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Joe Rogan · 2025-09-02 · 2h 40m

Joe Rogan Experience #2373 - Dave Landau

Comedian Dave Landau swaps wild Detroit war stories with Joe Rogan, covering addiction, 13 arrests, dangerous wildlife, and his road to comedy.

Joe Rogan Experience #2373 - Dave Landau
The guest

Dave Landau — A stand-up comedian and writer from the Detroit suburbs, known for his work in radio and comedy and as author of the memoir 'Party of One: A Fuzzy Memoir.' He came up through Second City Detroit and Mark Ridley's Comedy Castle and is in long-term recovery from addiction.

The gist

Joe Rogan and comedian Dave Landau open with the decline and bootlegging history of Detroit before drifting into a sprawling, story-heavy conversation. Landau details his harrowing addiction history, his mother's suicide and father's death from Agent Orange exposure, getting institutionalized as a teen, and racking up 13 arrests. The middle of the episode is a long run on dangerous animals, pit bulls, bears, moose, bow hunting, and ill-advised wildlife reintroduction programs. They also riff on the opioid crisis, the Sackler family, fentanyl, performance-enhancing drugs in sports, and Bill Cosby. The episode closes on Landau's path into comedy through Second City and the Detroit club scene.

Big reveals

  • Landau reveals his mother killed herself and he started SSRIs at 33; he is now weaning off after 10 years.
  • His father got soft-tissue sarcoma from Agent Orange in Vietnam, lost roughly $4 million, and the VA denied his mother's claims.
  • Landau candidly describes snorting, smoking, and shooting heroin, calling the injection 'majestic.'
  • Recounts a lady suing a family for $50,000 over a dog scratch, and settling because legal fees would top $100k.
  • Joe says it was his 13th arrest, 16 years ago, that made him get sober.
  • Landau was institutionalized for two weeks as a teen and roomed with a patient who believed he was a werewolf and attacked him.
  • They speculate Bill Cosby may be 'the most prolific serial rapist in history' and discuss his Spanish Fly act.

Things worth remembering

  • At one point 94% of the earth's heroin supply came from Afghan poppy fields the US military was guarding.
  • The Golden Triangle (Thailand, Myanmar, Laos) is a major synthetic-drug manufacturing hub.
  • Cartels began adding fentanyl to heroin because depleted soil made their poppies produce weak heroin.
  • Detroit had alcohol prohibition three years before it went national, spawning the ruthless Purple Gang that even Capone feared.
  • New Jersey has one of the highest black bear concentrations in the country, around 3,000 bears.
  • During WWI, German and Russian troops reportedly called a ceasefire to kill wolves attacking them in the trenches.
  • Warm-blooded animals grow larger the farther north they live, to retain heat (Bergmann's rule).
  • Cat-borne toxoplasmosis can alter human behavior toward impulsivity and aggression; at one point a large share of France was infected.
  • Wild boars overrunning central California are thought to descend from animals on William Randolph Hearst's estate.
  • Eating poppy seed bagels can make you fail a drug test for heroin.

Recommended in this episode

Books, products and media the guest or host genuinely endorsed here — with the buy link.

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Guest’s ownBook

Party of One: A Fuzzy Memoir

Dave Landau

“I brought up my book party of one a fuzzy memoir it did really well on Amazon and uh yeah it's a lot of people have enjoyed it” — Dave Landau 02:39:37
Find it on Amazon
Guest’s ownBook

Party of One: A Fuzzy Memoir

Dave Landau

“I put out a book. It's called Party who won a fuzzy memoir a little while ago and it's it's all stories of my youth” — Dave Landau 02:27:46
Find it on Amazon
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White Boy (White Boy Rick documentary)

Shawn Rech (inferred)

“if you if you see the documentary White Boy, I highly recommend. Yeah. See, a teenage drug informant for the FBI” — Dave Landau 00:18:03
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The Purple Gang: Organized Crime in Detroit

Paul R. Kavieff (inferred)

“Like that book right there, the organized crime in Detroit. That's a great book and it's got a lot of fun photos.” — Dave Landau 00:24:13
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“unless you're the grizzly man guy who just is one of my favorite movies ever because it's just” — Dave Landau 01:24:13
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