I stole Paris Hilton's birthday cake and gave it to the homeless. AMA

"For my next trick, I will steal the Kardashian family and donate it to the homeless."

This is your next move.

[deleted]

...or cocaine

Challenge accepted.

Congratulations for being the first person linking me to a PerezHilton post and not making me want to kill myself.

congratulations accepted :)

I once had dinner with Paris. (well along with 10-15 others)

All she said was "hi I'm Paris".

sounds about right

Can everyone stop downvoting all of his comments? If your pissed that he did the cake stunt for publicity just downvote the fucking thread. He's answering questions politely and in the spirit of an AMA, lordy some redditors are childish.

thanks

Yeah no worries. So question: did you eat any of the cake? I cant remember if that was in the article. If so did it taste good?

wound up getting about half a slice in the end. it was delicious -- red velvet, white frosting inside, just made it 100x more ridiculous that they were going to throw it out.

So you're making this second AMA to promote your music?

This is actually the first AMA I've ever done :) The original post was just a link to the story.

Ah, my mistake. There was my question for you though :)

No problem :) Question for you, inspiration for account name?

When Paz posted about it on FB he was warned against promoting his stuff like certain other celebrities would.

I recall being told not to "Rampart it" :) I don't think its awful to include a promotional link in the post, lots of AMAs do, but what was really terrible about that one was the draconian insistence that all questions must revolve around the thing he was promoting. If I did that, I would be strung up a la I_Rape_Cats. And rightly so.

Not to derail or anything, but I completely missed what happened with I_Rape_Cats...

Back on track, I wish I had a question for you. I think your story is great, and even better what happened with the cake.

thanks man. the cats thing -- last april fool's reddit decided to pick a random youtube video to go viral. i_rape_cats was the user everyone chose to pick the video. instead of a random one, he picked a friend's video and was discovered. there was much downvoting.

EDIT: cats stuff

You need to somehow top stealing that birthday cake.. The publicity from that got you a shitload of fans/downloads.

Also I saw your kickstarter page.. Pretty cool idea! Kinda made me want to donate $10,000 incase you get mad famous and then I'd be able to crash all your gigs and fuck groupies and shit.

it was such a serendipitous event that I'm not sure it could be duplicated. but I have some fun ideas :)

Has other stuff like that happened to you since you live in Hollywood? It seems like it was pretty easy to get into that Hilton party.

nothing nearly that awesome. after the cake thing went down, I started to record my new album, which meant much less free time. but I did try to break into warner bros music building for my kickstarter video. that was fun :)

Did you get an opinion from the homeless on how the cake tasted?

They loved it. It was actually the best part of the whole thing watching them carve it up and eat it.

I live vicariously through you. Keep up the shenanigans!

Funny, I live vicariously through you...

"The nod." The only authority a brave man needs. Well done.

that was my favorite comment from the original post. so true.

What happened after you gave the cake to the homeless shelter? What did they say?

They were thrilled! They sliced it up and served it to the guests after lunch. It was the best possible ending.

How did you pick the shelter? :p And did you just randomly show up and give them the cake, or tell them in advance?

I found a homeless shelter I had heard of and got their contact information. Called them in advance to let them know paris hilton had decided to donate her birthday cake to the hungry and I'd be bringing it by.

Have you ever been contacted by people representing Paris?

never, though the absinthe company that made the cake tried to get in touch to promote themselves more

The cake was made by an absinthe company? Was it made with absinthe? Please say yes.

there was absinthe in it, but turns out it all burns off during the cooking process.

How did you carry a 70 pound cake while piss drunk? Better yet, how did you successfully get it into the car while drunk?

Carrying it was kind of tricky, almost tipped over 2 or 3 times. People along the way helped me out, which was kind of funny. One of the security guards even helped keep the door open for me as I exited.

Getting in the car was a balancing act. It was so tall that it was almost scraping the roof of the car. Plus the party was up in the hollywood hills, so we had to go like 2 miles an hour down super windy roads to prevent tilting the cake over.

I actually read somewhere that you are friends with Paris, and she just let the cake thing slide. Basically, the article screamed "Conspiracy!" Have you met her before the birthday party?

I read that too :) nope, haven't met her. I've seen her around LA with her entourage, but I don't know her. I was kind of amazed when people thought the whole thing was some conspiracy cooked up by her PR team. I guess I'm pretty skeptical too when I see stuff on reddit (see: I_RAPE_CATS), so I can't really blame anybody.

can someone channel the "book of reddit" guy and refresh my memory on the i_rape_cats scandal of 2011?

posted this above too, copying here: last april fool's reddit decided to pick a random youtube video to go viral. i_rape_cats was the user everyone chose to pick the video. instead of a random one, he picked a friend's video and was discovered. there was much downvoting.

Jesus, what's with the downvotes? Okay, if you don't agree with him quickly promoting his stuff, downvote the thread and move on. Don't downvote ALL of his comments.

thanks

Awesome move. Have you thought about making any other efforts to feed the homeless?

I briefly considered a nationwide party-crashing tour, pilfering every cake along the way, but realized that would require more funding than the value of the cakes.

Why'd you do it? Was it to feed the homeless, or did it just seem like something fun to do to make a statement?

I mean it's a damn good statement, she probably spent atleast a few thousand on a cake.. Thousands of dollars can hand out a lot of blankets and sammiches to the needy.

it was a reaction to seeing something so valuable about to be put to waste. I actually thought of all the starving dudes on hollywood blvd. who would kill to eat that cake. something inside me just kind of said "do it."

Will you go see Rampart?

