Shut Up and Play the Piano (2018) Movie Script
Do you have a message for
your fans? What's the message?
Sometimes I worry that they just love me.
I think it's important that they hate me, too.
In moments like this I have no choice
but to speak directly to
the fans and tell them...
If you are a fan of my music,
you should also learn to hate me.
And, so, I...
I would like to try to hypnotize
you a little bit on the idea.
Look into my eyes and imagine
that I am the most
successful musician of all time.
Now imagine, just imagine
how rich I am, how successful.
The accolades, the prizes,
the awards. Everything.
Do I deserve it?
I don't think so. I'm totally insincere,
I don't take it fucking seriously.
Come on, don't you hate this guy?
Look at him! Why is he even on your screen?
Why are you even looking at this guy?
I love the crowd I hate the crowd
I constantly constipate the crowd
No shit
Chilly put the ants in your pants
Aw, shit
Just to put you in a trance
No, I don't wanna make you bounce
I wanna be loved and
hated in equal amounts, ah
No, I don't wanna make you bounce
I wanna be loved and hated in equal amounts
Where?
In the home of the showman
Home of the shaman
Home of the she-man
Home of the comedian
Home of the vaudevillians
with opinions by the millions
I gotta get my prank on
Prank on
And hit 'em with a sad song
Sad song
Oh, take me to Broadway
Oh, take me to Broadway
Oh, take me to Broadway
Oh, do it tonight And if I ever...
...get there,
Get there
I'm gonna show my chest hair
Chest hair
Take me to Broadway
Take me to Broadway
Now take me to Broadway
Do it tonight
Now take me to Broadway
Take me to Broadway
Take me to Broadway
...do it tonight
I got an extra testicle
But you're skeptical about a spectacle
These days bad taste is so delectable
And the crowd is so suggestible
I gotta get my prank on prank on
And hit 'em with a sad song sad song
Take me to Broadway
Take me to Broadway
Take me to Broadway
And do it tonight
Come on!
You like my video?
-Okay. -Okay.
Let's start with a really boring one.
Did you feel like an outsider as a teenager?
-An outsider? -Yeah.
I think I didn't know what an outsider was.
Something I felt was like a fraud.
I felt like I just didn't know
what my role should be
and so it felt like nothing
was fitting me good.
Sporty kid? No. Nerdy kid? Not really.
Uh, bad kid was not me either.
So I looked around until I found, "Oh,
"creative music kid."
And then this worked for me.
I think outsider is also a role.
You know, you can decide to be an outsider.
And then you kind of go
like, "Yeah, I'm an outsider!"
And it's, um...
It's just as conformist as being an insider.
You're a problematic child
Not quite a rebel, not quite wild
And I've seen the way you live
You're an intellectual, anorexic cyst
And I know your favorite show's not on
I know you're starting to smoke
Yeah
But when I told you that I care
I was just making a joke
So, how old... Which age
comes this music scene?
I was always playing music.
From age three I had a grandfather
teaching me piano lessons.
And then I made music with my brother.
And that I only really
understood that I could also
have a relationship on
my own, without my brother,
without my grandfather,
my own relationship to it.
Maybe 11 or 12 years old.
And then I started to form
a band and be the leader.
And I had other people in my school
who weren't very good at their instruments,
but I just told them what to play.
You know, I was like a dictator.
I was like, "Hey, you
play this, you play this.
"Oh, here." "Do that. Do that.
And then I became the leader,
and everyone was looking up to me.
And this was nice?
And this was nice. -
Bring it, Jerome. Bring it.
Where's the anger, huh? Where's the balls?
I want to see your balls! Okay?
We are all animals, aren't
we? We have animal instincts.
So which animal are you, huh?
I... I am the tiger. Hmm?
You are... the...
Say it with me, F...
Falcon.
Fly, falcon.
Fly!
Okay?
I'm a tiger!
Falcon says?
Falcon says? -
Yeah. Tiger says...
Falcon says?
Tiger says?
Falcon says?
Falcon screams!
I mean, where the urge
comes from to prove
something to people for Gonzo...
His father is a businessman,
so there must be some emphasis on competition.
Gonzo has a brother
who is in the music industry
and they have a very
interesting relationship, you know, musically.
I guess the best way that I would describe it
is look at Ivory Tower, the
movie we made together,
where there's a dynamic between two others
who are both in a very specific
and talent-intellect oriented field,
in this case it's chess,
but it could be music.
You're sweating.
Don't get the board wet.
My brother and I made music together
but we also had a very
competitive relationship.
Let's go!
I wanted to...
be not just better than him...
-Yeah. -...but I wanted to be deeper than him.
Because I didn't like
that his version of music...
To me it always seemed
a little bit more, um...
He was more interested in
the side of music that was technical, I would say.
Um...
Like, he liked Sting.
Knights.
Come on.
Come on!
Come on!
Whoo!
My brother chose professionalism
and I chose...
"art", let's say.
I chose no compromise.
He chose constant compromise.
Working with a team of directors
and producers in Hollywood.
There's so much compromise.
But this is a choice he made
and I chose something else.
He's definitely financially
more successful than I am.
And the competition, of
course, is still there in many ways
but, um, it's very complex
because we also do work together
and we have this memory
of falling in love with music together.
And, so, we can never really,
um, deny that.
And we're back for what could be
the final game.
I had a band at the time called
Fancypants Hoodlum and nobody liked it.
And a girl from the band
named Sticky and I became close
and we decided to make a
band together, and I was like,
"Yeah, let's make "a girl band. I
want to have a girl band with you."
And she's like, "Well,
"I know this guy. I know that he's
"into your band. I have a crush on him.
"And also my next door neighbor.
"He's also playing music."
He is perfect for me
"Why don't we get together
with those two guys."
And I was like, "Okay, fine."
But I didn't know them.
And she's like, "Let's jam with
them and see what happens."
So we went to a rehearsal space
and I walked in with an attitude
like, "Guys, forget it." You know?
I was gonna be the guitar player.
I had an electric guitar.
She had a bass guitar.
And then we just started jamming.
Right after that first rehearsal,
we all went, I think, to
McDonald's or somewhere.
And we were like, "Yeah, we've
got to change our names, all of us.
"Because this is really cool.
"This is like the best band ever,
"we're going to have so much fun.
"We should call ourselves 'the Shit'
"because we are the shit."
So we called ourselves The Shit
and then we gave ourselves names.
And mine, I wanted to be called Peaches.
And so it was Sticky and the other two guys
were Mocky and Gonzales.
That how the Shit was born.
Why call it?
When Peach and I had an apartment
on Queen Street in
Toronto it was just that flat
that everyone congregated at.
So, Gonz never lived there,
but he would just spent a lot of time.
It was kind of like our flat was the HQ
of that little crew at the time.
His eyes rolling back in his head
His eyes roll back in his head
Keeps my daddy strong
Makes my daddy stronger
But I see his eyes rolling back in his head
His eyes roll back in his head
Keeps my daddy strong
Makes my daddy stronger
Yet I see his eyes rolling back in his head
Yeah, at that time there was a lot of...
kind of, uh, early beat-making.
And there was a lot of
free association, freestyle rap sessions
where everyone would just sit on the couch
and some beat would be on for like 20 minutes
and everyone would just take...
take verses all in a row.
Not really me, because I
really am bad at that, but...
But, yeah, Peach and Mocky and Gonzo,
Taylor Savvy. Everyone was...
It was kind of a rap moment.
It was electro and a lot of...
There weren't...
Not a lot of tactile-instrument
playing going on.
It was a lot of...
kind of button pushing,
beat-making, rapping.
We got any people that like
it in the rear end, say, "Yeah!"
Yeah!
You're great fucking people.
We'll have a nasty night
We'll have a nasty night
I'll eat out everybody's
motherfuckin' ass tonight.
We'll have a nasty night
We'll have a nasty night
I'll eat out everybody's
motherfuckin' ass tonight
In looking back, it was only
like, maybe a year
or two years, maybe three years,
before everyone split for Europe.
Why Berlin? How...
How come you went to Berlin?
I took a trip to Europe with Peaches,
and we were going to explore different
European capitals and see if
there was somewhere that felt better.
And I was more focused on Paris...
-Mmm-hmm. -...actually. In my mind
my fantasy a bit more like,
"I'm gonna become a French
chanson piano man, whatever."
- And Peaches wanted to be the underground...
