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[0:13] Jennifer Ashley Tepper: Hi, I'm Jennifer Ashley Tepper. And I am Joe Iconis and you're listening to the ALBUM PODCAST on the Broadway Podcast Network.

[0:21] Joe Iconis: This episode is about the show stopping number "Amphibian," originally heard in the musical The Black Suits and as performed by Will Roland and the family on the album.

[0:32] Jennifer Ashley Tepper: Yeah, we go super deep in the history of this song, which is slightly more convoluted and complicated than I even remember before talking about it.

[0:45] Joe Iconis: We also talk in this episode about kind of the genre of songs in musicals where characters are writing a song. So that's exciting.

[0:54] Jennifer Ashley Tepper: Yes, for all you buddy musical theater writers out there. This is the episode for you.

[1:01] Joe Iconis: Also, if you like frogs, amphibians really.

[1:21] Jennifer Ashley Tepper: On this episode, we're going to be talking about one of my favorite Iconis songs if I'm allowed to have favorites, and that song is "Amphibian."

[1:29] Joe Iconis: Another song about a creature since we just talked about "Party Hat." "Amphibian" was written for The Black Suits, barely late into the trajectory of The Black Suits. So at what point of the journey of that musical did you write "Amphibian"?

[1:45] Joe Iconis: I wrote "Amphibian" when we did the production of Black Suits at Barrington Stage Company, and I wrote it for a few reasons. I wrote it for the—so it's the amphibian in the show occurs at the top of Act Two. And the idea behind the song is that Nato and Brandon, who are kind of like the sidekicks of the show. If like, you know, Chris and John are like the non-romantic lead love story of the show, Nato and Brandon are the best buds. And I felt like I really wanted to give them their own moment.

[2:37] Joe Iconis: And I wanted to give a sense of the fun of creating music, you know, like The Black Suits for as much as it's about a high school garage band, there's not a terrible amount of moments in the show where the band is actually like making music or playing music. You know, a lot of the show is devoted to the, you know, relationships of the people in the band and how the music affects them and how it mirrors their mental state and how they use it to work through things. But there's not a lot of like guys hanging around a garage, you know, like shooting the shit, making music. There was certainly more of that in the early days of the show. But eventually, like it was sort of a lot of it was cut away. And so I was like, Oh, it'd be so great to like just have a moment, you know, where we kind of capture this vibe of guys, you know, making music and having fun and bickering and all that.

[3:48] Joe Iconis: And that went sort of hand in hand with needing something to start Act Two with for the previous incarnation of the show, which we did in a workshop setting at the SPF Festival in New York City in 2008. Act Two began with "Joey's a Punk Rocker" as kind of this like sort of palate cleanser. You know, I'm a big fan of an Act Two that sort of begins with this like kind of self-contained moment or song that's sort of like, OK, we're getting back into it. And now the real story is going to start.

[4:29] Joe Iconis: Like most of the things that I do, it's probably, you know, just totally ripped off from Cabaret, which starts with the emcee, you know, chatting with the audience and the kick line that ensues, which is, of course, related to the show, but kind of feels like its own little like five-minute mini musical in and of itself. And so "Joey's a Punk Rocker" used to occupy that spot as sung by the character of Megan in The Black Suits. But as I believe we've talked about already, Megan, the character was cut along with her the song "Joey's a Punk Rocker." And so there was this kind of hole at the top of Act Two, and "Amphibian" was what I wrote to fill it.

[5:24] Joe Iconis: The other thing that "Amphibian" did was it's a song that references this character that I created for the Black Suits iteration. I'm sorry for the Barrington Stage Company iteration of Black Suits, which is this ceramic frog named Mr. Peepee, who Nato, the character played by Lance Rubin originally and Will Roland at Barrington Stage Company, cherishes this ceramic frog and kind of treats it as a mascot. And so "Amphibian" feels like a song that Nato started to pay tribute to his beloved mascot, Mr. Peepee, the frog.

[6:06] Jennifer Ashley Tepper: Were any of the older songs from Black Suits that got cut away, as you said, where the guys are like making music, were any of the other ones like that? Did they come from a place of like, we're making this song up for the first time, like the way "Amphibian" sort of does of like we're improving it a little or jamming?

[6:24] Joe Iconis: You know, a lot of the songs that I wrote that sort of like... And now we're going to like hear it rehearsed, you know, and I have to say I tend to find it very cringy in musicals or movies or plays when there are characters who are like writing something in real time. I think it's really, really hard to do that well, to have it actually seem like, you know, a human being like coming up with a song in real time, especially if you're trying to show a collaboration. You know, there's just like so many scenes in movies where it's like two people are writing a song and it just always feels fake. It always feels like, you know, it's like when doctors watch E.R. and they're like, this is so not how it is.

