The Joe Rogan Experience - Joe Rogan Experience #1656 - Adam Duritz

00:00:03.000 The Joe Rogan Experience.

00:00:15.000 Hello, Adam.

00:00:16.000 Hello, Joe.

00:00:16.000 How you doing?

00:00:17.000 I'm pretty good.

00:00:18.000 It's good to see you.

00:00:19.000 It's nice to meet you, man.

00:00:19.000 It's nice to be...

00:00:20.000 I've been a fan of your work for a long fucking time.

00:00:24.000 And it's always weird when you meet someone that you listen to their music or you've seen their stuff and you're like, oh, you're just a normal human being. 0.96

00:00:31.000 There you are.

00:00:32.000 A little whacked out, but yeah. 0.99

00:00:34.000 But it's, you know, like, I remember watching Mr. Jones on MTV, and I loved that fucking video, man. 0.97

00:00:43.000 And I loved you dancing in that, was it like a living room or something like that? 0.97

00:00:47.000 Yeah, yeah.

00:00:47.000 I'm like, I want to be that free.

00:00:50.000 Like, you seem so loose.

00:00:52.000 You were so in the moment.

00:00:54.000 I remember thinking that.

00:00:55.000 I remember talking to a friend of mine that night after a show.

00:00:59.000 I was at a bar.

00:01:00.000 I was like, you ever see that Mr. Jones video?

00:01:02.000 I go, when that dude's dancing, I go, I want to figure out how to get there. 0.99

00:01:06.000 Shit, I want to be that free. 0.98

00:01:08.000 You know, it's a weird thing. 0.99

00:01:09.000 I used to...

00:01:10.000 I'm going to take this off for now.

00:01:11.000 Okay.

00:01:11.000 I used to be...

00:01:13.000 For me, you know, life is...

00:01:16.000 Often very awkward and uncomfortable, but not on stage.

00:01:20.000 On stage, I always felt like, well, this is one place where everything I do is fine.

00:01:24.000 So when I started making videos, at first it was just like, this is easy.

00:01:31.000 Because all I've got to do is do the stuff I'm going to do.

00:01:33.000 And there's nothing wrong I can do.

00:01:36.000 I can just be as free as I want.

00:01:38.000 And that lasted about a year and a half.

00:01:40.000 Maybe two years.

00:01:42.000 Something about like...

00:01:43.000 Getting really famous out of nowhere and then, you know, all the kind of backlash that comes with it.

00:01:51.000 I noticed a couple years later I was a lot more self-conscious.

00:01:57.000 I'm still on stage.

00:01:58.000 I never think about anything.

00:01:59.000 When I'm playing it, nothing bothers me.

00:02:01.000 But in front of cameras, I got really self-conscious in front of cameras after Sometime in the middle of our second record, I just noticed that I started to suck on, not to suck on video, but definitely not like that Mr. Jones video.

00:02:13.000 You became aware that so many people were watching and criticizing you, or like what was it?

00:02:19.000 I think it was that, you know, because at first I just, well, didn't care, and I just thought that there's nowhere in the world I'm more comfortable than here, so I'm fine.

00:02:29.000 And then I think on our second album when we got a lot of backlash and you get a little too big and everybody, you annoy the shit out of people.

00:02:35.000 Especially in a band because you get a really successful song, they're gonna play it on the radio every five minutes.

00:02:40.000 After a while it's like, God, who wouldn't get sick of it, you know?

00:02:43.000 And then you get some backlash after that, people say some terrible things.

00:02:47.000 And then I started thinking about like, what do I look like on film?

00:02:51.000 Then I got really self-conscious, you know? 0.99

00:02:54.000 Does this song make my ass look big? 0.99

00:02:59.000 I noticed that I got kind of crappy just in front of cameras, not the rest of the time. 0.99

00:03:04.000 And not like cameras when I'm on stage at a concert.

00:03:06.000 Like, you play a big festival, there's lots of cameras.

00:03:08.000 It doesn't bother me there.

00:03:09.000 It's just kind of sometimes on TV and in filming, I got kind of self-conscious.

00:03:15.000 And I had never been that way.

00:03:16.000 The press stuff, like that kind of stuff got yourself- I think so.

00:03:19.000 I mean, I don't really know what caused it exactly.

00:03:22.000 The only reason I would say I think you're right about that is that it happened then.

00:03:26.000 And that was the first time I'd experienced that, because no one says anything bad about you when they don't know you exist, for one.

00:03:32.000 And then, on our first record, we couldn't buy a bad review.

00:03:36.000 But by our second record, we weren't even getting...

00:03:41.000 Forget him. 0.99

00:03:42.000 He's fucking this chick, so I don't have to forget his music, you know? 1.00

00:03:45.000 And then, like, he got fat, whatever it would be, you know? 1.00

00:03:48.000 Right, right, right.

00:03:48.000 You start, you know, when a nationwide, a national publication calls you fat, you know?

00:03:53.000 It's like, shit. 1.00

00:03:55.000 I remember getting a review in, like, in England once, and somebody called me, Ponce is a fishmonger's cat. 1.00

00:04:02.000 Which I suppose fishmonger's cats eat a lot.

00:04:04.000 Poncey?

00:04:05.000 Is that like chubby?

00:04:06.000 Poncey?

00:04:07.000 I thought it meant chubby, I assume.

00:04:10.000 I guess.

00:04:11.000 Poncey?

00:04:11.000 I don't know.

00:04:11.000 It just sounded bad.

00:04:12.000 That's so British. 0.82

00:04:13.000 Just being compared to a fishmonger's cat.

00:04:15.000 The fact that fishmonger is involved at all as a word when they're talking about your concert seems like a bad sign, you know?

00:04:21.000 Yeah, there's a thing that happens, right?

00:04:24.000 Like when people discover you and they find out about you and you haven't gotten big yet, like especially for bands, I think.

00:04:32.000 Where they love the fact that they're the first to tell their friends, you gotta listen to this band, gotta listen to this album, this is awesome.

00:04:41.000 But then when you get really big and other people like it, and too many people like it, then you're like, aw man, they were good in the beginning.

00:04:49.000 Well, I think that music, unlike almost everything else, It becomes our personal cool, you know?

00:04:57.000 I mean, we literally wear it on our shirts.

00:04:58.000 Right.

00:04:59.000 You know, and it defines who we are.

00:05:01.000 We talk about this genre or that genre as being our gang almost.

00:05:05.000 And when you're discovering stuff, yeah, it's really cool. 0.98

00:05:08.000 And then when you have to share it with that guy at the water cooler who likes the fucking worst music. 0.98

00:05:13.000 You know, that guy who's been coming in for years, and he's just listening to utter shit, and now he loves your band too, and you're like, I don't want to share this with Captain Asshole over there, you know? 0.98

00:05:23.000 I've never understood that, because why can't people with terrible taste also like great things? 0.97

00:05:27.000 Like, great things are great no matter what.

00:05:29.000 Like, everybody loves The Godfather, right?

00:05:31.000 Yeah, yeah. 0.98

00:05:31.000 It's like, whoever says that movie sucks? 0.98

00:05:34.000 Nobody. 0.87

00:05:34.000 But people who like terrible movies still like The Godfather. 0.87

00:05:38.000 Well, I think it's less because they now like it as that you were in a club without them, and now you're in a club with them.

00:05:45.000 And that just sucks, because you didn't have to be in a club with them before.

00:05:49.000 It's human nature. 0.75

00:05:50.000 I mean, I get it.

00:05:51.000 I didn't like it when it landed on me, but...

00:05:54.000 Yeah, I mean, I get it.

00:05:55.000 Well, and it happened to you pre-social media.

00:05:59.000 Yeah.

00:05:59.000 You guys were just getting reviewed by experts.

00:06:04.000 You weren't get shit on by the general public yet. 0.95

00:06:08.000 No, I mean, but that was a good thing for one. 0.93

00:06:14.000 For me, it had happened when I was kind of already into social media, because I remember moving down to LA after our first album, and that year, while I was writing the second record, discovering that AOL had these message boards.

00:06:29.000 This is 95, say, and I realized that AOL had these forums and message boards for all the bands, and it suddenly occurred to me, well, I could just go on there And talk to people.

00:06:39.000 Because when I read it, they were worried about, were we ever going to make a second record? 0.96

00:06:42.000 Were we going to shit? 0.99

00:06:44.000 Did we exist anymore? 0.99

00:06:45.000 All the questions that you wonder about your band between records.

00:06:49.000 And it suddenly occurred to me, well, I have the answers to all those questions.

00:06:52.000 I could just go on there.

00:06:54.000 And it took me a little while to convince the people on there that I was me.

00:06:59.000 Understandably.

00:07:00.000 Of course.

00:07:01.000 But eventually I did.

00:07:02.000 And then we sort of started this...

00:07:04.000 Kind of community there, you know, way before other social media.

00:07:08.000 But it occurred to me because the rest of the time, you can't get to your fans except through, or you couldn't then, except through the radio, the DJs, and the press.

00:07:17.000 So, like, you don't really get to give anybody your own words.

00:07:20.000 They've got to be filtered through everybody else.

00:07:22.000 Right.

00:07:22.000 But that AOL thing was a chance to just, like, well, like what Twitter and everything is now.

00:07:27.000 But...

00:07:27.000 It occurred to me back then it was really cool.

00:07:30.000 Then I got into arguments with our own fans.

00:07:33.000 I've always done that.

00:07:33.000 What kind of arguments?

00:07:35.000 I don't think I'm who they think I am.

00:07:39.000 Who do you think they think you are?

00:07:41.000 A classic rock guy driving around in a pickup truck.

00:07:45.000 Like going to drive-in movie theaters.

00:07:47.000 Because that's this Americana dream vision of like, we all sit around, you know, going to drive-ins and living some dream of a Springsteen song that Springsteen isn't even any part of, you know?

00:07:58.000 And I would go on there and I'd be like...

00:08:00.000 Have you guys heard the first Justin Timberlake album?

00:08:02.000 It's amazing.

00:08:03.000 It's got, like, Timbaland and the Neptunes doing all the songs.

00:08:06.000 And I would try and make this thing to tell them, like, you should listen to this.

00:08:09.000 It's brilliant music.

00:08:11.000 And they just couldn't grasp the Justin Timberlake thing, because in their mind, NSYNC was the guy at the water cooler.

00:08:17.000 Right. 0.99

00:08:18.000 And so, like, I would get in these huge fights with them, like, you guys don't know shit about music. 0.98

00:08:21.000 You're just like... 0.97

00:08:22.000 You're in this little niche.

00:08:24.000 Rigid.

00:08:24.000 You like us, and I think that's very smart and intelligent.

00:08:27.000 It shows a lot of wisdom, but you're limited.

00:08:30.000 I get in all these fights with them.

00:08:31.000 That's funny.

00:08:32.000 It's funny how people are unwilling to try certain kinds of music because it has this feeling to it.

00:08:43.000 If you like that, you can't be smart.

00:08:47.000 You can't be cool. 1.00

00:08:48.000 This is shit music. 1.00

00:08:50.000 You can't like this. 1.00

00:08:51.000 Well, you know, it came out of like...

00:08:53.000 It did seem at the time like the thing ruining music was the boy bands.

00:08:57.000 You know what I mean?

00:08:58.000 It just seemed like there was one after another back then.

00:09:01.000 It's kind of never stopped.

00:09:03.000 And, you know, I don't know how good some of them were.

00:09:05.000 Maybe they were.

00:09:06.000 I don't know.

00:09:06.000 I mean, I look back a little more fondly on the Backstreet Boys now, maybe.

00:09:10.000 At the time, I couldn't abide any of that.

00:09:12.000 But, I mean, I get it.

00:09:14.000 I guess.

00:09:15.000 But I don't think I was who they thought I was.

00:09:17.000 And why should you be?

00:09:19.000 You know what I mean?

00:09:19.000 Like...

00:09:20.000 We're all really individuals and we're certainly not going to just fit into the peg that people would like.

00:09:26.000 Why would they know who the hell I am?

00:09:28.000 Because I don't know them, you know?

00:09:29.000 Right.

00:09:29.000 And then there's always like whatever the publicists have put out and whatever image they're trying to promote for you guys, like whatever.

00:09:38.000 And then people take it in.

00:09:40.000 They put you in a box.

00:09:41.000 They got you in their head.

00:09:42.000 You're that guy.

00:09:43.000 What's the guy's name from Stained Aaron Lewis?

00:09:47.000 Oh, Aaron Lewis.

00:09:47.000 Yeah.

00:09:47.000 So now he's like, don't tread on me, country western, I'm always carrying a gun.

00:09:52.000 Like, he used to be this, like, you used to think of him as, like, this sort of alt-rock guy, right?

00:09:58.000 Yeah, yeah.

00:09:58.000 And then he's made this, like, hardcore shift to this, like, God, guns, and country type dude.

00:10:04.000 Yeah, and who else?

00:10:05.000 The other guy, a friend of mine.

00:10:09.000 Kate Quigley knows him.

00:10:11.000 Darius Rucker.

00:10:12.000 Darius Rucker.

00:10:13.000 Thank you.

00:10:13.000 Yeah, Darius from Hootie.

00:10:14.000 He's been a country star for a long time now.

00:10:17.000 Bigger probably than even when he was with Hootie.

00:10:20.000 Which is weird because it's a different world that you don't connect to.

00:10:24.000 You usually don't cross that border.

00:10:27.000 That can be a real restricted, closed society.

00:10:30.000 He's had a lot of success over there.

00:10:32.000 He's huge, right?

00:10:33.000 Yeah, I think.

00:10:34.000 I don't really know.

00:10:35.000 I think he's gigantic.

00:10:36.000 I don't know what goes on in that country scene.

00:10:38.000 I like a lot of new country.

00:10:40.000 I come from a country music background in that a lot of the guys in my band, but it doesn't really mesh much with what is country music now, I don't really think.

00:10:53.000 Well, there's a lot of different kinds of country now.

00:10:55.000 There's some really good artists that are doing...

00:10:58.000 Like Sturgill Simpson type dudes that are doing...

00:11:00.000 He's a really good writer.

00:11:01.000 Yeah.

00:11:01.000 They're doing country music, but they're doing great music that has just this sort of country flavor to it.

00:11:09.000 And his shit isn't even always country. 0.99

00:11:11.000 His last album threw everybody on their head. 1.00

00:11:14.000 They're like, what the... 1.00

00:11:14.000 This is some crazy arena rock shit. 1.00

00:11:17.000 What is this? 0.99

00:11:18.000 I haven't heard that record.

00:11:19.000 The new one's wild, man.

00:11:20.000 My guitar player loves Sturgill Simpson.

00:11:23.000 He's awesome.

00:11:24.000 Yeah.

00:11:24.000 He's a great dude, too.

00:11:26.000 You had him on?

00:11:27.000 Yeah, yeah.

00:11:28.000 Yeah, I've become friends with him.

00:11:29.000 He's a cool guy to hang with.

00:11:30.000 I always wanted to meet you, because we have a lot of mutual friends.

00:11:34.000 Like, guys that I've known for a long time that just love you.

00:11:38.000 Jeff.

00:11:39.000 Jeff Ross.

00:11:39.000 Okay.

00:11:40.000 Saget, Bob, for sure.

00:11:41.000 Love him.

00:11:42.000 Oh, you know, Brian Callen, too.

00:11:44.000 Oh, yeah.

00:11:45.000 Yeah.

00:11:45.000 Love him, too.

00:11:46.000 The first time I ever met Brian, we went to his friend's house.

00:11:50.000 We had just gotten there.

00:11:52.000 It was in France.

00:11:53.000 And we were walking out.

00:11:55.000 Everybody's like, here, have a glass of wine.

00:11:56.000 We're going to go look at the sunset.

00:11:57.000 It was on this cliff by the Atlantic Ocean there.

00:12:00.000 And we were walking out across the lawn.

00:12:01.000 I had just met Brian like an hour before that.

00:12:04.000 And there's about eight of us, and we're walking across this lawn.

00:12:07.000 And Brian is just walking next to me.

00:12:09.000 And he turns to me and he goes, all right, now.

00:12:13.000 You're going to say to me, Captain, it's really quiet out there.

00:12:17.000 I'm going to say, maybe too quiet.

00:12:20.000 And you're going to say, what do you think it is?

00:12:21.000 And I'll take it from there.

00:12:24.000 I said, what?

00:12:25.000 He goes, all right, I'll repeat it.

00:12:28.000 You're going to say, Captain, it seems really quiet out there.

00:12:32.000 I'll say, maybe too quiet.

00:12:34.000 You say, what do you think it is?

00:12:36.000 And I'll handle the rest of it.

00:12:40.000 I'm like, uh, okay.

00:12:42.000 Wait till we get to the cliff.

00:12:44.000 I get out there.

00:12:45.000 We're in this group of people.

00:12:46.000 Everyone's looking at the sunset.

00:12:47.000 My friend is talking about how right at the moment before the sunset, there's this green light.

00:12:51.000 This is a deeply spiritual, beautiful moment.

00:12:54.000 And I go, Brian nods at me and I go, It's pretty quiet out there, Captain.

00:13:02.000 And he says, aye, maybe too quiet.

00:13:06.000 And I said, uh, what do you think it is?

00:13:11.000 He looks around and he goes, Orca.

00:13:21.000 Apparently it's like this Richard Harris, remember that movie Orca, the kind of Jaws rip off?

00:13:26.000 Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:13:27.000 So like, Orca.

00:13:31.000 That sounds like Brian Callan.

00:13:33.000 Yeah, absolutely. 0.68

00:13:33.000 And then there was probably some gay stuff. 0.68

00:13:35.000 He probably talked about gay sex. 0.98

00:13:37.000 He's like, okay, we have to do that all the time now. 0.99

00:13:39.000 That's our thing.

00:13:40.000 Tocks and grabbing butts and...

00:13:42.000 Horses.

00:13:42.000 Horses?

00:13:43.000 Yeah, riding horses.

00:13:44.000 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:13:45.000 Maybe guns.

00:13:46.000 Probably the occasional sword.

00:13:48.000 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:13:49.000 Sword play.

00:13:50.000 Fencing.

00:13:51.000 Savate.

00:13:52.000 Maybe because you're in France, he'll bring up French martial art.

00:13:56.000 Savate.

00:13:57.000 Savate, yes.

00:13:58.000 Yeah.

00:13:59.000 He's quite a character.

00:14:00.000 Yeah, we know quite a few people.

00:14:03.000 Did you spend any time at the store?

00:14:05.000 At the comedy store?

00:14:07.000 More like the cellar with Jeff a lot of times.

00:14:12.000 I met Bob, I don't know how long ago, right when I first started out because my goddaughter's Her mother was really good friends with Lori Loughlin, so she's my goddaughter's godmother.

00:14:26.000 So when I was recording my first album, I met them and so Bob, I knew through her because he was on Full House and they would always come to shows.

00:14:33.000 I just stayed friends with him for years and then I met Jeff.

00:14:38.000 Bob had me come to the premiere of The Aristocrats, or not the premiere, it was like a screening at the Writers Guild just for all the comedians that were in it.

00:14:47.000 It was like me and a couple friends, and then Bob and 50 comedians.

00:14:51.000 And Jeff was there, so we met, and he had just made this movie called Patriot Games.

00:14:55.000 Did you ever see that?

00:14:56.000 No.

00:14:56.000 He took a trip to Iraq, right, when they first opened it after the desert storm, not desert storm, I guess it was the second Iraq war.

00:15:07.000 Yeah.

00:15:22.000 You know, being in a comedy tour over there with all the troops right then.

00:15:26.000 So he showed it to me and we just kind of became friends and started doing stuff together.

00:15:30.000 We did a trip with the USO, me and him and Sarah Tiana, Colin Cain.

00:15:37.000 I know Sarah very well.

00:15:38.000 Oh yeah.

00:15:38.000 Stewie Stone and like Robert Klein and we did a...

00:15:41.000 Oh wow.

00:15:41.000 And me.

00:15:41.000 So like five comedians.

00:15:43.000 And me playing the only songs I can play on piano, which are the mopiest shit we have. 1.00

00:15:48.000 So it's like, I was right in the middle of the show. 0.99

00:15:50.000 We went around Germany together to the basses and played shit. 0.91

00:15:54.000 Why did you decide to go solo? 0.97

00:15:55.000 Why did you decide to go without a band?

00:15:57.000 It was just like, because it's just kind of comedy.

00:15:59.000 They're doing it really bare bones.

00:16:00.000 So Jeff's like, hey, you want to do this thing?

00:16:02.000 I was like, ah, let's go.

00:16:04.000 So it was weird, though, because I mean... 0.99

00:16:07.000 I'm not a very good piano player, I can only really play a few things, and they're mopey, you know, as shit. 0.98

00:16:12.000 So it'd be like, Colin would play, then Sarah... 0.99

00:16:16.000 And Stewie was hosting all of it.

00:16:18.000 And then it'd be me, and then Jeff, and then Robert Klein.

00:16:22.000 So it's a pretty stark change in the middle there to the Mope Fest.

00:16:27.000 I had to start telling jokes and just ripping with Jeff.

00:16:31.000 The Mope Fest.

00:16:32.000 It was such a bizarre contrast.

00:16:35.000 It was fun, though.

00:16:36.000 It was really fun to be...

00:16:38.000 It was like being at camp with all the funny people.

00:16:40.000 Your music is oftentimes so emotional.

00:16:43.000 There's so much...

00:16:47.000 Did you ever feel almost like this is what you have to do?

00:16:54.000 Because your initial success was in this kind of music?

00:16:57.000 Or has your music always sort of had that kind of emotional flavor to it?

00:17:02.000 I think that was always the thing.

00:17:05.000 You kind of want to find something that you can bear to people.

00:17:09.000 I mean, B-A-R-E. The more you can open something up and let people in. 0.95

00:17:17.000 And that's kind of the whole thing, I think, when we're trying to make a record.

00:17:20.000 You just kind of want to make a world that people can climb into for a while.

00:17:24.000 Feel something you know go from here to there with you and yeah, so I know I always just kind of thought that was You know, but sometimes you know, there's there's hope and joy in there too, but yeah, it's about feeling stuff mostly I think That was always kind of what it seemed like it was about because I think I always had trouble uh Feeling things with other people,

00:17:47.000 you know, just in normal life, you know?

00:17:50.000 But, uh, and I always liked music, and when I would listen to it, I think that's one of the things I loved about it, was that you could get lost in it, and you could feel all this stuff, and they seemed to be able to communicate stuff to me when I was listening to a record.

00:18:03.000 You know, and I was, I just couldn't figure out what to do with music when I was a kid, because, you know, I didn't, I just could sing, so I don't know what that means, high school musicals or something, but where's that going?

00:18:12.000 When did you start?

00:18:13.000 When did you start singing?

00:18:14.000 I probably sang from birth.

00:18:16.000 As a kid I could always sing, and I liked singing, but I didn't know what to do with singing.

00:18:21.000 When I was a freshman in college, my first term, I wrote a song.

00:18:27.000 Within the first month and a half I was at school, there was a I was in chemistry class or something and I started kind of thinking of the song in my head and I wrote it down and was humming it to myself and after class I went back to my dorm because there's a lounge with a piano across the hall from my room and I went there like lock the door and sat there all day trying to figure out humming stuff and trying to figure out what note that was and then See if I could find a chord that worked with that note.

00:18:55.000 I kind of knew how to make a major and a minor chord, you know, that's all I knew.

00:19:00.000 And I wrote a song.

00:19:01.000 And as soon as I'd written that song, I was a songwriter.

00:19:06.000 Wow, so that was your first real attempt at creating a song, just out of nowhere in chemistry class?

00:19:11.000 Yeah, I mean, I think I'd written, like, lyrical stuff before, but I'd never actually tried to make it something I could play.

00:19:17.000 And I just figured this thing out.

00:19:20.000 And, you know, that's the thing when you're a kid.

00:19:21.000 You don't, like, you're pretty undefined.

00:19:23.000 You don't know what's going to go on with your life.

00:19:25.000 You don't know what you're going to be.

00:19:26.000 You know, like, the whole adulthood thing.

00:19:28.000 Because you've been pretty structured.

00:19:29.000 You go to school.

00:19:30.000 People tell you what to do when you're a kid, and you go do it.

00:19:32.000 You know, you do the best you can.

00:19:33.000 You go to school.

00:19:34.000 You go play a sport for fun.

00:19:36.000 You know, and, you know, I'm still in that in college.

00:19:39.000 The adulthood thing seems really confusing.

00:19:42.000 What am I going to do?

00:19:43.000 How am I going to take care of myself?

00:19:45.000 People get jobs, I guess.

00:19:46.000 Do people tell you what to do for the rest of your life after that?

00:19:50.000 That doesn't seem very good.

00:19:53.000 Literally, I wrote this song and it was like...

00:19:56.000 Light going off in my head or coming on.

00:19:58.000 I just, from that moment on, I was like, oh, I'm a songwriter.

00:20:01.000 I don't know how the fuck to do that or how to like, I'm not sure how to make a life being a songwriter, but I am a songwriter. 0.78

00:20:06.000 I'll have to figure that out. 0.94

00:20:07.000 You know, I kind of knew what I was going to do before any of my friends.

00:20:11.000 I didn't know how to do it, but like, it was just like, like something switch went on.

00:20:17.000 As soon as I did it, I knew who I was, kind of, in a way that I had never known before.

00:20:23.000 What did you think you were going to do for a living before that moment?

00:20:26.000 I don't know, man.

00:20:27.000 You just were trying to figure it out?

00:20:29.000 Yeah, my dad's a doctor.

00:20:31.000 My mom is, too, now.

00:20:33.000 What were you going to school for?

00:20:35.000 I thought I'd be a writer or something.

00:20:36.000 I liked English.

00:20:37.000 I liked writing.

00:20:39.000 I didn't really know.

00:20:41.000 For the first couple years, I was a women's studies major because I ended up in this class and it was really interesting.

00:20:47.000 I was kind of blown away by it.

00:20:50.000 But I don't know.

00:20:52.000 That's stuff you do in school.

00:20:55.000 Fields of study and things.

00:20:56.000 You could go on to school for a while.

00:20:59.000 But you had never been in a band or anything until that moment?

00:21:02.000 I had when I was a kid, like when I was like 13, I was in a band. 0.88

00:21:05.000 We played at Friends Bar Mises and shit. 0.83

00:21:06.000 Oh yeah? 0.99

00:21:06.000 We just did like Beatles and, you know, our parents told each of us we could get one song book. 0.99

00:21:12.000 So we just bought the Beatles, the Stones, and Led Zeppelin because they had the most shit in the book, you know? 0.97

00:21:17.000 They were the thicker books. 0.98

00:21:18.000 But that's just like cover songs when you're 13 or 14. No, my first band was still a few years away, but I wrote every day from that point on.

00:21:27.000 I just was obsessed with like, because all of a sudden, I had this way where I could, all the stuff I'd been feeling and thinking, and like, you know, I had all this stuff that I felt like inside me, but you know, you're not, I felt kind of plain when I was talking to people.

00:21:43.000 It didn't really...

00:21:45.000 I felt like a pretty average dude and not really impressive in the way I wanted to be, you know, and not special in any way.

00:21:54.000 And I thought I was supposed to be, you know, but then I wrote a song and I could, you know.

00:21:58.000 Then it was like, oh, I can communicate all this stuff.

00:22:00.000 You know, pretty rudimentary back then, but even then it was like...

00:22:04.000 Well, for me, it was real powerful.

00:22:06.000 To play a song, people could feel things.

00:22:09.000 All of a sudden, all this stuff inside me had a place to go.

00:22:11.000 That was big.

00:22:14.000 Isn't that interesting?

00:22:14.000 It's like kind of everybody feels like somewhere inside of them is something special.

00:22:20.000 I think most people...

00:22:21.000 I mean, there's a few people that have self-esteem issues that maybe don't think that.

00:22:25.000 But a lot of people feel like there's moments where they're capable of doing something special.

00:22:30.000 They just don't know what that thing is.

00:22:32.000 Well, I think they also don't realize...

00:22:36.000 How much it takes to do things like that.

00:22:38.000 It is dedication.

00:22:40.000 You're going to play music.

00:22:42.000 You want to go on stage and do comedy.

00:22:44.000 It's not going to be that good at first.

00:22:45.000 It's going to be a struggle.

00:22:46.000 There's a lot of people who are better at it.

00:22:49.000 It's a lot of work, a lot of dedication, a lot of risk.

00:22:54.000 Thinking about doing a job that's really hard to support yourself at, especially if you want to work in the arts.

00:23:01.000 It's a fraction of a fraction of a fraction that's so small that it's like a number that doesn't exist.

00:23:06.000 People who can support themselves doing the arts, any kind of art.

