Dave Hill already has your number and wants you to come on his show

Name: Dave Hill
Hometown: Cleveland, OH
Job description: Comedian; writer; musician; performer; host of The Dave Hill Explosion, a talk show with live music at UCB NY, which has featured the likes of John Hodgman, Rufus Wainwright, and Dick Cavett; member of the rock band, Valley Lodge
Select links: Contributions to This American Life, Interview with The Days of Yore, Interview with The Rumpus, Black Metal Dialogues, Dave Hill at Fashion Week Spring '09 (YouTube), The Birthday Party with Dave Hill (YouTube), Blog, Official site

What’s your state of mind, right now?

The past few days have been cloudy. I’m just trying to write things so there’s a lot going on in my head, just thinking about stuff. I was away in Edinburgh [for] Fringe Festival. I was in London before that and I haven’t been drinking at all since I’ve been back. I drank all the time when I was over there. [I’m letting] the fog lift for a little while.

There’s a huge drinking culture over there?

Especially the festival. Everyone’s going out so much. I think when I’m over there [drinking is] just more attractive, the idea of it just ‘cause the bars are 200 years old. It seems very romantic so every other place you pass seems to be a really great place to have a drink. 

I decided [that] when I came home I would take a break. I was hoping I would be more productive, but it hasn’t worked out that way. I’m writing a couple of things and I don’t really have deadlines so the pressure’s just all internal.

It’s better when someone says, “You have to finish this.” So basically I just end each day by calling myself a failure.

That’s a good strategy.

I think it’ll change in a couple of days, like the weather, I guess.

I like fall. I like layering clothes better than the way I’m dressed now. I just like more outfit possibilities. And then I like to hide my body because I don’t really like it that much.

Can you describe your sartorial tastes? 

I would say this is my on-the-go look: a T-shirt and jeans. That’s what I wear around the house and if I’m running to appointments and stuff. But beyond that I like wearing suits and English clothes. It just works out that way. They’re just cut better.

Where do you shop?

There are places that I go in London but you can get most of the stuff here anyway. I like Paul Smith. But it’s really expensive so I buy it when it’s on sale. And then there’s another company called Merc, which is much cheaper. These are my two. I’m a smart shopper. I just wait and I pull the trigger at the right moment. Or I get drunk and go shopping. Not to keep bringing it back to drinking, which seems like a bigger thing in my life than it is. But I’m a fan of drunken shopping.

Is that for better or worse?

Maybe not drunk, I should say. But after a few drinks, with all things, for better or for worse, that might help you make a decision quicker. Like, it’s good to clean the apartment after a few drinks ‘cause you’ll throw stuff out more easily, I think. And with clothes, you’ll shoot more from the hip. 

Should you drunken shop with someone or alone?

You shouldn’t shop by yourself, in general. Unless it’s a really good sale and the stakes aren’t very high. [You] should always be with someone else who’s been drinking.

How vast is your closet?

It’s vast, I would say. I almost have to move. 

You describe your apartment as small, with two, full closets that you want to pare down. Do you think you have any hoarding tendencies?

Well, some people would say that I do. But if you saw my apartment, you would say that most of the stuff that I have is worth keeping...maybe not worth getting in the first place, but not worth throwing out. 

What’s the most that you’ve ever paid for a garment?

I don’t really spend that much. I mean, the nicest stuff that I have is really much cheaper. I think the most that I’ve ever spent is like $800 on a suit. But it was half-off or something.

What kind of suit was it?

A Paul Smith suit. But even that’s cheap for those suits. But then the suits I perform in are a bit cheaper because they get ruined.

Is there a color that’s a through-line in your wardrobe?

All over the place. I don’t wear a lot of red, yellow or orange, but everything else is covered pretty well. One of the suits that I got was $50 in Scotland. And it’s gotten rave reviews. It smells like an old man’s been smoking in it for like 30 years.

What kind of suit is it?

I thought it was an English suit but then I looked at the tag the other day and it’s Swiss. It’s a cheap suit but the cut is really good. That’s the hard part. Most suits are cut pretty badly if they’re made in America. 

Are you into vintage suits at all?

It’s hard for me to find them because I’m larger. I think I’m large. Maybe I’m not. I don’t know. It’s hard for me to find my cut. I wear like a 42 and I feel like vintage stuff is 38.

