Comedian Garrett Williams has performed on enough shows all over the country to know what audiences really want: they want heavy naturals!
Specifically, they want his Heavy Naturals, the debut EP from his musical comedy band, Garrett & The Bad Boys. A seasoned improv & stand-up performer who cut his teeth in Chicago before becoming a staple of the NYC comedy scene, Williams frequently found himself working musical numbers into his routines, so he finally decided to weaponize that BFA of his and actually make a record!
How about we take this to the next level?
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The result is the raunchy, ridiculous, and riotously funny Heavy Naturals, created in collaboration with his backing band, The Bad Boys, and produced by Grammy award-winner Kenny Greenberg, who’s previously worked with the likes of Cyndi Lauper, the Indigo Girls, a little act you may have heard of, Taylor Swift.
Naturally, Williams and his fellow Bad Boys felt emboldened knowing they had the support of such a prestigious talent, which allowed them to really cut loose in pursuit of the funniest jokes and funkiest grooves. Take, for example, the EP’s lead single “Fell Asleep,” a catchy, horn-driven anthem for all the people out there who feel so over-extended that they can barely manage to stay awake… for sex. And there are plenty more horn-y/not-always-so-horny tracks where that came from!
With Heavy Naturals available everywhere on August 14 (and a special EP release show that night at NYC’s Night Club 101), we decided to invite Williams into the hot seat for our long-running Q&A series, Dishin’ It. In our conversation, the performer reveals the musical comedy icons who inspired his artistic pursuits, shares the surprising place he found community in his Texas hometown, and explains why joke-writing and song-writing aren’t all that different!
Is there a piece of media—whether a movie, TV series, book, album, theater, video game, etc…—that has played an important role in your understanding of queerness and the queer community, or your own identity? Why does it stand out to you?
Wow okay hmm. I mean for starters The Birdcage is a perfect piece of queer media in my opinion. Nathan Lane is a genius and I bow at his feet. I’m tempted to say all of musical theatre here but that’s because I have an immense desire to return to Marie’s Crisis. I do think watching Dicks The Musical in theaters for the first time really shifted something in my brain. I feel like it has ushered in this era of queer liberation and oddity that is so beautiful.
It feels like, these days, comedians find themselves in all kinds of different lanes: traditional stand-up, crowd work, sketch video, podcasts, etc… why did your band, Garrett & The Bad Boys, feel like a natural evolution for you?
Starting out in comedy, I got to cut my teeth in the Chicago Improv scene. And at the time, the Chicago comedy scene was kind of like West Side Story, the improvisers were the Jets and the stand-ups being the Sharks. So for years I considered myself an improviser and only an improviser, and there really wasn’t an infrastructure or even a desire to explore more than that. It was pretty siloed and I really stayed in my lane. But it was these years of improv that taught me how to hone my voice as a performer, get comfortable with trying and failing a bunch on stage and most importantly, I love love love collaborating with my friends.
And of course being a gay guy (the annoying kind) I have a BFA with the intent to weaponize it, so I found myself drawn to musical comedy like a moth to the flame. Growing up, I loved Tenacious D, and Flight Of The Concords, and the AMAZING Bridget Everett, which definitely influenced my comic stylings. So many of the shows I did in Chicago devolved into some sort of musical number or bit. I used to put up shows at iO with my friend, Ray Glass, and would adapt movies like Speed or Sweet Home Alabama into two-person stage shows.
Comedically, I love taking the stupidest idea and putting a lot of production value behind it, and that’s exactly Garrett & The Bad Boys. It’s a combination of all my skills packaged in the stupidest way possible. Like if Elton John wrote songs about boners, which… who’s to say he didn’t.
Also I already had a podcast so that box was checked off 
And congratulations on the album, Heavy Naturals! What was the hardest or most surprising part of bringing an album together?
Thank you, I am SO excited to bring Heavy Naturals to the people!
