The Joe Rogan Experience - Joe Rogan Experience #906 - Henry Rollins

00:00:00.000 I'm really looking forward to it.

00:00:00.000 I appreciate it.

00:00:05.000 Two, one, boom, and we're live.

00:00:07.000 Henry Rollins, we are live.

00:00:08.000 Alright.

00:00:09.000 I like how you do the one ear off.

00:00:10.000 That's the Jim Norton approach.

00:00:12.000 He likes that.

00:00:13.000 Yeah, I've always done it this way, so I can hear the room and hear me as well.

00:00:15.000 Keep your eye on the door.

00:00:17.000 One of those guys.

00:00:17.000 Yeah, yeah.

00:00:19.000 So listen, man, I heard you on Ari Shafir's podcast.

00:00:22.000 Ari's one of my best friends.

00:00:23.000 Yeah, he's a good guy.

00:00:24.000 I love that guy.

00:00:25.000 He is very funny.

00:00:25.000 Yeah, he's funny.

00:00:27.000 We were both doing his thing at that club, right?

00:00:29.000 You tell the story?

00:00:30.000 Yes.

00:00:31.000 And I saw yours, and I think I did like the month after you, so I saw yours on the internet, and then I did one, and he's the host, and that's how I met him.

00:00:39.000 This is not happening, yeah.

00:00:40.000 Yeah, that's it.

00:00:41.000 And didn't you guys meet somewhere?

00:00:43.000 Yeah, last year in August at the Fringe Festival, he was doing like 30 nights there, and I was doing like five.

00:00:50.000 And so I guess the agent said, hey, do this thing with Ari Muntz.

00:00:54.000 And so he met me in the lobby where I was staying, and he brought his gear, and we just did it.

00:00:54.000 Sure!

00:00:59.000 It was cool because there was background noise.

00:01:01.000 You could tell you guys were doing it.

00:01:03.000 Revelers outside.

00:01:04.000 I mean the whole that whole part of Scotland is full of people for 30 days.

00:01:08.000 Well, what was amazing is the way you're living your life, man.

00:01:08.000 It's amazing.

00:01:12.000 It's really fascinating.

00:01:13.000 Oh, thank you.

00:01:14.000 You know and this the conversation that you guys had it really blew me away because You're really doing it.

00:01:20.000 You know what I mean?

00:01:21.000 Like trying. 0.99

00:01:22.000 Yeah, you're really doing it Like you pick a spot on a map and you just fucking go there. 0.98

00:01:27.000 Yeah, you don't know anybody there No, you go by yourself and you just fucking hang out see what happens. 0.80

00:01:32.000 Yeah Yeah, and that's usually, like, say I'll go to a place like Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia, for like five days or whatever.

00:01:39.000 For two days, you get a tour guide, just so you can get the history, like this museum, not that one, this temple, not those two, just whatever.

00:01:48.000 And what I always try and do in a place like that is get the tour guide and break them.

00:01:53.000 And I'm like, okay, so tell me about the corruption in your government.

00:01:57.000 Well, sir, we don't have any.

00:01:58.000 Ma'am, I'm going to ask you one more time.

00:02:01.000 And by the afternoon, they finally submit.

00:02:04.000 I'm like, okay.

00:02:06.000 And when I was in Mongolia, the woman, by the end of the day, she said, you know what, I called this guy.

00:02:13.000 He's like this total insurgent rebel guy.

00:02:17.000 He wants to meet you.

00:02:18.000 And I'm going to be the translator because he and his guys are starting movements in this country to overthrow the government and he really wants to meet you.

00:02:27.000 I said, I really want to meet him.

00:02:28.000 Because they're rebelling against the government who's selling out that country for the titanium, the copper, all the mining.

00:02:34.000 I think to some Ivanhoe, some Canadian extractive firm.

00:02:38.000 Anyway, we go like an hour out of town to some spy bar.

00:02:42.000 Where there's like nobody and you walk and everyone's like, you must be on the up and up.

00:02:45.000 And I sit at this table with this guy just because I was able to take the tour guide and be like, tell me everything.

00:02:50.000 And I'll do that for a couple of days and try and get a real understanding of where I am.

00:02:55.000 And then I just leave the hotel or the tent, whatever I'm staying in, with my camera, my backpack, with some water.

00:03:01.000 And I just start walking.

00:03:02.000 I go, well, here's the street.

00:03:04.000 Look at that slum or that village or that souk or that bazaar.

00:03:08.000 And I go.

00:03:09.000 And so far, all ten fingers still work.

00:03:13.000 And I've been to about a hundred countries in all seven continents.

00:03:16.000 And the only times I've almost been killed, which was twice, was America. 0.59

00:03:21.000 By comparison, the rest of the world has been very friendly.

00:03:24.000 Where were the places where you were almost killed in America?

00:03:26.000 In California, a couple of times, nearly stabbed to death, and a guy shot at me and my friend, and he killed my friend but didn't kill me.

00:03:35.000 And so that was real close.

00:03:38.000 You know, that's real.

00:03:40.000 But the rest of the world, by comparison, I was in Pakistan when Bhutto was assassinated.

00:03:46.000 She was killed in Rawalpindi.

00:03:48.000 I was in Islamabad, a few miles down the road.

00:03:50.000 And I was there for a week because the airport shut down.

00:03:53.000 And I went outside every day.

00:03:55.000 And no one...

00:03:56.000 They just asked if I was lost, if I needed help getting back.

00:03:58.000 They thought I was like a journalist or embassy.

00:04:00.000 I went, no, I'm just a traveler.

00:04:02.000 And they said, basically, sorry, you have to see our country in this state.

00:04:06.000 I'm like, no, I don't get to judge.

00:04:08.000 And so I've had...

00:04:11.000 Travel experiences all over the world where I'm met by just amazing generosity and kindness and humility, and it informs kind of how I comport myself.

00:04:20.000 But that's what I try and do.

00:04:22.000 I try to live an eventful life.

00:04:25.000 Like, I work at it.

00:04:26.000 It's not by chance.

00:04:27.000 Like, you give me six weeks off or I know I'm clear, I just whip out my high-res GIF file of the map of the world, and I pick one country and go, okay, then I'll just go east from there.

00:04:37.000 Like China, Mongolia, Bhutan, Tibet, Vietnam, back to LA. And I'll just go do that.

00:04:43.000 I want to get back to this, but what happened with your friend in California?

00:04:46.000 Is this the same sort of a thing where you just wanted to check out a place?

00:04:49.000 No, no, no.

00:04:51.000 We were robbed and the guy started shooting.

00:04:55.000 And the guy killed my friend and shot at me and just missed me very closely.

00:05:02.000 But that was a big turning point in my life.

00:05:04.000 I mean, that changed everything for me.

00:05:06.000 When was that?

00:05:06.000 25 years ago.

00:05:08.000 But, you know, it changes everything that you think about everything.

00:05:11.000 I mean, I think everyone goes through trauma like that in their own way because it taps into everything you've ever done in your life beforehand.

00:05:22.000 But that was, you know...

00:05:24.000 Not to be crass, but that was a game changer.

00:05:27.000 But on the bigger topic of danger, the world is a dangerous place, as you know.

00:05:33.000 But at the same time, I don't think it's to be feared.

00:05:36.000 Because then you don't get anything done.

00:05:38.000 I mean, you live in America.

00:05:39.000 I live in America.

00:05:40.000 We're the roughest room I've ever been in.

00:05:42.000 I mean, we're a coast-to-coast Phillies flyer game.

00:05:44.000 You know, we are blood and teeth on the ice.

00:05:46.000 I mean, we are...

00:05:47.000 Because of freedom.

00:05:48.000 We're very free.

00:05:49.000 And people just, you know, walk up and, you know, smack you.

00:05:52.000 I And I've never been to a country as free as America.

00:05:56.000 I've been to countries that were way more hectic, like don't get caught outside at night, like, you know, downtown Nairobi or, you know, parts of Russia are kind of scary, just because they're living hard.

00:06:07.000 But as far as a place where anything can happen, America is like easily the hairiest place I've ever been day to day.

00:06:14.000 Baghdad was intense.

00:06:14.000 Really?

00:06:15.000 I was in Iraq for a few days.

00:06:17.000 But that wasn't real.

00:06:19.000 I was there on a USO trip, so you're just kind of camping out in the green zone.

00:06:22.000 What initiated this crazy thirst for travel, this wanderlust that you've got?

00:06:28.000 Is this something you've always had?

00:06:29.000 A combination of things.

00:06:31.000 When I was young, I was born and raised in Washington, D.C. And I lived down the road from the National Geographic Museum with a big whale in the front.

00:06:38.000 And the Smithsonian.

00:06:39.000 And whenever there was a snow day, my mom, she worked for the government downtown. 0.68

00:06:43.000 I'd get on the bus with her and we'd go downtown.

00:06:46.000 I'd spend the whole day at the Smithsonian.

00:06:48.000 Dinosaur bones, astronauts, you know, all that kind of stuff.

00:06:51.000 It was fascinating.

00:06:52.000 And my mom would save up her meager pay.

00:06:55.000 And she would save up for years.

00:06:56.000 She was like art nut. 0.99

00:06:57.000 So we'd go hit the museums in Italy, go to the museums in France, go to see all the islands in Greece, go to England, see the National Museum, look at Shakespeare and Chaucer's handwriting.

00:07:07.000 And so by the time I was a little kid, by 11 years old, like fifth grade or thereabouts, I'd been to Greece and Italy and England and different countries.

00:07:17.000 And so I kind of...

00:07:18.000 Wanted more of that and when you grow up with National Geographic magazine you look at the pyramids you look at the sinks and you like I want to see that like that doesn't look real and Then eventually I did go to all those places You know I stood in front of the stinks more than once in the the Great Pyramid in Giza It's bigger than you think it's like you kind of just it hypnotizes you stare at it all day.

00:07:39.000 Have you been recently?

00:07:41.000 I haven't been for a few years.

00:07:42.000 I've been there like three times.

00:07:44.000 I want to go, but I just keep hearing sketchy things about Egypt right now.

00:07:48.000 Yeah, yeah, it is sketchy.

00:07:49.000 It'll always be sketchy.

00:07:50.000 Because their GDP is you showing up and going to the pyramid.

00:07:53.000 It's like Las Vegas, but pyramids.

00:07:55.000 You can see your hotel from the pyramid.

00:07:59.000 They've made a highway that goes from the cluster of hotels.

00:08:02.000 It's like the Giza Highway.

00:08:03.000 Because what do you want to see?

00:08:04.000 The pyramid.

00:08:05.000 And so they take you right there, like seven minutes.

00:08:08.000 You're standing in front of these things.

00:08:09.000 And people are trying to, you know, sell you stuff.

00:08:11.000 I would go without hesitation.

00:08:13.000 You wouldn't have a problem.

00:08:14.000 Well, I need to go.

00:08:16.000 A buddy of mine, this has been on the podcast, his name is John Anthony West, and he's created these incredible DVD series called Magical Egypt.

00:08:25.000 He's an Egyptologist, like one of the most knowledgeable guys I've ever met in my life.

00:08:29.000 I mean, you can spend your whole life just studying one dynasty.

00:08:29.000 Yeah, there's a lot to know.

00:08:32.000 There's so much.

00:08:33.000 Yeah, I'm just a casual fan.

00:08:35.000 Yeah, I was planning on going with him, but unfortunately he was just diagnosed with stage 4 cancer.

00:08:40.000 A lot of you might not know about that.

00:08:42.000 If you do know and you hear about it, you can Google it, but I put a link up before to try to help him.

00:08:47.000 That's sad.

00:08:48.000 Yeah, not good.

00:08:49.000 He's an older gentleman, and he's been...

00:08:51.000 He's been trying to educate people on Egypt for a long time because he's a scholar when it comes to ancient Egypt, and he's one of those people that's actively trying to kind of rewrite the history of Egypt as far as how far back it goes.

00:09:07.000 They've got some pretty rock-solid evidence to point to the idea that Egypt is a civilization that was probably very, very advanced many, many, many thousands of years ago, and then some sort of a natural cataclysmic disaster, probably asteroidal impacts or something like that,

00:09:23.000 around 10,000 years ago, sort of reset society and civilization, and then they rebuilt from there with whatever was remained.

00:09:30.000 That's interesting.

00:09:31.000 I mean, they benefited from having the Nile.

00:09:33.000 Yeah.

00:09:33.000 Because the Nile, you know, the water's rich with nutrients, so agriculture was huge.

00:09:37.000 And people lived good lives.

00:09:39.000 You know, the Nile, it's massive.

00:09:41.000 There's parts of it that are still like a lake.

00:09:44.000 And then when you see it, like in northern Uganda, South Sudan, like right when you cross the border, you go across this river, like, you know, Category 5, whitewater roaring.

00:09:54.000 That's the Nile.

00:09:56.000 Wow.

00:09:56.000 I mean, it has a lot of different...

00:09:58.000 Faces to it now this this wanderlust that you have this like crazy touring thing where you just pick out a spot and go how long you been doing that?

00:10:05.000 I Did conventional you know I used to do a lot of rock and roll and rock and roll will get you all over Europe Japan Australia New Zealand Places like that, but it won't get you to Egypt Morocco Tunisia Mongolia necessarily and so in the 90s,

00:10:22.000 you know I'm like anyone else in this business you do every interview and And they say, you're pretty well-traveled.

00:10:27.000 And I always have to say, well, caveat, I've never been to the African continent.

00:10:31.000 And then one day I went, well, why not?

00:10:34.000 And so I did some research.

00:10:35.000 What do you got to do?

00:10:36.000 You got to go get a bunch of shots.

00:10:38.000 Like a lot of them.

00:10:39.000 Makes you sick for like a whole day.

00:10:41.000 They put so many vaccines into you.

00:10:43.000 And so you go to the travel doctor and you show them what countries you're going to.

00:10:46.000 They go, well, and they just line up syringes.

00:10:48.000 And they got on either side of me and just like just were just Charlie horsing me in both arms.

00:10:53.000 And they said, now you're ready to go.

00:10:55.000 So I just said, well, I'm going to go to Kenya.

00:10:57.000 I'm going to go to Maasai Mara on the Tanzanian border to see giraffes and zebras and lions and all of that, and the Maasai.

00:11:04.000 All of that was great.

00:11:05.000 I went from there to Madagascar.

00:11:08.000 I just said, Madagascar, you better go. 0.95

00:11:10.000 Because I saw it one day.

00:11:11.000 I was on a flight from Melbourne or Sydney to Perth, going across Australia, and I was whipping out the map on the airplane magazine.

00:11:18.000 I said, so there's Madagascar.

00:11:20.000 I did not know.

00:11:21.000 I better go.

00:11:23.000 And it was one of the better trips I ever did.

00:11:25.000 I was at my office one day, near the end of 1997, I think.

00:11:29.000 And I know that Black Sabbath is getting back together with the original lineup to do two shows at the Birmingham NEC in England.

00:11:35.000 So I called Sharon Osbourne. 0.99

00:11:36.000 I said, Sharon, I got this great idea.

00:11:39.000 I fly out and hang out with Black Sabbath and bro down with a band and go to band practice and have a really good time and you put me on the guest list for the shows and I hang out for free and it's like the best time I've ever had knowing she'd hang up on me and she said let me call him and ask him if that's okay because I already knew Ozzy but I didn't know the rest of the guys and she called me later that day she said oh they think it's fine here's the address just let us know when to expect you so I booked it I booked it around my trip to Africa So I went USA,

00:12:08.000 London, bus up to Wales where they were practicing.

00:12:11.000 Taxi, no, no, Ozzy's assistant came and got me.

00:12:14.000 So I hung out with Sabbath at band practice, me and the band in full band rehearsals, the best.

00:12:21.000 Watched the shows, the two reunion shows at the soundboard.

00:12:25.000 And then the next day I flew to Kenya.

00:12:27.000 And so it was just a good, you know, that was a good chunk of travel.

00:12:30.000 And I ended up in South Africa after all of that and said to myself, okay, I'm going to come to Africa once a year.

00:12:38.000 And I just started picking out different chunks of it.

00:12:40.000 And it just started going.

00:12:42.000 And that was 20 years ago.

00:12:43.000 And I've been there, I don't know, like 20 sometimes.

00:12:47.000 Wow.

00:12:48.000 Yeah.

00:12:48.000 And you never don't learn.

00:12:50.000 You know, I call it the big book.

00:12:52.000 It's where you learn about life and death.

00:12:55.000 And, oh, you can learn that anywhere.

00:12:56.000 But you see big stuff.

00:12:58.000 You see people who suffer painfully.

00:13:00.000 People who have no food or water or security.

00:13:03.000 Like you and I, we talk about retirement and life insurance and vacation.

00:13:06.000 A lot of tribes, there's no words or even ideas in their lives.

00:13:11.000 Like, I was hanging out with some Acholi people once in Uganda a few years ago, and I had a translator.

00:13:17.000 It's a Dinka guy who spoke, I guess, whatever Acholi people speak. 1.00

00:13:20.000 And I said, I asked them if they have any words in their language for life insurance, retirement, or vacation.

00:13:25.000 And they understood retirement.

00:13:27.000 You get too old, your kids take care of you.

00:13:28.000 But a vacation, they said, you leave somewhere and you come back?

00:13:32.000 Why would you want to leave your home?

00:13:33.000 It's where all your friends are and your family.

00:13:35.000 Why would you ever do that?

00:13:37.000 Or like life insurance.

00:13:39.000 They're like, what the hell are you talking about?

00:13:41.000 And you start meeting people regularly.

00:13:43.000 Who, their sense of time and space is, I've got a bowl, there's some rice in it, it's like today I got.

00:13:49.000 Tomorrow, we'll see.

00:13:50.000 Where you and I think, okay, in December I'm going to do this.

00:13:53.000 And we really have a realistic expectation of being alive and breathing in December.

00:13:58.000 And in your life you've no doubt thought of, okay, when I retire, or whatever that means to you.

00:14:03.000 Money, some kind of security up the road.

00:14:05.000 There's parts of the world where people live their entire, like, 37 years.

00:14:09.000 And they don't have a day of that kind of security.

00:14:11.000 They got the t-shirt, a stick, and some shade.

00:14:14.000 And I try and...

00:14:16.000 Not as some voyeur.

00:14:18.000 I'm trying to understand the world.

00:14:20.000 And I can understand it by reading some books and seeing some documentaries.

00:14:23.000 But there's nothing like getting out into what Mark Twain called the territory.

00:14:27.000 A phrase I stole from David Lee Roth when he said it to me.

00:14:30.000 And...

00:14:31.000 David Lee was actually a real inspiration to do a lot of traveling.

00:14:34.000 Because one time we were talking, and he'd just come back from open sea kayaking in the Pacific.

00:14:40.000 So I said, so why?

00:14:41.000 He said, Henry, it's because don't get eaten today is a great thing to have on your to-do list every once in a while. 0.98

00:14:48.000 I said, damn, that is profound. 0.96

00:14:50.000 You know what he was doing up until recently? 0.99

00:14:52.000 He moved to Japan, didn't know anybody there, and he was taking kendo lessons.

00:14:56.000 He was learning how to sword fight from a Japanese master.

00:14:58.000 Yep.

00:14:59.000 With his dog.

00:15:00.000 No, no, he told me.

00:15:01.000 He called me one Sunday a while ago.

00:15:03.000 I helped him with his autobiography, so I worked with Dave really closely for many, many months.

00:15:07.000 I met him when I was in Black Flag 30-some years ago.

00:15:10.000 I walked by him at an art gallery, and I went, wait a minute.

00:15:13.000 And he went, Black Flag, right?

00:15:15.000 I'm all like...

00:15:16.000 No way!

00:15:17.000 It's the Van Halen guy.

00:15:18.000 We became buddies.

00:15:19.000 But he called me from Japan and said, you know, he's learning Japanese.

00:15:23.000 He's very smart.

00:15:24.000 And he was, like, learning Japanese and started speaking Japanese.

00:15:27.000 And he's just taking lessons. 1.00

00:15:29.000 You know, he said the sword guy was just, like, every day, just like, you're stupid! 1.00

00:15:33.000 Just, like, just breaking him down. 1.00

00:15:36.000 Yeah, and he just got an apartment there.

00:15:39.000 Rockstar just gets this normal apartment with his dog and just starts taking kendo lessons every day.

00:15:44.000 I think Dave has always had a greater appreciation of that kind of discipline.

00:15:51.000 I mean, he comes up through martial arts since he was a kid.

00:15:54.000 And I think someone else in his family is into it, but he's been that way, that kind of discipline.

00:16:00.000 You can see it on stage.

00:16:01.000 The guy is very physical, but it's coming from a real disciplined, not messing around kind of aggression and control.

00:16:10.000 And Dave really loves Japan.

00:16:13.000 He called me and said, I'm living in a small apartment.

00:16:16.000 I'm taking my language lessons.

00:16:17.000 I'm taking my martial arts stuff.

00:16:20.000 And he was doing sword stuff for quite a long time, though.

00:16:23.000 Yeah, he's always been involved in martial arts, and even the way he sort of approached hedonism, I always felt like it was sort of like an applied approach to hedonism.

00:16:32.000 Like his rock star lifestyle thing, what he was doing, it's almost like, look, not a lot of people get a chance to do this, I'm gonna do it.

00:16:38.000 Yeah, one time he, when we were working on his book, he said, you know, I go home to Pasadena now and then, where, you know, born and raised, and some of his high school buddies see me, like, well, Dave, you know, must be nice, you know, being David Lee Roth.

00:16:50.000 And he said, you know what?

00:16:52.000 On graduation day from high school, we all were on the same starting blocks.

00:16:57.000 You chose the bank job.

00:16:58.000 That's a sure thing. 0.99

00:16:59.000 You're going to die in that cubicle.

00:17:01.000 I choose, and he said, to sail the seas of consequence.

00:17:05.000 I was like, I love it!

00:17:07.000 And I was like, yeah, man, that's daring.

00:17:09.000 And so he won.

00:17:11.000 I mean, like, he's had a pretty good ride, I reckon.

00:17:14.000 And so in my own way, you know, I come from minimum wage work.

00:17:18.000 I'm nobody from nowhere. 0.98

00:17:19.000 And I got into music via punk rock because the band Black Flag said, hey, you're a crazy guy.

00:17:24.000 You want to try out to be our singer?

00:17:25.000 I'm like, what do I have to lose?

00:17:27.000 Yeah.

00:17:27.000 And so I went for that.

00:17:29.000 And it led to everything else and ultimately why I'm here in this room with you today.

00:17:33.000 Do you miss rock?

00:17:35.000 Do you miss touring as a musician?

00:17:37.000 No.

00:17:38.000 No, because I did it.

00:17:39.000 I did it really hard until I had nothing left to give to it.

00:17:43.000 And so now if I went back to it, it would just be repetition.

00:17:47.000 And it might be fun repetition, but it wouldn't be meaningful in that I wouldn't be putting out anything new.

00:17:54.000 And for me, the day I stopped doing music was...

00:17:57.000 I woke up one day and I just sat up and it was like a light bulb went on.

00:18:01.000 I went, wow, I'm out of lyrics.

00:18:03.000 And it wasn't like, oh no.

00:18:05.000 I'm like, okay, well, give me my scroll.

00:18:07.000 I guess I've graduated.

00:18:08.000 When was this?

00:18:10.000 2003 or that.

00:18:12.000 And I just called the manager.

00:18:14.000 I said, hey, I'm done with music.

00:18:17.000 And he saw 15% of that, though, poof.

00:18:19.000 And he's like, no!

00:18:21.000 I went, yeah.

00:18:21.000 He goes, why?

00:18:22.000 I said, because I got nothing new to add.

00:18:24.000 He goes, well, then just go out and do the hits.

00:18:25.000 I'm like, man...

00:18:27.000 It's not what Coltrane would have done.

00:18:28.000 It's not what Miles Davis would have done.

00:18:29.000 I just can't...

00:18:30.000 I don't want to repeat.

00:18:31.000 It's not artistically brave to me.

00:18:34.000 And so I'd much rather just try new things.

00:18:37.000 But thankfully, by that time, I was already doing talking tours all over the world.

00:18:43.000 And they do very well.

00:18:44.000 Tons of acting, voiceover...

00:18:46.000 I had all this other stuff I was doing.

00:18:49.000 Had the book company, record company, music publishing.

00:18:52.000 I had all this other stuff.

00:18:54.000 And so I just kind of let all of that stuff fill in.

00:18:57.000 Put it this way, I'm busier now than ever.

00:19:00.000 And I don't miss the music.

00:19:01.000 I see bands in the airport all the time with like the laminates and their road gear.

00:19:05.000 I'm like, yeah, rumble, young man, rumble.

00:19:07.000 I had my fill.

00:19:08.000 Well, it's beautiful that you did it on your terms.

00:19:11.000 You decided to do it.

00:19:12.000 It wasn't just...

00:19:13.000 It wasn't like...

00:19:14.000 There's a lot of aging rock stars that have that sort of existence where they have to go out and do the hits.

00:19:20.000 Yeah. 0.99

00:19:20.000 And no one wants to hear new shit. 0.99

00:19:22.000 That's a big part of the problem. 1.00

00:19:23.000 Yeah.

00:19:24.000 And so they have to do that weird circle the wagons thing like, we're going to play this album in its entirety.

00:19:29.000 I go to some of those shows.

00:19:29.000 Okay.

00:19:31.000 I, you know, throw my money down and go see that band do that album in its entirety.

00:19:36.000 It's cool.

00:19:37.000 But it's not for me.

00:19:38.000 Well, I've heard The Stones still put on an awesome show.