00:23:13.000 If you want to play a musician, you're going to get in a band.

00:23:15.000 You're going to fight with your friends because it's not fun.

00:23:18.000 It's not a hobby anymore.

00:23:19.000 It's different.

00:23:21.000 It's satisfying, but fun is a very small term for what it means to do this sort of thing.

00:23:26.000 Fun doesn't quite cut it. 0.98

00:23:27.000 Well, I've always felt like a band was probably the hardest thing because not only do you have to figure your shit out, But you have to make sure that the other people in the band figure their shit out, too. 0.95

00:23:37.000 And you all have to be dedicated and professional and show up on time and be disciplined and be creative and also work together. 0.96

00:23:46.000 So you have to be cooperative and you have to be understanding and you have to figure out the ego dance and who's putting what and where and who's adding spice to the soup.

00:23:59.000 I mean, any kind of cooperative artistic thing like that, that is brutal.

00:24:03.000 It is really hard, but there's no way it's the hard...

00:24:05.000 I mean, to me it's funny, because to me it's always been comedy, because I have friends who do it, and you watch what it takes to be on stage.

00:24:12.000 I am not dependent on anybody in the audience to play a show.

00:24:16.000 Like, it just does not matter.

00:24:17.000 I'm glad they're there.

00:24:19.000 I really am.

00:24:19.000 It's great.

00:24:20.000 I hope they cheer really loud.

00:24:23.000 But I could play a great show either way.

00:24:26.000 In an empty room.

00:24:27.000 Yeah.

00:24:28.000 Or a room that doesn't get it.

00:24:30.000 I'm still going to play a show.

00:24:31.000 It's still going to be good.

00:24:32.000 But man, I watch Jeff sometimes, especially lately, because when him and Dave are doing that thing, it doesn't seem like there's any preparation.

00:24:41.000 They're just kind of winning.

00:24:41.000 They're just riffing.

00:24:43.000 And that's complete freestyle improvisation.

00:24:47.000 But either way, even if it's just all written material, you're still riding...

00:24:50.000 It's like surfing an audience.

00:24:52.000 That's terrifying and dependent in a way, because if you have the success of the moment, it builds to the next moment to the next moment in a way that we don't need.

00:25:02.000 But as a comedian, man, it is such a tightrope to walk.

00:25:08.000 Dealing with heckler everything that goes into that shit is just like I went to an open mic night last night Yeah, it was wild I hadn't been doing open mic night in a while and it was it was interesting to watch because there was maybe Six or seven audience members and maybe 20 comedians in the audience so they're mostly just kind of practicing talking into a microphone and You know just trying to work it out and you're just seeing You're seeing, 0.97

00:25:38.000 like, single-celled organisms try to divide and become complicated life forms, and you can see, like, the sort of clunkiness to the idea. 0.98

00:25:47.000 Because, you know, a lot of the folks that were on stage last night probably had only been on stage a couple of times, or maybe it was their first time, and you could see it, you know?

00:25:54.000 And I was like, wow, this is wild.

00:25:57.000 That's really cool, though.

00:25:58.000 I mean, like, you could see, like, the...

00:26:02.000 Genesis of things, you know, somebody like developing something.

00:26:05.000 Someone doesn't have their material there yet, but they've got a thing, you know?

00:26:09.000 But it seems so far.

00:26:12.000 It's like a person who lands on Plymouth Rock and you're going to walk to San Francisco.

00:26:17.000 Like, yeah, it can be done.

00:26:19.000 People have done it.

00:26:20.000 It could be done, but oh, those first steps.

00:26:23.000 You have so many steps.

00:26:25.000 It's such a far walk.

00:26:26.000 It is far, but that's what I meant about people not understanding how much you want to do this, you can do it.

00:26:32.000 There's no rule that says you can't, but it's not just the talent.

00:26:37.000 It's a long walk.

00:26:39.000 There's a reason why so few people do it.

00:26:41.000 There's a reason why so few people wind up actually being a professional.

00:26:45.000 You have to be able to grind.

00:26:47.000 Some people just can't.

00:26:49.000 They can't just embrace this process.

00:26:53.000 Because the process, there's a lot of days you don't want to do it.

00:26:56.000 There's a lot of days you don't want to go on stage, but you must.

00:26:58.000 You must, and you've got to continue to try to figure it out.

00:27:03.000 There was a moment at the improv in L.A. where...

00:27:09.000 There's this lady on stage, and I think she had just started, or she was fairly recent.

00:27:14.000 And so she would do one of the things that comics do when they're first starting out.

00:27:17.000 They'll have a premise, and it doesn't go anywhere.

00:27:19.000 And then they go into a completely unrelated premise, and it doesn't go anywhere.

00:27:23.000 Their bits are very short.

00:27:25.000 They don't expand on their ideas.

00:27:27.000 They don't really know how to yet.

00:27:29.000 And she's kind of bombing. 0.99

00:27:31.000 And we're sitting there watching her, and I was checking to see when I was up, because I was up like two people after.

00:27:37.000 And me and the DJ are watching her bomb, and I just go, it's a long way to the top if you want to rock and roll.

00:27:42.000 And then two people later was me, and I went on stage, and he brought me up to, it's a long way to the top!

00:27:51.000 And that has been my opening song from then out.

00:27:55.000 Every time I do stand-up, every time I go on stage, if there's playing music, they play ACDC, Long Way to the Top. 0.98

00:28:03.000 Because it's like, it's a fucking long and bloody grind. 0.99

00:28:08.000 And that song just nails it. 0.99

00:28:10.000 That song, you know?

00:28:12.000 And you gotta be brave, too.

00:28:13.000 Like, on top of the length of it, don't forget that, especially, like, for what you guys do, it is scary.

00:28:22.000 A lot, especially in the beginning, and at least you always have a risk of the bomb, you know what I mean?

00:28:28.000 It's always out there waiting for you, and even if it comes, you can climb out of it.

00:28:33.000 But the risk of the bomb is what makes killing so good.

00:28:37.000 It makes it feel so good.

00:28:39.000 You know you can bomb.

00:28:40.000 Everyone can bomb.

00:28:41.000 We can all bomb.

00:28:43.000 And so you know that.

00:28:44.000 And I've had moments recently that are just not that good.

00:28:48.000 You have a bit that you're trying out and it's kind of clunky or you fuck something up and you're like, ugh! 0.99

00:28:52.000 You have sets that are just flat and you're like, shit! 0.99

00:28:55.000 But that's just part of the process. 0.99

00:28:57.000 And that makes it...

00:28:59.000 Like last night I had a great show.

00:29:01.000 And last night everything sunk in and just...

00:29:04.000 It just was seamless and it flowed.

00:29:06.000 It was free.

00:29:07.000 It was fun.

00:29:07.000 And those moments only come out of the depths of despair.

00:29:13.000 You have to work your way through the shit. 0.99

00:29:16.000 And I guess it's got to be like that with music, too. 0.99

00:29:19.000 I mean, there must have been gigs that you guys did in the early days where you're just like, I don't even know how long I can do this.

00:29:26.000 I remember one.

00:29:27.000 I always remember this gig because I don't know that we've played this town since then.

00:29:31.000 It was a...

00:29:33.000 Was it Lexington, Kentucky?

00:29:34.000 I'm trying to remember.

00:29:35.000 It was a southeastern college town.

00:29:40.000 We were opening for Cracker, and it was this club, and it was upstairs was the club part of it.

00:29:48.000 And the stage is one of those ones that's in the corner, like a triangle, like comes across the corner.

00:29:53.000 And there's just, the audience is all out, the rest of the club is lengthwise.

00:29:59.000 And the stage is in the corner over here.

00:30:01.000 And there's no like, the backstage is near the front door.

00:30:04.000 And you gotta like, they just kept like a border around the club of people so you could walk and you have to walk around everybody to get up to the stage.

00:30:11.000 So we get up there to open the show, and the monitors are busted.

00:30:15.000 The tweeter's blown out on the monitors, so it's just like the whole time.

00:30:21.000 You can't hear anything, and I'm trying to sing.

00:30:23.000 It's before we had in-ears.

00:30:25.000 My voice is already wrecked from the first year of touring, because I had never sung that much.

00:30:29.000 I'm really tired.

00:30:30.000 So we played, and we were terrible.

00:30:34.000 I mean terrible.

00:30:36.000 Because it was just so bad.

00:30:38.000 I mean, later on that night, Cracker got on stage and they were pretty good, but they hated it so much that he stuck his guitar through that monitor after a while because he couldn't hear anything.

00:30:46.000 It was just like, you're a club, man. 0.99

00:30:48.000 Fix the goddamn monitor. 1.00

00:30:49.000 The horns are all busted. 0.99

00:30:51.000 So anyways, we get done this particularly terrible set.

00:30:56.000 And we do a lot of improvisation on stage, too. 0.99

00:30:59.000 We're making whole shit up, which doesn't get any better, by the way, when you can't hear anything and when you're sucking. 0.99

00:31:04.000 We're still trying it and it's still just like... 0.99

00:31:06.000 Just, you know, anything would have been better than what we did.

00:31:08.000 So, man, the set ends.

00:31:11.000 And it's just silence, man.

00:31:14.000 There's no booing or anything.

00:31:15.000 But nobody's clapping.

00:31:16.000 Like, nobody's clapping.

00:31:17.000 There's just nothing. 0.97

00:31:18.000 There's just fucking nothing happening in there. 0.97

00:31:20.000 It's just like... 0.99

00:31:21.000 Like, nothing had happened.

00:31:23.000 Like, they were just...

00:31:24.000 Everyone's just kind of looking at us.

00:31:25.000 Like, maybe we're going to play another song.

00:31:27.000 I don't know.

00:31:27.000 They don't really want us to.

00:31:28.000 But they're not trying to encourage us.

00:31:30.000 And so we just, like...

00:31:33.000 I remember some of those guys had to grab their stuff.

00:31:35.000 I kind of walked down off the stage and, you know, down the whole side of the crowd, across the back to the little dressing room.

00:31:43.000 Silence.

00:31:43.000 Just people looking at me.

00:31:47.000 It was just so fucking humiliating. 0.98

00:31:50.000 Just the worst. 0.99

00:31:51.000 I've never forgotten it.

00:31:52.000 Except I guess I have forgotten where it was.

00:31:54.000 But I think it was Lexington.

00:31:57.000 I don't know. 1.00

00:31:58.000 But it was just the worst fucking show. 0.99

00:31:59.000 And just the utter silence, though. 0.99

00:32:02.000 Like, they were confused as to what we were doing.

00:32:05.000 As if, like, it would have been confusing to them if we kept playing.

00:32:08.000 It was weird that we stopped.

00:32:11.000 Whatever we were doing, they didn't really get it.

00:32:14.000 I mean, understandably, it was just...

00:32:19.000 One time I came off a tour and I had messed up my knee.

00:32:22.000 I had scraped up my knee early in the tour and it kept getting infected.

00:32:24.000 I ended up having a staph infection inside my knee.

00:32:26.000 It was really bad.

00:32:27.000 So I got off stage the last gig and I had to go for surgery the next day.

00:32:32.000 They opened my knee up and cleaned it out.

00:32:35.000 They released me later that day.

00:32:37.000 And it was the day that Jeff was releasing...

00:32:39.000 He wrote a book.

00:32:41.000 I can't remember what it's called.

00:32:42.000 You only roast the ones you love, maybe?

00:32:45.000 And he had...

00:32:46.000 He was having like a...

00:32:48.000 I don't know what you call it.

00:32:50.000 A book release party, I guess.

00:32:52.000 At the Friars Club.

00:32:52.000 Because he was real excited.

00:32:53.000 And he'd wanted me to come.

00:32:54.000 And I was like...

00:32:55.000 I'd just gotten out of the hospital.

00:32:59.000 That...

00:32:59.000 Like...

00:32:59.000 Late that morning.

00:33:01.000 And I was...

00:33:01.000 But I felt okay.

00:33:02.000 You know?

00:33:03.000 And it was all sewn up.

00:33:04.000 So...

00:33:06.000 You know, I was a little high from the drugs, but I was okay.

00:33:09.000 So I put on like a tux, tails, but I couldn't wear the pants because I had this huge bandage on my knees.

00:33:15.000 So I just put some shorts on and nice shoes too.

00:33:18.000 And I got a cane and I went to the Friars Club to this thing.

00:33:21.000 I wanted to be there to support Jeff, you know.

00:33:23.000 So he comes, he's up on the dais, it's like in one of the rooms there, not a stage, but he's up on there talking, thanking some people, and he comes down, he got me a chair, it's just a room full of comics, and he got me a chair so I could sit down near the front,

00:33:39.000 everyone else was standing, just because I had surgery.

00:33:42.000 And he comes down, I want to thank my friend Adam, who came with me, and we went on this trip a little while ago, and he's just a good friend, and he hands me the mic, and For some reason, instead of just saying, you know, congratulations, Jeff, or whatever, I took the mic out of his hand and I walked up on the stage to,

00:33:58.000 like, the podium and put it in the mic thing.

00:34:02.000 Because, I don't know, some part of me thought, I'm at the Friars Club and I should make a speech for Jeff's thing.

00:34:08.000 But by the time I got up there and put the mic in, I realized, what am I doing here? 0.95

00:34:14.000 I'm like, I don't know what the fuck to do.

00:34:17.000 I just, like, sort of looked at them and I said... 0.99

00:34:22.000 So I peed on my girlfriend earlier today.

00:34:25.000 Because it had happened, you know, like when they finished the surgery, they gave me this epidural, and I'm your whole lower half of your body, so I don't know what's going on.

00:34:37.000 I'd come out of it and my girlfriend was like, how are you?

00:34:39.000 I'm like, I don't know.

00:34:40.000 I feel weird.

00:34:41.000 I feel pretty good.

00:34:42.000 Am I bleeding down here?

00:34:44.000 Am I wet?

00:34:44.000 And she reaches under the skirt to check me out and she's like, I think you're peeing.

00:34:51.000 That's all.

00:34:52.000 You're peeing yourself right now.

00:34:53.000 I'm like, how do you know?

00:34:54.000 And she goes, because you're peeing on me right now. 0.99

00:34:58.000 She pulls her hand and I'm like, oh shit, I'm sorry. 0.99

00:35:00.000 I didn't know what's going on. 0.89

00:35:01.000 I couldn't feel anything.

00:35:03.000 So when you're numb for an epidural, pee just comes out whenever it wants to?

00:35:07.000 I guess.

00:35:07.000 I don't know.

00:35:08.000 I felt weird and like a weird warmth and I asked her if there was something on there and she's like, yeah, you're peeing yourself probably.

00:35:15.000 And I'm like, how do you know?

00:35:15.000 And she goes, because you're pissing on me right now.

00:35:17.000 And I was like, so I'm standing there in the Friars Club and I just said, so I peed on my girlfriend earlier today and the place just breaks up and I was just, I guess that's one more thing she's got in common with my mom.

00:35:29.000 And I... I don't know.

00:35:31.000 I went on for a couple minutes, told that story, and I was just like killing.

00:35:35.000 I was like really good.

00:35:36.000 I was patient.

00:35:37.000 I was like not rushing anything.

00:35:39.000 Probably because I was kind of stoned from the drugs.

00:35:41.000 And I just like, I got about two minutes of it.

00:35:45.000 I just drilled.

00:35:47.000 It was hysterical.

00:35:48.000 I came down, some older guy comes up to me and goes like, You killed.

00:35:52.000 It was you and Vagoda.

00:35:53.000 You and Vagoda were amazing tonight.

00:35:54.000 You're always welcome to the front.

00:35:55.000 Where do you usually work?

00:35:57.000 I'm like, I'm not a comedian.

00:35:58.000 He's like, you're kidding.

00:35:59.000 That's hilarious.

00:36:00.000 It was like, but I mean, it was, it was the greatest thing.

00:36:03.000 Cause it's like you were saying, I was terrified.

00:36:05.000 I got, I stupidly got myself into the situation.

00:36:07.000 And then of all things, Did like, you know, it feels like I did 10 minutes, but it's probably like two minutes of stand-up.

00:36:15.000 I did like a minute and a half stand-up in front of like the history of comedy, like, and crushed it.

00:36:21.000 And as I'm coming down off the stage, I was like, hey, that was pretty good.

00:36:24.000 And Jeff goes, I know.

00:36:25.000 It's like crack, right?

00:36:26.000 And I'm like, that's amazing.

00:36:28.000 He goes, I'll talk to you more about it later.

00:36:30.000 And then he goes back up on stage.

00:36:32.000 I mean, it was just like, I don't know what I was doing getting up there. 0.97

00:36:34.000 It was the dumbest thing, but it was so like... 0.97

00:36:38.000 Could've worked out. 0.99

00:36:38.000 Yeah, because I've been there with friends of mine who are comics, and I've bantered with them, played piano, like, in that little keyboard, you know, in the cellar, with Jeff and with Bob sometimes, just done that shit with them, and, uh... 0.99

00:36:49.000 It's always terrifying, but that one moment, I wasn't even with them.

00:36:53.000 I just did it, and it was the greatest thing.

00:36:56.000 To this day, I don't know if there's a performing moment that I feel prouder of than that one, even though it was completely accidental.

00:37:04.000 Because it was so terrifying and unsupported.

00:37:07.000 I didn't have a band.

00:37:08.000 I didn't have anything.

00:37:08.000 I didn't have Jeff or Bob.

00:37:10.000 It was just...

00:37:11.000 It's probably just a minute, you know?

00:37:13.000 Whatever short it was, though, it was fire, man.

00:37:17.000 You know what I mean?

00:37:19.000 Is it recorded?

00:37:20.000 Oh, I don't think so, because it wasn't like a real performance.

00:37:23.000 It was like a little hall, and it was like one of the side rooms, and Jeff was in there.

00:37:27.000 Everyone was there to celebrate him, and a few people spoke.

00:37:30.000 I don't really remember where it was, because I've been to the Friars Club a few times, but...

00:37:34.000 I don't really know where that room was.

00:37:36.000 I'll have to ask Jeff sometime.

00:37:37.000 But no, there's no way it was recorded.

00:37:39.000 I don't think...

00:37:39.000 Because it wasn't like anyone was performing.

00:37:41.000 Right, right, right.

00:37:42.000 At least I don't think so.

00:37:43.000 Did it make you think about doing it again?

00:37:45.000 Like actually preparing a set?

00:37:47.000 Or you're like, you know what, I'm one and done.

00:37:49.000 I'm one and oh, I'm going to retire undefeated.

00:37:51.000 Yeah, I don't know.

00:37:52.000 I'll be honest with you.

00:37:53.000 Every time Jeff wants me to go play with him and do that sort of stuff, first of all, because I can't play piano very well, so I end up just picking four chords and playing them in a circle.

00:38:00.000 It's not like Mayer's up there with him who can actually play, you know?

00:38:03.000 Right.

00:38:03.000 But I like bantering with Jeff, and it's fun, if terrifying, you know?

00:38:07.000 But he's so good, he can kind of, like, hold your hand.

00:38:10.000 Yeah, he really is.

00:38:11.000 And help you through it.

00:38:12.000 If you stumble, he's got something funny to cover it up with.

00:38:15.000 Yeah, and he's got that, like, I'm not sure there's a better sound in this world than that laugh of his, you know?

00:38:21.000 Yeah.

00:38:22.000 When he's just giggling at the stuff that's going, I can't even do it.

00:38:25.000 The laugh, you know, when he's giggling, he giggles for his friends and laughs for his friends when they're being funny, you know?

00:38:30.000 I've known Jeff since before he was Jeff Ross.

00:38:33.000 Oh, Lipschultz, yeah.

00:38:34.000 Yeah, I've known him back in the old days.

00:38:36.000 Wow.

00:38:37.000 You know, he's a black belt in Taekwondo.

00:38:39.000 Only reason I know that is because I saw it on the...

00:38:43.000 When I was looking through your podcast at one point, I went to watch some of the ones with my friends on them, you know, people I knew.

00:38:51.000 Yeah, and I saw that picture of him when he's...

00:38:53.000 I don't know, how old is he?

00:38:55.000 I don't know.

00:38:55.000 He's pretty young.

00:38:56.000 Yeah, he looks really young.

00:38:57.000 He's got that big...

00:38:58.000 He used to have really curly hair, too.

00:39:00.000 You know, he had great curly hair.

00:39:01.000 Yeah.

00:39:02.000 Yeah, that's a great picture.

00:39:03.000 Yeah.

00:39:04.000 Did he not do it after that for a while?

00:39:06.000 I don't think he does anything.

00:39:07.000 I think he swims and, like, drinks.

00:39:11.000 Both pleasant.

00:39:13.000 Swimming can be unpleasant when you do it for too long.

00:39:15.000 Drinking is great.

00:39:17.000 Have you been to his house in Hollywood Hills?

00:39:18.000 No, no.

00:39:19.000 I haven't either.

00:39:20.000 I've been to his place in the village.

00:39:21.000 He sent me photos of it.

00:39:23.000 He has a pool where when you go in the pool, if you're in his house, you can see the pool.

00:39:31.000 Oh, really?

00:39:32.000 The side of the pool's glass.

00:39:34.000 And it busts up against the house?

00:39:36.000 So someone's swimming in the pool, like you can get up there and you can see it from outside.

00:39:42.000 Wow, note to self, don't piss in that pool.

00:39:44.000 Yeah, don't, people can see it.

00:39:46.000 Wow, that's wild.

00:39:47.000 Yeah, it's pretty wild.

00:39:49.000 So he's just up there lounging, looking at the world, watching it burn.

00:39:53.000 From the Hollywood.

00:39:54.000 Like literally watching it burn sometimes, at least a couple times a year.

00:39:57.000 Yeah, especially now.

00:39:59.000 No, he's like, that was kind of wild seeing that.

00:40:02.000 You did Taekwondo, too.

00:40:03.000 You were the champion in Taekwondo, right?

00:40:05.000 Yeah, I won a bunch of tournaments.

00:40:08.000 That's all I did when I was 15, from 15 to like 21, 22. That's the martial art that I did when I was a kid.

00:40:15.000 I must have been pretty young.

00:40:17.000 I was like Texas and Denver, so I was like 7 and 8. It's a good martial art for kids, teaching some discipline and stuff.

00:40:23.000 I remember it being fun, but it got me hit.

00:40:28.000 I don't know when I started doing that.

00:40:30.000 In like 2000...

00:40:33.000 Two, maybe?

00:40:34.000 I started boxing, you know?

00:40:35.000 I started boxing with this boxing trainer in LA just to get in shape.

00:40:37.000 I was really out of shape.

00:40:39.000 And then he would come on the road with us for a while and we would like...

00:40:43.000 Trained with the whole band in the mornings usually, and then he and I, after soundcheck, we would do like 10 rounds, you know, wherever we were at the gig, and just exercise in the afternoon.

00:40:52.000 Right.

00:40:53.000 So we'd do it for a while, but like early on when we were doing this, you know, he was doing some stuff where like, I was just working defensive stuff, and he threw like a low hook at me, and I did this thing, you know, I blocked it with my arm, and he's like, what was that?

00:41:07.000 And I was like, I don't know, it's a...

00:41:09.000 I just blocked it.

00:41:10.000 He goes, don't do that.

00:41:12.000 You'll get...

00:41:12.000 Why?

00:41:13.000 He goes, like, don't drop your hands when you're boxing.

00:41:15.000 It's a bad habit.

00:41:16.000 Like, okay, you know.

00:41:18.000 And then I did it one more.

00:41:19.000 He threw a low hook, and I, you know, just dropped my arm down to block it.

00:41:22.000 And he goes, where is this block coming from?

00:41:24.000 What is this kind of thing?

00:41:25.000 He goes, did you do taekwondo when you were a kid?

00:41:28.000 I was like...

00:41:29.000 Yeah, I did.

00:41:30.000 Weird.

00:41:30.000 Well, how'd you know that?

00:41:31.000 He goes, I think that's a Taekwondo block, but that's, you know, like, I think it works in Taekwondo because of the nature of the rules, but, like, you don't want to do that boxing.

00:41:42.000 Don't drop your hands boxing.

00:41:43.000 I go, what's the big deal?

00:41:44.000 He goes, well, because you're going to get hit. 0.89

00:41:46.000 You know, you're going to get hit in the head, too.

00:41:48.000 Don't drop your hands, especially not your right hand.

00:41:51.000 You know, that's where hooks come from, that side.

00:41:52.000 And I was like, well, I mean, I don't know.

00:41:54.000 I blocked your punch.

00:41:55.000 He goes...

00:41:56.000 Don't do that.

00:41:58.000 Don't say that.

00:41:59.000 Don't say that.

00:41:59.000 I was like, alright.

00:42:00.000 So we do a little more and he threw a low hook again. 0.50

00:42:04.000 I went like this and he just whack, hit me in the head.

00:42:08.000 Not hard the first time.

00:42:10.000 And he was like, taekwondo. 1.00

00:42:12.000 And I was like, ah, fuck you, man. 1.00

00:42:14.000 So I did it again. 1.00

00:42:15.000 I did it again.

00:42:16.000 I could not break myself with a habit.

00:42:17.000 And every time I like, he would just like, whoop, whoop, hit me in the head.

00:42:21.000 Whoop, whoop, hit me in the head.

00:42:22.000 And every time he would just go...

00:42:24.000 Well, you know what it is?

00:42:25.000 A lot of martial arts, especially in the old days before the UFC came around, a lot of them were closed systems.

00:42:33.000 So if you were doing Taekwondo, you would only do it against people who were doing Taekwondo.

00:42:37.000 So you didn't know that the things you were doing left you susceptible to certain techniques from other sports.

00:42:43.000 So, like, in MMA, you don't ever see anybody blocking like that.

00:42:47.000 Because they've realized, like, first of all, if you block a kick like that, you break your arm.

00:42:52.000 And second of all, you do leave yourself open to punches.

00:42:55.000 So now people block.

00:42:56.000 When they block kicks, they try to block with two arms.

00:43:00.000 If someone's kicking high, you try to block with two arms, and you try to get as much of your body out of the way.

00:43:07.000 But you don't do this.

00:43:08.000 Like, Taekwondo style.

00:43:09.000 It doesn't really work, but in Taekwondo it kind of worked, because it was a closed system.

00:43:13.000 Right, that's what he was trying to tell me.

00:43:14.000 He's like, this is something that worked.

00:43:16.000 Boxers never do that. 0.92

00:43:16.000 You have a habit there, because that's the one thing you learn when you're younger, so don't do it. 0.92

00:43:21.000 It's like, don't drop your hands.

00:43:23.000 It also happens when people get hit in the legs a lot and they get in pain.

00:43:26.000 Like when a low kick starts coming, they try to stop it with their arm just because it hurts so much, and then someone sets them up and pretends to throw a low kick.

00:43:34.000 There's a thing called a question mark kick.

00:43:36.000 You ever seen that?

00:43:36.000 No, but I know what you're talking about.

00:43:38.000 It looks like you're going to kick someone low and then it turns around and it kicks them high.

00:43:42.000 Yeah.

00:43:43.000 Either it looks like it's going to go up the front or it looks like it's going to go low on the outside and then it comes around.

00:43:49.000 There was a guy named Glaube Feitosa who used to fight in K1. He had like the most beautiful question mark kick.

00:43:56.000 And they started calling it the Brazilian kick because he was so good at it.

00:44:01.000 He had these crazy hips. 0.99

00:44:05.000 If you watch him do it, it almost doesn't make sense.

00:44:08.000 His foot would be coming straight at you, and then out of nowhere, it would do a full question mark and chop down.

00:44:16.000 Let's see if you can find it.

00:44:18.000 Glaube Fatosa KO. Question mark kick was always the name of it.

00:44:24.000 That was a traditional...

00:44:26.000 It was either called fake front kick round kick or it was called question mark kick.

00:44:31.000 But then with Fatosa, a lot of people started calling it the Brazilian kick because he was so good at it.

00:44:36.000 But it was weird how good he was.

00:44:38.000 Like his hips... 0.58

00:44:39.000 I can't do what he does.

00:44:41.000 He's got a weird hip flexibility.

00:44:44.000 You got something?

00:44:45.000 I couldn't spell his name right.

00:44:46.000 Hold on.

00:44:46.000 Yeah, it's a weird one.

00:44:47.000 He's Brazilian.

00:44:49.000 But he would literally, when the kick impacted, it would be coming down like a hammer.

00:44:58.000 Watch him.

00:44:59.000 Watch this.

00:45:02.000 That's not a good one.

00:45:02.000 That's a hard one to tell.

00:45:04.000 See if you can see it again, though.

00:45:06.000 Watch this.

00:45:08.000 Oh, yeah, yeah.

00:45:09.000 Come on.

00:45:10.000 That's crazy.

