Shakedown Street is the area of a jam band parking lot where the vending takes place. It is named after the Grateful Dead song of the same name, and began in the early 1980s in the parking lots at Grateful Dead concerts. Jim Marty joins Larry Mishkin to reports live from LA Forum prior to Dead & Co New Years concerts. Produced by PodCONX https://podconx.com/guests/larry-mishkin https://podconx.com/guests/jim-marty https://podconx.com/guests/rob-hunt
Shakedown Street is the area of a jam band parking lot where the vending takes place. It is named after the Grateful Dead song of the same name, and began in the early 1980s in the parking lots at Grateful Dead concerts. Jim Marty and Larry Mishkin to reports live from LA Forum prior to Dead & Co New Years concerts.
https://podconx.com/guests/larry-mishkin
https://podconx.com/guests/jim-marty
https://podconx.com/guests/rob-hunt
Jim Marty: [00:00:36] Hello, everybody, and welcome to the Deadhead Cannabis Show. This is Jim Marty reporting in from sunny Southern California. I have my partner up in nice and cold Chicago area, Larry Mishkin. How you doing, Larry?
Larry Mishkin: [00:00:49] Well, Jim, I was doing just fine. So you reminded me how much colder it is here. That where you're out right now?
Jim Marty: [00:00:55] Well, it's been chilly here in L.A. in the old 50s. People are walking around in their boonies and little ski jackets. And it's hard from the air from Colorado. This feels just fine to me. But they say right now it's about 60.
Larry Mishkin: [00:01:09] And they don't they don't know what they don't know what causes out there.
Jim Marty: [00:01:12] Right. But I'm very excited. I'm on my way to the forum. I'm in my left ride right now, getting out of the car here in a few minutes at the L.A. forum, which I've never seen a show at. So I'm really looking forward to tonight's and company. So.
Larry Mishkin: [00:01:28] Yes, that's a great place. The fabulous forum. You know, the Lakers played there forever. Los Angeles Kings used to play there. They had many a solid Grateful Dead show there over the years. It was always a very popular place. And I love how they can go back and revisit some of these. We'll go back to these old venues again. You know, going back to this one and it just brings back, you know, all the happy memories of people who saw the dead out there, who knows how many times or whatever great event they saw in the fabulous forum. It's a perfect place to go see Dunnin company.
Jim Marty: [00:01:58] Yes. Excellent. Looking forward to it. I'll be broadcasting part of the show in the next few minutes from shapefile Street so that the Cannabis news this week is that the cultivation licenses were announced in Missouri and there was over 500 applicants for 60 licenses that were awarded. I'm happy to say one of our clients did get some of the licenses, so we'll have some work in 2020 in Missouri.
Larry Mishkin: [00:02:28] Congratulations. Very exciting. Yes, they've been tough. They've been doing the announcing of all death. The list came out and everybody's been running over and checking it twice. And on this end, one of the things that I found a little bit surprising was that it looked like a lot of the big multi-state operators got shut out, a couple of them from Chicago that have typically done well in other locations. I did not get licenses down there. And I'm not sure if that was a conscious effort by Missouri to keep some of the big boys out or whether, you know, we had other people who just came up with better other applications. But either way, and not trying to just pick guys by any means. But I think it's kind of nice to have a program like that where, you know, it's it's more individuals and it's more people who are really trying to go out there and and create something. And, you know, we'll see maybe a year from now we'll all be wishing that they had some of the big boys there. But I think right now from Missouri to get started, that's a great way. And of course, this is just cultivation, right? The processing and the dispensary licenses get announced in January, one more towards the beginning. And I think dispensaries are more towards the end. So obviously, there's still a lot more opportunities for people out there who have applied in Missouri to be able to get their licenses. I have family and friends in Missouri, and I can tell you, if you'll pardon the pun, that it's quite the buzz down there right now. Everybody's very, very excited about it. And, you know, people are all waiting to see what it's going to be, how it's going to work. You know, this is Missouri, for God's sakes. You know, these people are like, oh, marijuana. But it is exciting. And that's great news about your plant.
Jim Marty: [00:04:02] Yes. And I'm fine with a large out-of-state operators not coming in. You know, there's a lot of smoke and mirrors there. We've seen the disaster on the Canadian Stock Exchange this past six months. So big doesn't always mean better. And for Missouri to start its program organically, I think also I agree with you, Larry, that that's that's a good thing.