How long have you had your apartment?

For like four years. It was my friend’s place. He gave it to me. 

Am I answering these questions okay? I feel like I’m doing a bad job. 

It’s just conversation.

I’ll pick up. I’ll get better at it. You might be the first person I’ve talked to today, besides my therapist. But then, that’s very one-sided.

Could you see yourself moving anywhere else?

To Brooklyn because most of Manhattan I wouldn’t want to live in, unless I had a shit load of money. Then, in my fantasy world, I would want to live on Central Park West. I’ve been in a few apartments like The Dakota. I was in Dick Cavett’s apartment. It’s like a movie or something. So it would be nice to live like that. But I have to do something to make some money.

If you didn’t live in New York, where would you want to live?

Practically speaking, I would live in LA. I like San Francisco, Berkeley, Portland. Probably those places. Maybe Connecticut but not really, though.

If you were to own property, what would it be? 

My neighborhood is all really nice townhouses and then my shitty building. I’m like the one crappy building in the neighborhood, for some reason. In my fantasy world I’d get a townhouse where I live now [West Village]. [It] would be a great way to live in New York.

What year did you arrive here?

2003.

Where did live before this apartment?

Cobble Hill. And I’ve lived in Clinton Hill. Strollers and stuff. And I lived in the Chelsea Hotel for a while.

There are a lot of stories about the Chelsea Hotel.

Yeah, it was interesting.

What was your room like?

It was a tiny room [with] a little mini-fridge in the corner. And there was a dollar store downstairs [that sold] plastic flowers. It was the first place that I ever lived where I was like: I could see killing myself here. That’s about right. But over time though it seemed sunnier than that. Just in my mind. It didn’t get nicer. But I loved it there.

So what brought you to New York?

I came here for the weekend. I just didn’t leave. I had been here before. It wasn’t like I just showed up on the Greyhound or something; I have friends here. But, seven years ago, I got offered a job and I just stayed. I thought I wanted to be back here and I needed something like that to happen, to sort of trick me into moving here. I’m really bad at making decisions. That’s kind of how I got into comedy, sort of drifting. I don’t think I ever would have done that. One little thing happened and I just went with it. It wasn’t like I decided to make this my thing.

The thought never crossed your mind?

The people I admired growing up, even though they were comedians, I didn’t really view them like that. It’s just like guys who were goofing around, having a good time, like David Letterman, or Chris Elliott, and Pee Wee Herman. It never occurred to me that they were doing an act.

That’s what I would do, act like an idiot in front of my friends. In that way I was like, I wouldn’t mind doing that. So I think that’s how I started playing around with video first, before I really started performing live. People were like, “Do you want to come perform on this show?” So that’s how I got into it. 

But it wasn’t like that with music: I knew that it was what I wanted to do. Comedy wasn’t like that. Maybe that’s why I was able to have things go well, early on. Because I had no expectations. I think now that I do have expectations, it’s not as fun. I want to make this thing happen and it turns it all into a nightmare. 

No, it’s still fun, but I have stuff that I want to accomplish, which adds this other thing to it that’s not always fun. 

How does the comedy and music compare to freelance writing? 

I haven’t been doing it as much. No, I would like to do more of it. I’ve just been slacking, lately. When I was doing more of that, it was partially for money. [It was] something I knew I could do.

What was it like for you making a living as a freelance writer?

I’ve always been doing my own thing, for better or for worse. There were times when I made a good living as a freelance writer, and there were times when I was completely struggling.

How do you handle situations where you're struggling like that?

I don’t know, just freak out, I guess.

Do you freak out a lot?

Yeah, kind of every day.

Is it like a quiet freaking out or a loud freaking out?

It seems quiet but most people, who know me well, know this isn’t the case. But I’m pretty anxious. The people that don’t know me as well think that I’m centered. I only say this because people have told me. Which I find really entertaining because I don’t [see that in] myself at all. 

On stage, at least, you do seem centered.

Well, being on stage is different than real life. What I like about being on stage is that you’re dealing with the audience and you're out of your own head. That’s one of the reasons why I like it. It’s a break from the rest of my life. 

Have you always felt comfortable being in front of people?

No. I’m still not, in a way. The idea sort of horrifies me.