00:19:41.000 Yeah, they're real. 0.97

00:19:41.000 And I think one of the cool things about it is they're like, wow, Mick Jagger can still fucking do it. 0.97

00:19:46.000 He still apparently works out twice a day.

00:19:46.000 Yeah.

00:19:48.000 Yeah, he's in amazing shape.

00:19:49.000 Always getting in great shape.

00:19:51.000 There's some people, and they're rare, they actually...

00:19:55.000 It's not about money.

00:19:56.000 That's when I really start trusting those old rock stars.

00:19:59.000 Like Rod Stewart.

00:20:00.000 Doesn't need a dime.

00:20:01.000 I mean, that guy can buy four countries right now.

00:20:03.000 He's probably playing tonight in Las Vegas or somewhere.

00:20:06.000 They just really like doing the thing.

00:20:06.000 Elton John.

00:20:09.000 Mick Jagger and Keith Richards. 0.99

00:20:10.000 They'll die on stage.

00:20:10.000 They'll be rock.

00:20:11.000 And it's not money.

00:20:13.000 It's not like, hey, we might get popular.

00:20:14.000 It's like, man, we really want to play brown sugar.

00:20:17.000 I don't.

00:20:18.000 But I admire them.

00:20:20.000 I think it's...

00:20:21.000 What I'm saying is, I think it's real.

00:20:23.000 Yeah.

00:20:23.000 Well, I'm sure it is real.

00:20:24.000 I'm sure it's real with a lot of them.

00:20:24.000 Yeah.

00:20:25.000 But what I like with you, what you're saying is that you had already figured out all these other paths in life that you were enjoying, putting your creative energy in.

00:20:33.000 You just decided, I'll just do those.

00:20:34.000 It was summer 1984. I was 23. I was in Black Flag, and we were touring.

00:20:40.000 We were staying out of California because the Olympics were coming, and we knew the cops would just be looking to smash down any...

00:20:46.000 Supposed ne'er-do-wells. 0.75

00:20:47.000 So we just stayed on tour the whole year pretty much.

00:20:50.000 And I noticed all these great bands around me, very talented people.

00:20:54.000 And we're all broke between tours.

00:20:56.000 We're living like sharks.

00:20:57.000 If we don't tour, we don't eat.

00:20:59.000 And between tours, the guys in that band, they're all waiters. 0.97

00:21:03.000 I'm not putting that down.

00:21:04.000 But the music wasn't keeping you in rent 12 months a year.

00:21:08.000 And I'm not nearly as talented as any of them.

00:21:10.000 So I said, man, if those guys are struggling...

00:21:13.000 Then what am I going to do?

00:21:14.000 I better get plans B, C, D, E, F, and G together.

00:21:17.000 And in those days, I just started my little book publishing company.

00:21:20.000 So I'm going to work harder on writing.

00:21:21.000 I'm going to become much better.

00:21:22.000 Started doing the talking shows.

00:21:24.000 I'm going to get much better at that.

00:21:25.000 And I'm going to start saying yes to things when they come along.

00:21:28.000 A couple of years later, Hollywood started calling, hey, can you act?

00:21:32.000 I'm like, as well as I can sing.

00:21:33.000 Click.

00:21:34.000 But I started, you know, acting.

00:21:36.000 It was Crispin Glover, the actor.

00:21:38.000 One day he said to me, he said, Henry, as a just...

00:21:41.000 Please consider acting.

00:21:43.000 If you get an audition, don't necessarily say no just because you're the music guy.

00:21:48.000 He said, I think you might really like it, and you could probably do it.

00:21:52.000 And so I said, okay.

00:21:53.000 And within a year I was doing film.

00:21:55.000 And then, hey, can you do a voiceover?

00:21:58.000 I'm like, yeah, I got a voice.

00:21:59.000 And so I just started saying yes to more stuff, and that was the plan.

00:22:03.000 Just have more things to do, which is fine, because I don't like sitting around anyway.

00:22:07.000 And then ironically, music ended up being very, very good in all of that for me.

00:22:11.000 But I had plans, other plans.

00:22:15.000 And I've noticed a lot of old geezers around my era, they didn't come up with something else. 0.85

00:22:20.000 And they just, I don't know why.

00:22:22.000 And they didn't make another plan.

00:22:24.000 And they get put into those weird tours where they're, you know, you bring your kid and all of that.

00:22:30.000 And it's more that they gotta more than they wanna.

00:22:34.000 And I'd rather wake up Wanting to do stuff, not having to do stuff.

00:22:38.000 I think, like you were saying a while ago, like less obligation.

00:22:42.000 Just so you clear the deck so you can really do what you want.

00:22:46.000 Because life is short.

00:22:47.000 I mean, last week I was 20 and now I'm 56. I mean, it goes by really fast.

00:22:51.000 It doesn't matter if you're in a cubicle or a prison cell. 0.99

00:22:54.000 Man, you wake up one day, you're like, damn! 0.99

00:22:56.000 That was fast. 0.98

00:22:58.000 And so you might as well make it as much as what you want it to be as possible, because all you're getting is older.

00:23:04.000 I don't understand why people don't fear that.

00:23:07.000 I wake up every day with the Grim Reaper's scythe whistling by my ear going, you better get up, man.

00:23:12.000 And it's all the up I need.

00:23:14.000 I don't ever sleep in.

00:23:17.000 How many hours a night do you get?

00:23:18.000 Between 4 and 5 or 6. That's going to age you quicker.

00:23:23.000 You still like sleeping or you don't like that?

00:23:23.000 I don't like it.

00:23:25.000 No, I love sleeping. 0.99

00:23:27.000 I get up and I'm like, damn, man. 0.99

00:23:29.000 I've got to do stuff. 0.98

00:23:31.000 But doesn't that diminish your energy?

00:23:32.000 Sometimes, yeah.

00:23:33.000 I have those woozy afternoons where I take the seven-minute power naps in my chair at the office.

00:23:39.000 But I just try and, you know, what I have found, if you want to not have to sleep eight hours a day, if you maintain a really good diet, you can shave about an hour of sleep off.

00:23:49.000 You keep your proteins and your carbohydrates lean and stay away from food that's really fun to eat, you know, burgers, french fries, and all that, which is, I'd live on that if I could.

00:23:57.000 But if you keep your diet really together and you keep your workouts up, I have found that you want to not get tired during the day.

00:24:06.000 Work out at 5 in the morning and the rest of the day you're just kind of buzzing.

00:24:10.000 You think you'd face plant onto your desk.

00:24:13.000 Sometimes when I'm really humming, I'm up at 4.30 and I'm in the gym by 4.50, 5 p.m.

00:24:21.000 and I'm just on the bike.

00:24:22.000 5 a.m.

00:24:23.000 you mean?

00:24:23.000 Yeah.

00:24:24.000 Yeah, 4.558.

00:24:25.000 Yeah, you said p.m.

00:24:27.000 Yeah, early in the morning, figuring, you know, oh, by noon I'll just be like dead asleep.

00:24:27.000 Oh, sorry.

00:24:32.000 Uh-uh, man, I'm wired.

00:24:34.000 And to go to sleep at night, like last night, I was kind of wired.

00:24:38.000 So I just started doing, like people have drinking games.

00:24:42.000 I was playing 45s on my record player.

00:24:45.000 So whenever I'd have to flip the 45, I would do a set of push-ups.

00:24:50.000 And so I played a bunch of 45s last night.

00:24:52.000 So I did a bunch of push-ups.

00:24:53.000 And by the time I'm done with the 45s, I felt like I'd been caned by a pro in Singapore.

00:24:58.000 I was so tired, man.

00:24:59.000 So I slept...

00:25:01.000 Dreamlessly last night.

00:25:02.000 That's like a dead man.

00:25:04.000 You wrote a piece a long time ago that I really enjoyed about Powerlifting and it was something along the lines of the iron never lies.

00:25:11.000 Yeah, it doesn't lie.

00:25:11.000 Yeah.

00:25:12.000 Yeah, I love that.

00:25:13.000 Oh, thank you.

00:25:14.000 It was great because it was- People put that in gyms all over the world.

00:25:17.000 It was so, you nailed it because it was so honest and it was just so highlighted what is so beneficial about forcing yourself to do hard work and Yeah, and the fact that you are going, okay, I'd rather not,

00:25:32.000 but here we go.

00:25:34.000 You build that muscle.

00:25:37.000 I'd rather not, but here I go muscle.

00:25:38.000 Yeah, and that's more important than any brawn you're going to have.

00:25:42.000 For me, the workout, I go to the gym to get my head right.

00:25:47.000 The benefit is, you know, you get in good shape.

00:25:51.000 But, like, I just finished a bunch of shows.

00:25:53.000 I did 27 shows in America.

00:25:55.000 I just finished a bunch of shows.

00:25:56.000 I did 27 on, one day off, 27 on.

00:25:58.000 Two and a half hours on stage at night, no notes, talking at a high rate of speed.

00:26:02.000 The only way I got through that was really good diet and three days on, one day off workouts.

00:26:09.000 It was the workouts that alleviated the stress that made the sleep restorative, the muscle tissue absorbed into nutrients, etc., and made the shows good.

00:26:19.000 And so, for me, the workouts, since I was about 15, that's been as much a part of my day as Anything.

00:26:26.000 Just to, otherwise I get, you know, kind of mentally clogged.

00:26:29.000 I get depressed.

00:26:30.000 Now, are you still doing all those, are you still doing powerlifting?

00:26:33.000 No, no, no, no.

00:26:33.000 Oh, hell no.

00:26:34.000 My body left the building on that years ago.

00:26:36.000 When you, when Beavis and Butthead made fun of one of your songs, do you remember that?

00:26:41.000 Hell yeah.

00:26:42.000 The Liar song? 0.99

00:26:43.000 It was fucking great. 0.99

00:26:43.000 Yeah, it made us sell it. 0.99

00:26:44.000 It sold a lot of records.

00:26:45.000 It wasn't the worst thing that ever happened. 0.99

00:26:47.000 But goddamn, dude, your neck was as big as my waist. 0.99

00:26:49.000 You were huge. 1.00

00:26:50.000 It was actually fatter than my ears.

00:26:53.000 Really?

00:26:53.000 Yeah, there's just those muscle groups that just jump up.

00:26:57.000 You know, if you do a lot of shrugs, all of a sudden your traps are like equal to the top of your head.

00:27:02.000 Their muscle groups just blow up.

00:27:04.000 And those, what are those, like the sternomastoid muscle, whatever that big one is on the side of your neck.

00:27:08.000 I just, everything I did seemed to hit that muscle group, the way I like pull up a deadlift or the way you hold a bar during squats.

00:27:16.000 That neck muscle's always doing something to support a lot of weight.

00:27:19.000 And so it just got worked and worked.

00:27:21.000 And that's when the beavis and butt are like, Oh, he's got a big neck.

00:27:24.000 I like that.

00:27:25.000 Yeah.

00:27:26.000 When did you stop doing the...

00:27:28.000 There is right there.

00:27:30.000 Yeah.

00:27:32.000 Yeah, that's 94. We shot that in the desert.

00:27:35.000 We shot that in the Mojave Desert.

00:27:37.000 When did you stop doing the powerlifting?

00:27:38.000 Oh, in the early 2000s, just because I felt problems in my back.

00:27:45.000 And, you know, for squat day, I'm like, you know...

00:27:49.000 I'm belting up.

00:27:50.000 I'm wrapping my knees.

00:27:52.000 I was really going for it.

00:27:53.000 And my frame just can't support my attitude. 0.99

00:27:56.000 And so my attitude is like, I'll lift the whole damn gym. 0.99

00:27:59.000 And I was reminded. 0.98

00:28:00.000 My body went, nah, not really.

00:28:02.000 You're more of a swimmer-runner type.

00:28:04.000 You're not trying to...

00:28:05.000 And so I was lifting a lot for a guy my size and my bone mass.

00:28:12.000 And so at one point my back and shoulders started hurting and like a different kind of pain like you know that you shouldn't be doing this anymore And so the workouts I do now if I can't lift it ten times I just don't I just pull the weight down so I can so a lot of it's you know treadmill elliptical and stationary bike and a lot of pull-ups push-ups and Like you know a lot of compound lifts like you know bench press stuff like that but mainly a lot of pull-ups TRX,

00:28:41.000 the straps, the guy who invented them gave them to me as a gift.

00:28:43.000 Yeah, that's great.

00:28:44.000 I love those.

00:28:45.000 And they're great, because it's just you and your body, and that natural resistance, I have found that makes me a bit more limber.

00:28:52.000 And, I don't know, I don't need to lift everything in the gym.

00:28:55.000 I'm 56. All I can do is blow out that one day and never be able to raise my arm over my head again.

00:29:03.000 You know, because I blow a shoulder out, so I don't need it. 0.99

00:29:05.000 Do you fuck around with yoga at all? 0.99

00:29:07.000 Uh-uh, but I admire it because you see people who do yoga and they're so, not only are they flexible, but you can tell they're really grounded in themselves. 0.99

00:29:15.000 Like they're really, they're coming on with an energy that I don't have.

00:29:20.000 Well, it does something to you.

00:29:22.000 The alleviation of tension, the increasing of range of motion and flexibility, it also does something to your mind.

00:29:28.000 Yeah, that's what I've noticed.

00:29:29.000 And they're grueling classes, like an hour and a half in a hot yoga room.

00:29:33.000 It also does something to your body that's probably related to sauna treatments.

00:29:38.000 Like, they've shown that sauna treatments and heat shock proteins do amazing things to your body to reduce inflammation.

00:29:44.000 And just the...

00:29:47.000 That grueling physical and mental grind of getting through a class.

00:29:52.000 I've heard the hot yoga is brutal.

00:29:54.000 Oh, it's brutal.

00:29:55.000 I've met so many people, as you do, and girls have said, you know, you think you work out hard. 0.50

00:30:00.000 You should come to me on a yoga class.

00:30:02.000 You'll crawl.

00:30:02.000 You won't even make it.

00:30:03.000 Like, they try and challenge me.

00:30:04.000 I'm like, actually, I'm kind of scared of all that.

00:30:07.000 They said, you want to work out?

00:30:09.000 You won't be able to pick up your car keys at the end of it.

00:30:12.000 Well, I'm sure you can pick up your car keys, but it is really brutal while you're doing it.

00:30:17.000 Afterwards, you don't feel the same way you feel like.

00:30:19.000 If you lift weights too hard, you know that feeling where you're like, oh, you can't move your body.

00:30:24.000 You don't really get that.

00:30:25.000 But you do get just fucking to the point where you're looking at the clock and you realize there's 20 minutes to go. 0.67

00:30:31.000 You're like, I don't know if I can do this. 0.87

00:30:32.000 It feels like 20 hours.

00:30:33.000 Yeah, your head is hot.

00:30:34.000 Your body's pouring water.

00:30:36.000 Wow.

00:30:36.000 You can lose five, six pounds in a class easily.

00:30:39.000 Yeah, I've heard that about those spin classes, too.

00:30:41.000 People lose too much weight.

00:30:43.000 They have to stop and go less days a week.

00:30:45.000 Yeah, it makes sense, because you're also on the momentum of the energy of the room.

00:30:48.000 If the instructor's really good, you get hyped up, and you start pushing a little too hard.

00:30:52.000 Yeah, I've never been in any class like that.

00:30:54.000 I'm not the biggest people person.

00:30:57.000 That's why I started working out when I was in high school, because I couldn't throw the ball straight, so the gym was always empty, so I just went in there.

00:31:03.000 But I've never been in hay class.

00:31:05.000 I've never done that.

00:31:06.000 Well, the good thing about yoga class is no one talks.

00:31:08.000 So even though you're around those people, there's no interaction.

00:31:12.000 You kind of feel each other, and it's kind of cool because you push each other a little bit without communicating.

00:31:16.000 But I'm a big fan of it, man.

00:31:18.000 And I think as far as increasing your longevity of your body, the use of your body, it seems to me that what it does is kind of forge all the connections between your joints and your body and your core, and it just makes everything better.

00:31:31.000 I don't have nearly as much back pain as I used to.

00:31:34.000 I'm more flexible than I have been in years.

00:31:37.000 I've been like a year and a half, maybe almost two years.

00:31:39.000 I've been really into it.

00:31:40.000 And how many days a week do you go?

00:31:42.000 I try to do three.

00:31:44.000 I usually wind up one.

00:31:45.000 That's a lot.

00:31:46.000 I usually wind up one or two.

00:31:48.000 But I try for three.

00:31:49.000 When I can get three in, I do it.

00:31:51.000 But between that and all the other different kinds of workouts, what I like to do is I like to wake up and decide what I'm going to do when I wake up.

00:31:59.000 And some days I'm like, I want to go kickbox.

00:32:00.000 I want to go to jiu-jitsu.

00:32:01.000 I want to lift weights.

00:32:02.000 I want to go to yoga.

00:32:03.000 That's cool.

00:32:04.000 Yeah.

00:32:05.000 Like we were talking about before the podcast started, what I'm trying to do with my life at this point, I'm almost 50. I'm 49. I'll be 50 in August.

00:32:13.000 Is to have as few obligations as possible and as much passion and interest as possible.

00:32:18.000 And just sort of pursue the things that I'm really enjoying.

00:32:21.000 That keeps you ageless.

00:32:22.000 I just have met so many people by 23 that are kind of retired.

00:32:28.000 And then you meet some 75-year-old guy who just run rings around you, and it's all in your head and the choices you make.

00:32:34.000 And I've seen both ends of that spectrum, where the old guy is younger than you'll ever be, and the young guy is just so boring and so...

00:32:42.000 He turned into his dad or something. 0.99

00:32:44.000 Like, damn, man, who got to you? 0.99

00:32:45.000 Well, what I take fuel from is things like your podcast with Ari. 0.99

00:32:52.000 Because I was listening to you talk all about...

00:32:56.000 We're good to go.

00:32:58.000 We're good to go.

00:33:16.000 You know, where it goes from the cerebral to the physical.

00:33:20.000 Like, I'm going to write this book.

00:33:21.000 Okay, three years from now, I'm still going to be working on this thing.

00:33:24.000 It's a long journey.

00:33:25.000 So here we go.

00:33:26.000 Or I'm going to get to this country. 0.95

00:33:28.000 Or I'm going to get back to this country and come in through that way. 1.00

00:33:32.000 And you just make these plans.

00:33:33.000 And then months later, boom, there you are.

00:33:35.000 Like, I was in Thailand making a documentary years ago.

00:33:38.000 And I was reading in the Herald Tribune at breakfast one morning, I was in Chiang Mai, that the following year was going to be the 25th anniversary of the Bhopal disaster in Bhopal, India, when Union Carbide India Limited, the methyl isocyanate tank exploded, killed a bunch of people.

00:33:53.000 I said, I'm going.

00:33:54.000 I'm going to be there for the 25th anniversary.

00:33:56.000 So I took an entire year and researched.

00:33:59.000 And I was there for the 25th anniversary.

00:34:01.000 I was in the march.

00:34:02.000 I snuck onto the Union Carbide India Limited site.

00:34:08.000 Panel where tank 610 blew up.

00:34:10.000 I found the switch.

00:34:11.000 I went all the way to where I was standing in front of it with the tag on the thing that says MIC, methyl isocyanate.

00:34:18.000 I think that's it.

00:34:19.000 That was the gas that hit the water and blew up.

00:34:21.000 They're making bug spray there.

00:34:22.000 And so I went all the way to, like, here is where the guy was flicking the switch going, oh no, oh no, the gas scrubbers, the neutralizers aren't working.

00:34:31.000 And I was sneaking around.

00:34:32.000 There's like armed guards.

00:34:33.000 They're not going to shoot you, but they'll tell you, they'll kick you off.

00:34:35.000 And so I just make these decisions, and then ultimately you're booking the tickets, you're booking the hotel, and then one day you are crawling through the weeds, avoiding security guys on their motor scooters with your camera, sneaking in and out of buildings getting your shots.

00:34:51.000 I mean, I love to take these things from like sitting in a coffee place going, Oh!

00:34:56.000 To, like, wow, here I am in Laos, in Zien Quang at the Plain of Jars.

00:35:01.000 It's a place I've always wanted to go to.

00:35:02.000 I saw it in a documentary.

00:35:04.000 And then two years later, I'm at the Plain of Jars.

00:35:07.000 And you're writing about all this stuff, too, right?

00:35:09.000 So this is a thing, you're taking the photographs and you're writing, I assume, blog entries?

00:35:09.000 Oh, yeah, right.

00:35:14.000 Yeah, I write for the LA Weekly once a week.

00:35:16.000 I write for Rolling Stone Australia once a month.

00:35:18.000 And then...

00:35:19.000 I've written about 27 books, and they're in translation.

00:35:22.000 Jesus Christ!

00:35:22.000 Yeah.

00:35:23.000 Well, I own the company, so I sleep with the owner every night.

00:35:27.000 And so a lot of my books are travel.

00:35:29.000 I do like two years of journal at a time, and the middle section's photographs.

00:35:34.000 I'm working on my second photo book.

00:35:35.000 My first one came out, and the second one's going to be pretty cool, because it's all my North Korea shots. 0.99

00:35:40.000 That'll be crazy.

00:35:41.000 Oh, wow.

00:35:42.000 You went to North Korea?

00:35:43.000 Yeah, it took three years to get that visa.

00:35:44.000 A few years ago.

00:35:45.000 It was just sad.

00:35:45.000 Wow.

00:35:46.000 Was it when Kim Jong Il was still alive?

00:35:49.000 It was Kim Jong Il, yeah.

00:35:51.000 The last days of Kim Jong Il before Kim Jong Un.

00:35:54.000 Yeah.

00:35:55.000 Yeah.

00:35:55.000 And it was just, you know, like...

00:35:58.000 When I was in Iran, just like they point you at what you're supposed to look at.

00:36:02.000 Don't look over here.

00:36:03.000 How much time did you spend in North Korea?

00:36:03.000 It's a propaganda.

00:36:05.000 About a week.

00:36:06.000 I was in Pyongyang and the areas around Pyongyang and then I went there via Beijing and then from there up to Mongolia, then over to Bhutan.

00:36:15.000 What was North Korea like?

00:36:16.000 Just sad.

00:36:17.000 You know, just poor people who are scared of their government.

00:36:21.000 And my tour guides, since I went there alone, they were very suspicious of me.

00:36:27.000 They put two tour spies on me.

00:36:30.000 The nice one who talked to me and the mean one who just scowled and took notes.

00:36:34.000 And every day, the guy would ask me basically the same questions like when a detective is trying to peel the layers of onion skin off.

00:36:42.000 So you said you're a businessman.

00:36:44.000 I'm like, yeah.

00:36:46.000 So what do you do?

00:36:47.000 I edit books, which is true.

00:36:49.000 Mine.

00:36:51.000 And it's, really?

00:36:52.000 I said, well, you know, often they're not that good.

00:36:52.000 What are the books about?

00:36:55.000 I was just winging it.

00:36:57.000 And so you're all put in one hotel.

00:37:00.000 You and the Dutch tourists and the Australians. 0.99

00:37:03.000 Everyone's in the one hotel across the bridge that's with men with rifles.

00:37:06.000 You're not going anywhere.

00:37:07.000 And so every day they go on their buses and I get in the car.

00:37:10.000 And the Australians recognize me.

00:37:12.000 The Brits recognize me.

00:37:14.000 And they all want photos.

00:37:15.000 Right.

00:37:15.000 And we're walking to the, whatever that room is, the room where the north and south meet, where they come in through the northern door and the southern door, it's that blue room.

00:37:28.000 The DSJ, I'll come up with, the joint, the JSA, the Joint Security Area, something like that.

00:37:35.000 I pulled one of the Australians to the side. 0.99

00:37:37.000 I said, can you please call your friends off me?

00:37:41.000 Because my tour spy is starting to ask me really weird questions about why people want their photo with me.

00:37:48.000 And if I'm caught being in movies, writing books, rock and roll, I'm going downtown for a meeting that I might not get out of.

00:37:56.000 And so he cooled out all his Australian friends.

00:37:59.000 But then there's this one British guy who just kept getting in my face with the camera. 0.98

00:38:03.000 Because you're all getting taken to the same places.

00:38:05.000 And I'll never forget this.

00:38:06.000 My tour guide, who for the previous three days was like, his English was from school.

00:38:11.000 Like, Henry, he went from that to, how does this guy know you?

00:38:15.000 And all of a sudden his English was as good as mine.

00:38:17.000 I'm like, oh no.

00:38:19.000 And I'm not good at lying.

00:38:20.000 So I said, I met him in the breakfast room.

00:38:22.000 I don't know, maybe he's hot for me.

00:38:23.000 I just tried to explain it away.

00:38:26.000 And I just had to kind of go, I don't know.

00:38:27.000 And I had to try and avoid this guy.

00:38:30.000 And I was really nervous. 0.85

00:38:33.000 The last day I was there, when they finally took me back to the airport in Beijing, I'm like, damn, man, am I really getting on this plane?

00:38:38.000 And when the plane took off, man, I just like, okay, I did that.

00:38:41.000 But why wouldn't you just say, I'm a musician?

00:38:45.000 Because I won't let you in.

00:38:46.000 I went on a tourist visa, and if you claim any of that, you're going to get tons of scrutiny, and they're not going to let you in.

00:38:53.000 They won't let you in if you're an artist?

00:38:55.000 Absolutely.

00:38:55.000 Absolutely not.

00:38:56.000 Because they fear it.

00:38:58.000 They fear what you'll go back to the mainland with.

00:39:00.000 Same thing in Iran.

