For the Love of the Map
For the Love of the Map is the ultimate portal to Supernatural: Unreal Fitness! Hosted by MJ, the show dives deep into the latest Supernatural choreography, detailed VR workout reviews, and exclusive interviews with choreographers, coaches, and community leaders. Whether you’re a seasoned Meta Quest user or new to the VR fitness world, this podcast is packed with expert advice, tips, and inspiration to keep you motivated and moving with joy!
For the Love of the Map
The Pit: Behind The Lore EP40
After two years of fan requests for a Madhouse sequel, Supernatural choreographer Justin Cromartie delivered something darker, deeper, and even more intense: The Pit.
Come hang out while we explore the origins of The Pit - a nightmare realm beneath the Madhouse universe, born from primal chaos and brought to life through sweat, music, and meticulous mapping.
From anchoring the playlist around “Nobody” by Avenged Sevenfold to introducing long-awaited 180-degree spins in “Eternal Blue,” Justin reveals the creative decisions, technical challenges, and relentless perfectionism behind what he calls his greatest work yet. Some tracks went through 20+ iterations, with targets adjusted pixel by pixel. Why? Because every movement should feel inevitable.
Justin also opens up about the lore behind The Pit, the role of community feedback, and the emotional connection between sound and choreography. Whether you’ve battled your way through this workout or you’re about to descend for the first time, this episode is a must-listen for fans of music-driven fitness, immersive design, and creative storytelling.
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Avenged Sevenfold - Nobody Music Video: https://youtu.be/UjrRTY2UDjw?si=QyNLOCBbzeF-m5SL
It's still madhouse appropriate. We're not making a madhouse or making the pit it should be. Mark is trapped in the madhouses originally. He kind of gets possessed by these evil spirits and what we're seeing now is that those evil spirits that enveloped the madhouse and created the monster and possessed Mark we are basing off against their essence at their base level. It's an experience like no other, just in terms of the dichotomy of sound, and I love that experience and I really love being able to apply movement to that. It's the smallest little thing, but every time I hit it it's like the most satisfying dopamine rush I've ever experienced.
MJ:I love it so much, it's a small thing.
Justin:A lot of that has to do with the music video of Nobody. Actually, a lot of the visuals in the song in general have to do with the music video. Okay, well, that's interesting. And then I added a few more. And then I added a few more. I was like, well, now this looks like a portal and that fits in really well. That crazy drum roll pattern during the chorus had changed probably about like 10, 15 times. Before I finally settled on it, the image I get in my head is a scene from Indiana Jones in a temple with a song was like do it. And I was like okay.
MJ:Can't ignore what the song tells you Hello and welcome back to the For the Love of the Map, where we chat all things supernatural choreography and the joy in movement. I'm MJ and today I'm super excited because I'm joined by one of my favorite creative minds ever Supernatural choreographer, justin Cromartie. Welcome back, dude.
Justin:Thank you for having me back and hello again, marla. It's great to see you, great to talk to you again.
MJ:You too, dude, and the last time you were on the show we got to chat all about your background, your education, your favorite foods, like all the random things, and obviously the Madhouse series.
Justin:Yeah. So today it will surprise no one Hopefully it won't surprise anyone why you are back on. What are we here to discuss today? I consider to probably be my greatest work and all my supernatural tenure, uh, being the recently released workout known as the pit.
MJ:Yes, I have so many questions, but my first and like the most important question, I feel like, is well, the last time you were on and for the last two years we've been told there would be no more Mad Houses. Yeah, and then we were gifted the pit. So is the pit in the same universe as the Mad House?
Justin:I would say that it is. I would say that it is. You can kind of think of the pit as the Madhouse's creator. The pit within up beneath us, and of course the illustrious smart carrara was like let's go find out what's down there. And now we're in a whole new world of shenanigans yeah, I love, I loved that part of the warm-up.
MJ:When you're just like, oh wow, you see matt mark fully in his get up and you're like, whoa, oh wow, you see Mark fully in his getup and you're like, whoa, where are we here? Are we really here? And then we go through the portal and get dropped into darkness. So talk to us about the concept of the pit. When did you decide? Okay, now it's time, let's do something, let's add on to this universe that we call the Madhouse and make a new workout.
Justin:Yeah, so the idea, I mean obviously there had been a lot of community outcry for another Madhouse, a lot of that coming from you.
Justin:Yes, for sure yeah but I think, like the formations of an idea for the pit began around summer of last year.
Justin:Actually, it's actually about right about now. Um, if I'm being honest, the fiddle and fury had just come out and I was thinking about the next big thing and some inklings of an idea began to brew around there. But my first steps for whenever I create something like this is always the playlist. So sometimes when I create a pros-only workout, the curation team will come to me and they'll say they'll come to everybody and say we have a pros-only who wants to take it and if it's something that I feel like I could do justice, I'll hop on it. If not, then I'll let somebody else handle it.
Justin:But when it comes to things like madhouse, portal combat, um other series that I've touched up on, like jk pop that I collaborated with with jr, I typically like to have full control over the playlist because I want to be as in tune with the songs and the music as much as I can before I really hop in there and start tearing it apart and looking at the intricacies of it and really seeing what beats I want to hit, what movements I want to touch up on and see what kind of experience I can create. So it was about this time last year that I was starting to think about the playlist itself.
MJ:Oh, so a year ago. And so you're like, hmm, if I was going to make a new addition to the madhouse, what songs would I get? And so what's that process like you just listen to music for like 48 hours straight, or how does this work?
Justin:Yeah, yeah, I usually start with one song and then I consider what other songs would do really well surrounding them and try to build off of that.
Justin:So, for Return to the Madhouse, that song was Sudden Death, because the idea of that song is based around this beast that you have to fight and that leads us straight into the monster of the Madhouse, madhouse 4.
Justin:With that one being not ready to die and that crazy guitar solo and just this fight to the end, you really get a good sense of that battle. And this time the anchor, what I call them, the foundational songs for each playlist, is Nobody, which Avenged Sevenfold is getting a lot of props because they had two back-to-backs, but Nobody was a song that was such a highlight for the year it came out. It was an amazing, beautiful song with so many different feelings and emotions and sounds just being brought into it, and I was like I would love, love, love, love, love to do some choreography to this, and so, once that got locked in, it became a question of what do I want the rest of this experience to sound like? As though, you know, I go through all of the artists that I know we have licensing for and then I start listening to all of the songs that are available and trying to pick and choose the ones that would really fit the tone musically but also fit the tone of the story that I'm trying to convey to our athletes.
MJ:You said story so is there a narrative, a story written into the pit by song, or is it just the narrative of the actual entire workout?
Justin:Yeah, it's a little bit of both, actually. The ideas that I have is the dying song starts us off with this ominous chant, and that is the dying song from the pit. The denizens of this locale are really singing this song. And then what you experience afterwards, when you approach the gigantic stone door that Mark refers to and cry of Achilles, you hear a cry and so you. You are naturally drawn towards it. Your curiosity that, upon opening that door, you find yourself in this shadowy jungle, forest area, which is poisonous shadows it takes it quite literally crawling through the darkness of. It kind of plays off of the lyrics there as well, before you come across where we kind of designate as our base camp, so to speak, with Eternal Blue, just this landscape of open darkness and stars that fill the sky and give you an opportunity to kind of gather your bearings. The sky and give you an opportunity to kind of gather your bearings, and then, out of nowhere, you get pulled into this cosmic landscape to face off against the pit's legions and nobody.
MJ:Wow, wow. So we, you really take us on a journey from the warm up all the way to the cool down. Now that leads me. Was this your whole Idea? Creative, you know, did you come up with the whole idea for this workout? This? Is your brainchild.
Justin:Yeah, I mean there is a lot of collaboration that goes on and, of course, I mean the idea wouldn't have really come to me if it weren't for the community first and foremost.
Justin:I remember a couple of years ago I think, probably around when Madhouse 3 first came out I saw a post somewhere that was mentioning like saving a coach from like the choreography or the choreographers specifically, and I like took that idea and kind of ran with it, um, and expanded it out into like this whole idea that I mean mark is trapped in the madhouses originally, kind of gets possessed by these evil spirits and, um, what we're seeing now is that those evil spirits that enveloped the madhouse and created the monster and possessed mark, we are facing off against their essence, uh, at a, at their base level, you know, like these, these primal energies, uh, within the pit. That is what we're fighting. That is why this choreography is so intense and just absolutely insane. Like those targets it's not just targets Like these are enemies that you're fighting, and this is something that I'm trying to convey within the coaching for Mark and also just with the choreography itself.
MJ:It's funny you brought up how, at the end of the dying song, mark asks about the stone, the big stone door he makes a comment.
MJ:So if a big stone door opened in front of you, what would you do? And I always scream at him jump. I would jump through. But I don't know that. The majority of people are as insane as me and like give me more, give me more of this crazy choreography. But I always get so pumped and I think, oh, I'm ready, I'm ready, let's go, let's go. And then you go into City of Achilles and that song is such a beautiful song with so much emotion and a fan favorite. I hear people talk about that song, that map, like it's one of their. They were shocked by it, they were surprised by it. In your process of building the playlist, when did you come across that song and decide to add it?
Justin:time actually what it comes down to. For altar bridge in particular, um, we have a couple of their songs in our workout library now and cry of achilles. It was a fight between that blackbird and fortress. Um, all of them have very similar sounds and similar lengths.
MJ:Actually it's a long song, man, it is a very long song.
