Unabridged: Poptimism in the Age of Beyoncé with Sam Sanders
It's Cowboy Carter SZN and we're breaking down Beyoncé's latest tour with friend of the pod and podcast host extraordinaire Sam Sanders. We talk about Queen Bey's latest tour, the good and the not so good, plus our thoughts on Blue Ivy's exposure and the future of stadium tours. We also quickly gab about the Pulitzer drama, Gwenyth Paltrow, and Lionel Richie.
TRANSCRIPT
Traci Thomas 0:00
Hey everybody. It's Traci Thomas, host of the Stacks, and I am here with another episode of the Stacks Unabridged. Our bonus episode, exclusive to Patreon and substack subscribers. Today I'm going to be talking about the Cowboy Carter world tour with friend of the podcast and podcaster extraordinaire Sam Sanders. We get into what we loved and didn't love so much about the concert and our thoughts about stadium tours in general. We also talk about Blue Ivy Carter, the Tribeca Film Festival, and Gwyneth Paltrow, this is Sam and Traci at our most chaotic best. Let's get to the cowboy Carter world tour with Sam Sanders. You
okay, guys, it's bonus episode with everyone's favorite person, Sam Sanders, Sam, welcome back.
Sam Sanders 0:57
No, sir.
Traci Thomas 0:59
I gotta live up to the intro I don't like. It's like, at what point do I stop giving people who come on the show regularly, and that everyone who listens to my podcast listens to probably twice a week, as I do. But I guess if you don't know Sam, you're new here. He is a co host of the vibe check podcast. He is also the host of the SAM Sanders show by Sam Sanders, produced and created by Sam Sanders of Sam Sanders fame. Also shout out to KCRW. And now, wait now you're a judge for the Tribeca audio award. Tell me about this.
Sam Sanders 1:30
Yeah, it's funny. Everyone's like, oh my god, congrats. And I'm like, it's just more work. So it is more work. You know, Tribeca started out as just the film festival, but they added an audio portion. I don't know how many years ago, but recently, and in fact, last year, said Zach and I did a vibe check taping at Tribeca audio. We interviewed Lena waith, producer extraordinaire, wonderful human. But now that they know I'm down to do stuff with Tribeca, they were like, you want to judge, which is great. We will just searching podcasts. We're judging podcasts. Is it all three of you? No, it's me, and then other folks from throughout the industry got it. I don't know who the other ones are, but I do know when they asked me to do it, and I said, yes, they sent me this little form letter that was like, thank you from Robert De Niro. And it's like, All right, that's cool. That's your payment. Girl. That's it. That's it. Yeah,
Traci Thomas 2:27
how many podcasts they think you're gonna have to listen to? Like, how many episodes of a show, like, do you have to consider? Do you know any of that?
Sam Sanders 2:33
Let me actually just tell you I can pull up the email because my deadline to listen is very soon. Oh, shit. I mean, listen, I can't say anything. You judge book competitions. That is, I did it one time and Okay, probably never again. You told me about it when it happened. How many books did
Traci Thomas 2:50
you have to read? We considered 140 books.
Sam Sanders 2:53
Oh, no, see, this is me listening to five podcast episodes.
Traci Thomas 2:57
Oh, that's it, yeah. Oh, I thought, okay, okay, okay, and they already probably whittled it down.
Sam Sanders 3:04
They whittled it down, and you're just picking, yeah, I am plotting a little quick Vegas trip with a friend for later this month that will be our homework for the drive.
Traci Thomas 3:16
Oh, perfect, done. Okay, but do you know what happened with the Pulitzer Prize this year
Sam Sanders 3:21
for fiction? I know they were awarded. Well, Percival one, right?
Traci Thomas 3:25
Percival one, yeah, it was drama, and we don't want you to be drama when you're a judge. Wait,
Sam Sanders 3:30
what was the drama? Tell me, okay, so,
Traci Thomas 3:34
yeah, you're gonna be okay. So the way that the Pulitzer works, for some of you listening, this is old news, but some of you might not know this. So the way the way the Pulitzer works is that it's run by Columbia, and there's a Pulitzer board, and these people are like, I think appointed for a long time, yeah, and they vote on the finalists, sort of like, what you're gonna do? Every category gets three finalists, and then they vote on those three. Oh, yeah, so, but they have a committee who goes before and goes through it down. Yes, exactly. So in the fiction category, I believe the head of the committee said they read over 600
Sam Sanders 4:06
books. Do you believe that, when you hear that? I
Traci Thomas 4:09
do, because I don't believe they finished 600 I believe they start and they go 20 pages and they're like, You know what I'm done. So
Sam Sanders 4:17
the lesson here is, make that first chapter good, damn it. Yes, that's right.
Traci Thomas 4:21
So they submitted their three finalists. Okay, wait. Let me backtrack. Okay, if the Pulitzer board does not like the three finalists or does not think any of them are winners, they have three options. They can award no prize, which they did. I believe in 2012 that's mean, yeah, they could just literally be like, nobody's good enough for us, damn. Um, they can award two prizes, like, if they can't agree on a winner, they could award two prizes, which they did a few years back for demon Copperhead and trust, okay, they can say to the to the committee, we don't love any of these. Can you give us one more? Or by three quarters majority? They can pick. They can add a book and pick it as their winner. This year, there were four nominees in the
Sam Sanders 5:06
category, so they added one in post, which one added one in post
Traci Thomas 5:09
or the group? So they asked the group to submit a fourth book. But either way, we know that the book that was submitted was James, because if James had been in the original it would have just won. After this, the head of the whittling down committee, MERV Emre, she posted on her Instagram. Never
Sam Sanders 5:30
do that. No, this is what I'm saying within within an hour, messy, messy. And she was
Traci Thomas 5:36
like, I'm very troubled by the state of books. We are too worried about what readers are like, about reducing
Sam Sanders 5:43
Percival in this situation. This is
Traci Thomas 5:46
what I'm saying. I don't have the exact quote. I don't have the exact quote, but it was something along the lines of, when the state of books is like, it's not doing well, and with the cuts of funding, it's only gonna get sicker. So when you read a book that really excites you, like then, you know, it's really special. Congratulations to our finalists. And then it was the three books that didn't win, and the board selected
Sam Sanders 6:13
winner, not just winner, the selected winner. She's saying, I don't think this thing should have won. I need to see her face.
