00:00:00 Speaker 1: Quest Love Show is a production of iHeart Radio. 00:00:18 Speaker 2: Open Mike Eagle. What up, sir? How are you? 00:00:22 Speaker 1: I'm gonna give you the real answer, Jack, I'm exhausted. 00:00:27 Speaker 3: Well you got reason too, and I'm gonna ask you about it in a second. But for everybody out there that's like, where is Questlove's voice? This is the Quest Love Show. This is a mini episode. I'm cousin Jake, one of the producers on The Quest Love Show, and we're here with Open Mike Eagle, who is newly getting integrated with the family. And I gotta say I love it, and I think the reason you're exhausted is one of the reasons I really appreciate you. 00:00:50 Speaker 2: You've had a busy week. 00:00:51 Speaker 1: Oh yeah, man, I was doing some touring last week, so I was in Brooklyn, Montreal, Toronto, Lansing, Michigan, and Cleveland and and it. You know, got back a couple of days ago and just been hitting the ground running in between tour legs because yeah, I fly out to start the next in Amsterdam in a couple of days. 00:01:14 Speaker 2: Nice. 00:01:14 Speaker 3: Well, around the time this runs, we like to go from farm to table around here pretty quickly, so this should be up if you are part of our audience in Europe. You know, definitely check Mike on the socials. Everyone should do that anyway, but he might be swinging through your neck of. 00:01:28 Speaker 2: The woods, and indeed, indeed that's dope. That's dope. 00:01:31 Speaker 3: So in those you know, five or six states, you just came off of any highlights. Was there any place in the limited downtime you had that you were like, I really like this area, you. 00:01:40 Speaker 1: Know, I really like Montreal. I got a chance to spend a couple of days there late last year. I was on tour with a Fantagram and we had a day off, so I really just got to hang out in Montreal for a while. And it's such a beautiful city with art everywhere and good food everywhere. You know, it's and it's even though you know, most cities on this hemisphere are relatively new, you know, compared to like Europe, and yeah, a lot of other places, Montreal feels old and I like that about it too. 00:02:18 Speaker 3: I went for the first time in I think it was twenty twenty four. 00:02:25 Speaker 2: It's funny. 00:02:26 Speaker 3: My wife is Canadian born and I had never been to Canada until I was in my forties, which is pathetic because I grew up like you did. I grew up, you know, in the Roust Belt. You know, I'm from Pittsburgh originally, which to get to Toronto is a short drive. Yeah, so shame on me. But I definitely felt like I was in an older city. And I agree with everything you said. And it's funny that you mentioned food. So when you did your episode this season as a guest, I really valued you kind of spoke about, you know, making some culinary or I should say eating miss up during the pandemic and you know, the turnaround journey you've been on since. So I wanted to ask you, you know, when you're on the road, what is your relationship with food? Because I think we all like good food, but good food isn't always good for us. 00:03:14 Speaker 1: It's tough. I go a lot of places where there is a lot of good food around, but I often don't get to experience it, to be honest, you know, that's one thing that people ask me all the time when you go to these cities, what do you eat? What do you eat? What do you eat? And like, I hate that. The truth is that I eat usually what's right by the venue, or usually or I play a bunch of places where there's a kitchen in house because there's a restaurant component of the venue, so whatever's on there men you you know, I think one of the things that it's hard for people to understand is the schedule when you're touring, especially the way that I tour, which is typically, you know, we're in a we're in a van. We're driving day to day, so we're spending you know, five six, eight, you know, hours in a van all day, and we're often getting to the venue very close to when it's time for sound check. If we're lucky and things go smooth, there's a few hours maybe between when everything is set up and then when doors open or when it's time to play, so you know, we can get out maybe and you know, walk around a little bit for for an hour or two. That's if things go smoothly, and they do not always. But what we don't get to do is typically go find the popping spot that's got all the great yell reviews everybody tells us to go to because there's a line at those places usually and we don't have time for that, let alone to travel to get to and from and make sure where where we need to be on time, so we often have to miss out on the on the good. 00:04:52 Speaker 2: Food well and the other part. 00:04:53 Speaker 3: And I'm not a performer, but like you know, the meal that gets the love on yelp is probably not the thing you want to eat before you're jumping around on stage for two and a half hours. 