Name: Nick Swardson | This Past Weekend w/ Theo Von #406
Uploaded: 2022-08-30T13:00:34.000Z
Description: Watch the stand-up comedy video 'Nick Swardson | This Past Weekend w/ Theo Von #406' from Theo Von on Comedy Buff. Published 2022-08-30. Transcript available.

Watch the stand-up comedy video 'Nick Swardson | This Past Weekend w/ Theo Von #406' from Theo Von on Comedy Buff. Published 2022-08-30. Transcript available.

Nick Swardson | This Past Weekend w/ Theo Von #406

I'm going to let you guys know I'll be coming to town with the Return of the
Rat Tour October 11th
and 12th in Wichita, Kansas. They still have tickets for the 11th at the Orpheum
Theater.
October 13th, Omaha, Nebraska. That's sold out. And October 14th, Denver,
Colorado.
Those shows, I believe, are sold out. We're going to add some new Omaha and
Denver dates.
They'll be, I think, either later this year or in the spring. So if you weren't
able to get tickets,
we'll put some new ones up soon for the Return of the Rat Tour. Thank you guys
for your support.
You can get your tickets at Theovon.com slash T-O-U-R. We have new Be Good to
Yourself tees
in new summertime colorways like Banana, Salmon. Check those out and more at
TheovonStore.com.
Today's guest is hitting the road with his new Make Joke from Face Tour. He's
been here before.
He's based, he was from Minnesota. He's that cold baby. And he is, he's been on
Reno 911,
Grandma's Boy, and he's led a real interest in life of debauchery and hilarity.
I'm excited to have him back, my friend, comedian Nick Swartzen.
Shine that light on me
I'll sit and tell you my stories
Shine on me
And I will find a song
I'll be singing
I'm going to stay
All right. What's up, dude?
What up, Nick?
What's up, dude?
What's up?
We're called the effing cops, dude.
What's up, man? What's going on?
Dude, I haven't had a drink in two months, so I've got that sober energy.
Is that true?
Yeah. I'm fucking sober, Kai.
Wow.
Yeah.
So you really, so two months, no alcohol?
No, I had one drink for a celebration, but then I just stopped it at that,
which is rare.
So you had a drink within the past two months?
Yeah, but it was one, so I don't count that.
What counts to you as drinking?
40 drinks in a night.
Wow.
Yeah.
Have you ever had that?
I have.
I remember one time I did a show in Miami, and I don't know if you've ever done
this, but I had one-
Oh, I've been to Miami, dude.
Well, you've been to Miami, but I had one show.
It was like a college gig, and I fucking stayed for a month.
Damn.
I just stayed at a hotel for a month, and my opener, Patrick Keen, super funny,
and after like two weeks, he's like, what are we doing?
And I'm like, Miami, bro.
And he goes, yeah, that's great.
I've got to go home.
I have another job and a life.
And I'm like, oh, yeah, right, okay.
And then I got him a plane ticket home, and I stayed another two weeks.
Just drinking.
Just drinking, just chilling.
And I remember the hotel bartender, I'm not bragging about this, but kind of.
The hotel bartender goes, Mr. Swartzen.
And I'm like, yeah.
And he goes, you just drank a whole bottle of Grey Goose today.
And I go, okay.
And he goes, yeah, how are you feeling?
And I'm like, I'm good, dude.
I'm like, can I get another cocktail?
And he's like, yeah, all right.
And I fucking just ripped Miami up, dude.
Grey Goose.
If you drink a whole bottle of Grey Goose, you become an endangered species, I
think, at that point.
Yeah, I think I started to get feathers on my jennies.
Yeah, shit got real.
I was waking up in an egg.
I'd come out and shit.
It was crazy.
You've never done that?
I've done that many times where I've done a gig.
And it's always fucking Florida.
Yeah.
It's like when I told you this.
When I was quarantined, I went to Key West for supposed to be 10 days.
During the pandemic.
Yeah.
And I was there a year and a half.
And you ran up.
I heard that you ran up a bill at the hotel there that was like astronomical.