Anytime you see songwriting in a movie or TV show or a musical, that's never how it is. You can't fake it. And so I think I was scared to attempt to write something that implied that this thing was being made up in real time. But I tried with "Amphibian," and I think in the context of the show, we do as well as one possibly could.

[8:09] Joe Iconis: For me, something that was helpful was like just thinking of like, you know, Nato is a bass player. And so when "Amphibian" starts, it's just bass. And so I needed to write something that was really simple where you could get the melody of the song and you could understand what the song was with just voice and bass. And the simplicity of it, I think, is something that helps. And the goofiness of it, which, you know, totally feels tied to the character. It makes it feel like, you know, I think it makes it feel a little more authentic. You know, it feels like, oh, yeah, this kid, this actually is something that we could imagine this kid coming up with on the spot as he's playing this really simple pattern on the bass that he's probably played 10 million times before.

[8:57] Joe Iconis: And then, you know, in the show The Black Suits, all of the verses that are on the album aren't in "Amphibian." I think there's one verse and there's this whole other section that involves Brandon played by Harrison Chad in the Barrington production. Brandon comes in and starts rapping, essentially over the bass figure, which I like a lot, but it felt like not appropriate to include on the album as it's not really a standalone thing.

[9:51] Joe Iconis: In terms of the kind of interesting conversation about like the craft of musical theater, when a character has to write a song, it is, I think, really instructive, especially if anyone who's listening to this wants to write a musical or is kind of working on doing their best version of this. I feel like the shows that do this well and the, you know, where "Amphibian" does it well is like it's so based in the character. It's so based in like something funny that the character would actually do and how that generates a song. And I feel like as hard as it is to do this well and as many times as we've seen it done badly, it's even harder to do it when it's funny.

[10:11] Joe Iconis: I was actually thinking about this. I saw a very wonderful production of The Goodbye Girl recently. And like, you know, the song "Paula" is not the same. It's not like, you know, the character improvs this song sort of, you know, it starts out by like this character we know to be kind of like a funny actor who might improv is improving a song. And I was like, that is such a rare occurrence in a musical where you really feel like it's genuinely funny and it comes out of a character writing a song on the spot in that format. That's my tangent about that.

[10:42] Jennifer Ashley Tepper: No, I think that that's a great tangent.

[10:46] Joe Iconis: And right on. Yeah, I think you're right. There's something about like the—it's like it feels like when it gets when we see it and it's cringy. It's because it's so general, you know, and because it feels like the songs that song themselves have nothing to do with the characters who are singing it. And also I feel like so often when there is a moment like that where we're seeing characters like write a song, it's always supposed to be that that song is like the best song ever written. You know, it's supposed to be like, this is the song that's going to save them all. And I think that as soon as you do that in a show to, you know, unless it's maybe like five songs ever written, like, you know, "New York, New York," which is one of them, you just can't—you're only setting yourself up to have the audience feel like that's not that good.

[11:33] Joe Iconis: You know, it's like the—

[11:35] Jennifer Ashley Tepper: Well, I think the hard thing about this also in terms of the art form is like we've seen it in so many jukebox musicals now, this trope where it actually is a great song and the lead up to it is like, oh my God, so and so are you going to write this? And it's some great hit writer who's, you know, musical jukebox musical we're already in the theater to see. And then it does turn out to be, you know, "Caroline."

[11:56] Joe Iconis: Right. A beautiful noise was the last most recent jukebox musical I saw.

[11:59] Jennifer Ashley Tepper: So that's what I'm saying. But, yeah, it happens in jukebox musicals and you're like, oh, that is a great song. So when an original musical writer is tasked with doing it, especially if it's a dramatic moment, the stakes are very high for the actual, you know, hit quality of the song. It's almost a little bit impossible.

[12:15] Joe Iconis: Amphibian is not one of them also very strange about Amphibian is like when did you know that this very specific very character driven song for a musical was going to be able to translate to being like kind of an out of context concert showstopper because it feels like it almost shouldn't be like it's very, you know, it's a very generic song that they're trying to write a love song for the radio. It feels like there's a lot of instances of that.

[12:41] Jennifer Ashley Tepper: Because it feels like it almost shouldn't be like it's very unlikely that this would be the song that translates to, you know, a room full of concert goers kind of singing along right?