How do you deal with those feelings?

Obviously, it’s not that bad or I wouldn’t do it. But there’s a certain dread to it because I want it to go well. This sounds really cliche, but I figure if anyone left the house to see you or to go to a show, period, that you should try to make it go well. And do the best you can, even if it’s brand new material. It can be really common, for comedians especially, to be like, Oh, I’m fucking around. This show doesn’t matter. This sucks. I see it a lot. I think it’s more like a defense mechanism. It’s easier to be like, This show sucks, rather than like, I suck. I’m just more inclined to hate myself first than to hate the audience. I mean, don’t get me wrong, I hate the audience, too. 

How do you choose the guests for your show, The Dave Hill Explosion?

I try to ideally have [an] absurd quality to it, like someone that's not likely [to] be in the basement of the UCB. It’s more interesting to me to have an actress, well-known musician, or author, rather than a peer [or] a comedian who performs at UCB. I try to find someone with a quality of like, Why would they do this? Or how did he talk them into [it]? 

So I’ve been trying to get Salman Rushdie to do the show because I think it would be awesome. But I think it would be absurd because he’s this well-regarded, serious author. But I have comedians on the show, too, and they’ve been great. Comedians are good when they’re multi-faceted. 

It’s just more interesting to me to have the less likely person on the show.

What’s the ratio between the acceptances and rejections for guest spots?

I was just talking about this last night. It’s really hard to get someone through the proper channels. It's really hard to call someone’s manager or publicist. Almost every guest I’ve ever had has been through some other means, you know? Not to say that I sneak around. This friend of a friend or something. 

[The publicists are] thinking, I want to get them on Letterman. They’re not thinking, I want to get my client in the basement with Dave Hill or whatever. Usually you write someone like that and they’re like, “No.”

Who else? Oh, Tony Clifton. That Andy Kaufman alter-ego. His publicist actually wrote to me [saying] his friend at the company told him to do Dave’s show. And then it was this whole thing where they were talking to me as if he’s this real guy. Like, “Oh my god he’s so hard to pin down.” I was like, This is  retarded. Even the emails, trying to set it up, were him being warped into this performance. So it was like, Fuck that. This is stupid. Whatever. I like whoever’s doing that but I don’t want to be part of the performance, in trying to get someone on a show.

I feel like I’m running out. For this show, Arianna Huffington was going to do it and she had to cancel because she's going to be out of town. So I scrambled to get somebody else. 

How far in advance do you book your interviews?

Usually it’s a couple of weeks, even the day of, I would say. It seems like the further out you you book someone they end up canceling, anyway. So if you lock someone in closer to the day of the show, it seems like it’s easier. 

Like Arianna Huffington. I emailed her. She had emailed me once and I still had the email. I write for The Huffington Post. It’s not like I hang out with her. She just wrote me a nice email one day. So I wrote her thinking, This email doesn’t work anymore. And she wrote back within the hour.

I’m scrambling to figure out who’s doing it next week and every time I’ll say, This is the last show. I’m not doing it anymore. But it always works out.

I’ve been trying to get the Naked Cowboy. He was actually kind of a dick on the phone. I talked to him a couple times about it. I don’t think he remembered the couple of times.

I don’t want to trash talk the guy ever. [He said], “Why would I do your show?” Which is a valid question. But [he] definitely made it clear that it was beneath him to do.

It’s pretty much beneath everyone to do the show, if you think about it. Because everyone I’ve had on the show has certainly had a lot more going on than being in the basement with me, you know? That’s kind of the joke.

I think that’s why people end up doing the show because it’s fun, low-stakes. [If] they're going on Letterman, the stakes are kind of high. [On my show], they're just in a basement with a couple hundred people. I try to get everyone to feel like they’re there together, having fun. And enough people have done it now [so that] when I ask [people] to do it they don’t think I’m crazy.

I had Dick Cavett and Rufus Wainwright. I got an email from a friend from Conan’s office. I don’t know if this is true, but someone from Conan’s office emailed me and said “Conan’s jealous of your lineup tonight.” I don’t know if Conan actually said that, or if he even knew about the line-up, but most of the guests that I have had on my show have done the real big shows. I’ve been trying to get Dr. Zizmore, you know, the facial peeling guy on the subway. I have his phone number. He’s never called me back. I don’t know how I got his cell phone number. But I have it.

