Dave Grohl

00:00:00
Speaker 1: Hey, I'm Norah Jones and today I'm reliving playing alone with Dave Girl.

00:00:04
Speaker 2: I'm just playing.

00:00:07
Speaker 3: With you.

00:00:11
Speaker 1: I'm just playing lone with you. Hi. I'm Norah and with me is Sarah.

00:00:22
Speaker 2: Hi.

00:00:23
Speaker 1: How are you? I'm good? How are you?

00:00:25
Speaker 4: I am good?

00:00:27
Speaker 3: Today we're revisiting one of our favorite episodes from the archive, our episode with the one and only Dave Girl. Of course, he's been a legend in rock history from his time with Nirvana to Foo Fighters, and I love this episode because I feel like you just see a different side of him.

00:00:47
Speaker 1: Yes, this was a fun one to record. I love playing with Dave, have known him for a long time. And it's a good time to revisit this episode because Foo Fighters have a new album coming out.

00:01:00
Speaker 3: That's right, it's coming out April twenty fourth. It's called Your Favorite Toy and the title track is out now, so be sure to check that out. Yay, So, have you missed it the first time or if you just want to hear it again, here's our episode Dave Cool.

00:01:15
Speaker 1: Hope you enjoyed this episode.

00:01:28
Speaker 4: The funniest part of that whole Kennedy Center experience was hanging out with Steven.

00:01:36
Speaker 1: Tyler Oh, he was a hoot.

00:01:39
Speaker 4: He was amazing. But I got stuck behind him at a metal detector no, and it was like a good twenty minutes of my life.

00:01:51
Speaker 1: Why if he made out of me ring?

00:01:53
Speaker 5: Oh, ring, ring, necklaces, necklace, nacklace.

00:02:00
Speaker 1: It was just likeous.

00:02:02
Speaker 4: I know, I felt like I was at Tiffany's. It was completely insane. But yeah, what a crazy experience. You know. One of the coolest things about that that weekend was there was that rehearsal stage. It was off to the side. First of all, I grew up in DC. I grew up outside.

00:02:21
Speaker 1: That's right where in.

00:02:23
Speaker 4: Alexandria, Virginia, just outside, and so you know, as a kid, we would go to the Kennedy Center on like field trips or sometimes like there'd be a show and the family would go. I saw Beatlemania there kid, And so the Kennedy Center was always this really really special place, even just to go, you know, it seemed like one of the museums, almost like a museum of music. You had the Smithsonian, but then to go to the Kennedy Center it was such a huge deal. And then to be invited to it to play, so I was I was freaking out. I'm like, oh my god, this is the coolest thing I've ever done in my life.

00:03:02
Speaker 1: That was the first time you'd been invited to do something there.

00:03:06
Speaker 4: No, okay, I went once when they were honoring the who Ah And it was during you guys can come in, It's fine. It was during the George W. Bush administration, so you felt conflict. Well, yes, I didn't necessarily agree with a lot of the politics at the time. But one of the things that was really cool about those Kennedy Center events was that people could kind of put aside their differences and just be there for their music. Yeah, and you know, you'd go to those receptions and you would meet people from both sides of the aisle. And having grown up outside of DC, the reason why my family moved to d C was because my father was a journalist, he was a writer, and he was a conservative Republican. My mother was a public school teacher and she was much more at liberal Democrat. So I kind of grew up in this world where both of those things can coexist. They divorced, but whatever, Like, I was kind of in the middle of those two things, so you know, I could hang out with my father's friends on the weekend when I was a kid, and we'd go to Georgetown and you know, they'd sit at this bar and have cocktails and talk politics and not really everybody agreed on everything, but they could at least like sit and have a cocktail and talk politics without like a brawl.

00:04:42
Speaker 1: That's kind of what we're missing totally.

00:04:45
Speaker 4: That old environment that fun, like all the president's men, like VW bugs and corduroys and cigarettes and the elevator and Scotch on the weekends or whatever. That's how I remember Washington, d C. Much different than it is now. But anyway, but being at those events, getting to really sit and talk to different people. At that one with George Bush, w you know, they do the metal ceremony in the East Room of the White House and afterwards it was around Christmas, and afterwards they said, hey, do you want to get your picture taken with the President? And there was that part of me that was like really kind of politically conflicted, But then I decided, well, we're here, and we're here to be a part of this event, and we're here to honor the musicians whatever. So I my wife and I walked into the room next to the Christmas tree to get our picture taken, and I greeted the first lady and then I said hello to him, and I mean, I look like this right, I don't look like a marine or a Republican or a politician or everything. And he looks at me and he goes really loud. He goes, where are you from? And I was like, uh, just right over the bridge over there. We're facing like the south lawn. I'm like, just over in Virginia. He's like, oh, what are you doing here? I said, I'm doing a song with the for the Who. He's like, oh cool. And we got a picture taken, and then I go downstairs. At the time, Jordan, my wife was pregnant, and she had left her coat in the coat room and I was going to try to find it before we went down to the Kennedy Center. So I was downstairs looking for the coat room and was lost in the White House and all of a sudden, these secret Service people come through the hallway and they're like they're like, everybody step beside. President's coming through and I kind of like hugged the wall and here he comes and he's walking and he looks me dead in the eyes and he goes, I see you down there, dude, and I was like, oh my god, I want to get wasted with this guy. I wanted totally hang and have cocktails and stuff. That was the thing. Oh but the one, the one for Paul, that was so cool. There was that rehearsal space that was sort of on the side of the main stage, and I was sitting there waiting. I think Steven Tyler was performing, rehearsing his thing. And I looked and I saw there's a house band and I saw one of the horn players was Blue Lou Marini from the Blues Brothers band.

00:07:33
Speaker 1: Wow.

00:07:34
Speaker 4: And when I was a kid, I was obsessed, fucking obsessed with I had Beatles records, Steve Martin records, and the Blues Brothers record and that was like, that's my musical foundation, Like Steve Martin at the Beatles, that's it.

00:07:48
Speaker 1: That's perfect.

00:07:48
Speaker 4: But then to see Blue Lou and he was kind of sitting by himself in the corner and I walked up. I star fucked him so hard. It was just like mister Marine. He's like, yeah, I'm like, oh my god, I freaked out so bad on him.

00:08:03
Speaker 1: That's so fun. Yeah, I mean yeah, meeting people like that you probably made his day too. He was probably stoked.

00:08:11
Speaker 4: I just I still honestly feel like that first of all, like meeting those heroes, like, it's never lost on me.

00:08:20
Speaker 1: Yeah, I never go it doesn't seem like it is.

00:08:23
Speaker 4: Yeah, it doesn't feel like that at all. It's that first moment of feeling like, oh my god, that person's real. This is like three D this is actually happening right now. Yes, But then over time you start to realize like, oh, it's kind of just like this community of people that like to play music.

00:08:41
Speaker 1: Yeah, it is, like it's it.

00:08:44
Speaker 4: Can be as simple as that. Or you can flip out and you know, meet one of your big heroes and lose your mind. But I do that, you know, there's there are also times where I get more nervous to meet people who are relatively unknown, like punk rock heroes.

00:08:59
Speaker 1: Yeah.

00:09:00
Speaker 4: Then there was once when we played a Music Cares thing and we were doing a song for Neil Diamond. I didn't grow up listening to Neil Diamond. I did it for this friend of mine who passed away. His mom was a huge Neil Diamond fan, so I flew her out from Virginia because I thought, oh shit, if we do this, she'll get to meet Neil Diamond. This will be huge after losing her son, Like, this will be huge. But I never listened to Neil Diamond, so when I met him, it was just like, oh yeah, he's like this cool dude. Like I didn't freak out at all. But then, like the first time I met the singer of like the Jesus Lizard or The Dead Kennedy's, I'm just like, you know, he completely lose my mind.

00:09:39
Speaker 1: When I met you, I felt really like a stone, Like I don't know what your memory of it is. But when I came in to sing Virginia Moon, yeah, I was like so excited to meet you, but I don't know how to show it sometimes and it gets inward and then I like, I'm a stone. There's something I do that's weird like that because I grew up air drumming to you.

