TRANSCRIPT Bullseye with Jesse Thorn: Why Biz Markie embodied hip-hop

[00:00:00]

Jesse Thorn: Hey gang, it’s Jesse. So, I’m working on a special Bullseye thing. I could use your help. Do you have an interesting job, or a weird job, or a strange job, or even a regular job that is surprisingly interesting? Like, are you a museum curator, or a firefighter, or a forest ranger, or—? There’s a lot of options. Anyway, we’re working on this special Bullseye. I want to hear from you. WhatsMyJob@MaximumFun.org. W-H-A-T-S-M-Y-J-O-B at Maximum Fun dot org. All one word. WhatsMyJob@MaximumFun.org. Just let us know what your job is. Send us a voice memo. Whatever. Again, this is a special Bullseye thing. It’s gonna be really fun. If we can use you on the show, it’ll be nice. WhatsMyJob@MaximumFun.org. Thanks!

Transition: Gentle, trilling music with a steady drumbeat plays under the dialogue.

Promo: Bullseye with Jesse Thorn is a production of MaximumFun.org and is distributed by NPR.

Music: “Huddle Formation” from the album Thunder, Lightning, Strike by The Go! Team—a fast, upbeat, peppy song. Music plays as Jesse speaks, then fades out.

Music: “Just a Friend” from the album The Biz Never Sleeps by Biz Markie.

(Music continues under the dialogue.)

Jesse Thorn: It’s Bullseye. I’m Jesse Thorn. Most people, if they know who Biz Markie was, know him from this song.

Music:

You, you got what I need

But you say he’s just a friend

Yeah, you say he’s just a friend

Oh, baby! You got what I need

But you say he’s just a friend

But you say he’s just a friend

Oooh, baby! You’ve got what I need

But you say he’s just a friend

But you say he’s just a friend

(Music fades out.)

Jesse Thorn: And for good reason. It is a great song. It’s one of those songs that you can play anywhere, anytime, and basically everyone present will be happy to hear it. But within hip-hop, Biz Markie was much more than just a guy with a hit record. He was a sort of avatar for everything delightful about the culture—every positive vibe, every party, every laugh, every human connection. When it came to good times, nobody beat the Biz. Biz Markie was funny, but he wasn’t a clown. He was a kind of keeper of the flame, first as a rapper and beatboxer, later as perhaps the universe’s number one celebrity DJ. His very way of being in the world reminded everyone around him how fun hip-hop could be.

That spirit was what Sacha Jenkins tried to capture in his film, All Up in The Biz. It’s basically a movie about the most beloved guy in the history of hip-hop. Sacha Jenkins himself is a hip-hop veteran. He was one of the founders of the legendary magazine, Ego Trip, and the creative director of Mass Appeal Magazine. He’s also directed a number of other films, including documentaries about the Wu-Tang Clan, Rick James, and Louis Armstrong.

Now, let’s talk about the Biz, emma-emma-zuh-ay, arruh-arruh-suh-kay, guaranteed to brighten your day.

Sacha Jenkins, welcome to Bullseye. I’m so happy to have you on the show.

Sacha Jenkins: Happy to be here.

Jesse Thorn: So, when you were thinking about making a documentary for a set of stuff Showtime was putting out for the 50th anniversary of hip-hop, there were a lot of topics you could have covered.

(He confirms.)

There are a lot of people in your movie who merit a documentary. Why did you choose Biz Markie?

Sacha Jenkins: Because all roads lead to Biz Markie. I mean, this guy had a heavy hand in the careers of people like Big Daddy Kane and Rakim. I mean, how could one man who no one had any expectations for have such a strong influence on the culture? And he was the personification of hip-hop, basically. He’s hip-hop Jesus in many ways.

Jesse Thorn: That’s a bold statement.

Sacha Jenkins: I challenge anyone to challenge me on that statement. I mean, who else is hip-hop Jesus? I mean, obviously there’s Jesus-Jesus, and much respect to that Jesus—most important Jesus. But when it comes to the hip-hop Jesus, it’s Biz Markie.