Justin:What it came down to really was how close each one of those three songs came to feeling like how nobody felt. So what I was looking for was a slow easing in opening, ripping guitar solo at some point, and just energy that builds and then falls. Now it doesn't fall as much as, say, poisonous Shadows, but that build especially is what I was looking for, and I wouldn't count out the other two by any means, because Blackbird is probably one of my favorite pieces that they've made, but it didn't quite just work for this set list, but it is still something that I think could really fit nicely within Supernatural and potentially another episode of the Pit, if I'm so lucky to make one.
MJ:Oh, I like the sound of that. Everyone go rate your workouts and send in emails. You want more pits. So what I thought was really one of the first things I thought was really cool? Obviously, the warm-up. I don't skip warm-ups. I watched warm-ups during my first play of every workout. This one had two warm-ups.
Justin:Yes, it did.
MJ:And it's the first time in Supernatural I've seen licensed music being laid over the warm up. What was that your idea? Why did you guys decide to go that way?
Justin:So funnily enough. So the two part warm up idea was something that I wanted to put together because I wanted Mark to get pulled back into the pit one way or the other. So this idea that you know we're relaxing and taking a siesta on the beach and we're trying to find a puka shell necklace for Doc it's just like this funny little aside that we can do before we get thrust right back into this nonsense. And you can kind of take that beach experience as a metaphor because, like, we've been away from the madhouse for two years, you know we've had our time to relax, but now we're getting thrown right back into it. No holds barred. So it is very much a representation of that grace period that I allowed you all.
MJ:You did. You did allow us to have. We sort of like, like you said, we're on the beach, chilling, relaxing, not even thinking it was the perfect way and the surprising way to start the pit, because you're like, oh yeah, we haven't had anything like this in two years. It had been two years. And then when Mark gets pulled in into a portal portal into the darkness- you're like oh crap, we're here.
Justin:We're here.
MJ:It's time, yep.
Justin:Yeah, as far as the licensed songs for the warm-up and cool-down go, that, honestly, was a surprise to me. It was something that the rest of the team had brought up to me. While we were collaborating and working through some of the special things that we wanted to do, like sound effects and the environment changes that we made, the suggestion came up and I was like, yeah, I totally want to have some licensed song to set the tone because that gives me some more freedom to really set the mood and give you guys some hidden things going on within my set list making and some ideologies for potentially some things we might see in the future. I believe we used what was it?
Justin:Hail to the King for the intro and Conquer or Die for the outro, and both of those songs, I mean Avenfold, again always getting used, and mega death, also always getting used. Um, both of those are songs that are well highlder. The king has been highly requested, uh, by another user, who I would definitely love to make that dream come true one day. It's just a matter of finding the right place for it. Conquer or Die, being a mostly instrumental song, fit right at home, setting a really chilling tone for the outro especially, but also has a tie-in to another song that I was planning to use in the Monster but did not get the opportunity to, so we may get to see that in the future. Oh cool.
MJ:So from the initial idea of the Pit, which you said started sort of last summer, to the release of the pit in may I guess that is the timeline. You started last summer thinking about it. So it was it was a good eight, eight, nine months from starting the process to it finishing. So how much time difference is it from like the conception, planning it, to the mapping? You know like how long does it take you to map something like this?
Justin:Well, starting from like the birth of the idea to the mapping, I didn't start mapping anything concrete until about November, probably end of September, start of November. I was doing some test runs because the songs got in a little bit earlier, like around mid-ish September, I would say. So I hopped in, listened to what they sounded like in headsets, started plotting some of the beats that I really wanted to hit on, but didn't really make anything concrete at the time. But then when it came up on my schedule, I was like, hey, now's the time to actually do this.
Justin:The initial first drafts of what I wanted to create for each song, I think, took about two weeks to finish, which is unusual, but not unusual for something of this caliber. It's unusual for like day-to-day work. I usually try to spend a full day on each one of these songs, at least. Sometimes they take a bit longer, and this one was a very special case, as I'm sure you've experienced, because there's a lot that went into it, not just the choreography but also the triangles and having all of these different effects coming on and testing things like the spinning triangle portals at the end of Cry of Achilles, and especially the spins.
MJ:Yes, yes.
Justin:So those took a bit longer to get all of those in and tested and making sure they were feeling really good and actually doable.
MJ:So in my mind, a workout like this, like you said, usually a map will take you about a day to work through, but for something as big pros only, it's very technical. There's lots of complexity. You hardly reuse any patterns, so it's constantly evolving and changing. I'm thinking you know, like months to create something like this. What you're saying is like about a solid two weeks give or take yeah. How many iterations of the maps? Like, let's just talk about one song, let's talk about Nobody, since that was your anchor song.
Justin:Yeah.
MJ:How many different versions of Nobody did you create till we have the one we see in headset now? I know it was above 20.
Justin:did you create till we have the one we see in headset now? Uh, I know it was above 20. I know, I know it was above 20 saved published drafts of nobody before I landed on the final version. Um, there was, there was a lot that went into that song and I know I was still making edits to it, Probably I'd say like two weeks before release, I would say, because there's a period of time where I will let things just kind of sit and simmer for a bit and come back to them and play them again and at that point, once I had kind of settled on the major concepts that I wanted to hit for each song, I would go back, play them, probably like once a week, once or twice a week, and see if there was anything that felt weird, felt awkward, any beats that I could probably expand upon.
Justin:There was a lot of sweeping changes across this workout as a whole. Nobody, I think, was probably the second most drastically changed in the workout. There were several sections that had complete reworks, probably like 200 to 300 targets removed and replaced with different patterns. So yeah, there was a lot of work that went into that and making sure that it was as beautiful and impactful and spectacular, as I really wanted it to be. One thing that I definitely do remember going back to do I think it was the last final change that I made was right at the end where you're lifting your hands up in that rise on the cello.
Justin:Hands up and that rise on the cello. Um, there was some slight issues with the tails. They were a little choppy and it's. It's something that I've let go in other maps before, because trying to make the, the editor or make the application itself render the tails that are really really long like that can be a bit of a mess at times. But I went in and I finagled with it for probably about an hour or two, just so you had this clean, smooth rise at the end that made you really feel like you're closing this out like a conductor. Um, that was the last thing I did, and then I just kind of sat on that, played it through three or four times and I was like now it's done.
MJ:Now it's done. So were there any surprising decisions or like pivots during the process of the creation of this workout?
Justin:Oh, there were so many, so many. Honestly, I feel like I should be asking you which one do you want to know about? There are so many. Honestly, I feel like I should be asking you which one you want to know about, because there are so many. I could talk to them about length. I would say the biggest one came with Poisonous Shadows. Poisonous Shadows had so, so, so, so, so many changes made to it. I feel like I ended up remapping the entire thing probably twice or three times over. Um, which is really weird, because it's usually the megadeth songs that I'm so locked in on, exactly that's why I'm a little shocked.
MJ:That's why I'm looking at you like huh, why, why? Yeah, I don't know, that was just kind of weird, um, I think.
Justin:Think the issue that I had and this was kind of the issue that I had with all of the songs was like I was just nervous Taking two years off of making something like this. And community expectations have changed considerably. I've evolved a lot since the Monster and I'm coming off of a really big change in my mindset about how I'm mapping. I'm doing a lot more stuff relating to movement and more expansive big movements that way and I'm doing a lot of lower body work. I have smaller toe tap triangles moving you to side to side and I do that a lot more now too. And I'm looking at my stuff and I'm sitting here thinking this does not feel like me. This was like me from like six months ago, which is still madhouse appropriate, but when I'm making a madhouse or making the pit, it should be different. Yeah, um, poisonous shadows.
Justin:I felt its first iteration was not doing that difference and that evolution of what I was making justice. The only thing that I was really confident in was that little sidestep hold pattern for a bit, sidestep, then step out sidestep and then lower body kind of cross-body movements for a bit. That I felt was a really good capture of what I wanted to do with the song and then from there it was like well, what else is missing? So there was a lot of things regarding the when you turn and the drum rolls and just the overall movements that I really wanted to touch up on and hit, and the intro itself gave me a lot of trouble too. And then we finally landed on this cross body, cross eye and cross mind experience, just like, wow, this is crazy, this is exactly what I'm looking for.
MJ:Yes, I personally, as a big fan of the Mad Houses and of your work, I see the evolution in your choreography in the pit. So, while I definitely feel Mad House vibes, it's a whole new workout, it's a whole new experience and it ties in all of the things that you've been working on since the Mad Houses came out, the things that you've been working on since the madhouses came out. So I could see why, while you were mapping it, you're like hold on a second. This still feels too much like madhouse. And how to bring in the expansiveness and the lower body movement that you are so famous for now. Um, and you did it so well with the pit. It really is the next step in the evolution of the madhouses and your choreography well done thank you.
Justin:I think a big touching point that I wanted to do was make this a full body experience and not just something that makes your arms want to cry.
MJ:I want your arms and legs to cry we want to kill our whole body and not just because drum rolls non-stop get it yeah, totally get that for sure and, as you know, I'm a huge fan of all of the mapping you do for Megadeth songs. It's huge. What you did in Poisonous Shadows was like so perfect. I could not imagine what the other iterations are like, because the one that we have in headset now is just so good, dude, so good, and especially that initial part, because it's so flowy and you've got us. You literally break our brain. Julia said to me it's so complex but so simple. You're asking us to do three things at once with our, you know, this arm's doing one thing, this arm's doing the other. Then you got to sidestep in and moving over here and it does break your brain until you just sort of like, let go and just follow what you're asking us to do, and then you're like, oh, this is so simple. How you take simple but make it complex is a skill.
