Nardwuar on his best and worst interviews | Hacker News Reader

Nardwuar on his best and worst interviews

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138 pointsherbertl51 comments

I'd love to learn about Nardwuar's research process. He can uncover what your best friend from 4th grade's favorite flavor of soda was. It's truly amazing.

My theory is that he tracks down the yearbooks of people and then finds and interviews classmates who reveal all sorts of specific and unusual memories.

I think Nardwuar's approach is beautifully disarming in a way the reveals an artist's lack of awareness or humility. Surely that's not always the case, and a person can have their own reasons for not liking the vibe, such as maybe not getting the humour in it all, but that's the impression I get, particularly when they try to keep their front up.

Exactly, his weirdo vibe works because he pairs it with an incredible love for music and respect for the artists he speaks to. I think Drake said it best in the hourlong interview they have together, along the lines of "I don't do interviews because most people want to catch me slipping up and find some dramatic quote to drag me with, but with Nardwuar it's 100% about the music, that's why we're here"

Best example of this is probably the first Pharrell interview. This was before Nardwuar was famous at all, outside of Canada anyway, so Pharrell wouldn't have heard of him, and Pharrell spends the first part of the interview obviously a little weirded out at the goofy-looking guy in front of him and probably wondering why his manager booked this for him in the first place. About five minutes later Pharrell says "This is one of the most impressive interviews I've ever been a part of" and as mentioned in the OP article immediately calls Jay-Z and says hey you gotta talk to this Nardwuar guy.

I had never heard of Pharrell before this interview but he seemed instantly likeable.

Nardwuar confuses people and I think a bit of their true selves comes through (whether that’s passion, narcissism, etc).

When he asks what sounds like an obscure question and the interviewee's face lights up, that is a beautiful moment.

Interesting. Would have thought the worst interview was where the guys from Blur were going to beat him up.

And finding a long lost VHS tape is the most on-brand thing for Kingsgate Mall.

Sonic Youth were dicks to him too.

Honestly whenever I’ve watched an interview with a musician I like they’re mostly either matching his energy or just pleasantly surprised.

Whenever I’ve heard of a bad interview it was never an artist I particularly enjoyed… or even heard of.

Henry Rollins is another good one - I still enjoy watching the expression change on his face when he realized that Nardwuar actually knew his stuff, but he had gone too far down the path of tough guy to save the interview.

Both of the Henry Rollins interviews. The second one really reveals something about Rollins: he accepted a second interview knowing exactly what to expect and nevertheless couldn't help behaving like a dick.

Sonic Youth were dicks to him too.

No they weren't. That's just a meme.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xu0B898X6ow

Disagree, and from the way the Nard was handling the situation (basically taking it all in stride) I don't think he saw that way either.

Narduar changed his style over the years. Today, he’s a lovable goof who’s all about gifts, research and warm fuzzies.

Back in his earlier days, he’d ask intentionally annoying and provocative question as a form of performance art. That some people would react badly seemed to be part of the plan.

Name checks out, reference to Kingsgate Mall checks out, are you a spy!?

Been a fan of Nardwuar since his CiTR days :-)

CITR! There be some 80s memories.

While the research of this guy is certainly impressing, the shtick never failed to repulse me.

It just seems so forced and over the top, and for me personally incredibly annoying.

I get it that it is a love it or hate it kind of thing, so I would be curious to hear about the opinions on people from the other side ?

His interview style is kind of like Sean Evans from Hot Ones crossed with the manic energy of Richard Simmons. It's mentioned in this article, but he tries to ask the questions that nobody else is asking, which can make for great interviews.

But, yeah, his schtick can be incredibly annoying. Part of the fun is watching the interview subject react to it.

The Richard Simmons comparison is PERFECT

If you think about it, he pioneered the style of completely annoying, insufferable yet somehow entertaining content that you see all over TikTok…

But he had to commit to a full interview and release it on classic media, then later on, internet, then finally platforms.

>If you think about it, he pioneered the style of completely annoying, insufferable yet somehow entertaining content that you see all over TikTok…

That's a good thing?

He used to repulse me, but I've gotten used to him and find him endearing now. No, it doesn't make any sense.

He is a genuinely kind person who does some seriously deep research and asks interesting questions.

If you’re ever interested in going down an interesting rabbit hole, you can read a lot of Nardwuar’s interviews transcribed on his website.

Here is one with Drake in 2013:

https://nardwuar.com/nardwuar-vs-drake/

If you read the transcripts, you can cut through the schtick. All that’s left is a very good interviewer with excellent research skills.