[00:05:00]

Jesse Thorn: When was the first time you heard Biz Markie’s music?

Sacha Jenkins: Well, being a kid growing up in Queens, across the street from the Astoria Projects, about a mile away from Queensbridge Projects—which is where the Juice Crew hails from. I remember just hearing “Nobody Beats the Biz” and just like going nuts in my bedroom.

Music: “Nobody Beats the Biz” from the album Goin’ Off by Biz Markie.

Nobody beats the Biz

(Nobody beats the Biz)

You know me as the B-I-Z M-A-R-K-I-E and

I go for what I know doing a show for human beings

I’m guaranteed to rock I make the ladies scream and shout

I’m bound to wreck your body and say turn the party out

(Music fades out.)

Sacha Jenkins: I would hear it at jams. I would hear it on the radio. It was—you know, it was inspired by a popular television commercial for a local electronics store called The Wiz.

Clip:

Music: A catchy commercial jingle.

Nobody beats The Wiz

Nobody beats The Wiz

Narrator: Nobody beats The Wiz on this programmable VHS VCR with wireless remote and HQ circuitry! A gift at $217! Grand opening sale at—

Sacha Jenkins: So, if you’re from New York and you know The Wiz, you’ll know how “Nobody Beats the Biz” is very similar. And it was just a special time for me in New York and for so many other kids at the time. So, yeah, that’s probably when I first—I’m sure that’s when I first encountered Biz Markie’s music.

Jesse Thorn: When did you first meet him in real life?

Sacha Jenkins: Interestingly enough, I hadn’t met him until maybe two years before his death, and we were meeting about—he wanted to do a documentary. And he came to my office, and we had a great conversation, and we were gonna try to do something. And at the time, I couldn’t get any takers for a Bis Markie documentary. But somehow in death—I don’t think it’s just because he died that I was able to do it.

Mass appeal. We said—when I was there at the time, we spearheaded something called Hip-Hop 50 for the 50th anniversary. So, there’s lots of hip-hop content that we made for Showtime. But I feel like if you’re telling the story of hip-hop, like to unravel, to unpack the story of Biz Markie is telling the story of hip-hop.

Jesse Thorn: That’s something that I really didn’t—look, like, I knew he was deeply connected with the Juice Crew, who are incredibly important. But like, last year, I interviewed Rakim for this show. And I had never heard the tapes of them rapping together as teenagers. You know what I mean? Like, like pre-professional teenagers, like 16-year-olds or 17-year-olds or whatever.

Music: A fuzzy recording of Rakim and Biz Markie rapping together.

It’s like that and a—

It’s like that and a—

It’s like that and a—

To the beat, y’all,

Don’t look, don’t, don’t, don’t freak, y’all (uh)

If you don’t stop

Well, I don’t act conceited

Don’t brag on books

But when it comes to saying rhyme twists

I got the most words to anybody else

This the MC, bitch; don’t get to ask you who’s the best

Tell them who it is

Tell them Biz or the Bizzie or Biz Markie

Or either way you add it up

It equals me…

Jesse Thorn: It was a small world, hip-hop in 1982. And Biz Markie seemed to be physically at every single point in the constellation.

Sacha Jenkins: Yeah, I mean, he was really inspired by it, and he found a way to amplify who he was. He was able to create an identity that he was comfortable with. I think Biz was teased a lot as a kid, made fun of, bullied. But he found strength in hip-hop, and hip-hop has this transformational power that—it’s like putting on a cape and becoming a superhero. It’s like once you figured out what your rhymes are and you figured out what you want to say and how you want to say it, you can totally become a superhero. And Biz Markie, before cell phones, before pagers, like this guy—before Uber and Lyft, this guy, you know, who lives out in Long Island made it his business to be at jams in Harlem. Made it his business to be at jams in Queens. I mean, the guy literally was everywhere. And that’s before people connected the dots with hip-hop.