Larry Mishkin: [00:04:25] Absolutely. And of course, while all that's going down well, we here in Chicago are busy enjoying our holidays by sitting at our desks and cranking out applications. Does the state of Illinois did us no favor by making the deadline January 2nd? Because as we all know, people will expand out to whatever amount of time they have. So I got to work Christmas Eve. I got to work Christmas Day, New Year's Eve and New Year's Day or on tap as we process all these applications and gentlemen and file. The only thing I can complain about any of it is that it may cause me to miss the Michigan Wolverines ball game on New Year's Day, which is a kind of a religious obligation for me, even though we're going to get killed by Alabama. But we're very excited about it. And I love, you know, having all this work, everybody saying to me, and you're so busy. And I get to call my father every now and then and say it's better than the alternative. And the timing may not be perfect, but that's OK, because it's still great billable hours for me to read. These are the clients and there's just a whole host of parties. Some of the dispensaries and some of the organizations are all planning here for New Year's Day, New Year's Eve and New Year's Day. And he was kind of funny looking to go through all the listings and pick up the one that looks like it might be the funnest to the best in a new world year.
Jim Marty: [00:05:40] Well, I don't feel lonely. I also worked some a little bit every day here, even on Christmas Day, because we have a lot of time sensitive work on our desk, too. So, yeah, it's very exciting time in the Cannabis industry. There's so much going on. Are they still predicting some big shortages of flour when Illinois opens up on New Year's Day?
Larry Mishkin: [00:06:00] You know, I've got to tell you, Jim, I'm chuckling because, you know, sometimes holidays just can't help from being a Illinois. You know, there's a regular medical dispensary that I go to. And for the last two months, they've had horrible, horrible shortages. It's know very, very limited selections of flour and dusts and concentrates and things like that. And a little will really tell you that the general answer you got is that, you know, that pipeline is being squeezed a little bit because everybody's trying to conserve and make sure they have enough for adult use. Where the rub comes in and Illinois is in, Illinois is one of the few states with a statute that actually says that the cultivators have to keep a reasonable notice supply available for the medical dispensaries. And so, you know, of course, the idea is, well, what's going to happen there? One of the state legislators going on to say, well, we know there's going to be shortages, but that's happened in every state. To me, that's a little bit of a cop out answer, right. I mean, do you have a commitment to your medical patients or you don't, which if if we if we're going to really believe this is medicine and not just a week, week to get to adult use, then like any medicine, you need to make it available for those people who need it. So it's going to be very, very interesting to see, you know, what happens to supply here over the next month or two and what the pushback might potentially be, depending on anyone, how all that goes down.
Jim Marty: [00:07:26] Yes. Well, I went to a dispensary here in Los Angeles today, and there was no shortage. They had prayed. I don't know, three or four dozen strains and plenty of extracts and vape pens and gummies and edibles of all kinds of big selection and a very tiny little store. But the prices were quite a bit higher than Colorado. Now, I really almost twice one gram joints were thirteen. Fourteen dollars. You got one of those under ten in Colorado.
Jim Marty: [00:08:01] And the grab didn't quite understand my question. I always tell them I'm in the cannabis industry and live off a business card. And I said, so are those prices pre-tax? Is another post-tax? And I said, Oh, you mean the taxes included? She does know the taxes extra. And they said, oh my. Well that's pre-tax. Thirteen dollars post-tax is like 16 because the tax at the cash register all ends. Local and California, including the additional excise tax is 35 percent at the cash register. So you're you're $13 joined. It's more like sixteen seventeen dollars. However, since it was our first visit, we got fifteen percent off nice and very nice. Plenty of selection, excellent quality. A going for about. There's some is for 50. But Burski, isn't he handsome? He's for 30, but mostly A's for 50. That's some very fine. A lot of it was outdoor California, but it was really pretty.
Larry Mishkin: [00:08:58] That's beautiful stuff. I have another story about Los Angeles, too.
Jim Marty: [00:09:03] Yeah, I had a meeting at Starbucks today with one of my L.A. clients and he just got awarded some licenses.
Jim Marty: [00:09:10] He was awarded a cultivation production and a delivery license.
Jim Marty: [00:09:16] And delivery is a pretty good deal or because any just buy and sell you. He said, you know, he'll want to farms, you know, buy 100 pounds and then place them at dispensaries in Southern California. But what's interesting is I know they have a social justice program in Illinois. They have one here in Los Angeles, too. And he feels like he was lucky to get his licenses. He feels like his prior felony conviction got him across the finish line. Isn't that funny?
