That’s right, Robert Downey Jr. made a music album. He not only wrote all the music, all the lyrics, plays the piano, but he also sings every song, including a YES cover. Maybe y’all were aware of this side of RDJ but we certainly weren’t!
Recorded and released in 2004, shortly after RDJ’s prison stint + finally becoming sober. He’d lost his first marriage but had just met his future second wife, and while he was uninsurable as a leading man the work in Hollywood was still coming. So RDJ’s life was slowly but surely getting back on a hopeful track.
Yet the man had some demons to exorcise, folks. And exorcise them he did with this 2004 album, THE FUTURIST.
Featuring 8 original songs and 2 covers, this would be RDJ laying his soul bare for all the world to see. He’d go on Oprah and speak candidly about his dark years, about his adddiction, recovery, and flaws as a human being.
4 years later he’d become Iron Man and shrink back from the public eye in terms of being so candid. Today RDJ rarely speaks of his personal life, he has a knack for being wholly entertaining while saying nothing in interviews. He’s a celebrity, but that’s all he is to the rest of us.
Yet for one brief moment in 2004, RDJ was an open book. And this album is the record of that.
Chapters
2:09 Wine Trivia Question of the Week
3:37 Background on the Album
11:36 Dallas' Wine Pairing
18:33 Dave's Wine Pairing
26:08 Masterpiece or Disasterpiece? (This is Never the Question)
40:33 RDJ's Singing Voice
44:20 RDJ's Lyrics
48:01 Is It a Shame He Never Made Another Album?
58:15 Dave's Favorite Song on the Album
59:49 Dallas' Favorite Song on the Album
1:01:35 Charlie Chaplin's SMILE cover
1:04:25 Wrap-Up!
1:06:33 Outtakes
Listen to this episode on your podcast platform of choice:
Wine Trivia Question of the Week
Scroll to the bottom to find out if you got it right!
The Wine Pairings
Dallas’ Pairing
2023 Ottella Lugana Le Creete (100% Turbiana), Lugana, Italy
Dallas spotted this wine at a local shop where the description was “oddly nutty yet refreshing.” Which he proudly stands by as the description of RDJ’s album, too.
The Otella vineyard’s lie close to Lake Garda and its distinctive terroir of the Lugana DOC is known for its mineral rich soil and temperate climate of northern Italy.
The vineyard is situated on the clay and limestone hills which gives it a distinct minerality and complexity. The grapes are handpicked and fermented in stainless steel tanks at highly controlled temperatures to cement its flavors and aromas. And then spends several months on the lees (dead yeast cells) to deepen richness prior to bottling.
The color is pale yellow with whispy green highlights. I get gobs of citrus and acidity but there’s a creamy balance with some herb and nuts in there as well. And again, it was pretty straight forward as this album is a little nutty but also weirdly elegant, just like almost everything RDJ does.
NERD ALERT: Lugana’s grape, Turbiana, is a bit of a mystery. For the longest time, it was thought to be a variant of Trebbiano (the Cognac grape) because it was called “Trebbiano di Lugana”. Then, a researcher discovered that it was indeed not Trebbiano. Then, DNA profiling in 2008 showed us that Turbiana was genetically similar to…Verdicchio.
In March 2021, it was announced that Verdicchio and Turbiana are close relatives (closer to each other than other varieties) but they are genetically distinct vines. Three clones of Turbiana were selected and placed into Italy’s national register of vine varieties. So, it’s its own thing!
Dave’s Wine Pairing
2021 Domaine Lumineux Pinot Noir Clone 114, Dundee Hills, Oregon
Everyone thinks of Francis Ford Coppola as being a Napa / Sonoma winery owner, but did you know he also has an Oregon winery?
Domaine Lumineux (House of Light) is situated in the Dundee Hills of Oregon, and grows incredible Pinot Noir and Chardonnay that expresses the unique terroir. Even better, they bottle single clone varietals like this CLONE 114 release.
THE FUTURIST is an album that is an underseen, lesser known work of an extremely talnted, celebrated celebrity. Personally, I think the album has depth, layers, and is an authentic expression of the artist and it continues to grow on me with every listen,.
So I paired it with a wine from the lesser known winery of a celebrity wine guy: Francis Ford Coppola's Domaine Lunineux. We recently were in touch with their winemaker,
who enjoyed our episodes on Coppola's winery empire.And I chose to pair The Futurist with their Pinot Noir made from 100% Dijon Clone 114.
Pinot Noir is one of the rare grapes that is rarely used in blends - Pinot is too delicate, it usually doesn't play well with other grapes, it just waters them down and/or the other grapes completely blow out the Pinot. But Pinot is often blended with other Pinot meaning other Pinot clones.
NERD ALERT: We talked all about clones in our episode covering the movie MOON from 2009 with special guest
, where I paired the film with a Zinfandel Clone blend where they named 4 different "clones" the wine was blended from. So go listen to that episode for a deeper talk on clones, but as an excruciatingly brief overview, that may not make any sense for how brief it's going to be but I'll do my best here:You can cut a piece of a vine off from one place, then replant it elsewhere. That new planting can be genetically traced back to its parent vine that it was cut from, but over time the new vine will adapt to the new place and exhibit properties that may not have existed in the parent vine. So now the new vine in the new place is a new clone. Many grapes have numerous clones all throughout the world, but extra attention is paid to Pinot clones as the grape is rarely blended with other grapes, so instead part of understanding how one Pinot differes from another is understading which clones were used in any given bottle.
So this is the Dijon 114 Clone, originally from the Dijon region of France, one of many, and 114 is known for its aromatic complexity and structure. Which is 100% what makes THE FUTURIST a worthwhile album - the overall unique sound and the complex ways in which the music is both woven together as well as the lyrics, swinging between on-the-nose confessional and overwrought opaque verse. This wine is elegant, but also intense and extremely layered. Bravo, Dave.
WINE TRIVIA ANSWER
The ruby red color of a red wine suggests….
B) Higher Acidity
The higher the acidity in a wine (aka the lower the pH) the more the color will shift toward the ruby red end of the spectrum. The lower the acidity (aka the higher the pH) the more it will shift toward the blue-purple end of the color spectrum. So you can always have a good guesstimate of what kind of acidity to expect the moment to note the color of any red wine!
If the wine is opaque, and therefore the color is difficult to make out, look to the “rim” of the liquid in your glass, where the color will still shine through. Opaque wine can still be red vs. purple. And transparent see-through wine can still be purple and not bright red! If anyone has had 19Crimes Snoop Dogg Cali Red, you’ll know what I’m talking about. ComPLETEly see-through, yet completely purple.
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