The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
the b-side
Thursday, November 19, 2015 — 3B

By JACOB RICH

Daily Film Editor

“You know, sometimes, I’d 

bring, like, four strippers to the 
radio show after work to party 
with us. So they were there for, 
like, five minutes, and I went 
outside to have a cigarette. When 
I came back in, the four girls were 
beelining out of there. ‘Oh my god, 
we’ve got to get out of there,’ they 
were saying, and, I’m like, ‘What, 
what?’ and there’s Bob, pants 
down, pubic hair on fire.”

 I can’t stop laughing. I’m 

Skyping with University alum 
Dee Simon, author and co-host 
of the “Sick and Wrong” podcast, 
and he’s telling me a story about 
his brief experience working as 
the host of a metal radio show in 
San Francisco.

 “Wait, his pubes were still on 

him?” I return. “He didn’t cut 
them off first?”

 “No, he was, like, lighting 

his dick on fire. Bob was a vile 
creature.” 

 Dee Simon is every Michigan 

parent’s worst nightmare. 

 Rather than file into line with 

the rest of the doctors, lawyers 
and engineers the University 
churns out every year, Simon 
(real name David Scott) decided 
that he wanted to do something 
different with his University of 
Michigan degree. He wanted to 
have his own radio show. 

 And, for a while, he did. After 

graduating from the University in 
1997 with a dual degree in English 
and Broadcast Communications 
(and a few Michigan Daily Arts 
articles under his belt), Dee 
moved out to the San Francisco 
Bay Area and hosted a late-
night program, Rampage Radio. 
Inspired by the lifestyle of shock-
jock radio DJs like Howard 
Stern, the heavy metal-focused 
show incorporated elements of 
dirty talk radio, complete with 
strippers and bizarre rocker 
guests doing drugs in the back of 
the studio. 

 However, Dee’s radio career 

didn’t pan out. There just wasn’t 
enough money in it to sustain a 
real career. For a while he spent 
time working first at a cushy tech 
job, then as a strip club DJ after 
the economy crashed in the early 
Bush era (he documented this 
journey in his autobiographical 
book, “Play Something Dancy”) 
but in more recent years he’s 
settled 
down 
into 
a 
more 

mundane, well-paying career in 

L.A. as a project manager for a 
kids’ software company. 

 “It’s weird. The place is owned 

by scientologists,” he said. 

 But Simon’s radio dream 

hasn’t died quite yet. 

 “I’ve always wanted to do 

radio. But it’s hard to get a 
broadcast radio gig, so podcasts 
are the next best thing,” he said. 

 For almost a decade, Simon 

has been the co-host of the “Sick 
and Wrong” podcast, the self-
described “world’s source for 
anti-social commentary.” “Sick 
and Wrong” features discussion 
of 
“the 
most 
disturbing 

news items of the week” and 
interviews with a huge variety of 
counterculture personalities. 

 Recent interviewees include 

Jinx Dawson, the lead singer of 
controversial ’60s-’70s satanic-
psychedelic band Coven, Mia 
Matsumiya, creator of the “perv_
magnet” Instagram page recently 
featured by Buzzfeed and Hung 
Yung Terrarist, a former sex 
cultist/current female MC. It’s 
easy to see how Dee’s origins as 
a shock-jock have influenced his 
work on “Sick and Wrong.”

 The podcast hit it big, but not 

huge. In the U.S., the show hovers 
around the bottom of the top 100 
comedy charts, while in the U.K., 
the show regularly has been seen 
in the top 10. The show’s fanbase is 
sizable, but insular.

 “It’s kinda cool to put out a 

product that has, you know, a niche 
audience,” he said. “It’s true, we’re 
not like Marc Maron or something. 
But you know, it’s fun!” 

 I’ve been listening to “Sick 

and Wrong” since I was, well, 
way too young to be listening to 
“Sick and Wrong.” I guess it was 
the subject matter that brought 
me to the show. Getting to learn 
about, drugs, counterculture and 
loose women at the age of 14 was 
something mundane small-town 
me couldn’t pass up. 

 Something I’ve always admired 

about the podcast is its ability to find 
humor in the darkest and strangest 
of places. It’s not disturbing for 
disturbing’s sake. Even when the 
stories the show covered got grisly 
or depressing, Dee and his former 
co-host (University alum Lance 
Wackerle, an electrical engineer) 
could always find ways to make me 
laugh about it. At its core, “Sick and 
Wrong” is a show about not taking 
life too seriously. 

 “Sick and Wrong” has over 500 

episodes available on the iTunes 
store. Producing one episode a 

week, that’s almost 10 years of 
podcasting 
experience 
under 

Simon’s belt. 