Larry Mishkin: [00:09:42] Jim, I got to tell you that that's what everybody is laughing about here, right. Because in Illinois, the two ways to qualify for social equity are either one. You live in a neighborhood that was disproportionately affected by the war on drugs or two, you yourself were a victim of the war on drugs. And that's that way that is defined is if you were not even convicted, if you were arrested for any one of the Cannabis crimes that are now available for expungement, that means any misdemeanor and up to up to a Class 4 felony as long as there's no violence involved. So people are coming back and saying, I spent my whole life trying to get this stupid. Conviction off my record. And now it's going to be my golden ticket.
Jim Marty: [00:10:25] Ain't life stranger, is it?
Larry Mishkin: [00:10:28] You know, it goes from being a, you know, a scarlet letter to a badge of honor. You know, just like that. And, yes, it's it's very, very interesting to see and you watch how everybody kind of scrambles around to try to fill in those those gaps and everything like that. But you which you said before about the 35 percent excise taxes is really fascinating to me because California has had a lot of problems with their adult use. Their black market is thriving. And as everything I've read suggests, it's because they slap such a huge excise tax on top of it that they basically priced the legal market right out of the market.
Jim Marty: [00:11:04] Yeah, it's interesting. You should you should say that I had a conversation with a gentleman in San Francisco a month or so ago and I was up there and telling him that our company, Bridge West, has kind of shied away from, you know, clients in the California market because it's is so much still black market.
Jim Marty: [00:11:21] And he said he knows, but he'll figure this, you know, worth, you know, nine, 10 billion dollar total market. And, you know, right now it's three billion is legal and six billion is black, Mark. And he goes over the next five years, that's going to reverse. And then five years later, they're six or seven billion in legal market and we'll beat the black market down to three billion. So that's a $9 billion shift in the market that I think my company would be very excited to be part of for sure.
Larry Mishkin: [00:11:53] Oh, yeah, that'll be wonderful for all of us. Right. It's a they can make that shift over and really put it into a situation where the legal market is really thriving and I don't have anything against the black market. Took care of all of us for years. But, you know, at some point if we're going to do this the right way. You know, everybody needs to be incentivized to shop at the dispensaries. And, you know, buy it that way. And this actually leads into a not a really good point that you and I have been following all along. And that's the vaping crisis, right? Because which would you and I have been saying all along is this is probably a bad batch. There's you know, it's not it's not formula to come through. The dispensaries was all black market. And now this is pretty much come out and confirmed that it was the vitamin E acetate that was used to liquefy the THC oil and to keep it from clogging up the day things has now been. Is there pinpointing that as the cause of all of these vaping related illnesses? And what did we learn from that? Number one, it wasn't the THC like everybody wanted to see first. And number two, if you buy legally through products that have been tested and, you know, inspected and all of that, you're much better off that if you go out to the black market and and buy it. Hopefully that change of situation will be another reason to channel people to go into the into the regular market, then to continue to use their black market connections.
Jim Marty: [00:13:21] Right. Right. But once you heard a little background noise because of that of the car now and headed for the safe down street outside the forum, I'm looking right at the new football stadium that's being built.
Larry Mishkin: [00:13:33] Oh, nice. That's supposed to be beautiful out there. That new football stadium.
Jim Marty: [00:13:36] Yes. I'll send in a picture, please. So how's the crowd out there? A lot of people.
Jim Marty: [00:13:40] Looks like they're just starting to get assembled in a few minutes as we head over there.
Larry Mishkin: [00:13:45] Excellent. Excellent. Well, you know, as anybody who's ever been to a Grateful Dead show knows, there's a right way and a wrong way to go to the show. That's just my own personal opinion, of course, with the wrong ways when you go running in right at the last minute and you can barely get your seat in enough time. The right way is when you get out there two hours early and you get to walk around, you get to walk to shake down street in the mall. And and you see all of the like minded people out there. And, you know, and that's where the three meet people, where you see things, where you learn things. It's it's a wonderful experience of group community coming together.
Jim Marty: [00:14:21] Yes. Well, I've got a couple hours here before we go in, so we'll be able to check out all the vending and the people and the fun, you know?