Traci Thomas 6:21
And then an hour later, she edited it just to say, and the winner, because they snatched, that's right, you better fucking not. I was with my girlfriend, Sarah. We were in Lake Tahoe having our little reading retreat, and Sarah screenshotted it because she was like, holy shit. And then when we went there was an article that came out, like, a few hours later on lit hub, and they had not the original post. And I was like, oh my god, Sarah, you have the news? No. So anyways, they basically the judge, or the committee was like, we don't think James is good. And the board was like, babes, get your head out of your ass. Stop being bitches. And it's the best book of the year, and everybody knows it. And then this woman, MERV, was like, I cannot. I don't even know I'm saying her name, right? But she was like, I cannot handle the fact that we failed, so I'm gonna talk shit about the board slash Percival. And they basically, like, made this award about them. So anyways, don't do that, Sam. Don't listen. Yeah. Don't make Don't be like, Can we get a sixth one? No, it's funny. And then, and then, oh, wait, this is another part of it. So the three books that were originally finalists were all by women. And so then people tried to be like, they brought a man in, blah, blah, blah. But then I went back because I was like, I don't like this narrative. I went back in the last 20 years. So okay, obviously the Pulitzer is not like, Yay, we celebrate diversity, so I'm not gonna like, defend the Pulitzer for the last 200 years. Yeah, but in the last 20 years, there have been 20 winners, but one year there wasn't an award, and one year there were two, but there's 20 winners. Eight of those winners have been women. 12 have been men. One winner who won two times was a black man. Was it Colson Whitehead? There have been no other black winners in that entire 20 year period. So I'm sort of like, I get it. We want women to win. But also, let's not pretend like this has been a fucking black people like that. Percival is somehow, yeah, it's not going into Jonathan Franzen, yeah.
Sam Sanders 8:30
Also, the book is really good, and he did something remarkable. The book is remarkable.
Traci Thomas 8:35
And the moment everybody read it, we all said, this should win. So it's not as if they like it's clearly that the committee went rogue here, and not the board. Because I think sometimes the board maybe goes rogue, but I think everybody sort of agreed this was going to be the winner, and then it became this whole thing of like, oh, they had to bring a man in. I'm like, Well, okay, a black man also, we don't have to do the identity politics thing here. This is just the best book of the year. Also,
Sam Sanders 9:03
they not. They don't need this drama when people are reading less than ever. Anyway. That's what I'm saying. You should just be encouraging the reading of the books and the books that were written, and they're all good and hooray. Please buy some fucking books.
Traci Thomas 9:17
And also,vif you're on the committee and they do this to you. You just take the L, you wait a year, and then you're like, Did I ever tell you guys about when I was a judge on the like to do it within the hour?
Sam Sanders 9:27
That's messy. I've it's messy. I've sat on smaller awards giving bodies before, and I just assumed the cardinal rule was like, You never talk about the finalist ever. You just don't, because so to do so would be tacky. I'm sorry. It's tacky.
Traci Thomas 9:45
It's tacky. And finalists, so the other finalists were Rita Bullwinkle, who wrote headshot. She's a debut. I always get up. It's either 1961 mice by Stacy. Levine, I think, and then Gail Jones, who's a black woman who's never one, who is like a literary GREAT, THE UNICORN woman, yeah.
Sam Sanders 10:08
Well, you know, the only woman I would have given it to over Percival, and I wouldn't, is my girl with the all fours, Miranda, July,
Traci Thomas 10:18
his wife, dancy,
Sam Sanders 10:22
they have one in their home now, like
Traci Thomas 10:25
they're not giving that award to fucking Miranda. July, are you out?
Sam Sanders 10:30
She's too she is not the authorial prestige that these finalists are, but of the books that rocked my socks the most, she was up there.
Traci Thomas 10:41
You know that book has been so controversial in the stacks community. I know stacks people hate it. I think in the world, half people love it, half people hate it. I have recused myself from this book. I've just said, you know, not gonna read it. Don't wanna have an opinion, because I know I'll have a strong one, and I don't wanna read it.
Sam Sanders 10:56
Don't care. Listen, it doesn't make me want to be closer to Miranda, July as a person, but I'm saying as a read. I was like, wow. Also, that said, speaking of danzy, you know, we saw her at her talk at La Dance Festival of Books. She was like, when are we going out for drinks again? So Traci, when are we going out for drinks again? With dancy, yes. Make it happen. Let's do it Okay? Done. Also, what is dandy? Said about the mess? Because Dan, they don't mind mess, and she'll get into.
Traci Thomas 11:25
Well, I don't know. I heard from her. She's not on social media. He's on social media.
Sam Sanders 11:31
I mean, if I'm new, group text, I—
Traci Thomas 11:33
Know if I'm her, if I'm her, I I can't wait to run into Murph.
Sam Sanders 11:39
Oh, well, you know, MERV ain't gonna show her face for a few months on the streets. I know events for her. Oh, is she? Is she proud of it?
Traci Thomas 11:46
She's a literary critic. You know, she's very high minded. She's got a podcast called The critic and her Publix, or something like that. I listened. I listened once, okay? And then I tried to listen the second time, and it was just a little too hoity toity for me. You know, I like to keep my criticism low level, like that was bad. That's my criticism. I'm not giving you, you know, existential dread
Sam Sanders 12:12
also, just to loop back on personal one. I'm such a fan. I actually was able to interview him for the BBC when he was making rounds for James, a brilliant mind, lest we forget, he also was the he also was in the midst of award season for a different kind of award, when the adaptation of his book won an Oscar for Best Adapted Screenplay for our friend cord Jefferson. And okay, yeah. So all I can say is, if Percival Everett's writing is good enough for the Oscars, I think it's also good enough for the Pulitzers, and
Traci Thomas 12:51
he was already a Pulitzer finalist. It's not like, that's my thing. I'm just like, it's not like he just wrote one novel and people liked it. This is like, his 30th book in 40 years. He's one of our literary he's
Sam Sanders 13:02
one of our guys. He's one of our guys. And this
Traci Thomas 13:05
book is his most commercial. But he has been pushing boundaries in literature since the 1980s like, what are we talking about here, this idea that he's like some commercial darling, that he is, you know, Miranda July, or somebody that, like people love and just read her books, no matter what, even though I know she's like avant garde in her film work, he's not. He's a career writer. He published with the small press his entire career, until James this idea that, like he is some that he's something that he's not really pisses like it really gets under my
Sam Sanders 13:40
also read erasure, the book on which America we did it for book based. Okay, good. So your folks have read it? Yeah, exactly. It was that. And I remember I couldn't listen to that one yet because I was still happy through the book now, well, you had to go
Traci Thomas 13:53
back and listen. Yeah. Okay. Listen up, everybody. Sam and I saw cowboy Carter night two here in Los Angeles, the night she brought out. Are we the same night came out? Yeah, don't you remember texting me and then me texting you? We've got to do an emergency podcast when we were literally three quarters through the episode, and
Sam Sanders 14:11
we can't read it anytime.