00:05:02 Speaker 1: True, you don't want the fancy burger right before you go on stage. This might be a little too heavy for you in the moment. 00:05:10 Speaker 3: So on the subject of food, there was something else I'm talking to you about it away. Oh, let me let me ask you this, Like when you go to Europe. I know what the schedule looks like, but is there one thing that just you look forward to that's on the eating tip of things of just like when you see that and you're like, I'm I'm gonna carve out an hour, whether it's in the morning or night, for this one thing in this one place. 00:05:33 Speaker 1: I you know, I have a hard time eating in Europe. I really do have a hard time eating in Europe. Jake. I'm so American. I'm so American, and it's like I encounter the worst parts of myself when I'm on the road in Europe. Because I am such a creature of convenience and habit and things like breakfast options. There's a lot of places in Europe where your hotel breakfast is just like a bunch of meat and cheese on platters and it looks fancy, but that's not the breakfast I'm looking for. I'm looking for from hot eggs somewhere. Nobody's got my hot eggs. It's that sort of thing I'm sort of always negotiating with and trying to figure my way around. Is how do I find something that I feel a satisfying or come out of my comfort zone enough to feel satisfied by what's being offered to me When it's not like I have a bunch of time to sit in the same city and get used to something. I kind of got a stick and move. So it can be tough. I think in Europe especially, it can be hard, just because culturally eating is so different over there than it is over here. 00:06:47 Speaker 3: You mean, just in terms of the act of it, or just the way the attention to detail, or. 00:06:52 Speaker 1: I think it's a little bit of both. I think that in America specifically, there are a lot of options for you to like eat substantially while also like moving around and that's not even just relegated to like fast food, like the idea of a diner or something like that, where you you know, they're they're making you food, but it's not designed for you to sit there all day and eat. A diner is usually you know, you're you're stopping and getting something convenient, You're sitting at a counter, You're you get up when you're done. A lot of the places to eat that I've encountered in Europe are sit down cafes. There's tables outside, people are, you know, smoking cigarettes and talking and they have time to sit and eat. And I would imagine the picture that it paints for me is people also eat good in their homes, but when you're out and about in the world, they don't have the same options. But there is good street food. Though, there's good street food, like depending on you know, what part of town you you can't get some good street food up. There's just not a lot of restaurants. The amount is a lot less. 00:08:03 Speaker 3: Yeah, I got you, and I've found that. I mean sort of like Canada. 00:08:07 Speaker 2: I did not. 00:08:08 Speaker 3: I had never crossed the Atlantic Ocean until you know, I was thirty six or thirty seven years old, which was great. I mean it was a privilege. So many people never get to do that. But the food that I've found over there that I like the most is street food or like taking walk with you type food I haven't found I have, but not as the same abundance of that sit down by But it is cool to just see people at three in the afternoon hanging out, whether they're having a cup of coffee or a drink or whatever. 00:08:37 Speaker 2: You know. 00:08:37 Speaker 1: That is one of my favorite cultural differences is when you go to Europe, and I mean there's a different version of this in London, and there is in France, and there is in Amsterdam. But you especially when you're going around this time of year. So I'll be going, you know, it's May, it's nice outside. Everybody's outside eating, everybody's outside, chilling, everybody's outside and joined the weather. Every one is outside convening as human beings in a place where like there are some cities in America where that sort of built in. I think in East coast cities there's a lot more natural, organic sort of meeting spaces. Here in la they got none of that. They got none of that like, the closest you get out here is like the grove, which is just like a retail, fake place thing. Yeah, exactly, you don't really get the sort of natural organic everyone is out sitting along a river, like, you know, you don't really get that out here. So that's one of the things I really do appreciate the most is human beings just convening outside and enjoying the weather and enjoying each other's company. 