Episode Transcript
Speaker 0 00:00:00 Good morning, Fort McMurray, wood, Buffalo, and the rest of the world. You've tuned into the Mac city morning show. My name is Elliot pier, your host, and we're going to start the show off the same way we start every show off with a moment of gratitude. I know you could be doing a million of other things with your time. And the fact that you're spending with us truly does mean the world to me on that note, Tanner hit him with these.
Speaker 1 00:00:21 Oh, she caught me, loves near listened to the next any morning show.
Speaker 0 00:00:30 All right. We're back now. I know I say this a lot, but I am really excited about this guest. I don't know him. So that makes it fun. He wants to talk about liquor. Not also makes it fun, but I know him from online from taking showers and drinking beer. So I want to find out what that's all about as you guys know. I do not introduce my guests because they can do a better job at that than myself. So on that note, sir, can you please, uh, tell everybody at home who you are?
Speaker 2 00:00:55 Yeah. I'm, I'm Ty Brandt and I'm a comedian and a, uh, alcohol enthusiast, not an alcoholic. There's a big difference. There you go. Uh, just cause I drink every morning before work doesn't mean it's a problem. I enjoy the morning shower beers. As you mentioned, I'm a big fan of that. And I'm also the, uh, the better looking half of the whiskey heathens. We are a YouTube whiskey show, uh, two fat guys that just enjoy drinking whiskey and we do some wild stuff with it. And we, uh, we release new episodes every week and we do lives every weekend. It's a, it's a lot, lot of fun.
Speaker 0 00:01:31 Oh, I knew about your show. I didn't know. You do live episodes. Yeah, we
Speaker 2 00:01:35 Do live episodes interact with all our friends and we call them friends, friends, fans. That's awesome though. Yeah. It's, it's, it's really enjoyable.
Speaker 0 00:01:42 That's great. So you guys just like, hang out, I'm assuming get a little bit buzzed a little bit and then record it.
Speaker 2 00:01:51 Yeah. Yeah, we drink. So you don't have to drink a lot of terrible stuff as well. That seems to, for some reason, be some of our most popular videos is when we drink horrible, disgusting whiskeys people enjoy watching.
Speaker 0 00:02:05 Yeah. They like watching you guys suffer. Yeah. Okay. That's awesome. Now your partner in crime was on the show a little while ago, but I didn't get to ask him as many questions as I had, so
Speaker 2 00:02:16 I never do. That's why we do this weekly. That's right.
Speaker 0 00:02:18 So, okay. So this show that you guys started, like I know he mentioned you started it just, you guys had some form of you guys wanted to drink with each other and recorded I guess, but we didn't delve deep into the show. So let's talk about the orange origins of this show, how it got started and like, let's go from there.
Speaker 2 00:02:36 Uh, I used to have a fairly successful podcast here in Fort McMurray a few years ago. Okay. Uh, my co-host moved away. Uh, she, she moved, she was the better looking, uh, partner in that enterprise and I needed to start a new project. Okay. Uh, so I really just wanted to talk to some cool people. I know. And a local radio personality, Andrew Willcox told me you like whiskey. I know a guy that likes whiskey and like cigars, maybe you guys should meet. Well, he put me in touch with, uh, my partner, Josh, and went to his place. First time I ever met him, we recorded our conversation for a podcast that never aired. Right. We have our very first conversation recorded. In fact, it was a couple of days ago anniversary. I got the photos for it and we have the audio for it.
