The Art of an Authentic Comeback - Jon Bellion

new album. >> Yep. >> But you're not touring right now? >> No. >> Why? [laughter] >> Right into it. Um the touring thing is uh it's been a bit of a I toured for a really long time before I walked away from artistry for about six or seven years. Um I've given this uh this spiel a couple of times, but it's just like kind of figured out how the ins and outs worked of it. Understood what the toll on my life was opposed to what I was getting paid for what I was bringing in, and the business just didn't make sense of it. So, I've walked away from that a long time ago and then was able to this time around just kind of like really do inventory on what's important to me and what I want to do. And we were able to do uh Forest Hill Stadium just two nights back to back sold out in a couple hours. And uh because the deal was right and I understand the business more, I can just drive home in my minivan and collect my money and be paid more than I've ever done for touring combined in two nights. >> Two nights made you more than entire tours previously? >> Yeah. Yeah. just because the because I don't regret any of it, but it just it definitely put in perspective. Oh, oh, this is how they're killing you. This is how they're getting you on the backside. And >> so, yeah. Yeah. So, we ended up doing just two nights. 26,000 people showed up. It's crazy. Crazy. After every after six or seven years of being away, it was like moving, super emotional. >> After such a long hiatus, were you surprised by the positive response to the album and the the Forest Hills shows? Yeah, I think you you you build up like it's like Dre with Detox or like you build up this thing and then the expectation becomes so high that you'll never be able to whatever. So I think I was fortunate enough to just like disappear and go away and write for other people for a super long time. >> And I think that the pressure resolved cuz I think the fans after a while were just like I actually just don't think he'll ever put out music again. So then when I was like I'm putting out music, they didn't have time for there to be this unrealistic expectation of like steps too. like they didn't have to it didn't have to be Dumb and Dummers too. Like it just was and on top of that I just like became a completely different person in seven years. Like you're tapping in with a the sound was different. My approach was different. Everything was different. So I think people were like fascinated and interested and it ended up being a blessing. It was a bigger debut. Top six in the country, top 10 in the world. Like and I'm not even like fake like oh it's been it's been a shock of a blessing. And it's and this time around you don't get to do things twice. I almost feel like I'm like Scrooge or something. Like I woke up on Christmas again and I'm like I get to do this over. So looking out at a stadium sold out two nights in a row and I've never done that 6 years ago and somehow it got bigger by the time I came back. >> I wasn't even in my own self. I was like watching the movie being like this is crazy. >> How'd that feel? You're so familiar with playing performing live stuff. >> Yeah. >> And then you do it and it's the same. It's the [ __ ] that you've done hundreds of times before. Mhm. >> And it's different at the same time. I'm interested in what that >> I had one of my guys who's played with me since we were in college, my my buddy George, he's one of my my closest closest friends. And uh he was on keys behind me and we both after the show just like held each other like just like you don't at this point it's like I'm on such borrowed time. I really feel that way. Like it's like you don't get to walk away and then end up being like nailing a few number ones to like pay for your life and then accept the fact that the artistry is never coming back >> and then the label's like you know what he's worth more to us giving him what he wants than him just never putting it out cuz I don't think he's bluffing anymore like he will not put out. >> So you played a game of chicken basically. a six year game with chicken and then had to go to therapy and and you know really settled it in my heart that's like this is okay if this if this guy's plan on my life I'm I'm never going to do this and I will serve other people forever and their vision like that's fine and I get a lot out of that and I learned a lot about serving people for a long time other artists >> for sure like it definitely >> gave me a tool belt and my vocal ability grew and stuff but playing that show looking out man run a clip if [laughter] you want like you can clip to it it's just it was nuts it was nuts I've played festivals and stuff but I've never solo sold out back to back 13,000 people in a night. It's just crazy. It's crazy. With with zero help from the machine or whatever. It's crazy. I'm interested in the hiatus and the fact that your fans still should buy in after you spent years away cuz I think most people in every industry feel like they always need to be producing content. >> Mhm. [clears throat] >> To keep their fans engaged. >> Yeah. You got any idea why people stayed resonant with you despite the fact that you were absent front facing? >> Probably. Yeah, it's it's probably a mixture of uh it's probably a mixture of like you know what you don't have. It's like you only sell 10 t-shirts. So then the time the 10 t-shirts come out again, you don't know if they're going to only do 10 again. So you you're going to you're going to get the t-shirt. You know, you're excited about I think there's a scarcity thing and the content stuff. I'm a very like I I still am in real time figuring out as we're talking what content even it's just not for me. It's not for me. It takes It takes up too much space in my mind. It causes me to not be present with my family. It's it's it's odd. And you It's like funny. I'm like talking to the guy who's like And you've had probably so you've spoken to so many prolific people about it. So your knowledge of wealth is probably way deeper than mine. But I just don't feel uh like I say it all the time. I'm not selling a chair. I'm selling me. And I go into town square and I get on a pedestal and I say, "These are my beliefs about life. This is my art. This is this is the deepest reflection I could possibly excavate of myself." And someone in the background goes, "Fuck you. I don't like it." It's like they're telling they don't like me. I'm not selling. If you don't like a table I made, >> someone can say, "I don't like the table." And I can somehow, even though the table's a representation of me, I can somehow separate myself to try to draw people to the table, not draw people to me. >> And the selfobsession stuff, it's tough. It's tough with kids. It's tough in a marriage. It's It's tough. It's It's tough to constantly be like, I wake up and how will my next decision make me look and my brand for the next chapter of my life. That's a tough and that's a tough person to be around. It's tough for people to be around that a lot when every move is this concerted effort to >> So, honestly, me walking away from music wasn't that hard because I never enjoyed and that doesn't I'm not like down to earth cool Joe number one. I just >> Hey guy, it's not >> When were you furthest away from that resonance? >> What do you mean? >> You So you mentioned that you're uh trying to be as uh transparent as as connected as possible to the work that you do, to the artistic integrity of how you're producing things, your time with your family, presumably time with friends, even like album artwork. You're deep on everything, right? Yeah. >> I really veered off a little bit there and I started playing the game to a level that I could >> I think maybe the day like the first day you get the first >> thing on YouTube the first I had 5,000 views on the last one. This one has 10. I think the second that became the feedback loop of positivity and whatever you get yourself on a little bit of a train that's you don't even know you're on the train until the the [ __ ] crashes you're like I didn't even it's like frog in the boiling water type of situation. >> I think I was always on a trajectory of >> it's the same thing. It's like you mention any artist who's like I had the most money and I was ready to kill myself. Look at the crazy story of artist X and everyone's like, "Wow, what a deep." It's the same archetype over and over and Oh, I just happened to be blessed enough, just blessed enough to be like, I don't know how I'm going to walk away from this. I don't know how this is going to work out cuz I wasn't writing for other people at the time. I'm going back home and I'm going to make music in my basement and I'm just going to walk away. >> Maybe work at McDonald's. >> I told my wife that. It's crazy. I told my wife that. I said, "Yes." And she's laughing at me. She's like, "You're forgetting how talented you are. You've been doing this for a long time." But I just walked away. And then by the grace of God, it was like, it was like, like hit after hit. But I think that was because I may have shedded I may have shedded uh what do people want and what's going to feed the next. >> It was like my heart is vibrating with this song and maybe that's what humans wanted and that will always cut through. So I try to just stay to that. I try to I know that sounds super pseudo like heavy. Dude, I I I couldn't >> I couldn't resonate more. Like, it's >> Instinct is the only thing that's ever led you right. >> Ever. >> Ever. Oh my gosh. It's >> the only thing that's ever led you right. Like with the show, um, >> you know, the currency that we traffic in is plays largely, right? Because, uh, have you heard me talk about hidden and observable metrics? >> Yes. Yeah. Okay. So um observable metric plays hidden metric uh how much it changes a listener's life. Absolutely. Right. There's a difference between breadth and depth. >> Absolutely. >> Um and unfortunately depth is just hidden metric. >> Yeah. >> When I feel most connected to the work that I do is when I'm following my instincts as sort of plainly as possible. >> Yes. And I think the big hurdle for me and the word that's coming to mind as you're talking about what you did is bravery or courage >> that I'm prepared to back myself >> totally >> to stick to my principles. >> Totally. >> How difficult would it have been to have done that without your wife? >> I wouldn't have. >> My point being a lot of people think that they can soloreneur their way through any industry, music, business, whatever. >> You can. I just don't know how. Like my wife is unbelievable. I really mean that. It's like it's a grounded perspective. It's an anchor that I would just be. I don't want to know. I don't want to know who I'd be or what it would look like. She's she like just she like almost knows who I am or knew who I was. Even when she married me, she knew the the person that like I was going to become that I don't even know. She almost sees that in a way or or something. Yeah. She's and she she even like I've not I mean I've noticed since middle school. I sat behind her in middle school. So she's uh what's the best way to put it? If I did wake up tomorrow and was just like I'm over it. I'm out. She's like cool. What are we doing today? She's not It's not She really does just want to see me happy. So she's she's down for the all right you want to write for six years. I was like, "All right, you want to spend $2 million a lot of money on an album and and risk it all yourself and come back after 6 years and rent the venues yourself and buy the merch yourself. All right, let's see if it worked." She's ready to go cuz you know, six years ago, I'm like, "I'm never again." And I know my future and and then 6 years later, I was like, I have a lot to say. And now they want to give me my [ __ ] back. So, I feel like morally, it's a good time for me to actually operate because I'm not a dancing monkey. I'm just making [ __ ] and getting paid properly off of it. So, >> dude, that's so cool. That's so sick. >> Yeah. >> Uh you mentioned that you changed a lot in the space of six years. >> Oh man, I had three kids. >> That'll change you. [laughter] >> Yeah. >> Uh >> in fact, actually, before we even get on to that, I need to talk about this fake Instagram account. >> Yeah. >> thing. >> Yeah. >> Seems like the forum ticket sales and most of the album roll out was talked about through a blank Instagram account called user 12261990. My birthday. Yeah. >> What the [ __ ] going on? >> Um, social media is too much is is the brand of my name is too much for me to care about. So, it was more freeing to just [ __ ] post and just say things in real time and not curate the post and not whatever. And then for some reason, when I removed it from my name and it was just this like doing this thing, I knew that the real fans would care. And then the harder it is for people to access the real information that's not on the main page, it would turn fans into more news herald type of people. So I just was like, let's do a Windows 98 like forum. Let's do a fake Instagram. Let's do all do stuff that creates people to have to kind of dig to then go tell the rest of the world who are passive fans, this is what it's going to be. Cuz then I hired a label for free, you know? So it it just took the pressure off cuz social media is just not for me. I haven't had social media on my phone until I got that fake Instagram. I haven't had it for six years. Not a single thing. So, it's like, how am I going to get back into this? Because the second I post from my main account, it'll be >> 30,000 likes and then my >> and then my whole [ __ ] starts to take over again where I'm like waking up being like, what is the thing that's going to remain my relevancy for people to know about my album? No, I can't do it. >> Did you fear irrelevance? >> Fear irrelevance. One of my deepest fears creatively is 100% my ideas not being valued to be brought to affect other people. My deepest fear is when you lose your quote unquote relevancy whether it be in production or artistry or whatever. There's a viable idea that could change the world but the world doesn't soak it in because the perspective that you've built of yourself is not as strong as it was years ago. So there is this weird dance you have to >> Okay. So you see your relevance as a vehicle. My relevance is only a vehicle for utility. My the relevance is a vehicle to present utility to other musicians and to other things to keep the soup turning of culture for this to birth cooler [ __ ] than when I'm gone other things will happen. >> You're like a vessel. That's it. Nothing else. It's not It's all borrowed books in a library and we're taking and we're reading and we're there's stardust coming and it's not like um there's days I'm on my high horse. There's days I think I'm the worst in the world. So, it's like, you know, you don't want to be like too over exaggeration, but like it's all borrowed. It's everything is borrowed. It's all just it's all um anything that is good in my mind comes from God. So, if he shows up to do it through you, it will be good. Good in a way that will last forever because he lasts forever. So it's like if he wants to show up then it'll happen. That's I'm on that time now. I'm on that time. He's going to either she's going to show up or he's not. It's like oh well then just sit in your room all day and wait for God to show up. It's like yes metaphorically it gets very but I I I can only speak from my gut. And I know right now at 34 years old with three kids and whatever. He's either going to he's either going to come in the room and play or he's not. It's just it's just it is what it is. There's a great quote which is uh God doesn't want to do all of the work. Some of it is left up to you. >> Yeah. >> And I think this balance between faith or belief and agency age old. Yeah. >> Correct. >> Yeah. >> You know, I I know that I need to make things happen, but I also need to have faith that I'm going to be pulled toward the right direction of this. >> Yeah. I mean, how many times in my life creatively I thought what I was making was for this and it ended up being something completely different that was not. You look back on it, you're like, "Oh, that ended up being unbelievable for me." >> Do any examples come to mind? >> Um, just like right now, this is the number one record at Rhythmic Radio. I've never had a rhythmic number one in my life. And it was a record that I was like, you know what? I'm going to return to just like really listening to something that I just listen to as a fan and I want to put it in the car and like I just like it. Not like I need hits. I want big songs and this it's going to affect the world. I just want to like get back to a place where I'm like my taste is driving all of this and I'm in the car excited playing it back right now cuz there's waves and flows. There's different >> ways to attack product and like my gut was saying whatever. So I made the song and I was like oh this will probably be for me. no one will ever find it and like the most unexpected artist in the world was like I'll take it and I'll take it to radio and it'll and it ends up going number one and it was like I never would have thought this artist would have took it. I never would have thought you know. So it's like sometimes you make things and as long as the offering is pure and it's like aligned with your gut, the universe will be like you think it's going to be here but I'm going to put it over here one day and then you look back four years later and you're just like I would have never predicted what that was like ever. Like crazy. I love the word taste. Yeah, >> I think it's so great and it's very difficult to define and very difficult to replicate and very difficult to create a blueprint for. I think it's one of the reasons that people don't talk about it because >> the uh good definition of taste being able to distinguish between good and not good. >> Yep. >> Right. This is good. Why? Don't know. Is >> this is not good. Not sure either. It just is >> literally literally that that's a forever coagulating uh not problem but a very interesting interaction with product and me it's it's always like >> when you say product what are you referring to >> just like the thing you made the the product not like a sellable thing just like the fingerpainting put it on the table on the table it's a product right there it's a product of my effort um yeah no it's it's wild there's always a forever interchanging uh what's good for the what's good for me. Some people would even say like the Rick Rubin approach is always just like it's about if I like it and nothing else matters. >> But like sometimes there's thoughts that creep into my mind where it's like this is like almost a cooler melody or this is like a really way like a cooler way of approaching it in my opinion. But I know >> bubbling it boiling it down here to allow the person to understand the point of the pre to then be affected by the hook. It will affect more people constructing it this way. Scorsese Scorsesei makes this and the Avengers is here. >> Mhm. >> And like it some people wake up in the morning and want Avengers and some people wake up in the morning and want Scorsese. To say that both of those things are one is better than the other in my older age. I think that's a young man's game. Young men want to argue about that. I realize as a as a utility guy, I'm starting to to disconnect from there's a time and a place and there's my artistry and I will take my taste to the ump and I will tell to the world this is what I think is the coolest [ __ ] ever. >> Put my balls on the table and be like ain't nobody [ __ ] with this. There's time for that. And then there's other times where I'm like it's not my the world doesn't want this from X and I'm working for X right now. So, I need to kind of separate myself from like even telling them I might not even listen to this in my free time. >> That's not my job. That's not my job. You want to be cool and do your taste all the way and maybe that's fine. But like I also enjoy just like sending my kids to college and there's times where if you want to [laughter] say if you want if you want to send your kids to college sometimes you just we got to pay the bills. You help. 