We’ve Got A File On You: John Early
Michael Tyrone Delaney
We’ve Got A File On You features interviews in which artists share the stories behind the extracurricular activities that dot their careers: acting gigs, guest appearances, random internet ephemera, etc.
I once had a theory that people without siblings can reliably detect a fellow only child, but John Early proves me wrong.
“I have a sister, but she’s six years older than me,” the comedian and actor tells me, a person without siblings, over Zoom from his Los Angeles home. “So there was a significant amount of time where I was essentially an only child. But I also do think a lot of the psychological profiles that I use to inspire my various personae can often be traced back to just being only children.”
I ask Early about siblings because of an early moment in his 2023 Max comedy special John Early: Now More Than Ever in which he motions to his parents in the audience as they sit beneath suddenly-blinding lights. “What’s it like being under the spotlight for once?” Early berates them. “It feels nice, right? Well, it’s hell for me. I have to live with that every day.”
Offstage, lamenting being the center of your parents’ universe is a sentiment you’d probably only expect from someone who grew up as the sole child in their family — but Early? He’s just always been a scene-stealer. “One of my first forays into the industry was a talent show at my daycare in third grade,” he recalls. “And I choreographed a dance to ‘Hot Stuff’ by Donna Summer.” Sometimes even birth order is no match for fate.
From 2016 to 2022, Early stole scenes in the black comedy-crime series Search Party; you’ve likely also seen him in either 30 Rock, I Think You Should Leave With Tim Robinson, Los Espookys, Netflix’s Wet Hot American Summer series, or in a music video for a certain “anti-heroic” pop star. Maybe you’ve seen clips of him doing standup opposite his frequent collaborator Kate Berlant. Though his live shows center around his irreverent brand of comedy, music plays a significant role in conjuring laughs — especially now that he has his backing band the Lemon Squares.
Early’s debut album, also called Now More Than Ever, collects some of the fan-favorite covers he and the Lemon Squares have worked into live shows: Summer, Britney Spears, Neil Young, Madonna, and more. He’s the first to admit he’s not a professional singer, but he sells his covers with the confidence of someone who’s spent the majority of their life doing them.
“When you do comedy, you’re often starting with little 10-minute sets or little two-minute open mics,” he says. “I knew that if I ever did a big, long show that was just me, I wanted a band up there. I find that being alone on stage can feel incredibly lonely.”
Ahead of the release of Now More Than Ever next Friday, we discuss what brought Early to the stage in the first place, singing with Yo La Tengo, starring in his friends’ music videos, oxycodone, and more.
Making A Music Video For His Cover Of Aaliyah’s “Rock The Boat” (2024)
JOHN EARLY: There’s something really funny to me about approaching comedy like a pop star with this stadium-sized grandiosity, especially in the beginning when I was doing really small bar shows in Brooklyn. In the “Rock The Boat” video, we took it very seriously, kind of like a dare. It’s like, “Yeah, we really did do multiple choreography rehearsals.” At my shows, I always like to work really hard on the music, and that’s part of the fun for me. But I never imagined I’d be making music videos – it just became a possibility once I was promoting the comedy album. We recorded these extra songs on the album during the [WGA and SAG-AFTRA] strike, and I wanted to make an extra little gift. The “Rock The Boat” video felt like that.
Your parents make a cameo in that, and it seems like they’re very into it and proud to be a part of it. But did it take a lot of convincing?
EARLY: I really lucked out in the parent lottery. It’s very sweet. There’s sometimes some nervousness from my mom to participate, because I think she, like most people, doesn’t want to be humiliated. But they know I won’t do anything genuinely torturous – it’s kind of fake torture. They are so down.
My dad and his friend Steve have been playing trumpet together since high school, and they actually played on “Rock The Boat,” and on our Madonna cover of “American Life.” It felt so essential to have horns, you know? And so once we decided that, I was like, “Oh my god, it has to be my dad.”
Making A Cameo In Peacock’s Girls5Eva (2024)
Girls5eva season 3 has dropped on Netflix. Here’s @ErinMarkey as my wife pic.twitter.com/iVgW3nLG2U
— John Early (@bejohnce) March 15, 2024
EARLY: I’m such a fan of that style of writing – that kind of 30 Rock, dense style of joke writing. I can’t seem to do that for myself, so I love when I get to be in something where every single half sentence is a joke. I find it almost soothing. All I have to do is know my lines, deliver it cleanly, and then the joke will do its magic. It’s so nice when someone else is already funny. I also just love the pop element of the show.
Covering Britney Spears’ “Overprotected” (2023)
You’ve been doing Britney Spears covers for years, but in your most recent special, you did “Overprotected.” That feels especially pointed and relevant. How has your relationship with doing Britney covers changed over time with the Free Britney movement?
