Mental Health, Touring, Family Life, Creativity & Anxiety - Underoath

Gentlemen, welcome to the show. Thanks for having us. It's an honor, man. How long have you guys been playing together as a band? I've been in the band for 24 years. And it was like a It was a local band 2 years before that, so 26 years. Yeah. Right. We've been playing together for 24 years, though. Yeah. Have you got any idea how many shows you've done? No, I don't. Do you? 2500 maybe. Where'd you get that number from? 24 years. 100 shows a year. Something like that. There's been years where we've done 06 though. I remember. probably more. I got married the first time in '06 and we did that year we did over 300 shows. Holy [ __ ] Cuz I remember I got married in Salt Lake City and no honeymoon anything. 72 Hours Later, you know, Back on the Road. Back on the road. We with Taking Back Sunday. I remember that tour specifically. So it was us Taking Back Sunday and a band called um Armor for Sleep. I remember. They were the opener. Yeah. So I I we started that tour 3 days after I got married. So I bet you it's more than 100 a year. Yeah, we played over a hundred last year. So at least 2,000, maybe 3,000 maybe. I'd say 3 to 4,000 shows. Yeah, I'd say 30. You realize that's insane. It is. It's I mean I think it's weird to think about doing something for a quarter of a century. Like you hear people like, "Oh, I've been married for 30 years." You're like, "Wow, that's impressive." And then it's like, "Yeah, we've been in a band for 25 years." Like the same band. Yeah. Playing some of the same song. something. I was going to say, how many times have you played their only chasing safety? I mean, literally every single show probably brush red like those like the bigger quotation finger songs off that record. Y like something I think about a lot as you were just saying that I I think about this so much is the people I love the most in the world like my wife and children. I have spent more time with him than them. Do you know what I mean? And I don't know why it does it does a number on my head sometimes if I really if I really like if I get introspective about it. It [ __ ] me up for some reason. And I don't know why. I I think there's a piece of like there's a piece of guilt or something about that to me. And I I've never really talked about that but and I don't know if guilt is the right word but there's like a thing like if I think about the fact that like I love you and I love spending time with you but like if I think if I think about it it's strange and I don't know you know what do you think the emotion is when you feel it? The one that keeps coming into my mouth right now just looking at you is guilt because you spend x amount of time all the time away from your wife and children with someone else and what we do is fun. And I and I I'm cognizant enough to know that I shouldn't be guilty. That doesn't make any sense like technically but for some reason I feel that sometimes. Yeah. It's it's an interesting emotion when you love what you do. So, it's kind of it's I think if we were oil riggers and we had to leave for seven or eight months and we were in like the middle of the ocean like eating [ __ ] it'd be different cuz there's a sense of nobility and sacrifice. Yeah. That doesn't happen when you're [ __ ] like there's a type of intimacy I have with my bandmates that I'm never going to have with my wife. Like there's a type of intimacy that you have. Like if if you're dating a musician, there's a type of intimacy that that person has with a [ __ ] random keyboardist playing in an airport that you as a non-m musician will never ever know. A non-spoken synergy. Yeah. And it's like Yeah. Doing something you love it. It it it can almost creep in personally on both sides, like the wife, you know, our partner side and ours. It's like, oh, we have, you know, we've got to go to Austin and do all these things. And it's like, oh, you know, it's very easy to go, oh, it must be so difficult hanging out with like Chris or hanging out with your friends and going to the comedy mothership and all this stuff. And it's like, it's weird that this is our job, you know? It's weird that talking to you is something that I would do for fun because I'm a big fan of you and what you've done and the the kind of journey you've been on. And then for that to be a priority because we happen to be in this weird public figure business thing is just Yeah. It's not work. It's like a It's like a velvet prison in a way. It's a very strange kind of sort of like golden handcuffsy type thing. And uh I I got sent this the other day. I wanted to read you guys this and get your get your thoughts on this. It's an essay called The Raw Truth About Touring and Mental Health. Touring breaks people in ways that most don't talk about and the industry rarely admits. At its core, touring is chronic displacement. You're always somewhere else. No routine, no grounding, no permanence. Your nervous system never lands. You live in fight or flight, travel delays, high pressure shows, interpersonal tension, constant over stimulation. There's no decompression and no off switch. And emotionally, touring swings between extremes. One night it's 1500 people screaming. The next it's a silent hotel room. You go from deep connection to total isolation over and over again. That kind of cycle burns out even the most resilient people. But the culture of touring rewards stoicism and punishes vulnerability. You're expected to power through, joke about it, drink through it, avoid it, and the deeper you go, the harder it becomes to admit you're unraveling because your whole identity is tied to the road. Your worth becomes about being needed, useful, reliable. So when your body screams, "I can't." Your mind says, "You have to. There's no road map for recovery, no built-in support, no decompression protocol. And when you finally make it home, you don't feel home." You feel disoriented and numb, out of place. No one around you quite understands what you've been through. And honestly, you don't either. The truth is touring is beautiful, but it can also dismantle you. And pretending it doesn't is why so many are suffering in silence. Admitting the toll doesn't make you weak. It makes you honest. And that honesty is where real change begins. Yeah. Yeah. Did you That's Did you write that? No. That that is s on Instagram. I got it sent to me. Yeah. I mean, I think all of that rings true to me in a lot of ways. I think there's an arrested development that happens in touring where it you have to make a conscious decision to grow up because it's very feasible and almost encouraged to not. What does not growing up look like? Um I mean we've all done it. Uh we grew up in public unfortunately unfortunately for us. Um I think having a tour manager, having an agent, having writers tells you what to do every day. your food's brought to you. Having shoppers, runners, you need anything. Drop of a hat, it's taken care of. You lose uh value of substances. You lose value of money and value of time because it's just excess all the time. And it it it's not like this massive toxic thing all the time. It could just be we always get a loaf of bread and five things of deli meat and nobody touches them and we just throw it out like things that in a normal construct you would be like what are you doing? But in touring it's like how are you not doing that you know? Um and then that's the very baseline all the way up to love commitment. How like relationships are really hard. Um, I mean, we know a lot of people in the industry that don't know themselves and don't know how to coexist with a partner. Why? What does it do to relationships and intimacy? Well, I don't know cuz I've been with the same woman my whole life. Um, but my perception is that it displaces purpose and replaces that idea with other things like instant gratification. Like the same way we were just talking about this earlier, but the same way like pornography is not positive for anyone. The people doing it, the people consuming it, it kind of just stretches out something that should be this one way into something that it never should have been. And I think that happens a lot on tour. I'll take one of those as well. Get in there. Mine's lost its flavor. Oh, you just That's when you know that you need another one. Take some of those suckers. Thank you. For the people that are listening, we're powering ourselves with nicotine via wood delivery system, dude. sucking on a cricket bat. I think I think a big yeah like a big answer to the thing is the the obvious thing with love is is absence but the biggest piece of it I know in my own life and we could talk about this for 3 hours cuz that just [ __ ] me up and in ways that I can't understand to you and I want to talk about something we'll go back into it. I want to talk about something specifically in there but I want to get to this love it got all the time in the world. I want to get to this love bit for a second. We go to work and we play in front of thousands of people and like you said everything is disposable in a sense. You know what I mean? Like you can have whatever you want. Truly like I can if I wanted to I could ask a tour manager to get me cocaine. I can do that. I want a new game boy at every show on my tech rider. No, I'm not joking. Whatever you want. Yeah. Like whatever you want. Whatever you want. And when you and when you get home, you're and it changes through various stages of life obviously. But where I'm at in my life now, I'm 42. I'll be 42 next month. And I have two children. And I get home and my wife has said this to me in colorful words sometimes is we haven't stopped living like we haven't. So I get home and expect like time time give me time, give me time, give me time. not only give me time but give me this deep bright level of intimacy that I need and crave and feel like I have been out here working so I don't get that and it's impossible I'm hungry for being parched and it's and it feels impossible to get on the road you know in a certain way like well there's no physical as long as you're being faithful and we all are so yeah so you get home and she always says to me she goes Aaron give me a couple days to like get used to having you here even to like hear your footsteps in the house, you know, and to like to see you with our daughter. And it's emotional for me because it's my reality, you know what I mean? And it hurts. I cuz I want her to just be like, you know, in not so many words, like come here, let me [ __ ] you and love you and like let's do the whole thing. And that's not reality for anybody. Well, it's it's too intermittent for that. You know, you do a normal 9 to5. You leave on the morning, you come back in, maybe wife runs up and jumps and gives you a hug. Uh, when you walk through the door, hooray. Yeah. You're away for 6 weeks at a time. What's the What's like an average medium length tour? Like a six week six weeks. Six six weeks. Something like that. We did one last year that was 12 weeks, [ __ ] It was. Um, and that's across time zones. That's the intermittent contact. That's all the rest of this stuff. And um if you have been away for that long, that's not I missed you today. That's I got used to life without you. I got used to a type of life that you were not in. And I'm aware that you went away from one peak experience of deep connection with your family to another peak experience of deep connection with your art form. But I kind of went through this insane acceleration deceleration process. I've had to develop all of these coping mechanisms emotionally to work out how to like split or like compartmentalize my heart so that I can open it up when you're here, but so that I'm able to silo it off when you're not cuz if I still have it open when you're not here, then it [ __ ] tears me up and you're up until 3:00 in the morning, 4 in the morning on the tour bus and I don't know what you're doing and I don't know who you're with and there's all of these screaming fans and you've got this like crazy but like yuck. Yeah, it's I used to come home and we just, you know, you end tours on weekends like, you know, your last show's Sunday or Monday or whatever it is and I just come home on a Tuesday and I'd get off the plane, Uber home and the house would just be empty and it's like, you know, the kids are at school, you know, and I'll come back to that. But to your point, like your kids are at school, your kids have, you know, extracurricular activities, your wife's has a doctor's appointment, and it it was that it was like, yo, I'm home. And you expect like this big parade very selfishly, like I'm back from war where also the like the tour continues cuz you start the tour and I imagine opening show, you know, like let's have a beer, let's do the whatever. It's like, hey, where's the fun fair and the banners and it's like no, you're not you don't get the special treatment no more. You're here with you're not [ __ ] guitarist, singer, [ __ ] drummer guy. You're dad and like frankly you're kind of like new dad or like absent dad that's now come back. Yeah. There's a you need to make it up to us, not us making. It's a weird thing to have a 15-year-old and realize I've only been physically in her life for maybe seven years if you act actually chop it up. Yep. You know, if I'm gone half the year, then if my 10-year-old is 10, I've only seen that child grow up for five of those 10 years, which is that's a that's a vacuum that you can't let yourself get sucked into because it will destroy you and it makes you You mean that kind of reflection, that kind of thought process? Yeah. It's it's good to reflect on it. And I think that kind of goes back to the arrested development. You have to see those things and look them in the eyes and not try to cope them away or forget them. But it has to come from a place of self-reflection to then inform your next step, which is how do you treat this person? And when you go on tour and you have all these people waiting on you hand and foot and then you come, you get home after 10 weeks and it's the first time you've had to do a dish. It's the first time you've had to take out a literal trash bag. And so I think a lot of people, thankfully for us, we do a good job of keeping each other in check, but I've seen a lot of people almost feel like home is the least valuable place cuz it's the only place that you have responsibility. So you go from, you know, screaming fans and girls and you can't go to a bar within 2 miles of the club without getting recognized and it's wow, wow, wow, wow, wow. And then you come home and it's like, take out the trash, pick up, can you pick up those socks? Can you fold that laundry? And it almost feels like the domesticated home life is the least exciting like that feels like work. Real real work is when you were at home. And it's meaningful work if you view it that way. It's a it's an honor to serve my wife and kids, but if I view it way, it could it could tear you apart. You expect it to be grounding. I think that's the biggest problem is when you're on the road you are like I can say for me and I I can probably speak for you but what you do you and this sounds cliche but what you do you do for them you know what I mean like you you you're making a living for your family and you work hard for your family in in the way that we do and then you get home and you have felt ungrounded or unmed for however many 6 8 12 whatever the [ __ ] it is and you get home and you expect to feel grounded You know what I mean? You expect that you're going to feel grounded cuz it's the person you love. It's your offspring and you expect to feel grounded. But what they need to feel grounded is you to pick up the [ __ ] socks or you to whatever. Yeah. You know what I mean? And make it up to me. Like you've just been away for 2 months. Totally. Make it up to me. I I think if you can get out of your headsp space and make it less about you, which is the point of life in general is to be of service to others, and the more you do that, the more you find the true purpose of being a human. Um, but it it's intimately attached to your wife and kids in a way that I don't think it could be replicated. Like, it's almost like if you've never been on tour or if you're on tour, but you just have a girlfriend, you don't understand what we're saying right now. like there's something else that like heightens it. It's all the same subset. It's all the same data sets. They're just infused with like volume's louder. Yeah. It's just it turns everything up a notch. And I I think it's important for all of us to recognize that and then also recognize what tour is capable of doing and then avoiding those things at all costs. Well, like like I think it's probably a rarity that I've been with my wife for 18 years and have only been with with my wife for 18 years on tour. Mhm. You know what I mean? I think that's a rarity. You're an out. It should be standard protocol, but it's not. Well, it's also that's also it's socially accepted that somebody who is a rockstar Yeah. I've had people be like, "Yeah, you're married, but you're in Milwaukee." Like, this is how this works. because we know that marriage laws don't apply in Milwaukee. Milwaukee is the place, brother. No, but but literally there's like there's women that know we're married and there's women that still try to uh disrupt that functioning, flourishing relationship. And I'm like, it's so easy to fall into those traps. And then what's interesting too is one of the hardest things for me is watching people fall in love theoretically with people that love what they do. Like there is no better feeling than having a partner who thinks you're the sickest. You know what I mean? Rule. So if you Yeah. If you bounce around with fan girls, a regular woman who's her own individual person who wants different things in life almost feels boring. She's not impressed by like look at this [ __ ] riff that I just wrote. That's nice, but this sock. Yeah, that's nice, but what about dinner date tonight? That's nice, but like let me tell you about the wheels on the bus go round and round that I did with the kids that I teach today. Yep. And you have to lean into them as much as they lean into you. And I think for me growing up, I met my wife when we were possibly at our biggest or when we became what we are year uh 2005. Yeah. So right in the middle. And I had seen that pattern flipping around. And my friend's like, "Dude, you got to meet my girlfriend's sister." I'm like, "I am not interested in women right now. Like it's too sticky." It's like I don't know why they like me. Is it because of this or is it because of who I am and vice versa? verse reasoning. Yeah. And and my wife is like, I don't listen to your music and I don't listen to like this style at all. And I was like, check. Like, let's go get a coffee. Like, let's go try this out. And then here we are. Your complete uninterest in my career is the most attractive thing you could have said to me. It was attractive to me. Yeah. But then there's then there's other people who literally view it the complete opposite. And that's what I mean by like the Arrested Development. Like literally what you just read is the path and you just have to read that before you go on the journey to look out for potholes. They don't become that. But if you do it if you do it the typical way, if you come up in touring in the typical way, it let's say we met 20 years ago and we sat across from one another with these cricket bats filled with nicotine and you read that to me. There's no world where that would have been anything that would have grabbed me in any way. There's sentences I could have gleaned, you know, information from, but I don't and that my energy sometimes goes up and down. Sometimes I feel lonely in a hotel room. Yeah. But I guess at the beginning it's like we sleep on a bus or we say for you know for us we we did it the oldfashioned way where you go to Buffalo and there's four people and you go back a year later and there's 50 and you go back 10 years later and there's 3,000. Like we did van y shitty van, nicer van, you know, RV bus. Like we did it that traditional way. And I just wish that I wish that there was that somebody told me could could have