- Okay.
...sort of punk, experimental artist.
Berlin
was wilder,
and more fascinating than even
our fantasies could have been.
It was like a playground.
Like a dream come true.
Like a really, um...
We just couldn't believe...
It turned out that this Berlin
experimental punk art scene
was an easier place to try to
find my audience then the
very closed world of France.
I really thank her for that, for pushing
towards going to places like Berlin.
Suck it up!
Suck it up!
I'm gonna let go from the get go
But you can't let go because I said so
He was my first inspiration.
He was my first inspiration first-hand
of like, you know, rapping with people.
Or, like, just rhyming.
I don't even know if I want
to call it rapping. Or just
expressing yourself in a different way.
Suck
Suck it up
Suck
Suck it up
I think it's funny because, um,
we were talking, I think last year,
and I was like, "You
know what, I was thinking,
"I never had a mentor.
"I never had a mentor. I
mentored so many people.
"I've never had a mentor.
"And I feel like you were my mentor.
"In some weird, sort of stoner-haze, of, like,
"not even knowing it."
And he's like, "No, you were my mentor."
That's what he said.
He said, like, "You were my performance, like,
"icon of like, you just let it all happen."
And then I was like, "But..." And he's like...
And we have this a lot with, um...
"No, you were that to me."
"No, you were that to me."
...going at the speed of
Rock, rock, rock, rock
Speed of Rock, rock, rock, rock
Speed of Rock, rock, rock, rock
Speed of Rock, rock, rock, rock
Speed of
This is how Chilly got his name.
That was in the late '90s.
Just after his arrival to Berlin.
We had a weekly residency
at this club called Maria.
Every Wednesday night
we would sit on the couch and jam
on awkward electronic grooves.
Now, one night,
as we were setting up our gear,
Chilly told me he needed a new name.
A new artist name
for his upcoming release.
And I looked up into the pre-set disco light,
hazed by the blunt Chilly was
smoking beside me on the couch.
And I saw a mouse in the desert
with a cowboy hat and a lasso.
I figured, "This must be Speedy Gonzales,
"the cartoon character I watched as a kid."
I turned around and I said,
"Call yourself Chilly Gonzales."
To my surprise, he didn't take it as a joke.
And we met up next week
on that very same couch,
and he said he liked the
name and would like to take it,
if it'd be okay, and I said,
"Of course it is. It's yours."
And he walked off,
scattered by the lights of the mirror ball.
And I never saw him again.
Oh, he's kind of Muppet.
I say he's got some
Muppet qualities, definitely.
And he's also got some animal qualities.
And that's why,
immediately, I thought to myself...
"Yeah.
"That's a homie I can work with."
Are you coming down?
It's Gonzales. I'm coming down.
Yo, Maloke.
-Oh, there you are. -Hey, hey.
When I finally got to a piano,
all of a sudden I could
just bring music out of it.
And these are what my musical
superpowers really are about.
It's the instant ability to
make music out of anything.
Yeah!
And Berlin brings this out in people.
It's a city of outsiders.
People who feel outside
can actually feel inside.
In this moment I was in
Berlin, it all seemed very clear.
Well, you choose art, you
get the artistic satisfaction...
but it was clear that I wasn't successful.
I really had zero money.
And I had to really, um,
play the piano in restaurants
to just earn my living.
I played in an auflauf restaurant.
The name was Fualfua,
which is auflauf backwards.
It got turbo-charged when I discovered rap
and it became super clear how to approach it.
So that was the time
when I kind of got the key
to be proud that I could be
superficial and deep at the same time.
The idea of rap,
what it represents, the kind
of capitalist revenge fantasy
that rap is,
it's probably very similar to
what my father went through
as a poor immigrant
who came to Canada, and he really was, like,
get rich or die trying.
He was kind of a rapper before rappers.
Because he had this real
survival, the hustle, and...
Make something of yourself.
Chilly Gonzales is the world's greatest
motherfucking underground!
Do you consider yourself as a Jewish rapper?
Mmm. I'm professionally Jewish.
See, I believe you need a press angle.
You need something to
stand out from the crowd.
You need to wear white shoes to
show them you're an entertainer.
You need to show off your hairy chest.
Let them know that you're not
afraid to use some sex appeal.
And so for me, it's really important
to be a Jewish MC in Berlin.
Because people have a
romance with this. They hear this,
"You're a Jewish MC in Berlin?
"Yeah, that's great.
People go for it. They suck it up.
They like the taste of it, you know?
My bullshit just smells better.
So I liked Frankie Goes to Hollywood.
Do you remember them? -INTERVIEWER: Sure.
Very conceptual. Already, like, characters.
David Bowie, Prince. I
loved Prince and the Smiths
with the singer Morrissey.
He's very sad but he's very funny.
He's very smart. Very damaged.
Both Frankie Goes to Hollywood and the Smiths
are... have singers that are gay.
And I think
it's no surprise that
what I do now is kind of...
Gay music?
Well...
I have been behind a microphone, okay?
- Oh, yeah?
- Oh, yeah, I have been behind a microphone.
-Behind a microphone? -Yeah.
I've made tracks. You can tell 'em, Tommy.
Yeah, I... I've been a singer. -How many?
I've been a rapper.
I've done beat-boxing.
Okay, you can do this. So maybe you think
you can do these lyrics right here.
-No problem. I can sing anything. -Okay.
You know the lyrics.
- Whatever... What, yeah, "Cum in my mouth."
- "Cum in my mouth."
- Yeah, cum in my mouth, Dorian.
- Come on, come on. Try it out.
- Let's go.
- Yeah. Glock in your eye, that's fine.
-Come on. -Yeah.
-Cum in my mouth -Yeah.
Glock in your eye
And then?
There before the taste of cock blow eye
Do it like that.
Cum in my mouth
Glock in your eye
There before the taste of cock blow eye
-Cum in my mouth -Super.
-Glock in your eye -That's right.
There before the taste of cock blow eye
Super. I've got a massive
cock stand right now.
All right, let's do this.
Let's take our shirts off.
-Take our shirts off. -Fucking right!
Cum in my mouth
-Yeah. -Glock in your eye
Like that.
There before the taste of cock blow eye
Go, lad, go.
Cum in my mouth
Glock in your eye
Like that
There before the taste of cock blow eye
Go, lad, go.
Cum in my mouth
Glock in your eye
There before the taste of cock blow eye
Tonight I want to relinquish my Canadianess.
I want to become un-Canadian
and show for you that I'm willing to become
purely for Berlin.
I am willing to run.
And I am willing to win.
And I will not lose.
I'm Chilly Gonzales.
You'll see that the most interesting thing
is the G-spot.
The G-Spot here on the scene
as a symbol.
The enjoyment of the tool.
Wicka-woo, ladies and gentlemen.
And the G-spot is a very
important part of what I do
because anywhere that Gonzales
goes could become the stage.
And that is the G-spot The Chilly G-Spot.
That is wherever I am.
That is wherever the camera is on me.
Wherever the tape recorder
is on me, baby, and I'm on.
That's right.
Any questions?
Yes?
Mr. Gonzales,
what exactly is your relationship to
Mr. Maloke?
What, are you trying to burst the illusion?
There is no illusion, man.
Why are you trying to burst the illusion?
You know what I mean? I thought you
guys were sick of music concerts, too.
I thought I was going to do something for you
that was, like, a little bit bigger, you know?
What the fuck am I saying? God damn. Oh, shit.
Oh, really?
"What's your relationship to Mr. Maloke?"
Well, why doesn't anybody
ask me good questions?
You want to ask about me?
I mean, why do you ask about him?
Who the fuck is he? Do you
even know? Do you even care?
Who's she? Yeah, she
works for my record label.
She works for my record label!
You insist on trying to
burst this fucking illusion.
I'm going to show you
something fucking real, man.
Something fucking real! "Oh, that's not funny.
"Oh, that's not funny, Gonzales.
"Oh, you're not so funny anymore,
"Mr. fucking Gonzales!"
I went a little bit too
far into Peaches' world.
There was no more music, in a way.
It was all concept, all sex, all punk.
All intensity.
Genius!
If I look at videos and look at footage
of what I was doing back then,
it looks a bit like, "Ah, okay. I'm...
"I'm glad that didn't last too long."
You know, sometimes I'm fucking
scared of this thing I'm becoming.
Gonzales!