What’s been so delightful about this whole process is having the most talented friends in the world and how gung-ho they have been on collaborating on this project. We recorded the entire album over a week in Nashville in the recording studio at my collaborator Henry Greenberg’s childhood home, which of course made me feel like Taylor Swift. Henry’s dad, Grammy-award winner Kenny Greenberg, helped us produce and played guitar on a lot of the tracks. So of course it was the thrill of a lifetime to get to hear him say things like “maybe during the blow job part we should have psychedelic guitars.”
The most difficult part is that I’m a perfectionist. And I won’t rest until it’s exactly how I want it. But I knew that going in so that wasn’t really a surprise.
is there another specific song on the album that you had a particularly fun, challenging, cathartic or just generally interesting time writing? What can you tell us about it?
I write the songs with the INSANELY talented Mandy Rodio, who is our guitar player. I will walk into a session with a loose idea and some references and she will say “so like this” and nail it on the first try. It’s been so funny because song writing is exactly like joke writing, in the sense that some of them you spend years developing and some come together in one afternoon.
Our first single “Fell Asleep” (which is of course about the universal experience of falling asleep during sex) was the first song we ever put together and boy has it taken 10,000 different forms. It’s been a ballad, then it was super fast, then we added a pre-chorus, then after we recorded it we were like… what if we added horns? So it feels like crafting that song has been a labor of love. Where other songs, like “Fat *ss, Bad Attitude” came together in the room based on a guitar lick that we all liked. I think in the room I go “what if this was our Proud Mary?” and we walked out with something completely made.
So they’re all a little different. Joke writing in songs has been fun because it’s all about rhyming, or setting up to break a rhyme. So writing a little couplet like:
“Don’t know how to do my taxes
My mommy does them for me
So when she stops I’m screwed
Tell the IRS to venmo me”
I put the pen down and I’m like, godd*mn Shakespeare wishes.
You and the band have become regulars at Manhattan’s iconic queer hot spot Club Cumming. Why do you love performing there, and what makes it so special?
CLUB CUMMING! I mean it’s just the best bar in the world! It feels like it’s been pulled right out of a movie about artists in New York.
I love performing there because they give artists, especially queer artists, the chance to try whatever they damn well please. In the current comedy and artistic landscape, this feels like one of the last places that you are able to get on stage and try something that is out of the ordinary or unique. Also they make literally one of the strongest martinis in New York which is always a plus.
Where’s one of the first spaces or places you can remember that made you feel a part of a queer community?
It’s so funny to grow up in Texas because it felt so devoid of queerness. But when I left and came out I realized that all the people I had surrounded myself with were also closeted queer people and we had just found each other, like by instinct. I was in queer spaces my whole life without even realizing it.
The first time that I felt like it hit me though was being a part of the queer comedy community in Chicago. All the queer people there REALLY have each other’s backs. My friend Charlie Smith created this team called Dreamboat and it was an every Friday queer improv show that ended up being one of the best in the city.
You’re a pro on stage, but do you have any horror stories of a “gig gone wrong” that you can share? Or perhaps a show that was especially strange, funny, or interesting?
Oh of course there are so many. The Bad Boys have been cursed recently with the drum kit falling apart mid song. So just completely derailing everything. And it’s not ever the same drum kit either, it’s been like 5 different sets of equipment. Which of course is awesome.
I have found a way to counter it though so I always have in my back pocket some “Garrett Williams Trivia” questions. And if they get it right they win a big prize (one hit of poppers).
Who is an LGBTQ+ artist/performer/creator that you think is doing really cool work right now? Why are they someone we should all be paying attention to?
I mean there are so many. I am lucky to live in New York because everyone I know is gay and they are all perfect. I have a couple:
- Spare Room: Our sister band writing some of the most beautiful and thoughtful songs in the game right now. Miranda Rozas, the lead singer, is hilarious and has the voice of an angel! She will sing one of the most amazing songs you know and then turn around and burp into the mic.
- Allison O’Conor: MY BESTIE! The best pen in the game right now. She is touring her hour Aspiring Icon and if you get the chance to see it you absolutely must.
- Erik Martini: My sister. His standup is the epitome of joy. It’s soooo delightful when a big sweetie is also such a true talent.
Garrett & The Bad Boys’s debut EP Heavy Naturals is available to stream beginning August 14.
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