00:39:01.000 Oh, because you're a public person. 0.99

00:39:02.000 But how the fuck do they let the basketball player? 1.00

00:39:05.000 What the fuck is his name? 1.00

00:39:06.000 Rodman. 1.00

00:39:06.000 Because he towed the party line. 1.00

00:39:09.000 And just told Obama, you know, just call your pal Kim.

00:39:12.000 Sure, that'll work out great.

00:39:13.000 And same thing when I was in, I went to Tehran via Dubai, and the guy who met me at the airport, after the airport people got done grilling me, he said, look, I got your visa.

00:39:25.000 I know who you are.

00:39:26.000 I'm not your tour guide.

00:39:28.000 He's a government guy.

00:39:29.000 Don't tell him what you do for a living.

00:39:31.000 We'll never get you out of here.

00:39:34.000 The last day I'm in that country, I'm eating dinner with this guy and his amazing wife.

00:39:39.000 They're both like rocket scientists.

00:39:41.000 And they get by with a website that gets visas done.

00:39:44.000 So his cousin, her cousin, Anusha, the woman, her cousin calls her and says, your friend Henry's on TV. And Ahmed dropped his fork and said, we've got to go.

00:39:59.000 We have to get you to your hotel.

00:40:01.000 You've got to pack up right now.

00:40:02.000 We just go to the airport, check in, check your luggage, find a corner, put your face in it, and wait for the flight.

00:40:08.000 And I got to the airport like four hours early because he said, you've got to go.

00:40:14.000 Whoa.

00:40:15.000 And so I just sat there in the airport with my face down and then eventually got on like, you know, the 3 a.m.

00:40:20.000 to Dubai and I was out of there. 0.99

00:40:22.000 Holy shit. 1.00

00:40:23.000 Yeah. 1.00

00:40:24.000 What would have happened if you got caught?

00:40:25.000 Questions, which leads to more questions and you just don't know.

00:40:29.000 It turns into like, well, he's been interrogated for the last three months and we don't know.

00:40:34.000 And since I'm not a hot looking girl, President Clinton's not coming to rescue me.

00:40:39.000 And so those are the two countries I've been to where...

00:40:43.000 Don't tell them what you do with what I was instructed before I left.

00:40:46.000 Wow.

00:40:47.000 Yeah.

00:40:48.000 Because anywhere else, you just go and show up.

00:40:50.000 Now, do you go to all these places that you go to, do you pick places where there's high populations of people?

00:40:57.000 Do you ever go to really nomadic places?

00:41:00.000 I tend to choose places where there's...

00:41:03.000 Just been in an election, or there's going to be an election, or there just was a war, where there's conflict, where you see signs of the wrath of globalization, the wrath of global climate change, places that are politically hot.

00:41:15.000 All of these are of great interest to me.

00:41:17.000 During the Bush administration, he said, don't go to this country, this country, this country.

00:41:21.000 I went to all of them.

00:41:22.000 I went to every Axis country they had.

00:41:24.000 And I even went to the ones that Ms. Condoleezza Rice told me not to go to.

00:41:28.000 I went there, too.

00:41:30.000 She told you personally?

00:41:31.000 No, no, no.

00:41:32.000 Don't go to Belarus. 0.98

00:41:33.000 Go to Belarus. 0.74

00:41:34.000 And so I tried to go to all of those places, and I'm fine.

00:41:40.000 I came back in one piece.

00:41:42.000 But in the last few years, I've started doing more eco-travel to learn about biodiversity, codependent ecosystems.

00:41:51.000 So two years ago, summer 2015, I had time off because So I wasn't on tour.

00:41:57.000 And so I went to Easter Island via...

00:42:00.000 I was in Ecuador for a while on the Napo River, which is a tributary of the Amazon, and I went on a science boat.

00:42:07.000 And I just sat with scientists, botanists, bird people, and learned about how the jungle interconnects and how this parasite kills that tree, which fertilizes that tree, and it's really integrated.

00:42:18.000 It's amazing.

00:42:19.000 And they're losing their force because of timber and oil, you know, the big money.

00:42:25.000 And cattle production, too.

00:42:27.000 That I did not know about.

00:42:29.000 But when I was in the interior, and it's all about hardwood and oil, and all those, you know, the Rouhani people, the interior tribes, are just getting discovered.

00:42:40.000 And, you know, their land is getting cleared out.

00:42:43.000 And the government's making a ton of money off cannibalizing their own land. 1.00

00:42:47.000 And in November of 2015, I went to Antarctica.

00:42:53.000 And that's the most substantive trip I've ever made.

00:42:57.000 That was the most mind-blowing trip I've ever done.

00:43:00.000 You go on Deception Island and you look down and there's bits of broken glass from the whale killers.

00:43:07.000 They use that island to process and render whales.

00:43:10.000 So it's like chips of whale bone and all the crappies people left.

00:43:15.000 Tin shacks. 0.99

00:43:17.000 There's like a transmission in the sand from some vehicle.

00:43:20.000 And you see what unregulated slaughter looks like.

00:43:23.000 Where they're just like, hey, let's make a bunch of money.

00:43:24.000 Screw the animals.

00:43:25.000 We'll grow back.

00:43:26.000 And they nearly hunted down the seals and whales, those particular species, to extinction.

00:43:31.000 And so I got on a ship full of scientists, and you take lectures every day, and you walk around amongst the Gentoo and the Chinstrap and the Adelie penguins, and you learn a lot, and it's hard to take, because it's almost destructing in front of you. 0.90

00:43:46.000 Wow.

00:43:47.000 And it's sad, and it's beautiful.

00:43:48.000 It was like being on the moon.

00:43:50.000 I mean, you didn't want to sleep just for looking out the window or walking around with some penguin walking by you.

00:43:55.000 And hopefully November of this year, I'll have some time.

00:43:55.000 It was surreal.

00:43:59.000 So I made friends with the scientists on the ship, and they said, look, obviously you're really into this.

00:44:05.000 You should come back, because we have a longer trip we do that starts in the South Georgian Islands.

00:44:09.000 I went, oh, I'm there.

00:44:10.000 So I'm going to see if I'm not working in November.

00:44:13.000 I don't have my schedule yet.

00:44:15.000 If I'm free, I'm going.

00:44:16.000 And you go down through Argentina, and you leave from there.

00:44:21.000 Oh, wow.

00:44:22.000 So it starts in Antarctica, you work through Argentina.

00:44:24.000 How long is this?

00:44:25.000 Well, you go down.

00:44:26.000 The first time, the one time I went, I went to Buenos Aires down to Ushuaia, which is the southernmost city in the world.

00:44:32.000 And that's where you pick up the ship.

00:44:34.000 And you go through the Drake Passage.

00:44:36.000 And by day four, finally, you start seeing ice.

00:44:39.000 And then you look off and like, whoa, those are penguins.

00:44:42.000 And there you are.

00:44:43.000 But it takes days to get there.

00:44:44.000 Wow.

00:44:45.000 Yeah, and then days to get back.

00:44:47.000 So there's like three days on either end where there's kind of nothing to do but take lectures in the lounge about history and all of that, which I did with my notepad out and questioned the lecturers afterwards and got a ton of information.

00:44:59.000 I keep in touch with them, actually. 0.96

00:45:01.000 What a fucking bizarre and exciting life you're living, man. 0.99

00:45:04.000 I'm trying. 0.99

00:45:04.000 I love it. 0.99

00:45:05.000 You know, knowing I was going to be meeting you, and I must say, you know this, you have a lot of fans, and I wish I had a dollar.

00:45:12.000 For the last few years, so many people have been writing me, saying like, you should be on Joe Rogan's podcast.

00:45:18.000 Or, have you done it yet?

00:45:20.000 And finally, this was like, and I knew who you were.

00:45:20.000 And I missed it.

00:45:23.000 So it wasn't like, who's this Joe Rogan guy?

00:45:24.000 I'm like, enough already!

00:45:26.000 But man, people like you.

00:45:29.000 And I used to You remember that show, UFC Primetime?

00:45:32.000 Yeah.

00:45:32.000 Yeah, I was the voice.

00:45:34.000 I did that voice.

00:45:35.000 So I don't know a lot about sports.

00:45:38.000 But I learned a lot about MMA just because these people, these fighters become relevant to me because I'm saying their names over and over and I'm watching the footage.

00:45:48.000 And, you know, I met BJ Penn.

00:45:49.000 I interviewed him once for the Independent Film Channel.

00:45:52.000 Or, no, for Participant Media, I think it was.

00:45:56.000 Anyway, I started...

00:45:58.000 Be more aware of these fighters and all of this stuff.

00:46:01.000 And then, you know, that's when I saw you.

00:46:03.000 And I was thinking about you the other day, knowing I was going to meet you, thinking, like, here's this guy with this, you know, very interesting life, because I've seen the stand-up on TV. And there he is in the middle of the octagon with, like, you know, some guy who just got finished knocking the crap out of someone.

00:46:21.000 That's a very eclectic life you've got.

00:46:25.000 I'm sure you didn't grow up anything like the rest of your family and all the kids you went to high school with.

00:46:32.000 You went a different way, right?

00:46:34.000 Yeah, obviously.

00:46:35.000 So when did you decide you're not going to be a realtor and your face isn't going to be on the bus bench?

00:46:42.000 Well, I had zero work ethic towards anything that I didn't enjoy, but anything that I did enjoy with, I'd become obsessed with.

00:46:50.000 Yeah, me too.

00:46:50.000 And just, it would occupy all my thoughts, and I couldn't wait to do it 24 hours a day.

00:46:55.000 And then, when I got out of high school, I took a year off before I went to college, and the only reason why I went to college was because I didn't want people thinking I was a loser.

00:47:04.000 I was tired of telling people that I wasn't doing anything, so I went to college.

00:47:08.000 I went to Boston, UMass Boston.

00:47:10.000 The only reason why I went was because I didn't want people thinking I was a loser.

00:47:14.000 And I knew that I could not exist in a regular job.

00:47:17.000 I just didn't have it, whatever it was.

00:47:19.000 Yeah, it's a thing.

00:47:21.000 When you know you don't have it, it's kind of scary.

00:47:24.000 Like, oh no, I'm not going to have a straight life.

00:47:26.000 Oh no, what am I gonna do?

00:47:28.000 It was like it was radioactive.

00:47:29.000 Like, I would take construction jobs and it was like I was being poisoned.

00:47:32.000 You know, it was like, it was like, literally like I was getting radiation from it.

00:47:35.000 Yeah, you feel like you're dying.

00:47:37.000 You're young and you're awake and you're like, I'm dying.

00:47:39.000 This is killing me.

00:47:40.000 I thought I was gonna have a life of those jobs.

00:47:42.000 So I went out of high school, I went one semester at American University in Washington, DC, trying to see if I liked college.

00:47:48.000 I liked learning, I just didn't like, you know, I hated school, so another four years on a student loan.

00:47:54.000 Like one semester, it took me so many years to earn my way out of that debt.

00:47:58.000 And so I just kind of went into the working world going, this is going to be rough.

00:48:03.000 I mean, this is going to hurt. 0.96

00:48:04.000 It's going to be swollen feet and a lot of top ramen noodles and no sleep in my crap apartment, but this is my life. 0.98

00:48:10.000 And I felt like someone was strangling me. 0.95

00:48:13.000 Because I just knew, I didn't know where I was going to go or what I should be doing, but I knew that this wasn't it.

00:48:19.000 Like this was going to kill me.

00:48:20.000 Well I think there's a lot of people out there like that and for some Awful reason they never find whatever it is that can break them free.

00:48:28.000 They never catch a ride on that river out Yeah, you know and I got lucky I found stand-up comedy and I had already I think a lot of it had come from martial arts too I'd fought a lot and then competed a lot in martial arts tournaments and I think that from that I realized that like these Unconventional paths they brought me something that I wasn't getting from regular life.

00:48:52.000 I brought It brought me self-esteem.

00:48:53.000 It gave me this feeling that I wasn't a loser.

00:48:55.000 It was the only thing that I'd ever done my whole life where I said, wow, maybe I'm not a loser.

00:48:59.000 I kind of thought I was an outcast and a loser, and then all of a sudden I was successful at something, only because I was obsessed with it.

00:49:05.000 But then I knew there was no way I was ever going to be able to hold a regular job, and then I got lucky when I was 21 and I found stand-up. 0.79

00:49:13.000 And so from then on, I'd kind of like locked into this thing where I'm just going to do what I like and fuck what everybody says because everybody's giving me advice to do this and advice to do that and it never seems to be what I want to do. 0.53

00:49:25.000 And their advice is coming from a different world. 0.94

00:49:27.000 And they mean well, but they're coming from the whole other value system.

00:49:33.000 And a whole other expectation of their own lives and what your life should be and all of that.

00:49:37.000 And all of it is not poisoned, but it's just kind of anathema to every breath you're taking.

00:49:44.000 And it's ultimately useless.

00:49:46.000 And they're always going to tote that line.

00:49:47.000 That's what they've got.

00:49:48.000 Like, you've got what you've got. 1.00

00:49:49.000 So when you say, here's how I do it, they're like, you're crazy, man. 1.00

00:49:52.000 And then you look at them in that job and you're like, you're the crazy one amongst us. 0.95

00:49:56.000 Because I couldn't handle wearing that tie every day and taking it from that dude.

00:50:00.000 Yeah, and some people, I guess, like the corporate world. 0.99

00:50:03.000 I just, I got lucky and I found a bunch of shit that I like. 0.62

00:50:06.000 And if you had said to me, you know, if you asked me if I was, you know, outside of my life, and if I didn't know that I existed, and you said, do you think it's possible to be a cage-fighting commentator slash stand-up comedian? 0.98

00:50:16.000 I'd be like, no.

00:50:18.000 They don't go together.

00:50:19.000 When you travel...

00:50:20.000 And they say occupation.

00:50:23.000 What do you write?

00:50:24.000 That's a good question.

00:50:26.000 Depends on where I am.

00:50:27.000 Oh no, what do I do?

00:50:27.000 If I'm going somewhere for the UFC, I always write UFC commentator.

00:50:32.000 It's the easiest one to do because then they go, oh yeah, I know you, and then they let me in and it's easy, you know, if you're getting your passport stamped.

00:50:32.000 Okay.

00:50:37.000 But most of the time I write comic, stand-up comedian.

00:50:40.000 Yeah.

00:50:40.000 Okay.

00:50:41.000 Yeah.

00:50:42.000 So that's, if I had like one thing that I definitely do, it's that.

00:50:45.000 Everything else I could kind of quit.

00:50:47.000 And even that I could kind of quit.

00:50:47.000 Right, right.

00:50:49.000 You know, I mean, you could kind of quit everything.

00:50:51.000 Yeah, and sometimes maybe it's maybe a good idea to clear the decks.

00:50:55.000 Citizen of the world.

00:50:55.000 Yeah.

00:50:57.000 Professional citizen of the world.

00:50:57.000 That's what I would say.

00:50:59.000 You know, and also I think...

00:51:02.000 There's a bravery that one takes when one embraces the straight world that I simply don't have.

00:51:08.000 There's a level of guts where you're like, well, I don't really like this job, but I love my family.

00:51:12.000 I'm going to do the right thing.

00:51:14.000 I don't have a family, so I'm not tethered to that value.

00:51:17.000 I admire it, and if I was a dad, I'd be standing up. 0.97

00:51:21.000 But there's a kind of guts where you just get on that bus every day and go like, damn, man, I don't like this job. 0.96

00:51:26.000 And you grimly hold on to your sack lunch and you just go do it.

00:51:30.000 I think like my mom and my dad, I don't know them that well, but they were very hard-working people.

00:51:36.000 And I'm not sure how much they ever really loved their jobs.

00:51:40.000 Like, I can't wait to go to the office!

00:51:42.000 They just kind of went, I'm an adult and this is what you do.

00:51:44.000 And they just kind of put themselves through that grinder and turned the handle themselves.

00:51:50.000 And I think a lot of people all over the world, they just kind of grimly set their jaw and go, I'm an adult.

00:51:57.000 And they go out into it.

00:51:59.000 And you look at a guy like Iggy Pop.

00:52:02.000 You know, who could never have a straight job.

00:52:04.000 It would just be, you know, the thing would fall over.

00:52:05.000 Because he's an artist.

00:52:07.000 He's the real thing.

00:52:08.000 And it's innovation, but it's an intolerance.

00:52:13.000 And it's, for me, just a lack of courage to...

00:52:17.000 To that line, I'm like, man, I just don't have it.

00:52:19.000 I don't have the stamina to go into that building every day for 28 years.

00:52:23.000 Like, my dad went to one building for his whole life with one corporation he worked for, and then he stopped. 0.70

00:52:29.000 I don't even know if he's alive or dead, but he was that guy in that building every damn day.

00:52:34.000 Like, hours and hours.

00:52:36.000 There is a dance that when you discuss these things like you don't want to disparage anybody that it genuinely has Shown courage and grinding it out because for their family does take courage.

00:52:45.000 I just don't have it I'm saying I consider them People in the real world and in my life.

00:52:52.000 I don't think I really live in the real world that much I live in my self-invented Henry world right and I saw this video with Lady Gaga I don't know much about her music, but she did this long intro, the $80 million thing.

00:53:06.000 And she said, she was like, reality, I hate reality.

00:53:09.000 I was like, I, there you go.

00:53:11.000 I just can't handle a lot of it.

00:53:13.000 And I don't shy away from it.

00:53:14.000 I go into situations that are hyper real.

00:53:17.000 But that kind of flatline existence that a lot of we adults engage in, I think that would have destroyed me.

00:53:26.000 I would have found alcohol or something really destructive.

00:53:29.000 Yeah, it's a droning, resonating existence.

00:53:33.000 Yeah, and some people go, hey, suck it up, and you'll get in there, and it's not that bad.

00:53:39.000 Cheer up.

00:53:40.000 And it's not that bad.

00:53:42.000 I just don't want it.

00:53:44.000 I don't want it.

00:53:45.000 I don't want it.

00:53:46.000 But people are malleable.

00:53:47.000 Some people can get through it.

00:53:48.000 Yeah, they have...

00:53:50.000 They just have a different mind. 0.85

00:53:52.000 But if you had a friend that was doing that, but you know that friend really wanted to be a novelist, wouldn't you just fucking go, dude, please, just try it. 0.70

00:54:01.000 Just write a book in your spare time. 0.93

00:54:03.000 Get out of there.

00:54:04.000 But the thing is, you've said that to him or her before.

00:54:06.000 Right.

00:54:07.000 And these people write me, hey, man, my band is pretty good.

00:54:10.000 I'm two years into college.

00:54:12.000 Should I quit college and take my band on the road and...

00:54:16.000 The truth is, if that person really had the thing, they wouldn't be writing me.

00:54:21.000 They would just be telling me when they were playing.

00:54:23.000 I never asked for advice.

00:54:25.000 I just said, either I'm going to play this music or I'm going to die trying.

00:54:30.000 It never occurred to me that there was...

00:54:32.000 Ask advice about what?

00:54:34.000 And so I never had any fear.

00:54:37.000 I ran at it, and I didn't care if there was a wall there or the cops.

00:54:40.000 I just ran.

00:54:41.000 But surely you must have had heroes that did it also before you, so you felt like there was a path.

00:54:47.000 Well, definitely not like you did it, but a lot of rock stars, a lot of bands, a lot of musicians, a lot of artists, they pursued their goals, they went out and chased things, and you knew that it was a path.

00:54:47.000 No.

00:54:47.000 Not like I did it.

00:54:57.000 The ones I had met before I was doing music full-time were all broke.

00:55:01.000 Like I met some punk rock bands like from England, you know, like whoever.

00:55:05.000 And you're like, yeah, you're broke too.

00:55:08.000 And they're just crazy people, and I identified with that.

00:55:12.000 But sometimes, have you ever done a show where you meet that actor who...

00:55:20.000 Has had like 80 years of acting class and all they talk about is their acting coach.

00:55:25.000 And after I get off the set today, I'm going to go back to my class.

00:55:28.000 And all they do is take classes.

00:55:30.000 You're like, man, if all you're going to do is ever take classes, the rubber's never going to hit the road because you're always in the...

00:55:37.000 On pause with the acting.

00:55:39.000 Some days you just gotta go like, I'm doing this.

00:55:42.000 And like, that's me.

00:55:43.000 And if it doesn't work, man, it's really gonna hurt.

00:55:46.000 So, here we go.

00:55:48.000 Like with music, I never was like, are we gonna make it?

00:55:50.000 Make what?

00:55:51.000 I'm just trying to do a good show.

00:55:52.000 I never thought...

00:55:53.000 I would ever make money doing music.

00:55:54.000 I never thought I'd ever be able to pay my rent.

00:55:57.000 I just reconciled my life to a life of fighting, bad tasting food, and sleeping, you know, next to the drum roost snort all night in the back of the van hoping the bass, the bass player, the guitar player didn't drive us into a tree because we didn't have a driver.

00:56:10.000 It is what it is.

00:56:11.000 It's independent music.

00:56:12.000 And you just crawl through these tours.

00:56:14.000 It makes you pretty tough. 0.93

00:56:15.000 You're like a junkyard dog. 0.79

00:56:17.000 But I never thought it would ever change. 0.97

00:56:19.000 I just figured this is your life and eventually, you know, The guy hits you with something and you die in the hospital.

00:56:24.000 I was not a fatalist, but I'm like, this is it.

00:56:28.000 And I never saw past that.

00:56:30.000 And then in the 80s, the band got bigger or whatever.

00:56:35.000 But I've always run at things going, well, this is it or die.

00:56:40.000 I never thought there was any wiggle room or any cushion or much alternative.

00:56:44.000 I'm not that resourceful.

00:56:45.000 I'm just kind of crazy enough to run at it.

00:56:49.000 And by running really hard, I've gotten through it.

00:56:51.000 But it's not because I'm smart or good looking.

00:56:53.000 It's just because...

00:56:55.000 As Richard Gere once said, I've got nowhere else to go.

00:56:58.000 And that has really helped me.

00:56:59.000 Well, I'm going to get through this tour because I've got nothing else going on.

00:57:02.000 I'll stay in this band because I've got nowhere else to go but be in this incredibly hard-to-be-in band.

00:57:08.000 And that's been very helpful to me.

00:57:11.000 Like, this really hurts.

00:57:12.000 Well, it's better than the pain at standing with the apron behind the counter.

00:57:16.000 That was a different kind of pain.

00:57:18.000 Yeah, but you've managed to transcend that, obviously.

00:57:21.000 You've managed to find this very unique path in life where you're doing all these different things.

00:57:27.000 You're no longer in a band anymore, and now you're this worldwide traveler slash performance artist where you're doing these spoken word things.

00:57:35.000 They're really funny.

00:57:37.000 It's kind of like stand-up.

00:57:38.000 There's a lot of comedy, isn't it?

00:57:39.000 Yeah, I had bought a couple of your CDs way back in the day.

00:57:43.000 It was like in the 90s, because I had thought it was music.

00:57:46.000 Right.

00:57:47.000 And I saw that you were, and then I was like, a spoken word? 0.99

00:57:49.000 Like, what the fuck is this? 0.98

00:57:51.000 And then I listened, I was like, this is kind of like stand-up, but in a freer form. 0.99

00:57:55.000 Yeah, more anecdotal.

00:57:56.000 Yeah.

00:57:57.000 Now, when did you start doing that?

00:58:00.000 Many, many years ago, in 1983, there was a local promoter in Hollywood, and he would take like 20 people, give everyone five minutes.

00:58:08.000 And it'd be the singer in the gun club, the guy from the Minutemen, the guy from this band, the girl from that band.

00:58:13.000 And I would go to these shows, because even when it was bad, it was great.

00:58:16.000 And everyone was cheering.

00:58:17.000 You know all these people. 0.93

00:58:18.000 So if it sucked, you'd applaud even harder. 0.70

00:58:21.000 Black Flag's bass player.

00:58:23.000 Would be on these gigs.

00:58:24.000 And he'd go up and, you know, read from his notebook.

00:58:26.000 He has an amazing intellect.

00:58:27.000 And I would always go hang out with him.

00:58:29.000 And one night the promoter said, you got a big mouth.

00:58:32.000 Let's get you up there next week.

00:58:33.000 And I go, you know, what am I going to do?

00:58:35.000 He said, like, you know, 10 minutes, 10 bucks or whatever it was.

00:58:38.000 I said, man, I'll take that money.

00:58:40.000 And the next week I got up there and I read something that I had written and told a story about what had happened at band practice the day before when a white supremacist tried to run over our guitar player with his car.

00:58:50.000 And the audience was like, ah!

00:58:52.000 I go, yep, that was Tuesday in the Life of Black Flag. 0.60

00:58:54.000 Well, my time is up.

00:58:55.000 I gotta go.

00:58:55.000 And so I walked off stage, big applause, and everyone came up to me and said, when's your next show?

00:59:00.000 I said, well, I'm going on tour.

00:59:02.000 I thought they meant the band.

00:59:03.000 They went, no, no, just the next show where you just talk.

00:59:05.000 I go, well, I got this $10 bill.

00:59:07.000 That was it.

00:59:08.000 And the promoter said, you're really good at that.

00:59:10.000 You're a natural.

00:59:11.000 How about you open for two of my poets next week?

00:59:14.000 We'll give you 15 minutes.

00:59:15.000 And a few times around with that, those poets are opening for me, which they didn't like.

00:59:20.000 And by 1985, I had done a cross-country tour and, you know, 12 to 15 people a night.

00:59:26.000 And they called it Spoken Word, which I thought, there's a way to starvation.

00:59:30.000 I was like, I don't want to go see a gig that says Spoken Word, the Snore Fest.

00:59:33.000 So I've always just called it a talking show.