00:45:11.000 Looks like it's coming up under his arm and then it whips over it.

00:45:13.000 And look at that. 0.99

00:45:13.000 He does that kyokushin, like the fucking ki at the end. 0.99

00:45:17.000 But look how it comes low. 0.99

00:45:18.000 And then, I mean, the way he would do it was like sensational hip flexibility.

00:45:24.000 Isn't that wild?

00:45:25.000 That rotation at the last minute.

00:45:27.000 Yeah, look at this wild man.

00:45:29.000 Nobody did it better than Glaube.

00:45:30.000 I mean, he's just famous for it.

00:45:34.000 A lot of guys are good at it.

00:45:35.000 Maybe Stylebender does it really good too.

00:45:38.000 It's wild watching, you know, mixed martial arts like that.

00:45:43.000 Interesting which disciplines tend to be effective.

00:45:46.000 I mean, it seemed to me early on when it first came around, it was a lot of grapplers, some guys that had beginning wrestling and then...

00:45:55.000 I mean, I haven't watched a ton of it, but jujitsu seemed to be really effective for a while.

00:45:59.000 What's his name?

00:46:00.000 Hoist Gracie. 0.99

00:46:01.000 Silva I was thinking of.

00:46:03.000 Anderson Silva?

00:46:04.000 Yeah.

00:46:04.000 Well, Anderson Silva was a Muay Thai guy.

00:46:06.000 He had Brazilian jujitsu.

00:46:08.000 He was a black belt in jujitsu, but his whole thing was striking.

00:46:10.000 He was a Muay Thai guy. 0.99

00:46:12.000 His whole thing was kicking the shit out of you. 0.99

00:46:15.000 Yeah. 0.98

00:46:17.000 Which would hurt.

00:46:18.000 Oh yeah, for him?

00:46:20.000 Yeah.

00:46:20.000 He's, to this day, still one of the greatest of all time.

00:46:24.000 You choked guys out.

00:46:25.000 He did those chokes.

00:46:26.000 He definitely did.

00:46:27.000 He choked out Chael Sonnen in the fifth round of a fight where he was losing. 0.99

00:46:31.000 He was getting the shit kicked out of him in that fight. 0.97

00:46:33.000 Well, he went into that fight, apparently, legend has it, with a broken rib. 0.99

00:46:38.000 He had a fucked up rib going into that fight, so he couldn't really move properly, couldn't defend against takedowns, but still figured out a way to win. 0.53

00:46:45.000 Boy, Chael Sonnen was just pounding him, and he finally, it looked like he was done. 0.92

00:46:50.000 He had him on the ground, he was on top of him, and all of a sudden his legs just went...

00:46:53.000 Caught him in a triangle, yeah.

00:46:55.000 Yeah, well, Chell was a beast, but Anderson figured it out.

00:47:00.000 I mean, that's a guy like him who could do everything. 0.99

00:47:03.000 He can strike, he can submit you, and because he has all these skills, like, even when he's losing, he still could pull it out of his ass out of nowhere. 0.99

00:47:12.000 That's what he did. 0.97

00:47:13.000 Are any of the guys who, like, I just love martial arts movies.

00:47:17.000 Are any of the guys that were, like, you know, the...

00:47:19.000 Have any of them been really good fighters as well?

00:47:21.000 I mean, I wouldn't know how to tell.

00:47:22.000 In movies?

00:47:23.000 Chuck Norris.

00:47:24.000 Chuck Norris was a world kickboxing champion.

00:47:27.000 He was super legit.

00:47:28.000 Out of all the people that have ever been in martial arts movies that are famous guys, Chuck is the most legit.

00:47:36.000 For sure.

00:47:37.000 100%.

00:47:38.000 There's never been a guy who had more battle-tested combat sports experience who became a movie star than Chuck Norris.

00:47:48.000 Because in his day, kickboxing back then was not the same in karate tournaments and everything.

00:47:55.000 It's not like the level that people have today.

00:47:58.000 Like if you watch a Nikki Holtzkin or some elite kickboxing guy today, it's a different level.

00:48:04.000 It's more advanced.

00:48:06.000 But it's the same like going and watching the UFC from 1993 and then watching the UFC in 2021. Everyone's more advanced.

00:48:15.000 They're just better now.

00:48:16.000 It's just the sport evolves and gets better. 0.97

00:48:19.000 But in his day, Chuck Norris was a bad motherfucker, like legitimately badass world champion kickboxer. 0.98

00:48:28.000 And I think he learned in Korea in the military. 0.98

00:48:33.000 I think that's when he first started, if I'm not mistaken.

00:48:36.000 But he was a Tang Soo Do guy, which is like another Korean martial art.

00:48:41.000 But yeah, out of all the guys that have ever been...

00:48:44.000 Supposedly this is him fighting.

00:48:45.000 I can't tell if it is or not, but that's what it says.

00:48:48.000 Grand champion match.

00:48:49.000 Which one is he?

00:48:51.000 The one on his feet.

00:48:52.000 The one winning?

00:48:53.000 In the end.

00:48:54.000 Yeah, that's Chuck Norris with his back to us.

00:48:56.000 This guy here?

00:48:57.000 Yeah.

00:48:59.000 Ooh, these guys are good.

00:49:00.000 See, this is early days.

00:49:02.000 1966. I wasn't even fucking born yet when these guys are doing karate. 0.98

00:49:10.000 Yeah. 0.98

00:49:10.000 Okay, so this is like a point karate championship. 0.98

00:49:14.000 Interesting.

00:49:18.000 Yeah.

00:49:19.000 Is it music playing?

00:49:20.000 Is that what it is?

00:49:20.000 Yeah, there's no sound.

00:49:21.000 I was hoping to hear something.

00:49:22.000 I think that's Chuck with his facing us, and the other guy's got his back.

00:49:26.000 It's hard to tell, though.

00:49:27.000 Yeah.

00:49:27.000 We're so young.

00:49:28.000 Yeah, it looks like Chuck.

00:49:30.000 But anyway, he did this.

00:49:32.000 He also did kickboxing.

00:49:34.000 Yeah, Chuck Norris, he'd done a lot of stuff.

00:49:37.000 Does Muay Thai use as many, like, those heavy elbow strikes that you see, like, Tony Jaa doing?

00:49:42.000 Oh, yeah.

00:49:42.000 Muay Thai is Tony Jaa.

00:49:43.000 That's Muay Thai.

00:49:44.000 Muay Thai is all about the elbows. 1.00

00:49:46.000 They have the best elbow strikes in martial arts.

00:49:51.000 Elbows, knees, leg kicks.

00:49:53.000 Yeah, all that stuff, that's Muay Thai.

00:49:55.000 That's crazy to watch him.

00:49:56.000 It's pretty great.

00:49:57.000 Every time I see Ong Bak again, he's coming down with some guy's head with two elbows.

00:50:04.000 Yeah.

00:50:05.000 It's very rare that a guy is like a legit martial artist and then makes his way and becomes a big time action star.

00:50:12.000 I guess Randy Couture has done pretty well.

00:50:14.000 He's done quite a few action movies and George St. Pierre was in Captain America.

00:50:18.000 But as far as like being like an action star, like the rock style star, it's definitely Chuck Norris.

00:50:24.000 He's the Mac Daddy of it all.

00:50:28.000 He's a super nice guy, too.

00:50:30.000 Really?

00:50:30.000 Oh, yeah.

00:50:31.000 He's like one guy that when I met him, I was so excited he knew who I was.

00:50:37.000 I met him at one of his World Karate Championship tournaments, his World Kick-Bot, I forget, World Combat League, that's what it was called.

00:50:44.000 And he's like, Joe! 0.68

00:50:46.000 I was like, oh shit, Chuck Norris knows my name! 0.99

00:50:49.000 And I hugged him. 0.98

00:50:51.000 But I didn't get a picture with him. 1.00

00:50:53.000 I was like, fuck! 0.99

00:50:53.000 And then finally, later, many years later, there was this award ceremony that they were doing and they asked me to speak at it. 0.99

00:51:06.000 And I did it just so I could meet Chuck Norris again.

00:51:10.000 I totally get that.

00:51:11.000 It was like in this conference room thing and I got a picture with Chuck.

00:51:14.000 It's on my Instagram somewhere.

00:51:15.000 I just had to make sure that I documented I actually met Chuck Norris.

00:51:23.000 When they know you, like man, that's cool.

00:51:27.000 We were on a plane once.

00:51:30.000 We phoned to LA and then we changed planes and we were going to Hawaii for a corporate gig or something.

00:51:35.000 I was with my tour manager and he was sitting across the aisle.

00:51:38.000 I'm on the window seat over here.

00:51:39.000 And this guy, I wasn't looking.

00:51:41.000 I was looking out the window.

00:51:43.000 Out of the corner of my eye, this really tall guy comes and puts some stuff on the seat and then goes up to the bathroom.

00:51:47.000 And I turn back around and see he's walking away.

00:51:50.000 I see Tom, my tour manager, and he's like, Oh, really?

00:51:56.000 I got really nervous because I thought, oh, it's going to be really uncomfortable.

00:51:59.000 I've got a five-hour flight ahead of me.

00:52:01.000 I'm not going to know what to say.

00:52:03.000 I don't know what to do.

00:52:04.000 This is really weird. 0.99

00:52:05.000 I get kind of anxious about that shit. 0.97

00:52:06.000 I'm not really very good at talking to my idols at all. 1.00

00:52:11.000 And he comes back from the bathroom, and as he's walking up, it's fucking McLeatwood. 0.98

00:52:16.000 Wow. 0.98

00:52:17.000 And as he comes back, he picks his stuff up off the thing.

00:52:19.000 He says, Adam, hello.

00:52:21.000 And I was like...

00:52:23.000 Mick.

00:52:24.000 He goes, I'm Adam.

00:52:25.000 He goes, I know.

00:52:26.000 Hello.

00:52:27.000 I said, how are you?

00:52:28.000 And he sat down and then he told me stories for four hours.

00:52:32.000 It was awesome.

00:52:33.000 Wow.

00:52:34.000 He told me history of Fleetwood Mac stories.

00:52:36.000 Talked about like... 0.99

00:52:38.000 It was like a fucking classic rock and roll history. 0.99

00:52:40.000 It was the coolest flight of my life. 0.98

00:52:42.000 He was just so nice.

00:52:45.000 And the next day, we exchanged phone numbers.

00:52:49.000 He came to our show, this corporate show.

00:52:51.000 I remember because whoever was at this company, Joe Torrey's daughter worked at the company.

00:52:58.000 Joe Torrey the comic?

00:52:58.000 No, Joe Torrey, the ranking manager.

00:53:01.000 Oh.

00:53:02.000 And so he came too because his daughter loved us and he brought her because he was involved with the company or something.

00:53:08.000 But Mick Fleetwood and Joe Torrey came backstage after us.

00:53:10.000 And then Mick just went to the bar with us and hung out at the hotel and talked to the other guys.

00:53:15.000 My guitar player, Emmer, is just a massive early Fleetwood Mac fan, Peter Green.

00:53:19.000 And it's his favorite song.

00:53:22.000 So he was going to flip out, and he wasn't there with us.

00:53:24.000 And I really wanted him to meet Mick.

00:53:27.000 It was just like, he still texts me to this day.

00:53:30.000 Happy birthday or Merry Christmas.

00:53:31.000 Just wanted to say hi.

00:53:33.000 It's been about 10 years now.

00:53:34.000 And it was just like... 0.98

00:53:37.000 He knew who I was, and he spent the flight chatting and telling me stories about rock and roll and shit. 0.99

00:53:43.000 It was fucking awesome. 0.98

00:53:45.000 That's amazing. 0.95

00:53:46.000 I'm not really good in those situations.

00:53:48.000 I have fled from people that I love.

00:53:53.000 Just been panicked?

00:53:55.000 Springsteen calls me.

00:53:57.000 I've known him forever.

00:53:58.000 He's the nicest guy on earth.

00:54:02.000 Like, I used to take my godson to school when I was still making my first album, so I hadn't even made it yet.

00:54:07.000 I had met Bruce because we played this Rock and Roll Hall of Fame thing, and his son went to the same school.

00:54:11.000 They were kids, you know, young kids, eight-something then, four, maybe younger, and so I would see him every day at school, and he would always come up and talk to me and say hi, and I just couldn't make sentences, couldn't think of anything to say.

00:54:23.000 It was so bad, you know?

00:54:27.000 He's doing a podcast now with Obama.

00:54:29.000 I heard.

00:54:31.000 I wonder how it is.

00:54:32.000 That show of his, that Broadway show, was so cool.

00:54:35.000 And he told such great stories.

00:54:38.000 I mean, it was...

00:54:39.000 I don't imagine the podcast can possibly be good.

00:54:43.000 Unfortunately.

00:54:44.000 I just feel like they would be so...

00:54:52.000 Let me phrase this better. 0.99

00:54:55.000 If Bruce Springsteen could be himself and Obama could be himself, and you could just put a camera on it and just let them shoot the shit, I think it'd be amazing. 0.99

00:55:06.000 Because Obama can be really funny. 0.99

00:55:07.000 Oh, he's brilliant.

00:55:08.000 He's a brilliant guy.

00:55:09.000 But I can't imagine that if they're doing something and they're recording it, that they're not acutely aware of how many people are paying attention.

00:55:19.000 And acutely aware of, like, getting the right message across and saying things...

00:55:26.000 Like, part of podcasting is being irresponsible. 0.98

00:55:29.000 Like, you're just talking shit, you know, and you don't even exactly know what you're going to say. 0.99

00:55:35.000 Like, right now, I have no idea what the next word out of my mouth is. 1.00

00:55:38.000 There's nothing prepared.

00:55:39.000 There's nothing like it when you think you're thinking out loud for hours, right?

00:55:45.000 Yeah, I never thought of that.

00:55:47.000 Yeah.

00:55:47.000 Oh, sorry, I didn't mean to interrupt you.

00:55:48.000 Go ahead.

00:55:48.000 No, it's okay.

00:55:49.000 But if you're a president, I mean, you're a distinguished statesman, one of the greatest presidents we've ever had, and one of the most historically important presidents we've ever had, first African-American president we've ever had, and one of the all-time greatest speakers ever,

00:56:05.000 right?

00:56:06.000 So he has this legacy.

00:56:07.000 And then you're hanging out with Bruce Springsteen, who's also this, like, Incredibly well-spoken, brilliant songwriter, iconic American musician, hero. 0.99

00:56:19.000 And the two of them together, there's so much, the weight of the eyes upon them is so heavy, I would imagine it would be very difficult to just shoot the shit. 0.99

00:56:28.000 But if you could get them, like a little buzzed, Just a couple of shots of tequila. 1.00

00:56:34.000 Just fucking talk, man. 0.99

00:56:37.000 Just to hear them talk for real would be amazing. 0.99

00:56:42.000 I just don't know if you could ever do that.

00:56:44.000 When I saw the podcast, I'm like, well, there's definitely camera people there.

00:56:47.000 There's definitely sound people there.

00:56:50.000 One of the best things about this place is it's just us and Jamie.

00:56:55.000 There's no one in here.

00:56:56.000 And so it feels like it's just us and Jamie.

00:56:58.000 But I've done other people's podcasts before, and I'm like, why are there so many people here?

00:57:03.000 Like Bill Simmons, who's great.

00:57:05.000 But I did his HBO podcast.

00:57:07.000 It was a show.

00:57:09.000 I'm like, dude, you have 100 employees.

00:57:11.000 Why is there 100 people here?

00:57:12.000 The nice thing about this is you don't necessarily need that.

00:57:15.000 You can do everything you want.

00:57:16.000 I assume they partake of the wonders of editing.

00:57:19.000 They feel comfortable.

00:57:21.000 But you're right.

00:57:21.000 I don't know what it is.

00:57:23.000 I don't know what it is.

00:57:24.000 But with all those people, it makes it very hard to just be two dudes talking.

00:57:29.000 Well, that's something.

00:57:29.000 I mean, I definitely had to...

00:57:31.000 I thought that to myself coming in here. 0.99

00:57:34.000 Well, you know, this is three hours of unedited shit. 1.00

00:57:37.000 So, you know, don't fuck your life up. 0.99

00:57:39.000 So don't fuck it up, sort of, but also like, you know, live with it, you know, because you're going to have three hours.

00:57:44.000 Like, you know, when we do our podcast, me and my friend James, you know, I definitely take stuff out of it at times.

00:57:49.000 You know, there are things I've been really careful.

00:57:52.000 What is it called?

00:57:52.000 It's called Underwater Sunshine.

00:57:53.000 We just kind of geek out about music.

00:57:55.000 Do you have a t-shirt?

00:57:59.000 I don't have them here.

00:58:00.000 I'll get you one.

00:58:01.000 Get me one.

00:58:01.000 I'll wear an Underwater Sunshine t-shirt.

00:58:03.000 I like the name.

00:58:04.000 It's the name of one of the records we made.

00:58:06.000 We did a record of literally the most obscure covers record ever made.

00:58:10.000 Oh yeah?

00:58:10.000 Nothing on there that anybody knows.

00:58:12.000 A couple songs people would know, but basically we just picked all songs by friends of ours that were really good songs, but the shit no one knew.

00:58:19.000 And then we have a festival called Underwater Sunshine, too, where we just do, like, it's independent artists.

00:58:23.000 It's totally free for a couple days in New York, usually.

00:58:25.000 Oh, that's cool.

00:58:27.000 We're going to expand it a little bit this year.

00:58:29.000 But we were expanding it last year when this whole thing happened, landed on us.

00:58:34.000 Yeah.

00:58:34.000 But yeah, I mean, coming in here, it's definitely a thought.

00:58:36.000 Like, okay, well, it's three hours of unedited talking.

00:58:40.000 Try not to, like...

00:58:41.000 I mean, like, I try and be really careful about, you know, I don't...

00:58:44.000 I will talk about things I love.

00:58:46.000 I love to talk about things I love. 0.98

00:58:47.000 I just want to geek out on music I love and shit I love all day long.

00:58:50.000 I don't want to talk about stuff I don't like because A, it's not going to turn anybody on to anything. 0.97

00:58:54.000 Right.

00:58:55.000 And, you know, everybody's got a sister. 0.99

00:58:57.000 You know, I know my sister doesn't like reading shit about me that somebody says that's just horrible. 0.87

00:59:01.000 You know, so I kind of try and avoid that stuff just because... 0.97

00:59:05.000 Yeah, through trial and error, you learn to avoid negativity.

00:59:08.000 It's just generally not worth it unless there's a real point to be made.

00:59:12.000 Yeah.

00:59:12.000 You have to, like, really express something because it's actually important.

00:59:16.000 But for the most part.

00:59:18.000 It's easy, too. 0.99

00:59:19.000 It's really easy to shit on somebody and, like, I don't know. 0.99

00:59:22.000 And it's very profitable. 0.99

00:59:24.000 Yeah, it certainly is that.

00:59:25.000 It's very popular. 0.99

00:59:27.000 People love when people shit on people. 0.99

00:59:30.000 Yeah. 0.99

00:59:31.000 It is funny.

00:59:33.000 That's part of the problem as well.

00:59:35.000 It's funny.

00:59:35.000 It's the amazing thing about what Jeff's done in the last decade or so, is making this thing not personal, to turn the roasting into something that's back like what it used to be when we watched Dean Martin when we were kids.

00:59:49.000 It's funny, it's insulting, it's not about getting the world to think you're a piece of shit. 1.00

00:59:54.000 It's about, I'm making up a joke about how you're a piece of shit right now. 1.00

00:59:57.000 And he's done it without anybody really Somehow he just makes it work without causing a huge uproar. 1.00

01:00:04.000 It's not even a bullshit uproar. 0.74

01:00:07.000 I don't know why. 0.93

01:00:08.000 He's managed to pull it off in a way that's good-hearted enough that I'm not sure how he's managed it.

01:00:14.000 Because that's actually who he is.

01:00:16.000 So what he expresses on stage is how he is.

01:00:19.000 And also, it's kind of how comics talk to each other anyway. 0.98

01:00:23.000 We always talk shit to each other, but it's with love. 0.98

01:00:26.000 It's funny. 1.00

01:00:27.000 Like if someone shits on your clothes or shits on your face or shits on your head or shits on whatever it is, it's like we're all laughing along with it. 0.99

01:00:36.000 It's like it's an honor to get roasted by Jeff Ross or any really good roaster. 0.99

01:00:43.000 And Jeff is...

01:00:44.000 Because of his love of old comedy culture, like the Friars Club and that kind of stuff, he always loved that.

01:00:53.000 When we were in our 20s, he'd be like, I'm going to go to the Friars Club. 0.99

01:00:56.000 I'm like, what the fuck are you doing? 0.99

01:00:58.000 You're in your 20s. 1.00

01:00:59.000 We're not old dead men.

01:01:01.000 In my mind, I'm like, why are you going to the Friars Club?

01:01:03.000 He wanted to hang out with Don Rickles.

01:01:06.000 He wanted to pick his brain because he's got that Rickles-ish thing.

01:01:09.000 I get it now.

01:01:10.000 I get it now.

01:01:11.000 But back then, I was brazen.

01:01:14.000 Yeah, I get that.

01:01:16.000 When I was in my 20s, I was a different human being.

01:01:18.000 I didn't understand traditions and all that stuff. 0.98

01:01:22.000 I was like, get the fuck out of here with these old dead men hanging out, cracking jokes with each other in wheelchairs. 1.00

01:01:26.000 I just thought of the Friars Club as being this thing, but I didn't know what it was. 0.99

01:01:30.000 It was totally out of ignorance.

01:01:32.000 I'd never been there before.

01:01:33.000 And then I realized as I got older, oh, it's like a camaraderie thing.

01:01:37.000 Like these comics would get together and they had a place where they could hang out.

01:01:40.000 And then Greg Fitzsimmons had gone there and he told me he'd go there and play pool and hang out with these guys.

01:01:45.000 He's like, it was just a fun hang with a bunch of guys who were just cracking on each other all the time.

01:01:50.000 I was like, oh, okay.

01:01:52.000 Yeah, I mean, there's nothing like that for us, for music.

01:01:55.000 You know, like...

01:01:57.000 He took me there.

01:01:58.000 Is there a place where you guys hang?

01:01:59.000 Not really.

01:02:00.000 I mean, there was at one point, you know, I bartended at the Viper Room for years.

01:02:04.000 Oh, did you really?

01:02:05.000 Yeah, well, that's how I ended up moving to LA. I was home.

01:02:10.000 It was getting really miserable in Berkeley.

01:02:12.000 I'd been home for about a week from the end of touring.

01:02:15.000 Everywhere I went, it was an issue.

01:02:16.000 Not, you know, mostly positive, but still, it's like, you feel like everybody's looking at you.

01:02:21.000 There are kids camped out on my lawn.

01:02:23.000 A couple days...

01:02:26.000 Bunch of days in a row at least one like a hundred people come up to me a day But one of them was like hey, are you that guy from County Coors?

01:02:33.000 Yeah, you're Adam Duritz?

01:02:34.000 Yeah You guys are so lucky.

01:02:35.000 Thank you. 0.98

01:02:36.000 I mean because you suck and there's so many good bands in the Bay Area It's wild that a band as shitty as you would be so successful to your face. 0.99

01:02:43.000 Yeah, I was just like It happened like four or five days in a row I mean it was dwarfed by the amount of people that were coming up just loving the band but still it was like it started to feel like If there's going to be one of these every day, is one of them going to have a gun? 0.99

01:02:57.000 Is this Mark David Chapman?

01:02:59.000 It seems such a weird obsession to walk up to a total stranger in the line for a bank and just say something like that.

01:03:07.000 It was so weird.

01:03:10.000 But we got really famous really quickly.

01:03:14.000 The only people I knew in L.A. really were people at the Viperim.

01:03:17.000 I'd met a few of them playing across the street at the Whiskey on their first tours.

01:03:23.000 So I went home that day.

01:03:25.000 I'd been home for, I think, seven days.

01:03:26.000 And it happened like six of those seven days.

01:03:29.000 And I got a phone call, and it was Sal and Johnny.

01:03:33.000 Sal Jenko, who ran the Viper Room, he's Johnny Depp's partner.

01:03:35.000 And they called me up, and they're like, hey, we want to invite you to this party tonight.

01:03:39.000 And I was like kind of half in, half out.

01:03:41.000 I wasn't really listening.

01:03:42.000 And finally, they're like, wait, what's going on, man?

01:03:44.000 And I told them what was happening.

01:03:46.000 And they're like, hang on a second.

01:03:47.000 I'm going to put you on hold.

01:03:49.000 I sat there on the phone and I didn't know what was going on.

01:03:50.000 They came back and they said, okay, it's Kate Moss's 21st birthday tonight and we're throwing a party here.

01:03:55.000 The club's closed.

01:03:56.000 We're just throwing a party for friends.

01:03:58.000 We wanted to invite you.

01:03:59.000 We got you a room at the Bellage and you have a reservation on the flight at 6 o'clock, Oakland to Burbank.

01:04:05.000 Just get on it.

01:04:06.000 Someone will pick you up at the airport.

01:04:08.000 You've got a room at the Bellage. 1.00

01:04:09.000 Get the fuck out of there. 0.99

01:04:11.000 So I like... 0.98

01:04:12.000 Grabbed my stuff, went to the airport, went to this party at the Vipram with just like interesting people.

01:04:19.000 And I was like, I didn't go home again.

01:04:21.000 That was it.

01:04:21.000 I moved to LA after that.

01:04:23.000 I did.

01:04:23.000 I stayed at the Bellage for a few days.

01:04:25.000 I moved to like a bungalow at the Sunset Marquee and then eventually...

01:04:29.000 I rented this house in the hills.

01:04:31.000 One of the bartenders, Shannon McManus, at the Viper, her best friend was Christine Applegate. 0.97

01:04:36.000 And she was my landlord. 0.99

01:04:37.000 She rented me this old, like, she had this fucking place. 1.00

01:04:40.000 It was like a little cottage in Laurel Canyon. 0.99

01:04:43.000 And it turned out it was built by the cowboy star, Tom Mix, in the 20s. 0.87

01:04:48.000 And then it was David Niven's, like, in-town fuckpad.

01:04:51.000 And he named it Rogues Retreat when there was a little sign up there after this TV show he was on called The Rogues in, like, the 60s.

01:04:57.000 And then, I don't know, I I don't know what it was after that, but she owned it, and I stayed there.

01:05:02.000 I wrote most of our second record in that place before I bought a place.

01:05:05.000 But yeah, man, the Viper Room, for a couple years there, I bartended all the time because it was just less crowded on that side of the bar.

01:05:13.000 My friends all worked there, so I would be there anyways hanging out with them.

01:05:16.000 So you bartended while you were a rock star?

01:05:18.000 Oh yeah, huge rock.

01:05:20.000 At the height of it.

01:05:21.000 Wow!

01:05:23.000 Because when I was back there and I'd be hanging out with Shannon, smoking a cigarette, drinking beers behind the bar, you know, in the downstairs bar there, the little one.

01:05:30.000 And I don't know, at one point, I'd help her out with stuff.

01:05:33.000 And at one point, she's like, I go to the bathroom, there's nobody else.

01:05:35.000 Will you just, you know, mind the bar?

01:05:37.000 And I was like...

01:05:38.000 Yeah, sure.

01:05:39.000 So I did it.

01:05:40.000 And I had no qualms about berating people for tips.

01:05:43.000 I'm a rock star and they're not my tips, so why not?

01:05:46.000 So I made her a few hundred dollars in the five minutes she was gone. 0.82

01:05:50.000 And she's like, you've got to do this all the time.

01:05:52.000 So I just started going there.

01:05:53.000 I mean, that's where I lived anyways.

01:05:54.000 I was kind of there every day.

01:05:56.000 The only people I knew.

01:05:57.000 So I just started bartending every night.

01:06:00.000 And it was like my home.

01:06:02.000 It was like a cheers thing.

01:06:04.000 I felt like...

01:06:05.000 Okay there.

01:06:06.000 It's kind of a cool way to interact with people, too, because there is a barrier, and it is less crowded over there, and it's probably kind of fun.

01:06:12.000 Yeah, and you talk to them if you want to.

01:06:15.000 If you don't want to, you've got to get a beer for someone else.

01:06:17.000 Right.

01:06:19.000 And there was just so many people.

01:06:20.000 It was like what I thought...

01:06:25.000 The Left Bank would have been like in Paris in the 20s.

01:06:27.000 I mean, it was like Allen Ginsberg coming in and William Burroughs, the Hughes Brothers, all these different filmmakers, you know, musicians, Tom Petty.

01:06:36.000 It was just really wild.

01:06:37.000 Gibby Haynes from the Butthole Surfers.