Traci Thomas 14:15
Okay, so we went and saw Beyonce separately, but on the same night, and we have thoughts about it, yes, and I think we should both just start by saying this, we are big Beyonce fans. How many times did you see Renaissance?
Sam Sanders 14:27
I saw Renaissance four times in two countries. Okay, one of my favorite live shows ever. It's
Traci Thomas 14:36
so it was so good. I saw it once. But this is my fourth Beyonce concert I have seen on the run, formation, World Tour, Renaissance, and now this so I have given her my money. I am a fan of her work. I love her. And I also want to say that all the criticism that I have for her is, as she would say, because she is one of one, the only one, number one. She even this. To me, is at a higher level than anything else I've ever seen. But I do have notes, yeah,
Sam Sanders 15:05
this is, this is the challenge of critiquing a star like Beyonce, because you know that you love her, you know that you understand and accept her as one of the best live performers in American music history. Yes. You know, we get one every 25 years. It was Michael before her. Like no question, yeah, so we accept that. But I also think that the challenge with critiquing Beyonce or discussing Beyonce critically is that so many fans of hers are full members of the Church of poptimism, and we know what populism is. Once you love your star, they can do no wrong. I thought this was a Taylor Swift phenomenon for the longest time. It's also a Beyonce phenomenon. It is. It is complicated by issues of gender and race, obviously. But I think when you talk about Beyonce, a lot of people who like her think that any critique is a dis of her, and in some instances, a dis of like a certain kind of black womanhood. So I acknowledge that exists, and I still think that we're allowed to speak critically about her. I also reject conversations that act as if Beyonce needs us to be on her side or defend her. At this point, she is the most powerful woman in pop and one of the most powerful women in the world. She can take a mid review,
Traci Thomas 16:25
I think that's right, and I and I liked, I would like to believe as a person, yeah, who is a fan of Beyonce because of her intense drive and perfectionism, that she actually would appreciate criticism of her work well, and she would like it, and that it would fuel her to do better. And she's
Sam Sanders 16:45
already implemented criticism of the show by changing the set list several times to include more songs that aren't on cowboy Carter. She added a whole oldie set after the first night, so she she she actually critiques herself in real time.
Traci Thomas 17:01
Yes, and I think, like, that's what I that's the thing I hate about I love this term poptimism, because I just know what it takes to be like, decent at something, because I know how much hard work it takes to be decent at something, and so I can only imagine how much hard work it takes to be great at something. And when we make it so that you can't criticize someone who is like firing on all cylinders, you sort of belittle their work and sort of like make them smaller than the thing that they are and what they've created. Like you take away the fact that even Beyonce in real time is adjusting to herself, and is like being critical and thoughtful and reflective of her art and improving in real time. And that is no small thing. And I think when people you can't say anything about her, it's like, why the fuck not? Like she's saying stuff about herself. She's real time feedback. Yeah, I just, I really, as a person who loves criticism, not but everybody else is I hate, I
Sam Sanders 17:58
agree. Well, we also do this thing where the stronger and more powerful a pop star becomes, the more people who love them feel the intense desire to treat them with kid gloves. Yes, it's people were hurt on Beyonce when she wasn't this powerful.
Traci Thomas 18:13
I know it's so weird. And I mean, I feel like, you know who else like this goes for, and I'm sort of guilty of this because I love the mess. But like Kendrick, I feel like we've gotten to a point now where it's like, you can't even say anything about Ken
Sam Sanders 18:25
right here and own it. I love Kendrick, but sometimes he's a bit Hotep in nice tone, woman kind of way. Let's have
Traci Thomas 18:33
it for sure. I'm really just locked into recent Kendrick hating Drake, because, as you famously know I hate Drake so much,
Sam Sanders 18:43
but I feel my biracial friends hate Drake. It's
Traci Thomas 18:46
self loathing. Honestly, it's like he's embarrassing us. Can you not? We already have so much to deal with, and you're over here posing with 7000 bras in a warehouse, like you're so embarrassed. Why
Sam Sanders 18:58
I forgot about that such a fucking a loser. What's that? Okay? What's that interlude from the Frank Ocean album, blonde, where, like the Auntie's voice is like an unconcerned they
Speaker 1 19:10
become sluggish, lazy, stupid and unconcerned. That's
Sam Sanders 19:16
how I feel about Drake, just an unconcerned little man.
Traci Thomas 19:20
I'm not a Frank Ocean person. I'm sorry.