succinctly told me that and made sense to me. Have I Have you guys heard me do my bit about unteachable lessons? You talk about this. Yeah. So, it's just there's certain things that we can't learn through explanation only through experience. Yes. And uh I get the sense that the raw truth about touring and mental health is is one of those things that you can warn people and it's the same um you're not in love with that girl, she's just hot and difficult to get. Money won't make you happy. Fame won't fill your self-worth problem. You should probably speak to your parents more. You shouldn't work as hard. You need to spend more time in a hammock. Like all of these things are lessons that we we disregard because they sound either cliche or purposefully um like paradoxical. It's like, oh yeah, being a rockstar is hard. Like you have to say that. That's like you paying your due in a way. We say it all the time. Oh, I got to go work for an hour. Boohoo. We say yeah. And it's like you making the normies feel okay. And in many ways when people can see all of the be like a billionaire saying that their money made them feel empty inside. Will Smith Will Smith said when I was poor and miserable I had hope. When I was rich and miserable I was despondent. Like cuz he thought that money was going to fix his self worth problem but it didn't. I heard him talk about that. Yeah. And when you have achieved the thing that you think was going to be the thing that was going to fix the problem still empty. You're like oh [ __ ] And now the solution's gone. Yeah. In other news, this episode is brought to you by Momentous. If your workouts feel flat, your recovery is slow, or you've just been feeling off, it might not be your training plan or diet, might be something a bit more boring, like your testosterone. So, if you're not performing in the gym or the bedroom the way that you want, or you just want to naturally improve your testosterone, tonatali is a fantastic researchback place to start. And when this is stacked with zinc can make a huge improvement in testosterone production, strength, recovery, and energy, which is why I'm such a huge fan of Momentous's zinc. It supports testosterone, boosts vitality, and helps keep everything running like it should. And if you're still unsure, Momentus offers a 30-day money back guarantee, so you can buy it and try it for 29 days. If you don't love it, they'll give you your money back. Plus, they ship internationally. Right now, you can get 35% off your first subscription and that 30-day money back guarantee by going to the link in the description below or heading to live momentous.com/modernwisdom and using the code modernwisdom at checkout. That's lim nu li.com/modern wisdom and modern wisdom at checkout. So, I think that this is one of those a little bit of one of those unteable lessons. And dude, let me [ __ ] roll this for you. As difficult as almost everybody in the industry has it, imagine how much harder it is if you're a woman. Oh yeah. If you're a female rock star. Yep. Now what? Now how you how are you navigating that? I saw it firsthand when Under Oro broke up for a period of years. I left in 2010. I quit. And then Under broke up from 2012 to 11. 16. And in that time I played drums for Parmore. Oh [ __ ] Haley Williams. Yeah. So I spent almost 5 years or whatever on the road with her and they sell out like [ __ ] Madison Square Garden twice in a row. But what you're talking about I saw firsthand and she's Is she a mom? No. No, she wasn't then. I don't think she is now. Is she? No. But she would she would kind of like hearing you say that. Imagine how much harder I would see. I got a glimpse of seeing that. And they she didn't distance herself much from us, you know, from the band, but she distanced herself a bit. And I at the time I was 29 or 30 or whatever and I would think like why does she distance herself from us? You know she had her own dressing room and there's the obvious reasons why but like I think even more so she she felt a different type of isolation and a different type of like unoring a different type of unsettling. You know where do you think that's coming from? I don't know. No, I I I mean I can imagine it's hard to be a female in rock and roll music, which is a predominantly male centered and fronted thing, but also for her, she came up in it so young. Like when Paramore signed their first record deal, I think she was when we met her, she was 14. A child. The drummer was the drummer was 11. Like the original drummer when we met them, we played at a place called Blue Sky Court in Nashville. I remember remember this show. Yeah. It was hotter than the devil's butt. And she she was 15 years old. [ __ ] You know what I mean? She was on Taste of Chaos tour opening and it was it was before Paramore. It was just Haley Williams and it was her and an acoustic. She was like 14 or 15. Is Paramore a like pseudo solo project? How much is it solo? She she something she says a lot and me spending time there is she always she would always scribble like probably once every 10 shows she would put a white tank top on and scribble param more as a band on it. Like that's her she is vehemently like this is abandoned. This is not the Haley Williams. says, "But I think that I think that she feels and I I don't want to speak out of turn, but I think she feels heavy pressure the other direction because if you were her and you look like she does and you dance like she does and you have this great talent that she does, the back I can see how the suits would be like the back you need to push her out of focus, guys." Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And she doesn't want that. They're all a band. They all write the music together. M um but by nature yeah that's something that only in the last 12 to 6 months I've listened to this music for over 20 years now I actually spent this a cool story about you guys so I spent when I was 21 years old I spent my final £10 to drive from Edinburgh where I was doing my placement year to go and see you guys play in Glasgow to put fuel in the car really to drive and then I came back And I had the choice between being being able to afford food that night. I was a uni student running a huge events company. What year was this? 200 8 2008 in Glasgow. Crazy. Uh I think that would have been just after Define the Great Line. I remember came out. It's a brick building. I remember the show. Yeah. Yeah. On the main strip. Yeah. Uh so I I drove to go and see you guys. uh and then and then went back. So anyway, I've been around this sort of world for a very long time and it's only within the last 6 to 12 months that I've realized how many bands that are ostensibly bands outwardly are solo projects inwardly. We actually talked about that uh a while ago. More and more now than there ever has. Yeah. Real bands like fullon groups that all have equal contribution andor veto power are dwindling. No, it's not even hiding though. I mean it it is if you just look at hey this is called a band and not a person's name but anybody can go and work this out and you know it's not it's not to say that anything is better or worse in terms of the way that you put things together but it's certainly a much more a much different kind of dynamic but for anybody that listens to any kind of music if it's a group go on Spotify go on a track and just on press on the song credits look at the song credits and see how many people are credited it's like huh those two people aren't they don't seem to be in the band it's like yeah that's a producer producer and that's maybe a like some session songwriter drummerry type person but yeah that that's a a whole I'm like what the [ __ ] kind of like you know Ronny Radkkey or something like that you go okay like kind of evidently like that's a [ __ ] insane project type thing but you go the rabbit hole of that stuff goes pretty deep it's pretty interesting it does it's deeper than you even realize a lot of it is not just you're talking about the creativity of it all like the you know producer A wrote this song and and songwriter B wrote this song but there's a lot of that wholeheartedly is a solo project like business-wise like the other four guys don't get to say you know can we have this kind of bus can we have this on the writer even like I I there's more and I it's uncouthed to speak about and I never would but there's if I told you all of them that are that way you'd be very surprised like I can't count them on my fingers and toes is that a function of uh bands struggling to get coordination from a creative standpoint and power struggles happening. Yeah. I think something I've observed is this new it's me, I'm calling it this and then you guys work for me kind of structure is from people who have already been in bands. Like it's like the it's like the next evolution I think like when you for us it's like a marriage, right? It's like it's hard enough being married to one person. We're actually married to five people and we have to manage everyone's mental health and physical health and who's getting sick and whose kids coming when and you know all of these things and [Music] it's it would be so much easier if it was just my band. I pick when we go on tour based on my schedule. I tell you who you're like we can't go on tour at that point. It's our anniversary. We can't go on tour at that point. It's the wife's birthday. The kids birthday. I mean, I'm playing I'm playing a show on my wife's birthday this summer. Like, literally, I'm going to be in Canada and I have to look at these guys and then look at my wife and go, I'm screwed here either way. So, that's the [ __ ] up guilt part, but it's true. And then I have to literally weigh like do I tell five people in our band and then all the surrounding people like our crew, manager, agent, even though you did your job and got us this opportunity to make some money, I'm going to say nobody here gets to eat because it's my wife's person. That must be difficult to do. Yeah. And and we've done a really good job of navigating it, but there was there was a time where it's like we're not doing this ever. That doesn't work. And then there's there was a time we said yes to everything. That's not sustainable. And you only arrive at this place, I think, after, to your point, an unteachable lesson over decades. I forget who it was, but you had someone on your podcast talking about something about falling in love and staying in love. Really brilliant guy. Arthur Brooks. Brilliant. Bald dude who sat there. Oh, cool. Yeah. And he he was talking about stage one, two, three, and four. Yep. And like stage one is where people get stuck in relationships. And that's where people get stuck in a lot of things. And then you kind of push through to stage four where it's like that's my brother. He's crazy. I'm crazy. We don't do the same things at all. But it's we're past that. But you know how you get to stage four was eye contact and touch. It's oxytocin bonding to push you through the serotonin dump. You get to come out on the other side, which is precisely the thing that being apart from your partner stops you from being able to develop. burns the newness. Yeah, I have to imagine that the um there is a lot of sort of cyclical I mean it seems like not for you but there has to be a lot of cyclical dating when someone maybe even somebody who I really want a partner I want a long-term relationship I want to make this work and you go you can never progress you're in this permanent like holiday romance thing where you're back home two weeks it's like a fling it's not a relation we have someone very close to us who's been in a fling for 20 years with I mean different You know what I mean? But it's rinse and repeat. Yeah. Yeah. And and I think I honestly think with this individual and I I not hyperbole. I I really believe that he craves and needs deep real intimacy, connection, reality, and he keeps rinsing and repeating trying to find it because he's chasing that oxytocin feeling, you know. Yeah. And it's it it's really interesting to like unpack all of that with one person, let alone five at the same time. I mean, Aaron's probably walked me through the hardest times of my life more than anyone in my family has. Like my dad died, we were on tour. He saw meltdown, you know, passed out in the front lounge for a whole tour. or dad has cancer, but I got to go work and what do I do? Literally, you reading that, I'm like, oh, I am in there. I'm not there now, but I've been everything you just read. And I think the easiest thing to do is, well, my next project, that was so that was so tough. I don't want to do that again. It's almost like if my wife left me, I wouldn't want to get married again because to have a good marriage is so much pain and work. And it's worth every cent of it and every second of the time spent crying together, fighting together, working through things together to get to that other side. But it's not easy. And everyone It's also not worth it if the end result is you falling just before the finish line or if the if the if the race ends up finishing. Yeah. Yeah. You know, and and it's like I think that's where solo projects with other guys come in. It's like I was in a band for 20 years. I don't want to be in another band. I would never start another band. I would literally start my thing. But you take all of that. We've we've both been all of those things. And I did do a side project. I remember. Yeah. And I brought all of this to the side project. And I thought the whole time here I have I have here here. I thought the whole time they might have dried out some. you might have started something with this. Um, the whole time I thought I have a severe um I have severe anxiety issue and the fight orflight thing is I've been in fight or flight for in varying degrees for 25 years and the work that I do around that is lifegiving and lifealtering. And I've probably been to the ER 250 times in the last 20 years with anxiety. And we can get into it later if you want. But the whole the what I'm saying is I I took all that with me. All this baggage, if you want to call it baggage, whatever you want to whatever you want to put on it. Like I just took it with me to this side project and it was worse. And I think that's why, you know, when we started this conversation of how many bands are actually solo project, there is a there's a a modicum of like this isn't a great thing. when you said it like I don't know exactly what you meant but I had this feeling that you're there's there's some dishnestness or something about it when you hear about a band that you know whatever and I think that's because that individual was in a band once like he said and they take it to the next thing and it doesn't fix anything if you're broken if you're broken and you're out of sorts and your priorities are out of whack changing the room does what? We'll get back to talking in one second, but first, this episode is brought to you by AG1. I've been drinking AG1 every morning for years now, and it just got even better. 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Right now, you can get a free year supply, vitamin D3, K2, and five free AG1 travel packs, and that 90-day money back guarantee by going to the link in the description below or heading to drinkag1.com/modernwisdom. That's drinkagg.com/modern wisdom. Yeah, getting all of the ving veto voting power makes no difference. That being said, but on paper, it feels great. But also on the flip side of that, if you have great vision, wonderful songwriter, all of the contacts, you're a healthy person in a well- reggulated relationship, you now get to do exactly what you want and your creative output is completely unbounded. That's a dream. I just wonder how many people are able to to reach that. Yeah. Didn't work for me. I mean, I I don't know. I don't know if we've reached it. I think in varying degrees we have. I don't know if we ever will. And maybe that's the whole point is like you just keep trying and you're you're never going to get it right. You know, I'll never have a perfect show. I will never be able to take my wife on the perfect date. And I think that life is designed that way on purpose. Cuz to your point, like when you have the perfect show and you have the perfect date and there's nowhere else to go but down from here, what's the point of doing what about if you have played the perfect show 300 times, but you refuse to let yourself actually believe that? Because if you did, then there would be this unreasonable next level. So, I think about it with regards to my show. Um, every time that we hit a new uh launch velocity on plays, let's say we do a million plays in in a day, it's like, "Holy [ __ ] that's insane. Million plays in a day." Immediately, two things come into my mind. The first one is, "That's [ __ ] great." And the second one is, "Holy [ __ ] the minimum bar for acceptable performance has just been taken up like double." So every time that you reach a new level of performance, not only is it a cause for celebration, but it's a cause for anxiety because anything less than that becomes a sense of insufficiency moving forward. Dude, I I think so launch of an album. I wanted I really wanted to get into this as well. Yeah. The uh analyticalization of music. Yeah. the fact that you guys have got Spotify for artist dashboards on the back end and you know exactly track on track where we were at, how many plays, what's the monthly at this album we're counting down or will waterfall release all of the singles so that we can get we can like bump the plays back up again. It's gamesmanship. It used to be it used to be tangible. So there used to be this thing called sound scan. So like Soundscan was literally like a big calculator that counted records sold. Okay. Still exists. It still exists, but it's now it's not the main the main metric now is what you're talking about. It used to be you'd have a your merch guy or whatever had a piece of paper and however many CDs or albums you sold out that they would just take a box and you would send it in. And the tangibility of it for me made it easier to process. I don't know how to explain why. And we could get into it, but like it's so weird now because people will say numbers to me about an album release or how many how many times something is streaming and I'll be like, "Okay, is that good?" And I the number will be large and I'll think it's great. And then I'll open my phone and band X or Y will have, you know, quadrillion plays first week and I'm like, well, [ __ ] Like, I guess that means I'm a piece of [ __ ] Well, one of the ways that behaviorism gets reinforced is the speed of the feedback loop. Yeah. So, the tie to the feedback loop. That's one of the reasons why I have massive envy over guys that get to do stuff live. comedian friends of mine, musician friends of mine that uh first off, you have feedback that happens in person. That's very positive, very reinforcing and it happens instantly. You play a [ __ ] cool riff, you sing a great note, the crowd reacts immediately. You can feel it. You put a good out maybe press the thumbs up button and it's this totally sterile arbitrary number that has no emotional salience to it at all. And in some ways that's good because you think okay I'm less at the mercy of some of the emotional fluctuations. You get your stability elsewhere. You do. But on the flip side, you go, "Fuck." Like that's a lot of work to not get the the like requisite equivalent amount of positive reinforcement that you want. So you have to find your motivation from elsewhere too. Yeah. I I mean I think I think it's to answer your first question to circle back to that. I think it is I think it's really toxic um without contentment. Like I think it was really easy for us. I I'll give you an example. I think it when we uh for I don't is there a more is there a better word than blew up when we when our bro when our band came out and we were whatever number two on Bill we had our moment we were selling out everything and we were in theory at least in our little scene the biggest band for a few years you you have this like we're on top how do we help everyone below us and then you fast forward and it's really easy to be a positive community focused person