It was insane.
I stayed at a resort on the beach for a year and a half.
And it cost, I heard, a million dollars.
I don't think it was a million, but it was a lot of money.
If you tipped, did you tip?
I always tip.
I'm really good at tipping.
I think it's important.
What do you think it was?
When you say a lot of money, how much was it?
I mean, it was definitely probably half a mil for sure.
But I feel like it was more than that.
It might have been.
I kind of don't want to know.
Because I just went into the ether of just zzz, weeew, and then just listen to
live music and shit.
But how, so, because I remember a time.
I came and met you.
I was in some city.
You were performing there.
I was performing there.
And I came and saw you.
And you were day drinking at a hotel.
Yeah.
And not like at a pool party.
It was like a dark, like, it was like kind of like a dimly lit.
It was like a bar in Star Wars or something?
Yeah.
There's just creatures or there are people there?
I didn't see any bartender.
I do remember a hand would come up every now and then.
Oh, no.
It would just conjure up a beverage, you know?
Oh, my God.
Just witch magic?
Yeah, you were like.
Or like the hand, like from Adam's family would just come in and fucking.
Dude, I heard that hand molested like a bunch of kids.
Dude, stay away from hands.
If it's just a hand, it's up to no good.
But yeah, I remember going to meet you at a hotel.
You were like, yeah, come over.
We're partying over here.
We're hanging out.
And I got there.
There's nobody there.
And I think it was football season.
And it didn't even have any TVs in it.
And I was like, this is.
What?
Really?
That's weird.
That was because I remember being like, oh, that's because I know you're a
Vikings fan.
And I was like, that's weird.
And there were like cavernous things lit.
There was like torches.
It was a weird ball.
Oh, my God.
Who was I with?
Frankenstein?
What the fuck, man?
What is wrong with me?
I felt like, is this probably like a geologist thing?
It had a very Indiana Jones meets like a sober living.
Right.
Okay.
That's interesting.
I do hunt for treasure when I'm on tour.
I do try to find treasures.
So I do end up in some sketchy snake spider bars.
Did you?
So you quit.
You had to quit drinking.
I had to take a time out.
Yeah.
But yeah, I like pick and choose.
Like I've gotten to the point where like Labor Day weekend, like holiday
weekend, I'm going
to drink.
Okay.
You know what I mean?
But then I won't go like bonkers because I'm going on tour this fall starting
after Labor
Day.
And I remember I'm going to not drink as much as I used to because it got so I
would just
get caught up with fans and going out.
And then there was one time, a couple of times, there's one time I sincerely
did this.
I walked out on stage in Louisville, Kentucky, and this is genuine.
I walk out and I go, dude, not only is this my first time in Louisville, this
is my first
time ever performing in Louisville.
And this guy goes, no, you were here last tour.
And I'm like, yeah, I know, but not this theater.
And the guy goes, yeah, it was this theater.
And I'm like, it's great to be back in Louisville.
Good to see everybody again.
But it's because the time before that, I don't drink bourbon.
And I went out and people took me into just ripping bourbon.
And that was just one of those alcohols where it's just the switch.
Yeah.
It's just, bye.
Oh, yeah.
Next thing you know, you're trying to fucking just suck off your knees.
Yeah, man.
You're trying to fucking blow your knees and a possum just starts fisting you.
And you're like, fucking game on.
Yeah.
So, I mean, and then Chicago is one of my favorites.
I love Chicago.
And I went out until six in the morning on Division Street.
And I was in such a blackout.
But I do remember like windows, you know, like when you remember just little vignettes.
Oh, yeah, yeah.
Like little commercials.
Yeah.
So, one of my little commercials was I went to McDonald's at six in the morning.
And I peed my pants.
And I was so hammered.
And I peed.
And then I ordered a shitload of food, like way too much on this tray.
And then I turned around and slipped in my own pee.
And then threw all the food all over the place.
I wiped out.
Panicked and ran out.
And then I had to find my hotel.
I had just gotten in.
I had no idea what was going on.