EARLY: I’m kind of perpetually out of touch, but I’m an American, so I knew what was going on [with Spears] to some degree. It certainly changed the nature of how I performed my impression. I always kind of couched it in reverence and love for her, but I’m doing it at a comedy show, so there’s clearly a line to walk.
At the time that I started doing my Britney impression publicly, she had already been through quite a bit, but as her struggles became more apparent, it made me maybe a little more self-conscious about the nature of the impression. I used to just do it at shows alone, and I would bring someone on stage to beatbox for me. But then, once I started doing the show with the full band, the Lemon Squares, part of the impression kind of faded away — not even intentionally, but the song would kind of take over, and I wanted to just sing it as me. What’s so amazing about doing covers with the band is you strip a song down to its basic elements and you learn about the genius of the original song in order to replicate it.
Every time we did a Britney cover, we were stunned by, like, the genius of Max Martin. As I started taking the music element of my live shows more seriously, the impression became less important to me and it was more about just letting the songs be as beautiful as they actually are.
I’ve noticed a lot of the covers that you do are originally recorded by women. Aside from them just being great songs by great artists that are obviously crowd pleasers, why do you think those songs specifically translate well into a comedy setting?
EARLY: Well, you know, it’s kind of a classically gay preoccupation. I’m really just choosing the songs that move me; that’s my only criteria. But I mostly listen to women vocalists, and I’m shooting myself in the foot, because I am not a woman. I feel so bad for my backup singers, who are women. We’re changing the key to fit my voice first, and then Dominique, who is an alto, then to basically be a bass. Princess, who’s this crazy soprano, is singing in this weird alto part of her range. But they’re both geniuses, and they can do it. What’s so funny is that I choose these songs by these pop and R&B stars, and most of them were meant more for the studio, not necessarily live. They’re often so hard. There’s no air. There’s no time to breathe, because they were all assembled in the studio in this way. I mean, I would say they’re mostly hard just because I am not a professional singer. But it’s just the music that I love.
I have really late-in-life Beatlemania. I’m realizing, “Oh, wow, if I chose songs like this, I could just kind of wail and it would be fine. I wouldn’t have to think about it.” We were talking about maybe doing “Mr. Moonlight” as a sweet little encore, and it works really well in our kind of lo-fi setup. But at this moment in time, I still feel wedded to the pop and R&B and disco covers. Eventually I’ll get bored.
Singing With Yo La Tengo During Their Hanukkah Residency (2023)
Yo La Tengo began Hanukkah 2023 run with Sun Ra Arkestra (@SunRaUniverse), John Early (@bejohnce) & more — check out pics, video and setlist https://t.co/Tn9M4P2hfY pic.twitter.com/bX5Tuz5mnR
— BrooklynVegan (@brooklynvegan) December 8, 2023
EARLY: Yo La Tengo came to see me in Seattle at the Neptune Theater because they were performing at the same venue, like, the next night. They had just gotten in town, and they saw my name on the marquee, and they came to see my show. I was so touched. They’re so dignified and talented and sensitive, and I’m so depraved in my act. They do these Hanukkah shows every year, and they asked me to be one of their surprise guests. I totally bombed, for the record. I ate shit. It was really confronting, because I was really flying high from the feeling of putting my special out in the world. It sounded really bad, but singing with them was such a thrill.
Playing Taylor Swift’s Son In Her “Anti-Hero” Video (2022)
EARLY: I’ve worked a lot with Jacqueline Novak, a fellow comedian, and her cousin is Jack Antonoff. Taylor was a fan of Search Party, and she went through Jack to get to Jacqueline to ask me to be in the video. And I was recovering from my third back surgery. I was literally on oxys. I wasn’t allowed to bend, lift, or twist for three months. So I’m sitting there, and Taylor asks, “Will you be in a music video?” I mean, I could not have been more immobile. I was like, “Yes, but heads up, I actually can’t move.” She was so sweet and accommodating. She was like, “We’ll work around you. There’s a fight scene, but we’ll just have everyone kind of do it around you, and you can just stand still and scream.” You can see in the video that I’m very rigid.
I have spent most of my career being a kind of niche figure, and I’m proud of that, and I also don’t really have a say in the matter. But it’s very crazy to then dip a toe in a world of like, “Oh, this is actually going to be seen by everyone.”
Did you notice a sudden shift after the music video came out, now that millions more people have seen your face?
EARLY: Every single day on Instagram, I just get tagged constantly in Taylor Swift content. If anyone who’s ever done anything with her at all has a birthday, fans will post, “Happy birthday, so-and-so!” with a picture of Taylor with that person. And then they tag everyone else she’s ever worked with. And I’m like, “What do y’all expect that I’m going to do? Do you think I’m going to be like, ‘Oh, wow, this is so kind of them. I’m going to show this to Taylor'”? It’s so funny. But that’s kind of it. When I go back home to Nashville and see our family friends, the nieces, the cousins, you know — I do feel like I finally have something that makes them think I’m cool.