Walk for hours
And hours
And hours
For you
Walk for hours
For hours
For hours
For you
Walk for hours
I think he...
There was a clean slate or something,
I vaguely recall...
...when he was 14, and his
relationship with the piano
and when he's 95.
Somehow, that's the through line that I see.
It's timeless.
It's ambition. It's beyond ambition.
It speaks to 100 years ago
and to 100 years in the future,
somehow, without getting dated.
It's like this ageless human sinew.
Solo Piano, I think for him, was such a huge
step back into his
just, musical bones, or something.
It was, um...
I don't know how to say, like...
He just let the music do the talking.
He shut up and played the piano.
I had fantasies that this piano album
could really become something special for me.
But I didn't dare to really dream it out loud
because I have to wait
to see what people think.
And the moment was really
when the album first came out,
and I started to suddenly see the comments,
and started to hear
how surprised,
in a positive way, people were.
We didn't know that the
loud guy could do this, also.
We didn't know that the loud
guy could also keep our attention
being quiet, in a way.
And so it was around the time of the release
of Solo Piano, I would say 2004,
when the album came out in September.
By the time January...
Four months later, I was
like, "Okay. "This is the way."
Solo Piano?
This was the turning point
from screaming to get attention
to trying to do something with this attention.
Ding-dong.
Who is it?
It's you, Attila.
Who am I?
Oh.
I'm the wall.
The balls are your musical ideas
and you bounce them off of me.
Come on, give me some balls.
Just throw me a musical idea. All right?
I'm this wall now.
Come on. One, two, three, four.
Nah, nah, nah
Nah, nah, nah
Nah, nah, nah
Let's keep it coming. Keep it coming.
Nah, nah, nah, nah, nah
Nah, nah
Mmm, nah, nah, nah
You're doing your Italian hustler voice.
No, no, nay!
Ni, na, nu, eh
Hey. Schriver's home.
-Is that a banger? -Shh.
Respect the silence.
Silence is music.
Daft Punk changed how I make music,
so to finally meet them and
then to be invited into their world,
was a metaphor for dreams becoming true.
Um... Okay, okay.
That they even know who I am
and want me to be on their album,
gives me a very deep sense of satisfaction.
Much more than any good review,
or anything from a non-musician.
We both had a lot of different experiences
before we ended up making music together.
But I would say that
I hadn't really began the long...
hurdle-filled, obstacle course
of finding what my songs
were going to be about.
Somehow he'd gotten the idea that he
wanted to see what being a producer was.
And I didn't even know
what that word meant, and...
I think it was just an
experiment for both of us,
that formed this relationship between us,
because it wasn't really like, "I need him."
Because I wouldn't have
known what I needed at that point.
And he wouldn't necessarily
have known what he can offer.
You know? It was...
We really were kind of born into
this collaboration simultaneously.
You are everything in time and space
Forget the face you knew
And I was allowing for the possibility of
sounding different than I'd gotten used to.
And that's when my...
The version of my life
I'm in now began with that
collaboration with Gonz
that became Let It Die.
It's really our record. It has my
name on it, but it's our record.
Take a trip into the sky with me
Fly with me
Whoa!
-Whoo! -Better?
I think for the reminder,
there was a couple fights
on that record because there
was some solos that, for me
I didn't understand the references and it felt
cheesy, and it wasn't something
that I could emotionally connect to.
And I think he would probably agree,
although who knows.
It irked him that I...
That I was expressing
the beginnings of control over my own fate.
Good
It just feels now like
maybe what a father feels like
when, like, his previously devoted daughter
suddenly turns into that rebellious teenager.
This constant feeling of, like, "No,
don't tell me what to do. I hate you."
We disagreed on 1234.
It was on the reminder...
and he didn't think it
should be on the record,
because he didn't think it was a good song.
So, I took it.
Because he kind of said...
He was like, "Nah,
"I don't agree, I don't think that
we should follow through on that."
So I went to a different guy.
I don't know if I just didn't tell Gonz
or if I maybe just
thought, "I'll surprise him.
"I'll finish it and then
he'll see," or something.
But he... He considered it
a huge betrayal that I'd gone behind his back.
Very excited to have in studio right now,
musician, producer, composer, creator
of all kinds of aural candy,
Chilly Gonzales is in studio.
What kind of music do you make?
What sort of, uh...
What sort of entertainment do you do?
You got the strong performance side
inside the music set.
Why did you do that in that way?
How do you penetrate the kind of mass media
kind of cloud, with your
special media manipulation.
The journalists are so badly researched,
that you can predict everything
they're going to ask you.
And then you decided one
day, "I'm going to leave Canada
"and move to Paris." Could you tell us why?
But the journalists still somehow
say, "Oh, they want face time."
You know, there's this ritual
about meeting the journalist face-to-face.
Even though their questions
are the same as everybody else's.
Even though 90% of the answers
you can find on other interviews.
Even though 90% of the answers
are already in my lyrics,
they will still say something like,
"So, it seems like entertainment
is important to you."
Duh!
You have to be louder
than everybody else
to cut through the noise.
You have to raise your voice so fucking loud
that no one will be able to deny hearing you.
That's how you cut through the media bullshit.
I still feel like they deserve an actor
to take my place.
What they deserve is...
fake.
They don't deserve reality.
That's why this fantasy kept on persisting
many, many years. I thought,
"I'll just send someone instead.
"What are they really going to say?
"This isn't Chilly Gonzales?"
Who's to say?
Hello, my name is Chilly Gonzales,
and today I'll show you
how to play an ordinary sofa.
Hello, I'm Chilly Gonzales the musical genius.
So I'm lip syncing
My brain's fucked
because my dick is thinking
My brain's fucked
because my dick is thinking
A truly clever pop musician
can do so much with so little.
Chilly Gonzales, stinky garnish.
Chilly Gonzales is finished.
Hello, I am Chilly Gonzales.
I'm the genius on the piano.
This is Chilly Gonzales...
I am Chilly Gonzales,
the musical genius.
Shut up and play the piano.
Hello there, this is Chilly
Gonzales, the musical genius.
Hello.
Hello, it's Prince Gonzo.
So, please, no pity.
You can never melt this ice-cold
hog between my two chinnies.
What's life but a competition?
You know my name. I Ambition.
I never stop.
The G-spot
is a very important part of what I do.
Because anywhere Gonzales goes
can become the stage, you know?
And that is the G-spot.
- WOMAN: And that is the G-spot.
The chili-cheese spot.
That's wherever I am.
It is wherever the camera is on me.
Wherever the tape recorder's on me, baby.
And I am on.
- Yes.
- Mr. Gonzales,
what exactly is your relationship to
Mr. Maloke?
Are you trying to burst the illusion?
There is no illusion, man.
Why are you trying
to burst the illusion?
You know what I mean? I...
I thought you guys were
sick of music concerts, too.
I thought I was going to do something
for you that's bigger, you know?
I'm sick of this shit!
"what's your relationship to
Mr. Maloke," you want to know?
How do you even know?
Why are you all asking me these questions?
Are you gonna ask him about me?
Why not you ask him about him?
What the fuck is he doing?
But, no, you don't even care.
Well, who is she?
Who is she? Yeah!
She works for my record label.
She works for my record label!
If you insist on trying to
burst this fucking illusion,
I'm going to show you
something fucking real, man.
Something fucking real! Oh, yeah.
That's not funny?
Oh, that's not funny?
Well you're not so funny anymore,
Mister-fucking-Gonzales.
Oh, my God!
Hello. -That's pretty good.
So, you're comfortable
with changing your hairstyle...
-to mine? -No.
Would you be comfortable doing
a love scene with my girlfriend?
Why don't we do the same monologue
but pretend that it's, like,
30 years in the future since this happened.
-Uh... -And you're like broken, old, sad man.
And if you try
to insist of bursting the... -
Behind all of that is the idea that...
maybe in a perfect world, I would
have dreamed of being a normal musician
and I wouldn't need to kind
of invent a persona around it
so that my music could
kind of have an audience.
If we can try it again
and I can feel a bit of that
sort of almost sad resignation,
you know, like, "Wow, this is
really who I have to be now?
If you insist on trying to
burst this fucking illusion,
I'm going to show you
something fucking real, man.
Something fucking real!
Oh, that's not funny, Gonzales.
Oh, you're not so funny anymore,
Mister-fucking-Gonzales! -
There was no Judaism
or Christianity in my house.
There was success religion.