Like back then, if you’re from the Bronx, you went to jams in the Bronx. If you’re from Queens, you just went to the local jams. You didn’t really travel far unless you had a cousin in whatever—some projects uptown. Like, you would stay where you were. And so, Biz was a weirdo. Like, he traveled, and he wound up becoming a physical conduit of hip-hop in its essence, by his travels.

Jesse Thorn: Even more to get into with Sacha Jenkins after the break. Stay with us. It’s Bullseye from MaximumFun.org and NPR.

Transition: Thumpy synth with a syncopated beat.

Jesse Thorn: Welcome back to Bullseye. I’m Jesse Thorn. My guest is director Sacha Jenkins. He is a co-founder of the hip-hop magazine Ego Trip and a documentary filmmaker. His subjects have included Louis Armstrong, Wu-Tang Clan, Ed Sullivan, and now hip-hop pioneer Biz Markie.

[00:10:00]

All Up in the Biz is streaming on Showtime and Paramount and is available to buy digitally pretty much everywhere. Let’s get back into our conversation.

You cover his early life a little bit in the movie, but it seems like it’s a little bit tough to pierce, because he didn’t talk much about his early life. What did you learn from talking to his foster siblings and his wife about who he was before hip-hop?

Sacha Jenkins: I mean, who he was before hip-hop was who he was during hip-hop. He was a funny guy; he loved to crack jokes. He was a collector of random toys, Barbie dolls, a collector of sneakers. I mean, all these things that are popular today, like collecting of sneakers—like, he did that in the ’80s. Like, he was just a big kid. You know what I mean? Everyone would just tell you, “We knew him, that he was a big kid, and his music really was a reflection of who he was.” So, if you had the benefit of knowing him before he was famous, you would say, “He didn’t change.” And that’s really hard for anyone. I mean, everyone changes. I mean, everyone evolves and grows. And that’s not to say that Biz didn’t grow to a certain extent, but his personality remained intact. The guy that they knew in ’82 was the guy they knew in ’92.

Jesse Thorn: It also maybe reflects the difficulty and trauma of the circumstances of his growing up, right? That that collecting, that interest in kid stuff is stuff that somebody who dealt with childhood poverty and the traumas of, you know, being in the foster care system—even with a very loving family—can lead someone to deal with for the rest of their life.

Sacha Jenkins: Well, his wife says that in the film, like he’s probably making up for all the things he didn’t have when he didn’t have them. And there’s—I don’t know; there’s comfort in that, being able to be in a position where you’re able to get the things that you really wanted at a time—there was a time when you could really couldn’t get those things, and now it’s a Barbie doll, but still something that he might have wanted when he was a kid.

Jesse Thorn: How did The Biz find hip-hop?

Sacha Jenkins: You know, through tapes. Back then, that was the thing. Like, you know, these mixtapes, these live tapes of live performances, jams, you know. He somehow—his brother wound up coming home with some jams, his foster brother, I guess. And the rest is history. He became obsessed with it and sought it out. And that was the thing about hip-hop. It was live, it was real, it was something that you could participate in. Like, you can—people weren’t going to Studio 54 to hear hip-hop; they were going to Studio Park. You know, the park up the block is where you can hear all this incredible music made by someone you might have grown up with or someone from your community. So, he just sought it out.

Jesse Thorn: Did Biz start with rapping?

Sacha Jenkins: I think everyone usually starts out either rapping or as a DJ. I think it was somewhere in between. I think he might have aspired initially to be a DJ, and at the end of his career when he was pretty much done with rapping or making original rap recordings, he wound up becoming one of the biggest DJs in the world.

And that’s the thing about hip-hop is—you know, in the ’90s, the emphasis really was on the rapper. You know, early like DJ Jazzy Jeff and the Fresh Prince. Fresh Prince was the “and”. It was about the DJ in the beginning. The DJ was the controller of the party, the controller of the action. And so, lots of people initially—their initial foray into hip-hop was by way of DJ.