00:10:07
Speaker 4: Oh really, yes, oh shit.

00:10:09
Speaker 1: I have this vivid memory of listening to never Mind in my aunt and uncle's bedroom spare room and just like air drumming the shit out of it.

00:10:22
Speaker 4: Are you a drummer?

00:10:23
Speaker 1: I'm I'm a drummer on the inside waiting to come out.

00:10:27
Speaker 4: What are you waiting for?

00:10:30
Speaker 1: No, but I would just like go nuts, and I don't know. So I was excited to meet you.

00:10:34
Speaker 4: Wow, that's so weird. But I was nervous to meet you because you're an actual musician and there's not too many of those around here.

00:10:42
Speaker 2: Yeah.

00:10:42
Speaker 4: Well, in our world, it's just a bunch of people that like, I feel.

00:10:45
Speaker 6: Like we all are though.

00:10:47
Speaker 1: I mean, you know, actual musicians, We're all actual musicians.

00:10:52
Speaker 4: That makes me feel so much.

00:10:54
Speaker 1: You're an actual musician. I'm an actual musician.

00:10:56
Speaker 4: You are an actual musician.

00:10:58
Speaker 1: Sometimes I don't feel like it's doing this. I'm like, what the fuck am I doing? How do I play this song?

00:11:03
Speaker 4: Really?

00:11:03
Speaker 1: And usually when I get in the room with the person and then we're doing it together, it's like, oh, yeah, I do know how to do this, but I don't know. Sometimes it's like you go in a room with someone and you overthink the moment, and then the moment is just an easy moment, and then if you overthink it, it becomes difficult.

00:11:23
Speaker 4: Well, there's also like, I'm sure at this point you feel like with your voice, your voice sounds so beautiful and so natural, that I can't imagine you have to think much about singing, and that's kind of the way I am with drums. Yeah, Like I don't really have to think about what I'm going to do next. And there's sort of this and not that I'm the best term in the world, but it's like there's this, yeah, you're coming out there, there's this there's this disconnect from like or maybe it's a connection from my head to my hands. Yeah, and my body will just do the thing that fits with the music, you know. So whenever I sit down and play the drums, it's like I feel totally at home. I feel totally comfortable and just like good, okay, well this is like it's relaxing to me, even if it's like beating the fucking shit out of the drums. To me, it makes me feel really really happy because I just get to let loose and not think about stuff.

00:12:32
Speaker 1: That's the best.

00:12:33
Speaker 4: It's the best, whereas everything else I do, Like in the Food Fighters.

00:12:38
Speaker 1: You've made it hard on yourself totally.

00:12:41
Speaker 4: I mean, I honestly think like after Nirvana ended, I had the opportunity to go keep playing the drums for other people, but I kind of knew that I could do it, and then there was this other weird thing that I had just experimented within the studio where I was playing guitar and I was singing and stuff. I was unsure if I could do that, and that was really a big part, like, Okay, I did that. I know I can do that, so I'm gonna try doing this other thing. And the intention really was like basically just to keep playing music, but also to do something that I didn't really know that I could do it, and that was sort of the excitement of doing it.

00:13:28
Speaker 1: I think the challenge is exciting, right without questions, and then once you do it, it's like.

00:13:35
Speaker 4: Yes, yeah, like if you really nail something, yeah. I was explaining this to someone recently that we were talking about my daughter Violet, who has this fucking beautiful voice. She's amazing. She's got this great voice, and she's just like intrinsically musical and can figure out instruments really quickly, and she's got amazing pitch and this really soulful voice and she has it. She's the real deal. And she sings with this confidence which is kind of beyond her years. It's almost like she's been doing it her whole life, which she has. But when she gets out to play live, and someone said, god, she's so confident. Does she get nervous? I'm like, oh, absolutely, But we were talking about those like thirty steps from the side of the stage to the microphone, and the courage that it takes just to go from here to there and then go do it. That that those thirty steps, that's ninety nine percent of it, just to like run out there and have the courage to bury your soul to a bunch of people or you know, yeah, what she does. She's such a sensitive, beautiful, brilliant person. But like most arted, she has this real vulnerability for her to like just stand out there and do it, and then to do it the way she does.

00:15:17
Speaker 1: It is like wow, yeah, it's the thing. She's got a beautiful voice.

00:15:23
Speaker 4: She got a great voice.

00:15:26
Speaker 1: Okay, you want to try, you want to try statues? Yeah, me see, does this is you on piano on the recording?

00:15:32
Speaker 4: It is, Oh my god, this is so dumb.

00:15:34
Speaker 1: It sounds great.

00:15:35
Speaker 4: Okay, So this is a long time ago. This is I don't know, fifteen years ago or something. Fourteen years ago. My birthday was coming up and my dream car was like an old Dodge hemy I think the car from Blue Velvet. I can't remember if it's a Challenger, but like a really badass, like seventies, like muscle car. And I've been talking about it a lot with my wife, kind of hinting but not obnoxiously. And my birthday was coming up and she's like, she's like, wait, do you see what I got your career birthday? And I'm like okay. She goes, you need to be here on Tuesday. It's arriving, and I'm like, she called me the fucking car. I was so fucking psyched. And we have this long driveway that comes up to the house and she's like, okay, it's here, and we were standing at the front door. I'm like, I'm like, I'm going to hear a muscle car coming up the driveway. It's gonna be fucking amazing. And I'm say there waiting, waiting, and all of a sudden, I look and there's two guys pushing a fucking piano up my driveway. I'd never played piano before, never, no ever, and I was like, oh, thank you. And so so eventually I started sitting down at it and just figuring it out, and you know, it was really cool because having done this my whole life, this is guitar's my first instrument, and having done that, just like having this new like template or palette and the notes are kind of funny play and in your hands are doing these weird things. It was really like I felt like a kid. I felt like I was just starting over with this thing. And I started writing a bunch of piano songs and yeah, this is maybe like sixteen years ago, and this is one of the songs. And one of the things that I loved about about the piano was that it kind of opened up my love of AM Gold radio like in the seventies. That's the shit I grew up on, like Jerry Rafferty and Andrew Gold and Phoebe Snow and Helen Ready and Carly Simon, shit like that. That's the kind of stuff I listened to when I was a little kid, try around in the car with my mom. So I still have this love of kind of really gentle, melancholy, pretty melody and harmony. And the guitar line in this is totally Baker Street by Jerry Rafferty.

00:18:17
Speaker 5: Okay, it's exactly what yes, I could see if I really remember it.

00:18:41
Speaker 4: I'm totally just trying to remember it, Okay.

00:18:52
Speaker 1: I think that's cool though, because I think when I started playing guitar, I wrote a bunch of songs that were totally different from anything I would have ever written on the piano, because I was limited to certain chords that were just different than what I would normally play. And I think that's the best.

00:19:07
Speaker 4: Well also, and I'll explain it and maybe some of the other songs that we do. I really only took a couple of guitar lessons when I was young, and then I just started to kind of figure it out. But I kind of look at the guitar as a drum set in a weird way. So a lot of the stuff that I do is sort of percussive, and they're all kind of syncopated drum patterns, like a song like ever Long, like that dud Dan da, And so I'll use like the lower strings as like kicks and snares, and then I'll use the higher strings as symbols, and so when a chorus comes around, I'll do more like and let those sort of those notes hang out like I was on a symbol but yes, it was cool to figure out songs on the.

00:20:08
Speaker 1: That's cool the way you think about it.

00:20:11
Speaker 4: Okay, let's see wait, I.

00:20:15
Speaker 1: Like you use all these two chords.

00:20:20
Speaker 4: Are used?

00:20:20
Speaker 1: What two chords?

00:20:22
Speaker 4: That is? That?

00:20:27
Speaker 1: What that is? No, I'm not going to it's funny.