[12:52] Joe Iconis: Yeah, no, it is. It's like it feels like Amphibian was like the surprise hit of that run of Black Suits, you know, which also like featured a really incredible performance by like a pre-Dear Evan Hansen, Ben Platt. And so I feel like if like, you know, pre-Evan Hansen, Ben Platt, having like musical panic attacks in a, you know, a really small theater when that is like trumped by idiot Will Roland singing about like frogs. And so yeah, there's something to this song, you know, and and so people just always, you know, liked it a lot. And like everyone always mentioned it to me. And so I the first time we ever did this song in concert, I believe, was at the the the gig at Musical Theater Factory, where it was the gig that I first did try again.

And it was after Be More Chill closed the Tea River in July of 2015. I think that was the first time we did Amphibian. And I and I believe Harrison Chad sang it for the first time. And and I wrote I wrote the extra verse for it for that because I knew like, oh, it's not gonna it's not gonna make sense to have the like the the Brandon rap in it. Because the rap, you know, is about it's so specifically tied to the dialogue scene. And he's he's singing about Beethoven and Marlee Matlin. And it's and it felt like, oh, this this is not going to hang by itself. But the but the the song itself might. And yeah, and from like the first time it was performed, people just reacted in a very visceral way to the song.

[14:36] Joe Iconis: And you know, it's so funny about it. It's like, it almost feels like a cover. For me, it almost feels like a song I didn't write, because when I wrote it, I was so thinking about it being written by, by, you know, NATO, Obenkrieger and Brandon Keyes. It doesn't it doesn't feel like I would never in a million years write that song if I was just like sitting down to write a standalone song. It's a song that only could have been written like by, you know, character by myself in collaboration with with characters. And I will even say this, when I when I first wrote it, I you know, I was at Barrington. And so the great Bill Finn, who's been a real supporter and sort of mentor to me throughout my career, he was, you know, at Barrington Stage Company running this musical theater, you know, stage.

And he was really around, you know, the black suits a lot. And so I wrote it and he like he really loved it. He thought it was just great. And I said to him, Yeah, you know, the only thing I the only thing that bugs me about it is that amphibian and oblivion don't really rhyme. And, and he said, What are you talking about? And I was like, Well, they don't, you know, it's like, it should be like, it would amphibian and oblivion would rhyme. But because it's the you know, the consonants, the B and the V, they don't, they don't, they don't match up. So it's not really a rhyme, but it almost is. And he he said, it rhymes, just like that. He was so dismissive of me of me bitching about those two words not rhyming.

And and I've thought about that so often in my life where it's like, and I think of Bill Finn as you know, he's like the consummate lyricist and his stuff rhymes for real. And, you know, and and the, the, the integrity of his lyric writing is so high, that it's like, okay, he thought that those those words, you know, rhyme. That it's, it's okay. So it's, it's also like, yeah, yeah, it's within the world of the piece. And, you know, Bill Finn as a professor has sat through I'm sure many classes where none of the songs rhyme, and everyone is trying to write something that sounds like the radio where it's like, you know, on a far different level. But, you know, I think Bill Finn sitting in a rehearsal for his own show, you know, in whenever time period, the 90s would have also said the same thing as you and been criticizing himself for that lack of rhyme.

But at the end of the day, isn't it that, you know, those characters would use that rhyme, you know, whereas someone who is not writing a song, but is hearing the song in their head might rhyme perfectly, if that makes sense.

[17:24] Jennifer Ashley Tepper: Yeah, of course, it does, like 100% 100%. And honestly, I think that like, if, you know, if I heard that song, as written by NATO and Brandon, I would feel like, oh, these, these kids are great writers. I'd be like, this is very, this is a very, very advanced. They're really, really good. Yeah, yeah.

[17:48] Joe Iconis: Yeah, and you know, it's like, this is, you know, not to be like, not to be like, I guess, gauche or something, and talk about specific things that people have said about me and, and the, the press. But you know, one of the one of the criticisms that I've always thought was so funny of be more chill in the Times Review was, you know, Ben Brantley said that it's like, it's that, like, the writing was so amateurish, that it's like, not only about high school kids, but it sounds like something that could have been made up by high school kids. And that, that's always like, that's always stuck in my brain, because I really do pride myself on anything that I write, I write in the vocabulary of the human beings who inhabit the story.