Jesse Thorn: And Biz Markie was also a pioneering beatbox. Like, he’s a dude who heard Doug E. Fresh and said, “Well, that’s a way to set the party off without even needing turntables and speakers.”

Sacha Jenkins: Yeah, I mean in the film Doug E. Fresh talks about how they met. And you know, they met at a performance, and Biz Markie just was on the side of the stage with his mouth open watching him and came up to Doug E. Fresh afterwards and said, “That’s amazing, you know. Can I come to your house?”

And he’s like, “Can you come to my house? Like, I’m just meeting you. But okay.”

(Jesse laughs.)

And then, you know, Doug E. Fresh lives in Harlem; Biz Markie lives in Long Island. And so, the next day, he comes home from school.

[00:15:00]

Because he’s a rap star, and he’s still in high school, and he’s a celebrity—he comes home, and Biz is in his living room. He had already gone to the store for his grandmother. You know? Like, what the hell kind of guy—who is this guy? But Biz studied under Doug E. Fresh and, you know, Doug E. Fresh said, “Look, initially he wasn’t that great, but then eventually he made his own sound. Something that was very distinct to him.”

Transition: Music swells then fades.

Clip:

Biz Markie: (Rapping acapella.) My name is Biz Markie

(Holds a long note that transitions into beatboxing.)

Speaker: Go, Biz!

Crowd: Go Biz Mark, go Biz Mark, go Biz Mark, go Biz Mark, go Biz Mark, go Biz Mark…

Transition: Music swells then fades.

Sacha Jenkins: So, he was a student. Biz was a real student of hip-hop.

Jesse Thorn: What do you think the appeal was of Biz to these dudes and women who were at that time kind of transforming rap from goof-around disco parties at the park to either “I’m a serious business lyricist” or even in some cases, like “this is street talk”. Like, why do you think they loved Biz so much as hip-hop was starting to change towards a straight face?

Sacha Jenkins: Well, hip-hop was really about the party, right? And the party’s about fun. Like, in the early ’70s, it wasn’t about busting dope lyrics out. I mean, it was about the DJ, and the MC was the guy who would get on the mic and tell you, like, “You gotta move your double-parked cars and your Green Pinto.” Like, the MC was just the MC, like hosting the party. He wasn’t a lyricist per se. So, I think Biz is a reflection of the essence of where hip-hop comes from. It’s fun. Like, people are going to jams not to be serious.

Like, I mean, I love Public Enemy. Public Enemy is a huge influence on me. But like, you know, Chuck D’s like—he wants you to dance, but really he wants you to think. And Biz Markie wants you to have fun. He wants to be—you know, he doesn’t want to talk about politics. He just wants to have fun. He wants to make you laugh. He wants to have a good time. And I think people are always going to want to have a good time. People are always going to want to laugh. And I think he just reminded people of the early days of hip-hop.

Jesse Thorn: It was impressive to me that maybe the two people who spoke the most lovingly and passionately about Biz Markie—other than his family members in your documentary—are Rakim and Big Daddy Kane. That these two dudes who were deeply engaged in transforming rapping specifically to a new thing were the guys who loved him the absolute most.

Sacha Jenkins: Yeah, and they are both super important MCs, foundational artists, influences even today from different places and different perspectives. But he was able to relate to them independently. And I don’t know; you gotta be able to be a special kind of person to be able to make—I mean, pretty much Rakim and Big Daddy Kane cry in the film. I mean, Rakim was shedding tears. And this is hip-hop; this is Rakim. Like, he didn’t say turn off the camera. Like, he was speaking his mind. I mean, he really loved this guy, and it was such a great loss to them.