00:59:35.000 So I would read things and anecdote between pages.

00:59:39.000 And then one day, I just stopped bringing the things to read on stage and said, look, here's what happened when I was in Holland.

00:59:45.000 And I just tell stories.

00:59:48.000 And by the late 80s, I was doing the entire continent of Europe, Scandinavia, Australia, New Zealand, and it went on and on.

00:59:58.000 We're the last tours, 19 countries and 165 shows.

01:00:02.000 That's what I came back from last week.

01:00:04.000 It traveled like comedy.

01:00:04.000 Wow!

01:00:06.000 It's like me and a microphone.

01:00:08.000 But it's more general admission theaters.

01:00:10.000 But every once in a while, I'll do like the Melbourne Comedy Festival, the Sydney Comedy Festival, or like three nights of comedy, and I'm like doing an hour on one of those nights.

01:00:19.000 I did a comedy club on this last tour.

01:00:21.000 There was a night off or doing a thing at like the Laugh Bucket or one of those places.

01:00:26.000 And, you know, the PA is like bolted into the wall.

01:00:29.000 There's no monitors.

01:00:29.000 There's one light.

01:00:31.000 And me and my big tour bus out front.

01:00:34.000 It's like right next to the strip bar.

01:00:35.000 And I went in there and I went, okay.

01:00:37.000 All those little 8x10 frame photos on the walls.

01:00:40.000 I don't go into places like this.

01:00:41.000 It's not below me.

01:00:42.000 It's just not my world.

01:00:44.000 Sold the place out.

01:00:45.000 The audience couldn't have been nicer.

01:00:46.000 And the owner thanked me.

01:00:48.000 And I said, man, if I'm ever back in this part of Illinois, I'll do this venue again.

01:00:52.000 And he said, we'll be here.

01:00:55.000 And it was a really good time.

01:00:56.000 And so a lot of what I do kind of lends itself to comedy in that life plus time.

01:01:01.000 Most of the time is funny.

01:01:02.000 And comedy, I don't try and I don't write material really.

01:01:08.000 But I just basically report on that which is funny.

01:01:13.000 And many things occur to me. 0.93

01:01:16.000 Either ultimately or eventually to be funny like almost anything then obviously some things are never going to be funny, but Most things are like I don't know which way your politics lean that much But you can look at the president administration go like ie we're all you know going down the drain or you can go man This is the lowest hanging fruit This dude has just jumped up on a table onto the silver platter with his ass in the air and an apple already in his mouth.

01:01:42.000 Like, this is gonna be great.

01:01:44.000 Like, he's serving himself.

01:01:45.000 He's jumped into my lap.

01:01:46.000 This is great!

01:01:48.000 And so there's different ways of looking at all of this.

01:01:51.000 And I guess comedians just look at things differently.

01:01:54.000 I've met many of them.

01:01:55.000 I'm not one.

01:01:57.000 But there's a lot of comedy, or at least humorous moments that inform what I do on stage, which allows me to go for a long time on stage, because if it had no humor in it, it would be stultifyingly boring, for me and for the audience.

01:02:09.000 In a lot of ways, when an administration is really fucked up, Comics do take joy in it because they know, like during the Bush administration, there was eight years of gold. 0.88

01:02:18.000 And Trump is that times five or ten. 0.95

01:02:23.000 But it's also when you find that goldmine of humor, it also equates on the other end to a disastrous time for the country.

01:02:33.000 Yeah.

01:02:34.000 And that's where it gets scary.

01:02:35.000 Environmentally, it's getting scary.

01:02:37.000 There's a proposal now to get rid of public lands and to make public lands private and start tapping into them and sucking out the resources and ruin all these places that people go and hunt and fish and hike.

01:02:51.000 You know, I think it's a really beautiful thing, what they call the commons in this country, where you can go to the park.

01:02:57.000 And I don't know if you ever spent time in parks.

01:02:59.000 There's a decency that you'll often find where, like, the family picks up the garbage.

01:03:04.000 And you'll even see the little kid picking up the cup.

01:03:06.000 Because it's our park.

01:03:07.000 And I'm not Mr. Kumbaya, necessarily, but I love that idea.

01:03:11.000 Like, don't screw this up, man.

01:03:12.000 It's yours and mine. 0.85

01:03:13.000 And while we're here, let's cut the crap and be really cool to each other and really appreciate these trees. 0.78

01:03:20.000 So I grew up in Washington, D.C., and you've been there. 0.98

01:03:23.000 It's a small town dropped into a park.

01:03:26.000 Everywhere you go, you run into a deciduous tree.

01:03:29.000 Right.

01:03:29.000 And it's Rock Creek Park with a White House near it.

01:03:31.000 I mean, it's just park, park, park.

01:03:33.000 And so I grew up every day.

01:03:34.000 I'm outside looking at bats and finding toads and like outside of my apartment is a park.

01:03:41.000 And I was outside all the time, and I really came to love that ethic of, this is ours.

01:03:46.000 Like when you're on the subways in Russia, there's no garbage.

01:03:49.000 They really take pride in their subways.

01:03:50.000 They're beautiful.

01:03:51.000 And it's our subway.

01:03:52.000 Don't litter.

01:03:53.000 And I think there's a rectitude and a moral decency that we Americans skew towards when we're in these places that we're all somewhat responsible for. 0.96

01:04:04.000 And to take that away, when everything becomes me, mine, I drew the line, you step over it, I kill you, all that stuff.

01:04:09.000 It doesn't bring out the best in us.

01:04:11.000 And I think those public lands are really part of what keeps us from, you know, going crazy.

01:04:20.000 And to see them be, you know, because you know there's people like Trump who look at Central Park and go, what a waste.

01:04:26.000 What a waste of land.

01:04:27.000 I could put nine hotels, four casinos, and a theme park in there.

01:04:31.000 Well, Teddy Roosevelt and a lot of the people that established the national park system in this country many, many years ago, they had an incredible vision.

01:04:39.000 They realized that we have this amazing landscape, and they decided to preserve it and put it in the trust of the public, make it a public thing where anyone can go.

01:04:50.000 Anyone can go and hike.

01:04:51.000 Anyone can go and camp.

01:04:52.000 Yeah, it's a beautiful thing.

01:04:53.000 It's amazing, and it doesn't exist anywhere else.

01:04:55.000 It's a really, really rare resource that we have here in America.

01:04:58.000 And right now, during this administration, we're in danger of losing that.

01:05:02.000 It's very scary.

01:05:03.000 You know, I'm not one who gets up every day with a hate list of people.

01:05:08.000 And I don't think Donald Trump wakes up every day going, how can I screw a bunch of people?

01:05:12.000 I really don't think that's on his menu.

01:05:14.000 But I do think he's a businessman who's looking to make deals.

01:05:18.000 The tell for me was when the president said, if Vladimir Putin agrees to help us in the fight against ISIS, I'll consider lifting those sanctions.

01:05:28.000 It's not, you know, we'll make a deal.

01:05:30.000 He does that, I'll do this.

01:05:30.000 We'll get that, he gets that.

01:05:32.000 That's a deal.

01:05:32.000 He's a dealmaker.

01:05:33.000 That's not really a deal.

01:05:35.000 In global affairs, necessarily all the time, especially not with that guy on that particular issue.

01:05:43.000 And I think he's kind of tone deaf to some of the more nuanced things that it takes to...

01:05:52.000 Yeah.

01:06:10.000 Yeah.

01:06:11.000 Or even like, I grew up, you know, a shy kid who didn't play well with others.

01:06:15.000 So I would go to the library all the time.

01:06:17.000 So I had that library card.

01:06:18.000 And I go, I can take this book home?

01:06:20.000 Well, yeah, you got to take care of it.

01:06:21.000 Okay.

01:06:22.000 And I'd read the book and take it back.

01:06:23.000 All those Alfred Hitchcock, you know, stories for kids or whatever.

01:06:27.000 I read all that stuff.

01:06:28.000 And the library was a big deal for me because I felt like an adult.

01:06:31.000 I have my card.

01:06:32.000 I can walk into this massive library.

01:06:34.000 Interesting, smelling, cool building.

01:06:37.000 And it's mine.

01:06:38.000 The whole thing is mine.

01:06:39.000 I couldn't believe the freedom I had in there.

01:06:41.000 These ancient seats and the place smelled of books.

01:06:44.000 And it was mine.

01:06:46.000 I never got my head... 0.83

01:06:47.000 It was never not amazing to me to walk into the library and go, like, any damn book I want, I can walk into any section and no one's going, hey, kid, get out of here.

01:06:55.000 And that's what you get in a park.

01:06:55.000 Right.

01:06:58.000 And when you're in New York, there's a lot of that.

01:07:00.000 They're like, look, it's our sidewalk.

01:07:01.000 It's our subway.

01:07:02.000 Be cool, man.

01:07:04.000 And there's an inherent...

01:07:05.000 A lot of people fear New York if they've never spent time there.

01:07:08.000 And there's an inherent decency amongst New Yorkers because you are so smashed together.

01:07:14.000 You're going to make human contact.

01:07:16.000 Right.

01:07:16.000 You're going to bump into someone.

01:07:17.000 It is what it is.

01:07:18.000 So you better bring some humor and a little bit of like, hey, it's okay.

01:07:21.000 And I see that in New Yorkers, this really great greatness.

01:07:27.000 And when you make us cheap and petty and we turn into some Twilight Zone episode, that is what I fear in this country is us kind of cheating ourselves out of how great we are when you don't scare the crap out of us all the time.

01:07:41.000 Yeah, well, I mean Trump is just such a polarizing figure.

01:07:44.000 I hope that it unites us in a lot of ways so that we realize how good we have it and we realize what really is important and that having this guy who so many people are opposed to and having these policies that so many people are opposed to, even if you're not opposed to him.

01:08:00.000 I know a lot of people that supported him that are now looking at some of these policies, particularly the public land policy, and they're kind of freaking out.

01:08:07.000 I think a lot of that is going to unite folks, and it's going to make people understand what is important.

01:08:12.000 Like that gigantic women's march the other day. 0.99

01:08:14.000 That was impressive.

01:08:15.000 Incredibly impressive.

01:08:16.000 I mean, who saw that coming?

01:08:17.000 Right.

01:08:18.000 Out of nowhere.

01:08:18.000 I mean, one statement that he makes, goofing around with a guy, that Billy Bush character, on a bus, Yeah.

01:08:35.000 Yeah.

01:08:44.000 Shifts the world's markets.

01:08:46.000 I mean, and I think other presidents have rocked that responsibility far more gracefully.

01:08:52.000 Even presidents I don't necessarily agree with, they really understood the awesome weight of that job, and they really kind of feared it and tried their best.

01:09:01.000 Even presidents whose policies I disagree with, I think they really got the magnitude.

01:09:06.000 When you think about your life, you know, you have this wanderlust and this passion for exploring new environments and learning about new cultures and, you know, and we're also talking about just the fucking great pull of death because it is there and it's always to be considered.

01:09:21.000 When you're looking at a guy like that who's older than us, he's 70-something years old, right? 0.99

01:09:26.000 And that fucking life is a meat grinder. 0.99

01:09:30.000 That job is the greatest aging job we've ever seen. 1.00

01:09:35.000 It destroys people.

01:09:35.000 We've seen people go in and they...

01:09:37.000 I mean, you see the Barack Obama before and after pictures.

01:09:41.000 It's crazy.

01:09:42.000 So what is going to happen to Trump? 1.00

01:09:45.000 I mean, he's a fucking old man already. 1.00

01:09:46.000 With a bad diet. 1.00

01:09:47.000 And why?

01:09:49.000 Like, what is... 0.83

01:09:50.000 When you have $4 billion or whatever the fuck he has, when you have your name on all these buildings all over the world, like, what is the motivation to continue? 0.91

01:09:58.000 That's what I've... 0.98

01:10:00.000 I've always wondered with the Koch brothers, the two angriest men in America, and the tyranny of Obama, they'd always opine about, like, dude, you've got $34 billion. 0.91

01:10:09.000 You can have me killed right now and all the pizza you want.

01:10:12.000 And why are we so angry again? 1.00

01:10:16.000 Where's the tyranny in your life?

01:10:18.000 $34 billion? 1.00

01:10:20.000 Shut up! 1.00

01:10:22.000 And I think with some people... 0.98

01:10:23.000 I did a movie many years ago, one of the first ones I was ever in with a very big movie star, and someone told me how much he makes in a year.

01:10:31.000 And I went, that's...

01:10:32.000 wow!

01:10:33.000 And why does he...

01:10:36.000 What's up with that?

01:10:37.000 He said, well, all his friends have $100 million, and so he wants to catch up.

01:10:41.000 I said, but after the first 50, it's like going out in the rain while you're soaking wet, going, ow, it's raining.

01:10:46.000 Like, pal, you're already wet.

01:10:47.000 Like, what do you do with the other $80 billion?

01:10:50.000 Like, what is it?

01:10:52.000 And I think with some people, it's maybe coming from some gnawing insecurity, and nothing's ever big enough.

01:10:59.000 Like, you've been around famous people.

01:11:01.000 I've met a number of big actors, or Big rock stars.

01:11:06.000 And the bigger the rock star, just my experience, the bigger the rock star, the more humble and cool they are, the more...

01:11:15.000 They love music, and they're humble in front of it, and they ask what you're doing.

01:11:19.000 I've been lucky.

01:11:21.000 I've met a lot of my rock heroes, and they're just really hoping...

01:11:25.000 When I met George Carlin once, I'd just done the Beacon Theater, and he was about to go do one of his HBO specials there.

01:11:31.000 And he said, did people get the jokes?

01:11:33.000 I said, what do you mean?

01:11:35.000 He's like, did people understand you when you were on stage?

01:11:37.000 Do you think it'll be okay?

01:11:39.000 I was like, you're asking me if your show will be okay?

01:11:43.000 You're George frickin' Carlin, man.

01:11:45.000 I mean, like, are you kidding?

01:11:46.000 And to see that kind of, not insecurity, but that kind of like, hey, did it go okay?

01:11:52.000 Because I've got to go there next.

01:11:53.000 Yikes! 1.00

01:11:54.000 Like, you're George Carlin!

01:11:55.000 You walk on water!

01:11:56.000 But the fact that he was still wanting it to be okay, that he didn't think, I've got this on George Carlin. 0.98

01:12:02.000 I was like, damn, he's still open. 0.98

01:12:04.000 He's still knowing that he could go south. 0.99

01:12:06.000 He might have a stinking night while the cameras are on.

01:12:09.000 And he still fears having a bad show.

01:12:12.000 It means so much to him.

01:12:13.000 And I think if you're in that mode, you can greet the day better.

01:12:18.000 But when you look at things like, well, I don't have as much as he has, or some guy made a nasty tweet about me, and I'm going to get on Twitter and answer back, oh no.

01:12:27.000 And I'm the president.

01:12:29.000 The point I'm making is nothing satiates that thirst.

01:12:35.000 Like, he's in the top executive slot and he's still probably grumbling about something.

01:12:40.000 Or just wanted to win.

01:12:43.000 And now that he's got it, when he did his acceptance speech, I was in Washington on the night of the election on stage at the Lincoln Theater. 0.91

01:12:49.000 I watched the whole damn thing until five in the morning when he made his acceptance speech. 0.75

01:12:53.000 And the look on his face, on Mr. Trump's face, was... 0.99

01:12:57.000 Wow, I've just sawed off a big chunk of meat for myself.

01:13:00.000 Oh, no.

01:13:02.000 It wasn't joy.

01:13:03.000 It was like, now I got to go to all those meetings. 1.00

01:13:05.000 Oh, damn. 1.00

01:13:06.000 This is a big dog I just bought. 0.99

01:13:07.000 This is a lot, a lot of, you know, a big deal.

01:13:11.000 And I just, I think one of the ways he'll escape the stress of it is I think he'll put it off on other people.

01:13:17.000 He'll delegate.

01:13:18.000 Mike Pence will be, it'll be President Pence.

01:13:21.000 And, you know, the other guy just looking good for the cameras.

01:13:24.000 And so I think that's how he'll get through it, because it destroyed Bush.

01:13:27.000 Eight years of the presidency took Bush, who was a very handsome man when he walked into office.

01:13:31.000 He came out of there destroyed.

01:13:32.000 And he was far younger, right?

01:13:33.000 How old was Bush when he was in his 50s when he got into office?

01:13:36.000 Late 40s, I think.

01:13:38.000 A little older than Mr. Obama.

01:13:40.000 And Obama, too.

01:13:41.000 Hair went gray.

01:13:42.000 He just got skinnier somehow.

01:13:44.000 They just get so tired.

01:13:46.000 Just because you don't get...

01:13:47.000 I was saying this on stage the other night.

01:13:49.000 The presidents don't get that three in the morning phone call.

01:13:52.000 Mr. President in Maine, the cat that was in the tree, the fire department got the cat down.

01:13:58.000 The cat's fine.

01:13:58.000 God bless you.

01:13:59.000 God bless the United States of America.

01:14:01.000 They come down to the Situation Room and look at the high-resolution video footage of the girls' intestines sailing through the air for the drone strike that zigged when it should have zagged.

01:14:09.000 They get bad news, and they make gut-wrenching decisions where they're like, yep, we're going in, and all those people are going to die.

01:14:17.000 Every president makes those decisions, and it's a job you couldn't pay me enough.

01:14:23.000 I wouldn't want a day of it.

01:14:25.000 And I think you either have to be either a nut or truly think, I've got this.

01:14:31.000 I'm neither.

01:14:32.000 And so I'm not that kind of megalomaniac, and I just don't ever think I got it.

01:14:37.000 And I don't know what Trump is going to do with a job that has not...

01:14:42.000 You see the last days of Johnson, and he didn't even serve two terms.

01:14:46.000 The Vietnam War destroyed Johnson.

01:14:49.000 His face was falling off his skull.

01:14:51.000 There was those sad shots of him and McNamara in the Situation Room.

01:14:54.000 His hand is on his cheek, and his face is falling down his chest.

01:15:00.000 Because every one of those deaths, I think, really aggrieved the president.

01:15:03.000 He's an interesting president.

01:15:05.000 The more you read about him, the more interesting he becomes.

01:15:07.000 But I think it's a job that fairly destroys.

01:15:11.000 The only one it didn't seem to really destroy was Clinton.

01:15:14.000 I don't know why he seemed to kind of walk out of there like, you know, hey! 1.00

01:15:18.000 Yeah, but he looks like shit now. 0.99

01:15:20.000 I mean, he's paid for it now. 0.99

01:15:22.000 Yeah, but the last few presidents, it's damn stressful.

01:15:27.000 Being, running this country, because we're so free.

01:15:31.000 I mean, you've traveled.

01:15:32.000 No country in the world enjoys our level of freedom, not our kind of freedom.

01:15:36.000 Like even Germany, England, where, you know, it's the Western world, it's free.

01:15:40.000 Nah, it's not nearly as free as this.

01:15:42.000 And we're so free to try and tell us what to do.

01:15:46.000 You don't tell an American what to do.

01:15:47.000 And sadly...

01:15:49.000 The president is part of the federal government, and so the states are already pissed off at you.

01:15:54.000 And any president, you know, you get bucketed.

01:15:56.000 You went on vacation?

01:15:57.000 How dare you go on vacation?

01:15:57.000 Well, it's Christmas.

01:16:00.000 I went to my mom and said, oh, you've seen your mom now?

01:16:02.000 I mean, there's nothing a president can do where half the country doesn't get mad.

01:16:06.000 And we'll see how our new president takes it.

01:16:09.000 I want him to be successful, because I want every boat in America to be lifted by the tide.

01:16:14.000 I want good for people I disagree with, people I agree.

01:16:16.000 I'm not that guy who wants...

01:16:17.000 I feel the same.

01:16:18.000 Yeah, I don't want...

01:16:18.000 You know, some state to go into the toilet because they don't read good or something.

01:16:22.000 That's not how I want to run it.

01:16:24.000 Well, I like the fact that he's talking about rebuilding the infrastructure and putting people to work in that regard and rebuilding American manufacturing.

01:16:32.000 I hope that really does happen and people do get good jobs and the economy does rise up.

01:16:36.000 What I worry about is all this corporate raider mentality backed by these people that think that he's somehow or another looking out for the little guy.

01:16:44.000 I just wonder.

01:16:46.000 I wonder what his motivations are, and I wonder how this is all going to play out.

01:16:50.000 But I guess everybody does.

01:16:51.000 Yeah, but to me, when someone says, oh, this new president, what he's doing is unprecedented.

01:16:57.000 I'm like, no, America's a broken 45. We just keep repeating trickle-down economics with more parts or less parts per million, in that in the early days of slavery, To be well-landed gentry in America was great. 0.96

01:17:11.000 You bought land, you bought the materials, and you built your plantation.

01:17:15.000 You bought livestock, human and animal.

01:17:18.000 When they bred, you kept the offspring.

01:17:20.000 Human, offspring, chickens, all of it was yours.

01:17:24.000 And you got free labor.

01:17:25.000 Things were great until 1865, the 13th Amendment, the abolishment of slavery.

01:17:29.000 And so that mentality of like...

01:17:32.000 You had a good day today because I didn't beat you.

01:17:34.000 That's your good day.

01:17:35.000 And here's your gruel.

01:17:36.000 And what do I pay you?

01:17:38.000 Here's your gruel.

01:17:39.000 Get back to the field and have another day where I don't beat you.

01:17:42.000 That's a good day for you.

01:17:43.000 That was an unbothered road to a brutal utopia.

01:17:48.000 And what you have over the years is these speed bumps.

01:17:51.000 Civil rights.

01:17:53.000 And that's where you get institutionalized apartheid.

01:17:56.000 You get Jim Crow. 0.56

01:17:57.000 You get an expansion of the Klan.

01:17:59.000 You get segregationist laws that sat on the books until, like, Brown v. 0.93

01:18:02.000 Board of Education, 1954. Virginia v.

01:18:09.000 Love v.

01:18:10.000 Virginia, that's the miscegenation laws, 1967. Obergefell v.

01:18:16.000 Hodges, marriage equality, 2015. And these are speed bumps.

01:18:20.000 If you're oppressive and you just want to pay this guy what you feel like giving him, minimum wage and all that stuff is your enemy, because you don't want these people being able to stand up.

01:18:32.000 And I think when Mr. Trump said, make America great again, I hate to say, I think he was talking about 1861 and the years before, when I paid you what I wanted to.

01:18:42.000 It's my factory.

01:18:43.000 How dare the government tell me what to pay you, like minimum wage?

01:18:48.000 You really think that that's what he means?

01:18:49.000 I mean, I think what he means...

01:18:51.000 Not in a mean way, like I want you to have a bad life, but look, I have a great factory.

01:18:55.000 I'm giving you a great job.

01:18:56.000 Here's what I'm going to pay.

01:18:57.000 Rejoice, you've got a job.

01:18:58.000 But it's not enough to feed my family.

01:19:01.000 Well, you know, beans on the weekend.

01:19:03.000 Cheer up! 0.95

01:19:04.000 And I don't think he wakes up every day going like, I want to kill people. 1.00

01:19:07.000 I want to murder Americans and have them have a crap life. 1.00

01:19:10.000 I just think he thinks like, look, we'll own stuff and you'll be the beneficiary as it falls from my mouth and trickles down to you. 1.00

01:19:19.000 You'll be happy that I have so much money because I'm a beneficent master.

01:19:24.000 Now, you're a guy that's really seen probably more of the world than one-tenth of one percent of the population of America.

01:19:32.000 I mean, you've been to so many different places.

01:19:34.000 Now, do you think that because of that, you have a unique perspective on what is possible today?

01:19:40.000 Because, like, in 2017, if you just live in America, this is the only thing you've known.

01:19:44.000 You think of the world as sort of this sort of state that we exist in.

01:19:47.000 But you having gone to North Korea, having gone to Mongolia, having gone to all these different places, we see oppressive regimes, you see very bizarre cultures where people are rigid in their ability to move around and rigid in their ability to behave and express themselves.

01:20:01.000 And you see that it could have turned out like that here.

01:20:05.000 You know, but it didn't.

01:20:06.000 We have this unique sort of experiment in self-government, and it's sort of hobbled along, and it's patched up with duct tape and Gorilla Glue, but it's here.

01:20:17.000 It's here.

01:20:17.000 Yep.

01:20:18.000 We are a miracle.

01:20:19.000 The fact that there's not been a second Civil War more catastrophic than the first shows you how amazing the Constitution is.

01:20:26.000 And even though we disagree a lot between the states and all of that, that we do ultimately get along.

01:20:31.000 We're all still united.

01:20:32.000 We argue a lot.

01:20:34.000 But we're still here.

01:20:36.000 And I did two years of programming for the History Channel.

01:20:39.000 I was talking to one professor and he gave me that sentiment.

01:20:42.000 He goes like, we are a miracle because let's think of all the people in this country you disagree with.

01:20:47.000 And yet here we are.

01:20:49.000 And what I have found by travel is what humans can still survive.

01:20:55.000 There's poverty in America.

01:20:56.000 Sure there is.

01:20:57.000 But not poverty like you see in Bangladesh.

01:21:00.000 Not poverty like you see in the streets of Cairo.

01:21:03.000 I mean, there's poverty.

01:21:05.000 That no American will ever experience in this country.

01:21:08.000 It'll never happen.

01:21:10.000 Like, no way.

01:21:11.000 There's a stick, a poverty stick, that this country will never be whooped with.

01:21:17.000 That, for other people in the world, millions of them, that is their entire life.

01:21:23.000 I was on a boat years ago on my way to Timbuktu with this guy I'd traveled with before, a Tuareg man named Mahmoud.