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And right now, you can get $100 off, bringing it down to $399 bucks. Get the exact same blood panels that I get and save that $100 by going to the link in the description below or heading to functionhealth.com/modernwisdom. That's functionhealth.com/modernwisdom. I love this point. The idea of like artistic validity or or artistic purity or something. >> Oh my gosh. I mean how many people music is very ripe with this but maybe even art modern art for instance would be even more so that the more obscure or inaccessible or clunky or difficult it is to get or to understand >> the more sophisticated you see look at how refined he is. He's able to consider the the complexity and the depth. >> Oh my gosh. And you're like, if it doesn't if it's not popular, it can't have impact. Like, as in if nobody wants it, you can think it's the coolest [ __ ] on the planet. And maybe it is, >> but if the world isn't ready for this, >> yes, >> it doesn't matter. >> You can I say it all the time. I make the joke in the studio all the time. If you want to be, you have to be seen. So, there has to be something that makes it attractive to say that nothing I do is attractive. And I don't care if anybody listens to my [ __ ] It's like, "All right, then live in your parents' basement, eat a bowl of cereal every day, and be broke as a joke until you're 50." And like, okay, I guess. But I'm not saying that that that validates [ __ ] I've seen the bull I' I've uh I've worked on the [ __ ] Mhm. >> I've worked on the most poignant >> just the gray sludge pumped out >> which we understand that the mom who's taking her kids to soccer on a Tuesday is going to turn on the radio and just listen to that. There's there's a directive there. There's a lot of money there. But for me to like waste time to just be like I am the most pure. It puts too much. It's a young man's game. It's it's a young man's game to be to me. Thank the Lord for my album. father figure is my space to go and say go listen to what I'm saying and put it up against that's a whole different thing but far be it for me to not like take a couple of days off to go work with XX to go make something huge that the world who doesn't really care about some people care about boxed wine some people care about stomping on the grapes >> and sometimes boxed wine sells because a 21-year-old who's going to a party just needs to grab something at 7-Eleven and that's viable that's real and that's a necessity and there's utility in that to for me to say that there's not utility in that is is so like like pew pew like I understand art and it's like what's your utility the utility is to serve then you can't get your way 100% of the time cuz that's not serving it's like and in order to be fulfilled in what you do there has to be a slice of servitude. Humanity and vanity are very important. You can't just always be vanity because then people will hate you. And you can't just always be humanity because you'll just get used up. There has to be this clunky, disgusting, muddy, in between greyness as a human or at least as a creator to help me live with myself. I have to be okay with both sides. I have to cuz the second I say I'm never going to be an artist anymore. I look pretty stupid going and being an artist. So it's like I wiggle every day being like if my gut tells me to go in that direction, hopefully it works out. It's a young man's game to be so sure of myself. I was so sure of myself in my early 20s. I knew everything. It >> crazy. As you get more experience, your certainty decreases. >> My certainty is out the window. [laughter] >> The only >> I don't even know my name anymore. >> The only things I'm certain of are the things that I can't pin down. >> Like I can't pin down like the direction I need to go to day by day, but my gut is is leading me in this uncertain thing. But I'm certain that the uncertain is like the adventure. It's the thing that brings the the spoils of of of war, you know. >> Okay. So, uh maybe the dynamic that's happening there. Early on in your career, you have less experience. Your taste is less refined. Your ability to follow your gut and your instincts aren't there in the same way. >> What that means is you need to have more of a prefabricated plan. You can't go up and just improv freestyle rap your way through this thing because what experience are you relying on? >> Yes. >> So you go in and you're a little bit more contrived, a little bit more curated, more purposeful. >> Oh my gosh. >> And then as you get further into your career, into your mid-30s after having a six-year hiatus at the peak of what would have been most people's careers, >> you come back and you go, "Well, I can now tap into I I have faith that my programming will carry me through." I told you I told you this story about last night. I played the town hall in Manhattan last night and the sound cuts out for 5 minutes in the middle of the set. I can't keep going with what I was supposed to be talking about. So, I just need to find um Zack my warm-up. They came and said, "Hey, um I know you've practiced your set 30 times. We need you to extend by 15 minutes because they're doing bag checks at the front." He's like, "Can you just create another five songs out of nowhere for us, please, this evening?" And he [ __ ] crushed it. Love it. that is that faith that my programming will carry me forward. >> One other example uh on that I was doing a big podcast a few years ago and I decided I wasn't going to eat on the morning and I was going to train hard and I was like the dopamine and the [ __ ] adrenaline are going to be going. I'm going to be super dialed. I felt amazing and then I went hypoglycemic partway through the episode and my brain just went completely blank. >> Oh my gosh. Making me nervous. I'm like staring [laughter] >> like watching watching someone talk at me >> and immediately my mind goes, "You're messing up. You were never supposed to be here. You're not supposed to be here. Everyone's laughing at you. This was your shot. You're going to blow it. You're d like >> and >> he's talking at me, chatting away." And when I watch the episode back, I'm having a fully cogent conversation about the power of Jake Paul's right hand. [laughter] I'm like, "Yeah, well, the interesting thing is Jake Paul's knocked out every opponent that he's faced." And I'm like, "You were never supposed to be here. You're not supposed to be here." Like, and I'm like, "Oh, that's programming." Yes. >> That's like a thousand hours plus 2,000 hours of conversations over the last 8 years just like pulling you through. >> So that's why you're allowed to use experience and taste and instinct deeper into your career and you can't use it at the I say it all the time. It's like Rihanna had to make Shut Up and Drive to get to like >> uh stay like like Bruno had to make the lazy song to get to like Uptown Funk. It's almost like you have to and you also have to be okay with the growth of what it is. Like you got to just like create, put it out, and then there's nothing you could do about your growth. If you want to get to somewhere, you're going to have to start somewhere. >> So, it's going to be messy. It's going to be sloppy, and it's not, like you said, it's going to be contrived, and it's going to be whatever. Like, if you listen to even like any song, uh, like Don't Shoot the Boy Down on my album now or six years ago, what someone's favorite song might have been. It's two totally different worlds. Totally different world. So it's like like even like you said the autopilot thing where just like your programming of what we we only rehearsed for four days for four sils because I used to rehearse for months >> but there was we did a middleion people on stage >> you improvd the whole thing conducting everything [laughter] >> that all right look I I get that you've got lots of experience 4 days feels like a highwire act >> okay [ __ ] looking at your manager through the window and he's like [ __ ] his [laughter] head >> yeah yeah yeah Yeah. Yeah. No, it was it was four it was 4 days of um >> of really intense rehearsal. I mean, they were like in the 10 hour range, but but you're right, though. It's like, you understand this will probably hit. This will work. I can pack that in. I'll remember to bring that part out. And I wasn't remembering a single lyric the first two days. But if that would have been six years ago, I would have been like, book another month >> and we're going to get in another 12 hours a day. And I can never forget while I'm rehearsing lyric. I was like, you know, it's gonna kick in when the adrenaline's there. And it did. Didn't need the the the lyrics on the sheet and [ __ ] I was just like, all right, it worked. And then another thing hit me, too, is that I don't really I I don't really need to keep touring. So, if this fails and crashes miserably, like this is the one show I was going to do anyway. So, I'll freestyle the whole middle of the show. We'll pick five songs. I'll like build the [ __ ] in front of everybody because that's kind of what I do in the studio. And if it fails miserably, it's not like it's like I'm not going to pay the barrels to to like finish my tour. It's It's just like that didn't work, but it felt like it worked. So when I walked up there, I was just >> [ __ ] up. [laughter] >> So when I So when we ended up freestyling it, it was programming. It was for sure like I also have a bit of just like I don't really have much to lose. >> This, you know, I walked away from it. I walked away from it for so long and accepted it and like put it in a coffin and sent it down the river and like watched it go away only for like God to like lift it up and present it at my front door when I woke up one morning. But like it was so gone that now I'm kind of like I could do that. And so it is actually which brings me to like I'm I very very vulnerably speaking. It's just like this stuff is very uh this is point that I just kept thinking about days before speaking to you is that I can't express what it's like to to be like it's it's hard for me to put uh a thought process on like if you really love your life then just like love your life. You don't need to inform people and let people know how great your life is. M >> so going on a podcast talking about how much I don't care seems counterintuitive which then makes me not want to even just like leave my house and come and talk to you about it cuz I don't know how to express the like I'm on a podcast with one of the greatest podcasters in the world and this is like one of the biggest platforms and I'm talking about how much >> I don't give a [ __ ] >> I don't give a [ __ ] But there is a piece of me that I do in my deepest morals find important and I should shoot those out into the world. But it's also a larger risk that I don't really care to take. Like like if I really if we talked about how me and how you speak with your best friend after a couple of drinks like back home or whatever, which is which is like everybody else, the people you trust the most. You get down to what you really believe. So there's a piece of me that doesn't want to just give fluff, but I also don't want to like I ain't like I I don't I'm not I don't want to be like this. like if you want to like fight the music industry and I but I have a bunch of knowledge that I think can help a lot of people. So I'm constantly struggling like I should say something and go on a podcast and have a conversation about balance while playing the game that's like in the machine that's plastic. >> Yeah. >> I don't even know how that popped out of my cerebral while we were talking. I don't even know if that made sense. >> Why did you Why did you decide to come on? >> I forgot. I said yes a really long time ago. >> Let's go, baby. >> And then Lewis, my my day today was like, "They flew out, dude. You're doing that tomorrow." I was like, [laughter] "I'm in." And uh all jokes aside, I find you your cause to be very uh I I find it at base route to be noble. It's not salacious. It's not something that is like entertainment. It's uh it's a meal. And I can get down with that. Like on a moral deeper level, I can have a conversation with somebody that I've learned a lot from. and the guests that you've had on like it's helped my individual life, my silent life at home with my family. So, it's like I I'm down. >> Well, I appreciate that. Thank you. I also appreciate your uh booking agent or whoever just sliding it into the calendar and being like, [laughter] Friday, what what am I doing today? >> Um >> and and and honestly, truthfully, I'm a really I'm a really big fan of you as what you've decided to put out into the world. I respect that. Thank you >> deeply on a really deep level. So yeah, >> that means a lot. I am taste is uh >> absent even more in my industry than in yours and uh I'm I'm trying my best to like hold on to that wherever I can and and and to refine that. >> What do you what what's the temptation for like a guy at your level, top level of of conversation, having podcasting content? like what is the daily temptation of the like I know I could blow the door open on D like what is your like content uh well first one would be um most almost all platforms big big big big platforms with like hardcore tribal audiences are built together over the mutual hatred of an out group not the mutual love of an ingroup. Wow. This is how all cults how all movements are built right by identifying the other. The if you look at the way that American elections have been won, the last election where the party that was voted in was voted for love of party, not hatred of the other was 2012. Since then, most people have protest voted against I am not that, not I am this. Wow. And that's how so a great a great um way to judge whether or not the content creator that you listen to is uh playing the game correctly or playing the game in a an honest way. Is the audience bound together over the mutual belief of something as opposed to the mutual disbelief of something else. >> Wow. >> Uh and I've never played that game. I don't start beef with people online. Uh, even if I get like poked at uh a little bit here and there, um, I genuinely try and platform people who I can go from [ __ ] John Bell and Matthew McConna to like some 22year-old YouTuber from London who I found a one video essay of and I [ __ ] love and I'm like, you're coming to Austin and I'm going to speak to you on the podcast and I'm just going to give you a shot. Um, like who the [ __ ] am I to say I'm going to give you a shot? But the entire industry is you holding on to the coattails of people bigger than you. And then you know three and a bit years ago Rogan puts me on when just a DM I've got 250,000 subs. It's nothing. And he brings me on and gives me a shot and it went really well and that was great. >> Wow. >> And being the like the opportunity to go from you like lying in the hammock everybody else has created for you to turning the hammock into a trampoline that other people can bounce off. >> Yes. is really [ __ ] cool. Two of the things I don't want to forget that came to mind while you were talking. The first one was you said that you stepped away for six years. Have you ever heard McConn talk about when he stopped doing romcoms? >> Bro, so he's like the romcom king. And what I didn't realize was romcoms were super easy to make, super cheap, would generate at the box office, get replayed at Valentine's Day, replayed at Christmas. Like it's just it was a cash cow. And he was the romcom king. But he realized that it was a little gray sludgy. He was becoming formulaic. He was churning these things out and he didn't want to do it. He stepped away. >> Yeah. >> And he stepped away, I think, for 18 months or two years at like the peak of his career. Real similar to to your your story. They came and they offered him 5 million for the next role and he said no. Then they said seven, he said no. Then they said 10 and he said no. Then they said 14 >> and he said no. And they were like, "Well, what's he got going on?" in order to say no to $14 million for this role, which is, you know, easy in, easy out, whatever, however many weeks of work. This is He's got something really serious that's happening. And that was the moment that his catalyst that got him. >> Exactly. See, it's funny at my age, I don't view him as the romcom guy, >> but now, but the only reason he was able to get there was cuz he dispensed with that outfit. Right. >> It's amazing. >> Second thing, >> it's amazing. >> You know those um balance board things? It's like a skateboard deck on a little sort of cylinder. >> Um I always think about this. So you were talking about the fact that >> you have to play the game but know that it's not about the game and sometimes you are playing it more and other times you are playing it less. >> Absolutely. >> When you think about standing on one of those balance boards, at no point are you actually in balance. You're always making these little micro adjustments. >> Forever coagulating. Yes. >> And then every so often you go, "Wo, holy fuck." like we really like nearly kissed the ground there on that one and then >> I gotten totally >> and I love that idea and I think that that >> what people want is to think if I can get myself to the perfect level of equilibrium I'll never have to readjust again. It just doesn't exist. Readjusting is the game. That is it. Then you start to realize that it leaning left or right is not even the thing. It's like you could just do your best to do ab workouts to stay on. >> Mhm. It's like it's like you I know this thing is going to go left and right and I have to be prepared for it to go left and right. So I got to make sure my core is like very very solid and then and then your whole entire holistic perspective changes to make sure your core is right to do the balance cuz the balance is all that's happening. Like you said you're never going to hit the perfect thing where you go I'm perfectly balanced no problems for the rest of life. Then your your mind starts to think. You're like, "Oh, it's not perfect artistry. It's not total commercialism. It's the reflection of this balance thing that is not black. It's not white. It's it's just a lot of nuance. It's some things there's no nuance at all. But I'm blown away in my older age how deeply nuanced it all is. Every bit of it. It's tough to even have. It's it's tough to even like confidently move forward. The only thing I'm confident in is is the music because I like it. My own music. Everything else is very very tough for me. Even people say like what do you what advice do you have for writers? I'm like like I don't even know what I did. I I really don't like I had a I had a weird unwavering belief in myself. That's super important. But like I know there's people out there that are wickedly talented that just it just the chips just don't fall. I don't know how to like combat that. >> I don't it's it's it's it's very interesting. We'll get back to talking in just a minute, but first, some things are built for summer. Sunburns, hot girl walks, your ex posting their Euro road trip, and now lemonade and salt. Huh? Element just dropped their brand new lemonade salt flavor, and it's everything that you want on a hot day. Tart, salty, and stupidly refreshing. It's like a grown-up lemonade stand in a stick with actual function behind the flavor. 