And when I’m interviewing Rakim, we’re in his high school lunchroom. And everyone has a story about Biz being in the lunchroom, meeting Biz in the lunchroom. But the funny thing is, Biz didn’t go to any of these schools. Like, everyone thought that Biz went to their school, but like, no, he somehow found his way into the lunchroom—which in 2024 would never happen.

Jesse Thorn: This dude was cutting school to go to other people’s schools?

Sacha Jenkins: Yeah. But that’s where hip-hop was. Hip-hop was in the lunchroom. Like, you can bang beats on the lunchroom tables. Like, this is what kids did. They made beats on the lunchroom table, and they rapped.

Jesse Thorn: As you said, you had talked to Biz about making a documentary about his life, but before you were able to get the documentary greenlit, he got very, very sick and eventually passed away a few years ago. And so, you were trying to make a movie that captured the spirit of this really singular human being, this person who was fun and ridiculous and silly and radiant without being able to, you know, question him directly and put that on screen.

[00:20:00]

One of the things that you did was put a puppet of him on screen. First of all—before we get into how the puppet ended up in the movie, first of all, tell me why in hip-hop Biz will always be tied to a puppet of Biz.

Sacha Jenkins: Well, there’s a MasterA song called “Me and the Biz” which, in the video—Biz Markie’s not in the video, but there’s a puppet. And this magazine I used to do called Ego Trip, we actually have the puppets in Jeff Mao’s basement somewhere in a dirty duffel bag years later. But I had the puppet, and the puppet was made for the video, because Biz Markie didn’t make the video. And actually, Biz Markie was supposed to be on the song, but it’s Masta Ace rapping Biz Markie’s parts.

Jesse Thorn: The verse that Biz was gonna lay down, it didn’t work out that way because of some sort of personal stuff. But the verse that Biz was going to lay down is a demo that Masta Ace sort of wrote and recorded in Biz’s style for Biz to come in and lay vocals over later.

Sacha Jenkins: Right. It was never intended for that verse that Masta Ace laid down to come out via Masta Ace. The intention was to have Biz spit those rhymes. And because of conflict with Marley Marl—Biz and Marley weren’t seeing eye to eye. Masta Ace was recording with Marley Marl. Masta Ace was a new artist, new to the Juice Crew, and he didn’t want to get mixed up in the politics. So, when Biz Markie didn’t wind up on the track, Marley Marl and (inaudible) said to put it out as is. Like, don’t worry about it. It sounds cool. Like, you know, you’re rapping as Biz. It’s kind of funny. So, they go and make a video. And of course, since Biz didn’t rhyme on it, they got a puppet to be biz.

Music: “Me and the Biz” from the album Take a Look Around by Masta Ace.

Put your lyrics back up on the shelf.

put your lyrics back up on the shelf

Now I’m going to pass it to the B-I-Z M-A-R-K-I-E

‘Cause I know you want to see him

 

[Master Ace as Biz Markie]

Ah one two, one two, this is what I’m gonna do

Keep the place jumping, get it wild like a zoo

If anyone can do it, the B-I-Z can

Peace to Marley Marl, Tragedy, and MC Shan

And my cousin Cool V and, TJ Swan E and

The Jungle Brothers swinging from a tree and

EPMD and, Nice and Smooth B and

(Music fades out.)

Sacha Jenkins: So, when I learned that, I asked Masta Ace, like, “Hey, man, would you—you know—write a song addressing this, addressing Biz?” And sure enough, he did, which to me, it’s like—I get goosebumps thinking about the rhyme and how he spat it and how he felt and the real story behind the song, which most people don’t know.

Jesse Thorn: We’ll wrap up with Sacha Jenkins in just a minute. As we have mentioned, the Biz had a hit song, a really huge hit song, but his legacy is much more. When we come back from a quick break, we’ll talk with Jenkins about why. It’s Bullseye, from MaximumFun.org and NPR.

Promo:

Jesse Thorn: The following are real reenactments of pretend emergency calls.

Music: Dramatic, ominous music settles in.

Operator: 911.

Caller 1: My husband! It’s my husband!