If you’re interested in an even deeper rabbit hole, compare some of his interviews to more mainstream interviews with the same artists. Nardwuar has a certain gift for breaking artists out of their perfectly crafted PR messages. I think his interviews tend to be a little more authentic (for good and for bad).

I have the same reaction as you - his persona makes me physically uncomfortable and I feel bad for the artists unless they have the common wholesome reaction to well-done research.

But how much of it is a "shtick"? I take it the guy is just weird. If that's the case, it's not forced or over the top.

> While the research of this guy is certainly impressing, the shtick never failed to repulse me.

"Schtick" implies performance, but I don't think it is an act or performance, I think he's genuinely that high energy and enthusiastic. (Which can certainly be annoying as a personality trait.)

Well, he's been at it since the 1990s, and I distinctly remember people being way less stuffy and easy to annoy back then

I dunno your age or background, but FWIW I feel like his shtick made a lot more sense in the context of early 90s Canadian media.

The zeitgeist was unpretentious, goofy, "slack", earnest-but-also-ironically-detached. So Gen X, but also MuchMusic in 1993 was a lot more like MTV in 1983, except as run by terminally uncool Midwesterners - it almost had the low-budget energy of public access. Weird Al (who has a similar shtick, now that I think about it) would take over the channel over the holidays, and they had an annual New Years tradition where they'd chuck a Christmas tree off the roof of their studio. One of their hosts was a foul-mouthed sock puppet. Growing up in Toronto, for a time it felt an awful lot like the biggest song in the world was "If I Had $1000000" by the Barenaked Ladies.

Nardwuar fit right in, in that media environment - not to say he wasn't sui generis, even then! But I can understand that, divorced of that context, he might just seem like a weirdo.

Oh man, how’d I forget about the Christmas tree and Ed. You just hit me with the 90s so hard.

I used to watch LOUD religiously and I imagine I thought that made me pretty hardcore. I knew about slipknot before they were cool (I probably thought)!

The best thing about Loud is how the promos featured bits of Cryptopsy and Morbid Angel videos that almost never actually showed up on the channel.

It did seem like the 90s were a bit more jovial of a time, and people who grew up during it identify nostalgically with the dolls and merch and sillyness of it all. I guess I never thought otherwise, Nardwuar's always been intuitively compelling to me, because I do think people tend to not let themselves feel vulnerable comedically, particularly in Vancouver, but I have heard of some locals not liking his thing.

I loved MuchMusic, which is really weird considering I grew up in Texas. For some reason our local cable company didn't have MTV, and so that meant that so much of my adolescence was influenced by TV from Canada.

Don't forget Speakers Corner.

I came to Canada in the late 90s, entered my tween/teen years around 9/11 and I saw the general tone of [D|V]Js really shift into weird territory as I got older. I also recall watching the Zone when I was 10 and then seeing it on TV about 5 years later when a friend's younger brother put it on while I was over. Was really shocked to see what I felt as really pandering and patronizing behaviour by the hosts where Phil Guerrero and Paul (can't remember his surname) were really down to earth and laid back. There was some measure, at least to my young, potentially overly naive eyes, of sincerity from TV hosts that I never really saw again.

His YouTube channel is a fun place to deep dive if you are into music at all. Is schtick can be a little bit grating, but some of the reactions from artists to the amount of research and understanding he has about their origins can be really fun to watch.

Also, he has his very first interview up from when he was a kid which is kind of cool: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=002S7Bho3jE

I'm on your side.

He has met lots of interesting artists, but most of his interviews are devoid of value, don't communicate anything, uncomfortable to watch, he often comes off disrespectful and patronizing. The bombardment with factoids is super random too, he picks stuff from old magazines and many answers to that are "what are you talking about, no idea where you got that from". Or "omg, no way, who told you that", but it's always some irrelevant trivia.

I understand that some people find his persona entertaining, he is an iconic interviewer in some sense, but not a good one.

I disagree, a lot of the interviews are quite humanizing and entertaining to watch (entertainment has value) and plenty of them being up early musical influences and encounters which might not be covered as much elsewhere (sometimes even forgotten by the artist themselves)

I think researching a guest for an interview is more about understanding what they are doing and trying to convey, less about digging into obscure facts. Obscure facts may be interesting, but not when it's 100% of the interview.

His newer videos have shifted towards this "adorable weirdo" persona, but he used to be really tactless and I am sure he knew what he was doing.