Larry Mishkin: [00:14:28] And I have to tell you, it's it's like anything else. You can see the dead anywhere. And I have seen them everywhere. But there's really something special about seeing them in California. It's kind of like you just sense their home. This is their environment. These are their people. This is the place to be. It's like this is you know, it's not it's it's nothing new in California. It's just another day. Going to see the Grateful Dead. Whereas, you know, they come into some cities in the Midwest and the newspaper, as you know, Anahad, Grateful Dead coming to town and everybody you know. Hey, California's the way to do it, man. I'm I'm a big, big fan of California. Grateful Dead shows.
Jim Marty: [00:15:04] Yes. Me, too. I've seen many shows here, including New Year's shows in San Francisco way back in nineteen eighty. I saw them at the festival of Fleetwood Mac and Jackson Browne. And Jimmy Buffett was way out in the desert. East of L.A..
Jim Marty: [00:15:22] Trying to think of the town, but that was a dead with the dead. They not only played at that festival, they played it like eight o'clock in the morning.
Jim Marty: [00:15:31] Yes, he was there was like early morning, broad daylight. That was a kick. Yeah, right.
Larry Mishkin: [00:15:39] Not necessarily that time you'd want to see them, but, you know, it's all part of the festival you catch and when you catch them.
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Larry Mishkin: [00:16:30] Speaking of New Year's shows, the other thing you and I have been talking about is that our other favorite jam band, Fish, is getting ready on Saturday night to launched into their traditional four night New Year's run at Madison Square Garden in New York. Based on their last tour, which more or less was a recreation of the ailing tour from the late 1990s going to Providence and Long Island, Nassau. I heard great things about the show's Trey is telling it. They played eight nights, I think, and didn't repeat a song once. That's that's the kind of thing you like when you go to see a jam band, right? You're going to see variety. You're going to see everything and listen. Believe me, if I wasn't up to my eyeballs in applications, I think he would be in California seeing the debtor in New York City and fish.
Jim Marty: [00:17:17] Yeah. A lot of good shows coming up. That reminds me, I just checked with my son. So being Phish fans and I guess as the others, it is a controversy between Bill Tool and Session, who's had the most shows at Madison Square Garden. And my sons tell me Billy Joel still has the lead on that. Yes.
Larry Mishkin: [00:17:36] And don't forget, when they did the baker's dozen shows a couple of years ago, that story came out. This fish was going to be challenging Billy Joel's record. Currently, he plays a bunch of shows there every year himself. But Billy Joel's quoted the time in response to that was first there, just a cover band. And so in response to that, Phish went out and played 13 shows at Madison Square Garden and never repeated a song. And then, like you said, they just did it on this last thoughts, which just goes to show, I think, that, you know, not only the maturing as a band, but as a consistently come out with more and more material. You know, it just expands the repertoire that much more and then gives them the flexibility to be able to play all those shows and not have to double dip.
Jim Marty: [00:18:20] I listen to this metro in Philadelphia that was like four or five thousand people, the smaller shows. This is done in a long time and they really are playing and playing really well.
Larry Mishkin: [00:18:31] Yup. Yup. They're playing great. My son is going to be out of New York with his crew and his fiancee. They're all excited to get out there and to see this. You know, I'm very, very happy for him because I have to tell you, Jim, I'm sure you're probably the same way. In the early 9th, early to mid 1980s, New Year's would roll around. And where else would you want to be a subset of Grateful Dead show? It was never a very difficult decision for me. You know, New Year's Eve tends to typically be, you know, overrated. And we all wait up somewhere drinking champagne and, you know, doing whatever. But to be, you know, a dud show all night. And then as you roll into the new year, they're cranking into a good sugar magnolia or whatever they're playing that night. That's that's that's pretty much it. And I mean, that's that's where you want to be.
Jim Marty: [00:19:13] Yeah, but Shakedown Street was great. I'll send some pictures in. It's a good long and big says downstream. Lots of bending going on Hemp parts and clothes and all kinds of Grateful Dead paraphernalia.
Larry Mishkin: [00:19:26] Check out those Hemp hats because a few years ago, the dead were selling Terrapin Station hemp hats and when they showed up, the tag on the inside of the head said 100 percent pure Hemp do not smoke this out. And to me, that was as funny as you get.
Jim Marty: [00:19:42] I look forward to doing this again tomorrow. If you want a bit of a review of the show.
Jim Marty: [00:19:47] Very nice talking to you, Larry. I'll let you sign us out.
Larry Mishkin: [00:19:53] Jim. Great to hear from you today. Enjoy your show out. There will all be very anxious to hear how it goes. And to all of our listeners. Nice talking to all of you. And we'll look forward to speaking again to you soon. Thanks. Have a good day.
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