3min chapter

20VC: Haystack’s Semil Shah on Whether Founders Are Bypassing Seed Funds in Favour Of Less Dilutive Multi-Stage Funds, How Fund Strategy Changes With Fund Scaling & Why The Hardest Challenge is Price Discipline

The Twenty Minute VC (20VC): Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The Pitch

CHAPTER

Celebrating Ecosystem Connections and Innovative Solutions for Startups

This chapter highlights the importance of returning guests and the strong relationships in the startup ecosystem. The hosts discuss Haystack's fundraising future and spotlight innovative companies like Brex and Pilot that support startup success.

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Transcript

Episode notes

Speaker 2

It's been it's been here forever. Yeah. There was no world before that. And so being able to say like, I can't believe that there is

Speaker 1

actually like a flesh and blood person attached to this. It's not even my favorite Beatles song, but it was just this moment of like the cognitive dissonance of, oh, these,

Speaker 2

some

Speaker 1

of these people are actually humans. Like they're not gods. They're not cartoon characters. Like I went on tour with David Bowie. And I remember the last night of the tour in we were at the gorge outside Seattle and he was backstage and he was so delightful and goofy. Like we'd spent a ton of time together, but this was the first time I had seen him at his most unguarded. Like he was sweaty. He just had a wonderful show and he was human. Almost going back to what we were talking about earlier, like the shadow self. Like this might have been like his shadow self because it was childlike and delightful. You know, like maybe a part of him that he didn't want people to see that much. And it was so endearing and so lovely. And I was like, I, this is David Bowie. Like this is the greatest musician of all time and he's acting like a super lovely goofy 14 year old right

Speaker 2

now. How did you come to meet him originally?

Speaker 1

Well, I actually met him for the first time at a nine inch nails party, but we didn't really get to talk much. And then in 1999 or 2000, he emailed me and he said, hi, it's David. I got your email address from someone at my record company. I'm moving into an apartment on Lafayette Street and I think we're going to be neighbors. And so he, we lived across the street from each other and we became friends. We would get coffee together. We spent holidays together. We worked on music together. We toured together. Can I tell you one of my favorite, favorite David Bowie stories? Please. Okay. We had agreed to play a fundraiser for Philip Glasses to Bed House. And so he came over to my apartment one morning. He stopped at Cafe Jitan to get coffee. So he came over with coffee and we sat on my sofa and I worked up all my courage and I said, what if we play an acoustic version of heroes at this fundraiser? And I thought he was going to say, no, no, how dare you suggest that. And instead he said, sure, why not? So he sat on my sofa, just the two of us and played this very slow, pretty quiet version of heroes. And it was like just one of the most wonderful moments of my life. And then afterwards, tying it back to Lou Reed, David told me that heroes was originally written as a cover version of waiting for the man. Wow. Dun, dun, dun, dun, dun, dun, dun, dun, dun, dun, dun, dun, dun, dun, dun, dun, I'm waiting for the man we would be, you know, so

Speaker 2

that was

Speaker 1

amazing. That's my favorite David Bowie story.

Speaker 2

Fantastic.

Speaker 1

I actually know I have a second favorite David Bowie story, but it's much, it's more nuanced.

Speaker 2

Okay, let's hear it.

Speaker 1

I was at his apartment and he had a very small studio in his apartment. And he wanted to play me something and I was like, okay, great. He said, he said, it's a song I'm working on, I'd love your opinion. And I first of all, just to put that in perspective, like I'm at David Bowie's apartment and he wants to play me a song to get my opinion. Like that's not right. That's not the way it's supposed to be. Like I'm supposed to be maybe like cleaning the toilets in the apartment adjacent to David Bowie's apartment, not in his apartment, but he plays me this song and it's the most beautiful David Bowie song ever. It's called slip away and it's on the album He's in. And it's, I would say, the most personal song he's ever written. It's actually inspired by his love, like his love with Iggy Pop. Like you know, friendship, whether it was more than friendship, I don't really know. But like it's this beautiful love song and it is so emotional. And I, that moment of just sitting in his studio where he played the CD, the demo of this song for me, and he was nervous. And it was done. And I was like, David, I said, that might be the most beautiful song you've ever

Speaker 2

written. How did he react to that comment?

Speaker 1

You know, it's funny because we never talked about music. If I remember, he responded a little formally and in a polite way, which is the same way I respond to people telling me about music. Like, he almost like, he took it in, but I could tell a sort of a wall came up. I think he felt exposed because it, if you think about it, most of his music is not personal. It's beautiful. It's phenomenal. But rarely did he write personal songs. You know, they're very theatrical. I mean, even heroes, heroes was written about Tony Visconti. And this song, Slip Away, is so personal. And I think it, I think I saw his defenses come down because he realized he was being perhaps a little too vulnerable. Yeah.