Instead of thinking Jesus is behind me,
I just sort of see my dad behind me.
Don't laugh at me.
Whoa, blood. Look.
Can I get a big C-major chord from everybody?
One, two, three.
It's not enough to be a punk, for me.
I can't...
I can't go against what my
grandfather said that much.
I still took something from what
my grandfather told me about respect
for the people that came before you.
All the work that every
musician did to advance
the technology of the
piano and to create this...
wonderful world
where there's like an
infrastructure in the world.
There's concert halls and
there's music schools...
and the gods of these music schools
are like Bach, Beethoven, Brahms,
and this is super-important.
Uh...
And the disrespect is also very important.
For me they need to be
together. They need to co-exist.
I love having this amount of people on stage.
You can imagine. Usually I'm on stage with...
some annoying French singer,
or some hipster who's
slightly more famous than me.
You know? -
But, tonight,
I have this army, in a way.
You can call them slaves,
I like to call them just good friends.
And
those of you who know
me, you know I'm a bit of a...
megalomaniac, right?
So, how does a megalomaniac start off a song?
Am I an artist or an entertainer, right?
I tell people I'm an entertainer. Why?
Because an entertainer is trying
to make love, you know, to you.
Right? Whereas an artist,
he's more of a masturbator,
because he wants to please himself, you know?
So, I do that sometimes.
I masturbate sometimes.
I mean musically, you know?
If I'm at home,
I don't play Take me to
Broadway and sing the lyrics,
and make stupid jokes,
you know? I play for myself.
I wouldn't make you want
to hear that, you know?
Because that's just for me.
But tonight, if you want, I
can play you the kind of stuff
I do when I'm just being
an artist, you know? So it's...
It's very complicated stuff, you know?
I doubt you'll understand it.
A lot of atmospheric stuff.
Sometimes I even play inside
the piano, you know? Like...
You know, like that?
Because, you know, for
really avant-garde people,
they look at the piano here,
and they say,
"That's not enough." You know?
Like, they think everything's been done
on this part of the piano.
You know, so they think, "Okay,
there's nothing more for me here.
"I'm going to have to go inside."
And so...
And so they start to play it inside
and it's like, "Wow!
"That guy really must be a
good piano player, because
"this, it's not even good
enough for him anymore."
You know? So he spends his time...
It's like he wants to be one. You know...
Look, if you're going to go inside the piano,
if you really want to know what that thing...
Just go in, you know?
It's cool, it's fine.
This...
This is getting down with the piano,
you know what I'm saying?
To really do classical music properly,
you need to actually play it properly,
because it's a more precise musical language.
I started a daily routine in 2012...
Actually, shortly after I
moved here to Cologne,
in a different apartment.
And, I, um...
I've had a more-or-less 15-20-years-long wish
to get better at reading music.
It would take me, like, a minute and a half
to put one complicated chord together.
And this was like, "Oh,
this is too humiliating for me.
"What kind of musical
genius am I if I can't even play
a Ravel chord, and it takes me two minutes.
So I started to do
daily exercises.
But I had to start really at the beginning,
because my reading was so bad.
I was probably starting with material
that would be appropriate for like,
a seven or eight-year-old child
who maybe has only been
playing piano for a year or two.
To hear me play this stuff was very humbling
because...
it was the opposite of all my
fantasies of Chilly Gonzales,
who is a musical genius,
and no one can mess with his musicality.
But here I was proving to myself
that I was more or less like a beginner.
When I was in Canada, I found a
whole box of journals and things,
and I found this very interesting
sort of letter to my brother
explaining what I wanted.
And when I was writing
him this fantasy letter,
I was saying, like,
"I don't want what you want.
"Here's what I want."
And I was reading it and the description
was something that had already happened.
You know, something like
living from my music,
have at least a few hundred
people come and hear me,
and all of that would be enough.
And I realized, reading this letter,
that this was already achieved.
And I really took time to celebrate this.
Thank you.
Now you are on your
right age to
think about your
death.
Well, it starts... I think
it starts around 40.
- At this point, it starts.
- Thinking about death?
-Yes. -Mmm.
Hi.
I'm Chilly Gonzales.
You can also call me Gonzo...
the musical genius.
What do you want to know?
Is it so ridiculous to think that maybe
someone else can be Chilly Gonzales?
Just looking for a kind of candidate.
Someone who I can eventually train.
Hi, I'm Chilly Gonzales.
To possibly take over for me when I
really want to stop being Chilly Gonzales.
Chilly Gonzales doesn't
have to be old, like me.
-Do you compose music? -No.
Have you ever played the piano? -WOMAN: No.
Do you look good in a bathrobe?
It's a popularity contest
You just got to put it in context
So you got to make it vivid that complex
Try living your life as a concept
Try living your life as a contest
And get out of the way Because I'm on next
Chilly Gonzo kickin' the concert
It can't hurt to preach to the converts
Grab the flesh and press the press, too
Press told promotional rescue
I got aluminum eyes
Going to assume it's a lie
Because we don't think it's all lies
Everybody thinks they have to
Calculate who to hate
Who's able to inflate?
And whose traits to imitate?
Because bullshit smells
great when you spread it, right?
So let someone else
go and take credit, right?
The test takin' anybody lightly
Why can't everybody like me?
Why can't everybody like me?
Chilly Gonzales!
And Chilly Gonzales!
Hello?
Gonzales?
Gonzales?
You're in the TV, Jarvis. That's amazing.
Yes?
What do you think?
You can see me. Can you hear me?
I think he just does...
his own thing, you know.
He's got a vision of things,
and it's his vision. He's not going to...
censor himself or adapt himself
according to what people expect of him.
I think he's more interested in exploring
what he's got inside himself to give.
And he doesn't care how
that comes out, whether its
a solo piano record, or
a chamber music record,
or a rap record. It's like...
I mean, that's what, um...
That's what art's about, innit?
It's like, about...
You find out things about yourself
through making things.
And I think that's... That's
why he's an artist. A true artist.
Well, here's the question
Do I speak just to seek attention?
Success a strange obsession
Maybe I could change professions
I could get a new image
I could become a critic
Ex-entertainer, former cynic
Maybe that could be my gimmick
Please be gentle
Tell me this instrumental has some potential
'Cause if a tree falls you won't hear
This invisible tune with disappearing lyrics
But in the words of my mother
Not everybody can be a music lover
Look, Mom I'm aware of my weirdness
I just gotta know who wants to hear this
We're crowd-surfing. Let's go!
Crowd-surfing. Come on!
Crowd-surfing!
Let's do this!
That's right.
I have no insurance.
Who touched my ass?
Hello, microphone it's me Chilly
No, no, take it again, take it out.
Hello, microphone it's me Jason
I know you prefer me
on the piano so be patient
You might've guessed I'm a bit rusty
So its best if you act impressed, trust me
When I rap it's like I'm someone else
It's like I don't know how to play the piano
Please, somebody help
My inner Eric Satie's buried so deep inside
I still can't decide where I reside
Ten years in still an underdog
Got 100 songs on 100 blogs
And I got a million opinions
And you'll never get rid of me
I'm like the Palestinians
So I slip into my
slippers 'cause these hipsters
I think they're starved
for music like Yom Kippur
And this piano doesn't laugh at my bad jokes
And this piano doesn't
like second hand smoke
One of these days
One of these days
One of these days I will
shut up and play the piano
Shut up and play the piano
Shut up and play the piano
Shut up and play the piano
Verbal gonorrhea I'm contagious
Pages upon pages like bank statements
I'm not meant for stasis
ABC, I always bring changes
So what more can I mouth moving
Not saying much anymore thus proving
My new album's now finished
You might not like it but it's
good for you eat your spinach
And I hope you speak English
Music professor professional flesh presser
Put your hands in the
air like an empty gesture
The haircuts change
but the head fuck remains
The cock is feign the pussy is your brain
Solo piano's musical cocaine
I tell myself make another don't be so vain
But imagine if I just tossed it off
Imagine if the cock was soft
Imagine if I turned just the
image of the one and only album
That people really cared
about, well that would be a problem
So bear with me I'll be right with you
Thank God, I got another
personality to switch to
Take the piano to a desert island
And take the time to write to remain silent
ABC, I always bring changes
So listen how a real arranger arranges
One of these days one of these days
One of these days I will
Shut up and play the piano
Shut up and play the piano
Shut up and play the piano
Shut up and play the piano
Shut up and play the piano
your fans? What's the message?