Sam Sanders 19:23
Next on Patreon, yeah,
Traci Thomas 19:27
I know this is really an unpopular opinion. I'm gonna make you a playlist. I'm gonna make you a playlist. You don't have to listen to it all. You don't have to. I like, I like channel orange, fine. I think blonde is a little too sad, but
Sam Sanders 19:37
is out there. Blonde is the language of psychedelics meets weed, that is an album and sad and just like, he's, he's a depressed girlie,
Traci Thomas 19:47
yeah, I can't handle it. I need I ended up. That's why I like. That's why I like. Knew Kendrick. He's so up tempo, hating Drake. He's like, I hate you. I hate you. We're having so much fun. I hate you. I hate you, and I love. Bad. Okay, so big picture, yeah, what did you think of cowboy Carter? Yeah? What? What's the big talking point for you
Sam Sanders 20:09
overall? Yeah, so it's I need to walk there from moving from seeing Renaissance alive several times to feeling kind of mid on the album to my thoughts on the cowboy Carter show. So I saw Renaissance four times. I played Renaissance the album, probably every day for a year straight. I've got the vinyl over here and bought a record player just to play the vinyl. It has become one of my like foundational albums, like D'Angelo second album, several of Stevie's, a lot of prints, and then, like, Renaissance is there on that list? Like, it's just, it's, it is such a cohesive work. You put it on, it's top to finish. You don't stop there. No skips. It is a well curated, hour long DJ set. The amount of music history she fits in dance songs is wild, like it is phenomenal, and the tour was just as fulfilling for me. Flash forward to cowboy Carter coming out. I just don't love the album, and my largest critique is that it's not cohesive. It gave me whiplash as a listener, and I want to say Linda Z O lads of The New York Times said it best. Cowboy Carter is less of an album and more of a thesis. Beyonce is proving in this album to Grammy voters that she knows her music history and deserves the award because she's the best student, and you hear her doing a presentation on the history of country and it's racialized history throughout the album, and that is powerful. I don't think that's that's something different than an album. And so my critique of the album was that I really only liked eight of the songs, and I wanted to. I didn't have any desire to go to COVID Carter because of that, because I knew I knew I liked it so much less than Renaissance, but I still respect it. Its brilliance. Technically, it's brilliant. She is an incredible musician who works with incredible musicians, so like, yeah, yeah. You have to give her points just for, like, the artistry of it, yeah, but it wasn't my jam. It didn't flow for me in the way that a good album flows. All this to say I kind of said I wasn't going to go to cowboy Carter unless I got free tickets. Lo and behold, got free tickets a friend of mine who worked of mine who works in entertainment, was like, You want us to come sit in the Paramount box? I was like, Yo girl, that's free, yeah. And so I just went in with not high hopes, yeah. And I think my review is best summed up by what my friend said to me when Beyonce was finishing one song that concludes with her singing opera. There's a song on COVID Carter that ends with opera. So she starts to sing opera in SoFi stadium. And I look at my friend because I'm like, This is impressive. And he looks to me and he goes, this is so impressive. It would probably be better if I could just hear Beyonce sing opera in an opera house. And I got it like besides feeling so so on the album, Beyonce, as an artist and a performer, has gotten too good for loud football stadiums. There were so many songs that she did there off of cowboy Carter that just deserve better acoustics than an echo stadium. You hear her singing alligator tears, a song I've struggled to love, but like I wanted to hear it live, it was just an echoey, guitary mess. And that's no fault of Beyonce is. It's the venue. Yeah, I think that Renaissance worked so well because the songs of Renaissance are made for dancing communally in a stadium. Yes, so much of cowboy Carter is not that. So I left cowboy Carter the tour saying to myself, have we reached peak stadium tour? Has Beyonce done the greatest stadium tour of the modern era, and is it time to give that up and push our biggest pop stars to other kinds of live performance, right? I don't know. Like put it on unplugged, that's what I want, yeah, anywho, that's a long review. Yeah,
Traci Thomas 24:04
okay, so I agree with a lot of this, my big takeaway, which, of course, you know, I'm not surprised that our takeaways are different because you have a music background, so you think more musically than I do, and I have, like, a theater dance background. So most of my critique comes from, like, the storytelling Pro, I felt like there were storytelling problems.
Sam Sanders 24:22
It was jerky. Like, what is the story of this, of this show, right?
Traci Thomas 24:26
So I feel like in previous concerts, she's had a very clear thesis. And when COVID Carter started, it felt extremely clear to me what was happening. Like, the show starts, she comes out. She does American Requiem, she sings a song, she goes into the national anthem. This big phrase flashes on the wall and red and black, and it's like, you can't ask for something that you built yourself, or whatever. She goes right into freedom. She goes into Blackbird and like, it's like, oh, okay, we're doing a black. American history, rooted in the south, rooted in country music, rooted in telling our stories. And that takes us through the first like third of the show, and I am locked fuck in like when she goes from ya ya into, why don't you love me? And I'm like, of course, these songs are in conversation. The melding she picked the songs from her back catalog that felt almost country like or like matched the other songs on cowboy Carter. I'm like, This is so clear. And then we go to the saloon. She starts over there with Texas Hold'em, yeah, all of her little friends, which
Sam Sanders 25:36
I still think sounds kind of kids, bop to me. I'm sorry. So okay.
Traci Thomas 25:39
So she goes, she goes to Texas Hold'em. And the night we saw it, she has like, jean shorts on, like a little like, white rhinestone. She's looking like furry pooper. She's every time she looks great. She looks great. She's Asian in reverse. She's amazing. Um, but her, her dancers are wearing these like, mismatch Jean outfits. They have these, like, silly hats on. And I pause, and I go, this is giving musical theater. This is giving I'm gonna go down to the saloon with my friends and sing a few songs, and we're and like, you know, the dancers are sort of like, acting like, oh, there's Beyonce singing the song. And then she just gives us the backlist catalog songs, like she's just singing at a bar, and I'm like, oh, all of the storytelling you were doing, all of the American history, all of the like radical, you know, Beyonce level radical. So I'm not, I'm not gonna say you know, but you know, all of the like thesis of the album, which you talked about, that I felt was present in the show as it should be, because it is the thesis of the album just goes out the window. I'm like, why are you doing if I were a boy, what does that have to do? What does irreplaceable have to do with any of this? If there's no country, there's nothing and so I'm thinking, either, you know, I'm like, How could she have fixed this? Because that's, you know, how my I'm like, How does this story work better if she wants to do these old songs, she either should have started the show in the saloon, like small like, Oh, it's just me and my pals, and then blow it up into this bigger thing, or do what a normal person does in a concert and just don't come out in a cowboy outfit. Just come out as Beyonce. You don't have to be in cowboy themed clothes the whole time. You could just do a little like cowboy, cowboy, back, back, come out in a gown. Because, like, even with Renaissance, she started in the gowns was not really Renaissance related. And then she was like, okay, but it's Renaissance time. But
Sam Sanders 27:34
in the thing about that, though, it was a clear two act structure, the open was slow songs and ballads. And then as soon as you're in Renaissance, you're in Renaissance, you're
Traci Thomas 27:43
in Renaissance, right? And this one, it got muddy in the middle, and like, I don't think she ever was able to come back, because after that she goes into the opera moment, she tries to go back, sort of, there's
Sam Sanders 27:53
some Renaissance, but then it's like, all these two, yeah. And I'm like,
Traci Thomas 27:57
wait, we're in Renaissance, but you're still in a cowboy outfit. And it just like, I felt like the thesis, like the arc of the story, which she usually does so good, was just not there for this one.