And so, you know, as I've said many times, like be more chill on the, the, you know, the words that those characters use are, you know, it's, it's completely different, you know, set of set of, you know, the vocabulary and references and blah, blah, blah. Then the characters in Love and Hate Nation use, or the characters in the untitled, unauthorized Hunter S. Thompson musical use. And that's intentional, you know, and, and, and that's how I always want to write, but I've always felt like, you know, it's like, yeah, be more chill, like the, the words they use are very blunt, and you know, they're not flowery, and they speak in a specific way. But if those characters were writing, like musical theater songs, they wouldn't sound anything like be more chill.

And I always think like, you know, listen to like Amphibian, you know, it's like the, the, the, you know, the Amphibian, which is so tied to the, the specific characters who wrote it in, in Black Suits. It's still like, it still sounds different from the songs that they sing when they're expressing themselves, you know, internally, it's like Amphibian sounds totally different from Social Worker, even though it's from the same show, because like, if you know, if Chris Thurzer was going to write a song, we hear some of the songs, they wouldn't necessarily sound like Social Worker, even though he's singing that. And so I've always like, I've always thought about the, the, just the connection between like, you know, the characters, how they sing in a musical, and how they would, how they would, how they would sing if they were, you know, if we were hearing them write a musical, and I think it's actually two different things.

[20:11] Jennifer Ashley Tepper: Yeah, that makes total sense. I guess the critics didn't know that you tricked them, that you wrote so authentically for high school characters that they thought it sounded like high school, high school characters wrote it.

[20:23] Joe Iconis: Yeah, I really, I tricked them.

[20:25] Jennifer Ashley Tepper: Nice work.

[20:26] Joe Iconis: Thank you so much. I'm really, I'm really proud of it. But I think in, you know, it's what you said, held up against other shows, the references are different, the way of, you know, speaking and articulating is different.

[20:37] Jennifer Ashley Tepper: Yeah.

[20:38] Joe Iconis: Yeah. It is interesting, though, when it's, you know, you've talked in other podcast episodes about not feeling like you respond to writing on spec, because you need to be writing from, like, characters perspective that you're really familiar with, or your own perspective and putting, you know, your brain inside a character, however you articulated it was better than that. But I feel like Amphibian, the way you just described it in this episode makes me think like, oh, if you were auditioning to write a musical about a high school garage band, like Amphibian could never have come out of your head, like it is far away. I feel like it's only after sitting with those characters, maybe and watching them evolve through different iterations of Black Suits that it was like, how would Brandon and Nato write a song like I feel like it's that thing when you're out of town with a musical and you couldn't have written the song for the characters without having gone through the process first, more than I maybe realized before.

[21:32] Joe Iconis: Oh, my gosh, 100%. And it's like, and some things and some things, you know, I think I, I can just jump in and write a song about and it'll it'll work and it'll be fine. But a lot of things like I just I need to be immersed in the in the characters, I need to be fully inhabiting their headspace. Because I think that I yeah, I'm just at my, my best. And I'm at my most, you know, I'm at my most me, when I'm writing really specifically, and I'm, I'm, I'm writing using things from the characters, lives and experiences, as opposed to like, you know, what someone might think a teenager would sing about or think about or feel about.

[22:16] Joe Iconis: Amphibian. Oh, you know what, and I, we should just talk, we should talk about the like, you know, the the basic shit to before we go. 516 is the area code of Nassau County, where I'm from, which, you know, I guess is an easily Googleable thing. But that's what it is. And Black Suits takes place in in Garden City, Long Island, where I'm also from. And just shout out to the incredible arrangements on this track. You know, Black Suits is a is a show that's about a high school garage band. And so the orchestrations are pretty, pretty basic. And so far as like the stuff I've written, it's just like a straight up little rock band in the band. And so, you know, Charlie Rosen really blew this one out with the horn section, and it just feels like the heat like the hugest, you know, most massive, like, you know, rock, ska, you know, whatever, rave up. And that's, that's all from the brand of of the incredible Charlie Rosen and those gorgeous horn players on the track. Love it forever. Amphibian. Amphibian.

[23:30] Joe Iconis: Hey, thanks so much for listening or watching to my podcast. Do me a favor and go to wherever you just listen to or watch this thing and subscribe or like or give us a great rating or review and then head to bpn.fm slash album to find out even more information about this podcast. More ways to watch more ways to listen and check out my album album. Thanks so much for hanging out.

[23:58] Joe Iconis: Album podcast is executive produced by Liz Armstrong, produced by Dori Berenstein, Alan Seals, Kim Garris and the rest of the team at the Broadway Podcast Network. Be sure to visit bpn.fm slash album for both audio and video versions of this podcast and to listen to album.

[24:28] Joe Iconis: Love it.