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That's drinklnt.com/modern wisdom. I've heard you say the most talented people in the world sometimes don't make the best [ __ ] to listen to. >> Yeah. >> Why? For sure. What gets in the way? You would assume. So funny. The way my mind works, I'm like I'm already editing that like I'm like uh well >> what would you say >> in my opin Yeah. It's like I think I've been blessed with an understanding that when I'm listening to something I think in my head humans will feel good because of this. People will enjoy this thing that hits this thing and this will work and this will be pleasing to people. It's a is a thing when I'm creating. I want this to feel pleasing to you. I want you to be affected by this. I want you to be have goosebumps and to be affected not just look at how uh talented I am. I know [ __ ] who can sing the phone book. Doesn't mean when they play me the MP3 in the car that I'm like I'm going to listen to that song again. It's like you're singing really great, but I just there's nothing about it that makes me and I don't know what that that about it is, which is my obsession. I love that. I live in the about it. I'm not the greatest singer. I'm not the greatest rapper. I'm not the greatest producer. I'm not the greatest um piano player, chord guy, harmony guy, but I just I'm like, I think people will like that. And I can now find a way to get I know who to call to to get it to the thing that I think people will like. And that's worked for me. It's worked for me. I don't know. People might say I'm I'm talented, but like I also just really really really deeply to the point of tears love what I do every day. I love it. I love it. I love it. I love it. Everything else is like a a day at work. For me to go in there, 7 hour, come in at 11:00, leave at 7:00, I get dinner at my house, I play with my boys, I put them to bed, and wake up and do the same thing every day. And life just gets better and better and better and better and better cuz I'm doing the same thing I did when I was 15. >> I'm so happy for you, man. >> Thank you. Thank [laughter] you. So [ __ ] And it's hard not to um to just say that. And I know that that might make people reflect on their own thing and not be happy about the statement, but why am I not touring or why am I I'm not even I I swore I wasn't going to get emotional, but it's like I just love I love my life to to live. [gasps] I love my life. I love it. I love it. It's It's mind-blowing. I get in a minivan and drive home from a stadium and wake up and clean diapers the next day. I got it all. I got it all cuz my life I might not have got the diapers. might not have got the sleepless nights. I might not have got the it's the [ __ ] that the world tells you is not what you chase after is the [ __ ] that I almost missed. It's like there's a renaissance coming of people and it's uh the renaissance is real realizing that the roof over your head, the plumbing job, and the cutting the grass is the good [ __ ] We've taken it to the extreme. Our society's taken it all. We got it all. We figured it out. We're the most connected we've ever been. We got the most money we've ever had. We I think everyone start myself included. It took me six years to be like, I almost lost. I almost chased this thing. And then I for 6 years, I was around a bunch of guys who had all the stuff I thought I needed. No, it's the dirt. It's the muck. It's the mistakes. It's the thing. That's it's the good [ __ ] But we spend so much time making sure no one ever no one ever sees us in a light that might seem average. Being average is the greatest thing in my life. It's the greatest thing in my life. Sometimes I I I go to the shoe store and people know who I am. And then other times I'll go 5 days without anybody even knowing who the [ __ ] I am. I take my kids to sports class and nobody bothers me. It's like celebrities. Like miss me with that. I've never had a conversation with a with a a famous [ __ ] I never had a a long two, three, four hour conversation in the studio with a famous [ __ ] that's been like, I love it. It was the best decision I ever made in my life being famous. God came out the sky and was like, you have the money like you're famous, but you don't have to be famous. I'm taking that all day long. Fame makes no sense to me. And I think the the general consciousness of the population is waking up to that. Like the idea of celebrities like everybody's like side eyeing these guys like you're not perfect because I'm not perfect. It's like what are we doing here? Like what are we talking about? I don't know how I just went on that tangent. I apologize. I don't I didn't mean to. Yeah. >> You guys have to make me look like I'm making sense. Thumbs up. [laughter] Yeah. Yeah. That was the main thing, guys. Even if I can get on this podcast today and just be like like my coffee in the morning and the grass on my feet and a roof over my head making music. It's like you will never you'll never stop me. You'll never stop me. I love what I'm doing so much. You will never I'll never stop. I'll be 90 years old just doing the same thing every single day because it gets better and better and better and the relationship changes with it. and and to be able to get paid like that where I don't have to I could play one show at Forest Hills and then people show up I think because I walked away and let go of it. When it came back I was like I didn't even know I had this when I had it 6 years ago and now coming back to it doesn't even define me but it's just like this funny like I'm like the Monopoly guy with a mustache. Like it's all fake money. [laughter] I'm rolling dice. I'm like, if I lose money on [ __ ] Boardwalk at this this >> Yeah. >> Like it's just life is good, man. Life is Life is good. >> Have you ever seen Peaky Blinders? >> No. >> Okay. So, it's a a show about a a gang from Birmingham in the 1920sish and [snorts] in it uh it's a group of brothers. They were in First World War. Two of the brothers were in the First World War and uh they went to the Battle of the S. And they were tunnel diggers. uh real dangerous, high uh like mortality rate. And Tommy and Arthur, the two older brothers, they have this line where they say um they basically thought that they were going to die at the Battle of the Psalm, but they didn't. And they refer to it as everything after that was extra. >> Yeah. >> And it feels to me like you died >> during that that time >> and you're like >> everything after that was extra. >> Absolutely. I look at I in in therapy I did an exercise where I looked at me on a boat and thanked him. Thank you for getting me this far, but I have to go on without you. You helped me survive. You you all your tendencies and all of your things, they helped you get to this place cuz it was survival. >> But I can't keep you with me anymore and I got to say goodbye to you and I got to move on. And I did it. It's just the boat went away. And once the boat went away, you start you look at things in a in a much different It's just much different. It's just much different. It almost comes to you when you let it. H I hate being the like guru guy. You don't I don't ch I just do I'm just not chasing much now. I just know that if I fish and make father figure, some artist out there, it's going to be a commercial for myself and some artist is going to hear it and then ask me to go work with them. I just I just know that. I know that in my two-year plan of spending all this money, whatever. It's like you when you fish, you just you fish. You can't get in the water with goggles and like start swimming after the fish. Most [ __ ] wanted to just like I really in my early 20s, I was like in a speedo with the goggles in the scuba trying to trying to get a bass. I'm like and then someone's on the dock like young man, young man just grab the pole and just hang out. Well, I can't see the fishing. What if they don't show up? They might not. But you you're not going to catch [ __ ] from forcing the universe. I don't know. I don't know. It's so counterultural because most people would tell you wake up and force the universe. >> No, no, no, no, no. You're Dude, you should not be doubting anything that you're saying. I I >> thank you. Coming from you get a lot of uh you get so many rounded polished perspectives of like good information. So, I appreciate that. I believe >> you're you're tapped in. There's two types of people in the world. There's people that are tapped in and people that aren't. And um when you think about that, you know, when you're talking about it and you're saying like, "You can't stop me. You're not going to stop me. I'm just doing what I want to do." You know that feeling that you get that's like a bird cage opening in your chest? >> Yes. >> That >> Yeah. >> Like that's what people should be chasing. >> That that is honest to the Lord. I think a lot of successful peoples, myself included, I swear to you that that is the superpower of whether it's production or podcasting or whatever is accessing the thing cuz once the thing is seen by people, they say that's the thing that I have hid for like there's a freedom in the bird cage opening up and if you can access the bird cage opening up, I just feel like by the grace of God, I've been able to open my bird cage on record. so many times that I've learned to be okay with the fact that I'm emotional, that I'm okay with the fact that like things can wreck my day. And seeing one thing on social media will [ __ ] me up so bad that I have to get off of it for for 6 years. I I'm okay with those things cuz I just think my bird cage is is uh I'm sensitive. There you go. [laughter] All that all that talking to to say >> No, no, dude. I uh I I really really appreciate you saying that. I think sensitivity is your strength with regards to this. >> Oh my gosh. >> I did I've been wearing this I guess the the audience might not have noticed, but I've been wearing this little piece of red uh for about 6 weeks now and uh it's got the letters ILM on the back and it's got an infinity symbol on there. I went and did a retreat um in Soma County about 6 weeks ago, 2 months ago. It was 12 hours a day from 9:00 a.m. till 9:00 p.m. >> Wow. uh of very deep emotional work, >> intensive, >> incredibly sober, non- psychedelic stuff. And uh the ILM on this stands for I love myself and it was the thing that you wanted to take away. Uh but in it, what you were talking about that I need to send that version of me off to see. >> Yeah. So many of the fears and doubts and patterns, the the patterns that people have, especially the ones that you don't like, they're there to protect you. They're there to try and keep you safe, there to get you validation from the world. And even my work, my work when I was 14 years old was every night I was lost in that screen creating and living in a world that was not reality. It's it's what it's what helped me get grow as a man. It's what helped me stay alive. Like music is lit literally something that I held on to like a life raft and it was so embedded in my but then at what point when you're a grown man you say is this escapism? Is it easier for me to be listened to in the studio all day long than go home and actually have an interactive marriage where my opinion doesn't actually end all beall of everything. There's a It's a very very very very interesting thing like you said saying goodbye to that person is saying like I know I was put on this planet and I've been given gifts to make music. I'm I'm pretty sure of it at this point but I always have to take inventory on whether it's escapism or not. Sometimes it's healthy to escape as men. I think there is a something very valid on a man who goes fishing on a Saturday. There's something very valid about your own time, your solace, your whatever. But you always have to take inventory on is like dude are you fishing on a Saturday or are you not able to stomach the idea of the normaly of your life which is always that's another thing I have to take inventory on with my job. >> You're on you're on that balance board dude. >> Totally. Totally. I have to always take inventory of saying let me let me see what this feels like to me. Is this a post just went viral about me doing something that makes me look talented. How am I Hey. Yeah. >> Hey. Hey. >> Calm down, buddy. >> You Hey, and it's a it's a lot of that. But I've noticed that that's been the biggest blessing in my life. Some people would be like, "She ripped the door open, man. Like, you just did 26,000 people at Forest Hills. We're going all the way back." >> Woo. >> And when I drove home, >> my wife was being Michelle Obama all day. She was tired as [ __ ] She was taking care of the kids all day long. There was a playground in the back. So about the time that the show was over, my kid my my son was like, "Dad, I didn't My son was like the other day he s me down. Can I talk to you?" I'm like, "Yeah." He's like, "I just I didn't like your show." I was like, "By [laughter] the way, the whole thing sold out." The whole thing about him. He's he's like, "Yeah." And he's dead pan. I'm like, "Oh, I thought he was going to be joking." So like my ego, he's four. My ego is like like everyone told me I killed it. That thing was sold out. I said, "Buddy, why didn't you like the show?" So he goes, "You know, you sang the first song, then you just kept singing and singing and singing." And I was just like, "When's he going to be done singing?" He's like, "I wanted to go play with you in the playground at the at the back of this thing." >> So it like puts the whole even that my son trusts me enough to tell me that. I'm like, "Oh my gosh, thank God, >> bro. >> Thank god the the trip back in the minivan that cuz we have too many kids now. We used to have a navigator and a Ranger over and now I'm I'm ripping the Kia Carnival. Wonderful product by the way. I'm driving home in Kia. She forgot to get gas. I'm in the middle of Bumble [ __ ] Brooklyn trying to get gas after I'm like, "Yo, I'm rich. I don't need this shit." But then it like it just was like, "No, this is the This is the good. This is the [ __ ] This I'm annoyed. I'm tired. My wife's over it." But you would look at me at the end of that show that day >> at the afterparty of everybody coming up to me. my daughters needs this and my cousin and listen to my demo and you're the man. That was the best show I ever seen. They don't recognize that there's this other thing. I'm just like, "Thank God I didn't spend my whole life pretending that that other thing just never existed." >> Oh, >> cuz I'm way more in that other thing than I am in stuff like this. >> Not Not seeing the value in it. >> Oh my god. Oh my gosh. It's so scary, dude. And then you build a kingdom that's predicated on the idea that you never have sludge or you never have mundane [ __ ] Then you're [ __ ] toast. You're trapped. >> It's not a kingdom. It's a prison. >> Bro, the amount of records I've written for people that by the end I've walked away and been like, I'm all the way good on everything this dude has ever. By the way, my heart breaks for them. That doesn't mean that, hey, I'm, like I said, I ain't Johnny Noble. I'm not like so much better than them. I I get on my knees. I get on my knees in my closet and I say, "Thank you. You didn't give me everything I ever wanted. Oh my gosh. Oh my gosh. If I got everything I ever wanted at at 20, I might not be alive." And then you and then you bring it back 10fold for me to look at it like I'm not even this isn't even I'm not even in this. Tomorrow I will wake up and I will be with my children and I will be in the studio making something maybe for me or something for somebody else doing the same [ __ ] I did every single day. It's not this. The 4th of July every day ain't the move, man. The 4th of July is great because it happens once a year. If Monday through Monday it's fireworks, alcohol, and craziness, but our job, I don't know. Societyy's just very much like if it ain't Fourth of July every day, then you are not accomplishing what you want. And then the [ __ ] who's got to sit in traffic on Tuesday is like, my life sucks. It's like, dude, no it doesn't. >> No, it doesn't. Because we're all living the same same fears, the same validation, the same way you want to be looked at when you walk in a room and you wonder what other people think about you. We just spend a lot of time making sure that that's not obvious. But the more time you get away from the machine, you're like, I'm getting I'm in my chubby phase. I'm a little bit of a dad. I'm making music as a dad. Like, thank God. >> Dad music [laughter] like because that's what the [ __ ] I am. If I spend half my life trying to pretend like I'm not. You get a lot of these artists I work with. I'm like, "Man, you ain't Why you want to say that? That's not your reality." >> Yeah. You've got kids at home, but you're still playing the baller up front. >> Me, what do the kids think? You know a lot about a man about what his kids think about him. I don't need to know what your fans think about you. I don't even I don't even know what my >> present is and mama. how you got never speak to to someone who adors somebody from a distance on on a character judgment that you can make about them. You will know the fruit if you know the person. That's the only thing you can count on. So for like you want to work your whole life for a bunch of people that don't know you to think that you're a good guy and then when you go home everyone's like this guy. That's what that's what most of the album's about. You've traded the validation of the people who would love you for who you are for the validation of people who love you for what you do. >> It's like and then your identity becomes what you do. So if you can't do what you do, your whole life is just shattered. >> It's taken away from you. So now you're locked into the and that's how you get locked into the prison. >> Bro, I've noticed that in in recently 10 years of some some kind. And it was almost like like even when I looked at my dad, my dad's job didn't it he wasn't trying to get like his whole community from his job and his whole purpose from his job. It was almost like you made money to then like go to church and like have another life of I don't really know what I'm saying. It's probably not going anywhere. But like what I'm trying to say is like the job is just the job. It's it's not the definition of what you are. And slowly but surely given our like whole lives being commercials which is what social media is. You have to turn your job into your and I've like lo like I'm just like man it's like this is just something I get to do. It's not me. It's it's a it's a facet within the other things that feed me in my community. Spending time with my wife, going on vacations with my friends, spending time with my family, eating a good meal with somebody. It's the little things. This is >> Well, imagine if you had a an investment portfolio and [clears throat] 95% of your investments were in a single stock. >> Insane. >> You would be very very careful and very very anxious about the progress of that stock. What you have is a distributed portfolio of investments. >> Oh my gosh. Amen. It's like I even think sometimes too it's just like this probably and again I'm just speaking from I'm here and it's like someone wants to hear me talk I guess. It's like I might as well throw whatever out there. is like I've also noticed just like living under my means and not living to the thing that I am has made me also wildly happy by beyond most once me and my wife stopped with the house additions and the hot tub and the pool and the yada yada yada >> pivoted to the Kia. >> What' you say? >> A hard pivot to the Kia. >> Bro, I'm in the Kia and they got these little nature sounds that you can put on in the car and [ __ ] I'm like I like this just as much as my $175,000 Tesla that I got neck pain from ripping on the highway on. I'm like oh thank god I got the Kia. So then it really started opening up in my life to be like, what if I just live completely under my means? I'm rich forever. If I live like a [ __ ] who makes the type of money that I make, I'm going to have to be on the wheel forever to keep that moving. But if I just make the house smaller and accomplish huge things and just don't make a big deal out of the accomplishments and just keep it kind of lowkey and then just tuck it away somewhere that if anybody ever needs it, it's there. But I'm here on the grass with my ass on the grass with the kids just hanging out and doing the thing. That is like bring you to tears levels of like thank god I did not keep chasing whatever cuz the money ended up coming and it ended up working out and I got enough of it to go around. So I'm It's so weird. It's like like frogging hot water. I I would have been the frog in hot water if I didn't find out how shitty my touring contract was and and artist contract was >> for sure. >> What an odd gift, >> bro. I be looking at people sometimes and I'm just like, man, says the guy with a bunch of money that money is not important. >> I know teachable lesson. I know. I know. We We've been down that road. I understand. But it's like I'm telling you, man. It doesn't uh the money me and you are still here no matter what's in your bank account and what's in my bank account because the only thing you can be is present. So if you're never present with yourself and you're never living your life, what the f who cares? [ __ ] out there in Thailand just on a boat happy as a [ __ ] and they're not the hot tub