Sam Sanders 28:10
And also, here's the thing that looms so large over all of this, had we not just seen renaissance and loved it just two years before, where we've all just been like, wow, this is the best stadium show ever. Cowboy car to Beyonce is better than everyone else because you compare it to the arrows tour,
Traci Thomas 28:26
it's still, it's still better than everyone else. It's just not as good as what she gave us just before. And I always thought that this tour, like to your point, should have been a sit down at the grand old Opry. I thought it's gone to Nashville, and then like, Fuck Nashville. Yeah, you guys come here. I'm gonna bring all my people here. You just watched me do this. I'm gonna, you know, and she could still hit some moves, still do her little choreo, but I just felt like, I felt like they lost the plot. Yeah,
Sam Sanders 28:54
I think larger and structurally, when thinking of like, moving through the phases of your career, we might have thought differently about this tour, had it either been a different kind of venue and setting, I thought it's gonna go to the sphere for a while, or even the grand, smaller venue, more sit down intimate or wait a few more years before your next stadium tour. Yeah, this is really, this is a, this is not that much time to wait before launching a brand new stadium tour,
Traci Thomas 29:26
right? Yeah, and like, again, I think, like, I have friends who saw her for the first time and were like, that was amazing, because it's still amazing. Her vocal was better on this tour than on Renaissance. I felt like I felt like she like Her singing was better, like some of her, like lower notes just felt so rich. But that's also because when we saw, at least when I saw renaissance in LA, it was towards the end. La was the first city, so maybe it was just like fatigue, but I definitely was like, she sounds better than ever to me. Yeah.
Sam Sanders 29:58
Well, and here is also. Other problem that an artist like Beyonce faces, she has been doing really good pop music, really good R and B since I was in eighth grade, right? And if you are Beyonce and saying, all right, this is my what, fifth, sixth stadium tour. And I know that there are some folks that have been here forever, some folks who like three songs, some folks who know it all you at a certain point begin to feel an obligation to make sure you sing enough of your own song so that everyone leaves satisfied. So then she has to break away from Cowboy Carter, because that's actually her least popular album of the last few. But in Renaissance, you know, yeah,
Traci Thomas 30:39
but I feel like what I liked that she did, and she did it at Renaissance too, is when she picked her old songs and made them fit the theme into the theme. Like, that's what I thought was cool about. Why don't you love me? Because I was like, she's doing, yeah, she's doing it. Oh shit.
Sam Sanders 30:52
I learned you flash forward. So like, the last sort of the show, she's just doing rapid hits in succession. Yeah.
Traci Thomas 30:57
Okay, yeah, okay. And I feel like, I feel like the specificity of making it fit in the show is the thing that she does so well, similarly to, like her Coachella set right, like she was, like, melding old songs with the new songs, making them do the whole marching band thing. Like, yeah, you know when she brought out Solange and they do the what tap, you know, we maybe that one, yeah, like it was like, of course, this song feels so HBCU, it feels so like playful and it fits. And she has so many songs that she could have done, but she's usually so good at picking the right song for the right moment and either modulating it to fit or knowing that, of course, daddy lessons goes here like there's no questions asked. Yeah, we had to hear daddy lessons
Sam Sanders 31:44
Exactly. Well also as just like between watching Beyonce now in the convertible, this time not the horse, and then seeing Taylor Swift in tiktoks popping up out of the state and floor in a different outfit every three songs, and yeah, watching pink continue to like, cartwheel and do Cirque du Soleil and all of her stadium shows. I am at this point as a consumer of popular culture over stadium shows. I Yeah, it's time for a new way for top level pop stars to see their fans and do shows for their fans. Sorry, I
Traci Thomas 32:21
yeah, I feel like that's why I was sort of into Coachella this year. Obviously, I didn't go I'm old, but I usually am, like, roll my eyes at Coachella. But it was sort of fun seeing people do like, a more proscenium style. You watched
Sam Sanders 32:33
the claro set. It was really cute. If you can go back and see clips, she made it seem like she was in a studio with her band in the midst of the Coachella set,
Traci Thomas 32:43
well, I just like, I like the, like, fourth wall styles a little bit right now, like, I'm just into, like, I'm on stage and you're the audience, like, I'm not going into the audience. Yeah, there's no, like, there's no they call that a thrust in the theater world where the stage goes out into the audience, yeah, like, three sides instead of one, I sort of like seeing people just be like, yeah, flat, flat across. Because I feel like you're to your point. Stadium shows have become so popular. It's
Sam Sanders 33:09
like, okay, how will you ride through the sky in this one? Everyone's doing it right,
Traci Thomas 33:13
right, exactly. And like everyone does a thrust. Now I feel like some stadium shows didn't used to be like that, or do it, yeah, but now you have to have it, okay, I have another question about concerts, because, yeah, I did not dress up for cowboy. I
Sam Sanders 33:28
wore a red jacket and a blue Dodgers hat. And I was like, that's giving red, white, blue, I don't know. And like, a white button up. I
Traci Thomas 33:35
wore white button up jeans, and I did wear my red sneakers,
Sam Sanders 33:38
country. Yeah. What?
Traci Thomas 33:41
Why do I we have to dress up now, you guys, like
Sam Sanders 33:45
I did it once. I did metallic silver looks good on nobody but Beyonce, and I wore it for you, Beyonce more than once. Don't ask me to dress up again. But also, this is just, this is a black people thing. Black folks love saying where it is. I just, I don't know, in church, oh, my God, we would have so many Sundays where it's like, oh, everyone's wearing white this week, and it's
Traci Thomas 34:06
like, Why? Why are we dressing up? Like Beyonce is dressing up. Let her dress up like I paid her for her to dress up. I didn't pay her for me to have to go buy a fucking cowboy hat. I will fringe. Yeah,
Sam Sanders 34:17
I will say I'm thinking about what I want the next version of mega pop star show to be I still feel very positively about Vegas residencies, and I'll tell you why. When Bruno Mars and Anderson Park had a little band together, silk Sonic, they did a residency in Vegas, one of the best shows I've ever seen in my life. They were dancing, singing. It maybe held 1000 people, and you just felt like you were there. It was so much closer and alive. And they locked into that cheesy post disco persona of that whole album, yeah, the outfits and choreo match, and they jumped from dancing to singing to playing all the instruments, and it was just like such a specific moment that was made more specific by the intimacy of the venue. You. I also saw and not on my own volition. Some friends wanted to go. I saw you too in the sphere. I don't even love you too. I love that show.
Traci Thomas 35:08
Okay, do you have to give your phones away when you go into the sphere? Yeah,
Sam Sanders 35:11
I had to give my phone away for because they sing a song that's called, we took your phone away. It's really funny. That's how they opened the show for the sphere. I think so as well. Actually, no, I took a bunch of videos in the sphere. I'll send you some my sphere videos.