01:06:39.000 You know, we were all just hanging out there.

01:06:41.000 Wow.

01:06:41.000 It was like Johnny's Clubhouse, and we had barbecues on Sunset on Sundays.

01:06:45.000 You know, and we just sort of, for a few years, it was this really cool...

01:06:51.000 Like, club.

01:06:53.000 Kinda.

01:06:53.000 Wow.

01:06:54.000 Like a clubhouse.

01:06:55.000 It was very much like that.

01:06:56.000 Was the negativity towards you, like, specific to the Bay Area?

01:07:02.000 Well, I think... 1.00

01:07:03.000 Because that's so unusual to me that someone would come up to you in person and tell you you suck like that. 1.00

01:07:09.000 Like, that's dangerous. 0.99

01:07:10.000 It is, and I think it's because...

01:07:12.000 And it's, like, unprovoked.

01:07:15.000 Yeah, no, it's just total strangers.

01:07:16.000 It's just trying to hurt your feelings.

01:07:17.000 So, like, where'd that narrative come from, though? 0.96

01:07:19.000 Because, first of all, you guys didn't suck.

01:07:22.000 Your music was amazing.

01:07:23.000 I was a giant fan.

01:07:24.000 I mean, still am.

01:07:25.000 But, I mean, back then, I was a giant fan.

01:07:28.000 So, like, it doesn't make any sense to me.

01:07:30.000 Well, I think it's just you get on people's nerves.

01:07:34.000 You know, you just do.

01:07:35.000 Just overexposure.

01:07:36.000 It's too much.

01:07:39.000 But I also think San Francisco in a lot of ways back then was a struggling artist town.

01:07:43.000 And so that kind of success wasn't Cool.

01:07:47.000 You know, it wasn't as well regarded.

01:07:49.000 When I moved to LA, it was a working artist town.

01:07:52.000 It was really nice for me there, because, like, all anybody wanted to do, you know, for all the...

01:07:55.000 There's a lot of things about LA I don't like.

01:07:57.000 I mean, a ton.

01:07:58.000 But I do like the part of it that it's like, it was a working artist town.

01:08:02.000 People just wanted to do their thing, and they were interested in what you were doing.

01:08:06.000 They wanted to show you maybe what they were doing.

01:08:07.000 But everyone was, you know, we were hoping each other had success, and there was nothing to be jealous of.

01:08:13.000 Everyone was doing stuff.

01:08:14.000 It just didn't feel like...

01:08:16.000 I love the Bay Area a lot more than L.A., honestly.

01:08:19.000 And in years since then, I've loved going back home. 0.78

01:08:22.000 But at that moment, it just seemed like it annoyed the shit out of some people in the indie rock scene I came from.

01:08:30.000 We were a college radio indie rock band in this club scene up there. 0.97

01:08:34.000 You got too successful.

01:08:35.000 Yeah, and pretty quick.

01:08:37.000 And I think it probably was all over the radio.

01:08:40.000 It didn't happen to any of our friends.

01:08:44.000 There were a lot of other bands in the Bay Area.

01:08:46.000 Three of us did really well right at the same time.

01:08:49.000 Primus a little bit before us, and then us, and then Green Day right after us.

01:08:52.000 But we were actually all Berklee kids, East Bay.

01:08:55.000 So I don't know.

01:08:56.000 But it happened for a little while, and then it stopped happening.

01:09:00.000 Well, the thing about San Francisco, the Bay Area in particular, is it's not a showbiz culture.

01:09:06.000 No.

01:09:06.000 Right?

01:09:07.000 It's a culture of more art and a lot of really intelligent people.

01:09:13.000 I lived there when I was a kid from age 7 to 11. And I remember thinking, it was like a very good place to be at the time.

01:09:21.000 It was a very fortunate place to be at that age of my life, because I was around a lot of eclectic people, a lot of interesting, weird people.

01:09:30.000 You know, we lived in the center of it all.

01:09:33.000 We were right down the street from Lombard Street.

01:09:35.000 So it was like, yeah, and it was during the Vietnam War, you know, so it was like, It was all weirdos and hippies, and my stepfather was a hippie, so it all fit in.

01:09:44.000 It seemed normal.

01:09:45.000 And then we moved from there to Florida afterwards, and the contrast was so stark that it made me go, wow, I was really lucky to live there.

01:09:56.000 That was a cool spot.

01:09:58.000 People were...

01:09:59.000 It was just interesting and creative and there was a lot of music and there was a lot of art.

01:10:05.000 It was just a different place to be.

01:10:08.000 But it's not a showbiz culture by any stretch of the imagination.

01:10:11.000 Whereas in Los Angeles, people celebrate overexposure.

01:10:15.000 They celebrate Overexposure and over-publicized people and people that are on billboards.

01:10:22.000 Whereas in a place like San Francisco, that's not cool. 0.99

01:10:26.000 That's all fucked up. 0.98

01:10:28.000 They'd be more into going to an antique store or something. 0.99

01:10:30.000 And that's a thing that I... The thing that I came to not like about LA after a number of years was their worship of fame, being famous just for being famous.

01:10:43.000 And their sort of circular worship of fame. 0.99

01:10:45.000 But what I loved about it was that that all really exists and it's annoying as fuck. 0.88

01:10:50.000 But it exists around a bunch of people who are out there doing stuff too. 0.78

01:10:54.000 And I thought that was really...

01:10:57.000 It's funny that you came up with the Bay Area to Florida.

01:10:59.000 We went from Texas to the Bay Area.

01:11:03.000 My dad was in the Army during Vietnam in El Paso, and I loved it.

01:11:10.000 We lived in Houston after that.

01:11:12.000 I didn't like Houston as much, but El Paso was, man, it was just like...

01:11:17.000 Because I think it's a... 0.99

01:11:18.000 It was a lot of vacant lots and desert and bugs and snakes and shit. 0.99

01:11:23.000 And it's also the first place... 0.99

01:11:25.000 You know when you're a kid, you like...

01:11:28.000 First, as a kid, you just do stuff with your parents.

01:11:30.000 You know what I mean?

01:11:31.000 And the family.

01:11:32.000 And then, at some point, you go off and do something by yourself with another kid.

01:11:37.000 At a certain point, you get a little off on your own.

01:11:39.000 To me, I was six when I got there. 0.99

01:11:42.000 That's part of the first experiences I have with going fucking around with shit on my own. 0.99

01:11:46.000 Just like vacant lots and snakes and spiders and riding my bike. 0.99

01:11:51.000 I just really remember that about El Paso and really loving that.

01:11:56.000 And actually, I don't know why.

01:11:58.000 Even the army culture, which was kind of weird, seemed cool.

01:12:02.000 And I just liked it.

01:12:03.000 I liked that town.

01:12:04.000 And it's like...

01:12:05.000 But it's a weird town.

01:12:06.000 It's like right on the border.

01:12:07.000 It's a...

01:12:09.000 It's kind of very much its own place.

01:12:11.000 It's Texas.

01:12:12.000 I haven't been to El Paso yet.

01:12:14.000 I kind of love it there.

01:12:15.000 Even now, it was the last place that I'd lived that I hadn't played.

01:12:19.000 Because I grew up all over.

01:12:20.000 You know, Baltimore, Boston, El Paso, Denver, Houston, and then Oakland.

01:12:26.000 And then I turned 10. So all that happened really early on.

01:12:30.000 But the last place I got to play was El Paso.

01:12:32.000 I'd hit everything else.

01:12:33.000 And it was just a few years ago, and we were at this club.

01:12:36.000 It was a big open-air place.

01:12:38.000 It had a roof over it, but no ends.

01:12:40.000 And it was right across the river from Juarez, somewhere right on the Rio Grande.

01:12:45.000 Enough so that our phones kept switching over, thinking they were in Mexico.

01:12:48.000 Oh, wow.

01:12:49.000 So it was just like...

01:12:52.000 The food was great.

01:12:53.000 The people were great.

01:12:54.000 I found the house where I lived, the two houses I lived when I was a kid.

01:12:57.000 I went in an Uber with my tour manager and found both of them.

01:12:59.000 I don't know how.

01:13:00.000 You know, it's like 1970. This is about five to ten years ago.

01:13:04.000 And I managed to, like, I remembered the street names and where they were on the streets from when I was six, seven, eight years old, you know. 0.83

01:13:11.000 I found both houses, which was fucking freaky. 0.54

01:13:14.000 I couldn't believe I found them. 0.97

01:13:15.000 That must have been a trip for the Uber driver.

01:13:17.000 Did he know who you were?

01:13:18.000 I don't know.

01:13:19.000 I'm not sure.

01:13:19.000 But it was weird for me and Tom.

01:13:22.000 Like, wow, can you imagine just finding some house you lived in when you were six, when you were 50?

01:13:27.000 Yeah.

01:13:27.000 It's really wild.

01:13:29.000 Yeah, that is wild.

01:13:30.000 I went back to the house that I went to high school with recently.

01:13:34.000 Where was that?

01:13:35.000 Newton.

01:13:36.000 Newton, Massachusetts.

01:13:37.000 Oh, yeah.

01:13:39.000 I was wandering around that area, and it just seemed...

01:13:45.000 Familiar, but yet different. 0.98

01:13:47.000 Because your memory is kind of shitty. 0.52

01:13:51.000 If you had to draw a picture of what the street looked like from your memory, you'd be like, I think there was a tree here. 0.98

01:13:59.000 Here's the arch of the bridge.

01:14:02.000 And...

01:14:04.000 Randomly, like a year or two later, I'm doing a gig at the Wilbur Theatre in Boston, and I'm eating with one of my high school buddies at a restaurant, and this lady comes up to me and she goes, I live in the house where you grew up.

01:14:18.000 And I'm like, what?!

01:14:20.000 And I took a picture with her.

01:14:22.000 That's cool.

01:14:23.000 But it was like, I'm here smiling with some lady who lives in my old house.

01:14:28.000 And she lived, yeah, and I had just been there.

01:14:31.000 Just like a couple years before with my family, wandering around.

01:14:34.000 I remember thinking, like, it's so odd.

01:14:36.000 It's so odd when you just try to...

01:14:39.000 Pieced together that weird, blurry slideshow of a memory, and then you see the actual place vividly, and everything looks so much smaller than you remember.

01:14:49.000 It's just strange.

01:14:52.000 Yeah, because you're bigger.

01:14:53.000 That's the weird thing.

01:14:54.000 I mean, because we do, especially those kid memories.

01:14:57.000 That's the thing, because that's how I found the first.

01:15:00.000 One of them I'm sure I found, the other one I'm not sure, because it was in the middle of a street, so I wasn't sure.

01:15:05.000 But one of them I knew was on a corner.

01:15:06.000 And it had a big stone wall on one side of the street and then the driveway on the other street.

01:15:13.000 And I remember thinking that I could find it because that stone wall, I used to climb it when I was a kid.

01:15:18.000 And, you know, when I saw that now, it's like this high.

01:15:21.000 Right.

01:15:22.000 But to me, it was...

01:15:24.000 In my memory, it's 8 or 10 feet high because I used to climb it and climb down it.

01:15:28.000 And there was like a...

01:15:30.000 I don't know.

01:15:31.000 I don't know.

01:15:32.000 I remember being big enough that I had to climb down onto a mailbox and then jump down to the street.

01:15:36.000 But it's not a lot bigger than a mailbox.

01:15:38.000 So I'm not sure why that would have worked.

01:15:41.000 But, you know, it's like I was six, you know, and I was a small kid.

01:15:45.000 So it was weird finding that because everything changes, you know.

01:15:50.000 The thing we were talking about when we were talking about going to LA and the showbiz culture and the culture of fame and all that stuff is there.

01:15:58.000 I was just having a conversation with a friend of mine about LA. The real thing that gets tainted is not necessarily the people that just happen to be famous, the artists that are doing things.

01:16:09.000 It's that...

01:16:10.000 There's a whole swarm of people that are trying to figure out a way how to get into that walled garden.

01:16:18.000 And they're bartending, and they're waitressing, and they're delivering Uber Eats, and they're doing all these different things.

01:16:26.000 So there's an anxiety of just...

01:16:31.000 There's like a feeling of all these people that desperately want in.

01:16:37.000 And they're all hovering around this area, and it changes the whole vibe of the town.

01:16:42.000 When you go to a place that doesn't have that, and it's one of the things that I love about Austin, it does not have that.

01:16:49.000 The feeling is different.

01:16:51.000 The feeling when you're around people, they're different.

01:16:56.000 There's people in LA that don't even admit that they wanted to be famous.

01:17:01.000 They just gave up on the dream.

01:17:02.000 They came out there for a very specific reason.

01:17:04.000 They wanted to be an actor or whatever it is.

01:17:06.000 And then it didn't work out and they became an architect or whatever.

01:17:08.000 Whatever it is.

01:17:09.000 But they wanted to be famous.

01:17:11.000 And then they want to meet people who are famous and then become friends with those people so they can get and hang out with famous people.

01:17:18.000 So at least they kind of get the rub. 0.99

01:17:20.000 And it's fucking weird, man. 0.99

01:17:22.000 It's a weird culture. 0.99

01:17:24.000 It's like...

01:17:25.000 There's a shallowness to it, but yet some of the most interesting, creative, and deep people live amongst that shallowness.

01:17:34.000 So you have all these really intense artists that are surrounded by all these very strange people that are trying to figure out how they can get on the cover of Rolling Stone.

01:17:47.000 But it's interesting because what you were talking about, it was one of the things that turned me off when I finally left because You're right.

01:17:55.000 Everybody, even people who do impressive things and are successful, only want to talk to you in conversation about the movie producer they had a meeting with last week.

01:18:04.000 You can be a very successful lawyer in finance.

01:18:08.000 You can be doing something very impressive in another field, and they aren't going to talk to you about being a doctor.

01:18:14.000 They just want to talk to you about the meeting they had for a pitch idea.

01:18:17.000 But I do think there's a flip side to that, too, that I did find kind of magical about being there, which is that So much of culture is about, I was born here, I grew up here, around all these same people, and we're all gonna do this thing here,

01:18:34.000 too.

01:18:35.000 And there's a certain amount to which LA is about, like, it's a bunch of people who all decided they didn't want to do what everyone else in their high school did.

01:18:44.000 Whether it's to be a poet or a sculptor or a painter or a musician or an actor or a model.

01:18:52.000 But it's still like, I don't want to stay here and just do this thing.

01:18:56.000 I'm going to go over there.

01:18:58.000 And there's a certain pioneer aesthetic about doing that.

01:19:02.000 The problem is if you get there...

01:19:05.000 And then it just becomes about famous and famous.

01:19:08.000 I dig the part of it that is like, I got a dream and I'm willing to go all the way over there to get it and to do it.

01:19:14.000 I love that.

01:19:15.000 I felt like I had that in common with all those people.

01:19:17.000 But then there's a side of it you're talking about where, A, you lose what you came there for originally and it just becomes about chasing fame and success as opposed to doing anything for it.

01:19:29.000 And that got really annoying right after the millennium when the A lot of the reality TV stuff started to become bigger and bigger.

01:19:36.000 And suddenly it's just like...

01:19:37.000 Fame for fame's sake.

01:19:38.000 Fame for fame's sake.

01:19:39.000 It's nothing about doing anything.

01:19:40.000 And that was when I started to get...

01:19:42.000 I lost my taste for LA. I really charred it to about the millennium and realizing it was like a year after that.

01:19:49.000 We had these birthday parties every year and I used to love them and having everybody come up.

01:19:53.000 And for years we had these big parties on Friday night where just everybody would come to my house on Fridays.

01:19:57.000 You know, just like a huge party.

01:19:59.000 But I remember thinking, I don't want to have anybody over anymore.

01:20:03.000 I don't want to be here anymore.

01:20:06.000 And then I had been spending a lot of time in New York visiting friends.

01:20:11.000 And I had a lot of friends here from years before.

01:20:15.000 Do you know who Mary Louise Parker is?

01:20:17.000 No.

01:20:17.000 I know who she is.

01:20:18.000 Yeah, so her and I met when we were kids.

01:20:20.000 Like, she had just gotten out of college, done her first movie.

01:20:23.000 I was in my first band.

01:20:25.000 She was out doing a play in Berkeley at Berkeley Rep, and we became friends.

01:20:28.000 I had a huge crush on her.

01:20:31.000 But we became friends, this is like 1980, 87, 88, something like that.

01:20:36.000 And so we've been friends ever since then.

01:20:38.000 So I would go in New York and I would visit her and her boyfriend and we'd go see plays all the time and I thought, I was really liking life in New York.

01:20:46.000 And me and Billy Crudup, who was then her boyfriend, We went to see this play called Private Lives.

01:20:53.000 It's a Noel Coward play, and it starred Alan Rickman and Lindsey Duncan.

01:20:57.000 And after the play, Billy took me backstage, and we ended up going out that night with Alan, having some drinks, and hanging out for the rest of the evening with Alan Rickman and Lindsey Duncan.

01:21:06.000 It was just so great.

01:21:09.000 The whole experience, and I felt, it felt, I don't know, a lot more grown up, kind of.

01:21:16.000 I don't know, I just felt like I'd been having conversations with people from the real world, and now I was having a conversation with Alan Rickman and Lindsey Duncan, and I really liked it, and I thought,

01:21:31.000 I think I gotta get out of LA. I think I would like to have these conversations more.

01:21:38.000 I realized how much I liked going to the theater, just because it was closer to what I do, going on stage and doing it live every night.

01:21:49.000 I wanted to get the hell out of LA. And I had really appreciated it up until about the millennium.

01:21:55.000 I had appreciated all the people that were creative and how much variety of it there was.

01:22:01.000 I really liked all that.

01:22:03.000 But something happened after the millennium where I just got really burnt out on it.

01:22:08.000 I think you nailed it with the comment about the reality shows, because that clearly changed the culture of the city, because now people realize you didn't really have to be talented.

01:22:19.000 You just had to demand attention.

01:22:21.000 Yeah.

01:22:22.000 And there's a lot of people that are doing that now, whether it's TikTok or a lot of these...

01:22:28.000 YouTube stars and things along those lines, they don't really necessarily have a talent. 0.94

01:22:33.000 They just either stir up a lot of shit, cause arguments with people, do pranks, whatever they can do to get attention. 0.63

01:22:40.000 So it's not the same vibe, right? 0.99

01:22:43.000 It's not about someone who's just trying to create great music or someone who's trying to make good movies or whatever it is you're trying to do.

01:22:49.000 It's now become a culture of attention and fame.

01:22:52.000 And that's LA now.

01:22:54.000 I mean, LA is like a lot of these great restaurants and bars, they're TikTok places now.

01:23:00.000 You know that?

01:23:01.000 No.

01:23:01.000 Yeah.

01:23:02.000 What do you mean?

01:23:02.000 Like, people go there because TikTok stars go there.

01:23:07.000 So, like, what is that place on Sunset?

01:23:10.000 Saddle Ranch.

01:23:11.000 Saddle Ranch is a TikTok place now.

01:23:15.000 Like, TikTok stars go there, and everybody goes there to see TikTok stars.

01:23:20.000 Is it even open now?

01:23:21.000 They're allowed to be open?

01:23:23.000 Fully open?

01:23:23.000 I don't know.

01:23:24.000 You go there every goddamn chance. 0.99

01:23:26.000 He's a TikTok fiend. 1.00

01:23:27.000 Look at him.

01:23:29.000 Just kidding.

01:23:30.000 Just kidding.

01:23:30.000 But that's a thing.

01:23:32.000 Like Boa is a big steakhouse on Sunset.

01:23:35.000 Yeah.

01:23:35.000 And it's infested with TikTok people.

01:23:41.000 I've only been there once with Bob.

01:23:43.000 Why are you laughing?

01:23:43.000 The steak was great.

01:23:45.000 Am I right about this?

01:23:47.000 It's always been infested.

01:23:49.000 Maybe different sections have been infested with young people.

01:23:52.000 Listen, when I say infested, maybe that's the wrong word.

01:23:55.000 It could be infested by rock stars.

01:23:57.000 Now it's infested by TikTok people. 1.00

01:23:59.000 It becomes the culture.

01:24:00.000 Well, you aren't wrong that, like, the way in early 2000s kids would flock to the front of MTV to maybe get a glimpse at some music video star.

01:24:10.000 They're standing out in front of Saddle Ranch, not going there.

01:24:12.000 They're just, like, taking their phones to take pictures with them.

01:24:15.000 That's the weirdest thing to me, because I remember that at TRL. You know, all that crowd in front of TRL on Broadway.

01:24:20.000 But, like...

01:24:22.000 That's a weird thing.

01:24:23.000 You know, you were talking about early on about being awkward in front of things.

01:24:27.000 I've never felt as awkward.

01:24:28.000 I already felt too old the first time we were on TRL. How old were you?

01:24:33.000 I mean, I had to be 30-something, so I was too old.

01:24:36.000 But, like, I became a rock star at 29 or 30. I mean, I put my first record out at 30 at 29. How old are you now?

01:24:43.000 56. Yeah, so I'm, you know, I'm just inches away from death.

01:24:49.000 That's right.

01:24:51.000 But the very first time we were on TRL, everyone was really nice, but I felt weird and old and out of place and like over the hill already.

01:25:00.000 And I don't think it existed for our first couple albums, but it was sometime around the third that I was like...

01:25:06.000 Boy, we are past our sell-by date.

01:25:09.000 It's 1999, so it's been 22 years and we're still here, so that's pretty good.

01:25:14.000 No, that's very good.

01:25:15.000 When you first made it, what was it like to go from just being a guy in a band to all of a sudden, holy shit, it's the guy from Counting Crows. 0.99

01:25:29.000 Holy shit. 0.99

01:25:30.000 It's that dude. 0.99

01:25:31.000 That was fucking weird for me because I was really shy, you know, and I had, you know, I have dissociative disorder, which is not dissociative identity disorder. 0.89

01:25:40.000 What does that mean? 0.97

01:25:41.000 That's split personality.

01:25:42.000 Well, dissociative disorder is like, it's that you don't quite, it's hard to describe it, you don't quite connect with the world and you feel a little bit like you're at the back of your head watching things as they happen.

01:25:53.000 Isn't that everybody?

01:25:54.000 Yeah, maybe not to the extent.

01:25:57.000 Don't tell me my mental illness is something everybody has.

01:26:00.000 Keep questioning.

01:26:01.000 No, I mean, I think it is to a certain extent, but it definitely kept me at a distance from things, and I always felt a little awkward.

01:26:06.000 How did you get diagnosed?

01:26:07.000 Like, how does that get...

01:26:09.000 Well, finally...

01:26:09.000 Do you have to describe the issues that you're having, and then the psychologist sort of explains it?

01:26:14.000 I don't think I really got it diagnosed until I was almost 40. Because they'd been diagnosed as different things.

01:26:19.000 They thought I was kind of bipolar at times. 0.99

01:26:20.000 I was medicated for a lot of different shit. 0.99

01:26:22.000 Really? 0.99

01:26:23.000 Yeah, which is not pleasant.

01:26:25.000 During the stardom period you were medicated?

01:26:27.000 Oh, yeah.

01:26:28.000 Did you get medicated after stardom?

01:26:30.000 No, before.

01:26:31.000 Before.

01:26:31.000 I just didn't want to tell anybody about it because you don't want to be a public spectacle while you're going downhill.

01:26:37.000 Right.

01:26:37.000 You know what I mean?

01:26:38.000 No matter how much sympathy people pretend to...

01:26:40.000 To offer.

01:26:42.000 We love to watch trains collide.

01:26:45.000 Did you feel like fame exacerbated your issues?

01:26:48.000 Well, yeah, because I was very anxious and very shy and all of a sudden and very awkward in company with people and then all of a sudden everyone in the world is coming up to me and it felt like It felt like claustrophobic, like the world is just pressing on you all the time.

01:27:05.000 You know, I remember when we got offered the cover of Rolling Stone and I told my manager I wanted to think about it.

01:27:11.000 You know for a day because you know and of course you're never gonna say no to the cover of Rolling Stone It is if you want to have a career and you get off the cover of Rolling Stone You should fucking do it because that's that's a career maker right there You know, but I also I mean it's not like this nowadays because there are no newsstands really or very few but remember like Having your picture on the cover of a magazine like that meant that you were like omnipresent You're everywhere on every street corner everyone your face was everywhere so like any sort of anonymity is is gone I mean,

01:27:40.000 it scared me.

01:27:41.000 It did. 0.83

01:27:42.000 It scared the shit out of me.

01:27:45.000 But, you know, you got to do that stuff.

01:27:47.000 So, I mean, I struggled with it at first.

01:27:48.000 It was really different.

01:27:49.000 People chase you down the street.

01:27:52.000 I remember going to a movie in Birmingham by myself in the middle of the afternoon.

01:27:56.000 Just went to see some movie.

01:27:57.000 It was a block or two from our hotel.

01:27:59.000 Just a matinee, you know, on a day off.

01:28:02.000 And I'm in there.

01:28:03.000 There's no one in the theater.

01:28:05.000 It's like one of those multiplexes.

01:28:06.000 There's no one in there, the one I was in.

01:28:08.000 And then, like, midway through the movie, this guy comes down.

01:28:13.000 Sits next to me, like in the middle of the theater.

01:28:15.000 He's like, hey.

01:28:16.000 I said, hey.

01:28:17.000 He's like, are you in County Crows?

01:28:19.000 I said, yeah.

01:28:20.000 And he goes, ah, I love your band.

01:28:22.000 Do you mind if I sit here?

01:28:24.000 And I said, you know, I'm kind of just trying to have some time to myself.

01:28:27.000 And he goes, okay.

01:28:28.000 Gets up, walks out.

01:28:30.000 Walks out of the theater.

01:28:30.000 Doesn't sit down in the theater, just walks out.

01:28:33.000 And I'm watching the rest of the movie.

01:28:35.000 Right at the end of the movie, guy comes in again, walks down a mile, sits next to me. 0.99

01:28:40.000 And I was like, God damn it. 0.98

01:28:41.000 And I turn, but it's a different guy. 0.99

01:28:43.000 And he's wearing the uniform from the place.

01:28:44.000 And he's like, hey, I'm sorry to bother you.

01:28:46.000 But the kid came in here earlier.

01:28:48.000 I said, yeah.

01:28:49.000 He said, well, he's been out in the lobby for the last hour on the payphone calling everyone he knows, I guess, because he's been on the phone the whole time.

01:28:56.000 There's like 100 people.

01:28:58.000 Out front now. 1.00

01:28:59.000 I was just like, fuck. 0.99

01:29:01.000 He goes, if you want to go out that exit, that takes you out the side of the building. 1.00

01:29:05.000 You can sneak out.

01:29:06.000 I was like, thank you.

01:29:07.000 I went down and ran.

01:29:09.000 I was around the side of the building, so I was a good block away before they spotted me.

01:29:13.000 And then they all came charging after me.

01:29:14.000 I made it to the hotel. 1.00

01:29:15.000 It's like some Beatles shit, son. 0.99

01:29:17.000 I know. 1.00

01:29:17.000 It was fucking weird. 1.00

01:29:18.000 It was like Beatlemania. 0.99

01:29:21.000 You don't expect that.

01:29:24.000 It was a lot to deal with.

01:29:25.000 For me, it just kind of freaked me out.

01:29:28.000 I've said this same quote a million times, but if you woke up on Mars, it would take you a minute to get used to the gravity.

01:29:33.000 But you do.

01:29:34.000 You adjust.

01:29:35.000 And I adjusted.

01:29:37.000 But at first, I was a mess.

01:29:39.000 I didn't know what to do about it.

01:29:41.000 So did they have you on medication before all of this happened?

01:29:45.000 Oh, yeah. 0.99

01:29:45.000 What kind of shit were you on? 0.99

01:29:47.000 Fuck, I don't remember now. 1.00

01:29:48.000 I mean, it's such a long time ago. 1.00

01:29:50.000 I was talking to a friend this morning because her son is taking Lamictal.

01:29:56.000 What is Lamictal?

01:29:57.000 It's like a drug for anxiety or depression.

01:29:59.000 I don't remember now, but I used to have to take it and it didn't work for me.

01:30:03.000 There's a different formulation for the chewable one that they gave to kids than the swallowable one that they gave to adults.

01:30:09.000 And the chewable one only came in like two milligrams.

01:30:11.000 And I had an ever-increasing dosage, you know, like 10, 20, 40, 100 milligrams.

01:30:16.000 Did it, like, stop working?

01:30:17.000 Is that why they kept increasing your dosage?

01:30:19.000 Well, they just generally do.

01:30:20.000 To get you on a drug, they start you small, and then they give you more.

01:30:23.000 Ramp you up?

01:30:23.000 Yeah.

