The Lore Behind This Star Wars The Clone Wars Commercial | Interview with Squashy Nice

if you watched Star Wars the  Clone Wars on Cartoon Network back in the day you might remember this commercial that commercial aired on September 30th 2009 to  promote season 2 of Star Wars the Clone Wars rise of the bounty hunters which aired the following  days on October 2nd 2009 I remember seen this commercial on TV and I loved it Cartoon Network  seemed to be pretty proud of it too the song used in that commercial comes from the album out  loud and is called the dud by DJ t rock squashy nic

e featuring skoolz from graffiti death  threat the song was released in 2007 two years before it aired on Cartoon Network I was able to  interview Joshua Montcalm AKA squashy nice with his experience with Cartoon Network using the dud  he tells a great story of how the song came to be how the album came to be and how Cartoon Network  eventually used it to promote Star Wars the Clone Wars so please sit back relax and enjoy learning  about this moment in Clone Wars history hey guys before we get s

tarted Josh is going to introduce  UC tck and himself I did reach out to tck um but was unable to make contact with him this time  around so Josh is going to do that and then I will proceed with question one DJ tck AKA Travis  Eller is a a DJ and a musician um and an actor and a filmmaker in Los Angeles I'm Joshua monom I'm a  a screenwriter in um Manhattan New York City also known as squashy nice and uh yeah this is the  story of how the Clone Wars trailer came to use a song from DJ T Rock and

squashy ni's album out  loud what did life look like for you around the time that you were recording out loud and the dud  what did that process look like and how long did it take to complete the entirety of the album uh  it took seven years over seven years from when I I first recorded the track for the dud to then  it became the dud and then a couple more years before it made it into this Star Wars commercial  I was 23 when I first made the track in 2002 yeah my life was pretty simple then it

was uh record  music try to go to class and try to make enough money to survive delivering pizzas musically life  for me at that point was um I was trying to make the best music the way I wanted it to be for you  know good five years ever since I graduated high school it's a long journey a long process to get  to where you're making things that sound the way that you want them to sound I was getting there  at that point tck and I had already recorded an entire album that wouldn't come out for an

other  four years but that one um eventually got uh released on a label in New Zealand and then as  streaming came about is actually gets millions of streams these days but at that time I didn't  know that we already had an album that we were really proud of and people would play it on  College radio a lot and all over the country and then in other countries it was one of these  things that just would get passed around but we could never find a label for it I started working  with other people o

n the scene in Atlanta I'm from Atlanta when I was making the beat for the dud  um it was a bit of a transition period because i' done a lot that I was proud of and then I  was also coming into my own in a way like I I'm really I was really proud of that track and the  way I was recording things and my whole process at that point I recorded the first version of  the dud in my in my bedroom in my little Studio where I pretty much recorded everything unless I  was recording in someone else's Studi

o it almost all everything started in my little Studio I was  really having fun with it I I remember finishing that one and just loving it and it took a lot  of took a lot of work you just you come up with one part and replace it and go back and forth it  originally had different drums on it um that was recorded before I recorded the first first  version of the the dud but wasn't released until a few years after I had recorded the dud  and that um that album was called techniques Rock and squash

techniques um and eventually was  streaming came about that became a pretty popular album for you know an underground Indie label  album and uh tck moved to LA at that point and I stayed in Atlanta we hadn't worked on anything  together uh for years um so some of these things take years to work out to happen so the recording  of the album that the dud eventually ended up on was after we finally got signed to a label and we  were like well we need to we want to make another album but he lived in

La I lived in Atlanta there  wasn't even Dropbox or anything then really I mean the internet was so weak back then it was that  was around 2006 2005 so we would just I would make music and mail it to him like mail him a  CD and then he would record his cuts on there and mail it back to me and he had he produced a  couple of things that were really good on that on that album too t Rock was a very good turn taist  and um it's like you know DJ that just cuts and scratches like crazy and gets the c

rowd going  and but yeah we just play it over the phone it was uh people of my age now would know how it how  it was at that point can you explain a little bit about what out loud and the dutter about and  what inspired them what's your favorite song on that album and how do you feel about the  dud today we wanted that album to show growth our first album was recorded mostly when I was  22 and didn't come out until I was 26 out loud was recorded between that time and when I was 28  so I I'd grow

n so much as as an artist where I couldn't even really listen to that first album  even though that's our our most popular album by far we just wanted to push ourselves and try  to make something creative and um emotional and and we're both very very proud of out loud I  think it's our favorite album and that album we had some great vocalists on there ja was a  an Atlanta underground Legends uh Christopher thirston is his real name and he actually  passed away around the time that that album cam