when you're at the top. You know, it's like you're big bank account. It's very easy to be charitable. Yeah. If you're a Rogan, you you want to give everyone a thing because you're at the top and you're in a super position and and it's almost natural. It's it's not even a sacrifice. And then you fast forward and we take out Spirit box and we take out Bad Omens and they're opening for us three years ago and now they're selling out arenas and we're playing the exact same room that they opened for us. We have not moved and they have gone nuclear. And it's interesting because you really see the person you are if when that happens, you're happy for them or if you're jealous of them, you know? And I think it's I I' we've seen it in our small circles of like as soon as that band pops, it's oh, it's because they have a mask or it'll be that like you start making excuses because you're feeling not validated. And it's like there are bands that are 10 times bigger than us that suck. And there are bands that are 10 times better than us that will never leave their small town. And that's just how the universe works. And you may never have 50 million, but you may have five. And is it worth stressing over how to get to six? Or can you just go, "Dude, look at me. I'm, you know, reasonably wealthy. I'm in great shape. I have a very successful podcast." Like, I have nothing to complain about. But then there's always a northstar. As soon as you ratchet down, your aim gets higher and higher and higher. Well, this is a habituation problem, right? That you play a show, that's your new minimum baseline. Yeah. Okay. Well, does that mean that anything that isn't that becomes failure? So, um to some people, yes. Well, let me give you it does feel that way. Let me give you this from a different industry to yours, uh books, authors. So, Mark Manson, good friend of mine, uh his first book actually is from 2013. It's called Models. It's one of the best books for guys that want to learn how to be more attractive to women. It kind of came out of the I guess like elevated pickup artist world where it wasn't like icky. It was seen the book. I just want to I just want to improve myself and you know find a find a good woman. Um but then he writes the subtle art of not giving a [ __ ] in like 2018 something like that. And uh this thing's been on the New York Times bestseller list for like 250 weeks. Every airport has like 18,000 copies. Atomic Kabits by James Clear. Morgan Hustell, The Psychology of Money. I've spoken to each of these guys individually. Mark said to me, he's like, "The worst thing that I could have done was have a book that went that big cuz every book after that's going to feel like a failure. Every single book that I write will never be as big as that one." How do you uh But we deal with that. It's like we we go on tour and we have a new record out and you know it's the place after this one and it's all about that and then the songs do well and then we play a 20-year-old song and the place explodes. And you have a choice in that moment. You can be grateful and be like, "Holy crap, we wrote this song in my mom's living room or our local church when we were 19 and now we're 40 and there's 2,000 people screaming." Every single word. This song again or same data set. We peaked when we were 19. Everything we've done since then's been dog [ __ ] How do you know? Nobody Nobody cares about my band. They just care about this one stupid record I wrote 20 years ago. It's like the author Those internal dialogues are all getting a drink at the same bar all the time. How do you navigate that emotionally, man? Honestly, I think uh for all the [ __ ] that we give it, growing up Christian really helped. Like having something whether it's real or not, we debate till to this day. We've shed all of it pretty much. But from a young age being baked in with your life is not your life. This is not the Tim or the Chris or the Aaron show. We are small pieces of sand and our job is to make the most beautiful beach out of this and we're a small part and just the almost the forceful humility and the forceful like what is what is life and it's it's never about us and all of those things which can be overexposed toxic and toxic literally and they have been but I think once you back out of that and you balance it and you kind of get all the the levers and everything's kind of balancing on a very thin edge. Uh it just turns it's almost like how can you not just be grateful like there's there is no other option you know I'm proud of Bare Tooth. I'm proud of Bad Omens and you know it's such a drain to try to listen to bands that are bigger than you and listen to their new song and pick it apart. Uh it's just it's not good for anyone and it's not helping you become better. It's just making you more violent in turmoil inside, you know. Um and I Yeah. I don't know. For me, I always go back to all I ever wanted to do was sell out the State Theater in St. Pete, which holds like 500 people. 500 people. All I ever wanted to do was play there, which we did. One of my first shows was opening for a band called Moss Feaster with Under Oath and which is named after a funeral home crematory. I thought about that in so long. So my first show at the band was playing state theater. We played first to nobody to 40 people or whatever. And I was like, man, how sick would it be if we were like the last band? We didn't know about headliner and direct support and two of we we didn't know anything. She's like, "What if we played late when people are here and then we sold that out and then everything else is just kind of unfolded?" And if you can remember where you came from and why you did it in the first place, this is all a blessing. It is not a game. I think you're really good at optimization and you have a lot of guests talking about, you know, if you want to go from here, do here and then IPOs and everyone's always trying to ratchet, ratchet, ratchet, ratchet, ratchet in a good way. But for us, I I we didn't set out for this to be our career, you know, and you could see the bands that do. And if it's your career, then it's different. We happened to be here. Like, we're here. I don't know what I'm saying. I have a theory. How many friends do you talk to? I've been thinking about this for the last 15 minutes. How many friends do you talk to that say this? Oh, I loved their first album. When you're talking about an artist, you're talking about artist X, Y, Z. They go, oh, I loved their first album. It's the And I think Lewis Capali is a good example of that. Yeah. And I think with our band, we're an example of that. And it it it hurts me to say it sometimes because I do think that we I know we work so hard on our new music and I we work so hard on optimizing the way we run our business and how much stuff can we bring in house and what can we purchase versus rent all this stuff. But I think that people like why is bad omens bigger and why is this that why is this that and the other thing? I I don't I don't know the answer but I think I know a piece of the answer. And I think when you make your first thing, you know, like this the subtle art of not giving a [ __ ] wasn't his first thing, but it was like basically it was bas basically. And I think that and I started thinking about this when you said that our first album it was it was honest. There was no reason we did it other than the fact that we wanted to. We weren't following something. We weren't thinking about what was next. We weren't even thinking about being big or popular or cool or any of those things. So now everything we do is like you said, it's hearkening back to that. But I think the first album syndrome theory is because the public feels that earnestness and that honestness, a word that I hate, that au that authenticity. You know what I mean? Like when we wrote They're Only Chasing Safety, there wasn't never a moment. I promise I can say this with with glee in my heart. We never thought a bunch of people will sing this in 20 years time. I never ever for any reason had that thought. I love the word earnest. It's one of my favorite ones. The bravery to take your emotions seriously. Yeah. Earnest. Yeah. I mean, you're not worrying about sucking and you're not worrying about failing. And I think that that's this whole thing. That's why people start side projects. That's why people chase the the rabbit, the dragon, whatever it is. So, if you will, with this business, with this art form, yeah, is because you're you're you're you're chasing something you and this is this is a huge generalization and assumption, but that you'll never get again. Like, no matter how hard Lewis Kapaldi tries, I don't think you're going to get that record again. Before we continue, if you haven't been feeling as sharp or energized as you'd like, getting your blood work done is the best place to start. Which is why I partnered with Function because they run lab tests twice a year that monitor over 100 biomarkers. They've got a team of expert physicians that take the data, put it in a simple dashboard, and give you actionable insights and recommendations to improve your health and lifespan. They track everything from your heart health to your hormone levels, your thyroid function, and nutrient deficiencies. They even screen for 50 types of cancer at stage one, which is five times more data than you get from an annual physical. Getting your blood work drawn and analyzed like this would usually cost thousands. But with Function, it is only $500. And right now, the first thousand people can get an additional $100 off, meaning it's only 400 bucks to get the exact same blood panel that I use. Just go to the link in the description below or head to functionhealth.com/modernwisdom. That's functionhealth.com/modernwisdom. when you mentioned about some of the challenges you've had with anxiety, nervous system regulation coming back down. Did you see um How I'm Feeling Now, the documentary about Lewis? Uhuh. Dude, it's on Netflix. It's It is like I know he's had struggles. It is [ __ ] cannon if you're a musician to watch this thing. So, I must I must talk about this like every every month. He uh writes his first album. I mean, he he blows up from a song video that was him playing in some random pub in the AR end of Scotland singing this song that he'd written when he was 16 and then he sort of slowly builds up this album. I think he releases it maybe when he's 19, something like that. And then it's billions, billions of streams, everything, every single everything. And he's got this really interesting way of presenting. He's very self-deprecating. He's very very sort of British in that way. He doesn't take himself too seriously. He's not glamorous, you know? Yeah. He like very self facing in the way that he he shows up. And then COVID happens and the documentary starts in CO and it's him in his mom and dad's old house in Scotland and he's in this back shed thing which very nice right recording studio and it's like the wall is just platinum record platinum record gold record platinum record platinum record award award award like D and his day-to-day life is him having had his entire childhood adolescence and early adulthood to write his first album and then the pressure of the biggest record labels on the planet saying Hey, how are we going with uh anything in the second album? How's anything? And he develops um a like twitch. He develops this nervous twitch over time uh that it turns out is Tourette's. So, he's got this predisposition for Tourette's, but it's 100% brought on by this. And then what you want is for there to be some wonderful conclusion, some sort of victorious hero moment at the end. And one of the final shows of the entire uh documentary, he steps out on stage and he's so nervous he can't sing the songs and his dad and his mom are in the crowd and his dad sprints from the seat to like be backstage to like hold his son. Yeah. And it like tears them up. and he went out and did Glastonbury. I think he might have done Glastonbury two years in a row and not been able to perform like got to stage and then shut down. Wow. Like multiple times and uh that that was that's like it's still it's one of the most formative things I've ever watched. And it taught me two lessons. First one, there's this bit partway through and uh he's explaining about this sort of, you know, wild trajectory of what's happened. He turns straight to the camera and he goes, "People think that fame changes you. Fame doesn't change you. Just changes everybody around you." And I was like, "Holy [ __ ] that's deep." Yeah. And then the second thing it made me realize is that there there are some people who have the skill set to be unbelievably famous and successful, but a disposition that is not very um comfortable with it. Or you could say there are some people that are built to be uh so talented that they would be famous but they can't deal with the fame and that be an introvert or whatever. I mean I think I think fame in general is not healthy. I mean, I think with technology and everything being everywhere, like now I can hear about a girl who was kidnapped and beaten up in Iowa and now I'm wearing that and it's like the world got so short and so small in our lifetime. Like we used to tour with Sam's Club pay phone cards to to call home. No cell phones. We had an Atlas. No GPS. It's an atlas. It's a TomTom. Oh, no. A company called Rand McNar early 2000s would make this like binder book, right? Okay. Yeah. Entire United States with the highways and roads. We've got we've got that in the And then every there's like 65 pages. So then you get into like per state and we would navigate literally by map [ __ ] orienteering your way to the next show. I don't know how we did. And then and then when we got lost it's just an additional [ __ ] burden. Yeah. Then you you get lost. So you have to go find a pay phone. You type in your minutes. It says you have 120 minutes left. And I'm calling this promoter being like, I think we're close. And then fast forward and we have Instagram and your podcast is being listened to in probably 75 countries. That was not possible. And I think that acceleration of information has just accelerated the kind of the fame engine a bit and I don't think anyone knows how to deal with it. I think we we were meant we were meant to be in a community, you know, of 100 people. We were meant to be in our neighborhood. I should know my neighbor's name and he shouldn't have to buy a lawn mower because he could borrow mine. Like that is what we have done literally until about 20 years ago as people. And the ones that did it before us were like these mythical outliers. The Beatles obviously. Yeah. Worldwide successes of course, but on a day-to-day life, our kids are the first generation just being born into this is the way life is. So, I think probably everyone that's listening to this podcast right now will have one friend that they know personally from earlier in their life or that they've spent some sort of a time with that's got a million followers on some platform. Yep. And for uh probably more than that, a variety of um like justified and unjustified reasons, you know what I mean? Like someone might know Bonnie Blue, someone might know like a great [ __ ] poet or some [ __ ] Um, and not that Bonnie Blue is not a poet, that speed of ascendancy. Yeah. Feedback loop like how fast and you know you mentioned about sort of tribe ancestral setup what's typical. Yeah. The problem that we have is our previous comparison group would have been so you got your Dunar number of about 150 but within the 150 tribe that wasn't one big tribe. It was a little pods typically of about 30 within that break off. Yeah. Yeah. They'd sort of be like moderately tightly affiliated but not totally totally tight together. And then you would have this this sort of wider group. You didn't have that many people to compare yourself to. Correct. Cuz out of 150, 75 are male. [ __ ] like of the 75 maybe 15 or 20 are under the age of 14, right? because everybody [ __ ] dies early. He's like, well, I'm kind of not competing with the 14-year-old. So, you know, there's such a small group of people that you end up actually competing with. And the issue is that in the modern world, we don't know where the boundary of what our competition comparison group is. You can compare yourself to everybody. Yes. In a different It's like you guys in some way are comparable with Sabrina Carpenter despite having you could not find a person that's more different than you other than the fact that she makes notes come out of her face. Yeah. Right. Yike. M. Yeah, I think I think with that knowing that like I'm not surprised by that documentary. And honestly, if we were filming our lives the whole time, we would have those moments, too. I I have a version of that. Even like I intentionally don't go on Instagram and I intentionally don't look at other bands Spotify numbers. I don't look at that because all it does is lead to comparison. And you know, even if I'm looking at it and looking at smaller bands to make myself feel better, it's still comparison. It's a it's the binary is still there. I'm I need a a dopamine hit. I need to feel valid. I don't. So, let me find something to be like, at least I'm not as bad as that guy, which is never the way anything progresses, you know? And I think fame is just an unfortunate uh an unfortunate thing to be honest. Would you tell me that story? You're Louisis Kapal the equivalent. Yeah. Um I uh in 2004 we I think we I guess we probably wrote Chasing 1803, right? We did. So in 2004 we started touring on it and we were still touring as a pre there was MySpace. So there was some evidence of how things big things were getting or not. But that year we did the warp tour and we we were playing on a stage called the smart punk stage which was like out of the seven stages it was the worst one. Like like literally like a truck with a flat surface like the opening band from the stage had to build it every day to to gain their access to play it. Yeah. Okay. Um some of those guys we're still friends with. One of those guys plays in Paramore now. Sick. Undermined Joey Mullen. So, um, we started out playing that summer in front of 15 150 people, people that were niche enough to know the underground hardcore scene that would come see us on Warp Tour. And by the end of that summer, it had blown up. I never forget it. We played in Boston and we played during the used. There was a lot of crossover during Warp Tour. So, there's this big blowup thing in the middle of the stage and you you didn't know when you what time you were playing until that morning every day 10:30 in the morning. There was no set set times on Warp Tour. Jesus Christ. So if you're in Milwaukee, like you might play at 8:00 p.m. and the next day you're in Chicago and you play at 11:45 a.m. So we were woken up a lot going year on in 40 and we're like [ __ ] a lot. So that particular day was the final day of the tour and we get told when we're playing and then we go look at the blowup the blowup thing and the used is playing during us and I'm like well there there's that you know we're [ __ ] like no one's going to watch us play and we got on stage and there was two or three thousand people like in front of the flat truck in front of the flat truck to see us play because Chasing Safety unbeknownst to us had had I hate this word and you said it now I hate it worse like blown up. Mhm. Right. But no one had a phone to be able to keep. No, there was no way. There was no there was no way to know. And then that that and then that fall um we toured with a band called Stretch Armstrong. Um and we had to play twice every day. So many people showed up to the shows. So you did a matinea to try and keep up. No, no, no. We didn't we wouldn't know because again the metrics were so messed up and there was no phones. So we'd show up at a 800 capacity club and we'd play and there'd be 900 people outside still and so we would just go run it back. I don't even know if we got paid for it half the time. Yeah. It was just we would just run it do it again. And in the middle of that, I started having um I started having chest pains like and I had experienced them a little before, like searing sharp like