01:30:24.000 But because the only formulation that worked for me, weirdly enough, was the chewable one, which comes in, like, two milligram package of pills, I had to take the chewable kind.

01:30:34.000 Because sometimes the formulations are different, you know, in the different kinds of ways they package up drugs.

01:30:38.000 And so something in the other version didn't work for me, so I had to keep taking the chewable one.

01:30:42.000 So at one point, I was taking, like...

01:30:44.000 25 of them.

01:30:45.000 You get 50 milligrams, and it's like 25 of these little...

01:30:48.000 Can you imagine taking like 50 or 25 different Flintstones vitamins every morning?

01:30:53.000 Jesus Christ.

01:30:54.000 All the liquid in your mouth just gets sucked out, and it becomes this paste. 1.00

01:30:58.000 You're trying to chew these fucking pills. 0.99

01:31:00.000 That's sort of the slightly sweet orange flavor of chewable pills. 1.00

01:31:06.000 She reminded me of this morning, and I just thought, oh my God, I forgot all about that. 0.58

01:31:12.000 Every morning, taking like 25 of these pills and chewing them up and just the fucking paste in my mouth for just this horrible, on top of everything else that's going on, you have this experience every morning, this trauma-inducing paste-in-your-mouth experience. 0.98

01:31:28.000 I called it happy paste, but it was just so fucking gross on top of everything else. 0.98

01:31:34.000 And you must have had to have cases of that stuff if you're eating so much every morning. 0.96

01:31:39.000 Yeah, it was weird.

01:31:40.000 So how'd you bring it in?

01:31:41.000 Like a suitcase everywhere?

01:31:43.000 Honestly, I don't remember.

01:31:43.000 Because if you're taking 25 pills every morning, is that what you're taking?

01:31:46.000 Yeah, they're real little, so you can get a bunch of them.

01:31:48.000 But yeah, it took like four pill bottles each dosage, you know, to get you through. 0.98

01:31:51.000 I mean, eventually they took me off, and it wasn't the right medication, and it was impossible trying to fucking chew up all this shit. 0.99

01:31:56.000 But the chewer... 0.99

01:31:57.000 Why would the chewable ones work and the other ones didn't work?

01:32:00.000 I don't know.

01:32:01.000 It's, you know, sometimes...

01:32:02.000 The way, you know, there can be slight differences between generic versions and regular versions of drugs, where, like, just the formulation's a little different.

01:32:09.000 I don't know.

01:32:09.000 But the chewable form of it worked, and the other one didn't.

01:32:13.000 Wow.

01:32:14.000 That was a long time ago.

01:32:15.000 What did it do for you?

01:32:15.000 What did the chewable stuff do for you?

01:32:17.000 Shit, I don't remember what it was for. 0.99

01:32:18.000 I guess it's for anxiety or depression. 0.99

01:32:21.000 When something alleviates anxiety, what is the feeling?

01:32:26.000 How does it alleviate it?

01:32:27.000 What does it do for you?

01:32:28.000 Well, sometimes for me, especially when it first came on when I was like 20, the dissociation was like being on acid.

01:32:37.000 You know when you get high, you're on acid, and everything looks a little different?

01:32:40.000 Just a little weird feeling?

01:32:41.000 That's what it was like.

01:32:42.000 I spent like Between 20 and 22 on a year and a half, two year acid trip at one point.

01:32:50.000 Wow.

01:32:50.000 When I was young, which was really shattering.

01:32:52.000 Way before my career.

01:32:54.000 But for me, I didn't talk about this in my career until 2007. We were making Saturday nights and Sunday mornings.

01:33:00.000 Because even though I was kind of a mess, Saturday nights was the bottom of the bottom for me.

01:33:05.000 And I really felt like I was falling apart.

01:33:07.000 But...

01:33:08.000 The Sunday mornings was kind of about getting my life together after that.

01:33:12.000 It wasn't fixed, but I felt like I was not sliding down the drain anymore.

01:33:16.000 And that felt like a time where it was safe to talk about mental illness. 0.67

01:33:21.000 It's not my mission in life.

01:33:23.000 I'm not a role model for anybody, but I just had avoided talking about it.

01:33:29.000 Because I didn't want to be a public spectacle. 0.98

01:33:31.000 Well, a lot of shit was going on in my life. 0.98

01:33:34.000 And that's what I was writing about. 0.99

01:33:36.000 I just didn't say it, you know?

01:33:38.000 But...

01:33:38.000 I don't know.

01:33:39.000 It's like...

01:33:40.000 Mental illness is a weird thing.

01:33:41.000 It's not like...

01:33:44.000 You know, diseases, most of the things that happen in your life, you're going to get cured of it.

01:33:48.000 You know, it's a problem, it has a cure, and then it sucks, and then you go back to normal, you know?

01:33:53.000 Right. 0.93

01:33:54.000 Or, you know, I guess, or you die.

01:33:55.000 But most of the time, we expect to go back to normal.

01:33:58.000 But it's closer to a handicap.

01:34:00.000 Mental illness doesn't go away.

01:34:02.000 It's just like you learn, well, you get the right medication.

01:34:05.000 But then you get a handle on how to live with being a little different.

01:34:09.000 It's just something you carry around with you, and you've got to learn how to carry that weight.

01:34:15.000 That's your life, and it's different.

01:34:17.000 It's a good crucible for things in some ways.

01:34:19.000 I mean, you do get some determination, which is, as it turns out, a pretty necessary part of this kind of job.

01:34:27.000 I went through two years of feeling like I was on acid.

01:34:31.000 Other things aren't as scary to me anymore.

01:34:33.000 Quite honestly, stage fright's just not an issue.

01:34:38.000 So it's just like that.

01:34:40.000 But it doesn't seem like stage fright was the issue anyway.

01:34:42.000 No, it wasn't.

01:34:44.000 The general public stuff was the issue?

01:34:47.000 More?

01:34:47.000 More.

01:34:47.000 The fame, the pressure, the criticism, the craziness?

01:34:50.000 But maybe that's why Stage Fright wasn't an issue by the time it came around, because I had been through other stuff.

01:34:55.000 Like, I mean, in my first band, as an adult, you know, so I was like 25, 26 maybe, for the first three gigs, I woke up each morning, I remember this, like, our first one was at a street fair in Berkeley, the Solano Stroll,

01:35:10.000 second one was at a club called The Omni, and the third one was at a club called The Hill.

01:35:13.000 Our first three gigs as a band.

01:35:15.000 I woke up each day of those gigs with complete and utter laryngitis.

01:35:21.000 I didn't feel anxious, I didn't feel like anything was wrong, but I couldn't make a sound.

01:35:25.000 Like, each day, I was like... 0.95

01:35:28.000 Just like some kind of fucking hysterical laryngitis. 0.97

01:35:31.000 Like I just lost my voice completely. 0.99

01:35:33.000 Out of nowhere.

01:35:34.000 Out of nowhere.

01:35:35.000 And I didn't feel nervous.

01:35:36.000 I was excited about playing gigs.

01:35:37.000 But on some part, you're like flipping out.

01:35:39.000 I played all three of those gigs. 0.77

01:35:41.000 Someone suggested that ginger is really good when you lose your voice because that just burns the shit out of your vocal cords and clears anything off them. 1.00

01:35:47.000 So I got those big ginger roots, you know, and I'd take it on stage with a knife. 0.99

01:35:51.000 And I would shave the fucking skin off the ginger root. 0.99

01:35:55.000 Cut off a little piece, like a stick of gum sized piece, put it in your mouth and chew, swallow the ginger juice that comes out of it, which burns your vocal cords clean of anything. 1.00

01:36:04.000 Really?

01:36:04.000 It works?

01:36:04.000 It will allow you to talk and sing.

01:36:06.000 It works for about a minute or two, and then you've got to swallow some more or you don't want to swallow that root, so you've got to throw that and shave a new piece.

01:36:13.000 Did you tell the audience what was going on?

01:36:15.000 Yeah, because it was too obvious. 0.99

01:36:16.000 I'm standing on stage with a fucking huge root on a stool next to me and a knife. 0.99

01:36:19.000 With a knife. 0.99

01:36:20.000 A big knife.

01:36:20.000 A big sharp knife or a paring knife of some kind.

01:36:22.000 And I'm shaving and chewing pieces of gum.

01:36:25.000 It went away after the third gig.

01:36:27.000 But the first three, complete laryngitis.

01:36:30.000 Do you think it was psychosomatic?

01:36:31.000 Absolutely.

01:36:32.000 Wow, isn't that crazy that your brain can trick your vocal cords into seizing up? 1.00

01:36:36.000 Because your brain is like somewhere there's an understanding that if this motherfucker can't sing, we don't have to go through this shit. 1.00

01:36:44.000 This is what we're going to do. 1.00

01:36:46.000 We're just going to send some crazy vibes down to those vocal cords and paralyze the fuck out of them. 1.00

01:36:51.000 Little do they know, but it's not that we're not gonna have to do this. 0.99

01:36:54.000 It's that we're now gonna send him on stage with a knife and some ginger root. 0.99

01:37:00.000 He's gonna be singing all the songs and I'm already like an idiot. 0.98

01:37:03.000 I'm so nervous about not playing piano and singing. 0.97

01:37:05.000 I'm standing up in front of everybody because I came to rehearsal one day.

01:37:09.000 I was the piano player and singer in my band, you know, and I came to rehearsal one day and there's this other guy there and he's playing piano and he's really, really good.

01:37:15.000 And they're like, hey, this is Dan.

01:37:17.000 He's our Dan Eisenberg.

01:37:18.000 I'm like, oh, nice to meet you.

01:37:20.000 He's our piano player.

01:37:21.000 I'm like, I'm our piano player.

01:37:22.000 They're like, you're our singer.

01:37:24.000 That was it.

01:37:24.000 I was like booted out of...

01:37:26.000 Granted, he was way better than me, but then I had to learn to stand up, so my way of getting around that was I got a trench coat.

01:37:33.000 I thought Prince was cool.

01:37:35.000 He had a trench coat.

01:37:36.000 I could get a trench coat, and I'll stand on stage in a trench coat, and I'll be cool in my trench coat.

01:37:40.000 It would have worked better if I wasn't, as it turned out, also shaving ginger with a knife and chewing ginger.

01:37:45.000 You know, like cooking.

01:37:46.000 It's like a cooking show.

01:37:48.000 With a trench coat on. 1.00

01:37:49.000 It's asinine. 0.99

01:37:51.000 Wow. 0.99

01:37:51.000 This is the stuff we go through. 0.99

01:37:53.000 I'm going to play.

01:37:54.000 I don't care.

01:37:55.000 My voice is gone.

01:37:56.000 I can't talk.

01:37:57.000 I'm going to find a way.

01:37:58.000 Chewing ginger.

01:37:59.000 Okay, that's going to do it.

01:38:00.000 It's not pleasant, but I will do it.

01:38:02.000 Wow.

01:38:03.000 Did you eventually figure out what's the best way to handle the anxiety and the weirdness?

01:38:11.000 What was the best way for you?

01:38:15.000 That year where I spent, or year or two, where I spent on the acid, you learned some tools during that.

01:38:20.000 One of them is just learning to breathe.

01:38:23.000 Breathing exercises?

01:38:24.000 Kind of.

01:38:25.000 Well, I mean, terror is a self-perpetuating thing because your heart rate speeds up.

01:38:31.000 That makes you more agitated and more scared.

01:38:34.000 If you slow your breathing down, your heart rate cannot increase.

01:38:40.000 If you keep yourself and you force yourself to breathe in...

01:38:44.000 And breathe out.

01:38:45.000 And breathe in.

01:38:46.000 Your heart rate is going to slow down.

01:38:48.000 And that will take some of the edge off that.

01:38:50.000 You know, it does.

01:38:51.000 You know, I had to learn to do that that year.

01:38:52.000 Because for a while after that, I would wake up in the morning and think it was happening again.

01:38:56.000 And I'd start to panic.

01:38:57.000 And that's going to cause it to happen.

01:38:59.000 But you just got to, like, you know, white knuckle it.

01:39:02.000 I still wake up a lot at, like, 6 a.m.

01:39:04.000 Like, right as the dawn is coming up, I wake up and... 1.00

01:39:07.000 Have a moment of like, oh god, not this shit. 0.99

01:39:09.000 But now it's like reflexive to just stop it. 1.00

01:39:12.000 But back then I had to make myself breathe.

01:39:16.000 So by the time I got to the stage fright thing, I wasn't really feeling stage fright.

01:39:22.000 But also I think I felt like I was in the right place.

01:39:27.000 I could express anything I wanted up there.

01:39:32.000 There's nothing wrong.

01:39:33.000 Any new melody, anything I wanted to sing, any feeling I wanted to put into it, it was all art.

01:39:40.000 It was all creativity, and there's nothing wrong about any of it.

01:39:43.000 I mean, you don't want to sing off-key all day long, but basically, you could just express yourself, and that was all By doing it, that's what you're there for.

01:39:53.000 You're there to express yourself anyway, so anything you do is just a part of that.

01:39:56.000 I felt pretty confident in that.

01:40:02.000 Whatever I did was the right thing to do, because that's what we were doing anyways.

01:40:05.000 By doing it, I make it the right thing to do.

01:40:07.000 So is it safe to say that the anxiety and the mental issues and all that stuff, it almost became tolerable because the art was so satisfying?

01:40:21.000 I think it made it a lot better, especially finding songs.

01:40:25.000 Finding the whole idea of songwriting, for one thing, gave me a place to put all that stuff.

01:40:30.000 That didn't fix the rest of the day, but I'd never had any place to put it before I wrote a song.

01:40:35.000 And now it's like, whoa, on top of...

01:40:38.000 People would ask me, is it cathartic to play music?

01:40:40.000 And I don't think it is.

01:40:42.000 It's not that—it doesn't process it and get it all out of you.

01:40:45.000 But if you have to choose between a day where you just feel shitty and a day where you feel shitty but you write a song, take the song.

01:40:52.000 You accomplish something that day, and that's what we're supposed to be— You know, life is supposed to be about accomplishing things, making things, doing things, so take the day where you do something, and then, you know what, try and do it again tomorrow, because it is better.

01:41:04.000 It doesn't fix it.

01:41:05.000 It's not replacing the difficulty, but at least what you know is that I can have difficulty, and I'm not a waste of space on Earth.

01:41:12.000 I'm not falling apart.

01:41:14.000 I'm not nothing.

01:41:16.000 I actually made a song, so in my difficulty of whatever yesterday was, Well, I made something beautiful.

01:41:23.000 And that's a powerful thing. 0.99

01:41:25.000 It means that while you were going through all that shit, you didn't just put your head in your hands and lay there. 0.99

01:41:31.000 You went ahead and made something, and you can take that with you for the rest of your days. 0.99

01:41:35.000 That song goes along with you, the sense of accomplishment, all the feelings of like...

01:41:41.000 Because I think that's the hardest thing about mental illness, is you know it's not what everybody's going through, you know it's harder than it needs to be, and there are people who are going through stuff, I mean, as I know now, they have their own difficulties, but it just seemed like it was harder, and there are times where you just want to go, I don't want to carry this today,

01:41:56.000 you know, I'll just go sit here.

01:41:59.000 A big part of it is not to just sit there.

01:42:02.000 It's to do something.

01:42:03.000 Is that also exacerbated by a heavy tour schedule?

01:42:06.000 I would imagine there's days that you just need to slow down and take breaks.

01:42:12.000 And when you're out there, bang, bang, bang, show after show after show, I would imagine there's very little of that time where you get to sit by yourself in a movie theater and just chill.

01:42:22.000 Well, you know, like in anything in the arts, there's a lot of sitting around.

01:42:25.000 You know, there's always going to be time, you know...

01:42:27.000 When you're not on stage.

01:42:28.000 Yeah, there's a lot of it.

01:42:29.000 But you know it's coming that night.

01:42:31.000 Yeah, but I don't...

01:42:31.000 There's something to that, right, where if you have a bunch of shows in a row, like even if you have the whole day off, that show is looming.

01:42:38.000 Yeah, but I didn't dread it.

01:42:40.000 It was the good part of the day.

01:42:41.000 You know, it was the best part of the day.

01:42:42.000 It was the one part of the day where I knew I was where I was supposed to be.

01:42:45.000 I wasn't struggling with what to do.

01:42:47.000 I had a...

01:42:49.000 I even have a set list, you know, so I know a path through the next two hours.

01:42:53.000 That wasn't the problem, except, you know, I wasn't—my voice is kind of weird. 0.94

01:42:57.000 It can do a lot of great shit, but it's not particularly durable, and I sing really hard.

01:43:02.000 So it was not the best at recovering, and early on a big part of it was learning— There are limitations to how many days in a row I can do without paying for it. 0.98

01:43:12.000 Even if you just do one three in a row for me, I'll be paying for it and recovering from it for the rest of the tour.

01:43:17.000 Two on, one off.

01:43:18.000 Two on, one off works.

01:43:19.000 We mostly do that.

01:43:20.000 Every once in a while we'll put an extra day off in there.

01:43:22.000 But we had to learn.

01:43:24.000 It took years to learn it that you couldn't You couldn't be too flexible about that.

01:43:29.000 It might seem like you could only play this one thing.

01:43:31.000 If you play three in a row, just do it that one time.

01:43:32.000 But I'd be recovering the rest of the tour from that.

01:43:36.000 So we had to learn that.

01:43:37.000 Because losing my voice, dealing with a lot of...

01:43:40.000 I'm getting nodes in my vocal cords because the only thing that really fixes nodes is one silence and two steroids.

01:43:46.000 You know, like, not anabolic, but systemic.

01:43:48.000 Cortisone.

01:43:49.000 Cortisone, prednisone, you know, stuff like that. 1.00

01:43:50.000 That's heavy shit, too, right? 1.00

01:43:51.000 It is. 1.00

01:43:52.000 It's not great.

01:43:53.000 That's why when I scraped my knee up that one time on tour, it eventually got really infected.

01:43:59.000 And also why it stayed infected, because they'd give me all the antibiotics for it, and the antibiotics kick the shit out of the infection, but you also have that prednisone in there, which keeps bringing it back and keeping it alive so it would come back over.

01:44:11.000 Prednisone kept the infection alive?

01:44:13.000 Well, you know, steroids just kind of basically make things grow faster.

01:44:17.000 That's why you heal faster, you rebuild muscle tissue faster.

01:44:20.000 Aren't they just anti-inflammatories, those kind of steroids?

01:44:22.000 No, but that's not what anti-inflammatories do.

01:44:24.000 They help your body heal quicker by reproducing itself quicker.

01:44:29.000 Cell growth, I think, gets instigated.

01:44:33.000 I think they're reducing inflammation.

01:44:35.000 That's why things like ibuprofen are called non-steroidal anti-inflammatories.

01:44:39.000 Right, but the way that steroids work and why they work so much better, I think, than Advil is because they create cell growth that goes faster, which is why if you have a virus...

01:44:51.000 Steroid side effects may increase the risk of staph infections.

01:44:54.000 There it is.

01:44:55.000 New research suggests that long-term use of powerful immune systems suppressing steroids such as prednisone, hydrocortisone, and dexamethasone may increase risk of life-threatening staph blood infections by a factor of six. 0.97

01:45:09.000 Holy shit. 0.68

01:45:11.000 Yeah, so like when I got the infection, the antibiotics were kicking its ass, but the steroids were kind of also, it's like the opposite. 0.99

01:45:16.000 Ramping it up.

01:45:16.000 It's like pouring gasoline on it, you know, and so like it was never quite going away and it, you know, would keep coming back.

01:45:23.000 That stuff's also, that shit will make you a little crazy too. 0.99

01:45:27.000 You know, prednisone can make you a little like antsy and crazy, which is since I was already a little antsy and crazy. 1.00

01:45:32.000 Oh no.

01:45:33.000 I mean, it's a great drug for fixing your vocal cords.

01:45:36.000 Do they have to give you IV antibiotics for your knee? 0.99

01:45:39.000 Little bits, like, not IV, but they give you a shot of it, and then they give you the antibiotics to take home with you, because my knee turned into a fucking balloon. 0.96

01:45:46.000 I've had staph before. 0.97

01:45:48.000 Yeah, it's bad.

01:45:49.000 It's rough.

01:45:49.000 It's amazing how much those antibiotics wreck you, though.

01:45:53.000 Yeah.

01:45:53.000 Like, you're so tired.

01:45:55.000 Well, they're turning everything off.

01:45:56.000 They're killing all the cell growth to stop the one thing from growing more. 1.00

01:46:00.000 And, you know, that shit. 1.00

01:46:01.000 That's why it's the same thing, like... 1.00

01:46:04.000 It fucks with your immune system because it shuts all that stuff down.

01:46:07.000 That's why some people are at more of a risk for the COVID thing, too, because if you're on that kind of autoimmune suppressors...

01:46:15.000 Exactly.

01:46:15.000 Yeah, a buddy of mine hurt his wrist, and they put him on...

01:46:19.000 The way he was describing it, he said it was essentially like a low-level chemotherapy.

01:46:26.000 He's like, just whatever this shit was they were doing for his wrist, because he just had constant wrist pain. 0.97

01:46:34.000 Yeah. 0.99

01:46:50.000 Because his body was like in severe compromised state already.

01:46:54.000 That's the one thing they say.

01:46:56.000 The biggest people who are still at risk for getting COVID after being vaccinated are people who had autoimmune disorders or are on medications for things like that.

01:47:05.000 And obese people still.

01:47:06.000 It's still a factor.

01:47:08.000 Well, I imagine so because your body's having a harder time taking care of itself.

01:47:12.000 And it's inflammation again.

01:47:14.000 That's a big factor of obesity is you're dealing with inflammation everywhere.

01:47:19.000 Yeah.

01:47:20.000 When you hear about people that are taking different medications to deal with anxiety or depression, the frustrating thing for many of my friends that have been on these kind of medications is trying to find the right one and trying to get it dialed in.

01:47:33.000 And then dealing with all the stuff that's happening while you're trying to dial it in.

01:47:39.000 A lot of side effects for that medication.

01:47:40.000 Yeah.

01:47:41.000 Well, a lot of them were medications that weren't, you know, we don't really know.

01:47:45.000 That's the other thing that's kind of, it can really kill your Your hope when you're dealing with mental illness is that we don't understand how it works the way we understand how other parts of the body work.

01:47:56.000 We don't understand the brain and a lot of these medications they realize they work for mental things because they were medications for something else and then it just happened to have this effect so it's good but it has a bunch of side effects.

01:48:08.000 It was originally designed for something else.

01:48:10.000 We don't know exactly how to tune it in.

01:48:12.000 I mean just the fact that like People who are ADD and really hyper, you give them speed, basically, and it makes them calm down.

01:48:24.000 I know. 0.99

01:48:25.000 What the fuck? 1.00

01:48:25.000 I mean, it's wild that it works that way. 1.00

01:48:27.000 I mean, because I had that problem, and when they gave me that, I was like, this is the worst thing.

01:48:30.000 I don't want to be more up.

01:48:31.000 And then they gave it to me, and I was like, oh, I get it.

01:48:33.000 I can think clearly.

01:48:35.000 That's wild.

01:48:36.000 It's wild that it works.

01:48:36.000 But it does.

01:48:37.000 It's like...

01:48:38.000 You know, those drugs, because your brain, we just don't understand the brain that well lately.

01:48:42.000 Did you ever try meditating or like breathing exercises or exercise?

01:48:49.000 Did you ever try any of those things to deal with?

01:48:51.000 Yeah, I think exercise is really good.

01:48:54.000 The breathing also obviously really helped. 0.97

01:48:56.000 Meditation, I had a lot of problems with because I felt like It almost felt like I was relaxing all the barriers and structures I had in there to keep this shit under control.

01:49:07.000 Everything that I had to hold it together, when I would relax into the meditation, it felt like it was like... 0.72

01:49:14.000 I don't know if it's actually what it does or just a way I was conceiving of it.

01:49:20.000 In my mind, I was picturing like I was letting stuff loose.

01:49:22.000 It's so crazy how many really creative people struggle with mental illness.

01:49:27.000 It's almost more than don't.

01:49:30.000 I imagine it has something to do with you spend a lot of years keeping things to yourself, not communicating with other people as well as other people do.

01:49:40.000 You got a lot of stuff pent up.

01:49:43.000 When you find a way to express it, You dive into that.

01:49:47.000 Creativity and art is one way.

01:49:50.000 Also, a lot of us don't deal with authority very well.

01:49:54.000 Now you find a lifestyle that provides independence.

01:49:58.000 I haven't had a boss for a really long time.

01:50:01.000 Isn't that nice?

01:50:02.000 It's really nice.

01:50:03.000 I've been running an independent shop for 30 years now. 0.73

01:50:08.000 Who'd have thought I'd be able to grow up and, you know, run my own company basically, which is fucking cool.

01:50:15.000 It's the best for everybody.

01:50:16.000 If you could figure out a way to do that, just be your own boss, my God, your life would be so much different. 0.98

01:50:22.000 The pressure and the weight of, like, a shitty boss who's, you know, like... 0.98

01:50:28.000 Dominant over their employees and cracks the whip and yells at everybody in the company meeting. 1.00

01:50:36.000 All that shit you're dealing with. 1.00

01:50:39.000 Someone looking over your shoulder while you're doing your work. 1.00

01:50:42.000 Fuck! 1.00

01:50:43.000 The pressure of that. 1.00

01:50:44.000 It's got to be crazy.

01:50:46.000 But I mean, look, you're running a big thing here and you've got a lot of people working for you.

01:50:51.000 Being a boss means what are all the people that are running around here? 0.97

01:50:54.000 Those security guys are cool as fuck. 0.99

01:50:56.000 They just hang out. 0.98

01:50:56.000 Oh, they're security? 0.98

01:50:57.000 Yeah.

01:50:58.000 I mean, because part of being a boss is taking care of everybody.

01:51:00.000 Dude, this is the most preposterous skeleton crew ever. 0.98

01:51:04.000 For something that reaches millions of people, it's the most ridiculous setup. 0.97

01:51:09.000 But that's the way it works so good, because it stays intimate.

01:51:12.000 Because like I said, I've been to other podcasts that become big, and they decide that they're now a Hollywood production.

01:51:19.000 And I met people, I'm like, what do you do?

01:51:21.000 Oh, I'm the executive producer.

01:51:23.000 You're the executive producer of what?

01:51:25.000 Do we need an executive producer? 1.00

01:51:27.000 The fuck are you talking about? 0.99

01:51:28.000 So you've got directors, executive producers, you've got camera directors, you've got people who are sound guys, you've got all these people. 1.00

01:51:36.000 You have people that are assistants, you have people that are PAs, you have people that are on the set that are They're interns, so they're getting college credits to be on the set, and they're taking notes and talking shit, and then occasionally there's problems, because some PA said something stupid to an intern, 0.95

01:51:55.000 and now you have to have HR. You have HR? You have human resources at your podcast? 0.95

01:52:01.000 Oh my god, what have you done? 0.99

01:52:03.000 What the fuck have you done? 1.00

01:52:04.000 You've created an office. 1.00

01:52:06.000 Now you have a corporation. 0.83

01:52:07.000 Like, you used to have just a conversation, where it was you and your buddy, and there was some fucking YouTube video, and you had a couple of cameras running.

01:52:14.000 And now, because it became successful, you changed what the whole thing is, and now you've got people breathing down your neck, and you've got a bunch of people telling you what to do. 0.93

01:52:22.000 Like, ugh.

01:52:24.000 I've been doing this thing, you know, I got, you know, about a month into the quarantine, I started, I went to my girlfriend and I said, I'm really worried that I'll just wake up a year from now and I won't have done anything.

01:52:35.000 You know, I want to do that.

01:52:36.000 I'm going to start, I'm going to learn to cook everything. 0.88

01:52:37.000 You know, so I just started like, I've always liked cooking, but I started really, Researching it and trying to make all kinds of shit for her and for our few friends that we were seeing.

01:52:47.000 And then it seemed kind of cool after a while to be doing this, so I started making little videos and just putting them up on our Instagram stories.

01:52:53.000 And now I'm sort of filming them myself.

01:52:55.000 What kind of stuff do you cook? 1.00

01:52:56.000 I mean, all kinds of shit. 0.99

01:52:57.000 I did New Orleans crawfish bread a few weeks ago. 1.00

01:53:00.000 Crawfish bread?

01:53:01.000 Yeah.

01:53:02.000 It's like this thing you can only get at the Jazz Fest where it's like...

01:53:05.000 Kind of make this loaf of bread that's got stuffed cheese and crawfish and spices in it.

01:53:11.000 I've always wanted it because it's my favorite thing from Jazz Fest, but I never knew how to make it, and it's still a work in progress. 0.97

01:53:18.000 Red sauce, meat sauce, my Italian shit has gotten really good. 0.97

01:53:23.000 What else have I done? 0.99

01:53:24.000 I've done about 20, 30 of them now.