00:09:57 Speaker 3: I wanted to ask you something about home because looking at the forty or so episodes that the Questlov Show has run this year, and this is rare, you are our only guest that has Chicago roots. Really yeah, I mean it's funny because Chicago comes up a lot, like a lot of folks just reference it being musical influences or folks have I'm trying to think if anyone lived there, but the biggest Chicago reference at least if we are going off of comments on YouTube or on Spotify or you know, places people leave comments is Amir had a conversation this spring with Padma Lakshmi, who has a new show, America's Culinary Cup. I believe it just declared its winner. I saw a few episodes was great, and she's kind of elevating what she had done with Top Chef. But Amir made reference to something I wanted to ask you about, and you may or may not have answers, but he said, it is a sin, or treated as a sin in Chicago to put ketchup on a hot dog. 00:10:53 Speaker 2: You know anything about this. 00:10:54 Speaker 1: I've heard about it. I haven't eaten a hot dog since I was thirteen years old, like one of the first things I ever in my life decided I didn't want know more of. Yeah, it was hot dogs when I was a child. So I do hear that there are customs. I do hear the Chicago dogs are treated in some sacred manner, and you can perform various types of sacrilege with how you treat the Chicago hot dog. But I'm not. I'm not a part of the religion. 00:11:22 Speaker 3: Without getting you know, too too personal. Was there was it the ingredients? Was it just the practice of a hot dog? 00:11:28 Speaker 2: Like you know? Was? 00:11:29 Speaker 3: Are you just like listen, there's so much other things to consume in this world. 00:11:33 Speaker 1: I think there it was a confluence of factors. I was raised by my grandparents, who you know, were not that far removed from you know, southern migration to Chicago. So I ate a lot of like pork, a lot of pork growing up like a lot of pork. And I think I started realizing when I was relatively I just didn't like it that much, Like it all just felt too salty, uh, and not the greatest taste to me. And then when I was about thirteen, I learned how hot dogs were made, yeah, and and bolgoney and all this other stuff that I was being fed, and I was like, I don't want that anymore. I don't I don't want mechanically separated, you know, I don't want to get too I don't I don't want to use too invokes too much dirty imagery here, But it's not the parts of the animal that you want to eat. And I felt like my experience of eating it was like, yeah, that's kind of what this tastes like. It tastes like amorphous gross meat. Like I don't, I don't enjoy this. And then there was another component of me really discovering hip hop and starting to understand and like the sort of five percent stuff that like the Wu Tang was talking about and and you know, so you know, I'd stop eating like skittles cause you know, the gelatine and okay, and so you know, I had gotten really aggressive on that sort of pseudo spiritual tip of the identity that I was taking on as a young hip hopper. So that started to make me pretty stringent about what I did or didn't eat at that time too, in a way that does not persist to this day, but that was part of the thinking at the time. 00:13:36 Speaker 3: No, I can I can respect it and relate to it in other ways of just like, you know, it's funny how hip hop does that. So you know, I know you've obviously you spoke about it. You've lived in LA for more than a decade now, correct, right. 00:13:51 Speaker 1: Yep, No, it's been it'll be twenty two years. 00:13:55 Speaker 2: Oh twenty two damn twenty two years. That's that's crazy. 00:13:59 Speaker 3: First of all, when you do go back to Chicago, be it on tour or to see loved ones, is there because you're not. I mean, if you're on toy you're working, But if you have the time, is there that thing that feels like home on the food side of. 00:14:12 Speaker 1: The things, it really is. I really do need to go get some of that deep dish. I really really, I really do. 00:14:18 Speaker 2: What's your spot? 00:14:20 Speaker 1: I mean, yo, So like there was a spot by my crip called Rico Benny's. I don't even know if that's still around, but that's like the one I associate with the deep dish most is lou Mault Natties. If you've got time to go to a sit down nice place, people talk crap about Gierdno's. I love gier Donald's. I will always love gier Donald's. The smell of that crust, all that spinach, and that deep dish pie. I'm a big fan. I'll always love it. I do personally think it's the superior piece of style. But I can say that and also hold space for the fact that you cannot eat that all the time. Die You will die quickly if you eat that all the time. It's a special thing. Reserve especial occasions, like when you say when you have time, you have to have time to allow them to cook this. You can only really eat two slices of a day, so