 
When 
Episode 
500 
was 

released a couple of months ago, 
it marked a huge change for the 
show: Wackerle, Dee’s co-host 
from day one, left the show. His 
new co-host, independent comic 
writer Andrew Harrison, has been 
picking up where Wackerle left off. 

 “It’s a weird situation when 

you have a long-running podcast 
and all of a sudden you need to 
switch hosts. So I was faced with a 
difficult decision,” he said. “What 
do I do? Do I start a new show? Do 
I finish my podcasting career? Or 
maybe like, try to find a different 
host? But then finding a different 
host poses its own problems, 
because they have to win the 
crowd over.”

 Dee met his new co-host 

Harrison through a mutual friend 
who met him on Tinder. 

 “They went on one date and she 

was like, wow, this guy is whacked. 
He started talking about doing 
heroin in Prague, and this whole 
thing about a dominatrix that 
pegged him, this weird shit. He’s a 
weird guy,” he said. 

 To top it off, the deep-voiced 

Harrison had years of New York 
radio experience under his belt. It 
was a match made in heaven. 

 “The cadence and the timing 

was there with him because he’d 
done radio. He wasn’t nervous, so 
that was kinda cool. His voice is 
great, and he has a great sense of 
humor, he’s a twisted individual.”

 Dee and Harrison are moving 

ahead with what they call “Sick 
and Wrong 2.0.,” a slight change 
in format to the show that still 
uses the same iTunes feed. A few 
drunken rants to Dee’s voicemail 
notwithstanding, 
the 
fanbase 

seems to have accepted Harrison 
with open arms. I can’t wait to see 
where the show goes from here.

 It was clear from just talking to 

him over Skype how much hosting 
talent Simon has. He told story 
after story and had me in tears. 
Maybe it’s a shame that Dee Simon 
didn’t make it big on the radio. Or 
maybe it isn’t, because in that case, 
my favorite podcast wouldn’t exist.

 If you’re looking for a comedy 

podcast out of the ordinary, you 
should listen to “Sick and Wrong” 
on iTunes. Dee’s autobiographical 
book about his experience as a strip 
club DJ, “Play Something Dancy,” 
is available on Amazon. Follow 
Dee on Twitter @deesimon666 and 
Instagram @mrdeesimon.

ARTIST
PROFILE

IN

COURTESY OF DEE SIMON

Dee Simon went from University student to podcast veteran.

SINGLE REVIEW

 Hip-hop fans have been 
downright spoiled this calendar 
year. Artists like Future and 
Young 
Thug have 
complete-
ly done 
away with 
traditional 
music dis-
tribution 
models, 
throwing 
out a staggering eight projects 
between them. While it could 
be argued that the shitstorm of 
free Atlanta mixtapes has in a 
way devalued contemporary rap 
music, Pusha T returned last 
week with a song that demands 
your attention for its entire 
duration.
 By this, I mean that upon 
its initial release you literally 
couldn’t play the song without 
holding and sustaining a “click” 
on the animated artwork on the 
label website; relax your trigger 
finger and the song starts over. 
It’s the details that make this 
single feel special, like the birds 
that fly around while the song 
plays (“flying a bird” translates 
to moving a brick of cocaine in 
Rapper Talk™). For those of you 
unfamiliar with Push and his 
long history with cocaine, it’s 
his raison d’etre. What weed is 

for Wiz Khalifa, money is for Jay 
Z, sex is for Lil Wayne, cocaine 
is for Push-A-Ton.
 While Push has been “the 
coke dealer in Balmain jeans” 
of rap for the last six years, he 
somehow never has to repeat 
himself. Every song in his rep-
ertoire is about freebase, but he 
consistently outdoes himself 
with the poetry he conjures; 
“Untouchable” is no exception. 
He uses “Cross-Fit” as a verb for 
lifting bricks of nose candy into 
his convertible.
 Given that he’s been dead 
silent since the fall of 2013 
(No, I haven’t forgotten that 
“Move That Dope” feature), it 
should surprise no one that he 

has a lot to say. What makes 
“Untouchable” one of the best 
hip-hop singles this year is 
the grandiosity with which 
he’s approached his return. 
There’s the obligatory flex of 
his new position at the helm 
of G.O.O.D. Music, and like 
any street hustler, he of course 
had to disclose his exact sal-
ary. In less than four minutes 
he manages to throw serious 
shade at Donald Trump, com-
pare himself to Pablo Escobar 
and evoke the mental image 
of a Rolls Royce with a trunk 
full of blow. Ah, he’s well and 
truly back.

- SHAYAN SHAFII

G.O.O.D. MUSIC

B+

Untouchable

Pusha T

G.O.O.D. Music

T

his year, I decided to 
switch up the focus 
of my food column, 

from opinion pieces and the 
occasional restaurant review, 
to report-
age on local 
restaurants. 
Ann Arbor is 
home to an 
increasing 
number of 
restaurants, 
many of 
them off-
campus and 
overlooked, 
run by peo-
ple preparing versions of their 
home country’s food. I’d like, if 
possible, to expose my readers 
to as many of them as possible, 
and document the extraordi-
nary journeys and work that 
have gone into building these 
restaurants.