01:53:27.000 I've been putting them up on Instagram TV. And it's catching on with all these people who are like...

01:53:31.000 I mean, I have a bunch of friends who are chefs who are really good cooks.

01:53:33.000 I'm not.

01:53:34.000 But I've been really trying, you know?

01:53:36.000 And then I've been trying to show people how to cook stuff that, you know, some of it's as simple as just, look, maybe you don't know how to make grilled cheese.

01:53:41.000 Grilled cheese is great.

01:53:42.000 I'm going to show you.

01:53:42.000 It's really simple.

01:53:43.000 And some of it is complicated like a 12-hour meat sauce, you know?

01:53:47.000 But...

01:53:49.000 You know, as I was doing this, unbeknownst to me, all these people started getting interested.

01:53:54.000 And my friend who works on American Idol now, she's a producer for it.

01:53:57.000 She lives here, but she flies out there for that. 1.00

01:54:00.000 She's my piano player's wife.

01:54:01.000 And she's like, yeah, man, all these people on the set, they're all obsessed with your cooking videos.

01:54:04.000 And three of them come to me and said, like, what about a TV show?

01:54:07.000 We should get Adam a cooking show.

01:54:09.000 And then, you know, I talked to my manager, Mark, and a bunch of people came to him and said, we want to put together a show for Adam, like a cooking show.

01:54:17.000 And my thought was like, look, I really like what I'm doing.

01:54:20.000 I like the cooking.

01:54:20.000 I like filming it myself and editing myself.

01:54:23.000 It's hard.

01:54:24.000 I had to learn how to do it.

01:54:25.000 Look at you.

01:54:26.000 That's crawfish bread I'm trying to make.

01:54:28.000 And what are you using?

01:54:29.000 Are you using a starter?

01:54:30.000 Is this like a sourdough bread?

01:54:31.000 No, I tried it the first time using my pizza dough recipe, and that was good, but it's the wrong texture.

01:54:37.000 This one, I found a recipe for like a...

01:54:41.000 Like a cheesy bread that looks like chewier.

01:54:43.000 And I thought that would be a better recipe.

01:54:45.000 And it's still not the right.

01:54:46.000 It's still not right.

01:54:47.000 But bread's not my...

01:54:48.000 I'm not really a baker.

01:54:49.000 I've just been trying to learn about it.

01:54:51.000 You should get together with Tom Papa.

01:54:52.000 Do you know Tom Papa?

01:54:53.000 Uh-uh.

01:54:54.000 Tom Papa the comic?

01:54:55.000 No, I don't know.

01:54:56.000 Hilarious comedian.

01:54:58.000 Amazing baker.

01:54:59.000 Really? 0.99

01:55:00.000 This fucking sourdough bread is off the charts, and he's been obsessed with it for years and years and years. 0.99

01:55:06.000 He's been working on cultivating the perfect sourdough bread and figuring out how to do it. 1.00

01:55:12.000 His starter's like 30 years old or some shit. 0.92

01:55:14.000 I forget how old it is. 0.96

01:55:15.000 You know, they start with...

01:55:16.000 Yeah, yeah.

01:55:16.000 And he brings over fresh...

01:55:19.000 We used to, when we lived in L.A., I would give him elk meat, and he would give me fresh bread.

01:55:23.000 We would make a trade-off, you know, and his bread is off the charts, man.

01:55:28.000 It's so good, and it looks good, too.

01:55:31.000 Like, he's got the presentation down. 0.99

01:55:33.000 Show this motherfucker some Tom Papa bread. 1.00

01:55:35.000 I figured it would have been the higher up on it. 1.00

01:55:37.000 Bro, it's so good.

01:55:37.000 Oh my god.

01:55:39.000 We would eat it on the podcast.

01:55:40.000 Just put some butter on it.

01:55:42.000 Oh, sensational.

01:55:44.000 Sensational.

01:55:45.000 And he just is a master at bread.

01:55:48.000 Maybe you could talk to him, and he'll give you some tips on how to make the bread better.

01:55:54.000 That's what I need.

01:55:55.000 He's got this show called Getting Baked with Tom Papa.

01:55:59.000 That's the flour I use.

01:56:00.000 I love that flour.

01:56:01.000 It's really good.

01:56:02.000 What kind of flour is it?

01:56:03.000 It's King Arthur's all-purpose flour, and they just make it better.

01:56:06.000 It's good flour.

01:56:08.000 So...

01:56:10.000 Is this just him talking?

01:56:11.000 It's part one.

01:56:13.000 He's got a...

01:56:14.000 There's one.

01:56:15.000 Look at that.

01:56:15.000 Come on.

01:56:16.000 Give me a picture of that bread.

01:56:17.000 That's a beautiful piece of bread. 1.00

01:56:19.000 Goddamn perfection. 0.99

01:56:20.000 And it tastes as good as it looks. 0.98

01:56:22.000 When you slice it open...

01:56:24.000 He had a show with the Food Network, but they canceled it.

01:56:27.000 But you know what?

01:56:28.000 That's better anyway.

01:56:29.000 He really should be doing it.

01:56:30.000 There's me eating his bread.

01:56:31.000 He really should be doing it 100% on YouTube.

01:56:36.000 I mean, that's...

01:56:37.000 That's really where it prolongs.

01:56:39.000 Just something like that where nobody tells you what to do.

01:56:41.000 Just do it.

01:56:42.000 Well, that was the thing, because everyone's talking about getting a cooking shot.

01:56:45.000 I'm like, I don't think you understand.

01:56:46.000 They say, well, you would love it.

01:56:47.000 I'm like, why would I love it?

01:56:48.000 I love cooking.

01:56:51.000 I don't love going on TV shows, and I don't know that I love having a TV show.

01:56:55.000 That's a whole different thing from cooking, having a TV show.

01:56:58.000 Then you've got some greasy producer that's like, Adam, we're going to do this again, but this time, you know, I'm not feeling you're having a good time.

01:57:05.000 I want you to smile.

01:57:06.000 I want you to smile, and your best friend is in this room, okay?

01:57:10.000 This camera is your best friend. 0.99

01:57:12.000 And you'd be like, what the fuck have I done? 0.99

01:57:15.000 What have I done? 0.99

01:57:16.000 Well, that's the thing.

01:57:16.000 People think having a TV show sounds like fun because they like the idea of being on TV. Right.

01:57:20.000 But I got enough.

01:57:22.000 Well, I'm going to have a little more fame.

01:57:23.000 If this record does really well, it'd be great. 0.99

01:57:25.000 It's like a band where it could be magic or it could be fucking hell. 0.98

01:57:29.000 It could be the lead singer and the guitar player hate each other and they only do the gig and then they talk shit about each other afterwards. 0.98

01:57:34.000 Or it could be like a brotherhood where they love each other and it's great. 0.95

01:57:38.000 And that's how TV shows are.

01:57:39.000 That's how any cooperative effort when you get a group of people together are.

01:57:43.000 It's like you can get lucky. 0.98

01:57:45.000 And you can get really unlucky, and sometimes some really successful shows are really unlucky collaborations, where the people are good at what they do, but the stress of working with these cocksuckers, they fucking hate the other people. 1.00

01:57:58.000 And I know people that work on television shows, and they'll have a drink afterwards and go, fuck man, my executive producer is such a twat, I can't handle this dude, all he wants to do is blah blah blah blah blah, and you're like, oh, I thought you were on TV, I thought everything was great. 0.98

01:58:13.000 It's not. 0.98

01:58:13.000 It's not great. 0.98

01:58:14.000 It's a cooperative effort.

01:58:16.000 The beautiful thing about doing a cooking show on your own with just a camera and YouTube is it's just you.

01:58:23.000 It's purity of vision and expression.

01:58:26.000 There's just singularity.

01:58:27.000 One guy.

01:58:28.000 Your thoughts and what you're trying to do.

01:58:30.000 And you could figure it out.

01:58:32.000 And you could say, you know, I used to do it like this and I don't like doing it like that anymore.

01:58:36.000 I've realized I like myself more when I prepare this way or when I do that or when I approach it that way.

01:58:43.000 You'll find it.

01:58:44.000 You'll find it.

01:58:45.000 It's nice, too. 1.00

01:58:46.000 But if you've got some fucking network... 0.98

01:58:48.000 You know, we've gone over the metrics, Adam, and it seems like whenever you do this, people tune out. 0.99

01:58:53.000 It's like every show.

01:58:55.000 It's 13 minutes in.

01:58:55.000 They're tuning out.

01:58:56.000 So what do we got to do to keep those people tuning in for another 13?

01:59:00.000 Because Daddy wants to buy a new house.

01:59:01.000 What can we do, Adam?

01:59:02.000 I'm looking at a Lamborghini.

01:59:04.000 I like to get a Lamborghini.

01:59:06.000 And I can't get a Lamborghini if this is not successful.

01:59:08.000 So what do we do, Adam?

01:59:09.000 I have a Maserati.

01:59:10.000 I want to pay my lease.

01:59:12.000 How do I make this show better so I make more money and put my kids through college?

01:59:16.000 I want to bribe USC so I can get my children into that school.

01:59:20.000 I need more money to pay off people.

01:59:23.000 You're dealing with so many different people and so many different issues, and to do something creative, it's so hard to do it with a lot of other people's input.

01:59:31.000 Yeah, and that's the nice thing about our creative thing.

01:59:33.000 It's me and six of my best friends and a producer, and it's all there.

01:59:38.000 It's not like, I mean, I've worked on movie stuff.

01:59:41.000 It's like a lot of levels of people and a lot more money, and it's a huge hassle, the executive levels.

01:59:47.000 Like you're saying, that is the biggest problem.

01:59:49.000 It's like all these people who have to justify their job.

01:59:51.000 And they're not creative.

01:59:52.000 No.

01:59:53.000 Generally speaking, that's not what they do.

01:59:55.000 What they do is try to maximize profit.

01:59:57.000 They try to maximize profit.

01:59:59.000 And sometimes it gets in the way of creativity because they're like, the way you're doing it, I just don't think this is the best way for our image and our brand.

02:00:08.000 Yeah, yeah, yeah.

02:00:09.000 What?

02:00:10.000 What are you saying?

02:00:11.000 What is this?

02:00:12.000 And I'm sure you had to deal with that with music, right?

02:00:14.000 Yeah, we didn't have to listen to it.

02:00:16.000 Right.

02:00:17.000 Did you have that kind of record company pressure?

02:00:20.000 A little bit, but we had a huge bidding war at the beginning.

02:00:25.000 Pretty much every record company in the world offered us a contract.

02:00:28.000 From the beginning?

02:00:28.000 At the beginning.

02:00:29.000 Before we were signed.

02:00:30.000 How did you get signed?

02:00:31.000 Well, we had a lot of demos, and we had been making them for a while, and they were really...

02:00:36.000 Our Gronenbach guitar player was a really good engineer, and he had a little studio, and so when we made demos, we had like...

02:00:41.000 You know, you're supposed to get a two-song demo or a three-song demo.

02:00:44.000 We had a 15-song demo.

02:00:45.000 Oh, wow.

02:00:46.000 Which is, I mean, on the one hand, we're just huge rubes, and people that got it at first were laughing at us until they listened.

02:00:52.000 Because, you know, it's the whole first album.

02:00:54.000 Right.

02:00:55.000 We had a lot of songs, you know, and...

02:00:58.000 So when it got out, when we finally got a manager and a lawyer and that got out and the rec companies got these demos, it was like they came to see us.

02:01:06.000 There were two weekends in like 91 or 92, January of 92 maybe, where we played these shows on two consecutive weekends.

02:01:13.000 And between the two weekends, every rec company in the world came to see us play.

02:01:17.000 The only people that didn't offer us deals were like people in the same company.

02:01:20.000 So like, you know, Columbia and Epic were both part of Sony.

02:01:24.000 So only Columbia offers a deal.

02:01:25.000 But other than that, We got a shitload of offers and there were millions of dollars on the table.

02:01:30.000 And we signed with Geffen and we took home, I think, $3,000 each.

02:01:35.000 Because they gave us complete creative control in the contract and a higher royalty.

02:01:41.000 Which doesn't matter unless it pays off, but it did.

02:01:44.000 And that was back in the day when people actually bought albums.

02:01:47.000 Yeah.

02:01:48.000 Which is why, you know, we did really well and we had higher royalty back then.

02:01:54.000 And we didn't owe any money because we only took home, like, you know, I took home $3,000.

02:01:58.000 I bought a 1970 Karmann Ghia and drove it.

02:02:02.000 Did you really?

02:02:03.000 Yeah.

02:02:03.000 I bought a convertible red 1970 Karmann Ghia and drove it down to LA to make the record.

02:02:08.000 Exactly.

02:02:09.000 I still have it.

02:02:10.000 It's a car I have.

02:02:11.000 I'll never get rid of it.

02:02:12.000 It's your only car?

02:02:13.000 You drive that?

02:02:14.000 Well, not much.

02:02:16.000 I did when I lived in L.A., but I live in New York now, so I don't need a car.

02:02:20.000 And so when you drive around New York, you drive this Carmen Kia?

02:02:23.000 No, I don't drive around New York.

02:02:24.000 You walk and take the subway.

02:02:26.000 Two of my friends and I bought a winery a few years ago, and so we were partners in Elise Winery.

02:02:32.000 The guy who runs my whole winery, he's a...

02:02:37.000 He's got it in his garage in Napa.

02:02:38.000 So when I go up there, I haven't driven it up.

02:02:40.000 I haven't been up there since...

02:02:41.000 He took it from me right before the pandemic started.

02:02:44.000 So I haven't been back there to drive my car around.

02:02:46.000 But it's in his garage.

02:02:48.000 Pretty much.

02:02:49.000 I mean, there's definitely been some things repaired over the years. 0.99

02:02:51.000 But it's pretty much the original shit. 0.99

02:02:54.000 Repaired but not upgraded. 0.99

02:02:55.000 It's basically as it is.

02:02:56.000 There's a better stereo in there now.

02:02:58.000 And I don't think the wheel's not original.

02:03:00.000 The steering wheel's not original.

02:03:02.000 Definitely some of the mirrors.

02:03:03.000 I mean, it's not...

02:03:04.000 It looks cherry.

02:03:06.000 It's beautiful.

02:03:06.000 And it is cherry red.

02:03:09.000 Actually, I'll find it somewhere.

02:03:10.000 It's a great little car.

02:03:12.000 When I was a kid, I always loved those Karmann gears. 0.98

02:03:14.000 They look like the bathtub Porsches, which is what they're based on.

02:03:19.000 I love the Roadster.

02:03:21.000 The whole idea.

02:03:22.000 The sports car didn't really do it for me as much as the roads.

02:03:25.000 I love the idea of driving around a little convertible.

02:03:27.000 And I always wanted one of those.

02:03:29.000 And when I got my record deal, I took my $3000 and spent $2000 on a Karmann Ghia.

02:03:34.000 Barely ran back then.

02:03:35.000 Drove it down to LA. Made the record.

02:03:38.000 It was my car for a while.

02:03:39.000 I did at one point buy a Boxster when they came out with Boxsters.

02:03:42.000 I'd never owned a new car in my life, and so I wanted one that was like that.

02:03:46.000 And that was great, too.

02:03:47.000 That was a great little car.

02:03:49.000 Boxer's a beautiful little car.

02:03:50.000 Yeah, it was great.

02:03:51.000 It's a brilliant car, too, like mid-engine.

02:03:54.000 Yeah, and it doesn't go 3,000 miles an hour.

02:03:56.000 It's not a real sports car, but it was like an upgraded version of my Ghia.

02:04:00.000 Yeah, it could.

02:04:01.000 The problem with Porsche, they have a real situation where their 911 is essentially a poor design in comparison to the Boxster.

02:04:11.000 The Boxster and the Cayman are a better design in terms of weight distribution because it's a mid-engine car where the engine is right behind the driver and then the axle is behind the engine.

02:04:22.000 So the balance of weight is beautiful.

02:04:26.000 It was a great car.

02:04:27.000 Yeah, but Porsche hamstrings them. 1.00

02:04:29.000 They keep them lower horsepower.

02:04:32.000 They don't have the same suspension setup.

02:04:39.000 Particularly horsepower, they don't let it eclipse the 911. No.

02:04:43.000 I mean, it's nowhere near as fast as I had friends who had the other kinds of Porsches.

02:04:48.000 Not that I was trying, but it was clear the difference in their cars.

02:04:51.000 But not anymore.

02:04:53.000 Now they have a Cayman GT4, and then they also do, there's companies that, like aftermarket companies, they take it and they build it up.

02:05:03.000 I'll show you my car.

02:05:05.000 I want to say it.

02:05:06.000 I love those.

02:05:07.000 Those Carmen Ghias were like a funky 1970s sort of lost car.

02:05:16.000 Oh, that's gorgeous, man.

02:05:18.000 Wow, that's so pretty.

02:05:20.000 It's like two, three pictures of it right around it right there.

02:05:23.000 That's really pretty, man.

02:05:25.000 Yeah, I love that thing.

02:05:26.000 Wow.

02:05:28.000 That's a really good color, too, for that car with the chrome and everything.

02:05:31.000 Can I send this to Jamie?

02:05:32.000 Yeah, go ahead.

02:05:33.000 I'll airdrop it to you, Jamie.

02:05:36.000 Until you can see it.

02:05:39.000 Alright, here you go buddy.

02:05:43.000 You got it?

02:05:45.000 Yeah, that was my first record advance, so I'm never going to sell it.

02:05:48.000 No, that's dope. 0.99

02:05:50.000 It's historical.

02:05:51.000 Yeah, it's special for me that way.

02:05:52.000 And it's also, like, it was the car I dreamed about having as a kid.

02:05:56.000 Really?

02:05:56.000 You dreamed about Carmageas?

02:05:58.000 Really?

02:05:58.000 I just really loved that, and I loved that Corvair Monza, the unsafe at any speed car.

02:06:05.000 That's a pretty car, man.

02:06:06.000 Yeah, they're just kind of beautiful cars.

02:06:08.000 It represents the time in which it was created, too.

02:06:11.000 It's like you look at it and you instantaneously know, like, oh, that's like late 60s, early 70s.

02:06:15.000 Yeah.

02:06:18.000 It's got a little bit of a vibe.

02:06:19.000 I love it.

02:06:21.000 It's got a lot of a vibe.

02:06:22.000 I love those a lot, man.

02:06:25.000 You were there.

02:06:26.000 You were in the middle of your rock star life when Napster hit.

02:06:34.000 What was that like?

02:06:36.000 Well, I mean...

02:06:38.000 I guess in a way, when I look at it overall, I shouldn't be surprised because if there's one thing that we've never really valued as a culture, I mean, humanity has never really valued the arts.

02:06:49.000 It's like, I mean, we do.

02:06:51.000 We understand that a painting is going to be worth $7 million or something.

02:06:54.000 But in general, it's just like something we want to be entertained with.

02:06:58.000 We'll spend money on new tires or a VCR, but if we can get away with it, we don't want to spend money on records.

02:07:07.000 That's the kind of thing where if we could get away with taking it, we would.

02:07:12.000 Partially, this is the fault of the record companies at the time.

02:07:17.000 If you're going to tell me that a record is worth a certain amount of money, and then you're going to tell me that a CD is worth the same amount of money, and I'm going to take both of those home with me, and now you're going to tell me that a group of ones and zeros that equals that CD Is worth the same amount of money as the CD, 0.90

02:07:33.000 I'm gonna call it a little bullshit. 0.95

02:07:34.000 You know what I mean? 0.98

02:07:35.000 When they went to putting out digital music, and iTunes came around and let them sell it on the store there, you know, it should have been $5 for a record, not $15.

02:07:45.000 But they didn't want to cripple the physical record sales.

02:07:47.000 Is that what the idea behind it was?

02:07:48.000 I think part of it was, but it was short-sighted.

02:07:50.000 And they also were like, well, if people aren't gonna buy these anymore, we don't want to sell things for $5.

02:07:55.000 They just panicked.

02:07:56.000 They gotta get the money where they could get it.

02:07:58.000 But, you know, people weren't stealing records before that.

02:08:01.000 It's entirely possible that if you'd said, okay, now we're doing digital and it's a $5.

02:08:05.000 It's $5 for a record because there isn't anything.

02:08:07.000 You get the music and you get all the art, but it's not costing us anything.

02:08:10.000 We don't have to get trucks.

02:08:11.000 We don't have to build physical, which is true.

02:08:14.000 The hardest thing about being an independent record company, because I had a couple independent record companies, was...

02:08:20.000 Pressing up the CDs and then getting trucks to take them to mom-and-pop CD stores where you'd get three in there and if you were lucky enough to have the guys who own the store love you they'd play it in the store and then someone would buy them but then they're gone because they only had three and you got to get more out there because now they don't have it at all that was distribution was the hardest thing and that's gone with all sudden you just got to load it up it's easy They should have made it a $5 thing and been like,

02:08:45.000 okay, now you're getting something that has no body to it.

02:08:48.000 We're not going to make you pay $15 for that.

02:08:51.000 And they should have done that and they didn't because they panicked.

02:08:55.000 And so after a while, people felt a little insulted by being told that now they should buy the same thing that they used to take home with them.

02:09:03.000 They should buy it for the same amount of money now that it doesn't exist at all. 0.99

02:09:07.000 And so when Napster came around and everyone could suddenly just steal it, I think they were like, well, fuck these guys. 0.99

02:09:13.000 And I don't think they were saying fuck you to the artists, really. 1.00

02:09:15.000 I think they were mostly saying fuck you to the record companies. 1.00

02:09:18.000 But when the artists protested, they said fuck you to the artists, too. 1.00

02:09:21.000 That's the part that really bothered me about Napster. 0.98

02:09:23.000 Not that they were taking the stuff, but that when someone like Lars Ulrich from Metallica came out and stood up and said what everybody already knew was true.

02:09:32.000 You're just stealing from art.

02:09:34.000 You're just stealing from us. 1.00

02:09:35.000 And people were like, fuck you. 1.00

02:09:37.000 Yeah, but see, the thing is, the comparison between that and a VCR and tires is not valid, because you can't just duplicate a VCR and tires instantaneously on a computer. 1.00

02:09:50.000 But you could duplicate these recordings.

02:09:54.000 Once they were in digital form, you could just duplicate it over and over again and send them to people.

02:09:59.000 There's no issue whatsoever doing that.

02:10:02.000 People always felt like it's not costing you any money because someone had to buy it originally.

02:10:07.000 It's costing you if I won't buy it and then I download it instead, but maybe I was never going to buy it in the first place.

02:10:16.000 Maybe.

02:10:17.000 I'm just downloading it.

02:10:18.000 But what you know for sure is that- But you know what I'm saying?

02:10:20.000 There's this weird justification that people have where it's not a physical thing that they're stealing.

02:10:24.000 It's not like there's a warehouse they go to and you have boxes of CDs and they go, oh, you got so many CDs, I'll just take these CDs.

02:10:30.000 They're like, no, but there was one that got sold.

02:10:33.000 But that's just because it's easier that way.

02:10:35.000 Well, it's a new thing.

02:10:36.000 But it's a completely gray area.

02:10:38.000 Once you've made a...

02:10:41.000 Once you buy a book, you could copy the book and press it up yourself and sell it.

02:10:46.000 But you're buying something.

02:10:47.000 That's the thing about art is it can be kind of ephemeral.

02:10:49.000 You're buying something that sort of exists as an idea.

02:10:52.000 But the difference is you could print up a book yourself and sell it, but the author deserves probably to get the money more than you do because it was his thoughts that went into it.

02:11:01.000 The thing about the music...

02:11:04.000 And the books, because it's happened to books too, is that it just, it was easy to duplicate.

02:11:08.000 But you are stealing because we know that within a year, record sales had dropped, well not a year, probably within about three years record sales had dropped by 50%.

02:11:15.000 Now they don't exist.

02:11:17.000 You know, like, but that's because now we have Spotify.

02:11:20.000 But for a while it dropped so much, the industry had been making all this money, and then it was gone.

02:11:26.000 Right, but let's look at it that way.

02:11:29.000 It dropped and then it doesn't exist, right?

02:11:32.000 Now it doesn't exist at all.

02:11:33.000 So wasn't it just a harbinger of things to come?

02:11:35.000 I mean, it wasn't necessarily stealing as much as it was an introduction to a completely new way of distributing music and the fact that it was digital.

02:11:45.000 They had to find new ways in order to profit because this thing of like buying physical copies It's not valid anymore.

02:11:53.000 Like, some people still do it because they love vinyl, and some people do it because they're nostalgic and they like to have CDs.

02:11:59.000 But the reality is, most people are just getting digital.

02:12:04.000 Right, but we're not really...

02:12:05.000 Well, that's part of what happened.

02:12:06.000 It's the same thing that caused the problem in the beginning, was the record companies, who were being so greedy, made it very easy to feel like it was okay to take it.

02:12:14.000 Because I don't disagree with that, because you were getting ripped off as a consumer. 1.00

02:12:17.000 If you want to tell me that something is the same amount of money when it doesn't exist as when it does, fuck you. 0.99

02:12:22.000 But also, what happened eventually was when they came up with Spotify, the record companies went to Spotify and said, pay us a lump sum, and we'll give you all of our music. 0.99

02:12:34.000 That's not trickling down to us in any way like it used to with record sales.

02:12:37.000 It only does if you own the music, right?

02:12:39.000 Right, but I mean- Like it's your music. 0.91

02:12:41.000 Even so, you're still getting kind of screwed.

02:12:44.000 Very few people own their own music for one thing.

02:12:46.000 Record companies are never giving that up.

02:12:48.000 And you can get it now kind of reverting to you in a shorter amount of years, but that was nothing that was available back then.

02:12:53.000 When did that change?

02:12:54.000 Well, because record companies have lost a lot of their power.

02:12:58.000 Because you needed a record company before, for one thing.

02:13:00.000 It was too expensive to make a record, and it was too expensive to distribute it.

02:13:03.000 So you needed the record company.

02:13:05.000 Now you can make a record on your computer at home, and you can distribute it by uploading it onto Bandcamp.

02:13:10.000 It doesn't cost you anything, so you don't really need a record company as much.

02:13:13.000 You can have one, and they'll do a lot of good things for you sometimes.

02:13:15.000 Like, we did this record with a record company.

02:13:17.000 But that was your choice.

02:13:19.000 Right, we sign one album deals now and we do it when we're done with the record.

02:13:23.000 We go to the record company and say, we have something.

02:13:26.000 We'll let you work with us.

02:13:27.000 You can do some of the distribution.

02:13:29.000 You can help us with some promo.

02:13:31.000 And there's some valid reasons to do it.

02:13:34.000 And we're getting it all back in a few years.

02:13:35.000 But you didn't have any leverage back then.

02:13:37.000 Do you remember that Courtney Love article that she wrote, I think it was in Spin Magazine, where she sort of laid out all the financial problems with record deals?

02:13:46.000 Yeah, there were a lot.

02:13:47.000 Did you ever see that?

02:13:48.000 I mean, I remember the idea of it, but I don't remember the article at all. 0.96

02:13:50.000 I think, you know, people were like, there's no fucking way she wrote this.

02:13:54.000 It was a ghostwriter because it was really well written. 0.97

02:13:56.000 Could be.

02:13:57.000 Could be.

02:13:58.000 But you saw it and you get to the end of it and you're like, Jesus Christ, this is how it works?

02:14:03.000 Like, it's really kind of crazy.

02:14:05.000 Yeah, it was terrible.

02:14:06.000 And then when you hear today, what they're doing is apparently they make these deals with bands when you first sign them.

02:14:14.000 Yeah, they have everything.

02:14:15.000 They take a piece of your touring, which doesn't make any sense.

02:14:19.000 It's crazy.

02:14:19.000 They take a piece of your merchandise, which doesn't make any sense.

02:14:22.000 They take a piece of you.

02:14:24.000 They take everything.

02:14:25.000 Everything you do.

02:14:26.000 I remember the first time a record company came to us with one of those offers.

02:14:29.000 What did they say?

02:14:30.000 Well, they were like, yeah, we're going to do a new deal.

02:14:32.000 We're going to give you a bunch of money up front.

02:14:33.000 Did you smell sulfur in the air?

02:14:34.000 Well, it was just kind of like, let me get this straight.

02:14:37.000 You are going to give me a piece of...

02:14:42.000 Of the part of our industry that is completely disappearing and worthless now, and in exchange, you'd like me to give you several pieces of the only things that still make money.

02:14:52.000 No.

02:14:54.000 How did they phrase it?

02:14:55.000 This is what I want to know.

02:14:56.000 Like, how do they make that sound good?