chest pains and my hand would go numb and my jaw hurt and I would get real nauseous and there was days on that tour I don't know if I can I don't know if I can and I would always muscle through it and just play. Meanwhile, I'm going to the hospital every third day. I'm having a heart attack. I'm having a heart attack. I would go walk in crying and saying that I'm having a heart attack. And they would go, "You're 21 years old. You're not having a heart attack. You got to find I got to find out. You got to do the work. You know, I need blood work and the metroponent levels." And I know all the jargon because I've done it so many. I probably had 300 EKGs in my lifetime. You know, I need an EKG. I need a retro ponent. You know, there was days where I remember the opening band one day, particularly this guy Chris telling me like, "This is just in your head." And I'm like, "How? I feel it. It's real. I feel it. It's real." Um, and it got progressively worse through the years. The band got more popular. Um, and in 2010, I quit. Um, and I put it under the guise of like, at the time, we were all pretty religious. And I put it under the guise of like I I got to, you know, I got to do something else for God. I got to, you know, and the reality was I just didn't deal with my nervous system and my anxiety. And if you ask me today, guntohead, like what caused it, you know, what caused the the onset of it. I have a bunch of theories, but I don't really have an what are the theories? I grew up in a super super Christian home like he said a little bit ago and my like my family talked like this like I grew up in the you know my family's from Georgia and they talk like this and um all I ever heard growing up was about medical things to this day like my mother to this day if I call my mom right now right now and I love my mother and I'm not I don't I don't I don't want this to come off if she hears this like mom you [ __ ] me. We love you mom. Yeah, but she she would Yeah. So and so, you know, sister, they in the churches they call you sister whoever, sister Gina, whatever. You know, Sister Gina's got like a they had to do something to her aorta. Can you believe that? You believe that? And growing up, the whole time it was like that. It was like that the whole time. And my parents, my dad had a mistress and I caught him with his mistress and kicked him out of my house when I was 18. I think that probably aids and a bets to it. And both of my parents had this anxious disposition as well. This health anxiety health anxiety disposition fed into you my whole life. My whole life to this day if I call my mom right now I promise Chris she would tell me something about her physical body. I promise like like I know my name like she would say so it was put into me that way and then the pressures of oh there's not only one show that's sold out there's another one that's sold out. Are we getting paid? I don't know. And Tim Tim and I are very different in we're very alike in some ways, but we're very different in Tim is the most punk rock person I know. I mean, like we'll do anything. Like if there was 500 people out in the street and you were like, "Can you guys play?" He'd be like, "Yeah, for sure." And I'm just I have a hard time with that. I'm getting better with that, you know, by being able to be more, you know, spontaneous. And but at the time, I wasn't. Um, and it aided me and aided me and aided me. And if I'm honest with you, which I think this format doesn't work and our conversation doesn't work. Um, I deal with it today. Not to the extent that I did then, but um something I deal with every day and it's really difficult and sc to be honest like it's scary sometimes. You know, the fact that I have to say this to you. Um, I hate a lot cuz I'm a fan of your show and I'm a fan of a lot of the people on your show. So to come here and say what I'm saying about my own life and my struggles, it feels like a little bit like those Spotify numbers where I'm like, I'm on Modern Wisdom and I'm talking about this. Well, don't forget, I mean, I appreciate you saying that and uh that must have been hard to deal with. That's tough to be a young kid thrust into the limelight and to be [ __ ] like this is my dream. It's my artistic outlet and like my [ __ ] nervous system is betraying me. Like this is my shot. This is my thing. Yeah. And my [ __ ] I'm That must be what it feels like to be Louis Capaldi. It's like this is what everything I've ever dreamed of. I'm on Glastonbury, the biggest festival in the world. All the flags. Yeah, man. Yeah. And my [ __ ] body is betraying me. So, I'm sorry that you went through them, man. That's really No, thank you for saying that. Tough. It's something that And on the flip side, I was thinking about this the whole time talking about Lewis, too, is all the struggles that I've been through with my mental health and my nervous system and the whole thing. it directly has affected him like indirectly and directly and that is something that I feel actual guilt for heavy guilt cuz if I really think about it like when I left I've never said this when I left there was a large decline in their they did a record without me when I left and there was a large decline in their career and I know that was directly correlated to me leaving and I left because I couldn't in layman's terms get my [ __ ] together, you know? I'm sorry that happened. Thank you. Yeah, but that kind of goes back to like how do you do that for 23 years and then like feel like you can be close with like your mom, you know? Let me pick the kids up. Yeah, that exact that exact thing is like there and I'm grateful for it. I'm I'm glad that me and my wife will never have stuff like what we've been through, but once you go through it or still deal with it, it does do something to a bond in your brain that it is is not better or worse or closer or more distant. It is just an it's a unique bond. It's not That's what I meant about it's a different type of intimacy music and another one's through tour. Yeah. It's like not brotherhood. It's not family. It's not best friends. It's not business partners. It's like all of it all the time, which is interesting. And that and I mean I talked to him a lot about his stuff. Like I mean the last fight we got into was in Europe. We were having like the oldest beer or something. and you were you were going to the hospital like three times that tour. And I told him straight up, I don't remember what the ailment was. It was some I just told him like, "Dude, you're going to have a lot of regrets at the end of this whole thing because you're you're either choosing to or being captured by I don't know which because I'm not in your head." And sometimes it feels like it swings different ways as we all do. Um, but to have this beautiful kind of thing happen and this random career that none of us asked for and for you to just be sitting in it in misery rather than going to the pub and grabbing pints with the boys or we were drinking the oldest beer ever made recipe ever made somewhere in Munich. Yeah. And Christ, but he was in a in a he was in a state um and I would and we were all in a manic spiral and we were all drinking. So when I drink, I I I'm a very direct talker anyway. Unlike him, I'm from New York and my New York family is like, "Say what the [ __ ] you on about, like say what you need to say." Um, very loving, but just very direct. And so I was just like, it's done through argumentation. Yeah. And I was just like, "You're just going to you're going to you're going to have a lot of regrets when all this is over cuz you're wasting this thing, you know?" And he got really mad. We all disbanded. You said it differently. And he came. What did I What did I say? I have to say this. I'm sorry, Chris. I'm sorry. You said I I'm not When you die, you say at the end of this thing, which is very podcast etiquette. You said when you die, you will regret so many things. There, I said it on your deathbed. Yes. On your deathbed. Yeah. Cuz that's that's when you get full perspective and reflection. And the goal is not to look at like Steve Jobs last 10 things he wrote. Money doesn't matter. I wish I would have spent more time with my family. To your point, these unteable lessons. It's like we're being taught these lessons now, man. Like we've had this. We've lost it. You left. You're back. Like we all have done the good, the bad, the biggest, the smallest, biggest man in the world. This tour is eating [ __ ] and we're making no money. We've done all of it now. So it's like how many more lessons are there left to learn? And to his point, he's like, "I don't choose. It just happens." Yeah. And kind of like, you know, the dude with the tick, like, can is it just do you just live here now? And is there anything you can or can't do? Um, and yeah, as far as that goes, like I think his his stuff specifically does directly affect us, but I think if I'm being honest, it's more like I can tune him out if he's going to the hospital. Like, if for this period or episode, I just need to reduce you to a coworker. As long as you get on stage for the hour I need you and we make our money and we can have enough gas in the tank to get to the next show, you can melt down for the other 23 hours by yourself in your bunk, you know, and that's not loving or true, but you have to in those states figure out a way to cope. He can't cope. I can't cope. What are we going to do? Blow up the whole tour? No. So, you then start putting in these protections and um sometimes they're not healthy. And so we've been through again so much that it's it it's kind of like you go home and somebody's having a bad day and it's like what are you on about? Like you haven't had a bad day in your life. You know, you've you've never been through certain things that we have. Therefore, I can't expect you to have the same perspective. But it's hard when your perspective gets shift shifted so much. I imagine you used a couple of times sort of soldiers coming back from war as a an example, which is a terrible example. I'm not trying to church up [ __ ] people. I had Jock Jocker Willing out today. Like that was the guy that did the Battle of Ramadi. So he's a Navy Seal. Saw that go up today. Yeah. Who is maybe one of the scariest men I've ever seen in my entire life. But is it comparable in terms of kinetic danger? No. Is it comparable in terms of emotional intensive in intensity? Yeah, probably. And I would like I really appreciate you opening up like that. One slight perspective that might be useful here. A quick aside, you've probably heard me talk about Element before, and that's because I'm frankly dependent on it. For the last 3 years, I've started my morning every single day with Element. element is a tasty electrolyte drink mix with everything that you need and nothing that you don't. Each grab-and-go stick pack contains a science-backed electrolyte ratio of sodium, potassium, and magnesium with no sugar, no coloring, no artificial ingredients, or any other junk. It plays a critical role in reducing muscle cramps and fatigue while optimizing your brain health, regulating appetite, and curbing cravings. It's basically a magic elixir. And this orange flavor in a cold glass of water is how I've started every single day for over 3 years. And I can genuinely feel the difference when I take it versus when I don't. Best of all, they've got a no questions asked refund policy with an unlimited duration. So, you can buy it and try it for as long as you want. And if you don't like it for any reason, they give you your money back and you don't even need to return the box. Plus, they offer free shipping within the US. Right now, you can get a free sample pack of all eight flavors with your first purchase by going to the link in the description below or heading to drinklmnt.com/modernwisdom. That's drinklnt.com/modern wisdom. Most of the things I think that you're the the shames that you have in your life, the ones that are the worst that you have about yourself, if you look at them, they're usually the dark side of the stuff that you're the most proud of as well. M so I have to assume that when it comes to writing a record or mastering a track or like dialing in a particular sound or working on the the new melody, the new lead, the new drums f whatever it might be that that is an area where your obsessiveness gets deployed in a really productive manner because you're able to go like no, it's not there. It's not there. I'm going to play it again. I'm going to play it again. I'm going to play it again. You look at the [ __ ] timeline, it's just like 60 takes, 100 takes, 200 takes to all the way down. Yeah. Oh, yeah. So, if you want that, like, do you appreciate that about yourself? The fact that you have this level of precision in your art form. Okay. Well, guess what the price is that you have to pay for that? The price that you have to pay in order to have that level of precision in your art form is that you don't get to switch it off in other areas. You don't get to turn that off. You don't get to turn it. You're not going to turn it off with your partner. If your partner makes you feel unsafe, like your nervous system is going to go like, "Okay, what did they say? Why did they say that thing? There was no kiss at the end of that text. That's what that meant." Ruminate, think, obsess. Okay, you don't want it then. You do want it when you're writing a record. Choose. Oh, you don't get to choose. You don't. So, what do I love about this? Well, I love my attention to detail. I love the fact that and this is something as well that you can sort of find I think between each other where you go [ __ ] like dude the way that Aaron shows up like he's the first person in the studio in the morning he's the last person out at night he will not give up or whatever it is right what however it is that you like the that obsessiveness sort of shows up in the process like I really [ __ ] love that about him and would it be cool if he didn't have this like like demon that he's got to battle in other areas but would it be [ __ ] total dog [ __ ] if we didn't get this level of performance out of him when the rubber meets the road. You know what scares me the most? Sorry. What scares me the most and what I I've seen a lot of therapists for this stuff and I've uh taken a bunch of pills for it and I've talked to a million people about it and nobody nobody has ever said that. It's always been um so thank you number one, but number two, it's always been um you'll get better if like you'll stop being obsessive about your health symptoms or whatever if if you do X, if you do Y, if you do Z, if you change this habit you have. No one's ever just said it like that. And that, my friend, is the essence of what it is to pump your tires up as high as they'll go. let me do that because you're absolutely right and it's scary to hear to know that like that pill, that conversation, that thing isn't going to fix it because it's it's connected in that other way. You know what I'm saying? Yeah. Well, it's who you are, dude. Like I I think so much of it is in the resistance. you know, if you ever have something that you're really struggling with, and uh I've had a I've had a rough 12 months. Jesus Christ, I've been kicked in the nuts so many times over the last 12 months. And uh maybe 20% of it, 30% of it is like what you're dealing with. And the vast majority of it is the resistance to the thing happening. It shouldn't be this way. I don't want it to be this way. This isn't what like if only it could be different. This is my fault. This is someone else's fault. What caused it? What did it? Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. How can I change it? What can I do moving forward? I'm wasting my life. I'm killing myself. I'm doing this thing. I can't do this thing. Like all of that, right? You have the first emotion, anxiety. Then you have resentment at your anxiety. Then you have bitterness about your resentment about your anxiety. And then you have frustration about your bitterness about your resentment about your anxiety. You have this infinite regress of second order emotions. Mark Manson calls them meta emotions. It's like you don't get to control the first one, but you do have choice over the second one. And the problem with that is, oh, I have choice over it. That means that I am bad if I don't control my matter emotions. And if someone says you'll get better when, that's a denial of you. That's them saying, you are not enough as who you are. And when you're that way, you're less you and you need to fix the thing that's happening because your behavior makes me feel uncomfortable. Yikes. You being that makes me feel uncomfortable. you not being okay makes me not okay. So, I need you to make yourself okay so that I can be okay now, too. And that's just a denial of whatever it is that you're going through. And that's rough, man. So, I'm again I'm sorry that you No, thanks for saying that. I think that um I've never heard it put that way and I've always felt that way and I've never heard it put like that because But that is it. It It's more We talk about that a lot as a band like even like with people are like, "How do you stay faithful on the the road? How do you stay diligent or not diligent? And it it's it's just that it's like we're all sexual beings. I can't change the first thought. Mhm. You know, if there's a really pretty girl somewhere, I'm not going to not notice. And then it's like great that I'm not looking for it. I have no interest, but I can't change that first spark. And I'm going to throw sand on it or I'm going to throw gasoline on it. There's a really cool story. David Bus, grandfather of evolutionary psychology. It's here at University of uh Texas. And um he wrote a book called The Evolution of Desire. And in it, he explains how men have an area of our brains which uh give us reward if we look at something that's sexual. Like guys will happily look at a pair of rocks that look like boobs and be like like kind of [ __ ] hot. Uh and this guy wrote in and he said, "Dr. Dr. Bus, I just want to thank you for saving my marriage because I was finding I'm happily married. I love my wife. I love my kids. I was happily married, but I found myself like finding other women attracted and I thought I was unhappy with my partner and something. I thought there was something wrong with me. I thought there was something broken. And your book taught me that no, like it's fine for me to see a hot woman and be like, that's a hot woman. In the same way, it's like, huh, those clouds look, you know, gray or what? It's a thing. Yeah. And I mean, is it the thing that you tell your wife? Probably not. It's like, "Hey honey, there's a beautiful cloud outside." Like, yes. Hey, honey, there's like a hot Latina walking past. No, but you know, the inside voice. Yeah. But the sense that you have with that and that same dynamic there, I think, is a good part of what we're talking about here, which is like, huh, I have this thing. There's some good in it. There's some bad in it. It is me. What happens if I'm like just okay with that? Yeah. What happens if I'm not trying to fix it? Just put it on a shelf and let it be there. It's just a part of it. It's just like here it is. We're not going to deny it. We're also not going to exacerbate it. It just is. I mean, I'm the question I've been the most fascinated with over the last few years. One of them has been the price that people pay to be someone that you admire. And Elon Musk, he does this episode with Lex Freedman a couple years ago and Lex asks him some question along the lines of like, "How are you really?" or something. Oh yeah. And Elon says, "I know what you're talking about. My mind is a storm. People think they want to be me. They don't want to be me. They don't know. They don't understand." You're like, "This is the richest guy in the world. Read the uh read the biography that was done on him." And it's like there was this day where his COO found him laid down in his office just like staring at the ceiling unable to sleep next to his desk. Yeah. They're like, "You need to come and do this shareholder meeting." He's like, "I'm not doing it. I can't I can't I can't stand up." He's like, "No, you need to come and do this