When a professor of mine, 

who had lived in Israel, told 
me to check out Haifa Falafel, 
I headed over immediately. 
Twenty 
bus 
stops 
down 

Washtenaw Avenue, I found 
the tiny shop. Painted on the 
storefront windows were the 
phrases “MEDITERRANEAN 
FOOD” and “HAIFA STYLE 
FALAFEL.” I had called the 
owner, Ali Usman, beforehand 
to schedule the interview, but 
when I arrived he was still 
hustling in the kitchen. I took 
a seat and took my standard 
atmosphere notes: jangly music 
playing, 
colorful 
lanterns 

hanging, 
smell 
of 
sumac 

wafting. Pasted on the walls 
were photos of Haifa, Israel, 

including its famous Bahá’í 
temple (Baha’i is a religion, of 
Persian origin, that emphasizes 
the 
spiritual 
unity 
of 

humankind). Usman prepared 
us two chicken shawarmas and 
a plate of crisp, mahogany-
colored falafel, and we sat down 
to eat. I ignored the food at first 
— I wanted to know everything 
about this restaurant, and him.

“Where are you from?”
“How did this place start?
“Are you Baha’i?”
Tall, lean and intense, Usman 

seemed a bit puzzled. He gave 
me the basics: He’s an Israeli-
Arab from outside Haifa, who, 
as an 18-year-old, followed his 
two brothers to Ann Arbor to 
open this shop, even though 
none of them had any formal 
training. His two brothers have 
since married and left, leaving 
him in charge. He’s not Baha’i. 
But that’s as much as he’d say 
about himself.

“Talk about the food,” he 

urged me. “Don’t talk about 
me, or all of … this,” gesturing 
towards the lanterns and the 
photos and the speakers. 

At this point, a customer 

sitting nearby pulled up a chair 
to offer his input.

“This is the best food in 

Ann Arbor,” he said. “The best 
falafel I’ve ever had. I come 
here two or three times a week. 
Make sure you take that down.” 
 

After eating there myself, 

I can see why. The terms 
“Mediterranean” and “Middle 
Eastern” are too vague. Take 
the falafel. Each city in Israel 
has its own variety: Jerusalem 
falafel are big, dense and 
green from copious amounts of 
chopped parsley. In Tel Aviv, 
they’re rolled smaller, but are 
still green. Haifa-style falafel 
are gumball-sized, golden and 
have a looser texture.

The ones Usman prepares are 

some of the best I’ve ever had — 
crispy-creamy, garlicky, great 
even outside of a sandwich. He 
takes great pride in preparing 
them, which also means that 
he can’t always get them to that 

perfect color.

“I make them myself, it’s a 

whole process,” he said. “I can’t 
get it right every time.”

Another 
non-downtown 

specialty of his is majadara: 
lentils cooked with toothsome, 
nutty bulgur wheat. But there 
are some things that Usman 
can’t translate from Haifa to 
Ann Arbor. In Haifa, falafel are 
typically stuffed into a half-circle 
of pita that’s squeezed open.

“We still can’t find a good 

enough pita to do that,” he said, 
in between mouthfuls. “One 
time, we had a grocery store 
try to bake it, and they sent us 
triangular pitas. Now, we just 
use flat ones and wrap it.”

Any attempt to bring hyper-

regional food to Michigan is 
bound to run into problems 
like that. More surprising is 
Usman’s customer base. Israeli-
Arabs and Palestinians make up 
just one part of the local Arab 
community, many of whom are 
from Lebanon, Syria and Iraq. 
But Usman told me that Arabs 
actually are a minority of his 
business — Jews and vegetarians 
flock there in huge numbers. 

Either 
way, 
Usman 
has 

a fierce pride in what he’s 
doing — feeding people, and 
exposing them to food that he 
doesn’t think they’ll be getting 
downtown. As I walked out the 
door, his farewell line said it all.

“One more thing: Jerusalem 

Garden has got nothing on us.”

Buonomo is exposing 

himself (to food, you perverts). 

To get a sneak peek, email 

gbuonomo@umich.edu. 

FOOD COLUMN

Mediterranean 

food in Ann Arbor

GIANCARLO 

BUONOMO

“One more 

thing: Jerusalem 
Garden has got 
nothing on us.”

Usman has a 
fierce pride 
in what he’s 

doing. 

TOP FIVE REASONS TO WRITE FOR 

DAILY ARTS

1. WE HATE LISTS

2. IT’S 2K15; GOD IS A RAPPER

4. WE DON’T KNOW MATH