01:21:31.000 I went to the Desert Music Festival twice to see all these African bands.

01:21:34.000 What is the Desert Music Festival?

01:21:36.000 It was a festival that they had in Mali in the Saharan Desert, and now it's too dangerous, so the festival's no more.

01:21:41.000 Wow.

01:21:42.000 But I went to go, because I buy all these records from Mali and bands, so I wanted to go see them do it in the desert.

01:21:47.000 So I went in 2008 and 9 or 9 and 10, something like that.

01:21:51.000 And I went over land through Dogon country one year, and then the next year I hooked back up with this guy, Mahmoud, and we took the Niger River on a boat.

01:22:00.000 The guy chain smokes every day. 0.99

01:22:01.000 And I said, Mahmoud, man, you're a freaking chimney. 1.00

01:22:04.000 What are you trying to do? 0.99

01:22:05.000 And he laughed.

01:22:06.000 He said, I'm 30. I was supposed to be dead two years ago, because people in his tribe get about 28 to 30 years.

01:22:14.000 And he just kind of laughed and kept smoking.

01:22:15.000 I'm like, okay.

01:22:17.000 And so what I've learned by travel is what humans can still, how they can still live in spite of what their circumstances are.

01:22:26.000 And what that means to me when I get back here is you have a lot to lose.

01:22:32.000 I mean, it can get so much worse and you'll still get by because humans are so resourceful and we're so tough.

01:22:39.000 But we shouldn't ever have to go near that because we're smarter than that.

01:22:44.000 And, you know, me and this other guy might disagree and he might call me a bunch of nasty names on the Internet.

01:22:49.000 But ultimately, does he really want to kill me?

01:22:52.000 Nah.

01:22:53.000 If I was in a burning car, would he try and pull me out?

01:22:55.000 Probably.

01:22:56.000 If I had a sandwich and he was hungry, would I give him half?

01:22:58.000 Yeah.

01:23:00.000 And I think to forget that aspect of us, since at least the Bush administration, where the polarization in this country has been so extreme, I think we have started to forget that we can be there for each other.

01:23:14.000 And I'm not saying we all need to have a big group hug.

01:23:21.000 Right.

01:23:23.000 Right.

01:23:26.000 Right.

01:23:33.000 Come on! 0.61

01:23:34.000 We have such a beautiful patch of land.

01:23:36.000 Because, you know, I've been all over the world.

01:23:38.000 There's some parts where people live.

01:23:39.000 You're like, what are you people doing here? 0.99

01:23:42.000 Like, this part of Africa wants you dead. 0.96

01:23:44.000 Why are you here? 1.00

01:23:45.000 That's where we live.

01:23:46.000 Where America, we are, this is one long vacation we have in America as far as climate.

01:23:52.000 It gets cold, but you can always boogie down the road to Miami in a Greyhound bus in seven hours, be in your shorts.

01:23:57.000 I mean, we've got it good here in every possible way.

01:24:01.000 Yeah, we certainly do.

01:24:02.000 We really do.

01:24:03.000 Now, I think it's really important what you were talking about, about people on the internet and that sort of bizarre communication that we experience today.

01:24:11.000 Yeah.

01:24:12.000 You remember pre-internet?

01:24:14.000 I mean, you were a grown man before the internet came around.

01:24:18.000 Don't you think that this existence that we have right now, where we are sort of communicating without looking at each other, without being there in front of each other. 0.95

01:24:26.000 Yeah, unless you be really cowardly.

01:24:28.000 Yeah, without social cues, without feeling emotions because of cruel statements, without like looking each other in the eye.

01:24:35.000 I don't really feel like we're designed to communicate like this.

01:24:38.000 Well, it certainly goes against how I was raised.

01:24:41.000 It's very strange.

01:24:42.000 It's a very strange time in that regard.

01:24:44.000 Yeah, and it leads to a lot of pettiness and just really mean stuff where the issuer of that, whatever that mean email or whatever, I wonder if they look back at that a week later and you're like, man, who was I that afternoon?

01:24:57.000 Because there's stuff you can read.

01:24:59.000 It kind of, you know, it peels the paint off your car.

01:25:01.000 I mean, I go on these chatroom websites and I just read.

01:25:04.000 I don't ever post things.

01:25:05.000 I just read.

01:25:06.000 And when we had our last president, there was things said about him and his family.

01:25:10.000 You're like, did you just read?

01:25:11.000 We're just depressing.

01:25:12.000 I read like three hours of it one night in 2000 and something.

01:25:16.000 I'm like, a baboon?

01:25:17.000 Oh, man.

01:25:18.000 I mean, really, that just happened.

01:25:23.000 Someone actually thinks that?

01:25:24.000 I don't know. 0.98

01:25:25.000 Well, what's interesting is when they get found out and someone exposes whoever wrote that and then they focus on them publicly and you see the scrutiny of thousands, if not millions of people come down on those folks and how they fucking panic.

01:25:36.000 Yeah, but then those people...

01:25:37.000 Turn into that.

01:25:38.000 Right.

01:25:38.000 They turn into that same monster.

01:25:39.000 Right.

01:25:39.000 They have the green light to go after them.

01:25:41.000 Yeah, and all of a sudden, you know, it's like a Twilight Zone episode.

01:25:44.000 Like, now you've got the stick.

01:25:45.000 Right.

01:25:46.000 I'm like, you know, why are you hitting that guy?

01:25:47.000 Because he was hitting a guy with a stick.

01:25:49.000 Right.

01:25:49.000 Look at you guys.

01:25:50.000 And so I come, and I'm sure you can identify with this, I come from the world of, if you say something, that guy comes around the corner and goes, like, what'd you say?

01:25:59.000 Wham.

01:25:59.000 Right.

01:26:00.000 And he just broke your face.

01:26:01.000 And so I never say anything about anyone.

01:26:04.000 Not expecting to turn the corner and be face-to-face with that person.

01:26:09.000 And so if I ever talk about a politician or, you know, I had a lot of disagreements with Judge Scalia and people like that, and I'd write about it in the LA Weekly.

01:26:17.000 I would have loved to have debated the 14th Amendment with Antonin Scalia who said it didn't have any of the traction that I think it does.

01:26:24.000 And any politician I bucket on, including Trump, I do, which I have fun with.

01:26:29.000 What's the 14th Amendment again? 0.61

01:26:30.000 Equal Protection Under the Law, 1868. Basically, if you're born and raised here, you get all the same protections as the wealthy land guy.

01:26:37.000 It was basically slave protection. 0.92

01:26:39.000 It was the one that came after the 13th.

01:26:40.000 It was to sure up the 13th Amendment, which abolished slavery.

01:26:43.000 It's my favorite amendment of the Constitution.

01:26:45.000 It's five clauses.

01:26:48.000 Two, three, four, and five are basically governmental mechanics, but it's the first paragraph, and it's beautiful.

01:26:55.000 All people born and naturalized in the United States are a resident of the United States and of the state wherein they reside, etc., etc.

01:27:03.000 And it's a beautiful thing.

01:27:06.000 I think that was put in place to make sure racists understood that the 13th Amendment wasn't going anywhere.

01:27:13.000 And that's what gives people like, well, you're an anchor baby.

01:27:16.000 That's just the 14th Amendment. 0.80

01:27:17.000 And Scalia didn't.

01:27:19.000 In his dissent on Obergefell v.

01:27:23.000 Hodges, he came down very hard on the 14th Amendment, which is my personal favorite. 0.60

01:27:29.000 My rationale is if I talk about somebody, I expect to see that guy within five minutes and have to answer for what I said.

01:27:40.000 So I am very careful with what I say because I take responsibility for what I say.

01:27:45.000 Like, you said something mean about Dick Cheney.

01:27:47.000 Yes, I did.

01:27:48.000 He's right over here.

01:27:49.000 Really?

01:27:50.000 Can I talk?

01:27:51.000 Please let me.

01:27:52.000 I want to talk to him.

01:27:53.000 If you stare at him, he'd turn to stone.

01:27:55.000 Well, you know what I mean?

01:27:56.000 I don't say anything that I'm not ready to...

01:27:59.000 Have you ever met Ann Coulter?

01:28:01.000 No.

01:28:02.000 After you wrote that thing about her?

01:28:03.000 You had that thing and you wrote about her and then there was a video of you writing it?

01:28:07.000 Yeah.

01:28:08.000 I really, really enjoyed that, by the way.

01:28:10.000 Oh, thank you very much.

01:28:11.000 I'd love to meet Ann Coulter and just spend an evening with her and just figure out... 0.99

01:28:14.000 What the fuck is going on? 1.00

01:28:15.000 How do you get so much self-loathing? 1.00

01:28:17.000 How do you do that?

01:28:18.000 She's so odd.

01:28:19.000 I know one female comedian, who I'm sure you're very well aware of... 1.00

01:28:25.000 And she knows her.

01:28:26.000 Well, you know, they've met on, like, Bill Maher or something.

01:28:28.000 And I said, what's she like?

01:28:30.000 She said the self-loathing is, like, just off the charts.

01:28:33.000 She's not a bad person.

01:28:34.000 You feel kind of sorry for her when you're in the green room with her because she just hates herself.

01:28:38.000 And, you know, Ms. Coulter's not here to defend herself.

01:28:41.000 But that's what I've heard.

01:28:43.000 She's not a bad person.

01:28:44.000 She just, you know, reads every tweet about herself and stays up at night with all of that. 0.73

01:28:50.000 You know, Bill Maher is friends with her, which I've always found very odd.

01:28:53.000 Like, he talks about her as his friend, and he has her on, and they joke around, they're jovial together. 0.99

01:28:58.000 And I'm like, well, what the fuck is going on there? 0.96

01:29:01.000 Like, well, who is she? 1.00

01:29:02.000 Is she this act?

01:29:04.000 I think she's a little bit of both.

01:29:06.000 Yes, a little bit of both.

01:29:07.000 A little bit of an act.

01:29:08.000 She knows how to butter the bread. 1.00

01:29:08.000 She knows that she says stuff that's over the top. 1.00

01:29:10.000 It helps her sell books and gets her airtime.

01:29:12.000 Recent one with the Trump book she wrote.

01:29:15.000 I mean, just the cover alone was like so bizarre.

01:29:17.000 But it's there to piss you off or get you inspired.

01:29:21.000 And eventually you can go to some market and buy those books for $5.

01:29:26.000 Because honestly, they don't sell.

01:29:28.000 Her books don't sell? 0.99

01:29:29.000 Not really.

01:29:31.000 That's why you can buy them for five bucks.

01:29:32.000 I have a few of her books.

01:29:33.000 I bought them at places like Costco with a big sticker on them.

01:29:37.000 I've read like a couple of her books.

01:29:38.000 They go through fast.

01:29:39.000 I read the Bush's autobiography.

01:29:42.000 I got that at Costco.

01:29:44.000 She wrote a Bush autobiography?

01:29:45.000 I read George W. Bush's autobiography.

01:29:48.000 Yeah, it was a Crayola coloring book for adults.

01:29:50.000 There's no footnotes, there's no index.

01:29:52.000 But you kind of end up liking him after the book is over.

01:29:54.000 Really?

01:29:55.000 Yeah, because he doesn't seem like the worst guy.

01:29:58.000 But I read Sarah Palin's last book, America by Heart.

01:30:02.000 I got that at Costco.

01:30:03.000 Is it written in crayon?

01:30:04.000 No, but it's like 80-point type.

01:30:07.000 It's like a 5,000-word feature in a skinny book.

01:30:10.000 It's funny, but I read these books.

01:30:14.000 I want to see sometimes where these people are coming from.

01:30:16.000 There's that fellow, that internet terrorist guy, the guy with the long polysyllabic Greek last name.

01:30:25.000 Internet terrorist guy.

01:30:27.000 Yeah, Yana Papakopoulos.

01:30:29.000 He has that book. 0.98

01:30:30.000 He's on his spoken word tour right now, the Dangerous Faggot Tour. 1.00

01:30:35.000 Oh, Milo. 0.99

01:30:36.000 Milo.

01:30:36.000 Milo Yuinopoulos.

01:30:37.000 Yes.

01:30:37.000 I've had him on a couple of times.

01:30:38.000 Okay.

01:30:39.000 He's interesting to me. 1.00

01:30:40.000 He's a fucking weirdo. 0.99

01:30:41.000 He's a very interesting guy. 1.00

01:30:43.000 He's incredibly smart.

01:30:43.000 He has a book coming out in March.

01:30:45.000 Yeah.

01:30:45.000 And I wrote in the Only Weekly two weeks ago.

01:30:48.000 I said, I'm going to read his book.

01:30:49.000 I want to read it.

01:30:50.000 I don't think I'm going to find consensus, but I'm honestly interested in finding out where this guy gets off.

01:30:55.000 Because he doesn't offend me.

01:30:57.000 I just kind of feel bad for him.

01:30:58.000 Why do you feel bad for him?

01:30:59.000 Just because it's a lot of aggro to kind of drag around.

01:31:04.000 I mean, you have to kind of invent all of that. 0.99

01:31:06.000 She's fat! 1.00

01:31:07.000 Just say it! 0.99

01:31:08.000 Oh, pal, you're just manufacturing stuff.

01:31:10.000 That must be a real drag to...

01:31:11.000 I would like to see the two of you guys talk together.

01:31:13.000 I think that would be kind of fascinating.

01:31:14.000 I actually enjoy Milo.

01:31:15.000 I enjoy his company.

01:31:16.000 I enjoy talking to him. 0.97

01:31:17.000 He's not a bad guy, but a lot of the stuff he says is retarded. 0.99

01:31:20.000 But he's trying to get someone to jump out of their seat.

01:31:23.000 For sure, yeah.

01:31:24.000 He's calculated.

01:31:25.000 He has a book coming out called Dangerous, I think.

01:31:28.000 It's on Amazon. 1.00

01:31:29.000 His whole thing is the dangerous faggot tour. 1.00

01:31:31.000 And he can't have that on the cover of a book, so it's just dangerous. 0.99

01:31:34.000 Right.

01:31:35.000 But I went to Amazon in show enough.

01:31:37.000 It's coming out in March, I believe.

01:31:40.000 And so I'm going to read it.

01:31:42.000 It'll probably be a bestseller.

01:31:43.000 He's smart.

01:31:44.000 Yeah, I know he's smart.

01:31:46.000 But I was just interested to see...

01:31:48.000 I mean, I read a big part of Dick Cheney's autobiography.

01:31:52.000 What is that like?

01:31:54.000 Fascinating.

01:31:54.000 Is it in Latin?

01:31:56.000 Like ancient Latin?

01:31:56.000 No!

01:31:57.000 But like, you know, the guy's had 80 lives.

01:31:59.000 I mean, he's served under like five presidents or something.

01:32:01.000 I mean, he's not a boring guy.

01:32:03.000 It's been a very interesting life.

01:32:04.000 You know, Nixon, Ford, Reagan.

01:32:07.000 He's been in the Oval Office a lot.

01:32:09.000 He's been in that building a lot.

01:32:10.000 He knows where all the bodies are buried.

01:32:12.000 And I don't...

01:32:13.000 Want to live with these people, but as far as like seeing, you know, reading what they have to say, I'm curious in that way, in that I want to know what is on someone's mind I might not agree with all the time.

01:32:26.000 Right.

01:32:27.000 Well, it's a good way to broaden your perspective, get an idea of how their brain checks.

01:32:31.000 Everyone is essentially coming from the truth, their version of it.

01:32:35.000 That's acting class, right?

01:32:36.000 You've got to be in that moment or whatever.

01:32:38.000 And when I see these Trump rallies, these people really do hate Hillary Clinton.

01:32:42.000 They hate Barack Obama.

01:32:44.000 And they really do want to build that wall.

01:32:46.000 It's all as real as me sitting here with you right now.

01:32:49.000 And I might not agree, but you can't not say they're sincere.

01:32:53.000 They're burning analog.

01:32:55.000 It is as real as anything you've ever felt is real.

01:32:58.000 I don't necessarily want to get into the inner mechanics of that person, because I kind of already know where it's coming from.

01:33:04.000 A lot of xenophobia and half knowledge.

01:33:07.000 But you can't say that they're not legit.

01:33:11.000 And you just saw that they spoke quite loudly, and Mr. Trump won, well, not the popular vote, but the Electoral College, certainly.

01:33:19.000 And so I want to know more about who I share a country with.

01:33:24.000 I can't spend all day with it, but I do designate some bit of the day to try and figure this out.

01:33:30.000 Otherwise, how do you get up the road if you don't know?

01:33:32.000 Because I don't want...

01:33:33.000 My enemies in America.

01:33:35.000 I don't want enemies in my own country.

01:33:39.000 People I disagree with, yeah.

01:33:40.000 But ultimately, I want to get up the road with them.

01:33:43.000 In order to do that, I don't want to get beat up by some guy getting out of his pickup truck to drill some freedom into my forehead with his fists.

01:33:53.000 Because, you know, I'm just not built for it.

01:33:56.000 And who is?

01:33:57.000 So I'm looking for a higher way to get up the road.

01:34:00.000 I'm not all that hopeful.

01:34:03.000 But I still try and dissect or forensically go through that American id. 1.00

01:34:10.000 I travel...

01:34:11.000 Through America, it's what I've been doing for 36 years.

01:34:13.000 I meet more Americans than any president.

01:34:15.000 I hear the stories, like you hear the stories.

01:34:18.000 Henry, my friend died in Iraq, and he loved you, and I hear that story.

01:34:21.000 My friend killed himself last month, and I'm really screwed up about it, and I want to tell you about it.

01:34:26.000 So I hear, I get a lot of input.

01:34:28.000 And it makes you like all these people. 0.91

01:34:30.000 Like, I'm the fat gay guy in Utah, and no one likes me, and my parents kicked me out of the house when I was 18 because I'm gay. 0.92

01:34:36.000 And like, you go, oh man! 0.87

01:34:38.000 You don't want to be mad at anyone when you hear stories like that.

01:34:41.000 All you want to do is give them a Devo record and go, keep breathing, kid.

01:34:45.000 Don't self-harm.

01:34:46.000 And so the more stories I hear, it makes me want to be more decent to my fellow Americans, understand us better.

01:34:54.000 And that's one of the reasons I travel globally.

01:34:56.000 It's one of the reasons I do a lot of shows in America.

01:34:58.000 And I do a lot of listening.

01:35:00.000 And I think that's what we don't do anymore.

01:35:03.000 But when you log on to Patriot 185 and you give some liberal snowflake, whatever they call these people, some grief on the internet, you're only listening to yourself.

01:35:13.000 You just like disagreeing with people and piling on.

01:35:16.000 It's very frat boy.

01:35:17.000 Yeah, well, you definitely can get into an echo chamber and lose perspective.

01:35:21.000 And you don't get out?

01:35:22.000 Yeah.

01:35:22.000 Well, I think what you're saying is beautiful because, I mean, it is a good idea to have an open mind and try to find out why these people think in a diametrically opposed way to the way you think.

01:35:33.000 Or find out what is their motivation?

01:35:35.000 What was their background?

01:35:37.000 What caused them to reach this conclusion?

01:35:39.000 And ultimately, how can we get going?

01:35:41.000 Right.

01:35:41.000 You know, because life is short, and I want renewable energy in my time.

01:35:45.000 I don't want it to be feared.

01:35:46.000 I don't want solar panels to be gay. 1.00

01:35:49.000 I'm sick of this. 0.97

01:35:50.000 Who says solar panels gay?

01:35:51.000 Is there anybody?

01:35:53.000 You know what I mean?

01:35:54.000 That whole idea of, oh, were you a science guy? 1.00

01:35:56.000 Were you a pussy? 1.00

01:35:56.000 Yeah, right. 1.00

01:35:57.000 Yeah, that's what scientists are.

01:35:59.000 Well, that's one thing.

01:36:00.000 Whenever you tweet something...

01:36:02.000 About global climate change.

01:36:04.000 One of the first things that happens is these trumpets jump on board and they start attacking what you're saying and then tweeting like, I don't know if they've researched it or not, but it's just like immediate attitude that the people on the right seem to have.

01:36:21.000 Where they immediately want to dismiss anything that diminishes industry, anything about climate change, anything that protects the environment, whether it's about this Dakota pipeline access thing that Trump is just getting involved with.

01:36:38.000 Yeah, he greenlit it.

01:36:40.000 That's intense.

01:36:41.000 Well, you know what?

01:36:41.000 That was going on during the Obama administration.

01:36:43.000 That's something that people need to recognize. 0.99

01:36:45.000 There's not a single fucking president that's really looking out for you. 0.99

01:36:48.000 There never has been one. 0.99

01:36:49.000 There's not one that you can really enjoy. 1.00

01:36:50.000 Every single one of them is doing some creepy shit. 0.98

01:36:53.000 And that whole thing where they were cutting easements through private land, they were arresting people on their own fucking land, they were saying that they had the right to drill through their land, that was during the Obama administration. 0.99

01:37:04.000 Started during his administration, supported by his administration, and they stopped it towards the end. 0.96

01:37:09.000 But it's almost like I kind of know that they stopped it knowing that Trump was gonna start it right the fuck back up as soon as he got in office.

01:37:15.000 I think the last few months of Obama, that's why he kicked the Russians out.

01:37:20.000 Because, like, let Trump bring him back in.

01:37:23.000 Let Trump lift that.

01:37:24.000 Let him be the bad guy.

01:37:24.000 Yeah, and get that headline.

01:37:27.000 And he'll greenlight that pipeline.

01:37:29.000 I think Obama had some fun on the way out, knowing that Trump is, you know, first week is going to turn it all around, and everyone gets to point the finger.

01:37:38.000 That's politics.

01:37:39.000 And that's why I don't love any politician.

01:37:42.000 And I've never wanted to meet one.

01:37:44.000 I wouldn't walk.

01:37:45.000 I come from Washington, D.C. You'd see him all the time.

01:37:48.000 You know, they've got to eat somewhere.

01:37:49.000 And I've never...

01:37:51.000 I wouldn't walk five blocks to go meet one.

01:37:53.000 I'd like to meet Jimmy Carter.

01:37:55.000 He's probably the only guy that I really want to meet.

01:37:57.000 I'd like to see him speak, just because, you know, I've never watched a president speak.

01:38:01.000 I think it'd be interesting.

01:38:02.000 But I just, I wouldn't mind meeting Jimmy Carter.

01:38:06.000 But I just kind of know they're all kind of cut from kind of the same bolt of cloth, just the different amounts of puke on the cloth.

01:38:15.000 Right.

01:38:16.000 So, like, if it's raining outside and they're outside, they're wet.

01:38:19.000 Yeah, because they're politicians.

01:38:21.000 As Gore Vidal said, by the time you get to the executive office, you've been bought and sold at least a dozen times, willfully.

01:38:28.000 How do you fix that?

01:38:30.000 By being a good person, because there's so much of it you can't fix.

01:38:33.000 The only way to fix it is to go local.

01:38:35.000 And, like, when Trump became president, I just did eight shows at Largo in L.A., and a lot of people were kind of, you know...

01:38:43.000 And I said, look, when they start pushing against LGBT rights or women's reproductive health rights or freedoms, we'll neutralize. 0.94

01:38:52.000 You know, we'll be doing benefits.

01:38:53.000 We're going to, like, you know, Planned Parenthood, ACLU, Southern Poverty Law Center, any LGBT activist group, we can get involved and start kind of neutralizing this and slowing it down. 0.94

01:39:03.000 This is not a time to be dismayed.

01:39:05.000 This is punk rock time.

01:39:06.000 This is what Joe Strummer trained you for.

01:39:08.000 It is now time to go.

01:39:09.000 You're a good person.

01:39:10.000 That means more now than ever.

01:39:13.000 Because as a voter, you know, you throw your penny and throw it in the sea.

01:39:17.000 That's all a vote is.

01:39:17.000 It's just like nothing.

01:39:18.000 Like, you don't even hear it fall.

01:39:20.000 But you can be thunderous in your own life and being cool to the eight people around you.

01:39:25.000 And that, you know, it rubs off.

01:39:27.000 Goodness is viral.

01:39:28.000 It resonates.

01:39:30.000 It really does.

01:39:31.000 And so I work locally.

01:39:33.000 Like, right...

01:39:34.000 As far as my eyes can see, I work there.

01:39:36.000 There was an orphanage in Los Angeles I contributed money to for years.

01:39:40.000 They've kind of morphed into something else now.

01:39:42.000 But I work locally, and if everyone worked like a yard in front of them, it would start looking really good.

01:39:49.000 So you don't have to change the world.

01:39:50.000 You can just change your street.

01:39:52.000 Yeah, and changing the world, what a daunting task.

01:39:55.000 But it happens when enough people change their street.

01:39:58.000 And so, as a Los Angeles resident, I'd be happy to work inside the county of L.A. doing good stuff.

01:40:05.000 Whatever I can figure out to do.

01:40:07.000 You don't have to...

01:40:08.000 Because you're not going to push Congress around.

01:40:10.000 They seem to be loving to sit still.

01:40:14.000 So you can work locally.

01:40:16.000 And so going forward in this country, when it gets better is when the electorate gets better.

01:40:21.000 It's what Jefferson taught you, a vigorous, educated electorate who votes and votes and votes to keep American government and democracy a transparent lens, as transparent as possible.

01:40:33.000 And that's what you can do in this time like don't you're not gonna move to Canada like the Canadians are gonna have you but you can be your decency now means more it's a it it's a more into a Fruitful currency.

01:40:47.000 It just means more now to help that guy out.

01:40:50.000 It's it's a help your help basically I also feel like great things get done in times of conflict absolutely We have something to push back against people organized like that women's March, you know exactly I Where you go, wow, decency is under threat.