I never saw him as patronizing and disrespectful. That is unless you put artist and celebrity on a pedestal where you think the common rabble shouldn't be asking certain questions.

If he were to come up to me and asked me all of these really interesting questions that he really shouldn't know to ask I would be flattered I would be like how the hell does this guy know all this about me... But I've always wanted to be asked...

His newer videos are probably okay, but his 90s interviews have questions like "do you still want to commit suicide?" [1], "from my research I got rumors that you slept with such and such person..." [ibid.], "there is a rumor that your cock is shaped like a soup can" [2] etc. How is this respectful, appropriate, relevant? He's also plain rude with the artists he dislikes for some reason. See Beck [3] or the Strokes. He often interrupts people and doesn't let them answer his questions.

If the goal is to break the interviewee, there are more clever and subtle ways to do that.

[1] https://www.serviette.ca/nardwuar-com/vs/lydia_lunch/index.h...

[2] https://www.serviette.ca/nardwuar-com/vs/henry_rollins/pg3.h...

[3] https://www.serviette.ca/nardwuar-com/vs/beck_hansen/index.h...

> Whenever I scroll down, the spinning ball of death appears. It’s like when you try to check someone’s old Tumblr page out. It usually takes me 20 minutes to get to the bottom of a document.

Yes, Tumblr profiles doesn't have pagination, is all progressive loading when scrolling down [1], but there is an archive page where you can pick the month/year of posts [2] ;)

[1] https://www.tumblr.com/3000s

[2] https://3000s.tumblr.com/archive

Often things are popular that I don't like but can understand why they are popular. Even in cases like "Hawk Tuah" I kinda get how these meme blow up and create celebs which people follow as a new form of pop culture.

But Nardwuar is one of those that every time I listen to an interview of his, I just don't get it. Like at all. His persona isn't just fake but overly exaggerated and annoying. It reminds of the people in my school who would do something stupid and say, "I'm so random haha!"

His vibe makes me feel uncomfortable and I often feel celebs feel uncomfortable in his presence but try to play along because they don't want offend or upset. Some really like his vibe, but many seem uncomfortable.

He'd be way better if he just dropped the early 00s "I'm so random" crap. That said, I don't really follow his stuff because I find him so annoying. Perhaps I am missing something.

> That said, I don't really follow his stuff because I find him so annoying. Perhaps I am missing something.

Yeah, you are definitely missing something, go watch some interview compilations from him. You will absolutely know why he is popular. Don't judge a book by its cover

I may have been understating the amount I've watched his stuff. I watch a lot of interviews with music artists so I've watched a lot of his interviews over the years. I meant it in the sense that I'm not a fan so don't actively follow his content.

I just watched a compilation as you suggested and I can't say my opinion has changed.

And to be clear, I'm aware this is a me thing. The reason I left the comment is because I know he's popular and people like his stuff, it's just that I don't get it. I guess I wondered to what extent that's just me or if others find his interview style annoying too.

I think in 2024, if you're looking for people who share your annoyance with any given thing, and particularly annoyance with any given media personality, you will be able to find them. A triumph of social media. It warms the heart.

Frankly, I don't get you don't get it. You can read the comment section in every of his videos and get a sense of why the popularity. I will try to explain it here for the record.

Basically it is all about how well he treat his interviewees. He makes a lot of research on somewhat obscure but fun facts about someone's life, like some trivia from his time as a child, some bands he was a fan in the past, etc. Sometimes he also brings gifts valuable to the person being interviewed, like the VHS tape he gave to Snoop Dogg. It is not only about being a quirky character, but also making some famous person very comfortable, a lot of people like that approach, maybe because your a fan of the person being interviewed, or just because it is nice to see famous people's normal life before the fame. Nardwuar is also a very nice guy, despite his persona.

>Even in cases like "Hawk Tuah" I kinda get how these meme blow up and create celebs which people follow as a new form of pop culture

Because by and large people are terminally boring?

His Lydia Lunch interview struck me as particularly acrimonious

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E92qnnRlQ2w

All three of them are trying not to break their character, and it's uncomfortable to watch. Many of his questions are inappropriate and disrespectful, I'm more surprised they could stand 15 minutes of this before walking off.

Imagine if there was a Nardwuar for developers and hackers. Not the same awkward, stilted, or just canned interview question stuff but actual Gonzo journalism, getting in there and being able to talk shop but also at the same time disarm the nerd so they divulge more personal and sensitive things so you could get more of a feel for things.

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