e out which was like devastating for everyone  but um he did probably my favorite song on that [Music] album The preix please fix Helix re weix to [Music] yourist [Music] the dud I mean  also was right up there it was a big album had 25 tracks on it and you know dud is top top three  on there for sure for me but lyrically I mean it was it was an anti-war song and I loved it I loved  what schools did with it a lot of new things that I recorded for that album and then there were a  lot of older so

ngs which like the dud which had just been kicking around that be on beat tapes  you know if you're working with other artists people could try to rap on or something like  I always love that beat but no one would ever try to rap on it or something I think because  it was just it was just too dramatic it was too overwhelming I think to try to put lyrics  on but at that time T Rock and I were were an instrumental group I mean we would do like beats  and cuts and samples um and on this second albu

m that the dub was on we wanted to start using  vocalists to fill out some of our songs and just really make it a a bigger tapestry he was  DJing for a group called graffiti death threat and that's where schools the uh The Lyricist  on the dud is schools SK o o l z he got that track and he he just crushed it when I finally  got it when I finally got like the CD mailed to me of of them finishing it I was I was blown away  what was it like having Cartoon Network approach you for wanting to use one

of your songs in a  commercial and how did they even get in touch with you at the Time Cartoon Network had always  been in the background of a lot of stuff that we did especially t-rock being in Atlanta I mean  that's where where Turner Studios are is where Cartoon Network is and when I very first started  working with tck gosh back when back when I was 21 he was already working with this guy Larry  Morris who was a producer of sorts at Cartoon Network he loved T-Rex stuff um but Larry at  Cart

oon Network was making a DVD of his entire album so it was like music videos for for an  entire album and it it was really cool it was very very creative and tck was really funny  and I got to participate in that a little bit and tck produced some other commercials  for Cartoon Network and uh also for Sci-fi channel um and he's also an actor who's um been on  some pretty big TV shows and has starred in some independent movies yeah and then I I had  worked on a couple of projects for adult swam f

or Larry um that didn't make it to the screen  and then he moved to Brooklyn to work for the Sci-Fi channel yeah that was effectively kind  of the end of our creative work together for a while until we were finishing out loud and then  he gotten back in touch and really loved what we were doing his fingerprints are all over the just  the visuals for for the album like the opening track foroud was actually a piece of music that  I made for one of the Cartoon Network shows he wanted to do a few ye

ars before called Sasquatch  motorcycle hero I think it was called yeah it so it just felt felt right to have him do all that  and be a part of the creative presentation of that album and he uh even shot a a video music  video for us for a song called um men are [Music] scarce a very cool video it's very cartoon  networking and tck and I are both in it tck shot his Parts in LA I shot my parts in Atlanta so  yeah skip forward a couple more years I'm working on trying to be a screenwriter at this

point I'm  not really doing music anymore at that point I I had taken a break to um to focus on this other  Endeavor that's when we got the call from from Larry who was working on the Clone Wars project a  Cartoon Network and he wanted to use the dud for a promo for Star Wars Clone Wars yeah I I don't  think I could believe it at the time because I I was like I'll believe it when I see it because I'd  been promised so many times you know that my music was going to be used on this or that what wa

s it  like seeing that commercial air live and what is it like revisiting this commercial 15 years from  when it first aired were you a Star Wars fan at the time so I was a Star Wars fan it was really  cool when that when that commercial came out it took seven almost eight years for it to go from me  working on the song in my my bedroom to coming out you know on a star as a part of Star Wars and  my life had changed so much by that point that yeah that's that's how it struck me was just just  pi

cture my my younger self in in his little Studio making this song not you know I wonder what that  guy would think if he knew that it would be on the Star Wars commercial someday that's what I always  thought and I still think when I see the trailer but no it was it was very surreal because I you  know nothing had been had been done to alter the track in any way since i' first made it like seven  years ago and it still sounded great and somehow they had the instrumental version for that the one 

on the album doesn't have all that open space at the beginning but at the same time it was uh it  was a bettersweet because um well I think most things when you achieve it are you know they come  and then they go but especially with that because it was just a commercial so after a month or so it  was just gone and it didn't you know didn't lead to to anything else and I'm just very surprised  that um and happy that that people remember it because it's um not often you get to do anything  really

that um gets Remembered in any way it was really cool to to see but I didn't really I didn't  really feel like I felt kind of separate from it cuz it was just my my beat under this Star Wars  imagery I didn't it was hard to connect the the two together because one is Star Wars and the  other is just little me and at the time too I don't think any like no one cared I told people  about no one really thought it was a big deal and you couldn't because it was a commercial you  couldn't just sit dow