Sometimes I worry that they just love me.
I think it's important that they hate me, too.
In moments like this I have no choice
but to speak directly to
the fans and tell them...
If you are a fan of my music,
you should also learn to hate me.
And, so, I...
I would like to try to hypnotize
you a little bit on the idea.
Look into my eyes and imagine
that I am the most
successful musician of all time.
Now imagine, just imagine
how rich I am, how successful.
The accolades, the prizes,
the awards. Everything.
Do I deserve it?
I don't think so. I'm totally insincere,
I don't take it fucking seriously.
Come on, don't you hate this guy?
Look at him! Why is he even on your screen?
Why are you even looking at this guy?
I love the crowd I hate the crowd
I constantly constipate the crowd
No shit
Chilly put the ants in your pants
Aw, shit
Just to put you in a trance
No, I don't wanna make you bounce
I wanna be loved and
hated in equal amounts, ah
No, I don't wanna make you bounce
I wanna be loved and hated in equal amounts
Where?
In the home of the showman
Home of the shaman
Home of the she-man
Home of the comedian
Home of the vaudevillians
with opinions by the millions
I gotta get my prank on
Prank on
And hit 'em with a sad song
Sad song
Oh, take me to Broadway
Oh, take me to Broadway
Oh, take me to Broadway
Oh, do it tonight And if I ever...
...get there,
Get there
I'm gonna show my chest hair
Chest hair
Take me to Broadway
Take me to Broadway
Now take me to Broadway
Do it tonight
Now take me to Broadway
Take me to Broadway
Take me to Broadway
...do it tonight
I got an extra testicle
But you're skeptical about a spectacle
These days bad taste is so delectable
And the crowd is so suggestible
I gotta get my prank on prank on
And hit 'em with a sad song sad song
Take me to Broadway
Take me to Broadway
Take me to Broadway
And do it tonight
Come on!
You like my video?
-Okay. -Okay.
Let's start with a really boring one.
Did you feel like an outsider as a teenager?
-An outsider? -Yeah.
I think I didn't know what an outsider was.
Something I felt was like a fraud.
I felt like I just didn't know
what my role should be
and so it felt like nothing
was fitting me good.
Sporty kid? No. Nerdy kid? Not really.
Uh, bad kid was not me either.
So I looked around until I found, "Oh,
"creative music kid."
And then this worked for me.
I think outsider is also a role.
You know, you can decide to be an outsider.
And then you kind of go
like, "Yeah, I'm an outsider!"
And it's, um...
It's just as conformist as being an insider.
You're a problematic child
Not quite a rebel, not quite wild
And I've seen the way you live
You're an intellectual, anorexic cyst
And I know your favorite show's not on
I know you're starting to smoke
Yeah
But when I told you that I care
I was just making a joke
So, how old... Which age
comes this music scene?
I was always playing music.
From age three I had a grandfather
teaching me piano lessons.
And then I made music with my brother.
And that I only really
understood that I could also
have a relationship on
my own, without my brother,
without my grandfather,
my own relationship to it.
Maybe 11 or 12 years old.
And then I started to form
a band and be the leader.
And I had other people in my school
who weren't very good at their instruments,
but I just told them what to play.
You know, I was like a dictator.
I was like, "Hey, you
play this, you play this.
"Oh, here." "Do that. Do that.
And then I became the leader,
and everyone was looking up to me.
And this was nice?
And this was nice. -
Bring it, Jerome. Bring it.
Where's the anger, huh? Where's the balls?
I want to see your balls! Okay?
We are all animals, aren't
we? We have animal instincts.
So which animal are you, huh?
I... I am the tiger. Hmm?
You are... the...
Say it with me, F...
Falcon.
Fly, falcon.
Fly!
Okay?
I'm a tiger!
Falcon says?
Falcon says? -
Yeah. Tiger says...
Falcon says?
Tiger says?
Falcon says?
Falcon screams!
I mean, where the urge
comes from to prove
something to people for Gonzo...
His father is a businessman,
so there must be some emphasis on competition.
Gonzo has a brother
who is in the music industry
and they have a very
interesting relationship, you know, musically.
I guess the best way that I would describe it
is look at Ivory Tower, the
movie we made together,
where there's a dynamic between two others
who are both in a very specific
and talent-intellect oriented field,
in this case it's chess,
but it could be music.
You're sweating.
Don't get the board wet.
My brother and I made music together
but we also had a very
competitive relationship.
Let's go!
I wanted to...
be not just better than him...
-Yeah. -...but I wanted to be deeper than him.
Because I didn't like
that his version of music...
To me it always seemed
a little bit more, um...
He was more interested in
the side of music that was technical, I would say.
Um...
Like, he liked Sting.
Knights.
Come on.
Come on!
Come on!
Whoo!
My brother chose professionalism
and I chose...
"art", let's say.
I chose no compromise.
He chose constant compromise.
Working with a team of directors
and producers in Hollywood.
There's so much compromise.
But this is a choice he made
and I chose something else.
He's definitely financially
more successful than I am.
And the competition, of
course, is still there in many ways
but, um, it's very complex
because we also do work together
and we have this memory
of falling in love with music together.
And, so, we can never really,
um, deny that.
And we're back for what could be
the final game.
I had a band at the time called
Fancypants Hoodlum and nobody liked it.
And a girl from the band
named Sticky and I became close
and we decided to make a
band together, and I was like,
"Yeah, let's make "a girl band. I
want to have a girl band with you."
And she's like, "Well,
"I know this guy. I know that he's
"into your band. I have a crush on him.
"And also my next door neighbor.
"He's also playing music."
He is perfect for me
"Why don't we get together
with those two guys."
And I was like, "Okay, fine."
But I didn't know them.
And she's like, "Let's jam with
them and see what happens."
So we went to a rehearsal space
and I walked in with an attitude
like, "Guys, forget it." You know?
I was gonna be the guitar player.
I had an electric guitar.
She had a bass guitar.
And then we just started jamming.
Right after that first rehearsal,
we all went, I think, to
McDonald's or somewhere.
And we were like, "Yeah, we've
got to change our names, all of us.
"Because this is really cool.
"This is like the best band ever,
"we're going to have so much fun.
"We should call ourselves 'the Shit'
"because we are the shit."
So we called ourselves The Shit
and then we gave ourselves names.
And mine, I wanted to be called Peaches.
And so it was Sticky and the other two guys
were Mocky and Gonzales.
That how the Shit was born.
Why call it?
When Peach and I had an apartment
on Queen Street in
Toronto it was just that flat
that everyone congregated at.
So, Gonz never lived there,
but he would just spent a lot of time.
It was kind of like our flat was the HQ
of that little crew at the time.
His eyes rolling back in his head
His eyes roll back in his head
Keeps my daddy strong
Makes my daddy stronger
But I see his eyes rolling back in his head
His eyes roll back in his head
Keeps my daddy strong
Makes my daddy stronger
Yet I see his eyes rolling back in his head
Yeah, at that time there was a lot of...
kind of, uh, early beat-making.
And there was a lot of
free association, freestyle rap sessions
where everyone would just sit on the couch
and some beat would be on for like 20 minutes
and everyone would just take...
take verses all in a row.
Not really me, because I
really am bad at that, but...
But, yeah, Peach and Mocky and Gonzo,
Taylor Savvy. Everyone was...
It was kind of a rap moment.
It was electro and a lot of...
There weren't...
Not a lot of tactile-instrument
playing going on.
It was a lot of...
kind of button pushing,
beat-making, rapping.
We got any people that like
it in the rear end, say, "Yeah!"
Yeah!
You're great fucking people.
We'll have a nasty night
We'll have a nasty night
I'll eat out everybody's
motherfuckin' ass tonight.
We'll have a nasty night
We'll have a nasty night
I'll eat out everybody's
motherfuckin' ass tonight
In looking back, it was only
like, maybe a year
or two years, maybe three years,
before everyone split for Europe.
Why Berlin? How...
How come you went to Berlin?
I took a trip to Europe with Peaches,
and we were going to explore different
European capitals and see if
there was somewhere that felt better.
And I was more focused on Paris...
-Mmm-hmm. -...actually. In my mind
my fantasy a bit more like,
"I'm gonna become a French
chanson piano man, whatever."
- And Peaches wanted to be the underground...
- Okay.
...sort of punk, experimental artist.