00:20:32
Speaker 4: Actually there was once when there was this uh we decided to take Violet, my daughter when she's little, she was like four or five, to to this class called piano play and the there was just these little kids and the first thing they do is they try to teach you sound recognition. And you don't have a flight or something you have to get to. I talk a lot. I can't help it. So I have a book called The Storyteller. It's available on day Street books. Where they sit down. The first thing they do is they do sound recognition, and they're like they teach them the sound of like a saxophone and then the sound of like, you know, a cello and things like that, just to attune their ear to whatever. And I would take her and we'd sit on the floor and it's really fun. They would do this thing with puppets where there was like there was like I think the lion and the mouse and the lion was like the low notes and the mouse like, I know, it's whatever. And then one day she comes in and she puts a white board down like a dry erase board, and she goes, okay, and she drives a circle and she goes, this is a whole note. And I was like, oh my god, I'm gonna learn how to fucking read use it right now.

00:21:54
Speaker 6: You finally was like.

00:21:57
Speaker 1: Hysterical, All right, let's say if we can do this one, two, three for.

00:22:26
Speaker 7: You and I were too old and tortured souls repaired by love, broken things. You're alife, just somebody's growing up, no fear of.

00:22:44
Speaker 8: Benefe.

00:22:47
Speaker 4: We're just stortin airy people. You and me Time will turn us into statue eventually.

00:23:08
Speaker 7: We got by though we never needed much slive of hope, diamond rings.

00:23:19
Speaker 4: We got high.

00:23:20
Speaker 8: It was heaving, it was hell.

00:23:23
Speaker 7: Fly over them broken wings.

00:23:30
Speaker 8: We're just startinary people.

00:23:34
Speaker 9: You and me.

00:23:41
Speaker 7: Tom will turn us in the statues eventually.

00:23:51
Speaker 2: Just your ordinary people.

00:23:55
Speaker 9: U me.

00:24:02
Speaker 8: Sam will turn some of the statues the acally.

00:24:12
Speaker 7: Uplowne storeever and so line humans.

00:24:19
Speaker 1: So Lie.

00:24:23
Speaker 7: Judas says, everything must fade away.

00:24:30
Speaker 4: Time.

00:24:55
Speaker 8: We're just ordinary people.

00:24:59
Speaker 5: Use me.

00:25:05
Speaker 8: Samuel the statues.

00:25:09
Speaker 7: Eventually, it's sortinmy people, you and me, Samuel turnis in the statues eventually.

00:25:35
Speaker 4: Oh that's nice. Wow, I haven't done that. I got choked up while I was saying.

00:25:42
Speaker 1: That it's a heavy song. It's really really beautiful. That was so pretty. Holy moly, thanks for letting me playing piano. You should play it?

00:25:53
Speaker 4: Do you fucking kidding me? There's no way I would have been able to pull that off. I don't even know the chords.

00:26:02
Speaker 1: Well, there's a C size and then there's A that's the best one. It's like a B flat. But it's got all these extensions, got like a major seven and a nine. You know. I noticed learning these. It's like it's like numbers to say, what what note? You're playing? Cow It's pretty because you do a lot of those you Oh.

00:26:26
Speaker 4: My god, I'm gonna learn how to read music right now.

00:26:29
Speaker 1: You do a lot of like major seven chords in these songs.

00:26:33
Speaker 4: I'll say, play a major seven? Wait? What was that? It's the A?

00:26:44
Speaker 9: Yeah?

00:26:46
Speaker 4: Is that it?

00:26:47
Speaker 1: Yeah?

00:26:49
Speaker 4: I mean it's funny because I literally don't know the names. I know, like the Cowboy chords, but I don't know which is kind of awesome because I don't ever know, like if something's right or wrong. Like I don't have any version of right or wrong.

00:27:05
Speaker 1: It's like there's no there is no right or wrong.

00:27:08
Speaker 4: Well yeah, but sometimes, like I would never encourage someone to not take lessons because I think it's great to like you know your hands and the thing where you're going or whatever. But I do like the mystery of really not knowing. Uh, you know, when I was writing the I can't not play Virginia Moon, I totally forgot it.

00:27:30
Speaker 1: But yeah, I know, we gotta do it. I mean, that's it's like a jazz song.

00:27:40
Speaker 4: Wa. Shit, what are those chords?

00:27:54
Speaker 1: I don't know, Honestly, I had a hard time figuring them out right, But I feel like you're going chromatic? Is that how you wrote it? You just kind of went chromatic and then use your ears. But that's the way you.

00:28:12
Speaker 4: Have to do it, right, Okay, Well let's move on before we get to that, because who knows that's okay anyway, So.

00:28:22
Speaker 1: So music music's read, I want to ask you.

00:28:28
Speaker 4: I was.

00:28:28
Speaker 1: I was at the Gordon show yesterday and I got to meet like Billie Eilish for a second, and I was stone cold, sober, like nothing. I'm a fan like, I love her. I think she's amazing, and I I just said the stupidest thing. You know, Like when you get to meet somebody that you like and you want to you want them to think you're cool, but you also want them to know that you think they're cool.

00:28:55
Speaker 4: And what do you think? I've been doing this whole time?

00:28:58
Speaker 1: So this is my question for you. How do you do what you do? I feel like everybody, as I've learned, everybody is just awkward and nervous all the time. I used to think it was just me, but it's everybody. But you don't seem like that. Oh do you still have that stuff inside? Because you just seem like one of the.

00:29:14
Speaker 4: Least I'm a mass you seem.

00:29:15
Speaker 1: The least like that of everyone I've ever met.

00:29:18
Speaker 4: Well, I think maybe I definitely get nervous when I meet people that I really admire or people that I've wanted to meet. But no, you know, I think that it might be that both of my parents were very social. Yeah, okay, so my dad working on Capitol Hill or working in politics, it's like he dealt with people right, and he could work a room like he could hang with the jazz musicians and talk jazz. He was a classic the trained flatus and a super jazz nerd Okay, he could hang with the jazz musicians or like Alan Ginsburg and then go like party with Bob Dole or whatever. Like he could really exactly, so he could do that. And my mother is a public school teacher. You know, both of them also were like in communications. I know that sounds so nerdy, but you know, my father was really good at public speaking. He could write speeches, He wrote speeches, and he was like a pr guy. And then my mother she taught public speaking and she dealt with fucking teenagers, you know, Like it's one of the reasons why I think I had such a great childhood. I really did, because, you know, being raised by a public school teacher, it's like she understood the mind of a child in in all of its phases and could really like sympathize or empathize or whatever it is. Like the shit I was going through as a teenager as like a rebellious punk rocker, It's like she dealt with that bullshit all day long. But I was her kids, so like, you know, there was real love but I don't know. I mean I always think, like imagine you imagine a backstage like you're hosting your friends at a barbecue or something, and you know, I like to make sure everyone's got a drink and everyone's happy. But then also when you go out in front of a bunch of people to play music, I used to get I used to get really fucking nervous, like nervous nervous. I had an anxiety attack once on stage at a Nirvana gig, and this set off like a good ten years of anxiety before every show. Really where it was before the record Nevermind came out and we were opening or no, maybe it was our own show. I can't remember. It might have been opening for Dinosaur Junior. But it was at the Warfield and the curtain was closed and we were we were gonna. We were opening the set with the song Polly, which is just Kurt on guitar and me just sitting there singing backups and then like hitting one symbol. So no way to like exercise any weird nerves or anxiety.

00:32:17
Speaker 1: It's like your hands are tied down a little bit.

00:32:19
Speaker 4: It's terrible, and so you're like strapped into this ride. It's not moving. And so the stage hand guy, who was probably like wired on blow or whatever, he kept coming over like two minutes are you ready? Two minutes away. I'm like, no, I'm totally fine. I've never been nervous before in my life. And then he's like.

00:32:36
Speaker 8: One minute, you got one minute?

00:32:38
Speaker 4: Oh my god, and I'm just like, okay, Jesus fun Christ. And I wanted to make sure that my kick drum was in place. I go bosh and hit it and the PA was on. It was boom and the audience goes wow. Right as the curtains open and the war field it's like it's it's like a wall of people, you know, it's really tall with a balcony. And I was just like and I started having this, I almost whoa God. It was terrible at every show from then on, I was fucking terrified every show for ten food fighters.

