Steve Aoki Is Skeptical About Banksy's Self-Destructing Art

The J.Rogan experience. 2010 was really somewhere around the time Vegas started becoming these electronic music shows started taking precedent. They're the biggest fucking thing. I was staying at the Wynn recently and the hotel room we were at was overlooking the pool and I forget who it was that was playing there, but it was fucking chaos. And especially when you're above, like high above looking down in the pool, the hotel room. Yeah, you get that. The inside view. It was so crazy. It was so loud and so crazy and there was everybody's in the pool. It was fucking madness and you're going, this never existed. Yeah, that's true. I mean, I've been coming to Vegas for a long time. This is a new thing. It is. It is a new thing over the last nine years. Exactly. And it's overtaken Vegas. Everywhere you go, there's these gigantic billboards with your face on it or whatever other DJs in this place. And who's the guy with the fucking marshmallow head? Is the guy a marshmallow? Yeah, well, that's marshmallow. Yeah. That's like the unknown comic. He's got a marshmallow on his head, but there's so many. I didn't even know who that was. Like my kids were explaining to me. My 11 year old was explaining to me marshmallow. I'm like, how the fuck do you know who marshmallow is? And we're there. Because it's just, it's everyone that's going out in Vegas. I mean, it used to be, Vegas used to be like a cultural weird void. Yeah. Right? You would have some big acts that would come through there, but it always seemed like they were at the end of their run. Right. Yeah. You had to be at the end of your run. Yeah. Like when Michael Jackson was considering doing Vegas, it was like, okay, he's like finally saying that this is the end of my run or, you know, it's like the legacy. Like Celine Dion, you know, she did a residency in Vegas. You're like, uh, she probably just tired. Donnie Marie. Yeah. You know, Madelow or Barry Madelow, you know, like Carrot Top does the residency there. I mean, he's doing really well. It's not, it's not a knock. Yeah, no, it's not. It's really not. But it's, that's what it was. Then all of a sudden it became electronic music and it's like, wow, what is happening? Like the, you know, these things are enormous. Like there's so much bigger than any other kind of event that you have in Vegas other than like massive sporting events like the USC or something. Yeah. Well, it definitely, it's, it's provoked by energy too, you know, like, and it's, that's infectious. Yes. Well, it's a fucking great time. Yeah. Like if you go to see Barry Madelow or, you know, whatever, who they have no knock on them, but you know what I'm saying? It's like, I'm sure it's fine. It's mellow. It's like whatever you're into, but when you're seated, you know, like you're seated for a reason. Cause you're there to like sit and just enjoy. Yes. At, there's no seats at a Steve Aoki show. I mean, there are, they're like the tables and stuff, but no one's sitting down. Right. That's the, that'll be strange to see someone say, unless there was this passed out drunk or something, but for the most part, everyone's standing and jumping and being part of the moment and that's, that's my job. Yeah. I need to make sure everyone's attention is on me and that I'm taking them to this next level. I always wondered what it's like to live in Vegas though. Like I've never lived there. My good friend Dana White lives there. He loves it there. He's, he raves about it, but I've always like, like Vegas. Okay. So for me, so I'm LA guy, right? Like my heart and like, you know, I love Los Angeles. I know LA so well and you know, with LA you have your limitations. It's Los Angeles. You can't like, if you want to build your dream house, you're going to have to have a lot of money to do that. In Vegas, when I moved there in 2013, I got a sick deal. I bought my house, 16,000 square feet. 2.8 million, I think. That's hilarious. Yeah. 2.8 million. It was a short sale. I was a total steal. I mean, like the guts were not good. Like it was like one of those like prop homes almost. So I had a regut and like, I spent like 5 million into the house and it was more about building my own dream house as I would want to have it. I have a foam pit in there with a trampoline room. The pool in my backyard was too far away from my house. So I filled it in and I built a pool at 16 feet deep right next to my patio. That's 20 feet up. I built the patio out so that way I can jump into the pool from the top. And I'm like kid. I'm basically a big kid. And I just think about how I want to make my house fun, interactive for the artists that come there for me. I have a fun gym. I got my own like chess station, backgammon station. I have a poker room. It's the most hospitable house. And I have all this space. I have like a big shoe room. I'm a big shoe collector. I got a crazy library with books and records. And I have a Bruce Lee mirror room. A mirror room. It's my closet. It's like you walk in. It's like LED strips everywhere with mirrors. I'm just having fun. I'm having fun with my house. There's the mirror room. I have some really crazy, really beautiful art. I got this amazing Banksy piece. And so I've been starting to collect art. There's my shoe room. Doesn't Banksy get mad if people buy his shit? Well, I bought it from him. Oh, you met him? Tell us what he looks like. He's a girl. I'm just kidding. I never met him. But I got in through some people to get into. Is he definitely a real person? I don't know. How weird is that that someone in 2019 has managed to stay that secretive? Really kind of amazing. It's incredible. Because he's a cultural phenomena. I mean, he's, I mean, everybody knows who Banksy is. Or you know of Banksy, I should say. But no one knows who he is, which is crazy. Who the fuck has ever pulled that off? Right? What a unique human being. Yeah, it's true. How does that work? How can someone still do that? I think, I mean, it's like he's always seeming to find a way to troll people in a social or political critique, just like he did with the art sale of the shredded painting. Yes, how amazing was that? Yeah. That was pretty crazy. To watch those people after they paid it and see the thing drop down, shred the artwork. But let me ask you this though. I don't want to go too deep into this, but because I don't know if I'm like stepping on anyone's toes here, but if this is really suffragist or you know, like a real auction house, aren't they going to look at the painting or the piece? Are they going to open up the frame and make sure there's not some weird drill going through? I don't think they would ever expect that to be the case. I mean, but your antique, you should be checking everything, making sure everything's authentic, no? Well, if it's an authentic piece and somehow or another some reliable source brings it to them as an authentic piece, they just accept the fact. They don't check the details of the piece? I mean, what can they do? Meanwhile, by the way, I'll take that and fucking glue that bitch back together again. Leave it that way. No, you want it like that. That's the way it's like what makes the value is that you actually have it hanging there. That's what you wanted in your house. Really. You want it just like that. Yeah. Look at the people's face. Sometimes I forget that I'm on the phone. Oh no. Oh no. Thurston, we've lost the piece. Yeah. You know, I wish like it's funny that we're talking about this because sometimes I forget like, you know, we're having a chat and I realized, oh, there's a lot of people listening in on this. Give away some of the stuff that I've learned about it. But yeah, anyways, I'll leave it there. Well, he's definitely a unique human.