it takes you a while to even eat it. But it is my favorite favorite for you. 00:15:20 Speaker 2: Oh that it's expensive too. 00:15:23 Speaker 3: I went to the Loom I was, I went on tour with Rock the Bells in two thousand and eight on the media side, and I remember I took my coworkers out. I thought I was just grabbing us all nice, nice meal. And the bill came for that was that was more than I had. Yikes, that was a past due moment for sure. But one thing I wanted to ask you that I just learned about recent years, and you're a West Sider of Chicago. Sorry sounds like, excuse me, I recently learned it. But this other style of pizza, the bar, the tavern, is that a. 00:15:56 Speaker 1: Thing is that you're talking about When it's cut into the grid. 00:16:00 Speaker 2: Yeah, it looks like a jigsaw puzzle, but it's the opposite. 00:16:03 Speaker 1: It's like it's super thin crust. 00:16:05 Speaker 2: Cracker. 00:16:05 Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, super thin crust. That's sort of associated in my mind with the North Side. Actually it might be on the West Side too, But that is the other pizza style. Like when you know, you were in elementary school and there was a pizza party in the school brought into pizza. That's the sort of pizza that they brought. Okay, you know, cut on the grid and you know you wanted the square pieza and the mill didn't necessarily want the corners, but they was like all crust right because of the way those were cut. But yeah, I grew up eating that and I didn't even realize until I was an adult that that was like a regional thing. 00:16:41 Speaker 3: Yeah, I and I just learned there's a spot in Philly that runs a cheap one like every day between like four and six, like a happy hour thing, and it's top three in Philly, and that's sacrilege because Philly takes a lot of produence pizza. But I enjoyed it, and they were like, yeah, we modeled after the Chicago style. And I'm like, man, next time I'm in Chicago, I want to go to some of those, uh, some of those those places that really kicked that off. 00:17:03 Speaker 1: Italian Village is the is the go to spot for the for the Grid pizza and I there's some actual name for it that alludes to me right now, but yeah, but that's that's the that's. 00:17:15 Speaker 2: The unofficial official. 00:17:18 Speaker 1: Yeah, but the spot, the spot is Italian Village. 00:17:20 Speaker 2: Okay, that'll be my first stop. I'm just curious. 00:17:24 Speaker 3: You know, like people make a lot of the show The Bear and you know, at QOLS we had Robert Townsend on and this season, Jamie Lee. 00:17:30 Speaker 1: Curtis to Robert Townsend, He's amazing. 00:17:33 Speaker 2: You ever met him? 00:17:34 Speaker 1: Yeah, well, I've interviewed him. I didn't know that I interviewed him remotely. 00:17:40 Speaker 3: Nice, nice, phenomenal storyteller and like one of those things. And we'll talk about this in another mini but like when you get done speaking to him, you literally want to just put on his entire cannon. 00:17:50 Speaker 1: Yeah, man, Hollywood shuffle the media. Yeah, let me show you something I got right behind me because I didn't know he was going to come up. Yeah, And for the I guess this is just audio, so I'll have to describe. 00:18:00 Speaker 2: Describe it. 00:18:01 Speaker 1: And I just happened to have this. This is the audio reels for Partners in Crime on HBO. This is the audio reel from the television production of that show. And it's very heavy, old two inch tape reels. 00:18:20 Speaker 3: That is, are you somebody like I know you collect things? You spoke in the episode about you know, obviously your boombox collection, But are you, like I know, a mere collects reels? 00:18:28 Speaker 2: Is that part of your thing? Though? 00:18:30 Speaker 1: No, those happened to come into my possession. There was a person who used to work for me as my assistant who had somehow those that come into his possession and he knew I was a big Robert Townsend fan, so he gave them to me. I'm in the process of getting those to Robert now because I got like four of them from different projects that he did see. I'm just trying to get him back to him because when I last I spoke to him about him, he'd be very happy to have them. 00:18:55 Speaker 2: Yeah, that's dope. 00:18:56 Speaker 3: I love when you hear those stories of people help getting, you know, very crucial pieces of memorabilia back to their creators. Is there anything like that in your career that you know is out there and you not even necessarily who has it, but that you would like back. 00:19:11 Speaker 1: Wow, that's a great question. So I feel like I look at old videos of me performing sometimes because I'll put that stuff on my live stream to sort of start it off, Like while I'm setting up, I'll have some old video on me performing playing. And I've always had a table