Speaker 2 00:03:22 And it just turned into a blossoming friendship where we spend, uh, probably an unhealthy amount of time together drinking become a, you know, excellent drinking buddies. There we go. And he's, uh, he probably didn't talk too much about himself. He doesn't like to hype himself up, so I'll do it for him. He's very famous in the whiskey community. He's huge on Instagram. Yeah. Is, is, is know your whiskey. Yeah. Instagram and he's very popular there. So we thought, how can we bring this to more people? And how can we share these exploits? What better way to do it than on a YouTube show. That's what we did. That's awesome. Uh, it snowballed into something pretty big and we're inserting ourselves into what we call the whiskey fabric. Right. And we're having a lot of fun doing it
Speaker 0 00:04:05 Doubts. Okay. So with your original podcast, as you're doing, and this is the thing, um, like right now, like people call this a podcast and fair enough. That's cool. Um, but there's the video aspect and so original podcasts and have that video aspect. So with your original podcast, was it the video component as well? There was
Speaker 2 00:04:24 A video component, but it was just us in a recording studio. It didn't look nearly as nice as this. Thank you. And, uh, it, it, we, we mainly interviewed comedians that would pass through town. Uh, we had some pretty famous comedians on and we had a lot of fun doing it, but yeah, I can't even say the name of it because there was, you know, it was a risky title for the show. We got pretty successful. We had some sponsors and stuff. And then, like I said, my co-host had to move she's since moved back to town, but that project fizzled out and we had our fun with it. We had to say fun sponsors, what Buffalo brewing company was a sponsor of ours. And we used to get a cake that we go through every couple of weeks. Nice drinking. A lot of beer on that show too. A good time.
Speaker 0 00:05:04 Okay. Now you've transitioned into your new podcast now. So let's talk about nerding out, kind of what Tanner's gig is in regards to your equipment. What are you guys selling with? What are you doing? The cameras might. So we like to do a lot
Speaker 2 00:05:19 Of fun B roll and stuff too. So we've got, uh, GoPros, we've got a drone that we'd do some aerial photography and video with. Um, we film on, I think it's a cannon. Uh, that's our main, main component. Um, we all make mistakes. My partner he's, he's the video and photo guy. Right. He has his, he has another thing where he, uh, photographs, beautiful, sexy models with bottles of whiskey, other fun venture. Uh, it's not
Speaker 0 00:05:47 A bad way to kind of spend your time.
Speaker 2 00:05:50 Yeah. We get to do all the, you know, the bad things you're not supposed to do. We just do, uh, and put it on film. Yeah. So it's a lot more fun way, becomes legitimate when you do it that way. Yeah. And then for our live shows, we have a green screen, so we're always, uh, thrown up different, uh, distillery, backgrounds and stuff. And yeah, we do that and interact with our fans and friends and have chats and drink. And we did one episode, not too long ago where we took like a poll to see what everybody wanted to drink. We all drank everything from the Buena havin distillery. So everybody, uh, they had, uh, I guess a week, maybe a little bit more than a week to a soar soda bottle if they didn't have one. And then we all just drank the same.
Speaker 0 00:06:28 That's so cool making COVID uh, COVID connection, virtual drinking buddies. That's awesome. Now we got some booze on the table here. So everybody always questions me about the booze on that table. But now we got some booze on that table. What are we looking at? Why did you bring these special bottles here? Um, we had a sip of one. I know it's 10 o'clock, but Hey, sometimes that's what you got to do a little late to start drinking, but that's okay. Yeah. Don't hold it against us. So explain to me what we have here on the table.
Speaker 2 00:06:58 So Josh, my partner he's he's uh, he's the resident scotch guy, right. I try to be more world whiskeys and Canadian whiskeys. He's also really good with the bourbons and American stuff. So yeah. Uh, starting on, uh, my right, we got the last straw cask strength. That's from Ontario. It's a 100% Ontario rye. Okay. Really lovely stuff. Right beside it is what was dubbed the 20, 21 whiskey of the year. It's the Alberta premium cask strength. Yes. The original batch 65.1. And that's not bad. Yeah. I prefer the last draw gastric myself right next to it is the puny Alba from Italy. It is one of my top 10 whiskeys of all time. It's just around a hundred dollars and damn near impossible to find right now, uh, due to COVID they've had import issues, bringing whiskey from Italy. Italy was a huge hotspot when this stuff happened. So yes, they've had a lot of problems, uh, exporting and importing the Canada beside that is the high coast Berg. That's from Sweden finished in Pedro Jimenez, CAS, which is a PX, Sherry casks. It's a lovely stuff. Yeah. Really lovely stuff. And then beside that is an route portal Nova it's a port cask finished Indian whiskey
Speaker 0 00:08:14 Indian. When you say Indian, you mean like from India,
Speaker 2 00:08:16 India. Okay. And it's also super lovely stuff. And the reason I brought all these different things was to showcase some of the better stuff coming out of Canada. And that there is whiskeys all over the world from countries you wouldn't think of people think of scotch. They think Johnny Walker or Glenlivet or Glenfiddich, they think Canadian whiskey, they think crown Royal or Gibsons. That's right. There's so much more stuff out there that you've probably never heard of. And if you want to find out more, you can follow the whiskey heathens on YouTube. You go.