Oh. Oksana Baiul. She won’t do it. I’m trying but I haven’t gotten her on the show. 

National broadcasters or a chef? 

I’ve tried to get Mario Batali, but he shot me down. People get busy, though. I understand. But I still remember. Terry Gross. She blew me off. She said she was too busy. 

What about people not getting back to you? 

All the time. I just keep [asking].

Other people?

No, them. Wear someone down. Like Dick Cavett. I just asked him every show for like a year. Finally, they were like, “Yeah.” And he’s done it three times.

How comfortable are you interviewing people in front of a live audience? Does it come naturally?

It depends on how you look at it. Part of what I do is intentionally unprofessional. So some people would argue that I’m horrible at it. But that’s part of the performance. I like to talk to people about whatever or what I really want to know. I think most interviewers try to stay, I hate to use this phrase, “on point.”

It’s more interesting to me to hear about other aspects of their lives than hearing about the tour or the show or the record. That stuff’s kind of boring to me. With some guests I am really intimidated about the idea of talking to them in front of an audience because I want to make sure I hold my own. Hopefully people would agree that I’ve done pretty well with it. 

Have you ever had a guest that was difficult?

Yeah. I like when they’re difficult. There’s only been one that’s difficult in a negative way. It didn’t make for a good show. He was just a dick. 

How was he a dick? 

He was sort of not game. Obviously my show is kind of silly. He was like, All right, I’m not going to go along with your silly show. I think he was really afraid of looking stupid, that he was being made fun of. But he wasn’t.

I don’t think I really do that to people. I mean, I make myself look stupid, as a joke. But the guests never look stupid unless they make themselves look stupid, which is rare. I don’t think it’s ever happened. Maybe there were guests that were boring but, generally, they’ve been pretty good.

What are you most curious about?

I’m curious about what’s next. I shouldn’t be, though. I should be living more in the present.

Sometimes I’ll read an interview [of myself], which is not to say that there are millions of them. Not that I’m the most sought after interview in the world, but sometimes I’ll read something. I was over in the UK and there was stuff written about me. I read it and a lot of times I’m like, Cool, that sounds like it was probably a lot of fun, or whatever they were saying that I did. I view it like something that happened to someone else. I’ll be jealous, almost.

I love traveling. I love going to other countries, where I have no idea what’s going on. New York’s good in that way, too. You find something new all the time. LA is like that, where you discover some totally different world.

I haven’t been anywhere that bizarre. I just saw this really funny Irish comedian, Tommy Tiernan. He talks about places he’s gone to do comedy. He described most of the world as “white people shopping.” I don’t really think the world’s like that, but when you’re doing comedy, you’re going where people speak English, so it ends up being like that. For me, most of the places I really want to go, people don’t really speak English.

Do you feel like people are more receptive...?

If they don’t understand what you’re saying? Like in non-English speaking countries?

You were popular in Japan.

My band is, I mean, relative to here. Japan, as far as I can tell, is super into American culture. More so than Americans are. I was more into seeing opening bands because they were all Japanese. I think when it’s more familiar, I’m less curious.

I think Marc Maron, I don’t know why I keep talking about other comedians' jokes, but I find that it’s true when you go to other cities. He said something like, “Someone will [say], ‘I know what you’re going to like.’ And they’ll take you to the Saint Mark’s of that city.” They think, You’re a creative little person so you want to go [see] these T-shirts or whatever. But I find [that] I’ll do that on my own if I have no idea what’s going on. I’ll be like, “Where’s the cool section of a town? I want to go there.” I was in Toronto, recently, and I had that thought. I can’t remember what street it was. But if this street was in New York, I wouldn’t be on this street at all. I would have no time for it. I would get the fuck out of here. But for whatever reason I think I’m 16 in another city. 

What’s the most difficult thing that you’ve ever had to do? 

It wasn’t truly difficult but it seemed intimidating. I was doing a show at Sing Sing Prison. It’s a lot of murderers and stuff. So I think, in theory, that was difficult, just in my mind. It wasn’t actually that difficult once I was doing it, in terms of something that seemed very hard leading up to it. Usually harder things are like death and things like that. My mother just died. 

Sorry about your mother. 