Operator: Calm down, please. What about your husband?

Caller 1: (Sobbing in terror.) He—he loads the dishwasher wrong! Please help! Oh, please help me!

(Scene change.)

Operator: Where are you now, ma’am.

Caller 2: At the kitchen table. I was with my dad. He mispronounces words. Intentionally.

(Scene change.)

John Hodgman: There are plenty of podcasts on the hunt for justice, but only one podcast has the courage to take on the silly crimes. Judge John Hodgman, the only true crime podcast that won’t leave you feeling sad and bad and scared for once. Only on MaximumFun.org.

Transition: Thumpy synth with a syncopated beat.

Jesse Thorn: It’s Bullseye, I’m Jesse Thorn. My guest, Sacha Jenkins, directed the Biz Markie documentary, All Up in the Biz.

The second half of Biz Markie’s career, he mostly worked as a DJ. You know, his hit records might be worked in there, but he was one of the most successful non-electronica DJs in the country, a really big deal DJ. What was so special about what he did, you know, on the ones and twos?

Sacha Jenkins: I think with Biz, it’s like there’s so many technical DJs. There’s so many like things that like DJs are very particular about, but Biz was just fun. You know, he wasn’t very serious.

[00:25:00]

I mean, he was serious in that he knows good music and knows how to curate good music, but he didn’t take himself so seriously as a DJ—not that he wasn’t a phenomenal DJ, because he was. But like, you know, sometimes in DJ culture or any culture, people can get kind of caught up in what it means and the aesthetics and things that DJs, you know, don’t—no requests, don’t ask me to play a song. You know, Biz, it’s like you felt like your cousin was in your basement just playing records, and I think that made him approachable and made him lovable and, you know, separated him from these DJs who are elite—so elite that you can’t even look at them.

Jesse Thorn: Let me ask you a wild question here. Let’s say somebody is listening to this, and they’ve heard “Just a Friend”. Maybe they’ve even seen Biz Markie in, you know, Men in Black 2 or on Yo Gabba Gabba! or something. What would you say to them to describe why he is important beyond that hit record and beatboxing and things from time to time?

Sacha Jenkins: Because he brings you back to what hip-hop is and where it comes from. And it’s this lack of pretentiousness. He wasn’t pretentious. He was honest and pure with his intentions and with his music. And I think, because hip-hop was created by kids who—you know—didn’t have that much life experience, like hip-hop is a bit naive to a certain extent, and that’s great. And I think that he throws back to those feelings of like not really knowing what’s going to happen and not caring, just wanting to have a good time. And I think that’s a universal power that young people have in any genre.

And so, outside of the music industry and the politics and like, the lust for money and the crazy things people do for money, as the song goes, Biz Markie just reminded you of why you were into hip-hop.

Jesse Thorn: There are a lot of biographical documentaries of famous people made for premium cable networks. I’ve seen a lot of them. And it’s easy for them to be a list of things that someone did. Which is perfectly watchable if the person is interesting, but it seems clear to me that you didn’t want to make that movie. What movie did you want to make?

Sacha Jenkins: I wanted to make a movie for people who know what hip-hop is. You know, the film—it debuted on hip-hop’s, quote/unquote, “50th birthday”—which is August 11th. August 11th, 1973 is hip-hop’s supposed birthday, which is good for marketing, and I’m glad everyone made some money this year. But like, I would beg to differ. But so, you know, Paramount premieres it on that day. And you know, but there’s shifting of platforms and Showtimes’ halfway going away, and people got fired. And so, I don’t know how many people actually saw the movie, so I’m happy to be here.

But I made a few of these documentaries, and I was a journalist for a while—a music journalist largely. And I think that I have a duty as someone who is a part of the culture to represent it in a way that is true to the culture. I mean, you know, people write about your movies or talk to you about your movies, but when you’re a part of a culture, like you have to answer to people. And so, I couldn’t make some half-baked interview celebrities trying to like stretch out who this guy was. I didn’t need to fabricate or to extend the narrative of who he was. Like, he was an incredible individual. There’ll never be another one like him.