Speaker 0 00:08:45 Now the one thing, which one did we take a sip of only a sip once it, yeah.
Speaker 2 00:08:48 Just one sip. That's why the bottle's almost empty. The Boonie Alba from Italy. And it's, it's in my opinion, fantastic stuff is very minerally. It tastes like you're drinking a mountain. Yeah.
Speaker 0 00:09:00 I was thinking about that, which is it's trouble is when you smell that, you're just like for the people at home, I smelled it and I thought, oh man, this is nothing like, it didn't have a harsh smell at all. And I was like, okay, I'm going to hit this. And I hit it hard. And then when you hit it, man, the flavors in that thing knocked me off my socks, man. They were, it was good. It's delicious. It was so good. But it was, it's a tricky one. It's a messy
Speaker 2 00:09:28 Thing. Right? It's not a normal place. You'd think of for whiskey. No one goes, oh yeah. Whiskey, the best stuff comes from Italy. Yeah. I mean, it's not a normal thought process. That's right. But you can taste the difference that doesn't taste like scotch. It doesn't taste like a Canadian whiskey. It don't taste like bourbon. No sound like anything else. That's exactly it. And that's the fun part of whiskey.
Speaker 0 00:09:46 Good though. It's like really good. But I think what you just said nailed it. It's like nothing I've ever tasted
Speaker 2 00:09:53 And you'll find the same with the high coast and you'll find the same with the Amery. Portanova it's all very different stuff. And it showcases the regions. We, uh, we did a whole week dedicated to Israel's first distillery. Yeah. And we did a whole bunch of different Israeli whiskeys. The climate in the Israeli desert is very, very good for maturing whiskey. And then, uh, some of our favorite stuff comes from Taiwan actually. It's called Kavalan. Yeah. And they make incredible stuff, but they don't do aged statements. But if you nerd out and geek out, like we do, you can read, uh, the, the numbers on a bottle and you can source out how old it is. But their stuff will look like 30 year old scotch. And it's four years old, just the climate. Cause uh, the Taiwan where they are, it's a subtropical island and the climate. They're just producing some incredible whiskeys as well. And again, not a place you think of you. I know you said you liked Japanese whiskey. Yeah. You got to try stuff from Taiwan, man. Okay. Yeah,
Speaker 0 00:10:52 I will. Oh, this meeting you guys, this is going to be a problem. I can see that from a mile away. So I told my story already more than once. So I'm not going to bore the people at home on why I started drinking harder liquor and whiskey, but I'm fascinated to find out what your journey was to drinking this because I think everybody starts off probably drinking beer coolers and then progresses into harder stuff as they get older. So
Speaker 3 00:11:16 Let me hear a little bit about your journey. Uh,
Speaker 2 00:11:18 I was in, uh, a youth program called air cadets when I was a kid and I made friends with, uh, some people now I wouldn't say that this is indicative of all air cadet, squadrons. Yeah. It just happened that, you know, we'd get together, uh, and, and drank at a younger age when we weren't supposed to. Right. And, uh, we had our cool, which is a absolutely terrible grain whiskey that you would just put like a full into a Punchbowl. And, uh, we didn't, we just drank it straight from the bottle Vidiots. And then when, you know, two guys are puking one guy's hemorrhage bleeding out of his eyes. Maybe we shouldn't drink. Yeah. That's a terrible idea. Yeah. Maybe we'll just stick to beer.