Appearing In Seth Bogart’s “Boys Who Don’t Wanna Be Boys” Video (2020)
EARLY: That was COVID time. Seth just asked me and his friends to dance. I was in a sling, because I had just been skiing — the only time I’ve ever been skiing. I jumped out of the ski lift at the wrong time and had a frozen shoulder for three months. So I guess a lot of my music video appearances are very injury-based. But I really, really love Seth, so it was very fun to dance for him.
Appearing In Molly Burch’s “Last Christmas” Video With Kate Berlant (2019)
Did you get any instructions before going into the studio, or was everyone just letting you and Kate do your thing?
EARLY: Those directors are old friends of ours, and Molly’s an old friend of ours. Kate and I did probably an hour and a half of totally insane, unhinged improvisation. I think there’s a really special charm to that video because we were having so much fun. And this is something that I love about the “Rock The Boat” video – there’s nothing funnier than the rehearsal or the studio, when you go behind the scenes of a pop star’s life. That trope will always be funny to me.
Starring In CupcakKe’s “Squidward Nose” Video (2019)
EARLY: I love that woman. The director, I think, was also a Search Party fan. That video was the coolest thing I’ve ever done, and every once in a while, I feel the need to bring the public’s attention back to that video. I’ve said this before, but I always wanted to be kind of the Kathy Griffin role in Eminem’s “The Real Slim Shady” video. It felt like that era of music video, with that kind of naughty spirit. It was so fun, and she was so sweet. I think it got removed from YouTube because of Spongebob copyright stuff, but I’m pretty sure it’s still on Vimeo.
Singing O-Town’s “Liquid Dreams” At Haunting Renditions Live (2018)
EARLY: That was with Eliot Glazer. He did these cover shows, and he likes to bring the secret sultry emotion, or some of the unintentional irony, out of these pop songs that we grew up on. He has special guests, and I think it was a boy band themed show and, and I chose “Liquid Dreams.” I don’t even have that big of a relationship with that song. It is just one of the funniest songs ever made. I mean, it’s crazy that it’s called “Liquid Dreams.”
There’s always an element to music of that era that is just so perverse, and it’s these really young artists doing really, really sexual stuff. The music industry has always run on, like, youthful sexuality. But there’s something about that song in particular that makes it feel like a weird AI song. It’s really gross. But God bless those boys. God bless O-Town. I hope they’re doing OK wherever they are.
Performing At Bonnaroo (2016)
EARLY: I think part of why I was there was that Search Party was about to come out on TBS, and they wanted to capitalize on that. But it was amazing. I haven’t really done festivals in a while, but there was a time there — and they’re welcome to have me back! — where I would go do these festivals with Kate, or I would do them alone. But I don’t love festival culture. It’s really hot, everyone’s so drunk and high, and it’s pretty punishing, honestly, as a comedian. There are literally people sleeping on the ground because they’re hungover or they’re so high, and that is not the best.
But I would say as far as festivals go, that was one of the better ones. [Comedian] Bridget Everett was there at the same time, which was so nice. There was some aftershow with a full band where we could cover a song if we wanted, and I did Tweet’s “Oops (Oh My),” which I do in my special. It was fun to be in a full-music setting.
Making A DIY Music Video To Céline Dion’s “It’s All Coming Back To Me Now” (2001)
EARLY: I’m trying to make a movie right now, and when I pitch it to people, I keep saying about the process: “I want it to be made sleepover style.” And they’re like, “What do you mean by that?” I’m always trying to get back to the spirit of that. That was what my social life revolved around as a kid and as a teenager, and honestly, through my early 20s – “Let’s make something.” We did pretty great stuff in my friend’s living room, including this video, which I actually like! I go back and watch it every once in a while, and I’m genuinely like, “This is gorgeous.” It was kind of pre-digital editing. We were literally pausing the boom box and the camera at the same time. There are these little gaps of silence where you can hear our breathing – it’s so sweet.
What other songs do you remember making dances or music videos to when you were younger?
EARLY: My friend Laura and I, whenever she would come over growing up, we would usually watch Romy And Michelle’s High School Reunion and we would try to learn the “Time After Time” dance. We also worked for what seems like years — although I’m sure it was just a few sleepovers in a row — on a dance to “Bombs Over Baghdad” by OutKast. We would buy frozen daiquiri mix, blend it, and drink virgin frozen daiquiris. We’d be so high on sugar, staying up until 4 a.m. and pissing off our parents, doing this tweaked-out dance to OutKast. It was absolute heaven.
Now More Than Ever is out 9/13 via Lookin’ For My Denim/Thirty Tigers.