Traci Thomas 35:25
Okay? Because here's what I'm thinking now, as we're talking about this, I feel like the intimacy is part of it, but I also feel like now, with the stadium shows, 5 million people go, it's after the first night. Everybody knows the set list. They know all the costumes. They do the whole thing. And there is something about the intimate venue and also the taking of the phones away, where it's like, you really have to go, and you have to be there. And I had this special thing because I feel like, with us, sure, you have to give your phone. You have to give your phone away too, yeah. And I feel like some of the other Vegas residencies, and I sort of feel like I know when Beyonce is off her mark one night because it's on Tiktok
Sam Sanders 36:05
or on Instagram. Oh, the whiskey. Poor missed the glass and it's like, yeah. So another bone to pick. Stop pushing that whiskey on me like it was, it was a lot. There were more little whiskey promo. Yeah, I did anyway. I digress. Go
Traci Thomas 36:22
ahead. Yeah, I just feel like maybe that's the thing is, like, the like, the show could be similar. It could still have all the dancing, all the singing, all the spectacle, but like, you just have to go, like, you just have to be there. You don't get well, like, you don't get to be you don't get to know everything that's coming from Tiktok. Like, I didn't think I was going. I didn't have tickets. I bought tickets day of at 2pm so I was like, Oh, I'm not going. I'm gonna watch a bunch of the videos on Tiktok. And then I was so annoyed because I was like, oh, there's a car, there's a horseshoe. I already know, and it only been the second night.
Sam Sanders 36:53
Yeah, I will say, though, and we didn't address this as, like, one of the really beautiful moments of the show, when her daughters are out there with her. I thought that was profound and special and really made me feel warm inside. I
Traci Thomas 37:05
want to talk about I want to talk about Blue. Talk about believing because I have a lot of thoughts and feelings about it. And this is not me judging Beyonce as a parent. This is me as a person who was a dancer as a child. I feel and I know blue is fine, okay, like, I know I'm being dramatic, but I do worry about her. She's improved so much, she really has, but working like that in public as a child, I just cannot imagine having to get better in public. And your mom is Beyonce, and you're like, exactly like your mom is Beyonce, and you're doing your mom's moves, you're doing your mom's move, and like, she's doing a great job. Yes, they do need to put her in ballet class. They do need to get her some real training, because if she wants to do this,
Sam Sanders 37:56
I'm not coming for you. If she
Traci Thomas 37:58
wants to dance, if she wants to be a dancer like she has. I guess what I'm trying to say is, like, there are 13 year old girls who can dance
Sam Sanders 38:07
far better than best 13 year old girl dancer in America. That's
Traci Thomas 38:12
what I'm saying. So if you're gonna put her out there and let the whole world watch her literally follow in her mother's footsteps and learn as she's going in front of all of us. She needs classical training. She needs to learn how to be a dancer, because I don't think it's fair to her like I don't think I should be able to have an opinion about a 13 year old girl who's learning how to be a backup dancer. And that's not that's not shade to Beyonce or blue. It's just knowing what it's like to be a dancer on this stage and this world.
Sam Sanders 38:45
But this is, I kind of look back on how Beyonce came up. She really didn't have any formal training either. Her dad boot
Traci Thomas 38:54
camp, but she didn't go in to being on the biggest stage ever. She built it. She got better as she went,
Sam Sanders 39:01
she worked, and this is to her credit, as soon as she got on, she always worked with really incredible choreographers, and she became a student of music. There was an era of Beyonce, I want to say the run the world era where she became obsessed with, like, really specific South African dance, like fancy footwork. And if you go back and watch the video for who run the world girls, she's just perfectly studied this one intensely difficult, specific kind of, like South African dance. And just like, whoop, okay, now I'll do it. Yeah, it is very hard to see anyone to order to think that anyone could do that at 13 on a stadium show. That's what I'm saying. That's why Beyonce grew into the amazing dancer she is. She
Traci Thomas 39:47
grew into it and like her, like, obviously, she's a singer too, and she's the headliner, but she grew into all of that, everything, like understanding how to be, you know, political on stage, yes, and. Understanding, like, one of the things I always talk about with Renaissance is in early in the show that I saw, she wore this, like white sequin leotard, or like rhineston leotard, and the whole thing was white, but subtly, the rhinestones on the side, like under her armpit, were a slightly different darker color, and so it made her look like slightly more snatched and I was like, that's something you learn from years and years of being on stage and seeing yourself in camera and saying to your costume designer, you know, what is there a way we can like, and the costume designer being like, yeah, we can actually like, darken those little bit. It would kind of give you that effect. And with like, with with your fish nuts, and with everything, tighten it up and like, I don't think it's fair for blue to to have to do all of this at 13, being dumped on the stage. I don't mean like ballet specifically. I just she needs, she's learning. I'm sure she's learning so much from the other dancers and all of that. But like, she needs to be able to practice and grow in private so that she can be great. I also have a theory that she's gonna end up being the number one agent in Hollywood. I don't think she's gonna be a performer. I don't think so. I think she
Sam Sanders 41:08
won't do this for like, a manager. You'll see when she like gives Beyonce, the not like, stand up now, yeah. Or like, when
Traci Thomas 41:14
she like, is like, roomy girl, come on. But I just think like, she's again, I'm not this is not me disparaging blue, because this is just something that I think about with performers. I think there's performers. Yeah, I think there's like, two kinds of performers. There are people who are like technicians, and then there are people who are sort of like performers. And I'll use the example of two people who I think are both great, who are on the spectrum of these two things. One would be Kieran Culkin is a performer. Jeremy strong is a technician. And I think that Lou is a technician. I think that she has the natural I think Rumi is a performer. I don't think we're ever gonna get Rumi to execute the choreography. Is just gonna pop out. Yeah, I know she's seven, but I just feel like some kids have it right. Like, some people are just like, the lights are on, they're ready to go in rehearsal, they're trash. But, like, you get them on stage, they light up. And then some people are so consistent. I think Beyonce is actually a technician who has learned how to perform exactly, exactly. And I think blue is more of a technician. And the question becomes, for her, when she's ready. Does she want to learn how to be a Beyonce, or does she want to take her technical, managerial, know how, and run Hollywood? And I sort of feel like that's the route she's gonna go, because then she doesn't have to be her mom, Jay or Beyonce, because you can't, she gets to be blue. Yes. And I that's what like. That's my hope and vision for her, yeah,
Sam Sanders 42:41
well, and also coming at this as a parent yourself, and of course, you're thinking all the time about, like, the pressures kids take on as they grow up. And it can be a lot. It can be a lot, I think a lot about what Blue Ivy on that stage says about how we expect famous, rich and powerful people to treat their kids and how we expect them to nurture kids who might be creative. And I always think about the way that the Smiths, to their credit, allowed Willow to blossom into a truly independent kind of artist, her last album I loved. And it seems like what happened there is they just let Willow go play. Yeah, they weren't being like, Come wrap my lyrics. We didn't say that to Willow. Jada didn't say come act in films like I've done. It seems like they just let her do her thing. Because you'll notice when she first came out the gate with that song with my hair, that was one kind of direction you flash forward to. Now she's a damn hippie. She found her way by doing her Yeah, and it seems as if, it seems as if Blue Ivy, whether she wants this, or her parents want it, she's not going that route. Yeah,
Traci Thomas 43:50
yes. I definitely think, like Willow did a more Will Smith adjacent kind of pop music. And then she got older, because she was super young when whit my hair came out. I was like, seven years old or something, yeah. So I feel like, blue. I feel like the obvious thing is just like, do what your parents are doing until you find your way. And my hope is that she will find her way, whatever it is, whether it is being a pop star or not, but like, there's a moment which I think everybody's seen on video where she's comes out and does the deja vu choreography. At the end, she, like, does the strut, and she walks everything and like, of course, this is my dancer brain. I'm sorry, but I don't know if you remember, but every like, eight to 12 steps, she would just like, adjust her hair. Yeah,
Sam Sanders 44:32
and it was I saw one where she pulled her pants up.