Justin:I'll give you a little cheat code for that pattern. Actually I wouldn't look at it too too hard because they're not exactly the same, but the Pattern in Cry of Achilles' intro I want to say see the first or the second one that shows up. You're doing this side-to-side swaying motion across three portals. It's essentially the same pattern but it's inverted in a way. So you have this expansive movement in Cry of Achilles. You're a little bit tighter in the movement in Poisonous Shadows, because you're kind of getting this feeling of moving through trees and moving through bramble and whatnot. But as far as the targets go, they are essentially flipped and then they're flipped in the hands and then they're flipped in the portals that they're coming out of too. So you're getting this exact mirror, essentially.
MJ:It's pretty cool. Now I have to really pay attention to that part next time. So let's back up, because I really want to go through each song. Right, I want to talk about the dying song. Um, why did you pick space for that location?
Justin:ah. So that was tricky because I'm sure you've noticed the theme with the environments for the pit. They're all pretty dark, yeah, but we don't necessarily have anything that was like pitch black, and the space environment was about the closest thing I could find. But this idea that you get dropped into this pit and you can't see anything and you're kind of just like fighting these things that are coming at you from literally every angle until you just happen upon this door, is what I'm kind of looking for here. So this space is just like this infinite blackness, with very little light, very little to see. It is, in essence, the pit itself.
MJ:Got it, so it goes into the story, into the vibe, into the whole narrative that you're creating in this experience.
MJ:It makes sense to use the pit or to use space for the first song. All right, I got to know if this was intentional or not. If this was intentional or not, at the very beginning of the dying song there is this section where we're about to turn and you have these two double hits, these two double turning hits and these triangles that show you hey, we're turning two more portals, we're continuing to go. Was that intentional to sort of foreshadow what you're going to do with the big spin that we finally get to see in eternal blue?
Justin:It is and it isn't. A little bit and I think a lot of that does have to do with the dying songs, like placement in terms of where it showed up in my process um, because we had a different slipknot song in the playlist originally, which I swapped out, not necessarily last minute, but pretty close to it really um yeah yeah, it was off the same album.
Justin:It was a song called Acidic, which had the same well, had a similar vibe, a closer vibe to Nobody, but didn't quite hit on all the points that I would want for a prose only. So we swapped it out for the Dying Song and by this point I had already had the idea for the spins concocted in my head. So I do think that those big hits at the beginning kind of foreshadow that to an extent. Whether that was my conscious intent or subconscious intent, I don't know, I'm going to take subconscious credit for that. Okay, fair. But I definitely wanted to experiment with an idea that actually benny had brought up years ago at a completely offshoot one-off conversation.
Justin:Um mentioned doing side hits. Uh, like the big drum hits and I was thinking about that and these large, like Japanese taiko drums that you hit from the side and you hit them with so much power and force but you have to hit them in such a specific way with your body and I really wanted to try to replicate that because again, we're experiencing a chant and this is what I feel like would really encapsulate that moment and that chanting experience. Like you see these like creatures, like building up an energy and you see these drums, these big tribal drums, being hidden and you're hitting these drums and it all kind of like flows into this image. But it also does have the added benefit of kind of getting you used to and familiar with this idea that, hey, you're going to be experiencing some pretty powerful turns at some point. So you know, I'll take credit for it. If you want to give it to me, I do.
MJ:I do want to give it to you because I it hit me one time when I was playing it and I was like, is the? It's like foreshadowing what we're going to get in song four and five? What a genius. So yeah, I'm sticking. I'm sticking with that.
MJ:I'll take it for sure, and you also play with. Something that I absolutely love is when there's three portals and the range of motion hits you. You play a lot with that in the dying song as well, and I think that's really cool that you are able to put that into a prose only. I mean, I know that's originally where we saw it long ago but now we're seeing it in highs.
MJ:We often see it in mediums sometimes, but a lot of people have trouble hitting power hits with the huge range of motion hits because they're so used to everything being close together, and so I think it's exceptionally challenging to add it to a prose when they're expecting just drum rolls nonstop. You know, like takes them out. They're like oh, we got to get big and flowy here and move our whole body to the side. I think that's a really cool addition, especially in the Dying Song.
Justin:Yeah, thank you. It's all about the sound that the song is trying to convey. For me, so, even if there is a lot going on musically, a lot of what I'll do is listen to what is really speaking to my body and my ears, and so you can have a bunch of drums, a bunch of guitars going, but if the vocalist is giving you a really loud belly scream, I'm going to want to harp on that and make you feel that and feel that emotion that the singer is trying to put into the song right now. And also just adding a bit of change and unfamiliarity is really nice to have in these moments too, because it gives you something to look forward to but also keeps you really on your toes, which you're going for. This workout allowed for that change all the time.
MJ:You don't know what to expect you know the music changes and the movements change with it. So there's this. I don't know if you know about this. This might be the first time you're hearing this, but there's this weird glitch or situation that happens during the song, at the very end, yeah, before the workout card pops up. If you happen to hit pause, it turns you backwards.
Justin:Yeah.
MJ:What's up with that? Is that intentional, justin, like did you? Why are you trying to confuse us? What's going on?
Justin:Well, it's an interesting use case. Okay, um, but I mean, I definitely didn't expect anybody to pause right before the song ended um, we weren't supposed to find this you know it's, it's a cool little easter egg, that's what we'll call it.
Justin:Okay, but it it has to do with the fact that you have this star triangle shape coming at you from both the front and the back at the same time, um, so they land on each other at the same beat, but I think, because the one coming from the back continues to move forward, um, but it's being rendered behind you, the application goes oh well, you should be facing this way, so now the pause menu is behind you.
Justin:Not the case, but it does kind of pan out that way and it's a good note for next time. But you know, I hope it doesn't ruin anybody's experience.
MJ:It shouldn't. I just think it's kind of cool. It shows that sort of what you're trying to put into these pros only is so new that the program, the engineering, the system itself is like hold on, bro, what are you doing?
MJ:We're not used to this, and so now we're going to turn everyone backwards. It's got to catch up with you and what you're creating is what it sounds like. Okay. So at the end of this, if you don't pause and all the stuff is there and you're facing the correct way, a stone door opens and we're dropped in to city of Achilles, which is really cool location. Can we talk about? This? Location's the monastery, um, but it's got the dark filter on it. I've only seen that in a halloween workout before.
Justin:follows your dark places theme, I suppose yeah, um, what to say about Cry of Achilles? The location specifically. So if the dying song serves as like, I guess the best like comparison I could give for the dying song and the Cry of Achilles is like. The image I get in my head is a scene from Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom.
MJ:Okay.
Justin:Where you're kind of like staring over all of these people in this weird underground ancient temple and they're doing this like chant and somebody's being lowered into the pit of lava and like that's the dying song, like you're experiencing that and you're like what is going on? And then so you're trying to just like bumble around, you trip over a rock and then all of these things are like chasing after you and you come across this door and you're like I got to get this door open. And so eventually you do, and that's that's cry of Achilles. Like you're, you're holding off this just onslaught of minions, while you, while Marcus, like trying to get the door open so you guys can escape. It's like trying to get the door open so you guys can escape.
Justin:And so we went with the monastery because it was, you know it, kind of that informed the story. More than anything, I would say I was looking for a way to tie us into like this expansive realm and, working with the environments we have, I want everything to make sense and have their place. So I was like what do? We got Looked at the monastery and I was like this is great, I can totally make something out of this. It's a little too bright, and then I found the other version. I was like, okay, we're good to go. So, yeah, the idea is that we were fighting off just these hordes of minions and Mark's trying to get this door open, and once we do, then we get that portal that shifts us into the foresty environment of poisonous shadows. But this whole idea of the pit is that nothing is really as it seems and you're constantly moving and shifting around because it's this like non-Euclidean environment that allows you to end up anywhere, but you are still very much within the confines of the pit.
MJ:Yeah, I can see that At the very intro of that song. It's a beautiful song, by the way. Yes, it's so layered, has so much emotion and feeling and, like I mentioned earlier, it seems to be a fan favorite. It shocks people. Um, you again start with these super flowy, huge range of motion movements. Um, and Mark's over there talking about hoedown, throwdown vibes.
MJ:And I roll my eyes at him so big. I'm like like get out of here with that. Um, but it it is so perfect before it goes into the drums and you start turning and you have these like triangle patterns during the part where it's like nothing left to follow you do this very specific pattern.
MJ:You use the three portals and you've got sort of a lunge on one side, a lunge on another. You're asking us to do a toe tap. You've got targets coming, but it all flows so beautifully with the music. Is that just the perfect sort of way of how you hear the music and how your body wants to move? That's what you wanted to do in that section yes, yeah, absolutely.
Justin:Um, especially for things like the pit. Uh, I take, I take the music and what it's telling me to do very seriously. I often joke that I don't make any of my mapping decisions. The music just tells me what I need to choreograph and I just do what it says. This is very much the case for these, those sections. We're dropping out the drums, we're moving to a more acoustic guitar. Dropping out the drums, we're moving to a more acoustic guitar and we are finding an opportunity to breathe and to move before we get thrust into much more powerful strikes.
Justin:And it's a lot of layering with the music and the body.
Justin:You should be mimicking the rise and fall of the sounds that you're hearing and there's a lot of play on the dynamics of the body. You should be mimicking the rise and fall of the sounds that you're hearing and there's a lot of play on the dynamics of the song and I want to harp on that for every single piece within the playlist. But I think that song gives probably the most consistent rise and fall. Poisonous Shadows, I would say, does a big arc. But Cry of Achilles is like low and then high and then low and then high and then low and then high, and it's like there's so many waves to it. And I want you to really feel that and you play off of that, especially because during those low parts you are working the lower body, you are staying low with the music and then, as soon as the chorus kicks in, you are rising up and low with the music and then, as soon as the chorus kicks in, you are rising up and you have these much bigger vertical motions and you're really playing off of those dynamics.
