The Workaholics' 30 Favorite Albums
Comedy Central's trio of slackers talk about the music that gets them movin'.
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The third season of Workaholics, everybody's favorite inebriated slacker comedy, premiered this week. To celebrate, Complex caught up with the stars and asked them about their favorite albums.
This feature is a part of Complex's Workaholics Week.
Adam DeVine, Anders Holm, and Blake Anderson are men of varied tastes. The stars of the Comedy Central sitcom Workaholics checked in with Complex from the set to talk about the music that shaped their slightly warped sensibilities.
There was some Dre, and some Dee-Lite. Blink 182's in the mix—as are the Red Hot Chilli Peppers, Kanye West, and Slayer. In other words, it's a pretty eclectic list [Note: albums appear in no particular order]. And their explanations for why these albums hold special places in their hearts are as intriguing as they are hilarious. Keep clicking to see for yourself.
Written by Brad Wete (@BradWete)
Follow @ComplexMusic
The third season of Workaholics, everybody's favorite inebriated slacker comedy, premiered this week. To celebrate, Complex caught up with the stars and asked them about their favorite albums.
This feature is a part of Complex's Workaholics Week.
Adam DeVine, Anders Holm, and Blake Anderson are men of varied tastes. The stars of the Comedy Central sitcom Workaholics checked in with Complex from the set to talk about the music that shaped their slightly warped sensibilities.
There was some Dre, and some Dee-Lite. Blink 182's in the mix—as are the Red Hot Chilli Peppers, Kanye West, and Slayer. In other words, it's a pretty eclectic list [Note: albums appear in no particular order]. And their explanations for why these albums hold special places in their hearts are as intriguing as they are hilarious. Keep clicking to see for yourself.
Written by Brad Wete (@BradWete)
Follow @ComplexMusic
Master P, Ghetto D (1997)
Master P, Ghetto D (1997)
Label: No Limit Records
Adam DeVine: “I have that shit, I love Southern rap. For whatever reason that just connects with me. I’m like, ‘Yes, no, mama does make crack like this.’ That makes the most sense to me. I’m just a little white kid growing up in the suburbs and I’m like, ‘Yes, mama makes crack likes this.’ ‘What’s that, Adam?’ ‘Nevermind, mom.’
“Basically, I feel like when I started smoking weed and drinking beer, I fell in love with every album. Every album is between 98 and 2003, it’s a real turning point in my life.”
Talking Heads, The Name Of This Band Is Talking Heads (1982)
Talking Heads, The Name Of This Band Is Talking Heads (1982)
Label: Sire
Blake Anderson: “It’s a two-disc of live performances. For the most part, I was never really a fan of live music on records, but this one takes all the Talking Heads songs and it totally improves them. You feel the beat more. It’s a solid buy. If you could just come up on that, the two discs are amazing. It’s almost 40 songs. Every single one of them is really rad. A lot of my music that I like puts energy in your body or makes you want to dance or break something or just go mosh or jump around. This is one of those ones that you can put on in the summertime and next thing you know, you’re dancing by the pool.”
R. Kelly, Chocolate Factory (2003)
R. Kelly, Chocolate Factory (2003)
Label: Jive/Sony
Anders Holm: “R.Kelly’s Chocolate Factory. I went back and forth with some of these albums because I really like Double Up for whatever reason, it was just something I spun for three months straight. I could just turn it up in the car and drive around. It was just a big album. You know, kind of ridiculous, kind of big in scope. ButChocolate Factory, you just throw that album on, and from beginning to end it’s pretty sick. Do you want to listen to ‘Step In The Name Of Love’ and crank that up? Or, he’ll break it down with ‘Dream Girl.’ That’s a song you can put on a mix for your girl or whatever and she’ll come over and you’ll have a pretty good afternoon. ‘Ignition” is on there, the remix. I played “Dream Girl” at my wedding during cocktail hour.”
The Wizards, Purple Magic (2009)
The Wizards, Purple Magic (2009)
Adam DeVine: “They’re a little known hip-hop crew, descended to earth from a magical realm. They delivered some of the most hardcore, gangster rap rhymes I’ve ever heard. Channeling Dre, channeling Nate Dogg, channeling Mystikal, channeling all of my heroes.”