00:33:10
Speaker 1: What festivals, that's crazy. It just set it off, dude.

00:33:14
Speaker 4: I couldn't get I couldn't get rid of it. It was terrible. And then I don't remember why I changed. But now when I walk out on stage, it's like I see people that I've seen for like thirty years almost, and like that the kid in the front row who was always in the front row is now an adult with a mustache and his kid is on his shoulders.

00:33:43
Speaker 1: You remember these people in the front I.

00:33:46
Speaker 4: Remember faces, like I swear, you know. But that's the thing, because I also like engage with the audience, and I like to say, like, hey, what's up. We're here, you know, high let's go for the next three hours or whatever. But to be able to like really to feel comfortable in that sort of connection or communication where you're just like you can really see the people in the nosebleeds. Yeah, and I got way off track with that fucking question, but but no.

00:34:11
Speaker 1: It relates to everything. I mean, it's interesting because you know, you seem so good at being around people. Is basically the question I do.

00:34:22
Speaker 4: But I also like getting stuck in traffic something, you.

00:34:25
Speaker 1: Like getting stuck in track myself so that you can like look at people next to you.

00:34:29
Speaker 4: And I'm like here in my car. Now that is that? Yeah, Like I just get to go, like.

00:34:37
Speaker 1: Because you are you exhausted yourself so tired? No, But like, yeah, I mean it's hard to be alone. I mean you also have a big family. You have, yes, a big band, and it's really rare to be alone, right, well.

00:34:55
Speaker 4: This is one of the reasons. But like I'll wake up before the sun, Like I wake up at fucking or thirty or five in the morning. Oh wow, just so I get a good two hours of.

00:35:03
Speaker 1: Like quiet and then it's like wow.

00:35:06
Speaker 4: Yeah, but no, I mean, you know, I also love I like to meet people.

00:35:11
Speaker 1: Yeah, well it is fucking.

00:35:14
Speaker 4: You get to meet so many people doing this thing where it's like I really do like meeting people and talking with them, and it's great. You know, in Virginia, growing up in people talk to each other in.

00:35:26
Speaker 1: Virginia, That's true. It's a different thing.

00:35:29
Speaker 4: You kind of like you're at like you're at the subway sandwich place or whatever, and you wind up having a conversation for like seven minutes. Maybe this is why I talk too much.

00:35:38
Speaker 1: I don't know, I talk a lot sometimes. Like if somebody asked me directions in New York City, I'll go above and beyond and they're like walking away, like okay, dude, I'm I'm sorry I asked, you know, like no, but you got to go left. But then there's that store, Oh and there's a coffee shop. I'll talk to strangers like that. But I won't, you know, I don't know how to talk to people that I'm meeting always.

00:36:03
Speaker 4: Hey, I want to play drums.

00:36:04
Speaker 1: I want you to play drums so bad. It's my favorite thing in my mind. I wanted. I was like, I just want him to play drums on something and maybe everything. Do you want to do this song? I'm so stoked you wanted to do this song because this is a good this is a good drummer song.

00:36:30
Speaker 10: M you are Jesus my twin can flames doing me game. I can't be fire, my twining flames.

00:37:04
Speaker 2: Let me from the grind.

00:37:16
Speaker 1: You hid the harder.

00:37:18
Speaker 10: I'm the speak of my twin.

00:37:21
Speaker 1: I'm in flames, moding.

00:37:25
Speaker 2: I have a names. You call me by my twin.

00:37:30
Speaker 1: I'm on fire, come putting me out.

00:37:52
Speaker 2: Sky's my witness, the child to be stock from my twim on fire. Don't say beg you for simple you go my swear haven't plan.

00:38:08
Speaker 1: We want to my pockets already your hearty stripped.

00:38:35
Speaker 2: Back my tween in frankly nave and the.

00:38:50
Speaker 10: Catsy pasketball also and swear in flame.

00:38:56
Speaker 2: Im sorry, how circle use as plain as gam I love him. I should let him be.

00:39:29
Speaker 10: You are the learner, I'm the chaser, my twenty flames.

00:39:35
Speaker 2: Do we meet again?

00:40:05
Speaker 8: Yes?

00:40:16
Speaker 1: Oh you just made my heart saying give me in bloom. Oh my god, I just died. I just died inside my sixth grade self just died. That's the best way to end that song ever. That was great. Thanks for that. Now I need a cigarette.

00:41:49
Speaker 4: When did you start singing?

00:41:52
Speaker 1: It's like church choir age five? Yeah, but I always sang. I think, yeah, I think singing is just.

00:41:59
Speaker 4: A natural writing.

00:42:00
Speaker 6: Oh well, like when I was.

00:42:01
Speaker 1: Twenty now, yeah, I wrote a song in high school. I was in this like synth I went to a performing arts high school. It was pretty great and we had this like synthesis group synth ensemble.

00:42:14
Speaker 4: Wow, I know nerd alert.

00:42:17
Speaker 1: Actually it was incredible. It was incredible. There are these three seniors that were my idols and it was awesome. But the guy had, the teacher, Ken Ellingson, had us write a song and we all like played, you know, somebody would take the moog base and some all these guys played drums too. They grew up in the church playing everything. Wow, and my song, Like, I was so scared, you know, I had never written a song before. So I wrote this like my teacher hit the time had just told me how to like outline chords on the piano.

00:42:53
Speaker 5: It was like.

00:42:56
Speaker 4: It was very like smooth, sort of right out of the gate.

00:43:00
Speaker 6: Oh no, no, I mean it was not.

00:43:03
Speaker 1: I don't know. And then the teacher had us put all these synth strings on it. He's like, yeah, let's build it up, like the production will be like super Yanni, and that just deflated everything for me. I was like, I came home crying. I didn't think Yanni was cool then.

00:43:20
Speaker 2: Now I kind of kind of into it.

00:43:22
Speaker 1: Kna Beannest's incredible, but like at the time, that was not what I was going for. And so I came home crying. Mommy, he said I sounded like Yanni, and then I clammed up after that, and I didn't write another song until I moved to New York, and I you know, I was playing jazz gigs and singing all these songs that were eighty years old, and then I went to this songwriter club and got hooked up with all these songwriters. I picked up a guitar and I learned four chords, and I wrote like come Away with Me.

00:43:52
Speaker 4: Amazing and it's kind of a country song, you.

00:43:54
Speaker 1: Know, And it was it was that simplified thing where it's just like, Okay, now I'm inspired.

00:43:58
Speaker 4: You know. That's kind of this when I was a kid. So I took the couple of guitar lessons and then it was like Mary had a little lambshit. And then my mother bought me the complete Beatles anthology that just had the chord charts right and the silvertone guitar with the amp in the case, and I had the Beatles record. So I would just sit around and look at the chords and play along with the record, look at the chords, and that's basically how I learned to play guitar, but also the idea of composition, arrangement and harmony and you know, melody and whatever. But you know, and then I was listening to Rush and things like that and starting to get interested in the drums. But I didn't have a drum set. So I had this weird like Captain's bid. It was like this bed that had like drawers under it or whatever, and I would put on records my mother would bring home. We didn't have a record player, so my mother would bring home those public school record players. Yeah, like you take the lid off and it like as a tiny speaker, and I would listen to records on that and I would set up. I had this chair that I would use as a high hat, and then I put a pillow between my legs as a snare, and then my bed would be the toms and the cymbals and stuff, and I would yeah, that's how I learned how to play really crash, and then I would I would do that all day long, and.

00:45:36
Speaker 1: It didn't bother anybody, no, because it was only quiet, like my.

00:45:39
Speaker 4: Mom's so lucky.

00:45:40
Speaker 1: Totally.

00:45:41
Speaker 4: I didn't have a normal drum set. My room was so tiny too, but I didn't. I didn't learn to play on a drum set. So but I was, you know, listening to rock songs and trying to figure out like guitar leads, but I wasn't really good, and like listening to Zeppelin, and but I wasn't any good. And then I saw a punk rock band. The first time I ever saw a band on stage was a punk rock band in Chicago, and they were called Naked Ragun and they had it was at this tiny little bar. There were maybe forty fifty people there. But they had four dudes in the band. There was a bass player, guitar player, singer, and drummer, and they, like, you know, they were an amazing band. But it was so simple and that's what inspired me the most, where I was just like, yeah, that song is three chords.