MJ:You also are really fantastic about creating momentum in those sections when we go down and then the music rises again. You make sure our body has that momentum with the way you're asking us to move with your triangle work. There's so much movement through the whole pit. If you just and I encourage people who aren't very comfortable with triangles to sort of not ignore the targets but sort of just put them to the side and only focus on the triangle work until you feel confident, because you will be moving all over your play space and the momentum it creates is fantastic it is like you're flying.
MJ:There are parts, especially in the Cry of Achilles, that it really feels like you're flying, dude, and you have these, you're in a lunge and then just suddenly, with the beat, you're going like this and moving up and man it. It gives me goosebumps even thinking about that.
Justin:Yeah I love the whole feeling of momentum, and really expanding things across those three front lanes allows me to do a lot of that. One of the movements that I really enjoy in that song, and also in Eternal Blue, is going into a bit of like a half lunge and then crossing an arm over your body and then coming back out on the other side is just so expansive and there's not a lot of other ways for me to really be able to replicate that just either. Timing-wise, song-wise it doesn't fit, but I love that motion so much it feels a lot like some contemporary moves that I learned back in college, which is not something that I would typically be able to do in a playlist like this. But when I'm given the opportunity to really say I want to explode with movement and emotion here, that's like my go-to motion. It's just like curling up and then coming back out yeah, it's exploding, yeah, I love that.
MJ:So let's talk about how you broke our brain at the end of this song with those crazy triangles that Mark tells us it's just a distraction, it's just a focus.
MJ:It's the first time during the workout that Mark says something about focus, which is sort of a theme for him in the book that I picked up on. But anyway, you ask us to do these crossovers but because you have these crazy triangles coming, your brain literally breaks. You're like what are you wanting us to do in this moment? And then when it finally clicks, you're like, oh, it's so simple, it's just crossovers. But that initial it's so shocking, it's just so cool. How did you come up with that idea?
Justin:um, it's just so cool. How did you come up with that idea? Oh man, that was. That was a really bad case of me being being basically sitting there. Being like this would be funny, yeah, um, now, I have moments like that all the time. But if we want to talk about, like, the origins of that from um, it's from a choreography standpoint.
Justin:Those triangles and pretty much all of the weird triangles that you'll see are a result of a fellow choreographer, dave, who came up with these just insane triangles one day when we were coming up with some new moves and we wanted to try in future workouts. And so before I want to say I made I think it was probably madhouse for the first time I really used those. Um, I came to him and I was like how did you make those weird triangles that I saw like about a year ago? And he was like, oh, this is how you do. It showed me how to do that, and so I've basically been using them ever since when I really want to do some crazy accents on something, with, I think, victorious being the first time. I started getting a little cheeky with the triangles from Go Big or Go Home, and now we can see the evolution of that.
Justin:But that pattern in particular was two constraints, the main one being the guitar in that section is going absolutely bonkers and, unfortunately, if I wanted to put targets on that, I wouldn't be able to hit every beat, every single strum that that guitar is doing. I don't think I would be able to hit and make it comfortable and make it actually visibly appealing and everything. So I was like well, I need to do something. So my go-to for spots in the songs that sound like this crazy guitar shred is like well, just put a bunch of triangles in them. I can't just have you standing there. So what else can I do? Well, we'll just put a bunch of triangles in, but I can't just have you standing there, right. So what else can I do? Well, let's put a bunch of triangles ahead. Lovely, you know we've been messing around with that a little bit, okay, but this isn't enough. What next?
MJ:well, make them turn, make them turn, yeah, I was like, okay, hey, that's cool.
Justin:So I originally I had it like every couple of beats and I was like, okay, okay, well, that's interesting. And then I added a few more. And then I added a few more. I was like, well, now this looks like a portal and that fits in really well. So I had that there just kind of by itself initially, but your arms were just kind of doing nothing. I was like, well, can't do that. So there's also these really powerful drum beats going on. I'm like, well, hey, hey, hey, hey, oh, it's so awesome by itself. And then, with the portals on it too, and then it came to be like, can I actually see these targets? So I had to sit on that for a little bit, because it's a yes and no. I think it's really difficult to see those targets, but I also think they are slow enough that if you can just catch a glimpse of them for just a second, you'll be able to do it. But if you can't now, you have an excuse to come back and try it again.
MJ:Well, it's a perfect example of how you are really good at creating workouts that get us to play them multiple times. The replayability of your workouts is very high because initially your brain is broken. You're like what did I just do? But then the next play, you're like okay, I'm prepared for this. Oh, he's putting these triangles here because it goes with the guitar, but our arms are hitting with the drums. So you know the music now, and so you go in there and you hit it and you and you nail it and it feels so good. And every time you play the workout again, you have that experience. You figure something else out. Oh, it makes sense. Now let me focus on this part of the song, and it just intuitively makes sense. So the pit has very high replayability for not just me, but lots of people in the community. I see them coming back for more. There are people who have already gotten 100.
MJ:I am not one of them I'm not one of them but there are people I know, my friend julie, I think she just got her fourth 100 on the pit Nash. I know he was the first person to get it and I remember thinking to myself I can't believe someone got it before me and no, I still have not.
MJ:But you know, that's fine, that's fine, that's cool. But the replayability of the pit, I would say, is I can't believe I'm going to say this. It might be higher than Return to the Madhouse for me personally and Return is my all-time favorite, I could play it any day of the week, any time. But the pit has sort of taken over my obsession for the Return.
Justin:Yeah, I think I would agree with you there too. I mean, originally I was really hoping that, with Madhouse 4 intended to be the last of the entire series, I was like I really want this one to be like we go all out, we go crazy. Unfortunately, it is a monster and it's like 48 minutes of just sheer nonsense. So I could understand why people wouldn't want to necessarily play that all the time right uh, even I don't want to do it because I it's.
Justin:If I do that once, I'm like I'm done for the rest of the day same same um, so yeah, I definitely think like return to the Madhouse is a much more palatable version of the monster, but the pit being a little bit longer, I think, than Madhouse 3.
MJ:It is just by a few minutes, just by a few minutes.
Justin:Yeah, but it offers so much more, not just in terms of the choreography and the complexity, in terms of like the choreography and the complexity, but so many lessons were taken from three and four in terms of just target placement itself and there were so many hours just like looking at a target and being like this would be better if it was one pixel to the right.
MJ:Justin, are you a perfectionist?
Justin:no, I didn't think so cannot tell it makes a difference. It makes a difference, and I'll definitely talk about this a little bit more when we get to nobody. But that crazy drum roll pattern during the chorus had changed probably about like 10-15 times before.
Justin:I finally settled on it and it was just really small, just like, oh, just make this angle slightly over here and then push this over here is like it, just you know, and then by the time you finish it it's completely different but it makes a difference and it makes it comfortable and for something like a pros only which we don't get that often, I feel like pros only are very special workouts.
MJ:Um, and the thought to know that you're sitting there tweaking little all the little things make such a huge difference for our overall experience in comfort. I'm incredibly comfortable during the pit. There's nothing that aggravates me, that doesn't make sense to my body. It just feels very intuitive and natural and you have a fantastic way of we get a hit and if I just leave my arms there, I know they're in the perfect spot for the next hit, and so I'm always just I'm like okay, I know if he's going to put me where I need to be, what I always refer to as the setup. So you're very good at that. So it doesn't surprise me that you're a perfectionist and it takes a lot of time and thought and care to get that placement correct. I'm into it. Thank you, thank you.
Justin:I try really, really hard to make sure that it's like. It's not comfortable for me, that I know it's not gonna be comfortable for you guys, so like I spend most of my time in the tweaking phase looking for comfort. So, yeah, okay.
MJ:So at the very end of Cry of Achilles we have those crazy dramatic portal triangles and then we go into Poisonous Shadows yes, Hmm, Megadeth. I was very pleased to see Megadeth on this playlist I was like oh, oh man, it better have mega death, and better have mega death than there it was.
Justin:thank, you always gonna have mega. It's like it's not the same without them. Honestly, I agree I agree.
MJ:Um, and the location. You touched on that earlier. You wanted it to be like the jungle feel, and that's why we're in. How do you pronounce it?
Justin:enderwin I call it enderwin, okay, um, I suppose you could probably call it endorin. I call it enderwin, yeah, I call it enderwin too.
MJ:Yeah, okay, someone else want to correct us, however you want to say it, but, um, you put us into this like super sci-fi pit jungle basically is where we are. Um, and it starts so beautiful. That song really lends to that movement in those flowy tales and, like I mentioned earlier, you're asking so much of the user right from the get-go, but it's actually really simple.
Justin:Yeah, it's tricky but it's, it's actually really simple.
MJ:Yeah, it's tricky.
Justin:Yes, but it's definitely one of those things where I considered the replayability of it a lot and I sit there and think to myself, like, is this going to be something that is actually doable? Is it doable within like one or two tries? Is it doable from the get-go? And after playing through it a couple of times, I usually put it into one of those three buckets. Um, if it falls into the this is impossible bucket usually gets taken out. I would say like 99.9 percent of the time it gets taken out.
MJ:That extra one percent I haven't mapped yet, but we'll see you're gonna have to let me know okay so there is a section I call them mega death drum rolls, and that is because in past workouts that was always something to expect during a mega death song. You always had a huge, massive turning, turning, rotating drum pattern. And we see that again here, five portals wide, five portals wide. I think I screamed when I saw it, especially in that location. And you just have all these hits coming and you really have to work on.