Young Jeezy, Let’s Get It: Thug Motivation 101 (2005)
Young Jeezy, Let’s Get It: Thug Motivation 101 (2005)
Label: CTE/Island Def Jam
Blake Anderson: “This is more for a specific time in my life. It just brings me back to a really specific couple of years. For about four or five years all I was doing was delivering pizza before we got the show. I was pizza trapping for sure. That album is exactly that, thug motivation. I wasn’t trapping I was out there slinging pizzas and that was my bible. I was thinking, ‘This isn’t it. You got to hustle.’ It was the motion picture soundtrack to not settle, keep working towards an ultimate goal. I haven’t listened to that album in a while. I have to pop it back in. That was my pizza slangin’ soundtrack.”
Deee-Lite, World Clique (1990)
Deee-Lite, World Clique (1990)
Label: Elektra
Anders Holm: “I will give Last Cab In California honorable mention, but I will stick with Deee-Lite, World Clique. Again, I am all about production. I just like listening to beats and cool sounds. They didn’t sound like anything at the time. I know everybody knows ‘Groove is in the Heart’ but that’s like the fifth best song on that album. They even had the look. They were funky, ‘70s, but hip-hop at the same time. One dude was Asian with goggles on and she had this soul voice and they had heavy piano. I always liked it. That’s just another album that’s upbeat. Maybe not the most masculine one, but whatever, man. I don’t care. I just picture ‘90s black chicks in biker shorts on the grind with Eric B. breaking down to those songs.”
Nirvana, Nevermind (1991)
Nirvana, Nevermind (1991)
Label: DGC
Adam DeVine:“Nevermind was the first CD I ever got. I remember my mom didn’t want me to get it because it had the fucking naked baby on the cover. My dad was pretty cool and into music. He went out and got it for me and told me to keep it undercover. I’d go in my room and listen to it.”
The Stooges, Fun House (1970)
The Stooges, Fun House (1970)
Label: Elektra
Blake Anderson: “The way I look at it is that I’ve been searching for the perfect album to drink beer to my whole life. As far as that goes, this is it. This is the album. Perfect music to get drunk to: Iggy Pop and The Stooges. It’s just that raw energy. All the pieces are there, but it’s not squeaky clean. Like his album Raw Power, that’s exactly what his music is. Take your shirt off and chug a beer. That’s all there is to life at that point when you listen to that record.”
Twin Shadow, Forget (2010)
Twin Shadow, Forget (2010)
Label: 4AD/Terrible
Anders Holm: “Another recent album that I love, and will probably always love. Again, this dude just has a sound that I’m like, ‘This guy knows exactly who he is.’ For 12 or 13 tracks or however many it is, he has a consistency where you recognize that it’s definitely a Twin Shadow song. A lot of albums could have 10 songs where they all kind of sound the same. But these all sound different. They all sound to me like fucking radio hits but he hasn’t really popped yet. But I recommend his album Forget to anybody.”
The Raconteurs, Broken Boy Soldiers (2006)
The Raconteurs, Broken Boy Soldiers (2006)
Label: Third Man Records, V2 Records
Adam DeVine: “I’m a big Jack White fan. Specifically, I love the Raconteurs. They’re just fucking great, man. They’re straight-ahead rock ‘n’ roll music and it’s pretty radical. I think he’s just a weird vampire, alien, music god that has descended to bring rock ‘n’ roll music back. The Raconteurs, I think, embody all that.”
Waka Flocka Flame, Flockaveli (2010)
Waka Flocka Flame, Flockaveli (2010)
Label: 1017 Brick Squad, Warner Bros., Asylum
Blake Anderson:“I think that it pretty much changed the game. You can say what you want about Waka or whatever. like, ‘Oh he can’t rap.’ He always is like, ‘I’m not a rapper anyway.’ The proof is when this dude drops his album, if 80 percent of
It just makes me want to shoot machine guns.
that genre of music changes to sound like him, you know you did something right. Everybody is trying to be hype and get Lex Luger beats and all that. Everybody is just all about that energy that I don’t think anyone matches as well as Waka. He just brings this almost punk-rock energy but it’s so hood and hip-hop. I just remember kind of taking a gamble getting the album and it’s just one of those times...I was sitting at Universal Studios about to ride some rides, but I just kicked it in the parking lot because as soon as I turned it on, I was like, ‘Whoa.’ It just makes me want to shoot machine guns. I love Waka, he’s the shit.”