And then I woke up, did sound check.
And my tour manager was like, what does that smell?
And I go, oh, God, yeah, I peed myself.
And he was like, what the fuck?
That's a big bladder, dude.
That's a fucking big bladder.
Yeah, big bladder.
I can't believe you.
Dude, I saw a guy pee actually in a, like this is insane.
I remember this, man.
This was growing up, dude.
We had like two, I don't know if we had two homeless guys bust, but we had like
one gay guy.
And everybody was like, that guy's homeless, you know, because he didn't have a
wife and kids.
And he was like.
They just immediately equated him to homeless.
I mean, it was like, you know, that was the times, you know.
It was 1940.
I was just saying.
It was like, oh, look at this homeless guy, you know.
He's perfectly dressed.
He's like, what?
No, I just don't like women.
No, you're a degenerate homeless person.
We were like, get off the streets, you know.
He's like, I own this shop right here.
We sell flowers.
Whatever, homeless.
Whatever.
That's hilarious.
But I remember this other dude had pee.
Remember they had those.
McDonald's had those trays, you know.
Bring them a McDonald's tray, can we?
You know what I'm talking about?
I know what you're talking about.
It was a tray.
Yeah, the brown one.
They used to have the brown one.
Yeah.
Yeah.
That's what I'm talking about.
Yeah.
So this guy had peed and would just get a perfect, like.
What?
Balance of it.
And he would carry it?
It was a trap.
Because whoever came in, the second you touched it, the piss would come off.
Oh, I like that.
Fuck.
Why did I think of that?
Still time.
So, but obviously, so it sounds like, I mean, you've obviously had some.
Issues with drinking, you know.
Yeah, I've gone up and down with it.
I mean, there's no secret there.
Yeah.
How bad did it get?
Like, what was one of those times where you're like, damn, this is.
Because it's just a sneaky thing.
I mean, half our audience, I think, probably doesn't, you know, or struggles
with all kind of shit.
Yeah, for sure.
I mean, it's interesting.
I've always tried to find a balance because I never thought I was like a raging
alcoholic.
Like, when I would drink, I would drink.
But I never craved it, you know what I mean?
It wasn't one of those things where, like, I'd gone to AA meetings and stuff.
And I would hear stories.
Like, go to an AA meeting just to hear some shit get real as fuck.
I mean, there were people that, A, would do like eight to ten meetings a day,
which is fine.
This isn't me judging anybody.
But, like, there were people that couldn't walk past a bar.
There were people that couldn't even look at an empty.
Like, people would tell stories about being at a wedding and they couldn't even
look at an empty champagne glass
without having, like, a full panic attack.
Yeah.
So, I mean, I was never at that point.
I would just, like, get into a, you know, if I had time off, I'm like, well, I'm
just going to get drunk.
Because it's fun as shit.
Like, there's also a contingent of people that drink that do enjoy it.
Like, I didn't start fights.
I wouldn't be rude.
There wouldn't be, like, that when you meet somebody and they get drunk and all
of a sudden they're racist now.
And you're like, oh, God.
Like, that type of shit.
I just always had fun.
Yeah.
So, that was kind of the catch-22.
It's like, when you're like that, you just have fun with it.
Yeah.
Dance and shit and fart.
Yeah.
That's true, man.
I guess there is, I guess if you're having, if it makes you have fun, it's
tough to, like, you know, curtail it back, you know?
Yeah.
The late Norm MacDonald, who was one of my best friends, he had so many great
drinking jokes.
But one of them, he goes, and I'm loosely paraphrasing, but he goes, yeah, yeah,
my uncle's an alcoholic.
And my mom was like, yeah, yeah, your uncle's, he's got a disease, alcoholism.
It's a disease.
And Norm goes, well, as far as diseases go, that's a pretty good one.
It's like, hey, Uncle Rick, what happened last night?
Well, I went out and my disease kicked in, ended up laughing all night, and
then had sex with a stranger.
I always, like, love the take on it, sweet Norm.
Yeah, that is a good take, man.
Yeah, I think if you can have, 