00:46:33
Speaker 1: It doesn't have to be Oh my god, you started playing trying to play rush.

00:46:38
Speaker 5: I know, I was like.

00:46:41
Speaker 9: This.

00:46:44
Speaker 4: I was like, oh my god, I could do that. We could totally do that.

00:46:46
Speaker 1: Totally. That makes sense. You start simple and just do it.

00:46:50
Speaker 6: That's the best.

00:46:51
Speaker 4: Yeah, And I think for kids too, it's important to to recognize the the simplicity and the relatability and that it's attainable. You know, Like it's one of the things when you see stuff on TV where you know, you're seeing these seeing these singers with these like amazing voices, these really soulful, established like voices, and then like this huge production and you kind of forget that it's really as simple as like your dad's old guitar that's in the garage he hasn't touched in twenty years, Like, yeah, pick it up and just start doing stuff and don't be you know, don't be worried about sounding like that or something else, just like just kind of suck, you know, and then keep sucking and then like get better and then have your friends come over.

00:47:50
Speaker 1: Like I do.

00:47:51
Speaker 4: Also think that it's important for for when you're young to play with people that you can relate to that your age, your little try, you find your weird friends said, you start doing weird shit, and before you know it, you know you have a band.

00:48:08
Speaker 1: So it's like the thrillingest thing, the most thrilling thing.

00:48:11
Speaker 4: Yeah.

00:48:12
Speaker 1: Also, I think when kids or or even adults even me now, like taking a pottery glass. You know, when you do something simple and you succeed at it, it makes you want to keep doing it. And when you do something hard and you suck at it, you don't want you put it down. Like me, it's me at the wheel. Basically, I put that ship down and I make masks instead, you know, weird creepy masks.

00:48:35
Speaker 4: You make creepy masks I do. Really Yeah? Cool?

00:48:40
Speaker 11: Is it?

00:48:44
Speaker 4: So?

00:48:45
Speaker 1: The new album? You just announced it this week and I'm very very excited, and I loved the songs I've heard because you sent me a couple and there really really great. They're beautiful and I love that one that your daughter Violet sings on.

00:49:07
Speaker 4: Oh she's show me how Yeah. Wow.

00:49:11
Speaker 1: She does have a super haunting voice, which is she.

00:49:16
Speaker 4: Has an amazing voice. And the cool thing we've recorded some things together. She has amazing taste of music, by the way, like she I mean, she's she's just as much about Joni Mitchell as she is like the Misfits or the Garden or that's cool young punk rock shit or like crazy Electronica or Billie Holiday. And you know, she goes deepest stuff. So when she sings, she really sings with this beautiful with soul, you know. But one of her favorite punk rock bands is the band X, which she loves some much. And years ago we recorded an X song together, the song called Nausea, and and we did a duet and it was really cool because she when we sing together, we totally lock in together, like we're so I mean, I taught her how to talk, so it's a real thing. It was really amazing. But yeah, that that song in particular, I mean, the new record is really heavy. There's a lot of emotional stuff on it. And so my mother passed away last year. I know, God, it was hard. Sorry, But while I was with her, towards the end, I was saying I would just sit and play guitar for her every day, all day long, and I came up. I came up with this melody and it was really pretty. And I remember at one point I'd been working on it for a while and I said to her. I was like, hey, I've got this thing I've been working on. What do you think She kind of went yeah. But that's why I turned it into the song show Me How, which is basically about my mother and her passing and Violet. I thought it would be very cool because in the song, you know, I'm basically saying like, don't worry, I'll take care of everything, and towards the end of the song, you have my daughter singing this same thing. So it's kind of this cycle of life trip.

00:52:06
Speaker 1: It's terrible, it's beautiful.

00:52:08
Speaker 4: It's really beautiful. It is the most beautiful song on the entire record.

00:52:12
Speaker 1: It's so beautiful in the way she sings the melody. Yeah, yeah, it's really special, and I mean, yeah, it's heavy, but that's that's life. That's the ship that everybody you know deals with, and it's so you know, it's so raw and and I think people people feel the same, you know.

00:52:35
Speaker 4: I know, I wish i'd remembered it.

00:52:39
Speaker 8: Oh.

00:52:40
Speaker 4: I know one thing that's kind of cool that I was thinking could be sort of net. I was talking about like how I played the guitar like the drums. So at some point I started getting really into this sort of like fingerpicky pull off sort of thing, and and just messing around with with patterns of just like things that I guess sound kind of like I don't know, blue grassy or country, I don't even know it's called.

00:53:14
Speaker 5: But like.

00:53:19
Speaker 4: There was once where there was once years ago where someone from my record company called and they said, they said, have you heard about this mine collapse in Australia place called Beaconsfield. They're like, there's there's this mine collapse and there were two miners I think there were three, and maybe one didn't make it, but there were two miners that were stuck in this mine shaft for days, and so the rescuer was drilled down, I guess, next to the mine shaft and contacted them. Two of them are still alive, and they asked them if they needed an thing before they could like get them out of there and they said they wanted water and an iPod with Foo Fighters music on it.

00:54:08
Speaker 1: Oh my god.

00:54:08
Speaker 4: And so the people for our record companies like, are you aware of what's going on? We said no, and so they told me, and so I sent them a message like, hey, fellas, I hope you're doing okay. We're all thinking about you. And when you come out like, beer's on me, like let's go, let's do this. So so the next time we went down to Australia, we were actually doing a show at the Sydney Opera House. We were doing this acoustic thing and I heard that Brent Webb was his name, one of the miners. He was going to come to the show. And so the night before I thought I would write him a song and perform this song just for him at the Sydney Opera House thing.

00:54:48
Speaker 1: Wow.

00:54:48
Speaker 4: And I sat in bed and I kind of did that thing where it was like sort of like a drum riff thing. I called it the Ballad of the Beacon Sealed Miners.

00:57:25
Speaker 1: Oh my god, that's awesome.

00:57:28
Speaker 4: It was pretty cool. And then afterwards we had beers that must have been incredible at the hotel and he was like, we were about to make the same record that Virginia Moon is. Is it on that one? And he said, he guess where you can put it on the record, right, And I'm like, yeah, totally, totally forgot about it, never thought of it until the last day of recording the record. I'm like, oh fuck, I promised that minor dude, So is.

00:57:57
Speaker 1: It on the record?

00:57:58
Speaker 4: Yeah? Yeah, it's not the ballad the beacons Field Manners.

00:58:01
Speaker 1: I love it. And you said Razor was hard, that looks much harder or is a weird one? Razor is hard, though, but that looks harder to me as a layman.

00:58:11
Speaker 4: It's sort of the same idea. I wrote it too. I wrote it for a gig. Really, there's a benefit gig here in Los Angeles and it was acoustic and I had to go up. I'm like, oh god, am I going to do the same shit over and over again. I thought, you know, write something.

00:58:31
Speaker 1: Cool that's always fun when it happens. Yeah. Yeah, it's a great song because it's kind of it's kind of indiany.

00:58:41
Speaker 4: Yeah, you mentioned that.

00:58:43
Speaker 1: It really is, and I don't know if it was in my head because you sent me that story about going to the George Fest and seeing my dad and my sister and stuff. But something about it just it's very drony and well you've met like the Sharp four.

00:58:58
Speaker 4: What it's that? There's this you know as a kid listening to a lot of Beatles and a lot of Zeppelin, you know, both of them really sort of did blend Eastern influence into a lot of their music, you know, yea, whether it's you know, Zeppelin and Jimmy Page and John Paul Jones. You know, John Paul Jones is really like such an unsung hero. I got to play in that Bandam Crooked Vultures with them, and I never for one second eased into the idea that John Paul Jones is a normal human being. I never, not once whenever we jammed, where we hung out. He's just such a phenomenal musician and such a huge part of Led Zeppelin. I really think that he's instrumental in making John Bonham sound even bigger, which is kind of this It's hard to imagine, but the way that John Paul Jones glues to and enhances the groove of whoever he's playing with, Oh my god. Also, did you ever hear that Diamanda Gallas record. Do you know about her? Oh? My God, wicked, crazy, amazing sort of goth legend who made a record called The Sporting Life with John Paul Jones playing bass, Pete Thomas from The Attractions playing drums, and her singing I have to play it for you. You'll lose your mind. It's one of the coolest things in the world. But it also has sort of that sort of influence. God, this is gonna be hard.