The Weeknd, House of Balloons (2011)
The Weeknd, House of Balloons (2011)
Label: XO
Anders Holm: “I’ll just drop The Weeknd House of Balloons, which I call black Portishead. [Laughs] It’s like, ‘Who is this dude? This can’t be a real person, right?’ That echo just seems like it was recorded—or wasn’t recorded—in some black hole and it was a sound just coming out and it just sucked you in. I could listen to that album 200 million times over and it still sounds fresh every time.
“To me, the lyrical content—I don’t know how much it means to him, as far as personally. But, I’m a guy that listens to David Bowie who was like, “Yo, your mom doesn’t know if you are a boy or a girl.” Just saying stuff—shocking, but I don’t know if it’s for shock’s sake. I’m sure he is not trying to do that. But it doesn’t sway me from the music. ‘Yeah, come over, I’ll get you real high and I’ll fuck you and maybe never call you again.’ To me, he is telling a story and we have all seen the movie Seven. That doesn’t mean he beat him and barbed-wired his ankle to a chair and his whole stomach explodes. But it’s fascinating.”
Dr. Dre, Chronic 2001 (1999)
Dr. Dre, Chronic 2001 (1999)
Label: Aftermath, Interscope
Adam DeVine: “I loved every song on that CD and that was right when I first started partying and drinking and girls were huge in my life. That was the CD that you could put on at a party in high school and put it on spin and convince girls to show you their boobs. There’s just a lot of getting high and trying to figure out exactly what Nate Dogg would say. ‘Smoke weed every day.’”
Slayer, Seasons in the Abyss (1990)
Slayer, Seasons in the Abyss (1990)
Label: Def American
Blake Anderson: “I think what’s cool about Slayer is no matter how old their albums are, it’s the one band to me that their sound is immortal. It never sounds corny to me. You can go back and listen to some Pantera and Metallica albums and you’re like, ‘OK, great music.’ But Slayer you go back and they always sound fresh and hard as hell. It’s always just a punch right to the face. I think that’s cool that their albums are almost undying.
“I like all different types of music. I don’t like going to any specifics. I switch with the seasons. I’ll get into an electronic kick and then I’ll get into rap. Listen to too much hip-hop you start to have some flavor for some guitar and next thing you know you’re listening to metal or hardcore.”
Black Sheep, A Wolf in Sheep’s Clothing (1991)
Black Sheep, A Wolf in Sheep’s Clothing (1991)
Label: Mercury Records
Anders Holm: “To me, they had the one of the best senses of humor in hip-hop. At the time, people were trying to be serious and shit. They were like, ‘Hey, man it’s about rapping and getting girls.’ Their album had like 20 tracks on it. It’s a sick album. Some of the samples on there are classics to me. That’s another album where I can just always have that on my iPhone and be playing that in my car. If I am going to go for a run, I’ll throw that on. I just think those dudes were hilarious and they did it right and they weren’t cynical. They weren’t about dropping knowledge during that time of conscious rap. They were these smart dudes that were like, ‘Just because we are smart doesn’t mean we have to preach.’”
Blink 182, Enema of the State (1999)
Blink 182, Enema of the State (1999)
Label: MCA
Adam DeVine: “The reason that hit so close to home is because, one, Blink 182 rules. I don’t care what anyone says. Two, I lost my virginity immediately following a Blink 182 concert. Literally they sang ‘All The Small Things,’ we went to a hotel and we did the deed. That song is really relevant. ‘All The Medium Things’ is probably a better example of what the song should have said.”
N.E.R.D., In Search of... (2001)
N.E.R.D., In Search of... (2001)
Label: Virgin/EMI
Blake Anderson: “Back in the day when Star Trak was taking over the music scene, everything they put out was so radical. All their beats were just insane. I remember first buying this and I thought I was buying a Neptunes album and it was something completely different, like live music. At first I was like, ‘This is so wack.’ After spinning it and spinning it, it soon became one of my favorite CDs. It’s a CD that I probably know the most lyrics to because I just listen to it so much. Pharrell is another dude who still sounds good no matter what he does. He’s for-real radical, he needs to keep grinding hard because we miss that guy.”
Portishead, Dummy (1994
Portishead, Dummy (1994)
Label: Go! Beat
Anders Holm: “I stole that from my brother. I was like, ‘What is this?’ I was in seventh grade or eighth grade and it was another album where it kind of takes you somewhere. You are like, This isn’t human. This was just dropped by a spaceship and it’s not a person singing this song or creating these beats. This is just a space alien.’ Portishead’s production is just insane beats you would expect to be on a KRS-One album. But then there's this little white girl with an angel voice singing over it. It was a cool juxtaposition. I like ‘It’s A Fire.’ That’s a chill song with kind of a military drum thing going on, like a drummer boy.”