Traci Thomas 44:37
I saw her do the adjusting my hair four times. And it was so clear to me that they were, like, it's a really long walkway, so you need to, like, adjust your hair, or, like, do something, like, every few steps. And so she was like, 5678, adjust the hair. 5678, adjust the hair. Like it was,
Sam Sanders 44:50
like, saw her counting. I
Traci Thomas 44:52
could just see her not knowing what to do yet. Like, she's just not comfortable yet. And I don't think I would be at 13 either. I mean. None of us would be, yeah, so it's not a knock on her. It's just, I thought it's hard for me to watch her, because I'm so like, it makes me go in my head, like it's like, triggering for me, or something. Dancer. I was a dancer. I mean, not obviously on that level who was, but like, I just think about all of the ways that you have to like come into dance and like all the ways you have to learn how to do it, and the way you have to like live your life and all of that stuff. And also dancing, unlike even singing or acting, is like, you don't get to use your words. And so your body is really on the line, like people are, even if they're not like objectifying you, they are looking at your body and your body only, right? Like, there's no, it's not like, oh, you know, she looks a little weird, but like her voice is amazing, or like, Oh, she's such a great actress. Like, whatever. It's like, yeah. How does her physical body look to 20,000 70,000 100,000 people, yeah, and all of the internet and I just It freaks me out. Sorry, yeah, it's hard
Sam Sanders 46:04
listen all this to say what we need out of all of this is for Beyonce. Is next big project to be Beyonce unplugged. Let's be kids Bob. I will go to my grave saying that Texas Hold'em is a Kidz Bop
Traci Thomas 46:21
song. I Okay, I sort of like Texas Hold'em like it grew on me
Sam Sanders 46:26
once it was on the album. But my still my favorite track from Cowboy Carter is bodyguard.
Traci Thomas 46:30
I don't Okay, you've always liked bodyguard. It's one of my least favorite. I really like it. I like 16 carriages a lot. Well,
Sam Sanders 46:39
that's a chain gang song that I know there's so much music history in that this is the thing. It's like she's also a scholar. She's a scholar in a way that no other pop star is, because they don't have anything, you know. Yeah. So let us end this, this part of the Torah dissection, by reminding listeners that we respect the intellect, and I'm gonna give her this the performance bravery of Beyonce. Yeah, she's always shooting big shots. I'm gonna give her that she
Traci Thomas 47:08
is, she's, I mean, and she's just the talent level is so high that it allows us to nitpick all of this stuff in a way that if she was less talented, like, if she was like, I don't know, Taylor Swift, I'd be talking about her flat boot or whatever, or like her looking like a frumpa lump on stage, but, you know, she's not that. So I get to talk about rhinestones and, you know, like costume traces and things that are much more interesting. Oh, speaking of costume choices, so what did you make of the light up dress?
Sam Sanders 47:38
Oh, I was just like, Okay. Everyone was like, Oh my God. I was like, that's a light up dress. I wasn't gonna see it again. I'm gonna Google. Hold on,
Traci Thomas 47:46
yeah. So this is a dress she does the opera song, and I think what's the song called? Oh yeah, yeah, um. And it's like this big. It looks like it's like a antebellum plantation dress kind of but then it lights up. Oh, and my, my hot take is that she should have just come out in a fucking antebellum slavery dress and been like, because that's a statement that is saying with the wind, like, that's what I'm saying, come out in the Scarlet O'Hara green and white dress from act one she's at the barbecue. Yes, because that shit would have blown people.
Sam Sanders 48:18
This is, and this is the problem of modern stardom. Once you reach a certain tier, you have to continually be maximalist and more maximalist. Beyonce is not allowed to be minimalist anymore, because we do bigger, bigger, bigger, bigger, bigger. The show must be the biggest. The air is tour must go on two years. Pink has to do Cirque du Soleil. It's like the pressure of the stadium tour is the maximalism of
Traci Thomas 48:43
it. I wonder, though, like, as we're saying this going back to the smaller venue, I wonder if Beyonce will lead that charge, like, I wonder if she will be the one to take the big swing and be like, I'm gonna go to and
Sam Sanders 48:54
once she does it, the rest of the industry will follow. You. Remember when she released self titled, before she released the self titled surprise album. The whole industry dropped new albums on one day of the week, right? Once she did it, the day changed because she did a different day she could, yeah, so Beyonce, if you're listening unplugged residency sphere, I'll see you there
Traci Thomas 49:17
anywhere. Okay, one last quick little thing, not related to Beyonce, but I had to bring this to you, because it's to you, because it's news, and I know you're very obsessed. Recently you did an episode on recession indicators. Yes, girl, tell me on the SAM Sanders Show, did you see that Gwyneth Paltrow is eating carbs? Again,
Sam Sanders 49:33
I saw that, and it confirms to me that she is and will always be, one of my favorite rich white women.
Traci Thomas 49:43
I thought it was a recession indicator. She's like, I cannot afford only Fresh, fresh produce I have. I love to bread and pasta. Yes,
Sam Sanders 49:51
I love the way that Gwyneth Paltrow is in on her own joke. She is. She's like, she is goop. What Fuck y'all.