meeting." Like, it was one of those Tesla's about to go under and we need to raise more money or fix the shareholders or do whatever. He's I can't I can't stand up. He's like, "No, you need to." It took 15 minutes like coaxes and coaxes and coaxes and coaxes and coaxes. finally get him up. It's like, all right, do you want to be Elon Musk? No. Do you want to [ __ ] be that guy? Because that's the price that you need to pay to be Elon Musk. And unfortunately, man, that's the price that you need to pay to be Aaron Gillespie. Like, to be you. Yeah. That's the price that you need to pay. You want to [ __ ] do the You want to do that? Like, you got to deal with the other thing, too. It's it's it's just so it's staggering. It's staggering to hear an acknowledgement of that. You just don't you don't hear that. You don't hear that when you're rehabbing through it. Not from your friends, not from professionals. You You hear, like I said before 20 minutes ago, if you do X, you'll get Y. You know what I mean? I don't have any incentive. And I think that that's one of the problems that even the best meaning guys, even the guys in your band, they want you to get better because and I understand it. I'm not I'm not I'm not sour grapes about it. No, it's it's it's it comes from a really well-meaning place. But um yeah, this is an area Joe Hudson who does the art of accomplishment has taught me so [ __ ] much about this and he has a a framework of uh view uh vulnerability, impartiality, empathy and wonder and that's like uh heart opening heart opening communication especially and impartiality is a really interesting one which is um uh sitting with somebody without wanting to change them. uh impartiality and I think a lot of the time when we see somebody going through something difficult we want to help them. Of course you want to help them. Is that not the good thing to do? Is that not the empathetic caring thing to do? Of course it is. Care about your friend. You see them in pain. You want to fix it. It's like but in that fixing is a denial of what they're experiencing. You aren't right as you are. You're not good enough as you are. This isn't okay. You need to change. And a lot of the time that is a transference of you saying your discomfort is making me uncomfortable. Stop your discomfort so that I can feel okay again. And that's where codependency comes from. You know, if if you see somebody and you think I'm not okay if you're not okay and roll that forward and all of you guys have got this which is I'm not what's the uh the Jimmy Carism which is uh as he's talking about comedians relationships with audiences. He says, "If you don't love me, I don't love me." Yeah. Yeah. I don't I I I think it's maybe more complicated than that, but yeah, at at its essence, yeah, for sure. I mean, I think it's significantly more complicated than that. Yeah. Um, I I would argue not even just nuance, but yeah, it's deep. But yeah, it's like I think I think overall it's just a matter of trying to find common ground where you can't and just being okay with things not being okay. Yes. And that's that's hard, but it's not as hard as we're not leaving this room till you're fixed. You know, Tim, you're doing this. we're not leaving this room till you stop doing this. Like that those ultimatums which don't happen. But I'm saying that's the other side of that. If it's not this, then it's on its way to be that. And I think there's a lot of like I don't even know. Like everything's so bite-sized now. It's like hard to even know what like truth is anymore, you know? Good point. Like music, same thing. like music and stoicism I think are like the same thing in the sense that like you have these stoics quote unquote that just put up like a little blurb like a Bible verse a day tear away calendar and you're missing the context you know there's like 14 hours of Marcus Aurelius on Audible and then you pick out like your favorite scripture and just pop it out and everyone's like this you don't you don't know how much I needed this and it's like something like if it doesn't bring you peace be confident enough to walk away. That without the surrounding context results in friendships dissolving, people walking away from relationships cuz this just isn't bringing me peace. And it's like music, all of those things are just kind of going in that way where it's like Tik Tok moments. Nobody listens to albums anymore. We used to write albums that were like 1 through 12. We don't listen to songs anymore. We would literally put this song as the fifth song on purpose in a linear sense and now it's waterfall singles. It's waterfall stoicism. It's pop pop. Waterfall stoicism is a funny way to put it. Yeah. And it's I think it does more I I I don't think it's all net positive. I'd say I don't know if it does more bad than good, but I think it does a lot more confusing like confusing than it does helping. Because even to your point with Aaron, it's like if you really zoom out, like everything you said I agree with and you know a lot of the talks we've had I agree with, but it's so much more complicated than that. Everything is. And I think yeah, just the the 10-sided die of life. It's it's not just oh, women are complicated, men are complicated. It's the whole [ __ ] ride is so complex. Yeah. That it could have been walking in on your dad. It could be when my girlfriend left me. It's a trauma response. It could be anything. It's like so deep. Like the cavern is like, you know, you could throw a flashlight into it and it just disappears. I've been thinking a lot lately about is is he who wins the one that um uncomplicates it enough. And what I mean by that is, for an example, um one of my favorite episodes of your show is is Dry Creek. Dry Creek Dwayne. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. I was texting him this week. And what I love about that episode is his story is crazy, but my favorite part of the episode is at the very end and I think you asked him this question or for some somehow I I gathered that you asked him this question. What's a good day to you, Dwayne? And he said, "Well, you know, like yesterday I woke up and I'm upset with my friend's wife and then he came home and I had a cigar and then I had another one." And I'm like, if I could I'm not and I'm not trying to make him sound like Forest Gump. That's not what I'm saying. But like that is that is pure peace to me when he's when he outlines that day. When you ask him what kind of day what's you know what's what's a good day to you, Dwayne? And he says all that and then we're talking about all this and you're saying that and all I can think of is the one who wins is the one who can decouple. I'm not saying to become ignorant of the complications of things and to become ignorant of the feelings of things and to become ignorant of the idioms of grief or whatever, but is the one who wins the one who can decouple the two and I had two cigars and talked to my friend's wife and we ate some separate Longhorn or whatever the [ __ ] he says. Do you know what I mean? Like is that is that Well, I imagine simple life is is very is highly underrated and I would argue more valuable than most things and it's becoming harder and harder to do. Well, this is one of the curses I think of being a introspective deep person. If you're someone that's sensitive, if you like to do the reflecting thing, if you like to ask the question, why? Why do I feel that way? Yeah. And it's like, well, I mean, this is an endless portal that you can tumble into of of thinking about yourself. And it's it's very interesting. I take an awful lot of pleasure from asking the why question. Like, the entire reason for this podcast is understand the world and uh understand yourself and the world around you. That was that was what I wanted to do. I didn't understand myself and I didn't understand the world. So, I wanted to speak to 9 [ __ ] 50 people or whatever that maybe that would that would maybe be able to tell me. But the problem with that is that as you alluded to earlier on, there's like a sort of beauty and simplicity like the guy that's just like, "Yeah, [ __ ] 500 person show. Pull it." Yeah, let's go. Like that don't overthink it thing. Yeah. When arrived at I have to assume more naturally as opposed to curate. that must be part of your nature that you've maybe sort of enhanced a little bit as opposed to Aaron with you to in order to get yourself to that stage. It's like 10,000 hours of meditation. Um, but to think, okay, well, what if it's not about unpacking more of my stuff? What if it's trying to like just be okay with whatever's going on and just like the letting go? And that's one of the things again to give some props to the guys that are in bands and also I think this show is the kind of thing that's listened to by people who are in a lonely chapter. You know there people who are struggling to find uh conversations, stimulus, support in their immediate surroundings. So they find it in other people who they can listen to. They have this this senseariously through community. Yeah. Like [ __ ] Like that's that that guy went through that stuff and that's real harm. Like I went through something like that. Holy [ __ ] I thought I was broken by having health anxiety and that's the first time I've ever heard anybody talk about it online. I'm not broken. Like this is part of the human condition. This isn't a personal curse that's being fired at me from above. Yeah. And you know the problem with that is that the lonely chapter by design is lonely, right? You're so developed that you don't resonate with your old set of friends, but you're not yet sufficiently developed that you've got your new set of friends and you're trying to do all of these things and you're developing your life and you're changing the way that you think and the stuff that you're into. And you're like, I don't know anyone that I can talk to about this and I have two choices. I can either regress back and go to like this old version of me, which I know that I can't shouldn't do this, but I where is the I haven't found my next tribe yet in that regard. And uh the problem that you have there and again this what I mean around the band. The one thing that you guys have is that there is always someone with you. And I imagine that if you want some introversion time, the fact that there is 16 people on a [ __ ] tour bus, double-decker tour bus and the support band's upstairs and the front lounge is full and the back lounge is full and someone's parking and someone's notware. Yeah. And you're like, [ __ ] Like all I do is pack and unpack and get into go to airport or whatever it is. Yeah, but being around other people is a really lovely way to pull yourself out of that. And I think it's at least for me now uh just yesterday we uh signed I bought my first office studio space here in Austin. Oh, sick, dude. Congrats. Thank you. That's going to be real special. That for me is because I have exhausted I have close to exhausted my solo sigma male like DGEN work energy tank. Like I that fuel I'm on [ __ ] fumes. Yeah. From that I like COVID happened. I started working from home and I just never grew out. I never graduated out of it because I'm like classic introvert. All I want to do is get my head down and crack on. And I just never stopped. I was like, "Oh, well this is good. So more of it must be better. So, I'll just keep going and keep going and keep going. This thing's growing, growing, growing. So, I'll keep going. Are you like, "Oh, well, this is this is" And then after a while, you go, "How did I get I kind of like, yeah, I kind of like miss people." I think so. That's the solution that I've had to have. And must be tough when you want to have your own space and you can't. But on the flip side, the fact that you've got this camaraderie, this sort of brotherhood, this group of people that know everything that you've been through. Yeah. I mean, imagine how much again, imagine how hard it is for male artists, make them female. Imagine how hard it is for bands, make it a [ __ ] solo artist. Holy [ __ ] you are on the road and you don't even have your boys with you. You don't have anyone that you can turn around and go, "Dude, when we did that thing on stage, it's like, who the [ __ ] is session guitarist number three?" Like, who the [ __ ] is that guy? Like, he wasn't here last week or last year. You see it eat people up like Amy Winehouse, Michael Jackson. these I mean these these stories are not they're not almost not even documentary worthy anymore because they're just so normal. It's almost like yeah we were talking about this earlier but it's like back in the day like the guys with tattoos were like the wild ones and now it's just everywhere that if you don't have tattoos you're like the weird kind of oblong out of out of uh sync with the culture kind of vibe. And I think it's just it it's a story that keeps telling the truth every time. And I think as humans we have a really interesting knack to go, "Yeah, but not me." You know, and that makes that gives you juice, too. I literally I lit I literally talk about like being rich and it's like if you win the lottery and you have $100 million. I don't care if you worked your ass off and built a company blood, sweat, and tears and come from a poor family and you know the cycle stops with me and that whole thing or you just find a winning lottery ticket. that there's a certain amount of money that will destroy you. And everyone goes, "Yeah, but I think I would do it different. I' i'd buy all my friends houses. I wouldn't I wouldn't I wouldn't do this. I wouldn't do that." And even for me, it's like I know that it would destroy me. And then if you said, "Well, here's a lottery ticket. It's worth $100 million. Tear it up." I'd literally probably not tear it up and think that I can do it better. Do you know that is uh the unteable lessons essay? Like that's a part of it. No. And it's uh watch me dance through this minefield and avoid all of the other trip wires that everybody else kicked. Some solypistic narcissistic version of that might be true for them but not for me. And I think I think that that's it. Like you you're we are attracted to a dry creek dry creek Dwayne type guy. [ __ ] impossible to say that [ __ ] Honestly, dude my Dwight tweak way. I had to practice before before on the way in. You're like dry because I I start every episode typically by going like dry creek drain welcome to say drain. Dry creek [ __ ] Dry Creek Dwayne welcome to the show. And I was like practicing it on the way in. Got all of these things to think about. I'm trying Yeah. I'm trying to work out the motherfucker's name. Yeah. But I think the reason why he's inspiring is because he's just like it's it's not about telling you what to do and how to get better. He almost solves his problems by just saying I just get up every day and try not to break something. Yeah. A day I don't break something is a good day. Yeah. And it's so simple. Yet it it's more powerful than being like, "Well, you're monochromic antibodies when you're when you're tired after you get seven hours of sleep versus seven and a half with the wrong bed with UV light and like all that's so overwhelming and then you just see a guy come up. He's like, "Man, just get up and don't break nothing. I didn't break anything today." I mean, that was my favorite story from him where he was saying, you know, I got up, I looked at this horse, he was trying to ride it or or or discipline it in some way and he just looked at it for an hour. He said he sat down. I had a cigar. And then I sat down and had another one. Yep. And he's like, I I didn't break anything. Yeah. What did you do today? Not much. You have a good day. Yeah. I didn't break nothing. Like that is more powerful than how do I scale 10x here and there and there. And then when you get there, to your point, your ratchet changes. Your happiness doesn't. And I think there's I don't know what study it was, but there was like a psychological study that came out that talked about um gratification and then satisfaction and the temporary stay of said satisfaction. Meaning I make $100,000 a year. You call me in and say, "Tim, you've been such a good job. I'm going to give you 140,000 a year." my happiness meter goes up about 15% for about 30 to 60 days and then it recalibrates back to I want I want I need a 180 and and and it's not and it's not even about oh now I'm spending 40,000 more and not living below my means. That's a whole financial question that I think is adjacent but not the point. It's it's that we keep thinking more stuff and more achievements are going to fill a hole that only contentment and peace that you find on your own can fill. Oh, it's not the clubs, it's the theaters, it's not the theaters, it's the arenas, it's not the arenas, it's the stadiums, it's not the stadiums, it's the global tour, it's Yeah, it's crazy. It's crazy that you're even saying those words because if you skinny it way down for us before you were here, it started like this. It started, let's go real micro for just 2 minutes. It started with me at 15 going, I just want to be in a band. I play drums at my parents' church. I just want to be in a band. Literally, I just want to play music with other people that aren't like the nerdy church people, right? And then it I just want to I just want us to write one song, right? And then I just want us to play one show. I just want us to play one show where people are at it. I just want us to play one show where people are at it and know the words. And now you just said stadium. And that's that's the most interesting thing to me about the whole thing is we never talk about how micro it is before it gets to this macro place. Oh, me me and Chris talk our keyboard player, we talk all the time. Oh, I know you two do, but like that is that this is this podcast, by the way. I'm not trying to be a fanboy. like this is my [ __ ] Like I love digging in and like yeah Chris and I our keyboard player talk a lot about it and to your point like how do you know you're grounded? Uh you know is it natural? Is it my predisposition or is it work? And I think it it's probably all of it but like a really interesting way to stress test like your priorities and where your head's at is like the band breaks up today. How do you feel? Aaron quits. I die of a heart attack. Whatever. Make up anything. Under oath is no longer. The best years of my life are over. I'll never do anything as meaningful as that again. Now I just work at FedEx. As if that's some like prison sentence. I have to get a real job. God forbid. All these things. Or same exact data set. I can't believe we made it 23 years. What a blessing. All we wanted to do was write one song. Like which one is it? Because both are true. That just tells you who you are inside, you know? Like if if this doesn't work or we break up in a week or 10 years or 100 years, I don't need this again. It's it's not part of me. It's informed who I am obviously and afforded me amazing experiences like the one we're doing right now. But if all of this goes away and you're just a quote unquote regular person with a regular job, like are you okay with that or do you need this? What part of this is you? And have you become the thing that you just did? You know, we would just do music and now have I be have I become Tim from under oath? You know, that was the I think you said at the very beginning, do people love me for who who I am or for what I do? Women and do I love me for who I am or just what I do? Yeah, 100%. You've been ask you've been talking like this and I think in the in the early days, especially when it when it blew up, I keep saying that and there's got to be another way to say the band got popular. It's the I think it's the way that everybody knows. Yeah. Yeah. But but you he has talked like this. I'm not telling you anything you don't know. You have talked like this since you were 21 years old. Like there was a time when the when the band first [ __ ] here it is again. When the band first blew up where he would ride and I don't think you mind me talking about this. No. He would ride with like the opening bands in Vans. Like he would Was this like your stoic hair shirt equivalent? Like you purposefully putting the [ __ ] uncomfortable