And I mean, it’s a miracle that it got made. Like, there’s not a million people knocking on doors right now wanting to make a Biz Markie film. And there are very few outlets for this kind of programming. So, the relationship that we had with Showtime, that I had with Showtime, was a magical one. And I was spoiled for some years. But things have changed in the business. And so, I feel lucky that I was able to make that film. But in 2024, I would probably not get money for that same film.

Jesse Thorn: It’s been a tough few years for hip-hop, you know. Myself, being from the Bay Area, it was pretty crushing to lose Zumbi from Zion I and Gift of Gab from Blackalicious and Shock G in what seemed like direct succession.

[00:30:00]

And Biz’s passing felt like it was part of that. It feels like part of that story is simply that earlier generations of hip-hoppers are reaching middle age and… health outcomes are not the same for the demographics who are represented in hip-hop. Did you think about that while you were making this film about a guy who had passed away from diabetes?

Sacha Jenkins: I mean, you know, as a somewhat middle-aged man myself, this is something I think about often now. A friend of mine who’s in the studio, a graffiti legend; his name is Sharp. We talk about this all the time. I mean, you know, people we know have challenges with health. And it’s just what can you do? I mean, hip-hop is like Peter Pan. Like, you know, you can be in this hip-hop Peter Pan world where you don’t get old, but like the time goes by quick. And Nobody Beats the Biz is like 1986, ’87. I mean, that’s a long time ago. So, you know, you can start getting those AARP notices when you’re 50. Hip-hop’s definitely got the AARP notices in the mail now that hip-hop is 50 years old. So, this is par for the course, I guess.

Jesse Thorn: I mean, we just re-ran an interview I did a decade ago with Prodigy, who passed away from complications of sickle cell. Gab died of complications of his diabetes and other conditions, and there’s a scene in the movie where Tracy Morgan lifts up his shirt to show his diabetes equipment, I guess you’d call it. And you know, it’s conspicuous to me that these are dudes who are dying at 50 and 55 and 57 and not 70 and 75 and 77.

Sacha Jenkins: Yeah. Well, that’s a much longer conversation, but it’s tough. It’s tough. I look at, you know, where I grew up, and lots of people I grew up with, and a lot of people are no longer here. And I don’t know. It’s a complicated situation.

Jesse Thorn: Well, Sacha, I sure am grateful for your time, and I really love the movie. I can’t recommend it to people highly enough. It is just an absolute blast.

Sacha Jenkins: Well, thank you. Please recommend it. Hopefully people can find it.

Jesse Thorn: Sacha Jenkins’s new documentary is called All Up in the Biz. It is just as exuberant and unusual and delightful as the Biz himself was. You can find it streaming on Paramount+, Showtime, and for purchase on Amazon, YouTube, and Google.

Transition: Cheerful, chiming synth.

Jesse Thorn: That’s the end of another episode of Bullseye. Bullseye is created from the homes of me and the staff of Maximum Fun, in and around greater Los Angeles, California. Our show is produced by speaking into microphones. Our senior producer is Kevin Ferguson. Our producers are Jesus Ambrosio and Richard Robey. Our production fellow at Maximum Fun is Daniel Huecias. We get booking help from Mara Davis. Our interstitial music is by DJW, also known as Dan Wally. Our theme song is “Huddle Formation”, written and recorded by The Go! Team. Thanks to them and to their label, Memphis Industries.

Bullseye is on Instagram. We’re sharing interview highlights, behind the scenes looks, and more. We are @BullseyeWithJesseThorn. We’re also on Twitter, YouTube, and Facebook. I think that’s about it. Just remember all great radio hosts have a signature signoff.

Promo: Bullseye with Jesse Thorn is a production of MaximumFun.org and is distributed by NPR.

(Music fades out.)

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