Speaker 0 00:12:00 That's right. That's right. Oh, that was my
Speaker 2 00:12:02 First like, and alcohol experience and uh, my next one was tequila and turned me off at tequila for years. Yeah. Until, uh, I think the one that turned me around was George Clooney's tequila. Oh, Casamigos the amino seven year. It's fantastic. Sipping whiskey. Yeah. When I got in or sipping tequila, when I got into whiskey, uh, it was just my, uh, my stepfather at the time, uh, an old Scotchman and he had, you know, the generals, the Glenlivet, uh, the Glenfiddich, you know, so you try to take some of that and you don't like it. And it just wasn't for me, I'm like this isn't sweet enough. No, I'd rather have like a Mike's hard lemonade. That's right. That's right. But, uh, as my pallet grew, I started smoking cigars at a younger age and it just kind of went hand in hand. I had a, I believe you said you tried <inaudible> yeah. Cause of Busta rhymes. Yeah. I, I didn't get to drink with Buster arms, but I drank on his tour bus. Oh, nice. That was fun. Nice. And it was a fully stocked Tavasia
Speaker 0 00:13:05 Well, imagine that's something I gotta get. I gotta get my hands on a bottle again, just because I was so young and dumb when I got it. Just because of the song I literally went from drinking. Yeah. Pass it. Glossy. I went from drinking, like, I don't know, just call him Mike. It was called blue typhoon. It was a cooler. Okay. Blue typhoon. And then every once in a while a beer and all of a sudden I got this beautiful
Speaker 2 00:13:27 Box and bottle of <inaudible>
Speaker 0 00:13:31 And bustin puff. You're talking all about it. And it was during Calgary stampede and I'm not a quitter. So me and my buddy went half on it and we finished that to six at night and boy, the next morning game, over game over. And there's nothing you can mix. Like your buddy was telling me, he, uh, has mixed like pop with whiskey and stuff. And we tried everything and it just, yeah, it did not help Glossier. Anyways, I hijacked your story. Keep going. Sorry about that. That's pretty much the story. Yeah.
Speaker 2 00:13:59 And just like, then you do the same thing. You mix your, you order a Jack and Coke or a rye and ginger, and then eventually it just gets to the point where like, you know what, I'm getting a headache and it's from the sweetness of that. So I'd really like to find out what this whiskey is all about on its own. And then, uh, you know, I started with mostly Canadian stuff, moved on to scotch. It's taken me a long time, but I just finally found an Irish whiskey. I like, what is it? It's Middleton rare. So this is the problem. It's like $300 a bottle. So if it's going to cost me $300 to really enjoy Irish whiskey, I'm just not going to drink Irish whiskey when there's so many other options out there. Yeah. So I mean, everything that's on here is under $200.
Speaker 2 00:14:43 Yeah. So it's, you know, you can find like that Alberta premium cask strength. I think we got, uh, we picked up this, uh, the day it was announced. We found two bottles in the wild, the whole video on it. It's super fun and it's not bad. And it was like under 60 bucks, two bottles in the wild. What does that mean? We found two bottles after it was announced in a liquor store in Boyle. We go whiskey hunting. Oh, okay. Our favorite pastime, we hit up, uh, 50 to 60, the liquor stores in one day own time really well, we know what we're looking for and we know what we're not looking for. And when we see something that we haven't seen before, like, Ooh, what's that like? And you know, we would get an image in our mind. You can picture, I can virtually walk down the aisles of over a hundred different liquor stores in my mind. And so we go whiskey hunting and we found two bottles in the wild. That's what we call it. Us. It's a running joke in the winter. Yeah.
Speaker 0 00:15:40 Nice. Cause when you said into Walden, like there's no
Speaker 3 00:15:42 Way you're finding this anywhere else. Yeah,
Speaker 0 00:15:44 Exactly. All right. I, once again, you're fascinating guests. So I could ask you questions all day, but I have to give, uh, Tanner his, uh, time for his segment. So here comes the Mac city minute. Tana hit him with your questions.