clothing on just to remind yourself of where you came from? Honestly, it was um it was I think at the time it was immature looking back like would I do that now? No. But I think it was a response to exactly what we've been talking about. But it came that's the point I'm making. It came from the same place. It came from fame and money and me going this is all gross and it scared us to death. The reason I brought it up, The reason I brought it up, cuz I think it's pertinent to say is that self-actualization and that realization of like FedEx isn't a prison. Like, let's switch this data set, the same data set. Let's switch the perspective to say we had 23 beautiful years. It scared us to death. some of us, some of the rest of us hearing that reflection like or it sounds like the person's less bought in or it sounds like they would be okay with a thing happening that you wouldn't be okay with happening. It's like, holy [ __ ] is Tim half out? Yeah. Like maybe he's not. Maybe he's just going to pull the [ __ ] pin one day. But especially and and I thought that and if you hold things open-handed, it's not about making sure I never let it go or intentionally throwing it. You just hold it like this and it doesn't matter. like when you realize it doesn't actually matter. And not to say that under oath doesn't matter. I think we I mean we know we've saved people's lives and they have tattoos and this got me through brain surgery and whatever. We've heard all the stories and the impact that we've had on life and culture is noticeable and palpable. But outside of that, if it wasn't us, it would have been someone else. And and it's more about it. It really doesn't matter. Like I'm always thinking about deathbed always. Like and then everything that comes out. Steve Jobs last things. I've already mentioned that. All these people's last things. Uh we asked 85 people in a nursing home their top 10 things they changed. You see it all day long and and it's all the same [ __ ] So why wait until we're dying? Question for you on that to deploy that. Question for you on that. the top five regrets of the dying the deathbed thing that a very famous uh survey that was done. What do you think are the top five deathbed regrets of ex rockstars? What do you think they would have in the I think it all depends on where they end up or or why they're why their ex is my question. I think that the first time you have an actual relationship with a woman, you probably regret wasting 20 years just having sex with random women. Uh I think when your kids grow up, and we'll see, and me and Chris talk about this, our keyword player a lot, like I know I'm doing my best and and I also know I'm breaking something. I just don't know yet which which what it is. You know, my kids could turn on me and say, "You were never there." And they're te technically correct. Um I FaceTime them. We have a great relationship. You know, my daughter's in a band. She comes to all the shows. She loves it. And I check in with my kids. I'm like, "Do you guys is this okay?" Um so for me, it's hard it's hard to hard to tell. But then you have people like dying like drugs, the whole thing. Like it's almost like what's good about being in a band? I think that's a lot easier to quantify. You can count those way quicker than what's bad. And you do feel like like the other night um I was dead asleep like two weeks ago on a Monday like very asleep. Like I've been so busy and I I work like a 9 to5 in Nashville as a song as a staffing songwriter. I've heard. Yeah. And I So I just I'm so when I get home you're in the cold phase of songwriting at the moment. Yes. So just tired, tired, tired. And this is something that I regret's the wrong word, but I I my daughter wakes up and vomits, has to vomit. Sorry. Sick stomach virus, you know, kids, whatever. She's four. Yep. And you know what the first thing she said was? She's scared to throw up. You know that feeling when you're trying to fight vomiting. She goes, "Somebody please take me to the doctor." And my brain went, "Oh, fuck." Because for years with the health anxiety thing, I've always that's what that's the first thing I do. Oh, this hurts or this I got to go get a scan. You know what I mean? And my brain went, I've passed the curse. I've passed the curse. And that to me is the biggest regrets of 50 dying rock stars or is is like like will I pass on the habits that I picked up touring and doing this? Will I pass that on to my offspring? And you and you will. I know. And I will. And I think that's kind of the thing of like we're all breaking something. And I think to make your top five list regrets or top five best things like it has to be it has to be in the construct of like we're not there yet. The story is still being written. The we have I have a pretty good idea, but I won't know until I'm 60. And I look back and go, "Huh?" when you're triple D and you can say it's a good day. I quit the band in my head probably four times a year and it's like and it's it is palpable and it's always on a plane always during turbulence and it's [ __ ] not real but I'm like what if I were to die? Oh I see. And it's all about me going to play in front of 3,500 people in Australia. How selfish was I to think that this was the only way that I can make money and the only thing that's going to make me happy and now my kids don't have a dad, you know, which is absurd. But like when you have these moments of like full clarity and peace and you see what really matters, like none of nothing matters more than a very few people that you've committed to raise and provide for and protect. Well, also on top of that, I obviously it certainly seems like you guys have been through some like a tumultuous past. People coming and going, challenges. We really haven't. I mean, we 23 years with the same light on for the most part except for the I mean, emotionally turbulent would I say between between you everybody, right? [ __ ] five six people. Five people. It was it was six, not five. To your point, uh the g the gamut, you're right. Addiction people people's lost parents. People have had ch kids. People have been in marriages. People have got divorced. People have, you know, [ __ ] been tempted to cheat on white. People have a you [ __ ] dude, you're coming home. You've had too much all that stuff. Like I mean this is the most like maybe it was the friends we made along the way that but um I'm I'm interested to just dig into the art form thing for a second cuz I think you know audience capture is something that's talked about a lot in my world. Yeah. um you know allowing the uh you create an avatar of what you think your audience wants and then you continue to throw red meat to them in an attempt to appease what it is that they want. Interesting. as opposed to doing what to you feels tasteful, earnest, uh, artistically pure, um, being led by curiosity and wonder and awe and intrigue and and sort of genuine bravery to say the thing that you mean and feel the thing that you do and not rush through the stuff like sit with the awkward com whatever it is. Yeah. And um, I have to assume as well that looking back on a body of work uh, you guys will have had I don't know but I have to assume that there was periods where you would have been like [ __ ] Okay. So, what do we need to write to be popular? What do we what do we need to write to be able to get like they're only chasing safety numbers again? And do we need to do that or do we need to do what we and [ __ ] like how do I even separate that out in my mind? Because there is this analyticalization of the music industry immediately. So, what's my metric for success? Is it how hard the [ __ ] crowd goes when we play it live? Well, what if the crowd's a little bit smaller? Is it how much I love the song? Well, what if somebody else in the band doesn't love the song quite so much? Maybe I'm wrong. You have all of this self-doubt that starts to come through. And uh I I have to assume that looking back on a a a library of work that you feel proud in has got to be one of the most dividend paying ways to spend a career that is in an artistic outlet because it's the it's one of the things that you can always feel proud about. You're like, "Dude, I [ __ ] loved that song." Yeah. I [ __ ] adore that that track. Like that was really really [ __ ] meaningful to me and I know that we shouldn't have made it and I know that the label [ __ ] hated it and I know that and it really [ __ ] meant a lot to me and like that's something that I real feel really [ __ ] proud of. It's been cyclical for me and I I think I'm there's been times in our career where I've been like if we do this we will we will and I've believed it. If we do this, if we make this type of song in this key with this type of vocal arrangement, it will become Chasing Safety. Mhm. Like I thought that I've thought that like 15 times. And then there's this other side of me where it's like, let's write a seven minute song about his father's death that I think is one of the most beautiful pieces of music I've ever written that no one listens to. Which tracks that? It's called Pneumonia. It's on our second to last record. So not our newest one, but one before. It's the final. Is it the last song? Yeah. Like I think about that song and I'm like, "Oh, that's everything I've ever wanted to do in this band, you know, and then you have and I have been cyclical like this the whole time looking back at that going, uh, that's what I wanted then." And I think you were probably the person in the band who has been the most steady with what with how you want it to be. Me being Yeah. You're the first person you You're the first person you're the first person person I ever heard refer to music as art. Yeah. When we were young, you know. Yeah. Never. For me personally, um and it did it it built a lot of tension in the band. I I think and well looking back I didn't know. Um yeah, always uncompromising. [ __ ] the label. Like literally our manager our manager is not allowed in the studio. Nobody's allowed in the studio to this day. He's ever you are not you are not allowed in the studio because you are an outside influence. It's just us. And you'll your eyes will light up but your eyes won't. Yep. And then dude Chris told me he came over for beers. He's like dude the third track like maybe we should do all of it. And maybe that's like a protect protect uh protective um coping mechanism. Um because I am impressionable. I don't know why it's so sacred or maybe so hardline, but it's never ever what's successful. Like to the point where I've literally hit them and I'm like I want to our last record, the one we just did, I was like I want to go to the cabin and I don't even want anyone to be on iTunes. I don't want to hear what Bear Tooth or Bad Omens or Rob Zombie or I don't want to hear anything about anything. I don't want any outside influence. I want it to be two ingredients, us and inspiration. That's it. And if you let the song drive, it will drive, you know? Um, and I've always I've always been that way. like Chasing Safety. They're like, "Dude, if you do this again, we're gonna get you on K-Rock and you're gonna be the next Fallout Boy." And so we wrote to Find the Great Line instead, which is the heaviest thing he's ever done. I [ __ ] love that up. And that was in direct response, in my opinion, to you guys trying to make me do this thing. No, go [ __ ] yourself. I love the album, too, but at the time, just to be frank, I was I was like, "What? But why?" You know what I mean? because I am the polar opposite of him and where I I have now learned with under oath that I want it to be just us and I think it's correct. I think it's the correct but on a day-to-day basis like I want to work with somebody different every day. Well, you do and this that you've found yourself in your [ __ ] Batman Bruce Wayne new lifestyle. You've found yourself Yeah. Yeah. I mean, can you explain for the people who don't understand what the sort of velocity of Nashville songwriting uh at the moment, please? For me, I So, I do I write five songs a week up to seven. So, like I get up, I go to the gym, I go to the studio, someone shows up, I've either met them before and written with them before or not. And you spend about an hour like this. Mhm. You know, a lot of this stuff does come up. the same stuff we've talked about today cuz and the artists now are so different than they used to be because they're dealing with like algorithmic issues like we kind of talked about earlier and they're dealing with like like a couple months ago I saw a girl's $250,000 album get shelves because she hadn't had a viral moment and she cried on my couch about what am I going to do you know because so yeah it's it's a it's a different song every day and it's usually written and demo tracked in four hours right and the under oath machine is it's a slog for me. And I I don't mean that in a derogatory way, but sometimes like what I've learned to do with Under Oath, this is what I do. Tim and I typically begin every song and sometimes Chris will bring something, but we typically begin every song. And for me, songs begin with like a thought. Sometimes a title, but most of the time a thought like I want this to be like uh like like fast and double time. And at the end it'll really sprawl out and do this thing like really edge theory. Like that's how it works in my brain. And Tim and I have such a close relationship that we can do that together very quickly. And then I like to leave. And then he will brood and ruminate for days over that 3 minutes that I [ __ ] out with him 72 hours prior. And then I'll come back at the end and go, "Oh, he was right." And then I'll do we'll do the lyric thing and then we'll do the vocal thing. That's That's the way that I But Nashville is like the [ __ ] Ford production line when you start to spread it out. I've only recently begun to understand, first off, I've only recently begun to understand how many ex scene kids are running the country scene. Crazy. What the [ __ ] All of them. What the [ __ ] Our very first tour manager, a guy that we met in Virginia. It was in a shitty club called Alleycats, is Jelly Rolls tour manager and sound guy. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And scene kids run everything. Dan and Dan and Shay. Yeah. I'm good. I'm good friends. Seen kids. Yeah, they do. I mean, the guitar player for 18 Visions is Zed's tour manager. like and I I think I really think it's an attractive quality to come from in like the DIY hardcore scene because we're the only genre I think that I can think of at scale that has to do everything themselves. Has to book your first show yourself. You have to carry around a diary, a freaking atlas, a notebook full of addresses, who's getting what, like in rap, in country and everything. a national from a jazz musician. It's built in a machine. It's built EDM. It's built in a vacuum on Soundcloud until your first shows in front of 10,000 people and then you're like, "What the hell? How do I get how do I get t-shirts made?" Like, "Oh, we we all own merch companies, bro." Like, we got you. Like, it's literally just a skill set that maybe is not even virtuous. It's just what you have to do, but once you've done it, that's valuable. And Yeah. You're a dime a dozen here and you realize our scene literally is baby and everyone else in the major world. Who knew? Who knew that the [ __ ] sad emo kids from school were going to grow up and Dude, I work with artists on a regular basis. Sick. I don't know. On a regular basis, I work with artists that have a label deal, [ __ ] brand deals, an agent, a lawyer, a merch deal, and they've never played a show. and then they come to Aaron to write their songs for them. That's not art. That's a business. I mean, we're seeing this a lot at the moment, right? Uh Benson Boon copying a lot of [ __ ] stick at the moment for Yeah. And I think about that last night. Yeah. Everybody is and it's not too dissimilar in uh in the world of content creation. Hey, how much truth is this person saying? Like how much how much is how much is this person saying what they believe and how much is this person saying something which is uh politically or culturally popular or expedient or useful or strategic or molested perverted in order to be able to get the outcome that they want to align themselves with a particular person? How much are they causing sucking up to this or that or the other? And uh how much authenticity is in here? I I love your use of the word molested. I I've heard you use that a couple times and it's so jarring because that only triggers in at least in the states is like weird stuff with kids. And you're right, it's like taking something and just distorting it and [ __ ] with it. And yeah, I don't know. I think I try I really try and this is I'm earnestly saying this like with all these people that I get sent to me, I really try to like inject and I learned that from him. I try to inject that art into song in a box. You know what I mean? And and that's why we've got four hours. Let's try and come up with something that's not totally meaningless. Yeah. Because, you know, he's so good at it. Like he's good at it. Like, and when I say that's not art, that's a business. Everything about that is about trying to find the right product to sell the most units. But in in that vacuum, there are actual artists doing the work, you know? Yeah. I mean, also, let's I don't think what he's doing is factory work. Let's not forget with the [ __ ] scene kid, whatever you want to say, Renaissance uh revolution perhaps. Uh the the level of talent that you have to be able to play those sort of riffs and to be able to play those particular drum pieces. Like that's got to be one of the contributing factors that it's technically quite a difficult music. And then you go up and you go like, "Hey man, like you're [ __ ] CADC." But it's back to it's back to what it's back to what he was saying though. Like when people come to me and they can't believe and I'm not pumping my own tires, but they can't believe that I'll just do it all right now. They're like, "What do you mean? You don't have to hire someone?" I'm like, "For what?" Because we had to do it all ourselves. That's the scene. That's the Scene Kid renaissance and why the Scene Kids are running Nashville. He can record, he can sing, he could play bass, play guitar, and drums and get you a full song. By the way, I'll give it like a little bit of a master as well. I'll be able to like just bounce it. It'll it'll like it's demo, but like it'll be it'll be [ __ ] throw some samples on there. The label the label will sound good. They'll like you could [ __ ] you can send I got a job. I got I I got gainful employment in Nashville and I'm successful in Nashville because of what you just said. Because Nashville was became such a song shop in the sense where you go to a songwriter, then you go to a producer, the producer would hire a band. I'll write the song with you and I'll give you a demo that slaps and then you'll call me in two weeks and say, "Can I have that demo?" and I'll go for this number you can have. Do you know what I'm saying? Like, but that's but that's how that's how we that's how we I'm interested I'm interested. You know, this is this very much is like kind of the whatever Batman to your Bruce Wayne thing. Uh that you've got a lot of pressure uh creative tension working at a pace that sometimes can be um artistically challenging uh for you, but you've got now this other part of your life. Um what what sort of fulfillment do you get out of this other bit? Is there how much ick versus fulfillment versus artistic expression? Are you ever conflicted about that stuff? Mm- on Roth to me is like um the this is going to sound so cheesy. It's the feeling of musical home to me. Um, I can suck so bad in front of Tim and just say I have this idea like and I I like for instance um, dangerous business walking out your front door, you know that time is running. I had this the original idea for that song was insane. I wanted it to be about different languages and people groups. I wanted to say they say they're French, they do this. It was ridiculous. Like the most ridiculous like but to me like that's free. That's the purest form