01:00:44
Speaker 6: We don't have to do it.

01:00:46
Speaker 4: I tried it this morning.

01:00:48
Speaker 1: It's just a good song. Okay, figure, can I sing some harmonies on it?

01:00:53
Speaker 4: Could you go do whatever you want to do. It's seriously been so long. This is gonna be so good. I haven't done this in a really long time. I'm sweating. I'm sweating.

01:01:07
Speaker 1: I've been sweating all day.

01:01:08
Speaker 4: What are you talking about? All right? Ray, wait, it's time. We need to find a bed place to hide.

01:01:50
Speaker 9: Me.

01:01:53
Speaker 2: You're mine.

01:01:57
Speaker 4: I need to know, I need need to know ton.

01:02:05
Speaker 2: Sweet did Ray, Oh my sweet did RAI bay shine.

01:02:45
Speaker 4: He shows, my dear.

01:02:53
Speaker 2: We could spend a lot of time with here by mane.

01:03:04
Speaker 4: This time, hope I get the chance to say goodbye.

01:03:17
Speaker 6: Sweet.

01:03:20
Speaker 2: Divine Raier.

01:03:28
Speaker 5: Oh my.

01:03:33
Speaker 2: Sweet Divine.

01:03:41
Speaker 8: Raiser read shine.

01:03:49
Speaker 2: Day after day, cold wait to.

01:04:11
Speaker 8: Waiting me, wait.

01:04:27
Speaker 4: Wait God, it's time. We need to find that a place to hide. Way God, you're mind.

01:04:51
Speaker 2: I need to know. I need to know to know, Sweet Javon Raise, Sweet.

01:05:23
Speaker 5: Ra ra Sh.

01:05:49
Speaker 2: Wow isn't it pretty?

01:05:56
Speaker 4: Wow? I haven't done that in twenty years? Really, yeah, we did a bunch we did. It was for that, for that record.

01:06:04
Speaker 2: Actually, we.

01:06:06
Speaker 4: Went on tour where we like played a bunch of rock shows and then we did this acoustic tour thing.

01:06:10
Speaker 1: Yeah, because wasn't it a double Was it a double album?

01:06:14
Speaker 4: It was a double album. I remember we made a double album and someone from the record company came to listen to it, and the first thing they said was I think maybe before we even hearing it, They're like, so, why did you make a double work? Don't you love that? I don't know. No, that was really that was really fun to be able to do that. I honestly think that the acoustic side of that album was better than the rock side.

01:06:43
Speaker 1: Well, it seems like you wanted maybe you wanted to make an acoustic album, but you didn't feel like you couldn't rock was that and maybe that's what it was. That's the hindsight thing. Probably.

01:06:53
Speaker 4: Yeah, we don't know what we're doing ever. Like it's like never I remember on the rock record the song best of You is on that record, and we recorded it and we're like, you know what, that sucks not that And we played it for John Silva, our manager, Yes, And then a long time later he was like, we played them a bunch of other stuff and he's like, what about that song that says best of you one hundred times? I was like, Yeah, what happened to that? I Oh, it's kind of cool.

01:07:30
Speaker 1: That's funny how your perceptions of things.

01:07:33
Speaker 4: Don't you do the same thing.

01:07:35
Speaker 1: I mean, I don't have hits in the same way.

01:07:37
Speaker 9: That you do.

01:07:38
Speaker 4: Yeah, But you know, when a song is a good song, I think I do.

01:07:42
Speaker 1: But then sometimes I'll do stuff that I don't think is good, and then I feel like I get fed by If other people end up it's one of their favorites. I get fed by that and my brain thinks it's good. Then.

01:07:55
Speaker 4: Yeah, is that a needy part of me?

01:07:58
Speaker 1: Maybe?

01:07:59
Speaker 8: Well?

01:08:01
Speaker 4: I mean I think maybe as a performer, you want people to appreciate what you do. Yeah, it's maybe not first priority if you're a musician or but if you're performing, it's nice to play songs that people enjoy hearing.

01:08:20
Speaker 1: They have fun come back exactly.

01:08:25
Speaker 4: Rather than just go I get it. Like, you know, there have been times where we'll record things that are you know, very like inward or sort of self indulgent, and you know, things that might please us greatly but won't necessarily translate to when we go out. Like I really love going out and playing songs that if it's a song they don't know, it has to be fucking amazing.

01:08:54
Speaker 1: Yeah, I've learned that you can't just be Yeah, I mean, yeah, it's more fun.

01:09:02
Speaker 4: Oh you know what we were talking about the new record? Then okay, so so I mean Rescued is so screamy. Yeah, you don't want me fucking screaming rescue that you you can. You can come over next door and hear us rehearse it in the You can.

01:09:17
Speaker 1: Do whatever you want. But I love Rescued and I could hear I could hear you doing it, you know, kind of the way you do times like these. You know, I've heard you do it in so many different incarnations. Yeah, And then I went back to the record version. I was like, oh, yeah, it's like crazy, crazy different each time.

01:09:38
Speaker 4: Well, you know it's crazy. It's this guitar that I've basically written all of our music for the last thirty years on this really yes, what is it? I don't know. It's an old Gibson. It's a Gibson country Western model. I know nothing about gear, drums or guitar. But yeah, pretty much everything from the first record to the Learned Flies and the Everlongs and all of that stuff was this thing. And that's what happens is I'll write a song and I'll come up with a melody before the lyrics or anything, and I'll sit on the I'll sit on the couch and I'll be like, I'll be like looking at the dancer and I'll like singing it sort of falsetto, and they'll get in the studio be like and it just doesn't sound the same at all. And then I realized, like, oh shit, I had to scream.

01:10:43
Speaker 1: That yeah, like I don't sit around the house otherwise it sounds too like yeah.

01:10:48
Speaker 4: And then the first time, the first time I sing any of our songs is always in front of the.

01:10:54
Speaker 1: Mic to record you don't play it for them before, I'll.

01:10:58
Speaker 4: Play them sort of demo, And even in the demos, I'm like, I save it for the moment, and then in that moment, I'm like, oh fuck, God, damn, I have to scream on this and then to fucking sing that scream out every night.

01:11:20
Speaker 1: That's a lot.

01:11:22
Speaker 4: You're up for it. I'm up for it.

01:11:25
Speaker 5: Job.

01:11:28
Speaker 4: I remember. The reason why we first started doing acoustic versions of our songs was because we went on the Howard Stern Show, Oh Boy, and it was whatever, like seven in the morning, and he's like, hey, bring a guitar. They might want you to play a song. And I don't know if we'd ever done an acoustic song or an acoustic version of a song. And the night before I was in the hotel room and I'm just like, oh my god, what are we gonna? Like, what can we play? At the time, I think we were only on our second record, but that song had I mean that record had like My Hero and Everlong and stuff like that. Then I thought, wow, every Long is probably the easiest to sing at seven in the morning with an acoustic guitar. And we did it, and it kind of opened up this whole new dynamic in this whole new world. For us to try some of our songs on acoustic guitars.

01:12:38
Speaker 1: It felt exciting.

01:12:39
Speaker 4: What's that?

01:12:40
Speaker 1: It felt fun and like exciting.

01:12:42
Speaker 4: Yeah, it was just nice to be we Actually we did it on the radio on his radio show, and then they kept playing it and Silva was like, oh my god, we need to record a version of it. Ah, And then that wound up on the radio and since then, at least once or twice a year, people will come up to me and be like, that was our song at our wedding.