02:14:58.000 Well, they would offer a lot of money up front.

02:15:01.000 But it's all recoupable.

02:15:02.000 That's the thing about money up front.

02:15:04.000 It's all recoupable.

02:15:06.000 You don't really get any other money until they get that money back.

02:15:10.000 Right, and they want to take that money back out of the small percentage in your deal, not out of the overall.

02:15:14.000 That was the other thing about record companies that was so insulting.

02:15:17.000 It's going to cost this much to make the record, and you'll start making money again when it's recouped.

02:15:22.000 Not recouped out of money, period.

02:15:26.000 If it cost $200,000 to make a record or something back then, whatever it was, you weren't recouped when the record made $200,000.

02:15:35.000 You were only recouping out of your 15% of that $200,000.

02:15:39.000 So however many it takes to six times that or whatever it takes to recoup out of your 15%, then you'd start making more. 0.95

02:15:46.000 They had so many ways of fucking you that it was just a little insulting. 0.99

02:15:50.000 Jesus Christ. 0.95

02:15:52.000 But there were a lot of things, when the internet came along and changed all that, a lot of things got crazy in the record companies, because they panicked at the fact that the internet all of a sudden, instead of being this really wild thing that connected everyone in the world for free, basically, which is what it really does,

02:16:07.000 you should be able to make a positive use of something that does that.

02:16:11.000 I mean, it really is quite the tool, as we've realized in years since then.

02:16:16.000 But all they could see was that it was like this drain that was slowly sucking all their money away.

02:16:20.000 So they saw Napster and what Napster was doing and they associated the whole internet with that.

02:16:26.000 I remember a year or two after that it all happened, we were doing a record It might have been Saturday nights and Sunday mornings.

02:16:33.000 I don't think it was Hard Candy.

02:16:35.000 So it was a few years later, and ABC comes along, and they want us to be on Good Morning America.

02:16:41.000 They love the record, and they want to feature our singles playing on the front page of ABC.com, which was a big website then, for a week and a half leading up to the release.

02:16:52.000 They're going to basically put our videos and everything on the front page of ABC.com playing for anybody...

02:16:58.000 What an advertisement!

02:16:59.000 That's like way better than, it's great, you know?

02:17:02.000 Universal's response was, okay, well how much are you gonna pay us to let us use the video?

02:17:07.000 They're like nothing and they said well, then you can't use it So we lost all that promo it happened like just just about like this is a few years ago when we released Some wonder wonderland our last record.

02:17:18.000 So it's like 2014 We were playing festivals in Europe.

02:17:21.000 We're touring we're playing pink pop in Holland's the biggest festival in Holland It's one of the oldest festivals in Europe and it's the sixth time we've played it we've at that point us and Pearl Jam have played that festival more than any other band at that point so They come to us before the show, like early that afternoon,

02:17:37.000 and they told us that the national radio station, whatever, like the BBC in Holland, and the national TV station would like to broadcast our entire set live.

02:17:48.000 So, national TV, you're set on radio and television when you play.

02:17:53.000 Okay, that's pretty cool too, right?

02:17:55.000 Amazing.

02:17:55.000 Yeah, we just need you to sign this thing, get the rec company to approve it and sign this thing.

02:17:58.000 So, same question.

02:18:01.000 What are they going to pay us?

02:18:03.000 We're like, you're kidding, right?

02:18:06.000 Later on, that guy, one of the lawyers came back and called our tour manager.

02:18:10.000 He goes, next time, don't tell me.

02:18:12.000 Just do it.

02:18:13.000 It's fine.

02:18:14.000 It's corporate rules.

02:18:15.000 It comes down from the top.

02:18:16.000 I cannot say yes.

02:18:18.000 But it's crazy not to do it.

02:18:21.000 But that's the kind of...

02:18:22.000 They got so panicked about the internet.

02:18:23.000 There's no... 0.99

02:18:24.000 You want to know why the rec company is a fucking shambles? 0.99

02:18:26.000 Because they couldn't think any more complicated than Napster bad. 0.99

02:18:31.000 Internet bad.

02:18:32.000 So we should just like...

02:18:34.000 We're losing money.

02:18:35.000 We should get everyone to pay us something.

02:18:37.000 Every time.

02:18:38.000 Otherwise we're going to die.

02:18:39.000 But now they make like similar slimy deals...

02:18:43.000 With artists that they were doing before, but now they've figured out a way to weasel through streaming, right?

02:18:50.000 Oh yeah.

02:18:50.000 But what I don't understand is what are they offering?

02:18:54.000 I mean, I guess...

02:18:55.000 Promotion?

02:18:56.000 Money to make it, because maybe you don't have any money.

02:18:58.000 Maybe you need to be in a studio because you've got a band and you can't do it in your home, on your computer.

02:19:02.000 God, but that seems like studios...

02:19:03.000 Promotion is a big thing.

02:19:04.000 Getting you on the radio, it's still something to get on the radio.

02:19:07.000 It does have some meaning to get you playlisted.

02:19:10.000 The radio?

02:19:11.000 Yeah, it still has some... 1.00

02:19:12.000 The fucking radio is still a real thing? 0.99

02:19:14.000 Nah, it's still something. 0.99

02:19:17.000 How much is it?

02:19:18.000 How many people are listening to the radio?

02:19:20.000 Well, don't forget this about streaming, is that a lot of people on their way to work and stuff, it doesn't have to be terrestrial radio, it could be satellite radio.

02:19:27.000 But think about this.

02:19:28.000 Here's the problem with, look, you want Spotify, you can get anything you want.

02:19:33.000 You can hear anything you want to hear, right?

02:19:38.000 The only bad thing about getting anything you want is there's no way to know you want something you haven't heard yet.

02:19:43.000 You know what I mean?

02:19:44.000 There's no way.

02:19:45.000 It's the problem with it.

02:19:46.000 You have to be introduced to new stuff.

02:19:48.000 And so, like, I can go on Spotify today and listen to any record I want, and I do, but I can't use it.

02:19:55.000 It's not gonna necessarily show me new music.

02:19:57.000 So I can't get anything new.

02:19:59.000 So if I got a new song and I'm a new band, somebody's got to play me somewhere.

02:20:03.000 Record company can get you on playlists probably.

02:20:05.000 I don't know if it's worth a trade-off.

02:20:07.000 And they can get you on the radio, help you promote that.

02:20:11.000 That might get people to go to you on Spotify and get you streams because if you're new...

02:20:16.000 You can't get people to request you until they know you exist.

02:20:20.000 You need to break that ground somehow.

02:20:23.000 That's hard to do.

02:20:24.000 I can see some value in that.

02:20:26.000 I don't know that it balances out against the deals they're offering most people.

02:20:30.000 We don't have those same deals because you're not getting my record.

02:20:34.000 With all that crap, you're not getting Butter Miracle by offering me, by wanting a piece of my touring and my merch. 0.74

02:20:40.000 You're never getting it for a million years. 1.00

02:20:42.000 And you're also not getting it if you want to keep my record in perpetuity, because fuck you. 1.00

02:20:46.000 I'll put it out myself. 0.99

02:20:48.000 And you're not getting it, you know, if you want, like, to give me a 20% or 15% royalty anymore.

02:20:55.000 Not a chance.

02:20:56.000 You can have 20%, maybe.

02:20:57.000 You know what I mean?

02:20:58.000 I'll take 80 now.

02:21:00.000 But I don't know that every band can force them to make that deal.

02:21:03.000 I just don't understand their position in the food chain.

02:21:06.000 If I'm looking at it objectively from the outside, I'm like, are they a promotional organization?

02:21:11.000 Kind of.

02:21:11.000 It seems like a radio show or a podcast has far more promotional power.

02:21:18.000 If there was a podcast that's dedicated to breaking music, Like a podcast on a streaming service like Spotify that has deals to distribute stuff and says, you know, we're just gonna play the coolest shit.

02:21:29.000 Like, you decide, hey, it's me, Adam, I got a fucking great show, and I'm gonna do this, I'm gonna break great songs, and like, that would be so much more valuable than any other form of promotion.

02:21:41.000 And if you could attach it to an internet entity, Like some sort of Instagram page that they had set up with a lot of followers or people new.

02:21:50.000 They'd go there and cool music would be broke there.

02:21:53.000 I mean, you'd cut them completely out of this food chain.

02:21:57.000 Because I don't understand the position where they could get a 360 degree deal.

02:22:01.000 The 360 deal is like so bonkers to me that you would get live touring?

02:22:06.000 And someone told me they get 50%.

02:22:08.000 Oh, I don't know.

02:22:09.000 I mean, I'm sure it's the art of the deal there.

02:22:11.000 Right.

02:22:11.000 That's the Wild West still.

02:22:13.000 And it was back then.

02:22:14.000 That is so crazy, though.

02:22:15.000 50% of live touring is so—if that's true, someone said that it's— Well, I'm sure they've gotten that from some people.

02:22:21.000 That's bonkers.

02:22:22.000 Yeah, but I mean, don't forget that at a certain level, live touring, it takes a lot of people.

02:22:27.000 To get into the profit in live touring.

02:22:29.000 Mostly you're losing money.

02:22:31.000 That's what I'm saying.

02:22:31.000 But not only that, but if you have a manager or an agent, right?

02:22:33.000 The manager or the agent, they don't get that much.

02:22:35.000 They don't get 50%.

02:22:36.000 No, no.

02:22:36.000 But they're not giving you money to tour, too.

02:22:37.000 How the fuck does a record company get 50%?

02:22:39.000 Well, in the early days, they'd pay you money. 0.96

02:22:41.000 I don't know.

02:22:41.000 I can't believe I'm...

02:22:42.000 I'm not trying to defend them.

02:22:43.000 I can't stand most record companies.

02:22:44.000 I will say this.

02:22:46.000 Since we've been independent, Working with record companies is pretty much a pleasure because we get the right situation where we can get them to do what we want them to do without getting ripped off and they do some great work.

02:22:57.000 My experiences since becoming independent with record companies have been nothing but positive.

02:23:02.000 They've done great jobs for us, but the other in the old days, but don't forget like music for me as a fan, okay, is way better than it's ever been before because it's so easy for bands to make music.

02:23:16.000 And so inexpensive that they can all do it.

02:23:18.000 And that means there's way more bands making way more great music.

02:23:21.000 Bands can stay together for longer so they actually get really, really good.

02:23:25.000 As a fan, it's an amazing time.

02:23:28.000 But you still have way more music than you ever have before.

02:23:32.000 And if I'm one of those individual bands, I've got to find a way to rise up out of the masses and get anyone to notice me.

02:23:39.000 Now the question is how do you do that?

02:23:40.000 How do you get anyone to notice that you exist?

02:23:42.000 You want to go on tour?

02:23:43.000 It's expensive to go on tour.

02:23:45.000 You're not going to break even necessarily even until you get up to...

02:23:48.000 Breaking even just on the money you're spending and the money you're making.

02:23:52.000 You can sell merch and make money too.

02:23:53.000 But like...

02:23:55.000 It could be a couple thousand people before you break even.

02:23:58.000 So how do you tour for a while when you can't possibly draw that kind of people?

02:24:01.000 Right.

02:24:01.000 It costs money.

02:24:03.000 That's one of the reasons I think people can turn to record companies.

02:24:05.000 They need money to tour.

02:24:07.000 If they have a band and they found they can't do it in their home, they need money to go to the studio, there can be reasons.

02:24:12.000 And they don't necessarily understand the business, and the record companies do.

02:24:15.000 Yeah, and they got better lawyers.

02:24:16.000 Yeah.

02:24:17.000 So you can get, I mean, they're still, I'm sure, ripping you off.

02:24:19.000 It also probably makes you feel like you're attached to something big.

02:24:24.000 Yeah.

02:24:24.000 Like, hey, Universal did this, yeah.

02:24:26.000 I felt like, when I got that deal, I felt like I was on top of the world.

02:24:31.000 Yeah.

02:24:31.000 All that stuff that had been pent up inside me all those years, that finally got released when I was making, writing songs, still, no one was hearing those songs, and, like, the knowledge that people would, that I'd at least get a shot, I was on Geffen, my label mates.

02:24:48.000 Geffen was different from any place else, for sure, but it was a little bit like the Viper Room.

02:24:52.000 I knew all those guys, the Posies.

02:24:56.000 Maria McKee, Nirvana, Sonic Youth.

02:25:00.000 I met them all right in the beginning.

02:25:01.000 We got to know everybody and it was cool.

02:25:04.000 It was really an incredible feeling.

02:25:08.000 The deal itself was probably shitty in some other ways.

02:25:11.000 Good in some ways because we argued for it.

02:25:13.000 But in order to get those royalties, we gave up a lot of money.

02:25:17.000 More than most people thought was smart.

02:25:20.000 We had a lot of money on the table, and if we'd never been successful, maybe we would have regretted never keeping any of that.

02:25:24.000 Who argued for you to do that?

02:25:26.000 Was that your idea?

02:25:27.000 Me?

02:25:27.000 Yeah?

02:25:28.000 I mean, I don't think our lawyer was against it either, or our managers.

02:25:31.000 I think we all were pretty excited about the band.

02:25:33.000 They had a lot of faith in us.

02:25:34.000 There was a reason everybody wanted to sign us.

02:25:37.000 We had...

02:25:38.000 Good songs and a lot of them.

02:25:40.000 And that's like the gold standard for a band.

02:25:42.000 Like, it's one thing to have a sound that's cool, but you don't know if that's gonna mean anything in a couple years.

02:25:47.000 But songs, that's reproducible.

02:25:49.000 If you've got good songs and not just one, you could probably write good songs next time, too.

02:25:54.000 And that seems like some real value, you know?

02:25:58.000 So, I had a lot of faith in this.

02:26:01.000 And I wanted a career in this.

02:26:02.000 I didn't want...

02:26:03.000 I wasn't there for, like, a payoff.

02:26:06.000 I wanted something to do for the rest of my life.

02:26:08.000 How long was it after you signed before things got really weird?

02:26:14.000 Like, before you really popped?

02:26:16.000 Oh.

02:26:18.000 Let's see.

02:26:18.000 We got signed sometime in...

02:26:23.000 Mid-92, and I think we blew up in...

02:26:27.000 The record came out in the fall of 93, and we blew up in the spring of 94. We didn't feel it yet, but we played Saturday Night Live in January of 94. We weren't even in the top 200. I'm not sure why they put us on.

02:26:44.000 They liked the band.

02:26:45.000 But the record jumped 40 spots a week for five or six weeks.

02:26:49.000 After we played around here on Saturday Night Live, the record literally jumped 40-plus spots every week for five weeks and landed us at Lake.

02:26:58.000 13 for a couple weeks, then six for three weeks, and then we were two for two years.

02:27:03.000 Wow.

02:27:04.000 Never one.

02:27:05.000 But two for a long...

02:27:07.000 We were one on our next record.

02:27:08.000 But the first record never got to number one.

02:27:11.000 People kept jumping us.

02:27:12.000 Bonnie Raitt jumped us. 1.00

02:27:14.000 The fucking Lion King jumped us. 1.00

02:27:15.000 The Lion King. 1.00

02:27:16.000 That was a huge record, you know?

02:27:18.000 Yeah, sure.

02:27:18.000 And Asa Bass jumped us.

02:27:19.000 The last one was The Lion King.

02:27:20.000 We had been at two for so long.

02:27:23.000 Bonnie Raitt came up, went back down.

02:27:25.000 Asa Bass came up, went back down.

02:27:28.000 And we were like, we're going to be number ones because we're still selling like 40,000 records a week for like a year.

02:27:32.000 It just went on forever.

02:27:33.000 That's crazy.

02:27:34.000 And then we were like, We had a really good week with something, and it seemed like it was going to go up again, and then The Lion King came out, and it was just like, man, we're never going to see number one. 0.96

02:27:42.000 That must have felt like a real genius move, though, to get royalties, to get less money up front, and then to get royalties like, Goddamn that, Adam. 0.99

02:27:51.000 When that second or third check came in, the one that was like the big one, I was like, fuck. 1.00

02:27:56.000 Told you, bitches. 1.00

02:27:57.000 Fuck. 1.00

02:27:57.000 Especially the publishing check, because that mostly went to me. 1.00

02:28:00.000 We still split everything evenly in the band for the other stuff.

02:28:03.000 Just the general record royalties, we split evenly.

02:28:05.000 And even publishing, I mean, I give a third of every song.

02:28:08.000 My songs are divided up.

02:28:10.000 Music is a third, lyrics is a third, and then whoever plays on it in the band gets a third.

02:28:15.000 We split between us.

02:28:18.000 But still, that publishing check was...

02:28:21.000 That was a big thing.

02:28:23.000 What did it feel like to all of a sudden be rich?

02:28:26.000 I wasn't sure what to do.

02:28:29.000 I remember like I bought I just bought a lot of CDs and I bought a lot of things that went on shelves.

02:28:37.000 I bought CDs, I bought DVDs, or not then, it was like VHS and...

02:28:42.000 what's the name?

02:28:44.000 Laser discs.

02:28:45.000 And then I bought a few pieces of art.

02:28:48.000 I bought some paintings.

02:28:50.000 You know, a guy who's one of my best friends now, Felipe Molina, who did the album cover for Somewhere Under Wonderland, our last record.

02:28:56.000 And painted a different painting for every song in there.

02:28:59.000 I bought a couple of his pieces.

02:29:01.000 I was wandering through, like, Soho.

02:29:03.000 We were on tour.

02:29:04.000 And I kept looking.

02:29:06.000 I went to this gallery.

02:29:08.000 I never really wandered through art galleries.

02:29:10.000 And I kept seeing these paintings by this guy.

02:29:12.000 And I loved them.

02:29:13.000 I spent a bunch of time in there one day.

02:29:15.000 And then I went off.

02:29:16.000 We played a show, like, at the Beacon or something.

02:29:17.000 And I went back down there the next day.

02:29:19.000 And I looked at these paintings again.

02:29:20.000 And, like...

02:29:21.000 The third day I went down there, I was like, I went away that night and I thought, well, I could actually buy a painting.

02:29:27.000 I mean, it was a couple thousand dollars.

02:29:28.000 It wasn't really, really expensive or anything like that, but it's more money than I'd ever spent on anything other than my car.

02:29:34.000 You know, and I bought a few of his paintings and I sent them to my place in California.

02:29:39.000 I was like, I'd never owned anything like that.

02:29:44.000 So it was cool.

02:29:45.000 I mean, honestly, I didn't know what to do with it.

02:29:49.000 Had an indie record company too over the years.

02:29:53.000 Spent a lot of money on making records.

02:29:55.000 Lost a lot of money making records.

02:29:57.000 Made some great records.

02:29:58.000 Why did you decide to start an indie record company?

02:30:01.000 I had a lot of friends who I thought were really good and I just didn't think they had good...

02:30:06.000 I thought record companies were really bad situations and I thought they pushed them to do things that weren't really great for their band musically and I thought I could make really cool records with these guys.

02:30:16.000 They're great.

02:30:17.000 Nobody realizes it.

02:30:18.000 But what about publicity?

02:30:19.000 What about publicizing them and promoting them?

02:30:23.000 Well, we tried.

02:30:23.000 We made great records and we didn't, like I said, the hardest part was distribution.

02:30:28.000 It was really hard to sell the records.

02:30:29.000 I think the bands got great reviews.

02:30:31.000 Critics loved them.

02:30:34.000 We did okay, but we never really...

02:30:36.000 It's why I like doing the festival now, because I never feel like I failed.

02:30:41.000 And I felt like I failed a lot with the indie record company, because we never made big successes of any of the bands.

02:30:46.000 We tried really hard and spent a lot of money on it.

02:30:48.000 Did any of them become marginal successes?

02:30:51.000 Well, some of them were already.

02:30:52.000 I mean, you know, Gigolo Ants are a band from Boston that I really loved.

02:30:57.000 That's hilarious.

02:30:57.000 They're great, I know.

02:30:58.000 Gigolo Ants?

02:30:59.000 Yeah.

02:30:59.000 A-U-N-T-S. Oh.

02:31:01.000 Yeah.

02:31:02.000 It's a Sid Barrett song, the guy that was the original lead singer of Pink Floyd.

02:31:07.000 Oh, okay.

02:31:07.000 So he had a song called Gigolo Ants.

02:31:08.000 That's the guy that went crazy, right?

02:31:09.000 Yeah, yeah.

02:31:10.000 Yeah.

02:31:10.000 So it's based on one of his songs, but they're an incredible band.

02:31:13.000 They're a fucking fantastic band. 0.92

02:31:15.000 They were some of my best friends. 0.99

02:31:17.000 I lived with the lead singer for a long time.

02:31:19.000 Have you ever thought about doing that again now, like the way we were talking about?

02:31:23.000 If you promoted something like that, you did it through a podcast and you had a social media page, like a Facebook page or an Instagram page or both, that seems like now that's a viable strategy to introduce people to bands and those bands could actually probably take off.

02:31:41.000 If they're really great bands, you could actually get eyes on them.

02:31:44.000 And ears on them.

02:31:45.000 That's what I feel like I do do now, because without the record company part of it, we run an independent festival.

02:31:52.000 We spend a year, or six or eight months each time, talking about every band that's going to play the festival, all 30 bands or whatever it is, and we...

02:32:01.000 For each band, when we release the announcement, we do a whole page about them.

02:32:05.000 We write essays.

02:32:06.000 We put the videos up and put the music on there.

02:32:09.000 We introduce you to each of them week by week.

02:32:11.000 We make the festivals entirely free so anyone can come and you never have to pay.

02:32:16.000 We make it as easy as possible to introduce you to all these bands.

02:32:18.000 We play them on our podcast.

02:32:20.000 We talk about it.

02:32:21.000 We film at my house every band.

02:32:24.000 The festival might be that weekend, but starting Tuesday of that week, we film acoustic sessions at my house in the living room with every band and put them up on our page on the Underwater Sunshine website.

02:32:33.000 Oh, that's awesome.

02:32:34.000 They're really cool.

02:32:35.000 That's very cool.

02:32:36.000 So, I mean, I feel like I'm doing all that stuff.

02:32:38.000 So you do these in your house in New York?

02:32:40.000 The festival's at a club.

02:32:41.000 But the filming?

02:32:42.000 Is at my house, yeah.

02:32:43.000 We have this area.

02:32:44.000 I call it the garden.

02:32:46.000 When I first got my place, you know, outdoor space is really expensive in New York.

02:32:50.000 It costs so much money to get just a balcony.

02:32:53.000 I bought this empty loft, you know, 20 years ago almost.

02:32:57.000 And it had a lot of windows, didn't have any outdoor space.

02:33:00.000 For a place half that size, it was like a million dollars more to have a little balcony.

02:33:03.000 So what I did instead was...

02:33:06.000 I put AstroTurf down at one end of the loft and then put a bunch of garden furniture.

02:33:11.000 And it feels like you're outdoors.

02:33:13.000 And it's really cool.

02:33:14.000 So I got a piano in the middle of the AstroTurf.

02:33:16.000 So we have the bands come and play.

02:33:17.000 We call it the garden.

02:33:18.000 It's just like this AstroTurf with beach furniture around it.

02:33:21.000 Oh, that's funny.

02:33:21.000 And the band's set up there and they play there.

02:33:23.000 Let me see what that looks like.

02:33:24.000 There might be a picture.

02:33:27.000 If you film it...

02:33:28.000 Oh, look on UnderwaterSunshine.com.

02:33:29.000 There's all kinds of...

02:33:30.000 They're called the Garden Sessions. 0.94

02:33:32.000 And so, I mean, I do all that, and I don't feel like I fail anybody.

02:33:35.000 Like, the bands we're taking out on this tour, Frank Turner's coming for the end of the tour, but I'm taking two of the Underwater Sunshine bands out, two of the guys, Matt Susich and Sean Barna, both of whose records I sung on, too.

02:33:47.000 I do a lot of that.

02:33:48.000 I sing on a lot of records, but mostly just with my friends.

02:33:53.000 Is this it here?

02:33:54.000 Yeah, that's like...

02:33:56.000 That's my living room.

02:33:57.000 That's a band called Scout.

02:33:59.000 That's Laura from Scout.

02:34:01.000 And you can see a couple of Felipe's paintings are in the background.

02:34:03.000 This clock of mine is up there.

02:34:05.000 I wish you could show the lawn.

02:34:07.000 It's really cool if you get a more distant shot because you can see the green.

02:34:11.000 Dude, this has a hundred views.

02:34:12.000 That's crazy.

02:34:13.000 I know.

02:34:13.000 Well, it's hard to promote stuff.

02:34:14.000 See, that's what it looks like.

02:34:15.000 That's bonkers.

02:34:16.000 A hundred views.

02:34:18.000 You know, I do what I can.

02:34:21.000 I'm not wildly successful at the podcast or this, but we play people's music.

02:34:26.000 They're really good.

02:34:27.000 That is kind of cool that you have a setup there with the AstroTurf.

02:34:30.000 It's hilarious.

02:34:31.000 Paintings behind you.

02:34:32.000 Yeah, so it's like all the press I've done for this record, except for this, I've done sitting right there.

02:34:38.000 I just put a chair there, and we got some cameras, and I've done every interview on Zoom, except for your interview.

02:34:42.000 And we even filmed for the Today Show and Kimmel right there, because we couldn't really go there, so we just did that.

02:34:52.000 I just love that you're so dedicated to music.

02:34:55.000 I love it.

02:34:55.000 It's just like 24-7.

02:34:58.000 I'm a music geek.

02:34:59.000 I can tell.

02:35:00.000 How do you find new music?

02:35:03.000 I look.

02:35:03.000 I spend a lot of time looking.

02:35:06.000 I've got about six, seven, maybe ten of us now, who work on the festival.

02:35:11.000 Some of us are musicians, some of them are journalists, some of them are bloggers.

02:35:14.000 Just people who really love working music.

02:35:17.000 My partner, Barbara Rappaport, Barbara Garrett now.

02:35:21.000 I met her when we were doing the Outlaw Roadshow, our first festival here in Austin during South by Southwest.

02:35:26.000 And she started doing that with us, and then her and I started Underwater Sunshine years later.

02:35:30.000 She lives in San Antonio now, but she's from down here. 0.76

02:35:33.000 And it was a lot based on kind of, we would come down here and we would put this big festival on in the middle of South by Southwest.

02:35:39.000 We would put on free shows with all these bands, like 30 bands at a show, like on many different stages over a couple days.

02:35:47.000 And we used to do...

02:35:47.000 What did we do?

02:35:48.000 We did the Rusty Spur for a few years.

02:35:49.000 I don't know if it's still there even.

02:35:51.000 It was up on...

02:35:52.000 What street was it?

02:35:53.000 Like 7th Street or 8th Street?

02:35:55.000 I can't remember.

02:35:55.000 But yeah, I mean, I just kind of loved...

02:35:59.000 Also, it's nice to have peers again.

02:36:01.000 When I was coming up in the clubs, I had a lot of friends who played music.

02:36:04.000 And then when you get out there, unless you're gonna hang out at the MTV Awards, you don't know a lot of people anymore.

02:36:09.000 But then with the festivals, I got all these friends who play music.

02:36:12.000 I sing on lots of records, but they're mostly just my friends' records.

02:36:15.000 And they're really good.

02:36:17.000 I'm really proud of them.

02:36:18.000 We're taking Matt and Sean out on tour this summer.

02:36:22.000 They're going to flip-flop each night who plays first, so they'll both get to play.

02:36:27.000 I kind of feel like I do all the stuff I used to do with the record company, and I never fail anybody, which is nice, because I really failed it.

02:36:33.000 Also, it cost me a lot of money.

02:36:34.000 A shitload of money.

02:36:35.000 How much do you think you blew in the indie record company?

02:36:38.000 I had two different ones, but I'd say...

02:36:41.000 Several million probably over the years.

02:36:43.000 It just costs money to do that stuff.

02:36:45.000 You know, you're supporting bands on the road and...

02:36:47.000 And how'd you get out of it?

02:36:49.000 At some point, I just stopped.

02:36:51.000 The second company, I... Just after a few years, I just kind of just didn't want to do it anymore.

02:36:58.000 Yeah.

02:36:58.000 So we started doing the festivals, and I really like that.

02:37:02.000 We're still helping out the bands.

02:37:03.000 We're doing what we can do, and maybe it'll take off.

02:37:07.000 Even me, though, it's hard for people to discover it.

02:37:09.000 Maybe if this record's really successful, everyone will check out Underwater Sunshine.

02:37:11.000 We packed the house at all the festivals completely, but they're small clubs.

02:37:16.000 We're going to try and expand it this year.

02:37:18.000 What size clubs are you doing? 0.61

02:37:19.000 Well, Rockwood, I don't know.