broke. It's like, dude, we we went for breakfast yesterday at Red Diner uh downtown Manhattan on like 43rd Street or some [ __ ] We sat in there and our server came over, Mexican lady, and uh I can't remember what happened. She asked some sort of question. She said, "Uh, I just finished a night shift. It was 11:00 a.m. and she started at midnight in her other job." and she's at the diner at 11:00 a.m. And I'm sat next to Zach, who's warming up for me on tour, and immediately we start going like, ironically, going, "Wh the ambient water in the dressing room was supposed to be chilled." W I'm not happy about the particular fruit and veg platter that we were supposed to get backstage. W the cat five cables that we were supposed to have triggered and it meant that I had to do an acoustic performance for five minutes on stage. I'm like, >> "Yeah, it really puts you." >> Are you [ __ ] high? >> Yeah, I did, >> dude. It Wealth is what you have minus what you want. And by that definition, some billionaires are broke. >> Wow. Wow. Yeah, I'm taking that one. I'm tucking that one in the back pocket. >> It's Morgan Hel. He's [ __ ] phenomenal. Wealth is what you have minus what you want. And by that definition, some billionaires are broke. But it's crazy because the things that you need that you find out that you need don't bring immediate gratification and sometimes they're not pleasurable and sometimes you're not even happy which is >> life changing. >> It's the unhappiness. Yeah. I don't know man. It's like you have kids and then you learn to die. And when you learn to die, you actually get your life in your death. M >> the giving up of oneself by saying my dreams, my millions, my potential, my MVP, my Olympics are dead because I brought a life into the world and I am everything in my my body will make sure that this child is okay. And if that means me reducing myself to make this child what to give this child even maybe what I didn't have. >> Mhm. When it's not about you, it's so much more enjoyable if everything is about you constantly. And I don't want to get too deep into just like what I think is wrong in society. Like I ain't Jordan Peterson. I'm not like educated. But there seems to there seems to be this it's all about you and chase what you want. And if you don't get what you want, your life is a failure. But I found so much freedom in it. not and me just not we don't have to go down that road with me. I I I if you want to go to your friend's house, I will or if you guys have to go to school today, I will wake up early despite being in the studio late and I will take you and I'll feel like [ __ ] but I'm going to take you to the studio. It's probably going to [ __ ] my day up in the studio, but I'm going to make sure you get to school. >> Kids shift your perspective on a lot. And I mean, it's so deeply to the point where I say people who don't have kids, that's another thing. I look at my children and I say, "Thank God I had you to refine me." into someone I didn't even know I was I had the potential of being or getting grabbing a level of patience or exposing how impatient I actually am. I thought I was this like patient level-headed guy until I had kids. >> Oh yeah, very patient when you only have to look after yourself. [laughter] >> Oh yeah, your patience is really being tested. >> Like even now like I I wake up with the kids. I don't have time to work out. I I should make time to work out. So, all I got to do is get up at 4:30 because so and so on Instagram told me like I'm almost I almost feel myself becoming softer around the edges because my concern is the life of somebody else. So, kind of me is is to some degree, don't get me wrong, I'm in a studio 7 hours a day. I live a great life. Uh, you know what? No, I'm not going to um what's the word? Validate everything that I'm saying or or there's a different word that my therapist tells me like not to use. I constantly try to like >> justify quivering. Yeah. Yeah. >> Yeah. Well, just on that, you have done it a few times today and I think >> it speaks to the fact that you don't want to come across as preachy and the fact that you're saying, "Hey, look, I'm an idiot, too." But the disclaimer, the reason that I have the compulsion to do that as well. >> Part of it's a protection mechanism because you don't want to be called out by somebody for saying this guy doesn't know what he's talking about and he's still he's still proitizing. >> Totally. That being said, not saying a thing that you believe because you're worried about the criticism of people who are going to hear it and misunderstand it. >> Y >> you really should not be worried about the criticisms of people who don't understand what you're trying to do. >> Absolutely. >> If people misunderstand you, that's a them problem, not a you problem. And it's like something to try and overcome that is really tough. That being said, in the music studio, we spent the first half of this conversation talking about taste and about how like I just know that it's good, but you're in an alien environment here. >> And you're thinking, well, I I know that this is good, >> but I'm not sure whether or not I'm allowed to think it's good. Yes. >> So, this is you at the beginning of the music career going like, well, if I can prescribe and I'll hedge and caveat and I'll litigate [laughter] my way through this thing. And so it's just a new and if you put me if you put me in the music studio you're like I have maybe we need to can we like roll that off on the kick. >> I'm not saying I'm a guitar player but maybe [laughter] yeah yeah. >> That's amazing. Yeah. That's amazing. Yeah. It's just it's funny. People even this a usual comment my whole career has always been people thinking I'm on drugs when I'm in the studio. I'm a different person. A different person. They be like he's whacked out. He's cracked out. Is he footage of me in the studio? >> Your demeanor in the studio. So, I'll sing something and it'll like be freestyled, but then I listen back to it like I didn't even make it. Like, this is the best part of my day. I'm having so much fun right now. I light up. It's like it's the thing that like my whole being feels like I'm supposed to be doing that. I just tell them like I'm a little it's like a screw loose or something. It's not necessarily that. And I think I've done it long enough now where I'm like Max Martin, Rick Rubin, Forel, every time I'm I'm around. The other day I was in the room uh working on BTS with and Max Martin was in another room and it was we I was in LA. I took a quick trip. They're like finishing up their album, blah blah blah. They asked me to come out there, work on on stuff for them. Um Max walks in the room. We're working on something and I'm not like creatively like what I'm not going to go there. Max Martin walks in the room and he listens to what we do. Max is is 20 years older than me, you know. I'm like, "All right, here we go. I've never seen him work before." I'm like on the couch and I'm looking at him and he like he's like, "Can I give some notes?" And he's in a room full of like eight people. I can't explain it. And producers, writers will know what I mean. This [ __ ] in 17 seconds was like he listened to it one time and he was like, "Oh, your intro is your pre. Just take your intro and make it your pre cuz that's your best part." He's like, "And then bring it back in 30 seconds later." We were like, "Boop." We moved it all and we all looked at it and I was like, "Oh man." Like only time can make someone that [ __ ] cold. It's the same thing with Forel. Freel be walking in the room after working on something all day. He'd be walking in and just be like, "No, no, just move this and do this here. I know that the wall looks like it's 5,000 ft tall, but it's only 5t wide. Just walk around it." I'm like, "God almighty. There's a [ __ ] be asking me how do I get good and I'm like yo it's just you got to just do it for 20 years because the 20-y year [ __ ] are so cold for so Rick Rub so cold Max Martin is so cold they're so good and then I thought when I got with them they'd give me this the keys but then I realized they just didn't get off the treadmill for 20 years I'm like oh that's true mastery like Picasso doing like a drawing on a napkin when he's 80 and it's just a stick figure >> after all that [ __ ] It's like the the wall was only 5t wide. I really look up to those 5t wide [ __ ] there. There it's amazing to watch. I don't know how I went on that tangent. I get I get passionate about music. >> I'm interested in what gets in the way of talent creating amazing music. If your sleep's been off, you're taking ages to fall asleep, waking up at random times feeling groggy in the morning. Momentouses sleep packs are here to help. 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That's limme n o.com/modernwisdom and modernwisdom a checkout. We spoke before about the most talented people don't necessarily cut the best songs. >> Yeah. >> How is it not the case that the person who has the most talent doesn't make the best music? What is it that's getting in the way? There might be a talent of making things that people enjoy to hear. Like Tamman Pa like Kevin of Kevin Parker. He's like I think he just like has a talent in making things that people enjoy to listen to. This is soothing to my ears and I want to play it on the way to the beach at the club. I don't think he's like the third chair at the [ __ ] Rag Manovich orchestra in Australia or some [ __ ] Or maybe he he might be a savant in making the thing that >> you know what I mean >> in delivering instead of that. I've had this thing. So I was thinking about um >> most most Sorry to cut you off. Most of the the bigger producers I've been around I've recognized that they don't really have any any technical ability. None. Some of them can't even play an imprario. >> No, they're just like I don't care that it's the third harmony and that's not in the chord. The chord just feels good. That's and that's how I've I've kind of been blessed enough to kind of be. I I don't can't tell you what I'm playing on a keyboard. I could play the [ __ ] out of the piano, but I can't tell you what key I'm playing in any of it. I just know when it comes back to me, I go, I would listen to this in my free time. >> Taste, yo. I'm like, sometimes riffers be just be riffing too much. I don't want to hear you. It's like, and then you want to play me the song and you just just [ __ ] all over the song, riffing. It's like, I don't even know what you're trying to tell me. Let me sit in the Let me sit in the room for a bit and at least look at the wallpaper before you invite me in the den. I got to If you try to take me on a house tour [gasps] and then you got to When do you take them out when they're bored to take them into the next room? Not just look at this house and there's purple walls and there's blue walls and some some talent [ __ ] be trying to you be trying to just give them the whole house tour on the whole [ __ ] >> Can Can talent be an obstacle in that way? >> Of course. tal talent self-belief. Uh what that's a whole other deeper conversation. What is talent? I mean we could spin our wheels all day into the the digression of what the basis of the root of the whatever. But talent is like I've just noticed it's just like that and a dollar and get you to ride the bus. Like it doesn't it doesn't Some people are talented at just working the system. I know a lot of writers that can't write a song. I'd never mention their names. I never would ever I know a lot of writers that have no business no business being in a room writing songs, but damn you know how to go to the bar mitzvah. Damn, you know how to talk to the CEO and get the dinner. But the some of the guys in the back be like, "Okay, if you're going to get me to the bigger artist and you're the social bridge that I have to tap dance to get to, all right, I'm I'm far be it from me to whatever." But but that's a talent. >> Mhm. Mhm. >> To say that because you play the guitar better than everybody else makes you successful in the musical industry, that's more [ __ ] up than you could ever imagine. That there's tal What's a talent, bro? Talent. Like I play the greatest piano in the world. It's like, yeah, but do you know the the radio programmer over its owner? It's this big weird coagulating thing. That's where uh the artistic purity versus the game playing sort of comes back in again, right? And I think >> there's always going to be a sense of elitism in He's so artistically pure. Absolutely. >> If only he was prepared to lower himself to the standard of you to have to go to [ __ ] the dinner, the bar mitzvah or whatever, you know, he's above that. >> There's people, it's funny. He's like, you know, for me in in a time in my life, I for those six years, I was so removed from being an artist that I just wanted hits. So, my brain wasn't geared toward like in six years, I'm going to go on a podcast and talk about some of the biggest songs I ever wrote. For then me to go on a podcast and talk about all the giant number one Billboard songs I have. For the comments to be like, here's why I hate every single song. I can't prove to you that I'm talented. Some people don't even think I'm talented. Some people think I'm the most talented to ever grace the [ __ ] didn't need to use the British accent then [laughter] just thinking he came out of me. I said, "Oh shit." I said, "I'm in." >> Remember remember the audience. >> I don't know why the British has to fall into that. >> Well, I I have to remind you that we are on stolen land right now. Specifically stolen from the British. Yo, I don't know. >> Should have started with a [ __ ] land acknowledgement before we began this podcast. >> I'm getting way too comfortable with you right now. We're going to get a a beer after this. Um, what was that? I don't even remember what I was saying. >> I want to tell you I want to tell you this thing that's been in the back of my mind. I was thinking about this conversation with you and I wondered where you were going to go and I said, "What what I I've realized that people that are very very talented don't always make that sell the most records, be the most popular or whatever, even be the most liked." like yes. Um, >> one of the things I've noticed since being around musicians more over the last couple of years is that artists tend to fall into two categories or there's a spectrum that they're moving in. And on one side is create like an artist, that's artistic purity, uh, that's skill, that's like are you an imprasario? What's your ability to play scales? And and also to uh create the music like on your side, like I just know what's good and I can put it I can put it into a track. Mhm. >> On the other side is operating like an athlete. >> So create like an artist, operate like an athlete. And it's okay. How many repetitions are you doing? Are you in 5 days a week from 11 till 7? Yes. >> Are you spending your time drilling and working and looking over game tape and working on your mindset and nutrition and you know whatever it is like all of the individual components. >> Yes. Especially after having kids, you have to be. >> So can't be Olympic without a uh an Olympic approach. One way to look at it would be uh you have to ship at a pace required to work out what works and >> have to ship. What do you mean >> ship ship a product? Send it send it. It's okay dude. We could just we could keep [ __ ] trying to record this riff for the next 3 weeks. >> Send the [ __ ] off to get mastered. Like mix it, master it. Let's get put it. Let's see what happens. And um just a lot of the time what I've seen is that because artists tend to be like away with the [ __ ] ferry, you know, like just a cigarette butt in a [ __ ] afternoon. I'm in a hammock. I'm going to have a walk. It's like, "Okay, dude, can you sit down and do some work, please?" >> Yeah. >> And uh I'm I'm interested in what you think about the the value of consistency might be a way to to look at it like and of for sure. You're you're >> I've noticed in my older age that you can't will it you walk away from it if it don't work. Cuz again, if you're just the instrument, if the player doesn't show up that day, you're not going to be played. A trumpet can't play itself. A trumpet alone without the player is like some some like a metal. But the second the player, the second God comes in or inspiration or the muse or the whatever comes in and and plays through you, it becomes this thing. The issue is that when the trumpet starts to believe that it's playing itself and then you wake up every day and think you can wheel this into existence and I'm going to and then you're like why hasn't it came in a bunch of years is because you didn't let the thing bigger than you come in the room. If the thing bigger than you doesn't come in you will never have energy. We're not getting energy from ourselves. You're getting energy from this like I don't know how that song was written that day or when that came or whatever. So you you're a little less I'm a little less hard on myself sometimes when it doesn't come out the way I want it to. >> You can't white knuckle creativity. You can't white knuckle creativity and you can't control culture. Some things you'll drop and it will not be the right time and 10 years later this [ __ ] will be looked back on and be like, "What an amazing piece of art." And >> so precient. He was able to predict where the genre was going to go a decade before it did. >> Yeah. And a lot of people in the beginning they just say it's a I've dealt with that my whole career. Whole career. Every album six years later is like the new one sucks but the old one was the one. Then six years later the new one sucks but the old one was the one. It's like what are you going to do man? It's crazy. Talk to me about the story of the new album. Yeah, man. Um, get a phone call one day. It's a new regime over at the old label that I had. There like three presidents removed. One of them is a fan. Why aren't you putting out music on our label? Uh, you guys are [ __ ] me on the contract. What would you do if we gave you your [ __ ] back? Uhhuh. Let's have that conversation. Talk to my lawyer. He's like, "You know, we might be able to get your whole the reason why you walked away. We might be able to reverse it." I'm like, "I ain't an artist." Well, go find out. Go see if it'll calls me back. He's like, "You now have X percentage of yourself. What are you going to do?" I was like, "Ah, I'm not I already I already pushed that down the river." And then over time, it was just kind of like working on songs for really really big artists and then being like, "I don't have to write about the experience. that's not mine today. Like I could >> felt like the door was >> and it started to turn into me telling like my buddy Pete Nappy or my buddy Tenrock or whatever like prolific prolific musicians and producers like like ridiculous like ridiculous only reason why the album sounds as good as it does. Um, yo, hang on to that one. Started turning. [laughter] >> It's like you play a bunch of records for like this huge artist and there's these millions that could possibly come from them taking it. And then you get to the playlist and there's one I'd be like, >> hit the next one. [laughter] Hit the space bar. >> So [ __ ] funny. >> Yeah. And I I found myself telling my wife like, I'm not having a blast right now, but you know what would be fun? If I went and wrote about and she's just like >> it's happening again. Yeah. >> And then one night she randomly I had an out of nowhere right before we went to bed. She my wife's amazing. She uh she goes, "I'm not asking you. I'm telling you." She's like, "You got to go do this." She goes, "You won't you're not going to be uh you're going to be regretful in many many years if you don't if you don't come back and do this again." She goes, "And I don't feel like dealing with you." Joking around. She's like, "I don't feel like dealing with you in 20 years when you say you could." She's like, "Go spend the money. Go risk it all. Go back into the world. go do what you got to do. She's like, I'm telling you to. I'm not asking you to. I was like, okay. And then I just I had a battery in my back. For some reason, when she when my when me and my wife are on the same page, life decision making, a lot of stuff is easier. Especially when she puts the battery in my back. She puts the battery on