because I've always sort of had my own gear to trigger my beats when I'm on stage, and I used to keep a lot of like very evocative knick knacks on the table. I had a little crown that I used to pass around and have everybody in the crowd touch. I used to have this little ice king from Adventure time figure. I had a robot somebody like a Felt robot somebody had stitched for me. And it's like, I don't know where any of that stuff is now. And I don't think I lost all of these things is in one go. I think just slowly, but surely I would misplace one thing, misplaced another thing. And now I don't really even carry stuff like that anymore. But if anybody ever like found or had one of those things that brought it to me, I'd be able to. 00:20:14 Speaker 2: All right, let's manifest that. 00:20:16 Speaker 3: So one last question, just as we, you know, chit chat about food in Chicago, is there anything about Chicago food that people get That's why I started to ask with the Barracle. 00:20:28 Speaker 2: Like people get wrong. 00:20:29 Speaker 3: I don't mean in media, but just like a misnomer when people show up. 00:20:34 Speaker 2: That they might not. 00:20:35 Speaker 1: Yet I mean, I do take it back to the pizza thing. For one, I do think that as Chicago ones, we are very loud in our support of Deep Dish pizza. But I do think a common misconception is that people think we want to or encourage people to eat that every day. I don't think it's it's not a good idea. It's it's similar to in London. You know, they're famous their their uh fry breakfast or whatever. Oh yeah, yeah, the sausage and the tomatoes and all of the stuff, and they are known for that. But when you go out there and you talk to them and they're like, yeah, we don't eat this every day. That would be impossible. So this is like this is like a Sunday morning thing with family. 00:21:24 Speaker 2: This is not special occasions. 00:21:26 Speaker 1: Yeah yeah, yeah, And so you know that's I think most food misconceptions start there. That, yeah, just because the reason enjoys the thing, people think that that is the staple. Like you know how people in New York they get a slice of pizza almost every day from the corners, Like, you can't do that with this pizza and nobody is asking you to. 00:21:46 Speaker 3: No, you can't do with the Philly cheese steak either, and people assume and they love to talk about it and like, to me, that is a low form of conversation and one of people are genuinely interested with the Philly cheese steak talk. I'm all it's just like, yo, let me know when you're done. 00:22:02 Speaker 1: So people have a lot of cheese steak opinions. 00:22:04 Speaker 3: Oh so many, so many, And it's one of those things. I don't know if this happens with pizza, but like your choice says five other things about. 00:22:12 Speaker 1: You, you know, and you believe that this is true. 00:22:17 Speaker 2: I believe that part is true. 00:22:18 Speaker 3: I've lived here twenty five years for the better part of and yeah, I mean just like if somebody says, you know, they they like this one spot where I probably know how you voted or I know how you see Wow, you know what I mean? 00:22:28 Speaker 2: Like there, it's one of those. It's one of. 00:22:31 Speaker 1: Those you tell on yourself with your. 00:22:33 Speaker 3: One unless you come in and you're like, hey, I know, like, don't get me killed out here, but I like this and here's why. 00:22:40 Speaker 2: There you go. 00:22:40 Speaker 1: But interesting, I don't know I had political implications. I gotta be really careful. 00:22:45 Speaker 2: Well you know, yeah you let But it's funny. 00:22:47 Speaker 3: There's been a lot of cheese steak talk over the years on the show, and Amir's opinions on places and certain spots has evolved and changed, but he shouted out some legendary ones. But yeah, man, it's always great to wrap with you. I wish Gary well on the street this tour. You're gonna come back with some stories. 00:23:03 Speaker 1: You know, always there's always something that's absolutely well. 00:23:07 Speaker 2: Please look out. 00:23:08 Speaker 3: We are dropping new questlov Show episodes on Mondays. These minis are hitting folks during the week or the weekend. You know, let us know if there's anything we can do to help keep this engaging on either side. But I know we have so many great things in the cannon, and I really just enjoy rapping with you. We're gonna get a mirror back on here as soon as he finishes up those roots picnic rehearsals too. 00:23:29 Speaker 1: I could imagine that those are quite daunting. 00:23:32 Speaker 3: Yeah, I'm getting much less correspondence with the man the legend these days, but I know come June first, we'll be back at it. 00:23:40 Speaker 2: So all right, man, until next time, What's 00:23:56 Speaker 1: Love Show is in production of iheartgree to You.