of home in music is where you can go and dare to suck in front of someone. Like really like really dare to suck. I can say anything to him and he won't be surprised. I could promise you if there's a studio over here and you're like, "Guys, write a song." I go to Tim and I go, "I've been listening to this one rap artist." He's like, he'll go, "I got these samples. You want to try them?" And we would try to make a rap song and it would come out as an under song somehow in the end. But that it's the true freedom that and I wouldn't trade it for the world. Yeah. The freedom to be able to suck is because without it I would implode. Yeah. I mean even going back to the question you just asked about like the the authenticity and who's who's spinning things and who's in a position of like this is hot right now. Let's cover that. Like we were talking about this earlier, but like rock music specifically to me is very uninspired. Um right now and and Yeah. And you know to Aaron's point to use his words he's like it's all sounds the same. It's all made by the same five people and somebody's just waiting for the next Nirvana you know and there is the turn styles and they're all these and then you zoom out and you're like oh but those are the biggest bands but they've all been bands for like 10 years 15 years. They're not they're more our peers than like oh the new crop are going to do it right. And then I think about the comedy scene here and I think that's the most punk thing happening in culture is like Dave Chappelle, Tony, all those guys, Gillis, like they are unhinged and you can feel that they're not pulling punches and I think people gravitate towards that even if it's like yikes like whoa he said that you believe them. And I think that goes back to what Aaron was talking about is where you hear everyone believes our first three albums cuz they're true. Like, well, how hard is it to get back there after you've spent such a long two and a half decades not knowing what real life is like? Oh, I don't think I don't think you do. I think that's the beauty. Like that's the beauty of the ride is like you can ride a roller coaster once and have your mind blown. Tell me you can recreate that if you got a free pass you could just ride it 10 times. Like you only get the ride once. We did a We did Matt Edgar's podcast this morning. Mhm. And it's in this like it's a little studio room but it's on the back of a I guess it it looked underground comedy club. Okay. Literally underground black cement dirty as [ __ ] Call like black sheep. There was a spew in the bathroom when I went to pee. Like like the place feels like a like the places like the places we grew up playing. Yeah. And Matt is like, "Yeah, I I uh I do a set here once a month." I was like, "Damn, it's pretty sick. What's that like?" Cuz at this point like And then he's going on Warp Tour. It's like I I saw like I literally thought about it today cuz we were talking about music and I literally saw myself in that guy. I was like, "Oh, you get to like you get to become like a Nirvana right now. You're at the front of the scene." Yeah. Yeah. In the basement of some [ __ ] ass building over here. And it's like that's the that's the that's the coolest part is like just seeing people go and go and go. And I think a big part of it too is like success. I think not that we were ever starving or we needed to make it cuz that was never the point. But there is something that's different about being our age now and being married and having kids and having other commitments where I mean I remember writing writing on the walls. We all lived in a like a commune apartment. Uh not all of us but I lived in a two-bedroom house with seven people and we had three people in per room and one person in the living room is the best. But like if we weren't just hanging out, it was just all music. Had no girlfriend, had no mom. Our friends weren't [ __ ] dying all the time like they are now. Like we didn't have any of the It was just excitement and limitless ceilings. I remember writing writing on the walls. I still have the computer cuz I'm trying to get the hard drive out of it in Garage Band. Programming all of the drums, you know. like the worst. But like I had everything, DI modelers, all of it. And I just wrote the song. It wasn't like, yeah, we're in the studio, we have all this gear, and it was just me just sitting. Everyone's downstairs playing Halo, and I'm just upstairs like, where where's where's this go? How's this go? And like we don't have that anymore. We have to literally like check with five people's spouses to see if these three weeks work for everyone and then consciously go away from our homes and then go somewhere and try to simulate the isolation and the freedom that you had when you weren't isolated. You just didn't have anything to do. So now we need isolation to try to mimic the freedom that we and the synthesized isolation is. So different than Yeah, it's Yeah, it's Well, it's because you know it's Do you Do you ever remember when uh Tim Kennedy got waterboarded? You ever remember that? No. You know Tim Kennedy? Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. So, Tim Kennedy wanted to show on purpose. Yes. So, he I can't remember this is a while ago now. He I think was making a point about enhanced interrogation techniques. Yeah. And uh basically said, "I'm going to let someone waterboard me and they can waterboard me for as long as you want." So, towel over face pouring whole things. I'm pretty sure the whole thing's video. It's on the internet somewhere. And a lot of people gave him stick for the fact, well, yeah, you know, you're getting waterboarded, but you know that at some point it's going to stop. You're in control. Yes. So, there's this degree of I'm sure that it was still [ __ ] awful and uncomfortable. And I'm pretty sure Tim said like, "Go for as long as you want. Keep going. Like, do it again. Hit me again. Hit me again." But there is something about the lack of authenticity that I think was the reason that people tried to poke holes in it and said, "Hey, like [ __ ] you." Like, let's be honest here. Like, it is your laughing. Your laughing is enhanced interrogation as opposed to that. Who's to say that the fake version of it that he went through didn't last longer than some of the real versions of whatever, whatever. But the emotional Yeah. of like, oh, these people don't have my best interest at heart is kind of the same as what you guys are trying to create when you go to the cabin in the woods. I think it went like three times, right, for this last went up went back up and then went back different producers, second time, etc. Yeah, I know. You did your research. I like it. Um so I think it's an odd realization that the start of something the liberation that you have there you know if people are to look back on any whatever career it is that they've got now go back to university or go back to college or whatever and think about what was like when was it really really good dude you know we had to hand that project in and it was like midnight on the Sunday and we slept at slept we ordered dominoes and everyone slept under their desks and then we got up the next day and we did it we [ __ ] made it man like that was what was cool Yeah. And um again, this is an unteable lesson that luxury becomes as much of a prison as it is an enabler. Absolutely. Like you know you guys on a [ __ ] double-decker tour, but like Dan and Shay, I went to go and hang with them after they played in Austin and they've got like two and I'm sure you know like the most [ __ ] insane. Oh well, you know the the way that we've actually done this bed is if you put it at the very back because no one has to walk past it. You can have like a additional queen size thing and it's over the back wheel which means that there's more dampening and whatever whatever like all of this stuff and uh you know it's cool as [ __ ] to see it but there's a something about the like rough and ready story of you having to get the [ __ ] orienteer ring out and we say it all the time. Yep. We say it all the time. the [ __ ] you remember, the [ __ ] that impresses upon you, and the [ __ ] that makes you you is like, bro, in the last 6 months we've played the forum, crazy arenas, all these places. I remember like I can tell you the way that a place in 2003 smelled, you know what I mean? Like sleeping in the van, in the gully. Well, it it I I think you dive into this a lot, but I know it's like kind of um very I I don't know if like Roganesque is a good thing and you can edit that out, but like the idea of like the Gogggins and these kinds of people where they're like similar to Tim Kennedy like suffering is where growth comes from. So, choose suffering. Choose something whether it be uh a cold plunge or this is where your world end in mine a run or anything sauna like do things that are uncomfortable intentionally to then allow everything else to kind of feel a bit normal. Um and and I think that's what that's the difference with your Tim Kennedy analogy is like me going in to a cold plunge is me setting a timer for four of 3 to 5 minutes. I'm in control. It's 33 degrees. I want to die. Y and it's not the same as me falling through ice as me being in the Titan fully clothed in 33° weather and maybe I'm only in there for 2 minutes. That 2 minutes would scar me compared to the five minutes that I willingly do upon myself. Although the environment is exactly the same uh as far as physically. And I think in a weird way, like we try to recreate stuff like that, but like when it actually happens naturally by life, like that's what forms you. You know, you could try to heat up metal and try to distill it and try to purify it and do this and like, yeah, like let's let's go do something hard again. Let's go to a cabin and and act like we're single and alone and maybe even try to go crazy a little bit to see what comes out. Like we're doing an experiment on ourselves, but we're really just attempting to set ourselves up in the closest form that resembles something that came natural so that we can receive transmission. You're laughing as an older version of yield. Yeah. Eating or a younger version. Yeah. Yeah. Of course. You know what I mean? Having [ __ ] uh Elon's [ __ ] Skynet Global Inc. Py Van Winkle whiskey, the whole thing. Yeah. Yeah. Like Yeah. Now it this it's the same as when we were doing it in an old storage space except for there's a movie theater, a hot, a grill, and he brings 15 bottles of whiskey and we make old fashions every night. And by the way, and by the way, and by the way, and we have a car, and we have three cars, actually like I bought my first car when I was 24. I drove the band van around as my person because we were like literally I did not own a vehicle or car insurance until we were all 22. So one guy had a college fund that we depleted. We spent all of his [ __ ] money. Yeah. And we used his phone. Thank you Dave and Karen Brandell. Um but yeah and and and you want to recreate it but you you can't. And I think I've heard you talk about this or someone was talking to you about it, but talking about slumps and like almost how you know year three, four or five of doing this podcast or whenever it was something in that realm. It's like that's where it started to get stale and like how how do I excite it? And like that's that seems to be everyone's real question and possibly the most important answers that nobody can answer. I mean, even today, uh, I forget who it was that asked it, but they're like, "You've been with the same woman for 18 years." Like, "Yeah, I'm actually I've only ever been with my wife. I've only seen one human being naked ever." Uh, in the physical, obviously, and and he's like kind of dumbfounded and then goes, "So, what do you how do you make that like special?" And just kind of like, "How do you spice it up?" I think was the bigger question. And what is it like over time? And yeah, and because I think we all think about things in like a it's constantly degrading and the first 6 months of a relationship, step one is always the best. The infatuation, the the romance is there, there were flowers and fresh cooked meals and the sex was great. And now 10 years in, you got a couple kids like and that's how everyone views it. And in a weird way, like I'd rather just age gracefully than try to recreate being a horny teenager. But that's a really interesting question that I've thought about a lot that there isn't I don't think there's a particularly healthy conversation around how to age gracefully as a man. There's not and I mean not for anyone. I well no that that would be true. I think the reason that it's particularly interesting, it's a tiny little bit like maybe novel, is just that um the conversation around women aging because the world places an awful lot of value on women's youth, the way that they look in terms of youth and that's why cosmetic surgery and makeup and and and facelifts, all this stuff exists in order to hold on to that, right? To not to not grow into it, to to go back. And that has to be tough for chicks to deal with. But I don't think that there is a I I simply don't think there's a conversation around what it's like to age as a guy physically, mentally, emotionally. Like what does that mean to transcend? It's like, you know, we we understand what it's like to have the super arrested development of like the adult manchild, you know, like the 35-year-old infant. Um there's a movie about it where some a couple hires some woman to break their son out of that. It's 40-year-old guy living in his house and I can't remember what it's called. Okay. It's going to drive me crazy. But yeah, so go on though. I I think I know where you're going next. It's just it's just not a it's not a particularly welltrodden path. And I don't think that there are very good archetypes for you know I'm 37 and the first time I think I noticed age was probably about 34 and I was like huh workouts actually take a little bit longer to is that [ __ ] gray hair in my beard. like it's one I mean that's kind of cool I guess like but you know what I mean and you think huh I haven't I haven't really ever heard and then when you start to roll in okay what does it mean about relationships what does it mean about your role in the world what how are you supposed to show up because like am I going to be the [ __ ] like leanest most jacked strongest coolest newest guy band [ __ ] singer songwriter thing I'm not hot [ __ ] anymore okay so what does that mean am I supposed to try and recreate that old thing Because we valorize success, especially first time success and descendancy and trajectory so much. Correct. Okay. Well, what does it mean? What does it mean to sort of graduate? What does it mean? What does it mean to to move on from that? Well, that's why I think a lot of men, older men, like don't have to, to your point, like there's no archetype. There's no uh no mentors. And it's like these people retire and then they go back to work. Like men don't even know how to stop being this one thing. You've been doing it for 50 years. Like you know what is next? What is the next chapter? And it's there there isn't one. And that's why I I think that's why you know episodes like the dry creek domain is nailed it. I said triple D earlier is is is cool because he's an old guy and he almost feels like he's so different than me that it feels like my grandpa or my dad talking to me about how to go about life versus you know peers people that are my age your age our age and it's like okay what happens at 50 what happens at 60 like what do you do with that and it's like there's such an emphasis on to your point recreating that it's like TRT therapy and this and this and this and all the things. And all we're doing is kicking and screaming, being dragged towards death, raging against entropy and doing the best we can to save it off rather than walking with the current and going here we here we sit. Well, having no examples too is I think is the biggest like Dry Creek Dwayne [ __ ] two is is really it really appeals to me. But to you, I could see I could see you in Wyoming [ __ ] wrangling a horse, but to you that might not appeal, you know what I mean? Like you might want to age and go out a different way. Yeah. You know what I mean? Like with And I'm not saying like with like with women, you can you can see it in television, in media, like you have the woman who's like the gardening lady and she ages that way, the yoga lady, like cat lady. Some of some of the wives in our band, some of the they're they're like they're be getting in their mid-4s and they're becoming yoga teachers and stuff and it's a beautiful thing to watch. Yeah. But men like because there's archetypes like it's either dry quick drain, you play golf and rot or you or become Elon Musk or die trying or you go back to work, you do the permanent management. Yeah, those are those are those are development the three options, you know. Um and I I think what helps me is having anything that can take me out of thinking of me is a good thing. Yeah. And I think having kids and having knowing that I'm going to be a grandfather one day like there my path has already been laid out. And so it's I don't know how I'm going to get there and I hope I'm valuable and can contribute when that time comes. I'd love to be a grandpa that's fit enough to be able to throw the football with his grandkids. Think about this. I know that you both have got challenges to do with [ __ ] like you know we we nailed it. We made the world a better place. We gave songs that sort of brought people out of themselves. We helped them to understand bits of their life. We we we created collective effvescence for like millions of people across a huge huge huge [ __ ] career. Yeah. But I I missed some of my kids upbringing and all the rest of it. But think about what it's going to be like when your kids have got grandkids and granddad has got the sickest stories. Like granddad's cool. Yeah. Granddad knows the world. He can tell you about Delhi and he can tell you about [ __ ] Jakarta and he can tell you about what it's like in Adelaide in the winter and he can tell you about what it's like to go to Dublin Island and have I be the Guinness fan. Let me tell you about the Guinness factory. You know [ __ ] dude that is a worldly patriarch in a family. Yeah. Is like that's where [ __ ] like druids come from. You know what I mean? Like that anchor of why they're why you're there. Uh, big hopeful that's a big hopeful piece rather than being the dad who rots in the chair. Yeah. And I mean I think I Yeah, it's it's always I we're we're breaking something every day. We're breaking something. We just don't know what we're breaking yet, you know? And I think that's the exciting part of life is it's not color in these lines and then beautiful picture comes out, color in these lines, another beautiful picture comes out, everything's in its right place. like there there are things that I've probably done or will do or I'm still doing that are hurting someone somewhere. Uh my goal is to make sure that I do less of them and recognize them as they come and then I think by the end of it all you just look back and go we all did our best. Yeah. You know that's all you can do. I think another way to look at that the breaking things is a an interesting an interesting way to frame it. Another way to frame it might be there's a price that you have to pay in order to do thing. There's a price. Yeah. Right. There's a barrier to entry to be there's a cost of doing business. Yes. Correct. There's a cost of doing business for this thing. You want to be you want to [ __ ] make music that changes a portion of the world. Okay, cool. I have to go to a portion of the world. There's a [ __ ] price that you have to pay for it. Yep. And I I think that's fine. And and for me personally, I don't know if the price necessarily is as valuable as the outcome. I don't I don't know that those correlate. Like if we had to start over and someone said, "Here's a crystal ball. You're going to start now. And if you do what you just did for the last 25 years again, by the time you're 75, you're going to be sitting down with a very old Chris Williamson and you could have the whole