday, I had two New York City Congress councilmen on my show, and they just created the cbgb caucus, because we're losing all the venues here in New York. They're not gonna survive this pandemic.

Russ Johns 13:29
If you can't come up with a venue, you can't pay for the rent. Right?

Drew Stone 13:37
Live music is the last thing that is going to be open. Especially the kind of music that I'm involved in, where kids are on top of each other, dancing and jumping and carrying on it's like

Russ Johns 13:53
Yeah,

Drew Stone 13:54
I think we're honestly we're probably a year or two away from that, at the rate. We're going These venues are not going to survive. It's going to be very strange. What's gonna happen, I also subscribe to the concept that my dad hit me to a long time ago about New York City when he said, the one thing about New York City that remains the same is that it's constantly changing. I don't think it serves me or anyone else for that matter, but I'll keep it in the eye.

I just don't think it serves me to try to try to hope grip and hold on to the past. I want to be in the present. I want to be looking towards the future. When the dust settles, and everybody after the nuclear after the zombie apocalypse, and everybody crawls out and after, it's like Stalingrad, you know what everybody everybody crawls out of a barn. Yeah, listen, we'll build we'll build it new. It'll be new and exciting and it'll be different. It's human nature.

Russ Johns 15:05
We just have to keep the creative process moving forward. I just want to highlight a couple of people in the room here that are popping in Laurie Knutson. She's a pirate. Thank you so much Laurie for being here. Good to see your face. I love that. Thank you so much. Stacy's in the house. Hi Russ. Good morning. She says welcome Drew.

Drew Stone 15:29
Hi Stacy!

Russ Johns 15:31
Welcome, people welcome you, man.

Drew Stone 15:33
Well, you gotta watch. Oh, okay, I was gonna say does only pretty girls. Watch your show like what's

Russ Johns 15:43
Gabriel! Gabriel!

Drew Stone 15:44
Hey Gaberiel! What's up Bro!

Russ Johns 15:46
Hello Pirates. Hello Drew. I love this conversation. Love the movie industry. He Gabriel does a very similar show in the evening at five o'clock, central time. I believe or seven o'clock central time

Drew Stone 16:02
right on Gabriel let me know when it's time for me to come on your show bro just reach out

Russ Johns 16:07
Yeah, love to and love the accent in the attitude he is bomb now Wendy's a filmmaker as well she's got a film going on right now she's getting ready to produce a film so

Drew Stone 16:22
watch my film on Netflix. Wendy you'll love it!

Russ Johns 16:25
Yeah, it's great one so passion and purpose are on fire. So we love that. And then we got Gabriel so the Sex Pistols around New York Dolls and so many other wonderful 80s punk bands. I love that you love music and film already loved your story and experience. So that's fantastic. And then all we got so many here.

Drew Stone 16:48
Yeah.

Russ Johns 16:51
I noticed that you were doing this all all along. Get out. Get up make it happen.

Drew Stone 16:58
Get up. Yeah. I kept the profanity out of that. there's a little bit of profanity in that, but I kept it out.

Russ Johns 17:07
I would love to have drew on my show love to pick your mind already intrigued by his tagline,

Drew Stone 17:15
Gabriel, just look for me on Facebook, whatever Google me I'm easy to find

Russ Johns 17:20
Make sure you're connectedGood morning. Good morning. How are you doing? Morning fellow pirates. Drew, I just want to talk a little bit about forward thinking. I know we're both advocates of you know, what has taken place and I know that we can sit down around and probably have a a beverage and tell stories back and forth and laugh our asses off. I want to make sure that we also share a little bit of the forward thinking and what you're imagining the film industry Doing what you're imagining that movie industry doing and kind of take the crystal ball out and see what you can imagine the possibilities could evolve into.

Drew Stone 18:12
Well, I think I'm a little keyed into this. My brother's out on the road right now,

Russ Johns 18:17
Right?

Drew Stone 18:17
Shooting up in Washington. My brother, by the way, is a cinematographer on a show called expedition unknown on the Discovery Channel. That's hosted by Josh gates and he worked on Naked and Afraid and finding Bigfoot. He's out there right now. Right now shooting. It's a different world. I mean, he's out there and with the masks and being tested, and, right now, if you have content, if you were doing something before this thing hit or you were almost done with something, you're in a good spot. I have a film that's I'm heading down the homestretch. We're editing it. I was in the Middle East shooting before this whole thing. Hit

You're in a good you're in a good spot if you have content and also I'm sort of I'm reconstituting so my other content one of my films I'm breaking up into a series because as we all know, series is what's happening it's like you look at Netflix and it's the six parts it's all these series and really a lot of these things I look at I'm like this is really too good hours of material stretched out to eight an eight hour miniseries,