Thanks. But that’s something that everyone has to deal with pretty much. I guess, if they’re lucky, they do, which sounds like a weird thing to say. But you would want to be there for it, as opposed to not. No one wants to precede [a] parent’s death.

But as far as something that’s out of the ordinary, I used to work at a homeless shelter and I had to apply lotion on this guy [with] scabby sores every night, when I was there. Someone else would do it on other nights. That was hard to do because it was just like rubbing lotion on some guy’s ass. So you kind of have to psyche yourself up for that sort of thing.

I have another friend who just died. Seven years ago she had a mastectomy. I was her de facto nurse after the surgery. I had to help her [clean] the wound, twice a day. It’s gross but I had to milk these tubes of blood and whatever comes out of surgery. I had to do that for a few weeks. That was hard to do. I think that’s the only thing I’ve ever done where I had to have a drink. Like, I would have it ready and then at the end of the night, I just needed to sit down and have a drink. That was hard.

I don’t know if that’s the hardest. Maybe that is the hardest aside from life stuff and mental stuff. 

What would you drink? 

Just beer or wine. Nothing really manly or bracing, really. Sometimes I drink scotch. But I only like one or two kinds. It’s rare that I have it. 

What’s your greatest fear? 

Fear of not being able to do what I want, being homeless, or going broke and having to clean houses or something. Which I’ve done before. I just don’t want to go back to it.

Some days, I just feel like, I don’t know if this is going very well. And other times [I think], Oh, this is going great. But then I think, God, I should do something completely different. I think I’ll be miserable and then I measure the misery of sticking with the stuff that I’m doing, versus the misery of just doing whatever else I might do. And I think it’s all horrible options, but I guess it’s less horrible. That’s me just thinking very negatively, which I do a lot. 

Would you call yourself a pessimist? 

No, I don’t think so. I hope for the best. I think if I were a pessimist I wouldn’t do some of the stuff that I do. I wouldn’t be like, Oh, I’m going to make my living by just being a goofball. And it’s simplifying. I do more than that. Everything I do comes back to what I wanted to do when I was 15: act like an idiot with friends and play my guitar.

All I do is the stuff that I [would want to do if I] did something else. Then I would go home and do the stuff that I do all day now. I think if I were a pessimist [I would think], Oh, I should have gone to Med School, even though I probably blew that a long time ago. Like in high school. 

What was your childhood like? 

I think pretty regular. Suburban. Cleveland. I think Cleveland has this dark, inferiority complex to it. A lot of people from there, myself included especially, [are] out to get [themselves] in a way.

Playing my guitar. I wasn’t part of one group or whatever. I wasn’t a jock but I played hockey. That’s my only sport, really. But I did pretty well in school and was a little bit of everything, kind of like now. I was probably more of a nerd than I would admit to. I guess just about everyone is a nerd until they become an adult. There are no real, cool 14 year olds; they’re all dorks. 

If you could have more of something, what would it be? 

I definitely desire more money. But I think everyone does. I make more money now than several years ago. But my panic is the same. It’s just different. Like, Oh my god, I only have this much money. Whereas, a time when I had $100 in the bank I’d be like, All right. I’m cool. I’m set. I’m fine. But now, more would be like, more opportunity to do stuff creatively and more money to just enjoy my life and not be stressed out about money. I think I’m one of those people who will always be stressed out. I think, unless someone could prove to me that I wouldn’t have to worry about money ever again, I would always worry about it, no matter what. It’s just how I am.

Can you talk about your exploration with Norwegian black metal? 

I just did it for fun, six years ago, just to entertain myself. At the time, I was fascinated by Norwegian black metal.

More recently, [Norwegian black metal] has become more recognized in pop culture through YouTube, parodies, and different things like that. But at the time there wasn’t really anything like that. I didn’t think it would be of interest to anybody. I just started emailing this guy who ran this Norwegian record label, and made up this whole thing about how I was a teenager in Indiana wanting to have him sign my black metal band. He was the most Satanic guy.

I had two friends who were into it; one was here and one was in LA. [I sent] them an email at the end of the week [that said], Here’s the correspondence from the week. And I’d actually done it a year or two before that, maybe like in 2001 or so. And those got passed around amongst friends, but it was less focused. 

I read those on the site. 