Traci Thomas 49:57
Yeah. She's like, Oh. Sorry, you can catch me at the fucking like Spaghetti Factory. Did you all have that growing up?
Sam Sanders 50:04
We did warehouse. Oh, whoa,
Traci Thomas 50:09
this ain't Texas. Yeah,
Sam Sanders 50:10
my favorite Gwyneth Paltrow moment years ago, she was profiled in the New York Times by taffy broaduser ackner, who was my favorite celebrity profiler, and in the middle of the interview, just to probably be cool, Gwyneth has a cigarette, like in her kitchen, and then Taffy writes this scene where she was like, I wanted to be cool, like when it so I bought a pack and smoked a cigarette in the alley by myself.
Traci Thomas 50:39
I My favorite moment is her singing, cruising. Is that with her
Sam Sanders 50:45
movie? Yeah, duets, duets. Now D'Angelo covered the Smokey Robinson cruising. That's the original. Isn't
Traci Thomas 50:51
that with her? Oh, then that's her and baby face. Sing something together. Okay, there's some she sings
Sam Sanders 50:55
with someone. Okay, I never saw duets, but I remember. I never
Traci Thomas 50:59
saw it, but I had the, I had the song, Gwyneth. I'm looking it up. Gwyneth Paltrow duets song. It wasn't Huey Lewis cruisin. It's Oh, it is. It's Huey Lewis and cruisin. That's right, yeah. But then, all right, D'Angelo has his own cover.
Sam Sanders 51:13
We love the D'Angelo cover of cruising, I want to say Smokey Robinson. Also Huey Lewis in the news. Loki loved them. Sports is a great album.
Traci Thomas 51:22
Did you watch the like one night in LA documentary about We are the world?
Sam Sanders 51:28
No, oh my
Traci Thomas 51:30
God, you have to watch it. Samuel died. I hated it too. I cried three times watching it. You know, I'm like a Lionel. Richie Stan, I love Lionel.
Sam Sanders 51:38
He's a good man. He's a good man, okay, he
Traci Thomas 51:41
is a good man. And he's like, the narrator of this documentary, and he's talked because, like, everybody's dead, and he's like, talking about how everything happened, but like, Huey Lewis is in it. There's so many, like, cameos, obviously, and you get all this behind the scenes footage, and they're like, talking shit about each other, and they're like, and then Michael's like, we should say, like, mama said mom is on makusan. And somebody's like, what does that even mean? And Michael's like, I don't know, a Swahili. And they're like, No, it's not, like, we're not gonna fucking say that. And
Unknown Speaker 52:10
then like, and like,
Traci Thomas 52:11
you see them going through all the rehearsals, and like, all the things changing, and then people who can't hit their notes, and like, other celebrities being like, it's just, it's so cool. It's so heartwarming. I literally cried. I was like, I am so good by this. And then I listened to the song every day for like, three days. And then I was like, then I was like, okay, never hear this song again. That's, I think it's called one day in LA or something like that. Anyways, done. Okay. Well, thanks for doing this. Sam. Anything else you want to say about Beyonce before we
Sam Sanders 52:41
go beehive? Don't fucking Dox me,
Traci Thomas 52:44
yeah. Also, this is behind a paywall, so if they get to this, that means they had to join my patreon. And so we love you for being here, yeah, so I guess you're also beehive and tea hive. We love it. We love it here. I used to call myself Traci.
Sam Sanders 52:56
I like that. I like that. Back
Traci Thomas 53:00
Back in my spin days. Um, anyways, well, everybody, you can catch Sam Sanders all over the interwebs, including his podcast, the SAM Sanders Show, and which comes out on Fridays and on YouTube. It's on YouTube, it is we try. I've never watched I've never watched a podcast. My
Sam Sanders 53:18
demo is people are my age or older, and we just aren't part of that YouTube generation. I actually listened to my podcast that said I wear cute sweaters on the YouTube.
Traci Thomas 53:28
So I see those on the internet. I see those on the internet. So you can, you can watch him or listen to him on Fridays, and then on Wednesdays, the same day that the stacks comes out after you listen to the stacks. Do it the stacks first. Okay, don't try to get cute. Then he'll listen to vive check with him. And obviously Friends of the show, Zach Stafford and Syed Jones, and they just had one with Elizabeth fucking Warren. She was so disrespectful to everybody else who's never had her on the podcast.
Sam Sanders 53:53
Zach, listen the devil works hard. Zach Stafford works harder. Zach, I got his Warren, and I was like, What did you mean? And he just did incredible, yeah. Also, listeners, go back and find you've been on my show twice now.
Traci Thomas 54:08
Sam Sanders Show, just once, just me and just go find.
Sam Sanders 54:11
So it was super fun. Franklin Leonard, legend, icon, genius, and Traci, what were y'all doing? What did we talk about? Was it your wicked? Wicked, yeah, it was your in review, yes, wicked.
Traci Thomas 54:22
Kendrick, yeah, I got you guys posted me talking about about wicked comments. I remember people in the comments were like, she's an idiot. I was like, okay, boo.
Sam Sanders 54:33
It was a good episode. It was very fun.
Traci Thomas 54:35
It was a great episode. And I stand by my wicked comments, and I'll see you guys in fucking November for wicked part two, back in the habit, and we'll see what John M Chu decides to do.
Sam Sanders 54:47
Wait, can we go together dressed as Wicked characters?
Traci Thomas 54:50
I'm going dressed as Fierro. No, I'm going dressed as Bach. I'm going dressed as Bach. Oh, which one is ba i have the name Bach is the Bach is the Munchkin land. No, he becomes Tin Man. Spoiler alert, the one who ends up with Nessarose.
Sam Sanders 55:07
He has no heart, yeah, not like Nessarose. No.
Traci Thomas 55:11
Someone told my mom. Someone told my mom, oh, there's a character in wicked who looks just like your daughter. And I was like, oh. And then I saw it, and I was like, That's racist, okay, just because we're both mixed, like, how dare you. I don't want anything like that. She's beautiful. But I was just like, not appropriate. No, I will see it with you, okay?
Sam Sanders 55:29
And I will come back to review wicked part two on your Patreon.
Traci Thomas 55:34
Okay, well, I'm gonna, no, we're gonna do it on Sam Sanders Show. We're gonna make Franklin come back. It'll be Year in Review. 2025, 25 I love it back in the habit. Okay? I love you everybody. Thank you for listening, and we'll see you in the Stacks.