Russ Johns 19:33
Yeah,

Drew Stone 19:34
I watch everything I love music documentaries, and I'm a documentary filmmaker. I'm watching documentaries all the time. I mean, I watch a documentary about my neighbor taking out the garbage, it's what I watch this stuff. I always have something going on in the background as I'm working. I go back to it and it's just you It's sort of the world that I live in, but moving forward. Everybody's a director, everybody's a photographer, everybody's

Russ Johns 20:11
Your media. You are the media

Drew Stone 20:16
That said, is dangerous ground here. Because this sort of concept that music should be free film should be free. I spent three years doing a film. We have a world premiere and the next day, I see some kid put it on YouTube. Now, I'm a filmmaker, right? This is what I do for a living. You might be a plumber, you might be an electrician. I don't ask you to come over and wire my place for free. I don't have a belief that you should be fixing my toilet for free. Then why do you ever believe that it's okay to take my art and give it away for free.

Russ Johns 20:59
Right. Yeah. There's been many battles in that. I want to touch on a couple of points that you brought up that are key. I think a lot of people fail to understand around that is that if many people actually had clear visibility in the moviemaking process, or even the ability and opportunity to create an album, or a piece of music, if they went through the process and understood how much work and effort it actually takes to get to the place where it's produced and out the door they would be dumbfounded. One you can never be involved in the moviemaking process and then watch a film the same way. It's just for me, you grew up in it it's always been that way.

Drew Stone 21:53
Also, let me say, I'm an independent filmmaker.

Russ Johns 21:56
Yeah,

Drew Stone 21:57
I'm not affiliated with a studio. It's not many of us left.

Russ Johns 22:03
You don't have a multimillion dollar expense account where you can just write checks everything.

Drew Stone 22:07
Oh, no, I'm here in my studio apartment. I'm here in my rent control studio apartment in Manhattan. Thank you! But as an independent film maker or an independent artists let's cast a wide net here, independent artists man, like needs support, and you can't hold the independent artist in the same mindset that you hold

Russ Johns 22:32
A plumber? It's a different process through we have to recognize that much like, and you're on Patreon, people support you and like years ago were the artists previous centuries. They had patrons that paid for them to come in and they grow Would commission a piece of art and then they would produce this artwork. Then they would maybe multiple pieces of artwork. It was a long drawn out process. We have to find some way that people can recognize the value and the benefits that art delivers to the world and actually produce value and increase the value for it and from it.

Drew Stone 23:27
Yeah, it reminds me of something Bob Dylan said about I forget the exact words so I'm going to paraphrase a little bit how ludicrous it is that baseball football players are being paid millions and millions and millions and millions of dollars yearly. Yet teachers and like that or are being paid like peanuts, like what kind of crazy balances this with teachers that are empowering people are barely getting by. I feel like it's that sort of thing because people, the dinosaurs are dying off a lot of the older bands, a lot of the old artists are dying off.

Aerosmith and you know, Fleetwood Mac and kiss or whatever, not going to be around much longer, and it'd be a new landscape. It's funny, because, all the bitching people did about record labels back in the day, record labels, rip me off this and that are made. Now people go man they long for the record labels, because there was an infrastructure there that was an infrastructure and labels would support bands and bands who go on the road and that infrastructure, you know, barely exists now. It's a whole new typography.

Russ Johns 25:03
Yeah. Well, and I think we much like the live venues in New York and the changes taking place constantly. You have to reimagine what that looks like going forward, because two things are true. artists create an art needs to be supported.

Drew Stone 25:22
Right on

Russ Johns 25:24
How do people support you in the creative process that you're going through and the films that you're making and the energy and the enthusiasm that you draw from your experience and pour into these platforms? How could people I know you're on Patreon. Talk us through some of the ways that people are supporting you now, and how people can support you going forward.

Drew Stone 25:49
Well, the Patreon thing is really big in my world right now. It's really almost like My personal channel where I release unreleased outtakes from my films. The film that I have on Netflix right now, which is called who the. is that guy? The Fabulous journey of Michael Lago. It's on Netflix. Cyndi Lauper is in it, john Johnny Rotten from the Sex Pistols, the Metallica geyser in it and all that, and so I'm releasing outtakes from that film, I'm releasing outtakes to my other films, outtakes from all the years that I've collected.

Part of the problem is now, I'm done putting stuff on the internet, because it gets passed around five minutes later, with no credit and no recognition. Internet's changed in the past couple years. For me, Patreon is a big thing, if anybody want and there's different tiers on Patreon. For $2 a month, you get you get this for $5 this for 10. So if anybody out there is interested, go check it out, go to patreon and just punch in my name drew stone and check out my page. See what's going on there? There's a lot of cool stuff a lot of different tiers. Also, anytime I do a film, it's independently finance. I mean, I do Kickstarter, I do GoFundMe, and that's how my films get funded.

