My Internets is Slow
You’d think I had dial up straight up in this bitch,
YouTube is so slow that I started to twitch,
The video loads and I can finally see,
But the sound isn’t synced, how can this be?
Gotta refresh and I know it’s a pain,
All this slow shit is gonna drive me insane.
Gotta stay straight and I gotta stay calm,
But if it crashes again, I’m gonna drop an F-bomb.
And so begins “My Internets is Slow”, the very first video to be uploaded to the Iowa Zoetrope YouTube page which also marks the “start of” and “demise” of my nerdcore rapping career. This can all be traced back to a sunny afternoon in June of 2010. By this time, the Iowa Zoetrope was beginning to flourish. We had just wrapped on Blow-ing Up the month prior with projects already in the can such as Steampunks, The Three Trials, Poomf, Roommate Roulette, and Things I Never Knew. As I was often to do, I stopped by Scotland Thompson’s house one day after school. Kipp Paulsen was living with Scott at the time and I was greeted at the door by Kipp. “Check this out!” he exclaimed leading me to the dining room table where his Mac was set up. Upon hitting play, my ears were treated to the aural pleasure of the demo version of “My Internets is Slow” which began with Kipp declaring, “My Internets is Slow,” and Scott responding in a high-pitched voice, “How slow?” Throughout the entire call and response mix was the incessant sound of Scott and Kipp giggling.
“What do you think?” Kipp asked as the audio concluded.
“I dig it.”
“Good, cause you’re going to be in it.”
“Oh? Okay.” I was taken aback. I didn’t quite know what Kipp was asking of me. In my mind, what Kipp had recorded was done. It was something that would be shared amongst friends at parties or poetry slams. I didn’t realize that he wanted me to rap alongside him and then be in a music video that would be seen on the internet (by like a hundred people). Didn’t he know how musically impaired I was (to be fair, I have come a long way vocally in the six years since).
But before we could do that, Kipp and Scott had to write the rest of the lyrics. I need to point out that I can take absolutely no credit for any part of “My Internets is Slow”. It truly is a collaboration between Scott and Kipp that reached the crux of all their witty banter, innuendo, and technological know-how. I remember sitting on the couch in the middle of the room, Kipp on one side of the room at the dining room table, and Scott on the other side sitting at his computer throwing down lyrics back and forth. If I remember correctly, Scott came up with the majority of the Pirate Bay segment.
When it came time to do the recording, Kipp told me that he felt more comfortable with the opening part. I was okay with that even though I kinda wanted to do it. I felt that because it was more angry, it would be easier and would easily disguise my own insecurities. Kipp knocked out his portion in less than two takes. Then I was up. Kipp and Scott had me read through it first. I started out angrily as if to imitate Kipp, “Now it’s all good. I got my YouTube fix. Time to lock the door and look at some chicks.” The two of them looked at me unconvinced.
“Uhhhh, try it another way.” I did several other read-throughs before settling (almost out of desperation) on a breathy, somewhat laid-back voice which made sense from a story-telling standpoint. I mean, the rappers are angry that their internet is slow and now that it’s working, we should be happy. “I like your voice there,” Kipp stated. We then started recording, which consisted of me sitting in front of Kipp’s Mac, lyrics in hand, speaking into the computer’s built-in mic. Upon completing my first recording and feeling satisfied, I turned away from the monitor to face Scott and Kipp seeking their approval. “Stephen, you went out of sync with the tempo. Go ahead and try it again.”
We began another recording and again, I started out fine, only to speed up my delivery as the music progressed. Take after take was like this so Kipp took it upon himself to record my part, then he played it back to me. As I listened to Kipp reciting the lyrics through a set of headphones, I expelled them vocally so as to get the tempo right. With my part finished, Kipp then recorded the chorus and pitched his voice extra low. We called it a night with plans to film the video the next day.
“Wear something a rapper would wear,” Kipp told me as we wrapped out for the day. Well, in my mind, the clothes I wore while striking theatre sets was exactly what someone like Eminem would wear. You know, a reddish plaid headband, a gray hoodie intended for someone 100lbs larger than me, and baggy paint-smeared khakis. Yeah, that’s what all the greats wear. Kipp, on the other hand, had a slick pair of shades, a bright yellow jersey, and baggy shorts. In my mind at the time, I thought Kipp looked like a professional snowboarder but looking at it now, Kipp looks like a rapper unlike me who really embodied an outsider making a fleeting attempt. When I first read through the lyrics, however, I envisioned us resembling Geek Squad members, as in wearing thick black glasses, bow ties, and other nerdy apparel but Scott and Kipp had a different vision.
Ultimately, the way the video plays out is that because the internet is slow, Kipp and I decide to go outside and vent about our grief. The shot of Kipp and I walking down the street, I’m actually holding Scott’s ipod with an mp3 playing so Kipp can lipsync. We did a lot of takes on this shot as Kipp and I learned, lipsyncing is hard. The take that made it into the final version of the video shows Kipp jumping after he proclaims, “If it crashes again, I’m gonna drop an F-bomb.” This is because Kipp finally nailed the take and was so happy, he leapt and stomped the ground in triumph.
My portion takes place at a car wash. I’m not really sure why we chose this location and I don’t quite see how relevant it is to the lyrics. I have to hand it to Scott when it came to editing as I didn’t know enough of the lyrics to lipsync. In fact, I’m not sure if I had a single take where I got through the whole thing. Scott managed to pick and choose from each take to make the whole thing coherent.
We shot the chorus of “My Internets is Slow” in Scott’s garage. With the lights out and staring directly into the camera, I took my part deathly serious and as Kipp stated to me afterwards, “Dude, you look pissed.” Scott would then combine this portion with an Iron Man hud-like matte interface he found online. It’s actually my favorite part of the whole video. Next, we changed costumes for the Pirate Bay verses. I brought with me several pirate themed costume pieces for us to change into. A pirate hat and bandana for Kipp and for myself, a Jack Sparrow wig complete with an eyeliner beard.
Scott immediately got to work on editing the video while I showed Kipp Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along Blog. Scott did have to tell us to turn down the volume a couple times but despite the distraction, he banged out a solid video. He then sent it to our absent Zoetrope co-founder, Trevor Swaim. Trevor immediately called us after listening to the video. I remember hearing his reaction over the speaker phone. “This is what’s wrong with society and it’s going to badly influence the youth of America.” Proud of what we had accomplished, the three of us laughed uncontrollably.
On June 9, 2010, “My Internets is Slow” hit the public and it immediately garnered 200 views thanks largely in part to Kipp’s massive amount of friends on Facebook. I recall posting the video to my profile and urging my family not to watch it because of all the swearing. It was a strong start to our small independent film company.
Ultimately, we reshot my scene at a computer as I had come up with an idea for the video to get more views. We'll have me hold up a picture of Olivia Munn and call it the Olivia Munn edition. I was somewhat inspired after attending Attack of the Show's panel at San Diego Comic-Con and thought it'd be a good way for the video go viral. Ultimately, it never happened although it almost has enough views to match the original.
To this day, whenever Kipp mentions "My Internets is Slow", he tends to talk about it in a jokingly ashamed manner such as, "From the guys who unleashed the shit that is 'My Internets is Slow', comes..." No matter how you look at it, "My Internets is Slow" has a certain comedic value that rings true about a topical issue most people have faced at some point on their computers or phones.