MJ:For me personally, when I hit drum rolls and I probably learned watching your side-by-sides but you roll your, your um elbows, and so I have adapted that technique for drum rolls and nail them every time. Sometimes I don't even know how I'm getting them. I'm like, how does my body know how to do this? But I was very pleased when I saw those what I call mega death drum rolls appear in the song. It's rad pattern Also brought me back to my all time favorite map in all of history, which is sudden death, and I appreciate that you used that in here, but different, you know.
MJ:Yeah, it was like a nod.
Justin:You were like yes, I see you. I would say it's a little bit more than a nod. If I'm being perfectly honest with you, I think one thing that you will notice and people who are really into the Madhouse and the Pit just at a general level will notice that when I use songs that are from the same artist, I have a tendency to use very similar patterns, because not only am I evolving, I want you guys to evolve too, and that means, as each song comes out, there's always going to be a bit of a through line in the way that I want you to move your body, because the songs are going to sound pretty similar, because they're going to come from the same people are going to have the same movements associated with them too. So each idea is like we're going to expand upon this, we're going to get a little bit harder this time.
Justin:And the five portal drum roll and poisonous shadows was supposed to show up in sudden death, um. And because there's a section I want to say, like right at the end of the chorus is you have a, uh, three portal terminal? I want to say, yes, probably three portals. At that point you end on that easter egg, um, originally it was five portals and I was looking at it and I was like, might be too much.
Justin:Might be too much, but that came out. Everybody said three portals was fine. Four came out. Everybody said three portals was fine. Now the pit, and I'm like well, three portals is fine.
MJ:So maybe let's try five.
Justin:That seems to be fine too.
MJ:I don't think we'll do seven. So yeah, I was gonna say yes, seven's next right, because we're good with five.
Justin:It's challenging but we get it I think five might be pushing like the hard limitations of peripheral vision. At that point probably seven might be a little outside of possibility we can hope, but you, you do train us when I think and look back like welcome to the madhouse.
MJ:You know the what was it?
Justin:black metal black metal and tornado souls yeah my two favorite on there.
MJ:But black metal is when you really introduce us to drum rolls, but it's front facing three portal I don't know if a lot of people realize that, but back then that was huge we didn't even realize we were stuck in front facing because so much was coming at us yeah but then the next madhouse.
MJ:You introduced us to that same movement, that same pattern, but moving more. It wasn't. We weren't just stuck. So you're, you've been training us and then, um, in return, you gave us three portal drum rolls and now, in the pit, you've given us five portal drum rolls. I think you did give us five portal germinals for a minute in the second to last song in the monster. It's one of my favorite and I'm spacing on the name of it, not ready. Not ready to die, didn't you? Is it five?
Justin:I think there is, I don't think it's five, I think it's three at a time.
MJ:Hmm, I'm going to have to go back and look now, because you might be right, maybe it's four.
Justin:Maybe you gave us four for a second four. I don't like even numbers, no, I I think I think it was three, um, because yeah, it has been like an evolutionary step from each one, from going with, just right in front of your face, one portal, then targets on portals on either side, then you converge in the middle, um, and now you're doing way out to the side, converging, then come back up and go out and then you do this whole like cascading from five, three, one, three, five, basically and then you have the wide, super wide crossovers, the super flowy tails, again at the end, oh man, and you just feel.
MJ:You just feel like you're a composer. Yes, you're sitting there ending everything in that way and your arms are up at the end, oh man, it's so perfect. Mm-hmm, which seamlessly flows into the next song, eternal Blue, where we're doing the one arm super flowy hits and where we see the spin for the first time ever, the spin.
Justin:Yeah, a lot to talk about with eternal blue.
MJ:So in the process, when you were building this playlist, your anchor song was nobody. When did you figure out you wanted to bring Eternal Blue from Spirit Box in?
Justin:That's a fantastic question. I want to say I Well. I want to say I have no idea, but that's not a good answer. Let me think about that for a second.
MJ:Sure.
Justin:Because I know I wrestled with the Spirit Box songs a lot.
MJ:Because you're a fan of Spirit Box, right?
Justin:Yes, love them to death now. It wasn't always the case. Yeah, I love them to death now. Eternal Blue and Spirit Box was just tricky because they offer this different sound from everybody else more hard rock than, like, thrash metal from mega death and new metal from slipknot and then the metalcore from avenge sevenfold. Somebody's gonna be mad at me for saying metalcore, but whatever. And then you have spirit box was like this combination of gent and metalcore.
Justin:We should have a separate conversation about all the sub genres at some point, but I'm not going to get too deep into that now. I promise um, but the. The one thing that both spirit box and slipknot really don't do is have guitar solos, um, which is something that Avenged Sevenfold and Megadeth and Alter Bridge do do quite a bit. So the tricky part for me was I wanted every song to have a guitar solo in it, and Eternal Blue was one of the very few that did, and it's not very prominent. It's really actually only a couple of strums on the guitar, but there was a lot to build off of with the general emotion that is coming out of that sound and that melody, especially since it's not something that they typically would do. There was Perennial and Trustfall, and I looked at Electric Cross for a little bit too, and I was like there's no way I can map that rhythm and be comfortable with it. It's so tricky.
Justin:But yeah, eternal Blue and Perennial and Trustfall were the three that I were really looking at, and then it kind of just became like how does this sound, going from Poisonous Shadows to one of those three songs and then into Nobody, and how does the intro sound and the outro sound and the guitar solo sound, and it was just. That was the one, that was the one sweeping just elegant nature of the whole song being placed against this backdrop of this really heavy punchy, almost like industrial, brutalist sounding guitar. It's just, it's an experience like no other, just in terms of the dichotomy of sound, and I love that experience and I really love being able to apply movement to that. And I mean, the results of that kind of just became the spins.
MJ:Yes, that's what I was going to say. You hear this song and you're like okay, this is the song I'm going to add. It goes with all the other songs. And then in your head are you like oh, when they sing slow down, we should spin Like. Is that how that came about?
Justin:A little bit. Yeah, the spins again, highly requested from the community for a long time. I would say that you were probably one of the biggest champions of that request. Spin, please, and it is something that I had wanted to try. I just couldn't quite figure out how to make it work. There is a song from a long time ago and I'm blanking a bit on the name, but it is in the Swedish House Mafia.
MJ:Artist Series, I want to say the one that you mapped, the song that you mapped in that one.
Justin:Yeah, it was a medium. That was pretty much a high.
MJ:Yes.
Justin:There are. There's a turning section where you do a three-lane turn with your top hand and then you do another three-lane turn with your bottom hand and that takes you from. It's basically just a quarter turn. That, I would say, is the foundation and I had pretty much never done it again since that point. But it's something that sticks in my head Every time I try something. I was like when can I get the opportunity to try this again? The reason I hadn't used it since is because there was some feedback that those hits were kind of difficult to see, difficult to perform, especially in a medium. They were definitely better served for a high, but the song was like do it, and I was like okay, can't ignore what the song tells you and so eternal blue was very much the same situation.
Justin:It's like here is an opportunity to expand on this concept in the right environment and an opportunity to give people what they've been asking for. And let's just see what happens. So the spins very much came about from this one word question that I posed to Benny one day. It was just spins and he was like spuds. I'm like, yeah, let's do it. What does that look like? What do I need to do to make this happen? We talked about it. I made some drafts.
Justin:It wasn't always triangles At first. I played around with a couple of different tools, a few ways to manipulate the camera to make sure that it was a visible motion, that we were getting the full concept that you need to move from here to here and you need to do it within this amount of time. And it was basically just like what do I need to do to make this happen? So benny got involved, my manager, dennis, got involved, leanne got involved and this is kind of the final results of like just having a triangle at head level that you can fit your head through. So it counts for the points that say go this way, go that way, go, go, go.
MJ:So, in all of the iterations that you did, what was it safety that made you decide to do it 180 versus 360?
Justin:Yeah, it's timing will definitely. Well, maybe you won't notice. Actually, the thing that I definitely noticed is, within those moments where you're turning, you can't do anything else but turn, so you lose a lot of targets or potential targets. The good thing about eternal blue is that there's nothing else going on in the song but courtney's vocals, so that is the perfect opportunity because you're not losing any potential value. Um, I won't necessarily say the same is the case for nobody, but at least with eternal blue, what I'm sitting there thinking like what am I losing? What am I gaining? I look, look at the value prospect of both of those sides. I'm not really losing anything at all. When I hit that part in the vocals, so I was like this is a perfect opportunity to try this, because there's only upside for our athletes.
MJ:One of the things that fascinates me about the way your brain works is at the end of every spin you have us doing something completely different. So at the end of the first spin turn the target we hit is with our left hand. Then after the second, it's actually multi-portal. It's actually multi-portal. So you've got three portals open and targets coming and everything like overlaps and goes. It's what I call three portal magic.
MJ:So, you have that come. And then, after the third turn, you have my favorite one, which is these unexpected crossovers where it feels like we spin and then we hug ourselves. After which I just thought, when you're telling yourself to, you know, or the vocalist is telling us to slow down, we spin, we hug ourselves. I just thought that was just so cool. And then the fourth turn, you have us do the right hand, and then the very final fifth turn right hand, and then the very final fifth turn. We go back to multi-portal work, um, and how you switch that up, for you could just take the easy road and put the same pattern for everyone, and then everyone would, you know, no one would probably notice, um, but it's definitely something I pick up on and appreciate that you put in that thoughtfulness. Why did you start with the left, with the left hand? What's what? What's your deal with the left and why you end us on multi-portal? I'm just wondering.