They’re really stupid. 

I went through the closings [“blacker than the blackest of the black”]. 

There’s a cartoon that uses one of them. I don’t want to say what cartoon it is, but it’s really easy to figure out. I say, “blacker than the blackest of the black times 50.” And then there’s a popular cartoon that says, “blacker than the blackest of black times infinity”, which sounds pretty stolen to me. I mean, times "infinity" instead of "50"? Maybe that’s just parallel thinking. But I don’t think so.

Are you ever concerned with your work being copied in that way? 

Not really. I don’t know what to think about it. Everything’s stolen in art, if you think about it, in a way, because everything influences everything. There was something that happened, recently, where someone changed an idea that I gave to [the person], slightly, and presented it back to me as [the person's] idea. I was a bit irritated with that. Because it was literally like, Here you go. And they said, “Here’s my idea.” And they said the same idea. They were like, “Do you want to work on this with me?” And I was like, “I already did that."

I think it happens in comedy like when people are influenced by stuff. There are all sorts of stories. But, generally, people tend to do their own things. 

How would you describe what you find funny? 

I like when people are extreme about things and wear their beliefs and passions, and that leads to absurdity. This brings it back to black metal. So ridiculous. I’m not necessarily a Norwegian black metal fan in terms of the music, but in terms of that culture, that’s what drew me to it. It’s just a strange way of thinking.

The video stuff that I do, the man on the street ones where it’s talking to people who have extreme opinions about fashion or whatever. I find that entertaining. It’s not that I think that they’re wrong but [it’s] the extreme context of it. 

Do you have any advice for aspiring comedians? 

No. I don’t know. Just go out [and do] what you find is funny. If you do that and you present what you think is funny, then the odds are, there’s going to be someone who also thinks that’s funny. Whether it’s a big or small audience. I hope it changes, radically, but I haven't reached a large audience. I don’t play arenas or anything. My goal is to be able to do what I like doing and just have the opportunities to make enough money to have a nice life. Most of the people I admire probably consider themselves failures, even if they’ve done very well.

Some people think I’m great and some people think I’m horrible. [Comedy is] the only profession where it’s up to someone else to really decide whether you are funny. I hate the word “comedian” because it sounds like it means that I think I'm funny. It doesn’t matter how funny I think I am. If the audience doesn’t laugh, I’m not funny on that night. It’s so subjective. And comedy, more than anything. It’s much easier to sit through a shitty band than to sit through a shitty comedian.

It’s much easier to be in a shitty band than to be a shitty comedian. 

It’s just you and the mic, right? 

Music, no matter what, if no one comes to see your show, or if no one claps, you can still play your show. Comedy, if the audience doesn’t show up or the audience doesn’t react, [the show stops].

How do handle moments like that? 

One thing I’ll say, and I feel like I’ll sound like an asshole if I say this, but I was lucky early on. It’s not like I had a run of bad experiences. Somehow I was lucky in that I didn’t start when I was 16 or 18. Most comedians start when they’re like 18, 20, and 21. By the time I started, I had already played in bands and had been on stage…

[Side-glance] That girl’s tattoos: I couldn’t tell if they were drawn on or if they were bad.

I thought about getting one when my mother died, something to remember her by. And then I’m really glad I didn’t. I was really close to it and then a friend, who had never met my mom, but knew enough about her, was like, “She wouldn’t be into that.” I would think, for me, that's for my mother. To everyone else, I would be some other dude with some shit on his arm. Not that I think that about tattoos. My friend, Arthur, is covered in tattoos. But his tattoos are awesome and they look great. They’re all very well done and they have a style to them.

But I think most tattoos are just evidence that most people don’t think for themselves. Like they’re just sheep. It’s like trying to be anything else.

...I was saying I didn’t have an awful experience in comedy, early on. I mean, I certainly have had [experiences that were] horrible, even recently in Edinburgh. But I think, somehow, my bad experiences were spaced out enough that they weren’t crippling. I had enough good experiences to make me think, I could keep doing this.

When I first started, I never thought I’d do it again after that one time. Because I viewed every show as a completely isolated scenario. I was thinking about it very differently than most people do when they start I guess.  I just thought "This is just what I’m doing tonight" and I didn't think beyond that. It’s a good way to go about life.