The Black Keys, Thickfreakness (2003)
The Black Keys, Thickfreakness (2003)
Label: Fat Possum
Adam DeVine: “I got on their train early and I’m just a really big fan of them. What’s cool is they’re a fan of Workaholics. They just did a cameo on Workaholics last week, which is cool to have some of my favorite rock stars to be like, ‘These guys are the shit.’ [People think this is one of their first albums] from all the commercials for the Brothers album, but you’re like, ‘Nah man, they have 10 albums.’ They’re still doing it big.”
Deerhunter, Microcastle (2008)
Deerhunter, Microcastle/Weird Era Continued (2008)
Label: Kranky, 4AD
Blake Anderson: “The lead singer for Deerhunter, Bradford Cox... I don’t like saying people are geniuses or whatever, but I just think that dude is so good at every single thing he does. He stays within his genre, but I think he does so well experimenting with stuff. He has two different bands. It’s just amazing how much he can expand over the one genre and make it radical. It’s a band I stumbled on and I was just pleasantly surprised by them. I really love all of Deerhunter’s stuff and they’re not afraid to get experimental which is really cool.”
Kanye West, Graduation (2007)
Kanye West, Graduation (2007)
Label: Roc-a-Fella, Def Jam
Anders Holm: "This album was like, ‘Yup, he knows exactly what he’s doing.’ Every album that he does is going to be dope. ‘Good Life’ is a classic to me forever. You put that CD on in any situation and things will start jumping. People will sweat that College Dropout, it was cool. I got a lot of songs on there that I like. Late Registration was real hot. He let people know how good he was with production on that album. He had songs that kind of trailed off and he could do his thing and there was no one rapping. On My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy, to me, you can dial it back. People sweated him for doing his thing and sure, do your thing. But I don’t know, three of those songs I could of have gone with ending 60 seconds earlier.”
Red Hot Chilli Peppers, Blood Sugar Sex Magik (1991)
Red Hot Chilli Peppers, Blood Sugar Sex Magik (1991)
Label: Warner Bros.
Adam DeVine: “That album is the shit. I thought I was too young to be listening to that shit. I remember when I heard it I knew I wasn’t supposed to be listening to it. I was in first grade, I don’t even remember how old I was. I had no idea even what the fuck it meant. I still don’t exactly.”
Keith Sweat, The Best of Keith Sweat (2004)
Keith Sweat, The Best of Keith Sweat (2004)
Label: Elektra
Blake Anderson: “See I’m a Pisces so I get down with love songs. I’m totally into slow jams and old-school R&B, all that. As far as R. Kelly and Usher, all that shit is really cool, but this Best of Keith Sweat is the most flawless album. You can throw it on and every song is legit. The beats are dope. People have sampled a lot of his shit. I just think it’s probably the best album to put on and freaking make love to your woman. ‘How Deep Is Your Love’ is the track for sure. That is such a heavy bass. Celly Cel from the Bay sampled it, ‘It’s Goin Down.’ That one is legit.”
David Bowie, Scary Monsters (1980)
David Bowie, Scary Monsters (1980)
Label: RCA
Anders Holm: “Beastie Boys and David Bowie are two of my favorite artists. The David Bowie album I am going to choose is Scary Monsters, which is kind of different. He always reinvented himself and he was doing something in the 1980s with Scary Monsters that nobody was doing. You can kind of hear stuff on that album that a lot of groups are doing now like, 'Aw, yeah I know where you got that from. That’s off that album.' It’s not one of his most popular albums to everybody, but I think it’s my favorite. There was a song on that, ‘Teenage Wildlife,’ and if you don’t like that, we don’t have to associate with each other. If you don’t get that song—it's cool man, I’ll see you around.
“‘Teenage Wildlife’ is just epic. It’s like five or six minutes long and it kind of crescendos and builds into this insane vocal of Bowie wailing. I think I would pay $5,000 dollars to see footage of that recording session. I don’t know how he hits the notes that he’s doing and how long he does it but he’s just belting it out. You know he was feeling something when he was doing it. It’s just a cool song.”
Red Hot Chilli Peppers, By the Way (2002)
Red Hot Chilli Peppers, By the Way (2002)
Label: Warner Bros.