02:37:21.000 Rockwood has three stages.

02:37:22.000 I don't know, you know, probably a few hundred people, a few thousand over the course of the two nights come in and out.

02:37:28.000 But we're spreading out to like two or three clubs this year at the same time, making like a little mini festival in the clubs there.

02:37:35.000 And we're also going to like do our show in New York with some of those bands opening.

02:37:39.000 And Frank Turner's going to play it this year, which will give a little more exposure.

02:37:43.000 The intimate shows like that are fucking cool anyway, man.

02:37:46.000 Do you see a really good band in a 150-seat room? 0.87

02:37:50.000 It's amazing.

02:37:52.000 It's almost like an amusement park, because there's three stages going at once with staggered start times, and you can just run to the ones you want to see.

02:37:59.000 Meet a bunch of different people, go between the clubs.

02:38:03.000 They're free, so you don't have to worry about paying each time, and it's just...

02:38:07.000 We also do...

02:38:07.000 The only thing we...

02:38:08.000 The only way...

02:38:09.000 The bands we don't pay either because they're free shows.

02:38:11.000 What we do do is we buy...

02:38:12.000 I think we did $400.

02:38:14.000 We bought $400 worth of merch from every band.

02:38:17.000 So it enables us to give them $400.

02:38:19.000 And then we set the merch up.

02:38:21.000 It stands at the show and we give it away free to the fans.

02:38:23.000 So people can get their music, their CDs, their t-shirts for free.

02:38:27.000 And it enables us to pay the band's money.

02:38:30.000 And it's just like make it as easy as possible to like...

02:38:34.000 Exposed people to these things.

02:38:36.000 Well, it's also the spirit in which you're doing this is so pure, right?

02:38:41.000 This is a completely non-profit venture.

02:38:45.000 You're not trying to make money.

02:38:46.000 You're just trying to distribute great music. 0.94

02:38:48.000 I fucking love it, man. 0.97

02:38:49.000 I just love hearing that you do it this way. 0.98

02:38:51.000 It's really cool.

02:38:52.000 You know, we wanted to sort of like expand because we've been doing all this music stuff for a while and the last time we did it, which is now like October two years ago, I guess it was 2019, Last time we did the festival.

02:39:04.000 And we had expanded to a place with three stages instead of two.

02:39:07.000 It was really successful.

02:39:08.000 But Kate Quigley came, and she was hanging out for the whole thing, and she was like, man, you should add some comedy to this.

02:39:13.000 Because we went out one night and watched an open mic with her, and she got up at it.

02:39:17.000 When you were telling about the open mic earlier, I was really thinking about that.

02:39:21.000 It's funny.

02:39:22.000 Kate and I, we met because we matched on a dating site years ago, but never met each other, but we sort of corresponded a little bit.

02:39:30.000 I hadn't talked to her in a long time, and I guess she wrote to me again later, and I was like, I'm just going to introduce her to my girlfriend.

02:39:35.000 I introduced her to my girlfriend, and my girlfriend and her are the best.

02:39:37.000 It's the best way to be safe about things.

02:39:38.000 Just any hot girl, introduce them to your girlfriend. 1.00

02:39:41.000 So they become best friends with your girlfriend.

02:39:43.000 You never make a mistake ever.

02:39:46.000 And your girlfriend has cool friends.

02:39:48.000 And you get to hang out with people.

02:39:49.000 I always liked Kate.

02:39:50.000 I thought she was funny.

02:39:51.000 Now I get to be her friend because there's nothing to worry about.

02:39:53.000 She's best friends with my girlfriend.

02:39:55.000 So I can be her friend from now on.

02:39:57.000 It's awesome.

02:39:59.000 But yeah, she was talking about how cool it would be to bring comedy into it, too.

02:40:02.000 I thought that would be a great thing.

02:40:04.000 That's a completely different kind of animal.

02:40:06.000 It is, it is. 0.99

02:40:06.000 You'd bring a completely different kind of mental illness into your little party there, too. 0.99

02:40:10.000 Well, you'd do it at a different club.

02:40:12.000 I'm not sure I'd mix them up on stages.

02:40:13.000 100% do it in a different club.

02:40:15.000 Because you'd want to be able to just run them, get people lined up.

02:40:18.000 Don't get involved.

02:40:20.000 Stay out. 1.00

02:40:22.000 Just leave that to other people that are used to dealing with these fucking maniacs. 1.00

02:40:26.000 You understand music, right? 1.00

02:40:28.000 You know comedians.

02:40:30.000 It's not the same thing as understanding it.

02:40:32.000 I hear you.

02:40:32.000 I don't want to do a music festival.

02:40:34.000 I would think about doing a comedy festival because they're my people and I get them, but I would not wish that upon anyone else to handle comedians.

02:40:44.000 We'll put you in charge.

02:40:45.000 Uh-uh.

02:40:47.000 Nuh-uh.

02:40:47.000 No, seriously.

02:40:48.000 It's great.

02:40:49.000 It's your comedy festival with my name.

02:40:51.000 No.

02:40:52.000 They do have several of them out here, right?

02:40:54.000 They got Moon Tower.

02:40:56.000 What else do they have out here?

02:40:57.000 There's more than one comedy festival out here, right?

02:41:00.000 South by Southwest, I think, was the whole thing.

02:41:04.000 Yeah, sorta.

02:41:05.000 I mean, they have comedy at it, but Moon Tower is basically just comedy, right? 0.94

02:41:09.000 That whole thing is, by the way, just for people who've never spent much time in Austin, that whole Moon Tower thing, the whole concept behind putting these towers around town that light up the town at night and that all look like different little moons, that's a crazy fucking thing to do. 0.90

02:41:25.000 That's fantastic.

02:41:25.000 I have not seen it.

02:41:27.000 Oh, yeah.

02:41:27.000 I just thought it was a name.

02:41:29.000 I didn't know they did that.

02:41:30.000 No.

02:41:30.000 Someone had an idea in like the 50s or 40s.

02:41:32.000 It was a long time ago to build these big towers with these big lights on top of them.

02:41:36.000 So there was almost like, instead of just being one moon to light up a town, there was a shitload of them.

02:41:40.000 Like an alternative to streetlights in a way.

02:41:42.000 Really?

02:41:42.000 Like, dazed and confused.

02:41:43.000 They're going to the fucking moon tower. 0.99

02:41:45.000 I have no idea. 0.99

02:41:46.000 And he's climbing up it.

02:41:47.000 And there's, like, I think, I've seen, there's five of them, I think, around town.

02:41:50.000 Yeah, most of them are gone.

02:41:51.000 They're only, yeah.

02:41:52.000 It's very weird. 0.99

02:41:53.000 Big fucking towers. 1.00

02:41:54.000 I don't get it. 0.99

02:41:55.000 It is the coolest idea ever.

02:41:58.000 So it lights up whole neighborhoods at night. 0.96

02:41:59.000 So it's like, you're not just in a dark, shitty neighborhood. 0.90

02:42:03.000 Oh, that makes sense. 0.84

02:42:04.000 So it's a little safer, too, probably.

02:42:06.000 Yeah, I mean, that was kind of the idea, to really light up a town at night.

02:42:09.000 And I don't think they have many...

02:42:10.000 Like you said, there's five left, maybe?

02:42:12.000 I think there could be a couple more than five, but I remember looking this up when I first...

02:42:16.000 1890s.

02:42:17.000 First put up in the 1890s.

02:42:19.000 So when did...

02:42:20.000 Is Moon Tower a comedy festival, or is it just...

02:42:22.000 It is that, too, yeah.

02:42:23.000 And that's the main one that pops up, Moon Tower Comedy Festival.

02:42:26.000 Okay.

02:42:26.000 It's probably...

02:42:27.000 Because they go to the Moon Tower in Dazed and Confused, in Linklater's movie.

02:42:29.000 Roy Wood Jr., powerful Roy Wood Jr. Interesting.

02:42:33.000 I mean, it's a really cool fucking thing for like... 0.99

02:42:35.000 This is a great... 0.98

02:42:36.000 College towns are the greatest thing on earth, and this is a really good one.

02:42:40.000 Well, this is a little bit more than a college town, you know?

02:42:43.000 It's like it's a live music town.

02:42:45.000 It's got...

02:42:46.000 That whole 6th Street has got this vibe to it that's so different.

02:42:50.000 The downtown area is so different.

02:42:53.000 It's a great town.

02:42:54.000 It's really special.

02:42:55.000 It really is.

02:42:56.000 I mean, I grew up in a college town.

02:42:57.000 I've always loved them.

02:42:58.000 It was my favorite thing when we'd do just, like, the tertiary tours, like, in those towns, as opposed to just the big cities.

02:43:04.000 Like, we'd do the big cities in the summertime, and then we used to do, like, in the fall and the spring, we would do the college towns more.

02:43:10.000 And it was such a...

02:43:10.000 I mean, I just...

02:43:11.000 Growing up in Berkeley, I've loved that kind of place.

02:43:13.000 Bloomington, you know, Athens, Georgia, especially Austin.

02:43:17.000 But it was always really cool.

02:43:18.000 But this one, like...

02:43:20.000 Because it turned into such a music town, too.

02:43:22.000 It's just a blast.

02:43:24.000 Yeah, it's an awesome town.

02:43:26.000 It's a great-sized place.

02:43:27.000 This is what I always tell people.

02:43:29.000 It's only a million people, and then there's a million outside of it.

02:43:34.000 And that's not that much.

02:43:35.000 But it's good enough.

02:43:37.000 It's plenty of room for great restaurants, great comedy clubs, great music.

02:43:42.000 You go down 6th Street, you'll hear great bands playing.

02:43:47.000 You've never even heard of them before.

02:43:50.000 You hear all this live music, and people are walking around.

02:43:52.000 There's a vibe.

02:43:53.000 There's an energy.

02:43:54.000 To this town that's just different.

02:43:56.000 Yeah.

02:43:57.000 You know, when you get those towns that support music, it's usually a pretty Temporary and then it cycles out of it because if you have that area where musicians can live and play There's usually some warehouses and they can get rehearsal spaces,

02:44:13.000 you know, San Francisco used to be that way Yeah, you know, but then they become cool places to live and then people move into those areas and they want to live in those kind of warehouses and then it gets upscale and eventually Bands can't afford it and then someplace else becomes that area, you know, but Austin's managed to stay Keep Austin weird.

02:44:33.000 It's managed to stay nice and weird for a long time now.

02:44:37.000 Strange, too, because it's the capital.

02:44:39.000 Yeah, people are worried now because of Google and tech companies and Apple's putting a campus here and Oracle, and they're like, oh my god, we're going to bring in the Silicon people.

02:44:49.000 Well, that could do it, too, because if you get too upscale, it becomes hard to afford just the rehearsal spaces, empty, cheap places to rehearse.

02:44:58.000 That'll kill the music. 0.82

02:44:59.000 It did it in the Bay Area in some ways.

02:45:01.000 It just got every warehouse turned into condos.

02:45:05.000 And the real estate here has gone bonkers.

02:45:08.000 It's very crazy.

02:45:09.000 It's hard for people to find affordable places to live in Austin.

02:45:13.000 They're all moving outside the outside area.

02:45:16.000 But that's kind of normal, right?

02:45:17.000 The normal expansion and spread.

02:45:19.000 But it's still tolerable and manageable.

02:45:23.000 It still works.

02:45:24.000 It's a good town that's managed to keep itself as that kind of a cool town for, I mean, a long time.

02:45:30.000 Yeah.

02:45:30.000 It also has the ethic of having small, independent businesses cherished, as opposed to, like, chains.

02:45:39.000 You know, it's like there's a lot of, like, particularly restaurants, a lot of, like, independent...

02:45:45.000 Individual places that are cherished.

02:45:48.000 There's like a vibe to that here.

02:45:50.000 And they get supported.

02:45:52.000 People line up.

02:45:53.000 There's food here that people can't get because it's just gone by the time you get through the line.

02:45:59.000 And they've managed to keep that sort of vibe alive for a long time.

02:46:02.000 Yeah, the barbecue vibe here is insane.

02:46:05.000 It's so strong.

02:46:06.000 Yeah, it is.

02:46:08.000 It's good, too.

02:46:10.000 Where have you gone in town?

02:46:11.000 I don't know.

02:46:12.000 I haven't been here in years.

02:46:13.000 Have you been to Terry Black's?

02:46:15.000 I had it last night.

02:46:16.000 I had a delivery from it last night.

02:46:18.000 It was really good.

02:46:19.000 I think it was Black's last night. 0.99

02:46:21.000 I was trying to get it from Stiles.

02:46:26.000 I haven't eaten there yet.

02:46:27.000 They call me back, which is something you don't get in New York.

02:46:31.000 We're out of everything except for turkey.

02:46:33.000 Wow.

02:46:33.000 I don't want that.

02:46:35.000 I want ribs.

02:46:36.000 Yeah, turkey?

02:46:37.000 Like, come on, man.

02:46:38.000 I'm not trying to be healthy here.

02:46:39.000 What am I doing with this turkey?

02:46:40.000 There was one...

02:46:41.000 What's the name of that place?

02:46:42.000 It was way in the east side.

02:46:45.000 They had a big poster up that said, Don't need no teeth to eat my beef.

02:46:50.000 Oh, yeah.

02:46:51.000 I've seen that.

02:46:52.000 I remember the name of the place.

02:46:53.000 That was really good.

02:46:55.000 Yeah, you get that Terry Black's brisket.

02:46:57.000 You could chew it with your fingers.

02:46:59.000 It just slices right through.

02:47:01.000 That's one of the things I was working on this year, was how to make...

02:47:04.000 Like, decent brisket.

02:47:06.000 House Park BBQ. That's what it is, yeah.

02:47:08.000 Need no teeth to eat my beef.

02:47:11.000 That place was great.

02:47:12.000 I love the sign, too.

02:47:14.000 Yeah.

02:47:15.000 I mean, you know...

02:47:18.000 Barbecue is a weird thing because it moves around the United States.

02:47:21.000 You know, almost all came from the South.

02:47:22.000 But, you know, depending on the area, what was going on, like Oakland, where I grew up, is big barbecue because everyone came out to the shipyards to work from the South in World War II. And so all this whole community of black people from the South ended up also because the South can be not a great place to live at times if you're black in the 50s and 40s. 0.62

02:47:40.000 You know, came out to California and ended up in Oakland.

02:47:43.000 So had great barbecue there growing up.

02:47:46.000 Adam Curry, do you know who he is?

02:47:47.000 The original podfather?

02:47:49.000 He's the MTV VJ? Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.

02:47:52.000 He's out here now.

02:47:53.000 He lives out here.

02:47:54.000 He's literally the original podcaster.

02:47:56.000 He's the podfather.

02:47:57.000 And he explained to me why Austin has this long history of barbecue, and it has to do with Germans, that Germans smoke meat.

02:48:05.000 Oh, right.

02:48:06.000 Smoking.

02:48:07.000 Right.

02:48:07.000 Smoking and then they sort of adapted it to like brisket and ribs and Texas barbecue and it all became like the Central Texas barbecue became like a scene.

02:48:19.000 It's a very specific way of barbecuing.

02:48:22.000 Yeah.

02:48:23.000 Like the stuff in, it was more like, I think, I feel like the Oakland barbecue is closer to what I've had in Mississippi.

02:48:30.000 What kind of barbecue is that?

02:48:31.000 What is the style?

02:48:33.000 The sauce is a little sweeter, and it's got a nice bark on it.

02:48:39.000 There's just this place in Oakland that I really love called Everett& Jones.

02:48:45.000 It's a little shack at the bottom of University in Berkeley, and then they actually opened a full-on restaurant in In Oakland, in Jack London Square.

02:48:54.000 I want to say a few years ago, but it must be 20 years ago now.

02:48:57.000 But the Shack was where I grew up going.

02:48:59.000 And I still order barbecue sauce from them, get it shipped.

02:49:02.000 I love their sauce.

02:49:04.000 I get it shipped to New York.

02:49:05.000 Because even if I get barbecue from one place, I generally don't love the sauce.

02:49:09.000 So I keep my Everton Jones sauce.

02:49:11.000 But also, that was one of the things I tried to do cooking this year.

02:49:14.000 Make a nice sauce.

02:49:14.000 I don't have a smoker.

02:49:15.000 How am I gonna...

02:49:16.000 No, not the sauce, but the meat.

02:49:18.000 How am I... I gotta learn to make a good barbecue brisket in my oven.

02:49:21.000 I gotta figure this out.

02:49:22.000 Maybe it's just a really low temperature for a long time.

02:49:25.000 If I get up early in the morning, I rub it all with salt and brown sugar the night before.

02:49:30.000 Did you figure it out?

02:49:31.000 Kinda.

02:49:32.000 It's really good.

02:49:33.000 You don't have a patio?

02:49:34.000 No.

02:49:35.000 Because remember, I didn't get the outdoor space.

02:49:37.000 So I can't get a smoker.

02:49:39.000 But, you know, I figured out ways to do it, like just really low heat.

02:49:44.000 Like 200 degrees and just start it at noon.

02:49:47.000 It'll be ready by about 6. Keep it covered for the first 2 or 3 hours.

02:49:51.000 Then take the foil off.

02:49:53.000 Let it get some air for the next 2 or 3. Sometimes I'll sear it all first before I put it in.

02:50:02.000 Yeah, it turns out pretty good.

02:50:04.000 I mean, I did it.

02:50:04.000 I wanted to make...

02:50:05.000 I used my beef brisket recipe on a pork shoulder I had a little while ago and just cooked that. 0.97

02:50:09.000 And I spent the next, like, three weeks eating pork sandwiches that were fucking incredible. 0.93

02:50:15.000 They were just thin-sliced pork. 0.93

02:50:16.000 Some of the best barbecue I've ever had is out of Van Nuys.

02:50:20.000 Van Nuys, California.

02:50:21.000 Dr. Huggly Wuggly's.

02:50:22.000 Dr. Huggly Wuggly's.

02:50:23.000 Tyler, Texas Barbecue. 0.99

02:50:25.000 Damn good place. 0.99

02:50:26.000 Oh, my God. 0.99

02:50:26.000 It's fantastic. 0.99

02:50:27.000 Fantastic.

02:50:27.000 That's the closest I've come to what...

02:50:29.000 That's what Everton Jones tastes like.

02:50:30.000 Tyler, that place is like, you don't understand why it's there.

02:50:33.000 The neighborhood, it doesn't make any sense where it's at, but it's been there forever.

02:50:38.000 I think they've been there since the 70s.

02:50:40.000 It was there the whole time.

02:50:41.000 I moved there, and my A&R guy took me there while I was making the record in, like, 92, and we would always make the trek out there.

02:50:50.000 There's nowhere else to get good barbecue.

02:50:51.000 I don't care what they say.

02:50:53.000 There's nowhere else to get good barbecue in L.A., or there wasn't then, but... 1.00

02:50:56.000 Dr. Huggly Wugglies, that shit is fantastic. 1.00

02:50:59.000 Fantastic. 1.00

02:51:00.000 And the people there are cool as fuck and there's no pretentiousness to it. 0.99

02:51:05.000 They've got shitty wood panel on the walls and dumb paintings that nobody gives a fuck about. 0.99

02:51:11.000 It's all about the food. 0.99

02:51:12.000 They bring that brisket out there and you're like, oh my god, there it is.

02:51:16.000 Yeah.

02:51:17.000 Dr. Huggly Wugglies in Van Nuys.

02:51:20.000 I mean, that's indicative of how weird it is. 0.93

02:51:23.000 You look at the signs, like the fucking graffitis on the billboards and everything, and that's the inside, like right there, scroll back up where you were, right there, bam, that's what it looks like inside. 1.00

02:51:31.000 I mean, it's just so unpretentious, just booths and wood paneling, and look at that stupid fucking rodeo sign. 1.00

02:51:39.000 Nobody gives a shit about it. 1.00

02:51:40.000 No, they're not even looking. 0.99

02:51:41.000 The ribs and the brisket there are off the hook.

02:51:44.000 Everything's great there.

02:51:44.000 They're so good.

02:51:45.000 The chicken's great there.

02:51:46.000 Everything's great there.

02:51:47.000 Their sauce is great, too.

02:51:48.000 That is great.

02:51:48.000 That is the closest.

02:51:50.000 Look at that.

02:51:50.000 Look at that, son.

02:51:51.000 That's what Everett Jones is like.

02:51:51.000 It tastes just like Hagi Wagi's, which is like Southern Mississippi barbecue.

02:51:54.000 Brisket just melts in your mouth.

02:51:56.000 It's sensational.

02:51:58.000 Absolutely.

02:51:58.000 I knew exactly what you were going to say the moment you said Van Nuys.

02:52:01.000 I was like, yes.

02:52:03.000 LA can have a lot of places that look just like great restaurants look, but that aren't as good. 1.00

02:52:09.000 But that place, that is the shit, man. 1.00

02:52:11.000 That place is the shit. 1.00

02:52:12.000 It's so fucking good. 1.00

02:52:12.000 It's the shit and it's like a hidden spot. 1.00

02:52:15.000 You go there, you're like, what is happening here? 1.00

02:52:17.000 Why are you here?

02:52:18.000 What is this?

02:52:21.000 Wish it was in town, but no, it's better.

02:52:23.000 Stay out here. 0.99

02:52:24.000 Stay right in this weird little neighborhood of Van Nuys, next to a barber shop and shit. 0.86

02:52:28.000 You know, it's just, it's cool. 0.72

02:52:30.000 We would trek out there.

02:52:31.000 When I lived...

02:52:34.000 I had too many people living with me at that cottage.

02:52:36.000 Too many friends.

02:52:37.000 Half of New Orleans came out and lived with me.

02:52:40.000 All my friends from New Orleans came out and lived with me in that cottage.

02:52:43.000 Eventually, I bought a house in Beverly Hills.

02:52:45.000 I bought a big old mansion so that all of us could live there because there was like 10 of us living at my house.

02:52:48.000 I bought this big place, but we would take treks out.

02:52:52.000 Someone would just go to Hoggly Woggly's to bring it all back.

02:52:56.000 Or we'd go out there together, but we would bring dinner back for everyone from Hoggly Woggly's.

02:53:01.000 Yeah, they have great to go.

02:53:04.000 It's the big trays of brisket and meat.

02:53:07.000 Now I'm hungry.

02:53:08.000 Adam, I really enjoyed talking to you, man.

02:53:10.000 Joe, thank you, man.

02:53:11.000 I appreciate this.

02:53:11.000 It was very cool.

02:53:12.000 I really enjoyed it.

02:53:13.000 Like I said, I've been a fan forever, so it means a lot that you came in here and did this.

02:53:18.000 So your album, it's available now.

02:53:20.000 You gave me a physical copy.

02:53:21.000 Thank you very much for that.

02:53:23.000 Can people get it digital?

02:53:24.000 It's available everywhere.

02:53:25.000 Yeah, it'll be digital.

02:53:26.000 The only way you can get it, there's no CD, so we made vinyl, and it's on, it's digital everywhere.

02:53:31.000 And, oh, I forgot to tell you one, we're gonna go on tour.

02:53:34.000 We're gonna leave, we're gonna go on tour in August in America.

02:53:36.000 August, September, October.

02:53:38.000 How can anybody find out about that?

02:53:42.000 Countingcrows.com. 0.99

02:53:42.000 They'll put all the shit up. 0.99

02:53:43.000 And they'll have the tour dates, and when will they be announced? 0.99

02:53:45.000 Today.

02:53:46.000 This is me doing it.

02:53:46.000 I'm not sure the exact...

02:53:48.000 We're not going to go on sale for a few weeks, but I think the dates will be up today on the website, and this is the first I've told anybody about it.

02:53:55.000 Oh, that's exciting.

02:53:56.000 Breaking the news right here.

02:53:57.000 Are you coming through here?

02:53:58.000 We are coming to Austin, yes.

02:54:00.000 When?

02:54:01.000 Well, we're playing the Moody Amphitheater, and I don't...

02:54:03.000 I could look it up.

02:54:05.000 I have it on my phone somewhere.

02:54:06.000 I took a picture of the schedule.

02:54:09.000 Breaking news.

02:54:13.000 Great minds, man.

02:54:14.000 Great minds.

02:54:17.000 Here it is.

02:54:19.000 So, Austin. 0.90

02:54:20.000 Where the hell are you? 0.78

02:54:22.000 Austin. 0.97

02:54:24.000 Still in Texas.

02:54:26.000 Right here.

02:54:27.000 Moody Amphitheater at Waterloo.

02:54:31.000 Wednesday, September 15th.

02:54:33.000 Beautiful.

02:54:33.000 Okay.

02:54:34.000 Shit. 1.00

02:54:35.000 Why? 1.00

02:54:36.000 Why?

02:54:36.000 I might not be here.

02:54:39.000 Where are you going?

02:54:40.000 You going on tour?

02:54:41.000 I'm not sure.

02:54:42.000 I might be here.

02:54:43.000 I might be elk hunting.

02:54:45.000 Yeah?

02:54:46.000 See how I'm here?

02:54:46.000 Well, you can come anywhere you want.

02:54:48.000 There's plenty of places.

02:54:49.000 Okay.

02:54:49.000 Well, I would love to see you here.

02:54:51.000 What do you hunt with when you hunt elk?

02:54:53.000 Bow and arrow.

02:54:53.000 You're hunting bow hunting?

02:54:54.000 Yes. 1.00

02:54:55.000 No shit? 1.00

02:54:56.000 Yeah. 1.00

02:54:56.000 Wow. 1.00

02:54:57.000 Yeah.

02:54:58.000 I'm just curious.

02:54:59.000 Yeah, that's what I do.

02:55:01.000 I've never hunted with a bow and arrow.

02:55:02.000 Mostly because I would miss and if I hit it.

02:55:05.000 Yeah, I practice a lot.

02:55:08.000 A lot.

02:55:10.000 Yeah, it's an obsession.

02:55:12.000 It's not a thing you just go and do.

02:55:15.000 It's a thing that I practice all year round.

02:55:17.000 I'm a big archery fanatic.

02:55:20.000 Wow.

02:55:21.000 I have a 3D range in my backyard with a giant rubber elk, 85 yards that I shoot.

02:55:27.000 Yeah, I shoot all the time, constantly.

02:55:30.000 Wow.

02:55:31.000 Yeah, and it's one of the things I do every year to acquire meat and go and bow hunt.

02:55:38.000 I did some of that when I was in England because I was on my own, so I would spend days just hunting rabbits.

02:55:47.000 I kind of liked cooking for myself after doing that.

02:55:51.000 Oh yeah, man.

02:55:51.000 Cooking something that you've actually went out and harvested yourself is something special.

02:55:56.000 Pheasant.

02:55:56.000 A lot of pheasant and rabbit.

02:55:59.000 Rabbit, different.

02:56:00.000 I mean, obviously very different.

02:56:01.000 Pheasant's a shotgun thing. 0.97

02:56:02.000 I've only pheasant hunted once with Anthony Bourdain and he got one.

02:56:08.000 He got one and I missed it.

02:56:09.000 I missed one.

02:56:11.000 It's a different kind of thing than aiming at something, you know, this is a movie.

02:56:14.000 Yeah, it's like...

02:56:15.000 I'm not adept with shotguns.

02:56:19.000 I need to learn how to, like...

02:56:21.000 I think there's got to be something to it.

02:56:23.000 Yeah.

02:56:24.000 Some technique that I'm missing.

02:56:25.000 You've got to lead it.

02:56:26.000 You think about it as a cone, like you're throwing a net in front of something.

02:56:29.000 It's a different...

02:56:30.000 It definitely...

02:56:32.000 One of the reasons I think I got into it is because since you missed the first hundred times, you lose all sympathy.

02:56:39.000 You hate it so much after you've missed it 50 times. 1.00

02:56:41.000 It's like, fuck you. 1.00

02:56:42.000 I don't have any sympathy for you anymore. 1.00

02:56:44.000 Because you've been fucking with me for an hour now. 0.99

02:56:48.000 All right, man. 0.99

02:56:49.000 Well, let's wrap this up.

02:56:50.000 Thank you very much for being here.

02:56:51.000 And I appreciate it.

02:56:52.000 And Butter Miracle, out now.

02:56:54.000 Yep.

02:56:55.000 Everybody can get it.

02:56:56.000 Go get it.

02:56:57.000 Support Live Music.

02:56:58.000 And your music festival is when again?

02:57:00.000 Underwater Sunshine.

02:57:01.000 It's going to be in October.

02:57:02.000 We'll finish up a tour in New York and then just the festival right after that.

02:57:06.000 Woo! 0.99

02:57:07.000 Bye, everybody.

The Joe Rogan Experience - May 21, 2021

Joe Rogan Experience #1656 - Adam Duritz

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Transcript