Just kidding. Really though, I read about this when it first hit the web. Nice going, glad you didn't get in trouble for it.

probably, it actually looks good. sucks that they had to ruin it by being jackasses. and thanks, me too.

Feel free to crash my party and steal my cake. I think what you did was amazing.

thanks :) I prefer red velvet, sprinkles optional. ice-cream cake also never a bad choice.

Hi Paz, your facebook sent me.

Tell us about Paris's recent birthday, I think you mentioned something about this the other week?

And you were talking the other day about forcing someone to 'like' a page before getting a free link to a download and how you disagreed with that..That was really cool.

Thanks :) Yea, I was always kind of curious if everyone else in the world felt the same way about artists forcing fans to "like" their facebook page before they could listen to a song. That always bummed me out. Glad to hear I wasn't the only one. I don't really blame any artist who does it, because the apps that enable it sort of prompt you to do it, like its a smart thing to do.

I used to do it myself -- you had to like the page to download my mixtape. But then I realized that was sort of ridiculous -- most people have never heard my music -- why would they "like" me before they even knew if they liked me? :)

The short story with Paris's birthday is I wasn't invited :) Honestly, I didn't even know it was happening until someone posted on my facebook wall that it was happening. By then it was kind of late to plot anything, but probably just as well.

I hope she steals your birthday cake.

Me too... me too.

Okay, cool story, but from reading the story, did your buddy, who was drinking all night, drive you home? If he did, fuck you, don't ever drink and drive, that is nothing to fuck with, no matter the facebook fame and karma implications

answered this in another question too, so pasting the answer here: It turned out he wasn't drunk. He stopped drinking way before I did, knowing he had to drive at some point. At the time I wrote the story, it was about 6 or 7am and I hadn't slept, so I didn't do a lot of fact checking.

So, was this pre-meditated, or was it spur of the moment?

mostly spur of the moment -- it was only once I heard they were throwing the cake away that I decided to do something about it.

[deleted]

the song or the dangerous combination of illicit substances?

Hey Paz. I have a way more important question.

What would you do…FOR A KLONDIKE BAR?

walk into a store, pay $1.50, and buy a klondike bar

No way I would do that, It's just too ridiculous.

Did it ever strike anyone else as odd the things they depicted people doing for an item that cost the same as a pack of gum?

Holy shit, last year? When I saw this my first thought was "Shit, this guy should of done this five years ago when people would have still remembered it."

Internet time is fucked up.

it feels like 5 years ago. real time is fucked up too.

I would like to thank you for taking a giant cake that would have never been eaten, and instead would been destroyed by some drunk guy, and taking it to a place where people would be appreciative of it. You did a good deed, sir.

thanks

THIS QUOTE IS BY FAR THE BEST:

"I am Jack's incredulous stomach."

High Five! Fight Club!!!!

thanks man. I never turn down an opportunity to quote that movie.

not many people catch onto it when i do manage to get a good quote in. just cocked eyebrows and a wtf look. :(

its a risky reference to throw out there -- you're either gonna get a high five or a bunch of weird-ass confused looks. worth it though

Your music's pretty good, I accidentally downloaded it when it came bundled with uTorrent eons ago, believe it or not.

thanks man

How did the cake taste? If you did not taste said cake, then why did you not eat cake?

It was pretty delicious. I had a small piece of it when it was being carved up at the homeless shelter. It was red velvet and all kinds of awesome. To this day, no idea why they were going to throw it away.

You have the change to collaborate with any living musician. Who do you choose, and why?

man. the easy answers are willie nelson and bob dylan, because they're the most incredible writers of our time still breathing. I consider myself a writer first, so those guys are easy picks.

But to go into a studio and record an actual track tomorrow, the guys who get me most amped are porter robinson, kanye, drake, deadmau5 and skrillex.

I'd lay out a song with an anthemic hook by kanye (he's good at those), and an instrumental base by deadmau5. Drake would take verse 1 and I'd go in on verse 2. Porter would drop the nasty after the first build, and Skrillex will have Optimus Prime take a shit on the remix.

EDIT: spelling

Where do you get the inspiration for your songs? Sorry if this has been asked before.

mostly from dragonballz trading cards and reruns of old fresh prince episodes

How did Kevin manage to get you into Paris's party?

Also, you're fucking awesome for giving the cake to the homeless.

He had a friend who was working there and able to get another name on the working list, while also finding out what kind of wristbands they were giving the guests. I really didn't think he could pull it off -- I was pretty sure we were just going to get turned away at the door. It was surprising as hell how smoothly it all went down.

And thanks :)

That is awesome!

Did you get one slice?

I eventually got part of a slice. I waited until after the cake had been served at the homeless shelter and got about half a slice worth of cake that was left. It was awesome.

[deleted]

thanks. this city has one of the weirdest dynamics, with all the celebrities who live up in the hills, contrasted with the thousands of homeless who live in the streets below. there's so much wealth and so much waste.

[deleted]

Despite its shortcomings, its an awesome city. It has blemishes, but what city doesn't? Its Rome for music -- if you want to be a musician, why not come here. I'm playing a small show this thursday at Coffee Bean that will be webstreamed. Here's the info

Paz, what is your favorite movie, food, and band. Thank you.

Blow Up, Bacon, and Girl Talk.

when are you gonna get over to us people in the midwest and east coast? I'd love to see you play

hopefully really soon. the biggest barrier to playing more shows is getting an agent who can book them :)

I absolutely love Young Broke & Fameless, just thought I'd say that.

thanks :)

What are your thoughts on Boom Goes The Globe? (www.BoomGoesTheGlobe.com)

they are awesome.