ride over again. I would say, "No, I'm good." Like I like the beauty of things being temporary and it's like and the contentment of just going, "Yeah, we've there's there's two ways to look at it. We're playing [ __ ] the Norva again. We played the We played the Norva in 2003, 2004, and now it's 2025. I'm still at the [ __ ] Norva. Yeah. Or holy [ __ ] the Norva sold out again 20 years later. Norva is sick. No. Yeah, I know. And yeah, for me it's always the second one. It's like 2018, whatever. These people are still coming to see us and it's but it's all the same. And what I'm not interested in doing is trying to be that like sad 55year-old rocker who can't let it go and be a career musician. Like that doesn't interest me. I don't if if we happen to be here in 10 years talking to you and still playing shows, I will gladly do it. I'm not intentionally sabotaging anything, but I think the open-handedness of just like whenever this is ready to go, I've had more than my fill. I've been beyond blessed. I've had more memories and lifetimes than I ever thought would be provided if it all goes away. I try to remember how blessed and fortunate we are to put like the Norva thing. I was I was um Where is Norva? Uh it's in Virginia Beach, Virginia. My isn't it? Norfolk. Norfick. Yes. My um my exfather-in-law I I've been blessed enough to to co-parent my first child with my ex-wife and um I'm still close with her family. I was there just there this weekend and um they live on the other side of the country. my ex-father-in-law who I'm close with, he's he's dying of empisma. He's in his 70s and he smoked cigarettes for like 50 some odd years and he carries around an oxygen tank. Um, and these guys all know this, but he's like he's an amazing guitar player and he played in bands all growing up. It's what he did. Bar bands, you know, like gigging. And he never um he never made it. and he was never in anything that blew up or sold records or was a real living. Um had a conversation with him on Saturday afternoon outside at a barbecue at a family member's house. And he goes, "I put it down. I did it. I stopped and I'm happy about it." And I'm like head stop playing. Can't breathe. He's like, "I put it down. I I don't I I I finally did it." Cuz when you saw him a few months ago, he was still lugging gear to venues in 70 with a [ __ ] with a [ __ ] oxygen tank. I mean, yeah. Holy [ __ ] But what was beautiful it was it I got emotional about it because he's like I did it closure. He's like my time is overfully and you know what he said and I thought like I literally when he started the conversation I was like oh [ __ ] oh [ __ ] oh [ __ ] oh go [ __ ] he's going to be like I never made it. None of this ever and he literally was like it was so fun and I'm so glad I got to do it and it [ __ ] me up cuz I was like we're over here bitching about the Norva you know or whatever in a theoretical moment by the way. I love you, Norva. Yeah, we all love the Norva, but he he never played for more than four or 500 people ever. Do you find it difficult? It seems like uh Tim's got a very balanced that open-handed impermanence sort of approach to things, but I get the sense that you're a little bit more conflicted, not necessarily about that precisely, but generally, what does this mean? sense of purpose. Where's it coming from? Given that you've got someone who is kind of like a a purist in no one else in the [ __ ] recording studio, but also with regards to this, that's kind of a little bit like being with the the LeBron James of impermanence a bit. You got this like Buddhist, you know, this Buddhist guy sat next to you and that's your first tattoo in one in one form. Uh, is that [ __ ] like maybe I should be like that. Maybe it would be easier if I could let go. Does that cause a little uh more so when I was younger? Because like I told you an hour ago, this motherfucker's been bent like that since the beginning. Like been like this since 2003 happened to 2003 when 2004 when it was like I grew up in a trailer on food stamps. 2004 someone we literally started making like real money like buying house money and he is over here like well you know if like whatever and there's been times where to answer your question more directly I've wished I was like that um and there's been times where I've gone he's a [ __ ] idiot he doesn't know what he's he doesn't know what he's got and he's squandering it with his psyche like and then and then now where we're at now at where we're both 42 years old and we're at now is I look at him and I go, that's a beautiful thing and I'm glad that he's able to do it. I'm glad that he can hold everything with a greased hand, you know, and I I hold on a little tighter. And I think the reasons I hold on tighter are irrelevant, but I maybe they are relevant, but like it it's just an acceptance that I you have if you don't it's like being like you said earlier, it's like being married to four other people and if you don't accept some of their quirks, you're really on the brakes. You're in trouble. You know what I mean? like your relationship this doesn't work and it's a constant marriage is hard. It's work. It's a beautiful work. It's one of the most beautiful works you can do in my opinion. But it is a labor. It is a labor that you do. You you get up every day and as cliche as it sounds, you choose to love that person and you choose to love the things about them that you don't agree with, number one, and that you can't see eye to eye with in any facet. And that's just what it is. And there's things about the greased hands thing, the open hands thing that I'm like, do you even care about what you're doing? And then I you circle back around and go, I get it. Mhm. And and some some days I wish I I wish. Yeah. I think I mean that that's a a a rational question, but to your point even earlier about, you know, you pop in and get all the ideas out and then I'm the one stuck for 3 days like brooding. It's like I I think I earn the right Yes. to qualify that statement with the fact that I am if not the one of the hardest working people in the band. Oh, you're the finisher. For someone who quote unquote can easily get painted as like, oh, he doesn't care. He's squandering it. Like, why am I working so [ __ ] hard? And it's because this has meaning yet it does not define me. And that's a difference. You got a really beautiful mindset when it comes to that. It's very impressive. um you know as a fellow uh obsessive it's uh it's difficult to find that level of equinimity right to be able to deploy everything but to have it come from a place of just I want this to be really good as opposed to if I don't this defines me and it is indicative of my selfworth and if I can't make this [ __ ] melody this track this [ __ ] fill this whatever this part this vocal I if I can't make this a success as beautiful as whatever it might be. Yeah. Then I am dot dot dot then it means this about me then and I'm going to be homeless and alone and under a bridge with a gluten intolerant. You know what I mean? Like all of these things are going to [ __ ] happen. Um I I learned about this thing the other day that was that was pretty interesting. Um hedging your identity. So the healthiest and happiest people in the world apparently have uh multiple different places that they take their sense of selfworth from. And uh yours might be a musician, father, husband, friend, bandmate, leader, uh confidant, you know what I mean? All of these different things. If it's someone else might be a Brazilian jiu-jitsu grappler, but also they're a a salesperson, also they're a pool player, also they're a, you know, whatever the [ __ ] And I think I was thinking about this literally on the way in. I wrote a huge message on the way in about this that The price that you need to pay to be the best in the world is to probably sacrifice absolutely everything else in order to be able to to get there. Now, this is the best in the world under a very very narrow domain, right? It's a very narrow window, which is you will perform in your chosen pursuit to the best of your ability. And the reason that you have to sacrifice all of these other things is that if you don't, you will be beaten by a person who's prepared to sacrifice all of those other things. Yeah. Like, make no mistake, if none of you guys had got married, none of you guys had ever decided to have kids, done all the rest of the stuff. I mean, who's to say that it hasn't informed you artistically. It's kind of the weird leverage thing how art works that uh sometimes stuff which is suboptimal actually ends up giving you a step change in terms of insight. But let's say that it's something a little bit more linear like football, right? Or or powerlifting or some [ __ ] like that. I always use this example, but Eddie Hall, World's Strongest Man, 2018, 19, British guy, and he's stood there on the winners podium and he's got this trophy and he's throwing it in the air and he's saying, "Nana, this is for you." His grandma died like not long ago. Nana, this is for you. Tears streaming down his face. And uh he does this interview afterwards and he says if I hadn't won I would be dead divorced with no relationship to my daughter because he was six foot two 200 like [ __ ] like 400 lb 400 plus pounds. He was on so many performance-enhancing drugs. His blood pressure was through the roof. All of these different things. Spending all of his time training and being obsessive. So his wife and his marriage [ __ ] falling apart. Wasn't seeing his daughter at all cuz he spent all his time in the gym obsessing over winning this thing. and you go, "Okay, that's the price to be Eddie Hall." Yep. Do you want to be Eddie Hall? Do you want to be Eddie Hall? Because that's the [ __ ] price that you need to pay in order to be that. Right. And this is where this is kind of the lesson that I keep drilling into myself. It's largely like this whole body of work for me has been like a thinly veiled autobiography. Um and uh like what I'm trying to drill into myself is okay, what is the metric of success? Like what what is it that you consider to be success? Because if it's the most plays, the most money, the most followers, the most whatever on the show, uh being known or validated or liked by the most people, that's going to pervert your uh direction and it's going to cause you to like you can end up if you do that, you can end up at at a place in life not only that you don't want to be, but one that you literally didn't even mean to get to. Yeah. And you can turn around and go, "Holy fuck." like I got to the top of this huge mountain and I was supposed to be on that meadow over the far side. Yeah. Supposed to be down there. And uh you're trying to shortcut that. But and here's the question that has kind of been in the back of my mind for all this conversation. I wonder how much and it it speaks to your exfather ex-father-in-law's point which is what you thought he was going to say too which is this unrequited unfulfilled level of success. I wonder how easy it is for or how much easier it is for you guys to be able to talk about, you know, like the ease, the open-handedness, all the rest of it because you like they're only Chasing Safety in many ways created a sound that 20 years later is now the ascendant or partly an ascendant sound that's coming back around, right? that is like how how much did it shape the next [ __ ] however many decades of rock in in lots of different ways and to be able to we've played like is there a [ __ ] country on the planet that's not at war that you guys haven't played in probably not like you know every single place of every single show of every single tour of every single everyone anybody that's in the rock rock industry knows the name of that it's okay so it's all well and good going you know like I just I'm open-handed with it man and like it's easy but how the the real rubber meets the road when you go You never played to more than 400 people in your entire career and you were never recognized and you never got a record label deal. Yeah. And I think that that again, this is an unteachable lesson being said by people who have got to some form of success within their industry to be able to tell people further down, hey man, you can you can chase it, but I'm telling you, your problems are still going to be your problems when you get to the top and they're going to say, "Fuck you. Watch me dance through this minefield and thing." Yeah. It didn't work for all of you. I'll be different. Yeah. Yeah. I I think that's true. I mean, that's all that's all life is is us looking at celebrities overdosing and all these people and rock stars never being good dads or good moms or good partners and cheating and I mean even Dave Gro had come out. [ __ ] Yeah. Like what a hero fallen from the top and literally like and that's kind of like I felt impossible. That broke people. That's my thing though is like why are we making these people our heroes? It's this is not new. Like and I don't know like it's just a weird thing to be like I look up to musicians that inspire me musically. you know, Run the Jewels is one of my favorite bands or groups and like I listen to a lot of hip-hop and then a lot of like weird stuff that is, you know, down here [ __ ] Yeah. Well, there's a band like Howdy, H O VD Y. You've probably never heard of them. I think they're from here. They're in Nashville now. I love them. They're great. Um Porsches, [ __ ] like that. And like they're not my heroes, they inspire me. But like to put someone in, especially for musicians, to have someone that you idolize that is just doing what you're doing at a 10x scale and not recognizing that it's just 10 times more [ __ ] up to pay to get there. Yeah. It's just like you don't want to be that guy. And if you could be that guy, you'd be miserable. [ __ ] hate it. And I think every I think the universe, if there is a God or an energy or a spirit, it's trying to tell all of us all of the time, go grab a cigar with your friend and don't break nothing and stop trying to be Elon Musk. There's nothing logically in my brain or heart, which is more important, or my spirit, whatever you call that, that says the opposite. There's just nothing. And it it just it kind of just ends there. I mean, three and a half hours later, you can end it on like this poetic like blah blah blah blah blah, but like if you can synthesize all of it down, like that's what it is. I don't want to be in Nashville writing more songs for more people. I don't want that, you know? I don't want to be more famous than I am. I love going to Target with my kids and just being a guy nobody knows, you know? Like, it's not about climbing the ladder. Next, next, next next, next. And I'm not saying he is either. I'm just saying I'm just naturally wired to just be like, man, the simple, the peaceful. You know, we used to take fishing poles out. Like we would just get out of the concrete jungle and just go to any lake and just fish, pack some beers. Let's get out of here. Like the nature, the mountains, the cabin, like everything that we are doing, even collectively, I might be maybe trying to forcefully do that. And some people are like, I guess we'll go to the mountains. But man, like when you're there, it's like different than being in LA. It's the beauty of enough, right? The beauty of enough. Contentment. That should be a whole other podcast. Even I, you know, I was listening to a podcast the other day. I think we listened to the same one with Bono. And Bono's polarizing for a lot of people, you know, like I don't know much about him. For music people, he's polarizing because Are you Are you serious? I don't know much. I mean, I know he's like I know his music. I don't know much about God. Oh, yeah. Yeah. I've never read an interview with polarizing for a lot of people because a lot of people hate modern YouTube, but something that was really and and he's player old stuff just like us. Yeah, he's been he's been involved in a lot of causes, you know. Um, but with enough being enough, like something that really got me that he that he said was he and he seems to have this huge ego with the glasses and he's [ __ ] mono. And he says, "Our band, like we started this conversation, I thought it was so cool." He says, "Our band is a democracy." And he's like, "That's one of my biggest like pride things that I have about what we do." You know what I mean? And for me, like the fishing, the the the the cabin, the the contentment, like like if you put something on Under Oath's gravestone, for me it will be that we did our own [ __ ] our own way democratically, even when it was impossible, even when it seemed impossible for us to do it in a democratic way. And even sometimes at our demise, like if we would have made Chasing Safety Part Two, would would I be richer? Probably. But I'm glad that we did. Would you be happier? That's That's exactly it. And Bono, I think Bono, the vibe I got is I think he's happy because those other three guys in his band and him agree and they fight to do it like we do, but they can say, "Yeah, this song should be this way or whatever." This ultimately, you're going to know, right? At the end of the day, maybe there's a certain level, very low level of self-reflection where people are able to kind of continue to masquerade as a thing while being a different thing in private. Yeah. And and continue to do things ostensibly outfront for one cause whilst secretly believing something different or wanting something different privately. Uh but ultimately, I think you're going to know you're going to know whether or not you fooled yourself. you're going to know whether or not you lied about this thing. And that's cool. Like you can look back on a string of miserable successes or inauthentic successes, right, that were crafted in a manner that kind of fugazied people into believing that it was you. Yeah. And you know, again, you unpack that a lot though, right? Cuz you have like imposttor syndrome. I hear that come up a lot. Like just are you wise? Are you this driven? Are you fit? because you know people like where's it coming from? Yeah. Yeah. But I but I think I think at scale over time you will be found out you know uh Naval's got this wonderful line. He says uh you don't need karma to deliver spiritual justice. All that karma is is people repeating their patterns, virtues and flaws until they finally get what they deserve. If you roll the dice enough times, eventually you'll get the same the thing the thing that is coming for you will come for you. And sure, some people some people can dance through the minefield and not kick it, right? But there are people in your industry. There are people in my industry. There are people in my old industry. Yeah. That I know. I'm like, "Hey, man. Like, I get it. You might be making it work, but you're a piece of shit." Yeah. or you're um selfdeceptive or you're uh obiscatory or you're you're um unfair or whatever, right? You're mean. You're mean. You're a mean person. And sure, maybe you're hot now, maybe you'll be hot forever, but like unless you have a [ __ ] half inch deep level of self-reflection, at some point it's going to come back around. It's going to come back around in your [ __ ] nervous system. It's going to come back around in an existential crisis or you're going to roll the dice one too many times and Snake Eyes is going to come up and your wife's going to catch you [ __ ] cheating or your bandmates are going to realize that you've actually been doing this thing all along. You've been like, you've been [ __ ] skimming transaction fees off the top of every bit of merch that we've done for the last [ __ ] however long. Like whatever it is that you do, y you'll repeat your patterns. And I think the goal is it's what uh Dwayne says is like um I like me. I'd buy me a beer. Yeah. You're like, you want to be a person that you can [ __ ] buy a beer? Triple D, baby. Boys, this has been [ __ ] unbelievable. We've done three hours. Hell yeah. It was an honor to do it, man. Thank you. Thank you for real. Appreciate it. Sick. Appreciate it very much. Well, let's go and eat some steak. Let us go. Congratulations. You made it to the end of the episode. And if you want more, well, why don't you press right here [Music]