my back. I'm like I'm like drool out the mouth, gorilla. Beat on my chest. Don't get in my [ __ ] way. That's how I feel when she's so the second she was like literally like awesome. Like they need whatever you need to say, I believe in my heart that that the world needs to hear it and your fans have grown up and they've matured with you and you have accomplished so much selfworth and you've put yourself in the background for so many years. She's like, it's it's it's okay to it's okay to like accept what's going to come from whatever's coming here. And I just went nuts and in like 6 months we had an album. Five months we had an album. So, that's the story behind it, >> bro. [laughter] >> Crazy. Crazy. And then fast forward, uh, there's a bunch of stuff I can't talk about that's coming out. But, like, I thought of this album in my mind as like I told my business manager, I said, I'm burning X millions of dollars of my own money, and I don't expect to ever get it back. This will be only pure exactly who I am, artistry. I'm not concerned about hits and I want to shoot the biggest videos and be like super creative on it and I don't expect to get a return on my money yet. This this money won't come back culturally for another 10 20 years because I can't I'd have to get back on the road and then start to schematicize how to make my money back which will d which will dilute the process. So like in myself having money, I was able to do a pure process of burn money by working on art that was just for art's sake. And I think that is a a reason why it came across as potent to bigger artists that I'm working with now or [ __ ] that's coming out soon or Thank God. I treated it like a two um a many million dollar commercial. This is not this is just like a commercial to stir the soup and remind the world that there could be other opportunity for me to go work on music in other areas. It's the greatest advertising campaign of all time. >> Exactly. It wasn't the definitive thing that's going to make me the greatest in the world ever. It never is. It's just always these constant It's a new lure in the ocean fishing for a new type of fish because I want to just keep it moving. But when you want to keep things moving, sometimes you got to do the thing that doesn't make sense. The machine's not going to help you. Then you fast forward and we're at Forest Hills, 26,000 [laughter] deep. And I laugh about it because it's [ __ ] hilarious. [ __ ] hilarious. Like The grateful the grateful thing changes a lot of a lot of uh I'm sorry if I'm rambling it dude >> it's it's been a uh someone be like my friends will be coming over and they'll be like dude can you believe you the [ __ ] and I'm like I know like they paid me for it like that's that's where I'm at consistently in my older age. I can't believe it. Yeah. It feels to me like uh mostly artists get split into two camps. Artists that have beef with other artists and artists that have beef with the industry. You fall into the latter camp. [laughter] I And also too, I was also I also signed it at a young age. I also like look at my publishers who signed me early and only gave me a $10,000 advance that I was in for 10 years before I signed my second publishing deal. It was all anger and it was blame and it was whatever. And then you get older and you and you realize like they were just trying to do what the it's a reflection of the norm of the industry. It's a reflection of people's greed. It's a reflection of whatever and it's my response. I don't ask for the trauma but it's my responsibility to process it. I don't ask for it and that's not fair. That's the injustice of life. That's the thing. Why'd you put me here if you were going to That's your fault for making me. I didn't ask to be born. It's like we don't ask for the traumas but it's our responsibility to process them because your life's going to be [ __ ] miserable unless you don't. So you have to take responsibility for even the things that were out of your control, which is tough. But I'll tell you at the other end of it, we are simultaneously living where everything is the most important decision we've ever made in our life leading toward this amalgamation of our work forever and co could like happen again. It's like this thing where like nothing matters but everything matters but none of it matters. So like shit's working right now. This like [laughter] I I want to know how you want Father Figure to make men feel who listen to it. It's funny like we were on a vibe and a feeling that I don't want to speak from that feeling. I almost have to like reenter myself to to open the bird cage to get to the general pure intention of what that was. Um, if I could soothe the guy who has lost sight of the fact that fathers are important and your role in your children's life are is is more important in the cat in the lineage of your family from a thousand years back to a thousand years in the future. Your job as a father will do more than anything you could ever do in this physical world. It will it will echo and reverberate further than you ever could because you're downloading and imprinting into something that came from you. My son is me and his son will be him and we will live forever through each other. You're the most important job you could ever do. I hope for 47 minutes or however long my album is that you can be reminded you've never lost the path far enough where you can't return to your kids. You are not damaged. You are not damaged so badly that you can't return to your children because your children need you whether whether you like that fact or not. So, if I could if I could put a little espresso in your cup in the morning to go and be whatever that figure is, which is different for all men and whatever, but somewhere along the way, we threw the baby out with the bathwater. And I don't know what I mean by that. I just mean culturally, somewhere along we've lost the thread of fathers. We've There's a thread that is like I cannot put my finger on it artistically. It's just No, no, no, no, no, no. It's important, man. Keep going. Clock in. Don't have that drink. Don't pick up the pill bottle. The child needs you and your role is important. Just because you're not on the radio or you're not making hits saying, no, fathers are the fathers are a bedrock, a pillar in something very, very important. We can't lose that. If I could bring some attention to that with another man who's struggling with that, I don't think a 12-year-old is going to relate yet. But if a guy my age who's like, "Man, I'm thinking about leaving. I'm thinking about just [ __ ] all. I'm going to just go back to the bar because I'm not good enough to take care of my children. I'm not perfect." And that's what I want that I want to just speak to. Not I don't know how the ending finish line will be, but if you could just pop that on and even if one day it prevents you from choosing something that's not going to feed you for the rest of your life, that's what I I genuinely at the bottom of my heart hope that the album speaks to. And I wanted to make the music and the cut so ball that it made you proud to listen to. Because there's a difference between an after school special and Good Fellas. Good fellas, the lesson that you learn. You're you're not feeling like you're being told something because it's in this messy murdered Italian heritage thing. It's in this thing. But then you go, be careful what you wish for. Be careful who you trust. Being the top dog sometimes is not even what you might want. Bang, bang, bang, bang, bang. But it's wrapped up in this thing. Like I wanted to make good fellas. I didn't want to make like being a dad is important. Like so I felt there was a responsibility there morally for me to creatively attack it to to the best that I could in that direction. It's a very long-winded answer, but was that a fear that you had? What not being able to live up to the your own standards for a father? It's a fear I have every day. You don't know how I don't know how I'm uh I want my kid to know what working for money is like, but I don't want my kid to be like this like starving like cuz I know some kids that grew up and be like, "My dad was rich. He didn't give me a scent. [ __ ] my dad." And then there's another kid in rehab who's like, "My dad never let me make any decisions on my own and gave me all my opportunity." So every day I pray to God. There's a balance and a patience with my son, all three of my sons to say, I know I'm like lightly messing you up somehow. I just like don't know yet. 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Right now, when you first subscribe, you can get a free bottle of D3, K2, and AG1 welcome kit, plus bonus AG1 travel packs. And for a limited time, US customers also get a sample of AGZ and a bottle of omega-3s. Just go to the link in the description below or head to drinkag.com/modern wisdom. That's drinkagg.com/modern wisdom. every single dad uh that I've had on the show who has achieved a level of wealth that's significantly greater than they grew up with has this ex exact same problem. They know that most of the things that they value in themselves were the byproduct of the struggle that they had to go through as a child. >> Yep. And they think, I don't want to rob my child of the opportunity to learn those lessons for themselves because I know how important those lessons were for me. >> Yes. Yes. >> And at the same time, what the [ __ ] was the point of working so hard if I'm not going to give them the opportunities that I didn't get? >> It's like the term nepo baby. People be like, "Oh, like you're a neo baby." It's like, but when a man like comes from nothing and makes something of himself, the second he makes something of himself, you become it's it's like they they exalt you to the to want you to chase after your dreams, but then when you get your dreams and you have kids, that kid's just the product of a man who reached his dreams. It's like, [ __ ] you told me to chase him. [snorts] Now I'm in trouble for the fact that you It's like it's that's like nipple baby to me. Like I hear that term being thrown around with like kids who have parents who are in the industry and this that and the third. It's like what do you want their parents to do? And if you are an epo baby, what do you do? You [ __ ] wear a dunk cap and sit in your closet every night and just be like, I'm I'm too privileged to to like have an opinion or or make art. Like, what are you supposed to do? >> I don't know. >> Interesting. You know, Fred again, >> yeah. >> You know, he I think comes from at least a little bit of wealth. >> I have no idea. >> I didn't know that. I found that out this week. Uh I think >> family comes from at least some degree of of what people would call privilege. I think I get the sense looking at the way that Fred presents and looking at the sort of shows he did. Do you see that he did a miniature tour around the islands of Scotland? >> No, I did not. >> He played 200 person cap working men's pubs. >> Sick. >> And clubs. Sick. >> Right. And it was >> love it. >> Stor away these tiny little [ __ ] islands or the Hebdes or some [ __ ] off the top corner of of Scotland. and uh the way that he uh presents online with his social media very sort of anti-marketing marketing type thing. Um >> I get the sense that a lot of that will be an additional burden that Fred has to pay in order to like wipe the potential accusation of Nepo baby. >> Say that again. Re rework that last part. >> He needs to what's called counter signal. >> Okay. >> Um that uh I'm playing these tiny shows. I'm not flying at this ridiculous like I'm a man of the people, >> okay, >> in an attempt. This is an additional burden that he has to get over just so that people see him as someone that is remotely [ __ ] resonant as a normal human. >> Got it. Got it. Got it. And because the accusation is so and I mean that's also by the looks of things like who he is like a pretty nice chill down to earth dude uh and the way that he wants to live and all the rest of the things as well but there has to be in the back of your mind this weird scenario where you go >> the privileges that I was afforded are a burden that I have to get over as well. I have to work harder or count a signal in this weird way or a downplay that I would say the last the last two years have really started. I feel like he's on an ascension and his his moment is like happening and it's all this stuff. So, he's going to figure that he he seems like a very brilliant bright guy. So, I'm sure he I wish him the best of luck on that journey because you're right. That is something that you have to deal with in the public eye. It's like it's so fake that it's not fake that I'm making fun of it for being fake and by the way go buy my album. It's like we're all [laughter] we're all uh uh >> on that. But I recognize there's another thing where it's just like something or at least I'm trying to work on creatively is just I am not apologetic for any space I'm in anymore. >> I will there it's a waste of time. It's a creative waste of time. I I can't I can't I have to believe I belong in a space in order for something to be believable. So for me to posture my whole life about making sure I'm accepted in the space creatively again as as I talk within the music stancer I I have a much more direct whatever it's just like a waste of to posture. That's another reason why it's like social media like you're damned if you do damned if you don't. I'd rather just not be on it. I don't I all of the caveatting dilutes down the purity of what it is that you're trying to say. Again, dude, it comes back to you're trying to justify yourself to people who don't understand what you're trying to do. Oh, you don't get it. Well, that's a shame. But if you tried to litigate your way or caveat or uh uh uh create in advance some odd disclaimer that front runs the criticism that you think most people are going to. >> What are you saying? >> H is this? >> Welcome to politics. >> It's so arduous, dude. I had Bernie Sanders is on the show on Sunday. >> Really? >> Yeah. Uh that came out. >> It's really good. It was really fun. Um >> in the space of a couple of comments that I saw. One was um uh this is absolutely unspeakable. I can't believe how judgmental you are. You are always shilling for the right and it's obvious that you that that all you're doing is like uh pushing these like hard right right-wing views. And then the next comment that I saw was, "You only interview liberal. You only interview liberal guests. It's evident who's paying you off." I screenshotted both of them and put them in Instagram stories side by side. I was like, "A story of the internet in two slides." >> Literally. Literally. Sometimes I feel like, why do I even like >> I'm being spit roasted by two people pointing in opposite directions. >> You can't be both. How could you be both villains? >> Well, apparently I am. [laughter] >> Unbelievable. And this is the point. If you try and please everybody, you're going to end up pleasing nobody. And if you [ __ ] caveat, you're going to dilute your work down so much. >> Double down. Double down. Double down until you really in your soul realize the error of your ways. If you don't feel like there's error of your ways, you're going to turn into a super angry person. >> You'll be angry at yourself for cowtowing to the thing that you like the uh the rehearsed speech you're supposed to give everybody before you go into a uh a space. It's a waste of time. It's a waste of time. Art is art suffers through that. Art suffers in the um the validation. Some of the best art comes from the people who were never supposed to get their hands on music equipment. Some of the best art comes from But to say you haven't paid your dues in the sense of blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah. It's like that ain't I'm not you're barking up the wrong tree with me. The wrong tree. At least in the studio. Everywhere else in my life I I don't know. But >> yeah, >> I would never be able to go into the places I'm going into on the album without me being like I am not by no stretch imagine asking asking for your opinion on that. >> Your opinion asking for your opinion on whether I deserve to go into that space or not creatively. Where do you think about self-belief coming from? Because that sounds like an awful lot of self-belief. is it probably has a lot to do with my father telling me I'm great constantly constantly my whole life even when I wasn't he was so proud of me playing songs for my family in the backyard my son made the my son made this and I'm like dad it's not good I made it stop embarrassing me but looking back on it it's like you are spectacular you're spectacular like I was I was told that for so long that I think your brain just snaps in and wires at a certain point and you go I'm spectacular and someone says No, you're not. You say, "No, the man who made me told me I am, so [ __ ] off. I'm" And then you look back and you're like, "Thank God I believed it even when it wasn't true." >> Because that's what got me to the place to be like, "I got really really good because I thought I could I thought I was good, but I wasn't in retrospect." But maybe that's the whole that's the whole equation is just like even when you're not. Yeah, I don't that's that gets really convoluted with self-belief. But I do think a lot of it has to do with both of my parents telling me I was great. >> You know what's strange? >> And and some people to this day don't believe things that anything I've ever done is great. >> God does. >> Yeah. Exactly. Exactly. [laughter] And I've noticed that a lot of my actions or my things come from A trillion fans are not worth dad saying you did a good job. I put my money I put all the money I have on that and it's tough for some people. So I'm not a big like privilege and thanks for letting me in the cool house. I'm not I'm not that type of guy. But I can't imagine that's why that album's important. I can't imagine. I ain't nobody's daddy, but if I could play an album that just tells you stay the course and you're not broken cuz everybody's broken. Like that's the that's the album. It's funny that that they just got back to that, but yeah, without I couldn't imagine. Couldn't imagine. Yeah. Silence on podcast. Crazy. We were saying before about the challenge of growing up with an a big pair of shoes to fill uh financially uh in terms of corporate success. Dad was a doctor and mom was a pharmacologist and you're going to become a lawyer or whatever it might >> were. No, no, no. Like you could just imagine we talked about the kind of nepo baby expectation. Yes. >> Uh I think it's one of the reasons that uh kids from wealth are more likely to use hard drugs not just because they can afford them but secondly because they need to find a way to be able to cope with the expectation. It's another reason why this is a great insight dude. I I learned this uh on a great Substack post. um we look at uh the kids of high performing parents are more likely to go to college. You say maybe that's because of advantages, maybe it's because of private tutoring, maybe it's because of whatever, whatever, whatever. What if it's because they have such a fear of insufficiency if they don't meet the minimum standard that their parents set for them? They are driven by the fear of insufficiency. So all of that is to say classic if you come from privilege there is an expectation that you live up to the opportunities and also the standards of your parents right um objectively >> what you have which is really interesting is what sounds to me like a really wonderful father and you have the obligation to try and live up to the standard of fatherhood that your father set for you. >> Yep. And this isn't you cannot fill this with the number of records you sell. You cannot fill this with the size of your bank account or the house or the [ __ ] however many keys you are does not matter. >> Yes. >> And that's a unique kind of pressure and expectation that's holistic and beautiful >> but is still going to be there. Holy [ __ ] I had I had like an Olympian level father and I now need to try and be that for my sons. >> Yes. >> Is that a a a pressure to sort of fill the shoes of dad for your sons that you fell. Wow. Um yes in the beginning and then it slowly turned into un like understanding that my father is me. And it's like, okay, we're going to have