Berlin
was wilder,
and more fascinating than even
our fantasies could have been.
It was like a playground.
Like a dream come true.
Like a really, um...
We just couldn't believe...
It turned out that this Berlin
experimental punk art scene
was an easier place to try to
find my audience then the
very closed world of France.
I really thank her for that, for pushing
towards going to places like Berlin.
Suck it up!
Suck it up!
I'm gonna let go from the get go
But you can't let go because I said so
He was my first inspiration.
He was my first inspiration first-hand
of like, you know, rapping with people.
Or, like, just rhyming.
I don't even know if I want
to call it rapping. Or just
expressing yourself in a different way.
Suck
Suck it up
Suck
Suck it up
I think it's funny because, um,
we were talking, I think last year,
and I was like, "You
know what, I was thinking,
"I never had a mentor.
"I never had a mentor. I
mentored so many people.
"I've never had a mentor.
"And I feel like you were my mentor.
"In some weird, sort of stoner-haze, of, like,
"not even knowing it."
And he's like, "No, you were my mentor."
That's what he said.
He said, like, "You were my performance, like,
"icon of like, you just let it all happen."
And then I was like, "But..." And he's like...
And we have this a lot with, um...
"No, you were that to me."
"No, you were that to me."
...going at the speed of
Rock, rock, rock, rock
Speed of Rock, rock, rock, rock
Speed of Rock, rock, rock, rock
Speed of Rock, rock, rock, rock
Speed of
This is how Chilly got his name.
That was in the late '90s.
Just after his arrival to Berlin.
We had a weekly residency
at this club called Maria.
Every Wednesday night
we would sit on the couch and jam
on awkward electronic grooves.
Now, one night,
as we were setting up our gear,
Chilly told me he needed a new name.
A new artist name
for his upcoming release.
And I looked up into the pre-set disco light,
hazed by the blunt Chilly was
smoking beside me on the couch.
And I saw a mouse in the desert
with a cowboy hat and a lasso.
I figured, "This must be Speedy Gonzales,
"the cartoon character I watched as a kid."
I turned around and I said,
"Call yourself Chilly Gonzales."
To my surprise, he didn't take it as a joke.
And we met up next week
on that very same couch,
and he said he liked the
name and would like to take it,
if it'd be okay, and I said,
"Of course it is. It's yours."
And he walked off,
scattered by the lights of the mirror ball.
And I never saw him again.
Oh, he's kind of Muppet.
I say he's got some
Muppet qualities, definitely.
And he's also got some animal qualities.
And that's why,
immediately, I thought to myself...
"Yeah.
"That's a homie I can work with."
Are you coming down?
It's Gonzales. I'm coming down.
Yo, Maloke.
-Oh, there you are. -Hey, hey.
When I finally got to a piano,
all of a sudden I could
just bring music out of it.
And these are what my musical
superpowers really are about.
It's the instant ability to
make music out of anything.
Yeah!
And Berlin brings this out in people.
It's a city of outsiders.
People who feel outside
can actually feel inside.
In this moment I was in
Berlin, it all seemed very clear.
Well, you choose art, you
get the artistic satisfaction...
but it was clear that I wasn't successful.
I really had zero money.
And I had to really, um,
play the piano in restaurants
to just earn my living.
I played in an auflauf restaurant.
The name was Fualfua,
which is auflauf backwards.
It got turbo-charged when I discovered rap
and it became super clear how to approach it.
So that was the time
when I kind of got the key
to be proud that I could be
superficial and deep at the same time.
The idea of rap,
what it represents, the kind
of capitalist revenge fantasy
that rap is,
it's probably very similar to
what my father went through
as a poor immigrant
who came to Canada, and he really was, like,
get rich or die trying.
He was kind of a rapper before rappers.
Because he had this real
survival, the hustle, and...
Make something of yourself.
Chilly Gonzales is the world's greatest
motherfucking underground!
Do you consider yourself as a Jewish rapper?
Mmm. I'm professionally Jewish.
See, I believe you need a press angle.
You need something to
stand out from the crowd.
You need to wear white shoes to
show them you're an entertainer.
You need to show off your hairy chest.
Let them know that you're not
afraid to use some sex appeal.
And so for me, it's really important
to be a Jewish MC in Berlin.
Because people have a
romance with this. They hear this,
"You're a Jewish MC in Berlin?
"Yeah, that's great.
People go for it. They suck it up.
They like the taste of it, you know?
My bullshit just smells better.
So I liked Frankie Goes to Hollywood.
Do you remember them? -INTERVIEWER: Sure.
Very conceptual. Already, like, characters.
David Bowie, Prince. I
loved Prince and the Smiths
with the singer Morrissey.
He's very sad but he's very funny.
He's very smart. Very damaged.
Both Frankie Goes to Hollywood and the Smiths
are... have singers that are gay.
And I think
it's no surprise that
what I do now is kind of...
Gay music?
Well...
I have been behind a microphone, okay?
- Oh, yeah?
- Oh, yeah, I have been behind a microphone.
-Behind a microphone? -Yeah.
I've made tracks. You can tell 'em, Tommy.
Yeah, I... I've been a singer. -How many?
I've been a rapper.
I've done beat-boxing.
Okay, you can do this. So maybe you think
you can do these lyrics right here.
-No problem. I can sing anything. -Okay.
You know the lyrics.
- Whatever... What, yeah, "Cum in my mouth."
- "Cum in my mouth."
- Yeah, cum in my mouth, Dorian.
- Come on, come on. Try it out.
- Let's go.
- Yeah. Glock in your eye, that's fine.
-Come on. -Yeah.
-Cum in my mouth -Yeah.
Glock in your eye
And then?
There before the taste of cock blow eye
Do it like that.
Cum in my mouth
Glock in your eye
There before the taste of cock blow eye
-Cum in my mouth -Super.
-Glock in your eye -That's right.
There before the taste of cock blow eye
Super. I've got a massive
cock stand right now.
All right, let's do this.
Let's take our shirts off.
-Take our shirts off. -Fucking right!
Cum in my mouth
-Yeah. -Glock in your eye
Like that.
There before the taste of cock blow eye
Go, lad, go.
Cum in my mouth
Glock in your eye
Like that
There before the taste of cock blow eye
Go, lad, go.
Cum in my mouth
Glock in your eye
There before the taste of cock blow eye
Tonight I want to relinquish my Canadianess.
I want to become un-Canadian
and show for you that I'm willing to become
purely for Berlin.
I am willing to run.
And I am willing to win.
And I will not lose.
I'm Chilly Gonzales.
You'll see that the most interesting thing
is the G-spot.
The G-Spot here on the scene
as a symbol.
The enjoyment of the tool.
Wicka-woo, ladies and gentlemen.
And the G-spot is a very
important part of what I do
because anywhere that Gonzales
goes could become the stage.
And that is the G-spot The Chilly G-Spot.
That is wherever I am.
That is wherever the camera is on me.
Wherever the tape recorder
is on me, baby, and I'm on.
That's right.
Any questions?
Yes?
Mr. Gonzales,
what exactly is your relationship to
Mr. Maloke?
What, are you trying to burst the illusion?
There is no illusion, man.
Why are you trying to burst the illusion?
You know what I mean? I thought you
guys were sick of music concerts, too.
I thought I was going to do something for you
that was, like, a little bit bigger, you know?
What the fuck am I saying? God damn. Oh, shit.
Oh, really?
"What's your relationship to Mr. Maloke?"
Well, why doesn't anybody
ask me good questions?
You want to ask about me?
I mean, why do you ask about him?
Who the fuck is he? Do you
even know? Do you even care?
Who's she? Yeah, she
works for my record label.
She works for my record label!
You insist on trying to
burst this fucking illusion.
I'm going to show you
something fucking real, man.
Something fucking real! "Oh, that's not funny.
"Oh, that's not funny, Gonzales.
"Oh, you're not so funny anymore,
"Mr. fucking Gonzales!"
I went a little bit too
far into Peaches' world.
There was no more music, in a way.
It was all concept, all sex, all punk.
All intensity.
Genius!
If I look at videos and look at footage
of what I was doing back then,
it looks a bit like, "Ah, okay. I'm...
"I'm glad that didn't last too long."
You know, sometimes I'm fucking
scared of this thing I'm becoming.
Gonzales!
Walk for hours
And hours
And hours
For you
Walk for hours
For hours
For hours
For you
Walk for hours
I think he...