01:41:05.000 I never thought about that.

01:41:06.000 Let's go.

01:41:07.000 And all of a sudden, your life has some definition.

01:41:09.000 I like adversarial relationships.

01:41:12.000 I'm not looking to get into an argument with you.

01:41:14.000 I'm just saying, like when I go on tour, it's not me versus the audience.

01:41:18.000 It's me versus the stress and the magnitude of the tour I've bitten off for myself.

01:41:23.000 And I get the fear of failing my audience, and I love that.

01:41:27.000 And I battle that fear all day.

01:41:29.000 Go to the gym, because you better put eight miles on that treadmill, because you've got a show tonight.

01:41:33.000 There's a sort of Damocles over your head.

01:41:35.000 Don't eat the pizza.

01:41:36.000 Eat that, because you've got a show tonight.

01:41:38.000 Don't screw this up.

01:41:39.000 When you decide to do eight miles on a treadmill, how do you feel like that benefits you when you do a show?

01:41:44.000 Mental toughness.

01:41:45.000 Like, I'm tired, I'm jet-lagged, and I'm going to be on stage in 40 minutes.

01:41:48.000 I'm so damn tired.

01:41:50.000 And then all that training comes in, and you're like, man, this is going to probably be the best show I've ever done.

01:41:54.000 Then you start laughing.

01:41:55.000 Like, man, I'm really tired.

01:41:56.000 This is going to be awesome.

01:41:57.000 And you go out there and crush it.

01:41:59.000 Now, when you do your shows, do you write it out in long form?

01:42:03.000 No.

01:42:03.000 But, you know, I've already written...

01:42:04.000 Yes.

01:42:04.000 I've already written out in my journal, because those journals become books.

01:42:07.000 I take tons of notes.

01:42:08.000 You write longhand or you type?

01:42:09.000 Both.

01:42:10.000 On my leisure days, I like to handwrite, so I just like writing.

01:42:13.000 But mainly, I don't have the time, so I've got to type it up.

01:42:15.000 Lefty?

01:42:15.000 Are you a lefty?

01:42:16.000 I'm left-handed, yeah.

01:42:17.000 And so, I... I've learned that you can't take too many notes.

01:42:22.000 You can't write enough.

01:42:23.000 Like you have to take 80 details of the last hour.

01:42:26.000 You forget it the next day because you're tired.

01:42:28.000 And so when I'm on stage, I have no notes and it's all in the front of my brain pan.

01:42:32.000 So if I'm going to quote the Constitution or quote a president or years that the Supreme Court did whatever, I just have to put it.

01:42:40.000 I memorize all of it and I just carry it around with me.

01:42:43.000 And before I go on stage, to center myself, I quote Lincoln from his speech, the speech to the perpetuation of our governmental institutions, I think it's called.

01:42:54.000 It's the speech to the Young Men's Lyceum.

01:42:57.000 It's been quoted.

01:42:58.000 One of his first ever speeches, he's really young, 1838, I think it was, in early January.

01:43:04.000 And I just quote parts of it to myself and kind of get ready to go out there.

01:43:09.000 How does that help you?

01:43:11.000 Just eliminates the rest of the day.

01:43:13.000 So it's like all I have in my life is a show.

01:43:16.000 I don't care about anything else.

01:43:18.000 My whole life is tonight.

01:43:20.000 And I don't want anything else in the way.

01:43:24.000 I think it was Bjorn Borg, some elite tennis player.

01:43:28.000 I read this in Sports Illustrated when I was a kid.

01:43:30.000 He said, I just basically concentrate to eliminate everything that's not the match.

01:43:35.000 I was like...

01:43:36.000 That'll work.

01:43:37.000 And I was hyperactive.

01:43:38.000 It took me years to be able to really embrace that.

01:43:42.000 But when I go on stage...

01:43:44.000 After a show 25 in 25 days, man, the only thing getting you through it is your love of being on stage, my love of the audience, and I love them.

01:43:52.000 Like, just crazy obsessive.

01:43:55.000 And just the fact that I'm not thinking about how tired I am and how tired I'm going to be.

01:44:01.000 I just, all there is, they go, and go!

01:44:04.000 And I walk out there.

01:44:06.000 And I've spent the last hour eliminating the other parts of the day.

01:44:10.000 So do you have an outline of what you're going to talk about?

01:44:12.000 In my mind, yeah.

01:44:13.000 Only in your mind?

01:44:14.000 Yeah.

01:44:15.000 Sometimes I'll, at the beginning of a tour, just to kind of get back in that groove, I'll write a page of notes.

01:44:22.000 I'll talk about this, into that, into that, and I look at it and I kind of walk it through in my mind.

01:44:27.000 And like, okay, you basically memorize where all the furniture is in the living room so you can run through it with your eyes closed and not bump into anything.

01:44:33.000 And so when I go on stage, one thing tends to go into the next.

01:44:39.000 And I just, all of a sudden, I have a stopwatch.

01:44:41.000 I bring it on stage and put it down for the audience's benefit, not mine.

01:44:45.000 Because if I'm not careful, the shows will go well over two hours.

01:44:50.000 And I look down like, oh no, these poor people.

01:44:52.000 I've got to start landing this thing.

01:44:54.000 And any story takes you like 20 minutes to get in and 10 to get out.

01:44:57.000 So I'm like, okay, we're taxiing.

01:44:59.000 I can see the runway and I'll let them go in 15 minutes.

01:45:02.000 And I apologize.

01:45:02.000 I was like, I've kept you here for like two hours and 20 minutes.

01:45:05.000 I'm really sorry.

01:45:05.000 I swear I'll be done with you in like 10 more minutes.

01:45:07.000 But I would imagine they want you to keep going.

01:45:10.000 No, dude, more!

01:45:11.000 But I just don't want to keep them there for three hours.

01:45:15.000 I do, but I can't.

01:45:16.000 Right, you don't want to...

01:45:18.000 Well, it's want to leave them wanting more.

01:45:20.000 And just don't leave them going, like, that was really long.

01:45:23.000 I'm never coming back to this again.

01:45:25.000 That was like having four molars being pulled.

01:45:27.000 Because I always tell them, I'm desperate for your attention and your approval.

01:45:31.000 I really need you to keep showing up.

01:45:33.000 Because without you, I'm the tree that falls in the forest unwitnessed.

01:45:36.000 And if you're not here, man, I got nothing going on.

01:45:40.000 Now, when you would do, like, say if you do a 25-show tour, if you go out for 25, are you doing the exact same thing verbatim?

01:45:47.000 No, no, no, no, no.

01:45:48.000 I'll have one or two big centerpiece stories.

01:45:51.000 Like, on the last tour, many nights of the week, I talked about the time I had lunch with David Bowie, because he had passed away last year.

01:45:59.000 And he was really, really cool to me.

01:46:00.000 And it's a fun story.

01:46:02.000 And I told some Lemmy stories, because Lemmy from Motorhead had died in the weeks before the tour started.

01:46:08.000 I said, well, you know, Lemmy's gone, and My fans are very big on Lemmy and Motorhead.

01:46:13.000 And I have a lot of stories.

01:46:15.000 I hung out with Lemmy a lot.

01:46:16.000 And he's just a wonderful guy.

01:46:18.000 Really amazing guy.

01:46:19.000 So I would tell some Lemmy stories.

01:46:21.000 And those would kind of fall in and fall out.

01:46:23.000 And then things would happen in the world.

01:46:25.000 And that would come into the mix.

01:46:28.000 And sometimes if something is really relevant...

01:46:31.000 I can connect it to something else.

01:46:32.000 Almost any country that falls down, I've probably been there.

01:46:37.000 And I go, well, okay.

01:46:39.000 Here's what happened in Syria today.

01:46:41.000 Now, when I was there, I can pull my afternoon in the El Hamidia Souk story out.

01:46:47.000 And so I have...

01:46:49.000 I was on...

01:46:51.000 RuPaul is a long-time pal of mine.

01:46:53.000 He's one of my favorite humans.

01:46:54.000 RuPaul?

01:46:55.000 Yeah, just an amazing human being.

01:46:57.000 Really?

01:46:57.000 Smart, funny...

01:46:59.000 And has had to run more than once because he's a black guy in a wig. 0.98

01:47:03.000 I mean, someone wants to beat him up.

01:47:04.000 And he's just one of the more extraordinary people I've ever met.

01:47:07.000 And I met him at band practice in the 90s.

01:47:09.000 He practiced down the hall from us.

01:47:10.000 And we became pals.

01:47:12.000 And so I talked about the time I was on RuPaul's Drag Race as a judge, which was hilarious.

01:47:18.000 But I talked about that story because I was just on his show, RuPaul Drives, where he puts a microphone on you and a GoPro camera, and he drives you around L.A. doing errands, and he interviews you, and he chops it up into content.

01:47:30.000 And so I was able to tell my being a judge on RuPaul's Drag Race story because I could segue into...

01:47:37.000 The day we ran errands, the normal places I go, because I live alone.

01:47:41.000 I'm very much a solitary type.

01:47:42.000 I made this story about how I walked into all these places, and the only time I've ever come in with someone else is the one time I walked in with a six-and-a-half-foot-tall black guy.

01:47:53.000 And everyone who knows me in all these stores goes like, oh, Henry's finally found someone.

01:47:58.000 And it was a story about perception, because you'd see the looks on their faces like, oh, hey, Henry.

01:48:05.000 Right, I always thought so.

01:48:07.000 It was hilarious.

01:48:08.000 And RuPaul and I would leave these places, and we'd just laugh hysterically because they think we're an item.

01:48:13.000 And we eventually had lunch in West L.A., and we were recognized by everyone on the sidewalks immediately.

01:48:20.000 People taking photos.

01:48:22.000 And I said, RuPaul, I think we've become a power couple.

01:48:26.000 And this, to me, is an anecdote I would tell on stage.

01:48:29.000 And it's funny...

01:48:31.000 But I'm not making up humor.

01:48:33.000 I'm telling you something that happened that was funny.

01:48:36.000 That's how I get to humor.

01:48:37.000 I basically stumble into it.

01:48:39.000 Like, whoops, I got humor on my shoe.

01:48:41.000 And it was funny.

01:48:43.000 Because I got email like, dude, you're not going out with RuPaul.

01:48:45.000 And I would write back these really funny, ambiguous email letters back.

01:48:49.000 I'm like, well, as a new couple...

01:48:53.000 We don't want external factors to determine what this thing is going to be, so right now we're just going with the flow.

01:49:00.000 And there's some kid in the Midwest whose head just exploded because I wrote him back, well, you know, we're just checking it out.

01:49:08.000 Let him post that wherever he wants. 0.91

01:49:10.000 I don't give a damn.

01:49:11.000 And so that's what informs the shows as the tour rolls out.

01:49:18.000 That story will be in the, you know, I'll do like 20 nights with that and then it falls away and it comes back like three weeks later.

01:49:25.000 Because I tour for months at a time.

01:49:28.000 Fiscal quarters go by.

01:49:29.000 And you don't have an opening act.

01:49:30.000 You just go right on by yourself.

01:49:32.000 By myself, yeah.

01:49:33.000 Sometimes, like, in Australia, they have a rule where if, you know, four people in your band, your American band, then four Australians have to play, too.

01:49:41.000 And I like that.

01:49:42.000 And so, a couple of times, I've had a comedian, really good guy, he opens for me on some of my bigger Australian shows.

01:49:49.000 He didn't do it this last time, but his name is Bruce, and he'll go do, like, 20 minutes, just so we can say, we did that.

01:49:55.000 And he's a great guy.

01:49:56.000 He's so hilarious.

01:49:57.000 But I work in Australia, and I bring American comedians to open for me.

01:49:59.000 I don't understand that.

01:50:00.000 Well, they just have this one-to-one thing.

01:50:02.000 The Canadians have it, too.

01:50:03.000 Like, if you're going to play, they want a local band playing, too.

01:50:06.000 So you'll usually have a Canadian opener.

01:50:08.000 But when I go to Canada, too, I bring American comedians to open for me.

01:50:11.000 And I've done tours where they didn't make me have an opener who is Australian, and I've done tours where they did.

01:50:17.000 Like, I just was there last year.

01:50:19.000 In 2016, like for a month of shows.

01:50:22.000 No opener.

01:50:23.000 I thought it was going to be my buddy again.

01:50:25.000 And they said, no, no insist.

01:50:26.000 I go, how am I doing that?

01:50:27.000 But not last time.

01:50:29.000 And it was explained to me and I didn't care that much.

01:50:31.000 I know they have that Canadian content rule when it comes to like television, right?

01:50:36.000 And radio, I believe, as well.

01:50:37.000 I think Canadians, I think there's a certain amount of Canadian content you have to have.

01:50:42.000 Right.

01:50:42.000 On the radio and in television in Canada, but usually I'm just on my own like the last hundred and fifty six shows I There's no openers.

01:50:51.000 Do you get lonely on the road like that?

01:50:53.000 No, I don't have that chip.

01:50:55.000 I used to get lonely when I was young.

01:51:00.000 You know, you had a girlfriend or something, and now I'm kind of like a lizard.

01:51:05.000 You're like, you know, this lizard has had no one in its terrarium for 80 years and still keeps eating bugs.

01:51:10.000 Yeah, I'm Henry Rollins and I still keep eating bugs.

01:51:14.000 No, I don't get lonely at all.

01:51:15.000 Wow.

01:51:16.000 I just don't have the...

01:51:18.000 I have faulty wiring or something.

01:51:19.000 No.

01:51:20.000 Not at all.

01:51:22.000 That's super unusual.

01:51:23.000 Depressed?

01:51:24.000 Yeah, sure.

01:51:25.000 Depression.

01:51:26.000 Feelings of blankness I have in combat.

01:51:29.000 But that's one of the reasons I go to the gym.

01:51:30.000 That kind of blows that away.

01:51:31.000 Music helps.

01:51:33.000 But lonely?

01:51:33.000 No.

01:51:34.000 I miss people who are dead.

01:51:36.000 I miss dead people because you can't talk to them anymore.

01:51:38.000 Like when my best friend's mom died, I miss her a lot.

01:51:42.000 But...

01:51:44.000 No, otherwise I see people when I see them.

01:51:46.000 You have to remember, basically, I'll be 56 in a couple of weeks.

01:51:51.000 I've been touring since I was 20. I've been playing the away game.

01:51:55.000 That's kind of what I know, where being off the road is difficult.

01:51:59.000 I live in a nice place.

01:52:00.000 It's cool.

01:52:01.000 A lot of records, a nice stereo.

01:52:02.000 It's got kind of all I need.

01:52:05.000 But after three days home, I'm bored.

01:52:07.000 I'm missing the tour bus.

01:52:08.000 I wish I was back on tour.

01:52:10.000 Man, there's a lot of people like that that have that wanderlust thing.

01:52:13.000 Anthony Bourdain has that same thing going on where he can't be home for a couple weeks.

01:52:17.000 He's home for a couple weeks. 0.99

01:52:18.000 He's got to get the fuck away. 0.99

01:52:19.000 Yeah, I feel like I would like to leave. 0.99

01:52:22.000 I don't want to run out of this building now, but if someone said, hey, you want to go to Iceland tomorrow?

01:52:26.000 I'm like, yeah, I can be packed in.

01:52:27.000 Give me 20 minutes, man.

01:52:28.000 Just keep the car on.

01:52:29.000 I'll be right out.

01:52:30.000 Yeah, and I'll go.

01:52:31.000 I'm hoping for some good location work this year.

01:52:34.000 If they said, you want to go move to the Czech Republic for a year and a half and make two seasons of a TV show, I'd say yes before I asked what the part was.

01:52:44.000 Really?

01:52:44.000 Yeah.

01:52:45.000 You're going to get an offer now.

01:52:46.000 Some dude from the Czech Republic right now is banging on his keyboard. 1.00

01:52:49.000 Well, you know what I mean?

01:52:50.000 There's like these gigs you get where they go, hey, do you mind going to live in this part of the world for six weeks to make a movie?

01:52:56.000 I'm like, I'll be there in two days.

01:52:58.000 Wow.

01:52:59.000 Oh, yeah.

01:52:59.000 No, I run stuff like that.

01:53:01.000 Man, I'm just totally opposite.

01:53:03.000 Everyone's different.

01:53:04.000 Yeah.

01:53:04.000 Do you have a family?

01:53:05.000 Yeah.

01:53:06.000 Forgive me for not knowing.

01:53:08.000 Children, wife.

01:53:08.000 Oh, well, then that's your home.

01:53:11.000 Yeah, but even if I didn't, I just never really, before I had one, I just never really enjoyed being out that much.

01:53:17.000 I like going away and coming back.

01:53:19.000 Yeah, I get you.

01:53:20.000 And I like being home for long stretches.

01:53:22.000 I feel more productive at home.

01:53:24.000 Huh.

01:53:25.000 Yeah, for me, all the good writing, the good thinking, the good workouts, it all comes from being on the road.

01:53:31.000 I just burn cleaner.

01:53:32.000 My mood elevates.

01:53:34.000 When I'm off the road, every day I wake up in my own bed, I feel I'm kind of failing.

01:53:40.000 And I'm wimping out.

01:53:42.000 Really?

01:53:42.000 At home?

01:53:43.000 You're failing and wimping out at home?

01:53:44.000 Yeah.

01:53:45.000 Wow.

01:53:45.000 You know what?

01:53:46.000 I put that on me.

01:53:47.000 I'm not saying anyone else is.

01:53:48.000 I wouldn't dare.

01:53:49.000 I don't get to tell people what to do.

01:53:51.000 But for me, every day I'm not out in the world, I'm thinking I'm trying to dodge the ball instead of deflecting it or catching it or getting hit by it.

01:54:00.000 Yeah, I'd rather be out.

01:54:02.000 Wow.

01:54:03.000 The people I travel with, my road manager and our merch guy, we've been traveling the world together for about a decade.

01:54:10.000 And we all, like, wow, we're off this bus in two days.

01:54:14.000 I guess I'll start packing.

01:54:17.000 None of us want to go.

01:54:18.000 Wow.

01:54:19.000 Yeah.

01:54:19.000 I mean, my road manager, he has a family, so he's looking forward to being back with them, of course.

01:54:23.000 But me and the merch guy, man, we're just, you know, two solo acts swinging from vine to vine.

01:54:28.000 And so this year, I don't have any...

01:54:32.000 I got like a few talking shows.

01:54:33.000 I'm going to keynote this cannabis thing in a couple of weeks in San Francisco.

01:54:36.000 What is that?

01:54:37.000 It's a thing for cannabis entrepreneurs.

01:54:41.000 And since I don't smoke marijuana or any cannabis product, but I'm pro-legalization and decriminalization, they want me to speak on that.

01:54:48.000 And I said, I'm in.

01:54:50.000 And so I've got a couple of gigs.

01:54:51.000 But beyond that, I've got nothing going on this year.

01:54:54.000 So I'm waiting for an audition or a meeting and someone gives me a gig.

01:54:58.000 And if I don't get any of that, then I'm just going to pack my bags and find some jungle and some desert and go dig it.

01:55:04.000 Now, when you're writing something about cannabis and you don't use it, I mean, you obviously had a long history with drugs before you got clean.

01:55:11.000 Me?

01:55:11.000 Yeah.

01:55:12.000 Oh, no, sir.

01:55:13.000 Never.

01:55:13.000 No, I got drunk like four times in my life.

01:55:15.000 I smoked marijuana once on 711 Hamilton Street in Trenton, New Jersey.

01:55:20.000 Nothing?

01:55:20.000 It was after band practice.

01:55:21.000 It was really boring, and my bandmates were smoking a joint.

01:55:24.000 I said, can I try that?

01:55:25.000 And they said, you?

01:55:26.000 I'm so bored, I'll try it.

01:55:28.000 I hated it. 0.98

01:55:29.000 So you never really had that time in your life where you were fucking around with drugs? 0.98

01:55:33.000 I tried weed once. 0.75

01:55:36.000 I had a few experiences with Michelob in 10th grade.

01:55:39.000 I just didn't like it.

01:55:41.000 I tried LSD a handful of times.

01:55:43.000 Interesting, but easy to lose your mind.

01:55:45.000 Tried mushrooms a few times.

01:55:48.000 And when I did that thing at the strip bar with...

01:55:51.000 For that TV show.

01:55:52.000 It was drug stories.

01:55:54.000 And they said, do you have one?

01:55:55.000 I go, yeah, I'll talk about the time me and this girl were on acid driving her car and damn near got killed. 0.97

01:56:00.000 And so, you know, she was crazy. 0.98

01:56:02.000 She's dead now. 0.94

01:56:03.000 But I told that story about being on acid.

01:56:07.000 That's probably where I got it from.

01:56:09.000 Oh, yeah.

01:56:10.000 Of my six acid trips.

01:56:14.000 So when did you just decide to go completely clean?

01:56:17.000 Well, I never really got started in my career as a drug addict.

01:56:21.000 I mean, I'm not even saying an addict.

01:56:23.000 I'm saying someone who uses it.

01:56:25.000 Oh, no!

01:56:26.000 No, it never...

01:56:26.000 I'm wired in such a way that any stimulant is kind of a depressant.

01:56:33.000 Like beer, and the times I drank, I just, you know, four beers, I'd throw up on my shoes.

01:56:38.000 I wasn't good at it.

01:56:39.000 I didn't enjoy it. 0.99

01:56:40.000 I just did because I wanted to hang out with the gang, like my dumb-ass friends at school. 0.99

01:56:45.000 I didn't like it. 0.99

01:56:46.000 I didn't like the dizziness.

01:56:48.000 It didn't make me happy. 1.00

01:56:50.000 It just made me stupid. 1.00

01:56:51.000 The time I smoked marijuana, I just sat there waiting for it to be over. 1.00

01:56:55.000 I sat trying to figure out how to pick up a glass of water.

01:56:58.000 I'm like...

01:57:00.000 How do I do that?

01:57:01.000 And all my bandmates are experienced stones.

01:57:04.000 They're like, you do that, Henry.

01:57:06.000 I'm like, thank you.

01:57:07.000 Because I just couldn't understand picking up a glass of water.

01:57:09.000 Well, you went too deep.

01:57:10.000 Well, I just said, how long does this last for?

01:57:13.000 They said about 20, 30 minutes.

01:57:14.000 I said, okay.

01:57:15.000 And I just sat and stared at my watch and waited it out.

01:57:17.000 Acid was interesting.

01:57:19.000 Where you're like, wow, I could lose my mind, so I just better concentrate so it doesn't run out of my skull.

01:57:25.000 Mushrooms are fun.

01:57:26.000 You laugh your ass off for three hours.

01:57:29.000 And that wasn't so bad.

01:57:30.000 But I just didn't see anything to pursue.

01:57:33.000 I tried it.

01:57:34.000 It was the same thing every time.

01:57:35.000 And that's kind of my entire history...

01:57:39.000 With drug use.

01:57:40.000 That was it.

01:57:41.000 Except caffeine, right?

01:57:43.000 Yeah, but this...

01:57:45.000 I would drink...

01:57:45.000 That's a small cup of coffee.

01:57:48.000 This will last me, believe it or not, all day.

01:57:51.000 One cup?

01:57:52.000 I drink a cup a day.

01:57:53.000 I make a cup of coffee and I just sip it.

01:57:55.000 So what I'm thinking is that I'm medicating with caffeine, like an antidepressant, and I use it as an IV drip.

01:58:02.000 Because I never drink cups of coffee.

01:58:04.000 I drink one.

01:58:04.000 So you just start off hot and by the end of the day it's just this cold...

01:58:07.000 Yeah.

01:58:08.000 But I sip it, and I think it's like just a drip IV of caffeine.

01:58:13.000 And it must be, because I always have a cup of coffee with me, and it's always half full.

01:58:17.000 Like on the weekends, if I'm off the road, I go to coffee places and sit and write for hours and work on book manuscripts.

01:58:25.000 And I'll buy the small coffee, like this one, and three and a half hours later, I'll leave.

01:58:31.000 And I just drop it in the trash because it's still about three quarters full.

01:58:34.000 So I don't drink a lot of coffee in the wintertime.

01:58:37.000 I'll drink a cup of tea in the morning and have a part of a cup of coffee.

01:58:41.000 I'll drink all of the tea.

01:58:43.000 What fuels you to be so prolific?

01:58:46.000 You're saying you write an article a month for the LA Weeklys?

01:58:50.000 No, no.

01:58:50.000 A thousand words a week.

01:58:51.000 A thousand words a week.

01:58:52.000 Yeah, which is not easy that you write for a Rolling Stone of Australia once a month and then I write I try and write a thousand words a day for myself and I have right now Five different books in various states of completion and that's not some college guy saying my manuscript these are they're done and I'm by day I edit and I'm editing the next journal book,

01:59:13.000 travel book, and then at night I'm writing another journal book and working on one of two different music books.

01:59:20.000 I do a series of music books called Fanatic, where I, you know, rare records and labels like music geek stuff.

01:59:26.000 And so I work on those at night.

01:59:28.000 And you also host a radio show.

01:59:30.000 And I have the weekly radio show.

01:59:31.000 I just filled in...

01:59:32.000 Oh, tomorrow in England, BBC Radio 6, I'm filling in for Iggy Pop.

01:59:35.000 He took a vacation from his show.

01:59:37.000 So I filled in for him last week and this week as well.

01:59:40.000 So I did those shows.

01:59:42.000 So I'm always busy.

01:59:44.000 And so stimulants...

01:59:48.000 Would get in my way.

01:59:49.000 What powers me, it's not money, it's not ambition, it's anger.

01:59:54.000 I'm one of those people, I wish there was a better way to say it, but it's vengeance.