Justin:Yeah, so remind me again. Yeah, are you? Are you saying you turning with the left hand first or do you end with like the next?
MJ:So after the turn you go straight into a left-hand target.
Justin:Yeah, okay, so the original section for that first iteration of Slowdown was not a turn, it was you've probably seen this a couple of times before those long sweeping tails that take probably four to eight beats at a time. You would do two of those and you do this motion where you cross the hands over and then they come up and then you come back down and it's very reminiscent of taking a meditative stance, and the thing I like about it a lot is that if you do it at the right tempo, you are like forced to take a breath. It opens up the chest and spine and the way that your arms lift up like literally forces your body to take a breath, which I thought is a really cool moment came in when I was doing the rest of them, and this is kind of like game design speak for me is that I had all the other turns on the slowdown sections except for that one, and for me it's like that's the first one and I want people to associate that section and those words with turning. And so the first time. You see, it is really really important for establishing that pattern recognition and it's also really important because I'm leading you into a pattern that you've already seen. So I don't want you to get jump scared by the next set of targets that come after that turn, because if you're a little slow, that next target is going to come at you like a freight train and you're going to scramble a little bit, and I anticipate that.
Justin:And a lot of tweaking went into making sure that there was ample time to get it and even if you miss, like the first one or two, um, you will pretty much always get the last one or the third one, specifically because there is space after the turn for you to set, see and then act. The first two not as much, but again, I mean I have to hit every beat. That is like I have to do that or else the song will call me and be like hey, what's going on, what's happening?
MJ:here it's going to come haunt you.
Justin:Yeah, basically I will have dreams about it. So, yeah, that first hit with the left hand is a couple of different mechanical things going on, like we are training your brain to recognize slowdown means turn. We're training your brain to say, oh, this is a pattern I'm familiar with, so I don't have to rewire to acclimate to a new pattern. And then we're also saying there are going to be targets right after this, so be prepared, keep your head on a swivel. So the second time you see it, that target comes pretty quickly, third time not so much.
Justin:And then you cross in and then you come into these butterflies and the sound goes out and then you go right back into the song. Um, then let me do one more time. And then you get the same thing that you had on the first chorus, and then you come back and then you go into the end of the song and that's more or less trying to just bring you back around to center. And that was another big thing too, was that, if I'm not mistaken, if you have five turns, you start from the front, you go front to back, and then back to front, which is two, and then front to back, which is three, and then back to front again. Yeah, I think that was right. I'm having to do weird math in my head right now, sorry.
Justin:One of the other issues was that you didn't end at the front. So I had to come up with some weird patterns that would get you back over there and I was like, well, if I just add this to the front, then I don't have to do that. So that was another big driving force.
MJ:That's funny. So was it a strategic move to not add the spin to the warm-up because, historically, if there's a new move. We see it in the warm-up, they go over it, they want to talk about it. Um, prepare us for it, but we don't see any of that was what's the deal? You just decide, no, let's. Let's let the shock and awe happen.
Justin:Basically, yes, um, yeah, there wasn't.
Justin:So there's a couple of things that kind of go into that, the first thing being, um, I gave Mark specific instructions, not to mention the spins, but also to do that step touch pattern and poison his shadows, because I really wanted him to focus on that, because it was something that users might not have seen before.
Justin:So that was kind of the overlaying instruction. The second thing is that it's kind of immersion breaking a bit to be in the middle of this like narrative warm-up experience, and then mark is like also, by the way, we're gonna see turns in the middle of those. It's like, well, that doesn't make any sense, true, um, but I definitely didn't want to draw any attention to that moment in particular because I wanted as much raw feedback on it as I could get to see if it was problematic in any way, what I would need to do to make it more comfortable for users, and I think the best way I could do that is to just see what happens if you're not prepared for it. I'm sure there were a lot of screams and yells and probably cursing my name or Mark's name, hopefully his, hopefully his.
Justin:But from everything I've seen and heard from the community so far, I know the spins were a big moment for a ton of people, which lets me know that it was successful in the sense that even without coach guidance like, say, you had your volume down, people in the house were sleeping, or if you skipped the warm-up you shouldn't skip the warm-up or if you had focus mode on that the move was still successful in conveying what it wanted you to do and getting you from point A to point B without issue. So that was a really big point for me, just kind of growing as a choreographer, and also what do I need to do to make this better the next time I do it?
MJ:And you do a lot of training us through your workouts. You know you talked about those drum roll patterns and sudden death being three portal. We weren't ready for the five portal version. But now, now that we have the pit, we're ready for the five portal version. So my hope is that we got this 180 spin and then we'll work towards this 360 spin one day. Just putting that out in the universe yeah, training, you know.
Justin:I don't want to say it's impossible, but it just has to be with the right song, because, again, you will end up losing a lot in terms of music if you have a spin that long. Because we can't make it fast by any means. We want to keep you guys as safe as possible, so a spin like that is probably going to take anywhere between like four to eight seconds and in terms of like a pros-only setting, that is a ton of time.
MJ:It is. That is, a ton of targets lost and not having any targets.
Justin:Yeah, so it just has to be the right song. So, like, eternal Blue could probably do it. If you wanted to double-time it, you probably could go all the way around really, really quickly, but it's just a matter of finding the right place. I wouldn't rule it out, but I definitely can't make any promises on it, because it's always going to be the song that tells me if I can do it or not.
MJ:Right. So Eternal Blue told you this is the song for this first iteration of Spin, so we need a song that pops to you about 360 Spins.
Justin:It's going to have to be a pretty slow song.
MJ:And how does that work for practice? Yeah, it's really difficult to be a pretty slow song. And how's that work for? Yeah, it's really difficult so yeah um, one thing I also want to mention is about the location you picked for a tournament it's bolivia, and I think a lot of people thought that was a new location to us, which it's not. It's an old school one, but you put a dark filter on it, right well, not so much a filter.
Justin:Um, we, I believe we did have to kind of make that environment from scratch. Okay, um, and joel was definitely the person to talk to about that process because I worked directly with him, um, and making that happen. But yeah, the song is called Eternal Blue and that environment in Bolivia, that large open mirror on the salt fields, it's literally like pure blue in the original environment. I was like, well, I have to use that one, but I can't justify the sun shining down, all happy and bright and also being in the pits. I was like, well, can we take this and just make it darker? We just slap on the brightness and just turn it down a little bit. Um, I had no idea they were going to go so above and beyond and make this whole new constellation filled landscape, and I was. I was blown away.
Justin:The stars all of that was so pretty it was so cool and when I hopped in there and I played eternal blue in that setting for the first time, I was like this team is amazing, this team is so cool. Yeah, um, just to make something like this happen. And it's like you know, I'm so humbled and so in awe of something like that, because not only was the turnaround so fast, but also just like having this team of people making a vision like this come to life for me and I'm like I'm just a choreographer. Really. It was like now you're, you are the director for this project and we're going to make this happen. I'm like that's, that's crazy. It's like just being in this position where I was like, well, can we do this? And I'm like, yeah, we'll do it. And then they did. And I'm like, oh, look at that.
MJ:You're like wow, I had no idea that every I mean you being the director, the creative force, obviously, the whole team. You're working with all of them, but it's your idea.
Justin:You know yeah.
MJ:But the fact that Joel could deliver such the perfect environment for the song, for the vibe, for the spin, for the whole narrative of the workout. So talented, great job, joel. That location is next level. So talented, great job Joel. That location is next level, so good.
Justin:Beautiful, beautiful location.
MJ:Yeah, and this is just a personal, this is me personally. Don't play the song in front facing three portal y'all, please don't. You just lose all the magic of it. It totally, with no modifiers, if you can. Yeah, it's totally worth it, especially for that song. Yeah.
Justin:Yeah, I mean we definitely want to take account and take responsibility for our mobility-impaired users, for sure. But if it's something that your body is capable of performing, my recommendation from like a safety perspective too, because we don't map with the intention of it being condensed down into three portals, um, so there are sometimes unintended side effects of, like, certain movements in the body that will be uncomfortable or just straight up, surprising to you, and we don't want anything to come out of that as an undetended side effect of just having the lanes be condensed. So my recommendation would always be to play it with full portals active if that's something that you are capable of. Listen to your body, yeah listen to your body.
MJ:It's so fun. If you have not played this workout yet which anyone who's listening to this, I'm going to assume, probably has at least played the pit once but if you haven't, please try and experience it safely, in the full original intended version, because man, especially that spin that first time and prepare. If you can record your reaction, do that, because I wish I would have recorded my action reaction, because I know I screamed, I was so excited, it was so fun, so fun. So we go from eternal blue to your anchor song, to your first song you picked out for this workout. Nobody by Aven sevenfold oh, and we get the full experience in this song. Everything from all the previous songs come together in the final boss, the final showdown of this uh workout yeah and we're in sephiria, right yepferia, yeah.
MJ:Sferia which is so pretty. All the locations you picked were great for this workout. Go with the vibe, go with the story man. This workout, this song here, let's talk about it. So you said you had over 20 iterations of this. This is the one that you edited the most changed even two weeks before the workout came out. Yeah, what section Did you just start from? The very first note, Like where did you begin to map this song?
Justin:Yeah, that crazy drum roll. That was like the first thing I looked at. So Nobody's a Bit of a Journey drum roll. It was like the first thing I looked at, um, so no, nobody's a bit of a journey. Um, when the life is about, a dream album came out. It was my favorite album of the year. It was phenomenal. It's fantastic. Every song on that album is phenomenal, um, and then a few months later, me and my best friend went to go see event seven fold in concert, um, with supporting artists Poppy, and went to go see M7 Fold in concert with supporting artist Poppy, who I would also love to map, and Sullivan King, who I would also love to map.