There was a clean slate or something,
I vaguely recall...
...when he was 14, and his
relationship with the piano
and when he's 95.
Somehow, that's the through line that I see.
It's timeless.
It's ambition. It's beyond ambition.
It speaks to 100 years ago
and to 100 years in the future,
somehow, without getting dated.
It's like this ageless human sinew.
Solo Piano, I think for him, was such a huge
step back into his
just, musical bones, or something.
It was, um...
I don't know how to say, like...
He just let the music do the talking.
He shut up and played the piano.
I had fantasies that this piano album
could really become something special for me.
But I didn't dare to really dream it out loud
because I have to wait
to see what people think.
And the moment was really
when the album first came out,
and I started to suddenly see the comments,
and started to hear
how surprised,
in a positive way, people were.
We didn't know that the
loud guy could do this, also.
We didn't know that the loud
guy could also keep our attention
being quiet, in a way.
And so it was around the time of the release
of Solo Piano, I would say 2004,
when the album came out in September.
By the time January...
Four months later, I was
like, "Okay. "This is the way."
Solo Piano?
This was the turning point
from screaming to get attention
to trying to do something with this attention.
Ding-dong.
Who is it?
It's you, Attila.
Who am I?
Oh.
I'm the wall.
The balls are your musical ideas
and you bounce them off of me.
Come on, give me some balls.
Just throw me a musical idea. All right?
I'm this wall now.
Come on. One, two, three, four.
Nah, nah, nah
Nah, nah, nah
Nah, nah, nah
Let's keep it coming. Keep it coming.
Nah, nah, nah, nah, nah
Nah, nah
Mmm, nah, nah, nah
You're doing your Italian hustler voice.
No, no, nay!
Ni, na, nu, eh
Hey. Schriver's home.
-Is that a banger? -Shh.
Respect the silence.
Silence is music.
Daft Punk changed how I make music,
so to finally meet them and
then to be invited into their world,
was a metaphor for dreams becoming true.
Um... Okay, okay.
That they even know who I am
and want me to be on their album,
gives me a very deep sense of satisfaction.
Much more than any good review,
or anything from a non-musician.
We both had a lot of different experiences
before we ended up making music together.
But I would say that
I hadn't really began the long...
hurdle-filled, obstacle course
of finding what my songs
were going to be about.
Somehow he'd gotten the idea that he
wanted to see what being a producer was.
And I didn't even know
what that word meant, and...
I think it was just an
experiment for both of us,
that formed this relationship between us,
because it wasn't really like, "I need him."
Because I wouldn't have
known what I needed at that point.
And he wouldn't necessarily
have known what he can offer.
You know? It was...
We really were kind of born into
this collaboration simultaneously.
You are everything in time and space
Forget the face you knew
And I was allowing for the possibility of
sounding different than I'd gotten used to.
And that's when my...
The version of my life
I'm in now began with that
collaboration with Gonz
that became Let It Die.
It's really our record. It has my
name on it, but it's our record.
Take a trip into the sky with me
Fly with me
Whoa!
-Whoo! -Better?
I think for the reminder,
there was a couple fights
on that record because there
was some solos that, for me
I didn't understand the references and it felt
cheesy, and it wasn't something
that I could emotionally connect to.
And I think he would probably agree,
although who knows.
It irked him that I...
That I was expressing
the beginnings of control over my own fate.
Good
It just feels now like
maybe what a father feels like
when, like, his previously devoted daughter
suddenly turns into that rebellious teenager.
This constant feeling of, like, "No,
don't tell me what to do. I hate you."
We disagreed on 1234.
It was on the reminder...
and he didn't think it
should be on the record,
because he didn't think it was a good song.
So, I took it.
Because he kind of said...
He was like, "Nah,
"I don't agree, I don't think that
we should follow through on that."
So I went to a different guy.
I don't know if I just didn't tell Gonz
or if I maybe just
thought, "I'll surprise him.
"I'll finish it and then
he'll see," or something.
But he... He considered it
a huge betrayal that I'd gone behind his back.
Very excited to have in studio right now,
musician, producer, composer, creator
of all kinds of aural candy,
Chilly Gonzales is in studio.
What kind of music do you make?
What sort of, uh...
What sort of entertainment do you do?
You got the strong performance side
inside the music set.
Why did you do that in that way?
How do you penetrate the kind of mass media
kind of cloud, with your
special media manipulation.
The journalists are so badly researched,
that you can predict everything
they're going to ask you.
And then you decided one
day, "I'm going to leave Canada
"and move to Paris." Could you tell us why?
But the journalists still somehow
say, "Oh, they want face time."
You know, there's this ritual
about meeting the journalist face-to-face.
Even though their questions
are the same as everybody else's.
Even though 90% of the answers
you can find on other interviews.
Even though 90% of the answers
are already in my lyrics,
they will still say something like,
"So, it seems like entertainment
is important to you."
Duh!
You have to be louder
than everybody else
to cut through the noise.
You have to raise your voice so fucking loud
that no one will be able to deny hearing you.
That's how you cut through the media bullshit.
I still feel like they deserve an actor
to take my place.
What they deserve is...
fake.
They don't deserve reality.
That's why this fantasy kept on persisting
many, many years. I thought,
"I'll just send someone instead.
"What are they really going to say?
"This isn't Chilly Gonzales?"
Who's to say?
Hello, my name is Chilly Gonzales,
and today I'll show you
how to play an ordinary sofa.
Hello, I'm Chilly Gonzales the musical genius.
So I'm lip syncing
My brain's fucked
because my dick is thinking
My brain's fucked
because my dick is thinking
A truly clever pop musician
can do so much with so little.
Chilly Gonzales, stinky garnish.
Chilly Gonzales is finished.
Hello, I am Chilly Gonzales.
I'm the genius on the piano.
This is Chilly Gonzales...
I am Chilly Gonzales,
the musical genius.
Shut up and play the piano.
Hello there, this is Chilly
Gonzales, the musical genius.
Hello.
Hello, it's Prince Gonzo.
So, please, no pity.
You can never melt this ice-cold
hog between my two chinnies.
What's life but a competition?
You know my name. I Ambition.
I never stop.
The G-spot
is a very important part of what I do.
Because anywhere Gonzales goes
can become the stage, you know?
And that is the G-spot.
- WOMAN: And that is the G-spot.
The chili-cheese spot.
That's wherever I am.
It is wherever the camera is on me.
Wherever the tape recorder's on me, baby.
And I am on.
- Yes.
- Mr. Gonzales,
what exactly is your relationship to
Mr. Maloke?
Are you trying to burst the illusion?
There is no illusion, man.
Why are you trying
to burst the illusion?
You know what I mean? I...
I thought you guys were
sick of music concerts, too.
I thought I was going to do something
for you that's bigger, you know?
I'm sick of this shit!
"what's your relationship to
Mr. Maloke," you want to know?
How do you even know?
Why are you all asking me these questions?
Are you gonna ask him about me?
Why not you ask him about him?
What the fuck is he doing?
But, no, you don't even care.
Well, who is she?
Who is she? Yeah!
She works for my record label.
She works for my record label!
If you insist on trying to
burst this fucking illusion,
I'm going to show you
something fucking real, man.
Something fucking real! Oh, yeah.
That's not funny?
Oh, that's not funny?
Well you're not so funny anymore,
Mister-fucking-Gonzales.
Oh, my God!
Hello. -That's pretty good.
So, you're comfortable
with changing your hairstyle...
-to mine? -No.
Would you be comfortable doing
a love scene with my girlfriend?
Why don't we do the same monologue
but pretend that it's, like,
30 years in the future since this happened.
-Uh... -And you're like broken, old, sad man.
And if you try
to insist of bursting the... -
Behind all of that is the idea that...
maybe in a perfect world, I would
have dreamed of being a normal musician
and I wouldn't need to kind
of invent a persona around it
so that my music could
kind of have an audience.
If we can try it again
and I can feel a bit of that
sort of almost sad resignation,
you know, like, "Wow, this is
really who I have to be now?
If you insist on trying to
burst this fucking illusion,
I'm going to show you
something fucking real, man.
Something fucking real!
Oh, that's not funny, Gonzales.
Oh, you're not so funny anymore,
Mister-fucking-Gonzales! -
There was no Judaism
or Christianity in my house.
There was success religion.
