A night of hilarity, pranks and Jackass appreciation! Thank you to long time pal Chris Thuss for joining tonight, and to Michael Morwood as well for your list!
Tonight’s show had three main phases:
Stories and reminiscing pranks
The original 2020 prank calls made to the show, and Michael’s role in them
The Jackass lists and appreciation!
As an added bonus, we received prank calls live on the show from some naughty viewer! And we even had a special drop-in from a certain Meat Man.
Next week I’m taking a break but we will definitely be back by April 23 for a special interview with Polychuck!
The LeBrain Train: 2000 Words or More with Mike Ladano and Chris Thuss
Episode 104 – The April Fool’s Day Episode
It’s April Fool’s Day and I already got in my morning prank! Tonight, in tribute to the new Jackass movie, Jackass Forever, long time pal Chris and I are counting down our Top Five Jackass Pranks. You know those guys did some legendary pranks over the years and they made us laugh, hard. We will be joined by a pre-recorded Michael Morwood with his own list of pranks.
This will not be just a simple Cinco de Listo show, however! Michael, Chris and I will also be reminiscing about different pranks we did to each other over the years. I’ll be running clips of the first prank calls phoned into the show back in March and April of 2020 and getting the inside scoop from one of the parties responsible.
Please join Chris and I tonight as we count down our favourite pranks.
Thussy here again with another Sunday Chuckle. Being a veteran contributor for the WTF column, this one came naturally.
Are these fart panties? Do they freshen the scent or muffle the sound? If the top right of the picture didn’t exist I would just think ok these are maybe some sort of padded biking shorts. Admittedly they looks like they would make long distance bike riding more comfortable. Is the top right of it just to show that they are breathable because it just looks like a fart?
This just looks messed. Is this some sort of medieval torture device that just eventually rips your nail off? The two side arms look like they would rip right through the nail making whatever problem these are supposed to solve so much worse.
$8 for what mouldy bread or cheese or maybe fruitcake? I swear this is some joke item someone trys to sell on eBay. I can just see the write-up now. “I found this wrapped up in the back of my fridge. Don’t remember what it is, eat at your own risk or make your own penicillin from it.”
Russian nesting knives? I’m an amateur cook and have a good set of knives and the one thing I know is you need a strong comfortable knife that are well balanced for weight. These look like they fulfill none of those categories.
I met Thussy back in 2007. He joined the team at work and we became friends immediately. We liked the same stuff. Trailer Park Boys, Guns N’ Roses, comedy. He is responsible for getting me into Super Troopers, which admittedly took a couple tries. We were also both getting married around the same time, so we had similar complaints and gripes to talk about. Drama with bridesmaids and seating plans, egads.
Thuss is a gamer, and we enjoyed chatting games. Axl Rose did a voice (a radio DJ) in the video game Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas. You could switch between stations, and if you chose the rock station you got Axl. It was one of the few things Axl did that was released during that long dry spell between albums. Of course, this led to ample discussions of Chinese Democracy.
“It’s never coming out,” Chris insisted. I hated to say he was right, but it sure seemed that way. He refused to back down on his position. We’d been fucked with by this band for so long. Guns had missed several release dates, so many that it had become a joke. Axl chewed up managers and spat them out like stale bubblegum. Then the Dr. Pepper soda company offered to buy a Dr. Pepper for everyone in America if Axl managed to make his 2008 release date. Axl seemed good-naturedly amused by the idea, offering to share his Dr. Pepper with Buckethead when the album comes out. (This because Dr. Pepper said the only Americans exempt from this offer were former Guns members Buckethead and Slash!)
On October 22 2008, I was working at my desk, listening to the radio when the DJ, Carlos Benevides, announced that they would shortly be playing a brand new single by Guns N’ Roses. It was the title track, a song both Thuss and I were already familiar with. He had a disc of rough mixes for many of the tracks, and I had the Rock In Rio bootleg CD set. We already knew half the new songs, and “Chinese Democracy” was a track I thought smoked. I called Thuss and he listened in as it played.
It sounded like shit on our little mono telephone speakers, but we were listening to brand new Guns! The overall listener reaction was mixed to negative, but I already loved it. “The album’s never coming out,” said Thuss.
“It has to, now. There’s a single out. It’s definitely coming.”
“No.” Thuss was insistent. “It’s never coming out.”
“But Dr. Pepper…” I began before being cut off.
“No. Not coming out. Never.”
The funny thing was, “Chinese Democracy” wasn’t actually the first song released from the album. A month earlier, “Shackler’s Revenge” became the first new Guns song in nine years, when it was released as part of the Rock Band 2 video game, which neither of us had.
A new release date of November 23 was announced. “Nope,” said Thuss. “Nothing is coming out on November 23.” It was, strangely, a Sunday. Generally, nothing came out on Sundays. It was absolutely an odd move that did throw the whole release into question for some.
I asked ye olde Record Store to hold a copy for me. “Do you want vinyl?” he asked. “No, just CD.” It was something I’d regret, when he sold out of the vinyl a week later. I emailed to ask if he had any left. “Do you remember me asking you if you wanted vinyl?” he scolded. “Yeah,” I sulked.
When I walked into the store on November 23 and was handed my precious copy of Chinese Democracy, it was so anticlimactic. There it is. It’s in your hands, the culmination of a decade and a half’s work. You’ve been waiting all this time for this album, and there it sits. An album that had “release dates” going back to 1995 and every single year since. Then, you witness Guns return to the live stage from their cocoon, different but recognizable. You watch them struggle to establish a lineup, and you hear rumour after rumour about song titles and release dates. Then you’re holding a CD in your hands, a pitiful little plastic case with a little paper cover inside. You hand the guy your debit card, he rings it in. Transaction approved, you are handed your receipt. Chinese Democracy goes into a little plastic bag. Even though it’s probably the most expensive and longest gestating album of all time, your little plastic bag weighs the same as if you bought Sex Pistols.
