D.J. Piehowski and Tourist Sauce: Bridging the Taste Gap
A big reason why I'm so excited for the new season of No Laying Up's golf and travel series Tourist Sauce.
Let me introduce you to The Taste Gap, outlined through the following quote from legendary radio personality Ira Glass:
Nobody tells this to people who are beginners, and I really wish somebody had told this to me.
All of us who do creative work, we get into it because we have good taste. But it’s like there is this gap. For the first couple years that you’re making stuff, what you’re making isn’t so good. It’s not that great. It’s trying to be good, it has ambition to be good, but it’s not that good.
But your taste, the thing that got you into the game, is still killer. And your taste is good enough that you can tell that what you’re making is kind of a disappointment to you. A lot of people never get past that phase. They quit.
Everybody I know who does interesting, creative work they went through years where they had really good taste and they could tell that what they were making wasn’t as good as they wanted it to be. They knew it fell short. Everybody goes through that.
And if you are just starting out or if you are still in this phase, you gotta know its normal and the most important thing you can do is do a lot of work. Do a huge volume of work. Put yourself on a deadline so that every week or every month you know you’re going to finish one story. It is only by going through a volume of work that you’re going to catch up and close that gap. And the work you’re making will be as good as your ambitions.
I took longer to figure out how to do this than anyone I’ve ever met. It takes a while. It’s gonna take you a while. It’s normal to take a while. You just have to fight your way through that.
I often return to this quote. My writing here is not at the level where I would like it to be and while that is frustrating and demoralizing, I remind myself that the Taste Gap exists and that I need to continue writing to have any chance at improving. It’s no surprise I’m experiencing the Taste Gap because the Taste Gap exists for all. The Taste Gap does not discriminate, everyone must grapple with it. For instance:
On that note, later tonight, No Laying Up is releasing the first episode of their new season of Tourist Sauce, a golf and travel video series. D.J. Piehowski has been the executive producer for each season. Though it may be oversimplifying things, I would describe these videos as his work. D.J. continues to improve the series with each season. You can watch D.J. bridge across his own Taste Gap with every iteration of Tourist Sauce that gets released, improving the output by taking on this creative challenge again and again. I find The Taste Gap a particularly poignant lens to analyze this new season through since the group is returning to Australia where they filmed the initial season many years ago.
At the time, I found the first season of Tourist Sauce quite enjoyable. I was captivated by the novel concept and the ability to see exotic golf courses which I may never get to play. I watched every episode, and nothing stood out as poorly done or suboptimal. I felt as though NLU were putting out the best version they could. I was excited by what D.J. was creating, though maybe not fully engrossed.
Then, NLU released their most recent season, Tourist Sauce: Scandinavia. After watching these episodes, you can tell the latter is a better work of art. This season was lauded for its dramatic improvements. First, there may be equipment upgrades to the cameras and microphones, but there were also shot composition, lighting, auditory, and storytelling improvements. The final production is more seamless and it’s much easier to get completely immersed within the Scandinavia microcosms being shown.
The most recent season is better than the previous iterations and I feel that D.J. himself would agree with this sentiment. The first season would have been this good if it could have been, but the Taste Gap got in the way. Through hard work and commitment, the series has markedly improved over time, even though each season was the best D.J. could produce in that moment. That is the nature of the Taste Gap.
The flaws and immaturity of the first season are only revealed once an upgraded version exists. Again, I enjoyed the first season of this series, but it pales in comparison to Tourist Sauce: Scandinavia. The old videos were great at the time, but now appear messy. The narratives feel rushed and incomplete. In fact, the videos are way shorter. The camera work is not as pleasing. The audio occasionally clips. And it is harder to follow the players’ rounds of golf. Yet it remains a fun, well-made project even if it no longer appears to be the gold standard. As outlined by the Taste Gap, the first season of Tourist Sauce had the “ambition to be good, but it’s not that good”.
D.J. seemingly has always had the drive to create work as good as his ambitions. We would not have seen the continuous improvement in the productions otherwise. And it is only through the hard work of D.J., and I’m sure the rest of their team, that each season is better than the last. I can all but guarantee that D.J. has wanted to make each Tourist Sauce episode as wonderful as the ones from Tourist Sauce: Scandinavia. These are the videos he has had in his mind all along but translating that cerebral ideal onto the screen is easier said than done. It requires repetition.
It is only by going through a volume of work that you’re going to catch up and close that gap.
Now, we get to return to Australia. Round two of Tourist Sauce: Australia serves as an unearthing of D.J.’s killer taste. The killer taste has always been there and now it can be revealed. Throughout this season, we will get to see how the first season should have looked and felt all along. Tourist Sauce season one will serve as a visible draft, a sketch to be compared against the finished product. It is not often you get to witness someone bridging across their Taste Gap so clearly, but this return of the No Laying Up crew to Australia gives us the opportunity to do so. I am excited to be vividly shown how much this creative endeavor has improved over the past six years.
The new season will be better than the first season but only because of all of the work that has been done between them. This is the visual art that D.J. had probably always wanted to create, but only now do has the ability to do so.
Thanks for reading.