to chop this up cuz I don't know how I'm going to even get to the what I'm trying to say. If we don't ask for the trauma, we don't ask for the trauma, but it's our responsibility to process it. Right? If you take the time to process it, the mountain of a father starts to look different. It's not a mountain anymore. It's another human being that worked three jobs to get his ice cream [ __ ] off the the ice cream truck off the thing in Brooklyn for him to move his family out to Long Island to give his son ProTools and to be able to afford it. He's a guy that like my dad be telling me stories about his father and his grandfather that I'm like my father is a miracle. A miracle. Think I think it has to do a lot with Jesus in his life. But my father is a miracle. All the good things I want from him in droves and more good things than bad things with my father because my dad was amazing. He was he was around every corner. or I have good I have my father did the right things around it and especially having children now I know what he sacrificed to get to be present with me I want all that stuff and then the other stuff that I didn't ask for that's deep rooted all the way into the grandfather's grandfather grandfather grandfather I didn't ask for it but it's my job to process this so I don't look at him as an unattainable thing the reason I am successful or not successful a figure that I can't mold myself into I look at him as somebody trying to figure out just like I am. And with with the tools he was given, he did a pretty damn good job. Because when I go to retreats and I and I'm around people that have made mistakes in their life or accomplished incredible things and won the PGA tour and yada yada yada, it all lines to daddy. There's a weird there's a really strong thick through line of men with their fathers and what it ends up being and what it doesn't end up being and whatever. But like I don't even know what I'm trying to say. I just say I guess what I'm trying to say is I look at my father now right now like today and there's no like Thank you for everything and I don't blame you for anything. Thank you for what you did give me. And it's 90. It's It's all It's It's all good. It's all good. It's like the biggest lie of it all is that you go you can't connect back with your father. Your father might be too successful. You can't connect with him. Your father might be too much of a drunk. You can't connect with them. Your father might be it might not even be healthy for some people to actually connect with their parents because they're in such [ __ ] up positions and whatever. You will never be able to figure much out without going headirst into uncovering what the story and lineage is with your parents and facing that whether you ask for it or not. That might not involve you even seeing your parents, but I can tell you that your life will open up if you can process that. I don't even know how I got to there from the question that you asked me. And we're going to have to edit all that space out and whatever. But >> no, no, no. The space is going nowhere. Sorry. >> Like the the I just think fathers are very important. I think I think that I I just might I might think that there's not much more importance than a mother and a father. Whatever we have to do culturally, I ain't no [ __ ] politician, none of that [ __ ] but whatever we have to do culturally to to re-establish the importance of that is important to me. That doesn't leave me on any side of the political spectrum. >> Mhm. >> I would go to war for the idea that fathers are important. I mean cosmically DNA from Saturn to here and back levels of since the primordial soup of cavemen fathers. It's it's and depending on how this depending on how this goes is where this whole thing will fall or stand. I'm speaking very symbolically but I know how we treat the the unit how we treat the leader in micro leader of every home culturally across the thing. What we do with this will determine what it all looks like top to bottom because it begins and ends with that. That's why it's tough for me to go on podcast. I don't really even know what I mean. I just know what I mean by that. Whatever that means is is what it means. >> Everybody knows what you mean. >> Yeah. It's going to get tough, man. It's going to get tough. You can't throw the baby out with the bath water. In the process of trying to get justice, don't don't burn you can't burn the whole [ __ ] thing down. Parents are important. You can't you can't burn the whole thing down in the pursuit that you believe to be righteous. It's it's and I don't know what I even that's not left that's not right. I'm just saying in the pursuit you can't [ __ ] burn the house down in the winter. You still got to have a roof over your head. Says there's a hole in the wall in a room and cold air is coming in and people are trying to go fix the hole. You can't just sit in the house all day and say, "Well, the hole wouldn't be there if you didn't [ __ ] D." I know, but there's still a [ __ ] hole. So, can you come with me to come and fix the hole? If we don't fix the hole, it's going to get cold. It's going to get cold in this [ __ ] Cold. And there ain't no uh not a lot of amount of millionaires are going to change that. I brought this up with Bernie on Sunday. It's my second time in New York in a week. And um he's big into inequality. >> Uh as am I. I grew up working. I grew up as working class as possible and I wanted to get his thoughts on a few statistics that I'll say to you now as well. Uh I basically put forward the idea that fatherlessness is the real inequality. Boys who grew up apart from their biological father are about two times more likely to land in prison or jail by age 30. Fatherlessness is a better predictor of incarceration than race or growing up poor. Young men are more likely to end up in prison or jail in the US than they are to graduate from college if they are raised in any non-intact family setup. More likely to end up in prison or jail than they are to graduate college if they grow up in any non-intact family setup. And that's like across the world. >> Just the US. Just the US. >> Wow. Regardless of family income, children in intact families are half as likely to be diagnosed with depression. And girls who grew up with without fathers are 10 times more likely to be diagnosed with depression. >> What do you gather from that? It's politically very unpalatable to talk about fatherlessness because it feels like you are putting blame on something very intimate and very closely associated to people's sense of selfworth. Um I think that there are probably some breakouts by demographic here too which are uh politically unpalatable for for people to talk about too that there are going to be uh subcultures and areas of the country in which this is worse and and and better. And that's also something that people don't really uh want to point the finger at because it sounds a lot like blaming. It sounds a lot like it's like it's a slippery slope to get toward uh a type of conversation that's not too nice. >> Absolutely. Um, and yet exactly as you said there, we cannot deny the raw reality that growing up without a father in the home is not good for daughters and sons and mothers and the local community. And the fact that people are so unprepared to be able to hold two facts in their mind at one time which is fathers are important and mothers can be independent. Absolutely. >> Uh you know how um there's a uncertainty principle in quantum physics. You have a what's called a superp position. the the the particle can be um in two places at once essentially. >> Uh uh thinking in superp positions, allowing yourself to hold two thoughts in your mind at one time. >> And unfortunately, we have a world that refuses to think in superp positions and it collapses down the space. >> If you're in this, that means this. >> Yes. If you want to give uh empathy to men, that means you're taking it away from another more deserving group. If you're saying that fathers are important, you're implicitly saying that mothers are incapable. If you're saying that, you know, pick your onedimensional argument of choice >> and um I think that you are right. I think that there are many things that need to be looked at. Inequality is a big one of them. Poverty is a huge one. class, the focus on the diversion away from the focus on class and into other in some ways more arbitrary uh uh uh uh um ways to delineate people from other people uh is a big problem. But removing focus from the family and from fathers and their role in the home in the hopes that what? By by reminding people or but by trying to convince people that fathers aren't important that somehow pedestalizes women that somehow makes them more independent. >> Yeah. Like there's no uh one like you said like the super Yeah. We can walk and chew gum at the same time. We can we can have a superp position in terms of our thoughts. And um I think it's very precient, dude. I think this weird position that you're in where you're talking your your album is a tribute to your father and an offering to your sons. >> Yes. >> At the same time. >> Absolutely. >> It's going in both directions. >> Absolutely. >> Um I don't think we need to be ashamed. I don't think we need to do this [ __ ] land acknowledgement each time before we do this. I I I I I talk about men and the the problems of men an awful lot and I it will never not fatigue me to have to do well we must remember that women have fell behind for all of this time and oh it's also important to remember that it's only been not been long since D like guys I get it I get it I wish I could just say it once >> or like have a disclaimer on my website and be like I understand completely the challenges that we're talking about I am not saying any of this huge list of things. Remember what we were talking about before? If you have to try and justify why you're in the room in order to be able to do the thing and you water it down and you have the caveat, which is exactly what I'm doing right now. >> No, no, no. >> You'd never get yourself >> Yes. No, no, no. This is not This is I don't see this as caveat. This is like >> You understand what I mean? Calling >> excavation of the thing. >> Yeah. Um I think I think people are deathly afraid of the excavation cuz you just don't know what the [ __ ] you're going to find. So, it's a lot safer to just not excavate it. >> You say this, you mean this. If you say this, you mean this. And now I get to go home and live my life and whatever. Because if we were both to excavate, [ __ ] I might actually like you. I might actually agree with you. We might actually be on the same page. Then I'm going to have to revert everything that is makes my life easier. It's easier to not excavate. It's easier to not excavate. If you have to excavate everything, that means you might have to really face yourself to find out what you truly believe at a gut level. Most people I don't think I just don't think people it's just a lot it's a lot easier to just not to excavate the problem. If we es if you excavate the problem you might have to ruffle some feathers. It's like oh I'm dealing with abuse in my family. Abuse runs in my family. Uh we just don't talk about that. It's like might be a little bit easier for now to not excavate it because if I excavate it, I might die facing that type of but the only way you get anything is the you got to have the the discourse I guess. And I just I guess discourse is not uh it's just risky, dude. It's risky. It's becoming increasingly less risky, which I like. >> Yes. And I think that this doesn't mean we need to have mask off. You can [ __ ] post whatever you want. Totally. Obviously. >> Um you can >> Yeah. [ __ ] God [laughter] damn it. Yeah. We should call each other out every time we do it. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. Absolutely. >> Um >> but I uh it seems to me like the trend is moving in the right direction now. I think people are prepared to say what is accurate and and caring and holistic and um makes the world a better place. It's it's yeah just with less of a concern about how it's going to land. I that will help art greatly, >> right? >> Yeah. I mean, if there's no it's just it's like when the Italians and the blacks and the Jews get together is magic. It is like it's just like we're all you can learn. There's there's uh art is like you take the Africa with the Europe with the thing to then make the thing that says this is the most newest European African thing I've ever like you got to be able to like you know but I think it's all it's like tribalism it's and to be honest with you I have taken the stance of kind of like like I got to make sure like my house is clean like I I I don't know what I mean by this but like I have to make that my like shoes are lined up at the door and my underwear is in the hamper for my wife before I'm like cuz there all these voices that's like how dare you make an album about your father when you about being a father figure and trying to be better when you lost your patience with your kid. Yes. >> Yeah. >> And there's this like but >> that is humility though. >> There's grace. Uh there there has to be some sort of grace to be able to make to be able to stumble into art. There's grace and stumbling. It's grace. It's stumbling. It's a it's it's uh learning what you did wrong or refining the product or whatever. But if there's people who you're not welcome in a space to create, we've already cut the art at the legs. So like you said, if there if as a cultural whole people are more excited about, I'm just going to do what I feel and let the chips fall where they fall, the potency of art will 100% change. It won't be watered down or homogenized or whatever. But I'll tell you what, I I don't know how much time we got. I'm having a blast. Um, not to just like expound on expounding, but like you know what the last conversation with my wife for the last six days and my therapist this morning was just like I like I also just like don't I like like I don't want the smoke. I don't need the smoke. I don't care. You can you just like I don't it's not even my uh when I go on social media I'm like whipped up into this frenzy to believe that like it's my role to speak out to join the ranks of the thing. I'm just going to shut social media off today and make sure I threw my underwear in the hamper for my wife. Like let's just like start there. Like, let's just like take a [ __ ] second to I have strong beliefs about a lot of things and a lot of things that I'll expound upon with people in the studio for four hours. People who lean super left and people who lean super right and people who don't believe the government's real. All of those things combined I will have the nuance conversation with. I I I struggle with just like I have a moral obligation in my art to like say what I believe in, but I also I don't need I don't need it to like I like I like going to the store and just like [ __ ] like hanging out, buying my [ __ ] going home, eating dinner, working on music, coming back. >> Well, you have to remember I I >> I struggle I struggle in that. That's that's the best way to put it. I have no answer. I I I struggle deeply with who I'm called to be. It's the balance again, dude. It's the balance board. It is. >> Wow. >> It keeps on coming up. And the reason that it keeps on coming up is that you have no obligation as a recording artist to do anything that you don't want to do. >> Yep. >> You have worked this hard to afford yourself the opportunity to not have to do anything that you don't want to do and say anything that you don't want to say. >> Yeah. I even say sometimes I say you may have been conditioned by too much content to grow to be angry at me for expecting what you think my output should be. That's not my fault. Like it's like somebody being like, "Well, you don't get good ticket sale uh ticket sale splits on your money because that's just the way the industry works." Like that's not my issue. Don't [ __ ] on me because that's just the like the artist is just this isn't a this isn't a weird It's It's weird. >> I want to >> like I owe you my music. Maybe if that >> kind of Yeah, if you're lucky. >> The gratefulness that pours out of me for people that like look back at me at a stadium is like a whole other level of appreciation. You took time out of your day and you spent money to come and do this. And I am so deeply thankful for that. But it's not my like I don't uh whatever you've come to expect from artists I'm not going to be unhealthy to fit myself into that if it just doesn't work for me. If my pace is four albums uh one album every four years and you get the best of me and I'm like a healthy father because of it and whatever like I you might have to like >> sorry >> sorry I'm not going to be doing two albums a year double-sided deluxe with the thing with the performance at the thing with the and I also don't need to be um right. I don't I don't I don't need to prove to the I do the thing I love every day and in that service it's between me and the creator. I create with collaborators and it's between me and him. And as long as I'm here and I'm doing the thing and I'm doing the crayon and giving it to my daddy for him to put on the refrigerator. >> Oh, look at this little creator thinking he made a masterpiece. And it's like I made the whole universe. As long as I'm here saying, "Hey daddy, I made this for you." There's not much else I could give to you. Cuz anything else beyond that to me, it's it's not in my alignment. It's not in my like it's not in my um >> the deeper I am in my purpose I will provide more utility for the long term of the world >> and I can only determine what I believe my deepest utility to be. So I have to operate within where I think I'm humming at my highest frequency of utility. For someone to say you're not you're not utilitizing the way I want you to utilitize. It's like well like what are we? It's a rough It's a rough go of it for artists right now. It's a rough It's a rough go of it. >> It is. It is. It's insane. Analysis paralysis. I don't know how I do not know how they do it. Kids, I have no idea. The [ __ ] out here 11 years old talking about so blessed to win the athlete of the year award comments. He ain't so and so old from Houston. It's like you're 11, dude. Some they're going to look at this like cigarettes. And artists are the main cigarette smokers because we got to use that to get streaming services [ __ ] on us. So we have to double down by using the platforms that only need us to use it because it makes users use the platform. They don't actually care about the artist. So then we have to change our behavior as artists to succeed on a platform that only cares about the platform getting eyes. So then we turn into like stupid monkeys performing for Instagram. You [ __ ] doing a Carlton out on TikTok to be like listen to my song. Do you think [ __ ] 20 years ago were like, "This is where it's going to go." But it's like once you invent the thing, Tik Tok just needs you to act like Tik Tok needs you to act to get the most eyes to keep the most people on the app. Tik Tok's not helping you get to your fans to you. They're helping you keep fans on the app. I don't know how to navigate it. I don't I wouldn't know how to navigate if I didn't have money. I'm just making an album, putting it out. And again, caveat, I ain't pure. I ain't the most I only make music because I'm the most moralistic. No, it's like I don't I mean, we're supposed to talk. It is what it is. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't I don't I don't know how to You're just going to have to create really thick skinned [ __ ] in the future cuz it's only going to get worse. So maybe this will breed a bunch of people who like naturally in the response of overcriticism by every comment. Maybe the generation next be totally [ __ ] from social media with self-image and all that stuff. Or it would breed like really resilient like I don't give a [ __ ] that you said I was >> that they follow the culture or that the counterculture. You drop a song and a [ __ ] is filming themselves as someone is watching them film themselves to react to them filming themselves. Why are we making music? Like it's almost as if the people trying is just raw content for these people who just want to be seen on the internet to use as a tool for their channel to blow up. >> It's a human centipede where everyone's attached to the person before them. It's like a you drop a song and a motherfucker's like, "Watch me listen." Why the [ __ ] would I watch you listen? I don't even I don't know, dude. I don't know. Some I you know what? I could be wrong. Sometimes I like watching people listen to an album that I love because I'm like, "Wow, you're gonna you're gonna experience it the way that I did and like this is a great album. I can't wait to see what you think about it." >> Dad listens to Nirvana for the first time. Like those are cool. I don't like mind them. But in general though, the whole over scrutiny of like a 100 comments and 20 of them were bad and then it >> Did you not always used to have this though with music critics, but it would have been in magazines and stuff like that >> for my [ __ ] or just like in general? Generally, you go back a couple of decades. That would have >> Yeah, but it's like if if the the newspaper of the New York Times just says like the Beatles, Sergeant Peppers, overindulgent and sloth of a mess and whatever. The New York Times said it, people read it. >> It wasn't uh like Taylor Swift, Life of a Showgirl. Okay, now it's not just the New York Times and then people talk about it for two days. It's here's the dissertation as to why that this album felt redundant and malignant and not in the I found it to be the exact opposite given its sweet nature and by the way buy my protein shake. It's like it's everybody is like a people are weighing in to such a degree that artists have to become a sensei at just being like the chips are going to fall where they fall. I cannot be affected by >> everybody needs a mindfulness practice. What did you make of the reaction to Taylor Swift's album? I don't think that I've seen a public reaction to that. Political commentators giving their thoughts. >> Were they? >> Oh, yeah. Yeah. Like there was no one that was beyond it was honestly the fact that Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump didn't do reaction videos [laughter] to it. In fact, Trump might Did Trump say something about the Taylor Swift? I feel like he did. I feel like he did say something about it. >> What was the general gist of the the the discourse? Was it a split discourse? Uh, I was certainly split. I think a couple of things that were interesting that people picked up on. One was you used to never be able to criticize a Taylor Swift song or album without Swifties calling for your head. >> Okay. >> And the fact that this time criticisms were put out and the Swifties didn't do that was seen as indicative that even her most ardent fans realized that this might not have been the thing. Whatever. It's like the the inside of the box is the inside of the box which brings the inside Christmas. >> The fans nonresponse to the criticism was indicative of what we might believe to be >> I'm not kidding. That was that was like a big that was a big talking point where three levels of derivative away from what the actual initial piece of content is now. >> Um fully vulnerable and transparent. The only clip I saw was over my wife's shoulder. it. She was scrolling through and somewhere on some sort of entertainment tonight or something it was her saying, "I'm not the art police and I like it." And like kind of just like leave it at that. And I thought that was pretty cool. That was the that was the whole my level of receiving discourse of like what that was. I listened to it. I listened to it and I have my opinions musically on I can get I can get into the minutia of like what I really thought about the wine as it was being stomped on the grapes like for sure. But I don't know how like a 14-year-old feels about it or like how it relates to the zeitgeist of her applying to her relevancy. I don't know. I I I uh genuinely did not take enough inventory to know. I just know what I thought about the album when I listened to it in my car. >> What did you make of the album? >> I liked it. I enjoyed it. I think she's a great songwriter. >> What a great opinion. >> I liked it. I I don't know. I just >> Or you could have said Yeah. >> It wasn't for me. >> Some songs were, some songs weren't. like 100% of the albums I listen to. Very rarely across the board am I like stopping an album and I'm like dog [ __ ] The whole thing was Taylor Swift must be kidding. Like I'm like no. Like the second pre on that third song was pretty sick. I could probably take something from that and that's Max G. Max Martin's a genius. Man, Taylor Swift knows how to write the [ __ ] out of song. I wonder what she means by this. I don't agree with that. H I'm not like I don't agree with that. Max Martin's a genius. Then make sure everyone knows how I feel about it. I know how I feel about it cuz I [ __ ] listen to it myself. I don't need you to know that I thought that I listened to it. It's like but that's my I think Teresa's been Olympic for a long time. And the crazy part is she writing them too. She's writing them. She's good. She's good. And that type of run I What am I going to be like? Her fault from Grace should be studied if people don't like the album. I don't [ __ ] know. I don't look at her that way. I look at her as she's like a very high level force Olympic creative that's just like like wow she does it at a really really high level and a lot of the songs I end up liking like these catchy I like this catches on the way to driving my son somewhere I'm like >> kind of going what's the sound system like in the Kia >> it's pretty great >> is it I paid the extra 15 grand for the uh deluxe Bose [clears throat] sound system >> this is turning into an ad [ __ ] key I want to talk about the direction of pop music right now I've seen those videos of Ed Sheeran playing 50 songs over four chords. You know, it's the same chord progression of whatever. >> Ed is Ed is like mind-numbingly talented. It's crazy. But >> um does that suggest that pop music is formulaic now? Where are we at in the arc of what do what do you consider pop music? >> I guess anything that hits the charts. >> Yeah. formulaic in the sense that bro sometimes I literally just be like like literally in my head I just like nothing means anything like it's like what do you like defeats the whole person's podcast but you're just like what do you what do you mean like is pop music formulaic it's like the bass that's going to pop music is looking to be fed in a way that is not that might not even um uh necessitate breaking the mold, >> right? It doesn't need to be experimental. It can be predictable. Another way instead of formulaic might be predictable. >> Yes. And some of the best people in the world are the best at taking something that's completely experimental and still creating like if it's we're all trying to make bikes, you're still trying to make a bike that will last long for you to do the the the marathon in the country. [gasps] Pop music, I guess, is just like the most people can ride the bike and enjoy it and whatever. And then there's some people will be like, "I drive a motorcycle." Like, "You don't even know what biking is like." And it's like, "I just like my huffy, dog." Like, I'm just I don't give a [ __ ] that you're so angry at the fact that I don't I don't have like answers. Like, the older I get, the more I'm like, h this is like a whole [ __ ] ton of everything matters and nothing matters. Like, everything matters and nothing matters. those six years while I was gone, I was like, I want hits. I will tap dance for whatever guy that's best friends with the artist that D and tell them they're great to just like sneak in and do what I got to do cuz I don't know how where this money is going to come from. Like, I need hits because songwriters do not get paid. Songwriters do not get paid. They are at the all the way the whatever the bottom of the barrel is. ask who's in the basement and who's got barrels in the basement. The bottom of the barrel. So, I was like, I need hits in order to really make a living to still do what I love to do. So, my focus is hits. I wasn't I had to kind of shut off the reverberation of like, maybe in six years I'll do a podcast and talk about it to the top comment to be like, he made a bunch of shitty songs that went number one because pop music sucks. It's like, dude, I don't know. I was I was trying to make some big songs and I tried to get in the best rooms to make a living for my family and the repercussions of that and what I did with pop music. Now, because I have money, I'm able to drive my taste more and a lot of the [ __ ] I'm making is just like cooler and harder and more like [ __ ] you if you don't like it type of [ __ ] because like you said, I'm not as rehearsed. I'm not as whatever. I'm a little bit more on autopilot and I could take a bit more risk. >> Dude, what what is the point of having [ __ ] you money if you never say [ __ ] you? >> There's no point. There's no point at all. So you say like would you say you're asking a musician like you're asking a musician on why pop music can it be formulaic? Is it it's like yeah it formulaic in the idea that one day when we get to heaven we're going to find out that the wall was only 5 ft around. Like like when we get to heaven like all of our lives like in this realm of trying to make music like all of us like in our flesh these magical things happen and God enters the room and you make like John Lennon makes Imagine and like these things happen and they change a generation and Bob Marley happens and it's it's this this thing that seems bigger than what our flesh is capable of and as music creators like we're going to find out that the wall we're in the wrong like dimension of it and we keep trying to pretend pretend like it's not 5 ft around. And I think a lot of the greats are somewhat have an understanding that's like you don't have to climb so high to try to like >> hey man, people just want to feel good. >> You know, like like when we get to heaven and we have the perspective that's outside of like the the body trap, >> get to heaven next plane, whatever the [ __ ] you believe. Great. >> We'll we'll um I don't know if pop music's formulaic. I think the world is searching for a lot of the same thing, you know, and then there's the young kid who says, "I'm going to change that thing up there and then they get too much money and they become depressed and they have to find out who they really are without the success." And it's the same uprising and falling of the same [ __ ] over and over and over again. >> Oh man, I look the reason that I keep laughing. We've we've >> all that from you said it's me is pop music formuling. Yeah. Yeah. You're the best sort of guest, dude. I flick you once and you're a [ __ ] infinite content infinite [ __ ] perpetual motion machine that just ticks away. It add ticks away. It takes away. >> Like guys like Max Martin, they're concerned about it feeling really good. I don't think they're in the room with the weekend. Max can correct me if I'm wrong. I just don't think Max's in the room with the weekend being like >> Yeah. I think he's like this will keep them listening because it feels good to listen to it. And sometimes that might come off as formulaic. Sometimes it might be groundbreaking. Sometimes things work because it resonates within like Olivia Rodrigo Driver's License. That's not um formulaic, but people would consider that somehow pop garbage. I don't understand how you would. That's one of the best to me that's one of the best written songs in in a very long time. >> It's so antithesis of what pop is, whatever, but you're still going to get people being like because she's in this sphere of artists, it's pop and formulaic and what? >> Let me give you a >> what is pop? What is cool? What is not? I'm not I don't Let me give you an insight that I've played with for a long time. There's a guy called Jack Butcher who made visualized value. He was a graphic artist for a very long time and then he started creating uh graphic representations of quotes and concepts. >> Now, you'd think as a graphic artist what you traffic in are fonts and colors and design. There's a million different degrees of freedom. But he put constraints in. He said it's only ever going to be white on black. It's going to be geometric shapes and it's going to be one font. What that meant was his constraint bred creativity. >> Absolutely. >> And I think about this which is why to me like Ocarine of Time or Toy Story or like the staples of creative genius were because of the constraints of what it was. Like now they drop games and it's it's like it's too good. Like I don't even want it to look this real and I don't want to like pay my taxes inside of a video game. It doesn't need to be like life. It's it was so removed from life that it Yes. Yes. The constraints that the Nintendo 64 had is what birthe Ocarine of time because they had to trudge through the limitations that they had which forced them to do really smart things to make the mountains look bigger in the background without doing bandwidth and [ __ ] >> What is it that people care about the most? >> Right? And for instance, like the the the analogy that we're talking about here when it let's say >> that you could only use four chords for the rest of time. Let's say there was some weird other universe. >> Yeah. >> Only four chords are allowed to be used in every song. >> Yeah. >> Okay. Well, what do we start to play with then? Well, we start to play with the arrangement. We start to play with the complexity. We start to play with the lyrics. We start to play with the musicality of >> this never ending unfolding, coagulating, resurfacing thing that just keeps eating itself into just >> you can end up with the reason that I I I thought it was real interesting. Constraint breeds creativity. So if you do have inside of pop music some constraint, some regular um uh formulas or levels of predictability or expectation or whatever it might be, >> it means well perhaps people begin competing >> in the area which is the highest contribution and maybe that's the resonance. How much of the artist's uh soul is put into it? What's the message of the song? Uh and I thought that was really cool. I was thinking about this on Walk through Manhattan. And I'm like, [ __ ] Like, wow. That constraint that Jack put on himself where he said he wasn't going to allow himself to use different colors, different shapes, all the rest of the stuff. It meant that the only two things he thought about was what was the quote I'm choosing and how am I representing it? That's it. Those are he had two things to play with. I'm like, >> well, those are the two highest points of contribution. Yeah. >> So perhaps >> unlimited degrees of freedom result. >> What do you think are the two highest points of the both >> for him? For him, it was what is the quote that he was choosing from a gazillion. >> Got it. Got it. Got it. Got And then how is it going to be represented? >> I can have all the colors in the world. And I think the same thing can be true of something like music where you have an infinite number of ways that we can represent this and but perhaps if you bring the constraint in you focus on what do people care about the most and where do I get lost in the source? >> Utility. Utility. What's the utility of this? Are we making a song? Sometimes, sometimes you'll be an hour in, you'll be like, "Are we just making a song because we're making one? What are we doing here? What's the purpose here? Where does this get played? Who's going to listen to this? Who's going to like that?" It does come into your mind. >> Lately, lately, I've just been I I can only stomach making something that I'm just like, I will listen to this in my free time. There's been other times where I haven't. >> There's just other times where I just haven't. I've just gone along with who's in the room, [gasps] whatever gets the cut and their fans will like it and it's big and it's just like whatever. And I can use my talents to kind of treat it like a day at work and making x amount of dollars off of just me spending eight hours by helping this person do this thing. It's like cool. But lately, it's tough for me to feel. For some reason, six years ago when I was making hits, I just wanted hits and it excited me. didn't I just wanted to figure out the code to get to the top of radio with the biggest artist with the thing and then that becomes just like everything else. It all becomes disenchanting. It's like the artist thing. I'm walking away and then I just want hits and when I just want hits I made enough money to where I'm like I'm not interested in making hits right now. I want to make an album and I make an album and go play Forest Hills and that's really interesting. So now >> what's interesting to you now? >> Shutting off as many things on the outside world as possible and making something that I am 15year-old John going batshit crazy about in my car and then maybe maybe again bringing that to the world one more time. I that's what's really interesting to me right now is not is just like shutting down. It's like open eyes, wake up, coffee, music, music, music, music, music, music. Kids, go to sleep, wake up, music, kids, music, music, music, music, kids, go to sleep, wake up. And it's been an interesting It's been interesting to see what artists have just like came into my universe from me just doing that. Cuz now I'm sending out songs that I'm like, I didn't even consider this, this, this, and this. But somehow that somehow makes more interesting for artists of different artistic calibers and how the world views them and blah blah blah blah. I don't know [ __ ] about [ __ ] I really love what I do. I really love what I do. So, right now, taking the necessary steps, whether that be living healthfully, living Olympically, um processing drama in order for my balance to not take too much out of me. >> That's what I'm what I'm enjoying right now is enjoying myself. >> I'm so happy for you, man. >> Thank you. I'm so [ __ ] happy for you. >> Thank you. I really I appreciate that deeply. >> And you did it all from [ __ ] Long Island. >> Yeah. And are there days where you want to strongarm the perspective and you don't feel like you're getting the just do of it comes and goes. It comes and goes. But but a normal life is a great life. I'm positive of it because in the details is where you find infinity. Infinity is in the details. It's not in the it's not it's just like not in the headline. It's just not. [snorts] So you see like [ __ ] seem like I live a very odd me and my wife talk about it a lot. We are smack dab in the middle of regular life and we're also smack dab in the middle of not. like there's no uh and I'm not even sure that what I'm doing is the right way to live. I just know that I'm I'm happy uh in an overarching sense. Not every day is perfect at all. But when you almost get wrapped into something and almost lose it all, like going to get smoothies with your kids is like it's hilarious. the jokes, the development, the way that they see life, the things that they trust you to say that the just like, man, if I would have just like lived for me, what a bummer. What a bummer. I know a lot of [ __ ] that got it. didn't turn uh didn't fill the hole, but the industry. I know it's the age-old archetype, but you'll be different >> because your message is the most important. So, of course, you're going to sacrifice a little bit of family time and a little bit of social time and a little bit of health right now. And of course you're going to do that because what you have to say what when when you get your message out into the world it'll be and that's what they tell you and that's what they that's the temptation. That's the thing. >> And then when you get there you've made so many [ __ ] sacrifices to get there that you're not even the person you began to be in the first place. It's like I have to become the I don't know like metaphorical president. But in order to become the president of course I'm going to have to slide some money here and do this because my >> burn my life down. My goal is the noble one. So me doing the wrong thing, what's immediately wrong in my present to get to there is the sum of all games. It's like that was something that I considered. You uh had this eye opening moment when you realized how much you're getting screwed on your deal and from that I don't want to tour anymore. But would you actually even want