02:00:00.000 You laughed at me in high school, man.

02:00:02.000 You said I wasn't going to be anything.

02:00:04.000 Really?

02:00:05.000 Like, watch this.

02:00:07.000 That's still pushing you at 56?

02:00:09.000 I hate to say it.

02:00:10.000 Oh yeah.

02:00:11.000 40 years later.

02:00:12.000 Oh yeah, all of it.

02:00:13.000 Like, you know...

02:00:15.000 My dad, you know, he was a big money guy. 0.99

02:00:17.000 I'm like, okay, you love money so much, watch me outgross you and your whole damn family combined. 0.99

02:00:23.000 And I don't even care about it. 0.99

02:00:25.000 I just like achieving it.

02:00:27.000 And it's one of the reasons when the agent goes, okay, five shows on, one off.

02:00:31.000 I'm like, oh, no, no, man.

02:00:33.000 No, no, that's a day off.

02:00:34.000 You put a show in there.

02:00:35.000 Like, why?

02:00:36.000 Because, like, screw that, man.

02:00:38.000 Watch me do it.

02:00:39.000 Put two shows on that night.

02:00:40.000 What, you think I can't?

02:00:42.000 I'm just...

02:00:42.000 Like I said, I set up adversarial relationships.

02:00:45.000 I'm not against you or anything.

02:00:47.000 I'm just saying, like, I have to have something to push against.

02:00:50.000 Like a schedule that is like...

02:00:51.000 The schedule is like Godzilla.

02:00:53.000 Like, you can't...

02:00:55.000 Finish this.

02:00:56.000 I'm like, really? 0.70

02:00:57.000 Man, I'm going to serve you up and eat you every day like a steak. 1.00

02:01:01.000 And I just have to have that.

02:01:02.000 And so I'm getting back.

02:01:04.000 And I think of all the people I was in bands with, I have to crush them.

02:01:08.000 Everyone I grew up with, I have to powderize them.

02:01:12.000 That's such a weird motivation. 0.99

02:01:14.000 It sucks. 0.99

02:01:15.000 It's immature. 1.00

02:01:16.000 It's an 11-year-old sandbox.

02:01:17.000 Wow.

02:01:18.000 But you're aware of it.

02:01:20.000 Yeah.

02:01:20.000 Which makes it even stranger, because it's not something that you're just operating under.

02:01:25.000 It's controlling you, and you don't understand it.

02:01:27.000 No, I quite enjoy it.

02:01:29.000 Yeah, so you use it.

02:01:30.000 Yeah.

02:01:32.000 I'm not an actor, but I go up for acting parts.

02:01:34.000 I'm basically going in there and winging it, and I get to go up for really big parts.

02:01:39.000 There's a little bit of trepidation, knowing I'm going in there, but then I think, like, oh yeah?

02:01:45.000 Sony.

02:01:45.000 Whatever, man.

02:01:46.000 Line it up.

02:01:48.000 And I almost like run out of my car, like, you know, where are you at, man?

02:01:51.000 And I'm not trying to impress you that I'm a tough guy, because I'm not.

02:01:54.000 I just need to, it just needs to be trying to tell me I can't.

02:01:59.000 And that informs everything I do. 0.95

02:02:03.000 Instead of just dialing my radio show in, I work on that sucker for like five hours. 0.90

02:02:07.000 It has to be all hand-picked. 0.97

02:02:09.000 No, that song.

02:02:10.000 Not that one.

02:02:10.000 This one.

02:02:11.000 And I make like three drafts of it.

02:02:12.000 It's intense.

02:02:13.000 It's one of the reasons why I live alone.

02:02:15.000 I work all the time.

02:02:17.000 Like, hey, come out on this weekend.

02:02:18.000 No, it's 7 p.m.

02:02:19.000 on a Friday.

02:02:20.000 I'm working.

02:02:21.000 Like, I'm not fun.

02:02:22.000 Dude is constant.

02:02:23.000 Yeah.

02:02:24.000 Wow.

02:02:25.000 I'm not fun to hang out with.

02:02:26.000 Do you vacation ever where you just chill?

02:02:28.000 No, I can't.

02:02:29.000 Intellectually and existentially, I can't understand the idea of a vacation.

02:02:34.000 I make a joke on stage. 0.92

02:02:35.000 I say I want to come back 10 pounds lighter with an internal parasite.

02:02:39.000 I want to come back with like a scar where the spear kind of grazed me and eight great stories and a dangerous insect in my bag.

02:02:46.000 I don't want to sit on the beach and soak in the rays.

02:02:50.000 I want to get sunburned by, you know, being in the desert and like, you know, figuring out how the sun won't try and kill me by noon.

02:02:58.000 That's the Sahara.

02:02:59.000 And so that's how I go about it.

02:03:01.000 So part of your motivation is actually the perception by other people of what you're doing.

02:03:07.000 Like, understanding that what you're doing is so undeniable.

02:03:10.000 The volume that you're putting out.

02:03:12.000 And the intensity.

02:03:12.000 Yeah, the intensity.

02:03:13.000 So undeniable. 1.00

02:03:14.000 Like, I'll show you motherfuckers. 1.00

02:03:16.000 Yeah, absolutely. 1.00

02:03:17.000 Wow, that's so weird.

02:03:18.000 Even with people who like me.

02:03:20.000 Like, yay, Henry's here.

02:03:20.000 I'm like, yeah, I'm here.

02:03:21.000 Check it out, bitch. 1.00

02:03:22.000 Check this out. 1.00

02:03:23.000 Yeah, here's a place you won't go.

02:03:26.000 And it's not that I have any aggression towards these people.

02:03:29.000 I just want to burn brightly.

02:03:32.000 And it's not about money.

02:03:34.000 It's not about I'm better than you, because I don't think I'm better than anybody.

02:03:38.000 I just want to explode as much as possible.

02:03:41.000 And I think, to my audience, it's to their benefit.

02:03:45.000 He's like, that dude's going to go out there to a place I don't want to go.

02:03:48.000 He's going to come back with ten great photos and a story about how he nearly lost his foot.

02:03:52.000 It's great!

02:03:53.000 And, like, put me in, Coach.

02:03:54.000 That's the game I want to play.

02:03:56.000 That's what I go for.

02:03:57.000 And I'm not trying to...

02:03:59.000 I'm just trying to...

02:04:00.000 Like, in high school, I was like, you know, the wise-ass kid who had awful grades.

02:04:04.000 I was on Ritalin.

02:04:05.000 I was a mess.

02:04:06.000 You were on Ritalin in high school?

02:04:07.000 I was on Ritalin since, like, right out of preschool. 1.00

02:04:11.000 Holy shit. 0.98

02:04:12.000 If you look at the early government documentation on Ritalin, this is not a joke. 0.99

02:04:17.000 Oh, there's these big books.

02:04:19.000 My mom had them.

02:04:19.000 There's photos of me.

02:04:20.000 They tried Ritalin out.

02:04:22.000 I was part of a test group. 1.00

02:04:23.000 Holy shit. 0.98

02:04:23.000 And we would get little orange tablets, and then we'd get little yellow tablets, and we'd have triangular orange tablets for a while. 0.98

02:04:30.000 And I went to a place called the National Research Center, and I was a hyperactive kid.

02:04:35.000 And they said, here, we're trying this stuff out.

02:04:38.000 My mom had me on Ritalin.

02:04:40.000 From, like, preschool all the way to 12th grade. 1.00

02:04:44.000 Holy shit! 0.99

02:04:45.000 And in the summertime, summer vacation, I wouldn't take it. 0.99

02:04:49.000 And within a day of that stuff kicking itself out of your system, man, your appetite comes back.

02:04:54.000 And in 9th or 10th grade, I started weightlifting, and I started, like, throwing the pills out.

02:05:00.000 Because...

02:05:02.000 It's speed, and so it suppresses your appetite.

02:05:05.000 And so I'm going through puberty, my hormones are raging, and I stopped using the tablet.

02:05:10.000 And all of a sudden, I'm that guy at lunch with the line of milk on the outer edge of the tray, because I'm eating tons of food.

02:05:17.000 I'm a locust, because I'm going to the gym, and I'm just getting really...

02:05:21.000 My frustration is now being informed by a physicality that I'm getting by lifting weights.

02:05:27.000 So all of a sudden, I'm putting muscle on, And I'm angry at the world.

02:05:32.000 And I'm a spaz.

02:05:35.000 And so by 12th grade, I was kind of a maniac.

02:05:38.000 And then I got into punk rock and, you know, just got into that slugfest and just kind of went into the world.

02:05:45.000 Just kind of wildly swinging away.

02:05:48.000 Why did they put you on Ritalin at such a young age?

02:05:50.000 Because it's what they were doing in America with a lot of young people who talked too much or, you know, had bad social skills.

02:05:56.000 Well, I had attention deficit and couldn't concentrate.

02:06:00.000 I got thrown out of the D.C. public school system for being, you know, he's yelling, he's doing this.

02:06:07.000 And I actually read a couple of teachers' reports about me years later.

02:06:10.000 And I said, I had no memory.

02:06:12.000 I said, I did all that?

02:06:15.000 They kicked you out of school.

02:06:17.000 Yeah, and I got kicked out of a few schools until they put me in a prep school where the advertising is like, oh, your kid has problems with studying?

02:06:28.000 We'll cool him out.

02:06:29.000 And the first few days of school, some kids spoke out of class, and I watched this one teacher pick this one kid up and just kind of toss him into a blackboard.

02:06:36.000 I went, right! 0.98

02:06:37.000 In his class, you shut up.

02:06:39.000 And so I didn't want to get a thrashing by a teacher, so I was always really careful.

02:06:45.000 But having that difficulty sitting down.

02:06:49.000 And I was fine with topics I liked.

02:06:51.000 I didn't, you know, I didn't groove on math or any of that.

02:06:54.000 But at lunchtime, I'd go to the library and start memorizing the Latin nomenclature of every North American snake.

02:07:00.000 I had to learn them all.

02:07:02.000 And by, like, 10th grade, I had...

02:07:04.000 And I have most of it still in my head. 0.99

02:07:07.000 I'm always very confused at these medical distinctions, whether it's ADHD or hyperactive or ADD, whatever the fuck it is. 0.98

02:07:16.000 Is that real? 0.75

02:07:17.000 Or do some people just have a different composition, a different passion inside of them, and they resist doing things they don't want to do, and they don't want to be a part of any structured school curriculum?

02:07:30.000 I think all of it. 0.94

02:07:31.000 But yeah, and is that a disease or is that or do you just have more fucking looking right now? 0.99

02:07:35.000 You don't have any pills. 0.99

02:07:36.000 You're not on anything and yet you have all this passion for life You have all this isn't that the same shit that you had when you were six? 0.99

02:07:42.000 Yeah, it's just it was undisciplined and unfocused but that's not a disease, right? 0.98

02:07:47.000 I don't know. 0.98

02:07:48.000 I mean, I wouldn't call it a disease I think it's just wiring right, but why the fuck is it named? 0.97

02:07:52.000 Why is it ADHD? So they can sell you a pill I know, but isn't that crazy? 0.97

02:07:56.000 When you look back at your own life, the fact that you were on that shit for... 1.00

02:08:00.000 I mean, what? 1.00

02:08:01.000 How many...

02:08:01.000 A lot of years.

02:08:02.000 Eight years?

02:08:03.000 Nine years?

02:08:04.000 And it really screws with you, because you can feel it when you take the pill.

02:08:08.000 You can...

02:08:08.000 You're basically...

02:08:10.000 You're a propeller that spins so fast.

02:08:13.000 It looks like they're spokes of a wheel, like the wheel is still, but it's actually going really fast.

02:08:17.000 That's how it felt.

02:08:19.000 Like, on the outside, I'm like this pale, skinny...

02:08:23.000 But inside, I'm like the last few minutes of Dave in 2001, where he's going through the space-time continuum, and everything is flying by.

02:08:32.000 That was like 10th grade for me, where I just kind of held onto my desk and fairly flew through classes, like not being able to retain much, because I was just speeding my brains out.

02:08:45.000 And then the pill would wear off around dinner, and all of a sudden you're like eating two meals.

02:08:49.000 And the next morning you take the pill and you don't eat again.

02:08:53.000 For hours. 1.00

02:08:54.000 That is fucking crazy. 1.00

02:08:56.000 It was nuts. 0.99

02:08:57.000 It scares the shit out of me, too, because my parents didn't put me on anything like that, but I know I would have. 0.64

02:09:03.000 I know I would have been diagnosed. 0.53

02:09:05.000 I know I would have been put on something if I had the wrong parents.

02:09:07.000 Yeah, my mom put me on this stuff probably because...

02:09:12.000 My doctor said, you know, hey, Iris, this helps a lot of kids.

02:09:16.000 But I was in these classes, and I'll never forget one day I'm going through my mom's books.

02:09:21.000 There's this big honking hardcover book, and I opened it up, and I saw a contact sheet of me.

02:09:28.000 I'm like, wait a minute!

02:09:30.000 That's that...

02:09:31.000 And then I saw the camera angle and I realized there were these mirrors on the wall.

02:09:37.000 They're observation rooms.

02:09:38.000 And I'll never forget one day I'm looking at that mirror and a door opened from the side and my mom walked out.

02:09:44.000 And we were being observed.

02:09:46.000 And the camera angle was from that observation room.

02:09:52.000 And there's me playing with blocks and stuff.

02:09:54.000 I'm like, I remember that sweater.

02:09:56.000 Oh man, I'm like four.

02:09:58.000 And that was part of that research group.

02:10:01.000 Wow.

02:10:01.000 And maybe because my mom was a government employee?

02:10:03.000 I don't know.

02:10:04.000 But I went to a place for two years called the National Research Center.

02:10:09.000 I got thrown out of there.

02:10:10.000 Wow.

02:10:11.000 For wounding a kid.

02:10:12.000 What'd you do to him? 0.97

02:10:13.000 I threw a bunch of powdered cement in his face. 0.90

02:10:15.000 Pfft. 0.61

02:10:17.000 Yeah.

02:10:17.000 Now, when you started lifting weights when you were in 12th grade and you...

02:10:22.000 No, no, more like 9th or 10th.

02:10:23.000 9th or 10th grade?

02:10:24.000 Yeah, early teens.

02:10:25.000 When you stopped taking the pills, did you feel like the exercise did for you what the pills were kind of supposed to do for you?

02:10:32.000 The weightlifting, you know, I had this coach.

02:10:37.000 He's mentioned in that article that you were talking about the iron.

02:10:40.000 I talked about Mr. Pepperman.

02:10:41.000 Yeah.

02:10:42.000 And I was in his carpool.

02:10:44.000 He was a Vietnam vet. 1.00

02:10:45.000 And he once said to me, I have to quote, he said, you're a skinny little faggot. 1.00

02:10:52.000 Thank you, sir. 1.00

02:10:54.000 And he said, I'm going to teach you how to lift weights.

02:10:56.000 I said, okay.

02:10:57.000 It's more attention than my dad gave me.

02:10:58.000 So I said, I'll take it.

02:10:59.000 And so he taught me compound lifts at the school gym.

02:11:03.000 So I bought a Sears and Roebuck sand-filled weight set, which I couldn't drag to my mom's VW fastback.

02:11:09.000 And eventually I did.

02:11:10.000 By three months of that wait, I'm fairly throwing it across the room.

02:11:14.000 Because, you know, you're growing so fast.

02:11:16.000 Like your muscles are recovering overnight.

02:11:18.000 You just do the same workout every day.

02:11:19.000 You don't even feel it.

02:11:21.000 And he said, you're not allowed to look at yourself until Christmas break after Christmas exams.

02:11:26.000 And this was like in September.

02:11:28.000 So I didn't.

02:11:29.000 I did everything he told me to.

02:11:30.000 And then he dropped me off before the Christmas break.

02:11:33.000 He said, now today you can look at yourself in the mirror.

02:11:36.000 And I ran home.

02:11:37.000 I ran home. 1.00

02:11:38.000 And I tore my stupid school uniform off and I stood in the mirror. 1.00

02:11:42.000 And my body had definition. 1.00

02:11:43.000 I'm like, wow, those are pecs.

02:11:45.000 I mean, I looked like I was a guy who lifted some weights.

02:11:48.000 And it was self-validating.

02:11:51.000 Like, wow, I'm here.

02:11:52.000 I did that.

02:11:53.000 I'm looking at myself going, I did that.

02:11:56.000 No one can lift those weights for you.

02:11:58.000 And the feeling of achievement it gave me, that I accomplished that.

02:12:03.000 Was a shot in the arm that I still feel to this day.

02:12:07.000 Wow.

02:12:07.000 I mean, because it was so like, wow, you can do this.

02:12:10.000 That's possible.

02:12:11.000 Right.

02:12:12.000 Because every other time, trying to meet girls at the school dance, I had no guts to talk to the girls, so they were alien creatures. 1.00

02:12:18.000 I didn't do well in school, so you could make fun of me.

02:12:21.000 I couldn't throw the ball straight, so they would throw it at my head to watch me run.

02:12:24.000 And so I didn't have any traction anywhere.

02:12:28.000 And then when I had the weights, I'm like, wow.

02:12:31.000 I'm filling out my t-shirt, man.

02:12:34.000 Noticeable improvement.

02:12:35.000 Hell yeah, man.

02:12:36.000 Work plus effort equals results.

02:12:38.000 Yeah, and I couldn't, didn't make my grades better because I still, you know, it was all Swahili to me.

02:12:43.000 Schooling was just obtuse to me.

02:12:45.000 It was probably too late.

02:12:46.000 I just, you know.

02:12:47.000 I was not good at sitting still. 0.99

02:12:49.000 But when I had the summer jobs, that's when I kicked ass. 0.98

02:12:53.000 I never had an allowance. 0.97

02:12:55.000 My mom never said, here's 20 bucks.

02:12:58.000 I'm like, where'd Henry go?

02:12:58.000 He's got three jobs over the weekend.

02:13:00.000 I'd wake up in the morning, go to the pet shop, work all day there, run home, shower, change my clothes, do the night shift at the movie theater, take the bus out to the surf shop in the suburbs and I'd repair skateboards and whatever on Sundays.

02:13:13.000 So I always had pocket money because I liked working a cash register on my keychain in school.

02:13:20.000 I had the keys to stores.

02:13:22.000 Bosses trusted me because I'd never steal.

02:13:24.000 So I would work like 20 hours a week and go to school in high school.

02:13:32.000 And part of that was informed by the weightlifting, and I like getting out of the house and being responsible.

02:13:38.000 But in school, it didn't mean much to me.

02:13:40.000 But showing up on time at the pet shop and cleaning out 20 cat pans, man, that was like I had to be there at 8 o'clock, not 8.01, man, because we got things to do.

02:13:50.000 I felt a real fealty.

02:13:52.000 And to this day, if I'm ever on a film shoot, who's the guy who's there early, man?

02:13:57.000 That's me.

02:13:57.000 I'm there.

02:13:58.000 I memorize the whole damn script. 0.99

02:13:59.000 I'm so happy to have a job. 1.00

02:14:01.000 I'm amazed anyone cares.

02:14:03.000 And so all of that, it keeps me on the straight and narrow.

02:14:07.000 I call myself a human frozen yogurt machine, just output.

02:14:12.000 I don't want the applause.

02:14:14.000 I like to build ships.

02:14:15.000 I don't want to sail in them.

02:14:16.000 And the best part about finishing the ship is it sails off to sea and you can build another.

02:14:21.000 So I love finishing a book.

02:14:23.000 Get this thing off my desktop.

02:14:25.000 Now I can start a new one.

02:14:26.000 Like, where can I go now?

02:14:28.000 And so that's how I live.

02:14:30.000 To achieve and to output.

02:14:33.000 But it's not...

02:14:34.000 I don't ever look at...

02:14:36.000 I have a thing on my computer.

02:14:38.000 It's called The List.

02:14:39.000 And I keep a list of every show, every book I've written, every movie I've been in, every album I've ever made.

02:14:45.000 And when you look at it, it's intense.

02:14:48.000 It's like...

02:14:48.000 You keep a list of every show you've ever done?

02:14:50.000 Oh, hell yeah, of course.

02:14:52.000 Wow, of course.

02:14:53.000 I don't know anybody who does that.

02:14:55.000 Yeah, and sometimes I write down the set length.

02:14:58.000 I take a lot of notes.

02:15:00.000 Wow.

02:15:00.000 Oh yeah, I write them all down.

02:15:01.000 But I have this one thing called the list.

02:15:03.000 And it's just like, you know, every film, every TV show, every voiceover, every book, every record, on and on.

02:15:11.000 And sometimes I look at it just because I have to input like the new book comes out.

02:15:14.000 I have to go to the thing and input.

02:15:15.000 And I look at this list and my bones start aching. 0.99

02:15:18.000 I'm like, man, this is a lot of crap. 0.99

02:15:20.000 A lot of crap this came out. 1.00

02:15:22.000 Yeah. 0.99

02:15:23.000 And I don't wave it around and go, see what I've done?

02:15:26.000 I just kind of go, I'm only interested in what I'm doing and what I'm doing next.

02:15:29.000 So why do you record it then?

02:15:30.000 Why do you write all that stuff down?

02:15:31.000 I like leaving a good trail of evidence.

02:15:33.000 And I like to be able to, when someone will say, I saw you in 1985 in Champaign, Illinois.

02:15:39.000 I'm like, no, that would be 1983 or 1986. We didn't play there in 1985. How do you know that?

02:15:44.000 Here.

02:15:45.000 It's right there.

02:15:45.000 See?

02:15:46.000 And they're like...

02:15:46.000 Whoa.

02:15:47.000 Yeah. 1.00

02:15:48.000 You got a fucking list from 1983? 0.99

02:15:49.000 Oh, I have every show since I was in Washington, D.C. with my first band. 0.99

02:15:56.000 So you've written down every single show you've done in your life.

02:16:00.000 Yeah.

02:16:01.000 You should publish that.

02:16:02.000 Well, it's in, you know, my journal books of the years I was in Black Flag.

02:16:07.000 That came out as a book.

02:16:08.000 But I mean, you should just publish that list.

02:16:10.000 You should put it up online or something.

02:16:12.000 Yeah.

02:16:12.000 Just so people could look at it.

02:16:13.000 Yeah, I have a lot of...

02:16:15.000 There's a lot of those kind of things.

02:16:17.000 You really should, just so people can feel lazy. 0.99

02:16:19.000 Just to look at that and go, what in the fuck? 0.99

02:16:21.000 Because sometimes, you know, something like that will change the way a person looks at the world. 0.99

02:16:27.000 To know that someone like Henry Rollins is out there recording every single show and here's all...

02:16:32.000 Like, you get this feeling.

02:16:33.000 Like, I'm getting this feeling when I'm talking to you.

02:16:35.000 Like, I want to go do something.

02:16:37.000 For real.

02:16:37.000 Get out of this interview.

02:16:39.000 No, no, no.

02:16:39.000 I love this interview.

02:16:40.000 I want to fucking accomplish something. 0.96

02:16:42.000 This is something that I... When I talk to people that are really motivated and really passionate, it gets me fired up. 0.97

02:16:50.000 And I'm listening to you talk about this stuff, and I want to go do something.

02:16:54.000 Yeah, that's all you get to do in life.

02:16:56.000 You get to do stuff, and then you die.

02:16:58.000 It's over.

02:16:59.000 And it's over fast enough anyway.

02:17:01.000 So for me, I don't tell people what to do.

02:17:04.000 This is a very compelling and attractive attitude you have, though.

02:17:07.000 It's very interesting.

02:17:09.000 It keeps me going.

02:17:10.000 And I never get to that point where I've been to enough places, or I've written enough books, or I've done enough radio shows, or I've bought enough records.

02:17:20.000 There's never enough records.

02:17:21.000 There's never enough time to do everything.

02:17:24.000 And I like living with that kind of...

02:17:28.000 Aspect of desperation, we are always kind of like, oh, come on, man, let's go!

02:17:33.000 And I like that, because it keeps the, as I say, it keeps the blood thin, and it keeps complacency at the door.

02:17:40.000 I have my bad days.

02:17:42.000 I'm like anyone else.

02:17:43.000 I'm just a, you know... 0.99

02:17:44.000 Yeah, but your bad days are probably ridiculous. 0.99

02:17:46.000 You're burning so hot. 0.97

02:17:48.000 I mean, your bad days are probably like an average ambitious person's, you know, quality time.

02:17:52.000 I don't know.

02:17:53.000 I mean...

02:17:53.000 I don't know, man.

02:17:54.000 It's pretty intense.

02:17:55.000 But it's one of the reasons why I pick the people I work with.

02:17:59.000 Like, today you met Heidi, who manages not only me...

02:18:04.000 But all my companies, and she's basically, she and I have been working together for damn near 20 years.

02:18:09.000 She's amazing.

02:18:11.000 And she's air traffic control. 1.00

02:18:13.000 Because if I'm not, I'm never careful. 0.97

02:18:15.000 I say yes to every damn thing. 0.94

02:18:17.000 And she's like, you can't say yes to that because you're going to be over here on this day. 0.99

02:18:20.000 She goes like, stop answering the phone.

02:18:21.000 I got this.

02:18:22.000 So she, like she's the one who coordinated all this with you.

02:18:26.000 Right.

02:18:26.000 Because I, you know.

02:18:28.000 I'll go and do it, but I'm not good at setting it up.

02:18:31.000 And so she locks in the coordinates.

02:18:33.000 And so I work with people who are used to kind of my velocity, like the road manager.

02:18:42.000 In a way, I'm very easy on Road Manager Ward.