01:13:12
Speaker 1: Acoustic version, acoustic version. Yeah, but that's also I feel like when you strip a song back from whatever it becomes production wise or full band wise, and it still works. I mean, it's just a great song. So it's it's it's if it didn't sound good acoustic, you'd be exposed. But because they're great songs, they work, you know, I know, so lucky you.

01:13:39
Speaker 4: We're going to do everlong right now.

01:13:42
Speaker 1: I don't know as well.

01:13:44
Speaker 4: Nah, we're going to do it. Okay, what's this chord? You know what, let's music kick it out.

01:13:49
Speaker 1: Let's go to music school. It's a D major seven with a major seven okay. Then this is a B minor with the minor seven and a nine.

01:14:06
Speaker 4: Then then backsup to the.

01:14:13
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah it goes okay, I get it. I mean I know the song too, just so used to ask you what the chords are. I need you to know that I do know this.

01:14:22
Speaker 4: This chord one time was this D.

01:14:24
Speaker 1: Major seven okay, B minor seven with a nine, B minor seven nine, it's G two. Omit the three. I'm sorry, but this is I am serious.

01:14:43
Speaker 4: Right, that's right.

01:15:08
Speaker 8: Hello, I've waited here for you.

01:15:15
Speaker 4: If along to remember the first out of the red out of the head, she said, do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do do.

01:15:43
Speaker 8: Come down.

01:15:46
Speaker 4: And waste away with me, Down with me.

01:15:55
Speaker 2: Slow, well.

01:15:58
Speaker 4: You wanted it could to be. It's over my head, out of my head because a bread freak.

01:16:12
Speaker 8: And I wonder.

01:16:17
Speaker 4: When I sing along with you, if everything could ever feel this real, for if anything could ever be this good? Uh, the only thing I'll ever ask of you, got a promise. I'm torturing you.

01:17:01
Speaker 8: Breath out so I can breed you well, old man, And now.

01:17:16
Speaker 4: I know you Bosben, out of your head, out of my head, I sang anytime, and I sing along with you. If everything good ever feel this real? Far well, anything good ever be this good? Up again? The only thing I'll ever ask of you, God, Promise not to stop when I say, she said, it's all right now, and I wonder and I sing along with you, if everything could ever feel this real, voy, if anything could ever be this good? H only thing I'll ever ask of you, God, A promise not to stop when I say when.

01:19:45
Speaker 1: She said, fuck yes, I feel like I'm not wearing any pants.

01:20:01
Speaker 4: That's a lot to ask you to play a song that you've never played before, and you just did it. I loved it me too.

01:20:10
Speaker 1: I was slightly unprepared, but I enjoyed every second.

01:20:14
Speaker 4: Great.

01:20:14
Speaker 1: That's a great one. It also does that drony thing that you do.

01:20:17
Speaker 6: You like you do that a lot.

01:20:19
Speaker 1: I love it. I do the Indian and me loves it.

01:20:24
Speaker 4: What is that?

01:20:25
Speaker 1: I don't know, but I like it and I write songs like that too.

01:20:28
Speaker 4: Sometimes.

01:20:29
Speaker 1: I just like there's something about like the pedal and the drone of it not changing keys, or like almost never going to the five. I know it went to the five chord a couple of times in that bridgy.

01:20:39
Speaker 4: Bit, but.

01:20:41
Speaker 1: There's something circular about it that gets sort of like haunting and under your skin.

01:20:45
Speaker 4: I feel like songs like that, you know, a lot of the droning, whether it comes from two different people. Zeppelin, there's this one song called in the Light off a Physical Graffiti. There's this one like whatever note it is that hangs out over the whole riff and it just lends to this like beautiful, sort of spacey, trippy drone thing. But then there's this punk rock band called Husker Doo who I loved so much when I was young, and the guitar player, singer Bob Mold, the way that he played guitar, he always had these like these notes that would ring out over the riff or chord structure, that just sort of sustained notes. I don't even know what I'm talking about, how would you call them? But it's always cool just to have that weird sort of drawn thing. But then also that whatever that is, what do you call that? Nour is it?

01:21:43
Speaker 2: Bob?

01:21:44
Speaker 1: Yeah?

01:21:47
Speaker 4: So I'm selling the d Yeah, you're playing.

01:21:51
Speaker 1: You and it's got the dissonance. Yeah, yeah, Yeah, I love that.

01:22:00
Speaker 4: I feel like I just went to fucking music school.

01:22:02
Speaker 1: This is the learner episode. I feel like when I came in to sing Virginia Moon, you guys thought I was a nerd that day too.

01:22:12
Speaker 4: I don't know. I don't know if you remember coming in and me showing you the song and you were like, oh, I kind of was hoping we were going to do a rock song.

01:22:20
Speaker 8: Do you remember that?

01:22:21
Speaker 1: Well? I think I said that. I did say that, didn't you You had already sent me the song though, right, didn't I already know?

01:22:29
Speaker 4: No? I feel like you fucking figured it out.

01:22:31
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, because when I got the call to do it, I was so excited and confused why you would call me? Also because you're fucking rock band, you know. And so I get there and it's a Boss and Nova and it's beautiful, and I was like, I thought I was going to get to rock.

01:22:52
Speaker 4: Well, whenever you want to make a rock record, I do. Actually, wait, didn't you have another You had a band? Didn't you were? You were in like a rock band thing, weren't you?

01:23:03
Speaker 1: Yeah? Oh, I had this band called El Madmo and we were kind of kind of it was kind of a rock band.

01:23:08
Speaker 4: Was it back then.

01:23:09
Speaker 1: It was back then, and it was around then actually right after then, and I had started playing guitar. That's how I was. I was learning how to play guitar on that That was pretty fun. But I came in to do Virginia Moon. Did I deflate the moment by saying that, No.

01:23:27
Speaker 4: You just scared me, did I more? Because as if I weren't nervous enough, I felt like that, I'm like, oh great, I'm already disappointing her.

01:23:34
Speaker 1: I'm sorry song. Yet I was so young and confused by everything at that time. I was like, who am I?

01:23:41
Speaker 4: God, damn, that was like twenty years that.

01:23:43
Speaker 1: Was twenty years ago. Oh shit, and I had just become successful and I was just like, what the fuck is happening?

01:23:50
Speaker 4: You know?

01:23:52
Speaker 1: And you had me come in and do this song and I loved it. It was beautiful. I just was so confused because because you're you.

01:24:00
Speaker 4: Full of fucking shit right now?

01:24:01
Speaker 2: No, it was amazing.

01:24:03
Speaker 1: And then and then I loved that song forever. And we've never sang it together after.

01:24:09
Speaker 4: That, No, and we never will because now I know how much you didn't want to do it.

01:24:13
Speaker 1: No, I did want to do it. I just didn't know what I was doing.

01:24:17
Speaker 6: Stop it, are we in a fight?

01:24:19
Speaker 4: It just did question.

01:24:21
Speaker 1: Why did you call me because you thought it would be nice?

01:24:24
Speaker 4: Well, you know, one of the things that we were doing on that record is we were asking people to come guest with us. John Paul Jones is on that That's right, he was, Oh god, John Ball Jones. You Kaki King? Do you remember Kaki King?

01:24:38
Speaker 1: Yeah?

01:24:39
Speaker 4: She played on this song Razor with me. I think either Razor or Beaconsfield Minors. It's actually how we got Ronny, our keyboard player, to join the band. He came and played all over it. Okay, go. I don't remember who else, but yeah, we were having a bunch of people come guest on the record, and I came up with that, and having heard your voice, I'm like, oh my god, this will be beautiful, This'll be perfect.

01:25:04
Speaker 1: I totally agree. It makes sense. Yeah, like I get I got why you called me after I heard the song, But whatever it is, I thought I was going to get to like air drum with you. No, I knew it.

01:25:18
Speaker 4: I know you can air drum, but can you play drums?

01:25:21
Speaker 1: I can play a backbeat, yeah, but I'm not great. I mean I play in this band, put some boots, I play some drums on a few songs. Yeah, I feel too much. I like get too excited, Like I try to do fills because I'm so excited to be behind the drums, and I lose everything.