to tour as a new father if a touring deal was the most perfect you could >> they put it on the table right after fours they were like they the proverbial they were like holy [ __ ] we didn't know he was going to sell it out in 3 hours we didn't know that it would stream this way it would chart on Spotify blah blah we had no idea they put in front of me they put in front of me like multi multi multi-million dollar 40-day just in case you want to see it I just looked at it as like I looked at it like a joke. I just looked at it like, "No way." >> Why? It's like a guy like Ed or like certain artists you have conversations with, they live to be on stage and it brings them a lot of joy bringing people joy in that way, you know, like like Ed is just like he lives and breathes by playing his guitar and singing and being like playing stadiums and that that brings his life so much joy that it's worth putting in the effort with his children to do that because it's so important to him. It's just not that important to me. People like the shows and they like when I'm on stage and I have fun and it's my adrenaline pumps, but I don't like the calm down. >> I don't like the two days of staring at the ceiling of being like, "What drug did I just take?" I don't like the drug. The drug's not It's not It doesn't feel normal for me. And I don't know how to regulate that. You do enough shows and you learn how to like not give it everything. I'm on stage losing my [ __ ] mind. And then by the time I get off stage, I'm reeling for two days. I don't enjoy it. I barely enjoy the the album release process. I don't like going into this thing where it's like you're about to release this thing and this podcast is coming out and will you get clipped and will it become this thing? That's I don't enjoy any of that. That's not none of that is like it's not exciting to me. But I'm lit up when someone plays a a just a a mean honking chord over just some ill [ __ ] drums and I'm just like I could just do this for the rest of my life. This is great. There's other stuff that comes with it because you have to make a living and your relevancy and >> play the game. play the game to some degree because you can't abandon the game completely. That's just like a again that's me at a young age. I'm burning the whole thing down. Just doesn't work that way for me at least. >> Nice pipe dream. >> Nice pipe dream. Not not possible. But yeah, it's uh I love what I do. I really do love what I do. The torren to answer your question, I don't enjoy it. I don't even enjoy I I I I don't even really enjoy um it's like the fanfare or the praise. I don't I don't like it. >> How's it feel? >> You know, it's it's like a selfish thing. You want it how you want it. It's like, dude, listen to my music and be affected by it and like think I'm the greatest, but like don't like put too much pressure on me cuz like I'm not that like it's not that serious. >> But it is very serious. But it's not very serious. But it is very serious and know it's like what how to even um how to even operate in it. I still have no idea. No idea. Well, I have an idea cuz I know that if you put a $7 million tour in front of me, it ain't 40 million or if you put a 70 I'm like I'm good because I just know myself at this point. I've walked away long enough to be like, "Finally, I'm back and they're accepting me and I can go on this soldout tour if they want me." It's like, "Dude, I made an album about being a dad to three boys." Like, I wasn't trying to apply to everybody. >> You imagine playing that live being like, I'm working really hard as a dad, but not for the next 39 days. >> Thank you for coming to the opening night. >> Honest to the honest to the Lord, that is the conundrum of my existence. That is the conundrum. >> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So, just to give you a little bit of insight that um you know uh Aaron Gillespie from Underath, he's the drummer and singer from Under Metal. >> I know Under the Drummer singer from that. Uh he struggled a lot, struggles a lot with uh performance anxiety, anxiety generally. I think he said on the pod that he's been to like >> [ __ ] the emergency room hundreds of times while he's been on tour. He's adamant he's having a heart attack, health, anxiety stuff. And as I was sort of listening to him talk about it, and I'm hearing sort of you say the same thing, he has a particular type of obsession which has caused him to get some outcomes that he's not happy with. having to go off tour to go to an emergency room and telling the nurses what scans to get because it's the same scans that he know that he got last time because he's been so many times like like going to a pub and ordering the usual despite the fact that he's never been to this hospital before but he already knows what he needs to prove to himself that he hasn't got the >> and I'm like you do understand that the level of obsession that is tormenting you with regards to your health >> is the reason that you're in one of the most famous and successful metal bands of all time. And the same thing for you with this. >> Yes. I I I run into all of these reminders every day that don't that feel counterintuitive to ambition, success, whatever. It's almost like this John guy's crazy. He's coming here preaching mediocrity. There's times in my life where I say, "I could finish this song today, and I know that so and so needs it, and I know I could this could really be a big win, and it's just it's just a graduation. It's it's just Christmas Eve. It's just a random day in July going in the pool and my kids are going there. I'll be three hours late. I run into that a lot where I'm just like this feels unimportant. >> But the thing I tell myself in my head, I just go follow that. And a lot of times I'm doing things that don't feel as a father. A lot of times I'm I'm doing things that don't feel uh they don't feel fun. They don't feel important. >> And I don't realize their importance until like 6 7 8 9 10 months later. So, a lot of it's just like kind of feeling out in the dark to like I'm actually walking toward the exact opposite of a self-help podcast. I walk toward mediocrity very aggressively because I find that the nuance inside of the mediocrity gives you a stronger baseline for a longer level of happiness. Mhm. >> When your ambition is so like I'm not going to throw any names under the bus of like giant athletes or whatever, but the ambition is so obsessive and so whatever. Just look at the fruits of the look at the fruits of the thing. >> How did ultimately your career is a marathon, not a sprint? >> It has to be. >> And uh >> why do you think every [ __ ] artist goes on a podcast over and over and it's the same story? It's the same story. I was at the height of my career and the loneliest I've ever been. It's like at a certain point someone I might be mildly not too dumb to look at that and just be like I'm going to I'm going to believe all of them and never look over the fence and never chase after the thing that no, if I got it because enough people have told me that it's not the end all be all. >> I'm going to have to do this. I was I I I didn't want to have to [ __ ] pull this one out, but I'm going I'm I'm going to have to read you I'm going to have to read you an essay. I'm sorry. >> I I'm in. >> Okay, >> I'm so in. >> Okay, here we go. >> Such [snorts] a good um conversation. >> I uh came up with this insight about a year ago and it's it's exactly what you've been talking about. Uh and I called it unteable lessons. Basically what I realized was that there is a a certain category of lesson that no matter how often people learn it, we refuse to uh to be able to hold on to. >> Yes. >> I've been thinking about a special category of lesson, one which you cannot discover without experiencing it firsthand. There is a certain subset of advice that for some reason we all refuse to learn through instruction. Untachable lessons. No matter how arduous or costly or effortful it's going to be for us to find out for ourselves, we prefer to disregard the mountains of warnings from our elders, songs, literature, historical catastrophes, public scandals, and instead think some version of, "Yeah, that might be true for them, but not for me." >> Absolutely. >> We decide to learn the hard lessons the hard way over and over again. Unfortunately, they all seem to be the big things, too. It's never insights about how to put up level shelves or charmingly introduce yourself at a cocktail party. Instead, we spend most of our lives learning firsthand the most important lessons that the previous generation already warned us about. >> Things like money won't make you happy. Fame won't fix your self worth. You don't love that pretty girl. She's just hot and difficult to get. Yep. Nothing is as important as you think it is when you're thinking about it. You will regret working too much. Worrying is not improving your performance. All your fears are a waste of time. You should see your parents more. You will be fine after the breakup and be grateful that you did it. It's perfectly okay to cut toxic people out of your life. And even reading this list back, I'm rolling my eyes at how [ __ ] trite it is. These are all basic [ __ ] obvious insights that everyone has heard before. But if they're so basic, why does everyone so reliably fall prey to them throughout our lives? And if they're so obvious, why do people who have recently become famous or wealthy or lost a parent or gone through a breakup start to proclaim these facts with the renewed grandiose ceremony of someone who's just gone through religious revelation. It's also a list of very contentious topics to say on the internet. If you interview a billionaire who says that all his money didn't make him happy, or a movie star who said that her fame felt like a prison, the internet will tear them apart for being ungrateful and out of touch. So, not only do we refuse to learn these lessons, we even refuse to hear the message from those warning us about them. >> Even more than that, for every one of these, if I think a bit deeper, I can recall a time, including right now, where I convince myself that I'm the exception to the rule. That my particular mental makeup or life situation or historical wounds or dreams for the future render me immune to these lessons being applicable. No, no, no. My inner landscape would be fixed by skirting around the most well-known wisdom of the ages. No, no, no. I can thread this needle properly. Watch me dance through the minefield and avoid all the trip wires that everyone else kicks. And then you kick one. And you share a knowing look between another person, the kind that can only occur between two people who have been hurt in exactly the same way. And a voice in the back of your mind will say, "I told you so. I to the tea to [laughter] we could have saved ourselves a whole [ __ ] conversation. I love it. >> That's exact, bro. I could never have related with something more in my entire life. It's like the gr is hey man the grass ain't greener. Like hey man, being present is really good. Like you don't know until you got like I give up artistry and I'm walking away from it to be it's like wow that I didn't even need it in the first place. Thank god I stripped that of myself. >> Dude, I love the fact that you are a this weird role model for both ends of the [ __ ] extreme for the complete dedication purest art form going forward and also winning in the weeds of taking your kids to the ice cream to get a [ __ ] like uh what's that [ __ ] ice [ __ ] that everyone on Long Island eats? >> Italian ice. >> Yeah, Italian ice. Yeah. Yeah, that's it. Why did you got to throw Italians in there like that? British did it, dude. Talking to me. >> He did the British thing. He did. >> Oh, well, I tell you about the It's like a French ice [laughter] or something like that. >> Yeah. >> Um, >> exactly. >> But I think it's really cool, man. I think that you are uh without knowing it like very on the nose of the zeitgeist of where people are moving. You said before, I think that fathers are important. I think that fathers are going to be increasingly important as we move through the future. and also might be one of the most culturally outofouch people that's been on the podcast. Um, and you know, you know when well you know when two of your different friends tell you, "Hey man, you got to watch this new series." And they don't know each other and they didn't coordinate to do it and you go, "Whoa." Or two people say, "Have you checked out the new [ __ ] Sleep Token record or whatever the fuck?" You're like, >> "I should probably pay attention to that." >> Cuz people are a lot of people are talking. Yeah. Yeah. >> You two independent people came up with the same realization. you you came up with in Unteachable Lessons, you had some other name for it in your mind. I wrote that essay a year ago. >> There's probably something there. I feel like there's something there. >> Yeah. >> The fact that the fact that you, Mr. [ __ ] Faraday Cage, sterile laboratory of music production and child rearing have arrived at the realization, I think fatherhood's important. I think you win in the weeds of life. Yes. I think that normality and boring victories and mundane successes daytoday are where the juice is to be squeezed from. >> Absolutely. >> I think the fact that you have done that and if you look at the zeitgeist that they're pointing in the same direction too that people are like dude the glitz and the glamour and chasing all of that stuff is becoming >> go. It's becoming cringe. It's becoming an ick. It's becoming shallow. it is >> in a way that maybe it didn't previously. >> Yep. >> I think that suggests that you're on to something, man. >> Which also takes me like and again last things just I totally agree. The zeitgeist is the there's just a level of consciousness that seems like if I if I'm conscious like that then we all connected then like if I feel that way chances are a lot of other people might feel that way. In the depths of myself it was songwriting. I recognize that when I identify something deep inside myself, I say, "Oh, hold on to that one." And try to always hold on to the way that that felt because you might be able to put that in something to then deliver it to the world because you're human just like everybody else. >> That's why when you start to doubt yourself, it's so dangerous. >> If you start to caveat for other people, that little whisper, Rick Rubin calls them whispers, right? Or my therapist said, uh, pay attention to fleeting thoughts, >> you're like, "Oh, hold on." >> Yes. >> Come back. >> Yes. >> Let's have a little listen to that. >> Mhm. >> Mhm. And that's where Oh, he sees me. >> Yes, he sees me. Yep. Holy [ __ ] dude. The the consciousness of it all. It almost feels like the uh times are are times are coming to a tie a tied up end. And I don't know what that means. It's just that and maybe you know nuclear war was always a threat threat and all this different stuff but in my deep in my gut somewhere it feels like the bedrock of reality is starting to like crack open like is school good what's college who's the president what's going on do we trust the government I don't know but it's like coming to this thing because everything's being recorded and truth is quickly getting you know thrown to the top of the pile because of our access to it that you're right there is some sort of consciousness that's moving in a direction that I don't Hopefully, it's toward >> Honestly, dude, as long as you know what I want to return to, uh, I appreciate you giving me the freedom to even feel this comfortable to have this conversation by the end of our conversation, but I almost like want to go back to being stupid because the dumber I stay, the larger and more aware I am of like in my happiness to some degree. And I don't mean willful ignorance. I don't mean ignoring problems and not addressing things and pretending like things don't exist just I don't know it felt good to make it to make that song or I don't know like one so one show it's like I don't know it just felt right with me it felt right well you're stupid you didn't get $7 million deal from your 30 tour you're back dude people are listening to you the whole world wants you you're dumb it's like I just like I'm think I'm like I'm start I was like I'm dumb like I'm all just be over here just like in my dumbness doing nothing having a popsicle on a Tuesday with my boys. I just going to stick to dumb cuz I think dumb's been work mundane and dumb has really saved my life. It's really helped me out. Sitting with the uncomfortability of the things that you don't want to touch, slowing it down and in the dumbness, you end up you end up coming into grips with that monster. You end up you end up things kind of just worked out. I've smarted myself into being so stupid. I'm like the I'm like the I'm like the smartest dumb person ever. I'd rather be like the dumbest smart person willfully letting go of like the wisdom. I feel like the more like insane wisdom I get, the more I'm like, >> "Okay, I I I need to I need to do a bit on you that most people on the internet will know, but given you're not on the internet, you wouldn't have seen it. Do you know what the Midwit meme is? >> Midwit. >> Midwit meme. Okay. So, imagine a bell curve that you've got here. And on the left hand side you have a meme of a guy who >> Will people not believe that? I don't know what that is. Like, is it that popular? >> Uh, probably not. No. I think it's a justifiable level of ignorance. >> Okay. >> Um, [laughter] >> the rest I can't speak. >> No, no, no. You're hopeless outside of that. Um, left hand side guy that looks a little bit like a caveman, big brown. He's so stupid like that. And then at the top of the bal curve, which is where most people are, you have this sort of screaming, raging, over complicated optimizer person. And then on the right hand side, you have this guy that looks like a Jedi with his hood up. And the meme, the joke is that the guy on the left and the guy on the right always agree. They always come to the same conclusion. And it's the person in the middle who overcomplicates everything. >> I love that. >> So, for example, >> I love that. >> Um, uh, how do I build muscle? Eat protein, lift weights. Eat protein, lift weights. I must ensure that my predigested weight is consumed [laughter] within a 30-minute window from a grass-fed, grass source, non GMO like right. Okay. Yes. And for this >> the everybody that is every guy in the middle is a guy on the left trying to be the guy on the right. You cannot be the guy on the right. Okay? There's no way to become the Jedi. You can only be the guy on the left. So question to ask yourself is what would the guy on the left do? the guy on the left Tuesday afternoon. >> We should get lollipops [laughter] >> as opposed to >> Yes. >> What is the most optimal way for me to ensure because that is you trying to be the guy on the right and ending up being the guy in the middle. >> Chase, have you still got that? Can you lift it up? Okay. So, this is what we're talking about. So, guy on the left, [laughter] guy in the middle, guy on the right. You can't be the guy on the right. It's only possible to be the guy on the left. >> Yeah. It's And it's almost like the more you're okay with being the guy on the left, you're kind of like it all just it all just ends up being all right, >> dude. >> Hey, I don't know, man. >> Dude, I I love it. John Bellian, ladies and gentlemen, dude. [ __ ] I've enjoyed today so much. >> That that means a ton to me. Over the years, like I I try to give people their flowers if I ever meet them and say, "If I ever come across that guy, I'll let them know first day, whatever." >> I just think it's very very noble. I think it's very uh I wish a lot more people thought the way that you did in what they decide to help people with and how they decide to help people. And I've seen you refine it over the years cuz I've been a fan for a super long time. So, I'm in, man. >> I appreciate you. >> I appreciate you having me and thanks for, dude, thanks for doing this all the way where I live. >> I got you, man. I got you. Until next time. >> Yes, sir. >> Congratulations for making it to the end of a podcast episode without getting distracted. What a wonderful achievement. How about another achievement? [music] Uh, this episode which I also love. Go on, watch it.