Justin:But we went to see them in concert and then they came out with that song and it's just a beautiful, phenomenal, amazing experience, the best concert I had ever been to.
Justin:But I was sitting there and I was watching them play it live and I was focused on the guitarist and the way his hand was moving and in my head I'm translating his hand movements to targets and I'm like I can see the pattern. And so the first thing I look at when I finally got my hands on that song was like how are we translating the motion of the hand to the motion of the body? And it took forever. It took forever, but that is where I started was just making this insanely long drum roll pattern, which I believe is the longest drum roll pattern I've come up with now with.
Justin:I believe it's 26 seconds long, um, something like that. In comparison to not ready to die, which again I'm just having to hold in their ridiculousness, I think that one was about 18 seconds, the guitar solo for that one, so it's a pretty sizable difference, but it is relentless and I love it. I love it Every time I listen to that song. Before the pit got started working, I was like I can't wait to get to that because that's going to be awesome.
MJ:That drumroll pattern is no joke. And you've got us turning, and those are always my favorite when you've got us actually turning and spinning, and some of us do this. I have a friend who does this like bouncing hop dance during the drum roll. That's the only way she can hit them all. I have to step my feet every single time. So, um, it's so fun, but it is so intense and you know it's coming like. You know it builds to that. How many portals is that one?
Justin:I swear it's five in some parts um the chorus section solos are three portals okay, really oh my yeah only yeah, they might feel like a bit more yeah the guitar solo expands up to five okay that section and the chorus, the ones I'm referring to specifically are three portals.
MJ:Yeah, fair enough. Fair enough, because I'm like confusing that part with the guitar, where there is five portals.
Justin:Yeah.
MJ:Which is still always so awesome to see happen. There is a section and we're staying. I believe we're standing to the back and we hit rainbow joy balls. Why did you pick the rainbow joy balls? Um?
Justin:A lot of that has to do with the music video of Nobody.
Justin:Actually, a lot of the visuals in the song in general have to do with the music video and I highly encourage after this if you go watch the music video for it, a lot of the decisions that I make for the choreography make a lot more sense with that context, Even down to like the color scheme of the environment itself. It came down to Tanzania, which has a very similar color scheme, and also the same kind of constellations in the sky, and Syria, spherea. But that section in the music video has this kind of like kaleidoscope mosaic of colors that are more in line with, like, spherea's color palette, but they are very much this like not like fully chromatic, but I don't really know the exact word for this this but it changes between these blues and pinks and yellows and it feels like a very specific, targeted rainbow of colors that you're viewing in the video and so it's like well, this has to be a rainbow here. Basically, I'm taking inspiration from the visuals that they provided themselves and I'm throwing it into here.
MJ:Yeah, okay, that makes sense. I'm always interested to know why you guys pick the joy balls you pick, and I know sometimes it has to do with the lyrics or, like in this case, it has to do with the music video, the video and what they're doing in that section of the song. So I find that fascinating. I'm glad that we had something that could translate to what you visually saw in the music video. It's one of my favorite parts of the song, is so beautiful. Yeah, with the music visually, what you're seeing with, with the targets that are coming before and after, it's just an awe inspiring moment. So now I really want to go watch the music video and see if I get that same feeling during that section that you gave us during the mapping yeah, I have a feeling that you will.
MJ:Oh, I hope so so what else can you tell us about? Nobody. Since this is your, I'm gonna assume your favorite map of the set Hands down for sure. Above all it's definitely your favorite.
Justin:Yeah, yeah, there's so much that went into this song. It's incredible, like speaking on to that part we were just talking about, like just before those rainbowter eggs come in, um, the. The lyrics say and see, and you're like, you're opening your eyes and you're seeing. And what I do for that pattern specifically is you, you cross in with both arms and the idea is that you're like you have your eyes covered and then you open them up and now you're seeing and your gift is this rainbow and this cosmic expand. Um, and it's again a lot like what they do in the music video.
Justin:Um, and then that drum roll section, just iteration upon iteration upon iteration upon iterations, trying to make sure that it was fun. It was tangible that there weren't going to be like an egregious amount of accidental hits. When you're moving that fast, the tendency is for you to accidentally hit a target on the upswing that you're not supposed to. So trying to find the right amount of spacing between your downstrokes and your upstrokes to make sure you don't hit anything in the way, because I know people are chasing 100% accuracy and I want to encourage that behavior. So you know, I don't want there to be anything where people are frustrated being like oh, this target's in the way. Well, nope, I tested for that.
MJ:Hello, cat Peter says he wants to come hear about the pit.
Justin:I'll tell you all about it we can have our own episode and the solo, the solo itself. It's just so much, and especially like the build with the cello and the easter eggs that I incorporated just before it, like really honing in on the build of the sound and the emotion, and then just this rise and fall and this just like plunge into madness itself. Yeah, such an incredible moment for me to be like. This is my solo now, um, and this is, this is my test, you know, like four mad houses and four songs deep into the pit and now you are here facing probably the most complicated pattern I've ever put together in flow, and I love it.
MJ:You love it. I love it so much. How many times have you played that map, do you think?
Justin:By itself, probably at least 30 or 40. Yeah, sometimes I'll just hop in and I'll just play Nobody alone and just enjoy it. Really, it's like a lot of the times I can go back to other songs and look through them while I'm playing and say, oh, this could be better, this could be better. Nobody is maybe one of the very few songs I've ever choreographed where I go back in and I'm like I don't have anything I want to change.
MJ:That's awesome, but also sort of scary if you think about it, because does it make you feel pressure for the next map that will make you feel complete in that way. Will make you feel complete in that way.
Justin:Nah, because I mean I have maps that I don't put nearly as much effort into. That also gave me that feeling Like what did I say? There's a couple that have come out recently, like Nasty90's Super Beast. Ton of fun, mapped it super fast, but it's like it's perfect. I have no notes.
MJ:I have no notes and then To Be Loved from Stronger.
Justin:Than Before, stronger Than Before, yeah, stronger Than Before. Yeah, also, it's just like, it's just fun, it's just a good time, and it's like I go back and I play those and I'm like, yeah, this is good, this is good, I don't have anything to change about this. I'm a lot more critical of my pros-only work, for sure, at a general level. But I look at all of my maps with a very critical eye and even when I'm done with them and I publish them, I'll go back after a few weeks or so, like when they come out usually, and play them and I'm like, ah, I should have changed that. But by that point I was like, ah, next time when I come across that pattern, I'll change it. And so it informs the future.
Justin:But I don't really like to dwell on like the past in that regard because I don't really consider them mistakes. They're just, they're informing me of what I need to do better next time, but informing me of what I need to do better next time. But there's never going to be another song like Nobody. I'm not going to use Nobody again. So I'm not really worried about striving for that same level of perfection, because it's a different song, it's a different form of perfection that I would be seeking essentially and Nobody is just a complete song as it is. Uh, I truly believe that there is not really many other songs like it and avenge sevenfold. If you come across this, I love it. Do another one of those albums.
MJ:That was awesome and you would uh definitely want to map those songs if they created them.
Justin:Oh yeah, oh yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, between Nobody and Cosmic. For sure, cosmic would probably be my second choice for a song to map in like a Madhouse score, pros only setting. Both of them have very similar vibes, although Cosmic is, I'd say it's, more of that sweeping dynamic that Cry of Achilles gives where nobody is like really big, build and then drop off. Cosmic is a little bit of that, but it gives you more rises and falls and then it ups you to a whole other plateau. It's like a completely different plane of existence.
MJ:um, when you really listen to that song but I would love to do cosmic at some point too so I know you're very active in the community. Check out posts. I see you commenting and reacting often yes what was like a surprising um feedback that you read from the pit.
Justin:Was there anything that surprised you that you read um, yeah, I I think the thing that really surprised me the most was how much people liked cry of achilles.
MJ:Yeah, same it was surprising for me to hear that I mean. Um, I thought for sure, eternal blue, nobody were going to be standouts.
Justin:But when I hear people talking about cry of achilles I'm like, oh okay, I mean, I see it, I see but, um, initially I didn't expect that, I suppose yeah, I, I guess, like part of me, thinks that Cry of Achilles feels a bit more like the outlier out of all of them. There's definitely some arguments that could be made for the dying song as well, and I think that's probably the least popular. But I definitely expected that. But Cry of Achilles, with its length overall being the longest song on the set and also being probably the most removed from the metal as a whole, I think for diehard metal fans.
Justin:That would be the one that's like, why is this in here? But it has its place and I think it being there makes the whole set list a little bit more palatable. So you know, heavy metal and like screamo, as some people like to refer to it as is, like, not usually the most palatable sound for a lot of people, it's an acquired taste, for sure. And even I don't like a lot of metal songs with like exclusively harsh, dirty vocals, which is why I like bands like Spirit Box and Slipknot. Even though Slipknot is usually more harsh, they do offer these moments of really beautiful sounding melodies. Courtney Courtney, the Plant does an amazing job of that with a lot of her spirit box tracks.
Justin:Granted, I tend to prefer some of the heavier sounding songs, but you know just the. The fact that we get a bit of both in most of their songs is what I really like to look for and listen for in my general music. But also, just like for something like this, it's more interesting for me to choreograph a song that has nuance and different levels of volume and intensity, and so when you have, like, the guitar section going crazy and the vocals are really soft and sweet, and then you have the exact opposite happening like. That's awesome and I love being able to play off of stuff like that.