Speaker 4 00:15:59 Question number one. What is your favorite part of getting to do a whiskey podcast, drinking with friends? Question number two. What is your favorite episode you filmed so far?
Speaker 2 00:16:10 Ooh, that's a tough one. We've had a lot of good ones. Um, I, I think the Alberta premium because it was, it was a rush to get it out and we, uh, we ended up at the boil fish pond. Uh, we, as soon as we bought it at the store, we went straight to the nearest place. We could pull off a highway and set up a camera and chairs and uh, drank it right there and then, and filmed it and put the episode up the next day.
Speaker 4 00:16:34 Question number three, what's the worst drink you've tried on the show.
Speaker 2 00:16:38 AC Nique, uh, is, is an Indian whiskey that, uh, was
Speaker 3 00:16:44 Horrible, horrible.
Speaker 2 00:16:46 Uh, another one was swear jar out of Montreal. One of the worst Canadian whiskeys I've ever had, uh, we've had some other bad ones. Recently. We did one called liberate or that we don't know what, what it was. Their marketing was terrible. Uh, just the way they presented it. It looked really cool, but it had a mashup of information that explained to nothing. So, you know, that just wasn't great on that aspect, but it wasn't the worst whiskey. So I'd say AC neat
Speaker 4 00:17:15 Question. Number four. What do you think is the most underrated country for whiskey making?
Speaker 2 00:17:21 Huh? Aw, man. That's a tough one. Um, near and dear to my heart. Cause we're drinking it now is the puny Alba Italian whiskey. Not a, not a place. Like I said, that you would really consider it to be a whiskey hub. I think they're very underrated. Um, Taiwan is another one. I mean, like we said, we've talked about Kavalan but there's other ones, uh, Shiro that we had. Uh there's there's a few others. Uh, yeah. India as well. I mean, that's why I brought these different world whiskeys. There's just so many great countries. And your
Speaker 4 00:17:52 Final question. What is your favorite environment to enjoy whiskey
Speaker 2 00:17:57 With friends? Again, it's the same thing. That's all it really takes is, is a good people around you. Don't like to drink alone, not out of a, you know, a mental health issue or anything. It just, I prefer and enjoy to drink amongst company. And certain bottles just tastes better with certain people. And those have been your five questions.
Speaker 0 00:18:15 I like what you just said about the drinking alone. I don't do it. And not for any other reason, like when COVID happened, I didn't drink for like six months. Cause I was at home. Yeah, it was. I don't, even my wife's not a drinker. Nobody's were coming over.
Speaker 2 00:18:30 Sometimes I drink alone in the shower, but mostly because my friends won't join me, I've asked. So it becomes awkward. I mean, I don't have a hot tub anymore. So the next best thing for hot water is a shower. They just call me a weirdo and you gotta get that hot to the back. Maybe now
Speaker 0 00:18:44 The one thing I was laughing and the camera's off me, cause it was supposed to be on you for that segment. But you did not miss a beat. When Tanner asked you the worst thing you ever tasted, you obviously like have that like stained in your mouth and your brain and you don't mind bashing a booze if it's not good, obviously. Yeah.