At least I’d be able to show it to Thuss. Monday the 24th rolled around.
“It came out. I have it,” I told him as I strolled into his office.
“No it didn’t. It never came out. It’s never coming out.” He was sticking to his story come hell or high water!
“Yes it did! It’s in my car right now! I’ll show it to you.”
“You have nothing,” he responded, refusing to come and look.
In the years since, Thuss has stubbornly stuck to his guns and his believe that Chinese Democracy has never come out. “I have the unreleased mixes,” he says. “That’s all there is.”
I emailed him to tell him I was writing this story, our tale of the time Chinese Democracy was released.
“So you are going to take a crack at some fictional writing…nice.”
I will never win this one!
So now I have two stories both titled “Chinese Democracy”. I say, why not? Peter Gabriel has three self-titled albums.
I get a lot of hits from people hoping to buy my stuff. This one popped up recently in my search terms:
“vince neil dragon guitar for sale”
Several years ago, the Vince Neil “dragon guitar” by Washburn was on sale so I picked one up. So did my buddy Thuss — except he did sell his. This is his story of how it (eventually) went down.
GETTING MORE TALE #791: The True Story of Thuss’s Vince Neil “Dragon Guitar”
BY THUSS
Lebrain and I had matching guitars for a while, that we both bought at the now defunct Future Shop. They were on clearance and we got them for a really good price ($70 plus tax, originally $300 each, limited to 2500 pieces). They were Washburn dragon guitars which were “autographed” by Vince Neil. The only real autograph in the package was Vince Neil’s actual signature on the certificate of authenticity. After a couple years I decided to sell mine as I never really played it anymore and had moved onto different hobbies.
So I did what everyone else did, and put it up on Kijiji. I wasn’t in a hurry to sell it so I put it up for more than double what I paid for it. I had a few bites, but nothing serious until one guy from Toronto wanted it. He was desperate for it! But there was only one problem: he didn’t drive. First he came to me with an offer of triple what I paid for it if I delivered it to his house. As I said I wasn’t in a hurry to sell it, so I answered no.
I didn’t hear from him for a week or so. Then he emailed back, and asked if I would meet him at the bus station downtown for what I was asking for it. Again I said no, because I hate driving downtown and I didn’t want to pay for parking just to make a sale.
Again a week passed, and he emailed me back. He said “OK”. He’d take about six buses and meet me at my house and he will give me what I’m asking for it. I said sure, and not surprisingly he never showed up.
At this point I had another offer from a dad wanting to buy it for his son. His offer was below what I was asking, but still well above what I paid for it. I accepted, and when they came to pick it up, the son was so happy to have a guitar. He was really excited to start playing, so I’m glad I sold it to someone who would appreciate it.
I thought this was the end of the story but come a month later, the original guy emailed me and said one of his friends was going to drive out to my house so he could pick it up. “Sorry,” I told him, “but I sold it to someone else.”
Guitar-guy immediately emailed me back, and he was pissed! He told me he said he wanted it, and was going to pick it up, so why did I sell it to someone else? I said it was almost two months since he first contacted me and I moved on and sold it to someone else. Finally that got rid of him and I never heard from him again. You meet some “interesting” people on Kijiji. At least I didn’t tell him LeBrain had one too!
My good buddy Thussy came to visit work a couple weeks ago, with his two beautiful daughters, Emily and Megatron (Megan). The girls love to visit my office, probably because I have toys and fidget spinners to play with. They were spending some time in there while Thuss was catching up with someone else.
“Why do you have a picture of my dad in your office?” asked Megan.
“Well,” I explained, “One day your daddy was in here messing with my things…”
“What was he doing to them?” she interrupted excitedly.
“Your daddy was throwing my pens and papers all over my desk, putting tape on my mouse, that sort of thing. I caught him doing it, and took a picture of his guilty face so I could show it to your mommy and she’d know what he was up to.”
The girls laughed. But why did I keep the picture?
“Well the truth is, I just miss having your dad around here and having that picture makes me smile.”
I think that’s the best reason to keep anything. For the smiles.
WTF SEARCH TERMS XLI: Another Guest Thussy edition
Thussy here again, with another instalment of WTF Search Terms. We’ve got a mixed bag of crap people type in and somehow wound up on Lebrain’s blog. So in no particular order, here is my top 10.
1. kiss ladano hotter
I wouldn’t want to kiss Lebrain. He does have a hot sister though.
2. english lebrain sex story
I don’t want to know any of Lebrain’s sex stories.
3. calf suck dick
I’ve bottle fed calves. They bite your fingers hard when you’re feeding them. I would suggest keeping your dick far away from them unless you want a cheap sex change.
4. 60 year olds men
Yes Lebrain looks like a 60 year old man.
5. i would like to hear a song on the cults weapon of choice album
Good for you if you want to read a review on the album you’re in the right place. If you want to hear it go to your local record store and purchase the album. That is the best way to listen to it.
6. snake game for 5.1version
How in the hell does this get them to Lebrain’s blog?
7. turn into pump
See above. On top of that what the hell are you looking for?
8. presinor in paradies song
Webster’s dictionary is available on the app store, download it… use it… love it… spell better.
mikeladano.com 