Justin:And Cry of Achilles, I think, does a really good job of blending tense emotional vocals with tense emotional guitar. And a really cool thing about what Alter Bridge does is they do a lot of stuff that's not in traditional 4-4. I don't think Cry of Achilles is in 3-4, but I do have to map on triplets instead of quarter notes, half notes, sixteenth notes, the usual traditional stuff. I'm mapping in triplets, sextuplets. I don't know what 12 is, but that's what I'm working on and just having like the difference in space alone for like the timing of targets offers a whole new world of possibilities and I love being able to do that.
MJ:That's amazing. I'm so glad that your creativity can come out with workouts like this, where you get to have a hand in picking out music, the environments, you get to curate it, um, because I think it shows the best of what you have to offer, what you would map for yourself, um, and it gives us a cool glimpse into your creative thought processes and what you like to play in supernatural. So I appreciate that this, um, these experiences are here for us and I know that you take in a lot from the community.
MJ:You know we begged for two years for a new mathhouse and here we are um so I I have to know if you could pick any coach other than mark to play the pit with. Like you guys both got in headset. You're doing voice chat in there and you could play with them alongside of them. Who would you want to play with?
Justin:and I feel like this might surprise a lot of people um, but my choice would probably be mindy. Um, for a couple of reasons, the biggest one being like mindy and I are just. I feel like we're on the same level of crazy. This is so, and I I love playing stuff with her in general, like with the Portal Kombat, playing those with her and just listening to her bubbly, excitable nature have to experience my insanity. It's just like the greatest thing ever. I love that so much.
Justin:But she's also probably like the person that's most used to that insanity outside of mark because of the portal combat series and just my boxing in general. But you know, I think just having her boxing experience and like knowing kind of what to expect from me in terms of just like pure nonsense and then having to translate that to flow where she's like less experienced, then I think would just be hilarious I think it would be absolutely hilarious as well, because, like you said, she doesn't have as much experience in flow um, so to hear her reaction to a workout like that would be fantastic.
MJ:I hope that happens for you guys try and record it. I'm like try and record part of it, especially the spin, actually no, the drum roll pattern, the long drum roll pattern in my body. That's what I want to hear her react to you know. So what is your favorite move out of the whole set? Do you have one?
Justin:this is the most specific thing ever. Nobody would ever guess, okay, I promise nobody would ever guess, okay. Um, within the guitar solo section of Nobody, there is one target that has. You're in the middle of the 16th note, drum roll and the target goes down and has a tail attached to it and it like swoops up into another tail in a different portal and the guitar at that section. You're doing all the stuff and then for just a moment it goes and I put a tail on it.
Justin:You put a tail on it the music told you to put a tail on it and you're like okay one section where you stop doing 16th notes for like just a fraction of a second and that tail guides you right back into the next set. And it's the smallest little thing, but every time I hit it it's like the most satisfying, like dopamine rush I've ever experienced. I love it so much it's such a small thing.
MJ:I love that. That's a cool one. So are there any hidden easter eggs throughout this workout that people have not picked up on? Like you're waiting for someone to discover though you just told us that one. We got a freebie out of you it's.
Justin:It's hard to say if I'm like hiding anything specific. I've talked about a lot of the intention behind stuff. Yeah, I mean, we talked about the portal transition from Cry of Achilles into Poisonous Shadows, talked about crawling and stuff with Poisonous Shadows. I think the only thing I could really harp on in terms of like a secret that people haven't quite figured out yet is, well, two things. One is the relation of the cooldown song, and that will only become available if we make another one, we make another pit. Then I can reveal the secrets of that. But the big thing I want to try to ask the community, for those who are invested in the story and the lore, is what is the pit, why are we down there and what is calling us?
MJ:this okay, and if, for anyone who is interested in digging deep into this, I will definitely make sure to post Justin's story that goes with the pit that he wrote, I will post that in the private Facebook group.
Justin:If you go to Justin's Facebook page, you can see all his side-by-sides for the pit and he has the story written there. So if you want to make any sort of thoughtful guesses as to what the pit is, there's a lot of lore that went into that.
Justin:I made a whole like little short story that went along with starting with, like, the creation of the pit and the madhouse, what it represents, and just kind of leading up to this moment before we go down into it. So that would definitely provide a lot more context than I can explain here, because the story alone is a podcast episode in itself.
MJ:It is for sure, and that's where you hook me lore, if there's lore, if there's more, I can investigate more than meets the eye. I want it, I want to know all of it. Hence why I have a podcast that talks about Supernatural I mean it just all plays into it. So you hooked me when you posted the very first song, the very first side beside of the pit and I was like what is he talking about?
MJ:I see the dying song, but now he's got this like short paragraph story. I was like I want more. Where's the next? Where's the next chapter? Where's the next part? So, um, for anyone else who's also into the deep lore of things, there is one for the pit, and I think that's really cool, really cool that you offered that for these workouts.
Justin:Yeah, no, that was a ton of fun.
MJ:Yeah, part of your creative process when creating the whole experience for us. That's great. So I have to know is the Pit the start of a new series, or is this just a one-time experience? And I know you've already kind of talked upon it. Yeah, if we ask for more, maybe we'll get more.
Justin:Yeah, it's one of those things where the community's voice speaks louder than pretty much anything I can say. I would love to make a second, I would love to make a third. A fourth, I think I'm going to cut it after that.
MJ:A sixth Come on.
Justin:I've only got so many songs.
Justin:Fair enough Fair enough, but I wrote my plan for this with the intention of having three. Whether or not we get three will depend on a lot of different, you know, situations within the, the company itself. Um, I have a lot of day-to-day choreography going on. As much as I'd love to just crank out pros only's every week, um, I don't think my body would like that very much. But this is one of those things where the community is like we want more, we want more. You know, I will send it to the powers that be and say, well, I didn't say it, but they all said it.
MJ:So basically start a petition and make sure we post a lot about it. So continue like when we were like we want Madhouse 5. We want Madhouse 5.
Justin:Where's?
MJ:Madhouse 5?.
Justin:Yeah, now we want a second pit, and I would be delighted to give it to you For sure.
MJ:Awesome. So it's not a no. There is hope there and there is still hope with the 360 spin too.
Justin:Yeah, marla, I'm not gonna say it's impossible. It's definitely possible. But the this song will let me know when it is possible.
MJ:Yeah, I get that. I think I really do understand how the music is, what guides you and why it's so important that prose only especially has the right music picked out for it, because it determines how you can move in it and what you can do in it. You can't put a sleepy song in a prose or it's going to be sleepy. So that I think I really do understand that and I hope people who are listening can can get that as well and why certain songs are picked for certain workouts, especially when it comes to the pit or any of the madhouses before that.
Justin:Yep, absolutely. It makes a world of difference. The right song with the right energy changes. So much about how the choreography plays into it.
MJ:And if you haven't played the Pit, or you've played it 30 times, like some of us this week's workout suggestion is definitely the Pit. Please go play it after you listen to this. See if you can pick out some of the things justin was talking about and explaining. See how it feels. Watch the music video for nobody before, definitely before you go experience the map.
Justin:Any other suggestions for people before they go play the pit again If you're looking for new bands to get into Slepnot, Alter Bridge, Megadeth, Spiritbox especially, and Event of Sevenfold Amazing, All of them are amazing, Massive and very, very robust sounding discographies. Something for everybody there, I think. But you know, if you're a fan of my work, prepare to hear a lot more of them.
MJ:You're getting them in there. You're going to be mapping those bands a lot, huh.
Justin:Hopefully, yes, hopefully.
MJ:We have a few Spirit Box workouts or that feature Spirit Box and they're actually your workouts.
Justin:Yep.
MJ:I just recently got into Spirit Box because of those workouts, yep, so I was very excited to see them in the pit. For sure they have a wide range.
Justin:Oh yeah.
MJ:It is so wide. It's not any new song I hear when I'm checking them out listening. It's always surprising to me and I'm always pleased You've got Eternal Blue, but then you have way more intense hardcore songs.
Justin:Oh yeah.
MJ:It's a great band to check out, for sure.
Justin:Mm-hmm.
MJ:Yeah, and then after people play their workouts, they should definitely rate them.
Justin:Most important thing you do Tell the people yeah, now, rating the workout is probably the most direct line that you guys have to, letting us know what you guys want, what you like, what you didn't like. It is the best way for us to get feedback from you guys and be able to act on it and make decisions, informed decisions, to help you guys have a better supernatural experience. Please, please, please, rate the workouts. Look to your left when you finish. Hit those buttons. Give it a double thumbs up, hit the other. If you want to talk about how much you love the spins or how you want to see more pits or more spirit box or whatever, whatever you want to say, that's the place to do it. That's the best place to do it. If you want to just tell me I'm doing a good job, I'd love to hear it. So please rate the workouts.
MJ:Yeah, he'll see it. He Please rate the workouts. Yeah, he'll see it. He'll see your comment. They get back to everyone. So it's very important that you write your workouts and then we get the things we want like the pit too, hopefully. Well, I appreciate you coming on today, dude, seriously, always a joy to hang out with you, talk choreography, talk about supernatural music and until next time, see you guys later.
Justin:Yeah, thank you so much for having me, marla. I appreciate it.
MJ:Anytime, dude, See you guys later. Bye. Thanks for joining us on today's episode of For the Love of the Map. As always, you can join the discussion in the private Facebook group and follow along with show updates on Instagram and TikTok. Links can be found in the description below. If you find value in the show, please share it with your friends. Your comments, likes and reviews are invaluable and I cannot thank you guys enough. See you next time.