Adam DeVine: “When I was moving to California with one of my best friends, Austin, we packed up everything in his car and we were driving out. Everything was just stuffed. We had a little Kia Sephia. We stuffed everything in the car, including the CDs. We couldn’t find the CDs anywhere, we couldn’t find his CDs and mine were all packed away—we couldn’t get to them. The only CD we had in the CD player was By The Way. We had that whole CD on repeat. It reminds me of leaving the safety of my parents' home to move to California where I was convinced I was going to be gang-raped. I had some seriously rape-able buttcheeks. 10 years later, they’re slightly less rape-able.”
E-40, In A Major Way (1995)
E-40, In A Major Way (1995)
Label: Jive Records, Sick Wid It
Blake Anderson: “It’s a throwback, but I grew up in the East Bay in Northern California. That was pretty much my first exposure to Bay area rap and I’ve just been in love with it ever since. I’ve always had love for the Bay and all that. I think that’s what started me on the tip of looking into other stuff like Mac Dre. Even Tupac is on that album. Even though E-40 is kind of mainstream, he’s always kept it underground, too. I just have fun memories of that tape with me and Kyle driving home from working at the movie theater in the middle of the night just letting that album slap in his tape deck.”
A Tribe Called Quest, Midnight Marauders (1993)
A Tribe Called Quest, Midnight Marauders (1993)
Label: Jive/BMG
Anders Holm: “[One of my favorite tracks is] ‘Clap Your Hands’ and I don’t know what it’s called but they sampled Biz on it, which I can’t remember, but it’s a record about trying to party out. ‘Yeah, I know it looks pathetic/Ali Shaheed Muhammad got me doing calisthenics.’ ‘The Chase Part II’—that’s my other one where I can just turn it on and I don’t care if I got 50 people at my house partying or I am just doing the dishes, it just sets the tone like, ‘Yeah man, life is good.’”
Weezer, The Blue Album (1994)
Weezer, The Blue Album (1994)
Label: DGC
Adam DeVine: “I was in fourth grade when it came out and it was the first type of music that I liked, that my dad thought was dogshit. Before that, I was just like, ‘AC/DC is cool, I don’t know.’ When I heard Weezer I loved it and my dad was like, ‘Uh that’s dogshit.’ I was like, ‘You’re fucking wrong, Dad.’ I cursed a lot as an elementary schooler. ‘Surf Wax America,’ ‘Buddy Holly’ all are just classics.”
Jay Reatard, Blood Visions (2006)
Jay Reatard, Blood Visions (2006)
Label: In The Red/Fat Possum Records
Blake Anderson: “That seems like the one album that if they were like, ‘Hey, you can only listen to one thing for the rest of your life,’ I think I can listen to that maybe forever. It’s kind of like punk, but it’s got poppy hooks to it. It’s pretty dirty and fast, but he was actually pretty good at writing choruses and melodies. It just is timeless to me.
"I saw a documentary on Jay, he passed away pretty early. But in the documentary, he said this shit about how he was thinking when you have your creative time in your life, there’s like two ways to look at it: either you have a certain amount of time, a certain amount of years where you are creative or you have a certain amount of ideas. I have just gone with the motto that it is a certain period in your life and you just kind have to hustle while you are hitting. I don’t know, I just think that was some inspiring shit that he said. Plus I kind of look like the dude so, the three times I’ve seen him I was weirded out, like he would see me and would be like, ‘Whoa that guy is trying to be me.’”
Beastie Boys, Paul’s Boutique (1989)
Beastie Boys, Paul’s Boutique (1989)
Label: Capitol
Anders Holm: “That is the album. It’s got all the songs on there that I love. You know, like ‘High Plains Drifter.’ That was an era of Beastie Boys that was between where they were like frat-partying animals and were like, ‘Whoa, hold up. We can really be artists with this rap thing.’ I think they were on the first album, obviously it was a breakthrough. I think this was their statement album—their first statement album of many. I am a huge fan.
“To be honest, I could have gone with Check Your Head or Ill Communication since those were more my era of when I was deep in music. I think I stole my brother’s Licensed To Ill tape. The first one I bought on my own was Check Your Head. After I got that I was like, 'Oh, this is the shit.' I went back to go buy Paul's Boutique. And Paul’s Boutique, along with the other few albums I chose, just sounded like it was from another planet. It existed always. There was nothing wrong with it. The voicemail, outgoing message about Paul’s Boutique: 'We are here in Brooklyn.' It was like, this is for real, I could go there. I could call that number. It just seemed, like, magical.”