n and watch it you had to hope it came on Cartoon Network while you were  watching TV there was a little a little bit of controversy I think because as as far as I know I  think it's the first ever um time hipop has been used in an official Star Wars piece I remember I  remember hearing that I think they wanted to use it on the uh DVD at the time but they didn't  it didn't make it onto the DVD and um I think that was because of the you know hip-hop doesn't  belong in the Star Wars Universe type

thing and also there there was a 60-second version of it  that is uh disappeared it's lost media now I'm glad that the 32 one still exists did you think  about the audience at all of Cartoon Network when the dud was going to be airing on TV and the fact  that it was mostly going to be kids seeing it did you ever think that that commercial was going to  be so influential or would have stuck with people even 15 years after it aired I didn't think  about the audience for it at all so I'm very surpr

ised that's very very cool to me you know you  can't really you put anything out there if you're putting out so much stuff you can't really think  about if anything's going to hit or not hit I only saw it as a commercial you know so I didn't  I didn't think that I didn't see it as real content it was on for a few weeks and then I you  know that's about how long it took me to spend the little bit of money I got for it and then it was  sort of lost forever and so I'm really surprised that anyone r

emembers it it's great to get to to  talk about it it's fun to think of people having Nostalgia for anything I had to do it is there  another song from that album you think would have paired well with a Cartoon Network commercial or a  Star Wars commercial I feel like the dud probably would be the best one for that it was one of  my all-time favorite every every bit of that and my recording process for doing it was I would  separate everything out into tracks and just over time tweak everything

to I get all exactly where  I wanted it to be and that one that one just had sonically like everything everything I always  hoped when I would sit down to try to make a a track are there any other commercials that have  used your music on television or in movies and if so what's your favorite use of your music and  other media yeah that one I mean that has got to by far be the coolest use of my music in TV or  movies they used to use at least one other song that I had made with a group called ps

yche origami  called directions for an adult swim bump that um was pretty popular too um I think it was the one  that said we are against it with you or [Music] something and Robin big used used  that same song featured it in in one of their shows to jacket right  here this jacket's hot just straight SE we'll save this for him too me next he's I just [Music] pull that was cool because mtv2 basically  only played Robin big around the clock locked back then so I could find it every other day on TV

  it was a very cool time and it was cool to uh have people reach out to me and say they you  know they heard my song out of the blue and I didn't get to hear it here but um I had people  tell me that it was playing in movie theaters before you know when they would show ads before  the trailers it was playing in movie theaters and I I missed seeing that and getting to hear that  is there anything you want to say to the people who were kids 15 years ago who were introduced  to the dud and your mu

sic through this Clone Wars commercial and remember it from so long ago  or to anyone who has just supported you from the early 2000s and has enjoyed your music yeah I  mean to any anybody who was listening to that song 15 years ago that um has any any affection  for that little trailer that I got to be a part of um yeah I would just if I say anything to  anybody just uh you know the whatever process or Journey you're on takes takes a while sometimes  and you know life is short but it's also ple

nty long enough um so if you're passionate about  about what you're doing you know do it do the best you can and um try to have fun and be kind to  yourself and be patient with yourself and um yeah out and any of our music anywhere really you  know Spotify my personal favorite album is uh one called all the way a solo album I did about six  years ago and you can find some of the vinyl and CDs and stuff like that still out there thank you  everyone listening that's it everyone that's the end of t

he interview I want to deeply thank Josh  or squash for answering all of my questions from this specifically Niche thing that I remember from  back in the day in my own childhood and I'm sure other people remember too thank you for listening  thank you for clicking thank you for being here I I'm thrilled again to be able to have done this  and getting able to hear everything from Josh was awesome thank you Josh thank you t-rock  even though he couldn't be here to um I want to thank him for his c

ontributions to everything  too and also thank you to school I doubt schools will ever hear this but um thank you schools for  your lyrics and your lyricism and your voice that you've contributed to this commercial and I am not  done searching for you so maybe one day we'll get to talk about your side of the story to everything  thanks everyone bye this project was obviously very personal to me the whole reason that I  started this is because I recently went on a deep dive of Star Wars the Clone

Wars commercials and I  found found this one it instantly took me back and I knew if I remember it I can't be the only one  so that's what pushed me to continue on through this process I'm just really happy I finally  get to share it all with you I want to thank my drive of trying to hang on to Nostalgia from my  own childhood and I want to thank again everyone that contributed to this commercial I also want  to let everyone know that I have reached out to Larry Morris to see if there's any oth

er Clone  Wars commercials I could do a deep dive on if you remember this commercial or this song or either  or or in pair with each other please let me know I I want to know that I'm not the only one I know  I'm not so please let me know also before I go I I had to listen to this album a couple times through  this whole process but this is my [Music] favorite w