See Tim Heidecker, Andrew Bird Perform ‘Trump Talkin’ Nukes’ as Ballad
Tim Heidecker, the comedian turned musician, joined violinist Andrew Bird for a Facebook Live broadcast of the latter’s Live From the Great Room series, where they discussed the relationship between music and comedy. They also discussed Heidecker’s history in music, since he released his debut album, In Glendale, last year.
Pitchfork reports that during the hour-long broadcast, they performed In Glendale’s “Central Air,” Bird’s “Fiery Crash,” Heidecker’s Our First 100 Days contribution “Trump Talkin’ Nukes” and Merle Haggard’s “Okie From Muskogee,” as well as a couple of new songs.
Regarding “Trump Talkin’ Nukes,” which begins around 25:25, Heidecker expressed anxiety about President Trump’s bellicose Twitter statements. “Really, Jesus, this is like the least funny thing I’ve ever written,” he said of the tune he put out earlier this year. “What made me so mad is I’m 41 … and I grew up with the end of the Cold War thing in my life and that felt like it went away to some degree. And then I was looking at Twitter and of course Trump tweets something, I think it was before the inauguration but it was after he was elected, but it was like, ‘We’re going to increase the size of our nuclear arsenal by 10-fold.’ He said something shocking and disturbing, and it was like, ‘Oh, that’s back.’ … So I sat down and wrote this song from that perspective of me talking about nukes, and that was six months ago and it feels even more resonant now with North Korea.”
Heidecker also discussed his musical history. “I had bands in high school and Eric had bands in high school and college,” he said, referring to his Awesome Show partner Eric Wareham. “And we also never thought of ourselves as comedians in that sort of traditional sense. … For a long time, I didn’t really have much to say lyrically that wasn’t meant to be absurd or ironic. And as I kept making music as a hobby, stuff in my life would creep up to be maybe I could write a song. But I still treat it as a hobby or a really pleasurable thing to do, because you can’t live off it anymore.” He paused and said, “Well, you can,” to Bird, who smiled.