Russ Johns 27:16
There's a lot of those platforms that didn't exist 10 years ago.

Drew Stone 27:20
Yeah, sure.

Russ Johns 27:21
That's what I'm thinking of, is we just have to continue to evolve and create something new to create support, and then create content, right?

Drew Stone 27:32
Yeah. It's tough for me, and I'm assuming it's tough. For some of you people out there. The technology thing is stressful. I'm not a technology whiz, all these platforms and all this stuff like it. As soon as I start getting into it, like my brain collapses on itself, you know, it's tough. I'm not that fluent, but I'm fluent. Enough and things like Kickstarter and GoFundMe. Anybody out there Hey, follow me on Instagram, stone films NYC on Instagram sto na Fei Fei Li m s NYC stone at stone films NYC, follow me on Instagram, see what's going on? Friend me on Facebook, I'd love to meet you.

Russ Johns 28:26
It's awesome because like I said I met you through your sister Kelly. She's an awesome individual that is out there making things happen. I just appreciate the fact that you're here drew I love the work that you're doing. I love the energy and the enthusiasm. I know our paths will cross again. I just wanted to highlight you because people that are doing #interestingthings need to be sometimes a little shout out. never hurts, right? It's always nice to get a little nod and say hey, you Who's doing something cool. Check him out. That's the whole point of the #piratebroadcast. I'm just a couple hundred episodes into it. If I can continue to grow and expand and support you in any way I can let's do it.

Drew Stone 29:16
Thank you very much. Thank you for having me, Russ.

Russ Johns 29:20
I know there's a few people out there. This is great man. William.

Drew Stone 29:26
Listen, my people are starting to come through here. Thank you. I'm Drew. Thank you, buddy,

Russ Johns 29:34
Sherry asks Do you have to get sponsors prior to starting your project as an independent?

Drew Stone 29:41
Well, I tell you what, Sherry Yes and No, because I'm a firm believer like, when i decide to do a film. I don't get hung up on money. I just go for it. I feel like if my heart's into it, and my passion is behind it. My films get done. They do eventually by hook or by crook, what's important to important is having the passion and the love to do it. It'll fall into place. It'll happen. But that said, Listen, a couple bucks helps. Yeah. The other thing is the way that I kind of do things, it's hard to get money unless you have something to sort of show people so it's like putting a cart in front of the horse. It's a little bit of both you want to get a couple bucks to get it rolling. And then once it's rolling, you got to get like the trains pulling out of the tracking the station and you got to get more people on board. And then people run an ASP net and then once the film starts getting done, people are running after the train they want to get on

Russ Johns 30:46
momentum creates momentum, right. I just any leave she's gonna be on the show. I think tomorrow What an incredible special background drew stone You're awesome. I support art creation in sport.

Drew Stone 31:03
Thank you.

Russ Johns 31:06
Hey #piratebroadcast just barely made it. This is great, man.

Drew Stone 31:15
Like the poster of my film that's on Netflix up.

Russ Johns 31:18
Yeah, you got it.

Yeah.

Share it up

Drew Stone 31:24
There you go. You should have it on your end there. There you go.

Russ Johns 31:29
So the other way.

Comments. Go. There we go.

Drew Stone 31:43
That's my film. It's on Netflix. Everybody, please go watch it. It's an incredible story about a gay Hispanic man who grew up in a Hasidic neighborhood in Brooklyn who went on to change the face of the music business. It has Cyndi Lauper and Metallica, white zombie, the whole gang. I'm really proud of this film. You love music, you will love this film.

Russ Johns 32:03
It's a great film. It's a great film.

Drew Stone 32:05
That's it.

Russ Johns 32:06
Drew. As always, it's a pleasure and an honor to have you on the show. Now that you're a pirate, we're connected, join #thepiratecommunity, people. Also just by the way, this episode will be up on Russ, John's COMM The podcast will be available, so it can be shared out and everything else. I'll send it over to you later, later. Let's support community, the creative process and everybody involved in it, and I just can't, I can't share this enough and always #interestingpeople doing #interestingthings is worthwhile. Hopefully you found value in this.

Drew Stone 32:51
thank you for having me. Yeah,

Russ Johns 32:53
Appreciate it, man.

Drew Stone 32:54
Thank you for having me. I want to thank everybody out there who supported me as an independent To the years and that's it, do good things and good things will come to you.

Russ Johns 33:04
Awesome. Take care,

Drew Stone 33:06
Take care everybody.

Russ Johns 33:08
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