Speaker 2 00:19:03 We don't have any paid sponsors for booze. We've told we've gotten lots of booze for free, which is super nice. We love when people send us whiskey, you want to send us something? Absolutely. Josh has always had a saying that you can buy our time, but you can't buy our opinion if it's not good, we'll say so if it's great, we'll say so. Yeah. You can't buy that opinion though. And that's part of what we do. So why we have so many great friends and fans is that they appreciate our honest, no nonsense, no BS, whisky reviews. Cause we'll, we'll tell it like it is save you having to buy a terrible whiskey and we'll save you time buying stuff that if it matches our palette, that's the great thing about our show as well is our pallets are similar, but also very different. And it's gotten to the point where people will, uh, agree with Josh's palette more than mine and vice versa. And so there's been whiskeys that he likes that I don't and ones that I like and he doesn't. And if someone's on the same wavelength of like, well, Ty liked that one and he recommended it and he said, it's worth the money. I'll go pick that one up. And I really enjoy that aspect of it. That's
Speaker 0 00:20:05 Awesome. Now we're going to get off the liquor for a second. Let's talk about your comedy. Yeah. Lack thereof right now. Yeah. So how I love, love, love, standup. Love it. I watched so much Stanhope since I was a child. Um, I just love it. So what peaks your curiosity and when it came to stand up? Um,
Speaker 2 00:20:29 I had every, I think everybody, my age had Adam Sandler, CDs growing up and there was that one or two kids that have like a Dennis Leary CD. Yeah. And then, uh, Mitch Hedberg came in and I was way too young to really appreciate Carlin for what he was. But you know, my dad watched that, uh, we had these VHS tapes of Jimmy Flynn, a pretty famous Newfoundland comic that would put out all these VHS tapes, campfire videos and stuff of him just telling street jokes and stuff. And I always thought that was super cool. One of the highlights of my old podcast was I got to interview Jimmy Flynn. I really enjoyed that. But when I came to Alberta, yeah. I found out that, you know, it's really not that hard to get into up comedy. You just got to go to an open mic. That's all right. And I'm extremely fortunate enough that I have a wonderful partner and she, uh, she let me take a year off work to pursue comedy. And I spent, uh, three to four nights a week. I was living in Fort Sask and I would drive to Edmonton to try to catch open mics at least three or four times a week. Really hone my craft. It took me a year and a half to get a half hour of comedy. Right. Uh, it's a grind, but man, it was ever, was it ever fun? That's right.
Speaker 0 00:21:45 So I know we're going over time. Sorry at home. Sorry guys name. If you can, because comedy is kind of like I'll call everybody has their own preference. You named a lot of comedians there who are your top three? I'm interested to find
Speaker 2 00:21:58 Out Doug Stan hope. Okay. Yeah. Is, uh, probably one of my all time favorites, Mitch Hedberg, just for his delivery. He's up there with like Steven Wright who was kind of doing a Mitch Hedberg style. And uh, you said three it's hard. Those are just two that come to mind. But yeah, more locally, uh, Sterling Scott at Edmonton. One of my absolute favorites as well. Uh, Trix who's living in Vegas now. He used to be a lot of, uh, much music pop-up video stuff. Uh, he he's great. Um, yeah. And then like there's just so many great comedians around the world as well. Yeah. So it's really hard to pin them down. Yeah. Well there's some Greg Ferguson.
Speaker 0 00:22:41 Okay. All right. Well, listen, you got to come back again. The show is 20 minutes for a reason. So you can keep coming back again. And again, it's a punishment to me when I want to talk to the guests though. So we're definitely going to talk some more after the cameras go off, but I want to say thank you for coming. Definitely appreciate it for having me. But before you leave shameless plug, please tell people at home who you are, where they can find you and how they can
Speaker 2 00:23:04 Support. So you can find me on Instagram at Thai Brant comedy there, you'll just find a bunch of shenanigans, uh, mostly shower beers and whiskey reviews in the shower. I drink a lot of bourbon and stuff in the shower too. Uh, the main project with my glorious partner is the whiskey heathens on YouTube. You can, uh, you can search that up. And my partner, uh, Josh ward, you can find him at know your whiskey. He's the famous one on the good-looking one. Uh, I'm not modest at all. And other than that, yeah, those are, we also have an Instagram. The whiskey heathens are on Instagram, but that's just basically a way to link it to our YouTube channel. You can find new episodes every Wednesday morning at seven where it's five o'clock and weekends varying Friday, Saturdays and Sundays, depending on schedules and availability of guests.
Speaker 0 00:23:52 There we go. Awesome. Well, on that note, Fort McMurray, wood, Buffalo, and the rest of the world. I want to thank you once again for tuning in this has been the max city morning show. I've been your host, Elliot Pierre. And once again, I truly do appreciate every person that tunes in to watch us. Hopefully you're having a great day. We'll see you tomorrow. Peace.
Speaker 4 00:24:30 Talk about quenching your ugly thirst.