02:18:44.000 I wake up, I go to the front of the bus, and he's already written out the map for me to walk to a gym.

02:18:50.000 So I wake up, I go right to the gym.

02:18:51.000 And I always want the same thing.

02:18:53.000 I want a gym, I want this, I want a gig, and then I want some sushi, and I want to go to sleep.

02:18:59.000 But it's intense, and there's hardly any days off.

02:19:02.000 So he knows how to...

02:19:04.000 Keep all of that going and the phone is ringing because I work in different media all the time and so Heidi's always juggling eight chainsaws and so I'm around people who can allow me just to really run at it and go as fast and as hard as I want to.

02:19:21.000 I call it living at the speed of life.

02:19:23.000 You just kind of go You let your imagination and your resolve dictate everything. 0.99

02:19:31.000 And to be able to do that and still keep the lights on, I'm just a lucky bastard. 0.97

02:19:36.000 And so I try and be really cool about it. 0.94

02:19:39.000 Well, this humility is very contagious too.

02:19:42.000 It's very nice.

02:19:42.000 It's very nice to hear that you have this attitude about it.

02:19:46.000 I don't know everything about you, but you and I do enough of the same stuff.

02:19:50.000 Come on, man.

02:19:51.000 We get in free to stuff all the time.

02:19:53.000 Doors open.

02:19:54.000 Stuff that other people pay for.

02:19:56.000 They just give you two of them, man, because they just like the fact that you came by. 0.97

02:19:59.000 And so the only way not to be a jerk with all of that is to don't take it too seriously and to be as grateful as possible. 0.96

02:20:10.000 And that's what we're... 0.96

02:20:12.000 Several minutes ago, I said I've met, you know, some big movie stars and rock star types. 0.99

02:20:16.000 The bigger they are, the more grateful they are, because they know they are just lucky bastards. 0.94

02:20:20.000 And all, like, your ACDCs and Black Sabbaths that I've met, they're, like, the most humble. 0.94

02:20:26.000 You know, they're just so happy they got a gig, and it's going pretty well.

02:20:30.000 Yeah.

02:20:30.000 And they just know that they beat the grind.

02:20:33.000 They obviously had something to bear.

02:20:35.000 They had something that the world says wow about.

02:20:38.000 But they also at the same time know that they're not going to take the same caning that a lot of really good people who don't deserve it are going to take.

02:20:46.000 It's what Bukowski wrote about.

02:20:48.000 He said, man, you've got to beat the grind because, man, this life will kill you.

02:20:51.000 It'll just use you up. 0.84

02:20:53.000 And so I'm not looking to escape any beatings, but to have an idea and get to do it and turn it into something that kind of pays me.

02:21:03.000 Like I can go into the world, have these crazy things happen, come back with photographs and a story, take it on stage and I can tour on that and people show up. 0.98

02:21:12.000 Damn, man, I should just be saying thank you every other breath. 0.98

02:21:15.000 And that's what I try and maintain. 0.99

02:21:17.000 You're obviously very prolific.

02:21:19.000 What do you do with all your money?

02:21:21.000 You seem like a guy who probably wears those kind of clothes all the time.

02:21:25.000 You probably live in an apartment.

02:21:26.000 I got 20 of these.

02:21:28.000 Do you live in an apartment?

02:21:29.000 No, I got a house.

02:21:30.000 Do you have a house?

02:21:30.000 Okay.

02:21:31.000 I have a lot of records, so you need some room.

02:21:35.000 I spend money on records, plane tickets, and the occasional lens for a camera.

02:21:42.000 That doesn't cost a lot.

02:21:44.000 No.

02:21:44.000 I drive a Mazda 6. What?

02:21:47.000 Yeah.

02:21:47.000 Do you do that on purpose?

02:21:49.000 I live in LA, man.

02:21:51.000 Do you fly economy? 1.00

02:21:52.000 You one of those motherfuckers? 1.00

02:21:53.000 Yeah. 1.00

02:21:53.000 Son of a bitch. 1.00

02:21:54.000 I have over a million miles on United. 1.00

02:21:56.000 I bet you do.

02:21:57.000 They're probably trying to upgrade.

02:21:58.000 You're like, no, no, no, no.

02:21:59.000 I'll take the aisle seat.

02:22:00.000 Give me the middle.

02:22:01.000 I save them up for when I go on tour.

02:22:03.000 Like last year, I was in Australia twice.

02:22:05.000 And so that's where I use the miles.

02:22:09.000 You fly to Australia economy.

02:22:11.000 Well, no, I upgraded into business because I had already saved up the miles.

02:22:15.000 But usually I fly economy, yeah.

02:22:17.000 Why do you do that?

02:22:18.000 Because I will not justify spending $2,000 for more leg room for seven hours because you can buy a truckload of records of that money.

02:22:26.000 Right, but you already have that $2,000 in the bank.

02:22:28.000 It's not like you need that $2,000.

02:22:30.000 I was really broke-ass in a band for many years, and all the money I made, it came with a lot of sweat and a lot of pain, and I must respect it.

02:22:42.000 And I'm not saying to put yourself in business class as being disrespectful to money.

02:22:48.000 What I'm saying is I can't justify it.

02:22:50.000 I simply cannot go, that was worth it.

02:22:53.000 I can't do it.

02:22:54.000 I just can't.

02:22:55.000 How many records do you think you have?

02:22:56.000 Oh, I don't know.

02:22:58.000 It's like triples, man.

02:22:59.000 They just keep showing up.

02:23:01.000 Wow.

02:23:02.000 Last night I listened to ten records, five LPs and five singles.

02:23:05.000 And when you sit down and listen to records, is this a solitary pursuit?

02:23:09.000 Just headphones on?

02:23:10.000 Oh, no, no.

02:23:11.000 I'm in front of a pair of Wilson XLF Sophia 3s.

02:23:16.000 What is that?

02:23:18.000 He's an audio engineer.

02:23:19.000 He just started typing as soon as you said that. 0.99

02:23:20.000 Yeah, you type him in and your laptop will go, oh, damn! 0.99

02:23:22.000 I'm sure he knows what he is. 0.97

02:23:25.000 It's a good system, but the one thing I miss when I'm on the road is my music, just easy access to analog.

02:23:33.000 And so when I'm off the road, I have a file on my computer called I Heard That, and I write down every record I listen to in the order I listen to it, the exact pressing.

02:23:42.000 Like last night I listened to a David Bowie single, Golden Years with Can You Hear Me, but it was the pressing from El Salvador, and I had to write that down.

02:23:52.000 Because I'm that guy.

02:23:53.000 Do you have a picture of the Wilson Alexandria Threes?

02:23:57.000 Wow.

02:23:58.000 So when you're sitting down and you're enjoying this music, you're just sitting down and enjoying this music.

02:24:03.000 You're not doing this, oh wow, those are badass.

02:24:05.000 Oh no, no, no, no.

02:24:07.000 A few models up, my friend.

02:24:08.000 I've got those too.

02:24:10.000 Those are Sophia's.

02:24:12.000 Go to Alexandria.

02:24:16.000 There you go.

02:24:19.000 Yeah, they're so big it takes a while to buffer.

02:24:22.000 Whoa.

02:24:23.000 Yeah, they're 660 pounds each.

02:24:25.000 What?!

02:24:26.000 Yeah.

02:24:26.000 These are in your living room?

02:24:27.000 Yeah. 1.00

02:24:27.000 Holy shit, dude. 1.00

02:24:29.000 Now, what is the benefit of these? 0.99

02:24:30.000 Oh, they sound good.

02:24:32.000 Every frequency is realized without even pushing the system.

02:24:35.000 It's a system you don't play loud.

02:24:37.000 You can play it at medium, and it's full saturation of frequency. 1.00

02:24:42.000 What the fuck? 1.00

02:24:43.000 Look at these goddamn things. 1.00

02:24:45.000 Yeah, mine are silver. 1.00

02:24:45.000 Why is this website so shit? 1.00

02:24:47.000 It's not our internet service. 1.00

02:24:50.000 It's fast as fuck. 0.99

02:24:51.000 They don't give a fuck about the web. 1.00

02:24:53.000 These are probably some weirdos just like him. 0.95

02:24:55.000 Because they're just meticulous builders.

02:24:57.000 Yeah, I guess.

02:24:58.000 And it takes a while.

02:24:59.000 Look at those speakers.

02:25:00.000 That's insane.

02:25:01.000 It's a stack.

02:25:02.000 So you have two stacks and you just face them towards you and you sit on your couch?

02:25:06.000 Yeah.

02:25:07.000 Yeah, and I'm looking at those.

02:25:09.000 Wow, that is a maniac's stereo system right there.

02:25:13.000 Yeah, yeah.

02:25:14.000 Okay, so you...

02:25:15.000 And so that's what I miss when I'm on the road, are those two.

02:25:18.000 And when I come home, I play a lot of records.

02:25:21.000 And so last night, to listen to all that music, it took about four...

02:25:26.000 Hours or so to get through all that music and you're just sitting there taking in the songs.

02:25:30.000 I'm writing you're right.

02:25:31.000 Yeah, I'm taking notes on things and I'm working writing in my journal and Just writing and listening.

02:25:38.000 I got a cup of coffee and Cold cup of coffee.

02:25:43.000 Yeah, it's from I made it the night before actually and And so I'm drinking the lower the second half of this cold stale coffee and Jesus Christ, man.

02:25:52.000 And half a glass of Perrier water.

02:25:55.000 I like that lime bubbly water.

02:25:58.000 Wow.

02:25:58.000 And that's my big kick-ass night.

02:26:01.000 Like this weekend, a band called Sleep is opening for the Melvins and they're playing two nights at the Fonda, so I'm going to both nights.

02:26:09.000 Because I love both bands.

02:26:10.000 And so if there's a gig in town, I'm going.

02:26:12.000 If they're playing two nights, I go both nights.

02:26:14.000 So you're still deeply involved in music and as far as you're being a fan and you appreciate it.

02:26:20.000 But you just don't have the desire to perform anymore.

02:26:22.000 No.

02:26:23.000 I came into music being a fan.

02:26:26.000 And I left.

02:26:27.000 I will always be a fan.

02:26:30.000 It's a drag when you meet a musician who's not a fan of music.

02:26:33.000 Like, oh, come on, man. 0.98

02:26:35.000 No one's like, oh, these bands all suck. 0.98

02:26:37.000 I could really don't.

02:26:38.000 I feel the same way about comedians that aren't a fan of stand-up.

02:26:40.000 I love stand-up.

02:26:41.000 I still love stand-up.

02:26:43.000 I think that's something that people lose somewhere along the line sometimes.

02:26:47.000 Some of them do, and it's really sad when they do.

02:26:49.000 I go to gigs all the time.

02:26:52.000 It's funny, but it's also sad.

02:26:54.000 A lot of times these bands write me because I play them on my radio show.

02:26:57.000 Hey, man, we're coming to The Echo next week.

02:26:59.000 We're going on at 11.30.

02:27:00.000 I'm like, ah, it's a Tuesday, man.

02:27:02.000 I can't.

02:27:02.000 I can't go see you at 1130 at night.

02:27:05.000 Why is that?

02:27:05.000 I'm just too damn tired.

02:27:07.000 I'm like, damn, I am really my age. 0.98

02:27:09.000 Because you say 1130 on a Tuesday to start a gig. 0.97

02:27:12.000 I'm like, I'm sorry.

02:27:13.000 Daddy just got really tired.

02:27:16.000 And I just have to go, sorry, man.

02:27:17.000 You know, I can't do that and be at my office the next day.

02:27:20.000 Wow.

02:27:21.000 I wanna.

02:27:23.000 If it was a Friday, yeah, or Christmas break.

02:27:26.000 But I'll be at the Fonda both nights this weekend seeing those bands.

02:27:30.000 So when you say if it's a Friday, so on weekends, do you have a relaxed schedule on Saturday and Sunday?

02:27:35.000 Do you allow yourself some leisure?

02:27:37.000 I'll sleep as long as I want, and I listen to different records.

02:27:42.000 During the week, I do protein listening.

02:27:44.000 Which is records I haven't heard yet.

02:27:46.000 And so just, you know, you have to really concentrate.

02:27:48.000 And on the weekends, I do carbohydrate listening.

02:27:50.000 Whereas records that I'm familiar with that I just like to listen to.

02:27:54.000 Wow.

02:27:54.000 So just like a sort of a light thing.

02:27:56.000 Well, just like songs, you know, albums I've had for 25 years that I still like to listen to.

02:28:01.000 And that's like, you know, chili and soup and bread and potatoes.

02:28:04.000 And then during the week, it's sashimi.

02:28:07.000 And clap push-ups.

02:28:10.000 What a strange life you have, man.

02:28:13.000 Yeah, yeah.

02:28:13.000 It's very original, I'll tell you that.

02:28:15.000 It's different.

02:28:16.000 Yeah, if you're, you know, be weird, live weird, you know?

02:28:19.000 Weird is as weird does, I guess.

02:28:21.000 Well, you get involved in relationships, you get a girlfriend or something like that, and they realize, like, what...

02:28:29.000 What I'm getting involved with and I realize I can't hack it.

02:28:32.000 Because here's the awful thing about being an adult in a relationship, seeking to be an adult in a relationship, I have found. 1.00

02:28:40.000 When I was young and I was a boy and I was dating girls, It's boys and girls and she's an idiot, you're an idiot, you do dumb things and everyone cheats and whatever. 1.00

02:28:48.000 Then you hit a certain part of your life where she's a woman and you're a man and you have adult expectations. 1.00

02:28:54.000 And you can't be running around being an idiot with someone who kind of wants you to be at the table because they are sincerely giving time of their adult life to this thing that you were doing together. 0.98

02:29:07.000 And when you come in still thinking you're in ninth grade and she's coming in like... 1.00

02:29:13.000 This is part of what my life is, is being with you.

02:29:17.000 I have never been able to answer that in a mature enough way to where I would have been able to maintain it.

02:29:26.000 Because, like, say, next weekend, if I had a girlfriend, she might say, it's Friday, what are we doing?

02:29:33.000 I'm like, oh, watching me write for four hours?

02:29:36.000 laughter And so that's not the way to be.

02:29:39.000 You can't do that.

02:29:40.000 And so I can't be a good person's other half, because the work has always attracted me more than coming home to someone.

02:29:50.000 I can't stand the idea of living with a person.

02:29:55.000 I can do it on the bus because it's Das Boot and we're going down the road.

02:30:00.000 But I never would want to wake up and she's there.

02:30:06.000 And I have no aversion. 0.99

02:30:10.000 A fucking expression that you just made, where you like, look to your right, she's there. 0.99

02:30:14.000 Well, it's every day, here we are together, and I'm just not wired that way. 0.99

02:30:20.000 I would be a drag, like, you haven't spoken to me in 20 hours.

02:30:24.000 Huh, I didn't notice.

02:30:26.000 And I'm just work-oriented, and so...

02:30:29.000 I'm not interested in wasting anyone's time.

02:30:33.000 I'm not interested in being mean.

02:30:34.000 I'm really not into it.

02:30:36.000 And so, I'm not the...

02:30:39.000 This woman was hitting on me a while ago, and I said, ma'am... 1.00

02:30:43.000 You called her ma'am.

02:30:44.000 That's a problem.

02:30:45.000 Well, she was very persistent, and I said, ma'am, I'm like a hunting dog.

02:30:52.000 I'm a dog, just not the kind you pat.

02:30:54.000 You know, I'm just not...

02:30:57.000 I'm sorry.

02:30:59.000 You should stop this. 0.98

02:31:01.000 She's imagining holding your hand, coming to your spoken word shows, going to dinner with you, talking about your day, and you're in front of your fucking crazy speakers and you're writing. 0.98

02:31:14.000 Hoping the phone doesn't ring. 0.99

02:31:15.000 Right.

02:31:16.000 I unplug it on the weekends except on Sunday my best friend since I was 12 and he was 11 were still best friends.

02:31:23.000 Ian, you ever heard of the band Fugazi?

02:31:25.000 Yes.

02:31:25.000 Okay, well Ian McKay, he's my best friend and we grew up together doing music and everything and we talk almost every Sunday and so we've been best friends since the Carter administration.

02:31:36.000 Wow.

02:31:37.000 And so Ian will call on Sunday.

02:31:39.000 We'll talk for a while.

02:31:41.000 Otherwise, the phone doesn't ring.

02:31:43.000 If it does, I'm like, oh no, why?

02:31:45.000 I thought you liked me.

02:31:46.000 Why are you calling?

02:31:51.000 I thought you liked me.

02:31:53.000 Why are you calling?

02:31:54.000 Yeah.

02:31:56.000 If you liked me, you wouldn't write me.

02:31:59.000 But meanwhile, I'm contentedly just working away.

02:32:04.000 And so...

02:32:06.000 I'm good for...

02:32:07.000 I'm like a racehorse.

02:32:09.000 Just watch me run around the track, but don't need to feed me any oats.

02:32:13.000 I got a trainer.

02:32:14.000 You're very rigid in your behavior pattern.

02:32:16.000 I mean, you've got it locked in, you know what you enjoy, you know what makes you content, what gives you happiness and appreciation.

02:32:22.000 Yeah, and it's kind of a replicant Vulcan.

02:32:27.000 You know, humans don't play a large part in it.

02:32:31.000 Like, I don't need to go hang out with my friends on the weekend and, hey man, you didn't call, man.

02:32:35.000 What's going on?

02:32:36.000 Don't call.

02:32:37.000 But you do appreciate those humans that come to see you perform, and you feel a deep obligation to them.

02:32:42.000 Absolutely, yeah.

02:32:43.000 And I serve them.

02:32:44.000 And I like servitude.

02:32:46.000 I like wanting to give them something good.

02:32:48.000 I make the best hash I possibly can, and then I sling it with everything I've got.

02:32:53.000 I just don't want to hang around afterwards and talk about it.

02:32:57.000 I'd just like to do it.

02:32:58.000 If I could just say thank you, goodnight, walk out of the building into a moving vehicle and be 10 blocks down the road before they get up out of their seats, that would be fine.

02:33:07.000 I don't know what else there is to do except hit it and then quit it.

02:33:13.000 And so it makes some interactions a little uncomfortable.

02:33:18.000 I like these people a lot.

02:33:20.000 They have no idea how much I just want to just rock their world with like a book or a show.

02:33:27.000 But beyond that, I... Hey, come and hang out with us.

02:33:31.000 I don't know how to do that.

02:33:32.000 But you do get appreciation from hanging out with people that you meet when you go on your journeys.

02:33:36.000 Sure.

02:33:37.000 You meet someone on the road, like some guy in his village, you know, alright, so man, what's your day like?

02:33:43.000 You know, what are you eating?

02:33:44.000 Okay.

02:33:44.000 Where do you get your water from?

02:33:46.000 Show me that.

02:33:46.000 And do you differentiate that because they're so unusual and their life is so...

02:33:50.000 It's just, you know, it's information extraction.

02:33:52.000 You're just, you don't really know that person and they're not...

02:33:55.000 It's just a different relationship.

02:33:57.000 But you don't feel that connection to someone that you meet in real life in America?

02:34:01.000 I meet them and I'm polite.

02:34:03.000 It's just that...

02:34:05.000 Some people want to, like, hang out and be your friend all the time.

02:34:09.000 I just don't understand it.

02:34:15.000 You get the same expression that she's there.

02:34:18.000 I just... 0.99

02:34:20.000 I'm not trying to be a jerk. 0.97

02:34:22.000 I understand. 0.98

02:34:23.000 It just doesn't compute.

02:34:24.000 And so instead of, like, hey, we're all going to go down to the park, come with us, like, well, how about I just make you a really good book?

02:34:32.000 And...

02:34:33.000 And I'll price it as cheaply as I can.

02:34:36.000 Wow.

02:34:37.000 And we'll just let that be okay.

02:34:39.000 Wow.

02:34:39.000 How about I'll just email you and say, I hope you're having a good day, and we'll just let it go.

02:34:45.000 And you don't seem to have any problem with anything that you're doing.

02:34:48.000 There's not some things that you're trying to resolve or work through.

02:34:51.000 You found this thing.

02:34:53.000 You found this way to do it.

02:34:54.000 This is my groove.

02:34:55.000 I come from Washington, D.C. And I love that city.

02:34:59.000 And I go there every once in a while to visit.

02:35:01.000 And some nights I visit with my good pal Ian, of course.

02:35:04.000 But some nights I just walk.

02:35:06.000 I'm on my own.

02:35:07.000 And I walk to all my old jobs.

02:35:09.000 And I walk by apartment buildings I lived in.

02:35:11.000 But I walk by people's houses.

02:35:14.000 People I grew up with were these amazing musicians.

02:35:16.000 They all became big musicians.

02:35:17.000 And I know they're in there.

02:35:19.000 Sometimes I can even see them in the window.

02:35:21.000 Yeah.

02:35:22.000 I don't want to go in.

02:35:24.000 I just like walking by their place and knowing they're in there.

02:35:27.000 And like, literally, I've walked, I've seen someone I grew up with, like, on the street, and I go, oh, there he goes.

02:35:33.000 Okay.

02:35:34.000 Well, Henry, why don't you run up and tap him on the shoulder and say, hey, man!

02:35:37.000 No.

02:35:38.000 I just like the fact that I just saw him walking.

02:35:40.000 That's all I need.

02:35:41.000 Wow.

02:35:42.000 Yeah, it's weird.

02:35:43.000 And I've been like that since I can remember, and it gets more...

02:35:48.000 Like that, the older I get.

02:35:50.000 Well, that would make sense, because as you get older, you're more rigid in your ways, and your groove is cut deeper and deeper.

02:35:57.000 Yeah, and a lot of the stuff I do, it takes a bloody long time to finish it.

02:36:01.000 You want to write a book? 0.97

02:36:03.000 Man, you better get ready for the long haul, because you'll be working on that sucker two years later. 0.82

02:36:07.000 And, you know, it just never ends, like editing revisions. 0.90

02:36:10.000 And, you know, the tours I go on, it's not like two weeks, it's like 13 months.

02:36:16.000 Like, I'll see you next year.

02:36:18.000 You do that, and then you take time off, right?

02:36:20.000 You do like a long stretch, and then you take time away from the tour.

02:36:24.000 Yeah, and the only reason is if I had my way, I'd be on the road every year, and I'd have hours of new material, and no one would ever get tired of me coming to their city once a year.

02:36:32.000 And I used to tour like that for years.

02:36:33.000 I'd go out every year.

02:36:35.000 And people are like, Henry, we love you, man, but you've got to start coming here less often.

02:36:38.000 It's a little offensive.

02:36:40.000 You just keep coming like, hey, it's me again.

02:36:42.000 And so then I started doing it every other year.

02:36:44.000 And then my promoter types, who are happy to take their 15%, they said, Henry, we love you, man, but you can't keep coming so often.

02:36:53.000 People are just getting a little up to here with it.

02:36:55.000 Even every other year?

02:36:56.000 Yeah.

02:36:57.000 But spoken word?

02:36:58.000 Uh-huh.

02:36:59.000 I would think that that would be enough time.

02:37:01.000 Me too.

02:37:02.000 I wish it was.

02:37:03.000 And so I did what everyone told me to this time around, because I know these people are all smarter than me.

02:37:09.000 And they said, can you wait a little while longer?

02:37:12.000 And so the last big tour is 2012. And I went out again in 2016. That was four years.

02:37:18.000 Basically, I went from one presidential election to another.

02:37:21.000 And the ticket sales spiked everywhere.

02:37:27.000 London was like 1,500 more tickets than I've ever done there.

02:37:31.000 I sold out two nights at the Sydney Opera House in Sydney.

02:37:33.000 It was amazing.

02:37:34.000 And I said, what's that about?

02:37:36.000 They said, you waited.

02:37:37.000 He gave people a time to forget how long you talk for.

02:37:44.000 And so it's sad to think that I have to wait until 2020. But I can do a little weekend here, a weekend there, but I can't go do the lap I just did next year.

02:37:56.000 No way.

02:37:56.000 But you want to.

02:37:57.000 Oh, man.

02:37:59.000 Yeah.

02:38:00.000 Yeah.

02:38:00.000 I like being on stage.

02:38:02.000 I love being in front of those people.

02:38:03.000 I like giving.

02:38:05.000 I guess getting is the hard part.

02:38:08.000 Like when people applaud at the end of the show, I just get nervous.

02:38:11.000 I just want to run.

02:38:12.000 I stand there like 1-1000, 2-1000, 3-1000.

02:38:15.000 Okay, I'm out of here.

02:38:17.000 Wow.

02:38:18.000 Yeah.

02:38:18.000 It just makes me uncomfortable.

02:38:20.000 Wow. 1.00

02:38:21.000 Listen, Henry Rollins, you're a unique motherfucker. 0.99

02:38:23.000 I don't think I've ever met anybody like you. 0.99

02:38:24.000 Well, thank you, sir.

02:38:25.000 No, I know.

02:38:25.000 I know I have not ever met anybody like you.

02:38:28.000 But I appreciate you.

02:38:29.000 I appreciate what you're doing.

02:38:30.000 And I appreciate your attitude.

02:38:31.000 And it is very contagious.

02:38:33.000 It's very exciting.

02:38:34.000 Thank you, sir.

02:38:34.000 And infectious.

02:38:35.000 And thank you very much for doing this.

02:38:36.000 Thank you.

02:38:36.000 I really, really appreciate it.

02:38:37.000 Thank you.

02:38:38.000 You got it.

02:38:39.000 Henry Rollins, ladies and gentlemen.

The Joe Rogan Experience - January 26, 2017

Joe Rogan Experience #906 - Henry Rollins

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Transcript