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Did Christmas Come Early?

Portlandia 2017 Season 7 Episode 1

SKETCH-O-VISION

A VERY GOOD USE OF YOUR TIME.

The setup

Run the Jewels meet two publicity executives whose album-release ideas make a surprise drop sound almost sensible.

Watch on YouTube

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Community rating

– / 10

The premise

Here’s the bit.

Killer Mike and El-P meet two publicity executives to plan the release of their new album. The executives want to outdo a conventional surprise drop: El-P could fake his death and emerge at his funeral with the record, or a Baby Jessica-style rescue could bring up a child with the record in her mouth. A pill containing the music would give “album drop” a bodily meaning, while their final proposal involves the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. The duo question the practicalities and ask for something between the pill and the end of the world. A mock news report announces that Run the Jewels have cut ties with the PR company after a disastrous launch, followed by the artists’ announcement that RTJ3 is out.

The funny people

Meet the cast. 4

Highly quotable.

The album's watching the baby.

Does it play as it comes out?

A little extra

Notes from the archive.

The clip also served as an announcement of RTJ3’s surprise Christmas release, ahead of Portlandia’s January 5, 2017 seventh-season premiere.

ScriptEnglish · 52 turns

Automatically generated script; wording may contain errors. Speaker labels are inferred.

00:00
Carrie Brownstein
All right, guys. We are so excited to talk strategy for the new album.
00:03
El-P
We're really excited to hear what you have to say.
00:05
Carrie Brownstein
First of all, do you know what an album drop is?
00:08
El-P
Yeah, when you drop an album and with no lead time and no press, and you just kind of give it to everybody. By surprise, boom.
00:14
Fred Armisen
But even that is tame now.
00:17
Fred Armisen
Yeah.
00:17
Carrie Brownstein
That's too slow.
00:18
Fred Armisen
So one thing you could do is you could fake your death. Do you ever think about doing that? I have. Look, you make an announcement. I'm dead. I'm really sorry. I've gone.
00:28
El-P
But if you're dead, how do you announce it?
00:30
Carrie Brownstein
Such a good question. So, if LP is the one that dies...
00:34
Okay.
00:34
Carrie Brownstein
...then you're the one that announces it.
00:36
Fred Armisen
All the fans show up to the funeral, right? Look, what a sad day. What? It's moving. Call the police. No, don't. Stop. He's alive. And he's got the album. His death was the new record.
00:50
Killer Mike
I think we could sell more records if we left LP dead. But he's my friend, and I don't want him dead.
00:57
Fred Armisen
He's not dead.
00:58
Killer Mike
Okay. It's not gonna work.
00:59
Fred Armisen
Now, do you remember baby Jessica?
01:02
El-P
Of course.
01:03
Yeah.
01:03
El-P
Baby Jessica fell down a well. I was so worried about her. I remember it was on the news. It was like a couple of weeks, right?
01:09
Carrie Brownstein
It's all we cared about. Baby Jessica, what is she? The real one, 40 now?
01:12
Fred Armisen
I'd say 40.
01:13
El-P
No, 41.
01:15
Killer Mike
Wow.
01:16
Fred Armisen
Yeah.
01:17
Carrie Brownstein
41 today. Baby Jessica's birthday.
01:19
Killer Mike
She's 41.
01:20
Carrie Brownstein
Just Jessica now.
01:21
Carrie Brownstein
So if we recreate that, a baby falls into a well. When we pull her to safety, it turns out it's your album.
01:28
El-P
The baby's the album, or the...
01:30
Fred Armisen
It's in the mouth.
01:31
El-P
Who's watching the baby?
01:32
Carrie Brownstein
The album's watching the baby.
01:33
El-P
Ah.
01:34
Killer Mike
That could hurt the baby. We don't want to hurt people.
01:37
Carrie Brownstein
What about this? Everyone takes a pill. When you poop it out, a literal album drop...
01:44
Fred Armisen
Does it play as it comes out?
01:46
Fred Armisen
No, you fish it out, and you find it. Something came out of me. I don't know. What's this? Oh, God. Sweetie, put this in the computer.
01:53
El-P
I don't think people are going to be into pulling music out of here.
01:57
Fred Armisen
I wouldn't shut it down so quickly.
02:00
El-P
How big is the pill? Is it necessary to have such a large pill for a USB stick?
02:08
Fred Armisen
No.
02:08
El-P
I like it. I think that we should put that one in the maybe pile.
02:13
Carrie Brownstein
What are your thoughts on Armageddon?
02:16
El-P
Um, it's...
02:17
Carrie Brownstein
Four horsemen of the apocalypse carrying your album in.
02:21
El-P
Can we actually get that to happen?
02:23
Carrie Brownstein
We didn't actually think we were going to get this far in the presentation.
02:27
Killer Mike
Could you get us anywhere between swallowing a pill and excreting it and the end of the world?
02:51
Killer Mike
Merry Christmas, motherfuckers, from Run the Jewels.
02:54
Killer Mike
Here's the album.
02:56
Speaker 1
Eh? Eh? Eh?