01:25:38
Speaker 4: The best drum lesson I ever. I only took two drum lessons, one from this crazy jazz drummer in DC.

01:25:45
Speaker 5: My mom.

01:25:46
Speaker 4: His name is Lenny Robinson. He might be in New York now, but my mom used to take me to this jazz club on Sundays outside of Georgetown in DC. It's called One Step Down Fun and and uh they on Sundays, they'd had this jazz workshop where the house band was a dude named Lawrence wheat Lee, and then Lenny played drums and dude named Maurice played sacks. I think I can't remember anyway, but seeing him play the drums and seeing a jazz drummer, it was just like I was so used to punk rock drummers. Yeah, I was like, I need to learn how to do that. And I think I was like fifteen or sixteen. I went up to him, like, excuse me, mister Robinson, do you give lessons? He was like, yeah, sure. It was like thirty bucks an hour for him to come in and tell me, like, you're holding your sticks backwards. I was like what. And so then I was just on a path going like for thirty dollars, I had to mow like six lawns in order to get the money. But then the and then I just kind of learned on the pillows. But then the best lesson I ever got was I joined this local punk rock band in DC called Scream, and they were all older than me. I was eighteen, and they like toured and stuff. They toward Europe and toward America, and that was my dream to like get in the van with a bunch of dudes and play punk rock shows and so but I was such an incredibly busy, hyperactive, over the top drummer, the same, just throwing stuff in everywhere too much. And there was once where I went over to the bass player's house or he said, like once I joined the band, He's like, let's Jim, and he's like, we're going to smoke a huge joint and we're going to sit down and play, and we're going to play the same riff for half an hour. And you're not going to do a drummer all whoa, and I was like okay, And so we smoke this huge spliff and I sat down and his name was Skeeter and he was he was really like a groovy, laid back bass player. And so I don't even remember what we played. It was like probably like something like like the song that I just played with you. Yeah, and like thirty seconds go by and I'm like and he would look at me and he broke me like a horse. Yeah. Oh my gosh, I swear it worked. It is the best lesson I ever had in my entire life.

01:28:16
Speaker 1: That is interesting, and I just wish I had a video of it.

01:28:20
Speaker 4: Yeah, it was in a bedroom. Okay, there's a drum set in there, this grass.

01:28:25
Speaker 1: Oh my god, that's true. It's the best lesson. Yeah, maybe I'll do that. Well. Should we try virginumine? Oh too much? Yeah, let's try it, Okay, I mean if we can't get it's fine.

01:28:40
Speaker 4: My god. These lyrics, I'm trying to be all fucking what romantic, and.

01:28:46
Speaker 1: They are romantic. Honestly, this is really sweet. These lyrics are I don't even feel like the romantic. I almost feel like it's a like a prayer like a morning.

01:28:57
Speaker 6: You know what I mean?

01:29:00
Speaker 4: Constant, damn Sam, it's hard, it's hard. We haven't done it in twenty you know.

01:29:09
Speaker 1: Did you ever play this live?

01:29:11
Speaker 4: We need that tour never. I would never do this without you, Ah.

01:29:15
Speaker 1: Violet would sound pretty on this.

01:29:16
Speaker 4: Actually, yeah, we've got this. Please, we totally have it.

01:29:22
Speaker 1: We have it. It's in us.

01:29:24
Speaker 4: It's happening right two three, four.

01:29:40
Speaker 9: Constantly surrounding soft Virginion move. I wait for you to night, sweets and.

01:30:15
Speaker 8: Shot pray.

01:30:19
Speaker 2: The day tune.

01:30:25
Speaker 8: Fee like god, dude, Virginium move. I wait for you to night.

01:30:40
Speaker 2: And now she's become shadows in your larn in morning, will way through and tomorrow resfuse you.

01:30:57
Speaker 8: I will say.

01:31:01
Speaker 2: Nine see fastening sho we spo gld to she me calling you, VIRGINI, how we fore to night?

01:31:37
Speaker 4: And now what she's become shadows in your life?

01:31:47
Speaker 8: In the morning when.

01:31:49
Speaker 2: Way through and tomorrows, I will.

01:31:55
Speaker 4: Say good.

01:31:59
Speaker 1: Night she you.

01:32:29
Speaker 8: I wait for you to night.

01:32:34
Speaker 2: And now she's become shadows in your.

01:32:40
Speaker 8: Life in the morning, way.

01:32:46
Speaker 2: Way through and tomorrow rescues you.

01:32:52
Speaker 8: I will say.

01:32:54
Speaker 4: Good night, I see.

01:33:33
Speaker 2: We did it.

01:33:35
Speaker 4: Oh my god, I'm I know. I know, God, I haven't done it so long.

01:33:42
Speaker 1: I'm glad we did it because we had to do it.

01:33:46
Speaker 2: We did it.

01:33:48
Speaker 4: We did it, nor we did We did. Remember that thing you were talking about, that feeling you get when you do something you don't know if you can do, and then you do it, and then the report it's like, yeah.

01:33:58
Speaker 1: It's great, thank you, thanks for doing this with me.

01:34:03
Speaker 4: We did.

01:34:04
Speaker 1: We did several of the twenty songs we talked about doing. I know, No, I just want to say something you.

01:34:13
Speaker 4: Thank you, Thanks Norah.

01:34:15
Speaker 1: I love you so much and this was so fun for me. Thanks for doing music with me.

01:34:22
Speaker 4: You're welcome.

01:34:22
Speaker 1: Do you want to hear what I said to Billie Eilish What I said, I'm just I'm so happy that I'm so happy that you're the people love you because I love you. It was hysterical.

01:34:37
Speaker 4: That's a nice thing to say.

01:34:38
Speaker 1: It was super awkward, though, and I don't think it came out what I meant to say in the right words, but we get it. It was funny, and I feel the same about you, Dave.

01:34:51
Speaker 4: That's what I'm trying to say. Damn, Sam, that was fun.

01:34:57
Speaker 1: Hey will you do a rock song?

01:34:59
Speaker 2: With me one day.

01:35:00
Speaker 6: Yeah, okay, oh that was so fun.

01:35:12
Speaker 1: Thanks for listening everyone.

01:35:14
Speaker 2: That was great.

01:35:15
Speaker 11: I'm so impressed by his unjadedness, you know, like in conversation but also like musically, it's like it's like he's achieved so much in his career and yet it's like he's nervous every time and still could get as excited as ever afterwards, like, Wow, we did it, you know.

01:35:33
Speaker 1: I love that He's definitely got a childlike wonder with music in a way that I hope he never loses. And I hope I never lose. I don't always have it, but it's the best when you do.

01:35:45
Speaker 11: Yeah, please never change.

01:35:48
Speaker 1: I hope you enjoyed the episode. If you want to know what songs we played, the first song was Statues from Echoes, Silence, Patients and Grace, the two thousand and seven Food Fighters album. The second song we played was Flame Twin, which is one of mine from Pick Me Up off the Floor in twenty twenty. The acoustic guitar number was Ballad of the Beaconsfield Miners and it's on the album Echoes, Silence, Patience and Grace. Also, we did Razor from In Your Honor the two thousand and five, Foo Fighters Album Ever Long, from The Color in the Shape, nineteen ninety seven Album from the Foo Fighters, and Virginia Moon from In Your Honor in two thousand and five. Thanks again to Dave Girl for joining us and letting us rerun him.

01:36:28
Speaker 2: We'll be back next week.

01:36:29
Speaker 1: With Lady Ray. Today's episode was recorded at Studio six oh seven in Los Angeles, California. Recorded by Oliver Roman, assisted by Jared Polacci, studio manager Ali Christi, mixed by Jamie Landry, edited by Sarah Oda. Audio post production and mastering by Greg Tobler. Additional engineering by Pete rem artwork by Eliza Frye. Photography by Shervin Linez. Coordinating producer Rachel Ward, Executive producers Aaron wan Kaufman and Jordan run Togg and marketing lead Allison Kantor Graper. Produced by Norah Jones and Sarah Oda

01:37:07
Speaker 2: Yay.