Rory & Mal Eloquently Address Split From 'The Joe Budden Podcast'

Source: Johnny Nunez / Getty

The Joe Budden Podcast helped usher in a new era in podcasting, and its deserved notoriety resulted in an exclusive deal with Spotify that effectively changed the landscape. The original format appears to be no more as host Joe Budden fired one of his co-hosts live on air, leading to Rory Farrell and Jamil “Mal” Clay to address the split in brutally honest, but perhaps necessary fashion.

In a special paywall video shared to Vimeo, Rory, and Mal, appearing to be sitting inside the studio hub of their former (?) colleague in Parks Vallely, who has been somewhat caught in the middle of this public split. This past Wednesday (May 12), Budden initially posted episode 437 of the podcast, only to remove and place it behind his Patreon paywall.

The podcast episode was “bootlegged” for lack of a better term and circulated widely on social media, becoming something of a celebratory moment for Akademiks, who held a mock funeral for Rory and Mal, rivals of his, during a live Twitch stream.

In Rory and Mal’s response, cleverly titled “I’ll Name This Response Later, which is a nod to the very podcast the pair joined years ago titled I’ll Name This Podcast later with Budden before its rebranding, features Rory and Mal countering many of Budden’s charges of greed, theft, audits, and backstabbing.

As fans of the show are familiar with, Mal is especially tight-lipped about his past prior to the show but maintained that a bond between him and Budden was the foundation that kept him wanting to keep the show alive. Forging a bond with Rory, Mal has stood by his former co-host’s side on the internal conflict between the three figureheads of the show, giving more details about the show’s inner workings than anyone should be privy to.

From those fans who did purchase the Vimeo video, it appears that Rory and Mal didn’t completely blast Budden in the fashion he did with them. In fact, it’s being said that they gave Budden far more grace than he did with them.

In Budden’s defense, he apologized on air to Rory in the latest episode of the show. Parks, to his credit, has been firm in saying that he wouldn’t have handled their issues in the explosive fashion Budden did, but he’s also trying to remain neutral.

While there might not a reunion of The Joe Budden Podcast and its original members anytime soon, hopefully, this puts to rest the tensions and all parties can move on from this.

Twitter is ripe with reactions, and we’ve got them listed out below.

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Photo: Getty

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