Instead of thinking Jesus is behind me,
I just sort of see my dad behind me.
Don't laugh at me.
Whoa, blood. Look.
Can I get a big C-major chord from everybody?
One, two, three.
It's not enough to be a punk, for me.
I can't...
I can't go against what my
grandfather said that much.
I still took something from what
my grandfather told me about respect
for the people that came before you.
All the work that every
musician did to advance
the technology of the
piano and to create this...
wonderful world
where there's like an
infrastructure in the world.
There's concert halls and
there's music schools...
and the gods of these music schools
are like Bach, Beethoven, Brahms,
and this is super-important.
Uh...
And the disrespect is also very important.
For me they need to be
together. They need to co-exist.
I love having this amount of people on stage.
You can imagine. Usually I'm on stage with...
some annoying French singer,
or some hipster who's
slightly more famous than me.
You know? -
But, tonight,
I have this army, in a way.
You can call them slaves,
I like to call them just good friends.
And
those of you who know
me, you know I'm a bit of a...
megalomaniac, right?
So, how does a megalomaniac start off a song?
Am I an artist or an entertainer, right?
I tell people I'm an entertainer. Why?
Because an entertainer is trying
to make love, you know, to you.
Right? Whereas an artist,
he's more of a masturbator,
because he wants to please himself, you know?
So, I do that sometimes.
I masturbate sometimes.
I mean musically, you know?
If I'm at home,
I don't play Take me to
Broadway and sing the lyrics,
and make stupid jokes,
you know? I play for myself.
I wouldn't make you want
to hear that, you know?
Because that's just for me.
But tonight, if you want, I
can play you the kind of stuff
I do when I'm just being
an artist, you know? So it's...
It's very complicated stuff, you know?
I doubt you'll understand it.
A lot of atmospheric stuff.
Sometimes I even play inside
the piano, you know? Like...
You know, like that?
Because, you know, for
really avant-garde people,
they look at the piano here,
and they say,
"That's not enough." You know?
Like, they think everything's been done
on this part of the piano.
You know, so they think, "Okay,
there's nothing more for me here.
"I'm going to have to go inside."
And so...
And so they start to play it inside
and it's like, "Wow!
"That guy really must be a
good piano player, because
"this, it's not even good
enough for him anymore."
You know? So he spends his time...
It's like he wants to be one. You know...
Look, if you're going to go inside the piano,
if you really want to know what that thing...
Just go in, you know?
It's cool, it's fine.
This...
This is getting down with the piano,
you know what I'm saying?
To really do classical music properly,
you need to actually play it properly,
because it's a more precise musical language.
I started a daily routine in 2012...
Actually, shortly after I
moved here to Cologne,
in a different apartment.
And, I, um...
I've had a more-or-less 15-20-years-long wish
to get better at reading music.
It would take me, like, a minute and a half
to put one complicated chord together.
And this was like, "Oh,
this is too humiliating for me.
"What kind of musical
genius am I if I can't even play
a Ravel chord, and it takes me two minutes.
So I started to do
daily exercises.
But I had to start really at the beginning,
because my reading was so bad.
I was probably starting with material
that would be appropriate for like,
a seven or eight-year-old child
who maybe has only been
playing piano for a year or two.
To hear me play this stuff was very humbling
because...
it was the opposite of all my
fantasies of Chilly Gonzales,
who is a musical genius,
and no one can mess with his musicality.
But here I was proving to myself
that I was more or less like a beginner.
When I was in Canada, I found a
whole box of journals and things,
and I found this very interesting
sort of letter to my brother
explaining what I wanted.
And when I was writing
him this fantasy letter,
I was saying, like,
"I don't want what you want.
"Here's what I want."
And I was reading it and the description
was something that had already happened.
You know, something like
living from my music,
have at least a few hundred
people come and hear me,
and all of that would be enough.
And I realized, reading this letter,
that this was already achieved.
And I really took time to celebrate this.
Thank you.
Now you are on your
right age to
think about your
death.
Well, it starts... I think
it starts around 40.
- At this point, it starts.
- Thinking about death?
-Yes. -Mmm.
Hi.
I'm Chilly Gonzales.
You can also call me Gonzo...
the musical genius.
What do you want to know?
Is it so ridiculous to think that maybe
someone else can be Chilly Gonzales?
Just looking for a kind of candidate.
Someone who I can eventually train.
Hi, I'm Chilly Gonzales.
To possibly take over for me when I
really want to stop being Chilly Gonzales.
Chilly Gonzales doesn't
have to be old, like me.
-Do you compose music? -No.
Have you ever played the piano? -WOMAN: No.
Do you look good in a bathrobe?
It's a popularity contest
You just got to put it in context
So you got to make it vivid that complex
Try living your life as a concept
Try living your life as a contest
And get out of the way Because I'm on next
Chilly Gonzo kickin' the concert
It can't hurt to preach to the converts
Grab the flesh and press the press, too
Press told promotional rescue
I got aluminum eyes
Going to assume it's a lie
Because we don't think it's all lies
Everybody thinks they have to
Calculate who to hate
Who's able to inflate?
And whose traits to imitate?
Because bullshit smells
great when you spread it, right?
So let someone else
go and take credit, right?
The test takin' anybody lightly
Why can't everybody like me?
Why can't everybody like me?
Chilly Gonzales!
And Chilly Gonzales!
Hello?
Gonzales?
Gonzales?
You're in the TV, Jarvis. That's amazing.
Yes?
What do you think?
You can see me. Can you hear me?
I think he just does...
his own thing, you know.
He's got a vision of things,
and it's his vision. He's not going to...
censor himself or adapt himself
according to what people expect of him.
I think he's more interested in exploring
what he's got inside himself to give.
And he doesn't care how
that comes out, whether its
a solo piano record, or
a chamber music record,
or a rap record. It's like...
I mean, that's what, um...
That's what art's about, innit?
It's like, about...
You find out things about yourself
through making things.
And I think that's... That's
why he's an artist. A true artist.
Well, here's the question
Do I speak just to seek attention?
Success a strange obsession
Maybe I could change professions
I could get a new image
I could become a critic
Ex-entertainer, former cynic
Maybe that could be my gimmick
Please be gentle
Tell me this instrumental has some potential
'Cause if a tree falls you won't hear
This invisible tune with disappearing lyrics
But in the words of my mother
Not everybody can be a music lover
Look, Mom I'm aware of my weirdness
I just gotta know who wants to hear this
We're crowd-surfing. Let's go!
Crowd-surfing. Come on!
Crowd-surfing!
Let's do this!
That's right.
I have no insurance.
Who touched my ass?
Hello, microphone it's me Chilly
No, no, take it again, take it out.
Hello, microphone it's me Jason
I know you prefer me
on the piano so be patient
You might've guessed I'm a bit rusty
So its best if you act impressed, trust me
When I rap it's like I'm someone else
It's like I don't know how to play the piano
Please, somebody help
My inner Eric Satie's buried so deep inside
I still can't decide where I reside
Ten years in still an underdog
Got 100 songs on 100 blogs
And I got a million opinions
And you'll never get rid of me
I'm like the Palestinians
So I slip into my
slippers 'cause these hipsters
I think they're starved
for music like Yom Kippur
And this piano doesn't laugh at my bad jokes
And this piano doesn't
like second hand smoke
One of these days
One of these days
One of these days I will
shut up and play the piano
Shut up and play the piano
Shut up and play the piano
Shut up and play the piano
Verbal gonorrhea I'm contagious
Pages upon pages like bank statements
I'm not meant for stasis
ABC, I always bring changes
So what more can I mouth moving
Not saying much anymore thus proving
My new album's now finished
You might not like it but it's
good for you eat your spinach
And I hope you speak English
Music professor professional flesh presser
Put your hands in the
air like an empty gesture
The haircuts change
but the head fuck remains
The cock is feign the pussy is your brain
Solo piano's musical cocaine
I tell myself make another don't be so vain
But imagine if I just tossed it off
Imagine if the cock was soft
Imagine if I turned just the
image of the one and only album
That people really cared
about, well that would be a problem
So bear with me I'll be right with you
Thank God, I got another
personality to switch to
Take the piano to a desert island
And take the time to write to remain silent
ABC, I always bring changes
So listen how a real arranger arranges
One of these days one of these days
One of these days I will
Shut up and play the piano
Shut up and play the piano
Shut up and play the piano
Shut up and play the piano
Shut up and play the piano